The Sunrise (24 page)

From time to time Maria let out a deep moan as she gripped the edge of the table. Her knuckles whitened and tears of pain dropped on to the lace cloth.

In the corner, on the floor, sat Vasilakis. His head was buried deep in his hands, which were clamped over his ears, and his knees were held to his chest. Certain that it would make him invisible, he kept his eyes tightly closed.

The door opened just for a moment, and a shaft of moonlight fell across the wall, briefly illuminating the glass
mati,
the evil eye, that hung on the wall. Markos slipped into the room.

Irini looked up, her concentration momentarily distracted from her daughter.

‘
Leventi mou!
You’re still here!’

‘Yes,
Mamma
, I’m still here. I wasn’t going to abandon you.’

‘But you could have left,’ said Vasilis. ‘Fled like everyone else …’

‘Well I didn’t,’ said Markos. ‘I’m here.’

He sauntered across to his mother and nonchalantly kissed her on the back of her head as though this was just a casual visit, a normal day.

Unlike everyone else in the room, he was feeling exhilarated. With Savvas gone, he had realised the potential of what he controlled. That morning, he had sold a gun from the safe. There were plenty of people desperate to own the means to protect themselves who were willing to pay anything it cost. And now the vault was filled with something even more valuable than weapons.

From the shadows came Panikos’ voice.

‘What’s going on out there?’

‘It seems quiet at the moment. Most people have gone.’

Maria, oblivious to anything but the spasms that gripped her body, let out a low howl, a sound immediately muffled by her mother’s hand.

‘Shhhh, my darling. Shhhhh.’

‘Somehow you have to keep her from making any noise,’ whispered Markos. ‘Otherwise we’re all in danger.’

‘I think it’s nearly her time,’ said the older woman. ‘
Panagia
mou!
Why now?’

Moments later, the heavy, rhythmic beat of boots was heard outside.

T
HE FIFTEENTH OF
August was an important date in the calendar. It was the Feast of the Assumption, the day of celebration for the Virgin Mary, one of the most significant days for the church and for thousands of women who bore her name. Maria would normally be celebrating.

This year it was different. As the final agonising pains of labour tore through her small frame, the Turks broke through the last defences in Famagusta. The remaining members of the Cyprus National Guard had fled. Linking up with Turkish fighters inside the walled area, the soldiers had walked unimpeded into an empty city.

In her parents’ bedroom, Maria held her newborn daughter. Two months premature, the tiny baby suckled feebly. Panikos came in and stroked his wife’s head.

During the last few hours, Maria had been aware of nothing but the shattering quakes of pain that racked her body. All the windows and shutters had been firmly closed to contain her screams, so the heat had built up.

She was exhausted now, and her eyes were shut. The world outside had ceased to exist.

As long as they remained silent, they might all be safe for a while. Now that the baby had been born, they were talking quietly about what should happen next. When could they leave? Or was it too late?

Markos had gone out again.

When he returned some hours later, Vasilis immediately demanded to know what was happening outside.

‘Looting,’ he said. ‘Ransacking, robbing …’

‘
Panagia
mou
…’

His mother sat down. She rocked gently as she sat.

‘We have to get out of here, Markos,’ said Vasilis.

‘Look, there’s no question of going out in the streets now. We need to wait, keep as quiet as we can and see what happens.’

‘What about food?’ asked his mother timidly.

‘When we run out, I will go and find some,’ he said. ‘Everyone has gone. It’s just soldiers out there.’

‘Turkish …?’ asked Irini in a whisper.

‘Yes,
Mamma
, Turkish soldiers. They’re just going into shops at the moment. But sooner or later they’ll begin on the houses.’

‘Come on,’ said Vasilis decisively. ‘Let’s get some furniture up against the doors.’

For the first time, Irini wondered if Christos, wherever he might be, was in less danger than they were.

Savvas and Aphroditi had not reached their destination. Several hours into their journey, they had realised that they might have to change their plan. On the congested road out of Famagusta, they began to encounter heavy traffic coming the other way.

A similar exodus was also taking place from Nicosia as residents fled the capital city. People in the capital were familiar with conflict and fear, having lived with the line dividing their city for a decade, but this time many of them were getting out. Rockets had been fired at the Hilton, which was being used as a Red Cross hospital, and even the psychiatric hospital had been a target.

Soldiers at the roadside warned them that Nicosia was as dangerous as Famagusta, and Savvas had to face up to the fact that there was no question of going there.

Along with thousands of others, they were being diverted to the relative safety of the British base at Dhekelia, fifteen miles south-west of Famagusta. Cars were at a standstill now. Families walked between the vehicles; some people even wheeled bicycles laden with their possessions. This teeming mass of thousands was all making for the same destination.

Cars, buses, tractors, fruit lorries and mule-drawn carts passed the checkpoint into the base. Old and young, rich and poor were all in search of the same. Everyone had come to find sanctuary and most had the same dazed and fearful expression on their faces. Tens of thousands of them had abandoned everything they knew for the unknown, leaving their city empty for the taking. Once the National Guard had gone, there had been no other choice.

Aphroditi felt her body temperature plummet, her fear making her cold on a warm day. She was shivering, and her palms felt like ice. If they were not going to Nicosia, what chance did Markos have of finding her amidst all this chaos?

Within two days, nearly forty per cent of the island was under Turkish control. The Attila line that cut off the north from the south was as good as complete.

Inside the base at Dhekelia, conversation was universally bleak. Everyone, male or female, religious or agnostic, was reduced to the same. What they were now and what they had been only a few days before were immeasurably different. For now they were all stripped to nothing.

The Turkish soldiers had brought terror into their hearts. The trauma they had suffered manifested itself in many ways. Some were completely silent; others wept openly. On the first day following arrival in the base, many were numb. After that, there were the practicalities to be dealt with: where to sleep, how to find food, how to get medical attention for the sick. Latrines had to be dug, kitchens erected, and shelter allocated.

Many of them now looked to their religious faith for salvation.

‘Only God, the Virgin and the saints can help us now,’ a woman repeated over and over again while they were standing in the queue for food.

‘What about America?’ Savvas muttered audibly. ‘Or Britain?’

‘Savvas!’ scolded Aphroditi, but the old woman was oblivious.

‘Blind faith never helped anyone,’ he snapped, ‘but the Americans could have done.’

‘Why not the Greeks?’ interrupted another voice.

People were pressed up together in the queue, jostling so as not to lose their places.

‘Because the odds are against them winning, that’s why.’

‘Greece got us into this mess,’ said an irate woman close to Savvas, ‘so they should get us out of it.’

Her view was a common one, but in their hearts they knew that Greece would already have come to their rescue if it was going to. The prime minister of the newly restored democracy there had inherited more than enough problems from the dictatorship, and taking Greece into a full-scale war with Turkey over Cyprus was something he could ill afford.

Makeshift churches evolved where people gathered to pray. Many were frantic over missing relatives, and their only comfort was to imagine that God would hear their prayers and safely reunite them. They had lost their homes, but this was a small loss compared with the separation from a son, a brother or a husband. The number of those missing was growing by the day.

‘
Thee mou!
’ was a common cry, uttered with despair. ‘My God!’

Priests moved around among the crowds, comforting, praying, listening.

Men were often silent, despising themselves for not having stayed to fight the invader, but knowing it was too late for regrets.

‘You
had
to run away!’ insisted their wives. ‘There was no choice! You had no weapons! Nothing to fight with!’

‘And anyway, it’s not for ever,’ others said. ‘We’ll be going back.’

Only a few days before, Savvas and Aphroditi had had chambermaids and waiters to do their bidding. Now they had neither bed nor food. They were obliged to join the queues for bread and to sleep on the bare ground.

With a good percentage of Famagusta’s population now inside the camp, the couple saw familiar faces. Members of their staff, workers from The New Paradise Beach building site, lawyers and accountants were all there. Nobody looked the same, however, reduced to this level of quiet desperation.

They found themselves almost neighbours with Costas Frangos, his wife and their children. For Savvas this meant someone with whom to exchange ideas and talk about the hotel.

‘At least the keys are in safe hands,’ he said to his manager. ‘And I’m sure Markos will meet up with us in Nicosia.’

Savvas refused to give up his hopes for his Famagusta projects, even though his wife did not seem to care.

While Anna Frangos nursed her youngest through an attack of dysentery, an illness that was becoming more common as the days went by, Aphroditi found herself looking after the older children. It was a welcome distraction.

The Özkans spent the first forty-eight hours of their time in the deserted city inside their dark, shuttered home, still hoping that Ali would return to them.

To begin with, they talked. There was little else to do.

‘If they hadn’t tried to make us second-class citizens,’ said Halit, ‘this would never have happened.’

‘But you can’t blame all Greek Cypriots for that!’ said Hüseyin.

‘Aphroditi never made me feel that way,’ said Emine.

‘Well, enough of them did, otherwise we wouldn’t be sitting here.’

‘Only a few people used to persecute us, Halit,’ said his wife. ‘But that’s how it often is.’

‘So everyone is getting punished for the actions of a few?’

‘Yes. Greek and Turkish Cypriots – we’ve all suffered.’

‘Why do you always—’ Halit Özkan’s voice was rising. He found it hard to accept Emine’s balanced views.

‘Father! Shhhh!’ implored Hüseyin.

From time to time they reached the point when they would argue. It was usually over the question of whether they needed to stay. Emine was still absolutely resolute.

‘If you leave, it’s without me,’ she repeated.

A mile or so away, Markos was out in the hauntingly empty city. Alert to the positions of Turkish soldiers, his ears tuned into the slightest sound, he moved stealthily, ducking into doorways if he heard a human voice.

He zigzagged his way across the city, along Euripides Street and down roads named after Sophocles and Aeschylus, all so redolent of the order of the classical past. Everything had been bold and confident in Famagusta, the names of ancient philosophers and poets happily woven into the resolutely modern commercialism of the city. How wrong it was now, he thought, as he turned a corner and found himself looking at the sign for Eleftheria Street. Its name meant ‘freedom’.

The wide, deserted streets full of luxurious department stores and glamorous cafés were already ghostly. Even after this short time, it seemed impossible that they had ever been full of people.

There was evidence of looting. Broken shop windows where jewellery had been ripped from displays and clothes hastily ripped from dummies suggested opportunism rather than anything more organised.

It annoyed Markos that he had to edge along the streets of this place over which he felt such a sense of ownership. It seemed that his city had been given away, handed over almost without resistance.

His mission for that day was to find food. Their own supplies were not exhausted, but he wanted to make sure that they had enough for the next few days. Broken glass crunched underfoot as he climbed into a grocery store. The shelves were still fairly full, but beer and spirits had been mostly removed. Markos was more interested in finding tins of condensed milk.

A cushion on the seat next to the till still wore the dent of the shopkeeper’s ample backside. He thought about the woman who worked there. She had a beautiful face, luxurious glossy hair and a plump body, but she was not really his type. He had always spent a few minutes flirting with her whenever he came in, enjoying her huge smile and the glint of a gold cross that nestled within the crease of her cleavage.

He helped himself to carrier bags still helpfully stacked up next to the till and filled them with several dozen tins. Maria, in particular, needed this sustenance.

Outside the deserted city, the number of refugees on the island’s roads continued to grow. It was being said that more than two hundred thousand Greek Cypriots had fled their homes. Thousands of Turkish Cypriots were leaving theirs too, realising that their lives were in danger as the National Guard acted in retaliation for the Turkish invasion. Many of them were seeking refuge in the British base at Episkopi in the south.

For Savvas and Aphroditi, the base at Dhekelia, in spite of the conditions which grew more uncomfortable and overcrowded by the day, was at least some kind of sanctuary. When news came that intense fighting was continuing in Nicosia, they realised that it might be some time before they could leave the camp to go there.