Bitter Lemons of Cyprus: Life on a Mediterranean Island

by Lawrence Durrell

  “The Cypriots forget many things,” I said reproachfully. “But we don’t forget. My brother’s corpse does not forget, and many another English boy whose blood stains the battlefield.…” I gave them a fragment from a newspaper peroration which I had once had to construe during a Greek lesson and which I had memorized for just such occasions. Frangos looked like a cornered bull, sheepishly turning his great head this way and that. It was clear now that he wasn’t even drunk, but merely mellow. He had been acting the part expected of him on a Name Day. A fleeting expression of shy reproach crossed his face. It was as if he had said aloud: “How damned unfair of you to introduce your brother just when I was getting into my stride. Perfidious Englishman!” I must say I sympathized; but I was unwilling to lose my advantage. It was clear that if I harped on my imaginary brother it would not be long before Frangos could be wrung out like a wet dish-rag. “Your brother,” he mumbled again, uncertain of the proper mood to wear. I saved him now by calling for more drink and he subsided into a smoldering silence at one end of the room, casting a wicked eye at me from time to time. He was obviously turning over something in his mind.

  “Englishman,” he said at last, having worked the whole thing out to his satisfaction, “come and stand beside me and drink to the palikars of all nations.” This was indeed a handsome toast and I lost no time in honoring it in brandy. It was not long before all of us, including Clito himself and the policemen, were splendidly tipsy. Frangos sat down in the traditional Cypriot fashion upon five chairs, one for the rump and one for each member, and taunted Clito into a few rather unsteady dance-steps. I obliged with a rendering of the “Forty Palikars” which met with great approval. The policemen giggled.

  Our evening was at last brought to an end by the appearance of an extremely smart Inspector of Police, a Greek, who in exquisite English, and with an intimidating politeness, asked me to break the evening up. “We might,” he explained gently, “have a breach of the peace.” It sounded a splendid thing to have but for Frangos’s own sake it seemed wiser to defer it, so we issued still amiably arguing and cursing into the moonlight where Frangos, after almost falling into a shop window, finally found his way to the tiny public garden where he unhitched an improbably small horse from an acacia tree and wavered off into the night accompanying his journey with toots on the flute. I gathered that he did not live far away.

  Clito, who had accompanied the party, wearing the air of a man concerned for our safety, but in fact because he hated to miss the least of Frangos’s drunken witticisms, now took my arm with an air of loving commiseration. “You must have one last drink with me,” he said. It seemed wiser to refuse as the hour was late, but he pleaded with me like a small boy who is afraid to be left alone in the dark. “For your brother’s sake,” he said at last, convinced that this at least could not be shrugged off, and led my lagging steps back to his cavern. Several of the spigots had been left on or half on and the worm-eaten floor of the cavern was liberally bepuddled with country wine. He lit a candle, cursing the failure of the electric light which had reduced Kyrenia to darkness that evening. By its dim light I studied the place. The confusion was indescribable; piles of empty cases, bottles and barrels were piled up in every corner, climbed every wall. But his was not really a tavern so much as a wholesale wine-shop with a few chairs for customers who became too argumentative or bibulous to leave: it was understood that before buying a liter of wine one had the right to sample the contents of each and every butt which lined the back wall of the cave. Insensibly samplers turned into tavern-clients, for it is always difficult to make up one’s mind in a hurry, and sometimes it might be necessary to have as many as three or four whacks at a cask before one was sure about it. Hence a few chairs and tables set about for the use of the undecided. Clito turned off all the spigots he could see, administered a well-aimed kick at some which were out of immediate reach, set up a bottle of cognac and two glasses, and sat himself down with a sigh of relief.

  “Thank God Frangos has gone,” he said. “Now we can drink to your brother. Long live your brother!”

  He did not seem aware that a certain incongruity lay in such a toast. I echoed him solemnly, however, and raised a glass.

  The front door of the wine-shop had been firmly locked behind us when we returned and it was some time before there came a knocking at the wooden panels. We were by this time deep in an argument about the growing of mushrooms—I cannot for the life of me think why, there are so few in Cyprus. Clito was laying down the law, and had actually banged the table to emphasize a point, when he heard his wife’s voice in the street outside. He froze. “What is it, dear?” he said in a small voice—the voice of a gnat attacked by the vapors. His wife replied in a clear voice. “What are you doing in there? I want to come in.”

  Clito put his fingers to his lips and said: “Just stock-taking, my love.” There was an ominous pause during which we both emptied our glasses and winked at each other. It was an unconvincing statement on the face of it—for the whole tavern, and indeed its owner, bore the unmistakable signs of belonging to that ideal world where income tax and stock-taking have never been heard of. To my surprise his wife gave a cackle of good-natured laughter. “You have become a great man of business, have you?” she said, and Clito answered, “Yes, dear,” with a mixture of meekness and injured dignity. “Why can’t I come in?” asked his wife in a friendly voice full of indulgence to the great wine merchant. “Because,” said Clito with a touch of asperity (he was on stronger ground here), “there is a little disorder in our shop.” It was putting it mildly.

  Over the bar hung a Victorian print. It was divided into two panels in the manner of a Byzantine icon. On one side sat an old gentleman in the prime of life, with elegant nankeen trousers and an opulent spread of gold watch-chain. A curled head of hair, neat whiskers of the mutton-chop variety, and spotlessly laundered cuffs, set off his appearance. He was seated jauntily before a roll-topped desk out of whose every drawer poured a cascade of five-pound notes which drifted about his ankles. He was smiling and held one thumb inside the flap of his tweed waistcoat. Under him was written in Gothic script the legend: “I sold for Cash only.”

  In the opposite corner sat another man, so yellow and cadaverous as to appear to be in the last stages of consumption; his rusty, moth-bedeviled business suiting and wrinkled dicky suggested extremes of dreadful indigence. His frayed cuffs and yellow teeth, his bald head and purple eye, showed to what lengths he had been driven by his refusal to adopt simple business maxims within the grasp of all. He too sat at a roll-topped desk—but out of every drawer poured frightful IOUs which had never been honored. Under him was written in letters of fire “I sold for Credit.”

  I examined these two monitors while Clito engaged his good-natured wife in further explanations, none of which sounded very subtle to me. But she was obviously a good-tempered woman and after a while she left us to ourselves, after extracting from him a promise that he would not be late home.

  “She is really a very good woman,” said my host grudgingly. “But much trouble, much fuss, and brain—finish.” From time to time, as a compliment to me, he dropped into a telegraphic English. He added in Greek: “We nearly starved, you know. Our shop is still not a going concern. And a lot of work, too.”

  The bottle of cognac was low and I now recognized in it, despite its colorless innocence, a formidable adversary which, if taken too lightly, would unhorse me completely; another bottle I thought would have seen us both comfortably to hospital, so I seized my host’s arm as he was about to wring the neck of one, and suggested a change to wine.

  “Wine,” he said, and his voice was charged with a professional tenderness. “Such wine as Clito has you will not see in Cyprus. Such wine.” He leaped up like a faun and smacked a cask with the flat of his hand until it gave off a resonant boom like a distant eructation of Frangos among the olive-glades. “Wine from Paphos” (bang), “Wine from Lefka” (bang), “Wine from Limassol” (bang). He walked up and dow
n the row of casks like someone playing an arpeggio on a xylophone. “And all fresh country wine, sent to me by my family, unbottled, free from chemicals.” He sat down and added in a small deflated voice: “So cheap too, but nobody buys it.”

  My curiosity aroused, I had him lay me out a dozen sample glasses which were filled, albeit somewhat unsteadily, from the line of spigots. There were, in all, about eight varieties of wine and cognac and we took our time, quietly going over the properties of each one as we drank it; Clito dwelt long and lovingly on the pedigree, the soil, the landscape and the character of its makers. His disquisition was so full of poetry that in some cases he made a sample taste a good deal better than it in fact was; but I was in no mood to cavil.

  He also produced some pickled beccafico which I had read about but never before tasted, and together we crunched the small birds to bits as we tasted the wines of Cyprus and sagely assessed them. There is no knowing how long this expressive and rambling conversation would have gone on had we not been interrupted—this time by one of Clito’s daughters who put her lips to the crack in the front door and shouted: “Mother says unless you come at once she will call her mother.”

  This threat had an electrifying effect on my friend. He made a swift tour of the spigots, blew out the candles and produced a bunch of keys. “We must go,” he said regretfully. I made some attempt to settle the reckoning but he brushed aside my money with the remark I was to come to know so well: “A stranger does not pay in Cyprus.” I thought I saw a reproachful flicker in the eyes of the two Victorians in the cartoon. “Besides,” said Clito, “none of my friends ever pays, and I consider you a friend after all we have passed through together tonight.” He seemed on the point of tears. I was afraid that he was thinking about my brother. “Tell me,” I said to divert him, “how would you set about buying a house here?” He thought. “I should go to the biggest rogue in Kyrenia—of course everyone is a rogue in Kyrenia except me—but I should go to Sabri the Turk. He is a terrestrial rogue of business and has many houses.” He spread his arms to try to indicate the full extent of Sabri’s roguery. I thought it odd that a Greek should recommend a Turk until I remembered how little he trusts his own compatriots. “Sabri,” said Clito firmly. “He’s the one I would go to. But beware!”

  His expiring hiss of warning died quietly on the moonlight. I saw his daughter take his unsteady arm and pilot him in the direction of home.

  Chapter Four: How to Buy a House

  Last of all came the Greeks and inquired of the Lord for their gift.

  ‘What gift would you like?’ said the Lord.

  ‘We would like the gift of Power,’ said the Greeks.

  The Lord replied: ‘Ah, my poor Greeks, you have come too late. All the gifts have been distributed. There is practically nothing left. The gift of Power has been given to the Turks, the Bulgarians the gift of Labor; the Jews of Calculation, the French of Trickery and the English of Foolishness.’

  The Greeks waxed very angry at this and shouted ‘By what intrigue have we been overlooked?’

  ‘Very well,’ said the Lord. ‘Since you insist, you too shall have a present and not remain empty-handed—may Intrigue be your lot,’ said the Lord.

  —Bulgarian Folk Tale

  SABRI TAHIR’S OFFICE in the Turkish quarter of Kyrenia bore a sun-blistered legend describing him as a valuer and estate agent, but his activities had proliferated since the board was painted and he was clearly many things besides. The center of the cobweb was a dark cool godown perched strategically upon a junction of streets, facing the little Turkish shrine of some saint or warrior whose identity had vanished from the record, but whose stone tomb was still an object of veneration and pilgrimage for the faithful. It stood under a dusty and desiccated pepper tree, and one could always find an ex voto or two hanging beside it.

  Beyond was a featureless empty field of nettles in which stood a couple of shacks full of disembodied pieces of machinery and huge heaps of uncut carob and olive, mingled with old railway sleepers and the carcasses of buses which always turned up here at the end of the trail, as if to some Elephants’ Graveyard, to be turned into fuel. Sabri’s Empire was still in an embryonic stage, though it was quite clear that he was speculating wisely. A circular saw moaned and gnashed all day in one of the shacks under the ministrations of two handsome Turkish youths with green headbands and dilapidated clothes; a machine for making cement blocks performed its slow but punctual evacuations, accompanied by a seductive crunch.

  Sabri could watch all these diverse activities from the darkness of his shop where he sat for the greater part of the day before a Turkish coffee, unmoved, unmoving, but watchful. His desk was in the far corner against the wall, and to reach it one traversed a terrain vague which resembled the basement of Maples, so crowded was it with armchairs, desks, prams, cooking-stoves, heaters, and all the impedimenta of gracious living.

  The man himself was perhaps forty years of age, sturdily built, and with a fine head on his shoulders. He had the sleepy good looks—a rare smile with perfect teeth, thoughtful brown eyes—which one sees sometimes in Turkish travel posters. But what was truly Turkish about him was the physical repose with which he confronted the world. No Greek can sit still without fidgeting, tapping a foot or a pencil, jerking a knee, or making popping noises with his tongue. The Turk has a monolithic poise, an air of reptilian concentration and silence. It is with just such an air that a chameleon can sit, hour after hour, upon a shrub, staring unwinkingly at the world, living apparently in that state of suspended judgment which is summed up by the Arabic word kayf. I have seen Sabri loading logs, shouting at peasants, even running down a street; but never has he conveyed the slightest feeling of energy being expended. His actions and words had the smoothness of inevitability; they flowed from him like honey from a spoon.

  On that first morning when I stepped into the shadows of his shop, the headquarters of the empire, he was sitting dreamily at his desk mending a faulty cigarette-lighter. His good-morning was civil, though preoccupied and indifferent; but as I approached he paused for one instant to snap finger and thumb and a chair materialized from the shadows behind him. I sat down. He abandoned his task and sat silent and unwinking before me. “Mr. Sabri,” I said, “I need your help. I have been making inquiries in Kyrenia and on all sides I am told that you are the most untrustworthy man of business in the place—in fact, the biggest rogue.”

  He did not find the idea offensive so much as merely interesting. His shrewd eye sharpened a trifle, however, and he lowered his head to scan me more gravely. I went on. “Now knowing the Levant as I do, I know that a reputation for being a rogue means one thing and one thing only. It means that one is cleverer than other people.” I accompanied this with the appropriate gesture—for cleverness in the hand-language is indicated by placing the forefinger of the right hand slowly and portentously upon the temple: tapping slightly, as one might tap a breakfast-egg. (Incidentally, one has to be careful, as if one turns the finger in the manner of turning a bolt in a thread, the significance is quite different: it means to be “soft in the head” or to “have a screw loose.”) I tapped my skull softly. “Cleverer than other people,” I repeated. “So clever that the stupid are envious of one.”

  He did not assent or dissent from the proposition. He simply sat and considered me as one might a piece of machinery if one were uncertain of its use. But the expression in his eyes shifted slightly in a manner suggesting the faintest, most tenuous admiration. “I am here,” I went on, convinced by this time that his English was good, for he had followed me unerringly so far, to judge by his face, “I am here as a comparatively poor man to ask you a favor, not to make you a business proposition. There is no money to be made out of me. But I want you to let me use your brains and experience. I’m trying to find a cheap village house in which to settle for a year or two—perhaps forever if I like it enough here. I can see now that I was not wrong; far from being a rogue you are obviously a Turkish gentleman, and I feel I c
an confide myself entirely to your care—if you will accept such a thing. I have nothing to offer except gratitude and friendship. I ask you as a Turkish gentleman to assist me.”

  Sabri s color had changed slowly throughout this harangue and when I ended he was blushing warmly. I could see that I had scored a diplomatic stroke in throwing myself completely upon the iron law of hospitality which underpins all relations in the Levant. More than this, I think the magic word “gentleman” turned the trick in my favor for it accorded him an unaccustomed place in the consideration of strangers which he certainly merited, and which he thenceforward lived up to in his dealings with me. By a single tactful speech I had made a true friend.

  He leaned forward at his desk, smiling now, and patted my hand gently, confidingly: “But of course, my dear,” he said, “of course.”

  Then he suddenly threw up his chin and barked an order. A barefoot youth materialized from the shadows bearing Coca-Cola on a tray, apparently ordered by some invisible gesture a while before. “Drink” he said quietly, “and tell me what house you want.”

  “A village house, not a modern villa.”

  “How far away?”

  “Not far. Among these hills.”

  “Old houses need doing up.”

  “If I can buy one cheaply I shall do it up.”

  “How much can you spend?”

  “Four hundred pounds.”

  He looked grave at this and this was understandable, for the price of land had been soaring since the war, and indeed continued to soar until the time of my departure from the island when building plots in the center of Nicosia cost roughly the same as those in Washington. “My dear,” he said thoughtfully, and stroked his moustache. “My dear.” Outside the darkness of his shop the spring sunshine glistened on trees loaded with cold tangerines; a cold wind touched the fronds of the palm trees, quick with the taste of snow from the Taurus mountains across the water. “My dear,” repeated Sabri thoughtfully. “Of course if you lived very far away it would be quite easy, but do you wish to be within reach of the capital?” I nodded. “If I run out of money then I shall have to work, and there is nothing to be found out of Nicosia.” He nodded. “Somewhere not too far from Kyrenia you want an arty old house.” That summed it up perfectly. Sabri took a thoughtful turn or two among the shadows and stubbed out his cigarette on the box. “Honestly, my dear,” he said, “it will be a matter of luck. I do hear of things, but it is a matter of luck. And it is very difficult to find one person to deal with. You are at once in a bloody family, my dear.” I did not then know what he meant. I was soon to learn.