The Green Lady (12 page)

Akis thought about Yiorgia. Would his wife have approved of what he was doing? She had been the local, born and bred in Kypseli, while he had been a labourer on the roads from the north of the country before he met her. They had fallen for each other in seconds and her father had approved, despite Akis's limited prospects. He'd shown his son-in-law everything he knew about fishing before his belly was riddled with tumours and he went to the place where his daughter had now joined him. Yes, he thought, Yiorgia would be in favour. She hated the permanent cloud that came across the water from the plant, as well as the red scars in the mountains behind it.

He looked over his shoulder as they drove along the town's sea front. There were banners streaming from the windows of the cars: ‘Down with the HMC!' ‘Close the plant NOW!' At the junction with the road to Dhistomo, Lykos bore right and soon the line of vehicles was on the road that led to the bauxite works. They had almost made it. The ecologists had found out exactly where the Hellenic Mining Corporation's land started, half a kilometre from the plant – there, even the road became private. Lykos stopped the VW. Even at this early hour, the pollution cloud was heavy over the hill that lay between them and what the workers called Red Gold Valley.

‘On you go, Aki!' Angeliki called, through the megaphone.

He manoeuvred past the van and started the series of turns that would get the tractor and trailer at right angles across the road. Then he drove as far forward as he could and pulled the lever. The trailer rose and the rocks thundered over the asphalt. He jumped down to see how far back he needed to go to block the road completely and then reversed to close the gap. Turning off the engine, he took the keys and hid them in his sock. He looked back towards Paradheisos. Already a line of HMC workers' cars was forming behind them. They wouldn't be going any further unless they got out and walked. That was when the fun would really start.

‘Well done!' Lykos said. He had run the VW as close as he could to the ditch, as had the drivers in the cars behind on both sides. Anyone trying to walk would face a slalom between stationary vehicles and angry protesters. That wasn't the end of it. The night shift would be clocking off soon and several hundred tired men would be unable to get to their beds without running the gauntlet. The ecologists weren't going to be popular, but Akis didn't care. The workers had sold their souls and, what was worse, had condemned their own families to the illnesses caused by the poison clouds and the bauxite residue that was piled in heaps around the plant and illegally dumped in the bay.

By the time the police arrived, there had already been several fights. Akis had blood on his knuckles and face, but he hadn't been knocked down. At first, only the few officers stationed in Paradheisos showed up. The protesters knew them and their foibles. The adulterer was hit by condoms filled with yoghurt, the drinker drenched in local ouzo, the gambler pelted with coins and the dope smoker had dried grass thrown over him. Even the boiler-suited workers laughed. Soon cops from Viotia headquarters in Livadheia turned up. The man in charge was taller than most basketball players and, unusually, had an air of reason about him.

‘All right, you've had your fun,' Akis heard him say to Lykos. ‘Let the workers past. They're not the enemy.'

Angeliki started chanting slogans through the bull horn again and the protesters joined in.

The policeman came over to Akis. ‘Give me the keys, will you?'

‘Who the hell are you?'

‘Deputy Commissioner Telemachos Xanthakos. You?'

‘Akis Exarchos. Fisherman and anti-HMC campaigner.'

The cop smiled. ‘Is the latter a job? Does it pay well?'

Akis wasn't falling for friendly overtures. ‘Does yours? Can you sleep at night?'

Xanthakos scowled. ‘The keys, please.'

Akis bent down and took them out of his sock. ‘Here you are.' Before the policeman could take them, he threw them as far as he could into the bay.

Then a full-scale riot broke out.

Mavros stayed a reasonable distance behind Bekakos as they drove westwards. The lawyer took the turn to Dhistomo, where 218 men, women and children had been massacred by the Waffen-SS in 1944, then followed the bends down to Paradheisos. By now, Mavros had heard on the radio that the road to the bauxite works had been blocked and that fighting had broken out between protesters, workers and police. According to one sententious announcer: ‘It's a disgrace that Greeks cannot conduct themselves in a civilised fashion while our country is hosting the Olympic Games, that inspiring symbol of Panhellenic peace in the past.'

‘Yeah, right,' Mavros muttered. ‘A few days off at Olympia and then internecine war for the rest of the fighting season.' He knew Greek history and he was sick of uninformed patriots harking back to the days of Pericles and Alexander. It was funny how rarely the twenty-seven-year Peloponnesian War that ripped the heart from classical Athens and numerous other cities was mentioned. Or that in the
pankration
event at the ancient Olympics, only biting and eye-gouging were penalized and contestants could end up dead.

As he drove past the zones of houses in pink, yellow and white, he realised he had come to some kind of cloud cuckoo land. He was no longer in Greece, but in someone's idea of a perfect community. He knew well enough where ideas like that led – to slaughter in the streets of towns like Dhistomo. The bay ahead looked inviting, but the water had a strange hue, as if the sea bed itself was bleeding. Across the Corinthian Gulf, the mountains of the Peloponnese were only just visible through the dirty cloud that emanated from behind a high headland. A line of cars over a kilometre long could be seen on the road from the dormitory town to the works.

Rovertos Bekakos took the Porsche as far as he could, before getting out and pounding his hands on the bonnet. Mavros watched the lawyer make a call on his mobile. A few minutes later, a young man on a motorbike, helmet on his arm, pulled up. Bekakos hitched up the legs of his expensive suit trousers and wrapped his arms round the rider's abdomen, then they set off for the centre of conflict.

Mavros had no choice but to follow on foot.

Y
iorgos Pandazopoulos was in twentieth heaven. Not only did he have a car that was considerably less decrepit than his old Lada, but he was actually being a dick – a private eye, Philip Marlowe in Athens. He'd always been envious of Alex's profession and his greatest joy had been hearing about his friend's cases. Apart from the one he'd foolishly got himself involved in and nearly ended up dead; his mother had given him serious shit about that, may the Saints preserve her. Alex would have ripped the crap out of him for that Christian thought. He'd never been able to understand how Communists could remain attached to the faith they'd been baptised into, even though they knew it was ideologically compromised. It was a shame Alex had only known his father Spyros for a few years. The old man would have explained to him that even Communists needed a religious crutch, especially where death was concerned. Still, at least Alex had found out about Spyros's activities during the Second World War. That had given him a fuller picture of the man who was one of Yiorgos's enduring heroes. But Alex would never be at rest until he discovered what had happened to his brother Andonis. Even though he didn't talk about him much any more, Yiorgos knew he still felt the absence keenly.

The Mercedes appeared about an hour and a half after the Porsche. The Fat Man started his engine and waited until Maria Bekakou had reached the end of the leafy street before setting off after her. He had a few anxious moments in the back streets of Kifissia, but then settled two cars behind her on the toll road that led towards the airport. Maybe she was doing a runner. He picked up his phone to call Alex, then decided against it. He was capable of doing this job without bothering his partner.

The Peugeot was going at full speed and only just keeping in touch with the Merc. At least there wasn't much traffic and he could still see it in the distance. Sure enough, Maria Bekakou was heading for the airport. She went into the short term car park. Yiorgos did the same, stopping a couple of rows behind her, then set off after her on foot as quickly as he could. The sun was hammering down and he felt his clothes dampen. She was wearing a white blouse and a short pale green skirt, and shoes with heels that slowed her down effectively. By the time she'd reached the road separating the car park from the terminal buildings, the Fat Man was only five metres behind her. She never looked round, suggesting either that she had nothing to hide or was careless.

Maria Bekakou went into the departures hall. She was carrying only a small handbag. If she was going to fly, it would probably be to a Greek destination. But she walked past the check-in counters and turned left, walking down the mini-mall of shops and restaurants. She glanced at the overpriced goods on display, but didn't stop. The place was festooned with Games-related flags and hoardings, making the scruffy old men selling lottery tickets stick out like cockroaches on a wedding cake. No one was buying from them. The tourists were loading up with Olympic souvenirs, including the appalling Athena and Phevos dolls, and locals with any sense were running for flights to escape the mayhem of Athens.

Then the target – Alex had used that word when he'd instructed Yiorgos – went into one of the restaurants, bought a small bottle of water and headed for a table in the far corner. The Fat Man was tempted by the pizzas and convinced himself that a couple of slices – oh, all right, four – would make his presence more convincing. He paid, choking back indignation at the exorbitant price, and found a table only two away from Maria Bekakou. She was speaking on her phone and completely ignored him.

It occurred to Yiorgos as he was chewing his way through the cardboard pizza that his appearance was actually an advantage when it came to surveillance. Who would imagine that a sweaty slob stuffing his face would be a private eye? The target certainly didn't. He was invisible to her as she sipped from her bottle, then lit a long cigarette. She looked at her watch a couple of times, convincing the Fat Man she was meeting someone. And so she was.

The man was wearing dark glasses and a Panama hat, the jacket of his cream suit over his arm. It wasn't until he glanced at Yiorgos and then swept his gaze around the restaurant that the drachma dropped. He was Paschos Poulos. What was the missing girl's father doing meeting his lawyer's wife – someone he was supposedly avoiding, according to Alex's client – at the airport? He wasn't even carrying a briefcase and, besides, it was impossible he could be flying anywhere, given his commitments with the Games. The Fat Man licked tomato sauce from his lips. Could they be shagging? They'd exchanged kisses and he had touched her hand a couple of times, but they didn't give the impression of being lovebirds. For a start, they were arguing, their voices sometimes raised above the racket in the busy eating-hall.

Yiorgos tried to make out what they were saying. He heard the word ‘paradheisos' several times, then a loud French family took the table in between and he couldn't pick up a thing. Besides, the couple was getting ready to leave. He stood up a few seconds after them and lowered his head, ears straining. That was when he heard the words that sent several shivers up his overheated spine.

‘They'll kill her, you know,' Pachos Poulos said.

‘That's the price you have to pay,' Maria Bekakou said.

‘Yes,' Poulos said. ‘But none of them will escape the son.'

They split up in the central corridor without kissing. The Fat Man considered following the businessman, but thought Alex wouldn't approve – his target for the day was the woman. She went back to the car park. He moved as fast as he could towards the Peugeot after she'd got in and started the Merc's engine. She was four cars ahead of him at the exit gate and had accelerated away down the highway by the time he was out. With difficulty, he kept her in view. She got off at the Kifissia Avenue exit and went back home without making any other stops.

Yiorgos parked at the other end of the street from the one he'd been at earlier and tried to get his thoughts in order. Paradheisos. That was probably the town in Viotia where the Hellenic Mining Corporation workers lived. As for the rich people's final conversation, he wasn't sure which part of it horrified him most – the dispassion with which Poulos had mentioned the likelihood of a female's (his daughter's?) death, Maria Bekakou's similar detachment, or the mention of ‘the son'.

He called Alex, but couldn't make himself heard. His partner seemed to be in the middle of a combat zone.

Mavros answered his phone when he saw the Fat Man's number on the screen, but he couldn't hear anything above the shouting and the banging of drums and cooking pots. Yiorgos would have to sort out whatever he was calling about himself. Pushing on through the increasingly angry mob, he managed to keep Rovertos Bekakos in sight. The lawyer stopped from time to time, speaking to men in boiler suits and shaking their hands.

‘What's going on?' he asked one of the few calm people, a moustachioed man in his thirties, sitting by a boulder on the roadside.

‘It's the ecologists, isn't it? They've finally got their act together and blocked the road. The night shift can't get home and we can't get to work.' He didn't seem unduly concerned. ‘I'd have a dip if I didn't know I'd come out in lumps.' He peered at Mavros. ‘Hey, you're not a journalist, are you?'

‘Certainly not,' Mavros replied, laying on the outrage. ‘I hate those scumbags. I'm with Mr Bekakos.'

The worker raised an eyebrow. ‘Tell him the new contract's a piece of shit.'

‘All right. You wouldn't give me your number?'

The man laughed. ‘Do I look suicidal?'

Mavros smiled and pushed on. Labour relations were obviously bad at the plant, but he already knew that from his research. He wouldn't pass himself off as a management lickspittle again. Eventually he reached the front line. A banner had been raised above an old Fiat. ‘Ecologists for a Better Viotia,' it proclaimed. The young men holding it up used their boots to kick back the workers.