Nurse for the Doctor (6 page)

CHAPTER V

The Marquis de Palheiro
’
s
summer villa occupied a commanding position on the wildly beautiful Costa Brava coast. A ridge of pines rose behind it, and in front there was an almost uninterrupted view of the sea. The road to it climbed nearly all the way from San Fernando, with glimpses of the Pyrenees, with snow upon their summits, rising up away to the north, afforded every now and again by the sudden twists and turns of the road. Nearer at hand were strangely shaped mountains of Montserrat, etched sharply against the deep blue of the sky, and a little forbidding in such a smiling landscape.

It was a perfect morning when Mrs. Duveen and her son, as well as Josie, were driven in superb comfort by the marquis’s chauffeur in the marquis’s car to the white villa where their host awaited them. The miles of maize, and the lavender fields, had been cut and denuded weeks before, but there was still color enough on every hand. The road proceeded like a snake, flashing through Catalan villages and terraced orchards, overhanging quaint harbors and splintered red rocks about which the peacock-blue sea swirled and eddied, filling the many crannies of the golden rimmed coast. It twisted upwards through vineyards, and then plunged down to meet the sea again, only to climb once more towards a fir plantation. The light was strange and clear and golden, the vegetation exotic and extraordinarily lush considering the lateness of the season. There were thorny shapes that Josie later discovered were torch-thistles, slender agave flowers, a profusion of trees that she came to know as mastic-trees, and clumps of prickly pear.

The air seemed full of the sharp scent of pine, and the marquis’s villa was actually overhung by the umbrella shapes, often leaning a little drunkenly from their rock crannies.

The villa itself stood well back from the road, and ornamental wrought-iron gates guarded the approach to it. Once the car flashed between these gates, however, and entered a sheltered drive, it was barely a minute before they emerged on to a broad open sweep before the house.

Looking up at it from her seat beside the chauffeur Josie thought it looked more like a small mansion than a summer villa—a sea-side villa, as she supposed it was looked upon by its owner. Although decorated with green-painted grilles and balconies and shutters fastened back against the severe white walls, it was extremely dignified.

A magnificent climbing rose bloomed in blood-red beauty above the stout, iron-studded front door, and a terrace ran the entire length of the front of the house. Where the terrace ended she could see long pergolas of roses, and on the other side of an arch cut in a whitewashed wall with a pantiled roof a gardener was driving a motor-mower up and down a strip of emerald lawn, and another gardener was hosing beds of flowers cut out of the turf.

The marquis himself appeared on the terrace when the car stopped, and it was he who helped Michael to alight from the car. The Englishman laughed protestingly, insisting that he was being made far too much fuss of these days, but the marquis merely looked grave as he assisted him to cross the terrace, and Mrs. Duveen fussed round her son like a concerned mother hen. Josie collected their personal impedimenta from the back of the car, and was about to carry it into the house when her future host ordered her to do nothing of the kind.

“Leave everything to Fernandez. He will see to it.”

The order was curt and imperative, and Josie would no more have cared to disobey it than she would have dreamed of arguing with the matron of Chessington House.

Inside they were met by a delicious coolness, and a dimness that was infinitely restful after the glare without. Through the dimness Josie made out a staircase curving upwards to a gallery, rather like that of a church, which surrounded the marble-floored hall on three sides, some Spanish oak doors that looked solid as ebony, and pieces of magnificent oak furniture. Then they emerged into the daylight once more, and were in a kind of patio with a series of arches confronting them that admitted to the extensive grounds; in the shadow of a cypress hedge comfortable wicker chairs with padded backs were arranged around a table that bore a tray of drinks and dishes of suitable accompaniments, like olives and salted almonds.

Two women were lying back in relaxed attitudes in a couple of these chairs, but as the new arrivals entered the patio one of them, at least, moved and sat upright. In spite of the brilliance of the sunshine, and the warmth of the day, she was clothed entirely in black, but it was superlatively cut black, and in her small, shell-like ears there were a couple of magnificent pearl studs that were as flawless as the exotic camellia-whiteness of her skin. Her hair looked like lacquered black silk coiled about her shapely head, and there was grace in every line of her as she stood up. Eyes that, most surprisingly, were as grey as wood smoke, looked straight at Michael Duveen.

“It is a long time, Senor Michael,” she said, and although she greeted Mrs. Duveen first it was just as if she had been waiting to say those words to him. She spoke with a simplicity that did something to Josie’s heartstrings, tangling them, confusing them, so that she didn’t know whether it was sympathy that moved her all at once, a conviction that she had known all along that she would feel this sympathy, or dismay because of that patient quality in the beautifully modulated voice of Dona Maria de Silva y Cortes.

“Why, Dona Maria, so it is!” Michael exclaimed, and took her hand and held it while he smiled down into her face, watching the color like the soft pink of the inside of a shell steal up under her lovely skin. “A
very
long time!” he emphasized, and there seemed to be an increased warmth in his voice, and also unmistakably a note of surprise.

The other young woman still lay gracefully in her chair—so gracefully that she might have been posing for an artist—and it was not until Maria seemed to awake from a kind of trance, and turned to introduce her, that she stirred languidly.

Green-blue eyes with slanting eyelashes looked upwards with a hint of a smile at Michael, and a slim white hand was extended with the same sort of languor as her attitude. She was wearing rose-pink linen, and her hair was the tawny gold of autumn leaves. Her complexion suggested the smooth sides of a peach lightly dusted with face-powder, and anyone more entirely suited to act as a foil to the arresting,
soignee
darkness of Dona Maria could scarcely have been found, even after a prolonged and intensive search.

The marquis explained that Miss Sylvia Petersen and his sister had become acquainted during the latter’s recent visit to America, and there was now no doubt that Miss Petersen had been accepted into the bosom of the Palheiro family as an extremely welcome, if temporary addition to it. There was warmth in her eyes when they looked towards Maria, and even greater warmth when they encountered the marquis’s sloe-black look, and the corners of her extraordinarily lovely mouth—she had a very short upper lip, and a slightly sensual lower—curved upwards the instant he so much as glanced in her direction. She was plainly not in the least stirred by the arrival of the invalid, but the marquis she seemed eager to have close at hand.

To Josie everything about her, from the exclusive simplicity of her dress to the diamond bracelet that encompassed one very slim ankle, suggested a background of opulence almost, if not quite, on a par with the background of the marquis and his sister.

When they had all been seated and provided with pre-lunch
aperitifs
Mrs. Duveen—who was only too obviously delighted to be at the villa at last—looked across at Josie and suggested with deceptive sweetness: “I know you won’t mind unpacking for me, Josie, will you?” She had only lately started to call Josie by her Christian name, and somehow it had the effect of robbing the girl of her status as a fully qualified nurse, and suggested she was instead a hired companion it was impossible to take too seriously. “You know how I loathe unpacking, and you put everything away so neatly. And I shall want something fresh to change into before lunch.”

“Of course, Mrs. Duveen,” Josie said, realizing at once that she was being dismissed—temporarily, at least, being got out of the way, because she was not in the accepted sense of the word an “invited” guest, and her constant society was not entirely desirable in a gathering such as this.

But Dona Maria’s slim eyebrows ascended in quick surprise. Once the faint but noticeable confusion Michael’s arrival had covered her with had passed, she had regained what appeared to be a normal calm, which was backed by a strong suggestion of the severely practical, as well as a tendency to be amused by the varying reactions of other people.

“I assure you that is not necessary,” she said. “Magdalena, an excellent girl in every way, has already been deputed to wait on you during your stay, and by this time she has probably unpacked Nurse Winter’s things as well.”

She said “Nurse Winter” with a faint query in her voice, and Mrs. Duveen thought it necessary to explain: “Oh, of course Nurse Winter
is
here to take care of Michael, because the poor dear boy is so distressingly weak, still.” She didn’t apparently notice that the “poor, dear boy” was lying in his long chair and carrying on a conversation with his host that he obviously found enjoyable, and looking as if his morning drive had actually done him a good deal of good, quite apart from the fact that the tan he had recently acquired had increased his attractiveness tenfold. “But we don’t like to emphasize the atmosphere of invalidism, and Josie is so understanding, and
so
useful.”

Which was another attempt to place Josie’s position in a really clear perspective, and Josie didn’t need a second hint to remove herself. But as she followed a servant upstairs to the suite of rooms given over to them she carried with her the memory of a second, rather long look—a rediscovering look?—exchanged by her patient and the grey eyed widow. And she also had the feeling that the Marquis de Palheiro watched her as she went, as if he, too, were a little surprised to see her vanishing at the behest of Mrs. Duveen.

The rooms given over to the Duveens were utterly charming, and unlike any rooms Josie had ever had the privilege of attempting to make herself at home in before.

Her own was much larger than her room at the hotel, and the severity of its furnishing appealed to her. The walls were cream-colored, and the ceiling low, so that the beautiful carved posts of the half-tester bed seemed almost to touch it. The bed itself was in a kind of alcove and on a little table beside it there was a telephone and a bowl of richly scented deep pink roses.

The dressing table stood in a petticoat of highly glazed English chintz, and Josie wondered for a moment who was responsible for the couple of new English novels, and the flagon of expensive toilet-water that reposed to the top. She decided that it must have been Dona Maria. But the thing that filled her with more pleasure than anything else was the tiny, beautifully private balcony outside her room, with its comfortable chair and little table whereon her early morning tea tray, or breakfast tray, could be set down, while the whole of the Costa Brava coast—or so it seemed—was spread out before her eyes. And the thing she admired more than anything else was a handsome and courtly
prie-dieu,
with a velvet cushion the rose-red of the bed curtains, worn and slightly threadbare from continuous kneeling, that stood in a little recess near the window, with an ivory crucifix on the wall above it.

Mrs. Duveen’s room was not greatly dissimilar, but instead of roses she had carnations beside her bed, and her flagon of perfume was something really choice. Michael’s room adjoining a sitting-room wherein he could rest when he felt unable—or perhaps disinclined—to join the others, and here nothing was lacking for his comfort, and he expressed himself as exceedingly well satisfied.

“Didn’t I tell you, Josie,” he said to her, while she was drawing the curtains in his room for his afternoon siesta, “that Spain was well worth a visit? That it had a great deal to offer?”

And she wondered, because his expression looked a little dreamy as he lay staring into the pleasant gloom she had created, whether he really was thinking of Spain at that moment, or whether it was Dona Maria who occupied his thoughts; Dona Maria who had surprised him—and disturbed him?—just a little.

That night, while she was wondering what she would choose to wear in which to make her appearance at dinner, Mrs. Duveen came fussing in from the bathroom, clutching her bathrobe, and with her hair tucked beneath a net and her face a protective mask of cold cream, so that she looked anything but attractive for once. Her manner was a trifle diffident, but it didn’t prevent her from coming to the point almost immediately.

“Look here, my dear,” she said. “I know you’ll understand perfectly, and you won’t take this amiss ... But the situation here is a little different to when we were all three staying at the hotel. There, of course, you had as much right to use the dining room as anyone else, and no one thought it odd that you should share all our meals with Michael and myself. To the management you were just another guest. But here...”

“Yes?” Josie inquired quietly, while Mrs. Duveen picked up the toilet water, and sniffed at it, and then put it down again.

“Here we are
not
all invited guests—I mean, you are an employee...”

“I think I understand what you are trying to say,” Josie said, but she was conscious of a distinct sensation of shock. Although when she thought about it afterwards she was not at all sure that she had had any right to feel shocked.

“You do, dear?” Mrs. Duveen looked relieved. “Then you won’t think it’s because
I
don’t want you to join us at dinner if I point out to you that—after all, the Marquis de Palheiro
is
a marquis, and although he’s very charming, and extremely kind to everyone—especially his own domestic staff, who, I believe, adore him—there is such a thing as taking advantage of that kindness, and if I try to thrust you amongst his guests ... There may be other people invited for dinner tonight, and I don’t have to make myself any clearer, do I...?”

“Of course not,” Josie answered, smiling at her reassuringly. But in spite of the smile she found herself recalling the moment when Michael had kissed her the night before, and she wondered what his reaction had been when he thought about it afterwards and realized that he had kissed an employee! She didn’t suppose he had ever done such a thing in his life before. “Of course not, she repeated, smiling as if she didn’t merely understand, but was in entire agreement. “And as a matter of fact I’ll be much happier having a meal up here in my room. If someone could be persuaded to bring it to me fairly early I could have it outside on the balcony, and that would be most pleasant, particularly as someone has supplied me with a couple of new novels.”

Mrs. Duveen actually beamed at her.

“My dear, I’ll see to it that you have something really nice brought up to you here. I’m sure a word in Dona Maria’s ear ... Or perhaps that nice maid Magdalena will arrange everything. I’ll speak to her while she’s helping me to dress.”

And she went away to begin changing with quite a load off her mind, for although she thought Josie was quite a nice inoffensive girl, she could hardly expect to have her included in such a select gathering as the marquis might see fit to surround himself with. And sometimes Michael could be irritating, and he might talk to the girl more than he should, when there were others with a definite right to his attentions...

Left alone in her room Josie slipped out of her own dressing gown and into a severe little tailored dress of pearl-grey linen. It had a white collar and cuffs, and was almost as good as a uniform, and she felt more correct when she was wearing it. She also felt as if she had been put rather severely into her place, and that in future it would be wise if she didn’t trespass from it.