"You killed him?"
"He was shooting, at Eva and me. Very unsociable." He glanced toward the back of the darkened room. "Zeno, our party guest tonight was—you're not going to believe this— a Japanese hood. Tell me something. Is the Yakuza trying to get a foothold in Crete? You know, maybe buying up property? That's their usual style. It's more or less how they first moved in on Hawaii."
"Michael, this country is so poor, there's nothing here for gangsters to steal." He laughed. "Let me tell you a secret. If a stranger came around here and tried to muscle me, or any of my friends, he would not live to see the sun tomorrow. Even the Sicilian Cosa Nostra is afraid of us. Crete is still a small village in many ways, in spite of the crazy tourists. We tolerate strangers, even open our homes to them if they are well behaved, but we know each other's secrets like a family. So, to answer your question, the idea of a Japanese syndicate coming here is impossible to imagine. You know that as well as I do."
"That's what I thought. But I saw a kobun from the biggest Yakuza organization in Japan tonight. I know because I had a little tango with their godfather a few years back. Anyway, what's one of his street men doing here, shooting at Eva and me?" He paused as the implications of the night began to sink in. "This scene could start to get rough."
"You did nothing more than anybody here would have done." He looked pensive in the dim light. "Years ago, when the colonels and their junta seized Greece, I once had to—" He hesitated. "Sometimes we do things we don't like to talk about afterwards. But you always remember the eyes of a man you must kill. You dream about them."
"Our party lighting was pretty minimal. It was too dark to make out his eyes."
"Then you are luckier than you know." He glanced away. "This was not somebody you knew from another job, Michael? Perhaps the mercenary group you sometimes—"
"Never saw the guy before in my life, swear to God. Anyway, I think it was Eva he really wanted. But whatever's going on, I have to get her out of Crete now, before whoever it is finds her again."
"I agree." He was turning toward the living quarters in the rear. "You should stay here tonight, and then tomorrow we can get you both passage on the car ferry to Athens, off the island. I will take care of everything. Tickets, all of it." He returned carrying two tumblers of raki. After setting them on the table, he continued. "I am very worried for her, Michael. And for you. We all make enemies, but—" He took a sip from his glass. "By the way, do you have a pistol?"
"Not with me." He reached for the glass, wishing it was tequila—straight, with a twist of lime—and he was back on the Ulysses, trimming the genoa. "That's a mistake I may not make again soon."