The Jade Dragon (8 page)

“Yes—it was six years ago. Mama and Papa had taken me to London for a few days’ holiday as a treat for my fifteenth birthday. We went shopping and to the theater and visited some of their friends. And then, on the journey home, there was a terrible collision. I ... I was thrown down but was quite unharmed—only cuts and bruises. My poor father was killed outright.”

“And your mother?”

I hesitated. Those anguished moments had remained vividly clear in my mind—the impact of the crash, the dreadful sound of splintering wood, of twisting metal, the angry hiss of escaping steam and the agonizing screams of the injured. In my memory I could see my poor mother trapped by some heavy beam that had fallen across her body, crushing her chest. Her face was a ghastly white as she struggled to speak to me. Her breath rasped, and blood trickled from her mouth. Sobbing desperately, I tried to wrench her free, until men came and dragged me away. I was held back by strong, imprisoning arms while the rescuers fought a grim battle against time to release Mama. At length, an official wearing a navy blue railway uniform had come forward, and in a gruff, compassionate voice, he broke it to me that my mother was dead.

I said quietly to Dona Amalia, “Mama only lived for a few minutes. She did not suffer for very long.”

In the drawn-out silence the old
condessa
seemed to be deep in thought. I imagined that she was feeling the poignancy of her daughter’s death, but she very soon dispelled that illusion.

“Who were these people who took you in?” she asked in a critical voice. “Another doctor, so I understand—another man of no substance?”

“Dr. Carlisle is a man of considerable substance,” I retorted. “He practices in London, at Harley Street, and he has many wealthy and celebrated families among his patients. He and Papa remained close friends from their student days. Apparently, while on a climbing holiday in the Welsh mountains with a party of other medical students, Eustace Carlisle became trapped on a narrow ledge. It was my father who saved him, at great peril to his own life. Both Dr. Carlisle and his wife have been extremely good to me, Grandmama. Living in their home, I have had everything I could need or want.”

The
condessa
sniffed. “From the way you speak, Elinor, it surprises me that you were able to tear yourself away from these estimable people and come to Portugal.”

Suddenly, I felt overwhelmed by a sense of helplessness. What was the point of staying on here, I thought wretchedly—unwelcome and unwanted? I had no hope of vindicating Mama’s action in marrying the man she loved, no hope of restoring her belatedly to her own mother’s affection. There was nothing left for me to do. I must acknowledge defeat and return to England. I would have to admit to Dr. and Mrs. Carlisle that they had been right all along and that I had made a foolish error of judgment. With typical generosity, my benefactors would forgive me, and everything would revert to what it had been before that afternoon two weeks ago when Stafford Darville had called to see me.

I said, “You and Carlota have made it very clear, Grandmama, that I am not wanted here. So it is best that I leave for England as soon as a return passage can be arranged. I will have inquires made at once.”

Dona Amalia stared at me, her eyes widening in astonishment. “What are you talking about, child? You have only just arrived.”

“But what is the use of my staying, in view of your unyielding attitude? Even if my mother’s actions were wrong in your eyes, even if she did offend against some rigid code of conduct, surely the time is long since past when you should have been ready to forgive her? But you even hold your bitterness against me, the next generation. And on and on forever, I suppose?”

“Forever, child. What is forever to me?”

“I ... I am sorry,” I stammered. “I didn’t mean to—”

Her black eyes were glittering as I had seen them glitter by candlelight the night before, when she stood over my bed and looked down at me. This time, I could swear, they were moist with tears. But tears of sorrow and regret, or of pride?

“Where is your courage, Elinor?” she demanded brusquely. “You have Milaveira blood in your veins, never forget that. You are a member of a proud and ancient family. Yet you snivel and want to run away because you are not embraced here with open arms. Or is it because you believe those stories Stafford is spreading, that we are ruined financially?”

“No.” I protested fiercely. “My reason for leaving has nothing to do with that.”

For a moment longer the black eyes challenged me. Then her erect body slumped back against the pillows, and her hands dropped limply on the gold and crimson quilt. “Ring the bell for Josepha,” she muttered. “I am tired ... so tired.”

I hastened to obey, fearful of a repetition of yesterday’s collapse. And when the elderly servant came hurrying in, I knew I was not wanted and quietly left the room.

To calm my turbulent emotions I decided to stroll in the topiary garden. The blazing heat of the sun was reflected up from the graveled pathways as I moved between fragrant beds of lavender and gillyflowers. I perched on the stone rim of one of the fountains and trailed my fingers in the cool, limpid water. Silver jets spurted from the mouths of dolphins and pattered down upon the floating water-lily leaves, the only sound in this still afternoon. Then from far off, faintly, I heard the notes of a melody, a simple tune played upon a flute. Who, I wondered, was the unknown flautist whose delicate fingering flavored the day with an elusive melancholy. I rose to my feet and went to seek the answer.

Guided by ear, I descended a flight of weathered steps and made my way along a path bordered by a high stone wall that was a mass of purple bougainvillea, a plant I had previously seen only in pictures. A gap in the balustrade on the opposite side led me through a grove of trees with glossy dark green leaves and delicate white blossoms. I broke off a leaf to rub between my fingers and inhaled the tangy fragrance of oranges. I thought of my mother, remembering how she had told me as a little girl about the orange and lemon trees that grew in her native land. Later on, if I remained here that long, I would be able to pick the ripe fruit fresh from the tree.

The clear piping of the flute drew me onward, down another flight of steps and past an ornamental lake of deep, still water where two black swans glided silently under the weeping branches of the willows. Then, turning with the path, I saw Vicencia. She was sitting on a sculpted stone seat beneath a magnolia tree, the ground around her strewn with the snow of fallen petals. When she saw me, she broke off from her playing and smilingly gestured for me to sit beside her.

“I think this is my favorite spot in the gardens, Elinor. I come here often.”

“How well you play,” I told her admiringly. “When I heard the music, I half-wondered what I should find. There seemed something almost ethereal about it—the pure notes falling upon the still air.”

“So you expected to discover some Pan-like creature,” she teased. “And all you found was me. I hope it was not too great a disappointment, Elinor.”

I laughed and said, “Actually, Vicencia, I’m glad to have this chance of a quiet chat. There is something I should like to tell you. Last night, my grandmother came to my bedroom. She was walking in her sleep, and she didn’t wake up. She just stood there looking down at me for a few minutes, and then she went out again.”

“Poor Elinor, it must have been rather an alarming experience for you.”

“It was,” I admitted, smiling, because now it was daylight and I could afford to smile at my fears. “For a moment I was afraid she was about to strike me with the heavy candlestick she was carrying. Vicencia, does Grandmama often walk in her sleep?”

“Not often, as far as I am aware. But it has been known to happen once or twice before.” She hesitated. “Have you seen Dona Amalia today? Did you ask her about it?”

“I’ve just come from her room, but I said nothing, because I was anxious not to upset her again.” I sighed. “I’m afraid that, once more, it wasn’t a very satisfactory talk I had with Grandmama. She seems hopelessly prejudiced against my parents. Some of her remarks were very unkind. Yet when I look around at this beautiful mansion and its lovely grounds, and realize that this was the home where my mother was brought up, I just cannot understand how anyone could think she would lightly abandon it—except for true love. Why is it that Grandmama is still so bitter? Why can’t she find it in her heart to forgive?”

A magnolia petal came drifting down and settled on Vicencia’s lap. She brushed it off absently. ‘It is possible, I suppose, that her attitude has something to do with that letter of your mother’s. If Dona Amalia knew what had happened, perhaps she feels on the defensive.”

“But you don’t really believe that, Vicencia?”

She shook her head. “No, I do not. I believe that the explanation is something else—above all, a question of money. You see, Elinor, these debts you mentioned yesterday are nothing new, though, now, with the old
conde
having recently died, they may be more pressing than ever before. But the Milaveiras, like some of the other great families, have clung to a mode of life that belonged to a previous age, when Portugal was a rich and powerful kingdom. They have lived far beyond their means. In order to make ends meet, the Milaveiras have frequently made advantageous marriages, trading their great name against a new injection of wealth. Such a marriage had been arranged for your mother—the man was a banker and extremely rich. So it is understandable that her parents were very bitter when Joanneira refused to comply with their wishes.”

“But that is monstrous,” I gasped. “How could they think of selling their daughter like that?”

Vicencia lifted her slender shoulders. “It happened so in the case of Dona Amalia’s own marriage. Her father had made a fortune as a shipowner in Brazil, and he was ready to give his daughter an enormous dowry for the sake of acquiring an aristocratic son-in-law. And Carlota, too—her father was a man of wealth. He had made money quickly by
building hundreds of dwelling houses in Lisbon and selling them at an enormous profit, and his daughter’s marriage to a Milaveira brought him the respectability that such a parvenu needed to be accepted in society.” She smiled at my growing expression of horror. “Do not look so shocked, Elinor, for it is often done. I would venture to say that more marriages are arranged by the power of the purse than are ever conceived in heaven—in England too, I think, just as much as here in Portugal.”

“I am proud that my mother was unwilling to let herself be sold like that,” I said heatedly. “I am proud that she had the courage to defy her family and marry the man she loved. It is certainly what I would have done in her place. I could never marry a man chosen for me, a man I did not sincerely and truly love. And I cannot understand how any girl could do otherwise.”

“You are very young and full of high ideals, my dear Elinor. Sometimes it is not so easy to cling to one’s principles. Life seldom works out the way one would wish.”

I glanced at her apologetically, afraid that I might have caused offense, but Vicencia smiled back at me.

“You are wondering, I believe, whether my own marriage was one such as I have described. At least it was not that. How could it be, for my father was by no means a rich man. Papa was the director of an orchestra in Lisbon, and sometimes, to augment his income, he took pupils in musical composition. That was how I came to meet my husband. Music was the one thing Carlos cared about passionately. He showed considerable promise as a composer when he was a young man, and the orchestra included several of his pieces in public concerts. Unhappily, after Papa’s death, Carlos somehow seemed to lose all his inspiration. He never achieved the success my father had forecast for him.” Vicencia suddenly rose to her feet. “Shall we stroll among the trees, Elinor? You have hardly seen the grounds at all.”

The path she chose climbed gently in a shady woodland walk. Beside us a glinting stream tumbled among rocks and boulders, here and there forming a clear, dark pool where goldfish lurked and giant ferns dipped their feathery fronds. The damp earth was starred with wild hyacinths and periwinkles, and we passed dense clusters of camellia bushes, splashed with their rose red blooms.

While we walked, my mind lingered upon what Vicencia had told me about her marriage. Was it after all so different from the others? Carlos da Milaveira, it appeared to me, had chosen Vicencia as his wife in exchange for something he I valued even more than wealth—the chance of fame as a composer. The Milaveiras all seemed to have been singularly calculating in their material alliances.

“Vicencia, you promised to tell me about your husband’s side of the family,” I reminded her.

“So I did. It is not a happy story, Elinor, in the true Milaveira tradition. My father-in-law, Duarte da Milaveira, was your grandfather’s younger brother, and when the two of them inherited from their father, they struck a bargain. Your grandfather had recently married again, and there was Dona Amalia’s dowry available. So
the two brothers agreed that Duarte should take his share in the form of cash, while Fernando, the elder, should retain the vineyards and family properties. Each of them, I suspect, privately thought he had made the better deal. Duarte at once set off for Paris and embarked on a wildly spendthrift existence. He married, but that made little difference to his way of life. There were two children—my husband, Carlos, and Luzia, who became Stafford’s wife.”

We had come to a place where a grotto had been cut into the rocky hillside. Ivy and creepers trailed across the cavelike entrance, and from the dim, mysterious interior I could hear the cool trickling of water. I would have liked to pause and explore it, but this hardly seemed the right moment. “What happened, Vicencia?” I asked.

She glanced at me with a brief, rueful smile. “Oh, the inevitable happened, Elinor. It was not long before Duarte’s money was all gone in gambling and extravagant living. The family somehow managed to scrape by until, in his mid-forties, Duarte suddenly died of a stroke. His widow, driven by sheer necessity, swallowed her pride and returned to Portugal, throwing herself and her children upon the mercy of her brother-in-law. She lived at Castanheiros for the rest of her days, and here her children were brought up, tolerated as poor relations. And now all three of them are dead, and I remain—so long as I make myself useful.”