A Most Unconventional Courtship

‘Hérete.’ The old woman grinned back, revealing a few teeth and rather more gum. She was the nearest thing Alessa had to a grandmother. Opinionated, independent and fiercely dismissive of all the invaders who occupied her island, she refused to speak any of their languages and attempts to address her in Italian, French or English were met with a blank stare. Alessa suspected she understood more than she let on, but never risked the experiment.

‘So.’ She grounded her hoe and waddled over. ‘You look better than when you arrived, child.’

‘I feel better.’ Alessa had thrown he

rself into ferocious cleaning, imagining that she was sweeping Chance out along with the dirt and the spiders. It had almost worked—she only thought of him now at night when the children were tucked up and sleeping and when the moon streamed through her un-shuttered window.

It would be early for the ladies and gentlemen gathered at the Residency, she had thought, turning restlessly in her efforts to sleep. They would be dancing and flirting, or perhaps playing cards, or one of the young ladies would be displaying her skill at the piano or harp. For a while Chance had held out the lure of joining that sort of society. Almost, she had begun to weaken, think perhaps it would be better to swallow her pride, find herself an easier life. Thank heavens she had discovered his insincerity before she had let herself be drawn in.

But how could she have overestimated him so? She thought herself a good judge of character. It was finding how wrong she was about that which had plunged her into such a black mood, of course; no one liked realising that they had been a fool. Even Kate, travelling with them because Fred’s unit was taking its turn to guard the Residency, had taken the hint and had not ventured to tease.

Agatha was still regarding her quizzically, her little black eyes screwed up against the morning sunlight. ‘Tell me about him, then.’

‘Who?’

‘This man your friend talks about. The one she says strips off so well.’

‘Agatha!’

The old woman shrugged unrepentantly. ‘What good is a man to a young woman if he doesn’t have the—’

‘Agatha!’ It was almost a shriek this time. ‘His lordship is a very good-looking man with a healthy body. I was looking after his sprained ankle, that is all. Anything else is none of my business.’

‘Pah! You need a husband, one who has lots of—’ She broke off to illustrate her point with a graphic gesture that had Alessa blushing. ‘You can pretend to be one of those silly cow-eyed little prudes, but how is that going to help you get him?’

‘I do not want to get him,’ Alessa protested.

‘You blush over him and you say you do not want him?’ The old woman shook her head. ‘Silly child. Go and sit on the beach and perhaps the spirit of Nausicaa will come and talk some sense into you.’ She waved a hand in dismissal and trudged back to her weeding.

Reluctantly Alessa smiled at her black-clad back. Like many of the Corfiots, Agatha treated the characters from the island’s myths in much the same way as they treated their saints. They held conversations with them, discussed their stories as though they lived just around the corner, drew cautions and morals from the tales. Who was she to criticise? She had been asking Ayios Spyridhon for advice herself, only the other day.

‘She didn’t get to keep him,’ she called back across the vegetable patch.

‘Who?’

‘Nausicaa. Odysseus sailed away in the end.’

The only reply she got was a cackle of amused laughter. Old terror, she thought affectionately. Perhaps she was right though, maybe an hour on the beach would settle her mind. Alessa picked up her hat and a water bottle and began to stroll down the dusty track towards the bay. The spirits of Nausicaa and her lover were unlikely to visit her on the cobble beach; if they haunted anywhere it was the wide sandy half-moons of Paleokastritsa where the hero had drawn up his ships below her father’s palace.

It was a much nicer beach, and perhaps she would take the skiff and sail round the headland with the children and Kate one day. It was too fashionable now that the Lord High Commissioner had taken it up, that was the trouble. Too many officers and their wives filling up the houses for rent, and lodgings appearing wherever an enterprising local family with one of the old Venetian houses could make the necessary improvements.

Alessa found the beach empty. The village children, including Dora and Demetri, were playing in the olive groves and the local fishermen had long gone out. Agatha’s little skiff bobbed at the end of its mooring rope in the shallows and the gulls swooped and screamed overhead.

She skimmed a stone into the waves and it managed one bounce and promptly sank, which seemed to sum up her mood. Alone, with nothing to distract her, she had to admit it—she had been attracted to Chance. No, be honest, it is more than that. You desired him, you were seduced by the idea that if you became a lady—at this point Alessa gave a piece of driftwood a kick which hurt her toe—he might want you too. ‘Oh, very likely,’ she muttered aloud. ‘Lady Blakeney. Ha!’

The tumbled dark rock of the cliffs edging the bay loomed up in front of her. Alessa turned round and began to crunch back through the pebbles at the water’s edge. I suppose I am in love with him, she thought glumly, just as a wave curled up and sloshed over her feet.

For a long moment it was touch and go whether she sat down on a rock and had a good weep, or saw the funny side of it. Then the sun came out from behind a cloud, catching the crests of the little waves, and a wading bird flew over, piping shrilly. Alessa kicked off her wet shoes and stripped off her stockings, balancing painfully on the pebbles. It was a lovely morning, and she was free from all her responsibilities. If she sat and sulked, what would it make better? Nothing, she decided, gathering up her skirts and wading in to pull on the skiff’s mooring line.

The little boat came towards her, bobbing and curtsying. Alessa tossed her shoes into the bottom, tucked the water bottle carefully upright and cast off the rope. She got badly splashed getting in.

‘Out of practise,’ she grumbled to herself as she settled down and unshipped the oars. A stiff row around the headland and along the coast to the first really sandy beach would give her so much to think about that men would have no opportunity to intrude. Alessa grasped the oars, squared her shoulders and dug in.

‘My lord wishes to hire a boat?’ The butler at the Residency villa regarded Chance with barely concealed surprise. ‘But there are only fishing boats, my lord.’

Chance turned from looking out over the twin crescents of sand that bit into each side of the causeway from the mainland to the promontory. High above, the monastery stood watch over the little village. He hitched one hip on to the balustrade.

‘They are not out every day, not all of them. Could one be hired?’