The Stars of San Cecilio (19 page)

A sudden, overwhelming urge to kiss an attractive girl was one thing, but anything more serious would never enter his head. She was so certain of that she felt a little sick as she went on with her packing.

And even if it did enter his head, there was Dona Beatriz ... Dona Beatriz, who was the right type of woman for him, and who planned to marry him. It was quite obvious that all

their friends were of the same mind about that.

Therefore it was doubly important that she should get away at once, back to a suitable obscurity.

When Aunt Grizel came into her room, wearing the usual bathrobe, she looked surprised to see her young guest up so early.

‘My dear, you are energetic!’ she declared. Then she looked at the slowly filling suitcase, but said nothing about it. ‘What happened last night?’ She asked. ‘Juanita says that Dr. Fernandez brought you home, and that you looked very tired. Was the evening too much for you?’

‘ No, but I twisted my ankle while dancing, and Dr. Fernandez was kind enough to offer to run me back here.’ She looked a little guiltily at her hostess. ‘I hope it wasn’t rude disappearing like that, and that you didn’t mind? That Senora Espinhaco didn’t mind? Dr. Fernandez said he would leave a message explaining why we had gone.’

‘Well, he didn’t do so, my dear — but it didn’t matter. I think most people saw the two of you depart, and Dona Beatriz certainly saw you go! ’ She paused. ‘Ricardo looked a bit upset after you had gone, and I don’t think Peter was pleased, but Dr. Fernandez is not the type to consider small fry like that. He obviously thought you needed bed, so he brought you home.’ Another pause. ‘How is the ankle this morning?’

‘Better.’ Lisa looked down at it as if she had forgotten it altogether. ‘Much better. ’

‘And why are you up so early?’

Suddenly Lisa decided she had better explain, and she did

so.

‘I feel I ought to go back. That I’ve had a long enough holiday. And really,’ looking almost apologetically at the older woman who was watching her with very shrewd eyes, ‘it has been a wonderful change, and you’ve been so terribly good to me. But I couldn’t go on accepting your hospitality like this, and — and I don’t feel Madrid is the sort of place for me to remain in. . . ’

‘Did Dr. Fernandez ask you to return to the coast last night?’

No, but I feel I ought to. You see, he insists on paying my salary, and I can’t receive a salary and do nothing for it. . . .’

‘I suppose not,’ Miss Tracey murmured, staring down at the satin bed-cover while she sat perched on the side of the bed.

‘And that’s why I’ve made up my mind to go and see him today and— and ask if I can take Gia back at once. After all, it can’t be good for a child in this hot weather in Madrid, and she does need the sea air. And I want to take her back. ’ Miss Tracey rose and stood facing her.

‘You want to get away from Madrid because you’d feel happier if you didn’t bump into your employer at parties in the way you did last night, isn’t that it?’ she said very gently.

Lisa nodded silently, and Miss Tracey sighed.

‘Poor child!’ she exclaimed. ‘I hoped you might fall for Peter in time, or some other nice young man I might produce for you. But it seems I was a little late. ’

Lisa swallowed.

‘Yes; I’m afraid you were a little late. ’

‘In that case,’ the older woman said, walking to the window and staring out at the brightness of early morning Madrid, ‘I think you’re wise to want to get away. And as soon as you can be freed I would go home to England. ’

‘I will,’ Lisa replied, as if she was making her a solemn promise.

Miss Tracey returned to her and patted her bright hair.

‘Never mind, child, you’re young, and------------------‘

She sighed again, and then put sentiment away from her. ‘You know where the doctor lives? He has a very sumptuous flat in what was once a very fine town house, but I imagine he lives by his appointment book. Oughtn’t you to telephone and make certain he is free? His consulting rooms are not in the same building as his flat, but his secretary could tell you what he is likely to be doing. ’

‘No, I think I’ll go straight to his flat,’ Lisa said, although she wasn’t quite sure why she arrived at that decision. It wasn’t curiosity to see the doctor’s flat. ‘It’s early, and I should think I’ll almost certainly find him there. ’

‘And you won’t telephone?’

‘No—no, I won’t telephone. ’

It was odd, she thought later, how a decision of that sort could affect the whole of one’s future life. If she had telephoned Julio’s secretary, or even telephoned him at his flat, she probably wouldn’t have run into Dona Beatriz when she arrived there, and found her in sole occupation of the luxuriously-furnished sitting-room that overlooked one of Madrid’s most leafy avenues.

Dona Beatriz was going round the room rearranging the flowers in the vases, and although it was so early in the day, and she herself couldn’t have been very early to bed the previous night, she was looking almost aggressively fresh and immaculate in a dove-grey silk suit with touches of white, and extremely high-heeled, hand-made shoes that made her elegant, Spanish woman’s feet look at least a couple of sizes smaller and more shapely than they actually were.

‘Good morning, Miss Waring! ’ she greeted Lisa, when a deferential manservant had shown her into the sitting-room. ‘This is rather early for a call on your employer, isn’t it? — And, incidentally, he’s a very busy man, which perhaps you didn’t know, and doesn’t normally receive anyone at this hour! ’

Her voice was cold as the drip of ice, and she was holding a long-stemmed scarlet rose in her hand. As she spoke her beringed fingers, with their crimson nails, caressed the petals of the rose with deliberately graceful movements.

‘I’m sorry,’ Lisa replied. ‘I was aware that Dr. Fernandez is a busy man, but I particularly wanted to see him. ’

‘That doesn’t surprise me so very much,’ Dona Beatriz drawled. She surveyed the English girl, in her simple linen outfit, with openly hostile eyes. ‘My dear Miss Waring, you may not realize it, but you are almost painfully transparent. From the very beginning it has been clear to me that as a governess you left quite a lot to be desired, but although Dr. Fernandez is an unusually attractive man, even I didn’t suspect that you might become a menace to his reputation! Miss Waring! ’ She moved nearer to her, still caressing the rose. ‘ Last night you caused everyone to look surprised when you seized upon an unexpected meeting to get him to take you away from a private party at an unusually early hour, and as he did not return to that party you can imagine what his friends thought? And what I would have thought if I didn’t know him a little better than you do! ’

Lisa felt herself turning cold, and she stammered slightly. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean! ’

‘Don’t you?’ Dona Beatriz looked contemptuous. ‘I think you do. But let me tell you one thing. Dr. Fernandez and I are going to marry very soon now — most of the details are arranged, although we have not yet informed our friends

— and I do not like to see a young girl like you making an exhibition of herself because of him. Perhaps it is not your fault — as I have said, the doctor is attractive, and you are young! — but I happen to know that you have been causing him embarrassment for several weeks now, and that is the reason why he appealed to me to do something to help him before the embarrassment got too acute. He asked me to take Gia away, and I decided to bring her here to Madrid — at a certain amount of inconvenience to myself, I might add. ’

‘But I don’t understand what you are talking about! ’ Lisa got out in a rush. She was as white as a sheet, and her pulses were thundering with shock. ‘You say that I have caused Dr. Fernandez embarrassment?’

‘Rather a lot of embarrassment, I’m afraid,’ Dona Beatriz answered smoothly. ‘Perhaps you don’t realize it, but to a nice man the sight of a girl in tears, suffering from pretended shock after stupidly interfering with a half-savage dog, and openly pleading with her every look to be taken into his arms and comforted, is rather more than embarrassing! And last night it was a twisted ankle! ... I have no doubt there have been other occasions, possibly a little more ingeniously thought out. So can you wonder at it that Dr. Fernandez would have been most unlikely to see you this morning, even if he had been here?’

Lisa was now quite white even to the lips, and her eyes looked like the eyes of an injured creature.

‘I — don’t know how you can say such things!’ she gasped. ‘I have never — never! embarrassed Dr. Fernandez! It was true I—’ she remembered the night before, and turned crimson instead of white — ‘I was upset when the dog attacked me, but I didn’t want any comfort. Oh. ’ She put up a hand and touched her mouth, like someone too lacerated to be conscious of what she was doing. ‘You say that Dr. Fernandez complained about me? And that he asked you to take Gia away?’

‘Well, my dear, he didn’t complain about you in so many words, but I could sense his embarrassment. I know that he felt rather helpless because he had engaged you, and you hadn’t turned out to be quite what he expected. The first little shock was discovering you on the beach with that English boy friend of yours, Peter Hamilton-Tracey, and after that he hardly felt he could trust you. But I think he would have been prepared to keep you on if — well, if he hadn’t begun to suspect that your interest in the Hamilton-Tracey youth was being transferred to himself! After that he became concerned. ’

‘I see,’ Lisa said. Dully she half turned away, and then she turned back again. ‘Last night,’ she managed, looking Dona Beatriz fully in the eyes, ‘ Dr. Fernandez told me that he wanted me to return to the villa with Gia as soon as you were ready to part with her. But that, I suppose, is not any longer true?’

‘I’m afraid not,’ Dona Beatriz returned, on the same note of complacence. ‘ As a matter of fact, our plans for Gia are now fully decided upon, and she is not returning to the villa. She is going to stay with friends of mine for a week or two

— friends who have young people of her own age, and who also have a villa beside the sea, and where she will be very happy and content. At least, until she goes to school. ’

‘And you have also decided upon her school?’ Lisa asked, in a choked voice.

Dona Beatriz nodded.

‘I think so. And it will be in England,’ she added. ‘Her mother was partly English — although perhaps you didn’t know that?’

‘Yes, I did,’ Lisa admitted.

‘And she was very beautiful!’ the Spanish woman informed her with emphasis. ‘Dr. Fernandez was very upset by her death — so upset that any lack of interest in his daughter you might have suspected was entirely due to the shock he received when the mother died. Some men take these things badly, especially when a birth involves the loss of a far more precious life. ’

‘Yes, I — see!’ Lisa heard herself saying mechanically, and realized that that was what she had always suspected. Julio Fernandez had loved once, and deeply — and not even Dona Beatriz was ever likely to arouse that love again!

It was the one thing she ought to be able to feel sympathy with Dona Beatriz over.

But she didn’t feel sympathy with her. She was too stunned and disturbed to feel sympathy with anyone just then.

She turned away.

‘I’m sorry I’ve troubled you this morning, ’ she said, in an unnaturally controlled voice. ‘I’ll go now.’

Dona Beatriz followed her, still holding the single scarlet rose, to the door.

‘I think you are taking this very sensibly,’ she said. ‘And it will be easier if you go home to England without much more delay. After all, there must be many more interests for you in your own country. I’ll tell Dr. Fernandez you took the decision to go home yourself. ’

‘Yes, please do that,’ Lisa answered, but whatever decision she now took it was too late to undo the final humiliation she had brought upon herself as a result of the night before. He had taken her in his arms to comfort her, no doubt because he suspected she badly needed that comfort

— and she had let him!

She felt almost blind and deaf with humiliation as she found her way out into the strong sunlight. She felt that Madrid was a sun-soaked trap that had done something to her that could never be undone.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Miss Tracey took one look at her when she arrived back at the flat, and decided that it would be wisest not to ask any questions. But when Lisa announced that she wanted to go home at once she not only looked her concern, but expressed it.

‘But, my dear child, you can’t do that! ’ she said. ‘If by ‘going home’ you mean going home to England, you can’t do it as suddenly as all this! ’

‘I can,’ Lisa answered. ‘And I must go! ’ she added.

Aunt Grizel’s expression became rather hopeless.

‘I feel it’s no concern of mine, so I’m not going to probe into your reasons,’ she told the girl; ‘but I’ve grown very fond of you, and I’ve got your welfare at heart. I happen to know you’ve got very few friends in England, so what will you do when you get there? You can’t exist without money, and you can’t expect to walk back into a job immediately!’ ‘I’ll find a job very quickly,’ Lisa tried to convince her, in a voice from which all life had gone. ‘With children, of course,’ she added. ‘There are always children to be looked after. ’

‘Other people’s children!’ Miss Tracey commented. ‘It’s about time, my dear, you started to possess children of your own! ’

Then as she saw how the girl winced as if something had wounded her internally she went to her and took her by her slender shoulders and held them firmly.

‘Look, child, I said I wasn’t going to probe — and I won’t if you simply can’t bear the idea of my doing so. But won’t you tell me one thing? Did you see Dr. Fernandez this morning?’

‘No,’ Lisa barely whispered.

‘You saw someone?’

‘I saw Dona Beatriz! ’

‘Oh!’ Aunt Grizel exclaimed. She peered into Lisa’s face. ‘Dona Beatriz said, or did, something to upset you?’

Lisa shook her head dumbly, and then admitted: ‘There is no longer any need for me to look after Gia. Other plans have been made for her, and — and Dona Beatriz is going to marry Dr. Fernandez — soon! ’ ‘I see,’ Miss Tracey said, and released Lisa’s shoulders and walked away from her. When she returned she tried to make her voice and her look severely practical. ‘In that case, perhaps it’s as well that you should go home fairly soon