Passage by Night - Jack Higgins [26]
'There's nothing quite like it, is there? A small boat and the sea on a night like this. All one's real troubles suddenly seem unimportant.'
Her face was faintly illuminated by the compass light, the eyes dark shadows that somehow gave her a strange, mysterious quality that was quite unique.
'You're a funny girl,' he said. 'Nikoli Aleko told me you were at Vassar?'
She nodded. 'Until a few months ago. It was my father's idea. He'd been left a legacy. Like most Greeks, he believes there's nothing like an education so he decided to send me to the States. Only the best was good enough.'
'What did you intend to do?'
'I was supposed to go to Oxford this year. I was hoping to read law.'
'And now this.'
'My brother Yanni was drowned last year. When papa wrote to tell me, he said there was no point in my coming home. That it was all over and done with.'
'So you stayed?'
'There didn't seem any reason not to. In his letters, he said everything was fine.'
'And you finally came home and found out different?'
'Something like that.' She leaned forward, pressing her head against the window and stared out into the night. 'You wouldn't understand this, but I didn't find my father. I found an old, beaten man travelling fast downhill, and he's never seemed old to me before.' She sighed. 'He'd even had to borrow money on the boat to keep me at college. Apparently the legacy had run out even before Yanni died.'
'And he thought he could make ends meet by going back to diving?'
'For desperate men there are only desperate remedies.' She used almost the same words Aleko had used. 'Of course, there was always Mikali's solution.'
'You can't be serious?'
She shrugged. 'We are a stubborn people, we stick to the old ways. Arranged marriages are still common amongst us. It was my father who refused permission.'
'I should damn well think so.' Manning was conscious of a sudden irrational anger. 'There must be a better solution than that.'
'But there is,' she said, 'and you have offered it to us.'
There was nothing he could say and they sat there in silence and gradually, the rain stopped and dawn began to seep into the sky. Daylight came with a slight mist on the sea and a chill wind, but Manning hardly noticed.
Anna leaned back in the corner half asleep, all tiredness and strain wiped from her face. He sat there quietly watching her for a while and realized, with a sense of wonder, she was beautiful. It was as if he had never really seen her before.
She opened her eyes and looked at him and a smile appeared on her face.
'Good morning, Harry,' she said.
He smiled back, absurdly pleased she had used his first name. 'A long night.'
'I'd better get breakfast ready.' She picked up the tray, moved to the door and hesitated. 'This may be the last chance I have to speak to you on your own.'
He waited, his heart a stone inside him. 'Whatever happens in San Juan, you've given up hope. For that, I'll always be grateful.'
And then she was gone and he sat there watching the door swing to and fro, listening to her footsteps fade away along the deck. When he opened a window to let in the cold air, his hands were trembling.
10
Isle of Tears
San Juan slumbered in the noonday heat as they turned past the concrete pillbox on the point and moved into the narrow channel. On the far side, the cliffs lifted a hundred feet out of the water with an old Spanish fortress perched on top.
Papa Melos leaned out of the wheelhouse window and nodded towards it. 'They're using it as a prison for political offenders. I've heard some terrible stories about what goes on up there.'
'I can believe them.'
Manning looked up at the fortress. It was at least four hundred years old and the amenities had probably altered little since it was built. From the Inquisition to Castro.