Songbirds(27)

There were questions – so many – I could have asked him. But I decided to keep us on our shared concern and knowledge that anyone who knew Nisha even a little bit would know that she would never take off in that way.

‘The only time she went away,’ I said, ‘was a few months ago. She went for the entire weekend to stay with a cousin of hers in Limassol. This woman was about to leave Cyprus and Nisha wanted to take her some things to give to Kumari. She gave me the woman’s name, her employer’s name, their telephone number – in case her battery went dead or something . . . she didn’t just take off. It was all organised.’

Yiannis was silent for a while.

‘When was this?’

‘In August,’ I said. ‘Yes, I’m pretty sure that’s when it was. I remember the heat that day. She packed an overnight bag and wore an orange linen dress that I had given her. I dropped her off at the coach station in the early morning. She was teary in the car. When I asked her what was wrong, she said she was going to miss Aliki. I remember saying, “Don’t be silly! You’re only going for a weekend!” But since Aliki was born, Nisha has never spent a weekend away from us.’

Realisation hit me. Nisha had lived here for nearly ten years and in that entire time, had only spent two days away from us. She had taken care of my daughter and loved her, she had scrubbed my floors and toilets, she had made us hot dinners and kept the garden looking beautiful. She even polished the frame of Stephano’s photo every day, and it broke my heart when I recalled the look on her face as she did this. She had lost a husband, too. She gave us everything. In this generosity, she had been the heart of this house. And yet, I had no idea about her life. I knew she held the heart locket some nights, and I knew there was a new gold ring on her dressing table that I had never seen before. How had her husband died? She had never told me, and I had never asked. How had she felt? What was it like to feel something for another man, after losing him? Had Yiannis given her the ring? Had she loved both these men in the way that I had loved Stephanos? Did she love this man sitting before me? Or did he have something to do with her disappearance? I could barely hold one thought before I jumped to another.

I heard a soft bump and saw the toe of a red Converse poking out from the doorway. Aliki was eavesdropping, but the intensity of Yiannis’s words surrounded me and pressed down on me. I didn’t want to break the spell to scold her.

‘Did she say anything?’ Yiannis asked now. ‘Before she disappeared. Did she say or mention anything that could help us to understand where she might have gone?’

‘We went up to the mountains on Sunday for a day out. While we were there, she asked if she could take the night off. It seemed as if she wanted to meet someone.’

‘Who?’

‘I have no idea. She didn’t say. And I didn’t approve of her going.’ I didn’t tell him about the whole conversation I’d had with Mrs Hadjikyriacou – that she had seen Nisha leaving that night around ten thirty. Something told me not to.

‘So, on Sunday afternoon she was with you in the mountains.’ He seemed to be turning this around in his mind. ‘And there was someone she wanted to meet that night. You say you didn’t approve of her going, but you haven’t said if she went or not.’

‘Nisha came home with us and I went to bed at nine o’clock. Nisha was here, putting Aliki to bed. Look,’ I said, standing up, suddenly exhausted, ‘I can see that you’re concerned but there’s nothing more I can tell you.’ I saw that Aliki’s shoe had vanished from the entrance to the hallway. ‘And plus, it’s late, and I haven’t made dinner yet. Aliki hasn’t eaten and I’ve been working all day.’

He stood up too, looking dismayed. ‘Yes, of course – I’m sorry, Petra. I didn’t mean to bother you.’ He hesitated for a moment, as if he wasn’t sure whether to go out of the front door or the back – either way, there was a stairway that would lead him to his flat. Then he seemed to remember his shoes and went to the front door, bending over to put them on. The mud had dried now and was breaking off in flakes on the rug.

‘Thank you for your time, Petra. And if you hear anything . . .’

‘I will tell you straightaway.’

He left. After closing the door, I went to the window and saw that he was standing again in the light of Yiakoumi’s shop, staring up at his flat, reminding me again of one of those wandering dogs, the ones that people leave on the streets when, for whatever reason, they are no longer good for hunting.





At night, a bat circles the lake, almost invisible against the black water. For a brief moment, the clouds part and the moon catches its large wings, its fragmented flight.

The new moon quickly disappears behind the clouds, as if it had never been there.

The earth around the crater smells fresh from the rain, and the fur of the hare has begun to dry. Earlier, when the sun was high and the air was warmer, the blow flies returned to lay their eggs once more in the open wounds of cracked skin, while the flesh flies deposited larvae around the eyes and in the mouth.

On this night the earth and the sky join without a seam. There are white flowers in the fields, hundreds and thousands of them. Had there been a fuller moon, had there not still been thick clouds in the sky, they would glow like stars, and heaven and earth would be mere reflections of each other.