Jack Higgins (10 page)

As we slowed to negotiate the gate, he came to life and staggered to his feet. I nudged Ampoulides in the side and he leaned out of the cab for his face to be seen.

It was enough. The sentry called something and waved and Spiro drove across the dark fort towards the door at the bottom of the tower over which another hurricane lamp hung. He turned the Bedford back towards the gate, ready for a quick exit, braked to a halt and left the engine running.

We'd been through what was to happen, in theory at least, half a dozen times, but I still had my doubts about Ampoulides.

I said, “If there's a sentry up there, you'd better make it good for all our sakes. If anything goes wrong, you'll be the first to go. I'm warning you.”

Perhaps it was a miscalculation, the final straw that pushed him towards the course of action he chose, although I suspect that he expected a bullet in the head whatever happened for that is exactly what he would have given me.

In any event, we moved towards the door, myself on one side of him and Dawson on the other and Spiro waited by the truck. I opened the door gently and light drifted into the dark passage from the hurricane lamp.

It was as quiet as the grave. Dawson slipped inside
and flattened himself against the wall, his Schmeisser covering the door to the guardroom on the left.

The flight of stone steps opposite was wider than I had expected and turned to the right some way up, light flickering on the rough wall, presumably from another lamp on the landing outside the general's cell.

I said to Ampoulides in a whisper, “All right, up we go.”

He took a light, hesitant step forward, spun round and jumped out through the door and ran for it. He didn't stand a chance for Spiro had been waiting, probably hoping he would do exactly that. There are twenty-eight rounds in a Schmeisser's detachable magazine and I think Spiro must have pumped the lot into Ampoulides, driving him back towards the entrance with terrible force.

There was a sudden shout inside the guardroom, a chair went over with a crash.

“They're all yours,” I said to Dawson. “I'll get Tharakos.”

I went up the steps on the run and reached the corner at the same moment a burly peasant appeared on the way down. He lurched into me with a cry of dismay, an old Lee Enfield rifle clutched to his chest, and I rammed the muzzle of my Thompson into his belly and blew him away from me with a short burst.

The door opened in the passage below and whoever emerged walked straight into a burst of fire from Dawson's Schmeisser. I kept on going round the turn in the staircase and found myself on a small stone landing.

There was a battered oak door opposite, heavily strengthened with bands of iron. In the light of the hurricane lantern hanging from a hook in the wall, I saw that it was held in place by two great iron bolts. I eased
them back quietly and kicked the door open.

There was heavy firing downstairs now, but up there, it was calm and still and nothing moved in the darkness of the cell. I took down the hurricane lamp and stepped inside.

“General Tharakos? I've come to get you out.”

He emerged from the darkness like some pale despairing ghost, a man whom I knew to be forty-nine years of age and who looked seventy. He shambled forward, reached out and clutched at the front of my coat.

“Are you all right? Can you walk?” I said.

He moaned horribly, tightening his grip on my jacket, then opened his mouth and pointed inside.

The bastards had cut out his tongue.

 

As I got him to the turn of the staircase, there was what seemed like a considerable explosion and the whole damned tower seemed to shake, dust rising everywhere in clouds. It was Dawson who, as I learned later, had thrown two grenades in through the door of the guardroom one after the other to finish the business off.

He rose to meet me as I came down the stairs, supporting Tharakos with one hand. Dawson grabbed him by the other arm and we stumbled to the door.

Spiro was waiting at the tail of the Bedford, his Schmeisser ready. “Get behind the wheel. Let's get out of here,” I said, and Dawson and I heaved the general up and over the tailboard and dumped him inside.

Dawson climbed over after him and Spiro slung his Schmeisser over his shoulder and ran to the cab of the Bedford. I was no more than a couple of yards away as he started to climb up behind the wheel. He never made
it because a single, well-placed rifle shot drilled into the base of his skull, killing him instantly.

I loosed off a great rolling burst into the shadows on the far side of the square from where that shot had come, pulled Spiro's body back out of the cab and scrambled up behind the wheel.

As we started to roll, the shooting increased considerably, lights flashing on and off in the darkness like some macabre firework display. Bullets thudded into the body-work of the Bedford, ripped through the canvas, for we presented a target as big as the proverbial barn door.

The arched gateway loomed out of the night and the sentry appeared dead in the centre, rifle levelled. I put down my head and increased speed. The windscreen shattered, showering me with glass. There was a sudden jolt, a desperate cry and we were through and darkness was our friend.

 

We were about a quarter of a mile from the farm when the engine coughed asthmatically and died on me. I could smell the petrol as soon as I jumped down and went to the rear.

Dawson dropped the tailgate. “I thought she caught a few down there,” he said. “What happens now?”

“We walk,” I said. “Run, if possible. If those characters back there get their hands on you, they'll roast you alive.”

“I can believe anything after tonight,” he said. “But I'd say we'll be lucky if we get the general to move more than a hundred yards under his own steam, sir. I don't
know what they did to him back there, but it must have been bad.”

“They cut out his tongue for a start,” I said. “And I hope that pleasant item of news puts an edge on you.”

And it did, for he responded magnificently to the challenge of the hour that followed. He had been absolutely right about the general. He was virtually a deadweight and after the first few yards, we had to carry him between us. When that didn't prove any more satisfactory, we took turns at carrying him on our backs, moving at a steady jog-trot all the time.

I had never felt so grateful for the extreme physical fitness that was a product of commando training and yet, when I turned into the farmyard, Tharakos across my shoulders apparently unconscious, I felt almost at the point of collapse.

I laid him down none too gently and said to Dawson, “A cart—any kind of handcart. There must be one around here somewhere. I'll see to Johnson.”

The room, when I lit the lamp, was exactly as I had left it. A bloody shambles, the smell of death everywhere, and it had touched Johnson also with its dark hand, for when I dropped to examine him, I saw at once that he had been dead for an hour at least, his face already cold.

The door swung open with a crash and Dawson appeared. “I've found a cart, sir, and there's somebody coming. I heard voices down the track.”

“Get Tharakos on the cart and move out,” I said, “I'll catch up with you.”

He appeared to hesitate. “Sergeant Johnson, sir, we're leaving him?”

“I'll see to Sergeant Johnson. Now get the hell out of here.”

There was lamp oil in a five-gallon drum in the back room and I emptied it across the floor, the bodies themselves. It was Johnson I was thinking of. We'd soldiered together for a long time now and I owed him something, one Marine to another. I couldn't take him with me, but I was damned if I was going to leave him to the bunch who were on their way here looking for us.

When I tossed the lighted lamp into the room from the doorway, it exploded like a bomb and I turned and ran across the yard and followed Dawson along the narrow track. I caught up with him within a few yards and took one handle of the cart and we put our backs to it.

When we reached the shoulder of the mountain, we paused to look back. The farm was burning well now, a beacon in the night, and I wondered what they were thinking on the bridges of those ships out there. I could see figures, a dozen, possibly more, black outlines against the flames, but no one saw us, or at least there was no shooting.

“A Viking's funeral,” Dawson said softly.

“Something like that. Now let's get out of here.”

 

The rest was mainly anti-climax. We pushed the cart to the edge of the cliffs above Thrassos Bay and got General Tharakos down to the beach between us, although it was a hell of a struggle and he remained unconscious for most of the time.

The sea was calmer now which helped when we put out in the dinghy, for the paddles had been lost in the upset on the way in and we had to make do with our
hands and a piece of driftwood Dawson found on the shoreline.

We were sighted by an M.T.B. which picked us up just after dawn and radioed the news at once to the destroyer that the admiral in charge of the task force was using as his flagship. They also reported on the general's condition which explained what started to happen within a matter of minutes.

I went out on deck and found young Dawson standing at the rail in a duffle coat someone had loaned him.

“How are you doing?” I said.

“All in a day's work, sir.”

I suppose he thought I expected that kind of remark. In any case, he tried to smile and started to cry helplessly instead. I put an arm around his shoulders and we stood there together at the rail. The destroyers of the task force, line astern, opened up with their big guns and started to blow the island of Pelos out of existence.

Dicky Dawson. Sergeant Major Richard Emmet Dawson, D.C.M., shot in the back by an E.O.K.A. gunman while shopping with his wife in Nicosia, January 1956
.

Instantaneous recall is the psychologist's term for it, just like the events of a lifetime flitting through a drowning man's mind in a matter of seconds. It took something of an effort to bring me back to reality. To the present that was the sumptuous lounge of the
Firebird
. To Sara Hamilton and Aleko.

I turned to her and said, “All right, I'll buy it. What's it all about?”

“He'd like you to do a repeat performance. For money this time.”

“Twenty-five thousand dollars, Captain Savage,” Aleko said calmly. “Paid into a Geneva account.”

It was beginning to take on all the qualities of a privileged nightmare. He produced the Jameson, one eyebrow raised, and I pushed my glass across.

“I think I'd better,” I said.

 

“May I start by asking what your attitude is towards the present regime in Greece, Captain Savage?”

It was captain all the way now
. We had moved to a room next to the saloon that he obviously used for business judging by the Queen Anne desk and the filing cabinet and telephone.

“I don't have one,” I said. “Politics don't interest me. I've had a bellyful or hadn't you noticed? So you've got a military junta running things and they don't like the mini skirt. I've been in worse places than Greece, believe me.”

“Political prisoners by the thousand, the educational system used as a weapon to indoctrinate children, the Left almost stamped out of existence. Come now, Captain Savage, does this sound like the home of democracy?”

“Nothing is ever that simple,” I said. “I was here during the civil war, remember. The worst things I've seen anywhere in war I saw in Macedonia when I was with our military mission. I've seen whole villages wiped out by the Communists—women, children, even the bloody animals. People don't forget that kind of thing.”

“So, you are a fascist by persuasion?”

Which was such a stupid remark that it was hardly worth answering, but I tried.

“I'm John Henry Savage—me, no one else,” I said. “I don't take sides.”

And as always with him, he did the unexpected. He smiled, looking extremely satisfied. “Excellent, Captain Savage, a first-rate mercenary who knows what he's about is worth ten idealists any day of the week.”

Sara sprawled in the big leather chair in the corner, legs outstretched, head back. She was smoking, eyes closed, as relaxed as a black cat and yet alert to everything that was said. Her eyes gleamed for a moment beneath the dark lashes, an unspoken communication. When I turned, Aleko was watching me, that strange, set look on his face.

“I don't think I've met a revolutionary millionaire before,” I said. “Who are you working for? The D.D.?”

“The Democratic Defence are not having a great deal of success,” he said, “and the Patriotic Front aren't doing too well either. No, I represent a rather more powerful organisation. Many are men like myself. Their names would surprise you. Industrialists, shipping magnates, politicians, artists. Men who are leaders in various walks of life. All brought together in the common cause. The fight for democracy in my unhappy country.”

Words, empty words mouthed by fanatics on both sides while the ordinary people in the middle got squeezed
.

“An interesting list,” I said. “Greek military intelligence would give a lot to get hold of it, if it existed.”

He straightened in his chair, his face suddenly rather pale. “But it does, Captain Savage, which is the purpose of the exercise, as they say.”

And now it
was
getting interesting. There was a large map of the Eastern Mediterranean on the wall behind him. He stood up and turned to it.

“About four weeks ago there was a meeting of certain interested parties at a village near Pilos in the Peloponnese. As a result of that meeting, a list of over two hundred prominent men hostile to the present regime was compiled. A list which the headquarters of the organi
sation, which operates from Crete, needed badly if they were to be able to plan the overthrow of the present government with any certainty. The list was entrusted to a special courier, a man named Apostolidis, who carried it in a briefcase chained to his wrist. He was flown out by night from a private airstrip near Pilos. The plane was a Piper Aztec and the pilot a young man named Andreas Pavlo.”

“The briefcase doesn't sound much of an idea to me,” I said. “I'd have thought they could have done better than that.”

“An explosive device in the lock ensured its destruction if the wrong person attempted to open it.”

“Along with Apostolidis?”

“He was what one would term a dedicated revolutionary.”

“I see. So he didn't make it?”

“Unfortunately the Aztec had engine trouble in a heavy rainstorm somewhere off the coast of Crete. It seems that Apostolidis was either killed or knocked unconscious in the crash. In any event the plane sank almost immediately and he was still inside the cabin. Pavlo only just managed to get out himself.”

“Then what happened?”

“He drifted round in a dinghy for a couple of days which didn't help his general condition. He was finally picked up by a fishing boat which took him into the nearest island at once. He was delirious and apparently dying.”

“Which brought the police into it?”

“Unfortunately for Pavlo there isn't a police station in Greece which doesn't have a poster on him. They've been snapping at his heels for a year or more now.”

“And down came the bright boys from Athens in a hurry? Where is he now?”

“They took him to the political prison on Sinos. There is a small hospital there.”

“And do they know what he was up to? About Apostolidis down there in the Aztec off Crete somewhere with that briefcase chained to his wrist?”

“Not yet.” He shook his head. “That will come later when they start to squeeze him. I understand it was touch and go for a while. He almost died on them. A broken arm, smashed ribs, a punctured lung.”

I nodded slowly, thinking about it all very carefully. “One thing I really don't understand. How did you manage to find out in such detail what happened when the plane went down?”

He smiled gently. “The mate of the fishing boat that picked him up after his two days in that dinghy. Pavlo had said a great deal in his delirium in the man's hearing—things which he had kept to himself.”

“Why?”

“Partly out of fear, I suppose. Like most ordinary people he just didn't want to be involved in this kind of thing.”

“And you persuaded him to change his mind?”

“For a consideration.”

“And now you want me to get Pavlo out?”

He nodded eagerly. “I have certain contacts on Sinos. Naturally, I can't disclose who they are even to you, but it means that I can furnish any necessary information. I have maps, plans. I can show you exactly where Pavlo is, who is guarding him.”

He opened a door in his desk and started to take out
a rolled-up map. I said, “Don't bother, I don't want to see it.”

There was genuine shock on his face as if he realised at once that I really meant it and his American accent slipped a little, the Greek peasant poking through.

“But compared to the Pelos affair this would be a picnic.”

“You're a businessman, Aleko,” I said. “And unless I miss my guess, you got where you are today by following one golden rule. Buy cheap, sell dear. If you're willing to offer me twenty-five thousand to go in after Pavlo, then it's worth a lot more than that and if it is, then it's too damned hot for me.”

He leaned across, hands flat on his desk, frowning at me. “All right. I'll make it thirty thousand.”

“Apparently you didn't get the message,” I said. “I'm just not interested. I've got my health and the boat. That's a whole lot better than being dead.”

He gave a sudden, sharp laugh as if making a discovery. “By God, I see it now, Savage. You've lost your nerve.”

“That's it exactly,” I said cheerfully. “Frightened to death.”

Sara stood up and yawned. “You know there are times when you're four different kinds of a fool, Dimitri. Now can we eat, please?”

“Not me,” I said. “I've suddenly lost my appetite for the finer things.”

“All right,” she said. “Give me five minutes to change and I'll meet you on deck. You can show me the sights.”

She went out quickly and Aleko stood glaring at me, his face whiter than ever, a muscle working in his right cheek. I wondered for a moment whether he intended
taking a swing at me, an unhealthy prospect when you considered the sheer size of the man. I turned and started into the saloon. He called my name and appeared in the doorway behind me when I was half-way across the floor.

“You're wasting your time, Savage. She isn't for you.”

I turned to face him. “Your opinion, not hers.”

I started to turn away again. He said, “She's dying on her feet, Savage. A little bit more each day.”

“Aren't we all?”

I tried to sound flippant, but the coldness was there in my belly and my heart began to pound and it was going to happen, whether I liked it or not, whatever it was he was going to tell me, the thing that would explain so much that had bothered me about her.

“Chronic leukaemia,” he said and there was a vindictiveness in his voice as if he must hurt, had to cut through at all costs. “Does that satisfy you?”

I struck out like a child does in anger and frustration at the nearest thing. My fist grazed his right cheek, he staggered back against the bar and stayed there, staring at me wildly, making no attempt to return the blow. I turned and walked out.

 

It was out of this world down there on the beach as darkness fell, a full moon lighting the sky, more stars scattered across it than I had ever seen before. A night when it was good to be alive.

The very thought was a knife in the heart and I glanced at her briefly. She had changed into a linen skirt and white sweater and had tied her hair back with a ribbon. It was the first time I'd seen her really look her
age and suddenly, the whole thing, the sheer blind pity of it, swelled up inside, threatening to choke me.

I lit a cigarette hurriedly, offered her one as an afterthought. She refused and we moved on past the boats, leaving the harbour behind, following the white strip of sand leading towards the cliffs.

“You still haven't told me your interest in all that back there,” I said, “or are you simply trying to be a latter-day Lord Byron?”

She shook her head. “Dimitri took me into his confidence, that's all. I've known what he was up to for some time now. All this political nonsense of his. He wanted my opinion about you—about how I thought you'd react to his offer.”

“Did you tell him?”

“Pretty accurately.” She laughed. “I didn't think you'd be hungry enough and I was right.”

“So you don't think I'm just too scared?”

“You'd be a fool if you weren't. Like you said, you've got your health and the boat and that's a whole lot better than being dead.”

“He'll hang himself,” I said. “You know that, don't you? Sooner or later they'll catch up with him.”

“I know and I sometimes think he does. God knows why he's doing it. Something that happened in his youth, I think. He lived in a village in the Peloponnese in the mountains. His mother and father and two sisters died in the fighting when the soldiers came. He won't talk about it, but he has this thing about the military.”

She was surprisingly cheerful and took off her sandals to walk in the shallows. “But you—you surprise me, Jack Savage. Whoever heard of an Irishman who wasn't interested in politics.”

“They killed my father,” I said. “He lived and breathed for Ireland. When he was sixteen he was out in the Easter Rising. Three years later he was carrying a gun for Michael Collins. By the time he was twenty-one he'd lost count of the men he'd killed and all for the Cause. Always the Cause.”

“How did he die?”

“He was a Republican to the last. Fought for the I.R.A. in the Civil War after your lot were kicked out. Refused to surrender even when De Valera called it a day. He spent his whole life on the run one way or another. They caught him at my mother's place. She had this farm near Sligo that her uncle left her. The officers in charge of the soldiers were all men who'd fought alongside him over the years.”

“And they killed him?”

“He wouldn't stay inside because of my mother and the children. I was a babe in arms at the time. Anyway out he went a gun in each hand, shouting “‘Up the Republic.'” They wanted to take him alive. There were young men there to whom he'd been a name over the years, a legend, but he was too good with a gun thanks to Mick Collins. Shot two of them stone dead so they emptied a Lewis gun into him.”