"You mean you really want to die, too. You want to take the world with you into darkness, with your rotten mind and body. But who are you to cleanse the world?" Durell asked. "Do you think the survivors will build better on the ruins? If Peiping says this, you are not only their lackey, but a fool."
Something flickered in the other's dead eyes. "I serve only my convictions, and of convictions, I have none. Does this seem odd? I serve nothing, you see. I wish for nothing. I can see nothing in the future."
"You're blind. I feel sorry for you."
"You are in no position to pity me."
"And the girl?" Durell asked. "Ursula can't help you. Her only crime was to seek a revenge that's turned bitter for her."
"But she will be my lever to make you talk, if you are stubborn. You will have your chance to scream your plans to me. But not for long, you understand. We are pressed for time. You have one hour, or we turn our attention to the girl." Dinov paused. "Tell me where to find Stephanes. Tell me what you ordered him to do. And how he means to do it."
Durell was silent.
Dinov said: "You will have an hour's entertainment, then."
He was half carried and dragged through the deserted rooms of the Pollini villa, with its statuary and marble halls. Moonlight glimmered through the tall windows. There was a graceful stairway spiraling up, and a mean flight of steps going down into a chilly cellar. Beneath this was another cellar, the ceiling vaulted in old Roman brick. His eyes followed the foundation of old Roman ruins on which the villa had been built, as the shepherd's flashlight played erratically on the walls.
Dinov spoke from the shadows. "No one can hear you down here, except the girl. She is near enough to hear you scream."
"How did you know of this place?"
Dinov laughed, a sound of harsh rust and gall. "You ask many questions, but our turn comes for our own. Pollini and I were old friends. He did not know what I was. Lisette was my introduction to Venetian society. The old man was gullible, easy to betray. He thought I was his dearest ally."
"And you killed him?"
"Ah, no, it was Shkoeder, in a foolish panic, because Pollini tried to reach your friend, poor Harris. Shkoeder's only thought was for the gold, which no one will ever find, and, in a panic lest Pollini end his hope, he stabbed the old gentleman."
"But you did the other killings."
Dinov nodded. "They were all necessary."
"And you'll kill me, too. You give me no reason to talk."
"Pain is a great persuader. The mind refuses to admit death. Hope remains even when the body is broken and dying. I will leave you to such persuasion."
He tried to count the bricks in the vaulted ceiling when the shepherd worked on him. Pain tore through him with the red, blinding winds of a storm. He accepted it, bit down on it, lived in it and became one with it. When his vision cleared, he saw the cruel enjoyment in the thepherd's small eyes, the sweat of his exertion, the growing frustration in the savage mouth that reviled him. Now and then he was revived with a bucket of sea water thrown over him. He tried to estimate the passing time. What was it Ursula had said? We will buy time with our bodies, our pain. Each passing moment helped to defeat Dinov. In the intervals when he was questioned, he tried to keep his mind empty except for the pain. The pain was an ally, and it provided a wall through which there could be no communication with his enemies.
Then he heard the girl screaming.
He swam out of a red darkness and knew his bonds had been cut to permit his torturer to manipulate him more freely. He lay still and blind. He felt cold. His teeth chattered. A cold, damp wind blew upon him. He thought he heard the sound of the sea. He decided it was the thud of his erratic heart.
Ursula screamed again. When he knew its source, he bit back a groan of despair. To what agony had he persuaded her to submit? He drowned in a tidal wave of panic. He opened his eyes, but he could not see. Was he blind? Gradually the swimming, pulsing pattern became' vaulted bricks, mossy, trickling with moisture. Roman bricks, yes. The old cellars under Pollings villa. He had almost forgotten it, in his journey into pain. He found it possible to raise himself on one elbow. They had torn off his shirt, his shoes. His fingers were numb, caked with blood. They did not respond as he wished. He saw the marks of knives and blood on his body. He tried his right hand. That was better. His shoulder felt wrenched from his socket when he moved his arm, but he knew it was all right. He sat up carefully.
She screamed.
They had left him in what had been a wine cellar; there were huge casks against the brick wall. They assumed there was time before he recovered again. He felt a lurching lift of hope. He thought of the third alternative he had given Ursula.
He would kill Dinov.
He tried to stand, and fell, and tried again, and fell again. The sound of his breathing was like the harsh panting of a desperate animal. Well, this was what they had made of him, in so short a time. He had requested it. He had bought a few precious hours with it. Perhaps it wasn't worth it. He tasted anger, and it was good, harsh and salt and hot on his tongue. The desire to kill erased everything he had ever been. He licked his swollen lips. He tried to stifle his breathing, cunningly, so they would not hear him. At one end of the cellar a massive door stood bolted against him. He made his way there across a field of pain, on legs that threatened to collapse. The bolt was too heavy for him. They had done too much to him; he had waited too long.
He saw another arched doorway, and it was from here that he now heard an impatient murmuring, a moan, a sound unlike anything he had ever heard before. What was the value of time? Could its price be measured in a girl's anguish and horror? The world slept, unsuspecting. Perhaps in Washington and Moscow a few men were awake, wondering, fearful of their valid judgments. But who would know truth from terror? The world was spinning to the edge of an awful darkness.
Cool, salt wind touched his face. He drew a deep breath as he paused in the archway and saw a short tunnel that opened on a glimpse of the beach, a glimmer of moonlit sea. He recoiled in suspicion. It was a trick, to lift him in hope in order to crush him in defeat. Well, if they handed him a lever, he might turn its weight against them. He breathed with difficulty. He did not hear anything from Ursula now.
He needed a weapon, and he needed strength.
He saw that his error lay not in the general scheme to delay Dinov here, but in failing to accept his own weakness in regard to the girl. Her pain affected him much worse than his own. He could not permit it. His training had been meant to harden him for sacrifice, to the loss of comrades or friends. But he was not as fine a weapon as he was meant to be. Yet he felt a curious hope, since he was not without a soul, as Ursula had charged him, back in Venice.
He might lose everything now; but he would not lose his humanity. To do so would be to become what Dinov was.
The sea wind touched him like a cool shower. The tunnel led onto the moonlit beach. The yacht floated darkly offshore. He sank to his knees on the cold sand and bowed his head. His hands trembled when he examined them. They had taken his weapons; he had nothing left, and only a failing strength he could not trust. He looked about for help. He had emerged through a wooden door that was ajar to the sea wind, a door with a round top cleverly fitted into the stones composing a sea wall. Above was a marble balustrade and a row of the Kerkyran beehive urns. Steps led to this loggia. He heard grating footsteps there, heard the scratch and hiss of a match, smelled tobacco smoke. Was it Alessandro? Or the brutal shepherd, taking a respite? There were no more screams from Ursula.
He hugged the shadows, concentrating on revival. There was not much time. Soon they would turn back and find him gone. He couldn't hold out against their efforts next time.
Desperately, he searched for some means to gain his end.
The man on the loggia moved away. Perhaps a hundred yards down the beach, a wire fence glittered, and a wooden watchtower lifted against the stars. It was the boundary of the military reservation. Perhaps an alert guard, a
cautious sentry—
He started for the fence, keeping to the shadows as much as possible. The beach merged with scrubby hillside that offered little concealment. He fell, and crawled for a time, and his hands bled again. The fence seemed an infinity away.
There was no alarm. But when he got there, he did not know what to do next. The wire was electrified, and obviously dangerous. The watchtower was too far off to be raised by a hail for help. He could not think clearly. He had moved this far only by instinct. But now he had to think and plan, to conceive of some way to rouse the militia over there.
Some driftwood lay at the water's edge. He looked back at the villa and saw a swift shadow moving along the balustrade of the loggia. Then it was lost against the trimmed cedars. A light went on and off, briefly, in the big, square house. He got up and ran to the water's edge for the driftwood.
The first piece was too heavy for his injured hands. He dropped the second, smaller one, picked it up again, drew a deep breath against the pain and hurled it as hard as he could against the electrified wire fence.
There was an immediate flash, a vicious blue arc of power, a sputtering, a puff of smoke. Far down the beach, a bell began to ring. He threw another piece, and saw it hang on the wire like a man's limb. More sputtering flashes. Beyond the fence was a cleared area of the beach. He was sure land mines were there, to judge from the warning signs and familiar skull painted on a board charging trespassers with death.
He threw more pieces of wood over the fence into that area. The first few did nothing. The distant bell became a low, growling siren that spiraled up in swift alarm. The fourth piece of driftwood hit its mark.
A mine exploded, throwing up a huge gout of sand and salt water. The roar was deafening. He fell prone on the cold sand. The blast rolled over him and he felt clods of earth and gravel rain on his naked back. Now the siren shrieked in frenzy, and a huge, blinding searchlight flicked on, a giant orb that swept the sea and beach. From far away came the sound of a truck motor starting up, and faint shouts and military orders.
He forced himself up again. The searchlight was probing the other way from the villa. He ran for the shelter of the scrub, facing the house. He had to get back. He had to face Dinov one more time, a last time. . . .
The lights went out in the villa. Behind him, sirens wailed and the truck sounded louder. Durell forced himself up the wide steps to the loggia, turned to the marble balustrade. He heard voices below. Dinov stepped out of the tunnel under him. The Russian's mouth and eyes were like dark holes in an animated skull. He waved his arm furiously at the shepherd behind him and pointed up the beach. They assumed Durell had gone that way to escape to the militia. But that isn't enough, Durell thought. There was Ursula, and he had to keep Dinov from getting to the yacht, where he might still interfere with Stephanes. . . .
He had no weapon. He had to find one, swiftly. He stood behind one of the huge, beehive jugs.
"Dinov!" he called softly.
And again: "Dinov!"
The man turned his face upward in surprise. Durell shoved with all his strength at the massive ceramic jar.
For a heart-stopping moment, it would not yield. Then it suddenly toppled from the ledge above the beach where Dinov stood. At the same instant, the spotlight finally found them all and centered them in its dazzle of blinding light. There was a moment when Durell saw his enemy's face reflect astonishment, confusion, and then dismay... •
The big urn crashed and shattered on his skull.
The shepherd screamed in fury and lifted a gun. Durell could not escape. He had fallen forward himself, clung to the balustrade, and now watched the gun helplessly. . ..
A rifle cracked down the beach. Aji automatic weapon stuttered. The big shepherd jerked upright, his arms shot out, his weapon spun from his hands. Dinov, who had started to crawl out from under the broken urn, his face a bloody, ugly mask, staggered like a broken doll on erratic strings and collapsed to the sand. . ..
Durell sank down to the marble floor of the loggia. The jeep approached, and he heard the booted clatter of soldiers running to him. Someone grabbed him and lifted his head, and they whispered in shock as they saw his face.
"Are you Mr. Durell?" a sergeant asked.
"Yes. There's a girl—in the cellar—" he whispered.
"We will get her. Colonel Xanakias was worried about you. But dear God, what happened to you, sir?"
He did not answer. Men were running to get Ursula, and he stood up, but then the sea and the beach and the dark, starry sky gyrated around him and sucked him down abruptly into an overwhelming night.
Chapter Twenty
He was a month in the hospital at Athens. The summer was full, the sky dazzling, the heat brazen. He did not remember the first week, and the second was only a series of brief memories.
There was Colonel Xanakias:
"Can you hear me, Mr. Durell? You will be fine. You have no permanent damage, thanks to an extraordinary physique. You should know, of course, that Dinov is dead."
"And Ursula?" he whispered.
But he did not hear the answer.
Much later, there was an American doctor bending over him, frowning in concentration:
"Another two or three weeks, Mr. Durell. You will be as good as new again."
"I want to know about the girl."
"Miss Montagne? She'll pull through. Don't worry about her."
"Don't lie to me, doctor. What did they do to her?"
"She'll be all right. She'll live. I promise."
One day there was Xanakias again:
"You have seen the newspapers from that anxious week we had? No? Well, then . . . the day after the business on Corfu, there were rumors of earthquakes again in the Debrec region of Albania. Then reports came of explosions and landslides. Naturally, the accounts were confused. The People's Republic of Albania denied everything. There were no such calamities, they said. In Washington, of course, matters remained on red alert for some days. In Moscow, too. The world stood on the brink, my friend. But we still live. It did not happen."
"Not this time," Durell said harshly. "What of Captain Stephanes? Did he come back?"
"Yes, he is quite safe." Xanakias' young, olive face was proud. "A most remarkable old man. He wrote a report for your Washington files. Would you like to see it?"
"I'd like to talk to him, when I can."
"He will be waiting for you in Epidaurus."
Durell drew a deep breath. "And Ursula? I want to know about her. I used her and sacrificed her. Is she alive?"
"Yes, in this hospital."
"I want to see her."
"I'm sorry, but—"
"Is it that bad?"
"She will be released in a few days."
"Then why can't I see her?"
"I am sorry, my friend. She refuses to hear your name. That is the whole crux of the matter."
When the doctors released him, the summer was half gone. Athens sweltered in July heat. But he welcomed the sun as he limped from the hospital doors and down the steps to a taxi. Xanakias was not there to meet him; he'd gone to Istanbul on a newly risen crisis. No one could tell him where to find Ursula. He stood alone on the sidewalk, leaning on the cane the doctors had given him. His right leg still troubled him, but he'd been assured that none of the damage would be permanent.
Traffic moved with a glittering rush, the passers-by were animated, a jetliner droned over the Acropolis. The world lived. Whatever had happened in those dark mountains to the north would probably remain secret forever. But man had gained for himself another small breathing space.
He was surprised to find in the meticulously sealed luggage returned to him by the hospital authorities the crisp wads of twenty-dollar notes, totalling ten thousand dollars, that he had drawn from Zuccamella in Venice. It seemed an eternity ago. Shkoeder had never gotten the money, and Durell shuddered wryly at the thought of the red tape involved if the cash had been lost. When he rang up the Embassy from his hotel room, he requested
a courier to come and collect the unwanted cash. Then he asked another question, learned what he wanted to know, and made another call to the apartment number the Embassy gave him. The maid who replied said that Lisette Pollini had gone to visit the Acropolis.
Ten minutes after the courier took his envelope of Zuccamella's cash, he was at the foot of the ancient fortress that had dominated history for two thousand years. He used his cane to walk slowly among the tourists who thronged the Propylaea, solemn among the wonders of Athenian antiquity. Here was the place where man's first freedoms flowered. But the struggle still was not over. Tyranny had been duplicated often by conquerors seeking to crush free men. It seemed to Durell that here were all the symbols of what he fought for in his own time. The past encouraged him as he recalled the men who had fought at Marathon. These ruins marked their dedication to freedom. The struggle had enlarged to a world-wide scale, but he felt uplifted with new strength that flowed from these ancient stones. No man who fought for what they represented could die in vain.
He saw Lisette over by the Caryatid Porch. She was alone, strolling beside the Erectheum, that temple once dedicated to Poseidon and Athena, near the ancient salt spring and sacred olive tree of the Athenians. He threaded his way toward her among the tourists, walking over the chips of marble that were still strewn on the hilltop.
"Lisette?"
She looked smart and beautiful, her auburn hair alive in the afternoon sun. Her summer frock outlined her figure in the faint breeze. Her pale green eyes widened, and then she smiled at the sight of him.
"Oh, I did not know—they gave me no information about you at the Embassy—" She paused and flushed. "I thought you had gone back to the States."
"I've been in the hospital. I'm all right now." He shrugged as she looked at his cane. "It will pass. I was curious to know about you."
She smiled nervously. "I've survived." Her eyes searched the crowd beyond him, as if looking for someone else.
"You haven't gone back to Venice," he said pointedly. "Or to France."
Assignment The Girl in the Gondola Page 18