Thomas Greanias - The 34th Degree

Franz furrowed his brow. “How do you mean?”

“Why, do business with him. Bring him to Athens, let Aphrodite see for herself what kind of coward he is. Then we can kill him, and it will be no loss to her.”

Franz nodded. “Yes, I see. But at this delicate stage in your operations, do you think it’s wise to allow yourself to be distracted?”

He pondered Franz’s question for a moment. To unmask Aphrodite’s idealized Andros as rabble was no distraction, he decided. She prized her freedom, so he would give her a choice, but he would make sure he was the better man for her to choose. To win her heart and kill Hitler at the same time would be the fulfillment of all his dreams. He could capture sanity itself and secure his future.

“Inform Bern that they are to permit Herr Andros safe passage to Greece,” he told Franz. “They have forty-eight hours to make the necessary arrangements and issue the official papers. And tell Buzzini that Aphrodite will fly out this afternoon for Athens. You and I will be leaving tomorrow.”

“Anything else?” Franz asked.

Von Berg stood up and walked across the floor to the glass case containing the Maranatha text. He leaned over and looked at the papyrus, pondering the significance of recent events and what seemed to him a fantastic convergence of the cosmos.

“Yes,” he replied. “Inform the house staff that while we’re gone, a certain Dr. Xaptz will be arriving at the Achillion as my guest. He does not know why. He is to be allowed access only to the upper floors of the palace and the Maranatha text in my study. Once he is here he cannot speak to anybody outside the house staff, in person or by phone. Until Aphrodite and I return together from Athens one week from today, Dr. Xaptz is not to leave here alive.”

“Zu Befehl,” Franz replied automatically. “And then?”

Von Berg smiled. “Then it’s off to Obersalzberg to make history.”

T here was music on the terrace of the Kursaal that evening when Andros and Elise came out from the little casino’s gaming room. Here the gardens commanded a superb view of the Alps with the city of Bern in the foreground.

“I can only thank the Maker that the boule table has a five-franc limit,” Andros said, looking up at the stars. “Between that and your little shopping sprees, Elise, you’ve drained my family fortune during our time together.”

He looked at her in the dim light of a nearby lantern. Tonight she was wearing a stylish caramel-colored suit with a white silk blouse. The jacket was padded at the shoulders and nipped tight at the waist. Her snug-fitting skirt hugged her hips. All paid for by Andros; he would pass the cost along to the OSS.

She laughed and playfully stroked the sleeve of his white dinner jacket. “But the night is young, darling, and there is so much more we can see and do.”

He thought they had done it all. He was tired of this ruse. He was tired of looking at her perfect features and scheming blue eyes. He decided to take advantage of the music and light atmosphere of the Kursaal gardens to bring up his visit to the German Legation. “Speaking of sightseeing,” he began, “I saw your friend the other morning while you were shopping.”

“I know, darling.” Her voice was sad now.

“You do?”

“Why else would he call me this afternoon and tell me to give you this?” She produced an envelope from her fashionable purse. “Oh, do open it, Chris. I’m anxious to see how much time we have to spend together.”

He opened it to see a train ticket for a one-way trip down the Simplon railway to Brindisi, an Italian port on the Adriatic. From there, said the accompanying instructions, a boat would ferry him over to Greece. In the meantime, he was to maintain his room at the Bellevue Palace Hotel, where he would return after his conference with Germany’s chief of Swiss industrial transportation, a certain Baron von Berg. Andros kept his best straight face as he looked up at Elise.

“What is it, darling?” she asked, trying to sound innocent.

He put on a brave show. “I’m afraid the money supply is low. It seems the man I need to see is in Athens.”

“But, darling, are you sure?”

He looked at the ticket. It was stamped with that day’s date: May 27, 1943. The train would leave at six. His watch told him it was already five. They weren’t giving him much time. He folded the envelope and slipped it in his suit. “I’m afraid so.”

“Oh, do be careful, Chris. I fear for you.”

“I fear for myself should I stay with you, Elise. You’re quite expensive.” He gazed at the pretty face next to him, at this vain woman of undeniable charm.

She kissed him, and it felt almost genuine. “Oh, Chris, darling. You won’t forget me?”

“How could I ever forget you, Elise?”

But he was looking at the Alps, thinking of what lay beyond. Twilight had melted the snowcapped peaks into a monolithic mound, an ominous black curtain through which he was about to pass. The other side promised another face, not quite as clear as the one next to him, but dearest to his heart.

T he town of Brig slid away as the train Andros was on pulled out of the last station in Switzerland.

Several more chateaus and a castle moved by, and Andros caught a final glimpse of the Weisshorn and Mischabel mountain groups before the track curved toward the Simplon Tunnel, the longest in the world. Halfway through the twelve-mile corridor, under seven thousand feet of alpine mountain, they would cross the frontier between neutral Switzerland and Axis territory, and there would be no turning back.

He felt a sense of exhilaration, the same exhilaration he experienced after his first parachute jump at West Point. To be sure, the Germans in Bern had given him no guarantee of their cooperation, and the risks ahead were even greater. But he had cleared the first hurdle. Tomorrow evening he would make his connection with a ship in Brindisi. He was on his way home.

A few minutes later, there was a sharp rap on the door of his compartment. It was the Swiss porter, and with him was an Italian customs official. They addressed him in English. “Passport, signore.”

Andros felt for the papers in his suit pocket and pulled out his special German diplomatic courier visa.

The Italian examined the passport and eyed him with a mixture of curiosity and fear. “Your destination, signore?”

“Brindisi. I have a trunk with me, too. Do you need to see that?”

“Trunks will be examined when we pull into Domodossola. We are just examining passports and hand luggage now.” The Italian returned his papers. “Grazie, signore.”

The door shut, and Andros settled back comfortably in his compartment. They were fast approaching the mouth of the tunnel, and soon he was swallowed by the darkness.

T he outer harbor of Brindisi hummed as the dockers loaded the last stores onto the Independence, a Greek freighter from Andros Shipping that was part of the convoy about to depart Italy for Greece.

On the bridge was Captain Paniotis Tsatsos, a big, hairy bull of a man in a sailor’s top and black baggy pants. He had a handlebar mustache, and his dark, swarthy face was crowned by silvery hair under a Greek captain’s cap. He was barking orders between the steady stream of curses with which his Greek crew was well accustomed. Now that Andros ships, like all Greek ships, were banned by the British from sailing the Mediterranean, Captain Tsatsos was reduced to short runs between Italy and Greece. That meant spending less time with his first love-the sea-and more time holed up in ports dealing with German and Italian authorities. It made him more ornery than ever.