The Other Side of Midnight

He was taxiing down the small, mountain-ringed tabletop airport at Dubrovnik when Demiris appeared in the doorway of the cockpit.

"You were right," Demiris said to Larry. "You're very good at what you do. I'm pleased."

And Demiris was gone.

One morning as Larry was getting ready to leave on a flight to Morocco, Count Pappas telephoned to suggest that he take Catherine driving through the countryside. Larry insisted that she go.

"Aren't you jealous?" she asked.

"Of the Count?" Larry laughed.

And Catherine suddenly understood. During the time she and the Count had spent together, he had never made an improper advance toward her or even given her a suggestive look. "He's a homosexual?" she asked.

Larry nodded. "That's why I've left you in his tender care."

The Count picked Catherine up early, and they started driving south toward the broad plain of Thessaly. Peasant women dressed in black walked along the road bent over with heavy loads of wood strapped to their backs.

"Why don't the men do the heavy work?" Catherine asked.

The Count shot her an amused glance.

"The women don't want them to," he replied. "They want their men fresh at night for other things."

There's a lesson there for all of us, Catherine thought wryly.

In the late afternoon they approached the forbidding-looking Pindus Mountains, their rocky crags towering high in the sky. The road was blocked by a flock of sheep being herded by a shepherd and a scrawny sheep dog. Count Pappas stopped the car as they waited for the sheep to clear the road. Catherine watched in wonder as the dog nipped at the heels of the stray sheep, keeping them in line and forcing them in the direction he wanted them to go.

"That dog is almost human," Catherine exclaimed admiringly.

The Count gave her a brief look. There was something in it that she did not understand.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

The Count hesitated. "It's a rather unpleasant story."

"I'm a big girl."

The Count said, "This is a wild area. The land is rocky and inhospitable. At best the crops are meager, and when the weather turns bad, there are no crops at all and a good deal of hunger." His voice trailed off.

"Go on," Catherine prompted.

"A few years ago there was a bad storm here and the crops were ruined. There was little food for anyone. All the sheep dogs in this area revolted. They deserted the farms they worked on and gathered together in a large band." As he continued, he tried to keep the horror out of his voice. "They began attacking the farms."

"And killed the sheep!" Catherine said.

There was a silence before he answered. "No. They killed their masters. And ate them."

Catherine stared at him, shocked.

"They had to send in federal troops from Athens to restore human government here. It took almost a month."

"How horrible."

"Hunger does terrible things," Count Pappas said quietly.

The sheep had crossed the road now. Catherine looked at the sheep dog again and shuddered.

As the weeks went by, the things that had seemed so foreign and strange to Catherine began to become familiar to her. She found the people open and friendly. She learned where to do her marketing and where to shop for clothes on Voukourestiou Street. Greece was a marvel of organized inefficiency, and one had to relax and enjoy it. No one was in a hurry, and if you asked someone for directions he was likely to take you where you wanted to go. Or he might say, when you asked how far it was: "Enos cigarou dromos," which Catherine learned meant "one cigarette away." She walked the streets and explored the city and drank the warm dark wine of the Greek summer.