Chapter Six
Six
They began in the front yard, Skye clutching a chipped mug of coffee that was doing little to temper her headache—a result of the three beers pressed on her by Joy the previous evening.
Returning home from her new neighbor’s house long after dark, Skye had attempted to prepare a meal of eggplant pasta using the single, burned frying pan donated to her by Andreas and had not been successful in her efforts.
Eventually, she’d had no choice but to gnaw on the remaining chunk of bread, which had become so tough that even soaking it in olive oil made little difference to the texture.
The morning was bright, luminously so, with a lively wind that twitched through the coarse patches of grass and flattened the damp strands of Andreas’s hair.
He was in his coveralls and boots, the former unbuttoned to reveal a paint-flecked T-shirt bearing some kind of logo.
Skye squinted at it through her sunglasses, but all she could make out was a fish.
“Is there something on me?” Andreas asked, his chin squashing against his chest as he attempted to look down.
“No,” she said. “Sorry, I was— Ignore me.”
“It is early for mosquitoes, but sometimes they will hunt during the day if they are hungry enough,” he said, saying the last part with a flourish of gleeful menace.
Skye, who had woken to find three new bites on her left ankle, frowned as she sipped her coffee.
“I hate them,” she said.
“éla,” Andreas replied, “they are only doing what they must do to survive.”
That, at least, she could relate to.
“I was going to ask you about this,” she said, gesturing to a large white concrete block that was situated not far from her boundary wall.
“Ah, yes.” Andreas moved toward it. “This is protecting your power cables. Each of the houses has one. Without them, there would be no electricity.”
“Did you put them in?” she asked, but he shook his head.
“This is not my area of expertise. The power and the water were done by a separate company hired by the municipality. Stamatis and me, we helped to dig the trenches for the pipes and removed some of the old materials, then we installed the bathrooms.”
“All of them?”
“In five of the houses, nai. It was a big job, because at the time of the war, when the homes here were abandoned, the facilities inside were very basic.”
“I did wonder why the bathroom was so neatly finished,” Skye said.
Andreas brushed a fly off her arm.
“There was not much of a budget given to us,” he said. “We did the best that we could, but if you wanted to change anything…”
“No,” she assured him. “I don’t mind the plain white at all, and Joy was thrilled with hers. She has grand plans to paint motifs on the tiles.”
Her coffee had cooled, the milk leaving an oily sheen across its surface. Skye tossed what was left in her cup across the ground, watching as the liquid seeped through the dry earth.
“I suppose we’d better do the inside next,” she said. “I’ve started making a list, but—” She paused as Andreas produced a slim notebook from the pocket of his coveralls and the stub of a pencil from behind one ear. “It looks as if you had the same idea?”
He showed her the page, but the scribbled words were Greek and thus indecipherable.
“Do either of those things say ‘new floorboards’ or ‘replastering’?” she asked.
Andreas chuckled.
“Unfortunately, yes, they do.”
When they reached the front door, Skye had to shoulder it open.
“I can fix this for you today,” Andreas said, running a hand around the wooden edges, which were warped and misshapen. “I have the tools in my truck.”
“I thought I might have a go at scraping the rest of the paint off,” Skye told him as a confetti-toss of blue flakes floated down onto the floor. “Although maybe I should concentrate on the bigger stuff first.”
“I think it is better to wait,” he agreed. “When the replastering work is done on the outside of the house, there will be a lot of dust, a lot of mess.”
The stone floor of her main living area was not, according to Andreas, in a bad state, considering its age. When Skye tentatively asked how much it would cost to lay terra-cotta tiles throughout, he tapped his pencil against the edge of his notepad, murmuring sums under his breath.
“The space inside is around thirty square meters, so with materials and labor, it would not be too much, perhaps one thousand or twelve hundred euros.”
“That seems reasonable,” she said. “What about upstairs? I’d ideally like to redo both bedrooms and the attic.”
“Wood or tile?” he asked.
“Wood,” Skye replied. Then, seeing his forehead crease into a frown: “Is that not the best option?”
“It is the most-expensive option. You can get some cheaper types of boarding, but it is better to use oak or pine, something strong and durable.”
Skye mulled this over as they continued through the house, listening as Andreas explained about limestone plastering, woodworm, and the fortunate lack of subsidence.
“Many of the buildings on Folegandros become damaged by earthquakes,” he told her. “You are lucky to have won a house with good foundations.”
“Earthquakes?” Skye repeated faintly, and Andreas turned to her.
“Do not worry. It is rare to feel more than a little shaking. As soon as you realize it is happening, it will have ended.”
As if in reply, a robust gust of wind buffeted the house, slamming back the shutters and making the windows rattle. Skye was becoming slowly accustomed to the constant sound of it, sometimes a whisper, occasionally a roar. Though Folegandros may have been a quiet island, it was not a silent one.
“Where do you live?” she asked as they moved from the small kitchen toward the stairs. It was a bold question, though given how well acquainted he was with her own living arrangements, it felt fair, and Andreas did not seem to mind.
“Karavostasis,” he said. “I prefer to be near the water, away from so much wind.”
“That’s where the main port is,” Skye said, and he nodded.
“I do not have a garden. Instead, I have a beach.”
“And have you always lived there?”
“No,” he said, “not always. I grew up in Athens and lived there until I was twenty-one, so I have been here now for fourteen years, although I travel often for work, over to the other islands or back to the mainland.”
Skye did the math. He was thirty-five—a year older than she was.
“Why Folegandros?” she asked as they reached the landing.
A fleeting smile passed across his face.
“My giagiá—that is the Greek word for ‘grandmother’—she was born here. When I was a young boy, she would tell me stories about the island, describe it to me. As soon as I was old enough to travel by myself, I came here to see it, and after that, it became…How do I say this?” He put a hand to his chest. “It became a part of me, and I a part of it.”
“And your grandmother?” she pressed as they went into the room she’d been sleeping in, with its desultory air bed and open suitcase. “Does she live here, too?”
Andreas appeared momentarily stricken.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “She has not been back to the island since she was very young, not once.”
Skye wanted to ask more, but Andreas had become distracted. He knelt to examine the split wooden boards, applying pressure that was answered with creaks and groans.
“Rotten,” he said, confirming what she had been expecting to hear. “We will need to rip all these out and begin again.”
It was the same in a second, smaller upstairs room, though Andreas surprised her when they climbed the ladder to the attic.
“The floor here is OK,” he said, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “We can lay boards across without having to replace anything. There are perhaps some places on the roof that will require attention, but we can do that from the outside.”
Skye stepped cautiously around to where she’d discovered the K engraving and beckoned for him to join her.
“Do you know anything about the family who used to live here?” she asked.
Andreas steadied himself on the raised boards.
“No,” he said, “but there may be a way to find out. In Greece, it is usual for the church to hold such records. If you want, I can make a visit to the one here, in Ano Meria, and speak to the priest?”
Skye could tell from his rapt expression that he was intrigued, drawn in, as she was, by the lure of a mystery.
“There is also a Greek national archive,” he went on. “But the office is on the mainland, in Athens.”
Leaving the island was not an option. Skye closed her eyes briefly as disappointment flared.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to trouble anyone, least of all you. Maybe the question of who this ‘K’ person is, or was, is one mystery that isn’t meant to be solved.”
Andreas did not look convinced.
“Somebody somewhere will know the truth,” he said. “All we must do is locate the right person.”