The Winding Stair (28 page)

‘I don't know.'

She could see he hated to have to admit it. ‘If you go, I go too,' she said. ‘Tell them that. You got me out here. I won't do it for anyone else.'

‘But your grandmother?'

‘Doesn't care. Not about me. Not about anything, I sometimes think. Gair, sometimes I don't trust her. It's horrible. I don't understand it. Of course, she's so old.', She was making excuses for her. She knew, too, what he was going to say next. ‘And don't read me a lecture about patriotism either! I hope I'm a good Englishwoman, and hate Napoleon and all that kind of thing, but there are limits, and I've just about reached them! It begins to seem as if it would go on for ever. And now, this week, waiting for you; wondering if you'd never come, if you'd been sent home already … It was the last straw, don't you see? Tell the people you work for that I won't go on; not if they send you home.' And then, furiously: ‘Gair! You're not even listening!'

‘I'm sorry.' He had been on the defensive ever since he had
arrived. ‘I truly am. Only – I was trying to think what I should tell you.'

‘The truth, perhaps? It would make a change.'

‘Truth can be dangerous. It's you I'm thinking of; I beg you to believe that. The less you know, the less danger you are in.'

‘I'm not so sure of that. Sometimes ignorance is more dangerous than anything. Oh! Here they come!' Daisy and Teresa had been out riding when Gair arrived, so that they had been able to achieve this tête-à-tête on the seaward terrace, but now she heard the girls' voices as they came out through the castle. ‘What is it you have to tell me? Quick!'

‘Just this. I have reason to hope that whatever happens I won't be recalled. I'll let you know as soon as it's certain.' He turned away from her to greet Daisy and Teresa as they emerged into the sunshine. ‘Miss Daisy! Miss Teresa! I was beginning to think you would never come.'

They were still in their riding habits, their cheeks flushed and their golden curls becomingly ruffled from their morning ride.

Daisy laughed. ‘You missed us, Mr. Varlow? Has Juana been telling you she's had another letter from her handsome cousin? Your nose is quite out of joint, I can tell you. We're all Portuguese here now. You English might as well go home to your fog and fox-hunting. There's no future for you here.'

‘I hope you are wrong,' he said.

At the April meeting of the Sons of the Star, the new Brother of the Silver Serpent spoke for the first time. His theme was caution. ‘How do we know we can trust the French?' he asked, citing the example of Holland where what had at first seemed liberation had soon showed itself in its true colours of tyranny. ‘Surely, Brothers, we do not wish to exchange the comparatively mild rule of Dom John for that of one of Napoleon's brothers? I say: Let us act alone, or not at all.'

‘I was impressed with him,' Juana told Gair two days later. ‘He seemed to me to talk sense.'

‘Did he convince the others?'

‘He shook them, I think. At least, nothing was decided, though the Brother of the Silver Hand made one of his inflammatory speeches, calling for action at once. But I think they are waiting for the leader who was here last time – the one who has gone back to Napoleon. I think he's the real master: the meeting seemed different when he ran it. While he's away, I think, they're merely marking time. They've actually cancelled the May and June meetings, thank God.'

‘Have they?'

‘Yes. They agreed not to meet until July, unless there's an emergency. I can't tell you what a relief it is.'

‘I'm glad. And I've good news for you too. I've heard at last from Canning, the new Foreign Minister. Nothing's to be changed. It's what I hoped. Strangford stays too. But it's time we joined the others.' They had managed a few minutes alone at the edge of the seaward terrace, defying the north wind that rattled the stiff leaves of the aloes and blew her short hair about her face.

‘I'd forgotten the
nortada
.' She turned beside him to walk back to Daisy and Teresa who were sitting in the sun, sheltered by the retaining wall of the terrace.

‘It blows all summer, they say,' he joined her in this innocuous topic.

‘Straight from England.'

‘You're never homesick, Juana?' Daisy came forward to meet
them. ‘Myself, I don't care if I never see England again. They can keep it all: fog, mud, roast beef …'

‘Even Almack's.' Teresa looked up from her sewing. ‘You can't really want to go back, Juana?'

‘I d … d … I'm not sure.' Sometimes she did not understand herself. But then, it was all very well for Daisy and Teresa, up here in the sunshine with the sea wind blowing. They knew nothing of the dark cavern that lay deep in the heart of the cliff. Speaking still only the most rudimentary Portuguese, they were happily unaware of the currents of suspicion Juana felt always seething beneath the placid surface of life at the castle. No need for them to be listening always for some word or phrase that might betray a familiar household figure as one of the Sons of the Star. ‘I'm sorry?' She realised, belatedly, that Daisy had said something to her.

‘Moonstruck!' Daisy laughed. (And that was nearer the mark than she knew.) ‘Confess, Juana, you were miles away. In Poland, perhaps?'

‘Poland?' Juana regretted it the minute she had spoken.

‘Isn't that where Eylau is? And a certain cousin, who talks of coming back, and never does? But at least he writes to you. Has he named the day yet? For his return, I mean,' she added innocently.

‘Of course not. It's no affair of mine.' She was annoyed with Daisy for raising the subject in front of Gair Varlow, angrier still because she was afraid her anger showed.

Life at the castle was not, somehow, quite so pleasant now as it had been in the first flush of family reunion after Christmas. Cynthia Brett hated the heat and grumbled about it endlessly. Elvira hardly spoke at all, and, when she did, confined herself, disconcertingly, to octosyllabic couplets. Pedro and Roberto were still away – Pedro presumably waiting on the Spanish court's pleasure at Madrid and Roberto in attendance on Dom John at Mafra. Missing them, Daisy and Teresa had slid back a little into the old sport of baiting their step-sister and the question of Gair and Vasco was an all-too-obvious subject for jibe and innuendo.

It was almost a relief to Juana when Gair rode out to the castle one breathless May morning to pay a formal call of leave-taking. ‘I could not go, even for so short a time, without saying goodbye to
you
.' This, with a languishing air, to Juana, was for
the benefit of the family group he had found assembled in the comparative coolness of the Ladies' Parlour.

‘You're going back to England?' Her heart plummeted. Had he been recalled after all?

‘For two weeks only.' Quickly, to reassure her. ‘My sister is not well,' he went on. ‘Lord Strangford has kindly given me permission to pay her a visit.'

‘Lady Forland?' Cynthia Brett pounced on it, and the conversation became general. Only, taking his leave, Gair lingered for a lover's moment beside Juana. ‘Even the two weeks Lord Strangford allows me will seem too long,' he said, making it a promise.

‘He's gone to see Canning of course,' said Mrs. Brett when Juana told her about it. ‘Two weeks, he said? I expect he arranged it as soon as he heard the May and June meetings were cancelled. Even allowing for the journey, he should be back in ample time for the next one.'

‘But suppose they hold an emergency one?'

‘We'll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it.'

But hot May dragged into hotter June and nothing of any kind happened at the castle except that Cynthia Brett kept more and more to her own rooms and looked, Juana thought, increasingly ill when she did appear. Anxious about her, she finally asked Daisy what was the matter. ‘Is there anything we ought to be doing for her?'

‘Nothing. Don't pry, Juana!' And then. ‘I'm sorry. It's the heat … it's making us all nervy. I can't sleep, can you? As to mother, she's homesick, of course. It's nothing …'

Juana was not so sure. Her father, who had seemed at first to settle back contentedly enough into the quiet routine of life at the castle now looked hag-ridden as never before. Juana longed to ask him what was the matter, but could not quite bring herself to do so.

But at least her grandmother seemed better these days, though she still kept to her own rooms. ‘Nothing would induce me to act as hostess to that woman.'

‘I wish you'd send them home, ma'am.' Juana had been waiting for a chance to say it.

‘Your family? You've changed your tune, haven't you?'

‘Not the girls. I don't think they'd want to go. Just my father and step-mother. I don't think she's at all well. And besides, now
Napoleon has taken Danzig, anything may happen. Seriously, ma'am, don't you think we've rather too many English in the castle for comfort?'

‘Nonsense! You're beginning to sound like your cousins! You'll be calling yourself Brett-Mascarenhas yet. And not a bad name either,' she added surprisingly. ‘What's the news of him, by the way?'

‘Vasco? None, since he wrote from Eylau.'

‘I wish he'd come back.' Fretfully. ‘I wish you could have written to him. He'd take care of you.'

‘I don't need taking care of, ma'am.'

Was it true? Life seemed to stand still. There was no immediate sense of threat, and none of safety. And there was no news. Almost, sometimes, Juana found herself reduced to regretting the cancelled meetings of the Sons of the Star. However terrifying, at least she could count on learning the latest news from them. She greeted Pedro with real pleasure when he rode into the castle courtyard one stifling July morning. ‘Pedro! It's good to see you. Are you straight back from Spain? How was your journey?'

‘As you'd expect. Dust, and filthy inns and, in Madrid, the usual interminable delays. But I'm back at last. How are your sisters, Juana? Not too tired of life in the castle, I hope? I have a message for them – and for you, too – from my mistress, the Princess. She is giving an entertainment next week at Ramalhao and hopes you will be able to come.'

‘The three of us? But, Pedro—'

‘And Elvira, of course. That goes without saying. I hope you're not turning Portuguese, Juana? Do you intend to shut yourself up in a darkened room until you marry?' He had dismounted and thrown his reins to a servant, but turned to dip his wrists in the shady pool below the fountain in the centre of the courtyard.

Juana followed him into the shadow of the trellised vine. ‘I don't understand you, Pedro. When we met that time at Lord Strangford's party, you scolded me for being there. What's made you change your tune?'

He looked up at her from the edge of the pool where he had seated himself, his eyes bright in his shadowed face. ‘That was an English party. This is a Portuguese one. And your sisters will
like to meet the Princess, surely? It's practically a royal command, you know.'

‘I suppose so. I'll have to consult my grandmother.'

‘Tell her Lord Strangford will be there, and his people, if that makes her any happier. Or you—' Again she was aware of his eyes, curiously bright in the shadow. ‘Seriously, Juana, I don't think this the moment for anyone with the slightest English taint to be stand-offish with the Portuguese royal family. Not if you want to stay here.'

She almost said, ‘But I don't.' Instead: ‘Yes, I see what you mean. I'll certainly talk to my grandmother. But are my uncles not invited?'

‘No. This is a party for the young in heart, the Princess says. It is to help us forget the news from the north.'

‘Is there anything new?'

‘Nothing worse than the fall of Danzig. But at least Napoleon is still looking eastward. So long as he is occupied with the Russians, we should be safe.'

‘And in Spain?'

‘Godoy remains all powerful. “The Prince of the Peace!”' He stood up. ‘I had best not talk of him. Where will I find your sisters, Juana?'

‘An entertainment at Ramalhao?' Old Mrs. Brett looked even more doubtful than Juana had expected. ‘I don't know about that.'

‘Lord Strangford is to be there. And his people, Pedro said. You know Mr. Varlow sent word he was back but too busy to come out. It would be a chance …'

‘Yes, I see—' doubtfully.

‘And Pedro thinks it would be wise to go.'

‘There is that. Fetch me a glass of my cordial, Juana. I'm tired today. Too tired to think. You must do what you think best. But, of course, if you go, Elvira must go too.'

Elvira did not want to go. ‘Nor should you, Juana. Nor your sisters. By all one hears, Ramalhao is no place for young girls.'

‘But Pedro will be there, and Lord Strangford's household.'

‘Meaning Mr. Varlow?' Elvira was disconcertingly acute today. And of course she was quite right. Juana did badly want to see Gair. His verbal message, sent by Senhor Macarao whom he had met in Lisbon, had been merely maddening. He was back, he longed to see her, but could not for the moment be spared. It
might mean anything. It might even mean that he was being replaced after all and had to train his successor. And here she was, starved for news, desperate for some kind of certainty. And the Princess's party was to be held on the twelfth of July, only a week before the next meeting of the Sons of the Star. Absurdly, perhaps illogically, Juana felt she must see Gair before that.

Elvira was looking beyond her from the sunlit loggia to the shadowed doorway of the house:

‘ “
By the pricking of my thumbs
Something wicked this way comes
.”

Don't go, Juana. I smell trouble.

Double, double, toil and trouble
.”'