The Silver Stain

NINE

‘Leave this to me,’ Mikis said, opening his door.

‘No,’ Mavros said, doing the same with his. ‘Time for me to play the blundering Brit.’ He walked forward slowly, waving his hand. ‘Hello!’ he said, in English. ‘Is the road closed?’

Mikis swiftly overtook him. The men in the pickup had levelled their shotguns at them.

‘The gentleman is British,’ he said, in Greek. ‘He asks if we can visit the village.’

‘Why?’ demanded one of the men, beetle-browed and bearded. ‘Don’t you know better than to bring tourists here?’

Mikis let his shoulders slump. ‘I’m sorry, but he insisted. He says his grandfather was here when the Germans held the island.’

The men’s expressions remained stony, but they exchanged a glance.

‘Was he sent by someone?’ the bearded villager asked.

Mavros was playing dumb, but the question put him in a dilemma. Should he lie about Waggoner providing an invitation? And if so, how could he get that across to Mikis?

The Cretan wasn’t thrown. ‘I think so,’ he replied. ‘I can’t understand the name he says.’

‘Ask him again.’

Mikis went through the process of asking Mavros in halting English for the name of the man whose writings had led him to visit Kornaria.

‘Waggoner,’ Mavros said.

‘O Lambis,’ hissed the bearded man to his sidekick.

Mavros presumed that was the cover-name Waggoner had used when he was on Crete during the war. He cursed himself for not asking the Fat Man to do those searches overnight. Outwitting Oskar Mesner had distracted him from the main case.

He nodded. ‘Lambis, that’s right,’ he said, in English.

There was a hurried conversation between the men in the first pickup and another who had come up from the one behind the Jeep.

‘All right,’ the bearded man said to Mikis. ‘You can go up to the village.’ He frowned. ‘Keep your tourist under control and don’t go beyond the houses.’

Mikis raised his shoulders. ‘It’s a dead end anyway, isn’t it?’

‘It’s certainly been that for all the invaders who tried to take us,’ the other man said, his eyes unwavering.

The pickup was manoeuvred out of the way and Mikis drove on.

‘I hope you enjoyed that demonstration of mountain hospitality,’ he said.

Mavros grunted. ‘Friendly types, aren’t they?’

‘Still sure you want to go through with this? I won’t be able to step in like I did last night. There are dozens of guys like those ones in Kornaria.’

‘I’ll keep my questions to a minimum.’

The track led down into a wide valley and ahead of them lay a surprisingly large patch of flat land covered in sheds, with a cluster of white houses in the centre. The air was clear and tinged by the chill of the snow on the peaks. It struck Mavros that this would be a very harsh place in winter.

‘See those sheds?’ Mikis asked.

‘Not for mushrooms?’

‘Correct. Don’t even think of taking photographs.’

‘Never crossed my mind.’ The only camera he had with him was in his mobile and it wouldn’t pick up much from such a distance. ‘Anyway, I don’t give a shit about them growing dope.’

Mikis glanced at him, then steered round a large pothole. ‘You say that, but it isn’t the way things work. Everything that goes on in Kornaria has some connection to the core business. And that business extends far beyond the village.’

Mavros thought about that. David Waggoner had a house up here — could the old soldier have anything to do with the narcotics trade? The mayor, Vasilios Dhrakakis, would obviously be in the business up to his neck. And what about Maria Kondos? Was the missing woman linked to it in some way too? Had she been driving Cara Parks’ car after all when the drugs gang member was killed?

They drove past a few abandoned buildings and into the village proper. It was spotless, the white houses on each side of the concrete road gleaming in the sunlight, their wooden shutters and fences freshly painted. There was obviously no shortage of water, as the bougainvilleas and oleanders were tall and healthy. Old women in black peered at the Jeep and its occupants curiously, while young women in jeans played with chubby children.

The road ended in a wide square with a large tree in the centre. It was very quiet — the men presumably in the cultivation sheds or playing cowboy in their pickups. Metal tables and chairs with wicker seats were arrayed outside a solitary kafeneion.

‘Give them a few moments,’ Mikis said. ‘They’ll have been told we were on the way.’

Sure enough, a trio of barrel-chested men in traditional garb and boots came towards the Jeep. They weren’t armed, but they hardly needed to be. Mavros had the feeling that they were being closely watched from the open windows of surrounding houses, each of which no doubt had a well-stocked gun cabinet.

‘Welcome,’ the man in the middle said, in Greek. He wore a moustache that extended horizontally across his cheeks. ‘I am the mayor, Dhrakakis is my name.’

Mikis introduced himself — he had no choice about using his real name since ‘Tsifakis’ was all over the Jeep. ‘I have brought an Englishman whose grandfather was here in the war.’

Mavros bowed extravagantly. ‘Arthur Smith,’ he said, with a tentative smile. ‘Very pleased to meet you.’

Dhrakakis eyed him diffidently and then extended a horny hand. ‘Kornaria welcomes the offspring of the brave man who fought for Crete’s freedom.’

Mikis translated for form’s sake.

The mayor turned on his heel and walked over to the kafeneion. He stopped at the most shaded table and extended his arms. ‘Please, accept our hospitality.’

Mavros nodded and smiled frequently, trying to look as foreign as possible. As he sat down, he realized what a dangerous game he was playing. These men had their code of honour and it wasn’t long since the vendetta had become less common — for all he knew, it might still be flourishing in Kornaria. Deceiving them might be very costly. Then again, he’d be off the island as soon as he found Maria Kondos and he didn’t think their reach would extend to Athens.

After glasses of raki had been consumed — Mavros pretending to choke — and coffee provided, along with slices of a dark, nutty cake, the mayor turned to him.

‘Your grandfather, what did he tell you about Kornaria?’

Mavros explained via Mikis that Ralph Smith had been a wireless operator in the mountains, spending weeks with only a pair of guards, but that he had always spoken with great pleasure of the days when they came down to Kornaria to replenish their food supplies. The villagers had been most generous, slaughtering sheep and chickens and opening casks of aged wine.

Dhrakakis nodded throughout Mikis’s presentation, a slack smile on his lips.

‘And he was part of Lambis’s group?’ he asked.

Mavros smiled broadly.

‘Ou-anggoner,’ Dhrakakis said, struggling with the English ‘w’ and ‘gg’ sounds.

‘David Waggoner,’ Mavros said, nodding vigorously. ‘I have read about him, but my grandfather didn’t say if he was attached to his unit.’

The mayor raised a shaggy eyebrow. ‘Lambis was in command of all the British in this area,’ he said firmly.

‘Well, then, my grandfather was with him,’ Mavros relayed back.

‘How was he called, your grandfather? He still lives?’

Mavros shook his head. ‘He died last year.’

Mikis’s translation brought exclamations of grief and sympathy. Again, Mavros felt bad about deceiving them. Then he remembered Dhrakakis’s voice on the telephone — he definitely knew Maria Kondos and had been concerned by mention of her name.

‘How was he called?’ the mayor repeated.

Mavros looked confused and then gave the impression of understanding. ‘Ah, you mean his cover-name? Yes, he told me it was Panos.’

Dhrakakis, who looked like he was in his late fifties, shook his head. ‘I have learned from the old ones of all the British and New Zealand fighters. No one ever mentioned any Panos.’

A heavy silence fell. Mavros considered and then decided to take another risk.

‘My grandfather mentioned a family he stayed with, they were very good to him. I can’t quite remember the name. . Kond. . there were more letters. . Kondo-something. .’

Mikis translated, with a dubious look on his face.

The three men in black leaned together and started talking in low voices. Mavros glanced at Mikis and then looked around the square, as if enchanted by the picture of rustic simplicity.

‘There was the Kondoyannis family,’ the kafeneion owner said, from the doorway. ‘They moved to America in the Fifties. There are none of them left here.’ He was given very heavy stares from his co-villagers.

‘How sad,’ Mavros said, realizing a hot piece of information had dropped into his lap and dissembling as best he could. ‘Do none of them ever come back?’ The return of Greeks who had made good abroad was a feature of Greek popular culture — they made elementary mistakes with the language, wore expensive clothes and threw money at their dirt-poor relatives as if it were feeding time at the zoo.

Dhrakakis was staring at him. Mavros had done what he could to change his voice from the one that the mayor had heard on the phone, but even if he had succeeded in fooling him on that count, all bets were off now he had heard what could be the vital name.

‘Perhaps I made a mistake,’ he said, looking at Mikis. ‘Are there any villages with a similar name?’

It wasn’t much of an escape plan, but Mikis did what he could.

‘Well, there’s Koulouridhiana and. . Kambanos and Koudhouriana. .’

Mavros asked for the last one to be repeated. ‘I don’t know, maybe that was what Grandpa said. He was quite vague in his last years.’

Mikis got up and extended his hand. ‘I’m very sorry to have brought this man to your village under false pretences.’ He was being deliberately over-respectful, which impressed Mavros. The young Cretan was turning out to be a useful associate.

Dhrakakis regarded Mavros with ill-disguised contempt. ‘The English today have become women,’ he said. ‘Take him to a barber, young Tsifaki.’

Mikis smiled. ‘I will.’

The appropriate farewells were made and they made it back to the Jeep. One of the mayor’s henchmen was already speaking on a walkie-talkie, alerting the guards to let them pass, Mavros hoped.

‘I hope you think that was worth it,’ Mikis said, as he drove out of the village.

‘It was. I have a name I can work with — Kondoyannis.’

‘May it bring you much joy.’ Mikis waved at the men in the pickup. ‘Christ and the Holy Mother, that was nerve-wracking. And it’s all right for you, back in Athens shortly. They can find me easily enough.’

‘Sorry about that. Anyway, there’s no reason they should come after you.’

‘Is that right? What if Dhrakakis describes the English visitor to David Waggoner?’

Mavros looked out at the sparsely covered terrain. The sea and the thick tranche of cultivated land alongside it were visible in the distance.

‘You’re right,’ he agreed. ‘That would not be ideal. Let’s hope that Waggoner’s too busy with the film to come up to the village for a while.’

‘It only takes a phone call.’

Mavros was getting irritated by Mikis being right all the time. ‘For your information, I’m not an Englishman. I’m half-Scottish.’

Mikis shook his head. ‘As if that makes any difference.’

In the context of heavily armed Cretan dope-producers, Mavros had to admit he was right. Now didn’t seem the right time to ask how often vendettas occurred on the Great Island these days.

About ten minutes out of the village, the track took a bend round a large rock. There was a line of ancient olive trees, their trunks as wrinkled as a dinosaur’s legs and their pale leaves almost touching the ground. It was then that Mavros saw the woman, stepping quickly down the hill.

‘Stop!’ he shouted, opening his door before Mikis brought the Jeep to a halt. He ran through the treeline and towards the woman, whose black hair flew out behind her as she started to stumble on more quickly. ‘Stop!’ he repeated, in English.

As he got closer, he realized her feet were bare and bleeding. She was wearing a soiled white blouse and a pair of black jeans that were badly stained with earth or something worse. Although he had caught only glimpses of her face, he was sure who she was.

‘My name’s Mavros, Maria,’ he called. ‘Cara Parks sent me to look for you.’

The woman slowed and then stopped completely, dropping to her knees and starting to sob.

Mavros reduced his own pace and approached with caution. ‘Cara’s been very worried about you.’

She turned to him, her face soaked with tears and her eyes wide. There was no doubt about her identity from the photograph he had been given, but she was thinner and there were heavy lines on her forehead and around her eyes. He managed to catch her before she toppled forward.

‘Steady,’ he said, holding her head to his chest. ‘You’re safe now.’ He glanced over his shoulder and saw that Mikis had driven the Jeep as close as he could. They needed to get Maria into the car and away from the stony hillside at speed.

‘Come on,’ he said, ‘there’s transport waiting.’

She tried to pull away from him, whimpering.

‘Don’t worry, we’re not going back to Kornaria,’ he said. ‘Is that where you’ve come from?’

The woman’s entire body was shaking and she didn’t seem to be able to speak.

Mikis arrived. ‘Is it her?’ he said, in Greek.

Mavros nodded, unsure whether she understood the language. ‘She’s in a bad way. Where’s the nearest hospital?’

‘There are clinics in the larger villages, but the best thing would be to get her to Chania.’

‘OK. You realize that we may be pursued. It looks like she’s been held captive — she has no shoes or belt — and somehow got free. Dhrakakis had her after all.’

‘Whatever you say. We need to move.’

They got the woman into the Jeep, Mavros keeping his arm round her when they were inside. She was shivering, but she seemed to be less terrified. She wouldn’t answer any of his questions, only gulping water from a bottle and chewing biscuits that the Cretan produced from beneath his seat.

Mavros was looking at the map. ‘There seems to be a choice of three roads at Karies.’

‘One of them’s only fit for goats and suicidal bikers.’

‘So which one’s quicker?’

‘The right turn that takes us down below Theriso.’ Mikis glanced at him. ‘The sensible thing to do would be to hole up somewhere and see if any tough guys come past.’

Mavros looked at Maria Kondos. She was shaking violently again and her breath was coming in rapid gasps. ‘No, this woman needs medical care. You’ll have to drive like the wind.’

The driver grinned. ‘That can happen. You’d better put your belts on.’ He did the same and then upped the revs substantially. He also made a call on his mobile phone.

‘Reinforcements?’ Mavros asked when he’d finished.

‘My cousin and a couple of his mates. We work out together. One of them’s the All-Crete heavyweight wrestling champion. They’ll come to meet us.’

‘Wrestling won’t be much help against shotguns.’

‘Don’t be too sure. Those arseholes won’t fire at us in broad daylight when we’re down in the populated areas.’ He laughed hollowly. ‘They’ll wait till dark.’

‘Great.’ Mavros looked at the woman. Her tears had soaked his shirt and were running like an in-car waterfall off the leather jacket he’d put around her. ‘Maria? Tell me what happened. It might make things easier when it comes to keeping you safe.’

She gave him a brief glance and then looked away. Ahead, there were more trees and the hillside was less bleak. They had passed a couple of villages. Mikis was driving as if he was in a rally, cornering with skill and accelerating past slow-moving farm vehicles when the road allowed.

‘Under half an hour now,’ he said, casting an eye in the mirror. ‘Oh-oh, we’ve got company,’ he said, in Greek. ‘The pickup with the two hard men in the back.’

Maria Kondos clearly understood as she shrank down in the seat, her upper body jerking back and forward so rapidly that Mavros thought she was having a fit. After a few minutes, when it became clear that the Kornariates weren’t gaining on the Jeep, she began to calm down.

‘You got any weapons?’ Mavros asked, in a low voice.

Mikis felt under his seat again. ‘A hunting knife.’ He handed over a sheathed blade not much smaller than a machete. ‘And a Colt 45 automatic.’ He kept that hidden.

‘You’re kidding,’ Mavros said, in amazement. ‘What if the cops caught you with that?’

The Cretan shrugged. ‘My old man knows people. It’s not like I ever use it, except on deserted beaches for practice.’

Mavros clung on to Maria with one arm and clutched the side of his seat with the other hand as the Jeep took a bend at high speed. ‘I don’t suppose your friends have similar arsenals?’

Mikis smiled. ‘I told them to bring what they could.’ He glanced in the mirror. ‘We should be all right. Those dope-heads can’t drive for shit.’

Then the nearside front tyre burst and they slewed all over the road, finally coming to a stop centimetres from a low stone wall. There was no sign of habitation nearby.

‘Oh shit,’ said Mikis, with surprising equanimity. ‘Everyone out.’

They opened the doors and clambered over the drystone wall, Maria Kondos wailing hopelessly. Mavros got her to lie down and put his jacket over her head and shoulders, then asked her to be quiet. Mikis handed him the knife, having slipped off the sheath.

‘You ever used one of these?’ he asked.

‘I’ve never even seen one like that. Maybe it’s better if I have the pistol. I’ve occasionally fired one of those.’

‘Occasionally isn’t going to get us far. Listen, you stay here. I’m going to work my way back up the road. The villagers are bound to stop some distance away and advance on foot, after splitting up. That’ll give me some chance to pick them off.’

‘You’re going to shoot to kill?’ Mavros asked, his stomach clenching.

‘If necessary. You think they won’t? They want the woman, though, not us. Stay next to her with the knife hidden. That way you might take one of them with you when they get close — if I don’t manage to deal with them all.’ He squeezed Mavros’s knee and headed up the slope, keeping below the wall.

‘Keep calm, Maria,’ Mavros said, in a low voice. ‘It’ll be all right, you’ll see.’

He couldn’t imagine a situation further from ‘all right’, but at least Mikis was looking out for them. He wondered how long it would take his friends to show up.

In the distance, he heard the sound of brakes being applied hard, then words which he didn’t catch. Then there was a shout and the sound of a shotgun being discharged. It was rapidly followed by the thunderous boom of Mikis’s pistol.

Mavros kept Maria Kondos’s head shielded by his arms.

A few minutes later he heard heavy steps and then Mikis appeared further up the wall, carrying a shotgun as well as his Colt. He was with them in seconds.

‘You didn’t kill him?’ Mavros said.

‘Didn’t even hit him. He dropped his weapon and took off up the hillside. The problem now is his two friends. They split up and disappeared into the vegetation.’

He looked around. ‘I’m going to stalk the one on this side of the road. The other, we’ll have to take our chances with.’ He crawled off under the trees.

Mavros had rarely felt so helpless. He had to stay with Maria — there was no knowing what she’d do if he left her — and all he had was a king-size carving knife. It was too large to throw, not that he had any experience of that. He rubbed his back where the sharp-edged stones were jagging into it, and suddenly had a thought. He had never been much use at sport, finding team discipline hard to handle. The only exercise he’d done when he was growing up in Athens was track and field. He’d been a decent long jumper and a passable discus thrower, but his best event — oddly, given his slim build — had been the shot putt. He carefully extracted several stones from the upper part of the wall and heaped them by his leg. If he heard anyone approaching across the road, they’d get an unwelcome surprise — assuming they didn’t manage to fire first.

There was a double shotgun discharge over in the middle distance and then a single shot from the Colt. His immediately felt his spirits rise. Two down and one to go. Maybe he’d take the hint and slip away like his friend. Then he realized how unlikely that was. A Cretan villager was unlikely to leave his comrades in arms and they would regroup. Besides, the mayor of Kornaria had probably sent backup.

There was the scrape of a boot on the other side of the road. Mavros got to his knees, selecting the most rounded of the stones he’d piled up. He heard cautious steps approaching the Jeep. After a few seconds, they moved closer.

Mavros knew he would have only one chance — if he was quick, he would succeed in dropping behind the wall after he let loose. Then, if the mountain man kept coming, he’d have time to grab the knife — not that he expected it to save them.

Maria Kondos had realized how dangerous the situation was and was lying mute beneath the leather jacket. He wondered where Mikis was. Maybe he’d only got the shot off after being hit by one or both shotgun blasts. This was down to Mavros. Niki and the Fat Man came into this mind unexpectedly and he found himself wishing he was with them in the safety of his mother’s apartment.

Then the sound of leather-soled boots came much closer. He took a deep breath as he took a firm grip on the stone, fitting it between his chest and shoulder and spreading his feet in a squat. There would be no chance of a swivel. Then he stood up as quickly as he could, taking a mark on the startled villager’s head and cast the stone.

It was a direct hit on the man’s forehead and he collapsed like Goliath before David.

‘Sweet move,’ said Mikis, from behind him. The Colt was in his belt and he was holding a fancy over-and-under shotgun and a pair of almost full bandoliers in his hands. ‘The second one fell over after I fired and will soon wake up with a very sore head. What about yours?’

Mavros hurdled the wall and grabbed the man’s wrist, after kicking away the shotgun. It was slow but regular. There was a lot of blood coming from the hairline.

‘No, just knocked-’

The sound of screeching brakes rendered his words inaudible. He watched as a trio of heavily armed men got out of a Range Rover.

Mikis waved to them. ‘You’re too late, but let’s get that tyre changed before the rest of the fuckers arrive.’

Mavros watched as that feat was accomplished in a few minutes. Then he escorted Maria Kondos to the Jeep. She was still silent, but more in control of herself.

He looked over his shoulder as Mikis drove on. The Range Rover was behind them and he didn’t think any men from Kornaria would get past Mikis’s friends.

He looked at his watch. It was only one p.m., even though the day seemed to have been going on forever. He’d still have time to watch the old planes being filmed at Maleme, though now he’d had his own experience of battle in Crete he wasn’t too excited by that prospect.

Maria Kondos had fallen asleep.