The Stars of San Cecilio (7 page)

‘I understood you had few friends, and I certainly didn’t expect you to run into one — quite literally! — so soon. ’

Lisa endeavored to convince him.

‘Mr. Hamilton-Tracey is not a friend of mine. I know practically nothing about him. ’

‘But you will continue to meet him while he is here?’

‘I — I may, if — if you have no objections?’ She sounded so weary suddenly that he couldn’t help noticing it, and when she once more pushed back her hair from her forehead as if the weight of it oppressed her his eyes narrowed. ‘How long have you been sitting there beside the bed?’ he

asked.

‘Since this morning. You told me to do so, and in any case I wouldn’t have dreamed of leaving Gia. ’

‘And you had no breakfast, I suppose?’

‘No, but it didn’t matter. We usually visit the beach before breakfast. ’

‘Did you have any lunch?’

‘Senora Cortina brought me a tray. ’

‘Did you eat what was brought to you on a tray? ’

But as both pairs of eyes became glued as if the result of some mesmeric attraction to the tray that was not quite hidden away behind the window curtains on the window-seat, where she had sat for a short while while Gia was sunk in heavy slumber in the middle of the day, and it was plainly scarcely touched, she thought it best to say nothing.

‘I think you had better go and have a bath and change, and then come downstairs and have a drink in the library,’ Dr. Fernandez said, with sudden incisiveness. ‘After which, of course, you will join us for dinner. ’

‘Oh, but if you don’t mind I’d rather not—join you for dinner, I mean. . . . ’ Lisa was beginning, when Gia awakened and stretched herself and reached forth a small, determined hand to clutch at her.

‘Oh, no, you mustn’t leave me!’ the child cried, almost imperiously. ‘I don’t want you to leave me! ’

Her father surveyed her coldly.

‘You are quite recovered,’ he said. ‘At any rate, you are recovered enough to be left alone, and Miss Waring has been cooped up here long enough. There is always the bell if you should require anything, and Senora Cortina can hear it in the kitchen. ’

Gia looked at him imploringly.

‘I might be sick again. ’

‘You won’t,’ in the same cold tones.

‘But I might! . . .’ She began to whimper. ‘And I am used to having Lisa with me! She always has her own meals up here with me. . . ’

‘What? In this bedroom?’ He looked definitely shocked.

‘No, no, in the sitting-room, which is next door,’ Lisa interposed hurriedly. She felt disturbed by the strange behavior of a man who could display so much concern for his child at one moment, and treat her almost with dislike the next. It strengthened her determination to stay with Gia. ‘And that, I thought, was a sensible arrangement, because it would be absurd to expect Senora Cortina to behave towards us as she would towards — well, you and Dona de Camponelli! ’

She didn’t know quite why she included Dona de Camponelli, or why it seemed absolutely natural to link the two of them together, but it did, and the name slipped out. She thought he frowned peculiarly for an instant, and then he returned rather curtly:

‘Sensible or not, tonight you will depart from a custom you seem to have established. I will expect you downstairs in the library in half an hour. ’

‘I’d honestly rather not. ’

‘And I don’t intend to argue the matter. ’

He turned away and Lisa stooped above the small figure in the bed to soothe her. But as she did so she heard him remark dryly from the doorway:

‘She has no temperature, and if you leave her alone she will sleep. Sleep is more important to her than your presence just now, although you may prefer not to believe that. ’

She felt not so much amazed as indignant, because having more or less openly accused her of neglect that morning, this evening he was implying that she coddled her charge. It was so unfair that she wanted to call him back to protest.

But he was not the sort of man one ventured to call back for any purpose whatsoever — not when one was merely an employee, and a more or less unknown English girl! And not for the first time she wondered whether she mightn’t have been wiser to have resisted the temptation to stay on in Spain

— and the temptation, which had been so overwhelming, to see more of him! The more she saw of him, apparently, the keener was going to become her sense of inferiority, the conviction that they were worlds apart, and that it had been sheer audacity to think that even in odd moments he might look upon her as if that was not the case.

She felt that so strongly when she went downstairs to the library that it was like an aura of foreboding that moved with her.

The library contained the Tintoretto and the Greek bronze. It was also a particularly attractive room at that hour of the day, with the last echo of sunset making an arresting loveliness of the sky outside the windows, and the swinging bronze lamps glowing like mellow moons in the room itself. The walls were starkly white, and there was a great deal of old oak across which the light fell softly. Spanish chests discovered a richness and a patina that fascinated Lisa, crimson silk curtains and velvet cushions were almost sensuously colorful, and silver candlesticks and copper bowls shone out of shadowy corners.

There were also a great many flowers, which Senora Cortina had arranged with a good deal of skill.

Dona Beatriz was lying back comfortably in a deep chair when Lisa entered. She was wearing her favorite black — which, incidentally, is a favorite with most Spanish women of good family, whether sophisticated or otherwise, as Lisa discovered after only a very brief stay in the country

— and she was looking supremely elegant. Her perfume, which was French, and not Spanish, overlaid sharply the milder perfume of the massed red roses in the room.

‘You feel quite easy about leaving your patient alone?’ she inquired almost indolently of Lisa, as the girl moved into the rays of light from the gently swaying lamps, and it could be seen that she had changed into a simple little cocktail-type dress of misty-blue georgette.

Lisa felt almost taken aback for a moment by the studied coolness — even insolence — of the inquiry, and a ready reply would not rise to her lips. She was still feeling oddly strained after her long, confined day, and not even a bath had restored her mental alertness. And the fact that she was still in need of a good square meal made her seem hopelessly vulnerable just then.

But, surprisingly, Dr. Fernandez came quickly to her rescue. He lifted a decanter and poured sherry into a wineglass, and put it into her hand, and then her into a chair. He didn’t smile at her, but his voice was quite gentle as he said, as if Dona Beatriz had said nothing at all:

‘You shouldn’t attempt to do a job of nursing on an empty stomach. It isn’t fair to the patient, and it’s certainly not fair to yourself. ’

Lisa heard herself stammering:

‘No, I — I suppose not. . . . ’

And then Dona Beatriz cut in:

‘I don’t suppose Miss Waring knows very much about nursing, Julio — she’s too young! That’s where your Miss Grimthorpe, though so offensive to look at, was in some ways more useful. She had trained properly for the job of looking after children, and she was of course thoroughly reliable. ’ The inference here was so obvious that even the man frowned. ‘ Did your training include any nursing, Miss

Waring?’

Lisa had to admit that her training had been very brief, but reasonably comprehensive. She had been so anxious to start earning money that she hadn’t dared to linger over the task of preparing herself, believing that all her instincts were the instincts that ultimately made for success when dealing with the young. And, so far as the young themselves were concerned, she had not so far proved that her instincts were at fault.

But she didn’t say all this to Dona Beatriz. She merely explained about the brevity of her training, and watched the slow look of satisfaction dawn in the other’s face.

‘Then it was a little impetuous of you, Julio, to say the least, when you engaged Miss Waring!’ the Spanish woman remarked. ‘And it could explain the unfortunate happening of this morning. Miss Waring isn’t quite alive— not, shall we say, sufficiently alive to the responsibilities of her position as yet. But for your timely arrival on the scene anything might have happened to Gia! ’

‘I don’t think so,’ Dr. Fernandez said, in a cool, almost a clipped tone, and his frown certainly didn’t diminish. ‘It was never my opinion that Gia was in any actual danger, and she has admitted that she made short work of the contents of a box of confectionery — rather an outsize box for one as small as she is! — which you sent her only a few days ago. It was extremely generous of you, but Gia has a natural passion for sweet things, and the young are not particularly abstemious when it comes to anything they enjoy. ’

As a vexed expression flitted across Dona Beatriz’s face, and she looked as if she was about to say something, he spoke quickly, cutting short any defence of herself she was about to make.

‘I asked Senora Cortina to put forward the evening meal, as Miss Waring has had practically nothing to eat all day, and I think I hear movements in the dining-room now,’ he said suavely. ‘Shall we go in before the gong starts to wake up Gia, if she’s asleep?’

During the meal — which was very definitely one of Senora Cortina’s best, in spite of the request to hurry her culinary arrangements — Lisa was glad that the other two seemed to get back on a more harmonious footing. She had been surprised by the doctor’s somewhat abrupt championship of herself, but she would have been uneasy if it had driven a wedge into the smooth companionship of this handsome pair who were in so many ways amazingly suited to one another. For Dona Beatriz was not the type to brook wedges being driven into any plans of her own. As it was, she was barely able to conceal the antipathy she felt for the English girl, and that antipathy would have increased if the English girl had been the cause of any strained relations between herself and the dark, determined doctor. And antipathy can be dangerous.

But, as the meal proceeded, delicious course following delicious course, the complacent calm of the dining-room seemed to fall like balm upon the spirits of each, and they discussed many things that could not possibly interest Lisa, content to be allowed to get quietly on with her own meal.

She had very little appetite, but the way to avoid attention was, she realized, to do as much justice as she could to the various savory helpings placed in front of her, and when at last coffee was served the only direct notice she received from her employer came her way.

‘You did very well,’ he said quietly as she refused a liqueur. ‘Don’t try starving yourself in future!’

Afterwards, in the big glassed-in verandah that opened on to the patio, Dona Beatriz seemed to regard her with more favor, also, and she even asked her a few questions about her life in England.

‘If you’re fond of foreign travel,’ she said, ‘and you prove yourself completely satisfactory while you are here’ — with a meaning little pause to let this sink in — ‘ I am almost certain I can help you to find another position that might take you even farther afield when the time arrives for Gia to go to school. I have a wide circle of friends, and a great many of them travel a good deal, and with young families help is always needed. Your time here will soon pass, and it might be as well if I begin to make inquiries with a view to obtaining for you some further employment. ’

‘You are very kind,’ Lisa said, sitting still and pale as a moth in the gloom of the wide verandah, although the light of the rising moon made a splendor of her soft gold hair.

‘Don’t you think it’s a little early to talk about finding Miss Waring further employment?’ Dr. Fernandez inquired, staring at the tip of the cigarette he had just lighted. ‘Gia hasn’t gone to school yet, and until she is reasonably fit I shall not make any definite plans for her to do so. ’

Dona Beatriz’s eyebrows arched.

‘But I understood they were made! We talked the whole thing over. ’

Lisa stood up.

‘Do you mind if I go to bed?’ she asked. ‘And I would like to make absolutely certain that Gia is quite all right. ’

The doctor nodded casually.

‘You will find that she is fast asleep, and in the morning will be much as usual. But you probably do feel tired, and of course we don’t mind if you go to bed. ’

It was a politely careless dismissal, and it made something deep inside her feel very lonely and isolated just then. But she took herself to task as she went up the wide staircase. Her employer was considerate in his detached, impersonal fashion, and if it was impersonal that was not his fault. A governess was, after all, a governess — and he had Dona Beatriz, with whom he no doubt wanted to be alone.

But it would have been impossible for anyone to swear to it that he wanted to be alone with Dona Beatriz. Lovely as the Spanish woman was

— his own enchanting fellow-countrywoman! — exotic as she appeared in her black dress, and alluring as those brilliant dark eyes of her were, there was, at frequent intervals, a something in their relationship—just a touch, of ill-concealed impatience on his part, a quick, resentful look on hers, that could have given rise to doubts if anyone had been attempting to speculate.

And Lisa found herself speculating frequently. She felt that it was all-important, even though it was no concern of hers whatsoever, that she should find out what their attitude to one another was. And whether that strange aloofness at time, that almost monastic withdrawal — as if women had no real place in Julio Fernandez’s scheme of things, because in spite of being rather more attractive physically than most men he had no real need of women, or the softer side of life — was merely a screen behind which he hid. Or whether there was nothing to hide.

C H A P T E R S E V E N

The next morning he and Dona Beatriz went off together in his big white car, and they didn’t return until lunchtime. Gia, as he had predicted, was quite herself again, but Lisa decided to run no risks with her, and they spent the morning extremely quietly within the confines and the shade of the tangled garden by the sea.