Free Traitor's Gate by Michael Ridpath

everywhere, all in the pay of General Franco. When they found them, the commissars shot them, even when, like David and Harry and Conrad, they were attacking the enemy at the time.
    Conrad knew now his father had been right. But Conrad still hated fascism, and in leaving Spain he felt he had left a job undone. The epidemic of collective insanity had started in Italy, spread to Germany and Spain, and was threatening France and even Britain.
    That was why he had come to Berlin: he couldn’t bear sitting in England, kicking his heels, while the Nazis ran amok in Central Europe. Here the epidemic was at its most virulent; here he could observe it at close quarters. But he was beginning to think that perhaps he should do more than simply watch it and write about it. Maybe he should do something to restrain it. Exactly what that something might be, he had no idea, at least not yet.
    But he wasn’t spying for His Majesty’s bloody Government, that was for sure.

6
    That evening Conrad telephoned Theo from his hotel. Captain Foley’s interest in his friend had aroused his own suspicions. There were too many unanswered questions surrounding Joa­chim’s death, questions that only Theo could answer.
    Theo sounded wary on the telephone.
    ‘I need to speak to you,’ Conrad said. ‘Can we meet this evening?’
    ‘I’m afraid that will be a little difficult. I am giving a small dinner party tonight.’ Still wary.
    ‘Oh come on, Theo. I can look in afterwards. It’s important.’
    Conrad could sense Theo’s hesitation. But then his tone became more welcoming. ‘I tell you what, why don’t you come to dinner? It would be good to introduce you to some of my friends. Eight o’clock at my apartment.’
    There were eight for dinner, including Conrad. In addition to Theo there was a lawyer, an officer in the cavalry, and four women, one of whom was clearly Theo’s girlfriend, a pretty blonde girl named Sophie. The food was good: Theo’s cook obvi­ously knew not only how to prepare food, but also how to procure it, an increasing problem in Germany in 1938 as the nation’s resources were concentrated more on guns than butter. A couple of excellent bottles of hock soon got the conversa­tion flowing. Conrad found himself seated next to another blonde, just on the heavy side of statuesque, named Maria von Tiefenfeld. She declared herself an Anglophile and insisted on speaking in English, although her English was much worse than Conrad’s German.
    ‘I love English gentlemen,’ she said. ‘They are so much more cultured and well-mannered than the Germans. German men are so brutish, with their duels and their drinking.’
    Conrad smiled in a way that was, he hoped, both cultured and well-mannered.
    ‘You remind me of Mr Alec Linaro, the racing driver,’ Maria said. ‘Have you heard of him? Perhaps you know him?’
    The smile that had been flickering on Conrad’s lips disap­peared. ‘Yes. Yes, I do, actually. The resemblance has been pointed out before.’
    ‘Now he is a fine English gentleman,’ Maria said. ‘I met him at the Nürburgring Grand Prix last year. You must be very brave to drive a car so fast around the racetrack, is it not so? But he is charming at the same time. Do you think not?’
    ‘I suppose so.’ Maria had a point. Conrad had first met Alec Linaro at a dinner party two years before. He was indeed brave, charm­ing and very good-looking. He was married to the daughter of an earl, but that hadn’t stopped him from pay­ing great attention to Veronica. They had bumped into him on a number of occasions over the following year, during which time his charm had increased.
    Maria then began to tell a long story about going with Linaro to visit the Rhine valley after the race. Conrad didn’t follow it, beyond getting the strong impression that Maria had spent at least one night, and probably several, with the dashing racing driver. His mind was tumbling, spinning in its own painfully familiar vortex.
    ‘I