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Mary had winced at these words, but she was
fully aware that Damos was right when he
maintained that it would be a blessing when
his mother was taken.
`She suffers too much,' he told Mary. `She's
going through agony now that
communication's become impossible.'
Mary nodded sadly. Mrs. Christou could not
even make signs these days, her hands and
arms having become so weak.
And Mary suspected that it was because he
was so sure that his mother was unable to
communicate that, one afternoon, he left
Mary alone with her for a few minutes while
he went away to make a phone call to one of
his managers in Athens.
Immediately he had left the room Mrs.
Christou managed to sit up and after
indicating her need of the writing pad and
pencil, was handed them by Mary who,
staring in some surprise, watched the pencil
scrape over the page and slip off at the edge.
But she managed to read, after a great deal
of difficulty,
`I've been worrying, Rita. Why did you leave
your lovely house? Damos was delighted with
it when he bought it, some years ago-' There
followed a gap and then a long pencil mark
where the words, whatever they were meant
to be, had trailed away into a thin spidery line
which meant nothing at all. But underneath
this Mary read, `Perhaps it was that Preveza
is not as pleasant a situation. Damos likes it
here, obviously. It was such a surprise-'
Another gap and then, `And I in turn had to
be moved-' No more. Mary was conscious of
tremors running through her, but no specific
emotion was aroused. Preveza.... So that was
where they had first lived - her husband and
herself. It was quite a distance from Yannina -
quite a distance for Damos to come,
especially when he had been so satisfied with
the house at Preveza. In addition, he had had
to have his mother moved in order that he
and his wife could continue visiting her.
There must have been some vitally important
reason for that move of residence. She
reflected on her husband's answer when she
had asked him the reason. They both wanted
to live near the mountains ...
Had she herself really had any say in the
move? she began to wonder. Was there
something particularly significant in the fact
that the removal had taken place during her
absence from home? Would any man make a
move that necessitated the removal of his
dying mother unless the move was
unavoidable? These and many other baffling
questions flitted through Mary's brain until,
overtaxed, it brought down, for its own
protection, that curtain of mist and with a
feeling of frustration and anger Mary found
herself - as she so often found herself - in-
capable of clear thought.
A slight lift of her mother-in-law's hand
reminding her that an answer was awaited,
Mary said soothingly, marvelling at the cool
unconcern in her voice,
`You shouldn't have worried, darling. We
moved be-cause we wanted the mountain
scenery. Preveza, as you know, is on the
coast.' What a good thing she had read about
her new country since coming back to
Greece!
'Damos is so close about the move,' wrote
Mrs. Christou. `He always passed it off when I
asked him about it, which I often did, at the
beginning. You were away, of course, at that
time, having your little holiday.' The scrawl
was becoming almost undecipherable and
because Mary took so long to make it out her
mother-in-law started to cry and flung down
the pencil and pad.
`I've read it, Mother,' said Mary hastily. `I
read it almost right away, but I was thinking,'
she lied. A sign of the hand then, and Mary
answered the question it asked. `I was
thinking about Damos's reticence over the
move. I expect he didn't want to bother you
with details which, after all, were
unimportant. We really did move because we
liked it here, among the mountains.' Why had
her mother-in-law been so puzzled about the
move? - so worried, she had said.
Another movement of Mrs. Christou's hand
indicated that she was quite satisfied with the
explanation given her, and Mary breathed a
sigh of relief.
The paper on which her mother-in-law had
been writing was still in Mary's hand. She
stared at it for a long while until, hearing her
husband's voice as he spoke to a
nurse in the corridor, she slipped it quickly
into her hand-bag.
Would there ever be an opportunity of her
visiting Preveza? she wondered, convinced
without a shadow of doubt that Damos would
never take her there.
`I must be patient,' she told herself, greatly
troubled by the faint glimmerings of distrust
that were persisting in spite of her loyal
efforts to thrust them away. But at the same
time she was profoundly conscious of the fact
that her mind at the present time was rather
more dull than usual and she was sensible
enough to acknowledge that her misgivings
could be over-exaggerated. `It will all be right
in the end - it must be!' She found herself
fingering her bracelet, and trying desperately
to reassure herself by once again repeating
what the jeweller had said,
`... it bring you good luck and much
happiness!'
Don's letter arrived a few days later. As Mary
had pre-dicted, he was delighted that her
husband had appeared on the scene to claim
her. And yet, as she read the letter through
for the third or fourth time, Mary became
more and more puzzled by the thread of
something incomprehensible that seemed to
run through it. She showed it to Damos and
said with a frown,
`Can you find anything wrong with it?'
`Wrong?' He was guarded; his eyes, which
had looked swiftly in her direction' as he
faced her across the breakfast table, held the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]