Mandy Robotham - The Secret Messenger

Published by AVON

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London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers 2019

Copyright © Mandy Robotham 2019

Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers 2019

Cover photographs © Mary Evans Picture Library (Piazza San Marco, Venice), Elizabeth Ainsley/Trevillion images (woman), Shutterstock.com(flags, planes, sky)

Mandy Robotham asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008324261

Ebook Edition © December 2019 ISBN: 9780008324254

Version: 2020-02-20

To my mum, Stella – a woman of stamina and enduring style

Contents

Cover

Title Page THE SECRET MESSENGER Mandy Robotham

Copyright

Dedication

Author’s note

Prologue: Clowns

Chapter 1: Grief

Chapter 2: The Lion’s Den

Chapter 3: Bedding In

Chapter 4: Discovery

Chapter 5: A New Task

Chapter 6: Two Sides of the Coin

Chapter 7: New Interest

Chapter 8: Finding and Frustration

Chapter 9: Drinks with the Enemy

Chapter 10: A New Role

Chapter 11: Casting Out

Chapter 12: Opening Up

Chapter 13: Story Time

Chapter 14: A Voice from the Lagoon

Chapter 15: Love and Fury

Chapter 16: A Lull

Chapter 17: On Hold

Chapter 18: Small Talk

Chapter 19: A Detour

Chapter 20: Arrival

Chapter 21: The City Cauldron

Chapter 22: The Seeker

Chapter 23: A Fiery Reaction

Chapter 24: Across the Lagoon

Chapter 25: A New Hope

Chapter 26: Revenge

Chapter 27: The Bloody Summer

Chapter 28: Seeking and Waiting

Chapter 29: Sorrow

Chapter 30: A Low Ebb of the Tide

Chapter 31: Playing Detective

Chapter 32: A Parting

Chapter 33: In Hiding

Chapter 34: The Search for Coffee

Chapter 35: Red-Handed

Chapter 36: Taking Flight

Chapter 37: Age and Enlightenment

Chapter 38: After

Chapter 39: Completion

Chapter 40: The Typewriter

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

By the Same Author

About the Publisher

War is ugly. Wherever it strikes, it destroys people, families and places, decimates lives and precious objects. Yet being so widespread, conflict also happens in beautiful places, and it was that contrast of light and dark which prompted The Secret Messenger . For me, there is no more stunning or fantastical place on earth than Venice; since my first trip in 1990, I’ve been beguiled on countless visits by the idea of a city effectively floating. I’m still in awe of its very existence and its beauty.

When I began to research how World War Two affected Venice, it became clear that historians were less captivated by its story of Resistance as perhaps in France or the Netherlands; that Venice, by comparison, had experienced a ‘soft’ war. What research I found seemed brief and factual, but those details of Venetian life – of how Venetians existed day by day – were scant. On a research trip (yes, of course, I needed to go back again!) I walked miles through Venetian calles , itching to know which areas of the city played their part in the fight against the Nazis and fascists combined.