Gospel (76 page)

Her sensations from the fling were still warm and the fact that it had fizzled so quickly was … relieving in a way. Now the memory could be processed and shaped and packaged for her own endless consumption, and for replaying to Judy, of course. Ha ha, Judy! Guess what? And after a photo session yesterday afternoon, Lucy and Stavros leaning against each other, she would even have proof! She would blow up a photo poster-size and put it on the refrigerator. She wondered if Judy and Vito were actually going steady by now or if that had crumbled, or better yet, had never been anything but Judy's imagination.

(If we have not
karitas
we have nothing, Lucy.)

Lucy continued to think: who's to say my romantic life is over? Let's go find Tracy and Derek at the Argonaut Klub. After a second bout of beautifying and application of scent, Lucy strolled down to the disco wearing her Florentine sundress, carrying her large red hat in her hand. Maybe The Handsome Stranger would be there.

He was. It took a moment but he recognized her, smiled warmly, and crossed the club to join her at the bar. Georgios's turntable was still mired in the '80s with “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.”

“I thought you maybe had left Ouranopolis,” he said, beholding her with his steady, soulful eyes.

“No. I thought I'd be gone too. But Dr. O'Hanrahan, the professor I mentioned, he has yet to come back from Athos.”

“My brother, I hope, is back tonight because we must leave for Athens tomorrow.”

“Oh,” she said disappointed, seeing endless dull nights in Ouranopolis stretch before her, even glimpsing a necessary rapprochement with Stavros.

“We are in the same hotel, no? The Poseidon?”

Lucy: “Why, yes, why haven't I noticed you?”

“I sleep very late,” he admitted, laughing.

Same hotel, last night in town. Luce, old girl, you might be two for two if you play your cards right. And lookee there, who just walked in: Stavros. He seemed ready to come talk to Lucy but saw her companion, stiffened, and went to a table by himself.

“I have,” he added, his back to Stavros, “however, seen your friend.”

“Stavros? He just drove us here, accompanying the professor. I barely know him really.” The Stranger seemed to half-believe that, but he seemed warmer as a result the next second.

“Do you want a drink?” she offered, trying to bury Stavros as a conversation topic.

“No thank you.”

She'd have liked one, but decided if he wasn't she wouldn't. He offered her a cigarette.

“Thank you,” she said, readdicted now thanks to O'Hanrahan. “I'm sorry, this is awkward, but I don't … I don't know your name yet.”

He laughed, shaking his head, mocking himself. “How foolish. My name is Abdul. Abdul el-Hassami.”

“Lucy Dantan,” she returned. “Abdul is an odd name for a Greek.”

“Excuse me, I am not a Greek. I am Arab.”

“But…”

“I am from Syria.”

How exotic! Lucy was more delighted by the minute. Lucy blew out a long, dismissive plume of smoke as if it had the taste of Stavros. “But why would you … I mean, Mt. Athos…”

“You think all Arabs are Moslems? Ten percent of Syria is Christian.”

“The Antiochene Church, of course! How extraordinary. Is your brother with the Jacobite Church? What language is the liturgy?”

He laughed uneasily. “It is, naturally, in Aramaic.”

“My God,” she giggled. “I have never in my life met anyone who could actually understand Aramaic, the language of Jesus. You must speak it for me, a line or two…”

He stood. “No, you embarrass me … I don't speak it. I confess I am not religious like Hossein, my brother. You should ask him. In fact, yes, it is 8:30, time for me to meet him at the dock.”

“May I come along?” she asked, noting that Stavros was seething in the corner.

“Yes,” he said politely.

Perhaps, Lucy thought, Abdul did not want her along. But it was enough to exit the bar with him and irritate Stavros; once Abdul and his brother bid her good night she could make up any lie she pleased to tell Stavros about what happened between them. As the ferry sputtered into the harbor, Lucy stood back and let the two brothers reunite under the streetlight by the pier. Abdul walked forward and kissed a shorter, darker man on the cheek and began talking quickly.

Funny, thought Lucy, they don't look a thing like brothers.

A quick introduction was made and they walked back to the Poseidon and the brothers chatted in Arabic rather joylessly. No laughing or joking, it seemed to Lucy. Abdul's brother Hossein was carrying a knapsack as well as an envelope about which he seemed to be explaining to Abdul. At the hotel desk Abdul took the envelope and, presumably, because neither spoke Greek and Hossein spoke no English, Abdul explained in English to the proprietor:

“This envelope is for a woman in Room 13, please.”

Lucy's pulse quickened. “Wait. I'm in Room 13.”

Abdul turned to look at her oddly, and then handed the envelope to her. It was a white letter-length envelope with a return address of Karyes, the Athonite capital, on the back.

Hossein was saying something to Abdul, and Abdul translated for Lucy. “An old man gave him this and said it was very urgent.”

Lucy went over to the light-blue vinyl 1950s lounge chairs in the lobby. Hossein got his key and went up the stairs and Abdul lingered to see if it was bad news.

Lucy,

I seem to be in big trouble. The police are after me and our entire mission is doomed unless I can get out of Greece. I have left Athos by fishing boat. Meet me in Athens tomorrow night, Hercules Hotel near the Plaka.

And “Patrick O'Hanrahan” was scrawled across the bottom. It was his handwriting, thought Lucy, not that she'd seen very much of it. How odd that there was not a mention of Stavros.

“I hope all is well,” said Abdul.

“No, it doesn't look like it,” she said. “There seems to be some trouble over there. And it looks like I have to go to Athens tomorrow.”

Abdul gave a sympathetic smile. “Perhaps, you could come with us. We leave at nine tomorrow. I will be happy to give you every assistance.”

“How kind,” she said blankly.

J
ULY
21
ST

Stavros said he would drive Lucy back to Athens, and she told him that she had had an offer from the Hassami brothers. Stavros reacted badly, launching into a stream of anti-Turkish invective that, Lucy imagined, Stavros thought applied to all people of the Middle East. On that note, she determined she would ride with the brothers after all, and snippily said good-bye to Stavros, holding out her hand for him to shake. In this final moment she could have abandoned this pretense and kissed him good-bye properly but the half-understood counterthreats between them had made this difficult.

The Hassami brothers were polite hosts and Abdul drove well.

She was quiet and sullen on the six-hour ride down. The trip slowed considerably as the urban sprawl and soot of Athens approached. Lucy was sufficiently jaded and despondent enough that the new views of the Akropolis and passing the ruins of the Temple of Zeus near the downtown park barely interested her.

The Hercules Hotel was not in the Plaka proper but in the modern city leading up to it. Lucy recognized some familiar landmarks around Constitution Square and she briefly revived, imagining that Dr. O'Hanrahan and she might go out that night, with O'Hanrahan telling his undoubtedly exciting story. Abdul and Hossein said the Hercules was too expensive and went elsewhere.

As she lay in her room, contemplating what she should do with her evening, the phone rang. She eagerly scooped it up and discovered it was Abdul: did she want to go to dinner in the Plaka? She decided she shouldn't, figuring O'Hanrahan would make contact soon. However, at 10:30
P.M.
she was starved and bored and determined to go out for a quick bite.

“A message for you,” said the hotelier when she returned twenty minutes later.

Lucy desperately stared at the simple phone message-slip, wanting it to reveal more. Patrick O'Hanrahan called, the note said in a strained Roman alphabet, an occasional Greek letter slipping in, and after that was the unrevealing message that “someone would be in touch again.”

“That's all?” Lucy asked the deskman, who shrugged yes it was.

She wished she hadn't declined Abdul's invitation to the Plaka. It was the brothers' last night in Greece and tomorrow they flew back to Damascus. Abdul even seemed eager for her company, flirtatious for him. Maybe she should go attempt to find him, make a night of it.

Then the phone rang.

“Halloo?” said a heavily accented female voice on the other end of the line, as Lucy's heart beat faster. “I am calling for a friend…”

“Who is this?”

“My name is not important. Patrick O'Hanrahan,” she said, mispronouncing his name completely, “is in hiding here and … I cannot talk…”

“
Wait.
What is going on here?”

“I will meet you tomorrow at the Piraeus metro station. Look for a woman in a black dress, dark hair, I will be carrying a white handbag. Tomorrow, 11:30
A.M.
”

And then she hung up.

Then Lucy again picked up the phone. If O'Hanrahan's in trouble, he would call Eleni Matsoukis, she was sure. Lucy found the phone directory and looked up the number. She dialed the first four digits. Then hung up. No, she convinced herself. If he was in danger he wouldn't risk scandalizing the Matsoukises.

And what if Stavros picked up the phone?

Lucy lay back on the bed and felt her stomach tighten. Something was very much wrong.

ΠEIPAIAΣ

J
ULY
22
ND

Lucy assembled her bag, packed her souvenirs, and arranged her makeup kit and clothes for what could be the last time. It seemed that, at last, O'Hanrahan's luck had finally played out. Would he—or worse, he and she both, end up in the hands of the police? In the middle of her sleepless night she figured that the incorrigible Dr. O'Hanrahan had been caught stealing a scroll, or something like that—some last senescent gesture of bravura. And now he would have to answer to the Greek people and the Minister of Antiquities. And she would get on a plane soon enough and maybe, grimly, she would be in Chicago in forty-eight hours. She had prepared herself for the worst.

Lucy paid the bill with the VISA card and then handed in the key at the front desk. She saw Hossein and Abdul talking, their bags beside them. They had come to say good-bye to her.

“Well, Abdul,” she said, handing him a slip with her Chicago address on it, putting out her hand to shake, “it has been a pleasure. And if you're ever in Chicago, do call.”

“Likewise, I hope to see you one day in Damascus.”

Hossein smiled broadly and Lucy felt uneasy.

“Have you got a cab to the airport?” she asked.

“No, you know how difficult getting a taxi in Athens is,” he said glumly. “Hossein and I are taking the bus to Piraeus where there are many taxis and take a taxi from there.”

She smiled. “I am going to Piraeus myself, on the subway.”

Abdul was delighted. “There is an underground train to Piraeus?”

She explained and soon they all picked up their bags and began the trek five blocks, through the market and the tourists and the endless array of amphorae and fake red-and-black clay plates to the busy Monastiraki Station.

As they put their metro tickets in the automatic turnstiles, Lucy asked Abdul, “Could you ask your brother one more time for me under what circumstances he saw Dr. O'Hanrahan?” Abdul conferred with Hossein in Arabic. Abdul translated in pieces:

“Hossein says the old man was very unhappy and upset … They met at a monastery, he says … There had been some trouble with the police and … He had to escape Mt. Athos right away, and Greece as well.”

Lucy nodded, convinced the professor had tried to steal a scroll. “Does Hossein,” she asked, “have any idea where Dr. O'Hanrahan wishes to escape to?”

Hossein and Abdul talked some more, as Lucy heard the southbound metro approaching.

“Hossein says very, very far away,” Abdul related. “The professor said he would, however, have to go to an Islamic library.”

“I see,” she said, as the train slowed before the platform. “We both figured we might end up in Egypt.”

Hossein smiled confidently, adding a detail. Abdul translated: “Yes, he said he could hardly wait to get on the airplane, yes?” Then he laughed as the train stopped.

Uh-oh, thought Lucy.

She looked over at Abdul, patiently returning her stare, handsomely groomed to perfection, and Hossein … who, she was now certain, was no relation to him, leering at some woman across the platform.

Lucy: “Oh, here's the train and I just forgot that—um, I mean, I think I forgot something at the hotel and I'd better run back and get it.”

“We are happy to wait for you,” he said smiling. “Is it important?”

Calm down, she told herself.

The train screeched to a halt and out poured a heavily cologned and perfumed pack of Athenian commuters. Abdul was busy putting her heavy bag inside the train, along with his own. Unfailingly polite, she thought, as she stepped inside and the doors closed behind her.

“No air-conditioning, no?” Abdul remarked, running a finger between his neck and his collar.

He couldn't name me one word in Aramaic, she remembered. Well, how many American Catholics could spout Latin anymore? She began weaving the facts through the pattern of coincidences. They go to meet the brother, he has the envelope, the announced trip to Athens, which conveniently these brothers had to make … Do you suppose Hossein has done something horrible to Dr. O'Hanrahan over on Athos? The note could be a forgery, the phone message from O'Hanrahan a fake, since I was out, and this woman I'm supposed to meet—God knows who she is.