Fear of Barbarians Read online

  After Igor went out to catch fish for lunch and Evgenii had finally fallen asleep, I went out into the courtyard again. Outside a warm wind was blowing even though it was December. I went over to the other house, but no one was there. No one appeared, not even the woman who had looked at me in disbelief. I returned home and lay down beside Evgenii. Later I dreamt that it was snowing outside, lots of snow, we are lying in your father’s study, there are maps of islands strewn about everywhere, you peel an orange and you give me a piece, and suddenly the whole room begins to smell of oranges, you pull a map from the pile and you point to an island and you say that only women live on this island, their husbands are sailors and whoever leaves never returns, in the summer fishermen come to the island and spend their nights with the women, but in the winters when the rain doesn’t stop for days, the women remain closeted in their stone houses and write poetry. They all write the same verses. There is no reason for me not to believe you, your father is a cartographer, who loves most of all to draw maps of islands; he knows everything about them.

  When I awoke, it had already grown dark outside. Evgenii was sitting up and looking at me; he told me that I had been laughing in my sleep the whole time. We stayed a bit longer in bed; I don’t remember when we last sat together like this. I wanted to tell him that ever since we came to Gavdos I have been thinking of you all the time, but I’ve never mentioned you, I don’t know whether I thought of you a single time all these years. Since the day you left, I promised myself I would forget you completely, that seemed easiest, but it was only after I left Donetsk and went to study in Kiev that I stopped remembering you. Evgenii saw that I was lost in thought, and he said he would let me lie there for a bit while he got up and moved about the room a little, but he couldn’t stand up, he had absolutely no strength even though he seemed better. I told him not to hurry, I would go see what was happening with Igor. When I went down to the kitchen, I saw that Igor had not come back at all. I went outside to see whether he was in the yard, but he wasn’t there either. I didn’t know what to do. I stood for a while in the yard then I noticed that not far away from our house someone was standing there looking at me. It was the woman with the blue eyes. I said ‘good evening’ to her quietly, in Russian, she had that same look, full of disbelief, I said ‘good evening’ to her again, this time in Greek, greetings were the only thing I knew, it was then I noticed she had an armful of wood, and when I took a step closer to her, she threw down the wood and ran towards her house. As I watched her run, I felt someone’s breath behind me, when I turned I saw Igor, he threw me a curt look and, uttering not a word to me, turned and headed towards the house.

  When I went in, he was standing there facing the table. Without looking at me, he said, ‘This is it for today, I barely managed to catch one fish.’ I didn’t know what to say, I took the fish and immediately began cleaning it. He went off to his room and, without turning towards me, said, ‘Make soup with it, give the fish to Evgenii, he needs to get stronger.’

  I brought Evgenii a plate of food. When I attempted to put the spoon in his mouth, he pushed my hand away and said that even though he was sick, he wasn’t a cripple and could still feed himself. Then he asked me to leave him alone in the room. When I went downstairs, Igor was sitting at the table, he had set out plates and spoons, we ate in silence. After our dinner he apologized for his stupid behaviour, he hadn’t wanted to insult me, but he was worried that something could happen to me. I said nothing, I gathered up the plates and went to the kitchen. A short time later he followed me in and told me he had a small present for me. From the inside pocket of his coat he pulled out a stone – turquoise, egg-shaped. ‘I took it from the sea for you,’ he said. I took the stone gently as if it were made of the thinnest glass and could easily break. Igor told me he was going to change his clothes. I brought the stone to my mouth and licked it with the tip of my tongue. It was salty. I licked it again. Suddenly I began licking it wildly until I had licked off all the salt. Then I lay on the kitchen floor and began to cry. I sobbed loudly. When I saw Igor standing in the doorway looking at me I stood up, wiped away my tears and told him to tell me how he had spent the day, what colour the sea was, whether there were waves or it was calm, to tell me everything, and also to tell me how he found the stone, why this stone and not some other, I wanted to know everything. Igor took me by the hand and led me to the table, sat down opposite me, he was silent for a while and watched a spider descending from the ceiling towards the window, then he began: ‘Since I caught only a single fish yesterday down by Sarakiniko beach, I decided to do something different today. While I was returning from the doctor, I remembered that the fisherman who had brought me here told me there was a lighthouse on the island, and if the sea is choppy you can catch the most fish there. The fisherman told me that the lighthouse keeper and his crazy wife live just beside the lighthouse; he told me that if I went there, I’d likely see her, she’s always standing on the rocks looking out to sea, she has long hair almost down to her feet, and if I saw her, it would be best not to go near her because she could be aggressive. When I got to the lighthouse, I went down to the sea along the goat path. When I reached the shore, I saw to the right of me a woman standing on a rock looking out to the sea. But she didn’t resemble at all the fisherman’s description. Her hair came down to her shoulders, she was behaving normally, she wore a grey dress, a bit faded but it looked clean, she didn’t give any sign at all of being crazy. I stood there awhile and looked at her, she didn’t glance at me even once, I think she was looking towards Crete. That’s the best place to see Crete, although it looks like a splotch between the sky and the sea. When I stepped closer to the sea, she turned and ran towards me. I stood there looking at her in confusion. When she was a step away from me, she looked into my eyes. Her look was wild, but not crazy. Her face was tender, she acted exhausted as if she had no strength for anything, least of all to harm anyone. After a long and uncomfortable silence, she said to me, “Show me your palm.” It sounded more like a command than a request. I cautiously raised my hand and showed it to her. Her own palm was tender, I felt all at once that I could trust her. She looked at it awhile thoughtfully, as if she were reading my fate. Then she said to me, “I see water… a lot of water… and a boat… far away… very far… it is barely visible…” With her finger, she pointed to the end of my lifeline. Then she let go of my hand, and taking fright, she began to run from me along the goat path, and while she was running, she turned several times to see whether I was following her. After she disappeared somewhere near the lighthouse, I sat on the rock where she had been standing and looked at the sea, I thought about that woman for hours. When it began to grow dark, I remembered I hadn’t caught a single fish. That’s why I returned so late.’

  ‘And the stone?’ I asked quietly. He looked at me as if he didn’t know what I was talking about, then he said, ‘I found the stone there, on the rock, I think she was holding it in her hand and when she ran towards me, she left it.’

  I began to squeeze the stone tightly, then I told him I was tired and that I was going to lie down, but all I wanted was for the next evening to come quickly and for him to tell me new tales.

  Temptation: Penelope

  Mihalis returned late at night. Irini was asleep in the bed beside us. When Mihalis came in, I pretended to be asleep. That woman, the Russian one, came again today, she stood there looking at our house. Mihalis lay down beside me and began gently touching my breasts, he drew close to my ear and said, ‘Wake up,’ his breath smelled of raki and his body of sheep, I thought I would vomit, I shut my eyes as tight as possible, but again he said, ‘Wake up,’ and dragged me over to his side. I lay on my back and slowly spread my legs. He penetrated me. The smell of raki and sheep grew stronger. I tried to think of you. His panting sounded like the grunting of pigs. He is a real animal, a real savage. Do you remember that day when you first spoke to me, after lunch, and you said we should go for a walk through the olive trees. While we walked you picked
out a tree with the thickest trunk and said that that would be our place from now on, we’d wait for each other there every day after breakfast. That day you asked me why I drew only the Virgin Mary and not also Mary Magdalene and Mary of Egypt. You spoke to me that day about their carnal experiences, about how, before they became saints, they had been whores, but I covered my ears and ran away in embarrassment. I never told you that while I was running through the olive trees, I thought Olympia was right, you really were a devil. That evening before going to bed I asked Sister Olympia if it was true that Mary Magdalene and Mary of Egypt had been whores before they were saints, she looked at me, her brows drawn, and said, ‘She told you that, didn’t she? They had been, but they repented. Don’t tell this to the other girls. I knew that that devil would bring us problems.’ I avoided you for the next few days, and you paid no attention to me. But I was hurt by your inattention, I didn’t want you to think that I was like the others. That day when I sat down next to you at breakfast and you got up and went to another table, I left the dining hall and went to the recreation room and began to draw, I drew Mary Magdalene, I didn’t know what she looked like, but I drew her with long blond hair like yours and a red dress like yours. Then I wrote a letter to you saying I would wait for you at the olive trees. I sat down in front of the thick trunk with the picture and waited for you, I don’t know how much time passed, it felt like all of eternity, and just when I thought you wouldn’t come, I saw you sitting under a different tree and you were looking at the sky, and when I approached you, you didn’t look at me, you kept looking up and whistling to yourself. That was the first time I saw that women also knew how to whistle through their lips, I thought only men could do that, I placed the picture in front of you and said, ‘There, I’ve drawn Mary Magdalene.’ You sat up, took the picture in your hands and looked at it silently. You can’t imagine how I was dying of fear at that moment, thinking you’d tell me that it didn’t look like Mary Magdalene and would throw it away. Finally, you looked into my eyes and said, ‘I knew you weren’t like the others. You are even better than El Greco.’ In embarrassment, I quietly asked who El Greco was. You spent a long time telling me about him, and with my head leaning on your shoulder, I imagined him in Italy and in Spain, although I didn’t know what those countries looked like. I don’t know how you knew all those things, maybe you really were a devil, but I enjoyed listening to you. Suddenly you jumped up and told me that when you turned sixteen, and I was fifteen, we would run away from the convent, we’d go to Athens, you would work, and I would study so I could enter the Arts Academy. Then we’d run off to Spain and we’d stay and live there. We would live somewhere by the sea, I would draw, and you, you’d open a pastry shop and you would bake cookies. I began to imagine you pouring out flour, and as it falls from your hands, a white fog rises up around you, and then I see your face completely white and I began to laugh, and you were also laughing. We lay there under the tree laughing. I am laughing even now.

  I had completely forgotten Mihalis; when I looked at him, he was standing over me looking bewildered. I started to laugh even louder, and he put his hand over my mouth and told me to be quiet, that it was enough for us to have one Stella, the crazy wife of the lighthouse keeper. But I couldn’t stop laughing. I fell silent a moment, then I looked at Mihalis and began to cry, Irini woke up and looked at me in fright. Mihalis tried to get me to be quiet, but I cried for you, for Crete, and I cried for the Arts Academy, and Spain, I cried for the pastry shop, and the boat that would never come to Gavdos.

  A Sick Country: Oksana

  This morning Igor went to summon the doctor again, the doctor told him he’d come under one condition, that we give him ten thousand drachmas; we have barely a thousand. In the end I gave him my ring, the one with the green amethyst my mother wore, she gave it to me when I turned eighteen and my grandmother had given it to her; Evgenii and I don’t have children, so I wouldn’t have anyone to give it to. Igor told me that when the doctor saw the ring, he said we shouldn’t lock the door, he’d come that night. I spent the whole day in the house. I sat and waited. I had no strength to get up from the table. Evgenii’s intermittent coughing reminded me I was still alive. I sat and waited for Igor to come. Someone knocked on the door. First lightly, and then more forcibly. I thought it was the doctor. There was no one outside. It had already grown dark. I stood for a while looking into the dark. From out of the darkness a pebble flew past me. ‘Who’s there?’ I shouted as loud as I could. And from the darkness a man emerged, tall with a thick, black beard and a wild look, with a sheep beside him. ‘What do you want?’ I asked loudly. When I walked towards him, he pulled back a step and then disappeared into the darkness and the sheep disappeared with him. I stood looking into the darkness until Igor appeared; he told me to go in, it was cold out. He asked whether the doctor had come, I told him about the man with the sheep. ‘That’s Spiros,’ he said and began to laugh loudly. ‘Everyone on the island says he sleeps with it, they’re never apart.’ I asked how he knew what everyone on the island said since he didn’t communicate with anyone, he knitted his brows and looked in confusion at the window; he said that the doctor had told him. There was something suspicious about his story. I stood there looking at him in disbelief. Suddenly he got up and said cheerily, ‘I have something for you.’ He pulled a white book from his pocket. ‘Take it,’ he said, ‘this will help you learn a little Greek, so you won’t be bored all the time.’ I looked at the black letters on the white cover, he stood beside me and began to read: ‘Petroula Psiloritis,’ then with his finger he moved along the title and slowly read out: ‘Arrosti Politeia.’ Then he looked at me and added, with a smile, ‘The Sick Country. Petroula Psiloritis is the pseudonym of Galatea Kazantzakis.’ Before he could continue, I cut him off to ask where he got the book. ‘I went by the lighthouse again today. There on the same rock as yesterday was the crazy woman. I stopped right behind her, but she didn’t look at me even once, she stood about three or four hours on the rock looking at the sea. Suddenly she turned and when she saw me, she looked at me in confusion, she looked at me as if she were seeing me for the first time. When I greeted her, she began to run along the goat path that leads to the lighthouse, she was running at breakneck speed, holding the hem of her dress so she wouldn’t trip, as she ran she would glance back to see whether I was following her. After she disappeared, I climbed up on the rock where she had been standing and I saw the book there.’

  Quietly, almost inaudibly, I asked if one day I might go there with him, I said that I really wanted to see her. ‘It’s still early for that,’ he said. I took the book and went off to the room where Evgenii was. He had a temperature again, and when I woke him to give him something to eat, he looked at me as if he didn’t recognize me, he ate some of the fish soup and looked at me with distrust, and I had no strength to say anything to him. It was as if I had forgotten how to speak. Every so often I felt like saying, ‘Arrosti politeia,’ but my throat would tighten, as though it would permit nothing to come out.

  The doctor didn’t come.

  A Boat Without an Oar: Penelope

  When Irini entered the room, I was embroidering an oar for the small boat I’d embroidered on a pillow. I had been trying to finish it for a long time but kept putting it off – whenever I picked up the needle, something would interfere with my plans. When Irini entered, I set the pillow on the sewing basket by the window. Irini sat down opposite me, she had the ironic smile on her lips that she had whenever she did something naughty, her eyes sparkled, she blinked from time to time and she looked like a perfidious cat trying to take revenge. She pulled out her hands, which she had been holding behind her back, her fingers were tightened into a fist, she waved her fists several times in the air then suddenly opened them. She unfurled her fingers one by one. Ten red nails flashed in the winter sunlight that barely penetrated through the small kitchen window. Nail polish, I thought, then said aloud, ‘Nail polish,’ how unreal that sounded here, like a parallel universe, h
ere the women don’t know what lipstick is, or what nail polish is, the women are always dressed in black, they don’t even know that any other colour exists. I finally managed to ask where she had found it. Irini hadn’t stopped waving her hands in the air and that ironic smile hadn’t left her lips. ‘The woman with the short hair, the barbarian, gave it to me.’ I couldn’t take my eyes off those nails, ten little red soldiers standing in a row one beside the other. Irini no longer laughed ironically, she looked at me in confusion, she had expected me to shout and maybe go over to see the woman. I glanced towards the house, but there was no one there, it looked as if no one had lived there for years. When I looked again at Irini, the red soldiers had disappeared, she had tucked her hands between her legs, and there was fear on her face, the same fear as when Mihalis told me about the foreigners. She looks so much like him, perhaps that’s why I never managed to love her. Nail polish, I hadn’t heard those words since the day you came into the dining hall and whispered to me that we would meet by the olive trees after lunch. I ate so quickly that Sister Theoktisti scolded me several times, telling me not to be in such a hurry, no one was going to eat my food, but I wanted nothing but to finish as quickly as possible and run off to the olive grove. You were the only one about whom they didn’t care whether you showed up for lunch. When I got to the thick trunk, you were sitting there drawing on the ground with a small stick. When you saw me, you smiled and pulled from your pocket a small bottle of red liquid. I thought it was paint, and as always, you knew then what I was thinking. You told me to sit beside you. You opened the bottle and began to colour your fingernail with the small brush. ‘Nail polish,’ you said, as you moved on to the next finger. This was the first time I had seen anything like it. Sometimes, when the convent was celebrating the Dormition, Sister Theoktisti let us pick roses in the courtyard, and we used them to colour our lips lightly. But without looking at me, you began to tell a story: ‘One morning, when I was seven years old, my mother saw my father off to the olive factory where he worked, she washed the breakfast dishes, put a chicken and potatoes in the oven to bake. After she had baked the chicken, she went to wash up, then she put on the dress she had brought from Moscow, which she wore only on holidays. She put on red lipstick, she always wore just a touch, it was nearly imperceptible, this time she put on more than usual, she told me to go to my grandma’s, she was going to Heraklion to buy red nail polish. She set off from Agia Varvara on the eleven o’clock bus and should have returned on the bus at two. Three o’clock passed, my father came home on his lunch break, we ate the chicken. Then six o’clock came, then eight, all the buses had gone. She never returned. After a few months someone at my father’s factory told him that he had seen her going about the shops in Hania, wearing a silk dress the colour of cypress. Two days later someone else told him that he had seen her at the Moschato subway station in Athens, holding a large black umbrella in her right hand though it wasn’t raining. A year after she left, a relative came to our house and said that he had seen my mother in Kokkinos Pirgos, not just once, he had seen her several times. He described the house, and my father and I went there just to ask her why she had left. We found the house easily; it was the only two-storey house that faced the sea. In the courtyard, lavender was growing, lots of lavender. When we stopped in front of the house a young girl came out the front door, her hair brushed the way my mother used to brush mine. When I saw the girl, I wanted to leave, but my father wouldn’t let go of my hand, he said that she owed both of us an answer. My father asked the girl if her mother was there, she said she was at the neighbour’s but she’d be back soon, we could come in if we wanted. That was the longest wait of my life, my father kept wiping the sweat from his forehead. I didn’t want to know why she had left; I wanted to know whether she had bought the red nail polish. I thought she would come in wearing the same silk dress the colour of a ripe fig, the one she was wearing when she left, and her nails would be lacquered in red polish. She finally appeared, but it wasn’t my mother. The woman really did look like her, but it wasn’t my mother. When my father told her why we had come, she looked with pity at me, she went into the kitchen and brought out two pieces of lemon cake and gave them to her daughter, telling us to eat them down by the sea. We stayed with them the whole day. At that moment I wanted my mother to love lavender and to know how to make lemon cake. I wanted her to know how to laugh like this woman; the only time I saw my mother smiling was the day she told me to go to my grandmother’s, that she had to go to Heraklion. We never heard anything about her again.’