Digging at the Crossroads of Time

by Christos Morris

  of a mule, a lamb, a mare.

  There’s the sound of two stones clicking

  in the night so still and bare.

  There’s the sound of two stones clicking

  beside the mast ropes clipping

  on waters that are slipping

  when there’s no one on the boat.

  There’s the sound of church bells ringing,

  the sound of mourners shedding tears

  and there’s the sound of two stones clicking

  that has been heard through the years.

  There’s the sound of men rejoicing

  of a bazoukia melody

  and the sound of two stones clicking

  while my soul floats out to sea.

  There’s the sound of women crying

  of men taking their last breath.

  But there’s the sound of two stones clicking

  calling through the sleepless death.

  There’s the sounds of ancient melodies,

  old voices from past years.

  Joined by sounds of two stones clicking

  and it speaks within my ears.

  Mavrokakis

  Circa 1880s

  G

  azing upon his mirrored reflection, Father Dimitrios made the sign of the cross three times. “Thank you, God,” he said. “You have led me through the darkness and given me courage. You have opened my eyes and I have learned to see for the first time. I am a free man.”

  From a bag brought to him by Semele, he removed scissors, a razor, and a can of shaving cream. He began slowly cutting his heavy beard, pondering the face before him. He wondered if his chin was weak or strong under that shaggy growth. When only stubble remained, he lathered his skin in shaving cream and shaved his face clean. How many decades had passed since he had shaved? He could not remember. He tried to recall himself as a younger man in the seminary standing before a broken mirror, cleaning his face.

  His skin felt soft to touch, so unfamiliar. In the mirror was another man, not only Dimitrios, but also another who had always been shackled within. He performed the sign of the cross as an act of completion and rubbed the smooth sea-washed pebbles against his face and gently over his closed eyes.

  From his sanctuary in the church clock tower he could view Elefsis Port and the village platea where a man sat alone. Dimitrios watched him as he leaned forward; elbows on his thighs, sombrely twirling his amber comboloys.

  “Aristides,” he whispered to himself. How different he looked now through the eyes of a free man.

  The shops of Elefsis were vacant. The new arrivals were not wandering the streets. They were nowhere to be found. The evening air descended, making the seascape grey and bleak. Dimitrios walked slowly into the platea. He wore a plain brown hooded gown. The hood was pulled back, leaving his face in full view.

  He stopped in front of Aristides and faced the harbour and the sea. There he stood in silence for some time. His presence went unnoticed. The sea was still and a scentless veil of night lowered to the ground.

  “Do you believe in the power of God?” Dimitrios asked.

  Aristides gave a disinterested glance, unaware who was speaking. “Be off,” he snapped. “Get away from me.”

  “Or do you believe in the power of yourself, Aristides?”

  “Who are you? How do you know my …?” He stared at the intruder whose voice seemed familiar. He sat back slowly and whispered, “Dimitrios?”

  The priest continued to look straight ahead. He stiffened and arched his back. Holding the two sea-washed pebbles in each hand, he stretched his arms outwards. “In all your life, have you ever had a vision? A vision of God? Of your dead mother? A voice? A sign?”

  Aristides cocked his head quizzically.

  “Have you ever called out to them?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. Maybe in a moment of grief. In a moment of weakness.”

  “And nothing? No reply?”

  Aristides shook his head in annoyance. “Get away from me. You’re crazy. There is no place for you here anymore.”

  Unmoved, Dimitrios closed both his eyes and slowly tapped the stones together. He tapped them twice, gently. He paused, then clicked them twice again with vigour.

  “You cannot disguise yourself, your nature. You—” The contemptuous voice of Aristides ceased upon hearing the sound of the fury coming from the sea. There was little time to look before it came; the thrust of chilling winds. A long, unnatural gust first rocked the boats in the port before exploding onto the platea, upturning chairs and forcing Aristides to cling mercifully to his bench. His face was wrenched with fear.

  Dimitrios leaned forward, grimacing, his arms still outstretched, the pebbles tight within each fist. Blinding dust was scooped from the ground and sent flying toward the shops and beyond to Oaxsa.

  Aristides bellowed with fright, gripped by the breath of something or someone brought on by Dimitrios. His eyes were transfixed upon the priest whose brown gown flapped violently, his arms outstretched. This was not the facile Dimitrios he had once known. This was not the humble priest of St Constantino and Eleni. This was another man entwined in the power of another realm.

  The wind subsided and fell silent once again.

  “Do you believe in the power of God?” asked Dimitrios again.

  A trembling Aristides pressed his eyes closed. He whispered, “No more of this. Please. Show me no more.”

  Dimitrios returned the two pebbles to the pocket of his gown. He pulled the brown hood over his head and turned to face the man beside him. His face was shrouded in darkness.

  Aristides felt his neck turn cold; a cold breath from the rear caused him to jump to his feet and stumble away. He walked home silently, alone.

  At the dinner table that night, Aristides’ wife looked forlorn, being guided by his mood. No words were spoken. She did not question his silence or his poor appetite, knowing, after so many years of marriage, he would speak when he was ready. She would eat her food in silence, as distant as one could be while sharing the same table. His heart and food grew colder at the same time. He divulged nothing, spoke not a word while fiddling with his spoon, turning it one way, then another. His eyes were as vacant as those of a corpse.

  She cleaned the table around him and then brought a bottle of fine cognac and his favourite glass. She retired to leave him alone with his demons, to grieve in loneliness. She lay upon her bed staring at the ceiling, suffering his agony, knowing he would not share their bed through the night.

  Aristides remained at the table, confronted with unwanted thoughts. The demon wind kept blowing through the eye in his mind. The priest was being upheld by it, leaning forward, arms outstretched. He could not reconcile the truth of it, the panic – and then the face of Skoulis, his bodiless head screaming as it flew by. He could not remove them from his mind.

  He hoped the cognac would numb the plethora of images, making him dreamless. It failed, and worse, his mind was wide open to the horrors of speculation. He prayed that God would spare Skoulis, return him safely from the mountain carried upon God’s forgiveness and not the maelstrom of His retribution.

  In the early morning, as he lay face down on the table, Aristides jolted upright. He awoke to a thought from the previous night that, until now, had gone undetected. The platea where he had been sitting was empty of the aliens. Not one was in sight. They had vanished. All of them! So joyous was this thought that he felt his body calm, soothed by the warm relief that the intruders had grown tired of waiting, and like a plague of locusts, they had moved on. It was a small sign that life would return to normal. The dawn of his memory and this new morning gave him hope for Skoulis too. Maybe this fastidious man had waited for the morning light to ensure his safe return. He imagined him walking down unharmed. Aristides was comforted by a violet slit on the horizon trumpeting the relief of a new day. He was certain both of them had made it through the night.

  As the sun lifted its orange eye over the sea, Dionysos lumbered into the main street
of Elefsis, his lips still sweet with the taste of the widow Ariadne. His chest was still warm from her breasts upon his own. He walked with a young man’s heart filled with her panting breath and screams of delight. He could never remain in her arms an entire night, unable to absorb so much joy at one time.

  His nostrils flared at the sweet smell of baking bread. He pushed his large head through the baker’s open window. “I swear to God there is no heaven up there, Christos. It is here in this bakery. Give me two hot loaves before I jump inside and eat the lot.”

  He strolled along the street devouring his bread. He came upon the drunken police guard from Oaxsa who lay curled on the ground near the harbour. The man snored loudly, his huge belly mounding in the air with every breath.

  “Hey! Wake up!” Dionysos lifted the man’s limp arm and shook it. “You are supposed to guard the mountain.”

  The guard spluttered and opened his eyes. “Go away. Leave me in peace.”

  “You’re drunk.”

  “So what! I sit up there by that stinking garbage tip every day and most of the night. What did you expect me to do when so many of them came at one time? Bark like Cerberus? I need more than three heads to scare them all away. They ran up the mountain like rabbits.”

  Dionysos laughed.

  “Am I to chase them all up there? No, I’m too fat. They pay me too little for no sleep and too much abuse. Besides, these new people brought me nice meatballs and raki.”

  Dionysos looked around the platea, realizing it was empty. It was free of bodies lying everywhere. He then gazed up to Oaxsa.

  “They’re all up there?”

  The guard rubbed the stubble on his fat chin and groaned dismissively. “They are looking for the ruins up there. The church of sacrifice, they call it.” He threw his head back with a tsk. “Crazy people. So! They all went up, looked at the ruins, and probably froze to death last night. Then they will come down hungry, cold, and wanting to go home. I did the town a favour. They will have seen what they came for and now they will go home.”

  Dionysos tore a piece of bread with his teeth and handed it to the guard. Looking toward Oaxsa, he shrugged and replied, “Maybe – maybe not.”

  By late morning, the shopkeepers were standing in their doorways in search of customers. The air was clear and the sun stood alone in an empty sky. Elefsis was at peace.

  At noon the archbishop arrived with the new priest to peruse the almost empty platea. With optimism in his heart, he began introducing himself and the young man to the locals. The archbishop explained that they would be conducting the Sunday service together.

  News of his presence spread quickly, bringing many to meet the holy man. It brought many whose lives on earth were receding, or who were in need of urgent redemption. Many wanted to be touched, or to kiss the most holy hand. Old women arrived from the villages, a parade of weary bones in black scarves and dresses. Their bent limbs seemed to have been blessed and transformed along the way, finding a new nimbleness in their desire to arrive before the others. They converged from all directions. Seeing each other, they began to shriek and cackle like seagulls, racing as fast as their feet and hearts allowed.

  There was an excitement, a fervour not often seen concerning Church matters. No one could ever recall when an archbishop had ever mingled with the people in the open air of Elefsis.

  Elefsis had, for many years, been a place to avoid. The nearby leper island of Spinalonga had a horrid history, a frightening curse of death and disease. Though the lepers were gone, the island uninhabited, rumours still persisted throughout Greece that leprosy infected the water, the fish, and therefore anyone who lived around Spinalonga.

  Burdened with their troubles, some villagers saw the coming of the archbishop as a form of purification, a reassembly of a higher order, and a purging of demons and bad luck. Others were distrustful of him coming upon the same wind that took their priest away. They would not be kissing his hand, though they still came to stroll around the fringes of the harbour, attempting to appear disinterested.

  Suddenly a clamour of voices and chants could be heard coming from behind Elefsis. It came from the road leading to Oaxsa and the rubbish tip. At first it appeared they were just another boisterous group arriving to meet the holy man. They formed a parade, chanting and singing their way into town. As they approached it was clear these were not local villagers at all, but the new arrivals coming from the mountain. There were over one hundred of them. They were singing a Greek funeral song.

  Among your saints

  Give rest, oh Christ

  To your servant, this dead man

  In a place where there is no pain

  Or sorrow sighing

  But only everlasting life.

  Over and over they repeated these words as they entered the main street. On their shoulders they carried a body wrapped almost entirely in a blanket.

  Eternal to his memory.

  Eternal to his memory.

  Eternal to his memory.

  As they crossed the street and walked onto the platea, this mass of pilgrims quickly encircled the raised corpse which was lowered to the ground. They chanted: “We give to you our sacrifice, for everlasting life. We offer you our sacrifice, for all of us, for everlasting life.”

  A woman bowing and about to kiss the holy man’s hand, shrieked at the sight of the corpse arriving, at the sight of its dangling, bloodied, shoeless feet. She dropped the archbishop’s hand and fell backwards. For Iakovos, his triumphant attitude had dissolved.

  As the blanketed corpse was lowered, it slipped and fell awkwardly on to the platea. A sea of people rippled outward from the body. Someone in the circle raised their arms and shouted, “A sacrifice! A sacrifice!”

  Another chanted. “We give to You our sacrifice for everlasting life …”

  “Who is it?” screamed an old woman. “I cannot see! Who is it?”

  Her cry prompted others to shout the same words and push to the centre, creating an ugliness as the new arrivals pushed back, shouting, “Stop, stop! He is ours.”

  The archbishop barked at the young priest to do something. He told him to open up a path for him to enter the mass of people. The priest attempted to prize the mob apart, but could not. He glanced back. The archbishop waved his arms and shouted to the mob to move aside and let him enter.

  “The dead deserve their last rites,” he said. “This man belongs to God, not you. Let me enter!” No one was listening. No one stepped aside to let him enter. Amidst the shouting, chanting and chatter, he gave up.

  Aristides came rushing onto the platea, grabbing people and pulling them away. Red-faced, he shouted wildly to all. “Get out of my way you … you … vultures!”

  He pulled two old women away, and a man who fell to the ground. He pulled at people’s hair and their clothes, ripping a wedge toward the centre. His mind was filled with images of Skoulis lying on the ground, the life squeezed out of him, yet surrounded by vultures, their beaks reaching in, tearing chunks of meat from the bone.

  His screams were beyond his control, savage and so wild that many twisted away in fear of him; the frightful sight of his foaming white saliva around his gold tooth; the wretched shape of his mouth bellowing obscenities.

  Aristides reached the centre and fell to his knees, pulling at the blanket shroud. Was it him? He yanked at the coarse material, jerking the corpse one way, then another. He angrily pushed at the legs that stood so near, so immovable, and finally slumped across the corpse, exhausted.

  As he lay there, the noise and chants seemed to cease and the mass of legs began to quietly shuffle away. He felt a hand on his back. It grabbed him and lifted his body from the ground on to his feet.

  The earnest voice of Dionysos instructed him. “Step aside. I want to see.” With his legs astride the corpse, Dionysos bent down and unfolded the blanket, revealing the body.

  Voices gasped in horror at the sight of it. Villagers shrieked and stumbled away. The head and upper torso had been crushed, flatt
ened beyond recognition. Only the trousers and shoeless feet conveyed that it was the body of a man.

  Aristides stared at the trousers, trying to remember what Skoulis had been wearing. It could be him. Or was it someone else? One arm was missing.

  Dionysos looked to Aristides. “Do you know this man?”

  With closed eyes, Aristides shook his head.

  The big man scowled, “Well, it’s not Steffanakis. That I know.” Dionysos looked with piercing eyes to the archbishop and the young priest who approached with hesitation. Dionysos made the sign of the cross on his chest and said, “Do something useful. Give the man what he deserves and bless his soul.”

  The platea was silent as people walked away, slowly, unable to look, sickened by the image now locked in their brains.

  Dionysos looked to the sky, then seaward, and grumbled profanities aloud. He looked toward Aristides and shouted, “Nothing will fix this. Your connections are not high enough.” He walked away.

  The young priest wrapped up the body in the blanket. The archbishop gave the dead man his last rites. A despondent Aristides knelt on the ground and pinched the bridge of his nose. An ambulance arrived soon after and carted the corpse away to Agia Eleni.

  Paramedes the fisherman stepped from his boat to join the archbishop, the young priest and Aristides on the platea. He lit a cigarette.

  “The sea was boiling this morning. It was full of bubbles and steam. There were no fish. Not a one.” He looked northward, out to sea. “Bubbles came to the top, out there,” he said, pointing with his chin. “It’s a bad sign. If I believed in God I’d say the devil is coming from below. But I don’t believe in God.”

  Aristides stood to speak, directing his frail words to the archbishop. He spoke softly. “I’m sorry, Father. I cannot speak in church tomorrow as planned. I’m too weak to make a difference – now. Please. Forgive me.”

  The archbishop bristled with indignation. “And what will you do? Leave? Go back in Athens? Flee this place and the mess you have made?”

  “Please, Father, I cannot.”

  “You walk away so easily. You have caused so much of this. You alone. We sacrificed a good priest and to what end? Judge yourself as you have judged others, Aristides.” He turned and walked away. The young priest followed.