Kakomi (title of the original: Ο Κακόμης)

By Alexandros Papadiamantis

(Rendered in English by Vassilis C. Militsis)

Among the lumpers of the seaside town, Apostoli Kakomi claimed the primacy. He was acknowledged by all as the chief of lumpers. He was famous for being able to lift on his back about four hundred and fifty pounds. He was bodily bent by birth, and had become more so because of his trade. When he bent to shoulder a burden, he used to say: “Once the sack is loaded upon my back, it moves by itself”.

He used to tell his colleagues that among the pack animals only the camel has the aptitude of kneeling to be loaded, and then, burdened, stands on its feet and walks away.

And this is not the only gift the camel possesses. Another faculty of the beast is to go without food for many days during a long trek, consuming its hump fat, thus supplying itself with food and refreshment. Apostoli Kakomi had seen many camels, as he sojourned some time not only in Egypt but also in diverse places, such as Smyrna, Salonika – with the Sephardic Jews – and on the Danube, as he was wont to brag. He could be said to be a globetrotter.

He spoke foreign languages; not only Turkish but Arabic, Aromanian and Ladino, as well. He knew to say: tsitsi fatsi? Gine¹ and altros cavos contaremus² and ya tale, ya maxura³, and other phrases. His colleagues held him in high esteem and regarded him as a sage.

He had a respectable family background in his birthplace, he acquired a tolerable education and he emigrated overseas. When he returned to his native land, everybody expected him to stay for quite some time, and if he did so, he was supposed have brought along some savings so as to set up a small business.

However, all of a sudden, one morning, he was seen at the seaside market, standing by the auction place, carrying his coolie’s back pannier and holding a small coil of rope.

• What’s up, Apostoli? … Have you decided to become a lumper?

• This is the most carefree job, replied Kakomi; I haven’t found a better one.

* * *

Indeed! After he had carried as many sacks of flour or pulses or any other merchandise as he would deign to carry in the morning, and had been paid by the load or in a down payment by agreement, he used to frequent Alexi Gatzino’s tiny café, and as soon as he drank his customary schnapps of masticha⁴, he started a row with Alexi, who was an odd fish and would pick on him:

• You’re just cut out for this sort of job; you’re only fit to be a coolie.

• As for you, Apostoli would reply laughing, you’re good for nothing, let alone being a coolie.

Then he exited from the shop’s other door leading to the upper town quarter, crossed the cobbled alley, and reached Uncle Marco Voulgari’s bakery. There, he would always order his usual daily pot of meal, which was ready at twelve noon.

He squatted down at the low table, by the doorpost of the bakery, grabbed half a loaf or preferably two bannocks, devoured the whole pot, drank a quart of wine, then dropped off to sleep either on the table itself or on the narrow stall of the nearby tavern and drove pigs to market⁶ for two and a half hours in summer and for only one hour in winter.

He would wake up leisurely, order his usual cup of coffee, smoke his occasional cigarette, if offered, and rarely would he relish a hookah. Afterward he got up listlessly, strolled about the market, hastened to where he was asked to carry some sacks, worked for not more than two hours in the afternoon.

If some urgent chore came up such as carrying and washing barrels by the sea, he would be vexed and yell to his would-be employer.

• Leave it for tomorrow. Tomorrow is also another day.

He would then take off his gear and rope, and after he had been paid a few coins for his afternoon labor, he headed through a side street to the upper parish and gradually arrived at some joint or other, where wine was sold to the dock laborers. Many small time vine growers, disgruntled by the local grocers, would not sell them their wine wholesale, but they broached their casks and peddled their wine in retail at a higher price on the street or from door to door.

The tapstress at the pub very often happened to be an attractive woman, sometimes a young widow who gave the glad eye, and then the consumption of wine was faster and the inrush of boozers, especially on Sundays and feast days, was larger within and without the joint. The patrons sat on crude stools or on the stony ledge tippling and humming some tune or other.

Such joints were wont to be open almost at all times, and especially in winter. Apostoli was acquainted with them all and was the first to savor the fragrant, pure wine, for he often served as the town crier and he heralded all over the various neighborhoods who has broached a cask of good wine. He was also a source of information on who has brought beans or onions onto the quay or if “a stranger sloop unloaded flour of good quality on the wharf… thereupon giving the necessary attestation, etc.”

Such were the places Apostoli frequented to wet his whistle. At first he would order to the man or the woman in charge his usual quart, and afterwards only five to six ounces. When he was through, he paid 20 pence for his quart and 5 for the rest. The bill therefore was discrepant, because the customary cost for the quart alone was 25 pence. He squatted on the ground or sat on the ledge or even on the tavern threshold, drank slowly relishing the fragrance of the wine and waited just for the church bell to sound the vespers. Immediately thereafter, he crossed himself, finished off his wine, and took his leave. He stopped at the church to light a candle.

 * * *

In the evening, after sunset, he enjoyed a short camaraderie on kokoretsi⁵ with colleagues of the market. As soon as darkness fell, Kakomy paid fifteen pence buying some bread, cheese or olives along with some fish roe, and dined at a table of the seaside tavern. On such occasion he only drank five ounces of a watered down and adulterated wine without any fragrance – paying one penny. Things cost more here.

On fasting days he saved 30 to 40 pence on his daily pot of lunch as it was cooked without meat. These few coins were his contribution to purposes of his own, often to the aid of a certain ex laborer, called Hadji, who had grown very old, destitute and pitiable, and unable to work any longer because of his gouty feet.

* * * 

When his was rebuked for and admonished against his excessive drinking, Apostoli would only plead:

• God ‘elp me not to end up like Hadji!

And indeed, he did not end up so. Apostoli died at the age of fifty. He, the poor man, had also anticipated “his future”, like so many others!

In this issue, and in many other cases, he did not resemble Hadji – neither did he resemble his colleague, Baltoyanni, about whom he used to say:

• If only I was at least like Baltoyanni, who has a wife and kids, and he’s gonna be looked after well in his old age… Just think on it! He buys more than a quart of wine every evening and takes it home… so that they’ll all get tight and won’t ask for more food!

This man in question, Baltoyannis, at the later stage of his life, had taken up carrying water from door to door. In this way, he had a lot of fun, which he was more than eager to convey it to others, as well.

On the other hand, in addition to his other virtues, Kakomy was meek, quiet and firm, both as a man and a worker. He paid no attention to general backbiting and machinations; neither did he care for issues outside his circle, nor did he snoop into the affairs of others. His old colleague, however, Baltoyanni kept always an ear out wherever he went: to the alleys, courtyards and houses. He would hear unfinished conversations, sparse words here and there, family altercations, and putting together this puzzle, he fabricated whole stories bragging that he knew every secret in the neighborhood.

“The good well”, wherefrom the town people preferred to get their water, was many hundred feet distant as it lay beyond the limits of every district. When Baltoyanni was on the way loaded with the enormous earthenware jug, he would laugh and often talk aloud to himself. He was fraught from the various neighborhoods with gossip, which he was unable to digest.

When in the evening he happened to come across Reverend Stamati, his father confessor, returning slowly from the vespers with his staff under his arm, Baltoyanni called him from afar bidding him to stop.

• Father!... Reverend!

Reverend Stamati turned around.

• What is this time, Yanni?

• Wait a moment, Father! I’ve got to tell you, I can’t help it… I’ll fess up to unburden my conscience.

• Now, in the middle of the street? … bless me, come to my cell, my child, so that I can give you absolution.

• I can’t hold it any longer … I’m afraid I’ll tell my Rebecca. I’d better tell your holiness to get it off my chest.

He meant that he risked telling his own wife. If he confessed it to the priest, he would relax and ward off the temptation of divulging his secret.

And after the priest had stood on some corner of the street, Yanni, still carrying the jug on his shoulder, started off his yarn:

• You can’t imagine what I’ve seen at the Upper Neighborhood today; such and such a woman was having a row with her husband and he was about to wallop her … then she began screaming and a whole throng gathered and there was quite a shindig! …

He couldn’t help laughing, but he restrained himself.

Or

• You should’ve heard what happened today over at the Threshing Floors or at the Cow Pastures… that whatcha-call-er woman kicked her husband out of her dotal house… locked him out and told him never to set foot on the doorstep…

Or

• That old hag P. sowed discord between a husband and wife, who are now about to split up. … You can never know what sort of snoopy tattlers these old witches are!

Or

• That old lecher F. tried to seduce a poor girl … and so on and so forth.

And then Baltoyanni went on:

• That’s all, Father, and now, if I may ask, can you bless me, and tell me when I can come so that you may absolve me … God bless your stole!

• Good night, Yanni! I do hope you’re telling me the last sins of others … so make up your mind that this time you’ll tell me your own for once, and then I’ll be willing to absolve you.

* * * 

But let us go back to Apostoli. After his dinner, he usually left his back pannier and rope in a corner under the tavern stall and went to bed.

He lived in a hovel within a garden at the end of the town, near the Threshing Floors. He rented it at a drachma per month from old Angouro, the proprietor of the hovel and the garden.

Only a few years ago he used to live in the still standing family small cottage. This, however, was lately given as a dowry to his sister, Chryssi, for whom Apostoli had found a husband as both siblings were orphaned.

Chryssi, much younger than he, was his half-sister, his stepmother’s daughter. His stepmother had taken fair care of her stepson, and yet Apostoli gave his sister not only the small cottage, but also five hundred drachmas, which had scrapped literally “off his shoulders”.

Recently his sister, still young, died at childbirth, leaving behind two motherless children. Apostoli could only remark with tearless grief:

• Woe! More orphans again.

And however he could, he hastened to help his two sister’s orphans, who soon had found a stepmother.

* * * 

One year later, Apostoli fell seriously ill and died in June.

His back pannier, cast off outside the garden hovel on the side of the country road, was being blown by the wind.

On the night of June 23, eve of St John’s feast, the swashers of the neighborhood made a roaring bonfire at some place in the street, and jumped over it, as it was the custom of the day. The kids fed the fire with all the mulberry branches – destined for the silkworms – some stolen and some given them by the womenfolk of the neighborhood; when they had also burnt the mayday wreathes of some houses, as it is wont, one of the kids spied out the back pannier and gave it a kick.

• Hey, hey, guys, here’s late Apostoli’s pannier. That’s just right for the fire, what do you say?

One of the swashers said:

• Hey, kids, perhaps Apostoli has turned into a vampire and hid inside it!

• That’s even better! Throw it into the fire for the vampire to burn!

The back pannier, its padded part of grated straw disemboweled, bore all the traces of daily contact with innumerable sacks and caskets and bales of merchandise and smeared with tar and resin. When it was thrown into the fire, it flared up quickly, the flames soaring sky high.

The first swasher, called Yanni the Guard, jumped boldly over the roaring fire and at the same time felt like shouting three times:

• God rest the soul of poor Apostoli.

The second swasher, called Mitso the Fish, mimicked his friend and while jumping, he wanted to parody the exclamation of God rest his soul, and uttered the first word backwards, making thus a profane pun.

No sooner had he uttered the phrase than oddly enough, the big flame flared up even higher growing into a terrible pillar of fire. A flaming fragment was flung and strangely enough stuck onto Mitso’s lips.

The burning fragment stayed only a few seconds on the little swasher’s mouth before he could detach it with his hand and spit out its ashes. But this short interval of time was sufficient to scorch his lips and tongue.

The incident was attested not only by the kids but also by two or three women of the neighborhood, who related it. It was indeed a strange coincidence.

(1903) 

1 tsitsi fatsi? Gine, Arumanian: How are you? Fine.

2 altros cavos contaremus, Ladino: We’ll meet more adversities.

3 ya tale, ya maxura, corrupted Arabic: you’d better come, or you’ll be thrashed.

4 masticha, a resin gathered from the mastic tree.

5 kokoretsi. A sort of liver and intestine wurst.

6 drove pigs to market. Snored noisily.