A Hero for Leanda

visitor aboard. Conway followed him across the deck and down a companionway to a luxuriously appointed saloon. The steward stood back to let him enter, and Conway heard the door close softly behind him.
    A short dark man of about Conway ’s own age advanced quickly to meet him, his hand outstretched. “Mr. Conway!” he said. His handshake was brisk and firm. His brilliant smile suggested more than conventional pleasure. “So my arrangements went smoothly? Good! Well, now, let me introduce myself....” He smiled again, mischievously. “As you spend most of your time at sea, it’s quite possible you may not have heard of me. My name is Victor Metaxas.”
    Conway said “Ah!” drawing out the word. Already, his own presence in St.-Jean-de-Luz seemed less surprising. The casual throwing away—if it should turn out to be that —of five hundred pounds and a two-way air fare was certainly more understandable now. The name of Metaxas was the world’s current synonym for riches. Metaxas was one of the big success figures of his generation—a financial prodigy who, from obscure Levantine beginnings, had built up a vast commercial empire and was now reputed to count his wealth in scores of millions. Everyone, everywhere, had heard of Metaxas.
    Conway said, “There was a radio on my ship. I always kept up pretty well with the news.”
    “Excellent!” Metaxas swiveled a chair round for Conway , held out a gold cigarette case, inquired what he would drink, and poured two shots of whisky from a decanter. “It was very good of you to come all this way to see me .“
    “I had some very material encouragement,” Conway said.
    Metaxas waved that aside. “I hope you had a good trip .“
    “A splendid trip, thank you. I’m still rather breathless. Five knots is my kind of speed.”
    “That’s something that makes me quite envious.... Well, now, to business. I understand, Mr. Conway, that you are a citizen of the Republic of Eire , and that you hold a southern Irish passport. Is that right?”
    “It is.”
    “Do you consider that you owe any allegiance at all to — England ?”
    “Indeed I do not.”
    “Would you have any objection to—shall we say, embarrassing—the British government?”
    Conway gave a huge grin. “I’d have no great objection to embarrassing any government!”
    “Well, that clears the air.... Now let me tell you what’s in my mind.” Metaxas got up and began to pace to and fro across the saloon. “I am, myself, a native of the island of Spyros . You know, of course, that Spyros is an English colony. You know, too, that for some years it has been engaged in a bitter struggle for its independence.”
    “Sure.”
    “You’ve probably heard the name of Alexander Kastella, the political leader of the liberation movement?”
    “I have.”
    “You know that he was arrested by the English some months ago and deported to the island of Heureuse in the Indian Ocean ?”
    Slowly, Conway nodded.
    “Well, Mr. Conway, what I want you to do is sail to Heureuse in your yacht and recover Kastella for us!”
    For a moment, Conway just stared. Then he said, “But I have no yacht.” It seemed as good a starting point as any.
    “A yacht would be provided.”
    Conway studied the dark, boyishly eager face. “It sounds quite an enterprise!”
    “It would be quite an enterprise. Heureuse is a thousand miles from the nearest land. But then you are used to sailing great distances.”
    “I wasn’t thinking of the distance. I was thinking of the very good chance I’d have of spending the next year or two in a British jail. I enjoy my freedom.”
    “Naturally there would be risks,” Metaxas said. “But there would also be danger money. This is my proposition. The moment you agreed to undertake the mission, you would receive a thousand pounds. The day before you sailed you would receive a second thousand pounds. The day you landed Kastella safely at an agreed spot, I would pay a further sum into any bank you cared to name. You would have to trust me over that, but anyone who has done business with me will tell you that I invariably honor my word. The sum I have in mind is—twenty thousand pounds.”
    Conway looked at him incredulously. “Twenty thousand... !”
    Metaxas smiled. “When I was a very small boy, Mr. Conway, I used to clean the shoes of tourists outside a hotel in Spyros. Those who paid me the best had the brightest shoes. I am a strong believer in incentives. Judiciously graduated