A Breeze Across The Aegean Read online

  “I understand from Eleni that Alessandra had been spending more and more time in libraries here in the town. That she was researching old trade routes around Rhodes for a potential exhibition.”

  “I don’t know anything about an exhibition, but she was certainly spending a lot of time in our reading rooms looking at old documents. She also used the town public library to research old maps. As you probably know, Rhodes and its port were once hugely important commercially across this area of the Mediterranean.”

  “Yes, I had never realised how strategically important Rhodes had once been.”

  “Alessandra seemed to have a particular focus on the early trading years – during the first millennium. Sometimes I helped her to find documents. She used the computer system in the main Greek archaeological library in Athens.”

  Nicholas asked if there might be a search record of documents Alessandra had accessed. Effie said she would check all the records as soon as she could. “It is so kind of you to give up some of your time searching for Alessandra. I would really like to help you in any way I can,” she said.

  “Your help is invaluable. You knew Alessandra. My only knowledge of her was from the time spent with her on the ferry. It’s not much to go on, and her parents were not particularly forthcoming – for whatever reason.”

  Nicholas asked Effie about Alessandra’s friends. He said he was aware that she had had a wealthy boyfriend called Andriy and that the relationship was quite volatile. Effie said she had met him a few times, usually after work with Alessandra.

  “I expect he found me a bit boring compared with Alessandra,” she said. Her mobile phone rang. She looked at it, hesitated, then turned it off. “It can wait. I will get back to them. Anyway, he said he was an academic studying early trade in the eastern Mediterranean. I think he said he was from Minsk. He had a large boat moored in the port, which I think Alessandra had been on several times.

  “He was certainly knowledgeable about ancient commercial routes through the Holy Land and across the Middle East. We had some interesting discussions.”

  Effie said Alessandra had brought him to the library a couple of times and they had spent quite a lot of time studying some of the documents in the reading room. She thought this shared interest explained how they had first met and started going out. “He was quite difficult and demanding and I was never sure what Alessandra really saw in him. However, knowing her, she always saw the positive in people. I was not surprised when it ended, though, although Alessandra had a hard time. Even though she ended the relationship, Andriy would not leave her alone. She told me at one stage that she was becoming a bit afraid of him.”

  “So he stayed here … in Rhodes?”

  “I think his business interests took him away quite often.” Effie said she had seen Andriy only once after he and Alessandra had split up. “I bumped into him in a street in Lindos one weekend, but he barely acknowledged me. I think his boat disappeared from its usual berth in the harbour here soon afterwards.”

  “And her other friends?”

  “Alessandra was also very friendly with Eleni, who you have already met. Alessandra often spent weekends with her and her family. Her daughter worshipped Alessandra.

  “There were also a couple of men that Alessandra occasionally socialised with when she was with Andriy. I never felt comfortable around them. They were not particularly friendly. I tried to make sure I was never alone with them. There seemed to be a contained aggression about them, although they never did anything to me. It was just an odd feeling I had. I am not sure how Alessandra felt around them. They talked very little about themselves. The rest of her friends were mainly from work. I know that, after she broke up with her boyfriend, Michael Kamides kept on asking her out for a drink, which she found a bit awkward.”

  Effie walked with him to the entrance and shook his hand, saying, “I wish you well Nicholas”. They agreed to meet at the end of the week.

  Nicholas’s mood had lifted. Perhaps it was just the sharing of the search effort or because he felt he could really talk to Effie. He could see how she and Alessandra had become such good friends. They complemented each other. There was an unexpected vulnerability about Effie that he found attractive. He hoped they could work together to find some concrete clue to reveal Alessandra’s whereabouts.

  He took out his phone and dialed Apollon Scuba Diving. He was surprised when the call was answered and he was greeted in English. ”Hello, this is Demetrius, OK. How can I help you?

  “Hello, Demetrius. I am hoping you can help me. I am looking for a friend who has gone missing. I know she did a scuba-diving course in Mandraki harbour over the last couple of years, so I am speaking to all the scuba schools on Rhodes, hoping to trace her.”

  “OK, I will help you, if I can. What is her name?”

  “Alessandra Bianchi, she is about thirty, slim with dark hair.”

  “Yes, I remember her. She was always friendly. She took her PADI course with us more than a year ago and then did some dives at sites around the island. I took her for her first dive in St Paul’s Bay at Lindos. It was where she wanted to go.

  “She told me she would like to dive off some of the other islands, OK. She wanted to know whether these islands had their own dive centres. She was a very confident diver, yes.” He told Nicholas that she had also said she would like to learn cave diving, but it’s not something they offered. “The last time I saw her was August, maybe September, last year. I hope you find her, OK.”

  Nicholas returned to his hotel. He phoned Alessandra’s parents and explained that he had made contact with their daughter’s friends on Rhodes. They reluctantly agreed to let him visit her apartment in the New Town. They would contact the caretaker and ask him to open the apartment for Nicholas. He wrote down the address and the caretaker’s name.

  “We were very surprised that you went back to Rhodes,” Mrs Bianchi said. She sounded weary. “Captain Petrakis phoned us to let us know that you had come in to see him about Alessandra, but they had no new information. Surely there is nothing you can do that the police can’t. You should come home and get on with the rest of your life.”

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t feel that I can do that, now.”

  “So, how much longer will you go on looking?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t found anything yet that I didn’t already know. I’ll keep searching for a while.”

  As he was ringing off, her voice softened. “Please be careful then.” Nicholas put his phone down, thinking that this was an odd thing for her to say. Why would he need to take care?

  Chapter Seven

  Rhodes Town

  Alessandra’s apartment was in a tranquil, tree-lined street, away from the busy main roads that circle the Old Town and the business district. The rain had returned and people were hurrying along the uneven pavements, sheltering beneath umbrellas. Nicholas crossed the road, avoiding an overflowing drainage ditch, and looked up at Alessandra’s building. It was a square, white, three-storey block, surrounded by a small garden of orange and lemon trees. He found the path to the entrance and sheltered in a small covered porch while he rang the caretaker’s bell. A voice answered in Greek. Nicholas asked if he spoke English. “Small, a little,” came the gruff reply. Nicholas explained that he wished to see Alessandra Bianchi’s apartment.

  “Wait, I come now,” came the response. Eventually, an elderly man with disheveled grey hair, and wearing an old white shirt and black trousers, opened the door. He indicated with a nod that Nicholas should follow him. They climbed slowly – one of the old man’s hips seemed to trouble him – to the top floor. He searched ponderously through a large bunch of keys. “Oopa!” he grunted, as he finally selected the correct one and opened the door to a large, light-filled apartment. Nicholas entered and looked around. He hadn’t been sure what to expect. On first glance the apartment seemed more functional than bohemian. The furnishings were sparse. The walls were painted a standard off-white, with light-grey tiling on the floors. It did not feel lived in and his initial feeling was that Alessandra did not spend much time there. He recognised flashes of her personality in the bright yellow curtains in the main room and a patterned silk scarf draped from a mirror by the front door. The caretaker indicated that he would remain in the doorway. Nicholas wondered if this was on the instruction of her parents.

  He didn’t know what he expected to find out from her apartment. It felt invasive going through her things and he felt uneasy. He had to admit, however, that he was interested in how she lived and what it might tell him about her. He was not sure how to start or what he was looking for. He decided to search the least likely areas for clues first and give himself more time where it might matter. Off the living room were a bedroom and a kitchen. There was also a small bathroom. Nicholas’s eyes were drawn to a diagonal crack in one of the tiles in the hallway.

  The bathroom and kitchen suggested that Alessandra did not intend to stay away. The bathroom was cluttered but tidy. Her toiletries and two bottles of perfume were still there – as was a toothbrush. Nicholas spotted a bottle of blue nail polish on the shelf. He moved on to the kitchen. The fridge yielded the same conclusion. It was fairly bare: there was an opened bottle of white wine, a full bottle of Perrier, a jar of olives and a mouldy plastic-wrapped loaf of wholgrain bread at the back of the shelf. Nicholas also found a small portion of dried-up cheese and a paper packet containing rotted tomatoes. He removed them and put them in a paper bag that he found.

  Otherwise, there were no dirty cups or plates lying around. He was pleasantly surprised to find that Alessandra was neat and orderly. Beside the fridge were four sealed packets of dog food. She must have been planning to take these to the sanctuary.

  The bedroom was just as tidy. The bed was carefully made, and covered with a blue and mauve patchwork duvet. There were no clothes strewn around. A watercolour of a colourful market scene hung over the bed. Nicholas could not identify the location – possibly it was French. A gaily coloured throw covered the chair in the corner. There was an old suitcase under her bed. It was empty. He looked in her chest of drawers and could see nothing out of place. It felt strange to be looking at intimate items. Unsettled, he hurriedly searched through each drawer and then closed them. He opened a wardrobe that contained an array of dresses and print skirts, but few trousers he noted. A selection of turquoise and emerald green bead necklaces, that looked as though they might have come from India, hung from a hook in the door. To one side of the cupboard were a couple of winter coats. Would Alessandra have left without a coat? He would not know whether any of her clothes was missing, but it did not look as though she had packed hurriedly. At the bottom of the cupboard her shoes and boots were neatly stacked. He also found a bag containing scuba and snorkeling equipment.

  On a cabinet next to the bed stood an alarm clock, phone charger and a small brown photo album. He flicked through the album, peering closely at each picture. Did they contain any clues? He wondered if the police had removed any of the photos to assist them in their initial search. Some photographs were obviously taken around the island or in Rhodes Town. In one he recognised Alessandra with her parents in the Old Town. Others were more difficult to identify, but were taken somewhere around the Greek islands. Some were underwater shots of various fish and the murky outlines of coral and rocky structures.

  He removed a photo of Alessandra smiling, dressed in a bright, patterned red skirt. Judging from the cobbled lanes and the pale brown stone of the surrounding buildings, it was taken somewhere within the Old Town. He took another, a group shot, showing Alessandra with her friends in the apartment. Everyone was sitting around the table in the living room, smiling or laughing. The table was covered with wine bottles, glasses and a typical local meze of cheese, bread, olives, tomatoes, tarama and tzatziki. A man with dark hair sat next to Alessandra – it must have been Andriy – his arm draped around her shoulders. He recognised Eleni. One of the last photographs in the album was a selfie of Alessandra and another woman, who looked Greek. She was slightly bigger than Alessandra, with shorter dark hair. Both were standing at the edge of a small harbour. Behind them was the sea with a small rocky island in the background. Nicholas could just see the tip of a Greek flag flying from a mast. He wondered whether the picture was taken on Halki and also whether the woman was Alessandra’s friend Helena. As an afterthought he took it as well.

  Tucking the photographs in his pocket, Nicholas moved on to the lounge. To one side was the table in the photo. On it were orderly piles of papers and another of Alessandra’s brightly coloured scarves. There was a large green couch and a comfortable armchair. None of the furniture looked new or to what he imagined would be Alessandra’s taste. She must have rented the apartment furnished. In the corner was a small television. No phone was evident.

  Nicholas started his search with the metal bookcase near the entrance. Along with modern fiction, he found books by Lawrence Durrell and Graham Greene, as well as travel guides to Rhodes, the Dodecanese and Greece. There were manuals on scuba diving, as well as illustrated guides to dive locations around the world. Alessandra’s collection included books on Greek and Rhodian archaeology and history, as well as a volume on Ancient Greek mythology. All looked well used. A section of the bookcase was devoted to maps, including detailed maps of Rhodes and the wider Dodecanese. On the top were maps of Symi and Livadia.

  The caretaker interrupted Nicholas’s search, signalling that he had to go downstairs. “Soon, yes,” he said, indicating that he would be back shortly. Nicholas concentrated on the piles of papers on the table. One contained bills. Alessandra had marked not only whether they had been paid but also when. There was also a receipt for the payment of the lease on the apartment – for a year. He searched the bills for signs of unusual purchases, such as airline tickets. There was nothing. There was also a large pile of unopened mail. Nicholas assumed that it had been put there by the police or the caretaker. He left it unopened.

  To one side was flyer advertising the dog sanctuary. He wrote down the phone number. He would contact them to find out whether they had heard from Alessandra.

  He turned to the third pile of papers, which seemed to be a collection of notes and articles on areas that Alessandra was researching. There was a writing pad with notes on the old trade routes around Rhodes. He flipped through and found details on early trade with Syria and Turkey. Further down the pile of papers he came across notes on dive sites around the coast. Included was a brochure of sites in Lindos. At the bottom was a clear plastic folder containing photocopies of maps of old trading routes around the Dodecanese, as well as old documents written in Greek that he could not understand. Another folder contained copies of academic and archaeological articles.

  Nicholas could hear the halting tread of the caretaker making his slow way up the stairs. He had just unearthed a folder with articles on the archaeology of the old harbour area, the Acropolis of Rhodes and the great earthquake. He had no time to read it, so he put all the folders in a large envelope he found on the table. He sealed it and tucked it inside his jacket. Turning, he made a final search for a laptop, diary and any other notebooks. He found nothing.

  Nicholas asked the caretaker whether anyone else had visited the apartment. Only one person – a Greek woman – had asked if she could enter the apartment. She said she was a friend of Alessandra. He had not let her in and could not describe her to Nicholas, other than that she sounded local.

  By the time Nicholas left the rain had softened to a drizzle. He zipped up his jacket to protect the envelope. It was early evening, so he stopped in a bar for a beer and a snack on his way back to the hotel. An English Premiership football match from the previous evening was showing. He was not a football fan, but it provided a diversion. Two hours later, having watched a tepid nil-nil draw, he emerged into the gloom feeling dispirited and left.

  —

  The barman asked Nicholas if he would like another drink. The question jolted him back to the present. He shook his head and looked around the room. Everyone had left and the music had finished some time ago. He was still shaken by the chill of the woman’s calm threat.

  Back in his room, it felt as though the air had been disturbed. Immediately he saw things were not right. The room was as meticulously tidy as he had left it, but everything seemed to have shifted – very slightly. The book he had been reading was in a different position on the bedside table. Opening it he found the envelope he had used as a bookmark was not where he had left it. He looked in his bedside drawer and found his sunglasses, car keys and headache tablets had been pushed into one corner. The maps of Rhodes town and the island, his guidebook, his notebook containing the notes he had made on Alessandra’s friends and their phone numbers, the paper with the contact name and phone number for the Rhodes police were jumbled, as though someone had been hurriedly searching through them.

  He went to the cupboard. The shirts, which he had folded neatly into a pile when he had unpacked, had been moved and were now all slightly askew. He checked the safe in the cupboard. It was still locked. He entered the combination and looked inside. His passport, airline ticket and money were still there. Nothing obvious had been stolen. He put the envelope containing the documents and notes taken from Alessandra’s apartment into the safe, reset the combination and locked it again.

  He went into the bathroom. When he left the hotel earlier his room had already been cleaned. He opened the mirrored cabinet above the basin. His toiletries had been moved. He looked into his wash bag and saw someone had been through it.

  Nicholas returned to the bedroom and sat on the bed. He felt invaded. His hands were shaking. He wished he had brought a second brandy up to his room. When he had finally recovered his composure he started to feel a sense of outrage. He caught the lift down to the lobby, where he asked the night manager whether anyone had asked for him or for his room number.