The following day, as I walked up the hill, I stopped several times on the path that led away from the road, and looked out over the view. The sky was cool, clear and bright, and the island of Kea lay across the deep blue of the sea; you could see its features clearly and the island deceived you and tempted you as it looked close enough for you to swim across to it.

That was an illusion, of course. The distance was too far and the water too cold for all except the most hardened swimmer to spend too long in it. The hillsides were green, almost lush, and I was wearing jeans to protect me from the gorsebush that could scratch your shins if you walked in shorts.
I soon rejoined the road to Gavrion, and then I made my way down to the bus stop in the centre.
Once upon a time, in summers, the bus from Gavrion to Batsi and the Hora would already be packed to the gills with old ladies carrying on board their squawking chickens, and gossiping in the corner like a gathering of gobbling turkeys. Men in sailor's caps played with their worry beads, or argued about the state of the nation; young women sat in their seats and looked mournfully ahead of them; young men made jokes and boasts; and children charged up and down the aisle if allowed to, or if they could get past belongings lying haphazardly in the way. On top of this, the driver was often a fan of Greek music, and so radio bouzouki would blend in with the animation of the bus crowd. But this was winter, and 1989, and fewer people got onto the bus.
I sat and gazed out of the window at the passing scenery of this island of Dionysus. Ayios Petros, a village splashing white at the top of the hillside it clung to, with its mysterious classical tower probably erected as a look-out for pirates and invasions. We rattled past fine sandy beaches , with tavernas nearby, and little chapels and shrines. Soon, we were descending the road into Batsi. This picturesque village with its sandy beach has been a resort since before the second world war; but today I was not going to linger there, but walk back up the road a while before coming to the gate and the entrance of Alekos' house.
Alekos' front yard was a maelstrom of building materials. You picked your way past saws, planks of wood, nuts, bolts, screws, poles, pots, and other things strewn in an apparently random way all over the place. Chickens strutted up to greet you and pecked at grains still lying in the earth. His house, in contrast, was ordered, neat and spotlessly clean.
We had lunch, and I explained that I was interested in a little local history.
"So, you want to know about silk," said Alekos.
"Why do you want to know about silk?" asked Spiros, his eight-year-old son.
"Because I'm writing a book. There's something mysterious about silk," I said. "For many centuries the Chinese kept the origin of this material a secret. And so, think about how it first came to Europe, silkworm eggs smuggled in the hollows of their walking sticks by two Byzatine spies - monks who had been to China and had discovered the secret..."
"Oh!" said Spiros.
So, Alekos started telling me about silk in Andros. Sericulture was big in the middle ages - in fact, Andros can claim that its prosperity during this period was because of it. Andros silk was known all over the world for its quality, and though much of it was sold in its raw state, some of it was also spun and woven on the island. You can still see some farmhouses with long roofs. These roofs were lengthened for a purpose; the bit between the ceiling and the roof was turned into a long and narrow loft, in which the farmer would put lots of mulberry leaves for the silkworms, voracious eaters, to devour. Then, when they had become full-size, the caterpillars - as they really are - spun the cocoon that was turned into silk.
I tried to picture silk traders plying their boats into Gavrion to pick up raw silk - or did they choose other parts of the island to collect it? And I thought of the traditional silk-weaving that must have gone on in homes and monasteries all over the island. And I thought of Lawrence Durrell's description of the inner valleys of the island in a cicada-zithered summer midday as 'sinister.' I would not agree with this description of these sleepy valleys, but there was a cocoon-like quality to the oppressive midday heat in a place where you couldn't see the sea.