By Victoria Hislop
The Island
The Return
The Thread
The Sunrise
The Last Dance and Other Stories
Copyright © 2014 Victoria Hislop
The right of Victoria Hislop to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Jacket photographs © Yiannis Kourtoglou/Demotix/Corbis (Famagusta),Jasper James/Getty Images (mother and baby) and ZoonarGmbH/Alamy (cactus)
Design by cabinlondon.co.uk
Map and timeline design by David Smith
Author photograph ©Ioanna Tzetzoumi
Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.
First published in Great Britain as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group in 2014
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library
eISBN: 978 0 7553 7782 4
HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP
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www.headline.co.uk
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Contents
By Victoria Hislop
Title Page
Copyright Page
About the Book
About Victoria Hislop
Praise for Victoria Hislop
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Map
Timeline
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
In the years that followed …
About the Book
In the summer of 1972, Famagusta in Cyprus is the most desirable resort in the Mediterranean, a city bathed in the glow of good fortune. An ambitious couple open the island’s most spectacular hotel, where Greek and Turkish Cypriots work in harmony.
Two neighbouring families, the Georgious and the Özkans, are among many who moved to Famagusta to escape the years of unrest and ethnic violence elsewhere on the island. But beneath the city’s façade of glamour and success, tension is building.
When a Greek coup plunges the island into chaos, Cyprus faces a disastrous conflict. Turkey invades to protect the Turkish Cypriot minority, and Famagusta is shelled. Forty thousand people seize their most precious possessions and flee from the advancing soldiers.
In the deserted city, just two families remain.
This is their story
About the Author
Inspired by a visit to Spinalonga, the abandoned Greek leprosy colony, Victoria Hislop wrote The Island in 2005. It became an international bestseller, published in thirty languages with over 3 million copies sold worldwide, and was turned into a 26-part Greek TV series. She was named Newcomer of the Year at the British Book Awards and is now an ambassador for Lepra. Her affection for the Mediterranean then took her to Spain, and in The Return (also a number one bestseller) she wrote about the painful secrets of its civil war.
In her third novel, The Thread, Victoria returned to Greece to tell the extraordinary and turbulent tale of Thessaloniki and its people across the 20th century. Published in 2011 to widespread acclaim, it confirmed her reputation as an inspirational storyteller and was shortlisted for a British Book Award. It was followed by her much-admired collection of Greece-set short stories, The Last Dance and Other Stories.
Victoria divides her time between England and Greece.
Praise for
‘Hislop’s fast-paced narrative and utterly convincing sense of place make her novel a rare treat’ Guardian
‘Pleasingly complex . . . Hislop has done well to tell a story as diverse and tempestuous as Thessaloniki’s with such lightness of touch’ Spectator
Praise for
‘Aims to open the eyes and tug the heartstrings . . . Hislop deserves a medal for opening a breach into the holiday beach bag’ Independent
‘Like a literary Nigella, she whips up a cracking historical romance mixed with a dash of family secrets and a splash of female self-discovery’ Time Out
Praise for
‘Passionately engaged with its subject . . . the author has meticulously researched her fascinating background and medical facts’ The Sunday Times
‘A beautiful tale of enduring love and unthinking prejudice’ Observer
For Emily
With huge thanks to the following people for insight, inspiration, love, friendship and hospitality:
Efthymia Alphas
Antonis Antoniou
Michael Colocassides
Theodoros Frangos
Alexis Galanos
Maria Hadjivasili
Mary Hamson
Ian Hislop
William Hislop
Agatha Kalisperas
Costas Kleanthous
Yiangos Kleopas
Stavros Lambrakis
David Miller
Chrysta Ntziani
Costas Papadopoulos
Nicolas Papageorgiou
Alexandros Papalambos
Flora Rees
Hüseyin Silman
Vasso Sotiriou
Thomas Vogiatzis
Çiğdem Worthington
Before this story begins …
1878 The British Government negotiates an alliance with Turkey and assumes administration of Cyprus, while the island remains part of the Ottoman Empire.
1914 Britain annexes Cyprus when the Ottoman Empire sides with Germany in the First World War.
1925 Cyprus becomes a British colony.
1955 EOKA (the National Organisation of Cypriot Fighters), under George Grivas, begins its campaign of violence against the British. Its aim is enosis (union with Greece).
1959 Britain, Greece, Turkey and the Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities agree on a settlement for the Cyprus problem – the London Agreement. Archbishop Makarios is elected President.
1960 Cyprus becomes an independent republic but the Treaty of Guarantee gives Britain, Greece and Turkey the right to intervene. Britain retains two military bases.
1963 President Makarios makes 13 proposals for amendments to the Cypriot Constitution and outbreaks of fighting take place between Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities. Nicosia is divided and the border is patrolled by British troops. Turkish Cypriots withdraw from power-sharing.
1964 There are further incidents of serious inter-communal violence. United Nations sends a peacekeeping force. Turkish Cypriots withdraw into enclaves.
r /> 1967 Further incidents of violence between the two communities occur. There is a military coup in Athens and tension builds between President Makarios and the Greek regime.
1971 George Grivas returns secretly from Greece and forms EOKA B, once again aiming to achieve enosis.
Famagusta was once a thriving city of forty thousand people. In 1974, its entire population fled when Cyprus was invaded by Turkey. Forty years on Varosha, as the modern city is known, remains empty, sealed off behind the barbed wire put up by the Turkish army. It is a ghost town.
Chapter One
Famagusta, 15 August 1972
FAMAGUSTA WAS GOLDEN. The beach, the bodies of sunbathers and the lives of those who lived there were gilded by warmth and good fortune.
Fine, pale sand and a turquoise sea had together created the most perfect bay in the Mediterranean, and pleasure-seekers came from all around the world to soak up its warmth and to enjoy the sensual pleasure of the calm waters that gently lapped around them. Here was a glimpse of paradise.
The old fortified city with its strong medieval walls stood to the north of the beach resort, and trippers went on guided tours to learn about its origins, and to admire the vaulted ceilings, detailed carvings and buttresses of the magnificent building that had once been the cathedral of St Nicholas but was now a mosque. They saw the remnants of its fourteenth-century history, heard tales of the Crusades, the wealthy Lusignan kings and the arrival of the Ottomans. All of this information, given by a well-meaning guide in the heat of the midday sun, was soon forgotten when they returned to their hotels, dived into the pool and felt the sweat and dust of history wash away.
It was the twentieth-century development that people truly appreciated, and after their excursion into history they happily came back to its straight-walled modern comforts and its characteristically huge windows that looked outwards on the glorious view.
The arrow slits in the old walled city had been enough to give a sighting of the enemy, but let in almost no light, and while the design of the medieval stronghold was aimed at keeping invaders out, the new city aimed to bring people in. Its architecture opened outwards and upwards to the brilliant blues of sky and sea, not inwards; 1970s Famagusta was inviting, light and designed to welcome the visitor. The image of an invader needing to be repelled seemed something from another age.
It was one of the world’s finest resorts, purpose-built for pleasure, with little in its conception that did not have the comfort of the holidaymaker in mind. The tall buildings that hugged the coastline mostly comprised hotels with smart cafés and expensive shops beneath them. They were modern, sophisticated and reminiscent of Monaco and Cannes, and existed for leisure and pleasure, for a new international jet set ready to be seduced by the island’s charm. In daylight hours, tourists were more than content with sea and sand. When the sun went down, there were hundreds of places to eat, drink and be entertained.
As well as its allure for the tourist, Famagusta also possessed the deepest and most important port in Cyprus. People in faraway destinations could enjoy a taste of the island thanks to the crates of citrus fruit that left in ships each year.
Most days from May to September were broadly the same, with a few dramatic leaps in temperature when the sun seemed almost savage. The sky was consistently cloudless, the days long, the heat dry and the sea cooling but always kind. On the long stretch of fine sand, tanned holidaymakers lay stretched out on sunbeds sipping iced drinks beneath colourful umbrellas, while the more active frolicked in the shallows or showed off on waterskis, slaloming expertly across their own wake.
Famagusta thrived. Residents, workers and visitors alike enjoyed almost immeasurable contentment.
The row of ultra-modern hotels stretched all along the seafront, mostly a dozen or so storeys high. Towards the southern end of the beach was a new one. At fifteen storeys it was taller than the rest, twice as wide and so recently constructed it did not yet have a sign with its name.
From the beachfront it looked as minimalist as the others, blending into the necklace of hotels that lined the curve of the bay. The approach from the road, though, was grand, with imposing gates and high railings.
That hot summer’s day, the hotel was full of people. They were not in casual holiday wear but in overalls and worker’s dungarees. These were labourers, technicians and artisans, putting the finishing touches to a carefully conceived plan. Although the outside of the hotel seemed to conform to a standard scheme, the interior was very different from its rivals.
An impression of ‘grandeur’ was what the owners were aspiring to, and they considered the reception area one of the most important spaces in the hotel. It should be love at first sight for guests; unless it made an immediate impact, it had failed. There was no second chance.
The first thing that should impress was its size. A man would be reminded of a football pitch. A woman would think of a beautiful lake. Both would notice the impossible gleam of the marble floor and experience what it might be like to walk on water.
The person with this vision was Savvas Papacosta. He was thirty-three, though he looked older, with a few wisps of grey in his otherwise dark crinkly hair. He was clean-shaven and thickset, and today, as every day, he was wearing a grey suit (the best available air-conditioning system kept everyone cool) and an off-white shirt.
With one exception, everyone working in the reception area was male. The lone woman, dark-haired, immaculately dressed in a cream shift, was Papacosta’s wife. Today she was there to supervise the hanging of the drapes in the foyer and ballroom, but in previous months she had been overseeing the selection of fabrics and soft furnishings for the five hundred bedrooms. Aphroditi loved this role and had a great gift for it. The process of creating a scheme for each room, using a slightly different style for each floor, was similar to choosing clothes and finding accessories to match.
Aphroditi Papacosta’s taste would make the finished hotel beautiful, but without her it would never have been built. The investment had come from her father. Trifonas Markides owned numerous apartment blocks in Famagusta as well as a shipping business that dealt with the vast quantities of fruit and other exports shipped out of its port.
The first time he met Savvas Papacosta was at a meeting of a local trade and commerce association. Markides had recognised his hunger and been reminded of his own younger self. It took him some time to convince his wife that a man who was running a small hotel at the less fashionable end of the beach had a promising future.
‘She’s twenty-one now,’ he said. ‘We need to start thinking about her marriage.’
Artemis considered Savvas to be socially beneath her beautiful and well-educated daughter, a little ‘rough’, even. It was not merely the fact that his parents worked on the land, but that their acreage was so small. Trifonas, however, saw this potential son-in-law as a financial investment. They had discussed his plans to build a second hotel several times.
‘Agapi mou, his ambitions are immense,’ Trifonas reassured Artemis. ‘That’s what matters. I can tell he is going to go far. There is fire in his eyes. I can talk business with him. Man to man.’
When Trifonas Markides invited Savvas Papacosta to dinner in Nicosia for the first time, Aphroditi knew what her father was hoping for. There was no coup de foudre, but she had not been out with many young men and did not really know what she was meant to feel. What was unsaid by any of them, though Savvas himself might have noticed it if he had studied the photograph given pride of place on the wall, was his resemblance to the Markides’ late son, Aphroditi’s only sibling. He was muscular, just as Dimitris had been, with wavy hair and a broad mouth. They would even have been the same age.
Dimitris Markides had been twenty-five when he was killed during the troubles that erupted between Greek and Turkish Cypriots in Nicosia in early 1964. He had died less than a mile from home, and his mother believed that he was just a bystander accidentally caught in crossfire.
Dimitris’ ‘innocence’ made his
death all the more tragic for Artemis Markides, but both his father and sister knew that it had not been a simple matter of bad luck. Aphroditi and Dimitris had shared everything. She had covered up for him when he sneaked out of the house, told lies to protect him, once even hidden a gun in her room, knowing that no one would come looking there.
The Markides children had enjoyed a privileged upbringing in Nicosia, with idyllic summers in Famagusta. Their father had a magic touch with investments and had already poured much of his wealth into the property boom that was taking place in the seaside resort.
When Dimitris died, everything changed. Artemis Markides could not and would not emerge from her grief. An emotional and physical darkness descended on all of their lives and did not lift. Trifonas Markides buried himself in his work, but Aphroditi spent much of her time trapped in the stifling atmosphere of a silent house where shutters were often kept closed throughout the day. She yearned to get away, but the only escape would be marriage, and when she met Savvas, she realised this could be her opportunity.
In spite of the lack of spark she felt with him, she was aware that life would be easier if she married someone of whom her father approved. She could also see that there might be a role for her in his hotel plans, and this appealed to her.
Within eighteen months of her first meeting with Savvas, her parents laid on the grandest wedding that had taken place in Cyprus in a decade. The service was conducted by the President, His Beatitude Archbishop Makarios, and there were over one thousand guests (who drank as many bottles of French champagne). The value of the bride’s dowry in jewellery alone was estimated at more than fifteen thousand pounds. On the day of her wedding, her father gave her a necklace of rare blue diamonds.
Within weeks, Artemis Markides began to make it clear that she wanted to move to England. Her husband was still benefiting from the burgeoning growth of Famagusta, and his business was thriving, but she could no longer bear to live in Cyprus. Five years had passed since Dimitris’ death, but memories of that awful day remained vivid.