'That's awfully sporting of you'—he gave her a grateful smile —1'but I couldn't let you get mixed up in this. If any harm came to you, I'd never forgive myself.'
'They say two heads are better than one, so we might talk things over, anyway. That is, unless you are one of those people who think women's minds are not up to weighing the pros and cons on serious matters.'
'Oh no!' he protested. 'As a matter of fact, I should think your brain is a good bit quicker than mine. You may have noticed that at times I'm a bit slow in the uptake. It's not that I'm a fool —at least I hope not. When. I was six, I was in an air crash. Both my parents were killed and I got a knock on the head that set me back all through my childhood.'
'Really! How awful for you.' Stephanie's voice was warm with sympathy, so he told her about his never having been to school, and of his unusual upbringing.
When he had done, she said that she would never have guessed that he had not had a proper education, although she found him quite different from any of the other young men she knew and liked him the better for it. As he finished his drink, she asked:
'What time do you want to leave tomorrow?'
'I'd like to get off about nine, if that's all right with you?'
She nodded. 'And where shall we be going?'
'I haven't had time to think yet. Let's settle that in the morning,' he replied; and shortly afterwards they went up to their rooms.
As Robbie undressed, he was still feeling very sore at the humiliation he had suffered in the caf6 and, although he had temporized with Stephanie, he had never had any intention of abandoning his mission. On the contrary, Barak's threats and Cepicka's sneers had only stimulated in him the determination to find out what they were up to. In them, too, he now felt that he had two tangible enemies, which would make his further endeavours much more exciting than setting such wits as he had against a nebulous organization.
For the next move he felt he had the advantage, for they would probably think they had scared him off altogether. In any case, he knew all the places at which groups were to be stationed, and they could not possibly guess which group he might decide to spy on. Corinth and Pirgos were the two nearest places. For the former, it was a safe bet that a second group would be landed at Patras, and sent with their machinery either by road or by motor-caique up the gulf. The Bratislava would then move down to Pirgos and land a third group there before proceeding to drop others at Kalamai and the islands. The machinery for the Corinth party would be cleared at Patras, but that for Pirgos Would have to go through the Customs there. From this Robbie reasoned that Barak, who appeared to be in charge of the whole operation, and probably Cepicka, would go down to Pirgos; so he would stand less risk of running into them again if he went to Corinth.
As he dropped off to sleep, his last thoughts were of Stephanie. He still had no intention of telling her the whole truth about his mission, but she had been sweetly sympathetic about the handicap from which he had suffered during his unusual childhood, and it was great comfort to think that he could now talk to her freely about his unorthodox activities.
By half past nine next morning, they were well clear of Patras and once more running along the road that followed the shore of the broad gulf. Across its blue waters, the mountains rose in a magnificent procession to the heights of Parnassus towering above Delphi. Even at such a distance their main features stood out distinctly, owing to the extraordinary clearness of the atmosphere which is peculiar to Greece.
Stephanie had so far made no comment upon Robbie's manuscript and, after they had covered ten miles, he could restrain himself no longer from asking her what she thought of it, as far as she had read.
'I like it, Robbie,' she replied; then, after a slight hesitation, she added: 'But it's rather an unusual book, isn't it?'
'In what way?' he asked guardedly.
'It's difficult to explain. It's crammed full of slang expressions that you rarely use except when you are talking about the Immortals. That makes it unlike both the person you seem to be, and an ordinary book, so rather queer to read. Surely, too, in these days authors don't refer to their "gentle reader".'
'I don't see why they shouldn't. I like to think of my readers as though they could be my friends.'
'I'm sure you do, Robbie. That's just the sort of thing which is so nice about you. What puzzled me most, though, is your attitude towards the Olympians. Things you have said to me have given me the impression that you almost think of the gods as divinities still to be venerated; yet you give them awful characters.'
'They had different standards from ours, so one can't blame them for always hopping into bed with one another. Admittedly, they could turn pretty nasty if they felt they had been insulted, but most of the time their decrees were just, and they spent much more time protecting people than harming them. Anyhow, it wouldn't have been right not to tell the truth about the way they behaved.'
'Yes, I agree about that; but they don't seem exactly the sort of people one would choose to worship.'
'Most races have chosen worse. Look at the Babylonians, who worshipped Moloch, and the Aztecs with their frightful gods who were always demanding human sacrifices. Come to that, how about the Christians? They took over Jehovah from the Jews, a harsh, jealous old brute who hated to see people enjoy themselves
and had to be constantly pacified by the smell of burnt offerings.'
Stephanie laughed. T suppose you are right. But how about your treatment of the Heroes? You always seem to be poking fun at them, and as far as I have read they all appear to have been dead from the neck up.'
'A lot of them were. Odysseus was an exception. He was as cunning as a cartload of monkeys. And Hercules had some pretty bright ideas. But, generally speaking, it's not fair to judge them by their brains. The great thing about them was their chivalry and courage. Most of them were Princes, who could have lived very pleasant lives if they had chosen to stay at home. But instead, they were always game to risk their lives to protect their peasantry from terrible monsters, or to suffer years of discomfort fighting not for themselves but to right a wrong done to one of their friends. The one thing they cared about was their honour, and never giving in before they had done what they set out to do. By that, they set a wonderful example to the whole people of Greece; and if it had not been for that spirit, Greece would never have survived the Persian hordes.'
For a while they were silent, then Stephanie said: 'In your first chapter about the Royal Family of Olympus, you say lots about Zeus and Poseidon and the innumerable affaires they had, but practically nothing about the third brother, Pluto. Didn't he care for the girls?'
'The chronicles don't give much information about him. They record only two cases of his being unfaithful to Persephone.'
'In view of the family temperament and the fact that she lived with him for only one-third of each year, that seems somewhat odd.'
'It does,' Robbie agreed thoughtfully, 'but perhaps he was really no better than the others. You see, he possessed a helmet that made him invisible whenever he visited the Upper World; so there is no saying what games he may have got up to without anyone being able to pin them on him.'
'That's certainly a thought. And his own kingdom sounds so gloomy that I should think he liked to get away from it as often as he could.'
'Oh, it couldn't have been so bad if you were the boss of it; at least, not as described by a chap named Er.'
'Who was he?'
'Er was a brave warrior who had a most extraordinary experience. He was killed in battle; so his chums did the usual, and put his body on a nice big bonfire. But it wouldn't burn, and after being cooked for twelve days he suddenly sat up and got off the red-hot ashes as fit as a fiddle. He said he had spent the twelve days in Hades, and had been sent back to tell everyone what it was like down there.