Decision at Delphi by Helen MacInnes Read Free Book Online Page A

side, he headed grimly for a door that might lead to the street. A voice said, “Hi, Ken! You look like a man who could use a third hand.” It was Steve Kladas.
    Strang said slowly, “What the hell are you doing here?”
    Steve grinned happily. His blunt-featured, rugged face, olive-complexioned, looked as if a ravine of white rock had suddenly split the furrowed surface of light-brown earth. His thick black hair, usually carefully combed, was ruffled by the wind. His raincoat glistened. But his fine dark eyes, almost as black as his hair, sparkled with delight. Surprises were his speciality. “That’s a nice way to welcome a friend.” His voice and manner were completely American, which was not surprising, since he had been born in Philadelphia, and had lived there for the first twelve years of his life, until his family had decided to return to Greece. “Hand over!” he said, and took a firm hold of hisown case, and—almost as an afterthought—the brief case. “What’s in here?” he asked. “Rocks?” He pretended to stagger and then brushed aside a porter, who, no longer needed, had suddenly appeared, with a short flow of ungrammatical but understandable Italian. He told Strang, “It’s only a few steps down to the street.” He wasn’t tall, a full head shorter than Strang, but he used his shoulders—he had become fairly thick-set in the last few years—to push his way through the groups of small, thin men loitering around the door. “No,” he snapped at one whispering character with the usual furtive hand holding out three fountain pens, “we don’t want anything. Go away!” The effect of that last simple phrase was magic. “At first I tried a few Italian curses. That just made these guys all the more eager. Then a waiter told me to say ‘Go away!’ That’s all. And boy, do they go away! It’s the final insult. Can you figure that out?” He gave his short, deep-chested laugh, and then went on talking in his usual torrent of words. “Got your nose sun-stripped, I see. Don’t tell me you found any warm weather on that damned Atlantic.”
    “It could have been worse. In fact, there were a couple of days when we could even go swimming.” But Steve wasn’t really listening. They had come out on to a street that was almost dark—perhaps dusk came early to Naples at this time of year, or maybe the black clouds were swallowing up the city— with the shimmers of scattered street lights reflected on the soaked pavement. Gusts of wind ripped off hats while tourists and short-order porters searched for taxis.
    “There’s one thing I won’t do,” Strang said firmly, remembering Steve’s sometimes irritating sense of economy. “I am not going to walk to the hotel.”
    “Now, now,” said Steve, “I’ve got a cab waiting, just across the street. Cost me two good American dollars.” He led the way at a half-run. “If he’s gone, I’ll spend tomorrow morning searching for the son of a bitch.”
    And he would, Strang had little doubt. “Why not tomorrow afternoon, too?” he asked with a grin as he followed Steve over the hard surface of stone blocks, slippery with rain.
    “Because I leave for Taormina then,” Steve said crisply. “There he is!” His cabdriver was yelling at them to run, while he struggled to keep his taxi door closed against the strong pull of a porter’s right arm. “Sorry, lady, the cab is taken. This gentleman has urgent business at the American Consulate,” Steve said to a tourist who had been standing hopefully behind the porter, and settled the question of who was going to open the door by dropping the brief case smartly down on the porter’s arm. “In!” he told Strang. Strang had recognised the dismayed round face of the pink-cheeked lady, now retreating. “Just a minute, Steve—”
    “In!” Steve gave a shove with his shoulders, and Strang was in. Steve followed, slammed the door, just missing the porter’s fingers. “Do you know how long it took