Till both thy eyes fall out.

they might let you have some ouzo. But some of us can get ouzo and the best Hocks and the best Moselles." The soldier wrinkled his face in disgust. Like almost every fighting man he despised Quislings, even when they were on his side: in Greece they were very few indeed. "I asked you a question," he said coldly. "What vessel, and where bound?" "The caique Aigion," Mallory replied loftily. "In ballast, for Samoa. Under orders," he said significantly. "Whose orders?" the soldier demanded. Shrewdly Mallory judged the confidence as superficial only. The guard was impressed in spite of himself. "Herr Commandant in Vathy. General Graebel," Mallory said softly. "You will have heard of the Herr General before, yes?" He was on safe ground here, Mallory knew. The reputation of Graebel, both as a paratroop commander and an iron disciplinarian, had spread far beyond these islands. Even in the half-light Mallory could have sworn that the guard's complexion turned paler. But he was dogged enough. "You have papers? Letters of authority?" Mallory sighed wearily, looked over his shoulder. "Andrea!" he bawled. "What do you want?" Andrea's great bulk loomed through the hatchway. He had heard every word that passed, had taken his cue from Mallory: a newlyopened wine bottle was almost engulfed in one vast hand and he was scowling hugely. "Can't you see I'm busy?" he asked surlily. He stopped short at the sight of the German and scowled again, irritably. "And what does this haifling want?" "Our passes and letters of authority from Herr General. They're down below." Andrea disappeared, grumbling deep in his throat. A rope was thrown ashore, the stern pulled in against the sluggish current and the papers passed over. The papersa set different from those to be used if emergency arose in Navaroneproved to be satisfactory, eminently so. Mallory would have been surprised had they been anything else. The preparation of these, even down to the photostatic facsimile of General Graebel's signature, was all in the day's work for Jensen's bureau in Cairo. The soldier folded the papers, handed them back with a muttered word of thanks. He was only a kid, Mallory could see nowif he was more than nineteen, his looks belied him. A pleasant, open-faced kidof a different stamp altogether from the young fanatics camera canon digital powershot sd800 of the S.S. Panzer Divisionand far too thin. Mallory's chief reaction was one of relief: he would have hated to have to kill a boy like this. But he had to find out all he could. He signalled to Stevens to hand him up the almost empty crate of Moselle. Jensen, he mused, had been very thorough indeed: the man had literally thought of everything. . . . Mallory gestured lazily in the direction of the old watch-tower. "How many of you are up there?" he asked. The boy was instantly suspicious. His face had tightened up, stified in hostile surmise. "Why do you want to know?" he asked stiffly. Mallory groaned, lifted his hands in despair, turned sadly to Andrea. "You see what it is to be one of them?" he asked in mournful complaint. "Trust nobody. Think everyone is as twisted as. . . ." He broke off hurriedly, turned to the soldier again. "It's just that we don't want to have the same trouble every time we come in here," he explained. "We'll be back in Samos in a couple of days, and we've still another case of Moselle to work through. General Graebel keeps hisahspecial envoys well supplied. . . . It must be thirsty work up there in the sun. Come on, now, a bottle each. How many bottles?" The reassuring mention that they would be back again, the equally reassuring mention of Graebel's name, plus, probably, the attraction of the offer and his comrades' reaction if he told them he had refused it, tipped the balance, overcame scruples and suspicions. "There are only three of us," he said grudgingly. "Three it is," Mallory said cheerfully. "We'll bring you some Hock next time we return." He tilted his own bottle. "Prosit!" he said, an islander proud of airing his German, and then, more proudly still, "Auf Wiedersehen!" The boy murmured something in return. He stood hesitating for a moment, slightly shame-faced, then wheeled abruptly, walked off slowly along the river bank, clutching his bottles of Moselle. "So!" Mallory said thoughtfully. "There are only three of them. That should make things easier" "Well done, sir!" It was Stevens who interrupted, his voice warm, his face alive with admiration. "Jolly good show!" "Jolly good show!" Miller mimicked. He heaved his lanky length over the coaming of the engine hatchway. "'Good' be