For Robijay
There's only one place to stay round here, a taverna with rooms above. The taverna – the whole village – is set among sweet chestnut trees that rustle in the breezes that blow off the Mediterranean, and often you can hear the distant, clopping tinkle of goat-bells drifting from the mountainside.
It's late afternoon as I pick my way down a rocky cleft, the weathered orange roof tiles of the village far beneath me. Beyond them is the gorge that splits the valley. The breeze is cool, but the rocks are giving out the heat of the day's sun.
I notice a small white car – a typical hire car – parked under the olives by the taverna. A woman wearing a lavender grey top gets out of the driver's side, and despite the distance I seem to see something attractive in the way she moves. Then a male passenger gets out, and they walk to the front of the taverna and disappear under the awning. A minute later I'm among the massive trunks of the chestnuts and the village is hidden.
When I arrive at the taverna the car has gone. A pity I missed her; still, it's not as though she was on her own.
I part the hanging chains of the flyscreen in the doorway and step into the shade of the bar. Theo, the widower who owns the place, must have seen me coming through the trees, because he has a drink ready for me. The upward light reflecting off the floor gives his face the look of an elderly satyr.
I've almost finished my drink when I hear the slap of sandals from the narrow, twisting staircase in the corner of the bar. I turn, and see the woman in the lavender grey top coming down from the guest rooms. She looks to be two or three years younger than me. Supposedly an unadventurous age, but her attractive face is made enticing by a lively spark in her eyes, which the severe cut of her hair only emphasises. She nods to me and I say hello – however, she continues outside, where the mobile reception's better, and speaks on her phone. I feel faintly jealous of whoever she's speaking to, tell myself I'm being absurd, and go upstairs for a shower.
By dusk I'm seated at a table at the front of the building, on the raised verandah with its awning. Theo has just taken my order for chestnut stifado when the slim woman steps out onto the verandah.
All of the younger villagers speak good English. Theo is not young. He says to her, 'Lady!' and gestures towards me. '
Kalespera
, good evening. Two people, English – sitting one table?'
He pulls out a chair for her. With good humour she accepts it, and tells me with a smile that her name is Robi. She's changed into a flimsy dress with shoulder straps like laces – too narrow to cover bra straps. Perhaps this is why she isn't wearing a bra.
We chat. She explains that her husband had taken a call about his work as they were driving across the island. He had to break their holiday for a day or so and return to the city, but she wanted to avoid the heat.
Attractive though she is, I find Robi hard to read. Her talk is genuine and engaging, and she says nothing flirtatious. But her body... Am I imagining it, or is she presenting it to my gaze? The night darkens, there is a murmur of conversation around us as villagers gather for wine and friendship, and a hanging oil lamp casts a soft pool of light on the table. When the food is finished she leans forward with her bare arms on the white tablecloth. Their honey-bronze skin glows in the lamplight, and at the same time the neckline of her dress scoops down and I can see how the tanned tops of her breasts fade downwards to creamy white. At the very tops they're lightly freckled. Erotically freckled. I try to keep my eyes on her face.
Theo brings the customary carafe of
raki
and two glasses to round off the meal. I ask him to make a picnic lunch for me tomorrow. As Theo places the tray on the table, Robi leans back. Keeping out of his way, of course – but she thrusts her shoulders back, and I notice the size and shape of her breasts, which are not small. My cock awakens.
Over the
raki
I explain that I've been taking photographs in the mountains. The landscape here has been inhabited for millennia, and there are traces of past civilisations everywhere. Tomorrow I plan to look for a spring which, according to Theo, is sacred.
The conversation flows. It's late when we head for our rooms. Robi walks ahead of me, and as we climb the narrow stair the
raki
gives me permission to watch her pretty bottom moving under her dress. We say a brief goodnight in the corridor, where the only light is behind her and I see her body as an outline under the gauzy fabric.
The night is warm, so once in my room I open the French windows, which give onto a little balcony. Outside I see starry sky cut by the long black spires of cypress trees. Below, the back garden drops away in paved terraces. On the second terrace is a small swimming pool, hidden by the trees except for a narrow strip of still, starlit water.
Soon I'm lying naked under a sheet. I think of Robi's body, but feel that it would be presumptuous to masturbate to her image, and fall asleep unsatisfied.
Before dawn the room becomes chilly. Sleep weakens its grip, and I'm disturbed by a faint splash. I sit up, and see that the room is not quite dark. I walk to the balcony to close the windows, and notice spreading ripples in the grey surface of the pool. Could the splash have been made by some wild animal drinking? I admire the delicate tint paling the margin of the clear sky.
My eye is caught by movement in the water. A figure has appeared, indistinct in the low light: a naked woman, floating on her back, rowing herself lazily with her arms. I retreat a few steps into the darkness. She's turning, placing herself in line with the gap between the trees, until she raises her head and looks towards my window. She stands up in the water, the sky glinting on her wet shoulders. Then she swims two strokes to the side of the pool, and clambers out to stand between the cypresses. Her body is a dark, feminine silhouette against the sky reflected in the pool
I hear a door open in the house next door. Light spills from it, cutting between the cypresses. Country people are early risers. The naked woman slips away among the trees.
*
Later, when I eat my breakfast on the verandah there is no sign of Robi. Theo comes to tidy a nearby table, and I ask him for directions to the spring. We walk to one corner of the verandah and he points out a series of landmarks on the mountainside. I thank him and turn to go inside, to find that Robi has been looking at us from the doorway. I wonder whether to hint that I might have seen her before dawn, but we only exchange friendly banalities.
An hour later I'm climbing the dusty, gritty mountainside, threading my way between knee-high shrubs. My backpack is stuffed with a litre of white wine in a plastic bottle and two old ice cream cartons holding tomatoes, olives, grapes, a huge chunk of oily cheese and half a loaf of barley bread – Theo's usual idea of a picnic.
The landmarks that he pointed out look different from up here. Eventually I decide that I've gone too far up and start cautiously descending. Many of the surrounding shrubs are a mass of vicious spines: it's essential to watch where I place my feet, and this is why I see nobody until I step onto a path and can glance around. Sitting on the edge of a rocky outcrop just below, her torso twisted round so that she can look up at me, is Robi. I can see down the front of her shirt to those freckles.
'Amazing views over the gorge from here,' she says, standing up. The shirt is alternating stripes of white and a more filmy white; below it she wears skimpy shorts and walking boots. Long, tanned legs fill the space between the shorts and the boots. She says, 'You went up that hillside like a mountain goat.'
'Meaning I look horny?'
She laughs. 'You looked athletic in a wiry sort of way, is what I meant. As you very well know. Did you find the spring?'
'I think I went up too far.'
'I more or less happened across it,' she says. 'It's just round the corner.' The path ahead runs at the foot of a jutting prow of rock.
'I knew it must be nearby,' I say, lamely.
The path takes us to a rocky hollow with a view of the valley and its wooded gorge. As we enter, a long lizard skims away almost at our feet and hides among the small boulders that litter the hollow. Near the back of the hollow are a few small, goat-nibbled olive trees; in front of them is the clear, deep puddle which is the spring. I look into its depths, and sunk within them see my own face gazing up at me, made lean and darkly mysterious by shadow. The water tinkles over steps cut into stone before vanishing down the slope among loose rocks. Some way below, the road curls and climbs, cut into the flanks of the mountain.
To one side of the spring are the tumbled remains of a few walls. Robi asks, 'Who built these, up here on the mountainside? Some of these stones are massive.'
'According to Theo its never been investigated. There are so many small sites like this. I'd guess that whoever built them spoke some form of ancient Greek.'
There is a sense of
genius loci
