What was the old kraut’s motives. And Teri. Did she know about the trap? Was she trying to warn him?
Or, did she bait him into being used and pumped for information by her uncle?
He shook all thoughts and questions from his mind. The bandages itched and he fought the agonizing urge to scratch… God, it was hot… if only he had a nice cold drink. The only item of clothing the doctor hadn’t cut off his body was his shorts. He rinsed them out in the basin and put them on wet.
Within minutes they were completely dry.
A light knock came from the door. It slowly swung open and the red-haired cabin boy poked his head around the bulkhead. “Are you awake, Major Pitt?” he queried softly.
“Yes, but just barely.” Pitt replied.
“I… I didn’t mean to bother you,” the boy said hesitantly. “The doc asked me to check on you every fifteen minutes to make sure you were resting comfortably.”
Pitt threw a withering stare at the cabin boy. “Who the hell can rest comfortably in this furnace with the air conditioning turned off?”
A lost bewildered look crossed the young sunburned face. “Oh my gosh, I’m sorry sir. I thought Commander Gunn left it on.”
“What’s done is done,” Pitt said shrugging. “How about something cold to drink?”
“Would you like a bottle of FIX?”
Pitt’s eyes narrowed sharply. “A bottle of what?
“FIX. It’s a Greek beer.”
“All right, if you say so.” Pitt couldn’t help but grin. “I’ve heard of taking a fix before, but never drinking one.”
“I’ll be right back sir.” The boy ducked around the bulkhead and closed the door. Suddenly it jerked open again and the young boy’s flaming hair reappeared. “I’m sorry, Major, I almost forgot. Colonel Lewis and Captain Glordino are waiting to see you. The Colonel wanted to bust right in and wake you, but the doc wouldn’t hear of it. He even threatened to throw the Colonel off the ship if he tried it.”
“All right, send them in,” said Pitt with impatience. hurry with the beer before I evaporate.”
Pitt lay back on the bunk and let the sweat roll down his body onto the rumpled sheets, sopping the areas that came in contact with his skin. His mind continued to turn, ransacking every detail of the past, assembling for the present, pushing ahead, and plotting future directions.
Lewis and Giordino.
They hadn’t wasted any time in coming. If Giordino received an answer from NUMA headquarters, it might help to supply one of the many missing pieces to the puzzle. The four borders were forming. but the middle was a scattered conglomeration of uncertain and unknown quantities. Von Till's evil face leered from the maze, his tight- lipped grin curling in smug disdain. Pitt’s mind raced on. The great white dog. He tried to force it into another piece of the puzzle, but it wouldn’t fit. That’s strange, he thought, the dog doesn’t correspond to the piece it’s supposed to. For some unfathomable reason he couldn’t force the animal between von Till and Kurt Heibert
Suddenly Lewis burst into the cabin with all the finesse of a sonic boom. His face was red and he was sweating. the tiny beads streamed down his nose and into his moustache where they were absorbed like rain in a forest. “Well now, Major, aren’t you sorry you passed up my invitation for dinner?”
Pitt half smiled. “I admit there was a time or two last night when I regretted turning down your scallops.”
He pointed to the gauze and adhesive tape crisscrossing his chest. 'But at least my other dinner engagement gave me a few memories that I can carry for a long, longtime.”
Giordino stepped from behind Lewis’ hulking form and waved a greeting to Pitt. “See what happens every time I let you go out and carouse on your own.”
Pitt could see the wide grin on Giordino’s face, but he also noticed a fraternal look of concern in his friend’s eyes. “Next time, Al, I’ll send you in my place.”
Giordino laughed. “Don’t do me any favors if
you’re a living example of the morning after.”
Lewis parked his bulk heavily in a chair facing the bunk. “God, it’s hot in here. Don’t these damn floating museums carry air conditioning?”
Pitt enjoyed a tinge of sadistic pleasure at Lewis’
steaming discomfort. “Sorry, Colonel, the unit must be overtaxed. I have beer coming that should help make the heat a bit more endurable.”
“Right now,” Lewis snorted, “I’d even settle for a glass of Ganges River water.”
Giordino leaned over the bunk “For chrissakes, Dirk, what mischief did you get yourself into after you left us last night? Gunn’s radio message said something about a mad dog.”
“I’ll tell you,” said Pitt, “But first I need a couple of questions answered myself.” He looked at Lewis.
“Colonel, do you know Bruno von Till?’
“Do I know von Till?” Lewis repeated. “Only slightly. I was introduced to him once and have seen him occasionally at parties given by the local dignitaries, but that’s about all From what I gather, he’s something of a mystery.”
“Do you, by chance, know what his business is?” Pitt asked hopefully.
“He owns a small fleet of ships.” Lewis paused for a moment, closing his eyes in thought. Then they shot open, transmitting a look of sudden recollection, “Minerva, yes that’s it, Minerva Lines: the name of the fleet.”
“I’ve never heard of it,” Pitt murmured.
“Small wonder,” snorted Lewis. “Judging from the decrepit rust buckets I’ve seen smoking by Thasos, I doubt whether anyone else knows of its existence either.”
Pitt’s eyes narrowed. “Von Till’s ships cruise along the Thasos coastline?”
Lewis nodded. “Yes, one passes every week or so.
They’re easy to spot; they all have a big yellow ‘M’
Painted on the smoke funnels.”
“Do they anchor off shore or dock at Liminas?”
Lewis shook his head. “Neither. Every ship I’ve bothered to notice came from the south, circled the island and reversed course south again.”
“Without stopping?”
“They lie-to for perhaps half-an-hour, no more, right off the point by the old ruins.”
Pitt raised up out of the bunk. He looked questioningly at Giordino, then Lewis. 'That’s odd.”
“Why?” asked Lewis lighting a cigar.
“Thasos is at least five hundred miles north of the main Suez Canal shipping lanes,” Pitt said slowly.
“Why should von Till send his ships on a thousand mile detour?”
“I don’t know,” Giordino said impatiently. “And frankly, I could care even less. Why not stop this verbal screwing around and tell us about your nocturnal escapades? What has this von Till character got to do with last night?”
Pitt stood and stretched, wincing from the stiff soreness. His mouth had a sand and gravel taste; he could not recall when his throat had been so dry before. Where was that dumb kid with the beer? Pitt caught sight of Giordino’s cigarettes, and he motioned for one.
He lit it and inhaled, increasing the rotten taste in his mouth.
He shrugged, smiling wryly. “OK, I’ll give it to you from beginning to end, but please feel free to stare at me like I’m crazy; I’ll understand.”
In the heat tortured cabin, the steel walls almost too hot to touch, Pitt told his story. He held nothing back, not even a thin belief that Teri had somehow betrayed him to von Till Lewis nodded thoughtfully on occasion but made no comment; his mind seemed to linger elsewhere, returning only when Pitt graphically described an event. Giordino paced the small cubicle unhurriedly, leaning slightly against the slow rolling of the ship.
When Pitt finished, no one spoke. Ten seconds passed, twenty, then thirty. The atmosphere had turned humid from perspiration and rapidly became stale from cigar and cigarette smoke.
“I know,” Pitt said a little tiredly. “It sounds like a fairy tale and makes very little sense. But, that’s exactly the way it happened, I left nothing out”
“Daniel in the lion’s den.” Lewis said flatly, without inflection. “I admit, what you’ve told us seems far
