Spies of the Balkans (35 page)

"The
Bakir?"

"Yes."

"Hmm, too bad, I liked the old
Bakir
. Anyhow, a lot of Greeks are coming out of the country, and a few of them we'll send back. Resistance operations, spy missions, the usual, into occupied Greece. And we want you to run the Smyrna part of that--it's an important job. Ever been there?"

"I haven't."

"Well, there's a big British expatriate community, and you'll find a way to get along with the Turks, no?"

"Of course," Zannis said.

"You'll have to sign a few papers, but there's time for that."

Zannis turned halfway around in the seat, hung his arm over the back, and told Demetria what Kolb had said. "Smyrna, of all places," was her only response, though she took his hand for a moment. A small gesture, for a couple who had indulged themselves in every possible intimacy, but it meant something, that late afternoon in Turkey,
we're safe for the moment, safe from a brutal world, and together
, something like that.

*

On 27 April, 1941, Wehrmacht forces occupied Athens and, at 8:35 that morning, German motorcycle troops appeared at the Acropolis and raised the swastika flag. Some weeks later, at the end of May, two Athenian teenagers slipped past German sentries and took it down.

From the
Tulsa Star-Tribune
, 5 June, 1942:

A new bookstore is coming to town. Two of our newer residents, the sisters Hedy and Frieda Rosenblum, will be opening The Bookmark tomorrow at 46 S. Cheyenne Ave. next to Corky's Downtown Cafe. The Rosenblum sisters, who've been working at the library, were brought to town under the sponsorship of Dr. Harry Gutmann, a local dentist, from New York City. Before that, they managed to escape from Hitler's Nazis and are writing a book about their experiences. The Bookmark will carry all the latest bestsellers and will have a special section for children's books.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

ALAN FURST is widely recognized as the master of the historical spy novel. Now translated into seventeen languages, he is the author of
Night Soldiers, Dark Star, The Polish Officer, The World at Night, Red Gold, Kingdom of Shadows, Blood of Victory, Dark Voyage, The Foreign Correspondent
, and
The Spies of Warsaw
. Born in New York City, he now lives on Long Island. Visit the author's website at
www.alanfurst.net
.

Spies of the Balkans
is a work of fiction. All incidents and dialogue, and all characters with the exception of some well-known historical and public figures, are products of the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real. Where real-life historical or public figures appear, the situations, incidents, and dialogues concerning those persons are entirely fictional and are not intended to depict the actual events or to change the entirely fictional nature of the work. In all other respects, any resemblance to persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

Copyright (c) 2010 by Alan Furst
Map copyright (c) 2010 by Anita Karl and Jim Kemp

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

RANDOM HOUSE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Furst Alan.
Spies of the Balkans : a novel / Alan Furst.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-679-60370-2
1. World War, 1939-1945--Underground movements--Greece--Fiction. 2. Greece--History--1917-1944--Fiction. 3. Thessalonike (Greece)--Fiction.
PS3556.U76S73 2010
813'.54--dc22 2010007755

www.atrandom.com

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