Jack Higgins by Night Judgement at Sinos

“This is quite a boat you’ve got here. I’m impressed.”
    I responded because it seemed the thing to do. “The best around for her size. Built by Akerboon about six years ago. Steel hull, twin-screw.”
    We kept it technical for a while. I showed him the engines and then we went up top to the wheelhouse and he had a look at the controls.
    Sara followed us and sat on the stern rail looking out across the harbour. She had tied a scarf around her headand was wearing sunglasses of a style particularly in vogue that year. Very large, so that virtually half the face was covered. The whole combined to give her a strange remote air.
    It was not that she had turned inwards on herself. No, it was more than that. It was as if she had stepped to one side quite deliberately, putting herself on the outside looking in. In some curious way she seemed to be waiting for something, though God knows what it could be and for some reason, I shivered in spite of the warmth.
    Aleko offered her another cigarette, As she took it, I heard him ask her in a low voice if she was feeling all right. I couldn’t catch what she said in reply, but she definitely wasn’t pleased.
    He turned with that great, fixed smile of his on his face. “I understand you’re making a living out of sponge diving at the moment?”
    I wondered who he’d been asking, but let it go. “Of a sort. It isn’t what it was in the old days.”
    â€œSo I believe. I should have thought there would have been more lucrative openings for a man of your talents.”
    I kept pace with him all the way. “Such as?”
    He smiled, a different smile this time, the smile on the face of the tiger just before the kill, but didn’t attempt to give me an answer.
    Instead, he said, “We’d be happy to have you dine with us tonight on board the Firebird , Mr. Savage. Seven-thirty, or would that be too early for you?”
    I told him that would be fine by me and he said he’d send a boat for me. He put a hand under her elbow and brought her to her feet.
    â€œTill tonight, then.”
    She didn’t even nod and they went off along the jettytogether. I watched her all the way to the end, the way her hips moved, the slant of her shoulders, the tilt of her head. Strange, but I could tell she was angry about something just by looking at her.
    My guts ached and not from belly hunger. No, it was something else I needed—needed and wanted with a fierceness I had forgotten existed.
    I went below, got a bottle from my private stock, found a glass and some ice and poured myself a large one. There was a fair view of the beach through the nearest porthole. Several children played tig in and out of the caicques which were drawn up out of the water and there was still plenty of net mending going on.
    Aleko and Sara Hamilton came into view walking close together just above the water-line. He still had a hand under her elbow, but quite suddenly, she pulled free of him. They stood there talking for a second or two, or to be more accurate, arguing. Yes, they were very definitely having one hell of a row. She ended it by walking away from him. He didn’t attempt to stop her; simply turned and went off in the other direction.
    I sat at the table, gazing morosely into the bottom of my glass. It was very, very quiet, the children’s voices remote and far away, an echo from another world.
    â€œWhat do you see?” she said from the doorway. “Past, present or future?”
    â€œThe present,” I said. “That’s all there is.”
    â€œNo future?”
    â€œNot in my line of country. I won’t make old bones as my granda used to say. What happened to Morg?”
    â€œDimitri gave him a couple of hundred drachmae . Told him to go and have a drink.”
    â€œEnough to keep him full for a week. Very generousof your Mr. Aleko. What goes on between you two?’
    â€œDo you mean how much time do we