by David Boyle
She had a few spare pairs of knickers but otherwise no changes of clothes and felt inadequate, weighed down, miserable and far from home. As indeed she was. She was comforted by the fact that she had managed to write a letter to circumvent Fleming’s “contract”, addressed to Mrs Lancing-Price, and left with Turing in case anything happened to her, telling her the truth about Ralph and their relationship and that she had a grandson. Turing had strict instructions not to send it until he was certain she had been killed – even if that meant waiting until the end of the war.
She carried in her head the rest of her instructions. The message needed to be sent late in the evening when Bletchley would have had the opportunity to calculate the settings of the day.
Her first task, once the sun was really up, was to find a man called Brown – apparently British – who would, she hoped, arrange for transport to the mainland. But among those elements which she had not been prepared for was more than a smattering of words in Greek – like kalimera or ti kanis. She also carried no maps and very little Greek money beyond a couple of notes, and she suspected those had been superseded by occupation currency. The Enigma machine would have to go separately or, if she was found with it, it could seriously undermine her status as a journalist.
She walked along the beach in the general direction of north, at least if the sun was anything to go by. The Mediterranean was glinting beautifully in the morning light. Somehow, she would have to make it to Athens and preferably within forty-eight hours or so, but it would be a wrench to leave this beautiful spot. In the distance, there appeared to be somebody in the fields, but otherwise, nobody was about. It was utterly peaceful. Or it would have been if it had not been for the unearthly row going on above her.
She stared thoughtfully at the sky. Hundreds, no thousands, of planes were now making their way overhead and, as far as she could see in any direction, heading south. It was clear that this was not just a squadron of planes, it was a whole invasion fleet of them, bombers towing gliders – whole armies sailing overhead, like swarms of insects.
She had been given no briefing about it, though she racked her brains to remember whether Fleming had predicted any such thing. They just kept coming. Where were they going? Egypt? Surely not so far for gliders. No, there was still no doubt about it. This aerial armada was heading in the direction she had come from by submarine, towards Crete. It was hard to ignore the noise as she made her way across the uneven scrub towards what looked like a small village.
“I was looking for Mr Brown,” she said hopefully. There was rather a lot of shuffling and shrugging, and it was clear that the villagers did not really trust her – and why should they, after all? Even if there were, as yet, no Germans on the island, as Fleming had assured her.
“Where should I go to find Mr Brown?” she said clearly, in English.
This time, the shrugging was seriously off-putting. It was not until she was walking out of the village again, via a rutted track that at least headed northwards, that a young man sidled up to her.
“You are American reporter, right?” he said.
“Bingo!” she said. “Right!”
“You want Mr Brown or you want something else? You know this was where the Myrmidons came from?”
“You mean, as in Achilles?” Her crossword clue background had left some knowledge. “I didn’t know. Thank you for that information.”
The boy smiled engagingly. She began to trust him.
“You want a meal? You want the Germans? They are not here.”
I haven’t got anything to hide from him, have I, Xanthe said to herself.
“I’m a correspondent for the New Yorker magazine in search of material for an article.”
The boy looked at her. Did he look sceptical, she wondered. He said nothing. Perhaps he was seeking out the words to ask why she was here exactly.
“Well, most of all, I want to go back to Athens. I understood that Mr Brown has a boat.”
Trust seemed to seep back into his eyes.
“There are many boats in the harbour. They dare not go out after what happened to the Ydra.”
“What was that?” asked Xanthe nervously.
“It was a torpedo boat, bombed by Stukas some weeks ago. Many sailors killed.”
They had been walking uphill for some time. It was a mountainous place and they were heading in a circuitous route along a small track, relatively level with the sea on their right-hand side. The roar of the planes overhead continued and they could see them disappearing over the horizon towards the south.
They turned the corner, past a large and forlorn bush, and there was the main town before them and the harbour, with colourful fishing boats bobbing by the shore. It could have been a perfect scene from the Greek islands, were it not for one thing. There was a grey military boat in the harbour as well, and – “What is that?” said Xanthe with a jolt. “Is that a Greek ship?”
“Impossible. The Greek navy has been disbanded. Also, look at its flag.”
Flying clearly behind the bridge was a Nazi swastika. It may have been a Greek navy ship some weeks ago, but it was now a German one.
For a moment, a feeling of panic swept over Xanthe. Control yourself, control yourself. It’s an opportunity, she told herself.
Yes, if the Germans had only just arrived here, then there was no question of her not having the right permits. She would go into town and ask them to take her to Athens. She would say she had been on Aegina during the invasion and had chosen to stay – and that she now wished to return.
“Thank you. I’ll go down there.” She felt suddenly alone and frightened. “Will you come with me?”
“No, thank you, madam,” he said, bowing formally. “My name is Argyris. Perhaps we will meet again, some day, and then I’ll be at your service.”
She shook his hand and walked down into the town. There remained the issue of smuggling her equipment to Athens – the idea had been to send it via a radio operator or the mysterious Mr Brown. She could try taking it herself, but it would be a serious risk. It was unlikely that most German officers would know what on earth it was – it hardly looked like an Enigma machine – but it certainly looked suspicious.
The small, narrow streets were shuttered, though the sun was now up, and people were locked indoors, afraid of what the day would bring: this was the first sight of the invaders, just as it was for Xanthe. There was nobody hanging around.
She made straight for the dockside. There were now German soldiers in their field grey almost everywhere. They looked nearly as lost as she felt. They seemed to be searching with checklists and looking at buildings, not for people.
“Can you direct me to the officer in charge?” she said, summoning up her confidence. What am I doing? Her heart was thumping.
A young officer bowed to her in the Prussian style and indicated that she should follow. She felt for the time being that it might be sensible to keep her German language in reserve. This was a moment for American English, if ever there was one.
“You asked for me? I am the acting commandant on the island. My name is Helmut Nikolas.”
“Hi,” she said. “Shirley Johnson, New Yorker. I’m trying to find a way to get to Athens.”
“My English is small, I am sad. But if you can wait perhaps two days, I would be delighted to offer you accommodation on my small ship. But may I ask you what you have been doing on the island?”
“I came here a month ago to write a piece on Greece but, since the arrival of your men, people have been reluctant to take their boats out. So I have been prevented so far from leaving. I am very grateful to you, sir.”
“Perhaps you could tell me where you are staying.”
Why had she not anticipated that question? She kicked herself.
“I have been staying on the other side of the island. I have only just arrived in town.”
“In that case, may I offer you some help. Argyris! This young man will find you somewhere to stay on my authority.”
Before her, ag
ain, was the young man from the mountain road.
“Does this mean you support the Germans?” she asked him delicately, as they walked away, side by side.
“No, I just speak German, so I have become an intermediary. When they arrive, they ask for me. I went to the German school in Athens,” he added by way of somewhat coy explanation.
“That must put you in a powerful position.”
“I do not think so, madam. This is only the second time they have come, and the first time, they hardly stayed long. But I can find you somewhere to stay, if that would help. I can even arrange to take you over the sea. I have friends on the boats.”
“Thank you. I think maybe that I should not go behind the commandant’s back, now I’ve asked him.”
“Do not worry. We can tell him later,” said Argyris. “He is a good German, I believe.”
“There are such things, then?”
“Of course, as in any nation.”
*
It was after a good dinner of olives and some kind of vegetable stew, during an afternoon which seemed to have involved sleeping, for everyone except the military – kept busy unloading crates and going house to house with checklists – when Xanthe experienced her first surprise.
There was a faint tap on the window of the house belonging to a friend of Argyris, where she had eaten lunch. So faint that, at first, she thought it must be a cat or something even smaller. She stood up – like everyone else, she had been snoozing – then watched, powerless, as the door handle began to turn on the back door. A moment later, there was a man in the room. Or was it a man? He was dressed like some kind of hedge priest. He had grown most of a beard.
“Can I help you?” asked Xanthe nervously, horribly aware that she was unarmed.
She felt flustered, trying to draft an article in her head for the New Yorker about the strange island and the gentle arrival of German invaders, and the incident with the boat that was bombed in the harbour. If she was going to be a foreign correspondent, then that was what she ought to be doing, she felt.
The new arrival said nothing. He moved a little closer. Then, in a cut-glass English accent, he said: “I believe you have been trying to get hold of Mr Brown.”
“I’m afraid I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
There was no point in giving everything away to anyone who asked.
“You know the Myrmiddons came from here?”
Why was she constantly being told this?
“So I’ve been told.”
“Well, I’m Achilles,” said the visitor. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Then, tell me, Achilles,” said Xanthe, excited that things were somehow now going right. “If I was the person you were waiting for, how would I know you?”
“I would tell you about the rabbits in the south of Spain.”
“Well, as they say, it never snows in Ibiza,” she said, checking for a look of recognition.
He shook her hand with enthusiasm.
“Delighted to meet you, my dear.”
It was impossible to work out how old he was.
“How did you know where to find me?”
“You were asking for me back in the early hours of the morning in Pachia Rachi, I believe. You weren’t hard to trace. Now, have you got the stuff?”
“I do. Can you take it? Can you get it to the… right destination?”
“Yup. Sooner the better, I think.”
She reached into her haversack and extracted the four pieces, wrapped in cloth, that would fit together into an imitation Enigma machine – three pieces plus a make-do set of rotors, rather amateur versions of the one with which she had killed Stumpf in Berlin.
“Thank you,” he said, depositing the pieces in a muddy sack. “All will be in place when you arrive. We’ll take it over tonight. In fact, you can come too…”
“No thanks. I’m an American correspondent. I can’t be too cloak and dagger.”
“Pfff, that’s what they all say,” said Brown, rudely.
“Was that a dig at the foreign policy of my country?” said Xanthe defensively, racking her brains to think of what the US government had done, actively, on behalf of an embattled Europe. “May I remind you of Lend-Lease…”
Brown spread his hands out innocently. “Nothing could be further from my mind,” he said.
They both laughed, then he shushed them.
“It’s siesta time,” he whispered. “No point in making ourselves conspicuous.”
“Then next time, don’t be rude about my president,” said Xanthe teasingly. “The US army is delayed. In the meantime, you’ll have to make do with me.”
*
When Brown had gone, she reached back into her bag with a great sense of relief and pulled out her portable typewriter again. It was time to begin her first despatch all over again. How would Mollie Panter-Downes do it? She would start as if in the middle of a conversation.
Xanthe imagined herself talking to Turing about her brief time in Greece, how would she tell him? She began to type:
“The trouble with being invaded is that nothing is quite what you expect and, because of that, almost nothing works. No shopping, no banks, no money – at least no reliable money: you suddenly need to have ‘occupation marks’, which have to be printed and brought in with the first troops…”
She had, in fact, already heard complaints about the occupation marks. They were in short supply because, or so she heard, the Germans had not yet brought the printer in yet.
She scribbled the date on her draft – 22 May – and began to fall asleep. It had been a long night and she felt completely drained.
She was woken by a knock on the door. Outside was the young temporary commandant. He bowed and clicked his heels.
“Fraulein, my apologies for this disturb,” he said. “My boat is at your disposal. I remain here. But you are welcome to join my men who are on their way to Piraeus.
“I’m quite grateful,” said Xanthe sleepily. “Have I got time to pack?”
“We leave in one hour precisely, Fraulein. I will say farewell to you at the harbour.”
He bowed and was gone. Xanthe felt a sense of disappointment which she put down to exhaustion. She was leaving the island earlier than she had expected but had already met enough characters to populate a book of collected articles. Yet also, she could think of little except Indy in his cot back home – but what home? She was still living at a secret cryptographic establishment, about five thousand miles or so way from Indy’s only other blood relatives outside Nazi Germany. He depended on her ability to get home safe. It was going to be a quick trip to Athens, find the safe house, send the signal, then back out again the way she had come.
*
As she walked up the gangway onto the docks at Piraeus, Xanthe was surprised to get a salute and a wink from the sailors. How very strange life is, she said to herself, returning the salute like a visiting queen.
But the harbour itself was something of a shock, once she was on solid ground. There was rubble everywhere and sunken ships and boats cluttering the sea lanes with their masts and superstructure pointing sadly above the water. For a moment, it reminded her of what she was supposed to be doing. Civilisation was under threat, from the kind of barbarism she had seen in the London Blitz and some of the behaviour she had encountered in Berlin. But at least it meant there was a purpose to this intense risk.
The key question now was how to get into Athens, and she had only just asked herself the question when a young man popped up alongside her and took her arm.
“Madam, if you will permit me. I have been asked by Mr Brown and by my friend Argyris, if I would accompany you today and take you wherever you want to go. My name is Giorgios.
“Giorgios, you are a godsend. Thank you so much. What do we do now if we want to get into Athens? I also need to find a Western Union office to send my article, if at all possible. Oh, and I need to get to the US embassy.”
“In that case, we will take this b
us.”
Xanthe had noticed the mode of transport that he indicated, but it was no kind of bus that she recognised. It was a cart with fruit and another goat, but he helped her up with dignity and she didn’t like to complain. After a hurried conversation in Greek, the driver motioned his horse forward with the flick of a wrist. Then they were off.
“I expect this is not your normal bus, madam,” said Giorgios, smiling, “but it is the most reliable. There are taxis, but they are jackals, and not very many of them.”
“Tell me, Giorgios. What do you know about occupation marks? And please call me Shirley.”
Giorgios laughed. She warmed to him. He was not much younger than she was herself.
“They are worth nothing. They bring them in great quantities, and when they run out, they just go and print some more. I have seen them do so. It is strange, is it not, just to make the money you need? Perhaps also arrogant…”
“Perhaps criminal,” she said.
Xanthe began to calculate that the cart was averaging about two miles an hour. If she had walked, she would have got into Athens at least twice as fast. But then she would have arrived tired, hungry and conspicuous. On this cart, with its fruit and vegetables wilting in the heat, and with her hair dyed dark to match her passport photo, she looked like every other young woman in Greece – at least at first sight.
An hour or so later, the cart stopped near the Acropolis, and Giorgios shouted his thanks and held out his arm for Xanthe to descend. The planes were still in the air above them, though not quite so many of them. She wondered how the Greek army was managing in Crete, assuming that was their target, let alone the British and their Australian and New Zealand allies. There were many more field grey uniforms in the centre of the city.
They drew up outside an office with an American flag.
“This is the US consulate,” said Giorgios.
“Thank you so much, I am so grateful to you.”
She felt elated that everything had been unexpectedly easy.
“Will I see you again?” he said. “Perhaps by the harbour for your return?”
“I hope so, Giorgios. I’m not sure right now…”
*
