“Keep talking,” Brad said. “You have a well modulated voice.”
“Thank you, but there really isn’t much more to say, is there?”
“Just one thing.”
“Yes?”
“Harry Avery plagiarized my story line for The Bandits and took my three thousand dollars to help finance the pilot.”
Draper sighed. “I seem to have wasted my time,” he said. “I hope not. I’m a quite passive man, but Mr. Lange can be really merciless—in a legal sense, of course. But I’m holding up your breakfast and you probably have a big day planned. There are some excellent city tours out of the hotel.”
“Wouldn’t you rather I took one of those seven day, island cruises?” Brad asked.
For the first time David Draper smiled. His teeth were beautifully capped. “It’s your holiday, Mr. Smith,” he said.
Draper left with his verbal knife planted neatly between Brad’s shoulder blades. It was clear that the guards in the hall would be the least of his obstacles in getting back to Rhona. But it was his hand that Rhona had clung to—not Peter Lange’s—and learning the reason for that emotional behaviour was worth the risk-taking.
It was holiday weather but Brad had no intention of taking a tour anywhere. After breakfast he returned to the registration desk and asked for the passport he had left with the clerk, when he checked in. The clerk explained that all passports had to be checked by the authorities and that it would be returned to him later in the day. Meanwhile, if he needed identification to cash cheques the hotel would be happy to oblige. Brad bought a packet of cigarettes instead and stepped outside the lobby, where the tour buses were lined up for loading. Each bus had its own tour guide, and launching each tour was a study in bedlam. Standing near the open doorway of the first bus was a girl—perhaps twenty-two—slender and dark haired and with the lively anxiety of a chaperone trying to mobilize a wayward group. At first glance she reminded him of the brunette at the pool in West Hollywood, but instead of a bikini and a chenille jacket she wore a light-blue shirtwaist dress, a white sweater and very sensible walking shoes. As he watched, she opened a large shoulder bag and took out a pair of sunglasses and a packet of cigarettes. At that moment a largish woman hurried up to the bus.
“Is this the Delphi tour?” she asked.
“Yes, Madame,” the girl answered. “If you are for Delphi, please board the bus now. We are leaving in two minutes.”
The woman whirled about and called to someone in a group gathered at the next bus: “Sammy, that’s the wrong bus. This is the bus for Delphi. Hurry up.” With the grace of a sale bargain-hunter, she climbed into the bus, unaware that she had elbowed the girl back against Brad’s shoulder and sent both the glasses and the cigarettes clattering to the pavement.
“Oh!” the girl gasped, “I’m sorry. My glasses—”
Brad stooped down and rescued the sunglasses while the girl scooped up the spilled cigarettes. Smiling, he returned the glasses and offered his own pack.
“Have an American cigarette,” he offered.
For an instant there was a look of anger in her face. Then the mask came back on. The tourist was the customer, and the customer was to be pampered. She accepted the cigarette and offered her own in exchange.
“Thank you. Have a Greek cigarette,” she said. “Go ahead. It’s quite good. There are some good things in Greece—still.”
Brad took the cigarette and lighted them both.
“Sammy!” shrilled the woman from inside the bus.
Brad laughed and the girl smiled.
“Are you for Delphi?” she asked.
“Not today. I have business at the hotel.”
“I see. That’s why you have no camera.”
Sammy arrived and she stepped back to allow him to enter. Sammy was about sixteen, six feet tall and wearing plaid Bermuda shorts, a sports shirt and two cameras about his neck. A dark young man in a chauffeur’s jacket and cap followed. He spoke quickly to the girl.
“Katerina, you took the Delphi and Stella is furious. She has her speech all worked out for the oracle and it’s even more dramatic than the routine she does at Epidauros.”
The girl laughed richly. “Good. My people are spared an ordeal. Have you seen my brother this morning?”
“Here?”
“He didn’t come home last night. I thought he might meet me here this morning.”
Again the masks—two of them this time—momentarily closing out Brad from the dialogue.
“Don’t worry. He’s with a girl for sure.” The driver flashed a smile and climbed up into the bus. The girl checked off the list of passengers in her hand and prepared to follow.
“Thanks for the cigarette,” Brad said. “I think there are many good things in Greece.”
The girl stared at him for a moment and then, impulsively, stepped closer. “If you see a boy—that is, a young man, a student, who wears a small beard—like a satyr. Do you understand a satyr?”
“I understand,” Brad said.
She smiled. “If he comes looking for me, Katerina, tell him to go home and wait. Tell him I am very angry.”
“You don’t look angry.”
“I am furious!” She donned the glasses and swung up on the lowest step of the bus entrance, as the driver started the motor.
“A light beard or a dark beard?” Brad called.
With one hand she tugged at her own hair. “Dark,” she called back.
“Does the boy have a name?”
“Stephanos!”
The bus roared forward and the girl stepped out of sight as the doors closed. Then the bus was gone and Brad was left standing on the pavement, smoking a Greek cigarette and feeling strangely happy, because on this morning, his first in Athens, he had been entrusted by a lovely girl with a message for her brother which would likely never be delivered. He waited until all of the tour buses had departed and then, because no bearded youth had come asking for Katerina, started walking towards the centre of the city. He had the message from David Draper to ponder, and he wondered how much of it would get back to Rhona. Surely she knew what Harry had done to him, but he had gone off to Vietnam, where the mails were slow and the distractions of a less glamorous kind than those of Hollywood. She had stopped writing long before her marriage to Harry. Once he had been reported dead—that might have been the reason. Theirs was a free, swinging affair with no strings attached and there was no reason why she shouldn’t marry Harry or any other available male. It was doubtful if anyone knew what happened to the few possessions he had left in her garage, possessions including the work sheets and carbons on El Bandido. Legally he might not have a leg to stand on, but he had always known that he would get satisfaction if he could meet Harry face to face. Harry was a hard driving, flamboyant type, who didn’t like to appear cheap, and, failing all other persuasions, there was always the therapeutic value of a hard right to the jaw. One way or another he would get satisfaction from Harry. But if Harry was dead he would have to deal with Rhona, which presented a much easier route. That was what worried Draper and Peter Lange, and it didn’t seem that two men, who weren’t concerned in this matter, had any right to be worried at all. Unless there was more to Harry’s empire than met the eye.
He began to feel foolish standing on the pavement, and so he started walking—that being the best way to become orientated in a strange city. He walked to Constitution Square and mingled with the patrons at the pavement cafés. He heard church bells and followed the sound through narrowing streets, where the old and the new mingled in the architectural blending of Byzantine cathedrals and ultra-modern commercial edifices. He became a pavement engineer at a construction site, where athletic, young Greek men, stripped to the waist, were unloading materials from a truck. They were beautiful people: museum pieces come to life. One had dark hair and a short, dark, satyr-like beard. He stifled an impulse to ask if his name was Stephanos. There must be thousands of young men in Athens who would fit the description of Katerina’s brother
.
But, now that he was aware of the group, it seemed they were being unusually careful in the unloading of a small metal box, that required the undivided attention of two men supplying the muscle, and the bearded one as an overseer. When one of the handlers lost his grip and one end of the box cracked sharply against the pavement, a howl of protest rose from his companions. The box was lifted again, carefully, and then another sound—the plaintive wail of a klaxon—caused a second reaction. The group froze like players in a children’s game of statues. The first vehicle, sounding a klaxon, roared past the intersection and Brad caught a glimpse of uniformed men inside. It was followed by three more official cars and the last one bore the insignia of the American Embassy on the door. Brooks Martins was seated in the rear seat. Following hard on this small cavalcade was a mobile television unit and two taxis. He watched all of the cars cross the square and realized that they were turning in the direction of the Hilton. Brooks Martins had promised a break in the Harry Avery story. This was probably it. He looked about for a cab and realized that the truck and the workers had vanished. He had no idea whether or not transference of the box into the building had been completed. They were simply gone. He caught a cab at the edge of the square and directed the driver to take him back to the hotel.
The auto entrance was jammed when they arrived, and the crew, from the television unit of an American news service, was rolling equipment into the lobby. Brad dismissed the cab and mingled with the press representatives, who were streaming into the hotel. The management, hoping to minimize the distraction, directed them into a small ballroom off the main lobby and Brad was able to pass through without question. David Draper stood on a small dais at the end of the ballroom, in intense consultation with Brooks Martins. The same uniformed military officer who had escorted Peter Lange from the airport before dawn, was also on the dais, accompanied by several other military personnel, and a row of blue uniformed traffic police, in gleaming Grecian helmets, maintained a distance between the reporters and the dais. When the television equipment was ready, Draper raised both hands for silence and stepped forward.
“Gentlemen of the press,” he said, “I have an official announcement to make at this time. I have just been advised by Greek authorities and by the American Embassy that the plane, chartered by Mr. Harry Avery on Corfu last Monday, has been located and identified by an aerial search party. The wreckage was first sighted several hours ago. We have delayed making an announcement until aerial photos taken at the scene of discovery could be developed and examined and the identification of the plane made beyond all doubt.
“The site is north-east of Kastoria, in a rugged mountain area which affords no place for the search plane to land. A rescue party has already been dispatched, but it will be some time before actual contact can be made with the wreckage.”
Several voices from the assembled reporters shouted a question.
“Are there survivors?”
“There is no indication of survivors on the photos taken from the search plane,” Draper answered. “These photos will be released at the conclusion of this conference.”
“Do the authorities think survival is possible?”
“No one can answer that question. No bodies can be seen in the photos, but they may be inside the plane. It is hoped that they escaped from the plane and are somewhere in the heavy brush that surrounds the area.”
“But the search plane discovered the wreckage unassisted. I mean, there were no signals given from the ground.”
“That is right. You have answered your own questions. I’m afraid there is nothing more to report at this time. It may be hours—even days—before the rescue party can reach the wreckage and get a report back to us. I have told you all that any of us know, to this hour. The wreckage of a small plane has been found and identified as that owned by Mr. George Ankouris of Corfu and chartered by Mr. Harry Avery last Monday.”
Draper stepped back, relinquishing the dais to the uniformed officer, whom he introduced as Captain Koumaris, and the Greek translation of his announcement began. Brad threaded his way to the doorway and returned to the lobby. He hadn’t made a solitary exodus. Most of the public telephones were already tied up by correspondents. Somebody was fighting with the house phone, under the impression that it was an outside line, and so Brad took the elevator up to his room and put in a call to Rhona’s suite. The switchboard was under heavy bombardment and it took a bit of time. Finally the call went through and Peter Lange’s cool voice answered.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Smith,” he said, “but you can’t speak to Mrs. Avery at this time. She’s still under sedation.”
“Did you reach Dr. Johnson?” Brad asked.
“Not yet. The hotel physician was sufficient.”
“Well, if there’s anything I can do—”
“Nothing. Thank you, Mr. Smith.”
Get lost, Mr. Smith. That was what Lange really meant.
Brad put down the telephone and walked out to the balcony. His room overlooked the cab entrance, where the mobile television unit was now pulling away, followed by taxis, and official cars no longer sounding klaxons. He saw Captain Koumaris step out briskly and enter the last official car, and now the klaxon did send its monotonous two-note warning echoing up from the canyon of the street below. Brad waited on the balcony until the last note had faded in the distance and only normal traffic moved in the entrance area. It was as if nothing had happened. Excitement was followed by depression as he began to realize the significance of what Draper had said. There was no signal of any kind from the plane wreckage. No flares, gunshots or flashing mirrors. He had seen enough silent wreckage in the war to know what this desolation usually meant. Not always, of course, but Harry Avery wasn’t a husky nineteen or twenty-year-old kid, with his body trained to peak strength and able to fight for the life within it. He was at least forty by this time, a human nerve centre, who drove himself as if there were no tomorrow. Now it might be true. Brad felt lonely. What he needed was a drink. It was still a little early for the cocktail hour, but he had caught sight of an inviting bar, just across the lobby from the ballroom where Draper met the press.
He had had two, perhaps three, Scotches and as many light flirtations at the bar, when he looked round to see Mikos Pallas climbing on to the next stool. He had exchanged the plaid sports coat for a white dinner jacket and black trousers. His shirt was ruffled, his black tie flowing. Without the beret on his head, a slight bald spot was barely visible under the hair brushed protectively forward. He saw Brad staring at him and smiled.
“So we meet again, Mr. Smith. You see, as I told you, I am a hotel man and so I visit other hotels to see what the competition is offering.”
“Thinking of going into competition with Hilton, are you?”
Mikos laughed thinly. “You have a sense of humour, Mr. Smith.”
“So have you. That joke with the taxi driver this morning really broke me up.”
“Joke? What do you mean?”
“You told that driver I would pay both fares.”
Now the little Greek looked truly horrified. “No! That swine! I paid him my share, of course. But that’s the way with taxi drivers the world over, isn’t that so, Mr. Smith? Now you must let me buy you a drink, at least, to make up for such scandalous treatment. What are you drinking, please?”
“Scotch,” Brad said.
“Good! I, too, will take Scotch.” He beckoned the bartender and ordered in Greek. “I like to keep in practice,” he explained. “But now, to be serious, have you heard of this news about Harry Avery’s plane? What do you think the rescue party will find?”
“I wouldn’t care to guess,” Brad said.
“Nor would I. I know this country where the wreckage was discovered. It is very rugged. Also, it is near the Albanian border. If the pilot and Mr. Avery survived the crash and wandered off over the border, they may never be found.”
“Why do you say that?”
“There are very poor people in Alba
nia. Mr. Avery always wore good clothes and carried a large amount of cash. Life is cheap among some people.”
“You think he would be robbed and murdered.”
“It is possible. Of course, if someone found him who knew who he was, he might be held for ransom. Or—if officials of the government found him, he might be held as a spy. I can’t understand why he had himself flown in that direction. There are no beautiful women there to play his Aphrodite.”
“Aphrodite?” Brad echoed.
“The title of his new film—the one he came to Greece to make. He has been conducting a publicity campaign: ‘The Search for Aphrodite.’ The idea is to find local girls to test for the leading role. I know this from Greek newspapers which I get at home. It’s the same technique he used when he filmed in Cape Town. All publicity, naturally. All the time he had the star picked and kept out of sight until the date chosen to announce her identity. In Cape Town it was his paramour.”
Brad stared at him quizzically. Pallas looked embarrassed.
“Is that an old-fashioned term? His mistress? His girl?”
“There’s nothing wrong with the term,” Brad said. “I was just wondering what Mrs. Avery was doing all this time.”
“Oh, come, Mr. Smith. We are a sophisticated people. It’s nothing much if an impressionable young actress thinks she’s in love with a glamorous producer. A wife understands this. After all, even the glamorous producer is human.”
“But this wife is an actress. I wonder why Harry never starred her in any of his films.”
“You must have been out of circulation, Mr. Smith.”
“I have been,” Brad admitted.
“Yes. Otherwise you would know that Harry Avery destroyed Rhona Brent’s career some years ago. It’s common knowledge that he vowed she would never work before the cameras again, while she was his wife. Mark my words, if Harry Avery died in that plane crash Monday, there is somewhere nearby a very unhappy young actress, who was scheduled to become a star as soon as the Search for Aphrodite nonsense was over.”
Shot on Location Page 4
