who was still pressing me down into the sand. The shock of it stilled me for a moment.
It was Oscar Davies.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I stared up at him, trying to make sense of it. I had never seen him outside the office, and I couldn’t seem to wrap my mind around the fact that he was here. Trying to kill me.
“I’m sorry, Ellie,” he said, a bit winded from our skirmish. “I didn’t want you to get hurt. You should have stayed out of it.”
“I … I don’t understand.”
“It’s simple enough. I’m giving the documents to the Germans.”
“You can’t do this, Oscar,” I said softly.
“You’re wrong. I can, and I’m going to.”
He grabbed me roughly by one arm and pulled me to my feet. I saw the gleam of something in the sand. The knife. Could I reach it?
But no. Oscar saw it, too, and pulled me along as he went to pick it up, wiping the sandy blade on his trousers.
“Oscar, it’s not too late to stop this,” I said. I was trying to keep the panic from my voice. I had always been steady under pressure, but I had never faced anything like this before.
I was still trying to figure out how he had come to be involved in all of this, but, to be honest, that part was of secondary importance to me at the moment. I was more interested in finding a way to get out of this alive.
Could he be reasoned with? Something told me there was very little chance of that, not when he had already come this far. That meant I was going to have to find another way to stop him from killing me.
“You’re wrong about that, too,” he said, answering my comment from what already seemed like a hundred years ago. “It’s much too late to stop any of this. I realized it a long time ago. That’s why I’ve got to do my duty.”
“Your duty is to your country,” I said, indignation overtaking my fear for just a moment.
“This country won’t exist as it is in another year,” he said. “Germany subdued France in a matter of weeks. How long do you think England can hold out?”
“As long as we need to,” I said defiantly.
He gave me one of his sad smiles. “You’ve been listening to too many of Churchill’s pretty speeches, Ellie. The Germans have a saying—a lucky thing I was schooled in the German language, don’t you think?—Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer. It means ‘One People, One Nation, One Leader.’ That’s how this is all going to end. Germany’s going to rule the world, and I’d rather be a part of it than fighting a losing battle from the outside.”
“But how … how did you even get involved in any of this?” I asked. I didn’t really care, to be honest. I had no interest at all in Oscar Davies or whatever sad story had led him to betray his family, his country, and his principles. But I needed to keep him talking, while I figured a way out of this mess.
“I met Matthew Winthrop at university,” he said. “We became friends and stayed in touch.”
“You were part of his underground group of fascists.” I didn’t bother to keep the disdain out of my voice.
He shook his head. “No. I don’t care much about philosophies. But to the victor goes the spoils, as they say, and it’s clear who the victor is going to be.”
So it was a matter of money, not ideology. That was just as despicable. Maybe even more so.
“Are you really Major Ramsey’s cousin?” I asked.
“Oh, yes. But not the earl’s son. I threw that in for a bit of fun. I’m his nephew. My mother is the earl’s youngest sister. But the old man does have a soft spot for me and agreed readily enough to get me a position working for Gabriel.”
“You knew what kind of work he was doing then?”
“I knew he was in military intelligence. The family’s always been rather keen on lauding him for his military career. When he came back to London I figured it was to do some sort of clandestine work, and I thought there might be something in it for me. I ran into Matthew Winthrop a short time after I got the job, and I could tell he was sounding me out about the German cause. When it became obvious he was involved in some sort of scheme that might prove profitable, I decided to throw