Food and drink were the center of almost every human contact I had in Greece and the region. Eating, talking across rickety wooden tables, marble-top tables, tables with paper covering, wrought-iron tables, tables set together on a pebbled surface by the sea. One of the mysteries of the Aegean is that things seem more significant than they do elsewhere, deeper, more complete in themselves. Those of us pressed together around the joined tables were raised in each other's estimation to a higher light perhaps, an amplitude that may or may not have been our natural due. The food itself was a serious thing, simple as it often was, eaten with dwarf cutlery from shared plates, an effort of our single will to be where we were, extravagant in our belief in each other's distinctiveness and worth. We never had to summon a sense of occasion. It was in and around us all the time.Andreas took me to a taverna in a half-finished street in a remote district. The place specialized in heart, brains, kidneys and intestines. I decided this choice of eating place had not been made casually. The evening was to be a lesson in seriousness, in authentic things, whatever is beyond a pale understanding, whatever persuades the complacent to see what is around them. He would use these parts of the animal's body to decorate his text. This is the real thing, kokorétsi, the spit-roasted entrails of the beast. These are Greeks, who eat it.On the other hand maybe it was just another dinner in a smoky room with homemade wine in tin mugs, distinguishable from a hundred other dinners not by the food so much as by the intensity of the conversation. His conversation. His furious, good-humored, incessant and maddening talk.He was not settled until he put his cigarette and his lighter on the table in front of him. I felt almost threatened by the gesture. Serious. A serious evening."Why are we having dinner, Andreas?”"I want to find out about your Greek. You said you were learning Greek. I want to find out if you are happy here.”"Not that people need a reason to eat.”"I am always interested in talking to Americans.”"Roy Hardeman.”"Professional duty. I am not so interested. He's a good manager, very smart, but we only talk about the job. He could be a Frenchman, a German, and I would hardly notice. I don't think there's any nationality in companies such as ours. This is submerged.”"I can't imagine you submerging your nationality.”"Okay, maybe this is why we are here. To make things clear once again. To show our status.”"You need someone to rail at. Why not a Frenchman or German?”"Not so much fun.”"A waiter said to us on Rhodes the other day, he said, 'You Americans are fools. You had the Germans down and you let them up. They were down and you did not crush them. Now look. Everywhere.'‘"But he takes their money. We all take each other's money. This is the role of the present government. Take the Americans' money, do what the Americans tell us to do. It is breathtaking, how they submit, how they let American strategic interests take precedence over the lives of Greeks.”"It's your government, not ours.”"I am not so sure. Of course we have experience in these matters. Humiliation is the theme of Greek affairs. Foreign interference is taken for granted. It is assumed we could not survive without it. The occupation, the blockades, the forces landing in Piraeus, the humiliating treaties, the distribution of influence among the powers. What would we talk about if not about this? Where would we find the drama that is so essential to our lives?”"You realize your irony is fixed in considerable truth. Of course you do. Forgive me.”"For a long time our politics have been determined by the interests of the great powers. Now it is just the Americans who determine.”"What is this I'm eating?”"I will tell you. Brains.”"Not bad.”"Do you like it? Good. I come here when I'm tense. When my job is crushing my spirit. Something like this, you know. Misery, depression. I come here and eat brains and kidneys.”"You realize the trouble with Greece. Greece is strategically located.”"We have noticed," he said."So it's only natural the major powers have taken a close interest. What do you expect? My boss once said to me in his nervous raspy way, 'Power works best when it doesn't distinguish friends from enemies.' The man is a living Buddha.”"I think he must be running American policy. Our future does not belong to us. It is owned by the Americans. The Sixth Fleet, the men who command the bases on our soil, the military officers who fill the U.S. embassy, the political officers who threaten to stop the economic aid, the businessmen who threaten to stop investing, the bankers who lend money to Turkey. Millions for the Turks, all decided in Athens.”"Not by me, Andreas.”"Not by you. We are repeatedly sold out, taken lightly, deceived, totally ignored. Always in favor of the Turks. The famous tilt. It happened in Cyprus, it happens every day in NATO.”"You're obsessed by the Turks. It's a spiritual need. Are they even remotely interested in you?”"They seem to be remotely interested in our islands, our air space.”"Strategy.”"American strategy. This is interesting, how the Americans choose strategy over principle every time and yet keep believing in their own innocence. Strategy in Cyprus, strategy in the matter of the dictatorship. The Americans learned to live with the colonels very well. Investments flourished under the dictatorship. The bases stayed open. Small arms shipments continued. Crowd control, you know?”"They were your colonels, Andreas.”"Are you sure of that? This is interesting to me, the curious connection between Greek and American intelligence agencies.”"Why curious?”"The Greek government doesn't know what goes on between them.”"What makes you think the American government knows?This is the nature of intelligence, isn't it? The final enemy is government. Only government threatens their existence.”"The nature of power. The nature of intelligence. You have studied these things. Where, in your apartment in Kolonaki?”"How do you know I live there?”"Where else would you live but there?”"The views are nice.”"The bidet of America, we call this place. Do you want to hear the history of foreign interference in this century alone?”"No.”"Good. I don't have time to recite it.”In the end he did recite it. He recited everything, interrupting his meal several times to light cigarettes, order more wine. I enjoyed myself even in the sweep of judgment and enormous accusation. He had made an occupation of these matters, he had taken pains, and I think he was eager to vent his scholarship. Diligence, comprehensiveness. He was a student of Greek things. It occurred to me that all Greeks were, both in and out of politics and war. Being small and exposed, being strategic. They had a sense of the frailty of their own works, the identifying energies and signs, and they instructed each other as a form of mutual reassurance."Does your boss tell you that power must be blind in both eyes? You don't see us. This is the final humiliation. The occupiers fail to see the people they control.”"Come on, Andreas.”"Bloody hell, nothing happens without the approval of the Americans. And they don't even know there is a grievance. They don't know we are tired of the situation, the relationship.”"You've had five or six years of calm. Is this too long for Greeks?”"Look how deep we are involved in the comedy. To make concessions to Turks for the sake of harmony in NATO. All arranged by Americans. Americans have played the game badly in Greece.”"And your mistakes. All your mistakes are discussed in terms of acts of nature. The catastrophe in Asia Minor. The disastrous events in Cyprus. This is the language of earthquakes and floods. But Greeks caused these things to happen.”"Cyprus is problematical. I will say this only because there is no documentary evidence. But one day the facts of U.S. involvement will emerge. I am certain.”"What am I eating?”"This is the stomach, the stomach lining.”"Interesting.”"I don't know if I would call it interesting. It's a sheep's stomach, you know. Usually I come here alone. It has a certain meaning for me. Brains, intestines. I don't know if you can understand. Did you ever see a Greek when he dances alone? This is private, a private moment. I'm a little crazy, I think. I need a moment of eating sheep's brains now and then.”The owner stood over us, totaling the bill in machine-gun Greek. We went somewhere for dessert, somewhere else for drinks. At two in the morning we walked the streets looking for a cab. Andreas told me about events leading up to this and that and the other calamity. Whenever he had a point to make he stopped walking and seized my wrist. This happened four or five times on a single windy street. Talk came out of him like the product of some irreversible technology. We'd stand briefly in the dark, then start up again, heading toward a boulevard somewhere. He was full of night vigor, a common property of Athenians. Ten paces he'd stop again. Nuclear stockpiles, secret protocols. His politics were a form of wakefulness, the alerting force in a life that might otherwise pass him by."What do you want me to do, Andreas?”"I want you to argue," he said. "It may be an hour before a taxi comes.”From the small balcony off my bedroom I looked into a room across the courtyard, a little below me. A bright day, shutters open, the room being aired. Self-possessed, a woman's room, a woman's shoes on the floor. I was in shadows, the room in clear light, utterly still, a cool space of objects and tones. What a mystery her absence was, full of unformed questions. There was something final in the scene, a deep calm, as though things had been arranged to be gazed on. Shouldn't a scene like this be marked by expectation? The woman will enter? She will enter drying her hair in a towel, bringing into the room so many things at once, so much affective motion, a lifetime's shattering of composed space, that it is possible to believe you know everything about her, just in that bundling of head and arms, that careless entrance, barefoot, in a loose robe. Alluring. This is what I missed. When the light changed, later, I would look again.My landlord, Hadjidakis, was standing in the lobby. He was a short heavy man who enjoyed speaking English. Almost everything he said in English struck him as funny, almost every sentence ended in a laugh. He seemed happily disconcerted, making these strange sounds. After we'd greeted each other he told me he'd just seen a group of riot policemen assembled near the center of town. Nothing seemed to be going on. They were simply there, about forty of them, in their white visored helmets, black uniforms, carrying riot shields, guns and clubs. As he told the story Hadjidakis kept laughing. All the facts in the story were separated by the sound of his laughter. It was an odd juxtaposition, of course, the riot police and the laughter. The story in English had an eerie dimension it wouldn't have had in Greek. And the sight of those shields and clubs had made an impact on him."It gave me an emotion," he said, and we both laughed.When I came down the next day with a suitcase, the concierge stood in the dimness, his right hand twisted in the air, the gesture of destinations.China, I told him,
Kina, not knowing the word for Kuwait.I rode out to the airport with Charles Maitland, who was going to Beirut to see about a job as security officer with the British embassy there."I was saying to Ann. They keep changing the names.”"What names?”"The names we grew up with. The countries, the images. Persia for one. We grew up with Persia. What a vast picture that name evoked. A vast carpet of sand, a thousand turquoise mosques. A vastness, a cruel glory extending back centuries. All the names. A dozen or more and now Rhodesia of course. Rhodesia said something. For better or worse it was a name that said something. What do they offer in its place? Linguistic arrogance, I suggested to her. She called me a comedian. She has no personal memory of Persia as a name. But then she's younger, isn't she?”We floated past the Olympic Stadium."There's something to it, you know. This sweeping arrogance. Overthrow, re-speak. What do they leave us with? Ethnic designations. Sets of initials. The work of bureaucrats, narrow minds. I find I take these changes quite personally. They're a rescinding of memory. Every time another people's republic emerges from the dust, I have the feeling someone has tampered with my childhood.”"You can't prefer Leopoldville to Kinshasa.”"The Ministry of Slogans. The Ministry of Obscure Dialects.”"Zimbabwe," I said. "A drumbeat.”"A drumbeat. That's just it, you see.”"That's just what?”"A drumbeat, a drumbeat.”Our driver eased into a gray line of taxis stretching down the thoroughfare. A woman and maimed child walked along the divide from car to car, begging. The light changed. We were almost to the airport when Charles spoke again."I heard about the belly dancing.”"Yes.”"An interesting night, was it?”"Do you know her?”"I know her husband," he said, and when he looked at me his jaw was tight and strong and I wondered if we were fixed in some near symmetry of friendships and adulteries. We walked through the doors into the towering noise of the terminal.Two phone calls.The first came the night I got back from Kuwait. The phone rang twice, then stopped. A little later it rang again. I hadn't been able to sleep. It was two in the morning, shutters banging in the wind.Ann's voice."This will seem strange, I know.”"Are you all right?”"Well, yes, but I've been putting this off and putting it off.”"Is Charles still in Beirut?”"He stayed on. We have friends there. He's fine. It isn't Charles, it isn't me exactly.”For a moment I thought she wanted to invite herself over. I studied the wooden surface of the table the phone was on. In the stillness before she spoke again I concentrated intently."It's about this man I've been seeing. It's about him actually.”I waited, then said, "Andreas. This is the man you're talking about.”She waited. "How interesting, James. Then you know." Waited. "Yes, it's about him I've been wanting to speak to you. Did I wake you? How stupid to call at this hour. But it's been absolutely pressing in on me. I couldn't sleep. I had to tell you, I finally decided. It may be pure imagination but what if it isn't, I thought." Waited. "How interesting, that you know.”The voice was rough-edged and faint. She would be sitting beneath the African mask, a drink at her right hand."We've talked about you," she said. "Every so often he asks. A question about your job one day. A question about your friends, your background, small things, falling more or less naturally into the conversation. At first I barely noticed. It was one subject among many. But lately I've begun to think his interest in you may be special. Something enters the conversation. A suspense, I think I'll call it. There's a curious silence in his waiting for my responses. And he watches me. I've begun to notice how he watches. He's a watchful man, isn't he?”"I like Andreas.”"He keeps bringing up your job. I've told him I haven't the foggiest idea what you do. All right, he changes the subject. But eventually it comes up again, perhaps a bit more directly the second time, a bit clumsily even. 'Why is his main office in Washington?' 'Andreas, I've no idea. Why don't you ask him?' Clearly he thinks you're someone who merits attention.”"He also thought I was David Keller, didn't he, at dinner that night. You were right there. He had us mixed up, remember? I was the unscrupulous banker.”"He mentions something called the Northeast Group.”"That's the firm I work for. It's part of a monster corporation. A wholly owned subsidiary, I think is the phrase.”"If I might ask, James, what exactly do you do? Not your company but you. When you travel.”"Generally I do reviews. I examine figures, make decisions.”"Well, see, that's so vague.”"The higher the post, the vaguer the job. The people with specific duties need someone to send their telexes to. I'm a presence.”"He mentions all the travel you do. He mentions the tiny staff you have in Athens. Just a secretary, is this correct? He wonders why your main office is in Washington and not New York. He does his best not to be direct. He rather worms these subjects into the conversation. The more I think about it, the more obvious it all seems. But I didn't know how to tell you.”"What else does he mention?”"He mentions a book you wrote on military strategy.”"Ghost-wrote. All I did was organize some facts. How the hell does he know about that?”"That's it, you see.”"I wrote a lot of things, a dozen subjects.”"I think he's read the book.”"Then he knows more than I do. I can't remember a word of it. It was grammar and syntax to me. Why didn't he mention it? I saw him a week ago.”"Something enters the conversation when we talk about you." Waiting. "Do you hear the wind?”"He can't be gathering information for someone. Nobody's that amateurish. And there's nothing to gather. What is there to gather?”"Maybe I'm wrong," she said. "We've talked about other people as well. Sometimes at length. I could be imagining.”"I like Andreas. There's a size to him. There's a force. He has deep feelings and deep suspicions and he should have them, why shouldn't he, when you consider events, when you consider history. I can't see what he'd be up to, doing this. He's with a multinational. They're based in Bremen or Essen or someplace.”"Bremen.”"It doesn't add up.”"Well, then, I'm imagining.”"Unless he has friends on one of the left-wing papers here. Maybe he's playing amateur spy. The Communist papers like to print the names of foreign correspondents they think are tied to U.S. intelligence.”"It doesn't seem like him.”"No, it doesn't.”"What do I want to say? He's so human?”"Yes.”"He is, you know. He has large feelings, as you say, but they pass very easily into a gentleness, a sympathy. How I would hate to think I was being used.”"It's not that way," I said. "If he wanted information, he couldn't possibly expect to get it without my finding out.”"Unless he thought I wouldn't tell you.”"But you have.”"Isn't it awful? He thought I'd be so smitten.”"It's not that way. There's an explanation. He said he'd call. I won't even try to get in touch. I'll wait for him to call.”"He mentioned several other things in connection with your activities.”"My activities? Do I have activities? I thought it was his activities we were concerned about.”"The more I reflect, the more I think I'm imagining.”"He said he'd call. I'll give him every chance to explain before I bring it up. When will you see him again?”"He said he'd call. But he hasn't.”"He will. What about Charles? What about the job in Beirut?”"I don't think so," she said."Were you willing to go back?”"There?" She sounded surprised that I would ask."Then why would he bother seeing about a job?”"To take taxis across the Green Line. To light up in a bloody great smile when Israeli jets break the sound barrier. He loves the roar, the boom. To pretend to be unaffected when the guns start firing round the corner. That's why he went.”The worn voice began to acquire a certain disregarding impetus. Soon it would fall into monologue, an inner speech that did not need a context or listener."To sit there with his beer, chatting with a colleague as the mortars rain down or whatever they do. Absolutely unmoved. I think he lived for such moments. They were the high points of Lebanon, as demonstrations were the high points of Panama when we were there. During the worst of the anti-American demonstrations he'd put on his Union Jack lapel badge and go walking right into it. How I came to hate that badge. He truly felt he couldn't be harmed, wearing it. And so he sits in someone's office in Beirut when the militiamen are active. To betray no sign of emotion. To chat. What's the point of getting excited, he liked to say to me. Truly believing there is good sense in this. As if getting excited had something to do with deciding to get excited, making a conscious decision to get excited. They're out there hurling grenades, firing rockets. What's the point of getting excited? What's the point?”The second call came from Del Nearing moments before I left for the office. She was in a phone booth off the main square in Argos, the Peloponnese, waiting for the Athens bus. She just thought I'd like to know.