Isle of Desire Read online

  silver cream jug.

  ‘It was nothing important, Dom Duarte.’ She managed to bring back the steadiness to her voice, managed to look directly at him as she spoke. ‘Just mind-wanderings, if you know what I mean?’ she added with a light laugh.

  The cream was passed to her in silence; she felt reproved by his deliberate lack of response to what she had said. The next time the Conde spoke it was to ask which liqueur she preferred. She told him and he poured it for her, still maintaining his reproving silence. However, Laura herself managed to reopen the conversation and the gathering tension was eased, much to her relief. They talked again of antiques, and to her surprise the Conde offered to show her some very special pieces which he had bought when in China a couple of years previously.

  ‘They’re Celadons,’ he explained after conducting her to the room in which the precious pieces were housed. ‘Their period— the Sung Dynasty.’

  Laura had seen Celadons before; she knew they were of the period between the tenth and thirteenth centuries, a period in China when cultural and creative achievements were at their peak. The beautiful things that had been made at that time had more than once left Laura breathless.

  However, for some reason she could not explain, she made no mention of her previous experience of these beautiful examples of delicate china, but merely enthused on their colour, their shape, and the fact that they had survived for at least seven centuries. Her appreciation was noted, but she gained the rather disconcerting impression that, somehow, she had made a slip, revealing the fact that she was not seeing this particular kind of china for the first time.

  The Conde, however, took her to another part of the room where he pointed out some examples of rare Meissen and some very early Bow and Chelsea figures.

  ‘Our porcelain was everywhere,' she commented with, pride. ‘It was in very great demand in the eighteenth

  century.’

  The Conde’s grey eyes surveyed her for a second, and she was sure they held a trace of mockery within their depths.

  ‘At that time the English were in the ascendancy with much more than china. This was the age of Sheraton and Hepplewhite. It was a short-lived stardom, though,’ he added in that smoothly foreign voice. ‘Injudicious planning brought about your downfall.’

  Her chin shot up; she forgot for the moment his exalted position, and her own lowly one. They were equals and she was not allowing him to make disparaging comment on her country.

  ‘We still produce beautiful goods,’ she stated emphatically. ‘Our porcelain manufacturers still export their products to all the important countries of the world!’

  ‘I would not argue the point, senhorita, but I still maintain that you’ve failed to hold your position—the unique and most enviable position which your country held two hundred years ago.’ He paused; she said nothing and after a moment he said, in a slightly less smooth and austere manner, ‘May I say, senhorita, that I admire your loyalty to your country. ’

  She flushed, aware of being strangely affected by the change in his voice.

  ‘Thank you, Dom Duarte,’ she returned shyly. ‘It is kind of you to say so.’

  Long after she was in her bedroom she was thinking about the evening. It had in many ways been unreal and there were some things that even now had become vague in her mind. But one thing that was not vague was the inescapable magnetism of the Conde. In what way that magnetism affected her she could not tell; all she knew was that his handsome face and arresting personality would be with her for a long while after she had left the lovely coral island of Torassa.

  CHAPTER THREE

  For the following two days Laura was conducted to various parts of the island by Teresa who, every now and then, would become exceedingly expansive, giving Laura details of the island and the people and especially of the Conde himself. But then she would suddenly realise she was saying far too much and immediately change the subject, talking affably about what was in view at that particular time.

  ‘The tide is low and you can see the fringing reef,’ she pointed out when they were strolling along the shore, having spent the whole of the morning and part of the afternoon in the rain forest. They had come back tired but both willing to take a stroll along the white sands, watching the little fishing boats and the larger pleasure craft belonging to the more wealthy people of the island. Teresa had already pointed out Dom Duarte’s large and graceful yacht, anchored alongside a jetty at the place where his grounds met the palm-fringed beach.

  ‘Beyond the fringing reef there’s a barrier reef?’

  ‘Yes,’ answered Teresa, ‘that’s right. The lagoon’s in between the two. It’s marvellous, swimming in the lagoon; the water’s so beautifully calm—and warm, of course.’

  Laura nodded.

  ‘It must be warm for coral to live in it.’

  The girl looked swiftly at her.

  ‘You know about coral, then?’

  ‘I know a little, yes. I learned at school about reefs, and that they

  are built up of coral—and other polyps, of course. I know that the temperature of sea water must be sixty-eight degrees Fahrenheit for coral to be able to live in it. ’

  ‘Look at the lagoon!’ said Teresa, changing the subject. ‘Doesn’t it remind you of something out of a book of fairy tales?’

  Laura smiled.

  ‘Or a glossy travel brochure.’

  ‘I expect it does,’ mused Teresa, adding after a moment, ‘There are no travel brochures giving details of Torassa.’

  ‘Dom Duarte told me that he does not allow tourists on the island.’

  ‘We do have visitors, though. We shall soon have company at the Palacio.’

  ‘You will?’ curiously as Laura sensed it was to be one of those times when Teresa would become expansive. Already Laura had learned that Dom Duarte had two sisters and two brothers, all living in Portugal. She also knew about a Portuguese girl called Dona Eduarda de Manso who, it was at one time thought, would become the wife of Dom Duarte. But she had married someone else and was now a widow. She visited the Conde two or three times a year and gossip had it that Dona Eduarda, unhappily married the first time, would eventually marry her first love.

  ‘Yes,’ answered Teresa, ‘we are to have visitors. One of the sisters of Dom Duarte, Dona Maria Mondego, who lives with her husband in Lisbon, has asked Dom Duarte if he will have her little girl for three months, because her husband has to go abroad and she wants to go with him. ’

  ‘And Dom Duarte has agreed to have the little girl?’

  ‘I can understand your surprise, senhorita,’ returned Teresa with a grimace, ‘because he doesn’t appear to be a man who would be interested in children. But he’s very kind, really, and he was very sympathetic when Dona Maria said she did not want to be parted from her husband for three months. The little girl, Clara, has her nanny with her, so she’ll be quite happy.’

  So the nanny was coming to Torassa. Laura could not help feeling envious of this unknown Portuguese girl who was to spend three months on the island. ‘When will these two be arriving?’ she asked.

  ‘Tomorrow, I think.’

  ‘So soon. I shall meet them, then?’

  Teresa nodded. She had been curious about Laura, but had not so much as asked one question as to why she was not remaining at the Palacio. Her fiance would have told her what little he knew, but that was not very much at all. Laura was most impressed by the girl’s reserve, and liked her all the more for it.

  ‘Yes, you’ll meet them. The little girl’s been here many times, with her parents, so she’s used to the Palacio, and to her Uncle Duarte.’

  ‘The nanny ... is she young?’

  ‘About your age, senhorita.’

  ‘ What’s her name? ’

  ‘Marianna. It’s pretty, isn’t it?’

  ‘Very,’ smiled Laura, then inquired the age of the child.

  ‘She’s five. Marianna has recently begun to teach her. You see, Marianna is a qualified teacher, which is t
he reason she was engaged by Clara’s parents. They do not want her to go to school for several years yet.’

  That evening the Conde himself mentioned his visitors.

  ‘They’ll be arriving tomorrow afternoon,’ he said with his customary aloof detachment. ‘I might, I’m afraid, have to take Teresa from you now and then. My young niece can be rather a handful and her nanny becomes a little harassed and tired. If this does happen I shall give Marianna a rest and hand over my niece to Teresa, with whom she gets on very well indeed.’

  It was with some astonishment that Laura looked at him, for his words were a revelation. She would never have believed he would trouble himself about the state of mind of a mere servant, especially as that servant was not one of his own.

  He and Laura were again in the Blue Lounge; Gigo had served coffee and Dom Duarte poured it out. Although feeling a little ill at ease in his august company, Laura was yet determined to appear cool and confident, since she strongly suspected that the noble Conde would have little or no patience with those who could not command their feelings and behaviour.

  ‘Teresa did mention that your niece and her nanny were paying a visit,’ she said, picking up her coffee and meeting those grey eyes over the rim of the cup. ‘I expect your niece keeps you alive on these visits.’

  Dom Duarte nodded, but absently.

  ‘She’s a most attractive child. But, as I’ve implied, full of mischief. ’

  ‘ She has no brothers or sisters?'

  ‘Unfortunately no. My sister and her husband had hoped there

  would be another within two years at the most----- ’ He shrugged

  his aristocratic shoulders. ‘These are the things over which we have no control.’

  ‘Does the little girl have playmates—at home, I mean?’

  ‘ Several. But in any case, she would never be a lonely child; she has too much interest in things around her.’ Faintly he smiled, and Laura was impressed by the change which even this slight curve of the lips could bring about. Dom Duarte was inordinately handsome even when austere; when he smiled he became devastatingly attractive, and Laura would not have been a woman had she not been affected by this attraction. She considered that the girl he married would be the envy of every friend she had. Laura began to wonder about his parents, sure that they, too, must have been remarkably good-looking.

  ‘She sounds a most interesting child,’ mused Laura, putting down her cup. ‘I myself am very fond of children, so perhaps, if her nanny does become tired ... ’ She allowed her voice to trail off to silence, aware that she had almost taken a liberty. However, to her surprise the Conde, who knew what she had been about to say, told her graciously that he would remember her offer, and perhaps take her up on it.

  ‘Of course,’ he went on thoughtfully, ‘you won’t be here much longer, so there might not be an opportunity of your taking over Clara for a day or so.’

  Laura was soon saying goodnight to him; she went out into the garden and wondered what he himself did in the evenings. But a short while later, as she was passing a window at the side of the Palacio, she heard the strains of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and realised that he was listening to gramophone records.

  The gardens were glowing with colour, subdued in parts, but bright in others, as those playing on the fountain. Gold, peach and a delicate green, these were the colours of the hidden lamps which shone on to the fountain and the cascade at the side of the pool. Several terraces lay before Laura as she wandered away from the pool. On one of these was a wide lawn with

  mature trees dotted here and there, and flower borders intruding subtly into its edges, so that scarcely any of them were straight. Ornamental gardens and parterres occupied the second terrace, and on the third terrace were beautifully fashioned yew and box trees forming peacocks, a heron in flight and many other birds. The following morning Laura went up to the Gallery to admire the pictures. She had already been there, on more than one occasion, but this time she studied the paintings more carefully, and with the experienced eye of the connoisseur. She saw the flaws, result of damp, she thought, and was in no doubt at all that she could restore these beautiful works of art to their original beauty. On sudden impulse she went back to her room for a notebook in which she then wrote down all that she thought needed to be done. It was an absorbing task and a most interesting one, so it was not at all surprising that she remained unaware of the quiet footsteps treading the carpet behind her. It was the appearance of the man himself, at her side, that made her give a start and drop the notebook in which she had been writing so busily.

  Without losing one degree of dignity the Conde stooped and retrieved the notebook. He handed it to her and said, in that suave and foreign voice which was now so familiar to her,

  ‘It would appear that you have been assessing the damage to my pictures?’

  She nodded, a trifle flushed and uncomfortable but enthusiastic for all that.

  ‘I could put them right,’ was her eager and impulsive assertion. ‘I once helped my father with some paintings which had been even more seriously affected by damp than these.’ Her smile brought that limpidity to her shy, grey-green eyes and for a fleeting moment the Conde’s entire attention was caught.

  ‘What makes you so sure that the damage has been brought about by damp?’ he inquired smoothly at length.

  ‘They look exactly as those others I have mentioned.’

  ‘You certainly sound as if you’ve had experience.’ His admission was rather in the sense of a grudging one. Laura tilted her chin unconsciously and told him that she had had a great deal

  of experience.

  ‘If you would allow me to tackle one,’ she ventured in a more meek and persuasive tone of voice, ‘I would then at least have an opportunity of proving my capabilities in this particular field of art.’

  He held out his hand for the notebook, which she immediately passed to him, her heart skipping a beat as the possibility of a prolonged stay at the Palacio loomed clearly on the horizon. She watched him as he opened her book, automatically wishing she had been neater with her writing. Scribbling down information for her own eyes was one thing; that the Conde should want to see those notes was something very different. She noticed the taut profile, unmoving as a statue, and she wondered If he had ever been stirred by any form of emotion. Certainly, she thought, he would never be seen in a temper. But why resort to anger anyway ... when by a mere look from those steely eyes would be censure enough?

  He seemed engrossed, and Laura moved away, to stand and stare at another lovely painting. The window was open at the end of the gallery and through it drifted the heady perfume of some tropical flower growing in the gardens below. She thought of the smells from the trading estate where she worked, and sent up a little prayer that the Conde would allow her to try out her skills on at least one of his pictures. To stay here, on this lovely tropical island, would be the most wonderful experience of her life, and one for which she would be forever grateful to the man who made it possible.

  Laura turned her head when he moved, and a smile came hesitantly to her lips and hovered there. Her eyes were wide, imploring in a way that was lost on Laura herself but which did not escape the noble lord of Torassa in whose hands her immediate future lay.

  ‘I’ll keep this if I may?’ A request that was really a firm statement, and Laura’s smile deepened. It did not for one single moment enter his head that she might refuse to let him take it away. Not that she wanted to do so—on the contrary, she was very keen that he should read what she had written, scribbly though her writing was.

  ‘Certainly, sir.’ The last word came out unconsciously; the Conde looked down at her from his incredible height and said with a trace of cold hauteur,

  ‘I prefer that you address me as Dom Duarte, senhorita.’

  She bit her lip, nodding meekly.

  ‘Yes—I understand,’ she said, noticing that he had put her little book into the pocket of his white linen jacket.

  ‘There
will be another visitor arriving this afternoon,’ he said after a slight pause. ‘My friend, Dona Eduarda de Manso, so there will be three of us for dinner. ’ Without another word he turned on his heel and strode along the length of the gallery, his lithe body swinging with a noble gait, his dark head erect upon broad arrogant shoulders.

  What a man! More like a king, thought Laura, her mind switching to the image which she and Avice had conjured up of the lord of Torassa. What a lot she would have to tell Avice when she saw her next week— Next week?

  ‘I’ll keep my fingers crossed that he’ll like what he reads!’ she exclaimed in a whisper as she followed the path just taken by the Conde. ‘Oh, but it’ll be heaven to stay here for a little while!' And what satisfaction she would derive from restoring one of the paintings. If she were given the chance, and was successful in pleasing the Conde, then of course he would seriously consider allowing her to set to work on the others, with the result that she would be here for the six months—or perhaps longer.

  The two figures down on the patio were indistinct, but Laura knew who they were. She had met Dona Eduarda at the same time as she had met Marianna and Clara, all of them having flown in on the same aeroplane, which was going on to the island of Sri Lanka. Marianna was youthful, of a happy disposition and yet serious-minded and studious. So quiet, too, as if aware of her place as a servant. She managed the child very well indeed, but it was easy to see that there were times when she had her difficulties, for even after only an hour or so in her company, Laura had taken in the fact that the child could be a handful. She had a strong will, which itself bred obstinacy. Dona Eduarda had been in Laura’s company only a few minutes but, in some strange indefinable way, the two women took an instant dislike to one another. And yet, despite her own dislike for the Portuguese girl, Laura had to admit that she would make an admirable wife for the illustrious owner of the Palacio de Mauredo, being able to manage the numerous servants that were necessary in so massive an establishment. Dona Eduarda was tall and slender, with black hair and glittering eyes that were as arrogant as those of her friend the Conde. Her voice too was unusual, having a vibrating coldness about it that was totally without depth, Laura had the swift impression that worldly possessions were all that the girl was interested in. And in fact Laura was later to learn that her first marriage had made Dona Eduarda into a millionairess, her husband having left her everything he owned.