The Doctor of Thessaly

by Anne Zouroudi

  ‘Between the hours of 8.30 a.m. and 2 p.m.,’ said the director, slowly, ‘Miss Kaligi is paid by this district to do this district’s work. Perhaps you could arrange to speak to her at a time when she is not working.’

  At the filing cabinet, Noula withdrew a heavy cardboard file.

  ‘Shall I bring it through?’ she asked the director.

  ‘Yes,’ said the director, turning back to his office. ‘Bring it through.’

  Noula followed him, closing the door behind her; she offered the fat man no goodbye.

  Picking up the manila envelope, he glanced inside it, and smiling to himself, tucked it away inside his raincoat.

  Downstairs in the library, the librarian was sticking more new labels in old books. By his left hand lay the book the fat man had requested.

  ‘Ah,’ said the fat man, smiling, ‘I see you found it. Excellent.’

  ‘Do you have a borrower’s ticket?’ asked the librarian.

  ‘A borrower’s ticket? I’m afraid not.’

  ‘Well, you can’t borrow the book, then.’

  ‘I think you have mistaken my intention,’ said the fat man. ‘I have a copy of my own – though it’s a little dog-eared now, after loans to the many people I felt might benefit from a little teaching in good manners. I didn’t mean the book for me; I meant it for you. I strongly suggest you read it; it will make a better man of you, by far.’

  He didn’t wait for the librarian’s reply. Outside, the clouds had dispersed. The fat man turned his face to the weak warmth of the sun, and judging the temperature acceptable for the drinking of coffee alfresco, set off from the library steps in search of a café.

  Twelve

  Leaving Platania, the fat man felt in no hurry to return to Morfi. A kilometre or two along the new dual carriageway was a junction with the old road, and here he carefully signalled a right turn and took the quieter route along the coast.

  The day held all the freshness of spring; the cobalt sea was lively with crests of foam, the rocky flatland between road and sea was bright with flowers – the purest white of rock roses, the purple of wild mallow, the blue of campanula. On the empty beach, a fisherman wore his down jacket zipped to the neck and the flaps of his Russian army hat pulled over his ears; as he cast a line from a long pole into the shallows, waves touched the toes of his leather boots. Where a sign boasted a new hotel opening soon, the builder’s gang had already left for lunch; a perplexed architect stood, shoes muddy, at the site entrance, holding the blueprints up to the wind, failing to match the drawings on the flapping sheets to the brick lines of foundations on the ground.

  Along the road, the sign to an ancient monument had lost one of its post screws, and pointed at an angle, down and right. Here, the fat man slowed the Mercedes and turned on to an unmade track, which led across the flatlands towards a promontory jutting out into the sea. At the track’s end, he parked the car and surveyed the land around him.

  The site was exposed, the wind blowing sharp and salty across rock and sand. Ruins lay all about him, the sad remains of ancient walls: stones laid in lines, the deteriorating foundations of shops and houses, schools, temples and stadiums. What had been here, was impossible to say: the city’s time had passed. For a while, he wandered amongst the stones, crouching now and then to examine the remnants of inscriptions or carved details on the stumps of fallen pillars. Grass grew amongst the stones; weeds flourished on the barely discernible pathways. At the water’s edge, the lines of the walls ran into the sea, disappearing into the deeper water. Here, by the toe of his tennis shoe, he found a pottery shard, a fragment of some plate or bowl broken centuries before. He picked it up, and rubbing it clean with the pad of his thumb, examined the faded marks of the potter’s tools, and – on the rim and very faint – the traces of an ancient fingerprint. The fat man smiled, and placed the fragment back on the dirt.

  He walked by the water’s edge towards the promontory, where at high seasonal tides the land would be under water. Here, at a distance from the ancient city, were a number of gravestones marking the limits of a cemetery whose greater part now lay beneath the sea. Each stone was engraved in the simplest fashion, though clearly by different hands: they bore a name and a single word: Xhairé – Be happy. At one grave, he bent and ran his fingers over the name, then patted the stone as if in affection, or gentle reproach.

  As he made his way through the graves, an object almost buried in the dirt caught his attention. From his raincoat pocket, he took an empty matchbox and a penknife, and with great care, dug out his find with the knife tip and placed it in the matchbox, adding a scraping of grave dirt for good measure. Closing the penknife, he slipped it with the matchbox back into his pocket. Then, offering a small bow to the grave where he had made his find, he turned his back on the cemetery and walked thoughtfully back to his car.

  Around the next bend on the coast road stood a small taverna. Its shutters were closed, there were no summer signs offering cold beer and souvlakia, and its tables and chairs were stacked up and roped down under plastic tablecloths on the terrace; but two men sat outside the open kitchen doorway, tossing coins to the centre of their table as bets on hands of cards.

  The fat man parked his car. As he approached the men, they paused in their game to watch him, both holding their cards against their chests in mistrust of the other, each with one eye on his opponent.

  The fat man smiled.

  ‘Yassas,’ he said, and the two men returned his greeting. From their appearances, they were related: cousins, maybe even brothers. Their oiled hair was receding to the same degree, their noses were equally noble and equally wasted: sprouting excess nasal hair, and on unshaven faces spotted with blackheads. In build, however, the men contrasted like a pair of stage comedians: one had run to fat, the other was too thin. The plump one of the pair wore a chef’s apron, its strings wrapped twice round his hefty waist and knotted at the front; the thin man had the red eyes of a drinker, and kept a tumbler of Metaxa at his elbow.

  ‘I was wondering,’ said the fat man, ‘if I might get something to eat.’

  The cook glanced at his cards.

  ‘The hell with this,’ he said. Throwing his cards on the table, he swept half of the stake money towards himself and nodded towards his companion. ‘He may not be much to look at, but he’s the luck of the devil at cards, this one.’

  Looking at his own cards, the thin man scowled and silently gathered up his stake money, placing it with the coins and small notes by his glass before taking a drink.

  The cook stood up from his chair, revealing the stains on his apron.

  ‘Sit,’ he said to the fat man, indicating the empty table beside theirs. ‘There’s rabbit stifado. I shot the rabbits myself yesterday.’

  The fat man waited for the rest of the cook’s menu, but the cook only looked at the fat man for his agreement.

  ‘I can do you an omelette,’ he said at last.

  The fat man smiled.

  ‘Rabbit sounds excellent,’ he said. ‘I’ll have a little salad, from whatever you have fresh.’

  ‘And to drink? I have a very good red, from the barrel.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Amessos.’

  The cook disappeared into the kitchen as the fat man took his seat. He watched the card player count his winnings, stacking coins and notes in 1,000-drachma piles.

  The view from the table was through the trunks of the pine trees which overhung the terrace, giving vital shade in summer; at this time of year, they gave some shelter from the onshore breeze, which nonetheless blew strongly enough to force the card player to weight his banknotes with a salt pot. Between the trees and at a little distance were the contrasting blues of sky and sea; between there and the terrace were straight lines of stone: more of the ruined city.

  ‘You have a view of the archaeology,’ remarked the fat man, pointing through the trees to the decaying walls.

  The card player looked up from his counting, and squinting, followed the
fat man’s finger with his red eyes.

  ‘Rubble,’ said the gambler. He waved a dismissive hand before his face. ‘They call it archaeology. But it looks like rubble to me.’

  The cook brought out a ceramic jug fired with a pattern of black olives. Slamming down a tumbler before the fat man, he filled the glass with wine from the jug. The wine was richly coloured, dark as bull’s blood. Still holding the jug, the cook urged the fat man to drink.

  ‘Try that,’ he said. ‘Tell me what you think.’

  The fat man sipped from the tumbler. The wine was complex, with the sweetness of figs on the tongue and the light perfume of plums; but as he swallowed, a pleasing dryness came through to balance it, hinting at the tartness of blackcurrants and the smooth wood of the barrel.

  The fat man looked at the cook in pleased surprise.

  ‘Truly excellent!’ he said. ‘One of the most characterful wines I’ve tasted in some years.’

  Delighted, the cook filled up the glass.

  ‘I make it myself,’ he said, ‘from my own vines. I combine two grapes – krassato, and xinomavro so it will mature well – but the secret’s in the picking. When you think the grapes are ready, when you’re sure they’re so ripe they’ll fall from the vine, wait a week longer. Then the wine is already being made inside the grapes before you even pick them.’ He kissed his thumb and forefinger in the Italian manner. ‘Superb.’

  ‘Ask him how he knows,’ said the card player, taking another drink of cognac. ‘No, don’t ask him, I’ll tell you. Because every year, he’s too idle to get out there and pick grapes when he should be picking grapes. Every year, he’s weeks behind everyone else. Lazy. That’s what he is – lazy.’

  ‘Then there’s something to be said for laziness,’ said the fat man, ‘in this instance, at least. Sometimes, rushing about is the wrong thing to do.’

  The cook spoke to the card player.

  ‘See,’ he said. ‘Here’s a gentleman who knows the value of good timing.’

  He placed the jug on the table, and returned to the kitchen. As the fat man savoured his wine, the card player tallied his stacks of money, and pile by pile, slipped them into the pockets of his trousers; and when the table was cleared of money, he drank down the last of his Metaxa.

  The cook brought the fat man a salad of crisp lettuce leaves and green onions and a dish of pickled vegetables – young carrots, hot peppers, stalks of cauliflower and black olives; returning to the kitchen, he fetched a saucer of brine-soaked caper leaves and a basket of fresh bread topped with toasted sesame seeds.

  ‘Oriste,’ he said. ‘Kali orexi.’

  ‘This looks excellent,’ said the fat man.

  ‘All my own produce,’ said the cook. ‘You’ll not find better. All grown within a kilometre of this place and all natural; no chemicals and no fertiliser, except for my own special ingredient: goat’s shit.’

  He disappeared back into the kitchen. A gust of wind moved the tops of the pine trees, causing a fall of loose needles. Unconcerned, the fat man picked a needle from the salad, and with a fingertip hooked a second from his wine before flicking it to the ground.

  ‘I expect,’ said the fat man to the card player, ‘this place is busy in summer?’

  The card player sighed, and shook his head.

  ‘We work all the hours God sends,’ he said, ‘and we try. There’s only four of us. Dmitri’s wife helps in the kitchen, and my eldest and I wait tables. In the old days, summer brought work for a dozen, but since they built the new road, folk pass us by. A few adventurous souls find us, as you have today. And the odd one or two who come to see the rubble. Why they want to see it, I couldn’t say.’ He leaned across to the kitchen door. ‘Dmitri! Bring another Metaxa!’

  From the kitchen came no answer but the rattling of pans; but moments later the cook appeared, a plate of stifado in one hand, a tumbler half-filled with brandy in the other.

  ‘Oriste,’ he said, laying the stew before the fat man. He placed the brandy beside the card player, and sat down beside him at their table.

  The savoury smell from his plate was quite delicious: tiny onions, cloves and cinnamon, the meat of young rabbits and above all, garlic. The fat man broke off a piece of bread, and dipping it into the thick sauce, began to eat. Swallowing the first mouthful, he smiled at the cook.

  ‘First class,’ he said. ‘My compliments.’ He tasted a piece of tender white meat. ‘Your food does you great credit. But your colleague was just saying, this place doesn’t draw people as it used to.’

  The cook shook his head, as if in despair.

  ‘We work like mules,’ he said. ‘Right through the hottest months, we never stop. It’s a hard life. And these days, there’s no money in it.’

  Taking a forkful of the salad, the fat man raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Six months of work and six months of rest seems a reasonable bargain to me. You’ll forgive me for saying that, to a stranger’s eyes, your life seems blessed. Your own business, land and the skill to produce your own wine, meat and vegetables, and talent as a cook – surely the gods have smiled on you? A beautiful view, and your health – more gifts! Who could possibly ask for more? You’re a happy man, I’m sure. And here’s to your continued health.’ He held up his glass, then drank more of the excellent wine.

  But the cook and his relative looked dour, staring out through the trees, across the ruined city to the sea.

  The fat man finished his meal, lit a cigarette, smoked half and stubbed it out. Putting his cigarettes away, his hand touched the matchbox in the pocket of his raincoat.

  ‘Let me show you something, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘Here’s a curiosity which may interest you.’

  He slid open the matchbox and picked out the dull-grey object he had found by the ancient graves. The cook and his relative looked dubious; at their doubting faces, the fat man laughed.

  ‘Appearances deceive,’ he said. ‘Look more closely.’

  He handed his find to the cook, who held it up to study it. It was a piece of flattened lead, formed into a roll; piercing the roll was an iron nail.

  The cook handed it back to the fat man.

  ‘I’m none the wiser,’ he said. ‘What is it?’

  ‘To begin with,’ said the fat man, ‘it’s an antiquity. This piece of metal was buried by someone when this rubble, as you call it, was a flourishing town. It carries, I think we’ll find, something intriguing. Chef, can you find me a pair of pliers? If you have none, scissors might do.’

  The cook rose from his seat; from the kitchen came the sound of drawers opening and the scattering of cutlery.

  ‘If that – whatever it is – has been there all that time, how come no one’s found it before you?’ asked the card player.

  ‘Sometimes an object waits for the right person to find it.’

  ‘Better keep it hidden, if it’s archaeology. Those museum folks’ll throw the book at you.’

  ‘I have a safe home in mind for this, if it’s what I think it is.’

  The cook returned holding up a pair of fine-tipped electrician’s pliers. The fat man took them, and with great care pulled the iron nail from the lead, laying it on the table by his glass.

  ‘Now,’ said the fat man, ‘our museum friends make heavy weather of these. It takes them weeks to open one and decipher it. But if you have the knack, it isn’t difficult. Watch.’

  Working it gently with the pliers, he teased the rolled lead into a resemblance of its original form – a square of beaten metal. When the lead was as flat as he could make it, the fat man laid it on his palm, and held it out for the two men to see the writing on the metal – tiny letters scratched with some kind of pin.

  ‘I’ll be damned,’ said the cook. ‘It’s a scroll.’

  ‘Of a kind, yes,’ said the fat man.

  ‘What does it say?’

  ‘Let’s find out.’

  Bending to his holdall, he took a jeweller’s loupe from a front pocket. Removing his glasses, he dipped a thumb int
o his wine and rubbed it across the lead scroll, darkening the metal to provide a deeper contrast with the dusty lettering, so the words were somewhat clearer. Fitting the loupe to his eye socket, he squinted at the writing on the scroll. For a minute he was silent, studying the script.

  ‘What does it say?’ asked the cook, impatiently.

  ‘It’s ancient Greek, of course . . .’

  ‘Can you make it out?’ asked the card player.

  ‘Oh, quite easily. It says, Great Hermes, bind him who stole my good name and so ruined me, and let him suffer punishments eternally. And there’s a name, but that I can’t read. It’s a curse tablet, obviously. Quite a nice one, actually. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it, if its target is still suffering the eternal punishments he was wished.’ The two men looked at each other, grimacing. ‘Of course this part of Greece – the hard north – was famous for its witchcraft, magic, that kind of thing. Thessaly – Thrace – was the capital of spiteful magic. Binding, as they called it. An important part of your ancestors’ rich history.’

  ‘History be damned,’ said the cook. ‘They’re at it still, in some of the smaller places – cursing, evil-eyeing, whatever you call it. Don’t cross anyone whilst you’re here, friend, or there’ll be old women binding you too.’

  A breath of cold wind passed over the terrace. The thin man shivered.

  ‘Superstition,’ said the fat man, ‘nothing more.’

  ‘What will you do with it?’ asked the cook. ‘If it were me, I wouldn’t walk about with such an object on me. To carry a man’s ill wishing can’t do you any good. If I were you, I’d take it back and bury it where you found it.’

  The fat man held the scroll in the flat of his hand.

  ‘The ill wishing died with the writer,’ he said. ‘This is a piece of metal, nothing more – and yet in the right hands, it might bring benefit instead of trouble. And I think I know where to give it a suitable home; and if I find the right place, you two might be amongst those who reap the benefits.’