A Bridge of Magpies

C H A P T E R O N E

`Master of the Equinoxes, Lord of the Solstice! The splendidsounding title is engraved on one face of the blade of a knife which lies on my desk as I write. It is dark and discoloured. It is an unusual weapon: a thin, pointed blade, widening abruptly at the hilt, which is very flat and hammered out of copper. A design has been tooled into the metal: a seascape about three inches long and half an inch broad, showing a setting sun, and ships sinking after battle. On the reverse side of the blade are scribbled the last words the Master wrote with the lead tip of a Taisho pistol bullet, using it like a pencil, after he had plucked the knife from his side ' Mei fa tzu! – it is fate!' These words underwrite not only his own fate, but add a strange and awesome new dimension to two of the great decisive naval victories of the twentieth century: Pearl Harbour and Tsushima.

Looking back on it, the Greek island of Santorin, on the Mediterranean tourist cruise belt about sixty miles north of Crete, was an improbable curtain-raiser for the desperate events half a world away on the Sperrgebiet, or forbidden diamond coast of South West Africa, which ended the Master's eight-hundred-year-old reign of influence. Had I been able even to guess at them I would have dismissed them as being as unreal as a nightmare, that soft late afternoon when I sailed my boat into Santorin's great lagoon in the sunset and headed towards the landing-place at Thera. The town's whitewashed houses on the cliff-top were still brilliantly spotlighted by the sun although the bay nearly a thousand feet below was darkening and taking on those unbelievable sapphires, blues, reds and golds which drive tour-, ists and artists ecstatic. I had really meant to tie up off the villa of Oia situated at the northern tip of the thirty-sevenmile crescent which constitutes the spectacular bay of Santwin. Thera is another three miles away; if I had carried out my first intention the odds are that I would never have received the summons which was waiting for me or, by the time I had, it would have been too out of date to be acted upon. What really switched me on to sail those extra miles was the prospect of a bottle of Thera's subtly sweet wine, because I'd had a blistering hot sail from Athens to Santorin on the meltemi or prevailing north wind. There is a bar on Thera's jetty, too, within easy reach of a mooring shelf of rock, compared with the mere offshore buoy at Oia. There is no regular steamer service to Santorin, only an intermittent cruise liner. Its berth was unoccupied on this occasion, which meant I'd have the bar virtually to myself. These were the small things which decided me in favour of Thera. Clad in my old jeans I splashed up to the knees in the warm Mediterranean water to make the Orga fast, while the sun projected its last theatrical effects on to the knife-edged cliffs soaring to the white town perched high above. I waded ashore to the jetty. The bar was built out of wine barrels, the lower ones full and the top ones empty, with-a canvas awning for a roof and a bright blue curtain across the back. The barrels creaked like a ship from the lift of the floating jetty. It was a good place to rinse from ones mouth, with wine, the salt of a hard sail, and to have the sea and your boat right there at your back, a spit away, if you got drunk.

'A bottle of Merovigli, Gigi.'

'My name's Annette, not

'You look like Gigi to me, Annette.'

'You get stoned again tonight, mister?'

'This is plain honest thirst, Gigi. It was bloody hot coming from Athens.'

She was dark, pretty, half Greek and half Alexandrian French. At twenty she could have been ravishing, properly made up; at forty she would be a hag. Her untidy blouse was too tight, and showed a tantalizing curve of white breast in the half-dark of the bar. Like me, she was barefoot. She placed the bottle of wine in front of me. The first taste made that extra sail across the bay worthwhile.

'Does Professor Cacouris know you drink so much, mister?' `

What the hell's eating you tonight, Gigi?'

'I just wonder whether the professor knows, that's all. All those precious vases and things he gives you to take to Athens in your boat'

'The best stuff doesn't go with me. I carry only the secondraters.'

'That's not what I hear, mister; '

Call me Struan.'

'I can't say it. It's a horrid name.' '

Good. Scots.'

– '

It'shorrid because she must have used it!

'Who's she?'

'The girl you ran away from. To Santorin.'

'For crying out! You're letting your imagination run away with you. Okay, then, if you're going to be unfriendly, stick to Mister Weddell.'

She leaned over the plank bar top. I'm not unfriendly; I'm only concerned:

'Good. Then you're falling in love'

'I would like to, but there's too much going on inside you. You would like me only for a little while in your bed. Then you'd be tired of me and I would be unhappy.'

'Let's stick to ancient vases and the prof's excavations. That way there'll be no emotional spin-off.'

'You don't want to talk about yourself, mister. You want the wine to talk.'

'In that case you'd better bring another bottle. Skates, this time. Good, strong rough Maros'

'Your hair is much too long. It is long and blonde like a woman's.'

'There's no one to see it at sea.'

'You need a shave. Your shirt is dirty.'

'For Crissake, Gigi, put a sock in it!'

'A woman would be good for you, mister.'

'When I want a woman I know where I can get one.' '

It's not that sort of woman you want, You want – a real woman.'

'Listen, Gigi, I could have stopped off at Oia if I'd wanted. I came here for a friendly bottle of wine, not a load of bitching.'

'You came because you're frightened of being alone, mister. You could just as well have gone on to the excavation site.'

Barbed wire, pumice dust, a spooky old place which blew up and killed everyone 3,500 years ago! No thanks!'

She was right, of course. Professor Cacouris was busy excavating an ancient Minoan city, on the southern horn of Santorin's bay, which was destroyed in one of the great natural disasters of antiquity. It ranks as one of the archaeo13 logical finds of the century. The principal treasures have been the superb frescoes which surpass any found elsewhere in the Mediterranean, including the famous ones from Knossos. There were also hundreds of pots, amphorae and vases; these provided me with profitable cargoes for the Archaeological Museum in Athens. The site was so valuable that it had been strongly fenced

'I hear you are very good now with the old vases and things. One of these days Professor Cacouris will let you help with the frescos.'

'You hear a lot, Gin.'

'It is a bar. People talk.'

'It's pretty empty tonight?

'Don't you want to be alone with me?'

'Not in your present mood.'

'I am a woman.'

'You're needling me into getting drunk.'

'You could have done that on your boat'

'I never drink at sea.'

'You drink on land, though.'

'Sweet Jesus! Can't you stop bitching and leave me to drink in peace?'

'It's not peace you're after-it's passing out,

'Then you can put the body aboard the Orga.'

'Another horrid name?

'When I get bored by my lady tourists I call her the Orgasm. Scares 'em off or lures 'em on. Depends. Actually It's the name of the village in Cyprus where she was built.'

'Cyprus! Who's taking my homeland's name in vain?'

Relieved to get away from Gigi's needling, I swung round on my stool to greet the newcomer. Byron, the Greek – a needle-sharp, devious, sophisticated ex-tanker officer who (if you believed his stories) had been washed by many waters, from the Persian Gulf to Piraeus. His long coal-black hair and lush sideburns against a tanned skin (also visible past swelling chest-muscles nearly to navel level through an open mauve shirt) would have made him the envy of any male model. And he knew it. Women couldn't stay away from him: he knew that, too, and bore the burden stoically. He sailed a bigger boat than mine. What his cargoes were was anyone's guess. Mine was that they were arms and anununition. He had a pied-a-terre the uncharitable would have called it a 14 funkhole-in the town of Them, eight hundred steps up the cliff from the bar. We often drank together. He was witty and entertaining; the most delightful liar I've met.

'Byron! Come and help me get the taste of Gigi out of my mouth.'

He grinned and said something to her in Greek which sent her sulking to the far end of the bar.

'I thought Gigi's was the most likely place to find you.'

He splashed himself a liberal dose of the Skaros. 'There are three people in Thera looking for you tonight' '

Three?'

'Myself, Ari, and the postmaster, old Tsaras. He'd fall apart at the seams if he tried the steps'

'You've found me.'

'But Ari has the telegram. He talked Tsaras into letting him deliver it to you at the excavation site.'

'Ad knew damn well I was away in Athens.'

Ari was an urchin, about ten years old, who attached himself to me whenever I came ashore. He was an orphan and lived in a hovel in Theta. Perhaps the strength of the proprietary feeling about me was in direct proportion to my liberal tips.

'Knowing Ari I'd say he was touching some sucker of a tourist for the fare to the site, and then hoping to double up by what you gave him'

I laughed. 'You bloody Greeks are all the same at heart-from the cradle onwards,'

'Aren't you interested in the telegram?'

'Why should I be?'

'The typical beach-comber syndrome.'"

'Where'd you learn that fine phrase, Byron? It sounds like the exit line of one of your women.'

He grinned, 'She was American. We met on an intellectual level.'

I looked him over. 'And you couldn't bear all that beau amp; ful body going to waste.'

'The telegram is something special Old Tsaras was all steamed up about it.'

Gigi came over and joined us. 'Maybe it's from Athens, about the vases you took.'

'Never. Athens wouldn't bother about me. They'd get in touch direct with the Prof.'

Byron spreading his hands in the deprecating, sympathetic way that only a Greek can, asked, 'Home?'

'No one gives a damn.'

'Old Tsaras said something about its being long-distance.' I refilled our glasses. 'Long may the home fires burn. And burn. And burn.'

Byron gave me a penetrating glance and said something to Gigi.

She replied in English. 'He's been in this mood all evening.' `

Listen, you two,' I said. 'I don't want any sympathy and I don't want any tears; I don't need 'em. Santarin's my life. I'm here by my own choice and I like it the way it is.' `That's why you're not interested in your telegram-maybe from the Cape?'

'Who said the Cape?'

No one. But that's where you're from.'

'Know the Cape, Byron?'

'I've sailed round it times enough.'

'Fine. Then you'll understand what I'm going to tell you, being a tanker man yourself. Ever hear of the Walewska?'

'What tanker man hasn't? Ripped herself open on a reef off South West Africa, carrying a full load of 150,000 tons. In these days of shortages! Then some trigger-happy sonofabitch commanding a frigate sent her to the bottom without even waiting to see.

'I didn't send her to the bottom. I blew her sky-high.'

A charge of plastic explosive under the seat of his pants couldn't have lifted him quicker off his stool.

'Christ! You! You?'

'Yes. Me. Mel'

Without being able to shift his eyes from me, he said to Gigi, 'Get me some of that whisky you keep stashed away for Americans.'

She gave us both a startled glance and scuttled away. Byron said slowly, holding out his right hand, 'I want to shake the hand that threw away a million dollars in a flash of flame-pool! Like that.'

Cut it out,' I replied. 'Don't get melodramatic. I had enough drama from the Press at the official inquiry into the sinking. From everyone, in fact That's why I'm here.'

`You were kicked out-cashiered?' Byron's voice was full of awe and admiration,

Gigi came back with the whisky and a light which she placed on the bar counter.

'No I wasn't. I quit. Of my own free will. The Navy was on my side. All the way. But there was a king-sized ruckus over the Walewska. The tanker company sued the. Government for millions. The court hearing went on for months and I was target number one. By the time it was finished I' d had the lot of them. Sure, I would have got another ship but I didn't intend to be strung along for the rest of my life at the end of a radio asking, "Please sir, may I do this, please sir, may I do that?" I was the captain of the frigate and I made the decision. I stand by it.'

'Fit for independent command,' murmured Byron.

'You're stuffed full of other people's cast-off phrases'

He shrugged. 'If the cap fits So, because you' don't like other people's querying your actions and decisions, you pulled up stakes and quit-to Santorin? An ex-Navy captain sailing aimlessly from nowhere to nowhere?'

'Just that. I was fed to the back teeth with the whole bunch of them: inquiry, Navy, lawyers, the lot. Anyway, who the hell are you to tell me what I should or shouldn't do?'

He touched my hand wonderingly. 'A million dollars up the spout!'

'If you go on fiddling with my hand I'll begin to think I'm Lady Macbeth or you're a lady-boy:

'Not in front of Gigi, please Struan!'

The wine-it had that fire which seems to be at the heart of all wines from volcanic soils -started to give me a warm feeling about Gigi; and I was wondering how to get rid of Byron, who was concentrating on the whisky, when Gigi exclaimed:

'Here's Ari now!

'Telegram for you, Boss. You must hurry.' He was puffing and grinning as if he'd run all the way down Thera's eight hundred steps. He clutched a buff envelope Only drachmas would loosen his grip.

'How'd you know, you little bastard? – you can't read.' '

Mister Tsaras said hurry. It's from overseas,' He offered the envelope. 'Money in advance, Boss.'

'Cape,' said Byron. 'I'll bet on it.'

He was right. Although I was half ready to accept that it might be, I nevertheless felt an odd contraction in my stomach 17 when I saw that the office of origin was Cape Town. It had been sent two days previously and read: 'Your mother critically ill. Imperative you come at once. Groot Schuur hospital.'

'It's my mother,' I told them. It says, come at once.' ' Where is she, Boss?' asked Ari.

'Cape Town. It's five thousand miles away. I can get a plane direct front Athens.'

'Is she bad, Struan?'

I caught myself staring at Gigi's breast and wondering when I' d see her again. For a beach-comber Santorin hadn't been a bad bit of beach.

'Critical. That was two days ago.'

Byron said. 'First you've got to get to Athena It's 150 miles. It'll be a hell of a beat right into the teeth of the meltemi. My boat's got an engine and I'd take you except I' ve got an appointment on the Turkish coast…'

'Thanks all the same, Byron. I'll make out under sail. Pity Santorin doesn't run to a steamer service,'

'Does it say what's wrong with your mother?' Gigi persisted. `

No. I'd guess a stroke, at her age.'

'The other brothers and sisters can be with her… in case. You needn't go.'

'There aren't any other brothers and sisters. I'm the only son.'

'And your father?'

'Killed in the war.'

'I'll come and help you sail the Orga, Boss,' Ari chipped in. 'Free. No charge.'

I looked at the pinched, pert face, surprised and touched at the generous gesture. He'd miss me-for a day or two. '

Thanks, no, Ari. You'd be left stranded in Athens after I'd gone. I can't tell how long be away.'

Byron assessed the sky. 'You'll have to make a long haul towards Therasia before you'll weather the entrance to the bay, Struan.'

'Yes, the sooner I get cracking, the better. Right now.. there's nothing to keep me.'

Gigi turned the light away so that I couldn't read her eyes.

'No, there is nothing to keep you.' She went on, speaking almost to herself, 'I wish you'd been drunk tonight then 18 you couldn't have gone. Tomorrow, when you surfaced again, it would have been too late.'

I'll come back, Gigi. The Cape doesn't hold anything for me any more.'

But she wouldn't reply: just went and prepared some food for my trip to Athena

Gigi, Byron and Ari waded into the warm sea and pushed the Orga clear of the flange of rock which made the easy mooring. Ari chattered excitedly, while Byron passed on some local sailing lore; but Gigi simply stood there with the water swishing round her bare legs. When I brought the stern round and called goodbye she didn't wave or say anything. The meltemi was ripping directly into the great bay and I set out, as Byron had indicated, on the long pull towards Therasia Island in order to strike through the bay's entrance to the open sea. The business of getting sail on the clumsy old calque took time and when I looked back all I could see were the lights of Gigi's bar shining against the backdrop of the great cliff.

I set course for Athens-and the Cape.