Icon of Gold

by Icon of Gold (retail) (epub)

  ‘Nikos —’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, swiftly. ‘I’ll do nothing to hurt you. I don’t ask for anything. I just wanted to come. That’s all.’

  There was a long moment of silence, then, ‘I’m glad,’ she said, simply. ‘I’m so glad.’

  ‘I thought you might be angry.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Cathy?’

  She turned to look at him, her green, slanted eyes beneath the tilted brows very wide, and he saw there were fine new lines of strain beneath them. The cheekbones in her too-thin face were delicate and razor-sharp. In the warmth of the day she had pinned her thick, unmanageable hair untidily up. Sweat-damp strands clung to her neck. For a moment he could barely breathe. From the hillside beneath them came the musical chime of bells, the bleating of goats, the clicking of hooves on the rock as a small herd clattered past, its hunched and ancient guardian toiling behind them up the steep and winding little path that led from the village below past the house and on up the mountain. ‘Do you love me?’ Nikos’ voice was very quiet.

  Leon called a greeting to the goat-herd, who leaned on his crook for a moment and exchanged a few words across the low stone wall that encompassed the garden.

  ‘Yes,’ Cathy said; and thought, with a painful twist of the heart that the smile that very slowly lit his face was the sweetest she had ever seen.

  Woodsmoke drifted down from the house, from where Anna was cooking in the kitchen. The goat bells chimed again as the animals stopped to graze.

  ‘That’s all I need to know.’

  ‘Hey — Nikos! Lazy one! Come and give a hand —’ Leon waved. He was stripping off his shirt, exposing his massive shoulders and the thick grey tangle of hair on his chest. A small bright arrow of light reflected from the icon at his throat.

  Nikos lifted his own hand in reply, stood up. ‘These last weeks have taught me something,’ he said, very quietly.

  She smiled up at him. ‘Oh?’

  ‘They have taught me that I am perhaps more Greek than I thought myself to be. I find I believe in fate.’ His own smile was wry. ‘And you are mine. For better or for worse.’ He slipped off his jacket and laid it on the seat beside her. She watched as he joined the group on the terrace below. Leon’s teeth showed bright in his brown face, and they bent once more to their labours. Ten minutes later the terrace was cleared, and the wine-cask was broached. Ten minutes after that Yannis arrived, leading on a tether two kids; tiny, soft mouthed, their big eyes sadly knowing.

  Cathy eyed them in some dismay. She had been in Greece for long enough to know that these were no pets. And she was right. ‘The Pascal feast,’ Yannis announced, tethering the pair under an olive tree. ‘Tender as the dawn. They will make fine eating.’

  That evening, over a Lenten meal of salt cod, courgettes and tomatoes that tasted a good deal better than Cathy had expected — Anna, she noticed, since Leon’s arrival, having quietly reverted to the traditional dishes of the season – Cathy broached the subject of the Shepherd’s Hut. ‘— it would make a perfect studio. If I could just enlarge the window a little —’

  ‘No.’ Leon shook his massive head in adamant refusal. ‘The building must not be changed. The father of my grandfather built this. It must stay as it is. There are many places, Kati, that you may use for your painting. But the Hut stays as it is. It is —’ he hesitated ‘— my patriko — my family home. It is a symbol. Of what was, of what is now. I make you a studio. You’ll see. But the Hut — no. Is best left alone.’

  The next day Cathy found herself agreeing to the conversion of a small outhouse on the far side of the house, and wondering how the devil it was that Leon always, it seemed, got his own way in the end. She wandered down to the Shepherd’s Hut late in the afternoon. The sun gleamed on the white walls and glinted on the tiny windows. The roof, like that of part of the house, was constructed traditionally of two layers of heavy timbers between which were sandwiched olive branches, and on top of which soil had been laid and rolled and left to bake in the sun. Inside the little house, which consisted of a single long, narrow room, it was warm and very quiet. A blackened fireplace with a flagstoned hearth stood empty at one end of the building. A bluebottle buzzed heavily at the window. There were a few antiquated agricultural tools lying around, a small broken chair, an empty olive barrel, an ancient box-bed in one comer, still filled with straw. She turned to look out of the door; the view was breathtaking, directly down the valley and to the sea. A pity. It really would have made a lovely studio; but she could see Leon’s point. Here were his roots, and to leave them unchanged was to tell the world how very far he had come. She leaned in the doorway, watching the sun dip, red as fire, through a heavy streak of cloud above the western foothills. It had been a very warm day. She wondered if there might be a storm.

  Movement caught her eye. Someone was coming from the house, winding their way down through the olive grove, the occasional glimpse of a white shirt flashing through the tracery of dusty leaves. Cathy stood quite still, watching him come. He stopped a couple of yards from her. The silence that enveloped them both rendered words entirely unnecessary. Nikos stepped past her into the shadowed interior of the hut, slipping his hand into hers as he passed and drawing her after him. They stood, hands linked, still silent, watching each other. As the sun sank lower a shaft of light, blood red, suddenly illuminated Nikos’ face, polishing the dark skin, the smooth and shining bone. His kiss was cool water in the desert; light in darkness. An opiate to a pain she had buried so deep that it had festered to agony. She leaned against him, for the moment aware only of the feel of his body against hers, the possessive strength of his arms about her, the tender insistence of his lips on hers. She could feel the effort he was making to be gentle, sensed the urgency, the leashed strength. He laid his cheek on her hair, held her to him so tightly that she could not look up into his face. ‘Pa’s just come back from the village,’ he said, quietly. ‘There’s a message from Adam. He’s back from New York. He’ll be here the day after tomorrow, in time for Easter.’

  She moved a little, trying to pull away. His arms tightened further, holding her still.

  ‘That only leaves us tomorrow. Once Adam’s here it’s unlikely we’ll be able to meet.’

  ‘Nikos — we can’t —’

  She felt him stiffen. Still she could not move. He stood for a very long time in silence; she could feel his trembling. Then he released a long, sighing breath, let her go abruptly and stepped back. ‘I’m sorry. That was unforgivable. Of course we can’t. Shouldn’t.’

  ‘Mustn’t,’ she said.

  He shrugged, his face bleak. ‘Forgive me. Please forgive me. I promised you — promised myself — that I wouldn’t do this — it’s just that when I realised Adam was coming —’ He shook his head, and the expression in his too-bright eyes cut her to the heart. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said again, and turned.

  He was at the door when she spoke. ‘Nikos. Don’t go. Please.’

  He stopped, his back to her, silhouetted against the angry red sky. Great drops of rain were beginning to drum an uneven tattoo upon the dirt roof, pattering heavily through the leaves of the “trees, setting them shivering. On the shadowed hillside the tree frogs had begun to call.

  ‘Nikos?’

  He would not turn.

  ‘Please. Don’t be angry. I can’t stand it.‘

  He bowed his head; the thick black hair fell across his forehead. ‘I’m not angry.’ The words were so quiet they were barely audible.

  There was a long silence. Then, ‘It’s starting again, isn’t it?’ she asked, close to despair.

  His breath of laughter was bitter. ‘It never stopped,’ he said. ‘You know it. It never will.’ He turned, suddenly fierce. ‘Cathy, I have to see you. I have to! Just once. Please!’

  ‘But —’

  ‘Listen. You know the little church by the spring — Aghia Magdalena?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘If you follow the path on past it, thr
ough the woods and up on to the mountain you’ll find a little hut not unlike this one. It’s been abandoned since before the war. No one goes there. I’ll be there tomorrow morning. I’ll wait. Will you come?’

  She hesitated only for a moment. ‘I’ll try.’ She joined him at the door. The sudden, heavy shower had passed, yet the air was still heavy, the sky ominous. A lone cicada called from somewhere nearby and set the tree frogs squawking dementedly again. The swift mountain dusk was falling.

  ‘This was my mother’s favourite time of day,’ Nikos said unexpectedly. ‘Winter and summer, whatever she was doing she would stop and watch the sunset.’ He lifted his face to the sky for a moment, his eyes intent.

  Cathy slipped an arm through his. ‘You must find it hard,’ she said. ‘To come back, I mean. To the place —’ she stopped.

  He shook his head. ‘Funnily enough, not as hard as I thought. Pa’s right, I suppose; it’s past and done. He’s changed it all. It’s nothing like it was. It’s just sometimes like now — I can see her. Hear her. It’s as if she’s close —’

  Cathy half laughed, shook her head. ‘Don’t! God alone knows what she’d think of me!’

  ‘She’d love you as I do,’ he said, with young and perfect confidence. ‘How could she help it?’

  Cathy shook her head again, but said nothing.

  He looked down at her. ‘You will come? Tomorrow?’

  ‘I’ll try. I promise I’ll try.’

  He left her then, striding through the rough, dampened grass, disappearing into the olive trees.

  In a last florid blaze of light the sun slid from the blood-stained sky and disappeared beneath the shadowed lip of the mountain.

  ‘I do believe,’ Cathy said, tracing the line of his eyebrow with a square finger, ‘that poor little Anna has fallen for you.’

  Nikos shifted a little in the rustling straw, smiled lazily, shook his head. The morning sun was high and through the gap where a door had once hung an eagle soared across a sky clear and cool-looking as crystal.

  ‘Oh yes.’ Cathy leaned above him, tickled his nose with a straw. ‘Believe me. I know the symptoms.’ She grinned a little ruefully. ‘I should, for heaven’s sake.’

  ‘Don’t be silly.’ He caught her head, burying his fingers in her hair, bringing her mouth back down on his. She relaxed for a moment, then struggled free. ‘It’s no good, my darling. Look at the time. We have to go.’

  ‘Oh, shit.’

  ‘Quite.’ Cathy was pulling on her shirt and slacks.

  Nikos sat up, drawing his knees to his chin, watching her. ‘I hate this.’

  She paused for a moment, then brushed her hair briskly, not looking at him. ‘No more than I do. But — we have no alternative. You know it.’

  For a moment his mutinous face looked very young. She bent to him and kissed him lightly. ‘Don’t be cross,’ she said, softly. ‘Don’t spoil it.’

  He took her hand. ‘No.’

  She hunkered down beside him, her face very serious. ‘Your father in some ways is very - unpredictable,’ she said. ‘You know it. If he found out about us I don’t know what he might do. To either of us. Nikos, we must be careful.’

  ‘I know. I just hate it. That’s all.’

  She squeezed his hand and stood up. ‘I have to go. Wait an hour. I’ll see you back at the house.’ A swift kiss and she was gone.

  Nikos stood and went to the door, watching her as she swung off down the mountain path into the woods. She did not look back.

  Cathy and Leon met Adam off the little ferry the next afternoon. Immediately and instinctively Cathy knew there was something wrong; Adam was too bright, too talkative, his laughter was too loud and his smile was brittle. The minute he joined them he reached for the ouzo bottle. Cathy studied him as he answered Leon’s questions about the journey from London and about his recent visit to New York. Despite his apparent high spirits he looked pale and tired and there was a worrying nerviness about him that set her teeth on edge. On the way back to the house as Leon concentrated on manoeuvring the old car around the occasional battered and war—scarred truck or bus, the plodding donkeys and the ancient carts that made the dusty mountain road an obstacle course, Adam fell silent, gazing from the window with preoccupied eyes. As at last they bumped along the track that led to the house he turned and caught his mother’s eyes upon him and, oddly, he flushed a little as if caught doing something wrong. ‘Are you all right?’ Cathy asked, and immediately the brilliant, meaningless smile lit his face.

  ‘Fine. I’m fine,’ and as if to prove it, began to whistle softly between his teeth.

  Cathy sighed and sat back in the sagging leather seat. The next few days were not going to be easy.

  *

  Anna — to her own disappointment, Cathy suspected, given that there were now two eligible young men in the house on the mountain — was spending most of Easter with her own family, though she had insisted on not leaving to join them until Saturday. During the past days she had worked as diligently as any housewife to ensure that the traditions of the feast would be observed in the Kotsikas household. In the week leading up to the festival Cathy thought she had never seen such scrubbing and cleaning; even the doorstep was freshly whitewashed. flowers were gathered from the fields, candles acquired from the stall in the village, ready for the midnight service on Saturday night. On the day of Adam’s arrival the hasapis — the village butcher came — to the house to slaughter the two kids. As tradition demanded the animals were killed by the door of the house and the sign of the cross drawn in their blood on the wall, to bestow good luck and a happy Easter upon the household. On Good Friday evening — the whole household apart from Adam but including Anna herself having attended the solemn morning service — Anna cooked the traditional frugal meal abstaining, for this one day of the year, even from using olive oil. ‘We’ll fade away, girl!’ Yannis grumbled good-naturedly, toying with his lemon-dressed salad.

  ‘Is good for the soul.’ She smiled shyly, delighted with herself as she scolded him. ‘And makes an appetite for Sunday!’ Yannis grinned as he reached for the wine bottle. ‘At least the good Lord doesn’t expect us to do without a drink!’

  Cathy, elbows on the table, put her chin in her cupped hands, glancing from face to face. She was sorry Adam had not accompanied them to the village church that morning; she herself had been deeply moved by the service. The solemnity of the day, the dark splendour of the interior with its sad-eyed saints and heavily carved and gilded wood, the melancholy tolling of the bell as the flower-strewn bier was carried three times around the church had been counter-balanced by the constant comings and goings of a congregation for whom the church was as much part of everyday life as the kitchen or the taverna. Children had been kept biddable by Easter biscuits and sweetmeats, men and women gossiped quietly, grandmothers in their best black-and—white murmured over their beads whilst keeping an all-seeing eye on the behaviour of the little ones. Later she had stood with Nikos at his mother’s grave, and had been oddly shocked to realise how young she had been when she had died; only in her early thirties. Neither had commented on the fact that Leon had been too busy talking to a man in a sharp business suit that immediately invoked Athens and money, to join them. At that moment her eyes met Nikos’ across the table in the flickering lamplight. He smiled gently.

  Adam, face expressionless, tossed back his wine and held out his glass for more.

  The next day, before she left for home, Anna prepared the magiritsa, a dish made from the offal of the slaughtered kids; one that was eaten in every household as they broke the Lenten fast after the midnight service on Holy Saturday. Cathy, a little queasily, watched this exercise with less than wholehearted enthusiasm. The intestines, heart, lights and fat were packed into a huge casserole with onions, leeks and other green vegetables, topped up with water and set on the stove to simmer. ‘Will be good,’ Anna promised, earnestly.

  ‘I’m sure it will be.’

  ‘Now —’ Busily the girl op
ened cupboards, set things upon the table: Easter bread, plaited and baked about red-dyed eggs, a large bowl of these eggs — kokkina avga — and a great plateful of sweet Easter buns. A huge bowl of salad and a dish of tzatziki. Cheese, and peppers. Lettuce and olives and dishes of fruit. ‘These are for tomorrow. You are sure you can manage?’ The young face was solemn. Cathy had long ago realised that Anna’s regard for her employer’s housekeeping skills was justifiably low.

  ‘Yes. I’m sure I can. Thank you, Anna. You’ve worked so hard.’ Cathy handed her a small, gaily wrapped package. ‘A little present for you, from us all.’

  The girl‘s face flushed with pleasure. ‘Thank you, Kiria. And see — I have something for you —‘ From yet another cupboard she produced a wreath of living flowers, intricately woven. ‘For the table, tomorrow.’

  Delightedly Cathy thanked and kissed her. ‘Now you must go. It’s getting late. Your family will be expecting you.’

  *

  For the midnight service it had been decided that they would go not to the village church but to the tiny Aghia Magdalena, up the track by the spring. It was an utterly delightful setting. The verdant cleft that gave rise to the spring cut into the hillside a mile or so above the house. The stream, clear and cold, bubbled from the mountainside into a rocky basin, and thence on down the mountain. The little stone-built church, erected in thanksgiving for the life-sustaining waters, was perched on a rocky ledge beneath a spread of ancient trees, within sight and sound of the water. The building itself was too small to hold an Easter congregation, so they gathered outside, murmuring quietly, the leaves over their heads rustling as counterpoint to the sound of the running stream. At midnight all torches and lanterns were extinguished. There was a moment of dramatic quiet. Then from the church issued the small procession of priests and acolytes carrying the lit candles that symbolised the Resurrection.