IV - Sweet Roses and Smooth Golden Handles

A faint smell of garlic hung in the garden air. He didn’t like it as he looked at the different plants around him and the many odourless olive bushes that gave nothing away. On his next steps forward he was bathed in shadow as he had walked passed the tall stone pillars that lined he front of the square house that made a high rectangular porch. He knocked on the heavy front door and waited and soon a square of bright orange appeared in the shape of a window and looking at it he saw that the window had no glass, only outside shutters. Then there were footsteps and the rustling of clothes and a barely audible murmur. The door creaked open and there in the dimly lit hall a figure stood, it was a dark shape and as his eyes adjusted he saw it was a woman. She smiled, signalled him in and he followed her through to the kitchen putting the delivery down on the large wooden table.

In the subdued lighting he discreetly he looked around the room, at its age, its décor and its condition. 'Thank-you’ she said catching his eye as she put the last of the items away. Her voice was slow and monotone, like she had been drugged.

‘You’re welcome’ he said flatly. He made to go and traced his steps back along the route he had come in and he passed by the room with the light on. He scanned it and saw that the window definitely had no glass, it was just a hole with shutters. ‘Do you get many break-ins?’ he found himself saying before he could stop himself. He heard her stop behind him and turned to make eye contact. Her eyes slowly moved to the left where the glassless window was in the room with the orange light.

‘No we don’t’ He second looked her and then went to walk on. ‘I’ve lived here a long time and we’ve had no problems like that. Amiz is a peaceful village, people are happy here’ He shuffled a step towards the front door and she watched him unjudgementally and he stopped through politeness. ‘There aren’t many people altogether, there are a scattering of farms and a handful of cottages. Most people leave their back doors unlocked even at night. It’s what you call a friendly, low-risk area’. He smiled  and nodded thinking of the shack he lived in near the beach. There were gaps at the bottom of the so called walls all the way around, anyone could get in from any angle, 360 degrees almost. ‘There was this boy, a teenager who used to sit in the garden, he would pick at the plants and scratch at the stonework, but he was no trouble. I missed him when he was gone. That was about twenty years ago’. She stopped and looked at him, taking him all in. ‘Of course the problem with having no windows is when it rains and it does rain a lot, at an angle usually from across the common and it sweeps right in. When it stops I clean it up, it’s all over the floor and these are such pretty tiles’. He looked at the mosaic design of light greens and off whites, it had lost its colour, but the design was clear enough.

‘It’s a lovely copy of…’

‘…Original, it’s Roman’ she corrected. His eyes searched it out through the dimly lit hall and he saw the shape of some sort of reptile, maybe a salamander or perhaps mythical.

‘It’s amazing. What do your family think of all this?’

‘There was only my husband and he’s dead. Died a long time ago.’

‘I am sorry’ he said thinking of her on her own and all the passers-by, Black Hill walkers and people getting lost. He looked at her and she looked straight through him, deep in thought. ‘Just got to find my way back now’

 

‘There is only one road, you cant really get lost’ she said. But he could.

 

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Everything was sweet roses and smooth golden handles, she had spoken to him as someone trying to be their very best would, country folk were like that. And so an understanding grew, grew like fiery smoke, burning away everything in its path. Looking at her as he left that day he knew he would come back and if necessary using all his god given power to do so