‘Shut the door,’ Zoë whispers. Tom closes it, the board walls give a shake and the tiny room is plunged into pitch-darkness. Hearing the cheap old catch snap into place, she finds her matches, strikes one and lights the kerosene lamp on the table. She adjusts the wick so that the light pools out over the old rug, the two chairs with their caning starting to unravel, the child-sized sofa. She feels the Englishman behind her, taking up so much room. A shiver goes through her: she is afraid, not of this man, Tom, but of his presence in Mama’s house. This is her only place of sanctuary. The silence inside these walls is Zoë’s only real treasure. But she is ashamed of it too. Lieutenant Tom didn’t grow up in a house like this. He doesn’t belong in a Kokkinia box. But this is where I am, she tells herself, watching the yellow flame of the lamp waver as she fits the glass chimney over it. This is where we both are.

Tom looks around. In the lamplight, the room they are in looks no bigger than a train compartment. First class, he thinks, but it isn’t funny. There is hardly any furniture but what there is of it is taking up all the space. There is an ancient-looking treadle sewing machine with some neatly folded fabric draped over it. Nothing on the walls except a rather beautiful oriental hanging, and a fading sepia photograph of a low city strung out across the curve of a bay. The place is spotlessly clean and smells faintly of sweet Greek tobacco and Zoë’s perfume. Then he notices the phonograph and the pile of records. Out of pure habit he steps over to them and picks up the top one. The familiar dog of His Master’s Voice sends a little glow of comfort through him, though the writing on the label is all in Greek.

‘Is this one of yours?’ he asks, and his voice sounds frighteningly loud.

‘Of mine?’ Zoë spins around, sees Tom holding up a record. He’s touching my possessions, she thinks. ‘No,’ she snaps. I must not be rude, she tells herself reproachfully. ‘I mean, no. I don’t have any of mine here.’

‘Oh? Why not?’

‘I … I don’t like the sound of my voice when it has been recorded.’ Aman, another thing I’ve never told anyone else, she thinks.

‘What a shame. I mean …’

‘Please. Take off your coat.’ Zoë holds out her hand for the greatcoat, which is heavy. When she hangs it from the wooden hanger on the wall by the door, the whole wall creaks. ‘Sit.’ She points to the sofa but he settles carefully onto one of the wooden chairs.