protege." We had reached the water point and she paused, the stream close beside us, the gleam of it like steel in the starlight. "You remember that book Holroyd read for an English publisher? It was all there, all Dr. Van der Voort's thinking on the origin of our own species. In outline, that is. Nothing confirmed. Just theory. But then he sent those bones to Dr. Gil-more for dating." She seized hold of my arm, her voice suddenly raised against the sound of the water. "Please-try to understand. If Holroyd can get supporting evidence, then he'll go to this Congress, read his paper. Dr. Van der Voort's theories are unpublished. He'll present them as his own."
"And what am I supposed to do about that?"
"Find him, you fool," she answered stridently. "Find him and bring him back, so that he can take credit for anything that's discovered here."
"That's all very well," I said. "But Cartwright has already searched the area. Your brother was with him. And Kotiadis has been searching too-not just this area, but half the country. You realize he's a Greek Intelligence Officer?"
She nodded. "I wasn't sure. He said he was from the Ministry of Antiquities in Athens-the General Direction of Antiquities and Restoration, he called it."
"He's Intelligence," I repeated. "And he thinks the old man is a Communist agent. Not only that," I added, "but he's leapt to the conclusion that Cartwright knew this and that's why my father attacked him."
"But that's ridiculous."
"Maybe, but what's the alternative? Why did he attack him? D'you know?"
"No. I can only guess."
"Well?"
"Can't you see it-from his point of view? Knowing Holroyd was using him. Alec, too. It must have worked on his mind-a feeling of frustration, depression. ."
"He was in a manic-depressive state you mean?"
"I don't know-yes, probably."
"But why-suddenly like that?"
She shook her head. "I don't know. He's so complicated. I don't pretend to understand him."
"Nor do I," I said. "I never did." I took hold of her arm. "Come on. Let's go and have that drink."
She nodded, and as we walked on I told her about Kotiadis and the questions he had asked as we drove up through Greece. "So you see," I said finally, "there's no question of my father being allowed to continue his work here."
"Yes, I see. And that's why we have a guard on the camp." She was silent as we turned into the steep alleyway that led up to the centre of the village. At length she murmured, "I can't bear the thought of Holroyd getting the credit for it all, for all his years of work."
"Not much chance of that," I said, trying to cheer her up. "Cartwright didn't seem at all optimistic about this dig when I questioned him this morning."
"Of course not. His instructions were to locate the dig from which those dated bones had come. The cave-shelter has a virgin floor, quite undisturbed. He knows this isn't it, but since Dr. Van der Voort disappeared. . Well, he's in charge now. He may not believe in your father's theories, but it's a great opportunity for him, and there's always a chance."
We had reached the square by then. There were lights on in the taverna and the radio was blaring Greek music as] pushed open the door. The interior was not designed for comfort, bare wood tables, some forms and the walls cracked and peeling. At one of the tables four men in open-neck shirts were playing dominoes, two others were talking, and an old man with drooping moustaches and baggy Turkish trousers occupied the only chair. All eyes were turned upon us as we entered. The owner appeared behind the counter that did service as a bar. He was a short bull of a man with black eyebrows and features that suggested he had just suffered some terrible loss. Sonia smiled at him. "Kalispera, Andreas."
"Speras," he replied, his eyes on me, watchful like all the rest.
"What would you like?" I asked her.
"Coffee," she said. "Just coffee. All we have at the camp is tea and I'm not used to it. We drink coffee at home."
I nodded, remembering how it had been in Holland-coffee at all hours of the day. "Bad for the liver," I said, and she smiled. "We're plain eaters and we don't suffer from le foie."
I ordered coffee and ouzo for both of us, but she shook her head and said something to Andreas. "I'm sorry, I don't like ouzo. Just coffee, please."
We sat at the one vacant table, watching Andreas make the coffee on a paraffin burner. She had a few words of Greek, but though the occupants of the tavema were polite, it was not a congenial atmosphere. I talked to her about the Barretts and the voyage from Malta, but it scarcely seemed to register. She had withdrawn into herself, her small face devoid of any expression, her eyes fixed on one of the faded posters that decorated the walls, seeing nothing, only what was in her mind.
The coffee came, black and sweet in tiny cups, each with its glass of water and my ouzo smelling of aniseed. "Tile-ghrafima," Andreas said and handed Sonia a cable.
"It's for Alec," she said, glancing at it, and then she seemed to freeze, sitting very still, staring down at it. Finally she looked at me. "Professor Holroyd is taking the night flight. He will be in Athens tomorrow morning."
"Does he say why he's coming out here?"
"No." She folded the cable sheet and slipped it into the pocket of her anorak. "No, he doesn't say why. But it's obvious, isn't it?" She called to Andreas, and then she said to me, "I'm so sorry. I don't like the stuff, but I've ordered one all the same." And when it came she picked it up and drank half of it at a gulp as though it were geneva. "They're like vultures," she breathed. "That's what he always called them-the desk-bound academics-vultures." She looked at me suddenly, her face pale and tense. "Can I have a cigarette please?"
I produced one of the duty-free packets I had brought
from the boat, and as I lit her cigarette, she said, "Suppose I told you where he was-what would you do?"
I stared at her. "You know where he is?"
She shook her head. "No-not for certain. But I think I can guess."
"How?"
"The book-I told you I was typing his new book."
I had forgotten that. I lit my own cigarette, watching her, waiting for her to tell me, conscious that I was nearing the end of my journey now.
"What would you do?" she repeated.
I sipped my ouzo and drank some water. The water was very good, soft as milk and yet like crystal; spring water from the mountains, uncontaminated by chemicals. I hadn't expected this and I couldn't think of an answer. I looked at her and our eyes met, and after that my hands began to tremble, for I was certain she knew, and the prospect of meeting him, wild and alone in some secret place, brought back my boyhood fears.
"Well?" she asked in a level, controlled voice.
"Why didn't you go yourself if you knew where he was?"
"I wasn't sure-" She hesitated. "I thought perhaps he needed to be alone. But now-"
"Well, where is he?" I asked. "Where has he holed up?"
"First answer my question."
"All right," I said. "I'll go."
"Of course you'll go," she answered quickly. "But what happens then?"
"That's up to him," I told her, not relishing the prospect. "I can only offer to help in any way I can." It was what I had come for after all.
I don't know whether that satisfied her or not. She drank her coffee and finished her ouzo. "Let's go," she said. "I can't talk here." I paid and we said goodnight, but it wasn't until we were clear of the village that she told me where he was-or rather, where she thought he was. "On the main road, before you got to Jannina, did you see the remains of an aqueduct?"
It came back to me then, the hillside sloping green with that gaping hole high up in the rock, and Kotiadis saying my father had been in that village the previous year. "Ayios Giorgios?"
"No, not Ayios Giorgios." We had reached the water now and she stopped, her voice only just audible above the sound of it. "On the other side of the valley. I've never been there, of course, but he describes it in great detail-two whole pages. And it was so important to him that, typing it, I could see the whole thing. The road cuts the line of the aqueduct; on one side the water was carried on great arches, on the other the Roman engineers drove a tunnel through the mountain. The entrance to that tunnel is right beside the road. The tunnel itself is blocked by a fall, but above it, on the tops of the hills, there is an area of red desert sand. It's a hang-over from some-thing that happened twenty thousand years ago."