Songbirds(56)

It was this thought: that loss cannot be reversed, that I could not bring back my father’s lost mind, or the child that – this lack of control, this helplessness – made my hand tremble over Nisha’s.

‘I wish it could have been safe inside me,’ she said.

‘You know it was not your fault,’ I said.

‘I do know.’

She looked up at the night sky, through the window. The moon was not visible, only stars. I placed my palm over her hands and we stayed like that for a long time.

I thought about the dying man in the gem-filled darkness of the mine. How long would it have taken him to die? Did he have time to sit in the dark and think about his life, his wife, his baby daughter up above, about all the things he loved and those that he hated, about his triumphs and regrets? What would he have felt, meeting the inescapability of death before it had arrived? What kind of hunger did he feel? What thirst? What pains plagued his body? What memories his mind? Or was he so panicked that his death came faster?

‘But I didn’t know what his favourite colour was,’ I heard her say.

*

Still cradling the owlet in my palms, I went to the balcony and saw that Petra and Aliki were having dinner with Ruba and Ms Hadjikyriacou in her front yard. This was a good time for me to go to the garden. I took a spade and buried the owlet in the soft soil beneath the orange tree. I buried it deep so that cats and wild animals could not get to it. Then I sat on the balcony holding the little bird, who had nestled deep into its feathers, and I listened to the laughter and endless chatter down below.

*

At exactly 5 a.m. the iPad rang again. I answered it. Kumari stared back at me, confused. Once again, she was in her school uniform, purple rucksack on her shoulders. This time her hair was down, straight as needles.

‘Hello, Mr Yiannis,’ she said.

‘Hello, Kumari.’

‘Can I speak to Amma?’

I paused for only a second: I didn’t want her to pick up on my anxiety.

‘I’m sorry, Kumari, your mum is at work again.’

She thought for a moment, clearly sceptical. Her eyes were round and severe. ‘But it is very early in the morning there. Why she is working now?’

‘She had extra duties to do.’

‘With the chickens?’

‘Erm, yes. With the chickens.’

She nodded, thoughtfully.

‘She told me to tell you that she loves you so much, more than anything in the whole world, and to be really good at school.’

‘OK, Mr Yiannis. You be good at work too.’

Once again, she smiled and she was gone.





19

Petra

T

HE NEXT DAY, AS I drove home from work, I decided to speak to Yiannis again. As I parked, I noticed the flyer of Nisha just outside the house was no longer on the lamp-post where I had put it. But her smiling face stared at me still further along the street.

Going through the garden and up the stairs, I knocked for Yiannis. It was the first time I had been in the flat since I had rented it to him. He kept it neat and tidy and so sparsely furnished that it looked as though he was only staying for a couple of days. He kept the patio doors in the living room wide open so that the winter light and wind flooded in. He pulled the doors closed when he saw me shudder, and offered me a hot drink, which I accepted.

In the kitchen he brewed coffee in a stainless-steel pot on the stove. On the windowsill were two plants: a small cactus and a jasmine flower, whose summer scent reminded me of the old man on the bus to Troodos.

‘I spy with my little eye, something beginning with N.’

‘Hm, that’s a hard one.’

I could almost hear them now: Aliki’s laugh, Nisha’s mock concentration, as she searched out of the window.

‘I went to the police,’ Yiannis said.

‘Oh?’

‘I couldn’t sit around and do nothing.’

‘What did they say?’

‘Basically nothing.’

He watched the coffee brew on a low flame, making sure that it didn’t boil and spoil the kaimaki – the marbley film of creamy froth on its surface.

‘Look,’ I said, ‘I know about your affair with Nisha.’

‘Affair? Why, who am I cheating on?’

‘What would you call it then?’

‘I love her. We have a relationship.’

He said this matter-of-factly, as he poured the coffee into cups and placed them on a heavy oak table, which looked more like a desk than something one might find in a kitchen. One chair was made of the same wood by the same hand, and opposite was a black plastic chair that had nothing to do with the table. I sat down on that one.

Yiannis took a sip of coffee, glancing at me momentarily over the rim of the cup.

At this point I heard a chirp and saw a tiny bird beneath the table by his feet, one of those songbirds that sweep in from the west in the winter. I used to hear them over the sea, when I went out with my father in his fishing boat.

Yiannis reached down so the bird could hop onto his hand. He brought the bird up onto the table and it settled beside the coffee cup.

‘That’s an odd choice of pet,’ I said.

‘It’s not a pet. Its wing was damaged. I’m taking care of it until it’s ready to fly again.’ He was silent for a moment, looking at the bird. Then he said, ‘Do you have any news about Nisha – is that why you’re here?’