by Paul Moomaw
He poured himself a brandy. He picked up the note and held it against the light bulb again, watching the cryptic message reappear. He would go, of course. Argyros had been right. Julian was still big brother. Pray turned to his computer, plugged in the modem and dialed up the Official Airline Guide, to find out just how the hell one got from Seattle to Corfu.
Chapter 2
Dieter Fugger was emphatically not fond of heights. Even standing well back from the white cliffs that marked the skinny toe of the Island of Lefkas, he felt ill at ease. A gust of wind snatched at his canvas sports coat, and his ass tightened. He looked enviously at Julian Pray, who strolled nonchalantly along the edge, a stone’s throw, for a strong arm ,from the lighthouse which guarded this stretch of Ionian coast.
“Have a care the wind does not blow you away,” Fugger said.
Julian grinned. He raised one foot, toe pointed like a dancer’s, and spun his compact body on the ball of the other, gravel crunching under his shoe. He spread his hands and bowed, and then relented and stepped to his companion’s side.
“It is midnight, and time passes, and I sleep alone,” he said, thrusting his hands into his trouser pockets and hunching a little against the wind.
“Wie, bitte?”
“Sappho. A line from one of her poems. She jumped from here. Broken hearted over some fellow. There was a temple to Apollo here.” Julian settled himself cross-legged onto the sparse grass.
Fugger sat down heavily an arm’s length away. He was big, with the kind of body that looks overweight even when it is not, and he felt clumsy next to the slender, golden-haired American.
“You are a scholar, Mr. Pray?” he asked.
“A collector of useless information.” Julian waved toward the cliffs. “People used to jump off those heights all the time. Regular ritual. The priests did it. Katapontismos, it was called. The sinking. Sometimes, when a whole village had angered the gods or the like, they would pick a scapegoat, bring him here, and toss him off. If he survived, which he usually did, he was still treated like a dead man from that point on . . . left completely alone.” Julian laced his fingers behind his head and stretched back onto the ground. “That might not be so bad, some of the time, don’t you think, Herr Fugger? To be left completely alone?”
“Call me Dieter.”
Julian sat up again. “I don’t do that,” he said.”
“Shall we talk business, then?” Fugger said.
“I assume that’s the point of this splendid isolation.”
“I am perhaps too cautious, I concede.” Fugger pulled a small, black cigar from a coat pocket, and used up three matches trying to light it in the wind. Julian held out a cigarette lighter, an old-fashioned Zippo of silver steel, with a flint, striking wheel and windscreen. Fugger accepted it with a grunt and lit his cigar. He examined the lighter briefly before handing it back.
“Were you in the military?” he asked.
Julian laughed.” Not even close. Found this on the beach, when I was a kid. I can’t imagine how I haven’t lost it by now.” He slipped the lighter back into a pocket. “Business, Herr Fugger.”
“Very well.” Fugger shifted stiffly on the grass. “I am told that you are very well acquainted with the Greek Islands.”
“Better than I want to be, sometimes.”
“You are intimate with many coastal caves. In fact you are a familiar sight, bobbing up and down in your little blue boat, looking for treasures. Do you find many treasures, Mr. Pray?”
“A few things. There are old cities under the waters of these islands. Some go back to Mycenean, even Minoan times.”
“And you find artifacts to sell?”
“Sometimes. Or I manage to sell my knowledge of the local real estate to a scientific expedition. Mostly I just poke around and keep an eye out for the Greek police.”
Fugger nodded ponderously. “Of course. If you find something, they want their share, and they are afraid you will be like the Englishman, Lord Elgin, or even my own countryman, Heinrich Schliemann, and steal it all.” He puffed on the cigar and smiled. “It sounds like a poor living.”
“I round it out with the odd job.”
“Very odd. Point . . . you are unwelcome in at least three harbors and countless inns, because of debts.” He ticked each point off on his fingers. “You are in bad odor with a certain French research organization upon whom you previously depended for much of your income. And, finally, a regrettable part of your knowledge of the real estate has to do with several local . . . Kerker,” Fugger pressed a thumb against his nose, “jails.” He smiled triumphantly.
“I’m flattered to be the object of such thorough research,” Julian said.
“What if someone offered to buy your knowledge on a more regular basis?”
“I would listen.”
“I wish to locate a certain type of cave . . . deep, accessible from the sea, but below its surface.”
“Those caves tend to be empty. If they weren’t before I found them, they are now.”
“All the better.”
Julian arched an eyebrow at Fugger. “Go on.”
“I will pay for that kind of information. I would need detailed charts giving the locations and dimensions of such caves, along with pertinent data on tidal flows and the like.”
“Do I get to know why I’m giving you that kind of information?”
Fugger tilted his head to one side and wagged his index finger at Julian. “That I am afraid, is my business. And, for my part, I will not ask you what you do with the money I pay you.” Fugger reached inside his coat. He pulled out an envelope.
“This contains ten thousand good German marks.” He placed the envelope between them. “I am going to close my eyes and count to one hundred. And like a child, I will wish with all my heart that, when I open them again, the envelope will be vanished. Like magic.” He squeezed his eyes shut.
Julian laughed and picked up the envelope. “Don’t waste a wish. You might need it some day.” He rolled back his pants and unstrapped an ankle wallet. He pulled the bills from the envelope, placed them into the wallet, and tucked it away.
“You did not count them,” Fugger said.
“Tacky to do that, don’t you think?”
Fugger smiled. “What I think is that, although we have different styles, we are kindred souls. We both strive for the detachment of a free spirit. Sometimes I convince myself that I succeed.” He rose to his feet and winced. He was not used to sitting cross- legged. “I expect that, as soon as I am out of sight, you will count the money.”
Julian laughed and stood up. “A pleasure to do business with you,” he said, and extended a hand.
“I hope I will see you again simply for pleasure,” Fugger said, shaking the other man’s hand briefly. “I own a ship called der Rattensinger. You will find her stationary approximately thirty nautical miles due south of the little island of Andikithira, off the northwest tip of Crete. I will be aboard next weekend, and I would love to show her to you.”
“I’ll make a point of it,” Julian said.
“Good. Otherwise, for the convenience of both of us, your usual contact will be a man named Milos Argyros, who has a shop on Crete, in Sitia. It is called some kind of fisherman, I believe. You take the information to him, and he will have money for you.”
“I don’t suppose you could arrange something in a different town.”
“You have a problem with Sitia?”
“Sitia has a problem with me. There was this girl, and things didn’t end well, and she has brothers . . .” Julian’s voice trailed off. He shrugged and smiled. “You understand?”
“I understand, but that has to be the arrangement. I am sure you will manage.”
The two men started down the path.
“I am told there is a pleasant cafe in Vassiliki, filled with healthy young girls who wind surf in the bay there,” Fugger said.
“Is that an invitation?”
“No. A suggestion. I am going to the other
end of the island, to Nidri.”
They reached the road, and Fugger touched his forehead in an informal salute. “I hope to see you on the weekend.”
“Absolutely,” Julian replied.
Fugger started to walk away, then paused. “That poet,” he said.
“Sappho.”
“That one. Do you suppose she didn’t jump at all?” He smiled broadly. “It could be someone was tired of her, and just hit her in the head and threw her off.” He nodded and strode away.
Julian watched until the other man disappeared around a bend in the path. Then he sat down and retrieved the ankle wallet. He pulled out the bills and counted them carefully.
“Ten thousand exactly,” he said, standing up. “A very perceptive man you are, Herr Fugger.”
Chapter 3
Emile Gotard lay on one elbow and watched the woman who stood at the chipped porcelain basin. She had gotten out of the bed as soon as they were done, and kept her back turned to him in an odd show of modesty as she washed. She called herself Rose, but her wrinkled ass reminded Gotard of a cabbage. The boarding house room she had brought him to stank, a thing he noticed only now, with his lust used up and the effect of the beer fading. He had the beginning of a headache as well. He got up and padded to the yellow, plastic table under the window, where he had left the bottle of vodka the woman had insisted on as part of her price. He ripped off the cap and took a large swallow, making a face as he did.
“If I had known I would be drinking this, I’d have bought better,” he said.
“That’s mine,” the woman said over her shoulder. “Leave it alone.”
“I’ll give you the francs for another,” Gotard said. He carried the bottle back to the bed and lay down. The woman pulled her slip over her head and tugged it past her hips, and only then turned to face him. She looked tired, and he felt a moment of softness.
“My mother did this for a living,” he said.
The woman reached for her dress. “Your time is up,” she said. “If you want to talk, it will cost another seventy-five francs.”
Gotard spat on the floor and took another swallow of vodka. It still tasted like shit, but it helped his head.
“You charged enough already for the little you did,” he said.
“No money, no talk. My time is valuable to me.”
“All right, seventy-five. Lie down.”
“The money first,” the woman said.
Gotard laughed. “Tough one, aren’t you?” He grabbed his trousers, which were folded on the floor next to him, extracted a roll of bills and peeled off five of them. The woman counted the money, put it into her worn, beaded purse, and settled on the bed. Gotard stretched out on his back.
“She was Italian,” he said, staring idly at the ceiling. It was covered with a cream-colored paper that had turned brown in places and was beginning to peel. “Born in Trieste. During the war she had a German boyfriend, and afterwards she was treated like some kind of traitor, even though the Germans and the Italians had been allies. She finally came to Marseilles. Got tired of the shit, I guess. But she never learned to speak French worth a damn. I still get called a macaroni, for that matter. Being a whore was the only kind of work she could get.”
Gotard took another drink. “What do you think of that?”
“You paid me to listen, not to talk,” the woman said. She had buried her head in the pillow, and it blurred her voice.
Gotard lay silent for a while, sipping at the bottle. “She did what she could for me,” he said finally. “Kept me clothed and fed, even sent me to Catholic school. Thought that would keep me out of trouble.” He laughed.” All it did was teach me to hate nuns. What witches. I was bruises and welts all the time. She gave me a different name, too. Said she wanted me to have a fresh start. Hers was Moschini. Rosa Moschini.” He paused and blinked at the ceiling. “Maybe that’s why I always pick women with that name, like you.” It surprised him that he had never thought of it before.
“She got my name off a street sign. My last name, I mean. Rue Gotard, and Emile because of some singer she had a crush on. In the end, she drank herself to death.” He held up the bottle, stared at it with distaste, then shrugged and took another swallow. “Do you worry that will happen to you?”
The woman did not answer.
“I forgot,” he said. “I talk, you listen. With my boss, it’s the other way around. He talks, I listen. He’s a rich German, name of Fugger, born in some castle. He has a picture of it on his wall, alongside of his big deal noble father who got killed in World War Two. He thinks I’m scum, just an animal he pays and uses.” Gotard laughed. “I guess I’m a whore, too, now that I think of it. We’re just a couple of hookers, n’est cepas?”
The air next to Gotard’s ear filled with a fluttering snore. He nudged the woman, but she continued to sleep.
“Shit,” he said, and rolled out of bed. He dressed, then opened the woman’s purse. The seventy-five francs lay separate in a neat roll, next to a larger wad of bills that had been folded over. He pulled the rolled bills out and tucked them into his pocket. He tossed the purse gently in his hand. “What the hell,” he said, and took out the rest of the money.
“Put that back, bastard!” The woman was awake and on her feet, glaring at him.
“You fell asleep,” Gotard said.
The woman flung herself at him. “Give me my money, you lousy thief,” she said.
“I don’t pay for snores, not that the rest was worth anything either.”
“I did the best I could with that little thing between your legs,” the woman said, and kneed him in the groin. “No wonder they call you un macaroni.”
Gotard lifted the woman off the floor and threw her across the room. She lay there for an instant, fear in her eyes, then got up and stumbled toward the door.
Gotard hit her. His fist caught her at the angle between her neck and her collar bone. Something snapped, and she dropped to the floor. She lay there, breathing harshly, her head twisted at an impossible angle. The breathing grew more shallow, then stopped, and a faint smell of feces filled Gotard’s nostrils.
“You got what you deserved, bitch,” Gotard said. He pulled out a dirty handkerchief and wiped off every surface he could think of that might carry his fingerprints. Then he stuffed the handkerchief back into his pocket and let himself out of the room.
Chapter 4
Milos Argyros watched Julian Pray’s retreating back.
“I told you he wouldn’t count it,” he said to Andreas, his son, who stood beside him at the counter of The Fat Fisherman. “Americans think they are too good to count their money.”
“How much did you take?” Andreas asked.
“A small commission.” Milos Argyros patted his pocket, then let his hand slide absently across his belly.
“So you can pay for the bones that Dina Skevis’ father and brothers break when they find out you’re doing business with the Devil?”
“You should be more concerned about Lydia Kouris’ father, if you ask me. Coming home at all hours, grinning like a tomcat.” The older man plucked a fifty-drachma coin from the counter. “At any rate, what Kyrios Pray does behind the barn isn’t my concern, especially with a Skevis. They’re not even real Greeks. Who cares what happens to a Macedonian?” He held out the coin and squeezed it. “This is my concern, to be a wealthy man, able to support the sons who are coming to me.” He glanced toward the ceiling of the shop.
“She is tired a lot, these days,” Andreas said. “Irene, I mean, not Lydia.” He grinned. “Maybe you need to get out of the saddle for a while, and give her a rest.”
“Don’t be disrespectful,” Milos said, but he returned the grin. He wrapped a heavy arm around his son’s shoulders. “I think she is pregnant. You will have a brother soon.”
Andreas shrugged. “Maybe. She didn’t give her first husband any kids that I noticed.”
“What do you expect, with a man who drops dead for no reason before he’s thirty? Did you know
the doctors couldn’t find a thing wrong?” Milos snorted. “I think he just wasn’t man enough to stay alive. Didn’t even own a decent pair of boots, for God’s sake.” He glanced upward again, and crossed himself quickly, Greek style, from right to left. “He hardly ever did it with Irene anyway. Couldn’t make it hard. She told me herself, when I asked her if he had been as much a man as I am.” He rubbed the coin against his crotch, as if one had something special to offer the other, then tossed it into the air.
Andreas snagged the coin. “A commission for me, too,” he said. “What’s it about, this business with the American?”
Milos shrugged.” Who knows? The German from the big ship sends me money. The American brings me sealed envelopes. I give him the German’s money, and then someone comes and picks up the envelope. A Frenchman, I think. Huge, ugly son of a bitch who never smiles, just comes and says ‘Give it to me,’ like I should know right away what he means.”
“Don’t you?”
Milos cuffed his son lightly on the side of the head.
“Of course,” he said. “That’s not the point. It’s a matter of respect. When you’re going to be the richest man in Sitia you deserve a little respect. Say that for the American. He knows how to observe the proprieties. When he comes it’s always a handshake and a smile, and a ‘Kyrie Argyro, tikanete? How are you?’ He never fails to ask after Irene’s health. Yours, too, for that matter. If I get that kind of courtesy from an American, I should be able to expect it from a Frenchman.”
Chapter 5
Homer Pray gazed dourly at his son’s attire—dirty gray New Balance running shoes with a hole above the right toe, yellow-and-blue argyle socks, button-fly Levis, a T-shirt from a jazz festival in Corpus Christi, Texas, and a corduroy jacket that flapped in the damp October wind. He shook his head, then gazed out to see again.
“So where are you going, Adam?” he asked.
“Going?”
“From here. This has never been your idea of a destination resort, so I assume you’re passing through on the way to somewhere else.”