Beacon in the Night, page 15
Van Drooge refused to either confirm or deny Stick’s statements. Instead he said, “Also the police might get interested in that car of yours. It could be embarrassing, if nothing else.”
Stick laughed. “This is a fine way to begin a… business arrangement.”
Van Drooge did not share Stick’s amusement. “So far,” he pointed out, “I see nothing to be gained by joining your plans.”
Abruptly Stick became serious again. “I know when the rendezvous is to be made,” he said softly, “and I know where. Do you?”
Van Drooge carefully studied the end of his cigar. Finally, he sighed and exhaled the smoke. “Perhaps we can do business after all,” he admitted.
Stick nodded, then asked Van Drooge about the plans he had made. Van Drooge described to him the hijacking plan which he had worked out with Mikailis. “Excellent… excellent,” agreed Stick, “but now you need not be on your guard twenty-four hours a day. I know the day, or days, that he’ll go. And I also know where we can cut him off on his return. We can take care of Cordial all right, but what do you know about Konstant? What are his plans?”
“I know nothing concerning him,” replied Van Drooge, “except that I did not shoot Mauret… so, if you’re correct in your theory, Konstant killed him.”
“I have no way of knowing if you’re telling the truth,” replied Stick frankly, “but I should believe you are. There’s nothing to gain by a lie now, and the truth will help us make our own plans.”
“It’s the truth,” said Van Drooge, heavily.
“Your only contact was with Willy Berth, is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“Willy was to take the original map to Amsterdam, and you were to contact him there. Then you were to make copies of it—the copies slightly altered, is that it?”
“Yes. That was the way it was planned. But I do not know who was to contact me to pick up the maps.”
“Konstant,” Stick pointed out, “must’ve been that man. He’s here on Pelos because he traced you here; you’re here because you traced Willy Berth too. Is that right?”
“Yes… I arranged to have him followed from New York.”
“Kronos’ original plan,” Stick explained, “was this: Valjac gives the map to Willy Berth; Willy Berth gives the map to you; you give the copies to Konstant; later Kronos makes his deals through Konstant. In the beginning, no one knows who else is in the plan except his own particular contact.”
“Where did you fit in?” asked Van Drooge.
“I was supposed to keep an eye on each contact, as it came off.” Stick nodded in satisfaction. “When Konstant found who your contact was—Willy Berth—he decided you were entirely expendable.”
“I’ve thought of that myself,” replied Van Drooge.
Stick sighed. “The Konstants are blooming idiots,” he said in part exasperation. “They linked up Cordial to Willy Berth, finally, just as you did. Now they’re watching him too.” He paused and took a long drag on his cigarette. “They’re up to some plans of their own, you know,” he said thoughtfully, “and I wish I knew what they were.”
22
Daphne told Cordial, “This is the man. His name is Demetrios Onopas. When he was very young, he worked for year in Bucharest.”
Cordial shook hands with the thin, stooped Greek. It did not surprise Cordial that Daphne had found someone; he was coming to depend on her assistance with complete assurance. Nor did it surprise him that she had actually found someone who had worked in Rumania. It seemed to him that the Greeks had worked everywhere. Because of the poor economic condition of the country, the young men leave home and wander the world following trades of all kinds. Onopas, Daphne explained, had worked for a tailor in the capital of Rumania before going on to Italy, and eventually returning to Greece. “He says he does not remember much of the language—it was long ago—but perhaps he can speak a little.”
“Ask him if he can say, ‘Your life is in danger!’”
The girl turned to the Greek and explained Cordial’s request. The Greek shook his head, and lapsed into an explanation to Daphne. She in turn took a negative stand against some of his evident suggestions, and, finally shrugging, turned to Cordial again. “Demetrios apologizes that he cannot say the words which you requested. He has forgotten much, and he did not speak the language well even when he was in the country. But he can say, ‘Beware the time!’”
“All right,” agreed Cordial, “that will do… if he really can say it clearly.”
“He can,” Daphne assured him.
“Please tell him, then, what I want him to do. He is to speak the sentence softly, but clearly. He is not to make any gestures or even pause when he says it.” Cordial continued to outline his plan, and Daphne translated his words to Onopas, who agreed. It was arranged that they meet at the taverna at six in the evening, and to wait there as long as it was necessary.
At the appointed time, Cordial and Daphne took a table and Cordial ordered a glass of beer. Onopas stood some distance away, at the bar, talking to acquaintances. Within half an hour, Senhora Konstant and the husband strolled into the taverna and selected a table, near the front, looking out on the street. The senhora recognized Cordial and nodded politely. Cordial returned the greeting. After seating themselves and ordering two lemon drinks, they settled back to watch the people of the town who were returning to the square after their siestas.
Cordial shifted slightly in his chair and caught Onopas’ eye, then deliberately looked at the Konstants. Onopas finished his glass, and strolled through the taverna, making his way to pass by the table of the Konstants. As he passed it, Cordial saw Onopas’ lips move; then the Greek was out in the square.
The Konstants, who a moment before had been relaxing in their chairs, both appeared to be watching Onopas intently. Konstant turned suddenly to the senhora, but a hand on his wrist silenced him, and both followed the Greek with their eyes until he was out of sight. The senhora finished the drink, then arose from the table and, followed by Konstant, returned to the hotel.
After the Konstants had departed, Cordial, accompanied by Daphne, walked several blocks inland from the square and there met Onopas. The Greek, pleased with the intrigue, described to Cordial the whispering of the sentence, and his movement away from the table. “I sensed they understood me,” he said. “I could feel their ears extend… invisibly… through the air.”
“Did they say anything?”
“No.”
“Did they start, or turn to look at you?”
“No. They did not start, they did not even glance at me. I spoke clearly in Rumanian, saying, ‘Beware the time!’ But, as I breathe, they understood what I said.”
Cordial was inclined to believe Onopas, but he could not be sure that the Greek was not being overenthusiastic regarding his part. As he recalled the scene, the Konstants had done nothing more than watch Onopas depart down the street. True, they had watched him leave, but wouldn’t anyone else, being spoken to in a language which they didn’t understand, and being unable to reply, sit and stare in puzzlement? Cordial paid Onopas, warned him to stay indoors and away from the square, and returned to the Nysa.
In the Splendide, the senhora looked at Konstant and asked, “Well?”
Behind the security of their locked door, Konstant removed his coat and hung it over the back of a chair. “I heard,” he replied. “I wonder who the fellow was.”
“I’ve never seen him before.”
“Neither have I.” Konstant lit a long, highly perfumed cigarette and eyed it thoughtfully. “Could it be a new man of Van Drooge’s?”
“If you hadn’t been such a bungler, we wouldn’t have to worry about the Dutchman any more.”
Konstant shifted his eyes from the cigarette and looked at the senhora uneasily. “I can always get Van Drooge,” he said.
“Not now. It’s too late. Even if you were successful this time, there’d be such an investigation by the police, with two murders on Pelos, that we might all be packed off. Certainly, they’d watch all foreigners around the clock.” The senhora glanced at the wrist watch and noting the time, removed a small earphone, not much larger than an earring, from inside the front of the dress. “It could very well be,” Senhora Konstant said, “that… our friends… are watching us closely.” Opening the large, black, leather handbag from which the senhora was never separated, the senhora took out a very small radio receiving set which was permanently tuned to single, extremely high frequency, limiting its reception to a comparative few miles. While the senhora attached the earphone to the set, the senhor ran a spool of fine wire around the walls of the room. The end of the wire he attached to the set for an antenna.
Senhora Konstant, seated with a pencil and notebook, turned on the set. After listening quietly for some minutes, the senhora suddenly began to jot down a series of coded numbers, and eventually covered both sides of a page. Then the earphone was returned to the inside of the dress, the set concealed in the handbag, and Konstant rewound the ball of wire, concealing it in a large sewing basket where it disappeared among the balls of yarn and the spools of thread. The senhora removed a French edition of Camus’ L’Etranger and referring constantly to the notes, began to look up pages, then lines, and finally words, scribbling them down as soon as they were located.
The decoding completed, the senhora told the man, “They believe they’ve narrowed the possible rendezvous point between two places about ten kilometers apart. They have also fixed the identity of the man bringing the map, but he has now disappeared into the mountains. The People’s Police will be well grouped around the two areas, and the harbor police are being brought up from Sarande to patrol the coast. All that can be done now is to wait, except we have instructions that no one is to prevent Cordial from going through. They are anxious to capture him for questioning.”
Konstant nodded, although he remained silent for a while. Then he said, “That is all very well, but so far all I’ve received is very little more than promises. And most of the promises have come from you.” He added, “Besides, those people are not to be trusted.”
“They pay well—otherwise they’d never receive any information. When I offered them my services, they gave us money for expenses but it was agreed that when they recover the map, we shall get our money in full. Far more than we’d have received from working for Kronos. It was a good bargain and an easy one to strike through the right connections.” The senhora shrugged. “As you know, there are more sides than one from which to drink out of the cup.”
“If Kronos were alive you’d not dare to inform on him.” The senhora shrugged. “Why argue? Kronos is dead. Our deal is with the Albanian authorities now, and they’ll pay us well for the information—which is a great deal better than nothing. Furthermore we take no risks, run no danger.” The logic of this argument was hard for Konstant to refute. Some time later, however, a Greek navy launch under the command of a young lieutenant, from the destroyer based in Pelos, drew alongside of the Nysa. Accompanied by two sailors, the lieutenant climbed aboard and began speaking to Vanikiotes. The old captain shook his head in violent denial and swept his arm to include the small boat. The sailors quickly and methodically began to search the Nysa and in a few minutes had completed their inspection. After a word of apology, the lieutenant and his men returned to their launch, and departed on their tour of all the boats in the harbor.
Cordial and Helene had stood silently, waiting until the inspection was completed. With the departure of the navy party, Mark turned to Daphne and asked what had occasioned the visit. “The authorities are looking for an illegal radio,” she said.
“Radio? Radios aren’t illegal in Greece.”
“Regular radios are not illegal,” Daphne explained. “But radios built to foreign, extra-high wave lengths must be registered.”
“Is someone on Pelos receiving these broadcasts?”
“It is possible—or on Corfu, or some other of the small islands. The transmitter is in Sarande, and because of the high frequency can carry only a short distance. So that in itself limits where the broadcasts can be received.”
“What was the broadcast about?”
The lieutenant hadn’t said. Probably it had been in code. Daphne turned and looked in the direction of the Albanian coast. “You’re doing a very dangerous thing,” she told Cordial. “Albania is only a very small country, but it is a very cruel country, too. After civil war with Communists in Greece, when World War II finished, Communists and Albanians take twenty-eight thousand Greek children and babies to Albania. They raise them up—do you know why?”
“No,” replied Cordial.
“They raise them, train them. Someday, they send them back to Greece… to fight Greeks.”
Cordial said nothing. He walked away, then pivoted and suddenly climbed over the side of the Nysa into the skiff and began rowing to the pier. When he reached shore, he left the rowboat and went to the taverna. Van Drooge was seated at a table. Looking around the partly filled room, Cordial did not see either Stick or the Konstants. Walking to the corner of the square, he turned and entered a narrow alley which passed the rear of the taverna and continued past the back patio of the hotel. There he climbed the back stairs to the second floor of the Splendide.
In Greece, hotel rooms when not occupied are left with their keys in the doors on the hall side. The keys to all four rooms were in their doors. Cordial remembered that he heard Mauret was put in the back bedroom when Van Drooge had been moved to the front. This left only the two center rooms to be occupied by the Konstants and the wine merchant from Rhodes. Without hesitation, he opened the door to his right and entered it. Snapping on the light, he took only a moment to discover that it was occupied exclusively by a man. Immediately, he put out the light and crossed to the room on the opposite side of the hall. Dresses hanging in the wardrobe identified it as the one rented by the Konstants. He quickly searched the valises, the contents of the bureau, and the beds without discovering anything of an unusual nature. Returning to the wardrobe, he examined three suits of male clothing which were hanging in it. All pockets had been neatly emptied. One of the suits, however, was larger than the other two as if it had been made for a heavier man. On turning the inside coat pocket out, he found a cleaner’s identification mark in waterproof, purple ink. The name: Queresque. Cordial remembered the warning in Willy Berth’s letter: “Watch out for a Rumanian with a name starting ‘Quer—.’” Without waiting longer, he darkened the room, and left the hotel by the rear entrance. Willy Berth had been right.
About twenty minutes after Cordial had departed, the Konstants returned to their room. Instead of returning there immediately after dinner, as was their custom, they had strolled slowly around the town hoping for a glimpse of the Greek who had spoken to them. They had no way of identifying him, and didn’t know his name. But they hoped to catch sight of him, and perhaps establish some kind of contact with him. Senhora Konstant, upon entering the room, turned and said, “We had a visitor while we were gone.” Konstant looked at the floor where lay a tiny, tentlike folded piece of paper not much larger than a postage stamp. On leaving their room, they had carefully placed this piece of paper in such a position that it would be moved by the door if the latter were opened beyond a very limited area. The senhora removed the sewing basket and opened it; the spool of fine wire was still concealed in it. “The authorities were making a search tonight,” Senhora Konstant continued, “so it might’ve been they. The wire’s here, and I had the handbag with me.” She added, “Or… the police investigating Mauret’s death again.”
“Or Cordial… or Van Drooge… or Stick,” Konstant added.
Stick returned to the table where Van Drooge had been sitting all evening, keeping watch on the Nysa. “Where’d they go?” Van Drooge asked.
“It seems to me the Konstants were looking for something,” Stick told him. “They walked around the streets—peering about, you know—as if they’d never seen the town before. After strolling just about every place possible, they returned to the hotel.”
“Cordial came ashore for a while this evening,” Van Drooge reported. “He came to the taverna here, looked around and left.”
“Where’d he go?”
“I don’t know. Did he meet the Konstants?”
“No.”
“In less than fifteen minutes, he showed up again down at the pier and returned to the Nysa.”
“He’s aboard now?”
“Yes.” Van Drooge was interrupted by the appearance of Mikailis who limped into the room. He stood in obvious indecision, hesitating to approach the table with both men. Van Drooge, however, motioned to him to join them. When Mikailis had seated himself, Van Drooge asked, “Did you hire the boat?”
“Yes. We are lying just outside the harbor and up the coast about a kilometer. She is the Thetis, a pleasure yacht I rent in Corinth—forty-two feet, very fast. Good cabin, carry six peoples. Handle good in not too heavy sea.”
Stick had been listening closely. “Do you have anyone else on the boat to help you?”
“Sure. Okay. One man, he work with me before. Keep watch on engine.”
“Are you sure this boat you have is fast enough to catch that little one of Cordial’s?”
“Plenty fast enough,” Mikailis assured him. “In nice smooth baby pond, maybe not. At sea in night, little launch bob like cork. We overhaul very easy.”
Stick considered the situation for a few moments, then asked the captain, “You don’t think he’s going to try to cross the straits directly from Pelos in that launch, do you?”
“No,” Mikailis told him. “Too dangerous. Vanikiotes take him over in Nysa—Nysa good strong boat, very slow. Near shore, Nysa stand to, Cordial take little boat.”
“You’d have no trouble overtaking the Nysa—even if she had a good head start?”
