Codename Xenophon Read online

  ‘Is there anyone here in Aegina who was particularly upset by his writings?’

  ‘I could suggest a name or two.’

  ‘OK. That needs looking into. Now, the police. Who have you been dealing with? Locals, or someone from Athens?’

  ‘Locals as far as I know. The investigation seems to be in the hands of a certain Captain Bagatzounis. A ridiculous man!’

  ‘What has he done?’

  ‘Nothing! That is my problem! This man has done nothing at all!’

  George had heard this complaint many times before. ‘With respect, Mr Petrakis, even a Greek police inspector can’t do nothing when faced with a murder.’

  Petrakis spluttered, ‘Of course he did the minimum! The bureaucratic minimum. Took statements and photographs, strutted around the apartment, glanced out of the window, asked a few utterly obvious questions. He may even have compiled a report. But effectively he has done nothing!’

  ‘Is GADA involved?’

  ‘GADA?’

  ‘The central police authority.’

  ‘I don’t know. They give out no information. Certainly not to me! Every inquiry is met with blankness and evasion. They are incredible. In a modern democracy, to behave with such contempt for the public!’

  George said nothing. There was something hollow in this man’s words.

  Petrakis glanced at his watch. ‘We must go to Madame Corneille. She will be waiting. Are you ready?’

  3

  They walked up a lane of low 19th-century houses, overhung with fig trees. The pavement was narrow, a broken strip of concrete obstructed by rubbish bins, pallets of bricks and badly parked scooters. They had to step into the roadway, squeezing against a wall when a car came by, filling the lane with exhaust.

  They turned into a street of shops, lively with mid-morning conversations. A butcher, an ironmonger, a baker. Past the cathedral, with its ochre-painted bell tower and nesting doves. Past a ruined mansion, windows and roof open to the sky. They came to an alley of dazzling white houses and courtyards, draped with laundry drying in the fierce sun. They climbed a flight of steps. Petrakis pressed the bell.

  The door was opened by a woman in her forties, slim, lithe, in an open-necked white shirt and blue jeans. Her eyes, a deep grey-blue, were set in a pale and pensive face, with a halo of frizzy golden hair.

  ‘Constantine! My darling! Welcome.’

  ‘This is the gentleman I told you about, Rosa. Mr George Zafiris.’

  They shook hands. George was struck by the softness of her skin, her otherworldly air.

  The entrance hall was shuttered, dark and cool. A smoke-trail of incense hung sweetly in the gloom. She led them into the lounge, lit by a single ray of intense light that cut through a gap in the wooden shutters and lay across the floor like a strip of gold.

  ‘Your aura is down, Costa,’ she said, turning on Petrakis without preamble. ‘You need to look after yourself.’

  ‘Are you surprised?’ said Petrakis angrily.

  ‘Not in the least. But this is the time for repair. For healing.’ She glanced at George.

  ‘There you see a man with an excellent aura!’

  ‘Pleased to hear it,’ said George.

  ‘Look at his shoulders. Strong but relaxed. Yours are hunched, like a gnome. A goblin. You’re much too nervous.’

  ‘Let’s leave all that,’ said Petrakis. ‘We’re here on business.’

  ‘Fine. You do your business, I’ll do mine. Sit down, gentlemen.’

  They each took a chair. George’s eyes were getting used to the half-light.

  ‘I need to ask you about the shooting of John Petrakis,’ he said.

  She lit a cigarette. ‘I hope this doesn’t bother you.’ She waved the smoke vaguely away. ‘It was a horrible experience for me.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘John was a close friend. We had a consonance of intellect, of artistic interests, of feeling. He was a genius, A companion soul. We were not lovers, although I sensed very strongly that in another life we might have been. Often we lead many lives, in parallel…’

  Petrakis cut in. ‘Just tell Mr Zafiris what happened.’

  ‘I’m coming to it, in my own time. This is not easy.’

  ‘Tell it your way,’ said George.

  ‘On the evening of his lecture he went into the shower, just after seven o’clock. We had been listening to the BBC news. He took his towel, his shampoo, his bath bag. He said I shan’t be long. But at half-past seven I noticed that he still hadn’t come out. I was worried. I knocked, I waited, I knocked again. I could hear the shower still running, which was odd. John was a spartan type, he never wasted water. So I called his name. There was no reply. I called again. Silence… I had a terrible misgiving. I opened the door and there…’ She stopped, her voice catching. Tears began running down her cheeks. She took a deep breath.

  ‘You heard no shot?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Can you tell me what you saw?’

  ‘He was hanging over the side of the bathtub, limp as a piece of cloth, with blood…’ – her hands waved in circles – ‘…sprayed everywhere.’

  George waited.

  ‘That’s it,’ she said hopelessly. ‘I called the doctor who lives round the corner. He listened for a heartbeat. Nothing. He was gone. Then we called the police. They invaded my flat, treated me first as a suspect, then as a nuisance, and then lost interest in the case.’

  ‘What were you doing for the half hour that the professor was in the shower?’

  ‘I was getting dressed.’

  ‘And you heard nothing?’

  ‘I was listening to music.’

  ‘Loud music?’

  ‘Not especially. But my bedroom door was shut, so was the bathroom…’

  ‘Was there anything in the hours or days leading up to the murder that seemed unusual? Any incidents? Odd remarks?’

  ‘Nothing. This was lightning from a clear sky.’

  ‘OK. Is there anybody, either here or in Athens, who had a reason to kill the professor?’

  ‘No. He was admired and respected by all who knew him.’

  ‘He upset people with his books.’

  ‘Of course! Bigots, fanatical patriots.’

  ‘Is it possible they knew where he was staying?’

  ‘Most unlikely.’

  ‘Did anyone else know he was here?’

  ‘A couple of friends.’

  ‘Did they meet him?’

  ‘We had dinner together the night before he died.’

  ‘Here, or out?’

  Petrakis interrupted. ‘I can’t see what –’

  ‘Hush, dear Costa! It’s a reasonable question. If we were out, our conversation could well have been overheard. Is that not what you were interested to know, Mr Zafiris?’

  ‘My thinking precisely.’

  ‘We dined here.’

  ‘I may have to speak to your friends.’

  ‘Of course. Their names are Abbas and Camilla. Telephone number 58360.’

  George made a note. ‘I now have a question of a more personal nature.’

  ‘Feel free.’

  ‘Did the professor have any sexual adventures during his stay?’

  She glanced at Petrakis, who said wearily, ‘He knows about Bill.’

  ‘Bill was with him until the morning of the lecture,’ she said. ‘Then he flew back to London. But I would not call Bill a “sexual adventure”. They were practically married.’

  ‘Why didn’t he stay for the lecture?’

  ‘He wouldn’t have understood it,’ said Petrakis.

  ‘Nonsense! He would have understood it perfectly. Bill had work in London the next day.’

  ‘Was there any sign of tension between them?’

  She thought about this. ‘No. They were relaxed.’

  ‘What sort of man is Bill?’

  ‘A good man, intelligent, practical, with a certain aesthetic development, but of course he’s imprisoned by a materialis
t vision of existence, as you would expect of a builder.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘He sees only the physical. No spiritual dimension whatsoever.’

  ‘To say the least!’ said Petrakis.

  ‘Costa! Control your snobbery!’

  ‘Did you ever see them argue?’ asked George.

  ‘Only in play. “You’ve stolen my sun cream” – that kind of thing.’

  ‘Did John ever go out looking for rough trade?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  ‘Did he meet anyone else here? Friends, associates, colleagues?’

  ‘If he did, he never told me about it.’

  ‘OK,’ said George. ‘As far as you know, nobody had any reason to kill him?’

  ‘That’s right. I find it impossible to believe that such a mild, harmless man, so open and amusing and cultivated, should have even one enemy.’

  ‘I believe you’re wrong, Rosa,’ said Petrakis abruptly.

  ‘OK, I’m wrong. You tell him your theory, Costa.’

  ‘No,’ said Petrakis sharply. ‘This is not the moment. I want Mr Zafiris to reach his own conclusions. If he has eyes to see, let him see!’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said George.

  ‘Any more questions, Mr Zafiris?’

  ‘I’ll need a list of contacts. The Chief of Police, the President of the Historical Society, everyone. And I need to see the bathroom.’

  ‘Will you show him, Costa? I don’t think I can bear it.’

  ‘I’d prefer it if you show me yourself.’

  ‘Why?’ Petrakis objected.

  George tried to be patient. ‘Madame Corneille is the main witness. Her account of the crime is important.’

  ‘She has already told you what she saw and heard.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So? What is the point of forcing the poor lady to go through it all again?’

  ‘People often remember details at the scene of the crime. Subconscious recall, triggered by the senses. These details can be crucial. I don’t ask Madame Corneille to do this lightly.’

  ‘Facts are facts!’

  ‘Facts are surprisingly slippery things.’

  ‘Are you an investigator or an amateur philosopher, Mr Zafiris?’

  ‘I just want to see the bathroom.’

  ‘I think you’ve made that clear!’

  ‘If you don’t want me to do this job properly I’ll go back to Athens and drop the case.’

  ‘You’ve used that threat before.’

  ‘Don’t force me to use it again.’

  Petrakis seethed. He was a man who had to be in control. George had met hundreds like him, all convinced they were unique; domestic dictators, forged in their mothers’ worship of their sons. He waited for the counterstroke.

  ‘I am not in the habit of paying for insolence, Mr Zafiris. I can get it any day I want for free.’

  ‘I’m sure you can.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  George stood up. ‘Shall we stop wasting time?’

  Petrakis waved a dismissive hand. ‘Go with him, Rosa. Tell him what he wants to know. And try not to be too emotional.’

  Madame Corneille closed her eyes, gathering herself.

  They walked into a little vestibule hung with Indian and Persian prints. To the left a kitchen, to the right a pair of bedrooms. With a reluctant gesture she indicated the half-open bathroom door. George gently pushed it back. There was the bath under the window, the shower on the wall. He took off his shoes and stood in the bath. From there he saw what John Petrakis would have seen in the last few seconds of his life. Outside the window, directly opposite, a large neoclassical house in a well-ordered garden; beyond it, a jumbled townscape of alleys, houses, electrical cables and trees. With a rifle he could have shot into the windows of fifteen, maybe twenty homes. A gunman, he thought, might also risk firing from a rooftop or a courtyard. Probably not from the street.

  ‘Whose is the big house opposite?’ he asked.

  ‘Colonel Varzalis.’

  ‘Who’s he?’

  ‘A retired army officer.’

  ‘It’s ideally placed.’

  ‘I know,’ she said.

  He watched her face, which was anxious and pained.

  ‘Would you mind telling me exactly what you saw when you found the professor?’

  She pointed to the bath. ‘He was hanging over. Arms and head on the floor.’

  ‘Can you remember his head?’

  She shuddered. ‘Of course. Half of it was missing.’

  ‘And where were the fragments, the blood?’

  ‘On the floor.’

  ‘Anywhere else?’

  ‘The shower curtain.’

  ‘Where? Can you show me?’

  ‘At the top. And running down.’

  ‘Was it this shower curtain?’

  ‘No. The police took it away.’

  ‘Did they take anything else?’

  ‘The bathmat. John’s clothes and belongings.’

  ‘Papers, wallet, passport?’

  ‘Everything.’

  ‘Do they still have them?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  His eyes travelled around the bathroom once more. It was crowded with cosmetics and decorative objects. Everything was impeccably clean and orderly.

  ‘You must have had a hell of a job clearing up,’ he said.

  She nodded. ‘A whole day. On my knees, and up the ladder. Bleach, water and blood… There’s no cleaning product in the world that can purge that image from my mind.’

  4

  Back at his desk in Athens that afternoon, George had an urgent matter to deal with. It had been on his books for a while. He called it his ‘dirty political quartet’. A government minister, Byron Kakridis, had approached him in early May with a straightforward commission: to report on his wife’s social life. It had not taken long to find out that she was having an out-of-hours romance with an opposition politician, Angelos Boiatzis. They met in a downtown hotel, once or twice a week, in a calm and settled routine which appeared not to harm anyone. George had been about to present his report when an intuition held him back. He never liked exposing extra-marital affairs, which often seemed justified by the misery of the marriage. Despite money, big cars and luxurious homes, these people were trapped in wretched lives, seeking freedom wherever they could find it.

  He had been through all this himself, and wished now he had never known what his wife had been up to. The knowledge had poisoned him, burnt up his heart, destroyed his happiness… What good was achieved by proof?

  In the case of Kakridis and Boiatzis, his usual hesitation was accompanied by a more shadowy sensation, a premonition of stranger things to come.

  A few days later, a call came from Mrs Kakridis. Suddenly the woman he had been following and photographing for a month was asking him to follow her husband.

  ‘I think he’s having an affair,’ she said.

  He should have refused the case, but the old radical in him stirred. He could not resist the temptation to see what another of the nation’s elected representatives was doing in his spare time. Torn between curiosity and professional correctness, he gave Mrs Kakridis the number of a fellow investigator, Hector Pezas. He and Hector shared information. It was hardly the most ethical arrangement in the world, but it worked.

  Byron Kakridis was trickier to follow than his wife. He had a constituency in the north of the country. His life passed in a blizzard of flights, car journeys, meetings and sessions of parliament. Between these he was either on the telephone or asleep. Meals were snatched in unscheduled moments. The reading and drafting of papers could only have taken place late at night or early in the morning, at home or in hotel rooms. Hector Pezas came to the conclusion that this man could not possibly be having an affair.

  He put this to Margarita Kakridis. She insisted. Her husband was a highly sexed man – ‘a volcano’, as she put it. He had lost interest in her too sudden
ly. There could only be one explanation. They stepped up the level of vigilance to 24 hours a day, with two extra investigators. George advised Pezas to take the money in advance. She paid, no hesitation. And Pezas, a thorough and conscientious man, finally got a result. Mr Kakridis used to slip out of parliamentary sittings using a back entrance, then walk to a flat in Pangrati, where he and an attractive blonde lady spent exactly forty-five minutes together behind closed doors. He would leave the flat and be back in his seat in the chamber in just under an hour. Not a hair out of place.

  ‘Any idea who the blonde might be?’ asked George.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can you tell me?’

  ‘It would be unethical.’

  ‘Of course. But helpful.’

  ‘All right. It’s Mrs Boiatzis.’

  ‘Mrs Boiatzis? Isn’t she bit old for a goat like him?’

  ‘You should see her. She’s a hot thirty-five year old from Russia. I don’t know where he found her, or she found him, but I tell you she’s a hell of a woman.’

  ‘So why is Boiatzis messing around with someone else?’

  ‘Maybe the Russian’s hard work. They usually are.’

  Now they had to decide how to tell the truth to Mr and Mrs Kakridis. They went over the possibilities several times. Pezas saw it very simply. ‘They’ve paid us for the information. It’s our job to give it to them. What they do with it is their business.’

  ‘I don’t like what happens next,’ said George. ‘There’s an equilibrium here. We’re going to destroy it.’

  ‘They’ve asked us to.’

  ‘They don’t know what they’re doing.’

  ‘They’ll know soon enough.’

  ‘They’ll regret it.’

  ‘That’s their problem.’

  ‘Can we at least send them a written report with a recommendation that they don’t read it?’

  ‘You’re joking!’

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘You’ll only whet their appetite.’

  ‘At least they’ll have a warning.’

  ‘Whatever you like. My report will be ready tomorrow.’

  ‘I need a few more days.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I have to go to a friend’s funeral tomorrow.’

  ‘So I’ll send mine.’