1940.
As Soviet forces storm Lithuania, Zofia and her brother Jacek must flee to survive.
A lifeline appears when Japanese consul Sugihara offers them visas on one condition: they must deliver a parcel to Tokyo. Inside lies intelligence on Nazi atrocities, evidence so explosive that Nazi and Soviet agents will stop at nothing to possess it.
Pursued across Siberia on the Trans-Siberian Express, Zofia faces danger at every turn, racing to expose the truth as Japan edges closer to allying with the Nazis. With the fate of countless lives hanging in the balance, can she complete her mission before time runs out?
Praise
'Taut, compelling and beautifully written – I loved it!'
~ Daisy Wood
'A fast-paced, exciting read … kept me reading late on several nights. Will appeal to all lovers of both romance and wartime novels.'
~ Kathleen McGurl
'Tense and thought-provoking'
~ Catherine Law
~ NetGalley review
Excerpt
Masha walked impatiently up and down the deserted street several times before the shiny Russian sedan drew up alongside her. The car was kerb-crawling and she slowed as the door was pushed open from the inside. Vladimir Illeyvich moved over so she could swing herself in. She got into the back, where he was leaning against the leather upholstery, the faint smell of cigar smoke and hair oil still hanging on his suit. His cigar smouldered in the ash tray, giving off a noxious smell, and she wished he’d put it out.
He said nothing. Illeyvich was born in Siberia and others in the NKVD joked that he was frozen from the inside out. Stiff in bearing and with a face that hardly moved, he was chief of the Russian Secret Service in Kaunas and never wasted words.
‘Kowalski’s in hiding with his sister.’ Masha answered the unasked question. ‘She came to tell him about the round-ups.’
He glanced sideways at her. ‘You couldn’t go with him?’
‘Not without blowing cover or making trouble with my father. It would look odd to go on the run with him.’
‘Your father doesn’t suspect?’
A shake of her head.
‘Sure about Kowalski?’
‘Kowalski thinks he’s attractive and intelligent and that a girl like me should be grateful. He pretends not to care about what he thinks is my lack of education, while simultaneously trying to educate me. He insults me without having the slightest inkling that’s what he does.’
Illeyvich gave a small suggestion of a frown. ‘Don’t get too angry Masha. It might cause you to slip up. You have the names and addresses?’
‘Yes. All Kowalski’s contacts from the press office are in here.’ She patted her bag. The smoke from the cigar was making her eyes water, but she dared not touch it; it would be presumptuous.
‘Good. Most were taken in the first swoop. But if they run, we’ll track them down before they can print anything. It’s vital to close down all media outlets in the first days. Gag anyone involved in the press or the news. Then, the more confusion the better.’
‘Got it.’
‘We rounded up everyone from the Kaunas Star, except your man Kowalski,’ he said. ‘Keep tailing him and get details of any other contacts he has, especially in the Jewish press. Kovno must be picked clean of anti-Soviet risks.’
So quick. Her excitement mounted. It was already Kovno and not Kaunas. ‘Your men know who I am?’ She needed reassurance she wouldn’t be taken with them.
‘You’re not exactly easy to miss. And they’ve been briefed.’
‘Kowalski’s sister is a problem. She doesn’t like me flirting with her precious brother and is looking for any excuse for him to ditch me.’
‘Then don’t give him any. By the way, sorry about your job.’ The hairdresser’s was closed now and under Soviet control.
She shrugged. It had been a useful listening post to feed information back to Illeyvich and the NKVD, but the loss of it meant she’d be short of cash, and this she resented.
‘You’ll be deployed in a better role from now on,’ he said, as if reading her mind. ‘Intelligence. More pay. It’s all gone quicker than we hoped. We expected more resistance. But then the Lithuanian men are weaklings who’d rather bleat than fight.’
The car was moving slowly down the main street with its red flags. The sight of them gave her a thrill, the feeling that at last things were changing. She hadn’t thought the revolution, when it came, would be so bloody or so final. It had given her immense pleasure to see the people who had previously controlled the power and the money in the town, all the old tsarists, strung up by their necks.
In the end it had been easy, the liberation of the proletariat; the many versus the few. It was either the dictatorship of the landowners or the dictatorship of the common people, and she knew whose side she was on. It still riled her how her father and her mother had nothing and expected even less. Thirty years of night shifts, of heavy, dirty engineering for her father, and what had he to show for it? Injured hands and an empty bank balance. Her mother – toiling all hours, sweating in the stink of sheepskin at the glove factory. From now on, under Stalin’s guiding hand, it would be different. She was working for a world where everyone would have an equal chance, where no one would have to escape the grind of their work through vodka and using a woman as a punchbag.
At last, Illeyvich opened the window to flick out his cigar butt. ‘You’ll alert us if Kowalski decides to leave?’
She nodded.
‘The usual number.’
He wound up the window and tapped the chauffeur on the shoulder. She sat back as the car did another slow circle of the block before she unclipped her handbag and passed over the handwritten list of Jacek’s contacts.
Moments later, Illeyvich opened the door again to let Masha out, and the car eased away in a stench of petrol fumes. The rain was pelting down now, splatting in the dust in dark splodges. She watched the car go before holding her bag above her head and running for home.
A few streets from her front door, she slowed, putting on her sulky persona, the one she used at home, the one guaranteed to make her parents leave her alone and not ask questions. Jacek Kowalski would come to her, she knew, because he couldn’t help himself. She had him in a snare, convinced he was ‘in love’ with her. The love was all in his pants.
Thank you so much for hosting Deborah Swift on your lovely blog today, with an enticing excerpt from her evocative new novel, Last Train to Freedom.
ReplyDeleteTake care,
Cathie xx
The Coffee Pot Book Club
Thank you for hosting my excerpt today. I hope you enjoyed reading it.
ReplyDeleteYou are welcome. Good luck with the rest of your tour.
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