by Dillon, Paul
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
© Paul Dillon 2012
All rights reserved
This story is a work of fiction. The resemblance of any characters to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
ISBN: 978-1-908961-40-2
Published by Mark Williams international Digital Publishing
www.mwidp.com
Dedicated to Dionysis Synodinos-Vallianos
Fourteen years old at the time of the Kefalonian Earthquake
A man's work is nothing but this slow trek to discover, through the detours of his art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened.
—Albert Camus
Chapter 1
THE ISLAND OF KEFALONIA, WESTERN GREECE
He sat on a wooden bench, eyes closed, in the shade of an olive grove. I didn’t know his name so thought of him simply as old man. Thyme scented the air, which remained strangely fresh, at odds with the suffocating mid-day sun. Intense though the heat was, it couldn’t eclipse the sound cascading inside the canopy.
Singing … I had no better description; the trees were singing … their song familiar, a song of joy.
Puzzled by the sound’s origin, I looked up, thinking perhaps birds, but saw none.
“Sit,” said the old man. “Close your eyes and listen.”
I sat beside him. After I got used to the rhythm and harmonics, he spoke again. His voice was soothing, musical, so very easy on the ear.
“They're cicadas,” he said.
I had asked nothing.
Although I heard him clearly, I never stopped focusing on the sound.
“The males are calling the females,” he continued. “Concentrate on the frequencies and step back in time, a time without birds, without animals, a time where nothing moves amongst silent trees and grasses. Eons pass, life finds movement and, with it, sound; a sound so primal that you still feel its music deep within you.”
The old man’s voice faded away but I continued to listen becoming ever more absorbed until the sound became a fountain, life’s fountain, gushing up like a spring. For a moment, all nature’s secrets were revealed, but even as the epiphany dawned so it dispersed. I retraced my thoughts, desperate to hold on to the exquisite knowledge but the harder I tried the faster it evaporated…
***
Ben’s eyes opened to the whisper of intangible loss. Thin curtains drawn across the veranda took the sting out of the light. The heat ignored their feeble barricade. He stared at a fold in the drapes, where the sun’s rays alternated shadow and brilliant fire through the louver doors. Focusing on the intense bands of sunlight kept him clinging to a trance-like state. Outside, cicadas called from the cypress trees; their chants forming the melody of some hypnotic August song.
He would not stir just yet. It would require an effort of will to release his gaze from the incandescent stripes. Eventually, his eyes withdrew, scanning the room for any object that might trigger a memory. A second bed, its green cover a flat and featureless meadow, stretched towards him. Only a bedside table held meaning; on it stood a bottle of water, a book, his mobile phone.
With scant regard for harmony, the clamor of squabbling crows drifted in from the garden.
Were they fighting or playing?
The question began Ben’s ascent to consciousness and he raised his head to absorb the rest of the unfamiliar room.
A wardrobe with two narrow white doors stood next to a mirrored table, its glass top supported on a gunmetal frame. Nearby, a pair of jeans draped over an unopened suitcase.
Ben considered reaching for the water bottle; the first sip would formally awaken him. Resisting the urge to drink, his head rolled back on the pillow and he stared up at the ceiling, contented and serene. This disposition, almost numbing, had become his normal waking state for several years; he could not remember how long. He attributed this condition to his lack of purpose. This morning, as most others, there was no particular reason to hurry. He groped for his phone, checking the time; 10:05 meant little. Slowly, his brain activity reached critical mass; as the water wet his lips, Ben Anderson was loaded into consciousness.
Flip-flopped feet slapped the tiles outside his door, echoing along the corridor. Children shouted, their excited voices reminding him this was a hotel in the height of the Mediterranean summer. Ben rose, taking another gulp of water.
Drawing back the curtains, he opened the louver doors and stepped out. Clay tiles, warmed by the sun, felt comforting under his feet. The veranda overlooked a garden bordered by tall cypresses. Beyond the flame-shaped trees, hills of pine rose to meet a pristine sky. The garden would be a cool, pleasant place in the afternoon, once the sun disappeared behind the ridge.
He relaxed in a rattan chair, one of two, about a round white table and rolled the bottle back and forth, watching the sunlight reflect off the water. Something was more tangible this morning; he could not say exactly what: trees, insects, life, flowers, hills, himself, sun, sky, birds…
Two crows cawed and swooped down from the trees, bouncing as they landed on the smooth green lawn. He watched as they walked, like little people, past the sundial and under the cypresses. Nobody was in the garden to disturb them.
Chapter 2
ARGOSTOLI, KEFALONIA
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 12th, 1953
Nine-year-old Ioannis Katros sat on stone steps at the back of his grandmother’s house looking out at a dry dusty garden. School had closed for the summer, a summer of unprecedented seismic activity. The sun crept towards its zenith in a cloudless sky, yet an ominous shadow threatened Ioannis’s spirit. He wasn’t alone with his fear; the whole of Argostoli was on edge. In rich and poor areas alike, neighbors talked, rumors spread, everywhere superstition held sway. Disaster, they said, lay right around the corner. Perhaps the doomsayers were right; the tremors were more frequent, more powerful this past week.
Ioannis’s thoughts went back to yesterday, to an hour before dawn. The first earthquake brought down a section of ceiling in the bedroom he shared with his brother. The damage forced the family to move the boys to their grandmother’s house. A second tremor, hours later, saw Ioannis running through the town, alone, searching for his brother, praying for his safety. Ioannis got his wish. There in the yard, Stamos played, without a care in the world.
The garden was small, unkempt, and enclosed by high walls. A lone pear tree rose above the weeds, its branches swept the rusty iron roof of an old stone outbuilding. Covered in vines, the ruin housed an ancient olive press, unused since the death of its owner a decade earlier. Now, only pigeons roosted there, flying in through a sun-bleached window, its paint and glass a faded memory. Under the window, fallen leaves and dead insects fl
oated in a large wooden barrel, three-quarters full with winter rain.
Stamos played an improvised game. Placing sticks in the barrel, he climbed into the overhanging branches of the pear tree.
“Yanni, come and play,” he called.
Ioannis didn’t answer. From his perch on the steps, he watched his older brother throw stones in the water, causing the make-believe boats to lurch violently in the waves.
The garden was hot, oppressive, and filled with the sound of insects. Ioannis was on edge, too disturbed for play. He got up, walked over to the barrel and peered down at the floating decay. With a sense of disgust, he went back indoors.
It was cooler inside; Ioannis’s gaze fell on his grandmother, hand-washing clothes in the old stone sink. A wooden cross protruded from the front pocket of her apron. The symbol reminded Ioannis of the upcoming festival in honor of the island’s patron saint, Gerasimos.
Earlier this morning, the two boys had prayed with their grandmother at the small altar dedicated to the saint. Alarmed by recent events, the old woman called on Gerasimos for protection, lighting candles under his image. The boy could see the shrine now, in a darkened recess, across the room. A whiff of breeze caught the flames, casting shadows on the icon’s ancient, gilded frame, upon the bearded figure in a hooded gown, his white scroll unfurled, a golden halo behind his head…
***
The old lady was wringing water from a heavy cotton dress when the earthquake struck, destroying the town of Argostoli. It was 11:24am.
Silence, infused with menace, descended like a fog, clinging to the last remnants of order. Then came the thunder; an ear-splitting crack, the sound of an entire island being lifted higher. Shock waves of unimaginable power hammered into the house. Ioannis’s feet left the ground, a deafening roar blanked out his senses as he flew through the air. For a whole minute, the ground rampaged out of control, as if some mythological demon had but sixty seconds to shake every last person off the world. Tossed around like a plaything, Ioannis shielded his head with his arms and prayed.
The shaking stopped; the roar gave way to distant shouts, cries, and the sound of snapping timber. The rear of the house was a pile of debris. Grey sunlight, diffused with dust, rained down on Ioannis as he lay dazed on the rubble-strewn floor. There was pain in his leg, he couldn’t move. He peered into the dust, straining his eyes until they hurt. Slowly, the impenetrable grey mist deepened, transforming into the dark, brackish water of the outhouse barrel. A drowning insect crawled onto a leaf to dry out in the sun. Ioannis passed out.
When he came to, the dust had settled revealing a new, disturbing world. Chunks of masonry covered the floor. He tried moving but could not. The sharp pain in his leg gave way to a numb throbbing that chilled him to the bone. Ioannis cried out for his mother.
His cries turned to whimpers, he lay paralyzed, choking with fear that he might never walk again. To Ioannis, paralysis was a horror beyond imagination. He lay still on the ground, listening to his own sobs, waiting for the mercy of sleep.
Drifting in and out of consciousness, time ceased to exist. When next he woke, the most intense pins and needles, hot and icy, stabbed and stung at his leg. He took heart, nothing pinned him down. Summoning his remaining strength, he turned away from the garden, where his eyes fell upon the Saint. The icon lay on the ground, at an angle, propped up against the broken altar. Ioannis prayed, as he had prayed yesterday, begging the saint that he might walk again. With the image of Saint Gerasimos seared into his brain, Ioannis passed out once more.
Chapter 3
The monastery stood in the center of the island, on a wide plain surrounded by mountains. The road down was winding and steep; trees, mostly olive and pine, dotted the slopes. As the car snaked downward, the white buildings floated in and out of sight on the far side of the valley.
Elena sat in the back of the rental car, idly watching the scenery drift by. Her father, the driver, complained at the lack of power, as the vehicle struggled to haul its four occupants high into the mountains.
The journey’s a pilgrimage for him, she reminded herself.
“I’m so glad you decided to stay. I thought you’d be dying to get back to Boston.”
Elena turned away from the window and looked kindly at her cousin. Sophia was twenty-four, three years her junior. She spoke fluent English with barely a trace of her native accent. Last night, over dinner, she’d convinced Elena to extend her stay on the island.
Sophia lived with her grandparents, who owned a large villa in Argostoli, the island’s capital. Elena had fallen under the spell of the house; her guest bedroom overlooked the family’s olive orchard, which stretched down to the sea. She imagined a time, in her distant future, wanting nothing more than living in such a house, on such an island as this.
“Boston, you’re kidding,” said Elena. “Life’s so much more relaxed here. I’m going to wake up every morning, open the curtains, look out over the olive grove and think I’m in heaven.” She paused, “I’m still not sure what I’ll do all day with you working and all.”
“I told you, don’t worry,” said Sophia. “I can juggle my hours around for a week or two.”
Pretty, with large brown eyes, Sophia worked at her grandfather’s gallery in Argostoli. She had returned to the island only recently, having studied ceramics and art history at the University of Seattle. The studio, specializing in pottery, also exhibited the work of local painters.
Silence ensued; the car continued its winding descent. Elena’s mother sat in the front passenger seat turning round repeatedly.
“Have you spotted the others yet? I hope your brother didn’t get held up with the kids.”
Elena ignored her question.
“They’ll be right behind us.” Her father spoke to no one in particular.
Close to the valley bottom, the first houses of a small community appeared. Less than a mile in length, the village was narrow, its buildings plain and modern. A few cafes and tavernas, crowded with tourists, stood out from an otherwise forgettable main street.
A group of restaurants, huddled together, marked the end of the township. Here, the road leveled out, the houses giving way to a wide avenue, bordered on either side, by hundreds of plane trees. Half a mile long, the majestic boulevard opened into a circular plaza at its mid-point, forming a stately approach to the monastery of Saint Gerasimos.
Cars, parked bumper to bumper, lined both sides of the avenue. Elena looked past them to a field littered with trucks and caravans
“What’s going on over there?” she asked.
“It’s a gypsy camp. They come every year for the festival.” Sophia pointed over by the church. “See there? They’ve setup a mini-bazaar.”
Tourists and locals thronged the area, spilling out into the street, forcing the car to inch its way along the last fifty yards. Elena lowered her window and leaned out. Heat rushed in, carrying with it the noise of the crowd. The air bristled with expectation. She looked up, straining to see the red-tiled dome that towered over the main roof of the church.
Sitting atop a series of wide stone steps, the massive white building obscured the older monastery compound. Elena thought it odd, how such an imposing structure could be built in the middle of nowhere.
Police, in navy polo shirts and baseball caps, marshaled the crowd behind temporary barriers, keeping the route of the procession clear. Above the steps, festival colors jostled for attention, banners and flags lined the promenade, where bandsmen waited in vivid tunics.
The car turned right at the crossroads, past the complex and into a dirt lot. As the vehicle drew to a halt, Elena laid a hand on her father’s shoulder. He turned his head towards her, trying in vain to mask the unease in his heart.
Elena offered a reassuring smile. She understood what this day meant to him.
Chapter 4
Elena sat at a large oak table under the shade of a cluster of pines. A clear blue sky promised another glorious Mediterranean day. From the east, over th
e Ainos Mountains, the sun filtered through the treetops casting patterns of light on the table. To the west, an olive orchard sloped down towards the glistening bay of Argostoli.
Across the table sat cousin Sophia, already dressed for work.
“How long do we have?” asked Elena.
“We should leave in about thirty minutes.” Sophia refilled her glass with freshly squeezed orange juice, lifting the pitcher higher and higher as she poured.
Distracted by the noise of cicadas, Elena looked up into the veil of a blue-green archipelago and listened to their calls echo in the branches.
Aunt Nicia’s voice, calling from the courtyard brought her attention back to the table.
“More coffee?”
“No, thanks,” Elena replied. “Come and sit with us.”
She couldn’t get used to thinking of her aunt as Sophia’s grandmother. Nicia was standing between blue iron gates, under an archway at the rear of the house. On either side, two oleander trees with silver bark stood ten feet high; their leaves bayonet shaped and covered with large red flowers.
“Don’t move. I want to take a picture,” called Elena.
Nicia stood, smiling.
“Okay, you can move now.”
As Nicia walked towards the table, Elena stared at her aunt’s image on the display. She flipped back through the recent photos; Nicia was in the last four shots.
“I’m jealous. You’re in every picture I take, and you always look so happy. This one of you and Andreas is my favorite.” She passed Nicia the camera.
“Was this yesterday? I don’t remember you taking it. My memory isn’t what is used to be.”
Yesterday, here under the pines, Elena had spent a pleasant hour, listening to Nicia and Andreas reminisce about their life together. It was a story she knew well but sharing it with them, by their peaceful orchard, had moved her almost to tears. Nicia was becoming an influence; that much was clear.