I sat dozing on my armchair; high above me, hidden in the branches of one of the cypress trees, a hummingbird called. I drifted back to my childhood, and the sound of a wood pigeon in my grandfather’s garden one summer evening. I was content. Then the telephone rang. The telephone network in this part of the island of Corfu had been designed and constructed by German engineers, during the war years, to improve communications between a long-demolished observation post, and the gun battery which protected the harbour from marauding pirates, or smugglers, or the Royal Navy, depending to whom one spoke, and how intoxicated the informant had become at the time of telling the story. In any event, the telephone network was more reliable than the electricity grid, a phenomenon which I struggled to understand, not being of a scientific or technological persuasion, particularly on hot nights, when one needed a guaranteed supply of ice cubes, not assurance that one could speak to relatives or friends one had been trying to avoid.
I sat back in my chair, with my shoulders thrust back deep into the fabric and the horsehair cushions, burrowing almost, with my eyes clenched tight shut. The ringing stopped. I breathed out. Then the telephone started again; a harsh sound, metallic, ordered, demanding. Where was Sophia? I thought. I opened my eyes in irritation, the bright sun flooding my consciousness. Then I remembered, today was laundry day; she had washed the clothes, and in the company of Anastasia, had taken up the wicker basket and a bag of wooden clothes pegs, to go down the garden toward the sea, where the garden spoil was kept, and the washing line. I mused that against the sound of the wind and the waves crashing onto the rocks below, she would not hear the telephone. I contemplated rolling over and levering myself out of the chair, to pad bare foot to the house. Lord Byron occupied the other armchair; he sat, languid, for all I know bored, and considered me. The thought occurred to me, that I could ask Sophia’s husband to make a leather harness, that we would put on Lord Byron, to allow the cat to carry the telephone around on his back, trailing the cord across the flagstones. This would be characterised in London as rank animal cruelty by the RSPCA Thought Police, with a penalty of twelve months imprisonment, but in Corfu, it would likely be heralded as a marvel of human invention or met with an indifferent shrug. Lord Byron gave me one of those looks which suggested that his powers of telepathy were up to my schemes, and that he did not approve. “Well,” I said defensively, “it’s only an idea!”
Just as I had levered myself up, the telephone stopped ringing for a second time, peace was restored, and the hummingbird reigned supreme in the heavens.
Peace, as after the Second World War, did not prevail for long. The telephone range for a third time; now seemingly with a more strident, shrill, and insistent tone, like a whining child at a toy shop. I resigned myself to giving up my place of sanctuary and comfort, to hurl myself into the maelstrom of the twentieth century. As it had started, so it stopped; but now I heard Sophia’s voice, entombed in the house, an occasional phrase reaching my ears through the open living room window. I reassessed my assumption; she must have heard the telephone and had walked up the path in her Dr Scholes exercise sandals, a Christmas present from me, at a sedate pace. The conversation ended; I heard her steps on the flagstones, slow and persistent in the heat. She appeared before me, her apron wet from hauling the laundry; in one hand she held a piece of damp paper, which flapped forlornly in the excruciating Greek summer heat.
“Is message Mr Gardner,” she said in explanation, handing me the paper, a sheet torn from a blue notebook which had been placed beside the telephone. I sat up and took my spectacles from the chest pocket of my damp shirt. Rather than ask her who had called, I read the note, blotchy in places and distorted.
Brother. Arrive Tuesday. London cold. Dorchester. I mouthed the words silently. Whose brother was arriving? The weather in London had been seasonal, with some cloud, and light rain showers. What was the connection between London and Dorset? I knew no one in Dorchester, for all I knew a sleepy dump, only rescued from obscurity due to the machinations of Thomas Hardy. I looked at Sophia for an explanation. She seemed happy.
“You glad Mr Gardner?”
“If I knew what this was about,” I said.
“Brother coming to see you,” she said, beaming; just then Anastasia arrived, and nestled against her mother to form a picture of family love and contentment.
“My brother!” I said, aghast.
Sophia, alarmed at the facial contortions which had accompanied the news, leant forward, to ask a question.
“You no like your brother Mr Gardner? Is sad.”
I had two brothers, Gus, older by two years, who lived with his wife and three children in Wembley, and Richard, younger by three years, known since childhood as Little Dick, who did not. Richard had emigrated to Australia some years before; he threatened to return every Christmas, to surprise us; but thanks to Quantas’s mismanagement, he alleged, had never pulled the stunt off. Until now.
“I have two brothers,” I said, imagining the chaos of Gus and his wife Imogen, and their three children taking over my home for a vacation. Imogen was Welsh; she had imbued in her offspring a love of open spaces and exploration, which they gave vent to by keeping their Wellington boots on indoors. Richard had not married; it was a ribald family joke that he found the kangaroos in Australia more accommodating than the women, which he strenuously denied. Sophia’s brow crinkled in the heat, she thrust one hand into a pouch in her apron and withdrew another piece of blue notepaper, so damp and shrivelled that it looked like a little blue shrimp. Between damp fingers she carefully unravelled it, before handing it to me, in a hesitant gesture, like a child who had gone swimming with a bank note tucked into a trouser pocket.
Copyright © David Alexander 2024