The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 2003, Volume 14

by Stephen Jones

  His gaze wandered to a nearby building under construction. He had stopped here the day before, in an effort to find out whether a luminous rectangle on a wall in the roofless second floor was sky through a real window or light so intense that it had pierced the solidity of concrete, dissolving it, turning matter to light and light to substance. In the end he took out his binoculars and, focusing on the spot, saw it resolve into the granulated surface of thrown plaster.

  Looking down, he caught sight of Elizabeth’s tanned bare legs: she was already well along on the way down to the dock and the restaurants lining the quay. He sighed, and then began to pick his way along the zigzag path, shaded by a plane tree and tamarisks, hoping his body would soon adjust to the heat.

  But entering the basin where what life there was on this outlier to the bigger, more heavily trafficked tourist islands had concentrated was equivalent to entering a steam bath. A few beadlets had already re-formed on his brow in the short while since he had started down.

  One supposed that the clammy humidity, unusual this far north in Greek waters, was a result of the place being so heavily wooded. It was green, even greener than Thassos. Most Ægean isles were sun-scorched rocks with rare, if any, natural shade; Charles and Elizabeth had chosen this place just because it promised change from the eternal sun-bleached landscapes that had begun to form the habit of their travel each year.

  Before reaching the asphalted bit connecting the path to the main shore road, Charles saw that Elizabeth was, in her impatience to get out of the sticky pre-noon haze, entering post-haste the air-conditioned office of Poseidon Travel. Across the street from that agency, on the narrow town beach, its little flotilla of rental boats was neatly lined up, waiting for the next customer to make a choice for the day’s excursion.

  Today was the first of September, Elizabeth’s birthday, and the climate was still molten in these parts, as Charles had found out to his extreme discomfort the day before. The two had separated: Charles determined to reach the island’s highest point, his variant on Munro-bashing developed over repeated visits to the Ægean, whilst his spouse had settled for relaxation on the strand, Sybaris ahead of the local Olympus.

  His walk had started well, but the lack of shade had left him exposed to the sun and broiling before too long. Later, alone, with metalled road turned to track, local resin-collectors and any traffic far behind, he had left the cutting for the peak. The place was silent but for the wind.

  Charles had never seen brush so dense as on those lower slopes, a thick, barely penetrable maquis. Treelike bushes, plants whose baking in the sun erupted forth with aromatic, pungent odours. And bushlike trees bent by the wind, with thick exposed roots, so rocklike themselves that the stones between their twistings appeared to have grown there, organic intrusions studding and enveloped by the worn mineral bark.

  The only way was along animal trails, literal tunnels through the steamy thorny mass, that made passage a travail of clothing and hair caught in spiky and desiccated vegetation. When he saw his progress to be a few tens of metres that hour, he had given up, disgusted.

  Resting on a block of stone in a rare clearing, he had sat facing the nearby island to the east. Gulping water from his plastic canteen, he had regarded the place between swallows. It was greener even than Tiflos.

  With half the bottle finished, he had taken out his map, matching names to the prospect in front of him, a favourite private game. The island was Aghios Mikhailis, Saint Michael. The chart showed it to be about half the length of the main island and divided into two distinct sections, each with its own pronounced summit, separated by a narrow saddle-like neck of land at the middle.

  The peak on the left was called Frangòberga – something to do with the Franks, a presence here in the Middle Ages? – and the one on the right was Stefáni, which he vaguely remembered from Greek classes to mean “bridal wreath” or “crown”. Through the binoculars, he had explored the visible parts of the opposite shore, four or five kilometres out. There was a white spot high up that hill, probably some herd of sheep eking it out in the sparse shade of afternoon.

  On the long return to town, Charles had suffered near-heat stroke, and took an icy shower to recover. Stretched out nude on the sheet, he had a sip of their duty-free Scotch and read a few pages of Symonds’s Michelangelo. He had then put the book down and broached the idea of taking a boat out to Aghios Mikhailis, suggesting the outing as the perfect day-trip for a birthday.

  By habit, Charles avoided the area of the harbour promenade that he knew was covered with what looked to be a permanent oil slick. As he came up on the spot, he saw a weathered old man, face gnarled and darker than tanned, forcefully throwing something like the head of a wet mop on to the pavement. A rusty three-pronged harpoon, shaft like a weathered broom handle, lay at his feet.

  Charles stopped to see, and then realized that the object being thrown was an octopus. The man repeatedly dashed it against the concrete, the hard slaps resonating throughout the seaside neighbourhood. That was the explanation: no motor oil wilfully dumped here, but a slick that was the sudsy juice of cephalopods.

  Why did the people do it? The claim was that the animal was only edible if made tender in this fashion. Charles thought, however, that there was more to it than that: some form of revenge, or beating out of a devil, or the liberation of a form, forced unwillingly to leave its mortal habitat for a new round on the wheel of all existence.

  Unable to say why, he abhorred the practice. There was something nasty and unpleasant about it, connecting at some illogical level in his thoughts with fantasies of furtiveness, and impotence.

  When he entered the agency, he saw his wife already seated, chatting and joking with the proprietor, who was related to the owners of their hotel.

  “Panagiotis,” she said with a small smile on her face “has been telling me how his boats are the best in the Sporades.”

  “It’s true,” the Greek interjected, standing up to move to the other side of his desk, where Elizabeth sat. He was bearded, bulky and dark, with a gold chain that swung from his neck, like some faux crack dealer.

  Leaning over her shoulder, the man placed a thick, hairy hand on her bare arm, ostensibly for balance, as he reached with his other for a folder that lay in front of her. He opened it to a section showing coloured photographs of boats, calling Charles over to see. Charles thought that they could as easily have gone to the window, from which the boats could be seen perfectly well.

  While Panagiotis pointed to the various models, extolling their individual virtues, Charles saw that he had not removed his hand from Elizabeth’s upper arm. Voluble and vociferous, the words rolled out of him in a friendly bass boom. However, there was a look of stealthy challenge in his eyes each time he glanced at Charles, a look like that of a pickpocket caught in the act, daring a bystander who has discovered him to blow the whistle; a sort of smirk, full of arrogance blended with contempt.

  All the while, he kept his grip on Elizabeth, while Charles, too polite to react while still unsure about what after all might only have been effusive Greek friendliness, thought he saw the man’s thumb stroke his wife’s bronzed skin lightly, as she imperceptibly leaned in to the Greek.

  “Now this boat, it’s the one you should have. Only ten thousand drachmas for the day, until sunset, with gas in the tank. A special price for you, my friends, on this, your wife’s name-day.” So she had told him of her birthday.

  The boat indicated was a quasi-inflatable, a Zodiac-type raft, with rubber pontoon sides and a plywood floor, that took a heavy outboard motor.

  “What about that one?” queried Charles, intruding his pointing arm between the two in such a way that Panagiotis was forced to relinquish his grip on Elizabeth. A pout formed on his face like that of a child denied extra sweets.

  “Which one?”

  “That one, there.” Charles had placed his finger on the picture of a small cabinless inboard with a sunshade, made of plastic or fibreglass. He had the vague notion o
f touring the sea rocks a few miles out in the water, visible beyond the office window, that the large-scale map showed strung out in a line, like beads on a chain from here to Syros. Perhaps, he thought, we could even get to Syros and back, and dive for fish at each of the uninhabited islands along the way.

  “My friend, how much time have you spent in boats? Have you ever driven one before, huh?”

  Charles was forced to admit to little knowledge of things nautical; his maritime experience was limited to a few pulls of the oar in rowboats, and a turn or two at the rudder of pleasure craft owned by friends.

  “Well, then, don’t think about a big boat like that. It will only get you into trouble, my friend. Besides, it costs too much for you.”

  It grated to realize how easily the islander had sized up their economic status, as did his contempt for their boat-handling abilities, and his constant use of the word friend when his relation to them was that of a shopkeeper. Charles nonetheless acquiesced on the choice of vessel, noticing at the same time that Panagiotis had again insinuated his hand on to Elizabeth’s upper arm, now massaging it openly between his thumb and fingers as if it were a piece of cloth he were testing before deciding on purchase. Was she luxuriating under the attention, or was it his imagination? If she were a cat, would she be purring now?

  A contract in Greek and French was signed, something about insurance; money changed hands; and suddenly the man was all business, the cloying affection turned off like a tap. He yelled through the door to a colleague or employee, or, most likely, a family member, “Dimitri, take these nice people over to number four, and show them how the boat works.” He turned back to the couple. “Dimitri will take care of you. Where are you thinking of going today?”

  Before Charles could frame his answer, Panagiotis continued. “Maybe you stay away from Aghios Mikhailis. There’s rocks along the shore you can’t see. They can tear the bottom off the boat. Especially around the middle of the island. And the police don’t want anyone around the south of the place – the archaeologists are working on a wreck there. Byzantine. Too many people going over to watch them, someone might get hurt. Much nicer beaches here, on Tiflos. Stay here.” That last almost coming out as a grunt, he turned on his heel and ambled back to his desk.

  And the devil to you, sir, thought Charles. He had already had enough of the Greek’s thinly veiled sneering and half-disguised fondling of his wife. They would go where they pleased, now that payment had been made.

  Dimitri, a somewhat sullen young man of twenty or so, got up from lubricating a motor he had taken apart, and led the couple down to the inflatable, which was drawn on to the brownish sand. In English more broken than that of his chief, he gave them running instructions for the operation of the motor and its refuelling. He drilled them through starting and stopping the motor a couple of times, until he was satisfied they could handle the job. He was more serious than Panagiotis, more concerned with doing his work, and more distant.

  With Dimitri gone back to his motor, the two loaded their picnic and gear, and Elizabeth shoved off, nimbly jumping in just after the boat left shore. When the water was deep enough, Charles lowered the motor and started it according to the instructions he had received moments before. He was pleasantly surprised when it took life just as easily as it had during Dimitri’s demonstration, although there was no reason why it should have behaved otherwise.

  He opened the throttle and, going slowly, they exited the harbour in a few minutes, entering the chop, before swinging to port to follow the coastline northwards. They had discussed their intended route over breakfast at the hotel, and had decided to visit the several bays strung out along the shore of Tiflos, where beaches were promised by the parasol symbols on their crude map. With confidence built by several landfalls, stops and starts, and the boat holding up, they would cross the channel between the two islands at its narrowest point, and visit what was perhaps a settlement that Charles had seen with his binoculars the day before, at the middle of Aghios Mikhailis.

  Rounding the point, their cruise along the coast continued uneventfully; that was to say, it went well, and they each handled their own end of the routine of landfall and launch in a way that made them begin to feel that they were well suited to the sea. Putting in at the small yacht basin at Steni Vála, away from the bigger boats, they were not displeased with the lack of attention paid to them, since it meant that they had handled themselves in a passably honourable nautical fashion, which was what they had hoped. Beaching the craft, they went ashore and had an iced drink on the verandah of the small marina café before starting out again.

  The next stretch was longer, past the middle of the island to Aghios Dimitros. Its umbrella on the map called forth undue optimism; the triangular cape was loose shingle of large rounded stones. A pair he recognized as French, from having exchanged a few words with them in town, occupied one end of the enormous strand. Elizabeth and Charles saw no reason to linger; at the narrowest point between Aghios Mikhailis and Tiflos, they were eager to get on with their odyssey of one day and cross the strait to terra incognita.

  The sun was out as they crossed over but, with the breeze, the air was cool. Elizabeth removed her top and let her naked breasts catch the sun and spray. Charles, hand on the throttle, watched her with a mixture of admiration and exasperation. He did not share the typical sunseeker’s disdain for local custom, and was afraid that even on this deserted stretch of sea someone might see them and try his hand at pestering them afterwards, justifying the unwanted attention with the excuse that Elizabeth was a loose woman.

  She, for her part, did not care a bit what the locals might think. They were only here for a week, and the chances they would be remembered when they came back – if they came back – were minimal. Charles was a prude in any case, and she would do as she pleased, Greek sensibility be damned. Besides, she thought the local men nice, and was not averse to the idea that more attention might be paid to her if she was, in her desert innocence, reported back to Panagiotis by some rumour-monger shepherd hidden in the hills, watching through binoculars.

  The northern part of the island loomed before them; the water seemed deep enough to manoeuvre in close to the cliffs. Charles, without a hat, was feeling the effects of the sun and wanted the few yards of shade that the steep slope could provide. They entered the narrow shadow and Elizabeth, sighing, drew her top back on, and watched the depth as they sped on. Hugging the coast for a quarter of an hour, they burst into sunshine again when the cliffs turned to low hills. The middle of the island broadened to contain the sheltered bay of Vassiliko, where Charles had seen some traces of habitation from his perch the day before.

  They eased around the northern point of the opening and he cut the boat’s speed, seeing numerous low-lying jagged rocks that broke the surface on the approach to shore. Carefully navigating past these, they saw an arm of the bay appear and grow to port; a small homestead or summer farm lay at its head. Because of the rocks, and also on account of his unwillingness to expose their craft and selves to the curious pokings and proddings of local adults and children bound to assemble if they landed nearby, Charles pointed the prow at a sandy flat a hundred yards or more away from the buildings.

  There was only one main whitewashed house, meaning that no more than a single family lived here. Some olive-oil cans, tops removed, sported wilting geraniums; a few unpainted rails and drystone walls topped with dried-out thorns were corrals for sheep or goats. The area immediately around the structure, long grassless, was dusty and bare.

  “It would be nice if there was a kafenion there,” Elizabeth commented forlornly, having already given up hope.

  “Mmm. It looks deserted to me,” Charles answered. “But I agree – help me pull this thing up on the shore and let’s have a look.”

  What they had taken from a distance to be sand was mostly rotting seaweed and dried-out mud, cracked tan plates curling at their edges. Its breakage as they walked on it, evidently the first to do so in months, made a c
risp noise, like flatbread broken at the breakfast board.

  “No chapel,” he commented, half to himself.

  “It’s probably on the other side of the island; there’s likely ten of them about.”

  They had visited Greece often enough to have developed an amateur passion for the place, even having studied the language at local evening courses; both were aware that the smallest of rocks in the sea would have its little ecclesia, or at least a ruin thereof, built by mariners in grateful devotion, as thanks for rescue from the sea’s travails or for some favour granted by a saint.

  Here, obviously, there was no little church, the expected adjunct to any such lonely house, protection against the terrors of isolation and night, and the demon that walks at noon. It must be, as Elizabeth had said, invisible from where they were; there was certainly enough bush about to hide one in, or ten of them, for that matter.

  “If there’s anyone around, we can inquire,” she said, watching the place for signs of life as they approached. A few ducks and geese waddled towards, and then around them, hoping to be fed. Charles thought he heard a dog bark, from not so far away, but was not sure and so said nothing to his wife. A faint smell of smoke, as from a fire burned out the day before, would now and then waft their way. Of people they saw no trace.

  “Clearly there’s no one here, and I think we can forget the café, let alone human contact,” he ventured, stating the obvious.

  “They’re all back on Tiflos, and probably come out here every other day to water the goats and feed the birds,” Elizabeth replied. They stopped, nearly on top of the house, realizing that to go any further would be a violation of the owner’s private space, even with the hospitality of the local countryside and the relaxed Greek attitude to invasion of the blurred division between public space and private property taken into account.