Delphine stepped in behind me and I left her to it while I took the bags into the kitchen and stuffed fresh meat and fish into the fridge.
‘You have done such a good job, Anna,’ said Delphine. ‘It’s lovely.’ She went through both rooms, touching the old dresser, the throws, cushions, and the chunk of black marble acting as a hearth, before finally resting her hand on the wooden kitchen counter.
It made me uneasy, all this touching. What was she after? It could never be as simple as needing a friend, surely? I was aware that my suspicion was entirely about who she was married to, it seemed wrong to think she was the same as him when I had no proof.
‘It’s very warm and cosy. It has the feel of a real home.’
‘Thank you. That’s the look I was going for. To keep the spirit of my grandmother, but add in modern pieces where necessary.’
‘It’s lovely.’ She looked out through the back door and smiled at the cat. ‘I do like cats. They are so graceful, yet essentially self-centred. They know a good place when they see it. And that is a good thing for survival, I find.’
I was at a loss, so I just smiled. Was she warning me? Threatening me?
‘Well, I must be going,’ she said. ‘Do you have a card?’
I took one from the desk and handed it to her. ‘Thanks very much for the lift up the hill. I am planning to get a car soon,’ I said, not wanting to look completely hopeless.
She gave me a genuine smile then, displaying perfect, expensive teeth. ‘Thank you. I will be in touch regarding the decorative project I have in mind, and perhaps you would like to join my husband and I for dinner one evening? You can bring a friend along, of course.’
She waved as she drove up the street. I was relieved that she’d gone and I was full of mixed feelings toward her. I had no idea what was going on, if anything was, of course, but she made me feel like I was on the menu for dinner, rather than just attending.
I’d barely shut the front door and gone to the kitchen when the back gate creaked and Mrs Pantelides came shuffling up the path.
‘Mrs Kokorakis,’ she exclaimed. ‘Here, in this house!’ She clutched both sides of her face, which would have been comical if it hadn’t been for the look of shock.
‘What is it?’ I asked. ‘Are you all right? Here, sit down.’ I pushed her gently into a kitchen chair and put the kettle on to boil. ‘A nice cup of mountain tea will do you good.’ I certainly needed one.
I busied myself loading cupboards and filling the fridge until the kettle boiled, then placed the teapot filled with mountain tea, and two mugs onto the table. ‘Right, tell me what you mean,’ I said.
The old lady didn’t look at me. ‘There is much to tell, but it is not my place to say. How did you meet her?’
‘She gave me a lift from the corner of the road. Just got out of her car and offered. I wasn’t going to turn her down. And what do you mean, not your place to say?’
‘You have no idea who she is, do you, Anna?’ Mrs Pantelides asked.
‘Oh, maybe I know a little more than you expect,’ I said. ‘I know she is the wife of Nikos Kokorakis, a man not to be messed about with.’
‘Yes, that is true. But what did she want from you?’
‘She wants me to help her with a design project, and she invited me to dinner.’
Mrs Pantelides took a sip of her tea. ‘I never thought, after all this time.’ She looked down at her cup and swirled the hot liquid. ‘Perhaps, this will be for the good. Perhaps it is time.’ She stood up carefully and prepared to leave.
‘Please don’t go yet.’
‘I have much to do, I must go,’ she said.
‘But you haven’t told me anything!’ Why wouldn’t anybody tell me what was going on? ‘And I want to know more about Andreas and Nyssa, my other grandparents, and why I never met them.’
She turned at the door. ‘I cannot answer these questions for you, Anna. I spoke without thinking. You must ask your parents. Tell them what happened today and ask them to tell you about your other grandparents.’ She came back and placed a hand on my cheek. ‘It is a story for your father to tell. But, I warn you, Delphine wants something from you, so be careful what you offer.’ With that, she walked off back down the path shaking her head.
Whatever was that all about? I sat back down at the table and poured more tea.
What did I actually know about my family history? I knew that Dad moved to England when he was eighteen, to learn the restaurant trade. His father had given him enough money to set up on his own, and that was all I knew. Dad was an only child, and had never mentioned relatives. Now I was here, it seemed most unlikely that there weren’t any family members to find. Any normal person would have asked their father, but he was a totally closed book about Crete.
I marvelled now at my own previous lack of interest in his side of the family. Mum had come over from Crete when she was just twenty to join Dad once he had a place to live and a job. They had been together since school. Mum was my contact with the island. I met her parents, a great-aunt or three and my other grandmother, not that I knew it at the time. I didn’t remember meeting any men, but that was because they would have been working. I doubted I’d recognise any of them now, if they were still alive. I had obviously met Nyssa and stayed here in her house, but really not known who she was, or that I was in my paternal grandmother’s house. Now it made sense. I didn’t have strong memories of those holidays in terms of people we met, but I did remember Mum being much closer to one ‘great aunt’ than she was to Nyssa. I suppose that was her own mother, Cybele, and she was keeping me in the dark so I wouldn’t tell Dad about Nyssa. Why couldn’t I know? Had Nyssa disowned Dad? It was eating me up, not knowing. I wished I could remember some of the younger people around at the time, but it was a blur. I was too young, I suppose.
I looked around the small house that had become my home. I had shared the second bedroom with my mother, and spent my days with people who were kind, and gave me sweets and cakes, but otherwise ignored me. I was used to this treatment as it was what happened at home. I remembered playing with the china ornaments my grandmother kept on the old dresser, and getting stuck in the tiny cupboard at the top of the stairs. I must have been eight or nine when the visits suddenly stopped. Mum didn’t come over for the funeral of Nyssa, and I only knew she had died when the will was read and I was contacted by her solicitor. I’d had my own problems when it had all happened, of course, and didn’t think to question the legacy while I was getting divorced. It was a lifeline that had been thrown to me, and I’d grabbed it.
I drank up and rinsed both mugs, then dug in the cupboard for the box into which I’d placed the personal papers that had belonged to my grandmother. I sat at my desk and piled them up, separating out the boring legal stuff and her birth certificate from the photographs. The photos were mostly black and white and many were artificially-posed, stiff family portraits featuring, I assumed, Nyssa’s own parents and family. My grandparents and family. Frustratingly, it was impossible to make sense of the people in them without a guide, so I gathered them up and slipped them into a folder ready to take round to Mrs Pantelides so I could ask her about them when she was more receptive.
It was definitely time I went back to Manchester for a visit, although the flights were rubbish at this time of the year and I didn’t want to see the parents anyway. I knew it would be difficult dealing with my mother’s pleas for me to go back home, and Dad’s silence. But if my father had kept his past a secret for forty years, then there was a reason for it, and I had no chance of finding out about it over the phone. I had to be there and force it out of him. Maybe in a couple of weeks.
10
Nikos watched as his wife swung the car into the driveway and parked it roughly in front of the house. She looked almost jaunty, he thought, as she hurried inside. He went through to the kitchen, took the lunch his housekeeper had prepared from the fridge and set two plates, dips and bread onto the edge of the island unit. He hated the formal dini
ng room, even though he knew Delphine loved it. Today they would eat together and he would try to build bridges with her. He rooted through the drawers until he found cutlery and glasses, and poured a delicate white wine from Spina.
‘Niko?’
‘I am in the kitchen, come in here,’ he shouted.
Delphine appeared at the door. She had two spots of pink on her cheeks and looked happier than he had seen her in a long while. ‘Is everything okay?’ he asked.
‘Yes, more than okay. What is this?’ She pointed at the food and drink laid out on the island.
‘I wanted us to eat lunch together, on our own. Come, sit. Have a small glass of wine and some meats and salad, and you can tell me what happened in Paleochora.’
He could see the usual resistance in her face to any of his ideas, but then, in an instant it had gone and she smiled at him. ‘I am very hungry,’ she said, sliding onto a high stool. ‘This is a nice idea, Niko, thank you.’
He shrugged and took a sip of wine. ‘So, how did the Andreanakises take the news?’ he asked, spearing a piece of cold chicken and dipping it into the little pot of tzatziki.
‘Niko, I will buy them a little house and I have given them money for clothes, but I have had the most marvellous idea. I ran into Anna Georgiou on the way back, and gave her a lift home as she was carrying heavy bags.’
Nikos stopped chewing. ‘Did you go into the house?’ He could feel tears in the corner of his eyes.
‘I did, and it is lovely. So many signs of your mother. Her old china, the big oak dresser, the pine kitchen table, all of these she has kept. But there is a sense of the girl too. I think she may be quite a good designer.’
Nikos wiped his eyes. ‘All those years when I was never allowed to visit Mama. I’d drive past and sometimes see her, but that woman next door was always there and I could never get Mother on her own to talk, to explain. Ah, Delphie, I regret so much of that time.’
‘I know you do. Drink some wine, I have more news.’ Delphine ate a slice of tomato and a piece of Mizithra cheese. Delicious. Why did the food taste better suddenly? ‘I realised that she can help me with the Andreanakis project. I will choose a house, and Anna can help me to decorate it for them. It’s perfect. That way I get to know her, she sees that we are not horrible rich people who take no care of others, and I have a proper excuse to invite her here to discuss furniture and fabrics. So you can meet her.’ She looked at him sideways and sipped her wine. That tasted wonderful, too.
Nikos paused, filled fork dropping its contents back down onto the plate. ‘You mean I should tell her, don’t you?’
Delphine patted the top of his hand. ‘It is time, you know that. Not immediately, of course. She has no idea about all this bad history, but if we handle it well, you may gain a niece and just possibly regain a younger brother. Wouldn’t that be worth risking everything?’
‘It would, it would.’
Nikos watched his wife eat more than he had seen her eat since he told her about Anna’s arrival weeks ago. He hadn’t understood how much the story of his past had affected her, and how hard she was trying to sort it out for him. ‘You are so good to me, Delphie,’ he said. ‘Thank you.’
But would it, he wondered, be a warm meeting of long estranged brothers, or the bloodbath that most Cretan feuds ended in? That he didn’t know.
11
I had some lunch and worked on the finalising of the altered drawings and plans for the restaurant in Edinburgh. The client had approved the alterations, and I needed to send the actual plans to the architect who would hate the last-minute changes, but that wasn’t my problem. It was calming to focus on something I felt I had under control. Once the little clock on the mantel chimed four, I packed it all into a cardboard tube and got ready to go out again. If I got a move on, I could get to town for the afternoon post, and pick up some terracotta paint for the bathroom.
I’d tried to speak to Leo about what had happened in the morning with Delphine, but he must have had his phone switched off, so I left him a text. I wished we had made a firmer arrangement to meet, then I wouldn’t be checking the phone quite so much.
On the way back from town I called in at the taverna to see Maria. I couldn’t get the worry about Spiros’ involvement in the burning of the café out of my mind, but I couldn’t believe that Maria would have anything to do with it. She was so warm and open. At least I’d thought she was.
Through the window, I could see that Spiros was behind the counter, wiping glasses and looking like thunder, so I didn’t go in, but walked around to the back, where I knew I would find Maria sitting on the step, slicing vegetables or doing some other preparation for the evening meals.
She looked up and waved vaguely at me with a small knife. ‘Hello, Anna, do you want coffee? Or a glass of wine?’ She put the bowl of tomatoes down, threw the knife in and rubbed her hands on her apron.
I’d not seen her looking so careworn. She looked exhausted and like she’d been crying, hard.
‘No, Maria, I came to see you,’ I said, plonking the tin of paint on the concrete path. ‘Are you okay?’
Her eyes flashed with some message that I couldn’t decipher. ‘Spiro,’ she shouted over her shoulder, ‘going for a cigarette break.’ Then she took my arm and walked me out of the back gate and onto the shingle.
‘What is it?’ I asked when she stopped marching me along the beach.
Maria sat down onto a flat stone and lit a cigarette. ‘I am so angry, Anna. It’s him. Despicable,’ she spat.
I sat upwind of the cigarette. ‘So it’s true, he was involved in the fire. I can’t believe he would do such a thing.’
Maria gave an ugly laugh. ‘Oh, Anna, such an innocent. He was more than “involved”.’ She did quote marks. ‘He is a, how would you say, henchman? But you are right, he would never have done such a thing before he got lost in the drink.’
‘So he is the one Mr K uses to do his dirty work?’
She puffed furiously on her cigarette and nodded once. ‘Because of him and his stupid, drunken behaviour we will lose everything. I will lose everything. Do you understand?’
‘No, I really don’t, Maria. I don’t think I understand anything.’
‘I have paid for the taverna many, many times over in the last twenty years. But he, Kokorakis’ – and here she really did spit onto the shingle – ‘he holds the deeds. He has given us notice this morning, to get out by the end of the summer season.’ She sucked hard on what remained of her cigarette.
I hate smoking, but at that moment I wanted to join her. ‘How could he do that? In fact, can he do that?’
‘Oh, he can do that because my husband is a drunken fool and he set the fire. It was an accident, he says, a lit cigarette in the bin, but the result is the same, eh?’
I didn’t know what to say, so I took her free hand and squeezed it.
‘Kokorakis wants to gain some of the money back that he has given Delphine to sort out the mess. It’s a lot of money. Spiros has to pay some of it back, so I have to pay also. Kokorakis will sell my home and my business. I’ll have nothing left.’ Maria broke down and sobbed.
I held her in my arms. How bloody dare they? How dare Kokorakis destroy lives like this? ‘He can’t treat you like this, Maria. It’s inhuman.’
She took a shuddering breath. ‘Yes, it is inhuman. It is just business to him. I wish…’
‘Go on.’
‘I wish he would one day understand what he has done to me.’ She used the hem of her apron to dab at her eyes, but she would need much more than that to wipe away the pain.
‘Is that all? Personally, I’m wishing him a slow, painful death from cancer and an eternity burning in hell.’
Maria glanced at me and laughed, stubbing out the cigarette on a rock. ‘You are definitely Greek, Anna. But you know there is nothing I can do. It has always been like this.’ She moved away from me, got up awkwardly and ran her hands over her face. ‘To think he once thought this face was beautiful. Now, he
throws me away like dirt.’
I struggled to my feet and linked her arm. Maria and Kokorakis? Never expected that. ‘What will you do now?’
We turned and walked slowly back the way we had come.
‘Do? We will continue to work in the taverna until the end. What else can I do? I have money saved up, enough to join my daughter in Chania if she will have me. But him?’ She cocked her head towards the taverna. ‘I don’t care what he does, but he is not coming with me.’
‘But you’re going to have to work together all summer.’
‘It will be a first for him. Kokorakis no longer wants him, so I will put him to work full-time. It means one less wage to pay in the summer months. I have lived with him a long time, Anna. He will do as I ask.’ She kept her head down as we walked, her shoulders slumped.
I thought she should know about my meeting earlier in the day. ‘Maria, I met Delphine Kokorakis today.’
She didn’t meet my eye. ‘Oh?’
‘She wants me to help with a design project. Do you think it’s the Andreanakises’ house she wants help with?’
‘Of course, it makes sense. Spiros told her what you do for a living and she can use you.’ She took me by both arms, and shook them. ‘Anna, you need to know that they are very interested in you up at the house. Be careful what you say to them.’
‘I will. I already feel a little worried to be honest. I’m not in Delphine’s league, am I? So why are they interested in me? But, surely if I help to rebuild that old couple’s life, then that is a good thing?’
‘Yes, probably. Delphine is good underneath and she will not like what has happened, so, a good thing, yes. But him. Watch out for him.’ She gave me another intense stare, then ran her hands through her hair, scraping it back from her face. ‘I should get back, we will have customers.’
Those You Trust: compelling women's psychological fiction Page 7