Deadspeak

'Go on, Manolis,' Darcy prompted him.

'The Samothraki has been absent from the harbour since the night of the trouble under the old windmills, when I saved Layard from the sea. This morning the fishermen have brought in many pieces of burned wreckage. It is - it was - the Samothraki! And still there is more. A girl, a prostitute, died on the streets three, four nights ago. She has been examined. The doctor says it could have been anything: not eating - the, how do you say, malnutrition? - or perhaps she fainted and lay in the alley all night, and so died of the exposure. But most likely it is the anaemia. Hah! You know this anaemia? No blood in the body? My God - anaemia!'

'Like a plague.' Harry groaned. 'She must be burned, too.'

'She will be,' Manolis promised. 'Today. Believe me, I will see to it!'

Sandra said: 'And still we're no closer to discovering who the vampire is, or what he's done to Ken. And I for one would like to know how those bats got in here...'

Harry indicated a domed wood-burning fireplace where its flue went up into a brick wall. 'At least there's no great mystery there,' he said. 'As to Layard: he's now in thrall to this thing and, depending how strong his will is, serving it faithfully. And the vampire's identity? Well, there's a clue I can follow up. I think I may know someone who has the answer.'

'What clue?' Manolis faced him. 'Any clue - all clues -are for me. No more secrets. Also, I want to know about that word the bats made on the walclass="underline" what did it mean?'

'That's the clue,' said Harry. 'Faethor fixed it so that I couldn't mistake his meaning. He wants me to go and see him.'

Frowning, Manolis looked from face to face. 'This Faethor who fixes such things, and in such a way. He is... what?'

'No more secrets?' said Harry, wrily. And: 'Manolis, even if we had an entire day to waste, still we couldn't tell you everything. And even you wouldn't believe it all if we did.'

Try me!' Manolis answered. 'But in the car. First you dress and I take you to breakfast, then to the police station in town. I think is the safest place. And meanwhile you tell me everything.'

'Very well, we will,' Darcy agreed. 'But we must be allowed to get on with this thing in our own way. And Manolis, we have to be sure that all of this will go no further than you.'

'Anything you say,' the other nodded. 'And anything I can help you with, I will. You are the experts. But please, we are wasting the time. Hurry now!'

They got dressed as quickly as they could...

By mid-morning their plans were finalized, and by noon Manolis Papastamos had set them in action. Once he'd known what was to be done, he wasted little time doing it.

Harry Keogh was now the owner of a suitably worn and well-thumbed Greek passport, stamped with a visa for Romania. Ostensibly, its bearer was an 'international dealer in antiques' (a cover which had brought a wry smile to Harry's face), one 'Hari Kiokis', a name which shouldn't give him too much trouble. Sandra had been fixed up with a flight to Gatwick, London, leaving Rhodes at 9:10 that night, and Darcy would stay here and work with Manolis. E-Branch had been put as completely in the picture as possible, but for now Darcy hadn't called in any esper help. First he must ascertain the size of the problem, and after that he'd call on help as required and available directly through Sandra.

Harry's flight to Bucharest via Athens was at 2:30; with an hour to spare he and the others had lunch on the high balcony of a taverna overlooking Mandraki harbour. And it was there that one of the local policemen found them, with information for Papastamos.

The man was fat and sweaty, scarred and bow-legged; if he hadn't been a policeman then he would've had to be a brigand. He arrived in the road below their balcony on a tiny moped which his huge backside almost entirely obscured. 'Hey, Papastamos!' he shouted, waving a fat arm. 'Hey, Manolis!'

'Come on up,' Manolis called down to him. 'Have a beer. Cool down.'

'You won't feel so cool in a minute, Inspector!' the other called back, entering the taverna and panting his way upstairs.

When he arrived Manolis offered him a chair, said: 'What is it?'

The other got his breath back, and in wheezing Greek told his story. 'Down at the mortuary, at the hospital,' he began. 'We were recording statements about the missing corpse - ' He glanced at Manolis's company and quickly shrugged his apologies in the Greek fashion. 'I mean, about the circumstances in the case of your dead English friend. We took statements from everybody, like you said. There was this girl, a receptionist who was on duty the night you saved his life. She said in her statement that someone went to see him in the early hours of the morning. It was her description of this one that I found interesting. Here, read it yourself.'

He took a crumpled, sweat-stained official statement form from his shirt pocket and handed it over. Manolis quickly translated what he'd been told, then read the statement. He read it a second time, more thoroughly, and his forehead creased into a frown. And: 'Listen to this,' he said, reading aloud.

'It must have been about six-thirty in the morning when this man came in. He said he was a Captain and one of his crew had gone missing. He'd heard how someone had been rescued from the sea and wondered if it was his man. I took him to see Mr Layard in his room where he was sedated. The Captain said: "Ah, no, this one is not mine. I have troubled you for nothing." I began to turn away but he didn't follow me.

'When I looked back he was standing with his hand on the bump on Layard's head, and he said: "This poor man! Such an ugly wound! Still, I am glad he is not one of mine."

'I said he must not touch the patient and showed him out. It was strange: although he had said he was sorry for Layard, still he was smiling a very peculiar smile...'

Harry had slowly straightened up in his chair as he listened to this, and now he asked, 'And the description?'

Manolis read it out, and mused: 'A sea-Captain; very tall, slim, strange, and wearing dark glasses even in the dawn light. I think ... I think I know this one.'

The fat policeman nodded. 'I think so, too,' he said. 'And when we were watching that fleapit the Dakaris, we saw him come out of there.'

'Hah!' Manolis thumped the table. 'The Dakaris? It's a spit away from where they found that poor whore!' And at once: 'I'm sorry, Sandra.'

'Who is he?' Harry demanded.

'Eh?' Manolis looked at him. 'Who? Oh, I'll do even better than that and show you where. There he is!' And he pointed out across the harbour.

The sleek white motor-cruiser was slicing her way out of the harbour through the deep-water channel, but the distance wasn't so great that Harry's keen eyes couldn't read her name. 'The Lazarus!' he breathed. 'And the name of the owner?'

'The same, almost,' said Manolis. 'Jianni Lazarides.'

'Jianni?' Harry's face was suddenly drawn, lined, grey.

'Johnny,' Manolis shrugged.

'John,' Harry echoed him. And in the back of his mind another voice - or the memory of one - said, Janos!

'Ahhhr Harry clasped his head as pain lanced through his skull. It was sharp but short, nothing so bad as a full-scale attack, a mere warning. But it confirmed his worst suspicions. For Janos could only be a name he'd learned from the dead - perhaps from Faethor himself - with whom conversation had been forbidden. He unscrewed his eyes and let in the cruel sunlight and the concerned expressions of his friends. And: 'I know him,' he said, when he could speak. 'And now I know I'm right to go and see Faethor.'

'But why, if we already know our man?' Darcy asked.

'Because we don't know him well enough,' Harry told him, as the pain quickly subsided. 'And since Faethor spawned him, he's the one most likely to know how to deal with him.'