I was not paying much attention to Anthony at this point, partly because jet lag had set in once again, but also because I was mesmerized by the now familiar khaki hat bobbing among the Sunday crowds, heading in the direction Anthony had pointed. When I turned my attention back to the two of them, Sophia, sensing my fatigue, gave Anthony a warning nudge.
“Actually,” he said, catching on, “a coffee would be great!” Despite my intentions, I turned back to where I had last caught sight of die hat, but it was nowhere to be seen.
As we selected a table in the square beside the House of Representatives, and I had a chance to sit down and really look around me, I began to forget the occasionally tacky shops and the advertising billboards, and to see Valletta as I think Anthony did, as a beautiful city of plazas, palaces, and churches laid out on an elegant grid. I could see that the plan and the style of Anmony’s hero, the great Gerolamo Cassar, had been a pervasive influence; indeed, he had set the tone for the city and influenced its structure over the centuries since he had first envisioned and built it. It really was a magnificent achievement, and I was pleased for Anmony, for some inexplicable reason.
We ordered coffees and I, hungry for lunch, bought a couple of little pastry pies called pastizzi, filled with cheese and peas and onions. Both Anthony and Sophia ordered sweets, he a cheesecake of sorts, she something called a treacle tart. I, as me tourist and host, got to try everything, but found my new young friends’ sweet tooth far exceeded mine.
While we were eating, I mentioned that I would like a good guidebook on the islands so I could see as much as possible in the time I was there. Anmony leapt up as soon as he was finished and said he knew exactly the guide I needed, and that he would get me one immediately. I insisted on giving him some money despite his protestations, and off he went.
Sophia and I sat enjoying the sunshine but saying little. She was very shy.
“I expect the guidebook will have a section on Gerolamo Cassar,” I said as an opening conversational gambit.
She giggled. “I think you may be right. A long section, probably.”
“He’s a very nice young man,” I said, sounding to my own ears, at least, like a doting auntie or something. Nothing like being with a couple of teenagers in love to make you feel old and tired.
“He is, isn’t he?” she glowed. “Even if he does go on about Cassar.”
“It’s difficult to be an architect, you know,” I said, continuing on in my aged auntie mode. “It takes years of study and dedication. Lots of people never qualify. And then it’s hard to get commissions, to get started. And it must be very difficult to put so much of yourself into a design and then have people criticize it. I think you have to be pretty committed and focused.”
She nodded. “I think he’ll do it,” she said.
“Are you married?” she asked in a moment or so, glancing at my ringless hands.
“Not anymore,” I said.
“Have a boyfriend?”
I thought to explain to her that at her age you had boyfriends; at mine you had the chronic problem of coming up with a suitable description for the man, like partner, or significant other, or whatever. But I restrained myself.
“Yes,” I said. “His name is Lucas, and he’s an archaeologist.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed. “Then you really are interested in archaeology!” I nodded.
“I’m studying history. You know they don’t teach us much of anything in school about our own history, just everybody else’s,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at the statue of Queen Victoria in the square.
“I have this great new teacher. She’s here from England, on a sabbatical, but she knows more about the history of Malta than anyone I’ve ever met. She’s teaching us about the ancient archaeological sites—she says they are among the oldest and most important in the Mediterranean. I’ve been going to see them since I was a little girl and I had no idea! I can hardly believe what she’s teaching us. We’re even doing a play about Malta’s history right from ancient times. The teacher calls it a tableau, or something. I have a small part in it.” She smiled shyly.
“I think it sounds wonderful!”
“Do you, honestly?”
“I do, yes.”
“She’s giving a public lecture Tuesday night at the University. I really want to go, but I’m not allowed to go by myself. I can’t ask my parents. The teacher talks about ancient gods and goddesses, and my parents would think that’s heretical. Anthony says maybe he’ll come, but I know he’s not really interested in anything except architecture, and anyway he has to study every night if he’s to get into the Academy next year. I don’t suppose…”
“I’d love to come,” I said. And why not? I thought. By that time the painting and electrical work at the house would be done and the furniture would be mere, or at least on its way. A couple of hours off would be fine. “Just tell me where and when,” I said.
Just then Anthony returned with the guidebook, and immediately showed me the section on Cassar. Sophia gave me a conspiratorial grin. Anthony, on learning that I planned to attend the lecture, suddenly announced that he too would attend. I told them I’d meet them there, and Anthony spread out the map that came with the guidebook and began to give me directions. He also pointed out other sights of interest, all designed by Cassar, of course, including something called Verdala Palace, not too far from the house.
Then we sat companionably together watching as the late afternoon sun began to turn the yellow stones of the buildings around us to gold.
As we did so, I got that feeling we all get occasionally, the feeling that we are being watched. I don’t know why or how we know. Perhaps it’s some vestigial remnant of an ability inherited from our earliest ancestors who lived in more dangerous times. But I think we are almost always right when we get this feeling. I scanned the crowd, and caught a glimpse of a now familiar figure near a column in the shade of the arcade that runs down one side of the square.
“This island sure is a small place,” I said to my companions, trying to hide my unease as I pointed my fellow tourist out to them.
“Neat outfit!” Anthony said admiringly. Sophia rolled her eyes.
As we turned our attention to him, the Great White Hunter drew back quickly and vanished into the darkness of the arcade.
“Skittish too,” Anthony said.
“Creepy,” Sophia demurred.
I agreed with her. I also think that in addition to knowing when we’re being watched, we sometimes have a sixth sense when a stranger wishes us ill. I had that feeling now.
I shook off my apprehension, however, as the sun and the beauty of the surroundings soaked in, and was actually reluctant to leave the square when the three of us headed back. The house looked much the same as it had when I left. Except for a dead cat, strung up and swinging from the branch of a little tree in the backyard.
FOUR
From tyre and sidon they come, the seafarers, children of Melqart, puissant protector of Phoenician sailors. Neither chart nor compass guides them, sights set on distant lands. Is it My temples, long abandoned, that beckon you from the safety of North African shores? Traders, craftsmen, keepers of the color purple, leave us alone. But leave your language, your alphabet, when you go.
It took all the courage I could muster to stay in the house that night, but I managed it. Indeed, by the next morning, I’d persuaded myself that the dead cat incident, as it became known in my mind, was a childish prank of some sort. An exceptionally cruel one, but a prank nonetheless.
Anthony had cut the cat down, as Sophia and I clutched each other, and we found a little patch of ground to bury it in. They’d stayed with me a while, but then Sophia had to get home, so I found myself alone. I spent the evening checking the doors and windows, peering out into the darkness, but most of all thinking about The Deez, my shop cat, whom I loved even though he was a rather standoffish little beast. In the end, mercifully, I slept.