The Age of Olympus

by Gavin Scott

  “Jump,” he said, and as Kretzmer’s bullets split the air around them, they leapt into the darkness and fell into the churning water of the Futur’s wake.

  Treading water, they watched the boat racing towards the harbour entrance as, on the quayside, they heard Yanni commandeering a dinghy, no doubt to come and get them.

  “I thought I’d lost you,” Forrester said, and Sophie looked at him, and shook her head.

  “Not so easy,” she said.

  11

  POSEIDON

  Within half an hour of being fished out of the water they were pursuing Notre Futur in Yanni’s caïque. The harbourmaster had alerted the authorities on every neighbouring island to the theft, and the furious owner, a Swiss, was berating the Futur’s captain for failing to leave any of the crew aboard while he “ate and drank like a pig” at his, the Swiss’s expense. But Forrester knew that officialdom would have no effect on Kretzmer’s escape. The German now had exactly what he needed to get out of Greek territorial waters.

  In truth, Forrester was well aware there was little chance of Yanni catching up with Notre Futur. The caïque could do little more than five knots; Yanni had already established from the owner that Futur was capable of ten.

  Down in the cabin, as Yanni steered and Forrester peered through the binoculars into the night, Sophie made soup. After forty minutes the moon rose and disclosed the Futur two or three miles ahead, heading northwest. Yanni altered course, but there was no jubilation in his face.

  “What’s the matter, old friend?” said Forrester.

  “Hold tight,” said Yanni, and as Forrester steadied himself against a bulkhead, the first oily swell hit the boat. It rocked, as if it had gone over a little hill.

  “There’ll be another one in a minute,” said Yanni. “But that’s just the beginning.” He directed Forrester’s attention to the sky, where the moon’s brightness was now reflecting off towering cumulonimbus clouds.

  “Go all round the boat,” he said, “and fasten down anything that’s loose. Oh, and find the hand pumps. We may need them.”

  As he spoke the next swell hit them, and for a moment the caïque wallowed in the force of it. Then came the first crack of lightning and seconds later the first roll of thunder, as if the gods were announcing the beginning of a play.

  They were sailing into the middle of an Aegean storm.

  For the first quarter of an hour Forrester and Sophie took little notice of the deteriorating weather; they could hear the wind getting up, and feel the buffeting of the waves on the elderly planks of the boat, but they were concentrating on their tasks, largely ignoring what was going on in the sea around them.

  When they rejoined Yanni in the wheelhouse, Sophie pulled out a bundle of woollen jerseys and oilskin coats and insisted that they put them on. By now the wind was moaning steadily, flattening the wave-tops. There was a sleety rain driving at them from the north and forks of lightning splitting the sky at regular intervals.

  “Can you still see him?” Sophie asked.

  “Just,” said Yanni. “He’s further into the storm than we are, and it’s slowing him down.”

  “Will he be able to cope?” asked Sophie.

  “It’s a much more powerful boat,” said Forrester.

  “Yes,” said Sophie. “But he has to sail it on his own.”

  She was right, but her guess about the difficulties Kretzmer might be facing brought no satisfaction to Forrester. If Notre Futur went down, so did the stone. He wanted to catch the German; he had no desire to preside over his destruction.

  But there was nothing he could do about that now; the rain was sheeting down vertically, so torrentially heavy it seemed to draw a curtain between them and the rest of the world. The swells had become waves, and with every passing minute the waves were steeper and higher. Time after time the caïque laboured uphill to reach the summit of a wave, teetered there for a moment and then plunged sickeningly down into the trough on the other side. Yanni’s face was set and grim as he strained to retain control of the wheel, for there was no respite. As soon as they were at the lowest point of the valley between the waves, he had to force her head up again to make it to the top of the next. Beneath the banshee howling of the wind Forrester could hear the planks creaking and straining.

  “Time to start pumping?” shouted Forrester above the noise.

  “Time to start pumping,” said Yanni.

  Then began an endless time of bent backs and aching arms as he and Sophie strove to get the water out of the engine bay with the ancient hand pumps. Beside them, wreathed in the smell of hot oil, the elderly engine strained and groaned and through a miasma of diesel fumes Forrester willed it to keep going, because he knew that once it gave up the ghost they were lost.

  It felt like being on a diabolical funfair ride. Looking up, he saw the wheelhouse silhouetted against the lightning as the caïque climbed yet another wave, and then the stern, foaming with phosphorescence, high above them as the ship careered down the other side. Sometimes they could see the propeller itself, high out of the water, churning fruitlessly, and he prayed that the packing that kept the water out of the propeller shaft would hold firm.

  And then the waves became so steep and so close together that as the caïque reached the bottom of each trough its bows began hitting the wall of the next wave instead of climbing it, and the shuddering crash of each collision made it seem as if the ship was being shaken to pieces. Forrester began to wonder how long Yanni would have the strength to hold on to the wheel, but there was no chance to go and relieve him, because he knew all too well that if either he or Sophie stopped pumping, the engine would die, and with it the ship.

  He looked at Sophie, her eyes red with salt water, her face sagging with weariness, her hair a tangled mess as she worked on without complaint – and knew that whatever other uncertainty there was in life, he loved this woman and always would.

  It seemed then that the wind ceased to be a predictable force of nature and became a wild, mad thing, blowing not from one direction but from all directions, one after another, backing from north east to north west to south west to south east, shrieking in crazed glee, bent, it seemed, on nothing but their destruction. It was as if someone with a vast hammer had smashed the symmetry of the sea, the very pattern of waves and troughs, so that all around them was broken water, and the old boat was no longer climbing and descending the waves but swinging wildly from one side to another. Forrester was certain then that the caïque would simply fly apart, the wheelhouse spinning off into the sea, each plank separating from its fellow so that the water rushed in and swallowed them all. He could see, in his mind’s eye, the engine falling away into the liquid darkness and spiralling down to rest beside the ancient wreckage of some Greek trireme. He reached out and took Sophie’s hand and it was as cold as ice.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said, but his words were torn away as they left his mouth.

  Sophie made no attempt to speak: she simply met his eyes, and smiled. It was a forgiving smile, but it was more than forgiveness. It was love. If that was the last sight Forrester saw, he was content with that.

  And then the wind died.

  The waves returned. Not the steep waves of fifteen minutes before, and not calm waves either, but suddenly there was a pattern in the waters instead of madness and incoherence. Forrester looked up and there, to starboard, reared a headland, and he knew that Yanni had steered them out of the full force of the storm into the lee of some island, and there was now a chance at least that they would survive.

  “Keep pumping, boss,” yelled Yanni. “We’re not home yet.”

  But gradually the boat’s wallowing slowed and steadied, and suddenly, when neither of them was expecting it, Yanni cut the engine.

  Forrester stuck his head up to see, to his astonishment, they were gliding silently up to a jetty.

  “Tie her off!” shouted Yanni, and Sophie and Forrester stumbled back to the deck and fumbled with frozen hands for the ropes.

&n
bsp; They were in a deep inlet, and though the wind and waves were quieter, when Forrester turned his gaze out to the sea from which they had come, out beyond the headland, he could see the storm still raging as fiercely as ever, the sky still repeatedly split by lightning.

  “You should be at the bottom of the sea, all of you,” roared a voice from the darkness. A dark figure was coming down a set of steep steps from somewhere above. “How in the name of Poseidon did you manage to get through that?” Forrester’s salt-caked eyes opened wide as he heard the voice.

  Because the figure coming down the steps was General Aristotle Alexandros.

  12

  PENELOPE’S ISLAND

  For a long moment Forrester and the General stared at each other, and then Alexandros threw his arms wide.

  “Duncan!” he cried. “And his countess! Welcome to Hydros.”

  “This is Yanni Patrakis,” said Forrester. “He’s the only reason we’re not at the bottom of the Aegean.”

  “Then I owe you a lot, Mr. Patrakis,” said the General. “For these are good friends of mine. Here, wrap yourselves in these.” And he swung a rucksack off his back, pulled out a bundle of blankets and handed them out. “Come, let us get you up to the kastello. You have arrived on night of great significance.”

  “What’s so special about tonight, Ari?” asked Forrester as they plodded up the steep main street of the village that lay below the kastello.

  “I will tell you when we are out of the storm and you are warm and dry,” said Alexandros, because the wind was still howling around them. Then began a long climb up steep switchback steps until they turned a corner and there, above them was the great bulk of the fortress, soft yellow light from its windows spilling out into the night; the smell of woodsmoke perfuming the wind. Despite his weariness, Forrester was conscious of something strangely familiar about the shape of the building, spread as it was along a long crest in the hillside, just one storey high for most of its length, buttressed by sturdy pillars. At first he was unable to make the connection, then, with a start, he realised the shape was subtly reminiscent of Minoan palaces, and as they were about to make the final ascent to the massive front door, he remembered something else.

  “You didn’t see a motor yacht,” he asked Alexandros, “coming from the same direction we did?”

  “I did not,” said the General. “I only saw you because I was looking out for Giorgios Stephanides, who has been on the other side of the island. He was supposed to be back hours ago.”

  At which point the front door swung open, the light flooded out into the wild night, and a woman stepped out of the mythical past into their present.

  “Allow me to present my wife,” said General Alexandros as the door, mercifully shutting off the noise of the wind, slammed firmly behind them.

  * * *

  The first thing Forrester noted about Penelope Alexandros was that she was tall and beautiful, her dark hair still rich and thick, her large dark eyes alight with life. The second thing was that she seemed quite capable of killing anyone who got in her way.

  “Welcome to Kastello Drakonaris,” said Penelope Alexandros. “The servants will find dry clothes for you.” Then, to her husband, “Did you find Giorgios?”

  “No. He must have taken shelter at Limani Sangri.”

  Penelope nodded and burst into a volley of orders in Greek, summoning servants variously introducing themselves as Agathe, Adonis, Theodosius and Socrates, and almost before they knew it Sophie, Forrester and Yanni had been swept off to large, stone-floored bathrooms, stripped of their sodden clothes, sluiced with hot water, dried with large, rough towels and provided with approximately appropriate garments. So efficient was the operation that it was less than fifteen minutes before they emerged in their borrowed clothes in the main room before a blazing fire, opposite which the windows looked out at the dark sea beyond the bay.

  Almost before they were through the door, glasses of brandy were being pressed into their hands and they were basking in the warmth of the resin-scented logs in a huge stone fireplace. The walls of the room were covered in ochre-coloured plaster and hung with ancient rugs, their faded colours glowing in the firelight. Kelims were draped over most of the chairs and sofas, and provided a covering for a huge ottoman in front of the fire. The light that did not come from the fire radiated softly from oil lamps dotted about the room. There were bookshelves against one wall filled with leather-bound volumes, and another wall was covered in ancestral oil paintings and what looked to Forrester like a seventeenth-century map of the archipelago. When he came closer he saw it was full of tiny holes.

  “Where my ancestor took his prizes,” said Alexandros.

  “Prizes?” said Sophie, clearly imagining some sort of awards ceremony.

  “Taking prizes is a polite way of saying capturing ships,” said Forrester.

  “Of course!” said General Alexandros. “Lambros Leonides was a pirate – one of the most successful in the Aegean. You are standing in the fortress he took from the Venetians.”

  “Our fortress,” said Penelope Alexandros, handing round a tray of mezes, which caused Yanni to give a moan of pleasure.

  “Thou must introduce me to thy cook, my lady,” he said. “I will marry her.”

  “Then I certainly will not,” said Penelope. “Because I intend to keep her for ourselves.” But she did not look displeased by the compliment, or with Yanni’s presence, and Forrester was not surprised: he could see at once that she and Yanni and Ari were all cut from the same heroic cloth. She turned graciously to Forrester and Sophie.

  “I say this is our fortress,” she said, “because I too am descended from a pirate clan, the Drakonari. The Drakonari defeated Ari’s ancestor and took the kastello from him.”

  “But fortunately,” said Alexandros, smiling, “my pirate forbear had a beautiful daughter, and a marriage was arranged between the two clans.”

  “Or, to put it another way,” said Penelope sweetly, “the Drakonari took not only Leonides’s fortress, but also his daughter.”

  “Who thereafter ruled him with a rod of iron,” said Alexandros, “which, perhaps, was divine judgment. But enough of ancient history. Tell me how you came to give us the pleasure of your company tonight.”

  “We were in pursuit of someone who has stolen the stone I told you about in Athens.”

  “Germanós,” said Yanni.

  “A German?” said Alexandros. “Where is this swine? I will make him wish he had never been born.”

  “He stole a motor yacht in Koros,” said Forrester. “That was how we sailed into the storm.”

  “Where did you last see him?” demanded the General, jabbing a finger at the map. “Show me!”

  Yanni looked at the map for a long moment and then pointed. “Four miles east of this cape.”

  “Had the storm begun? Was his vessel in trouble?”

  “The storm had begun,” said Yanni. “And we were the ones in trouble. But though his was a much larger ship than mine he was sailing it alone.”

  “Give me details,” said the General, and examined the map closely. “You have probably lost him,” he said at last. “His boat should have been able to ride out the storm, and in that case he will be well on his way out of Greek waters by now. But if his engine failed, or he met with any other accident, the Peloponnesian current will have brought him here.”

  “The Peloponnesian current?”

  “Why do you think our ancestors chose this spot for their headquarters?” said Penelope. “That current rules this part of the Aegean. They knew that sooner or later every ship that had lost its battle with wind and waves would be swept here – and into their clutches.”

  They stared at one another – but Penelope was no longer looking at them: she was staring out of the window, over the sea.

  Where a red distress flare had risen high into the sky and was now curving slowly down back into the storm.

  “Perhaps the gods are with you,” said Penelope, “and the man you
pursue is here already.”

  * * *

  It was as well Forrester and Yanni had eaten, drunk and put on dry clothes, because the rest of the night was a blur of action. At Penelope’s insistence Sophie stayed behind in the house, but Forrester and Yanni joined the rescue party organised by Alexandros, and soon, draped in oilskins, they were among a dozen villagers rounded up by their host, streaming down to the waterfront.

  Within fifteen minutes Alexandros’s boat was motoring out into the bay, with Yanni and Forrester peering ahead through binoculars for their first glimpse of Notre Futur. But it never came. As the stricken vessel limped around the headland it was clear this was no luxury yacht, but a converted minesweeper. And far from being piloted by a lone fugitive, its decks were crowded with people.

  And as the minesweeper came close enough, Forrester’s mouth fell open, because he recognised nearly all of them.

  “I say,” said David Venables, “you couldn’t throw us a line, could you?”

  13

  THE THUMB OF ST. PETER

  “I was beginning to wonder what we had done to annoy Poseidon,” said David Venables as he settled into one of the armchairs in front of the fire. The rest of the party, unrecognisable in the darkness and shrouded in blankets, had been hurried into the house by the servants and were busy drying themselves off. Venables looked around the room. “But now I’m wondering if he was actually doing us a favour.”

  “He may have been doing us a favour,” said a slight, fair-haired man coming into the room as he pulled a jersey over his head. “But what has poor Mrs. Alexandros done to deserve an invasion like this?” The man, who always put Forrester in mind of a small blond firework, bowed towards Penelope. “Lawrence Durrell, of the Aegean Times.”

  Penelope smiled. “Endangered travellers have been offered hospitality in this place for many centuries, Mr. Durrell,” she replied. “It is my privilege to be able to help you.”