Page 121 of Villa of Secrets

‘Neck cream.’

‘I just wanted to tell you, the perfume worked. Fannes says the magic has died; he still likes me a lot but only as a friend. No more nights of rampant sex. It’s such a relief!’

Bubba snored, her grin so wide that if she’d worn dentures they would have fallen into her lap.

Georgia appeared at the door. ‘May I come in? I’ve brought you your mail, Naomi.’

‘Of course,’ Naomi said. ‘Will somebody put the coffee on? And, Bubba, you can stop pretending to be asleep.’ She studied the brown envelope of officialdom before tearing it open. ‘It’s about the court case.’

She read the letter twice. The court could not accept anything in the Italian census as it had been taken out of the country, and the information about the Rhodes property was unlikely to be found in time.

‘That’s that, then. A dead end. So bloody annoying. I’ll just pop over to Papas Yiannis while you two make the coffee.’ Naomi pulled her cream off the stove.

The priest, obviously disappointed said, ‘Let’s not fret about what we can’t change. I’ll scan the letter and send it to your lawyer.’

‘What’s going on?’ Naomi stared at a mound of furniture with rugs and pictures piled on top in the centre of the room.

‘Marina’s boyfriend offered to do the painting, which reminds me, the sooner you take my old sofa, the better, though I wonder where you’ll put it.’

‘I’ve a plan. The boys can earn their keep while they’re here and knock out the banquette.’

*

Naomi wondered if her boys could make any more mess. She scooped up another bucket of debris and tipped it on the patio corner.

‘Just going for a coffee in the square,’ Angelos called. ‘We can’t do any more until that rubble’s out of the way.’

‘You’re not going anywhere until the job’s done!’ Naomi shouted. ‘Rebecca will be back in a couple of days and the wall needs to be plastered and painted. Now shift that mound of rubble while I get your washing out of the machine, prepare your food, and make your beds!’ She stomped upstairs, only halting for a massive dust sneeze.

She snatched the diary and a pillow from her bedroom, locked herself in the bathroom, and got comfy on the floor in the corner. She found another two airmail letters between the pages, and opened them carefully.

1st June,1947

My Dearest Pandora,

I can’t tell you how much your letter has lifted my spirits. I am weak and have pain in my joints, and after what I have seen, sometimes I think I don’t want to live any longer. I’ve prayed for death. Now, YOU have given me new life. I must get better and stronger. Oh, the joy I felt when I received your letter, to know I wasn’t the only one left.

I’m determined to recover enough to come home.

You asked me to describe what happened to us. Dear sister, it is too difficult for me to recount it all at once. I will write as often as I can bear to recall the days after we left Rhodes.

We were about six hundred people to each ship. I was separated from the others and forced into the hold where we were crammed, unable to sit down. When that space was full, they filled the upper deck. I don’t know which was worse, to suffocate below or fry up top. We had no toilet or water.

We left the port on the 23rd of July. It was over one hundred degrees Fahrenheit, and the rusting old ship was burning hot. In the dark hold, I thought I would die, and feared for the rest of our family up top in the blazing sun.

I don’t know how they managed up there with no food, water, or toilet. In the hold, we all had to press even closer together so that there was a corner where people could relieve themselves. The old women and the young children cried a lot, and soon the stench and the heat were choking.

The sea was rough. Urine and excrement swam about our feet. Exhausted and cramped, many of us became seasick, vomit adding to the intolerable conditions. One of the old men near me died. He made a whimper, clutched his chest, and then his knees buckled. We managed to get him over to the door, where he lay at our feet in the filth. That poor old man was our first fatality. Little did we realise the number of deaths ahead of us.

In the morning, we docked at the deserted island of Piscopi. Two of our men were allowed to take the body off the ship and bury it at the foot of one of the nearest mountains.

On the second night, still on our feet, we berthed at Kos, where another group of Jews, between ninety and a hundred of them, were forced onto our boat.

We had been three days without food or water when we anchored at the island of Leros.

Later, I learned from those on the open deck, that the other boats were also moored up in that port. There, the captain of the fleet hired to take us to the port of Piraeus, an Austrian national, refused to continue after seeing the atrocious conditions we were forced to travel in. Unless they gave us food and drink, he would not set sail for Athens.

We were given a little bread and water. The piteous crying from the children was the only sound in the hold. The stench was intolerable. Three more old people died, their bodies thrown overboard.