—But we’d beat them to it. We’d tried them ourselves.
—Not them. We didn’t know them.
—First we caught Anéstis.
—We caught Balátsas first. Stylianós. From Mesorráhi. Balátsas was his nickname. Everyone called him that.
—Tyrovolás was his name. Stylianós Tyrovolás.
—But he was in prison.
—Well, I used to go to some land we had for grazing sheep. We call the place Bouzouriá. Down in Koubíla. There someone named Fotópoulos tells me, Look up there. Isn’t that Balátsas? We thought he was in prison. I tell him, What are you talking about? I go to the sheepfolds. I had the mules with me, I left them with some shepherds. I go back to the village. I get four or five men and we go there at night and we catch him.
—That was in 1946.
—1946 or ’48.
—Not in ’48. I was in the army in ’48.
—Anyway, 1946. I got the men together, we went straight to his house. We knock on the door, they wouldn’t open. We break it down. His wife runs out, she started shouting. Stylianós isn’t here. He’s not here. She was shouting. Even though she could have said that more softly. I tell the others, He’s hiding somewhere. Either at Souroúpis’s place or at Markoúlis’s. By shouting she was signaling him to clear out. We run over to Souroúpis’s place, he wasn’t inside. We go down to Markoúlis’s place. What was his name?
—Kambylafkás.
—He was from Galtená. He’d married someone from Mesorráhi and was living there. He opens the door. I tell him, Where’s Balátsas? He says, I don’t know. Soon as he says I don’t know I smack him. Listen, I don’t know, he says again and motions upstairs with his eyes. He had a very small attic—and that’s where Balátsas was hiding. Hey listen, I don’t know. And he motioned upstairs with his eyes. I think to myself, he’s here. I shout, Come down, Balátsas. He comes down. He’d taken out his release papers and he was showing them to me. His release from prison. I take them and I tear them up, I bash him with my rifle butt. And with that my rifle goes off, I could have been killed. We take him outside. I tell the others, Leave him to me. Because I was the one had a beef with him. And then I started beating him. I beat him like an octopus, until the same time the next day. He’d been in prison, stayed there for a year or so, maybe less. And then he got out, when they were ordered to reduce the number of prisoners. We took him down to Perdikóvrisi. I tell him, Where’s Poúlios? Anéstis Poúlios. He says, You’ll find him at Kóstas Tyrovolás’s place.
—In Mesorráhi.
—We put him in the cellar, tied and bound, and we left. We went home, we all had something to eat, and then we went after Poúlios. And we caught him. I started beating him. Then Karelína threw a rock at me. An old lady, a relative of his. From up behind a wall. Almost killed me. I go back and I give her two swift kicks. We got Anéstis, we took him off to Tservási.
—On the way were some vineyards, they’d fenced them off with pear trees and gorse. We’d pull some up and beat him over the head.
—He could barely walk at that point.
—We take him to the village, I take some scissors, I cut off his ear.
—His ear, his hair. His hair, his scalp, I cut it all. We dump him in a corner. And in comes Kóstas Nikoláou’s sister with an ax handle. Nikoláou who they’d executed in Ayiliás. Telésilla. She starts beating him with it. On the head. Trying to break his head open. We carry him out of there. We go to a deserted house. That lawyer Karamítzas’s house. We throw him in the cellar. There was an empty barrel there. The top was missing. We shove Anéstis in there, head first. We tie his hands behind him and pull down his pants. So he can’t walk. And we leave him there. Now if you mention Anéstis and the barrel in Kastrí they’ll tell you all kinds of stories. Like that we screwed him. That’s not true. We left him there. Half dead from the beatings. And what did he do? He came round little by little. Now they say that a cousin of Karíbakas, a woman whose brothers were kapetanaíoi, went there and let him out. And he jumped over some terraces, got as far as Kótronas, and someone named Fotópoulos untied him. Soon after that we caught him again. We took him to Náfplion, and they kept him in custody awaiting trial. Then I left for America. I was discharged from the army, I left in 1951. In June. I had that right. My father was an American citizen. Twenty-eight years. 1951–1979. The year before last I was at the bus depot in Trípolis. I was waiting for my daughter, she’s married, in Corinth. I see Anéstis. An old man now. He comes right up to me, he doesn’t recognize me. He asks, Has the bus from Kastrí arrived yet? I pretended to be American. I say in English, I don’t understand Greek. Because I thought to myself, maybe he was looking to get me into trouble again. And last year I saw him again. Again I was on a bus and the bus stopped in Mesorráhi. He was waiting there with a man named Panayótis Tsíkis.
—They’re first cousins.
—First cousins, and they were going to get chestnuts. It was October. The bus stopped, I was in the front seat, he put out his hand so I could help him up. He couldn’t get up, he was an old wreck by then. I pretended not to see him. And he got up by himself, with Tsíkis pushing him from behind. Well, hello there Nikoláou, he says. Hello, Anéstis, I say. And I thought, now that we’re about to leave this life, why did we do all that? For revenge, that’s why.
—Revenge, yes. Then from Eleohóri they sent word to us to go after someone named Mathés. An important Party cadre. We left and went to Ayiasofiá, traveled all night. At the railroad tracks Antonákos the doctor was waiting for us. He got us and took us back to Samóni. He was an important cadre, that Mathés. I don’t know how that man stayed alive. There were seven men from Másklina and us. He was a murderer. A murderer. Just like those other men who are getting pensions today. Who took part in the Resistance and are getting pensions. Murderers’ Resistance.
Chapter 42
And that’s how the wife of the justice of the peace lost her things. Manolópoulos was the justice of the peace in Kastrí. Pavlákos let it slip somewhere that they were going to arrest him. Vasílis goes and tells him, Take your wife and get out. I don’t remember if they had children, they were both young. They were staying at Horaítis’s place. Did I hear you right, Manolópoulos says to him. Don’t ask me anything else, Vasílis says, I can’t talk to you. They’re following me. You didn’t dare talk to anyone back then. The court clerk lived right above our house. Konstantinídis. He had a sister named Vasilikí. Manolópoulos’s wife called her and said, Come and pack up the house if you can. And I’m leaving a present for you on the table. Take it, I’m leaving. She told her that and she left. She and her husband left at night. She went the next morning, she tidied up the house, and she took a very lovely nightgown the other woman had left for her. She supposedly closed up the house and left. A few days later they supposedly got her things and took them to some shelter. Then Harís arranged things the way he wanted. And later, when he would quarrel with Kouroúnis, every time they had a spat, he’d say: You took those things and you sold them in Megalópolis. All Manolópoulos’s wife’s clothes.
—Who said that to whom?
—Kouroúnis said that to Harís. Because it was Harís who was going and selling them.
Chapter 43
Our legislature provides for the mutual exacting of oaths. As do all legislatures. A person may establish the truth of all his allegations by the negative process of challenging his opponent to take an oath. I say, You owe me a hundred. You say, I don’t owe you anything, because I never borrowed anything. I enter a sworn statement against you. Legally, you can either take an oath or exact one from your opponent. The tug-of-war ends there. No further challenges are allowed. And then, of course, come the penalties for perjury. The process is called the mutual exacting of oaths. It is exacted by one litigant of another, the judge being obligated to administer it. But only in certain kinds of disputes. In trials regarding marital disagreements, for example, the exacting of oaths does not apply. In trials that tend toward t
he breakup or annulment of the marriage, oaths cannot be exacted for the simple reason that there is a lack of material evidence. In the old days cases of this sort were frequently heard by the Supreme Court. Suddenly the question arose as to whether the fact of not being a virgin constituted “lack of material evidence.” Because in those days a woman’s chastity was given paramount, statutory importance. Which could be proven only by the presence of an intact hymen. Or again in cases of deception concerning a person’s identity. I know that that’s how they married off the Manavélas girl. Because people in those days were more than just simple-minded. They were sneaky. The bridegroom was only supposed to see the bride at the church on their wedding day. All made up and decked out and covered by a veil. And they usually put the elder daughters there, the ones they wanted to get rid of. They showed me one daughter and they gave me another. That’s how that practice came about.
Chapter 44
—I want you to tell me that story.
—No. You ask and I’ll answer.
—Fine. When did they arrest you?
—Okay, they arrested me in February. Not February. They arrested me in 1944.
—Do you remember what month?
—That’s easy. They arrested me in October. In November to be precise.
—In 1944?
—In 1944. They arrested me in Astros, Kynouría.
—Had the Germans left?
—The Germans had left. I wanted to get out of the country. To go to the Middle East.
—Hold on a minute.
—I wanted to leave.
—Wait a minute.
—So. Triantafýllis tells me. And Matsiólas. Matsiólas the colonel. And Yiánnis the air pilot, Yiánnis Logothétis.
—No, Yiánnis Konstantélos.
—Oh yes, Konstantélos. They tell me, Stay put and see if you can help us, so we can all leave on the Papanikolís. The submarine.
—When was that?
—In 1944, in the month of October.
—No, it must have been earlier. In October 1944 the Germans were gone. You wouldn’t have left then.
—The Germans had left. They’d gone, because they had to leave. The rebels were in control of everything. The Germans left on October 12. They left on October 12.
—Yes.
—Exactly. And the authorities agreed to say it happened on the seventeenth. But they left on October 12.
—All right.
—They left straight from Trípolis.
—Right. And where were you then?
—I was here. I’d gone up to Mount Taygetus. Then I came back, and I was in Trípolis in 1944. But it was before I went to Trípolis—on February 2, the Day of the Presentation at the Temple.
—In 1943?
—In ’44. It was in 1944 on February 2 that the Germans arrested us in Mávri Trýpa. Two hundred fifty-eight prisoners we were.
—In hiding?
—No. Prisoners.
—Tell me about that.
—Yes. Prisoners. But before that I sent those officers out of the country. To the Middle East. I went to Fokianós. In Leonídio. Very rough sea there. The Papanikolís arrived, the submarine, it surfaced, and it picked them up, five of them. Matsiólas, Yiánnis Konstantélos, the air pilot from Karátoula, Stámos Triantafýllis.
—Was all that before then?
—Yes, I told you, before.
—They left before 1944.
—They left in ’43. In 1943.
—In October?
—Yes. In 1943 I was still on Mount Taygetus. And in 1944 we mounted our major operation. So to speak.
—Wait, you’re confusing me. When did they kill your brother?
—On July 29 of 1944.
—In 1944.
—July 29.
—Where were you then?
—The Germans were still here.
—Yes.
—July 29.
—Yes. Where were you?
—I was in Meligoú.
—I see.
—We’d gone on a raid, I was freed in February, on February 2.
—Had they captured you before that?
—Of course, before that. They captured me before that.
—Tell it to me from the beginning. Tell me. It began in 1943. No. It began in 1940. Did you see action in Albania?
—Of course.
—Where did you fight in Albania?
—In all the theaters of operations of the Second Front.
—The Second Front.
—All the way to the lake in Ochrída. To the lake there. That’s how far I went.
—And on your retreat?
—On our retreat I was last. The very last one.
—And you came to Kastrí?
—We got ourselves to Corinth. They took my car, outside Thebes. The Germans.
—Were you a driver?
—Yes.
—And you were coming by car?
—I was coming down—and I was bringing some soldiers with me. Stratís Perentés, Yiórghis, Kyriákos Doúmos’s boy, Leonídas Méngos, God rest his soul. Polyánthi’s son Yiórghis, and Tsarnákos. The Germans made them get out. We started out from Koritsá. I wanted to get my brother, and Vasílis Méghris, and someone named Ilioúpoulos from Kerasítsa. They didn’t come with me. I tell them, I’m the last one, the last car. They wouldn’t come along, they were blowing up bridges. I picked up a girl from northern Epirus, I took her to Yiánnina. In the front, with me and the captain. The captain didn’t want us to take her. At any rate, the bottom line is that we took her. I arrived in Lidoríki. In Ámfissa. And from Ámfissa I went to Thebes. There the Germans requisitioned my car. Then we went across to Perahóra. In Loutráki. We took the train. It took us an hour and a half to get there. We got off at Eleohóri. From Eleohóri we came to Kastrí. I brought my rifle here from Albania. My automatic rifle.
—What month was it when you arrived in Kastrí?
—April.
—April.
—After the Tsolákoglou capitulation agreement was signed we came here. On April 20, something like that. The twentieth or the twenty-second. I don’t remember. In any case, it was April. I arrived in the village. We came back. I’d served about thirty-nine months since I was drafted. And another six or seven in Albania. I arrived in the village in April. I stayed in the village. I didn’t stay long. I worked here and there. I was working in the Polychronópoulos warehouse. With fertilizers and whatnot. With Sotíris Tsourapélos.
—Where was the warehouse?
—Just above Kasímos’s house. I was working there. One day Níkos Mávros arrives, he takes me downstairs He says, Kapetán Zahariás wants you.
—When was that?
—In ’44. No. It was before the Germans even came to Kastrí. But there were Germans all around.
—You mean in ’43.
—Yes, about then. In ’44 the Germans were there, not in ’43.
—In ’43.
—Yes but in ’44 they came to the village. They set up the blockade.
—Were you here until then?
—I was here.
—When did you join the Battalions?
—I joined in February. No, in March. It was March when the Battalions were formed in Trípolis.
—Yes, I know.
—In March.
—In March of 1944?
—Yes. Níkos Mávros arrives, he takes me with him. Down to Ayía Paraskeví. Kapetán Zahariás was there, with about ten men from Voúrvoura. They were there. He says, I’ll knock your block off. But why, Kapetán? What did I do wrong? Will you become a rebel or not? I tell him, I can’t join. I can’t join the rebels. He says, You’ll join, all right, and you’ll do it gladly too. Or I’ll knock your block off. Well, I tell him. There are eight of us. And two older folks. Ten altogether. I’m working. I’m earning fifty drachmas a day, enough to buy bread. He says, Will you give us bread? I tell him, I have no bread. I have a little wheat at home, I’ll give that to you. And they sent s
ome men and took a truckload of wheat from me. Then Níkos Magoúlis takes me down to Paraskeví’s taverna. It belonged to Níkos Konstantélos back then. Before they killed him. Takes me down to the cellar. To buy me a drink. He says, I’m paying. Okay, Mr. Níkos, I tell him. Don’t call me Mr. Níkos, don’t call me that. Call me Comrade. I tell him, What does that mean? He says, We’re part of the struggle. I ask him, What struggle, Mr. Níkos?—I called him that again. I can’t join the struggle. There are eight children in my family. My father was ill. Back then I was earning sixty drachmas. One thousand eight hundred a month. Driving Galaxýdis’s truck.
—Mihális Galaxýdis’s truck.
—No, Kyriákos’s.
—Mihális’s brother Kyriákos.
—Mihális’s brother.
—They killed him.
—He was killed in Ayiórghis. We were on a raid and he was killed. We brought him back dead to Trípolis. And that’s when Mihális killed Tsígris. Lýras was interrogating him. They heard shots, a German comes running in. What’s going on? Nothing, Some bastard got killed, Lýras said. Lýras was from Karakovoúni, an army captain. And that was that, it was over.
—What was Tsígris?
—He was an officer. An officer in ELAS. We had all agreed in 1943, Tsígris, Vazaíos, and me, and we had gone to Pyramída, just above Ellinikó. When we left Mount Taygetus. I’m talking about 1943 now. When we left there.
—Which of you left?
—Me, Petrákos, Tákis Drínis, and that Mýlis fellow from Karátoula.
—Did you go with Vrettákos?
—We went under the command of Colonel Yiannakópoulos. That rat who sold us out.
—I see.
—He finished us. He’s the one who finished us off.
—When did you go with Yiannakópoulos?
—In 1943.
—What time of year, what month?
—Summertime. Yiannakópoulos was out in the mountains.
—Wait a minute, one thing at a time. You were working here, and Magoúlis took you downstairs.
Orthokostá Page 22