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  It had taken months for Evangelia to find someone to train. Not many young people were interested in moving to a backwater village where the hardware shop was the only place selling women’s fashion and the clientele at the beauty parlour comprised cantankerous old men stinking of fish and women whose sense of style was stuck in the dark ages. Luckily Thea had suggested her goddaughter Sofia would be perfect for the position as she was eager to learn how to style hair and makeup professionally. Evangelia was blissfully unaware Sofia’s dream job was working with corpses. Sofia’s uncle, the proud owner of Cosy Coffins Funeral Home, had been a tad suspicious of Sofia’s enthusiasm for getting up close and personal with dead bodies and insisted she gain a years experience working on living people before he would let her loose on his corpses. The supposedly enthusiastic youngster was due to arrive in Astakos from Athens the next day.

  After feeding the cats Evangelia kicked off her shoes and carried a Greek coffee out to the balcony, sighing with relief to take the weight off her feet. Barely glancing at the spectacular sunset her prime position above the harbour afforded, she grabbed the salon scissors ready to slit open the envelopes of the four letters she’d received that day. Petros the postman’s curiosity was getting the better of him and he had slipped into the pesky habit of making sly comments, prying to discover if the constant stream of mail bearing foreign stamps were billets-doux. Not trusting him not to blab about the steady supply of letters arriving from overseas she made a mental note to complain about his gossiping ways at the post office. She refused to allow her sudden annoyance to dampen her excitement for the contents of the letters.

  A flutter of anticipation caused her breast to heave as she prepared to read the tender words penned by one of America’s most notorious serial killers housed on death row. Stan the Salt Lake City Strangler swore he was innocent, insistent it was an abominable case of mistaken identity that led to him being arrested for the bevy of choked corpses found accumulated in his cellar. He enclosed a photograph of his pudgy white hands to demonstrate to Evangelia they were not the hands of a killer. Evangelia made a mental note to enclose an emery board with her reply, noting Stan’s cuticles were in a terrible condition.

  Evangelia blushed and grabbed her palpitating chest when a naked photograph of Arsenic Anthony’s muscle ripped torso fell out of the next envelope. “Po po, that looks nasty,” she muttered, staring at the suppurating infected tattoo reading ‘EVAN’ emblazoned across his bare chest. Arsenic Anthony explained a fellow death row con had improvised with melted plastic but he’d only had enough cigarettes to pay for the first four letters of her name. He begged her to send him some more prison currency so he could cough up the necessary to pay for the remaining five letters. Evangelia made a mental note to stock up on cigarettes at the supermarket, hoping Fat Christos would not ask awkward questions about her sudden nicotine habit. She had no idea she was being scammed and the convicted murderer’s chest actually bore the name of his prison bitch Evan.

  Evangelia had corresponded with her next pen pal for over two years, sharing sweet secrets with the manipulative Marvin the Mincer who had cleverly convinced her of his innocence. Marvin was languishing on death row having been found guilty of chopping up his victims, feeding their body parts through a mincer and turning them into meat pies he sold on a market stall. As a side line he stuffed pillows he enjoyed embroidering in his spare time with his victims’ hair.

  Evangelia had recently boasted to Marvin she had a famous client, the weather girl Masha. Ever since Marvin had Googled Masha on the prison computer he’d developed an unhealthy obsession with the Russian beauty, showing more interest in her voluptuous assets and long blonde hair, than in Evangelia. Stabbed through with jealousy the hairdresser hadn’t the heart to break off their correspondence. However, as she perused his latest missive in which he begged her to send him some cuttings of Masha’s hair, her hackles rose and made her question if she really was a good judge of character. She made a mental note to never mention Masha again to Marvin the Mincer and to make sure any hair she swept up from the salon floor was thrown in the compost.

  Evangelia’s, by now obsessive hobby, began as an innocent pastime. When she first started writing to condemned men on death row she had welcomed the chance to practice her written English and to develop relationships with men she would never have to face in the flesh. She’d turned each killer, in her by now considerable motley collection, into her personal project, convinced they were all misunderstood. All they needed was the love of a good woman to reform them. Now she had to admit it was all getting a tad out of hand. At her last count she was secretly engaged to three serial killers and was mulling over the marriage proposals of another two murderers, but she hadn’t the heart to reject them.

  The final letter was from her favourite fiancé, a serial killer called Gonzalo, who penned the sweetest letters. His plea that she visit America so they could tie the knot in prison was quite tempting as Evangelia had developed a definite soft spot for Gonzalo. Although she wanted to believe he was innocent there was substantial evidence pointing to his guilt as a serial bigamist who had married and murdered his wives for their life insurance. She felt reassured that if they made it legal by exchanging vows on telephones divided by a bullet proof glass partition there would be no financial inducement for Gonzalo to finish her off as he was permanently banned from taking out any more insurance policies. In fact he’d told Evangelia she should take a life insurance policy out on him, promising her she would be ‘quids in’ when it was time for him to take his seat in the electric chair. Evangelia made a mental note to check out the cost of the premiums.

  Hunched over a lavender scented notepad Evangelia composed replies to the men in her life, while calculating whether she had enough cash stashed away to fly out to meet up with Gonzalo on Kentucky’s death row. With the ink barely dry she found a frame for Arsenic Anthony’s naked torso and added it to the collection of prisoner photographs cluttering up her bedside table. Even if all her prison pen-pals were as devoted to her as they professed Evangelia had to admit to herself she was still lonely, but was too afraid to commit to a man she could actually get her hands on.

  Chapter 5

  Old Crone Power

  ‘Call me Mel’ Melecretes was thoroughly enjoying his impromptu visit to Greece and hoped to use this opportunity to explore his Greek heritage. Although it involved sifting through mountains of dusty old files stored in offices staffed by obstreperous civil servants he was determined to discover if he was related to Nitsa as their familial moustaches indicated. He found the companionship of Fotini, Nitsa and Hattie most delightful. When he turned on his charm offensive they made a great fuss of him, pampering his every need and refusing to let him lift a finger. He was in no rush to return home to Idaho as his restaurant ‘Granny’s Greek Gyros’ was running smoothly in the capable hands of his brother.

  Melecretes huddled under a blanket on the sofa waiting for the two old crones to return from their taxi run and put a match to the fire already laid in the grate. Although he was a dab hand in the kitchen he considered any other form of domestic chores beneath him as a manly moustached Greek.

  “Brrr, it’s cold in here,” a sodden Hattie announced, returning from a brisk walk. “Why didn’t you light the fire Mel?”

  “That is women’s work. I have been engaged in much loftier things, my dear Hattie,” Melecretes replied, referring to his ongoing communications with the ambulance chasing lawyer who was determined to win hefty compensation for the outrageous treatment meted out to the two old crones by the heartless TSA authorities who had strip searched and detained them at the airport.

  “It pains me to recount the details of the torture poor Fotini and Nitsa suffered,” he sighed to Hattie’s sceptically raised eyebrows. “Luckily those eejits at Amnesty International ‘ave been persuaded to adopt Nitsa as the face of their latest poster protesting against torture.”

  “Tortured, my hat,” Hattie replied, putting a match
to the fire. “Still, a bit of compensation would come in handy to supplement their meagre pensions.”

  “Any interesting news from the village?” Melecretes asked.

  “Oh just the usual,” Hattie replied, completely clueless about any of the exciting events that had recently unfolded. “Stavroula’s taverna was closed so I had to have coffee in the kafenion and got chatting to some of those Doomsday trippers. It’s hard to believe they could be so gullible as to fall for this end of the world nonsense and hand over good money to pay for Adonis’ overpriced hotel rooms and Bald Yannis’ rip-off apocalypse kits.”

  Melecretes shook his head in agreement while inwardly laughing. He had heard all about Hattie’s own gullibility by handing over a fortune to a fraudulent Nigerian cat fisher who had wooed her with excruciating declarations of love and conned her into buying her own engagement ring.

  “That sounds like Nitsa now,” Hattie proclaimed at the sound of the old Mercedes taxi crashing into Quentin’s new ornate garden gate. The pair of them rushed outside to survey the damage.

  “It’s a good job yous were driving slowly Nitsa otherwise yous might ‘ave done some serious damage to the taxi,” Melecretes exclaimed, taking a look at the now mangled gate. The latest dent in Nitsa’s bumper was barely discernible amidst the multitude of others.

  Nitsa climbed down from the pile of magazines she was perched on and staggered unsteadily out of the taxi, the others gawping at her frightful appearance. Her dyed neon orange mop was streaked with unsightly brittle white patches, the result of Fotini being a bit free with the bottle of spray bleach on the hair-pin bends.

  “Tell me you didn’t pay good money for that hairdo in the beauty parlour?” Hattie spluttered.

  “I told yous to watch what yous was doing with that bleach,” Nitsa shouted at Fotini, contorting her frame to peer at her hair in the taxi’s wing mirror and muttering “’ow bad is it?”

  “Po po, there’s nothing wrong with yous ‘air, it just needs a bit of a fluff,” Fotini lied. “It’s better to ‘ave some bleached bits than risk ‘orrible germs from the ‘ospital breeding on yous ‘ead.”

  Nitsa raised her hands to fluff up her hair but as her bony fingers became entangled in the locks large clumps of the disastrously bleached brittle hair broke off. The others looked on in shocked horror as Nitsa, clad in her hideous old lady dress and wrinkled pop socks, clutched fistfuls of hair. One half of her orange moustache had received the bleach treatment and fell away as she rubbed her fingers across it.

  “See what yous ‘ave done now Fotini. Yous ‘ave sent me ‘alf bald with yous obsession with bleaching,” Nitsa shouted as more and more clumps of brittle hair broke away from her scalp.

  “At least yous wont’s ‘ave to ‘ave yous moustache waxed,” Fotini chortled. “Well, only ‘alf of it.”

  “’As anyone got any superglue?” Melecretes demanded, hoping to find a way to reattach the clumps of hair back onto Nitsa’s scalp.

  “No, but I ‘ave just the thing to hide the bald bits,” Fotini offered, whistling to the parrot to fly over and perch on Nitsa’s head. The parrot refused to be tempted, preferring to cast disdainful looks at the ridiculous humans from its superior position on a high branch of an olive tree.

  “What’s all this commotion?” Quentin shouted, emerging from his house and spying his recently acquired ornate gate in its newly mangled state. His question was somewhat muffled as he had taken the precaution of investing in a bee keeper’s hat to protect his scalp from the persistent unwanted advances of the parrot. The rest of his body was clad in a protective bee keeper’s outfit. Melecretes, not familiar with the sight of rural beekeeping outfits, mistook Quentin’s ridiculous costume for a hazmat suit and went into a full blown panic, shouting “oh my God, when did the quarantine start? We are all going to die of Ebola.”

  “Pull youself together Mel, the only Ebola round ‘ere is the cuddly kind Fat Christos flogs in the supermarket,” Nitsa reassured him.

  “It looks like the gormless wonder ‘as started keeping bees but is probably clueless and will likely do himself a serious damage,” Fotini cackled.

  “Ah, but think of the benefits of all that fresh honey,” Melecretes hastily pointed out; embarrassed he’d made a fool of himself by presuming a nasty plague was about to decimate the village.

  “This bee keeper’s hat is to protect my head from your blasted parrot. Unfortunately the only one I could find was attached to a full-body protective suit,” Quentin explained, lifting the visor to make his words decipherable. Catching sight of the parrot he hastily slipped the visor back into place but stood his ground firmly, daring the bird to try anything.

  “Worth every cent,” he triumphantly cried when the parrot for once ignored him. Retreating indoors before the others could notice his visor had steamed up and sweat was dripping from the bottom of his trouser legs, Quentin made a parting shot, threatening to send Nitsa a bill to have the gate repaired.

  “’Ow am I supposed to afford that on my meagre pension?” Nitsa called after Quentin as he slammed his front door. “It’s not enough that I’m nearly bald, now K-Went-In expects me to fork out for his vanity gate.”

  “Nitsa, worry not, I am a manly moustached Greek man and more than capable of mending K-Went-In’s mangled gate,” Melecretes said. “What’s more it will be my pleasure to pay for yous to ‘ave yous ‘air repaired at the beauty parlour.”

  “Ooh Mel, yous is such a good boy, I really do ‘ope we is related,” Nitsa gushed, clasping him to her bosom.

  “Steady on Nitsa, yous bleach might be catching,” Mel protested through a mouthful of her fallen off hair, attempting to extricate himself from her suffocating embrace.

  “I’ve got some news that will make yous day Mel,” Fotini announced. “Stavroula is determined not to shift from that old fool Vasilis’ bedside till he comes out of ‘is coma so I ‘ave volunteered yous services to run ‘er taverna.”

  “Fotini, I could kiss yous,” Mel declared joyously, delighted to have the chance to show off his culinary skills in the village.

  “Keep yous lips to yous self, yous young pervert,” Fotini shouted, desperately flapping her arms to keep him at a safe distance.

  “Can I persuade yous to come an’ ‘elp me in the kitchen Fotini?” Mel asked. “There’s nothing like the experience of a Greek granny to add the authentic touch to traditional Greek dishes.”

  “Po po, I’m not likely to ever be a granny with Pedros’ pathological obsession with avoiding women intent on ensnaring ‘im in romantic entanglements,” Fotini huffed. “But I could give yous a hand in Stavroula’s kitchen. It would get me out of the ‘ouse.”

  “What a team we will make,” Mel beamed delightedly.

  “An’ I can pick up unwilling passengers in the taxi and deliver ‘em to taste yous cooking,” Nitsa offered.

  “I’ve had an idea too, I am going to start keeping bees,” Hattie declared. Determined not to be left out she’d impulsively decided to steal the beekeeper’s suit off her son’s back and produce her own honey. High-fiving Fotini and Hattie, Nitsa crowed, “Old Crone Power.”

  “Yous three ladies are going to be so busy there won’t be a moment left to get on with the housework,” Melecretes mused. If they expected him to pitch in with the household chores he would be reluctantly forced to move into Adonis’ hotel.

  “I might ‘ave the solution to that,” Nitsa cackled, pointing to Fotis arriving clutching a lobster and a bottle of brandy.

  Chapter 6

  Bathing in Oil

  “Ooh Yanni, this is so thrilling. I never dreamt I would ever ‘ave an ‘andsome ‘usband whisking me off to eat in a taverna,” Soula cooed excitedly as Bald Yannis escorted her into ‘Mono Ellinka Trofima.’

  “Yous can’t bring that goat in ‘ere Bald Yanni,” Takis protested at the sight of the hardware shop man’s pet goat Agapimeni kitted out in a cheery daffodil yellow jerkin with a matching bow. “The only goats welcome in ‘ere are the ones we
serve up on plates.”

  Bald Yannis was about to object but the sight of Soula’s crestfallen face persuaded him not to kick up a fuss on her special evening and risk being banned from the taverna again. Instead he meekly led his darling goat outside, tying her lead to a low lying lemon tree branch close to the door.

  The taverna was packed to the gills with local villagers and Doomsday trippers vying for tables. Adonis beckoned Bald Yannis and Soula to join him at the table he was sharing with Quentin and Deirdre, saying “let me buy yous a drink for sorting out those foreign Doomsday morons earlier.”

  Quentin gave Deirdre a sharp kick under the table, warning her to conceal her obvious displeasure at being stuck at the same table as Bald Yannis.

  “’Ave things settled down now at the ‘otel?” Yannis asked Adonis.

  “There was a bit of an incident when some rich Kazakh sent ‘is bodyguard down to complain there was no bathtub. Apparently he likes to bathe in a tub full of oil every evening.”

  “What a wicked waste of extra virgin,” Yiota piped up, depositing a platter of tasty lamb chops sprinkled with oregano on the table.

  “Not olive oil. He likes to soak ‘imself in a spa treatment of crude oil, it’s some old Soviet custom,” Adonis explained.

  “That wouldn’t do yous sceptic tank any good,” Bald Yannis opined. “It’s a good job the ‘otel only ‘as showers.”

  “I’d never let crude oil anywhere near my lobster adorned shower curtains,” Adonis said.

  Gorgeous Yiorgos, sitting with Prosperous Pedros and Tall Thomas, was complaining Stavroula had unceremoniously thrown him out of her taverna earlier without explanation, barely giving him chance to tuck into his moussaka.