She lay back, looking at the sky. It had never looked so beautiful. I’m alive, she was thinking, I’m alive... His arms went around her, drawing her up to him. She met his kiss with hers.
23
The ambush at the road had taken seven minutes by Partridge’s watch. Seven minutes of delay; that was how Insarov would see it. He must have checked with each of his outposts as the mule had come on its hour-long journey, making sure of the time for each stage. And now there were seven minutes to be accounted for. “Keep your eyes open,” Partridge told Chris Holland needlessly. “We may expect one of Insarov’s men appearing on that hillside above us, just to make sure everything is all right.”
Holland’s high spirits had returned: his fears were over; O’Malley was alive and safe. “Ease up, old boy. All he will see is one mule, gaunt and revolting; three men prodding the poor beast along, giving a convincing imitation of real fishermen; and a very silent package being brought safely to the house. A little late, it’s true, but you know what mules are. The worst part of this whole operation was getting that bloody animal to start up again. Thank God we had our Greek friend with us.” He grinned widely. “A Greek-speaking mule. That’s all I needed to send me to bed laughing.”
“What did you expect it to speak?” Partridge was trying to take Holland’s advice, but he was still on edge. Sure everything was going well, but it was just at a time like this that something went wrong. It always did.
“You’re a real worrier,” Chris Holland told him cheerfully. “Craig knows how to handle himself. He will dodge any of Insarov’s scouts and join us exactly where you told him to meet us. Where was it, anyway?”
“Before the path branches down to the main road again. I thought we’d better start up the trail to the house in full strength.”
“Nice clusters of clouds.” Chris looked approvingly at the veiled moon, and then at the rising terraces of bleak land, ridged with walls. “Sure we didn’t land on the dark side of the moon?” But for all his light talk, he had his gun out first as the Greek spoke a low warning and nodded to the path just ahead of them.
“It’s Craig,” Partridge said with a surge of relief. Perhaps I do worry too much, he conceded to himself. Or perhaps when I’ve put in another ten years on operations like this one, I’ll be as cool as Holland. Or perhaps I’ll worry even more. Anyway, he thought, looking at Craig, so far so good. So far...
Craig had left the shelter of the low wall where he had been lying and was taking his place in the procession. “Thought I had missed you. I had to wait until the two Greeks arrived.”
“Didn’t they arrive just when we got the mule going?” Partridge asked sharply. There had been movement up there by the rock strata. Too much damned movement, he had thought at the time.
“No. That was one of Insarov’s men. He tried to send a message, but Veronica delayed him. And I got close enough to have a shot at him. Cancel that one.”
“Pretty good shooting,” Chris said.
“Not so good. I aimed for his knees and caught his chest.” He paused. “He shot at Veronica.”
“She’s all right?” Partridge asked.
“Fine.”
“But how did she delay—”
“Post-mortems later,” Chris said, dropping his voice from its low tone into a whisper. “From now on, let our Greek friend do the talking.” They had passed the small neck of headland and were almost back on the main road to Mykonos. In a few minutes they’d reach the sparse group of trees and the track that branched up to the house.
Partridge nodded, looked curiously at Craig, and wondered.
At the trees, the Greek urged the mule uphill with a couple of shoves and a flow of demotic oaths. Craig, the collar of his borrowed jacket turned up, the cap well down on his head, his face tilted as if he were watching the sack on the mule’s back, must have passed unrecognised. He breathed more easily as he heard the cooing of a dove behind him, and then the answering call from the same old wall on the hillside. The rest of Elias’ men, now surrounding the house, would find these two easy to pick up. The same thought must have struck the Greek, for he slowly nodded in solemn agreement as he made way for Craig to take the lead.
They came to the small clump of bushes where Veronica’s case had been dropped, and then—as the mule decided to snatch a bite of spring leaves—were halted, milling around (the Greek cursing the mule’s ancestry, blessing its lack of progeny, in a sibilant whisper), pulling and pushing and hauling.
Okay, okay, thought Partridge, anyone watching would think he now understood the delay of seven minutes.
Look out for that damned sack, thought Holland, and lunged at the rope as it began to slip.
That lousy mule, thought Craig, he’ll nose right into Veronica’s case and come up with it between those long yellow teeth.
The Greek’s thoughts were totally unprintable even in the twentieth century. He vented them all in a kick where it would do the most good. The mule set off at a run uphill, one wisp of branch dangling from its mouth.
“Come on, Carmen,” Craig said between his teeth as he caught up with it and grasped its rope halter. It quieted unexpectedly. The entry through the gate in the white wall was sedate, circumspect. Sweat could now break out on four brows.
Firmly, Craig turned the mule’s head towards the path on his left. It was quite dark here, with bushes and shrubs growing wild. He didn’t look towards the placid house, shuttered and quiet, not even when the front door swung open and a stream of light fell across the porch. A tempting target, he thought, but he did as he had been told and kept on going at the same steady pace towards the dovecote. The mule was amiable enough now, as it drew the dangling branch into its mouth inch by inch, chewing noisily. The Greek brushed lightly past him in the shadows, heading for the dovecote’s door, a knife in his hand. Craig felt for his revolver. So did Partridge and Holland, close on his heels. The door of the dovecote was open. A small light burned inside.
The Greek stopped at the side of the door, motioned to the mule to hurry. Which it did not. He followed it into the stone-walled room. Someone spoke. The Greek replied. Then he must have struck, for something fell. The Greek was back at the door, beckoning them in.
“You know this character?” Partridge whispered.
Craig looked at the man on the floor beside a rough wooden table. He nodded. It was the man he had shouldered into the harbour. “One of the servants.”
Holland had lifted the candle from the table and was also studying him, eyes narrowed, recalling a photograph in a secret file. Servant? Assistant chief of the secret police in Khrushchev’s brutal clean up of the Ukraine in ’forty-eight; promoted to full charge in the Hungarian investigations, possibly responsible for the betrayal and disappearance of General Maleter. The Hungarian Freedom Fighters would say a clean knifing had been too good for him. A nice little nest we’ve uncovered here, thought Holland, and exchanged glances with Partridge as he replaced the candle.
The Greek whispered a warning from the door. Partridge and Craig hauled the body to the side of the room, while Holland pulled the sack free from the mule’s back and threw it on top of the dead man. That, he thought grim-faced, could have been O’Malley lying there.
Craig stood by one side of the mule, drawn against a wall, and kept his back turned to the doorway. Recognition was his chief danger, meanwhile. Partridge sat on the edge of the table, Chris stood in front of the sack; each had one hand nonchalantly on his hip, the other behind his back. The Greek loitered near the door, shoulders slumped, hands in the pockets of his ragged trousers.
Two men entered. Craig glanced briefly from under the peak of his cloth cap, saw one of the house guests and the other servant. Insarov was still taking his time, was he? Craig bent to rub the flank of the mule, and it kicked out gratefully.
The servant spoke sharply to him in a language he didn’t understand. He nodded, keeping his head turned away, and tightened his hold on the mule. “Get it out of here!” the man repea
ted, now in German, then in French. He looked more closely at Craig, took a step forward. His back was turned to Partridge, giving a perfect target for the revolver butt that smashed down on his skull. Holland and the Greek moved simultaneously on the other man. The surprise was complete and effective. He went down like a wall of loose bricks.
“Never,” said Chris Holland softly, as they used the ropes from the sack, along with belts and ties, to truss the two men as helpless as chickens for roasting, “did I think I’d bless that mule.” He removed their weapons: an automatic and a revolver apiece, large calibre, fully loaded. Pessimists, he thought.
“We were obviously supposed to get it out of here,” Partridge said, back to worrying. “But where?” We’ll keep this element of surprise, he thought, if we don’t step away from the pattern of their arrangements. “Did you notice any stable?”
Craig shook his head. “Let it chew its head off in the garden,” he suggested, crossing quickly to the door as lookout. The Greek was more expert than he was at tying the un-loosenable knot.
“And have Elias, when he arrives, think someone is waiting in ambush for him?” Partridge asked testily. No, it was too tricky having a mule blundering around the strange shapes and shadows of this garden. Dangerous, too, to keep it in here. It was restless, perhaps it had smelled the blood on the floor; if it started kicking, in one of its sudden frenzies, all hell would sound broken loose. It’s always the way, he thought bitterly: at a time like this, we’ve got a mule on our hands.
Craig could see the upper side windows of the house, shuttered and dark. No gleam of light, either, from the direction of the porch. “They’ve closed the front door again,” he reported. Dismay gave way to irritation, to real anxiety. It would have been better after all, he was thinking, if we had rushed the house when the door was first opened. A very solid door, he remembered; it would take a battering ram to force it open once it was locked and bolted.
“The problem is not insoluble,” said the Greek quietly in excellent English and a highly educated voice. “We’ll get the door open when we want it.” He came over to stand beside Craig, smiled enigmatically, and looked not at the house but in the direction of the hillside to the north. He made a polite gesture for silence and settled to wait.
Wait for what?” Craig wondered. He had his answer when a small blue flare, a safe distance away, shot up over the fields.
Partridge took a deep breath of relief: Elias was in position, Insarov’s men had been neutralised, time to move in. At last, he thought, at last... He beckoned to Chris, who had been spending those three last agonising minutes in examining the contents of a large wooden box in the far corner of the dovecote.
Chris came forward, saying, “All their usual paraphernalia. Thorough questioners, those boys. They’d make the Inquisition look like a Sunday-school picnic. Come on.” He took Craig’s arm and led him out on to the path. The Greek was ahead of them, dropping from his normal walk into a shambling slouch.
Craig looked around for Partridge.
“He’s tying that damned mule to a tree,” Chris whispered, and shook his head. Insarov would simply have put a silenced bullet into it.
The Greek was almost at the beginning of the path to the front door. He halted, drawing close to a tree, looking back. Chris halted, too, kept Craig with him. Partridge joined them, running silently. Partridge whispered to Craig, “You lead. Get us to the porch under the best cover you can. Okay?”
Craig nodded and started quickly up through the garden, desperately remembering the trees and clumps of bushes he had noted earlier tonight. The Greek was hurrying up the longer path to the house, quite openly, a messenger with urgent news.
Craig reached the side of the porch, hoisted himself over its wooden railing. Partridge and Holland followed silently. The Greek was almost at the steps. Someone had been watching the front path, for the door of the house opened. At the first gleam of light over the threshold, Partridge and Holland flattened themselves against the house wall. Craig was not quick enough. He stood motionless against one of the wooden uprights on the porch, and hoped its mass of encircling vine disguised his outline. He need not have worried. The Greek’s wild string of sentences was holding all attention.
“What is he saying?” the woman’s voice asked inside the hall.
The Greek came up the steps speaking more slowly. “Dead,” he kept repeating, “the man is dead.” He gestured back in the direction of the dovecote.
“Dead?” a man’s voice asked. The door opened more widely. He shouted back over his shoulder, “The American agent is dead!”
“Achtung—” That was Insarov’s voice, clear, decisive, quick.
But the warning was too late. Partridge and the Greek lunged together, caught the man as he reached into his pocket, knocked him senseless. Holland had blocked the door, kept the woman from closing it. The front gate burst open; Elias and two men came running at full speed towards the house. The woman screamed. Holland and Partridge stepped into the hall.
As simple as that? thought Craig and followed them. The woman had stopped screaming. She had backed away to the staircase but someone had grasped her wrist and pulled her into the main room. Insarov was in there.
As simple as that, thought Craig. If he had had his way, he would have forced the house some fifteen minutes ago; and he would have failed. There would have been five men facing them, and no help from Elias possible. A little waiting was a necessary thing, it seemed. He glanced at his watch as he nodded to Elias. Fifteen minutes, all told, since they had first turned inside that front gate with a temperamental mule. Barely two hours since he had stood on this very spot and looked up that staircase, worrying about Veronica. The life and education of John Craig, he told himself, wryly, and moved towards the room. At the door he hesitated, and let Elias join Partridge and Holland inside. He stood with some other men, a tight group of watchful faces, but made sure he could see Insarov. This was the moment he had promised himself: the dropping of the mask, the abandonment of that bland, benign look on the face of Heinrich Berg.
But the mask was still in place. If there had been alarm, or fear, it was under control. Berg—or Insarov—was standing at the fireplace, facing Partridge and Holland and Elias as the master of this house. Not even as he watched the handcuffs, which a Greek detective was clamping around the woman’s wrists, did his expression change. Nor did Partridge’s words make any impact as he pointed to the woman and said, “The French want her. Jeanne Saverne. Take her down to the house where they are holding Maritta Maas. Also the man at the front door. He is using a French passport.”
“And I think,” said Holland, watching the unemotional face staring so calmly at him, “you could put out the message to Athens for relay to Paris: Pear Tree is in full harvest. Then,” he was smiling at the certain embarrassment on Partridge’s face, but still watching Insarov, “Uncle Peter can be picked up.”
“And we’ll let Smyrna know,” Partridge took over, watching Insarov, “that O’Malley is well, and in good hands. He is regaining consciousness in a nice soft bed. Also, we have caught Alex. His name is Robert Maybrick Bradley. We’ll pass that news to Paris, too. Our agent there would be very interested in tracing his contacts at NATO.”
“And I shall advise Athens,” Elias said, joining in, watching Insarov, “to inform the Communist agent whom we arrested yesterday morning as he attempted to take a ship from the Piraeus that he might as well tell everything about the kidnapping and murder of Yves Duclos. Because the man responsible for Duclos’ death has now been arrested.” He nodded to one of his men. “Take him,” he said, pointing to Insarov.
Insarov’s cold glance lingered on them one by one: Elias, Holland, Partridge. I shall remember you, he seemed to be saying. He did not bother to glance at the four other men crowded near the door. They were the subordinates, only worth thinking about if he were to try to break out of this room. The time was not right for that. They were all too excited, too ready to fire their revolvers. It w
ould be madness to reach for his. There was a suspicion of a smile on his lips, but the scarred eyebrow was markedly noticeable. “A mistake,” he said ominously, watching Partridge. “Put away those silly pistols. What a ridiculous figure you cut!” Then he looked at Holland. “A man of your age, and of some experience no doubt, ought to know better than to come in here like an American gangster.” And now it was Elias on whom the sharp blue eyes rested. “There will be repercussions. Very grave repercussions, indeed. You will be reduced to peddling fruit on the streets of Athens.” He waved a hand, dismissing them all, and turned his back to look at the picture over the fireplace.
Elias said, “You are under arrest, Igor Insarov.” He nodded to two of his men. “Search him.”
Insarov tried to pull his arms away from their grip, then—as they swung him around to face Elias again—dropped all resistance. He even smiled. “Another mistake. Insarov left half an hour ago. You will find him on the Stefanie, now out at sea. If you can find the Stefanie.”
“Dear dear dear me,” Holland murmured. “We did make a mistake. We forgot to tell him that the Stefanie and the cabin cruiser, and even that harmless sloop, were all boarded with little resistance, just ten minutes ago.”
“Search him,” repeated Elias.
“Take your hands off me! Diplomatic immunity!” Quickly, he repeated it in Greek.
The two detectives froze, looked at Elias.
Partridge shook his head. “Ah, that old story. Is it the best you can do, Insarov?”
“Search him,” said Elias.
“My name is Pavel Ulinov, I am a citizen of the USSR. I am a special adviser to our Economic Trade Mission visiting Milan in connection with a projected contract for the sale of petroleum. I have the standing of assistant to the third secretary of our Embassy in Rome. I have full diplomatic immunity.”