Colin Forbes: The Heights of Zervos

He finished drying himself, glanced at the inviting bunk and looked away quickly. Lord, it had been a swine of a trip from Bucharest. Four hours' sleep in forty-eight, his reflexes shot to hell, but he'd better check this damned ship – and forget any ideas about sleep until he was actually on Greek soil. He put on the leather coat and the hat, tested the action of his Luger, glanced in the mirror. He was back in business again. The arrogant, uncompromising image of Dr Richard Dietrich stared back at him. Replacing the gun inside his coat, he left the cabin to carry out his inspection of the 5,000-ton Greek ferry.

The bitter wind raked his face as soon as he reached the deck, a wind unpleasant enough, he soon found, to keep the handful of fellow-passengers below decks. Half an hour later, his tour of the vessel completed, he stood near the stern where he could keep an eye on the gangway for late arrivals. It was just possible that the Abwehr might send someone on board at the last moment. Standing by the rail, Macomber seemed impervious to the weather as he quietly smoked his cigar. The lifeboat covers were still crusted with last night's snowfall, the masthead rigging still encased with glassy ice, but the battered yellow funnel was dripping moisture as the ship began to get up steam. To all outward appearances Macomber had wandered round the vessel with the idle curiosity of the newly arrived passenger who is interested in his temporary home, but now as he smoked his cigar he was cataloguing his discoveries in his mind.

From the chief steward he had learned that the Hydra carried a crew of six, that the captain's name was Nopagos, and that he had plied this regular passage between Istanbul and Zervos for the past fourteen years. Macomber stirred at the rail as the chief steward reappeared at his elbow, chattering amiably.

'Looks as though we've got our full complement of passengers aboard, sir.'

Macomber nodded, wondering whether he had overdone the tip: the steward was becoming his shadow. He checked his watch. 'There's still time for last-minute arrivals.' Again he was subtly probing for information.

'Doubt that, sir. I was talking to the ticket office manager a few minutes ago on the phone – he sold seven tickets for this trip, so it looks as though that's the lot.'

Macomber nodded again and the steward, sensing that he was no longer in a talkative mood, excused himself. Left alone once more, the Scot continued his mental inventory. Two British civilians he hadn't yet seen, one man in his late twenties while his companion was probably a few years beyond thirty. Which was interesting, since both men were of military age. One Greek civilian who lived on Zervos and apparently had something to do with the monastic order which owned the ferry – again a man of military age, but Macomber presumed that his slight limp had kept him out of the Greek Army. And, finally, the three Germans. He had seen two of them briefly, both civilians in their early forties who had the appearance of businessmen, but the third, a man called Schnell, had apparently come aboard very early in the morning and locked himself away in his cabin. 'With his cabin trunk,' as the voluble steward had explained earlier. On this point the Scot had detected an uncertain note in the steward's voice and he had asked a question.

'You find that odd – that he should keep a trunk in his cabin?'

'Well, sir, it takes up a lot of space and I offered to have it put in the hold when he came aboard. After all, we shall be docking at Zervos in twenty-four hours. He was quite abrupt with me, the way some…' He had paused and Macomber, knowing he had been about to say 'the way some Germans are', had smiled grimly to himself. But the steward had changed his wording in time. '… the way some people are when they arrive early. He insisted it stayed with him in the cabin so he must be carrying something valuable.'

Something valuable? Macomber frowned as he recalled the steward's words – it was this cabin trunk and its unknown contents which occupied his thoughts as he gazed out over the muddle of decrepit-looking tramps and coasters which congested the Golden Horn harbour. He heard a sound behind him and remained staring out across the water, one large boot resting on the lower rail. Was it likely that an attempt would be made to assassinate him at this late hour – a few minutes before putting to sea? Out of the corner of his eye he watched the Greek approaching, heard the faint slur of his limping step.

The man's name was Grapos and even with that slight limp Macomber thought he would be an asset to any army: of only medium height there was, nevertheless, a suggestion of tremendous physical strength in those broad shoulders and that powerful chest which swelled the coloured shirt. Not a prosperous individual, Macomber decided: his grey jacket and trousers were of poor quality, the red tie round his neck was faded and his boots were shabby. The steward had told him of an unexpected facility Grapos possessed – the monks had taught him to speak English. The Greek was very close now, stopping almost behind the Scot, and his eyes were shrewd and alert.

'Always it seems so long before the boat sails,' he began. 'You have been to Zervos before?'

'Once.' Macomber replied in Greek and turned bis head away to study the harbour. Grapos might have been surprised had he known how much Macomber had registered in that brief glance. The Greek's face was strong-featured, the jaw-line formidable, and the long straggle of dark moustache which curved round the corners of his wide mouth gave him the look of a bandit or guerrilla. He was one of the most villainous-looking characters Macomber had encountered since entering the Balkans. But the point which had alerted the Scot was the fact that Grapos had spoken to him in Greek. Which could only mean that he had eavesdropped while Macomber was conversing in that language with the steward, unless that talkative individual had informed Grapos that they had a Greek-speaking German aboard.

'There is bad weather on the way,' Grapos remarked and looked upwards.

'Why do you say that?' Macomber's tone was brusque and unencouraging, but the Greek seemed not to notice.

'Because of the birds.' Grapos lifted a hand and pointed to where a cloud of seagulls wheeled and floated in erratic circles high above the white-coated domes and minarets onshore.

'Don't you always get birds over a harbour?' Macomber sounded bored with the company which had thrust itself upon him, but now he was observing the large, hairy-backed hands which gripped the rail as though they might pull a section loose bodily.

'Yes, but not so many, and they are uneasy – you can tell by the way they fly. I have seen them fly like that over Zervos before the great storms. This will be a bad voyage,' he went on cheerfully. 'We shall run into a storm before we land at Katyra. Let us hope it does not strike us off Cape Zervos. You see,' he continued with relish, 'the entrance to the gulf is very narrow and the cape has been the graveyard of a hundred ships or more…' He broke off, grinning savagely as he displayed a row of perfect white teeth. 'But, of course, you know – you have been there before.'

Macomber said nothing as he hunched his broad shoulders and threw the smoked cigar butt into the water. Two ships away along the wharf another vessel was preparing to leave, her white funnel belching out clouds of murky smoke which the wind dispersed in chaotic trails. Behind him he heard footsteps retreating, one of them out of step. Grapos had taken the hint and was on his way to find someone else who would listen to his chatter. Extracting a Zeiss Monokular glass, a single-lens field-glass, from his pocket, Macomber focused it on the other vessel getting up a head of steam. The Rumanian flag whipped in the wind from her masthead and she was, he knew, the Rupescu. Her decks were strangely deserted for a ship on the point of departure and at the head of the gangplank two seamen stood as though on guard. It was quite clear that shortly she would follow the Hydra across the Sea of Marmara and into the Dardanelles, which he found interesting.