Lie down with lions - Ken Follett [114]
“Then he must be pointing toward the caves.”
“Yes.”
“He must be telling the Russians to look there.”
“Yes.”
“But that’s awful. How could he . . .” Her voice tailed off, and after a pause she said: “But of course that’s what he’s been doing ever since he got here—betraying people to the Russians.”
Ellis noticed that Anatoly appeared to be speaking into a walkie-talkie. A moment later one of the circling Hinds roared over Ellis and Jane’s hooded heads to land, audible but out of sight, on the hilltop.
Jean-Pierre and Anatoly were walking away from the mosque. Jean-Pierre was limping. “He is hurt,” said Ellis.
“I wonder what happened.”
It looked to Ellis as if Jean-Pierre had been beaten up, but he did not say so. He was wondering what was going on in Jane’s mind. There was her husband, walking with a KGB officer—a colonel, Ellis thought, from the uniform. Here she was, in a makeshift bed with another man. Did she feel guilty? Ashamed? Disloyal? Or unrepentant? Did she hate Jean-Pierre, or was she merely disappointed in him? She had been in love with him: was there any love left? He said: “How do you feel about him?”
She gave Ellis a long, hard look, and for a moment he thought she was going to get mad, but it was only that she was taking his question very seriously. Finally she said: “Sad.” She turned her gaze back to the village.
Jean-Pierre and Anatoly were heading for Jane’s house, where Chantal lay concealed on the roof.
Jane said: “I think they’re looking for me.”
Her expression was drawn and scared as she stared at the two men down below. Ellis did not think the Russians had come all this way with so many men and machines just for Jane, but he did not say so.
Jean-Pierre and Anatoly walked through the courtyard of the shopkeeper’s house and entered the building.
“Don’t cry, little girl,” whispered Jane.
It was a miracle the baby was still asleep, Ellis thought. Perhaps she was not: perhaps she was awake and crying, but her cries were drowned by the noise of the helicopters. Perhaps the soldier had not heard her because there had been a chopper directly overhead at that moment. Perhaps the more sensitive ears of her father would hear sounds which had failed to catch the attention of an uninterested stranger. Perhaps—
The two men came out of the house.
They stood in the courtyard for a moment, talking intently. Jean-Pierre limped across to the wooden staircase which led to the roof. He mounted the first step with evident difficulty, then got down again. There was another short exchange of words, and the Russian mounted the stairs.
Ellis held his breath.
Anatoly reached the top of the stair and stepped onto the roof. Like the soldier before him, he glanced at the scattered bedding, looked around at other house and then returned his attention to this one. Like the soldier, he poked at Fara’s mattress with the toe of his boot. Then he knelt down beside Chantal.
Gently, he drew back the sheet.
Jane gave an inarticulate cry as Chantal’s pink face came into view.
If they’re after Jane, Ellis thought, they will take Chantal, for they know she would give herself up in order to be reunited with her baby.
Anatoly stared at the tiny bundle for several seconds.
“Oh, God, I can’t stand this. I can’t stand it,” Jane groaned.
Ellis held her tight and said: “Wait, wait and see.”
He strained his eyes to make out the expression on the baby’s face, but the distance was too great.
The Russian appeared to be thinking.
Suddenly he seemed to make up his mind.
He dropped the sheet, tucked it in around the baby, stood up and walked away.
Jane burst into tears.
From the roof Anatoly spoke to Jean-Pierre, shaking his head in negation. Then he descended into the courtyard.
“Now why did he do that?” Ellis mused, thinking aloud. The shake of the head meant that Anatoly was lying to Jean-Pierre, saying There is nobody on the roof. The implication was that Jean-Pierre would have wanted to