The Girl Under the Olive Tree

by Leah Fleming

  ‘Thank you,’ a voice said in English. ‘I know you will do a good repair.’

  Penny turned round and saw Rainer Brecht standing smoking in the doorway. ‘Why are you on this ship?’ he asked. ‘It should not be so.’

  ‘No one down below should be on this ship,’ she replied, trying not to shake at being so closely observed by him. He looked thinner, drawn in the face, his hair bleached by the sun and greying at the temples. Why was he on this ship? She was just about to ask when there was a sudden and ear-splitting explosion from below deck. Immediately bells and alarms sounded, but then all power was lost, the engines died and the lights failed. Black smoke caused a roar of panic and confusion among the crew still standing. Penny was thrown backwards in the darkness, banging herself against the wall. They’d been hit mid-ship.

  ‘Up on deck!’ Brecht yelled.’ Life jackets!’ There was no time to search. Penny pulled the drunken guard to his feet, half dragging him, stunned by the noise.

  The rest was a confusion of scrambling for jackets, gasping for air as men were trying to loosen the lifeboats before the ship went down.

  ‘Let them out, for God’s sake, let them out down below!’ Penny heard herself crying, not wanting to be pulled out of danger, but the ship was already listing. Then there was a terrible whirring noise as the ship exploded from another hit. ‘I must go and help!’

  An arm grabbed hers. ‘No, Miss George, you stay on deck. You can do nothing now but get yourself killed.’

  ‘Let me go. We can’t leave them to drown,’ she spat at Rainer.

  ‘There is nothing we can do . . . come.’ His grip tightened on her arm.

  Then came such a loud bang, right underneath them, throwing Penny into the cold black water as the ship was torn apart, dense black clouds of smoke and pieces of metal hurling into the water too. Arcs of burning fuel spurting out, people were screaming, men abandoning the ship as it broke up, sliding rapidly down into the deep.

  Penny woke, stunned by the cold water over her body as the instinct to survive took over, her lungs bursting with the effort to stay afloat. Brecht was swimming close to her, urging her forward. They were swimming for their lives through a fog of smoke, swimming in the dark rippling Sea of Crete.

  Penny felt nothing. She was strangely calm as if this were a dream she knew so very well. There had been no time to think anything but water and waves, the fear of being sucked under by the swell. A life raft bobbed out of reach, taunting her to catch it, pulling her further from the ship, from Maria and Angeliki, and Sara and Solomon Markos. She swam away from the burning oil and the debris of broken bodies blocking her way towards the escort ship, Hera, already rushing to the rescue.

  She felt herself weakening, the panic rising that she was not going to make it, but when she sank, an arm was locking hold of her arm, guiding her until she was lifted up out of the murky waters where the Tanais had sunk down to the sea bed, pulled up the ladder onto deck alongside wounded, dying, burned men, survivors shivering, blackened faces, shocked beyond reach, who needed reviving.

  They were mostly German guards, crew with clothes burned off in the blast, a few others sitting with blankets round their faces, weeping. She searched every face for one she recognized but she knew in her heart that none of the captives in the hold had a chance to escape the watery grave. She did what she could for the rescued crew but many were too far gone.

  Opposite, sat Brecht, smoking a cigarette, trying not to shake. For a second a flicker of compassion sparked inside her for the man who had kept her afloat, but she doused it quickly with knowledge of all that she’d seen of his kind.

  Penny couldn’t cry or feel anything. It was as if her whole body had shut down, pared back to the most basic instincts: to sleep, to drink, to stay alive and do her job. They found her a blanket and trousers and a battle shirt of sorts. No one questioned her presence when they docked briefly on the island of Santorini to report the incident. The Hera carried on to Piraeus port with the limping, stricken, silent passengers who’d been to hell and back.

  Part 5

  THE REUNION

  A lady in black is sitting

  At Maleme and crying

  Holding in her arms

  A lifeless body

  Washing it with her tears and

  Dressing it with rose petals

  In lamentations she speaks

  And utters a thousand curses.

  Hitler, Never be born again.

  ‘Olympia’s Lament’, Olympia Kokotsaki-Mantonanaki, translated by Susana Kokotsaki

  May 2001

  I woke seeing the sun burning through the slats in the shutters. The nightmare that never left me was very real tonight. I sipped the taste of salt water on my lips, saw the faces of the dead staring up at me accusingly from the deep. Why had I been rescued? Why me above all others? For years afterwards not a word was mentioned of that sinking or what happened to all the Jews of Crete; an ancient community wiped out in an instant.

  Some will say a quick death by drowning was better than what was in store for them: cattle trucks from Athens in the heat of summer to the death camps in the north. I think not. Drowning, trapped in a hold, doesn’t bear thinking about, but it happened and should be remembered. Who sunk the ship? Who knows? Most probably a British submarine on a routine patrol. But deliberately? There are theories but I don’t know the truth of any of it. No one came forward to explain. It was just one more act of war among many.

  How much of this should I tell them? How could I explain why I was favoured without telling the rest of it? I didn’t know but I’d have a damned good try. Keeping secrets had become a habit I wasn’t sure I could break, even now.

  Don’t think about all that stuff on your day off. Just stay in the present, enjoy the holiday, forget all those nightmares. This is your holiday too. You’ll have plenty of time for tears later at the memorial service.

  I was glad it was Mack parking up a narrow side lane leading to the Commonwealth War Cemetery, struggling to squeeze past coaches and police patrols on bikes to find a spot. It was a beautiful afternoon and the sun was hanging high over Souda Bay, still the largest inland harbour in Europe.

  We had dressed for the occasion. Even Alex looked smart in his shirt and cargo shorts. Mack was in a blazer and chinos, and Lois all in white, which suited her dark looks. I had brought a black linen jacket and silk scarf, glad of dark glasses against the sun. We could hear a military band tuning up on the grass, that special sound made only by British soldiers in scarlet and gold.

  There were veterans in berets and blazers, with medals jangling, holding poppy wreaths, calling out to each other. Cretan veterans took my eye in their black shirts and breeches, white knee boots, standing at the entrance alongside officials of every nationality and uniform: dress whites, air-force blues and army khakis and greys. The lump already in my throat swelled up, seeing so many people assembled. I suppose I hadn’t known what to expect.

  I kept imagining this peaceful commercial port full of battleships and wrecks, belching smoke and fumes. Now there were warships trimmed up ready for a gun salute. Where were the craters from the screaming Stukas diving down onto the port? The hills were now covered in smart villas and buildings.

  We made our way slowly down towards the central cross, to get a closer view, collecting a service sheet on the way. Lois and Alex followed behind among the throng of tourists and locals, and the ceremony eventually began. I smiled, knowing this was a British-organized event with a royal visitor, so it would run like clockwork.

  A lone piper played a haunting lament as he led a parade of old veterans with their wreaths slowly down to the white cross and the clergymen waiting to greet them. I felt my eyes filling up behind my glasses.

  The wreath-laying ceremony went on for ages. I was glad when I was offered a chair. There were hymns and blessings. We sang the national anthem in croaking voices. The gun salute from the warship was impressive. Who could not be moved?

  I was glad to
be anonymous, free to patrol down the aisles of pristine white gravestones, marvelling at the precision and neatness of the green grass, the borders of red roses and the names of so many men and women cut down before they had really lived.

  A war cemetery has a strange quietude; it humbles even the most effervescent of youth as they stare at the ages on those stones, grateful not to have been tried and tested in such a way. It is a place of sadness and regret, guilt and reminiscence, so many emotions filling my heart. Why had I left it so long?

  I paused at the gravestone of Captain John Pendlebury, who I’d met briefly before the war. His was a mythical martyrdom, another one-eyed hero, athlete, academic, curator of the British School at Knossos, vice consul at the embassy and soldier extraordinaire, who was executed while injured in the first days of occupation. He was still a legend for his bravery and his love of this island.

  I moved away from the others quickly, wanting to make this a private viewing, a reunion and a moment to come to terms with long-forgotten memories of some of these names whose faces I had known.

  Slowly down the rows I walked, reading each name until I came to one that took my breath away, the name that had meant the most to me in those years: Bruce Jardine.

  I had not expected him to be here, but buried somewhere on a hillside in New Zealand. I had found out he was dead, only when I returned home. Evadne broke the news to me one morning in the garden at Stokencourt when they felt I was strong enough to take it in. I’ve always hated that rose walk ever since for reminding me of the utter desolation and futility I felt at the news. It was like a punch in the stomach, taking my breath away in its intensity. I walked away from her to the lake, shaking my head in despair. I think she thought I was going to jump into the water as she ran after me. How little they knew of me to think I’d take an easy way out of life. Better to live out my span in honour of all those who couldn’t.

  I had waited so long for news that never came, but by then I was another person. So much had happened and I knew my feelings for him had altered irrevocably, but not to know he’d been lost to me even before I left the island . . . Like everything else, it was shoved in the suitcase in the attic of my mind, not to be disturbed.

  Now, as I was touching the stone, bowing my head, I noticed, lying half-hidden on the manicured brown earth, a posy of mountain flowers and herbs wrapped in a black, red, gold ribbon: the colours of the Cretan flag. The inscription was in Cyrillic script from a poem: ‘Your blood spilled on our soil was not in vain. Thank you.’ That was all.

  I stepped back, shocked to see Bruce honoured, looking round to see if there was anyone hovering, but there was no one else down the row. I wished I had something of my own to put there, suddenly ashamed at this careless oversight. We’d not brought even a rose or a poppy for remembrance. I was still trembling with the shock of seeing his name.

  Who else was here who knew him? A wave of frustration and confusion flooded over me that all in my generation were so old and altered by time, unrecognizable to each other without labels. The veterans who marched so slowly, and some in wheelchairs, were mere shadows of the cocky bronzed men I’d the privilege of nursing. Who would recognize me now?

  The posy was dry. Whoever had come to pay their respects preferred not to attend today for some reason . . . Curiouser and curiouser. A posy was a women’s touch, delicate, unlike the flamboyant foreign wreaths covered in national ribbon and palm fronds, piled high now on the cross steps where veterans posed for their photographs.

  Yes, it was comforting to know he wasn’t forgotten or neglected, but unsettling. Someone who was still alive might have also been part of my life too, but I knew the special ones were long dead.

  How could a little bunch of flowers suddenly throw all we’d done in the past weeks up in the air? Why hadn’t they put on their name? I had to know just who it was.

  I stood looking out to sea, feeling foolish. All this time Bruce was here and you never bothered to find out, I sighed. Didn’t you care? All these friends and relatives travelling halfway across the world to attend today and you couldn’t be bothered to come back once in all this time to remember him?

  Everything is heightened on Crete: light and shade, black and white, human passions in the heat. In such a place where big things happen the emotions lie in wait, dormant, never forgotten, waiting only to be reawoken. There was no more escaping from the past, and I knew why I hadn’t returned.

  In the beauty of the sun-drenched evening, I was retreading those stormy days. I knew the reasons why I couldn’t face this island, hadn’t mourned Bruce as he deserved. I wasn’t worthy to be linked with his name. At least he never knew of my shame . . . The tears were dripping slowly. I gulped to gain control. I could not stay here among these worthy people. If they only knew the truth about me . . .

  ‘There you are, Aunt Pen. We thought we’d lost you.’ Lois linked my arm. ‘This must be a sad place for you. Shall we go now?’

  I swallowed my tears as we walked away from the grave I was not ready to share with them, grateful that her simple gesture of love had brought me to this sacred place. This pilgrimage had taken a new turn and I was not going to leave until I knew just where it was leading me.

  Rainer stood on the fringes of the crowd, leaning on his walking stick, surveying the proceedings with interest, his eyes hidden behind tinted glasses. He was unsure of his welcome here. The absence of his own national flag was no surprise. Who wanted reminding of their occupation?

  It was enough to recognize some of his old enemy agents, those daring officers who’d played havoc with his men in the mountains and stolen General Kreipe. He’d read their memoirs with interest, spotting Nicholas Hammond; Monty Wood-house; the hero of Galatas, Sandy Thomas; Patrick Leigh Fermor, the brashest of them all. He would like to shake their hands. Soldiers are the same under the skin, only the uniform marks them as different, he mused.

  It would be good to meet them on equal terms and see what they had made of their lives. Some were statesmen, politicians, authors and adventurers even in old age. Others he knew lay here, as did so many of his comrades in Maleme.

  The contrast of their two resting places was marked: one on land gifted by the Cretan peoples in gratitude on a shoreline overlooking the bay, the other a darker, shadier spot but just as poignant. That’s where he belonged but he wasn’t in a hurry to join them yet.

  He stood back, not wanting to introduce himself now. This was their moment of victory. There were always two sides to a story and it could have so easily been himself interred under the Cretan sun. It was touch and go, who had been the victor in May’41. So much had changed since their defeat. Didn’t they say history is written by the victors?

  He was proud that there’d been many acts of reparation by his countrymen after the war: rebuilding village houses, repairing wells and water supplies, scholarships for students.

  He stood under the olive trees watching the crowds dispersing slowly. His eye caught an older woman in a black jacket and white slacks, bending over a grave in a private moment of grief. But there was something about her that flashed an image into his mind. She had that upright English posture of a certain class of woman, a military air, and the sight of her tugged at his memory.

  He was still curious when her granddaughter, the granddaughter’s husband and son came to lead her away. He would like to have seen who she was visiting but somehow it felt discourteous and intrusive to follow. He watched them striding away and there was definitely something familiar in her gait and composure.

  I’ve seen you before, he smiled with relief, realizing that they’d been on the same night ferry from Piraeus. He’d seen her standing alone on the deck as the ship moored into Souda Port at dawn: another pilgrim perhaps?

  It was fanciful to think she had any other claim on his memory, but there was something ageless in her presence that reminded him of another time and another shore.

  June 1944

  As the outline of Piraeus harbour came slowly in
to view, Rainer stared down from the crowded deck of the Hera at the sorry state of the survivors. About thirty ragged burned soldiers, slouching in shock, some crew men staring blankly at their feet, also shocked, like himself, to have survived the attack on the ship.

  He watched Penelope working down the lines of prostrate men, handing out cigarettes and drinks, never stopping, as if her whole concentration was just on the job in hand. Not once did she look up or talk to him. He’d saved her life but she was not going to give him the satisfaction of a thank-you. Her face was grey as granite, hawkish features, lips tightly drawn, the baggy trousers hanging off her skeletal frame.

  By rights she must be handed over as a prisoner of war, a British Resistance worker, to be shipped north to some camp, perhaps to nurse under fire.

  If she was not on the deposition list or if she was under her false name of Athina then she would be listed as missing with all the others. Once they landed she would have to be given papers, statements taken, identity proven and he knew he held that power over her. It made him uneasy. Was she too proud, too angry and shocked to care what happened to her any more?

  He felt such a relief to be free of the island, free to go north away from the heat and dust, free to be an active soldier again, but Penelope wouldn’t be free to return to England to see her family. Who were her family? Who were the people who had reared such an iron-willed warrior? He was curious to know more about her before he let her go.

  She had nothing but the sorry outfit they’d cobbled up for her from the crew. She looked good in trousers, reminding him of that first time he’d seen her walking along the line of stretchers at Galatas with that look of grim endurance on her face. Now she needed kitting out with uniform. Her oil-sodden hair was coiled up, her complexion leathered by squinting into sun and wind. Yet she’d never looked as awesome, in his eyes, as she did now. How he wished he could dress her in silk, with a corsage of orchids on her shoulder, and whisk her off to a fine restaurant to fill out those gaunt cheeks. He flushed at his ridiculous fantasy.