3

Next morning, Kapotas arrived at about half past ten looking in roughly the same state as the octopus in the kitchen only weaker. He was about the one man in Cyprus I wouldn't have swapped heads with; my own was merely sore, with occasional shooting pains. I still had the lump on the jaw, but for some reason it hadn't coloured up so I only looked a bit lopsided.

To Kapotas I probably looked triplicated. 'Oh God, I am so sorry,' he croaked, clinging to the reception desk. 'I will never drink whisky after dinner again. Never.'

I diagnosed him. 'Better have one now to seal off the nerve ends. Or a Bloody Mary-' I lifted my own glass from under the desk top; '-the hair of the dog with food value.'

'No, no, no.' He shuddered. 'What happened at breakfast? -I should have been here.'

They got a choice of boiled or fried egg and black or white coffee.' The Castle only served Turkish or instant coffee anyway. 'No mutinies yet. Next time, sleep here.'

'My wife said the same thing only she took half an hour. What happened in the night?'

'We sold six short-stay rooms and the hotel cut came to ten pounds, 300 mils. Four of them were still around by morning so I served 'em a compulsory breakfast at 500 mils each. Two families have checked out early, we've got three new guests coming in this afternoon. And an order for champagne and caviar. I'm damn sure there isn't any caviar, what about champagne?'

He shook his head very very carefully. "They took it all.'

'Ah. I'd been wondering why they hadn't nicked all the ordinary wine. Well, you're the man with money: you'd better go shopping.'

'Oh no,' he said limply. 'Please – it would be better if you… I must think about our problems…'

That did it. I swallowed my drink and stood up. 'Listen, Jack-'

'Loukis.'

'Listen, Jack: yesterday I got up at six and flew nearly eight hours and two refuelling stops, solo, before I even got here.

Then I find I probably won't be paid for that, so I sit down and coo Jc dinner for twelve when I could have told you to stuff the whole kitchen sideways. As far as I recall, whatyou did was boil some eggs, pass some plates and get smashed on company whisky. Today… today go shopping, Jack.'

By now he was standing up straight and looking a good quarter bottle less hungover. I sat again. I don't know why I'd stood up, really, except these things don't sound the same sitting down.

He muttered: 'Yes, of course… I… just a cup of coffee… will you stay here?'

'Sure. I'm waiting for a call to Israel.'

He tried a quick smile and tottered off towards the kitchen.

Actually I was waiting for my third call to Israel. The first two hadn't got me anywhere, though I'd been pretty thick to expect an Israeli airport to tell me if a certain person would be on a certain aeroplane. The way they feel about airport security, they wouldn't tell me if there were wings on that aeroplane. So now I was trying the British consulate in Tel Aviv.

Somebody came through on a rough Une. I yelled: 'Does anybody there know anything about Kenneth Caviti?'

'What about him?'

'He's supposed to be coming out of Beit Oren today. Have you heard anything?'

'The prison?'

The Sergeant came downstairs, looking pink, clean and dignified. He nodded graciously to me, then planted himself out on the doorstep and studied the sky.

I lowered my voice. 'Yes, that's right.'

'Are you a newspaper?'

'No, no. I was his partner. Name's Roy Case. I'm waiting for him in Nicosia.'

'I see. Hold on.'

The line went quiet except for the atmospherics. The Sergeant clasped his hands behind him and rocked gently on his heels, sniffing the warm coffee-flavoured air.

A new voice came on. 'You were asking about Mr Cavitt? We've been told he'll be aboard the afternoon flight to Nicosia. That's ELAL 363.'

'Thanks very much.' Then something about that phrase 'we've been told…' made me wonder. 'Who told you about him?'

"The Ministry of the Interior. It's standard procedure. They always try to get us to pay the fare and we never do.'

'Every time a British citizen gets out of jail?'

'No, just whenever one is being deported.'

'He's beingdeported T Now we were both surprised. 'What did you expect? That's also pretty standard for a foreigner found guilty of espionage.'

Kapotas got back from his shopping trip just before noon, having bought a small pot of caviar, two cooks and a waiter. No champagne.

'Do you know theprices!' He stared disbelievingly at the caviar. 'So I remembered: we have an aeroplane full of champagne.'

'And a grand opening in Lebanon.'

'No. That is postponed indefinitely. I got the message from London when I called at our office just now.'

Well, it didn't surprise me. Opening a new pad would be a pretty pricey commitment.

Kapotas added: "They say, can we try and sell the champagne out here?'

'Not without an import licence. And paying duty and all.'

'I think the hotel has a licence to import some wines… I saw something in the file…' He went through into the little cubbyhole of an office behind the desk and started rummaging.

I called after him: 'And who do we sell it to? It would take years to get rid of 144 bottles of that stuff over the counter here, so unless the Ledra Palace or the Hilton want some.,.'

He came up with a piece of paper and studied it, frowning. Finally: 'I don't understand it. I will ring the Customs and ask.'

He started dialling, and I drifted back to the desk and to brooding about deportation. Ken wasn't going to like it. A pilot's life is travelling and he can't afford having places he can't travel to. The big airlines even put it in your contract: getting yourself barred from a country can be a valid reason for dismissal.

The trouble is, deportation isn't a 'legal' thing, if you see what I mean. It isn't a court decision, but a minister's one. In some places you can appeal it through the courts, if you can invent some grounds, but it likely won't help. And just because it isn't a court sentence, it can last forever – or a day. All you can do is wait and hope for a change of government, policy, wind or the minister's liver and – bingo – you're back in favour again.

If, of course, you're important enough for it to be worth somebody changing his mind about you.

Kapotas came out of the office looking almost cheerful for once. 'They understand our problem: it is okay to bring in just one box, on this licence, as long as the others stay "airside", if you understand that.'

I nodded. 'On yonder side of the barrier, in the aeroplane or a Customs store. There's no point in unloading it and renting store space until we know we'll get an import licence for the lot -andwe've got a buyer waiting. So leave it on board.'

He was ready to agree to any scheme that saved money. 'Good, then. If you go to the airport now you will be back by half past one. You may use my car,' he added magnanimously.

'Hold on, now. I'm meeting a flight at two-ten so I shan't be back before three anyhow.'

'But we must have the champagne before then! '

'Then come with me and bring the box back while I hang on there. We can use your car,' I added magnanimously.

Stand 8, the visiting light-aircraft park, was just about next door to the Customs supervised store, so they let us take the box out through that. They even offered to rent us a porter, but Kapotas had just found out about the duty on imported wine and gone mean again.