Che Committed Suicide (30 page)

I was looking to see which meaning best suited the taking over of my post by Yanoutsos. It was very close to two of the first
meanings
: those of ‘seize’ and ‘destroy’. He had seized my post while I was in hospital and, given the way he was handling the cases in the Homicide Department, he was undoubtedly destroying it. The other meaning was redundant because ‘he hadn’t captured my heart’. On the contrary, the second meaning ‘take as plunder, as spoils’ suited him to a tee. Yanoutsos had done what the adviser had asked, bypassed Ghikas, rounded up the three blockheads and had taken my post as his plunder and spoils. As for me, that was perfectly expressed by the third meaning: I was completely undone.

It was one of the rare occasions when I had taken Dimitrakos with me into the sitting room. The bedroom resembled a street market with Russo-Pontian wares. The wardrobe had been emptied out and all the clothes were scattered over the bed, the armchair and the dressing table, where Adriani was sitting and putting on her make-up. Decorating the centre of the double bed were two open suitcases, which operated on the lines of communicating vessels: the one emptied and the other filled. All this was part of Adriani’s preparations in view of our departure the following afternoon on the high-speed. Actually, she had time the following morning to pack the cases, but it took her so long to overcome her indecisiveness that she felt safer when she had a whole night in front of her.

‘Come and choose what trousers and shirts you want to take with you.’

‘Pack as many shirts as I need to have a clean change every second day, and throw in three pairs of trousers and a jacket for the evenings when it’s windy.’

So then, a hasty departure. Even if it wasn’t secret, it was certainly fleeing, as Dimitrakos had it. Put more simply, I was taking to my heels in search of the meaning in 5: refuge, sanctuary, except that the refuge was on an island and not in a mountain.

While I was investigating the lexicographic formulation of my situation, the idea became lodged in my mind that my self-sacrifice in saving Elena Koustas from the bullet of her adopted son had, in the end, brought me nothing but bad luck.

Fortunately, Fanis appeared at just the right moment to dispel my pessimism. That was the good thing about Fanis. He always breezed in with a smile on his lips and in two minutes he had raised your spirits.

‘I just popped round to say bye and wish you happy holidays,’ he said as I opened the door for him.

‘Except that I don’t have any treat for you this evening,’ said Adriani, who had emerged from the bedroom. ‘I decided not to cook given that we’re leaving tomorrow.’ She always apologised to him when there was no home-cooked food in the house, as she considered it her duty to make up for her daughter’s culinary incompetence.

‘What do you think tavernas are for?’ Fanis replied.

She liked the idea, because she immediately showed willingness. ‘Let me finish packing and I’ll get ready.’

She jumps for joy when it comes to going out to eat but as soon as she sits down in a taverna, the one dish smells funny to her and the other she thinks is off. You just can’t win with her.

‘It seems Andreadis thinks the world of you,’ I said to him when we were in the sitting room.

He laughed. ‘Because of his mother. The patient and all his family think that you’re a good doctor, but you yourself know that you just got lucky. When they brought her in, she had a blockage the size of the Anatolian fault. I was certain she wouldn’t make it through the night, but the old woman’s organism reacted and she got away with it. I gained Andreadis’s gratitude.’ He looked at me gravely. ‘Did you find out what you wanted?’

He had no idea what game was being played at the office at my expense, but he realised that it must be something serious for me to want to talk to a Member of Parliament.

‘He was helpful and polite with me, but I didn’t expect to learn what it was I wanted.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I was looking for a needle in a haystack.’

‘It’s a good thing your wife’s not listening. According to her, that’s what you’ve been doing all your life,’ he said, laughing.

‘A drowning man clutches at straws.’

He saw my expression and became serious, but at that moment we were interrupted by the sound of the doorbell and I went to open the front door. Standing in the doorway was a young lad of the kind that delivers letters sent by courier.

‘Costas Haritos?’

‘Yes, that’s me.’

‘Sign here, please.’

I signed and he handed me a thick and heavy A4-size envelope. The young lad turned and left, leaving me wondering who might possibly have sent me an envelope by courier and at seven thirty in the evening. I looked at the name of the sender and froze. The sender was Minas Logaras, 12 Nisaias Street, Athens 10445. The addresses of both the sender and the recipient were typed on labels.

I went back into the sitting room, tearing open the envelope in the same way that in the village my mother would skin a rabbit to make rabbit stew. Inside was a thick pack of printing paper. My eyes fell immediately on the title:

I was unable to shift my gaze from the name Vakirtzis. Apostolos Vakirtzis was one of the most well-known newspaper and radio
journalists
. His articles were something of a barometer for the political scene and his morning radio programme was heard by the whole of Greece, from bus drivers and barbers to car mechanics.

I tried to understand why Minas Logaras was sending me the typed manuscript of his new biography. Fanis came over to me and looked over my shoulder. He murmured to himself bewildered:

‘Apostolos Vakirtzis? The journalist? Why would Vakirtzis commit suicide? He’s got the government and the opposition in fear of him. He can make and break ministers. He’s made more money than he knows what to do with. Houses, villas, yachts, whatever you can imagine.’

Then he came out with the same question that had passed through my mind: ‘And why has Logaras sent the biography to you?’

‘He’s warning me,’ I said. ‘He’s warning me that Apostolos Vakirtzis is going to commit suicide.’

‘I don’t understand,’ he said with a troubled expression. ‘Why would Logaras warn you? So that you’ll prevent him from doing it?’

His bewilderment suddenly opened my eyes for me. Correct, why would he warn me? He knew that I would immediately move heaven and earth to prevent Vakirtzis committing suicide. I tried to imagine what Logaras had in mind, but I was flustered and my mind was working at half speed.

Adriani walked into the sitting room all dressed and spruced up. ‘I’m ready,’ she said with a smile of satisfaction.

I grabbed Fanis by the arm and began shaking him. ‘He’s playing with me!’ I shouted angrily. ‘He’s playing with me! He’s not warning me that Vakirtzis is going to commit suicide. He’s telling me that he’s doing it at this very moment and there’s nothing I can do about it!’

Adriani stared in amazement, first at me, then at Fanis. ‘What’s wrong with you both?’ she asked.

‘We’re not going. It’s off!’ I shouted.

‘But didn’t we say we’d eat out?’

‘Not that! The holiday is off! There’s been a third suicide!’

She remained speechless for a moment, then she raised her eyes to the chandelier and began crossing herself. ‘Holy Mother of God, enough of all these ups and downs. Let my husband have a normal job, let him go to work at nine and come back at five, and I’ll light a candle to you that’s as big as I am.’

She had no idea just how close she was to having God fulfil her wish. I rushed to the phone to call Ghikas at his home. No one answered. I searched for his mobile number. He only allowed us to use it in extreme circumstances, but this was as extreme as they came. I heard some old mother hen saying that my call would be forwarded. I called the exchange at Security Headquarters in the hope that he might still be in his office or that they might be able to tell me where he was.

‘Turn on the TV and find the channel where Favieros and Stefanakos committed suicide!’ I called to Adriani, while I waited for them to answer. If Vakirtzis had already committed suicide, they would lose no time in announcing it. If not, perhaps there would still be some hope, but every moment that passed counted in favour of Logaras.

‘Inspector Haritos! I want to speak to the Head of Security,
Superintendent
Ghikas! It is extremely important!’

‘Just a moment, Inspector!’ I waited, at the same time trying to bridle my impatience and my nerves. ‘The Superintendent will be away for a few days, Inspector. Would you like to speak to someone else?’

The ‘someone else’ would be Yanoutsos. ‘No,’ I said and hung up.

Ghikas had obviously moved in the same direction as I had, but more quickly. He had turned his back on it all and gone on holiday. I cast a quick glance at the TV, but there was nothing that looked like a special news bulletin. I grabbed hold of the remote control and began switching channels at random. All the channels were much of a muchness. That relieved me somewhat though it didn’t bring me any nearer to preventing Vakirtzis’s suicide.

‘What if it’s just a farce?’ asked Adriani, not believing it herself, but simply saying it to calm me down.

‘And what if it’s not?’ Fanis asked her.

‘It’s not,’ I answered categorically. ‘No one sits down and writes a three-hundred page biography as a farce.’

As I was replying to Adriani, I had a sudden flash of inspiration and I remembered Sotiropoulos. I called him on his mobile, praying that he would answer it. God left Adriani’s wish in abeyance and fulfilled mine. At the second ring, I heard his voice.

‘Sotiropoulos, listen to me and don’t interrupt.’ I told him the whole story with the biography. ‘Do you know where Vakirtzis might be now and how we might notify his family?’

‘Give me a minute to think.’ Silence followed. Then I heard his voice again, this time with a much more anxious tone. ‘It’s his name day today and he’s throwing a party at his place in the country. He invited me, but I have a TV programme and I couldn’t go.’

That’s it, I thought to myself on hearing this. He’s going to commit suicide at the party in front of his guests. There’d no doubt be at least one TV crew there that would record the scene and
broadcast
it as an exclusive on the news bulletin. For nothing to have been broadcast yet meant that he was still alive.

‘Can you inform anyone in his family?’ I asked Sotiropoulos.

‘I’ve got Vakirtzis’s mobile number, but I doubt if he’s going to answer.’

‘Don’t call him! If he’s made his mind up that he’s going to go through with it, he’ll only speed it up and we won’t be able to prevent him.’

‘I’ve no idea who else will be there.’

‘Where is his place?’

‘Somewhere near Vranas.’

‘Exact address?’

‘I don’t know, but I can find out.’ Suddenly, he changed his tone and shouted angrily. ‘And how the hell am I going to communicate with you when you don’t have a mobile phone?’

‘I’ll give you another number.’ I gave him Fanis’s mobile number.

‘You get going and I’ll be right behind you.’

That meant he would set off after first securing a TV crew. ‘You drive, please,’ I said to Fanis. ‘I don’t want to take the wheel. I feel too shaken.’

‘Okay.’ He turned and glanced at Adriani. She had remained in the middle of the sitting room, at a complete loss.

‘I’m sorry we’ve ruined your evening, but it’s not our fault,’ he said to her tenderly.

‘Never mind, Fanis, dear. It’s not the first time.’ She didn’t say it with spite, but rather with a sigh of resignation that made me go over to her.

‘Listen,’ I said, ‘we’re not cancelling the trip to the island, just postponing it for a while. We still have the whole summer ahead of us. We’ll go for sure. I give you my word.’

‘All right, all right. Now go quickly so we won’t have another suicide on the screen.’

It was one of her good points. As soon as you acknowledged the sacrifice she was making, she stopped feeling sorry for herself and paid you back tenfold.

Fanis drove a Fiat Brava, a sort of great grandchild of the Mirafiori. I sat beside him in the front seat, holding his mobile phone in my open hand. I was waiting for Sotiropoulos to call and give us the exact address of Vakirtzis’s place in the country. But Sotiropoulos was delaying and I kept casting an impatient glance at the screen of the phone, which showed the time and simply increased my anxiety.

Fanis was of the opinion that we shouldn’t go via Stavros, but via Penteli, then drive down past the former pine forest and
present-day
charred forest of Dionysos to Nea Makri, from where we could continue on to Vranas. It had only been forty-five minutes since we had left the house and we were already driving up towards the forest at Dionysos. Fanis turned out to be right, because if we had followed the route Mesogheion Avenue-Aghia Paraskevi-Stavros, we would still have been stuck outside the ERT-TV building in Aghia Paraskevi because of the Olympic works underway at Stavros.
Nevertheless
, another idea began gnawing away inside me. Did Fanis know the way from Dionysos or would we get lost in the mountains and vales and Vakirtzis would commit suicide while we were still looking for someone to ask for directions? I saw him driving with great assuredness and that relieved me somewhat.