Night of the Singing Birds

by Susan Barrie

  Once she was married—once she was Dona Martinez— she, too, would step back into a pattern that had been repeated for generations, and would probably go on being repeated for as many generations in the future unless the backwash of a changing world affected Spain as it seemed most unlikely it would do at the present time.

  Her face must have reflected a certain resignation which temporarily deprived it of much of the lustre of its youth, for quite unexpectedly Dona Miranda softened, and she bent forward and touched Angela’s smooth, pale cheek with an unusually caressing bony forefinger.

  ‘Ah, child,’ she said, ‘you are talking a lot of nonsense, but that is because you are young, and even I when I was young did not always conform in the way that was expected of me. I can remember quite clearly that I had moments of rebellion.... We all have moments of rebellion! But Don Felipe Martinez is everything I could desire for you in a husband, and when you go out with him to-night you must think only that he is the right man for you, who will safeguard your future and care for your well-being as every good husband should, and once your children come along you will not feel the need to care for other people’s! Believe me, I know!’ And all at once she smiled, and there was just a hint of secrecy and mystery in that smile.

  Angela smiled back, with the same amount of secrecy and reservation.

  ‘And it is not necessary to love a man before you marry him?’

  ‘Certainly not! Love does not enter into it.’

  ‘Not even once you are married? ’

  ‘Sometimes—sometimes one grows to love the man one marries.’

  ‘But in your opinion affection and obedience are enough?’

  Dona Miranda smiled a trifle more astringently. ‘You must not quote me, child—not in matters of this sort. But as a general principle you can take it that a woman’s most prominent role in life is to care for and plan for her children, and the greater part of the love in her life should be lavished upon them.’

  ‘Just as you lavished it upon my mother?’

  ‘I—I suppose so.’

  The old eyes and the young ones met. Years ago Dona Miranda had been a remarkably handsome woman, with much fire in her eyes and veins. Even to-day the fire was capable of being rekindled, but at the moment she looked a trifle wry.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, more decidedly. ‘A woman’s place is in the background of a man’s life. I personally believe that.’

  ‘Liar!’ Angela thought to herself, with a feeling of warmth and softness towards her grandmother welling up like a spring in her heart. Then a maid came to inform her that Don Felipe had arrived to collect her, and she turned without another word and followed the girl from the room.

  Don Felipe was looking almost unbelievably handsome and quite spectacularly well-groomed in a white dinner-jacket and cummerbund, and that his mood was urbane it was easy for Angela to gather from the almost paternal way in which he smiled at her and greeted her.

  He took her hand and turned it delicately about and kissed the inside of her wrist, where she had not omitted to add a touch of perfume before she left her room. And then he complimented her on her appearance, not as if he was in any way affected by it himself, but as if he was mildly surprised she had taken quite so many pains to appear at her best in his company. It occurred to Angela that he was half expecting her to look a trifle sulky, and he had possibly expected her to have selected one of her least attractive gowns for the occasion, such as the black which did not become her but which so many Spanish women wore as a kind of uniform. But the girl’s enchanting white dress, with its exquisite embroidery, lent her a rare look—even if at the same time it emphasised her youth, which as a man who was committed to marry her he could have disapproved of. A girl of marriageable age should look as if she was ready for matrimony, with all its attendant cares—if Dona Miranda was to be believed. And Angela Grevil still had something of the schoolroom and the cloistered life clinging about her. She had been taught to behave so beautifully that she almost did it too well. And in addition she looked so uncompromisingly English.

  For just one instant a rather wry look invaded his eyes before he released her hand. And then he said crisply:

  ‘Well then, we will go, shall we? You are, I trust, looking forward to the evening ahead of us?’

  She assured him that she was, and he actually flashed hey a white-toothed, dubious smile.

  ‘In that case I must see that you are not disappointed,’ he said.

  They set off in his car, and not for the first time in his company she wished he was not quite so addicted to slightly reckless speed. Not that she imagined for one moment that he was capable of losing control of a car. His strong and shapely hands on the wheel, and his whole attitude of assurance, prevented her having any doubts on that score.

  But she was not fond of speed for speed’s sake. And at that hour of the evening there was a soft, sensuous warmth in the atmosphere, after the more brazen heat of the day, that was stirred up by their swift passage through the starlit night.

  As yet there was no moon, but the stars were very bright.

  Angela loved the fertility of the wide valley wherein the Moors had set down Granada, and all that triumphant colour that was Andalusia, and she wished they had set off a little earlier, while there was still light enough left by the sunset to show her the richness and abundance of the flowers, fruit and grain that she knew were extending on all sides of her; while the Sierra Nevada, rising in a solid bulk against the sky, would have brought the excited breath catching in her throat while they were still highlighted by the fires of sunset.

  As it was, everything was seen through a richly purple haze, and on it the perfume of the tobacco plantations floated in sensuous clouds. It stirred her blood, despite the fact that it was so balanced and English ... and as the moon climbed slowly into the sky, and everything surrounding her was drenched in a miraculous flood of silver, she wondered why it was that her thoughts harked back so constantly to England, and why she actually craved to spend some part of her life there.

  She loved Spain. She knew that she loved it quite passionately at times. But never could she quite overcome the feeling that it was alien country, and that her roots lay in a cooler clime altogether. She had dreamed that if she ever married and settled down it would be in England. But now, all at once, she actually failed to understand her constant preoccupation with a land that had not even figured prominently in her upbringing, although it was true she owned a house there. Why could she not settle down and live happily in Spain? Or, at any rate, why could she not make up her mind to make the effort to concentrate on living happily in Spain, with a man whom lots of young women of her age—including a number of her old schoolfellows—would have been thrilled to bits by the very idea of living with him and his vast estates and splendid income in a land that was all colour and warmth and enchantment by comparison with duller and more northerly climes?

  She glanced at him, but he was concentrating fixedly on driving, and it struck her, not for the first time by any means, that unless he was making a deliberate effort to entertain her he seemed to have very little desire to talk to her. There was usually a little frown between his well-marked black brows when he was concentrating on something quite apart from her, and it was there now ... as if his thoughts worried him, and the soothing perfume of the tobacco plants had failed to have any effect on him.

  They entered the town to find that it was taken over by tourists, and the steep and narrow streets were thronged with them. Granada has so much to offer the tourist that it was small wonder they were milling around in lightly clothed bevies, while the hotels were doing most satisfactory big business. From the courts of the Alhambra, where tall cypresses swayed dreamily against the sky, to the small Arab-style shops in the Zacatin, a feeling of holiday—of fiesta—was affecting the spirits of everyone. The more affluent sipped cocktails on hotel terraces, the young and the adventurous and the more homely roved the streets and waited for the fireworks that would provi
de such a spectacular show later on.

  Angela had no real idea where her escort was taking her to dine, but she strongly suspected it would be somewhere extremely respectable. She was perfectly right, for despite the crush they were received by deferential waiters in a somewhat unusual hotel that was more like a centuries-old inn, with a Moorish-style decor and an extremely exclusive clientele. They sipped aperitifs on the terrace while their table was made ready for them, and afterwards Angela found herself ensconced with her husband-to-be in a discreet corner of a flower-filled room, and pressed to decide upon what she would like to eat. She decided to leave all matter of choice to Don Felipe, and he proved his experience by selecting for her the very things she would herself have chosen if she had not considered it more diplomatic in a woman to leave the ordering to him.

  The wine he ordered was not, as she had half expected it would be, champagne, but a light and very pleasant local wine that was quite unlikely to have any disastrous aftereffects, and she doubted whether she could have become intoxicated on it even had she allowed herself more than one or two glasses. Don Felipe himself had something slightly stronger, and he concluded the meal with a liqueur which he did not permit her, any more than it would even have occurred to him to offer her a cigarette.

  As it happened she did not smoke, but she was slightly amused. The way he treated her was exactly the way he would have treated a favourite niece, or even a young sister, he was taking out to dine. Sweet things had to be selected for her, and of course there was lots of fruit, and a very special ice cream with fruit in it and a delectable colourful whip on the top of it.

  Afterwards they returned to the terrace, and coffee was brought to them. From somewhere inside the hotel music reached them, but it was not music to which they could dance, like the throbbing guitar music that was being played across the street in a more modern and with-it hotel crammed to capacity with holiday-makers. Angela sat back in her chair and looked up at the brilliance of the sky above Granada, and just for one moment she wondered what it would be like to be taken out for a really gay evening, with Flamenco and eager, swaying bodies, tapping of heels and fluttering fans, a glistening floor on which anyone and everyone could tap and sway, too, and perhaps a careless wander through the moonlit streets

  afterwards.

  She sighed, her lips parting a little without her knowledge ... and she saw that Don Felipe was regarding her a trifle quizzically on the softly-lit terrace.

  ‘All is not well, little one?’ he asked. ‘Or is it simply that you are bored?’

  She denied being bored almost indignantly, for if she had appeared bored then she was guilty of a lapse of good manners that troubled her. But she need not have worried. Felipe was not offended. He was racking his brains for something to say to her, something that would get through to whatever type of mind it was that lay behind her well-bred-young-woman exterior.

  And then a party of people passed below them in the street. A woman looked up at him, ceased laughing lightheartedly at something one of her companions had just said to her, and then made for the foot of the steps and extended both hands as she moved towards Angela’s escort.

  ‘Why, Felipe!’ she exclaimed, and her voice was as English as Angela’s own. But nothing about Angela was as glamorous and unusual as the radiant creature the Spaniard, galvanised into delighted movement, rose to greet.

  CHAPTER IV

  ‘I was half hoping I might bump into you, but never thought I would do so in quite this fashion,’ she said, as her hands lay in Felipe’s and the two of them gazed at one another as if the meeting was pure pleasure on both sides. ‘I could of course have contacted you before my arrival in Spain, but it occurred to me you might be on the other side of the world, and in any case I’m accompanied by friends. We’re moving on all the time.’

  ‘I still think you should have contacted me,’ Felipe told her, declining to let go of her hands. ‘You and your friends could have come and stayed with me. You know—you must know! —that you are always welcome as a visitor!’

  She made a slight but engaging face.

  ‘As a visitor, Felipe? Are we as distant as all that

  these days?’

  He smiled at her.

  ‘You and I could never be distant, Carmelita.... And then he turned to the little group of people who had followed her up the steps to the terrace, and were standing rather awkwardly waiting to be acknowledged. ‘Introduce me, please! Any friend of yours is my friend!’

  The necessary introductions were made, and there was a good deal of bowing and hand-shaking. The radiant young woman’s escort comprised a couple of Spaniards and three English friends, and there was only one other young woman amongst them. She, too, appeared to be English, and she gazed at Don Felipe as if it had always been a secret dream of hers to meet someone of his exalted rank amongst exciting-looking Latins, and now that the dream had come true she was a little over-awed. Particularly as he saluted her hand with his lips in a way that it had never been saluted before.

  Then, and only then, did he remember Angela. His newly discovered and very beautiful friend had been staring at her in the mellow flood of light that illuminated the terrace, and she was looking faintly quizzical when the Don at last presented her.

  ‘Miss Angela Grevil, my fiancee,’ he said. And as Angela stood up: ‘Mrs. Martin Ruddock. Mrs. Ruddock’s husband was a very close friend of mine.’

  ‘Was?’ Angela said to herself, since the husband didn’t appear to be amongst Mrs. Ruddock’s coterie of supporters. She extended a diffident hand, and Mrs. Ruddock took it.

  ‘I’m a widow,’ she explained sweetly. ‘I’ve been a widow for exactly two years. ’

  And then her’s, and the Don’s eyes, met.

  ‘Granada is en fete to-night,’ Angela murmured mechanically. ‘I expect you’re hoping to see the fireworks.’

  ‘Fireworks?’ Mrs. Ruddock shrugged her shoulders. ‘Does one really bother one’s head about fireworks nowadays, when there are so many more entertaining things to be seen and to do? The thing I love about a crowd like this is that it lets its hair down, and even Spanish courting couples make love in doorways, and if you feel like dancing uninhibitedly you can. In fact, there’s no point in wandering about the streets if you’re going to behave in a very prim and proper fashion.’ She glanced upwards provocatively at Don Felipe. ‘But I’ll confess I can’t imagine you behaving in anything but a prim and proper fashion in the streets of Granda, Felipe— or London or Paris, if it comes to that! You never forget your dignity! ’

  ‘Perhaps my dignity is all I have,’ he replied, a bright sparkle of amusement in his handsome black eyes. Then he put her into a chair, and a waiter brought other chairs to their table. ‘This is an occasion, I think, that calls for champagne,’ he added. ‘Juan, what is your favourite vintage year? Let us have something very special for my friends!’

  ‘Si, senor,’ Juan responded, and departed to carry out the order.

  Mrs. Ruddock lay back in her chair, and as she was now immediately beneath one of the lights Angela could see that she was rather more than quite spectacularly lovely. She had hair that was not unlike her own, except that it was even fairer, and she wore it swathed about her head in a silken coil. Her dress was of midnight blue chiffon, rather short, permitting one to dwell on excellent legs, and she must have stepped out of her hotel just after dinner, for there were diamonds in her ears and diamonds sparkling at her neck and wrists, and her escorts were all smartly and properly attired for the evening. But for the presence of the other young woman Angela would have thought of her as a prize bloom being protected and cherished by a favoured band of the faithful, but the other young woman was attractive, too, only she certainly hadn’t a pair of eyes like Mrs. Ruddock.

  As she tipped back her head to look up at her host Angela could see them very clearly, huge, and smoky grey, with long fringes of (possibly false) thick black eyelashes. She was skilfully, but not too heavily, made up apart from the eye
lashes, and her mouth was particularly arresting. Certainly, no man could have gazed at her for long without becoming conscious of it.

  And when she smiled, the smile was like a deliberate act of seduction.

  Angela caught herself up, wondering why her thoughts were wandering along such lines. And then it occurred to her that it was not perhaps surprising. The arrival of this young woman on the scene had resulted in an order for champagne, which a dinner she and her fiance had sat through together, without anything in the nature of outside diversion, had apparently not called for. It had not been in any sense a celebration dinner.

  ‘You know, Felipe,’ Mrs. Ruddock told him, ‘you really surprised me just now when you introduced me to Miss Grevil. For some reason I’ve never thought of you as a marrying man. ’

  ‘No?’ He was bending towards her, offering her a cigarette, and the gleam of amusement persisted between his own thick dark eyelashes.

  ‘Which was rather silly of me, I suppose,’ Mrs. Ruddock continued, accepting the cigarette and allowing him to light it for her. Her eyes dwelt on him almost with absorption. ‘You Spaniards are very family-minded, aren’t you? And I expect you thought it was high time you got married! ’

  ‘Rather more than high time,’ Felipe agreed with her. ‘If I had had any real sense of responsibility and all that is expected of me I would have done so long ago.’

  ‘But at least you are placating family interests now?’ The huge eyes communicated a sense of amusement, of slightly derisive humour. ‘I am sure you are thinking hopefully of an heir, and all that sort of thing. With estates like yours an heir is most important.... When do you get married?’

  ‘In another five or six weeks.’

  ‘Then the date is not fixed?’

  ‘Not yet. Angela is in the midst of collecting clothes for the event.’