by Joseph Badal
John looked toward the second man. He was amazed to see still seated in the chair, legs crossed, smoking his cigarette.
The man looked back at John, shook his head, stubbed out his cigarette on the chair arm, and then stood.
“You surprise me, Mr. Hammond,” the man said while he walked over to where John stood, his leg still in the iron clasp of the other man. “I hoped you had more sense.” He reached around John and calmly pushed the door shut. “Get up, Josef,” he said, “you’re embarrassing me.”
John looked down at Josef, then turned his head back toward the other man, when fireworks went off in his head and he felt himself falling.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
After dropping John Hammond off at his hotel, Christo drove to the other side of the island, back in the direction of the airport. It had been a long, tiring day. Although he’d gotten used to handling homicide cases and to the long hours associated with them when he worked with the Athens police, he was now out of practice—both from the standpoints of time required and emotional impact. And he didn’t have the support staff here he’d had in Athens. He thought over every step he’d taken and couldn’t think of anything more he could have done. He smiled when he thought about how Hammond had gone from suspect number one to an unofficial assistant. He had begun to like the American.
The road dropped quickly toward the sea, then led away from the coast. Here Christo made a sharp turn onto a dirt driveway that climbed precipitously. Olive trees bordered both sides of the drive and grape vines showed through the moonlit trees. He felt pride and a sense of belonging every time he followed this drive. This was home. Where his father and his father’s father had made a living from the land. The Panagoulakoses had owned this land for generations before the Turkish occupation of Samos that ended at the beginning of the twentieth century, and ever since.
A light shone in the distance. Sophia was more than likely working off her anxieties about his work schedule and about the risks of his job by baking. He smiled at the wonder of it all. Sophia baked enough for an army; he ate everything she put before him, and he was still just as rail-thin as he’d been as a teenager. He checked his watch and sighed when he realized it was hours past the children’s bedtime. Another night of lost opportunities to be with his son and daughter.
Sophia Panagoulakos met her husband at the front door of their one-story house, set in the middle of their forty acres. “Christo, you are late again,” she said, sympathy, rather than complaint in her voice.
“I’m sorry, Sophia. Tee na kaname?”
“You can let someone else handle some of the cases. You can’t do everything yourself.”
Christo kissed his wife’s cheek. “I’ll try,” he said, knowing he wouldn’t. There was no one else on Samos to assign his cases to.
Sophia knew it, too. She gave him a look that said she’d heard that before and didn’t believe a word of it. “Go get changed, I’ve got a nice kalamaria casserole in the oven.”
Christo blew her a kiss and walked into his bedroom. The telephone rang while he unbuttoned his shirt.
“Christo,” he heard. He turned to see Sophia in the doorway, “It’s for you.”
He walked back into the living room and picked up the phone. “Panagoulakos,” he growled. He listened for several seconds and felt his blood rise to his face. “Is he alive?” he asked. Then he replaced the receiver and turned to Sophia. “I’ve got to go out.”
APRIL 24
CHAPTER TWENTY
The rocket exploded, raining wet earth, metal, and yellow and white sparks. The shrapnel cut through Jim Eastly, his driver, and Ernie Baca, his machine gunner. Like marionettes dumped by a thoughtless puppet master, they lay unnaturally bent, half-in, half-out of the jeep. Something—the explosion itself or some debris—had knocked John from the vehicle, up against a giant, twisted tree. The tree had leaves as big as elephant ears; he knew its name, wanted to remember it for some stupid reason, but couldn’t think of it. Confused, bleeding—red drops cascaded onto his hands lying like useless bowls in his lap—he watched everything around him move in slow motion. Even the tall, thin man who wore a waistcoat over a perahan and a lungee on his head approached him with dream-like speed—slowly, deliberately, almost floating.
There was nothing that missed his attention—not the butterflies stirring the air six feet above the man’s head, not Jim and Ernie’s bodies already pale from loss of blood. Come on guys, it’s only a dream. You can get up now. He squinted at the bright early morning sun and felt amazement at the sight of sparkling crystals the sunlight fabricated out of the dew. He wondered what was wrong with his arms and legs and questioned why the man in tribal clothing pointed an AK-47 assault rifle at him. The man shoved the muzzle of the rifle toward the middle of his forehead, making his eyes cross. He felt a stab of pain and his head bounced back against the tree.
His stunned mind processed information in slow, asymmetrical pulses. There were gaps in his thought processes. This is . . . Taliban. Oh-oh, . . . not good. The man glared triumphantly, evilly. He showed John a gap-toothed smile and pressed his finger on the trigger. He screamed Allah Akbar!
Amazing, John thought, matter-of-factly, calmly, I am about to die.
The clack of the striking hammer sounded like an explosion. Misfire. That clack wiped away the Taliban fighter’s smile and brought John out of his hypnotic stupor. Suddenly, all the electric circuits in his mind sparked and adrenaline washed through him like a flashflood quenching a dry riverbed. He pulled the .45 from his shoulder holster and aimed it at his enemy’s startled face.
Then everything around him turned pale yellow.
John awoke drenched in sweat. His head throbbed painfully and there appeared to be a yellow aura all around him. This is a new twist to my dream, he thought.
“John, can you hear me, are you all right?” a man’s voice asked. He sounded worried.
What’s wrong? John thought. What happened?
He tried to respond, but his throat was too dry. His tongue felt glued to the roof of his mouth. He rasped out, “Water.” Someone placed a straw in his mouth and he sucked on it reflexively. Water had never tasted better.
His eyes focused enough to recognize Christo. A second man who stood behind Christo pushed forward and announced, “I am Doctor Stavros Pappas. Mr. Hammond, you are in the hospital at the Pythagorio Army Base. You have had a nasty knock on the head and have a concussion, along with a gash on the side of your head that took thirty-four stitches to close. I assure you that you will have a vicious headache for at least several days and I would not be surprised if you experience some nausea.”
John seemed to get the gist of the doctor’s speech, but his brain felt fuzzy. For some reason he imagined his skull stuffed with cotton candy. He scrunched his eyes shut and willed himself to focus on the doctor’s words. He looked back at Christo. The inspector looked worried. With some effort, John smiled at him and gave him the thumbs-up sign.
“How long will he have to stay here?” Christo asked.
The doctor skewered Christo with an impatient, incredulous look, which John found humorous. He giggled, but then wondered what he had just found so funny.
“Mr. Hammond is lucky to be alive!” the doctor said. “The blow to his head was just indirect enough to avoid crushing his skull. Either the person who clubbed him had poor aim or Mr. Hammond turned his head at just the right moment. A direct hit would probably have killed him. He will be our guest for several days . . . at least.” He made the speech sound like a scolding. Then he made a noise that sounded like “humph” and walked out.
“Wh . . . what hap . . . happened, Chris . . . to?” John asked, knowing that his words slurred, but unable to do anything about it.
“All I can tell you,” Christo said, “is that Soula Demetridakis heard a noise and got out of bed. She found you in a pool of blood just inside your open doorway. All o
f your things were thrown around the room and someone even slashed open the bedding. Whoever hit you on the head thought you had something he wanted and, from the looks of the knot on your head, he meant to kill you. Do you remember anything?”
Christo’s voice sounded to John as though someone was playing a 45 RPM record on 33 RPM speed. His eyelids felt heavy, then all went black.
John awoke feeling less stuporous. He noticed Christo slouched in a chair at the foot of the bed.
“Christo.”
The inspector started, but quickly came wide awake. “Thank God!” he exclaimed as he leaped to his feet. “You look almost human again.”
John smiled. “I only feel half human.” He gingerly touched the side of his head and moaned. “Damn! I’ve got quite a lump.”
Christo laughed, but his face turned suddenly serious. “You know how lucky you were?”
John hunched his shoulders. “I guess.”
“Can you tell me what happened?”
John blinked several times, as though he were trying to make his memory zoom in on something. Then he said, “I found two guys in my room when you dropped me off last night. There was a scuffle. That’s the last thing I remember.”
“In another month, the hotel would have been full and someone might have seen something. The bastards got away,” Christo said.
Not until Christo finished speaking did John remember the copy of the map he’d made. He’d put it in his jacket pocket. Where was the jacket? The men who’d assaulted him must have found it.
As if able to read John’s mind, the inspector said, “Oh, by the way, John, I found your jacket on the back seat of my car. I brought it with me.” He pointed toward a corner of the room. “It’s in the closet.”
John recalled only then he’d left the jacket in the police car. The map was safe. He felt reprieved until Christo looked at him with his cop eyes and said, “Guess what fell out of your jacket when I lifted it off the back seat?”
It took all of the backbone John could muster just to look Christo in the eyes. The inspector gazed back sternly for several seconds, then laughed.
“You should see your face,” he exclaimed. “Priceless, that’s what it is. Absolutely priceless.”
“You son of a bitch,” John moaned. “What’s so damn funny?”
“You are. I haven’t seen anyone look so guilty in a long time.”
“Well, I’m glad you find it so amusing.”
“I forgive you for your little white lie about not holding anything back from me. I think you’ve been punished enough already.”
John settled back into the pillows. Then a new thought struck him. “Where am I?”
“The Greek Army Hospital,” Christo answered.
John now recalled the doctor saying something about the Army Hospital. “Why the Army hospital?”
“Two reasons,” Christo answered. “First, this is the best hospital on the island. Second, this base has a chain link perimeter fence and is guarded twenty-four hours a day. Someone tried to kill you and I can’t think of a safer place than right here. I think it’s fair to assume whoever broke into your room wanted the map and assumed you had it. He didn’t find it, obviously. For all he knows, he did kill you. With you dead, he has no hope of getting the map from you. Besides, from the way they trashed your room, they’ve probably figured out that you didn’t have it after all.”
John wondered how the men had tracked him down. Then another thought struck him. “If those men saw you arrive at my hotel after I called about Petros Vangelos, then they must know I met with the police.”
Christo finished his thought. “And they also must know that, if you found a map on Mr. Vangelos, you would have turned it over to the police.”
“You’d better watch your back, Christo. These men don’t seem to be the type to care who they kill.”
Christo’s eyes went diamond-hard. “I’m counting on that, my friend.”
Suddenly, the doctor’s prediction came true and a wave of nausea swept over John, accompanied by a jackhammer of a headache. Without having to be asked, Christo went into the hall and came back with a nurse. Whatever she gave John knocked him out until the early hours of the following morning.
Between the drugs and his injuries, John felt like hell. Although it was dark outside, he could see a faint hint of dawn through his window. He had one overriding need—to get to the bathroom. Cautiously, he slid off the bed until his bare feet touched the cool tile floor. He held onto a wheeled intravenous rack next to his bed to steady himself. Overcome by dizziness, he would have fallen to the floor but for that rack. When the room stopped spinning, he slowly made his way to the bathroom.
While he washed his hands, he hazarded a glance in the mirror and was shocked by his appearance. A blood-stained bandage circled his head. Both of his eyes were blackened.
He slowly made his way back to the bed, rolling the intravenous rack beside him. His hospital gown rode up his legs, barely covering his butt, as he negotiated the climb into bed. He fell onto his right side as he heard giggles behind him. He rolled onto his back and looked toward the open door to his room as he pulled the hospital gown down as far as it would go, which was barely to his knees. The beauty from the Vangelos house stood in the doorway. John groaned and felt his face go hot.
The woman stood in the doorway and, in excellent British English, asked, “Would it be all right if I came in?”
“Yes, please,” he said as he arranged his bedclothes as best he could and pulled the sheet up to his chin.
She stepped forward into a ray of sunshine that sliced through the window and spotlighted her as though she’d entered a stage. John felt his breath catch.
“Mr. Hammond, I came here this morning to thank you for what you did for my father . . . and my mother. Inspector Panagoulakos told me you were the last person to talk with my father and that your injuries are probably a result of your efforts to help him. I cannot put into words the gratitude my family and I have for you.”
John blushed like a kid on his first date. “You don’t need to thank me,” he said. “But I appreciate your comments.”
“Mr. Hammond, I will always be in your debt.”
Wonderful, he thought. Just what I need. A gorgeous married Greek woman in my debt. In a land where husbands castrate you if you merely stare at their wives.
She took a seat in the chair at the foot of the bed.
“How do you feel?”
“Great!” he lied.
“Forgive me for saying so, but you look as though you lost a wrestling match with a tiger.”
“Actually, madam, I feel like I look.”
She laughed in a way that reminded John of wind chimes—full of life and good humor.
“Mr. Hammond, you need not call me ‘madam’ since I am not married. Please call me Zoë.”
John felt suddenly lightheaded, exhilarated. She had not been waving to a husband when he’d seen her on the dock. Maybe a fiancé? He tried to come up with a way to ask about the man she’d waved at without sounding like an idiot, but a nurse came into the room just then and ruined his chance for further conversation.
The nurse glared at Zoë. “You are not supposed to be in this room without permission. Wait out in the hall until I can find the guard.” The nurse turned on her heels and ran square into Inspector Panagoulakos.
“Thank you for your concern,” Panagoulakos said, “but Ms. Vangelos is here with me. I will escort her off the base.”
The nurse seemed to recognize the voice of authority and backed off immediately.
Zoë smiled and assured John she would return for a visit the next day. She walked out of the room ahead of Christo, who turned his head and winked at John, then followed her out.
APRIL 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
John found showering and shaving an ordeal, bu
t one he would have performed if he’d actually been on his deathbed, rather than just feeling as though he were dead. No way in hell he’d let Zoë Vangelos see him again looking like a skid row bum. He did the best he could to clean off yellow antiseptic stains from his face and neck while he tried to avoid wetting the bandage around his head. After repeated efforts, he gave up attempts to make his hair look presentable. Unruly tufts of hair framed by the stained bandage stood up like miniature sheaves of wheat.
He awaited Zoë’s promised return with the anticipation of a lovesick adolescent, increasingly anxious and impatient while the minutes turned into hours. He’d expected her to arrive in the morning as she had the day before, but by noon she hadn’t shown up and John had fallen into a full-blown funk.
Christo and Zoë finally arrived at 4:00 p.m. She had the same electric effect on John as the first time he’d seen her. Her smile seemed to light up his room and obliterated the frustration and depression he’d felt all day.
“How’s the patient?” Christo asked.
“Great,” John said. “I’m ready to get out of here.”
Christo opened his mouth, about to say something, but Zoë beat him to it.
“Oh no! You cannot leave the hospital yet,” she said. “You must stay here until the doctor is certain you are well.”
John changed the subject. “I thought you might be here earlier.”
Zoë gave John a sympathetic look. “I met with Inspector Panagoulakos this morning and gave him a statement about what we knew about my fath . . . my father’s state of mind and activities. I am afraid I was not much help. Then, for most of the day, I helped my mother arrange for the funeral and burial. It has been a very long and tiring day.”
John felt stupid then for having shown his impatience, when he should have thought about what she must be going through. The dark circles under her eyes and the fatigue that showed in her less-than-erect posture provided ample evidence of the stress she was under.