There they found Kara and her aunt. Kara jumped to her feet and came running to Domini; her eyes were like a stricken fawn's, dark and hurt and bewildered. "Oh, Domini," she said helplessly. "What shall we do without Paul?"
Domini took hold of the girl and hugged her close. She had no answer for Kara, no answer for herself.
They waited, not speaking much, while the clock ticked persistently on the wall and the density of the fog slowly cleared to leave a hazy midnight sky. A young nurse came in with steaming cups of coffee on a tray, and Domini was clasping her cup and trying to warm her hands with it when the door opened again and the nurse they had first seen came into the waiting-room. She beckoned to Domini and when Kara jumped up as well, the nurse said regretfully that only the wife of Monsieur Stephanos was to be allowed to see him at the moment.
Kara, holding on sternly to her self-control, took Domini's half-finished cup of coffee and said huskily: "Go to him, kyria. It is your right."
Domini followed the nurse to Paul's sickroom, and she didn't notice when she first entered that a man in medical white was standing quietly in the shadows by the window. Domini walked slowly to the side of the white bed, where Paul lay very still, his eyes closed, his black hair in pain-damp scrolls along his forehead. Pain of an indescribable nature had set its mark on his face, leaving it fine-drawn and shadowed. Very gently Domini touched his cheek and felt the taut bone. He didn't move. Her touch was not felt, for he had gone beyond all awareness of her.
She didn't hear the doctor as he came across to her, but sensing a presence she turned her head and met the kind, shrewd eyes of Metros Suiza.
"It seems so wrong to see Paul lying so helpless," she murmured. "Doctor," she gripped his arm, "can't anything be done? Have we got to stand by and see him— die?"
Dr. Suiza studied her for a long moment, then he took her hand and led her out of the room, into which the waiting nurse slipped at once. Dr. Suiza led Domini down the corridor, away from the waiting-room and into a consulting-room. He closed the door very firmly and told her to sit down. She did so, wearily, and faced him across the desk.
"What is it that's killing my husband?" she said painfully.
"A fraction of metal," Metros said quietly. "A splinter from a grenade that exploded in his face when as a mere boy he fought in the rebellion that tore his beloved Greece in two."
"But it happened so long ago," Domini protested. "How could he have gone on all these years—?"
"Stranger things have been known, my dear, and that destructive fraction of metal might have lain undetected, giving him little trouble at all—but for a certain incident that occurred just under two years ago. You know that Paul had a brother?"
She felt the dilation of her eyes as they locked with the doctor's. "Loukas died of drowning almost two years ago.” she said. "Paul went undersea to try to save him."
"Quite so." Metros inclined his head. "And upon coming to the surface he suffered a prolonged blackout. We thought it advisable to detain him in hospital in case of complications, and it was during those few days that we made tests and discovered that during his act of re-surfacing on an inadequate supply of air that splinter of metal had shifted under the pressure and re-located itself in a far more dangerous section of the brain. From the moment that shifting took place, Domini, your husband began to live on borrowed time."
"You—told him of this?" Domini asked, a hand at her hurting throat.
"Paul Stephanos is not a man from whom you can keep the truth." Metros shrugged, his faint smile was tinged with sadness and admiration. "A brave andarte at sixteen turns into quite a man as the years go by. A bold, daring man, who has too much respect for the earthy truths of life to be fobbed off with weak fabrications. The headaches began almost at once. Acute agony which drugs help—but not always."
Domini sat very still, recalling the times when Paul had withdrawn alone into his shell of pain. She had felt compassion for him—God help her—but stubborn pride had kept her from going to the tiger who wanted to be alone to lick his wounds.
A hard, tearless sob broke in her throat. "Can nothing be done?" she cried across the desk at Dr. Suiza. "Surely this metal splinter could be removed by surgery? Paul has money. He could afford the cleverest of brain surgeons—·"
"I quite agree." Metros leant towards her, his hands gripped together. "There is an operation that could save him, and without it he will die as surely as morning
must come. He will go out with one of the tides, unless a surgeon removes within the next few hours what is killing him—to give him dark life for even darker death!"
Domini stared at Metros, her heart in her throat. "Dark life?" she whispered. "Blindness?"
"Blindness certainly, but whether or not it would be total we are not sure." Metros got to his feet and came to lean on the desk near Domini's chair. His face looked haggard, but his eyes seemed to hold small leaping flames that burned into Domini's. "I have begged Paul to be sensible and undergo the operation, but he shrinks from the horror of being blind and a possible burden to the people he has always cared for and protected— little Kara, and now yourself, my dear."
"Oh, why didn't he tell me?" Domini whispered, half to herself.
"He is not a man to want pity," Metros said quietly. "He is strong; he has the heart of a tiger. But for a Greek to face the awful prospect of blindness is worse than death itself. Have you not noticed how Greeks love to be out in the Grecian sun from early morning to the fall of dusk? Have you not seen how they keep darkness out of then houses with many lights at night? Paul is all Greek. He has chosen to die rather than live in the dark."
"But he can't die!" Domini clutched at the edge of the desk. "What would we do without him—Kara and I—and all the other people here on the island who care for him so much?"
"Do you realise what you have just said, my dear?" Metros quietly smiled.
She nodded, her eyes brimming with tears above the hand she crushed against her pain-wrenched mouth. "He must have that operation," she whispered fiercely. "I-I can sign for it, can't I, Dr. Suiza? That is the right of a wife?"
"Very much the right of a wife!" Metros strode round the desk and snatched up the telephone; his eyes held hers, very fiery and Greek. "Have you the courage to face Paul — a live and threshing tiger of a Paul—in, say, a week from now?"
She was standing up, head high against the collar of her ocelot coat, her eyes very blue and stinging with tears. "He can kill me if he wishes," she said with spirit. "Where's that form I have to sign, doctor?"
"First I am putting through a call to Athens." He rapidly dialled a number. "The Graces have been good enough to lift the fog, now let us pray that the surgeon we need is free to take a plane at a moment's notice."
Domini closed her eyes and silently prayed, while Metros Suiza crackled Greek into the mouthpiece of the phone.
The grounds of the hospital were damp with the dews of dawn. Small opals of moisture clung to blades of grass and the furled petals of a mass of morning-glory. The early birds were chattering away, and the rising sun was firing with gold the tops of the trees. After the fog of yesterday it was going to be a lovely day, as Domini saw from the window of the hospital room she had shared through the night with Kara.
Kara still slept. Nikos had taken his mother home some hours ago. Barry had gone as well, pressing Domini's hands between his as he had done long ago when they had parted on the beach at Knightley . . . for good, they both knew that now.
Domini drew her coat about her and walked carefully to the door, for she didn't wish to wake Kara. She opened the door with equal care and stepped outside into a cool, antiseptic corridor, where already there was a busy coming and going of nursing staff and orderlies. Several of them glanced at her, but they seemed too busy to speak and she made her way undeterred to the floor on which Paul's room was situated. Arriving at the door, she hesitated, then eased the door open and took a look inside . . . Paul's bed was empty, the covers drawn aside, leaving
a gaping, empty mattress.
Domini had never felt so cold, so acute a sense of loneliness as she stood looking at that empty bed. The indentation of Paul's head was still visible in the pillow, his wristwatch lay on the bedside table, the strap still curled to the shape of his wrist
"Steady!" Firm hands took hold of her and impelled her into the room to a chair. She sat shivering while Dr. Suiza poured cold water into a glass and held it to her lips.
"You foolish child, to give yourself such a fright!" He spoke gruffly. "You should have waited for me to come and tell you that Paul has been taken to the operating theatre. His surgeon arrived half an hour ago."
The water was cold on her lips, the news a warm relief. "How long will the operation take?" she asked.
"Some hours, I am afraid. Look, child, why don't you go home? You are worn out already, and this hospital atmosphere will play more and more on your nerves as the hours go by."
"I'd prefer to stay," she said quietly. "I promise to be good. Kara and I will have some coffee from the canteen, then we'll wait on a bench in the grounds."
"As your doctor I should order you to go home." Metros shook his head at her. "But no doubt you would worry even more, waiting there for news. Very well, sit in the grounds. The sun is rising and it grows warm; you and the little sister will come to no harm there."
"The surgeon is good, Metros?" She sat looking up at him, with eyes too large in her pale face.
"One of the very best," he assured her. "He is tough and ruthless as Paul himself—and such men have their way, do they not?"
"Not quite—this time." She bit down on her lip. "Paul is sure to hate me when it is all over—but how could I let him die?"
Metros could still hear her saying the words, so simply, so quietly, as she walked away from him, along the corridor and down the stairs that led to the room where Kara might have awakened to find herself alone. Domini quickened her pace, eager to share with Kara the news that Paul was now in the hands of the surgeon, and the hope that his skill would give Paul his sight as well as his life.
The time passed slowly, and yet all at once it was over as Domini saw a nurse approaching the bench on which she sat with Kara. They rose and went to meet the nurse. Monsieur Stephanos was now out of the theatre, and they could come to the recovery-room just to have a look at him.
The nurse added — speaking in Greek which Kara translated — that the surgeon would then like a few words with Madame Stephanos.
Domini's heart gave a cold little jerk. She met Kara's eyes, appealingly, and Kara questioned the nurse in rapid Greek. "She says it is a formality," Kara said, but their fingers clung as they walked along the path between a double row of heart's-ease, and in under the shade of a side entrance.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
PAUL looked as people always do after an exhausting and protracted operation, as though he would never wake again. His head was swathed in white bandages, and the quietness of the recovery-room was broken as Kara gave way at last and began to cry.
"I-it is because I am so happy," she sobbed. "S-so happy that Paul is g-going to get well."
The surgeon was a tall, blackbrowed man with heavy shoulders and an uncompromising manner. Madame must understand, he said, that it could not be certain at this stage whether her husband's blindness would be total or partial. In the course of extracting the metal splinter, the optic nerves had suffered damage . . . in short, Madame Stephanos must be prepared for the worst and hopeful of the best.
At best, it seemed, Paul would have the sight of his left eye.
Aunt Sophula insisted that Domini spend the next week or so at her house. It was closer to the hospital; besides it would do Domini no good to worry alone in that big, empty house on the eagle's crag. Domini fell in with the suggestion, but she had to go home for some clothes, and she also wanted to assure Yannis and Lita that Paul was going to get well.
How quiet the house was, though far down on the beach men were moving to and fro like worker-ants. Some of them were blocking in the cave-tunnel which was no longer safe for use. Others were busy erecting an electric cable on which a cabin would travel up and down from the beach to the headland — Paul's idea, which had gone into operation some days ago. It would be very useful now, Domini thought. Paul would not run like a ram down the uneven-stepped path for many weeks. Maybe never, if the miracle she was praying for did not occur.
She wrote a long letter to her uncle before Yannis drove her to the old harbour mansion, sitting at Paul's desk in his private den, using the ornate pen that had belonged to his grandfather. There was a lot to tell Uncle Martin, but she didn't want to worry him too much and she made no mention of the baby she had lost. The letter ran to several sheets and it helped to put into words some of the deep anxiety she was feeling in connection with Paul. At last she laid down the pen and sealed the letter into an envelope, adding a Greek stamp and visualising her uncle as he opened the letter at the breakfast table in the shabby morning-room at Fairdane.
Fairdane seemed a long way away, a house in a dream where like Alice she had wandered and played and never quite grown-up.
She sat on quietly at Paul's desk, fingering the carving of the age-polished wood, and finally taking into her hand the little brass unicorn which she had given to Paul that honeymoon day in Looe. Strange, fateful day, the fabric of their night sewn happiness doomed to be torn into shreds before the sun went into the sea.
She traced with a finger the outlines of the unicorn . . . symbolic of the most elusive thing in the world, Paul had said. Symbolic of happiness; fabric of dreams, gift of the gods. She rose and made her way out of the den, carrying the unicorn like a talisman.
Lita had packed a suitcase for Domini and she carried it down to the front door for her. The door was open and a cluster of people waited on the steps, anxious-eyed, eager to hear from Domini herself that her husband was going to recover from his illness and be well and strong again. All of them had gifts of fruit and flowers for her to take to him, and as Domini's arms filled with the flowers she couldn't speak for the band of pain tightening around her throat. Tears gathered in her eyes, falling on to the lovely, scented mass of flowers as she buried her face in them and ran to the car.
The women in the crowd nodded to each other. The little Anglitha was touched by their gifts . . . such a nice girl for a foreigner ... so much in love with her husband.
The next few days were made much easier for Domini by the company of Kara, and Nikos when he was home from work. He had a very serious and grown-up air since finding himself in full charge of the local office. "My son is almost a man," Aunt Sophula sighed over her lacework, as mothers will when they see the last traces of boyhood fading from the faces of their sons. "It seems only a day or so ago that I held in my arms a baby . . . ah, but forgive me, Domini, I should not talk to you of babies just yet. Though I don't doubt there will be others, with Paul making such progress after his operation. It will not be long now, child, before he is home."
Domini kept her eyes glued to the magazine she was looking at, for her conversations with Paul at his bedside had not included any mention of the future and what it might or might not hold. Kara always went with her on her visits and whenever she mentioned leaving them alone for a private chat, panic seemed to clutch at Domini and she was always glad to see Paul smile rather narrowly and order his sister to stay just where she was. Kara, looking like an elf in her best green dress, would curl down again on the side of his bed and shoot puzzled glances from him to Domini.
Domini saw those glances, though she pretended not to. She strove for as normal a manner as possible as the days passed and Paul's head-swathings grew less and less. Soon the bandages would be removed from his eyes. Soon they would know whether he was to see a little or not at all.
Domini was dressed to go to the hospital on Friday afternoon, when she discovered that Kara was nowhere in the house. Aunt Sophula couldn't say where she was, and she added that Domini should not hang about waiting
for her. She was wasting valuable minutes of the visiting hour. "Will you come with me, Aunt Sophula?" Domini's fingernails bit into the raffia bag that held fruit for Paul.
"My dear child," Aunt Sophula patted her arm, "this is a golden opportunity for you to be alone with Paul. You should not be so good as to take Kara with you every time. I am sure she monopolises all the conversation. Such a chatterbox! She quite tries my poor old head at times."
"Paul enjoys the company," Domini insisted. "Please come."
It was then that Aunt Sophula looked at her very shrewdly. "Are you afraid to be alone with him?" she asked point-blank. "Do you fear he will blame you if when the bandages come off he is found to be blind?"
Domini went very white as she stood there in the cool hall of the house, wearing a blue suit piped with white: tiny lapis lazuli hearts clipped to her earlobes.
"Paul hated the thought of being blind, and dependent," she said. "I may have condemned him to that for the rest of his life."
"He has his life, has he not?" Aunt Sophula propelled Domini to the door. "The car is waiting, and time is going. Adio, my child."
"Aunt Sophula," Domini gave a tormented laugh, "you are ruthless."
"It runs in the family," the old lady said dryly, standing on the steps and waving as her chauffeur started up the old-fashioned car and it moved off sedately with Domini sitting tensely on the back seat.
Paul knew at once that she had come alone, and she talked nervously all the time she took grapes and peaches out of her bag and arranged them in the bowl on his bedside table. Petals were falling from the flowers she had brought the other day and she picked them up, crushing them in her hand as she turned to see him unrelaxed against his pillows, his mouth set in a stern line below his arrogant blade of a nose.
The Honey Is Bitter Page 16