by Leta Serafim
They spoke respectively about Richard Svenson, reminiscing about their time together in a mournful way.
“A tragic loss,” Patronas said.
Gilbert nodded. “I told him I wanted to learn how to dive and he taught me. I never would have learned if it hadn’t been for him.”
“You could feel his passion when he was teaching,” Bowdoin said. “He really wanted you to learn. He was a man obsessed.”
It went on like this for some time, a kind of impromptu memorial service.
Eventually Patronas asked them what they wanted to eat and they ordered. Between mouthfuls, the three continued to extol the virtues of Richard Svenson and express their sorrow over his death.
They’re good, Patronas concluded as he listened. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought they cared.
“What was he doing on the boat, anyway?” Bowdoin gave Patronas a searching glance.
“I don’t know,” Patronas said. “Something drew him there, but we’ll probably never know what it was. As far as we’re concerned, it was a tragic accident.”
“Are you going to check his cellphone records?” Nielsen asked.
“We don’t have that capability,” Patronas said, “nor do we have the manpower. Government can barely pay our salaries.”
He was watching Nielsen carefully and thought he saw something. It wasn’t much—nothing he could take to Stathis or a jury. Only a release of tension in the boy’s shoulders, a subtle exhalation as if he had been holding his breath. Also, the other two seemed to visibly relax.
Patronas studied them for a few more minutes. The why, the reason they’d killed Sami Alnasseri, continued to elude him, but the rest he was pretty sure he’d figured out. Svenson must have gotten there before him and that was why they’d killed him.
They spent quite some time together, and by the end, the boys were completely at ease, teasing each other and joking around.
It turned out Bowdoin had started out his life in Texas and still subscribed to that state’s cultural values. “As soon as I finish college, I’m moving back there. Get a ranch on the plains and raise some cattle.”
“You have a cowboy hat?” Patronas asked with a smile.
“Yup. And a gun.” He mimed firing off a revolver with his hand.
The other two exchanged glances. “Charlie just talks big,” Gilbert said. “He’s actually pretty harmless.”
“How about you?” Patronas turned to Nielsen. “Do you have a gun?”
“No. Guns are Charlie’s thing, not mine.”
Patronas was trying to determine the identity of the ringleader, the so-called criminal mastermind, but as with the motive for the crime, he couldn’t quite get there. One minute, it appeared to be Bowdoin who was in charge, the next it shifted to Gilbert or Nielsen. It was almost as if they were running a relay and passing the baton.
According to case studies Patronas had read, often a psychopath will partner with a weaker person. A symbiotic relationship, each would then feed off the other, challenging their co-conspirator to commit ever more heinous crimes, to escalate to a higher level of violence, the relationship reinforcing the darkest aspects of both personalities. It had happened in Columbine, Colorado, and elsewhere, and Patronas found himself wondering if the same pattern was in play here.
If it was, the dominant personality was definitely Charlie Bowdoin. But he didn’t present as a psychopath, nor did Benjamin Gilbert, which left only Michael Nielsen. Patronas tried to remember the physique of the person who’d thrown the firebomb, the man he and Tembelos had chased across the fields that night. Whoever he was, he’d been fast—that much was certain—and Nielsen, if he remembered correctly, was a runner. Another piece of the puzzle slipped into place.
At one point, Patronas flicked his fingers through Nielsen’s hair, saying he’d seen a mosquito and wanted to kill it. Pretending it was an accident, he yanked out two or three strands, saying they’d caught on his ring, after which he carefully folded them up in a napkin, taking care not to touch them more than necessary. The chain of evidence wasn’t as pristine as he would have liked, but he didn’t know what else to do. He was after Nielsen’s DNA, but he didn’t want to tip his hand, to put the students on notice. He used a similar trick later during dinner, asking the waitress to bring everybody a beer.
“Never mind bringing glasses. We’ll drink it out of the bottle.”
Unsophisticated, the boys had initially wanted to order the Greek equivalent of steak, but Patronas demurred, saying they had to try paidakia, lamb chops—they were far better. He also requested a xoriatiki salad with extra olives.
When the meat came, he demonstrated how to eat the chops, picking them up with his fingers and gnawing on the bones. As intended, the Americans followed suit, gobbling them down and leaving behind a pile of bones. They also ate the olives in the salad and spat out the pits. Patronas looked over their leavings, praying the coroner would have enough.
“When are you leaving Greece?” he asked.
“In ten days,” Bowdoin said. “We’re going to Turkey after we leave Sifnos. Professor Svenson arranged everything and we thought it was the least we could do, to honor his wishes. You know, see the things he was so excited about.” He shrugged. “Kind of a tribute to him.”
“And after that you’ll go home?”
Bowdoin nodded. “That’s the plan.”
After he paid the bill, Patronas sent them on their way. “It’s late and you’ve got class tomorrow. Why don’t you head back to Leandros and get some rest?”
They thanked him politely and departed, walking along the beach toward Leandros, wading in and out of the water. They weren’t talking as they splashed along the shore, each keeping his distance from the other two, isolated and alone.
Patronas watched them go; then, pulling on a pair of latex gloves, he collected the bones from each of their plates, dropped them in separate bags and labeled them with the appropriate name. He did the same with the olive pits and the beer bottles, the napkins and forks—all of it. Repelled, the customers at the other tables watched him with disgust.
“For my dog,” he said.
When he got back to the municipality building, he called the coroner and left a message, saying he was shipping some key evidence to him early the next morning that he needed processed as fast as humanly possible. “Fingerprints, saliva, anything you can match up. The suspects are leaving the country soon. We have to hurry. We’re running out of time.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
The tailor is at fault and they beat the cook.
—Greek Proverb
At breakfast the next day, Patronas ordered his men to monitor the kids throughout the day, dispatching Evangelos Demos to the summer study to work as a janitor, Tembelos to do the same later at Leandros. Equipment in hand, they were to go from room to room and pretend to clean. Petros Nikolaidis would drive to Kamares and arrange with the harbor patrol to keep watch on the ferries in case the suspects tried to board one and flee.
“A bucket and a mop?” Tembelos said. “Really, Yiannis. After all these years, this is what you and I have come to?”
“Only you. As of this morning, I’m still a cop.”
Patronas still had a job as far as he knew, although Stathis had been noncommittal on the phone after Patronas had disclosed the coroner’s findings.
“A mistake, huh?”
There’d been a long silence as Stathis digested this fact, after which he stated that as of this moment Evangelos was on administrative leave, pending a formal investigation, and could no longer serve as a policeman in any capacity. Hence, his assignment as a janitor. The fate of Patronas, on the other hand, was anybody’s guess.
“You were the officer-in-charge,” Stathis said. “That makes you responsible for the shooting of Achilles Kourelas.”
“You had a hand in this, sir. You ordered me to question him.”
“I did not tell you to let Evangelos Demos keep his gun after that debacle on Chios.
Just the opposite. ‘Remove that man’s weapon,’ I told you at the time. ‘He’s an imbecile. He cannot be trusted.’ But did you? No, you forgot. Nor did I tell you to try and put Achilles Kourelas into the backseat of a car without searching him for weapons, a flagrant violation of procedure. And I most certainly did not tell you to have one of your subordinates shoot him.”
“It was an accident. Achilles stabbed me and everything went to hell.”
“Patronas, I talked to his doctor. Achilles Kourelas was shot less than five centimeters from his heart.”
Patronas continued to argue, claiming Evangelos Demos lacked the necessary skill to shoot anyone, anywhere on purpose. “It was a lucky shot. He’s no sharpshooter.”
“Lucky? Do you even realize the pile of shit you’ve landed me in? Chrisi Avgi is clamoring for my head, thanks to you. They’re claiming we shot Kourelas on purpose, to terrify their membership and shut down the party.”
“You know that’s not true.”
“All I know is you’re in trouble, Patronas. If you were here, I’d fucking skin you alive.” And with that, Stathis slammed down the receiver.
But he hadn’t fired him. At least not yet.
Waiting to hear back from the coroner, Patronas took the Rav and drove to Kamares to meet Petros Nikolaidis. It was a bright, sunlit morning and he was struck anew by the island’s beauty—the villages scattered along the brows of the hills and thickets of olive trees, their leaves like flecks of silver in the early morning light, and beyond it all, the dark blue waters of the Aegean. He could see the island of Antiparos rising in the distance like a sea serpent, its bulk dusky against the sky, Paros and Serifos and countless others. The sea was threaded with whitecaps, a lone sailboat off the coast nearly horizontal in the wind.
He fooled around with the radio, seeking old-style Greek music, cantatas maybe, or ballads from the war. All he could find was modern stuff that sounded like a mix of static and thunder. That morning, he and Lydia Pappas had talked about taking a vacation together after the case was over, swimming in secluded coves, eating gavros—fish the size of french fries—and sleeping out under the stars.
Like Orpheus, the god of music she’d spoken of, he’d wake her at dawn with a song. Propose marriage when the time was right.
He’d found her presence a great comfort after the case unraveled. Today might be shit, but if he was lucky, the two of them might have tomorrow.
The ringing of his cellphone jarred him out of his reverie, and he pulled over to the side of the road to answer it.
It was Stathis, calling back. “I forgot to ask you the status of the case. Have you solved it yet? Do you have a viable suspect or was Achilles Kourelas your only lead?”
“I solved it, sir. I’m sure of it.”
“You’re sure of it?” Stathis’ laugh was ugly. “A little late for that, isn’t it, Patronas? Won’t do Achilles Kourelas, our shooting victim, much good now, will it? Won’t keep the press off our backs.” His boss went on for some time, raking him over the coals. “One of your suspects is dead, the other’s in the hospital, so by process of elimination, who does that leave us with?”
“Three of Svenson’s students: Michael Nielsen, Benjamin Gilbert, and Charlie Bowdoin. Americans college kids, they’re enrolled in a summer study here. I have reason to believe they killed Sami Alnasseri and Richard Svenson. They might even have firebombed the camp.”
“You better watch your step. You can’t afford to mess up if Americans are involved. Tha se stavrosoun.” They’ll crucify you.
“I sent samples of the kids’ DNA to the lab and I won’t make a move until I have the results in hand. I don’t want to be accused of framing them and have everything blow up in my face.”
“No, no, we don’t want an incident like that one in Italy where the police arrested an American girl and charged her with murder, only to have the judge throw the case out after she’d spent four years in jail.”
“Amanda Knox.”
“That’s the one. Everybody involved in that case ended up looking like jerks. We don’t want that, do we, Patronas?”
“No, sir.”
Noting the ‘we,’ Patronas relaxed. Stathis was back onboard. His job was safe.
Stathis said he would speak with the coroner, see if he could speed things up. “Let me see what I can do. Keep me informed.”
After hanging up, Patronas mentally reviewed the case for the hundredth time, seeking to determine which of the three students had been the instigator. But no matter how many times he went over it in his head, he couldn’t come up with a definitive answer. All of them seemed to be what they claimed—college students on a lark in Greece. Foolish, yes, but hardly lethal.
If he only knew which one was the leader, he might be able break the other two. Turn Papa Michalis loose on them and garner a confession.
He considered contacting the administrators at their universities—Hobart College in the case of Charlie Bowdoin, the University of Virginia in the case of Benjamin Gilbert and Michael Nielsen—to see if any of the students had been in trouble, suspended for assault, for example, but decided against it. College administrators might be required to notify a student’s parents if there was an inquiry from the police, in which case, the kids would undoubtedly learn of it and he’d lose whatever advantage he had.
Patronas sat there for a moment, going over his options. Maybe he should call the police in their hometowns. Colleagues, they might be more likely to help. These kids weren’t minors. If they had criminal records, perhaps they could be shared. If there was indeed a psychopath among them, it was unlikely the murder of Sami Alnasseri was his first foray into violence. Whoever it was had probably been at it since childhood.
He did a quick calculation. Seven hours’ time difference—six in the morning, American time. He’d have to wait. No good would come of calling a police station at the start of the workday.
Petros Nikolaidis was waiting for him in Kamares, standing in front of the headquarters of the harbor patrol. Together, they went inside and briefed the officer in charge, a handsome young man with a Cretan accent. Patronas had made copies of the students’ passports, and he handed the man the photos.
“This is what the suspects look like. Under no circumstances can they be allowed to board a boat and leave Sifnos. We must do everything in our power to keep them here.”
“We’ll do our best,” the officer said, “but there must be at least a hundred people leaving Sifnos on any given boat. It’s a mob scene when one of those ferries departs.”
Patronas ate a hasty lunch in Kamares, a tired gyro wrapped in pita bread. After he finished, he drove back to the municipality building and set about calling America. He had his Divry’s open to the word ‘arrest’ on the table and the language application up and ready on his phone.
The first police officer he spoke to—a stiff, by-the-book sergeant named Wilson in McLean, Virginia—made it clear from the beginning he wasn’t going to help. “You have to go through the proper channels,” he told Patronas, “fill out the requisite paperwork. I cannot release potentially damaging information over the phone.”
“Are you saying there is damaging material on Benjamin Gilbert?”
“No, I’m saying that you have to go through channels. But I can tell you right now juvenile records are sealed here. They’re sacrosanct and nobody can touch them.”
“Sacrosanct, what is this … ‘sacrosanct’?” Feverishly thumbing through his dictionary, Patronas continued to plead with him, “Was Gilbert ever arrested?”
They went back and forth for a few more minutes, Wilson growing more and more impatient with Patronas’ halting English.
“I repeat: juvenile records are sealed,” the American said. And with that, he hung up.
The officer in San Diego was equally unhelpful, echoing the sentiments of his colleague in Virginia. “What you’re asking is impossible. The file of a juvenile? You’d need a court order to open it. ”
“We belie
ve he murdered a ten-year-old boy.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Patronas, but we are responsible for the well-being and safety of more than a million people here and we have their hands full. We don’t have time to do your job for you.”
Patronas could hear phones ringing and people yelling in the background. There was truth in what the American said.
The last person Patronas spoke to, a police officer in Wellesley Hills, Massachusetts, was even more short with him. “Can’t do it,” he told Patronas. “How do I know you are who you say you are? That you’re not someone wanting to blackmail that boy’s family?”
An odd response, Patronas thought. One that indicated the man was familiar with Bowdoin.
But no matter how hard Patronas pushed, the policeman refused to clarify his statement.
After he hung up, Patronas sat there, wondering what he should do. Maybe Stathis could get something out of the Americans. Contact the attorney general or the FBI. He didn’t know how it worked. But reaching out to them from here was hopeless.
Chapter Twenty-Six
A cassock does not make someone a priest.
—Greek Proverb
Patronas met with his men that evening in Kamares. A harbor patrolman named Stelios Mavros had volunteered to take over the stakeout at Leandros so that they could go to dinner. After they finished eating, Patronas planned to send them on their way—Nikolaidis to his home on Sifnos and Evangelos Demos, Giorgos Tembelos, and the priest back to the Morpheus Hotel to get some sleep. He himself would relieve the harbor patrolman at the apartment building and work surveillance there throughout the night.