Nemesis of the Dead (7 page)

‘Was there anywhere you could hide something dodgy?’

‘Like what?’

‘Oh, I dunno – portable laboratory equipment, chemicals, stuff like that.’

‘Why? You don’t think somebody’s making a bomb up there, do you?’ Corrie sat up, her face suddenly illuminated. ‘Actually, Jack, it would make a brilliant hiding place for stolen goods.’

She hopped out of bed and sat on the end of his.

He groaned. ‘Corrie, you’re doing it again …’

She carried on, undaunted. ‘D’you remember what it said in that leaflet I found in reception? When Hotel Katastrophos was first built, smugglers used to raid the mainland and hide the loot in the islands.’ She looked at him expectantly, as if he ought to know what she was getting at. ‘What if it’s still going on?’

‘Eh?’

‘It could be stolen icons or Greek bronzes – there’s a big market for that kind of thing, especially in the States. Rich American collectors would pay a fortune. And with more than fourteen hundred Greek Islands to choose from, who’d come to Katastrophos to look for them? I’ve never seen so much as a village policeman here, have you? I doubt there’s any kind of structured law and order at all, apart from the old priest and he must be at least ninety.’ She began to pace the room, piecing together the scam. ‘All you’d have to do is make the hit, nick the stuff, have it away fast and stash it in the monastery. Then you lie low and when the heat’s off, you fence it to the highest bidder.’

‘Corrie, don’t be so lurid. Try to remember you’re a caterer. You’re starting to sound like a seventies TV villain. Nobody talks like that in real life.’

She ignored him, warming to her crime. ‘It would explain those lights we saw. The boat bringing the loot across from the mainland signals to his accomplice up in the monastery, who flashes back to let him know he’s up there, ready to receive the icons. The boat ties up on the cliff side of the islet, out of sight, and they use the medieval winch to haul up the stuff. The accomplice hides it in the abbey church until it’s safe to contact the buyer, then they flog it and split the cash. How’s that?’ She folded her arms with a triumphant flourish.

‘Sounds risky to me.’ Jack grunted. ‘What if somebody else spots the signals, gets curious, and goes up there to investigate?’

‘They wouldn’t. You heard what Yanni said when Sid asked about it. Except for pilgrimages, nobody slogs up all those steps and even if they did, they wouldn’t poke about among St Sophia’s precious relics. This is a profoundly superstitious rural community. They live under their saint’s protection and they sincerely believe something bad will happen to anyone who displeases her.’

‘Any danger of you going to sleep tonight,’ asked Jack, wearily.

Corrie grinned. ‘Not much. Pity I didn’t have time to case the joint properly while I was up there, but the storm was brewing and we had to come down.’ She went back to her own bed and lay down. ‘I don’t feel like climbing back up for another look, though, do you?’

‘Nope,’ said Jack. His eyes closed and he went straight off to sleep.

N
ext day, the storm had cleared. At dawn, Helios, in his sun-chariot, emerged from his golden palace in the east and leapt up into the brazen sky where he would rest until evening.

Corrie stood on the terrace, shielding her eyes and staring out to sea, intoxicated by the candescence of sun on water with boundless blue sky pouring into it. She was not aware of Professor Gordon standing behind her until he spoke in his deep, educated voice.

‘You are not, of course, the first visitor to Katastrophos to be mesmerized by “
To Phos
” – the light. The Greeks believe it is the naked eyeball of God that blinds the wicked and the unwary.’

She turned and smiled self-consciously. ‘It’s easy to believe almost anything on this spellbinding little island. Even the Greek myths take on a kind of relevance to human nature.’

After witnessing their sexual contretemps that night on the landing, Corrie was even more seduced by her notion of sultry-eyed Diana as Medusa and Ambrose as the lecherous, cheating Poseidon.

As if reading her thoughts, the professor nodded. ‘The Greek gods were the first gods to resemble humans. Not just look like them, but act like them too. They each had his or her own personality and shortcomings. Some were beautiful, some were lustful, some were ruthless and so on. The entire mythological world is based on humans.’

‘You make them sound very ungodlike and fallible,’ said Corrie.

‘By no means. The myths were full of heroes, men of genius who destroyed their enemies by their superior intelligence and wit. For example, Oedipus beating the Sphinx at the riddle and murdering his father when he crossed his path. Ancient Greeks had an unquenchable curiosity about creation and, more to the point, destruction. Death to them was nothing more than a means to an end and they didn’t hesitate to kill in order to achieve a higher objective.’

‘But did the Ancient Greeks have a healthy respect for plants, Professor?’

He smiled, sensing she was teasing him. ‘I’ll give you an example, Coriander. Athena and her uncle, the sea god Poseidon, were in competition for the affections of the Greeks. It was decided that the divinity who created the most useful object would win the right to have the capital city named after them. Poseidon provided a magnificent horse, but Athena created the olive tree, giving shade, oil and olives. Naturally, the Greeks preferred her gift and so the capital of Greece is Athens, not Poseidonia.’

Smiling, he touched her shoulder in a friendly farewell and strode away in the direction of the olive groves, carrying his sample case.

Jack appeared from inside the hotel, eating a slice of seed-cake he had pinched from the kitchen, since nobody seemed to be doing anything about breakfast.

‘What did the professor want?’

‘Nothing really. We were just having a chat.’

‘Do you know where he’s gone?’

‘Yes, he’s off to collect more plants.’ She looked thoughtful. ‘He really is a fascinating man, Jack. Compelling, even. Most of the time, he’s all bluff, cranky and absent-minded, but then you get a glimpse of a determined, almost obsessive personality underneath. I mean, look at the way he worships Diana despite the way she behaves. Stereotypical professor, I suppose. But you have to admire his absolute dedication to his work. You can see why he’s so highly respected and wealthy.’

Jack shot her a sudden glance, then shrugged dismissively. ‘Yanni’s looking for you. I don’t know what he wants.’

I bet I bloody do! thought Corrie.

Maria was fully conscious now and much better, but the prolonged bouts of vomiting and diarrhoea had left her too weak to get out of bed. Corrie sympathized, recalling her encounter with the deadly Provençal snails. Food bugs could quite literally lay you out. Ariadne was still deeply disturbed by her daughter’s sudden illness but even more so by her apparent fall from St Sophia’s grace. Thankfully, she had stopped wailing, but refused to leave Maria’s bedside except to put out the traditional battery of charms and offerings needed to flatter the saint and coax her into lifting her curse.

In the meantime, there was no one but Yanni in Hotel Stasinopoulos to prepare and cook the food.

Corrie knew what was coming as soon as she saw him approaching, wringing his hands in humble supplication, like a Greek Uriah Heep.

‘
Kiría
Dawes,’ he began in a wheedling tone. ‘
Kírie
Jack says you are very good cook – excellent cook –
ipérocho
!’ He threw his hands up as if overwhelmed by the sheer brilliance of her catering skills.

‘Yes, all right,’ said Corrie, bowing to the inevitable. ‘Cut the flattery and spit it out, Yanni.’

‘
Kírie
Jack say to ask if you could … if you will …’ his English was running out and he ended up pointing towards the kitchen, hopefully.

Corrie made a mental note to have a quiet word with ‘
Kírie
Jack’ who, she suspected, had acted more in the interests of his own stomach than for altruistic reasons.

It was only later, when she was up to her elbows in goat’s entrails that it dawned on her. She and Jack were supposed to be on honeymoon – a relaxed, romantic holiday that was a ‘retreat from the stress of modern-day living’ and, most of all, as far away from crime and catering as possible. Now here she was, slaving away in a primitive foreign kitchen while Jack was skulking around like Inspector Clouseau, questioning people about flashing lights and contaminated eggs. She was cooking and he was detecting. The two things they had both promised each other they wouldn’t do! And as for a retreat from stress – they had only been there four days and so far, she had narrowly escaped falling to certain death off a cliff, been soaked to the skin and almost struck by lightning, witnessed the near expiry of the hotel owner from salmonella poisoning and been given the evil eye by a demented hippy.

‘If this is paradise island,’ she grumbled aloud, ‘give me demonic south London any day.’

Hearing Corrie muttering imprecations to herself in the kitchen indicated to Jack that a little masterly disappearance might be in order, so he took himself off to the
kafeneíon
in St Sophia for a beer. Sid was there, chatting and laughing with the old men, an interaction achieved solely through his irrepressible charm since he spoke no Greek and they spoke no English. When he saw Jack he motioned to the bar owner, already a bosom pal, to bring him a beer.

‘Wotcher, Jack, mate! Where’s your good lady?’

Jack grinned. ‘Back at the hotel. I think she’s volunteered to cook some food for supper.’

Sid’s face lit up. ‘Smashing! For someone who sells shoes, she certainly knows a lot about food, your missus.’ He picked up a deck of cards from the table. ‘Fancy a game?’

It was then that Jack noticed an angry, blistery rash on Sid’s left hand. He pointed.

‘That looks nasty. Is it a burn?’

Sid rubbed at it. ‘No. I think it must be some sort of allergy. Don’t know what, though.’

Jack remembered their botany lesson in the olive groves with the professor in his surgical gloves.

‘I bet it was that squirty cucumber thing. The professor said watch your hand for any reaction because the liquid can cause irritation.’

‘Yeah, that’s what I thought to start with. But then I remembered – it was the other hand that got squirted.’ Sid held out his right hand which was unblemished. ‘Queer, eh?’ He shuffled the cards and started to deal. ‘You want to watch these old geezers, Jack, they cheat worse than me.’ He beamed his lighthouse smile at the old men, who chuckled wheezily over their dangling cigarettes and slapped him on the back.

Jack took a long slug of beer and picked up his cards, but his mind was on something quite different.

Once she got organized, Corrie discovered that the quality of the local produce was actually extremely good – it was what Ariadne did to it that made it disgusting. Two of the blackened cooking pots had their bottoms burnt right out as if she’d been boiling something up for days.

Ariadne cooked mostly in an outdoor oven, a humpy whitewashed dome with a blackened mouth, nearly as big as Ariadne herself. As far as Corrie could make out, you lit the fire inside the oven and smoke escaped from time to time when you unplugged a small hole. When the heat was intense, you raked out the fire and put in the food which baked in the hot air. Not particularly responsive but not a health hazard either, although the ancient clay storage jars that she still used might well be. There was a whole row of them, holding all kinds of staple foods including the infamous eggs. Corrie couldn’t believe that any provisions would keep well under such conditions. One of the jars contained a number of what appeared to be small medicine bottles with old-fashioned stoppers. She uncorked one, sniffed it, turned slightly green and had to lean against the sink for a bit. Herbs, definitely, probably preserved by Ariadne for flavouring her noisome stews. It was, Corrie thought, food poisoning simply lying in wait for its next victim.

By dinner time Corrie had prepared baked red mullet, a huge moussaka, Greek salad with herbs and feta cheese, sausages and chips for Sidney and
tirópitakia
– small pastry triangles filled with goat’s cheese – for Ellie. For dessert, there was fruit salad and a honey cake which she had knocked up using nuts and spices from the clay storage jars, that she had considered safe to eat.

She looked at everything spread out on the big, olive-wood table and felt ridiculously pleased with herself. She even considered putting Greek food on the menu of ‘Coriander’s Cuisine’. She could introduce ‘Greek Dinner-Party Nights’ and let the guests smash the plates afterwards. She would need something to revive the business when she got home. Profits had plummeted since poor Lavinia died. Corrie frowned. The mysterious stomach upset that had caused her fatal heart attack had struck very suddenly, just like Maria’s, but unlike Maria, there was definitely no question of food poisoning, the post mortem had been unequivocal. Nevertheless people tended to be cautious. Perceptions had been more persuasive than reality and catering bookings had dropped almost overnight.

With the exception of Sky, who came down to dinner very late and only ever picked at the food anyway, everyone tucked in with gusto. Even Ambrose admitted grudgingly to Marjorie that while the food was still ‘Continental muck’ it was much improved muck. At the end of the meal, they gave Corrie a round of applause.

‘That’s the best meal I’ve had since I left Stoke Newington,’ said Sidney. ‘You know, Corrie, you’re wasted in a shoe shop. You ought to take up cooking professionally. I bet you’d do really well.’

Jack choked on a laugh and Corrie gave him a look cold enough to stun a polar bear.

‘Thanks, Sid. I’ll give it some thought.’

He winked. ‘Any chance of a bit of egg and bacon in the morning?’

But Corrie knew she’d really cracked the authentic Greek menu when Yanni asked if he could take some food up to Maria as the smell of the cooking had rekindled her appetite.

Much later, basking in the glow of approbation and far too many glasses of Yanni’s excellent wine, Corrie found herself sitting next to Diana under the vine-covered pergola. Her new resolve not to poke her nose into other people’s business had vanished along with her prim misgivings about the young American woman’s obvious lack of moral rectitude and her unforgivably gorgeous figure. All this forgotten, she chatted amiably.

‘So how do you think you’ll like living in Switzerland?’

‘Pardon me?’ Diana looked at her, puzzled.

‘You know …’ Corrie, rather tipsy, nudged her in the ribs with her elbow, ‘… the Gordon Research Scholarships. It isn’t a secret, is it? The professor was telling Jack and Sidney about how he’s soon going to be Master of a Swiss University. It must be such a great honour for him. I bet you’re really looking forward to it.’

‘The hell I am.’ Diana’s green eyes flashed briefly. ‘There’s no way I’m going to be buried alive in some crummy college just so Cuthbert can play the great benefactor to a bunch of plant nerds.’ She drained her glass of wine in one go.

Corrie was beginning to wish she hadn’t started this conversation but she was in the proverbial hole and too much wine had deprived her of the sense to stop digging.

‘But it need not be crummy
all
the time, surely. There are lots of really super things in Switzerland.’

‘Like what?’

Corrie racked her wine-fuddled brains, trying to think of some. ‘Well, there’s skiing and wrist watches and … er …’ she could hear herself talking drivel but couldn’t shut up, ‘… those little army knives and … er … Swiss roll.’

‘I’ve already told Cuthbert, I’m not going.’ Diana was adamant.

‘But Diana, he was very excited about it. Jack said he regards it as the culmination of a lifetime’s work in botany – the international recognition of his genius. If you refuse to go with him, aren’t you afraid he might go anyway? Without you?’

Diana laughed and put a confidential hand on Corrie’s arm.

‘Oh no, honey. Cuthbert can’t go anywhere without me.’

She stood up in a storm cloud of perfume and sashayed across to Sidney, who refilled her glass. A few minutes later they were attempting a really awful rendition of ‘I Got You, Babe’.

It was three in the morning. The initial sedative effect of the wine had worn off and Corrie was wide awake. The euphoria of her triumph with the food and her odd conversation with Diana spun round in her mind, preventing her from going back to sleep. She peered through the deep-purple shadows at the motionless body in the other bed.

‘Jack …’

There was no answer, just peaceful snores.

She raised her voice slightly.

‘Jack, darling.’

Still nothing.

‘Jack, are you awake?’ she yelled, tetchily.

‘I am now.’ Jack’s sleepy voice drifted back through the darkness.

‘Good. Are you listening, sweetheart? I had a really weird conversation with Diana tonight.’