Santorini

Talbot smiled. 'Be ye as pure as snow ye shall not escape calumny. Something like that. We captains become inured to such injustices. I have the odd feeling ? all right, all right, Vincent, let's settle for just a few microscopic traces of Highland blood — that Andropulos is going to be asking the odd casual question at table tonight. I suggest we have Dr Wickram up here.'

Andropulos did indeed have the odd casual question to ask at table that night but he was in no hurry to introduce them.

It was not until after they had finished the main course that he said: 'We do not wish to pry, Captain, nor ask questions about purely naval matters which should be none of our concern. But whatever is happening surely does concern us, whether directly or indirectly, and we are but human and very, very curious. We can all see that the Angelina is alongside with that highly suspect atomic mine lashed down in its cradle on the deck. I thought the intention was to sail it away with all possible speed?'

'We shall be doing just that, Mr Andropulos. In the fullness of time, by which I mean after we've finished dinner. You will not be happy until it is gone?'

'I confess I will feel a considerable degree of relief when I see the Angelina disappearing over the horizon, and with a clear sky and an almost full moon we should be able to see that. Selfish? Cowardly? Maybe, maybe not.' Andropulos sighed. 'I do not see myself in the role of hero.'

'I don't see myself as such. No sensible person does.'

'But, surely ? well, that atomic mine is still highly unstable, is it not?'

'I don't think it's quite so highly dangerous as it was. But why ask me? You're sitting next to the expert.'

'Of course. Dr Wickram. How do you see things now, sir?'

'The Captain is right, or I hope he is. The radioactive emanations of the hydrogen missiles, from which of course the atomic mine is now separated, have an extremely limited range. They are no longer affecting the mine which should be now slowly beginning to stabilize itself. But I have to emphasize that it's a slow process.'

'How long will it be before it has fully stabilized itself? By which I mean when will it reach a condition when a passing vessel's engines will have no effect on it?'

'Ah. Well, now.' Wickram's tone was the verbal equivalent of a shrug. 'As I've said, we're in the realms of the unknown, die untested, but I have been making some calculations.

Difficult calculations involving some rather advanced mathematics so I won't bother you with those, but my estimate is that the mine should be quite safe in twelve hours at the most Possibly even in six hours. At a lesser time than that ? well. the risk would be unacceptably high.'

'Damn you to hell, Talbot,' Wotherspoon said. His voice was low and controlled but the ivory-knuckled fists showed the depths of his anger. 'It's my boat you're talking about. It's not the property of your damned Navy!'

'I am aware of that, Professor, and I'm most damnably sorry about it.' Talbot was with Hawkins, Wotherspoon and his wife in the admiral's cabin. 'But you are not coming along Did you honestly imagine that the Royal Navy would idly stand by and let you, civilians, risk your lives for us?' Talbot smiled. 'It's not only our duty but we're getting paid for it.'

'It's not only bloody high-handed, it's piracy! Hijack. That sort of illegal behaviour you're sworn to destroy. You are, of course, prepared to resort to force in order to restrain me.'

'If we have to, yes.' Talbot nodded to the opened, darkened doorway. Wotherspoon turned, caught sight of three large figures half-hidden in the gloom. When he turned back, he was literally speechless with fury. 'It's the last thing we wan; to do,' Talbot said, 'and it's totally unnecessary.' He let an element of coldness creep into his voice. 'Quite frankly. Wotherspoon, my primary concern is not your welfare. I think you're being most extraordinarily selfish and totally inconsiderate. How long have you been married, Mrs Wotherspoon?'

'How long have — ' She tried to smile but her heart wasn't

in it. 'Almost six months.'

'Less than six months.' Talbot looked at Wotherspoor without enthusiasm. 'And yet you're willing to expose her to danger and ? the chance is very real ? to send her to her death because your stiff-necked pride has been wounded. You must be proud of yourself. Do you really want to go, Mrs Wotherspoon?'

'Angelina.' The correction was automatic and this time she did smile almost certainly because of the incongruity of it in the circumstances. 'You put me in an impossible situation.' She paused, then went on quickly: 'No. No, you don't. I don't want to go. I don't want James to go either. Delving around m antiquities is our business, not violence and death. Heaven knows I'm no latter-day Amazon and if there are any dragons waiting around to be killed I don't want my husband to be St George. Please, James.'

Hawkins spoke for the first time. 'I make no appeal to your emotions, Professor. All I ask you is to put yourself in Commander Talbot's position. I think you would agree it is a pretty impossible one.'

'Yes.' Wotherspoon had unclenched his fists. 'I see that.'

'I think three signals are in order, John,' Hawkins said. The Wotherspoons had left. 'One to the White House, one to General Carson in Rome and one to Rear-Admiral Blyth. The same signal, coded of course, to each. How about 'Settled weather with favourable north-west wind. Angelina about to sail with armed mine. Transfer of hydrogen missiles from plane to Kilcharran continuing smoothly.' That should fit the bill?'

'Admirably. It should come as quite a shock to them all. We haven't of late, I must admit, been sending them much in the way of good news.'

A small knot of interested spectators were gathered round the head of the gangway, the foot of which offered easy access to both the stern of the Angelina, whose sails were already hoisted, and the bows of the Ariadne's launch. Among the more interested of the spectators was Andropulos.

He turned to Talbot and said: 'How much longer now, Captain?'

'Ten minutes. Thereabouts.'

Andropulos shook his head as if in disbelief. 'And then all our troubles will be over?'

'It's beginning to look that way, isn't it?'

'It is indeed. Tell me, why is the launch there?'

'Simple. It's coming with us.'

'Going with you? I don't understand. Won't the sound of its engines ? '

'Maybe trigger off the mine? The launch won't start up until we're at least three miles clear. It will then proceed to circle us, again at a distance of three miles, to warn off any vessels ? powered vessels, that is ? that threaten to come too close to us. We haven't come this far, Mr Andropulos, to take any chances.'

'The thought, the precaution, never occurred to me. Alas, I fear I will never make a man of action.'

Talbot gave him what Andropulos misinterpreted as a kindly smile. 'One cannot be all things to all men, sir.'

'You are ready to go, Captain?' Hawkins said. He had just joined them.

'A few minutes, sir. Sails are filling rather nicely, aren't they?'

'You are going, Captain?' Andropulos seemed a trifle disconcerted.

'Certainly. I've always rather fancied myself as the skipper of an Aegean lugger. You seem rather surprised, Mr Andropulos?'

'I am. Rather, I was. But not now.' He looked down to the deck of the Angelina where Van Gelder was adjusting a halyard on the foresail. 'And of course, inevitably, Lieutenant-Commander Van Gelder. Hand-picked men, eh,

Captain? Hand-picked by yourself, of course. I congratulate you. I also salute you. I suspect that this is a much more dangerous mission than you have led us to understand, a mission so perilous that you have chosen not to delegate some members of your crew to carry it out.'

'Nonsense, Mr Andropulos. You exaggerate. Well, Admiral, we're off. Taking a median estimate on Dr Wick- ram's time limits we should be disposing of this mine in nine hours' time — six a.m. tomorrow. If the wind holds — there's no guarantee that it will, of course ? we'll be well on our way to the Kasos Strait by then.'

Hawkins nodded. 'And with luck ? although I don't see why the factor luck should enter into it ? we should be picking you up in the early afternoon tomorrow. We shall remain with Captain Montgomery until he has finished loading the hydrogen missiles and until the destroyer I've radioed for comes to pick him up and escort him to Thessalonika. That should be between nine and ten in the morning. Then we'll come looking for you.' He turned his head. 'You're off, Mr Andropulos? I should have thought you would have remained to witness this rather historic moment.'

'I intend to do just that. I also intended to record this historic moment. I go to fetch my trusty Leica. Well,