The Burning Sky Read Free Page A

off?’
    ‘The call she made will have been from a public phone, Peter, and Lette always knew this was possible. She will find another man to comfort her, and if you’d ever seen her you would know it will not be long in the coming.’
    ‘A little callous perhaps?’
    ‘Make your call.’

CHAPTER TWO
    H amburg was a great, bustling city and also an international trading port full of seamen from all over the world. It was therefore a perfect place to avoid detection: even if rendered curious, no one overreacted to a strange face, a different voice or odd clothing, so there was little risk in travelling to wherever Jardine was headed. He bought a newspaper, a copy of the Völkischer Beobachter , flicking quickly through the pages before handing it to Lanchester.
    ‘It’s unlikely anyone in Hamburg will trouble you if you’re reading that rag. Old Adolf is not held in high esteem hereabouts.’
    ‘And here we are in England, convinced the entire German nation adores him.’
    ‘What you have to worry about, Peter, is all the idiots in England who admire him and his mode of governance.’
    ‘Where are we going?’
    ‘It would do no good for me to say, since you don’t know the city, and let us stop speaking in English, shall we?’
    They travelled by bus, crowded given it was the end of the working day, boarding separately and sitting apart. Lanchester was at the rear, the newspaper held open to hide his face, though he kept a watch out of the corner of his eye, while trying simultaneously to decipher the stories in the Nazi Party’s daily house journal, the banner headlines screaming abuse at the ‘International Jewish Conspiracy’ being the easiest to unravel.
    The bus wended its way through various streets of Altona – wide boulevards of tall buildings, deep pavements lined with trees – until Jardine stood up. Lanchester waited a few seconds before doing likewise and joining him on the step, staying separate still as they alighted, though heading in the same direction along an avenue lined with small shops. Jardine stopped by a public phone while Lanchester moved past to idly examine a pillar plastered with posters full of warnings and exhortations from the Propaganda Ministry, vaguely aware that his companion had dialled more than once; in fact he did so three times.
    ‘Code was it?’ he asked, once Jardine joined him.
    ‘A simple method, using the stories in the newspaper. Pick one on a page, refer to it and that page number is the key to the meeting place, one of half a dozen. You have to assume every Judenhaus is being watched, even if only by a nosy neighbour. Maybe a phone is being tapped, so no names either. My contact will come to meet me at a coffee bar, which is the designated number.’
    ‘Might he not be followed?’
    ‘He’s good at avoidance.’
    The coffee house in question was cramped and had no chairs, just a series of small, high, round tables at which a customer could stand, a commonplace in Germany, which Lanchester, in a whisper, condemned as comparing unfavourably with a Lyons Corner House.
    ‘I agree, Peter, but the coffee is so much better.’
    ‘Too strong for me, old boy, and no pretty Nippies to serve us and tickle our fancy with thoughts of illicit carnality, quite apart from the fact that I prefer tea.’
    Two cups were consumed before Jardine’s contact arrived, his appearance – slim, athletic, with blond, near-white hair and blue eyes – giving Lanchester cause to wonder, not helped by the loud and very obvious way he greeted Jardine, returned without the use of a name by either. Another round of coffee was procured and then the two heads came together over the top of the table while Lanchester made a show of once more trying to read his paper. After a few minutes the contact left and at a nod from Jardine they exited a few paces behind to follow him.
    ‘Your chum looks the perfect Aryan, I must say.’
    ‘One hundred per cent Jewish, Peter; they’re not all ginger