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Her voice cracked as she reached her final heart-rending words.
He leaned across the table and took hold of her hand. She remained very still but she could feel the prickly tears at the back of her eyes waiting to be released.
“I couldn’t understand why you wouldn’t take time off,” he said gently. “Why you wouldn’t let me take care of you, why you turned me down when—”
“I think my hormones were jumping around too much. I wasn’t sure if you were proposing because…well, because you thought it was the dutiful thing to do.”
“Was that why you turned me down for the second time?”
“Manolis, let’s defer this discussion, shall we?” she whispered. “I can see people looking at us.”
“Of course.”
She knew now she’d been mistaken to turn down his proposal. In the agonising weeks after they’d split up she’d realised how stupid she’d been. She’d destroyed the most essential part of her life. The love of the person she’d admired as a child and desired when she’d become an adult. And by the time she’d come to her senses it had been too late.
She swallowed hard, very aware of the big hand holding hers.
One of the young waiters put more meze on the table. Taramosalata this time to add to the kalimara and the Greek salad, all of which remained largely untouched.
Manolis held out a plate towards her. “Try some of these Ceres shrimps. You used to like them when your parents invited me for supper, I remember.”
She removed her hand from his and took some of the tiny pink shrimps. “Delicious as always.” She chewed slowly. “Some things never change.”
“And some things do. You, for instance,” he said gently.
She leaned back against her chair. “How have I changed?”
“Well…you always were stubborn but—”
“Stubborn? I suppose you mean when I didn’t agree with something you wanted?”
He smiled. “Possibly.”
She nodded. “I have to admit that some of the ideas I had when I was younger have changed. I don’t think I would be quite so…well…stubborn, as you put it, now.”
He wondered if he was in with a chance now with this older, wiser woman. No, of course not! If they were ever to become close again and he was to raise the question of marriage she would dash his hopes again. What did she mean when she’d questioned if his proposal had been merely dutiful? When the time was more convenient he’d quiz her further.
“So, you got all your information about me from Costas?”
“Mostly. We rather lost touch when he went to South America to work in that rural area. He hasn’t answered any of my letters for ages!”
“He’s chosen to live in a remote hospital near the Amazon. Sometimes he doesn’t get his mail for weeks, months or at all. Often he can’t get his letters sent out of the area. He’s very dedicated to his work and doesn’t have much spare time to worry about the outside world. My mother worries continually about him, of course, but she’s adamant that he’ll tire of this difficult life when he’s had enough deprivation.”
“He had a relationship in Australia that went wrong, I believe,” Manolis said, quietly.
“Yes.” She sighed. “These things happen.”
Their eyes met and Tanya saw the moistness in Manolis’s gaze before he looked down at his plate and began crumbling a piece of bread.
“You haven’t drunk your wine.”
Tanya took a small sip. “The jet-lag is getting to me. I’d better not drink it. It might make me sleepy and I want to stay awake. I feel that we…well, we’re getting to know each other again.”
“I was completely surprised when you turned up here today. I’d had no news of you for ages.”
The people on the next table had now gone. He waited before he dared to broach the subject of their disastrous break-up again. He’d been so unhappy, so completely devastated and depressed that he couldn’t imagine how Tanya had suffered when her physical health had been at an all-time low and she’d had to cope with the emotional confusion as well.
“I was so proud that you coped by yourself after I left Australia. It couldn’t have been easy after…”
“After I’d lost the baby?” she said quietly.
“Yes. Costas said you went straight back to medical school.”
“I was still in a state of shock, I think. As I said, I now know I should have taken some time off but I was very confused. Keeping busy kept me sane—or so I thought. You must have done something similar when you went off to England and almost immediately married.”
She tried but failed miserably to disguise the bitterness in her tone of voice.
“Tanya! I…”
The young waiter was placing the main course plates in front of them, having removed the scarcely touched meze dishes.
“Tanya, it wasn’t like that!” he continued when they were alone again. “You’d made it clear that you didn’t want me. My old tutor in London had already contacted me about a newly created post as head of surgery which he said would be perfect for me. I was holding off discussing it with you because I wouldn’t have gone over to London without you. When you virtually sent me away I decided to go for it. There was nothing to keep me in Australia any more. Victoria and I were old friends and we just happened to meet up again.”
“How convenient!” She couldn’t hold back the jealous anguish she’d experienced when she’d heard that he’d gone straight into the arms of another woman.
She took a deep breath. “And then married and had a baby very shortly after.”
“On the rebound, I suppose,” he said quickly, regretting how much she must have been hurt when she’d found he had a child. “But in mitigation…I’m not trying to sound as if I’m in the dock being tried for something…”
She watched him, anguished about what he’d done but still unable to crush her feelings for him.
“Go on, Manolis, tell me why you’re hoping to be forgiven for jumping from one bed to another in double-quick time.”
His eyes flashed. “You’d turned me down, told me to go away, said I was making things worse for you by staying, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did,” she said quietly.
“So, Victoria being an old friend helped to salve my wounds. Somehow the comfort she gave me turned to sex. She fell pregnant. We married in haste and repented at leisure, as the old saying goes. It didn’t take us long to realise that we would drive each other mad if we stayed together. We split up when Chrysanthe was six months old. Victoria was busy with her career and agreed with me that Chrysanthe would be brought up well on Ceres with the extended family here. My mother was overjoyed to add another granddaughter to her brood, and I came over as often as I could. I was on a long-term contract at the time so I had to wait before I could give in my notice. When a vacancy came up here on Ceres I applied and was accepted.”
“They must have been delighted to have you here.”
He nodded. “Yes. After a while I was offered the newly created post of Medical Director. We’ve had to expand in recent years because of the long tourist season from April to November. Better boats, more tourist facilities…”
His voice trailed away. He hoped he’d helped to justify what had happened since he’d walked away from her. She’d asked him to go, but maybe, just maybe she hadn’t meant it.
He gave a deep sigh. There he went again, giving himself hope that he could turn the clock back to the time when they’d been so idyllically happy together.
“Dr Manolis.” The young waiter was standing beside his chair. “There’s a lady in the kitchen who wants to speak to you. She’s climbed all the way up the kali strata to find you. Her granddaughter is having a baby in her house and there’s some problem that I…”
The young man paused in embarrassment. Manolis was standing now, his hand on the young waiter’s shoulders.
“I’ll come and see her. In the kitchen, you say?”
Tanya was also on her feet. She’d heard what had been said and her medical training was taking over. She was holding her jet-lag in check as she followed Manolis up the three worn old stone steps that led from the main restaurant part of the taverna into the ancient kitchen with the moussandra platform in the high ceiling where Giorgio and his wife had first slept when the taverna had been their home before the six children had arrived.
The agitated elderly lady was sitting on a chair sipping a brandy that Giorgio had poured for her.
It took only a couple of minutes to elicit the medical information they needed. Manolis ascertained that there was someone with the woman who was in labour before telling the grandmother to stay where she was. Someone from the hospital would come to collect her later. Yes, he knew the house where she lived.
As they hurried down the kali strata, Manolis was on his mobile phone, speaking to the hospital maternity section, giving them instructions, telling them to send a midwife, a stretcher with a couple of porters, and have an ambulance standing by at the bottom of the kali strata in case an immediate transfer to hospital was required, as well as the medication and instruments he would require if that happened.
Tanya was trying desperately to keep up with him but the ancient cobblestones beneath her feet were treacherous and slippery and the moon was covered in clouds again. Manolis, sensing her difficulty, took hold of her hand.
“Nearly there,” Tanya said in a breathless, thankful voice. “I know the house where this family lives. My father used to say the houses in this area are in the worst place to get to for an emergency. Neither up nor down.”
“Exactly! And yet nobody around here has a phone,” he said in exasperation as he reached for the old brass door knocker.
The door was opened almost immediately.
“Doctor! Thank goodness you are here. My daughter…”
Manolis and Tanya stepped straight into the living room where the patient was lying on a bed. A low moaning sound came from her as Manolis gently placed his hand on her abdomen.
“It’s OK, Helene. I’m just going to see how your baby’s doing.”
Tanya had immediately recognised Helene as an old friend from her schooldays. Helene smiled through the pain as she recognised Tanya, holding out her hands towards her.
One of the hospital porters arrived shortly afterwards, carrying the Entonax machine that Manolis had ordered. He explained briefly that the maternity unit was very busy and they weren’t able to send a midwife yet but that one would arrive as soon as she was free.
Manolis nodded. “That’s OK. Tanya will assist me.”
While he was examining the patient Tanya fixed up the machine and placed the mask over Helene’s face.
“Breathe deeply into this mask, Helene,” Tanya said in Greek. “That’s going to help the pain. No, don’t push at the moment, Manolis will tell you when. I know it’s hard for you. You’re being very brave.”
Helene clung to Tanya’s hand as if her life depended on it.
Manolis began whispering to Tanya in English. He was totally calm and in control of the situation but she recognised the urgency in his voice.
“The baby is in breech position. I’m going to have to deliver it as soon as possible because it’s showing signs of distress and the heartbeat is getting fainter. Take care of Helene and don’t let her push yet. I’ve tried to turn…No, it’s too late, I’ll have to deliver the baby now. Ask Helene to push now so I can get the baby’s buttocks through…Yes, that’s fine…No hold it for a moment—I’ll need to do an episiotomy. Pass me that sterile pack.” He took out a scalpel and some local anaesthetic injection and performed the procedure.
It seemed like an age as Tanya, almost holding her breath, kept her cool with the patient.
“Manolis has everything under control, Helene.”
Please, God, she thought. Don’t let her lose this baby. She knew the anguish of losing her own baby and wouldn’t wish that on anybody. Helene had carried this baby to full term and she couldn’t imagine anything worse than losing it at this late stage.
“The baby’s buttocks are through, Tanya,” Manolis said. “You can ask Helene to push. One last push should…There, brilliant!”
As he lifted the slippery baby up it gave a faint mewling cry, rather like a kitten that had been disturbed from its warm, cosy sleep.
“Let me see, let me see my baby!” Helene held out her arms.
“In a moment, Helene,” Tanya said, gently. “Manolis will—”
“Tanya, will you cut the cord while I put a couple of stitches in?” Manolis said quietly.
Tanya quickly scrubbed up. Taking the surgical scissors from the sterile pack, she cut the cord and wrapped the protesting infant in a clean dressing towel.
“You’ve got a little boy, Helene,” she said gently as she put the baby in her arms. Tears sprang to her eyes as she saw the wonderful first meeting of mother and son. She dabbed her eyes with a tissue and held back the tears. She had to stay professional and think only of her patient. But she sensed that Manolis was looking at her. He was standing beside her now and had put a hand on her shoulder.
She looked up into his eyes and saw they were moist and knew he was thinking of their baby. She swallowed hard. How could she have hardened her heart and told him to leave her? Why had he not understood in the first place what a miscarriage did to a woman? Would they ever recover from what might have been? Would it ever be possible to repair the damage they’d done to each other?
The future was impossible to predict. She would take one day at a time, but she knew without a shadow of a doubt that she wanted to stay here on Ceres for a long time, whatever happened. This was where she belonged.
She looked around the room, which had become rather crowded during the time that she and Manolis had been taking care of their patient. Standing near the door that led straight out on to the kali strata was a midwife, two porters and a young man who now identified himself as Lefteris, the baby’s father. The midwife had held him back when he’d arrived a few moments ago.
“Baby’s father is here, Manolis,” Tanya said. “Is it OK if…?”
Too late! The young father had already sprung forward to embrace Helene and his son.
“We’ll need to do some tests on your baby, Lefteris,” Manolis said gently after a short while. “He had a rough passage into the world and we need to check him over.” He smiled. “Although from the way he’s crying, there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with him.”
The midwife came forward and said that someone from the postnatal team would do the tests as soon as they got baby and mother settled into the hospital. The ambulance was waiting at the bottom of the kali strata for them now.
* * *
As they emerged from the crowded room into the cooler night air Tanya took a deep breath.
“It’s such a relief that we got here in time,” Manolis said, taking her hand in what seemed to have become a natural instinct again. “It could have been otherwise.”
His hand tightened on hers as he became animated about a subject close to his heart. “It’s so strange here on the island. On the one hand we’ve got the latest technology at the hospital and on the other we’ve got people who haven’t even got a phone living in a difficult place to reach, yet within minutes of help.”
He broke off in frustration at the situation. “Sorry, Tanya. I don’t want to offload my problems on you.” He let go of her hand and turned her to face him.
In the moonlight she could see his eyes shining with happiness as he looked down at her. “We could be such a good team you and I—I’m talking professionally, you understand,” he added quickly. “It felt so right working together just now. We seemed to sense that.”
“Yes, I felt the rapport between us was…natural,” she said quietly.
He lowered his head and kissed her gently on the mouth.
Oh, those lips, those sexy, wonderful lips. She’d never thought she would ever feel them on hers again. She’d cried with frustration when she’d realised how much she wanted him and he was never coming back. But here he was.
He raised his head and murmured against her lips. “So, do you want me to put your name forward as a candidate, Dr Tanya?”
Shivers were running down her spine. “Let’s talk about it later,” she murmured as she looked into his eyes.
She was making it patently obvious that she wanted him to kiss her again…
