The Silver Stain (27 page)

‘Alex!’ the actress said, when she saw the dressing on his neck. ‘What happened to you?’

‘Yeah,’ Jannet added, from the armchair he was slouching in. ‘Cut yourself shaving?’

‘Something like that.’ Mavros looked around. Alice Quincy was sitting behind her boss, but there was no sign of the producer.

‘Don’t worry,’ Cara said, giving him a cup of coffee, ‘Rosie’s on her way. Who’s your friend?’

‘Mikis Tsifakis,’ the Cretan said. ‘Driver.’

‘You brought the hired help?’ Jannet asked contemptuously.

‘Why not?’ Mavros replied. ‘That’s what
I
am, isn’t it?’

Mikis smiled and went over to one of the windows. Shortly afterwards, the external door opened and Rosie Yellenberg came down the hall. She looked at Mavros, but made no comment. He watched as she cast an expressionless glance at her brother and then caught Cara’s eye.

‘What’s this about? Some of us have got work to do.’

‘Aw, chill out, will you, Rosie?’ Jannet said, looking up from his phone.

‘Was she always like this?’ Mavros asked. ‘I mean when you were kids.’

There was silence while people exchanged surprised looks.

‘Well, lookee here,’ the director said, his eyes narrowing. ‘We’ve got ourselves a dick who knows how to dig.’

Mavros wondered if that was a reference to what he had put Oskar Mesner and Roufos’s skinhead through last night. It seemed unlikely as even Waggoner hadn’t seemed to know about it.

‘You and Rosie are brother and sister?’ Cara said, in astonishment.

The producer directed an icy glare at her. ‘Something wrong with that?’

‘Well, yes, actually,’ the actress replied. ‘Like why you’ve kept it secret.’

Jannet looked at his sister. ‘Any reason why we shouldn’t? That is, any reason we have to share personal stuff with you?’

‘It’s weird,’ Cara said.

‘Like everything else in the movie business isn’t?’ the director returned.

‘It’s more than weird,’ Mavros said. ‘What they’ve also failed to mention is that their father, Eugene Tzannetakis, came from the notorious drug-producing village of Kornaria and that he was jailed for drug trafficking in the States.’

‘Kornaria?’ the actress said. ‘That’s where Maria was held, isn’t it?’ She moved towards Jannet. ‘What have you done to her, you animal?’ she demanded, her voice rising.

‘Whoah.’ The director raised his arms. ‘I haven’t done anything to that bitch.’

Cara kicked him on the shin. Given that she was wearing pointed boots, he must have been in pain, but his face didn’t show it.

‘Sit down,’ Rosie said, with authority. ‘And calm down as well.’

Mavros took Cara back to her place at the end of the sofa. ‘Leave this to me,’ he said quietly. He went back to centre of the room. ‘Let’s be clear about this, Mr Jannet,’ he said formally. ‘When you hired me, did you or your sister know where Maria Kondos was?’

The siblings exchanged glances.

‘No,’ they said, in unison. The effect was reasonably convincing.

‘OK,’ Mavros continued. ‘Are either of you involved in the drugs business?’

Again, they looked at each other.

‘Not exactly,’ Jannet said.

‘What the hell does that mean?’

‘Cool it, man,’ the director said, with a wry smile. ‘Here’s how it is. Yes, our old man was sent down for trafficking. That’s one reason why I changed my name – as well as the fact that no fucker could pronounce the full version.’ He looked around but received only stony stares. ‘Anyway, when we came to Crete, we decided to keep away from the village in case any weasel journalist picked up a scent.’

‘If you’re not involved in anything illegal, why would that have been a problem?’ Mavros asked.

‘Now your naivety is showing like a pole dancer’s tits,’ Jannet said. ‘You any idea how hard it is to raise money for pictures these days, especially ones with foreign locations? Tell him, Rosie.’

The producer nodded. ‘Everything in Hollywood is about surface appearance, from Cara’s pretty face and beautiful . . . chest, to the people with the money. As long as investors can say to their shareholders that everything looks all right, we can do business.’

‘Obviously you knew that Maria Kondos’s father was a mobster,’ Mavros said, glancing at Cara.

‘What?’ she shrieked. ‘What the fuck is going on here?’

‘Michael “the Bat” Kondoyannis,’ Jannet said. ‘He’s some piece of work. I heard he had a snitch sliced up in front of the guy’s wife and kids. They never went to the cops.’

Cara was staring at him, her eyes damp. ‘I don’t understand any of this,’ she said, with a sob. ‘Are you saying Maria’s some kind of criminal?’

‘Oh yeah,’ the director confirmed.

‘We weren’t sure what she was doing,’ Rosie Yellenberg put in, ‘but in the first week here we saw her with a man we later discovered was the mayor of Kornaria. Then she disappeared.’

Mavros held up a hand. ‘Hang on. If she was tied to the village, maybe as her father’s representative, why was she held captive there? And where is she now?’

‘Fucked if I know,’ the director said. ‘You still on the job or what?’

Mavros walked over to him and let the knife handle appear between the flaps of his shirt. ‘I told you at the beginning that I’ve never failed to find a missing person and I don’t plan on letting you screw up that record. Why didn’t you tell me all this upfront?’

Luke Jannet smiled. ‘Would you have come running, even at that fee? Anyway, you managed to get her back the first time.’

‘At the risk of her life and my friend’s here, let alone my own. Before I try again, is there anything else you’d like to tell me?’

The director looked at his sister.

‘Let me make one thing crystal clear,’ Cara Parks interjected. ‘You can forget about me working until Maria’s back.
Capisce
?’

Rosie Yellenberg rolled her eyes. ‘Mr Mavros, you see the urgency of the situation. The only other thing I know is that Maria has a cousin living in Galatsi. Naturally, we checked she wasn’t there before calling you in.’

‘And have you checked again this time?’

‘No. That’s your job.’

‘You don’t really want her back, do you?’ he said, stepping towards the producer. ‘Except Cara’s made that impossible for you now.’

‘I don’t know what Maria’s doing, but if she’s involved with the drugs trade, she could screw this project into the ground,’ Rosie said.

‘Give me the cousin’s name and address,’ Mavros said, taking the piece of paper she scribbled on. ‘All right, Miki, let’s get out of here. The stink of bullshit is really getting to me.’

Cara came with them to the door. ‘I can’t believe this,’ she said.

‘I know those unlikely siblings are holding out on us,’ Mavros told her. ‘Don’t believe anything until further notice.’

‘Except that you’ll find her, won’t you, Alex?’ Cara put her hand on his arm.

‘I’ll find her,’ he repeated.

She kissed him on the cheek, not far from his lips.

Mikis got them to Galatsi in a few minutes. The cousin, Yiota Prevelaki, lived on the main street, a short distance from the square, in which there was a marble statue of an ancient goddess cradling a dead soldier in her arms.

‘There was a hell of a battle during the war,’ Mikis said.

‘I know. My father was here.’

The Cretan almost drove into a tree. ‘What?’

‘He was in EAM. He tried to convince the locals not to take part in the charge.’ Mavros told him what else he had found out about Kanellos.

‘Good for him. Dozens of them were killed.’ Mikis glanced at Mavros before he drove on. ‘Those Hollywood assholes aren’t the only people who’ve been keeping secrets.’

‘Sorry, I’ve been struggling to come to terms with it. You see, I didn’t know anything about what he did in Crete until a few days ago, and then there were Waggoner’s lies.’

‘Yes, that must be tough.’ Mikis stopped outside a small but neatly maintained house, the garden out front full of flowers. ‘Uh-oh.’

Mavros followed his gaze. There was a wheelchair lying on its side at the bottom of the steps that led to the terrace around the house.

NINETEEN

M
avros looked up and down the main street. There were cars parked on both sides, including a large black pickup with tinted windows.

‘You’d better get your pistol,’ he said to Mikis. ‘And your meat cleaver.’

The Cretan came back with the weapons covered by a jacket. ‘How do you want to do this?’

‘Let’s get up to the terrace. You go left and I’ll go right.’

‘Thought your old man was a Commie.’

Mavros smiled as the adrenaline began to flow. They went up the steps as quietly as they could, obscured from view by tall bushes. When Mikis moved away, Mavros took out the kitchen knife and put his ear against the bright blue door. Nothing. He walked to the nearest window and slowly put his head round. He saw a tidy sitting room, but there was no one in it. Then he heard a high-pitched wail that could have been a cat, but he was sure was human. It came from the rear of the building. Stepping less cautiously, he rounded the corner and went along the side wall. A window towards the rear showed the kitchen. There was a pair of bare legs lying inside, while the rest of the person was on the back terrace.

By the time he got there, Mikis was crouching over a women in a short skirt and white blouse, who was on her front. There was blood on her arms.

Mavros joined him and they rolled the woman on to her side. Blood came from her mouth, as well as a couple of teeth.

‘Bastards,’ Mikis hissed.

The woman moaned and opened her eyes, looking at them blearily as she spat out more blood.

‘Yiota?’ Mavros asked. ‘Yiota Prevelaki?’

‘Yes,’ she said weakly.

‘Where’s Maria?’

The woman tried to focus. ‘Maria? She’s . . . she’s inside.’

‘Shit,’ Mikis said. ‘Stay with her.’ He stepped over her legs and headed inside. A few seconds later, there was a loud crash and the sound of subdued male voices.

‘Stay on your side,’ Mavros said, getting up and going into the kitchen.

By the time he made it to the hall, the front door was open. Mikis was lying motionless a metre inside. Two men in black, caps drawn low over their faces, were carrying a woman out of the gate, her long black hair hanging down.

‘Stop!’ Mavros said, looking for Mikis’s pistol. It was nowhere to be seen. He ran down the steps, brandishing the kitchen knife. ‘Stop thieves!’ He hoped that would attract attention from passers-by.

The men were pulling shut the doors of the pickup when he got to the street. The engine roared and it veered out into the street, provoking vigorous horn blowing from an old man in an ancient Fiat. Mavros squinted into the late morning sun and tried unsuccessfully to make out the number plate. He cursed himself for not taking it earlier – the vehicle was the kind that men from Kornaria drove.

Running back to the house, he turned Mikis on to his side and made sure his airway was clear. There was a nasty wound on the side of his temple, blood welling from it.

Mavros called for an ambulance as he headed back to the woman. She had pulled herself up and was sitting against the doorframe, her head back.

‘Did you recognize the men, Yiota?’ he asked, checking that she was breathing without obstruction.

‘No . . . one . . . one of them knocked on the door and they . . . they just pushed in, grabbed me by the hair. I managed . . . to pull away and run this way, but one of the pigs caught up with me and punched me . . .’

He found a cloth and soaked it in water. ‘Here, hold this against your mouth.’

He looked back at Mikis. He hadn’t changed position, but his chest was moving.

The paramedics arrived quickly and looked the casualties over. One of them led Yiota to the ambulance and then returned to help his colleague with the still unconscious Mikis.

‘I don’t like the look of that wound,’ he said, turning to Mavros. ‘What happened?’

‘He was hit, I don’t know what with. Maybe a pistol butt.’

The men exchanged glances and started to move Mikis on to a stretcher.

‘Take them to the West Crete Clinic, please,’ he said, slipping the Cretan’s phone and car keys out of his pocket. His large knife must have been removed along with the Colt.

Before he went to the Jeep, Mavros scrolled down the phone book and found the entry for ‘Dad’. Inhaling deeply, he called Mr Tsifakis and explained what had happened.

‘We’ll see you at the clinic,’ Mikis’s father said, with impressive composure. ‘Don’t call the police.’

I wasn’t thinking of it, Mavros said to himself, as he walked past the overturned wheelchair.

But the police, in the form of Inspector Margaritis and a bull-chested sidekick, were waiting for him at the clinic.

‘Alex Mavro,’ the inspector said, with a thin smile. ‘You’ve been poking your nose in all sorts of places.’ He pointed at the dressing on Mavros’s neck. ‘You should be more careful.’

‘You should be looking for Rudolf Kersten’s killer.’

‘Rudolf Kersten killed Rudolf Kersten,’ was Margaritis’s riposte. ‘The forensic examiner’s report is in.’

‘That was very quick.’

‘We don’t have as many suspicious deaths as you do in the big city.’

Mavros made to move past them. ‘If you don’t mind, I’d like to see how my friend is.’

‘This won’t take a minute,’ the inspector said, grabbing his arm and pressing long nails through Mavros’s shirt. ‘Get off the island, you meddling piece of shit. There’s nothing to keep you here.’

Mavros said nothing about Maria Kondos’s abduction. ‘You’re not the first person to say that. Who’s paying you?’ He leaned close to the thin man’s sparsely covered head. In the background he saw a large man with grey hair and a face that was a heavier version of Mikis’s. The woman next to him was almost as bulky and her face was set hard as she looked at the policemen. He reckoned he could go put the boot in. ‘Waggoner? Roufos? Or the wankers up in Kornaria?’

Margaritis dropped his arm like it was a piece of carrion. ‘You—’

‘
You
fuck off,’ Mavros said, glaring. ‘If you want to arrest me, go ahead.’ The inspector stood motionless. ‘Thought not.’

‘What happened to the woman and young Tsifakis?’