The Curious Case of the Missing Head

by Gabriel Farago

  ‘Exactly,’ said Teodora. ‘You didn’t expect that, did you?’

  ‘It certainly pays to have the right clients,’ said Silvanus.

  ‘We have rendezvoused with the Caritas a few times before,’ said Giacomo. ‘I know the captain well. The Giordanos are major sponsors of the charity and frequently do business with the ship’s owners. You could almost call them business partners. You get my drift?’

  ‘We do,’ said Silvanus, laughing.

  ‘All we need to do now,’ said Teodora, turning serious, ‘is to keep Stolzfus alive until we get there, and hope the Royal Navy doesn’t send a warship to intercept us.’

  ‘Highly unlikely. We just entered international waters,’ said Giacomo, laughing. ‘We should be all right here, especially after Aladdin charmed that young officer and played his part so convincingly. I don’t think they suspected anything.’

  ‘Here’s to you, Aladdin,’ said Teodora and lifted her glass. ‘As this is our last assignment, you can always take up acting and make that your next career. Cheers.’

  Just before Giacomo left the saloon, Teodora walked up to him. ‘A quick word?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘About my sister ...’ Teodora was struggling to find the right words and finding it difficult to hold back the tears.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Could we bury her tomorrow, at sea?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Could you do the ...’

  ‘Certainly. I would be honoured. We usually do this at first light ...’

  ‘Thank you. This means a lot to me.’

  16

  Somewhere off the Atlantic coast of France: 16 June, before sunrise

  Teodora turned off the light on the bedside table, lay her head on the pillow and listened to the mesmerising hum of the engines. Exhausted and craving much-needed sleep after a day with so much sadness, she was desperately trying to forget, hoping in vain the gentle rocking of the boat would send her to sleep. But sleep wouldn’t come. Instead, the face of her dead sister – composed and serene – kept floating into her mind’s eye, impossible to blot out.

  And with Nadia’s face came memories, conjured up with alarming clarity out of long-forgotten, hidden corners, reminding Teodora that she had lost much more than a sibling; she had lost part of herself. Coming to terms with the cruel finality of death is always a struggle, but for a twin, it is infinitely more than that. Exhaustion can distort reality, and Teodora refused to accept that her sister was no more. She couldn’t accept that Nadia’s dead body was lying in a small compartment a few feet away, awaiting burial in the morning. I have to say goodbye, she thought, before it’s too late and she descends into the deep, gone forever.

  Feeling better, Teodora sat up and turned on the light. The light seemed to banish the ghosts, but the reality they left behind was no less disturbing. Teodora opened the cabin door and looked down the deserted corridor, the brass fittings gleaming in the dim nightlight like eyes of demons watching. It’s just over there, she thought, remembering the concealed compartment Giacomo had shown her just before she had gone to bed. Teodora tiptoed down the corridor, opened the door to the compartment, took a deep breath and turned on the light. Still wearing her torn leathers covered in blood, Nadia was lying on a narrow bunk.

  ‘We can’t bury you like that,’ whispered Teodora, and began to unbutton Nadia’s jacket. It took her more than an hour to undress her dead sister, wash her body and then dress her in fresh clothes. While she was doing this, she kept talking to her. In a strange way this seemed to calm Teodora, as a sense of peace embraced her broken heart and eased her sorrow.

  Only the shoes to go, thought Teodora. She tied the shoelaces and stood up. That’s better. Now you are ready, and so am I. Then she bent down and kissed Nadia tenderly on the forehead. ‘Goodbye, my darling,’ she whispered, stroking Nadia’s hair, and then turned off the light, left the compartment and went back to bed. This time, sleep came almost at once, as stubborn refusal was replaced by stoic acceptance of death as an inevitable part of the journey.

  As the first glow of the morning sun drove away the darkness and lit up the horizon with a strip of pink gold, Giacomo stopped the engines. The entire crew had assembled on deck and was standing to attention. The engineer had sewn Nadia’s body into sailcloth as tradition demanded, and had tied a heavy iron weight around her feet, which would quickly take her to the bottom of the ocean.

  Looking like a mummy, Nadia’s body was lying on a narrow wooden plank. The plank was resting on the handrail and could be tilted. Teodora, Aladdin and Silvanus stood next to it and looked silently out to sea, waiting for sunrise.

  Teodora had asked Giacomo not to conduct a formal service, and she didn’t want any speeches either. Her sister would be farewelled with love, she had told Giacomo, and love didn’t need words. While they had both been brought up as devout Muslims, Teodora and Nadia had drifted away from their faith after their parents had been killed. A merciful God would never have allowed that, they argued, and turned their backs on religion.

  As the brilliant disc of the morning sun rose out of the dark waters of the Atlantic, heralding a new day, Teodora placed her shaking hands on the plank. ‘Ready?’ she whispered, waiting for Giacomo’s signal. Giacomo lifted the small boson’s whistle to his mouth and began the familiar boatswain’s call by opening and closing his hand over the hole to change the pitch.

  Aladdin and Silvanus stepped forward and together they tilted the plank until Nadia’s body slid over the edge and plunged into the water below.

  For a while, the three friends held hands and watched the spot where Nadia had entered the sea and disappeared out of their lives, leaving only memories and a bittersweet feeling of sorrow that would stay with them for a long time to come.

  During the night, Stolzfus had rapidly deteriorated. His sweat-covered body was racked by a severe fever, and he appeared to be in pain and hallucinating. Giacomo had called the Caritas several times to obtain some urgent medical advice. The best the doctors had been able to come up with was to keep Stolzfus cool, keep the drips going – and hurry.

  Teodora joined Giacomo on the bridge after the burial to thank him and to talk about Stolzfus.

  ‘It was very moving,’ said Giacomo. ‘I buried my brother the same way.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘It’s a long story ...’

  ‘Stolzfus is in a bad way,’ said Teodora, changing the subject. Giacomo obviously didn’t want to talk about his brother’s death.

  ‘We are doing all we can.’

  ‘I know. So, what’s the answer?’

  ‘Speed. The sooner we meet up with the Caritas, the better. It’s his best chance. I just spoke to the captain. He is going as fast as he can and so are we. If we keep up this speed we should meet about here.’ Giacomo pointed to a spot in the Atlantic on the chart in front of him.

  ‘When?’

  ‘All going well, about five this afternoon. But there’s a possible problem ...’

  ‘Oh? What?’

  ‘The meteorologists call it an extratropical storm.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘A capricious storm, some call it a “zombie cyclone”. I’ve been watching it for a couple of days now. It’s weird. The storm formed about two weeks ago in the central North Atlantic and has been meandering through the Atlantic as a cyclone, fluctuating between tropical storm strength and Category 1. It even has a name: Hurricane Patrick.’

  ‘And why is this a problem?’ asked Teodora, looking apprehensive.

  ‘Because as of an hour ago, Patrick was headed for the coast of France, right here.’ Giacomo stabbed his finger at the chart. ‘And unless the storm changes direction, the place we are hoping to meet up with the Caritas is directly in its path, here.’

  ‘Good God!’

  ‘Under normal circumstance, we would change course right now to get out of its way if possible. But we can’t do that, can we? See my dilemma?’

&nb
sp; ‘Of course. Stolzfus.’

  ‘Quite. And then we have the added problem of having to transfer him to the Caritas at sea. To do that in the middle of a storm like that? I don’t know ...’ Giacomo shook his head.

  ‘So, what are we going to do?’

  ‘Proceed as planned and hope for the best. As I said before, this storm is very unpredictable. Anything’s possible.’

  ‘And the Caritas?’

  ‘Doing the same, for now. We are both keeping a close eye on the storm and our fingers crossed. Being at sea is like that.’

  Teodora put her hand on Giacomo’s arm. ‘Thanks, Giacomo,’ she said.

  ‘No problem.’

  ‘I meant the burial.’

  ‘I know ...’

  All went well until about two in the afternoon when dark storm clouds appeared on the horizon to the south, the wind picked up and the sea became choppy. Stolzfus had deteriorated further and his blood pressure had dropped alarmingly.

  Giacomo called everyone to a meeting on the bridge. ‘I just spoke to the captain of the Caritas. He’s much closer to the storm than we are at the moment and is heading straight for it. Could be pretty rough, he said.’

  ‘So, what’s the plan?’ asked Silvanus.

  ‘I also spoke to Alessandro. He would like us to give it a go, if possible. But of course, it’s my decision.’

  ‘And, have you decided?’ asked Teodora, watching Giacomo carefully. She realised the entire project was hanging in the balance. If Stolzfus didn’t get medical attention soon, it would be too late.

  ‘We go ahead as planned for the time being. If it gets too rough, we may have to pull out. I will not endanger my—’

  ‘Of course not,’ interrupted Teodora to make it easier for Giacomo. ‘No-one wants that. And the Caritas?’

  ‘She’s of course much bigger than we are, and therefore better equipped to ride out a storm like this. The captain is prepared to take her through it. So, it’s all up to us now. It’s between us and Patrick.’

  ‘We better batten down the hatches then,’ said Aladdin cheerfully, ‘and have a couple of Guinness?’

  ‘Might be a good idea,’ replied Giacomo, his mouth creasing into a wry smile.

  As Teodora, Aladdin and Silvanus left the bridge, they could see bolts of lightning criss-crossing the storm clouds to the south and hear the rumble of thunder in the distance. To Teodora it sounded like a warning, telling them to stay away, but she realised of course that staying away wasn’t an option.

  17

  MI5 HQ London: 16 June

  Major Andersen arrived early. An urgent appointment had been arranged for her by the CIA to find out more about the disastrous events of the day before. The major had submitted her report to her superiors in Washington shortly after the rebuff from the Metropolitan Police officer in charge of the London investigation had brought her enquiries to such an abrupt and frustrating standstill. To her great relief, she was told that the director of the CIA understood her position and no blame for the fiasco could be attributed to her in the circumstances. In fact, he had gone a step further. He asked her to stay in London to represent the CIA and liaise with the authorities, but discreetly carry out her own enquiries to get to the bottom of the disaster as quickly as possible.

  As far as the press was concerned, the spin doctors had already gone into overdrive in an attempt to keep the full extent of the incident out of the public domain. As Stolzfus’s collapse in Westminster Abbey had been witnessed by hundreds and televised around the world, it was impossible to keep that away from the press.

  However, Whitehall and the Metropolitan Police had gone to great lengths to make sure there was no connection between the Stolzfus incident and the subsequent ambulance attack. Officially, that was being treated as a separate terrorist incident with an information embargo under a national security umbrella. The last thing the UK authorities needed was a curious press sniffing around and interfering with their investigations at a time when embarrassingly little was known about what really happened. The simple question being asked by those in charge was: what happened to Stolzfus?

  The unofficial word leaked to a curious press was that he had sufficiently recovered from a minor medical episode and had returned to the United States in the Air Force plane that had brought him across the Atlantic. To everyone’s relief, the ever-hungry newshounds seemed to have accepted that, at least for the time being, and had focused on the more interesting Hawking memorial service instead.

  It was therefore hardly surprising that the major’s involvement was considered a nuisance by MI5, which unfortunately couldn’t be ignored. The Americans had a point. Stolzfus had disappeared while in their care and his brazen kidnapping had been witnessed by one of their own: a high-ranking CIA officer and one of the few reliable eyewitnesses of the attack. To ignore the major and keep her out of the investigation was therefore not an option. Instead, she had to be treated with kid gloves and given the impression of full cooperation without allowing the Americans too much access, or say, in what was going on, especially not before the full facts of the incident were known. This delicate task had fallen on Daniel Cross, one of the MI5 officers involved in the investigation.

  Cross looked at his watch and smiled. He believed letting someone wait was an art. Let them wait too long, you caused aggravation and offence. See them immediately, you gave the impression you were eager to see them and they were important. The most effective approach was somewhere in the middle and Cross, an arrogant man, fancied himself to know exactly what that entailed.

  Immaculately dressed and with polished shoes so shiny they would have made a drill sergeant proud, Cross swept into the waiting room. His carefully cultivated accent was supposed to suggest Oxford, but he hadn’t quite managed to erase giveaway undertones of his childhood in Hackney, one of the poorest parts of London.

  ‘I am so sorry to keep you waiting, Major,’ he said, extending his hand. ‘You know how it is. We are slaves of the urgent. Please come in.’

  What a pompous little man, thought Andersen as she followed Cross into his office. She hated limp handshakes and decided the best way to deal with him was to ignore his affectation and pander to his ego instead to get what she wanted.

  ‘Thank you so much for making time to see me this morning,’ she said, giving Cross her best smile. ‘I’m sure you appreciate our concern. This is a most serious matter.’

  ‘Of course, of course. Please take a seat.’

  Cross pointed to a small conference table by the window. The major noticed that Cross already had a slim folder waiting for him on the table. It was obvious he had carefully prepared for the meeting.

  ‘I understand you would like to know where we are up to with our investigation, right?’

  Is he stating the obvious to feel his way, or just being patronisingly rude? thought the major. She decided it was most likely the latter.

  ‘That would be most helpful, thank you, because so far all I’ve received is a cold shoulder, especially from the Metropolitan Police.’

  ‘That is most regrettable. I will try to rectify this.’ Cross reached for the file in front of him and opened it. ‘Your plane landed at six-oh-five yesterday morning, and Professor Stolzfus remained at the airport until eleven am. An unmarked police car was provided by the Metropolitan Police to take you and the professor from the airport directly to Westminster Abbey, where you arrived at eleven-thirty am.’

  Why is he telling me all this? thought the major. I was there! She decided not to comment.

  ‘As soon as you and the professor got out of the car, you made your way to security at the Great West Gate and entered Westminster Abbey, correct?’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘Now comes the interesting bit,’ said Cross. He turned over a page and then paused, obviously for effect. ‘Moments after you went through security, Professor Stolzfus met someone he knew. Can you remember who that was? After all, you were with him all the time.’

  ‘Yes, a
priest in traditional dress with a Greek name. He introduced himself as Christos something—’

  ‘Alexopoulos,’ interrupted Cross.

  ‘Yes. That was the name.’

  ‘It may have been the name, but it wasn’t the real Father Alexopoulos.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Because the real Father Alexopoulos was discovered comatose by a housekeeper in his room at a hotel in East London. Someone had broken into his room, drugged him and stolen his identity papers and invitation to the service, and then entered Westminster Abbey in disguise, pretending to be Father Alexopoulos.’

  ‘How extraordinary. Do you know who that was?’

  ‘We are working on it.’

  ‘And why is this relevant?’ asked the major.

  ‘Because after we reviewed the appropriate security footage it became clear that the only physical contact Professor Stolzfus had with another person since leaving the airport was with that man. When they shook hands.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that something happened when they shook hands?’

  ‘Yes. We believe the professor was poisoned. We’ve come across something like this before. Quite recently in fact, with similar consequences. Very sophisticated and effective.’

  It was clear to the major that Cross was trying to impress her with certain progress that had been made so far in the investigation, to cover up the fact that the culprits were still at large and the authorities had no idea what had happened to Stolzfus, or where he might be.

  ‘What happened to the priest? Has he been apprehended?’ asked the major.

  ‘No. He left the Abbey shortly after the handshake.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Disappeared.’

  ‘What? No security footage? No leads?’

  ‘No. Not at this stage.’

  ‘I see. Any leads from the hotel room?’

  ‘Forensics are still working on it.’