The Angry Hills - Leon Uris [27]
Part 2
ONE
THE PHONE RANG. KONRAD Heilser grunted, rolled over and fumbled for the lamp on the night stand. He pulled the receiver to his ear and dropped back on the pillow.
“This is Zervos,” a voice said. “Forgive me for disturbing you, Herr Oberst, at this hour. I only this minute returned to Athens.”
“Where are you?” Heilser mumbled, still half-asleep.
“Headquarters.”
“Come up to my hotel at once!” He hung up rudely.
The naked woman next to Heilser cuddled up and groaned. He threw off the blanket and got out of bed. The girl’s eyes opened.
“Where are you going, darling?”
“Business. Go to sleep.”
She propped herself against the headboard and reached for the box of candy on the night stand. She pouted a bit to show her disappointment at his leaving. Deceitful little fool, Heilser thought, as he walked to the closet and took out a robe. The girl stretched her naked body sensuously to attract his attention but forgot to stop chewing the chocolate.
Lovely to look at, the little bitch, but she was becoming quite dull. Completely without imagination, she had no new tricks to hold him. He’d get rid of her next week and find another woman. One more on his intellectual level. One not so obviously greedy for the comforts he could offer. He walked toward the bathroom. The woman snuggled down beneath the sheet.
“Come kiss me, darling,” she invited.
“Go to sleep.”
The German splashed some water on his face and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. He applied some lotion to his hair and stared into the mirror for a long time. The usual look of self-admiration was gone. Zervos, the Greek pig, would be coming up with more bad news. Of that, Heilser was certain.
Zervos had botched the job miserably. First, he had allowed the old attorney, Stergiou, to commit suicide and so take the secret of the list to his grave. Second, Soutar had escaped. Third, the American, Morrison, had upset everything.
That damned American! There was nothing worse to contend with in this business than a desperate amateur. All the pieces fit together now. The American was used by Howe-Wilken and Soutar as a last-ditch measure. Already Heilser’s office had been bombarded by a dozen inquires on Morrison’s whereabouts.
Heilser had told the American Embassy quite truthfully that he wished he knew where Morrison was and that he was looking for Morrison day and night. He did not, however, mention what would happen when he found Morrison. The Embassy even went so far as to oblige Heilser with two pictures of the American. One from a dust jacket of a book, another from a passport.
Unfortunately one could not identify his own mother from such photos.
The trained agent takes certain paths, certain risks. The trained agent puts his mission above his life. Not so the desperate amateur. He will be unorthodox, develop the cunning of a wild animal to keep alive.
Heilser reconstructed the chain of events. First Mosley’s call from Kalámai informing him that Morrison had not escaped from Greece and had been located in the B.E.F. After the call Heilser and Zervos had dashed to Corinth to await Morrison. Morrison had never showed up. Then, Mosley’s body was discovered near the beach at Kalámai and Heilser knew the desperate amateur had won a round.
Next, Soutar’s body was found near the rail bed outside Nauplion. Heilser had questioned every prisoner and guard who rode the train. Working sixty hours without sleep, Heilser was able to establish the fact that Morrison had been on the train with Soutar and that they had tried to escape a few moments apart. Soutar had failed, Morrison had succeeded.
Here the trail ended.
A strange, unaccountable disappearance. Zervos had been sent to Nauplion with a team of men to question everyone there and in the nearby villages.
Heilser threw down the hair brush in disgust. He knew the price of failure to turn up the Stergiou list. He knew the work involved in trying to locate a desperate amateur.
Zervos stood in the drawing room with his hat in his hand. His envious eyes moved around the luxurious suite and stopped at the