The 34th Degree

81

A phrodite could barely contain her hysteria. Chris had returned only seconds before Ludwig appeared with Franz at the top of the steps. Now Ludwig was motioning for Peter to come over.

“Did you find what you were looking for?” she asked Chris as they danced.

He looked over her shoulder at Ludwig and Franz. “Not exactly. But I got enough.”

She could smell sulfur from his hand. He had fired a gun. He had killed somebody in her family’s home. Dear God in heaven. “What happened?” she asked him. “Something went wrong, didn’t it?”

“Von Berg came in just as I was leaving,” Chris explained. “I managed to slip around the corner and climb back up the balcony to your room.”

“What about Hans?”

“What’s done is done,” he replied. “I stuffed the uniform into the same drawer I took it from. You’ll have to take it with you when you leave tonight.”

She decided now was the time to tell him. “I’m not coming.”

He looked at her incredulously. “What do you mean, you’re not coming?”

“You got what you wanted,” she said coolly. “Now leave me alone.”

“You’re what I want,” he pleaded with her. “That girl in Bern-she was nothing.”

His voice was rising with his passion, and she glanced around to make sure nobody had overheard him. He was losing his head and becoming unreasonable. She would have to do the thinking for both of them.

“I know that,” she said. “But the Baron isn’t about to let me out of his sight for one second. If I stay here at the party, at least you might still have a chance of getting out of Athens alive.”

Chris put his two firm hands on her shoulders and pulled her close to his desperate face. “You’re coming with me to Piraeus,” he said, shaking her. “You hear me? We’ve got less than an hour to get there, and I’m not leaving you behind!”

But she was staring at a red stain on his white tuxedo shirt. “Your shirt, Christos,” she gasped. “There’s blood!”

His eyes dropped to his shirt and came up horrified. “Aphrodite,” he gulped, “you’ve got to help me!”

She glanced around helplessly and then saw Ludwig, Franz, and Peter starting toward them. “Oh, God, Christos, I don’t know what to do!”

“Come with me to Cairo!”

But she would have none of it and grabbed a glass of red wine from a floating tray and flung it at him. The wine splattered across the front of his tuxedo, and she smashed the glass on the ground, bringing the dancing and music to an abrupt halt.

“I hate you, Christos!” she screamed. “I could never marry you!” Andros, his white shirt drenched in red, watched in horror as she turned around and ran up the steps of the garden into the house.

“Aphrodite!” he called.

But it was too late. She was gone by the time von Berg came up to him.

The Baron glanced back at the house and then looked him over curiously. “I can see you’ve had a little too much wine tonight, Herr Andros.”

Andros nodded grimly as he borrowed a white linen napkin from a passing orderly and patted the stain. “She’s right, you know,” he said. “I never should have come back.”

Aware of his guests, von Berg suggested, “Perhaps you should leave, Herr Andros. We can discuss business first thing tomorrow morning before you depart on the Turtle Dove.”

Andros nodded reluctantly. “As you like, Baron.”

As Andros walked away, von Berg turned to Peter and said, “Follow him. Don’t let him out of your sight.”