Colin Forbes - The Greek Key

'Time for me to push off.' Newman stood up. 'The others are coming with me?'

'Yes.' Sarris smiled drily. Their stories fit what you've told me. You can all go home. Maybe you and Marler should really go home – back to London?'

'You're deporting us?' enquired Newman as he opened the door.

'Wish I could.' Sarris grinned, slapped Newman on the shoulder. Take care of yourself. Greece could be bad for your health…'

Nick drove his Mercedes along Alexandras as streaks of the real dawn painted the sky with vivid slashes of red and gold. Above a band of black receding night was a curve of pure cerulean, intense as a blue flame, warning that another scorching day was coming.

Take us somewhere very quiet and lonely, Nick,' said Newman. 'Somewhere we can talk without interruption.'

'Lycabettus,' Nick responded. 'Very high, very lonely -at this hour…'

He swung off Alexandras. Soon they were climbing steeply up a road spiralling round the lower slopes of Mount Lycabettus. They drove higher and higher. And as they climbed, below them Athens receded, the view expanded. Newman gazed out of the window. Already the panorama was awe-inspiring. They went on climbing, Nick turning the wheel all the time, negotiating the large car round diabolical hairpin bends, blowing his horn in case a vehicle was coming down. They met no one by the time he stopped at the edge of a precipitous curve.

'End of the road,' Nick said, alighting quickly to open the door, but Newman beat him to it, stepping out and taking a deep breath of fresh clear air. Marler stood on one side, Nick on the other.

'How did you get on, Nick – with their questions?' Newman asked.

'I told the truth.' Nick grinned. 'Some of it. I told them you hired me when you were last here. That explained how you knew me. I told them I drove you to Piraeus to show you the sea, that we looked at the boats at Zea and then drove back. Thank God I had the rear window repaired. It would have been difficult to explain the bullet-hole.'

'I thought of that. Go on.'

'I told them you gave me pictures of Masterson to find out where he'd stayed. That reference you made to him just before we left your room tipped me off I could talk about that. I told them Giorgos was taking too close an interest in our activities, that you wanted to ask him why. So I obtained his address in the Plaka from one of the assistant receptionists – by saying I owed him some money When we got there we found he was dead. I kept it simple.

'Which linked up beautifully with what I told Sarris, How did you cope, Marler?'

'I coped. Much the same story Nick told. Kept it simple. I only answered what I was asked. No elaborations. I must say I didn't care too much for your description of me as your assistant.'

'You'll get used to it.' He stared down. 'God, what a view.'

The huge eye of the sun was already glaring down on Athens. A city of white buildings crammed cheek by jowl, spreading out towards the horizon, merging with Piraeus, once a separate port. From that height the immensity oi the capital showed dramatically.

In the far distance Newman could pick out a shoehorn-shaped bowl which was the new stadium they had passed on their way into Piraeus. Beyond, the Mediterranean was already a shimmer of hazy blue. It was the sheer density of the city of three million inhabitants which astounded Newman.

'Where the devil is the Acropolis?' Marler asked.

'I show you…'

Nick ran back to the car, returned with binoculars, focused them. He pointed below into the middle of the endless congestion. 'There. Perched up with the Parthenon on top.'

'Incredible.' Marler gazed at the ancient temple through the glasses as Nick went on talking.

'Most people who first come to Athens think the highest point is the Acropolis. But Mount Lycabettus towers like an old volcano far above anything else. And we are not at the top.'

Newman looked up to where Nick pointed. The mountain soared up further. Perched on its summit was a church with a brown-coloured dome.

The Church of St George,' Nick explained. 'You can reach it by the funicular at the top of Kolonaki.'

'Kolonaki? I remember that from when I was here before. District for the people with big money?' Marler remarked, handing back the glasses.

'Christina Gavalas has an apartment in Kolonaki,' said Nick.

The key is somewhere down there,' Newman reflected, gazing down at the vast sprawl. The key to who killed Masterson.'

Nick drove them back down another equally hair-raising spiral road into the city. The streets were still quiet. Outside a few shops women were spraying water on the pavements with hosepipes. As soon as their backs were turned the water shrank into damp patches, then evaporated.

'Another hot day coming up,' Nick commented. 'So we all sweat again. Grande Bretagne?'

'You can sweat,' Newman said. 'I'm going to sleep.'

They approached Syntagma Square along Sofias Avenue, a street which Newman remembered ran straight from the Hilton to the square. They would visit the Hilton later.

Nick was stopped by red lights at the entrance to Syntagma and Newman leaned forward, staring through the windscreen. Nick nodded.

'It is the same car…'

'With the same registration number…'

The black Mercedes with amber-tinted windows was parked across the street from the main entrance to the Grande Bretagne. Behind the tinted glass Newman could see two men sitting in front, two more in the rear seats. Nick parked at the foot of the steps leading up to the hotel. Newman got out slowly, stood upright, stared at the car.

One of the front windows lowered slowly, moved by automatic control. A head leaned forward, looking direct across the street at Newman. He stood quite still, hands in his jacket pockets.

In real life he looked even more like an Old Testament prophet than in the photo Sarris had showed him. Aged and ageless. The curved beak of the cruel nose. The eyes intense beneath the bushy brows, the craggy forehead. Their eyes clashed over the width of the street. Newman sensed a look of pure hatred, venomous. The window closed slowly, shutting out the gaze of Petros Gavalas. The black Mercedes slid away from the kerb and was gone.

Petros Gavalas sat beside the driver, his grandson, in silence as the Mercedes headed down Syngrou Avenue. A very big man, he had pushed his seat back to its fullest extent to give comfortable leg room – so far back that the henchman sitting behind him had cramped knees. As they approached the point where the avenue forked, he spoke in his gravelly voice. 'Dimitrios, take the turn-off to Piraeus.' 'I thought we were returning to the farm…' 'Later. I have phone calls to make from the apartment at Zea. You are a fool,' he continued. 'I told you to shoot the driver of their car – to discourage Greeks from helping the English. You missed.'

'But we did not miss with Giorgos,' Dimitrios replied as he turned down the right fork. He chuckled unpleasantly. 'That one had his fill of wine forever.'

People should not ask for more money than has been agreed. And he was a Greek. He should have known better. He knows now.'

'We are going to kill those two Englishmen?' Dimitrios asked.

'Not yet, cretin.' Petros shifted his bulk: the heat was making him irritable. 'I have already given orders. They will be followed night and day. Let us first see what they are up to. They had better not come near the farm. And they would be most unwise to start asking questions about Andreas. I trust for their sakes they do not go anywhere near Siros.'

'Does it matter? If they do go to Siros?'

It was the wrong thing to say. Petros hit Dimitrios on the arm. He almost swerved off the road. Petros swore at him, turned to glare at his grandson.

'Any English who goes near Siros could be involved in the great betrayal over forty years ago on Siros. Someone will pay for that. With his life…'