Page 66 of Never Tear Us Apart

Chapter Sixty-Four

Nicco waits for me on his roof terrace, where he sits at a blue-painted wrought-iron table drinking strong coffee from an espresso cup.

He is wearing a pair of round-rimmed dark glasses, and he gazes out across the island like a king surveying his kingdom.

Heat hazes the island, making its golden hues shimmer and dance against the bright sky and sparkling sea.

Relaxed, leaning back in his chair, Nicco lights a cigarette with a gold lighter.

He inhales deeply and blows smoke into the air.

He does not have the air you might expect from a man dealing in national secrets, as I’m fairly sure he’s doing, but then I have met people like him before, so immune to human emotion that they are almost another species.

So often they are the leaders, the generals and the dictators, the psychopaths who see the rest of us as pieces in their personal game of chess.

‘You are late,’ he observes mildly, pouring me a cup of coffee.

From the rich, dark scent I imagine it came via the same channels as all of Elias’s stock. To drink it feels like a betrayal, but I do – it’s exactly what I need after this morning. My nervous system is still humming.

‘Sorry I couldn’t come early,’ I say. ‘One of the bombs crushed a house with a child inside. I helped get him out.’

Nicco takes off his shades and our eyes meet. His are dark and empty but intently focused. Any other person might ask about this event, enquire after the child at the very least. Nicco isn’t interested in that kind of minutiae, though. It doesn’t impact on his big picture.

‘The suffering of the Maltese people in this conflict is unbearable to me,’ he says. ‘But it is necessary.’

‘Is it?’ I ask, careful not to show the flare of temper that flashes in my chest.

Nicco observes me for a moment longer before leaning forwards in his seat.

‘Maia, the time has come for us to reveal ourselves,’ he says.

‘I’m no fool. The information you passed to me – it was accurate.

Not useful, but verifiable. So, I had you investigated by my contacts, and we’ve been watching you. ’

‘Naturally,’ I say, although the thought had not occurred to me at all.

‘You arrive from nowhere; there is no record or trace of you on the island until last week, when you came to Elias for fake papers. There is no trace of you in England either.’

Do his sources really stretch that far, or is he testing me? The best response is none at all.

‘Then you give me information that a man of my standing should immediately have you arrested for.’

‘But you didn’t,’ I say, ‘which tells me a lot about you.’

‘You are fascinating,’ he says.

I tilt my cup to him in a toast. ‘As are you, Nicco.’

‘Then you strike up a very fast romance with an American airman . . .’

‘Canadian,’ I tell him.

‘Quite the day you spent at the beach,’ Nicco says, licking his lips. ‘My man was rather hot under the collar after witnessing that . . .’

All of my focus is on maintaining a neutral expression, forcing all gut reactions right to the pit of my belly with a fist of self-control. The moment to catch him out is almost here. All I do is listen.

‘And then we observe you and the professor going into the old temple at night. Only the professor comes out.’

‘So?’ I ask.

‘So, my men went down there, and there is nothing. No radio set, no secret bunker, not even tunnels that might lead off the island for a covert meeting. My man lost sight of you until this morning. Where did you go?’

Taking a long, slow sip of the delicious coffee, I think fast. ‘Your men did not look well enough,’ I tell him. ‘I didn’t leave the island. I could tell you where I went and who I was with, but all you need to know is that I learnt nothing of use.’

‘There is only one subject that matters now, to all sides,’ Nicco says.

‘Yes.’ I nod. ‘When will the convoy cross Axis waters?’

‘Do you know?’ he asks. ‘Has your pilot let slip any information into your honey trap?’

‘I don’t, and he has not.’ I meet his eye. ‘Do you know?’

‘I will soon,’ Nicco tells me. ‘There is to be a party tonight. Your friend the plotter is throwing it. You will attend, I assume?’

I nod. ‘I will.’

‘A contact of mine will find you, they will greet you with the phrase, where there is life, there is hope. They will pass you the information. You will bring it to me.’

‘Why can’t your contact just give the information directly to you?’

‘It is best for me not to been seen in public places with the person concerned – not in a room full of service personnel who might make unwanted connections. I have already regretfully declined the invitation.’

‘And you will send the news to Sicily at once.’ I phrase it as a statement rather than a question. I just need to hear him say who he really is with my own ears.

‘There are many people in many places searching for this information,’ he replies.

‘My compatriots may find it faster and more accurately than I can deliver it. But yes, as soon as I have that intelligence, I will pass it to Sicily. The convoy must fail. The island must fall. The British must retreat to leave Italy to control the Mediterranean and, with it, entry to North Africa, and the continent beyond. With those positions secured, it’s only a matter of time until the war is won and Malta is released from her servitude, back into the arms of her mother country, my beloved Italy. ’

There is not one part of him that sees Malta as its own nation, free from any rule but its own.

‘I will do my part,’ I say, and that’s not a lie. I will.

Nicco nods. He trusts me. ‘I have one more question for you, Maia.’

‘Ask it,’ I say.

‘Why? Why are you willing to act against your own nation?’

‘I’m only half-British,’ I tell him. ‘But my heart – my heart is all Maltese.’

If he wasn’t so blinded by his own ambition, he might understand exactly what that means. Instead, he believes that Malta can never be her own country, entirely independent. Like so many who have come before – the French, the English included – he wants to claim the island for his own nation.

‘Oh, I have a favour to ask you,’ I say, taking out of my pocket a piece of paper on which I have scribbled the last piece of information I took from the twenty-first century. ‘Please could you translate this for me?’