“‘To Athens! to Laurion!’ exclaimed my father, breathless at the bare notion of so stupendous a journey.
“‘Of course I must,’ I added, laughing, though secretly terrified lest he should flatly refuse to let me go; and before I went to bed that night my father promised to give me ten drachmas for my expenses. ‘Only take a few of your specimens, Kola; keep the best back;’ for my father is a shrewd man, though he has never left Sikinos. But on this point I was determined, and would take all or none, so my father grumbled and called me a ‘peacock,’ but for this I did not care.
“Next day I ordered a box for my specimens. ‘Why not take them in the old barrels?’ growled my father. But I said they might get broken, and the specimens inside be seen. So at last a wooden box, just four feet long and two feet high, was got ready—not without difficulty either, for wood in Sikinos is rarer than quails at Christmas, and my father grumbled not a little at the sum he had to pay for it—more than half the produce of his vintage, poor man! And when I thought how my mother might not be able to make any cheesecakes at Easter—the pride of her heart, poor thing!—I almost regretted the game I was playing.”
The Easter cheesecakes of the island (τυρόπηττα) are what they profess to be; cheese, curd, saffron, and flour being the chief ingredients. They are reckoned an essential luxury at that time of the year, and some houses make as many as sixty. It is a sign of great poverty and deprivation when none are made.
“The caique was to leave next morning if the wind was favorable for Ios, where the steamer would touch on the following day, and take me on my wild, uncertain journey. I don’t think I can be called a coward for feeling nervous on this occasion. I admit that it was only by thinking steadfastly about Kallirhoe that I could screw up my courage. When it was quite dark I took the wooden key of the store, and, as carelessly as I could, said I was going to pack my specimens. My brothers volunteered to come and help me, for they were all mighty civil now it became known that I was bound for Athens to make heaps of money, but I refused their help with a surly ‘good night,’ and set off into the darkness alone with my spade. I was horribly nervous as I went along; I thought I saw a Nereid or a Lamia in every olive-tree. At the least rustle I thought they were swooping down upon me, and would carry me off into the air, and I should be made to marry one of those terrible creatures and live in a mountain cavern, which would be worse than losing Kallirhoe altogether; but St. Nikolas and the Panagía helped me, and I dug my statue up without any molestation.
“She was a great weight to carry all by myself, but at last I got her into the store, and deposited her in her new coffin, wedged her in, and cast a last, almost affectionate look at this marble representation of life, which had been so constantly in my thoughts for months and months, and finally I proceeded to bury her with specimens, covering her so well that not a vestige of marble could be seen for three inches below the surface. What a weight the box was! I could not lift it myself, but the deed was done, so I nailed the lid on tightly, and deposited what was over of my specimens in the hole where the statue had been reposing, and then I lay down on the floor to rest, not daring to go out again or leave my treasure. I thought it never would be morning; every hour of the night I looked out to see if there was any fear of a change of wind, but it blew quietly and steadily from the north; it was quite clear that we should be able to make Ios next morning without any difficulty.
“As soon as it was light I went home. My mother was up, and packing my wallet with bread and olives. She had put a new cover on my mattress, which I was to take with me. The poor old dear could hardly speak, so agitated was she at my departure; my brothers and father looked on with solemn respect; and I—why, I sat staring out of the window to see Kallirhoe returning from the well with her amphora on her head. As soon as I saw her coming, I rushed out to bid her good-bye. We shook hands. I had not done this for twelve months now, and the effect was to raise my courage to the highest pitch, and banish all my nocturnal fears.
“Mother spilt a jug of water on the threshold, as an earnest of success and a happy return. My father and my brothers came down to the store to help me put the box on to the mule’s back, and greatly they murmured at the weight thereof. ‘There’s gold there,’ muttered my father beneath his breath. ‘Kola will be a prince some day,’ growled my eldest brother jealously, and I promised to make him Eparch of Santorin, or Demarch of Sikinos if he liked that better.
“The bustle of the journey hardly gave me a moment for thought. I was very ill crossing over in the caique to Ios, during which time my cowardice came over me again, and I wondered if Kallirhoe was worth all the trouble I was taking; but I was lost in astonishment at the steamer—so astonished that I had no time to be sick, so I was able to eat some olives that evening, and as I lay on my mattress on the steamer’s deck as we hurried on towards the Piræus, I pondered over what I should do on reaching land.
“You know what the Piræus is like, Effendi?” continued Nikola, after a final pause and a final glass of raki, “what a city it is, what bustle and rushing to and fro!”