the baby’s garments were clad and intricately carved in silver, only allowing painterly visibility, in the Byzantine iconic fashion, of their two faces. Both mother and child looked serene and sublime.
Calli made the sign of the cross and brought her lips to the cold silver as she looked up into the Panagia’s eyes. For a moment she thought she saw them glistening with moisture; she pulled back, made the sign of the cross again, and smiled. ‘I want to believe in miracles,’ she whispered and kissed the icon once more. She stepped back and looked around her, this time her eyes searching for Raphael.
She located the archangel’s icon in a position of prominence, propped on its own on a wooden stand at the edge of the iconostasis beside the candle holders. She made her way towards him and stood for a while, gazing at the image of her guardian angel. On the right-hand corner of the icon the angel’s name was written in the Greek script, ΡΑΦΑΗΛ; his wings were a fiery orange and his garments a combination of red and green. His halo framed a tranquil and benevolent face; with his right hand he held an open box and with his left a spoon; perhaps a medicinal offering, she thought, or the holy communion. After all, didn’t Maya tell her that Raphael was the angel of healing?
She stood looking for some moments longer, then crossing herself three times she leaned forward and kissed it. Seized by a sense of awe, she picked up a candle, lit it and plunged it into the sand with others which had been placed there before hers. Staring at the dozen or so candles as their flames rose towards the ceiling, she silently repeated the same plea she had made earlier that summer under a glowing blood moon.
‘Isn’t it beautiful?’ Michalis’s voice shook her out of her meditation. He was standing close to her, holding a candle, ready to light it and no doubt to make his own prayer and wish.
‘This icon is very ancient,’ he explained in a whisper, moving closer. ‘Some of the nuns here still paint. They are famed for their work and have a little gallery of icons that we could go and look at if you wish.’
‘Do you want to have children, Michalis?’ Calli heard herself ask, seemingly oblivious to what he had just said.
‘Er . . . yes . . . perhaps, some day,’ he replied in confusion. He stood awkwardly, waiting for a moment, unsure if she would continue, before turning to light his candle and place it next to hers.
After leaving the chapel, Michalis and Calli made their way towards the cloisters in search of directions to the painting workshop and gallery and towards some shelter from the now unforgiving late morning sun. The nun they came across in the courtyard, who so graciously invited them to join her for a glass of water and a cup of coffee under the shade of a mulberry tree, turned out to be none other than the elderly Mother Superior. Calli looked up at the canopy of rich green leaves from the tree that spread over them like an organic umbrella and wondered if the nuns kept silkworms. She remembered her grandmother explaining to her that mulberry leaves are essentially what silk is made of, since that is what the silkworms feed on.
They sat talking with the nun for a while, her voice and wise words as welcome and gentle as the cool sea air that blew from the shore. She spoke of life in the convent and of the miraculous performing icons that they were blessed to house in their modest chapel, while the young novice they had encountered earlier brought them slices of orange glyko, coffee and ice-cold water.
The visit to the convent had a significant impact on Calli. She had visited monasteries as a child with her parents, she had encountered monks and nuns over the years, yet this occasion had been a different experience for her. The simplicity and serenity of the nuns’ lives, the dedication to their faith and work emphasized how little anyone needs to achieve contentment; her own city life felt tainted and superficial.
As they left the convent, Calli entered the chapel once more to light another candle below Raphael’s icon. This time her prayer was for her aunt Froso.
9
At last the phone call she had been waiting for arrived – though it woke her out of a deep and delicious siesta.