Chapter 17
The Germans came to Kastrí. They broke into our house. We were in Koubíla, Yeorghía stayed there. I left to go see what had happened. They had taken two shaggy bedcovers, they had them up at Xinós’s place. They were sleeping there too. Then they decided to close up the house. And Pavlákos went and closed it up. And Réppas’s old lady was screaming, Not the girls, don’t touch their things. God rest her soul. I arrived in Kastrí. Haroúlis comes over, he tells me, Klaría, did you hear, they broke into your house, they took two bedcovers from you. But we had a suitcase belonging to Uncle Periklís in our house, full of things. And they took that too, the whole suitcase. There was a box from America, a metal box, with jewelry in it. My grandmother had brought it from Amaliáda, from the shrines of Saint Dionýsius and Saint Spyrídon. It disappeared. I found one of my dresses, a silk one, left on a fence. It was Diamantís Evanghelíou who took the suitcase. Because they were the ones who slept up there. Pavlákos told them, Who do you think you are, coming here to sleep? But in the meantime the things had been taken. I arrived in Kastrí. They didn’t find the suitcase. Pavlákos told me all about it. About Evanghelíou. I tell this to Pítsa. What are you talking about, woman, she tells me, what are you saying? The covers, I tell her, they were ours. Anghelikí, Bisbís’s wife, cuts in and tells her, They took those things from the Makríses’ house, they brought them up to your place. And that’s all she said. Haroúlis arrives, he says to me, Klaría, we have a shelter, get your things and take them there. I didn’t know what sort of person he was yet. I went there, it was a small shelter, just a hole in the wall. I carried whatever things we still had over there. Iríni’s sister helped me and we took them there. Two trunks, a chest, just like one we still have. We filled up both trunks. The Haloúlos sisters also took some of Old Man Boúrdas’s things there. And Lámbros took medicine there, and Yiórgos Yiannakákos’s wife took clothes. Just about the whole neighborhood did. The shelter was small but we packed it full up with things. And we kept guard there. Later on the Battalions arrived, our brother Yiánnis arrived, the girls go to him, they tell him, Yiánnis, let’s open up the shelter, take our things, and divvy them out. And Yiánnis tells them, What are you saying, you girls, that we should give the hiding place away? Then Harís gave it away later on. It was Harís himself who gave it away. Kontalónis’s division arrived to burn down the village. They started setting the fires. Sotiría hid in the clay oven to save herself. And when she came out that night she was all black. They had taken the rest of the people to Ayios Panteleímonas. And Yeorghía came back from halfway along the road. I don’t know what excuse she found, but she saved her father’s houses. Kontalónis himself was right there in their yard, and their houses were spared. The other houses were reduced to ashes. Harís told them where the shelter was and they went and ransacked it. They broke in, they took anything they could. They took the medicines, they took the clothes. They took everything. Yeorghía went there, she tells them, Hold on, you men, we have things there too. Boúras cuts her off. He’s in an old-age home now in Trípolis. He says, Kapetán, she’s with the Security Battalions, she can’t take things. Because her brother-in-law is in Trípolis. He was talking about Iríni’s husband. But Iríni had just married Vasílis and she and her sister weren’t speaking, she and Yeorghía. And that’s how Yeorghía was able to take a few things and save them. They took everything else. They didn’t burn any of it. They took it all. I don’t want to mention any names, whoever they were, well, anyway. And that Haroúlis who had set up that shelter and told people to put their things in there, he was the one who betrayed them. And Márkos’s wife went there, and they sent her round every which way to find her clothes, to this village and that village. Her daughters’ dowries. They burned the village to ashes. They ransacked the shelter. And the year before last I went into Old Man Yiánnis’s store — and we talked very specifically. Spýros Galaxýdis came in. There we were, me, Old Man Yiánnis, Nikólas Diamantís, and Kalamarás from Mesorráhi. Spýros comes over to me, he says, Who set the fire, do you know? No, I tell him, I don’t know. And he says, Yesterday I met with Spyrópoulos, who was the section chief here. And he told me, Tell them in Kastrí it wasn’t me who burned down your village. My village, Bertsová, was spared, I saved it. It was Yiánnis Velissáris and Haroúlis Lenghéris, they burned down your village. So don’t let people from Kastrí go blaming anyone else. That’s what he said. Yiánnis Velissáris and Haroúlis Lenghéris. Velissáris was killed. He was court-martialed, they told him to sign a renunciation of his Communist allegiance, he refused. He told all this to Léandros, Tsátsis’s daughter’s husband. He was the chief guard at the courthouse. Before he came here as a policeman, before he married Anthí. Léandros told him, Yiánnis, you’ve been betrayed. Impossible, he said. Yiánnis, you’ve been betrayed, because the others have all signed renunciations. Delivoriás who was the ringleader, and the rest of them. He told him this out of earshot, through the window. They were holding them prisoner in the basement of the courthouse. It’s not possible they betrayed me, Velissáris said. To Léandros. Impossible. But even if they did, I’m not signing anything. I’m not having my hair cut off so I can get out. So they killed him. And what about Haroúlis, when
he was held on that island, he never signed anything and they let him go free. And where do you think he was hiding when he gave the orders? During the big fire. But I heard this from someone else. And he didn’t tell me this by chance. Well, Haroúlis was holed up in the sanctuary of the church in Karátoula. All of this back then. And many years later Yiórgos Kambýlis talked about it. I said I wouldn’t mention any names. But how can I not give names? The year before last Tasía says to me, It was Haroúlis who burned down your house. Haroúlis and Kambýlis had quarreled, and Kambýlis got sore so he started telling on him. And he told his sister, It was him, he was hiding downstairs in Ayiánnis, and he and Babánis were liaisons, and he was sending messages with the names of people whose houses would be burned down. He was hiding in Ayiánnis in Karátoula. Right there in the church of Ayiánnis. In the sanctuary so he wouldn’t be seen, and he was sending out those written messages. Haroúlis.