The Silver Stain am-4

by Paul Johnston

  If Stavrakakis knew who Cara was, he didn’t show it as he outlined Maria’s injuries. The wounds on her feet had been dressed by the surgical team — they were fairly severe and she wouldn’t be able to walk for several days. A full set of tests was also being carried out.

  ‘I would like to ask how your assistant, friend, got into this state.’

  ‘Mr Mavros here found her.’ Cara stopped speaking abruptly, passing the baton to him.

  He described Maria’s disappearance and her downhill flight, but said nothing about the location or the clash with the villagers.

  ‘You see,’ the neurologist said, ‘I’ve examined the patient closely and can see no sign of a head wound — though obviously an MRI scan will confirm that. Do you know of any reason for her silence? She has not said a word to anyone and we have tried both English and Greek. I take it from her name that she has Greek heritage.’

  Cara nodded. ‘But, as far as I know, she doesn’t know the language and this is her first time in Greece.’

  ‘I’ll ensure that English is the sole language used. I understand you are filming out at Maleme.’

  So he had recognized the actress, Mavros thought.

  ‘Maleme and neighbouring areas, yes.’

  ‘And it’s a war film. I wonder if anything could have shocked her into this condition. Has she been near explosions or suchlike?’

  Cara shook her head. ‘Nothing like that. We’ve been doing pre-invasion scenes so far. It’s only today that the aircraft are flying for the first time.’

  ‘Did she seem normal before she disappeared?’ the doctor asked. ‘And why did she disappear?’

  ‘She was completely all right,’ the actress said. ‘Busy, as we always are on a shoot, but not unduly pressured.’ She didn’t offer any more information.

  Stavrakakis turned to Mavros. ‘So we don’t know why she disappeared?’

  ‘She was seen walking out of the Heavenly Blue resort on Sunday evening. We don’t know where she was until I picked her up today.’

  ‘And you are. .?’

  ‘Alex Mavros, a member of the production team,’ Cara put in.

  The doctor nodded. ‘Very well. I will let you know when I have news.’ He left the room.

  Mavros looked at the actress. ‘A member of the production team?’ he asked, with a smile. ‘Rosie Yellenberg wanted me on the plane back to Athens tonight.’

  ‘Rosie’s a coin-counter,’ Cara scoffed. ‘Do you think this case is over?’

  Mavros shook his head.

  ‘Good,’ she agreed. ‘I need to know what happened to Maria. Until she comes back to herself, I want you to keep on it.’

  ‘OK,’ he said, not sounding over-enthusiastic. ‘Ms Yellenberg did say that I could stay as long as I like since I found Maria.’

  ‘I’ll bet she did,’ Cara said sharply. ‘She wants me back at work.’

  ‘Are you going to oblige?’

  ‘Can’t really say no now, can I? But I’ll stay here for the rest of today. I want to see Maria and assure her that everything’s all right.’

  Mavros looked out of the window. Mikis and his friends were crowded round the Range Rover across the road.

  ‘I don’t think you should stay here alone,’ he said.

  Then the door opened and Rosie Yellenberg walked in.

  ‘Go get ’em, tiger,’ Cara Parks said, with a surprisingly warm smile.

  He left the women to it.

  ‘Shit!’

  Mavros ducked as a Messerschmitt 109 with Luftwaffe markings screamed overhead, only a few metres above the electricity poles. He watched as it streaked towards the airfield, where a Junkers 52 troop carrier was manoeuvring in a cloud of dust.

  Mikis had left him at the entrance to Maleme aerodrome and gone back to the resort to talk to his father. The security guys on the gate let him through when he showed the plastic-covered card he’d been given by Alice Quincy.

  ‘Where’s Mr Jennet?’ he shouted, as the fighter came back to make a second pass.

  The guard pointed to a group of people at the far end of the runway from the modern buildings. ‘You can wait for a lift or take a papaki.’ He indicated a row of ‘little ducks’ — Honda 50s.

  Mavros hated all forms of mechanized two-wheel transport, but in this case he was prepared to make an exception. It was hot and he didn’t want to wait in the sunlight. Mounting the contraption, he was pleasantly surprised to find that he remembered how to start it and even change gear — like every Greek boy, he had messed around with them before becoming heartily sick of the racket from shot exhausts.

  He made it to the crowd in a few minutes. There was a large amount of equipment spread around — not only cameras, but generators, screens and numerous other things he didn’t know the name or purpose of. Then he saw a line of chairs under sunshades, as if an impromptu cafe had been set up. Rudolf and Hildegard Kersten were at one end, while David Waggoner was at the other. Between them were members of the film crew, some working on laptops and others arranging equipment. Alice Quincy saw him and came over.

  ‘Hello, Mr Mavros,’ she said, struggling to make herself heard above the sound of the taxiing Ju52.

  ‘Alex,’ he shouted back. The noise reduced as the plane headed away.

  ‘Can I help you?’ The young woman was in jeans and a long-sleeved black shirt that must have made her uncomfortably hot.

  ‘I want to talk to Mr Jennet. Is he available?’

  ‘If it’s about Maria Kondos, he knows you found her.’ She shaded her eyes as dust gathered around them. ‘The runway’s concrete, but we’re throwing up dust to make it look like it was back in the war.’

  ‘Art’s all about the little things,’ he said.

  Alice Quincy wasn’t sure how to take that, which was his intention.

  ‘If you don’t mind, I need to sign off with Mr Jannet. He was the one who hired me, after all.’

  Irritation flashed across her face, then she nodded. ‘You’ll have to wait. He’s arranging the next shots.’

  Mavros shrugged and went over to the Kerstens.

  ‘May I join you?’ He signalled to the old man to remain seated. Hildegard gave him a soft smile.

  ‘Of course,’ Rudolf said. ‘I hear you found Maria Kondos, Alex. I’m so glad.’

  There were bottles of water on the table and Mavros helped himself after offering the others. He was still plagued by thirst. He wondered what it must have been like for the soldiers.

  ‘Did you have enough water during the battle?’ he asked.

  Kersten was watching the Ju52. ‘Tante Jus, we called them,’ he said. ‘Auntie Jus. I don’t know why they had that affectionate nickname. They were slow, cramped and highly vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire. To answer your question, no, we never had enough to drink. Most of us drained our bottles within minutes of landing.’ He looked over his shoulder to the trees in the distance. ‘It may look well irrigated now, but I can assure you that back then there was very little water on the ground. We survived by taking dead men’s bottles.’

  Hildegard had turned away, as if mention of the fighting was abhorrent to her.

  ‘Look at that,’ Rudolf said, pointing to the group of men in wartime jumpsuits and parachutes outside the now stationary Ju52. ‘I’ve told them several times that they should hold the end of their cords between their teeth as they climb the ladder. Only one of them paid attention.’

  ‘Did they use Maleme for jumps after it was captured?’ Mavros asked, puzzled.

  ‘No, they’re pretending this is an airfield outside Athens. I boarded during the night, but it’s true there were later waves. The producers didn’t see any need to film on the mainland as well.’

  Mavros watched as the men finished clambering on board and the plane taxied to the other end of the runway. He noticed that there were cameras mounted on pickup trucks all around, presumably to give many different angles to the flight.

  ‘This morning they filmed inside the Tante Ju,’ the old man s
aid. ‘They could only fit six men in with the cameras and other equipment. Now they’re going to record the drop, both from inside the plane and from the ground.’

  There was an increasing roar as the plane’s three engines were gunned and it started down the runway, dust rising in its wake. Pickups kept up with it, the cameras pointing at the dun-green fuselage. The black crosses on the side and swastika on the tail gave Mavros a bad feeling, but he told himself to get a grip. It was only a movie.

  The Ju52 moved sluggishly down the runway, eventually pulling into the air not far in front of the hangars. It headed out to sea, followed by a pair of smaller and more modern planes that filmed it from above, below and alongside. Eventually the troop carrier turned and came back towards them, the engines pulsing more powerfully now. Mavros felt hairs raise all over his body. From what he remembered, there had been dozens of planes in each wave. It must have been the most incredible sight for the defenders — awe-inspiring and terrifying. He leaned forward and looked over at David Waggoner. He was watching through binoculars, his jaw set firm. What memories was this bringing back to him?

  The Messerschmitt made another pass, diving over the airfield. Lights flashed from its machine-gun slits — Mavros assumed that the sound of firing would be added at the editing stage. Then the Tante Ju came over the land, only a few hundred feet above them. Cameras all around were trained on it, as the door was pulled back and a man appeared.

  ‘They are Greek paratroopers,’ Kersten said. ‘I have spent many days instructing them in the jump and landing positions that we used. Now we will see if I was successful.’ He gave a rueful smile.

  Mavros watched as the man launched himself into the air with his arms and legs extended in the shape of an ‘X’. A few seconds later, another man dived out, then another and another. Their parachutes sprouted into inverted white cups at what seemed far too close to the ground. Mavros felt his palms sweating as the men came down fast. They hit the ground and rolled forward, then started pulling in their chutes. The last man shook in his harness and then hung limp for as long as he could before making a different kind of landing.

  ‘They didn’t shoot so many of us in the air,’ Kersten said. ‘That was Allied propaganda. A man falling at that speed is not an easy target. But they certainly did kill hundreds in the trees and on the ground before they reached the weapons canisters.’ His eyes clouded and he turned away.

  Hildegard was immediately on her feet and at her husband’s side. She spoke to him in German, before turning to Mavros.

  ‘I told him this would be too much for him. He didn’t need to be here today. His work has already been done.’

  ‘No,’ the old man said, his eyes damp. ‘It is good that I saw it. Now I understand what it was like for the Cretans, seeing the invader come in with all his hubris and conceit.’ His wife wiped his face with a tissue. ‘We had no right,’ he said, his voice wavering. ‘No country has the right to invade another. But the Cretans had every right to fight us with everything they had.’

  Mavros looked up as a shadow fell over them.

  ‘Not weeping for your lost comrades, are you, Kersten?’ David Waggoner said callously. ‘The ones who were shot to pieces in the olive groves and slaughtered in the open ground?’

  Mavros stood up and put his hand on Waggoner’s arm. ‘You’re wrong,’ he said bluntly. ‘Leave him alone.’

  ‘No, Alex,’ Rudolf said, getting to his feet slowly. ‘Mr Waggoner is right. The Fallschirmjager met their match on this island, there’s no doubt of that.’

  ‘And you’ve made a fortune with your fake remorse, your blood money to the victims and your rich man’s resort.’ The Englishman stared up at the taller German. ‘Just remember this. I know what you did. I know you were at Makrymari.’ The ex-SOE man executed a parade-ground turn and marched away, the sun glinting off the regimental badge on his blazer.

  Rudolf Kersten sat down again. His wife spoke to him in German. Mavros wanted to ask what Waggoner had meant, but he could see it wasn’t the right time. He moved away and saw Luke Jannet and Alice Quincy coming towards him in a golf cart.

  ‘What’d’ya think of that?’ the director said triumphantly, as the vehicle drew up. ‘We got enough material for the whole drop in one afternoon. We can edit it so the single planes look like dozens.’

  ‘It was certainly spectacular,’ Mavros agreed.

  ‘And you found pouting Cara’s dyke too. Quite a day it’s turned out to be.’

  ‘She’s been badly treated,’ Mavros said, his eyes on Jannet’s. ‘And she isn’t speaking.’

  The director stared back at him. ‘Some rapist pick her up?’

  Mavros was angry with himself for not thinking of that. It would certainly explain Maria’s condition — but Jannet hadn’t seen her. It was quite a thing to suggest, unless he’d heard something from the clinic.

  ‘Has Rosie Yellenberg been on the phone?’ he asked.

  ‘Rosie? Nah, she knows better than to bother me when I’m shooting.’

  Mavros glanced at Alice Quincy. She looked uncomfortable, but that was her default mode.

  ‘We’ll be having a drink tonight,’ Jannet said. ‘Alice will tell you where and when. Guess you’ll be leaving tomorrow.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Mavros said, turning away. He wasn’t sure about Luke Jannet — either he was nothing but a coarse Hollywood operator, or he was more concerned about Maria Kondos than he was letting on — his eyes had been hard to read when he was talking about her. Either way, he could probe again later.

  Riding the papaki back to the gate, Mavros saw Mikis leaning on the Jeep outside.

  ‘Good timing,’ he said, as he was let through on foot.

  ‘That’s what you think. My old man thinks you should get off the island immediately.’

  Mavros’s heart missed a beat. ‘Why?’

  ‘We had a call from Kornaria — that wanker Dhrakakis. He made all kinds of threats to us and to you, including one about your kidneys.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘There’s only one thing you can do if you want to stay,’ Mikis said, a smile hovering on his lips.

  ‘Take up pistol shooting?’

  ‘Wouldn’t hurt. No, you need to take heed of what the mayor of Kornaria said.’

  Mavros stared at him uncomprehendingly.

  The Cretan laughed. ‘Seriously consider getting your hair cut.’

  ‘Screw you, Miki. I’d rather take my chances with the dope-growers.’

  ‘Oh, that’s on the cards,’ the driver replied, his expression darkening. ‘That is definitely on the cards.’

  ELEVEN

  Back in his room in the hotel, Mavros booted up his laptop and checked his emails. The Fat Man had forwarded a large number of files in English — the old communist had never learned many words of the former imperial power’s language on principle. He had learned other things, which he asked Mavros to call him about.

  ‘How goes it, Yiorgo?’

  ‘Ah, the arse-licker of Hollywood. Still alive?’

  Mavros told him about the dust-up with the men from Kornaria and the vendetta that had been proclaimed.

  ‘Marx, Engels and Lenin,’ the Fat Man said, with a groan, ‘you’ve been on the Great Island less than two days and already there’s a price on your head?’

  ‘Just doing my job. What about yours?’

  ‘Oh, I’m getting paid for this, am I? That’ll make a change.’

  Mavros rolled his eyes. ‘As a matter of fact, the money is the only good part of this case. Make out an invoice. And talk.’

  ‘“Make out an invoice,” he says,’ Yiorgos said caustically. ‘Where do you think you are? Germany?’

  The Fat Man wasn’t far from the truth, Mavros thought. The Heavenly Blue was an oasis of German order and calm, despite the staff in local costumes. Outside the perimeter fence, things were rather more fraught.

  ‘All right, let’s have it, Fat Man,’ he said, opening his notebook.

  ‘Who do y
ou want first? There’s more on the Greek sites about Rudolf Kersten than the others. And — get this — he’s really popular for a German.’

  As his friend spoke, Mavros was scrolling down the pages he’d been forwarded about the former paratrooper.

  ‘He made a fortune in the building trade in the Ruhr valley after the war,’ Yiorgos said, ‘starting off as a bricklayer and ending up as chief executive of the company.’ He grunted. ‘What we’d call a class traitor.’

  Mavros ignored that, his eye having been caught by Kersten’s later war record. ‘He served on the Eastern Front,’ he noted, ‘wounded three times, twice seriously, and was both decorated and promoted several times.’

  ‘So he was an enemy of the Soviet motherland too,’ the Fat Man said sourly.

  ‘He passed through the denazification programme in 1947 and, having made his fortune, moved to Crete in 1964 to build the Heavenly Blue. He used only Greek architects, designers and labour, as well as donating large sums of money to villages that had suffered during the Axis occupation.’ He remembered what David Waggoner had said about blood money. That seemed a pretty uncharitable view.

  ‘He was in with the bastard Colonels, of course,’ Yiorgos said. ‘They were very happy to sell him permits to develop the hotel.’

  ‘Not sure if you can blame him for that,’ Mavros countered. ‘How many Greeks did the same thing?’

  ‘Greeks of the thieving, collaborating class.’

  Yeah, yeah, Mavros thought. There was some truth in what the Fat Man said, but life wasn’t that simple. The dictatorship had lasted seven years and people had to feed their families somehow. He had a brief glimpse of his brother Andonis — long lost and a likely victim of the brutal regime — but, unlike in the past, the smiling face faded quickly.

  ‘Your problem, Yiorgo,’ he said, scrolling down more attachments, ‘is that Rudolf Kersten seems to be a genuinely good man, even though he’s a capitalist.’

  ‘And former Nazi. You should see what David Waggoner has to say about him.’

  ‘I’ve already heard him on the subject.’ Mavros found a file bearing the Briton’s name. There was a newspaper report of the sixtieth memorial of the Battle of Crete in 1941, when there had been tension between Allied and German veterans. A group of former SOE men, including Waggoner, had rounded on paratroop survivors and berated them for singing Nazi songs in the cemetery near Maleme. From what he could gather, Rudolf Kersten had stood apart with Hildegard and remained silent.