Bloody Passage - Jack Higgins [79]
"I don't think so. Not for a while anyway. I need a rest."
"A pity. Still, I'll send her in to you."
He went back to the two girls and after a moment or so of conversation, Simone came out on the terrace.
"Well?" she said.
"Are you all right for money?"
"I have a bank account here. Enough for now. And Aldo's offered me a job, if I want one, doing the stage design at that beach club of his."
"That's nice."
I lit a cigarette. She said, "What will you do? Afterward, I mean?"
"God knows."
She reached out suddenly and touched my hand. "I'm sorry, Oliver."
"What for?"
"You know what I mean. The way things were at the beginning."
"Never apologize for anything," I said. "It's a sign of weakness."
"Damn you!" she said, and then they called our flight over the tannoy and that was very much that.
As for Hannah, I decided to tell her the truth for once in my life, in every detail, and tossed in a few unpleasant facts about her brother while I was at it.
She took it extremely well under the circumstances, which is more than I can say for my grandmother, who received me coldly in the beautiful Victorian drawing room of her house in St. John's Wood and demanded an accounting.
When I was finished she said, "I don't think you should come here again, Oliver. Not for a while at any rate."
"I know," I said. "I'm bad news."
"Bad for Hannah," she replied calmly. "And that is all that concerns me."
Which was fair enough. I stayed in London another two days, mainly to see my lawyer and make certain financial arrangements, then I caught a flight to Madrid where I hired a car and drove south.
It was late afternoon when I arrived at the villa at Cape de Gata. Everything was exactly the same as I had left it on that day a thousand years ago when it had all started--except for one thing. The Alfa was parked in the courtyard.
I had a quick look round the villa, but there was no one there, so I got back into the hired car and drove down toward the marshes.
I found her at the end of the causeway, sitting in front of her easel, painting. When I got out of the car she made no sign. It was, of course, a watercolor as usual, a view of the marsh and the sea and the evening sky beyond, that was very fine indeed.
I said, "You get better all the time. That background wash is fantastic."
She said, "It occurred to me that you wouldn't know where I'd left the Alfa. I thought I'd better return it."
"Thanks," I said.
I lit a cigarette and crouched down beside her. The sea was calm, the evening sky the color of brass. A sandpiper skimmed the water and fled like a departing spirit. It was all very peaceful. I wondered for how long.
A Biography of Jack Higgins
Jack Higgins is the pseudonym of Harry Patterson (b. 1929), the New York Times bestselling author of more than seventy thrillers, including The Eagle Has Landed and The Wolf at the Door. His books have sold more than 250 million copies worldwide.
Born in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, Patterson grew up in Belfast, Northern Ireland. As a child, Patterson was a voracious reader and later credited his passion for reading with fueling his creative drive to be an author. His upbringing in Belfast also exposed him to the political and religious violence that characterized the city at the time. At seven years old, Patterson was caught in gunfire while riding a tram, and later was in a Belfast movie theater when it was bombed. Though he escaped from both attacks unharmed, the turmoil in Northern Ireland would later become a significant influence in his books, many of which prominently feature the Irish Republican Army. After attending grammar school and college in Leeds, England, Patterson joined the British Army and served two years in the Household Cavalry, from 1947 to 1949, stationed along the East German border. He was considered an expert sharpshooter.
Following his military service, Patterson earned a degree in sociology from the London School of Economics, which led to teaching jobs at two English colleges. In 1959, while teaching