Daughter of the Winds (22 page)

Chapter nineteen

“
What are you doing?” I whispered urgently. “You can’t be in there! Anna, come here now!” I beckoned her towards me. “Come!”

She fluttered her hand at me in a childish wave and then disappeared around the side of the building.

“Bollocks!” They wouldn’t shoot a young girl would they? She was almost certainly safe.
Almost
certainly. I should probably alert someone so that she could be found and escorted to safety. I looked frantically around me not knowing what I should do next.

“
Where’s a UN patrol when you need one?” I whispered to no one in particular.

I made my way along the fence
, shaking it as I went. At last I found where the fence had been loosened at the ground. It didn’t look like anyone had been through this way recently, so there had to be somewhere else that Anna had managed to get in but I didn’t know whether I had enough time to find it. I dropped my bag to the floor and fell to my stomach muttering “Bugger, bugger, bugger” under my breath.

As I
pulled myself under the fence it caught on the back of my top and I wriggled to free it, hearing the material rip. Of course, if I was caught by the Turkish Army now, the holes in my top would be the least of my worries. I’d be worrying about holes of another nature – bullet holes. I dug my toes into the soil and pushed myself further through the opening. I looked back at my overstuffed bag. There was no way it was going to fit through that slim gap so it would have to stay there. I pushed myself into a crouching position. What the hell was I doing? I half ran, half crawled to the building where I’d seen the little girl.

“
Anna!” I hissed. “Where are you?”

I worked my way around the back of the building and peered about me.
I could see Anna skipping down the street before me with her plaits swinging in her wake and her arms windmilling at her sides. I started to jog as quietly as I could, keeping my stride wide and feet soft. I didn’t want to shout out from this distance, in case it alerted any Turkish patrols.

She rounded a corner just as I inhaled about to call her name.
I quickened my pace, so as not to lose her, but slowed as I reached the corner and ducked down. Anna was nowhere to be seen in the dark, narrow street. I paused, listening out for any movement at all but there was nothing. Even the breeze had died down now and silence was the only pedestrian meandering down the vacant streets.

“
Anna!” I growled. “Where are you?”

I looked behind me.
Should I go back to the fence and call someone for help? I was likely to get us both shot at this rate. She was almost certainly safer on her own anyway. Almost. I gazed longingly the way I came but couldn’t leave this innocent little girl here alone. I felt responsible for her, and who knew what dangers were lurking here? Snakes? Collapsing buildings? Worse?

I pulled myself up and started walking softly up the street trailing the cool, brittle walls, under my sweating hands. I warily looked up at the hollow-eyed
buildings. There were unlikely to be soldiers in these buildings, otherwise they would have spotted Anna. I also believed, naively perhaps, they wouldn’t be expecting anyone to enter the Ghost Town during daylight hours and either wouldn’t be particularly vigilant or, at the least, wouldn’t bother concealing their positions. I hoped to God that I was right as I quickened my step to a silent jog.

There were several streets leading off this one.
None of them were wide enough for two cars to pass but they were too wide to be called alleyways. There were no sounds from these streets either. They held their breath in anticipation of what I might do next. I stood motionless, hoping to hear some footsteps from Anna but still there was nothing but a solid rampart of silence.

I walked tentatively to the end of the street and came out onto a wide road that would have, at one time, been a busy thoroughfare.
There were shops and restaurants lining up tattily down each side of the street. Metal signs advertised Coca-Cola and souvlaki in styles reminiscent of the 1970s. It seemed too exposing to try to cross the road so I headed cautiously along the boulevard, hugging the walls. Torn between searching for Anna, keeping an eye out for Turkish patrols, and the sheer amazement of being so close to buildings that had been left abandoned for so many years, I stumbled warily along the road.

“
Anna?”

A sou
nd from a building ahead of me made my heart lurch and I melted back into the shadows. I had to will myself to move on in case it was the brown-haired girl but my feet were rooted to the spot. I clenched and unclenched my fists, digging my nails into the palms of my hands to keep me focussed. I slid along the wall, holding on to it for misplaced security. When I reached the bones of what had once been a store of some description, I could see that part of the metal shutter had been torn back, formally saluting the street. I had very little inclination to go in there so got to my knees in front of the gap.

“
Anna, are you in there? Anna?”

The sound of breathing and light footsteps inside started coming closer to the sunlight.
I peered in but could see nothing in the gloom.

“
Anna? Please come here now. I’m not cross with you, I just want to take you home.”

The footsteps quickened and rushed out of the small gap, knocking me on my back with surprise.
As I fell I saw the brown blur of a small dog running across the street with newspaper hanging from its mouth. I lay there for a moment with my hand cupped over my eyes staring into the grey-blue sky as my heart calmed down and the sour taste of bile subsided.

I was going to have to head back to the gap in the fence.
I had absolutely no idea where Anna was now. I could be wandering around the city for hours to no avail. I had no choice but to go and get Stefanos and then he would alert someone to find her. He must have some contacts within the UN. I had no idea if Anna had skipped down this way or if she was still in Varosha. I felt guilty at the thought of abandoning her but I was sure that I was absolutely no use to anyone if I got shot or arrested now. There was a part of me that wanted to stay here a little longer; after all, I had inadvertently succeeded in my plan to get into Varosha, but I really should alert someone to Anna’s presence here.

I was panting heavily as I sat up and wrapped my arms around my knees. Rocking backwards and forwards I took in the truly incredible sight before me.
I felt like I was in an old Western. All I needed now was tumbleweed rolling down the dusty deserted street before the bad guys rode in to town. It was difficult to accept that there was no one living here anymore. How often would I come across a conurbation of this size absolutely devoid of any residents except wild dogs? My mind refused to shake the feeling that there must be some home-makers behind those shutters, or hiding out in the back of the shops. It was simply unfathomable that all of this could be left to decay. One day it had been full of bustle and thriving businesses and the next day jilted like an unwanted bride and left to age, alone and unloved, like Miss Haversham.

Directly opposite me was a clothes shop with yellow plastic sheeting covering the inside of the window, supposedly to stop the sun from fading the clothes.
The clothes stood like wallflowers in neat rows. Dresses that would never find a dancing partner and shoes that would never know what it was like to walk down a road, skipping over puddles from an unseasonable shower.

There was something so abjectly miserable about the sight I felt the urge to go over and try some of the clothes on
, just to give them an outing. I smiled to myself at the thought, but shoplifting, even thirty-odd years since the shop had closed, wasn’t something I would ever feel comfortable with.

I pushed myself to my feet and brushed the dirt off my denim shorts.
On my way here I had been so intent on searching for Anna that I hadn’t taken stock of my surroundings.

I was becoming a schizophrenic. I wasn
’t just in two minds, I was two almost separate people. The me of old – British me – was hyperventilating at the thought of trespassing and breaking the rules. She was consumed by the fear of being caught and shot. She was convinced that she would never find her way out of here and if the Turkish soldiers didn’t shoot her, then she would find herself at the mercy of rabid dogs and feral cats. The new me – Greek me – demanded to know her birth right and dared anyone to stop her from retracing the steps of her mother.
That
me wanted to make the most of the serendipitous opportunity that had presented itself and explore a little.

I stopped
my spinning head from thinking about what to do next and stood at the side of the dusty street, sticky with perspiration. In a concept that was alien to me, I allowed myself to simply ‘feel’. I switched off my mind and let my heart propel my feet down the street towards the magnetic lure of the sea. There were more houses now, interspersed with the shops. The terraces showcased bountiful fig trees which were clearly flourishing with neglect. I began to reach out for one of the lusciously green and purple fruits but stopped myself before I could stroke the velvety skin. There was still that ingrained thought that someone would come rushing out from their home shaking their fists at me for purloining their pride and joy. The curtains were drawn in some of the windows as if some of the inhabitants were merely asleep. Perhaps they were. The curtains now hung in rags behind the begrimed, mottled windows.

I turned to my right and walked up a cracked and uneven path between the houses.
Here I could see washing strung out between sun-washed homes sagging on bright plastic lines. Strips of rags unrecognisable as garments hung side by side while a solitary pair of trousers still hung there intact, impervious to the elements and the bombs. They stood still and straight, a lone sentry in defiance of the Turkish presence in these streets. I no longer felt any fear at being discovered. I felt like I belonged here. My feet knew where I was going even though I had never set foot on any of these roads. I was being guided now by something other than my curiosity.

The road in front of me wasn
’t in as bad a condition as I had feared, even though low growing, lush green foliage with yellow flowers seeped over the hot grey thoroughfare. A building to my left housed a strip of shops with apartments on top. Each shop was open to the elements and completely empty inside. Panes of glass littered the pavement and dusty puddles of bottles and twigs pooled in the corners. Signs indicating that these had once been hairdressing salons and beauty parlours hung limply from above.

To my right I could see a church down the end of an alleyway.
Never had a house of God looked so uninviting. Rusting barrels and oil drums piled high behind thick iron railings and barbed wire conveyed a clear message that I was not welcome there. I carried on walking in the silence past a beautiful house which, in its day, would have housed one of Varosha’s elite and wealthy inhabitants. Terraces and archways were dotted pink with the rice-paper flowers of Bougainvillea. A half-hearted attempt to board up the windows and doors with a wire mesh had been dismissed by either hand or wind. I allowed myself a brief moment to picture the home in its full glory and how I would develop it, imagining myself sipping gin and tonic on the terrace with a slice of lemon from my own tree.

Ahead of me down the broadening road was what was left of a hotel.
Even from here I could see the devastation the war had wrought on its once imposing walls. The missing walls exposed pink wallpaper that was never meant to be unmasked to the outside world. In the courtyard of the hotel, chairs and bits of wood congregated in the empty swimming pool. I’d read that somewhere in Varosha there was a car showroom with cars sitting idle, never to be driven. It was unlikely that I’d be able to locate it, even though it intrigued me.

I picked my way over the detritus and stepped into what would have once been the foyer of the hotel.
Chairs squatted in armless huddles. Something bulky and long lay on the floor by the front desk. Nervously I approached it to try and take a closer look. It was what was left of a grand piano. The inner workings of the piano were still there but the keys were all missing and most of the wood had been taken away. I backtracked out of there, stumbling over a mislaid shoe. I chose a road at random and started jogging down it, keen to leave the hotel behind.

In front of me I could see the golden blossoming of the open,
unshadowed street up ahead but my path was now blocked. Thick, prickly, thistle-like weeds had punched their way through the walkway, demanding their day in the sun. A small white fridge lay rusting and pock-marked on its side. The door was open, lying flat against the floor. Leaves and cardboard had taken up residence in its shelter. I picked my way over the obstacles, ignoring the barbed spikes of the monstrous plants. Dirt and twigs had drifted to the walls in neglected brown peaks.

Placing both hands on the white peeling wall beside me I saw what I knew would be there all along. The buckled metal sign on the wall opposite me read
‘Lakira Street’.