“You didn’t care what the Church said—you were going with your heart,” Eva replied quietly.
“I know what the Church says, but I lost you once before and I’m not going to lose you again,” Father Haralambos stated. “I don’t understand it, but if that is what you have chosen...”
“Does it make you love us less?” Zoe asked.
He closed his eyes and shook his head. “My dear, dear, Zoe,” he said, pulling her closer to him. “I can’t love either of you less. It would mean denying my flesh and blood, and that is something I vowed before God never to do.”
“We love you so much.” Zoe smiled. She leaned over and brushed away the tears that were falling down Eva’s cheeks. “And I love your daughter very much.”
“And to think once you wanted to kill her.” Father Haralambos cupped Zoe’s cheek in his palm. “You are a blessing to Eva,” he said. The three of them huddled together. Father Haralambos put his right hand over Eva’s head, and with his left touched Zoe’s head. “You don’t have the church’s blessing but you have mine.”
Eva and Zoe broke down and sobbed together as they hugged him. “Come on now, this isn’t supposed to be about tears,” Father Haralambos said, gently rubbing Eva’s back. “Let’s get to the important part. I won’t have any grandchildren?”
“No. Unless Earl gets Eva pregnant, you won’t,” Zoe said, wiping her wet face with the heel of her hand.
“Who is Earl?” Father Haralambos asked sharply.
“Eva’s boyfriend,” Zoe said, earning herself a swat on the arm from Eva.
“You have a boyfriend?”
Drying her tears with a handkerchief, Eva said, “It’s a long story, but no, he’s not my boyfriend. Not in that sense. He’s a very dear friend to us, but that’s all.”
“I see.” Father Haralambos’ expression relaxed in relief. “Does he know you two are...?”
“Lovers,” Eva supplied.
“If you want to use that word, yes.’” he said.
“Yes.” Eva smiled at him.
“All right then, does this Earl know you are married?”
“Yes, he does.”
“Hmm, I have to meet this man,” Father Haralambos stated. “Now tell me all about life in Sydney.”
Chapter Twenty
“Father!”
Father Haralambos smiled at the exasperated cry from Eva. “Yes?” he asked, knowing full well what had caused his daughter’s outrage. He was sitting at the dinner table with Eva to his right and Zoe to his left. Across the table sat Earl, Elena, and Henry. He was certain that Eva had not mentioned her part in the war to her friends—Eva was reluctant to talk about herself and her past. He deduced that since Earl and Elena were very much aware of Eva’s relationship with Zoe, then revealing a little about their past wasn’t such a bad thing. He smiled at the glare he was getting from Eva.
“Don’t stop, sir, I’m enjoying this,” Earl said. His quip was rewarded with one of Eva’s glares. “You really are not scaring me,” he said to Eva mockingly, eliciting a low growl from Eva which only made him laugh.
Henry chuckled. “Her glares are really harmless.”
“You are not helping, Henry,” Eva reprimanded her friend before she turned her attention to Father Haralambos. “Father...”
“No.” He took Eva’s hand and held it. “I’m going to be right in saying that Earl and Elena haven’t heard how the two of you, with Henry’s aiding and abetting, helped the Resistance during the war.”
“I haven’t heard any stories,” Elena said.
“I’m sure you haven’t.” Father Haralambos went on. “My two daughters worked side by side, forging documents and delivering them to me. Henry was Eva’s guard and when Zoe came to join them, he was trying to guard Eva from Zoe.”
“That must have been a full time job,” Earl said with a laugh which was quickly joined in by Henry.
“Eva wasn’t easy either,” Henry said. “When she wasn’t trying to go off on her own without me, she was yelling at her new maid.”
“She wasn’t scary then either,” Zoe added, making Eva shake her head. “Eva was a thrower.”
“A what?”
“She threw a plate at me once.”
All eyes turned to Eva, who was shaking her head. “That was a ruse! That’s the only plate I ever threw, unlike you, who liked to throw stones.”
“It was a tiny pebble,” Zoe retorted and held up a few grains of salt, making everyone laugh.
“Who was the forger?” Earl asked, winking at Zoe.
“Eva.” Zoe replied and pointed to Eva. “She forged Muller’s signature and I delivered the papers to Father H, or sometimes when I couldn’t get out of the house, Henry went.”
Elena smiled at Eva, who was looking down at the table self-consciously. “You helped Jews escape?”
“I did what I could do,” Eva replied modestly and looked over at Elena with a shy smile.
“She did more than that, El; she saved some soldiers when they were hiding in Larissa...”
“Zoe...”
“Will you stop? These are our friends and they should know.”
Elena reached out and touched Zoe’s hand. “I’m such a busybody; I just want to know everything about my friends.”
“We were lucky we didn’t get caught.”
“How did you forge Muller’s signature?” Earl asked.
Eva played with the hem of the tablecloth for a moment before she looked up. “I sat in my room and practiced his signature. I would then burn the papers so no one could find them. It took some practice, but I managed to fool everyone. I wasn’t alone in helping the Resistance. I couldn’t have done it without Henry’s help in France, and in Greece, Zoe was the one who took the papers from me and delivered them to my father, which was actually more dangerous if she had been caught.”
“How did you two meet?” Earl asked.
Henry lowered his head and started to chuckle as Eva gently slapped him on the shoulder. “Stop that.”
“You hit like a girl.” Henry chuckled and clutched his arm. “If ever there were two people who were going to try and kill each other, these two were it.”
“I didn’t want to kill Zoe.” Eva protested. “She wanted to kill me.”
“Looking at you today, I find that so hard to believe,” Earl replied.
“It’s true.” Zoe gazed at Eva for a moment.
“What changed your mind?”
Zoe took a moment and closed her eyes before she opened them to find Eva’s gaze on her. “Eva’s laugh.”
“That’s all it took?”
“No, but it was her laugh that made me stop and think. There’s so much of this story and it’s not a happy time for us.” Zoe replied softly. “We’ve been through a lot together, but that’s all in the past.”
Earl whistled in amazement. “How many Jews did you save?”
“Don’t know.” Zoe shook her head. “Evy doesn’t know because she didn’t keep track. She just did the paperwork and passed it on.”
“It was safer that way,” Eva said. She got up and stood behind Zoe, resting her hands on her shoulders. “If I got caught, I wouldn’t give anything away.”
“They didn’t know that,” Elena said. “You could have been killed.”
Eva smiled sadly. “Yes, that’s true,” she said. Zoe gazed up at her. Eva continued, looking down and meeting Zoe’s gaze. “We all could have been killed.”
“So Zoe was a Resistance member?”
Both Henry and Eva nodded.
“My father died trying to save two Australian soldiers that were stuck and needed to cross the gorge to get to their regiment. I was thirteen when I joined the Resistance.”
“That’s so young,” Elena exclaimed. “We were all so young.”
“So how did Eva come into the picture? Did the Resistance want to kill her?”
Zoe shook her head. “No, they didn’t. I did.”
”Zoe’s mission was to kill me,” Eva said mat
ter-of-factly, and returned to her place at the table. “But I had ways of changing her mind,” she observed, sitting down.
“Did you try and keep them apart?” Elena asked the very quiet Henry, who merely smiling at the banter.
“They were two very stubborn women, and I was stuck in the middle.” Henry threw up his hands only to find a pillow had sailed over from the living room and hit him on the head.
“You poor baby,” Eva exclaimed as she put her arms around his shoulders. She leaned down and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “He was my protector.”
Henry glanced up and smiled. “Always.”
Silence descended on the group for a long moment before Henry cleared his throat.
Father Haralambos turned to Earl. “So, young man, tell me about yourself.”
Earl flashed a charming grin. “Not much to tell, sir.”
“There isn’t?”
“I work at the factory with Eva, or used to work, since she’s gone and left me all alone,” Earl said as he reached across and touched Eva’s hand.
“Hmm, so what is this I hear from my Eva that you want to marry her?”
Earl looked at Eva, who merely shrugged. “I...um,” he stammered helplessly, frowning in puzzlement.
“You haven’t asked me yet,” Father Haralambos said, feigning seriousness and scratching his ear. “You have to do that first.”
“I do?”
“Yes, that is the Greek tradition.”
Eva smirked and winked at Earl. “Rules are rules.”
“But I don’t want to marry you,” Earl told her with trepidation, obviously feeling that Eva had not explained their unique situation.
“You don’t want to marry my Eva?” Father Haralambos scowled at Earl.”
“Uh, no, sir,” Earl said, sparing a quick look at Eva and then turning back to Father Haralambos.
“Hmm,” Father Haralambos murmured and stroked his chin. He could see Eva was enjoying the little “interrogation,” although Earl was looking a little alarmed. He liked the young man and could see why his daughters liked him. Earl was a decent young man who appeared to have won Eva’s and Zoe’s trust, a trust that wasn’t easily given. “Do you want Zoe?”
Earl’s frown turned into a crooked smile. “I don’t think so! And now I know where Eva gets that evil streak,” he said as everyone started to laugh.
“I don’t have an evil streak,” Eva protested.
“Oh, that is so wrong,” Zoe said cheekily. She got up from her seat and stood behind Eva’s chair, flicking Eva’s head with her fingers. Eva caught Zoe’s hand and held it.
“Takes one to know one, eh, Zoe?” Father Haralambos quipped before turning his attention to Elena. “Zoe tells me you’re an artist.”
Elena smiled shyly. “Not as good as Zoe.”
“Don’t be so modest,” Zoe said as she went back to sit in her chair. “Don’t believe her, Father H. She draws so beautifully.”
“Is that so?” Father Haralambos smiled. “And you are both studying to get into this art college?”
“Yes, sir.” Elena nodded. “Earl and Eva are helping us.”
“That’s very generous.”
“I was a school teacher before the war,” Earl said. “I haven’t taught in such a long time, but Zoe and Elena are great students.”
“Ah, yes, the war.” Father Haralambos took a long, assessing look at Earl and decided not to pursue his next question about what Earl had done during the war. “Do you work in the same factory as Eva?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You are wasting your talents, young man.” Father Haralambos turned to Eva. “You were as well, but you’ve corrected that problem,” he added, pointing his finger at her.
Eva shrugged. “For everything there is a season.”
“Quoting Bible texts at me won’t change my opinion.” Father Haralambos ruffled his daughter’s hair. Eva smiled, then caught his hand and kissed it.
Earl watched and, after a moment, caught Zoe’s attention. Zoe gave him a knowing smile.
“I keep telling her that,” Zoe said, only to be on the receiving end of Eva’s mock glare.
“Stubborn. You didn’t get that from me,” Father Haralambos added, and chuckled anew when Zoe let out a peal of laughter and nearly fell off her chair. “You’re going to hurt yourself,” he warned Zoe.
“Can I ask you something?” Earl asked.
“Of course you can.”
“How do you pronounce your surname?”
“Getting into practice?”
Earl turned to Eva and rudely stuck out his tongue at her before turning back to Father Haralambos, his attitude now earnest. Father Haralambos was a little perplexed by their antics, but he undertook to answer Earl’s question.
“You break it up into two words—hara is one word and lambos is the other. Hara means happiness, and lambos means...” He paused for a moment to find the right word in English. After a moment’s mental groping, he continued, “Lambos means a shining bright light.”
Earl put his arm around Eva. “Muzza, you’re going to get a new nickname.”
“Muzza? I don’t know what that word means.” Perplexed, Father Haralambos looked at Earl and then at Eva for an explanation.
“The Australians have a nickname for everything. I don’t know how it works, but he takes Muller and turns it into Muzza,” Eva said.
“Very strange. Earl, why do you ask about my name?”
To his surprise, Eva answered the question. Her unmistakable joy was infectious. “I know this news will make you as happy as it makes me. I’ve put in an application to have my surname changed to Haralambos.”
Her father’s smile widened until the muscles in his face protested. He opened his arms and gathered his daughter into his embrace. Eva kissed his cheek tenderly. “I wanted to honor your memory,” she said.
“Thank you. You have greatly honored me,” he whispered and returned her kiss, pressing his lips against her soft cheek. “When is this going to happen?”
“As soon as I’m interviewed by the Immigration Department,” Eva replied. “I got the letter a couple of days ago.”
“So you go from Muzza to Huzza.” Earl guffawed.
“As much as I would like to sit and talk to you all, I need to get some sleep.” Father Haralambos pushed away from the table and got up from his seat, holding on to the back of the chair for support. His bad leg had started to ache and he hoped a good night’s rest was going to be better than taking pain pills, which he hated. “Thank you for your company, Earl and Elena.”
“Thank you, sir,” Elena and Earl said in unison, smiling.
Father Haralambos followed Eva into her bedroom. He was tired but happy that he had met his daughter’s friends, and that both she and Zoe seemed to be thriving in the new life they had made together.
***
“What a nice man,” Elena whispered to Zoe, who nodded her head.
”I need a beer and there’s none left,” Earl announced. “Come on, Henry, let’s go and get some more beer and some smokes.” Earl got up from his seat and took out his car keys.
“More what? What are smokes?”
“Smokes, my friend, are cigarettes. We will be back soon and in time for chocolate cake,” Earl said as he and Henry walked out of the apartment.
Eva cleaned up the plates and took them into the kitchen. She was joined moments later by Zoe, who put the cups aside. She put her arms around Zoe’s slim waist and looked down. “Have I told you how much I love you?”
“Not since this morning.” Zoe sighed and embraced Eva. She rested her cheek against Eva’s chest. “I hate talking about the war.”
“I know, but Elena and Earl don’t know about that part of our lives. They were just curious.”
“Henry and Earl have hit it off.”
Eva’s gentle laugh filled the kitchen, making Zoe giggle. “Our boys like each other.”
“Have you noticed how much they look like each other?”
&nb
sp; “No.”
Zoe giggled. “You have a type. Earl and Henry were trading swear words out on the balcony earlier.”
Eva groaned. “Those two are dangerous together. I don’t have a type.”
“Yes, and I'm not Greek,” Zoe joked. “Elena’s a bit wary of Henry.”
Eva gazed at Zoe for a long moment. “He’s was a German soldier, Zo. I would have been more surprised if El wasn’t wary of Henry.”
“When are we going to tell Father H about Muller?”
“Tomorrow. I’ve really enjoyed this, and I really didn’t want Muller intruding, not tonight.”
Zoe nodded. She let go of Eva and stacked the dishes for washing. Elena put on a record in the living room and the music drifted into the kitchen.
“May I have this dance?” Eva asked as she took Zoe’s hand and they began to waltz to the music.
Chapter Twenty-One
Elena pushed open the door to the kitchen and smiled when she saw Eva waltz Zoe around the room. “Zoe, there’re two gentlemen at the door. I think it’s a little late for salesmen, but you might want to come out and see.”
Zoe hated to be intruded on in the evening. More and more salesmen were making evening calls, and more than one of them copped her ire.
“I’m going to complain to their head office,” she muttered as she followed Elena out the door.
Zoe padded her way to the door to find two men standing outside. One of the men was short with close-cropped brown hair and brown eyes. His black pinstriped suit looked quite severe for a young man. Adding to the look, he wore glasses with thick black frames. He held his brown briefcase in front of him like a shield, which was a little weird even for a salesman. His partner was blond with green eyes, and he was taller than his colleague. This man also wore a black suit, but with a red tie and no hat. Zoe didn’t trust a man who wasn’t courteous enough to wear a hat, strange as that seemed.
“Hello. May we speak to Miss Muller?” the brown-haired man asked smiling.
Zoe stood still for a long moment with her hand on the doorknob. She had never seen two salesmen come to the door together. “How do you know I’m not Miss Muller?”
The brown-haired man looked at his partner, and then shifted his gaze back to Zoe. “We know you’re not.”
Where Shadows Linger (Intertwined Souls Series Book 2) Page 17