The Winding Stair

by Jane Aiken Hodge

‘For two weeks only.’ Quickly, to reassure her. ‘My sister is not well,’ he went on. ‘Lord Strangford has kindly given me permission to pay her a visit.’

  ‘Lady Forland?’ Cynthia Brett pounced on it, and the conversation became general. Only, taking his leave, Gair lingered for a lover’s moment beside Juana. ‘Even the two weeks Lord Strangford allows me will seem too long,’ he said, making it a promise.

  ‘He’s gone to see Canning of course,’ said Mrs. Brett when Juana told her about it. ‘Two weeks, he said? I expect he arranged it as soon as he heard the May and June meetings were cancelled. Even allowing for the journey, he should be back in ample time for the next one.’

  ‘But suppose they hold an emergency one?’

  ‘We’ll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it.’

  But hot May dragged into hotter June and nothing of any kind happened at the castle except that Cynthia Brett kept more and more to her own rooms and looked, Juana thought, increasingly ill when she did appear. Anxious about her, she finally asked Daisy what was the matter. ‘Is there anything we ought to be doing for her?’

  ‘Nothing. Don’t pry, Juana!’ And then. ‘I’m sorry. It’s the heat … it’s making us all nervy. I can’t sleep, can you? As to mother, she’s homesick, of course. It’s nothing …’

  Juana was not so sure. Her father, who had seemed at first to settle back contentedly enough into the quiet routine of life at the castle now looked hag-ridden as never before. Juana longed to ask him what was the matter, but could not quite bring herself to do so.

  But at least her grandmother seemed better these days, though she still kept to her own rooms. ‘Nothing would induce me to act as hostess to that woman.’

  ‘I wish you’d send them home, ma’am.’ Juana had been waiting for a chance to say it.

  ‘Your family? You’ve changed your tune, haven’t you?’

  ‘Not the girls. I don’t think they’d want to go. Just my father and step-mother. I don’t think she’s at all well. And besides, now Napoleon has taken Danzig, anything may happen. Seriously, ma’am, don’t you think we’ve rather too many English in the castle for comfort?’

  ‘Nonsense! You’re beginning to sound like your cousins! You’ll be calling yourself Brett-Mascarenhas yet. And not a bad name either,’ she added surprisingly. ‘What’s the news of him, by the way?’

  ‘Vasco? None, since he wrote from Eylau.’

  ‘I wish he’d come back.’ Fretfully. ‘I wish you could have written to him. He’d take care of you.’

  ‘I don’t need taking care of, ma’am.’

  Was it true? Life seemed to stand still. There was no immediate sense of threat, and none of safety. And there was no news. Almost, sometimes, Juana found herself reduced to regretting the cancelled meetings of the Sons of the Star. However terrifying, at least she could count on learning the latest news from them. She greeted Pedro with real pleasure when he rode into the castle courtyard one stifling July morning. ‘Pedro! It’s good to see you. Are you straight back from Spain? How was your journey?’

  ‘As you’d expect. Dust, and filthy inns and, in Madrid, the usual interminable delays. But I’m back at last. How are your sisters, Juana? Not too tired of life in the castle, I hope? I have a message for them – and for you, too – from my mistress, the Princess. She is giving an entertainment next week at Ramalhao and hopes you will be able to come.’

  ‘The three of us? But, Pedro—’

  ‘And Elvira, of course. That goes without saying. I hope you’re not turning Portuguese, Juana? Do you intend to shut yourself up in a darkened room until you marry?’ He had dismounted and thrown his reins to a servant, but turned to dip his wrists in the shady pool below the fountain in the centre of the courtyard.

  Juana followed him into the shadow of the trellised vine. ‘I don’t understand you, Pedro. When we met that time at Lord Strangford’s party, you scolded me for being there. What’s made you change your tune?’

  He looked up at her from the edge of the pool where he had seated himself, his eyes bright in his shadowed face. ‘That was an English party. This is a Portuguese one. And your sisters will like to meet the Princess, surely? It’s practically a royal command, you know.’

  ‘I suppose so. I’ll have to consult my grandmother.’

  ‘Tell her Lord Strangford will be there, and his people, if that makes her any happier. Or you—’ Again she was aware of his eyes, curiously bright in the shadow. ‘Seriously, Juana, I don’t think this the moment for anyone with the slightest English taint to be stand-offish with the Portuguese royal family. Not if you want to stay here.’

  She almost said, ‘But I don’t.’ Instead: ‘Yes, I see what you mean. I’ll certainly talk to my grandmother. But are my uncles not invited?’

  ‘No. This is a party for the young in heart, the Princess says. It is to help us forget the news from the north.’

  ‘Is there anything new?’

  ‘Nothing worse than the fall of Danzig. But at least Napoleon is still looking eastward. So long as he is occupied with the Russians, we should be safe.’

  ‘And in Spain?’

  ‘Godoy remains all powerful. “The Prince of the Peace!”’ He stood up. ‘I had best not talk of him. Where will I find your sisters, Juana?’

  ‘An entertainment at Ramalhao?’ Old Mrs. Brett looked even more doubtful than Juana had expected. ‘I don’t know about that.’

  ‘Lord Strangford is to be there. And his people, Pedro said. You know Mr. Varlow sent word he was back but too busy to come out. It would be a chance …’

  ‘Yes, I see—’ doubtfully.

  ‘And Pedro thinks it would be wise to go.’

  ‘There is that. Fetch me a glass of my cordial, Juana. I’m tired today. Too tired to think. You must do what you think best. But, of course, if you go, Elvira must go too.’

  Elvira did not want to go. ‘Nor should you, Juana. Nor your sisters. By all one hears, Ramalhao is no place for young girls.’

  ‘But Pedro will be there, and Lord Strangford’s household.’

  ‘Meaning Mr. Varlow?’ Elvira was disconcertingly acute today. And of course she was quite right. Juana did badly want to see Gair. His verbal message, sent by Senhor Macarao whom he had met in Lisbon, had been merely maddening. He was back, he longed to see her, but could not for the moment be spared. It might mean anything. It might even mean that he was being replaced after all and had to train his successor. And here she was, starved for news, desperate for some kind of certainty. And the Princess’s party was to be held on the twelfth of July, only a week before the next meeting of the Sons of the Star. Absurdly, perhaps illogically, Juana felt she must see Gair before that.

  Elvira was looking beyond her from the sunlit loggia to the shadowed doorway of the house:

  ‘ “By the pricking of my thumbs

  Something wicked this way comes.”

  Don’t go, Juana. I smell trouble.

  Double, double, toil and trouble.”’

  She dropped her embroidery and scurried away to the far end of the loggia.

  ‘What set her off?’ Prospero came out of the house on silent feet. ‘I thought she was better.’

  ‘She is mostly. She doesn’t want to go to the Princess’s party.’

  ‘Not go? Nonsense. Of course you must go. I only wish Miguel and I were invited, but my boys will be there to take care of you.’

  ‘Roberto too?’

  ‘I believe so.’

  ‘Oh well, in that case …’ Juana had heard enough about Carlota Joaquina’s parties to feel relieved that she and her stepsisters would each have a man to look after them.

  So it was disconcerting to arrive at the party, just as the sun was setting, and be presented, at once, with a domino and mask. ‘The Princess’s orders,’ explained Carlota Joaquina’s Camereira Mor, a wrinkled old woman in rusty black. ‘All her guests are to remain masked until supper time.’

  ‘Delicious!’ Daisy was already wrapping herse
lf in the all-concealing domino.

  ‘Don’t look so anxious, Juana.’ Teresa adjusted her mask at the glass. ‘They’ll contrive to find us, masked or not.’ She turned to the old woman. ‘Os Ingleses,’ she began in halting Portuguese, and then, giving it up, in English: ‘Have they come yet? Milord Strangford?’

  ‘Nao entendo.’ The woman looked puzzled.

  ‘Os Ingleses!’ Teresa raised her voice. ‘Are they here yet? Oh, Juana, translate! You’re the one who wants to know, after all.’

  ‘I don’t!’ But of course she did. She turned to the Camereira Mor and asked the question in Portuguese.

  ‘Milord Strangford?’ the old woman shook her head. ‘We sent no invitation to him.’

  ‘What does she say?’ Teresa was satisfied now with the set of her mask and eager to be out where the music was playing.

  ‘That Lord Strangford wasn’t asked.’

  ‘Oh, poor Juana! But never mind; Pedro and Roberto will find you a cavalier!’

  ‘Aunt Elvira!’ Juana turned impulsively to her aunt, hoping for support. Every instinct urged her to leave at once.

  But Elvira had been stranger than usual all day. Now she broke, disconcertingly into Camoens’ lament for his beloved: ‘ “Minha alma gentilha …”’

  The Camereira Mor took her arm. ‘Don’t trouble yourself about the old one,’ she said to Juana. ‘I will see she is well cared for. Do you go down and amuse yourselves. I was told to tell you that the air in the courtyard is sweet.’

  ‘What does she say?’ Daisy turned from the glass.

  ‘She advises us to go down to the courtyard. Apparently she was told to do so.’

  ‘Pedro, of course. No need to look so grave, Juana. Anyone would think you were our chaperone, instead of the youngest of us.’

  In the courtyard, water splashed as background to the melancholy music of a group of guitarists. A singer was whispering the words of a modinha:

  ‘ “Love is so sweet

  Love is so bitter …”’

  The light was beginning to fail, but the moon was not up yet. Masked figures moved to and fro among the shadows of vine and colonnade, some of them already in pairs, others still on the hunt.

  As the three girls hesitated at the top of the shallow steps, two masked figures advanced from the shadows to greet them. Watching each of them take a hand of one of her companions, Juana realised what an unmistakable tall figure she herself must cut.

  ‘Quickly!’ Pedro’s voice. ‘The fireworks are about to begin.’ He had Daisy’s arm and offered his other one to Juana. ‘The bottom of the long walk is the best place to see them.’

  Roberto and Teresa had moved off already, but Daisy hung back. ‘Should we not find a cavalier for Juana?’

  ‘No names! It’s the Princess’s order that we should all be incognito until we unmask at supper. Come, it’s nearly dark.’

  Making their way out of the courtyard and down one of the long jasmine-scented alleyways that were laid out between orange and lemon groves, they found themselves part of a crowd of masked figures all moving in the same direction. ‘What a squeeze,’ said Daisy. ‘I had no idea it would be such a large party.’

  ‘Nor I.’ If she had known, Juana thought, she would most certainly not have come. Passionately now, she wished she had followed instinct and gone home when she discovered Lord Strangford had not been invited. And to make matters worse, all Pedro’s attention was centred on Daisy, and her own position as the spare third was awkward in the extreme. The alley was really only wide enough for two, but she dared not let go Pedro’s arm, for fear of losing him in the crowd. So she scraped along, half beside, half behind the other two, and was grateful for her domino as a protection against spiky leaves and branches. Ahead of them she could see that the alley opened on to a wider space lit by coloured lanterns, and she was just congratulating herself that they must catch up with Roberto and Teresa there when they met a noisy group of masks and she was torn suddenly from Pedro’s arm and swept back the way she had come.

  ‘A prize! A prize!’ One of the masks seized her arm. ‘No cavalier is allowed two ladies tonight. A lawful prize!’

  ‘No! Let me go!’ Struggling with him, she saw with horror that Pedro and Daisy had gone on down the alley to join the crowd at the end. They must have thought she had left them willingly. ‘Let me go, I say!’

  ‘A spirited filly!’ Like her, he spoke in Portuguese.

  At least he did not know her. Instinctively, she stooped a little to conceal her betraying height. ‘Please let me go. I want to rejoin my friends.’

  ‘I am your friend.’ He tightened his grip on her arm. ‘Come with me, my pretty, and I will show you just how good a friend I can be.’ He pulled her back into a dark side-alley.

  Short of screaming and precipitating just the kind of scene she must avoid, there was no way she could stop him. ‘But I want to see the fireworks!’ If she could not save herself by force, she must do so by guile.

  ‘Fireworks! I’ll show you something better than fireworks.’ His slurring speech warned her that, unusually for a Portuguese, he was considerably the worse for drink. No use reasoning with him. She must wait and watch for her chance to escape.

  He pulled her down on to a rustic seat in a vine-covered arbour. ‘Now, my pretty, it’s time to unmask!’ But his hand went, not to her mask, but to her muslin gown, where the domino had fallen open.

  ‘No!’ As she struggled, the first rockets roared and hissed into the sky. It was her chance. His grip slackened, she pulled away and was off, in a flash down the nearest alley. He came after her swearing, but she found a turning among heavy-scented jasmines, took it, then plunged into the bushes to stand, face hidden by her domino, hardly breathing as he blundered by. Another shower of fireworks terrified her with the chance of being seen, but must merely have confused him. She heard him carry on down the path, but stayed there, statue-still, for a few more minutes, just in case …

  More fireworks. They would have been beautiful in other circumstances. At least they lit up the garden enough to show her that this path led back toward the house. Nothing mattered now but to get back there and find the Camereira Mor and Elvira. She must just hope that Daisy and Teresa were safe with her cousins, while blaming herself bitterly for having come to such a party. Not only herself. How could her family have let her? They must have known.

  Everyone was watching the fireworks, which roared and sparkled and flashed above her as she made her way unmolested back to the house. Pausing in the darkness of the archway that led into the courtyard, she saw one tall mask standing alone as if waiting for someone. Tall. Wild illogical hope boiled up in her, and as she entertained it, sceptically, he called, low and cautious: ‘Juana?’

  ‘Gair! Thank God.’ She moved forward into the lamplit courtyard.

  ‘I’m sorry if I have kept you waiting.’ Something very odd about his tone.

  ‘Kept me waiting? What in the world do you mean? But, oh Gair, I’m glad to see you.’

  ‘You surely expected me, since you asked me to come.’ Again that disconcerting note.

  ‘Asked you to come? What do you mean? I thought you were coming, it’s true. Pedro said all Lord Strangford’s people would be here.’

  ‘Lord Strangford at a party like this! I was appalled when I got your note, but there was no time to stop you. How could you do such a crazy thing?’ He took her arm. ‘We can’t talk here. Come out into the garden and for God’s sake keep your mask on.’

  ‘Gair! You’re hurting me.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ They were out among the rose-beds of the formal garden. ‘I’ve been worried to death about you. I was in Lisbon when I got your note.’ He led her to a seat in the centre of the garden where they could not be overheard. ‘I got here as fast as I could. But how could you be so stupid, Juana? This kind of party is well enough if you’re escorted – the hostess’s name gives a kind of sanction – but to come on your own …’

  ‘I did nothing of the kind.
My sisters are here, and Aunt Elvira, and my cousins.’

  ‘I hope they are taking better care of your sisters than they have of you.’

  ‘It wasn’t Pedro’s fault. We were separated in the crowd.’

  ‘Exactly.’ It gave him a kind of savage satisfaction. ‘And then?’

  ‘It’s no concern of yours.’ Anger rose in her to match his. ‘But why do you keep talking as if I had asked you to come?’

  ‘Because you did.’

  ‘Nonsense. Now you’re the one who is crazy. We agreed, did we not, that I’d only write you in an emergency? Does this look like one?’

  ‘By what you say, it might well have been. Yes – it’s true – I was surprised; but life must be dull for you at the Castle on the Rock—’

  ‘So you thought I was snatching at straws of entertainment?’ The fact that this was partly true added fuel to her anger. ‘And would risk anything just to go to a party like this?’

  ‘That’s what you said, after all.’

  She stood up in one furious movement. ‘How many times do I have to tell you that I wrote you no note!’

  ‘A forgery!’ Anger bred by his anxiety for her had made him slow to take it in. ‘I should have guessed, I suppose. Forgive me, Juana. But, why? I don’t like it: I don’t understand it. But thank God it brought me here, and in time. I’m sorry I was so angry. You must understand: I was frightened sick for you.’

  ‘You were right to be.’ A burst of laughter nearby as a group of masks crossed the garden in pursuit of a couple of squealing girls gave point to her words. Suddenly, remembering her conspicuous height, she sat down again beside him. ‘I’m sorry too. Of course I didn’t write, but I’m certainly glad you came. I was frightened too. But what do you think it means?’

  ‘I wish I knew. Trouble, I’m sure. I think I had best take you home at once.’

  ‘Gair, we can’t do that. I can’t leave Daisy and Teresa here.’

  ‘But your cousins will be looking after them. And your aunt. No one will notice if you leave. You can plead headache, anything …’

  ‘And go home alone with you at his time of night? Here, in Portugal? It would be bad enough in England … You’re not thinking, Gair.’