He bought a gun the next day. The city was oversupplied with black market ex-army service guns, a customer had said months ago. At the Bardwell Newsagency, a business that also sold firearms and which everyone referred to as the ‘paper shop’, Achilles asked the owner to show him the new rifles in store. Nodding, his eyes unfocused, not much interested in the overview of stock, Achilles waited to ask whether there might be any ‘second-hand rifles’ for sale. As a matter of fact, said the owner, there was a .303 ex-military gun available. He asked if Achilles was an anarchist, or if he were planning to shoot anyone. Achilles said he wanted a weapon for the cafe, in case of emergency. He had no plans to ever use the thing. Other people possessed guns. He required one too.

Then Achilles began to pray: at times to God, at times to his deceased wife, Eleftheria. Please bring back my daughters and my customers. If you do I promise to be kind to all men. For a week he said this prayer when he got into bed and when he woke up, and each night he slept poorly, had to medicate himself with drink or excessive amounts of food. In the second week of prayer he called in a Greek Orthodox community priest, Father Nektarios, a tall and pale man whose cheekbones were accentuated by red filigreed veins. The priest asked for payment (Achilles provided) and then they sat together and prayed in a booth of the cafe. They prayed, specifically, for customers to return. Achilles didn’t tell Father Nektarios about the outrage committed against Penelope, but the priest, though he socialised little, had heard the gossip about the cafe owner, Mad Achilles, and his daughters. Nektarios didn’t ask about the assault—wanting to spare himself a difficult conversation—but he vaguely asked after Achilles’ family, and Achilles said his daughters were at school. Like that, done: the two patriarchs’ dance of denial and avoidance. On the table between them lay an icon of St Georgios, patron of the Hellenic army. For thirty minutes, Achilles estimated, he and Nektarios prayed hard for people to return to the cafe.

‘And will this curse end?’ asked Achilles, after paying Nektarios.

‘It will end,’ said the priest. ‘In one month!’

A new customer, stewbum drunk, arrived two days later. He rode a grey, malnourished horse, bridle but no saddle, into the Cafe Achillion and gave a tug on the reins when he reached the counter. The cafe doors were tall, they pushed inwards, and the poor horse was indoors before any objection could be raised. Achilles came out from the kitchen and pointed to a small sign stationed above the cigarette stand:

No dogs no cats or other animals at any time

—the owner achilles