Read Online Bones of the Buried by David Roberts - Free Book Online

to London as you know but I can be here or wherever else you command in twenty-four hours. The boss said you only had to telegraph him and he would rub his Aladdin’s lamp and, hey
presto, I would appear to do your bidding.’
    It cheered Edward to know that the aviator would be able to pluck them out of danger if it became necessary. He was not in his element here. His Spanish was rudimentary, though he could speak
French fluently so supposed he ought, fairly quickly, to be able to learn enough Spanish to get by. He knew no one in Madrid and did not know how the authorities would react to a foreigner without
any official status trying to interfere with the course of justice – or rather he could guess: they would either ignore him, which was the most likely, or push him out of the country if he
was too annoying. And then there was the politics: he knew himself to be as innocent as a babe as far as Spanish politics were concerned and, if Tilney’s proved to be a political murder, as
he suspected it was, he might very well put Verity and himself in danger by some ignorant remark or false assumption.
    Carrying their bags, Edward walked over to Hester Lengstrum who held out her hand to him. ‘So, I guess you must be Captain Marvel,’ she said out of the corner of
her mouth. Verity, Edward saw, was blushing prettily.
    ‘Don’t take any notice of Hester, Edward, she likes to shock. She wants to see if you mind.’
    ‘No offence, honey, but you have gone on so about Lord Edward,’ she emphasised the ‘Lord’ ironically, ‘it’s quite a relief to see he’s a human
being after all.’
    ‘And you’re American,’ said Edward, deliberately sounding disappointed. He dropped his bag and took Hester’s hand. ‘You were supposed to be a Swedish baroness.
I’d rather hoped for a Viking.’
    ‘Oh, I’m afraid I’m no Garbo. I was married to a Swedish baron, I guess I still am, and it’s certainly useful to be a baroness in Spain – even Republican Spain. But
I’m as American as stars and bars, Lord Edward, as I guess you can hear – from Denver, Colorado.’
    ‘How is he?’ Verity asked, impatient of badinage.
    ‘David? He’s OK, I guess, that is, considering his situation.’
    ‘Did he have any message for me?’
    ‘No. He seemed to think you were wasting your time though – bringing over Captain Marvel. I don’t know what you did to him,’ she said turning to Edward, ‘but he
doesn’t seem to rate you highly. I’ve gotten the impression he thinks you’ve got the hots for his girl.’
    Verity blushed. ‘Oh, that’s nonsense, Hester. I can’t think what gave you that idea.’
    ‘OK, hon. But it’s not my idea, it’s David’s. Maybe it’s just he’s given up hope, but when I said you were bringing your friend to see him tomorrow morning,
he didn’t seem to be particularly interested.’
    Verity looked vexed and Edward bit his lip. He doubted very much if there was anything he could do for David Griffiths-Jones in his terrible predicament and he feared it might look as though he
had come to Madrid to gloat. Whatever Verity might choose to believe, Edward had no illusions: he and David were oil and water. They had disliked each other at Cambridge and, when Verity had
brought them together last year, their mutual antipathy had hardened into settled enmity. David saw him, he knew, as a playboy, a drone, a member of a caste he was dedicated to destroying. Edward
saw him as the worst kind of bigot, and Verity complicated the whole thing.
    Verity’s feelings for both men were confused, inchoate. Her instinctive affection for Edward and respect for what she recognised to be his innate decency went against all her political
beliefs. She had committed herself to communism as the only political creed a self-respecting libertarian could subscribe to and the only effective opposition to Fascism. David was, in her eyes,
the living example of this – Mr Valiant for Truth – though he