‘I won’t keep you,’ he said, taking out an Olympus camera of very recent design. ‘If you wouldn’t mind showing me where I’d get the best shot, I’ll do what I have to do and get out of your way.’
‘Through here.’
She showed him into the salone, where the sun shone through the open balcony doors, highlighting the African memorabilia. Lemonia crossed straight to the balcony and stood there expectantly; but the fat man seemed to be taken with the collection. He looked closely at a lampshade made from the stitched-together skins of some small animal; then he examined the table the lamp stood on – an upended tribal drum with a warthog’s hide stretched over a cane frame, all lashed together with knotted thongs. He studied a beaded ostrich egg, then stood over the zebra-skin rug.
‘An extraordinary collection,’ he said, looking round at the masks and the necklaces. ‘Extraordinary. Though there seems to have been a lot of bloodshed to put it together. Do you know what animals are in the lampshade?’
‘I believe they’re some kind of shrew. Elephant shrews, I think.’
‘I myself would find it disturbing, to have my nights lit through the skins of dead animals. Still, a different man, a different taste.’
‘The best view is from here,’ she said, and he joined her on the balcony, where a binocular case lay on the table alongside Uncle Vasso’s Russian pistol.
The fat man picked it up.
‘A Stechkin 9mm,’ he said, turning it in his hand. ‘Where on earth did he get this?’
‘On his travels,’ said Lemonia. ‘He acquired many things on his travels.’
‘This is quite a rare item, in this part of the world. It must be very hard to find ammunition for it. And it’s a strange thing to have to hand, surely? Do you not feel threatened to have a weapon like this lying so casually about the house?’
‘There’s nothing casual about it,’ she said. ‘Only he and I are ever here, under normal circumstances. And it’s quite safe, because you’re right about the ammunition. He has no bullets left for it now. He used the last one very recently, doing someone a favour, as usual. Which is your boat?’
He pointed out Aphrodite, just beyond the harbour’s end.
‘She’s splendid,’ said Lemonia.
‘She is,’ agreed the fat man. ‘But she’s getting to be an old lady now, and so is becoming temperamental. That’s why we’re here in Mithros. We put in to make repairs.’ He aimed the camera; the shutter whirred as it opened and closed. ‘I appreciate your allowing me in here. The light at this moment is perfect, and the vantage point unique. It puts me in mind of Sophocles’s poem.
‘“Here stretcheth by the sea
A fair Eubœan shore, and o’er it creeps
The vine of Bacchus, each day’s growth complete.
In morning brightness all the land is green
With tendrils fair and spreading. Noontide comes,
And then the unripe cluster forms apace:
The day declines, and purple grow the grapes;
At eve the whole bright vintage is brought in,
And the mixed wine poured out.”’
‘That’s beautiful.’
‘Are you a lover of poetry?’
‘I know very little about it,’ said Lemonia. ‘I used to have an interest in literature. I suppose I lost it, somewhere along the way.’
‘You should revive it. Our interests – our true interests – are never lost. Sometimes they lie dormant for a while, but when the moment is right, they come back to us. As for poetry, a good poet will move you with his words, and a great poet will stir your very soul. But I suspect your soul is stirred enough, with a view like this to enjoy.’
‘Vassilis enjoys this view alone, mostly,’ she said. ‘As he is entitled to do, this being his house. He spends much of his time alone. He was the victim of an attack, some years ago. It had a deep effect on him, and made him nervous of others. He finds it difficult to trust people.’
‘Even you?’
‘He trusts me more than most. And I’ve betrayed that trust by letting you in here. If you’re finished, forgive me, but it would be better if you left.’
‘Of course.’ He put away his camera. ‘I shall tell no one I was here. Yet it seems a tragedy for this house – which cries out to be filled with people – that he is too nervous to entertain anyone here. The attack on him must have been serious.’
‘It was brutal, and unnecessary. Even now, I think he expects the robbers might come back at any moment. That night still casts a long shadow. But he escaped with only scars – his hands, if you could see them . . . Another man lost his life.’
‘Socrates Rokos.’
‘Yes, Socrates. He tried to stop them getting away. He left a family with no one to take care of them. Of course Vassilis has done his best for them. That’s the kind of man he is.’
‘I have heard of his reputation for generosity,’ said the fat man. ‘I was talking to Socrates’s son, Milto. A talented musician, who I gather got his start in music with a gift from Vassilis. That was an inspired choice. Milto told me the police investigation came to nothing.’
‘When do their investigations ever come to anything?’ said Lemonia. ‘Vassilis expected nothing from them, and he wasn’t disappointed.’
‘Are you sure? In my experience, most people who haven’t received justice are bitterly disappointed. They brood, and hatch devious, vengeful plots.’
‘Not Vassilis. His view has always been to trust in God. God sees all and knows all, he says. He leaves it in His hands.’
‘Sometimes we do well to give the Almighty a little help,’ said the fat man. ‘I take it he is cautious enough not to keep any valuables in the house, these days? In a small place like Mithros, rumours of hidden treasure grow wings, and fly to the ears of those who’d be better not to hear them.’
‘As far as I know, there’s nothing here. I take care of this house, and I believe I know every last corner. If there’re treasures here, they’re very well hidden.’
In the kitchen, the pot on the stove was hissing.
‘I have outstayed any welcome,’ said the fat man, ‘and you will think me incorrigible, but before I go, do you think I might try what you are cooking? It smells unlike anything I have ever tasted.’
She smiled.
‘Goat curry,’ she said. ‘A favourite of Vassilis’s. I should warn you, it has a little kick to it. Not too much, but enough.’
She lifted the pot lid, and the steam rose in a symphony of spices. She gave him a spoon; he dipped it into the sauce, blew on it to cool it, and tasted.
‘It’s good,’ he said. ‘As you say, it has a little kick. You are a good cook, Lemonia. Maybe you could write down your recipe for me, and I’ll see what my man makes of it.’
She laughed.
‘If only I could,’ she said. ‘There is no recipe. I make it as I feel. I cook by principles, rather than by recipes.’
‘You are an artist, then, a creator and improviser. And I see by your preserves you’re industrious too.’
‘Take some,’ she said. ‘I make too much, and there’s no one to eat it.’
‘If you’re sure,’ he said. ‘A jar of the rose-petal syrup would be most welcome. I’m very partial to it.’
She gave him a jar. As he slipped it inside his hold-all, he said, ‘I must return your favours. And a gift for a gift. I have a book of poetry I’d like you to have. I’ll make sure it reaches you. Yassas.’
‘Yassas.’
He turned towards the door. Lemonia began to unpack her bags of shopping.
The fat man glanced down at his feet. One of his shoelaces was undone.
‘Forgive me,’ he said. ‘One moment.’
He crouched down, and spent a minute or two fastidiously retying his lace, making sure both loops and tail-ends were equal lengths.
Lemonia reached for the last bag of her shopping. It had come from a harbour cobbler’s, and held a pair of shoes: the prettiest of shoes in soft pink l
eather, decorated with sequinned butterflies and in a size to suit a very young girl.
Twelve
Back at the harbour-side, the fat man asked the way to the butcher’s, and was directed to a shop in the traditional style, a box of bare stone walls with brown-painted doors the whole width of the frontage. Yet despite its being peak business hours, the doors remained closed; only at one end was one a little ajar, with an open padlock hanging in a hasp.
The fat man put his face to the narrow opening. There was the buzz of flies, and the smell of flesh and dried blood, and faintly beneath that, of putridity.
‘Butcher! Are you there?’
There was a short silence before a face appeared close to the fat man’s own.
‘I’m closed this morning,’ said the butcher. ‘Come back this evening. I might be open then.’
‘It’s you, Makis,’ said the fat man, with apparent surprise. ‘Hermes Diaktoros, of Athens. We met yesterday, at Kolona. I wonder if I can persuade you to open up, only briefly. I’ll be quick in my choice, and I won’t keep you.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Makis. Still only his face was visible. ‘I can’t serve anyone this morning.’
‘Does your reluctance have anything to do with the corpse you’re storing in your fridge? Please, don’t worry about him on my account. I’m well aware he’s in there. On a small island like this, his presence could hardly be kept secret. I only want something from the freezer, and I’ll be gone.’
Makis hesitated, then pulled back the door a fraction further.
The temperature inside the shop was markedly cooler than on the street outside. In the dim light, the fat man made out along one wall the boarded front of the refrigerator cabinets, which reached from floor to ceiling, solid-seeming as a safe. On the opposite wall was a glass-topped chest freezer; at the back of the shop, an old office desk held an antiquated till with round brass keys, a mincing-machine plugged into a high socket, and a pile of waxed paper printed with ‘Makis Theonas, Best quality meats and frozen foods’. A cigarette burned in an ashtray; there was a cup with cold coffee in its saucer. At the centre of the floor was a butcher’s block, a hefty slice of hardwood mounted on a pinewood trestle; the block was stained to a third of its depth with the blood and juices of raw meat, and its surface was crossed with hundreds of scars from the saw, knives and chopper which lay ready for use. Flies crawled on the block; beneath it, a cat licked at its extended leg.
Makis wore a red apron over his shirt and jeans. His fingernails and cuticles were foul with dried blood.
The fat man gave him a warm smile, and crossing over to the freezers, looked down through the glass on to the stock: imported chickens, skinny rabbits with opaque eyes, ice-glazed red mullet, milky-white squid. He slid back the glass, and shifted a few bags of vegetables – French beans and artichoke hearts, scattered with green rondels from a burst bag of peas.
‘Well, well,’ he said. ‘Here’s a guilty secret.’
Makis blinked. The fat man pointed to a tray of tiny birds, plucked and cellophane wrapped in pairs.
‘Are these quail?’ asked the fat man. ‘I don’t think they can be. Could they possibly be . . .?’
‘Ambelopoulia,’ said Makis. He snatched up the cigarette from the ashtray; there was a slight tremor in his fingers as he put it to his lips.
The fat man was leaning down for a closer look.
‘What are they, finches? They can’t be thrushes, surely. They’re too small.’
‘Don’t ask me to sell you those,’ said Makis. ‘I don’t know you. And it isn’t me that traps them. I’m just the middleman.’
‘I’m sure they fetch very good money, don’t they, especially since the ban? I imagine they’re almost worth their weight in gold. But it’s a risky business, isn’t it, these days?’
‘It’s the trapping that’s illegal,’ said Makis. ‘That isn’t down to me. It’s a ridiculous law, anyway. They’re just birds. If people want to eat them, let them.’
‘So you let someone else take the risk, and you take the profit? That might be good business, except I think you’re mistaken that the illegality is all in the trapping. I believe the trade in general has been outlawed. Still, let me put your mind at rest, on this score. I shan’t report you for what you’re keeping in your freezer.’ He covered the songbirds with the vegetable packs, and slid closed the lid. ‘Actually, my father is very partial to ambelopoulia, particularly to larks. He boasts he once ate fifty-four at a single sitting. I myself have no taste for them. The eating is too fiddly, and I think they’re of more value on the wing, where they belong. And for my purposes, they’re hardly adequate to serve my guests for dinner. Might you have mutton in stock, or goat? My man’s a fair cook, and can do wonders with most cuts of mutton, but I’d favour the leg, if you have it.’
But the butcher jerked his chin up to signify no.
‘I can only sell to you from the freezers today,’ he said. There was a blackness under his eyes which hadn’t been there the previous day, and whereas he had been clean-shaven for the festival, now a dark shadow of stubble covered his face. He yawned a yawn he didn’t trouble to cover. The tobacco on his breath mingled with the yeasts of alcohol.
‘There’s squid, but its frozen form is so inferior to the fresh,’ went on the fat man. ‘Did your wife enjoy the festival yesterday, by the way?’
‘My wife? My wife didn’t go. Someone had to stay and mind the shop.’
‘Ah. You’re an unusual couple, then. I’ve always found women much keener on those festivities than men are.’ He peered again into the freezer. ‘I suppose there’s always chicken, but that’s such an unadventurous choice. Look, Makis, I realise you’re reluctant to open up the fridge. But you must have a quantity of meat in there which will, quite frankly, very soon be unfit for anything but cat food.’
The butcher shook his head.
‘You’re wasting your breath,’ he said. ‘That fridge stays closed, until they come to take him away.’
‘It would take you only a few moments. Cut me a leg of mutton, and we’re done. Better that, surely, than to throw it out. You’re losing a morning’s business already, and no doubt you lost a good deal more last night. I’ll go away a satisfied customer, and you’ll have made a sale.’
‘I don’t want the sale, with him in there,’ said Makis. ‘Come back this evening. They’ve promised me he’ll be gone by then. I’ll be scrubbing the fridges from top to bottom, after they’ve taken him away.’
‘Forgive me, but you’re very squeamish for a butcher,’ said the fat man. ‘I would have thought you’d be hardened to dead flesh, whatever its species. Surely a man’s carcass isn’t so dissimilar to a cow’s or sheep’s?’
‘His is,’ said the butcher. He went to the ashtray, and stubbed out the burned-down cigarette, then took a fresh one from the pack and lit it, inhaling deeply on the smoke. ‘He’s about as ugly a corpse as you could make. The sooner they take him away, the better. Though he’s done me plenty of damage already. I’ll be lucky ever to see my customers in here again. I thought there was some hope of keeping it quiet, but that was only wishful thinking.’
‘Why did you let them bring him here, if you were so against it?’
‘It was an act of Christian charity,’ said Makis. He drew again on his cigarette, and flicked a short length of ash into the ashtray. ‘Who else has a fridge he might go in? Left in the open air, he’d have been stinking by the day’s end. As it turns out, he isn’t so fresh now. He was down that well too long.’
‘The nature of his death interests me greatly,’ said the fat man. ‘How on earth do you suppose he ended up down the well?’
The butcher shrugged.
‘Drunk, most probably.’ He inhaled again on his cigarette, and stubbed it out, hardly smoked. ‘My wife’s beside herself, worrying about the business. She thinks we’ll have to change our line of work. If there’s one job I never saw myself in, it was undertaking. We’re lucky no one’s put a name to him, or w
e’d have the next of kin down here lighting candles.’
‘Has no one put a name to him, then? You’ve no idea who he is?’
‘They’re trying to find out,’ said the butcher. ‘Seems to me the only way is to track down that boat he came in on.’
‘You will perhaps think me morbid for asking,’ said the fat man hesitantly, ‘but I have something of a professional interest in these matters – accidental death, and such. I’d be very interested to see the body, if you wouldn’t mind.’
‘I would mind,’ said Makis. ‘If you see him, I have to see him.’
‘Avert your eyes,’ said the fat man.
‘I can avert my eyes, but I can’t avert my nostrils, can I? Once you open that fridge, he’ll stink the place out again, and my business’ll be done for the day.’
‘I could make recompense for that,’ said the fat man. ‘I wouldn’t want you to lose trade, on account of me. What should we say? Three thousand? Four? Five?’
The butcher sighed.
‘On your head, then,’ he said. ‘But Christ knows, he isn’t pretty. His own mother wouldn’t know him. Be warned, he’ll turn your stomach.’
‘It would take a great deal to turn my stomach,’ said the fat man. ‘Believe me, I am used to unpleasant sights.’
Makis opened the refrigerator doors. There was a rush of chilled air, and the iron smell of cold blood, and bad meat. Dangling on hooks were hacked and sliced carcasses – a sheep, almost intact, the remains of a pig hooked by a vertebra, the ribs and foreleg of a cow – and on a shelf, the pig’s head and its feet, alongside several sheeps’ heads ranged like trophies, and a large bowl containing bloody livers, hearts and lungs.
On the refrigerator floor, under the hanging carcasses, a white sheet covered an object laid lengthways. The fat man crouched, and peeled back the sheet.
The Bull of Mithros Page 16
