The Youngest Sister

by Anne Weale

  ‘Please.’ When he had poured it, she said, ‘Do you have to worry about sponsorship for your journeys, or do the estate and your books make you independent?’

  ‘The estate just about breaks even, and fortunately my books have done well in America and in paperback, so I don’t have to kowtow to sponsors. But I can’t afford to sit around enjoying Ca’n Llorenc for long. The key to success in my line is a steady output and journeys which either haven’t been done before or are in the footsteps of some obscure but fascinating guy like Arminius Vambéry.’

  ‘I’ve never heard of him. Who was he?’

  ‘A Hungarian born in 1832 who taught himself Turkish and Arabic and travelled, disguised as a dervish, to Bokhara and Samarkand. But I’m not going to tell you any more. Wait for my next book.’

  The telephone rang in the house but Nicolas ignored it until Catalina appeared and beckoned him. As he rose from the table he said, ‘When you’ve finished your coffee we’ll make tracks.’

  Cressy would have liked to linger at the table, talking, but obviously he had a lot to do—as had she, come to that. She hurried upstairs to brush her teeth again and make sure she had everything she might need in the day-pack which she preferred to a shoulder bag—except on the rare occasions when she was dressed up.

  Nicolas was still on the telephone when she passed his room. Waiting for him in the drawing room, she had another look at the portrait of Jane Digby whom he said she resembled.

  On either side of the fireplace were shelves of books in Spanish, English and several other languages. She was admiring the leather bindings of the older volumes when she heard Nicolas coming down the stairs with that unexpectedly light step for a man of his height and physique.

  ‘Cressy?’ he called.

  ‘I’m here.’ She stepped into view.

  At the table his neck had been bare but now he had knotted a light scarf of faded Indian cotton round his long neck and, like her, a day-pack was slung across one broad shoulder. He looked casual yet debonair, a man to turn women’s heads wherever he went. She wondered what Fuzzy would make of him.

  As they were leaving the house Catalina called to him from the kitchen.

  ‘Won’t be a minute,’ said Nicolas.

  This morning it was the Range Rover which stood in the courtyard, all four doors left open to keep the interior cool, for already the day was hotting up. Cressy was about to climb in when she realised the back seat was occupied by a dog.

  ‘Hello. Where did you come from?’

  The brown and white spaniel raised its head from its paws. It had a furtive air and, looking more closely, she saw it was in appalling condition—thin, its coat dull and matted, with a horrible open sore on its flank.

  Hearing Nicolas coming, she looked over her shoulder. ‘There’s a stray dog in the car.’

  He leaned into the vehicle from the driver’s side and looked at the spaniel with undisguised distaste. ‘Where the hell has this sprung from? Out dog...come on, out!’ He clapped his hands at it.

  The dog didn’t budge.

  ‘I shouldn’t touch it,’ said Cressy. ‘It might snap at you and it doesn’t look well, to say the least. It could even be rabid.’

  ‘I have no intention of touching it,’ he said curtly. ‘I doubt if it’s rabid, but it’s probably riddled with fleas and ticks, and that sore’s not a sign of health.’

  Taking a heavy-duty torch out of a compartment, he tried to induce the dog to move by poking its scrawny backside.

  Still it wouldn’t budge.

  ‘Poor thing, it looks so miserable,’ Cressy said sympathetically.

  ‘Poor thing be damned. It’s not staying in here,’ said Nicolas. ‘Get me a walking stick from the stand just inside the door, will you, please?’

  ‘You can’t hit a starving dog. It’s half-dead already.’

  ‘I’m not going to hit it...just use enough force to make it shift itself.’

  ‘I know how to get it to move,’ she exclaimed. ‘Offer it some food...some meat.’

  ‘All right. We’ll try that.’ He went away to fetch some.

  In his absence, Cressy spoke kindly to the spaniel. ‘Poor old thing, are you starving? I wonder what happened to you? Did you get lost? Did some vile person dump you? Never mind—we’ll look after you.’

  Followed by Catalina, Nicolas came back with a bowl of food which he brandished under the dog’s nose and then set on the ground. It was clear from the spaniel’s expression that it was torn between staying in a safe place and relieving its hunger.

  Hunger won. It heaved itself onto its feet, flopped unsteadily to the ground and began to wolf the bowl’s contents.

  ‘It’s on its last legs, poor love. Are spaniels a popular breed here? Or d’you think it’s a foreigner’s dog?’ asked Cressy.

  ‘As it isn’t wearing a collar, the chances are it belonged to someone who doesn’t want it any more and has dumped it as far as possible from where they live,’ said Nicolas.

  ‘How can people do things like that?’ Her anger made her voice shake.

  ‘They do worse than abandon their pets,’ Nicolas answered sardonically.

  ‘Is there a vet in this area?’ she asked. ‘That sore needs professional attention.’

  At this point an angry hiss made them turn to find Juanito behind them, his back arched in outrage at the sight of a strange dog on his territory.

  Having licked the bowl bare, the spaniel retreated behind the Range Rover.

  The housekeeper spoke to Nicolas.

  Translating, he said, ‘Catalina will make enquiries and find out if anyone around here has lost a dog. We must get moving; I said we’d pick up the car soon after nine.’

  As they set out for his friends’ house Cressy said, ‘If I had my way, people who ill-treat animals would be put in prison and fed on bread and water for a few weeks.’

  ‘You’d get on well with my mother,’ said Nicolas. ‘If not restrained, she’d take every down-and-out tyke for miles around under her wing.’

  ‘You wouldn’t, I gather.’

  ‘I wouldn’t ignore an animal which was obviously lost or suffering—but nor would I adopt it. If it couldn’t be restored to an owner who wanted it, I’d pay to have it put down.’

  ‘Is that what you’ll do with this one?’

  ‘If there’s no better alternative—yes.’

  She knew he was right. It was the sensible course. But it hurt her to think of the spaniel—a young dog, and probably a healthy one before whatever had happened to it—being given a lethal injection. Animals trusted people. To break that trust seemed scarcely less unforgivable than betraying a human being’s trust.

  She was thinking about it when Nicolas suddenly put his hand on her leg, just above the knee, and gave it a brief squeeze. ‘Don’t worry. It may not come to that in this case. I can see you’ve taken a shine to our uninvited guest—I’ll try and sort something out for it.’

  ‘I hope you can. It looks a very nice dog.’

  ‘Do you like it enough to give it a bath?’ he asked.

  ‘Of course! I’d be happy to bath it.’

  Nicolas slanted a mocking glance at her. ‘I may put you to the test.’

  ‘You’re welcome to. I’m not squeamish.’ She told him about an experience with a small balloon-shaped boy she had been instructed to meet off a plane at Heathrow and escort to his home on the other side of London. During the journey he had been suddenly and copiously sick in her car.

  Her light-hearted account of the incident made Nicolas laugh. ‘I can see you’re made of sterling stuff, Cressy.’

  ‘I felt sorry for the poor little wretch. Not, admittedly, when he was throwing up all the junk he’d gorged on the plane—but I did afterwards. He was the son of a couple who had split up and remarried. They’d both made new lives with new partners and new babies and, reading between the lines, he’d become surplus baggage. That’s a dreadful situation for a child. I’m sure he was making a pig of himself because he
sensed he wasn’t wanted.’

  For some moments Nicolas made no comment. Then he said, ‘You may not be squeamish, but I think you’re very tender-hearted. Perhaps rather too compassionate to be in the job you’re doing.’

  ‘Oh, no, not at all,’ said Cressy. ‘You can’t do the job properly unless you care about people. But my boss says the main qualification is being able to see the funny side of situations. You do agonise a bit sometimes, but you also get a lot of laughs.’

  By now they had reached the gateway of a large modern house whose upper storey was visible above the wall surrounding its grounds. Nicolas pipped his horn and a minute later the heavy wrought-iron gate disappeared into a pocket in the wall.

  ‘Luis is a self-made man with Hollywoodian tastes, but he and Victoria are a nice, generous couple,’ said Nicolas as he drove up to an imposing entrance.

  Victoria came out to meet them—a plump woman in her forties, with elaborately coiffed hair and a vivacious manner. She greeted Nicolas with kisses and shook hands with Cressy. She spoke good English.

  The car she was lending was housed in a four-car garage with an empty space where her husband kept his Mercedes. She also ran a Mercedes, and the four-wheel drive alongside it was for family picnics in the country.

  When Cressy attempted to thank her for the loan of her daughter’s runabout, Victoria dismissed it with a smiling ‘De nada. Nicolas is a dear friend. We are very glad to help any friend of his. I would like to offer you coffee and show you the house, señorita, but I have to visit my hairdresser.’

  Although Cressy felt sure she could remember it, Nicolas insisted on leading the way to the hospital.

  ‘It will give you a chance to get used to driving on the right,’ he said adamantly.

  So she followed him back to the main road and then along the route they had driven the day before. Changing gear with her right hand took a little getting used to, but she had always liked driving and soon began to feel at home.

  She thought when they reached the hospital’s car park that he would continue on his way. But the park wasn’t full and he drove in and stopped in a place where his vehicle wouldn’t obstruct those coming and going.

  After Cressy had parked and locked the borrowed car, he beckoned her to the Range Rover.

  ‘From now on we’ll keep Spanish hours. I’ll expect you back for lunch at three. If you run into problems, call me on this number. I’ll be back at Ca’n Liorenc from about eleven.’ He handed her a number written on a scrap of paper.

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Drive carefully.’ Unexpectedly he reached out an arm, captured one of her hands and, leaning out of the vehicle’s window, carried it to his lips. ‘Adios, guapa.’

  Cressy walked away feeling as if she were floating. It was a heady combination—the touch of his lips on the back of her hand while being the focus of a look reminding her of her response to last night’s kisses on the sofa.

  In the hospital, the receptionist was speaking English to an elderly couple. When Cressy’s turn came, before explaining her reason for being there, she said, ‘I don’t have a Spanish dictionary with me—is there a word which sounds like “gwarper”?’

  The receptionist smiled. ‘I think you must mean guapa. It’s spelt like this.’ She wrote the word on a message slip. ‘If a man calls you guapa, it means he thinks you are beautiful.’

  ‘Oh... really?’ Cressy said, smiling, trying not to blush. ‘I’ve come to see Miss Dexter. Is it all right to go up to her room?’

  On the way to her great-aunt’s bedside, she put the slip in her pocket with the telephone number.

  Could Nicolas really think her beautiful? Or was it something he had said to hundreds of girls?

  Kate seemed pleased to see her, and had a string of errands she wanted Cressy to run for her—one of them being to go to her cottage and find certain books.

  ‘Where are you staying?’ she asked.

  Cressy explained. ‘Have you read Nicolas’s books? Have you heard of him?’

  ‘Heard of him, yes. In days gone by his mother’s people were one of the island’s leading families. But I hadn’t heard that he’d married. He used to have the reputation of being what the Georgians called a rake. Now known as a stud, I believe.’ Miss Dexter’s tone indicated that she didn’t think much of the new term.

  ‘He isn’t married.’

  ‘But there are people in the house... aunts... cousins... stray relations.’

  ‘There’s a stray dog,’ said Cressy, smiling. ‘And a housekeeper and her husband. He does the garden.’ She chose not to mention that they occupied separate quarters.

  ‘It wouldn’t have done in my youth. Fifty years ago, staying with an unmarried man would have been what was called a compromising situation. That code of morals has long gone. Nowadays people do what they like and nobody raises an eyebrow—unless one of the parties involved is a public figure and the tabloid Press make a scandal of it. I dare say, even at your age, you’ve slept with more men than I have.’

  This left Cressy momentarily tongue-tied, and before she could answer her aunt continued, ‘Did you think I was an elderly virgin? Well, the young can never imagine their elders enjoying sex. Each generation thinks it’s something they invented. Have you read any of my books?’

  ‘All of them.’ This was a half-truth. Cressy had made a serious effort to read them but had found Kate’s three long volumes of feminist polemic heavy going.

  ‘Then you’ll know I was anti-marriage—anti-women allowing themselves to be hobbled to the kitchen sink and the cradle. But I wasn’t against men as friends and lovers...only as husbands.’

  Suddenly she closed her eyes, her head sank back against the pillows and her lips compressed.

  ‘Are you in pain? Shall I call a nurse?’ Cressy asked.

  The woman in the bed gave a long sigh. ‘The worst pain in life is regret,’ she said in a low voice. ‘There’s no medication to dull that ache. I’m tired now. Thank you for coming. Come again tomorrow.’

  Having been taken under Nicolas’s wing, Cressy had not changed money at the airport cambio on arrival. After leaving the hospital her first task was to provide herself with enough pesetas for the foreseeable future. She then bought the things Kate needed, plus a bunch of carnations, and delivered them back to the hospital.

  On the drive back to Ca’n Llorenc, she thought out a letter to send to her boss at Distress Signal on Nicolas’s fax machine. At the moment she had two weeks’ leave of absence, but it seemed likely she would be here for at least a month, and possibly longer.

  As she walked into the house Catalina bustled through from the kitchen to give her a fold of paper. Written on a word processor, the note read:

  Busy transferring my travel notes to disk. If you swim before lunch, don’t forget factor fifteen and don’t sunbathe till late afternoon. N.

  He was in her mind all the time she was swimming. She remembered the long brown shape gliding under the surface, and later the drops on his chest like crystal beads on brown satin. What would it be like to spend a long afternoon on the king-size bed in his room, with the shutters closed against the sun and the table fan near the bed sending eddies of coolness over their naked bodies?

  The thought of it sent a delicious frisson through her. What if he kissed her again tonight after dinner? Would she be able to resist him a second time?

  ‘Señorita... señorita... te liaman al teléfono.’

  Startled out of her reverie by the urgent voice, Cressy looked round and saw Catalina standing by the edge of the pool, holding an imaginary telephone in one hand and beckoning urgently with the other.

  While Cressy swam to the side and hoisted herself out of the water the housekeeper scurried to fetch the towel she had left by the steps.

  There was a wall-mounted telephone close to the entrance to the barn. Cressy dried her hands, said ‘Muchas gracias,’ to Catalina and lifted the receiver. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi! How’s it going?’ The speak
er was instantly recognisable as her sister Frances. ‘I’ve been deputed to check out the situation. Ma’s on a fact-finding mission and Pa is locked in battle with a planning authority. What are you doing?’

  ‘A minute ago I was having a swim before lunch.’

  ‘Some people have all the luck. I’m in the office having a sandwich at my desk. What’s the latest on the old girl?’

  While Cressy was giving her sister an update they heard the sound of Catalina replacing the receiver of the kitchen telephone.

  ‘What sort of shape is she in mentally?’ Frances asked. ‘In her day she had a mind like a razor. But that was way back in the Sixties. She must have long since lost her edge, living alone in the back of beyond for years.’

  ‘She says she has all her marbles and I believe her,’ said Cressy.

  ‘In that case watch out she doesn’t try to bully you. Even Ma didn’t argue with Kate. She was a big gun intellectually.’

  ‘Perhaps she’s mellowed a bit. Anyone would, living here. It’s the most heavenly place. We must be insane to live in London when we could be here, with glorious views everywhere you turn.’

  ‘Glorious views are nice, but one also needs bread... in both senses,’ Frances said crisply. ‘Gotta go, Cress. As usual I’m up to my eyebrows.’

  ‘I haven’t told you my exciting news,’ Cressy said quickly, before her sister could ring off. ‘You’ll never guess who I’ve met—who is helping me with the language problem.’

  ‘Some ancient film star who’s in retirement out there?’

  ‘A writer, but he’s not ancient. He’s about your age,’ said Cressy. ‘Nicolas Alaró... the travel writer. You must have heard of him, Frances, even if you’ve never read him.’

  There was silence at the other end of the line. Cressy wondered if her sister had her hand over the mouthpiece while she talked to someone who had come into her office.

  Then Frances said, ‘Nicolas Alaró... whose real name is Nicolas Talbot? Is that the man you mean?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. Have you met him?’ Cressy felt oddly disappointed.