The 34th Degree

85

T he spray of salt water slapped Andros’s face as he stood at the rail of the Independence, watching the black mass of mountains of the Peloponnese move against the starry sky. In the ship’s wake lay the island of Hydra, sleeping on the Aegean.

Andros tried to light a cigarette but couldn’t. To his dismay, he realized he was using the phony lighter containing the secret camera. He had left the lighter Aphrodite had given him in his tuxedo, which was in Eliot’s car back in Athens. His folly was complete, he decided. Not only had he not come out of Athens with Aphrodite, but he had lost his only token of their relationship.

Thank God his family was safe on the Turtle Dove.

Andros removed the microfilm cartridge from the lighter and looked at it in the moonlight. In all probability, the information it contained was worthless. All it confirmed was what his OSS masters had known all along: that the Allies were invading Sicily, not Greece. Clearly, they had expected him to be captured and to spill their precious lie to the suspicious Baron von Berg. Only, he had escaped, and von Berg presumably was more suspicious than ever. To top it off, he had seen nothing resembling an ancient Greek text and was beginning to wonder if it even existed. He put the microfilm in his pocket and grasped the hollow shell in his hand. Cursing the name of Jason Prestwick, and himself for his naivete, he hurled the good-for-nothing lighter into the sea and went up to the bridge.

Karapis stood by the helmsman while Tsatsos scanned the darkness with his night glasses. Andros moved to the chart table and examined their route, trying to push Aphrodite out of his mind.

“I still don’t understand,” Andros said a minute later. “According to the charts, there’s nothing north of Monemvasia.”

“Ah, nothing now,” said Tsatsos, handing him his night glasses. “But soon you’ll see.”

Andros took the night glasses and looked out at the wall of mountains to the starboard side. Still a monolithic mass, he thought, until he saw a flicker of light, and then the wall seemed to part like angels’ wings, revealing something like a valley of stars between two dark peaks.

“The Villehardouin Gorge,” Tsatsos explained. “It starts wide by the sea and narrows through the mountains for twelve miles, with only a stream at its bottom. The National Bands base is situated in a defensive position on the high ground between the gorge and the sea.”

Andros continued to scan the shore until he saw a light. “I see something. The signal, I suspect.”

He gave the glasses back to Tsatsos, who looked for himself. “That’s it,” said Tsatsos, lowering the glasses. “We’ll signal back while you and Karapis get ready. Remember, once you’re ashore, send Karapis back immediately. We must make up for lost time.”

Andros nodded and went to the deck, where the crew lowered a lifeboat and its pilot, Karapis, into the water. Andros climbed over the side and descended a rope ladder one sagging rung at a time. Then he dropped into the bobbing boat, and they cast off.

As they peeled away, Andros could see Tsatsos standing by the rail on the deck of the Independence, waving good-bye. “You’ve made an old sailor proud, Christos!” he called out as he was swallowed by the darkness.

Andros waved back dutifully and said, “Farewell, old friend.”

The sea was rough as they approached the cliffs along the coast, but soon they rounded a promontory, and Karapis eased the small boat into the inlet of a bay.

“An ancient Minoan harbor abandoned for centuries,” Karapis informed Andros. “Guillaume de Villehardouin used it in the twelfth century as a secret supply dock during his three-year siege of Monemvasia. The two piers were built later by the Venetians. One of them is a good six feet underwater, so we have to watch it going in to keep from ripping the hull.”

Andros could see the other pier, an old, crumbling stone peninsula jutting into the water, and on it a row of dim, ragged figures holding torches.