Evolution of Fear

by Paul E. Hardisty

  Regina Medved had Rania. It was the worst possible outcome.

  He broke into a run, joining the crowds fleeing the mayhem. An ambulance screamed past, lights flashing. Clay upped his pace, running through the warren of crumbling, turn-of-the-century homes, past walled courtyards and gardens gone wild, relics of a time when cities were built for people, not cars. Breathing hard now, he passed an ancient stone church, and further on an abandoned mosque, the windows and entrance boarded up and the fraying stonework covered in graffiti, and then a row of newer warehouse buildings, seemingly unfinished, square-cut with barred windows and white neon tube lights swinging naked from concrete ceiling beams. The noise of the riot receded behind him.

  As the crowd thinned, he slowed to a walk, opened his phone and dialled. ‘It’s me,’ he said.

  ‘What the fok happened down there?’

  ‘Politics.’ He looked down. There was blood splattered over his trouser leg.

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘On my way to you now. He sold Rania to Medved.’ More on his sleeve.

  Silence on the other end.

  ‘Call Medved, Koevoet. Call her now. Tell her you want Rania, that you have the illumination, that you’ll trade.’

  ‘Understood.’

  Clay put his phone in his pocket, kept walking.

  Behind him, sirens echoing from both sides of the line, the smell of burning rubber drifting over the city. So much he should have asked Chrisostomedes. There hadn’t been time.

  Crowbar’s apartment was near Paphos gate, not far now. Just beyond was the old Ledra Palace hotel. Sitting between the Greek and Turkish lines, cut-off in no-man’s land, it was the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping mission, the venue for the cross-border enquiry scheduled to begin tomorrow morning.

  Clay turned into the alley behind Crowbar’s building, walked into the back service entrance and took the fire stairs to the third floor. The flat was at the end of the corridor, immediately adjacent the stairwell, at the far end from the lifts. Clay knocked twice, waited, heard the chain come off, the bolt pull back. Crowbar looked him up and down and closed the door behind him.

  Clay slumped into a chair and poured himself a whisky from the three-quarter-full bottle on the lounge room table. The TV flickered live images: ambulances speeding down narrow streets, smoke blanketing Ledras Street, a man with a bandaged head being helped by police, aerial shots from helicopters circling overhead, the crowds still streaming away from the border on both sides, all the sounds of it pouring through the open balcony doors. A UN helicopter thudded past close overhead, the sound of dawn hangovers under canvas in the Caprivi. He looked up at Crowbar, searching for an answer in his face.

  Crowbar sat opposite, picked up the bottle, swirled the contents, lifted it to his mouth and drank. ‘I called Medved.’

  A capacitor tripped somewhere inside Clay, emptied him. The void held, defying him. And just when he thought it would last, fear flooded in cold and fast, a glacial torrent. ‘Is Rania alive?’

  ‘I spoke to her.’

  Relief exploded inside him. Like that feeling after a barrage – the smoke and dust drifting like fog, and the smell of the earth ripped up around you, and the sounds of the wounded and dying calling for help, or just crying, and you know you have survived. ‘Allah akhbar,’ he said.

  ‘What the fok does that mean?’

  ‘What did she say?’

  Crowbar put his hand on Clay’s shoulder, glanced at the blood on his sleeve. ‘She’s fine. Unhurt but scared. Who wouldn’t be? We meet Medved tonight, west of town, on the Green Line. She’s agreed to the deal. Get cleaned up and get some sleep, seun.’ He handed Clay the bottle.

  Clay put it to his lips and felt the whisky go into him. ‘I haven’t slept for ten years.’ Except for that one night in Istanbul.

  Crowbar frowned.

  ‘When, Koevoet?’

  ‘Midnight. Medved will be there. She wants to see the Illumination herself. She doesn’t trust her lieutenants with this. If it’s the real thing, she’ll give us Rania.’

  ‘And if it’s not?’

  ‘Don’t use your imagination.’ Crowbar reached down and produced first one, then the second icon and placed them on the table. Side by side, the illuminations looked nearly identical.

  Clay gazed at the men falling into the abyss, the terror in their faces. He picked up one of the icons and turned it over. The backing was dark hardwood, polished with age. A square hole about the size of a fingernail pierced the centre. Clay pushed his little finger into the hole up to the first knuckle. Then he looked at the second piece. The shape and thickness of the wooden backing varied subtly between the two. There was the same kind of hole in the back of the second illumination, but its outline was more in the shape of a parallelogram, as if the square had been stepped on. Near the hole was a tiny silver fleck the size of a grain of salt. Chrisostomedes’ microchip. ‘We better find out.’

  ‘Ahead of you, Straker, as always. I’m meeting the curator of the Cyprus museum at six o’clock this evening. If anyone knows, it’s him.’

  Clay looked at his watch, still awkward on his right wrist. ‘One of them is real, at least. Question is, are they more important to Medved than revenge?’

  ‘Medved doesn’t give a shit about Rania.’ Crowbar picked up one of the icons. ‘This is what she wants, ja. She’s desperate. She believes. Fifteen million cash. That’s what she’s bringing tonight. Three for you, two for that dead bliksem in my car, ten for this. Rania was just a lucky accident as far as she is concerned.’

  ‘It was no accident, Koevoet.’

  Something from the TV interrupted his thoughts. Clay grabbed the remote and turned up the volume. A policeman in a blue uniform with gold braid and a peaked cap was speaking to the cameras, a waggle of microphones jammed into his face.

  ‘–the suspect is a foreigner, white, male, with fair hair and blue eyes,’ the cop said in accented English. ‘He is very tall, and is missing his left hand. He is believed to have entered the island illegally with the help of the Turkish authorities, and is armed and extremely dangerous. Anyone who may have seen this individual should contact police immediately.’

  ‘Goddamn,’ said Crowbar. ‘Very tall?’

  ‘It’s all relative, oom.’

  Crowbar snapped a grin.

  The station cut to more footage of the aftermath: broken bottles, injured people being helped by paramedics, heads swathed in white bandages, arms in slings, fires still burning. Every emergency vehicle and policeman in the city was tied up dealing with the aftermath of the riot. And then a face he knew, the hair combed quickly back, the dark suit impeccable. Cameras flashed, hands pushed microphones towards him.

  It was Dimitriou: ‘–the result of Turkish treachery,’ he said in English, pointing behind him towards a column of smoke rising into the sky. ‘This was an unprovoked attack on innocent people. For twenty years we have lived with a military occupation. One third of our country appropriated and occupied, our property stolen, our people raped and murdered while the international community stood by and did nothing. Today, Turkish agents operating inside Cyprus used this disgraceful attack as a diversion for the attempted assassination of Nicos Chrisostomedes, one of our most prominent citizens. With the help of God and our prayers, he will survive. This incident has convinced me, once and for all, that our destiny as a nation, as a European nation, as a Greek nation, can only be fulfilled with the complete and permanent withdrawal of all Turkish occupying forces from our island. This is Nicos Chrisostomedes’ vision: a new Hellenic renaissance here in Cyprus, a new Enosis: Union with Greece. I am pleased to announce today that in the upcoming election I will be endorsing Nicos Chrisostomedes’ campaign for the Presidency.’

  Cheers rose in the background, clapping.

  ‘They had this all planned,’ said Clay. ‘They had agitators in the crowd. I saw them. They started it, sent over the first petrol bombs.’

  A question from one of the reporters,
something about the transborder commission on coastal development.

  Dimitriou paused, looking into the camera. ‘All Cypriots should see this commission for what it is: a farce, an illegitimate attempt by outside parties to dictate to us, here in our own country, how we are to manage our affairs, our economy, our own lands and property. I have been called to testify, and I say to you now that I will not be attending this disgraceful kangaroo court.’

  More cheering.

  ‘Furthermore, I will be formally asking Parliament in session tomorrow to demand that the EU and UN dissolve the Commission, and focus its attention instead on the heinous atrocities being committed here by agents of the Turkish military and the illegitimate Turkish puppet government in Northern Cyprus.’

  ‘Congratulations, Straker. You’ve now joined the ranks of the Turkish army.’ Crowbar pulled on a dark jacket, checked his Beretta. ‘Stay put. They’ll have roadblocks up, and your picture’s everywhere. I’ll be back by six.’

  Clay grabbed him by the arm. ‘Where are you going?’ He’d done it too quickly, had sounded too desperate. He let go.

  Crowbar put a hand on Clay’s shoulder. ‘It’s okay, seun. I’m going to see Hope. I’ve got some bad news for her.’

  ‘Shit. Is she okay?’

  ‘As well as can be expected, with her kid missing. But at least the cops aren’t going to charge her. That’s what they came over to tell her this morning.’

  ‘So what is it?’

  ‘That girl, Maria. She’s disappeared.’

  Clay exhaled.

  ‘I did some checking on her. Appears she’s married.’

  ‘A lot of people are.’

  ‘True. But not everyone is married to Dimitriou’s sister’s son.’

  ‘Jesus.’

  ‘She sold us out, seun.’

  Blood. Here, it was everything.

  ‘Looks like she destroyed the samples. Tipped off Hope’s ex, the cops too probably.’

  Trust. It was the only thing that mattered.

  Without it, what did you have?

  45

  A Question of Faith

  Clay stayed put.

  He showered and found some clean clothes.

  He ate.

  He tried to sleep. Tried not to think.

  Built surfaces and shapes in his head with double and triple integrals, saddles and spheroids, ran n-1 algorithms with sequences of prime numbers, anything.

  Crowbar returned after nightfall, more than an hour late. His mouth was set in a scowl. He gathered the icons, wrapped them in the towels and put them into the black bag.

  ‘Let’s go, seun,’ was all he said. ‘Get this done.’

  The museum wasn’t far, a short drive through the old city. The traffic was bad, the narrow roads choked with ambulances and police cars. Clay sank low in his seat and tilted his chin to his chest. Crowbar was silent at the wheel.

  By the time they arrived, the museum was closed for the day. Crowbar parked around back, a property line of big cypress trees swaying evening shadows across the buildings. Clay glanced at his watch: almost eight o’clock, the meeting with Medved still four hours away. He followed Crowbar to the back of the building – a British Empire sandstone affair of vaults, pillars and arches – scanning the perimeter gardens as he went.

  Crowbar knocked on a rear service door. They waited as the light faded.

  ‘Kak,’ Crowbar cursed. ‘I said six-thirty. Maybe he’s gone.’ He knocked again, harder this time.

  ‘Or maybe he called the police.’

  ‘I don’t think so. I said I had information about the Patmos Illumination. He sounded very keen.’

  Clay nodded.

  Koevoet grunted something, scuffed the concrete walkway with his boot.

  At last the door opened. A smallish man in a grey suit and grey woollen tie peered out at them from the semi-darkness. Thick-lensed glasses perched on a substantial and very Cypriot nose. His hair was thick and wiry, the colour of winter cloud.

  ‘You have brought it?’ he said. He sounded breathless, as if he’d just struggled up five flights of stairs.

  Crowbar wedged his boot into the door and lifted the black bag that Zdravko had been carrying just a few hours earlier. The curator led them down a dimly lit, tiled corridor, past a series of closed doors, up a set of iron stairs and into an office. The room could have been in a heritage-listed government building in England – stone-mullioned windows, ancient polished wood panelling, heavy oak furniture, dark with age, the smell of book must and old leather and wood polish everywhere, something out of the 1800s. It reminded Clay of the dock in the Central Criminal Court in London, coming up the spiral iron staircase from the cells below, emerging into the chambers, staring up at the judge.

  The curator sat behind his desk, turned on a table lamp. Clay and Crowbar sat in leather armchairs before him.

  ‘Gentlemen, I must tell you,’ the curator began in perfect, public-school English, wiping his eyeglasses on his shirt tail, ‘I am asked to look at so-called Patmos Illuminations almost every week.’

  Crowbar put the bag on the desk, unzipped it, pulled out a white towel, unwrapped it and put the first piece on the ink blotter.

  The curator put his glasses back on and directed the lamplight towards the piece. For a long time he sat looking at it, tilting the lamplight this way and that, not speaking. After a while he reached out and picked it up. He handled it as if it were a landmine, as if he was afraid it would blow his hands off if he jarred it. He turned it over, gazed intently at the back for a long time. Then he put it back on the blotter.

  ‘Where did you get this?’ he said.

  Crowbar glanced over at Clay, back at the curator. ‘We found it in a car.’

  The curator frowned, thought about this for a moment, then reached out and touched the base of the illumination with his index finger and held it there a while.

  ‘What do you know about the Patmos Illumination?’ he said, staring at them. He looked like an owl, big eyes blinking behind powerful lenses.

  ‘Not much,’ said Clay.

  ‘The Ladder of Divine Ascent has been missing since the invasion. It disappeared from the Church of Aya Katerina in Karpasia in 1974 as the Turks advanced through the north. It is one of the most important historical artefacts in Cyprus, a direct link between this island, the disciples, and Christ himself.’

  ‘Is it true what they say?’ said Crowbar. ‘About the blood of Christ.’

  ‘That is what some believe. There is basis for this in historical fact. The first record of the illumination itself is from Sinai in the twelfth century. It was brought to Cyprus in the fifteenth century by Celestine, an Alexandrian monk. In the early 1970s scholars from Greece took samples of the wood on which the illumination is anchored. Carbon dating confirmed that the wood was cut in what is today Lebanon, about two-thousand years ago. Ancient scrolls speak of parts of Christ’s cross being carried across the region by the disciples and used to create religious icons of all kinds. The wooden backing has long been believed to be from the cross piece. It has a hole where the nail is believed to have pierced Christ’s hand.’

  ‘Goddamn,’ Crowbar muttered in Afrikaans. ‘And the healing?’

  ‘There are rumours, stories through the centuries of miracles, of healings.’ The curator took off his glasses, reached out again and touched the edge of the illumination with his fingertips. ‘I suppose it is a question of faith.’

  Clay’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He grabbed it, put it to his ear.

  ‘Declan, is that you?’ A woman’s voice.

  Clay said nothing.

  ‘Doctor Greene? This is Katia. You remember?’

  ‘Yes, I remember.’

  Crowbar glanced at him, raised his eyebrows.

  ‘I think I know where he is,’ came Katia’s voice.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The person you’re looking for.’

  A jolt. ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘Can you come over? I’
m scared.’

  ‘Tell me where he is.’

  She paused. Clay waited.

  ‘I heard them talking,’ she said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Dimitriou and Chrisostomedes. Last night. I think I know what they are doing.’

  ‘You’re a smart woman, Katia.’ He could hear her smile.

  ‘Can you come to my flat?’

  ‘Tell me where he is, then I’ll come.’

  ‘Dimitriou owns a taverna near Famagusta Gate. Xilares, near the wall. Do you know it?’

  ‘Yes.’ It wasn’t far, a couple of clicks across the old city.

  ‘He’s there. There is a house in the back. I heard them. That’s what they said.’

  Clay put his hand over the phone, leaned over and whispered into Crowbar’s ear: ‘They’re holding Hope’s son at Xilares.’

  Crowbar nodded.

  Clay looked out of the window, at his watch.

  ‘Declan?’

  ‘Yes, Katia.’

  ‘What’s your real name?’

  He looked up at the curator. ‘Clay.’

  ‘I want to leave him.’

  Clay said nothing.

  ‘Do you believe me?’ she whispered.

  ‘I believe you.’

  ‘Will you come tonight?’

  ‘Yes. After I get the boy.’

  Clay closed the phone, put it back in his pocket, looked at Crowbar. ‘We’ve got to go.’

  ‘So,’ said Crowbar to the curator. ‘Is it the real thing?’

  The curator put his glasses back on. ‘The piece is genuine, gentlemen. Very old. Beautiful.’

  Crowbar glanced at Clay, grinned.

  The curator cleared his throat. ‘It is quite valuable, actually. It would make an excellent addition to the museum.’

  Clay picked up the icon.

  ‘What are you doing?’ said the curator, eyes widening until they seemed to occupy the entire area of his lenses.

  ‘We’ve got what we needed,’ said Clay. ‘Thanks for your time.’

  ‘You haven’t let me finish,’ said the curator, out of breath again.

  ‘Finish, then,’ said Crowbar.