Deep Waters (26 page)

‘So he had both motive and opportunity, Mr Vlora.’

‘But I know he didn’t do it, Sergeant!’

‘How do you know?’

‘I just do,’ Aryan said lamely.

‘Mr Vlora, I understand that you love your brother and want to help him. But you must see that the case against him is strong, even without his confession. We also have good reason to believe that he was in the same place as Rifat the night he died.’

‘If it’s all so hopeless, Sergeant, why have you come to speak to me?’

It was a reasonable question, and the answer, that Mehti Vlora’s story was not entirely consistent with the facts, was not one that Tepe felt it would be prudent to give at this point.

The silence was broken by Engelushjia who walked over to Aryan and crouched down beside him. ‘Why don’t you tell Sergeant Tepe about, you know, what we were talking about earlier?’ she said.

‘Look,’ said Tepe in frustration, ‘how exactly did you two suddenly become best friends? You say you’re working together but frankly I find it hard to—’

‘Sergeant!’ Aryan Vlora’s voice was loud and commanding but as he spoke he didn’t take his eyes from Engelushjia Berisha.

Tepe noted how they were looking at each other but did not read very much into it. He was just annoyed that he had been shouted at by a civilian.

‘Yes, Mr Vlora?’ he threw back angrily.

‘If I give you someone who is a real murderer, will you listen to me about Mehti?’

‘Can you give me Rifat’s murderer?’

‘No,’ he said, ‘I cannot. But I can give you Egrem Berisha’s killer and a description of how Mehti reacts around violence.’

‘Go on,’ said Tepe cautiously.’

‘When my brother Mehmet killed Egrem Berisha, Mehti screamed and sobbed like a child.’

Tepe leaned back sharply in his chair as if pushed by the force of this information. ‘Were you actually present at the time, Mr Vlora?’ he asked gravely.

‘Just after I was, yes.’

‘And you didn’t report it to the police?’

Aryan looked down at the floor. ‘No.’

Tepe sighed. ‘Well, I hope you understand the implications of what you’ve said, Mr Vlora. For yourself as well as for your brother.’

Strangely, given the gravity of the situation, Aryan smiled. ‘Oh, yes, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘I know what I’ve done. It’s something I should have done a long time ago.’

Taking hold of Tepe’s chair by the arms, Suleyman moved it across to İkmen’s desk and sat down. Outside, night was already beginning to fall and in the silence that preceded their conversation both men listened to the sound of the relentless rain, the occasional ship’s foghorn and the rapid footsteps of people who didn’t possess umbrellas. With some displeasure Suleyman observed that his shoes were quite disgusting, what with the ever present mud and the rancid food and tainted puddles of old İstanbul.

Nothing so trivial was bothering İkmen. ‘You know,’ he said, having inserted himself deftly behind his great desk and lit up a cigarette, ‘although there is nothing I can actually tell you about the Evren family that gives me cause for alarm, I’m not happy about their involvement in this case. To use a word that Zelfa would approve of, I don’t feel comfortable about the “dynamics” between that man and his children.’

Suleyman shrugged. ‘İlhan Evren is a gangster. The Metropolitan Police in London say he has one conviction for fraud and there is evidence, if not proof, that he arranged for refugees to sell body parts to rich Europeans. There are also rumours of violence. Such people and their families routinely live lives circumscribed by secrets and deception.’

‘Yes,’ İkmen said with a frown, ‘and that’s what bothers me. If your assessment of him is correct, Evren is probably a most accomplished liar. But he was quite open about his feelings about Rifat, and the daughter, too, has been quite helpful in her own weird way. There’s been no attempt to hide their involvement with Rifat on that night.’

‘No.’

İkmen paused to puff heavily on his cigarette and stare at the smoke-stained ceiling. ‘The only thing I really didn’t like,’ he said, ‘was the way the young son always looked at his sister before answering questions. Smiling, sly. Something about it gave me the creeps. It was odd. I mean, had he been a small child I could have understood it. But not a teenager.’

‘You think he should have been more confident?’ Suleyman smiled. ‘Perhaps back in England he was told about how monstrous the feared Turkish police can be.’

Smiling too, İkmen said, ‘Maybe.’

Suleyman took his cigarettes out of his jacket pocket and lit up. ‘So what do you think about this present Evren now says Rifat brought for his daughter? Seems he used it as a sort of excuse to gain entry. At least that is what I assume he did.’

‘Yes,’ İkmen said, ‘although he apparently left with it, whatever it was.’

‘Mmm.’ Suleyman sucked thoughtfully on his cigarette. ‘It’s a pity we don’t know what it was.’

İkmen nodded in agreement. ‘In particular, whether it was a coloured glass item. It would be interesting to discover what precisely was smashed so venomously into Rifat’s face.’

‘If it was the gift for Felicity, it would open up various possibilities.’

‘Yes.’ İkmen smiled. ‘Perhaps the lady involved didn’t like the gift.’

‘Or another lady was consumed with jealousy.’

İkmen pushed back on his chair and rocked it on its two back legs. ‘But with absolutely nothing to go on with regard to other women we are thrown back onto the Evren family. Just because Felicity and her brother were supposed to be asleep when Rifat was at the house doesn’t mean that was so.’

‘In that case,’ Suleyman said, ‘why did Felicity Evren lay herself open to discovery by presenting herself at the Berisha house?’

‘She was invited by Engelushjia Berisha. The girl informed her about Rifat Berisha’s death. I don’t suppose she imagined Engelushjia would report her visit to us. After all, as far as Felicity was concerned, Engelushjia might have been aware of her friendship with Rifat but she didn’t know he’d told his sister about going to London. And quite honestly I don’t think Engelushjia would have reported it if she wasn’t sweet on Tepe. Besides, Felicity would have had to visit the Berishas, wouldn’t she, as soon as she saw the story in the papers. After all, she did love Rifat.’

‘Even though she and he were never lovers.’

İkmen laughed. ‘Oh, the cynicism written on your face is a joy to behold!’ He clapped his hands in appreciation. ‘When I first knew you, you delighted in letting me know that in your opinion sex was really quite an unimportant aspect of human activity. There were lots of things people could do without that, you said.’

‘OK! OK!’ Suleyman, smiling in spite of himself, rubbed a tired hand across his face. ‘I was very young.’

‘And oh so traditionally repressed,’ İkmen said with obvious glee in his voice. After all, love and respect Suleyman as he did, the younger man was still part of the ‘old order’ and therefore a legitimate target for a peasant like himself.

Suleyman did not take offence or even react to this minor slight; he simply, as was his custom, returned to the subject that concerned him.

‘I suppose if Mehti Vlora really was outside the Evrens’ house on the night Rifat was killed – and I believe he was – he might have seen something of significance.’

İkmen’s face resolved into a scowl. ‘Possibly. But we’ll have to get past his desire for family approval and his Albanian machismo before he’ll tell us. Unless, of course, Mehti is doing all this under orders from the unsavoury Mr Evren. Not, of course, that we have established any connection between the two.’

‘No.’

‘No. But I must say that I do like the idea of Rifat’s gift being smashed into his face. It indicates spite. Although I can’t see why the apparently bereft Felicity would do such a thing and I doubt whether that brother of hers could do it.’

‘Evren’s Russian friends probably could.’

İkmen inclined his head to one side. ‘True. And dumping a body near to its home is a very mob thing to do . . . If only we had some hard forensics.’

‘Indeed.’

‘But we don’t,’ İkmen said with a sigh, ‘so we must work with what we’ve got, which, at the moment is an unsound confession. I think some further investigation of Mr Evren’s associations is called for. Although Rifat apparently donated one of his kidneys to Evren’s daughter of his own free will, I can detect a certain unsavouriness in that business, which has little to do with old suspicions regarding İlhan’s involvement in the organ business.’

‘Yes,’ Suleyman agreed, ‘I do too. Like why would Rifat do it? But then perhaps we need to ask ourselves whether we would feel like this if Felicity Evren were young and pretty.’

İkmen smiled. ‘Well, he got a car out of it and a holiday.’

‘In hospital?’ Suleyman said acidly. ‘How delightful.’

İkmen allowed his chair to fall forwards with a thump. ‘Which reminds me,’ he said, looking at his watch, ‘I need to go to the hospital and pick up my uncle.’

Suleyman put his cigarette out in İkmen’s ashtray and asked, ‘So how do we proceed then, Çetin?’

İkmen removed his jacket from the back of his chair and stood up. ‘We still need to find out what Roditi discovered from the chauffeur, as well as looking into Mr Evren’s associates. I’ve asked the British consul to contact me. Perhaps Rifat was working for this “British” businessman.’ He shrugged. ‘I also think that perhaps Mehti Vlora should be appraised of the worst-case scenario with regard to his current situation.’

‘You mean you want him really frightened.’

‘Yes.’ İkmen shouldered his jacket. ‘Perhaps when Çöktin returns in the morning you might speak to him about it. After all,’ he added, his eyes twinkling wickedly, ‘if one of Shaitan’s own can’t frighten a man, who can?’

Suleyman was about to respond to this somewhat controversial observation when Tepe, unannounced, burst into the office.

‘Sir,’ he said as he fought to catch his breath, ‘sir, we’ve got something in the Berisha case!’

‘Aryan Vlora has given details of the exact manner and location of Egrem Berisha’s death,’ said Ayşe Farsakoǧlu, almost hidden from view by Tepe’s considerable height.

İkmen frowned. ‘That’s Rifat’s brother.’

‘Yes! Aryan Vlora says that Mehmet Vlora definitely killed him.’

‘And how does Aryan know this?’ a far calmer Suleyman inquired.

‘He knows because he was there, Inspector,’ Ayşe Farsakoǧlu said as she pushed herself past Tepe into the room. ‘A fact the sergeant here very cleverly got out of him.’

‘Oh, indeed,’ İkmen said, fighting against the discomfort he was feeling being in a room with a woman he knew had slept with both of his colleagues. ‘And why would Aryan allow him to do that?’

‘Why don’t I tell you on the way?’ Tepe said as he held the door open for his superior.

‘He’s here, is he?’ İkmen asked wearily.

‘Yes.’

‘And Engelushjia Berisha,’ Ayşe added. She looked triumphantly at Suleyman. ‘It’s quite a story.’

‘I expect it is.’

With a sigh, İkmen took his mobile telephone out of his pocket and keyed in a number he knew by heart.

‘Well, if I’m going to have to listen to yet more confessions of guilt, I’d better arrange for someone else to pick up my poor uncle,’ he said and waited for the familiar voice of his eldest son to come on the line.

Uncles, or rather the opinions of a particular uncle, were very prominent in Zelfa Halman’s mind as she dragged herself wearily into her cold bed that evening. It wasn’t even nine o’clock yet but she felt weary and even though she knew she had promised to telephone Mehmet, she just didn’t feel up to it. And as if having a body that felt like lead were not enough, the telephone call she’d received from her Uncle Frank had upset her. Virtually demanding that she tell her father about her engagement, which was something Zelfa had in fact now done, Father Frank had also gone into far too much detail about an aspect of his work she had always found particularly disturbing.

There was, apparently, an unquiet spirit in the house of one of Frank’s parishioners. Manifesting itself as a tall, grey man, this ‘ghost’ had caused great consternation to the elderly lady who lived there; so much so that Frank, without even thinking to consult his superiors, was fully intending to wade in with bell, book, candle and lots of Holy Water.

Zelfa, who failed to see how anybody with even the minutest grasp on reality could believe in such bullshit, had told her uncle that she thought he was being most irresponsible.

‘This lady could be mentally ill, for all you know!’ she’d snapped at her now rather offended uncle.

‘Oh, don’t talk so ridiculous, Bridget! Mrs Morgan is as sane as I am.’

Reigning herself in from vocalising the obvious riposte, Zelfa had instead said, ‘But she could still be having an autoscopic episode – anyone can have one of those, particularly if they’re under stress or—’

‘What the hell are you talking about, girl?’

‘Autoscopic experiences are about the mind making something appear to a person when that thing isn’t really there. It’s often a form of wish fulfilment. Like for instance if a woman’s husband dies and then, three months later, she starts seeing him in her bedroom.’

‘Oh, for the love of—’

‘It’s true, Uncle Frank. It rationally explains such phenomena.’

‘To prove there’s no such thing as the spirit, I suppose!’ he had retorted angrily. ‘You and your science. Jesus God, as if it isn’t bad enough that you’re marrying a heathen . . .’

As soon as he’d said it, she could tell by his sharp intake of breath that he wished he hadn’t. But by then it was too late, a fact Zelfa made very plain by slamming the phone down on him.

Now, some two hours later, Zelfa was still troubled. Heathens and ghosts and medieval ceremonies – it was all the stuff of ignorance and prejudice. Like the notion of evil, these things had no place in the modern practitioner’s therapeutic armoury. But still they persisted, if in perhaps more clinical guises. After all, wasn’t young Ali Evren in a sense ‘haunted’? Guilt plus fear, which was a common combination in bereavement, particularly after suicide, were high on Ali’s agenda. Perhaps it was his dead mother’s ‘ghost’ that made him behave so strangely – wanting her son to die or go mad so that she could make contact with him again. Scary echoes of
Wuthering Heights
. But on a more mundane level, poor shrunken little Felicity Evren was enough to frighten the shit out of a gladiator. Creeping around like some portent of doom. Despite everything her brother might believe, she was not, unfortunately for her, either lovely or invisible. But then if she had really been invisible, Ali would have been sad. After all, he loved his sister. A simple and laudable emotion.