Cometh the Hour Read online

  “No, I think I’ll skip that, but why don’t you all come over to the Hall for lunch on Sunday?”

  “Isn’t that putting a little too much pressure on Karin?” said Harry.

  “When you’ve been living under a Communist regime for most of your life, I don’t think you’d consider having lunch with the Cliftons as pressure.”

  “If you’re sure, then we’ll see you both on Sunday.”

  “I’m sure,” said Giles, as the front door bell rang. “Got to dash, Harry.” He put the phone down and checked his watch. Could it possibly be ten o’clock already? He almost ran into the hall to find Markham opening the front door.

  “Good morning, Mr. Pengelly, Sir Giles is expecting you.”

  “Good morning,” said Pengelly, giving the butler a slight bow.

  “Come on in,” said Giles, as they shook hands. “Markham, can you rustle up some fresh coffee while I take Mr. Pengelly through to the drawing room.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  “Karin should be down in a moment. It’s a long story, but she’s trying to decide which of my sister’s clothes to wear.”

  Pengelly laughed. “Women have enough trouble deciding which of their own clothes to wear.”

  “Did you have any difficulty finding us?”

  “No, I left it all to the taxi driver. A rare experience for me, but this is a special occasion.”

  “It certainly is,” said Giles. “The chance to be reunited with your daughter when you thought you might never see her again.”

  “I’ll be eternally grateful to you, Sir Giles. And if the Telegraph is to be believed, it was a close-run thing.”

  “Brookes exaggerated the whole incident,” said Giles, as the two of them sat down, “but one can hardly blame the man after what they put him through.”

  Markham returned carrying a tray of coffee and shortbread biscuits, which he placed between them on the drawing room table.

  “Comrade Honecker won’t be best pleased that you upstaged him,” said Pengelly, looking down at the Telegraph headline. “Not that there was anything in the speech that we haven’t all heard before.”

  “Several times,” said Giles, as the door opened and Karin burst in. She ran toward her father, who leapt up and took her in his arms. Funny, thought Giles, I never noticed that simple white dress when my sister wore it.

  Father and daughter clung onto each other, but it was Mr. Pengelly who burst into tears.

  “Sorry to make such a fool of myself,” he said, “but I’ve been looking forward to this moment for so long.”

  “Me too,” said Karin.

  Giles looked at his watch. “I apologize, but I’ll have to leave you both, as I have a meeting in the Commons at eleven. But I know you have a great deal to catch up on.”

  “When will you be back?” asked Karin.

  “Around twelve, possibly earlier, then I’ll take you both out to lunch.”

  “And after lunch?”

  “We’re going shopping. I haven’t forgotten.” Giles kissed her gently on the lips, while Pengelly looked away. “See you both around twelve,” he said as he walked out into the hall where the butler was holding his overcoat. “I’m expecting to be back in about an hour, Markham. Don’t disturb them, as I suspect they’ll appreciate having some time to themselves.”

  * * *

  Karin and her father remained silent as they waited for the front door to close, and even then they didn’t speak until they heard Markham close the kitchen door.

  “Did everything go to plan?”

  “Almost everything,” said Karin. “Until we reached the border, when an overzealous young officer started asking far too many questions.”

  “But I personally briefed the border guards,” said Pengelly. “I even told Lieutenant Engel that he was to give you a hard time before ticking off your name, so Barrington would be even more convinced you’d been lucky to escape.”

  “Well, it didn’t work out quite as you planned, comrade, because a Fleet Street journalist decided to poke his nose in, and even started taking photographs.”

  “Keith Brookes. Yes, I gave orders for him to be released soon after you crossed the border. I wanted to be sure he didn’t miss his deadline,” Pengelly added as he looked down at the Telegraph headline:

  SIR GILES BARRINGTON RESCUES GIRLFRIEND FROM BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN

  “But we can’t afford to relax,” said Karin. “Despite the lovelorn look, Giles Barrington is nobody’s fool.”

  “From what I’ve just witnessed, you seem to have him eating out of your hand.”

  “For now, yes, but we can’t assume that will last, and we’d be unwise to ignore his record when it comes to women. He isn’t exactly reliable.”

  “He managed ten years with his last wife,” said Pengelly, “which should be more than enough time for what our masters have in mind.”

  “So what’s the immediate plan?”

  “There’s no immediate plan. Marshal Koshevoi looks upon this as a long-term operation, so just be sure you give him everything his two previous wives obviously failed to do.”

  “That shouldn’t be too difficult, because I think the poor man is actually in love with me. Can you believe that last night was the first time he’d ever had oral sex?”

  “And I’m sure there are one or two other experiences he can look forward to. You must do everything in your power to keep it that way, because we’ll never have a better chance of getting a foot in the British establishment’s door.”

  “I won’t be satisfied with getting my foot in the door,” said Karin. “I intend to break it down.”

  “Good. But for now, let’s concentrate on your other responsibilities. We must develop a simple system for passing on messages to our agents in the field.”

  “I thought I was only going to deal directly with you.”

  “That might not always be possible as I’ll have to remain in Cornwall for a lot of the time if Barrington’s not to become suspicious.”

  “So what should I do if I need to contact you urgently?”

  “I’ve installed a second phone line for your exclusive use, but it’s only for emergencies. Whenever you want to get in touch with your “father,” use the listed number, and only ever speak in English. If you need to call the private line—and I stress, only in emergencies—I’ll speak in Russian and you should respond in German. So there are only two numbers you’ll need to remember.”

  The front door slammed, and a moment later they heard Giles’s voice in the hallway. “Are they still in the drawing room?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And I’ll never forgive myself,” Pengelly was saying, “for not being by your mother’s side when—”

  Giles burst into the room. “I wanted you to be the first to know, my darling. Harold Wilson has offered me a place in the House of Lords.”

  Both of them looked pleased.

  LADY VIRGINIA FENWICK

  1971

  12

  THE EARL OF Fenwick wrote to his daughter and summoned her to Scotland. Almost a royal command.

  Virginia dreaded the thought of having to face her father. As long as she kept herself out of the gossip columns and within her budget, the old man didn’t seem to care too much about what she got up to in London. However, her high court libel action against her ex-sister-in-law Emma Clifton had been extensively reported in the Scotsman, the only paper the noble earl ever read.

  Virginia didn’t arrive at Fenwick Hall until after dinner, and immediately retired to bed in the hope that her father would be in a better mood following a night’s sleep. He wasn’t. In fact, he barely uttered a word throughout breakfast, other than to say, “I’ll see you in my study at ten,” as if she were an errant schoolgirl.

  She was standing outside Papa’s study at five minutes to ten, but didn’t knock on the door until she heard the clock in the hall strike the hour. She was painfully aware that her father expected one to be neither early nor late. When