The lights of Chania’s suburbs were shining ahead.

‘I heard Mr Kersten was involved in the massacre at Makrymari.’

Yerasimos didn’t speak for some time, his hands tight on the wheel.

‘There are people who say that, usually inspired by that piece of shit Waggoner. The British think he was a hero, but all he did was bring down more Nazi reprisals on the heads of innocent Cretans. We didn’t need the British. If they’d dropped us the weapons, we’d have done the job ourselves but, of course, they never trusted us enough.’

That was a different angle to those Mavros had heard before. He thanked the driver when they pulled up outside the clinic. Mikis was at his door before he could open it.

‘Interesting guy, Yerasimos,’ Mavros said, after the saloon had departed.

‘Yeah,’ Mikis said, with a grin. ‘Hidden depths. Did he tell you he was in New York for years?’

‘Yes.’

‘But he didn’t tell you why he went, did he? He was involved in a vendetta. He pushed a guy who betrayed his father to the Germans off a cliff.’

A tremor of unease ran through Mavros. ‘How was it resolved?’

‘Eventually the major players died of old age and agreement was reached.’

‘Thirty years,’ Mavros said ruefully.

‘Yeah, encouraging, isn’t it?’

Mavros looked around at the men on the street — some of them he recognized, other not. The Range Rover was where it had been in the afternoon, baseball bats visible through the windows.

‘The influence of American culture,’ Mikis said, following the direction of his gaze. ‘They’re useful weapons because they aren’t lethal unless you really want them to be.’

‘As long as you don’t bore out the middle and fill it with molten lead.’

Mikis laughed. ‘Now there’s a thought.’

‘Are your boys all right for an hour or two while we go and eat?’

‘They’re organized for the whole night and I’m only a phone call away.’

He went over and spoke to the young men and then beckoned Mavros to the Jeep.

‘I’ll take you to a good place,’ the Cretan said, heading for the city centre.

‘On the harbour front?’ Mavros asked, not wanting to run into the well-lubricated Luke Jannet.

‘No, this is a family taverna in the backstreets. If you’re lucky, they might have snails.’

Mavros made no comment. Cretan snails were a delicacy he had no desire for, having had a disastrous encounter with them in the past.

Mikis parked near the cathedral and led the way down a narrow street. The taverna was under a huge spray of pink bougainvillea blooms. There were only a few tables outside and the nearest was occupied by two men, one stocky and one lanky, both of whom Mavros recognized immediately. He put his hand on Mikis’s shoulder and retreated behind him.

‘We’ve got to go back the way we came,’ he said in his ear. ‘I don’t want those guys to see me.’

Mikis stared at him and then turned, keeping himself between Mavros and the taverna. ‘Start walking,’ he said, ‘single file like in the army.’

After they were round the corner, Mikis spoke. ‘So you didn’t want to see David Waggoner. I can understand that — he’s a nasty piece of work. But the tall streak of piss?’

‘That was Tryfon Roufos, the owner of Hellas History SA and the most bent antiquities dealer in Athens, probably the whole of Greece.’ Mavros shook his head. ‘He’s also a suspected child abuser and blackmailer of the rich and famous.’

‘Charming. Do you want me to bring him in for questioning?’

‘No! What I would like to know is what he’s doing in a huddle with the British war hero David Waggoner.’

‘Want me to tail them when they’ve finished?’

Mavros smiled. ‘Did you get rejected by the police academy?’

‘You think I’d work for those bullies? No, I’m trying to learn from you. It might help me stay alive.’

‘It might help usstay alive,’ Mavros corrected. ‘No, let’s leave them to it. At least that asshole Oskar Mesner wasn’t with them. If he had been, I’d have been straight on the phone to Rudolf Kersten about his coin collection.’

‘Speaking of which,’ Mikis said, leading him down another narrow street. ‘I’ve got something to tell you about that.’ He smiled. ‘But let’s wait till we’ve had something to eat and drink. I could put a donkey away.’

Mavros followed him reluctantly. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility that the taverna they were en route to offered stewed beast of burden as a speciality.

THIRTEEN

As it turned out, the food in the small taverna Mikis knew was excellent, the lamb succulent and the mountain greens a subtle blend of sweet and bitter. The owner’s casked wine had a faint taste of flowers to it and they got through a kilo quickly.

‘OK,’ Mavros said. ‘Time to talk.’

Mikis grinned and discarded a toothpick. ‘If I wasn’t such a pushover, I’d be charging you for this.’

Mavros had a vision of the fight on the way back from Kornaria. ‘“Pushover” isn’t the word that immediately comes to mind. Anyway, I can pay you, as I did before. One thing you can say for the production is that there’s plenty of cash around.’

‘Except this doesn’t directly concern the film people,’ Mikis said.

‘Really?’

‘But it may have something to do with that mismatched pair we saw round the corner.’

‘Roufos and Waggoner? I’m all donkey’s ears.’

‘I was going to ask you about that,’ the Cretan said, laughing. ‘All right, here it is. I got this from my old man, among others. The story goes that during the war, in late 1943 after the Italians had surrendered and the Germans got even more jumpy, a group of resistance fighters found a hoard of silver — ancient stuff, coins and other things — in a cave up in the White Mountains.’

‘Has this got something to do with Rudolf Kersten?’

Mikis held up his hand. ‘I’ll get to that. And before you ask, it wasn’t near Kornaria.’

Mavros let him continue, taking notes.

‘The andarteswanted to rebury it and split it up after the war was over — at least, that was what their leaders ordered them to do. They were from different villages, so there was some dispute.’

Mavros imagined the half-starved mountain men, few of whom would have possessed more than a coin or two after years of fighting, coming to blows over this sudden source of wealth.

‘And then other people got to hear of the find.’ Mikis raised an eyebrow suggestively.

‘David Waggoner.’

‘One out of two. It wasn’t his area, but the British commander there had been sent back to Egypt after being wounded and Waggoner — Lambis — was temporarily in charge.’

Mavros nodded. ‘And the other guy?’

‘A Communist, one of the few EAM people with any influence in western Crete. He was known as Kanellos. Maybe he had cinnamon-coloured hair.’ Mikis drained his glass. ‘As you can imagine, he was keen on the silver being used for the good of the people.’

‘Meaning, not divided amongst the andartes.’

‘Correct.’

‘So then what happened?’

‘You should ask Waggoner.’

Mavros gave him a stony look. ‘Maybe I will. But he’s not the one sitting opposite me.’

‘All right, all right. What I heard was that Lambis wanted to send the hoard to Alexandria on a submarine. He ordered it to be brought to a monastery called St Athanasios that’s in the middle of nowhere on the south coast, just a few hundred metres from a small beach that had been used for landings more than once.’

‘And?’

‘The Germans were waiting for them. Over twenty andarteswere killed, while Waggoner managed to get away with a bullet in his shoulder. The silver was taken to the German headquarters building in Chania and that was the last anyone heard of it. The rumour was that Kanellos had betrayed the mountain men and Waggoner rather than lose the silver to the British imperialists.’

Mavros knew there had been such betrayals during the occupation. He looked at Mikis. ‘There’s more?’