The Girl Under the Olive Tree

by Leah Fleming

  But for every good one among them there was the other sort, the pestering drunk, the foul-mouthed abuser, the greedy glutton and the arrogant, pushing Cretans out of the way and into the traffic in their rush to find amusement in the town.

  The nurses dealt with girls from the brothels, beaten and degraded, with injuries Yolande could never explain to her parents.

  They thought they were sheltering her honour but she, in turn, was protecting them from knowledge of the real price paid for occupation. Their world was changing beyond recognition, leaving them confused and clinging on to old ways. She knew this in her heart but it didn’t make her own life any easier.

  Andreas’ private clinic helped supplement their meagre medical supplies, while his treating officers brought scraps of information, useful in finding out who was deployed and where. Extracting these facts was not without risk, however.

  Andreas had known nothing about the big raid near Vrisses, but there were brave girls risking death in the German HQ offices, passing down crucial details of the arrests and who had been executed, risking exposure even when they knew a traitor agent was in their midst posing as an interpreter. This Agent K was moved for his own safety to a villa close to Venizelou Street but the address was known now to the Resistance and his days were numbered.

  One night Andreas met Yolanda at their secret rendezvous, flushed and out of breath. ‘I’m being followed. I had to give someone the slip. I think some young hostage talked in the prison under torture. Now his mother is mad with grief, deranged and calling through the streets to anyone who’ll hear that her son was innocent and it should be others who should be shot, men who should know better. She’s been pointing out our clinic. I daren’t put any of my staff at risk. I’ll leave.

  ‘There are others to take my place. I’ll carry on my work up there, sta vouna,’ he said, pointing towards the shadowy mountain range. ‘You must come with me too. There’s no future for us here. If they capture me, they’ll take you and your parents, any excuse to harry Jews. There have been new intelligence officers flown in to toughen things up. I heard one of my patients complaining only the other day. Your community has been lucky so far but on the mainland it’s another story.’

  ‘I can’t leave them if they are in danger,’ Yolanda wept.

  ‘If you stay you will compromise them. Everyone in the clinic knows about us, tongues wag and there are paid spies, gaolbirds without an ounce of loyalty who wouldn’t care who they denounce if it brings booze, cigarettes and whores. There’s no time to delay. I hope to God it will all be over soon, but until then we have to survive. But I won’t go if you don’t . . .’

  ‘Please, go. I’ll follow when I can, but how will I do it?’

  ‘No, we’ll go together. Carry on as normal, as I will, but one afternoon when I give the signal we’ll just walk out. There are secret routes out of town avoiding checkpoints. We’ll look as if we’re going for a lovers’ stroll, no walking boots or luggage,’ he said, smiling down at their feet. ‘As if we have a half-decent pair of leather shoes between us. You wear your uniform. Leave a letter and bring only your purse and papers.’

  Yolanda sat down, winded by such a plan. ‘How can I desert my parents? You have family up there,’ she sighed, waving her hand up to hills. ‘What’ll become of me as a Jew among Christians?’

  ‘You will be Kyria Androulaki, no one need know anything other. It doesn’t matter as long as you’re safe.’ He kissed her and they clung to each other as if the whole world were coming to an end. It felt like it was. ‘Be brave, my lion-heart, but we have to go soon.’

  Yolanda lay awake all that night, Andreas’ warnings echoing around her head. If she stayed and she was denounced by some traitor in the Resistance, they would arrest all her family. If she left with Andreas, and the soldiers came for her, her parents would know only that she’d eloped with a Christian and disgraced her family. She would be dead to the community, her name never to be uttered again. It would be a scandal and the talk of the streets in hours, but her parents would be blameless and pitied. Would this ruse work?

  The clinic would continue. There were other, older doctors who would step in. She and Andreas could continue their work together, man and wife. She loved him so much that the thought of living without him, spending the rest of her life sitting with the women upstairs in the synagogue trying to pray, was unbearable. If he stayed because of her and was arrested, she would be overwhelmed by guilt.

  Somewhere up there in the White Mountains she knew Penny was working and hiding out. There was the chance they might meet up again and work together with the Resistance groups. She’d not be alone with her two dearest friends.

  She felt her decision was made, and as dawn broke, the cock crowed and the first dogs were barking, her mind was set. She found an old notebook, tore off a page and began to write.

  When would this wretched winter ever end, Penny sighed. Nothing would grow until the snows receded. They had been cut off for a week, their food and fuel almost exhausted and there was talk of cutting down the precious olive grove.

  How could she be getting sentimental about a tree? But the need to lop down Uncle Clarence was getting ever closer. Pruning was one thing, but a wholesale hatchet job was unthinkable. Olive trees were the lifeblood of the island, but people had to eat and live. The decision was not hers to make, but Clarence had been the scene of a wonderful and unexpected reunion when Panayotis and his men made a detour for the Easter celebrations before making one final round-up of stragglers hiding out with families.

  It was always a shock and relief when they turned up, as if out of the mists, strolling down the mountainside, guns across their shoulders like yokes in Cretan style, peeling off right and left into village houses for the night.

  She knew not to ask any details of their escape route or who took them off the island and where. One day, she imagined, they would all sit down over glasses of wine and all questions would be answered. It was enough to see Bruce looking so lean and craggy in his mountain breeches and black shirt, sporting a moustache, with the traditional black-lace bandana wound around his head. How could she ever tire of those craggy features?

  They met as usual under Clarence’s watchful eye, close to the ancient burial chamber that had sheltered passing soldiers on the run. Now it was proving a useful storage space for the last of their oil and grain, out of reach of looters.

  Bruce was concerned about infighting between different factions of the andartes groups. ‘Politics is rearing its ugly head,’ he moaned. ‘The communists won’t sit down with the royalists. You’d think we’d enough to do keeping the enemy from overrunning the whole terrain, but no, every gathering is like the clash of the Titans. It’s driving us demented and my bosses in Cairo are getting impatient.’

  It was the first Penny had heard of such divisions. She only saw resisters with aches and pains and wounds, who were as docile as lambs in the hands of a strange woman. She assumed everyone was up in arms for the same reason: to rid their land of the enemy. Why was she surprised that human beings fought for their own ideals first?

  ‘It’s making our job harder and harder. You need the wisdom of Solomon and the patience of Job to deal with that lot. I’m glad I’ll be out of it.’

  Penny had not seen Bruce so dejected before. He looked tired, thin and in need of a break, so they walked through the mountain slopes into fields where, to her delight, she saw the first hints of green shoots. Soon the field would be a riot of poppies, chamomile, daises, vetch; a rainbow of colours in a field full of bees and with the promise of honey to come.

  Easter week progressed as it had for centuries: the ritual household cleaning, fasting days, everyone in black mourning, the procession of the body of Christ, carried on a bier surrounded by flowers, round the village streets. The total darkness of the church on Easter Eve before the lighting of the Resurrection candle and the small candles, lit to the shout of ‘Christos Anesti’ . . . Christ is risen, risen indeed.

 
; To a flood of flickering lights came the torching of the Judas bonfire and the sharing out of the blood eggs, boiled in dye, just a few for the children’s treat as many of their hens had been butchered for the feast. No one went hungry, with the slaughter of a sheep and a basket of Easter biscuits, though it was a meagre feast.

  Penny was just pleased that Panayotis, as she had learned to call Bruce, was here sharing it with her.

  Katrina missed nothing. ‘He is your man, I can see, and you are his woman. You should marry,’ she laughed. ‘Life is short, the priest can do it now that Lent is passed.’

  Penny smiled and shook her head. ‘All in good time.’

  ‘No, take your chance when it comes to you or it will disappear. You walk to it. It won’t walk to you.’

  How she wished Bruce was around to hear Katrina’s advice, but he had left the day after Easter, parting from her with only a kiss on her cheek. ‘I’ll be back. I know where you are, and Clarence will keep you safe.’

  She’d smiled, trying not to cry. So even hardened Resistance organizers could be sentimental. Suddenly her spirits plummeted. Once these men were gone south, her role as nurse and guide would be over. She was surplus, another mouth to feed. All she could do was tend the fields, help in the house. She had no money, dependent on the charity of these kind people, and utterly alone.

  It was with a sad heart she returned to her hideaway from seeing Bruce off, only to hear Katrina’s news. ‘We’re going to a wedding. There’ll be a feast and dancing . . .’

  ‘Whose wedding is this?’ Penny asked, since there were no telltale signs in the village of such a big event. No one had money for anything lavish.

  ‘It’s a family near Vrisses, in the hills. Ike has done business with them. We are all invited. Come on, don’t look so glum. It will be your turn one day.’

  ‘But I’ve nothing to wear,’ Penny sighed, looking at the drab skirt and shirt she had on.

  ‘Don’t worry, I have a case of American dresses I brought back. You will wear one of them. I am sick of seeing you in widow’s weeds.’

  ‘But I am supposed to be in mourning for my aunt in Athens.’ This was now her cover story for why she had sought asylum on Crete with distant relatives.

  ‘Even the bereaved brighten themselves up for a wedding, and if you wear a pretty headscarf, no one will see the state of your hair.’

  Since staying hidden Penny had not retouched her hair dye and now her blond roots were six inches long. ‘It’s such a mess,’ she sighed.

  ‘I have some root powder to colour it again. It may turn everything reddish but Crete is famous for its flame-haired beauties.’

  What could she do but go along with preparations; a shivering shower under the cascade of a spring waterfall, a change of clothes into a pretty checked-cotton frock that came down only to her knees. She brushed out her newly orange-tinted hair and wound it into a plait, covering it with a pretty lace-edged headscarf.

  Spring had burst out at last and, with the shoots and blossoms, up came mountain greens and salads, herbs and snails. The olive grove was spared, the prunings hidden away for precious firewood before they could be stolen.

  The family would travel to the wedding in the cart together. It lifted Penny’s heart to know there would be something cheerful to watch, instead of following behind funeral processions, as she had these last few months, as older villagers and babies had succumbed one by one to the rigours of this hard winter. There were so many rituals to follow when this happened: days of fasting, special memorial services, special food. Every aspect of life had its superstitions and rituals, so different from the simpler English way of doing things. How plain the English ceremonies seemed compared with the processions, chanting, candle-lighting and icon-kissing she now observed. She wondered what would St Mark’s vicar have made of it all. That set her thinking of Stokencourt – would she ever see her own family again?

  Always at the back of her mind was danger. Penny must not draw attention to herself at this wedding. She was an alien in disguise; her very presence put Katrina and Ike in jeopardy. She must remain invisible in the crowd, but she wished the lucky couple, whoever they were, all the luck in the world. She envied them their courage to look to the future in such treacherous times.

  If only it could be me, she sighed, looking down the valley. If only she had a clear understanding with Bruce about their future together but there was nothing for them on the horizon. How could there be with danger lurking round every corner? It was enough to know he was still alive in the world. That must suffice for now.

  The smell of the fresh unleavened bread floated down the backstreets from the ovens and Yolanda sniffed the aroma with sadness. I may never do this again, she thought as she prepared the table, while Momma polished the Pesach pots and pans for the Seder supper.

  Everything was prepared for the supper when they could relive how their ancestors made a hurried exodus out of the slavery in Egypt to freedom. Each ritual dish was eaten in memory of this event: roasted eggs, the shank bone of a lamb and a dish of bitter herbs in salt, reciting the Haggadah, a story so familiar to every Jewish family. Then followed a real feast of roasts and cheese pies, honeyed pastries, just a few reminders that there were eight days of festival, but finding treats to put on the table this year had been such an effort. Precious spices and delicacies to be squirrelled away for just such an occasion were few and far between, but that didn’t stop the excitement in the homes along the Jewish quarter.

  Yolanda had made her decision and now she sat trying not to cry with guilt at her devious plans, knowing no one here would understand. Yet she felt strangely calm. There was nothing to pack from her life here, just her precious toothbrush, identity papers and her gold chain and Star of David. The chain alone would fetch a good price.

  Now she looked along the table to her parents with longing and love. If only they had managed to get to Palestine and not been stuck on Crete. How good it would have been to know they were safe. But at least fate had brought them back together for these past two years, and for that she would be forever grateful.

  Perhaps one day, if she brought them a grandson to hold . . . She sighed, knowing it would be a far-off dream. She must make the most of every moment with them. She felt tears welling up at the thought of deserting them. Perhaps her tears were being seen now as devotion. Just seven days left before she changed her life forever.

  On the morning of her intended departure, she took the letter she’d hidden, explaining her elopement.

  I know you will be angry and withhold your blessing, which will be to my eternal shame, but I do not do this lightly. I want to carry on working alongside the man I love. I go of my own free will. I never meant to hurt or shame you but I know I will have, and I have no right to beg your forgiveness. What I do, I do for love. It is the only way for us to be together.

  She put the letter on her pillow, slipping out as usual for an early shift, making her way through the backstreets as they came to life in the dawn light: housewives busy beating rugs, children whimpering from the upstairs windows, the bustle as the baker lit his oven. She paused to look one last time at the scene she knew so well. Under her uniform cloak she wore all her underwear and in a small sakouli she carried her best shoes and a crumpled frock and the only portrait of her parents she had from their days in Athens. Her purse was almost empty; she had left her wages for them with the letter. She could picture the scene when they found the note; Papa’s face crumpling with grief, Momma’s lips pursed in fury and despair. They were better off without a disobedient and thankless child, Aunty Miriam would chide.

  Andreas was waiting at the clinic. ‘Everything must be as normal. You do your rounds with the junior nurses.’ He could see the agony on her face. ‘Be brave, my violet flower, in a few hours we’ll be free. I have arranged everything and by tomorrow we’ll be married. I promise. I have no intention of shaming you. Here’s the package of supplies to be delivered. You walk out to meet Giorgio’s cart with it
as normal and wait for me. I will be following behind.’

  Yolanda worked like an automaton, only stopping to breathe when she wondered if her mother would tidy her room and see the letter. Even now they could be rushing to get her . . . Her thoughts were racing as fast as her heart. Of course they wouldn’t come. They were proud and she had shamed them before the community. They would be dignified, counselled by the rabbi and his wife. Everyone would pity them, and Papa would hate that.

  It was this thought that almost made her turn back and retrace her steps, tear up her letter, but her feet wouldn’t budge. Her stubborn heart was fixed and there was no going back.

  True to his word, Andreas left his clinic, locked the shutters and doors as normal, and was waiting for her as arranged. They walked out of the town for miles and then picked up a mule cart and drove through the dusk, walking through a gorge and up a sheep track to a village cut out of the rock. Here a group of rough-looking men with guns were waiting. They patted Andreas on the back as if he were a hero. Then they banged on the priest’s door with rifle butts. The old man came to door in his shirt, puzzled and half asleep. He recognized Andreas.

  ‘We want to be married,’ Andreas said.

  ‘This is no time to wake a respectable holy man. It’s barely daybreak. Go home and see me in the church like everyone else.’ The priest made to close the door but the men stuck their boots in the way.

  ‘He will be married now,’ they ordered.

  Yolanda slunk into the shadows, horrified.

  ‘No, you will not, Doctor.’

  ‘Who says?’ said his friend, built like a tree trunk, waving his gun in the priest’s face. The old man got the message, put on his robes. They were married in minutes as he conducted his office at full speed and heard their vows.

  ‘Now you are married. May I never see your faces again.’

  Yolanda didn’t feel a bit married but Andreas crossed himself, satisfied. ‘Now to the mayor’s house to make it legal.’