‘Thanks, Mr Zoulakis, you’re being so very kind. I appreciate it.’
‘It is nothing, Miss Wells, truly it is nothing,’ Demosthenes Zoulakis said, wishing he could help this beautiful American woman who was apparently so important.
Two hours later Nicky was being led to the Mercedes by the affable assistant manager, who had genuinely put himself out for her, but to no avail. ‘I am so sorry we have not been able to help you, Miss Wells,’ he said. ‘Perhaps your friend merely passed through Athens, en route to another destination.’
‘That is a possibility,’ Nicky agreed, and thanked him again.
***
Nicky was halfway across the lobby of the Hotel Grande Bretagne when she stopped dead in her tracks. A second before, she had passed the newspaper and magazine kiosk, and now she realized that Clee’s photograph had been on the cover of one of the magazines being prominently displayed.
Clee was the most famous war photographer in the world today, and the only reason he would be on the cover of a magazine was if something had happened to him. He was in Leipzig, and that wasn’t a battlefront, but there were demonstrations going on in East Germany, and there were other places to die as well as in a war zone. But she knew he was all right. She had spoken to him only last night. Perhaps he was on the magazine cover because he had won an award for his coverage of the demonstrations in Beijing. That was a possibility. But if so, why hadn’t he mentioned it? Modesty? Clee was one of the most modest people she had ever met.
Nicky swung around and walked back to the kiosk. She opened her purse, took out some money and handed it to the vendor. Then she lifted the magazine off the rack and held it up for the vendor to see what she was buying.
The man nodded his head, counted out the change, and dropped it into her outstretched hand.
Turning away from the kiosk, Nicky took a few steps, and looked down at the magazine. It was called Tachydromos; it was a news magazine similar to Life or Paris Match, and there was Clee on the cover, smiling faintly and wearing an open-necked shirt and his worn, brown-leather bomber jacket. Except that it wasn’t Clee. It was Kevin Costner, the actor, she was looking at. It was true that they did bear a striking resemblance to each other, and it had been an easy mistake to make.
Once she was inside her suite, Nicky threw the magazine down on the coffee table and went to the mini-bar. Taking out a bottle of coke, she opened it and poured herself a glass. After a long swallow, she carried the drink over to the sofa and sat down.
My God, Kevin Costner really does look like Clee in this shot, Nicky thought, eyeing the magazine cover facing her. He’s the spitting image of him. He could be his twin. In the back of her mind a voice suddenly echoed. It was Philip’s, and she heard his words again. ‘They say we all have a double living somewhere in the world.’
Nicky sat bolt upright with a start. It had just dawned on her that if she could mistake Kevin Costner for Clee Donovan, then perhaps she was mistaking some other man for Charles Devereaux.
Damnation, she muttered to herself, I am on a wild goose chase. She leaped to her feet, impatient, irritated with herself, and walked over to the window, stood looking out, her mind racing.
It was quite possible that the man filmed in the news segment emanating from Rome was a total stranger. Certainly that’s what Anne and Philip believed. Who was to argue with them, really. She had no one who could endorse her opinion that the man was Charles. What a pity Christopher Neald was on vacation. Charles’s English partner would have agreed with her, she was certain of that. A small sigh escaped, and she leaned her head against the pane of glass. Admit it, there’s no point continuing with this search, she muttered, then she straightened as a thought suddenly struck her. There was one person who might back her up, if he was shown the photographs: Don Pedro Alejandro Perez, Charles’s Spanish partner.
One last shot. I’m going to give this one last shot, Nicky thought as she hurried across the room to the desk and her address book. Within the space of ten minutes she had found Don Pedro’s number, telephoned Madrid and spoken to a receptionist at Don Pedro’s sherry and wine exporting company. The woman had told her that Don Pedro was out of town until Monday, that she should ring again after lunch, at five o’clock, in order to speak to Don Pedro’s secretary, Señorita Lopez.
Nicky sat at the desk for a short while, hesitating, wondering what to do next. She could stay in Athens until Sunday and fly to Madrid that morning, but it was unbearably hot in Athens; also, she didn’t know a soul here, whereas ATN had a decent-sized bureau in Madrid, and although Peter Collis, the bureau chief, was not a close friend, he was at least an acquaintance of long standing. Madrid it is, she thought, making a snap decision to leave immediately. She would go today, if that was possible.
Years of travelling with her parents as a child had taught her one thing: if you wanted to get something done, and especially in a hurry, ask a concierge to help you. They knew everything; they also had a network that stretched from hotel to hotel across Europe. And so now she dialled the desk downstairs to enlist the head concierge’s help. The line was busy, so she left the suite and went down to the lobby, feeling more impatient that ever to move on.
Yannis, the head concierge, greeted her pleasantly and asked how he could be of assistance.
‘I need to get on a flight to Madrid today. Any airline, it doesn’t matter which, and I need a suite booked at the Ritz. Can you do that for me please, Yannis?’
‘Yes, immediately, leave it to me, Miss Wells. I will telephone your suite as soon as I have news.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Are you packed, miss?’
‘More or less.’
‘It is almost three. I think you should be prepared to leave for the airport soon. I know there is a late afternoon flight to Madrid. I will try to get a seat on it for you.’
‘Thank you, Yannis,’ she said, smiled at him and walked across to the reception desk. Aristotle was nowhere in sight, but Costa was on duty. She had felt his eyes on her all the time she had been talking to the concierge.
Nicky said, ‘Hello, Costa. Thanks for trying to help me yesterday.’
He inclined his head with his usual politeness, and asked, ‘Did you have any luck at Vouliagmeni?’
‘No, unfortunately, I didn’t. Would you please arrange for my bill, Costa?’
‘You are leaving, miss?’
Nicky nodded.
‘Back to America?’ he asked.
‘No, I’m going to Madrid, as a matter of fact.’
‘Madrid,’ he repeated, sounding slightly startled.
Nicky stared at him curiously. He had such a look of consternation on his face she could not help wondering why. She said, ‘What’s wrong with Madrid?’
The young desk clerk seemed baffled for a split second. Then he murmured, ‘Excuse me, I don’t understand.’
‘You sounded so surprised when I said I was going to Madrid.’
‘Not at all,’ he responded, sudden denial on his face. He offered her a faint smile, and added, ‘I will have your bill prepared, miss. Immediately.’
She reached into her bag, pulled out a handful of drachmas, and pressed them on Costa. ‘Thank you,’ she said.
‘Thank you, miss,’ he answered, pocketing the money.
Costa watched her walk across the lobby to the elevators. When she had entered one and disappeared from sight, he left the reception desk and went over to speak to the head concierge.
‘Do you think you can get Miss Wells a seat on a plane to Madrid?’
‘I am sure I can,’ Yannis said somewhat sharply, frowning at Costa, obviously puzzled by his interest.
‘And the hotel? Did you get her a hotel?’
‘The head concierge of the Ritz is an old friend. I will have no problem when I speak to him,’ Yannis boasted. ‘And what’s it to you?’
Costa grinned, and winked. ‘She’s nice. She tips well. I want to be sure everything goes smoothly for her.’
Yannis nodded, and turned awa
y to answer one of the shrilling telephones.
Costa walked back to the reception desk where another colleague was speaking with a guest. He hurried into the back office, which was empty, and made a quick phone call.
‘She’s leaving,’ he muttered into the receiver. ‘She’s going to Madrid. What could she have found out at Vouliagmeni? She must know something. She’ll be at the Ritz. Tell him.’
TWENTY-EIGHT
It only occurred to Nicky that she really was being followed when she came out of the Prado Museum early on Friday evening, and stood for a moment under its shady portico.
She was debating whether or not to go directly back to the Ritz Hotel when she noticed the man with the black cigarillo again.
He had first sprung to life that morning, had suddenly appeared by her side whilst she was speaking to the concierge. The man had been puffing hard on his little black cigar, and the smoke billowing around her had caused her to splutter and cough. The concierge had said something politely but firmly in rapid Spanish, and the man had immediately moved away from her, stepping to one side. Once she had finished her business she had hurried across the lobby, glad to be away from the man with the cigar, who was deep in conversation with the concierge. On her way up to the suite in the elevator she had silently cursed him, since she was still coughing behind her hand.
Then later, on her way to lunch with Peter Collis of the ATN Madrid bureau, she had stopped to wander along the Galeria del Prado, a shopping arcade under the Palace Hotel. As she had left a boutique she had seen the man with the cigar gazing in its window. Immediately, he had glanced away, looking somewhat self-conscious, had swung around and darted into a shop on the opposite side of the arcade.
Now, here he was once again, only a few yards from her. He stood near the statue located between the steps and the small park just beyond, and he was with another man. In his mouth was the usual black cigarillo.
The man had not seen her. Not yet, anyway. The only reason she had spotted him so quickly and so easily was because of the screaming children. They were toddlers and flanked a young woman, were clinging to her hands, and they were bawling at the tops of their lungs. Their harassed mother had stopped to speak to the two men near the statue, and the man with the cigar was saying something, apparently in response to a question. He was pointing and gesticulating, obviously giving her directions.
Suddenly a group of young German students came out of the museum, surrounding her and laughing and chattering, and Nicky fell in with them. She stayed close as they trooped through the little park and into the Paseo del Prado.
Within a few minutes Nicky was entering the Plaza de la Lealtad where the Ritz stood in its own lovely gardens. The man with the cigar was nowhere in sight. Not that it mattered, since he clearly knew where she was staying anyway.
After collecting her door key and several messages, Nicky went up to her suite, preoccupied with thoughts of the strange man, and the possibility that someone was having her movements monitored. Someone? If it was anybody, it was Charles Devereaux.
The minute she walked into her suite Nicky was conscious of the smell of an unfamiliar perfume. She stood in the small foyer, frowning and glancing about, the door key clutched in her hand. She sniffed several times. There was no mistaking it—a pungent odour clung to the air. It struck her then that it smelled more like a man’s cologne than a woman’s perfume, so this eliminated the maid. Had the valet been here? But for what reason? She had not sent any clothes out for pressing. Had the strange man gained entry to her suite? If so, how? That’s stupid, she muttered. He could very easily have bribed a member of the staff. As her father always said, money talked. And certainly he would have had the opportunity. She had seen him in the shopping arcade around eleven o’clock that morning, before going to the ATN bureau to pick up Peter. They had gone to lunch at the Gran Café de Gijón around one thirty and from lunch she had strolled off to the Prado. Once there she had spent several hours gazing in wonder at the paintings by Goya and Velázquez, and she had been out of her suite for most of the day.
A worried crease wrinkled her brow as she went into the sitting room and put her key, the messages and her handbag on the coffee table. Her suspicions now fully aroused, Nicky walked through into the bedroom, went immediately to the wardrobe and pulled open the door. Her big carryall bag, which she never travelled without, looked oddly askew, yet she knew that she had placed it neatly in the corner before leaving to meet Peter.
Reaching for the carryall, she dragged it out and carried it over to the bed. Inspecting the lock on the front, she noticed at once that it had been tampered with; when she touched it with her finger she realized that it was very loose. Seemingly someone had picked the lock, then had been unable to close it properly afterward because it was badly damaged. Certainly the carryall had been secure when she had left earlier, so someone had definitely been in her suite, poking around.
Nicky inspected the carryall. Nothing was missing. Her notebook, tape recorder and all of the other items were intact. She had her passport, press credentials, credit cards and Spanish money in her white leather shoulder bag, but she had left a wallet containing foreign currency in the carryall. Pulling this out and examining it, she saw that none of the money had been taken. But she was positive the bag had been searched, and very thoroughly at that. Quite aside from the broken lock, her things were not as neatly placed inside as they usually were. And her tape recorder was not in the corner of the carryall, where she invariably put it for easy access.
Closing the bag and returning it to the wardrobe, Nicky hurried over to the chest on the other side of the bedroom, and began to open the drawers one after the other. Again she knew that someone had rifled through her things, for the simple reason she always stacked everything carefully. They were now rumpled, and, like the carryall, slightly askew. There was no doubt that someone had handled them.
She shook her head, a concerned expression settling on her face as she closed the drawers and walked back into the sitting room. Flopping down onto a chair, she closed her eyes, trying to concentrate on the problems at hand. Was it just a coincidence that the man with the black cigarillo had been under her feet several times today? Or was he actually following her? If he was, then it certainly proved one thing: Charles Devereaux was really alive. There was no question in her mind that her rooms had been searched and her carryall tampered with; the evidence was there. Obviously this also reinforced her theory that her former fiancé was flourishing here on the Continent.
Suddenly Nicky snapped her eyes open and sat up jerkily. If Charles was having her followed in order to know what she was doing, who she was seeing, and if he had had her room searched, then he must be aware that she was in Madrid. But how did he know that? Did he have a contact here in the Ritz? Or one in the Hotel Grande Bretagne in Athens, perhaps? More importantly, why was he doing it?
There was only one answer to that: he wanted to know what she was up to, and very badly.
It struck her then that he might possibly think she was doing an investigation on him for a story. After all, he knew full well that she had been an investigative journalist before she had become a war correspondent, and still was one, in fact. But if he believed this, then he must be involved in something that merited an investigation. Something illicit. Something immense, maybe. What was illicit and immense and made big money? Arms smuggling. Drug trafficking. But why would Charles want to make more big bucks? He was already a rich man. Still, she kept coming back to the idea that whatever he was doing involved money.
Unless it was something else, something quite bizarre, as she had suggested to Arch in Rome. But what could that be…
The telephone rang, interrupted her thoughts, and she rose, went to the desk to answer it. ‘Hello?’
‘Nicky, Peter here. I called before and left a message. Did you get it?’
‘Oh Peter, I’m sorry, I just came in and I haven’t opened any of my messages yet.’
‘No problem. A
my and I want you to have dinner with us tonight. Are you free?’
‘Yes, and I’d love to meet your wife. But look, Peter, you don’t have to feel obliged to look after me, really—’
‘We want you to join us,’ he interrupted. ‘We’ve invited a few friends. We’re going to the Jockey Club, it’s quite famous.’
‘I’ve heard of it.’
‘I’ll pick you up around eight thirty, and take you home for drinks. Dinner won’t be until ten, even ten thirty, I’m afraid. When in Madrid do as the madrileños. See you later, Nicky.’
‘I’m looking forward to it, Peter. Bye for now.’
Immediately after she had hung up the phone rang again. ‘Hello?’
‘Hi, babe, it’s me,’ Clee said.
‘Darling, hello. How are you? Where are you calling from?’
‘I’m terrific, and I’m in Berlin… at the Intercontinental. Didn’t you get my message?’
‘Yes, but I only just got back. I haven’t had a chance to look at it.’
‘Nicky, I’ve got great news! The greatest!’ he exclaimed.
She could almost feel his excitement flowing down the wire. ‘What is it? Tell me!’
‘Yoyo! I’ve had a message from Yoyo, Nick.’
‘Oh Clee, thank God. He is all right, isn’t he? And where is he? Is he in Paris?’
Clee laughed. ‘Whoa, I can only answer one question at a time. He’s fine. He’s in Hong Kong, but he’ll be in Paris soon. Hopefully in a few days, another week at the most.’
‘That’s wonderful,’ she said, and unexpectedly her eyes filled with tears of relief and gratitude that he was alive and well. She was unable to speak for a couple of seconds.
Clee said, ‘Are you there, babe?’
Swallowing hard, Nicky replied, ‘Yes… I felt very emotional for a moment or two, that’s all.’
‘I know what you mean. I had the same reaction when I heard the news from Jean-Claude.’