Indiana Jones & the Peril at Delphi

the train must have been Farnsworth. He glanced toward the doorway again. The boots were no longer visible, and the arguing was more distant now. He listened as Conrad continued.

That night, Conrad had gone to the Jungle and started drinking. He'd just ordered his third scotch when Shannon recognized him as a professor from his alma mater. It didn't take long for Conrad to discover that Shannon had

been Indy's college roommate, and that he also had talked to Indy before he'd left for Greece.

'When I told Jack what I'd found out, he knew you were in trouble, and he wanted to help.'

Indy couldn't contain himself any longer. 'What did Farnsworth tell you?'

Conrad frowned. 'I had a photograph with me when I arrived. I must have misplaced it. Anyhow, it's—'

'Wait a minute.' Indy reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the photo Nikos had given him. It was crumpled now, and he did his best to flatten it out. 'You mean this one?'

'That's it,' Conrad said excitedly.

'Keep it down.' Now Shannon was taking charge of the noise level.

They all glanced anxiously toward the doorway, and listened. The guards were still talking, but in more restrained tones.

Indy held up the photo. 'So who is he?'

'His name is Richard Farnsworth, Gerald's younger brother and a former archaeology graduate student at the University of Athens where Belecamus used to teach. He disappeared two years ago. No trace of him was ever found.

'So Gerald Farnsworth started searching for his broth er,' Conrad continued. 'He found out that Richard and Dorian Belecamus had been lovers, but that she also was involved with Mandraki. It just so happened that the weekend Richard disappeared the colonel was seen with Belecamus.'

A chill ran through Indy. Although Conrad was still talking, the words sounded as though they were being spoken underwater. Long vowels, short consonants, like a voice played on seventy-eight rpm. He rubbed his ear against his shoulder and tried to clear his head.

'Gerald Farnsworth also found out about another gradu-

ate student of hers who was found shot to death in his apartment just a year earlier. He had also been her lover, and there were suspicions about her, but no one was ever charged in the murder. Then, shortly after Farnsworth disappeared, she resigned from the university. Supposed ly, she was about to face charges of unprofessional and inappropriate behavior with students.' 'Damn inappropriate,' Shannon put in. 'That's when she left Greece for Paris.' 'She gave me quite a different story about why she left Greece,' Indy said.

His anger and resentment were build ing. 'I guess she's got an appetite for graduate students, and I was just one in a line. But how come Nikos, the kid at the hotel, didn't know who Farnsworth was? He gave me the photograph.'

'Because Farnsworth never came here to Delphi. Her affair with him was in Athens. She's been careful to avoid romances here where it would be too difficult to hide.'

She must have had at least one, Indy thought, recalling Nikos's story. The frigid feeling had passed; in its place was a huge, heavy lump in his gut.

'And when she's done with her boys she feeds them to her killer boyfriend,' Shannon added. 'But that's not all, old buddy.'

Indy couldn't imagine what else they could tell him after the Farnsworth story.

'My family has a few contacts in this neighborhood of the world,' Shannon began. 'You know what I'm talking about. People with connections. Political connections. In side information.'

Mob contacts, Indy thought, but Shannon was being as cagey as ever. 'What did you find out?'

'First of all, your archaeology prof had more than an old stone tablet in mind when she took this trip. Do you know her father is a Greek dissident and he's living in Italy?'

'She told me all about that. Her old man has a gripe against the king. A difference of opinion.'

'It's more than a difference of opinion. Her friend, Mandraki, is close to her father. I hear that he's up to something, maybe planning a coup, and that Dorian Belecamus is involved.'

'A coup?'

'Right. So someone I know broke into her office at the university, and discovered a letter from Mandraki that verified it.'

Shannon was probably that someone, Indy thought. 'But if what you say is true, why would Dorian bring me along?'

'They're going to use you somehow,' Shannon said. 'It must have something to do with your seeing the king today. My guess is that they're going to kill him and you're supposed to take the fall. These guys are just like Chicago gangsters. Maybe smarter.'

'Did Mandraki threaten to kill you?'

'Didn't you see those graves in the cave before they blindfolded you?' Shannon asked. 'They're planning on killing all of us today.'

Just then the cloth door of the hut was pushed aside and one of the guards stepped, into the hut. He gestured angrily for them to stop talking. His partner brought in three plates, each containing a piece of hard bread, boiled-potatoes, and a slice of feta cheese.

As they ate in silence, Indy decided that Dorian was capable of doing what Shannon had suggested. He didn't know how she planned to do it, but somehow he had to warn the king.

Indy moved over next to Shannon as he finished eating. 'Sorry you guys got involved.'

'We got ourselves involved.'

Conrad laid down his fork. 'I didn't realize how quickly we would be singled out once we got here. But Belecamus remembered me, of course.'

'By the away,' Shannon said, 'what the hell is your squeaky-voiced friend Madelaine doing here?' He laughed for the first time. 'That really threw me. We'd just gotten here, and the last person I expected to see walks up to me in the street.'

Just then the two guards burst into the hut and pulled Shannon and Conrad to their feet. 'What's going on?' Indy yelled.

He leaped up, but was shoved to the ground and kicked in the stomach. By the time he uncurled himself, Shannon and Conrad were gone, and he was gagged again. 'Bastards,' he muttered into the gag. He rolled over and peered toward the door. He could still see a pair of boot heels. He wondered if he would ever see Shannon or Conrad again. He thought of Shannon and their college antics, and how upset he'd been that Conrad had turned him in to the dean. All of that seemed distant and petty compared to the trouble they now faced. His attraction to Dorian Belecamus had gotten the better of him. That was what it amounted to.

Angrily, he kicked at the wall, and to his surprise his foot broke through. He realized that the spot he'd kicked had been burned in the fire he'd accidentally started the day he was in here timing the vapors. He pulled his foot back, and looked at the heels in the doorway. They hadn't moved.

Cautiously, he jabbed his foot at the burned thatchwork around the hole. Piece by piece he knocked off chunks of the wall until he'd made a hole that looked wide enough for him to squeeze through. He crept forward feet first, wriggling his way through on his stomach. But his thighs were too large, and he wedged tightly against the wall.

He pressed his legs together, and tried again, gritting his teeth as the thigh he'd bruised in his fall scraped against the wall. This time he made it, and now he was half out of and half in the hut. He worked his knees against the ground and edged further out.

Not much more to go now, he thought, and then his shoulders stuck firmly. He twisted right and left, pulled and pushed, but nothing worked. If anything, he was caught even tighter. He expelled the air from his lungs and buckled his knees, pulling as hard as he could. The hut shook, but he was still trapped. He looked up at the doorway. The boot heels were no longer visible.

Oh, shit. Now what?

It didn't take long for an answer. He felt hands grip his ankles and pull. He grunted as his shoulders scraped sharply against the thatch, and then he was through the hole.