‘Let’s hear it then …’
‘We’re going to this estate agent because you think that there’s something fishy going on, right?’
‘Right.’
‘So why would the estate agent open up to two coppers paying him a visit, and unofficially at that?’ She fell silent and waited for a response from me. She saw that I didn’t have one and went on. ‘But consider if we were father and daughter. You have a two-bedroom flat in the area and want to sell it, to chip in a bit and get me another in a better area. The guy sees the father, sees the daughter, smells a winner and opens up immediately.’
Her idea was simple, correct and most probably effective. ‘So we’re all right on ideas,’ I said laughing, ‘but where are we going to get the flat from?’
‘My aunt, my father’s sister, has a flat a little further down, near the Moni Arkadiou. To tell you the truth, I don’t know what’s become of it, but maybe the estate agent will know it?’
She had all the answers and all I could do was to agree. We turned from Syrrakou Street into Pantazopoulou Street and drove around the square. We found the estate agency just before we had gone all the way round, on the first floor of a small apartment block.
The office was in a small flat consisting of two adjoining rooms and a sliding door between them. Facing the entrance was a young girl, nondescript in appearance, who was chewing gum and arranging some papers in a file. At the desk beside her a thirty-five-year-old with T-shirt, linen trousers and shaved head was immersed in what was on his computer screen. In the past, they used to shave our heads when we went into the army. Now we shave our own heads after being discharged. The atmosphere was stifling in spite of the fans on the ceilings in both rooms.
‘What can I do for you?’ said the girl, stopping short her filing but not her chewing.
‘We’re here to see Mr Iliakos.’
‘Mr Iliakos is no longer with us,’ said the man with a smile. He got up from his desk and held out his hand. ‘My name’s Megaritis. How might I help you?’
‘It’s about a flat …’ I began.
‘Coffee?’ he interrupted me abruptly as if he had forgotten something very important. ‘We have Nescafe … Greek coffee. An iced coffee is just the job in this hot weather.’
I politely declined, but Koula accepted the offer. ‘I wouldn’t mind an iced coffee with a little sugar and milk,’ she said.
I shot a look at her. She sat down with her legs close together and an innocent smile on her face, rather like a modest maiden minding her manners in front of her father. The secretary got up with a bored expression and disappeared behind a door, which evidently led to a small kitchen.
‘It’s about a flat,’ I began again. ‘I want to sell it and buy something a little better for … Koula, and in another area.’
As soon as he heard the word ‘sell’, Megaritis resignedly nodded his head and let out a sigh as though it was a question of the fall of Byzantium rather than the demise of Sepolia.
‘Where is this flat exactly?’
‘Near to Moni Arkadiou,’ said Koula intervening, afraid I might have forgotten what she’d told me. ‘It’s a two-bedroom flat, around eighty-five square metres.’
Megaritis adopted the expression of someone about to say something unpleasant and who doesn’t know where to begin.
‘It’s a tragedy what’s happening in that particular area. Ordinary people, family-men, who’ve managed to build a little place or buy a flat after a lifetime of saving are watching their fortunes evaporate, are selling up and leaving, because the place has been taken over by foreign hordes.’
Just imagine, I thought to myself, on his construction sites, Favieros was the champion of foreigners and immigrants, while the employees in his estate agencies longed for the old neighbourhood with its narrow streets and cursed the immigrants for spoiling the idyll for us.
‘Yes, but if they’re selling their places, it means they find buyers for them,’ Koula observed.
‘At the price they’re selling them for, anyone can buy them.’
‘And what price are we talking about?’ asked Koula.
Megaritis heaved a sigh. ‘I’m ashamed to say … really I am.’
‘Don’t be,’ I said. ‘It’s a shame for us not for you.’
‘Near Moni Arkadiou, you said? And is it a house or a flat?’
‘A flat?’
‘How big?’
‘Two bedrooms. Eighty-five square metres.’
‘Let’s see.’ He thought for a moment. Then he turned to me. ‘You’ll be lucky if you get twenty-six thousand euros for it,’ he said. ‘More likely, around twenty-three …’
‘What are you talking about?’ Koula jumped up almost spilling her iced coffee. ‘That’s what you pay just for altering the form factor!’
She was furious, as though she really were selling a flat. I nodded my head approvingly and tried to conceal my surprise at her reaction. Megaritis smiled sadly.
‘The good old days are over, miss. Now no one cares about altering the form factor in those neighbourhoods. That’s why people are trying to save something of their fortunes any way they can. He took a card from his desk and handed it to me with his fixed expression of sorrow. ‘What can I say … Think it over and we’ll still be here if you decide to go ahead … Give me a call so we can arrange for me to take a look at the flat and to get the keys …’
He saved the final shot for last, just as we were about to leave.
‘You shouldn’t lose any time if you want my opinion. Prices are falling day by day. Today it’s worth twenty- three to twenty-six thousand, tomorrow it might only fetch twenty.’
Koula didn’t even deign to turn round and look at him. I was slightly more conciliatory. ‘All right, we’ll think about it and if we decide we’ll contact you.’
‘Did you hear him, the crook!’ Koula screamed as soon as we were outside in the street. ‘Twenty-six thousand euros! You can’t buy a bedsit for that price!’
I was standing on the footpath staring at her. Now that we were outside, I openly expressed my surprise.
‘And what do you know about house prices and form factors?’
Suddenly, she looked at me with a feigned expression of sadness. ‘You’re not concerned at all about my personal life, are you? Have you forgotten that I was engaged to a building contractor?’
Of course, I’d completely forgotten about the contractor who had been building without a licence in Dionysos. As soon as he had become engaged to Koula, he had started using Ghikas’s name every time that he had problems with the police. Ghikas got wind of it, threatened to transfer Koula and she had sent the contractor packing.
‘So where do you propose we go from here given that you’re the expert,’ I asked her.
‘Why don’t you let me ask around a bit on my own and I’ll tell you what I find out tomorrow?’ she said sheepishly.
‘Why, what can you find out alone that we can’t find out together?’
‘At this time of day, the only people at home are women. And women open up more easily to other women.’
I wasn’t at all convinced that she would manage it better on her own, but I saw in her eyes how much she wanted to try, so I gave in. After all, if she didn’t manage it on her own, I would come back the next day without her finding out and complete the investigation.’
‘All right.’
‘Thank you,’ she said, glowing from head to toe.
She accompanied me as far as the Mirafiori to get her things. As she was about to go, she leaned over and planted a kiss on my cheek.
‘All right, all right, we’re done! We’re no longer father and daughter,’ I said to tease her.
‘You’re the only male colleague on the Force who doesn’t think all I’m good for is filing and making coffee,’ she replied in all earnest.
I watched her quickly walking away and started up the Mirafiori.
