by Graham Marks
23 A LONG WAY TO GO
It was a terrifically long way down, or at least it seemed that way to Trey, diving towards the coal black waters of the Bosphorus. As he flew like an arrow, the cold night air singing in his ears, he tried to keep in mind what he’d been taught at his swimming lessons...keep your head down; keep your arms completely straight in front, hands together, like a knife to cut the water; don’t let your legs wave about and keep your feet as parallel to your legs as you can. All of which wouldn’t matter one tiny bit if the water was too shallow, of course.
Before he’d launched himself off the roof, Trey had taken one last deep breath, which he had held all the way down. The shock of hitting the water made him breathe out, which was exactly the right thing to do as he plunged down, the drag from his clothes and the shoes tied to his belt slowing him up; and then he remembered, too late, that he should have pushed his hands up the moment after he hit the water so that he wouldn’t go too deep. Trey bent backwards, pushing at the water with his arms and kicking as powerfully as he could; opening his eyes he could see there was light above him, although he couldn’t tell how far away it was, and he swam towards it for all he was worth. Now that he hadn’t crowned himself by diving into water that wasn’t deep enough, he didn’t want to end up drowning because he’d gone down too far.
Five seconds later – five of what had to be the longest seconds in the entire history of the whole world, in his opinion – Trey broke the surface, completely disoriented and sucking in air like there was no tomorrow. He trod water for a moment or two, swinging round left and right until he’d finally got his bearings.
He floated low in the water, his clothes clinging to him like folds of sagging skin, shoes still attached to his belt and, amazingly, his jacket still tied round his waist, and he looked up at the house. It wasn’t built at the water’s edge, as he’d assumed, but right over the water, with twin boat houses under the veranda. As far as he could tell his dive hadn’t prompted anybody to turn a lamp on and look out of a window to see what had happened. Yet.
Still and all, hanging around in the water, right in front of the house where anyone who did take a look might spot him, was probably not a terrific idea. Best that he got himself to shore as quick as he could so he could decide what to do next – attempt to get back into the house to see if his father was there, or start making his way back to Constantinople for help.
It took seconds to figure that getting help was his only real option as he did not want to get caught. Remembering that south was to his left, Trey started swimming, breaststroking as quietly as possible in that direction, figuring that he’d better get further away from the house before he made for the shore. Which was when he saw the seaplane.
Bobbing on its floats, with its double set of wings making it look kind of old-fashioned in comparison to Major Bernardi’s sleek, red, single-winged Macchi M.52, the plane was moored downriver from the house; as Trey swam towards it he allowed himself to imagine that in fact he was an experienced pilot. That the Italians had taught him everything he needed to know back in Venice and all he had to do was climb up into the cockpit, turn the engine over, and before the men who had kidnapped him knew anything about it he’d be airborne! The truth of the matter was he had absolutely no idea how to fly the seaplane, but it did occur to him that something useful might’ve been left in it – like, maybe, a map?
You never knew.
Trey glided over to the nearest float and used one of the struts to help pull himself up onto it, his waterlogged clothing doing its level best to pull him into the water again. The plane rocked back and forth as he stood up rather unsteadily. Holding onto the lower wing, with water cascading off him, the night air suddenly made him shiver quite violently, his chattering teeth sounding like someone was playing a game of pick-up with knucklebones inside his head. Moving along the float he ducked under the wing, coming up below the pilot’s cockpit.
Carefully hauling himself up onto the lower wing he took a look and saw nothing there that seemed like it was going to be any use to him. He was about to look in the rear cockpit, where the co-pilot would sit, when it occurred to him that this must’ve been where they’d dumped the case with him in it! Incensed at the treatment he’d had, Trey reached into the cockpit and grabbed a lever at random...then he stopped for a moment, feeling just a bit guilty that he was about to vandalize a beautiful machine. Only for a moment, though, and only a very tiny bit guilty: these were bad people. Then he yanked sideways on the lever as hard as he could and it came off in his hand.
Try flying without that, he thought as he held on tight and leaned over at a fairly perilous angle to see whether there might be anything of interest in the back. Peering into the dark space Trey saw, tantalizingly just out of reach, the shape of what looked like it could possibly be a leather briefcase on the seat. But if he was going to get his hands on it he was somehow going to have to get an awful lot nearer. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained”, that’s what good old Pistol Gripp would say, so he ventured, clinging to the side of the cockpit, legs dangling down, and scrambling with his bare feet until he eventually fell head first onto the seat.
Squirming himself back upright, Trey got a hold of what he’d seen on the seat and discovered that it was, after all, a rather excellent brown leather case, like a very grown up satchel, complete with brass clasps, a handle and a shoulder strap. It was pretty heavy, like all the best presents on your birthday or at Christmas were, and feeling quite excited he undid it and took a peek inside. Papers. And a gun. An automatic pistol, by the look of it.
Trey could feel his pulse racing. A gun. He had a gun! Just like Trent and all the sleuths in the Black Ace stories. It was kind of careless of the people who’d grabbed him to leave it out here on the plane, but, he supposed, this did seem like it was the boondocks. And who would expect a kid to jump off the top of the roof in the middle of the night?
He was just about to start the process of getting himself out of the cockpit and back down onto the float when he heard a noise. His nerves completely on edge, Trey immediately sank down in the seat. Was someone out there? Did they have a guard, patrolling round the house? How the heck was he going to get ashore now? Panic spread like blood from a gunshot wound, the dread of being found and taken back to that attic room making his scalp tighten. Hunkered down out of sight Trey then cottoned on that what he was hearing wasn’t footsteps at all, and that now he could also hear some kind of snuffling.
Snuffling?
He inched his way upwards until, in the gloom, he saw it. A pig. And not the kind of jolly Piggly Wiggly-style porker like you might expect to see on a farm, but a big old wild boar. On its way to who knew where, the stocky, bristle-covered animal took a last look around and then trotted off, disappearing into the night. Trey sat up. It dawned on him that, wherever he was, the fact there were wild boar out there meant it was proper countryside. With who knew what other wild animals. He looked at the briefcase he was hugging, in which there was a gun. Trey glanced over at the shoreline and let out a sigh...all he had to do now was somehow find a way of swimming over to it without getting the pistol wet and everything would be just fine and dandy.
A quick search of the cockpit of the seaplane showed that it was entirely devoid of anything waterproof to wrap the briefcase in (the search did, however, throw up a couple of maps – the reason he’d taken a look in the plane in the first place – which he stuffed in the briefcase without looking at them), so he’d just have to find another way.
Trey carefully slid down onto the float nearest to the shore and lay the briefcase on the float; easing himself back into the cold, black water he looked behind to gauge how far he had to go and took a deep breath – which was nowhere near as meaningful as the one he’d taken on the edge of the rooftop. Reaching up for the briefcase, he held it as high as possible over his head and struck out, kicking as hard as he could.
It wasn’t that far to the shore, but it felt like he was never going to get t
here. His shoulders were aching, he was getting more and more tired (and the case getting nearer and nearer to the water) with every kick, and he was making what sounded like an unholy racket as well. Then his foot hit gravel and mud. Trey splashed to a halt and stumbled to his feet knowing exactly how a drowning rat must feel. And look.
Holding the briefcase out to the side so he didn’t dribble water onto it, Trey dragged himself up to the top of the slope and sank to the ground, shaking the Bosphorus out of his hair. He’d made it. And all he had to do now was make it to Constantinople... He looked to his left at the silhouette of the house. Even if his father was being held a prisoner there, no matter which way he looked at it, the only way forward was to find help. If his father was there, he had to leave him. And if he wasn’t there, Trey had to find him.
He unknotted his jacket from around his waist and wrung as much of the water out of it as he could, laying it on the ground beside him, then took his balled-up socks (which contained his wristwatch) out of one of his shoes. The lame attempt to stop his watch from getting too wet had failed miserably and it was now stuck at just after half past twelve. For ever. Trey put it on anyway and tried to undo the laces attaching his shoes to his belt. It was no easy job as his fingers were numb, waterlogged and wrinkly, while the laces had swollen and at first refused to budge.
Finally, as damp, uncomfortable and tired as he felt, he was at last ready to go, and then he remembered the maps. He got them out and discovered, by the light of the silvery moon (the tune, one of his mother’s favourites, started to run in his head) that they were German, which he might know the sound of but he couldn’t read. One of the maps had Das Königreich von Serben, von Kroaten und von Slovenes on the cover, which even he could tell was going to be no help at all to him, but the other map was titled Die Türkei: Konstantinopolis und das Bosphorus. Trey opened it up to find that it was going to be a lot more useful than he could ever have imagined.
Someone had helpfully marked on it what Trey took to be a rough flight path, with what looked like compass bearings and other notations every so often. The pencil line went from Constantinople (or Konstantinopolis) to where he could make out that the word haus had been neatly written next to a dot on the western side of the Bosphorus.
There was nothing else marked on the map. No sign of a town or a village, or houses, for that matter. This really was Nowheresville, good and proper.
But, while Trey couldn’t fly himself back he could read a map, and he was sure, if he kept close to the line he figured must be a road, that he’d find his way okay. He’d bet good money on it (if he was allowed to). Refolding the map he stashed it in the briefcase, which he slung over his shoulder, and wearily stood up. “Time to move on out,” he muttered to himself, like ranch-hands in the Saturday morning Tom Mix movies always did. “Git along there...”
24 IRONS IN THE FIRE
Baba Duan had not let grass grow under his feet since Herr Reinhardt Gessler’s visit. In fact, much like his eldest son, he too had been busy; going here, there and everywhere else, he’d worked until the early hours doing what he did best: gathering information. His methods, unlike Evren’s, were much more subtle and they had, also unlike Evren’s, been really quite successful.
Circumstances had seen to it that father and son had absolutely no idea what the other had been up to. Baba Duan had already left the house when Evren came rushing back to tell him what had happened to Trey, and he didn’t come home until some thirty minutes after Ahmet had dropped Evren off. Thinking that his father was at home, and still a little shaken that they’d been shot at by the Russians, Evren had sneaked back into the house, silent as a moth. He’d gone straight to bed and not heard his father come home.
Even though Baba Duan had only managed a few hours’ sleep, he was up (as he knew the English liked to say) with the lark. Although, to be honest, he could not remember the last time he’d seen one of those birds in Constantinople. He had a plan, and as anyone with any sense at all knew, a plan would remain nothing but hot air, speculation and guesswork until it was put into practice. Whistling to himself, Baba Duan strolled into the kitchen, patting his recently-shaved cheeks, to find Evren already at the table and involved with a bowl of figs, a slab of bread and a glass of tea.
“Ah...well, well,” Baba Duan looked slightly taken aback at finding someone else, albeit his adored first-born, in the kitchen. “Another early bird. Is it because of some job that I’ve forgotten I have given you, or are you maybe going to see Trey?”
“Um, no, Baba...” Evren had been hoping to get out of the house without seeing anyone, so he didn’t have to answer any awkward questions...like where had he been when there was work to be done (there was always work to be done), and what time had he eventually got back? But now that his father was standing there in front of him he knew he’d better come clean about everything. “I cannot see Trey, Baba.”
“Oh? Why not?”
“I don’t know where he is.”
“At the Consulate, surely...no?”
“No, Baba.” Evren shook his head. He sat back in his chair, his appetite gone, and began telling his father what had happened the day before. He gave every detail that he could remember of the events, like his father had taught him a good reporter should be able to do. When he’d finished, Baba Duan had also finished the figs, bread and cup of tea.
“You did well, Evren, very well. Although what might have happened if you had really gone in the house and been caught I do not know. Did the Russians really shoot at you?”
Evren nodded. “But only because the car backfired. I think.” He got up and went to get some more food, his appetite having returned, now that he’d told the whole story and his father hadn’t bitten his head off. “What can we do now, Baba? The same men who have his father have got Trey as well.”
“We don’t know that...”
While his son had told him his side of the story, chapter and verse, Baba Duan didn’t think it appropriate that he was as honest in return. When it came to information, he believed, not everybody needed to know absolutely everything. “Even after your adventure with Neyla and the English boy,” Baba Duan continued, “we still don’t know exactly who it is who has either of them. That is still a mystery which remains to be solved.”
“But how, Baba?”
“Let me put it this way,” Baba Duan took some more of the food his son had brought to the table, “I have some irons in the fire. Which is, in the present state of this and that, the best I can be doing at the minute.”
Evren knew his father well enough to know that he had not been telling him the whole story. Baba Duan had a way of licking his lips when there was more to tell than he was prepared to say. Or when he was being less than truthful. He remembered the first time he’d realized that Baba Duan was lying to him. It had been a shock to find out that his trusted parent could do that, and he’d angrily confronted his father, demanding to know why he’d done it. “We should both treat this as a lesson,” Baba Duan had replied, seemingly not at all put out that he’d been caught. “A wise man once said ‘Any fool can tell the truth, but it takes a shrewd and clever one to lie well’, and I believe he was right; I was found out because I was careless, and you were cleverer than I gave you credit for.”
Evren heard the front door close downstairs and leaned out of the kitchen window just in time to see his father turn the corner and disappear. Evren still found it odd that he was wearing a bowler hat, instead of his beloved red fez, but, for some inexplicable reason, the government had banned the wearing of fezzes the previous year (on pain of death...he really didn’t understand that). Part of him wanted to drop everything and follow his father to see where he was going, but a sensible voice reminded him that he’d made an agreement with Neyla to meet early and then go on up to Arthur’s house.
The night before Ahmet had apologized for not being able to join them, because, he’d said, he had a family to feed and had to get back to work. So, whatever they decided to do
next, they were going to have to do it without the aid of a car and driver. Which Evren was all too aware was going to severely limit any course of action they might come up with.
Arthur and his sister were barely on speaking terms. Christina could not believe that her brother had gone out with the others and left her behind! And she particularly didn’t like his claim that when he’d left she’d been snoring. The absolute truth was that he’d sneaked out and left her behind on purpose because he never liked to take her anywhere with him. And the only reason she was saying anything at all to him was because she knew that the perfectly rotten boy would quite prefer it if she actually didn’t say anything.
Somewhere outside a dog barked twice. Christina noticed her brother look up from his desk, where he was sitting squirting oil onto parts of one of his silly trains. She saw him stop what he was doing and listen, his frown turning to a smile when the dog then barked three more times, and then twice again. Out of the corner of her eye she watched him put the green liveried train and red oil can down, absent-mindedly wiping his hands on his trousers (if Miss Renyard had caught him doing that he’d have been in trouble!) and make for the playroom door.
Christina beat him to it and stood, blocking his way. “Where are you going?”
“Mind your own beeswax.” Arthur attempted to dodge round his sister. “Nosey parker.”
“I am not!”
“Are!”
“Not!”
Outside the dog barked again, in exactly the same way, and Arthur’s face took on an extremely agitated expression.
“That isn’t a dog, is it?” Christina smiled in a way she knew would really annoy her brother, and was pleased to see that it did. “It’s Evren and Neyla, isn’t it, Arthur?” Arthur looked like he’d just swallowed a spoonful of particularly vile cough mixture. “If you don’t let me come with you I shall tell. Just you see if I don’t.”
