Chapter 27
That’s how they captured Penelope Kaloútsis. It was Pikinós who got her. I’m not all that certain, maybe Yeorghía knows better. And someone else. There were two of them. And when he got hold of her she told him, Now listen here, you came here after me, you came to capture me, why, if you scratch between your teeth, my bread will still be there. All this in Ayisofiá, before they burned it down. She was from Kastrí. From the Farmasónis family. Not Farmasónis. Kaloútsis. Farmasónis was her mother’s name. Kaloútsis. Anyway, they caught her, they took her somewhere, I don’t know where. They said to Orthokostá. And they slashed her up afterward, poor thing. They say she put up a fight, we weren’t there to see. Fought for her life. But they beat her down.
— In the detention camp they told me, If you see them taking folks out that door, you know they’re taking them to be executed. The monastery had two doors. They took Penelope out that same door.
— She had the flu, that’s exactly what they said. And Pikinós got her up out of bed and took her in. Because she might have given shelter to someone there. And they left. They went and burned down the whole village, those rebels. And the people got out, they went across from there.
Chapter 28
The old man had become romantically involved with Leonídas Grigorákis’s daughter. Venetsána. They went to school together, to the junior high school. It was a rare thing in those days for a girl to keep on with her studies beyond the second year, or the third year of primary school. We’re talking about the end of the past century. Around that time. Eighteen ninety-five. At any rate, that childhood romance ended up in a formal engagement. Rings were exchanged. An engagement party was held, right and proper. In the end, due to some whispering, and perhaps some political expediency, the marriage was called off. Leonídas was the mayor. Of what was then the municipality of Tánia and Dolianá. And the Grigorákis kin had been keeping that office in their family. So the marriage was called off, and not without incident. On Saint Nicholas’s Day,1 after church, the folks from Karátoula were making their way home. At Láni the road forks. The old man invited his fiancée to go to his house. His brother Nikólaos was in America. His only brother. And the bride-to-be was going to make loukoumádes.2 To celebrate his name day. But her mother didn’t let her go. The old man was insulted, he grabbed the girl by the hand and insisted that she follow him. Stubborn as mules, both the groom and the mother-in-law. And Venetsána in the middle. Weak-willed. Finally the rest of her relatives intervened. They attacked the old man. He jumped off the road, down into a vineyard. He took out a pistol from his back pocket, he fired a few shots in the air. His third shot nicked the mayor’s wife’s long woolen vest. Grazed her hip. An entirely superficial wound. At that point Konstantís Grigorákis, Koufós’s father, threw himself at the old man. Who had just enough time to bash him with the butt of his pistol, he knocked out a few of his teeth. And he kept insisting that his fiancée follow him to his house. But the girl refused. Look what you’ve done to your house now. Believing the mayor’s wife dead, and seeing the other covered in blood, she thought he’d become a criminal. After what you just did to your home, where will you take me? She refused. The old man got mad, he took out a pocketknife, and he slashed all her clothes. He slashed them and threw them away. Left her half-naked. He was out of control. They said they found her shoes all the way down in Kokóis’s yard. So the engagement was called off once and for all, in spite of the exchange of rings and the much-vaunted announcement of the engagement party, and in spite of the fact that he had made an official trip with his fiancée to Roúvali, where they baptized Zagléras. Who was a small child then. Not only that, when they passed by the house of my grandfather-to-be, my mother, a young girl then, came out and pinned some basil on them.3 Here, cousin, have a long, happy life together. Cousins, four or five times removed. Cousins. And the old man used to repeat that story. Who could have told me that in two or three years’ time the woman you have next to you as your fiancée will have left you and the woman who wished you well for your wedding would be here instead? That