White Moon Black Sea Read Online Free Page A

One by one he pushed open the shutters so that the still-bright late afternoon sun streaked across the carpet and the room sprang to life. If the curtains were frayed, hanging in ribbons in some places, it hardly mattered because they were more museum-worthy than just tattered. Indeed the room reflected culture, pride — and power. And to all this the two men and their purpose added tension and excitement.
    Christos and Rashid sat opposite each other, separated by a handsome mahogany George III partner’s desk. Christos glanced first at his watch and then at a sheet of paper lying on the desk. The phone began to ring. He ignored it, his eyes fixed on Rashid’s face. He thought he actually saw Rashid flinch as the phone cut into the quiet of the room.
    “Your golden fleece, Rashid?” he said as he reached down and picked up a dark purple kidskin box by its handle. He stood, smiled, and handed it across the desk to Rashid, who rose to receive it.
    Both men sat down again and Rashid returned the smile. A light danced in his dark brown eyes.
    “Could be,” he said. “I hope so. But let’s wait for the telephone calls.” He looked at his watch and added, “Well, one of the banks is calling on time.”
    “Your integrity has never been in question, Rashid. Only your involvement with Mirella. But I think a cool head rules that heart of yours. Take the box now, and enjoy your triumph. Here’s the key.”
    He tossed a gold key to Rashid, who caught it in midair with one hand. Christos picked up the telephone.
    Rashid listened to his cousin’s conversation, his left handon the box, his right clenched around the gold key. He made no move to use it.
    “Ah, Mr. Phenneger. And is the sun shining in Lausanne? How does it find you, sir? Well, I trust?” There was a long pause while the banker on the other end of the line spoke. Then Christos continued, “I see. Well, thank you for being so prompt in confirming its arrival. I hope to see you soon, sir. Good-bye.”
    Christos replaced the receiver, chose a Mont Blanc fountain pen, and ticked off several items on the white paper in front of him.
    “The million in dollars,” he said, “and the deeds to your house in Xania and all your other property in Crete, you brought with you in the brown paper parcel. That checks out. Now Phenneger confirms a deposit in my account for six million dollars’ worth of gold bullion.” He looked up and was surprised to see that Rashid had not opened the box. He was about to say something when the second call came through. It was from a banker in Zug.
    “Confirmed, five million in uncut industrial diamonds,” Christos said, and made another tick on his list. “That does it, Rashid, I’m satisfied. Now, for God’s sake, man, aren’t you going to open the box? Or don’t you like the color I chose for you?”
    “Very smart, Christos. I will open the box.”
    Christos watched Rashid going over the contents of the purple box. He felt the force at Rashid’s obsession with the Oujie legacy concentrated in the tiny movements of his fingers. The ancient power over Turkey of Rashid’s family was being restored to his grasp.
    Christos had no such obsessions, either private or public, and certainly none about family. So a second private deal with Rashid was easy. He had consented to act as chairman for the syndicate backing Rashid’s scheme to swindle Mirella of another part of the Oujie legacy. Their private deal had suited both.
    Their mothers had been sisters, high-born Turkish women of impeccable Ottoman lineage. Whereas Rashid’s mother had married into an even more princely Ottoman family, her sister, Christos’s mother, had married out ofher faith and into an enormously rich and cultured Greek family from Istanbul.
    Christos’s paternal great-grandfather had foreseen the persecution of the Greeks in Istanbul as inevitable, so he had moved his family into Greece. This explained the mix of Turkish and Greek among Christos’s holdings.