A Ghost at the Door Read Online Free PDF Page B

older, greyer. A few minutes later they were sitting around an old varnished table beneath the low beams and brass
bric-a-brac at the Royal Oak. The beer was local, better than in London. When they had taken the head off it, Harry produced the letter of regret about Johnnie’s death that the former consul
had written all those years ago.
    ‘Oh, so it’s you, is it?’ Smith said, looking more keenly at Harry.
    ‘Can you tell me about what happened to my father?’
    ‘Yes, remember it. Didn’t get too many bodies to deal with,’ Smith began, reflecting into his glass, ‘not that I really dealt with your father’s body at
all.’
    ‘You didn’t see it?’
    ‘Good God, no. Honorary vice consuls have no power, no authority. We’re little more than glorified messenger boys. Corpses are way above our pay grade. Not that we got paid, of
course. Did you know that, Mr Jones?’ His tone betrayed an edge of bitterness. ‘Got no expenses, no training, either, absolutely nothing, apart from a manual of procedures with an
oversized crest on its front, and it took them two years before they even gave me one of those. I had to make much of it up as I went along.’
    ‘How wonderfully reassuring.’
    The other man shrugged and drank.
    ‘So you didn’t arrange for my father’s burial?’
    Smith shook his head. ‘All I could have done was suggest the names of a couple of funeral directors. But nobody asked.It’s usually the family, but apart from you there didn’t
seem to be any family. And you didn’t ask.’
    ‘You were satisfied that everything was . . .’ Harry suddenly hesitated. A note of discord began to flutter through his thoughts. ‘You satisfied yourself that everything was in
order. Due process, or whatever they call it.’
    ‘Satisfied myself? To be honest, not particularly. Wasn’t my job. As I said, I was a messenger boy. Inform the embassy in Athens and the next of kin, that was all. The rest was up to
others.’
    ‘Who, precisely?’
    ‘The Greek authorities. And you know what they can be like, particularly in a place like Patras.’
    ‘Not really.’
    ‘Well, you know where your father is buried.’
    The statement was left hanging, as a question. Harry didn’t respond, seemed suddenly embarrassed. He hadn’t even visited the grave. Not once.
    The old consul sighed, recognized Harry’s guilt, and a layer of aggression seemed to peel away from him. He understood the pain that raking the embers of a past life could bring. ‘I
lived there twelve years, should love the place but . . . Patras is what it is. A port, a crossroads, it’s sprawling, sometimes mucky, not particularly glamorous. I remember your father
– his case, I mean. Yachts like that have their autopilots stuck on places like Venice and Cannes and Santorini. They didn’t stop off in Patras, and certainly not with bodies on
board.’
    ‘So what happened?’ Jemma encouraged.
    ‘Well . . . Mrs Jones?’ he enquired, raising his eyes at Jemma.
    ‘No, not quite yet.’
    He nodded softly. ‘Wish you well, young lady. As much luck as I had with my wife. She died in Patras, too.’
    ‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’
    He blinked in gratitude, was elsewhere for a moment before he returned to his tale. ‘Anyway, I got a call from the chief of the port police. About your father, Mr Jones. Courtesy call,
nothing for me to do, but I wandered down nonetheless.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘Dunno. No need, not as a consul. But my wife . . . Anyway, it was a fine day. I needed the exercise.’
    ‘The consulate is near the port?’
    ‘The consulate? What sort of operation do you think Her Majesty still runs? The consulate didn’t exist, not beyond me and my mobile phone. I’m half Greek, Mr Jones, named
Euripides after my grandfather. We’d been living in Patras for a few years, my wife and I, living off a bit of business here and a bit more there – you know what it’s like in the
Med. One of those bits was a restaurant; I ran the