Then, still hitting him, she switched to English. She used just the same abusive tone as before, so that she seemed to be cursing him in his own language. But what she said was: 'Listen to me. These men... are enemies.' Slap! 'We must get away. I'll take the fat one. You take' - slap! - 'the other. Then... follow me.'
She stopped, moved laughing towards the plump man, cracked her knee into his crotch and drove her stiffened fingers at his eyes. He squealed thinly. Without conscious thought Bond went for the other man, who had involuntarily half-turned, and chopped him cruelly at the side of the neck. The plump man was doubled up with his hands over his face. Bond brought his joined fists down on the base of the squat skull, grabbed Ariadne and ran.
Straight along the empty, shadowed colonnade to the western end, off the marble pavement on to the ground, uneven and awkward with its tussocks of slippery grass, past a pair of willowy youths with Germany written all over them, towards the entrance.... But Ariadne pulled him away to the left. Yes - danger of more men at the main gate. But was there another way out? He couldn't remember. Where were they going? No questions: he had instinctively chosen to stick to the girl and must continue to. Covering distance without falling took enough attention. He ran on.
Now a shout from behind them; another couple of astonished faces; the edge of a cliff too high to jump from, too sheer to clamber down in a hurry. But a stretch of wall joins the cliff at an angle, and in the angle a bunch of thick electric cables runs down. Down, then, down a face of irregular, almost vertical rock hanging on to the cables, the girl following. A gentler slope close to the wall, a final slither down more wall, helped by a single cable running horizontally. Run together across bumpy rock and earth - a yard away a jet of earth springing into the air. No report: silencer. Above them the sounds of scrambling and cursing. Now another drop, off the roof of some hut built into the hillside, a curving, descending path, a metal fence, and people ahead and below, hundreds of people. Easy to get over the fence, help the girl over, and join them.
At Bond's side, Ariadne laughed shakily. 'Theatre of Herodes Atticus. Performance ending. In all senses, I hope.'
Bond's glance was full of admiration. Whatever her motives might be, the girl had shown herself to be speedy, resourceful and determined: a valuable ally indeed. He said easily, 'It was clever of you to know about that alternative exit.'
'Oh, we plan carefully. I could draw a map of the Acropolis blindfold.'
'Who are 'we'?'
'Maybe I'll tell you later. Right now it's your job to push us through this crowd, get us out to the street and grab the first taxi, by force if necessary. Show me how rough and rude and un-English you can be.'
The next few minutes were a hell of struggling and shoving. Bond felt the sweat running down his chest and back. The departing audience were cheerful, talkative, in no hurry, not in a mood to resent being jostled, not heeding it much either. Twice the two of them were separated, but at last reached the street together. There was a brief scuffle by a taxi, Ariadne keeping up a stream of indignant Greek about the airport and her husband's sick father, and they were in and driving off.
Ariadne lolled against Bond's shoulder, trembling violently, and her lips shook as she kissed his cheek. He put his arm round her shoulders and drew her close. She had fully earned her moment of reaction, of temporary collapse after the extreme and varied time of stress she had just gone through.. He murmured softly to her.
'I'm sorry I spat at you,' she whispered jerkily, brushing her cheek with her hand. 'But I thought I had to do it. And then all those mean things I said. I kept hoping you weren't understanding. And you can't think I meant- '
'You were brilliant, absolutely brilliant. I don't know anybody who could have made a plan as fast as that and then carried it out so skilfully. You made fools of the pair of them. But now... I've got to ask you some questions. Haven't I?'
Her face was against his shoulder and he felt her nod.
'You were to decoy me to the Acropolis where I was to be picked up by two of your men. Correct?'
She began in a muffled voice: 'But I didn't want to- '
'We'll save that for now. Well, when the men appeared you realized they were the wrong men. How?'
Ariadne swallowed and pulled herself upright. 'We... there was to be a recognition signal just before they moved in. A thing with a handkerchief. They didn't give it. So I told them I was informed Legakis and Papadogonas were going to do the job. Then the guy said they'd been called away to another assignment. But as far as I know there's nobody named Legakis or Papadogonas who's working for us. So then I just gambled that they won't know enough English. And here we are. Can I have a cigarette?'
'Of course.'
Bond gave her a Xanthi, the pungent Macedonian blend he always smoked in Greece, lit one himself and inhaled deeply. He felt charged-up, almost exhilarated. Whatever lay immediately ahead the expected gloomy pattern of abduction and captivity had been broken. He was still free and the initiative was not all on the other side - or sides.
'Ariadne, who are you working for? You said you'd tell me.'
When she spoke she was herself again, quick and assured. 'I said maybe. It's still maybe. For the moment I can't tell you anything. And there's so much I don't know myself. Who were those men? It's frightening. The whole situation must have changed in the last few hours. It could be it isn't you we want after all. I don't see how it can be, now that this...'
She was thinking aloud, but her voice died away before she had done much more than express confusion. By now Bond had arrived at his own views about the scene on the Acropolis. For the moment he must follow through and put what faith he could in the midget transmitter in his shoe and the efficiency of Thomas's men. He said dryly, 'Where are you taking me?'
'To see my chief. He must talk with you. Obviously I can't force you to come with me. You can stop the driver now and get out and walk away. But please don't. We have to talk. Can you trust me?'
'Trust doesn't enter into it. I've got to come with you.'
'I don't understand that. Like most things about this.' Ariadne turned and gripped his hands. 'But I do have one reason for feeling happy. Oh, not happy, but less miserable than a quarter of an hour ago, when I thought I'd
