A Sentimental Traitor Read Online Free PDF Page A

crafted phrases that had been prepared for him but thoughts that came from within, that’s
what mattered now, some sincere-sounding reflection that might do justice to the fact that there had been no survivors, not a single one. He spoke of sorrow, of unfairness, of pain spread wide and
tragedy shared. About children who had carried the futures of their families with them, of others who had been hoping for nothing more than to share the special spirit of Christmas with those they
loved, of pilots who had done their duty with courage and huge skill, and had avoided an even greater calamity.
    ‘I can’t pretend to imagine what’s going through your hearts right now,’ he said, speaking directly into a camera lens, trying to reach a conclusion. ‘If it were my
own . . .’ There was an unmistakable catch in his voice; there was no need to finish the thought. ‘Perhaps all I can do right now is my duty. And that, it seems to me, is to make one
promise above all else to those families – British, American, Belgian, French, the others, too – those of you who have lost loved ones and will find Christmas such a desperately painful
time this year. To you, I promise you this.’
    Flashbulbs blazed away, the television lights shone into his eyes, he couldn’t see a thing. He spoke very slowly.
    ‘We will find out what went wrong.’
    It wasn’t much of a commitment, not if anyone stopped to analyse it, nothing more than what would happen as a matter of course, but it was necessary that he should say it. There had
already been so much speculation about poor design and inadequate maintenance, even a bird strike, a flock of Canadian geese that might have been ingested into the engine and blown the front off.
Just a few more days, then they would know for certain. Give those who were suffering some sort of reassurance, and perhaps they would stop blaming him. Pity’s sake, it wasn’t his
fault, yet still he felt responsible and that sense of guilt drove him on.
    ‘I vow to you all,’ he said, his voice swelling with passion. ‘We will discover what happened. And who was responsible.’
    No! It was supposed to be what was responsible, not who. But it was too late, a slip of the tongue, a frozen thought. It had been said. Only a couple of words, but already more
than enough. It was someone’s fault! Someone was to blame!
    And the media weren’t going to stop until they had that someone and had dragged him out into the cold, just like poor King Charlie.

    Despite the season, Patricia Vaine sat at an outside table on the Place de Luxembourg in Brussels, her coffee neglected, her cigarette turning to ash, shivering in her overcoat
despite the glow of the overhead heater, staring into nothing.
    Vaine was English by birth, European by employment. A sound Catholic education at St Mary’s in Ascot and a rather more adventurous few years spent stretching her mind and occasionally her
legs at Oxford, had taken her on a rapidly rising track through the labyrinth of the British Foreign & Commonwealth Office, but she’d always suspected she would never be allowed to make
it to the top. Partly it was her Catholicism – the Blairs had made being a ‘left footer’ unfashionable – but perhaps more so because she was intellectual, better than most,
and there were times when she couldn’t resist the temptation to show it. She was forty-six, had blue eyes accentuated by a well-boned face and carefully built blonde hair, and if her
hairdresser was aware of the first signs of grey, he hid it so well that few realized she wasn’t, and never had been, entirely the genuine article. For a middle-aged woman she had the ability
to cross and uncross her legs to the distraction of most men, an asset she had found more effective in Brussels than ever she had in stuffy London. Intellect and ankles; she used both as
weapons.
    Distraction formed a large part of her remit; indeed, it was possible to spend a long time walking