The Rush Cutter's Legacy

by Sara Alexi

  Part of Vasso did not want to know. If this gave Argyro excuses to behave as she did, it would not make life any easier to know it. It would just give her, Vasso, more to endure. But if it would help her to understand and sympathise with Stamatis, maybe she could listen. No one should be alone in their suffering.

  'Tell me.' The words were uttered as an offering.

  'I just hope you don't think less of me, Vasso. I value your regard, and I did what I did out of the best of motives. Maybe I was wrong, and maybe what I did was cruel but, if you lose your soul mate like I lost Anna, God forbid, you don’t think straight. In my defence I will say that I saw no future life for me, even though Spiros was still only young. I saw no personal future for me, so to use my life to benefit another seemed the best thing to do. At least, that’s what I thought I was doing. I think in reality I may have made everything worse.'

  'I don't think I quite follow, Stamatis.'

  'No, why would you? You see, my mama had just given birth to me and, naturally, my baba, Theodoris, was elated. Theodori's best friend Augustinos was celebrating the announcement of the pregnancy of his wife, with Argyro.'

  Chapter 31

  Two metal tables stood on the uneven flags in front of the boat shed, on the harbour front. The double doors, large enough for a fishing boat to pass through, stood open, and the light from the bare bulb inside shone on the stones outside, making them sparkle where the spray from the sea had reached. At the back of the boat shed, nets and other fishing paraphernalia were piled up, but towards the front there were more tables and wooden chairs with rush-work seats, and a makeshift counter where Augustinos served Greek coffee in tiny cups and shots of ouzo and brandy to the fishermen. A wood burner had been installed in one corner, and a large group of men were huddled around this at one of the tables, playing cards and laughing. All the other tables were occupied, too, with groups of two or three.

  ‘Have you finished yet?' Theodoris sat heavily on one of the chairs outside. The night sky was spotted with stars but clouds kept blowing in front of the moon, darkening the harbour. Olive oil lamps on the two tables flickered their own yellow light and spat and hissed as the raw wicks burnt.

  'New Year’s Eve?' Augustinos laughed. 'What do you think! People will be drinking till dawn. There is a card game over there that has been going on since six this evening. Or rather, since yesterday. What time is it?'

  'About three!' Theodoris answered, noting that every table had been equipped with a pack of cards to keep the New Year tradition alive. 'Come Augustinos, put down your tray and let’s drink to my little Stamatis and your pregnant wife.'

  'Ah yes!' Augustinos exclaimed, as if he had forgotten the baby that was soon to come to him.

  ‘All those sitting here are friends, are they not? They will not object if you are a little leisurely in your work tonight.' Theodoris looked around the tables, at the people there who were his friends, his cousins, his neighbours, as they were Augustino's.

  'I will buy you an ouzo from yourself.' Theodoris laughed. 'In fact, bring the bottle!' Whilst he waited he looked to the sky and thought about Stamatis, his little dark head, his wide-eyed stare, and wondered who he would be as a man.

  'What are you pondering?' Augustinos returned and sat down, put the cloth he always held in his hand on the next chair and uncorked the ouzo.

  'I was thinking about little Stamatis, wondering what his life will be like. If it will differ from mine,' Theodoris said.

  'Of course it will differ from yours. Life is different for every generation, and, as you said yourself, it is only a matter of time before plastic chairs take over from the wooden ones. It is not likely he will follow you in your trade. You should bring some plastic chairs onto the island yourself, Theodoris, sell them, make yourself a new trade. They can be wiped clean, and there is no need to paint them year after year, and no need to repair them. I’m sorry to say, but soon your work is finished, my friend.'

  'Ah well, there are always your chairs.' Theodoris felt along the edge of the rush seat he was sitting on. These rushes he had harvested and stripped and soaked until they were malleable, and had then woven over the wooden frame of the chair, building up the layers to make the seat comfortable and hard-wearing. Not everyone was permitted to collect the rushes, and all those years ago when he applied for his licence he thought it was a trade in which he could never lose out.

  'Yes, well, I do need to talk to you about that, but not tonight. Tonight is New Year!'

  'Talk about what, exactly?'

  'Not now, Theodoris.'

  'You are switching to plastic chairs?'

  'It is only a thought. Most of mine need reworking and they all need repainting. It would just be easier, and cheaper, I’m afraid. There, I have said it. But it is not decided yet. Come, drink with me.'

  Theodoris put his glass to his lips but he could not drink. His joy had turned to worry. No more repair work from Augustinos would be a serious blow. He didn't have a huge number of chairs but he had more chairs than anyone else on the island. It would be a big dent in his income if that stopped, and now he had a baby how would he manage?

  'Drink, Theodoris. I didn't say I was swapping to plastic chairs… Just that – well, let us not talk of it now. Yamas!' And he chinked his glass against his friend’s and they drank. Then they talked of their children, and of the year to come and what the new mayor might do, and of years past, but all the time Theodoris worried for his boy’s future.

  'Yamas!' The cry came from a dozen voices, from the group nearest the wood stove, who had been playing cards since six the previous evening. One of them beckoned Augustinos, who picked up his cloth and marched inside to bring more ouzo. He collected the empties and came back outside.

  'Come, Theodoris,’ he said to his friend. ’Let us celebrate the new year ourselves.' And he opened a pack of cards and shuffled them.

  They played a few hands and they refilled their glasses. Worries were forgotten and the two friends talked of their schooldays, the mischief they got into and the teacher who came from the mainland, so young and pretty. They remembered the wicked things they did as teenagers, which they thought they had kept private from their parents only to find out years later that parents know most things about their children, especially on an island too small for secrets.

  'I have run out of cigarettes.' Augustinos stood. 'I have some inside.'

  'I have one here.' Theodoris slipped one out of his breast pocket, 'But I am not going to make this easy for you. You can play me for it.' And he dealt the cards. Augustinos won and they smoked together, looking out to sea. The wave tops caught the light of the moon when it appeared from behind the clouds. Jasmine, somewhere between the houses behind them, gave off its scent, elusive and subtle, and Theodori’s thoughts returned again to tiny Stamatis. He thought of the child’s future, and then of his own.

  'I’ll tell you what.' Theodoris slurred his words. 'I will play for you not to take on plastic chairs this year.'

  'And if I win?' Augustinos laughed before he spoke, a big belly laugh as if this was the funniest thing he had heard in ages. He, too, was drunk.

  'I will repair half your chairs for free!'

  'That is a rash promise, my friend.'

  'I mean it. If you take plastic this year I will have none of your chairs to repair. This way I assure half my income.'

  'But I never said I had decided.' Augustinos continued to chuckle.

  'Then this is a way to decide.'

  'Ok then!' He shuffled the deck and dealt. 'Why not!'

  They began in good humour but, as the cards began to go against him, Theodoris realised what he had agreed to. If he lost, Augustinos would get plastic chairs, and if Augustinos did that others on the island would eventually follow suit. He could go out of business. It had been a bad judgement, thanks to too much ouzo. He slammed back another shot of the aniseed spirit and swallowed hard. Would Augustinos hold him to it? Irrelevant. He, Theodoris, was a man of his word. If he lost he wou
ld keep his word even if Augustinos didn't want him to. It was a matter of principle.

  'Let’s up the stakes!' Theodoris roared.

  'I think we’ve had too much to drink to up the stakes, my friend. Let us play on, but just for fun.' Augustinos chucked back his own ouzo and refilled the glasses. Close to his eye, the tic had started – the one Theodoris noticed he always got when he felt under pressure. Augustinos rubbed at it with his free hand but it did not go away.

  'We cannot play on for fun. A bet has been made. I suggest we increase it! This could be a tremendous start to the new year.' Theodoris felt brave, seeing the tic.

  'But only for one of us,' Augustinos replied, and they drank again, and again he refilled the glasses. 'Besides, I am not sure I could play another hand as I think there are two of you now.'

  'It sounds to me like you are playing chicken.' Theodoris made a clucking sound, taunting Augustinos as each had done to the other back in school, and Augustinos laughed, but the glint in his eye told Theodoris that he had hit his mark.

  'Alright then. So what shall we up this bet to?'

  'If you win I fix all your chairs for free. And if I win you do not take plastic chairs for five years.'

  'That’s crazy! How do we know what will be happen in five years? They give out fewer fishing licences each year, and that means fewer fishermen in my cafe. Every year more people leave the island because there are no ways to make a living. The harbour front is exposed and cold during the winter and exposed and hot during the summer. I might not even have a cafe here in five years.'

  'Ah, so you are scared, are you?'

  'Certainly not, but that is a crazy bet. If I win you lose your entire income, but if you win I do not lose my entire income, so it is not even.'

  'Okay then, so let’s say that if you win then I will buy you the plastic chairs and the rest of the island will follow you and I will go out of business. But if I win I take your cafe and you take my business, and I do not buy plastic chairs.'

  'You are talking like a madman,' Augustinos said with a laugh, and refilled both their glasses, the muscle by his eye twitching as he spoke.

  'We can hear you!' A man at the next table called across. 'Is that Augustinos, playing chicken like he did back at school?'

  Theodoris saw his friend bristle at this.

  'What's the bet?' another from the same party called, and the whole table stopped their game to look over to Augustinos and Theodoris.

  'I think the bet was a swap of jobs, wasn't it?'

  'What, this boatshed Augustinos calls a cafe against a rush-cutting licence? What man would not jump at the chance, game or no game!’

  'It's true.' Another spoke up. 'There's hardly a living to be made with a harbour side café. We fishermen are few and the coins we hold even fewer. Anyone with money sits in the better places, not out here, exposed to the elements. Take the bet and hope you lose, Augustinos.' And all the men at the table dissolved into laughter.

  'Take the bet,' Theodoris pushed, but he was beginning to doubt himself and now he, too, was wondering whether he had offered a good business for a bad one. Yet just a minute ago it had seemed the other way around. However, the words had been spoken; he could not back out.

  Chapter 32

  'So your family won the taverna in a bet?' Vasso rocked the baby, even though he was asleep.

  'It was not the same back in those days. There was no tourism, just fishermen on the front there. The bet really was the building for the rush-cutting licence. It was a closed profession and those licences were like gold, back in those days. But my baba, when he went to the mainland to cut the rushes, saw the future in the bigger towns. The plastic chairs were taking the place of the old wooden ones, and he was scared.'

  'Still, it was a heavy bet.' Vasso shook her head in disapproval.

  'Ach, there have been bigger bets, and crazier ones too. Last year an American lost his yacht to one of the Kaloyannis brothers in a game of cards at New Year.'

  'Well, if Argyro's baba lost the building in a card game, does that really excuse her behaviour?' she said.

  'Well, that is where I made my mistake. You see, the building had been earmarked for his unborn baby as a dowry, if it was a girl. So, the way Argyro sees it, her dowry was lost to my baba in a game of cards.'

  'I can see how that might hurt.'

  'Without a dowry she had less chance of marrying.'

  'Yes.' Vasso nodded but something was still not clear. 'But really, once it was done, it was done.'

  'Well, that is what I thought. The cafe was nothing when I was a youngster – a fisherman or two had a coffee there. Sure, it was full at New Year, or during a festival, but most of the time it was just a hobby. A way for him to pass the time. I mean, I grew up crawling on the floor of that café, but it was Anna’s idea to turn it into a taverna. Tourism was at its height and the tourists wanted to sit where they could see the water. From a taverna there was a really good living to be made. I never even thought that making it a success would cause a problem.'

  The baby murmured and Stamatis leaned over and kissed the small child’s forehead.

  'But you see, Anna was more sensitive than me. There was no interest from anyone to marry Argyro and after I married Anna she began to be spiteful. One day she so upset Anna, and Anna couldn’t understand why Argyro would have anything against her. They didn’t even know each other. So I told Anna everything. I wanted her to see that it wasn't her, you see? Do you know what she said?'

  Vasso shrugged her shoulders gently.

  'She said, "Stamatis, if we ever get the chance to make it right for her, we will." Can you imagine saying that after Argyro had been so mean? But that was Anna. A sweeter soul you could not imagine.' He stared blankly at the wall for a few moments.

  'After Anna died, I forgot her words. From the moment of her death Argyro was here all the time, as if Anna had been a special friend of hers. I could not really understand her presence, but nor did I care. All I wanted was Anna, but that was impossible.’ He paused and sighed as if he had no energy left for such a cruel world. Vasso wanted to say something sympathetic, but before she had thought of anything he spoke again. ‘Life continued with me behind a black curtain. I could feel nothing of life and I felt dead. I had no future. Then, one day, and I forget what started it, but Argyro actually confronted me and accused my baba of stealing her dowry from her.’ He said the words without malice but Vasso covered her mouth with her hand to hold in a gasp of surprise and horror. ‘As her words struck me I remembered that it was Anna's wish that we should find a way to make it right and, just for a second, the first chink of light for weeks entered my world and I felt closer to Anna.’ He physically relaxed as he said these words; his shoulders dropped, his neck extended a little; and then the tension returned as he continued. ‘It closed as quickly as it had opened. I wanted to feel it again, but I knew Anna was gone, and I could still see no point in my life and the world was dark again.’ Stamatis sighed, and paused for so long that Vasso began to wonder if he was going to say any more. After a while he looked up and resumed his monologue.

  ‘Also, and this seemed very important at the time, Spiros had lost his mama. So, from a very sad place, thinking it would bring me closer to Anna and give Spiros a mama, I offered to marry Argyro. The brightness of being near Anna opened up again, just for a moment.’ The smile that came to his lips as he said this faded fast. He went on to say, ‘Argyro looked at me as if I was mad but I explained that the property would then be hers and she would be married just as her baba had always intended. Everything in her world would be well, and she would have her dowry after all.'

  Vasso flinched and then checked to make sure her involuntary reaction had not disturbed the baby.

  'I thought what I was doing was a kindness, but now I wonder if it was wrong and cruel, and I think Argyro feels that, too.'

  'It was probably not the best reason.' Vasso tried to think of kind things to say. 'But people have been married for worse on
es… Some in our village have been married for land. I knew a girl who was married to end a feud between two families.'

  'I know, but those are people who try to make their marriages work.'

  'Oh, come on, Stamatis. You have the patience of a saint. No one could accuse you of not trying to make your marriage work.'

  'Ah, but what is the one thing Argyro wants?' Vasso looked up, at these words, as Stamati’s hand flew to his mouth. He looked down at his grandchild, and mumbled, ‘I’m sorry my dear, I should not have said that. Vasso followed his gaze to the child, and wondered if she understood his meaning. 'Well, I have said it now,’ he continued after a long pause, ‘and you may as well know. The fact is, that is the one act I cannot bring myself to do. It never occurred to me before we were married. Not only was I consumed by my grief but I still felt very married to Anna. Hard as it might be to believe it, it was something that had not occurred to me, I had blocked the thought from my mind entirely. As time has passed, I’ve realised that as long as I love Anna I cannot go near Argyro, and…' He sighed and his shoulders dropped. 'I will always love Anna.'

  'Does Spiros know all this?' Vasso asked.

  'No. And I do not want him to know.’ A look of fear crossed his face. ‘It would humiliate Argyro even more if anyone knew, and it would make me a fool in my child's eyes.’ He hesitated. ‘I am sorry, Vasso – I had not meant to be so indiscreet. I have burdened you, and I did not mean to do that.’ Vasso shook her head, trying to reassure the old man. ‘I guess some things are easier to tell to someone who is not so involved. Is it possible that this could be our secret, Vasso? Please say you will not tell him.'

  'Under any other circumstances I would not keep a secret from Spiros – but this one? I think it would hurt him more to know it than for me to keep it.’

  'Thank you, Vasso. And do you see me with different eyes, now you know how cruel I have been?'

  'I can see why you put up with so much from her, but you did what you did at a time when you were very distressed. If it had been me that was asked by a man who was grieving I would have told him to ask again in a year. All the blame cannot be on your shoulders. Argyro was very quick to grab what she thought should be hers, is all I can say.'