Luc Girard was already there, as were Agent Bondurant, Officer Villas, and Sophie. Sophie looked alert now, greeting me with a little wave. We pulled a couple of chairs around, making a sort of conversation circle. Chief Letsos was conspicuous by his elsewhereness.
Bondurant spoke first. “It’s a bit out of order, I know, having Mrs. Lamb with us, but Captain Quattrocchi and I felt that, although she was mentioned as having possibly had something to do with the placement of George Gaskill’s watch on the floor of Miss Benson’s closet . . .” He paused for breath and looked toward Sophie. “Mrs. Lamb has nevertheless become the target of certain denizens of the smuggling underground, and that’s what we’re here to talk about.
“The funeral of Nikos Papadakos was held today, as you all know, and Dimitris—Officer Villas—and I attended. Although Papadakos had never been suspected before, he did come from an area that’s a known source of smuggled artifacts. Dr. Girard has even given me the name of a man he knows is involved, and he lives in Papadakos’s village.”
Luc Girard nodded, his hands tented beneath his chin.
Our only suspect in the murder, so far, has been an American passenger named Nigel Endicott, and that’s because a shop owner in Mykonos picked his photo as the most likely buyer of the knife that we think probably was the one used to kill Papadakos.”
“It is not a lot to go on,” Marco said.
“Exactly. And we can find no connection between Endicott and Papadakos, between Endicott and antiquities, smuggling, Mykonos, photography, or anything else. He has no criminal record. He is a retired insurance adjuster and a widower who has recently moved from New York to Vermont. But we mustn’t forget this happened on the island of Mykonos, and it may have nothing to do with this ship. Dimitris? Would you talk about that?”
Officer Villas said, “There is not much to tell. We have talked to a hundred people on the island. Everyone known to have been in that part of Little Venice that day, all the usual suspects, as you Americans say.” He nodded at Bondurant. “And we have come up with nothing. No one we have questioned seems to have ever heard of Nikos Papadakos, in spite of the fact that he has been on the island fifty times in the last two years.
“We have also considered the possibility the killer may have been someone from his own homeland, Crete, but there is simply no way to check that. Boats, ferries, small planes, come and go between Mykonos and Crete every day. Unless someone comes forward and tells us ‘I saw this man who I know is from Crete and he was talking to Papadakos,’ we have no way to follow up.”
Bondurant looked around at all of us and said, “Right. Now let’s talk about the artifacts on this ship that, thanks to Mrs. Lamb and Dr. Girard, we now know are stolen. How many of them are there and how did they get here? This is a subject Captain Quattrocchi and I have both been investigating for some time. Dr. Girard, be specific. How many stolen items are we talking about?”
Luc Girard, who had been staring unabashedly at Sophie throughout the whole discussion of Papadakos’s murder, blinked as if surprised to find himself here. “There is the Panathenaic amphora, of course. The big vessel on display in the Zeus deck bar. It was stolen from a museum on the Greek mainland and it’s very important because it dates from the earliest Athenian games. Then there is the gold serpent bracelet that, until yesterday, was on display in the case outside the main dining room. It’s been stolen again, and a similar-looking copy has been put in its place.”
Marco interrupted to ask him several questions about the bracelet. He had been in Italy when the theft occurred and knew nothing about it.
“There is a stone-and-gilt bull’s head attached to a wooden block for display purposes,” Girard continued. “It’s near the embarkation door on the Athena deck. It was stolen from the Iráklion museum some five years ago. And finally, there is a red-figure krater, a two-handled bowl, in the case near the entrance to the show lounge. It is about . . .” With his hands, Girard indicated it was about as large as a carry-on bag. “It is beautiful. It was stolen from a well-known private collection. So there are four items we know for certain were stolen and one of them, the bracelet, has been stolen again.”
Bondurant turned to Marco. “Captain Quattrocchi, as I think you all know, has made a quick trip to Milan to check the Carabinieri files on known antiquities smugglers. Captain?”
Marco said, “It rang a bell in my head when Mr. Bondurant told us the address of Brittany Benson. All of the staff and crew are asked to provide a permanent address for the ship’s records so they can communicate between touring seasons. Brittany Benson gave her address as 1253 rue de Lausanne, Geneva, Switzerland. I thought that sounded familiar and when I checked our files, I found that it is also the address of Robert Segal, the American man who used to operate a huge antiquities exchange in Switzerland.”
“Used to?” Bondurant asked.
“Maybe he still does. We do not know. Interpol and the Swiss police broke up his operation three years ago and raided his warehouse, but he may have set up another. Agent Bondurant also discovered that when Miss Benson moved from Florida to Lima, Peru, she shared a house with the same man, Robert Segal. I think we can safely say she is up to her neck in the smuggling of artifacts.
“Mrs. Lamb says she saw Miss Benson talking on her mobile phone this morning as the funeral line was forming on the dock and Miss Benson seemed very upset. I have said to the Iráklion police this could be how the almost-assassin of Mrs. Lamb and Miss Antonakos knew where to find them.”
Marco turned to Sophie who must have been nodding off because her head jerked up when he said, “Sophie, you will probably need to return to Crete to testify in a few months. Mrs. Lamb and I will be leaving Greece in a few days, and you will be the only witness left to testify against the man who kidnapped and shot at you.”
“And I also need to write a formal statement, Dotsy told me. May I fax it to them?”
“I do not know. Perhaps you should do nothing until they contact you.”
This was getting tedious, I thought. We had too many bits and pieces that didn’t seem to have anything to do with one another. I’d heard unsolved mysteries described as jigsaw puzzles, but if this mess were a puzzle, what would the picture on the box look like? We’d got murder and smuggling, accusations of rape, stalking, late-night phone calls, secret meetings, theft, revenge, hatred, greed, and poker. The picture on the box in my mind looked like Picasso’s Guernica. A mish-mash of slaughter and swords and severed legs and horse’s heads. The fact that we also had four law enforcement bodies—if you could count ship security, Chief Letsos et al., as law enforcement—with their fingers in this pie made things even worse. If only someone could tell us which of these bits and pieces were key and which didn’t matter so much. I tuned back in to what Bondurant was saying.
“Chief Letsos followed the group that went to the Palace of Knossos today, while Dimitris and I were attending the funeral. We split up that way deliberately so we could see who was interested enough in Papadakos to go to his funeral and also keep an eye on our other persons of interest.” The FBI man looked at the policeman from Mykonos and, almost grinning, said, “That’s another American cop phrase for you, Dimitris. Person of interest.”
It occurred to me these two men had forged a friendship. They’d met only three days ago, but had worked together almost constantly since then.
“Letsos watched Ollie Osgood and Malcolm Stone throughout the tour and saw nothing unusual, but Nigel Endicott was there as well. He was a good boy all day, too. We’d like to find the brightly colored shirt he was wearing when he got his embarkation photo made. It was that shirt or one similar to it that caused the knife shop owner to pick out his photo. Unfortunately, the shop owner claims to be color-blind, and we don’t know what sort of shirt Mr. Endicott was wearing while he was ashore in Mykonos anyway, but the shirt he was wearing in the photo has mysteriously disappeared. Would that be because it was spattered with blood? We asked him to show us the shirt and we searched his
room. He says he thinks he sent it to be laundered but the ship’s laundry doesn’t have it. So in Rhodes yesterday I followed Endicott to the Turkish bath and managed to check out the contents of the backpack he was toting. I thought he might be trying to get rid of the shirt by leaving it at the bath, but I was wrong. Towels and clean underwear. No shirt.”
It was way past time for me to tell them about what I’d overheard between Kathryn and Nigel. I only hoped I could tell the story without inferring more than was there. “Excuse me, but I must tell you that last night, Kathryn Gaskill was in Nigel Endicott’s stateroom. I happened to walk by on the promenade and I recognized her voice through the open window. She didn’t see me, I’m sure, because the light would have been in her eyes.” Plus, I was hiding against the bulkhead, but I didn’t mention that. “Now, I know I could be misinterpreting it, but he was holding her. They had their arms around each other. Of course, he might simply have been comforting her over the loss of her husband. It’s what I heard her say that really bothered me.”
“And that was?”
“She said, ‘It had to be done.’”
“What did Endicott say?”
“That’s all I heard. ‘It had to be done.’”
Bondurant exhaled and rose from his chair. “Well, I hope something breaks loose soon. In two more days the ship will be back in Athens and our suspects will scatter to the four winds, because we don’t have enough evidence to hold anyone.”
* * * * *
Luc Girard caught up with Marco and me on the promenade deck when the meeting broke up. “Would either or both of you like to go to Akrotiri with me tomorrow? I could give you a special tour and show you some things they don’t usually let tourists see.”
A special tour sounded wonderful to me, and Marco, who, I imagined, didn’t even know what Akrotiri was, said he’d like to go, too. We agreed to meet tomorrow when the ship docked in Santorini. It was only ten o’clock but I was exhausted, so I asked Marco to walk me to my room.
I asked him to come in because I wanted to show him the contact lens I’d discovered. I expected to find my water glass on top of the TV but found only a fresh, clean one on the bathroom sink. Then I remembered pouring the water out through my fingers and examining the jelly-like disc that remained in my hand. What had I done with the lens? Oh, yes. I’d stuck it back on top of the TV. I ran my hand across the top of the wall-mounted set and the lens, now returned to its desiccated state, popped off.
“I found this in the little unisex bathroom at the end of the hall while you were out on the deck examining the pool of blood.”
“Why did you think it was worth saving?” Marco leaned over my shoulder and took it from me. I felt his warm chest against my back. The lens on the tip of his index finger, he put his other hand on my waist.
“It probably wasn’t. It’s just that the bathroom was so clean. It smelled of pine, as if it had been scoured a few minutes earlier. It seemed like this thing couldn’t have been there long or the cleaner would have wiped it off.”
“Did George Gaskill wear contact lenses?” Marco stuck the silly thing on my dressing table and turned me around to face him.
“I don’t know.”
He kissed me. A long, slow kiss that now seemed to have lost its threat. I knew the threat had been completely and totally in my own head all along and had nothing to do with Marco. It was my problem. To shift this burden onto Marco, a good man, was simply wrong. I let myself enjoy the kiss. Except for the whiskers! He hadn’t shaved for two days and his chin felt like sandpaper. It was sweet of him, deciding to grow his beard back so I’d like him again, but this could get painful in a few minutes.
“Marco?” I whispered in his ear. “When you decided to regrow your beard, did you throw your razor away?”
“No, it is still in my room.”
“Go and shave. I’ll be here when you get back.”
Chapter Twenty-five
Marco and I joined Lettie and Ollie at their breakfast table. I couldn’t resist the temptation to tease Lettie a little. “Are you ready for the Voodoo Island, Lettie? I’ve heard if you ignore zombies they won’t bother you.”
“Give me a break, Dotsy. I got two words mixed up. So what?”
Ollie explained to Marco, who hadn’t been present for the voodoo discussion, “Lettie thought Santorini was Santeria. It’s a religion in the Caribbean Island that’s also called voodoo. Lettie saw Santorini in the brochure and thought we were going to an island full of zombies.”
Lettie shot a withering look at Ollie and then turned to me. “How are you feeling today, Dotsy?”
“Great! I feel great.”
Marco coughed and quickly covered his mouth with his napkin.
“Your collar bone doesn’t hurt? You’re not wearing your brace,” she said.
“Oh. My collar bone. No, it’s just a little sore.” Now it was my turn to change the subject. “Dr. Girard has offered to take Marco and me to Akrotiri today. That’s a Minoan town on the southern tip of the island. It was uncovered recently after lying buried under volcanic ash for 3,500 years, so the ruins are in great shape—for ruins, that is. Would you two like to come along?”
Lettie and Ollie looked at each other and Lettie answered for both of them. “Thanks, but I’d rather wander the streets and hit a few stores. Ollie wants to locate the fishermen, of course. They may have some sponges he could buy.” Lettie put her hand up beside her mouth as if she were whispering an aside to me and Marco, but continued talking in a voice loud enough for Ollie to hear. “He wants to make sure he buys every sponge in the Mediterranean before we go home.”
The waiter brought my omelet and fruit and replenished everyone’s coffee.
Ollie said, “Have you heard about the procedure for going ashore? You can’t just walk off the boat and into the town because the town’s on top of this huge cliff.” He leaned forward, raising his eyebrows until his forehead wrinkled along a fault line that marked where his hairline used to be. “You can take the cable car, you can take a donkey, or you can walk. But the walk is up five hundred and eighty steps.”
Lettie said, “The donkey sounds like fun, Ollie. Let’s do the donkeys.”
“Sweetheart, the donkey hasn’t been made that can carry me up five hundred and eighty steps. That would constitute cruelty to animals. Plus, my feet would drag! No, dear, I’d need a mule.”
“Or a Clydesdale,” Lettie said.
“I’ll definitely take a cable car,” I said. “My collar bone doesn’t need to risk another tumble like the one I took yesterday.”
Having decided we’d all take the cable car, we finished our breakfast and agreed to meet again later.
* * * * *
On my way to the Poseidon deck to watch for the first glimpses of Santorini, I walked past the Internet café. The attendant must have remembered me from my earlier visit to email my son Charlie, because she waved me inside. As I approached her desk, she disappeared behind it and popped back up with a pink sticky note on her index finger. “You’re Dorothy Lamb, aren’t you? You have mail.”
She led me to a nearby computer. “Came in last night. I’ll pull it up for you.” She clicked through several things, stopped when she got to a screen that had Charlie’s email address on the “from” line, and walked away leaving me alone with my message.
Charlie had kept working at the assignment I’d given him. Since his last message, he had looked further into George Gaskill’s trial for sexual abuse of the minor child, Brittany Benson. “Mom,” he wrote, “everyone I’ve talked to is of the opinion it was a trumped-up charge. I met several school administrators from PA at a conference last summer, so I emailed them and asked if they remembered the case. Now that the furor has died down, all seem to agree Gaskill got railroaded by the Bensons.” Charlie had also attached another photo of George, one that had appeared in the newspaper at the time of the trial.
I asked the woman at the desk to print it for me and a minute later I was looking at a Geo
rge Gaskill ten years younger than the one I had dinner with last week. His hair was different. Of course it would be, wouldn’t it? The thinning hair of a decade ago had been augmented later by a hairpiece. The hairpiece that had floated to the surface and been picked up by the police boat. I was shocked at how much he had aged in the decade between the taking of that photo and his tragic death. I folded the picture and stuck it in my pocket.
No one I recognized was on the Poseidon deck when I walked out, although I had rather expected to find Marco or Luc Girard. Did we say we’d meet on the Poseidon deck or the promenade? I couldn’t remember. I nudged myself a space at the rail and looked to the north as the volcano that was Santorini rose from somewhere beyond the horizon. The morning sun bounced off tiny white cubes, probably houses in the town of Fira, along a section of its summit. I knew from my reading that Santorini was a crescent-shaped island, its hollow center a huge caldera out of which ashes and rock had been blasted in 1450 b.c., blowing most of the island into the stratosphere. Since then, a smaller island or two, still-active volcanoes, had popped up in the middle of the caldera. The tsunami spawned by the 1450 b.c. eruption had wiped out Minoan civilization on Crete, not to mention what the explosion did to life on Santorini.
A man standing beside me at the rail told me that, like the harbor in Patmos, our ship wouldn’t be able to dock, so they’d send tenders out to pick us up and take us to shore. If these tenders were the same size as the ones we’d had in Patmos, they’d be capable of taking one or two hundred people at a time.
I dug in my pocket for my lip balm and felt the photo of George. Was the photo of George and Kathryn, the embarkation photo, back on display in the photo shop? The last time I’d seen it was when Kathryn and I had given it to Demopoulos, Chief Letsos’s young assistant. He’d shown it around in an effort to locate the missing man. I decided to pop back around to the photo shop and compare that picture to the one my son had sent me. The photo shop was one deck down, between the main desk and the show lounge.
Death of an Aegean Queen Page 20
