A COTTAGE IN SPAIN
Rosalind Brett
Aunt Natalie’s legacy of a villa on the Costa Brava was really a thinly-disguised plot to manoeuvre Linda into marrying a charming Spaniard.
Linda’s English neighbor had charm too; and the situation might have developed as a pleasant, harmless comedy if Maxine had not turned up. For where Maxine went, drama and disaster might easily follow.
CHAPTER ONE
“I DO not understand you English,” said Senior Garcia, spreading his puffy brown fingers tentwise on the light wood of his desk. “We have a phrase—‘He who says Spain says all’—and you are the first of the English I have met who has seen our country yet has no wish to live here.”
Linda sighed and gave him her prettiest smile. “I have a father and a very nice brother in England. We have friends—lots of them—and I’d hate to give them all up. In fact, it was frightfully eccentric of Aunt Natalie to insist that I live in her cottage.”
“But only for six months of the year, Senorita!”
“If she’d stipulated a fortnight I could have managed it as I’m managing this visit—during my summer holiday.” The lawyer said “Poof!” and sat back, regarding her. Clearly, his jaded-brown glance said, she was like the rest of the English, more than slightly mad. But to Linda her own reactions were most sensible, particularly as she had to admit that this coast possessed magnetic beauty and that a fortnight was far too short a time in which to tour a country of infinite grace and excitement. She still had ten days to go, of course, but presumably two or three of them would be occupied with the business of her aunt’s exasperating will.
‘Why Aunt Natalie, who had married a Spaniard many years ago and become known in the family as Aunt Nutsie in consequence, should have decided to leave her cottage and his contents to her brother’s daughter, none of the Bradens could fathom. There was a nephew of her husband’s of whom she was reputed to be inordinately fond, yet she had bequeathed him not a peseta. It was uncanny.
Also, Linda’s brother was older than Linda, and Aunt Natalie, on her last visit to England some six years ago, had thought him a fine fellow. To be sure, she had taken to the fifteen-year-old Linda and been annoyed with Mr. Braden when he had refused her request to carry the child off to live with her in Spain. And there was the gift of a hundred pounds on her last birthday—her twenty-first. Still, Aunt Natalie de Meriaga had been comfortably off, so the furnished cottage was no doubt worth two or three thousand pounds; most of her income, it seemed, had died with her.
“I must tell you, senorita,” the lawyer was saying, “that if you have not lived for six months in the cottage during the first year, it is to be sold, and the proceeds used for the promotion of good spoken English among the people of Montelisa.”
“Good heavens!” said Linda. “Do they want to speak good English?”
Senor Garcia’s long, loose face tried to look severe. “It is not a joke, Miss Braden. Your aunt may have been a peculiar woman, but she had the big active heart of a Spaniard. It is many years since her husband died, and she has worked ever since for a better understanding between our two countries. The Costa Brava is a luxury coast, and above its beaches you will find many rich English people who own houses to which they escape from the northern winter. Most of those people knew your aunt and respected her.” He smiled suddenly, showing large teeth. “But you are right. The Montelisanos are probably too lazy to learn even bad English; therefore, I beg you to consider carefully before you refuse this inheritance!”
“It’s very difficult,” she admitted. “I wish my father had been able to come with me. He’d know what to do.”
“Take my advice, senorita. Go and see the cottage. Sleep there for a night or two, walk in the rose garden and speak with the excellent Anna, who was your aunt’s servant and is to be yours, if you so desire. Remember that you will be allowed twenty-five pounds a month for the six months you spend at the cottage, and ask yourself how that compares with this work that you do for your father in England!”
The proposition was, of course, insidiously attractive. So far, all the adventure in her life had been wrung from the books on the shelves in her father’s shop; vicariously, she had travelled and, tensed with excitement, become absorbed in queer places, met strange people. It had never occurred to her that she would ever in reality journey farther than the northern coast of France, for a brief holiday. Candidly, she had never wanted to, until the letter from this Senor Garcia had made imperative a visit to Spain. Then, naturally, her vista had widened enormously, right down to the blue Mediterranean.
Her father had said, “Take a month this year, Linda. Miss Woodham and I can get along without you, particularly if she brings in her young sister for the weekend trade. John will help, too, when he’s free.”
John, as Linda well knew, was never free. As borough architect to the council of the provincial town in which the Bradens lived he had ample leisure, but as the fiancé of Maxine Odell he had no moment to himself. For Maxine was the treasured only child of a rich silversmith; she spent hours in beauty parlors and dress salons, and was always free to pick up John at his office in her own scarlet roadster. Such a pity that staunch, inarticulate John had had to fall in love with a spoilt darling; rather odd, too, that Maxine, who could have had her pick of all the eligible young men in the district, had chosen John Braden. When Linda had voiced doubts her father had remarked, in his abstracted fashion, “Maxine is not a fool, my dear. She recognizes in John all the qualities that are essential in a good husband, and that brother of yours is good-looking, besides. She’s only twenty-four, and under the tinsel she’s quite sweet. Don’t you worry about John.”
Linda did feel, though, that Maxine should have had more consideration for John’s career; and it wouldn’t have hurt her to sit with him quietly for an hour or two now and then, while he did his father’s accounts. No, Linda couldn’t rely on John’s being able to help in her father’s book and gift shop while she was away. She daren’t take more than two weeks.
“Tell me something, senor,” she said. “Was the cottage and the money to run it for six months of the year all that my aunt left?”
“I am afraid so.” He nodded dejectedly. “The cottage and furniture were hers absolutely, and she set aside a sum of money which would cover ten years at one hundred and fifty pounds a year—which is the twenty-five pounds a month I have mentioned. If you wished to live in the cottage permanently your income would be only twelve pounds ten shillings a month. But as your business adviser I would point out that if you occupied the cottage for only six months and rented it to some artist or poet for the other six months, your financial position would be sound.”
“For ten years?”
He shrugged. “After that the money would be used up but the cottage would be yours to do with as you wished. It would always be an asset. Your aunt, I must tell you, hoped that long before then you would marry a Spaniard, and that was the chief idea behind the will.”
“I might, at that, if I stayed,” returned Linda lightly. “Some of them look so romantic!” She stood up, and he, alertly courteous, came round the desk, a thickset, dark-skinned man with silvery hair. She added, “I feel rather sorry for that nephew. What is his name?”
“Sebastian de Meriaga. Yes, on the face of it, it seems unfair, because he was always very attractive to the old Senora and she had much pleasure from his company. He is an engaging young man, but we of Catalonia have always our suspicions of the volatile Andalusians; his family originated in Andalusia. You will go to see the cottage, senorita?”
“Yes, tomorrow. Do I have to take a key?”
“You may have this one, but the good Anna has a key also, and I will see to it that she is at the cottage
to greet you. Her married son works here in Barcelona and tonight he will take a message. I will arrange for a taxi to call at your hotel in the morning. At ten o’clock?”
“That will do nicely.”
‘You may rely upon me, senorita. Ah, but I am forgetting!” Much more swiftly than one would imagine a man of his age and size could move, he went round the desk and pulled open a drawer. “Here is a photograph of the house which I was going to send to England, if you had been unable to come yet.”
Linda’s very blue eyes stared entranced at the white villa in a nest of tall trees. “Oh, dear. I wish it weren’t so lovely. And to think it’s mine!”
His raised hand showed forefinger pressed to thumb in a typically Continental gesture. “Yes, senorita. But for a few negligible conditions, it is yours! You will give me a telephone call when you get back to town tomorrow?”
Linda promised she would, slipped the photograph into her bag and said good-bye. As she went down the old staircase into the sunny street she felt lightheaded and bubbly. She stood still on the pavement of the Rambla, savoring the beauty of the flowers massed in great baskets and tubs under the plane trees, and she hugged her bag under her arm, thinking that all this, and the cottage at Montelisa, could be hers if she wished. In her trim powder-blue suit with the froth of white lace at the throat, and the navy blue hat perched jauntily upon her soft, light-brown curls, she looked like a cornflower venturing among peonies; the flowers offered for sale were so big and brilliant, the vendors so full-lipped, and richly olive-skinned.
The caged birds for sale caught at her heart. She would have liked to buy all the parakeets and finches, the white pigeons and skylarks, and set them free in the woods.
Her hotel, in one of the narrow avenues off the Rambla, was of the type that sets out to attract English and American tourists, but the rates were remarkably reasonable. Her bedroom on the first floor, to which she now mounted, was large and comfortably furnished in a baroque style, and it even boasted a writing desk which was well supplied with hotel stationery. She got out her pen and sat down at the desk. She must write to her father of all that had happened this morning, and she felt that in order to evoke atmosphere she ought to send him the photograph of the cottage.
The letter took an hour to write, and soon after she had finished there came a knock at the bedroom door and Miss Doan, a retired schoolteacher who had been Linda’s companion on the journey, came in to ask how her young friend had fared with the Spanish lawyer.
There was nothing staid about Miss Dean. She insisted on wearing tweeds whatever the weather and her hats were of the uncompromising flat-crowned variety, but that was because it would have affronted her to be thought anything but English. For the early months of each year she stalked all over the Continent, and somehow she escaped from even the most dangerous situations completely unruffled.
Miss Dean had taught for a number of years in Linda’s home town, and for part of the time she had boarded near the Bradens and paid them frequent calls. It was because of her knowledge of the Continent that Mr. Braden had suggested that Linda write to Miss Dean and ask her advice about a trip to Montelisa. To the older woman, it seemed, such a journey was no venture at all. Instead of Linda waiting till Easter or later, why shouldn’t she go at once and settle the matter? She, Miss Dean, would be only too pleased to start her own wanderings from Barcelona.
Travelling with the seasoned Maud Dean had robbed the undertaking of strangeness. It had also ensured that Linda should reach Spain only a few weeks after her aunt’s death. She was very grateful to Miss Dean and gladly related to her the details of the interview with Senor Garcia.
The other woman’s elderly, sprightly face, was smiling as she listened, and she commented, “I told you you’d find it difficult to walk out on Montelisa. It’s a lovely place, and farther along the coast—just far enough!—there’s quite an English colony of the wealthy, bohemian type. If I were as young as you are I’d have to try it out for at least a couple of months!”
Linda nodded, resignedly. “I’m afraid it’s going to be tempting, but I just couldn’t leave my father that long. Miss Woodham is a wonder at running the flat and helping in the shop, but John isn’t able to do much and the accounts would get into an awful muddle if I weren’t there.”
“Nonsense,” said Miss Dean briskly. “Supposing you married?”
“I’d have to train someone.” Linda laughed. “There’s no fear of it, anyway, though Senor Garcia said my aunt would have liked to hitch me to a Spaniard. Can you imagine it?”
“It must have worked well with her, or she’d have gone back to England when her husband died. I’d love to go with you to that cottage tomorrow.”
“I’m hoping you will go with me.”
“I can’t,” regretfully. “I’ve been in touch with some friends this morning and have a chance to combine a little business with pleasure—some coaching of a backward young lady in Valencia. I promised to leave with them by car at nine tomorrow morning.”
“Does that mean I shan’t see you again?”
“You’ll surely come to Valencia, if only for a day or so; it’s enchanting. I’ll give you the address and you can telephone me when you get there.”
Linda would have liked to have the benefit of Miss Dean’s company and common sense for a few more days but, as one does as soon as one becomes accustomed to the alien features, sights and sounds, she was beginning to feel quite at home in Barcelona. Even to those who hadn’t a word of English she could make herself understood by smiles and the use of her hands, and there could surely be few perils in a country where the men were so embarrassingly courteous and the women so beautiful.
The politeness of the shopkeepers and the willingness to oblige which was part of the complex Spanish character were a perpetual delight. That evening with Miss Dean, first at the Teatro and then in a restaurant for the abnormally late dinner in which these people revelled, was like an exciting dream. But the whole time, in the back of Linda’s mind, lay the disturbing beauty of the white villa at Montelisa, which was hers if she cared to make use of it. For the first time in her life she wanted to do something without having to think first of her father and John. Oh, well, one had to take the long view. The most fascinating house in the world would be boring if one had to five in it alone for long.
She said good-bye to Miss Dean at nine o’clock next morning, and soon after ten was on her way through Barcelona in one of the yellow and black taxis which threaded the streets like erratic wasps. Her driver was youngish and talkative; he also had a grand contempt for the Guardias Civiles, but as his innuendoes were phrased in his own language Linda caught only the tone; which was enough.
She had learned four words: “Yo no tengo Espanol.” She trotted them out glibly to the taxi-driver and he immediately changed to execrable French. He had, he averred, lived for a while along the coast at Marseilles, so he was what one might call “cosmopolite”!
He drove round the back of the park into the Avenida de la Meridiana, and quite soon the town was left behind. It seemed at first that they were travelling inland, but presently they turned back towards the coast between flower gardens which provided the Ramblas in Barcelona with cartloads of mimosa, roses and carnations; the mimosa trees were like drifting yellow clouds. They met the mountains and the sea, followed a high road which ran through woods that gave glimpses of blue distant water between their branches, and dipped into the coastal village which was Montelisa. According to Senor Garcia’s instructions, said the chauffeur, the cottage to which he was to conduct the senorita was the very last on the coast road beyond the village.
The villas, most of them white and set amid profusions of mastic-trees and vines, bougainvillaea and cactuses, looked solid and cosy but not opulent, even though some of them had large grounds and terraced orchards stretching away at the back. Their architecture was varied but undeniably Spanish; some even had three or four storeys and ornamental barred windows.
Then Linda sa
w the cottage. Oddly breathless, she said, “Wait! There it is. Just like the photograph.”
It was not large but it had an appealing mellowness. The paved path ran between lawns into a covered porch, on each side of which an archway gave on to the long glassed-in patio. The door, Linda saw with a delicious catch at the heart, was of the stable type, in a heavy dark wood, and the upper half was open invitingly.
To the driver she said quickly, “I may be an hour or two. Find a tavern in the village and come back after lunch.”
He appeared to understand very well, for she was less than halfway along the path when the taxi roared away. She walked softly up to the door, poked in her head and pulled back the bolt which locked the bottom half, and stepped into a square room that gleamed with old wood and bright cushions. The floor was tiled in pale grey, the mgs were of Catalan embroidery, and upon the walls hung a few miniatures in dull gilt frames.
She took a few paces which brought her into the archway through which one entered what was apparently the dining-room. But there, Linda paused and stared. Good lord, who would have thought that even Aunt Natalie would go in for such things! Skulls and earthy-looking ancient implements, a scattering of potsherds over a table, and a few eerie bones; all a pale pink-tan in color.
The desk was incongruous. It was square and modern, and above it a set of new bookshelves held great tomes with such titles as “The Bronze Age in Arabia” and “Ancient History of the Jordan Valley.” The lowest shelves were loaded with heavily-bound files arranged in alphabetical order; they looked horribly learned.
She went closer to one of the skulls, saw that it was packed tight with clay so that the features, pure as those of the famous Neferiti, were beautifully outlined. Why in the world hadn’t Aunt Natalie left the things to a museum? They must certainly be good specimens. Almost unthinkingly, she ran a finger over the face.
“Don’t touch that!”
Linda jumped violently. She must have jerked the table, for the skull began to roll and the next moment it was swept up between two brown palms—very large brown palms, they looked to Linda. She clutched her throat, looked up into a lean and furious face.
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