The Dead Travel Fast (14 page)

“Who has the authority to instruct you? I thought you were most senior here.”

“Most senior, yes. Most influential, no. I’ve said all that I intend to; if you want to know the rest you need to talk to Andraki again. Then if you still want to know more and are prepared to sell your soul, try Vassilis.”

He looked Theodrakis in the eyes and contorted his mouth into a mirthless smile, made a dismissive gesture that made Theodrakis think of Pontius Pilate and said,

“That’s all; go.”

Adamidis placed his head back in his hands, the overhead fan
whirred above his head and the clock ticked; Theodrakis turned and left the room.

He didn’t want a squad car so took a taxi to the university in Karlovasi. He slumped in the back ignoring the driver’s diatribe about bankers, German money men, Greek politicians, communists, murders sent as a curse and anything else that came into his angry mind, which started as soon as the taxi started and ended forty minutes later in Karlovasi. The university vestibule was dusty and deserted as usual so he followed the corridor to Professor Andraki’s office. As he got close he heard raised voices: Andraki’s in protest, and perhaps fear, and another voice higher pitched and malicious. He waited outside to hear more but the door opened and a man came out. He was young, dark haired and unnaturally pale and as he brushed past Theodrakis he paused as if he recognised him.

“I see you Athenian, clown and victim, you and Andraki, you could be made for each other.”

He made a sound between a hiss and a cat spitting, and Theodrakis noticed the bloodshot film across his eyes, then he was gone. Andraki was dishevelled, red faced and breathing heavily. The office was in an even greater state of disorder than it had been on his previous visit, and Theodrakis wondered at the rate at which Andraki was deteriorating. He waited for him to compose himself before questioning, but it was Andraki who spoke first.

“That thing was Antonis, the son of Vassilis of whom you have heard; even Vassilis doesn’t deserve a creature like that as a son, if that is what he really is.”

“What was he so upset about?”

“Upset? That’s too mild, too human a word for Antonis, the little shit should have died in that car, would have but for that English man who is now fucking his sister. Saves the brother and the sister drinks his soul, not much thanks that, is it?”

Theodrakis understood none of this, Andraki seemed deranged. To give him time to calm down he walked across to the desk and examined the collection of flint artefacts scattered there. He
noticed several blades. After some moments he turned back to look at Andraki, who seemed calmer.

“Professor, I have just come from Kirios Adamidis, there has been another killing and we are exploring a new avenue of enquiry.”

“Which will be a cul-de-sac like all the others. I use the French deliberately with its suggestion of arse end.”

This was not what he expected from Andraki, whom he’d considered a fastidious man like himself, apart from the drinking of course. It was this last thought that put into place something else he found odd. There was no trace of alcohol on Andraki’s breath, the man was sober.

“Professor, I think you could be very helpful. I want to know more about the prehistoric, or more precisely the Neolithic aspects of this killing.”

“Then you would be better talking to the English man. Vassilis places more faith in him than in me, the leading Greek scholar. I’m sure Watkins will be prepared to take time off from screwing that overheated bitch to talk to you.”

“Thank you, Professor, I will bear that in mind, but for now it is you to whom I must talk. I’m interested in the fact these killings started shortly after you reported an ancient burial site had been disturbed. Would that have been a Neolithic site?”

“That just displays your ignorance of Aegean archaeology; there are no major Neolithic burial sites, and few, if any, known burials on Samos. The burials in question are from the very much later Geometric, although it is possible that the site overlies earlier evidence.”

“So where did all those implements on your desk come from? They are Neolithic, are they not?”

“Yes, but from a variety of sites and some were imported from other islands.”

“Professor, you are party to the facts that indicate the murderer uses Neolithic blades to kill, blades like those on your table perhaps. Where would he get hold of such blades?”

“How would I know that?”

“Well, what about the bones, was it not a tradition in Neolithic times to take selected long bones of the dead to collective burial sites?”

“I see you have bothered to research the subject, Syntagmatarchis, but like many lazy students you have been too superficial. The practices you allude to pertain to the British and elements of European Atlantic Neolithic only and, as I understand from recent research, even there the jury is still out. What you so confidently refer to as Neolithic is, in reality, a wide range of different cultures, with different practices spread across thousands of years. I can promise you there is no tradition of disarticulation for collective burial in the Aegean, and as for associated ritual murder, well I don’t think you will find evidence of that anywhere.”

Theodrakis had been through a very stressful time and began to feel anger building up, anger which was now aimed at Andraki.

“Nevertheless, Professor, the bones have been taken and believe me, we will find them; and when we do then perhaps I will consult the Englishman you seem so fond of. But for now I think I will take that collection on your desk with me to help with enquiries.”

“You can’t do that, it’s a private collection.”

“Just watch me, Professor, and while you’re at it tell me what you really know about the curse and the ritual.”

He walked across to the desk to collect the flints, wondering what he would carry them in. As he was sweeping them into a pile he was conscious that Andraki had joined him at the desk. He ignored him and leant across to gather in the flints at the desk’s far side. As he did so, he noticed a half open drawer that looked to have a couple of bigger blades wrapped in a piece of cloth inside. He reached for them and as he did he felt sharp pain as something struck then skidded off his shoulder blade. He tried to turn, but only ended up stretched out on his back on the desk; above him Andraki was stabbing at him with a flint blade that already dripped blood. He pushed his hands out to protect his face and felt the flint slash through the palm of his right hand and slide on, so that he managed to grab hold of the wrist with his left.

Andraki’s face was above his; he was breathing heavily and spittle flew from his fleshy lips, moistening Theodrakis’s face. He tried to use his shredded right hand but it bloodily slipped off whichever part of Andraki it touched. The hand holding the
knife bore down towards his face forcing his own back with it; he was not strong enough to resist. He felt Andraki’s other hand, strong, but with a strangely soft and girlish texture, grip his neck and begin squeezing his windpipe. He’d never been a hard man, never been a fighter and knew he was going to die. He had no thoughts about this, only terror.

He squirmed and wriggled about on the desk trying to shake free like the dying squid on the boat deck as it tried to return to the sea. He shut his eyes so that he wouldn’t see the flint point inexorably boring its way towards his face, and his ruined right hand thrashed uncoordinatedly across the cluttered surface of the desk. His spasming fingers grasped something; a pen, and through some instinct beyond thought he thrust it towards where he knew Andraki’s face must be. There was a squeal and his face was covered with something hot and sticky, the grip on his throat relaxed, the hand with the blade fell away and a horrible squealing began.

He opened his eyes Andraki had moved away from the desk and was bent double with his hands covering his face; spouting between them like some terrible antennae was the handle of the pen. He didn’t need to look more closely to know where the pen had lodged. He looked down at his boat trip outfit, now blood-soaked, and was sick.

Theodrakis wasn’t a malicious man, he called the ambulance before the cops but, when he had, he was seized with a level of rage he’d never experienced. The whimpering sounds gnawed at the anger rising within him, and before he could stop himself he walked across to where Andraki crouched holding his face where the pen had entered his eye and kicked him as hard as he could in the balls. Then, in horror at what he’d done, he retreated to the far corner of the room where he slumped in the corner with his hands over his face to wait for whichever of the emergency services could be bothered to arrive first.

As it transpired, the bones remained locked in the trunk of Steve’s car. That long night he tossed sleepless in bed; the idea of them lying there silent gnawed at him and by early morning he decided his nerves were too stretched for him to wait for Giles. He’d take them to Andraki. Once he made this decision, he managed to drop into an uneasy sleep.

He was woken by the man in the truck that sold plastic chairs and potatoes shouting his wares through a megaphone on the truck’s roof. One of the things that pleasantly surprised Steve about the village was that, not only did such practices still exist in the world, but that here, at least, they seemed to thrive. But today the amplified if unintelligible grunting, and the roar of the truck crashing through its lower gears as it clattered along the track beneath his window, gave him no pleasure.

His head throbbed from the last night’s drink as he tried to get himself together for his trip to Andraki. The face that gazed back at him from the shaving mirror was liverish, and his furred and yellow tongue looked too fat to be healthy. He swallowed a half cup of coffee made from the type of powder that he thought had ceased to be used in Western Europe decades ago but was ubiquitous here, and left the apartment. The chair and potato truck was right outside his doorway with the engine running and the cab door open. The driver was sitting drinking at a table with a couple of old fisherman cronies about twenty metres away; they
all seemed to be shouting at once. It seemed so normal, and he wished he were a part of it.

Inside the car he had to stop himself from checking whether the bones had made their way out of the locked trunk and were now on scuttling about on the back seat. He knew this was ridiculous, but since Skendleby he didn’t believe in the everyday world that other people existed in. So he got out of the car to make sure the trunk was still locked and having reassured himself drove off.

Once he’d crossed the spine of the island the fire damage was behind him and the sea, stretching towards the Turkish coast, was sparkling ahead. He thought how good it would be to see Giles and Claire at the airport later. He found a spot to park near the university by the statue of Anaxagoras who had predicted that the earth rotated round the sun fifteen hundred years before Galileo. A hero now but, like Galileo, he’d been persecuted by his contemporaries.

The statue had the bland bearded face common to all statues of Greek philosophers, and Steve thought it would also serve as a template for statues of university archaeologists if ever any of them were so elevated. He was thinking about this when he blundered into the temporary police barrier erected across the University main entrance. The bored looking cop on duty showed no inclination to answer his questions and just waved him away, so he wandered over to a group of students gathered across the road to smoke and pass the day awaiting further developments.

“What’s going on over there, then?”

“Don’t know but we think someone’s been murdered.”

“I heard a cop’s been killed.”

“Christos told me it was in Andraki’s room, he said there was an ambulance.”

No one really knew but the general consensus was that Professor Andraki was involved either as victim or assailant and that he’d been whisked away in an ambulance or police car. Steve felt a griping in his guts, certain the bones in his car were linked to whatever had happened here. He remembered how vehement Andraki had been that anything out of context be reported back to him.

What could be more out of context on an ancient site than disarticulated twenty-first century bones with scraps of soft tissue still
attached? He tried to ring Alekka but only got her answer phone; he didn’t want to go to the police until he knew more so decided to go back home and wait for Giles. He returned to the car with its grisly cargo and drove back over the mountain spine towards the village. As he entered Marathakampos he realised he was out of cigarettes and rather than pay the tourist prices in the village store, he stopped off at a cheap cafenion on the main street.

He parked Greek style: just stopped the car in the road and walked off through the tables under the awning and into the bar. There was a very old man in a corner away from the window singing to himself, otherwise the place was empty. Eventually the owner, a one-eyed fat man in a greasy stained vest, walked out of the back room to serve him. He bought forty cigarettes and ouzo to settle his nerves which he took to a table outside.

He sat under the trellis of vines watching passing traffic manoeuvre round the obstruction caused by his parking. He began to feel that he was being observed. When he couldn’t resist the compulsion any more he looked round and saw a man in a black robe and broad-brimmed hat sitting under the deepest shade of the trellis. He hadn’t been there when he arrived and no one had come in since he had. The apparition lifted its hand as if it were a great effort and beckoned him over.

Steve couldn’t see the man’s face in the shadows but was horribly certain it was the cadaverous priest from the Vassilis estate. He sat havering in indecision and watched as the pale and bony finger beckoned again. He stood up and walked across to the priest’s table; up close he looked even worse. The red pustules on the dead white skin were weeping, the skin was so thin Steve could see the bone. He preferred to avert his eyes from the bandage wrapped round the throat and the discolouration that was leeching through. He wondered could such a thing be considered alive.

“Welcome, Doctor Watkins, I thought I would find you here.”

The voice was dry and thin like newspaper rustling in the wind. How could he have expected to find him in this dirty, depressing cafenion?

“Father John, how are you?”

He mentally kicked himself for asking such a stupid question. He needn’t have worried, the priest ignored the question and gestured
for him to sit. He sat at the edge of the table furthest away and waited to hear whatever it was that Father John had to tell him. Despite his surprise he’d worked out that although he didn’t know how the priest found him he did know this meeting was not by chance. He didn’t have long to wait. Father John gestured him closer then spoke.

“Listen carefully, I do not want to have to repeat myself.”

Steve reluctantly drew nearer.

“There is no need to be so afraid, I mean you no harm and one day you may need me. Andraki has been infected, you will not see him again.”

Steve was about to ask what he meant but Father John raised an almost translucent hand to silence him.

“Listen, don’t speak; finish your work on the site without delay, your friend who arrives today will help. Bring what you find to Vassilis, show it to no one else; talk to no one else. No one, you understand.”

There was a silence; the priest’s eyes were closed and Steve thought maybe he was asleep or perhaps dead, but they opened and with an obvious effort he added,

“Bring the woman too, now go.”

Steve needed no second invitation; he got up and walked quickly to his car. The walk took less than a few seconds but when he looked back the table in the shade was empty. He pulled off immediately; half way down the mountain to the village he wondered how the priest could have known about Andraki or Giles arriving later today and why Vassilis would want to see Claire. He assumed that it was Claire he had meant by ‘the woman’. But he hadn’t mentioned the bones and Steve couldn’t figure out if that was good or bad.

The mobile lying in the coin tray bleeped as he was negotiating the hairpin bends leading down to the village. He saw it was Alekka. He didn’t share the local’s skills in driving this road with one arm holding a cigarette and the other holding a phone, so he pulled up into the grove.

“Steveymou, I am sorry I could not talk to you earlier but I look forward so much to seeing your friends from England tonight.”

Steve was pleased but thrown by this; he hadn’t told her about
Giles and Claire arriving and made no arrangement for her to meet them. In fact, he’d wondered when he’d see her next. But this was a minor quibble compared to his desire to see her and show her off to his friends and he soon forgot it. A few minutes later as he was parking up outside his apartment Captain Michales slouched across.

“Steve, I will tell you about big things that have happened here, come have one drink.”

The idea of a drink appealed, but the ouzo he’d just drunk was lurking as an incipient headache at the front of his skull.

“Sorry, I’ve got to get to the airport but I’ll be in the bar tonight and you can meet my friends.”

He ignored the captain’s grimace and got back into his car; he’d intended to hide the bones before he went to the airport but with Michales showing up he couldn’t, so he drove off. He’d checked the airport staff weren’t on strike and was reasonably sure, or as sure as you could be in Greece these days, that the flight would get in roughly on time.

But when he pulled into the approach road to the terminal he saw there was trouble. The airport staff were working, but the taxi drivers were on strike and they were out in force to prevent any bits of private enterprise by other drivers. There were scuffles outside the arrivals hall, flustered holiday reps were ushering their charges into a variety of coaches and mini-buses, some of the more battered had obviously been brought out of either retirement or the scrap yard. The taxi drivers let these through but tried to prevent any private cars picking up individuals, so there were a number of distressed families with their luggage sitting in the sun with no way of crossing the mountains to begin the holiday. He recognised Yanni, a taxi driver from the village, and explained what he was doing.

“When your friends come on the London flight, show them to me and I will bring them to you, we don’t want to upset tourists but we will not let cockroaches take our work.”

So Steve passed the time until the London passengers got through baggage reclamation hiding the sack of bones, which had begun to smell, under the spare wheel. The sight of Giles shepherding Claire through the crowd brought tears to his eyes,
it had been so long since he’d been with people who knew what he had gone through at Skendleby. He pointed them out to Yanni and moments later they were slaloming through the mass of obstructively parked taxis towards the main road. In the car conversation was muted, how could you pick up normally after what had happened? Giles and Claire were tired, and gradually lapsed into staring out of the window at scenes of breathtaking beauty alternating with the blackened tree stumps and scorched earth of fire damage.

The accommodation Steve had reserved for them was in a small development of eight houses in an olive grove overlooking the sea, a few hundred metres above the village; a great place for a holiday but now, like much of the accommodation on the island, empty. So they had the grove, the pool and the views to themselves. They fixed up to meet in the bar at seven and Steve left them with mixed emotions.

Back in the village he couldn’t settle, and by six he was nursing a drink in the bar. Slowly the village and alcohol worked their magic and he sat back inhaling the mixed scent of drifting tobacco smoke and sea air. He stared at the sea: flat and limpid with occasional dazzles. Condensation gathered on his glass and he began to feel lulled, time didn’t matter; feral cats dozed and stretched, eyes half closed in the dust under a tree. He rolled a smoke and gazed out towards the horizon where Patmos drifted in and out of focus in the heat haze.

He sensed, rather than saw, a man take a seat at the table behind him and ask for a coffee. After a while he turned his head and recognised the detective he’d seen in Andraki’s office. He looked pale, his left hand was heavily bandaged and he was writing in a leather backed notebook. As he sat and watched and the fragrant smoke dispersed into the air he felt an urge, suppressed for years, to write himself. Without thinking he asked for a sheet of paper, the detective looked surprised but with an air of reluctance tore out a leaf from the notebook and passed it across.

He began to write and as he did he temporarily forgot Alekka, the numbness in his fingers and the other anxieties infesting his consciousness. He lost himself trying to distil thought into the minimum number of words. Sometime later he put down his
pen and re-emerged into the world. He looked round and saw that the fastidious detective was re-reading whatever he’d written. He looked up and their eyes met and, on an uncharacteristic impulse, Steve asked,

“May I see what you’ve written?”

“If you can read Greek then help yourself.”

Steve stretched out his hand and Theodrakis passed across the paper; on it was a short poem neatly written and despite the crossings-out, beautifully symmetrical.

‘The rattle of Tric Trac the prattle of logos

Life sweet and sharp as a pear.

Is it

The slit eyed cat in the dust who watches the bird on the twig?

Or

The slow rotation of an ancient potsherd through crumbling

earth?

Through time’s passages the planets turn.’

Steve handed it back.

“That’s good; far better than I could manage.”

“Thank you that is most kind but it reads like a poor pastiche of Elytis don’t you agree? Perhaps you would show me the use to which you put my paper?”

“If you can read English help yourself.”

“I read it fluently, thanks to a year’s internship in Cambridge.”

Steve looked down at his scrawl with crossings out spreading like a rash across the paper then passed it across; Theodrakis took it with the semblance of a bow in return. He read and then re-read it before handing it back.

“Strange don’t you think how both of us, strangers here, end up in the same cafe writing poems full of images of the past? Instructive for me to see how ancient death affects you, and how great are the similarities between your work and mine. I know who you are, and before long would have come to question you. You are the English archaeologist who works for Vassilis.”