Read Online The Concubine's Secret by Kate Furnivall - Free Book Online

footsteps hurrying towards the washroom. Lydia had shuffled her way up to second place in the line. Not that she was in a rush to use the squashed little facility, but she wanted to delay her return to the carriage. The footsteps stopped. Lydia looked behind her and was astonished to see a queue of four women and a child – when had they arrived? – all waiting patiently, clearly rural workers with headscarves and shawls and big-knuckled hands that laboured hard in the potato fields. Their faces were uncommunicative, their thoughts private. The child, a small boy in a cap, was nibbling at his thumb and making little mouse noises to himself. Behind him stood the new arrival. Lydia felt a jolt of surprise, though she shouldn’t have. It was Antonina, the wife of the camp Commandant, and she was wrapped up warm in the silver fur coat.
    ‘ Dobroye utro , comrades,’ the newcomer said brightly. ‘Good morning to you.’ She nodded at Lydia.
    The women stared at her the way they would at a gaudy magpie. One muttered, ‘ Dobroye utro ,’ then looked at the floor. The others remained silent. The child touched a grubby hand to her coat and she stepped away from it. She was wearing the white cotton gloves and started to rub them together awkwardly, fingers curling round each other.
    ‘Comrades,’ she said, but her brightness was cracking at the edges, ‘I’m desperate.’ She gave them a smile that reached nowhere near her eyes. ‘Do you think I could-?’
    The line turned on her.
    ‘ Nyet.’
    ‘Wait your turn.’
    ‘My boy needs to go but he doesn’t complain. You should know better.’
    Antonina’s deep-set eyes blinked. Her mouth looked fragile. She shook her head and as one hand started to scratch the back of the other, a tiny thread of crimson appeared on the white cotton.
    ‘Comrade Antonina,’ Lydia said pleasantly, as she stepped out of the queue, ‘you can take my place.’
    The child’s mother gave her a quick look of disapproval.
    ‘Comrade,’ she said, her tone quiet and reasonable, ‘we no longer have to let worthless parasites, like this woman in her bourgeois finery, steal our rights from us. She is clearly not a worker. Just look at her.’
    Everyone stared at the pale pampered face, at the ruby earrings nestling in the dark hair and at the luxurious fur coat.
    ‘It’s obvious she is-’
    Lydia interrupted. ‘Please, comrade. Pozhalusta. This is not harming you. I’m giving her my place in the queue, so-’
    ‘Young girl,’ the child’s mother said with interest, ‘what is your name?’
    Lydia’s mouth went dry. ‘My name doesn’t matter. It is no concern of-’
    The woman pulled a small blue notepad from her pocket. Attached to it by a rubber band was a pencil.
    ‘Your name?’ she repeated.
    The Commandant’s wife said abruptly, ‘Enough of that, comrades. ’ She half turned her head, raising a gloved hand, and immediately one of her uniformed travelling companions appeared like a shadow at her side. He said nothing. He didn’t need to. The women stared at the floor. Lydia didn’t wait for more. She squeezed past his bulk and headed back towards her compartment, but as she approached it she saw the second of the woman’s uniformed guardians blocking her path.
    ‘Excuse me,’ she said politely.
    He didn’t move. Just rested his hand on the gun holster at his hip. He was tall with fine Slavic features and a high colour to his cheeks. His dark eyes were amused.
    ‘Tell me, girl,’ he asked, standing too close and scanning her coat, her shoes, her ugly hat, ‘what is your interest in our Comrade Commandant’s wife?’
    Lydia shrugged. ‘She’s nothing to me.’
    ‘I’m here to make sure it stays that way.’
    ‘That’s your business, comrade. Not mine.’
    His eyes were no longer amused, but after a long stare he stood aside to let her pass. His uniform smelled stale, as though it had been slept in too many times. She felt his eyes bore into the back of her head as