by Janet Tanner
Today, however, apart from the wildfowl and a few fishermen, the lakes looked deserted and the water, dark and mysterious, kept its secrets.
‘Looks like we’re back to the English weather!’ the man sitting next to Maggie grumbled.
He was still wearing a singlet more suited to the sunshine of Corfu than this damp grey day. When he had moved in beside her Maggie had been unable to avoid noticing that his arms were scorched red from too much unwise sunbathing and the skin across his shoulders and back was peeling away in big flaky bubbles.
He was a holidaymaker, of course – herself excluded, holiday-makers made up the entire passenger list of the plane, she guessed, and she knew she had been lucky to get a seat at such short notice.
Lucky – and crazy, as Ari had maintained.
‘You can’t go to England just like that!’ he had said when he had finally come home the previous night to find her packing. ‘It’s madness!’
‘I have to go,’ she had said, trying to make him understand. ‘I’m really worried about Ros. And it’s not as if I have anything to stop me. No one will even notice I’ve gone.’
‘My mother will notice,’ he said, deliberately misunderstanding her. ‘It’s the big family get together next week and you know how she likes everyone to be there. Besides, aren’t you supposed to be helping her to wash the carpet?’
Washing the great carpet squares that covered the living room floors in Corfiote houses was an important annual event. In a country where carpet shampooers were all but unheard of, the carpets had to be scrubbed and then spread out in the sun to dry, a job which needed at least two women to manage it.
The suggestion that Maggie should postpone her trip until the carpet wash had been done grated on her already frayed nerves.
‘I should have thought finding my sister was just a little bit more important than washing the carpet!’ she had retorted scathingly. ‘It can be done any time between now and September and if I’m not here your sister will just have to chip in and help.’
Ari’s mouth had tightened.
‘You are being childish now, getting at my sister. She has her hands full with three small children. Anyway, I’m not very happy about this – you just deciding to pack up and go without consulting me.’
‘If you’d been here I would have consulted you. But you weren’t here. You never are. Where have you been until this time?’
‘You know where I have been – working hard to put food on the table and clothes on your back.’
That had been the point when Maggie’s temper had finally snapped, and now, looking out of the aircraft at the green sweep of countryside beneath her, she saw only Ari’s arrogantly handsome face scowling at her with displeasure and heard only her own angry voice above the buzzing that always affected her ears when flying, or, more specifically, coming in to land.
‘You haven’t been working until this time of night, surely? What do you take me for, Ari – a fool?’
He had stared at her, his black eyes narrowing.
‘What do you mean by that?’
‘Just what I say. I don’t believe you have been at your office all this time. You’ve been with her, haven’t you? Melina Skripero. Your secretary or whatever it is she’s supposed to be.’
For a moment she had thought Ari was going to strike her. An expression of fury contorted his features, an expression so thunderous that a cold hand of fear clutched at her stomach. But Ari was not a violent man. For all his hot Mediterranean temper he had never laid a finger on her and he did not do so now. After a moment his angry expression hardened into something very like guilty defiance.
‘So? What if I have been?’
It was Maggie’s turn to be shocked.
‘Aren’t you even going to deny it?’
‘What’s the point?’ He shrugged and turned away. ‘Obviously you have been spying on me.’
‘No, I haven’t! I just put two and two together. I’m not stupid. I’ve seen the way she looks at me when I come to your office, smirking like the cat that got the cream. I’ve seen the way she looks at you. And I’ve smelled her perfume on your clothes. You can’t hide something like that. It clings, Ari.’
‘You’ve never said anything before!’
‘I didn’t want to believe it. I didn’t, really! I thought if I kept quiet it might all blow over …’ She broke off, tears threatening suddenly. Oh yes, she’d known about Melina for weeks now, for all the reasons she’d enumerated and a dozen others besides, all the tiny pieces of evidence a wife gathers almost subconsciously until they come together to make a whole picture. But it was still a shock to hear him confirm it – and so nonchalantly too, as if he was admitting to having left a ring of scum around the bath instead of telling her that yes, it was true, he had another woman.
‘How could you?’ she asked miserably. ‘How could you do it, Ari? What’s happened to us?’
He shrugged. ‘ Nothing has happened to us. You’re still my wife, aren’t you? I’m here, aren’t I?’
‘Yes – but not because of me. You’re here because this is your home – your family home. That’s what matters to you – what they think – the family.’
She heard the bitterness in her voice and hated herself for it. She hadn’t meant to drag his family into this, though sometimes she felt she hated them, hated the claustrophobic sway they held, whilst at the same time being oddly hurt because she felt excluded. It was like being gripped by the tentacles of an octopus, she thought, yet in her case it was a very cold fish indeed. She was tied down by tradition, prevented from taking a job, expected to conform and accord respect in every way, yet looked upon a little askance, the English girl with no dowry who had captured a heart she had no right to.
In better times she had tried to talk to Ari about the way she felt, but it was one area in which she had never been able to break through to him, never been able to explain how she felt. Where his family were concerned Ari was fiercely defensive – he could not, or would not, understand. Now he homed in on her implied criticism, turning the line of attack deftly back towards her.
‘Why do you always have to bring my family into it?’
‘Because they are the ones you really care about, not me. If your mother wants something you’re there like a shot. She rules you as if you were still a little boy.’
‘That’s enough!’ Ari said furiously. ‘ The trouble is you just don’t understand the Corfiote way of life. I’m beginning to think you never will.’
‘And that is why you are having an affair with Melina Skripero, I suppose.’
‘Who said I am having an affair with her? We go for a drink and something to eat when we have finished work at the office. I like her, yes. I like her company. Is it so surprising? At least she understands. She does not go on forever about my mother, my sister, my father. She understands respect. Perhaps if you were to try a little harder then I might find it more pleasant to come home at the end of the day.’
‘That’s not fair, Ari!’ she protested. ‘I have tried, very hard indeed. Can’t you understand how different all this is to what I’m used to?’
‘I understand the family is of no importance in England. This is why you have problems with lager louts and football hooligans – they have no family pride to uphold. Then mothers and fathers feel no shame when they behave badly. And why? Because they do not care for their children either. They go to work, leave them to come home from school to an empty house, allow them to run wild. Here there is always a member of the family to keep an eye on them, comfort them if they fall down and hurt themselves, box their ears if they are bad. The family unit …’
‘Do you know how pompous you sound?’ she demanded. ‘And how hypocritical too? You go on and on about the family, yet all this started because you object to me going home to find out what has happened to my sister. When you say ‘‘the family is important” what you really mean is your family. Mine can go to hell!’
She saw the uncertainty for a moment in
his face and rushed on: ‘What’s more, it’s hypocritical to go off and have an affair with your secretary behind your wife’s back!’
Ari rolled his eyes. ‘I told you, I am not having an affair. It’s not like that. Don’t you believe me?’
‘No!’ she said. ‘ No, I don’t!’
He spread his hands in a little gesture that was typically Mediterranean. ‘ Then you understand me even less than I thought. Maggie … listen to me. I like women, yes. I like Melina. But you are my wife. One day we will be the ones to carry on the traditions. We will be the family to our children and our children’s children.’
The change in his tone, the sudden realisation that yes, she did believe him, and most of all, the reference to the children he was still hoping she would give him in spite of all the disappointments and the slowly growing despair, made Maggie suddenly weak. Tears sprang to her eyes and she turned away.
‘It upsets you?’ he said more gently. ‘You hate the idea of the family so much?’
She shook her head. ‘No, of course not. Ari … are you honestly not having an affair with Melina?’
‘I told you. How many times must I say it?’
‘I don’t know … I really thought …’
He came up behind her, putting his arms around her. She thought she caught a whiff of that perfume she had come to associate with Melina, strong and sexy, smelling of musk, and tried to ignore it.
She loved Ari. She wanted to believe him. She had to believe him. Particularly if she was going away.
‘Come to bed,’ Ari said in her ear, and her stomach twisted. It was always like this, in spite of all the frustration and despair, in spite of the rows that flared and died as suddenly as a summer storm; in the end he still had this animal magnetism for her. She would cross the world for him – she had! – and she would do so again. Her legs felt weak, her body, sensitised by all the emotional upheaval, responded urgently, almost treacherously quickly, to his touch.
She turned to him, feeling the cool cotton of his shirt against her bare skin as he eased the silk wrap from her shoulders, letting him part her lips with his mouth, arching her body so that her hips and thighs moulded to his. For a little while, as she let him guide her into the bedroom, peeling off her swimsuit and easing her back on to the big old bed, the anxieties and despair of the last hours became unimportant. She gave herself up to his lovemaking with a fervour heightened by the recent trauma of their differences. But afterwards, when it was over, the first thing she saw was her suitcase, half packed, on the old fashioned carved wood chest at the foot of the bed, and her dresses hanging on the outside of the wardrobe waiting to be folded, and reality began to creep in once more.
‘Ari – I do still want to go to England,’ she said, half afraid.
She felt him stiffen slightly but he only said: ‘Yes, yes, I suppose it’s a long time since you went home.’
‘It’s not just that. I wouldn’t go off at such short notice if it was just a holiday. You know that. I have to find out what has happened to Ros – make sure she is all right.’
‘Surely it is up to your English police force to do that?’
‘But I’m her sister. We can almost get inside one another’s minds. Please try to understand, Ari.’
He did not answer and she went on: ‘And when I come back, let’s try to make a fresh start. Remember how wonderful it used to be? It could be like that again, I know it could, if we both really tried.’
They had fallen asleep in one another’s arms and Maggie had woken in the night from a good dream to nestle against him again, her body warmed through with twin senses of relief and purpose.
But in the morning he had already risen when she came drifting out of the layers of sweet refreshing sleep, and when she joined him on the patio where he was eating his usual breakfast of muesli, fruit and thick creamy yoghurt, she knew immediately that he had gone away from her again.
‘There’s nothing I can say, I suppose, to stop you going to England?’ he’ said, stirring sugar into his thick, aromatic black coffee.
You could say you love me and want me here, she thought. You could promise me that you won’t stay out late with Melina again and tell me that however it might look I am more important to you than your mother and the rest of the family. But she knew it would only sound childish.
Aloud she said: ‘I have to go. I thought I’d explained.’
‘Yes. Well, if that’s your decision I suppose I must abide by it.’ His voice was cold; the closeness of the previous night’s lovemaking might never have been. ‘How long will you be gone?’
‘I don’t know … it depends. However long it takes to find Ros, I suppose.’
‘Don’t hurry back on my account. I’m going to be very busy the next few weeks. I have a big job on – a new hotel complex down in Kavos. If you’re not going to be here I might decide to stay in the apartment in Kerkira. That would save me quite a bit of travelling time.’
And be very convenient for Melina, too, she had thought involuntarily, but she had not said anything. She did not want to raise the subject again now, just as she was leaving, did not want him to realise that she still did not know whether to believe him when he protested that theirs was nothing more than a friendship between employer and secretary. But it had been there in her mind as she kissed him goodbye and it was still there now, worrying at her as the plane approached Bristol Airport.
Even if it wasn’t a full-blown affair yet she’d given them every opportunity to make it one by flying home to England and leaving Ari alone. If she had stayed in Corfu now that he knew she was suspicious he might have had second thoughts about what – if anything – he was doing, if he cared for her and their marriage at all, that was. With her out of the way it would be easy, so easy, for him to turn to beautiful Melina with her dark eyes and olive skin, clever Melina, who spoke perfect English and had more than a smattering of German as well, suitable Melina, whose father would no doubt present her future husband with a prika of a grove of olive trees, and who understood Ari perfectly because she was native-born Corfiote.
The plane descended a few hundred feet rather swiftly and Maggie’s stomach went with it.
I had to come, she thought. I had to make my stand and I had to make sure Ros is all right. And if I can’t trust my husband for a couple of weeks, then what point is there in any of it?
Wheels touched tarmac, the engines went into reverse and the jet slowed on the runway.
I am home, Maggie thought, and it never even occurred to her that the sentiment had betrayed her deepest feelings, nor that, after living there for almost three years, it was Corfu she should think of as home.
Mike Thompson stood in the waiting area beyond the customs hall. Maggie had telephoned him this morning asking if he could meet her at the airport, and naturally he had agreed.
‘My plane is due in at eighteen-thirty your time,’ she had said. ‘I know it’s an imposition to ask you to meet me and if you can’t I’ll quite understand. But I thought I could stay at Ros’s cottage and I imagine you have a key.’
‘Yes, of course,’ he had said. ‘ But look – I didn’t mean to worry you to this extent. I wouldn’t like you to think I was implying you should come.’
‘I want to,’ she had said. ‘You still haven’t any news of her, I imagine?’
‘No, nothing.’ As usual the line had begun breaking up. ‘I’ll be at the airport,’ he said hastily.
‘Are you sure it’s not inconvenient?’
‘Not a bit. I’ll see you.’
And so here he was, watching the passengers from the Corfu plane emerge. Most were obviously holidaymakers, sunburned, dressed in leisure suits and anoraks, pushing trolleys laden with suitcases and plastic carrier bags of duty-frees, and Maggie did not appear to be among them. Would he recognize her? he wondered – and felt sure he would. He’d met her only once but he remembered her very clearly indeed – a younger, softer version of Ros.
The flow thinned to a trickl
e and Mike began to wonder if perhaps she had changed her mind and decided not to come after all. Or perhaps she had got to Kerkira airport only to discover there were no spare seats on the plane. But wouldn’t she have telephoned again to tell him so? He turned around, looking at the cars drawing up and pulling away outside the airport building, and when he turned back there she was, emerging from the customs corridor, a tall girl with shoulder-length brown hair, wearing navy-blue chinos and an expensive-looking T-shirt, logoed with a designer emblem, beneath an unstructured white linen jacket.
She saw him at precisely the same moment and smiled, a sweet, somewhat apologetic smile that lifted the corners of her wide mouth, as she hurried towards him.
‘Mike! I’m sorry I’ve been so long getting through. My case was the very last on the carousel and then the customs officers decided they wanted to check me out. I don’t look like a returning holidaymaker, I suppose – but I didn’t think I looked like a drug-smuggler either!’
‘You don’t.’ He returned her smile. He was thinking that the customs officers, bored with the endless routine, had probably fancied ten minutes with a very attractive woman. ‘I must say I was beginning to wonder what had happened to you, though. I’d almost given you up.’
‘Thank goodness you didn’t. Look – it really is very good of you to meet me. Are you sure I haven’t put you to any trouble?’
‘Quite sure. I’m the one who’s put you to trouble. I was going to say I hope I haven’t dragged you over for no reason, but of course I don’t mean that at all. I sincerely hope it is going to turn out to be a fool’s errand.’
‘You really think something may have happened to Ros?’
‘I hope to God not. But I am worried, yes. Look, I’ll go and get the car. We can’t talk here.’
