The Heights of Zervos Read online

  As soon as the porter had gone, Macomber locked the door, picked up the two largest pieces of broken carafe and deposited them in the wastepaper basket. God, it was a relief to be inside neutral Turkey, to be on board, to be alone in his cabin. And within thirty hours he would be able to revert to his real identity, to be known once more as Ian Macomber, to talk in English all day long if he wished. He went over to the washbasin and looked in the mirror above it, gazing into the glass like a man seeing the result when surgical bandages have been removed.

  For the first time since he had left the flat in Bucharest his features relaxed, the crinkles of humour appeared at the corners of his mouth, and even though still wearing the German hat and leather coat the Teutonic image was gone. It was going to be irksome - keeping up his German impersonation until he landed safely on Greek soil - but it was necessary. He was travelling with German papers and the Greek captain might not appreciate his sudden conversion to another nationality. So for one more day and one more night he must go on playing the part of Dr Richard Dietrich, German archaeologist. The knock on the door startled him, reminded him of the extreme fatigue he was labouring under - and also that the danger might not be past yet. He unlocked the door, his hand clutching the Luger inside his coat pocket, opened it cautiously. It was the chief steward and he showed surprise when Macomber addressed him in fluent Greek.

  'What do you want?'

  'You speak our language - it is most unusual for a German ...'

  'I said what do you want?'

  'Is everything to your satisfaction, sir? Good. If you need something you have only to call me..." The voluble steward chattered on while Macomber stared at him bleakly, then he said something which again startled the Scot. 'I'm sure you'll be interested to know we have three of your fellow-countrymen also on board...'

  For a muddled moment Macomber thought he was referring to three Englishmen, then he recovered his tired wits. 'Are they together?' he enquired in a bored tone which concealed his anxiety about the reply.

  'No, sir, they are all travelling separately.' The steward paused and there was a malicious gleam in his quick-moving eyes. 'There are also two British passengers.'

  'You find that amusing?'

  'No, sir.' The steward replied hastily, taken aback by the grimness of this overbearing German. He tried to correct his blunder. 'I shall be in the dining-room where breakfast is being prepared, so if you require anything...'

  'Then I shall ask you! And take this -I want a comfortable trip, so do your duty.' Macomber had handed the flabbergasted man a generous tip before turning bis back and closing the cabin door, but it had suddenly occurred to him that the steward could be a valuable source of information and he had already decided to question him further about the other passengers. But not now - it would arouse too much interest. Alone again, Macomber stripped off the hat and coat and doused himself in ice-cold water. Three Germans aboard, he was thinking as he dried himself slowly; perhaps it wasn't all over yet. When he had reached Istanbul he had avoided going anywhere near the British Legation - because the Legation was the very place the Abwehr might be watching for his arrival. It was too late to arrest him but it certainly wasn't too late to have him killed. Not that he feared the Abwehr's revenge - they had a far more powerful motive for ensuring that he never reached Allied territory alive, and they were perfectly capable of putting an assassin aboard the Hydra, an assassin not necessarily of German nationality. It's what I'm carrying in my head they'd like to destroy, he reminded himself. Information gathered over months of patient observation in the Balkans - data about assembly points, storage depots, the routes along which supplies were being sent to the Reich ...

  He finished drying himself, glanced at the inviting bunk and looked away quickly. Lord, it had been a swine of a trip from Bucharest. Four hours' sleep in forty-eight, his reflexes shot to hell, but he'd better check this damned ship - and forget any ideas about sleep until he was actually on Greek soil. He put on the leather coat and the hat, tested the action of his Luger, glanced in the mirror. He was back in business again. The arrogant, uncompromising image of Dr Richard Dietrich stared back at him. Replacing the gun inside his coat, he left the cabin to carry out his inspection of the 5,000-ton Greek ferry.

  The bitter wind raked his face as soon as he reached the deck, a wind unpleasant enough, he soon found, to keep the handful of fellow-passengers below decks. Half an hour later, his tour of the vessel completed, he stood near the stern where he could keep an eye on the gangway for late arrivals. It was just possible that the Abwehr might send someone on board at the last moment. Standing by the rail, Macomber seemed impervious to the weather as he quietly smoked his cigar. The lifeboat covers were still crusted with last night's snowfall, the masthead rigging still encased with glassy ice, but the battered yellow funnel was dripping moisture as the ship began to get up steam. To all outward appearances Macomber had wandered round the vessel with the idle curiosity of the newly arrived passenger who is interested in his temporary home, but now as he smoked his cigar he was cataloguing his discoveries in his mind.

  From the chief steward he had learned that the Hydra carried a crew of six, that the captain's name was Nopagos, and that he had plied this regular passage between Istanbul and Zervos for the past fourteen years. Macomber stirred at the rail as the chief steward reappeared at his elbow, chattering amiably.

  'Looks as though we've got our full complement of passengers aboard, sir.'

  Macomber nodded, wondering whether he had overdone the tip: the steward was becoming his shadow. He checked his watch. 'There's still time for last-minute arrivals.' Again he was subtly probing for information.

  'Doubt that, sir. I was talking to the ticket office manager a few minutes ago on the phone - he sold seven tickets for this trip, so it looks as though that's the lot.'

  Macomber nodded again and the steward, sensing that he was no longer in a talkative mood, excused himself. Left alone once more, the Scot continued his mental inventory. Two British civilians he hadn't yet seen, one man in his late twenties while his companion was probably a few years beyond thirty. Which was interesting, since both men were of military age. One Greek civilian who lived on Zervos and apparently had something to do with the monastic order which owned the ferry - again a man of military age, but Macomber presumed that his slight limp had kept him out of the Greek Army. And, finally, the three Germans. He had seen two of them briefly, both civilians in their early forties who had the appearance of businessmen, but the third, a man called Schnell, had apparently come aboard very early in the morning and locked himself away in his cabin. 'With his cabin trunk,' as the voluble steward had explained earlier. On this point the Scot had detected an uncertain note in the steward's voice and he had asked a question.

  'You find that odd - that he should keep a trunk in his cabin?'

  'Well, sir, it takes up a lot of space and I offered to have it put in the hold when he came aboard. After all, we shall be docking at Zervos in twenty-four hours. He was quite abrupt with me, the way some...' He had paused and Macomber, knowing he had been about to say 'the way some Germans are', had smiled grimly to himself. But the steward had changed his wording in time. '... the way some people are when they arrive early. He insisted it stayed with him in the cabin so he must be carrying something valuable.'

  Something valuable? Macomber frowned as he recalled the steward's words - it was this cabin trunk and its unknown contents which occupied his thoughts as he gazed out over the muddle of decrepit-looking tramps and coasters which congested the Golden Horn harbour. He heard a sound behind him and remained staring out across the water, one large boot resting on the lower rail. Was it likely that an attempt would be made to assassinate him at this late hour - a few minutes before putting to sea? Out of the corner of his eye he watched the Greek approaching, heard the faint slur of his limping step.

  The man's name was Grapos and even with that slight limp Macomber thought he would be an asset to any army: of only me
dium height there was, nevertheless, a suggestion of tremendous physical strength in those broad shoulders and that powerful chest which swelled the coloured shirt. Not a prosperous individual, Macomber decided: his grey jacket and trousers were of poor quality, the red tie round his neck was faded and his boots were shabby. The steward had told him of an unexpected facility Grapos possessed - the monks had taught him to speak English. The Greek was very close now, stopping almost behind the Scot, and his eyes were shrewd and alert.

  'Always it seems so long before the boat sails,' he began. 'You have been to Zervos before?'

  'Once.' Macomber replied in Greek and turned bis head away to study the harbour. Grapos might have been surprised had he known how much Macomber had registered in that brief glance. The Greek's face was strong-featured, the jaw-line formidable, and the long straggle of dark moustache which curved round the corners of his wide mouth gave him the look of a bandit or guerrilla. He was one of the most villainous-looking characters Macomber had encountered since entering the Balkans. But the point which had alerted the Scot was the fact that Grapos had spoken to him in Greek. Which could only mean that he had eavesdropped while Macomber was conversing in that language with the steward, unless that talkative individual had informed Grapos that they had a Greek-speaking German aboard.

  'There is bad weather on the way,' Grapos remarked and looked upwards.

  'Why do you say that?' Macomber's tone was brusque and unencouraging, but the Greek seemed not to notice.

  'Because of the birds.' Grapos lifted a hand and pointed to where a cloud of seagulls wheeled and floated in erratic circles high above the white-coated domes and minarets onshore.

  'Don't you always get birds over a harbour?' Macomber sounded bored with the company which had thrust itself upon him, but now he was observing the large, hairy-backed hands which gripped the rail as though they might pull a section loose bodily.

  'Yes, but not so many, and they are uneasy - you can tell by the way they fly. I have seen them fly like that over Zervos before the great storms. This will be a bad voyage,' he went on cheerfully. 'We shall run into a storm before we land at Katyra. Let us hope it does not strike us off Cape Zervos. You see,' he continued with relish, 'the entrance to the gulf is very narrow and the cape has been the graveyard of a hundred ships or more...' He broke off, grinning savagely as he displayed a row of perfect white teeth. 'But, of course, you know - you have been there before.'

  Macomber said nothing as he hunched his broad shoulders and threw the smoked cigar butt into the water. Two ships away along the wharf another vessel was preparing to leave, her white funnel belching out clouds of murky smoke which the wind dispersed in chaotic trails. Behind him he heard footsteps retreating, one of them out of step. Grapos had taken the hint and was on his way to find someone else who would listen to his chatter. Extracting a Zeiss Monokular glass, a single-lens field-glass, from his pocket, Macomber focused it on the other vessel getting up a head of steam. The Rumanian flag whipped in the wind from her masthead and she was, he knew, the Rupescu. Her decks were strangely deserted for a ship on the point of departure and at the head of the gangplank two seamen stood as though on guard. It was quite clear that shortly she would follow the Hydra across the Sea of Marmara and into the Dardanelles, which he found interesting.

  From the steward he had learned that the Rupescu, a fast motor vessel, was twelve hours out of the Bulgarian port of Varna and the situation could be a little tricky since she was bound for the Aegean. German troops now controlled Bulgaria so technically the Allies might regard the Rupescu as an enemy vessel, a prize to be sought out by the Royal Navy. Certainly the British Legation at Istanbul would already have wirelessed Egypt of her presence in the straits, but Macomber doubted whether she would be seized - the British Government had broken off diplomatic relations with Rumania but had not yet declared war on that unhappy country. Satisfied with what he had seen - nothing out of the ordinary -Macomber put away his glass and then stiffened as a shabbily dressed man dashed up the gangway. Under his arm he carried a batch of newspapers and he flourished one in the Scot's face when he came along the desk. Macomber bought a copy, glancing at the banner headline before he went below. German Army Poised To Attack?

  The engines were throbbing steadily as he made his way along a narrow companionway and walked calmly into the saloon, a small cramped room with panelled walls which was already reeking of acrid cigar smoke. Pulling out his copy of the Frankfurter Zeitung, Macomber sank heavily into an ancient arm-chair in a corner which allowed him to see the whole room while he pretended to read. Hahnemann, a thin-faced German in his early forties and dressed like a travelling salesman in a cheap suit, sat in the diagonally opposite corner smoking one of the cigars responsible for the bad air. In another corner, a heavily built German of medium height, his clothes well-cut and dark, sat reading some typed sheets and also smoking a cigar. That would be Volber. The fourth corner was occupied by a small bar where a man in white uniform was polishing a glass. Thank God, Macomber was thinking, those two don't exactly look like sociable types. I could do without useless conversation in German at the moment. The thought had hardly passed through his head when two men opened the doors and stood hesitating as though not sure whether to come in. Their first words warned Macomber. They were British.

  'Go on in, for God's sake,' Prentice said impatiently to Ford, who was standing in the doorway. 'Don't just stand gawping. We've paid our fares just like the rest of these johnnies.'

  Ford's face was expressionless as he carefully made his way through the smoke to a table close to the bar. As they settled behind a low table the steward took Macomber's order and a minute later placed a glass of beer in front of him. Ford kept his voice low as he made the remark. 'That chap who's just got his beer looks like another bleedin' Jerry.'

  'I think they all are,' Prentice murmured nonchalantly.

  'This is a funny, funny war at times.' Unlike Ford, who sat stiffly and kept an eye on the other three men without appearing to do so, Prentice was outwardly the soul of relaxation. When the steward arrived for their order he deliberately raised his voice so the whole room could hear. 'A beer and a glass of ouzo, laddie.'

  'Beg, please?' The steward looked at a loss. Prentice leaned round him and stabbed a ringer in the direction of Macomber's table, his voice louder still. 'One ouzo and a beer - beer - like that chap over there ordered.' The other two Germans glanced in his direction and then looked away, but the Scot, who had lowered his paper, stared hard across the room with an unpleasantly inquiring expression.

  'Tough-looking basket, that big one,' Ford remarked, keeping his own voice quiet. 'If I met him in Libya I'd let bin have two in the pump. Yes, two - just to be sure.'

  The drinks were served and Ford sipped at his palely coloured beer cautiously, then grimaced. 'They've got the washing-up water mixed in with the beer.' He eyed Prentice's glass with even more distaste. 'You're not really drinking that, are you?' But his question was purely rhetorical - Prentice would drink anything, smoke anything, eat anything. Some of the dishes he'd consumed during their brief stay in Turkey had astounded and appalled the conservative Ford. Prentice pushed the glass of yellowish liquid towards him.

  'Go on, it tastes just like whisky.' He watched with amusement while his companion took a gulp and then almost dropped the glass, looking round suddenly to make sure his experience hadn't been observed. Macomber was still watching him over his paper.

  'Lovely!' Ford choked. 'A delicate mixture of nail varnish and turpentine. If that's the Greek national drink no wonder the Romans licked them. It still seems odd travelling with a bunch of Jerries for company.' He looked round the saloon as he heard a distant rattle. The gangway being hauled up probably. In one corner the thin-faced German was absorbed in a book while the man crouched over some typed sheets made notes with a pencil. They might have been aboard a normal peacetime boat and the war seemed a long way from Istanbul 'It really is damned funny,' Prentice began, his lean, humorous
face serious for a change. 'Here we are on a Greek ferry just leaving for Zervos - in the middle of a life-and-death war with Adolf Hider's Reich - and because the Greeks are righting the Italians but not the Germans, we can travel with three Jerries we mustn't even bump into if we meet them in the corridor. I must remember this trip when I write me memoirs, Ford.'

  'Yes, sir,' said Ford automatically, and received a sharp dig in the ribs for his pains. He understood the hint and swore inwardly. He'd be glad when this ferry trip was over and they could get back to normal service life, to being Lieutenant Prentice and Staff-Sergeant Ford. Before they had boarded the Hydra Prentice had given him a stern lecture in their Istanbul hotel bedroom and he had tripped up already.

  'Ford,' Prentice had begun, 'for the purposes of this sea trip back to Greece and while we're on board the ferry, I want you to forget I'm a lieutenant and, what's more important still, forget that you're a staff-sergeant. We're sporting civvies, but if you keep on calling me "sir" it's a dead giveaway. There may even be a German tourist on that broken-down old Greek ferry.' Prentice hadn't really believed that this would happen but he was dramatizing the situation to try and make Ford forget his years of professional training for a few hours.