The Last Nymph

Prologue

The girl was a sudden and unexpected visitor to his isolated world. "Maera," she called herself. And yet, the young woman standing oddly quiet in front of him did not have to give much more information to Professor Roussos than her name. For he had early in his career, memorized all fifty of the Nereids' names as they had appeared, both in ancient Greek and English. They were the mythological daughters of King Nereus of the seas, according to classic Greek literature, and "Maera" was clearly the name of one of them.

It had been Doc's business to know that. For over thirty-five years as a professor of Classical Studies at California's Stanford University, he had taught and written with honors on the heroics and intrigue of the Greek myths. And now, looking still relatively young for his age he stood before the girl who had surprised him with her unexpected presence. Appearing before him with a panoramic turquoise sea behind her, and the bright afternoon sun on her lovely face, was a maiden who introduced herself as "Maera," and yes, as she went on . . . a "Nymph."

In retirement for the past three years, Professor Roussos had traded in all he had amassed materially in the United States. He had given all of it up for the serenity and simplicity of life which he believed could only be found on a remote Mediterranean island. This particular paradise was Kalamos--located west of the Greek mainland on the Ionian Sea. It was an island that had haunted and beckoned the professor for years—simply by its beauty, as well as its elusiveness. The pine-covered and mountainous isle lay half-way around the world from California where the former scholar had spent the greater part of his life.

Professionally and informally, Professor Roussos was known simply as "Doc" to his American friends and students. But now as Orestes Roussos, he had finally come back to his ancestral land and heritage. While living so many years in the San Francisco area as himself a former student, and later professor, the allure of Greece had always captivated him. Expending so much energy researching the faraway land, it was his own reward to himself upon retiring to finally locate there where his roots had always been. And though the move was not unexpected by his supportive colleagues, occurring quietly and unannounced by "Doc," it was a profound move—literally a dream which had finally come true.

But on this day, standing upon an ancient stone battlement within which was his makeshift home, Doc found himself not alone. The twenty-something beauty, incongruously barefoot and wearing a pistachio-green gown, simply appeared out of the rarefied Greek air. She stood with him on the bluff looking over the sea, amid the disintegration of an abandoned stone village he had called home the past two years.

The remote place was once a primitive settlement, crowned by an imposing castle. The fortress now lay in parts and disarray, mostly a haphazard collection of huge, granite blocks with a few of its towers still intact. This strategic location—providing an overlook of the deep-water strait between the town of Mytikas on the mainland, and the former village of Kastro, was imposing. It had its roots there, thousands of years ago—even before the Venetian royal families had come to build their ramparts on the headlands in the seventeenth century.

Still in a state of wonder at the girl and compelled by civility, the professor felt it proper to formally introduce himself and invite his visitor in out of the blustering wind. He gestured for Maera to enter a section of tower which he had rebuilt. It was where he lived, along with some persistent rats, a pair of night-visiting foxes, and a host of magnificent birds of all sizes and colors which invaded the trees around the ruins each day.

When he asked Maera if she would be more comfortable speaking Greek or English, the young woman smiled and simply explained that all languages to her were the same. For she had intervened, she said, in the lives of people on the islands with more than just speech. Over the ages, she informed him, she witnessed war, starvation and piracy. When the professor seemed incredulous of this fact, Maera innocently counted on her fingers silently, beaming up with an answer to his original question. Seven, she told him. Seven languages were spoken during the many epochs she had witnessed.

While stepping away briefly to fetch some wine, water and bread to offer his mysterious guest that afternoon, Doc was perplexed when he returned to find her already gone. Only the gusty island air now blew through his door, stirring an imposing enigma where she once stood.

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