Chapter 10 Chapter 9
Although the leper was shot only a few meters away from the shore of Plaka, it had no effect on most people in Plaka, except that they hated the Germans even more in the future.This event brought the realities of war to their doorstep, and everyone finally realized that their village was now as vulnerable as anywhere in this world war.People react differently.For many, only God can bring true peace, so sometimes churches are filled with people stooping in prayer.Some elderly people, such as Fotini's grandmother, often accompanied the priest, and they always had a sweet smell of incense. "Grandma smells like candles!" Fotini would say, bouncing around Granny.Grandma smiled dotingly at her only granddaughter.Even though God didn't show up and do something to help them win this battle, her faith told her that God was on their side in this battle.When news of the vandalism and destruction of the church reached her ears, her conviction became stronger.
All Saints' Day is still celebrated.The icons were taken from their places and carried by priests in procession, followed by the town band, brass pipes and drums screeching out an ungodly cacophony.Although there was no rich banquet and the sound of fireworks, when the relic was safely returned to the church, people still danced wildly and sang unforgettable songs, with more enthusiasm than in peacetime.The anger and frustration of the occupation was washed away by good wine.But at dawn, everyone regained their composure, and everything was still the same as before.At this moment, those who do not have rock-solid faith begin to wonder why God does not answer their prayers?
No doubt the Germans were fascinated by these sacred and strange secular activities, but knew it best not to prohibit them.Even so, they interfered as much as possible, questioning the priest when he was about to begin a service, and searching the house while everyone was dancing.
On Spinalonga, candles are lit daily to pray for the suffering on the mainland.The islanders were well aware that the Cretans lived under the brutal German terror, and they prayed that the occupation would end soon.
Dr. Lapakis believed in the power of medicine, not in divine intervention.He gradually came to his senses, knowing that research and clinical trials were more or less abandoned.He wrote to Crites of Heraklion, but received no reply for several months.He came to the conclusion that Crittis must be on more urgent business, so he had to let it go and wait a little longer before meeting him.Lapakis has increased his trips to Spinalonga from three days a week to six days a week.Some lepers required constant attention than Athena Manakis alone could handle.Eleni was such a patient.
Giorgis could not forget the day when he arrived on the island and saw not the slender figure of his wife but her friend, the stocky Elpida.His heart was beating fast.What happened to Eleni?It was the first time she hadn't come here to pick him up.Elbida spoke first.
"Take it easy, Giorgis," she said, in a tone as reassuring as possible. "Eleni is fine."
"Then where is she?" There was a clear panic in his voice.
"She's going to be in the hospital for a few days. Dr. Lapakis is going to watch her for a few days until her throat clears up."
"Will it be all right?" he asked.
"I hope so," Elpida said. "I'm sure the doctors will do their best."
Her tone was vague.Eleanor knew no more about Eleni's chances of survival than Giorgis did.
Giorgis returned to Plaka shortly after putting down the package he had brought.It was Saturday, and Maria discovered that her father had returned earlier than usual.
"This meeting is short," she said. "How is mother? Have you brought any letters?"
"No letters, I'm afraid," he replied. "She has no time to write letters this week."
It was all true, but he went out quickly again, lest Maria should ask any more questions.
"I'll be back by four o'clock," he said, "to mend the nets."
Maria felt something was wrong, and that feeling haunted her all day.
Eleni spent the next four months in the hospital, too ill to struggle through the tunnel to meet Giorgis.Every day when he took Lapakis up to Spinalonga he hoped in vain to see her waiting for him under the pines.Every night Lapakis would report to him, at first with a hint of hope.
"Her body is still fighting the disease," Lapakis said, or, "I think her temperature dropped a little today."
But the doctor soon realized that he was inventing false hopes, and the stronger these hopes were, the more difficult it would be when the last days came.He knew in his heart that these days would come.He wasn't lying when he said Eleni's body was wrestling.Her body was literally engaged in a furious battle, with every tissue fighting the cells trying to control them.Leprosy has two possible outcomes: getting worse or getting better.The damage to Eleni's legs, back, neck and face was multiplying, and she lay there in agony, turning in pain no matter which way she turned, her body a mass of ulcers.Lapakis did everything possible to treat it, sticking to the minimum principle: If the ulcer can be kept clean and free of infection, it may reduce the deadly cell proliferation.
At this time, Elpida brought Dimitri to see Irene.He was now living with the Kentumaris, an arrangement they had all hoped would be temporary, but which now looked as if it would be permanent.
"Hello, Dimitri," Eleni said weakly.Then, she turned her head towards Elpida, and it took a lot of effort to say three more words: "Thank you."
Her voice was very low, but Elpida knew what she meant: this thirteen-year-old boy was now in her capable hands.It at least gave her a little peace of mind.
Eleni had been moved into a small ward where she could be alone, out of the sight of the other patients.In the dead of night, when she was covered with damp sheets due to fever and sweat, suffering from pain, and moaning in pain, she was neither disturbed nor disturbed by others.Athena Manakis nursed her in the dark of night, feeding her soup with a spoon between her lips, and sponged her burning forehead.However, the amount of soup became less and less, and one night, she couldn't even swallow, and her throat couldn't even swallow water.
The next morning, Lapakis found his patient gasping for air with his mouth open, unable to answer any of his ordinary questions.He understood that Eleni had entered a new phase, possibly the last.
"Mrs. Petkiss, I need to see your throat," he said softly.With the new pain around her lip, he knew that even opening her mouth wide and examining the inside of it would be very uncomfortable.Inspections only confirmed his fears.He glanced at Dr. Manakis, who was standing on the other side of the bed.
"We'll be back in a minute," he said, shaking Eleni's hand.
The two doctors left the ward and gently closed the door behind them.Dr. Lapakis said quickly and quietly, "She has at least half a dozen lesions in her throat, and the epiglottis is inflamed. I can't even see the back of the pharynx because of the swelling. We have to get her comfortable—I I don't think she can last much longer."
He went back to the ward, sat next to Eleni, and took her hand.At the moment they were gone, her difficulty breathing seemed to be getting worse.So many patients in the past made him understand that he can do nothing for them now, except to accompany them at the last moment.The high terrain of the hospital allows doctors to have an excellent view of Spinalonga.Dr. Lapakis sat beside Irene's bed, listening to her labored breathing, and he looked out through the large window, at Plaka across the sea.He thought of Giorgis, and in a moment he would set off for Spinalonga, and come across the sea, flying fast through the monstrous waves.
Eleni's breathing was now short gasps, and her eyes were wide with tears and terror.Lapakis could see that life was not at all peaceful in the last hours, and he squeezed her hand tightly in both of his, as if trying to reassure her.When the last moment finally came, he sat like that for two hours, or three hours.Eleni's last breath was a futile struggle, and the next breath never came.
The best comfort a doctor can give a bereaved family is the peaceful passing of their loved one.Nothing Lapakis had said before was true, but he preferred to say it again.He rushed out of the hospital.I want to wait on the pier for Giorgis' arrival.
Not far from the shore, the small boat is bumping in the big waves of early spring.Giorgis wondered why Dr. Lapakis was waiting.It was rare for his passenger to wait there first, and there was something about his manner that made him nervous.
"Let's stop here for a while, shall we?" Lapakis asked, realizing that he had to tell Giorgis the news here now, to give him time to calm down before returning to Plaka and facing his girls.Dr. Lapakis reached out to Giorgis to help him out of the boat, then folded his arms and looked down, nervously picking a stone with the toe of his right foot.
Before the doctor could speak, Giorgis knew his hopes were about to die.
There was a low stone wall around the pine forest, and they sat down on it, looking out to sea.
"She's dead," Giorgis said quietly.It wasn't the fatigued dejection on Lapakis's face that gave the news away, the man could feel his wife was gone.
"I'm sorry," the doctor said, "and in the end there was nothing we could do, she went away peacefully."
He put his arm around Giorgis' shoulders, the old man, with his head in his hands, and big tears splashed down his dirty shoes, and the sand around his feet was black with wetness.They sat like this for more than an hour, and when Giorgis' tears stopped winding down, it was almost seven o'clock, the sky was dark, and the air was crisp and cold.Giorgis was like a wrung cloth, exhausted and unexpectedly relieved as the first wave of intense sadness receded.
"Girls will wonder where I am," he said. "We have to go back."
As they jolted toward the lights of Plaka in the dark waters, Giorgis confessed to Rapakis that he had not told his daughter Irene's worsening condition.
"You're right," Lapakis reassured him. "Just a month ago, I believed she could win this fight. There's nothing wrong with hope."
Giorgis came home much later than usual, and the girls were anxiously waiting for him.The moment he walked through the door, they knew something terrible had happened.
"It's mother, isn't it?" Anna asked. "Something must have happened to her!"
Giorgis' face crumpled, his face contorted as he clutched the back of the chair.Maria came forward and put her arms around him.
"Sit down, Dad," she said, "tell us what's wrong... tell us."
Giorgis sat at the table, trying to calm himself down.It was several minutes before he could speak.
"Your mother...is dead." He almost choked up the words.
"Dead!" Anna screamed, "but we didn't know she was going to die!"
Anna could never accept that her mother's illness could have only one real, inevitable outcome.Giorgis' decision not to tell them about Eleni's worsening condition meant a huge blow to them, as if their mother had died twice, returning all the pain they had to go through five years ago.Anna, who was one year older than sixteen-year-old Maria, was also slightly smarter. Her first reaction was anger. Her father hadn't told them anything beforehand. This drastic change was like a bolt from the blue.
For five years, Eleni, pictured with Giorgis hanging above the fireplace, had been the mother in Ana and Maria's minds.They only remembered her roughly. In the photos, Eleni had a maternal kindness and exuded the fragrance of a happy life.They had long since forgotten the real Eleni, only this idealized picture.Here, Eleni is wearing a traditional dress, a long pleated skirt, a narrow apron, a very beautiful Sotamaka, with sleeves rolled up to the elbows, smiling, and her long black hair is braided Panned all over her head, she is the perfect representation of Cretan beauty, captured in a snap of the camera shutter.But the mother died in the end, and it was too difficult for Anna and Maria to accept. They had always hoped that she would come back.They were even more hopeful when they heard the news that leprosy might be cured.And now the result is this.
Anna could hear the weeping upstairs in the street, and even as far away as the village square.Maria's tears did not flow so easily.She looked at her father, who had shrunk in grief.Eleni's death represented not only the end of his hopes and expectations, but the end of his friendship.His life had been turned upside down when she had been deported to Spinalonga, and it was beyond repair now.
"She walked peacefully," he told Maria that night, when they had dinner together.There was a place for Anna at the dining table, but she couldn't coax her down, let alone eat.
They were totally unprepared for the impact of Irene's death, and their triangle family combination was only temporary, wasn't it?The doors and windows of their house were closed, and the oil lamp in the front room was burned for forty days as a sign of mourning.Ireni is buried under a concrete slab in the Spinalonga cemetery, but in Plaka a candle is also lit for her in the church of Santa Marina on the edge of the village.The sea was very close to the church, and the waves beat against the steps of the church.
After a few months, Maria and even Anna came out of mourning.During this period of time, the family disaster blinded them from seeing the major events happening in the outside world, but when they broke out of their sorrow, everything around them continued as before.
In April, the audacious kidnapping of General Kolpe, the commander of Sevastopol's forces on Crete, heightened tensions across the island.With the assistance of members of the resistance, Colpe was ambushed by Allied forces disguised as German soldiers, and despite an extensive manhunt by the Germans, he was smuggled from his headquarters in Heraklion and taken across the mountains , sent to the south of Crete, and from there was sent by ship to Egypt.Colpe was the most valuable Allied prisoner of the war.Everyone feared that German reprisals for such an audacious kidnapping would be more savage than ever.The Germans, however, told people in no uncertain terms that the horror they had been carrying out would happen anyway.The most horrific one occurred in May, when Vanglith Ridage returned from Naples to see the horrific, burnt-out village.
"They destroyed the whole village," he roared, "and burned it to the ground!"
The people in the tavern heard him describe in disbelief the scene that the village south of Laxixi Mountain was engulfed by fire, and thick smoke rose from the ruins, and their hearts suddenly became cold.
A few days after this incident, Antonis brought the German leaflets to Plaka, and Antonis returned briefly to reassure his parents that he was still alive.The threatening tone of the leaflet remains:
The leaflet has been passed around and read, and the paper wears away under the touch.But this does not dispel the determination of the villagers.
"That just means they're desperate," Ridake said.
"Yes, but we are also desperate," his wife said. "How much longer can we take it? If we don't help members of the resistance, maybe we can sleep peacefully."
The conversation continued well into the night.To submit, to cooperate with the Germans, goes against the nature of most Cretans.They should resist, they should fight.Besides, they like to fight.From petty family squabbles to blood feuds of the century, men are eager to fight.Instead, most women prayed ferociously for peace, thinking that their prayers had been answered if they took a closer look and found the morale of the occupiers low.
The printing and distribution of these threatening leaflets may have been an act of desperation, but whatever the underlying motives, the fact is that some villages were razed to the ground.Every house in the village was reduced to smoking ruins, a scarred scene all around, and the silhouettes of blackened, twisted trees were often horrific.Anna insisted on telling her father that they should tell the Germans everything they knew.
"Why would we risk the destruction of Plaka?" she asked.
"That's just some publicity stunt," interrupted Maria.
"Not at all!" Anna retorted.
It wasn't just the Germans who waged propaganda, though, the British organized their own and found it to be an effective weapon.They distributed leaflets in large numbers, giving the impression that the enemy was in danger, spreading news that the British had landed, and exaggerating the victory of the resistance. "Kapitulation" is the theme, and the Germans woke up to see the huge letter K painted on the sentry box, the wall of the barracks, and the car.Even in small villages like Plaka, mothers wait anxiously for their children to return from such graffiti; the boys, of course, are thrilled to be able to contribute, never thinking that they might put yourself in danger.
Such attempts at weakening the Germans may have been insignificant in themselves, but they helped change the situation.The situation in Europe began to turn around, and cracks appeared in the continent under the iron fist of the Nazis.In Crete, the morale of the German troops was low, they began to retreat, and there were even desertions.
Maria was the first to notice that the small garrison in Plaka had withdrawn.Usually around six o'clock, there will always be a show of force on the main street, a so-called march of bragging rights, and occasionally question passers-by on the way back.
"It's a little strange," she said to Fotini. "It's a little different."
It didn't take long to figure it out.It was ten past six, and the familiar sound of steel-nailed boots walking on the road had not yet been heard.
"You're right," Fotini replied, "it's quiet."
The tension in the air seemed to lift.
"Let's go for a walk," Maria suggested.
The two girls, less keen to go to the beach than usual, walked straight to the end of the main street.There is the headquarters of the German garrison.The front door and shutters were wide open.
"Come on," said Fotini, "I'm going to look inside."
She stood on tiptoe and looked in through the front window.There was a table in sight, nothing on it except an ashtray piled high with cigarette butts.Four chairs, two of which fell carelessly on the ground.
"Looks like they're gone," she said excitedly. "I'll take a look inside."
"Are you sure no one's in there?" Maria asked.
"Absolutely," Fotini whispered, stepping over the threshold.
Apart from some rubbish and a yellowed German newspaper scattered on the floor, the house was empty.The two girls ran home and reported the news to Pavloth.He immediately goes to the bar.In less than an hour, the news had spread throughout the village, and that evening, people gathered in the square to celebrate the liberation of their little part of the island.
Only a few days later, on October 11, 1944, Heraklion was liberated.It is astonishing that, despite all the massacres that have taken place here in previous years, German troops were escorted out of the city peacefully without a single loss of life; the violence was left to the traitors who colluded with the Germans.The Germans continued to occupy the rest of western Crete, however, and it took several months before the situation changed.
One morning in the early summer of the second year, Ryducky turned up the radio in the tavern. He was sloppy washing the glasses from the night before, rinsing them with a basin of grayish water, and using a freshly mopped floor. Wipe the mug dry with a cloth on a few piles of water.He was a little annoyed when the music cut off suddenly and a few news announcements were interrupted, but he pricked up his ears when the solemn voice sounded.
"Today, May 8, 1945, the Germans formally declare their surrender. In a few days all enemy forces will be withdrawn from Haria and Crete will be free."
The music started playing again, and Ridake wondered if the announcement had been a trick of his own head.He poked his head out to look outside the bar and saw Giorgis hurrying toward him.
"Did you hear that?" he asked.
"Got it!" said Ridake.
That is true.Tyranny is over.Though the Cretans had always believed that they would drive the enemy from their isle, they were ecstatic when the time finally came.Must have the biggest celebration ever.
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Notes: