From the Torrid Past

by Ann Cristy

  She followed him to an ancient Rolls-Royce that was in mint condition. It was like sitting in a living room to ride in the back seat.

  The road curved away from the dock area and out into the rocky countryside where goats and children roamed the hills. She frowned at the sight of battered donkeys, heads hanging in the burning heat. She had been told that Greeks could be most cavalier in their treatment of animals and not to interfere.

  "I'm telling you now, D'Arcy, leave well enough alone. Don't crusade in Greece or they'll toss you outta there," Gregson had admonished her.

  The road wound through rock strewn hills, then angled back toward the sea. The house was like a white pearl in green velvet, the lawns leading downward toward a rocky cliff that ended at a white beach. D'Arcy hoped she would have a chance to swim in that clear water.

  The heat hit like a hot fist after the air conditioning of the car. Blowing upward she tried to lift the damp hair from her forehead, but her hair had already tightened into more curl. She followed the taciturn driver into the house, carrying her camera bag, the film bags, and assorted equipment. He managed her bags easily and, unlike her, without perspiring.

  The front door was opened by a dragon of a woman, black hair going gray, scraped back into a bun. Her highly starched apron crackled and D'Arcy thought even the sound was disapproving. "Miklos tells us from the radio that you are not the right person. Madame may not let you stay." With that she turned on her heel and led D'Arcy across the black and white marbled foyer that was at least two stories high and had a. priceless crystal chandelier hanging from its center. The stairway curved in a half circle up one wall, to an open balcony that followed halfway around the foyer.

  D'Arcy looked down to see the pursed-lipped dragon holding open a mahogany carved door. She entered a large airy room with floor-to-ceiling windows now open to catch the sea breeze. The room was done in sea green and cream, with matching cushions on the couches and chairs and carved mahogany furniture everywhere. It was cluttered but warm and inviting, understated yet not formal.

  The woman who rose to her feet was diminutive, her piercing eyes belying the dainty bone structure. She too had black hair going gray pulled back in a bun. Her dress was black but of the finest silk, her shoes were plain and black but of a soft supple leather. She inclined her head, yet didn't offer her hand. After some moments of studying D'Arcy, she spoke, her voice oddly harsh. "My staff thinks I should drive you from the island, Miss... er...Kincaid." The voice was unaccented.

  "I'm sorry my editor didn't reach you, but I am qualified to interview you, Madame, and I have all my credentials right here." D'Arcy reached into her shoulder bag after setting down her camera equipment and proffered the papers.

  Reluctantly the woman took them, scanned them, then gave a minute shrug. "All right you may stay, but if I decide that you are not what I want, you will go and there will be no interview. Is that understood? Sit down, Miss Kincaid, we will have coffee and you will tell me about yourself."

  D'Arcy took a deep breath, throwing a quick glance around the room to see if the redoubtable Miklos was poised to throw her out the door. Her first answers to Madame were stilted and fragmented as she struggled to keep her composure.

  Madame Davos fired question after question, making D'Arcy feel as though she were the one to be interviewed. By the time Madame rose, signaling the end of the meeting, D'Arcy's hands were slick with moisture and the inside of her mouth was bone dry.

  "Dinner will be at eight o'clock, Miss... ah Mrs. Kincaid. You should have told me that you were married .. ."—Madame looked disapproving—"... rather than let me find out when you tell me that you have a son. In Greece we are proud of family life."

  "We are proud of family life in my country as well, Madame Davos." D'Arcy lifted her chin.

  The older woman shrugged and turned away. D'Arcy was sure that she didn't believe her.

  She exhaled deeply as she closed the mahogany door behind her and stepped into the hall.

  Maria, the dragon, stood there like a watch dog, waiting only to catch D'Arcy's eye. Then she tilted her head toward the stairway.

  No words were spoken as D'Arcy was escorted to her room by the grim-faced Maria, but she was too wrung out to care. She felt as though she had gone through a police grilling after answering all Madame's questions. Some of the questions that the older woman had asked about her family were too personal and for that reason she had not divulged to Madame Davos that Kincaid was her maiden name.

  Maria opened the door to the room, then to the connecting bathroom.

  D'Arcy wanted to ask the woman if, after tonight, she would be expected to take her meals on a tray in her room as she suspected, but the older woman seemed loath to linger, so D'Arcy said nothing.

  When she was alone she walked to the floor-to-ceiling windows and looked out over the expanse of lawn. Madame had told her that a nephew would be joining them for dinner and that he, too, would be asking her questions. D'Arcy sighed, wondering what other questions he could ask.

  She looked around her at the pale turquoise of the walls and ceiling, then went into the bathroom that echoed the same color in floor-to-ceiling tiles. Even the recessed tub, the shower stall, and vanity were in the same aqua hue.

  She indulged herself in a bubble bath in the round tub, feeling like a princess when the bubbles covered her body up to her neck.

  When she padded back to her room, she couldn't help but admire the handcrafted carpet in greenish blue, the handloomed bedspread a lovely match.

  She stood at the French doors that opened onto a narrow balcony and watched the sea darken, noticing idly that there was a sleek black Ferrari in the drive. Her lip curled with distaste as she thought of the poor people on Keros and the ostentation of the Davos family.

  A glance at the time told D'Arcy she would have to hurry. The dress she picked was 3 shirtwaist in raw silk, the aqua color a shade lighter than her eyes. The pleats were inverted, giving it a more tailored look until she moved, when the material flared about her shapely legs. Her sandals were straps of whitish green leather. She was an avid Third Avenue shopper in Manhattan and had found both a dressmaker and a shoemaker that were skillful and not too expensive. At the last moment, she slung a small camera over her shoulder and hurried from the room, her heels making a tapping sound on the marble parquet of the first floor foyer.

  She hesitated outside the sitting room, taking a deep breath.

  "You should not be listening outside the door." Maria remonstrated, startling D'Arcy so much that she almost lost her camera.

  "For your information I was not eavesdropping," D'Arcy said, flustered, having the strongest desire to point her tongue at the woman whose lip curled with disapproval. Instead she sailed past her into the room, her momentum carrying her almost to where Madame Davos sat talking to someone D'Arcy assumed was the nephew. The man had his back to her but she could see his head over the high backed chair. For a moment as she looked at the gleaming chestnut hair, there was a roaring in her ears.

  She stopped dead as she saw Madame's eyes lift toward her. The man must have seen the look because he rose from his chair and turned toward the door in one easy movement.

  The shock that registered in those tawny eyes was echoed in her own, D'Arcy knew, but his was more quickly masked. D'Arcy turned to look at Madame, saw her lips move but didn't know what the other woman said. It took every bit of strength she had not to turn and run from the room, escape the house, fly away at once.

  Had she conjured him up because she was thinking of him today?

  "Mrs. Kincaid? Are you ill? You are very pale. Have you been drinking the water? Mrs. Kincaid?" Madame's voice was even more harsh.

  "What? No, I haven't been drinking the water," D'Arcy answered through waxen lips. "I'm fine." She stood there, hands at her sides, feeling as though she was in a tumbrel cart going to the guillotine.

  "Well, then come over here and meet my nephew, Keele Petrakis. He manages all my businesses." Madame
said this in an amused alert way as though waiting for a reaction from D'Arcy. None came. Madame frowned, her irritation evident as D'Arcy continued to stand there. "He is my heir and the director of all my firms."

  "I see," D'Arcy muttered, her eyes glazed.

  Keele Petrakis walked toward her, his hand outstretched. D'Arcy looked at the hand as though it were a hooded cobra. She had to take a deep breath before she lifted her fingers to touch the tips of his. When she would have drawn away, he grasped her hand and lifted it to his mouth. D'Arcy saw the way Madame's head snapped around to observe this, saw Madame's lips tighten before Keele's broad shoulders blocked her view.

  "Look at me, D'Arcy. Look at me." His voice grated like shards of steel.

  "No." The sound barely made it through her stiff lips.

  "You will look at me." His teeth nipped at the soft skin of her inner wrist.

  "What are you doing, Keele? What are you saying to Mrs. Kincaid? Do you know her? Did you know her husband?" The querulous voice turned Keele back to face his aunt.

  He pulled D'Arcy with him, his hand now at her waist. He led her to a chair and all but pushed her into it. "Yes, Anna, I know Mrs. Kincaid and yes, I knew her husband." He gestured to his aunt to resume her seat, then he sat in a chair near D'Arcy. He took a case from his inner pocket, extracted a cigar, then touched a pencil-slim lighter to the tip.

  It surprised D'Arcy to see a slight tremor in the hand holding the lighter. When she looked at his face, it was a mask.

  Madame Davos shifted in her chair, her frown more pronounced as she looked again at D'Arcy. "You did not tell me that you knew my nephew. I do not like that." She pushed both hands in a smoothing motion down her lap as though she would thrust D'Arcy from her. "I do not want people around me who dissemble. I think..."

  Before Madame could continue, Keele blew a stream of smoke into the air. "D'Arcy did not know that I am related to you, Anna. She knows nothing about my family." He turned his head, the chestnut hair catching a glint from the lit candles on the mantel. It was too warm for a fire, but D'Arcy would soon discover that Madame always had candlelight no matter how warm it was. The look on Keele's face held a veiled menace. "As I know nothing about her family. I knew her first husband, not this Kincaid."

  D'Arcy opened her mouth to answer when Maria entered the room, her slash of a mouth turned upward in the semblance of a smile, surprising D'Arcy. A very lovely woman accompanied her. To D'Arcy she looked like a magnificent magazine cover. Glossy, slick, touched up to perfection, her black hair was in a flawless coil, her brows black and arched, her skin matte white, the red of her lipstick matching her nails. Shoes, bag, and dress were the same black as her hair.

  When Keele rose, took her in his arms, and kissed the pouting upturned mouth, D'Arcy felt as though her insides had been cauterized by a hot poker. His smile was lazy and intimate as he looked down at the woman before turning her toward D'Arcy. "Elena, let me introduce you to the woman who has come to interview Anna. This is D'Arcy Kincaid. D'Arcy, this is Elena Arfos, an old friend of our family."

  "Darling, how formal you are!" Elena made a moue. "I feel that I'm closer than that to you." She broke into a spate of Greek that had Keele laughing and Madame Davos tittering in an indulgent way.

  D'Arcy squirmed in her chair, certain that they were talking about her. An amused glance from golden eyes confirmed it in her mind.

  "D'Arcy doesn't speak Greek, Elena. Speak English, please," he coaxed, putting his arm about the tiny brunette and leading her to a chair.

  "D'Arcy?" Elena cooed, draping the folds of her dress before crossing, her ankles. "Are you on a first-name basis with employees so quickly, Keele? You never used to be so open with the help." She accepted a glass from his hand, looking into his face.

  D'Arcy bristled, wanting to upend the drink on that shining chignon. Before Keele could reply, she responded. "How sweet of you to be so democratic, Miss Arfos, but I assure you that I am not part of the help in this household." She rose to her feet setting down her own glass. "Madame Davos, you have already shown a marked displeasure toward me, but I tell you now, I will not be insulted by anyone, nor in any house. I'm sorry not to get this interview, perhaps someone else will have more luck. I'll leave on the ferry tomorrow. Good night. Thank you for your hospitality. I had always heard about Greek hospitality. Now I've experienced it." She saw two circles of red on Madame's cheeks and D'Arcy was sorry about that. She had not wanted to embarrass Madame, but she had vowed after Rudy's death she would take no abuse, verbal or otherwise, from anyone. She felt it was the only way to protect her son, to show him how to grow straight and strong.

  She was through the door and at the bottom of the stairs when the hand grasped her arm hard.

  "Where the hell do you get off speaking like that in my aunt's house?" Keele gritted the angry question through clenched teeth. His eyes shone like just-mined ore.

  "Take your hand off me. You're not my boss. And you can keep your damned bad mannered family, too," D'Arcy spat at him, trying in vain to pry the fingers from her arm.

  "We're bad mannered? That's a laugh," he barked, tightening his grip as she scratched at his wrist. "What the hell do you call that performance in there?" He jerked his head toward the sitting room.

  D'Arcy could see Maria standing, arms folded in the entrance hall. "Why don't you tell that creature at the keyhole to get lost and I'll tell you?" D'Arcy all but shouted, glaring at the open-mouthed Maria.

  Keele's head swiveled around and rapid Greek was hissed from his lips. Maria looked incensed, but she retreated with an angry swish of skirts and petticoats.

  "You or no one else is going to speak to me in that condescending, nasty way. That's what I'm telling you and you can bloody well do your worst if you don't like it," D'Arcy sputtered, feeling the tightness in her throat, but fighting. "I am never going to take that again." She pronounced the words like a lesson in phonics, sounding out each syllable. "I can always find another job, too." She wrenched her arm free, her body heaving as she fought to control herself.

  He stared at her, his eyes on a level with hers, because she was standing on the first step. Those golden eyes riveted her as though they entered her brain, picked it, and retreated.

  With a shuddering gulp, D'Arcy tried to keep her voice steady. "Tell your aunt that I'm not hungry and I will be out of the house in the morning." She wheeled and ran up the stairs, not stopping until she reached her room. She threw herself on the bed, shoving her face into the pillow, forcing her tears to dry inside. She had not cried since she had lived with Rudy. She wouldn't start now.

  She had no idea how long she lay there until the restless sleep took her, but the nightmares were there almost at once.

  Rudy came at her, his face outsize, grotesque, the eyes and nose protuberant and mean. She wanted to fight back, but fear kept her immobile as he kept coming down that long dark corridor, kept coming and coming until finally he struck her again and again. She woke as usual bathed in sweat, pink dawn replacing gray night light. She rose, showered and packed, and sat waiting for eight o'clock when she would start her walk to the dock to pick up the ferry at nine-thirty.

  The knock at her door startled her.

  "Come in."

  Maria stepped over the threshold. "The kyrie requests that you join him for breakfast. He asked me to unpack your bags, if you will let me. He say that Madame will join us for lunch and that the interview will begin then." The older woman straightened and looked at D'Arcy for the first time. "I can tell you what Madame Davos likes to eat." The woman stared at D'Arcy, as though she wasn't taking a breath.

  D'Arcy released the handle of her camera case and nodded. "Thank you, Maria, I would like to know what Madame's preferences in food are."

  The woman inclined her head and gestured for D'Arcy to precede her.

  D'Arcy rubbed her hands over her forearms and walked past the woman and down the stairs, feeling Maria close behind her.

  "The kyrie is waiting on the ter
race. I will show you." She wasn't smiling, but D'Arcy sensed that she had unbent somewhat. She couldn't help but wonder what had been said last night after she had gone to her room.

  Keele was sitting at a metal and glass table on a matching scrollwork metal chair. The terrace was a convex portion of stone and tile that reached out over a lush garden, giving a view of turquoise sea. The sunlight glinted on his chestnut hair, showing far more reddish highlights than she had noticed before. He rose at her hesitant approach across the tile, his face unsmiling, his hand going to the chair beside him to pull it back and usher her into it. "Good morning. You must be hungry, not having had your dinner last night. I have ordered you an American breakfast of French toast, sausage, orange juice, and of course eggs over easy. I'm afraid you will have to accustom yourself to our coffee."

  D'Arcy looked at him, mouth agape. "I never eat breakfast," she said in fading accents. "I am hungry now, but I could never eat so much."

  "You should eat more. Before you were too thin, too tense," he growled, though his hand was steady on the silver coffee pot. "What in Hell made you jump into marriage so quickly after being married to a swine like Alessio? Don't you learn? Anna says you have a child, a son." He spit the words from his mouth as though they were rough stones. 'Tell me about them."

  "I'm a widow." D'Arcy decided at that moment that she would volunteer no more information about herself. It wasn't safe to do so to Keele Petrakis.

  His head snapped up and he lowered the silver pot to the table in slow motion, not taking his eyes from D'Arcy. "Poor luck all around, isn't it?" His tones were dry, his eyes flicking over her like a laser, as though he would disassemble her mind.

  "If you say so." D'Arcy cut a small square of French toast and popped it into her mouth, the taste of the syrup surprising her. She looked in question at Keele.

  "No, it isn't our famous honey. It's maple syrup from your state of New York. I thought you would prefer it."