Mayhem in Greece

Candia Palace, just along the street here, round midday tomorrow, will you?'

Robbie promised to do so, then the American said: 'Just one other thing. I'm holding you to your word not to mention to Madame Barak anything we've discussed. How she saved her pretty neck after she was supposed to have gone over that precipice in your car I wouldn't know, and I'm not asking. But one thing I am certain about. It is that the Czechs fixed it that you should take her with you when you left Athens, so that she could report back to them how much you were finding out. Maybe that's news to you. If so, I'm sorry to have spoiled any illusions you may have about her having gone with you all for love. But there it is. She started out on the other side, and maybe is so still. So, for the sake of the Europe that you evidently like, not to mention the old U.S. that means a lot to me, you've really got to watch your step with her.'

With a rueful grin, Robbie replied: 'Since you know so much I'll admit that, to begin with, she was acting under her husband's orders. But after we met Barak on the mountain road, he pushed her over the precipice and I had the luck to save her. As a result of that, she is completely through with him and has come over to us.'

'Maybe she is through with him as a person. If they had still been turtle-doves, it's odds-on he would have found some other cutie to lead you up the garden path. But, in my experience, once a Communist always a Communist, with only remarkably rare exceptions; so keep on loving her plenty if you wish, but do it with your mouth shut.'

After spending another far from comfortable night in his draughty hide-out, Robbie went to a barber's, had himself shaved, then met Stephanie on the corner of Liberty Square. As soon as he was in the car, she said with an excitement which she could not altogether conceal: 'At the G.P.O. I picked up a letter from Vaclav. He is arriving by the evening plane and, as I suggested, has asked me to meet him.'

'Thank God for that!' Robbie exclaimed. 'I can't say that I am looking forward to taking him to pieces, but the way things are developing, it has become terribly urgent to force him to talk. I've just got to put any scruples about fair play behind me.'

'How did you get on last night with Henry?' she asked.

'Very well, although he's still no wiser than we are about the so-called oil prospecting. I told him that your husband had tried to do you in, and that you had since come over to us. But he wouldn't take my word for that. I have to meet him at the Candia Palace at midday.'

'Then that knocks on the head a trip down to Malea to see the windmills. We couldn't possibly get back in time. How would you like to fill in the morning?'

'We might run out to Knossos and spend an hour there. I'm sure there are lots of it that we haven't yet seen.'

Without comment she accepted his suggestion and, twenty minutes later, they left the car in the parking place, took tickets and again made their way across to the vast pile of ruins.

After exploring the treasury and store-rooms on the eastern side of the slope and admiring the giant oil jars which—shades of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves—could each have held four men, they made their way up again to the reconstructed parts with their curious red pillars, broader at the top than at the base, and gaily painted walls. For the second time they strolled through the room of the Double Axes, the room of the Dolphin frescoes and the Throne Room, in which the throne—a leaf-back stone chair with a hollowed seat, and the oldest throne in the world—still stood.

In all the principal rooms, to one side or in a corner, steps led down to a sunken area several feet below the level of the floor. On their first visit, a guide had told them that these pits had been filled with sacred water, because the Minoans were so superstitious that they were constantly feeling the need to purify themselves by total immersion.

Looking down into one of the pits, Stephanie remarked: 'You know, I can't believe that a people so civilized as the Minoans were so obsessed by their religion that, every time they ate or kissed or told a naughty story, they felt such a compulsion to cleanse themselves by jumping into holy water that they couldn't wait but had to have a bath of it in every room.'

Robbie smiled. 'No, I'm sure the guide was wrong about that. The Minoans were so far advanced as architects, with their drainage and that sort of thing, I should think it certain that these pits in every room have something to do with minimizing the effects of the earth tremors. That ties up with the established fact that the Minoans held all their public ceremonies in the great open courtyards, and built only small rooms indoors; so that they would stand up better against earthquakes.'

As Robbie said this last word, his mouth remained open on the last syllable and his eyes suddenly grew wide.

'Whatever is the matter?' Stephanie asked, giving him an anxious look.

'Earthquakes,' he repeated. 'Earthquakes; earthquakes. My God, I've got it! That's the answer.'

After a quick look round to make sure that no guides or visitors to the ruins were within earshot, he hurried on: 'Don't you see? Every site to which we've been has suffered from a series of earthquakes. All the Aegean islands are subject to them. Many were thrown up by them, even, according to the ancient chronicles, the great island of Rhodes. Barak and Co. mean to drop H-bombs down those holes and, when the time comes, explode them underground. Explosions in a confined space have many times the power that the same amount of explosives would have in the open. These won't only rend vast holes in the earth; the shock will operate downwards, too. The crust of the earth is thin here and violent fires are always raging beneath it. The shock of each explosion will link up with that on the next in the chain. Rents scores of miles long will be torn in the land and under the water. The sea will boil, whole mountains will come sliding down. It will be just like another war of the gods and titans. The bomb at Corinth will destroy the isthmus so that the Peloponnesus will become an island. All round Greece, and right up to the Dardanelles, the whole coastline will be changed.'

Taking Stephanie by the arm, he added: 'Come along. I mustn't lose a moment in letting Henry know about this.'

As they hurried back to the car, she said: T can't believe that even a dozen H-bombs would have quite such terrible results But say you are right; what is the object of destroying great chunks of Greece? What have the Soviets to gain by churning the Aegean into a raging lake, just for a day or two?'

Tt will be far more than that. Parts of it would become impassable, owing to the vast quantities of molten lava and mud thrown up. That would take months to settle. In the meantime, the levels of its bottom would have altered so much that all navigational charts would be rendered useless. Every ship in it would be wrecked, and that's what they are guoning for. They are planning to bring about this cataclysm in order to knock out at one stroke every U.S. submarine in the north eastern Med.'

Sixteen minutes later, Stephanie pulled the car up outside the Candia Palace Hotel. As Robbie was about to jump out, she said quickly: 'Shall I wait for you or shall we meet somewhere?'

Stepping on to the pavement, he replied: 'I may be some time. Better go to some small restaurant and wait for me. I know; go to that little place where we lunched on Sunday. It was called the Ariadne. We'll lunch there again.'

It was only twenty to twelve, so he was early for his appointment. At the desk, he learned that Mahogany Brown was up in his room; so he rang through, said he wanted to see him urgently and asked if he might come up. Two minutes later he was shown into a bedroom where the American was sitting with his coat off, working at some papers at a small table by the window.

After one look at Robbie's face, he grinned and asked: 'What's cooking? Have you just heard that the police are on to you at last?'

Robbie gave a quick shake of his head and launched straight into his theory. Hardly pausing to draw breath, he spoke for three minutes. As Mahogany Brown listened, his expression changed gradually from mild scepticism to wondering dismay. Having heard Robbie out, he exclaimed:

'Hell's bells! I believe you've hit it. And if you're right about ail these places being so susceptible to earthquakes, this could lose us the war.'

There is no question about the situation of the earthquake belt,' Robbie assured him. 'It runs from Naples in the north and Sicily in the south, right across Greece and the Aegean to Turkey. Any geologist will confirm that. They may be playing some game similar to this in Italian territory; but I doubt it. You were saying last night that the nearer your submarines could get to Rumania and the Balkan wells, the better their aim would be. From that it follows that they wouldn't be stationed off Italy, but in the Gulf of Corinth and the Aegean. The only thing which might make nonsense of my theory is if a dozen nuclear bombs with intervals of so many miles between them would be insufficient to do the trick.'

Mahogany Brown considered for a moment, then he said: 'One of those Czechs you overheard talking at Gortyne spoke of dropping cylinders five feet long. Given an eight-inch diameter, now that the mechanism to explode such bombs has been so much reduced in size, they could contain as much fissionable material as would go into a warhead of an I.C.B.M. and, of course, they could be exploded by remote control. The Russians are believed to have about fifty I.C.B.M.s, and with those they reckon they could flatten most of the principal cities in the West. Things have gone a long way since Hiroshima. It's calculated now that the bomb used there was only about the power of old-fashioned T.N.T., compared with the power of the stuff we have now. One megaton of it would render a thousand square miles of territory uninhabitable. That should give you the picture.'

Robbie drew a sharp breath. 'Then I'm right. Even if those cylinders contain only a quarter of the load in the war-head of an I.C.B.M., a dozen of them would set earthquakes going that would destroy the islands and tear southern Greece into pieces. As for your subs, in the Aegean, they would be thrown about like matchsticks and smashed to bits.'

'You've said it, friend.' The American grabbed his coat. 'I'm off to my local H.Q., to get on the "blower" to my Chief in Athens. I'm telling him that he's got to act fast and, whether the Greeks like it or not, bust this Czech oil-prospecting wide open, if you're wrong, I'll be out on my ear; but if you're right, I'll get the Congressional Medal and be the No. 1 hero in the United States.'

As they went down together in the lift, he said to Robbie: T gather that this big think came to you while you were out at Knossos this morning. Was your girl friend with you?'

'Yes. That car you saw us in yesterday is one we've hired for the week in her name, and whenever we go anywhere she still does the driving.'

'Did you tell her this theory of yours?'

T saw no reason why I shouldn't. It has nothing to do with any arrangements between you and me; so my telling her didn't infringe our pact.'

'Sure, sure. I'm not complaining. You'll be seeing her again shortly, I take it?'

'Yes, we're lunching together.'

'Well, she's certain to want to know what I thought of your idea and I'd be glad if you said that I didn't consider it practical. We can't be too careful. Where will you be lunching, in case I want to get in touch with you?'

'At a little place called the Ariadne.'

'Good. I don't suppose I'll be bothering you but, as you're so cagey about giving me your address, you'd best look in here again this evening, round seven o'clock, to see if I've left a message for you.'

By this time, they had reached the entrance to the hotel. They parted on the pavement outside, Mahogany Brown to get on his motor cycle and Robbie to walk down to the Ariadne.

Stephanie was having a drink at one of the tables on the narrow pavement. As Robbie sat down beside her, she said eagerly: 'Well?'

He grinned at her. 'Henry is still afraid that you are in secret communication with your husband; so he didn't want me to tell you. But I made no promise that I wouldn't. He thinks I'm right, and by this time he will be in communication with his Chief in Athens. He means to push him into having all the sites raided, and hopes to get the Congressional Medal for having spiked the great Communist plot.'

'What cheek!' Stephanie exclaimed indignantly. 'He hasn't discovered a thing. All the credit for this ought to go to you.'

Robbie shrugged. 'I don't give a damn who gets the credit. What matters is preventing the possibility of this part of the Med. being blown up, and the destruction of the U.S. subs.'

'Anyway, you are safe now. Once the sites have been raided and the plot uncovered, no one is going to hold it against you that you killed Cepicka while trying to prevent Greece being blown off the map. I think we ought to celebrate. Instead of lunching in this shoddy little place, let's go down to the Glass House.'

'1 told Henry I'd be lunching here, in case he wanted to get hold of me,' Robbie demurred. 'Still, he said that was unlikely, and I promised to look in at the Candia Palace about seven, to pick up any message he might have left during the afternoon. So let's leave it at that.'

At the Glass House a quarter of an hour later, they found that the chef had just had in some live crayfish; so they selected a fine hen and, while it was being boiled, they ordered the rest of their meal at a table at the far end of the restaurant. When the waiter had taken their order, Stephanie said: 'What shall we do about Vdclav?'

'You mean, what is the best way to secure him when you have brought him along to me?'

'No.' She shook her head. 'I wasn't thinking of that, I was wondering if you still wish me to meet him. After your wonderful hunch this morning, and now that Henry is acting on it, we could let sleeping dogs lie. You never have liked the idea of taking him to pieces. Now, apart from the fact that you hate him on account of what he did to me, there's no reason why you should.'

After a moment, Robbie replied thoughtfully: 'I think you're wrong there. I feel pretty certain my guess is the right one, but there's a chance that it might not be. There's a chance, too, that Henry's Chief may refuse to believe him and do nothing, anyhow for the present. Your getting Barak here will give us the opportunity of making certain, and I don't think we ought to throw it away.'

'Very well, then. His plane is due in at the airport at ten to five. That means that I should be able to deliver him over to your tender mercies at about half past. Unless, of course, he wants to register at an hotel first and drop his bag. In that case, it will be nearer six. But you'll be careful how you tackle him, won't you? Remember, it is you he is coming to get, and it's certain that he'll be carrying a gun.'

'You bet I'll be careful,' Robbie smiled. 'I should look pretty silly if this boomeranged on me.'

'You wouldn't have a chance to look anything,' Stephanie told him grimly. 'Once I've led him into the ambush there must be no mistakes. When we've finished lunch, we'll go over to your hideout and work everything out very carefully.'

About half-past-two, Stephanie drove the car back to its garage, while Robbie made his way to the half-ruined house among the rubble. Half an hour later, she joined him. Their problem was to think of a way by which Robbie could stun Barak, by hitting him over the head with a sandbag, before he realized that he had fallen into a trap and drew his gun. Their difficulty was that there was no place in the house in which Robbie could lie concealed and that, being empty, even taking a few steps on tiptoe from one room to another meant boards creaking so loudly that they would give away a stealthy approach.

After much discussion it was decided that Barak must be ambushed outside the house and, as this required darkness to prevent anyone seeing from a distance the assault on him, the following plan was adopted: Stephanie was to tell him that Robbie had gone over to Phaestos to see what he could find out about the site there, and he would not be back until eight o'clock. When he returned he would go straight to his hide-out for a meal, since he avoided as far as possible being seen in the town from fear of the police. She would take Barak to the hideout about half-past-seven, and he could lie in wait for Robbie there. That was the sort of set-up that Stephanie had suggested in her letter, and it would still be daylight when she brought Barak to the house; so there would be no reason for him to suspect

that she was leading him into a trap.

Actually, however, a little before the time that Barak was due to arrive at the house Robbie would conceal himself behind the low wall outside it. Having brought Barak there, Stephanie would leave him. The half hour would pass and twilight would be falling. Barak, believing Robbie's return to have been delayed by some unforeseen circumstance, would continue to wait for another hour, perhaps two, or it might even be three. But is was certain that by midnight, at the latest, he would become so weary of standing in the darkness that he would throw in his hand and decide to go to his hotel. As he passed along the low wall, Robbie would then rise up, slog him on the back of the head and drag him into the house. The plan might mean a long vigil for Robbie, but it reduced to a minimum the risk that he might be shot by Barak before he could overcome him.

At four o'clock, Stephanie left to collect the car and drive out to the airport. Robbie also went out and bought some stout cord with which to tie up Barak. On his return to the house, he tore an old shirt into strips, suitable for gagging his enemy, and put them in his pocket, then filled a sock about a third full of finely crumbled plaster. These preparations completed, he had a meal from one of the tins and some of the fruit Stephanie had brought for him and washed it down with half a bottle of the red wine.

By that time it was half-past-five. As there was just a chance that Barak, believing him to be absent at Phaestos, might demand to be driven straight to the hide-out so that he could reconnoitre it in daylight before returning later to lie in wait there, Robbie decided to play for safety and leave the house. Putting a slab of chocolate, some biscuits and a paper-back 'thriller' in his pockets, he went out and selected his hiding-place.

The wall ran from the side of the house down to the great barn that was used as a sawmill and faced on to the road along the sea front. From the road a track led up along the side of the barn to the beginning of the wall, and up to the end of that track Stephanie would bring Barak in the car; after that they would have to walk. The wall was broken and crumbling in places, so Robbie had no difficulty in finding a spot only about thirty feet from the house where he could force out a few bricks and so make himself a spy hole which would command the approach to the building. Having got over the wall he settled down with his back to it, on a pillow which he had brought out with him, then endeavoured to concentrate on his 'thriller'.

For a variety of reasons he found it far from easy to do so. He still disliked intensely the idea of tying up any man—even the husband who had been cruel to Stephanie and had attempted to murder her—and torturing him. The thought that Stephanie was again with her husband filled him with uneasiness. To carry out their plan, she would have to spend at least two and a half hours with him and, excellent actress though she was, should she make a slip during that long session in her husband's company, not only would their plan be brought to naught but she would then be in great danger. There was also the chance that the plan might somehow go wrong. Robbie could think of no reason why it should but, all the same, the thought that if it did he would probably pay for it with his life was distinctly unnerving.

For the next two hours, in fits and starts, he read a few pages of his book then, each time realizing that he had not taken in a word of what he had been reading, he turned back and went over most of the passage again. By half-past-seven the light began to fail; so he put the book in his pocket and, knowing that if Stephanie had succeeded with her part of the plan she should soon be bringing Barak to the house, he began to listen intently.

About ten minutes later he caught the sound of a car approaching, and it pulled up not very far away. Then came footsteps. But they puzzled him, for it sounded as though more than two pairs of feet, and one of them a woman's, were crunching the rubble. Anxiously, he peered through the spy-hole he had made. He suppressed a gasp of dismay and his heart began to hammer heavily. Stephanie was leading, but there were two men behind her. Barak must have brought one of his thugs to help him exact vengeance on the man who had ruined his looks.

The party of three went on into the house. Robbie sat down again and endeavoured to rally his wits to cope with this unforeseen complication. Stephanie must have received the same shock as he had, on finding that Barak had brought one of his men with him; but, having met him, she had evidently found herself unable to think of any excuse for not taking them both to Robbie's hideout. According to plan, having led Barak there, she should now come out of the house leaving him behind. But his companion would remain with him. If, later, they left together, Robbie could have no possible hope of knocking out both of them. Even if Barak came out alone, leaving his underling to remain on watch, Robbie would not be able to sandbag him without the other man hearing the scuffling on the rubble and appearing on the scene to find out what was going on.

Clearly the whole plan had broken down. The only thing to do now was to wait till Stephanie came out, follow her to the car and go off with her to some place where they could talk over the situation, devise some new plan to trap Barak or, if that seemed beyond them, agree to abandon their idea of forcing him to disclose his secret.

Anxiously, Robbie waited for the sound of Stephanie's light footfalls as she walked from the house; but they did not come. After a while he decided that Barak must be keeping her there, to ensure that she should not give way to a last-minute change of heart and waylay Robbie to warn him that she had betrayed him. They had envisaged such a possibility but had agreed that

Stephanie's being with Barak when Robbie knocked him out would have no adverse effect on their plan. The only thing Stephanie had stipulated was that she should not be present afterwards for, although she had not an atom of love left for her husband, she was still averse to standing by and watching while he was maltreated.

For over an hour, that seemed like an eternity, Robbie sat behind the low wall, straining his ears. Darkness had fallen and, being so near the house, he could see tiny chinks of light round the edges of the black-out curtains in the upper room. Now and again a low, indistinct murmur, which he knew must be muffled voices, came to him, but that gave no indication of what was going on up there. He had been due to return at eight, and a glance at the luminous dial of his wrist-watch showed him that it was a quarter to nine. Barak, he felt, must by now be becoming impatient.

Ten minutes later, he had evidence of it. The murmur coming from above suddenly became louder and faintly there came to him what sounded like cries of protest. There was a brief interval of silence, then the sounds of a scuffle, followed by a wail of pain. The blood drained from Robbie's face. Those sounds could mean only that, on his failure to appear, Barak had become suspicious that Stephanie had deliberately misled him, and was now trying to drag out of her the truth about where Robbie might be found.

The thought of the extent to which their plan to trap Barak had now miscarried appalled him. Standing up, be stared with agonized gaze at the blacked-out windows. His imagination ran riot as he visualized the scene now taking place behind them, Stephanie bound and with the end of a lighted cigarette pressed against her skin, or her arm being twisted to near-breaking point behind her back, or Barak's fingers clutching her throat, so that she could get her breath only in gasps at intervals when the pressure was relaxed.

But what could he do? To dash into the house and attempt to rescue her from two armed men would be hopeless. He would be riddled with bullets before he could even strike a blow. In desperation, he looked about him. He could run to the road and back along the quarter of a mile of deserted sea-wall to the harbour, then up into the town until he met a policeman. But when he did, would one policeman be willing to return with him, and go into the house, knowing that there were two men in it who, rather than allow themselves to be arrested, might shoot him?

Robbie's glance suddenly came to rest on lights sixty yards away. They were those of the car at the end of the track. As twilight had been falling when Stephanie drove up, she had switched them on before leaving the car. He had not driven a car since he had taken the Ford Zephyr into Pirgos, but he knew that most cars were much alike; so he should be able to get this one started and drive it to the police station. The explanations he would have to give there would necessitate his giving himself up but, in the circumstances, he felt that was a small price to pay for help.

He started off towards the car. Before he had taken two paces that muffled, agonized wail came again. The sound brought him to a halt. He had no idea where the police station was. Even if he met with no hitch in starting the car, a quarter of an hour or more must elapse while he enquired the whereabouts of the station, then found it. To rush in, shouting that a woman was being tortured, would not be enough. He would have to give particulars, perhaps to some slow-witted junior who might insist on taking them down, then repeat them to someone higher up before any action was taken. Even after that further time would be needed for the return journey. Given the best of luck, it would be twenty-five minutes before he could bring a squad of police to the house, and it might well be forty.

Meantime, what would be happening to Stephanie? In jthe space of half an hour, she could be made to suffer terribly. Far worse, having wrung all he could out of her, Barak might kill her. He had failed when he pushed her over the precipice, but here there was no one per cent chance of her possible survival should he decide to rid himself of her for good, and no attempt could be made to stop him. In a matter of minutes, he could strangle her and, with the help of his man, in a further ten carry out her body and bury it under a pile of rubble. If Robbie went for the police, it could easily be ail over by the time he came back with them; Stephanie dead: her body hidden, Barak and his thug gone and only Robbie's word for it that they had ever been there.

Driven frantic with fear that Stephanie might be murdered before he could get help, he decided to go in. Whatever Stephanie had said to Barak, he would hardly ignore the possibility that Robbie might return to the house. Therefore it seemed certain that, while he held her prisoner upstairs, he would have left his companion downstairs; so that he could hold up Robbie the moment he entered the front door. If that were so, Robbie felt that he had at least a sporting chance, because he could enter the house from the side where the wall had collapsed. With luck, he might take the man on guard by surprise, overcome him and get his weapon. Then the odds between Barak and himself would be even.

Quickly, but as quietly as possible, Robbie moved round to the side of the house. He was armed only with the plaster-filled sock and, while that would be as good a weapon as any for knocking out an unsuspecting man from behind, he might have to tackle his opponent from the front. Fortunately, amongst the rubble of the kitchen wall, there were a number of pieces of broken wood. He knew roughly where they lay and the star-light was now sufficient for him to find them without difficulty. Hastily he rummaged amongst them, discarded two or three, and chose a tapering piece about three feet long, with a thick end, that would make a good club.

Stepping over what was left of the side of the kitchen, he tiptoed across it. As he did so, the fallen plaster crunched under his feet. Actually the sound it made was faint, but to him, in his state of acute tension, it seemed so loud that his enemies could not fail to hear it. At the doorway to the hall, he paused for a moment. Down its side showed a two-inch-wide streak of faint light. When he had first taken up his quarters in the house he had tried to shut this door, but the wood had swollen and it had jammed like that. The question that now faced him was—should he attempt to ease it open on the chance that he would not be heard, or should he wrench it wide and go bald-headed for Barak's watch-dog, if he were standing on the other side?

As Robbie stood there, he clearly heard a moan that came from upstairs. Spurred to action by this confirmation of his belief that Stephanie was being tortured, he pulled the door open. There was no one in the hall but next moment a dark figure showed up in the faint light, emerging from what had been the sitting room. Robbie raised his club high and rushed at it. The figure sidestepped so that the club, instead of striking it on the head, came down on the shoulder. At the same moment, a pistol flashed. The bullet struck Robbie in the upper part of his right arm, partially swinging him round. The club dropped from his nerveless fingers. He heard a clatter of feet on the stairs and realized that Barak was plunging down them. As he turned his head to look up at Barak the man who had shot him hit him hard under the chin, knocking his head back violently against the door post. The double blow made his head sing. The bitter thought that he had failed, and failed dismally, entered Robbie's mind then his knees gave, he slumped to the floor and passed out.

He was not out for long. When he came to, Barak and the other man were dragging him up the steep stairs. By the time they threw him down on the bedroom floor, his eyes were wide open and taking in everything round him; but his right arm was hanging limp, he had lost his club and he was miserably aware that Barak had him at his mercy.

As he sat up, his glance met Stephanie's. She was sitting in the folding canvas-backed chair she had bought for him. The cord he had bought only that afternoon, with the optimistic intention of using it to bind Barak, now bound her. Its ends secured her wrists to the two flat pieces of wood that served as the arms of the chair. Her hair was dishevelled, her blouse torn open, tears were streaming down her cheeks and a towel was over her mouth. Its two ends dangled behind her, so that it could be pulled tight to muffle her cries.

Suddenly, to his horror, Robbie saw that the two middle fingers of her right hand were bent back unnaturally. It was obvious that, while her wrist was tied, the finger tips had been raised and gradually turned over backwards, until the joints at her palm had broken, enabling the useless fingers to lie at an acute angle to the back of her hand, which was now dripping blood.

If Robbie had had the power, he would have killed Barak there and then; but, still half stunned and with his right arm useless, he could do no more than curse him. Barak only smiled at him with cynical satisfaction, then he said to his man:

'Keep him covered, Alexej. If he tries any tricks, put a bullet through his other arm. But don't kill him. I want to arrange his death myself.' Then he went round behind Stephanie, began to undo the cord that bound her, and added: 'We shall need this to tie him up.'

Owing to the collapse of the plaster partition at the time the house had been bombed, the back and front bedrooms on that side of it had become one. Only two stout, wooden posts which had given strength to the partition, and a heap of plaster on the floor, remained to show where it had been. When Barak had freed Stephanie, he said to Alexej: 'Get him up now. I want to tie him to one of those posts.'

Alexej gave Robbie a sharp kick and he stumbled to his feet. For a moment he contemplated striking out with his left fist, but he was still feeling very groggy and realized how futile it would be. Under the threat of Alexej's gun, jabbed against his left shoulder, he backed up against the post. Barak went round behind him and lashed him to it. When he was firmly secured, the Czech came round to the front, fingered his little hair-line moustache and said to him:

'I don't know exactly how you two turtle doves planned to get the better of me, because my wife is still reluctant to talk about it. But I guessed that you must be somewhere round and that by letting her open her mouth a little, while giving her the treatment, I should bring you running to the rescue. Anyhow, now you're both in the bag.'

He paused for a moment, then went on: 'This is a nice little hide-out you have here, Mr. Grenn. You could stay here for months without anyone being the wiser, couldn't you? And that is exactly what you are going to do. Presently, we will tear your towels and a few other things into strips and use them to tie my wife firmly to this other post. Then you can stand looking at one another until your eyes begin to pop and your swollen tongues stick out of your mouths from thirst. I'm told it takes quite a

time to die that way, and it's very unpleasant. But before-'

'You . . . you! My God, if I could only get my hands on you!' Robbie burst out, beside himself with mingled anger and terror. What Barak had said was so terribly true. Not a soul, other than those then in the room, knew about the hide-out; so, if

Barak left them tied up there, before anyone found them they might have become skeletons hanging from posts in loose bundles of clothes. Their only chance, Robbie realized, lay in his being able to shout loud enough to be heard perhaps by a passer-by on the water-front. He opened his mouth to yell for help. But Alexej was too quick for him. Guessing his intention, the thug hit him a sharp blow in the stomach.

As Robbie gasped for breath, Barak nodded. 'Good work, Alexej. I doubt if anyone would hear him, but we'll take no chances so you'd better gag him.'

Seeing that one of Robbie's side-pockets was bulging with something soft, Alexej put his hand into it and pulled out the very strips of stuff that Robbie had prepared for the purpose of gagging Barak. Before he could get his wind back, Alexej had forced one of them into his mouth and tied its ends behind his head.

'Now,' said Barak. 'As I was about to say when you so rudely interrupted me, I owe you something extra for this.' He gingerly fingered his broken nose. 'Before we leave you, I mean to do some carving on your face.'

Producing a long flick-knife from his pocket, he opened it and took a step towards Robbie. Stephanie had so far remained silent, her face a picture of pain and despair. Suddenly she jumped up from the chair, seized Barak's arm with her uninjured hand, and cried:

'No; no! Not that. We've lost! I know you mean to kill us. But at least have the mercy to do it quickly.'

Snatching away his arm, Barak turned and gave her a violent push that sent her reeling back into the chair. Then he said to Alexej: 'Get behind her. Hold her down by the shoulders if she tries to interfere again. When I've finished with him we'll tie her up to the post, then we'll go and have some supper.'

As he advanced again, Robbie began to struggle violently. The cord that bound him to the post was too strong and too tightly tied for him to have any hope of freeing himself; but the post was loose, both where it entered the floorboards and about two feet above his head, where it joined the rooftree that formed the apex of the ceiling.

Barak stood for a good minute, watching his futile struggle with amusement, then he said: 'I think your nose first. We'll see what you look like when I've slit it.'

At that moment, there was a sharp knocking on the front door of the house and a voice cried in Greek: 'Open up! We know you're there. We can see chinks of light round the windows.'

Alexej was standing behind Stephanie. She opened her mouth to shout. But, as he had been with Robbie, he was too quick for her. His hands shot out, gripped her round the neck and strangled her cry.

Barak said to him in a whisper: 'Quick. Go down. Find out

who it is. Get rid of them somehow—anyhow. I'll look after her.'

With a swift, cat-like tread, Alexej ran across the room and down the stairs. Barak put away his flick-knife and took a pace towards Stephanie. Then all three of them up in the bedroom strained their ears to catch further sounds from below.

They heard Alexej wrench open the front door, then the Greek voice came loud and clear: 'We are police officers. Mr. Robert Grenn, alias Monsieur Thevanaz, I have a warrant for your arrest in connection with the murder of Mr. Carl Cepicka.'

Robbie's mind took in the words as though they had been printed in poster-size letters and held in front of his eyes. The police had succeeded in tracing him after all. The trail had been clearly laid from Rhodes to Crete, yet how they could have succeeded in discovering his hide-out he could not imagine. But what did that matter? Their arrival at this moment could have been decreed only by a Divine Providence.

Then an awful thought struck him. They had taken Alexej for the man they were after. Barak had told his underling to get rid of whoever it was, 'somehow—anyhow'. The police probably had only a rough description of the wanted man and, in the uncertain light of torches down in the hall, would not get a very clear view of Alexej's features. What if he let them believe for the moment that he was Grenn—alias Max Thevanaz—and allowed the police to march him off? Stephanie and he would again be left to Barak's mercy.

The same thought had rushed into Stephanie's mind. Again she made a move to cry out. Alexej had gone from behind her chair, but it was no more than three feet from Barak. His left hand shot out and grasped her throat in time to prevent her uttering a sound. With his right, he took her injured hand and crushed it in a sudden, fierce grip. What would have been a scream of pain passed his stranglehold on her windpipe only as an agonized gurgle. Her eyes rolled up and she slumped back in a dead faint.

Being gagged, Robbie could not cry out, but already he had resumed his desperate struggle to free himself from the post. Planting his feet firmly, he tensed all the muscles in his strong back and strained on it. Under the tug of his body, the top of the post was now attached to the rooftree by only a single nail. Compelled to witness Barak's fiendish treatment of Stephanie, Robbie was seized with a frenzy of rage. He redoubled his efforts. Barak, evidently fearing that the groaning of the post against the floorboards would catch the attention of the police below, again pulled out his knife. Flicking it open, he stepped up to Robbie and said in a fierce whisper:

'Keep still, you swine! Keep still, or I'll stick six inches of this into your stomach.'

Robbie ignored the threat. He gave another mighty heave. The old post came away at the top. Still tied to it and with his feet still planted on the floor, he suddenly fell forward. Before Barak had time to jump out of the way, the top of the post hit him on the head. He went over backwards. Robbie came down on top of him. But Robbie's last effort proved a minor repetition of Samson bringing down the pillars of the Temple. As the two men crashed to the floor, there came a rending sound. The beam of the rooftree suddenly sagged. Great lumps of plaster began to fall, the room was filled with noise and dust. One of the lumps struck Robbie on the side of the head. Darkness descended on him, in which he saw flashing stars and whirling circles. Then he

passed into oblivion.

* * * *

When he came to, he was lying in bed and a nurse was bending over him. His wounded arm was strapped to his chest and his head ached abominably. For a few moments, he had no idea where he was or what had happened to him; so he asked the nurse in English. When she shook her head and murmured a few soothing words in Greek, memory flooded back to him. He was still very muzzy₅ but his thoughts flew to Stephanie and he stammered out an anxious enquiry.

The nurse had only a vague idea how her patient had received his injuries but she was positive that a girl had been brought in with him, suffering from nothing worse than shock and one hand with broken fingers, and that she was now in the women's ward. Unutterably relieved, Robbie drank the sedative that the nurse gave him and soon afterwards fell into a deep sleep.

He was woken by the sound of cheering outside the hospital, and wondered what could be going on. It was daylight now and his thoughts turned quickly to the events of the previous night. But he had little time to ponder them, for shortly afterwards another nurse and a doctor arrived to dress his wounded arm.

The doctor told him that the cheering had been due to the news having just come through that the war crisis was over. On the orders of the President of the United States, the trapped submarine had attempted a break-out during the night. It had succeeded and the blockading Soviet warships had not endeavoured to sink her. It had been a terrible risk to take because, if the Russians had attacked her, presumably the Americans would have retaliated by launching their rockets and strategic bomber force. Once the submarine was free of ice she might, too, have sent her missiles hurtling towards Moscow before she could be sunk. Evidently, when the Russian bluff had been called, they had had the good sense to refrain from an act which could have plunged half the world into chaos.

Robbie's arm, the doctor told him, would probably never regain its full former strength, because muscles and ligaments in it had been badly torn; but he had been lucky that the bullet had not shattered the bone, as he might then have had to have his arm amputated. He had sustained no permanent injury but the wound was inflamed, so he must remain where he was for several days.

He sent a message to Stephanie and asked for news of her. Then he was given another draught and slept again.

It was late afternoon when he was roused by the nurse looking into his cubicle. 'He's awake,' she said to someone behind her, 'but don't stay too long.' She stepped aside and Mahogany Brown came in. With a grin he sat down beside Robbie's bed, asked how he was, then said:

'Well, we fixed them. The boys went in with the Greek security people last night and caught every group cold. You were right about their intending to put nuclear bombs down those deep holes and start a chain reaction of earthquakes. What a night and day it's been. First scotching this Czech racket in the small hours, then the good news coming in that our sub. is out again in neutral waters and heading for home.'

Robbie said how pleased he was, then asked if the police had got Barak.

'He's dead,' came the prompt reply. 'The beam you were tied to hit him on the temple. His buddy got a broken jaw as a result of resisting the police and, like you, was brought to the prison hospital. He's only a few cubicles away.'

'So I'm in prison,' Robbie said.

'Why, yes. What did you expect? The police here are holding you for Cepicka's murder. But not to worry. I've already had a word with my Chief about how I met up with you, and found you were on a private venture gunning for the Czechs. When you are taken back to Athens, that will all be sorted out and you'll be given a clean bill for having killed Cepicka during your endeavours to prevent Greece being blown off the map.'

'It's good of you to have spoken to your Chief,' Robbie said gratefully. 'And I've certainly no right to complain about being under arrest. If the police hadn't come along to pick me up, I'd probably be dead by now. I wonder, though, how they managed to trace me. Do you happen to know?'

Mahogany Brown grinned broadly. 'Sure. I put them on to you.'

'You what?' exclaimed Robbie indignantly, pushing himself up with his good elbow. With an 'ouch' of pain, he quickly sank back again as the American replied:

'If you'd lunched at the Ariadne, as you told me you were going to, you'd have still more to thank me for. You'd have escaped getting a bullet through the arm and what I gather must have been a pretty sticky time while Barak had you cornered. I tipped off the police to pick you up at the Ariadne. As you weren't there and didn't come into the Candia Palace at seven o'clock, they alerted all stations to keep a look-out for you. They might not have found you for days, but for a lucky break. Your girl friend left her car with the lights on in the middle of a quarter of a mile of rubble. A patrolman went over to investigate, checked the car number with the one I'd given when I filed your description, and jumped to it that the pair of you must be somewhere in the offing. He telephoned his H.Q., and they sent out a search party. They spotted chinks of light coming from your hide-out and that was that.'

'But why?' Robbie asked in a puzzled voice. 'What conceivable reason had you for turning me in?'

'It wasn't you I was worried about. It was Mrs. B. who had to be put out of circulation. You admitted to me that you'd told her about your earthquake theory, and I wasn't trusting you not to tell her that I had fallen for it. Knowing that, she might have managed to get a message through to her pals, alerting the whole set-up that we were on to them. If a tip-off had got through, they could have dumped their bombs in the sea before our people had the chance to get them with the goods.'

'You're talking nonsense,' Robbie protested. 'She was on our side and doing her utmost to help me.'

The American gave a disbelieving shrug. 'She was Barak's wife and we knew that she was being used to keep tabs on you.'

'She was to begin with; but, as I told you, Barak tried to kill her. Naturally, that altered everything. After that--'

'It altered nothing. Communists, like other people, may change their sex relationships, but they don't stop being Communists. She was still selling you down the river.'

'She was not! I swear she wasn't!' Robbie cried indignantly.

'She was. We have proof of that. On Barak's body the police found a letter. It was from her, admitting that she'd slipped up, but asking to be taken back into the good books of the Party. As the price of her pardon, she offered to sell you out to him.'

'But . . . but,' Robbie stammered, 'she wrote that with my knowledge. We'd planned to lure Barak here and get the truth out of him, but he turned the tables on us. That's how it was that our car happened to be left outside for so long with the lights on. He prevented her from coming out and driving off in it.'

'Where were you at that time?'

'Hiding just outside. Our plan was that she should tell Barak that I'd be back in half an hour, and then leave him there. We hadn't counted on his bringing another man with him. We thought that, after he had waited there for a couple of hours and I hadn't shown up, he'd get sick of waiting and come out on his own. Then I meant to sand-bag him from behind.'

'Very nice. But it didn't work, eh? And I don't have to be a crystal-gazer to tell you what happened. Instead of coming out, she stayed there chatting with him about this and that for a while. Then he told her to open her pretty mouth and let out a yodel or two, so that you'd hear and think he was beating her up. You fell for it and came bursting in to rescue her. Isn't that just what you did?'

'Yes. That's why I went in. But you are utterly wrong about her. She didn't lure me into an ambush. The cries I heard were because she was being tortured.'

'So you say.'

After thinking hard for a moment, Robbie exclaimed triumphantly: 'Her hand is the proof of it. That fiend Barak had broken two of her fingers. When they lugged me up into that room, her hand was all out of shape and bleeding. You have only to go over to the woman's ward to check on that. When I came to in the night and asked about her, the nurse told me that Stephanie had suffered no other injury but, as I feared, some fingers on one of her hands were broken.'

Mahogany Brown stood up. 'I've a lot to do, so I must get along now. But listen, pal. You say the nurse told you about this hand. Well, it could easily have been crushed by a falling brick, and there's only your word for it that she got her injury any other way. I know you're nuts about this dame, and you're not the first guy who's been prepared to swear black is white in the hope of getting his sweetie out of trouble. But it's just no good. She's in this up to the neck.'

Robbie was appalled at the thought that Stephanie was believed to have aided her husband and that there might be no way in which her innocence could be proved. 'What . . . what d'you mean to do with her?' he asked hoarsely.

The American's reply was shattering. 'Why, she'll be shipped back to Athens with the other saboteurs we've caught in Crete. Maybe she'll get a prison sentence, maybe the Greeks will be satisfied by ordering that she's to be repatriated to her own country. Anyhow, except in a Court of Justice, you won't be seeing her again, so the sooner you forget her, the better.'

Epilogue

It was a week later, the 7th of May. Robbie had been back in Athens for two days. On his second day in hospital in Crete, a senior police official had taken a long statement from him. The following morning the British Consul had come to see him, with a message from his uncle that his case would be put in good hands and that he was not to worry. The Consul had then offered his services, if there was anything he could do. Robbie had asked him to find out about Stephanie, and had later received a note informing him that she was being flown back to Athens under escort that evening, with the other Czech prisoners.

His wound was clean and mending well. On the Sunday he had been pronounced fit to travel and, also under escort, had followed her that afternoon. At the Athens airport he had been met by his uncle's P.A., and it then transpired that Sir Finsterhorn had entered into recognizance for him. His escort handed him over and he found himself a free man or, at least, in the position of one on bail.

Six weeks earlier, the knowledge that he would have to give an account of himself to his uncle would have made him sweat with fear, but the Robbie Grenn who had left Athens towards the end of March was an utterly* different person from the one who returned there early in May. During those few weeks he had changed from a shy, overgrown adolescent to a self-confident, mature young man.

He had accepted his uncle's message as a normal expression of esprit de corps, to be expected from an older relative when a member of his family was in trouble in a foreign country. However, he took it for granted that Sir Finsterhorn would resent most strongly his having got himself into a situation where he had killed a man and been hunted by the police. Mahogany Brown had, he imagined, taken all the credit for solving the riddle of the oil-prospecting by the Czechs, so he had no expectation of receiving praise for that; but at least he had the satisfaction of knowing that, however angry his uncle might be with him, he would now be able to face a dressing-down with complete indifference.

In consequence, when he reached the Embassy he was all the more surprised by his reception. Lady Grenn had returned from England. She greeted him like a long-lost son, saying how worried she had been about him, and showing great concern over his wound. Sir Finsterhorn stood beside her, patted him twice on his unwounded arm and said: 'We haven't had the full story yet, Robbie, but we've heard enough to be very proud of you.'

That evening, suppressing only the episode with Stephanie at the pool, he had given them an account of all that had happened to him since he had started on his self-imposed mission. He then learned that Mahogany Brown had not taken all the credit, but had reported that they had been working together and had given him a share of it. Sir Finsterhorn had been told that by Luke Beecham, who in turn had had it from Mahogany Brown's Chief. Before they went up to bed, Robbie had begged his uncle to help him save Stephanie from the terrible situation in which she was placed, and the Ambassador had promised to do everything that lay within his power.

On the Monday, accompanied by the lawyer who acted for the British Embassy, Robbie went to the Ministry of Justice. They had a long interview with a high official who was in charge of the prosecution against the Czechs. The upshot of it was that, as it had been Barak who had brought the charge against Robbie of murdering Cepicka, and Barak was now dead, it was probable that the charge would be dropped; but, if the Czechs insisted on a trial, one would have to be held. However, in the circumstances, that was most unlikely and, should it happen, a plea of self-defence would certainly be accepted. Robbie anxiously asked about Stephanie's prospects; but the official would say no more than that she would be brought to trial with her compatriots, and it was not for him to forecast the sentence she would receive.

That evening Robbie dined with his good friend Luke, thanked him for taking the steps that had set Mahogany Brown on the warpath, and again recounted his adventures. But when it came to Stephanie's prospects, Luke proved far from hopeful. He had heard on the side that the Czech Travel Bureau had been raided and among the papers seized had been Stephanie's reports of Robbie's activities in Patras, Corinth and Pirgos. In the face of those and her last letter to her husband, Luke felt that any plea that Robbie might make for her would be disregarded, in the belief that he had become so enamoured of her as a mistress that he would go to any lengths to get her off; so, in spite of all he could say, she would be sent to prison.

On Tuesday Robbie could settle to nothing. All day his thoughts were never far from Stephanie, alternating between desperate depression at the thought of the fate that might be in store for her, and hope that his uncle might succeed in getting her released after an interview that he was to have with the Minister for Home Affairs the following morning.

And now it was just before lunch on Wednesday. Sir Finsterhorn had come in from his interview and was facing Robbie in his study. In reply to Robbie's almost breathless enquiry he replied:

'Well; I have good news for you. In the first place the Greek Government wish to give you a decoration—and a good one, too.'

'What!' Robbie's eyes opened wide. 'A decoration! For me!'

'Yes, my boy.' Sir Finsterhorn patted him on his good arm. 'A decoration for gallantry. From now on, whenever you have to attend a full-dress function, you'll be able to hold up your head with the best of them. Of course, I must get permission from our people for you to accept it, but there will be no trouble about that. Fd have recommended you for a British decoration myself, if I'd thought there was any chance of your getting it. But now that we live in the era of the Welfare State, decorations are more or less reserved for fellows who can boost our export market, do things for charity or have sat behind a desk for thirty years without blotting their copy books.'

'Thanks, Uncle,' Robbie said quickly. 'But what about Stephanie?'

'Good news there, too. They are fully convinced of her guilt, of course; but, as a gesture of goodwill to me—and to you— they've agreed not to prosecute. They will only inform her Legation that she is persona non grata and must be sent back to Czechoslovakia.'

'But . . . but,' Robbie stammered, 'that's worse ... worse than her being in prison here. Her own people know she double-crossed them. They'll send her to the uranium mines. She'll die a lingering death from radio-activity. It's condemning her for two

years to a living hell.'

♦ * * *

That afternoon, Robbie again took a taxi to the parking place below the Acropolis. Slowly, he climbed the steep slope to the Propylaea, mounted its great, broken steps and came out on to the lofty plateau. Now that it was May, it was baking hot up there. The sun blazed down relentlessly, making the stones hot to touch and dazzling to the eyes. Owing to the great heat, no conducted tours were scheduled to be taken round it in the early hours of the afternoon; so only a few perspiring tourists and people inured to tropical sunshine were strolling about the ruins.

Robbie made his way over to Athene's olive tree. Casting a quick look round, to make sure that he was not observed, he took a small medicine bottle from his pocket. It contained another ration of his uncle's port, to which he had helped himself after lunch was over. Pouring the wine as a libation at the foot of the tree, he bowed his head and said in his thoughts:

'Great Goddess, you told me that, for the sake of my country and yours, I must go on to the bitter end. Well, with Stephanie's help I've done that. But must the end be so bitter?'

A light breeze rustled the leaves of the little olive tree, and a golden voice replied: 'Strange mortal, who in this modern age still has faith in the great ones of Olympus. One by one the cruel gods who demanded human sacrifices have died. Now, those who have for so long demanded sacrifice of self, in a dreary life of humility, poverty, fasting, chastity and self-denial, are also dying. But we, who are no more than the elder brothers and sisters of men and women, created by the Maker of All Things with the same weaknesses and strengths, yet given greater powers: we, whose only wish is to see each human derive the maximum of joy from life, are the true Immortals. We shall live on for ever, and never lack the power to grant the prayers of those who believe in us.'

Then the great goddess Pallas Athene told Robbie Grenn

exactly what to do.

* ♦ * ♦

The following morning, Robbie secured a special permit to visit Stephanie in prison. The Deputy-Governor received him and handed him over to the head wardress, with instructions that he should be allowed to talk to the prisoner for half an hour, on the same footing as if he were her lawyer.

In consequence, he was taken to a waiting room in which there was no barrier between prisoner and visitor, but simply a wooden table and a few chairs. Stephanie was brought there and the wardress who escorted her took a chair in the corridor outside.

Stephanie's hand was still bandaged and her face was drawn; but she raised a faint smile as she entered the room, and said: Tt's nice of you to come, Robbie. I hadn't expected to see you again.'

He cleared his throat and asked: 'You know what they intend to do with you?'

She nodded. 'Yes. They told me this morning. I'm not to be charged with the others. I'm to be handed over to my Legation to be repatriated.'

'And we both know what that means.'

'Don't, Robbie, please. I ... I'd rather not talk about it.'

'But I must. I want to know if you think there is any chance of their letting you off.'

She shook her head. 'No. They'll add it to my other crimes that I was responsible for bringing about V&clav's death. For that, they would never forgive me. If only they'd kill me and have done. But they won't. They . . . they'll send me to the uranium mines. But please, please-'

Seeing her intense distress, Robbie cut her short and said: 'I've come here to suggest a way out for you.'

'There isn't one,' she said pessimistically. 'I know you'd help me if you could, Robbie. But there's nothing you can do.'

'Yes, there is,' he blurted out. 'I can marry you. If you are married to me, you'll become a British citizen. No one will be able to send you back to Czechoslovakia then.'

Her blue eyes wide open to their fullest extent, she stood staring at him as he hurried on: 'Of course, I know you don't love me; so I'm not suggesting that it should be a real marriage, although it would have to be a legal one. We . . . we'd live together only as we did in Rhodes. I'd take you to England with me. Then, after a few months, I'd let you divorce me. But you'd be safe there. And, later on, perhaps you'd meet some nice chap that you liked . . . and . . . and-'

Tears suddenly welled out of Stephanie's eyes and began to run down her cheeks. She laid her sound hand on his good arm and choked out:

'Of course I'll marry you. Even if you were the most revolting man on earth, any woman in my position would be crazy to refuse such an offer. But . . . but tell me something. Down by the pool at Olympia. Did you . . . did you do what you did just because you wished to humiliate me ... to be avenged? Or because you wanted to? I mean, had wanted to for some time?'

'Well, I was angry with you,' Robbie admitted. It was that which gave me the courage. But I'd been having to struggle with myself for days, not to seize hold of you and kiss you as though I'd never stop.'

A radiant smile suddenly broke through Stephanie's tears, and she whispered: 'Then need we . . . need we think about a divorce? Oh, Robbie, you're so different from any other man I've ever known. So kind, so gentle, so brave. Everything a woman could ever want. I think I've loved you from the very moment I met you.'