Blue fire so faint as to be almost invisible raced back along the ledge and into the mouth of the cave. There came a whoosh and a tongue of fire like some giant's blowtorch - followed in the next moment by a terrific explosion that blew out the mouth of the cave in chunks of shattered rock and brought loose scree and pebbles avalanching down from above. The shock of it was sufficient to cause Manolis to stumble, and sit down beside Darcy.
They looked at each other and Darcy said: 'What the - ?'
Manolis's jaw hung loosely open. Then he licked dry lips and said: "Their explosives. They must have kept their explosive charges in there.'
They got up and went shakily back to the blocked mouth of the cave. Down below, boulders were still bounding down the mountain's steep contours to the sea. Hundreds of tons of rock had come crushingly down, sealing the diggings off. And it was plain that nothing alive - but nothing - was ever going to come out of there.
'It's done,' said Manolis, and Darcy found strength to nod his agreement.
As they turned away, Darcy saw something gleaming yellow in the rubble. Next door to the collapsed cave another, smaller opening was still issuing puffs of dust and a little smoke. The stone wall between the two excavations had been shattered, spilling fractured rock onto the ledge. But among the debris lay a lot more than just rocks.
Darcy and Manolis stepped among the rubble and looked more closely at what had been unearthed. There in that broken wall, carefully packed in and sealed behind cleverly shaped blocks of stone, had lain the treasure for which Jianni Lazarides - alias Janos Ferenczy - had searched. That same treasure he himself had lain down all those centuries ago. Only the changing contours of the mountain, carved and fretted by nature in storms and earthquakes, had confused and foiled him. The old Crusader castle had been his landmark, but even that massive silhouette had crumbled and changed through the long years. Still, he'd missed his mark by no more than two or three feet.
The two men scuffed among the dust and broken rocks, their excitement dulled to anticlimax after the horror of their too recent experience. They saw a treasure out of time: Thracian gold! Small bowls and lidded cups... gold rhytons spilling rings, necklaces and arm clasps... a bronze helmet stuffed to brimming with earrings, belt clasps and pectorals... even a buckled breastplate of solid gold!
Their find eventually got through to Manolis. 'But what do we do with it?'
'We leave it here,' Darcy straightened up. 'It belongs to the ghosts. We don't know what it cost Janos to bring it here and bury it, or where - or how - he got it in the first place. But there's blood on it, be sure. Eventually someone will come looking for those two, and find this instead. Let the authorities handle it. I don't even want to touch it.'
'You are right,' said Manolis, and they climbed back up to the castle.
By 12:30 the two were back down into the village, where Manolis refuelled the boat for the trip to Karpathos. While he worked his fishermen friends came over and asked how were the diggers. 'They were blasting,' Manolis answered after a moment, 'so we didn't disturb them. Anyway, the cliffs are very steep and a man could easily fall.'
'Snotty buggers anyway,' one of the fishermen commented. 'They don't bother with us and we don't bother with them!'
Finished with his fuelling, Manolis bought a litre of ouzo and they all sat around tables in an open taverna and killed the bottle dead. Later, as their boat pulled away from the stone jetty, the Greek said, 'I needed that.'
Darcy sighed and agreed, 'Me, too. It's nasty, thirsty work.'
Manolis looked at him and nodded. 'And a lot more of it to come before we're through, my friend. It is perhaps the good job ouzo is cheap, eh? Just think, with all of that gold we left up there, we could have bought the distillery!' Darcy looked back and watched the hump of rock which was Halki slowly sinking on the horizon, and thought: Yes, and maybe we'll wish we had...
Halki to Karpathos was a little more than sixty miles by the route Manolis chose; he preferred to stay in sight of land so far as possible, and to cruise rather than race his engine. When the rocks Ktenia and Karavolas were behind them, then he set a course more nearly south-west and left Rhodes behind for Karpathos proper.
That meant the open sea, and now Darcy's stomach began to play him up a little. It was a purely physical thing and not too bad; after what he'd faced already he wasn't going to throw up now. At least his talent wasn't warning against shipwrecks or anything.
To take Darcy's mind off his misery, Manolis told him a few details about Karpathos:
'Second biggest of the Dodecanese Islands,' he said. 'She lies just about half-way between Rhodes and Crete. Where Halki goes east to west, Karpathos she goes north to south. Maybe fifty kilometres long but only seven or eight wide. Just the crest of submarine mountains, that's all. Not the big place, really, and not many peoples. But she has known the turbulent history!'
'Is that right?' said Darcy, scarcely listening.
'Oh, yes! Just about everyone ruled or owned or was the governor of Karpathos at one time or another. The Arabs, Italian pirates out of Genoa, the Venetians, Crusaders of the Knights of St John, Turks, Russians - even the British! Huh! It took seven centuries for us Greeks to get it back!'
And when there was no answer: 'Darcy? Are you all right?'
'Only just. How long before we're there?'
'We're almost half-way there already, my friend. Another hour, or not much more, and we'll be rounding the point just under the landing strip. That's where we should find the Lazarus. We can take a look at her, but that's all. Maybe we can hail someone - or something -on board, and see what we think of him.'
'Right now I don't think much of anybody,' said Darcy...
But as it happened Manolis was wrong and the Lazarus was not there. They searched the small bays at the southern extremity of the island, but found no sign of the white ship. Manolis's patience was soon exhausted. In a little while, when it became obvious that their searching was in vain, he headed north for the sandy shallow-water beach at Amoupi and anchored there where they could wade ashore. They ate a Greek salad at the beach taverna, and drank a small bottle of retsina between them. When Darcy fell asleep in his chair under the taverna's split-bamboo awning, then Manolis sighed, sat back and lit a cigarette. He smoked several, admired the tanned, bouncing breasts of English girls where they played in the sea, drank another bottle of retsina before it was time to wake Darcy up. Just after 5:05 they set out to return to Rhodes.
That evening, coming in stiff, weary, and tanned by sun and sea-spray, Darcy and Manolis found four people waiting for them in the lounge of their hotel. There were several moments of confusion. Darcy knew two of the arrivals well enough, for Ben Trask and David Chung were his own men; but Zekintha Foener (now Simmons), and her husband Michael or 'Jazz', were strangers to him except by hearsay. Darcy had anticipated four and had booked accommodation accordingly, but of this specific group he had only expected two. On Harry Keogh's advice he had tried to get a message to Zek and Jazz that they should stay out of it, but either it hadn't reached them or they had chosen to ignore it. He would find out later. The two missing men were E-Branch operatives finalizing a job in England, who would fly out here a.s.a.p. on completion of that task.
The four newcomers, having already dropped off their luggage in their rooms and introduced each other, were more or less ready to talk business. Darcy need only introduce Manolis and make known the Greek policeman's role in things, then replay the action so far, and all systems would be go. Before that, however...
... Darcy and Manolis excused themselves and took invigorating showers before rejoining the E-Branch people where they waited for them. Then Manolis took them all to a rather expensive taverna on the other side of town which wasn't likely to be swamped with tourists, and there arranged seating around a large secluded corner table with a view on the night ocean. Here Darcy quickly restated the introductions, this time detailing the various talents of his group.