Serpentine Page 26

  Reposing under heavy guard in an Athens police lockup, Charles sifted through his options. One thing he could not tolerate was extradition to Turkey. He suspected the minimum sentence he would receive there was twenty years, provided he survived the beatings he would surely receive from enthusiastic interrogators. Better that he remain in Athens, dally with Greek law, and search for some way to elude long-term punishment. He found himself alone with André for a few minutes in a corridor outside a police captain’s office and he whispered urgently, “Don’t admit anything. Say nothing. Let me handle it. I know the Greek law.”

  Charles knew one interesting fact in the Greek code of justice: a prisoner could be kept in jail for a year and a day without going to trial. But then, if a trial had not begun, the prisoner had to be released. He elected to gamble and play with the year and a day. Who knew what might happen in that length of time? Charles refused to make a confession. He denied robbing the Egyptian. He denied using Anton Kecvic’s passport and insisted he had no idea how it got in his briefcase. Perhaps the police had planted it and the other incriminating items. He refused to plead one way or another to a charge of robbery and assault. All of this was designed to make it harder for the Greek prosecutor to assemble a case, and Charles further intended to file a flurry of delaying motions.

  He had squeezed out of precarious positions before, but one thing nagged at him. He prayed that the Greeks would not uncover his long ago conviction in absentia for the drugging and robbing of the Englishman, Converse, on the island of Rhodes. That meant thirteen months in prison, possibly more, as he had fled to avoid prosecution. Charles doubted that the Greeks would make the connection. One government had fallen since then, the new one seemed shaky. Records often disappear when governments collapse. At least Charles hoped they did.

  An Athens magistrate directed that Charles Sobhraj and André Darreau be confined in the prison called Korydallos while the case went through the legal process. Upon hearing this, Charles felt modest elation. In the grapevine of the underworld, Korydallos was, as prisons went, not a bad place. Compared to the dungeon of, say, Kabul, it was almost luxurious. Charles could “operate” in Korydallos, and, to confound his captors even further, he conceived a bizarre—if self-serving—trick.

  En route to the prison, in a police van, Charles was able to speak to André, who was lashed to his half-brother by chains at hand and foot. “The moment that the police turn us over to the prison authorities,” said Charles, “the jurisdiction changes. The police know who we are, but the prison officials do not.” André nodded, but he was unable to follow this riddle. Charles continued. The prison authorities did not even know they were brothers, only two Oriental men who looked a little alike. But Europeans think all Orientals look alike. So, proposed Charles, the moment they stepped across the prison threshold, they would switch identities.

  Not unrealistically, André wanted to know what this would accomplish. Why would Charles want to become André Darreau, and vice versa? At this point, André was probably thinking he had put quite enough trust in his seductive brother. A few months before, André had been living quietly in Paris, gainfully employed, living modestly but reasonably well, enjoying the delights of girls in short skirts and boulevards to follow them on—and now he was riding in a police wagon toward an unknown sentence in a Greek prison. Not to mention Turkish police who were practically standing at their border begging the Greeks for extradition. Sensibly, André shook his head and refused to assume the name and identity of a man wanted in six countries and two continents.

  But Charles persisted. He had thought this one out carefully. It gleamed with Machiavellian luster. After a few weeks inside, the authorities would discover that André Darreau had no previous criminal record in Greece, that the case against him was weak, and that he should be released with a scolding—and expulsion from Greece. A light began to dawn on André. If Charles were to become André Darreau, then he would be the one to gain freedom. “What about me?” André said coolly.

  Charles shushed him. Once he was safely out of the country, he would send a coded telegram to André in Korydallos Prison. Then all André had to do was step forward, ask to see the warden, reveal that he was the real André Darreau, that the stupid authorities had released the wrong man.

  André chewed on this for a minute. They would be at the prison gates in another few moments. There was little time to argue. He found one more question. But wouldn’t the warden be furious and take it out on him, he asked? Charles shook his head. André would then threaten to telephone the French Embassy. Greece has a new government, they cannot afford the embarrassment of keeping a French national in prison, particularly when he is the wrong man. André had no time to mull the scheme, for Korydallos was coming into view. Only twenty minutes from the heart of Athens, it sat on a sun-baked hill near the port of Piraeus, almost washed out by the intense white light of noon. Set down in the heart of an industrial district, the prison, with its gray and cream walls, could be taken for a factory, save for the Greek women, some ancient grandmothers, others vividly painted birds of the street, who stand outside and call endearments to their men within.

  The two men were escorted through a cool and airy entrance, into a pleasant garden with carefully tended beds of marigolds and daisies, and orchards of figs and olives, into a building called Section 4, where prisoners were kept while awaiting trial. The floors were green speckled marble, the walls washed frequently with soap, the recreation room containing television and a radio. And when a prison official came to count heads and take identities, he called out from his clipboard, “Charles Sobhraj?” After a moment of hesitation, André Darreau stepped forward. And when the subwarden said, “André Darreau?” Charles Sobhraj stepped forward promptly, bowing obediently. From that moment on, the two brothers had traded places.

  A few weeks passed. The days became routine. Charles and André were fortunate to have been placed in the same cell, on the second floor of a wing devoted largely to foreign prisoners. Morning wake-up was not even until seven-fifteen. “I’ve been in jails where they throw you out of bed at five,” said Charles. And the food was, all in all, good. Milk tea and toast for breakfast; fish, vegetables, and fruit for lunch and dinner. No work was required, thus the days were free for reading, writing letters, or milling about in a recreational area. They passed themselves off to the other prisoners as Vietnamese, Charles not wanting to become friendly with anyone he did not feel could benefit his cause. The Number One rule in prison, he cautioned André, is to pick your friends carefully. One never knows who is squealing to guards. Because nobody could speak Vietnamese, Charles and André were left alone. They further ensured this by staging karate exhibitions replete with ominous grunts and cries. The first week in prison, André was cornered by a three-hundred pound Greek who approached with a gleam in his eye and arms prepared for a bear hug. When André demurred, the Greek was outraged and lunged at his rejector. André waited calmly until the giant was but a garlic breath away before sending out a vicious kick to his kidneys, followed by a chop that almost sliced open his neck.

  Charles used his free hours to study Greek law, writing an eloquent letter to the court pleading for his release (he being at this point André Darreau). Quoting from sources as varied as Plato and modern as novelist Nikos Kazantzakis, shuddering at the loss of personal liberties under the shameful half decade of the colonels (Papadopoulos was in another wing of the prison), reminding the bench that Greece was the cradle of democracy, Charles concluded his petition by pointing out that he had fallen under the influence of evil associates. If the court in its compassion would release him from bondage, then he would leave the country and never return. Signing Andrés name with a flourish, Charles mailed the letter and predicted that both would be free in a fortnight.

  Two months passed. No response from the letter. Bleakness settled over André, anger over Charles. Each day the men waited and each day they were disappointed. André asked why Charles did not reveal the swit
ched identity plot. The response was that Charles felt it was not “foolproof,” and besides, he had to be out of prison in order to make it work. For several more days he brooded. “I think,” he at last told André, “we can escape.” He asked his half-brother for patience.

  For the rest of the day Charles was absent from his cell, wandering around the communal room, talking in whispers to both prisoners and guards. That night he astonished André by unbuttoning his shirt and pulling out a map of Korydallos, plus a set of architectural plans. “Where did you get them?” exclaimed André. Charles smiled and shook his head. “One learns when one has to,” he answered.

  The two men studied by candlelight. Charles was stimulated to discover that a large water canal ran underneath Section 4 of the prison to accommodate the runoff from 120 cells. This canal emptied into a major water main outside the walls to join the Athens sewer system, presumably flowing thereafter into the harbor at nearby Piraeus. Most Greek prisons had very small water pipes, impossible for a man to crawl through. But the pipes beneath Korydallos seemed large enough, particularly if a man was small, compact, and strong—“like us.” A little digging down to the pipes would connect the men to freedom.

  They faced an immediate problem before any tunnel digging could begin. Charles and André occupied a cell on the second floor and would have to finagle a transfer to the ground floor. Therefore they turned testy, fighting, yelling at one another, causing such commotion that the other prisoners complained. One morning the guards marched in and announced that the two Vietnamese were being moved to the first floor where they would be watched more carefully. The guards were tired of running upstairs to quell disturbances. If the two men did not stop quarreling, they would be separated and thrown into solitary. Understood? Charles made theatrical protest in Vietnamese, but on the way downstairs he winked at André. So far, so good.

  Now they became model prisoners, as quiet and as obedient as lambs, and the guards soon withdrew their heavy attention. The next problem, said Charles, was finding two more men to help. The floor was a foot thick, composed of cement with a marble overlay. And it would be safer if the tunnel were dug in another cell, for his estimate was that the work might take six weeks. The possibility of the guards discovering the work-in-progress had to be faced. If that unfortunate event occurred, then it would be better for Charles and André if the hole were found in somebody else’s cell floor.

  “We must study this carefully,” said Charles. The one hundred or so prisoners in Section 4 were, for the next few days, scrutinized by Charles as carefully as tourists in a Hilton lobby. He was disappointed not to find any Frenchmen, except for one rag-and-bones morphine addict from Normandy who insisted he was once Edith Piaf’s lover and who sang obscene songs about George Pompidou. Attention settled on a pair of young American boys nailed on a minor hashish charge. Their names were Pete and Snapper, their misfortune having been caught with a few grams of hash in their knapsacks. Both were terrified by their confinement and were happy to receive a visit from Charles and André, who seemed wise in the ways of prison and Greek protocol. As a fillip, the Americans had been militantly opposed to the U.S. involvement in Vietnam and they were pleased to meet two actual Vietnamese victims of the war—or so Charles had them believe. Long discussions on the fate of that ravaged country were held, with Charles paying them lavish compliments for their opposition. He was more interested in the fact that both Americans had been college athletes and still had strong bodies with heavily muscled arms and shoulders.

  The four prisoners became friends, a convenient arrangement since their cells were directly opposite one another on the central corridor. During the daylight hours, prisoners were allowed to have their cell doors open, and visiting went on routinely if there was no noise or trouble. Nothing was mentioned about an escape for several days. One night André asked Charles why he had not broached the subject. The answer was that he had to be convinced of their dependability—and their hunger to escape. It was Charles’ intention for them to conceive the idea of breaking out. They would recruit Charles and André. “I’ll never understand you,” said André truthfully. “A day with you is a like a month with anyone else.”

  When next the four met, Charles deftly turned conversation into a discussion of what penalties they might face. How much hashish were they accused of possessing? Twelve grams, said Snapper. He was a tall, gangling boy from Texas with sandy hair and a freckled face, appealing despite a scraggly beard and a rarely washed body. Not even half an ounce, chimed in Pete, who was from Oklahoma and had fled first to Canada to avoid the draft, thence to Europe, where he married an English girl only to find out that she had another husband, who sold computers in Malta.

  Charles whistled sympathetically. Twelve grams did not seem substantial, but he knew a previous prisoner in Korydallos who had been caught with only one gram—and received a six-year sentence. The two Americans were stunned. They had been led to believe by a lawyer that they would get less than a year, probably suspended at that. Charles shook his head in disagreement. The Greeks were fanatic about punishing drug pushers. Under the dictatorship of the colonels, judges meted out death in certain drug cases.

  Gloom settled over the Americans’ cell like a final curtain. Calculatedly, Charles moved the talk to his case; he and his “friend”—they were still concealing the fact that they were brothers and using switched identities—probably faced staggering prison terms, perhaps life on charges of armed robbery and assault.

  “Life!” echoed Snapper in disbelief.

  Charles nodded sadly. The blame should be placed, he felt, on the Vietnam War. He and André had been forced to flee their country, winding up in Greece alone and broke, pressured to commit robbery just to buy food. The Americans were all consolation.

  Charles sighed. If he only knew how, he would attempt to break out of this prison. Someone had given him a map of the underground beneath the cells, and it seemed there was a water pipe big enough to crawl through. But he had no idea how to accomplish a tunnel. Slowly, brilliantly, Charles made the American boys feel it was not only their idea but their duty to help the Vietnamese escape. And they could make it, too! They would commence digging immediately, in their own cell. Would Charles and André consider helping?

  Later André congratulated his brother. The tactic had been daring. He had taken his own idea and grafted it on two strangers. “You see what I mean about using psychology?” said Charles. He yawned and commanded silence. They needed sleep. Tomorrow they would dig to freedom.

  Their tools were a handful of rusted nails, a fork, and a spoon. With these, the four men intended to cut through a foot-thick floor, burrow into the earth for almost six feet, and then—who knew what or where? To reach this point would take, Charles estimated, eight solid weeks of work, work every day, work seven days a week, work from sunrise to lights out—with a guard station only twenty feet away. The feat was breathtaking in its ambition and danger. After two weeks, a hole was cut through the foot-thick floor, then, once the earth was reached, Charles and André spent all of the time actually inside the tunnel. It was wide enough only to accommodate their slim bodies, not the broad-shouldered Americans, a fact that Pete and Snapper did not fully understand. Charles made an occasional vague remark that “when it was time” the hole would be widened. In the Americans’ naïveté they believed him.

  Only one man could work inside the hole; the three others passed the time in distracting conversation, card playing, karate, anything to make the scene appear normal when the guards strolled by. At the very beginning of the labor, Charles devised a clever way to conceal the hole. He found a piece of paper and drew a marbleized design that matched the floor exactly. The custom in Korydallos was that prisoners could clean their cells if they wanted to—or, failing that, they could live like pigs. The American boys had been known as poor housekeepers even before they met Charles, so the guards never remarked or grew suspicious of the layer of dirt that covered the piece of paper that covered the
hole.

  The most demanding problem was how to dispose of the dirt and rocks. Charles solved this by teaching each man to stuff dirt into his shirt, walking like a pregnant woman into the recreation yard, and discreetly emptying the soil into a corner, several times a day. As the weeks passed, the men experienced exhilaration, fear, hope, and—inside the hole—terror that clawed at the heart. “There’s no air, there’s no light, you realize you are nothing,” gasped André when he emerged after an hour below. He was carrying a rock as big as a watermelon. Charles made light of the discomfort, even the muscle tears and stabbing pain, for he had to be the cheerleader, keeping spirits up and determination alive when a bent spoon encountered a stone eighteen inches in circumference.

  When the hole reached six feet, Charles directed that the digging flatten out and turn in a direction toward what he believed to be the large water pipe. But in the ninth week of endeavor, when André was digging, he encountered an unexpected brick wall. Charles shook his head. There was no wall on the plans. “Perhaps it’s some old ruin,” suggested Snapper, who was interested in archaeology. He had, in fact, gone abroad to join a dig in Egypt, but was refused employment and discovered instead the joys of non-committal drifting and smoking hashish. Charles doubted the wall was ancient. He went down, looked, and then told André it would have to be cut through. There was no alternative. Aching, caked with dirt, André dropped back into the hole and began chipping away at the mortar between the bricks. Hours passed. Charles relieved him. More hours. André returned. A hole was almost accomplished.

  Suddenly, with a cracking noise, the wall broke and a flood of water rushed out, sweeping over the terrified prisoner and quickly starting to fill the hole. André screamed, but water filled his mouth. He was going to drown! Desperately he clawed at the now slippery passage, tearing chunks of mud, fighting his way up the longest six feet of his life. Charles heard the water and plunged the top half of his body into the hole to rescue his half-brother. He pulled André out and laid him down, hurriedly wiping the water from his face and arms. At the same time he directed Snapper and Pete, nearly paralyzed with fear, to throw rocks into the hole and dam it up. As it happened, the afternoon’s dirt and stones had not yet been dumped in the recreation yard. The four men watched in suspense as water gurgled almost to the level of the cell floor, then, blessedly, receded. Not a drop splashed over into the cell to incriminate them. Charles would not permit despair. “We’ll start again tomorrow,” he said. “The earth will be softer now.”