The Dark Side of the Island. Jack Higgins
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JACK
HIGGINS
THE DARK SIDE OF
THE ISLAND
Contents
Publisher’s Note
Foreword
Book One: The Long Return
Chapter 1 - On Kyros, Nothing Changes
Chapter 2 - A Man Called Alexias
Chapter 3 - Two Candles for St Katherine
Chapter 4 - The Bronze Achilles
Book Two: The Nightcomer
Chapter 5 - Cover of Darkness
Chapter 6 - A Willingness to Kill
Chapter 7 - Of Action and Passion
Chapter 8 - ‘The Little Ship’
Chapter 9 - Temple of the Night
Chapter 10 - Fire on the Mountain
Chapter 11 - No Hard Feelings, Captain Lomax
Book Three: A Sound of Hunting
Chapter 12 - One Should Never Return to Anything
Chapter 13 - To the Other
Chapter 14 - A Fine Night for Dying
Chapter 15 - A Prospect of Gallows
Chapter 16 - The Run for Cover
Chapter 17 - Confessional
Chapter 18 - Dust and Ashes
Also by Jack Higgins
Copyright
Publisher’s Note
The Dark Side Of The Island was first published in the UK by John Long in 1963 and later by Signet in 1997. It was originally published under the name of Harry Patterson, an author who later became known to millions as Jack Higgins.
This amazing novel has been out of print for some years, and in 2010, it seemed to the author and his publishers that it was a pity to leave such a good story languishing on his shelves. So we are delighted to be able to bring back The Dark Side Of The Island for the pleasure of the vast majority of us who never had a chance to read the earlier editions.
Foreword
One of my earliest forays into the Second World War. A holiday spent visiting the Greek islands and my discovery of the undercover work there by the SAS in its earliest years gave me the idea for a thriller which has the hero return to the island that had been the scene of his most brilliant exploit, only to find that the local people believe him a traitor and responsible for the executions of many partisans. In a way it is a whodunit, as he tries not only to stay alive but to find out who was really responsible.
Book One
The Long Return
Chapter 1
On Kyros, Nothing Changes
Lomax lay on the narrow bunk in the airless cabin, stripped to the waist, his body drenched in sweat, and stared up at the stained and peeling ceiling.
Looked at long enough, it became a pretty fair map of the Aegean. He worked his way down from Athens through the Cyclades to the larger mass that was Crete, but where Kyros should have been there was only an empty expanse of sea. For some reason it made him feel curiously uneasy and he swung his legs to the floor.
He got up, splashed water into the cracked basin that stood beneath the mirror beside the bunk and washed the sweat from his body. His shoulders were solid with muscle, his body bronzed and fit, and somehow the ugly puckered scar of the old bullet wound beneath his left breast looked sinister and out of place.
As he dried himself, a stranger stared out of the mirror. A man with skin stretched tightly over prominent cheekbones and dark, sombre eyes that examined the world with a curiously remote expression he could no longer analyse, even to himself.
As he reached for his shirt, the cabin door opened and the steward looked in. ‘Kyros in half an hour, Mr Lomax,’ he said in Greek.
The door closed behind him and for the first time Lomax was conscious of a faint stirring of excitement, a cold finger that seemed to touch him somewhere inside. He pulled on his linen jacket and went out on deck.
As he stood at the rail watching Kyros grad-u ally rise out of the sea, Captain Papademos emerged from the deck-house and paused beside him. He was heavily built and almost blackened by the sun, his face seamed with wrinkles.
He put a match to his pipe. ‘It’s difficult in this heat haze, but if you look carefully you can see Crete in the distance. Quite a view, eh?’
‘Something of an understatement,’ Lomax said.
‘I’ve been everywhere a sailor can go,’ Papademos continued. ‘In the end I found I was only travelling in a circle.’
‘Aren’t we all?’ Lomax said.
He took out a cigarette and Papademos gave him a light. ‘For an Englishman you speak pretty good Greek. The best I’ve heard from a foreigner. You’ve been out here before?’
Lomax nodded. ‘A long time ago. Before the flood.’
Papademos looked puzzled for a moment and then his face cleared. ‘Ah, now I see it. You were in the islands during the war.’
‘That’s right,’ Lomax said. ‘Working in Crete with the E.O.K. mostly.’
‘So?’ Papademos nodded, serious for a moment. ‘Those were hard times for all of us. The people of these islands don’t forget how much the English helped. Have you been back before?’
Lomax shook his head. ‘Never felt like it. In any case, I always seemed to have something more important to do. You know how it is.’
‘Life, my friend, she grips us by the throat.’ Papademos nodded sagely. ‘But seventeen years is a long time. A man changes.’
‘Everybody changes,’ Lomax said.
‘Maybe you’ve got a point there, but why Kyros? I could think of better places.’
‘There are some people I want to look up if they’re still around,’ Lomax said. ‘I’d like to see if they’ve changed too. Afterwards, I’ll move on to Crete and Rhodes.’
‘On Kyros nothing changes.’ Papademos spat down into the water. ‘Ten years I’ve been making this trip and they still treat me as if I’ve got the plague.’
Lomax shrugged. ‘Maybe they just don’t like strangers.’
Papademos shook his head. ‘They don’t like anybody. You sure you’ve got friends there?’
‘I hope so.’
‘So do I. If you haven’t, you’re in for a pretty thin time and you’ll be stuck for a week until I call again.’
‘I’ll take my chances.’
Papademos knocked the ash from his pipe on the rail. ‘We’ll be here for four