He took both her hands, smiled at her and pressed them, as he said, 'There wasn't anything very clever about it. I would have come sooner if I could; but the only line I had was offering to help interrogate you, and to begin with they thought the experts would get everything out of you that could be got without any help from me.'
She gave a contemptuous shrug. 'The people they sent tried wheedling and threatening by turns, but I knew that none of them dared lay a finger on me; so I just laughed at them. I stymied them from the beginning by quoting at them your Duke of Wellington. You know his famous dictum, "Never explain".'
'I felt pretty certain you wouldn't go to pieces,' "he said seriously. 'But your being here is very far from anything to laugh about; and I hope you are going to explain to me, if not officially, anyhow off the record.'
'Yes. I owe you that.' She sat down and, as he took a chair beside her, went on, 'I didn't like making use of you; but 1 had no alternative if I was both to save you and keep from failing in what I regard as doing my best for my country.'
'When you persuaded me to bring you here, then, it was with the deliberate intention of spying for the Nazis?'
'Yes. It was the outcome of that night when Ribb spoilt our fun by turning up just after I had got into bed with you. During the awful wrangle that ensued with Grauber and the rest of them, I was driven into admitting the truth about how I really did first meet you, that through you I had met Sir Pellinore, and that he was an old friend of my father's.'
'I remember that.'
'But you didn't overhear what followed; because you were driven from your hiding place by a sneezing fit or something.'
'That's right. I missed five or six minutes of the row between Grauber and Ribb, and when I got back Grauber had gone.'
'Well, Ribb wouldn't be where he is if he hadn't a very quick mind. The moment he learned I was persona grata with Sir Pellinore, he realized that fact could be used to save him from Hitler's wrath. I mean if Himmler tried to do him dirt by reporting to the Führer that his mistress had been aiding a British spy. If I could get you to plant me on Sir Pellinore, he would be able to say that I had been working for the Nazis all the time, and at great risk to myself had gone to England to carry on the good work.
'He tried his utmost to sell the idea to Grauber that there was far more to be gained by letting us escape to England than by cutting you up in little pieces and trying to have me put in a concentration camp. But Grauber wouldn't hear of it. He was obsessed with the idea of getting his own back on you. He went off still in a towering rage, vowing that he would stop at nothing to get you, and that if the Hungarian Police refused to cooperate he would demand that special pressure should be exerted on the Regent by Berlin.
'After all the admissions I had been forced to make, Ribb took it for granted I was concealing you somewhere in the house. As it was against his interests to give you up, when Grauber had gone I ceased to deny it. And I told him how we had planned for you to drive me across the frontier using Mario's passport. Ribb agreed that the plan offered the best chance for us to escape, and said that he could get the Regent to prevent any official attempt being made to stop us for twenty-four hours, but that any time after that Grauber might get the upper hand.
'Then he tackled me about working as a spy when I got to England. He said that apart from getting him out of the mess I had landed him in, and helping to defeat the Russians, it was in my own interests. If I wouldn't play, then there could never be any worthwhile future for me. I wouldn't be able to get my fortune out of Hungary, or ever go back there, or live anywhere in Hitler's Europe, after the war was over; and I'd be publicly branded as a traitor to my country. Whereas, if I could only get one really valuable war secret out of Sir Pellinore, and send it back to him, that would not only clear him with Hitler, but make me a privileged person in the Greater Reich for the rest of my life.'
Gregory nodded. 'It must have been just after you had agreed that I got back to my hiding place. I remember his saying that he would brief you next day, and wondering what he meant; but you told me afterwards that it was about getting across the frontier.'
'There was no need for him to do that; my passport and Mario's already carried special visas enabling us to cross any frontier controlled by the Reich without going through the usual formalities. I had to see him so that he could give me particulars of the people to contact in London, who would pass anything I could get hold of back to him.'
'So that's how it was. It was certainly a clever scheme if it had come off.'
'But it hasn't. Where I slipped up, I don't know; but they caught me red-handed.' A sudden note of anxiety came to her voice. 'What will they do to me, Gregory? What will they do to me?'
'My dear, I don't know. You'll be tried in camera, and by a military court, I suppose. But let's not talk of that for the moment. Tell me about your contacts. I want to hear all you can tell me about the Moldavian Embassy.'
Sabine shook her head, 'No, my dear, no. I've told you my personal part in the story; and if you care to pass that on I've no objection. I see no reason why it should make my case worse. But I'm not giving away other people. As far as my activities since I've been in London are concerned, the Duke's dictum still stands: "Never explain".'
'That's all very well, but I'm afraid you've got to if I'm to help you.'
'Help me!' She made a little gesture of despair. 'I'm sure you want to. But with the best will in the world, how can you. Having brought me here must have made you to some extent suspect. I take it that they regard you as having been completely fooled by me; but now I've been caught anything you may say on my behalf could only make them doubt your veracity, and it wouldn't do me any good.'
He stood up and took her hand. 'I don't intend to say things but to do them.'
She looked up at him with a puzzled frown. 'Do? What can you do?'
'God knows! But no sentence they can inflict on you would be half as bad as what Grauber would have done to me if you hadn't saved me from him in Budapest. So I'll still owe you something if I can get you out of this. I mean to gamble everything on planning your escape.'
Chivalry in Our Day
Chapter 23
Oh, Gregory!' Sabine came quickly to her feet. She laid her free hand on his shoulder and tears started to her eyes. 'How wonderful of you! But do you think it's really possible?'
He looked away from her, a shade uncomfortably. 'Honestly, I don't know. In some ways it should be easier to escape from a place like this than from a modern prison. In them they have all sorts of checking systems cells that can be looked into at any hour of the day or night without the doors being opened, electric rays which if broken by anyone passing through them instantly set off alarm bells, and that sort of thing whereas in the past they simply relied on big locks and thick bolts and bars. If this were an ordinary old fortress I'd back myself to get you out of it; but the trouble is, it's not. It's the size of a small town. To pull the wool over the wardresses' eyes and pinch the key to your room would be only a beginning. I'd, still have three gates to get you through before we reached the street. At night they are locked, and as the Tower is now closed to the public any strange woman going through them during the daytime would be certain to be challenged. Perhaps it was wrong of me to rouse your hopes prematurely. I can only say that I mean to try.'
'I saw what a warren of towers and gates the place is when they brought me in here,' Sabine volunteered. Then she pointed to the windows. 'But there's nothing on that side. It overlooks an embankment and the river. Perhaps you could let me down with a rope?'