Swimming to Ithaca (12 page)

He looked genuinely contrite. ‘Have I offended you? I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it. When the Muse calls …’

She felt absurdly prim standing there, schoolmarmish and slightly ridiculous. ‘I think I must go and change,’ she said, and retreated to the bedroom. There she stood in the middle of the room, looking at her figure in the mirror on the wardrobe. Her legs. Was it true, what Damien had said? She shivered, despite the heat. She could imagine Geoffrey sitting there on the veranda, laughing inwardly at her fright. In something like panic she took a cotton frock out of the wardrobe and pulled it over her head, struggled with the zip at the back, and then looked around as though for some kind of alibi. The newspaper was there on the bedside table, folded to Geoffrey’s poem. She picked it up and, still barefoot, went out to confront her guest.

He looked relieved at her reappearance. ‘God, I’m sorry to shock you. I thought—’

She tossed the newspaper on to his lap. ‘There’s the poem. Tell me about it; tell me about your
proper
poetry.’

‘My poetry? It’s nothing. Just a sideline.’

‘But you
do
it.’ She was happier now, cooler, her body moving freely beneath the loose cotton.

‘It doesn’t sit very well with my work, does it?’ he said.

‘What
is
your work?’

‘I’ve told you. Banking. The Levant Investment Bank, Limassol branch.’

‘But what do you
do
?’

‘Read miles and miles of tickertape,’ he said airily. ‘Buy and sell shares in unlikely enterprises in the Lebanon, that kind of thing.’

‘And where did you learn your Greek?’

‘What is this, an interrogation?’

‘Just a question. No one speaks the language here, none of the British. Except you. I’ve been here a few weeks and already I know as much as most people –
pos íste?
and
sto kaló
and that kind of thing. Why are you so different?’

‘Classics at school, my dear, and then at university.’

She couldn’t suppress her surprise. ‘
Classics
?’

‘Does it shock you? You don’t think of Geoffrey as a man of refined eddication, do you?’

‘Well, it does seem a little surprising. And what happened then?’

He laughed and drained his drink. ‘This
is
an interrogation! I must be going. I can’t spend the whole day being interrogated by a pretty woman, even though that might be more to my taste than sitting at the teleprinter receiving abusive messages from head office.’

‘But you haven’t answered my question.’

‘Don’t you know you should never ask about a man’s past? He may be forced to tell the truth. After university I went to Greece. I wanted to turn my ancient Greek into demotic or something. Worked for the British Council, and then I got caught there in the war and had a bit of trouble getting out.’ He
waved the newspaper at her. ‘I’ll give you a copy of my slim volume.’

‘Slim volume? You mean there’s a book? You’ve had your poems
published
?’

He looked gratified. ‘Most certainly I have. Foreword by Larry Durrell. Published by Faber & Faber, greeted with indifference, died of neglect.’

‘Who’s Larry Durrell?’

‘Another poet fellow. Left the island only last year. I must show you where he lived. It’s in the north. A very beautiful place’

‘How wonderful, to be published.’

‘Not once you are. Once you
have
been published you crave real recognition – sales, fame, the adulation of beautiful women. What did Oscar say? The only thing worse than being famous is not being famous.’

‘I think it was “being talked about”.’

‘I’m sure it was. Anyone can quote accurately; quoting inaccurately takes skill. That sounds like Oscar as well, doesn’t it?’

‘Is it?’

‘No, it’s me. Now, how am I going to get a copy of my deathless poetry to you? Why don’t you come to dinner? Next Wednesday? Will that be OK? Don’t dress up. Come in shorts if you like.’

G
eoffrey lived in Limassol, in an old Levantine house in the centre of town: there was a vaguely ogival arch to the windows, an arabesque ornateness about the exterior decoration, columns that might have come from a mosque. Geoffrey himself opened the ponderous door. ‘Come in, come in,’ he said. ‘Welcome to my ’umble abode.’

The house wasn’t humble, and it certainly wasn’t ‘’umble’. The rooms were high-ceilinged and white and almost cool. There were rugs on the floor and the sly gleam of brass in shadowy corners. Hanging on one wall was a Turkish carpet that glowed red and cream in the half light, almost as though it were illuminated from within. ‘Hereke,’ Geoffrey said as Dee paused to admire it. She put out her hand, and found the touch as soft and cool as skin.

‘Is it silk?’

‘Certainly it’s silk. Worth a couple of hundred quid. Fancy making an offer?’

Worth seemed a very vulgar consideration when confronted with such a treasure. She looked round, feeling foolish, overwhelmed by the place and conscious of the poverty of their own home, the sense of impermanence that she had when she was there. ‘It’s wonderful. You never said anything about where you live. I imagined – I’ve no idea what I imagined. Gosh, some of these things must be priceless.’

Geoffrey laughed. ‘Funny, isn’t it – the difference between priceless and worthless? Has it ever struck you?’

She didn’t know how to answer. The puzzle seemed too difficult, like a crossword clue you couldn’t solve. He led them through from one room to the next, where there were sofas and armchairs and more carpets on the floor. Doors were open on to the garden. ‘However did you find this place, Geoffrey?’ she asked. ‘How old is it? How long have you had it?’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t know much about houses. I just live here.’

‘What do you mean, you just live here?’

He looked at her with that smile – self-mocking, mocking of other people, mocking of everything: ‘Actually that was another quote. But that doesn’t mean it’s not true. I rent the place. None
of this is mine. The owner’s a businessman in Istanbul. Runs a chain of brothels.’

‘He must be a pimp with very good taste,’ Edward said. He had picked up a framed photograph. It was the only piece that seemed out of place in the whole room – a monochrome photograph in a frame of chrome-trimmed Bakelite. ‘Is this one of his, Geoff?’ He showed it to Dee. It was a portrait of a young woman, her face turned profile to the camera. She was looking down, past her bare left shoulder, towards something on the floor. Or perhaps she was merely averting her grave gaze from the photographer. Her features were sculptured out of shadows and light, the line of her neck moulded into a long, fine arabesque. Dee fancied that her skin would feel just like the Hereke carpet hanging on the wall – cool and silken.

‘That’s Guppy. It’s by Bill Brandt.’

There was a hiatus, like a slight, embarrassed cough. ‘That’s
Guppy
?’ Edward returned the picture to its place. ‘My God, no wonder you’re keeping her secret.’

‘Who’s Bill Brandt?’ Dee asked.

‘Photographer fella. One of her friends.’ He pronounced the word with elaborate care, as though ‘friend’ meant something quite unusual. Edward grinned. Dee frowned.
Don’t
, she mouthed at him from behind Geoffrey’s back.
It’s not fair
. But Edward ignored her. ‘Well come on, old fellow, you can’t hide her away for ever. Especially if she looks like that. Isn’t she coming out to meet us all?’

‘Maybe,’ Geoffrey said. ‘Maybe.’ But it was unclear exactly what he was referring to, her coming out or his hiding her away for ever. ‘She doesn’t like travelling, can’t bear it in fact. Now, let me get you both a drink. What will you have? Dee has quite taken to pink gin …’

The other guests turned up shortly afterwards, a Greek Cypriot lawyer and his wife and an under-secretary or something
from Government House. They ate at the table out in the garden. Dinner was cooked by a Greek woman who smiled and bobbed in the background, and it was served by a young man who was, so Dee presumed, the woman’s son. There were peppers and aubergines, and things done with yoghurt and tahina. The conversation was fitful, partly fuelled by their host’s laughter, partly halted by an elaborate discourse on politics and economics from the lawyer. While crickets trilled among the vegetation, the question of
enosis
arose, and EOKA. There was talk of the emergency, of nationalism and terrorism. The name of Grivas darted through the shadows of the discourse. Old Grievous, Geoffrey called him. ‘Of course, terrorism pays,’ he said. ‘We’ve seen that clearly enough in Palestine and India. Why do we try to pretend that it doesn’t?’

‘Why do you call it terrorism?’ asked the lawyer. ‘Why not call it a struggle for national identity?’

‘You can’t make that sort of claim when a quarter of your population is Turkish.’

‘A mere eighteen per cent,’ the lawyer insisted. It was difficult to interpret his feelings. He spoke perfect English. His manner was balanced and reasonable, but there was an undercurrent of anger beneath his even tones, as though he knew that he was being teased, and, despite knowing about the British habit of teasing, had not learned the ability to shrug it off.

The mollifying words of the under-secretary tried to ease the conversation on to safer ground: ‘I see Cyprus as the crossroads of the Mediterranean. A melting pot. If the Cypriots seize the moment they can show us the way to the future. When I was in Lebanon—’

‘But it is
not
a melting pot,’ the lawyer pointed out. ‘In four hundred years of living together there has never been a single mixed marriage between Greek and Turk. Not a single one. There are no mulattos here.’

Geoffrey laughed. ‘What about Othello?’

‘Othello,’ the lawyer pointed out with a triumphant smile, ‘was an agent of an imperialist power.’

The dinner party broke up soon after that. The under-secretary had to drive back to Nicosia, and the lawyer and his wife liked to get to bed early. They made their goodbyes and thanks, and Geoffrey watched them out into the darkness of the street. ‘For God’s sake stay and have a nightcap,’ he pleaded when Edward and Dee made a move to follow.

So the three of them settled into the chairs in the sitting room, and there was a feeling of relief at the departure of the others and the possibility of relaxing. Brandy – ‘Armagnac, not bloody Cyprus gut-rot,’ Geoffrey said – gleamed like amber in their glasses. They talked – or rather, Geoffrey talked. His conversation was alternately funny and serious, revealing and guarded. He talked about his time in Greece, about how he had escaped from Piraeus aboard a leaking tramp steamer in 1940, and how they had been attacked by an Italian aircraft off Crete – ‘Bloody great monster with floats. Like Donald Duck flying’ – and how they had finally reached Alexandria. ‘Met up with Larry Durrell there,’ he said. ‘Just as he was shedding his first wife.’

‘What did you actually do in Egypt, Geoffrey?’ Edward asked. ‘Surprised we didn’t meet – Shepheard’s or somewhere. The Gizeh. What were you up to?’

The man laughed and waved an airy hand and poured more brandy. ‘This and that. You know the kind of thing. That’s where I met Guppy. And where I first read Cavafy.’

‘Who the hell’s Cavafy?’

Geoffrey made a face. ‘You don’t know Cavafy? He’s important, dear Edward, important. The poet laureate of the Levant. Which’ – he got up from his chair – ‘reminds me.’ He held up his hand. ‘Don’t you move. Just stay where you are. I won’t be
a moment.’ He crossed the room, his progress slightly unsteady, as though he were still on the deck of the tramp steamer out of Piraeus. They heard his footsteps on the stairs, and then above their heads.

‘Probably not come down again,’ Edward suggested. ‘Probably flake out on his bed and wake up halfway through tomorrow morning.’

But Geoffrey did return, with a steadier step and a sly smile and in his hand a book that he presented solemnly to Dee. ‘With my compliments.’

‘Oh, my goodness!’ She turned it over delightedly, like a child with a surprise present. It had a plain blue cover and the title
Aphrodite Died Here
and Geoffrey’s name on the spine. She had never expected him to remember. Perhaps she had even imagined that he had been teasing her over his claim to have been published.

She opened the book to the title page and there was his handwriting – four lines of verse above a line of dedication:

Priceless is the measure of your glance

But worthless is my gaze;

Treasure are the words you spoke

But paltry is my praise.

She read the words with something like shock, remembering their conversation earlier. ‘How appropriate. Where do these lines come from?’

He smiled and tapped his forehead.

‘You made them up?’ It seemed astonishing. ‘I don’t know how to thank you,’ she said.

‘“Thank you” is quite enough.’

‘But can you spare it? I mean, you say it’s not in print any longer …’

‘I’ve got a whole warehouse full of them back home. And you’ll find a copy in every sixpenny tray outside every bookshop in the Charing Cross Road.’ He laughed. There didn’t seem to be any bitterness in the laugh, just genuine amusement.

‘Old Geoff?’ said Edward when they were undressing for bed that evening. ‘You’ve certainly made a conquest there.’ He was whispering, trying to keep his voice down because Marjorie had been babysitting and now she was in the spare room just next door. ‘I think the fellow’s a complete fraud.’

‘That’s just your snobbishness,’ Dee said sharply. ‘Because he’s got a cockney accent.’

‘South London, actually. And you’ve got a Sheffield one and I don’t say that about you.’ He was laughing at her. She had loved his laughter. The sublime laughter of a pilot, that’s what she had thought when they first met.

‘Who cares where he comes from? He’s a character, and you and your awful air force friends can’t abide characters. Particularly characters with talent. How many other people do you know who are published poets?’

‘Now you
are
being silly. We adore old Geoff. But you’ve got to admit he is a bit of a phoney. It wouldn’t surprise me if—’