a Dodecanese chronicle
Day Seven
Leros → Leipsoi · the Dodecanese
Fifty-seven photographs, and two islands. Pancakes and scrambled eggs on the blue-and-white cloth at 8.54, the tender loaded at Lakki by a quarter to ten, and by ten past Mark was at the gate of the tunnel museum, its 1943 ultimatum framed on the wall. Beck walked the whitewashed path to a chapel with a blue door at eleven; at 12.52 her pin was still on Leros, and by five past five it was on Leipsoi. In between: a cove, lunch on the plates the chef laid twelve of, a harbour of little boats, a wall that says I ♥ LIPSI, Craig’s donkey, and sundowners at anchor carried out by the man Mandy put in the Hero folder. Mark’s report came in at 7.52 and is the only account anyone gave of the skipper, the dinghy and the four ladies from Lucerne.
Five frames in one minute from two phones, all of the same table: pancakes dusted with sugar on the long white plate, scrambled eggs with chives, a bowl of guacamole beside the starfish, and at 8.59 Mandy stood back for the whole spread with the orange juice and the arms reaching in. At 9.45 Maria had the tender alongside with six of them already in it, the town on the hill behind, and Mandy’s 9.51 is the same boat from the water, sunglasses and caps, the beam of Serenissima above them.
Mark’s 10.14 is the gate: a jet on a plinth under the eucalypts, two of them posing beneath its nose. His 10.30 and Beck’s 10.31 are the same framed page — Ultimato!, the surrender demand of October 1943, in Italian and in English. Then the tunnel itself: Beck’s 10.32 looking down the vaulted concrete with a figure at the far end, the long gallery of cases at 10.36, an anti-aircraft gun on its carriage from Mark at the same minute, and at 10.38 a table of helmets, a dozen of them in a row, each with its label.
Beck’s 11.00 is the path itself, white-edged steps climbing through the scrub with two figures ahead. At 11.02 she had the door — blue, with a white cross in the blue arch above it — and at 11.03 Mark photographed the party on the rocks beside the red-domed chapel. Beck on the steps at 11.06, twice, in the hat; and at 11.19 a white duck on a balcony rail, which she photographed twice too, and which the log will not explain. Mandy’s 11.39 is the boat from the shore, at anchor off the town, and Maria’s 11.51 the two of them on the bow cushions as the lines came in.
Maria’s 3.06 is the water off the swim platform, green over white sand, and then the cove — a strip of beach under a rock wall with three people on it. Lunch was at half past three, and it went to three phones: Beck’s 3.27 of the galley bench with twelve blue-and-white plates laid out in rows, each with its mound of rice and prawns, then Maria’s 3.29 and Beck’s 3.30 of a single plate on the woven mat. At 4.59 Maria was ashore: a taverna with coloured chairs on the quay, the little harbour with its fishing boats and the white town behind, a blue chair at 5.01. Mark’s 5.16 is the six of them under the letters — I ♥ LIPSI painted on the wall — and his 5.25 the harbour from the road. Craig’s only frame of the day is at 5.48, and it is a donkey, close, looking straight at him.
Everything written on Day Seven, in the order it arrived. The log has added nothing.
Mark’s 6.28 is a long table under a vine, the party around it and the light already going. From 6.43 the sun was doing the work: Mandy’s anchorage with the boats black against the water, Mark’s 6.53 of Sheila and Rod in the tender in their whites, the 6.54 from Beck looking forward over the helm into the sunset and from Mark of Serenissima herself against the hill, then the three of them on the flybridge at 7.18. At 7.21 Mandy photographed the man with the tray of drinks coming aft against the last of the sky, and three minutes later put him in the Hero folder with four words. Beck’s 8.04 is the pin on Leipsoi. Maria’s 8.42 is the table being laid on the aft deck, the blue-and-white plates again, and her 8.59 two of them up and dancing beside it before anyone sat down. Dinner at nine: olives, a bowl of tzatziki, a dish of stuffed vegetables. The day ends on Mandy’s 9.46 — a man in a green shirt, laughing, holding up a silver foot.
