Despite Koula’s comments, my anger still hadn’t abated. I stood in Dimitsanas Street, in front of the church of Aghios Savvas, and waited for a taxi, but to find a taxi in the centre of Athens at two in the afternoon you have to have gone through special training. My schooling was only basic so other people grabbed the taxis from under my nose before I even had time to talk to the driver. After much ado I finally managed to grab one myself, I was ready to explode. The moment I sat in the front seat, I realised I’d chanced upon the rule rather than the exception, in other words, on the music-loving taxi driver who has his radio on constantly at full blast. My nerves gave way at the corner of Michalakopoulou and Spryrou Merkouri Streets, when a female voice started singing: We’re getting on so well, I’m starting to hear bells.
‘Shut the damn thing off and honk the horn so we can get through the traffic!’ I said to the driver.
He turned and looked at me with that arrogant expression that taxi drivers have. ‘Why, are you ill? You don’t look ill to me.’
I stuck my police ID in his face. ‘I’m a police inspector and I’m on official business. And your radio is interfering with my CB. Turn it off and honk the horn or I’ll hand you over to the first patrol car we meet and you’ll lose your licence for six months.’
He did exactly what I said without a second thought. He drove like a kamikaze pilot and within two minutes we were at the corner of Aristikleous Street. I asked him how much the fare was.
‘Never mind about it, Inspector. I’d rather you let me have your name,’ he said as though he were planning to invite me out. ‘You never know, it might come in handy some time.’
I flung three euros onto the seat and slammed the car door behind me.
‘Where have you been all this time, dear?’ Adriani asked, with a worried look.
‘Omonoia Square. I missed the illegal immigrants.’
She saw my expression and understood that it was useless to go on. ‘Let’s go and eat,’ she said.
As soon as I took the first bite of my plate of stuffed vegetables, I felt better and my anger evaporated as if by a miracle.
‘Tastes delicious, Adriani! That’s the best present you could have given me today,’ I said, full of enthusiasm.
‘Oh come on, you don’t have to lie. They’re short on onion, like I said.’
I took a second bite and held it in my mouth to allow my taste buds to do their work. There was so much we were short on, I wasn’t going to complain about the onion.
7
I was sitting in a deluxe cabin. Not on one of those passenger-car ferries that ply the south Aegean, but in the duty ward of the Cardiology Department in the State General Hospital, that had roughly the same dimensions and facilities as a deluxe cabin. I was waiting for the results of the analyses, for Adriani to finish with the formalities and for the surgeon to examine me. This was my reward for consenting to come for the tests: I would sit in a deluxe cabin while Adriani would do all the legwork. There was nothing wrong with me; I knew it, the doctors knew it, even the nurses knew it. It had been weeks since they had removed my stitches, my wound had completely healed and I only felt it tugging at me slightly with sudden changes in the weather. Adriani, however, insisted that I went for tests, in the hope that the doctors would find some tiny hole that had remained open in order that she might prolong her domination over me on account of continuing ill health.
She stuck her head round the door. ‘They’re ready, Costas, we can go.’
The duty ward was on the third floor, whereas the Outpatients Department was on the ground floor of the building opposite. Adriani pressed the button to call the lift.
‘Never mind, we’ll be waiting an hour for it to come,’ I said and began walking down the stairs in order to prove to her that I was in fine fettle and not to hold out any vain hopes.
It was unbearably humid and just a few days before I had gone back to wearing a suit and tie so that by the time I reached the Outpatients my clothes were stuck to me. Either it rains and you end up soaking wet or the sun shines and you end up soaking in sweat. Damn weather.
Fanis was waiting for us outside the door of the surgery and we went in for the tests under the astonished gaze of the social security plebs who turn up at six in the morning to get a priority number and are examined at around two in the afternoon.
‘What seems to be the problem, Inspector? Do you have any pain?’ asked Evkarpidis, the surgeon in charge.
‘No, no doctor,’ replied my personal government spokeswoman. ‘We’re fine, thanks be to God, but we thought of having a little check-up just to be sure.’
From the very first day at the hospital, she had been using that ‘we’, as if we’d been wounded in association. I stripped to the waist and lay down on the couch. Evkarpidis took a quick look, without touching the scar left by the wound. ‘You’re doing just fine,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘And your tests are very good. Your white corpuscles are at normal levels and your blood platelets too. That’s it, no need for you to come back.’
‘Costas dear, why don’t we have a cardiograph while we’re here?’ Adriani said meekly once we were back outside in the corridor.
I knew where she was leading. She couldn’t get any blood out of the wound and she was trying to get it out of the cardiograph. I was ready to answer her with a sharp ‘no’, but I was stopped by Fanis’s laughter.
‘You had the other tests, you may as well have a cardiograph, you’ve nothing to lose,’ he said.
I accepted in silence as I couldn’t say no to my daughter’s boyfriend.
We entered the lift to go to the Cardiology Department together with two nurses who seemed agitated and were talking to each other in an intense tone.
‘Is it certain?’ the one asked the other.
‘They just announced it on the radio.’
The first one crossed herself. ‘Dear Lord. The world’s gone mad.’
We got out on the second floor, so I didn’t find out what had been announced on the radio. That the world had gone mad, I already knew.
‘Your heart is like clockwork,’ Fanis said to me satisfied, after studying the cardiograph. ‘How are you doing as regards medicine?’
‘He’s out of diuretics, Fanis dear. Give him a prescription for another box just in case,’ said Adriani, who, like a proper quartermaster, knew off by heart exactly what medicines I had left.
‘Get two Frumil and a Pensordil for the Inspector,’ Fanis said to the nurse.
A nurse of about fifty, who was waiting for the other cardiologist, raised her head and looked at me oddly. ‘You’re lucky to be here at the hospital, today,’ she said. ‘Your colleagues outside have got their hands full.’
‘Why?’ I asked a little testily. It always irritates me when people start up a conversation with me without knowing me.
‘Haven’t you heard? That organisation that claimed to have forced Favieros to commit suicide?’
‘The Philip of Macedon Front?’
‘Exactly. They murdered two Kurds last night. They just announced it on the news.’
I immediately turned to Fanis. ‘Is there a TV in here?’
‘In the refectory.’
‘Why are you in such a rush?’ Adriani asked. ‘It’s going to be on TV for the whole of next week.’
She was right, but I couldn’t stop myself. The refectory was situated in a little park full of pine trees. It was packed. Male patients in pyjamas, female patients in nighties, visitors, young doctors and nurses were squashed together at the tables and against the walls and were watching the special bulletin on the TV that was positioned on a bracket on the wall. I happened to get there halfway through the organisation’s announcement as it was scrolling down the screen:
… Because certain people didn’t take our announcement concerning Favieros’s suicide seriously, we were obliged last night to execute two foreign workers who were working on Favieros’s construction sites, to prove to all concerned that we mean business. We call u
pon everyone to see sense and take what we say very seriously. From now on, the responsibility for whatever happens rests with the relevant authorities.
The announcement faded on the screen and the camera descended some narrow steps leading to a basement room, the size of a bedsit, with two divans against the two walls and a Formica table and two plastic chairs in the middle. White sheets were covering each of the bodies on the divans.
‘The victims, Ladies and Gentlemen, are two Kurds, who were living here, at 4 Frearion Street in the Rouf district,’ explained the newscaster. ‘Both were shot through the right eye.’
As I gazed at the screen, the questions were piling up inside me. How had we gone in the space of a few days from the suicide of Jason Favieros to the murder of the Kurds? And why did I continue to insist that the public suicide was a jarring note that no one else wanted to hear? At least not Ghikas or that twerp Yanoutsos. Suddenly, amidst everything, I felt a glowing sense of satisfaction run through me, because the previous day they had looked down their noses at me and now they really had their hands full. They couldn’t see what was staring them in the face. Even if we supposed that this nationalist organisation had come out after the event and claimed involvement in Favieros’s suicide, they wouldn’t have done it if Favieros’s suicide had not happened in public and they wouldn’t have needed to murder the two Kurds afterwards to convince any doubters.
What does a copper long for at such times? A patrol car. My feeling was so strong that I looked outside the refectory, sure that one was waiting for me. All I saw was some old doctor drooling over one of the nurses.
I turned to Fanis. ‘How quickly can I get a taxi?’
Two pairs of astonished eyes fixed themselves on me. Fanis’s on the right and Adriani’s on the left, because, at least according to Dimitrakos, omens coming from the left are considered not to bode well.
‘What do you want a taxi for?’ asked Adriani suspiciously.
‘I want to have a quick look round the crime scene.’
‘You’re on sick leave, have you forgotten?’
Her voice rang out like a bell and everyone turned round and stared at us in astonishment. Evidently, I had pushed her to the limit with my gradual extrication from her hands over the previous few days and she was ready to explode. I took the initiative and walked out of the refectory so that we wouldn’t create a scene.
‘Could you call a taxi,’ I said to Fanis.
‘Never mind, I’ll take you there. In any case, I only stayed for you. Yesterday I had the night shift and I’m off duty today.’
‘Well, I’m going home,’ said Adriani categorically. She had assumed the look of a crabby governess who doesn’t smack her young charge, but nevertheless makes it quite clear that from now on there are no more sweets or chocolates. To be honest, I’d missed that look and I found it amusing.
Fanis put his arm round her shoulders, took her aside and started to talk to her, breathing into her ear. Then he left her and called over to me.
‘Wait here and I’ll bring the car.’
Adriani came back over to me, but averted her gaze. As for me, by rights I should have explained to her why I wanted to see the two dead Kurds and their hovel, but I had no satisfactory explanation, not even for myself.
Fanis came and stopped in front of us. I let Adriani sit next to him. I tried to guess what they might have been saying and if she was planning to accompany me to the murder scene, which would make me a laughing stock, but I didn’t dare ask. I left it in the hands of fate.
Fortunately, I saw Fanis turning from Mesogheion Avenue into Michalakopoulou Street and realised that we were taking her home. When we got to Pangratiou Square, she told Fanis to pull over.
‘Leave me here, Fanis dear. I have some shopping to do.’ She got out without saying anything to me. It was our first tiff after nearly two months, but I couldn’t care less. I was only too happy to be back to old times.
‘What did you say to make her change her mind?’ I asked out of curiosity.
‘That as you would go anyway, it was better at least if your doctor went with you. I’ll wait for you in the car. Anyway, this whole business intrigues me too.’
It intrigued everyone except Ghikas and Yanoutsos, I thought with some resentment. This thought obliged me to confess one more reason why I had rushed to the crime scene: I wanted to see Yanoutsos’s face when he saw me there after having more or less thrown me out of the office the previous day.
We had turned into Amalias Avenue and were passing by the National Gardens. I began to feel remorse at having taken advantage of Fanis to satisfy my investigative perversions.
‘Why don’t you leave me here and I’ll get a taxi?’ I said. ‘You’re without any sleep and I’m putting you to a lot of trouble for no reason.’
‘I told you, the whole business has aroused my curiosity.’
‘And Katerina’s too. Last night we had a whole discussion on extreme right-wing organisations.’
Fanis laughed. ‘I’ll confess something to you, but you mustn’t tell her. Every night we sit in front of our TV sets, lift up the phone and discuss the various explanations. An amateur and a semi-amateur!’
‘And the semi-amateur is Katerina?’
‘I’d say so. At least she’s studying Law. I’m only a cardiologist. What do I know?’
‘And why is she hiding it from me? Why doesn’t she say something?’ I again felt that lump, just as always when I realise that someone else is closer to Katerina.
‘Because she’s afraid,’ Fanis replied.
‘Afraid?’
‘Yes, of her policeman father. Afraid of coming out with some drivel and making herself look ridiculous.’
We had now reached Achilleos Street, which at that time of day was chock-a-block with traffic heading in the direction of the city centre, and we turned into Konstantinoupoleos Street. Frearion Street was on our left as we were going up and so Fanis turned and parked in Megalou Vassileiou Street.
‘I’ll wait for you here.’
‘Won’t take long,’ I replied, certain that Yanoutsos would spot me straightaway.
The apartment block was one of those overnight constructions that were originally two-storey before their owners greased the palms of the police or someone in the local authorities in order to add another couple of floors on the sly to pay for their daughter’s dowry or their son’s studies. I saw no ambulances or any TV crews and I concluded that the bodies must already have been taken to the morgue.
As I was going down the steps to the basement, I bumped into Diamantidis from Forensics.
‘What are you doing here, Inspector? Are you back on duty?’ he asked, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.
‘No, but I’m back in training as you can see,’ I said and he broke into laughter. ‘What’s going on down there?’
He hesitated for a moment as if about to say something, but then changing his mind. ‘Go on in and you’ll see,’ he said.
The door to the flat was open and voices could be heard. The flat was just one room, just as it had appeared on the TV, with a sizeable recess that served as a kitchen. Beside it was a door that must have been the bathroom.
The bodies had been moved as I had thought. Standing in the middle of the room was Yanoutsos together with Markidis the coroner. They were glaring at each other like cocks, ready to begin fighting.
‘I’m not saying a word,’ shouted Makridis at Yanoutsos. It was the first time in all the years I’d known him that I saw him losing his composure. ‘You can wait and read the report.’
Standing behind were my two assistants, Vlassopoulos and Dermitzakis. Their backs were half-turned to the other two and they were pretending to be chatting so as not to appear to be listening in to the conversation.
Suddenly, as though on cue, they all turned and looked at me. Yanoutsos was goggling. Even more odd was my assistants’ behaviour. They stared at me at a loss, unable to decide whether they should greet me or not. In
they end, they settled for a formal nod of the head accompanied by a smile, before turning their backs again.
The most congenial of all of them was Markidis, who offered me his hand. ‘Glad to see you up and around,’ he said. His face had become somewhat friendlier as he had exchanged the huge glasses he had worn all his life for an oval-shaped, metallic frame.
‘Why are you here?’ Yanoutsos asked. ‘As far as I know, you’re still on sick leave and we’ve no need of you.’
‘I came so you could tell me again what you told me the other day in Ghikas’s office,’ I replied with spite.
‘And what was that?’
‘That if you were to take every prattling announcement seriously, you’d be running all over the place. Well now you are.’
‘This has no connection with the announcement. This is the work of the Mafia.’
The other three had now turned round and were watching the second cockfight.
‘Where were they shot?’ I asked Markidis. I knew, but I wanted everyone to hear it.
‘In the eye. Both of them.’
I turned back to Yanoutsos: ‘Mafiosos wouldn’t have wasted their time with details like that. They’d have let fly with five or six bullets and then been on their way.’
‘They might have had a reason for staging the scene.’
‘What reason when they were only two miserable Kurds? Do you know what work it requires to stage an execution by shooting someone in the eye?’
I turned and cast a look around. Everything was in its place, there were no signs of any struggle. I heard Yanoutsos say to my assistants:
‘Dermitzakis, Vlassopoulos, you can go. I’ve no further need of you.’
I looked up, curious to see whether they would acknowledge me as they left. But they pretended to be engrossed in their conversation and left without even looking at me. I couldn’t explain their attitude and I felt infuriated, but I tried to control myself so as not to spoil my mood for riling Yanoutsos.
‘From what I see, there are no signs of struggle,’ I said to Markidis.
‘No.’ We looked at each other and Markidis shook his head. ‘You’re right. I’d noticed that too.’
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