At dinner one night in their grand Neapoli house, Eleftheria and Alexandros Vandoulakis raised the subject with their son and his wife.
‘We don’t feel it necessary for us to go to the . . . er . . . the event,’ said Alexandros tentatively. ‘But you should be there to represent the family.’ He was referring to the celebration that was going to take place in Plaka.
‘And with the family connection especially . . .’ said Eleftheria supportively.
Anna sat in silence.
‘Yes. Of course we’ll attend,’ said Andreas curtly. ‘Won’t we, Anna?’
His wife stared vacantly at her plate of untouched food and managed a nod. She did not look up, so nobody could read her expression, but her taut shoulders said everything about her state of mind.
Chapter Four
AFTER FIFTY YEARS of being bystanders to the tribulations of the sick, 25 August would be a historic moment for the villagers of Plaka. Almost everyone wished to mark it. There had been fear during those decades, but there had also been empathy and even economic gain from the existence of the leper colony opposite. The whole region of Lassithi, a substantial area of eastern Crete, had both benefited and suffered from the proximity of the island. They willingly sold goods to the patients while at the same time fearing potential contamination from them, sometimes wondering whether infection could be carried across the sea.
Giorgos was not the only local person who had been personally connected with Spinalonga. There were many others whose lives had been altered by the diagnosis of a relative, and the dreaded words that would change their lives: ‘We regret that . . .’
In Plaka itself, the brothers of Dimitris Limonias, who had gone to Spinalonga at the same time as Giorgos’s wife Eleni, waited anxiously. It was almost twenty years since his departure, and their own lives had steadily progressed and improved since then, with wives, children and a successful local business. They were nervous about how Dimitris would fit into their lives.
There was a couple in the village whose only child had been diagnosed with the disease fifteen years before. She had been nine years old at the time and her parents now waited to meet her. Not only would she be a fully grown woman, but she might be facially disfigured. Time and disease would have transformed her into a virtual stranger.
Other families, such as Apostolakis’s, lived in Elounda, and there were plenty in Neapoli too, the biggest and most important town of the region. For patients with families from faraway towns such as Iraklion and Chania, and even Athens, there might be no one waiting for them. There were some who had been disowned by everyone who knew them on the day they were diagnosed, and in many other cases, leprosy patients had outlived their relations.
Whether it was fear or joy, as the day approached there was nobody whose feelings were not stirred by the impending event. This panegýri was going to be the biggest the area had ever seen, marking a moment that would never be repeated. For everyone who was there, it was to be an evening of celebration, reunion, repatriation.
As preparations for the mass return of the patients from Spinalonga were under way, Manolis, in spite of everything he had told himself, was having some moments of disquiet. How did he actually know that Maria was not expecting him to be there for her?
He knew that Antonis’s sister, Fotini, had been brave enough to visit Spinalonga from time to time, and wondered if Maria might have said something to her. Shortly before the day of evacuation, when they were inspecting the vines together, he tentatively mentioned the subject to Antonis. He hoped his voice did not betray the anxiety he felt.
‘Apparently she is excited about leaving,’ said Antonis.
‘She must be,’ responded Manolis blandly.
‘Fotini says that she has hardly changed at all. It sounds as if she’s had only the mildest form of leprosy.’
‘That’s good to hear,’ Manolis replied with nonchalance. The information did nothing to allay his nagging fear. If Maria was unchanged, there was all the more reason that she might imagine they could resume their engagement.
He drove through the village on the morning of the celebration and saw men hanging lights in the trees and trailing bright flags between them. Children were carrying chairs from the school to the square and women were laying long tables and tying flowers into posies. He saw Fotini and her husband struggling along the street with huge dishes of cooked food, and others with armfuls of hórta, picked fresh from the hillside. The baker was unloading trays of golden loaves from his van.
When the day’s work was done, Manolis had a quick drink in Plaka. He had missed the spectacle of the flotilla that had sailed across from the island during the afternoon, but he could see all the boats now, crammed into the small harbour, vessels of all different shapes and states of seaworthiness, moored side by side, almost too many to count.
By the time he had gone home to shower and returned to the village several hours later, he had to park some distance away, as many other vehicles had arrived. It was around nine. He had not hurried. It was curiosity that brought him there, rather than enthusiasm.
He had never seen so many people in Plaka. Everyone was oriented in the same direction, watching the dancing that had already begun. The music was loud and joyful and those who did not dance clapped the rhythm. Nobody noticed Manolis. Normally he was the centre of attention – and wanted to be – but tonight he stayed in the background.
He spotted the friend of Apostolakis whom he had met in the kafeneío and saw that an elderly woman took the stump of his hand without hesitation and led him to the dance.
There were many strangers there. Some were lame and others were disfigured, but they were outnumbered by those who were whole. Children weaved in and out between the dancers and ran about on the edge of the circle, which moved first one way and then the other. It was a scene of great joy and serenity.
Manolis had a flask of raki in his pocket and sipped it as he observed. The well and the newly well mingled and merged until it was hard to tell which was which. During any other panegýri, he would have grabbed his lyra from the wall of the nearby kafeneío and played. Tonight his blood was stirred by the music but he had no desire to move forward to join the party.
All the while, he was looking out for one person. It did not take him long to find her. First he made out Antonis, then he saw Fotini and knew that Maria would not be far away. Finally, amongst the hundreds of faces, he spotted her. There was no mistaking her. She was totally unaltered and yet there was something about her that he did not recognise. Every few moments, as the dance completed a circle, she was illuminated by a light that was brighter than the rest and he could see her more clearly. He did not remember ever noticing her smile in this way. It was both broad and radiant.
After a while, there was a break in the dancing. Manolis kept watching. Maria sat down on the far side of the square, and above the heads of the crowd he could see that she was sitting between her father and a man in a smart suit with neatly cut grey hair. Manolis remembered spotting him on a few occasions in Giorgos’s boat. The old man had mentioned that he was a doctor. He and Maria were engaged in conversation, heads bent inwards. Something then happened that he did not expect. The grey-haired man got up and, followed by Maria, disappeared from the square.
Noticing the direction they were taking, Manolis skirted round the alleyways behind the square and glimpsed them passing along the street that led up towards the church. They stopped inside its entrance.