Kourtis remained alone, but the interview was being televised live and the voice of the news presenter was heard in the background.
‘Yannis, I want you to put a question to Mr Stefanakos when he returns. I want you to ask him what his opinion is concerning the murder of the two Kurds by the Philip of Macedon organisation and whether he thinks the policies he is proposing may lead to more murders of a similar kind.’
‘Okay, I’ll ask him, Panos,’ Kourtis replied.
But the question was never put. As soon as the conversation between the reporter and the presenter had finished, the door opened and Stefanakos staggered in. Blood was running from three places on his body: from a wound in the area of his heart and two more in the area of his stomach. His suit was dyed red.
Kourtis saw him and leapt to his feet, but instead of going up to him, he took two steps back. Steafanakos continued to stagger towards the centre of the office. He stopped there and opened his mouth in an attempt to say something, but he had no voice. After a great effort, he managed to whisper something.
‘I hope Favieros and I are not dying for nothing…’
Without finishing his sentence, he collapsed to the ground. Kourtis found the courage to go over to him but didn’t touch him. He leaned over him and said his name: ‘Mr Stefanakos… Mr Stefanakos…’ as though trying to wake him up.
‘Yannis, leave Stefanakos and find out how he did it.’ The voice of the presenter was heard giving orders. ‘Sadly, the lot has once again fallen to us to have to describe this second suicide on air by a leading figure.’
By the sound of his voice he seemed about to burst into tears. Kourtis moved away from Stefanakos and went towards the door of the office. He opened it wide. The camera zoomed in. Stuck in the back of the door were the blades from three sharp knives, at precisely the points where Stefanakos had been wounded. Two metal handles had been screwed on the two sides of the door.
It was clear what had happened to Stefanakos. He had taken hold of the two handles and pushed his body with force onto the blades.
The scene faded and the discussion was resumed. ‘As you know, our TV crew lost no time at all in calling for an ambulance,’ said the presenter, as though they had performed some kind of brave feat. ‘But the politician Loukas Stefanakos was already dead on arrival at the hospital.’
I had no need either to see or hear any more and I switched off the TV. Fanis turned and looked at me.
‘Well, what do you think?’
‘Same style as Favieros. There’s no doubt about that.’
Adriani thought it unnecessary to remind us for a third time of the fact that she had been right and she confined herself to a smug and triumphant smile. I got up and went to phone Ghikas.
‘I saw it,’ I said the moment I heard his voice and I repeated what I had said to Fanis: ‘Same style as Favieros’s suicide. There’s no doubt about that.’
‘I told you I could smell a rat. I was right!’ he said in a voice that rang out like Easter bells with satisfaction.
This time his arrogance had no effect on me. After all, we were both treading on other people; he in order to prove himself right and I in order to save my job.
19
The kiosk owner hadn’t seen me since the day of Favieros’s suicide. He stuffed all the newspapers, apart from the sports papers, into a plastic bag and winked at me meaningfully.
‘That politician’s suicide, right?’
He’d also got smart with me after Favieros’s suicide and I felt the need to clarify matters:
‘Listen, I don’t only read the newspapers when someone’s committed suicide.’
‘Come on now, Inspector! You don’t have to justify yourself. I’ve got customers who only buy the sports papers when their team wins.’
What did he mean? That I, too, only buy the papers when I’m winning? I decided not to give it any more thought and I headed back home. For the first time in who knows how many years, Adriani abandoned her kitchen before three in the afternoon and got stuck into the newspapers along with me.
The climate had completely changed since the first suicide. Then, everyone wondered what reason Jason Favieros had to commit suicide and each newspaper came up with its own version. Now they were all linking Stefanakos’s execution with that of Favieros and were openly talking of some government scandal that had sent both of them to their graves. ‘Voluntary exit from scandal?’ asked one of the opposition newspapers. One politician, also from the opposition party, threatened to make a sensational revelation. ‘Olympic Projects’ Deadly Secret’ was the headline in another newspaper, while a fourth wrote in its leader: ‘Though there is no evidence to prove it, at least at present, it is safe to assume that behind the suicides of Favieros and Stefanakos is some scandal that, should it break, will more than likely lead to further victims.’
Actually, the likelihood of a scandal was not at all to be excluded. When Favieros committed suicide, we were all completely in the dark. Now, following Stefanakos’s suicide, things were becoming a little clearer. A businessman and a politician committed suicide to avoid public disgrace as a result of a scandal that was about to break. Of course, there was still the matter of two public suicides. Why would people who wanted to avoid disgrace commit suicide publicly? Isn’t committing suicide in front of thousands of viewers a kind of public disgrace? Who knows, if we ever found out more, we might be able to explain the public suicide too. Anyhow, even with the facts we had, scandal was a reasonable enough motive, except that it was one I didn’t need to investigate. Whether it would come out into the open or not depended on others and I ran the risk of coming a cropper.
An idea suddenly came to me and I called Sarantidis, the publisher of Favieros’s biography.
‘Do you by any chance have in your hands a biography of Loukas Stefanakos?’
‘No, Inspector.’
‘Are you telling me the truth?’
‘Why would I lie to you? Besides, you couldn’t stop me publishing it.’
His disappointment at the other end of the line reached all the way to me. If thanks to Favieros’s biography and suicide he had been overjoyed at the thought of having a bigger office and his own secretary, now he was bewailing the villa he wouldn’t have in Sifnos.
The lack of a second biography left the field wide open for speculation. The most probable hypothesis was that Favieros had written his autobiography under the pseudonym Minas Logaras, whereas Stefanakos hadn’t given any thought whatsoever to his posthumous reputation.
Koula came at nine thirty. She too was carrying a plastic bag with all the day’s newspapers. ‘I thought you’d want to read them.’
‘Thanks, but I already have. You hang onto them.’
‘What, read all those pages? No way!’ she replied. ‘I’ll dump them on the way out.’
Adriani, who had heard her come in, put down her newspaper and went into the kitchen. ‘Morning, Koula dear,’ she said, as she walked past her.
From ‘Morning, miss’ to ‘Morning, Koula dear,’ with a warm voice and lips their natural size. The progress was more than impressive. It was only a question of days before the kissing on both cheeks would begin.
‘Such a coincidence!’ she said when we went into the sitting room. ‘First Favieros, then Stefanakos…’ And suddenly, as if wanting to erase the scene, she covered her face with her hands. ‘What a horrid spectacle, heavens!’
‘Highly unlikely it’s a coincidence. Most probably it’s what the newspapers are all saying: some scandal about to break drove them to suicide.’
‘And what are we going to do?’
‘We’ll carry on from where we left off.’
She stared at me in surprise. ‘And Stefanakos?’
‘Do you want a little advice? The worst mistake you can make is to leave an investigation in the middle and go off on another. The only sure thing is that both of them will go up in smoke. We’re going to continue with our investigation into the Favieros case, and if it’s in any way linked with Stefanakos, no doubt we’ll find out as we make progress. Unless we are blinded and fail to see it. So tell me, what did you find out yesterday?’