There was a loud knock at the door, and in this room, wherever it was, I heard the voice of the concierge call out, “Mr. Brigg. It is nine o’clock.”
“Yes, I am awake,” I called back. And then, “Yorgos?”
“Yes?”
“Can you bring me some coffee?”
“I will bring it!”
“And some hot water, for shaving.”
“I will bring it!”
I shaved, using hot water from a clay pitcher. The pitcher was a replica, from one of the tourist stands no doubt, a milk jug with a black image of Hercules and the Nemean lion worked onto it. As was my habit, I had a cigarette in my mouth and shaved around it, moving the cigarette around with my teeth. I parted my hair and combed it neatly. My eyes were still a mess, bloodshot and puffy. I put on my suit, forgoing a tie. This was, after all, a European holiday and an open collar was fine. I’d seen it in the French movies, mostly set in places like Rome. I played with my collar, unsure of what it was supposed to do. This new casual attitude left me on shaky ground, which was a novelty, since I’d always had a reputation for being perfectly presentable: stylish, even. Cutting edge. I put on my jacket and swung my arms around a few times, trying to work the stiffness out so it would match my new relaxed attitude. There was still some of Kelly’s whiskey in the glass, and I had the last of it while watching the street for Nikos.
At ten, a woman, Greek, appeared in front of the hotel and Steve Kelly walked out to meet her. There was an awkward pause where the two seemed to be evaluating each other; then Steve offered his arm and the woman gripped it. I watched them walking down the street together, and then Nikos pulled up on the Vespa. He hopped off, lit a cigarette, and looked around. Nikos was tall and thin, very handsome, with his father’s blue eyes and considerably more hair. He was wearing a dark jacket and matching dark pants, light material a bit on the shiny side.
I called down to him. “Nikos!”
Nikos looked up and waved.
“I’ll be right down. I’d have you come up for a drink first, but I don’t have anything.”
“We’ll take care of that,” said Nikos, nodding with conviction.
The elevator was still out of order, so I took the stairs. I thought I was in a hurry, I’m not sure why, and when I finally exited the building I was out of breath. Nikos seemed to find this amusing.
“The elevator,” I said.
“Yes,” said Nikos. He offered his hand and I shook it. “Are you hungry?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe.”
“You want to hear bouzoukis?”
“Do I?”
“People dancing around and breaking plates?” Nikos had a twinkle in his eye.
“Well, I’ve heard of that. And also read in one of my books that they charge you extra.”
“You want to see the real Athens?”
“I do?” I lit a cigarette and looked out on the street. “The fake Athens would be fine. What do you for fun?”
“Me? Everything I do is fun.”
“I read about that in the tour books too.” I didn’t really trust it, and Nikos saw that and laughed out loud.
“You like Greek food?”
“I like the rabbit. I don’t need it again.”
“Let’s walk,” said Nikos. He rolled the Vespa onto the sidewalk and parked it. Nikos gestured to the street and we crossed together. “How is the room?”
“Well, you saw it. There’s a very friendly American guy down the hall. Steve Kelly.”
“Steve Kelly. He is a journalist.”
“Yes. That’s what he said. But I wondered.”
“Why?”
“He seemed a little too friendly.”
“He is interested in what you are doing?”
“Yes.”
“I am interested in what you are doing,” said Nikos. “You were with an auction house? That seems like a very good job. And now you are here. …”
“I needed a change,” I said. Nikos had stopped walking. We were in front of an elegant bar.
“An aperitif?” said Nikos. I followed him inside. I had the feeling that I would follow him anywhere. The bar was paneled floor to ceiling, with heavy light fixtures and dim mirrors. The effect was fin de siècle. There were mostly men but a few well-dressed women, Greeks and others. I could hear a woman’s voice, English accent, protesting the price of a tablecloth. We went to stand by the bar.
“I am having a Scotch,” said Nikos.
“Do they have bourbon?”
“Of course,” said Nikos, nodding slantwise. “So, the auction house?”
“My ex-wife’s father owned it.”
“That is how you got the job?”
“No,” I said. I fixed Nikos with an admonishing gaze. “That is how I met my wife.”
“No wife, no job?”
“It was my choice. How about you, Nikos, why aren’t you married?”
“I’ve been engaged for two years,” he said.
“But not married?”
“The man has four daughters, and I am engaged to the youngest. Her older sister is still waiting to have money for the dowry. … This is boring and stupid. If you want the ancient Greek, look at our marriage customs.” Nikos laughed. “I could be waiting years for this to work out.”
“Doesn’t stop you from looking around,” I said.
“When I marry,” said Nikos, raising his glass, “it will be forever.”
I took the comment as he intended and raised my glass. We drank.
“Another?” said Nikos.
“Of course,” I said. “Next one’s on me.”
Nikos nodded appreciatively. “Do you know why there are so many Western women touring here in pairs?”
“Because of the art?”
“Of course,” said Nikos, “but also because Greeks do not yell at the women. We don’t hassle the tourists. We wait and are patient, not like the Italians. The women feel safe here.”
“Well, are they?”
“Are they what?”
“Safe.”
Nikos pondered this. He looked around the bar. The English-woman was casting furtive glances at the handsome Nikos. She was a bit soft in the face and forearms and had the overall effect of an overripe fruit. Nikos smiled at her, then leaned over to me. “That one,” he said, “is safe.”
An hour later and three drinks the better, Nikos and I decided it was time to leave.
“Hungry?” asked Nikos.
“Not exactly,” I responded, “but not addled enough to not eat.”
“Addled,” said Nikos. “I like that word.”
“Confused, befuddled.”
“It is a bit more polite, a bit funny.”
I nodded.
Nikos gestured into the street with his cigarette. “I have an idea,” he said. “Instead of sitting in a nice place, we can get a gyros with pita and walk around. We are young men. There’s no reason to sit with a salad as if we are waiting for death.”
This seemed like a very good idea, although I wasn’t sure what a gyros was. I was enjoying following Nikos and was beginning to forget that I was a depressed man.
Nikos said there was only one gyros place to go to, so we went there. We sat on stools, eating, mugs of beer in front of us. We were quiet as we ate. I was thinking about Uncle William, how he and I had argued about this trip. I’d told him I would not have fun in Greece, that trying to have fun did not seem like fun at all, but here on the street all the couples were beautiful and somewhere, echoing but out of sight, some drunks—Scots? Australians?—had burst into song. A skinny cat took to scratching its neck against my shoe, which was no doubt mere convenience, but I felt wanted. I considered the possibility that I might be having fun.
“Is that your cat?” asked Nikos.
The cat looked up and fixed us with a worldly expression. Nikos tossed it a bit of meat.
“It is its own cat,” I said. I gave it another bit of meat and it started purring. The cat was sitting between us on the ground but getting bold. It stretched to standing and seemed to have intentions of leaping onto the bar. I looked up to see what Nikos thought of this, but he was far more interested in viewing something across the street over my shoulder. I turned around. Two girls with a map stood a short distance away, dressed in skirts and sandals. There was something disheveled about them and they seemed to be operating through a fog of confusion. Nikos smiled at me and raised an eyebrow.
“Eat,” he ordered.
“Do you think they’re American?” I asked.
Nikos shook his head. “They’re English.”
“How do you know?”
“The shoes.”
I stole a look at the girls’ sandals, which were stout, sturdy, nunlike. “Not that I’m interested, but they’re looking at us.”
“They’re going to come to us,” said Nikos. I was about to question Nikos’s apparent sixth sense when the two girls walked up with their map.
“Excuse me,” said the taller one. She had dark hair, an Irish paleness to the skin, and green eyes. She was, as predicted, English. “I don’t mean to bother you, but we’re supposed to be meeting people at this restaurant and I don’t know how to get there.” Her companion, blond, mortified, more delicately pretty, stood back as if aware that girls in ugly shoes shouldn’t talk to men in suits.
“You are not bothering us,” said Nikos, suddenly serious. “And what is this restaurant?”
“It’s called Bacchus. I think it’s here.” She pointed at the map, and Nikos nodded sympathetically. “But I don’t know where I am, so it doesn’t really help.”
“And you are meeting friends there?”
“Yes. We’re a bit late.”
I caught the blond girl rolling her eyes.
“Bacchus is over there, at the foot of the Acropolis.” Nikos gestured vaguely. He seemed deeply concerned. “Must you go there?”
“Why?” said the dark-haired girl.
The blond girl started looking quite scared and I smiled at her, trying not to laugh.
“The food. …” Nikos shrugged. “It’s in the tour book so everyone goes there, but for that money you can do better.”
“We’re eating sandwiches,” I said. I held up my gyros proudly. “Lamb with yogurt sauce. Very tasty.”
“Maybe you would like to eat here,” suggested Nikos, “and meet your friends later?”
“What do you think, Sue?” asked the dark-haired friend. Sue hesitated.
“My friend Nikos is in the export business,” I said gravely, “and I am an art dealer from New York. Have a sandwich, then we’ll walk you over to wherever your friends are.”
Sue, fed up but apparently resigned, crawled onto the stool next to me. Nikos vacated his seat for her friend, whose name was Helen.
“That is a Greek name,” said Nikos.
I smiled into my beer. Without looking, I knew that Helen had blushed appealingly. “The sandwich is good,” I said to the more choleric Sue. “You can have a bite of mine, if you’d like to try it.”
“Thanks,” said Sue, “but what I really need is a beer.”
I called to the waiter to bring her a drink.
“She’s been like that in every city we’ve been to. It’s a bloody nightmare. ‘Let’s go on holiday, Sue. See the sights.’” Sue rolled her eyes again and took a rather long drink.
“Susan,” I said, exercising my maturity, since I guessed Sue to be around twenty, “it’s just a sandwich.”
Sue and Helen were from outside of London on a trip financed by their well-heeled parents. They were on an adventure, had packed light (this explained the ugly shoes), and were in search of the real Greece. Sue, the serious one, had brought along a volume of Byron’s work and had pictured hikes through mountains and valleys dotted with goats and lyre-playing goatherds.
“We did see the Acropolis today,” said Sue, “but Helen forgot her hat and was scared she’d get a burn, so we had to leave after half an hour.” She drank more beer, finishing off the glass. “What’s he saying to her anyway?”
Nikos and Helen were to my right. I listened in. “He is telling her the story of the Trojan war,” I informed Sue, “fitting, since her name is Helen.”
“Bloody hell,” said Sue. “And she’s listening? She had to translate it two years ago, third-year Greek with Ms. Warrior. I should know. I was in the class.” Sue waved for the waiter to bring her another beer. “Is he all right, your friend?”
“An absolute gentleman,” I replied, but I really didn’t know.
After Helen had finished her sandwich and Sue her second beer, it was decided that there was no reason to escort the girls to Bacchus, because, no doubt, her friends had finished their meal and most likely moved on. Sue was not so prickly now. I had done quite well as the calm, honest friend. If she hadn’t thought me handsome before, she thought so now. I looked younger than I was, maybe twenty-five, and after my last two beers I was finding Sue’s edgy cleverness attractive, even though I was most often attracted to dark women with sharp cheekbones and withering gazes.
“Let me carry your bag for you,” I said. “It looks quite heavy.” And Sue handed me her canvas satchel, which wasn’t heavy at all.
Nikos, who at this point was holding Helen’s hand, looked over his shoulder and yelled, “Jazz?”
I looked at Susan, who shrugged. After all, what was Nikos asking? But I yelled back, “Why not?” which seemed like a good response.
The jazz club was down a dark and nearly deserted alley. A few shops selling vases and other trinkets were still open, the owners calling from the steps, but Nikos waved them off. Sue was now clutching my arm a little desperately, and I began to wonder how much she had had to drink.
“Come on, you two,” yelled Helen. She seemed in her element, the dangerous friend. She and Nikos were poised at the top of a stairwell that led down to the club. On drawing closer, I could hear the metallic edge of light drum music, the whine of a saxophone.
“Well, here we are,” I said to Sue. She giggled.
The club itself was crowded and smoky. Nikos clearly knew people and raised his hand when he entered, prompting a chorus of welcome. In rapid succession, I was introduced to a number of well-dressed Athenians, their girlfriends, and the proprietor, who brought drinks to the table. Whiskey, which I drank. I watched Sue drain her glass as if she’d forgotten it was to be sipped.
Nikos tapped me on the shoulder. “So, how do you like Athens?”
Nikos’s arm was now wrapped around Helen’s waist and he was rubbing up and down her side. “Not as much as you do,” I replied. “But that’s quite all right.”
The next song was a Chet Baker cover, a bit sadder than the others, recognizable but not one I knew well. I lit a cigarette and looked over at Sue, who was smiling in a pleasant way. “Can I get you another drink?” I asked.
“What?” she called back. The club was noisy.
I leaned in and smiled. “Do you want another drink?”
“Yes, please,” she said.
An hour later, with Sue collapsed warmly against my side, I felt the old sadness welling up. I’d been running away all evening, happy for the distraction, for the pretty English girls, for the urbane Nikos. I felt twenty-five again, as if the last five years had never happened and I was still somehow innocent. Sue’s hair was soft against my chin. I watched Nikos dancing slowly with Helen, Nikos whose face seemed impossibly serious, and although this would have made me laugh an hour before, I now felt a weird nostalgia. Nostalgia, yes, and strangely enough a nostalgia for the present, for now—this night that was still unfolding around me. Sue tangled her hand into mine, and with my left I shook a cigarette out of the pack and lit it.
“Can I get you something?” I asked Sue.
“What?”
“A drink.”
“Robert, I don’t feel very well.”
I moved her away from me and studied her face. “Let’s hold off on the drink,” I said.
Sue struggled to her feet. “Will you excuse me for a minute?”
“Let me escort you,” I offered. She looked wobbly, deathly pale, and it occurred to me that during the past half hour of my reverie she could have been asleep. I got up, and walked Sue to the back of the club. I stood by the ladies’ room, holding her up. Finally, a striking Greek woman—big cheekbones, withering glance—exited the bathroom. I felt Sue grow heavier in my arms. I watched the woman navigate the narrow hallway, her skirt pulled tight across her broad hips.
“The bathroom’s free,” I said. I opened the door, poured Sue inside, and closed it behind her.
After ten minutes of waiting in the hallway, I decided that something had to be done. I tapped on the door. “Sue,” I said, “I’m going to check in with Nikos, and then I’ll take you home.”
“All right,” came a weak voice.
I walked down the hallway, checking over my shoulder. The proprietor looked at me in a concerned way. “I’m taking her back to her hotel,” I said. And then I added, “where I will leave her in peace.”
On the dance floor, Nikos and Helen were still propped up against each other, swaying romantically, arhythmically. I tapped Nikos on the shoulder.
“Yes,” said Nikos, as if he had just woken up.
“I have to take Sue home. She’s been in the bathroom for the last ten minutes.”
“Too bad,” said Nikos.
“Where can I get a cab around here?”
“At the end of the street, by the kiosk.”
I nodded and was about to return to Sue when Nikos placed his hand on my shoulder. “Can I have the key to your hotel room?”
I looked at Nikos, feeling suddenly that I was back at Columbia and would be sleeping on someone’s couch. I gave him the key. “You owe me,” I said.
“We are friends,” said Nikos dramatically. “We are constantly indebted to each other.”
By the kiosk, waiting for the cab, Sue threw up on a tree. I wondered about this. I too would have chosen the tree rather than the sidewalk, but why? I held her shoulders.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. She looked as if she were about to cry.
“Don’t be,” I said. “I shouldn’t have given you so much to drink.”
“I can usually handle it. It must be the heat.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “The heat. Do you think you can manage a cab?”
Sue nodded stoically. I remembered my handkerchief and gave it to her. “Something to remember me by, along with the hangover.”
And Sue laughed.
Her hotel should have been a five-minute drive, but with the two stops and one false alarm, it took nearly half an hour. I tipped the driver extravagantly and steered Sue up the steps. The hotel was small and neat with a hand-shaped Venetian door knocker, mailboxes, and a polished marble floor. The elevator was the size of a broom closet. “What room are you in?” I asked.
Suddenly a woman came running out from the back room. She was wearing an apron, apparent industry at this late hour, and when she saw me with Sue her eyes ignited.
“Ochi! Ochi!” she said.
I stopped obediently.
“No mans!”
“What?”
“No mans!”
I patted Sue lightly on the shoulder. “Sorry, Sue, no mans. You’re on your own.”
Sue nodded. She entered the elevator and pressed a button. She turned back to me, her face full of remorse, “I’m so—”
But the elevator whisked her into the heavens and out of harm’s way. I faced the woman, raising my hands in surrender.
She was still muttering at me when I went into the street.
It was a nice night and I decided to walk home. Sue’s hotel was not far from the National Gardens, and from there Hotel Nikis was just a short distance through Syntagma Square. The air was still and barely cooler than daytime, but walking felt good after the closeness of the club, and I knew I should proceed at a leisurely pace; although I did not know Nikos well, I thought it safe to assume that he was a man who took his time with all things pleasurable. The moon was nearly full and the palace lit up. A few honking taxis circled Syntagma. Businesses were finally closing. I wondered how late it was. Two small boys, one with a bicycle, played unattended by a fountain; near them a stray dog lay passed out, apparently napping.
“Hello, dog,” I said.
In response to this, the dog wagged its tail.
I stopped at a shop where the owner was busily going around shutting off lights. I stood at the counter, feeling invisible, until the man finally noticed me.
“Kalispéra,” the man said.
“Can I get some whiskey?” I asked.
“Whiskey.” The man nodded and took a bottle off the shelf.
I took a handful of money out of my pocket. I didn’t know what it was worth, so to be safe, I handed him a large bill. The man shook his head. He gave the bill back to me and went through my cash picking out a smaller bill and a couple of coins. He folded my hand around the remaining money.
“Endaxi,” the man said.
“Endaxi,” I replied.
It was with some displeasure that I noted Nikos’s Vespa still parked on the sidewalk. The window to my room was closed. I was not sure how to proceed, but I found myself walking up the steps to my room. The hallway was dimly lit and mostly quiet, other than the staccato of a typewriter coming from Steve Kelly’s room. I walked quietly down the hall and listened, feeling like a pervert, at my door. Nikos’s voice was whispering sweetly in there and, although I was well within my rights to knock, I couldn’t seem to find the energy to do it. I walked back up the hallway to Steve Kelly’s room and knocked on the door. The typewriting stopped and I knocked again.
Someone yelled out in Greek. I was quiet, and more Greek words issued forth. It was Steve and I thought that his Greek might be very good.
“It’s Rupert, from down the hall,” I said.
“From down the hall?” he responded. He had been deep in thought.
“Not to be confused with that other Rupert.”
I heard him laugh. “Come in,” he said.
I swung open the door. Steve was in his undershorts at his typewriter.
“Do you want a drink?” I held up the bottle of whiskey. “I know my timing’s awful, but there are extenuating circumstances.”
Steve’s eyes lit up. “And here all this time I thought it was you.”
“It’s my friend Nikos. I can wait downstairs. …”
“No, no. Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll stop and have a drink now. I do have a deadline tomorrow, but you’re welcome to stay. You can nap in the armchair.”
“Thanks very much.”
“You must be exhausted.”
“Yeah.” I kicked off my shoes. “How long have I been here?”
“Not even a day.”
“Oh my God,” I laughed. “Funny thing is, I feel like I’ve been here forever, but that I’m getting younger.”
Steve, who had fetched the glasses from the bathroom, poured me a whiskey. “Younger?”
“My friend is having sex in my room.” I massaged my forehead. “I spent the evening buying drinks for a girl wearing sandals.”
“What kind of sandals?”
“The kind that girls wear at school.”
“I didn’t realize that footwear was a function of time or age.”
I took a long drink. “It is,” I said. “Most definitely.” Steve was now seated on the end of his bed. “What are you writing about?”
“The north. The Communists.”
“Are they really a threat?”
Steve shrugged. “Their threat is really a threat. The right-wingers exploit them, and they are a bunch of lunatics. Then there’s the Center Party, Papandreou’s party, which is more moderate.”
“How long have you been here?”
“Six months.”
“And you speak Greek?”
“I think I do. Some of the locals might disagree.” Steve sipped his drink. “I held off learning for a while. I originally came to cover the situation in Cyprus. I thought it would be over in a matter of weeks, but Cyprus is still Cyprus. And there are other things going on.”
“Other things?”
“Like tourism,” said Steve, and he smiled pointedly.
Rather than keep me up, Steve’s typing lulled me to sleep. It was the Vespa, protesting on the sidewalk directly below Steve’s window, that told me my room had been vacated. Steve was now asleep, sprawled on top of his bed, snoring. I went over to the window and saw Nikos disappearing into the night. I glanced over at the typewriter, but there was no paper in it. In fact, there was no paper on the table at all except for a virginal stack of white sheets.