The Portuguese Escape (35 page)

‘Oh, the women don't much; anyhow no one ever sits in here,' Julia told him. ‘Listen, Hugh—Hetta's all right again, quite fit to come up tomorrow, so we must settle how to get her here. Should I go down in Richard's car?— if I might?'—glancing at Atherley.

The two young men broke into eager enquiries, which Julia answered, rather brusquely. ‘Yes,
perfectly
all right; I spoke to her. But for goodness' sake be quiet for a minute and let me settle this with Hugh.' She pursued the thing with Torrens. ‘She's given something away, I gather.'

‘What?'

‘Of course I wouldn't let her tell me. I presume simply that Father Antal is here—she begged me to be very careful. And I imagine, too, that by now the pavement outside the Lucrezia is stiff with Commie agents, disguised as camellia-sellers!' Julia ended, with vigour.

Torrens laughed. ‘We'd better consult the Colonel,' he said. ‘Where's the Duke? Out, please God.'

The Duke was out.

‘Spilt some beans, has she?' the Colonel said, displaying his usual pleasure in using English slang. ‘Well, no wonder. Was she tortured?' Torrens couldn't say. ‘In any case, you and her friends are much more likely than I am to find out what she
has
said, and it would be useful to know—
precisely,
please, if she can remember. But people under torture are apt to forget what they have said; it is part of the psychological blotting-out of distress.'

Those words, so casually uttered, caused Major Torrens to shiver a little. He knew that Communists do use such methods, and merely said—

‘The thing is how to get the person in question up here. Miss P. thought of going down to fetch her, in the car in which she brought me up.'

‘Oh, do not let her go to this trouble! Why not allow this admirable Englishwoman who succours her—and to
whom we owe the fact that the young person was discovered so soon—to bring her up? I can supply a car and chauffeur, which will be closely followed by another car with my own men. No one knows the old lady by sight, and
la petite
can wear a veil, as she did at Portela. Can Miss P. arrange this at your end? I gather she is the contact for the Englishwoman.'

‘Hold on,' Torrens said, and spoke to Julia.

‘Of course. Lovely! The Duque will adore Mrs. H.!— and so will you. Say
Yes
.'

Major Torrens thankfully left it to Julia to organise the reception of these extra guests. How on earth, without her, could all this have been managed? A perfect hide-out, too, with those high walls all round the place. In the circumstances he did not worry over-much about what the poor wretched little Countess might have given away.

Julia took no immediate steps. The Duke was out on the farm, and Nanny usually had a shut-eye in the afternoon. She observed with amusement that both Hetta's admirers showed every sign of remaining where they were—' Oh very well!' she muttered to herself, as she went in search of Father Antal.

She found the dear old man in the priests' study, just about to set out for a walk; he looked rather like Hilaire Belloc, arrayed in an extraordinary cloak with a shoulder-cape and a broad-brimmed hat, produced by the Monsignor as chaplain-disguise; he had a breviary in his hand.

‘Oh, you are going out?'

‘Yes—will you not come too? It is a most beautiful day,' he said, smiling on her.

‘Well, just a little way—I have some good news for you,' she said, stepping through the open French window. The sun stood high and hot over the knot-garden, bringing out the aromatic woody scent of the tiny box-bushes; men with rakes were smoothing the walks between them. ‘Let's go into the park,' Julia suggested.

They descended by the flight of steps near the corner seat with the
azulejo
picture of the hunter being treed by a bear; as they walked over short pastures, where sheep were grazing, Julia told Father Antal that the girl at the Lucrezia was undoubtedly Hetta, that she was nearly recovered, and was coming up to Gralheira tomorrow. His delight at this news moved her a good deal. ‘Tell me more about Hetti, Father,' she said.

He told her, obviously happy to be asked, how Hetta
had come to his country presbytery as the protégée of the poor incompetent old nun, and how promptly and energetically the girl of sixteen had taken over the running of the house, the cooking, and all the dealings with people who came for help or advice when he was out. ‘This poor Mother Scholastica could seldom get a message right!— but Hetta always had everything clear for me. In no time at all it was the old religieuse who was really
her
protégée; but she never failed in showing her all deference and respect. This dear child followed so completely the example of our Blessed Lord—she “took on her the form of a servant”. And so happily, and with obedience.'

‘That's funny—I can't see Hetti very obedient,' Julia said.

‘In one thing she was
not
,' the priest replied, smiling reminiscently. ‘I could not stop her, in summer, from going to swim in the Tisza—in her night-dress! She went in the afternoons, when in the great heat there was no one about in the fields, but it was unsuitable; however, in this she would not be controlled. She had the passion for water of a little fish!'

Julia had begun to tell him of Hetta's swimming at the Guincho when suddenly Father Antal stood still and held up his hand, enjoining silence. ‘What is this sound?' he asked.

Julia listened too. ‘Oh, that's from the windmill,' she said, now hearing the ‘clock, clock, clock, clock' that filled the sunny air. ‘Look, there it is, just over the wall.'

They had reached the eastern boundary wall of the demesne; a narrow iron gate, heavily padlocked, led through into the open country outside, where the four blunt-ended sails of a whitewashed windmill revolved rhythmically, clocking at each revolution. Father Antal went and stared through the iron bars.

‘Is this the mill of the miller whom they call The Blacksmith?' he asked.

‘Yes,' Julia said. ‘How on earth do you know that?'

‘Luzia told me.' He continued to peer through the bars. ‘Is this he, this old man who digs?' he asked.

Julia also looked through the gate. A rather bent figure, using the outsize hoe which in Portugal takes the place of
a spade, was diligently turning up the reddish-brown soil. Europe is divided into the races which dig
away
from themselves, as in France and England, and those who dig
towards
themselves, as in Portugal.

‘Yes, that's him.'

‘It is true—he does not look round as he digs,' Father Antal said. ‘Luzia was quite right.'

‘She's usually right, about country things especially,' Julia replied.

The sound of their voices did cause the miller to look round, not at his mill, but towards the gate; seeing Julia he waved.

‘
Boas tardes!
(Good afternoon)
Minha Menina
,' he called.

‘
Como estai, O Ferreiro?
' Julia called back.
Ferreiro
is the Portuguese word for blacksmith; the old man, grinning at this greeting, shouldered his heavy tool and walked over to the small gate, quite ready to break his toil with a little gossip. He asked who the priest was?

One of the Duke's chaplains from the house, Julia told him promptly, but foreign—he spoke no Portuguese. The miller expressed regret. ‘I could have wished to speak with him; he has the countenance of a saint.' Not being able to converse with the saint he asked after Luzia, and then broke into a paean of her praises. ‘Ah, there is one who has all the loving-kindness of
a mãi
and the intelligence of
o pãi
. A noble child!'

Julia translated this for Father Antal as they turned homewards: loving as her mother, intelligent as her father; she knew it would please him.

‘Yes, she is a noble child,' he said. After a moment's silence he asked suddenly—‘How well do you know my little Hetta? Have you seen much of her?'

His train of thought was obvious to Julia—for him Hetta was another noble child.

‘I haven't seen as much of her as I should have liked,' she said. ‘What I have seen I like very much.' This sounded cold and inadequate, and she added quickly—' I think she's intelligent, and brave, and very honest; perhaps too honest for her own comfort, let alone that of the people about her.'

He laughed. ‘You are very right! How often I have seen this in my own house. She would give me, as I told you, a perfectly clear message from some peasant; but when I asked what she had said in reply, nine times out of ten her answer would be—“I told him not to be a fool, and not to bother you!”'

Julia could hear Hetta saying it.

‘And this young Englishman?' Father Antal pursued— ‘What is he like? Is he serious, good? You must know him well—I notice that you call him Richard.'

‘That means nothing. Everyone calls everyone Richard or whatever their name is, if they don't call them “darling”,' Julia said rather impatiently. ‘I don't know him particularly well, though I've known him for some time. He's intelligent too, as you can see, and rather unusually open-minded for a diplomat, but I've no idea whether he's “serious” or not; in fact I'm not sure that I know what you mean by serious. “Sérieux”, in the French sense?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well, no, I shouldn't have thought he was; rather
volage
, really. But I do think he's seriously in love with Hetta—I suspect for the first time in his life! Funny, isn't it? Because I imagine his other affairs have been with middle-aged married women who never put a foot wrong socially.'

The priest stared at her.

‘You know of Madame de Vermeil, then?' he asked in surprise.

‘No—who's she? One of the middle-aged mistresses?'

Julia had merely been guessing, rather shrewdly, at the component parts of Atherley's love-life hitherto—she gurgled with pleasure when Father Antal burst out laughing at her last question.

‘Miss Probyn, I think you must be a witch!' he said.

‘The last person who thought I was a witch was a half-caste bar-keeper in Tangier!' she exclaimed gaily. ‘But one needn't to be a witch to spot the normal line of a person like Atherley. All the same, I do think he's really nice, underneath all the diplomatic stuff; if he were to marry Hetta, though they'd have a rough passage at first, I think she might be the making of him.'

‘You answer my questions before I put them,' the old man said, bending a benignant smile on her. ‘Witches I believe wait to be asked; so probably you are something better than a witch—wise! I speak openly to you. While this child lived in my house I came to love her dearly; now she has left my care and my world, and I know as little of her new world, and the people in it, as I know of the great geographical New World to which I soon go, and of the people in that—though I confess that I dread this experience! So I seek to learn all I can about her surroundings.'

‘Well of course her mother is a perfectly
pestilential
woman, in my opinion,' Julia said flatly. ‘Anything to get Hetta away from old Dorothée.'

‘You mean, even take something of a risk in marrying this young man? Is he, in your opinion,
fundamentally
able to love her and value her?'

Julia reflected before answering.

‘He
loves
her, anyhow,' she said. ‘You'd only to watch his face this morning to see that. I fancy he did something frightfully stupid which made her come rushing up here with Townsend—the American; and he's been in agony over it. But as for being capable of valuing her—honestly, Father, one has to take some risks in any marriage; you can't expect safety on a plate! If she's in love with him— and I think she is—I should say they'd better marry as soon as possible, take a
long
honeymoon, and Richard get himself transferred to some other post in the meantime, out of the way of the old Countess.'

He smiled at this blue-print for Hetta's future. ‘Thank you. I believe I agree with you,' he said.

‘Good.' She paused for a moment and then added—‘As Hetta's Father in God, couldn't you tip her off to be a little less uncompromising herself, and bottle up her prejudices? It really won't do in diplomacy for her to tell her husband's visitors not to be fools!'

‘I had it in mind to do this,' the priest said, smiling. ‘So much I see.'

On their way back to the house they encountered the Duke deep in conversation with his head shepherd and the bailiff about some new rams from England, who were
nibbling away in a small hurdled enclosure in the pastures; he joined them.

‘Duke, there's good news,' Julia told him.

‘Is she found?'

‘Yes, found and safe. And with your consent she will be coming up here tomorrow.'

‘Of course I consent! To whom do I say so?'

‘Well, in fact as you were out, and as you
had
asked her already, I gave your consent myself,' Julia said. The Duke laughed.

‘Miss Probyn, I think you must never leave us again! You manage my affairs better than I do. I am delighted.'

‘Yes, but there's just one thing,' Julia pursued. ‘She'll have to come with an escort.'

He looked alarmed.

‘Not the mother?'

‘Oh Lord no—heaven forfend! With that English lady who found her. Would you mind? You see, no one in Portugal knows
her
by sight, so she's good cover.'

‘Indeed I do not mind! I should like to meet this spirited lady, and as a friend of yours she is doubly welcome. Have you given my consent to this also?' he asked slyly.

‘Well, yes, I have,' Julia admitted.

‘Excellent! I will tell my sister. Really, how interesting it makes one's existence to be involved in these matters!, Usually here at Gralheira we lead a life which is tranquil almost to the point of being a little dull,' he said to Father Antal. ‘But since you and the Monsignor came we have the house full of handsome young men, we have alarms and excursions, the telephone ringing at all hours—and now a rescued heroine and her duenna! So amusing.'