by Anne Hampson
‘If you are agreeable. I thought it would be nice for Rian; she loves swimming and hasn’t been in the water for a week. We could of course swim here, in the pool, but it would be pleasant to go on to the beach.’
‘Yes, I’d love to. I haven’t brought my swim suit, though, so we’ll have to call at the villa on our way down.’
There were few people on the beach, but as the morning progressed several groups of tourists arrived, their beach wear and bright umbrellas providing a gaiety and colour to the scene. Rian’s hair was as usual immaculate, and she wore a cap. Shara on the other hand swam without and when they were sitting on the sands Rian shyly touched the wet strands of hair.
‘Is it nice swimming without a cap?’ Prim the voice -yet Shara detected a hint of wistfulness in it, and the child sent her father a strange look - a mingling of reproach and pleading.
‘It’s a wonderful feeling, Rian.’ Shara’s glance flickered to Carl; he lay stretched out, but his head was raised on the support of his hands, folded behind it. ‘Can Rian swim without hers, Carl?’
He turned; she noted the unsmiling countenance. He had been deep in thought and she had the impression that the problem, or whatever it was that troubled him previously had now returned.
‘It will spoil her hair.’
‘I can wash it for her when we get back.’
He frowned, but before he could speak Rian had added her plea to that of her aunt.
‘Very well,’ he consented, and somehow Shara knew
- this was the first move in what was to be a complete victory. And it was. Rian with miraculous swiftness became all that a little girl of five should be. And side by side with the relaxation of the constraint imposed by her father there came naturally a dropping of the child’s own manner of restraint. She laughed more; she would flop down on a chair regardless of the fact that her dress might become creased; she lost a hair ribbon or scratched a knee, she romped around the garden with Shara, playing hide and seek among the trees, finishing up with soiled clothes and perhaps grubby face and hands ... but aglow with the happiness and freedom which is the birthright of every child. At first the Greek woman in whose charge she had been was not pleased, but with careful handling and tactful smiles, and the deliberate exhibiting of her innate charm, Shara won the day.
Everyone appeared to be much more happy and free; Carl seemed relaxed even though there was something heavy on his mind at times. He gave dinner parties to which Shara and her employer were, quite naturally, always invited; he spent time at Gilbert’s villa, helping with the book by providing information about customs and festivals and the way of life of the Cypriot peasant. Together the three attended several village weddings, on one occasion - and this especially for the book - they spent the whole three days in the village, as guests of the bride’s people.
‘This is certainly an experience.’ It was the first day, and preparations were going on everywhere; all work having stopped. Spits and ovens were prepared for the cooking that would take place the following day; chickens and piglets were being slaughtered by the hundred, for the number of guests on this occasion was well over a thousand. ‘Look at that poor little fellow!’
The piglet, having escaped, was screaming as it ran around the square followed by a man brandishing a knife.
‘How - awful!’ Shara turned away, but everyone appeared to be highly entertained by the spectacle. The piglet captured, it was killed instantly, and this happened all the time. The man killing the chickens had them tied to a long pole, and as each one was taken down its head was severed. ‘It’s primitive!’ exclaimed Shara, but she was far from being shocked, having had plenty of experience of the barbaric way in which the peoples of the East treated their animals. She had once said to a to a highly educated man from one of the Greek islands, ‘That donkey of your neighbour’s is not happy. It has nothing to graze on.’
‘Happy?’ The man had thrown back his head and laughed heartily. ‘Why - tell me why - should a donkey be happy!’
‘Daddy, look at the lovely baby goats. Aren’t they sweet and white and furry?’ Not for the first time had Rian called Carl Daddy. Shara, often forgetting that here children called their fathers, ‘Papa’, would refer to Carl in the English manner and Rian was quickly beginning to do the same.
‘Very pretty, Rian.’ But Carl looked at Shara, who was frowning in spite of the fact that she knew full well the goats must be slain to help load the tables which, the following day, would be laid out in the bride’s orchard which, along with the house, was part of her prika.
Dancing and singing accompanied all the activities.
The bride’s maidens, twenty-four in number on this occasion, laughed as they stitched ribbons and other ornamentations on to the nuptial mattress. This took place the following day, accompanied by dancing and bouzouki music and light-hearted laughter and chatter from everyone concerned. The whole village was one gay carnival, with every inhabitant busy in some way. On the morning of the ceremony the black-bearded priest arrived to shave the bridegroom, whose koumbari - or best men -danced and sang as they stood around watching the ceremony of the shaving; the bride’s maidens were in the house, arraying her in all her finery. Today - for the first and only time in her life - she would wear make-up. This was applied by the laughing girls, each getting in another’s way as they all tried to be helpful. It was gay, and very Eastern. The father of the bride took the rolled-up mattress on his shoulder and carried it into the house. Inside was the bride’s trousseau, also money which had been dropped on to it at the same time that the baby boy was being bounced on it. Hundreds and hundreds of presents lay in a great pile in one room; others had been taken from their wrappings and put on display.
The procession was on its way at last, making for the white church on the rise at the top of the main street of the village, the bride carrying flowers, her maidens lighted candles of enormous length, and with great wide ribbon bows attached to them a little below the flame.
The ceremony was described by Gilbert as hilarious, and he and Shara were making notes the whole time.
People chattered and laughed, half of them not even hearing a word of the ceremony. It was nothing for a relative or guest to stop the priest in the middle of what he was saying and ask to be allowed to take a photograph.
Cameras would then snap from all over the church and the service would recommence. Repeatedly this happened and with a benign smile the priest would pose between the couple. Hundreds of snapshots must have been taken by the time the service came to an end. The best men passed round a ribbon and each signed his name upon it. This would be treasured by the bride and groom.
The ‘feasting’ lasted for hours, with dancing and singing afterwards, and of course the delicious Cyprus wine flowing. The bride and groom took no part in all this until, after having sat and given out wedding biscuits to each guest, they performed a ritual dance during which the guests would come and pin money to their clothes. These clothes were in the end covered with notes.
‘I’ll bet they’ve collected something in the region of a thousand pounds,’ calculated Gilbert as he and his two companions watched the dance begin again after they had pinned on their own contributions. ‘This custom was introduced by someone with an ingenious mind!’
‘What’s an in - ingenious mind?’ Rian wanted to know, looking at Gilbert who, during the past couple of weeks, had become ‘Uncle Gilbert’ to the child who so short a time ago was so shy and reserved and unnaturally stiff with all whom she came into contact.
‘Clever, Rian, that’s what it means. Someone had a very clever idea when they thought of the custom of pinning money on the clothes of the bride and groom.’
‘I wouldn’t like to have money pinned on my beautiful white dress, would you, Auntie Shara?’
‘No, Rian, I should not like money pinned on my dress.’
‘The pins would spoil it, wouldn’t they?’ Rian was smiling up at her aunt, and she placed her small hand in
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p; hers, gripping it tightly. Something stirred within Shara -something between warmth and gratitude and the relief of knowing that now she could broach to Carl the question of the transfer of the money to his daughter.
‘They would indeed.’
‘And you want to save your wedding dress for ever, don’t you?’ The small face was animated, the dull-green eyes expressive and very wide and frank.
‘Of course you do.’ Shara had the greatest difficulty in avoiding a direct look in Carl’s direction; she wished to know his expression and yet of course it would be too pointed an action to allow her eyes to stray to him. ‘It becomes a keepsake.’
‘Is that what you call it? I like that name.’ Rian chattered on and seemed never to tire. However, eventually she did begin to go quiet, and whereas on the previous two evenings she had been put to bed in the room allotted to her and Shara in one of the cottages, this evening her tiredness was an excuse for them all to get away, and this they managed to do just after eight.
‘You might as well stay for a while,’ invited Carl when they had all arrived back at his house. ‘I don’t know whether you feel like dinner after all that food, but if so Maria will get something—’
‘Good heavens, no!’ interrupted Gilbert, then immediately glanced apologetically at Shara. ‘At least, I’m not hungry, but you...?’
She shook her head.
‘I feel I’ve had sufficient to last me for a week.’
‘In that case,’ said Carl, ‘we’ll have a snack later.’ He looked at Shara. ‘You’ll probably find you’re peckish in an hour or so.’
‘Can Auntie Shara put me to bed tonight?’ from Rian as she glanced at her father. ‘I like it when she does, because she reads me a lovely story.’
Carl said, making an apologetic gesture,
‘Do you mind, Shara?’
‘I’d love to do it.’ Her glance was happy, the curve of her lips tender and sweet as she gave a smile to her niece. ‘Come, my pet, the bath first and then the story when you are comfortably settled in bed.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
FOR the next ten days Shara and Gilbert were away at Famagusta, touring the entire district in search of material for the book.
‘There’s so much,’ Gilbert said as they sat in the square of the Old City and drank delicious lemonade. ‘We’ll have a great deal of sifting to do, I’m afraid. Otherwise the book will be far too long.’ The Turkish proprietor of the cafe came out, asking if they required another drink. ‘Have it on me,’ he said with a smile.
‘Indeed no. But I would like another drink. You, Shara?’ She nodded and Gilbert ordered. The man insisted on their having it free and both looked at one another and shook their heads. Greek Cypriots or Turkish - all were gifted with this incredible spirit of hospitality. ‘Thank you very much,’ Gilbert said when twenty minutes later they made a move to go. ‘We shall see you again some time, I hope.’
‘You come back to Famagusta one day?’
‘If it is at all possible.’ His voice was a trifle nostalgic and Shara wondered if he would in the end decide to take Carl’s advice and buy the plot of land in readiness for his retirement. Not that she personally believed he ever would retire, but he might decide to leave England
and settle permanently on the island.
From the cafe Gilbert and Shara strolled over to the beautiful cathedral built by the Lusignans and one of the most lovely examples of Gothic architecture in existence.
‘Can you imagine the pomp and splendour when the king was crowned here?’
Gilbert nodded, but reminded Shara that the kings of Cyprus were crowned first in Nicosia, and then headed a grand procession from the capital to the Old City where they would be crowned a second time. The cathedral was made into a mosque - the Lala Mustapha Mosque - at the time of the victory of the Turks over the Venetians, and it was still a mosque, for the Old City of Famagusta was inhabited entirely by Turkish Cypriots. On another side of the lovely square had stood the Palazzo del Proveditore, a beautiful Venetian palace of which there was little left except the facade with its three arches supported by massive granite columns taken from a temple at Salamis.
‘It’s so very oriental,’ murmured Shara, taking down what was being dictated to her by Gilbert. ‘The Moslem effect of the minaret, the men in their vraga and the fruit stalls and shouts of the marketmen.’ She continued and Gilbert made no interruption, for as she. spoke she jotted in her notebook. Then he resumed his dictation and so it went on all afternoon until, tired but pleasantly so, they took supper at a cafe where the tables were set outside, in the exotic garden, and where the roof was made of trailing vines threaded about the poles which had been provided for them. Through these vines the stars twinkled, and now and then as a faint breeze rustled through them the enormous moon could be seen as the leaves of the vines parted obligingly as if to give the people dining there below a little bit more value for their money.
The following day, which was their last in the Old City, was spent going round some of the churches with the Director of Antiquities who had previously consented to show them all they wished to see. Later, there was Othello’s Tower to visit, and the massive walls to traverse and numerous photographs to be taken.
‘I think we’ve done this area pretty exhaustively,’ commented Gilbert as they were driving out of the city through the Land Gate where the smiling Turkish Cypriot officer waved and smiled as they went past him. Leaning back in her seat, Shara gave a small sigh of contentment.
‘It’s all so peaceful and pleasant on this island.’ She spoke softly, almost to herself. ‘I shall feel pretty awful when the time comes to leave it.’ No response from Gilbert, but she knew he was dwelling on her words. ‘What is it, Gilbert?’
A swift twist of his head and then,
‘That gets you, you mean? I expect that, first and foremost, it’s the hospitality, the sheer unadulterated friendliness of the people. Then combined with this you have the island itself, which is indeed favoured by nature in both climate and vegetation. The sea and the beaches are superb, the archaeological sites fascinating. You have the mountain scenery and if you want it you can have the mountain life. I believe the villages up in the Troodos are idyllic.’
‘Yes, I’ve heard that too.’ She fell silent then, her mind going to Carl and his rather erratic behaviour. The burden of some problem had been evident; then he appeared to have shed it by some resolve quite quickly determined upon, but later he again seemed weighed down by the same nagging worry. Shara gave a little sigh and wondered if her hopes, which she hand allowed to soar dangerously high, would soon come tumbling down.
Suddenly Gilbert interrupted her thought stream by talking about his work, and for the rest of the journey the time passed in this way. They had several invitations waiting on their arrival home - some to cocktail parties and sundowners, and the others to dinner parties.
‘Hmm. ... ’ Gilbert looked ruefully at his secretary when, after they had both bathed and changed, they were sitting on the terrace waiting for dinner to be announced. ‘We’ve a gay round before us, it would appear.’ Idly he fingered one of the cards which Shara had laid on the table before him.
‘We could get out of one or two,’ she began, but Gilbert was shaking his head.
‘It wouldn’t be diplomatic to turn some down and accept others. No, Shara, we must resign ourselves to a rather hectic social life while we’re here.’ A small pause before he continued, ‘It’s about time we ourselves gave a party, don’t you think?’
She nodded, turning over another envelope. It was addressed to her and had come by air. Colin. She smiled and slit it open.
‘Oh ... how nice!’
Gilbert raised an inquiring eyebrow and was immediately informed that his nephew would be coming over on the tenth of next month for a fortnight’s holiday. ‘He hopes you will not be going away to another part of the island, and says he can change his holiday if this should be so.’
Gilbert was shaking his head; his e
yes flickered rather oddly as they rested on Shara’s face.
‘You and he have always been very good friends, haven’t you, Shara?’
‘Of course - ever since I came to work for you and you introduced me to him. We seem to have so much in common.’ She felt happy at the idea of seeing him again, of introducing him to Carl and his charming little daughter. Colin loved children, and Shara did often wonder why he had never married. Teasingly he would say, were she to speak of this,
‘Marriage? But, my dear, I’m waiting for you to make up your mind.’
‘So much in common ...’ Musingly Gilbert repeated his secretary’s words. ‘So much... and no more.’
She smiled.
‘Not sufficient for us to get together, Gilbert.’
‘It would have pleased me - I think.’ He frowned then, and added, ‘No, I don’t feel sure after all.’ He gave a small sigh. ‘I’d like to see Colin married nevertheless. He isn’t the sort to lead the bachelor life indefinitely.’ Another odd glance in Shara’s direction. ‘Carl ... you ...?’ But he tailed off and for the first time since knowing him she realized he was faintly unsure of himself -embarrassed and regretful of what he had begun to say. She paused a while in indecision and then,
‘I care for him, Gilbert,’ she confessed in a very low
tone.
Gilbert picked up his glass and for a space he allowed his gaze to rest on the pile of correspondence which Shara had put on the table. Idly he turned one of the invitation cards, took it up, then flipped it back among the others. His fine features were a trifle drawn, his bushy eyebrows pushed almost to meeting point by the gathering together of the lines between them.
‘And he himself?’ he said at last, and Shara knew that he had been searching for something to say which would not sound quite so blunt. ‘How does he - act?’
Act. Not ‘feel’. So much was contained in the difference of the words. Gilbert seemed to know that Carl had given her no real inkling of his feelings. She said, by-passing his question for the moment,