The men had gone. They must have been wearing rubber boots; and they must have wadded their equipment well to make so little noise. For some reason they had been waiting there to catch me. But the fact that I had waited to hear the boat leave, and then not walked very fast, must have made them think I had gone another way back; or perhaps that I was still hanging about Bourani. That explained the flare. They had been recalled.
I grinned to myself. Conchis was certainly still on the island; this was why he had been away. Julie would have been kept innocent; he could not have risked her telling me, though he might have hoped I would suspect her of leading me into whatever trap I had just escaped. But this time the fox was through the net. I was even half tempted to follow the men down to see where they went, but I remembered old lessons from my own military training. Never patrol on a windless night if you can avoid it; remember the man nearer the moon sees you better than you see him. Already, within thirty seconds of their passing, I could hardly hear them. One stone was loudly kicked, then silence; then another, very faintly. I gave them another thirty seconds, then I pushed myself up and began to climb the path as fast as I could.
At the top of the cleft where the ridge flattened out, I had to cross fifty yards or so of open space before the ground dipped down to the northern side. It was a windswept area littered with stones, a few lone bushes. On the far side lay a large patch, an acre or so, of high tamarisk. I could see the black opening in the feathery branches where my path went in. I stood and listened. Silence. I began to lope across the open space.
I had got about halfway across when I heard a bang. A second later a Very flare burst open some two hundred yards to the right. It flooded the ridge with light. I dropped, my face averted. The light died down. The moment it hissed into darkness I was on my feet and racing, careless of noise, for the tamarisks. I got into them safely, stopped a moment, trying to work out what insane new trick Conchis was playing. Then I heard footsteps running along the ridge, from the direction in which the flare had come. I began to sprint down the path between the seven-foot bushes.
I came to a flat, wider curve in the path, where I could run faster. Meteorically, without any warning, my foot was caught and I was plunging headlong forward. A searing jab as my flung-out hand hit the sharp edge of a stone. An agonizing bang in the ribs. I heard my breath blasted out of my lungs with the impact and my shocked voice saying “Oh Christ.” I was too dazed for a moment to realize what had happened. Then came a sharp low command from behind the tamarisks to the right. I spoke only a word or two of the language. But the voice sounded authentically German.
There were sounds all around me, on both sides of the path. I was surrounded by men dressed as German soldiers. There were seven of them.
“What the bloody hell’s the game?”
I scrambled onto my knees, rubbing the grit off the palms of my hands. I could feel blood on one. Two men came behind me and seized me by the arms, jerked me up. Another man stood in the center of the path. He was apparently in charge. He had no rifle or submachine gun, like the others, but only a revolver. I looked sideways at the rifle the man to my left had slung over his shoulder. It looked real; not a stage property. He looked really German; not Greek.
The man with the revolver, evidently some kind of NCO, spoke again in German. Two men bent, one on either side of the path, and fiddled by tamarisk stems: a tripwire. The man with the revolver blew a whistle. I looked at the two men beside me.
“You speak English? Sprechen Sie Englisch?”
They took not the slightest notice, except to jerk my arms for silence. I thought, Christ, wait till I see Conchis again. The NCO stood in the path with his back to me, and the other four men gathered beyond him. Two of them sat down.
One evidently asked if they could smoke. The NCO gave permission.
They lit up, helmeted faces in match-flares, and began to talk in a low murmur of voices. They seemed all German. Not just Greeks who knew a few words of German; but Germans. I spoke to the sergeant.
“When you’ve finished the clowning perhaps you’ll tell me what we’re waiting for.”
The man pivoted round and came up to me. He was a man of about forty-five, long-cheeked. He stood with his face about two feet from mine. He did not look particularly brutal but he looked his part. I expected another spit routine, but he simply said quietly, “Was sagen Sie?”
“Oh go to hell.”
He remained staring at me, as if he did not understand, but was interested to see me at last; then expressionlessly turned away. The grip of the soldiers relaxed a little. If I had felt less battered, I might have run for it. But then I heard footsteps from the ridge above. A few seconds later the six men I had first seen came marching down the path in a loose single file. But before they came to us, they fell out by the group of smoking men. The boy who was holding me on the right was only about twenty. He began siss-whistling under his breath; and in what had been, in spite of my remark about clowning, a pretty convincing performance until then, he struck a rather obvious note, for the tune was the most famous of all, “Lili Marlene.” Or was it a very bad pun? He had a huge acne-covered jaw and small eyelashless eyes; specially chosen, I suppose, because he appeared so Teutonic, with a curious machinelike indifference, as if he didn’t know why he was there, who I was; and didn’t care; just carried out orders.
I calculated: thirteen men, at least half of whom were German. Cost of getting them to Greece, from Athens to the island. Equipment. Training-rehearsing. Cost of getting them off the island, back to Germany. It couldn’t be done under five hundred pounds. And for what? To frighten—or perhaps to impress—one unimportant person. At the same time, now that the first panic had subsided, my attitude changed. This scene was so well organized, so elaborate. I fell under the spell of Conchis the magician again. Frightened, but fascinated; not really wanting it not to have happened as it did; and then there were more footsteps.
Two more men appeared. One was short and slim. He came striding down the path with a taller man behind him. Both had the peaked hats of officers. Eagle badges. The soldiers he passed stood hurriedly, but he made a brisk movement of his hand to put them at ease. He came straight to me. He was obviously an actor who had specialized in German colonel roles; a hard face, a thin mouth; all he lacked were spectacles with oblong lenses and steel frames.
“Hello.”
He did not answer, but looked at me rather as the sergeant, who was now standing stiffly some way behind him, had. The other officer was apparently a lieutenant, an aide. I noticed he had a slight limp; an Italian-looking face, very dark eyebrows, round tanned cheeks; handsome.
“Where’s the producer?”
The colonel took a cigarette case out of his inside pocket and selected a cigarette. The lieutenant reached forward with a light. Beyond them I saw one of the soldiers cross the path with something in loose paper—food of some sort. They were eating.
“I must say you look the part.”
He said one word, carefully pursed in his mouth, spat out like a grape pip.
“Gut.”
He turned away; said something in German. The sergeant went up the path and came back with a hurricane lamp, which he lit, then set behind me.
The colonel moved up the path to where the sergeant was standing, and I was left staring at the lieutenant. There was something strange in his look, as if he would have liked to tell me something, but couldn’t; searching my face for some answer. His eyes flicked away, and he turned abruptly, though awkwardly, on his heel and rejoined the colonel. I heard low German voices, then the sergeant’s laconic command.