Deadline in Athens (38 page)

Standing in the center of the room were two men. One was medium height, medium build, and medium hair. His coat was open and he was wearing a suit with a shirt buttoned to the neck, no tie. This had to be Hourdakis. The other was roughly the same age, fifties, thin, with a department-store suit and a tie so worn that it must have been dying of loneliness because there was certainly no other of its kind anywhere in his wardrobe.

"Where have you been, Mr. Hourdakis? We've been looking for you everywhere. We even had to put your wife and son to some inconvenience," I said.

"I've been on a trip."

"Christodoulou, Inspector, Mr. Hourdakis's lawyer," the thin one chipped in. "I would ask that it be taken into consideration that my client presented himself of his own free will as soon as he heard that you were anxious to speak with him."

"A warrant has been issued and we would have found him in any case.

"Nevertheless, it's not the same."

I didn't have time to waste on the lawyer and I turned to Hourdakis. "Do you know why we have been looking for you?" I said. "We want to know who was giving you the occasional million that you spread out over your family's accounts-payments for turning a blind eye to the Transpilar refrigerator trucks."

Hourdakis turned to look to his lawyer.

"I want you to know that my client came here to offer every help to the police, Inspector."

"Fine. We'll take that into consideration if his answers are satisfactory." Back to Hourdakis. "Well then, get on with it! Who was giving you the money?"

"I don't know," he said.

"Listen, Hourdakis. I've spent too much time on you already. Don't make me lose my temper. We've got the two drivers, Milionis and Papadopoulos. We've also got Eleni Dourou, who took charge of the children. We know everything. Tell us who was paying you so we can put an end to it."

"My client is telling you the truth," the solicitor interrupted again. "He doesn't know."

I stared at them and I felt something wasn't right. "How did you get the money?" I asked Hourdakis.

"Let me go back to the beginning. One evening, when I came home from work, I found a package waiting for me. It was an ordinary box, like those used for packing glasses. When I opened it, I found 500,000 drachmas inside. I thought there had been some mistake, but the package had my name and address on it. I was racking my brain trying to think who might have sent it when the phone rang and a man asked me if I'd received the 500,000. I asked his name, of course, but he wouldn't tell me. All he told me was that on the following night a Transpilar refrigerator truck would be crossing the border. If I let it through without inspecting it, he'd send me another 500,000."

"When did all this happen?"

"I don't remember the date exactly, but it must have been sometime in May of 1991."

"And so you let it through."

"Yes. Three days later, I received the other 500,000. After that, he'd phone me and give me the number of the refrigerator truck, I'd let it through without any inspection, and he'd send me the million."

It was that simple. The first refrigerator truck that had gone through in May'91 was almost certainly empty. If Hourdakis hadn't taken the bait and had inspected it, he wouldn't have found anything. What, after all, was Sovatzis risking in order to test him? A salary, perhaps not even. When he saw that Hourdakis had taken the bait, he began his operation.

"How was the money sent to you?"

"In a package, always. Brought by courier."

"And who was the sender?"

"It had a different name each time."

"And why did you stop, given that everything was going like clockwork?"

"The trucks always came at night. I had to change shifts in order to make sure I was there. At first it was easy, because no one wants to work at night. But eventually, they got suspicious because I kept asking to work nights. And then I got wind of the fact that someone had begun asking questions about the trucks."

"Who was asking questions?"

"Someone from Athens, I don't know who. I never found out."

I knew. It was Karayoryi.

"As I was eligible for early retirement, I applied and my application was accepted."

Now someone else was getting money in a package. We'd find him too, but I still had nothing on Sovatzis. Only if we got our hands on Krenek, but he'd be in South America by now.

I took out the famous photograph of the two of them, anyhow, and showed it to Hourdakis. "Do you recognize either of these men?"

He looked at it and shook his head. Then we went, together with his solicitor, to the photography records. I showed him the photographs of Milionis, Papadopoulos, Dourou, and Seki. He immediately recognized the first two, but Dourou and Seki he said he did not know, had never met. I sent him to make a written statement and then to the cells.

Sotiropoulos was waiting for me. "What happened with Hourdakis? Did he talk?"

"The chief will make an official statement."

"Oh, come off it."

I motioned him into the office. I told him briefly what I'd learned from Hourdakis. I wasn't doing him any special favor because Ghikas would tell the others the same.

"How involved is Sovatzis, Dourou's brother, in the business?" he asked me.

"Do you think he's involved?"

"He's involved, all right, but I'm afraid that you won't be able to prove anything," he said, puncturing my morale. "You've absolutely nothing on him. Your only hope is Pylarinos."

"Why Pylarinos?"

"Because Sovatzis is a pain in the ass for him. If he discovers anything whatsoever, he might just hand him over to you for the peace of mind."

I liked that idea. "What did you do about Kolakoglou?" I said as he was leaving.

"About Kolakoglou?" he turned and looked at me in surprise.

"Weren't you going to prove that he'd been sent down unjustly?"

It was no longer a priority; he'd virtually forgotten it. "I'd really like to, but it's not possible," he said and sighed. "Kolakoglou is no longer news. No one's interested in him. Even if I were to put together a report, the news editor would kill it."

Robespierre, employee of Media Inc., with a lump sum on retiring and a pension. It was already four. I'd been on my feet for forty hours. I decided to close shop and go to sleep.

Before leaving, I called Sotiris in and told him to leave no stone unturned until he had something on Sovatzis.

CHAPTER 41

They came one by one and handed me their reports. And with each report my hopes tumbled. In the end they were crushed completely. No one had been found who could recognize Sovatzis. Not at Hellas Channel, or on Karadimas Street, where the Albanians had been murdered, or in Kostarakou's neighborhood. No one knew him on Koumanoudi Street either. None of the building's residents or the neighbors knew him. The fox hadn't gone anywhere near The Foxes so as not to arouse suspicion.

I was in a state of despondency because the doors were closing, one after the other. In the end, I'd have to take the plunge. I'd bring Sovatzis in and lean on him. I tried to work out what the best tactic would be: to use the evidence I had on him and Krenek, or to try and scare him with the twenty years his sister would get. But before I had come to any conclusion, the telephone rang.

"Come up," Ghikas said in that curt manner he uses when he has someone with him and he wants to play the boss.

I wasn't wrong. "Big-shot visitor," Koula said to me as I went through.

"Who is it today?"

"Pylarinos."

My hopes were raised. For Pylarinos to have come back meant that he had something important to tell us. Could Sotiropoulos have been right after all, that he was going to sell out Sovatzis for his own peace of mind?

He was sitting in the same chair he'd sat in during our last meeting. As soon as he saw me, however, he got to his feet and shook my hand warmly.

"I've already congratulated Superintendent Ghikas, but I wanted to tell you personally, Inspector. You don't know how relieved I am that the case has been closed without any serious consequences for my businesses."

"The case has been partially cleared up, but it's still open," I said, correcting him. "Whoever murdered Karayoryi and Kostarakou is still walking free."

"I'm no police officer, of course, but in my mind the most likely murderer is one of the two drivers, or the customs official. The Albanians were killed to keep their mouths shut."

"The most likely culprit is Sovatzis. The others have alibis. And Dourou couldn't possibly have killed them. The murders were committed by a man."

He looked closely at me. "I have to admit that I thought of that too. That's why I phoned the superintendent and asked when the murders were committed. The first was on November 27 and the second on November 30. Mr. Sovatzis went abroad on November 25 and came back on December 2." He took a passport out of his pocket and handed it to me. "You can verify the dates from his passport."

I took it and thumbed through it. It was true. It had a stamp in Czech on November 25, another in Czech and in German on November 29, and an exit stamp in German from Vienna airport on December 2. The bastard had arranged Karayoryi's murder and made sure he was abroad on the day of the murder. Then he had given instructions to the murderer to kill Kostarakou too.

"The charge of accessory before the fact continues to weigh upon him," I said to Pylarinos. "Sovatzis is the only one who can lead us to the murderer."

"I am persuaded that Mr. Sovatzis has no involvement in the matter, Inspector," he said in a tone of voice that brooked no objection. "And I'm ashamed for having suspected him at first. You've done a wonderful job, you've arrested the guilty parties, and the case is closed. However, in order for me to put my mind totally at rest, I had Demos transferred to another position, with no administrative responsibility."

Ghikas couldn't restrain himself. "Where did you transfer him?" he said.

Pylarinos didn't answer immediately. "I made him vice president of the governing board," he said with some awkwardness, and immediately added, as if wanting to dispel an adverse impression: "It's a purely decorative position. The vice president has no executive involvement. He simply handles matters assigned to him by the chairman, and that's me. A bit like the vice president of America, who has the title, but effectively has no power." He laughed at his attempt at humor.

We were speechless. He took advantage of our surprise and got up to leave. "Gentlemen, once again, I offer you my warmest congratulations." He turned to me. "You can keep the passport to check the dates."

What was there for me to check? He'd made sure he was sitting pretty. "That won't be necessary," I said and handed it back to him.

As soon as Pylarinos was gone, I leapt to my feet. "If either you or I had done a hundredth of what Sovatzis has done," I said angrily, "we'd have been suspended right now and we'd be preparing our defense. He got promotion and a raise."

"Nothing would happen to us either if we had the minister in our hands," he said, smiling grimly.

"What does that mean?"

"Don't you see? Sovatzis knows about all the money that Pylarinos appropriated in order to become an independent businessman. He may even have concrete evidence. He threatened to reveal it and Pylarinos backed off."

True. I'd forgotten about that in my rage.

"The only thing," Ghikas went on, "is that, this way, they're pinning everything on Dourou."

I rushed to the door, as if Dourou were getting away from me. On my way out, I told Koula to call down to the cells and tell them to have her brought to me immediately.

I found her in the same seat at the end of the table. I went and sat next to her. "Eleni, I have bad news for you," I said in a friendly tone.

"Why, when did you ever have good news?" she said.

"Your little brother has sold you out, Elenitsa. He has proof that he was abroad when the murders took place. He says that you planned it all. He had no idea."

"Of course he had no idea. He didn't have any idea and I didn't plan anything. All that is your own fabrications."

"Wake up, dimwit! You've become as stupid as the Albanians you mix with! We've got the two drivers of the refrigerator trucks. We've got Hourdakis. We know that the drivers handed the kids over to Seki outside Kastoria and that he brought them in a van to your nursery. We know it all!"

"How do you know that he brought the children to me? Did you actually see him?"

"Your girl saw him and she has identified him."

"Ah, yes, the photograph," she said. "Just try proving from the photograph that this Albanian was somehow linked to me."

"We'll prove it, don't worry. Now that your little brother has made sure he's well out of it, it's you we'll settle for as an accessory to the fact for the murders of Karayoryi and Kostarakou. You'll go down for ten years at least. Your only hope is to cooperate with us. We know you didn't have anything to do with the murders. All you have to do is to tell me who your brother hired to kill the two reporters and I'll see to it that you only do half your time."

She looked at me, and it was the first time that she wasn't able to find anything to say. That was a good sign. Most likely, she'd begun to waver. I leaned toward her. "I can see that they're trying to pin everything on you and I feel sorry for you. These kinds of jobs only last as long as they do, and when they go wrong, everyone tries to save their own skin. That's what your brother is doing. Why sacrifice yourself on his account?"

She suddenly leapt up, like a wild animal. "Leave my brother out of it!" she screamed. "You don't know what he's been through! He was still in my mother's belly when she went to find my father up in the hills. She left me with my grandmother. I grew up scared stiff of policemen like you! They'd come to our house every so often and turn it upside down, terrorizing us! And when I wanted to enter the college for nursery carers, they made my grandmother sign a state ment. Can you imagine? A seventy-year-old woman! Do you know when I first saw Demos? In 1978. One day there was a knock at my door and I found myself looking at a man. `Are you Eleni?' he asked me. `I'm Demos, your brother.' I knew that my parents had been killed in an accident, about a year before Zachariadis had been deposed as secretary of the party. But I knew nothing about my brother's fate. Demos had been brought up by the party. And though I was older than him, I couldn't help him or even send a letter to him. And now you're asking me to sign a statement just to save my skin? Leave my brother out of it! He doesn't have anything to do with any of this! He's innocent!"