Robbie gave her a glance of admiration. ‘You think of everything, don’t you? Without you, I wouldn’t last twelve hours.’
She smiled back at him. ‘You saved my life this evening, Robbie. And, knowing that you can’t face heights, I can guess what coming down that slope to get me must have meant to you. For what my mind is worth, every bit of it is yours. Can you draw enough money to keep us going for a week or two?’
‘Yes. When we left Athens, I had no idea how long we should be away; so the Letter of Credit I’m carrying is still good for quite a large—’ Suddenly he stopped in mid-sentence, then continued with a frown: ‘But I’ve just remembered. Tomorrow is Sunday.’
‘So it is. I’d forgotten that, too. Then you’ll have to draw the money in Athens on Monday. That is a pity as it will give away the fact that you have been there. Still we should be out of the capital again before your bank learns that the police are after you.’
They talked for another ten minutes or so, making further plans. There was always the odd chance that the Americans might learn that a car smash and murder had taken place just before their arrival at the spot where they had picked up the two young Germans. If so, and they informed the police, it was certain that the police would endeavour to trace the hikers, in order to find out if they had seen Robbie or could give any information about the affair; so they decided that, on reaching Athens, they would change their identities again and pass themselves off as French. They also decided that they would go to Rhodes. By then it was getting on for half-past-twelve, and the scruffy landlord came in to say that he was shutting up for the night.
In spite of the hardness of the beds, they were both so tired that they slept well. In the morning, a slatternly woman brought them unappetizing breakfasts of bad coffee and sweet buns. The geyser in the only bathroom did not work, and the lavatory stank to high heaven but at least the bill amazed Robbie by its modesty. Having never before stayed in any but expensive hotels, he had had no idea that it was possible to get a night’s lodging so cheaply.
The train for Athens left at eleven o’clock. It consisted of only four coaches: three thirds and one first. Robbie had travelled on a Greek train some months before, out to Marathon, so he knew that going first class was much more pleasant than travelling first on British Railways. A third of the coach consisted of a kitchen, and between each pair of broad, stuffed seats there was a wide table on which at any hour one could have a well-cooked meal of one’s own choice from an enormous menu.
But Stephanie insisted that they would draw less attention to themselves if they travelled third, and the third-class coaches were very different. They had wooden seats and were packed to capacity. As it was a Sunday, the travellers were mostly dressed in their best and no live-stock accompanied them. Even so the smell was considerable, and the strong sun grilling down on the roof of the carriage soon set everyone perspiring freely.
The little train puffed its way past Mycenae and up into the mountains, then round bend after bend through them and so down to Corinth. From there it crossed the canal and, ascending again to several hundred feet above sea level, followed the north shore of the Gulf of Athens as far as Eleusis. When it stopped there, Robbie drew Stephanie’s attention to the name of the station and sighed with relief. They had already been cooped up in considerable discomfort for over four hours, and he judged that another quarter of an hour should see them at their journey’s end. But he was counting his chickens. Instead of following the coast further, the train turned inland and, stopping frequently, made an hour-long detour right round the capital; so it was after five o’clock before they arrived in Athens.
While in the train, they had pretended to know no Greek and had spoken German to one another. Now, carrying their light suitcases, they went into the station buffet, talking loudly in French. Robbie, pretending to know only a few words of Greek, then ordered drinks for them and, in halting sentences, asked the woman behind the counter if she could give them the name of a small hotel that was both cheap and clean. The woman consulted her colleague, who called a waiter who spoke some French. A heated argument between the three ensued then, with many smiles, the Hotel Theodori in Paleologou Street was recommended, and the waiter gave Robbie the number of a bus that would take them there.
They found the hotel drab but adequate, and registered there as Monsieur Jules Colbert and Mademoiselle Louise Hachette. Until half past seven they rested in their rooms, then met again downstairs and went out for a meal at a nearby tavern. Over the meal they held another conference.
Now that Robbie was in Athens his Letter of Credit was redundant, as he had only to walk along to his own bank to draw money. But to do so would mean that the police would soon know that he either had been or still was in Athens. Stephanie suggested that he should make out a cheque, bearing a date a week old, which she should take to his bank and cash for him. He still had on him about fifty pounds in Greek money; but he felt that he ought to obtain at least another two hundred while he had the chance as, apart from the few items he had bought in Tripolis, they had only the things they stood up in. The question was, would the bank cash such a large cheque, made out simply to ‘bearer’, without requiring evidence of the identity of the young woman who presented it?
For Stephanie to produce such evidence would, in due course, lead to the police learning that she had not been burnt up in the Ford, but was still alive. She was greatly averse to that because, as long as they believed her to be dead, they would be hunting for Robbie as a man on his own, not one accompanied by a woman.
In this connection he said to her: ‘It’s a pity that we can’t pose as brother and sister, but we are so unlike that we would never get away with that. It would only make people more suspicious of us.’
After a moment, she said thoughtfully: ‘The best cover of all for you would be for us to travel as husband and wife. But we would have to share a room then. Of course, that need mean no more than when a man and a girl share a bathing tent and take it in turns to change in it. You could get up an hour earlier than me in the mornings, have your bath and go downstairs, and at night I would go up to bed half an hour before you. I’m not standing for any repetition of that business by the pool, though; and the question is, can I trust you?’
‘You can,’ Robbie gave a solemn nod. ‘It’s terribly good of you, Stephanie, to go that far to give me a better chance of keeping out of the hands of the police until I can pin something on Barak. If I let you down in this I’d never again be able to look at my own face in a mirror.’
She smiled. ‘I believe you, Robbie. We’ll do that, then. The next question is: when we get to Rhodes, are we going to stay poor or live medium rich?’
‘Normally, I’d be all for staying at the Hotel des Roses. I’ve heard that it’s one of the best in Greece. But won’t it be in that sort of place that the police will look for me?’
‘I don’t think so. By playing poor in Argos and here in Athens, we should have put them off your track and, naturally, they will assume that you have gone to earth in some cheap hotel somewhere in the Peloponnesus. The last place they are likely to look for you would be sunning yourself on the beach of the Hotel des Roses with—if I may say so—a rather pretty wife.’
‘Oh, come on!’ he exclaimed spontaneously. ‘Don’t be so modest. You know jolly well that you are lovely.’
Her eyebrows went up and she gave a sudden laugh. ‘D’you know that’s the first compliment you have ever paid me? It’s nice that you should think so. Still, I hope you are not going to let that give you ideas, otherwise I’ll have to call off our sharing a bedroom.’
He had gone red at finding that, without thinking, he had said the sort of thing he had wanted to say to her for a long time past. But he quickly shook his head. ‘Don’t worry. I’ve given you my word.’
Stubbing out her cigarette, she said: ‘There are several advantages to staying in a big hotel. It is not so likely to be noticed if we never go up to bed at the same time, or come d
own together in the morning; and if we want to hire a car, there will be no nosey landlady to wonder how we can afford such an extravagance.’
‘Right, then. The des Roses it shall be, providing we can get hold of enough money.’
That question was solved by an idea that came to Robbie while he was still lying in bed the following morning. Luke Beecham could get a cheque cashed for him without any questions being asked, and Stephanie could collect the money without having to give away her identity. As soon as he got downstairs, he wrote a note to Luke on a plain sheet of paper. Not wishing to embroil his friend, he made no reference to the events which had led to his present situation. The note ran:
I am still on the war path, and am certain now that the people I am interested in are up to something pretty nasty. But, for the time being, it is essential that I keep under cover, and I need money. Would you be good enough to cash the enclosed cheque right away through your bank and hand the proceeds to the bearer of this, who wishes to remain anonymous but is entirely reliable?
As soon as Stephanie came downstairs, they went out and had an early coffee. Over the table he gave her the note and the cheque, telling her the address of Luke Beecham’s office. It was then agreed that if Luke were there and she got the money, she should go to the Olympus Airways office and try to get two seats on the next morning’s plane to Rhodes. Then she was to buy herself a better suitcase and some clothes which would pass muster for a stay at the Hotel des Roses.
At her suggestion it was agreed that he should go meanwhile to a barber and have a crew-cut, and also buy himself a pair of dark glasses. When she had set off, with considerable reluctance he had the back and sides of his head shaved, so that he felt he looked like a convict; then, with some of the money he had on him, he bought himself two shirts, another pair of shoes, some socks and four ties.
When they met again for lunch, he learned to his relief that Stephanie’s mission had been successful. Luke had asked no questions; she had the money and a note from him, which said:
I was getting quite worried at hearing nothing from you. Things are looking far from good, so anything you can get hold of in the immediate future may prove of exceptional value. I take it the ‘bearer’ is the ‘chauffeuse-secretary’ you told me about. No wonder you refused to take my advice, and preferred to risk blackmail or having to cough up alimony. What a dark horse you’ve turned out to be. Anyhow lots of luck to you, and let’s hope that we are still all alive this time next week.
Robbie and Stephanie had been so completely absorbed in their own affairs for the past three days that they had not given a thought to the international crisis. Now he got hold of a paper. The headline read: ‘Soviet Threat. Unless U.S. accepts terms, Russia will consider issuing Ultimatum.’
They read the leader, and a long article which amounted to little more than a recapitulation of what everyone already knew. The American submarine was sitting on the bottom under the ice in a bay on the Arctic coast of Russia. She was hemmed in by Soviet surface ships, and Moscow, asserting that she had been on a spying mission, demanded her surrender. As a gesture, the Russians had offered to release and return her crew, but they insisted on the ship being handed over undamaged and complete with all her secrets. The Americans continued to refuse.
Since there was nothing that Robbie and Stephanie—or the many millions of other people whose lives hung upon the issue—could do about it, they returned to their own affairs, and Stephanie searched through the paper to see if there was any mention of themselves. But, as they had supposed, it was too early for the police to have issued any statement to the Press.
Stephanie had also secured their air tickets. She said that she had taken them in the names of Monsieur and Madame Max Thévanaz and had given their nationality as Swiss, as a precaution against their being forced into contact with either German or French people at the des Roses. In the first case, their imperfect accents would be accounted for by the belief that they were French Swiss and, in the second, German Swiss.
Later in the afternoon Robbie bought himself, now that he no longer had to be so careful about what he spent, a dark blue suit for evening wear, a raincoat and a soft hat. Then they went to the G.P.O.; and, to his considerable relief, he saw his precious manuscript handed over to Stephanie. He straightway re-addressed it to himself, to await collection, care of Luke Beecham, then posted it off again.
On the Tuesday morning they were up early, because they had to be at the Air Terminal in Constitution Square by half past seven. There Robbie wrote labels in the name of ‘Max Thévanaz’ and tied them on to their luggage. The bus then took them out to Phaleron, where they spent an anxious half hour going through the formalities. But Robbie was wearing his dark spectacles and carrying his hat in his hand, so that his semi-shaved head might mislead anyone who thought he recognised him. He was given no cause for anxiety and, soon after eight-thirty, they were airborne on their way to Rhodes.
In less than ten minutes, they had crossed the Sounion Peninsula and were heading out over the blue Aegean, glittering in the sun and starred with its many rocky islands. The big islands of Andros, Kéa and Kithnos could all be seen clearly from the aircraft. It passed right over Siros and, when half an hour out from Athens, over Delos.
Once up in the air, Robbie had felt a sudden relief from the tension under which he had been for several days. In Rhodes he would still be liable to be picked up by the Greek police and charged with Cepicka’s murder, but the psychological effect of having got safely away from the mainland acted on him like a tonic. For the first time in nearly a week his mind ceased to be occupied with his personal anxieties, and he craned eagerly forward to see as much as he could of the sacred island on which the mighty twins, Apollo and Artemis, had been born.
Looking down on Delos made him think of his book and, in his new mood of optimism, he allowed himself to assume that somehow he would get out of the mess he was in and, in due course, finish the book. The islands below them brought to his mind Ithaca, of which Odysseus had been Prince, although that lay far away on the other side of Greece. He wondered again if he should include a chapter on the Odyssey and, as he had already done one on Homer’s other immortal epic, the Iliad, with its tale of Troy, felt that perhaps he should.
That Odysseus had taken ten years to get home from the siege of Troy had been due to his incurring the wrath of Poseidon, because he had blinded one of the Sea God’s sons, the Cyclopes, Polyphemus, by driving a pointed stake through the giant’s solitary eye. Thinking of that, Robbie suddenly wondered if all his recent troubles had been brought on him owing to Athene’s anger at his having signed that promise at Pirgos to abandon his mission. If so he could only pray that, now he had resumed it, she would forgive him.
Poseidon never let up on the unfortunate Odysseus and he was unlucky from the start. He lost some of his men on the island of the Lotus-Eaters and others were eaten by Polyphemus. Then, after the King of the Winds had tied up all the winds in a bag for him, except one which very nearly brought him home, his inquisitive sailors opened the bag and his ships were driven to the land of the fierce Laestrygonians, who murdered the crews of all the vessels except his own.
The survivors next came to the island of the lovely enchantress, Circe, who turned a number of them into swine. Odysseus saved himself and rescued them only through the god Hermes giving him a more potent drug than that used by the witch. He became her lover and stayed there a year, until his homesick men became mutinous. Circe let them go but said they would never reach home unless they consulted the ghost of the blind seer Tiresias. Under Circe’s directions they reached the land of perpetual night, and there dug a great hole into which they poured the blood of sacrificed oxen, while Odysseus called on the shade of Tiresias to appear. The smell of the blood brought the ghosts crowding up from Hades to lap at it and so enjoy a brief return to life. Among them was his mother, whom he had not known to be dead, Agamemnon, Achilles, Ajax and others of his companions at the siege of Troy. At last
old Tiresias appeared and prophesied that, although Poseidon’s malice would continue to give them a rough passage, they might get safely home provided that, should they come to the coast of Trinacria, they did no harm to the Sun god’s cattle pastured there.
On their return to Circe’s isle, she gave Odysseus further good counsel, for they next had to sail through the waters of the Sea Sirens, whose beautiful voices lured sailors to their death. She told him to stop the ears of his crew with wax and have himself lashed to the mast. Circe’s advice saved them but they then had to pass between Scylla and Charybdis, a narrow passage of grim rocks made trebly dangerous on the one side by great waterspouts belched out by a daughter of Poseidon, and on the other by a six-headed monster that plucked six of Odysseus’s best men from the vessel as it passed.
They came then to Trinacria and went ashore. Contrary winds kept them there for a month and they exhausted all their provisions. Odysseus’s lieutenant, Eurylochus, incited the starving sailors to revolt and, despite the warning of Tiresias, they slew the Sun god’s cattle. After a week of feasting, a favourable wind sprang up; but no sooner were they out of sight of land than vengeance fell upon them. A tempest arose, the vessel was sunk and all hands lost, except Odysseus. He succeeded in clinging to some wreckage and, after nine days and nights, was washed ashore on the island of Ogygia, on which lived Atlas’s divinely beautiful daughter, Calypso.
He lived with her for seven years, but at last became homesick again; so Zeus decreed that Calypso must release him. He built himself a raft but, on his seventeenth day at sea, Poseidon learned what had happened and sent a storm that wrecked it. A sea nymph saved him by throwing him her veil and, three days later, he was washed up naked on the shores of the rich kingdom of Phaeacia.
At last his luck changed. The King’s daughter, Nausicaa, found and clothed him. Her father received him kindly and, on learning that he was Odysseus, renowned for his exploits before Troy, but believed dead long since, did him great honour, then lent him one of his ships. When they reached Ithaca, Odysseus was still asleep. The sailors carried him ashore on his bed, leaving many rich gifts beside him on the beach, and when he awoke he found himself in his own land again at last.
Mayhem in Greece Page 44