The Last Laugh

by Lynn Freed

  “Irina’s staying on in London for a bit,” Wilfred said casually. “We’re trying for a residency permit for her.”

  Rex rested his elbows on his knees, knitting his fingers together. “I’d like to see the results of that test, if I may,” he said.

  “Certainly, certainly. Oh, hello, Ruth. Happy birthday to you.”

  “Rex,” I said, touching his shoulder, “would you like to join us? We’re sitting over there.”

  He glanced up with such a look of sorrow on his face that I thought, He’s in love with this sad excuse for womanhood. Or with the idea of her. Or with himself as the father of her child. “I’ll be with you in a minute,” he said vaguely, turning back to the girl.

  * * *

  à gg, Greece

  One of the best things about our joint birthday party was that we didn’t have to do a thing to prepare for it—or, better still, clean up afterward. Gladdy ran the show with the help of her friends in the village. For her, and for all of us in different ways, this was the real culmination of our year.

  The women had been preparing for days—our kitchen, their kitchens. And then, on the night before the party, their husbands trussed the lamb, dressed it, set up the rotisserie, and loaded the wood. In this way, on the day itself, the lamb was turning on the spit before the first guests even arrived.

  (The recipe below is provided simply to give you an idea of what’s involved in preparing lamb on the spit. It does not begin to approach the complexities of choosing, dressing, trussing, and basting a thirty-pound lamb. If you are determined to try this for yourself, I’d suggest a trip to Greece in the late spring, and an apprenticeship of several weeks or even months to a willing mentor.)

  Basting sauce for lamb on the spit

  best quality olive oil

  5 or 6 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed

  fresh Greek oregano, rosemary, and sage

  lemon juice

  salt and pepper

  There should be 4 or 5 cups of basting sauce for a 30-pound lamb, and it should be basted inside and out with a bundle of fresh oregano, rosemary, and sage sprigs throughout the roasting. The cooking will take 4 to 5 hours.

  * * *

  I’D WRITTEN THE OPENING OF the column days before the party, thinking that, failing all else, I’d fill in with recipes afterward. There were still three columns left to do before the year was up. Bess would certainly be on strike after the downhill-sentence standoff, and there was no point in even considering Dania. I was just starting to say something about this to Bess—anything to lure her away from the sight of Rex and the au pair—when, suddenly, down the steps in a swirl of musk came Dania herself, arms wide like a conquering heroine.

  “Daniushka!” I cried, jumping up.

  “What?” said Bess, turning around at last.

  “Ruthi!” Dania threw her arms around me. There were tears in her eyes, real tears. “I was without you like an orphant!”

  “Here,” said Dionysos, standing to give her his chair. “Sit down, please, here. You want lamb? You want fish?”

  She took my hand in hers and held it tight. “You can’t imagine how exhausted I am!” she said. “Every day Yael is sailing in the water with the children, and every day I am cleaning and cooking, can you imagine?”

  “Miss Dani?” Dionysos was almost bowing to her now. “You want lamb? You want fish?”

  She looked up vaguely. “Lamb,” she said, “but not bloody, please.”

  I glanced at Lily, who was gazing at her in amazement.

  “Always,” Dania went on, returning to her lament, “always she was keeping me under her eyes. If I took for myself extra time with the patients, she went off the handle. Can you imagine this?”

  I looked at her in wonderment. She was back as if she’d left nothing behind.

  “We’ve had children here, too,” said Bess grumpily, pouring herself more red wine. She’d had several glasses already, and would soon, I knew, become belligerent. “And their children. Including the one that they’re adopting. And its mother. And, as it happens, its father as well.”

  Dania cocked her head at me.

  “Except that Rex is not the father,” I said. I’d given her this news several times already, but clearly it didn’t help.

  She huffed around in her chair. The party was showing no signs of winding down, and clouds of mosquitoes were beginning to sing around us.

  Dionysos arrived with Dania’s plate. He placed it in front of her like a waiter, one hand behind his back.

  And behind his back, too, I saw his wife approaching.

  “Oh, for God’s sake!” muttered Bess. “This is all we need.”

  But she was smiling this time—not at me, apparently, or at anyone, but still she was smiling.

  “If she spits on me again,” whispered Bess, “I’ll kill her. I’m telling you, I will.”

  Despite the weather, the woman was wearing some sort of fake fur collar over a gold brocade jacket. Bright gold earrings hung from pendulous earlobes, and her feet were squashed into gold shoes.

  Dania smiled up at her. “Parakalo!” she said. “Parakalo!”

  “It’s ‘kalispera,’” I murmured.

  “Dania!” said Bess. “Could you please get a move on so they can serve the cake?” She turned to Dionysos for help, but he was standing behind his wife now, the ideal courtier—sober, proud, silent.

  Dania looked down at the plate in front of her. She stabbed at the meat. “Is it lamb or is it goat?” she said. “Goat I don’t like.”

  “Just eat it!” cried Bess in exasperation. And Lily let out a small squeal of fright.

  “No goat!” Dionysos said, stepping forward.

  “No goat!” said his wife definitively.

  I stood up quickly and put a hand on Lily’s shoulder. “This is my granddaughter,” I said to the wife. “Engoní.” I’d had the word at the ready for just such a circumstance. “From California.”

  “Yasas, yasas,” she said, baring an uneven set of cigarette teeth in a smile.

  “Maybe I fetch for myself the lamb,” said Dania. “Whatever he says, this smells like goat.”

  But this was too much for Bess. She leaned across the table to Dania. “For God’s sake!” she hissed. “Finish your fucking goat! Can’t you see everyone’s waiting for you? Or don’t you care?” She slapped at her elbow. “What’s the bet these mosquitoes don’t even bite Greeks?” she said.

  “Gott!” Dania muttered, putting her knife and fork together and pushing the plate away. “I ate already on the ferry a sandwich.”

  And then, as if on cue, Gladdy beckoned us to the cake table. She’d given up trying to light the candles, she said—the wind kept blowing them out. So, we stood on either side of her like schoolgirls while the crowd broke into loud song.

  * * *

  à gg, Greece (conclusion)

  Birthday cake, or Ruth’s grandmother’s Victoria sponge

  (For two 8-inch layers)

  butter to the weight of 4 eggs

  sugar to the weight of 4 eggs

  flour to the weight of 4 eggs

  4 eggs

  a bit less than 6 tablespoons whole milk, warmed but not hot or it will curdle the eggs

  1 teaspoon vanilla essence

  1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

  With an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until creamy.

  Add flour and eggs, alternating.

  Add a little milk as needed to make the mixture smooth.

  Add remaining flour and eggs.

  Add vanilla essence.

  Add baking powder.

  Pour into two 8-inch buttered and floured baking tins.

  Bake at 350° for 25 to 30 minutes.

  * * *

  THE LIGHTS WERE BLAZING IN the house when we got back. Somehow, Gladdy had got there before us and was sitting on the couch again, this time with the policeman.

  “What’s going on, Glad?” said Bess.

  Gladdy clicked her tongue. “He come for
Miss Dani,” she said.

  The policeman stood up soberly, nodding to Dania.

  “Is there even a jail on the island?” Bess whispered. The drama with Dania seemed to have sobered her completely.

  “What is the problem?” said Dania.

  But the policeman just shrugged. He pointed to the door.

  “I must go with you?” she said, walking her fingers to illustrate. Presumably, she didn’t have any Greek for the question.

  He nodded.

  “Ruthi,” she said, “please keep with you your phone. I will soon be back.”

  “Listen,” said Bess after they had left, “that woman can talk her way out of anything.”

  “E-hê!” said Gladdy. Perhaps even she had had some wine, I thought.

  I looked at my watch. Midnight. In two days Hester and Agnes would be leaving. Two months ago, a ferry had gone down between one island and another, only the crew surviving. And just as I was wondering how to suggest to Hester that she find a seat for them near the lifeboats without her exploding into the mocking laugh, she burst in in a flurry of bottle green.

  “Have you seen Lily?” she shouted. “Where did she go?” Her face was scarlet, her hair wild. “She’s with that thug again!” she said, looking round. “I just know she is!”

  “Thug?” said Bess. “What thug?”

  “Eleftheria’s son!” shouted Hester. “That car mechanic!”

  “Don’t be such a snob!” said Bess. “He’s drop-dead gorgeous! Wow! Lily!”

  “Yes,” I said, joining in. “Wow!”

  “You’re both ridiculous!” said Hester. “I’m going to find Eleftheria.” And she raced out again.

  Gladdy sat up. “They going to lock up Miss Dani for good?” she said happily. Certainly she must have had some wine.

  I walked onto the veranda. For better or for worse, I thought, Dania will be fine. All these years I’d seen her talking her way around immigration officials, flight attendants, traffic police, university administrators. “Amn’t I great, Ruthi?” she’d say. “I give myself a raving review!”

  “I don’t know what I want, you know,” said Bess, coming to stand next to me.

  “Nil desperandum. Rex will tire of her.”

  “But I don’t even want him back. I want something without words for it. Like Lily. Tonight.”

  “Something new? Something to look forward to?”

  “Those are just words,” she said impatiently. “Anyway, I’m not asking for an answer, I’m just telling you I want something without a word for it. I always have. Only now I know I’ll never find out what it is.”

  “Oh, Bessie,” I said, reaching out for her hand. The night was soft and the moon full. It was the way it had been when we’d first arrived.

  “Maybe that’s the thing about old age,” she said. “We understand that we can never know.”

  I saw a tear meandering down her cheek.

  “And we can’t do anything about it either,” she said. “I mean, we’re stuck with ourselves, this one life.”

  “Timor mortis conturbat me.”

  “You’re always doing that!” she said. “Showing off!”

  “‘Fear of death disturbs me.’”

  “Oh.”

  * * *

  THERE WAS NO GOING TO bed that night, at least not for me, because, just as we were coming in from the veranda, Eleftheria burst in, still dressed in her party finery, with Hester close behind her.

  “What’s happened?” I said.

  “Yorgos he is a good boy!” Eleftheria cried. “Good boy!”

  “Yes,” I said, “we know that. What’s the matter? What’s going on?”

  She grabbed my hand and kissed it.

  “He’s gone off with her!” Hester shouted. “That’s what’s the matter!”

  “With Lily?” I said, my heart leaping to my throat. “Where with Lily?”

  “To beach!” Eleftheria said desperately. “Boys and girls. I tell her!”

  “Which beach?” said Hester. “Where is this beach?”

  I put my hand on Eleftheria’s shoulder. “How did they get there?” I said slowly. “Car? Bus? How?”

  “Oh!” She laughed. “Motorbike!”

  “See?” Hester cried.

  I certainly could see. I saw him roaring Lily down the mountain, leaning this way and that way through all the twists and turns, and if they flipped over the edge, like Wendy, they’d be just another break in the fence.

  “Come,” I said, grabbing the keys and leading the way to the car. “Eleftheria, you sit in front to show me the way.”

  We raced down the hill, Hester silent for a change. Go here, Eleftheria said, go there. And then, at last, “There! There!”

  I swerved onto a grassy outcropping and stopped behind a flock of Vespas.

  “I show you,” said Eleftheria, taking off her shoes.

  We could hear them as we climbed down the hill—laughing, shouting, singing—and I stopped for a moment. The sound of their voices in the moonlight, the swish and salt of the sea, had filled me suddenly with the sort of happiness I’d forgotten over all these years—the happiness that comes with a night on a beach with a boy, with the laughing and singing and a whole life left to live.

  * * *

  DANIA WAS BACK WHEN WE returned, flopped into a chair, with the policeman standing behind her. “Gott!” she said. “Am I tired!”

  “Daniushka! Already? What happened?”

  “Come, come!” she said to the policeman. “You want a cup of coffee? A glass of uzi?”

  “Parakalo!”

  “Ruthi? Would you fetch for him a glass of uzi?”

  There was nothing for it but to play her slave, certainly with the policeman settled in place now next to her.

  “They found Wendy, can you believe it?” Dania said. “I had to identify the body.” She shook her head in a perfect show of grief. “Terrible,” she said, “and terrible smell!”

  “Where?” said Bess.

  I shivered. Amos, Wendy, and who next?

  The policeman emptied his glass and stood up, smiling around awkwardly. “Efcharistó!” he said. “Efcharistó!”

  “Where did you see the body?” I asked as soon as he was gone.

  Dania sighed. “Down there at the hospital. They had it in the morgyoo.”

  A snort from Bess. “And they didn’t wonder how she died?” she said.

  “They wondered,” Dania said. “I told them she was violent, she was screaming. The woman was crazy, what can I say? So, let’s now all go to bed. It’s already morning.”

  * * *

  à gg, Greece

  Now that we’re nearing the end of our year, I begin to count up all the things we’ve been free of here, and don’t really want to go back to. Clearly, children aren’t one of them as they’ve been with us, one way or another, from the start. But what we don’t have is anyone wishing us a good rest of the day—at least not that we know of. Ditto, no one has been reaching out. And sharing is reserved for goods divided up. Telling someone the news is not sharing it; it’s telling someone the news. On the other hand, if you offer a drinker a glass of your wine, you are sharing, however inadvisably, not enabling. If your offer is refused, you’ll get a “no thanks,” not an “I’m good,” which answers a question that hasn’t been asked. Here we have problems, certainly, but not issues. Vegetables are not veggies. And at a restaurant, you won’t be asked if you’re enjoying your meal, certainly not whether you’re still working on it. Fortunately, we enjoy good health, no thanks to the wellness bulletins that come in regularly from our health insurers. “Let’s not go there” means, literally, “Let’s stay where we are or go somewhere else.” Parenting doesn’t happen here; neither does birthing. And when people die, they die. When they pass, they do so in a car or on foot and, after they’ve passed, they’re still here, on earth [sic], which may also be a planet, but so what? Hopefully means full of hope (although I’m almost ready to give up on this one). And when you’re “on t
he same page,” you’re reading the paper together. The halt, the crippled, the feeble minded, etc., may be challenged or differently abled, but they are also unfortunate. And when you sign off on something, you actually put your signature on a contract. For someone over the age of about nine or ten, things might be frightening, but they are not scary. They might be delicious, even fabulous, but they’re not yummy. I’ve already dealt with the plague of “love you,” so we can pass over that and onto a few of the words and phrases, once so alive in the black community, that suffer instant death when uttered by middle-class whites: “sistah,” “girlfriend,” even, God help us, “cool”—we’ve had none of this here. No one hitting the ground running either, not even at the end of the day or 24/7 BTW. And no one except tourists trying to be mindful. What we do love is the canopy of stars that show up every night. They make us want neither to lean in nor to reach out. We just sit out on our veranda with our glasses of ouzo and can of DEET, and if anyone says, “OMG, how cool is this?” we’ll give them a dose of it.

  * * *

  I MIGHT HAVE KNOWN FINN would arrive on the same ferry on which Hester and Lily were leaving. Somehow, his timing had always been like this. I watched him make his way down the gangway in the crush, his bag over his shoulder, wondering whether I’d be able to see them off before he saw me.

  “Mum!”

  “Yes? What?”

  “We’re leaving! We’re going! Do you even care? Lily!” she barked.

  Lily was standing apart, sulking. Every now and then I saw her glance back toward the fence, and, yes, there was Yorgos slouching against it, smoking a cigarette. When Hester had retrieved her from the beach, I’d seen, for the first time, the flash of defiance in her eyes. And then, all the way back to the house she’d sat in front with me, maintaining a stubborn silence in the face of Hester’s recriminations. And at last, when I’d said, “That’s enough now, Hester,” she’d flashed me such a look of gratitude that I wished I could turn the car around and take her right back to the beach.

  “Lily!” Hester barked now.

  But Lily was deaf to her.

  “Darling,” I whispered, “just let her be sad. Remember what it was like? It’s awful.”

  Hester hung her head then, furiously wiping at her eyes. She’d always cried like this—furious, shuddering, biting her lips together.