At a coffee shop just behind customs, in Schiphol airport, Van Rijn sits with a man he calls Lazlo, one of three men who will act as intermediaries in Munich, whom he refers to as his “gypsies.” Dressed all in black with long, dark hair; I sense Lazlo’s uneasiness in meeting me. Van Rijn says, “I’ll be back in a moment with our coffees,” and when he leaves for the self-service counter, I attempt to engage Lazlo in friendly conversation.
“What do you do when you are not working with Van Rijn?” I ask with a warm and friendly smile.
“Don’t talk to me,” he says in a tone that sounds close to a growl.
“Excuse me?” I say, confused by his reaction. He points toward Van Rijn.
“You talk to him. Never directly to me,” says Lazlo. “That’s the protocol. If you insist on crossing the line—” He runs his finger across his neck making a gurgling sound as if his throat was cut. As he stares me down with his vacant eyes, shivers run down my spine.
An announcement comes over the public address system. Flight 546 to Munich, Germany, will be delayed.
Van Rijn returns.
“Are you carrying the two hundred thousand Deutsche marks ($114,000) that we need?”
“I would never carry that kind of cash, and don’t you dare question whether or not I’ve done my job. You control your people and I’ll control mine.” Looking at Lazlo, I continue, “That’s my protocol.”
“The flight is delayed, so come be my lucky girl at the casino,” Van Rijn suggests.
“Casino! You’re on your own,” I retort.
Van Rijn says, “You have an obligation to keep an eye on me.”
Van Rijn, unfortunately, is right. I can’t risk having him out of my sight. I feel compromised just being in his company.
I look over and see Van Rijn is placing bets at the roulette wheel for a thousand dollars a turn, and losing.
“Isn’t succeeding in Munich enough of a gamble for you today?”
At the roulette wheel, the dealer calls 47 black the winner. I hardly know where to cast my gaze when Van Rijn tries to goad me into participating yet again.
“Come on, girl, give me a number.”
In the course of a few minutes, Van Rijn loses thousands of dollars. Remembering how my family in Cyprus struggled to begin again after they lost everything in the war leaves me with no tolerance for witnessing such wastefulness. Spending is an addiction for Van Rijn.
“You sabotage yourself,” I say, alarmed by the fact that he is showing signs of instability en route to complete the sting.
“You will never get another penny from me or the Church if you go broke here,” I say angrily.
“Come on, Tazulaah . . .”
An hour and a half later we arrive in Munich. Once we pass through customs, there is a glass wall leading out to the exit, which provides a clear view into the arrivals area. Van Rijn points to Peter Kitschler and, never having met him before, he says, “There’s your dog, Tazulaah. I can smell him a mile away.”
Peter Kitschler, chief of the art theft unit of the Bavarian police, is quite tall, with a muscular frame, and his jet-black hair and mustache give him an appearance more Greek than German.
Kitschler ushers Van Rijn and Lazlo into his car and places me in another car with a curly-haired man wearing a single earring who identifies himself as Helmut, my bodyguard. We check into the Hilton Hotel and make arrangements to meet later in the bar. I find Peter alone.
“Helmut is in the room next to you. He is your shadow twenty-four-seven.” He points to several different people in the lobby. “There are seventy agents working undercover in the hotel. The telephone lines are bugged. Van Rijn’s room is under surveillance. I want to assure you that we have taken every precaution to ensure your safety,” says Kitschler. That Peter Kitschler has managed to arrange all this in such short time is impressive. Van Rijn and Lazlo join us.
Kitschler says, “No use of mobiles. Dikmen has links to a large criminal network. We can’t risk them breaking into our conversations.”
“How many of your men are on board for the sting, Mr. Van Rijn?”
“Lazlo is aware that this is a sting operation. Veres and Rossi believe it is a legitimate purchase and that I am working undercover for the Cypriots. We thought it best to use the name of Eftis Paraskevaides [an art dealer in London]. Paraskevaides stems from one of the wealthiest families in Cyprus, so Dikmen now believes that Eftis will be purchasing the artifacts to return to Cyprus.”
“Is Eftis aware that you are using his name as a cover?”
“No. Eftis has no idea. Dikmen trusts Veres because they have a long history of doing successful deals together so Dikmen will believe whatever Veres tells him.”
In this art underworld, reputations are not checked in traditional ways. You must have an established trust within the network, as most deals are executed with a handshake. The world-wide web did not exist at this time so access to information was not readily available as it is today. There was little concern that Van Rijn’s cover as Eftis would be blown. The fact that Eftis chooses to work through an intermediary and not deal with the Turk (Dikmen) directly also makes sense, considering the history of feuding between the two cultures. Veres believes this is a straight deal, which will not jeopardize his relationship with Dikmen. He will receive a tidy fee and believes access to Van Rijn’s connections will expand his own business prospects.
“How are you planning to execute the buy?” asks Peter.
“Lazlo will be in constant communication with me by phone for the entire duration of the sting,” Van Rijn continues.
Kitschler says, “I need to see the people involved.”
“Of course,” says Van Rijn. “Peter, regarding Veres, if anything causes Veres’s trust to waver, Dikmen will feel it. We must not do anything to evoke his suspicion.”
“And the other men?”
“Stephen Rossi is the younger, collegiate-looking intermediary who will be acting as Veres’s assistant. Veres will be reporting to Eftis, my alias for the sting.”
Kitschler says, “Special Operation forces needs photographs of your men to ensure their safety. They will be at the hotel at ten thirty tonight.”
Peter thinks momentarily and says, “It’s best if we photograph Lazlo separately at the station tomorrow. Veres and Rossi will be photographed tonight under cover.”
Van Rijn interrupts. “Tazulaah, you’d better keep your distance.”
“Remember who is in charge. I’m not going anywhere,” I say.
“Your picture is always in the papers. We can’t take any chances on you being identified and our cover being blown,” says Van Rijn.
Kitschler says, “Leave this to me.” He turns to Helmut and says, “Tonight in the lobby, you sit at another table with Tasoula. We can pose you as a couple. Your backs will be turned to Van Rijn’s table.”
“I will still manage to keep my eye on you regardless,” I say, bringing a moment of levity into a tense situation.
Van Rijn continues, “Dikmen is the godfather of the underworld. He is under the protection of the Serbians and Montenegrins and already has one hit out on me. If he gets wind of my involvement in the sting, I’m a dead man.”
“The phone call to Eftis will not raise suspicions for Dikmen?” Kitschler asks.
“No, he thinks that Eftis Paraskevaides is in the hotel with the money, and once the inspection takes place, he’ll release the cash through his intermediaries. Remember that Dikmen is a Turk and Paraskevaides is a Greek Cypriot. Dikmen will understand why Eftis will not consider going to a Turk’s house to buy. Trust me, the bad blood between the Greeks and the Turks goes back to the Ottoman Empire.”
“When shall we begin?” asks Kitschler.
“My men have worked all week in preparation. I promised them a lunch tomorrow. Afterward we can go to Dikmen.”
“But the Cypriot police don’t arrive until tomorrow night,” I say.
“I can’t hold my men until Monday. It’s tomorrow or never,” says Van Rijn with complete conviction.
“We are in agreement, then,” says Kitschler. “Tomorrow we sting. Let’s meet down at the station first thing.”
“I have to make a stop at the bank first to check on the transfer,” I say.
“I’ll have an officer accompany you,” says Peter. He ends the meeting by saying, “For everyone’s safety, please, no contact with the outside.”
That evening my bodyguard and I sit with our backs facing Van Rijn’s table in the Hilton Hotel bar. Van Rijn, Veres, Rossi, and Lazlo are drinking heavily and talking about the lavish lunch they will have the following day at my expense. Van Rijn is being the “big man,” cursing up a storm as he shares his adventures.
“Remember,” he says to them. “Eftis expects to be given a list of preferred items, and he will tell you what he wants to buy. Eftis wants mosaics and frescoes, icons, bibles, crosses; he will buy anything originating from Cyprus and he has very deep pockets. We’re all going to make a bloody fortune because of this guy,” says Van Rijn. The men raise their glasses to him and they all drink.
Veres asks, “Van Rijn, are you alone here in Germany or do you have a hen in your nest?”
Van Rijn is only just out of rehab and he’s right back to his old ways.
Van Rijn makes a final toast with the boys. “Let’s nail this tomorrow. Cheers to Eftis,” he says, as they raise their glasses one last time.
Helmut escorts me to my hotel room. “No need to worry. We have eyes on you. Sleep well.”
Once inside my room, I wonder if having “eyes on you” means that the police have cameras in my room.
I step into the shower and push the curtain closed to ensure privacy when changing into my pajamas as my paranoia peaks. Checking my reflection in the mirror afterward, I notice a rash on the surface of my neck, a pale pallor and heavy bags forming under my eyes. My nervous energy burns more fuel than I can consume in food, and my gaunt appearance is reflective of the hunger I feel for this ordeal to be over. I slide into bed and pull the covers over my head but the sound of my anxious heartbeat prevents me from sleeping. Alone with my fears and anxieties, I remind myself about what I am fighting for as my thoughts drift back to my life in Cyprus before the war.
FAMAGUSTA, APRIL 1974
A few blocks from the sea in the most desirable resort district in the Mediterranean, artists, writers, musicians, and poets are drawn to the island of Aphrodite’s birth. It is where Shakespeare set Othello. Hollywood stars and international society types vacation here, but to me, it is simply home.
I’m fourteen years old, lounging in my baby-doll pajamas at the onset of spring. I feel more drawn to feeding my shoebox of silkworms their diet of mulberry leaves than going to church. As I watch the worms nibble on the leaves for nourishment, I am filled with excitement knowing I will soon witness their metamorphosis, a process that takes twenty to thirty days. The silk generated by the worms will be spun into sheets or a tablecloth that will become part of a wedding dowry, a Cypriot tradition that begins at birth.
Hailing from a blue-collar, working-class family with limited financial means can limit the caliber of men I have to choose from, so emphasis is placed on the quality of my dowry. My parents instill in me that beauty, intelligence, and a flawless reputation are what will dictate my chances of gaining upward social mobility; they enforce a strict moral compass for me to follow. Turning to the Saint Andreas icon that sits on my bedpost, I pray for added insurance.
As much as I would like to lounge around the house, it is Holy Week, and the Orthodox are flocking to churches and monasteries in anticipation of Easter. Every year on the first Sunday that follows the first full moon of the spring equinox, we celebrate the resurrection of Christ.
“Tasoula!” Mother cries a little louder, “you will make us late for church if you don’t hurry.”
Holy Week, the most sacred time in the Christian Orthodox calendar, is upon us. Every waking moment is a devotional experience as we attend daily morning and evening church services that are choreographed in elaborate detail to portray the circumstances leading up to Christ’s torture, demise, and return to life. This is the culmination of a fifty-day fast, a strict vegan diet that ends with the arrival of Easter. Today being Holy Thursday, we revisit the final moments of Jesus’s life and the collective heart of Cypriot Christians aches all over the world.
Vasilios, my cousin who is a young novice monk, invites us to attend services at the Saint Barnabas Monastery near the ancient city of Salamis, where he will assist in conducting the oldest form of the Eucharist, The Divine Liturgy of Saint Basil.
“God doesn’t like to be kept waiting,” I whisper before sliding the shoebox of silkworms back under my bed for safekeeping. In true tomboy fashion, I dress for church in under five minutes.
“Your sisters have collected the figs, fed the animals, and you turn up at the last minute!” My father, Leonidas, with his classic chiseled features, tries to hide his amusement in vain.
“How will you ever find a husband with zero interest in household duties?” asks my mother, Andriani, a brown-haired, petite beauty with Socratic wisdom. The matchmakers are always looking to negotiate a young girl’s hand, and a few unflattering observations could be detrimental. Truth be told, my secret goal is to be number one in my class, win a scholarship to study abroad, and travel the world.
As we drive a short distance from Famagusta, we arrive at a domed monastery surrounded by green cypress trees. Three of the monks, Chariton, Stefanos, and Barnabas, are actually brothers in the literal sense, too, and all three have dedicated their lives to the church. Many days, they can be found outside painting icons in the courtyard, but today the Holy Thursday service takes precedence.
Every Cypriot child is familiar with the story of how our church achieved its independence. According to church tradition, Saint Barnabas’s most dramatic intervention came in the fifth century, a time when Christianity was thriving but also riven by power struggles between different centers of the faith. The church of Cyprus was struggling hard to keep independent from the bishops of Antioch, a powerful city in present-day Turkey with equally ancient Christian roots.
Luckily, the ecclesiastical fortunes of Cyprus were boosted when Saint Barnabas appeared to Archbishop Anthemios of Cyprus in a dream to lead him to the exact location where the saint had been buried hundreds of years earlier. After digging, the archbishop found a signed gospel of Saint Mathew lying next to the relics of Saint Barnabas. He traveled to Constantinople (now Istanbul) to gift the gospel to Emperor Zenon, who showed his appreciation by affirming the self-governing status of the Cypriot church, which continues to this day.
As a young girl there is a part of me that would rather be outside exploring nature, but once I step inside and become surrounded by vividly painted scenes from the Bible, my spirit surrenders.
Skill and devotion to the fashioning of religious images has been one of the glories of Cyprus throughout the Christian era, and it has survived all its vicissitudes. There was a period in Greek Christian history when the emperors and patriarchs wrestled hard with the question of whether it was right to use imagery in prayer. In Islam, for example, pictorial depictions of the divine are forbidden. At certain times the opponents of images prevailed and set about destroying sacred pictures. But Cyprus, helped by its ecclesiastical independence, was able to stay out of the controversy and provide a refuge for iconographers. Byzantine scholars consider Cyprus an “iconography heaven.”
We were taught that in some countries there were people equating reverence for icons with idolatry. But in the course of the Greek Christians’ long spiritual struggle to find a correct, balanced attitude to these images, a very subtle understanding developed. Distinction was made between worshipping or praying to material objects, which is unacceptable, and venerating objects that navigate us to God, which is legitimate. As a child, though, I could not imagine anybody arguing over religious images. I simply could not have conceived a church without them.
Vasilios stands just behind the royal doors, ready to assist his abbot. It’s time to receive communion, and children always go first. I close my eyes and pray that my sins may be forgiven.
The abbot dips a long, thin spoon into a silver goblet where consecrated wine is mixed with tiny pieces of equally consecrated bread: as my parents have explained to me, tasting these holy gifts is the nearest we will come on earth to meeting our Savior. Vasilios stands just off to the side holding a plate of uniformly cut bread; these are fragments from the same loaf as the consecrated bread and they too bring blessing, albeit of a lower status. I step forward as the priest proffers the spoon and gently addresses me: “The handmaiden of God, Anastasia receives the body and blood of Christ.” Tasoula is the Greek diminutive for the name Anastasia, which means resurrection in Greek. Tilting my head back slightly, I consume the sacred gifts and step toward Vasilios to take an additional piece of cubed bread, which adds to my feeling of purity.
After the ceremony, Vasilios, who is dressed in a simple black robe and a black cap or skoufos, greets us. “Come, let us pay our respects,” he says as he escorts us to the grave of Saint Barnabas. He stops to fill several bottles with holy water pumped from a well next to the burial place. In keeping with Cypriot tradition, Vasilios hands my mother additional bottles of blessed water, which she will use for protection and to mix with flour to make the dough that will make bread for my family for the rest of the year and provide us with protection. He also asks her to convey some bottles to his own mother.
We enter a cavelike structure, and as we descend several steps, the temperature drops while the scent of raw earth rises. After we pray in a small, square space, my brother Andreas asks Vasilios in a whisper, “Is it true what they say about the saint’s bones?”
Vasilios smiles. He is used to being asked this question and loves to share his spiritual knowledge, especially with young minds. “I see you know your studies, Andreas.
“Like many saints of that time, Barnabas was martyred for his religious beliefs, and his remains were buried in an unmarked grave. He sold all of his wordly possessions to spread the word about Christianity. That’s why he was given the name Barnabas, which means ‘son of encouragement,’” the young novice explains.
“Will you be an archbishop one day?” I ask as we climb the stairs back into daylight.
Smiling, he says “I wish to be of service to God, not to climb earthly ladders.”
As a competitive fourteen-year-old, I add, “It must be hard to be a monk.”
Along the coast from the monastery, where Barnabas was born, there is an even older settlement. Salamis is an ancient city by the sea that dates back to 1000 B.C. with a history of conquerors who have fought to possess the island. But even their large armies could never douse the fire that lives within the spirit of the Cypriot people, who have fought for their independence and to preserve their Hellenism since the earliest days of their existence. The fields are full of daisies, poppies, wild orchids, seasonal vegetables, and all kinds of herbs. We pick artichokes raw from the field and eat them with homemade tahini and bread while taking cover under a nearby tree.
Our playground was among Greek and Roman ruins—an ancient gymnasium, the king’s palace, even an amphitheater became the backdrop for my siblings and me to reenact the actual battles fought in Salamis. When the Venetians ruled Cyprus in the fifteenth century they built and fortified the city’s walls. After Famagusta fell to the Ottomans, they kept the walled city of Famagusta for themselves, prompting the Greeks to build another settlement next to it, and this became the town of Varosha. But the older generation that drilled us in that history failed to anticipate that the past would repeat itself during the Turkish invasion of 1974. On this occasion, Varosha was fenced in and declared off-limits to its inhabitants. Varosha, the place where I came from and where I belong. These ancient landmarks heightened my awareness about my Greek Cypriot culture, history, and mythology, which fueled my imagination and enforced my identity. We lived our day-to-day lives walking in the footprints of kings and saints who had come before us.
“Don’t forget to pull some rizarka,” father cries, hoping his voice will carry over the sounds of my siblings and me teasing each other as we run through the fields. The rizarka root, as we call it in Cyprus (known in English as madder or rubia tinctorum), grows high in the moist soil near the sea. I find some and tug until the earth releases the root. The rizarka, daisies, and onion skins will be boiled and turned into red, yellow, and orange dyes, which we will use to color our Easter eggs once we arrive in Mandres.
The picturesque drive to the village of Mandres circles around the Kyrenia mountain range toward the Pentadaktylos peak. Passing through the Turkish village of Agios Iacovos, we carry a sense of guardedness because of the heavy history our two communities share.
“Do not look them in the eyes,” my father would say. “If their eyes happen to meet yours, smile politely and look away.”
Prior to the invasion of ’74, the Greek Cypriots made up 78 percent of the population, Turkish Cypriots 18 percent, with Armenians, Maronites, and miscellaneous groups making up the remainder. Tensions between the two cultures stemmed from a three-hundred-year history of Ottoman oppression but more recently had to do with some Greek Cypriots wanting union with Greece (Enosis) and some Turkish Cypriots wanting unity with Turkey, or else partition. Under the treaty that granted Cyprus independence, from 1960, the Turkish Cypriots were given a 30 percent share of power, which Greeks saw proportionately as too high, and the arrangement broke down violently after three years. For the most part, the majority of Greek and Turkish Cypriots lived in relative harmony, but the extremists on both sides stirred the pot regularly.
As the truck continues to make its way up the mountain road, the village of Mandres finally comes into view. It’s set into a cliff on the mountainside and has spectacular views that stretch down to the sea and beyond. It is a small village with a population of a few hundred people comprised of farmers who grow everything from watermelon to tobacco leaves. Each family raises animals, mostly rabbits and goats, and donkeys are used as a mode of transportation. There is a wholesome simplicity to country village life where everything revolves around the local church and the coffee house where the village men play backgammon, exchange news, and debate politics.
After a warm welcome from the extended family, we get to work coloring the eggs for Easter as work both in the fields and in the house will halt tomorrow in observance of Good Friday.
Afterwards we head for the village church, to assist the priest and his young helpers drape long black linens over every sacred image in the interior of the church, to signify our mourning the death of Christ. The entire Orthodox community actively participates in this week leading up to Easter. This profound experience instills within me a rich sense of belonging.
Later we attend the evening service, in which we learn how Jesus Christ is betrayed and how he takes on every aspect of the character of our human vulnerability, including hopelessness. The priests and servers are all dressed in black. A large wooden cross is already present at the front of the church. Some people kneel and pray before it, showing their respect for the dead as they would at any funeral.
At the end of the ceremony people line up to pay their respects to the cross once again. We return to my aunt’s home after the service; there is a little time for some lighter tasks, such as placing the colored eggs in bowls and positioning unlit candles around the house. If this were not Holy Week, we would perhaps take turns playing the flute and mandolin, or singing and dancing to folk songs.
The next day is Holy Friday, the day Christ died on the Cross and was buried.
“Reflect on your sins today. Don’t forget to ask for forgiveness,” my mother instructs. We allow ourselves to eat diluted lentil soup (no olive oil) for nourishment while we consume small amounts of vinegar, the bitter drink Christ was offered instead of water while he was on the cross. The children play an integral part in preparing for the funeral procession. During the day we go from house to house and collect beautiful and aromatic citrus flowers, which we then use to decorate the Epitaphios, the wooden structure that is used in the evening service to represent Christ’s coffin. The base of it is covered by a tapestry that bears the image of a man wrapped in a cloth in preparation for his burial; that too is covered in flowers. We sprinkle rose water over it as a symbolic substitute for myrrh, which is traditionally used to embalm the dead. We use string or pins to make bundles of lavender and citrus blossom to decorate every square inch of the Epitaphios which occupies center stage in the drama of our Good Friday devotions.
The evening service is a moving tribute to the slain Christ, tinged with hope that he will rise again. The most heartrending part is the series of hymns of lamentation, beginning with the familiar words “I Zoi en Tafo,” (Life itself in the Tomb), sung to a haunting Byzantine melody that everybody knows and joins in, singing softly. The words elaborate the theme of Mary’s suffering, giving parents who have ever had to bury a child the opportunity to mourn anew.
Several of the faithful pick up the Epitaphios by the handles and carry it in procession around the church and outside. We young girls have baskets of flowers to hand out to the other worshippers, which they will continue to use in various rituals throughout the year. As a young Orthodox girl, I am mesmerized by the procession and reenactment of the Savior’s burial. The experience gives me a kind of inner strength, something that will always remain with me.
On Saturday morning, the mood changes. The solemnity dies down, and there is tingling anticipation instead. The local ladies roll dough into squares and triangles and then place a mixture of cheese, egg, raisins, and mint inside to make flaounes, a traditional Easter pastry. The sides of the dough are folded and we children brush them with egg yolk and then sprinkle them with sesame seeds. The wood ovens are then fired up, and within hours the scent of the freshly baked pastries lingers in the village air. My stomach, tested by fasting, reacts with a wanting growl.
Arriving at church for the first service on Saturday morning, we immediately notice that the priest and his helpers are no longer wearing black. The atmosphere is lightening. They remove the black drapes from the icons.
Although we only half understand the liturgical Greek words, an extraordinary, enjoyable story is being told in the service that now unfolds. Christ enters the kingdom of the dead. The prince of darkness lets him in, thinking this is just one more mortal coming to be enclosed forever. But far from being captured by death, Christ immediately begins liberating the dead, sending hell’s master into a rage. “You have tricked me! Why was I so foolish as to let you in?” the devil rails.
With suitable gusto, the bishop rings the bells as we stamp our feet and rattle our wooden seats, our way of showing that the powers of death are being conquered at that very moment.
Back at the house, we watch my grandmother and mother prepare a delicious avgolemono soup, made of chicken broth, rice, egg, and lemon, the perfect first dish to ease our stomachs into accepting rich food again.
We try to rest a little before we head back to church toward midnight and finally connect to the Holy Light of Jerusalem, the resurrection light that will illumine us for the rest of the year. We walk in procession through the village with our lanterns and candles to celebrate the return of Christ. Before we enter our home, my uncle makes a black seal with the smoke from our little piece of holy light, placing it to the right of our door to bring the Easter blessing to our home. Inside we light the kandyli, which is a glass jar filled with water and oil upon which a small wick is floating. It will illuminate our prayer corner, adorned with icons old and new and photographs of family members who have passed away. The Holy Fire is now within our domain, and its miraculous power has come to our home to protect us.
The celebration can begin. We have our soup and flaounes to break the fast, and each of us children will select a colored egg. We knock each other’s eggs to see whose will crack first, saying “Christos Anesti” all the while.
The following day, I watch my mother and aunts assemble the mouthwatering Easter feast of roast lamb and think about the day when I will carry on this tradition in my own home. Even today, I cherish these memories of Cyprus as if they were priceless personal antiquities, unwilling to let them fade as things naturally do with the passage of time. If only I had known the war was coming and that this would be my family’s last supper in Mandres.
My eyes bolt open. I frantically call the front desk of the hotel.
“Why didn’t I receive a wake-up call?”
“Madame, it is only two in the morning.”
I shower and dress for the sting operation and lie back down fully clothed, waiting for the alarm to signal the true start of this day.
OCTOBER 8, 1997
The Munich police station is a flurry of activity. An officer takes photographs of Lazlo to circulate to his men, to go alongside the images of Veres and Rossi. Kitschler escorts me into his office.
“The two hundred thousand Deutsche marks ($114,000) have not been posted to my account. I’m worried about the money reaching us in time.”
Kitschler reassures me, “We can change the plan. The intermediaries will tell Dikmen they will return with more cash after they view the inventory. It actually works better for us.” I trust Peter’s judgment. A feeling of relief washes over me knowing I won’t be required to spend another dime of the Church’s money to secure these artifacts.
We shift to the subject of Van Rijn.
“To secure Van Rijn’s safety he must keep his anonymity,” Kitschler says. “The intermediaries must leave Germany as soon as the operation is completed.”
“I will advise Van Rijn.”
“Are you ready, then?” Kitschler inquires.
I rise to shake his hand. “You have no idea how ready I am.”
A few hours later back at the Hilton Hotel suite, Herman, my bodyguard, and I nervously wait for Van Rijn to return from the lavish lunch he promised his men last night.
The phone rings. It is Kitschler.
“You have to stop Van Rijn! He’s in the car with the intermediaries on their way to Dikmen’s.”
“What?” I scream. “I’ll call you back,” I say, trying to camouflage the terror I feel. Van Rijn answers on the first ring.
“Get back to this hotel!” I say as if I am reprimanding one of my children.
“I have to be there,” he says, sounding inebriated.
“Are you insane? If you don’t return to this hotel immediately, I will have you arrested on the spot.”
There is an awkward silence.
“Step out of the car,” I say with all the authority I can muster.
“Okay, Tazulaah. You win.”
With trembling hands, I dial Kitschler.
“I have a police car escorting him back to you.”
This latest fiasco proves that Van Rijn is his own worst saboteur and possibly now mine. As he walks through the door of the hotel suite, I know my job is to get him focused on the matter at hand. I pour him a glass of water, and motion for him to sit.
“We have come a long way, you and I. If we don’t succeed, we fail your father, and my people. Are you ready to get this job done?”
The telephone in the suite is ringing. He answers coolly, “This is Eftis.”
I hold my breath as I hear Veres describe what he is being presented.
“Frescoes from the Church of Antiphonitis. Exquisite.”
Van Rijn interjects, “Tell him you love the Frescoes.”
“Eftis is interested in your Fresco collection,” says Veres. There is a long pause. I search Van Rijn’s face to see if there might be a problem, but he seems perfectly relaxed.
“Ah, an icon . . . Virgin Mary holding the Christ child, but the eyes are scratched.”
“Ask him if he knows the origin,” says Van Rijn.
Veres repeats the question to Dikmen.
“Cyprus,” is heard in response to the question.
“Good, tell him you’re thinking about it and want to see more,” instructs Van Rijn.
Veres repeats to Dikmen what Van Rijn instructs him to say. There is another long silence. Then we hear Lazlo react to what he is being presented.
“Eftis, there is a mosaic of unprecedented beauty . . . very old.”
“Good, ask him from what period,” instructs Van Rijn.
“Saint Thomas, 525 A.D.,” we hear Dikmen say in the background.
The situation looks more and more promising.
Veres inquires, “Is that from the Church of Kanakaria?”
“Yes,” Dikmen responds.
Veres continues, “Do you have anything from the Monastery of Antiphonitis?” Both of these churches had treasures from the fifth and seventh centuries and were located in the Turkish occupied area of Cyprus heavily targeted by looters.
“Ask him the price,” says Van Rijn.
“One hundred and fifty thousand Deutsch marks,” says Dikmen.
“Good,” Van Rijn whispers to Lazlo, “Now ask him to see more.”
Dikmen continues to show the intermediaries artifacts.
“Tell him that you will take all the frescoes and the mosaic, the icon with scratched eyes, and the coins,” Van Rijn whispers into the receiver.
Veres informs Dikmen, and Dikmen requests to see their cash.
“Now tell him you were not expecting to purchase as much. You must return to the hotel to get more money from Eftis.”
We hear Veres say, “It won’t take long. We’re staying at the Hilton.”
Van Rijn gives me the thumbs-up sign.
“Will be back shortly,” says Lazlo.
Ten minutes later the phone rings. It’s Lazlo. They are out of Dikmen’s apartment and on their way to the hotel.
“MOVE, MOVE, MOVE,” shouts Van Rijn giving me the cue to phone Kitschler, who is waiting for a signal that the intermediaries are clear.
Van Rijn paces the floor waiting to get word from Kitschler that they have Dikmen.
The phone rings.
“We have your man in custody,” says Kitschler, “We searched the apartment and all we find is a few pieces.”
“Kitschler is saying they can’t find any inventory,” I say.
Van Rijn screams, “Impossible!”
“How can this be? We all heard what went on in that room.” I tell Kitschler.
“I’m telling you Dikmen is hiding the inventory!” Van Rijn, shouts, looking panicked.
“Your men had his apartment surrounded, the inventory has to be in there,” I say to Kitschler, totally frustrated myself.
Meanwhile, Van Rijn continues to rant.
“Check the floors. Break open the ceilings. Look for dummy walls. Check the shed. Did you look through his papers? It has to be staring you in the face!”
Van Rijn becomes more angered.
“Rip up the floors. Bust through the walls. Find it!” He kicks the leg of a nearby armchair and orders a taxi to take him to Dikmen’s apartment.
I alert Kitschler who says, “Absolutely not. We have no authority to let him enter the premises. You must control him,” says Kitschler.
Van Rijn flings the chair across the room and my bodyguard jumps to his feet to restrain him. Without substantial proof of inventory, Dikmen will be released within the day.
The shock and disappointment open the door for paranoia to slip in and I watch Van Rijn with different eyes now wondering whether or not this has all been an act. Maybe he never intended to deceive Dikmen. What if the throwing of the chair, the upset demeanor, is all a show? Dikmen put a price on his head when they had a falling out. Could Van Rijn be playing both sides of the fence to win his trust back?
What if his plan all along might have been to humiliate me? I can just see him saying, “I got you, Tazulaah. It took me ten years, but I finally made a fool of your government and the art traffickers of the world rejoice with me today!”
The hours continue to slip by with the police finding nothing. It is I who urged the Archbishop to spend the Church’s time, money, and resources and encouraged the government not to arrest Van Rijn and work in cooperation with him.
The thought of having to return empty-handed terrifies me. Worst of all if Dikmen slips through the authorities, hands I will not have fulfilled my quest to see justice served. To the contrary, Dikmen can seek his own justice against me. I never contemplated failure until now. Pacing anxiously, I wonder if I might have wasted the last decade of my life. I curse the day that Van Rijn first approached me as consul, the day he walked into my life.