Authors: Leon Uris
“And do you agree with them, Dr. Thackery?”
The bony-faced man remained silent for many moments. “I do not choose sides,” he finally said. “It is not my affair. We know that the British will establish a mission here when they receive the Stergiou list. It means that we must organize and act on information about arms shipments, train schedules, troop movements, submarines... It means the British will ship in arms to help us carry out missions. We know, too, that the Germans will destroy villages and cities and kill your citizens for every act we commit against them. What is our gain? If we become strong—if we can place enough pressure on the Germans, they will be forced to keep their troops here and will not be able to release them for fighting on the main fronts. Neither you nor I can stop the Greek people from striking back. Truly, Papa-Panos, the hills are angry.”
The priest sighed. He knew these men spoke the truth. Greece was destined for a blood bath that would make all the ancient tragedies trivial by comparison. He nodded his head slowly. “Very well, we will spare no expense in finding the American and getting him out of the country.”
Then the four of them turned to Lisa. Her lips were white. She arose slowly and spoke. “Before you make a decision, there is more I must tell you now.”
In slow, deliberate words, Lisa unfolded her story beginning with the day that the Gestapo had picked her up and taken her to Konrad Heilser. The four men looked shocked. Then she told of the weeks of terror and ended her story at the point where Morrison had dashed from the apartment at Satovriandou, 125.
She asked no mercy. The men sat in horrified silence. Lisa walked straight and proud to the door. “I shall wait in the next room,” she said.
She felt as though life itself was gone now. What did it matter? She had lost her children and she had lost him. At least she had purged herself....
Through the paper-thin walls she heard Michalis pound his fist on the table.
“Lisa Kyriakides is a traitor to the Greek people!”
Thanassis shook his head in disbelief. His studious appearance belied the fact that he was one of the most daring men in the movement. “Lisa—I can’t believe it—I can’t believe it. I have known her since she was a girl of sixteen. She was a student of mine at the university. I brought her in to our organization....”
“I too have known her and her family for many years,” Michalis said. “We cannot let sentimentality rule us.” He spoke as one who had lived a life of iron-clad discipline. He felt no sympathy for those who failed to perform their duty. He had dealt too long with too many of those who played both sides.
“It seems we have no choice,” Thanassis said. “But I will not be the man to pull the trigger.”,
Thackery said nothing. This was not his matter.
“If she was a traitor, would she have told us her story?” Papa-Panos said.
“Do not be taken in by female tricks, Father. She is a marked woman. She came to us first in hopes we would be more merciful than the Germans. If we are to maintain discipline in this organization we have no choice.”
“And by her execution we place ourselves on the same level with the Nazis....”
“And what do you propose we do? Pray, perhaps, to get her to repent?”
“Quiet! I have heard enough of your ranting for one day, Michalis. Lisa is no more a traitor than I am. Do we not already have enough killing? Remember, she is the daughter of Ioannis Rodites, a martyr of the Greek people. Is your memory so short you cannot remember the first man in Athens to recognize your union without bloodshed?”
“Do not dishonor the name of Ioannis Rodites,” Michalis shot back. “What of her sister, Maria Rodites, a whore for a German officer? What of her husband, Manolis Kyriakides, a filthy collaborator?” He spat on the floor.
“Hasn’t this woman had enough sorrow to bear? Surely, Michalis, you must realize that if she had treason in her heart she could have become the mistress of Konrad Heilser. She could have the wealth of Athens at her feet. You seem to forget she only did this to protect the lives of her two sons.”
“I am the father of a son also,” Michalis said. “I speak to you as a man who loves him as I love life itself. I would rather see him in his grave than see his father become a collaborator.”
“Yes, Michalis,” Papa-Panos answered. “Perhaps you would see your son in his grave. But tell me something, would your wife?”
TWO
T
HE
A
RKADIA
WAS NEITHER
fast nor trim. She was an out-sized mud scow and Mike wondered if she was seaworthy.
“Go below,” Antonis said in his longest speech of the day.
The cabin held four bunks, a galley and a head. Mike stretched out and could see up the ladder topside where Antonis stood by the rail, puffing away on his pipe and looking alternately from water to sky.
Although riddled with anxiety, Mike began to feel a certain security. So far, Julius Chesney had delivered. One thought comforted him. Somehow, Chesney knew his true identity and he knew of the Stergiou list. Perhaps Chesney was overdramatizing his love of drachmas, for Mike knew that his capture by the Germans would have brought Chesney ten times the passage money. Mike also felt an instinctive trust in the silent skipper, Antonis. Mike began to relax.
After standing motionless for an hour at the rail, Antonis poked his head into the cabin, his pipe, as weatherbeaten as his face, firmly clenched in his teeth. “I go for the clearance papers.”
It had all gone smoothly, Mike thought, almost too smoothly. At the dock gates of Piraeus there had not been so much as a raised eyebrow from the guards when Mike had passed through with Antonis. Mike credited Julius Chesney with knowing his business.
He did, however, underestimate the man’s love of drachmas. In a half hour, Antonis returned to the boat with two men and a girl.
In the cabin, a bull of a man, an Australian named Ben Masterton, introduced himself. The other man was a sallow-faced lad of about twenty, a Palestinian named Yichiel. At Yichiel’s side stood a frightened girl, his wife, Elpis, who said she was going to join the free Greek forces in Egypt.
Mike was going to protest to Antonis about the extra passage money. He had been bilked, but he decided to do nothing. He was thankful he’d have someone other than Antonis to talk to during the voyage. Then, the other three would serve as a good covering force—safety in numbers—and give the trip the air of being a routine escape.
The Greek police went through the motions of an inspection, stamped the clearance papers and the
Arkadia
chugged away from the dock. Chesney had apparently oiled their palms well. Mike became uneasy about the slickness of the operation. It just couldn’t be this easy, he thought.
The sea air was chilly.
Young Yichiel and his bride went to the cabin and huddled close on a single bunk and began to whisper softly.
Mike envied him. How he envied him!
The hills of Athens grew smaller and smaller. Somewhere in Athens there was a garret apartment... Only last night, he and Lisa ... Mike was sinking into a state of moroseness.
The
Arkadia
cleared the harbor area. Antonis stopped the engine and dropped anchor.
“What in ’ell’s comin’ off?” Ben Masterton demanded.
“We stay till dawn. German orders. British submarines. If we move, a patrol boat will stop us.”
“Well, I don’t like it.”
“Do not tell me my business,” Antonis said, ending the discussion.
They waited out the hours at anchor. Mike never took his eyes from the hills of Athens. He was overwhelmed with sadness.
Darkness fell.
Yichiel and Elpis slept locked in each other’s arms in the cabin below. Antonis stood at the rail, looking from water to sky.
Ben Masterton sat aft on the deck near Mike, his back against the rail. He began to sing softly.
The Australian bull fancied himself a concert singer. He sang his way through all of the old numbers of the baritone repertoire with most of the time-worn hammed-up gestures of a baritone. His left hand caressed his beard and his right arm swept the air.
Mike liked Masterton. Earlier the Australian had told him of his four previous attempts to escape, only to get so drunk that he tried to whip the entire German Army.
“Hey, Linden,” Masterton whispered, sliding close to Mike.
“Yes?”
“Look. I don’t make it a habit of drinkin’ with New Zealanders, but I likes the cut of you.” Ben pulled a bottle from his jacket.
“Brandy—just what the doctor ordered.”
“Shhhh, not so loud, you bloomin’ fool. Well be splittin’ it five ways when there ain’t rightly enough for the two of us.”
Mike took a long swig and tried to burn the hurt out of himself. Ben yanked the bottle from Mike’s lips and drank, matching Mike’s swig.
The level of the bottle moved downward quickly.
Ben scratched his head, looked at the empty bottle and flipped it over the rail. “You goddamn Kiwi,” he said. “I shoulda knowd better’n to drink with a goddamn Kiwi....”
“Aw, shaddup, ’less you wanna take a bath, Masterton....”
“I likes the cut of you, Linden.” Ben’s powerful arm went around Mike’s shoulders. “Tell you what... I likes you so much I’m gonna let you sing a duet wiff me—that’s how much I likes you. Too bad you wasn’t wiff me when I whipped fourteen of them spaghetti eaters—fourteen of ’em, see.... Mos’ fun I ever had... what’ll we sing, matey?”
“Don’ feel like singing, Ben.... Don’ feel like singing. There’s a broad in Athens—goddamn broad in a goddamn ’partment and I want that broad...”
“Aw, come now, matey—don’ cry—don’ cry...”
“Can’t hep it... What that goddamn broad...”
“Le’s sing London Dairy Air—les you got a version to a good English song...”
“Thatsa tenor song, you ignorant slob.”
“Linden! I can sing anything—’cluding souprano.”
Soft grunts came from the cabin. Ben got on all fours and began crawling toward it. Mike grabbed him by the belt and dragged him back. “Leave ’em alone, you bastard....”
“Goddamit, Linden, thatsa last time I drink with a Kiwi—very last time....”
They put their arms around each other’s shoulders and blended in dubious harmony.
Antonis held his pose by the fore rail.
The noise in the cabin subsided.
The
Arkadia
heaved gently under a swell.
Suddenly Antonis took his foot from the rail and stood tense, as if listening. Mike poked Ben in the ribs and they both stared hard through their alcoholic haze.
The distant sound of a motor reached their ears.
Mike and Ben stumbled to their feet and went fore beside Antonis.
“Let’s get this pisspot moving,” Masterton said.
“Hold still,” Antonis ordered. “They may turn away.”
Mike felt his guts turn over. A minute passed, and the motor seemed to fade away. Suddenly it became louder and louder.
“I say let’s get underway!” Masterton roared with the sweat pouring down his face.
The boat was coming close now. They could see its outline about four hundred yards to the starboard side.
Yichiel and Elpis scrambled topside, bug-eyed in terror. The girl buried her head in the boy’s chest.
A siren shrieked.
A flash of light streaked across the water. It settled on the
Arkadia
and caught the five of them in its beam. The motor roared in louder.
“Arkadia!”
a voice boomed in the darkness, “stand by to be boarded!”
THREE
A
SEMI-CIRCLE OF
German soldiers at fixed bayonets waited on the dock as the patrol boat eased in. Mike was stupefied with fear. A wave of nausea swept through him as he set foot on the pier. He closed his eyes dizzily. Ben’s strong hand gripped his shoulder. A caged truck drove up. The five were thrown in. A convoy of armed cars escorted the truck. Sirens cleared a path and the convoy sped from the docks onto the highway toward Athens.
Fool—fool—fool—fool! Madness to do business with Julius Chesney! Madness to fall in love!
Elpis sobbed in the arms of her sallow-faced Palestinian, Yichiel. But Antonis showed no anxiety. He puffed his pipe complacently and stared through the barred door at the rear of the truck.
Ben started to mumble to himself. “I got myself drunk last night.... I must have shot off my mouth....”
The convoy arrived at the outskirts of Athens.
“Where will they take us?” Mike whispered hoarsely.
“Averof Prison,” Ben said. “Get a hold on yourself, matey, they’re all bluff....”
The five captives were taken to a room with walls and floors of stone. Arrayed about them were two dozen brown-shirted Nazis armed with pistols and clubs.
Behind a desk sat Colonel Oberg, the Commandant of Averof Prison. He had a classic Prussian face, complete with monocle. Oberg was annoyed that the
Arkadia
gang had been hauled in at such an ungodly hour. It had interrupted the orgy with the yawning mistress who sat on the edge of his desk.
His cold eyes took them in one by one. He stopped at Ben Masterton. “You again, Masterton?”
“Just can’t stay away from home, Colonel.”
“Quiet! No buffoonery,” Oberg snapped. He turned to the clerk at the small desk near his own. “Charge Masterton with espionage and sabotage.”
“’ere we go again...”
“Lock him up.”
Four massive Nazis surrounded Masterton and marched him off. “See you later, matey,” he called. “Remember, they’re all bluff....”
The heavy door banged shut after Ben.
The room became quiet.
Oberg slapped his riding crop into an open palm and rocked back and forth in his swivel chair. “I hear we have a Jew here. Step forward, Jew.”
No movement from the four.
“Step forward, Jew, I say!”
Yichiel released Elpis and moved to the desk. Oberg continued rocking in his chair.
“What is your name, Jew?”
“I am a British soldier.”
The rocking stopped. Oberg arose slowly and walked around the desk. He faced Yichiel. The Palestinian returned his cold Prussian stare. He lifted the riding crop under the boy’s nose.