Levkas Man (Mystery)

by Hammond Innes

  I think I must have stood there for quite a time, my mind lost in the past, my eyes searching and searching the whole hot expanse of shimmering sand. There was a small wind blowing from the north and it gradually chilled the sweat on my body. Search as I might, I could see no sign of life. There were no birds, no cicadas even, the whole area so utterly still and lifeless it mig^ht indeed have been the moon. And when I called out in the hope of an answer, my shouts seemed deadened by the dunes, the sand acting like a damper.

  It was almost two and I stopped to eat on the top of a dune where the breeze touched my damp skin. Below me the sands pulsed with the heat, and on a ridge away to my left the third of those strange shafts spilled stones into a hollow. It had the shape of an old worn-down molar, and near the crown of it a shadow cast by the sun showed black like an unstopped cavity. It was a possibility—about the only one left in this desolate stretch of country. But by then I had opened up the rucksack. Sonia had made up a package for me of bread and cheese and tinned ham. I put on my sweater and began to eat. I was facing south-west at the time, my back to the breeze and the way I had come. I don't know what made me turn—some instinct, some sixth sense. The second of those stone shafts stood like a cairn, sharp against the blue sky, and beyond it, a long way

  away, the purpling shape of a distant range stood humped on the horizon. And then my gaze fell to the red sand valley below and I saw something move, a shambling figure wandering with head bent intent upon the ground.

  The sight of him so shocked me that for a moment I did not move. I just sat there unable to believe what my eyes recorded, for he looked so frail, so insubstantial. Partly it was the khaki shirt and trousers. They seemed to have taken on the colour of the dunes so that they merged into the sand. But the long white hair, the way he walked, head bent, searching the ground . . . those nights in Amsterdam so long ago came back to me and the certainty that it was him was overwhelming.

  I got to my feet, tried to call out to him, but though I opened my mouth no sound came and I was trembling. He was moving slowly nearer all the time, coming up the floor of the valley, and he looked small, a ghost of a figure in the red immensity of that dune landscape, walking with slow uncertain steps, searching, but not stopping, not picking anything up.

  I started down the dune slope then, loose sand under my feet, and even when I reached the hard-packed sand of the valley floor, he still did not hear me. It wasn't until I was within a few yards of him that he stopped suddenly, his head lifted, his body quite still, alerted to the fact that he was not alone. I had stopped, too, waiting for him to turn. And when he did so, slowly, there was no recognition in his eyes, only a secret, hunted look.

  "Who are you?" he asked, the words coming falteringly as though speech were strange to him. "What do you want?"

  I didn't answer. I couldn't—I was too appalled. I had expected him to look older, of course, and those two photographs should have warned me, the observations Gilmore had made. But I was not prepared for such fragility. He seemed smaller, a shadow of his former self, withered and stooped, and so thin he looked half starved, the khaki trousers hanging loose, the rib cage staring through the torn shirt. But it was his

  face that really shocked me, the hunted, burning look in his eyes.

  It had always been a remarkable face, the leathery features like a piece of deep-chiselled, fine-carved wood. Now there was the grey stubble of a beard, and beneath the stubble the lines had deepened. The flesh seemed to have fallen away, exposing the bone formation of the skull, accentuating the jut of the jaw and the beetling brows. It was a haggard, tortured face, and the eyes, which had always been deep-sunk, seemed to have retreated deeper into their sockets.

  They were staring at me now, seeing me only as a stranger who had invaded his secret world. I said my name, and for a moment it didn't seem to register. And then suddenly there was recognition and his eyes blazed. "Who sent you?" There was hostility, no sign of affection—I might have been an enemy out to destroy him. "What are you doing here?" The words came in a whisper and he was trembling. "I was worried about you," I said.

  A rasping sound came from his throat, a jeering laugh of disbelief. "After eight years?" And then, leaning forward, he repeated his first question—"Who sent you?"

  "Nobody sent me. I came of my own accord."

  "But you knew where to look."

  "Sonia thought I might find you here."

  "Sonia Winters?" His face softened, the eyes becoming less hostile.

  "She's at Despotiko," I said.

  "And you came—to look for me?"

  I nodded, wondering how to break through to the man I had once known.

  He was silent for a long time. Finally he seemed to gather himself together. "That was good of you." He said it slowly as though making an effort, and then suddenly there were tears in his eyes and I stood there, staring at him stupidly, uncertain what to do or what to say. He'd been here—how long? A fortnight, nearly three weeks. The red dunes all around

  him, and nobody with him, nobody at all. "What have you found to live on?"

  But his gaze had wandered, searching the ground. "You haven't seen the sole of my boot, have you? I lost it last night, and I've been searching."

  He was wearing an old pair of desert boots, tough camel skin, and the right foot had the crepe rubber missing. "It's no good to you," I said. "You couldn't repair it here."

  "Somebody may find it. . ." His eyes were roving again, his voice irritable. He seemed obsessed by his loss and I realized he was afraid it might betray his presence here. "Are you sure nobody sent you?" He was looking at me again, his eyes shifting and uneasy.

  I did my best to reassure him, but it was only when I told him how I had come to Greece that his attention seemed to focus. "A boat? You chartered a boat?"

  I nodded.

  "Where is it—at Pylos you say?"

  "No, Preveza. They should have arrived at Preveza by now."

  "Preveza?" His eyes gleamed, a strange suppressed excitement. "If they'd let me come on my own—that's what I wanted. I could have been there a month—more now. But they gave me a Land-Rover and an assistant." His body sagged, dejected. And then, suddenly, he sank to the ground as though he couldn't support himself any more. "I'm tired," he murmured. "Very tired. I haven't the strength I had once."

  I offered to get him some food, but he shook his head. "It's only the sudden heat. And walking ... I thought if I searched for it now, in the middle of the day, nobody would see me."

  "But you must eat," I said.

  He shook his head again. "I'm beyond that. And the last time it made me sick."

  He told me then how he'd killed a sheep, had beaten it to death with a stone and taken it to his lair up there on the dune ridge where that third shaft showed a cavity in the circle of fallen stones. He'd cooked it inside his burrow, gorging him-

  self sick and sucking the marrow from the bones. He told it with his eyes closed, dwelling on all the revolting details as though to saturate himself with disgust. "Have you ever gone for a long period without food?"

  I shook my head.

  "I did it once before—lost my way in the Kyzyl Kum desert. The mind floats free. Everything very clear. But it was different then. It wasn't of my own choice and I had no water."

  He had no water here either, but every night he told me he went down to the reservoir. That was how he had come to lose the sole of his boot. "And what happens when you're too weak?" I asked. "You can't live without water."

  "No, I'd die then." The dusty lips behind the stubble cracked in a smile. "That would be the easy way." The smile had lit his face with some inner calm. "But I shan't die. I mustn't die—not yet." His brows dragged down, his eyes suddenly glaring at me. "You don't know what I'm talking about, do you? It was always the same with you—like talking to somebody who's never learned—who'll never bother to learn—one's own language. We're strangers, you and I."

  There was nothing I could say and I stood there, silent.
The stillness of the place, the sense of being alone with somebody who was not quite real ... I didn't understand him. I never had. And the way he was staring at me from under those shaggy brows . . . "What do you want?" he asked abruptly. "Eight years, isn't it?"

  I nodded.

  "Then why are you here?" His eyes drew mine, holding them, the stare so penetrating that I had the feeling I had always had that he could read my thoughts. "You're in trouble again. Is that it?"

  I couldn't help it. I laughed, an awkward, jarring sound in the stillness. Looking down at him squatting there, weak with hunger and half out of his mind, and thinking I'd come to him for help. Yet perhaps he was right. In the end I had always come back to him. Perhaps it really was the reason.

  "Yes," I said. He might as well know. It might help him even —to know that he wasn't the only one who was on the run. "I think I've killed a man. In fact, I'm certain I have."

  I saw the shock of that register, his eyes appalled, a look almost of horror on his face. "You?" He bowed his head. "You were always violent—always that same streak of violence." And then after a while he said, "Sit down, Paul. Sit down here and tell me about it. How did it happen?"

  "It was at the end of the voyage," I said. "We'd come into Fawley with oil from Kuwait—the long way round the Cape." I had seated myself cross-legged on the sand, the two of us facing each other like a couple of Arabs. "I was first officer and we had a Czech on board, a man called Mark Janovic—a good deckhand, cheerful, hardworking. The papers said he was a Pole, but I'm damned sure he was a Czech, and they were waiting for him—two toughs from the Polish embassy. The turn-round is quick, but I'd given several of the hands shore leave and I was on the pipeline terminal when they came off the ship. Janovic was the last to leave, and as he did so these two thugs closed in on him. They had a car waiting. There was an argument and I went over to see what it was all about. It was something to do with his family. I could see Janovic was scared, and then he suddenly made a break for it. One of the bastards grabbed him and I just reacted instinctively. I smashed his face in. He was right on the edge of the pier. He went straight over into the water. It was dark and the tide was running. There wasn't a chance of anybody fishing him out alive. And then the other man started to come at me." I felt like a child again, telling him my troubles. "I didn't stop to think. I just hit him in the stomach, grabbed the car and drove off."

  He didn't ask me why I'd been such a fool, why I hadn't stayed to justify my actions. He just sat there, silent, lost in his own thoughts. Finally he said, "I've been afraid of this—always." The words seemed dragged out of him. "Both you and I, we've the same temperament, the same predeliction to violence ..." He was staring at me as though looking at a ghost.

  "It's an odd place to tell you—but you're old enough now, a man ... I loved your mother once. A long time ago now." He seemed to gather himself together, his eyes looking straight at me, very direct. "You're my son. My own son."

  "Yes," I said. "I know that now."

  "You know?" It seemed to worry him, the brows dragged down, the eyes staring, bloodshot. "How do you know? When?" And he added slowly, almost painfully, "I tried to keep it from you. After what had happened . . . the shock of their death ... I felt I had to. How did you find out?"

  "The letters—that note pinned to my birth certificate." And I told him how I had gone back to the house in Amsterdam, "But I didn't come here to burden you with my own troubles."

  "You went to Amsterdam?"

  "I needed money, somewhere to hide out till the heat was off."

  "Is that all?" He sighed. "I've never refused to help you. Surely you know—"

  "How the hell could you help me?"

  I saw him wince. "No, of course. You're right. And there was no money in the house." He was peering at me, his eyes probing my face. "Then why are you here?"

  "To tell you that Professor Holroyd left London by air last night. He should be in Athens by now. Sonia thought you ought to know."

  He didn't seem surprised. "He's in a hurry, of course. And she told you where to find me?"

  "Yes."

  "But that doesn't explain why you came to Greece,"

  I told him about Gilmore then, his concern after reading his Journal. But all he said was, "It was good of Adrian to bother." He was following quite a different train of thought. "Now tell me the truth." He leaned forward, his voice urgent. "Why did you come—after eight years? And not a word from you in all that time. You're not interested in me or my work."

  I didn't know how to answer him. "I just felt I had to,"

  "Because you discovered I was your natural father?" That rasping sound again, that jeering laugh.

  How I hated him! I always had—his twisted mind, his bitterness. He saw the hate in my eyes and smiled. "You haven't changed."

  "No," I said angrily. "I haven't changed. And nor have you." I got to my feet. "I'll go now."

  I left him then, climbing the dune side hurriedly, back to where I'd left the rucksack. There was still some food left, but when I called down to him that I'd leave it there for him, I saw him staggering up the slope towards me. By the time he reached me I'd taken off my sweater and slipped it, with the remains of the food, into the rucksack. "Here you are," I said, handing it to him. "The rucksack's yours, anyway."

  He had collapsed on the sand at my feet, breathing heavily. "We shouldn't—part—like this," he gasped. "You and I—the same blood—and those nine years. We had nine years together."

  "You were away most of the time." My voice sounded hard and brutal.

  "Yes. So much to do—always seeking—a new location, some find reported. There was always something, beckoning me on. That's what drove me. I'm sorry." There were tears in his eyes again. And then he was staring up at me. "I need your help."

  "No," I said. "No, I'm leaving."

  "Paul." He was gasping for breath. "I've no time left. I'm old and ill and I need you."

  Gilmore's words almost, and our roles reversed. It was incredible. "I'm going now." If I didn't go now, I'd get involved. And I didn't want to get involved. "I can't help you."

  "Yes, you can. That boat." He was tense and urgent, his eyes over-bright. "You said you had a boat, and it's not more than a day's run from Preveza." He was pleading.

  "You want to go to Levkas, is that it?"

  "If I had the use of that boat—just for one day."

  The urgency, the absolute driving urgency, his eyes burning with excitement, his whole face lit by a desperate desire. I

  hated to kill it. But there was Kotiadis, and when I told him what had happened after we had landed at Pylos, the light died in his eyes, a dead look, and his hands clenched slowly. They were big hands, big in proportion to his body. "So they've checked with the Russians now. Everything I do . . ." His body seemed to droop. "Ever since I was a student. Do you wonder that I'm here, hounded, alone—my ideas, my whole life wasted. Nobody believes in me—nobody except myself."

  "There's Dr. Gilmore," I reminded him.

  "Yes, but Adrian's old. It's men like Holroyd rule the academic world now. And in Russia—they only helped me so long as it suited them." And then he returned to the subject of the boat, what sort of boat and asking about the Barretts. "The dig at Despotiko would take too long. But on Levkas— a week, a month at most, and I'd have the answer—know for certain. And the summer ahead of me—warmth. I've friends there." Then he leaned forward, gripping hold of my hand and pulling me down on to the sand beside him. "Listen, Paul. You're a seaman. Have you been through the Malta Channel?"

  "Once," I said.

  "Then you'll know the depth there."

  "I know it's shallow."

  "And further west, between Sicily and Tunisia—the islands?"

  "I've seen Marettimo, once in the dawn."

  "No, not Marettimo, though there is a cave further inshore on Levanzo. But south of Sicily—Linosa and Pantelleria, both volcanic, and another island, Lampedusa, much older." His gaze had fastened on me, his v
oice urgent with the effort to communicate, to engage my interest. "Geologists have for some time believed that the Mediterranean was a himdred to two hundred feet lower during the Ice Age. Here you see the evidence of it." He waved his hand at the dunes around us. "This sand belongs to two distinct periods—the lighter colour has an iron ore content, the darker and later is manganese. Nobody has checked it, as far as I know. I don't know of anybody

  who even knows about it, and if I could get one really authoritative geologist . . ." He picked up a handful of sand and ran it through his fingers, watching it intently like a man watching an hourglass. "But why should I help them? They don't like being taught their business any more than anthropologists. They'd take the credit for themselves . . ." He flung the remains of the sand away in a gesture of disgust. "They don't know the water level of the Mediterranean twenty thousand years ago. They're just guessing. It's an enclosed sea and they're not even sure that the Straits of Gibraltar existed then. Suppose the level was four or five hundred feet lower. Then all the sea between Sicily and Africa would have been one vast plain, with Lampedusa a small mountain range. Have you ever seen Pantelleria?"

  I shook my head, and he went on, barely pausing for breath, "It's like a volcanic slag heap, the north of it all black lava, probably dating from the period when Knossos, the old capital of the Minoan civilization of Crete, was destroyed. There's a Greek volcanologist who believes that the destruction of Santorin was the basis of the legend of Atlantis. But the rest of Pantelleria is the product of older eruptions. I spent a month there some years back. If I could have stayed longer . . . there are some underwater caves there, but you'd need divers—aqualung equipment. In Homer's day there was a story about Odysseus descending into Hades, meeting the shades of the great men of Greek history. Why did he write that into the Odyssey? Everything he wrote was based on stories handed down by word of mouth, and if Atlantis was Santorin, remembered to this day, why not a cave some sailor had stumbled on?" He looked at me then. "You've never seen the Vezere—those beetling limestone cliffs with caves marked by the engraved drawings of mammoths going back sixty thousand years. I was brought up in the Vezere, you remember. It's a long time ago now, but I've never forgotten. It's been my dream—that somewhere, some time before I die, I'll find others—painted caves that will prove beyond doubt the pattern of Cro-Magnon migration."