They moved on up the trail. Mallory let the others pass by until he and Andrea were bringing up the rear. Mallory glanced incuriously at Andrea, his face registering no more than a mild concern for the condition of his friend. Andrea caught his glance and nodded fractionally: Mallory looked away. Fifteen minutes later they were halted, at gunpoint, three men, all armed with machine-pistols, who simply appeared to have materialized from nowhere, a surprise so complete that not even Andrea could have done anything about it — even if he had had his gun. Reynolds looked urgently at Mallory, who smiled and look his head.
'It's all right. Partisans — look at the red star on their forage caps. Just outposts guarding one of the trails.'
And so it proved. Maria talked briefly to one of the soldiers, who listened, nodded and set off up the path, gesturing to the party to follow him. The other two Partisans remained behind, both men crossing themselves as Petar again strummed gently on his guitar.
Neufeld, Mallory reflected, hadn't exaggerated about the degree of awed respect and fear in which the blind singer and his sister were held.
They came to Partisan HQ inside another ten minutes, an HQ curiously similar in appearance and choice location to Hauptmann Neufeld's camp: the same rough circle of crude huts set deep in the same jamba — depression — with similar massive pines towering high above. The guide spoke to Maria and she turned coldly to Mallory, the disdain on her face making it very plain how much against the grain it went for her to speak to him at all.
'We are to go to the guest hut. You are to report the commandant. This soldier will show you.' The guide beckoned in confirmation. Mallory followed him across the compound to a fairly large, fairly well-lit hut. The guide knocked, opened the door and waved Mallory inside, he himself following.
The commandant was a tall, lean, dark man with that aquiline, aristocratic face so common among the Bosnian mountainmen. He advanced towards Mallory with outstretched hand and smiled.
'Major Broznik, and at your service. Late, late hours, but as you see we are still up and around. Although I must say I did expect you before this.'
'I don't know what you're talking about.'
'You don't know — you are Captain Mallory, an you not?'
'I've never heard of him.' Mallory gazed steadily at Broznik, glanced briefly sideways at the guide, then looked back to Broznik again. Broznik frowned for a moment, then his face cleared. He spoke to the guide, who turned and left. Mallory put out his hand.
'Captain Mallory, at your service. I'm sorry about that, Major Broznik, but I insist we must talk alone.' 'You trust no one? Not even in my camp?' 'No one.'
'Not even your own men?'
'I don't trust them not to make mistakes. I don't trust myself not to make mistakes. I don't trust you not to make mistakes.'
'Please?' Broznik's voice was as cold as his eyes. 'Did you ever have two of your men disappear, one with ginger hair, the other with black, the ginger-haired man with a cast to his eye and a scar running from mouth to chin?'
Broznik came closer. 'What do you know about those men?'
'Did you? Know them, I mean?'
Broznik nodded and said slowly: 'They were lost in action. Last month.'
'You found their bodies?' 'No.'
There were no bodies to be found. They had deserted — gone over to the Cetniks.'
'But they were Cetniks — converted to our cause.' 'They'd been reconverted. They followed us tonight, the orders of Captain Droshny. I had them killed.' 'You — had — them — killed?'
'Think, man,' Mallory said wearily. 'If they had arrived here — which they no doubt intended to do a discreet interval after our arrival — we wouldn't have recognized them and you'd have welcomed them back escaped prisoners. They'd have reported our every movement. Even if we had recognized them after they had arrived here and done something about it, you may have other Cetniks here who would have reported back their masters that we had done away with their watchdogs. So we disposed of them very quietly, no fuss, in a very remote place, then hid them.' 'There are no Cetniks in my command, Captain
Mallory.'
Mallory said drily: 'It takes a very clever farmer, Major, to see two bad apples on the top of the barrel and be quite certain that there are none lower down. No chances. None. Ever.' Mallory smiled to remove any offence from his words and went on briskly: 'Now, Major, there's some information that Hauptmann Neufeld wants.'
To say that the guest hut hardly deserved so hospitable a title would have been a very considerable understatement. As a shelter for some of the less-regarded domesticated animals it might have been barely acceptable: as an overnight accommodation for human beings it was conspicuously lacking in what our modern effete European societies regard as the minimum essentials for civilized living. Even the Spartans of ancient Greece would have considered it too much of a good thing. One rickety trestle table one bench, a dying fire and lots of hard-packed earthen floor. It fell short of being a home from home.
There were six people in the hut, three standing, one sitting, two stretched out on the lumpy floor. Petar, for once without his sister, sat on the floor, silent guitar clasped in his hands, gazing sightlessly into the fading embers. Andrea, stretched in apparently luxurious ease in a sleeping-bag, peacefully puffed at what, judgement from the frequent suffering glances cast in his direction, appeared to be a more than normally obnoxious cigar. Miller, similarly reclining, was reading what appeared to be a slender volume of poetry. Reynolds and Groves, unable to sleep, stood idly by the solitary window, gazing out abstractedly into the dimly-lit compound: they turned as Saunders removed his radio transmitter from its casing and made for the door. With some bitterness Saunders said: 'Sleep well.' 'Sleep well?' Reynolds raised an eyebrow. 'And when are you going?'
'Radio hut across there. Message to Termoli. Mustn't spoil your beauty sleep while I'm transmitting.'
Saunders left. Groves went and sat by the table cradling a weary head in his hands. Reynolds remained by the window, watched Saunders cross the compound and enter a darkened hut on the far side. Soon a light appeared in the window as Saunders lit a lamp.
Reynolds's eyes moved in response to the sudden appearance of an oblong of light across the compound The door to Major Broznik's hut had opened and Mallory stood momentarily framed there, carrying what appeared to be a sheet of paper in his hand
Then the door closed and Mallory moved off in the direction of the radio hut.
Reynolds suddenly became very watchful, very still, Mallory had taken less than a dozen steps when a dark figure detached itself from the even darker shadow of a hut and confronted him. Quite automatically, Reynolds's hand reached for the Luger at his belt, in slowly withdrew. Whatever this confrontation signified for Mallory it certainly wasn't danger, for Maria, Reynolds knew, did not carry a gun. And unquestionably it was Maria who was now in such aren't close conversation with Mallory.
Bewildered now, Reynolds pressed his face close against the glass. For almost two minutes he stared at is astonishing spectacle of the girl who had slapped Mallory with such venom, who had lost no opportunity of displaying an animosity bordering on hatred, now talking to him not only animatedly but also clearly very amicably. So total was Reynolds's baffled incomprehension at this inexplicable turn of events that his mind moved into a trance-like state, a spell that was abruptly snapped when he saw Mallory put a reassuring around her shoulder and pat her in a way that might have been comforting or affectionate or both but which in any event clearly evoked no resentment the part of the girl. This was still inexplicable: but only interpretation that could be put upon it was uncompromisingly sinister one. Reynolds whirled and and silently and urgently beckoned Groves to the window. Groves rose quickly, moved to the window and looked out, but by the time he had done so there was no longer any sign of Maria: Mallory was alone, walking across the compound towards the radio hut, the paper still in his hand. Groves glanced questioningly at Reynolds.
They were together,' Reynolds whispered. 'Mallory and Maria. I saw them! They were talking!' 'What? You sure?'
'God's my witness. I saw them, man. He even had his arm around — Get away from this window — Maria's coming.'
Without haste, so as to arouse no comment from Andrea or Miller, they turned and walked unconcernedly towards the table and sat down. Seconds later, Maria entered and, without looking at or speaking to anyone,
