Алистер Маклин - Partisans

‘Oh, come now,’ Giacomo said easily. ‘I don’t think that’s being too fair. I’m quite sure, Carlos, that she didn’t mean what she implied.’ He looked at Lorraine in mock-reproval. ‘I’m sure Carlos would willingly leave his safe and sound ship and accompany you into the mountains. But there are two inhibiting factors. Duty and a tin leg.’

‘I am sorry.’ She was genuinely contrite and put her hand on Carlos’ shoulder to show it: Carlos, who was addressing himself to the confection that Giovanni had just brought, looked up at her and smiled amiably. ‘Giacomo’s right’ she said. ‘Of course I didn’t mean it. It’s just that – well, Sarina and I feel so helpless.’

‘Giacomo is in the same position. He doesn’t look in the slightest bit helpless to me.’

She shook his shoulder in exasperation. ‘Please. You don’t understand. We don’t know what’s going on. We don’t know anything . He seems to know everything.’

‘He? Peter?’

‘Who else would I be talking about?’ For so patrician-looking a lady she could be very snappish. ‘Perhaps I can shake you out of your complacency. Do you know that he knows where Giacomo and I are going? Do you know that he seems to know about my background? Do you know that he knows I’m not Italian? That he knows that you and I knew each other in the past, but not in Pescara?’

If Carlos was shaken he concealed it masterfully. ‘Peter knows a great number of things that you wouldn’t expect him to. Or so Colonel Lunz tells me. For all I know Colonel Lunz told him about you and Giacomo, although that wouldn’t be like the Colonel. He may have expected you aboard. He didn’t seem annoyed by your presence.’

‘He was annoyed enough by Alessandro’s presence.’

‘He wouldn’t know about Alessandro. Alessandro is controlled by another agency.’

She said quickly: ‘How do you know that?’

‘He – Peter – told me.’

She removed her hand and straightened. ‘So. You and Peter have your little secrets too.’ She turned to Sarina. ‘We can trust everybody, can’t we?’

Giacomo said: ‘Carlos, you’re beginning to look like a hen-pecked husband.’

‘I’m beginning to feel like one, too. My dear girl, I only learnt this during the night. What did you expect me to do? Come hammering on your cabin door at four in the morning to announce this earthshaking news to you and Sarina?’ He looked up as the dyspeptic engineer-chef appeared again in the doorway.

‘Breakfast has been served, Carlos.’

‘Thank you, Giovanni.’ He looked at Lorraine. ‘And before you start getting suspicious of Giovanni he only means that he’s given food to our friends in the fore cabin.’

‘I thought the door was locked.’

‘Oh dear, oh dear.’ Carlos laid down knife and fork. ‘Suspicious again. The door is locked. Breakfast was lowered in a bucket to their cabin porthole.’

‘When are you going to see them?’

‘When I’m ready. When I’ve had breakfast.’ Carlos picked up his knife and fork again. ‘If I get peace to eat it, that is.’

George said: ‘Took a bit of a risk back there, didn’t you? Chanced your arm, as they say, pretending you knew all about their plans and backgrounds when you knew nothing.’

‘Credit’s all yours, George. Just based on a couple of remarks of yours about ethnic background. Couldn’t very well tell them that, though. Besides, Lorraine gave away more than I extracted. I don’t think she’d make a very good espionage agent.’

They were threading their way through cranes, trucks, both army and civilian, and scattered dock buildings, a few yards behind the two Italian soldiers. The snow had stopped now, the Rilić hills were sheltering them from the north-east wind but the temperature was still below freezing point. There were few enough people around, the early hour and the cold were not such as to encourage outdoor activity. The soldiers, as Carlos had said, were either reservists or youths. The few civilians around were in the same age categories. There didn’t seem to be a young or middle-aged man in the port.

‘At least,’ George said, ‘you’ve established a kind of moral ascendancy over them. Well, over the young ladies, anyway. Giacomo doesn’t lend himself to that sort of thing. That paper Carlos gave you – a message from our Roman allies?’

‘Yes. We are requested to remain in Ploče and await further orders.’

‘Ridiculous.’

‘Isn’t it?’

‘You think sending that cablegram was wise? We might have expected this.’

‘I did. I hoped to precipitate exactly this. We know what to expect and we’ve got the initiative. If we’d got clear of the port without trouble and then were stopped by a couple of tanks up the valley road we’d have lost the initiative. Our two guards in front there – they’re not very bright, are they?’

‘You mean they didn’t search us for handguns? One’s too old to care, the other’s too inexperienced to know. Besides, look at our honest faces.’

The two guards led the way to a low wooden hut, obviously a temporary affair, up some steps and, after knocking, into a small room about as spartan and primitive as the exterior of the hut – cracked linoleum on the floor, two metal filing cabinets, a radio transceiver, a telephone, a table and some chairs. The officer behind the table rose at their entrance. He was a tall thin man, middleaged, with pebble glasses which explained clearly enough why he wasn’t at the front. He peered at them myopically over the tops of his glasses.

‘Major Petersen?’

‘Yes. Glad to meet you, Commandant.’

‘Oh. I see. I wonder.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I have just received a detention order–’

‘Ssh!’ Petersen had a finger to his lips. He lowered his voice. ‘Are we alone?’

‘We are.’

‘Quite sure?’

‘Quite sure.’

‘In that case put your hands up.’

Carlos pushed his chair back and rose. ‘Excuse me. I must have a look at that cabin door.’

Lorraine said: ‘You mean you haven’t seen it yet?’

‘No. If Peter says it’s welded, then it is. I should imagine one welded door looks very much like another. Curiosity, really.’

He was back in just over a minute.

‘A welded door is a welded door and the only way to open it is with an oxyacetylene flame-cutter. I’ve sent Pietro ashore to try and find one. I don’t have much hope. We had one but Peter and his friends dropped it over the side.’

Lorraine said: ‘You don’t seem worried about it.’

‘I don’t get worried about trifles.’

‘And if you can’t get them out?’

‘They’ll have to stay there till we get back to Termoli. Plenty of facilities there.’

‘You could be sunk before you get there. Have you thought of that?’

‘Yes. That would upset me.’

‘Well, that’s better. A little compassion, at least.’

‘It would upset me because I’ve really grown quite fond of this old boat. I would hate to think it would be Alessandro’s tomb.’ Carlos’ face and voice were cold. ‘Compassion? Compassion for that monster? Compassion for a murderer, a hired assassin, a poisoner who travels with hypodermics and ampoules of lethal liquids? Compassion for a psychopath who would just love to inject you or Sarina there and giggle his evil head off as you screamed your way to death? Peter spared him: I wish he’d killed him. Compassion!’ He turned and walked out.

‘And now you’ve upset him,’ Giacomo said. ‘Nag, nag, nag. It’s bloody marvellous. People – well, Peter and Carlos – tried, judged and condemned when you don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about.’

‘I didn’t mean anything.’ She seemed bewildered.