Free The Green Lady by Paul Johnston

destroyed and the teeth were visible. The eyes had clouded over, reminding him of the Easter goats he’d seen as a boy. His father and uncles had taken bets to see who got to eat the roasted organs.
    The ME laughed curtly. ‘Well, his teeth are in decent shape, as you can see. Apart from that, who knows? The hair on his calves is black, so there’s a good chance that his head was that colour. Then again, he could have been graying.’
    â€˜I was going to ask you about age.’
    â€˜Again, the calves and feet are the only guide at this stage. There are quite advanced varicose veins, which points to middle age or later, though there are other factors to be taken into account. Examination of the brain and other organs will give me more of an idea how old he was.’
    Xanthakos let him get on his with his work, watching dispassionately as the Y-cut was made in the abdomen and, later, the cranial cavity opened.
    â€˜There are small wounds here,’ the examiner said, pointing to cuts in the blackened flesh on the chest. ‘I think he’s been tortured by something pointed – maybe a probe of some sort. Gangland?’
    â€˜It’s within the parameters.’
    After the pluck had been removed and the component organs separated and weighed, Priftakis took the stomach from the bowl held by his assistant to another table.
    â€˜Let’s see if there’s anything recognisable in here.’ He used a scalpel to lay open the wall and put his gloved fingers into the shrivelled sac.
    â€˜What are those?’
    The ME emptied the slimy residue from the stomach and laid out the small fibrous objects he’d found in a row on the stainless steel surface.
    â€˜Seven of them,’ he said.
    â€˜But what are they?’ the deputy commissioner asked, squinting at the shrunken remnants. ‘Seeds?’
    â€˜More than that,’ Priftakis said, pointing. ‘They’re arils, the covers of seeds. And if you ask me—’
    â€˜Which I’m doing.’
    The ME laughed. ‘Patience, my friend. The liquid has more or less gone, but the seeds will still be inside. In my opinion, these would normally be red.’ He pointed his finger at Xanthakos. ‘And you can eat them.’
    â€˜Pomegranate seeds?’
    â€˜Very good. Now you’ve got another question to answer. They were in the stomach rather than the intestines. That means they were swallowed up to three to four hours before death.’ Priftakis lowered his mask. ‘So there must be at least a chance that your killer made the victim swallow them. Why?’
    The deputy commissioner thought about that. ‘Pomegranates haven’t been in season for months.’
    â€˜Maybe the murderer kept the seeds in the deep freeze.’
    â€˜How weird is that?’
    Back in his office, Telemachos Xanthakos decided to wait for the ME’s full report, as well as an update from Inspector Tsitas, before calling Athens. This case was getting stranger by the hour.

SIX
    M avros had never felt so confined by a case. He had plenty of information, but none of it was germane to Lia Poulou’s disappearance. The Fat Man was still out pursuing his own angle, so he went down to the kitchen and made himself a salad. When his friend was around salads were permitted, but only alongside large pieces of grilled or roast meat, even in summer. He considered eating in front of the Olympics, but couldn’t face it – commentators creaming their slacks every time a Greek competitor appeared, advertisements all the time, and a host of sports he couldn’t give a shit about.
    He sat at the small table in the kitchen and tried to clear his mind. A fourteen-year-old girl, willowy and with a pretty face. According to her mother, Lia didn’t have a boyfriend. Was that likely? The culture at the international school was probably more progressive than at state schools. Boys and girls would mix in class and during