The Bull of Mithros

by Anne Zouroudi

  ‘Meltemi,’ said the fat man, as Enrico poured beer into a chilled glass. ‘Maybe we shall have some relief from the heat at last. Are we ready for our guests this evening?’

  ‘All will be ready,’ said Enrico. ‘Do you want me to serve the mutton?’

  The fat man looked across to the harbour, near-deserted at the beginning of siesta. The jeweller was locking the shutters across his shop windows; at the kafenion, the patron was clearing cups from the empty tables. On the water below the periptero, Nondas was climbing into his boat.

  ‘Let’s wait and see,’ said the fat man.

  As he ate the frittata, Enrico sat down with him, drinking beer.

  ‘Has anyone come to claim the man from the butcher’s, kyrie?’ he asked.

  ‘Not as far as I’m aware,’ said the fat man. ‘And though I know he was not the human race’s noblest, and that the world might be the better for his absence, I have to say it makes me sad to think of him still there. Whatever he was guilty of in life, like everyone he deserves honour in death.’

  Nondas was motoring slowly towards Aphrodite. As the fat man wiped the last olive oil from his plate with a piece of bread, Nondas reached the steps at Aphrodite’s stern, where Enrico caught his mooring rope.

  The fat man leaned over the rear deck-rail.

  ‘Yassou, friend,’ Nondas shouted over the noise of his engine. ‘I’ve come to do a trade with you. I’m hoping you still have that mutton, so I can make my wife a happy woman, so she might make me a happy man tonight!’

  He stooped down into the boat, and lifted up a wooden box, where – amongst the last shards of melting ice and stinking melt-water – was a splendid snapper, pink-scaled and wide-eyed.

  ‘I had some real luck,’ he said. ‘I was only on my third or fourth cast when I landed this beauty. He was so heavy, I thought at first I’d caught my hook on the rocks! I was about to get my knife and cut the line, but then I felt him tug. He fought me all the way, and I was sure I’d lose him. But I got him in the boat, and now here he is. Just have a look, friend, and tell me if we have a trade!’

  ‘We certainly do,’ said the fat man. ‘Enrico, fetch Nondas our leg of mutton.’

  ‘Wait a minute, friend, wait a minute,’ said Nondas, and from under one of the boat’s benches, he brought out a jar of sea-snails preserved in brine. ‘I brought this for the gentleman too. A gift from me to him.’

  The fat man smiled.

  ‘Excellent!’ he said. ‘Nondas, thank you. You have done me a favour, and now I owe one to you.’

  The fat man slept away the afternoon, and spent the earliest hours of the evening with a volume of poetry. The hillsides were still warm from the day’s heat, and the perfume of the herbs that grew there filled the coming night; as darkness fell, stars glittered on the black sky, and the reflection of an orange moon glimmered on the sea.

  Just after seven, Ilias brought over Professor Philipas in the prow of the dinghy, and when the professor had stepped aboard, Ilias slowly backed into the bay, and set off in the direction of Kolona.

  ‘Welcome,’ said the fat man, offering his hand.

  He led the professor to Aphrodite’s prow, where canvas chairs stood round a pretty table inlaid with pear wood. The fat man indicated one of the chairs to the professor, and took one himself.

  ‘This is a beautiful yacht,’ said Professor Philipas.

  ‘She’s not young any more, but she has lost none of her charm for me,’ said the fat man. ‘Like a beautiful woman, age has softened and mellowed her. She is supremely comfortable, and if properly cared for, gives reliable service.’

  Enrico approached with a tray in the Turkish style – engraved brass swinging from three chains, so it could be carried without spillage. He gave a small bow to the fat man, and placed a drink from the tray before him, then did the same for the professor. He put a bowl of roasted sunflower seeds between them, and gave another small bow as he left.

  ‘I hope Campari is to your taste?’ asked the fat man. ‘I find it a very agreeable aperitif for the heat of summer.’ He picked up his glass, where a lemon slice floated amongst ice cubes, and held it up to the professor, who did likewise. ‘Yammas. Your wife decided not to join us, I assume?’

  ‘I never thought she would,’ said the professor. ‘I did ask her. As I said, she’s not a sociable woman.’

  ‘Perhaps she’s the exception that proves the rule. I drew a parallel a moment ago between this craft, and the mellowing of a beautiful woman. I have the impression from you that your wife is not the mellowing kind.’

  The professor looked out across the water, where the moon cast its strange light.

  ‘If I had a boat like this,’ he said, ‘I’d sail away. You could go anywhere, in a boat like this.’

  ‘You could,’ said the fat man, ‘and she has taken me many, many places. But it is a fallacy that in leaving a place, a man can leave his problems behind. Rather, solve the problems that trouble you, and find peace in the place that’s home. What about your son? You wouldn’t want to leave him, I’m sure. Though no doubt he’ll be leaving you, shortly. He’ll be of an age to join the army, before too long.’

  ‘We’ll apply for a deferment. He’s a bright boy, and there might be university or college. I never had those chances, and I’d like to do my best for him.’

  ‘He seems a solitary young man, if you don’t mind my saying so. Maybe the army’s camaraderie would do him good.’

  ‘He would hate it, I’m sure. I hated it, when I did my time.’

  ‘But not everyone hates it. The discipline and the teamwork appeal to some. And for many it’s an excellent rite of passage, an introduction to the world of men. In the past, Greece bred some of the finest armies in the world, and though our forces now may lack the glamour of the Spartans, in their own way, our modern generals do the same work, with the same aims at heart – the protection of Greece’s boundaries against her enemies.’

  ‘We have no enemies, surely?’ said the professor. ‘Not declared enemies, anyway.’

  ‘We all have enemies,’ said the fat man. ‘Sometimes we fail to recognise them as such. And sometimes those we think of as our enemies turn out to be our truest friends.’

  The buzz of the dinghy’s engine was drawing close.

  ‘I saw the museum on the television, by the way,’ said the fat man. ‘Mithros as the island with two missing bulls made a good story. Is there any news of the replica?’

  The professor shook his head.

  ‘None,’ he said. ‘I’m absolutely at a loss as to who would take it. It seems to make no sense.’

  They felt the touch of the dinghy’s nose as it reached Aphrodite’s steps.

  ‘That will be my other guest,’ said the fat man. ‘Come, bring your drink, and we’ll go and meet him.’

  Enrico had covered the table with a white cloth and laid three places. The candle lamps had been lit; the candles were of caramel-coloured beeswax, and gave off pollen’s essence of spring meadows. The silver-bladed knives had handles of ivory, carved with vine leaves set with grapes formed from tiny amethysts, with two-tined forks to match. The spoons were shaped like scallop shells, and the wine-goblets were in the Venetian style, their stems wrapped in engraved silver.

  The professor’s attention was on the cutlery; the forks were similar to one displayed in the Herakleion museum. He heard footfall on the steps, and the fat man offering a welcome.

  ‘I believe you two know each other,’ he said.

  Even in civilian clothes, Capain Fanis could only be a soldier, with his military haircut and his straight-backed, at-ease stance. He was smiling to greet his fellow guest; but when he saw the professor, his smile fled, and a flash of anger spread over his face. The anger, though, was quickly repressed, and replaced by an expression of indifference.

  On seeing the captain, the professor offered an uncertain smile, and, equally uncertainly, his hand; but reading the captain’s face, he dropped his hand, and himself took on an attitude of
detachment.

  When both wore similar expressions, the resemblance between them was marked.

  ‘Captain,’ said the fat man, coaxingly, ‘please become reacquainted with your brother.’

  The captain remained cold, and spoke to the fat man as if the professor were not there.

  ‘Forgive me,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to offend you, but I can’t sit down at a table with this man. So as not to spoil your evening, I thank you for your invitation, but ask that you get your man to take me back to Kolona.’

  The fat man gestured at the table.

  ‘Please,’ he said. ‘My crew has gone to some trouble. And there’s too much food for only two of us.’

  ‘It’s impossible,’ said the captain, and turning his back on both the fat man and the professor, he made for the stern steps. The dinghy wasn’t there.

  ‘Ilias has another errand to run,’ said the fat man, ‘but if you still feel the same when he returns, of course I will have him take you. I will not force you to stay.’

  ‘Fanis,’ said Professor Philipas, quietly. ‘My brother. Forgive me.’

  With his back still to his brother, the captain’s head lifted as though he had been struck.

  ‘Please, listen to him, Fanis,’ said the fat man. ‘I have gleaned a little of his story, and I don’t believe it has been happy.’

  Fanis turned towards his brother with tears in his eyes, struggling to control rage, or grief, or both. He waved a threatening finger at Philipas, but the words he spoke through clenched teeth were to the fat man.

  ‘You see this man?’ he asked. ‘This snake, this vermin? I loved that woman, and he knew it. She was going to marry me. She’d given her word, her family had given its agreement. We would have been happy, she and I, if my own brother hadn’t cut in, and stolen the woman who was to be my wife! My wife!’ He looked now at Philipas. ‘Why?’ he asked, shaking his head. ‘Why did you make such a fool of me? Why couldn’t you have left her alone?’

  Tears came to Philipas’s eyes.

  ‘Oh Christ, I wish to God I had! It was a black day when either of us laid eyes on her! I did you wrong, and I admit that, freely, now. But believe me, I’ve long ago come to my senses. You didn’t deserve her, Fanis. I deserved her.’

  Fanis sneered.

  ‘How dare you!’

  ‘I mean it,’ said Philipas. He spread his arms wide. ‘Hit me if you want to, give me the beating I’ve earned. But you are too good a man for her! You’re right, I was the lowest and the dirtiest kind of snake, and I’ve been reaping the rewards of that for years. She’s the sourest, most disagreeable woman you could ever meet! It was madness to steal her, and make you wear a cuckold’s horns. Don’t ask me what I was thinking, because I don’t know. You are my brother, by blood and birth, and I disregarded that to get to her. But God sees all, Fanis, and by Christ, I got my just reward! Outside a doll, inside the plague! She’s a bitch of a woman, who makes it her duty to make me miserable. If there can be anything noble in what I did, it’s that I spared you the misery of her company. Believe me, I’ve been punished for my sin against you. Every day is a punishment. Not least of all because now I’ve met the woman I should have married, and I’m not free!’

  ‘I can vouch for the truth of what your brother says,’ said the fat man. ‘The lady you fell out over is difficult, to say the least. You had a narrow escape, Captain.’

  But the captain shook his head.

  ‘I had no escape,’ he said to his brother. ‘You and she together broke my heart. I’ve never since then looked at a woman, in any serious way. How could I ever trust one of them again? And for my own brother to betray me!’

  ‘I’m so sorry!’ Philipas moved towards Fanis, but Fanis flinched, and held up his hand to stop his brother coming closer. ‘Fanis, forgive me, and let bygones be bygones. You have a nephew, did you know?’

  ‘I’ve seen him,’ said the captain. ‘I’ve seen him with her, and I’ve seen him with you. It makes me sick to see him, because he should have been my son. And if you’re so sorry, why didn’t you come and say so, years ago?’

  ‘I’ve tried,’ said Philipas. ‘But every time I see you, you disappear down some back alley. How could I apologise to you, when all you do is run away?’

  ‘I wish to leave now,’ said the captain to the fat man. ‘If your man isn’t ready to take me, maybe there’s somewhere I can wait until he can.’

  ‘Fanis.’ The fat man placed his hand on the captain’s shoulder; the soldier stiffened, but then seemed to lose his will to fight, and slumped a little. ‘Your brother did you a great wrong, but he has paid double for it, with the misery of the bad marriage that might have been yours, and the heartache of loving a woman he is not free to be with. You might still – if you wish, if you choose – make your nephew the son you didn’t have. Between us, from what I have observed, he would benefit greatly from your company. The boy’s on course to be his mother’s son; time spent away from her influence would change him for the better. You have a gift with boys and youths; you gain their trust easily, and bring out the best in them. Don’t ever think of your life as wasted, because you lost that woman. If you had married, it’s unlikely you’d have pursued the career you did, and hundreds of young men would have lost the benefit of your care. Losing her put you on the right track for your life, and made you the exceptional man you are. Your brother hasn’t had it easy, by any means. Now, I know human nature, and I know that knowledge will bring you bitter pleasure. That I can understand; but bitterness is corrosive, and will burn away a heart’s finer emotions.

  ‘You have lost many years of family life, and the love you had for each other as brothers must seem the husk of what it was. But think of that husk as charcoal, which seems the black and soulless form of the growing tree. Charcoal keeps the form it had in life, and given the right conditions – oxygen, and a spark – will burn twice as long and twice as hot as green wood. It is not too late.’ He grasped Fanis’s wrist, and so made him hold out his hand, then beckoned Philipas forward. Cautiously, Philipas touched his brother’s hand; and the captain reluctantly took it in his own, and let Philipas hug him to his chest.

  They ate Nondas’s snapper, and drank a bottle of good wine.

  ‘A friend of mine has a vineyard in Santorini, where they have perfected the art of growing Assyrtiko grapes,’ said the fat man, in response to the professor’s question on its origins. ‘I have vineyards of my own, in the north. If the Assyrtiko is finished, maybe you’d like to try a bottle from there?’

  But when Enrico filled Fanis’s and Philipas’s glasses from a second bottle, the fat man gave a subtle shake of the head, and Enrico replaced the wine in the ice-bucket without pouring for him.

  Enrico brought out dessert: pink sugared almonds, rose-flavoured Turkish delight, sliced cantaloupe.

  ‘I have to ask you,’ said the professor, ‘how did you know we were brothers?’

  ‘I rely heavily on what you might call intuition,’ said the fat man. ‘It’s a skill I have worked hard to develop, over the years. But you’ll remember you drew a map for me, on the back of an envelope. The envelope was addressed to you, and your family name was the same as Fanis’s.’

  The brothers drank more, until the second bottle was gone. As they stood up from the table, they embraced, and the fat man shook both their hands.

  ‘I cannot tell you what pleasure it gives me to see you reconciled,’ he said. ‘Blood is always thicker than water, and family ties are the heart of a happy life. Put what’s passed behind you, and move on. Make up for the time you have lost, and befriend each other again. Fanis, spend time with your nephew. He needs your influence to make him the young man he might be. And Professor, now the boy is older, you might perhaps consider that your church permits divorce. Since you have acknowledged the grossness of your offence to your brother, maybe the time is right to move on.’

  He called Enrico to his side.

  ‘Our guests are ready to leave,’ he said. ‘Tell I
lias to bring round the launch. I shall go ashore with him; I have business I must conclude tonight. We shall leave Mithros at dawn, so be sure we’re ready. And make sure nothing delays our departure. There are matters elsewhere demanding my urgent attention.’

  The butcher’s wasn’t open for business. Makis had opened in the morning, but trade had been too slow to be worth his time. The first hours after siesta had been no better. Then visitors had arrived, and ordered him to close the doors.

  The contents of the freezer – trussed chickens and trays of their livers, skinned rabbits, pork hocks and filo pastry, green beans, prawns and minced beef – were on the floor, and the butcher’s stock was defrosting by his feet; the rime of frost on the wrappings, the artificial snow that came out with the boxes and bags, were already puddles of water on the stones.

  With some sympathy, Spiros in his white uniform patted Makis’s shoulder. The police sergeant and the constable with him were keen to be gone.

  ‘Open it up, then, Makis,’ said one, gesturing towards the fridge. ‘Let’s get this done, if we have to do it.’

  With reluctance, Makis lifted the refrigerator handle, and opened the door a crack. The cold air took a moment to reach them. When it did, it carried the corpse’s stink.

  ‘Panayeia mou,’ said the sergeant, wafting his hand in front of his face to disperse the smell. ‘He’s a bit overripe, wouldn’t you say? For God’s sake, let’s get him out of there. If we leave him much longer, he’ll be slipping off the bone.’

  ‘Have some respect,’ said Spiros. Under his tan, he didn’t look well; sleepless nights had left him drawn. ‘Makis, open it wide and let’s get him out of there.’

  ‘I still don’t see why he has to stay in my shop,’ complained the butcher. ‘My business will never recover! All my frozen stock will be lost! And there’ll have to be a new freezer when he’s gone, but how long will I wait for compensation? Why can’t they just come and take him away?’

  ‘They’ve no one to send,’ said the constable.

  ‘They’re still trying to trace his relatives,’ said the sergeant.