The Flag of Freedom by Seth Hunter

change of temperature that heralds an earthquake or an approaching storm. For though her face was without the artifice of rouge or powder and her hair was unkempt, she was stunningly beautiful.
    And then there was an audible gasp of astonishment.For the court official had read out her name and rank.
    â€˜Sister Caterina Caresini, Deputy Prioress of the Convent of San Paolo di Mare in Venice.’
    The fact that Spiridion shared this astonishment was not because of her beauty. He had seen her before, many times, and though he was not inured to it, nor indifferent, he viewed it with the same circumspection as he might the beauty of a tigress, or a bird of prey. Nor was it because she was a nun. He had known that, too.
    The reason for Spiridion’s interest, and almost certainly that of Naudé, was that in her previous existence, Suora Caterina Caserini had been the foremost British agent in Venice.

Chapter Four
Of Apes and Swallows

    I t was the final week of October and Nathan was watching the last of the swallows heading out towards Africa. At least, he had been told they were the last, for the weather had grown noticeably cooler over the past few days, and for the first time on his afternoon walk, though the sky was clear, he wore an overcoat – a Spanish army greatcoat that he had purchased from one of the local stores. He suspected its previous owner had died, possibly during one of the long sieges to which the outpost was prone, but there were no suspicious holes or obvious bloodstains to cause him embarrass ment in fashionable circles, inasmuch as these existed upon the Rock of Gibraltar.
    Nathan had been here for nigh on three months. At first he had been confined to his quarters in the Moorish castle, now used almost exclusively as a prison, but theLieutenant Governor – General O’Hara – had generously conceded him the freedom of the peninsula, at least between the hours of sunrise and sunset, in return for his parole.
    There was little chance, in any case, of escape. From his perch on the highest point of the Rock, Nathan had a perfect view of the surrounding area – most of which was sea. The Bay of Gibraltar lay to the west, with the port of Algeciras, almost lost in the haze; the Alboran Sea to the east; and the Strait of Gibraltar to the south: very still for once and very blue, like shot silk under the crisp autumnal sky, and a distant smudge on the horizon that could be cloud – or Africa.
    Where the swallows went.
    To the north, much closer, was the great Spanish fortress of San Felipe, whose battlements and towers stretched across the mile or so of land joining the Rock to the mainland. A barrier of stone and iron, armed for war. Gibraltar had been in British hands now since 1704, and under an almost constant state of siege. But every attack had failed, broken on the guns and ramparts of the invincible Rock.
    â€˜I expect you think we are all mad,’ Nathan remarked to his solitary companion, who had found something of interest behind his ear and quite sensibly put it into his mouth. ‘Fighting to the death over a chunk of rock that you cannot even eat.’
    There was no reply. His companion was not inclined to comment on the affairs of men, though his silence, accompanied by a certain look from under his heavy eyelids, could be eloquent at times. Although Nathan had twicereferred to him as ‘Johnny’, and once, more formally, as ‘Sir John’, he was, in fact, an ape. A Barbary ape from Africa. Mature, male, and usually morose, though he had his more amiable moments when there was food at his disposal.
    Nathan had named him after the Admiral – Sir John Jervis – less on account of his temperament than his appearance, though in truth, it was not a resemblance that many others would have noted, and in any case, Sir John – the Admiral – had lately been ennobled and taken the title Earl St Vincent, after the battle he had won. But the