Secret Passages

by Paul Preuss

  An hour later, after her daughter had given up her excited play and lapsed back into sweet sleep, Anne-Marie and her mother sat across from each other at the dining-room table, a piece of wreckage Madame Brand had acquired at the antiques-and-ham market in Châtou. Under a yellowing bulb in a flyspecked ceiling fixture, they ate bean soup out of mismatched bowls.

  “Alain looks fine,” Anne-Marie said. “His business seems to be doing well.” Her mother hadn’t asked, but Anne-Marie thought she might like to know.

  “Mmph.” Madame Brand was intent upon a spoonful of soup.

  Anne-Marie leaned away from the table. “We had a long talk about what’s between us.”

  After a long silence the older woman said, “I’m glad you’re willing to talk to him again.”

  “He admits the truth. To me, anyway. Maybe soon he’ll be willing to admit it to others.”

  “I don’t know why we can’t put all that behind us. It was so long ago. God knows it was a hard time for us all.”

  “Are you defending him or yourself, Mama?”

  “Why does he never come to see me? Is it because you’ve made him afraid to face me?” Under the ceiling fixture, Madame Brand’s face was a tragic mask. “Why do you cling to the dead past? Are you determined to torture yourself forever?”

  “No more than you.” Anne-Marie looked around the apartment, at its stained and peeling wallpaper, its dirty windows, its flea-market furniture. “You’re a wealthy woman. You own an apartment building in one of the best suburbs of Paris, and you live in it like a beggar. Why don’t you show yourself some respect?”

  “And you think money can be taken for granted, because you never had to work for it. All your life you got it from men…”

  “You mistake me for yourself,” Anne-Marie said angrily.

  “…even what you inherited. Well, your father has been dead a long time. He can’t sell recordings forever.” She seemed grimly satisfied at the thought, even though the money to be lost was mostly her own.

  “I’m not so sure of that,” Anne-Marie replied. “Eric Brand is more popular on CDs than he was on LP records; maybe he’ll be an even bigger star when they invent the next…Oh, merde.” She slumped in frustration. Once more she’d let herself be tricked into her mother’s game of contingencies. “Anyway, my point was, you own this building, thanks to Papa’s royalties. If you don’t let it fall to pieces, it will give you a living forever.”

  “No one lives forever, dear,” her mother said primly.

  “Some people never live at all,” Anne-Marie answered. “You left Algeria a long time ago. Long before you had Alain and me to worry about. You’re not a little girl anymore. You don’t have to steal bread. You don’t have to eat stewed rats.”

  Her mother said nothing, only dipped her spoon into the soup and brought it slowly to her mouth, sipping noisily at each spoonful as if it were the last she might ever taste.

  Watching the performance with amusement, Anne-Marie conceded defeat. She dipped another spoonful of her soup and swallowed it. She said, “You’ll be glad to hear that Alain and I have agreed to do as you suggest—put the past behind us. He’s going to do what I’ve asked, and in return I’m going to help him with…a business matter. Unfortunately it means I have to be gone—a few days at most. Will you keep Jennifer a bit longer?”

  Madame Brand looked up from her soup, her voice soft, her expression full of resentment and hurt. “What will that new husband of yours have to say about all this traveling?”

  “I’ll ask him tomorrow. I have to see him by myself, without Jennifer. For Alain’s sake.”

  Her mother looked at her as if this were a tissue of lies not worth pulling apart. “I will be happy to keep the little girl as long as you want. I think she is happy to be with me.”

  “I know she is, Mama. She loves you. She knows you love her.”

  Madame Brand looked away, momentarily forgetting her soup. “Hmph,” she said, her eyes bright with tears.

  3

  Under the springtime sun, Delos was an arid sliver of granite strewn with marble. Minakis waited patiently as hired caïques, modified to hold tourists instead of fish or lumber, puttered across the strait from Mykonos and deposited their cargo, sunburned European and American and Asian passengers who stepped ashore, peered at their maps, and started straight up the rocky slope to the east, enticed by the gathering shape of the amphitheater on the hillside and the guidebook’s promises of mosaic floors in ruined Hellenistic villas.

  Peter Slater was one of the caïque passengers, but he turned away from the others and meandered among the jumble of wrecked buildings at the water’s edge. He moved with a tall man’s angular grace. Impatiently raking his long-fingered hand through his sandy hair, he looked younger than his thirty-five years. His fair skin was flushed in the heat and bright with sweat.

  Peter followed the Sacred Way of this once most-sacred island, which led him into a field of ruins only a classical scholar could have made sense of. He was not a classical scholar. He could not see what was once there, only what was there now: the hard ground, the tough grass, the low courses of stone relaid to sketch out the building plans of the ancient sanctuary, with a few column drums, a few white marble herms, set upright to suggest the vanished third dimension. And underfoot, the paving stones and low stone steps of the Sacred Way, a riverbed of stone deeply carved into smooth hollows by a centuries-long stream of shoes and sandals and bare feet…

  To the uninitiated, to Peter, it could only be glittering wreckage. More than the ruins were bright; every crystal in the granite of the low, barren hillside glistened with refocused sunlight. He came upon a curious pair of white boulders looming in the ruin field and stopped to peer at them.

  Minakis, stalking him silently, wondered what he made of the pitted and eroded gobbets of stone. He approached, making no effort to be silent but moving up silently nevertheless.

  “‘We will not ever know his legendary head,’” he said, “‘Wherein the eyes, like apples, ripened.’”

  Peter turned to find a man as tall as himself, as slim and erect, but darker, more used to the sun—and upon inspection much older, his eyes as black as lava and his teeth, under his broad gray mustache, whiter than marble. Teeth and eyes and height, that is what registered; Minakis was used to it.

  “Professor Minakis. I didn’t see you.” He offered his hand.

  Minakis shook it neatly, then turned his eye to the weathered remains. “You know the poem?”

  “Rilke, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, ‘An Archaic Torso of Apollo.’ I was inspired to learn it because of this ruin. Not every kouros was Apollo, but this one certainly was.”

  “This one?” Peter looked at the two trapezoidal boulders that were once a statue. One would have been the upper torso, now chopped off and set upon its waist; the other, two or three yards away, must have been the pelvis.

  “It was almost twenty feet tall, made on Naxos at the end of the eighth century. The pedestal—it’s still over there, by what’s left of the Naxian house—is inscribed, ‘I am the same stone, figure and base.’ The Naxians had a habit of carving these things in one piece, right out of the mountainside.”

  Peter looked across the grassy court to the rows of stone Minakis had indicated. “What happened to it?”

  “Pirates tried to carry it off. It was so heavy they had to cut it up just to drag it this little distance. They must have decided it wasn’t worth the trouble. Delos had been in ruins for more than half a millennium, but the unfortunate thieves were hundreds of years too early to capitalize on our modern appetite for stolen antiquities.”

  “Do you remember all of it?”

  Minakis’s eyebrow lifted. “All of it?”

  “The poem.”

  He began again without preamble. His accent was educated British overlying native Greek.

  “‘We will not ever know his legendary head

  Wherein the eyes, like apples, ripened. Yet

  His to
rso glows like a candelabra

  In which his vision, merely turned down low,

  Still holds and gleams. If this were not so, the curve

  Of the breast could not so blind you, nor this smile

  Pass lightly through the soft turn of the loins

  Into that center where procreation flared.

  If this were not so, this stone would stand defaced, maimed,

  Under the transparent cascade of the shoulder,

  Not glimmering that way, like a wild beast’s pelt,

  Nor breaking out of all its contours

  Like a star; for there is no place here

  That does not see you. You must change your life.’”

  “Change your life?” The imperative caught Peter by surprise. His laugh was a dry sound in the dry surroundings. “Easy to say.”

  “Perhaps not so easy for the poet.” Minakis stepped back. “Forgive me. I’ve thoughtlessly interrupted you.”

  “Nothing to interrupt.”

  Minakis persisted. “The others went that way. You came this way. I assume to be alone.”

  “They have guidebooks. I’m following my nose.”

  “Then your nose is good. But of course you’ve been here before.”

  “No. What makes you think so?”

  “You were at the first Delos. Your paper on neutral kaons made a stir. You had interesting things to say about field theory.”

  “I never left Mykonos, actually; I hardly left the villa. In those days I didn’t pay as much attention to…” Peter waved his long fingers and, after a momentary pause, passed them through his hair. And then, almost absentmindedly, he walked off. Minakis caught up and walked beside him in silence, moving with easy strides over the bare ground, listening as Peter spoke. “Delos I was ten years ago—quantum theory seemed as natural as water to me then; I could play in it without a care. If I’d had any sense of history, I would have recognized that I’d swallowed the Copenhagen interpretation whole.”

  “Back then, you insisted that the quantum world is not a world at all,” Minakis prompted him. “No microworld, only mathematical descriptions.”

  “Yes, I was adamant. Those who protested were naive—one has to be willing to tolerate ambiguity, even to be crazy.”

  “Bohr’s words?”

  “The party line. Of course Bohr did say, ‘It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature.’ Meaning that when we start to talk what sounds like philosophy, our colleagues should rip us to pieces.” Peter smiled. “They smell my blood already.”

  “Do not think I am not after your blood.” Minakis bared his teeth in a happy grin.

  “Thanks for the warning.”

  “But do consider that I am an old man, well past my theoretical prime. Not averse to philosophy.”

  They came to a row of stone lions, some shattered, some almost whole, crouched on stone pedestals—lean female creatures carved to show their ribs, their skins stretched over coiled haunches. The iron rods that propped up the marble fragments had seeped rust, staining the marble like dried blood. To the east, where the lions stared, a drained lake bed full of reeds lay motionless under the high sun. The stillness was disturbed by a bright green lizard, breaking cover to swim across the bending reed-tops.

  Peter glanced at Minakis. “Let’s say there are indications—I have personal indications—not convincing, perhaps, but suggestive, that the quantum world penetrates the classical world deeply.” He was silent for a moment, then waved his hand at the ruins. “The world of classical physics, I mean. I suppose I’ve come to realize that the world is more than a laboratory.”

  “We are standing where Apollo was born,” Minakis said. “Leto squatted just there, holding fast to a palm tree, and after nine days of labor gave birth to the god of light and music—who was a bloodthirsty savage. What did the world know of laboratories then?”

  Peter said, “Even to me, my search seems foolish. Worse than philosophy. Metaphysics. Ideology.” He pressed his lips together. “So if you are after my blood…”

  Minakis held up a thin hand, his fingers as long as Peter’s and, in the everywhere-reflected light, almost transparent. Peter, usually so fluent, stood as if transfixed.

  Maintaining his hieratic gesture, Minakis turned to face the rocky hill that loomed to the east. On the far side of the vanished lake a woman was descending the path from the temple of Isis, her bright cotton skirts flowing about her knees, her dark hair stirring in the breeze of her passage.

  Minakis dropped his hand. Peter’s gaze slipped away, upslope. He squinted in puzzlement, then called out, “Anne-Marie!”

  She walked toward them, raising a well-used 35mm Canon to her eye. She tweaked the focus and adjusted the exposure with practiced skill while she levered the film forward and clicked off half a dozen frames, never losing her stride. Watching her, Peter brushed his scalp absently, lost in admiration.

  Suddenly she was standing in front of him. “Hello, handsome.” Dropping the camera into her bag, she took his hands and gave him a wifely peck on the lips.

  “You weren’t coming until tonight. I would have met you.”

  “I caught an early plane. I just missed your boat. I’ve climbed over half this pile of rocks.” She brushed at her dusty skirts, then looked up and smiled at Minakis.

  “Professor Minakis,” Peter said, “my wife, Anne-Marie.”

  “I’m very glad to meet you, Mrs. Slater.”

  “Actually it’s Brand,” Peter said, “Her own name.”

  “Call me Anne-Marie.” She offered her hand and watched with approval as he shook it firmly, not trying to kiss her hand or bow or do anything smacking of fake charm. “You’re from Crete?” she asked.

  “What makes you think so?”

  “Well, a name that ends in akis.”

  “Not much of a clue.”

  “Your broad shoulders, then, and your wasp waist, and your height—and, if you will forgive me, your very good looks. Vaivaios, eisai apo tin Kriti, apo ta oroi Kriton.”

  “You speak Greek?” Minakis’s eyes were fixed upon hers.

  “Pend’-exi lexeis, mono.”

  “More than five or six words, I think.”

  “Anne-Marie speaks eight modern languages fluently,” Peter said proudly. “She studied literature at the Sorbonne.”

  “I was a poor scholar. But I lived on Crete a short while.”

  “Doing magazine photography,” Peter said. “She’s an excellent photographer.”

  “Mostly I was doing drugs. Then I got married.” She darted Peter a warning look: Let me speak for myself. “Not to Peter. That was later.”

  Minakis watched the edgy exchange. “I can’t resist asking you what any other Greek would have asked by now…”

  She smiled. “Two. Not Peter’s, though.”

  After an instant Peter caught on. “Oh yes. Jennifer lives with us, she’s one…She’s with her grandmother now?” He raised an eyebrow at Anne-Marie, who nodded. “And Carlos is six; he, uh, he’s going to spend time with us this summer.”

  “When do you plan to have…?”

  “No plans,” Anne-Marie said, cutting off the inquiry.

  Minakis nodded. “I will now stop being a Greek. Have you been to Delos before, Anne-Marie?”

  “Once. I spent my time running up and down rocks, glancing at things out of the corner of my eye, scared I’d miss the boat back. So far, this trip is no different.”

  “We can walk around a bit without worrying about the boat,” Minakis suggested. “I know the curator. If necessary, she’ll send us back in her launch.”

  “Shouldn’t we check with the woman first?” Peter asked. “I can’t be stuck here all night.”

  “It’s true, my friend will probably insist we stay for dinner,” Minakis said, nodding solemnly. “And if we get too jovial, we may have to be her guests overnight. Yes, Peter, I think you do risk missing tomorrow morning’s talk…what’s it
called?”—the peremptory hand came up—“I remember now: ’Amplitudes versus probabilities in reduplicated space-time,’ isn’t that it?”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  “Warmed-over Hawking. You can afford to miss it, in my opinion.” Minakis hesitated. “Oh my, please forgive me. I’ve just remembered that Hawking was your thesis adviser.”

  Anne-Marie’s expression made her preference plain. Peter thrust his hands into his pockets. “Never mind. We’ll be glad to have you show us around.”

  Minakis grinned a glittering grin that said, Of course you would. He turned and walked away, pausing at a discreet distance to admire the afternoon sun on the columns of the temple of Poseidon.

  Meanwhile Peter leaned toward Anne-Marie and wrapped his fingers around her bare arms, on the verge of pulling her to him—“I’m just so happy to see you!”—but she evaded his hungry gaze. He leaned to kiss her, a light kiss on her mouth. Then, feeling her tension, he let her go. “Jennifer’s okay? Your mother’s all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Anne-Marie…”

  “Let’s talk later. When we’re alone.”

  Together, not touching, they walked toward Minakis. He was an indistinct silhouette in the afternoon’s shimmering light.

  Hours later, after a tour of the island and its museum that would have exhausted even a scholar, they gratefully agreed to an early dinner with the ephor of antiquities and her husband in their square little house beside the square little museum above the sacred compound. Through clerestory windows, the westering light was honey colored on the walls of the airy dining room and on the fragments of statues that decorated it. The long table was set with dishes of gleaming black olives and slabs of white cheese, bowls of pink taramosalata and plates of green salad, loaves of bread and sweating jugs of wine; the aroma of roasting lamb came from the kitchen.

  “My good friend Manolis here has often tried to enlighten me concerning reality,” said the ephor, Popi Gorgopoulou, an energetic woman in her forties whose stiff yellow-blond hair was prematurely streaked with gray, “but I have never been able to make sense of his explanations.” She directed her fierce attention upon Peter. “You are famous for your theoretical work, according to my friend. Also according to my friend, you are interested in the nature of reality.” She lifted a glass of purple wine. “So I made him promise to bring you to meet me. I invite you to explain reality to me.”