Bay of Secrets (28 page)

He smiled. It was true that England could be damp, cold and grey. He still wasn’t entirely used to it.
How could he have brought himself to leave?
What could he tell her? ‘When you are young,’ he said, ‘the island – it can feel like a prison.’ Which in itself was true enough. He and Izabella had often talked of moving away – to Paris, Barcelona or London. But he had been pushed into leaving, while Izabella was still there, now rooted to the island she had wanted to escape from.

‘The other man’s grass is always greener?’ Ruby asked.

‘Good,’ he pointed out, ‘to even have grass. We do not get a lot in Fuerte.’

She laughed. He liked that feeling – of making her laugh.

‘But is it still home?’ she asked. She ran her fingers through her short blonde hair. It managed to be both tufty and spiky at the same time, he thought. And would it be soft to the touch? He thought so.

‘Well … ’ They paused to take in the view. From here you could see past the fields, hedgerows and drystone walls down to the village of Seatown and the ocean beyond.
Was it still home?
This was not an easy question either. Yes, England had held more opportunities. But … It was still a big but, he realised. ‘I do not know,’ he said. ‘I am not sure what it is that I want to find.’

Ruby’s thoughtful glance flickered over him. ‘I don’t know that either,’ she admitted.

They smiled at one another. And in that moment he felt something encircling the two of them; separating them from the rest of the world. He knew that his instinct had been correct. The second he saw her, the moment she began to play the saxophone, the first time they spoke.

The path divided and they turned off for Golden Cap.

‘You have walked here before, of course?’ he asked her.

‘Not for a long time.’ She hesitated. Her eyes filled and she looked away from him as if she was looking into the distance of the past.

‘What is it, Ruby?’ But Andrés thought he knew how she felt. She had lost her family just as he had – although in a
different way. Was that the bond between them?

‘I was about to say that I’m rediscovering some of the places of my childhood. Since my parents died.’ She hesitated as if about to say more. ‘Since I came back here to Dorset.’

He reached out his hand to help her over the stile. Her hand in his felt small and chilly. ‘Does it feel like a good thing to do? To go back? To revisit?’ He was asking for himself as much as her. And yet the memories were always there, in his head. The feeling was still there, in his heart. No one could take that away.

‘Most of the time it does feel like a good thing, yes.’ She jumped down lightly from the stile. ‘And I need the connection with them. Especially now.’

He could understand that too. The connection. Though he wasn’t sure what she meant by ‘especially now’. He wouldn’t ask though – let her tell him in her own good time. He felt a shaft of anger. The usual shaft of anger – against him: his father.

They began the climb up to the Cap. ‘Do you miss your family?’ she asked him.

‘Yes,’ he said. Especially his mother and his sister. ‘We were close once. Very close.’ Like the rocks of a
corralito
. Like the waves of the sea.

Ruby touched his arm. ‘Perhaps one day you’ll go back,’ she said. She let out a breath as they reached the summit.

Andrés remembered his mother’s words.
Nothing has changed.
So how could he go back? He gazed down at the sea and the village. It was breezy up here on the Cap but all very
calm below. He could see the houses on the hill and people down on the beach at Seatown quite clearly now. He looked at Ruby. She wasn’t like most people. Sometimes she didn’t say much, but she seemed to know how to say the right thing. ‘Perhaps,’ he said.

They walked across the grassy top of Golden Cap, to the other side. It was the highest point in Dorset and today it was clear, so there was an excellent panoramic view along the coast – past the Fleet and through to Weymouth one way, and almost to Salcombe on the other; way beyond the Cobb of Lyme Regis. They sat down to enjoy the view and chat of other things – Ruby’s music, the Jazz Café, of Tina and Gez and about the forthcoming summer exhibition of Andrés’s work.

After a while, Andrés pulled the sketchbook out of his bag that he always carried with him. He had a sudden urge … He drew fast with strong sure strokes, the woman sitting on the grassy cliff top, hugging her knees, her short hair catching in the breeze, the sea a backdrop behind her. She regarded him, head on one side. Her expression was dreamy. Andrés liked that. He wanted to find out more about what went on inside that head.

When he’d finished, he tore off the sheet and handed it to her.

‘For me?’ She clapped her hands, like a child.

‘If you like it.’ It was a decent resemblance. He watched her expression – delighted at first, and then thoughtful, as if
the sketched portrait had reminded her of something – or someone.

‘It’s very good,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’

He shrugged. ‘It is nothing.’ He stared out to sea. ‘My father is the expert.’

‘Your father?’

‘Enrique Marin.’ He could hardly bring himself to say the name. ‘He is the portrait painter,’ he said. Did he sound bitter? Probably. But his father had done well, very well. Still. Had he become the
caballero
he had always wanted to be? A gentleman? An image materialised in Andrés’s head. His father in his paint-spattered shorts and overalls, skinny cheroot held between his fingers. Hardly. Another image resurfaced – the one that made Andrés shudder.
Some fucking gentleman
 …

*

Later, they strolled back down towards Langdon Woods.

‘And where is this cottage you wanted me to see?’ Ruby asked.

She smiled up at him and suddenly, with that smile, he longed to take her into his arms. She was that kind of woman. You thought you knew exactly how she would feel, how she would smell; the texture of her skin, the softness of her hair, the fragrance of her sinking into your senses. You could be wrong. Oh, there was a sadness about her still. But it attracted him, it drew him.

‘Pride Bay,’ he said. ‘We could go there after lunch, if you like? I have the key.’

‘Lunch?’

‘I thought the pub by the beach.’

‘You’re on.’

*

After lunch they walked along Chesil Beach. Like Andrés, Ruby seemed glad to be down on sea level. And like him, she seemed to love the beach. He watched her pick up a stone and skim it over the waves. Like him, she had grown up on the coast; the sea was in her blood. He took deep breaths of the fresh salty air. The flamboyant golden cliffs always reminded him sharply of the Playa del Castillo back home – his favourite stretch of honeycombed sand, baked by the sun, blown by the wind, backed by the mountains. Andrés had surfed there as a boy – most of the kids had. But he had stopped surfing when painting had taken over his life.

They cut through to the cottage which was half a mile inland. It was a simple two-up two-down, white-rendered place and belonged to one of Andrés’s clients who lived in Sherborne. He had asked Andrés to give it a paint job and a top to toe spruce-up so that he could get it rented out.

‘So it hasn’t been advertised yet?’ Ruby asked when they got there. She turned to look at him, her face slightly flushed. In the pub they’d both drunk a pint of beer; lager for Andrés, a dark local ale for Ruby. He’d been surprised. He had visualised her sipping Chardonnay or even knocking back a shot of vodka and ice.

‘Not yet.’

‘And how much a month does he want for it?’ Her expression was deadpan now. Did she like the place? He had no idea. Just because he could imagine her here. What did he know? You had no need to analyse expressions on the island – people tended to shout what they thought. English people were more reserved. You had to guess what they were thinking. Perhaps it was the weather that made them all so damned inhibited.

Andrés told her. It was a fair price and she seemed to agree because she nodded and smiled. ‘When would it be available?’

‘As soon as I have done the work.’ They were in the kitchen now, which was basic, to say the least. ‘I could put you up some more cupboards and a better worktop,’ Andrés said. ‘And some shelves in the living room maybe?’

‘With the landlord’s approval?’ she teased.

He shrugged. ‘He will not mind as long as he does not have to pay for it.’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Why would you do that, Andrés? You hardly know me.’

‘I just would.’

‘But, Andrés … ’ And the way she said his name made him shudder for a moment inside.

‘Ruby.’ He put his hands on her shoulders.

She looked up at him, all sadness and dreams and forget-me-not blue eyes.

And he couldn’t resist it any longer. He bent towards her and he kissed her, firmly on the mouth to stop her saying
more – and because she would probably taste good. She did. ‘I think we have a deal,’ he said.

She blinked at him. ‘Do you kiss everyone you make a deal with, Andrés?’

Andrés wondered what he would say to Tina the next time she asked how he and Ruby were getting along. He took her hand and pulled it into the crook of his arm. It was becoming a habit. ‘You are my first,’ he said.

Barcelona, 1956

Things were changing – slowly – in the city as the decade progressed. Ration books disappeared and in the press, Sister Julia read that earnings were rising. The economy was still fragile though. In 1956 a severe frost hit Spain’s citrus production and olive harvest – this affected the farmers and in turn the people; it seemed to be two steps forwards and one back. But still, Sister Julia thought, at least there was now some sense of hope. This morning she had walked along the street towards the clinic and she had heard a man whistling a bolero. Her spirits had risen. The Spanish were a strong race. They could not easily be trampled on.

Now, it was seven p.m. and Sister Julia was exhausted. Three babies had been born in the Canales Clinic that day and she had hardly stopped to rest.

The first, a healthy baby girl, thank the Lord, had been born at midday. This baby was due to be adopted and the new parents would be arriving very soon to take her away.

Sister Julia had spent some time in the afternoon comforting the mother, a woman called Inez Leon, who had made
her decision to give up her baby with what seemed to be a heavy heart.

‘I am alone in the world, Sister,’ she had said. ‘I want my daughter to have a good life. I want her to have everything I cannot give her.’

‘
Si, si
, of course you do,’ Sister Julia murmured, as she helped Inez express her breast milk. This would be a relief to her and it would give her baby daughter the best possible start in life.

‘But do you think my little girl will ever forgive me, Sister?’ Inez asked.

Sister Julia stopped what she was doing for a moment. She glanced across the room to see if anyone had heard her – especially Dr Lopez. But the doctor was conferring with one of the nurses at the door to the sluice room and no one else seemed to be listening.

It was not a question that Sister Julia was accustomed to hearing. Mothers either kept their babies or they gave them up because they had been persuaded that it was for the best.
Forgiveness
 … What could she say? She could hardly tell Inez that her little girl would probably never know that she had once had a different mother.

‘Of course she will forgive you,’ Sister Julia said. ‘Your daughter will be grateful to you, I am sure.’ And she offered up a silent prayer. Would God understand that the truth was sometimes too painful to bear? She hoped so.

Inez sighed. ‘But I will always wonder about her, Sister,’ she said.

And what if the child too ever should wonder about her true birth mother? It was possible, was it not? She might be told that she had been adopted, or indeed, she might find out. And if she did – she too was very likely to wonder. Which was one of the reasons why Sister Julia had continued to keep her book of names. That little girl – like all the others – deserved the right to know.

*

The second child – another girl – was born mid-afternoon following induction. This mother – Danita Diez – was married and was keeping her child. The midwife had been massaging her in an attempt to improve the presentation of the foetus. She seemed to be a long way off her time still to Sister Julia, but Dr Lopez had instructed for her to be given an enema and castor oil first thing in the morning.

He examined her later. ‘The cervix is favourable,’ he pronounced. ‘And the presentation is now good. I will perform the rupture.’

Sister Julia knew what was coming. Once the amniotic fluid was released the pressure of the baby’s head would increase the force and frequency of the uterine contractions. She helped the nurse prepare the surgical trolley and then drew the screen around the bed.

The nurse put Danita’s legs up in the stirrups and Dr Lopez worked quickly and professionally as ever.

‘She will get better care in the daytime, Sister,’ he muttered as he pulled off his white mask, having completed the procedure.

Danita shrieked as the first strong contraction pulled at her. Breaking the amniotic waters in this way might reduce the amount of time she was in labour, but it always made it more painful for the mother. The pains were so sudden, so fierce.

Sister Julia and the midwife took her through to the delivery room. The midwife was shaking her head.

‘Should she have been induced?’ Sister Julia dared to whisper.

The midwife glanced at her. ‘It is simpler this way,’ she said.

Sister Julia was aware of that. But simpler for whom?

*

While Dr Lopez was busy dealing with the third birth of the day, Sister Julia slipped down to his consulting room on the pretext of fetching something a patient had left in the waiting room. She found an excuse to do this two or three times a week – frequently enough to ensure she kept abreast of the birth and death records; frequently enough for her to be able to memorise names so that she could write them in her book, later, in the privacy of her room at Santa Ana. Sister Julia had to do this often, she found – or the files would disappear. Were they destroyed so that there was no evidence of what was going on? She feared so.