Again, her hostess seemed to read her thoughts. ‘Being in a wheelchair does not stop me from seeing the world, I can assure you. My cousin and I go away for two months every year, July and August, when the weather becomes too hot here. Damian does the rounds of auction houses and antique shops looking for our Greek heritage, while I go shopping for clothes and jewellery.’ A cloud swept over Helena’s beautiful features. ‘Though this year it’s different – Damian’s busy with the new excavations,’ she sighed sadly, but the dangerous glitter in her grey eyes, belying an outward calm, didn’t escape Oriel.
‘I think travel is one of the most liberating pastimes of all,’ Oriel said brightly, trying to keep the conversation light. ‘That’s one of the attractions of my job, I suppose. I love seeing different cultures.’
‘I envy you your freedom. I have always wondered what it must be like to go wherever one pleases, whenever the mood takes you. If not for this,’ Helena gestured to her wheelchair, ‘I might have had a different life, away from Helios.’ She looked at Oriel with interest. ‘It is impressive that you have achieved so much as a woman when we live in a man’s world.’
Oriel smiled. ‘It hasn’t been easy but I’ve always been addicted to challenges.’ She began to relax a little. The antagonism Damian’s cousin had shown her on their first meeting now seemed to be replaced by an unexpected cordiality. ‘If women don’t push themselves in a man’s profession, how will progress ever be made?’
‘Yes, but it’s different here,’ Helena said thoughtfully. ‘Still, let us drink to progress. As Heraclitus said: “There is nothing permanent except change.”’ Yet it seemed to Oriel there was a melancholy tinge to her expression as she said it.
Both women raised their glasses once more and clinked them together.
With the onset of evening, a glory of colour came out in the light of the setting sun. The earth and sky were suffused with a delicate pink tinge – the closer to the earth, the deeper the pink. And then the boundless cloth of gold was tarnished suddenly with darkness. The night was soft and cool. The moon came up and from where Oriel sat she could see that it had carved a brilliant pathway of light across the sea to the edge of the world.
The waiter, Beshir, a silent shadow despite his great stature, came over and lit the candles, which stood on the dining table in their pink-coloured glass globes, thinly etched with gold. Genuine treasures from the Ottoman Empire days, no doubt, Oriel thought.
Dinner was delicious with avgolemono soup, a concoction of egg and lemon mixed into a chicken broth, which Oriel had never tasted before, and stifado, a stew of wild rabbit and bay leaves that was richly flavoured. It was a much less elaborate menu than the one Damian had given her the night before but just as enjoyable – if not more so – because its simplicity put her at ease.
They talked about Greece and their travels, and Oriel had the distinct impression that her hostess lived for those times when she could escape the confines of this ‘beautiful prison’, as she called Heliades. By the time Beshir brought in a plate of baklava and the coffee, Oriel was beginning to take a genuine pleasure in the evening.
‘Will you have some Turkish coffee or would you prefer instant?’
‘I would love Turkish coffee, please.’
‘How do you take it?’
‘Métrios, medium, thank you.’
There was a lull in the conversation while they ate the sweet pastries with their coffee, enjoying the peaceful night as the moon hung high above them.
Then Helena put down her coffee cup. ‘So, how do you find my cousin, Despinis Anderson?’
Oriel glanced at her in mild surprise, not expecting the question. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Damian usually has an effect on people, whether it’s good or ill.’ Helena stared at her expectantly.
Oriel turned her attention to her coffee, her finger tracing the ornate silver handle of the cup. What could she say? There was no way to describe her feelings about Damian. She could hardly voice the thought of how his broad shoulders, tanned muscular chest, long, firm thighs and arms with their strength of steel made her lose control of her own body. Or that his eyes had a way of glittering enigmatically when he looked at her. Yet none of that explained the power he had over her; the sense that only he could unlock a part of her she had never known existed, if only she could trust him. Her mind went back to the picture of the singer she’d seen in the magazine in her room. The thought of him with another woman made her stomach twist painfully again.
‘He’s a very charismatic man, that’s true.’ She glanced at Helena, hesitating. ‘I didn’t realize that he may soon be engaged to Helios’s most famous inhabitant,’ she added, deftly redirecting the conversation.
But Oriel’s tactic to deflect worked too well. Helena’s eyes became flints of steel. ‘Yolanda is a nobody! In spite of her vulgar fame, she has not been distinguished by noble birth. Damian cannot marry such a woman.’ Her response was coldly dismissive, but a spark of something volatile lurked in her expression.
‘I suppose arranged marriages have been the tradition with your ancestors,’ Oriel replied carefully.
‘Exactly, my dear.’ Despite the cool breeze, which made the leaves on the lemon trees waft gently behind them, Helena dabbed at her upper lip with a napkin as if she were feeling hot. She clearly viewed marriage as a union of rank and breeding as far as her family’s dynasty was concerned. If Damian was expected to marry into a high-class Greek family, Oriel thought ruefully, that was yet another reason why the two of them could never be together.
Helena breathed deeply and placed her napkin down. ‘Damian may be the head of this island, but the poor man doesn’t see what’s good for him half the time. That’s why he needs me to protect him from his own mistakes. No one understands what it is to be a Lekkas. Damian must keep his focus.’ She had been speaking almost as though to herself but when she looked at Oriel her gaze suddenly became penetrating. ‘When he’s not distracted by his own weakness, he does great things for Helios.’
Oriel blinked. Was this a veiled threat aimed at her?
Her hostess smiled pleasantly once more. ‘So you are starting the important excavations tomorrow?’
Oriel’s feeling of wariness had begun to creep back. ‘Yes, I’m really looking forward to it.’
‘My cousin is obsessed with these antiquities. He studied archaeology at the University of Athens, and then worked for the same institution for three years. It took him five years to get an excavating permit from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. There are very strict laws that control the sea around these islands and inspectors come to Helios every now and then to make sure that we are observing them.’
‘I didn’t realize until I came here that Kyrios Lekkas was himself an archaeologist.’
‘A passionate one. He dives almost every day during the hot months, and once or twice a week in winter. He’s never so happy than when he is grubbing around in the mud, looking for broken jugs.’ Helena’s proud demeanour instantly gave way to an oddly theatrical look of distain. ‘But I don’t understand all this interest in the dead. I find it much more exciting to concentrate on the living.’
Oriel looked down at her coffee. She couldn’t have disagreed more. ‘I can understand him. I find it thrilling to walk where ancient feet have trod.’
‘This time it’s that shipwreck Damian discovered a few months ago,’ Helena went on, not listening to Oriel. ‘It’s Roman, apparently. He brought up a beautiful bowl the last time he was down there, quite intact. Of course, he had to hand it in to the museum. What a waste! He doesn’t seem to mind the risk of being eaten alive in those deep waters when there are such treasures for the taking.’
Oriel decided it might be best to humour her. ‘Do you really think there are sharks around here? Have there been any incidents?’
Helena burst out laughing, an hysterical sort of laugh. ‘I see you took on board my unfortunate remark yesterday evening. Oh, you mustn’t worry too much about that.’
She shrugged. ‘I only said it to wind up my cousin. Damian has a thing about sharks.’ She laughed again and the high-pitched sound of it rippled through the silent night, causing a shiver to run up Oriel’s spine. For a brief, shocking moment, as if glancing into a private room, she glimpsed a raw blaze of cruelty in those magnificent grey eyes and in the twist of those sculpted red lips.
The Greek woman’s gaze glittered as it searched Oriel’s face speculatively. ‘This is a harsh island, Despinis Anderson, and if you are going to live among its people you must be prepared to face the primitive occurrences that knock us down from time to time.’
Shallow hollows lay about Helena’s cheekbones. Her features now held a strangely placid expression so that, in the moonlight, her face became like a mask of blackened and tarnished copper. Something had shifted in her expression as she stared vacantly ahead. It was as if her poise was beginning to slip, like wax melting from a candle.
‘Helios makes everyone suffer its primitive urges,’ she went on, ‘generation after generation. The island rules us all. But it is home … my home. Pericles has always understood that. He would never let me live anywhere else but here. Not any more, not now he is the ruler of Helios. He brought me home again, where I belong.’
‘Pericles?’ Oriel looked confused at these ramblings. She was talking as though Pericles were still alive. ‘You mean Damian?’
Helena turned to Oriel. ‘Mmm? Pericles, yes. He was such a beautiful man, so strong. He could have been an athlete, you know.’ Her eyes sparkled almost girlishly and her voice became lighter, like a teenager struck by her first crush. ‘He used to visit me and take me out. He was so kind to me. And no one understood him the way I did. All the things they said he did … not true, not true. Pericles was a slave to his passions, that is all.’ She turned away, her eyes gazing at nothing as she muttered: ‘It was the women … they threw themselves at him in a disgusting way. He was a pure spirit, too good for this world.’
Oriel was intrigued. Helena seemed lost in her own world, and it was clear her capricious moods were completely unpredictable. Still, not once had Damian talked to her about his brother, so perhaps this was her chance to piece together more of the mystery of this claustrophobic family, she thought. She knew she had to tread carefully with Helena Lekkas but her curiosity was now aroused.
‘Were you close to him?’ she asked softly.
‘Close?’ Helena looked dreamily at Oriel. ‘Oh yes. We were in love … We were always meant to be together, even as children. Bound by the tragedy that struck us all.’ Her face fell. ‘The curse of our family took my father, then my dear Pericles.’
Oriel reached for her coffee cup slowly, watching her hostess. ‘Curse?’
Helena looked surprised and leaned forward, her expression becoming almost comically earnest. ‘The curse, my dear, yes. Can you not see it? It’s there in my cousin’s scarred face. The Lekkas family is doomed to a life of tragedy. Every one of us. Ah, Beshir, my saviour,’ she said, smiling beatifically once more.
The manservant had come back to clear the table and on a silver tray was bearing a bowl of the fat chocolate-covered dates that Damian had offered Oriel the night before. Beshir glanced at Helena. Scanning her expression with his midnight eyes, he frowned. Had he picked up on her change of mood from that single look? Oriel found her eyes meeting those of the waiter and she sensed that behind his impassive features lay the brain of a powerful and intelligent man. She couldn’t help thinking of Ajax, from Homer’s Iliad, who, loyal to a fault, would lay down his life for his mistress. Beshir held the tray to his chest and bowed, melting back into the shadows.
She wanted to know more about this so-called curse though dared not ask Helena how Pericles had been murdered. Had it happened before Damian’s wife, Cassandra, had died? Had she also fallen prey to this ‘curse’ too? But she was distracted just then by Helena’s voice. ‘You’ll have a chocolate date,’ her hostess pressed as Oriel set down her cup. ‘Pericles used to love these. Have you tried one? With your fine frame you don’t need to avoid sweet things, or do highly strung nerves keep you slim?’
Oriel was a little taken aback by what seemed a double-edged compliment. ‘I’d love one, but it was a delicious dinner and I’m afraid I over-indulged myself. In England, I’m not used to eating a meal at night. I usually have just a slice of fruit or some yoghurt.’
Helena smiled condescendingly. ‘You need all your strength to face up to the challenges that will come at you on Helios. A few kilos more will do you no harm at all …’ She tipped her head to one side again in that strange way, and regarded Oriel with a pout of exaggerated concern. ‘You have a worrying fragility that I don’t think will withstand the taxing work that awaits you.’
Oriel glanced at Helena but decided to ignore the gibe. ‘I’m sure I’ll manage somehow,’ she answered, her tone as friendly as she could muster. She didn’t feel like lingering any longer around Damian’s cousin, but she was itching to probe a little further about the dead wife and there was no easy way to introduce the subject. She hesitated, then said: ‘Damian – Kyrios Lekkas, I mean – he seems to enjoy challenging work. There’s a great deal for him to supervise, the family business as well as the excavations. Your family seems to have suffered a great deal. I expect he finds solace in keeping busy, particularly since he lost his wife. Cassandra, wasn’t it?’
Helena flinched as if she’d been struck. ‘Agamemnon’s concubine!’ she hissed and something feverish shifted in her gaze. ‘The Lekkas dynasty is the lifeblood of Helios. That blood cannot be tainted by the offspring of whores and harlots!’ Helena’s knuckles were white as they gripped the handles of her wheelchair; her breathing picked up, a red flush staining her cheeks. ‘She tried to take him away from me!’ Helena became more and more agitated, her chest heaving as she gulped for air. Fumbling at the top of the wheels of her chair, she pushed herself away from the table.
‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you, Kyria. It’s getting late and I should go,’ said Oriel, horrified at this excessive reaction.
‘Oh yes, I agree.’ Helena’s pale eyes bored into her. ‘You should indeed go. A woman needs her beauty sleep, especially when surrounded by so many healthy and virile-looking men, but I don’t need to tell you that. You know it already, don’t you?’ She sneered vituperatively, her words tumbling out in a gravelly wheeze.
Oriel’s instinctive, angry reaction gave way almost immediately to pity – pity and fear. The beautiful Greek goddess might have been the perfect hostess earlier that night, but it was plain to see that Damian’s cousin was a troubled soul, endowed with unstable passions.
As she stood up hastily from the table, Beshir appeared as if from nowhere, gliding on to the terrace like a towering, dark apparition.
‘Beshir, my medication. Take me inside!’ Helena hand was clenched against her chest, her eyes still narrowed on Oriel.
Taking her leave with an awkward smile and eager to return to her room, Oriel hurried away from the terrace as if the devil himself were at her heels.
‘Goodnight, Despinis Anderson. Sweet dreams,’ Oriel heard her hostess rasp behind her, followed by an unsettling, high-pitched laugh.
With a little shiver, Oriel crossed the narrow corridor that separated Helena’s apartment from hers, the heels of her shoes tapping intrusively on the black-and-white Greek tiling. Shadows gathered beneath the high stone arches leading to the moonlit garden; the lacy foliage of the flame tree, trembling in the soft breeze, seemed to be whispering to her to run from the island.
Once in her bedroom, she flooded it with light and stood a moment against the closed door, her heart in turmoil. She glanced at the canary, twittering briefly at her arrival before settling quietly on its perch, and took a deep breath. Not for the first time since her arrival it seemed that she’d been on the island for ages – England seemed so far away.
She undressed and prepared for bed, but found she was still wide awake. Her thoughts drifted to the Frenchwoman
who had left the team so suddenly. There were two women, weren’t there? Hadn’t there been a Dutch girl in a previous year, as well as Chantal Hervé? She should have pressed Stavros about the other student, too. Oriel couldn’t help but wonder what was behind their hasty departures. Maybe they had left for family reasons, something as simple as that, but wasn’t it a strange coincidence that only women had left the team? Was it anything to do with Damian? He was still extremely handsome, despite his scarred face. His rough sort of arrogance and his flirtatious manner were just the sort of traits that a woman could fall for, if she wasn’t careful – Oriel knew that only too well. Had he made a pass at them? Maybe they had fallen for him, or for one of the crew, or another islander, and had been hurt? Perhaps … although two women on the team succumbing to unbearable heartache in a relatively short space of time seemed unlikely.
Oriel sighed. She knew she wouldn’t sleep if she went to bed now. She shouldn’t have had that Turkish coffee, she thought – caffeine didn’t suit her, she was so jumpy. Yes, it must be the caffeine; normally it took quite a lot to unnerve her. Anyhow, better to unwind and relax before trying, and failing, to get to sleep – otherwise she would be tired for her dive the next day.
She went out on to the terrace and paused at the balustrade, looking up at Typhoeus. The vast, conical peak of the volcano stood darkly against the firmament, the myriad points of the distant stars like a vast infinite curtain, pulling Oriel’s own small world close on this perfect night. Her wrestling emotions, almost too much to contain, were caught and held by this vivid theatre of nature; the grandiose, spectacular sight seemed to reflect back to Oriel her own limited experience of love and romance. The air was heavy with the scent of iodine, algae and stone pines. The wildness of Helios – in the cliffs, the sea, the threatening slumber of the island’s volcano – was at odds with the sophisticated, modern comforts of Heliades, she thought: a volatile contrast that reflected the character of the people who lived in this house.
Aphrodite's Tears Page 14
