Over the Sea to Seriphos
AFTERTHOUGHT
By JOHN WELLS
WISHING to visit friends on the island of Seriphos in the Cyclades, I went last week to the offices of Thos. Cook and Sons in Athens. The man behind
the counter listened gloomily, pulling at his moustache in a manner suggesting black despair. It was, he explained, im- possible to buy steamer tickets in Athens, and I would have to go to Piraeus, some five miles away. I thanked him, and crossed the road to the agency opposite, where I was immediately provided with a ticket by a smiling obsequious infant of twelve, who also gave me a neatly printed timetable in which the shipping routes to the islands were set out in black and white. The timetable was issued by Hermes, traditionally, among other things, the Conductor of Souls, and I left the agency secure in a naive pagan optimism.
I arrived at the docks at nine next morning, an hour before the `Pandelis' was due to leave. The boat had not come in yet, and I was directed to a quiet gathering of Greeks sitting among their baggage on the quayside. It was already very hot, policemen in white were blowing their whistles and shouting at drivers, and the heavily- laden lorries banged and rumbled up the steel ramps. An old biscuit-seller, with one hand and a rather distressing divided stump, came and sat beside me on my suitcase and began sorting out his basket. It all seemed a colourful background to my reading on the Russian Revolution, and I settled down contentedly with Isaac Deutscher. At half-past ten I walked over to the shipping office, and was told that the boat had been delayed: it would be in now at half-past eleven. Returning to the other refugees on the quay, I became immersed in my book once again, and finally went back to the shipping office at half- past twelve. The man affected polite curiosity. I reminded him of our former conversation. He shrugged and looked at the ceiling. There • was no boat. Tomorrow. Not today.
It was in this way that I found myself sitting on the deck of the `Myrtidiotissa' an hour or so later, eating a huge half-moon of water-melon with a very old and toothless lady in black, with the wind fluttering in the awning above and the white spray drifting away from the bows across the swimming-pool blue sea, bound for Syros. The island is about twenty miles from Seriphos, and the man at the office said I might be able to get a boat across. Examining the timetable more closely, it seemed more likely that I might not, so I decided to abandon Seriphos for the moment, and go down to Santorini, dramatically Described to me before I left by a poetic Irish friend as 'this great black wall rising up out of he sea with the little white houses right up at the top of the cliff.' I arrived in Syros, com- pared my timetable with the painted notice- board outside the harbour office to confirm that :here was a steamer leaving for Santorini the text evening at seven, and sat down to enjoy a ample but intoxicating supper beside the gently- apping black waters of the harbour.
When I came back the following evening, the :lerk could hardly have been more helpful.
Taking my timetable, he examined it in silence for three or four minutes, then took a soft lead pencil and crossed out the word Syros against the date in question. The boat did not call there any more. There was, however, a boat leaving for Mykonos in half an hour. I went gratefully aboard, and leant on the rail filled with a sense of purpose and progress as the ship churned on through the dimly foaming water under the bright stars. The lights of the island grew more distinct, and eventually the anchor clanked out and splashed into the harbour. I turned to an affable old sailor to reassure myself that this was Mykonos. He said it was indeed, and wished me an agreeable stay. It was not until the ship had sailed that I found out purely by chance that it was in fact Tinos.
After a peaceful cruise in a small boat to Delos and Mykonos, I returned to Tinos to ask about boats to Santorini. The clerk was bright but firm. There wet'e no boats going to Santorini. There was a boat for Santorini leaving the next evening at seven from Syros, but the boat to Syros from Tinos did not arrive until after it had gone. Smugly believing that I could break the system, I went next door to the office of a rival line. A domestic scene was in progress, the small plump wife weeping quietly in a corner and the husband tapping his fingers angrily on the desk. He brightened at my approach. He said there was of course a boat to Syros, at eight in the morning. While buying the ticket, I mentioned en passant that I had been afraid of missing the boat for Santorini in the evening. He looked at me suspiciously. The next boat to Santorini from Syros was in three days' time. I drew his attention to the timetable. He dismissed it, growing angry again. His wife, smiling at me encouragingly through her tears, said quietly that perhaps there was a boat from another line. This drove him mad. Getting down off his high stool, he walked purposefully across the room and slapped her.
Some days later, after an idyllic and fruitful time in Santorini wandering among the ruins of ancient Thyra high above the sea, where a guide came running fifty yards through the rubble, waving his arms in order to show me a phallic symbol carved on a broken wall, and down among the smoking ovens of bright yellow sulphur in the crater of the volcano, I rode down the cliff path in the darkness on the bony back of an elderly mule to the harbour in order to take the night boat back to Athens and from there to Seriphos. I entered the harbour-master's office and asked whether the Athens boat had been delayed. He shrugged and repeated the gesture of looking at the ceiling. There were no boats tonight. I thanked him, and went out to sit on the quay, wondering whose nerve would snap first. After an hour he came out. He apologised. There was a boat, yes. It would dock in half an hour. Still glowing with overweening confidence that I had finally beaten the gods, I climbed the unsteady gangway and .was shown into my cabin. The next morning I asked the steward when we would be arriving at Piraeus. He said he did not know. We should, however, be in Rhodes about midnight. Next year I am going to sacrifice a goat to Hermes before I start.
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