“It’s time you started to earn your right to live,” said Dietrich in a more measured tone, “since I’ve kept my side of the deal. You see, Lockhart, I am a man of honor, and if you do not prove to be one too—if you betray me—then I only have to cable my friends in the SS, and—well, I don’t need to tell you. Understand?”

Lockhart nodded.

“And I’ll probably burn down a couple of villages too. So you see, Lockhart, you really do have to help me. Fasshauer here will be your liaison man and you will report to him at least once a fortnight. You can discuss the details with him after this.”

Dietrich stood up.

“I’m not going to salute you, Lockhart, but I almost find myself respecting you. Many informers are butchered by the Cretans, so you will have to be careful, very, very careful. In a way, Fasshauer and I are your only friends on this island—remember that. So goodbye, Lockhart, and good luck.”

Dietrich leaned over the desk and held out his hand.

Even as he was shaking it, this small gesture caused Lockhart more pain than any torture ever could.

That night, Lockhart found himself refusing a cigarette from a guard in the back of a truck. They were climbing out of Rethimno, heading for a barren stretch of country where he was to be dropped off unnoticed. He was sandwiched between two guards, and on the bench opposite sat Fasshauer, cradling an MP40 submachine gun, its safety catch off. With the way the truck was lurching and jolting, Lockhart expected a few rounds in his chest at any moment. No doubt that would please Fasshauer, who would tell Dietrich that Lockhart had tried to overpower a guard. Fasshauer cleared his throat.

“So, Lockhart, you’re clear about our arrangements?”

The idiot had been over them repeatedly.

“Yes, Gunther my friend, quite clear,” Lockhart replied brazenly, knowing that with Dietrich’s protection he could revert to his normal cockiness. “I’m to meet you at the Fournare cave outside Patsos at midnight in exactly one week’s time. And if I’m not there then my wife dies and a few villages get burned down.”

Fasshauer looked quietly enraged, but nodded in the darkness.

“Good,” he muttered.

They carried on in silence for another ten minutes. Lockhart was feeling mildly elated at the prospect of freedom, or a semblance of it. All Fasshauer would tell him was that he was going to be dropped off somewhere between the monastery at Veniou and the village of Apostoli. The Germans had it in their heads that the area was thick with andartes, and that Lockhart should have no problems reestablishing contact. The truck would slow down for a bend, and Lockhart would jump out the back.