Dennis Wheatley - Mayhem in Greece

Next morning they drove right round the outside of the great Venetian ramparts which still surrounded the city, to get on to the road leading west along the coast. After a few kilometres it turned south, inland, and ran through a valley rich in vineyards with, between the vines, such masses of oxalis that their flowers formed a bright yellow carpet. Gradually the road mounted, in a series of zigzags, until in front they had an excellent view of Mount Ida.

It was in Crete that Zeus had been brought up in secret to save him from his father, Cronos, and it was said that, as a memorial to this, he had reshaped the mountain as a portrait of himself. Seen from the south, its outline certainly looked like the profile of an enormous head of splendid proportions lying on a pillow, with brow, nose and chin all sharply defined.

By half-past-eleven they had come down through the pass and reached the village of Ayioi Dheka, in the vicinity of which had lain Gortyne, the capital of the island during the centuries of occupation by the Romans. According to a pamphlet which Stephanie had acquired, there were a number of interesting remains there on both sides of the road; so, on seeing a ruin through the trees on their left, they pulled up, got out of the car and went over to inspect it.

The country there consisted mainly of small orchards, separated by low, crumbling walls largely composed of blocks of hewn stone, obviously from ancient buildings. Sightseers were so infrequent that there were no sign-boards or even tracks, and the foliage of the fruit trees made it difficut to see far in any direction. The ruin they had seen proved to be only a fifteen-foot-high section of a thick, brick wall but, during twenty minutes of scrambling about, they found the foundations of what must have been an enormous temple, and the ruins of the Roman Governor's palace. The remains of an Egyptian temple were also said to be there, but they could not locate them; so they returned to the car and drove on for a quarter of a mile, till they came to a large ruin on the right of the road.

This, they learned from the pamphlet, was the oldest Christian church in Crete, and had been built by St. Titus. Beyond it lay a Greek theatre, in which St. Paul had preached, and a wall inscribed with the 'Law of Gortyne' which was of special interest because it was the first Code of Laws formulated in Europe, and the work of Greeks living in the second century b.c.

Having walked round the church, they followed a path to the other ruins. The theatre was quite small, with only about twenty-five semi-circular rows of seats, in good preservation and quite charming. Unlike the other ruins they had just visited, it was not entirely deserted. Two men were sitting smoking cigarettes on the edge of the slightly raised stage from which St. Paul had preached. They exchanged nods and smiles with Robbie and Stephanie who, the moment they had passed them gave one another a swift glance. The two men were talking in Czech and one of them had said:

'It went more quickly than one would have expected; but I'm glad the job is finished and we'll soon be home.'

Robbie could hardly control himself for excitement. Czech visitors were so rare in Crete that he felt it highly probable that these were some of Barak's people. What the man had said tended to confirm that. It suggested that the Bratislava had, after all, landed a group in Crete.

Stephanie had jumped to the same conclusion. In order to overhear more of the conversation, she halted to examine an inscription carved on the back of one of the seats in the front row. They heard the other man reply:

'I don't agree. I'm glad to have had the chance to see some of these old places. I only wish we had longer, so that I could visit more of them.'

For once, Robbie took the lead. To have remained where they were would have looked as if they were deliberately listening to the Czech's conversation. But, instead of walking on, he took Stephanie's elbow and guided her up the steep staircase made by the rows of seats. When they reached the top they appeared to be out of earshot but, owing to the admirable acoustics in Greek theatres, they could still hear perfectly every word spoken by the two men sitting on the stage.

As they were making their way up, the first speaker had said: 'It's all very well for you, Frantisek; you are a bachelor.'

'What of it?' the second replied. 'I'd have thought you'd be glad of the chance to get away for a bit from your wife and kids.'

Their conversation then continued:

'Well, it's a change; but I prefer ordinary jobs and the sort of food I'm used to. I resent having my life upset by the Bosses.'

'My dear Viliam, I hope you will not be fool enough to show it. Far better pretend that, like myself, you are glad to have been one of those selected to be sent here for this work.'

'Anyhow, they can have no complaints. We have made a good job of it.'

'True. All the same, I wonder if all the labour and material we have expended could not have been saved.'

'How would you have done that?'

'By making use of the place we went to yesterday. That grotto where they say Zeus was hidden as a child.'

'What! Drop one down there, instead of having bored our shaft?'

'Yes; why not? The pit there is said to be bottomless. Of course, it's not. But, all the same, it's probably quite deep enough to have served the same purpose.'

Tt might, but it's a long way from the N.A.T.O. air base.'

'I don't think that has any special bearing on the operation.'

'Perhaps not. But you couldn't possibly control the drop of a five-foot-long cylinder down a wide hole in the rock, and with jagged sides, too. It would smash itself to pieces before it got to the bottom.'

Tt could be lowered carefully. Still, perhaps you're right. Anyhow, it was only an idea. Let's get back to the car.'

As the two Czechs stubbed out their cigarettes, stood up and walked away, Robbie whispered to Stephanie: 'They are two of Barak's people. They must be, and we're really on to something now. They haven't been boring for anything; only holes down which they mean to drop something. Atom bombs, perhaps.'

'What good could that do—unless the bombs explode under something that matters? And one of them said he didn't think it had anything to do with the N.A.T.O. air base. Anyhow, we know that the sites in Pirgos, Corinth and Rhodes were nowhere near any military objective.'

'I don't get it,' Robbie agreed, 'but come on. We must follow them. With luck, they may lead us to the site where they've been working.'

Keeping the two Czechs in view, they walked back along the path. As they approached the road they saw now that, just round the bend, a hundred yards ahead of where they had left their car, there was another with a driver sitting at the wheel. The Czechs got in and were driven off towards Phaestos. Robbie and Stephanie got to their car as quickly as they could and, keeping about a quarter of a mile behind, followed.

After about twelve kilometres, they could see the ruins of Phaestos perched up on a hill ahead and, to the left, a well-made-up side road that led off up to them. But the Czechs had not taken it. For another few kilometres, Stephanie kept on their tail along the rutty, dusty, little-used main road to the south coast. Having breasted a rise, she suddenly applied the brakes and brought the car to a standstill. At the bottom of the slope in front of them, the other car had pulled up. The Czechs got out and one of them paid off the driver. He ran his car to and fro until he had turned it round, then started to drive it back up the slope. Stephanie took off her brakes, ran down the hill past the other driver and pulled up at the spot where the Czechs had paid him off.

'You stay here,' said Robbie quickly, jumping out.

'Take care of yourself,' she called after him, but he had already disappeared into the bushes on the left of the road, along a footpath that the Czechs had obviously taken. Five minutes later, he caught sight of them. The belt of trees and bushes ended abruptly along a line of greyish pebbles that formed a river bed. Some distance away, a sluggish stream flowed roughly in the middle of its course. One of the Czechs was standing on the far side of the water, the other was in the act of crossing it on a donkey guided by a peasant. Beyond the river lay a steep hill.