One of the nurses at the University Hospital remembered the incident of the suspected murder of the motorcycle driver. She said that she had noted it especially because the bereft honeymooner appeared to be Scandinavian while the family of the bride was typically Muslim and that at that time intermarriages of this kind were not very common. The disappearance of the man immediately after the cyclist was found dead in his hospital bed seemed to be more than a coincidence and the police questioned the staff about this. The nurse could not provide any more details about the groom but said that there was probably a medical record of his examination after the accident as he was in shock and suffered superficial wounds when he was brought in by the ambulance that also carried his bride. The hospital required a court order to release the medical records but once this was presented and the records were examined no further information was obtained.
Examination at the Swedish passport control authority of all people leaving the country in the three week period following the disappearance of Oscar Gunnar Axelsson yielded nothing. The police concluded that he either had assumed a new identity and remained in Sweden, or more likely, that he had managed to slip out of the country without being registered. Jorgen forwarded all this information to David who was just on his way to the Mossad headquarters in Tel Aviv.
Once again David Avivi presented the latest developments and new information to the Mossad head, Deputy Director and division chiefs. He reported that it was highly probable that Oscar Gunnar Axelsson was the mysterious blond man that had coordinated the work of Professor Modena and Dr. Smalley and the efforts to produce fissile materials for an improvised nuclear device. Furthermore, if this was the case then his ties with the radical Islam could mean that his true target could be in Israel rather than in Europe. This stunned all the participants and they discussed the significance of this new information and the potential implications on Israel's security. Next they discussed the countermeasures that should be deployed to minimize the risk and divided the problem into two parts: finding the device and finding the blond man, preferably before they entered Israel.
The data they had on the improvised nuclear device was quite limited. They knew that it was probably quite large as it had to be transported in a standard container and had to be lifted with a crane. They had some information about the container but could not be sure that it had not been painted over or that the device was not moved into another container. They also figured that if they could locate Modena or Smalley, or any of the people who had worked in the Padova laboratory they would be able to get more details about the device. The key personnel would also know about the mechanism used to detonate the device, which would be helpful for rendering it safe if they got hold of it.
The information they had on the blond man was also quite limited although they now did have a recent photograph of him, taken by Agda in Athens. They did know the name he assumed in Stockholm, Olaf Gunther Andersson or Ollie for short, and also the name he used in Uppsala, Oscar Gunnar Axelsson or Ossi for short, which was probably his real name. They were sure that he would not use any of these names in his travels, yet they thought that it was highly likely that he would still maintain a Swedish passport, or perhaps a Finnish, Norwegian or Icelandic passport, as it would be quite difficult for him to pass an official check as being of any other nationality. They also speculated that he might try to change his appearance but had no idea what form he might choose.
The countermeasures at the borders were to alert all passport control officers to closely examine all tall, well built, blond men travelling with Scandinavian passports, with special emphasis on single men travelling unaccompanied. The three seaports were also alerted to scan all suspect containers with radiation detectors, but considering the volume of such containers this would cause serious delays that would infuriate customers. The Mossad head also called for a continent-wide effort of all agents to try to trace the man and the container and said that the information would be passed on to all friendly countries in Europe and asked David to update the international task force. There was no decision whether to inform the public about this threat, or even about the "dirty bomb" cover story, as this was more of a political decision than a professional security one. The Mossad head said he would inform the Prime Minister, Minister of Interior Security, the Chief of Staff of the IDF, the head of the Israeli Security Agency and the Chief Inspector of the Police and ask them to decide how this serious, unconventional threat should be handled.
Chapter 11
David took the morning flight from Tel-Aviv to Athens and was met by an agent of the Greek National Intelligence Service (NIS) who drove him directly to the director of the service. Although the director was appointed by the Minister for Citizen Protection and could be fired by him he was a professional intelligence officer and not a political appointee. The head of the Hellenic Police, in charge of counter-terrorism, was also present. Both were well aware of the dangers to Greek democracy posed by Golden Dawn and were determined to protect it. David showed them the selfie photo of Niko and Agda and told them that she had informed the Swedish police about the meeting with Golden Dawn functionaries that she thought took place at the marina in Piraeus, although she wasn't sure about the exact location. They called the local head of the political surveillance section and he instantly recognized Niko as Nicodemus Alexios, an activist in the Golden Dawn movement, a prominent TV persona, famous for his smooth talking. Niko had also been frequently interviewed by foreign TV networks due to his good English and apparent moderate presentation and rationalization of the movement's principles.
David accompanied the two detectives from the Hellenic Police who were sent to pick up Niko and bring him to the station. They found Niko at a café in Exarchia sipping a cold beer and chatting up a blonde tourist who appeared to be hypnotized by the handsome Greek man. When the detectives approached him, Niko who was used to being harassed by the police, made an apology to the disappointed lady, and accompanied them without protest. At the police station he said that he was willing to cooperate as he had nothing to hide but initially claimed total ignorance when he was asked about Agda and the blond man but when he was shown the selfie photo with them he suddenly had a vague recollection of meeting the two tourists when they asked him for directions and then requested to be photographed together.
Niko was taken to one of the interrogation rooms and David was allowed to watch the progress of the questioning on a closed circuit TV. As he did not understand Greek an interpreter sat next to him and gave a live translation of the discussion into English. After Niko's memory was "refreshed" by recounting the highlights of Agda's testimony about the wild affair they had carried on in her hotel room he suddenly remembered that he was simply asked to take the couple to a private meeting at the marina. After a little more not too gentle prompting he even remembered the address of the club and the name of the person he brought there as Ollie. In the evening, after some further hours of interrogation, he recalled that the Greek person at the club was called Guido, no last name, and described him as a man with fine aristocratic features. The detective doing the questioning left the room and joined David in the room next door and told him that he knew who Guido was and where to find him, but also that he was well connected to senior politicians and could not be brought in without a magistrate's order which would be impossible to obtain in view of Guido's influence. David said that all he needed was the name and address of Guido and he would take care of everything. The detective pretended not to understand the meaning of this statement and simply gave him the information as requested, so David thanked him and left the police station. It appeared that Guido lived in an isolated villa in an upper class neighborhood just outside Athens.