CHAPTER 16
At last, I saw the man from the defaced photograph in the flesh. He was a porky forty-something with chubby cheeks, hair cropped short at the sides and bushy on top-a real doughboy. In appearance, he played on two fronts: that of the serious news editor, with his dark gray suit; and that of the casual reporter, with turtleneck sweater, without ties or formalities.
We were inside Petratos's cubicle and I was facing him, but at an angle. Facing me was the newscaster, with his tailored suit and the handkerchief in his breast pocket. They smiled at me. Smiles full of condescension for the poor police officer who'd come to pay his respects. I played the fool because it suited me that way.
'Kolakoglou is an interesting case,' I said in a friendly tone. 'Of course, it's a little too early to say for sure that he's our murderer. We will need to continue investigating.'
They swapped more smiles and Petratos shrugged. 'We're done with our investigation,' he said. 'But you go ahead. When all's said and done, it's your job to investigate.'
'That's why I'm here to see you. Do you have any other evidence, that you haven't yet revealed to your audience and that might help our investigation?'
'We don't keep cards up our sleeves, Inspector,' the newscaster broke in. 'What evidence we have, we come out with it, so that the public may be informed.'
Petratos rested his elbows on the desk and put his hands together. 'Let's speak openly, Inspector Haritos. Yesterday, Mr. Delopoulos suggested that we work together. You'd give us precedence in informing us about the course of your investigation and we'd give you whatever evidence we have. This morning I sent Kostarakou to see you. Not only did you not tell her anything, but you even interrogated her. And now you're asking us to give you evidence. That's not the way it works.'
'I didn't give any information to Miss Kostarakou because I had nothing to tell her. We're still in the dark. You're already one step ahead of us.' If it seemed as if I was sucking up to them, I wasn't; it was a tactical maneuver. Not one learned from the FBI, but one learned in the Greek village. 'That's why I came to ask for your help. From tomorrow morning, we'll be inundated with phone calls. Every two minutes someone tells us that they've seen Kolakoglou. We don't know where this mass hysteria will take Kolakoglou. So we have to find him, and quickly.'
'We disagree on that too, Inspector Haritos.' He looked at me as if I were a person with special needs, who had to be taught basic literacy. 'Would that the public were so concerned about Yanna Karayoryi's murder as to take to the streets tomorrow and look for her murderer. That would not only be a huge journalistic coup, but also a mark of recognition for everything Yanna achieved.'
'And what if the murderer was someone else? Okay, there's incriminating evidence with regard to Kolakoglou, but we cannot yet be certain that he killed her. He may be innocent.'
'What are you afraid of?' the newscaster said. 'That you might tarnish the reputation of a pederast who was sentenced to six years in prison?'
'No. I'm afraid that we may waste time looking for the wrong person.
'First of all, it's not our job to prove Kolakoglou's guilt,' Petratos broke in. 'We're simply handing him over. Everything else is up to you.
In other words, they were lumbering us with Kolakoglou. It was for us to run around and prove his guilt. Meanwhile, they'd fill their news bulletins with the story and up their ratings.
'Anyway, you're worrying for nothing,' Petratos went on. 'It's ninety percent certain that he's the murderer. If it hadn't been for Yanna, he'd have got away with his squalid little crimes. He's the only one with a motive.'
'You're wrong,' I said quietly. 'There are others who had motives too. Even you.'
He stared at me open-mouthed and the image of the doughboy was complete. He couldn't decide whether I'd said it seriously or in jest. In the end, he evidently plumped for the latter, because he let out a howl of merriment.
'Me? You are pulling my leg, of course.'
I didn't reply, but turned to the newscaster, who was trying to recover his poise. 'Would you leave us, please?'
The newscaster was taken aback and didn't know what to do. He responded, however, to Petratos's nod and got up.
'I don't like your tone at all, Inspector,' he said to me icily.
'Nor I yours, especially when you're presenting the news.' It left him speechless. He would happily have slammed the door behind him, but it was made of aluminum and he was probably afraid of bringing the whole cubicle down behind him.
'So, Inspector? What motive did I have for killing Yanna Karayoryi?'
'You had an affair with her. She used you to scramble up the ladder, and when she'd got where she wanted, she dumped you.'
He made an effort to maintain his ironic smile but failed, because he hadn't liked what he'd heard.
'Who told you that?'
'We asked and we found out. That's our job.'
'Just because we had an affair and split up-I stress that she didn't dump me, we split up-that doesn't mean that I had a reason to kill her.'
'I heard it differently, Mr. Petratos. You didn't split up, she dumped you as soon as she had direct access to Mr. Delopoulos and could do as she liked without having to go through you. She offended not only your male but also your professional pride. You would have given anything to teach her a lesson, but she had Mr. Delopoulos behind her. You could neither control her nor fire her. And from what I know of Karayoryi, she would have made sure she re minded you of that every working day, which of course made you furious.' If I'd had the photographs with me, I'd have stuck them in his undefaced face, but I'd left them in my office.
He was fuming inside but was trying hard to appear calm. 'That's all speculation on your part, there's no evidence whatsoever for it.'
'It's not speculation. It's the conclusion from statements made by witnesses. Karayoryi's murder has all the elements of a crime of passion. That fits Kolakoglou's case, but it also fits yours, given that you'd written her threatening letters.'
His surprise seemed genuine, at least as genuine as a journalist could get. 'Me?' he said after some time. 'I wrote Yanna threatening letters?'
'We found them in the drawer of her desk. In the last one you openly threaten her.'
'And is my signature on those letters?'
Now it was me who was in a tight spot. 'You signed them N. Your name is Nestor, if I'm not mistaken.'
'And because you found some threatening letters signed by someone with the initial N, you automatically concluded that I wrote them? What can I say? The police force should be proud of you.'
I ignored the insult and said, very calmly: 'It's easy for us to prove who's right. The letters are written by hand. Give me a sample of your handwriting and I'll compare it with that on the letters.'
'No!' he answered in a rage. 'If you want a sample of my handwriting, you can take me down to the station for interrogation and ask for it officially, in the presence of my lawyer! And if you're wrong, I'll drag your name through the gutters!'
And the whole of the police force with it. From the minister down. I'd be lucky to get away with a transfer to the VIP guard.
'First, you have to prove that I had the opportunity to kill her. Yanna came to the studio at around eleven- thirty. I'd left by ten. At least four people saw me leaving.'
'They saw you entering the elevator. That doesn't necessarily mean that you left.'
'So where did I hide? In a cupboard or maybe inside a wardrobe?'
'In the parking lot,' I said. 'You took the elevator down to the parking garage, hid there, and came back up just before the latenight news.'
So far I'd been doing quite well, but then he lost his temper, jumped to his feet, and started shouting: 'You won't get away with this. You can't go around making unfounded accusations.'
'What accusations?' I said in all innocence. 'Weren't you the one to suggest we exchange information? I'm giving you what I have. You can hardly complain.'
