Stephen Burke: The Reluctant Contact

Yuri turned to look at her, and she smiled.

‘After everything, you still want to be here?’ he asked. ‘Why?’

‘I like it here,’ said Catherine. ‘It’s not without its challenges, I’ll admit.’

‘That’s an understatement,’ said Yuri.

‘And you still need an assistant, don’t you?’ she asked.

Yuri grinned. ‘I wouldn’t say need, as such. But you’re welcome to hang about, if you’ve nothing better to do.’

Catherine punched him hard on the shoulder. ‘You deserve that. I work my ass off all winter and this is the—’

‘All right,’ Yuri interrupted. ‘I need an assistant. I’d be very pleased if you stayed. Although you would have to be a bit mad to.’

‘Pleased! That’s quite the compliment coming from you,’ she said.

‘Yes, it is,’ he agreed. ‘Almost unheard of, and most likely never to be repeated.’

Catherine smiled. ‘Going soft in your old age.’

They heard a loud noise above them on the mountain, and they looked up in time to see a large section of snow sliding off a cliff that had been supporting its weight.

‘You miss her?’ asked Catherine.

‘No,’ he replied.

‘Sorry you met her in the first place?’

He pondered this for a moment. ‘No. The sex was amazing. Really exceptional.’

‘Hey! I don’t need to hear details,’ she said. ‘And now we’re both single.’

‘Yes. And I intend to stay that way,’ said Yuri. ‘How about you?’

‘Oh, we’ll see,’ said Catherine, looking away. ‘Never say never.’

‘It pays to check out the new arrivals off the boat,’ he offered. ‘Before the good ones are all taken.’

Catherine laughed. ‘I don’t think I’ll be doing that, do you?’

Yuri watched the water level at the dyke rising as the newly fallen snow began to melt.

‘You know I’m surprised you are staying on after everything that happened. I thought it would put you off us for life.’

Catherine became pensive. ‘It certainly gave me pause for thought. As you said to me once, I had a picture in my head of what it was like here, and it turned out not to be like that. It’s not so different from home after all. You had a workers’ paradise, and you’ve all made a mess of it. Communism was supposed to put an end to personal ambition and selfish motives.’

‘Was it?’ said Yuri.

‘Yes,’ said Catherine. ‘Lenin himself said…’

While she was talking, in a matter of seconds, the water level rose too high and breached the town’s defences. The course of the river took a sharp turn to the left, flowing over the dyke. It flooded freely down past Lenin’s statue, making a muddy mess of the town square and the Street for the 60th Anniversary of the Great October.

‘Oh dear,’ said Catherine.

‘Come on,’ said Yuri. ‘We have work to do.’

Many thanks to Francine Toon at Hodder and Stoughton and Caroline Wood at Felicity Bryan Associates. And to readers Paul Fitzgerald and Jane Doolan.

While this story is fictional, Pyramiden does exist, and was a functioning mine until the 1990s.

The Good Italian

Stephen Burke was born in Dublin, Ireland. His first novel, The Good Italian , was shortlisted for the Historical Writers Assocation Debut Crown award and the Romantic Novelists Association Historical Fiction prize. He is also a screenwriter and a director, his first feature film was Happy Ever Afters , starring Golden Globe winner Sally Hawkins. A father of three children, he lives and works between Ireland and Italy.

First published in Great Britain in 2017 by Hodder & Stoughton

An Hachette UK company

Copyright © Stephen Burke 2017

The right of Stephen Burke to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

Ebook ISBN 978 1 848 54921 0

Hardback ISBN 978 1 848 54919 7

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