Enemy and Brother (31 page)

There were several lines crossed out here, Webb uncertain of the order in which to place the incidents. One of them I include now in brackets although he did not restore it:

[I should say that when I reached Athens I reported to the government having seen Alexis Frontis, and vouching to them that he was a Russian prisoner.]

Margaret was released after several weeks of negotiation. We had become friends. In the early days of her freedom we became lovers. Meanwhile I had been ordered to Athens by my newspaper. We were married at the British Embassy the day before I left, Margaret following me a week later. I remember her comment on how fortunate it was that she had learned a little Greek.

I will not condemn my wife. I have loved her and I thought that she loved me, a man twenty-seven years her senior, and one of obvious conceit to have assumed her love. If I return to Athens I shall—what shall I do? I was about to say I would take her back to America and protect her even from herself. But that will not be possible, her boldness in espionage having brought me to this turn. To protect her I shall stand myself accused of being a Soviet agent. If I knew why she serves them I would tell it here. I hope it is conviction. That would not be so bad. I had thought I was making a liberal of her, converting her from the Right! I should have known in our own relationship that a woman of her pride could be humble only by an act of will. And once she told me she could not bear the company of fools unless they crowned her Folly. There is not time, but I would feel better, knowing.

I must set down the beginning of the present situation. I have been aware for several weeks that I was under surveillance of both Greek and American Intelligence. Are you one of them, Emory? I no longer think so. But I did at the time we left Athens. I had thought so from the beginning of your knightly attentions to my wife. I was hoping that you were, for I could think of no better way to lay the ghost of suspicion than to take with me one of the suspicious. If you are an agent, then you and your superiors have been no less deceived than have I. To me it no longer matters. My colleagues have been questioned, my mail has been delayed, numerous things, but nothing in the open. I told Margaret I thought I was under security observation. She then confessed to having herself been interrogated about me by British Intelligence. I was furious. As always under attack I wanted to counterattack. I was fed up also with playing puppet to the Athens regime, manufacturing stories to the pattern of their propaganda. I said there ought to be some way of covering the rebel cause, and if I could find it I would blast my way out of Athens. Something like that. I spoke of leaving and re-entering Greece by way of Yugoslavia. Margaret begged me not to do anything precipitous. She said the government’s attitude toward the foreign press was likely to change. She had it from very close to the horse’s mouth. Like most people of her class, Margaret was not long in Athens before drifting into the social set. The family connections—hell, the money connections, were already made. I said it was a long way from the horse’s mouth to a horse’s ass like me. It was our first good quarrel, and, like most quarrels, I thought afterwards, it had been argued for the wrong reasons. It was also our last quarrel. Within a week Paul Stephanou approached me and said he understood I wished to interview the
ELAS
leader. I had made no secret of it. Other correspondents felt the same. I was honored to be chosen. A good reporter must have entry everywhere. But when I saw Demetrios waiting for us tonight, the whole sickening picture came clear, and I knew I had walked into a trap. I was not meant to leave alive. I have been such a successful cover, such a magnificent one. And if I die, her guilt will be buried with me in my grave, if you so choose. When I was trying to figure out why I was under surveillance Margaret even suggested that it might be due to my having been the intermediary in Iran. And I thought it might be so. My God, I am on the point of admiring her!

My first thought on recognizing Demetrios was that my only chance lay with Markos himself. I demanded through Stephanou, when Demetrios left the room, to speak to Markos alone with only the translator present. Markos did not want us there at all. He made that plain enough. I was not sure I was going to get to see him until the woman, Maria, came for me and asked if I spoke Italian. I knew then that Markos was not himself entirely sure of Demetrios.

And by then I also knew that I had been used as an actual carrier. I suspected it when Demetrios remained out of the room so long. I later discovered the neat slit in my coat collar.

One thing has saved me if I am saved—and for what am I saved? To accuse my wife? Or to be silent, myself accused? One thing. It was I who told Markos that I had carried, without my knowledge, some information to his camp. This was some two hours after we had arrived. Demetrios had made no mention of such information to him. I told Markos the circumstances under which I had previously met Demetrios—and my wife. Markos had not expected Demetrios when he arrived two days ago. He came on Soviet instructions. I think Markos is still waiting to learn why he is here. I have told him what I believe, that if I die, a presumed Soviet agent, Margaret is clear, and that Demetrios had probably come on instructions passed through diplomatic pouch. Markos said he would confront Demetrios in my presence, and if what I said were true the woman would be waiting for me in the fourth cottage from ours at one-thirty in the morning. You will remain in camp until morning. No one is to know how I have left here. If I am alive I will be watching for you at the Ioannina road when Stephanou brings you down.

While we were eating, Markos asked Demetrios if it were true that he had found me a useful carrier of information. Demetrios denied it at first, I suppose protesting such discussion in my presence. Then he produced the three strips of binding cloth containing the neatly coded intelligence. The code was in French which the General did not like either. Demetrios went for his code book. Through the woman Markos said to me, “He will tell me also no more than he thinks I have to know.” I am sure he believes there is a conspiracy against him. He does not trust the Soviet promises, but he does not dare to offend them and Demetrios is their man.

Demetrios returned and worked out the code while Markos and I sat silent. I am not sure, but I believe the intelligence to be almost entirely political. It was not translated for my benefit. If the woman is waiting it will not be because Markos is sentimental about me. He will believe himself betrayed also. History must write it if it is so, but my last dispatch before leaving Athens gives my belief that the civil war is almost over. Markos knows that Stalin will not stand by the Greeks. No more than if he had the choice would Markos stand by Stalin.

It is ten past one.

Of all countries, this troubled land is the one I wanted foremost to write truly and deeply about. I suppose it was arrogant of me to think I alone could do it, and that is what brought me here. I would have told the story—not of Markos or those who will supplant him—but of young Paul Stephanou who will either be tried for treason or will live in exile from the land, the people he loves dearer than life. And writing this I would be called a Communist anyway, and I do not think you, friend Emory, would gainsay it. Which is as sad as anything I can think of now.

I have one last thought to put down here and no time to examine it first. If I am going to my death, and that is what I am writing against, it is probably under an inner compulsion to do so. Sometimes men die when and because they want to. I have said I hoped you would not read this. I am not even sure of that.

Sleep well. I started out with you thinking you were doing a dirty job. Now there is a far dirtier one to be done. As the boys say up there in the sky, Over!

[Alexander Webb]

I sat in silence, the notebook in my hand.

From deep within the cloister came the sound of the scraping of plates, then the murmur of prayer. The nuns lived by oil or candlelight. There were no light or communication wires. The sky when I looked up into it was the lucid mixture of pearl and gold that deepens in luster as the sun nears its setting.

Maria, sitting at Paul’s feet, still held fast to his hand.

“Are you happy here, Maria?” I asked her.

Paul passed along her response. No and yes.

He asked her, “Would you like to go home?”

Yes!

I wondered why, but I said, “In a few days, Maria, perhaps the priest from Kalpaki will come for you.”

Paul said, “Professor, I wish to accuse him tonight. I will put on the costume again, and when all the other singers have gone in, I will arrive late and be admitted.”

I thought of Elsa and the hotel room arrangement. By the time we returned to Ioannina everyone would be at the festival. With Elsa’s help later it might work. And I had my own moment of confrontation before me. This had to be the night. There might not be another.

“Of what will you accuse him, Paul?”

“Of the greatest crime, a Greek’s betrayal of a friend of Greece. And, Professor! I want to take Maria with us to bear witness.”

I thought of all the reasons not to take her, the delay, the danger—suppose we should break down on the road near Kalpaki, suppose the military should be on the lookout for me—I thought of them all, but I said, “Tell her, and if she wishes to go, we shall go together.”

A
T ELEVEN, AS ELSA
had promised in a note left for me with the key to her room, she returned to the hotel from the festival before going on to the reception. I don’t know what she had expected, knocking and opening the room door, but the three of us waited: Maria, scrubbed and combed but dark as a gypsy, her black eyes glowing with wonder, excitement and a childlike love for Paul. She wore a bodice of virgin white, gold-embroidered by the nuns, and the long full skirt of interwoven black and red. Paul sat in the mountain costume from which I had brushed most of the dirt. As I solemnly introduced them, explaining that the woman had no tongue and Paul no sight, Paul rose smiling and said, “But I have speech and your own language, Madame Elsa, and I thank you for your kindness, which is presumptuous of me, but I thank you all the same.”

Elsa bit her lip, seeing them, took both their hands briefly in hers and turned to me.

“You are beautiful tonight,” I said. She wore a long dress of gold lamé.

“So are you,” she said, distinctly embarrassed. I wore my dinner clothes, white jacket.

“Were all our friends at the festival?” I asked.

“All,” she said, and directly to the point: “Colonel Frontis is out of uniform. Helmi pointed him out to me. He’s wearing a dinner jacket, and he walks always near the Princess, as though about to anticipate her slightest need.”

I gave Elsa a package. I had wrapped Webb’s journal in white paper. “I’m going to ask you to keep this for me, Elsa, until I ask for it. If by any chance things go wrong, read it afterwards. It’s Alexander Webb’s journal.”

She was carrying a beaded purse, one that dangled pouchlike from a golden chain. Folded, the package fit, protruding a little at the top. It would do.

“You will be late arriving, Elsa,” I said, “later even than me. Can you drive a Vauxhall?”

“It was made in England. So was I,” she said.

“Thank God for that. It will seem odd, your driving up dressed like that, but when your passengers get out with you, it will be distraction enough.”

I had driven past and around the Chaconis residence, returning to Ioannina. It was one of the few great houses left from Byron’s time. The party would be in the garden which was hung with lanterns, the reception of guests first on the balcony to which there were two outside stairways in the Epirot style.

“We shall go in a few minutes now,” I went on. “We’ll find a place for you to wait in the car with Maria and Paul. I must go in directly and choose my time to reintroduce myself to the former Mrs. Webb.

“The entertainers are due at midnight. You will see them entering the gate, but you will wait and listen. When the singing commences, drive up to the gate. Someone will take the car, I’m sure. Otherwise just leave it. Maria will lead Paul in and find him a place near the singers….” Maria was holding Paul’s hand.

“Yes,” Paul said. “It is understood.”

“And I will come to you, Elsa, as quickly as I can.”

“And God be with us all,” Elsa said.

The limousines were still arriving when we neared the Chaconis house. A policeman waved us on. I hadn’t counted on that, foolishly, nor on the security men we could spot stationed around the block

“They’re parking cars in the schoolyard,” Elsa said. “It’s only eleven-thirty. We had better drive in with the rest and choose our own place. If Maria and Paul can wait, I’ll go in with you and come back to them when the entertainers arrive.”

Paul agreed. Waiting in the front seat, Elsa might have attracted attention.

No one paid us the slightest heed. I parked the Vauxhall near the street between two cars so that there was no room on either side for another. We sat in silence, listening, when I cut the motor. The murmur of voices, talk and laughter, carried across the street, even the tinkle of glassware. Singing would be clearly audible.

Paul said, “Perhaps, Madame Elsa, you will not need to come for us at all.”

“I shall come just to make sure you are admitted. I have command if I need to use it.”

“Paul,” I said, my last council, “be brief.”

“Brief—and eloquent. But who will understand me? I shall be speaking the language of the people.”

“You will be understood,” I said. “It is the language also of poets and you are not the only poet in modern Greece. I can say this because we are as brothers, but it is also the truth.”

I clapped my hand on his, and then, touching my fingers to my lips, I reached back and touched them to Maria’s. As Vasso’s mother had done that long ago day of my arrival in Kaléa, Maria caught my hand and kissed it.

The garden was crowded with people, clustered in little groups in that post-theater animation where everyone wants to talk at once. Jewelry sparkled, as did the lips of the women. People coming down the steps from the balcony were met by the waiters with trays of champagne. Helmi and Elena were on the stairs before us, among those waiting to be received. There was the fragrance of sage in the air, and smoke from the open spit where, at the far end of the garden, white-capped cooks were broiling racks of lamb chops.