They Thought I Was Dead: Sandy’s Story

75 Autumn 2011

I stared at Julia numbly. My mind hung, my brain spinning like one of those infuriating little pinwheels on a computer screen. ‘Police?’ I said lamely.

I was frantically trying to think of all the reasons the police would want to speak to me. Had Roy finally tracked me down? Was I here illegally? But that could not be the case, this was the EU, I could travel freely anywhere within it if I wanted. It had to be something to do with Nicos, I concluded, but what?

Was he going to accuse me of stealing from him?

No way.

Julia Schmitt turned to the woman behind her. ‘This is my colleague, Ellen Reinbach-Brenner. She will take Bruno to see Dr Borg, if you come with me.’

Her colleague gave me a reassuring smile.

‘But — I... I want to be there for the consultation.’

Very firmly Julia replied, ‘It is Dr Borg’s preference to see him alone and then to speak to you afterwards. And these police officers must speak to you urgently.’

I leaned down to Bruno and explained quickly to him that this lady, Ellen, would take him to meet the man I’d talked about yesterday. He looked at her very closely, as if appraising her head to toe and then back up to the head, like a tailor or dressmaker. ‘What computer games do you like?’ he asked her.

I took the opportunity to slip away and followed Julia back across the Refectory, then along the labyrinth of corridors, the stone walls lined with sconces holding unlit candles, and framed motivational quotes that were on just about every wall in this vast building.

Man cannot seek new horizons until he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.

A mind once stretched can never return to its original dimensions.

Failure isn’t making the mistake. It’s allowing the mistake to win.

Then we came into the entrance foyer. Standing by the reception desk, which Bruno and I had arrived at just two days ago, were two men in smart green uniforms that had a military cut. One, tall and wiry, in his forties, with wavy grey hair, had two pips on his epaulettes, and the other, some years his junior, with sleek black hair, and a good-looking but a don’t-mess-with-me face, had just one.

Julia introduced me.

The tall one said, with no handshake offered, ‘Good morning, sprechen Sie Deutsch?’

‘I’m sorry, I don’t.’

He smiled, pleasantly, but not that warmly. ‘We are detectives from the Munich Headquarters. I am Kriminalhauptkommissar Ludwig Bollenbacher, and my colleague is Kriminalkommissar Jörg Steinmetz. We would like please to ask you some questions.’

‘Sure,’ I said, shaking with nerves. ‘What about, exactly?’

They both looked at Julia, and I had the uncomfortable feeling she knew something I didn’t. She led us through a doorway behind the reception desk into a small, cluttered office, with a table and four chairs surrounded by shelves loaded with a printer and a mass of files, and general office clutter. ‘Kann ich Ihnen ein Getränk holen? Kaffee?’ she said to the police officers.

Both shook their heads and she left the room, closing the door behind her.

I felt very alone and very scared. I looked at Bollenbacher, who seemed the friendlier of the two. Was I about to be interrogated by the hard man — soft man technique I’d read about in books and seen in movies?

Bollenbacher spoke first. ‘Frau Jones, we have been requested to speak with you by the States of Jersey Police, in regard to Herr Nicos Christoforou, who we understand is your partner?’

I stared at him for some moments, in silence. Wondering just how much he knew. Perhaps that I’d changed my name. But how far back had he drilled? Did he know who I really was?

I chose my words carefully before replying, not at all sure where this might be going. ‘He is my ex-partner, I have left him.’

The two officers exchanged a glance, which unnerved me. Just what the hell did they know?

‘How long have you been his ex-partner, Ms Jones?’ Steinmetz said. From his cultured voice I could tell he was more comfortable speaking English than his colleague.

‘I left him just under a week ago.’

‘On Monday, September the twenty-sixth?’ Steinmetz said. ‘The last time anyone has seen him?’

I felt like I had just stepped onto the edge of an elephant trap. Gathering my thoughts quickly, I said, ‘What do you mean, “the last time anyone has seen him”? Has something happened to him?’

The two officers exchanged another glance. Steinmetz responded. ‘You are not aware that Nicos Christoforou has not been seen since the night of September the twenty-sixth?’

I had no idea what my rights were, here in Germany. Should I ask for a lawyer? I decided, for the moment, to play dumb and innocent. Both of them were looking at me, no doubt reading my body language and wondering why I was pale and trembling. I shook my head. ‘No, I had no idea. He has not been seen since then? I did not know that. I just wanted to get away from him — and get my son away from him.’

‘He is not your son’s father?’ Jörg Steinmetz asked.

‘No. I did not move in with him until some while after my son was born.’

‘Could you tell us your movements on Monday, September the twenty-sixth?’ Steinmetz said, in perfect English, and only a slight German accent.

Again I was careful before replying. ‘Well, yes. I returned from England on the Condor ferry at around 5 p.m.’

‘And the purpose of your trip there, exactly, was?’ Bollenbacher asked.

‘I had not been back for three years. I wanted to see some old friends.’ Then, in what I thought was a flash of inspiration, I said, ‘I wanted to take my son to his grandparents. And I thought it would be good for Bruno to see where I lived before Jersey.’

I felt very uncomfortable about the penetrating way the two German detectives were looking at me. The scepticism on their faces.

I felt myself squirming. I was starting to blush. They could see I was lying. ‘Tell me something,’ I asked. ‘How did you find me here?’

Bollenbacher replied first. ‘We are informed by the States of Jersey Police that during the past months you have made phone calls to Hans-Jürgen Waldinger on the apartment phone. It was not hard. We contacted the schloss on their behalf and they told us you are here.’

I thought carefully before responding again. ‘OK, what you need to know is that I was in an abusive relationship with Nicos Christoforou, which is why I left him. Years of hell, in which I felt that my life and also my son Bruno’s were in danger.’

‘Can you tell us, Ms Jones,’ asked Jörg Steinmetz, ‘when was the last time you saw Nicos Christoforou? The exact time, to the hour?’

‘Yes, it was about 8 p.m. on the evening of last Monday. He told me the sea was quite calm and it would be a good night to go out fishing for bluefin tuna.’

‘This is something he did regularly?’

I nodded. ‘Fishing was his hobby.’

‘Is it not coincidental, do you think,’ Steinmetz continued, ‘that the night you disappeared is the same night your partner, who you say was abusive to you, was last seen? Because it seems a little more than coincidence to the police in Jersey who have requested us to detain you.’

‘What do you mean?’ I blurted, panic rising inside me.

The Kriminalkommissar dug his hand inside his tunic and produced a document, which he unfolded. ‘Frau Jones, I have a request here from the States of Jersey Police to arrange for you to be taken to our police headquarters in order that Jersey detectives can question you about the suspicious disappearance of Mr Nicos Christoforou.’

I jumped up in blind panic, yelling, ‘That is ridiculous!’

My one thought at this moment was to get to Bruno. No one was taking me and making me leave Bruno behind.

But Steinmetz had read me, and was blocking the door seconds before I reached it. ‘Please, Frau Jones, be calm.’

‘Be calm?’ I shouted, looking at him incredulously. ‘You’re accusing me of murdering my monster of a former boyfriend and you’re telling me to keep calm?’

His colleague intervened in his clumsy English. ‘Frau Jones, it is not we accusing, we are on the instructions of the police in Jersey. If you wish us to restrain you with handcuffs, we will do this, but I don’t think it is needed?’

I took a very deep breath and tried my hardest to calm down. Then I sank back into my chair and began sobbing. ‘This is not possible, it’s not possible. There’s been a big mistake, a terrible mistake.’

‘There are two detectives on their way here from Jersey to speak to you, Frau Jones,’ Steinmetz said. ‘They will be here in Munich in around —’ he checked his watch — ‘two hours. We will take you to the police headquarters for processing and there they will interview you.’

‘Processing?’ I asked, the word freaking me out. ‘Is my son coming too?’

‘This has all been arranged,’ Steinmetz said. ‘Your son, Bruno, will remain here in the care of Frau Reinbach-Brenner.’

I felt close to throwing up from nerves, and from the anger inside me, as the realization hit me. Julia Schmitt already knew about this when she came to the Refectory to collect me. She had already been making arrangements. Presumably Hans-Jürgen knew also.

‘You don’t need to handcuff me,’ I said lamely, through my tears.