The train is about to depart. Eleni stands by the window and looks outside. I mean, she has to stand and look. It’s her first time traveling by wagon-lit. She is wearing a pink nightgown with lace. She bought it on sale at the supermarket. Her own nightgowns have faded from washing again and again in the neighborhood’s automatic laundry. You can’t travel by wagon-lit in a faded nightgown! Next to her stands Eugenios. He borrowed his pajamas from Manos, who is twice his size. Eleni pinned up the pants at the back with a safety pin, but the jacket hangs pitifully on him.
– Don’t look so worn out, advises Eleni. You must be scared. Something is happening outside on the platform and you’re trying to guess. Eugenios gets annoyed: – Stop with the directing. Look at yourself instead, with that candy-colored nightgown! Outside the train window stands a man in a dark suit, wide-brimmed fedora, and black glasses. He is the director. Who knows why he dresses like that. The train of horror. A blockbuster. Four big stars and two hundred and fifty extras are acting. Among the extras: Eleni, Eugenios, Panos, Anna, and Stefanos. Eighty francs a day and shooting for at least five days. Four hundred francs! None of them have work permits. But the third director, who is a friend of Stefanos, arranged it. He is a leftist and knows everything about Greece. About the dictatorship of the “colonels,” the political refugees, the self-exiled. Even much earlier, the Occupation and the civil war.
