“Yes, Monsieur, not without difficulty; but to reach Madame Karkoff was the only hope of getting assistance for our friends.”
“I think you’ve been wonderful,” said Richard frankly. “It must have been frightful for you not knowing Kiev or Moscow, and hunted by the police.”
Marie Lou felt a little glow of warmth run through her. Valeria Petrovna had almost made her wonder if she had not been cowardly in running away so quickly instead of waiting to see what happened when the agents of the Ogpu appeared on the scene.
Valeria Petrovna rose impatiently to her feet. “I ’ad ’oped, Mistaire Eaton, that you would ’ave ’ad fresh news; ’ow long are you in Moskawa?”
“I only arrived this morning. I slept at Smolensk last night.”
She frowned. “Slept at Smolensk? Why ’ave you done that?”
“I came in my own ’plane,” Richard explained. “If I had arrived last night it would have been too late to do anything, so I preferred to take the last two hundred miles this morning.”
“So — and what plan ’ave you to ’elp your frien’s?”
“I can go to the British Embassy,” he suggested, doubtfully. “I set inquiries on foot in London before I came away.”
Valeria Petrovna waved the suggestion aside. “Useless,” she exclaimed. “Nevaire will the Kommissars admit that they ’ave them prisoners — they ’ave been in the forbidden territory — it will be said that they died there in the snows.”