by Ann Bridge
“Well, was that all right?” Mrs. Armitage asked, as she stood up and shook out her dress.
“Yes, fine. What a clever idea” Julia replied. “Did you invent it?”
“Oh no; they always take tourists up in hammocks.”
“Well, I suppose I could have climbed it, but this was much quicker” Julia said politely.
The Paul da Serra is a remarkable place. On all sides the ground falls away sheerly, so that from it one looks over the rest of the island, spread out like a panorama, golden-buff to the south, a green tangle of mountains to the north, and on both sides the ocean; to the east the peaks round the Grande Curral, the great volcanic cirque, rise higher still beyond the Encumiada Pass. The plateau is fairly level, slightly undulating, and covered with grass and bracken; they walked forward across it, leaving the men with the hammocks, smoking, and still laughing, sitting down to await their return.
“I thought you said there were sheep up here” Julia said to Pauline Shergold.
“Yes, there are, lots; they must be further on.” And after about a quarter of a mile they came on a group of them in a hollow by a spring—small and rather leggy, with long, straggling, untidy fleeces. “Goodness, don’t they shear them?” country-bred Julia asked; it was the end of the summer, and she would have expected to see sheep neatly shorn.
“They’ll do that in a few weeks, when they’ve finished getting in the grapes and the sugar-cane. No winter here that you’d notice, remember” Terence Armitage told her.
“Oh no, of course not.” She continued to peer at the group of sheep; though they were round the spring they were not drinking, but stood turning their heads from side to side, and uttering deep wheezy coughs. “Is there something wrong with them?” she asked Terence.
“I don’t suppose so, except that they seem uncommonly tame; usually they scoot off as soon as they catch sight of one. Scram!” he shouted, and struck his stick against a rock. But the sheep paid no attention whatever; they still stood, coughing, and turning their heads idiotically from side to side; occasionally one walked a few steps, in an uncertain fashion, and then stood and coughed again.
“Terence, there is something wrong with them” Gerald Shergold said, standing still; the rest stopped too, and all stared at the sheep.
“They’ve certainly got a filthy cough” Terence said, peering at them through his glasses; he went over towards the little group to get a closer view, and stood still again—one of the creatures, moving in that dazed way, came in his direction—when it was within about a yard of him it stopped, and then, hesitantly, turned round and shambled off.
“Funny, that” Gerald said. “It only seemed to notice you when it got close to. Let’s try the others.” And indeed the rest of the sheep stood, or nibbled at the grass, quite unconcernedly till any of the humans came within about a yard of them—then, uncomfortably, they moved away.
“What on earth can be wrong with them?” Pauline said.
“Hadn’t we better tell the shepherd about it?” Julia suggested.
“There is no shepherd; they’re on their own up here” Penelope replied brusquely. “Look, Terence, we ought to see if the rest are all right. There may be something wrong with this pool.”
“What could be wrong with it?” he asked, going over to the water.
“How do I know? But we can take some down later on in one of the thermoses and get it checked,” his wife replied impatiently. “Come on—let’s spread out and look for the others.”
“Hold on a moment, Penel” Terence said, as she started off with her long rapid stride.
“Now what?”—but she stood still.
“I don’t think anyone had better go on their own” Terence said, in his slow gentle tones. “ If the clouds come up, we shan’t be able to see two yards, and it’s frightfully easy to fall over the edge. Let’s go in two parties; we can spread out a bit while it stays clear, and see what we find.”
“Ah, and how far do we go?” Gerald Shergold put in. “Right to the far side?”
“Hardly necessary, I should have thought” Terence said; “if we go half-way it ought to be enough to find out if these are the only ones affected.”
The Paul da Serra is nearly four miles across from east to west; a very faint track runs roughly along its centre.
“All right” Penelope agreed. “Let’s walk for forty-five minutes, and then come back and meet here. We can leave the haversacks. How do we divide up?”
“I’ll take Ag and Pauline, and Gerald and Julia go with you. Got your whistle? All right, so have I. Let’s go.”
The two groups set out, one walking to the right of the old track, the other to the left; Penelope marshalled her party like a tank commander, about a hundred yards apart, taking the outside post herself. In less than ten minutes Julia shouted, “Mrs. Armitage! Here are some more.”
Gerald and Penelope came over to her. There were about forty sheep in this group, and they were behaving exactly like the ones near the pool: wheezing and coughing, turning their heads from side to side, and occasionally taking a few steps in a dazed way.
“I can’t understand it” Gerald said.
“They may have been to that pool too” Penelope said. “They’re quite near it. Come on—let’s see what we find further on. Spread out again, you two.”
Julia, amused by her ruthlessness, obediently moved some distance away from Gerald. But the further they walked, the more sheep they found, and all in the same strange condition— wheezing, turning their heads from side to side, and all totally oblivious to the presence of human beings until they were within two or three feet of them, when they seemed to try, slowly and awkwardly, to escape.
“This is nasty” Gerald said. “They don’t seem able to see properly.”
“Yes—we’ll have to do something about it.” Penelope looked at her watch. “Thirty-eight minutes; that’s quite near enough. Let’s go back.”
“It’s as though they’d been doped” Julia said, still staring at the last lot of sheep they had come on, who were now nibbling at the grass again.
“But how on earth could they be doped, up here? And who would want to dope them?” Penelope asked. It was not a question any of them could answer.
“Obviously we must check on the water in the pools” Gerald said, as they retraced their steps.
“Yes—but we can’t do that before Monday; everything will be shut. Oh what a bore!”
“Is there a vet down this end of the island?” Gerald asked.
“No, only a sort of old wiseacre—well, he is quite knowing about animals, as a matter of fact, but I shouldn’t trust his opinion on a thing like this. No, Terence will have to get Pereira from Funchal to come and have a look at them.”
“Who do they belong to?” Julia wanted to know.
“Oh, to a whole crowd of people, all round about. We must let the priest at Calheta know on our way home.”
“Why on earth the priest?” Julia asked.
“He’ll broadcast it at Mass tomorrow. The pulpit is the great channel of communication here!” Penelope said, a sudden grin making her rather harsh face charming for a moment.
Before they were half-way back, clouds swirling up from below engulfed the plateau; with frightening suddenness great white wreaths of mist swept across the grass and bracken towards them.
“Let’s get back onto the track” Penelope said—“We shall go faster, too.”
In fact they only just found the track, indistinct as it was, before the mist was all round them, chill and clammy. “I see what Terence means about people not wandering about up here on their own” Gerald remarked, turning up his jacket collar. “Does this track go right by the pool? I can’t remember.”
“Fairly near it. In about another ten minutes I’ll start whistling.”
5
In Fact they heard Terence’s whistle just as Penelope was about to use hers, and a few moments later the two parties converged in the mist, and walked along the track together,
comparing notes. The others had found just what they had found: quantities of sheep, all dazed, all wheezing. “It must be some epidemic” Terence said; “they’re definitely ill. We must get Pereira down here as soon as we can.”
“Yes, and we must check on the water. Now where has that pool got to?”
They soon found it, and sat down to eat their lunch. Penelope Armitage hurried them remorselessly over their sandwiches and cake; as soon as one thermos was empty she went to the far end of the pool, partly filled it, swilled it out, emptied the contents onto the grass, and washed the cork. Then she came back to the nearer end and filled it again. “Get as clean a sample as possible” she explained. “Now, second cups, anyone?”
Julia, Gerald and Pauline all had second cups; but there was no temptation to linger—the mist was chilly, and concern about the wretched sheep affected everyone. When his wife made to empty the second thermos onto the grass Terence caught her hand. “Hold on, Penel—the men would love that.”
“They’ll have to go without it this time. Anyhow there’s hardly any left” she replied inexorably, and repeated the routine of rinsing out and refilling the flask.
“You’d better mark the corks” Gerald observed. “If the water turns out to be poisoned you’ll have to get new ones.”
“So I shall—good idea. Give me your knife, Terence.” With the blade she scratched a mark on the plastic top of each cork. But the mention of poison had given Julia a fresh idea.
“Mrs. Armitage, would it be worth asking those men with the hammocks if they’ve brought anyone up here lately? I mean, someone must have put the poison in the pool, if it is poisoned, and if they put some in all the pools they’d have had to bring up quite a lot. So they might have used the hammocks.”
“We can try; they’re pretty woolly-minded as a rule” Penelope said with her usual brusqueness.
“We will certainly try it; it’s an excellent idea” her more polite husband said.
“Anyhow do for goodness sake stop calling me Mrs. Armitage. It gives me the fidgets!” that lady said, as she hastily stuffed cups and sandwich-papers into the haversacks, along with the thermoses and the remains of the cake. “What’s wrong with Penelope?”
“Nothing—nor with Julia!” Julia said cheerfully. “Thank you very much.”
In fact the hammock-men, questioned about recent visitors to the plateau, responded with some rather striking information. Yes, about a week ago, or rather more—anyhow it was not the Domingo (Sunday)—they had taken a large number of turistos up onto the plateau; muito curioso, they had stayed up there all night! Sim, they had effects to camp out with; many, many bundles, and large. Sim, they were undoubtedly straneiros (foreigners); but Terence Armitage’s painstaking endeavours to find out what their nationality might have been were of course quite fruitless. Well, some were dark, but others, on the contrary, were fair. No, their speech was very strange; the men thought it was not English—Terence spoke a few sentences in English, slowly and loudly, but this only produced bursts of laughter. Penelope asked in what money the men had been paid?—predictably, it was in escudos, and they had bargained much, the men said, looking rather disgusted.
“Then it can’t have been Americans” said Pauline Shergold. “They never bargain.”
“French would, like mad” Julia put in.
“Yes, but why should either French or Americans come up here and camp out all night to poison the wretched sheep?” Penelope asked impatiently.
Terence went quietly on with his enquiries. From what direction had the party come? Up from the north side, they did not know from where; two men had come up the day before, and had ordered the hammocks, and the men, to be there next day during as tardes (the afternoon) and to be ready to take them down a manha d’amanha—the following morning. Impossible of course to establish the exact time, but the men were clear that they were expressly told not to come at all early.
“Well, we shall have to make enquiries down on the far side, of course” Terence said. “Such a large party must have been noticed.”
Julia seldom employed her rather moderate Portuguese in the presence of those who spoke it better, but on this occasion she addressed herself to one oldish man and asked him if these turis-tos had smoked at all? The reply interested her. “Sim” the man replied, and here was another most curious thing—the cigarros these turistos smoked were brown!—brown, and very small. Now “cigarro” in Portuguese is the word not for a cigar but for a cigarette; cigars are called charutos, as Julia knew. She looked very thoughtful.
“Well, we’d better go down; this is getting us nowhere” Penelope said. “I told you they were completely bat-witted.” Julia and Aglaia were once more parcelled into their hammocks and slung down the rock wall; at its foot they were undone, the men were paid off, and the party made its way down the open slopes, where they left the mist behind, into the forest, and back through the noisy echoing tunnel. At the far end they emerged into brilliant sunshine, and began to walk down the ridge to the cars. On the way Terence said to his wife “Penel, I’ve been wondering— might it be a better plan not to tell the Cura about the sheep till the vet has been? I mean, if he gives it out at Mass tomorrow, all the owners will go storming up in the afternoon.”
“Well, why shouldn’t they?”
“Only if it were some infection, and they bring the creatures down, their goats and cattle might catch it.”
“Ah, and however much the Cura warns them, someone will be sure to take a drink from one of the pools, if it is poisoned,” Gerald Shergold put in. “He’s right, you know, Penel; much better get Pereira, and hear what he has to say, before you give the alarm—and get the water analysed.”
“Oh, all right. But we’d better see old Dr. Fonseca, and find out what he thinks of Marcusinho.”
They drove down to the little town, and paused there to seek out the doctor; to Penelope’s vexation he was still absent—he had returned, been given her message, and had gone out again.
“What a bore he is! Now we shall probably miss him!” she said crossly.
Which was precisely what they did. Both the Armitages kept a sharp look-out on all cars, passing and parked, but there was no sign of Dr. Fonseca’s old Peugeot on the way back; at the house Luzia, the maid, informed them that the doctor had been, had seen the boy, and had left again. Penelope, swearing mildly, went across to the farm; she came back some time later looking worried.
“What did Fonseca say?” Terence asked, getting up and pouring his wife a cocktail.
“Oh, thanks. He seems to have been rather stumped; by what I could make out—but you know how vague Manoel is” she said, sitting down. “He certainly listened to Marcusinho’s chest, and told them there was nothing there; and he hasn’t got any temperature to mention—I took that myself. And yet he’s got this fearful wheezy cough, and complains of terrible headache; he keeps moving his head about on the pillow.”
“What did the doctor tell them to do?” Terence asked.
“Oh, the usual things—he gave him a purge, and told them to keep him in bed, and only to give him slops. But he seems quite ill, to me; obviously the pain in his head is really bad, and it seems to have affected his sight—he didn’t know me till I was quite close to him.” She emptied her glass.
“Rather like the sheep” Aglaia was ill-inspired to say. Penelope rounded on her.
“It isn’t funny!” she said sharply.
“It wasn’t meant to be—oh, I am so sorry” Aglaia said, almost tearful at her tone. “I only meant it all seemed a bit alike.”
“Yes, well leave it for now, Ag dear” Terence said, kindly but firmly. “Penel, didn’t old Fonseca give the child anything for the pain?”
“Yes, he left them dois asprini, and told Carmen to melt one in warm water; but he wouldn’t take it,” Penelope said. “I wish I hadn’t missed him—Carmen is so witless.”
“Have you any ripe grapes?” Pauline Shergold asked.
“Yes, the white ones on the h
ouse are practically ripe—but what on earth for?” Penelope asked impatiently.
“To get the aspirin down—peel a grape, take out the pips and put the powdered aspirin inside, and it slips down without their knowing. That’s how I dose the brats!”
“Come and show me how” her hostess said, springing up. “I must do something about that pain.” She and Pauline Shergold left the room together.
“Well, I shall have a bath; being near sheep always makes me feel as if I’d got ticks” Gerald Shergold said.
“Ah yes—why not?” his host replied. “I think I’ll just go and telephone, if you’ll excuse me” he said to Julia. “I might catch Pereira at home. Ag, put a bit more gin in the cocktail-shaker, will you, and give Mrs. Jamieson another drink—I’ll make fresh ones before dinner.”
Aglaia got up and did as she was told, tipping three glasses of gin into the jug used for filling the shaker.
“Oh, won’t that be rather strong?” Julia exlaimed.
“Oh, p’raps it will—I’d better put in some more Vermouth.”
“But not the dark!” Julia protested. “Use the white French— and only one glass,” she added.
“So sorry—I always forget. I’m no good at making cocktails” Aglaia said plaintively. Julia got up and helped her, cutting some more lemon-peel to add to the brew before pouring it into the shaker; after agitating it for a moment or two she poured out a little and tasted it. “That’s all right” she said. “Give me your glass.”
“I’m sorry I vexed Penelope so much” the little thing said then. “I didn’t mean to. Only it did seem so funny, the boy wheezing, and not being able to see her till she was close to— just like the sheep! And moving his head about on the pillow. Of course the sheep had no pillows!” she said, with a small giggle, “but they might have had headaches too—they wouldn’t be able to tell us!”