by Anne Mather
'To the coast, seňor?'
Caroline absorbed this blankly, while Emilia put down the plastic bag and turned to her father eagerly. 'You really mean it?' she exclaimed. 'You will really let us go to Mariposa?' She caught her breath. 'Will you be coming with us?'
'Alas, no.' Esteban's mouth twisted regretfully, but Caroline sensed his inner excitement. She had registered little after that word 'Mariposa', and she guessed his announcement had been deliberate and Emilia's response all he had intended. 'You would like to see the ocean, would you not, Miss Leyton?' he asked. 'It is not far—a matter of fifteen—perhaps twenty miles by road. Tomas will accompany you. Always providing you would like to accept this invitation.'
Taking a deep breath, Caroline chose her words with care. 'If Emilia would enjoy the outing, then naturally I accept. It was kind of you to think of it, seňor.'
Esteban smiled, but Caroline knew he was enjoying her consternation; she could see it, and she wished she was a little more adept at hiding her feelings. But the news that Luis was only ten or fifteen miles away, across the river estuary, had devastated her. If she had thought of their separation in terms of distance, she had imagined hundreds of miles between them, and to discover that he was so near, and yet so far, was at once painful and incredible.
'You did not know Mariposa was so near, seňorita?' Esteban probed, and she knew he knew she did not.
'I knew the ocean was not far away,' she responded quickly. 'I can see it, from my bedroom windows. I remember remarking on it to your brother.'
'And he did not tell you how far away it was?' Esteban mocked.
'Oh, yes, he told me,' she answered, and it was nothing short of the truth.
'But not that that was where the seminary was,' Esteban persisted, and Caroline had to shake her head. 'Verdad? But you can also see the bell tower from your window, seňorita. A reassuring sight, I am sure.'
Caroline was equally sure it was not, and she wondered what had happened to bring about this sudden reversal in his character. Since the night after their visit to Las Estadas, he had given her no cause for complaint, and if occasionally she suspected he was deliberately playing a role to disarm her, this morning he had certainly abandoned that part.
'So, you will be ready to leave in a few minutes,' he said. 'I will have Tomas fetch the car to the door.'
'Thank you.'
Caroline looked at Emilia's expectant face, and knew she could not disappoint her, but as she went upstairs to repair her make-up she wished she better understood her employer's motives.
It was impossible not to take the time to go to her window, and look out across the stretch of pampas to the distant ocean. There was the sea, glistening invitingly on the horizon, and beside it, the dark shape of the bell-tower, which previously had had no significance for her.
Mariposa was as different from Las Estadas as it was possible to be, unless perhaps the fact that the sun was shining made white-daubed houses look quaint instead of shabby. The town was approached by a tree-lined highway, and the main street faced the ocean. A narrow promenade circled the tiny harbour, where fishing boats bobbed on their moorings, and the streets that ran up from the seafront had pinkish-red roofs, and flowers in the window boxes. A tiny market near the harbour offered fish and all kinds of fruit and vegetables, huge juicy melons jostling beside mackerel and whitebait, red snappers and yellowtails.
They had driven to Mariposa not in the Range Rover, as Caroline had expected, but in an elderly Bugatti, which Tomas treated with much reverence. He parked the vehicle now by the harbour, and then turned in his seat to address his passengers.
He spoke in Spanish, and Emilia, realising Caroline could not understand, translated: 'He says he has some shopping to do for Consuelo,' she explained, after listening carefully to his instruction. 'He suggests we—might like to go for a walk, while he attends to his business.'
'To go for a walk?' echoed Caroline thoughtfully, glancing about her at the curious faces all around them. 'A walk—where?'
Tomas was beginning to look anxious, and he began speaking again, more quickly now, gesticulating to Emilia and spreading wide his hands. Caroline wished she could understand even half of what he was saying, and she waited impatiently for the child's explanation.
'It's all right,' said Emilia carelessly, lounging back in her seat. 'He's only concerned that we should not get lost. But I told him, I know my way about Mariposa. I shan't get lost.'
Caroline sighed, and Tomas gazed at her appealingly, starting to speak again. She thought she caught the word playa, which she recognised as meaning beach, but apart from that his rapid chatter meant nothing to her.
'Are you sure he wants us to go for a walk, Emilia?' she asked, biting her lower lip, and Emilia's jaw jutted.
'I don't tell lies, seňorita,' she retorted coldly, and Caroline made a placating gesture as Tomas clambered out of the Bugatti.
Emilia waited until Tomas had been absorbed by the crowds of people thronging the little market place, before she pushed forward the front seat, and opening the passenger side door, climbed down from the vehicle. 'Are you coming, seňorita?' she enquired, from the roadway, pulling the straw boater she was wearing firmly down upon her head, and with a helpless movement of her shoulders Caroline complied.
The sun was hot, but after two weeks Caroline was getting used to its brilliance, and looping the strap of her handbag over her shoulder, she followed Emilia along the salt-pitted promenade. They attracted some curious glances, but they were not accosted, and after a few moments Caroline began to look curiously about her.
She wondered where the seminary was situated, and then guessed it was probably on a rise, which accounted for her being able to see the bell-tower from her window. In consequence, she looked up, and immediately she saw the grey stone walls of a two-storey building, standing on a promontory overlooking the small town.
Her throat went dry as she gazed up at the unmistakable cupola of a bell-tower, and then Emilia intercepted her stare and gave a knowing snort.
'That's not where Tio Vincente stays,' she declared scornfully, as Caroline tore her eyes away. 'That's the Convent of the Sisters of the Annunciation, seňorita. Where Tio Vincente's mother lives.'
Caroline moistened her parched lips. 'Then where—?'
'Further on. Across the river,' answered Emilia offhandedly. 'If you like, I'll show you where.'
'Oh, I—' Caroline shook her head helplessly. 'I don't think that's a very good idea, Emilia.'
'Why not? You want to see where he stays, don't you?' The little girl's mouth had drawn down. 'Don Esteban thinks so.'
Caroline drew an uneven breath. 'What possible interest could there be for anyone in seeing the grey walls of some religious academy?'
'I don't know,' Emilia shrugged, her face sulky. 'But you asked.'
Caroline sighed. 'I was curious, that's all.'
Emilia looked at her broodingly. 'Didn't you really know where Mariposa was?' she persisted. 'I wonder why Tio Vincente didn't tell you.'
Caroline endeavoured to appear indifferent. 'I suppose it has nothing to do with me,' she replied, stopping to lean on the harbour wall, peering down into the grey-flecked waters that surged against the rocks. 'We should have brought a shrimping net, Emilia. There are dozens of tiny fish down here, swimming about in shoals.'
Emilia leaned on the wall beside her, but her interest was elsewhere. 'Perhaps he doesn't want to see you, seňorita,' she remarked doggedly, and Caroline lifted her head to stare at her.
'How could he see me?' she argued, wishing Emilia would leave it alone, then caught her breath when the child replied casually:
'He isn't a prisoner, you know. He sometimes comes into town. Don Esteban knew that when he sent us here. That's why he wanted us to come.'
Caroline had had just about enough. Straightening away from the wall, she faced the child without patience. 'I think you're imagining things again, Emilia,' she declared tautly. 'I've warned you before about the c
onsequences of making up these stories.' She pressed on determinedly, in spite of the little girl's whitening face: 'You've been too long without playmates. People of your own age to mix with. You've become obsessed with things that any normal child would never think of.' She paused, and then finished raggedly: 'You don't need a governess, Emilia. Personal relationships are beyond your comprehension. You should go to school, to a boarding establishment, where you won't have time to worry about your mother or your father, or find ridiculously twisted reasons for a perfectly innocent outing!'
It was a brutal set-down, and Caroline felt an immediate sense of contrition for taking out her own insecurity on the child. As soon as she had finished speaking she wanted to retract her words, but Emilia did not give her a chance to do so.
Her dark eyes wide and wounded in her white face, she turned abruptly away from her governess, and before Caroline guessed her intention, she had darted across the road. Holding her hat on to her head with one hand, the other swinging in urgent motivation, she ran rapidly up the side-street opposite, disappearing swiftly among the lines of drying washing.
It happened so quickly that Caroline was nonplussed. By the time she had gathered her wits and hurried across the road after the little girl, Emilia was nowhere to be seen, and only vacantly staring faces confronted her mute-lipped agitation. If only she knew the language, she flayed herself impotently, then hastened on up the street, hoping that Emilia would change her mind and come back.
Whereas the sun had been only pleasantly hot on their shoulders as they walked beside the harbour, now its rays became a pitiless weapon, beating down on her mercilessly and soaking her limbs with sweat. The simple cotton chemise she was wearing began to cling where it touched her, moulding her skin, and outlining every stimulated curve of her body. She soon tired in the unrelenting heat, and as her footsteps slowed, the glare seemed to envelop and devour her.
'Seňorita?'
She heard the voice as if from a distance, the waves of light around her seeming to bring its resonance on receding swells of sound. She blinked, but all she could see was the sun striking off whitewashed walls, and smell the pungent odour of dust and heat, and unwashed humanity. She was in another of the narrow streets that opened off one another like a rabbit warren, and her heart raced in panic as she realised how far she had come from the harbour.
'Seňorita!'
The summons was repeated, and shading her eyes, she swung about, her legs protesting as she poised herself for flight. She doubted she could outrun anybody in her weakened state, but she would try, even if she collapsed in the attempt.
But, to her astonishment, she found only an elderly man behind her, dressed all in black, with a curious round-brimmed hat upon his head, the crown shallow, and scarcely concealing his wispy threads of hair.
'Puedo ayudar usted, seňorita? Se ha perdido?'
Caroline didn't know what he had said, but his manner was gentle, conciliatory, and she expelled the breath she hardly knew she had been holding. 'I'm afraid I don't speak any Spanish,' she ventured, without much encouragement, but the old man nodded, as if he understood.
'Inglesa,' he said, and she understood that. 'Se ha perdido!'
'I am looking for a little girl,' said Caroline wearily. 'Una niňa, seňor.' She put out her hand to indicate Emilia's size. 'She ran away.'
'Una niňa, seňora? Su hija?'
Caroline blinked. Hija? That was daughter, wasn't it? He was asking if the girl was her daughter, and rather than confuse things still further, she nodded.
'A little girl,' she repeated. 'Emilia. Emilia de Montejo!'
'Hah, Montejo?' he echoed, obviously recognising that name. 'Emilia de Montejo? Venga!'
His bony fingers gripped her forearm, while he indicated that she should go with him, and Caroline glanced about her. The women standing in the doorway of a house opposite were unlikely to help her if she cried for their assistance, but in any case, she doubted the old man could prevent her if she really tried to free herself. She was torn between the awareness that she was lost, and that he might conceivably be trying to help her, and the inevitable possibility that his frailty was just a shield for other men of more dubious appearance. She couldn't forget what Luis had told her about the ever-present threat of a kidnapping, and the idea that Emilia might, at this moment, be in the hands of such men was terrifying.
Yet the old man had seemed to respect the Montejo name, and he looked harmless enough. What else could she do, after all? Return to the harbour without her charge? And no means of communicating with Tomas to gain his assistance!
Shaking her head, she let the old man draw her further into the maze of streets, stumbling as a stone twisted her ankle, dodging the billowing lines of washing. She was so hot and weary, she hardly noticed which way they were going, and while common sense told her, she should keep .alert, a numbing lethargy was addling her brain.
When they rounded a corner, and she felt a sudden draught of air on her face, her astonishment was total, and she gazed in amazement at the mudflats of the estuary. Somehow, she didn't know how, they had emerged on to the coast road, and ahead of them lay a narrow bridge over the river.
Her lips parted to make some futile protest, to explain that she would have to go back to find Emilia, when she saw two figures crossing the bridge. One was small and dark, dressed in white, with what looked like a straw boater on her head; while the other was tall and dark, and unmistakably attired in similar robes to her companion.
And suddenly Caroline understood. The man who had rescued her was not some devious villain, but a priest, from the seminary across the river, and he had recognised the name because he knew Luis.
Her eyes darted back to the figures on the bridge, and as they did so, her heart plunged. It was Luis who was holding Emilia's hand, Luis who was returning her charge to her; and the old priest beside her folded his hands in satisfaction.
'Alli esta su hija, seňora!'
Caroline could have tried to explain then that she was not Emilia's mother, but she was too shocked to do anything but stand and watch Luis and the child as they came off the bridge and along the dusty road towards them. She felt sick with reaction, and weak with relief; but overriding everything else was the painful resuscitation of emotion, and the knowledge that separation would be harder a second time.
The old man greeted Luis warmly, and offered his explanations in his own language. He used his hands a lot in the process, gesturing back towards the streets they had negotiated, pointing at Emilia, and rocking his head expressively from side to side.
Luis's response was curt and concise, the glance he cast in Caroline's direction eloquent of his disapproval. No doubt he blamed her for the whole sorry affair, thought Caroline wearily, and pushed shaking fingers through the damp weight of her hair.
Emilia clung to Luis's hand, avoiding Caroline's eyes, her features still mutinous. Caroline wondered what Luis had thought when the child appeared at the seminary, and acknowledged that in his position she would probably feel angry, too. After all, the little girl must have run a fair distance. Looking across the estuary, Caroline could see the walls of a square building and guessed that was the seminary. But then, she thought, fanning her hot face with a languid hand, Emilia had known where she was going, while she had not.
Eventually the old priest ran out of things to say, and with a sign of benediction he bade them adios, trudging off up the road again towards the bridge. Caroline managed to thank him before he went, but he only shook his head in deprecation, wagging his finger at Emilia, as if admonishing her for her recklessness.
Alone with Luis and his niece, Caroline felt completely exhausted, and totally incapable of handling the argument which she was sure was to come. The excitement of seeing Luis again had dissipated in the cold shadow of his disapproval, and although her heart ached in anticipation of his anger, she felt too weary to defend herself.
'Father Enriques tells me you were lost when he found you,' Luis remarked at las
t, looking at her intently. 'Dios gracias, he did! You appear to be on the verge of collapse. How did it happen? How did you and Emilia get separated?'
Caroline opened her mouth to protest, then saw Emilia's anxious expression. Obviously the child had not told her uncle the whole truth, and she was waiting with tight-lipped hostility for Caroline to explain what had happened.
But Caroline felt too fatigued to comply. What did it matter, anyway? she thought dully. Emilia had been lost, but now she was found. Let that be an end of the matter.
'Emilia and I were walking together,' she said now, slowly. 'There were a lot of people about and we got separated. I had to look for her.'
Luis's grey eyes narrowed, the long silky lashes shadowing his expression. That he didn't believe her was evident in the glitter in their depths, and the sceptical line of his mouth, but Caroline told herself she didn't care. He was so cold, so remote, so detached from her world, in his long black gown, tied with a plaited cord. A gold cross hung from his belt, and it glinted in the sunlight, reminding her with painful intensity that whatever had been between them was irrevocably over. She told herself she didn't care what he thought of her. She meant nothing to him. But her treacherous senses craved his forgiveness, and yearned for a contact he could not give.
'Where is Tomas?' he demanded now, and Emilia, recovering from her relief at being exonerated of all blame, jerked back her head.
'He parked the car near the market,' she said, permitting a tentative smile in Caroline's direction. 'Miss—Miss Leyton and I didn't want to stay in the car, so we just went for a walk. Like she said,' she finished lamely.
Luis's lips twisted. 'Indeed.' His eyes flickered over Caroline once again, and she became aware of how dishevelled she must look. 'Then I suggest we walk back to the harbour this way,' he indicated the coast road, 'and assure him that you have not disappeared off the face of the earth.'
Emilia nodded eagerly, and Caroline reluctantly straightened herself from her lounging position beside the sea wall. She didn't honestly know if she had the strength to walk back to the harbour, but somehow she would have to do it.