Innocent Obsession

by Anne Mather

  Andreas looked up in mild amusement as she took her seat beside him, and then glanced sideways at her after she had settled herself to her satisfaction. ‘No luck?’ he asked innocently, arching his dark brows, and she had to steel herself furiously to suppress the desire to strike him.

  ‘You knew!’ she accused him in a low voice. ‘You knew what was in those crates!’

  Andreas shrugged. ‘I see.’ He paused. ‘Do I take it then that my company is preferable to raw fish?’ he queried with wry humour, and Sylvie couldn’t prevent the smile that suddenly parted her compressed lips. Andreas was watching her, his dark face mirroring her expression, and with a sigh of impatience she lay back against the rail and moved her head from side to side in a gesture of defeat.

  ‘Why did you agree to bring me?’ she exclaimed. ‘Why didn’t you protest? You know you didn’t want me to come, so why didn’t you tell Leon so?’

  Andreas moved his shoulders indolently. ‘Did I say I did not want you to come?’ he exclaimed, resting his elbows on the rail behind him, and she sobered as she remembered exactly what he had said earlier.

  ‘You offered to take Nikos,’ she declared carefully. She turned her head to look at him. ‘Not me.’

  Andreas contemplated the view before speaking again. Miles and miles of glistening water stretched to the horizon, dazzling in its brilliance. ‘Perhaps I guessed what Leon would say,’ he remarked at last. ‘My brother is nothing if not honourable.’

  Sylvie digested this. ‘But why?’ she asked helplessly. ‘After what you said—–’

  ‘Let us forget what I said, for today at least,’ Andreas suggested flatly. ‘Do as Leon said. Enjoy the day for what it brings.’

  It was about eleven o’clock when the caique docked at the jetty on the small island of Piso. Andreas sprang up on to the stone quay and held out his hand to Sylvie. After a moment’s hesitation she took it, allowing him to haul her up beside him, flushing when for a brief moment his steadying hand was hard upon her waist.

  Piso was very like Monastiros, a cluster of whitewashed cottages clustered about the harbour, with the bare, rocky hillside rising behind. A dusty track, it was hardly a road, led up from the harbour, and silhouetted against the skyline was the simple austerity of a small monastery.

  Andreas did not take this track, however, but set off along the coastal strip, soon leaving the village behind, and following a path over a rocky promontory and down through orange groves, cultivated, he explained, for the tourist trade on one of the larger islands.

  ‘Nothing grows naturally here, except perhaps the lizards,’ he amended, as a pale yellow body slithered hastily between the rocks, and Sylvie suppressed the slight shiver its darting beady eyes had promoted.

  She wondered where they were going, and how far it was. Already she was soaked with sweat, the hair that had escaped from its braiding, clinging in moist tendrils to her forehead and the nape of her neck. She was afraid her face was red and blotchy with the heat, and that she looked as exhausted as she felt, and she wished they could rest a while and recover in the shade of some cool awning.

  ‘That is our destination—see!’

  Andreas had halted, waiting for her to catch up with him, and as she did so, panting in her efforts to regain her breath, she looked down on a most desirable scene. Below them was a small cove, and set slightly above it was a square stone house. The house was not large, but it was evidently inhabited, and as they approached down the stony slope, Sylvie could see goats grazing nearby and chickens pecking in the earth at the back.

  ‘This—this is your friend—Riva’s house?’ she ventured breathlessly, struggling to retain her footing, and Andreas nodded before jumping down the last few feet and turning to bid her to do the same. Sylvie jumped, mainly because she couldn’t wait to get indoors out of the glare of the sun, but when Andreas caught her and held her momentarily against his chest, that proposition suddenly seemed less important. But remembering what he had said, she pushed him away, and with a wry inclination of his head Andreas accepted her dismissal and led the way round the building to the shaded verandah.

  A man of perhaps forty was seated on the verandah, his feet stretched out in front of him, arms folded, eyes closed. He was wearing nothing but a disreputable pair of baggy pants and a wide-brimmed hat tipped over his forehead. There was a bottle of wine on the table nearby, with a half empty glass standing beside it. But what attracted Sylvie’s attention were the sketches strewn carelessly all over the table and the floor, and the curled-up balls of paper that betrayed efforts attempted and discarded. And they were brilliant sketches, too, she realised wonderingly, vivid likenesses of a face she had seen over and over since her arrival in Greece. It was the face of an old woman, gnarled and weatherbeaten, yet possessing a wealth of character that made her seem almost real.

  Andreas grimaced at the mess, then unsympathetically jolted the man’s legs from their relaxed position. ‘Ti ine afto, Angelos,’ he chided sardonically. ‘Ehete tipota na kano?’

  ‘Ti?’ The man started up in surprise, blinking uncomprehendingly at Sylvie. Then, swinging his head round, he saw Andreas, and his look of blank insensibility changed to one of warm indulgence. ‘Oriste, Andreas! Embros! Embros! Ti kanete?’

  ‘Kala, kala …’ Andreas responded to the other man’s embrace with goodnatured enthusiasm, submitting to his repeated pats on the back with a lazily mocking smile. Then, turning to Sylvie, he said: ‘Angelos, I would like to introduce you to my sister-in-law Sylvie. You remember—Margot’s sister? She has joined us for a visit, but she does not speak our language.’

  ‘Ohi?’ Angelos surveyed Sylvie with a disturbingly intent gaze. ‘I am most pleased to meet you, thespinis. Welcome to my humble abode.’

  ‘How do you do?’ Sylvie shook hands politely, and finding Andreas’s eyes upon her too, was briefly glad of her hot face to hide her feelings of awkwardness and embarrassment. ‘I—er—are these your sketches?’ She moistened her lips when he did not immediately reply. ‘They’re very good.’

  ‘Thank you. I am glad you like my work.’ Angelos Riva bowed his head deferentially. On his feet, he was still shorter than Andreas, but sturdier, stockier, with the curly dark hair Sylvie was more used to seeing. He had a moustache, too, that curled down to his jawline, giving him a somewhat piratical appearance, but his smile was self-confident as well as infectious, and she doubted he needed her immature approval.

  ‘Angelos’s work is not unknown in Greece—as well as in a few other places,’ remarked Andreas dryly, and Sylvie, intercepting the glance he exchanged with the other man, felt even worse.

  ‘What my friend is trying to say is that I paint a little,’ inserted Angelos, taking pity on her. He put out his hand suddenly, startling her by tilting her face into the light. ‘Perhaps I will paint you, thespinis. The face is inexperienced, but the bone structure is good.’

  Sylvie pulled her chin away, helpless at the mercy of two such sophisticated men, and Angelos laughed, and made a gesture of apology, saying something to Andreas in their own language that made the younger man regard her with mocking interrogation.

  ‘Etsi,’ said Angelos at last, indicating that Sylvie should sit down, and offering Andreas some of the wine. ‘What brings you to Piso? Do you have a mind to teach your little sister the delights of diving off the headland?’

  Sylvie’s brows arched, but she sank down thankfully into the chair that was offered as Andreas said: ‘She’s not my little sister, Angelos. And perhaps I will take her out in the bay. But diving—not today, I think. The face mask is enough.’

  Angelos nodded, and then turned to Sylvie again, saying gently: ‘You must be thirsty, thespinis. Some Coke, perhaps? Or some fruit cordial? Even in this remote place, I manage to chill my ice-box, and I can even offer you ice-cream, if that would please you.’

  Sylvie was suddenly angered by the patronising tone of his voice. How old did he think she was, for God’s sake? Surely she didn’t look like a schoolgirl? />
  ‘I am eighteen, you know,’ she declared stiffly. ‘I do drink wine, and alcohol occasionally.’ She pursed her lips. ‘But Coke would be very nice.’

  Angelos grinned. ‘My apologies, thespinis. I thought—well, no matter. Lemonade it shall be. One moment, please.’

  When they were alone, Sylvie looked up at Andreas half accusingly. ‘How old do I look?’ she demanded irritably. ‘Fifteen? Sixteen?’

  ‘With your hair like that—perhaps,’ he commented indifferently, moving to the low wall of the verandah and resting his hips upon it. ‘That’s what makes you so provocative, did you not know? The mind of a child, and the body of a woman.’

  Sylvie was still digesting this when Angelos returned, carrying some glasses and two bottles of Coke. ‘My friend drinks only fruit juice when he goes diving in the bay,’ he said, half mocking, half apologetic, as he handed the second Coke to Andreas. ‘Forgive me if you thought I was being rude earlier. I did not expect Andreas’s little sister to prefer a stronger beverage.’

  ‘I have told you, Angelos, she is not my sister,’ Andreas averred dryly, refusing a glass and drinking from the bottle. ‘And she does not prefer a stronger beverage. She was only fooling.’

  ‘Really?’ Angelos looked sceptical, but Sylvie refused to be baited further, and putting down her glass, she rose from her seat and stepped down on to the beach below the verandah. The sand was warm, even through her sandals, and kicking them off, she padded to the water’s edge.

  The water curling round her toes was deliciously soft, and after only a moment’s hesitation she dropped her skirt and ran into the waves. It wasn’t cold, but it was refreshing, and all the stickiness of the journey, and her embarrassment at their hands, was washed away in the space of a few moments. She hardly had to use her arms at all. The water was so buoyant she floated effortlessly, and it was some minutes later that she remembered where she was, and how impolitely her behaviour could be construed.

  The splash of someone nearby caused her to open her eyes fully, and allowing her legs to sink, she looked about her rather apprehensively. She had not forgotten earlier this morning, and Andreas’s apparent indifference to her modesty, and the sight of his dark head only a few feet away caused her no minor upheaval.

  He was swimming towards her, and she put out her hand warningly, as if to hold him off. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she cried, as he got progressively nearer, and his lips parted in a knowing grin as he interpreted her reactions.

  ‘I thought—if you have recovered from your outrage—that we might do a little snorkelling,’ he remarked, and as her eyes adjusted themselves once more to the clarity of the light, Sylvie realised his body looked black below the level of the water. He was wearing a rubber suit, and she was too relieved to protest when he came up beside her.

  ‘Do—do I have to wear something like that?’ she asked doubtfully, not at all confident of her appearance in something so revealing, but Andreas shook his head.

  ‘This is for scuba-diving,’ he explained patiently, bidding her follow him back to the shore. ‘Come on, I think you will like this. Have you ever tried it before?’

  Sylvie hadn’t, but in no time at all she had mastered the art of breathing through the long tube that was attached to a face mask. It made her eyes smart, the first time she endeavoured to dive underwater, however, and her throat felt sore after prolonged efforts to breathe through her mouth. But gradually she became more confident, swimming some distance out from the shore, the tube safely above water, her masked face only inches below. It was a revelation. There was so much to see. The floor of the ocean was not thickly foliaged as she had seen in films of explorations that had taken place in more southerly waters, but the varieties of fish and the different kinds of rock formation were endless, and her indignation with Andreas gave way to a genuine gratitude for his having given her this experience.

  ‘I really do appreciate it,’ she exclaimed, as she walked up out of the water with him, after he had accompanied her out to the headland and back. She pulled off the mask and wiped the moisture from her face. ‘It was marvellous!’

  Andreas’s smile was deprecating. ‘It was worth the journey?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ Sylvie looked up at him frankly. ‘Thank you.’

  Andreas’s dark eyes flickered over her scantily-clad body, then he turned abruptly away, hoisting the oxygen tanks he had left on the beach earlier for his own particular recreation. ‘Tell Angelos I will be back in thirty minutes,’ he said, pulling up the strap between his legs and securing it firmly, and Sylvie nodded, her lower lip caught between her teeth as he walked back into the water and disappeared from her sight.

  The scraps of her swimsuit would soon dry in the hot sun, and the briefs barely dampened her skirt as she wrapped it about her. Angelos was not on the verandah when she climbed the steps, however, and she went tentatively to the door of the building and called his name.

  He appeared almost at once, from a room at the back of the house, and as Sylvie’s nose reacted to the delicious aroma he brought with him, Angelos gestured that she should come in. She followed him into a stone-flagged kitchen and saw that he was in the process of preparing lunch. A delicious concoction of rice and prawns in a creamy sauce was simmering on the stove, and on the scrubbed wooden table in front of her there was cheese, and fresh bread, and a mouthwatering bunch of grapes.

  ‘Help yourself, if you are hungry,’ Angelos advised, observing her longing look at the food. ‘We do not stand on ceremony here. When we are thirsty we drink, and when we are hungry we eat. Is that not a more civilised philosophy than setting times for meals, hmm?’

  Sylvie smiled. ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘So—where is Andreas?’

  ‘Oh—–’ Sylvie paused in the process of cutting herself a piece of cheese. ‘He’s gone scuba-diving. He said to tell you he would be back in half an hour.’

  ‘Ah,’ Angelos nodded. ‘Good. That gives the pilaff more time to cook. If I had known you were coming, I could have killed a chicken, but as it is, the prawns will have to do.’

  ‘They smell delicious,’ said Sylvie honestly. ‘Do you live here alone, Mr Riva?’

  ‘Angelos,’ he said firmly. ‘Call me Angelos.’ His eyes twinkled. ‘I am not so old that a young lady needs to treat me deferentially.’

  Sylvie acknowledged the teasing reference to her earlier reproval, but somehow, without Andreas’s knowing eyes upon her, she felt more relaxed. ‘So—Angelos,’ she said obediently. ‘Is this your home?’

  ‘It is my home on Piso,’ he agreed, stirring the contents of the saucepan, and Sylvie sighed.

  ‘That isn’t quite an answer, is it?’ she commented. ‘Does that mean you have a home somewhere else?’

  Angelos glanced at her. ‘Perhaps.’

  Sylvie grimaced, and seated herself on the wooden bench, set at one side of the table. ‘I take it you’re really a very successful portrait painter.’

  ‘I have had some luck,’ he conceded, turning to help himself to more wine, raising his glass towards her with a rueful smile. ‘It is to Andreas I owe my good fortune. Without his support—and his faith—I should never have progressed beyond sketching likenesses for the tourists at a few drachs a time.’

  ‘You—you’ve known Andreas a long time?’ Sylvie asked.

  ‘More than twenty years,’ he agreed, sighing reminiscently. ‘I used to work for his father, you understand? When Andreas was still at school. I was the chauffeur, and in my spare time …’

  ‘… you sketched likenesses for the tourists?’

  Angelos nodded. ‘Ehete thikeo. You are right. So many years ago.’

  Sylvie munched thoughtfully on the cheese. Then, choosing her words carefully, she said: ‘So you probably know the girl he—he was going to marry.’

  ‘Eleni?’ Angelos smiled. ‘Yes, I know Eleni. Andreas was very fond of her.’

  ‘So why didn’t he marry her?’

  The question was out before Sylvie co
uld prevent it, but to her relief, Angelos did not seem to find it pre-sumptuous. ‘I do not think Andreas was in love with Eleni, not then,’ he said slowly. ‘He was young. He was not long out of the university. He did not want to be—what would you say?—tied down, ohi?’

  Sylvie bent her head. ‘And Eleni married someone else.’

  ‘Giorgios Frederiks, ne. A man more than twice her age, but with the fortune she so desperately craved.’

  Sylvie looked up at him, but Angelos was already moving away, attending to the pan on the small gas stove. It was obvious he felt he had said enough, maybe too much. Either way, he was indicating that that particular part of their conversation was over.

  By the time Andreas returned, entering the kitchen like some avenging sea-god, water dripping heedlessly all over the flagged floor, Sylvie and Angelos had progressed beyond his work to their individual likes and dislikes in the world of art and literature. The painter looked quite sorry when the other man’s arrival interrupted their discussion, and Andreas commented rather dryly that he obviously hadn’t been missed.

  ‘We have just been sharing our opinions of neo-Impressionism,’ declared Angelos cheerfully, pouring himself more wine. ‘Your little sister is a radical, Andreas, my friend. She actually likes the work of Angelos Meya.’

  Sylvie could not understand Andreas’s suddenly mocking smile, but his next words helped to clarify the situation. ‘And does she know who Angelos Meya is?’ he inquired, pausing in the doorway, on his way to change.

  Sylvie stared at him, then at Angelos, and then back to Andreas again. ‘Angelos Meya!’ she exclaimed. ‘Angelos! You mean—you—–’ She turned back to the other man, and he chuckled.

  ‘I confess I am he,’ he agreed, with a careless shrug of his shoulders. ‘But I hope that will not prevent you from enjoying my prawn pilaff. I assure you, my talents are not limited to the easel.’

  It was late when they left Angelos to walk back to the harbour to catch the evening ferry. Already the crickets were performing their nightly ritual, and the incessant scraping of their legs was like some tuneless concerto for violin.