The Angry Hills - Leon Uris [23]
EVERY MUSCLE IN MORRISON’S body tightened.
He stood over the prostrate body of Jack Mosley and stared down on it, wild-eyed.
A man stepped from behind a tree a few feet away. He was a little man, only five feet tall and he wore horn-rimmed glasses and there was a smoking pistol in his hand.
The little man stooped quickly and went through Mosley’s pockets. Then he rolled the body over to a small clump of underbrush. He picked up Mosley’s pistol and shoved it into Mike’s hand.
“Hide this under your belt,” he said.
Mike continued to stare at the body.
The little man shook Mike, then took him by the arm. “Come on, man,” he said, “we’ve got to get out of here.” Mike, still dazed, was half-dragged through the woods. They circled about and approached the troops on the beach. The men were stacking their rifles for confiscation.
Mike slumped down on the sand and shook his head.
“We are in luck,” the little man said. “No one heard the shot.”
Mike looked up to the little man standing over him. At this point he wouldn’t have trusted his own mother. The little man slipped down beside him and talked in half-whispers. Mike clamped his mouth shut.
“My name is Soutar. Major Howe-Wilken, may his soul rest in peace, was my partner.”
Mike tried to comprehend what Soutar was saying, but one strange thought kept running through his mind. He had been running away from this man, positive he was working with Jack Mosley. Perhaps he and Mosley had staged a fake death scene in the woods to deceive Mike. No, it couldn’t be. Mike saw the blood gush from Mosley’s mouth.
“Morrison, this is no time to play coy. We’ve got high plannin’ to do.”
Mike kept his silence.
“See that road there. In a few minutes German troops will be comin’ down it. They have a prison camp already staked out at Corinth.”
“All right, be quiet then. Hold your tongue. Konrad Heilser will find you in two days. See if you can stay quiet with him. Look, Morrison, the Germans have burned down over a hundred villages. They’ve been killin’ off civilians like flies. It’s going to be brutal when they find they’ve bagged a brigade of Palestine Jews.”
The man who called himself Soutar lit a cigarette. “Don’t be a fool. I’d’ve killed you along with Jack Mosley if I thought for a moment you weren’t the right sort. I heard what you said to Mosley.”
Maybe the pistol is full of blanks, Mike thought. It seemed futile to resist him. He knew his name, who he was. Anyhow, he was certainly done for one way or another if this Soutar was a German agent.
His heart pounded. He opened his lips, still uncertain. “All right,” Mike said. “I’m Morrison and I’m an American citizen. I’ve had it—I want out of this mess. I was sucked into it and I want out.”
“That,” Soutar said with an impish smile, “poses a bit of a problem. You may as well face up—you’re in this up to your neck.”
“Why?” Mike demanded. “Why?”
“Like it or not. You know, Morrison, sometimes we have little to say with the turns of our lives.”
Mike pawed at the sand, feeling more confidence in Soutar now. The little man was right—Mike knew it. There comes a time when a man is forced to say to himself, “This is the way things are—try to make the best of it.” He had to accept the fact once that Ellie was dead—that he’d never see her again. There are certain things that can’t be fought with mere will power.
“All right,” Mike whispered, “I’m in.”
As they sat and waited for the German round-up, little Soutar related his story in his thick Scottish burr.
When the German army invaded Greece and Yugoslavia, he and Major Howe-Wilken were sent to Athens to get the Stergiou list. From the moment they landed they knew that the enemy had got wind of their plans. This was later confirmed when Soutar discovered that Zervos, a government clerk, had suspected and sold the information to the Germans.
Soutar and Howe-Wilken avoided making contact with Stergiou. They arranged, instead, to have the list passed to Morrison. Then they made their move as a cover to exclude Morrison from any suspicion.
Howe-Wilken went to Stergiou’s home and Soutar