Solo - Jack Higgins [66]
He emerged, as he'd expected, by a public taxi rank and got into the one at the head of the queue. 'The Piraeus,' he told the driver. 'I've got to catch the Flying Dolphin for Hydra at six-thirty.'
'That's cutting it too fine, mister,' the driver said. 'I don't think we can make it.'
'Five hundred drachmas says we can,' Asa Morgan told him. He reached for the handstrap as the driver grinned, gunned his motor and shot out into the stream of traffic.
11
At Heathrow, it was just three-thirty as Katherine Riley hurried up to the British Airways check-in desk followed by a porter with her luggage.
The young clerk examined her ticket. 'Sorry, madam, they're boarding now. Too late to pass you through. Would you like me to see if I can put you on our seven o'clock flight?'
'Yes,' she said. 'Please do. I must get to Athens tonight.'
He checked and came back. 'Yes, we can do that for you. You get in rather late, I'm afraid. Half an hour past midnight, Greek time.'
'That doesn't matter,' she said. 'I'm going on to the islands. It means I'll get an early start in the morning.'
'Fine, madam. Now if I could have your baggage, I'll check it through for you.'
It was Ferguson who phoned Baker this time, with the bad news from Athens.
'I've just had Rourke on the line. Asa gave him the slip, and rather easily, from the sound of it.'
'Jesus Christ,' Baker said, for once totally unable to contain himself. 'Where in the hell do you find these idiots?'
'A special dispensation from the Almighty, Superintendent. Who are we poor mortals to question his ways?'
'So - what do we do now, sir?'
'Like Mr Micawber, sit tight and hope for something to turn up,' Ferguson said and put down the phone.
Morgan made it to the hydrofoil quay at the Piraeus with ten minutes to spare. It wasn't particularly crowded and he paid for his ticket on board and found a seat by the window.
It was a calm evening and the Flying Dolphin was able to operate at maximum speed, straining high out of the water on her stilt-like legs. And the scenery was spectacular enough. Salamis with the blue waters of the Saronic Gulf, the great bulk of the islands of Aegina and Paros, glowing with brilliant colours in the evening light.
None of it meant anything to Morgan, even when he went out to the well deck and leaned on the rail, staring blindly into space, thinking of only one thing. John Mikali. And when they met, what then? He had no weapon. Impossible to risk being caught trying to bring one in by the security checks at the airport. There was always his hands, of course. It wouldn't be the first time. When he looked down at them, they trembled slightly.
Finally, there was Hydra, bare and austere in the evening light like some great stone basilisk, curiously disappointing until the Flying Dolphin moved into harbour and the enchantment of Hydra town itself was revealed.
The houses rose in tiers, back into the hills, reached by a network of twisting cobbled alleys. The evening was just getting going, cheerful crowds moving into the tavernas.
Morgan took a seat at one of the open air tables close to the Monastery of the Dormiton on the waterfront. The waiter who came spoke fair English so Morgan kept his Greek to himself and ordered a beer.
'You American?' the waiter asked.
'No, Welsh.'
'I've never been to Wales. London, yes. I worked in a restaurant on the King's Road, Chelsea, for one year.'
'And that was enough?'
'Too cold,' the waiter smiled. 'Nice here in the season. Nice and warm.' He kissed his fingers. 'Plenty of girls. Lots of tourists. You here for a holiday, eh?'
'No,' Morgan said. 'I'm a journalist. Hoping to interview John Mikali, the concert pianist. He has a villa here, I understand?'
'Sure, down the coast beyond Molos.'
'How do I get there?' Morgan asked. 'Is there a local bus?'
The waiter smiled. 'No cars or trucks on Hydra. It's against the law. The only way you get anywhere is on a mule or your own two feet. A mule is better. In the interior of the island, it's rough, mountainous country and the people