The Scapegoat (5 page)

Not that he cared. Minas had gotten his stubbornness from Teta’s side of the family: Evthalia’s Pontic mind never budged once it was made up. As the months passed, Georgiou realized that it wasn’t an act or pose. He even went with Teta to their son’s school, though he hadn’t set foot in the place in years. He listened as Minas’s teachers explained what the problem was, though none suggested a solution. They cared, but caring wasn’t enough.

Teta went back alone the next day to talk to Soukiouroglou, who assured her he’d do what he could to intervene. She knew Soukiouroglou wasn’t one to spout empty words. If he said something, he meant it—but the promises Teta wanted weren’t ones the teacher was able to make.

KYRIA MARIA GRIS, MOTHER OF MANOLIS

My lips may smile, but inside there’s sorrow
.

We’re refugees. What did we know of Greece? We used to hear the name in church,
for the good of Greece
, Father Evgenios would chant. We would cross ourselves three times. I was born in Trapezounta. Trabzon. In a house by the sea. My hair would curl from the salt in the air. I’d wash it and iron it on the table to make it straight. I was a girl then, didn’t fear God, only my father. I was in love with the psalter in our district. A polite boy. His voice trembled when he sang the Good Friday lament,
my sweet springtide
, he sang with tears in his eyes and the mothers would cry, and we cried too, the girls who’d covered the bier of Christ with flowers that morning.

One day my father brought me a man to marry. From a good family, established in the town. They shook hands. I was fourteen years old, I thought I would die. My mother-in-law grabbed the silk from my dowry as fast as she could, as if it were hers. On the day I entered her house as a bride she made me wash her feet. So I would learn which of us ruled the roost. She made me kneel in the dirt. My husband watched and didn’t speak. Nor did the neighbor women who had gathered from nearby houses. I scrubbed her feet with my bare hands, tossed out the washwater, poured fresh into the tin basin and scrubbed some more. When I got tired, I lay her feet on my skirts to dry. I was wearing my best dress, my wedding dress. She dirtied it with her filthy feet. Then she pulled me up off the ground, kissed both cheeks and pushed me into the house.
Come inside, girl
, she said, yanking my braid.

We had four children. Manolis, Savvas, Evgnosia, and Violeta. Another two died on me, twins. I light candles for them on
the Day of Lights, I learned that from my mother. I fill a basin with sand, stick the candles for the dead in there, so there’s a light to show my little birds the way. I lost them before they even tasted milk. You people here don’t know that tradition. You don’t bring your dead into the house.

My husband, Stathis, worked in the fields. A farmer. Nineteen years old, what could he know, you’ll say, of running a household, a beardless child himself. Quick to anger, and to punish the children. He never lifted a hand against them the way other fathers did, who hit their boys with belts. You could hear the screams from the street. Stathis just furrowed his brow and stared at us with that look of his, like a bull. It made our knees quake. He used to shut the littlest, Violeta, up in the barn with the animals, and left Manolis there to make sure she didn’t sneak out. My little girl never ate much, even as a baby. All she wanted was eggs, she couldn’t stand the sight of bean soup. He would let her go hungry and that imp still wouldn’t open her mouth to let a bite go down.

My boys were more obedient, especially Manolis. They had respect. Stathis wanted to send them to school. He wanted to make them into men, that’s what he used to say.
We may go hungry, wife, but our children will go to school
, he would shout, mostly for his mother to hear, who had other ideas. He would raise his hand and point toward the Greek school of Trabzon.
We have fine schools here, and my sons are going to learn their letters, they’re going to make something of themselves
.

We made plans. We had no idea that the Turks were sharpening their knives.

Don’t ask me how we made it to Greece. The children hear the stories adults tell and think they remember. But only Manolis remembers. I had no husband by my side, so he became the man in the family, a boy of eight. He helped with the little ones, he took charge. I was a widow with four children. Try to imagine that.

Later on they’d come and say,
You folks were rich, you had money. You came with gold coins sewn into the hems of your dresses, whole fortunes
. Whoever hasn’t lived the life of a refugee has easy words to speak.

When they brought us to Salonica, I didn’t care about the hunger or about how filthy we were, after days on boats. I looked at the city and said to Manolis,
This is where we’ll live
. The sea was a comfort to me.

I grabbed the girls in my arms, the boys clung to my skirts.
Hold tight
, I told them, and walked as fast as my legs would carry me. I didn’t want to lose courage. I couldn’t get sick, either. I had children to care for.

I bought our first eggs from a local woman at the port. She looked at my hands, hoping for rings or bracelets, but I gave her coins. The dirty thing spat on the ground.
You’ve come to eat our bread
, she muttered, tucking the money into her dress. She wanted more, for a pot with a hole in the bottom, but I pushed her away.

At the church of Agia Sophia I pulled the key to our house in Trabzon out of my apron. A big wrought iron key. I set an egg in the hole, it fit perfectly. I crossed myself and cooked it over the candles burning as offerings. I fed my children in the churchyard. Violeta laughed.
Mama, it’s nice here
, she said, clapping her hands.

Manolis spent two years at the Papafeio orphanage learning to be a carpenter. One day a teacher came to the house and told
me about the American School, said my child should study there, he’d do well. I remembered Stathis. He would’ve cursed me from the grave if he knew his child was an apprentice carpenter. I was ashamed before Manolis, too. His heart leapt at the teacher’s words, but he just sat in the corner and didn’t speak. That child never asked for a thing.

—A boy’s studies, Kyra-Maria, the teacher said, are the golden bracelet on his wrist. You’re from the Pontus, you understand, he added to butter me up.

That night when the other children were asleep, Manolis came and stood at the head of my bed.

—Mother, he said, touching my arm.

—You’re barefoot, son, you’ll freeze, I scolded him.

There was a cold like poison that night.

—Mother, Manolis said again. If I study, I’ll be able to take care of the little ones.

Ai, let me take pride in my dear boy
.

That’s what he called them,
little ones
, though he was just two years older than Savvas. But Manolis was old from birth.
What a serious child
, others said, impressed. Sometimes even I forgot he was a child and spoke to him as if he really were the man of the house. Because Manolis took charge of things. He placed orders with the butcher, helped his siblings with their meals, with their studies. He scolded them, yelled at them if he felt the need. And they looked up to him, Violeta most of all. She’d run to him with her drawings, or in tears if something went wrong. He was the only one who could get her to eat, she would clean her plate for him.

May lightning strike me, there’s not a bad word I can say about my son. He finished the American School, found work. As a reporter. He knew English, that helped. We all took a deep breath. I thought we’d been saved. I thought our worries were over. Our sadness had brought joy.

My mind couldn’t even imagine.

I sent two children off to war, but only one came home. Years passed, the tears dried in my eyes. I still think about Savvas every day. I light a candle, I pray for his soul to be as light as a feather. And I don’t fear death as I used to. When the time comes, my boy will come to lead me away. I’ll hold him in my arms. I’ll get my fill of him, my second son, the son who felt neglected.

—Mother, he used to say, you’ve only got the one child, Manolis.

I’d get mad, lash out at him.

Not a year had passed since he died when he came and found me in my sleep.

I opened my arms and waited. He was wearing his good white shirt, the one I’d sewn for him. The dead don’t speak in dreams, that’s what my mother used to say. But Savvas had a bone to pick.

—Mother, he asked. If you had to choose, who would you choose?

Oi, oi.… I woke in a sweat, sobbing. The ceiling struck my chest like iron. My soul ached. My heart stung, deep in pain.

Woe to me, such a great evil I never saw
.

—Which son would you give to Hades, mother?

I knew the answer.

And my Savvas knew it, too.

I’d told them I loved them all the same. We would lie together in bed, and the little ones would ask:

—Who do you love best, Mama? Tell us, Mama!

It was their game. Only Manolis never asked. I would raise my hand, show them my fingers.

—Look here, at my fingers. Each one is different, none like the next. But whichever one I cut off, I’d hurt just the same.

Lies. I told them lies.

They would fall asleep amid laughter, kisses and caresses. Lullabies, songs about the sea at Trabzon.

My Savvas was killed in the service of the country.

—I could shit on your country, I howled, and Evgnosia ran to shut the windows.

I shouted at her to take down the icons.

I wanted nothing of God in my house.

I never had a chance to kiss the blood of my son.

They buried him in a foreign land and sent me a piece of paper.

I thought I would die.

My guts turned to rock.

If you slit me open, you’d find soil and stone.

Any mother would understand.

And anyone else should keep quiet.

May their mouths be filled with cement.

Manolis suffered, but he didn’t show it. He had to seem strong, to support me. That’s how firstborns are, they shoulder all the
weight and never say a thing. I didn’t realize it then, I thought the pain was mine, belonged to me alone.

I didn’t forget my Savvas, but I stopped crying in front of the children. I didn’t want to poison their days. But when the children were out, when the house was empty, I brought the whole world down with my sobbing.

One night Manolis came home, sat down beside me, stroked my back. He started to say something, but the words stuck in his throat. He was a wise child, he never spoke without thinking, the way others do.

—It would have been better if I had died, mother.

I turned and looked at him, for the first time in a long while. He was hunched over as if he were carrying stones on his back.

I remembered the dream.

If you had to choose, who would you choose?

The next day I ran to church and confessed. I told the priest.

—God forgive me, Father. I’m torn to pieces over the child I lost. But if I lost Manolis I would die.

ZOE TSOKA, WIDOW OF THE AMERICAN REPORTER

He stared at my arms. A widow doesn’t wear sleeveless dresses, I’m sure that’s what he was thinking. They all look at me strangely, and they’ve called me in for interrogation eight times. I don’t cry, don’t beat my chest, don’t wear a kerchief. I’m young, beautiful, slender. Too much the stewardess for their taste.

If they could, they would have buried me with him.

And he, the head of the Security Police, is the worst kind of village boor. A lout. I caught him picking his nose. I’d rushed into the room, I couldn’t understand why he’d called me down again, just to tell him the same things over and over. He pulled
his finger out of his nose and stuck the precious discovery on the bottom of his chair with an air of indifference.

Revolting.

Where I’m from men like him were my servants, they shined my shoes, opened doors so I wouldn’t dirty my gloves. I grew up in Alexandria, with a silver spoon in my mouth. I had a French governess and a real porcelain tea set for my dolls. The lace from my dowry dates back three generations. My dresses were all tailored in Paris.