The House on Paradise Street by Sofka Zinovieff Page B

out drawers. Later, I brought this system to my own work, aware of how it made the world look better, bringing order to the chaos, just as it had given boundaries to my childhood, which so often seemed treacherously unstable.
    One pile of folders was spread across a table and I found them filled with photocopies and pages of notes in unfamiliar handwriting I presumed was Danae’s. There was a small, black lipstick lying close by. I opened it, twisting up the plum-coloured, pointed tip and examining the unwelcomely intimate object. It made me aware of how much I didn’t know of Nikitas’ life, of how I may have been loved, but I was also shut out. There was so much he chose to share with other people rather than me. I remembered overhearing Nikitas speaking with Danae on the phone not long before, and he was whipping himself up into a satisfying rant about his bête noir.
    “The thing about the English,” (Nikitas, like most Greeks, didn’t say “the British”) “is that what they like about themselves is all that crap about fair play, cricket, decency, moderation, and yet their whole history has been about oppressing other people with slavery, colonialism, and war. We are supposed to be taken in by their upright, perfect manners and their cups of tea, and we are all meant to love them as if they really were tzéntlmen and milórdi. But in fact they’re the number one drunken hooligans – they invented football violence. And if you look at problem tourists in Greece, it’s always them. Who else would create pub-crawls and open-air blow-job competitions in Greek tourist resorts? Not to mention their huge success with serial murderers back home. Have you ever wondered why we never had a Greek Jack the Ripper?”
    I remember waiting in the room while he listened to Danae’s answer, wondering what she was saying, until he shouted, “Exactly! Wherever you look in the world and pick a troubled place with civil war or terrorism, you’ll often find the English had something to do with it. India and Pakistan, Israel and Palestine, Northern Ireland – and that’s before we even look at Africa.”
    I picked up the whisky bottle from the desk and took a sip. It made me shudder, but then warmed my stomach and helped my breath go back to normal. I knew I shouldn’t fill my mind with petty complaints at this point – Nikitas’ obsessions and varied friendships were part of who he was. But I couldn’t help feeling hurt. Why had he needed to keep these things from me? It was as if his death was the culmination of a collection of secrets, and possibly betrayals. I had never clung to him or nagged to know the details of his life, but I had always assumed I was honoured with the truth. Now I was beginning to wonder.
    I sat down in the chair and began flicking through a pad of lined notepaper filled with jottings in Nikitas’ handwriting. The uppermost page had only one word written in large capital letters: ΣΦΗΚΑ ( Sfíκa – WASP). It had been underlined several times, but meant nothing to me. On the other side of the desk was a large manila envelope marked with the initials J.F. Its bulging contents were held in by a thick rubber band, which I removed. I pulled out several letters, all addressed to Antigone Perifanis, Nikitas’ mother. He had not told me anything about this material and I wondered where it could have come from.
    As far as I could see, the letters were all sent from England by someone called John Fell, whose sharp, italic script scratched across the pages in black ink. I opened the first one, dated September, 1938. It was written on fragile, pale blue paper from Wadham College, Oxford and signed Johnny.
    My dear Antigone,
Your letter was waiting for me when I got home and made me miss you and your family awfully. So much so, in fact, that I wanted to go straight back to Greece. England is as soggy and bland as the puddings they serve in college. I yearn for the intense colours and scents of the