by Averil Ives
It was, therefore, somewhat of a surprise to Mrs. Duveen when the extremely aristocratic Dona Amelie de Manzanares extended her invitation to Josie, as well as the other members of the villa house party. And when Josie made a point of seeking her out to ask whether she approved of her accepting the invitation or not, Mrs. Duveen hardly knew how to reply.
It seemed unnecessary, to her, that the girl should accompany them. Michael and Dona Maria, the marquis and Sylvia Petersen, were just right, but an unescorted young woman was not right. However, Luis de Manzanares might be invited to act as a partner for her just for the evening, and it would look odd in that case if she didn’t turn up.
“I don’t see why you shouldn’t accept,” she said, as she inspected the effects of the new face lotion she had been working into her skin. “Dona Amelie might take it a little amiss if you refused, and I expect you have something suitable to wear?”
The way she uttered the word “suitable” carried with it the inference that it would not be suitable according to her standards, but if it was neat and correct it would pass muster.
“I have a black cocktail dress I haven’t worn to far,” Josie answered. “I’m afraid,” she apologized, “you’re becoming rather familiar with my only two evening dresses.”
“The green and the white?” Mrs. Duveen nodded, patting a delicately perfumed cream into her cheeks. “Your wardrobe is a little bit limited, isn’t it? But for anyone in your position it isn’t too limited. A cocktail frock is a little informal, however, so if I were you I’d wear the white.”
But on the way to Dona Amelie’s Mrs. Duveen wasn’t at all sure that she had been wise when she recommended Josie to wear the white. It fell in graceful folds to the silver sandals that peeped below it, and the close-fitting bodice was draped, so that Josie’s slender figure was made the most of. In order to introduce just a touch of color, she wore a stole of palest flamingo pink about her smooth shoulders, and a neat row of pearls was her only ornament. Mrs. Duveen felt vexed to note how the flamingo pink caused an echo of color to appear on the delicate cheeks that were otherwise just a trifle too pale for white, and the large, extraordinarily clear brown eyes looked positively luminous under the unusual bright-tipped lashes.
She would have been wiser to have recommended the green, she thought, especially as the girl had been ill recently, and green was trying color when you were not yet a hundred per cent fit. And Michael might not have stared so hard when he handed her into the car if she had worn the green.
But Michael not only stared, he whispered to Josie as he helped to tuck her skirts in around her ankles: “You’re looking marvellous, Josie! I hope you’re somewhere quite close to me at dinner.”
The smile he gave her was almost tender—and that in spite of the fact that Dona Maria, superb in oyster satin and some outsize rubies, was waiting for him to join her in her own cream-colored coupe. But Josie thought she understood Michael fairly well by this time. He wasn’t quite certain what he wanted, but one day he would make up his mind and in the meantime someone could get hurt. But it was extremely unlikely to be herself, for she was proof against any of Michael’s English-Irish charm. She was insulated and protected by the armour of her hopeless love for another man—a man with an entirely different kind of English-Spanish charm.
And she always thought of him as a Spaniard in any case. There seemed little of the Englishman about him.
The marquis had gone ahead in his long black limousine with Sylvia. Mrs. Duveen and Josie had an almost equally luxurious car to themselves.
When they arrived at Dona Amelie’s Josie was surprised to find the marquis waiting to help them alight from their car. For the first time he was wearing severe black-and-white evening dress, and she thought it became him, if anything, more than the white dinner jacket in which she was now accustomed to seeing him. The black tails and the white tie—they were so dignified, and so formal, and they somehow matched perfectly with his personality. He said quietly but clearly, as she very nearly stumbled as she stepped from the car: “Be careful! A sprained ankle on top of your recent chill would be too much.”
And then he lifted his eyes and looked at her, and she felt her heart turn over. It was—it must be admiration that she saw in his eyes, and behind the admiration there seemed to be a little light that flickered strangely. It was just as if a tiny lamp were glowing in the midst of darkness.
And then Dona Amelie came tap-tapping across the floor of her hall, and Josie went hurrying to be greeted, and to offer thanks for her invitation.
Dona Amelie said, actually touching her cheek: “Tut, tut, child! Why shouldn’t I invite you? Didn’t I tell you I wanted to see you again?”
The evening was the sort of evening Josie knew she would never forget, because she had never experienced anything quite like it before. At the marquis’s villa there was elegance, and opulence, and a lavish if restrained display of wealth, but Dona Amelie’s dinner party was quite a regal affair. She might have been a queen in her diamonds and her velvet, as she sat at the head of her table, and in spite of her great age she was carefully, if a little heavily, made up. The table itself was massed with white flowers. Candles flickered in ornate silver candlesticks, wine glowed ruby-red in glass that looked so thin and exquisite it could shatter at a touch, and the table mats were all of priceless lace. There were several other guests at the long table, and the women all wore black that was entirely unrelieved save by the most expensive jewellery, and the men were extremely correct.
Don Luis was not amongst them, which surprised Josie as well as Mrs. Duveen. Josie was escorted in to dinner by an elderly man whom, however, she found almost excessively attentive, and very easy to get on with.
At a signal from the hostess the ladies rose and left the men to the many decanters that were placed upon the table, and once inside the great drawing room tea was brought in on a completely noiseless trolley. The china was so beautiful and so fragile, that Josie wanted to praise it aloud, but she knew that that would have shattered Mrs. Duveen, who imagined she knew all there was to know about correct behaviour on occasions such as this. But once again she was to be surprised when the hostess invited Josie to preside at the trolley and pour out, while the maid handed round the cups. And once everyone was served, including herself, Josie did venture to remark on the beauty of the ware.
Dona Amelie’s handsome dark eyes—very like the dark eyes of her nephew the marquis—smiled at her.
“You like lovely things, do you, child?” she suggested. “Then in this house there are many that you would appreciate, and many more in my house in Madrid. It is my weakness to collect them and surround myself with them—especially the old as well as the beautiful. One day you and I must examine some of them, and I will tell you a little of their history.”
It was just as if her old eyes were promising that that should really take place, and Josie—who knew it could never happen, because she had made up her mind that she must go home soon now that Michael no longer really needed her—felt her heart expand, and her whole inner being grow warm, for just a few seconds until the talk became general.
Then, when a little group of elderly women—including Mrs. Duveen—formed themselves about the hostess, she managed to make her escape to one of the tall windows which opened outwards into the usual patio.
It was a brilliant night, and quite warm considering that for the past week and more there had often been a severe nip in the air once the sun had set. Josie wanted to get outside the room before the men joined them again and one of them found it necessary to sit beside her and entertain her. Her elderly partner at dinner had been charming, but she felt that he had been detailed to look after her, and somehow it was not a reassuring sensation to feel that an arrangement had had to be made to ensure that she was not left lonely and neglected.
Michael would inevitably gravitate to the side of Dona Maria, and Sylvia would see to it that the marquis was quickly chained to her side. For one instant, as Josie pushed op
en the window a little wider, and stepped into the patio, she wished that Don Luis had been one of the guests, because at least she felt at her ease with him, and it would have not seemed unnatural that he should seek her out.
The patio was dark, but the stars were like lamps overhead, and the tail end of a late rising moon hung in the sky. It was already after midnight, for in Spain the best society dines late, and the dinner just ended had been an affair of a great many courses. Josie realized that there was a chill in the air—the sort of chill that follows upon the twelve strokes announcing the witching hour—and the smell of the sea was strong. It was an exciting smell, that salty tang, and underlying it was the scent of the roses that went on blooming.
Josie could feel the flowers reaching out and touching her face as she found her way along the narrow paths in the caressing darkness. She came to a kind of little terrace raised high above the sea, and stood looking out across the dark surface of the slightly restless water, highlighted here and there with little gleams of phosphorescence, and the pale sheen of starshine. A red light flashed across her face, and she realized it was from the lighthouse on the point not far away, and almost immediately afterwards she thought she saw an answering flash far out at sea.
She gripped at the low parapet in front of her, formed of small boulders placed one upon the other, with rock-plants growing in the crevices, and suddenly a sensation of utter forlornness and despair took hold of her. She would have to say goodbye to all this before long. She would have to! She would have to exchange the warmth, and the color, and the sunshine—these breathless, starlit nights—for the starched efficiency of Chessington House, the day-to-day routine, the drab streets that surrounded the nursing home, the noise of taxicabs, and the endless odour of petrol fumes. For, although she knew that the marquis had invited the Duveens to accompany him to Madrid, when he returned there in a week or so’s time, that invitation couldn’t possibly include her. There was no longer the excuse that Michael needed her. He could get on excellently without a nurse, and, in any case, it was best for her to go—and to go soon.
She had told the marquis that she would go home as soon as she was well, and although he had spoken of a period of convalescence, that was nonsense. She didn’t need any convalescence. What she needed was to get back to sanity, to reality, and the knowledge that what was intended for the Sylvia Petersens of this world could never be intended for her.
She gripped harder at the parapet, so that a piece of rough rock hurt her finger. She didn’t want the things Sylvia Petersen accepted as her due, but she did want she would always now crave for—the presence of one man.
It was frightening: the thought of how badly, in her empty future, she would go on wanting and needing just one man’s quiet gentle voice and deep, black velvet look; his sudden smile; the gentle inquiry when his eyebrows shot upwards; the sight of his one hand gripping a chair arm; the feel of his heart beating strongly against her when he carried her all the way up a curving staircase.
She put a hand up over her mouth as if to still a little cry of pain, and then she heard footsteps crunching sharply on the gravel behind her.
She turned almost in a panic as the marquis’s voice called out to her sharply: “Josie! Where is your sense that you come out here without a wrap? Do you wish to catch another chill...?”
He came up swiftly behind her, and she felt him drop something over her shoulders—something so deliciously warm, and soft, and scented, that it caused her to shiver with sudden pleasure. As she drew it gratefully around her she recognized the feel of fur—mink, or sable, lined with silk. Surprise rendered her dumb for a few seconds before she managed: “Whose—whose is it?”
“My aunt’s, he replied, tersely. “I asked her maid to fetch me something for you.”
“For—me?” She could hardly believe her ears. “Then you came out specially to look for me?”
“Of course.”
There was silence between them while the red light from the lighthouse described its sweeping arc again, and an incoming wave on the beach below uncurled itself upon the sand with a noise like muted thunder. Josie inhaled the perfume of her fur cape—a scent like crushed sandalwood—and looked upwards into the dark face of the man who stood so close to her.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
He took her hand. She felt his fingers close over hers in the darkness, and he drew her away from the terrace.
“There is an arbour just here,” he said, “and I would like to talk to you.”
She followed him into the arbour, and he indicated a rustic bench. There was just light enough for them to see one another’s faces, and when they were seated he offered her his cigarette case, but she refused.
“You do not often smoke?” he said.
“No, I—don’t.” She felt as if there was a constriction in her throat, and her whole body was trembling a little, as if she really had become a trifle chilled.
“You don’t behave like a very modern young woman,” he told her—“not a very English modern young woman. In some ways you remind me of our own women.”
Which told her that he regarded himself as a Spaniard. She could see the glowing tip of his cigarette, and the strange scent of it reached her—the strange scent that was unlike that of any English cigarette she had ever known, and the very foreignness of it affected her oddly. She knew that he was looking straight at her, and after a little pause he requested! “Tell me about yourself ... Do you realize that I know nothing at all about you? The sort of home you come from, the kind of background that is peculiarly your own, the things you like to do above all others, the way you would live your life if you could choose! You are like a closed book, and I would be grateful if you would turn the pages.”
At first she felt it was impossible even to start telling him about herself, and then somehow she found the courage to get started, and went on with naturalness and ease.
She told him about her father, who was a farmer—or had been a farmer in Yorkshire, for the better part of his life. It had been his ambition to be an artist, but his father had frowned on the idea, and so he had stuck to the land. Recently he had retired and bought a little house near London, and Josie saw them more often. She had an older brother, and a married sister, and another sister who was young and lovely and studying music. The whole family hoped great things for her. There was also a small brother at boarding school.
“And you?” Carlos asked quietly, still watching her. “What do your parents hope for for you?”
“Why—why, nothing very much.” She smiled up at him swiftly, as if surprised. “I’m just a nurse—I took up nursing because it appealed to me. I love it. I shall go on with it.”
“Will you?”
“Yes; of course.”
“You don’t think you’ll give it up to get married?”
“I—I don’t think I shall ever marry!”
He seemed to be digesting this reply, for while she sat staring at some lights that twinkled through the trees, somewhere far away above the denuded vineyards, he sat in silence, his cigarette smouldering away as if he had forgotten it between his fingers. And then he surprised her by saying in an odd voice: “You tell me that you have a sister who is very lovely. She must be very lovely indeed, if she outshines you in any way.”
Josie felt the tension, that had disappeared for a short while, filling the little arbour like something that not only pressed on her, but was waiting for her to make an unwary move, or say something that would give her away to him hopelessly—in the way she dreaded. In the way that, simply must not occur. And she made the only move she could make. She pretended to shiver suddenly, and stood up and announced that she would like to return to the house.
“Of course.” He stood up at once beside her, but she could feel his eyes gazing down at her, searchingly, and just a little perplexed. “You feel that it is impertinent for me to pay you compliments,” he said, with a mere suggestion of stiffness.
“No, no! Of course n
ot.” But she knew that she had to get away from him quickly, or any further compliments would find their way under her guard, and she moved swiftly towards the entrance to the arbour, forgetting that a short flight of steps led down to the level of the terrace. Only a miracle and his arm that came out with one lightning-like move prevented her from missing the top step and falling flat on her face in the darkness, and as she was fastened protectively to his side the marquis said something that sounded very Spanish.
Very Spanish, and completely horrified.
And then, as soon as his mind started working in English again, he added: “You might have injured yourself badly. It was my fault for not warning you about these steps.”
“But you saved me from falling down them.”
Her voice sounded breathless, and her whole body was being shaken by the violent pounding of her heart as she lay against him, held more securely than she had ever been held by any human arm in her life, and the wonder of it made her feel a little faint. She wasn’t in the least concerned because she had narrowly missed falling down the steps, but that he should have caught her so promptly, and that he went on holding her, were two things that played havoc with her normally excellent power of subjecting herself to control. She felt as if something inside her had suddenly become heedless and indifferent to aught but the blissful contact of the moment, and when his arm tightened its hold she turned her face towards him a little as if she would bury it for protection against him.
He looked down at her, and she could feel his breath stirring her hair, and a note in his voice shook her to her foundations.
“You poor child,” he said, as he had said once before, “life is treating you very harshly these days.”
“Oh, no,” she protested, in a barely audible voice. “It was just that I was careless.”
“I wasn’t referring only to what nearly happened to you just now, or to your recent illness. I was referring to—well, other things.”