Chapter Thirty-Eight
Norwich
‘She’ll be up soon,’ Marita said as her daughter entered the kitchen. She poured them both a coffee and pulled up a stool and sat beside Anna. ‘Any further progress on that project your German friend was working on?’
‘We’ve gone as far as we can for now. But we’ll pick it up later on. I’m sure of it.’
‘Good. He sounded like a nice person.’
‘Yes. I suppose he is.’
Marita stood up. ‘I’ve got some croissants in the freezer. Will they do for breakfast?’
‘They’ll be fine, Mum. Shall I go and wake Yiayia?’
‘No. I wouldn’t. She’s not been so well these last few weeks. She’s had a cold she can’t seem to shake and needs as much rest as she can get. Let her sleep a bit longer, eh?’
‘I don’t need sleep!’ a thin voice sounded from the kitchen door and the two women looked up to see that Eleni had quietly emerged from her room and made for the kitchen. ‘Ah, Anna. I thought I heard your voice.’ She looked a little confused. ‘When did you get here?’
‘Last night.’
‘Late last night,’ Marita sniffed. ‘She came up straight from London on the train.’
Once Marita had poured the coffee and placed the croissants in the oven she excused herself and went upstairs to dress and get ready to go into the city to do some Christmas shopping. When the croissants were baked enough, Anna served them with some butter and jam and poured some more coffee. She watched as Eleni ate clumsily with trembling gnarled fingers. It was hard to believe that this frail, grey-haired woman had once been a fighter in the Greek resistance and Anna felt a pang of sorrow that so great a spirit could be ravaged this way by the passage of time. Age withered all people, she reflected, and perhaps recorded history was the saving grace of those who became old. A reminder that they too were once young and vibrant and making their mark on the world around them. And when they were gone they would be preserved that way.
When she had finished and wiped her crinkly lips, Eleni regarded her granddaughter. ‘I’ve been hoping we might continue our discussion about my younger days. I had thought all that was behind me, but now I want to remember.’ She smiled. ‘Thanks to you, my girl.’
‘No. It’s you I should be thanking. I’ve learned a lot from you. All through my life actually.’
‘As a young person should. Even old people can teach the young something useful, eh? So we’ll talk some more. First, let me get dressed.’ She glanced sharply at Anna. ‘And comb your hair, girl, it looks like a rat’s nest.
Then
we can talk.’ She leaned forward and her face contorted as she coughed, again and again, and Anna began to grow alarmed and went to put her arm around the old lady’s shoulder, but Eleni waved her away and croaked. ‘Water. Get me a glass of water.’
She felt better after a few sips and settled back with a worn-out expression.
‘Do you want me to help you, Yiayia?’
‘No. I shall be fine. I can manage. Now let’s waste no more time. Get dressed and come to my room when you are ready.’
‘You read my letter?’ Eleni asked half an hour later when they had settled in their chairs in her room.
‘Of course.’
The old woman nodded. ‘Then you know what happened.’
‘Yes. I’m so sorry.’
Eleni shook her head slowly. ‘It all happened long ago. Sometimes I remember it as if it was only yesterday, and it breaks my heart . . .’
‘What happened to you afterwards? After the fight at the cave?’
Eleni did not appear to hear the question; she looked down into her lap and mused, ‘Andreas was a brave man. The bravest I ever met and that was part of the reason I loved him . . .’ She cleared her throat and looked up at Anna. ‘In any case, he was killed and I was wounded at the same time. Shot, here.’ Eleni indicated her side, halfway down. ‘I might have died, if someone had not taken me to a doctor. He saved me and then arranged for me to be hidden from the enemy. I stayed with a cousin of Yannis Stavakis for a month before I was evacuated by a submarine delivering supplies. I was taken to Egypt and treated at a military hospital in Alexandria. That’s where I met your grandfather, Julian, for the second time. He had heard that I had been wounded and brought back from Lefkas and came to find me. It took me many months to recover and he came to see me and take care of me.’ She smiled at the memory. ‘He, too, was a fine man and I grew to have a great deal of affection for him. And so, he eventually asked me to marry him. I accepted, and after the war Julian brought me to England and the rest you know.’
Anna nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘It’s not much of a story after all. At least not to anyone outside the family. But it has been good to tell the old tale again. To remember. I hope I haven’t bored you, my dear.’
‘Of course not. Besides, I have been able to find out some more about what happened for myself.’
‘Oh?’
Anna collected her thoughts and began. ‘You know you showed me that picture of you and your friends before the war. The one with Andreas, and the German boy, Peter.’
‘I remember.’
‘You told me that you had met again when Peter had become your enemy. I know the story of that time now, Yiayia, from what you have said to me, and what Peter’s grandson told me. He has the diaries that Peter kept, as well as the notes of Dr Muller. He gave me an account of events from what he had learned. Dieter told me about the cave and what was in it. About how Andreas died and how you were wounded, and saved from death. I must admit, I had thought that Peter was not quite as bad a person as you said when we talked about this earlier.’
Eleni sucked in a breath. ‘He told you everything?’
‘As far as I can tell,’ Anna admitted.
‘I see . . . Did this Dieter say what happened to my parents?’
‘Yes.’
‘And knowing that, you were still prepared to speak with him?’
‘Yiayia,’ Anna responded gently. ‘I understand that a great wrong was done to you and those who suffered in the war. But Dieter cannot be blamed for what his grandfather’s generation did. And Peter did not betray you to his superiors. That was the work of another soldier. He tried his best to save your life. You might try to forgive him a little . . .’
Eleni looked down and waved her hand as if trying to swat something away. ‘I try to forget, but I cannot forgive. How can I? It is easier for you. You have not lived through what I had to. Otherwise you would understand. I live with my past every day, here in my heart. It is not just a story to be told to children. Is that what you teach these days?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Then what is the point of history?’
Anna had an answer ready. The same she gave to all her pupils when they asked that question. ‘In the end, it is to learn from our mistakes.’
‘And what have you learned?’ Eleni sat up and pointed a finger. ‘And what has anyone learned? Nothing. Men still start wars, and the rest of us still suffer them. So, I shall tell you the true purpose of history. It is to remember why we hate, and why we love. If it is not that, then it is just a story we tell to amuse ourselves . . . Nothing more.’
There was a long silence in the room, broken only by the steady ticking of a clock, marking time. Then Eleni stirred and sat back, drained and shrunken.
‘I cannot talk about this any more. I need to rest. You need to go. Go and do something useful with your life.’
‘Yiayia . . .’
‘No more. Please.’
Anna paused and then nodded. ‘All right. But there’s something else. Something I must give you.’
She reached into her bag and took out the tobacco tin that Dieter had given her. Then carefully opened it with a soft metallic ping.
‘Dieter discovered this amongst his grandfather’s belongings. It was supposed to be given to you by Peter, but he must have forgotten he had it until you had gone into hiding and then it was too late.’
She took out the locket and leaned forward to place it in her grandmother’s hands. Eleni frowned.
‘What is this?’
‘Here, let me open it up.’
Anna slipped the catch and the case parted to reveal the two small portrait photographs inside. Eleni reached for her reading glasses on the table beside her and put them on. She squinted slightly and then frowned.
‘No . . . It can’t be . . . This was on Andreas. He always wore it.’
‘He passed it to Peter to give to you. Andreas knew he was dying. It was his last wish.’
Eleni touched the photograph tenderly and stroked it. ‘Andreas . . . My love . . . My only love.’
She clenched her eyes shut and seemed to shrink into herself, trembling. Anna could only watch as the old lady clasped both hands round the locket and held it up to her lips and gave in to the memories and grief that flooded back into her thoughts as she recalled the man she had loved, with all her heart.
And still did.
Epilogue
May, 2014
T
he bell sounded for the end of lunch break and Anna carefelly swept the crumbs from the desk in her work cubicle into the palm of her hand and deposited them in the wastepaper bin. Still chewing the remnants of her tuna and cucumber sandwich, she stood and picked up her bag and the stack of exercise books waiting to be returned to her year nine students. As she passed through the staffroom, the other teachers were hurriedly draining cups of tea and heading off to teach their classes.
In April she had received the phone call from her mother in Norwich to say that Eleni had died in her sleep. Anna had visited her as often as she could in the last months of her life and had seen her grandmother slowly waste away. Her last memories had been of Andreas and the short, perilous life they had shared with the
andartes
. The funeral was a small affair with a handful of family at the crematorium. She left what little she had to Marita, and her ashes were placed in the grave beside her long dead English husband.
For Anna the sense of loss had been twofold. She had lost her beloved grandmother, and Eleni – the young woman she had discovered in recent months. Her grief was made worse still by the knowledge that Eleni had found her great love in life in an extraordinary moment in time. Whereas Anna had not yet found anyone to inspire such a depth of feeling. Still, she was young, and things might change, she told herself. Besides, it was time to move on. She had decided to get back in touch with Dieter to let him know about Eleni’s passing. Perhaps she would take a trip to Lefkas and explore the island herself. As much to better understand her grandmother as to locate the resting place of Andreas.
Outside the staffroom the corridor was filled with students hurrying to class, totally ignoring the headteacher’s two-lane system for easing movement through the main thoroughfare. Anna settled in behind a block of big year eleven boys and used their slipstream to negotiate the corridor before taking the side door leading out to the mobile classrooms. The usual raft of conscientious students had already taken their seats by the time she entered the mobile and she made herself smile in response to their greeting. The others drifted in, even after the bell rang to announce the start of lessons. As usual, Jamie was last and he tossed his bag on to his desk over the heads of two of the girls, making them flinch and duck.
Anna completed the register and took out the worksheets she had spent the lunchtime photocopying and asked one of the boys to hand them out. There was a shuffling of bags as the students got out their pens and notebooks and when she could see that everyone was ready to start, Anna stood in front of the class.
‘Start of a new topic today,’ she announced. ‘We’re going to be looking at the Weimar Republic and the rise of the National Socialist Party. You’ve all heard of them, although they’re more commonly referred to as the Nazis. We’ll be looking at evidence for conditions in Germany in the nineteen twenties and the grievences of the German people and why they might have been persuaded to vote for the National Socialists. You have the text of one of their pamphlets in front of you, together with a newspaper report of one of their early meetings. What you need to do, in pairs, is read . . .’
A movement at the back of the class caught her eye and she saw Jamie muttering to one of his mates.
‘Jamie,’ she began patiently. ‘Have you got something to say about the subject that the rest of us might benefit from?’
He nodded slowly. ‘Yeah, now you mention it, I have.’ He tapped the worksheet. ‘This is stuff that happened nearly a hundred years ago, right?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Then how is it supposed to help me get a job? How is it even interesting? It’s all about boring dead people. We should be learning useful stuff.’
‘The learning process
is
the useful stuff, Jamie.’
‘That’s what you say, miss. But I want to know something interesting. Something real.’
‘Do you? Really?’ Anna sat on the edge of her desk and looked over the faces of her students. Young and full of promise. She felt something stirring in her heart. Something inspiring and important. Far more important than the dry worksheets in front of them. ‘All right then. You can do the worksheets for homework. But now I want you to put them away. Put away all your pens. Everything. Then I want you to listen. I’m going to tell you a story, from history. Something interesting. Something real . . . Listen.’
Author’s Note
For a comparatively small country Greece occupies a significant space in a world history. Intellectually, culturally and militarily. Although awareness of classical civilisations is being slowly but surely squeezed out of the curriculum in schools – to the shame of education ministers over recent decades – those of a certain generation can readily recall the inspirational example of the Ancient Greeks. Foremost perhaps is Cleisthenes, the father of early democracy which spread through the Greek city states in one form or another and, despite the criticism of certain philosophers, became an ideal that lives down to the present day. Then there’s the great tradition of expanding the scope of human knowledge, led by the towering figures of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. But there were many others whose influence thrived throughout the ancient world and led to the construction of the greatest wonder of the ancient world – the Great Library of Alexandria. Hand in hand with the philosophy were the arts, painting, sculpture, theatre and poetry providing early benchmarks for the millennia of artistic output that followed in the western world.
Despite such cultural achievements, a fact often overlooked is that Athens, the greatest of the city states, spent the vast majority of the nascent democratic era at war. Indeed, some historians have argued that it is precisely because Athens was so often at war and therefore needed frequent assemblies of its manpower that democracy became the inevitable expression of the will of those soldiers and sailors who defended the city. It is an interesting thought that war and democracy go hand in hand, a prospect that seems counter-intuitive to our modern mindset. We seem to have bought into Von Clauswitz’s oft quoted dictum that war is the continuation of politics by other means, as if war is somehow the aberration. I was once in conversation with a retired American diplomat when we discussed this aspect of Athenian history and I suggested that perhaps it would be better to think of peace as the continuation of war by other means. It’s a point of view that I think is much closer to the mark in understanding human history. We have never had peace and we never will. The best we can hope for is managed conflict. Between nation states, between social classes, even between family members!
From a military point of view Greece once again offers great inspiration. It was the plucky city states that stood up to the gargantuan might of Persia and who defied Xerxes at Thermopylae and humiliated his empire at Salamis and Plataea. Afterwards, it was the Greek soldiers of Alexander who carved out an empire that stretched from the Mediterranean to the heart of Asia. And it was one of his generals who established the dynasty in Egypt that was responsible for the creation of the Great Library. Thereafter the light of Greek power dimmed and was then eclipsed by Rome. Greece began its slip into the backwaters of history under the domination of Rome, and after the collapse of that empire. Even though its ancient heritage lived on in the cultures of later nations, Greece was bandied around between greater powers for many centuries before it became an independent state around 1828. Athens, when it became the capital, was a mere village with a population of six thousand. One-tenth the size of the ancient city.
In the modern age Greece played a minor role in the First World War before becoming embroiled in a bitter and bloody conflict with Turkey. But it was during the second global conflict that Greece played a prominent role in defeating the fascist powers and it is this indomitable spirit that forms the context within which the story of
Hearts of Stone
takes place. At the outbreak of the war the Greeks had supported the Allies and there were tensions between Greece and Italy. Mussolini had invaded Albania in 1939 and made little secret of his longer term plans to use his new conquest as a springboard to assault Greece. When the moment came for the swaggering Italian dictator to issue his ultimatum in October 1940 – that the Greeks surrender to immediate Italian occupation – the Greek leader, General Metaxas, rose to the occasion with a simple NO! The Greek word is ‘
Ochi
’ and since then the Greeks celebrate a national holiday on 28 October, known to them as ‘Ochi Day’. That same spirit of defiance lingers on to the present day, albeit for different reasons . . .
As soon as the Greeks refused to bow down to Italian demands, Mussolini unleashed the army in Albania that had been poised to invade Greece. However, to the surprise of the Italians, and the rest of Europe, the Italian invasion was not only stoutly resisted by the Greek soldiers, but the defenders actually managed to drive the invader back across the border into Albania with heavy losses. Bear in mind that this was the year in which Axis forces had conquered France and driven the British Expeditionary Force into the sea at Dunkirk. On all fronts the Allies had been facing humiliation. The spirited Greeks had provided the first Allied victory of the war and proven that the Axis alliance was not invincible after all. Or, at least, the Italian component of the alliance. Either way, the defeat dented the confidence and competence of the axis leaders.
Such was the reverse that Hitler was compelled to come to the aid of his hapless Italian friend in April 1941 when the Germans unleashed their onslaught of Greece from occupied Bulgaria. This was a crucial moment in the war. Had Greece buckled under pressure from Italian forces then Hitler would not have been forced to delay his invasion of Russia by some months while he secured his southern flank. That delay almost certainly doomed Germany’s attempt to take Moscow and drive deep into the industrial heartland of Stalin’s Russia. While such a result might have prolonged the war even if it had not handed victory to Germany, it might have undermined the will of the Allied nations to continue fighting, and strengthened the hand of the non-interventionists in the USA. But thanks to the pluck of the Greeks, Hitler’s ambitions were thwarted for a few critical months that made all the difference.
Be that as it may, the misery of German and Italian occupation of their country weighed heavily on the Greeks. The very first act of defiance that followed the fall of Athens is indicative of the Greeks’ determination to defy their invader. Konstantinos Koukidis, a soldier on guard at the Acropolis, took down the Greek flag. Instead of handing it over to the Germans he wrapped it around himself and leapt to his death from the heights of the Acropolis. It’s possible the story is apocryphal, but it certainly inspired his compatriots and provide a martyr for the cause of national resistance that followed. It also marked the start of the suffering that was to ensue.
The occupying powers ruled with an iron fist, brutally suppressing any expression of defiance or armed resistance. Worse still, they destroyed villages and seized stocks of food which led directly to the starvation of nearly a quarter of a million Greeks by the end of the war. Nearly a tenth of the entire population of the country perished, and two thousand villages and towns had been erased in retaliation for the actions of the resistance fighters. In such circumstances the economy of the country virtually collapsed. Nearly all trade ceased. Merchant ships and motor vehicles not destroyed during the invasion were seized by the Axis powers. Moreover, the central bank of Greece was looted and the gold and currency was expropriated by Germany. (As an aside, given recent history, it is no wonder that tensions between Greece and Germany are evoking historical grievances.)
The suffering of the Greeks was exacerbated by the conflict between two different elements of the Greek resistance: the communist National People’s Liberation Army and the right-wing National Republican Greek League. Neither accepted the authority of the Greek government in exile. What little cooperation there was between the two resistance organisations eventually gave way to open conflict, even on small islands like Lefkas. Worse still, this divide foreshadowed the Cold War that was to come with Russia tacitly supporting and instructing the communists while Britain conspired with the right-wing in order to ensure the return of the unpopular Greek king to his throne once the Axis forces had been driven out of Greece. Ultimately this led to the Greek civil war of 1945–9 when, thanks to the backing of Britain and the USA, the communists were crushed, despite representing the political ambitions of the majority of the population. Thereafter Greece was ruled by a series of ruthless right-wing despots. Many of those who were proscribed by the government were imprisoned, or forced to flee the country, many settling in Australia and the United States, while a far smaller proportion settled in Britain.
Today Greece is an attractive tourist destination, catering equally for those who appreciate its history and its scenery. It’s also a country in turmoil, struggling against the restraints imposed on it by more powerful nations. Whatever one makes of the case put by the Greeks to defy the most powerful nations of Europe, it is hard not to admire their rediscovered pride in their nation and a determination to resist outside control over their lives. Once again Greece has found the will to say ‘
Ochi!
’ Eleni Thesskoudis would have understood the sentiment completely, as would those of her generation.
For those readers who are keen to delve further into the era and conditions against which
Hearts of Stone
is set I would recommend a few excellent non-fiction titles.
The Cretan Runner
by George Psychoundakis is a wonderfully evocative account of being a messenger for the
andartes
in Crete. It captures the spirited courage of the Greeks and is clear about the great danger and discomfort that they endured while fighting the German occupiers. It also provides an interesting take on the British participation in the resistance movement, and therefore acts as something of a corrective to the occasional romantic impulse in other accounts. From the British side, with a special focus on the activities of the SOE, I’d recommend William Stanley Moss’s gripping
Ill Met By Moonlight
, which details the kidnapping of General Kreipe from Crete and his abduction to Egypt. It’s a terrific tale and provides a good sense of the ethos of the SOE agents who lived life very much on the edge. Then there’s the rather more emotive and poetic account of the same event by Patrick Leigh Fermor, as well as Xan Fielding’s
Stronghold
, a plainly written but detailed account of the daily hazards and discomforts of life amongst the
andartes
.
Simon Scarrow
February 2015