The Bull of Mithros

by Anne Zouroudi

  ‘I never married.’

  ‘Really?’ Manolis raised his eyebrows. ‘An unmarried man, alone on a beach with all these young men? Don’t you worry about your reputation?’

  The captain’s face hardened.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It’s not about what I mean. It’s what others might say that would worry me. Plainly it doesn’t bother you. But being stuck here wouldn’t suit me, regardless. I like to be where the women are. I like to have something to look at, and there’s not much to look at here. But you’re wise never to have married.’

  ‘I wanted to be married, once,’ said the captain. ‘And I often wish that I’d had kids. But then, these boys are my family. I’ve been father to hundreds of them, over the years.’

  ‘Can you understand, though, the importance of my getting to a phone?’ asked Manolis. ‘If she cools off, there won’t be another chance. So what about it? Would one of your lads drive me? Hey, lads!’

  He called out to the young men, but over their joking and baiting, they didn’t hear.

  ‘Before you ask,’ said the captain, with a smile, ‘I should warn you that Jeep has been Lillis’s project since the day he arrived. He’s tinkered and taken it to bits, and put it back together again, and let me tell you, it’s never driven a single kilometre these past three months. You’ll come with us tomorrow, in the launch. We head out of here usually by ten. In the meantime, relax, and enjoy your dinner. If you’re a businessman, what business are you in?’

  Manolis was watching the soldiers, still hoping for an opportunity to enlist their help.

  ‘I turn my hand to many things. You might call me a travelling salesman.’

  ‘We get a lot of salesmen in the islands. Everything from garden pots to snake-oil. What do you sell?’

  ‘I’m in the export business. You name it, if there’s money to be made, I’ll sell it. I don’t suppose you have a beer, do you? I’d kill for a cold beer.’

  ‘I allow no alcohol on this post,’ said Captain Fanis. ‘Army regs. And if I did, we’ve no facilities to keep it cold. But this water’s from the well here. It’s pure, and it tastes good. This boat you were on – what was its name, its registration? When we go to the port tomorrow, we’ll radio from the coastguard office and get your crew brought in.’

  Manolis shook his head.

  ‘No need, no need at all,’ he said. ‘It was a joke, a stupid prank. Besides, I don’t remember the boat’s name. And I didn’t ever notice the registration.’

  ‘Where was it bound for, then? We’ll get the coastguard to track it down after it docks.’

  Manolis put his hand to his head and rubbed his temple.

  ‘Do you know,’ he said, ‘I’ve got a lousy headache. I suppose that’s what you get for taking a punch in the mouth.’ He laid down his fork. ‘If there’s really no hope of getting out of here tonight, I’d like to get some sleep.’

  ‘I’m sure you would,’ said the captain, after a moment’s silence. ‘There’ll be some formalities tomorrow, of course. Since you have no ID with you, I’ll escort you to the coastguard station. I expect there’ll be some paperwork before you’re free to go.’

  ‘I’m no illegal immigrant, Captain,’ said Manolis. ‘I’m a citizen of this country, born and bred. If you could just take me to the port, that’ll suffice.’

  ‘Unfortunately, that won’t be possible. The circumstances of your arrival are unusual. The vessel you were on wasn’t Greek registered, and you seem unclear as to its port of origin. Besides, you’ve no resources on which to travel. You’ll need either the coastguard or the police to vouch for you, if you want to get funds from the bank. And forgive me for pointing this out, but you don’t even have a coin to call your woman. Though I’ll be happy to give you change for the phone myself, when the time comes.’

  ‘I’d appreciate that. And thanks for the sandals.’

  ‘That’s nothing,’ said the captain. ‘One of the soles is loose, as you’ve no doubt noticed. Be careful not to trip over it. If you’d come tomorrow, they might have been thrown out, so you’re welcome to them. You’ll sleep all right, I’m sure, over in the stores. That campbed isn’t the most comfortable in the world, but you’ll be better by yourself than lying awake all night listening to my garrison snoring.’

  ‘I’m sure I’ll be fine.’ He got up from his chair, and looked again to the bottom end of the table. ‘’Night, lads,’ he said, to the soldiers; but they were laughing at one of Skafidis’s jokes, and didn’t hear.

  Captain Fanis watched Manolis go, then turned his attention back to his plate; but as he wound strands of over-boiled spaghetti around his fork, Kastellanos stood up and reached across the table for a basket which still held a slice or two of bread, showing as he did so the leanness of his torso. Captain Andreadis glanced down at his own soft belly, and pinched a little spare flesh through his undershirt. He looked again at Kastellanos, and pushed the spaghetti away, and served himself instead a spoonful of salad. As the captain finished eating, Gounaris cleared away the plates and glasses, and Skafidis brought out a bowl of watermelon, glistening in the light, its black seeds shining. The young men grabbed for the rough-cut slabs of fruit, and bit into it without caring about the juice which dribbled from it; they wiped it from their mouths with the backs of their hands, and from their chests and bellies with their palms, and wiped the wipings on their shorts or their bare thighs, and went on ribbing each other with cruel affection, arrogant and cocky, naive and clear-eyed, optimistic about life as it beckoned them forward: into the next few minutes, where there might be the glory of a victory at poker; into the brightness of the coming years, and the brilliance of the futures which would be theirs.

  When the fruit was gone, Lillis fetched a pack of cards in a ragged box, the cards themselves dog-eared and sticky with use, and so many of them nicked and bent that from ace to king of every suit might be said to be marked. All the conscripts had a handful of small change with which to gamble; all approached the game with such excitement, the stakes might have matched the highest in Monte Carlo.

  They began to play. The captain watched, and the hot night moved slowly on. The soldiers won or lost, laughed, complained and jeered. Kastellanos threw his cards down, and stormed off in a rage; minutes later he was back, smiling and ready to take his chances, confident of winning back what he’d lost.

  ‘Shall I deal you in, then?’ asked Lillis. ‘But don’t go crying when I clean you out.’

  ‘Deal, malaka,’ said Kastellanos. ‘I’m feeling lucky.’

  Lillis dealt the cards, and they studied the hands they’d been dealt.

  The lights went out.

  They groaned. In the darkness, Skafidis slapped Lillis’s head. In the new silence created by the generator’s failure, the blow was loud.

  Kastellanos fumbled for his lighter, and struck it; by its flame, he found the torch kept on the windowsill for these eventualities. The dark was deep but not complete; a little moonlight, and a faint glow from the stars allowed them, as their eyes adjusted, to see.

  ‘Why didn’t you fill it, for Christ’s sake?’ asked Captain Fanis. ‘I told you to make sure there was enough fuel.’

  ‘I did,’ objected Lillis. ‘It should run for hours, yet.’

  ‘Go fix it, then,’ said Skafidis. ‘I’ve got a great hand here, and I want to play it.’

  ‘Forget it,’ said the captain. ‘It’s getting late. Kastellanos, you’re on night duty. You’ll have to use a storm-lantern as watch-light. The rest of you, turn in.’

  The captain made his way to his tiny quarters, and undressed by the light of the lamp which burned before the icon of the Archangel Michael. He placed his boots side by side, folded his undershirt and laid it over a chair-back, folded his trousers and placed them under his mattress to be pressed. The room was impossibly hot; with the door ajar and the window open, still there was no air. In only underwear, he lay down on the old mattress. In the flicker of lamplight, the saint’s expre
ssion seemed to move from smile to frown.

  The captain closed his eyes, and tried to sleep.

  At the waterfront taverna, all the tables were taken. In the kitchen, Tavros sweated as he turned skewers of chicken and lamb over the charcoal, and kept an eye on the grilling swordfish steaks. His belief was that personal hygiene was the obsession of homosexuals, so the smell of him, sour and musky, wafted over the food. From time to time, he dipped a paintbrush into a bucket of his special marinade (the secrets of its composition were never revealed, but the smoke rising from the hot coals suggested lemon and a flourish of allspice, maybe juniper and certainly garlic) and basted the seared meat.

  Out on the terrace, Uncle Vasso sat in his reserved seat at a table with a clear view of the harbour. A squat man, very overweight and very dark, with oiled grey hair and a dominant Syrian nose, he had (as always) taken some trouble with his clothes, yet still seemed more mankas than gentleman. His new jeans were in a very large size, making them too long for his height, and so the extra length was rolled into fifties-style turn-ups. The dark leather slip-ons on his silk-socked feet were vigorously buffed; the open neck of his navy shirt showed a great deal of grey chest hair, and over the shirt, he wore a jacket in pale-blue seersucker, which – being large enough to fit him around the torso – was also too long for him, and reached to his mid-thigh. Disproving Tavros’s theory of personal hygiene, he had the Turkish habit of regularly splashing on cologne, and favoured an iris-scented brand ordered from Izmir.

  The men with him were talking politics, their solutions for the problems of the state becoming more dogmatic with each glass of ouzo. The dishes before them were empty, except for the oily sauces of stewed beans and okra; the ashtray was filled with crushed-out butts which Tavros had not yet found time to remove.

  ‘Don’t tell me that koproskilo knows what he’s talking about!’ said a hotelier. ‘He knows less about foreign policy than my grandmother!’

  Across the harbour, a late-arriving vessel turned stern-on to a narrow berth, beckoned by the town councillor’s boy with a whistle.

  Uncle Vasso touched the hotelier’s arm. On his hands were gloves of kidskin.

  ‘That boat that’s just arrived,’ he said, pointing, peering across the water, whose surface shimmered with reflected lights. ‘What flag’s that she’s carrying?’

  The hotelier paused in his argument.

  ‘I can’t see very well,’ he said, ‘but I should say that’s Luxembourg. Luxembourg, or Holland.’

  ‘I agree, it’s Luxembourg,’ said Uncle Vasso. He patted the hotelier’s arm, and returned his hand to its resting place on the top of his cane.

  Tavros carried out an order to the corner table, balancing his tray on a chair-back and announcing each item as he placed it before three men: a half-litre jug of red wine from the barrel; octopus salad dressed with oregano, and a plate of spinach rice; an order of fried kasseri cheese and one of courgette fritters; chicken braised with bay-leaves, served with baked figs on the side; beetroot boiled with its own leaves, sprinkled with chopped garlic. He had dipped his own fork into the spinach rice before he brought it out, and tasted it to check the seasoning; now flecks of spinach were stuck between his teeth.

  ‘Can I get you gentlemen anything else?’ he asked.

  Untroubled by the heat in cool French linen, the fat man smiled up at him. His tennis shoes were freshly whitened; his hold-all – a bag of the type favoured by athletes, in antique but well-cared-for tan leather – was tucked under his chair. Beside him in white uniforms, Enrico and Ilias – a stately blond youth, who cultivated an air of innocence which seemed to draw the girls – sipped Dutch beer.

  ‘Thank you, no,’ said the fat man. ‘This will do very well, to begin with.’

  A young man approached Uncle Vasso’s table. His face was lined from the outdoor life; his shirt – faded with washing and the sun – was ripped under one arm, with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows to show strong forearms. There was dust in his hair and in the deep creases at his eye-corners, and he brought with him the grassy smell of the fields. Under his arm he had a violin case, and as he took the chair he was offered, he kept his head low so his hair fell over his eyes. His greeting to the company was brief, and the company, expecting no more from him, went back to its discussion of foreign policy; but on his way back to the kitchen, Tavros called out to him.

  ‘Hey, Milto! Play us something! Give us a tune!’

  Milto shook his head.

  ‘Later,’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean, later?’ shouted Tavros from the grill, coaxing more heat from the coals by wafting them with a piece of cardboard. ‘Tomorrow? Next week? It is later! The people want some music with their dinner! Play us something! And make it something light. Something Yiannis can dance to.’

  Yiannis – a man of close to eighty, with similarly elderly companions – nodded his delight.

  ‘I’ll dance!’ he said. ‘Give me a tune, and I’ll show these women what I can do!’

  Milto snapped open the catches on his violin case, and took out an old instrument with mellowed varnish. In the case-lid was the foxed address label of a music shop in Athens, which, given the label’s age, seemed unlikely to be there now. He ran a block of resin up and down the bow’s fraying horsehair, then put the violin to his chin, and held it there whilst he plucked the strings and turned the pegs to tune it.

  ‘OK, Tavros,’ he called through the kitchen doorway. ‘I’ll play.’

  ‘Of course you’ll play, malaka,’ said Tavros cheerfully, and slammed down a chair above the kitchen steps, and told the girl washing the dishes to fetch Milto something to drink.

  Milto sat down on the chair, accepted a bottle from the girl and placed it by his feet. Then he began to play: lilting island dances, and popular tunes all the Greeks knew. For a while they clapped, and tapped their feet. Old Yiannis did his best at a fisherman’s dance, and bowed to the company and sat down when he couldn’t do any more.

  When the customers began to drift away, Milto let his music follow different tracks, and slipped into slower, soulful songs.

  Uncle Vasso rose from his seat, and leaning on his cane, made his way to the kitchen, where Tavros was sitting by the till, counting the takings. Uncle Vasso pushed several notes across the counter.

  ‘This should cover my table,’ he said. ‘What about him?’ He jerked his thumb towards Milto, who seemed lost in a doleful melody. ‘Has he eaten?’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Tavros.

  ‘Take for something for him, then,’ said Uncle Vasso. ‘Give him some of the stewed lamb, on me.’

  ‘He won’t eat it,’ said Tavros. ‘You know he won’t. The peppers are good. Or there’s pilaf.’

  ‘Serve him the lamb,’ said Uncle Vasso. ‘A man needs meat. Tell him I said he’s to eat it.’

  The fat man drained the last wine from his glass, and rose from his corner table. He sent Ilias into the kitchen to pay the bill, and followed him as far as the doorway, where Milto was finishing his tune.

  ‘You have talent, my friend,’ he said. ‘Your playing is very good.’

  Milto lowered his violin, and bowed his head to acknowledge the compliment. The fat man pressed a banknote into Milto’s hand, and Milto thanked him.

  A distant church clock struck midnight. The fat man called out kali nichta to all those who remained, and followed Ilias and Enrico out into the sultry night.

  Kastellanos, on watch, left the storm-lantern burning by the tree-trunk and struggled into the temperamental hammock. He disliked being on watch alone; but as Captain Fanis always said, the probability of invasion was so absurdly low, there was no point in keeping two of them awake. But Kastellanos was a town boy, not used to the sea’s strange noises as it ran up the beach stones, and the others, knowing his vulnerability, frightened him with country tales of ghosts and wraiths, which took root in his mind. Gounaris, a local boy, told of a haunting in this very place, where a man had died a tragic and violent death;
of how his spirit walked at night playing his fiddle, tempting the living with unearthly music to join him in his world of troubled souls.

  The others, when on watch, always claimed to go straight to sleep, and the captain turned a blind eye to their dereliction. Kastellanos, however, could rarely sleep, and in this deeper than usual dark, knew his prospects tonight were poor. He lay wakeful, and saw the captain’s lamp go out; he heard the voices in the bunkhouse quieten and fall silent.

  He dozed a while, but something woke him. He listened. At first there was only the sea tumbling the stones, and the slightest rustling of the tamarisks. Then he thought he could hear music, down on the shore, and – though he dared not move to look in case the hammock tipped him out – a shadow seemed to be moving behind the storeroom.

  He was almost sure enough to sound the alarm; then he wasn’t so certain, and dismissed it as his overtired brain. But as he dozed, the sound he’d heard came again: there was a footfall on the beach path, but whether coming, or going away, was hard to say.

  Three

  First light broke in a line of blazing red, marking the boundary of sea and sky. On the hillside, a rooster crowed, and away below was answered by another, and another.

  Uncle Vasso wasn’t sleeping. Despite the open window on the seaward side, the first part of the night had been too hot for sleep; then he had slept, but bad dreams had woken him in the early hours. The tablets on the bedside table hadn’t helped; a double dose had done no more than make him drowsy.

  The lamp had been left burning through the night to chase away the memories of his dreams, but daybreak was now turning the lamplight pale. Through Uncle Vasso’s restlessness, the woman beside him had slept deeply. He turned away from her, on to his side; still not comfortable, he settled on his back. Despite his drowsiness, his mind gave him no peace, running in its usual channels of anxiety. When the hammering came at the door, he was immediately alert.