The Mediterranean Caper

“Later,” he murmured, “when our audience has gone home.”

“A most stimulating little scene,” said Zeno impatiently. “Come along, Inspector Zacynthus rapidly loses all compassion when he is kept waiting.”

Zeno dropped about five paces behind the group, holding the automatic at hip level Darius then escorted them across the football field length of the building, up a rickety flight of wooden stairs that led to a hallway, lined on both sides by several doors. Darius paused at the second door on the Left and pushed it open, motioning Pitt and Giordino inside. Teri started to follow but was suddenly halted by a huge barrel of an arm.

“Not you,” Darius grunted.

Pitt whirled around, anger clouding his face. “She stays with us,” he said coldly.

“No need to play rescuing hero,” Zeno said lightly, reinforced with an expression of seriousness. “I promise you, no harm will come to her.”

Pitt studied Zeno’s face carefully, finding no sign of treachery. For some strange reason Pitt experienced a marked degree of trust in his captor.

“I’ll take you at your word,” he growled.

“Don’t worry, Dirk,” Teri threw an icy look at Zeno. “As soon as this stupid inspector, whoever he is, finds out who I am, we’ll all be free of these wretched people.”

Zeno ignored her and nodded at Darius. “Guard our friends here, guard them closely. I suspect they’re very cu

“I'll be alert,” Darius promised confidently. He waited until Zeno and Teri, padding the dusty floor in her bare feet, were gone. Then he closed the door and leaned lazily against it, arms folded across his massive chest.

“Personally speaking,” Giordino muttered, for the first time since the ride from the rains, “I prefer the accommodations at the Hotel San Quentin.” His gaze focused on Darius. “At least the roaches weren’t king size.”

Pitt gri

“If I was to guess,” said Pitt. “I’d say this place was a deserted warehouse.”

“You’re close,” Darius volunteered. “The Germans used this building for an ordnance depot when they occupied the island in forty-two.”

Pitt pulled out a cigarette and casually lit it. To offer Darius a cigarette would have immediately put the brute on his guard. Instead, Pitt took a step backward and began tossing the lighter in the air, each time tossing it a little higher till he noticed Darius following it out of the corner of one eye. Once, twice, four times the lighter sailed into the air. On the fifth toss it fell through Pitt’s fingers and clattered on the floor. He shrugged stupidly and bent down, picking it up.

Pitt charged Darius harder than he had ever charged any halfback, any quarterback, in his Air Force academy days. Lunging forward from a football crouch, his feet dug firmly into the coarse grained wood of the floor, he thrust his head and shoulders like a battering ram, backed with every driving ounce of power his muscular legs and one hundred and ninety pounds could muster. At the instant before impact, he drove upward, catching Darius in the unprotected stomach just above the beltline. It was like ru

In football terminology it was called a ru

Pitt went numb. The shock and the pain that erupted from his arms and neck gave way to utter surprise that any man could not only take such a charge and remain standing but shake it off like a love tap.

Darius pushed him against the wall, slowly bending Pitt’s body, like a vertical pretzel, around an upright support post. The pain really began to come now. Pitt clenched his teeth and stared into Darius’s expressionless face, only a few inches away. His spine felt as if it would snap at any second. His vision began to fade.

Darius just stood there, eyes gleaming, and increased the pressure.

Suddenly the pressure stopped and Pitt dimly perceived Darius staring back, his lips working, fighting for breath. Mutely Darius mouthed an agonized groan and sank to his knees, weaving silently from side to side.

Giordino, blocked by Pitt’s frontal assault, was forced to stand by helplessly till Darius swung sideways, pi

Giordino rebounded off Darius with a tooth loosening jolt and crashed jarringly to the floor, badly stu

It was too late. Darius was the first to recover, triumph etched in every scar of his ugly face. He lunged at Giordino, the great mass of his weight crushing the smaller man beneath him. There was an evil grin on Darius’ face now, a sadistic sign of the violence yet to come. Iron hands clasped together, fingers interlocking, around Giordino’s head and squeezed — squeezed with the unrelenting pressure of a closing vise.

For what seemed like unending seconds Giordino lay inert, fighting off the shooting pain that burst in his skull from the crushing palms. Then he stirred, slowly raised his hands and grabbed Darius around the thumbs and pulled downward. For his size Giordino was strong as an ox, but he was no match for the man who towered above him. Darius, seemingly oblivious to the bone twisting pull, hunched his shoulders and exerted an even greater effort.

Pitt was still on his feet, but just barely. His back was a spreading sea of pain that flowed to every part of his body. Numbly he stared at the murderous scene on the floor. Move you stupid bastard, he screamed to himself, move fast. He clutched the wall with both hands, preparing to launch himself at Darius. Something gave behind him, and he swung around, new hope ablaze in his eyes.

A wall plank had torn loose from the support post and was dangling at a crazy angle, one end still held by rusty nails. Frantically he jerked at it, first one way then the other, until metal fatigue broke the nails and the board, about four feet long and an inch in thickness, tore free from the post. God, if only it wasn’t too late.

Pitt raised the board above his head and, drawing on the last of his ebbing strength, brought it down on the back of Darius’ neck.

Pitt would never again forget the shock of hopelessness and despair that flooded through his mind at that moment as the rotted plank shattered with all the harmless force of a piece of peanut brittle around the giant’s shoulders. Without turning, Darius let loose of Giordino’s temples, giving his victim a brief respite, and struck Pitt with a sweeping backhand blow that caught him in the stomach and sent him reeling across the room to fall limply against the doorway and melt slowly down to the floor.

Somehow, clutching the door knob, Pitt pulled himself to his feet and stood there swaying drunkenly, conscious of nothing, not even the pain, the blood that began to seep through the bandages onto his shirt, and Giordino’s face, now turning blue under the tremendous hands. One more try, he told himself, knowing it would be his last. Pitt’s mind slowed down. The forgotten words of a marine drill sergeant, he once met in a Honolulu. bar, returned and pounded into his brain. “The biggest, toughest, meanest sonovabitch in the world will always go down, and go down fast, from a good swift kick in the balls.”