Kiss of Hot Sun

by Nancy Buckingham

  I took the plunge. “Miss Harcourt, I’ve been thinking. I know it was terribly kind of you to give me this job, but... well, we both know there isn’t any job really...”

  The old lady image slipped out of focus as Adeline asked sharply: “What do you mean by that?”

  “Only what I’ve said before—there’s not enough for me to do with so few guests staying here.”

  “It is possible I may decide to take more guests later on. In the meantime, surely it’s enough to know that I want you.”

  “I really don’t see why you should.”

  “Please stay, Kerry. Please!”

  There was an intensity about her appeal that astonished me. For an instant I thought I saw fear in her eyes. Then she looked away, and was at once so much in command of herself that I felt sure I’d imagined the fear.

  Adeline kept silent for a moment. She was watching me shrewdly, as if trying to get under my skin.

  Suddenly, right out of the blue, she asked quietly: "Had you met Philip Rainsby before he came here?”

  “No!”

  The lie was on my tongue before I’d worked out the reason for it. Caught on the hop, my reply was blind instinct, a defensive reaction. If I admitted I had known Philip, she would ask more questions. I didn’t want that; the hurt was too deep.

  “No,” I reaffirmed with more stability. “Why do you ask?”

  “It was the way you were looking at one another when he first arrived.”

  So Adeline had noticed my moments of stunned surprise at Philip’s turning up here. I’d been kidding myself she’d seen nothing.

  Foolishly, I was committed; I could hardly go back on that emphatic denial now. She would think me mad if I told her: “Well... actually we did meet in Rome...” So I too would have to join in the ridiculous game of pretence. Well, if the Blunts and Zampini could keep it up, then I could too.

  I tried to shrug lightly. “I can’t imagine what could have given you the impression that we knew one another.”

  Adeline dismissed the matter with a little no-consequence smile, and briskly disappeared into the salon. Delighted to escape her probing, it was some time before I realised that the question of my leaving had been forgotten.

  Or had it? Maybe the diversion about Philip was a stratagem to get me off a subject she wished to avoid.

  Somehow I was curiously hesitant about raising it again. I couldn’t forget Adeline’s almost desperate entreaty— “Please stay, Kerry—please!” I couldn’t forget that fleeting look of fear which I still wasn’t certain I had really seen at all.

  I felt myself trapped by circumstances at the Villa Stella d’Oro. There was really nothing tangible to stop me going away—right back to England if I felt like it. Yet I couldn’t bring myself to take that step. I was stuck here for the time being.

  To make matters worse, I was in the absurd position of having denied all previous knowledge of Philip Rainsby. Still, with Philip so aloof, there was mighty little danger of him blowing the gaff about our meeting in Rome.

  But in comforting myself, I was entirely overlooking a vital fact. Philip and I had met at a party given by Guido Zampini. He must have seen us together.

  Resigned to staying on, I determined that as of now I’d take a real hand in the running of the Stella d’Oro. And if Adeline didn’t like it that way she could either lump it, or fire me.

  In this new tough mood, I sailed through to the kitchen.

  I’d already discovered that domestic arrangements at the villa were not quite so perfect as they’d appeared at first sight. Now I noticed a breakfast tray of coffee and rolls waiting on the dresser. The coffee pot was barely warm.

  “Whose is this?” I asked abruptly.

  Carlo didn’t even trouble to reply. But Maria, in her usual placid way, told me it was for the honeymooners. They always breakfasted in their room.

  “Then why hasn’t it been taken up to them?”

  Carlo regarded me with deep dislike. “I am busy.”

  I swung back to his aunt. “Please make fresh coffee, Maria, and then Carlo will take the tray upstairs immediately. Is that understood?”

  I enjoyed the next couple of hours. It was great to be really occupied again. I realised now that I’d been missing out on that sort of satisfaction ever since leaving Dr. Stewart. Monica had been fun, but never for a single moment had she taken work seriously.

  Everything I delved into except the cooking itself was wide open for improvement. After a huddle in the storeroom, Maria and I agreed on several ways of cutting waste. I felt convinced that Carlo was up to his neck in petty fiddles. That young man was in for a mighty big shock!

  About eleven I started on the flowers, a job I had already made my own. With all that fabulous colour rioting in the garden, it seemed a pity not to bring some of it indoors. The old gardener and I were fast friends, even though our conversation was limited to my few words of Italian. Pietro kept me supplied with all the blooms I needed.

  The little utility room off the hall smelled like heaven, Pietro’s lavish offering for the day stood all around me in buckets of cool water. Opposite, through the salon’s open doors, I could glimpse Adeline and the Blunts. They seemed to be doing a tour of the room and after a while I realised they were discussing the paintings.

  “My soul demands beauty,” I heard Adeline say in her carrying voice. “I must be surrounded by lovely things.”

  I grinned to myself as I fixed a vase of madonna lilies. From anyone else such high-flown sentiment would sound like humbug, but Adeline could get away with it.

  George Blunt’s voice boomed. “You’re a lucky woman to own such a grand house, Miss Harcourt. Happen you’ve been here long?”

  “Just over fifteen years,” she told him. “But of course the Stella d’Oro has been in my family for generations. It was built by an ancestor of mine a couple of centuries ago.”

  “Was he English?” queried Rosalind.

  “No, no. I have a soupçon of Sicilian blood in my veins. The villa remained in the hands of the Italian branch of the family until quite recently...”

  In sheer astonishment I stopped working on the flowers. I was trying to reconcile this story with what Adeline had told me on the plane. She’d said then, and without wrapping it up, that the Villa Stella d’Oro had been a gift from her lover.

  Just who was she trying to impress—me or the Blunts? And why, for goodness’ sake, tell lies to either of us?

  Maybe Adeline’s flamboyant nature demanded a background suited to her immediate audience. Maybe she thought that the romantic tale of an Italian lover would be fascinating to me. The Blunts, however—nouveaux riches from stolid Yorkshire, would be more likely to go for an ancient family home with English and Italian roots.

  And the funny thing was, I didn’t hold it against her one bit. If she spun a different tale to everyone she met, good luck to her! With Adeline Harcourt it wasn’t a matter of 'lying’; just that she was always on-stage.

  “You’ve got a lot of grand paintings here,” George Blunt was saying. “Right champion, I reckon.”

  Adeline accepted the compliment modestly. “They are nice, aren’t they?”

  “One or two of ‘em I wouldn’t mind having myself. No, I wouldn’t mind at all!” There was a pause, as if he was studying a picture more closely. Then I heard him say: “Ever think of selling?”

  “Sell my paintings! Good heavens no, I should never sell any of these. They are far too precious.” She sighed wistfully. “Of course, I know they aren’t terribly valuable, but it’s the... the sentimental associations, you see.”

  “That’s very understandable.”

  “Having been part of my life for so many years, I feel that our destinies are bound up together.” Through the two doorways I caught the glint of her silver hair as she shook her head decidedly. “No, Mr. Blunt, I don’t think I could ever bring myself to dispose of any of the paintings in here.”

  “Happen you’ve got some others that aren’t quite
so precious to you,” George Blunt suggested. “As my Rosie told you, I’m quite a collector in a modest sort of way. Always ready to offer a fair price, cash down, for something that takes my fancy.”

  Rosalind chipped in: “George is always saying to me, ‘Never mind your old masters’, he says. ‘If I like a thing, that’s good enough for me’.”

  “How very sensible of him,” agreed Adeline. “Too few people these days dare trust their own judgement.”

  She hadn’t taken up George Blunt’s hint, and he repeated it.

  “If you’ve got any other paintings knocking around, Miss Harcourt, happen I’d like to take a look at them.”

  Adeline seemed not much interested. “There might be one or two, I suppose. As a matter of fact, I believe there are some put away in the attics, though I’ve hardly been up there myself for years.”

  “Could I have a look at them, do you reckon?”

  Adeline sounded faintly amused by his persistence. “If you really want to, Mr. Blunt, I’ll show you sometime.”

  “There’s no time like the present, I always say.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said flatly, “but I’ve got far too much to see to just now. Anyway, there’s no hurry.”

  The flowers were finished. I carried an urn of tall delphinium spikes through to the salon.

  Adeline and the Blunts had been talking without restraint but at the sight of me they dried up abruptly. It was as if, by mutual consent, the subject of pictures had been dropped like a hot potato. George Blunt blustered a fatuous remark about the pretty flowers, and his wife and Adeline eagerly jumped aboard the bandwagon. They were still all fervently discussing flowers when I left the room.

  At noon I was checking the dining-room tables when Giles stuck his head round the door.

  “Well well, what a busy little bee you are, then.”

  “Hallo, Giles. Have you come for lunch?”

  “Is that an invitation, Kerry darling?”

  “It is not an invitation. I just want to know whether to have an extra place laid for you.”

  His wide grin took on a rueful twist. “And here was I fondly imagining you wanted the pleasure of my company.”

  Discovering that two of the pepper pots were empty, I gathered them up to show Carlo. “It’s for Miss Harcourt to ask you to stay to lunch, Giles, not me.”

  “Oh, Adeline won’t mind,” he said carelessly. “What about this afternoon, Kerry?”

  “What about it?”

  “Would you like to come to my studio and see some of my paintings?”

  I flickered him an ironical glance. “Are you sure you don’t mean your etchings?”

  “Now that really would be something!”

  Opening the door to the kitchen, I handed the pepper pots to Carlo for filling.

  Giles asked again : “Will you, Kerry?”

  “What? Come to your studio?”

  “Uhuh.”

  So far I’d not been taking him seriously, just idly back-chatting. “Not today, Giles. I really am too busy.”

  “You can’t be—not at siesta time.”

  “Oh, I’m not bothered about that.” I’d planned to go through the linen room upstairs. From what I’d seen it badly needed clearing out.

  “Don’t be daft, Kerry,” he said explosively. “There’s people whose job it is to look after that sort of thing.”

  “And it’s my job to see they do,” I slung back. “Make it tomorrow, will you? I’d like to come then—just for a little while.”

  Giles stayed at the villa for lunch, easily wangling an invitation out of Adeline. But he wasn’t successful in getting me to change my mind about going back to Taormina with him. He went off round about three, none too pleased with life.

  The linen room was certainly in a mess. I decided to make a start by chucking out an accumulation of junk which had been pushed to the back. I fetched a big cardboard box from downstairs, and filled it with bits and pieces—chipped vases, copper hot water cans, and some ancient oil lamps. With as much as I could carry in one load, I tottered through to the rear of the house, and started up the attic stairs.

  At this time of day everything was deathly still. The villa was in semi-darkness, shutters closed against the scorching heat outside.

  I could hear a low murmur of voices, and guessed it must be the Blunts resting in their room. I could just detect a Yorkshire brogue in the man’s deep voice, though I couldn’t decipher what he was saying.

  Wedging my load against the wall at the top of the stairs, I made a random choice of the door on the right, throwing it wide open.

  The room was not empty, as I had confidently expected. Adeline and the Blunts stood in a tight-knit group, facing me, gawping their eyes out. In the moment before George Blunt took a sly sideways step, I caught sight of a painting propped on the table behind them.

  Adeline was first to recover composure. “What do you want?” she asked coldly, omitting that almost inevitable 'Kerry darling’.

  “I was just bringing up this box of oddments to get them out of the way,” I said, cross at being thrown on to the defensive.

  “Oh... oh I see.” But Adeline’s voice was still freezing. “Well, put it down, girl. Just put it down anywhere.”

  It was as if she had only just managed to check herself from adding: ‘And be off with you.' Her urgent desire to get rid of me was patently clear.

  Dumping the box on the floor, I backed out. “I do apologise for butting in...”

  “Nonsense! We were only...” Adeline was full of scorn; but she didn’t finish the sentence.

  Closing the door behind me, I skipped down the steep staircase.

  The whole episode had me guessing. Although I’d overheard George Blunt asking to see the paintings in the attic, I was amazed that Adeline should be showing them to him now, at siesta time. She made it such a rigid rule to rest each afternoon, declaring herself completely Sicilian in this respect.

  There was no doubt at all that my sudden appearance had shaken all three of them. George and Rosalind Blunt had kept their worried eyes clamped right on me, though they hadn’t uttered a single word. They gave the impression of being caught in the act.

  But what act? Could it be they were trying to put one across a simple old lady? Maybe they were hoping to pick up a valuable painting for a song, because Adeline didn’t know any better.

  But I couldn’t fit Adeline Harcourt into this handy bit of theorising. She was intelligent, a woman of wide worldly knowledge. She was also very shrewd, I was sure of that. And anyway, Adeline had been just as bothered as the Blunts when I’d blundered in on them.

  I just didn’t catch on. For the next hour, as I worked in the stifling heat of the small linen room, I kept chewing it over. But when I’d finished the job, I was no nearer a solution of the mystery. Nothing made any sense.

  By the time the company assembled for afternoon tea Adeline was her usual elegantly charming self. Everyone was there. Zampini, in a tight-stretched suit, sweated sullenly. Giles, in white shirt and lightweight slacks, coolly tried to hold my eye. The Blunts were oddly reserved, even George keeping his mouth shut and smiling at everyone with obvious artificiality. The Austrian honeymooners sat away across the room, close to one another, and as far from the rest of us as possible.

  And Philip. It seemed mighty odd to me, the way he’d hung around the villa all day. I’d have expected him to be off on a sightseeing trip.

  But what Philip Rainsby did, or what he didn’t, was no business of mine. I wasn’t even interested.

  Adeline, serenely playing the grand lady, dispensed tea from the chased silver pot and led the conversation where fancy took her.

  As the talk flowered, I thought what a false assemblage we were! The Blunts and Zampini, making out they didn’t know one another; and Philip and I pretending the same thing. Adeline, lying in her teeth to the Blunts, or me or both, about how she came to acquire the Villa Stella d’Oro. And then there was this thing between Philip and Rosalind
Blunt.

  Was anything in this darned place on the level?

  Chapter Seven

  Curiosity got the better of me. When tea was over I waylaid Adeline on the stairs.

  “Miss Harcourt,” I began contritely. “I’m awfully sorry about this afternoon.”

  “What are you referring to, Kerry darling?”

  “I mean, bursting in on you like that.”

  I was watching her closely, trying to read her expression. But she gave nothing away.

  “My dear child, it is not of the slightest consequence. What could have made you think it mattered?”

  “I thought... well, I got the idea you were displeased.”

  She shook her head emphatically. “Of course not. I was delighted you were making yourself so useful.” Standing with her hand on the banister rail, she paused thoughtfully. I imagined she was going to explain the scene in the attic, but I was quite mistaken. She shot out suddenly: “Perhaps I could ask you not to take your duties quite so... enthusiastically. You see, darling, Carlo has been complaining...”

  “Carlo? I don’t get it.”

  “He feels... Now you must not misunderstand this, Kerry darling, but these Sicilians can be very touchy at times. He imagines you are being over fussy about the way he does his work.”

  It riled me that Carlo should go running to Miss Harcourt. It astonished me that she should even listen to his whining.

  “I assure you that nothing I said to Carlo was unjustified.”

  She put a placating hand on my arm. “I am quite certain you did not mean it to be, darling.”

  “You see...” I fumbled, trying to find the right words. I wanted to avoid sounding critical of the way Adeline had been running the villa; or rather, of the way she had been letting it run itself. “Maybe you’ve not had time for the close supervision I can give things now.”

  The cautious approach hadn’t worked. Her pained expression was slightly larger than life-size.

  “You are probably right. I am an old woman.”