by Leah Fleming
The mayor was knocked awake in the same fashion, told of the ceremony just performed and persuaded at gunpoint to give them a certificate of marriage, which they duly signed on the dot in the light of the rising sun. Everyone cheered ‘Chronia Polla’, many years. Even the mayor got caught up in the romance of it all and gave them a pitcher of wine.
‘Welcome, Kyria Androulaki.’ Andreas kissed her deeply, and his friends melted away as he kissed the silver twisted ring he’d put on her finger and they sipped the wine. ‘Not much of a wedding breakfast, but that can come later.’
It was barely light but the night was warm. Their escorts walked ahead, leaving them alone in the narrow ravine before the track climbed steeply into the hills. Andreas paused to tether the mule and brought out a woven wool blanket of red, gold and black stripes from its saddle and put it down on the grass under the nearest olive tree. They sat, kissed again lying down until the moon dipped away and the sun began to rise. It was as sacred a wedding night as anyone could wish for, Yolanda thought as she lay back, expectant of what would happen next.
Now they were truly alone with no guards to quench the burning desire she’d felt inside for so many long months; all those sleepless nights, tossing under the sheets dreaming of such bliss, were over. Now she was locked in her lover’s arms, sinking down into an embrace that would change her for ever. He was tender and loving, but there was no shame in the passion they expressed with their bodies, the kisses they exchanged as their bodies melded into one. She lay back in his arms, hardly believing so much could happen in the course of one day. Yolanda Androulaki – how lovely it sounded. She was truly a married woman now.
Next day they made their way to his family’s farm high in the hills, walking through fields of yellow daisies and poppies, and over tracks high up so they had a wonderful view of the coast below. As they drew nearer Yolanda began to fear how his parents would react to his news. He had broken all their traditions marrying out of his faith, bringing a town girl into the family without asking approval. She had no dowry of beautiful embroidery to offer, no olive trees or livestock. Nothing but the clothes she stood up in. Even she knew this was not how most Cretans went about their marriages. What if they turned her away in disgust?
She need not have feared. She was treated only with kindness, if a little surprise. When Adonis, Andreas’ father, heard about the midnight nuptials, he roared with laughter. ‘Heavens above, and the poor girl not even a Christian!’
It was the only time they referred to her religion. Andreas swore them to secrecy. From now on she was to be treated as any bride. All the talk now was of a feast and singing and a proper celebration in the village, which made Yolanda shudder. Her own parents would be in deep mourning for her elopement. For her husband’s sake, she would learn the Christian traditions. What was done was done and she had no regrets.
Now the heat of summer was coming, all talk was of the wedding feast, a sheep or two to be slaughtered, pies to be made, flour to be found. Everyone in Chania was starving, but this was the country and they had ways of eking out their supplies from hidden stores.
Besides, farmers knew a thing or two about making a little go a long way. No one would come to the feast empty-handed, and they would invite everyone so no one would go hungry.
Kyria Dimitra, Andreas’ mother, smiled. ‘It’s like the story of the loaves and fishes; much comes from little. It is a miracle how we always have enough to go round.’
Yolanda smiled and kept kneading the bread. She had nothing to offer but her gold chain, which they refused even to look at.
The night before the wedding feast, Andreas’ mother produced a simple white dress with lace at the sleeves and hem. It smelled of camphor balls. ‘You will wear my wedding dress. It will suit your slim figure. You town girls are like sparrows.’
Only then was Yolanda presented to the crowd of curious faces, her hair braided with blossom, her dress freshened with lavender water, a country bride, a stranger among strangers, but in wartime no one was surprised that customs had been ignored. His family towered over her, and to her it felt like living in a dream where music was playing, and she was expected to dance with all the handsome men and receive little gifts of money in a special purse. She felt like a ghost floating among them, half expecting to wake up in her little boxroom listening to Momma and Miriam arguing from the stairs.
Round and round she swirled, dizzy with dancing, drunk with wine, until her eyes alighted on the face of a woman standing by the wall and she stopped. Could it be . . . ? Surely not, here . . . And the red hair . . . ? What a wonderful surprise. Should she draw attention to her in public? No one would know their connection here, why shouldn’t they recognize each other. And yet . . . oh, why not?
‘Penny!’ she screamed. ‘My friend Penny is here.’
The girl in the cotton dress and headscarf rushed towards her with open arms, startled. Hugging her, she whispered in her ear, ‘Athina, please, not Penny . . .’
‘Why do I get everyone’s names wrong?’ Yolanda shouted to cover her mistake. ‘Of course, it’s Athina, one of my nurses.’
The mayor, who’d been snapping the party with a tiny box camera, drew close. ‘Smile,’ he commanded, but they were too busy grinning with delight at this unexpected reunion to notice the click of the shutter.
2001
And so for a few precious months, a brief spell of brightness flickered in a tunnel of darkness. We danced and sang as if the world was not going to fall in on our heads, as if there were no enemies lurking on the fringes; even at these celebrations, loose tongues wagging that the doctor from Chania had brought a Jewish bride back to the farm. Yolanda looked so beautiful that night and I envied her. Oh, how I envied her for having a lover who would bang down doors to make her his bride.
But war or no war, I must wait for Bruce to return and do things the English way. I was furious that he wouldn’t even make love to me when he had had the chance. Was he not man enough to take the opportunity offered to him? It still rankled that his mission came before personal desires, though I despised myself for such terrible selfish thoughts.
All these frustrations I poured out to my silent audience, Clarence. If a tree is a living being, he was the nearest thing I ever had to a father confessor. I wondered if he was still there, grown fatter and more pock-marked in the last sixty years. I would love to find him again. Perhaps with a detailed map we could locate Katrina’s village, if only I could recall its name. I think it began with a K . . .
I wrote to them after the war but my letters were returned. Little did I realize that after the war far worse things happened between neighbours in the name of politics than ever happened in the conflict.
Memories of my time with Yolanda were so precious now. Our paths crossed many times after that. Being in her company was like an oasis in the desert of my life before the bad times returned . . .
Now I could feel the warmth of the sun easing my bones, its brightness lifting my spirits, my senses touched by familiar sounds and scents. Siesta time over, I felt refreshed, ready to carry on my pilgrimage as if those cheerful memories had given me the courage to face the darkness to come.
Part 4
BETRAYAL
When will the skies grow clear?
When will the spring come round?
So I can take my gun again
My beautiful patroness
And go down to Omalos
And the path of the Mousouri . . .
Extract from ‘When will the skies grow clear’
A traditional Cretan folk song
Knossos, 2001
The Minoan Palace of Knossos outside Heraklion city had changed out of all recognition. Coaches disgorged thousands of tourists in the heat of the May morning. There were entrance gates, tickets to buy, garish stalls selling souvenirs, all the usual trappings of a world-famous site. Rainer found himself ushered towards a guide and told to join the queue, which was not his intention. He would much prefer to wander th
rough the excavations at his own pace. He wanted to consider whether he liked what had been reconstructed since the last earthquake, to revisit Sir Arthur Evans’s layout with a fresher eye.
Now there were roped-off areas, duckboards, guides with umbrellas waving their flocks from one section to another. He’d chosen a busy day in the height of summer and his coach party were more interested in finding benches in the shade and taking snapshots than taking a detailed tour of the buildings. They didn’t realize that the huge blocks of crystallized stone glinting in the sun, the timber-framed stonework, the sophisticated drainage systems and storage areas full of pots, hid an even older civilization underneath. This had been a sacred grove since the cradle of man. Who had lived here – a king, a priest, a dynastic family – no one was sure, but everyone seemed to have an opinion.
He filtered away from the group to look at the wall frescoes. He never tired of those ancient figures, men in pleated skirts, their jewelled ankles and wrists, and on the fabric were detailed patterns with symbols long lost to modern man: blue monkeys or birds, animals, figures. This place had been the centre of the archaeological universe when he was a student, but all their certainties were blown apart now by new theories. There were so many layers: Neolithic, Minoan, Mycenaen, Greco-Roman, and earthquakes shunting layers into each other making more puzzles. His own interest in Minoan history was fuelled by visits here before the war. The heat was too much for an old man, and as he sat watching the other tourists he thought how empires came and went. This had been a real centre of power once, but now all that was left were dust, stones and theories. Enough was enough; he needed a beer. These crowds were too much for him.
He found a taverna on the main road, cooled his hands on the chilled lager and took stock. He must be close to the Villa Ariadne, the HQ of the most senior German officers on Crete, the most famous being Commander General Kreipe, kidnapped towards the end of the war. The event was later made into a film. What a fiasco, and the consequences . . . But that was not his story to tell.
If he recalled correctly, if he walked up the side lane he would find a back entrance somewhere into the grounds of the villa now owned by the Greek Government, not the British School of Archaeology in Athens. He’d like to see it again.
It was a steep climb and he paused to turn and view the expanse of still-green valley where there were hectares of unexplored ruins waiting to be unearthed. He wondered if the gate was locked and if the tennis court was still there at the side of the main building, built in the style of an English country house by Sir Arthur Evans when he began his excavations.
He pushed open the door in the wall and followed a rough path towards the outbuildings. He was trespassing but no one was around to challenge him. There was an old taverna lodge still used by students as a field study centre somewhere towards the proper entrance. He’d stayed there once so he just wanted a peek at the villa for old times’ sake.
It was exactly as he recalled, surrounded by palms and a riot of plumbago, with morning glory tumbling over the walls, scattered pillars and plinths dotted around the grounds, a headless Hadrian at the foot of the stairs. The veranda remained to the side where he had watched generals dining alfresco all those years ago.
This place had seen many occupants, as a garrison mess, a hospital clinic, a refuge, a seat of learning. It was the signing place of their final surrender in 1945. The house had ensured its survival and Knossos remained untouched, in so far as any site could be undisturbed when there were bombs and battles, earthquakes and civil war. It would have been a pity to have lost such heritage. He was glad work was still going on, finds being recorded and students pursuing their dreams.
Why was it important to see all this again, he mused. He’d not been stationed here. He stood in the overgrown court and shook his head. How full of plans he’d been in his youth, none of them achieved. The war had done that to him. This was a place of shadows. He must find another beer and get out of this empty place. It meant nothing to him now.
July 1943
That first journey into Heraklion was not without incident. They fought off an ambush on the road somewhere close to Rethymno, a band of partisans, wild men with beards and rifles shooting at the convoy, thankfully with armed guards giving them as good as they got. These bands of rebels leaped out of nowhere with an uncanny knowledge of where and when they were coming, a worrying trend, which meant spies close to HQ. There was now a co-ordinated push into the badlands of the White Mountains to find the caches of arms and supplies being dropped from the air, ambushing the bandits in the act of retrieving them. They’d had some successes but the groups were being trained up by British agents into fighting platoons to make smash-and-grab raids, for which the villages supporting them must be rendered useless.
Recently there’d been a campaign of chalked messages scrawled in German on walls around the town, propaganda, with news of Italian capitulations and warnings that they feared were coming from their own men. There were disgruntled elements based on the island, a spate of suicides and desertions that had to be stamped out quickly, but an uneasy standoff with locals produced some informers.
The plan was to capture some of these enemy agents in the act of sabotage, squeeze out names and contacts, and Rainer hoped to meet a young man able to assist them in this. He was to give him the once-over and check he wasn’t a double agent.
He met him on site at Knossos, exploring the ruins with interest. To the casual eye they were two archaeologists on an outing, just talking over their interests. But there was another agenda.
At first Rainer didn’t know what to make of Agent Stavros. He was a strange mixture of English good looks and fiery Greek temperament: fair-haired, blue-eyed, full of zeal to follow the Führer and his creed, an ardent National Socialist, friend of Oswald Mosley, anti-communist to the point of fanaticism, and he could play a mean game of tennis, too. He thrashed Rainer six games to one. Rainer’s leg was healed by now so there were no excuses. The boy was too good for him, placing the ball just out of his reach, his face a picture of determined steeliness. When Rainer admitted defeat, Stavros replied in perfect English, ‘You can thank my public school for a killer forehand. I perfected it on the bottoms of my fags.’
Stavros was a student in Athens and keen to join the excavations out west, but he’d been told he must earn his keep. He was recruited after the fall of Athens and there was no doubting his loyalties. Converts always made the most fervent soldiers. Tested out in the hills in the Italian sector, he picked out a few British boys on the run and made sure they were executed before they could doubt his cover, as a spy.
He was the genuine article. There would be no silly gaffes with this man, the perfect English gentleman with the accent of the officer class. They were working up a new legend for him as his first attempt had backfired. He’d moved further towards the coast and filtered into the hills as an escapee, sheltering in a village for the night, where he was promptly beaten up and returned to the local gendarmerie as a prisoner of war.
This was either a rare case of Cretan loyalty to the occupying forces in yielding up evaders, or a clever ruse to play them at their own game. Either way, he had to be moved on with a better cover story. It would be hard to explain his presence on the island when most of the evaders were gone long ago. He must claim injury and that he had been staying on to help the natives in their struggle, but was now desperately trying to head south for a boat. Now he was happy to join the Resistance fighters and meet the agents. Stavros had added his own flourish, playing the absent-minded professor, keen on all things Minoan. This would explain his wandering around in search of findings, behaving like a total British eccentric in accent and looks. He would be perfect for reporting back any news from the White Mountains closer to Chania. Here he had a better chance of being picked up by a sympathetic village passing him down the line. If he got to Cairo he’d be implanted in the British Army. It was a daring scheme but this boy was unstoppable.
‘You’re a brave
one,’ Rainer commented.
‘It has to be done. From what I’ve heard they’re all a bunch of thieves and bandits feuding amongst themselves. Divide and rule – long may it continue, I say.’
‘If you’re caught, there’s nothing we can do to save you,’ Rainer warned. ‘You are on your own, I’m afraid. We’d claim no knowledge of you.’
Stavros clicked his heels and gave the salute. ‘Heil Hitler! It’s my honour to die for him.’
How confident, how committed and how naïve this boy was to think the Führer cared a hoot about him, dead or alive, but Rainer had to admire such loyalty. It made his own uncertainty and lazy compliance seem so hesitant. He’d seen too much now to be certain of anything but that innate desire to survive long enough to see his family again. His sister, Katerina, would be sixteen, a young lady. How was she growing up in the midst of such turmoil?
‘You have papers under your false identity. Is there anyone I should inform should . . .’ He hesitated to continue.
‘I have no family I wish to contact.’
They spent a pleasant evening in Heraklion, walking round the harbour and dining in the square. To have such an agent working in the Chania area was just the fillip needed. They were not going to rush; one false move and his cover would be blown. ‘Siga, siga,’ slowly, slowly, as the Greeks say. Stavros might be a bit of a cold fish but he was a brave one and needed the best support they could offer. Rainer wondered what whales or minnows he’d trawl into his net.
Yolanda was finding country living daunting: the pungent smells, the routine chores, all the physical work expected of a woman. She was a city girl at heart, but that part of her life was over. She was learning fast to understand the thick accent, the gestures, the rules she must live by here if she was to be accepted. The close-knit community watched her with interest and kept its distance.