So he was running. Running from his own pseudo-thunder. Through the empty market. Running on his too short, once muscular, now watery, staggery legs.
The wind and the silence were against him.
He ploughed on till streets petering out in those choppy waves around the Agora tore into the last of his strength. He fell panting, grunting, amongst the earthworks, on the withered caper vines. There in past summers he had meandered with Loukas his friend, laughing at the lovers as they undulated amongst the twining capers, in a smell of dust still warm with sun, under a yellow moon. Now the capers only rustled as a gritty wind tweaked at their husks; the lovers had vanished with the velvet nights. Of melon ices melting trickling. Of swelling, bursting, golden moons. This year, all those who pushed with their bellies against the wind were thin girls tragically loaded.
From being thumped by his breathlessness against the winter grass, he was suddenly lying still, he realized. Not from exhaustion, or not altogether. It was the dish of roasted kid he had eaten somewhere out Halandri way. Memory made a museum piece of it: bronze skin incised with no particular myth beyond that of succulence, then the streaks of ivory in rosy, grained flesh, the bones not yet cast in their final sculpture. As crux, an exquisite small kidney.
Tears ran out from under his eyelids into the whispering capers. The most agonizingly live juices had begun to flow again through his veins his muscles wiry as green vines his cock fighting against his flies.
He sat up. Of course he had earned eggs in the past, and a tin or two of German meat. Bach only titupped along beside the need to stuff your mouth with food. Always eventually transformed into that same slobbering beast, the spirit stood grinning at him in the Agora.
He got on his feet after clawing at sand and a shard or two. The German corporal would be less messy, if more painful. In any case Mrs Vassilopoulo, of bruised pears and perfect eggs, would have already left for her sister’s after mopping out the saloni. It was the German corporal of huge meaty hands.
Costa (they called him Costaki, but he saw himself as IORDANOU in print) was apparently walking away, in the direction of his dubious intention, though uneven ground and a cloudy mind helped him remain unconvinced. A little longer. In normal times he would have crossed the Agora with care, listening for the crunch of treasure. Now he ought to hurry, though. He started hobbling. He might have been lame. A noose set by a weed trapped him by the ankle. He jerked. Stumbled. Ran clacking at last along the street which led to Monastiraki.
He ran.
Swallowing the air.
He was running past the iron shutters. Flat faces of whores and spivs flickered in the entrances to alleys. They didn’t seem in any way surprised. Wasn’t he of their world? His own smell was married to that of crumbling plaster, damp cardboard, rags not fit to steal, shit. As he searched for the corporal who should have awaited his intentions. He couldn’t believe the statue might have melted away. Or the tin of German meat.
That alone had been far too solid. His mouth was becoming furred, but gummy buds were swelling on his tongue. Hands throbbing already with cuts from tearing the tin apart. To get at the marbled meat beyond the jags.
All the while he was running houses shops he had been passing all his life that one dusty divided cypress the monument to Diogenes were rooted in reason a practical life could still be led and was. He, for instance, was only being practical. He could never have swallowed a raw egg. He would have had to carry eggs home, to share, boiled, with aunts whose devotion had made him so vulnerable, and a maid whose man’s appetite hadn’t been dulled by age. So. Eggs. Meat he could scoff down, face to a wall, on the way up, from behind fulfilled lips ignore the pain of getting it.
Meat.
It was distressing ludicrous as he ran to realize what he was doing peering down arcades up culs-de-sac for the figure of an illusory corporal. If ever they met he would greedily kiss the meaty mouth. Force the issue too hard perhaps. But all Germans love to talk Wagner, and no Greek could accuse music of treason.
There, you see, the spirit does survive the shit-pit, and the orthodox faith need not be so orthodox.
While he ran she had begun loping beside him. She had discarded her blue for the short white pleated kilt. Each one of her movements was performed with the utmost grace and ease. Health. She would have lobbed an accurate ball into her opponent’s court. His Panayia. He searched her eyes, with a love he had never experienced and perhaps never would, her hair streaming in strands of palest sunlight.
Weakness on his part finally caused the milky dimples in the knees of his Valkyrie-Virgin to thin out and blur.
He was passing the little Church of the Annunciation at the bottom of the hill, a brown, lesser, chunk of a church favoured by Pronoë: ‘the poorer saints are always saintlier.’ He had come there with his aunt during their last Easter of peace. Now he pushed the tottering door, and was at once received into an enclosed emptiness.
He leaned, or flopped, against the stassidion, to get his breath, and the ancient wood did give him support of a kind as he lay spread-eagle, his Byzantine ribs cruelly creaking, while the professionally hungry stared at him out of the iconostasis: dog-headed saviour, lion-happy troglodytes, evangelists in cloaks of cruciform check – the whole luxury of consecrated poverty.
He might have prayed if he hadn’t forgotten the language, all but a few burnt-in phrases. In moments of indolence or joy he liked to believe that being was prayer, but this did not help on occasions of guilt or desperation. So now he locked his hands together. He snuffed up the smell of dead incense, he rocked his head, and shuffled with his slanted feet. One anaemic candle was burning amongst the grubby pellets, the sickly stalactites, of last year’s wax. The gold liturgies of then still hung carved in the grey, fluctuating atmosphere of now. From which his lips were hopefully sucking for sustenance.
And there in the centre stood his own wooden Panayia, sternly encased, however the wind tormented her orthodox hair, her supernal eagle’s beak. Until it seemed his familiar Virgin was flowing through the whorls of his ears into the sanctuary of his brain.
Take, eat, She said, this is my body, my mess of watery black-market rice, which is given for you.
And at once he saw clearly through the cloud of his exhaustion the cloud not of incense but of steam rising out of a plateful of boiled rice.
The heavy lids of his Panayia confirmed her decision.
Costa Iordanou elbowed himself away from the stassidion. He stood himself on his props of legs. If not exactly restored to strength, he was again distinct, his own will, as he faced the last lap up the mountain, zigzag here, between the staggered cypresses, up up the streets of ochreous houses, through what had once been a good address.
Towards the dish of sacramental rice already gumming up his lips with opalescent goo.
On and off he tried to give thanks to his stern Virgin, but rising slowly higher on this half-deliberate, half-mystical ascent, he invoked, rather, Debussy. Another cobby little swollen-headed fellow, Debussy was eaten in the end, he had read, by a cancer. There was a wall to the right on which Costa, long enough ago, had written amongst the other scribble – Iordanou. The writing existed still. Death was something which happened to others to Debussy or others. For Iordanou rising in swimming chords on weighted feet a submerged future must surely emerge out of the slurp of soupy rice.
He broke roughly into the house. It did not sound as though Stavro or Anna was at home. It made him joyous, if not cocky. Racketing up the dark stairs.
What would he say if she opened her eyes? But She had already opened Hers. And revealed.
He hadn’t realized there were so many doors to overcome before you reached the innermost.
The knob on Aunt Maro’s door gave. He seemed to have expended unnecessary breath as he threw open the easiest of doors. The long thin old woman was lying as usual nowadays: stretched straight, eyes closed, the sheet under her cold chin. What was unorthodox shocking shattering was the chip chip of spoon ag
ainst porcelain.
It was Aunt Pronoë guzzling at a wobbly plate of rice.
Pronoë rolled her eyes in her old chalky downy face as she rammed the spoon into a mouth he had never seen before. She rammed again. He could hear the metal striking her still pretty little teeth. But rammed. Desecrating her sister’s room with a clatter. Obviously Pronoë had never understood the respect due to sanctity.
‘You!’ Though he heard his voice a thin hiss, his tongue felt shaped like a radish.
As he pounced on the plate.
Then they were wrestling together.
‘You don’t understand!’ She was deafening. ‘I feel so terribly hungry!’
In any glimpses he got, his aunt’s face was that of an aged greedy girl. The strength in her deceiving hands enraged him. She was cold as lizards, but her stiff satiny agility suggested a large bird refusing to give up its prey. Her breath came at him in waves, sweetly scented with masticated rice. Her ugly tongue stuck out of her mouth.
‘Costaki! No! No!’ shrieked his gentle aunt. ‘Haven’t you any pity – respect?’
As they scrambled and fought, the veins in her eyeballs were terrible. At least her rings didn’t scratch; they had gone to the Armenian. The spoon fell bouncing on worn carpet finally tinkling into silence over boards.
‘No, no, Costa! Cost-ah-ki!’
The name lashed.
‘You’re a criminal then!’ Her vehemence made it sound like laughter.
It strengthened him, if anything; it almost persuaded him he had a mission.
The plate fell: Anna’s plate. In the absence of a dowry, they had given her a good dinner service, with a few things besides. Anna had been very proud of her household belongings.
The plate falling amongst their feet trampling scuffing the last of the pile from the carpet smashed.
‘Costa you will suffer!’ Pronoë the gentle aunt couldn’t shriek enough to accuse someone other than herself.
Like some kind of black-and-white insect, she had begun hopping beyond his reach. Out of the room. Suppressing any afterthought of a shriek because of the maid, who was shifting the pots around in their empty kitchen.
When his aunt had gone, Costa Iordanou plumped on the carpet, intent on stuffing his mouth with rice. If only the few surviving grains. Sometimes fluff got in. Or a coarse thread. His lips were as swollen as cooked rice. The grains stuck to the tips of his fingers, the palms of his hands. He licked the grains. He sucked them up. The splinters of porcelain cutting his lips. The good goo. The blood running. Even blood was nourishment.
At one point, he could never remember which, his aunt Maro must have opened her eyes.
‘Eat, poor souls,’ she said. ‘Fill your stomachs, children.’
He had been too engrossed to look. But continued hearing.
‘I only pray you’ll know how to forgive each other.’
Towards evening Paraskevi came calling through the house, ‘Miss Pronoë? Costaki! Can you smell it? Anna was given the head of a lamb, two feet, and the lights! My God! My little Panayia! We’re going to have a feast.’
During the night Costa Iordanou, in his emptiness, went back into that same shameful room hoping the oracle might reassure him that none of what had happend had happened. He touched the bones of her fingers. But her eyelids didn’t stir. He stood for a little, gratefully listening to her slight breathing. Otherwise, there was the sound of silence and furniture.
Fortunately there were distant corners in their strait flat, in which those who needed to, could hide. The funeral, however, forced them out. It stood them face to face. After which, they were alone together – the heart, it seemed, of their mortified city.
The Night the Prowler
MRS BANNISTER REACHED THE bathroom in time to vomit into the wash-basin. She had meant to use the lavatory, but the night had been so ghastly it wasn’t surprising her plan misfired. She stood running the taps while her reflection fluctuated at her in the glass. In their own bathroom. Her reflection. She shuddered, and turned the taps off. She almost dabbed herself with Humphrey’s mouthwash before the shape of the bottle suggested it wasn’t her eau de Cologne.
Though it was already nine-thirty Felicity was still in her room. Sleeping? Lying awake on her bed? Only God knew. Mrs Bannister preferred not to dwell on her daughter’s probable state of mind for fear of churning up her own barely controlled distress. At least Felicity had consented to take Dr Herborn’s sedative. They had all, even Humphrey, accepted pills.
Mrs Bannister couldn’t hold back what sounded like a mew. She had never been one of those women who expect the superhuman in a husband, but what made the whole affair far more ghastly was to discover the limits of her own powers: when she had always secretly believed that, with the exception of cancer, air disasters, and war, she had circumstances under control.
Her self-confidence had suffered so badly she would have rung hours ago to confide in Madge Hopkirk, if Humphrey’s ideas about what you can tell even your most trusted friend hadn’t been so rigid. Humphrey himself had warned the office that he would be late, and was now she couldn’t imagine where. The incinerator, possibly. Some men wasted endless time burning things. Did they perhaps find solace in it? The thought would have been less irritating if she had dared ring Madge to tell about their experience.
Frustration had dried Mrs Bannister’s cheeks to chalk when she twitched aside a curtain in the still darkened living-room, and there was her husband, stooping, snipping the deadheads off the geraniums in the tubs beyond the sill. His rather thick fingers, his methodically shaven cheeks, all the visible signs of male insensitiveness, sent her in a rush to the telephone. She dialled with such force she half wondered whether an unfamiliar voice would answer. But it didn’t; and mentally, she flung herself into her friend’s arms, without her normal reservations when Madge was audibly munching toast.
‘Darling … Yes, I know it’s later than usual, but you can’t imagine what we’ve been through … what a night … hardly a wink, though Dr Herborn gave a pill … Well, I’ll tell you, Madge, in strictest confidence, as you’ll soon understand … because Humphrey … You must be patient with me, Madge dear.’
Mrs Bannister took fright at the sound of herself, but through a revival of will, got the better of her voice.
‘It was like this, as far as I can remember, because you will realize what a shock. It was about two-thirty. I woke from one of my light sleeps. I heard Felicity crying, but sobbing, in the dining-room. I went in. She seemed quite hysterical. She was wearing only her torn night-dress. She told me she had woken to find someone beside her in her bed. One of these prowlers, intruders, we read about, who break into girls’ bedrooms, and … A psychologically deranged person … A man, Madge – Felicity found a MAN in her bed … Yes … Well, I can hardly bring myself to say it. He – raped – my little – Felicity!’
For some moments Mrs Bannister sobbed into the telephone. It occurred to her it might sound frightening to Madge, but those who are closest to anyone are always the most frightening in the end.
‘I can imagine the agonies my poor darling must have suffered. When it was all over,’ Mrs Bannister couldn’t help hearing her own voice make a disagreeable sucking noise, ‘he dragged her into the dining-room. He had a knife, Madge … No … I know they do, but he didn’t. He menaced her … He smoked one of Humphrey’s best cigars. He drank a tumblerful of brandy. He forced her to drink with him – while insulting her in the vilest language – all at the point of the knife … Yes … Yes … Oh, well, yes, yes!’
While Madge ran on Mrs Bannister remained aware of the dreadful weight of events bumping around in her own mind. Of course Madge was incapable of realizing. One had to admit it: she was superficial.
‘You needn’t ask … But give me a chance, darling. Everything possible has been, and will be, done. Humphrey would sleep through the Last Trump, but when I succeeded in rousing him, he knew exactly what steps ought to be taken. He dialled an emergency number, and the po
lice threw a cordon round the neighbourhood. Two detectives came to the house. We were allowed to send for our own doctor. That was a great comfort. Felicity has known Dr Herborn since she was a tot.’
Madge had to have another go.
As soon as she was given an opportunity, Mrs Bannister managed, ‘One of the detectives was such a charming little fellow. Clever too, I’d say. He grows staghorn ferns as a hobby.’ She glanced at the chair in which the sympathetic detective had sat: there was still a depression in it, which made her throat knot again.
‘But of course they didn’t catch that brute … Probably escaped through the park – through the gaps in the railings … They won’t catch him. And if any of this leaks out, we’ll have the scandal on our hands without the cause … The second detective I didn’t take to at all – not exactly insolent, but as close to it as cynicism can get. You know how the Law takes pleasure in insinuating, regardless of the fact that you’re the innocent party. It was like that. The second detective, for some reason – probably political – didn’t want to be on our side … Madge? You’ll be discreet, dear. Humphrey would never forgive me.’
Such a spate of protest poured out of the receiver Mrs Bannister was forced to remove it from her ear; then when the crackle showed signs of letting up, she nerved herself to introduce a less dramatic, though major issue.
‘John hasn’t been told yet.’
Perhaps one had launched it too casually: Madge sounded distressingly remote.
‘And who should tell him?’ Mrs Bannister was considering aloud rather than asking for the advice nobody would be able to give. ‘Who will make it sound – not acceptable – less ugly? The right person would soften the blow. Because it will be an immense shock to – to the psyche – of even a sophisticated young man, to hear a month from the wedding that his bride has been raped … Madge? … Oh dear, I’m sorry! It’s horrid when you upset it on the sheets.’ Mrs Bannister could afford to show sympathy: her vision of Madge Hopkirk sitting in a squalor of spilt coffee made her feel superior. ‘But returning to this question of who shall tell – Humphrey shouldn’t attempt it – or so I consider. I mean – two men blundering round such a delicate situation would probably end up making it appear vulgar.’ Mrs Bannister moistened her lips. ‘I began to think, in the course of this sleepless night, that I might tell John myself. Such a splendid relationship has developed between us during their long engagement. Oh, these long engagements! But he was so firm about sparing Felicity the climate when he was appointed to Djakarta. As soon as he heard he was to be posted somewhere else … we don’t know where – not officially, though I have it from somebody at Canberra – somebody high up – they’re making him First Secretary at Rome … Yes, dear, I know I didn’t tell you: Humphrey wouldn’t have approved of it. And now this dreadful thing!… Who is going to tell John … at this point … in his career?’
The Cockatoos Page 11