by David Carter
He paused for a moment; the thought of not marrying her had never crossed his mind.
‘Of course, once you’re better, now that everything’s sorted. Understand?’
She nodded and a trace of a smile flickered across her pretty face.
‘As long as you still want me, Midge. That’s all that matters.’
‘You know I do, Liz.’
She wanted to marry him more than ever; she wanted his children and was determined to bear him sons as soon as possible. Recent days had served to underline how deeply she loved him, and how lonely and vulnerable and worthless she felt without him.
He leant down and kissed her lips. They were ice cold.
‘I’ll fetch Coral, you can chat with her. Tell her all about it.’
‘I love you, Midge.’
‘I love you too.’
He grabbed Coral outside the bedroom and reminded her not to tell Lisa any details of their trip, though he was more concerned about how dreadful she looked.
‘Call a doctor if she’s ill. It’s probably women’s things, she’ll talk to you,’ and he pushed Coral into the bedroom and hurried away.
SERGEANT SHARISTES sat back in his chair and sipped black coffee. The office was unusually quiet; it sure wasn’t the same since the MIT, the Murder Investigation Team, had been recalled to the capital. There had been a spate of unsolved murders in the Athenian suburbs, resulting in Skeiri Thorikos and his disciples debunking as abruptly as they had arrived. It was as if they had never been there, as if they were part of Sharistes’ imagination. Yet when he looked up at the photocopies of Callia’s drawings staring down from the notice-board, it brought everything back. Christos guffawed.
When they were on the island, they’d cluttered up his office and were forever under his feet. Now they were gone he found he missed them, especially the permanently cheerful Callia, and the resigned Ploutos. He’d shared a late night drink with Ploutos in the Ace, and had discovered that after a few snorters he was most agreeable company, full of stories and impersonations of famous and senior Athenian policeman, past and present. Christos laughed again.
No helicopter was sent; they were bundled aboard a busy ferry, mixing uncomfortably with herds of backpackers, and the weird human flotsam that permanently drifts around the eastern Med and Aegean. Desperate travellers impatient to view the next island before their return flight date appeared on the calendar. Christos had escorted the team onto the boat. Callia had paused, reached up on tiptoe, and kissed him gently in the middle of his forehead. She thanked him for all the help and assistance he’d given. She was the only one who had, thanked him, not kissed him, and he was grateful for that.
Kephalos had turned away, as Ploutos hauled the bags aboard the ferry, Keph insisting loudly that the criminals would be brought to book on the back of his scientific evidence. He might be proved right, though still no one had been interviewed in connection with Nicoliades’ death. The first they knew of the recall was an early morning call to Christos’s office.
‘Get your team back to Athens now, today, you are needed here!’
Skeiri justified it by saying, ‘We’ve all but solved the crime. We’ve identified the killers. I am satisfied Brian and Brenda Nichols were responsible for the murder of Nicoliades Emperikos, probably through jealousy, after he’d made a move on the woman. The file of evidence has been dispatched to New Scotland Yard. The ball is in their court.’
To their credit, the English police soon replied, stating they would seek the persons responsible, and would report back when they had news. Nothing further had yet been heard. Perhaps the English police weren’t as good as they thought they were. Maybe their international reputation had been made in another age. Skeiri was happy to be leaving the island; he’d all but wrapped up the case, and that was what he would tell his superiors. He’d grown bored with Christos Sharistes and his one square room where nothing ever happened, and the uncomfortable bed he slept in above the queasy harbour. He’d wrapped it up, Inspector Skeiri Thorikos, another case cracked.
The more he thought about it, the more he embellished his achievements, and the more he convinced himself the job had been done well, so long as no one dwelt on the fact the murderer, or murderers, were still walking free.
Sergeant Sharistes closed his diary and sighed. He never would have believed it but he missed them. Working alone wasn’t good for anyone, and he knew that. He locked the office and trudged towards the Ace.
Since the murder he’d taken up almost permanent residence there. Somehow he couldn’t bring himself to return to Nicoliades’ Bar. Perhaps it was the shame of failure that followed him around like a storm cloud, or maybe it was because he missed his old friend, listening to the mischief that Nicoliades was constantly involved in. Sharing a drink and raucous laughter, but whatever the reason, he would not go there again, not until the Nichols, or someone else, was standing in court flanked by Greek policemen, charged with murder. He was surprised it hurt him so much, but it did. It festered, and he thought of little else.
Helen watched him slowly enter the bar and smiled at him from the end of the counter. He looked tired as if he had lost some of his appetite for life, and she knew what was eating him.
‘The usual, Chris?’
He nodded and perched precariously on a high stool.
Behind the bar, set high up above the bottles of drink, sat a small old television. It was beaming out a Champions League match, and that explained why the bar was busy and rowdy whenever the away team attacked, for the away team was Olympiakos, his bête noir, playing in their red and white stripes like bleeding teeth. He was a green Panathinaikos man, always had been, the big city glamour club, and always would be. Christos didn’t care who beat Olympiakos from the rough Piraeus district, just so long as they lost.
‘What’s the score?’ he shouted to no one in particular.
‘No score,’ someone yelled. ‘It’s a good game, we are playing well.’
We? What is this We business, thought Christos. You can count me out.
‘Who are they playing again?’
‘Liverpool City! Don’t you know anything?’
He glanced back at the screen. It wasn’t a great picture, it was probably fed from a portable aerial, but the stadium looked packed and the fanatical English fans seemed nervous. In breaks of play the cameras panned around the stands where banks of scarved and badged supporters were biting their nails and looking anxious. If it remained nil-nil Olympiakos would squeeze through, and time was ticking away. Come on Liverpool City!
VIMY RIDGE HAD BOUGHT ten tickets from a casual friend on the Corn Exchange on a whim. He had no idea who the opponents were scheduled to be. He’d bought them because it presented a rare opportunity for the family to go out together, and everyone said it would be an exciting evening. Qualification to the knockout stages rested on the result. It would be an old-fashioned big European football night, full of tension and excitement.
At first, the girls weren’t keen to go. Football wasn’t really their thing, and Messine had never set foot in a football stadium. But Vimy’s enthusiasm and desire to keep the family together had won the day. On the night of the match she wore a wholly inappropriate primrose suit, shortish skirt and wide-brimmed matching hat, one of her own creations that would have looked more at home at Ascot racecourse than the inner Liverpool suburbs.
Worse than that, she’d brought as her guest, Marlon Fasey, a slight annoyance of a man, who according to her, was a wizard at design. He was looking forward to the game, watching the tanned athletic well turned out boys in their pretty shorts. He was not a regular football supporter either.
Persia’s builder friend, Brian, was interested in football, and he’d jumped at the chance. He knew tickets were like gold dust, and if someone else was paying, that was fine by him. He supported Tranmere Rovers across the river, but a Champions League match was something different. Persia wore more suitable clothes, tight jeans and a short black leather jacket.
>
Coral roped in Harry from the rugby club to make up the numbers. He was a sometimes football fan, and an occasional Coral kisser, whenever she let him, which was about once every two months, and only when she was in the mood, and had nothing better to fill her face. Midge, accompanied by the recovering Lisa, and Vimy and Laura made up the impressive Ridge team.
It was a crisp night, smoke in the air from casually tossed fireworks. Somehow that added to the excitement, the smell of hotdogs and hastily applied aftershave, the steam and stench festering away from the police horses’ dung, the pee in the streets from kids who couldn’t wait a moment, a discarded meat pie, a wet Nellie, rotting and waiting for the rats. The vast crowd walking one way like a river, flooding unnaturally up the hill towards the ground, between the tower blocks, heading for the floodlit stadium, walking with intent, jumping from the pavement to the road and back on the kerb, smoking as they went, blue smoke flying from above and behind their freshly combed heads, beer on breath from hastily quaffed and emptied glasses that lined the deserted bars in the Scottie Road pubs, tapping their rolled up Liverpool Echo’s on their thighs, progressing in step like marching bands, talking in hushed tones, speculating on the match.
A little boy crying out in panic, parted momentarily from his father, bursting into tears, as he gratefully clutched his daddy’s hand. Scruffy teenagers offering to look after your car for a fiver, mate, and woe betide anyone refusing their generous offer. It was like visiting Santa Claus in the grotto, for grown-ups, the same excitement, the same nervous anticipation, the same sense of expectancy, like going on a date with a beautiful girl for the first time. Football could do strange things to the soul.
In the crush, the Ridge team were forced to park their cars and walk the last half-mile to the ground, slumming with the common herd, like wildebeest on migration. Someone whistled at the startling sight of Messine’s eye-catching creation.
‘Go ’ed geel, where did ya get that ’at?’
Messine beamed and took the comments as compliments to her designer. She tapped Marlon’s thigh and grinned and replied loudly in her best Cheshire accent, ‘Oh do you like it? Thanks.’
WHEN THE FAMILY REALISED the opponents were Greek, there was some talk of cancelling, but that hadn’t lasted long.
‘Hell, these tickets cost me over £500,’ protested Vimy. ‘We’re going, and that’s final!’
The match was everything it was cracked up to be, tense, nervous, and so exciting, as Liverpool City went close time and again. They struck the foot of the post in the first half, and just after the restart, crashed a shot against the crossbar, as they frantically attacked the favoured end. Wave on wave bore down on the Greek goal, yet that vital score would not come. If the match was to be ranked alongside the all-time great European nights, they must score.
Vimy glanced at his Rolex. Time was ticking away. They were into the last ten minutes and two thousand visiting Greek fans were whistling and shrieking for the final whistle.
IN THE BAR IN EDRIS, Christos fell silent, resigned to seeing the hated O’s in the next round. He would have to shoulder their supporters’ taunts for another season. Panathinaikos were already out, dumped by a team rejoicing under the name of Young Boys, just another thing to increase his miserable mood. The Olympiakos fans in the bar were bullish and noisy as they ratcheted up the volume. That annoyed him, and he thought of leaving, but did not, for there was still hope. Around him, O fans were screaming the club’s songs in an effort to will their team home. They were prematurely dreaming of jousting with glamorous clubs in the group stages, Milan or Roma, Barcelona or even Real Madrid, but please God forbid, not Galatasaray from Istanbul, anyone but them. The seconds ticked down, the match was in injury time, and Olympiakos were nearly through.
The home captain, Stevie Tynan, picked up the ball outside the penalty area. He beat one defender, then a second, cut into the corner of the box, beat a third man, but had he been driven too wide? Everyone stood open-mouthed; time seemed to stand still as he unleashed a vicious cross shot that flew across the face of the goal. It smacked onto the inside of the far post, squelching a muddy mark on the frame of the goal. It bounced down and out towards the scrambling wide-eyed goalkeeper. The ball hit the goalie on the shoulder and ricocheted into the bottom corner of the net.
IT’S THERE!!!!
GOAL!!!!
All hell broke loose.
The ground exploded, and the crowd tumbled down as in days of yore. The TV camera cut away to the main stand where the supporters were on their feet to a man, woman, and child, screaming ‘GOAL!!! GOAL!!! GET IN!!!’
Pictures picked out the woman in the yellow hat and those around her, arms above their heads, mouths open, voices flying to the ether. GOAL! GOAL! An injury time goal, and surely Liverpool City were through! And even better than that, so far as Christos was concerned, Olympiakos were going out!
He almost fell off his stool. He felt his heart surge as the ball squeezed into the net. He wouldn’t have been the first person to drop dead from a heart attack at a football match, but perhaps he would have been the first from 2,667 kilometres from the stadium. But he didn’t have a coronary, and he didn’t die. He jumped down and did a silly war dance in front of the silent and surly Olympiakos fans. One of them swore at him. Another threatened to punch him on the nose, policeman or not. Christos ignored them. For a split second he glanced back at the screen and saw a shot of the Ridge family celebrating. The cameras switched back to Stevie Tynan wheeling away from the goal, racing like a sprinter in front of the main stand, his shirt in hand, waving it frantically above his head like a helicopter blade, his ripped body catching the eye, before bolting back towards the halfway line, screaming Liverpool City players in pursuit like wild dogs.
The final whistle screamed and the Ace emptied. Christos ordered another drink, a double in celebration, as the Olympiakos fans headed sullenly home, their banners dragging in the dirt, their hoarse voices silent, shoulders slumped, all joy abandoned.
‘I never knew football could be like that!’ gasped Messine, as their car wended its way down Scotland Road towards the Mersey tunnel.
‘Unbelievable!’ repeated Marlon, ‘I’m definitely going again!’
‘Best game I’ve ever seen,’ said Brian, as he curled his arm around Persia’s waist, and pulled her close and whispered, ‘It’s really put me in the mood.’
‘You’re always in the mood.’
‘You don’t complain.’
In the other car the excitement was no less intense.
‘See! I knew you’d enjoy it,’ Vimy said, and no one disagreed.
‘What a night, I’ll never forget it,’ blurted Coral. ‘Never!’
And she wouldn’t, none of them would.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
WALTER DARRITEAU SETTLED the phone to his ear and spoke to Doc Grayling, ‘So you are still alive, are you? The rumours are false.’
‘Very funny, I’m sure. This information doesn’t just come trailing out of a computer like half the useless intel you obtain these days. Do you have any idea how much time and work is involved in a double human Post Mortem?’
Walter contented himself by saying: ‘I have been in this business for more years than I care to remember.’
‘Well, you wouldn’t think so. Have some patience, man. Your mob has always been so damned impatient, and with the passing of the years you don’t seem to get any better.’
‘Your specialist services are highly valued, Doctor, you know that,’ said Walter with a smirk, ‘always have been and always will be.’
Whether Doc Grayling heard the remark must have been in doubt, for he ignored it and said, ‘Do you want my prelim findings or don’t you?’
‘Of course I do. You know me. Always interested in anything you have to say. Titbits of intel build the jigsaw until it is complete, as you well know. The things you tell us are often the hard-to-find edge pieces that get the adventure under way.’
Doc Grayling s
norted and said, ‘You have a weird way with words, have I ever told you that, Darriteau?’
‘More than once, if memory serves.’
‘OK, Walter, let’s not waste any time on juvenile verbal jousting. Do you want the man or the woman first?’
‘Not bothered. I need to know it all.’
‘Make a decision, man!’
‘OK, the man.’
‘Right!’ said Doc Grayling. ‘Jack Terrington, it is. Rampant lung cancer. First diagnosed four years ago. Had some chemo but it didn’t reverse the process and from what I glean he wasn’t keen to proceed with it.’
‘In effect signing his own death warrant?’
‘You could say that, but none of us know how we would react until we were in the same situation.’
‘Quite so.’
‘Heavy smoker, as we know, and that goes for both of them, and the time of death is a little tricky as it was a while ago, and as you know, the more time passes, the harder it is to be accurate on that. But my thirty years of operating in this field would put it at between three and four weeks. My staff have checked on his drugs prescription and nothing has been dispensed for twenty-six days.’
‘So, as we rather imagined, it’s death by natural causes?’
‘Yes, if you want to describe cancer as natural.’
‘I think that’s how it’s normally classified.’
‘Anything else on the guy?’
‘Not really, large drug residues in the body, as you’d expect. But from what I can see they are all drugs you’d expect to see.’
‘Which brings us to Meryl Terrington.’
‘Indeed, the woman believed to be Meryl Terrington, though as we speak she had not yet been formally ID’d, and that, Walter, goes for both of them.’
‘True, I think Karen may have tracked down a relative who will have that terrible task.’
‘Fine. Meryl Terrington died of heart failure.’