Forth into Light (The Peter & Charlie Trilogy) (5 page)

Peter burst out laughing, which Martha took as an expression of his usual high spirits as he put his hand out and touched hers.

“I’ll go check the genius. Shall we go swimming soon? I’d like to find out what’s going on. I can’t imagine what’s taken George away from his work at this hour.”

“They
do
worry me. I’m glad you’re worrying too. If anybody can help them, you two might be able to.”

He rose, reminded of young Jeff. He was a sensitive kid and Peter hoped to run into him to confirm their date for later and make him feel welcome. He liked the young and their problems because he still felt so close to his own troubled youth. He and Charlie had suspected what Jeff’s great problem would be ever since they had first known him, before he was even in his teens. It was hard to say why; something indefinable, something they had both felt. He hitched up his sarong more securely and gave Martha’s shoulder a squeeze. “Okay, old lady. Give me an hour or so. Right?”

“Yes, darling. Try not to be longer. It’s so hot.” She addressed a well-muscled and shapely back as he jauntily left the room bursting with pride at being consulted about Charlie’s work. She felt a brief resentment, but it was quickly absorbed into the almost dense stability she sensed in her household. By comparison, the more conventional lives of their friends seemed fragmentary and ephemeral. They brought so little stamina to their relationships. Like the Leightons. Flying apart because of some past foolishness of Sarah’s. Of course, fidelity wasn’t a problem for the Mills-Martins. At the beginning she had expected, perhaps even hoped, that other young men would prove to be a disruptive force but it hadn’t turned out that way. Once she had become a mother she had ceased thinking in such terms. She had found child-bearing sensually thrilling, more fulfilling sexually than anything she had known with a man except for the first days of clandestine love-making with Charlie. Bearing children had slaked her passions by offering her a greater passion. She still sometimes caught herself nurturing a fantasy about Peter falling for a girl and making a new life for himself, but she couldn’t really imagine its happening and probably would fight it if it did. There was enough to treasure in what she had. It distressed her to see others less fortunate tearing at each other and courting disaster.

The Leightons. It was doubtless the heat that made her feel something explosive in their estrangement that threatened all of them.

By now, the island could be said to be awake. The dedicated alcoholics were settling down at tables along the waterfront. Sid Coleman and his girl had shared their first joint of the day. One of the more laggard households was that presided over by Joe Peterson, the student of theology.

Joe was wandering naked and befuddled around the kitchen of his rented house wondering how he could make coffee without disturbing any of the dirty dishes that were piled up in the sink and spread out on the limited counter space. The two-burner stove had been selected as the repository for dirty pots. The congestion of the kitchen had its counterpart in the long narrow room upstairs where two splayed and sagging beds contained four bodies, three female and one male.

One of them was Lena, Joe’s principal girlfriend for the last week or so. Until Joe had retreated to the kitchen, they had formed a threesome with an English girl called Penny who had turned up from somewhere a few days before. Lena had a wholesome Scandinavian attitude toward sex—the more of it the better and in the greatest possible variety. Heaven knew what she was up to now. The other bed contained the German traveling companions, Gunther and Hilda, who had moved in only yesterday.

How any of them could remain up there in this heat Joe couldn’t understand. He had never felt anything like it, not even in his native California. It was utterly still, unnaturally still, so oppressive that it felt as if something would have to give. Joe felt crowded by it in the cramped kitchen.

He was a big man, big bones covered with a solid layer of smooth California flesh. His curly brown hair grazed the kitchen ceiling. He had a big mouth that turned his face into a dazzling array of teeth when he smiled.

He stared at the dirty pots on the stove. As long as they were there he would have no coffee. He picked them up and carried them through the bare room adjoining the kitchen and threw them into the courtyard. The clatter seemed to melt into the heat. He returned to the kitchen and scooped water into the kettle from the jar in the corner and put it on to boil. Gunther drifted silently into the kitchen, also naked.

“Hi,” Joe said.

“Good morning.” The German wandered over to the kitchen table and stood in front of it.

Joe was embarrassed by their nakedness despite the promiscuity prevailing above. “I’m trying to get some coffee going,” he explained. He lifted his hand to wave Gunther away from the table and touched his hip. The hip didn’t move. Joe looked at him.

The boy’s gaze was level. “Enough of girls, I think. You and me,
ja?
” he suggested. His face was expressionless, but his eyes managed to convey his thought. He shifted his hip slightly, reminding Joe that his hand was still on it.

Joe felt himself blushing. He should probably give it a try just to find out what it was all about and what guys did together; it seemed to be the thing to do these days.

Biblical references paraded through his mind, all of them minatory. All the same, he had been tempted to experiment with Costa the boatman a week ago, before Lena had moved in. Costa was the go-between for the foreigners with the local population; he could come up with anything from lobster to pot. He had made suggestive gestures in a joking way late one night at the house and had proposed staying till morning. Joe had sent him away with some reluctance. The island was nutty. What would he be tempted to do next? He found his eyes fixed on Gunther’s.

“Well, I don’t know,” he said. “It’s a pretty crazy idea. We’ll see.” His characteristic tone was eager and innocent and he sounded perhaps more willing than he intended. He spread his fingers on the boy’s waist.

“Is good. We will be brothers. Is different with girls.”

Joe found nothing to dispute in that statement and exerted pressure with his hand to move Gunther out of the way. As he did so, without actually looking, he could see from the lower rim of his vision that he had excited the boy. His own quiescence reassured him that he wasn’t going to turn queer overnight.

He pulled open the drawer of the table with the insubstantial hope of finding some clean spoons. There were none. He started to push the drawer closed but hesitated and then pulled it all the way out, gazing into its emptiness.

“Son of a bitch,” he exclaimed. “I put a thousand drachmas in here yesterday. Where is it?”

“You lose something?”

“No, goddammit.” Joe lifted accusing eyes. It wasn’t much in dollars but it was worth two weeks living here. “My money. It was here yesterday. Somebody’s taken it.”

“You think I steal? Your money? What for?” For the first time since Joe had met him, Gunther smiled. It wasn’t an expansive smile but it indicated amusement and immedinately exculpated him.

“No, not you. Of course not.” Joe put his hand on the boy’s shoulder. It’s slightness was very pleasant to the touch, quite like a girl. “Maybe Lena took it. I’d better go ask her.”

Gunther stepped closer to him. “We go to bed now?”

“Not now. Aren’t you hot?” Joe’s eyes were on the boy’s mouth, finding that if you overlooked the slight shadow of mustache above the upper lip, it appeared kissable. “Anyway, I’ve got to find my money. I don’t like being robbed. I wonder what old George will make of it. He’s always maintained that nobody steals here. Do you know him? George? George Leighton? The famous novelist?”

“Novelist. Money. What matter is it to me? I offer to be your brother.”

“Thanks, Gunther. Later maybe,” Joe said distractedly. “I have to look into this. I don’t guess the police would be any good. George will be able to advise me.” He pushed Gunther firmly aside and went up to confront the girls.

George Leighton was bathed in sweat when he reached Lambraiki’s. He pushed his way into the dark narrow store past a knot of shopping women and went on around to the back of the counter, a privilege only he could dare assume. Stavro caught sight of him out of the corner of his eye, but went on weighing out a block of white cheese.

“Good morning, my Yorgo,” Stavro crooned, not making the effort to move his lips. The lethargy communicated by the ample figure in a soiled smock was deeply soporific and the vague fumbling of his hands suggested that he would go on ladling out cheese forever. George sighed as he adapted to the island rhythm. He felt foolish for having practically run all this way. At least, the end of his mission was in sight.

“Listen,” he said, pleading. “Did you find any money last night?”

Stavro wrapped the cheese and pushed it across the counter. “What else?” he crooned to the customer and in the same tone, without turning, he said, “Money? What money, my Yorgo?”

“A lot of it. A bundle of thousand-drachma notes. Almost sixty thousand. I must’ve dropped it at the table last night.”

Without giving any sign that he had heard, Stavro counted out change for his customer. There was a monumental deliberation about everything he did that was almost soothing. George half-expected him to withdraw the bundle of bills from his cash drawer with the same expressionless deliberation and hand it over. Instead, he turned from the counter, put his hand on George’s shoulder and, gently easing him around, guided him past groceries into the back room which, in addition to tables and chairs, contained a confusion of tin tubs, coils of rope, kerosene lamps and great barrels of wine and brandy and ouzo. He gave George a little hug.

“You were outside. Then at the end, you were sitting here,” he said, stating a fact which Goerge was obliged to accept on faith. “I swept up myself. There was much broken glass. There was no money, my Yorgo.”

George’s heart had been beating rapidly in anticipation of the conjuror’s trick, the rabbit pulled out of the hat, the money suddenly materializing in his hand, and now it seemed to stop entirely as the words soaked with black finality into his mind. “Why were we in here?” Did it matter that he had perhaps caught Stavro in an error? “It was hot last night.”

“You were outside. Then you and Sarah came in here. Others followed, the way they do.”

“There’s no chance you swept it up without noticing it?” he asked, not aware of the incongruity of finding hope in such a suggestion. All the sweepings would have been dumped into the sea hours ago.

“I always notice, Yorgo,” Stavro said with tender regret. “People are always losing things here.”

“Oh, Christ.” Leighton swore helplessly in English. “I tell you, it was a lot of money. I was planning to pay my bill.”

“Never mind.” Stavro immediately brightened at having found a silver lining. He rocked George in a bear hug and patted him reassuringly on the back. “The bill doesn’t matter. You can pay any time.”

With what? George wondered. It was impossible for the locals to believe that the foreigners might have financial problems like ordinary mortals. They were here, far from home, with no jobs and unlimited leisure. They were obviously rich. He would be violating Stavro’s trust if he continued to run up a bill under these circumstances. He extricated himself from the big man’s embrace with a shrug.

“Well, if it isn’t here, it isn’t here,” he said because he could think of nothing else to say, because the catastrophe had gone beyond the bounds of relevant comment.

“That’s it,” Stavro agreed, happy to have the unpleasantness disposed of. “Have a drink. I will pay. What will you have?”

“Thanks, Stavro. A beer might help.”

“Stamatis, a beer for Mr. Yorgo,” Lambraiki called to one of his invisible children as they drifted back together toward the front of the shop. Leighton squeezed past the waiting customers and stumbled into sunlight and slumped into a chair. Even under the awning, the heat was dense. It clung to him so tangibly that he felt he could remove it, along with his sweat-soaked shirt.

“Oh, Christ damn,” he muttered to himself, running his fingers through his hair. The money was gone. The money was
gone
. What was he going to do now? He forced himself to think bleakly about the subject that interested him least in the world—money.

As the son and only heir of rich parents, he had never given much thought to creating an “estate” or whatever it was people were supposed to do. He had spent freely in the big years and his reserves had quickly dwindled when his last two books had failed to earn anything like what he had been accustomed to making. Still the picture wasn’t all black. He had provided for Jeff’s and Kate’s educations by setting up trusts for them. He carried a lot of insurance for Sarah. It had some cash-in value, but he was vague about just how it worked. It would take weeks of tiresome correspondence with the family friend who managed such things to realize anything from whatever assets he had left. The missing money was all the immediately available cash he had. What was he supposed to do until he found more?

Work. That was what he wanted to do. He had to be free to work. How was he to finish the new book if he had to spend the next month or two trying to rake up more money?

He felt the prickling of fear down his spine and turned restlessly in his chair, looking for his beer. A small boy with an apron flapping around his ankles approached the table and set down a bottle and a glass. George poured it out gratefully with hands that still shook. The first cold swallow soothed his spirit and he took a long breath of relief.

At least they were here and not trying to be grand in some city. One of the things he had liked best about it here was that you could spend money all day without thinking about it and end up with change from a couple of dollars. If you had a couple of dollars. The shopkeepers would carry him indefinitely, but he still had to give people bits of metal and paper for certain things. Why not use leaves or blades of grass? Maybe the Mills-Martins would lend him some of the stuff. Jesus. Had it come to that? Sponging off friends? All his debts so far were confined to his professional sphere; they weren’t debts so much as options on his future.