Matoula's Echo E-Book

Richard Romanus

• Herausgeber: Armida Publications
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 444

Beschreibung

“It’s Greece’s Dr. Zhivago but with a better story. And it would make a great movie”.-- Kurt Russell, actor

In the tradition Of Corelli’s Mandolin and Eleni comes an epic historical fiction novel set in Greece. By Richard Romanus, a nominee for The Writers Guild Of America Award For Best Original Screenplay.

In the hardscrabble villages of northern Greece, strength is the only measure of a girl’s beauty. But Maria Christina is delicate, nearsighted, unmarried at 17 – already a spinster, in a town with few choices– and hopeless. She’s overshadowed by Matoula, the nimble, radiant older sister whom she loves but envies. Worse still, she smolders with shameful desire for handsome, worldly Yiannis, Matoula’s husband, a doctor from sophisticated Athens.

It’s the bitter winter of 1940, war just over the horizon, the Axis Powers massing to invade. All the able-bodied men have gone to defend the border. The women must supply their food and clothing, their bandages and bullets – on foot over mountain trails, by starlight, through deep snow. But only those deemed strong may help. Not Maria Christina. For her that’s just another humiliation.

Defiantly, she joins Matoula on a supply run. And then her worst nightmare comes true: it is strong, deserving Matoula who dies. Yiannis is left a widower, torn between commitment to the resistance, where his skills are desperately needed, and responsibility for Zoitsa, the young daughter Matoula bore him.

War rages on – against the Italians, then the Germans, and then heartbreaking civil strife among the Greeks themselves. Conflict burns within Maria Christina and Yiannis, too. They are engulfed by passion, separated by duty to country, bonded by common loss and devoured by Maria Christina’s guilt at surviving her more beautiful, capable sister.

A vivid epic of calamity and longing, of modernity vanquishing tradition, Matoula’s Echo makes just one fragile promise of redemption in the form of Maria Christina’s new awakening.

Praise For This Epic Greek Historical Fiction Romance Novel.

“A phenomenal achievement, not only because it tackles the great themes – war and civil war, heroism and sacrifice, love and loss, joy and misery, inner conflict and struggle merely to survive – but because it handles them so adroitly.”

-- Dr Darcy Powers, Professor of English at the University of Denver

Leseprobe

Matoula's Echo

Richard Romanus

Published by Armida Publications, 2014.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Copyright page

Acknowledgements

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

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10

11

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18

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Also by Richard Romanus

About the Author

About the Publisher

 

To the Women of Metsovo

Copyright page

Copyright © 2014 by Richard Romanus

All rights reserved. Published by Armida Publications Ltd.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Armida Publications Ltd, P.O.Box 27717, 2432 Engomi, Nicosia, Cyprus or email: [email protected]

Armida Publications is a founding member of the Association of Cypriot Book Publishers, a member of the Independent Publishers Guild (UK), and a member of the Independent Book Publishers Association (USA)

www.armidabooks.com | Great literature. One book at a time.

Editors: Katerina Kaisi and Miriam Pirolo

Assistant editor: Ine De Baerdemaeker

Cover design by: Josh Murtha

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

First paperback and electronic edition: September 2011 under title “Chrysalis”

ISBN-13 (paperback): 978-9963-706-06-1

ISBN-13 (kindle): 978-9963-255-07-8

ISBN-13 (e-pub): 978-9963-255-18-4

Acknowledgements

I am especially grateful to Elena Averoff, whose admiration for the women of Metsovo inspired the story and whose encouragement steeled my resolve to write it. I am also indebted to Ioannis Averoff for his guidance and his extensive library. I would also like to thank Kostas “Pappou” Todis, Maria Todi, Apostoles Bissas, Dr. Fanis Bouzalis, Nikolas Mitsos, and Spiros Mavrikis for sharing their memories, and Annabel Davis Goff, Vicky Kyriazi, Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman for their professional advice, and to express my appreciation to my editors, Katerina Kaisi and Miriam Pirolo. Thanks also to Irina Averoff, my brother, Billy, and my son, Robert Christopher for their love and support. Finally, I wish to express my abiding gratitude to my wife, Anthea, who is my muse.

1

There were no women in Metsovo, only men. This had been a source of amusement for countless generations among the neighboring villagers high in the Southern Alps of central Greece. Of course it wasn’t true. All the men who lived in this region known as Epirus were forced by the long, cruel winters to drive their flocks down to more mild elevations for most of the year, but it was only the men of Metsovo who left their women and children behind to do the strenuous work necessary for their survival. And it was precisely for survival’s sake that strength in the women of Metsovo became the measure of beauty, and it was also the reason Maria Christina Triantafyllou, an aspen among sycamores, was considered the least attractive girl in the village. Moreover, in a community where you were considered a near spinster at fifteen, she was already seventeen and not one suitor had appeared, not even a rumor of one. And yet, it was the furthest thing from her mind this morning in October of 1940, as she sat on a small bench in front of a fire in the family’s gray stone cottage. In the last few weeks she had found it impossible to concentrate on anything but Mussolini’s army amassing on the border not eighteen hours from their village, which was the only western route into Greece.

“A cup of my tea, my soul,” came a low hoarse voice from the large platform next to the fireplace, breaking the oppressive silence.

“Right away, Pappou.”

It was comforting for her to pour warm water from a kettle into a cup filled with his special herbal mixture, then swirl the liquid and carefully add two drops of paregoric. She lit a lamp and set it on the low round table in front of the fireplace. It was always dark in the winter room. The two windows and the door to the room were covered in thick wool weavings to help the room retain as much heat as possible. The only daylight was from a small window beneath the hearth.

Lying in his sickbed, her grandfather spoke with difficulty, “How you look like your grandmother just now. So beautiful.”

As he took the cup, Maria Christina leaned into the stubble of beard and softly kissed his cheek. Having been aware of her quiet suffering these years, the old man had decided his gift to her would be that of hope. He would teach her to dream. To that end he plied her with stories of his beloved wife, her namesake, who had died from tuberculosis when Maria Christina was only three. And whenever he described his bride, tall and thin, with long chestnut hair and eyes like sapphires, her skin the color of a fresh white peach and her tiny waist, it was as if he was describing Maria Christina herself.

“She was the most beautiful woman in all of Bucharest. And may I be spitting in God’s eye if they aren’t the most beautiful in the world! And I’ve been everywhere!”

Of course she stopped hoping and dreaming and believing him years ago, although she continued pretending to him that it must be so. Still, his stories made her feel melancholic, knowing he felt compelled to lie to her because no man would ever find her acceptable as a bride.

His cheek felt warm. As he sipped the tea, he talked about the last day of October 1912. “I was alone in a remote village in the Rodope Mountains in Bulgaria. I don’t remember the name now. I was carving an altar screen when I heard from a peddler that the Turkish rule over Metsovo had finally ended. After five hundred years. And I had no one to celebrate.”

She had heard all of this before but listened attentively as he then spoke about his three sons, one of whom he had lost in the First Balkan War against the Turks and then his other two in the war that was to end all wars. How tired he was of war. And as he continued, he spoke again about his wife and his voice became softer and slower.

“How we used to laugh... So smart, my Maria. Like you. Like...” his voice trailed off.

Maria Christina took his cup and placed it in a niche in the wall, then leaned into him and gently combed his hair with her fingers. Her hand was cool. He stopped frowning and smiled as he looked up at her. Then he closed his eyes, let out a small sigh, and turned his face into his pillow. After a moment he let out another small sigh.

When she thought he had fallen asleep, she took his eyeglasses from his lap and put them in their case and was placing them beside the cup when he stopped her with a sharp gesture and a renewed burst of life:

“You keep them for me, my blood and heart.”

The old man smiled at her as he settled back into his pillows. It was her grandfather who first noticed they had the same severe astigmatism when at three years old she was looking at her thumb an inch from her right eye. Her father insisted it be kept a secret if she ever hoped to have a husband. Pappou felt responsible, having passed on this handicap to his favourite granddaughter, and discreetly shared his round tortoise shell glasses with her when they were alone in the house. 

As he lay peacefully smiling up at her, Maria Christina quickly dismissed the thought of life without him. He was old and unwell but surely not near death. It was the anticipation of war that tired him so. She wiped perspiration from his forehead with her apron and softly kissed his nose. Then she rose and returned to the bench, running her hand along a beautifully woven tapestry which wrapped around the curved white chimney just above the fireplace. It was the last of the chimney aprons her mother had woven, and it was becoming dry and brittle from the heat and would soon have to be replaced. She put her cheek to it. Over the years so much of the evidence of her mother’s life had disappeared, and the slow deterioration of the fabric only served to deepen the longing for the ghost who died shortly after giving birth to her. Feeling alone and frightened once again, she clutched the glasses to her breast and sat back down on the bench and rocked back and forth a moment. Closing one eye and squinting with the other, she could see huge snow crystals swirling in the wind outside the small window at the base of the hearth, as if they, too, were anxiously awaiting the inevitable sound of war.

2

Matoula always entered like a gust of wind, constantly moving, straightening, dusting, cleaning, teaching, talking, with an easy smile, always heartfelt, revealing perfect teeth. She always knew what the weather was going to be, whose garden was finest, who was fighting with whom, all the latest gossip. Glancing at Pappou deep into his nap, she spoke softly while unloading an armload of packages, two small oak barrels of water, and her two year old daughter, Zoitsa, whom she routinely handed to Maria Christina, who smothered her with kisses as she took off her small shepherd’s cloak and unlaced her little boots.

“Costas Stahoulis was dancing outside his pantopolio, knee deep in the snow, twirling his draft notice from the Ministry of Defence as if it were a handkerchief.”

“It’s very comforting to know that clown will be defending us.”

“The same battalion my Yiannis will be joining in a few days.”

“That’s good. Stahoulis will probably be needing a doctor.”

Matoula coughed then covered her mouth to stifle a laugh. She loved to laugh, and nobody could make her laugh like Maria Christina. Telling a story, Maria Christina would act out all the parts using different voices, even their cow, Afendoula, and Matoula would hide her face in her hands and laugh until she had to hold her sides.

“No more! I can’t breathe!” Then she would walk around all day laughing to herself.

As if nature hadn’t been cruel enough, Maria Christina had grown up in the shadow of her stunningly beautiful sister, two years her senior, tall and strong and nimble as a deer, a goddess by any measure, and she was married. For Maria Christina her older sister was the best and worst of her life. Matoula was her eyes and ears to the world. From her earliest memories it was Matoula’s loving hand she was holding, always happy Maria Christina was tagging along, describing with exquisite clarity what Maria Christina could see only in blurred images. Especially in the warm summers, in the fields, in the garden, they were inseparable. But Matoula was also everything Maria Christina was not and, as much as she loved her, she envied her. She was aware of it, but she couldn’t help it and likened it to a termite infestation that was slowly hollowing out her soul, her ability to love, to care, and in its place leaving nothing but the growing feeling that her life had no purpose.

“You wouldn’t believe how many soldiers are on the streets.”

“I hope they’re more qualified than Stahoulis or we’re dead.”

“Now sweet?” Zoitsa’s little voice whispered in Maria Christina’s ear as her aunt took off her second boot. The girl’s eyes widened as she waited for her aunt’s response.

“After your dinner.” Maria Christina kissed her scowling cheek and directed her to play on the floor by the fireplace with the small group of barn animals Pappou had carved for her.

Matoula spoke even more softly so Zoitsa wouldn’t hear. “The talk in the village is that the Italians will have to fight for every meter. After five hundred years of Turkish occupation everyone says they’re prepared to give their life rather than be occupied again.”

“Fearless until the first bomb drops. We’re going to be occupied. The only question is will we be eating macaroni or schnitzel.”

Just then the door opened and their father, Papa Yiorgos, the village priest, and his older spinster sister, Panorea, entered. They had left before dawn to help their neighbors round up their flocks. The first big snowstorm had arrived early and continued heavily for three days, and many of the villagers’ animals had been caught in the blizzard before they could be driven far enough down the mountain. Setting his flat-topped hat on a table, Papa Yiorgos glanced at Pappou, then looked to Matoula and whispered, “All is well?” 

Matoula nodded and he took off his cloak and hung it on a peg as the girls quietly began serving the dinner, a leek and cheese pie.

The priest strode over to Pappou, gave him a closer look and a quick blessing, then stood with his wide back to the fire and spoke to Matoula while stroking his long black beard.

“We drove what we could into the schoolhouse. The rest we corralled in the monastery.”

Maria Christina was cutting the pie when she felt her father’s eyes.

“You finished your chores?”

“Yes, Patera.”

Yiannis came in with a basket of individual cream pies for everyone.

“Fresh from the bakery,” he said just above a whisper as he held up the basket. Zoitsa jumped up and ran to her father as he smiled at Papa Yiorgos and acknowledged Panorea and Maria Christina each with a nod. As he scooped up his daughter, he handed his wife the basket.

“What are we celebrating?” she smiled.

“No reason. Just because.” He gave her a quick kiss and gently squeezed her hand.

If Matoula was a goddess, Yiannis was a god. Tall and strong with a square jaw, a brush mustache, and a mop of blonde curly hair. A sophisticated Athenian who had traveled extensively, he smoked English tobacco in a splendid pipe made from meerschaum, a rare white mineral found in Turkey, and dressed in western clothes and was the idol of all the modern-thirsty young men of the village. While visiting a medical school friend, he saw Matoula dancing during the summer festival of the Prophet Elias and was so taken by her beauty and grace that he arranged to marry her in spite of his family’s vehement objections.

Yiannis was also the most beautiful man Maria Christina had ever imagined. From the moment the young doctor from Athens arrived to propose marriage with his friend, the village veterinarian, she found it difficult to keep her eyes from following him. Although she had never actually been close enough to see him other than as a blur, Matoula’s description coupled with his soothing voice and mild manner sharpened his image for her, and she constantly fought the urge to stare at him. It was her dark secret that she was in love with him. In her heart she feared she might even sacrifice her sister’s happiness if he declared his love for her. She knew it was silly and impossible. He was always painfully polite with her, but he otherwise hardly noticed her. Yet she was incapable of stopping herself. Left alone, her imagination would invariably wander to images of him, standing by the fireplace smoking his pipe, or walking into the room carrying his medical bag, or holding Zoitsa who was tickling her nose in his mustache, and in her reverie Zoitsa’s nose would become her own.

Aware these fleeting moments together might be among their last, there was a slow sadness in everyone’s gait, a heaviness that was unusual. Yiannis crossed over to Pappou and gently took his hand to feel his pulse. As she stoked the fire, Maria Christina tried not to notice Matoula join him and speak softly in his ear. That morning he and Matoula hid extra sacks of grain and corn and buried the family’s few treasures in a room originally designed as a hiding place from the Turks, the ‘blind room’, which was located under the ground floor.

Talk over dinner was of the impending war. The rag tag army of Greece wasn’t prepared.

“Everyone says we have no tanks, no anti-tank guns, not even one good anti-aircraft battery.” Yiannis leaned into his father-in-law while filling his pipe.

“From what I see in the village, you don’t even have matching uniforms,” Papa Yiorgos added, looking up at the ceiling and waving his hands as if churning the air. 

“Most of the men are joining with their old hunting rifles.”

“Well, at least they’re accurate.”

“But they aren’t modern! Who knows how they’ll hold up in a battle? Especially with an army and air force with ten times the fire power.”

“Still, we mustn’t lose our faith,” Papa Yiorgos concluded after a moment’s despair.

Following supper the family sat around the fire, Papa Yiorgos and Yiannis drinking tsipouro and talking in low dull tones, Panorea embroidering a vest for herself, Matoula at her loom, while Maria Christina and Zoitsa lay on a platform where Maria Christina was quietly teaching her little blonde niece her colors. Before long there was a light knock on the door. It was Saul Chaimaki, a tall, slender Jewish man in his thirties. Speaking barely above a whisper, he explained that he and his brother, Elias, had ended up with two drachmas too many in the till of their small dry goods store, which meant they must have short-changed someone. Since Panorea had purchased some silk from them yesterday, could it possibly be hers? He looked at Panorea, with her gray hair, gray skin, gray eyes, and her gray personality, while she in turn gave him one of her looks.

“I know you always count your change, Kyria Panorea,” Chaimaki smiled shyly.

“But I have been to everyone’s house who purchased from us. You are last on our list, Kyria, and no one has claimed it.” He looked at Papa Yiorgos, “May I keep it?”

“You have every right, Saul,” Papa Yiorgos assured him.

“Bless, you, Kyrios.” He put his hand over his heart, then backed out of sight with a bow and a small smile. 

Thus the few hours of remaining daylight passed, and when the sun finally disappeared behind the barren limestone peaks everyone went to bed. Families in Metsovo customarily slept together in no particular order on two platforms on either side of the fireplace. Maria Christina always made it a point not to lie next to Yiannis directly for fear it would be like sleeping with the devil. This night, on the right platform Panorea lay lightly snoring between Papa Yiorgos and Pappou. On the other, Yiannis and Matoula cuddled like spoons, while Zoitsa curled up next to Maria Christina, who lay awake on the furthest edge, her back against the wall, her mind racing into the future, trying to pray herself to sleep.

After Yiannis believed everyone was asleep, he slipped quietly out of bed, followed by Matoula, who threw a heavy cloak over their shoulders. Maria Christina heard them proceed to the sitting room where they would be lighting a fire. It was where married couples in Metsovo went in the winter to be intimate.

While they were gone, Pappou dreamt he was being visited by his wife, Maria, who was bathed in a bright light and wearing her wedding dress with its gold embroidery shining like stars. And when she lifted her veil she indeed looked almost exactly like Maria Christina, her sweet face looking happy and warm and welcoming, and he missed her so much, and she beckoned him to join her. And he did.

At that moment, Maria Christina finally prayed herself to sleep.

3

It was just before sunrise when Matoula touched Maria Christina’s arm, waking her, and softly put her finger to her sister’s lips. 

“Pappou is gone,” she whispered. Her eyes were red and filled with tears.

“Gone?”

“To heaven. Please wake Zoitsa and take her down with the animals.”

Maria Christina quickly sat up and turned to see the blurred figures of Yiannis and Papa Yiorgos carrying a body wrapped in a thin blanket out the door. Matoula tenderly kissed the top of her sister’s head and pressed it gently to her waist. Then she hurried from the room. Maria Christina remained frozen a moment, then quickly threw a heavy woollen cape over her shoulders and scooped up Zoitsa in a thick blanket and, before Zoitsa was fully awake, was hurrying down the stairs, desperately searching for a way to explain to the two-year-old something she could barely comprehend herself. She showered the child with kisses as the little one fluttered her eyes awake, then set her in the corner on a bundle of hay and turned away to milk Afendoula. Zoitsa was now wide awake and wondering.

“Moumou. Pappou has gone away. He is in heaven with God.” She let the thought linger a second before she turned back to the puzzled child, smiling through watery eyes, “And we are happy.”

Just then Matoula hurried in from the outside, quickly kissed her daughter, gave Maria Christina a hug with one arm, then ran up the stairs and into the winter room. Within seconds two old women came through the open door, weeping and wailing, and kissed Maria Christina who reached for Zoitsa who had become suddenly frightened. The women continued weeping and wailing and crying out to Pappou as they climbed the stairs, followed by then yet another neighbor arriving wailing and crying. The next few days would be lost to Maria Christina forever, although she would always remember Pappou lying in his coffin facing to the east, clean shaven with his mustache neatly trimmed, wearing his best suit and black curly-lamb cap, a peaceful smile on his lifeless face and a piece of bread in his pocket, so he wouldn’t be hungry on his journey, his hands loosely cupped on his chest, and his wedding band on his finger. Now and then someone would put a coin in those hands and ask him to give their regards to a loved one on the other side.

Everyone from the village came to pay their respects, the women wailing and crying as they sat in the sitting room around the coffin, telling Pappou the latest news and who was there and how much they would miss him. After paying their respects, the men would retire to Papa Yiorgos’ room to smoke and drink tsipouro and talk about Pappou and the coming war.

The funeral was at Papa Yiorgos’ church, Agios Demetrius, named after one of the most important Orthodox military saints. It stood under three huge sycamores in the lowest part of the village at the end of a very steep and winding stone path that led to a series of winding stone steps to within sight of the bell tower, then continued down until you stood parallel to the big bells not ten feet away, then down to the entrance of the stately and proud stone church.

Papa Yiorgos led the somber service with tears in his eyes, while the four Triantafyllou women sat next to the coffin with the rest of the family. After the service, the men walked in a procession to the cemetery, while the women returned to the house to lay out the meal they had collectively prepared and await the men.

At the end of the long day, the rituals had done what they were designed to do, exhaust the bereaved by keeping them continually occupied. Maria Christina was thoroughly drained after the last relative had left and the last crumb swept as she crawled into bed next to the spot where Pappou had always slept. Holding his glasses to her breast and laying her other hand on his absent form, she closed her eyes. He had taught her to read and write and created games to make rudimentary mathematics fun. Whenever he sensed she was feeling melancholic, he would remind her that her name, Triantafyllou, meant “of the rose”.

“There are many kinds of roses,” he would kiss her hand, pretending to be a suitor, making her laugh and blush. “Your sister, Matoula Triantafyllou, is a big red rose, like an autumn cabbage. Maria Christina Triantafyllou is a fine, delicate, wild pink rose with brave blue eyes. Each is perfect and beautiful. But remember, even though the wild rose appears to be the more delicate, it is in fact the stronger.” 

Then he would squeeze her hand to test her strength to which she always squeezed back as hard as she could. Who would tell her now that the world viewed beauty differently than in Metsovo? That her slender wrists and long fingers would be admired everywhere else?

“I’ll go drown myself in the well if it’s not true!” he would bellow.

The person in the world who knew her best, the man she would always be closest to was gone. She hadn’t even realized just how sick he was. She had been told he was just weak from old age. Then with a long sad sigh, she fell asleep almost immediately.

For the next forty days the Triantafyllou women would not leave the house lest they be spat upon by the villagers, it being considered disrespectful to the departed. In three days a large oak vat filled with water appeared in the courtyard, and Pappou’s half-sister, Lena, arrived with a block of black dye and collected all of the tapestries hanging in the house, including the treasured chimney apron, all of the rugs, bed and table covers, curtains, cushions, and the clothes the women would be wearing, including those of Zoitsa. All were to be dyed black and then the weavings returned to their place, tapestries re-hung and the clothes worn for one year.

All the next week Maria Christina didn’t really think much about Pappou - only fleetingly and with no sense of loss. Then on the ninth day it began to snow again and, as was the custom, the women of the village came to sit and wail amid the coal black tapestries in the sitting room, while Maria Christina stayed in the winter room in front of the fireplace, holding and rocking a frightened Zoitsa. With one eye closed and the other squinting, Maria Christina looked through the fireplace window and saw a large white snowflake drift onto the glass, stick for a moment, then melt into nothing. That was when she fully grasped that her beloved Pappou was irretrievably gone. A welling in the pit of her stomach wanted to make a sound she had never made before. It frightened her, as it certainly would her little charge, so Maria Christina quickly hid it away in the deepest recess of her being and continued rocking and letting her thoughts wander, until she suddenly remembered a promise he had made he could now never keep. He would take her to see the sea one day. And the welling began again when the door opened and Yiannis and Matoula came to take their daughter downstairs to play in the hay.

After she had been alone for a moment, Maria Christina held herself tightly and stared out the little window at the gray light. She knew what it meant to have a wounded heart. But for the first time she would allow the wail in her wounded heart to escape. And when she began, she was astonished at how deep and how great the well of sorrow was, and that nearly no amount of wailing might be enough to drain what now appeared to be a sea of despair. And so she continued wailing for her grandfather, for herself, for every woman in the sitting room who had ever lost someone so important to them. She didn’t even stop when Panorea walked in, watched her a moment, then left with a tray of sweets.

The morning of Yiannis’ departure, everyone pretended to be cheerful as he stood in the fog at the door of the cottage in his western clothes under a heavy goat-hair cape, with two large heavy woollen sacks strapped to his back, one with medical supplies, the other personal. Holding his walking stick with the handle of white meerschaum that Pappou had carved and custom fit to his hand, Yiannis looked tired as he kissed the family one by one inside the door of the cottage. Even Panorea allowed herself to be bussed quickly. When he leaned in to kiss Maria Christina she involuntarily inhaled and, for the first time, smelled his musky odor and blushed. Matoula, who was holding Zoitsa, noticed the moment and thought it sweet. Then she handed the child to Maria Christina and walked with Yiannis to the edge of the courtyard, where they stood a moment, her head against his chest. After a moment, they embraced sweetly and kissed, and then Yiannis, too, was gone. Although for Maria Christina, his sweet smell would always remain.

4

By now it was the end of October and the sky had been clear for several days.

The sun had turned the snow in the village to gray-white slush which would freeze later in the day, making the forty-five degree climb up and down the narrow foot-polished stone streets all the more difficult. The autumn harvest had been stored. Children had already gathered the walnuts, men had sorted white and red grapes for the wine-making before taking their flocks to the warmer valleys below. Gardens were rich with squashes and pomegranates. Women were stringing garlands of dried beans, peppers, onions, and garlic which they would hang from the rafters. Everyone who remained in the village found time to take a long stroll in the sun, among the butter yellow crocuses and the huge golden sycamores. 

With each passing day Matoula reported more and more Greek soldiers from as far away as Crete passing through Metsovo on their way to Ioannina or to the mountains in the east. Overlooking the main square, two older carpenters and a woodcutter, men whose work was seasonal, were sitting drinking tsipouro inside Costas Stahoulis’ pantopolio, and listening intently to his wireless radio as the newscaster assessed the state of Greece’s chances in the coming war: 

“Poland, Holland and Belgium, all better armed than Greece, were crushed in but a few weeks. France, a nation of forty-five million, collapsed in only seventeen days. The British are suffering great losses.”

In the small Triantafyllou garden the air was crisp and clean and refreshing. Even on a clear day the sun would only shine for about an hour on their tiny plot of rich black earth, creeping over the roof of the house behind theirs and lighting the arched gate, then passing over the old hand-turned food grinder and the outdoor shower made of barrels, then quickly lighting the animals’ entrance, which was then the first to fall back into shadow as the sun retreated until it disappeared behind the roof of Lena’s house below.

Dressed in their black dresses, crocheted wool shawls, and wool aprons, Maria Christina and Matoula were on their knees sweeping slush with their hands, then placing leeks on the earth and covering them with ferns. This would keep them fresh until late spring. Zoitsa was secured inside Matoula’s shawl, peeking out, watching, learning, occasionally shouting something into her mother’s ear and then laughing, and so the hour was spent with a renewed sense of life.

Yiannis had written from Ioannina. He had reunited with some medical school friends who had also been conscripted, and for them it was as if time had stood still. But he longed for his girls and he missed Metsovo and promised to come home in six weeks for a few days. Matoula carried the letter with her and read it over and over, which vexed Maria Christina, for she longed to read his words, know his thoughts. But Matoula didn’t share the contents except that he might be coming home, which so elated Maria Christina that she had to pretend to do some chore so her sister wouldn’t notice.

Zoitsa, who spoke before she could walk, was now beginning to speak in full sentences and had become a little chatterbox.

“Why?” was her favorite word. And if she didn’t like the answer she would try to change your mind. She had discovered that with a small flirtatious glance, a smile and a kiss, she could have her way with everyone but Panorea, who wasn’t so easily cajoled. She missed her Babá and insisted Maria Christina tell the story about the first time he milked Afendoula and squirted himself in the eye, and then she would laugh and hold herself and parrot her mother:

“Stop! I can’t breathe!”

And no matter how many times she told the story, Zoitsa would have the same reaction. Several times since the funeral, with no apparent connection to anything they were doing, Zoitsa would stop and look up:

“Pappou is with God. We are happy.” Then she would smile and continue as if nothing had changed, as if by knowing death at this early age she now considered it simply another interesting part of life.

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Since the road stopped at Metsovo, so did the Greek army vehicles loaded with supplies, which meant that resupplying the equipment centers high in the mountains had to be left to those in the area who were available and who knew the donkey paths which, of course, meant the young village women. Realizing the army would be utterly dependent on these young women for their survival, in early August the Minister of Defence had instructed the mayor of Metsovo to call a meeting of these women in the beech forest above the village. Both Matoula and Maria Christina attended and the speaker gave a rousing speech which invoked the women of Souli, a village three days walk to the south. Now a legend in Greek history, in 1821, twenty-two women, their ammunition exhausted, starving and having gone days without water, realizing they could no longer fight off the Turks, hurled their children over the high cliff at Zalongo and, as the Turks below watched in disbelief, held hands, sang and danced, stepping and bending, until one by one, they stepped off the cliff and fell to the rocks at their enemy’s feet, choosing death over slavery.

So it was in early October under the leaves of the beech trees now turned yellow that the women once again met and schedules were given out to everyone except Maria Christina and one other girl, an asthmatic. They would remain “on call”.  Maria Christina was so deeply humiliated she avoided looking at anyone for the next week, even Matoula. More than ever she was feeling bitter and angry and helpless and hopeless. She bore it silently, of course, and no one but Matoula seemed to notice what had become a permanent frown. 

Matoula understood her humiliation, but the resupply was certain to be difficult and extremely dangerous. The women would have to travel on foot high into the mountains in the deep snow by night, packed like human mules with food, woollens, arms and ammunition. The resupply route would be under constant surveillance during the day by the Italian Air Force, so the women would have to go to the depot and return home in the same night. Matoula was part of the first group to make the trek. Throughout that night, although they all pretended, no one in the house but Zoitsa slept. Just before dawn, the door opened and Matoula slipped into bed just when it was time for everyone to rise.

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Agios Demetrius’ name day came and went. In preparation for the celebration, Papa Yiorgos went about his duties without showing much enthusiasm. It was his job. He knew what was required. During the long winters less was needed since so many of his parishioners were away. In the last few years, his church’s name day had become less a celebration for him than a marking of time.

At night, with both Pappou and Yiannis gone, Papa Yiorgos sat up alone in the winter room, slowly sipping tsipouro by the fire. He missed having men in the house, the two different generations, older and younger, each with different views of the world. Politics was not a subject for women. He especially missed his father-in-law. The old man’s passing was a great loss to him. Over the years he had grown to love the old wood carver. He had come to consider him a model for all men. He admired his courage in the face of his every misfortune, and again as he quietly suffered his long agonizing stomach cancer. More and more he had sought his advice, leaning on it more than on scripture. The priest was supposed to be the wise one in his parish, the one with the direct line to the Almighty. And yet he felt weak and deserted by his God. And knowing the calamity that was approaching, he was beginning to question the very existence of a God.

His mind would also wander to different loved ones spanning four generations with whom he had lived in this room. He would have imaginary conversations with them about how much the world had changed. How so many had passed on and so few brought into the family. Thinking of his father, he decided that it must have been the same for him and his mother and everyone through the ages. You started as the youngest, then watched yourself become the next generation, until finally you were the old man sitting in the chair your grandfather sat in all day or where your dear mother lay in her sick bed, her essentials within her grasp. And everyone knew what was coming and it was all right because they had tried to live according to the laws of God and Christ and the Virgin, and soon they would cross over to their promised reward, thoughts which always seemed to comfort the priest.

Two days after Agios Demetrius’ name day, while returning from a visit to a sick cousin, Papa Yiorgos passed a large company of soldiers and army trucks amassing at the main square, usually a sleepy place. At the pantopolio, the crowd was much larger than when he had passed it earlier. Everyone was huddled around the wireless listening to the news, so Papa Yiorgos stopped in for a tsipouro. According to reports, Greece was being unjustly accused of allowing British warships to enter its territorial waters and of instigating attacks against Albania. For those reasons Mussolini had given the Greek prime minister, Yiannis Metaxas, an ultimatum in the middle of the night, demanding that the Italian troops be allowed to occupy the islands of Crete and Corfu, the country’s largest port, Piraeus, and the part of Epirus that bordered the Albanian frontier which, of course, included Metsovo. 

The men listening spat on the floor and cursed the Italians. The prime minister had rejected Mussolini’s demand and rudely dismissed his ambassador. Even before the three-hour ultimatum had expired, heavily armed divisions of Italian troops, one with tanks, were crossing from Albania into Greece.

Papa Yiorgos never finished his tsipouro. Instead he hurried directly to his church to try and calm himself, but he found the door ajar and Aristotle Tritos sweeping the floor. The small square widower, known affectionately by everyone in the village as Tatamare, had also heard the news and had retreated to the one place and activity that quieted him when he was upset. A retired shepherd in his sixties, Tatamare had three married daughters who, having seen so little of him for so many years, waited on him hand and foot. He had become the Candle Lighter, or caretaker, of Agios Demetrius Church as an offering of gratitude for all his good fortune. It was Tatamare who, twenty years ago, first pointed out Pappou’s excellent qualities to Papa Yiorgos when the priest had been resentful that he had inherited another dependent.

Papa Yiorgos watched the small, square Candle Lighter disappear behind the altar and listened to the sounds of his sweeping a moment longer, then quietly closed the door and hurried up the wide stone steps towards his house, reporting the news to everyone he encountered along the way, and encouraging them to have faith in God.

5

Maria Christina was in the courtyard, combing Zoitsa’s hair for lice, when she first heard the airplanes. Zoitsa was initially excited by the big birds streaming across the sky and the huge snowflakes they were dropping, but became suddenly afraid when Maria Christina reflexively picked her up and prepared to run inside. When there were no explosions, no smoke or fire, but rather a groundswell of voices and cries of surprise, Maria Christina hesitated, then slowly set Zoitsa down and waited as one of the bombers darkened their garden and the giant snowflakes started to land: three in their little patch, and one that slid down the roof.

The snowflakes appeared to be handkerchiefs. When Maria Christina opened one, she was surprised to see it was filled with chocolates and a note which began:

“Roman brothers for freedom...”

Having researched Metsovo, the Italian high command discovered they had a common ancestry. The town had been settled in the 14th century by a group known as Vlachs, a people believed to be descendants of the progeny of Roman soldiers sent to Greece in the 3rd century to guard the high passes, and who had fraternized with local Greek women before they fled in the wake of the barbarian invasion. The village was inhabited almost entirely by these same people who still spoke a language Latin in structure and, to a great extent, used Latin vocabulary, which the high command decided they could exploit.

Zoitsa was naturally pleased when she saw the chocolates, but Maria Christina quickly gathered up the handkerchiefs and, in spite of the child’s protestations, scooped her up once again and retreated back into the house.

Before dinner, Papa Yiorgos stood with his back to the fire and reported to Matoula what she had already reported to the others before he arrived.

“Most of these gifts from the sky are now in the pockets of a cavalry unit who just arrived. Given to them by the villagers with instructions exactly where the Italians should stuff them!” He laughed and shook his head “God forgive me!” then laughed again and continued. “Their unit is moving forward to protect the pass. All the available infantry have also been sent. They’re moving in small groups with pack artillery, and many guns and firearms. To tell you the truth, Matoula, I’m heartened by their enthusiasm.”

His optimism infected the household and there was a temporary burst of cheerfulness as the family went about its day. 

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Having received the same response to their chocolates and handkerchiefs that their prime minister had given to their ambassador, the Italians started bombing their Roman brothers and sisters. At the sound of the first explosion, the Triantafyllou family retreated to the blind room where they lit candles and Papa Yiorgos led them in prayer. When it first started, Maria Christina felt a strange sense of relief. No more waiting. It was happening and her heart was thumping and her breathing was short and shallow, and all she could think about was Yiannis, who was on the front line covered only by the canvas of a hospital tent. Zoitsa sat tightly sandwiched between her mother and Maria Christina, and became increasingly frightened as the earth shook with each thunderous explosion. And then it was over. The silence that followed was total. It was equally frightening, as if it was only a pause before the bomb which was destined to be yours. Then, after a minute or two, a sigh of relief, a prayer of thanks, then up the ladder to the ground floor and they would resume their daily chores, while Papa Yiorgos would rush down to the church to assess any damage. It was never touched. But adding to everyone’s sorrow and fear, Zoitsa’s godmother, Athena Bouba, was killed during the first wave while in her garden storing leeks. 

Because Metsovo was critical for their conquest of Greece, the Italian ground invasion was entrusted to the famous Julia Alpine Division of twelve thousand men. Outnumbering the Greeks two to one, and their artillery ten to one, the Italian generals soon became awed by the courage of the Greeks and the accuracy of their artillery. By the time they realized that it was the glare of the sun on their shiny helmets that was signalling the Greeks their exact positions, the fine Julia Division found itself separated on two different mountains, hampered from movement by sudden torrential rains and attacked day and night by small units taking advantage of the element of surprise. In the pass just above Metsovo called Katara, or “the curse”, Italy’s proud Alpinists in their smart green-gray uniforms and shiny black plumed helmets were halted for five days by a rag tag army of soldiers wearing mismatched uniforms and shepherd’s cloaks. The Italians were evidently weary and, as the blinding torrential rains became sleet and ice during the long nights, thousands became victims of the white death, frostbite, which turned their legs and feet black and swollen like potatoes. They slept in the yellow mud, urinated on themselves, and cracked open the skulls of near dead donkeys to use the steaming brains for warmth.

News of the war traveled quickly from the field to the telegraph lines to the wireless radios and, after returning home from the village every day, Matoula would deliver the news to Panorea and Maria Christina, who always expected to hear the worst. Yet in only a few days five thousand Italians, surrounded and exhausted, surrendered, and a panicked Rome ordered the few thousand still remaining to retreat with all possible speed.

Neither Maria Christina nor Panorea could believe their ears. Or their eyes the next day, when the bombs stopped dropping and houses in Metsovo suddenly were housing Italian prisoners of war and the women were treating them as recalcitrant adolescents.

“After all, a mother birthed them as well.”

Matoula reported that, throughout the village, heads were held high and chests were puffed. Talk was that they were the first to defeat the Axis, fighting with the same valor and wile as their ancestors who had defeated the Trojans, the Persians, and the Turks, and that this was simply another glorious page in their three-thousand-year history. Everyone was mad with pride and patriotism, flags were flying everywhere. With each victory the people would emerge from their houses and cheer and dance and sing in the streets. Church bells would ring madly and the village would remain alive late into the night.

“If you want to visit Italy, join the Italian army,” Maria Christina said dryly to Matoula one night during a victory celebration, a joke Matoula spread until it was on the lips of everyone in the village by morning.

Papa Yiorgos held special prayer services both at home and at Agios Demetrius to thank the legendary warrior for his help. His faith had been restored. There was indeed a God. And he was a wise and just God, and simply because the weaver didn’t see the pattern of the tapestry until it was completed and he finally turned it over didn’t mean there was no pattern, or that life was random and there was no power in prayer. And he now went about his duties with a renewed vigor and a special place in his heart for the saint whose stately church he pastored.

Another letter arrived from Yiannis. He was still in Ioannina and was up to his elbows in blood, trying to stitch together wounded Greeks. His leave was, of course, canceled and he would be moving east with the army to set up a field hospital. God knows when and from where he would be able to write again. But he loved his girls and missed them, and wanted to be remembered by the family and the boys at Stahoulis’.

So life continued normally in Metsovo for the little family with one small exception.

While everyone seemed happier, Matoula seemed to grow dispirited and appeared unusually tired. After much prodding, she confided to her sister that she had missed two periods in a row and her breasts had begun to swell. Maria Christina’s mind immediately raced to the fact that in a few days Matoula was again scheduled to resupply the troops. And because the army was pushing the remaining Italians towards the Albanian border, the equipment center had been moved further away and the women were no longer able to reach it in one night. They needed to lay in the snow without moving during the day, so they had been instructed to wear dark earth colors that would appear like rocks to the Italian Air Force, who were constantly patrolling. Trekking back down from the resupply center to Metsovo in one night was not a problem, since it took half the time.

Maria Christina was relentless in her appeals to Matoula to be her substitute. She argued passionately, first for the safety of the baby.

“The baby will be fine,” Matoula shrugged her off.

Then for the health of the mother.

“I’m pregnant. I’m not sick. I feel fine.”

Finally, Maria Christina begged her to give her the chance to finally be respected by the community. She was stronger than anyone imagined. She could do it, she was certain of it. It would mean so much to her. So much. When she finally, tearfully exhausted her arguments, Matoula cleverly told her that she would leave it to someone with the wisdom of Solomon to decide. So Matoula agreed if Maria Christina could get their father’s permission, which she knew was impossible, she could take her place. But she wouldn’t allow her sister to use the pregnancy in her argument.

“The first to know should be Yiannis. So for now it has to remain a secret.”

“Of course. I understand,” Maria Christina bit her lip, deeply resenting her sister’s utter lack of sympathy and support.

Even though it had begun to snow, the church was filled to overflowing on Sunday morning and Papa Yiorgos, known to have the best singing voice of any priest in the village, had been in excellent form and was now in an exceptionally good mood as the three women served him wine and feta cheese pie, which he ate hungrily. When he had finished, he bowed his head and clasped his hands, after which everyone stopped and did the same. A thank you for the blessed meal, and the priest stood up and stepped to the fireplace. Maria Christina moved close to him and quietly asked him if she could speak to him in his room.

Though there were only four rooms in most houses in Metsovo, the master of every household had one room which was exclusively his, where he would conduct business or just be alone. Papa Yiorgos’ room contained books and mementos which included a photograph of himself with the Archbishop of Epirus, and valued icons handed down from unknown generations. In winter a fire was lit every morning, so the room was still warm when the father and daughter entered. Maria Christina was sorely tempted to tell her father the truth. But she understood that it was not her secret to tell.

Trembling slightly, she held her hands behind her back as she stepped to the fireplace. Papa Yiorgos waited patiently. It was quite unusual to have his younger daughter request a private conversation. Maria Christina started by saying how she felt as though she had been unjustly undervalued by the mayor’s wife.

“It would extinguish any chance of ever finding a husband, Patera. On the other hand, by joining I could prove I was worthy.”

The more she talked the faster the words came, until Papa Yiorgos backed away and with a hand in the air he ordered her to stop.

“You are much too delicate.”

“But Patera...”

She had been dismissed. And before she could blurt out the truth, her father had turned and left the room.

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The night before Matoula was scheduled to leave, the two sisters slept together and held and cradled each other as they sometimes had as children, mother and daughter, taking turns, each closer to the other than anyone else in the world. Just before she drifted off to sleep, Matoula thought she heard her sister whisper in her ear.

“I’m going with you.”