The Summer of the Spanish Woman

by Catherine Gaskin

  ‘Equally, Marquesa, she cannot be permitted her freedom. You may, of your generosity, be able to forgive her the murder of your niece, but the law will say that, at the least, she must be prevented from doing the same thing again. If she feels herself persecuted, as is obvious from her strange remarks about Lady Blodmore, who knows what she will do next? It is not, I repeat, a matter for the military.’

  ‘She must be confined; certainly, Colonel. The tragedy must never be repeated. It will need several doctors to certify that she is insane ‒ doctors who have observed her behaviour over the years. We have tried to avoid this extreme measure. She has an exaggerated horror of being “shut up” as she calls it. But obviously her mental condition has deteriorated to an extent none of us realised. You heard that quite unrelated remark about a rose garden. Pure imagination. Poor soul. You should have known her when she first came to Jerez, Colonel … What a woman she was then …’ It was hard to believe it was the Marquesa speaking.

  The Colonel looked helplessly from the Marquesa to me, and then to Richard, who had returned and was standing in the doorway slumped against the frame.

  ‘What am I to do then? I cannot put her in gaol. It would be unthinkable in the circumstances. The gaols are overflowing with Republican murderers. Coming from a family such as yours, Lady Patricia would be in danger of being harmed ‒ perhaps in danger of her life from them. And as for the usual places such unfortunates are sent … well, they no longer exist. The nuns have been driven from all their institutions. The Church is no longer permitted to engage in such charitable activities. Naturally all that will be restored when we have established the proper order again, but in the meantime we are in a state of war, and conditions are extreme. I can think of no place where I can reasonably send her.’

  ‘With your permission, of course, Colonel … after the doctors have given their testimony. After the facts have been noted and the depositions taken. After all that, I could pledge you that she would be put in a safe place of confinement where she can hurt no one. I have a castle ‒ a fortress, really, at Arcos. Perhaps you have heard of it? There, I assure you, she would be quite safe, and unable to escape. You may satisfy yourself on all these conditions. We, the family, would be responsible for her until such times as conditions return to normal.’

  For a while the Colonel said nothing, he sat sipping his brandy, smoking, trying to rid himself of this awkward problem. ‘Perhaps I should consult with General Queipo … though with all he has on his hands at this moment he won’t thank me to trouble him with civilian matters.’

  ‘Need we trouble him, Colonel? You are in charge here. It is obvious that one cannot condemn a madwoman to death. Spain has not reached that point. It will be understood that my family bears enough sorrow in the death of my niece without the additional horror of such an action. No ‒ it is unthinkable. Arcos, I believe, is the answer …’

  The old cracked voice went on, making the plans, smoothing the way. The Colonel was nodding; the smoke from his cigarette half obscuring his face. He seemed almost mesmerised by the Marquesa’s voice, the compelling, undeniable logic of what she argued, and persuaded him to. I slipped past Richard. He would remain there to reinforce whatever the Marquesa said, and Tomás’s name would not be mentioned. But my mother … It couldn’t have happened, and yet it had. My mother had killed Elena. As I climbed the stairs I heard again and again the terrible words of sentence for her crime. ‘I have a castle at Arcos …’ My mother would take the place of the woman who had inhabited it before her.

  I found her in bed, Maria Luisa seated beside her. She was propped up on her pillows, wearing a white lawn nightgown, edged with lace. Her hair had been brushed, and lay smoothly on her shoulders. It was now completely silver, and one could no longer see the white streak that had appeared so dramatically after her accident. In the soft light she looked beautiful again, and perfectly serene. She smiled at me. A glass with a little brandy left in it was on the table beside her. Maria Luisa gave me the chair closest to her. My mother stretched out her hand and took mine.

  ‘There you are, darling. I’ve been waiting for you. Everything’s going to be all right now, isn’t it? She won’t interfere in our lives any more, will she? She’s gone, and we can have peace now. Only you won’t let them shut me up, will you, Charlie? You always promised me that.’

  I stroked her hand. ‘You must try to sleep, Mother. It’s going to be all right.’

  ‘Yes … all right. I know it will be all right. You would never let them shut me up. I’d rather die than be shut up.’ I sat there, holding her hand, in an agony of love and sorrow. I could not weep; I could say nothing. I thought of the promise, so often given, and never, I had believed, to be honoured. Gradually, the pressure of her hand in mine relaxed. Her eyes were closed and she was breathing deeply.

  Maria Luisa touched my shoulder. ‘Leave her now, querida. She is sleeping. She will not wake.’

  * *

  Outside in the passage I leaned against the wall. I was sweating again. Maria Luisa pressed her handkerchief into my hand, and I wiped my face.

  ‘What, in God’s name, am I to do?’

  Down below I heard Richard’s voice in the hall, the Colonel’s voice; I heard Dr Ramírez’s voice. Then the noise of the motor, and someone calling to the guards.

  ‘So ‒ the Colonel leaves, and Ramírez has come,’ Maria Luisa said. ‘What is going to happen?’

  I told her quickly how the Marquesa had explained Elena’s request to the Colonel, and what the Marquesa proposed to do with my mother. ‘She believes she is doing the best she can ‒ and I suppose it is the best. But it’s the same as shutting my mother in prison. She will have no freedom. After what she has done, they will turn it into a prison, up there on that rock. She’ll not ride again … not do anything again. She won’t see her grandchildren. And I promised her, Maria Luisa. So often I promised ‒ but I never thought it would be a promise I would have to keep. Why did she do it? She really must be … mad. There’s no other word. She must be quite mad.’

  ‘I believe myself, querida, that she never had a saner moment. She knew exactly what she was doing at the time. She meant to prevent Elena telling the Colonel about Tomás and the guns, and she achieved that. We have imagined her sitting in a fog of drink, but she heard and knew everything. She knew Tomás was in danger. She had to stop Elena. She told me she heard her speaking on the telephone to the Colonel’s aide, asking for the Colonel to come. The gun-room was locked, but she remembered where she could find a weapon. She was quite ready when the Colonel came. It is, perhaps, a mercy that it was not the Colonel who received the bullet. The military would hardly overlook that.’

  ‘But does she think there will be no punishment? Does she really understand that she has killed Elena? She hasn’t just stopped her from talking about Tomás. She has killed her.’ Maria Luisa shook her head. ‘That part I do not know. She expects to be looked after, as she has always been looked after. You know how quickly she changes. One moment able to understand everything perfectly. Able to plan, to see ahead. The next it is all gone. She is back in her fog. But she trusts and loves us, querida. And she counted on your promise.’

  ‘Which I cannot keep.’

  ‘It is kept, querida. I have seen to that. I told you she will not wake. That is the exact truth. She will not wake.’

  I gripped her arm, and she winced. ‘Please, querida. Not so hard.’ I released her.

  ‘What have you done?’

  ‘I gave her the medicine Ramírez gave me. All of it ‒ in the brandy. She will not wake.’

  ‘That ‒ that tonic? What can that do?’

  ‘Morphine is a very powerful tonic, querida. It was for the pain. There is nothing Ramírez or any other doctor could do for me, except to give me morphine against the pain. More and more of it. In the dose I gave her, along with the brandy, it is lethal. She will never be shut up, querida. The promise is kept.’

  ‘The pain … Maria Luisa, what are you saying
?’

  She held up her hand as if to dismiss the question. ‘I have only a few more weeks, at most. Perhaps not even that long. A little lump in the breast.’ She shrugged. ‘Who wants to bother with such things? By the time I went to Ramírez there were other lumps, in other places. He said I should go into hospital. They could try. He didn’t hold out much hope. So … well, I am too old to let them start cutting me up. What difference would it have made for just a little extra time? I preferred to die in my own way, in my own time. So I took his tonic, and delayed as long as possible the moment when I would have to take to bed. I forbade him to speak to you of it. But I am happy that, in the end, I have been able to serve you. I have kept your promise for you, querida. You have been my life, my beloved child. All these years … I was an old maid, and you gave me a family. You have loved me, I know. And I … I hope I have been, finally, of service.’

  I clasped her to me, careful now that I didn’t hold her too tightly. She was so frail and thin; I could feel the fluttering beat of her heart, like a frightened bird one holds in one’s hand. The tears were hot on my cheeks.

  ‘How am I to lose you both?’

  She gently disengaged herself. ‘Where there is love, querida, nothing is lost forever. I will go now and sit with her, and pray to God that He understands. He should understand the way love works, He should understand the way love goes, shouldn’t He, Charlie? The things it is sometimes necessary to do out of love? Who but God would understand better. I do not fear His judgement.’ She turned the handle of my mother’s door softly. ‘Do not tell the Marquesa or Lord Blodmore until Ramírez has gone. It would be his duty to try to revive her, and that would only be distressing, and would not work. So let her go peacefully. In the morning she simply will not wake.’

  * *

  I stayed with the Marquesa while Ramírez examined Elena. The Colonel, she said, had taken the little pistol. Ramírez came into the dining-room and signed the certificate in our presence. ‘A most unfortunate business,’ he said. ‘And Lady Patricia?’ he added. ‘May I do anything for her ?’

  ‘She is asleep,’ I answered. ‘You know how easily she sleeps when she has had a lot to drink. Maria Luisa is with her.’

  He closed his bag. ‘I will come in the morning again. I will see her in the morning.’ I thought he looked at me very closely, as if he discerned too much in my too-quiet words. But he said nothing more, asked no more questions. He had kept a great many secrets for this family. He would keep this last one until the morning.

  When he left in the car the Colonel had sent back to collect him, I told the Marquesa and Richard what Maria Luisa had done.

  After a long silence the Marquesa nodded her head. ‘It is well. It took great courage to perform such an act, but she has done all she could do for this family. She has done well.’

  II

  I sat with my mother as long as she breathed. It was peaceful; there was no struggle. As Maria Luisa had said, she simply did not wake.

  Then in the dawn I went down and found Richard and the Marquesa together. They were drinking coffee. The cigarette butts in the ashtray indicated how the night had gone. The Marquesa’s personal servant, who had also waited through the night, brought fresh coffee. Although the day already promised heat, I shivered, and was grateful for the warmth of the liquid. Richard looked ill and tired and old. He was a man well on in his fifties. We were young lovers on the shore no more.

  ‘I have told the Marquesa,’ he said, ‘that you and I will marry as soon as possible. I will take you and Luisa to Clonmara.’

  I shook my head. ‘Marriage will come when it does, Richard. And you will take Luisa to safety ‒ to Clonmara. But you know that I cannot go.’

  ‘Will you tell me, in God’s name, why not? What will keep you here now?’

  ‘I have sons, Richard. I have sons who fight on opposite sides of this war. My senses tell me that it will not be over quickly. My senses tell me the Republicans will resist the Army to the last bullet and bomb, and it will be long and agonising. Many will die. Perhaps some of my sons will die. But while they fight, on whatever side, I must be here. I must hold the centre. I am neither Left nor Right. I am their mother. This is their world, their home. I will be here to hold their inheritance for them, to guard it, to keep something of the good they remember, to try to keep what each of them believes he is fighting for alive. I can do it only here. Not at Clonmara. Clonmara must wait.’

  The Marquesa turned to Richard. ‘That is what I told you she would say. That is her answer.’

  He put his elbows on the table, and his face was cupped in his hands. At last he looked up and directly at me.

  ‘I will take Luisa, if that is what you want. I will take her to Clonmara, and give her into Edward’s care. You need have no fears for her. From Edward she will have kindness and concern. He will care for her the way he does for Clonmara. Both are safe in his hands. And I ‒ I will come back here. I will come back. My instinct tells me to go now to look for Tomás, but the Marquesa has convinced me that your instincts are right. He cannot be dragged back against his will, and my very presence, if I should find him, might only lead others to him. He will probably vanish into the morass of this war. I cannot bear the thought that I may never see my son again, but neither can I put him into more danger. Oh, God, Charlie ‒ help me!’

  Before the Marquesa’s gaze he put his hand out and reached for mine across the table. And from her expression I knew that she had never doubted that Tomás was Richard’s son.

  III

  Richard waited only to see Elena buried, and my mother, and that was done swiftly, and with little ceremony. I watched the coffins lowered into the Spanish earth, and thought of how much of me now was buried here. My past was buried in the earth, with Carlos, with Mariana, my grandfather’s wife, with Luis, whom I had loved, with Don Paulo who had hated and, in the end, given power to the Blodmores, and now with my mother. That was the past. The future was with my sons, and with Luisa. And, at last, my future was with Richard. I prayed silently that I would see none of them lowered into the Spanish earth.

  The military had been greatly relieved that their problem concerning Lady Patricia and the Marquesa de Pontevedra had been resolved. The Colonel even attended the burials, representing the Army. He asked no questions as to where or how my mother had obtained the morphine. Such things were better left alone, and with the country in a state of civil war, the death of an old, mad woman was but one more death. The violent death of the Countess of Blodmore, who would have been the next Marquesa de Pontevedra, was but one more violent death. The house of Pontevedra would survive, in the person of Richard Blodmore’s son and Spain would survive even the agony of civil war, the Colonel indicated as he offered his condolences. So once again the power and influence the great families of this land wielded covered up what was best not disclosed, and Elena, Countess of Blodmore and Lady Patricia Drummond were laid quietly to rest.

  But the Marquesa, leaning on Richard’s arm, Maria Luisa, myself and Luisa, all wore the black veils of mourning, and I held Luisa’s hand tightly as we left the burial ground. ‘I will miss Granny,’ she said softly as we walked. ‘She was so different. A special sort of person.’ She mourned, but she did not weep.

  Only Juan, who had come hurriedly from Cadiz for the occasion asked about Tomás’s absence. ‘I have sent him to Doñana,’ I said. ‘In times like these it is better to have a boy of his age out of harm’s way.’

  Juan looked at me sharply, and said nothing. Asked no more questions. The answers would come soon enough.

  IV

  Very early on the morning after the burials, Luisa stood before the Marquesa. The old woman looked at the young girl; both wore black.

  ‘You are a very special child,’ the old woman said. ‘Much is carried in you. You bear the old Spain, and the new Spain, however that shall form itself. Go with courage, and with strength, like your mother. Here, child, take these …’ She was stripping off the famous rings that, f
or as long as I had known her, she had worn. ‘I cannot give you the title of Pontevedra and all that goes with it. That belongs to Edward Blodmore. Through your mother I give whatever else may be left for me to make a disposition of. Your mother will be the heir to whatever remains after our country has settled its disputes. It may be nothing. It may be a great deal. But your mother will be here. She has learned to tend her vines. If my husband, the Marqués de Santander, Don Paulo, were here, he would say it was the most sacred trust.’

  So we sat and waited, three women in black. Maria Luisa waited for death. The Marquesa waited for I knew not what. I waited for the return of Richard, for the return of my sons. I waited for the violent fermentation of a country in civil war to end. I waited for the violent fermentation of the must to end. I waited for the wine to fall bright.

  And I did not know then, as I did later, that the whole of Europe had begun its decade of war. Nor did I know that there was a man in the south of France called Meilland who was perfecting a rose called Peace.

  THE END

  Preview: The Property of a Gentleman by Catherine Gaskin

  Prologue

  About half of the ninety-three passengers, those in the tail section, of the flight out of Zürich bound for Paris and London survived when the plane ploughed into a mountainside shortly after takeoff. Among those killed was a Junior British Cabinet Minister, half of a Dutch football team, an antique dealer from London by the name of Vanessa Roswell, and a man, presumed to be a Dutchman, whose body no one came to claim, and whose passport the authorities, after close examination, found to be forged.

  Within hours of the crash the daughter of Vanessa Roswell and a friend, Gerald Stanton, were on their way to Zürich, with the desperate unspoken hope that Vanessa might be among the survivors; they had only just learned that Vanessa had been on that flight. Before he left London, Gerald Stanton put through a telephone call to an associate in Mexico City, who in turn managed the difficult feat of reaching by telephone a remote hacienda in the mountains south of Taxco; then a man who hated cities, and hated flying, went to Mexico City and took the first plane to Europe – any city in Europe which had a connection to Zürich, he wearily told the booking clerk. It was the day after the crash when he arrived, and it was snowing, the snow blanketing the terrible debris. The man shivered and longed for the Mexican sun. The bodies of the victims were in the school of the small village near to where the plane had come down. The body of Vanessa Roswell had already been identified, so he went to a hotel five miles away to which the police directed him. There he found, sitting in silence before a fire in a private sitting-room, Gerald Stanton and a young woman, a beautiful young woman, he thought, gauging her with his painter’s eye, whose face now wore the numbed expression of shock and grief. She looked at him without recognition. That was not surprising; he hadn’t seen her for twenty-seven years.