“Damn your Christ, the bastard!” swore Nuri Bey.
They flouted their gods, but their blood would not catch fire. Then they tried with the saints and circumcision, with the Sultan and the Greek race. But that did not provoke them to the desire to kill each other. At last Manusakas thought of something.
“Captain Michales should be here to settle with you. Remember how he caught you by the belt and flung you onto the roof? But I’ll throw you in the same way.”
He rushed forward to catch the other by the waist. But the Bey eluded him nimbly. He took a step backward and ulled from his sash the two-edged, black-hilted dagger. Now both pairs of eyes grew bloodshot. “Giaour!” “Dog!”
Nuri sprang forward with raised dagger. But Manusakas bent and instantly stepped aside, so that the Bey nearly fell. Manusakas from his crouching position butted his head with full force into the other’s stomach. Nuri nearly fainted with the pain. Then he mastered himself and again gathered his strength. While his opponent was still bent, Nuri plunged the dagger deep in his side. Bones cracked. Hot blood spurted out and spattered Nuri as he wrenched the dagger out. He gave a shout of joy and licked the blade greedily, till his lips and beard were smeared with blood.
“That’s for my father!” he cried. “I’m avenging his blood!”
Manusakas leaned swaying against the trunk of the tree.
“Dog,” he muttered. “You’ve got me.” “The account’s settled,” Nuri answered. His nostrils quivered.
“You just come here… .You just come here,” muttered Manusakas, who felt his strength going and could not jnake a rush at his enemy.
The hoarse, masterful voice provoked Nuri. He raised Ms dagger.
“One more,” he bellowed, “one more stroke, to the heart, giaour, for Turkey which you flouted, you and your brother Captain Michales.”
He leaped forward like a flash, to pierce his enemy’s heart. But Manusakas dodged, and the dagger struck the trunk of the tree. It broke. Manusakas collected his last strength and plunged his short knife deep and low in the Bey’s body.
The Bey bellowed like a buffalo. He tore the knife from his enemy’s already limp hand. “For Turkey!” he yelled, and plunged it in his heart.
Manusakas collapsed over the roots of the tree. In a flash his wife Christinia, hs children, the pen and the half-shorn ram passed through his mind. Then a thick black cloud covered bis eyes. He saw nothing more-and fell forward in a pool of blood.
Nuri crouched beside him. Blood was running from his breeches and flowing to the ground beside Manusakas’ head. A sharp, unbearable pain tortured him. He put both hands to his wounded testicles and bellowed. He looked around. The sun was sinking. The mountain was again ringing with the bells of the sheep, and a wind arose.
“Allah, Allah, help me to reach my horse and get away!” Nuri groaned, and tried to stand up.
He held tightly onto the trunk of the tree, pulled down the silver pistols, and stuck them hi his sash. He picked up Manusakas’ shepherd staff to support himself and looked at the dying man, who was rattling and convulsed. He tried to give him a kick. The pain prevented him. He spat on him.
“I’ve kept my oath,” he muttered. “But you’ve got me too, giaour!”
He put his left hand between his thighs and groaned, “It would have been better if you’d stabbed my heart, giaour.”
Manusakas half opened one eye. It was dim and bloody. His lips were dark blue; they moved to speak. But they stiffened and remained half open. Nuri Bey crawled, howling with pain, to his horse. The noble animal heard his groaning and turned around. The whites of its eyes flashed.
Oh, if I could only get on and ride away, thought the Bey. Mustapha Baba knows herbs that will cure me.
Blood made a trail behind him. Darkness was before his eyes as at last he reached the horse and collapsed hi front of it. It bent its neck down and sniffed at its masterat his neck, his hair, his back. Finally it raised its intelligent head and neighed, as though calling for help.
Nuri tried to hit his foot as far as the stirrup. He could not. The pain almost made him faint. He fell close to the orse’s front legs and clung to them. It looked at him, with lowered head. Suddenly it understood. It moved forward and bowed its knees over a stone until it was kneeling. Again it looked at its master. When he saw the horse kneeling, he stumbled, face foremost, and placed his arms round its neck. Then he heaved his body and both legs up, till he was fast in the saddle. He clenched his teeth, to be able to bear the pain. But he could not open his severely wounded thighs, and so he rode woman-fashion.
“On, on, brother! Away from here,” he muttered. “Slowly, slowly …” and he stroked the beloved animal’s neck.
The horse moved slowly downhill in the evening twilight, watching the ground carefully so as not to stumble, skirting holes and precipices.
The sun had sunk, blood red, over the mountain. A few women were coming up the mountain to visit their men. When Nuri saw them, he clenched his teeth and held his head high. But the blood was running in thick drops over the saddle and the horse’s belly and was painting a track on the stones.
It was a most gracious hour, now that the heat was past. The face of the earth grew fresh. Two or three big stars already hung in the sky. In a hut at the foot of the mountain a lamp was burning, and a song could be heard from within: a mother was lulling her child tenderly to sleep. Nuri Bey had shut his eyes. He saw nothing, and heard only the awakening insects, loud as bells. He clung to the horse’s mane. Where was it going? It knew its way unerringly. He trusted it
The horse stopped before the door of the Bey’s country house. Nuri opened his eyes and shouted. Servants came running and carried him in. The old nurse made up a bed for him on the sofa. Scarcely was he stretched out before the sheets were covered with blood. Nuri moved his hand and whispered, “Mustapha Baba … Mustapha Baba.” Then he fell back on the pillows.
It was deep night before Mustapha Baba arrived at the house, breathless, with his sack of healing herbs and ointments on his shoulder. The servants brought lamps and candles. He bent over Nuri Bey and shook his head.
Nuri Bey lay unconscious, with his eyes shut. The old man put some drops of rose vinegar into his nose, and rubbed his temples. The Bey opened his eyes, looked at him, and asked in a trembling voice, “Shall I live?”
“You are in Allah’s hands,” the old man answered. “He can heal you.”
“No one else?” asked Nuri in terror. “Can’t you, Mustapha Baba?”
“The wound is severe, Nuri Bey, and hi a bad place.”
Nuri Bey groaned.
“Allah guided the knife where He willed it to go.”
“Why, why, why?” whispered the Bey miserably, and gazed with fear at the old man.
But the old man did not answer. He had known since this morning, when he had seen the Bey so radiant on his threshold.
“Keep still,” he said. “Don’t ask questions, if you want to get well.”
RaM was brought. He washed the wound, stopped the blood and put on a bandage. From his sack he took a handful of herbs and gave them to the old woman to boil. This was for a sleeping draught. He turned the servants out and opened his bag again, to take out a small bottle and some ointment. Weeping, the old woman watched him.
“Mustapha Baba, is the master badly wounded? Can he get well?”
“He can get well,” muttered the old man. “But what win he do with life then?”
“What will he do with life? Why do you ask, Mustapha Baba?”
The old man looked about him. “He will never be a man again,” he said softly.
The old woman shrieked, and covered her face with both hands.
Next day, just as the sun was “beginning to set, Captain Michales stood on the threshold of his shop and stared out at the Harbor Gate. Ships were again loading and unloading, while the waves of the sea were a deep red. He stared, but saw nothing: his gaze was directed within. His body had grown slack in the last few days, and his mo
uth was bitter and firmly shut. Passing Turks cast evil glances at him, and many of his Christian friends avoided him. They guessed at a dark power in him, and dared not come near him.
Captain Michales took his tobacco box from his belt Neither wine nor a ride on his mare now brought him any relief. Above all, not this wretched cigarette. He lighted it, took a few puffs, and spat furiously. It poisoned his mouth. He threw it to the ground and stamped on it. “To the devil with you too,” he muttered, and turned to go back into the shop, to sit there and, as soon as the day came to an end, to shut it up and escape.
But now there appeared, covered with dust and bathed in sweat, his tongue lamed by terror, Thodores, the firstborn son of Manusakas. He stopped in front of his uncle, and stared at him. He tried to speak, but his heart was too full. Captain Michales seized him by the arm and shook him.
“Speak!” he told him, and bent over him. Full of evil foreboding, his thoughts rushed to his brother Manusakas.
“They’ve killed my father, uncle!”
“Who, boy?”
“Nuri.”
Captain Michales let his nephew’s arm drop, stuck his thumb between his teeth, and bit. He could taste hot, salt blood on his lips.
“When, boy? Where?”
With tears and curses, Thodores told how at noon that day they had found his father lying under the big oak. He had two knife-wounds, one in the side, the other through the heart. Two women who had come up the mountain in the twilight yesterdayHadzijorgos’ wife and daughter ad met Nuri clinging, pale and exhausted, to Ms horse, and had found tracks of blood all along the cliff path.
For a few moments Captain Michales said nothing and did not move. He simply stared at the ground. He could see the thick-leaved oak in the hollow, and at its roots a majestic body dabbled in blood. When he had had nis fill of this picture, he raised his head and seized his nephew by the shoulder.
“Are you a woman, howling like that? The gates are still open, you’ve time to get back to the village. Tell them to wait and not to bury him. I’m coming!”
When he was alone, Captain Michales went into the shop, and ordered Charitos out. Nobody must see him. He gave the chair on which he usually sat a kick, so that it smashed in pieces, and flung himself upon a coil of rope, pressing his fists against his head. The shop and Megalokastro sank from his sight, and an oak spread itself before him, a darkly gleaming one, surrounded by thorns. At its foot lay his brother Manusakas. He was not deadthat was not blood streaming over him, but wine! He was clapping his hands and singing, “The Muscovite will soon be here!”
He shook his head and stood up. His decision was suddenly made. He shut the shop and stuck the key in his belt. He did not go into Broad Street, but made his way through the narrow alleys. Out of the Greek quarter, he came into the Turkish. The Hags were not yet at their peepholes and did not see him. In front of the green door he halted. Like a falcon his gaze shot up to the high, blind walls and perched on the tiny balcony with its closed lattice. But suddenly he wrenched his gaze away, with rage and disgust hi his heart, as though he had defiled himself, and let his eyes once more sweep over the rough walls. This evening he was not concerned with women and balconies. The falcon of his spirit swept over the head of Nuri and longed to strike its claws into his eyes and his brain.
A strange, inhuman rejoicing filled him. His spirit suddenly shook free and rose. It seemed to enter another odya man’s. It did not deck itself, it did not paint itself, it did not smell of musk. It smelled of male sweat. Now Captain Michales went home. His eyes were blazing.
“Manusakas, my brother … Manusakas, my brother …” he murmured as he went.
Night fell, and the stars appeared, while a doleful, half-eaten moon hung in the sky. The doors in Ai-Janni were bolted, the lamps went out one after another, and the village was plunged into darkness. Only Manusakas’ door stood wide open. The lamps were burning, and in the middle of the main room, on a bier, was the corpse of the master of the house, laid out for the funeral ceremony. It had been washed with wine and veiled in a linen shroud. A cross of wax lay upon the lips, and a small icon of the Redeemer had been placed in the crossed hands. Two huge lamps were burning, one at the feet, the other at the head. His eyes had remained open and were glazed: since no one had been there to close their lids when they were still warm, they would not shut. Ever since morning the relatives and friends had been coming. With mourning strokes the bells announced the dread presence of death. From Ai-Janni, from Petrokefalo and all the neighboring villages the Christians had been coming, to kiss the dead man and take leave of him.
His wife Christinia had flung herself over him and was sobbing and beating her breast. The neighbor women had comethe widows, the mothers whom Charos had robbed, and the orphan girlsand at the sight of the family’s grief their own had welled up, and they loosened their hair and joined in the keening. Old Sefakas came on foot from Petrokefalo, armed as though he were going to war. He carried old-fashioned pistols, a long knife with a white handle, and his father’s heavy muzzle-loader with its wide muzzle. He halted, stood motionless on the threshold, saw his son lying on the bier, came forward and stretched out his huge hands to clasp both the dead man’s hands.
“All’s well, Manusakas,” he said. “Only you’ve been in too much of a hurry. It was my turn. Now greet the people below for me. Tell them I’m coming too.”
After these words he sat down on the threshold for a while. Then he stood up and went back, silent and dry-eyed, to bis village.
Slowly the keening continued. The bodies of the mourners grew weary and found consolation and sweetness in weariness. One after another, the friends and relatives got up to go home, to eat and sleep. They were still alive, and tomorrow work was waiting for them. Other people’s grief still belonged to other people. It could even secretly bring pleasure, because Fate had struck their neighbor and not themselves. There remained hi Manusakas’ house his three bosom friends only: his brother Famurios, the man of the grasslands; his godson Stratas, a sturdy young man of thirty-five, of healthy stock, with a pointed beard, slender hips and an open forehead. He was a stranger from Kisamo, who five years ago had turned up in the Lasithi district for the Krustalenia fair. There his fate lay in wait for him in the shape of a girl from Ai-Janni whom he saw dancing. His soul desired her, and he took her. Manusakas set the wedding crowns on their heads. Nine months later he had his firstborn christened. That was how they had become godfather and godson. The third was Patasmos the lyre player, a bit of ill-leavened bread the witches had licked at. His father had begotten nine sons, and he was the lasta graybeard’s work. But he was a man in whom the wrath of God moved. No one could challenge him when, at the fair, the jeering mantinades(*Rhyming couplets, usually topical or personal) began to ring out. In the flick of a wrist, there he was with his scornful rhymes. He knew everybody’s weakness or secret anxiety. Fear seized men and women when, enthroned in the middle of the dancing space with his lyre on his knees, he stabbed them, one after the other, with his eyes. At last he would open his mouth, and out would dart the mantinade. He lived alone as an old palikar, without a care. He was the first and best at every fair, wedding, christening and drinking bout. Everyone competed to have him as a guest to avoid being sung about. He was known as Patasmos and Beelzebub and Spear and Captain Wasp. Yesterday he had come to Ai-Janni for the christening. Stratas’ third child was to be christened. But now here was an evil reunion with Charos, who had also come for a visit. Patasmos had been an inseparable friend of Manusakas. They had emptied whole casks of wine together, devoured whole sheep to the bones together. He had loved Manusakas and had never made fun of him.
He bent down, looked at the corpse, and sighed. “Yes, a man’s no more than a bladderit swells and swells and suddenlypoof!it bursts and goes to the devilI mean, to Paradise,” he corrected himself quickly, for he was ashamed in front of the corpse.
Stratas bowed his head and said nothing. He took his kerchief and flicked the flies away from the
dead man’s nose and lips. Famurios stood up, put his arm around Christinia’s shoulder and raised her to her feet. Then he lifted each of the other mourners in turn.
“Out with you, women, that’s enough! Out with you, and be quiet, sisters of misfortune. We three are taking over the watch for the night.”
The women united in an outcry and tried to resist. But the herdsman raised his paws and drove them like a flock into the inner part of the house. Then he came back and sat down at the feet of the dead man.
For a while the three gazed at the murdered man without a word. Each had his thoughts ‘elsewhere. Stratas’ thoughts were with his wife, and with the mule he had bought the day before yesterday (it had turned out to be very wild: it kicked, and might one day kill one of his children).
Patasmos was building in his mind a new poem, a dirge, a mixture of truth and lies: how Manusakas had fought with seven Turks, and had killed six of them. Famurios was hungry. He had seen, hanging on the wall of his brother’s cellar, some pork sausages, and in the corner a little cask of raki. Also Christinia had done the baking yesterday, and the wheaten bread still lay in the tray, giving out fragrance. His mouth filled with saliva, and while his eyes remained bound to the corpse, his mind was pondering how he could give the conversation a turn toward suasages and raki.
It must be midnight. A light north wind was making the leaves of the lemon tree hi the yard rustle. It cooled the brows of the death watchers. Now that the women were quiet, an owl could be heard hooting up above in the loft. And in the neighborhood the dogs had scented Charos and were howling.
Famurios could feel his innards growing tense with hunger. He could not find a subtle way to guide the conversation. So he burst out:
“Men, what do you think? My eye caught sight of some strings of sausages and a cask of raki in the cellar. Shall we drink to his salvation?”
“Why shouldn’t we drink?” asked Patasmos, rubbing his belly, which was beginning to rumble. “Only the dead don’t drink. Go, Famurios, with God’s help! Go to the cellar! What do you think, Stratas?”
Freedom or Death Page 20
