Pale Dawn Dark Sunset

by Anne Mather

  During the journey, Miranda’s attention was captured by the sights and sounds about her. Constancia pointed out the small, flower-decked chapel with its cone-shaped bell tower, the wooden span of a narrow bridge which crossed the waters of the Rio Lima. The river was peaceful today, she told her, but when it was in flood, bridges were swept away and sometimes the valley itself was flooded. In such times, the people fled to the safety of the lower slopes, taking refuge in the chapel, making homes in the barns.

  There were occasional groups of adobe dwellings where the estate workers lived, a store, a garage, a doctors’ surgery. Once Miranda thought she saw Rafael’s Landrover parked outside one of the buildings, but she could not be certain. There seemed little design to the placement of the houses, no rows or streets, but merely a disorganised gathering of habitations without running water or electricity and little sign of sanitation. This last discovery concerned her a little, but she was loath to make any comment which might alienate Juan’s friendship. All the same, she was glad when the houses were left behind and they began climbing the track to higher ground where a small white-painted monastery showed unmistakably against the verdant greenery of the hillside.

  Constancia pointed towards the building. “There! You can see where the niña is staying. It is the Monasterio de San Miguel. Father Esteban e Father Domenico—they do much good work for the people of our valley.”

  “There are only two priests?” Miranda was surprised.

  Constancia nodded. “Although it is still called the Monasterio de San Miguel, most of the priests who used to live here died many years ago. Father Esteban is the last surviving member of the original order. Times change. People grow old and die. There is not the people in the valley that there once was. The estate has become mechanised—”

  “—and Rafael sends the young people to the city!” declared Juan, with unusual vehemence.

  “He tells them of the better living conditions there,” agreed Constancia, nodding. “And the money to be earned in the factories is much more attractive than what you pay, Juan.”

  “Disparate! The valley is their home, Constancia.”

  “They do not all share your obsession for the land, Juan. Do not blame them for seeking to better themselves.”

  “I do not blame them, Constancia. It is Rafael who makes them—what do you say?—malcontento?”

  Constancia smiled at Miranda. “As you can see, my brothers have very different views concerning our people. There are points on both sides. Juan would argue that what one does not have, one does not miss, but Rafael—” she shook her head, “Rafael thinks as a doctor thinks, and he sees only the disease and deprivation. The achievements of our ancestors in wresting this valley from the wilderness and creating an oasis of civilisation and cultivation does not swell the pride in his breast. Rather he sees it as an exploitation of the Indian.”

  Juan snorted irritably. “Rafael is a filistino!” he snapped, but Constancia shook her head.

  “He is an idealist, Juan.”

  “And do you know what this means?”

  “Si. It means that Rafael believes that man is more important than possessions. He does not admit the primary concept of materialism which is the code we live by, do we not?”

  Juan made some uncomplimentary comment in his own language, and then said: “And you are a conversa, pequeña?”

  Constancia shrugged, running manicured nails along the polished rim of the door at her side of the luxurious vehicle. “I did not say I agreed with him. I am afraid I am too lazy—too fond of material things—to ever fully share his beliefs. But I admire him for them, nevertheless.”

  Miranda had listened to this interchange in silence, but she had registered every word. What had Constancia meant when she had said Rafael thought like a doctor? Was he a doctor? Was that what he had meant when he said he had no part in the estate? She would have liked to have asked, but in fact it was no concern of hers. And besides, they were nearing the monastery and the prospect of seeing Lucy drove all other thoughts out of her head. Now that they were so near, she was eager to reach their destination, and she refused to admit to a certain cold feeling of unease at the inevitably to be faced possibility that this child might not be Susan’s daughter.

  The tall stone walls which had gleamed so brilliantly from a distance could now be seen to be crumbling, and the massive iron gates which had once guarded this scholastic retreat from intruders hung on rusted hinges. Above the gateway, an arched bellcot housed a blackened bell which could not have been rung for many a year, while within the courtyard the stone flags were being displaced by the upward thrust of grass and bindweed. The whole place had a melancholy air to which Miranda was instantly sensitive. And then a man and a child emerged from the darkened interior of the building and all other considerations were forgotten.

  The man was solemnly garbed in flowing black robes, but above his cassock his homely face beamed. A thatch of thinning overly-long white hair moved in the wind and he constantly endeavoured to smooth it across his balding pate. But it was the child to whom Miranda’s eyes were drawn. Small and slender, dressed in a simple cotton frock which Miranda could not remember having seen before, blonde curls framing a piquantly attractive face, there could be no doubt in Miranda’s mind that this was Lucy. Although it was eighteen months since she had seen her, there was no mistaking the tip tilted nose, the ofttimes petulant twist of her mouth, which was so like her mother’s, the quick, nervous movements.

  But if Miranda recognised Lucy, Lucy did not recognise Miranda. After a cursory glance at his companions, it was to Juan that the child sped, holding her arms wide and being swept up into his.

  “Tio Juan, Tio Juan!” she shrilled excitedly, hugging him. “Father Esteban told me you were coming. Are you staying? Are you taking me to the hacienda? You will take me with you, won’t you, Tio Juan?”

  “Quietud, poca!” he commanded, but he was laughing, and Miranda thought wryly that it would be most uncharitable of her to suppose that Don Juan was well pleased with this exhibition of his power over the child. All the same, after what Rafael had intimated… “We will see, no?”

  “But you promised!” protested Lucy, pursing her lips sulkily. “You said—”

  “Uno momento, chica! I bring someone to meet you—”

  “Tia Constancia, I know—”

  “No, chica, not just Tia Constancia. See—there! Do you know who that is?”

  He directed the child’s attention towards Miranda and she could feel herself stiffening almost without volition. In the uneasy stillness that prevailed after Juan’s words she was conscious of every small sound about her—the drugging scrape of the crickets, the chatter of the birds in the branches of a nearby cypress tree, the steadily increasing drone of a vehicle’s engine coming up the valley.

  Lucy’s eyes were painfully intent for a few moments, and then she shrugged indifferently. “Should I?” she asked impatiently.

  Don Juan put her slowly to the ground. “Perhaps,” he answered, his tones non-committal.

  “Of course you should, Lucy!” Miranda made a deliberate reference to the child’s name. “Don’t you remember me?” She went down on her haunches, beckoning the child towards her. But Lucy made no attempt to leave the security of Juan’s side, and worse, there was no sign of recognition in her eyes.

  “Why do you call me that?” she demanded scornfully. “Lucy! That’s not my name. Nobody knows my name.”

  “I know it, Lucy,” insisted Miranda quietly, continuing to hold out her hand, although the coldness inside her refused to be denied now. “It is Lucy. Lucy Carmichael.”

  “No.” Lucy turned startled eyes up to her benefactor. “No—no, it’s not—”

  “I think you should not frighten her, Miss Lord,” said Juan, his hands resting possessively on Lucy’s shoulders. “Perhaps this is not the way—”

  He broke off abruptly as another man suddenly entered the courtyard, and Miranda remembered vaguely hearing the vehicle
in the valley and how it had stopped a few moments ago. Tall and lean, in mud-coloured cotton pants and jacket, with no shirt to hide the muscular broadness of his chest, Rafael Cueras took in the small group that was gathered with a single glance. Then he turned to his brother, and his eyes were hard as he said:

  “What is the matter, Juan? Are you afraid the child will remember?”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  MIRANDA rode back to the hacienda with Rafael in the Landrover. She had not wanted to go with him and she knew with certainty that he had not wanted to take her, but Juan had insisted that it would be easier that way. He had said he needed time to talk to the child, to explain the situation to her—and that it would more easily be achieved without Miranda’s presence.

  To Miranda herself it was all wrong. She should have been the one to talk to Lucy, to try and explain a little of the circumstances leading up to her presence here, endeavouring to ease the child’s immature mind into a state of awareness without making it too painful for her to bear. But instead, Juan had taken command, and although she knew Rafael opposed him there was nothing he could do without creating an impossible state of hostility. Lucy believed in Juan absolutely, she clung to him as a swimmer might cling to a lifeline, and although Miranda could understand this, she could not understand Juan’s persistent strengthening of this bond by his attitude. His hold on the child was such that only he could break it, only he could direct Lucy’s actions without hysterical reaction. And it seemed he was in no hurry to relinquish that hold…

  The priest, Father Esteban, was a different proposition. He only wanted what was best for the child, and his attitude towards Miranda had been one of gentle understanding. He had urged her after their introduction to be patient, not to expect too much too soon. Lucy was only eight years old. It was natural that she should need an anchor in these uncertain seas in which she found herself, but that sooner or later nature would take its course and her memory would be restored to her.

  Miranda had listened to him intently, but all the while the uncertainty inside herself was growing. How long might nature take to restore the child’s memory? How long before she remembered what had happened, that her parents were dead, her true identity? It was four months already since their aircraft went missing. How many more months might elapse before any concrete proof of her identity made itself known to her? And was Miranda expected to remain here for that length of time? No! Apart from anything else, she could not afford to do so. David had agreed to giving her two week’s leave of absence, but after that… And in any case, she could not accept the Cuerases’ hospitality for any length of time, and to stay for more than two weeks at an hotel or pension was simply beyond her means…

  A faint sigh escaped her and attracted her companion’s attention. “What is it, señorita? Is the situation not as straightforward as you imagined?”

  “You know it’s not!” Miranda gave him an impatient glance. “I just don’t know what I am expected to do.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Miranda sighed again. “What if Lucy doesn’t remember who I am?”

  “You’re sure it is Lucy, then?”

  “Oh, of course.” Miranda brushed a fly from her knee. “It’s Lucy, all right. But—” She paused. “Your brother doesn’t make it easy.”

  Rafael’s mouth turned down at the corners. “Did you expect he would?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what I expected. I suppose the possibility of his becoming attached to the child didn’t occur to me. That was what you were trying to tell me on our way here, wasn’t it?”

  “Among other things,” admitted Rafael dryly. “My brother is flattered by the child’s devotion. It is a new experience for him. It will pass.”

  “And what am I expected to do in the meantime?” exclaimed Miranda, turning her palms uppermost. “I can’t wait around here for Lucy to regain her memory!”

  “Why not?”

  “Why not?” Miranda was amazed. “Señor, I have a job to do back home. I’ve been given two weeks to settle Lucy’s affairs. At least part of that time will be needed to make arrangements when we get back to London.”

  Rafael shook his head. “An optimistic estimate.”

  “It’s not an estimate. It’s an ultimatum! David—that is—Mr Hallam my employer, demands efficiency.”

  Rafael looked her way. “You speak of him very familiarly for an employee,” he remarked ironically.

  “I don’t.” Miranda uttered an exasperated ejaculation. “People are not so—formal back home. In any case, that has nothing to do with it. I couldn’t stay here longer than two weeks even if I wanted to.”

  “Why not?”

  Miranda hunched her shoulders. “If you must know, I couldn’t afford to do so.”

  Rafael frowned. “Staying at the hacienda will cost you nothing.”

  “Maybe not. But I can’t go on staying there!”

  “At the risk of repeating myself yet again—why not? You seem to be making a great many difficulties out of what seems to me to be a perfectly simple situation.”

  Miranda gasped. “It’s easy for you to say that. Your brother may not see it that way.”

  “May not see what that way?”

  “My staying at the hacienda. As you told me, you have no part of it. Your brother owns the estate.”

  “Ah!” Rafael’s fingers tightened around the steering wheel. “Bien—nominally this is so.”

  “Nominally?”

  “It is a complicated affair, señorita. Sufficient to say that if I wish you to stay at the hacienda, have no fear, my brother will not object.”

  Miranda shook her head. “I have to get back.”

  “With—or without your niece?”

  Miranda’s eyes clouded. “You think your brother would keep her here?”

  “Your tone implies—against her will. But that might not be so. If—Lucy—does not regain her memory, I venture to state that she will not wish to leave. At least, not yet.”

  Miranda pressed her lips tightly together to prevent them from trembling. “Oh, what a mess!”

  “A mess, señorita? At least Lucy is happy. That should mean something to you.”

  Miranda turned her head away and stared through the open window. “That’s very easy for you to say, isn’t it?” She scarcely saw the fields of waving corn that flanked the narrow track. “But what am I going to do?”

  Rafael swung the wheel to avoid a deep pothole and moved his shoulders thoughtfully. “Dare I venture to suggest that you are being a little—how do you say?—precipitate, no? It is too soon to start worrying about what is to happen. The child does not remember you. You must begin to know her all over again.”

  Miranda shook her head. “And how long do you expect this will take? How long before Lucy will give up—all this?” She gestured towards the blue sky above them, the increasing heat of the sun which was already causing her shirt to cling to her shoulder blades.

  Rafael shrugged. “Who knows?”

  “I could take her anyway.”

  “You could,” agreed Rafael quietly. “But I somehow do not think you will force her to go with you. What kind of beginning would that be for your life together?”

  “You’re so—so practical, aren’t you?” she declared, turning to stare at him mutinously. “But you’re not involved, are you? What a pity Lucy isn’t in your care!”

  Rafael slowed as a small herd of cattle on the track in front of them blocked their passage. The herdsman waved and shouted a greeting to him, and Rafael leaned out of the window as they passed, speaking in the native patois which Miranda found totally incomprehensible. Then, as the cattle fell behind them, he said: “Why should you suppose I would be any more willing to relinquish my guardianship of the child than my brother, señorita?”

  Miranda looked down at her hands. She didn’t honestly know why she thought that herself. The impression Rafael had deliberately created had not been a favourable one and yet, for some inexplicable reason, sh
e believed he was an honourable man, a man who could not use devious means to win a child’s affection.

  “I don’t know,” she said at last. Then she looked up. “Why is your brother doing this? He must know that sooner or later Lucy’s memory will return.”

  Rafael sighed. “I cannot answer for my brother, señorita. Perhaps you should ask him.”

  Miranda returned to her contemplation of her hands. “I—I don’t know how. Oh, God, I wish I knew what to do—I wish—I wish there was someone…”

  She could feel tears smarting on the back of her eyes and brushed her hand across her cheek impatiently. Self-pity was going to get her nowhere. What was the matter with her? She had always considered herself capable of coping with any emergency—free, independent, any man’s equal. And now suddenly she felt as helpless as a babe in arms.

  They were approaching the collection of houses which, as it encompassed the store and doctor’s surgery, seemed the main street of the community. To Miranda’s surprise, Rafael turned the Landrover off the track and wound his way between the shabby dwellings with the expertise of long use. Children squatting, half-naked, in the mud, squealed as he passed and women stopped what they were doing to raise a hand in greeting. It seemed obvious that Rafael was well known and well liked here, although, thought Miranda rather cynically, it was only natural that as he was the brother of the patron it should be so. Even so, she wondered where he was taking her and speculated upon Juan’s reactions when he discovered they had not followed him more closely. The sleek convertible with Juan at the wheel, Lucy bouncing excitedly on the seat beside him, had left the monastery ahead of the Landrover as Rafael had lingered to talk to Father Esteban.

  Through the open doors of the houses she glimpsed the bare interiors and her lips tightened when she recalled the exquisite elegance of the Hacienda Cueras. So great a distinction in so small a community was all wrong. But, of course, she said nothing.

  They emerged from the houses on a sloping lip of land overlooking the river. The air was much fresher here, although the sight of an open sewer running down into the surging waters was disturbing. Standing squarely on the slope was a small stone building, with a sloping tiled roof. White shutters stood wide from windows without glass, and a creeper with small purple flowers which reminded Miranda of morning glory clung round the doorway. Rafael accelerated up to the house and then cut his engine.