‘We both have letters,’ said Themis, putting them on the kitchen table.
Kyría Koralis had appeared at her side and was already eagerly slitting open the letter from Margarita.
Themis left hers on the table and went across to continue playing with Angelos. He was already protesting at being abandoned and, besides, she was in no hurry. She expected disappointment.
‘Poor girl,’ Kyría Koralis muttered. ‘Poor child. Still no sign of a baby. Even after everything I sent her. What can she do? And the husband is impatient. Oh dear, oh dear . . .’
‘That must be difficult.’
Themis tried to sound sympathetic but found it hard to feel very much for her sister.
‘Perhaps I should suggest she comes back to Athens?’
Themis shot a glance at her grandmother but kept quiet. There was nothing she could imagine that would make their lives more difficult than an embittered Margarita living in their midst, her aspirations and hopes entirely dashed. An unexpected equilibrium had been achieved between herself and Thanasis, and if Margarita returned she was certain the fragile balance would be lost.
Kyría Koralis started preparing lunch and Themis absent-mindedly slit open her letter. It would say the same as the others: ‘Many thanks for your letter. We are sorry to inform you . . .’
She was still thinking about Margarita when her eyes began to scan the lines.
‘Yiayiá!’ she shrieked. ‘I’ve found him! I’ve found him!’
She stood up and waved the letter triumphantly in the air.
‘He’s in Thessaloniki! I’ve found him. I’ve found Nikos!’
Themis was beside herself with joy. She picked Angelos up and danced with him, burying her face in his curls.
‘Your brother is coming,’ she exclaimed. ‘Your big brother . . .’
She kissed Angelos on both cheeks before putting him down on the floor.
Kneeling down to be at his level, Themis took her son’s hands in hers.
‘Say Nikos, darling,’ she said, almost beside herself with excitement. ‘Say Nikos!’
The little boy, who was at a stage where he would parrot any word he heard and liked, dutifully responded.
‘Niko,’ he said dutifully. ‘Niko.’
‘Bravo, agápi mou. Bravo!’
Thanasis had come in quietly during the commotion.
‘So,’ he asked. ‘What’s all the fuss about?’
Themis hastily got up from the floor, straightened her skirt and passed her hand over her hair, knowing that she must look dishevelled. She was emboldened by excitement.
‘You remember you found me the record of Anna Kouzelis? Well, I have found her son. And she asked me to take care of him if anything ever happened to her.’
Even now she was adding another layer of untruth but it would make no difference to Thanasis’ reaction.
‘Take care of him?’ said Thanasis, aghast. ‘What exactly do you mean, “take care of him”?’
‘I mean just that. Bring him up as my own.’
Thanasis began to splutter. His indignation prevented him from speaking but his face said it all. His scar had reddened and his eyes bulged with fury.
‘Try and stay calm, my dear,’ said Kyría Koralis. ‘And listen to your sister. Hear what she has to say.’
Kyría Koralis turned off her pan of boiling water and began to play with Angelos again.
Themis was shaking. Thanasis stared at her.
‘Very well. I am waiting,’ he said impatiently.
Themis had long prepared for this moment, rehearsing what she would say to her brother and anticipating his reaction.
‘This boy. This little boy. He has spent these past years in one of the Queen’s homes. He will be disciplined and well-behaved. They are taught good manners and patriotism and how to behave in church. Apparently they’re model children, schooled just as Queen Frederika wishes.’
The words stuck in her throat like gristle from old meat but they were words that her brother would want to hear.
‘But why should we have him here, Themis?’
‘Because I promised, Thanasis. And don’t you think it’s better to give a child a normal life?’ she appealed to him. ‘And let Angelos grow up with a brother?’
‘He’ll be a nice, decent child, Thanasis,’ said Kyría Koralis weakly. ‘Those paidópoleis are very disciplined and the children are all nice and clean . . .’
‘I have told them that I am his aunt,’ added Themis. ‘But to him, I will be his mother and Angelos and he will be brothers.’
Thanasis did nothing to hide his disgust and Themis could see the sweat of agitation dripping from his brow.
He came up with one objection after another.
‘There isn’t enough space,’ he said.
‘I don’t mind sharing my room with two boys,’ said Themis quickly. ‘And besides, we might all move out one day.’
She harboured a dream of finding someone who might love her enough to adopt her children. The woman who had been a soldier and survived great hardship admitted to herself, with just a modicum of shame, that life in this society would be much easier with a husband.
‘And how exactly do you think that will happen? Who’s going to take on not one but two little bastards?’
‘Thanasis, please!’ pleaded his grandmother.
In spite of his affection for Angelos, Thanasis could still be cruel. Themis kept calm.
‘Who knows? But I promise, Thanasis, that I will do everything to make sure that he fits in and becomes part of our family.’
The whole plan relied on her brother’s compliance. If he really wanted to prevent it, he would succeed.
‘I need time to consider,’ he said firmly.
The conversation was over and Themis left the room with Angelos. Kyría Koralis returned to the stove and carried on making lunch. The subject of Nikos was not raised again that day.
In the interim, Themis made plans.
She decided not to wait for Thanasis’ response. What did she care for it? She had no doubt in her mind what she must do, reminding herself of all the risks she had taken in the past, hiding, fighting, surviving hunger, torture and pain. She would not be afraid of her brother.
The paidópoli of Agios Dimitrios was situated close to Thessaloniki. In a few days’ time, she would take the train from Athens.
Chapter Twenty
THEMIS PACKED A small tapestry bag of her grandmother’s with two clean blouses, some underclothes and a knitted cardigan.
‘It’s a long way north,’ warned her grandmother. ‘And it might be chilly at night.’
Themis did not like to remind her that she had slept outside on the mountains of northern Greece.
Kyría Koralis tucked some dried fruit and bread into the side of the bag, gave her some money and waved her off. Angelos was still sleeping and Themis did not wake him, preferring to avoid a tearful farewell. She knew her grandmother would care for him well. Thanasis had already left for work.
Themis had never travelled by train, and the noise and confusion of the station was overwhelming. After a long wait, she found herself at the front of the ticket queue and bought a one-way ticket to Thessaloniki that would take her via Lamia and Larissa and arrive in the early hours of the following day.
‘You’re not planning to return?’ asked the man behind the counter officiously.
It was too complicated to explain that she would not be coming back alone, and in any case did not know exactly when that might be.
By the time she found the correct platform her train was about to leave. In the chaos of passengers and porters shouting and giving orders, she narrowly avoided collision with two men carrying a trunk. Even as doors were still being slammed shut, the train began to pull out. For a moment she panicked that she was heading in the wrong direction but other passengers soon reassured her.
She found a seat by the window and stared out, her bag held close to her chest. She carried nothing of value except the
letter from Agios Dimitrios and a book that she had brought with her, the recently published Freedom and Death by Kazantzakis. It was so long since she had had this many hours to herself, and she eagerly began to read. With the late-morning warmth coming through the window, she soon fell asleep, not waking until the afternoon when the landscape had flattened and they were passing through farmland near Lamia. Athens was already far behind.
She ran her hand along the spine of the book and her fingers traced the author’s name. Nikos. Themis was missing her own son, but she was on her way to find Aliki’s. A tingling sensation ran up and down her spine.
The whole day the train trundled through Greece. The windows were dirty so it was hard to see much of what lay outside, but they passed entire villages of burnt-out houses. For an hour or more she saw scarcely a single figure in the landscape. Only as they stopped at various small towns did there seem to be a population of any kind.
The whole country seemed submerged beneath dereliction. Themis had got used to the dilapidated state of Athens. It was the normality since the occupation and civil war, but this journey showed her parts of Greece that she had not seen before. It seemed that most of it was in a similar or even worse state of disrepair and she felt a twinge of guilt for the role she had played.
A young woman climbed aboard at Lamia and sat next to Themis. She was about the same age and on her way to live with her sister in Thessaloniki.
‘Maria has found me a job as a seamstress,’ she said, proudly. ‘It’s in a fashion house. Haute couture.’
‘That sounds nice,’ said Themis.
‘It’s a new start anyway,’ said the other girl. ‘And we all need a new start, don’t we?’
Themis did not answer, even though she agreed.
Themis had enough food to share and the other girl gratefully took some. All day, she slept fitfully on and off, sometimes dipping into her book, at other times listening to the idle chit-chat of her travelling companion.
That night, both women agreed to keep an eye on each other’s things while the other one slept, so Themis enjoyed a few hours of relatively comfortable sleep.
‘You can’t really trust anyone these days,’ said the trainee seamstress.
In the early hours of the following morning, the train rattled into its final destination. The women wished each other well and went their separate ways.
Themis would never forget her first sight of the city of Thessaloniki. Mist was rising over the sea and she wandered away from the station and found herself on a wide esplanade that curved along the edge of the water towards a fortified tower in one direction, and towards dockyards in the other. Parts of the city seemed very grand to her, others were more industrial and some of the streets reminded her of Patissia.
Her grandmother had been generous with what she had put in her wallet and she felt no anxiety about sitting down in one of the pastry shops in her drab clothes and ordering a coffee and a sweet bougatsa, its creamy custard bursting into her mouth as she sank her teeth into the light pastry parcel. The waitress giggled and brought her another paper napkin. Themis’ impression was that people were friendlier here, less anxious than they were in Athens.
For half an hour or more, Themis sat and watched people coming and going. It was coming up to eight in the morning, the time of day when people were at their most purposeful, the day was still new and everyone hopeful for what they would achieve. Themis looked at two or three young women hurrying along and wondered what their work might be. Shop assistants? Office workers? If the events of the past five years had not intervened she might still be working in the pharmacy and even be a qualified pharmacist by now.
She stirred her coffee absent-mindedly. She wanted to delay a little more before setting off, but eventually was ready to pay. Like the women who passed by, she too had a specific mission today. As she counted out some coins, she asked the waitress if she knew how to find a place called Oraiokastro. It was the suburb where the paidópoli was situated.
The young girl called her colleague over.
‘Zoe, you live there, don’t you?’ she said. ‘Oraiokastro? What’s the best way to get there?’
The other girl drew a map on the napkin showing how to find the bus station, the number of the bus she should get, how much it would cost and how long it would take. Themis was touched by her kindness.
‘What takes you to my town?’ she asked.
‘I have to visit the paidópoli,’ Themis answered innocently. ‘My nephew is there.’
The woman, Zoe, seemed surprised that anyone would ever want to visit such a place.
Moments later, Themis was walking along Aristotelous Street, disconcerted by the waitress’ reaction but full of anticipation for the next stage of her journey.
Themis had enjoyed her brief time in Thessaloniki and reluctantly left the city behind. She took a seat at the back of the bus and when she glanced behind her caught a glimpse of a sparkling sea.
Oraiokastro was closer to Thessaloniki than she had imagined, and also the terminus of the route. When she got off the bus it was about mid-morning and a single enquiry got her to her destination. Five minutes later she was at the paidópoli.
A pair of iron gates towered above her and through the bars she could see a vast building stretching away into the distance, a huge Greek flag fluttering over its entrance.
She had not allowed herself to imagine this moment, and now felt daunted by what was ahead.
For so long she had been on the inside of bars wanting to get out; now she was on the outside hoping for admission. In the yard in front of the main building dozens of boys were playing. Some of them were kicking a ball, others stood around talking. One or two of them loitered shyly on the edge of the group.
The children were all wearing identical blue shorts and shirts, an outfit that reminded her of her own hated EON uniform.
Themis scanned the faces of the boys. What would Nikos look like now? She had a line drawing of him as a small child but that had been done four years ago. He would look very different now and there were at least fifty boys in the yard, en masse their faces all so similar: dark hair (identically cropped), dark skin, dark eyes. Suddenly a whistle was blown and they immediately fell into a single line and marched like soldiers into the building. It was silent again.
A moment or two passed before it occurred to Themis to push the gates. To her surprise, they moved easily and a moment later she was at the main door, nervously putting her finger on the polished bell.
Themis took a deep breath.
‘Have courage,’ she told herself. ‘Stay strong. Think of Aliki.’
‘Kaliméra. Good morning. Can I help you?’
The door had been opened almost immediately by a young woman, probably Themis’ own age. She was neither friendly nor hostile.
Themis had rehearsed what she was going to say and the words tumbled out easily.
‘I have come to enquire about a child,’ she said. ‘Nikos Kouzelis. I am his aunt.’
‘Ah, yes,’ the woman replied, as though she had been expecting her. ‘Come in.’
Soon Themis was sitting in the director’s office. On the wall hung a huge portrait of Queen Frederika, whose eyes met hers. Themis had not changed her views about the German even though she had successfully promoted herself as the mother and saviour of Greek children.
The director came in and she stood to greet him. As soon as they were both seated, he began to speak.
‘So my secretary tells me that you wish to take Nikos Kouzelis from us.’
‘Yes . . . I wrote to you.’
‘I have the letter here,’ he said curtly, looking down at it. ‘Before releasing him, I need to inform you of a few things.’
The terminology reminded Themis of prison.
‘First of all . . .’
Themis felt her heart thumping. The moment he demanded proof of her identity all might be lost, but she was ready with the excuse that all her personal papers had been lost in a fire during
the events of December 1944.
‘I need to tell you that he is a very rebellious boy,’ continued the director. ‘In spite of our efforts he does not really . . . conform, shall we say.’
‘Oh . . .’ Themis said, trying to sound disapproving. ‘I’m sorry about that.’
‘He does not really embrace the ideology of this institution,’ continued the director strictly. ‘So when he leaves, we will rely on you to continue with his education in that respect.’
‘Of course,’ said Themis, enthusiastically. ‘My brother will happily undertake that.’
Referring to Thanasis made the conversation feel more authentic.
‘The very least he must do is learn the words of our national anthem,’ continued the director. ‘And he must continue to say his prayers.’
An outsider might have imagined that he was talking about a youth, rather than a five-year-old child.
Themis continued to nod.
‘Well, that completes the process, I think,’ said the director. ‘I just need your signature here.’
Themis hastily signed the paper he passed to her. It summarised the various things he had already outlined and her signature was her undertaking to fulfil them. Essentially, she must ensure that Nikos became a good citizen.
Yes, thought Themis as she picked up the pen. I will happily bring him up to be a good citizen: to love his motherland and his fellow Greeks.
She had no objection to these principles, even if her definitions were at odds with those of the austere figure who sat in front of her.
The director took a cursory look to ensure that the signature matched the one on her original letter but before the ink was even dry, he stood up and led Themis to the door. He politely opened it to let her through and thanked her for coming.
‘My secretary will deal with the rest of the business,’ he said.
Themis got the impression that it was a relief for him to reduce the population of the paidópoli, even by one. The process had been astonishingly simple.
Before she even had the opportunity to thank him, the door had shut behind her.
The young woman was standing there, waiting.
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