The Key to Rebecca
Ken Follett
Language: English
Pages: 352
ISBN: 0451207793
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Ken Follett’s The Key to Rebecca took readers and critics by storm when first published more than twenty years ago. Today, it remains one of the best espionage novels ever written.
A brilliant and ruthless Nazi master agent is on the loose in Cairo. His mission is to send Rommel’s advancing army the secrets that will unlock the city’s doors. In all of Cairo, only two people can stop him. One is a down-on-his-luck English officer no one will listen to. The other is a vulnerable young Jewish girl. . . .
assured that if it suits my purpose I will kill Billy. Yours truly, Alex Wolff It was a letter from a madman: the polite salutations, the correct English, the semicolon, the attempt to justify the kidnapping of an innocent child . . . Now Vandam knew that, somewhere deep down inside, Wolff was insane. And he had Billy. Vandam handed the note to Gaafar, who put on his spectacles with a shaky hand. Wolff had taken Elene with him when he left the houseboat. It would not have been
a fez, leaped out of his car. A young Greek in a mohair suit jumped out of the Packard. The Arab said the Greek was the son of a pig. The Greek said the Arab was the back end of a diseased camel. The Arab slapped the Greek’s face and the Greek punched the Arab on the nose. The people getting off the bus, and those who had been intending to get on it, came closer. Around the corner, the acrobat who was standing on his colleague’s head turned to look at the fight, seemed to lose his balance,
note-taking lieutenant. “Those, then, are my orders for tomorrow.” He glared defiantly at Kesselring. Von Mellenthin put his hands in his pockets and crossed his fingers. Von Mellenthin remembered that moment when, sixteen days later, he and Rommel watched the sun rise over Tobruk. They stood together on the escarpment northeast of El Adem, waiting for the start of the battle. Rommel was wearing the goggles he had taken from the captured General O’Connor, the goggles which had become a
saw him in the water. He appeared to be naked. He clambered up the side of the little boat, using the portholes for handholds. She reached for his arm and pulled him onto the deck. He knelt there on all fours for a moment, glancing up and down the riverbank like an alert water rat; then he scampered down the hatch. She followed him. He stood on the carpet, dripping and shivering. He was naked. She said: “What happened?” “Run me a bath,” he said. She went through the bedroom into the bathroom.
made him more visible. He stayed well behind Wolff’s car, knowing there was nowhere to go but Cairo. He wondered what Wolff planned next. Would he take Elene home? If so, where would he go afterward? He might lead Vandam to his base. Vandam thought: I wish I had that gun. Would Wolff take Elene to his home? The man had to be staying somewhere, had to have a bed in a room in a building in the city. Vandam was sure Wolff was planning to seduce Elene. Wolff had been rather patient and gentlemanly