Aphrodite's Island Read online

  A moment later a voice came over a loudhailer.

  ‘Do not try to move forward. The road ahead of you is blocked. If you do not give way some of your people may get hurt. I repeat, move back! Disperse quietly and go to your homes. There is nothing you can do here.’

  The appeal was met with a new bout of chanting and insults but the pressure eased a little. Looking around me, I saw a narrow alleyway just behind and to my left. A few people were already slipping quietly away down it. I squirmed and shoved my way through the crowd until I reached it. The relief of being out of the crush of bodies and into the comparative coolness of the alley made me feel light-headed. I followed the others towards the road at the far end, with very little idea of where I intended to go next, and just as I reached the junction a jeep pulled up across the end of the alley. Two soldiers jumped out and came towards me.

  One of them took me by the arm and when I struggled he said cheerfully, ‘No need to panic, miss. Our officer wants a word, that’s all. We’re not going to harm you.’

  They marched me to the jeep and pushed me up into the passenger seat. Stephen sat behind the wheel.

  He said, ‘OK, lads. Get back up on the roof and keep an eye on what’s going on. I’ll join you in a minute.’

  The two men turned and ran back down the road, their boots clattering on the paving stones. I gazed straight ahead of me and tried not to let him see that I was shaking.

  He said, ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Thank God! I was terrified you were going to get hurt. It’s lucky I was able to see what was going on and warn the officer in charge. The last thing we need is a death or a serious injury.’

  I glanced sideways at him. ‘It was you who made them stop shoving us?’

  ‘I radioed the CO and told him what was happening.’

  ‘Thank you.’ My voice was tight and my throat ached.

  He put his hand over mine. ‘Ariadne, darling, why couldn’t you stay away? Did you have to get involved?’

  I pulled my hand away. ‘Why can’t you people stay out of the way? We only want to make our feelings known. It’s our city, after all.’

  ‘You know why. Remember what happened to the British Institute? We couldn’t let the government offices be burnt to the ground, could we?’

  ‘Why not? It’s not our government. Why should we be governed by some British aristocrat who doesn’t know anything about our country?’

  ‘Darling, Sir John Harding is not a British aristocrat. He’s a career soldier and he knows this island and loves it. I’m sure he only wants what is best for all of you.’

  ‘Don’t call me darling! Your soldiers have just nearly crushed me to death.’

  ‘I’m sorry. You know I would never have wanted this to happen.’ His voice was anguished. ‘Ariadne, please! Don’t let this come between us. I have to carry out my orders. You know that.’

  People were still coming down the alley and they gazed at us curiously as they passed. I moved to get out.

  ‘I can’t be seen sitting here with you.’

  He restrained me with a hand on my wrist. ‘It’s all right. Tell anyone who asks that I had you brought in for questioning because I thought you were one of the ringleaders. That’s what I told my men.’

  I looked at him properly for the first time and felt the usual quiver in my stomach, as if I had just stepped into thin air.

  He said, ‘I love you! We mustn’t let this make any difference. Please!’

  I knew he was right. Whatever happened between our people, nothing could alter the way we felt about each other.

  I said, ‘Shall I see you on Sunday?’

  ‘Yes, of course. But I want to see you alone. When?’

  ‘When can you get away?’

  ‘Any day. I’ll find an excuse, somehow.’

  ‘Tuesday, then. About four o’clock.’ A plan was beginning to shape itself in my mind.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I’ll give you a map on Sunday. Bring some papers with you and put them where I can knock them off.’

  ‘I understand.’ His smile wiped away the last traces of my anger. ‘Thank you, my darling girl.’

  I started to get out of the jeep. He said, ‘Won’t you let me drive you out of the city? I could drop you somewhere you could get a bus back to Ayios Epiktetos.’

  I shook my head. ‘I’ve got to find the others. If this is going to work, they have to think I’m committed to the cause. Don’t worry. I’ll be careful. I’ll see you on Sunday.’

  I crouched on the sandy floor of the cave and peered out between the branches of the fallen pine tree that almost hid the entrance. My brothers and I had found the place years ago, when I was still young enough to be allowed to roam the hills with the boys. It had been our secret hiding place for a long time – a pirates’ cave, a spaceship, an outlaws’ hide-out – until Iannis and Demetrios grew out of make-believe and exchanged their toy pistols for real guns and I was told it was time I began to behave like a young lady. I had almost forgotten it existed until the day of the demonstration.

  The pine tree had blown down in some long-ago storm but had clung to the rocky slope with enough roots to keep it alive, so that the sunlight filtered in through green branches and scented the air with resin. Where I sat the cave-mouth was fairly wide and we had thought at first that it was no more than a sheltered overhang in the side of the rock face. When we looked closer we discovered that further back there was a narrow passage leading into the hillside. Iannis and Demetrios had wanted to explore it but the sunlight did not penetrate beyond the opening and within a few yards they found themselves in total darkness. We often talked about making torches out of the pine branches and going deeper but we never had – at least not to my knowledge. Iannis tried to tell us that he had gone in once alone and that after a short distance the passage opened out into a huge cave, but he spoilt the story by adding that the cave was full of gold bars and jewels left by pirates long ago and now guarded by a fire-breathing dragon. Even then, young as I was, I knew there were no such creatures. Just the same, when I arrived that afternoon I had taken the precaution of throwing a few small rocks into the dark opening, just in case some less than mythological serpent had taken up residence there.

  I had given my parents the impression that the events at the demonstration had fired me with patriotic resolve. As far as they knew, I was even now attending a meeting to plan further action. I craned forward, watching the narrow path that slanted up the steep slope through the trees. It was just after four. Surely, I told myself, Stephen could not have misunderstood my directions. My plan had worked perfectly. He had left his books and papers on the arm of his chair and when I passed to collect his coffee cup it had been easy to knock them to the floor, and easy as I knelt to collect them to slip the map I had drawn in among them. He must know his way around well enough to recognize the landmarks. I had even marked the tree at the beginning of the narrow path, as I had promised in my note, by hanging an old Coca-Cola can from one of the branches.

  A rock clattered down the slope, dislodged by somebody’s foot. A moment later I saw him, moving cautiously, one hand on the revolver at his hip. For an instant I felt afraid. Could he really think I was luring him into an ambush? Then he stooped on the far side of the screen of branches, trying to peer into the darker space beyond.

  ‘Ariadne?’

  I caught my breath. ‘I’m here!’

  He pushed the branches apart and scrambled through. There was no need for words. We went straight into each other’s arms. His kisses burned my mouth. I could feel the sun-heat of his body and smell his sweat. The rest of the universe vanished.

  At length he lifted his head and looked down into my face. ‘Ariadne, what do you want – from me?’ I frowned, unsure what he was asking. Did he think I was spying for the terrorists – or looking for money? He went on, ‘You know, if things were different I would be coming to speak to your father, to ask for your hand in marriage
. But you tell me that is impossible as things stand. I would take you away from here and marry you anyway, if I could. But neither of us is a free agent. I have to serve out my two years’ National Service and you will not come of age for longer than that. If I thought that at the end of that time we could marry, I would wait – if that is what you want. I know long engagements are normal here. But I can’t do it like this. Not if we are going to meet secretly, alone. It’s more than flesh and blood can stand. Do you know what I am saying?’

  I knew. I had little experience of men except for dark hints from my mother but I was not completely naive. I had thought of little else since I slipped the map into his papers and I had come to my decision. My heart was thumping so hard that it seemed to shake my whole body.

  ‘I understand. I can’t help what my father thinks – and three years is too long to wait.’

  ‘You’re sure? You’ve thought about this?’

  I reached my arms round his neck. ‘I’m sure.’

  I had heard fearsome stories of the pain and embarrassment of a bride’s first night, whispered in the twilight by friends who had heard it from older sisters and cousins. It was nothing like that. Already every nerve in my body was pricking with desire, so that when his hand slipped inside my blouse and found my breast the nipple was already as hard as an almond and when he eased the blouse off and unfastened my bra I was proud that my breasts were full and firm enough to please him. He undid my skirt and I lifted myself so that he could pull it down and my knickers came with it. I kept my eyes closed but the knowledge that he was looking at my naked body sent a thrill of ecstasy through me. There was a moment of awkwardness when he drew back and I was aware of him fumbling with something but I understood what he was doing. Then he slipped his hand between my legs and my body took control so that all conscious thought ceased. When the pain came it was sharp but brief and I felt it as a kind of triumph. Sensing the urgency of his desire and hearing him pant and groan with pleasure as he came, I was suddenly flooded with a sense of power, of what it meant to be a woman.

  CHAPTER 4

  Karaolis will hang! He was condemned to death for the murder of a policeman the day after I let Stephen make love to me. Iannis says he will be our first martyr. Since then, five British soldiers have been killed. I am terrified for Stephen. I know he goes wandering about the island alone and everyone thinks he is a spy. Perhaps he is. How do I know what he does when he is not with me? Am I a traitor to my own people?

  Two nights ago I was woken by the sound of footsteps and low voices outside my window. Looking out, I saw five mules standing in the street below. Men were coming and going from the house, carrying packages wrapped in oilskin, Iannis and Demetrios among them. I recognized the packages. They were the rifles that had been hidden under the floorboards for months. Some of the mules were already loaded with unfamiliar crates and boxes. I wondered whether they were arms that had just been acquired somehow or whether they had been hidden all along in other houses in the village. Whichever it was, I could understand why the decision had been taken to move them. Every day we heard tales of other villages that had been surrounded at night by troops who travelled in convoys without lights through the mountains. At dawn the search would commence and there was no time to move the arms to safer hiding places.

  The night air was cool and I wrapped myself in my shawl, but it was not the cold that made me tremble. I had no idea what EOKA’s plans were, except for the hints Iannis gave when he talked of ‘giving the Brits a taste of their own medicine’, but there had already been deaths on both sides and the situation was getting more tense every day. It occurred to me that perhaps these guns and whatever else was in the crates were not being moved to a safer place but were being prepared for an attack or an ambush. In that case, should I warn Stephen? How could I, when my own brothers might be the ones caught or killed in the confrontation?

  I knew most of the men down in the street but there was one I had never seen before, a short, powerfully built man who seemed to be in charge of the operation. When the mules were all loaded he beckoned the others to him and they gathered by the wall of the house, just below my bedroom window. Voices were lowered but in the still night air I could hear every word.

  ‘Which of you knows the way to this cave?’

  ‘I do.’ It was Iannis’s voice. ‘We played there as kids. I’m the one who suggested it.’

  ‘Right. You lead the way. Let’s get going.’

  I sat rigid by the window until the clacking of the mules’ hooves had faded into the distance. My brain felt as paralyzed as my body. Eventually, I dragged myself back to the bed and lay down, pulling the blankets close around me to try to still the trembling that gripped me like a fever. Later that same day I was due to meet Stephen at the cave. How could I stop him from going there? He had warned me never to try to contact him at his base in Famagusta and I had no idea where he would be during the earlier part of the day. And even if I could contact him, what excuse could I make for changing our meeting place? I could stay away; tell him later that I had been taken ill. Then, if he found the cache of arms, at least I could not be accused of betraying their hiding place. But I had told him that Iannis knew about the cave – that we three were the only ones who did. He would immediately connect the arms with my family. How could I inflict that dilemma on him? Another thought struck me. Suppose they had left someone to guard the cache. Stephen would walk in on them, all unsuspecting, and would probably be shot. At all costs I must prevent him from doing that. I would have to wait for him on the track below the cave and find some excuse not to go there. But what? The sky was light before I managed to sleep again.

  Next day I cut my last lesson in order to be sure of getting to the cave before him. I took the bus, as I always did, to the next village to Ayios Epiktetos and walked from there. There had been rain during the morning and the air was clear and cool, making the climb into the hills much less arduous, but I suddenly noticed that I was leaving footprints in the softened ground. It didn’t matter here, the track was often used by people moving between the two villages, but if I took the path up to the cave they would give me away. My stomach clenched with alarm as a new thought came to me. Had Stephen and I left telltale prints and other traces in the cave? Would Iannis have seen them, in the dark? Could he possibly guess that I had been there? And what of last night’s mule train? They must have left tracks. Would Stephen notice them?

  When I reached the place where the path to the cave branched off, I was relieved to see that the rain had turned it temporarily into a watercourse. All traces of any passing had been washed away, leaving the rocks swept clean and gleaming dully in the sunshine. I stood quite still, listening for any movement above me. It had occurred to me with the daylight that it was unlikely that anyone would have been left to guard the cave. All the men I had seen last night had jobs and families. They could not disappear into the hills for hours on end without raising suspicion. And the cave had been chosen specifically because no one was likely to stumble across it. Still, I had to be sure that I was not allowing Stephen to walk into an ambush.

  After a few moments I began to creep cautiously up the path, pausing every few steps to listen. There was no sound except for the rustle of the wind through the branches. I reached the final bend in the zig-zag track and flattened myself behind a large rock. Beyond the cave mouth the path ended in a tumble of loose earth from an old landslide. There was no sign of movement and the branches of the fallen pine appeared to be undisturbed. I began to wonder if I had misheard the conversation below my window, or even dreamed it. Silently, I moved out of the shadow of the rock and crept up to the fallen tree. Beyond the branches I could see nothing but darkness. For a while longer I crouched there, nerving myself to enter. Then I pushed aside a branch and scrambled through.

  Once my eyes grew accustomed to the dimness I saw that the front of the cave was empty and, moreover, someone had swept the sandy floor with a pine branch so that it was smooth and tr
ackless. To anyone else it would have seemed that the cave had not been entered for years but I knew that Stephen and I must have left our footprints in the dust and we had never bothered to wipe them out. Had anyone else seen them? Or perhaps with so many men coming and going they had been obscured by others before they were noticed.

  For the first time I had brought a torch with me. I made my way to the back of the cave and found the narrow slit in the rocks that led back into the interior. There was still no sound. If anyone was in there, they were sitting in silence and complete darkness. I switched on the torch and edged into the cleft. It was so narrow that my shoulders touched the rock on either side and a man would have had to turn sideways to pass through. A few yards in there was a turn to the right and once I had passed it the last trace of sunlight was obscured. My heart was pounding and I had to force myself to go on. I had never believed Iannis’s stories, but they had left their mark none the less.

  The passage was shorter than I expected and quite suddenly I found myself at the entrance to the inner chamber. It was smaller than I had imagined from Iannis’s description but with a high-vaulted ceiling where the beam of my torch failed to penetrate the darkness. There was no treasure, and no fire-breathing dragon, but on the far side, stacked in a pile, were the crates and bundles I had seen loaded onto the mules.

  As soon as I was sure of what I was seeing I was seized by a new wave of panic. I was convinced that someone would come into the cave behind me and to prevent me from revealing the secret would somehow block the narrow passageway leading to the open air. A terror of being closed up in the dark gripped me and I blundered back towards the mouth of the cave, choking and almost sobbing with fear. Once I was in the light again, I sat down on the floor and tried to regain control of myself. The arms were here, but well hidden. Stephen had never shown any inclination to explore the back of the cave and I had never mentioned the existence of the passage. Rather than arouse his suspicions by making some excuse to change our meeting place, would it not be better to try to behave as if nothing had happened?