‘West Coast Americans,’ Yerasimos replied, as if that was sufficient explanation.
‘Loud, overconfident?’ Mavros encouraged.
‘Put it this way. I spent thirty years driving a cab in New York City. Californians are pussycats compared with the customers there. But I don’t think they’re very serious people.’
‘Hollywood doesn’t exactly have a reputation for encouraging intellectuals,’ Mavros said, realizing that Yerasimos would know plenty about the film crew. ‘Have you driven Cara Parks?’
‘Occasionally. She seems like a nice person. I don’t like her assistant, though. She’s got a tongue in her head.’
‘You heard she went missing?’
‘I did. Can’t say I was sorry. She’d have got on all right. She could tell anyone what she thought of them in the coarsest Greek, Cretan pronunciation and expressions included.’
That was interesting. No one had said that Maria spoke good Greek, let alone the local dialect. What might that add to the issue of her disappearance?
‘How about the director, Luke Jannet?’
Yerasimos overtook an ancient tractor smoothly. ‘Jannet? I’ve only had him a couple of times. What was that you said about loud and overconfident? I won’t be going to see his film, I can tell you that.’
‘You reckon it’ll be another Captain Corelli?’
‘Full of inaccuracies and unconvincing love affairs? Probably. But not just that. It’s an exercise in bloodsucking.’
‘Striking phrase. What does it mean, exactly?’
The driver smiled tightly. ‘You’re from Athens, right? I know that plenty of people there died during the Axis occupation, maybe you’ve even got relatives among them. But here it was different. People haven’t forgotten on Crete.’
‘You mean the massacres?’
‘Those, and the burning of villages and the torture and the beatings. It may look like everyone’s welcoming German tourists with open arms — and they are, for their money — but deep down there’s a hatred, especially among the older generation and in the villages that don’t have income from tourism.’
‘What about Rudolf Kersten?’ Mavros asked. ‘He was a paratrooper during the invasion.’
‘Ah, Mr Kersten is the exception that proves the truth of what I’m saying. He’s done so much for this part of Crete that it would take days to list everything. He’s rebuilt villages, he’s given thousands of people jobs over the decades, he’s set up scholarships for poor kids to study abroad. . he’s that rare thing, a genuinely good man.’
Mavros thought of David Waggoner. ‘But still there are some who hate him.’
‘There will always be dissenters, jealous people who got less than others.’
The lights of Chania’s suburbs were shining ahead.
‘I heard Mr Kersten was involved in the massacre at Makrymari.’
Yerasimos didn’t speak for some time, his hands tight on the wheel.
‘There are people who say that, usually inspired by that piece of shit Waggoner. The British think he was a hero, but all he did was bring down more Nazi reprisals on the heads of innocent Cretans. We didn’t need the British. If they’d dropped us the weapons, we’d have done the job ourselves but, of course, they never trusted us enough.’
That was a different angle to those Mavros had heard before. He thanked the driver when they pulled up outside the clinic. Mikis was at his door before he could open it.
‘Interesting guy, Yerasimos,’ Mavros said, after the saloon had departed.
‘Yeah,’ Mikis said, with a grin. ‘Hidden depths. Did he tell you he was in New York for years?’
‘Yes.’
‘But he didn’t tell you why he went, did he? He was involved in a vendetta. He pushed a guy who betrayed his father to the Germans off a cliff.’
A tremor of unease ran through Mavros. ‘How was it resolved?’
‘Eventually the major players died of old age and agreement was reached.’
‘Thirty years,’ Mavros said ruefully.
‘Yeah, encouraging, isn’t it?’
Mavros looked around at the men on the street — some of them he recognized, other not. The Range Rover was where it had been in the afternoon, baseball bats visible through the windows.
‘The influence of American culture,’ Mikis said, following the direction of his gaze. ‘They’re useful weapons because they aren’t lethal unless you really want them to be.’
‘As long as you don’t bore out the middle and fill it with molten lead.’
Mikis laughed. ‘Now there’s a thought.’
‘Are your boys all right for an hour or two while we go and eat?’
‘They’re organized for the whole night and I’m only a phone call away.’
He went over and spoke to the young men and then beckoned Mavros to the Jeep.
‘I’ll take you to a good place,’ the Cretan said, heading for the city centre.
‘On the harbour front?’ Mavros asked, not wanting to run into the well-lubricated Luke Jannet.
‘No, this is a family taverna in the backstreets. If you’re lucky, they might have snails.’
Mavros made no comment. Cretan snails were a delicacy he had no desire for, having had a disastrous encounter with them in the past.
Mikis parked near the cathedral and led the way down a narrow street. The taverna was under a huge spray of pink bougainvillea blooms. There were only a few tables outside and the nearest was occupied by two men, one stocky and one lanky, both of whom Mavros recognized immediately. He put his hand on Mikis’s shoulder and retreated behind him.
‘We’ve got to go back the way we came,’ he said in his ear. ‘I don’t want those guys to see me.’
Mikis stared at him and then turned, keeping himself between Mavros and the taverna. ‘Start walking,’ he said, ‘single file like in the army.’
After they were round the corner, Mikis spoke. ‘So you didn’t want to see David Waggoner. I can understand that — he’s a nasty piece of work. But the tall streak of piss?’
‘That was Tryfon Roufos, the owner of Hellas History SA and the most bent antiquities dealer in Athens, probably the whole of Greece.’ Mavros shook his head. ‘He’s also a suspected child abuser and blackmailer of the rich and famous.’
‘Charming. Do you want me to bring him in for questioning?’
‘No! What I would like to know is what he’s doing in a huddle with the British war hero David Waggoner.’
‘Want me to tail them when they’ve finished?’
Mavros smiled. ‘Did you get rejected by the police academy?’
‘You think I’d work for those bullies? No, I’m trying to learn from you. It might help me stay alive.’
‘It might help usstay alive,’ Mavros corrected. ‘No, let’s leave them to it. At least that asshole Oskar Mesner wasn’t with them. If he had been, I’d have been straight on the phone to Rudolf Kersten about his coin collection.’
‘Speaking of which,’ Mikis said, leading him down another narrow street. ‘I’ve got something to tell you about that.’ He smiled. ‘But let’s wait till we’ve had something to eat and drink. I could put a donkey away.’
Mavros followed him reluctantly. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility that the taverna they were en route to offered stewed beast of burden as a speciality.
THIRTEEN
As it turned out, the food in the small taverna Mikis knew was excellent, the lamb succulent and the mountain greens a subtle blend of sweet and bitter. The owner’s casked wine had a faint taste of flowers to it and they got through a kilo quickly.
‘OK,’ Mavros said. ‘Time to talk.’
Mikis grinned and discarded a toothpick. ‘If I wasn’t such a pushover, I’d be charging you for this.’
Mavros had a vision of the fight on the way back from Kornaria. ‘“Pushover” isn’t the word that immediately comes to mind. Anyway, I can pay you, as I did before. One thing you can say for the production is that there’s plenty of cash around.’