Captain Corelli's mandolin (34 page)

At the summit of Mt Aenos, Alekos rose from his bed of skins at dawn, and reminded himself that he had better milk a few nanny goats if he was going to make any cheese. But first of all it was time to go out with his rifle and check if all of his charges were still there. Just recently there had been people who called themselves 'andartes', who appeared from nowhere and tried to steal his goats. He had already shot two of them and left their flesh for the Egyptian vultures.

He did not understand it. This kind of thing had not happened since his great-grandfather's time, in the days when these andartes were called klefts. Well, never mind, he had acquired two new rifles and a lot of ammunition thanks to the goat-thieves, and he doubted very much if they would ever return. It took a man of incredible tenacity and stamina to climb that mountain, and he had probably shot the only two who had been sufficiently strong in leg and lung.

Perhaps it was something to do with the war. He had noticed early on that there must be a war, because sometimes at night the whole sky was lit up with distant searchlights, and very often he saw flashes of gunfire followed by distant rumbles. It was a lovely and entertaining thing to sit outside his but at night, watching the fireworks and eating cheese dunked in olive oil and thyme. It made him feel very much less alone, and he hoped wistfully that the war would not end before the festival of the saint. When the doctor had come up the mountain, he had confirmed that indeed there was a war, saying that some people were starving so pitifully that tiny children had grown straight into little old men with wispy beards and stooping backs. It seemed that their stomachs had told them that there was no point in bothering to be young, and it seemed that before long Mother Nature would see to it that babies came out of their mothers already nailed into a box.

When the Liberator growled overhead, he did not pay very much attention, because they flew frequently and in pairs or threes, disappearing like noisy bats in the general direction of the mainland.

But this time he looked up, perhaps from instinct, and beheld a particularly pretty sight. A sort of white mushroom was drifting down with a tiny man suspended underneath, and what was marvellous about it was that the rising sun was glinting from the silk before it had had time to become more than a suspicion of a glow upon the horizon. Alekos stood up and watched it with fascination. Perhaps it was an angel. It was certainly garbed in white. He crossed himself and struggled to remember a prayer. He had never heard of an angel that floated about below a mushroom, but you never know. And it seemed that the angel had a big rock, perhaps a package, hanging from his feet on a rope.

The angel tugged hard at one side of the strings that attached it to the mushroom, and at the last minute it seemed to be coming down so fast that it was bound to crash. Alekos felt some satisfaction in having been right when indeed the angel came down with a thud, fell over sideways, cracked its head on a rock, and was dragged along the ground, the crosswind billowing out the silk. He seized one of his rifles and ran over to it; it was best to be sure, and perhaps even the angels were so famished nowadays that they had taken to stealing goats.

It was a very red-faced angel, and it was terribly tangled up in strings and the fabric of the diaphanous mushroom. Alekos cocked the rifle and pointed it straight into the angel's face. It opened its eyes, looked at him politely, said, 'What ho,' and went straight to sleep.

It took Alekos some time to disentangle the angel from its webbing and cords, and he decided that the wondrous cloth of the mushroom would make a most luxurious sheet. It also had an ingenious hole in the middle through which one could place one's head, thereby allowing the mushroom to be worn as a robe. Alekos decided that he would wear it to the feast of the saint, if the angel would give it to him and allow him to cut off the strings.

He moved the heavenly visitor into his hut, and went to open the large packet that had fallen with him; it contained a heavy metal box with dials, and a small engine. Alekos was by no means stupid, and he concluded that the angel was probably bringing in the engine so that he could build himself some kind of vehicle.

For two days he fed it on honey and yoghurt, and other dainties that he thought suitable for such a creature from another world, and was delightedly pleased when it began to sit up, rub its head, and talk.

The trouble was that he could not make head or tail of what it was saying. He did recognise some of the words, but the rhythm of angel-speech was quite foreign to him, the words did not seem to fit together, and it spoke as if it had a pebble in its throat and a bee up its nose. The angel was obviously very annoyed and frustrated at not being understood, and it made Alekos feel fearful and guilty even though it was not his fault. They had to resort to communicating by signs and facial expressions.

The most intriguing thing about the angel was that when it wanted to speak to God or one of the saints, it fiddled about with the metal box and made lots of interesting whines and hisses and crackles. And then God would speak back in angel-speech, sounding so far away and stilted that Alekos realised for the first time how difficult it was for God to get himself heard by anyone. He began to recognise words that were repeated often, like 'Charlie' and `Bravo', and 'Wilco', and 'Roger'. Another odd thing about the creature was that it carried a pistol, a light automatic, and a number of very heavy khaki-coloured iron pine cones with metal levers that he was not allowed to touch. All the angels he had ever seen in pictures carried swords or spears, and it seemed odd that God had seen fit to modernise.

After four days the angel showed clear signs of wanting to go somewhere, and Alekos, having struggled with his reluctance to leave his goats to the andarte thieves, tapped his chest, smiled, and indicated that the angel should follow him. It accepted with gratitude and gave him chocolate, which he ate in one go, feeling slightly sick afterwards. However, it did not want to go in daylight, and Alekos had to wait until dusk. It also wanted to exchange its webbing packs for a large goatskin. As far as Alekos was concerned, this was the best deal that had ever come his way, and he accepted with alacrity, despite a small twinge of guilt over having diddled an angel, albeit involuntarily and by consent. It consigned its metal box and small engine to the goatskin, bound it up with cord, and slung it over its shoulder.

Alekos knew that the only person who might have a chance of understanding angel-speech was Dr Iannis, and accordingly it was to that house that he took the angel. It took four days of travelling at night with what Alekos considered to be quite unnecessary stealth, and it took three days of hiding in the maquis in the outrageous heat, being bitten to death by mosquitoes and trying to talk in whispers. It seemed quite likely that God had expelled this particular angel from heaven on the grounds of insanity. But Alekos was not going to protest; it had very fair hair, was outstandingly tall, had indefatigable powers of endurance, and possessed all of its teeth, giving it a very engaging smile. It also scowled fiercely when Italian or German soldiers were nearby, and from this Alekos deduced that God was undoubtedly fighting for the Greeks.

Dr Iannis was awoken at three o'clock in the morning by a gentle tapping on his window. He lay still for a moment, wondering with irritation how a branch could be doing such a thing when there was not any tree. Finally he rolled out of bed and unbolted the shutters.

He saw Alekos, which was surprising enough, but he also saw a very tall fair-haired man dressed in the fustanella of an evzone. Alekos perceived the expression of perplexity on the doctor's face, raised his hands, shrugged, said, `I've brought you an angel,' and departed before he could become involved in any arguments about responsibility for it.

The angel smiled and held out his hand, 'Bunnios,' he said, 'I cleped am.'

'The doctor shook the proffered hand through the window, and said, 'Dr Iannis.'

'Sire, of youre gentillesse, by the leve of yow wol I speke in pryvetee of certeyn thyng.'

The doctor knitted his brows in bewilderment, 'What?'

The strange man signalled that he wanted to come in, and the doctor sighed impatiently, reckoning upon telling him to go around to the door. But as soon as he nodded the man put one hand up to the frame of the window and bounded through. He dumped his skin full of equipment upon the floor; and shook the doctor's hand all over again. Pelagia came in blearily, having heard the sounds, and beheld a man dressed in the tasselled cap, the white kilt and hose, the embroidered waistcoat, and the slippers with pompoms that was the festival dress of sortie people on the mainland. It was very grubby, but unmistakably new. She looked up at him in amazement, and put her hand over her mouth.

Wide-eyed, she demanded of her father, 'Who's this?'

'Who's this?' repeated the doctor. 'How am I supposed to know? Alekos said it was an angel and then ran off. He says he's called Bunnios, and he talks Greek like a Spanish cow.'

The outlandish man bowed politely and shook Pelagia's hand. She let it go limp in his, and could not conceal her astonishment. He smiled charmingly and said, 'I preise wel thy fresshe beautee and age tendre, I trow.'

'I am Pelagia,' she said, and then she asked her father, 'What's he speaking? It's not Katharevousa.'

'Of course it isn't. And it certainly isn't Romaic.'

'Do you think it's Bulgarian or Turkish or something?'

'Greek of th'olde dayes,' said the man, adding, 'Pericles. Demosthenes. Homer.'

'Ancient Greek?' exclaimed Pelagia, disbelievingly. She stepped back for fear of being in the company of a ghost. She had heard from childhood all about the Marble Emperor who had been carried by an angel to a cave, whence he would return one day to drive out the oppressors. But this man seemed more flesh than marble, and it was only a silly legend. There was another tale about fair-haired strangers from the north who would bring deliverance. Who knows? The doctor tapped his forefinger to his forehead, and looked up triumphantly.

'English?' he asked.

'Engelonde,' agreed the man. 'Natheless, I prithee, by my trouthe . . . ' 'Of course we won't tell anyone. Please may we speak English? Your pronunciation is truly terrible. It hurts my head. Pelagia, bring a glass of water and some spoon sweets.'

The Englishman smiled with what was obviously an enormous relief; it had been an awful burden to be speaking the finest public school Greek, and not be understood. He had been told that he was the nearest thing to a real Graecophone that could be found under the circumstances, and he knew perfectly well that modern Greek was not quite the same as the Greek of Eton, but he had had no idea that he would be found quite so incomprehensible. It was also very clear that someone in Intelligence had contrived a completely aberrant notion of what was worn in Cephallonia.

'We are having an Italian officer asleeping in a room,' said the doctor, whose English was not as good as he liked to believe, 'so we are being very quiet, please.'

The Englishman unbound his goatskin and removed a revolver. Pelagia was horrified. As far as she was concerned, no one was going to shoot Antonio. The man saw her consternation and said, 'A precaution. I wouldn't want to bring about reprisals unless I jolly well had to.'

'A spy?' asked the doctor. 'Espionage?'

The man nodded, and said, 'Very hush-hush. Do you have any clothes I could have? I would be most frightfully grateful.'

The doctor indicated the fustanella; 'Is not our cloths of Cephallonia.'

He pointed to a framed picture on the wall of a young man in kneelength breeches, a white sash about his waist, a white floppy cap upon his head, and a waistcoat with two rows of broad silver buttons. 'Is our cloths,' he explained, 'but only feast. We dress same as you. I bring you cloths, you give me fustanella, OK?'

The doctor had always wanted a set of fustanella and had never been able to afford it. Whilst fetching some ordinary clothes he said, `Thank you Wiston Tzortzil,' raising his eyes to heaven as though Churchill were the deity. One day he would astonish everybody at a celebration. He chuckled with anticipative delight. The mangas in the kapheneion would think he had given up being a Europeanised alafranga and turned into one of those traditionalist fustanellophoroi. He wondered where he could find one of those elaborate traditional pipes, a tsibouki, to complete the picture.

It was far from easy to get the spy into the garments of a smaller man, but it was a small consolation that they both required an identical size of hat. The trussed Englishman departed for Argostoli at dawn, the turn-ups of his trousers half way up his pink calves and the jacket unfastenable, bearing his equipment in a hessian sack, also provided by the doctor, who would not let him depart without imparting some sound advice: `Look, OK? You accent terrible-terrible. Not to talk, understand? You are quiet until you learning. Also, you watch out andartes. They thieves, not soldiers, they say Communist, but they thieves. They not interested fighting, understand? Italians OK, Germans not good, see?'

And so it was that Lieutenant `Bunny' Warren, seconded to the SOE from the King's Dragoon Guards, with astounding initiative and outstanding cheek, set up his home in a large house in which four Italian officers were already billeted. He perplexed and confounded them by trying to communicate in Latin, and every week he trekked to the deserted shack where he had installed his radio and his recharging engine. He reported in great detail to Cairo, informing them of troop movements and numbers, just in case the Allies should decide to invade Greece instead of Sicily.

It was a lonely life, and it was galling to be considered mad, but then madness was perhaps the best disguise. With his bodybelt full of gold sovereigns he covered Cephallonia on foot, memorising everything, and once or twice he climbed Mt Aenos to pay his respects to his first host, who was never entirely convinced that he had not been an angel. He sometimes joined up with the conveniently peripatetic Father Arsenios, and passed for another prophetic religious fanatic.