Over the next days, as they swam and sunbathed together on the remote beaches, they talked about what they would do. Gradually Naomi prevailed, and Sam agreed that the humanitarian thing to do would be to go back and bring the castaway a basket of food and some necessities. It was a simple thing to do and it was also a moral thing to do, and being both moral and simple it was an easy thing to do. Easy, simple, and moral: but it had to be planned. Every night Naomi monitored the Greek news in case their charge had been apprehended by the police, but he never appeared in the media and she heard no mention of him in the flow of island gossip, to which her nativized ear was attuned. He remained invisible, and the longer he did the more intensely she felt the emotion of her mission. She didn’t believe in signs, but there were surely signs involved here—to her mind, there was no one on the island who would be more sensitive to the issues than she was. She couldn’t possibly allow anyone else other than Sam to become involved in this salvation. But that said, she also needed Sam at her side, complicit and eager and docilely attuned to the project at hand. For Naomi, it could not be a solitary endeavor. She needed a platonic lover in her orbit.
At nine one morning, when they should have been snorkelling near Mandraki, they rented a small skiff with an outboard, loaded it with two bags of groceries, and returned to the far side of the island.
This time it was different. When they returned to the same place where they had seen him previously, they saw him at once, washing himself in the cove, using his hands as a little bucket. He wasn’t as handsome as Sam remembered, but his relaxed gaze and the body language, his resignation and indifference, served him well. The two women stopped and put down the bags and, with a nervous banality, waved. The man came out of the sea, dried himself, and sat down where he had slept. He dressed, but without hurrying, and Naomi turned to Sam, as if for the last time.
“You see, it’s just him. There’s nothing to worry about. And there are two of us.”
The man turned finally and waved back, a sign that encouraged, and they went down toward the beach with all the calm they could muster.
He had pulled on socks and sneakers and a dark blue T-shirt, tattered and on the verge of disintegration by now, and next to him lay what appeared to be the most precious thing still in his possession, a bar of soap wrapped in paper. It was a scene of quiet ruin, at the center of which sat a man who was unruined. The long hair and beard, even, had been groomed with his fingers and flattened out. He’s about the same age as Naomi, Sam thought. A little older perhaps. She was gripped by a sudden doubt, but they had to talk, and as soon as they did the doubt ebbed away and she was left with human immediacies that demanded all of her attention. It was Naomi in any case who asked him if he spoke English or French, or even Greek, and he said, “The first two,” in English. She stood about six feet away, and her shadow fell across his face, as she intended. But she spoke as soothingly as she could, because although questions were unavoidable they could be uttered without alarm.
“Where did you come from?”
He pointed to the sea, but without any convincing vehemence.
“You swam from a boat?”
“That’s right.”
“Where is it now?”
He shaded his eyes to see her better. They were not calculating eyes, and they were not particularly inquisitive. Earth, Naomi thought. He has eyes of earth. His voice was soft, educated, slow in rhythm and the accent unobtrusive. His English was excellent. But that was not a remarkable fact in the world these days; an expensive school evidently underwrote his command of their language.
“Gone—it’s just me.”
“And the others?” Sam said.
He waved a hand—no others.
She didn’t believe him, but she said nothing.
They set down the bags and opened them, and when the man saw peaches he clapped and shouted “Merci!”
“We saw you the other day,” Naomi blurted out.
It had to be explained, after all.
There was the stilted moment when she had to hand him the little penknife she had brought with her to cut the peaches and the tomatoes. He took it and looked her in the eye; something grated between them. “I saw you too,” he said, turning to the peach in his hand. “But then you ran away.”
“We came in a yacht—do you remember?”
“I saw it. But you had Greeks with you.”
“You don’t think I’m Greek?” Naomi chimed in.
He said she had English written all over her.
“What about me?” Sam said defiantly.
“Australian.”
Naomi turned to Sam. “This is Sam. She’s not Australian. She’s American. I’m Naomi.”
“And my name is Faoud.”
It was only then that Sam thought back to the time she had first seen him and remembered that he had been wearing tracksuit bottoms and thong sandals. The fantastical idea came to her that it was not, after all, the same person at all. We don’t know either way, she thought. Naomi doesn’t know any more than I do. We’re both in the dark.
The dark, however, was not a bad place to be. They sat down beside him and all three cut up the bread and laid chunks of feta on the loaves with tomatoes sprinkled with some coarse salt they had brought with them. It was as if they had just met in a London park, strangers exchanging names and peaches. Faoud didn’t appear distrustful or distant; he seemed to have measured the two interlopers and judged them according to his own view of the world. He had been expecting them, or expecting someone. He said he had been considering scaling the mountain and making his own way to the windward side, though he had no idea what might lie there. A village, a town. There was always a village at the very least. There were always houses, places where you could ask for water or help. But it was a gamble to approach a house in the remoter islands, as many back in Turkey had told him. He asked Naomi what the name of this island was. When she told him he rolled the word around in his mouth and considered it. Hydra. It didn’t mean anything to him. He asked her what kind of place it was, the windward side. She said, “There’s a port, many houses, it’s a different world.”
“Then I got lucky,” he said, lowering his eyes.
“You came through Turkey?”
He had, but there was no elaboration on his past. It was as if it was superfluous to make commentary on something so rudimentary.
All right, she thought, he doesn’t want to go there.
“When did you last eat?” Sam asked.
“Many days ago,” he said.
“It’s an abomination,” Naomi said, echoing her father’s tone.
Seven days before you die of starvation, Sam thought coolly.
There was something about him she didn’t accept, a smooth quality that eluded her. Some elusive qualities in a man were acceptable, but others spelled unwelcome outcomes.
“Eat the cheese,” Naomi said to Faoud. “Get the protein. I’ll bring something better tonight.”
“Merci.”
A line of vaporous cloud had formed at the horizon. As it spread and turned a hot silver, waves of new heat touched their faces. The summer was ripening into its full delirium. The sea darkened and lost its cool metallic sheen. When they glimpsed it now—suddenly, at the end of a lane or from a high set of steps—it had a feverish depth of color that made them momentarily forget that they were even in Europe. Exposed to the sun all day, and an equally feverous empty sky, the two women began to feel loosened, their consciousness deliciously weakened, and they thought of the cool conveniences of the port, the cafes at midday under the awnings, the iced beers and the siestas that would follow. But none of these things extended to Faoud; inevitably, then, they began to think of where their charity led next. Naomi immediately thought of the abandoned houses in Episkopi. She told him that he couldn’t possibly stay here on the beach, that it would be better to move into one of those. He bowed his head and said nothing.
“You have to move today,” she went on. “Tonight. I’ll come back tonight and take you there.”
“Really?” Sam burst out.