‘So what happens next?’ asked Maria, steering them both away from danger.
‘I wait,’ said Anna. ‘I wait until he asks me. But meanwhile it’s torture and I’m going to
die
if he doesn’t do it soon.’
‘He will, I’m sure. He obviously loves you.
Everyone
says so.’
‘Who’s everyone?’ Anna asked sharply.
‘I don’t know really, but according to Fotini everyone on the estate seems to think so.’
‘And what does Fotini know?’
Maria knew that she had said too much. Though there had been few secrets between these girls in days gone by, over the past few months this had changed. Fotini had confided in Maria about her brother’s infatuation with Anna and how it aggravated him to hear all the estate workers talk of nothing but the impending engagement between their master’s son and the girl from the village. Poor Antonis.
Anna bullied Maria until she told her.
‘It’s Antonis. He’s obsessed with you, you must know that. He tells Fotini all the estate gossip and everyone’s saying that Andreas is about to ask you to marry him.’
For a moment Anna basked in the knowledge that she was the focus of discussion and speculation. She loved to know she was the centre of attention and wanted to know more.
‘What else are they saying? Go on, Maria, tell me!’
‘They’re saying he’s marrying beneath him.’
It was not what Anna expected and certainly not what she wanted to hear. She responded with vehemence.
‘What do I care about what they think? Why
shouldn’t
I marry Andreas Vandoulakis? I certainly wouldn’t have married someone like Antonis Angelopoulos. He doesn’t own more than the shirt he stands up in!’
‘That’s no way to talk about our best friend’s brother - and anyway, the reason he has nothing is that he was away fighting for his country while other people stayed at home and lined their own pockets.’
Maria’s parting shot was one barbed comment too many for Anna’s liking. She hurled herself at her sister, and Maria, as ever when she became embroiled in an argument with the unrestrained Anna, chose not to retaliate. She fled from the house and, being a faster runner than Anna, was soon out of sight in the maze of little streets at the far end of the village.
Maria was a mistress of restraint. Unlike her volatile sister, whose feelings, thoughts and actions were simultaneously played out for all to see, she was thoughtful. Generally she kept her feelings and opinions to herself, observing that outbursts of emotion or careless words were often regretted. In the past few years she had learned to control her feelings better than ever. In this way she kept up the appearance of being contented, largely to protect her father. Sometimes, however, she would allow herself the luxury of a spontaneous outburst, and when it came, it could have the impact of a clap of thunder on a cloudless day.
In spite of the opinions of the estate workers and the residual misgivings of Alexandros Vandoulakis, the engagement took place in April. The pair had been left alone in the gloomy drawing room after dinner, which had been an even stiffer event than usual. The anticipation of the engagement had been such that when the moment finally came and Andreas asked for her hand, Anna felt little emotion. She had played the scene through in her mind so often that when it actually took place it was as though she were an actress on a stage. She felt numb, unreal.
‘Anna,’ said Andreas. ‘I have something to ask you.’
There was nothing romantic, imaginative or even remotely magical about the proposal. It was as functional as the floor-boards they stood on.
‘Will you marry me?’
Anna had reached her goal, winning a bet with herself and cocking a snook at those who might have thought she was not up to marriage into a landed family. These were her first thoughts as she accepted Andreas’s hand and kissed him fully and passionately on the lips for the first time.
As was customary during a period of engagement, gifts were then lavished on Anna by her future in-laws. Beautiful clothes, silk underwear and expensive trinkets were purchased for her so that, although her own father could provide very little, she would not be lacking for anything by the time she finally became a Vandoulakis.
‘It’s as though every day is my saint’s day,’ Anna said to Fotini, who had come to view the latest array of luxury items that had been delivered from Iraklion. The small house in Plaka overflowed with the scent of extravagance, and in this post-occupation period, when a pair of silk stockings was out of reach for all but the wealthiest women, Anna’s trousseau was a spectacle that all the girls queued up to see. The oyster-coloured satin camisoles and nightgowns that sat in boxes between layers of crinkly tissue paper were the stuff of Hollywood movies. When she lifted some of the items out to show her friends, the fabric ran between her fingers like water spilling into a pool. They were beyond even her own wildest dreams.
A week before the wedding itself took place, work began in Plaka on the traditional crown of bread. Leavened seven times, a large circle of dough was decorated with intricate patterns of a hundred flowers and fronds, and in the final stage of its baking was glazed to a golden brown. The unbroken circle symbolised the bride’s intention to stay with her husband from beginning to end. Meanwhile, at the Vandoulakis home, Andreas’s sisters began work on decorating the nuptial quarters at the couple’s future home with silk cloth and wreaths of ivy, pomegranates and laurel leaves.
A lavish party had been thrown to celebrate the engagement, and for the wedding itself in March of the following year, no expense was spared. Before the service, which was to take place in Elounda, the guests arrived at the Vandoulakis home. They were a curious mix. Wealthy people from Elounda, Agios Nikolaos and Neapoli mixed with the estate workers and dozens of folk from Plaka. When they caught sight of Anna, the people from her old village gasped. Enough gold coins to fill a bank vault jangled across her chest and heavily jewelled earrings hung from her ears. She glittered in the spring light, and in the rich red of her traditional bridal gown she could have stepped from the
Tales of the Arabian Nights
.
Giorgis looked at her with pride and some bemusement, marvelling that this was his own daughter. She was almost unrecognisable. He wished at this more than any other moment that Eleni was here to see their firstborn looking so beautiful. He wondered what she would have thought about Anna moving into such an important family. So much of his elder daughter reminded him of his wife, but there was also a part of her that was completely unfamiliar. It seemed an impossibility that he, a humble fisherman, could have anything to do with this vision.
Maria had helped Anna get ready that morning. Her sister’s hands trembled so violently that she had to do up every button for her. She knew this was what Anna wanted and that she was achieving her ultimate goal. She was confident that her sister had rehearsed being the
grande dame
so often in her daydreams that she would have no trouble adapting to the reality.
‘Tell me it’s really happening,’ Anna said. ‘I can’t believe I’m actually going to be Kyria Vandoulakis!’
‘It’s all real,’ Maria reassured her, wondering as she spoke what the reality of going to live in a grand house would be like. She hoped it would mean more than fine jewellery and smart clothes. Even for Anna such things might have their limitations.
The mix of guests made this an unusual event, but even more unconventional was that the pre-nuptial feast was held in the groom’s house rather than the bride’s, as was the tradition. Everyone understood the reasons for this. They did not need to be articulated. What kind of feast would have been on offer at the house of Giorgis Petrakis? The smart ladies of Neapoli tittered at the very thought, just as they had done when they heard that the Vandoulakis boy was marrying a poor fisherman’s daughter. ‘What on
earth
is the family thinking of?’ they had sneered. Whatever anyone thought of the marriage, everyone was there to enjoy the fine lunch of roast lamb, cheese and wine from Vandoulakis’s own crops, and when all two hundred stomachs were full it was time for the marriage service. It was a motley procession of cars, trucks and donkeys pulling carts that finally made its way down to Elounda.
For Cretans both rich and poor the rituals of the marriage ceremony were the same. Two
stephana
, the simple marriage crowns made from dried flowers and grasses and linked by a ribbon, were placed on the heads of the couple by the priest, and then exchanged three times to cement their union. These crowns would be framed later on by Anna’s mother-in-law and hung high above the couple’s bed so that, as the saying went, no one could tread on the marriage. For much of the time, the words of the sacred ritual were lost in the chatter of the congregation, but when the bride and groom finally joined hands with the priest, a hush spread around the church. Now they performed a sedate dance around the altar, the Isaiah Dance, and the guests knew that soon they would be outside in the sunshine.
Following the bride and groom, who rode in a carriage, everyone trooped back to the Vandoulakis home where trestle tables were laid out for another feast. People ate, drank and danced into the night, and just before the sun rose a volley of gunshots was fired to mark the end of the celebrations. After the wedding, Anna more or less vanished from life in Plaka. She visited once a week to see her father, but as time went on she began to send a car down to collect him instead, so her appearances in Plaka became very few and far between. As the wife of the future head of the estate, she found her social position much altered. This was, however, not a problem for her. It was exactly what she wanted - a disconnection from her past.
Anna threw herself into her new role and soon found that her duties as daughter-in-law were as weighty as those of being a wife. She spent each day in the company of Eleftheria and her friends, either calling on them or receiving them at their home, and just as she had hoped, they all enjoyed a level of leisure that bordered on idleness. Her main duty was to help manage the domestic aspects of the Vandoulakis household, which largely involved ensuring that the maid had laid on a great spread of food for the menfolk when they returned in the evening.
She longed to make changes to the two family homes, to relieve them of their dark drapes and sombre furnishings. She nagged Andreas until he took his mother aside to ask for permission, and Eleftheria in turn consulted the real head of the household. This was the way in which everything had to be done.
‘I don’t want the big house altered too much,’ said Alexandros Vandoulakis to his wife, referring to the house in Elounda. ‘But Anna can give the house in Neapoli a lick of paint if she’d like to.’
The new bride threw herself into the task and was soon carried away on a wave of enthusiasm for fabrics and wall-papers, making endless trips to an importer of fine French and Italian goods who had a smart shop in Agios Nikolaos. It kept her busy and absorbed and Andreas benefited, finding her in a lively and buoyant mood at the end of each day.
Another of her duties was to manage the
panegyria
celebrations which the Vandoulakis family threw for their workers. Anna excelled at putting on a show. At these feasts she would sometimes feel the eyes of Antonis Angelopoulos on her and she would look up to meet his steely glare. Occasionally he would even speak to her.
‘Kyria Vandoulakis,’ he would say with exaggerated deference, his bow rather too low. ‘How are you?’
His manner made Anna flinch and her reply was appropriately curt.
‘Well, thank you.’
With that she turned her back on him. Both his look and his manner challenged her right to be there as his superior. How
dare
he?
Anna’s marriage brought a change not only to her own status; her departure also meant a change in Maria’s. The younger sister now clearly had the role of mistress in her own household. Much of Maria’s energy had gone into pleasing and pacifying her sister, and the fact that Anna was no longer there meant a lightening of her load. She put renewed energy into running the Petrakis home and now often went with her father to make deliveries to Spinalonga.
For Giorgis, who could not lay flowers on her grave, each visit to the island was an opportunity to remember Eleni. He continued to go to and fro with Dr Lapakis in both fair and stormy weather, and on these journeys the doctor talked about his work, confessing to Giorgis how many of the lepers were now dying and how much he missed the visits of Dr Kyritsis.
‘He brought a hint of good things to come,’ said Lapakis wearily. ‘I don’t believe in very much myself, but I saw how belief can be a good thing, an end in itself. For some of the lepers, having the faith that Kyritsis might be able to cure them was enough to stop them wanting to die. Many of them feel there’s nothing left to live for now.’