The Medusa Stone

Chapter 26

The place was modest, but lavish. It was a proper dining hall with paintings on the walls of magnificent mountainous landscapes and adorned with marble statues of gods and warriors. Some were covered, velvet and silk draped over them to prevent atmospheric damage. If this was but one of Fidikos’ houses, they could only imagine in their wildest dreams what his own home looked like.

Large chandeliers hung in gold and porcelain from the ceiling, three in number. Even the ceiling sported the Greek motif of the drapes in the bedrooms. It was peculiar that the room had no windows, but the art made up for it. The floor was covered with a large Persian rug, covering the pattern fashioned by mosaic tiling.

“I took the liberty of serving, how shall I say, normal food. A lot of people might not enjoy traditional Greek food, you see?”

“I have meant to ask, Mr. Fidikos,” Helen dared what she had been reluctant to find out. “Where are we?”

He smiled as he pulled out a chair for her, “A few kilometers outside Athens, Prof. Barry.”

Claire almost swallowed her tongue. “You mean we are in actual Greece right now?”

“Yes. You have been out for over a day. Why do you think you are so hungry, dear?” he chuckled, heartily, as if kidnapping the two women were a favor.

On the table, there was the usual fare of what Mr. Fidikos called normal food.

“We did not know if you were meat eaters or vegetarians or those silly people who live on oxygen and water alone,” he jested as he examined the dishes on the antique table. “Please sit.”

There was a combination of foods, eclectically selected for what Helen and Claire imagined was the indecision of an old man. Pork cutlets, onion rings, Caesar salad, roast beef and chicken with gravy, potato wedges, basmati rice and an assortment of roasted vegetables.

“There is also pudding if you want,” he bragged.

Both women protested instantly, vehemently declining politely.

“You Europeans,” he said and shook his head, “are not like Mediterranean women. Our food is a pleasure, an occasion. Here women are beautiful because they are sensual and healthy, not emaciated and sick looking creatures. Forget about your skeletal frames and enjoy life, ladies. Enjoy the good food, good wine, good sex. The latter lacks sorely in the British Isles.” He leaned forward with a naughty glint in his eye, “I speak from experience.”

“I bet you do,” Helen flirted back, to Claire’s astonishment. True, Soula’s husband was exceptionally charming, but she had never seen her boss react that way to an older man — not since David Purdue.

Deon Fidikos smiled warmly as they dished up for themselves, whatever they wished.

“I should not eat too fast after such a long fast, but boy, this all looks so good,” Helen remarked.

“May I pour you some wine, ladies?” he asked, lifting an unmarked bottle in a woven bamboo cover from his portable wine container.

“Thank you,” both women smiled as they started to wolf down their food.

“Will you not be eating, Deon?” Claire asked with a mouth full of at least three different meats.

“Me? Oh no, thank you, my dear. I have already dined at my own home,” he replied, filling their crystal glasses with delectable red liquid.

“You are not poisoning us, are you?” she asked without thinking. Helen’s mouth was full, but she slammed on the table, staring in disbelief at her assistant’s uttering.

Deon laughed and shook his head. He motioned for Helen not to be angry at Claire, maintaining an amused expression.

“I am, actually,” he revealed. His words were directly opposed to his calm and sweet demeanor, confusing his two captives even more. They stopped chewing while trying to figure out if he was joking or not. Deon slapped his knee in jovial response to their reaction.

“Not to kill you! God, no! I’m not a monster! The food does contain a sedative. After all, you are my prisoners until I get what I want. Come now, you know that I cannot have you running around by your full positives, ladies.”

“You are serious,” Helen remarked with genuine fear in her eyes.

“For what it is worth, the wine is perfectly safe. Go on, eat. You have already consumed enough to keep you nice and docile for the next two days. Look,” he smiled as he poured a third glass, “I’ll be delighted to join you in drink!”

When their glasses were filled the large, well-built Greek stood up and said, “A toast! To Claire, without whom my men would not have retrieved what she had kept in her locker at the museum!”

A brief uncomfortable pause followed. Helen looked very confused and Claire just looked terrified. They raised their glasses nonetheless, feeling very lethargic from whatever the food held.

“What was it that you had in your locker, Claire?” Helen asked just as they had drunk the first sip of wine. Claire was hesitant, unable to explain as she did not know what the purpose of the relic was.

“Something I kept for Dr. Heidmann,” she told her boss.

Deon looked down on the two women, his smile now void of any kindness or humor. In fact, he looked villainous and sadistic for a moment as he filled Helen in.

“In her locker, your assistant kept a very valuable ancient stone that I had been seeking for decades, Professor Barry,” he admitted. His voice was now softer, deprived of its flamboyant charm. Now he just spoke, delivering the exposition Helen craved from him. Claire nurtured a thousand thoughts all at once, wondering what Heidmann was going to do to her when he found out that the item he had entrusted to her care had been taken.

“What stone? Claire? You’ve been keeping relics in your locker?” Helen scowled.

“No, it’s not like that, Prof. Barry,” Claire defended.

“No it is not,” Deon concurred. “She was asked to hold on to it for the man who had been a festering boil on the ass of the Order of the Black Sun with his delusions of grandeur and severe misjudgment. Overestimating himself around every turn. I mean, the boy actually considered himself of the same thread as the most powerful of men in this world… of which I am one.”

Helen’s heart sank when she heard mention of that insidious organization, but she was relieved that the symbol she left under her desk was in fact the correct assumption.

“But then what do you want with me?” she asked in bewilderment. “If Claire gave your men the stone, why not let us go?”

“Because there are three stones, each named after one of the three Gorgons from Greek Mythology, my dear Helen. I now have one. The other,” he sighed laboriously, seeming truly burdened by the thought, “my beloved wife thought good to give to her lover after taking it from my collection. The poor clueless woman! For all the knowledge she held on relics and Greek Art History, she did not know what she had done, the magnitude of loss I suffered when she gave Professor Megalos that stone.”

“Professor Megalos!” Claire gasped. “Dr. Heidmann referred him to Mr. Purdue. I was the one who invited him, but I had no idea who he was! Professor Barry, I was only following orders, I swear to God!”

Helen just patted the young woman’s hand in consolation.

“Now, Megalos has the Stheno stone. Thanks to you, Claire, I am now in possession of the Euryale stone, and I must say, it has served me well,” Deon declared. “Now we must just find the last one, the Medusa stone.”

He walked over to one of the covered statues against the wall. “And that is why I cannot let you ladies go yet. I need Mr. Purdue to locate and bring me the Medusa stone, and you are my leverage,” Deon explained.

“You don’t know Dave Purdue, Mr. Fidikos,” Helen replied, withholding all threat in her voice. “He will never let the Black Sun get their way with him again.”

“You know, that is just what my wife told me,” Deon smirked. He tugged the silken cover from the tall, shapely shape of detailed stone.

“Oh, Jesus!” Helen screamed hysterically. “Oh, sweet Jesus! Soula! Soula!”

Claire was speechless, so spellbound by the grotesque remnant of Soula Fidikos, still in her long flowing black dress, that she could not move. Next to her, Helen Barry was screaming like a trussed sacrificial animal, unable to control her horror.

Her shrieks of madness only hushed when she passed out from shock, but Claire hushed once and for all. The trauma of what had befallen Soula Fidikos twisted her mind so that she remained quiet. She would never speak again.