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were few illegal seafaring missions that the Komarevo had not undertaken in the last three years, and Captain Bela had the pleasing thought that those operations had almost been rehearsals for this, the one major strike that would assure his future. He and his boat had delivered guns to people of every political and criminal persuasion. They had transported passengers without passports from one country to another without benefit of immigration authorities. They had recovered sunken ships and lost cargo that were registered with no insurance company. They had staged funerals at sea at night without the ceremony of the last rites. His employers in Athens had told him that the cargo was gold, held in a special hold off the engine room, that it had to be recovered swiftly and silently, and Captain Ilich Bela knew with cold certainty that a very considerable percentage of that gold would stay with the man who recovered it.
    He indulged in speculation as he watched the Komarevo ’s determined bow cut through the water. An apartment in Nice would be convenient. Those French girls: even a good Communist must bow occasionally to human frailties. He would have to keep the Lamborghini there, of course, for it was one of the minor irritations of revolution that even half a century later it had not lost its puritanical zeal. What was it he always said when his Western friends queried his excellent if expensive tastes? “Comrades, I would dearly love to wear a hair shirt, but they are always so dreadfully cut.” Bela’s slim fingers again checked his cuff, and he was making a mental note to speak to his shirtmaker about sleeve lengths, when the plump young radio operator came puffing up the steps to the bridge.
    Bela took the decoded message from his hand and read it with a slight frown. More to himself than to anyone, he said, “Do we know a Detective Lieutenant Michael Rogo? I can’t imagine that we do. Whoever he is, our friends in Athens are most concerned that he should not appear on the survivors’ list.” The world, as far as Captain Bela was concerned, would be none the worse with one less policeman of any nationality.
    “And tell Anton,” he told the radio operator, “to stand off one hundred meters. We shall board her in the pinnace, and he is to hold that distance until our return.”
    Captain Bela raised the binoculars once again. No, there was nothing on that half-sunken ruin that the Komarevo could not handle, and although the smooth young Bulgarian had many reservations about the Americans as a people they did occasionally find exactly the right phrase for a situation.
    “Like shooting fish in a rain barrel,” he said aloud, and the Komarevo, its engines drumming solidly, a plume of black smoke lying behind in the windless air, headed for the scene.
    The tired figures around the table in the Athens office stood to attention when Stasiris came bustling into the room. They had been there over six hours now. Jackets were off, ties undone, and dress shirts were rumpled and stained. Their faces, without exception, were drawn with weariness and distress.
    “Gentlemen, we have news.” Stasiris wagged a sheaf of wire messages.
    “Has it sunk?” The questioner did not attempt to conceal his hope.
    “I fear not,” Stasiris replied. “The Poseidon is still afloat, down by the bow, keel up, about two-thirds submerged.”
    The questioner dropped his head into his hands.
    “There are other developments.” Stasiris continued in his impersonal, businesslike manner. “Three of the survivors have returned to the wreck.”
    “Returned?” Several voices repeated the same word.
    The president looked around the group. “One of them . . .” he consulted a paper, “. . . a detective lieutenant of the New York police named Michael Rogo, and two other men.”
    The bleary-eyed faces were blank with astonishment. “Why?” one member asked. “Why did they go back?”
    Stasiris’ upturned palms showed he had no answer.