The Sunrise (25 page)

Thousands more streamed in, bringing with them news of what had taken place in the capital over the past few days. Suspicious that the invasion had been a conspiracy between the United States and Turkey, a huge group of protesters had marched on the American embassy and assassinated the ambassador. Many Cypriots were in despair.

‘
Infighting!
’ said Savvas. ‘You’d think that EOKA B and the Makarios faction would realise there’s a common enemy now.’

‘With the island cut into two, we don’t need any more problems,’ agreed Frangos.

‘And if they can’t agree a strategy amongst themselves,’ Savvas said, ‘how are they ever going to get rid of an organised army?’

‘God knows …’ said Frangos. ‘I am sure the British will send some help eventually. They’ve made some big investments here so it doesn’t make sense for them to ignore what’s happened. Apart from anything, they’re supposed to help protect our constitution!’

There were rumours that a new guerrilla army was being formed to fight back against the Turkish soldiers. Groups of men in the camp were fired up by the prospect of going to war, and those from Famagusta imagined themselves marching to free their city. EOKA B, communists and supporters of Makarios were all active among the vast refugee population.

‘They all have a plan of action,’ said Savvas, ‘but it adds up to nothing!
Tipota!
All we do is sit here waiting for …
what
?’

The lack of real activity in the camp was a terrible thing for a man like Savvas. He helped to erect tents and construct latrines, but when those tasks were finished he found himself unoccupied and frustrated.

Aphroditi found it easy to keep silent when Savvas was voicing his point of view. Everyone in the camp was in the habit of giving out opinions. What should happen? What should have happened? What needed to happen? No one knew the answers to any of these questions but they debated them endlessly. The refugees had control over neither their own lives nor anything happening outside the camp. For now their lives were ruled by periods either queuing for handouts or crowded around a radio hoping to hear news of relatives from whom they were separated.

For Aphroditi, even now, there was only one thing that preoccupied her. Not
if
or
when
they would see the arrival of Greeks, Americans or British soldiers, but
if
or
when
she would see the man she loved. The rest had no meaning.

While rumours proliferated in the camp, in the silent streets of Famagusta there was nothing to inform the Georgious or the Özkans of what was taking place.

After a few days they had lost their electricity, so there was no possibility of listening to the radio. Their city was the focus of the world’s attention, but they were unaware of it.

In homes little more than fifty yards apart, the two families were even unaware that the other was there.

The Özkans had not ventured outside even once since the day their city was occupied. Living under siege conditions in the enclaved village a decade before had taught Emine one thing: that her store cupboards should always be full. Lentils, beans, rice and specially dried bread were always neatly stacked there.

‘We always need to have them, just in case,’ she said.

‘Just in case of
what
?’ Halit had always enquired teasingly.

Now there was no humour. He was merely grateful that his wife still had a siege mentality.

When they had heard the heavy sound of footsteps several days before, Hüseyin had been sent up to the roof of their two-storey house to ascertain where the soldiers were.

He had raced down again, always swift and impatient in his movements.

‘They’re at the end of the street,’ he panted. ‘Half a dozen of them. And it looks as if the city is still full of smoke.’

Since then, there had been nothing but silence and cicadas.

Hüseyin crept back up to the roof.

‘Is there still smoke?’ his father asked when he returned.

‘Not that I could see …’

‘And sounds?’

‘Nothing at all.’

The sound of artillery had ceased; guns were no longer being fired.

In the Georgiou apartments, Maria, Panikos and their two little ones were now staying downstairs with Irini and Vasilis. They felt safer together. Markos continued to sleep upstairs. He came and went, usually after dusk, often not returning until it was daylight.

‘Why does he go for so long?’ Irini asked Vasilis anxiously.

‘He’s finding food for us!’

This was true. Markos always returned with plenty for them to eat. He knew now which stores were still full and that Turkish soldiers mostly used the main streets.

Maria was content to stay inside with the baby, who was named after her grandmother. She would not have gone outside for forty days even under normal circumstances, as was tradition with a newborn.

Irini had brought her canary inside and liked to let it fly around in the darkened room.

‘Look how happy it makes him,’ she said.

But the bird kept fluttering towards a chink of light between the shutters and she had to put him back in his cage.

‘I’d love to let him see the sunshine again,’ she said. ‘
Tse!
Tse!
Mimikos!
Tse! Tse!
Please take the table out of the way.’

‘But …’ protested Vasilis.

‘I just want to hang his cage outside for a while,’ she said firmly. ‘I’m not going anywhere else.’

‘It’s not
safe
!’

‘There is no one out there, Vasilis,’ she said. ‘And if I hear anything at all, I’ll come straight back indoors.’

As Vasilis moved the furniture and opened the door just enough to let his wife through with the cage in her arms, the apartment was filled with light. Dazzled by the unfamiliar brightness, Irini went outside and stretched up to replace her bird on his hook. It was seven days since she had been into her
kipos
. Many of her gerania had withered, but there was a huge crop of ripened tomatoes waiting.

‘Oh, Vasilis,’ she cried. ‘Come and see!’

They picked the fruit together, carefully placing them in a bowl. Irini then plucked a handful of basil. She smiled. Her mind had travelled a long distance.

‘I wonder how the oranges are …’ she mused.

Vasilis did not answer. Every day he thought of his precious trees and knew they would be suffering without him. Irini had dreamed that the entire crop had been stripped from the trees and lay trampled on the ground.

Back inside, she carefully sliced some of the tomatoes and covered them generously with olive oil. For the first time, Vasilis opened one of the shutters by an inch to release them from the oppressive darkness.

The five of them sat round the table to eat. It was the first fresh produce they had had for days and the sweetest salad they had ever eaten. Irini had also made a stew with the last of her chickens. In the corner, the baby slept.

They ate in silence. It had become a habit.

At the Özkan home, Emine, Halit, Hüseyin and Mehmet were also sharing a meal. They were eating dried bean stew. Their vegetables had run out.

‘How much longer do we have to stay inside?’ asked Mehmet.

Emine and Halit exchanged glances. Emine’s eyes were swollen from crying. She put down the picture of Ali she had been holding all day and pulled Mehmet on to her lap.

Hüseyin had spent several hours each day on the roof. He reported that soldiers sometimes went on patrol, which told them that the military presence was still there.

‘We don’t know,’ answered Halit. ‘We’ll only go out again when it’s safe.’

At that moment, they heard a sound in the street.

It was a jeep. Then voices: Turkish, but with an accent a little different from their own. They were shouting.

The crunch of heavy boots came closer and then stopped.

Everyone in the room froze.

They saw the door handle being moved from the outside. Many people had fled the city without pausing to lock their doors, so the soldiers were used to breaking in without effort. A moment later they heard a boot kick against the wood – once, then again, harder the second time.

Emine put her head in her hands and rocked.

‘
Bismillah irrah manirrahim
,’ she mouthed over and over again, noiselessly. ‘May Allah help us.’

The door handle rattled again. Then there was some inaudible muttering and after that something that sounded like scratching.

For some time the Özkans could hear soldiers in the street. It took a while for them to repeat the process with a dozen other doors. When they succeeded, the sounds changed. Soldiers went in and out ferrying anything they could carry, and the noise the Özkans heard was the sound of stolen goods being carelessly thrown into the back of the jeep. Laughter and joking accompanied their task.

Markos was on his way home from finding food when he turned the corner into their street and saw the jeep right next to the Georgiou apartments. The back of it was loaded up, and soldiers were staggering out of the neighbouring block, one with a small fridge, another with a television. A couple of other doors had a mark chalked on them. From watching their movements, Markos knew that if a door did not open easily, the soldiers left the property alone. There were too many places that could be easily ransacked to bother with those that had been made secure. Any locked door was marked with chalk to indicate that the home was untouched. They would come back another time.

He could see that his parents’ door was still shut. Perhaps they were the next target. There was nothing he could do but wait and make sure he was not seen. He felt for the gun in his pocket. He would prefer not to use it unless he had to.

Inside, the Georgious waited in silence and terror. Vasilis had moved the women and children into the back bedroom. If baby Irini made a sound, then they would be in trouble.

He took two sizeable knives from the kitchen drawer, handed one to Panikos and gestured that he should stand close to the front door. His son-in-law obeyed the instruction and the pair of them stood trembling as they listened to the sounds only a few inches away.

Vasilis understood enough Turkish to know that the car the soldiers were driving was virtually full.

‘Let’s go now,’ said one of them, to the accompaniment of a scratching sound on the door. ‘It’s enough for the day.’

They still seemed to be in the
kipos
.

Vasilis could hear a slight creaking, more laughter and then the high-pitched sound of a bird. They had unhooked the canary’s cage.

As the sound of the vehicle receded into the distance, Vasilis and Panikos put down their weapons. Vasilis went to open the bedroom door and found his wife, Maria, the baby and Vasilakis sitting huddled on the floor behind the bed.

‘They’ve gone,’ he said, his voice trembling. He did not tell Irini about her precious bird.

At that moment, they heard knocking on the door.

‘
Panagia
mou!
’ whispered Irini, clapping her hand over her mouth. ‘
Panagia
mou!
’

‘
Mamma!
’ It was Markos’ voice.

Vasilis and Panikos slid the furniture out of the way to open the door.

‘They were here!’ said his mother, weeping. ‘We thought they were going to break in.’

She was visibly shaking with fear. Everyone else remained calm, but Irini was overwhelmed with thoughts of what might have been.

Markos tried to reassure her.

‘But they didn’t get in. You’re safe,
Mamma
. We’re
all
safe. They’ve gone. Come outside and you’ll see.’

Irini went out into the
kipos
. Immediately, she noticed the absence of the cage.

‘Mimikos! Mimikos!’ she cried out. ‘Markos! They’ve taken my bird!’

She began to weep. The canary, her constant companion in the day, had been her pride and joy, his music immeasurably precious.

‘If only I had kept him inside,’ she sobbed.

The absence of the bird reminded her of an even greater absence. Christos was still out there somewhere. For several hours, she was beyond consolation.

Although they had no radio, the occasional sound of far-off artillery told them that Cyprus was still at war. In the last hour, that reality had come closer than before.

In Irini’s dreams that night, Turkish soldiers overran the whole of the island from Kyrenia in the north to Limassol in the south. She dreamed that every Cypriot had been slain, except for the inhabitants of her own home.

As the days went by, the Özkans began to run out of supplies. All of them were constantly hungry, especially Hüseyin, but Emine was still determined to stay.

‘I’m going out,’ Hüseyin said.

‘Going out where?’ his mother asked.

‘Look, we need to find some food. And I’m sure there’s some still sitting in the shops.’

‘Let him go, Emine,’ said Halit. ‘The boy’s a fast runner. He’s our best hope.’

‘At least wait until it’s dark,’ pleaded his mother.

That night, Hüseyin rolled up an old flour sack and quietly left the house. Taking a serpentine course through the back streets, he made frequent stops, keeping out of sight in doorways in case soldiers should unexpectedly appear.

Once outside, he was in no hurry to return. After all these days with little food, he was as slim as a wheat stalk and he knew he could hide with ease. He wanted to look round his city. He wanted to see what had taken place outside the prison of his own home.

Were there soldiers everywhere? Were he and his family alone in this city? He walked this way and that, keeping to side streets but occasionally taking a glance down the main streets. He was astonished.

The same quietness in their own small street extended across the whole city. The night was hot and still and the silence heavy.

Once or twice he saw movement in the distance and hid while soldiers passed. He could hear their laughter and see the glow of cigarettes. They seemed relaxed enough, as though off duty. Clearly they felt their work was done and they were not on the lookout for anyone.