“Trouble?” he said.
Lomax nodded. “German patrol. One man on a motor cycle.”
Joe Boyd pulled a gun from the soft leaather holster that hung beneath his left armpit under his shirt. It was a Mauser automatic with an SS bulbous silencer, a weapon much favoured by German counter-intelligence agents, souvenir of an earlier affair hi Crete.
“Don’t be a fool,” Lomax said. “If we kill him they’ll turn the island upside down. It would ruin everything.
“Captain Lomax is right,” Katina said. “You must collect your things and go into the loft. When he arrives, I’ll tell him I was just leaving.”
There was no time to argue. They moved into the living room and Boyd mounted the ladder to the loft and opened the trapdoor. Lomax and Alexias quickly passed the packs and the rest of their equipment up to him and Katina put the remnants of the supper and the dirty crockery into a cupboard in the corner.
She extinguished the lamp, moved across to the kitchen door and turned to see if they were ready as the motor cycle roared into the yard outside. Lomax nodded briefly and went up the ladder to join Boyd and Alexias in the warm darkness.
Boyd lowered the trapdoor, jamming it open slightly with a piece of wood. Through the crack it was possible to see a little of the room below. A corner of the fireplace, most of the table and a chair beside it, but not the door.
They waited and Lomax thought about the girl, remembering her face as he had last seen it, very white, but strangely calm, and then they heard voices and the door opened. A moment later and the German moved into view.
He was almost as big a man as Alexias and the knee-length black leather jacket which covered his grey uniform was coated with white dust. He took off his hehnet and gauntlets, dropping them on the table, and took out a cigarette. Without the hehnet he looked younger and he ran a hand over his short blond hair and called to Katina in bad Greek.
Lomax couldn’t hear what was said, but after a moment, Alexias leaned close and whispered, “She is making coffee. I can smell it.”
The German got to his feet and disappeared from view, obviously going to lean in the kitchen doorway. A few moments later he returned to the table and sat down and Katina came into view carrying a tray.
As she reached for the coffee pot, the German grabbed her wrist and pulled her round. She tried to get away, making no sound, but he was. too strong for her. He laughed once and Lomax closed his eyes and brushed sweat from his forehead.
When he opened them again, she was half across the table, the German sprawled on top of her, his hands moving over the young body.
Her face was bone-white and she seemed to look straight into Lomax’s eyes. He felt his throat go dry and clenched his right hand and then she cried out sharply.
Before he could move, Alexias growled like an animal, sent the trapdoor back with a crash and scrambled through the opening. As he dropped, his right foot slipped between two rungs and he lost his balance and fell heavily to the floor.
The German turned hi alarm. For a moment he stared down at Alexias hi horrified surprise and then he pushed Katina away from him.
Lomax dropped through the opening and moved in fast. The German hastily unbuttoned the flap of his holster, but he was too late. As he drew his pistol, Lomax grabbed his wrist, pushing the weapon to one side, and raised his knee into the man’s crotch.
The German grunted with pain, his head coming forward, and Lomax struck him sharply against the jaw with his right elbow, snapping the bone. The German screamed, his head going back as he fell against the table, and Lomax slashed him across the throat with the edge of his hand. The table went over with a crash and the German rolled on to his-, face.
Katina was already on her knees beside her uncle and Boyd was half-way down the ladder, his Mauser ready in his hand. He slipped it back into his holster and helped her raise Alexias into a sitting position.