The 34th Degree

55

U pstairs in her bedroom at her family’s estate that afternoon, Aphrodite Vasilis was busy unpacking her belongings and answering the relentless questions of her mother and father. Was she all right? Had the Baron harmed her? Where had she been for the last several weeks?

“Now, you know I can’t answer that, Mama and Papa,” she told them, self-consciously folding the nightgown Ludwig had given her.

Her short, balding father waddled back and forth across the floor in his tuxedo, nervously anticipating the party he had the privilege of hosting against his will. His fleshy face looked flushed from liquor, and his bow tie was crooked. “Well, thank God you’re alive.”

“Yes,” chimed her mother from the other side of the room, making the sign of the cross. “We can’t enjoy even an hour of sleep whenever you’re gone. Not one hour’s peace until we can see you with our eyes and know that you are fine.”

Her mother was sitting in front of the vanity, admiring herself in the mirror. Outwardly, she looked as cool and elegant as ever, but her gaudy green dress was a bit much. So was her denial of what was happening to the family. The occupation had turned them into pathetic figures, and Aphrodite felt more sorrow for her parents than anger. The latter emotion she reserved exclusively for the Nazis.

“I’m not fine,” Aphrodite replied, placing the nightgown in the top drawer of her dresser. “Nothing is fine as long as Kostas is in prison and Christos is in America.”

She noticed that the picture of Chris she kept on her dresser was missing. “Mama, where’s my picture of Christos?”

“I put it away in the bottom drawer,” her mother said.

Aphrodite turned sharply to face her mother. “Why?”

Her mother held up her hands in a pleading gesture. “It makes the Baron jealous.”

Aphrodite knew it was her mother who had always been jealous of Chris and her daughter’s happiness. “Good,” she said. “He should know that just because he holds my body doesn’t mean he holds my heart.”

“Aphrodite!” cried her mother, biting the knuckle of her clenched fist. “You mustn’t say such things.”

“But it’s true, Mama.” Aphrodite pulled open the bottom drawer and found the picture in the back, lying facedown. She took it out, wiped it clean, and placed it on top of her dresser, where it belonged. “We all know the arrangements of this estate,” she went on. “You get to live here as long as I sleep with Ludwig. If I stop, then you two are out on the streets, where I don’t think you’d find much sympathy from the ‘peasants,’ as you call them.”

“See here,” said her father. “Don’t talk to your mother that way. She loves you, and so do I. We don’t want to do anything rash. Yes, if we all keep calm, this whole thing will blow over.”

“Blow over, Papa?” she repeated. “In case you haven’t noticed, the old days are gone for good: Metaxas is dead, King George isn’t coming back, and this country is going to hell. When is this all going to blow over?”

“After the war,” he said resolutely. “You’ll see.”

She plopped down on the bed. “After the war, I’ll be an old maid,” she lamented, “despised by everybody.”

“You’ll be a beautiful, rich young woman, the envy of Athens, and the best catch,” said her mother, admiring herself in the mirror one last time. She turned from the vanity and came over to the bed with a gold brush and began brushing Aphrodite’s hair. “Love? What is that? You think I loved your father here? It comes in time. Hold your head still.”

“Ludwig isn’t even Greek, Mama. We’re collaborators, traitors-”

“We are not traitors,” her father insisted. “We are simply waiting for this godforsaken war to end. What other options do we have? Sit and do nothing while the Germans commandeer everything we’ve worked for? Risk our lives to escape the country on some ramshackle caique piloted by a Communist pirate who would probably slash our throats, steal our money, and throw us overboard for shark bait? Fight the enemy and die like so many other simple, misguided peasants who want to be heroes? No, I say we stay right where we are, where it’s safe. We mustn’t do anything drastic.”

The truth, she feared, was that her father, ever the shrewd businessman and speculator, was simply hedging his bets. He didn’t know there was a difference between finance and morality.

“Yes,” her mother agreed. “Family loyalty is more important than anything, Aphrodite, more important than laws or love or even the church. Don’t put your faith in some young fool who’s never going to come back.”