“That can’t be genuine and still in one piece.”
“It came from a tomb under the Temple of Apollo on Rhodes. The Greek government were excavating there just before the war.” Van Horn grinned. “By rights it should be in Athens, but I came to an arrangement with the rather underpaid young government official who found it.”
“It’s one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen,” Lomax said.
“The handiwork of man, that’s what still gives me hope, though what to make of some of the stuff they were churning out during the twenties and thirties and calling art, I’ll never know.”
“On the other hand, some of these are hardly representational.” Lomax indicated a case containing several early Cretan figurines, mostly crude images of the Earth Mother.
Van Horn chuckled. “You’ve got a point there.’.
He put out the light and they went back along the corridor to the hall. As they went upstairs, he said, “I know we haven’t got much time, but with luck we should be able to have a long talk in the morning. I expect you could use some sleep now.”
He said good-night and Lomax went along to his own room and lay on the bed, listening to Boyd’s easy breathing, and went over the night’s events.
He kept thinking about Katina Pavlo, remembering how pale and tired she’d looked when he had last seen her. His last conscious thought was of her face glowing in the darkness and the strange thing was that she. was smiling at him.
“The Little Ship”
It was just after noon on the following day when Katina turned the cart into the main square of Kyros and the Nazi flag hung like a limp rag in the great heat.
Lomax sat beside her, his back against the load of firewood they carried, one foot on a shaft, the other swinging idly.
In the old reefer jacket, broken boots and shabby tweed cap she had brought him, he looked like a typical peasant from one of the mountain farms.
Katina had a scarf round her head peasant-fashion and wore a faded print dress with no sleeves that made her arms look very thin. She’d hardly spoken since leaving Van Horn’s villa, but her eyes were clear and there was a freshness to her face that indicated that she had slept well.
She reined in the mare as a squad of soldiers in field grey cut across their path and Lomax eyed them with professional interest.
“Old men and boys,” he said as they started forward again. “They’ve been draining Greece and the islands of their best troops for months now. At least it proves who’s winning the war.”
As they turned on to the waterfront, he leaned forward to get a view of the harbour. The brightly painted caicques were all drawn up on the strip of beach and fishermen sat in the shade of the stone wall and mended their nets.
An E-boat moved out to sea, churning the water at its stern into a white froth, sending waves rippling across the surface of the harbour.
Several more were moored to the pier, their crews busy on deck, stripped to the waist in the hot sun, cleaning and polishing.
“Are there always as many E-boats in the harbour?” Lomax said.
She nodded. “There are as many as you see here out on patrol.”
She turned the mare into a narrow side street on the corner of which stood The Little Ship and Lomax dropped to the ground and went and opened the double gates that gave access to the yard at the rear of the building.
He pulled a small military pack from under the firewood and they went inside and moved along the whitewashed corridor. He could hear the murmur of voices, a glass clinked and someone started to play a gay tune on a bouzouki. There was a bead curtain at the end of the corridor beside a flight of stairs and Katina motioned Mm to stay and went through.
He peered through the curtain into the bar. It was a cool, pleasant room with whitewashed walls and a vaulted roof like a wine cellar. It was crowded with fishermen. There didn’t seem to be a single German soldier in the place.