“Yes, yes. Thank you.”
The papers shuffle; the footsteps scrape into the corridor; the door snaps shut.
Violet opens her eyes and lifts her head. Lionel stands breathing in the center of the compartment, a few feet away. A crack of moonlight escapes the curtains and touches the outline of his still body with silver-blue.
“Everything all right?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Go back to sleep, Violet.” He ducks into his bunk.
There’s no question of sleep. Violet stares at the low ceiling above and listens to the jump of her heart, the clackety-clack clickety-clackety-clack of the carriage wheels.
“Lionel, what does the P stand for?”
“The P?”
“Your initials. Your middle name.”
A sigh. “It stands for Philip, Violet. Lionel Philip Richardson.”
Violet lifts the blankets from her legs and climbs down the ladder to the carpet below. The pile is plush beneath her bare feet. She kneels next to Lionel. In the thick warmth of the compartment, he rests on top of the covers, his long blue legs bent slightly because the bed is too short.
“What is it, Violet?”
She reaches for his left ankle and draws the loose blue-striped pajamas up above his knee. She traces the smooth skin, the wiry hair. “There’s no scar,” she says softly.
“No.”
“You weren’t in Berlin for surgery, were you? There was no doctor, no operation. You didn’t need a cane.”
“No.”
“Our new papers. Edward and Sylvia Brown. Your American accent, your perfect German. The way you handled that official just now.”
“Just ask me, Violet. Ask me.”
“Who are you, Lionel? Or are you really Lionel?”
He laughs drily. “Oh, I’m Lionel, right enough. The Honorable Lionel Richardson, Captain in the Life Guards. I did murder my stepfather; you can look that up. I did study with Grant, back at Oxford. That’s why I was in Berlin, because I knew him before, because my German was excellent.”
“What do you mean?”
Lionel reaches for the cigarettes on the little fold-out table beneath the window. “Violet, Grant’s a traitor. He was supposed to be gathering information on German war preparedness for us, except that he wasn’t.” He lights a cigarette and settles back against the wall. “He was playing us false, telling us what his generals and his officials told him to tell us. A double agent, to use the familiar term.”
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
“He was doing it on purpose? He wasn’t . . . They weren’t simply using him?”
Lionel reaches for the ashtray. “That was the question I was supposed to answer this summer.”
“And you did. You found out.”
“I did.”
“That was why you killed him.”
“Does that make it easier for you?”
Violet jumps to her feet and turns to the window. “And me. You seduced me in order to learn about Walter. Another reason to send you, of all men: you’re irresistible to neglected wives.”
He’s behind her, covering her back, his hands braced on either side of the window. The smoke trails away from the cigarette between his fingers. “That’s where you’re wrong, Violet. Perhaps that was the plan, at the beginning, the very beginning, but then I met you—”
“Oh, yes. How could I forget? You fell headlong into love with me. Imagine the coincidence. You simply had to have me in your bed, to seduce me, to gain my trust.”
“Violet . . .”
“Yes, the sacrifices one makes for one’s country.” She ducks under his arm. He grabs her elbow.
“Wait, Violet. Just listen to me.”
“The way that official just listened to you and believed it all? Your perfect American act?”
“I’ve told you the truth. I’ve answered your every question, haven’t I?”
“As you answered his.”
“You can’t leave. You’ll be arrested without me, without our papers.”
“I don’t care.”
“I care, by God! I risked my life to bring you out with me. To make you safe.”
Violet stands with her back to the door, her eyes closed against him, sobbing quietly. “Stop. Just stop talking. I am so very sick of words.”
“Oh, Violet. Violet.” His hands on her face, her arms. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“Just stop talking, Lionel.”
? ? ?
THE BED is impossibly narrow. Violet sprawls almost entirely on top of Lionel, and still her foot bounces slightly over the edge, her back touches the wall with every jerk of the moving train. How she loves his strength, his bulldog chest and shoulders, the carnal muscles of his legs, holding her steady in her precarious perch. What heedless risk, to lie here naked with Lionel in the airless compartment, utterly vulnerable, when a single official boot could snap the latch on the door and expose them together. Why doesn’t she care?
“I suppose Jane is part of it?” she says softly.
“Can we not talk about Jane?”
“Just answer me.”
“Yes, she is.”
“But why? She’s American.”