The House of Adriano (21 page)

CHAPTER XI

Within
a few days arrangements were completed to move to the Castillo. Dona Teresa had said that it was very different from Marindos, the town house, but until they arrived Aileen never realised just how different it was.

They left fairly early, so that they could be up into the mountains by the time the sun was really hot. Their road south took them across flat, fertile plains that stretched far off into the distance on either side of the road, through village after village, until gradually the countryside and the architecture became more Andalusian. The houses were whitewashed, dazzling in the sunshine, ornate iron grilles at the windows. The temperature was rising rapidly, yet it was still not too uncomfortable in the luxurious car. At one stage Peter fell asleep, the rest of the time he spent looking out of the window. As always he was a good traveller and a picture of good behaviour

Soon the end of the cultivated plain was reached and they started climbing up into the mountains. Duarte drove fast, but was a very good driver, so the speed did not seem to matter. When they were right up in the mountains a brief stop was made for lunch at an old building that had been turned into a hotel. It was beautifully preserved and the meal served was of excellent quality, as might have been expected. Aileen could not have imagined Duarte stopping at any other kind of place. The Adriano family seemed to be well-known there, and the deference with which they were treated might once have caused her some irritation, but she had grown accustomed to that now with Duarte. Perhaps he did have a “lord of creation” air, as she had once termed it, but it was natural and quite unconscious. One or two speculative glances came her way and she guessed they were wondering what her standing was, since although she accompanied Peter she was not attired as his nurse, or anything like that.

After lunch they went on again, still travelling fast. They were well into the mountains now, and a short way back the main Madrid-Granada railway line had disappeared into the heart of one of the mountains. Great outcrops of grey rock towered above them, shading the road.

With the plain of La Mancha behind them they came out on the other side of the mountains to a scene of vast olive groves, travelling mile after mile, until eventually the road began to degenerate somewhat and Duarte was forced to slow his speed. They were climbing again now, towards the distant Sierra Morena, although it was not a steep ascent as yet.

They stopped again for refreshments in the mountains, sitting on a terrace that overlooked the valley of the Guadalquivir. When they went on again they left the main road they had been following, until in about .half an hour they came to a fairly large village

“Now at last we come to Marindos,” Dona Teresa remarked from the back seat.

Aileen looked around her for some sign of the Castillo, but nothing that looked remotely like it was in view, unless it was a rather picturesque
hacienda,
somewhat larger than the rest of the houses in the village. She did not think it could be that. No stretch of imagination could make it into a
castillo.

Dona Teresa laughed. “I am sorry. I puzzled you. I should have said that we now enter the Marindos estate. There are three of these villages, another to the west and the third near the Castillo itself.”

Aileen glanced at Duarte, but he did not answer and seemed intent on his driving. The villages apparently knew the car and there were old-fashioned curtsies from the women as it went by, men dragging
off
their hats and bowing, children waving boldly.

Duarte did dart a swift sideways glance at her after a moment. “Do not let the feudal atmosphere frighten you. We are comparatively
modern
at the Castillo.”

“I don’t really mind isolation,” Aileen replied. She was sure that was not quite what he had been speaking about, but since she did not know just what his true meaning had been, she chose to take it that way. “I think I mentioned once before that I used to live on a station when I was a child.”

“Ah, yes,” he said. “We must arrange about this mount for you. I remember you said you had once ridden frequently.”

“Please don’t put yourself to any trouble,” Aileen said hastily.

“It is no trouble,” he replied with equable firmness.

He still spoke as if her stay was to be of a fairly long duration, and that puzzled her. She did not try to work it out, though, because she had long since given up trying to account for the actions and remarks of such a complex personality as Duarte Adriano.

After a while the second village
Dona
Teresa had mentioned came into view. This was larger than the previous one - and perched high on a hill she at last saw the Castillo Marindos.

Even from a distance it took her breath away. There seemed to be a wall at the foot of the hill - whether it ran all the way round, for many miles, she could not see - but on the other side of the wall terraced gardens were visible, climbing step by step up to the Castillo, a great building that merged two distinct styles of architecture. Even from where she was she could see that part of it looked very ancient, the traditional castle appearance, but the main section was Moorish, reminding her that in Granada, not very far away, the Moors had made their last stand before they had at last been driven out of Spain.

It was days before she managed to get some idea of the layout and size of the Castillo, with its towers and patios, the elaborate filigree decorations of the rooms, beautiful Moorish archways and graceful marble and alabaster columns, the sweeping staircases and corridors that led into room after room, with floors of marble, mosaic tiles or polished wood, sometimes scattered with luxurious carpets, sometimes quite bare.

The older portion, the castle part, was not lived in, although some attempt had been made to stop it falling into ruin. It was kept more or less as an historical piece. A covered walk led to it and it was safe enough to enter, but too bare and draughty to be really liveable in. In any case, it was hardly likely that anybody would want to live there when there was the main part of the Castillo, the exquisite Moorish section. For days she never knew what she would come across next, the sunken patios and gardens, the doors at the ends of one or two of the corridors that opened suddenly into stairways that climbed the Moorish towers that gave a view over the whole countryside. There was the
library too, a vast room with many hundreds of books, tall columns supporting a lofty ceiling and the floor of intricate mosaic. Ultimately she even found a little Grecian temple out in the gardens and a Chinese pagoda tucked away in a specially walled-off section, with a miniature waterfall from a spring that bubbled up at the top of the hill and fell down through the terraced gardens eventually to reach the stream that flowed by at the foot of the hill, in the end emptying itself into the Guadalquivir.

But all that did not come until some time later. The first day, as the car drove towards it, all she was breathlessly aware of was the sheer magnificence and beauty of the Castillo Marindos. No wonder Duarte Adriano was ... as he was. No man could grow up mediocre and ordinary among all that magnificence. No wonder he had a background he could never escape from and would never want to escape from. There was something here that had taken many centuries to build up and which not even the swiftly changing traditions of the
modern
world would ever entirely sweep away.

When they reached the foot of the hill, high, ornate gates were swung open for them by a man in a neat, light-coloured uniform, and then the car was sweeping upwards, through the first terrace of the gardens, climbing higher and higher, until at last it stopped in a paved courtyard where a flight of wide, shallow steps led up to double doors that had on them a shield emblazoned with the Adriano crest. They already stood open and a bowing major-domo was awaiting them. Impression crowded impression, one upon the other, so quickly that she did not have time to take everything in. All she was aware of at first was that the hall was marble-floored and tall columns swept up to a ceiling that was carved and gilded. A graceful stairway curved its way up to the other floors of the Castillo and there was a hanging lamp with crystal pendants that tinkled in a slight breeze coming in from outside.

They went into a salon off the hall and, although everything was on a much larger and grander scale, the furnishings were of the same type to which she had grown accustomed at Marindos, so some of the strangeness began to wear off. Sometimes she had been a little amused at herself in Madrid for so quickly having
become used to and even in a way taking for granted the exquisite and luxurious furnishings all around her. It merely pointed out how quickly one could become accustomed to luxury. She knew she would not be human if she did not miss it when she eventually had to return to her own sphere of life.

After cool drinks they went to the rooms prepared for them, and Aileen found that she once again had a little suite of her own, as she had in Madrid - even to the fact of another of those little tea cabinets. Duarte must have specially ordered it to be installed by the time they arrived and, realising it, she could not stop the little feeling of shame for what she had once believed of him, that he had no consideration for anyone’s wishes but his own. Her first estimation of him had been proved far from right. She could not delude herself, however, that these little considerations meant anything. It was just the type of thing that was bred in him. He would have done it for anybody - such as the time his upbringing and natural courtesy and consideration had made him drive her home when he had seen her caught in the rain in Sydney.

Peter was intrigued with his new home, but tired enough to be put to bed earlier than usual without any resistance. Indeed she was tired enough herself to want to retire early, and as Dona Teresa did so too, and Duarte, in spite of that natural courtesy of his, could not want to spend the evening entertaining her, she went to her room directly after dinner.

In the morning Peter and herself went on a little preliminary exploration, then the boy went off to his lessons. The tutor had also arrived in the “luggage” car and everything was to be as usual.

When he was settled with his tutor and lessons - after the Spanish lesson that was the first thing on the curriculum and which both of them took - she went along to find
Dona
Teresa, but instead of being in her room the old lady was sitting on a terrace that overlooked - of all things - a swimming pool.

She smiled as the younger girl came up to her.
“
Buenos dias
,”
she greeted her, giving the Spanish “good morning” and Aileen replied in kind. “This is my favourite spot,” Dona Teresa went on. “I have spent many hours here.” Her eyes went down to the tiled pool, with its ornamental balustrade and fountain,
and for a little while her expression was wistful and far away. “Eric used to swim here ... and we would talk and laugh together.” She seemed to give a little shrug that put the past in its place. “You, I expect, swim too. All Australians swim, I am told.” Her impish smile flashed out. “At the Olympics they seem quite unbeatable.”

Aileen shook her head with a laugh. “I’m certainly nowhere near Olympic standards, but I admit I do like swimming. We used to spen
d
quite a lot of time at the beach. Peter can swim too,” she added.

“Already?” Dona Teresa raised her eyebrows. “Do they teach children to swim in Australia before they can walk?”

Aileen shook her head again, laughing. “No
... but I suppose it is a kind of national pastime. He isn’t a very strong swimmer, of course, but he can do a few strokes and he likes splashing around in the water.”

“It is shallow at this end of the pool,” Dona Teresa told her. “You must bring him here when he has finished his lessons. Have you brought your swimming dress with you?”

Aileen nodded. “I had to bring everything,” she explained. ‘There was nowhere I could have left them as we only lived in one room.” She laughed again. “I even have my rubber flippers, although I didn’t know when I was going to use them again.”

There was a slight interval while she had to explain what flippers were, but Dona Teresa soon grasped it and nodded her sleekly dressed head.

“Ah, yes, I understand. It is a pity we are not near the coast, although there is of course the danger of sharks.”

“We had that danger too,” Aileen said sombrely. “Every year somebody would be attacked, in spite of all precautions. I think you get in the water ... and when you’re enjoying yourself you tend to forget or minimise the danger ... then it suddenly happens.”

“You have never had a scare like that?”

Aileen shook her head. “No, although not because I’ve been sensible all the time,” she admitted. “There have been one or two occasions when I suppose I’ve been out too far.”

They sat talking for a while, until lunch-time, and during the afternoon Aileen did some more exploring. For some days afterwards there followed an oddly halcyon interlude. As Dona Teresa had mentioned once before in Madrid the Castillo was isolated, but there were many compensations. The scenery in the district was wonderful, especially as a horse had been found for her to ride, and it took only a short time for her childhood aptitude to return. Peter also came in for his share of equestrian recreation, and took to it like the proverbial duck to water when a small pony was procured for him. Sometimes a middle-aged groom accompanied them, sometimes Duarte himself. The villagers began to become accustomed to the sight of her, and when she went down there greeted her with smiles and little curtsies she felt she did not deserve, as she really was not one of the family, whatever the villagers might think of the situation up at the Castillo Marindos.