The Angry Hills by Leon Uris Page A

were a crazy man.
    “You do not like the girl? She has done something wrong?”
    “I like her very much.”
    “Then why send her back to Dernica?”
    “Well—the fact is, I like her—well, maybe too much. It is a rather delicate situation. Well, look at it this way. You’re a man. You know how things might happen. You see, I like you very much, Christos, and I wouldn’t want to bring anyone any unhappiness.”
    “Jay, you talk like one damned fool.”
    “Well, what I’m actually trying to say—it might lead to complications if she stays.”
    “Complications! You say you like her?”
    “Yes—but...”
    “She wants to stay. You like her—settled, she stays!” Then, as an afterthought, Christos added, “Besides, my poor wife, Melpo, has been working too hard.” This was the first time he had so much as acknowledged Melpo existed.
    The two men stared at each other for several moments like stubborn roosters. Mike was disturbed by Christos’ sly fox act.
    “Why don’t you go out and watch the dancers, Jay? Eleftheria wants to teach you the syrtos so you can dance too.... You like to dance?”
    Mike shoved the chair back and stomped from the room. Christos looked after him with a childlike smile.
    In the middle of the night Mike awoke in a cold sweat, his heart racing. He flung off the covers and walked to the window. He calmed down after awhile as he shook off the nightmare. For many moments he stared down the street of the sleeping village. In the next room he could hear Christos and Melpo snoring in rhythm. From the window he could see the barn where Eleftheria slept. He visualized her there on a cot and his mind traced every line of her soft body.
    He spun away from the window in anger. He had allowed himself to be lulled into a fool’s paradise. He was angry because he knew, deep inside him, that he did not want to leave Paleachora. Yes, Paleachora had become like an irresistible lure.
    But in his nightmare the names of seventeen men had rumbled through his mind in the form of a roaring train and the click clack of the wheels said—Dr. Harry Thackery—Dr. Harry Thackery—Dr. Harry Thackery. Suddenly the train was in San Francisco Bay enshrouded in fog and he heard the voices of his children, Jay and Lynn, call in desperation from the water, “Daddy—Daddy—Daddy...”
    Mike Morrison was trapped in heaven and he was angry. Christos hadn’t fully played out his hand, but Mike surmised what was coming. Without the help of Christos, Mike was powerless unless he was willing to risk a walk of two hundred kilometers to Athens. Strange land, no travel pass, no personal papers, no friends. The odds would be crushing. Too crushing a risk for the Stergiou list. On the other hand, he could not press Christos into unfriendliness.
    There was still another part of Mike’s dream. A far-off chorus whispering, “They’ll find you—they’ll find you—they’ll find you...” Mike was frightened. He knew full well that each day in Paleachora brought Heilser closer. The German was not sleeping either and sooner or later a trail would bring him to the village.
    Mike thought it through carefully and decided to give Christos another few days to calm down from this evening’s fencing. Then he’d have to press Christos, even at the risk of daring the journey to Athens by foot.
    He looked from the window once more to the stable where Eleftheria slept. Then he climbed into the huge bed over the oven and pulled up the covers. He lay on his back and stared at the blackness and heard the sounds of Melpo and Christos snoring. He could not sleep.
    Konrad Heilser sipped his Scotch and water and lit another cigarette. The fat Greek, Zervos, sat next to him, rumpled and drowsy. Heilser looked across the broad polished table at the defiant fisherman named Maxos.
    Maxos glared back at Heilser. His bulging muscles rippled through a tight-knit navy-blue sweater. His massive arms were almost black from years of whipping winds and