Colonel Sun

Bond picked up the telephone and asked for the number of the small foreign-language bookshop Stuart Thomas managed as his cover. In less than a minute the hotel operator rang back to say that the number was unobtainable: 'No, sir, not engaged, not no reply - unobtainable.' Alarm flickered in Bond. He checked the number, asked the girl to try it again, got the same result, put Ariadne on the job of chasing up Service Inquiries. The engineer on duty was sympathetic but not helpful. He could find no record of anything that concerned the number in question. He would attend to the matter, of course, as soon as he had the opportunity. Perhaps the lady would care to telephone him again later. Meanwhile had she thought that her friend might have overlooked the payment of his bill?

Without exchanging a word, Bond and Ariadne hurried out.

The situation turned out to be quite simple, and quite final. The firemen had done their work and left; the police were in possession. In charge of them was a stocky young lieutenant in smart light-grey uniform, courteous, probably efficient, and anxious to show off his English to Bond, who represented himself as an old customer of Thomas's drawn by curiosity and concern. There was plenty to arouse that: great blackened fragments of glass on the pavement, jumbled heaps of charred and saturated paperbacks, atlases, dictionaries, guidebooks, capsized cases and stands, a strong smell of burnt cardboard and glue. Some of the stock had escaped damage, and the fire in the shop itself had not spread to the adjoining furrier's and travel agency. The inner apartments had suffered worse, being more or less gutted in parts. One corner was open to the sky, and the rooms at the back of the travel agency were in almost as bad a state. It had been a remarkably fierce blaze.

The police lieutenant accepted a cigarette. 'The firemen have not done badly. They were notified quickly. We're still not certain what has caused the outbreak, but it's being suspected that this was no accident. The heat has been greater than we expect in an ordinary fire. Our expert's working here for the last hour. Some bomb, perhaps. Do you know by any chance, sir, if Mr Thomas is having some enemies? Business rivals, men of that sort?'

This was dangerous ground. Being roped in to help a police investigation would be a fatal setback. Bond said firmly, 'I'm afraid I don't know him on that basis, only as a customer. You'd better ask Mr Thomas himself.'

'Unfortunately this is not possible at the moment. Mr Thomas is not present. He wasn't present when the firemen came. I was understanding from the neighbours here that this seems unusual. Normally he's spending the night in his quarters at the back of the shop. A most lucky escape. No doubt the news will reach him soon and bring him. You're wanting to see him particularly, sir?'

'No,' said Bond. 'Not particularly. I'll contact him later. I just thought I'd like to ask him if I could do anything. Thank you.'

'Please, sir. Miss.'

The lieutenant bowed slightly, glanced at Ariadne with admiration, at Bond with cheerful envy, and turned away to meet a middle-aged man in plain clothes who, brushing ash off his jacket, was approaching from the back of the shop - no doubt the fire expert. Bond also turned away. He couldn't get at the information about to be delivered, and in any case it made no difference which particular technique had been used to cripple the British intelligence network in Athens, any more than it mattered - from this point of view - whether Stuart Thomas was alive in enemy hands or lying in the ooze off the Piraeus waterfront. Bond had had his most powerful weapon snatched away before he could grasp it.

As he put it to Ariadne back at the Grande Bretagne, 'It wasn't only him they were after - they wanted to prevent me from getting hold of his records, his lists of contacts, pick-up points and times, locations of letter-boxes and the rest of it, so as to cut me off from our people. All that stuff would have been in the back part of the shop, of course. That was the centre of the fire.'

Ariadne frowned. 'Why not just remove everything? Less to be seen. They could use what they took, certainly.'

'Less safe, too. They couldn't have been sure there wasn't some material in places they couldn't find without pulling the building to pieces and which I might know about. No doubt they took away what they could find easily. There wouldn't have been much of that if I know Thomas.'

'His assistant?'

'I can't see how I dare approach him after this,' said Bond, staring at the wall. 'If he's not dead or kidnapped he'll be watched. And I can't hang on here in the hope that somebody'll come to me. Pretty useless, anyway. The tags Thomas put on me last night have vanished. God knows how many other people have. How did Gordienko put it? Extreme ruthlessness. You and I seem to be in the same situation.'

'Yes, and so we must deal with it together.' Ariadne came over and sat beside Bond on the couch. She spoke with great determination and force. 'I too have been thinking. We must move immediately. We've a long way to travel and it's only... sixty hours exactly until the event Mr Gordienko mentioned. Probably less than that, because- '

'What is this event?'

'I'll tell you when we're on our way.'

'So that I won't get the chance to tell London beforehand,' said Bond dispassionately. 'Of course.'

'Darling, I know you must tell London if you can, don't I? Be reasonable... Good. Now, we have a sea-trip ahead of us. About two hundred kilometres - a hundred and twenty miles. At least, it's that in a straight line. So we must have a boat and someone to sail it for us. I know who.'

Chapter 9

The _Altair__

'LITSAS WAS in General Papagos's army which fought the Italians when they invaded Greece in 1940. You remember how the Greeks threw them way back into Albania? Well, Litsas was with the infantry that took Koritsa. His platoon had used up their ammunition and he killed twelve Italians with his bayonet. They made him a sergeant for that. He was eighteen then.'

Ariadne paused in her recital as she and Bond entered the little high-ceilinged café. The proprietor, chunky and grizzled, with the standard tobacco-stained moustache, came bustling forward.

'_Kaliméra sas__,' said Ariadne courteously. '_Boreíte na mou peite__, _sas parakaló__ - _pou eínai o Kyrios Litsas?__'

The man took them to the doorway and pointed diagonally across the road towards the quays. There followed one of the animated discussions that, in Greece, accompany even the most elementary piece of business. Finally, with that ripple of the shoulders that does duty for a shrug hereabouts, the caféowner left them, seeming to imply that he took no responsibility for what use might be made of his information. They moved off in the direction he had pointed.

'When the Germans came,' Ariadne went on, 'they cut Papagos's supply lines and he had to surrender. The soldiers weren't made prisoners, they were just disarmed and sent home. Litsas walked a couple of hundred miles across Greece to Euboea, where his home is. He joined some guerrillas and went on killing Italians. Germans too when they started trying to crush the resistance movement.'

Bond took her arm as they crossed the street. 'You certainly seem to have studied his career.'

'My father was his officer in 1941 and they met again in the resistance. They were very brave, both of them, I have to admit that.'

Ariadne's face had clouded. Bond said, 'Admit it?'

'I know it sounds odd, but.... You see, I believe that in our civil war the wrong side won. You'd say the democratic side. It would have been so right for the country if the Communists had been allowed to take over. They were the real Greek patriots. They'd mostly done the fighting during the occupation...'

'A large part of which was against rival organizations on the same side,' said Bond dryly. 'But what do you care about the civil war? You can't have been more than six when it ended.'

'Seven. I've studied it.' Ariadne looked sheepish.

'No doubt. Anyway, what about your father and Litsas? They were on the wrong side in it, I gather.'

'Please, James, it was no joke to me. Father became very reactionary. He joined what was known as the National Army. Most of them were Fascists, terrorists, no-good people. Litsas joined it too. He was a liaison officer with the British for a time, but he transferred because he wanted to be in the fighting.'

'And kill Communists. You know, Ariadne- '

'There he is. There.'

They had been moving along the walk that follows the curve of Pasalimani, the larger of Piraeus's two yacht-basins. On the far side, the motionless water held scores of assorted craft, from fishing-boats and twelve-foot sailing dinghies to yachts as opulent as any in the Mediterranean. Immediately below, on the narrow stretch of yard, boats in various stages of repair and conversion were being worked on. Bond immediately picked out a tall white-shirted figure evidently giving vigorous instruction to a couple of cowed-looking employees. As Ariadne and he turned towards the steps leading down to the yard, Bond went on with his train of thought.

'From what you've been saying, this man sounds exactly the opposite of someone who'd help your side.'

'It's also your side for the moment, remember. And he's very pro-British. And although he's always been mad at me for joining the Communist Party I think he's continued to be fond of me, because he loves my father. And there's something I know about the other side which may help if he becomes obstinate.'

Litsas turned and saw them. He was tanned to a rich brown by years of sun and salt air, a remarkably handsome man in his mid-forties with thick black hair just starting to go grey, neat pointed ears close to the skull, sad and watchful brown eyes, a jutting nose, and a mouth that at the moment looked good-naturedly sensual, though Bond imagined - rightly - that it would harden to a fierce line in times of action. The belly showed no trace of fat and the shoulders and upper arms bulged with muscle. Bond put him down as a loyal friend and a totally implacable and ruthless enemy. He trusted him on sight. After an instant's pause, strong white teeth showed in an unreservedly warm and welcoming smile. '_Ariadne, khrisí mou__.'

'_Yassou, Niko, ti yínese?__'

The two embraced affectionately. Then the watchful eyes moved to Bond.

'This is James Bond, Niko, an English friend of mine.'

'How do you do, Mr Bond.' The handclasp was strong and warm. 'You've picked a good time for your visit. I'm just finishing here before I go over the road for a drink. I hope you'll join me. Let me manage these two idiots first. They know as much of carpentry as I know of... knitting.'

Apart from a few falterings (no doubt from lack of practice) this was said in a manner approaching that of a middle-class Englishman - above all, with less of the difficulty with 'ch', 'sh' and 'j' than most Greeks experience. Litsas now moved back to his workmen. Despite his gay, friendly tone, his brown eyes had not for a moment ceased their discreet but careful appraisal of Bond.

The boat under discussion was a twenty-footer with an unusual pointed stern, broad in the beam, a fishing-boat or perhaps lifeboat part-way converted into a pocket-size cabin-cruiser. Two bunks had been completed, also the skeleton of the superstructure in slender pine beams. Bond guessed that the final result would look grotesque to a yachtsman's eye, but fetchingly 'quaint' to the French or German tourist interested in a not-too-expensive hire.

No doubt feeling that words were inadequate to express his disgust, Litsas put out one large brown hand and, seemingly with a mere flick of the wrist, broke one of the vertical members away from the gunwale as if it had been fixed there with stamppaper. The two workmen put on exaggerated expressions of guilt and self-reproach. With a final sweeping gesture of contempt, Litsas turned away. He winked at Bond and Ariadne.

'They're children,' he said, making a herding motion towards the steps. 'Nice children, but children. Not just lazy and careless: they cannot see the idea that very much effort is required if you want to make something even a little good. When I tell them that the deck-housing would fall when the first decent wave hits it, they want to say, "Perhaps, but be nice, Mr Litsas. See how beautiful we have made the bunks." That's Greece for you, I'm sorry to say: people that don't try hard enough. But I mustn't bore you with this grumbling. What brings you to Greece, Mr Bond? You're on holiday?'

'No, I'm afraid not.'

Litsas caught the tone at once. 'I hope there's no trouble? If I can- '

'There's trouble all right. We desperately need your help, Mr Litsas.'

'We? Love trouble?'

'I wish it were. Ariadne and I are fighting an international conspiracy which is threatening England and Russia and probably Greece too. I'm sorry to sound melodramatic, but- '

'I don't care what you sound, Mr Bond.' Litsas had stopped dead on the pavement opposite the café. His eyes and voice were full of hostility. 'I've finished with politics altogether, and in any case I would never help the... the faction you represent. Now you must excuse me.'

He started to move away. Bond stepped into his path. 'I swear to you I'm not a Communist. I'm on your side.'

'Several Communists have said to me almost those exact words. The last one tried to kill me ten minutes afterwards.'

Ariadne intervened. 'Niko, I promise you that if my father came here and knew what we know he'd ask you to do all you could do to help us.'

This increased Litsas's anger. 'My dear young lady, it's most wrong that you bring the major into this business. And stupid. I don't admire you.'

'Listen to me, Mr Litsas,' said Bond desperately. 'Our cause is just and we're in deadly earnest about it. I give you my word for that as an Englishman.'

'You do, yes?' Some of the fire left Litsas's manner. 'That doesn't mean as much as it has done, to most people. To me... well, I'm sentimental, I suppose. Very good, Englishman, I agree to hear your story. I promise nothing more.'

With no more said they reached the café and sat down at one of the little oblong marble-topped tables - plastic had yet to find its way here. The speckled wall-mirrors did what they could to give an illusion of roominess. There, amid a buzz of chatter, among games of backgammon and what looked like gin-rummy, over cup after cup of scalding Turkish coffee, Bond gave the full account, all the way from Quarterdeck to the fire at Thomas's shop. Litsas's eyes never left Bond's face. At the end he sat for a full two minutes perfectly relaxed, without a hint of the fidgeting of hands and feet so curiously common in Greek men. When he spoke his tone was cold and measured.

'So it comes to this. You and Ariadne want me to take you to some island of which the name she won't say. There, something she calls an _event__' - the deep voice grew contemptuous - 'will take place, if it isn't prevented by some enemies. A British chief of Security has been kidnapped by the same enemies and may be made use of to damage British interests. When you get there you may think what to do next. At the moment it's clear that you have no plan. And not a very good story either. I'm sorry - I can introduce you to dozen people who will charter to you a yacht and crew to go to the islands. If you're so fussy. There are public steamers which- '

Bond interrupted brusquely. He had settled in his mind on a force of three as an absolute minimum for the task in hand and he felt sure that this man was the best available for making up the number. 'Look,' he said, 'that line of talk won't get any of us anywhere. What do you imagine is at stake for you is this? Do you think Ariadne and I have told you all this because we're out to steal one of your boats? What are you afraid of?'

'That's enough from you, Mr Bond, I won't stand- '

It was Ariadne's turn to cut in. 'Niko. Listen to me. One fact, or almost certain fact. Von Richter is involved.'

She got her effect. Litsas snarled like a wild animal. '_To poústi! To thráko, to __... That... savage! The butcher of Kapoudzona! Come on, Ariadne, I must know more. How was this found out?'

'He was seen quite accidentally by a guy who was a resistance fighter. The man told the local Party chief, and so on. We got the news yesterday.'

'So? He's in Greece. Nothing strange in that. Those German bastards are coming back here always, to enjoy in peace the beautiful country they began to love while they were burning our villages and shooting our men and sometimes also our women and children. He was on his way to Kapoudzona to enjoy his pleasant memories.'

'No. He was making inquiries about boats to... the place of the event. Yesterday we hadn't thrown away the idea that it might be coincidence. Lots of people go to this place in the summer. But I don't think now it can be coincidence. Do you?'

'No,' said Litsas grimly. 'No, I don't.' He took a deep breath and looked from one to the other with the beginnings of a grin. 'All right. You've caught your fish. I'll do anything you say. It's time for a change for me. Don't think I believe completely, though. This sweet girl here might still be lying when she tells me about von Richter. But perhaps she tells the truth and that's enough for me. I'd go halfway round the world for a chance in ten of seeing that squarehead in my sights.'

Bond's heart had lifted in relief, in exultation. He said, 'How soon can we leave?'

'Soon. We'll take the _Altair__. She's a fifty-footer with a Diesel. Strong. Not easy to be noticed. Do you know anything of boats, James?'

'A bit. I spent a lot of summer holidays years ago in a converted Brixham trawler.'

'You'll be useful, then.' Litsas turned authoritative. 'Right. If things were different you could cross the road and eat clams at Diasemos, but you must put up with what I bring you. The _Altair__ is moored along by the clock-tower. Panamanian flag. Next to a big Yankee thing for millionaires. The two of you go on board now and remain out of sight until we sail. Do you think you were followed from the hotel?'

'Doubtful. In what we stood up in and just carrying a shopping-bag we stood a fair chance of not being assumed to be leaving. Our most vulnerable moment was when we stopped for me to wire London and Ariadne to warn her people. But we had to take that risk.'

'You must take the next risk too. It's not far and nobody's on board. You have just one gun, James? Yes. Leave everything to me. Be off with you.'

Within ten minutes Bond and Ariadne crossed the afterdeck of the _Altair__ and made their way into the tiny saloon. Here everything was squared away, the floor scrubbed, the windows polished, the miniature royal-blue curtains freshly laundered. Bond guessed that the boat had been about to go out on charter, and grinned to himself as he visualized Litsas airily riding over the protests of the party who had rented her. They explored briefly. The narrow companion-way led below to a cupboard-sized galley on the starboard side, a head and shower to port. Bond lowered himself from the galley into the engine-room, gasping at the heat and the reek of oil, and looked over the single-drive 165 hp Mercedes engine. New condition; clever use of available space; maintenance up to Royal Navy standard. Bond's respect for Litsas rose a further notch.

For'ard of galley and head were a pair of cabins with double bunks and, for'ard again, another pair with tiered single bunks. They took the port midships cabin. Ariadne unpacked and stowed away their minimal luggage: changes of underclothing, handkerchiefs, a couple of shirts, toilet gear and, incongruous among these humdrum necessities, eighty rounds of ammunition for the Walther. She smoothed back a tendril of brown-blonde hair and turned straight into his arms.

With her face against his neck, she murmured, 'So I have you for a little longer. It seems like it was days and days before I thought I'd have you at all. I don't care what happens tomorrow. Now. I know I'll care if you're taken away from me. So let's use every moment we have.'

She drew her head back and desire made her eyes look unfocused, opaque. 'Don't shut the door. We're alone here.' Her breasts seemed to swell against his chest.

There on the hard unluxurious bunk Bond made long love to her, both of them taking their pleasure easily, slowly, searchingly, with none of the near-hysterical frenzy of the early hours of that day. The buzz of activity all around them, the shouted orders, the rattle of anchor-chains, the fluctuating hum and roar of engines, lost all meaning and vanished. At last, exhausted, they drew apart and slept.

Bond was woken by voices and footfalls overhead. He dressed swiftly, his eyes on the uncovered form of Ariadne, fast asleep on her back, one knee raised in an attitude of total abandonment. He stooped and kissed her warm cheek.

By the time he had moved the few yards back to the saloon Litsas was standing alone, hands on hips, among heaps of various stores, and the voices were retreating in the direction of the dockside.

'Ariadne is asleep?'

'Yes.'

The big man looked directly at Bond with eyes that were sad and pleading now, not watchful. 'You'll be good to her, won't you, James? The way you think, it isn't my business, but her father's my best friend and that means very much in Greece. If you treat her bad, drop her suddenly, make untrue promises to her and so on, then I shall come for you and neither of us would like that. Especially you. You understand me?'

'Yes. You won't need to come for me.'

'Then we shall all be happy.' Litsas slapped himself on the chest a couple of times and his manner lightened. 'I envy you, taking a girl on this trip. I couldn't have found one in the time. Five years ago things were very different. Litsas is not like he was. Anyway, if I bring one, that's not serious enough. I don't know any female spies. Honestly, James' - he shook his head defeatedly - 'to think little Ariadne is working for the Russian bloody Secret Service is fantastic. I thought she's just making cups of coffee for the workers and reading Karl Marx in the evening. Instead of this.... Oh well, it's good that the world can still surprise us.

'Now. Fuel and water. Full up. Food. That can wait. Drink. That can wait too, but not so long. Weapons. You'd better look at them now. Here.'

Bond moved to the table. On it were neat oilskin bundles which Litsas untied to reveal one of the excellent Beretta M.34 9-mm automatics and a couple of boxes of ammunition, four Mills HE grenades, and - almost unbelievably - an example of that greatest rifle in the history of warfare, the British short magazine Lee Enfield, with perhaps sixty rounds in clips of five. All the items were in beautiful condition, the metal surfaces of the guns shining dully with a thin film of oil. Bond picked up the rifle and squinted along the V-andblade sight. 'You got this little lot together in pretty good time.'

'Oh, it was easy. This is my private store. I've had all this stuff for over twenty years. The British gave me the Lee Enfield in 1944. It seemed perhaps not such an expensive gift, since it was made in 1916. Anyway, I made very good results with it, and kept it when they made me an officer. I picked up the other stuff in the same sort of way.'

Bond nodded. 'What made you keep it all?'

'Yes, it must seem rather silly. It isn't really. Not in Greece. You see, here you can't be sure. Oh yes, the Communists were completely beaten in 1949 but you'll agree that Communists don't give up easily. I must admit that they're not being violent now. But recently they've begun to be active again. Anyway, if they do try again, they won't get rid of me without some trouble. And it isn't only the Communists by a long chalk. Only last year I had some trouble down in Crete. Some of them are a bit primitive there, poor chaps. I'll tell you the story some time. Anyway, I was facing a bunch I had to pacify with this. Just waving it at them was enough, thank God.'

While he talked Litsas had taken the wooden lid off the starboard-side bench and brought out another oilskin package. This one proved to contain a Thompson MI sub-machine gun of World War II vintage. It had been as lovingly cared for as the other pieces.

'A present from the USA. It lives on board. Stacks of ammunition. I hope you think now our fire-power is enough?'

Bond grinned delightedly and slapped Litsas on the shoulder. 'With what we've got here we can take on anything short of a tank.'

'A cruiser tank at least. We shan't be shooting until the morning, I suppose, so let's stow the stuff, eh?'

They had about done so when a light step sounded on the deck outside and a youth of about sixteen, not tall but powerfully built for his age, stepped over the coaming into the saloon. He nodded gravely to Bond.

'This is Yanni,' said Litsas. '_Yanni, o Kyrios Tzems__.... You and I could manage the boat together, but we need a relief for the wheel. Yanni knows boats and he knows these seas. This is all we need. I shall slip him a couple of hundred drachmas and put him ashore somewhere before we begin the shooting. Well, since you like the weapons we can get the gangway up.'

He spoke to Yanni, who nodded again and slipped away with the same almost noiseless tread. Just afterwards Ariadne joined them.

She looked coolly desirable and at the same time impressively businesslike in blue jeans and a man's fine cotton shirt several shades darker, her hair pinned back close to her head. She looked quickly from Bond to Litsas.

'Well, why aren't we moving?'

'We're ready, my dear. But only you know where we must move. Isn't it time you trusted us?'

'Not until I have to.' Ariadne, at her most strict, avoided Bond's eye. Her tenacity in holding on to this information struck him as about equally absurd and admirable. She blinked, came to a decision. 'Go toward the Cyclades group. I'll tell you which island when we're sailing.'

'Very good. Right, James. Let's go.'

Five minutes later, a man in a grubby linen suit arrived panting at the quayside, peered after the receding shape of the _Altair__, turned and ran for the café and its telephone.

Chapter 10

Dragon Island

'THAT'S WHERE we're going.' Ariadne's finger came down on the map. 'Vrakonisi.'

Looking over her shoulder, Litsas nodded. 'Fourteen hours at least - I don't want to make her go more than about eight knots. Longer if the weather's bad. And it might be.'

'It's calm enough at the moment,' said Bond.

The dark indigo-blue sea slid past almost unwrinkled. Two miles away, the larger detail on shore was still perfectly clear, but its colours were just beginning to change in the approaching September dusk, the white of the scattered buildings losing its glare, the green of the trees fading and turning bluish, the tan and ochre and gamboge of the hillsides seeming oddly to have become more intense. A fishing-boat with a chain of dinghies passed towards Piraeus between the _Altair__ and the coast, all the craft moving as smoothly as if they were running across ice.

'It's usually calm here,' said Litsas, 'but wait till we get past Cape Sounion and leave the shelter of Attica before you be sure. Out there you can meet a norther and it's often quite bloody. Right. We make over here towards Kea, run south past Kithnos and Seriphos, round Siphnos and sail due east. That part may not be good either, but if it's rough we'll get some shelter from Antiparos and Paros for the last miles. Right. I'll just go and speak with Yanni.'

Litsas left them. Bond sat back and gazed out at the coast with eyes that hardly saw. He felt wonderfully relaxed and confident. The broad caique hull thrust its way sturdily through the still water, the muffled roar of the engine was even and regular, accompanied by no vibration. There were big questions yet to be settled and battles to be fought, but until first light at least everything was secure. He had had to learn to get everything possible out of such interludes before action, to savour each moment of calm that lay between him and the shooting, the running in and out of cover, the final assault and the blood.

He glanced sidelong at Ariadne's profile. Along with its abundant sensual beauty, its strength and intelligence impressed him anew. In America, in England, anywhere in the developed countries a girl of this calibre would be carving out a brilliant career for herself in journalism or entertainment. In Greece these opportunities barely existed. He felt he understood a little more than nothing of what had driven her into the arms of Communism.

Bond picked up the map and found the sickle-shaped island.

A memory clicked in his mind. 'Vrakonisi. So that was where Theseus went after he'd dumped your namesake on Naxos.'

'I thought you didn't notice,' said Ariadne, smiling and biting her lower lip like an embarrassed schoolgirl. 'That was a silly mistake of mine.'

'I'd only to look up the books and I could have identified the place straight way.'

'You won't find this story in the books; it's just a local legend the old people tell.' Ariadne settled down to impart information, but with a warmth of manner she never showed when the subject was politics.

'None of the scholars know why Theseus took off from Naxos in so much hurry. The Vrakonisiots do. Their king had heard about Theseus slaying the Minotaur and so he sent some men to him and they begged him to come over and fight a dragon who was burning up their island with the flames of its breath. So Theseus left Ariadne sleeping and went over to Vrakonisi with the messengers. He thought he'd be back very soon.

'But the dragon was dangerous because he could hurt you when you couldn't see him. He'd hide himself behind the mountain and breathe fire at you over it. Theseus waited for him to get started and then swam around the island and took the dragon from the rear and pulled him into the sea. And the water boiled and the steam rose so high in the air that the gods on Mount Olympus saw it and wondered what it was. At last the dragon was drowned and sank to the bottom of the sea. When Theseus got to shore he found that the boiling waves had melted so much that only a tenth part of the island was left, but the king and his family and his palace had survived and his daughters took care of Theseus while he recovered from his burns. That was a big job, and when he got back to Naxos and looked for Ariadne she'd gone. He'd been too brave for his own good.

'They'll tell you that that's just a mythical story of what happened when the island was formed as it is today. A volcano was erupting and pouring down burning lava and at last it exploded and the sea rushed in. But I'd as soon believe in the dragon. Vrakonisi - they'll tell you it means just "rocky island", not exciting. But that ought to be Vra_kh__onisi, with the letter _khi__. What it must really be is Thrakonisi. Dragon Island.'

'And now there's a dragon round the place again,' said Bond flatly. 'Only this time it's a Chinese dragon.'

Litsas reappeared at that moment and the words caught his ear. He checked in his stride.

'There's Chinese handwriting over every part of this business.' Bond offered cigarettes. 'The scale, the disregard for the unwritten rules of peacetime intelligence work, above all the recklessness. None of the smaller Powers who might want to resist Russian influence in this part of the Mediterranean or the Near East - Turkey, for instance - would or could risk a fraction of what these people have done. But before we go on theorizing, let's have a dose of fact. Ariadne's told us the location of this event. What we need to know now is what it is.'

'All right. This is it.' Ariadne drew her legs up on to the bench and clasped her knees.

'A secret meeting has been arranged between a top Russian official - you're sure to know his name - and representatives of some countries around here and in North Africa. High-up representatives; I heard that Nasser intended to come himself, but in the end he had to appoint a substitute. All the invitees accepted the Russian invitation at last, but a snag happened when they tried to fix on a place to hold the meeting. Russia would have been the obvious one, but two of the delegates got very reactionary and said they wouldn't go there. And then they all started fighting about prestige. So they finally settled on some halfway spot on neutral ground - for some reason Greece wasn't invited. The Turks must have been behind that. Russia should have stopped them.'

Ariadne's momentary but real indignation spoke of the undying nationalism that sits in the heart of every Greek, even the most sophisticated. Litsas responded at once, nodded in sympathy, but Bond failed to notice. His thoughts were racing ahead, outlining the consequences of what Ariadne was saying and fitting this picture into the information he already had. What looked up at him was frightening.

'So,' the girl went on, 'an island seemed just ideal - out of the way, but enough tourists and people around so that a lot of visitors suddenly coming wouldn't be noticeable. Vrakonisi was chosen because at one end of it there's a big house on a kind of rock that you can only get to by water.'

'I know the place you mean,' Litsas put in. 'That was clever of them. It'd be damned difficult to take them by surprise there. And that's what the enemy must want to do.'

Bond's eyes narrowed thoughtfully. 'Let's consider his strategy,' he said.

'Over a glass of ouzo, please, James.' Litsas got up from the table and went over to the ice-box on the port side of the companion-way. 'In Greece you consider nothing unless with some stimulating drink, and it's the wrong time for coffee. We modern Hellenes must help our poor brains with something.'

From a tall wicker-covered flagon he poured three stiff drinks on to chunks of ice and handed them out.

'This stuff is from the barrel - much better than the bottled. Stronger and not so sweet.'

Bond sipped and agreed. It had the bland fieriness he looked for in all short drinks: cool and dry in the mouth, warmly powerful in the belly. He pondered for another few moments. 'The intention,' he said slowly, 'is to break up the conference by violence, killing as many people as possible in the process, and making the whole thing as public as possible. After that, the plan would have been to make it look as if my chief and I had done the job, and put us in no position to say we hadn't. Our bodies would be found with the deadly weapons in our hands. No doubt we'd have papers on us "proving" we were acting under orders. The whole affair would stink to high heaven of being fixed, of course, and nobody who understands the British would be taken in, but that's a long way from being everybody. Enough people would believe it, or go on as if they believed it, for British influence hereabouts - which is still not negligible - to vanish overnight, British prestige to be ruined everywhere, rioting to break out, burnings, shootings, and worse... Gordienko wasn't fooling when he talked about a risk of war. I think he was making even more sense than he probably knew.'

'One moment, James.' Ariadne leaned forward earnestly. 'I agree with all this, but I still don't see why you're so sure that the Chinese must be responsible. The Americans are quite capable of this sort of thing. Consider their behaviour about Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Vietnam; they don't hesitate to- '

Bond started to speak, but Litsas held up a hand. 'Let me reply, James. Listen, young lady. At Pierce College in Athens the Americans educated you, taught you English, explained to you their way of life. Were you such a bad and lazy student that you're forgetting all that? Can you see no difference between fighting aggressive Communists and this caper, killing chaps in the public streets of a friendly and peaceful nation, taking a Security chief from England completely openly? Even the worst men in Washington would not advise that. I beg you, Ariadne, forget your Leninist Institute and start to think!'

'And,' said Bond, 'if they're still telling you there that the United States is world enemy number one they need to catch up on their studies. The Kremlin knows perfectly well that the main threat isn't the West any more, but the East. Surely that's not news to you?'

Ariadne had flushed. She gazed at Bond and said, still with a touch of defiance, 'Maybe. You could be right. I don't know.' Then she turned to Litsas and went on as before: 'But don't tell me about aggressive Communists. That's straight out of the... the Lyndon Johnson Institute!'

Bond chuckled. Litsas roared with laughter and slapped Ariadne on the thigh. The three shared a moment of total understanding and pure uplifting gaiety. It was gone in a flash. Bond sipped ouzo and took up his exposition.

'What really frightens me,' he said quietly, 'is the thought that this thing is so violent, so ruthless, so... so _crazy__, that it might easily not be a one-shot deal, but the first step in something on an even more ambitious scale. Let's consider what might conceivably happen, how bad it could be. Stage one: Britain fatally damaged, Russia's prestige weakened, in this part of the world very seriously weakened - so she couldn't even protect the delegates to a conference she'd convened, couldn't she, and what about the gross infringement of Greek territoriality? The eastern Mediterranean laid open for Chinese penetration. Stage two: the whole Arab world and/or Africa. I'll leave it to you to wonder what Stage three might be.'

Nobody spoke. The _Altair__ moved peacefully and purposefully on its way. Litsas fetched fresh drinks.

'That could be the big plan,' he said, sitting down again. 'But now the details. What might be the Chink plan of attack? Sea or land? Or air, perhaps? A few bombs would make plenty of casualties.'

'Air I rather...' Bond shook his head. 'They'd have to crash the aircraft somewhere near by, and crashes are tricky things to rig. There's the question of getting the pilot away - oh, they wouldn't think twice about his being killed, but he would. If they put the machine down on land they risk burning everything beyond recognition. In the water you're in even greater danger of losing the lot. I suppose you could try a duplication, one aeroplane for the assault and a twin for the crash, but that way you'd more than double your risks. No, for the time being I think we can rule out the air. Now, land. How well do you know the place, Niko?'

Litsas screwed up his face and sighed. 'I'm trying to remember.... That end of the island's pretty wild. Parts of it were never cleared for cultivating. Big blocks of stone and some dense bush. Difficult to move about, but first-class cover. If you knew your business you could hide a platoon in there.'

'In a different way that isn't very promising either,' said Bond. 'You'd need something a good deal heavier than small arms to make any impression on a house. And any sort of artillery would take some installing, if the going's as rough as you say.'

'One of those anti-tank things - what are they called, bazookas?'

Bond shook his head again. 'I doubt it. They couldn't do much more to a tank than blow its track off. I suppose - if you could get at a window.... But you'd have to get up bloody close. Of course, atomics would solve everything and to spare, though you still have a delivery problem. On the whole I think the sea's the most likely. Well, that's as far as we can go now. All we can do is get there.'

Bond's voice and manner had turned suddenly cold, so much so that Ariadne glanced at him in concern. In fact he had gone cold inside at the mental picture, hideously clear, of a thirty-knot cabin cruiser with a stolen tactical atomic device on board slipping round the corner of the island, throwing its insanely destructive punch, and making at full speed for the horizon and a rendezvous. God, that would rock the world all right!

To conceal his agitation from the others he got to his feet and went to the saloon doorway, unconsciously allowing for the motion of the ship as he did so. By imperceptible degrees the weather had been freshening. Whitecaps were beginning to break up the surface of the dark water. The lights of a village clustered at the shore and wound away upwards and to one side. The day had not yet quite gone. Against the faint luminosity of the sky the columns of a ruined temple could be made out, an image of defiant integrity and loneliness that quietened Bond's fears. Its makers could have had no notion of how long even these remnants would outlast them and their god, but had they known they would have gone on building just the same. That was the only way to behave: to see to the doing of what had to be done.

Litsas joined him. 'We should get busy. I suggest an early supper, because the wind and sea are getting up.'

He glanced at the sky, moved a couple of yards for'ard and looked over the cabin-top out to the fading horizon. 'It'll be Force 5 or 6 in a couple of hours and the old _Altair__ does roll a bit. She only draws just over five feet - that's the bad thing with _karavóskaro__ hulls. Anyway, eating's better if your plate stays still. Afterwards an early bedtime; for you two, that is. Yanni and I will split the watches. We'll be off Vrakonisi about six. I'll check the course and the weather reports and then we'll see what's in the larder.'

When they were alone on the narrow strip of deck, Ariadne turned and clung to Bond. Her lips tasted faintly of salt. As he closed his eyes and kissed her more deeply, he recognized the old feeling of surrender to another person, as always with the illusion of permanence, the seeming certainty that this, here, now, was the end of the torturing quest for fulfilment. But knowing that the illusion was an illusion, the surrender destined to be revoked, curiously made the moment sweeter. Bond yielded himself to it utterly. On all that enormous plain of black water it was as if only two human beings existed.

That was an illusion too, and a dangerous one. He heard the mental alarm-bell that warns the experienced campaigner of duty left undone, the unlikely but possible approach-route unguarded, the vital item of equipment checked but not double-checked. It was not even so very unlikely that, somewhere on that watery plain that just now had seemed a guarantee of solitude and safety, a group of enemies, cruel, intelligent and well armed, was looking for him, bent on capture or murder.

The three of them accordingly made what defensive plans appeared most flexible, and the necessary preparations. Then they ate a meal of black olives, fresh bread, delicious plum-shaped tomatoes, sliced raw onion and manouri cheese, followed by peaches and tiny sweet seedless grapes. They drank the light Mamos retsina and rounded off with Votris, which Litsas declared was the only drinkable Greek brandy. Two small glasses of it were enough for Bond. It carried the hint of treacliness which he could never stand in a drink. But he made the necessary polite noises.

At ten o'clock Litsas got up and stretched. 'Good night, you two. I'm going to bed down here for a few hours. I hope I won't be seeing you before the morning. But if I do, remember: keep quiet and keep low.'

The weather was coming from behind them now and the _Altair__ was pitching in a steep, short rhythm. Making love in a small ship with a sea running is not unlike flying through some strange element that at one moment seems thinner than air, at the next thicker than water. For an instant, at the climax, Bond and Ariadne hung weightless, then plunged as if into the still black depths above the ocean floor.

Bond lay on his face with his arm across Ariadne's belly and sleep came quick and heavy. But he was awake in a flash when a hand pressed his shoulder and a young Greek voice whispered: '_Kyrie Tzems. Despinís Ariadne__. Boat.'

Chapter 11

Death by Water

THE DECK was in darkness, apart from the glow aft, where Litsas would be at the wheel. Elsewhere there seemed to be no light at all. Cloud covered the moon and stars. The wind had abated a good deal, to Beaufort 2 or 3. Keeping below the gunwale, Bond crawled aft and round the corner of the deck-housing.

'Dead ahead,' said Litsas quietly. 'Stay close to the mast and have a look.'

Bond raised himself with caution. He narrowed his eyes. A shadowy bulk, showing its starboard green and a light in a pilot-house amidships, lay almost broadside across their bow perhaps six hundred yards distant. It appeared not to have way on. Bond caught a glimpse of a swept-back stub mast above the cabin top, a movement in the pilot-house. Not much else.

'They came at about twenty knots from where Paros is,' Litsas went on. 'Then, when they were on our port bow, they lost way and hove to. Engine trouble, or they're imitating it.'

'Is real engine trouble likely?' Bond still kept his eyes on the other ship.

'It's possible. Some boat-owners forget their maintenance. They're Greeks. Don't try enough. Anyway, if these people are true they'll have trouble if the weather gets worse again. You could hang no more than a sail like a handkerchief from that little penis which is all their mast. I'm at half-ahead now. We'll go in slowly.'

Neither spoke while the distance between the two craft lessened. Bond found that he could make out an intenser patch of darkness to his left that must be Paros. On the starboard bow was an even vaguer shape; he guessed it to be the smaller island of Ios. Ahead, beyond the gradually expanding profile of the other boat, there lay something above and around which an almost indefinable change was taking place, as if an infinitely thin sheet of water were being lowered on to a pool of black ink: Vrakonisi, and the first hint of dawn.

When the gap had narrowed to something under two hundred yards a faint hail came from the cabin-cruiser.

'_Kapetánie!__'

'_Akoúo - ti thélete?__' shouted Litsas, and throttled his motor right back.

The exchange continued. Litsas relayed excerpts and comments to Bond.

'Both their engines are overheating. They say. They say they've nobody on board who can make repairs. A _meltémi__ - a northern gale - was blowing for four days and they're afraid it'll freshen again when the sun comes up. That's reasonable. If they're true they must call for assistance. Left alone they could pile up on a reef in a couple of hours. They want us to give them a tow into Vrakonisi. Somebody else might come by, of course. But nobody might. Probably nobody will. What do we do, James?'

Bond considered. 'This is one line that we more or less predicted. I don't suppose for a moment that this lot is anything but a boat-load of the opposition. But we're not entitled to ignore the faint chance that they're what they say they are and in serious difficulty. Whatever we're up to we're still sailors. Tell them we'll take them in tow.'

'I agree.' Litsas shouted acceptance, then lowered his voice. 'Right, James, here are your parcels. I hope to God we've fastened them well.'

Within twenty seconds Bond had tied the string of small plastic-wrapped packages round his waist and donned the only two useful items of equipment that chance had stowed in the _Altair__'s odds-and-ends locker: a pair of flippers and a hunting-knife for underwater fishing. In similar adventures in the past Bond had had a luxurious armoury of devices to choose from. This time, he realized without dismay, it had been and was going to go on being a matter of improvisation, guts and what physical skills he could command.

He was ready. Litsas turned from the wheel and spoke low and urgently.

'The only thing we at this end must fear is ramming. With their speed and ours I couldn't avoid that. Now over the side with you. Good luck, James.'

They gripped hands for a second. Bond threw a leg over the rail and slipped silently down into the invisible water. It struck chill, but he knew that in this sea at this time of the year it would be no worse than cool once he started to move. For the next few minutes he would be confronted with nothing more severe than a simple test of his sense of position and timing - the need to ensure that the bulk of the _Altair__ lay continuously between him and the presumed opposition. He found time to smile at the thought of the presumption turning out to be comically mistaken, elaborate and highly lethal preparations being made against a party of Dutch businessmen or Swedish teachers on vacation. Then the _Altair__'s engine revved up, her bow began to come round to starboard, and Bond was breast-stroking gently to keep his position.

To take and secure a line from a craft without steerage-way in anything but a flat calm is not straightforward. To do it single-handed is hazardous, but all three had agreed that Yanni was not to be involved in what was not his quarrel and must stay below in the fo'c'sle as long as danger threatened. And Ariadne could not leave her post.

Every minute counted - or might count. While the two vessels approached closer and shouted directions were being swapped, Bond pushed off from the _Altair__'s hull and began to swim on a slowly turning path that would keep him well away from the strongest light now burning, a fairly hefty installation mounted at the point where the cruiser's stub-mast joined the deck-housing. Even so there was no guarantee of not being spotted, but Bond intended as far as possible to make the trip below the surface, and a really safe circuit would have taken too long.

It was not a particularly tough swim. His burden served as a makeshift diving-weight and the flippers added bite to every stroke. Even a yard or so down most of the turbulence subsided. The deeper swell, a long swaying motion, remained, but this was no hindrance, nothing more than the familiar feel of the element. He surfaced a dozen or more times to breathe and check his position. At last he was within twenty feet of the cruiser and dead astern of it. He made his way cautiously forward into the shadow cast by its hull, found and noted a fender hanging overside amidships, then moved for'ard again until he could watch and listen.

Litsas was securing the tow-rope. Four men incongruously dressed in city suits were at the cruiser's bow. A conversation was in progress. Bond waited for the expected next step. It soon came. The four reached some agreement with Litsas, took up positions at the tow-rope and began clumsily hauling at it. In a minute or two they would have brought themselves up to the _Altair__ and be in a position to jump on to the counter. It was time for Bond to get going.

He stripped off the flippers and let them sink, moved back amidships, grasped the rope of the fender, heaved himself up, grabbed the rail and rolled inboard without making a sound. Crouching in the shadow of the deck-house he unfastened the packages at his waist but left them in position. He drew the knife from its scabbard below his knee and glanced for'ard. One of the cruiser's men had reached the _Altair__; the next, in obvious apprehension, was studying the fluctuating gap between the two boats while his two companions struggled with the tow-rope. No immediate hurry, then. After a swift prowl on hands and knees Bond had satisfied himself that the party numbered five: four men for'ard, one, in the faded shirt and slacks of a sailor, leaning on the instrument-panel in the pilot-house, closely watching the movements of his companions. On the assumption that this was an opposition force, there would be nobody below at such a time.

Bond moved to a point just aft of the open door of the pilothouse. There was one more detail which with luck could be settled now. He edged forward for a risky look. Yes. In the flooring by the pilot's seat was a brassedged trapdoor with a countersunk ring at its centre. Bond settled back and waited, a mere couple of strides from the fifth man's back, knife in hand. Three of the party were now on the after-deck of the _Altair__; the remaining one was evidently to stay where he was. An altercation broke out. Litsas was spreading his hands, protesting, the picture of outraged innocence. Bond caught a mention of his own name, then Ariadne's, then the word _astinomía__ - police.

This was no shaker; quite the contrary. It was as if the group were interpreting, without much imagination, a rough shooting-script drawn up for them by Bond and the others the previous evening. Real police would have approached openly, with all the paraphernalia of searchlight, loud-hailer, uniforms and levelled guns. The thing was virtually certain now - but that was not certain enough. The other side must somehow be provoked into declaring itself unmistakably.

Litsas continued to protest, gesturing back the way they had come, no doubt explaining, as planned, that he had put the Englishman ashore at Sounion. One man stepped forward and tapped Litsas's trouser pockets, then gave an order. The other two filed forward and turned in at the saloon door. The search had no need to be prolonged. Within a minute the two reappeared. The leading one gave the slow upward nod that means 'no' in these parts. Another order, and the pair went further for'ard and out of Bond's sight.

Complete silence, except for the faint creakings in the cruiser's superstructure. Then a man's laugh, shockingly out of key with the atmosphere of strain. Then the lunatic metallic chattering of the Thompson, sounding flat and echoless across the water. A loud moan. Bond had a glimpse of Litsas grabbing for the place on the roof of the deck-house where the Beretta lay hidden under a folded tarpaulin. The man near Bond moved at the same moment, flung himself into the pilot's seat and pressed a stud on the panel. Two powerful engines came instantly to life below decks.

Now Bond acted. He leapt forward, flung his left arm round the man's face, covering the mouth. The knife thudded into the chest once, twice, three times, the torso jerking at each blow while the hands fought unavailingly for a grip. Bond heard a thin wailing that would be inaudible a couple of yards off. Poor bastard, he thought - they told you it might just involve a bit of tricky sailing with a couple of thousand drachmas at the end of it. A fourth thump of the knife. Then trunk and limbs relaxed, warm blood flooded out on to Bond's left sleeve, he stepped aside and helped the body out of the seat.

There were yells and shots from the _Altair__, but Bond had no time to spare for them. He darted one glance for'ard. The enemy there was crouched behind the gunwale, pistol in hand, evidently trying for a shot at Litsas. Bond dropped to his knees, shoved out of the way the legs of the man he had stabbed, got his finger through the brass ring of the trapdoor and heaved it aside. The roar of well-tuned machinery and an engine-room smell came up at him. He moved to the deck immediately outside the doorway and there, swiftly and methodically, drew from the pouches at his waist the four Mills grenades. Each was surrounded by a half-inch-thick protective coating of heavy-duty grease from the _Altair__'s stores. Again he made no delay, but with quick deft movements grasped one grenade after another in his right hand, drew out the safety-pin with his left index finger, and had tossed all four down the hatchway before the seven-second fuse of the first had had time to release the firing-pin.

Then it came, a monstrous pounding, shivering bang underfoot that made the deckboards leap as if struck with a massive hammer, the buzz of flying metal, a wash of flame above the hatchway. Immediately afterwards a revolver bullet fizzed through the air four or five feet above Bond's head: a poor shot, but the next might be closer. Knowing better than to poise himself for a dive, he vaulted the rail and fell anyhow into the sea. Just as his ears went under he thought he heard a second explosion. Then he arched his back and kicked out and swam at top speed a couple of feet below the surface for a hundred counted seconds. Finally he turned and let his head come up.

One glance told him that anybody who might be still alive in the cruiser would not be standing at the rail in the hope of getting a shot at a swimmer. Nor was there now any question of the vessel ever ramming anything. Amidships she was burning heavily, with the rich fat glow of oil. The breeze was whipping the blaze for'ard and Bond caught the glow of flames sweeping the deck-house. He could hear the roar of fuel-fired combustion. Something aft went up with a kind of puffing bellow and a bunch of flame, intensely orange in colour, jerked and eddied outwards. Not for the first time in his career, Bond felt a surge of sickening remorse at the gross, outrageous destruction he had caused, the stabbing of the man in the pilot's seat and the unknown, but probably dreadful, fate of the other. He tried to push the thought out of his mind. It was necessary, he told himself. It was duty.

The sky beyond Vrakonisi had become a couple of degrees more transparent. No colour could yet be pointed to, but the dawn was gathering. Three short blasts - the success signal - came from the _Altair__'s horn as she made slowly away from the burning wreck. Bond leant forward in the water and swam with leisured strokes towards her.

* * *

'I think two of them went off,' said Litsas, 'but it was hard to tell. The fuel was exploding too. Anyway, it was enough.'

From his place at the wheel he nodded towards what was left of the cruiser. It was a mile astern now, burning less fiercely, partly obscured by the ragged smoke-cloud that was being blown almost directly towards them. If not earlier, she would begin to settle when the fire reached her waterline and the first waves came inboard.

As soon as Bond was safely picked up it had been a matter of first things first. The _Altair__ had to get out of the area before boats from Paros or Vrakonisi could reach the scene. Bond had taken the wheel while Litsas and Yanni hoisted the mainsail, foresail and jib. Now, before a stiff following breeze, the little caique was making close to ten knots. They had decided to run south and circumnavigate Ios before coming up to Vrakonisi - another couple of hours' sailing time, but worth it to provide the makeshift alibi that would protect them against involvement in official, and unofficial, inquiries. It was not until now that they had had the leisure to compare notes.

Bond told his story squatting on the after-deck, sipping the glass of Votris and drawing deeply at the Xanthi that Ariadne had handed him. The cigarette tasted wonderful and at this moment he did not mind the sweetish tang of the brandy. He ended by asking, 'Did anybody see what happened to the man who stayed on the cruiser's foredeck?'

'I certainly didn't,' said Litsas. 'He made one shot at me, a bad one, I made a much better one and he ducked down. Then the explosions started and I never saw the chap again. Their dinghy was lashed down for'ard and he didn't go to it.'

'He's had it anyway.' Bond forced callousness into his voice. 'Fire or sea. But tell it from the beginning.'

'Oh, they asked very many questions and I was the stupid peasant - perhaps you saw some of that. Then one bloke stayed with me and the other two went for'ard to look at my daughter sleeping on the cabin-top and to make sure the dangerous criminal James Bond wasn't hiding in the fo'c'sle. Then... but I must let Ariadne tell the next part.'

'Like Niko says, it was all luck really.' Ariadne, sitting beside Bond with her knees drawn up and her shoulder touching his, was at her most direct and matter-of-fact. 'I recognized one of the men. His voice was familiar right away and just then the ship turned or something and I saw it was a guy called Theodorou, who was in the same Party branch I was for a while before they expelled him for being a criminal and a leftist - you know, attacking the USSR for leading the world to peace at the time of Cuba. Well, the Greek police are very corrupt and Fascist and everything, but even they wouldn't sign up a skunk like Theodorou. When he saw I recognized him, he made a horrible laugh and said I must come to his boat for questioning and... something more besides. Greek police don't behave that way either.

'So then,' Ariadne went on, taking another cigarette and lighting it from Bond's without ceasing to talk, so that her words came in jerks - 'so then... I said... that would be just fine with me... and he must wait a minute while I... found my sweater. But what I found was the Thompson under the blanket and I shot him with it.

'It was just like you said, Niko: vibration and a pull to the right, but mostly I hit him and he yelled and went down. But the other man got down too and that worried me, because I hadn't had time to shoot him and he obviously had a gun, and I was kneeling on the cabin-top while he could move around on the deck without me seeing him and might pop up anywhere and shoot me before I could turn. - Darling, could I have some of that, please?'

She took Bond's glass with both hands. They were shaking. He put his arm round her shoulders as she drank.

'That was where young Yanni turned up,' Litsas put in. 'He said he didn't want to be sent to bed like a child before the trouble had even started. He wanted to help. So he went to his bunk and got out his knife and stood on the little ladder that comes up from the fo'c'sle. When the first bad man was knocked over, the second bad man was getting ready to shoot at Despinís Ariadne. But unluckily for him his back was to Yanni. The distance isn't more than about a yard and Yanni can walk like a cat. He came up from the fo'c'sle and shoved four inches of the best Sheffield steel under our friend's left shoulder. He gave no trouble after that.

'I asked Yanni if he wanted some brandy and he said no, thank you, he thought he mustn't start drinking at his age. After knifing a man with a gun!' Litsas laughed heartily. 'He's back on the job now, washing down the deck. It did get rather messy.'

Bond shuddered. He had had to get used to the idea of involving innocent outsiders in the kind of savage, unpredictable violence he traded in, but to have brought about the initiation of an adolescent into the ways of killing was something new to him. He hoped desperately that the relative unsophistication of Greek youth would protect Yanni from the progressive intoxication with lethal weapons that, in an urban British lad of this age, could so easily result from such an episode. The alternative was not to be thought of. He asked with assumed eagerness, 'What happened at your end, Niko?'

'Oh, that was nothing at all. My chap had had the common sense to get his revolver out, but when the Thompson started up the poor devil couldn't help moving his eyes off me for a second. I kicked his gun half out of his hand and then shot him in the face. Child's play.'

There was a call from Yanni amidships. They turned and followed his pointing finger. But there was nothing to see. Steel-coloured water, lightly touched with the lilac of the opening dawn, stretched unbroken over the place where the cruiser had been.

Chapter 12

General Incompetence

IT WAS a beautiful morning. Out at sea the rising _meltémi__ was blowing the tops off the waves, but off the southern shore of Vrakonisi it did no more than impart a pleasing sense of motion to the slightly flawed surface of the water, as if a giant mirror of liquid blue stone were perpetually moving south and perpetually renewing itself from the edge of the land. And on the land, in the house on the islet, all that could be felt was a mild breeze, gusting a little at times and fluttering the natural-coloured linen curtains, raising the corners of the papers on the long pale Swedish desk by the window, but cool and delicious.

Sitting at the desk with a glass of tea before him, Colonel-General Igor Arenski felt comfortably relaxed. This was his first undercover assignment outside the Soviet Union, though as a high official of the KGB (Committee of State Security) he had naturally made frequent trips to foreign countries in the guise of trade delegate, manager of cultural mission and the like, and had worked for over five years as a counsellor at the Russian Embassy in Washington.

Arenski folded his hands behind his bald head and gazed out over the placid stretch of the Aegean. Supervising the security arrangements for this conference had been a simple matter to a man of his experience. All the real work had been done weeks before in his Moscow office. Coming all this way merely to witness the operation of the foolproof machinery he had devised was, between himself and his professional conscience, quite unnecessary. Half a dozen of his subordinates - that charming dark-eyed lad Gevrek from Soviet Armenia, for instance - could have done this part of the job equally well. That was the sort of thing these _yobannye__ politicians never understood. They thought in terms of rank, of roubles, of protocol, of producing senior Security officers when senior diplomats were being taken under protection. As if these Arabs and Levantines would know the difference between a distinguished higher member of the _apparat__ and a provincial area-controller!

Still, he must not complain. It was a good thing to have got away from Moscow for a time; even a short trip like this helped one to maintain an international outlook. And, although not up to the climate and standard of comfort to be enjoyed at his villa outside Sevastopol, this was an agreeable enough location. The inhabitants were a barbaric lot in general, uncouth and suspicious, but his contact with them for intelligence purposes had had to be no more than minimal, and it was true that his contact with one inhabitant - a fisherboy or something of the kind from the port - was turning out to be unexpectedly interesting. Life was treating Igor Alexeivitch well.

Though he would have denied it strenuously, Arenski was himself a politician of the most durable sort. Under Beria in the MGB, the old Security Ministry, he had conducted himself with a sort of inspired circumspection, making neither friends nor enemies and yet avoiding the dangerous status of the individualist. His sexual tastes had paradoxically stood in his favour - the consensus in the corridors of the Kremlin had been that someone as obviously vulnerable as that was no danger in any quarter. When Beria fell, when the fat baron and all his vassals went down in the bloody aftermath of Stalin's death, Arenski had moved a major rung up the ladder. He was nobody's man, anybody's man, safe, silent and slow, the perfect politicians' choice, and therefore unqualified to rise to the occasion in any real emergency.

At last, bored with the play of sunlight on the most beautiful water to be found off any European coast, Arenski sighed and glanced at the file that lay open in front of him. It was necessary to go through the motions of work in order to preserve good habits. His small blue eyes moved idly over the topmost sheet, although he knew its contents by heart. The closing lines ran: DAY 4 _Time__

_Event__

_Remarks__

1200

Degree of readiness yellow

Cordon round house

1600

Arrival of Ministerial group

Sea patrol begins

1700

Degree of readiness red

1800

Arrival of delegates

Identity checks

-1930

2000

Speech of welcome, toasts

Check on cordon

2030

Conference in session

Land staff fed in shifts

2330

Dinner

DAY 5 0030 Conference in session

0300 Refreshments, rest period

Check on cordon

0400 Conference in session

0530 Speech of thanks, departure

-0600 of delegates

0630 Degree of readiness yellow

Sea patrol returns

1200

Departure of Ministerial group, degree of readiness blue

Cordon withdrawn, close down radio links

1700

Departure of staff

Arenski himself would not be departing with his staff. He had ten days' leave coming to him and proposed to spend as many of them here as he felt like. At the moment he felt like spending them all here. There was something about that boy's way of laughing...

A knock at the door brought him out of his reverie. '_Da?__' he called irritably.

One of the two men who had first occupied the house entered and spoke in an appalling Ukrainian accent.

- Good morning, Comrade General.

- Good morning, Mily. Please sit down.

The general had quickly mastered his irritation and spoke amiably. It was a rule of his never to antagonize anybody, not even a worthless peasant like Mily who ought to be doling out bowls of soup at a labour camp.

The man perched himself awkwardly on a bad copy of a Venetian stool by the empty marble fireplace. - Only one thing to report, sir. There was a fire at sea about five o'clock this morning, I was informed by a man at the harbour. Two boats went out to investigate. They made a search of the area but the ship had sunk without trace. They picked up one survivor, rather badly burnt. There's a hospital of sorts in the town above the port and he was taken to it. He had some story about a fire in the engine-room.

- A sad story, Mily. But I don't see that it concerns us, do you? Some fool of a Greek throws a cigarette-end into a tin of petrol and blows his ship up. It would be surprising if something like that didn't happen every week in a country as backward as this. You really mustn't go about flapping your ears at every piece of local gossip. A good Leninist like you should be able to distinguish at once between the essential and the inessential.

Mily flushed and said humbly, - I'm sorry, Comrade General, I didn't think.

- It's of no consequence, my dear Mily. Anything else?

- Boris kept listening watch on the Athens frequency at the usual time, sir. No transmission.

- Very good. See what that is, will you?

There was movement on the terrace outside and an excited murmur. A man's voice shouted in Greek. Mily went to the door, opened it, letting a bar of intense sunlight and a surge of heat into the shadowed room, and went out of sight for a moment. When he reappeared he seemed agitated.

- A rowing-boat is approaching, sir. A girl and a boy of about sixteen. They're making for the anchorage.

This sort of situation had arisen a dozen times since Arenski's arrival on the islet - tourists coming to ask if and when the house would be available for rental, tradesmen from the island touting for custom - and had been easily dealt with, as he had known it would be, by one of the Greek members of the team following laid-down procedure. Normally the general would have allowed this procedure to run its course without rising from his chair, but this time he decided to oversee the matter in person. He got up, pulled his green-and-turquoise check shirt into position and sauntered outside.

The sun beat down at him and its reflection on the water was dazzling. He shaded his eyes. A hundred yards away a white-painted dinghy was being rowed straight towards him. The senior Greek employee, binoculars in hand, asked him for instructions, but Arenski went on studying for a moment the play of strong bare brown shoulders at the oars. Finally he said in English, regrettably the only language common to himself and the man at his side, 'Have you asked them what they want?'

'Oh yes, General. But they are not answering me.'

'Try them again. Ask them who they are, tell them that this is a private house and so on.'

The Greek did as he was told. This time there was a response, from the girl. It was gibberish to Arenski except for one name, a name he recognized and reacted sharply to.

'General, she is saying she is a friend of Comrade Gordienko and she is wishing to speak with the gentleman of the house, please.'

Arenski fingered his pendulous lower lip. What was happening was inexcusably irregular, but he recognized with some weariness that he could not afford to send this person away. And there was another consideration. He said with fair cheerfulness, 'Tell them we don't know any Mr Gordienko, but the girl and her... her escort are very welcome to come ashore for a chat.'

Two minutes later the general, hands on hips, was on the mole surveying the two arrivals. The girl, a Greek or Bulgar, was cheaply pretty, over-developed about the bust. The boy, he assured himself out of the corner of his eye, was satisfactory, muscular, and tanned. Arenski waited: always let the other speak first.

The girl faced him. 'Do you speak English?'

'Yes.'

'My name is Ariadne Alexandrou. I am an employee of Mr Gordienko in Athens. I have an urgent message for the man in charge here.'

'I'm the tenant of this house, if that's what you mean. But excuse me one moment.'

Leaving the pair in the sun, Arenski strode briskly on his short legs back into the room he had just left. He took out a spring-back file bound in the yellow of Personnel and containing photostats of identity documents and dossiers. Alexandrou. Here it was. The hair in the photograph was longer but the rest was the same. He shut the file and returned to the doorway.

'Come over here, will you? Both of you.' When they had reached him he went on pleasantly, 'Your credentials are in order, Miss Alexandrou. You may come inside.' Then, his little eyes running over the boy's body, he added, 'And please ask your young friend if he would care for a glass of something cold in the kitchen.'

The boy looked back at Arenski while the girl put the question. His look said, as plainly as any words, that he knew what was in the general's mind and found it total filth. With a word to the girl he turned his back and strolled away.

Arenski swallowed and drew himself up. By a tremendous effort he managed to smile at the girl, introduce himself, and say, 'Let's sit down in the cool, shall we?'

The contentment he had felt half an hour earlier had totally departed. All things considered, he was probably the least suitable man in the whole of Soviet Security to react appropriately to Ariadne's story. Nevertheless he heard her out to the end without once interrupting.

When she had finished he sat silent and motionless for a time in his revolving chair, hands behind head. Then he turned round to his desk and reopened the Personnel file. Finally he said, looking out of the window, 'You were recruited by the Chief Intelligence Directorate, the GRU.'

'That's correct.'

'Why was that? What's a girl of your sort doing as an agent of the Red Army? Surely it would have been more natural for you to come directly under the orders of the KGB.

'Maybe it would, sir. It was just that... well, the man who originally signed me up to work for Russia was the Number Two of the GRU in Athens.'

'Yes.' Arenski still stared out of the window. 'He was your lover, this man?'

'Please, General, is this important?'

'He was your lover, this man?' It might have been a tape-recording of the previous query.

'Yes. He was.'

'And it was he who... converted you, I think would be the right word here - converted you to Marxist Socialism?'

'Yes.'

'Have you done much counterespionage work?'

'Not a great deal. Chiefly on jobs that called for a girl like me.'

'A seductive temptress,' sneered Arenski. 'Really, some of us behave as if we're still in the pre-Revolutionary era. Now, your father' - he glanced at the file - 'your father is an official of Pallas Airlines. A comfortable bourgeois.'

When this drew no reply, the general swivelled his chair round again and studied her impersonally. Eventually he drew in his breath and said in what he meant to be a kindly tone, 'You know, Miss Alexandrou, you're not the sort of person one expects to find working for peace in a primitive country like this one. What can be your experience of the class struggle? Where are your roots in the workers' movement? You know what you are? You're a romantic. Drawn to Communism by sentimental pity for the oppressed and to Intelligence work by false notions of glamour. And this means- '

The girl cut in sharply. 'General Arenski, I came here to discuss something much more important than why I became a Communist. There's a terrible threat against your country and against what we both believe in. I'm awaiting your instructions.'

Arenski wrinkled his nose and sniffed. 'Romantics like you are peculiarly apt to lose their sense of proportion. Let us look calmly at what you've told me. This episode in which Major Gordienko and two of his assistants are killed. Were any of the assailants identified?'

'I forgot to tell you that. Mr Bond recognized the man he shot as one of the group who kidnapped his chief in England.'

'Just so. I must say that kidnapping appeals to me. It has such an air of fantasy about it. But of course we know that fantastic things do happen. It's a pity that we have no way of obtaining confirmation of this one. And then the episode of the fight in the boats. You yourself recognized the man called Theodorou. A traitor to the working class, clearly. A criminal, you said. There you are likely to be right. That episode carries conviction of a sort. It would be interesting to interview the man who survived it.'

'There was a survivor?' asked the girl, sitting up sharply.

'Oh yes. He's in the hospital here. I will institute inquiries.' Arenski's tone carried no sense of purpose. One of the minor irritations of this intrusion was the way it had compelled him to change his mind about the significance of the fire at sea. He forced himself to continue his analysis.

'There are other elements of fantasy in your story. Consider this idea - put forward by Bond, naturally - that the Chinese People's Government is conspiring against us. Now I know it's fashionable to take the view that China has replaced the capitalist West as the chief threat to world peace. And it's true that our leaders have been properly severe on the ideological mistakes of the Chinese. But it would be disastrously unMarxist to jump to the conclusion that their pride, their ambition and their envy of the USSR could ever drive them to the attempted use of violence against our conference tomorrow night. That would be gangsterism; gangsterism of the same kind as you have twice been involved in, though of an infinitely greater degree. And gangsterism is the typical resort of Western warmongers.

'My dear young lady,' - Arenski tried another smile - 'the key to this whole affair is the character of the man Bond. I know him well by repute. He has conducted terrorist activities in Turkey, France, and the Caribbean. Quite recently he committed two assassinations in Japan for motives of pure personal revenge. He is a dangerous international criminal. He has very cleverly involved you in his schemes with tales of kidnapping and wicked Chinamen - the very thing to appeal to your romantic nature. Who his opponents really are is scarcely worth conjecturing about. Some rival gangster group, probably American. Our concern lies elsewhere.'

'May I ask a question, Comrade General?' For the first time, the girl spoke with proper respect.

'Certainly, Comrade.'

'How does this theory square with the murder of Mr Gordienko and his two assistants, and with Mr Gordienko thinking for sure that there is a traitor in our organization in Athens?'

'That is two questions, but we will examine them. Gordienko and his men were killed because the rival gang wanted Bond and they were in the way. Very regrettable, but not mysterious. Gordienko's notion of a traitor... well...' The general turned over a small, well-manicured hand. 'I respected old Piotr in a way, but he was never the most efficient of men. And he's been out here too long. By your own account a breach of security had clearly taken place. There'd been a leak. Gordienko had slipped up, but he didn't know just how or where. What more natural than to create an unknown traitor who takes the blame for all your mistakes?'

'I quite understand that, sir. You make it very clear. But I would like you to explain why, if there is no traitor, my message to you via the Embassy in Athens has never arrived.'

Arenski sighed. 'You said you don't know who you spoke to there. Some junior clerk, no doubt, probably a Greek, who was too stupid to understand your no doubt guarded phrases, went out to lunch and forgot the whole thing. And your zeal was commendable, but before very long I shall be reading all about the affair in the newspapers when they're fetched from the port. It'll be interesting to see how they treat it.

'There, then, is your explanation. There are half a dozen other such explanations. Whereas your explanation, of course, involves the mysterious traitor.'

'Well... yes, sir.'

'Kidnapping, Chinese terrorists, traitors: is there no end to it?' Arenski turned businesslike; he had spent too long being reasonable. 'Now, I will outline our course of action. I want Bond here. He clearly has designs of some sort against our conference. Aided by this Greek ruffian and an unwashed small boy he has little chance of achieving anything spectacular. There are weapons here that would drive off a small warship. I think I can say that I've neglected nothing.' The general gave a narrow smile. 'But Bond may be a nuisance. He must be kept out of harm's way until our delegates have departed.'

'Anything I can do, Comrade General...'

'Yes, Comrade Alexandrou, there is a great deal. I take it you have been sleeping with our Mr Bond?' Arenski managed to keep out of his voice very nearly all the distaste he felt at the idea.

'Yes, sir. He won't let me alone.'

'Is he infatuated with you?'

'Oh yes. I've very much influence over him.'

'Better and better.' Arenski almost beamed. 'Persuade him to come here for an interview. Say I am gravely concerned about what has happened and need his help. Give him my word that he'll be able to depart unmolested at any time he may wish. You'll know what arguments to use. Is that clear?'

'Perfectly clear, Comrade General,' said the girl, getting up. 'I'll bring him here as soon as I can, but you must give me a little time.'

'By all means.' The general also rose. 'Tell me, how did you persuade him to let you come here this morning?'

'By the same sort of methods as I shall use to persuade him to come himself.'

'Just so, just so,' said Arenski hurriedly, then, remembering his manners, added, 'A glass of something before you go, my dear?'

'No thank you, sir. The sooner I return the better.'

'We shall make a Marxist of you yet. Let me say how much I appreciate your services.'

The girl smiled gratefully and said with obvious conviction, 'And let me say, Comrade General, how grateful I am to you for interpreting the situation scientifically to me and for being merciful with me about my bad attitude to this spy's deceptions. I hope I have learnt from the experience.'

Arenski bowed. He had thought her a typical Balkan whore, foolish, sentimental and pleasure-loving with a streak of gangsterism, but she had determination and her readiness to correct her mistakes was promising. He would mention her favourably in his report. 'Au revoir, Comrade Alexandrou, I look forward to seeing you very soon.'

Left alone, he paced the floor for a time, frowning. It crossed his mind that the notion of a Chinese attempt to sabotage the conference was not entirely fanciful. According to report, Mao Tse-tung had been in some odd moods recently, as his retirement approached. And the behaviour of the Red Guards, the new hostility to foreigners.... Then the general's brow cleared. Fantasy must be catching. Overt violence on the scale required was unthinkable in peacetime, even granted the uttermost in neo-Stalinist irresponsibility among the Chinese leaders. Nevertheless, one or two points must be cleared up at once.

He went to the desk and rang a small brass hand-bell. Mily came in.

- Go to the wireless room and tell the operator to contact Athens immediately. I'll come along and speak in a couple of minutes.

- And break wireless silence, sir?

Arenski clenched his small fists. This ploughboy gaping would drive him mad. He answered in a tone of caricatured patience - Yes, Mily, and break wireless silence. Exactly that. Now go and do as I say. And get one of the Greeks, the fat one, to go up to the hospital in the town and inquire about a - no, tell him to come and see me.

The fat Greek arrived, was briefed and sent on his way with Arenski's usual politeness. (Once outside the door, the man made the traditional five-finger gesture, meaning roughly, 'May all your senses leave you.') Then the general went up to the tiny oven-hot cubicle on the top floor that housed the wireless station with its R/T links to Athens and to Plovdiv in Bulgaria, which would act if required as a relay to Moscow. The latter circuit was not to be used except in conditions of threat-to-peace emergency. The room reeked of sweat and cheap Russian cigarettes. An unmade bed filled most of the space not occupied by the grey-enamelled set. Arenski pulled out a scented silk handkerchief and inhaled.

The operator, a bull-necked Muscovite with a heavy shaving-rash, handed up the microphone and Arenski got down to it.

It was frustrating, it was unbelievably prolonged and the howl of static surrounding and blurring the incoming voice set his teeth on edge, but at the end of twenty agonizing minutes he had the situation clear. He thanked the operator and left the room, sweating freely.

Descending the broad whitewashed stone stairs to the terrace, where he would sit out of the sun and enjoy his midmorning glass of fresh lemonade, Arenski almost smiled at the predictability of the answers to his questions. Why had the shootings - 'the forcible retirements of the sales manager and two representatives' - not been reported? Because on attempting to make this report the transmitter had been found to be defective. And repairing it had taken a long time. It had only been functional for the last two hours or so. Why had not the report been made then, at once? Because it had been thought better to wait until the allocated transmission period at 1200 hours. Why had the arrival of Bond - 'a dangerous English competitor' - not been reported? Because by the time the plans to detain him in Athens had broken down the transmitter had become defective. Apologies were offered, plus an assurance that the assistant sales-manager was now in complete control of the situation.

Arenski relaxed in his basket chair and sipped his lemonade. On further reflection he actually did smile. How like poor old Piotr Gregorievitch to have imagined he could deal with Bond by himself. How like him to have failed to institute an efficient maintenance-and-repair system at his wireless station. And how totally, hopelessly like him to have got himself killed in a quarrel between two bands of Western thugs. It was painful to think ill of an old comrade, but it was as well that Piotr had gone before doing any real damage.

Bond... Arenski was looking forward to the encounter. And not only that. It would be satisfying as well as advantageous to him to be able to tell the minister, 'I have a prisoner who may interest you. A Western gangster called Bond. No, oddly enough I found him quite easy to capture.' Then, when the conference was over, Bond would snatch a gun and the general would have to shoot him in self-defence. Perfect.

After a moment Arenski muttered to himself in English, 'The man who killed James Bond,' and chuckled wetly.

Chapter 13

The Small Window

'HERE THEY come.'

Litsas lowered the Negretti & Zambra binoculars and put them down on the cabin-top. Through the sun-dazzle Bond saw the smudge that was the dinghy, seemingly stationary at this distance, just off the joint of the island beyond which the islet lay. The _Altair__ had dropped anchor in a tiny cove whose granite sides dropped steeply into the water. Here they were secure enough from observation, but the north coast of Vrakonisi is never really comfortable in anything but a flat calm, and the caique, moored to a pinnacle on an odd tongue of rock and anchored on its narrow underwater continuation, was swinging and lurching unhealthily.

'Go on, Niko,' said Bond from his canvas chair on the tiny foredeck. 'By the way, where is Kapoudzona?'

'Macedonia. Mountain village. They're quite tough people there. I don't like them much, they have too many Bulgars and Turks, but they're tough. Well, just after the village the staff car comes to a road-block, some chaps rise up behind the rocks and blaze away, and all the German colonels are killed.

'Von Richter is commanding the support company of an SS infantry battalion who are training close by. There's a new German order saying that attacks of the guerrillas must be punished in a quick and - and severe way. That's enough for him.

'In two hours he's put a cordon round the village and he's lined up everybody in the square. He makes the women and the children under fourteen go into the village school. It's big and it's made of wood. Von Richter makes his men lock the doors, throw petrol down the walls and set fire to them. Some of the mothers try to push their kids out of the windows, but for them he has tommy-gunners. Then he shoots the other people. Two hundred and eight killed altogether. Two old men somehow survive to tell the story.'

After a short pause, Litsas went on: 'I'll always remember one thing. Von Richter was standing at the school door while the women and kids were going in. When he saw a child who looked nice he patted its head or pinched its cheeks like an uncle, and spoke kindly to the mother. Oh, all the Germans love the family values.'

The last words were spoken in a thick, choked voice. Litsas had turned his back. Bond went up and put his arm round the heavy shoulders, saying nothing.

'Promise me you'll let me have him, James. I must kill him myself. You understand that.'

'Yes, Niko, I promise.'

Bond moved away and looked towards the approaching dinghy. It was near enough now for him to be able to see Ariadne's blue shirt and her fair hair shining in the sun. He waved to her and got an answering wave. Thank God she was near. He realized he wanted to see her - not make love to her, just look into her face and touch her hand - with more longing than he could remember feeling towards any other woman.

A movement on the hillside above the dinghy caught his eye. Somebody, a man, was making a painful diagonal descent through the piles of rock and clumped bushes, moving across the steep shoulder of the cove. His movements were peculiar, as if he were handicapped in some way. Bond, idly curious, picked up the binoculars, but by the time he brought them to bear the figure had gone out of view.

* * *

The roughly-flagged terrace where Colonel Sun was sitting, like his whole establishment on the island, was on a more modest scale than that of his Russian opposite number on the islet. It was also far more secluded, facing inland at the back of the house. A lot of persistence would have been needed to make an inquisitive stranger climb either of the precipitous spurs that cut the colonel's headquarters off from the neighbouring coves, and a good deal of physical toughness to approach directly by scrambling down the barren hillside, overgrown with thorn bushes, littered with great chunks of granite and marble, most of them shapeless, a few of weird geometrical regularity, like building blocks for some colossal unconstructed temple.

The man who had made this uncomfortable journey, and who now sat facing the colonel on the terrace, was physically tough all right. He would have had to be, after sustaining fairly extensive second-degree burns on board the cabin-cruiser, spending an hour in the water and walking five miles in the sun in order to gain the ridge above the house. His left arm was bandaged and in a sling and he had fallen badly twice during his descent as a result of this handicap. Because, as well as being exhausted, he was still suffering from shock, he told his tale ramblingly and with repetitions.

Sun was tolerant about this. Hands on knees, he sat on an olive-wood stool in an upright posture that would have put a crick in any Western back in five minutes, and gazed almost benignly at the unimpressive-looking small-time crook from the Piraeus waterfront who had endured all this for two hundred American dollars. Between them Doni Madan lounged on foam-rubber cushions wearing a black-and-green check bikini, an incongruous get-up for an interpreter. Now and then she sucked noisily at the straws of a tall pale drink.

'Tell Mr Aris I think I have it all clear now,' Sun said to her, 'thank him for his services, and offer him another drink or whatever refreshment he may desire. Then I have some questions. First: how was he able to find me?'

While this was being translated, Sun kept his pewter-coloured eyes fixed on Aris's sallow, pitted face, then watched the mouth show its plentiful gold fillings as it answered. This man had behaved well, no better than any politically-conscious Chinese would, but surprisingly well for a Westerner and a non-Britisher.

Doni had leaned forward to pour more brandy into the glass that was being shakily held out to her. Now she heaved her body back on to the cushions, adjusting a shoulder-strap and revealing light wisps of uncut fine hair in the armpit. She enunciated carefully in her dry voice, 'He said he thinks it's necessary to warn you, and he had received half only of his money before.'

'That's why he made his way here, not how he knew where to come. Again.'

The colonel, sitting just as before, waited with his invariable and unnerving patience.

'He said they all were showed a map, in case that a man was killed.'

'Remarkable forethought and pessimism. Fully justified, as it's turned out. Well, I think I have enough for the moment.'

Aris gulped brandy and said something on his own account. He appeared uneasy. Perhaps he was discomforted by the bland politeness with which his story of abject and spectacular failure had been received. Fear, much more than conscientiousness or the thought of his money, was what had made him walk out of that hospital when his whole being had whimpered for rest. There were tales going round Piraeus.... But he did not dare mention such matters. He talked on, gesturing painfully.

After listening in grave silence to Doni's rendering, Sun turned thoughtful. 'How these people worship words. They have no concept of the relation of words to action. If I had to take a serious view of this fellow's actions, he could not be saved by words in any language. How can he not know such a simple thing? He is divorced from reality.'

Doni waited for this part to be over. A sleepy languor possessed her, compounded of sun, sea air, the hot scents of thyme and fennel from the hillside, the effects of bed and the anticipation of lunch and more bed. She felt dimly, complacently, that nobody was ever going to take a serious view of _her__ actions. Pretending to be rubbing oil into her skin to aid her tan, she stroked her thighs slowly.

The colonel went on in a brisker tone, 'Tell Mr Aris I quite understand the difficulties that had to be faced. Assure him that the escape of the man Bond is not serious. It will be turned to account in the interests of peace. And tell Mr Aris too that his money will be paid in full, plus a bonus of fifty American dollars for devotion to duty. He may receive medical attention now. Take him to Dr Lohmann. And get Evgeny to cook him something. Then you or your colleague may comfort him if he so wishes. But remember that he's in a weak physical state, so be sure not to comfort him too energetically.'

With a smile that cut off abruptly when she woke up to who she was smiling at, Doni pushed herself on to her knees, turned away and began talking earnestly to Aris. Sun got up from his stool, unfolding himself vertically like a puppet on a string.

Still keeping in the shadow, he moved to the corner of the stone balustrade at the outer edge of the terrace. There, perfectly impassive, he waited, his half-shut eyes flickering over the wild and glaring but motionless scene before him. They took in nothing. The rattling chirrup of the cicadas beat at his ears without penetrating them. Even if his mind had been unpreoccupied, he would still have had no attention to spare for this irrelevant alien landscape. What was important was action, not its setting. History was a matter of deeds and their doers. If people had to ask _where__ a thing happened, it was a scientific certainty that the thing itself was not unique. And within a short time, a good deal less than forty-eight hours, he, Sun Liang-tan, was going to have accomplished something unique.

When the conversation behind him had ended and the two had gone back into the house, the colonel's face changed, though his body remained immobile. A dim slow fire seemed to be kindled behind the grey layers of the pupils and the liver-coloured lips stretched and parted. There was a rhythmical hissing like the sound of a distant air-pump. Sun was laughing.

He recollected himself, hurried indoors and bounded actively up the stairs. In excellent spirits he shot the bolts on the door at the end of the corridor and entered.

'Good morning, my dear Admiral. Or rather,' - Sun consulted the black dial of the Longines at his wrist - 'since I know you sailors are meticulous about times of day, good afternoon. How are you? I hope you have everything you want?

M had been looking out of the tiny window. It gave him a view of a thin sliver of sea and, once or twice a day, the blessed, almost unbelievable sight of a yacht or fishing-boat, a reminder and a reassurance, for the dozen seconds it was visible, that the world still went on and was still sane. He could not manage more than a few minutes on end at the window, because standing tired him and the one chair the tiny airless room contained (its other furniture consisted of a single bed) was too low to let him see over the sill. Two things in particular tormented him: the fear that a vessel might be going by unseen while he was resting in the chair, and the knowledge that he was beginning to look forward to Sun's visits as some sort of relief from total vacancy. He was in a position to understand the first stages of that sickening and mysterious intimacy that gradually comes to unite prisoner and interrogator. He turned and faced Sun now, pale and hollow-eyed, the skin drawn tight over his cheek- and jawbones, but the look he gave the Chinese was steady and his voice, though strained, was firm.

'What does it matter to you, you yellow slug,' said M with great distinctness, 'whether or not I have what I want? Talk as you think, for God's sake.'

'No abuse, please, sir. It causes hot blood and obstacles to thinking on both sides. In answer to your question, of course it matters to me whether you have what you want, or at least your fair share of what's available here. Your strength must be kept up for your part in the experiences which lie ahead of us - which, I venture to assure you, will be far in advance of anything we've so far undertaken together. And to keep you short of food, deny you access to the lavatory and so on, is no part of my plan. I will not have you subjected to any petty privations during your last days.'

M's gaze did not alter. 'That's decent of you.'

'But I didn't come up here only to inquire after your health, important as that is to me. I also bring you news. News of your subordinate and fellow-terrorist, James Bond.'

The effort of self-control needed to avoid betraying any sign of hope, of anything more than mild interest, almost made M stagger. He put out a hand, not too fast, and gripped the edge of the window-sill. 'Oh yes?' he said politely.

'Between ourselves. I don't mind admitting that Bond has been conducting himself with some skill and energy. He has done considerable damage in the Athens sector of this operation. However, that phase was not my responsibility and is now concluded. Bond is here in the vicinity.'

No reaction from M.

'Our habit of working in separate units, each answerable to the top, has had the curious result that while Athens was seeking to neutralize Bond at any cost I have been preparing to receive him undamaged. It will turn out my way. I'm sure we can both trust the resourceful 007 to find his way to this house. When he does so, some time tomorrow, perhaps, if not today, he'll be taken prisoner. In himself he's formidable enough, I grant, but he has no allies of any substance - merely a local whore who has done some messenger work for the Russians and a Greek Fascist cut-throat from the dockside taverns. Whereas very shortly I shall have five experienced men here to deal with him. The outcome is not in doubt.'

'To adopt your own hideous jargon, it would be unwise of you to set too much store by your superiority in numbers.' M managed a grin. 'Bond has successfully taken on far worse odds in the past. Organized by much more dangerous intelligences than a sadistic Chinese infant living in a world of fantasy. Say your prayers, Sun, or burn a joss-stick or whatever you do.'

The colonel showed his inward-pointing teeth. 'Burning is a topic you should have the tact to avoid, Admiral. How is the skin on your chest?'

M went on looking at him.

'Later we might see what we can do with your back. There we have the added factor that the recipient is unaware of where and when each successive stimulus will be applied. The uncertainty can have interesting consequences. But it's vulgar to exchange threats. I'll leave you to your lunch. Evgeny has promised something special in the way of an omelette. And today I think we might allow you a glass of wine. You'll want to drink to the safe arrival of your friend and colleague.'

Turning away, M gazed out once more at the empty sector of sea.

Chapter 14

The Butcher of Kapoudzona

'THE GENERAL was very worried by what I had to tell him,' said Ariadne. 'He wants you to go see him and have a talk. I think he proposes to join forces with you. He said he needs your help. After the interview, of course, you're free to go if you want to.'

Bond examined the tip of his cigarette. 'What guarantee have I that he'll let me go once he's got me there?'

'Oh, you have his word for that. The word of a colonel-general in the KGB.'

There was silence for a moment in the saloon of the _Altair__. Then Bond and Litsas exploded into laughter.

'Did I do it well?' asked Ariadne eagerly. 'Did I have you fooled any of the time?'

Bond put his arms round her and kissed her cheek. 'No,' he said, 'I'm afraid not. You'll never make a proper spy; you're too honest. We could tell you were hating every word you said and despising the whole thing for being so unbelievable. A very poor performance all round.'

'That chap seems to be raving mad.' Litsas was pouring ouzo for the three of them. 'What was he thinking? You told him the whole story, I suppose?'

'Everything. He didn't believe me. Oh, he believed the part about Mr Gordienko because even a moron like myself wouldn't tell a lie he could check out. But the rest was that James was smooth-talking me to help him fight some gangsters so that he could try to blow up this conference. He wouldn't succeed, of course, because the general's precautions are so marvellous, but the man Bond is a dangerous criminal,' - she mimicked Arenski's accent scornfully - 'and might be a nuisance; I had to pretend to go along with him or I would not have gotten away myself.'

'In other words,' said Bond, 'he went on as if he'd decided not to believe you as soon as he set eyes on you.'

Ariadne nodded vigorously. 'Right. I was exactly the person he couldn't believe. I'm Greek, so I'm backward and stupid and a peasant. Then I'm a woman.'

'Oh, he's...' - Litsas gestured - 'one of the boys, is he?'

'Yes: you should have seen the look he gave Yanni. You ask him. Well, also I'm middle-class, so I'm a sentimental idiot who can't understand politics. And finally I'm GRU and Arenski's KGB.'

'Yes, that would certainly make you enemies,' said Litsas dryly. 'It must.'

Bond grinned. 'The GRU is the Intelligence agency of the Red Army, Niko. They go in for ordinary regular spying too. That brings them up against the other lot, the KGB. They're the secret police and much larger and more powerful. There's quite a bit of rivalry there.'

'Rivalry!' said Ariadne with a snort. 'Jealousy and hate. A private cold war. You remember Oleg Penkovski, the GRU colonel who spied for the West with that English businessman, Greville Wynne, and committed suicide in prison in 1965. 'Yes,' she went on as Bond looked up quickly, 'the official story is that he was shot in '63, but really they were keeping him, in the hope of using him in a conspiracy against the Americans. Then by poisoning himself he escaped them after all. Anyway, everybody in the capitalist countries wondered why he became a spy - it wasn't money, you see. All of us in the GRU know that Penkovski was having revenge on the KGB, getting back at them the only way he could for what they'd done to him and his friends and...'

Ariadne checked herself. Bond gave her a sardonic glance and chain-lit another cigarette.

'Well, no help from the general,' he said. 'In fact we must keep out of his way. We've learnt that much.'

'More. A survivor from the cruiser is in the hospital here. Arenski's going to check on him.'

Bond and Litsas exchanged a glance. 'So he was picked up after all, James. Interesting.'

'That's about as much as you can say. We haven't the resources to watch him and find out who goes to see him and I can't believe he's any threat to us. Von Richter is our lead. Where do we start looking?'

'The harbour. Always the harbour. We can be safe there for a short time and we must get some food, real food, hot food, meat, not these meals of a shepherd. And I'd like to refuel; the range of this tub is only a couple of hundred miles. Off we go, then.'

Litsas drained his glass and disappeared in the direction of the engine-room. Bond glanced at Ariadne. The girl's light-brown eyes were veiled and the firm Grecian mouth drooped at the corners. He put his hand gently on the back of her neck.

'What is it, Ariadne?'

'Oh, darling, I'm so depressed. A big operation like this and they put that man in charge of Security, a fat little fairy, a... a monster of complacency. At least they were competent before. What's happened?'

'I could read you a lecture about bureaucracy and how promoting people for political reasons means not getting the best people, but I'll spare you that. Forget it. Rely on Niko and me. And yourself. We'll do what Arenski couldn't.'

Ariadne nestled against him. Bond grinned to himself. Not the least oddity of this adventure was finding himself promising a Soviet agent that Soviet interests would be safeguarded. If M ever heard about that, he would- The engine caught and Bond's mind shut down.

* * *

The main harbour of Vrakonisi, though comparatively small, is one of the best in the southern Aegean, safe and comfortable in any weather except a southerly gale, which is uncommon in these waters. Most volcanic islands rise too steeply out of the sea to afford decent anchorages - the bay of Santorini, for instance, is over a thousand feet deep, and you must tie up to the shore or to a communal buoy - but a primeval disturbance of the sea-bed has tilted part of Vrakonisi northward, reducing the angle of its cliffs and providing a shallow strip up to eighty yards or so from the shore. This area is bounded by two short moles, the western one visibly dating back to Venetian times. Here, after refuelling, the _Altair__ moored.

Bond stood on the mole in the brilliant sunshine, waiting for the others to join him and looking about. There was plenty to see. The basin to his right was full of small craft: yachts, fishing-boats, transport vessels (most of Vrakonisi's needs have to be supplied by water), and a feet of the little twenty- and thirty-footers necessary to an island where roads are few and bad and many inhabited places are virtually inaccessible except from the sea. Ahead, a row of small buildings lined the waterfront. At the near end were whitewashed cottages with blue or tan shutters and doors, then a grocery, a ship's supplier, harbour offices, a _tavérna__ with a faded green awning. No neon, no cars, no souvenir shops. Not yet.

Litsas and Ariadne came ashore and the three moved off towards the bustle of the little port. From behind it the faltering zigzag of a dirt road led to the dazzling white scatter of the town, built on and around half a dozen minor crests at four or five hundred feet. And everywhere - apart from the slopes of an isolated limestone peak standing against the sky, older even than the volcano itself - ran the fantastic horizontal bands of igneous rock, black lava, porous white and yellow tufa, harder, more violently coloured strata of crimson, royal purple, seaweed-green. Vrakonisi is an unforgettable sight, but strange, even disturbing, rather than beautiful, in some way out of key with human habitation. The legend Bond had heard from Ariadne came irrepressibly to his mind. It struck him now as in one sense truer than any geological chronicle could be, in that it expressed the almost supernatural awe which any serious attempt to visualize so gigantic an upheaval must inspire.

They had a late lunch of fish soup made with plenty of lemon-juice, and half a dozen each of the admirable little quail-sized birds that fall to the gun all over Greece at this time of the year, accompanied by a sensible modicum of retsina. Litsas refused coffee and took himself off, explaining he must visit the harbourmaster's office, not merely to stay within the law by presenting the _Altair__'s papers there, but to keep his ears open and drop a few carefully-framed questions in that centre of island gossip.

He was back within the hour. The brown eyes were snapping and the mouth compressed in a kind of mirthless downward smile. One glance at him showed that he had news.

With a flourish he sat down, called for coffee now, and leant forward over interlaced fingers. 'Two points,' he said in a lowered voice. 'I believe I have traced von Richter. A mysterious Dutchman who's calling himself Vanderveld and says he's studying rocks has taken a cottage near the eastern tip of the island. He has with him another man, a young one, also supposed to study rocks. It wasn't difficult to find this out. Von Richter hasn't tried very much to hide himself. He dined at this _tavérna__ last evening. Of course, he didn't think he could be recognized. I think he was never within a hundred miles of here during the Occupation. We've had good luck.'

Bond frowned. 'Niko - forgive me, but how do we know we have the right man? A description can't really- '

'My dear chap, I have some sense. Von Richter had a special mark. He has got a blast from a gun in the face. The gases from the muzzle have given him a bad burn on the left side of the head. That ear damaged, and the skin near it, and he lost some hair for always. Our friend the Dutchman who likes rocks had the same thing. Enough?'

'I'm prepared to go along with it, yes.' Although he spoke coolly, Bond felt a surge of excitement. All day his restlessness at the lack of action had been sharpened by the fear that the right way to action might never be found, that the three of them might be ignominiously and hopelessly reduced to spending the crucial night in the offing of the islet, ready to pit the _Altair__ and a rifle and tommy-gun against whatever mass-assassination weapon the Chinese had in store. Now at any rate they had a meaningful next step. But there was something else first. 'What was the second point?'

'Oh yes.' Litsas drained his coffee and chased it with icewater. 'It would be useless to ask at the hospital. Our man walked out of it as soon as they'd bandaged him. On his way down into the town he met a farmer on a mule and he made him tie his shoes up. The farmer offered him a ride on the mule, but he said he would walk. Some people in the town asked him to stop and rest, but he wouldn't. Everybody's talking about it and saying the farmer should have made the man go back to the hospital. Anyway, the thing is that when last seen, this chap was walking to the west. Where the Russians are having their meeting on the islet. The opposite direction to von Richter's hide-out. What do you make from that?'

'Two hide-outs,' said Bond, gazing at the scrubbed boards of the table. A memory was stirring, pushing feebly at the threshold of his consciousness. Something small, something recent. To grope for it was no good, he knew; to thrust it away might double its pressure, force it in the end to break through. He went on, 'They'll join forces soon. Tonight; they can't leave it any later. The business end of the operation is presumably in the western part of the island rather than the east, so it must be von Richter who'll be making a move. The question is how. This house he's taken, Niko: is there a road to it or a path or anything, do you know?'

'Above the house there are some vine-terraces, but you must climb a cliff to reach them. Not impossible, but very hard. I think we can forget that. He'll move by water.'

'So we watch the place from the _Altair__ and follow him when he comes out,' said Ariadne briskly. 'Obvious.'

Litsas made a face. 'That will be damn tricky, my dear. If we're near enough to see we're near enough to be seen. I can't see how to help that. We're somebody who just happens to be passing? Then he waits until we pass. Very very tricky indeed.'

'So we dowse our lights.'

'The moon'll be up.'

'I saw him!' said Bond suddenly. They looked at him. 'Not von Richter, the man from the hospital. This morning, while we were waiting for you to come back, Ariadne. He was scrambling down the hillside in a clumsy sort of way, as if he were injured. From where he was he might have been making for any one of half a dozen houses along that shore. But we know the area now.'

'How can you know he was that chap?' asked Litsas.

'I'd bet anything you like. I remember asking myself what could be so urgent that it would make an obviously handicapped man undertake a bloody awful ordeal like that. It was him all right, going to report to his lords and masters.'

'But that's the northern shore.' Litsas still seemed dissatisfied. 'You can't even see the islet from there.'

'And they can't see you. We've no hope of understanding that part of it at this stage. What we have got is what to do next. We go off now and sail past that part of the coast at a discreet distance and find somewhere to...'

Litsas's expression changed and his body grew rigid. His hand on Bond's forearm felt like heavy metal. He said in a strangled undertone, 'He's here. Herr Hauptmann Ludwig von Richter. To your right, James. Coming out of the grocer's. You can look at him. They still stare at the foreigners in these parts.'

Bond turned his head casually and at once caught sight of the German about twenty yards away. In sports shirt and shorts, a bulging shopping-bag in his hand, the man was looking over his shoulder and laughing, sharing some joke with the grocer. His companion, a fair-haired youngster carrying a wine-jar, grinned amiably. Between them they made an attractive picture of holiday high spirits, innocence, relaxation. Then von Richter faced his front and Bond saw the livid patch of skin round the ear and the dark hairless region above it. Chatting light-heartedly, the pair turned away and moved off along the quay.

'Going home,' said Litsas. 'I'll just stroll along and have a look at their boat. Might help us later.'

He left. Ariadne said, 'James, one thing puzzles me. With plenty of others. Why do they want this guy along? He always might be recognized. What's so special about him that they must have him?'

'A good point. I suppose he might have done some work for them before. Then he's an ex-army man. That could have its uses all right.'

Ariadne nodded thoughtfully. 'Then you're thinking of some sort of gun. A gun on the land more likely than the sea?'

'Oh God, there's no knowing at this stage. Land diversion, sea attack, the other way round. Anything.'

Another thoughtful nod, but one that suggested a private train of reasoning being pursued. 'There are millions of exarmy men. This one's an atrocity expert. That's what's special about him. But why must they have one? And that gun still bothers me. How could you get anything big enough up that slope? And how was it brought here? Perhaps there's a sort of gun that- '

'Atomics,' said Bond grimly. 'Close-support type. That would be portable enough. At the moment I can't think of any feasible alternative.'

The thought silenced them both until Litsas returned.

'A biggish dinghy thing with an outboard motor,' he reported. 'They're casting off now - we'll give 'em five minutes.'

'There's a matter we can settle in those five minutes,' said Bond. 'Yanni.'

'What about him?'

'Well, we've got to pay him off now, haven't we? We shan't get another chance.'

Litsas considered. 'I know we said we'd do that, but must we, the way things have turned out? He's good with the knife. And he's jolly useful on board. He can stay out of the really bad part.'

'Look, Niko.' Bond faced the other man squarely. 'Yanni is going. Right away. The kid's got a family, I suppose, parents? Well, how's anybody going to face them if Yanni's damaged or killed? And there are other ways of being damaged than just physically. Enough has happened to Yanni already on this trip.'

'I didn't think of that,' said Litsas, looking crestfallen and self-reproachful now. 'Of course you're right. There's a chap I know just along there who will go to Piraeus late this evening. I'll fix it up with him.'

Ten minutes later, after a brisk exchange of handshakes, Yanni had been dropped and the _Altair__ was standing out from the port. In one of those mental film-clips that the memory sometimes records at such moments, Bond registered everything around him in all its hardedged clarity.

Astern were the gay variegated tints of the harbour, sails, awnings, flags of a dozen nations and freshly-painted hulls showing among a dense thicket of masts, and above all this the natural colours of Vrakonisi itself, no less diverse, but grim and ancient, giant washes and scribblings on a raw pile of rock with a life-span measured in millions of years. To Bond's right Litsas was at the wheel, dark eyes narrowed, brown hands easing the bows round to starboard; to the left Ariadne stood poised like a statue, clothed marble, fine tendrils of tawny hair blowing forward above her ears in the evening breeze. And ahead, the sun going down like a fat incandescent orange and a hint of lead entering the steely brightness of the enormous sea.

Chapter 15

'Walk, Mister Bond'

BOND SAT on the moonlit hillside two hundred feet above water-level and longed for a cigarette. He had found a lump of granite the size of a golf-hut which gave him shadow and something to lean his back against. It was not a perfect observation post but it was the best that could have been hoped for after a hurried visual reconnaissance from the deck of the _Altair__ just before the daylight went. Stationed at a roughly central point above and behind the five scattered houses marked down earlier as possible headquarters of the enemy, he had a direct view of two, could see a third by moving fifty yards to his left, and had a clear enough grasp of the positions of the fourth and fifth to make it impossible for von Richter's boat, even if it approached unlit, to put people ashore without giving away their destination.

For the moment all seemed in order. While sailing past they had spotted a tiny beach no bigger than a billiard-table, with what was evidently a climbable outlet to the steep slopes above. Down there, after a lot of grumbling, Litsas had agreed to remain and watch developments from a lower angle, the dinghy hauled up behind a tongue of rock that would, by night at any rate, mask it from seaward observation. The _Altair__, with an even more rebellious Ariadne on board, was a mile and half away on the southern coast, tied up at the quay of a fishing village among a dozen other boats of similar build, the best camouflage available.

Though most of the time the silence was immense, it was not altogether unbroken. Until an hour before, a wireless or gramophone in the nearest house had been playing snatches of _bouzouki__ music, that curious amalgam of conventional Western harmonies and Slav, Turkish and Arab rhythms and turns of phrase, a style in which the best singers, with their broken, complaining intonation, can blend together harshness, sexual excitement and desolate sorrow. Now the exotic melodies had faded and the house they came from was in darkness, but its neighbour was still lit up and an occasional snatch of talk or laughter drifted up to Bond on the warm air. Once or twice he had heard the wavering, chilly call of an owl from the crags above him and, immeasurably far off in the direction of the town, the clink of a goat-bell. Otherwise nothing.

Bond peered at the luminous dial of the Rolex Oyster Chronometer on his wrist. Three ten. He had no doubt that his basic reasoning was correct and that von Richter would come. When he would come was another question. First light was favourable, but arrival at some other time could not be ruled out, even possibly well on into the following morning with everything out in the open, von Richter and his companion welcomed as house guests. That would almost certainly put paid to any reasonable hopes of effective counter-measures. Typically, Bond did not allow himself to pursue this train of thought, but he was coldly aware that this operation was becoming more and more of a slippery slope, on which not merely a false step, but miscalculation of any detail of the lay-out could be fatal.

Then he heard the boat.

It was approaching from the west, coming round the corner where the islet was. In a couple of minutes it puttered into view, carrying navigation lights and a rather dim white one for'ard. When it had completed its rounding movement it ran parallel with the shore for perhaps a quarter of a mile, then turned in and began to make straight towards the farther of the two houses Bond could see from his post, the one whose lights were still burning. No fuss, no elaborate concealment, no double-bluff blaze of publicity either. Bond nodded to himself and got to his feet. He must get down for a closer look. Losing lateral distance but gaining time, he began by moving back down the way he had come, a zigzagging trough at about ten degrees from the vertical between two banks of granite slabs. Next, an all-fours scramble across a larger, smoother expanse canted like the deck of a foundering stone ship, a drop of eight feet on to bare soil, a piece of straightforward rock-climbing down a cliff-face pocked and knobbed with erosion - the last and most exposed stretch protected from upward view by a bulging overhang. This first leg of the descent had taken care of about half the height he needed to lose, but had brought him a hundred yards or so too far to the east. Here was a handy left turn, a natural terrace running parallel to the shore-line for almost the length of a football-pitch, the first half of it at least in the visual lee of the overhang, and level going. Underfoot was rich springy turf like the green of a well-kept English golf-course. When had he been at Sunningdale? Tuesday afternoon. And this was Friday night, or rather the small hours of Saturday. A fairly strenuous three days.

At the point where the ground began to fall away to his right Bond dropped to his knees and looked down. The boat was coming in at reduced speed. Part of an anchorage was in view but the house itself was still hidden. Further lateral and downward movement needed. He hurried to the end of the terrace-like formation, bending low to use the dark background of a straggle of stunted thorn-bushes. Now, in bright moonlight, a wide bare slope of whitish rock littered with loose stones, the mouth of a narrow gully downhill at its far side. There was no time for a detour. Bond walked slowly and deliberately across the exposed slope, his eyes on the ground. He would be seen only by somebody who happened to be looking in his direction; if he dislodged a stone he would make his presence obvious to anyone with ears. The boat's engine had been cut and he could hear voices. He listened with held breath for the sudden urgency in their tones which would show he had been spotted. They murmured levelly on.

He reached the gully. It was an irregular fissure in the granite, twisting this way and that but leading him down in the general direction of the house, its floor smooth and overgrown with tall coarse grasses, such that it might have been a dried-up stream if watercourses of any sort had existed in the island. Twice he had to push his way into and through the clinging, ripping embrace of bushes that filled his path from wall to wall. Then a swing to the left, a bad moment when those walls leaned towards each other and he had to crawl for five yards or more, a rapid drop eased by a sort of straggling banister on the seaward side, another corner, and he was there, very much there, dangerously near.

Cover first. He glided into the protective shadow of a slab shaped like the gable end of a farmhouse that lay across the lip of the gully as if it had fallen there yesterday, though it must have reached its present position before Vrakonisi was on any map. The nearest angle of the house was less than thirty yards away, its flat roof on a level with where he crouched; that could wait. A little farther off at about ninety degrees, von Richter was just stepping on to a miniature stone quay. Bond caught the shiny, hairless patch of skin above the left ear. A short heavy man with a round head, who had been making fast at the bow of the boat, now moved amidships and, with the help of von Richter's blond assistant, heaved ashore what looked like a large sports-bag. Bond craned forward. The bag bulged oddly and was clearly awkward and heavy. There followed perhaps a dozen boxes about eight inches square, of dark-painted metal as far as could be made out in the illumination of the one light on the boat and another, not much stronger, on a bracket at the corner of the house. The boxes too seemed heavy for their size. Then, incongruously, came two smart tartan-panelled, plastic-covered suitcases. So far, the unloading had proceeded more or less in silence. Now a voice spoke.

The speaker was somewhere at the front of the house and out of view. His voice was pitched at a conversational level, in key with the casual, non-furtive atmosphere of the whole landing procedure. The man addressed von Richter by name and welcomed him to the house in the most ordinary terms. Unexpectedly, he spoke in English, but much more striking were his odd pronunciation, as if instead of learning the language he had had it fed into him mechanically, and, through a thin veneer of pleasantness, the unmistakable ring of authority in his tone. Bond knew that he had heard the enemy leader speaking. He waited as patiently as he could for a sight of the man.

For the moment, evidently, he was to be denied this. Von Richter, calling a greeting in return, moved across to the front of the house, extending his right hand just as he went out of sight. There was more talk (indistinguishable), a laugh or two, and the voices faded as if the speakers had gone indoors. The light on the boat was dowsed. The stocky man and the fair-haired lad picked up the sports-bag between them, carried it past Bond's hiding-place and in at a side door. They returned and made a series of journeys with the boxes, then the suitcases. The door shut with an air of finality. The light at the angle of the house went out. Silence fell, except for a mutter of talk and the occasional faint slap of water under the hull of the moored boat.

Bond stretched himself full length in the darkness and prepared to wait out the chance of something left on board being remembered and returned for. To assume that he had just had a view of the assassination weapon and its ammunition seemed irresistible - part of that weapon, at least: the mounting must be elsewhere, brought here separately. Even so, surely the bloody thing was far too _small__. Nothing that size, with its inevitably puny muzzle-velocity, could do more than bounce a shell off the walls of the house on the islet, stoutly built of local stone. The dismal thought suggested itself that his first guess had been right, that this was to be the centre for a diversion and that the real attack was to come by sea, launched from somewhere there would be no chance of finding. Then he thrust this away. The leaders were here; it was here that mattered.

He hung on for another twenty minutes. No change. He moved.

It took him something over an hour to make a slow, careful circuit of the house and the possible approaches. At the end of that time he had satisfied himself that there were no trip-wires or similar alarm systems, that no sort of access from the sea was both physically practicable and free of a strong risk of immediate detection, and that, in addition to the gully he had used tonight, a good alternative route led directly down the hillside to within ten seconds' dash of a terrace at the back of the house. The terrace was a difficult but possible climb for one man, no problem for two.

Back in his shelter under the horizontal slab, Bond weighed chances and times. At the moment, with the moon down, the darkness was entire, relieved only by starlight, but the first signs of dawn could be expected within fifteen minutes. He must be off soon. But a glimpse of the internal lay-out of the house would be invaluable. He walked briskly down the final slope and across rough stone flags to the side door of the house. Without hesitation he lifted it against its hinges by the shank of the knob and turned slowly, producing a single, almost inaudible squeal of metal. Then, still lifting, alert for the first beginnings of a creak, he pushed. The door yielded. A millimetre at a time now.

In five minutes or so he had an aperture a foot wide. He took in the staircase in profile ahead of him, the beginning of steps on the left that must lead to the rear terrace, a dimlylit corridor with rooms opening off it. At once, as if activated by his glance, the door of one of these rooms opened and somebody started to come out.

What saved Bond for the moment was that whoever was emerging paused at the threshold as if to exchange a word with another person inside the room. Bond shut the side door in an agonized conflict of care and speed, turned and ran. Before he was halfway up the slope the external light flicked on. He dived into his refuge and was facing the house, Walther in hand, without an instant's conscious thought.

This was a justified precaution. The side door opened and von Richter came out. He glanced around for a moment or two, then walked purposefully up the slope straight for where Bond was lying. Bond took aim at the German's chest. The man came on until he was a bare five yards away. Abruptly he turned aside and passed out of view. Bond waited two minutes, three minutes. He could hear nothing, assumed that von Richter had halted somewhere close by. Waiting for something, for somebody. Now another man came out of the side door and Bond had his first sight of Colonel Sun Liang-tan.

He stared hard at the tall spare figure as it approached, the shoulders and hips loosely jointed, rolling easily, the yellow face set in a faint smile, presumably in the direction of von Richter, but not altering its basic impassivity. Movements and expression gave an air of vast careless power. This was a man who would do anything. Bond was considerably impressed, but he grinned savagely to himself at this confirmation of another guess. All the way from China, by God!

The man followed the direction von Richter had taken. Ten to fifteen yards away, and slightly above Bond's position the two began to talk.

'Is this place suitable for your purposes?' asked the first voice in English, the same English as Bond had heard earlier from the front of the house.

'Yes, Colonel, I'm sure it will do admirably.' An unexpected light drawl, accented but agreeable. 'Not on the rock, of course. I may have to water the soil a little, but I can experiment with that later. So. Quite satisfactory. Perhaps we could have the light off now.'

'Certainly.' The Chinese raised his voice. 'Evgeny! The light, please.'

Evgeny: a Russian. That would be the stocky man.

'Now we shall see exact operating conditions,' the curious tones went on. 'I think you'll find we've timed it correctly.'

The light went out.

'We shall have to wait a little while to recover our full vision,' said von Richter, 'but it looks to me already all right.'

All right indeed! Bond bit his lip. Ten seconds was enough to show him that dawn was already on the way. The first faint tinges of colour were beginning to steal into his surroundings, the rocks, the vegetation, the side of the house. How long were these two going to continue their parley?

Infuriatingly, neither spoke for several minutes. Then the German said, 'There! You see him?'

'Ah yes. Excellent.'

'We're using a simple colour code which we've brought to something near perfection this last month. As I told you, we had every facility. Enjoyable work. And the necessary _research__' - von Richter put a special emphasis on this word; Bond imagined an accompanying grimace or gesture - 'was fascinating.'

'And conclusive, I hope.'

'Yes, yes. It'll look right and be right. Ballistically and medically. You can be positive on that point.'

The Chinese muttered something polite and silence fell again.

Bond was sweating. He had just made up his mind to shoot both men in the back as they returned to the house and count on surprise to deal with Evgeny and the blond boy and whoever else was about. He wiped his right hand on the torn knee of his slacks and settled himself more firmly.

'Well, I think we've seen enough for now,' said von Richter. 'Willi and I will line up after breakfast.'

'Very good. This Willi - how did a boy like that take to the research?'

'Remarkably well. He's had rather an interesting history, young Willi. His father was one of Himmler's men; the Americans hanged him at Nuremberg - you know, the usual war-crimes fantasy. Willi was a baby in arms then...'

There was more, but Bond stopped listening. The voices were retreating in the direction of the anchorage. He brought his gun up and waited. Perversely, the two did not cross diagonally from where they had been standing, but evidently walked straight to the water's edge. When they finally came into sight they were between seventy and eighty feet away. Bond dismissed it at once as not worth trying: the light was still poor and the chances of an effective left-and-right negligible. Unless they turned back... But no; awkwardly bunched from his point of view, they strolled past the upper-works of the boat and disappeared behind the front of the house. So much for that.

Poor the light might have been for an aimed shot, but it was already uncomfortably good enough for movement to be spotted, and increasing as if a screened lamp-wick were being turned up. Bond spent a minimal three minutes listening for any sign of the return of the German and the Chinese, then came out of his shelter and started up the gully. But going up was slower than coming down, and by the time he reached the upper end the sun was showing signs of appearing. He paused here to breathe and consider; the stony slope looked horribly exposed; still, there it was, a naked streak of hillside he would have to climb a hundred feet to get round. So... He got to his feet, squared his shoulders and walked steadily over to the far side. Up on to the level stretch, walking as before - no point in using the thorn-bushes as background in this light - and into the shelter of the overhang. On to where the flat pathway ended.

Ahead of him now, and below, lay an extraordinary geological formation, or rather hundreds of these: a great jumble of squarish and near-rectangular stone blocks twenty and thirty feet high and stretching for half a mile, piled next to and upon and across one another so haphazardly that gaining ten yards in the desired direction meant climbing and descending twice as many. Above and below were cliffs. On Bond's outward journey it had taken him fifty minutes to cross this dump of outsize nursery bricks; even now he could not hope to do it in less than thirty. Still, once past it there was a short rise to a level platform of rock, and after that an easy descent to the beach and the boat. On with it, then.

In the event it took him well over the half-hour. He was moving up on to the rock platform when a man on the far side of it got up and levelled a revolver at him.

He was a tall man in a cheap dark suit, now crumpled and torn. Binoculars in a green plastic case were slung across his shoulder. He said in a thick Russian accent, 'Good morning, Mister Shems Bond,' and sniggered.

Bond stood stock still and waited.

'I see you from... up,' the man went on in a tone of good-humoured explanation. 'Now... we go up.' He pointed to the hillside with his left hand.

Bond made no move.

'No? Then... shoot you. Not too bad.' The Russian slapped his leg. 'Friend of me... up.' He made hoisting and carrying motions, but the revolver never wavered. 'Is difficult. You fall maybe. Me... that's all right.' Another snigger.

It was plain enough. The only hope was to wait for a chance of finding a moment's cover from the revolver during the proposed climb and before the absent friend made his appearance. Bond nodded.

'Good boy.' A gold-toothed grin. 'Come to here.' The left hand indicated a point on the platform well beyond rushing distance. Bond went to it.

'Now... gun of you. Slow, please. Slow slow.'

The revolver pointed steadily at Bond's breast-bone. Nobody can aim and fire faster than a man already on aim can fire. Helplessly, Bond took the Walther from his hip pocket and held it out in the palm of his hand.

'Intelligent. Throw... away.'

Another chance gone. Bond tossed his automatic aside and heard it land on rock.

'Friend of you' - a gesture towards the beach - 'no good, eh? Now... walk, Mister Bond. Slow slow.'

Bond was on the point of obeying when the other lurched abruptly as if slapped hard on the back and the unmistakable sharp bang of a medium-calibre cartridge came apparently from beneath their feet, immediately followed by the sound, thin but clear, of a rifle-bolt being pulled back and returned. There was one echo of the shot, distant and delayed.

The man's gun-arm had dropped. His eyes held Bond's with a dreadful look of puzzlement, of pleading to be told how this thing could have happened. Bond said hoarsely, 'You've been shot with a rifle, from the beach.' His heart was thumping. He never knew if his message was understood. The Russian had half turned to look behind him when a second shot flung him off balance. He went down the slope in a sort of slack-limbed dive and finished with his face in a heap of small stones. There was a patch of blood on one shoulder-blade and another above the hip.

After scooping up the Walther Bond made it to the beach in two minutes. Litsas had the dinghy already in the water, pushed off at once and grabbed the oars.

'Good shooting, Niko,' said Bond at length.

'Not bad, eh? Uphill too, but fighting in Greece makes you used to that. Anyhow, not more than two hundred yards. I dropped a Jerry staff-sergeant once at six hundred with that little beauty.' He gave the Lee Enfield, now lying across Bond's lap, an affectionate nod. 'These fellows today forget all about the rifle. If they see nothing for fifty feet all round they think they're safe. Eh, I bet our friend up there had a very big shock when I hit him.'

'He did,' said Bond in a hard voice, remembering the look on the man's face.

'I was watching jolly carefully but I had no idea he was there until he popped up at you. Didn't give me much time.'

'He saw you all right. He said as much.'

'Oh, really? Then he had no excuse at all to show himself to me like that and to stay exposed while he waved his gun at you. Who was he, anyhow?'

'One of Arenski's men. He saw me while he was patrolling the hillside and came down to cut me off.'

'I'm afraid we make the brave general very angry. Let's hope he doesn't try to interfere with our plans for tonight.'

Chapter 16

The Temporary Captain

AT NOON that day the _Altair__ was five miles due south of the port of Vrakonisi, running north-westwards. Visibility was excellent, promising fair weather to come, but the sea had again got up a little since the early morning, and the caique, moving diagonally across the direction of the waves, lurched clumsily from time to time. More clumsily, in fact, than an experienced hand at the wheel would have permitted.

George Ionides was relatively inexperienced with boats of this sort, though he was an expert handler of his own little coastal runabout, the twenty-four-foot _Cynthia__. He hoped the weather would not get any worse before it got better, not for his own sake - his next few hours' sailing would be mostly in the protection of one island or another - but for the sake of the _Cynthia__ and, to a less extent, of the people now on board her. What did they want with her and where were they making for?

First things first. With a satisfied grin, George brought the head of the _Altair__ round just far enough to take an extra steep sea squarely under the bow and so forestall any tendency to roll. He was learning fast; he always had. It was a matter of instinct, of being a natural sailor. His grandfather had often said.... But forget that. Those people. They were up to something illegal, no doubt of it. The two Greeks, the man and the girl, had been smooth and plausible enough, but the other man, the hard-faced Englishman, was undoubtedly a desperate type. George Ionides had seen that immediately. It had been no surprise to him at all when, an hour previously, the men had taken aboard the _Cynthia__ two objects wrapped in sacking that were clearly guns of some sort. George had politely turned his back, of course, and pretended to study the weather. It was not for nothing that he was a native of Cephalonia in the Ionian islands. That was the Cephalonian way of handling things: use your head, use your eyes, keep your mouth shut. So, except to agree to everything proposed to him, George had kept his mouth shut when this Athenian approached him at the harbour and suggested that, for a consideration of three thousand drachmas (half now, half later), he might be willing to exchange boats for thirty-six hours or so. He had merely nodded his head, as if such things happened every day, when the Athenian stipulated that the hand-over should take place, not here at the anchorage, but at a sea rendezvous to the south, and that he should let half an hour go by before making any move to set off. He had shown no surprise, let alone resistance, when the Athenian told him very forcefully that, as soon as the transfer was complete, he must head straight on south to Ios and stay there until the two parties rejoined contact tomorrow afternoon or evening. Cheerfully and readily, he had sailed south at a good eight knots until the _Cynthia__ was below the horizon. Then he had simply turned and headed north-west. For George had never had any intention of going to Ios. Not today, anyway. By six o'clock that evening at the latest he would be moored in the port of Paros. Anything like an early start in the morning would give him a nice comfortable southward run, with the weather behind him, down to Ios in plenty of time to be sitting innocently drinking coffee outside one of the harbour _tavérnas__ when the _Cynthia__ arrived. He grinned to himself, then shouted to his cousin, a boy of fourteen who crewed the _Cynthia__ for him and at the moment was idling in the sun on the _Altair__'s cabin-top. When he came running up, George said a few words to him, pointed briefly, and strode for'ard to the saloon, leaving the boy at the wheel. The sea had moderated as they came into the shelter of Vrakonisi, and there were no shoals off this corner of the island.

Obeying instructions to help himself to whatever he fancied, he poured a glass of _kitró__ and settled down on one of the benches. He sipped luxuriously at the delicious drink - native to Naxos and obtainable only there, on Ios and on Vrakonisi - and reflected that it was perhaps a little early, but he was on holiday. The deceptively weak-tasting liquor, bland and viscous, with the bitter tang of the lemon rind in it as well as the sugared-down sharpness of the flesh, relaxed him.

Lighting a cigarette, he glanced idly out of the window. They were passing, at a distance of about a hundred yards, the islet at the south-western tip and, on it, the grand house where a very rich foreigner was known to be staying and amusing himself with the local boyhood. These people seemed to think they could do as they liked in the islands! George made a spitting grimace. Then he noticed somebody in a dark suit, perhaps the foreigner himself, standing on the terrace of the house and apparently looking straight at him. As George watched, screwing up his eyes against the glare, the man hurried indoors, returning after a quarter of a minute with another. The new arrival examined the _Altair__ for a longer period through binoculars, which he then passed to his companion. More examination. A third man now came bustling out and joined the first two. All three seemed very interested in the passing boat. George could not imagine why. He got up, strolled out to the rail and gave a friendly wave.

The effect, in a small way, was extraordinary. The three figures straightened abruptly, looked at one another and then back at the _Altair__ with exactly the demeanour of a trio of priests taken off guard by some unseemly act. George waved again. This time there was a response, half-hearted at first, then suddenly enthusiastic - priests deciding to show they were men like anyone else. George laughed aloud and went back into the saloon. It was quite true, the old Greek saying that all foreigners were mad! But these were certainly rich enough, he decided a minute later, catching sight of a big grey-painted motor-boat lolling gently at the anchorage below the house. Rich. And mad. It crossed his mind uncomfortably that perhaps the cause of the recent excitement was that the _Altair__ had been recognized as a stolen craft or as belonging to wanted criminals. Both these possibilities had already occurred to him. But then foreigners, tourists, took no account of such matters. He dismissed the idea.

As, half an hour later, he and the boy were finishing their bread and cheese, olives and beer on the after-deck, George's thoughts returned to Paros. The point about Paros, as far as he was concerned, was that Maria lived there. He had been engaged to her for three years, and marriage was in sight at last, but it was no use pretending that everything was as it should be. Although her parents liked him and knew he was honest, they pretty clearly did not think he had come as far in the world as, at twenty-seven, he ought to have done. Tonight he was going to show them how wrong they were. First, he would invite them all on board - Maria, her father and mother and younger sister - and show them round, offer them drinks in the saloon, explain casually that one of his friends from Athens had put the little tub at his disposal for a couple of days so that he could thoroughly try her out and see what he thought of her. Then he would take them all out to a lobster dinner, and finally buy them each a good present at one of the expensive tourist shops that lined the alleys of the town.

By way of immediate return for these efforts, George would be entitled to talk to Maria, to hold her hand and above all to look at her. He would not, of course, expect to spend much time with her alone. That had always been part of the system, the way life was arranged. George was tall and well-built and dark-eyed, and working in the tourist trade brought him plenty of sexual opportunities. He took them. Nobody minded that, but a great many people would have minded a great deal if he had started trying to treat his affianced bride in public like a German or English office-girl on holiday. He knew that some of the younger people made a mock of the system, but it suited him well enough. (It had never occurred to George to wonder what Maria thought of the system.)

However, at times when he was picturing Maria in his mind, as now, he would find himself trying to imagine in detail what lay beneath her spotless white dress, what that swelling bosom would be like to see and touch, what she would do when he... George pulled himself together. Such thoughts were useless as well as disturbing - if he had been backward and provincial, instead of modern and sophisticated, he would have called them sinful.

They left his mind for good when he glanced astern. A shape rapidly overhauling them soon identified itself as the motor-boat he had seen moored at the islet. This was puzzling, and a little frightening. George Ionides examined his conscience and, as best he could, his legal standing. The paperwork position might be irregular, but he had done nothing against the law by temporarily swapping boats with a man whose good faith he had had no specific reason to doubt. George held to his course.

The motor-boat came up, matched its speed to the _Altair__'s and stayed parallel with it. The three men George had seen by the house watched him again. He waited, maintaining speed. Half a mile off, a fishing-boat chugged past in the opposite direction and, on the horizon, a streak of smoke showed where one of the big passenger steamers was making its way down to Sikinos.

Presently a hail came in Greek.

- What ship are you?

- _Altair__, Piraeus. What ship are you? George added with a boldness he had not consciously intended.

This was ignored. - Who are you?

- George Ionides,. temporary captain.

- Who is with you?

- Only my cousin, this boy here.

There was discussion in the motor-boat. Then: - We will come aboard you.

- By what right?

- That of the Royal Hellenic Coastguard Authority.