Greek Fire

by Winston Graham

  “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “Go ahead. There’ll be time to talk to you before they come.”

  She had changed into a green jersey and narrow black velvet trousers. They stared at each other. He said: “D’you really think I killed him?”

  “Didn’t you?”

  “D’you suppose I’d stab him in the back? Is that what you think?”

  She put the telephone down. The hard certainties had gone from her eyes. He came into the room.

  “You have a maid?”

  “She goes home, at night.”

  “So we’re alone?”

  She didn’t answer but put up her hands to her face. “God, I think I’m going to faint.”

  He went to a corner cupboard and clattered among the glasses and bottles there, came back with half a glass of brandy. “ Sit down. Drink this.”

  She said: “Michael said you were there.”

  “Michael?”

  “George’s son.”

  “How did he know who I was?”

  “He’d seen you on Saturday. He always peeps in at his father’s guests.”

  “I was there. But I didn’t do it.”

  She burst into tears. “I loved him.”

  He got her to sit down. She tried hard to keep her hands steady to hold the drink, but they were shaking like someone with ague.

  She said: “I have b-been holding on tight, tight. One can’t go on for ever.…”

  “Don’t try.… Finish this.”

  She took the glass in her own hand again but could not steady it, and he took it back, holding it while she sipped.

  He said quietly: “Anya, I had to come and see you. It was the only thing to do. The one absolutely necessary thing in my life now is to get this straight with you.”

  “I thought—you see what I thought.”

  “You wouldn’t have, if you’d had time.”

  “But you were there.…”

  “I was there.”

  After a few minutes she began to steady herself. It was with an anger directed against herself. She blew her nose, tucked the handkerchief into the waistband of her trousers, took the glass a second time, trying to claim self possession, like someone denying illness because it was shameful to be weak.

  He said. “I also came to you for another reason. Because I’d promised George.”

  “You promised him?”

  “When he was dying he said two things: ‘Burn the letters’ and ‘Tell Anya’. I’ve come to do what he said.”

  “I don’t understand. What letters?”

  “The letters that came from Madrid.”

  “Some did? Today? …”

  “That’s what I have to tell.”

  When he’d finished she stared at the pile of letters he’d put on the table before her.

  “So what you said, what you implied in the mountains—that was true.”

  “Yes.…”

  She took up one of the letters, read a few lines, let it fall.

  She said: “As men go I do not think George was a bad man.”

  She said it half challengingly, as if she expected him to disagree. But he said nothing and got up to re-fill her glass.

  She said: “ George made his money perhaps to begin with in shady ways, and he increased it tenfold by speculation during the inflation. But the money, once got, he used often in good ways. He was, within limits, kind and generous to his wife, devoted to his children, he gave money and time to the arts. He loved his country. He was a thinker. I thought, I always believed, that he was working for the future of Greece.”

  “So he was.”

  “These letters prove he was a Communist?”

  “Communists are not necessarily bad men. They are only working for what we conceive to be a bad thing.”

  “With my background it is hard to see the difference.”

  “Yet you say that you loved him.”

  “When did I?”

  “Just now.”

  She got up, went to the mantelpiece, subtly recovering herself every moment. “ D’you suppose that I can take his death without feeling it? He did everything for me. He made me, kept me. I owe everything to him.”

  “Did you give him nothing in return?”

  She made an impatient gesture. “He said so. But when someone who has been very close to you dies, you feel that loss here—you don’t first weigh everything in a balance and think should I be sorry, should I grieve, should I be upset!’

  “No. I know, my dear. I’m sorry.”

  “And where is this woman that you say did it? Where is she now?”

  “Soon out of Greece, I hope. I had to give her the chance to escape.”

  “Why? If she did it, she is responsible, not you! Are you too making a mistake in your feelings?”

  “She’s nothing to me except that I have to take some of the responsibility.”

  “Why?”

  “Without my help Juan Tolosa’s widow would have gone back to Spain. Her brother-in-law would have given up the letters as the price of his freedom and they would never have been heard of again.”

  “And George would have been free to go on with his plans for a coup. Is that what you wanted?”

  “No,” he said, coming up against it hard like a wall. “ No.”

  “Well, you’ve stopped him.”

  “I’ve stopped him and I’m glad—even if it meant his death—even if it means mine. But too many other people have got involved for me to have satisfaction out of it. I didn’t expect it to lead to a woman committing murder and a child crying for his father and … you being hurt——”

  “And you are wanted for that murder.” She turned on him. “D’you realise what you’ve done? It’s not just a question of getting out of Greece. Wherever you go you’ll still be wanted—and when you’re caught you’ll be extradited wherever you are—and you’ll have to stand your trial here in Athens! And who’s to believe your story—except those who know and—and perhaps understand?”

  He shrugged. “I’ll worry when the time comes.”

  “You have taken such a risk in visiting me. Every minute counts now against you.”

  “I had to see you.”

  She would not look at him. “ What am I to do with the letters?”

  “What you please. He asked me to burn them.”

  “But you haven’t.”

  “Not yet. I had to bring them to you in case you doubted what I told you.”

  “I can’t now.”

  Gene said: “In a way, even doing this, I haven’t played quite fair with him. ‘Burn the letters. Tell Anya.’ He didn’t mean it this way.”

  “Does that worry you? You have such strange scruples.”

  “Well burn them now—now you’ve seen them. They’ve caused enough trouble.”

  And what are you going to do?’

  “Go,” he said. “I can get out all right.”

  She considered for a second. “I don’t believe that.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s—a hunch. When you came into Mme Lindos’s …”

  He held up his hand. “What’s that?”

  “What?”

  “A car, I think. It may be nothing.…”

  He went quickly to the window and moved the blind a fraction of an inch. A car had stopped at the door and men were getting out.

  “Police,” he said.

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Gene said: “What way out is there?”

  She’d gone that transparent white which sometimes follows fever. “No way but the front. This house stands with its back to another. Everything comes through the front.”

  He grabbed up his hat and bag. “Then I’ll get out of here.”

  “No”

  He stopped a second, his movements as high-strung as hers.

  She said: “Let me think——”

  “There’s no time to think——”

  “Stop!” She got between him and the door. “It’s too late: you know what the s
taircase is like: they’d see you.”

  “Perhaps not leaving this flat; I can take care of myself.” He tried to get past, she caught his arm, he wrenched it free but she snatched it again.

  “Then maybe I can put you in the clear,” he said, raising his hand.

  “No, no, no!” she said. “I can hide you. Let me think!”

  “The window?” he said.

  “Wait.”

  She fled past him into the bathroom, turned on the bath taps, was back.

  “This way.”

  She led him into a bedroom. It looked like a spare room or a maid’s room. He said: “Which way does this window look?”

  As he spoke there was a ring at the door. They had lost no time.

  “Here.…” She beckoned him to a chest of drawers beside the bed. “Help me.”

  He helped her to lift the chest out. Behind in the wall was a panel about two feet square. She pressed some sort of a spring catch and the panel swung open.

  “In.”

  “If they catch me this will mean——”

  “In.”

  He crawled through into a mass of pipes, which were obviously behind the bathroom. The trap door was for getting at the plumbing, but it was not a man-hole as such because there was no room for a man. He had to force his way in and lie on a tangle of pipes, with his head bent against the sloped roof and his feet cramped at the other end. The panel would just shut and he was in complete darkness. He could hear her struggling to get the chest of drawers back in place. Then the door-bell went again.

  For half a minute there were indistinct noises. He heard her calling something. The taps were shut off.

  Silence fell, except for slight hurried movements in the bathroom. Something dropped on the floor. Then she must have opened the door to them for he could hear the growl of men’s voices.

  He could tell she was arguing and indignant; but after a minute she gave way. Heavy footsteps. The hot water pipe was burning his back. It was very close in the confined space and he could hardly move an inch any way. His shoulder was pressed hard against the door. The footsteps moved on.

  Suddenly her voice came quite clearly: “Do please look in here if you wish!” They were in the bathroom.

  “I’m sorry, madame. You realise it is solely a matter of duty. I personally should not wish to intrude on your grief.”

  Nevertheless their apologetic manner didn’t seem to be preventing the police from having a thorough look round. He heard them moving about. His shoulder was cracking.

  She said: “I think it a little strange that you should suppose I would conceal this murderer.”

  “I’m very sorry, madame. We thought perhaps he might have got into you flat unknown to you.”

  “And into my linen basket while I was in the bath?”

  “Of course not. That’s enough, Cassimi.”

  They went out, and for a time Gene could only hear movements further away. Then abruptly they were again within hearing. They had come into the spare bedroom.

  She said: “But who was this man who reported that he had seen the murderer entering this building?”

  “We received the information. We took it to be a reliable source.”

  “How do you know that this man even knows the murderer? How do you know it is not a hoax?”

  “We can’t be sure, madame. But it is our duty to check the information we receive.”

  A cupboard door opened very near Gene.

  Any minute the pressure of his shoulder on the panel would make the spring catch fly open. Yet he could not move to take away the strain.

  “There are other flats in the house, officer.”

  “It is what I was thinking myself, madame. This is a spare room?”

  “My maid sleeps here when she sleeps in.”

  “She isn’t sleeping in at present?”

  “As you see.”

  There was a creak of the bed.

  “If I may advise you, madame, I would suggest that you keep your door locked for the rest of the night.”

  “It’s a custom I often follow.”

  “Yes—er—I beg your pardon. Is this the last room?”

  “There’s the kitchen.”

  “Of course. If you will——”

  “It’s this way.”

  A long wait in blackness and in heat. Sounds and movements for a time, and once Gene thought he caught some stirring in the bedroom still, as if perhaps one of the men had stayed behind in the room. Then there was a murmured conversation in the sala. Then silence.

  Lack of air in the man-hole. Gradually the pipe, which had nearly burned through his coat, began to cool. The beginnings of cramp in both feet. Mustn’t think of cramp. Or suffocation. A door banged somewhere in the distance but no footsteps followed it.

  He began to count. It was a way he’d followed for years of getting through high discomfort. He had counted to beyond four hundred when someone turned on the water again in the bath. That went on for two or three minutes and the pipe behind him grew hot again. He began to wriggle his feet, fighting the cramp again and fairly sure that any slight noise he made now would be covered. He was soaked in sweat, and it was running off his forehead, down his face and trickling inside his collar. The water stopped. Then someone came into the room and he heard the chest of drawers being cautiously dragged back.

  Light fell into the dark. She said: “I think they’re searching the other flats. Are you all right?”

  “Yes, fine.”

  “Can you stick it for a few minutes more until the car goes?”

  “Yes, if you leave the panel open.”

  He watched her feet move away. She was wearing the same green pumps, but above four inches of bare ankle was a scarlet bathrobe. He stuck his head out and gulped at the air. Almost immediately she was back.

  “They’ve just gone. Did you hear the car?”

  “All of them?”

  “I can’t be sure. But it’s safe to come out.”

  He began to wriggle through the opening and got to his feet. There was no feeling in either of them and he collapsed into her arms and thence to the bed.

  She said: “I am sorry. I could have come earlier but I was expecting a trap; I thought they would come back.”

  He began clumsily to massage his feet, and she stood and watched him. Presently she pulled off her bathcap and shook out her hair. He said: “ Did you change into all that before they came?”

  “Yes. I was terrified of two things. The bathroom was too—unused, too unsteamed. And that mark.” She pointed to a scrape on the polished parquet floor. “I made it pushing the chest back. I was in too much haste.”

  He got up, first testing one leg, then the other. “I’ll give them another ten minutes and then go.”

  “Go where? I was asking you when they came.”

  He limped back into the living-room, moved over to the blind, peered out. “It wasn’t the police who saw me come in. I don’t like that. This evening, when I went back to the place where I’d been staying, the police were there. I was warned just in time. I doubt if they would have found me on their own.”

  She tightened the cord of her bath robe. “There’s the paper. The Lieutenant left it for me. Perhaps he thought I would recognise you better.”

  He picked Aegis up and stared at the two photos, at the glaring headline. The paragraph underneath was very brief—later editions would carry more. “No name or nationality.”

  “That’s a government tactic, I should say. If possible they’ll hush it up or try to call you British. But it won’t stop them bringing you to trial. George had many friends.”

  “I’ll get out.”

  “Which way can you go?”

  “I shall make my way down to Piraeus and smuggle on board a ship, if possible one going to Venice. From there there’s all Europe to choose.”

  “It will be impossible.” When he looked at her she added: “Without help.”

  He offered her a cigarette. She shook her head. “Do
you know, there is only one safe place for you, Gene, for the time being.”

  “Where?”

  “Here.”

  He lit a cigarette for himself, broke the dead match, put it in an ash-tray. “ No.”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, thanks, but I don’t see it.”

  “It is obvious. Everyone will expect you to be on the run, to be trying to get out of Greece. The last place the police will look is here—which has already been searched.”

  He thought round it carefully. “Maybe you have something. But even if that was so, I’m not willing to involve you any more.”

  She said: “Don’t you know I am involved?”

  “Not if I get out now.”

  “Whatever you do now—I am still involved.”

  He looked at her, his eyes going carefully, almost painfully over her face. “ Yes … in that … but that’s not the way I mean.”

  “I sent you away,” she said. “ It was your view too. But tonight you have come back. That is—just the way the cards, have fallen. It does not mean I may not be permitted to help you.”

  “It does if your safety is concerned as well.”

  She said: “ If you stay here tonight I think I can make arrangements. I have money and still some influence. Perhaps you could leave tomorrow night, but that will depend.”

  “And your maid?”

  “I can telephone her. I will tell her not to come.”

  He shook his head. “ If I stay tonight it may mean I’m stuck here for three or four.”

  “Does that matter?”

  “Yes, yes, yes. Every hour increases your risk. D’you realise what being an accessory after the fact means?”

  “Do you realise that I don’t care?”

  He came across slowly and put his hands on her elbows and smiled his crinkly smile at her. “You don’t care?”

  She looked at him directly for a moment, then glanced beyond him with a sort of removed matter-of-factness, a drawing back as if he were a stranger. “ I must hide you here until I can make arrangements to get you out. What chance do you think you would have of slipping through tonight or tomorrow at any Greek port or station or air terminal?”

  “I’ve slid out of difficult corners before.”

  “But this is not war. You have not got the population on your side. You have no passport except one which will get you instantly arrested. You have no disguise but a pair of spectacles. You admit you will not ask your friends to help you. Therefore it’s essential you should stay here.” He released her and walked up and down once, thinking it over,