“It’s okay—you don’t need to do that.” Her voice came out high and reedy. She wondered if he could tell how close she was to tears.
“It’s no trouble—I need to call at the post office.”
They walked in silence until they reached the ruined mill. Zoltan asked her if they could sit down for a few minutes. She followed him inside, surprised that he needed to rest when they were going downhill, not up the mountain. He sank down onto the ancient grinding stone and patted the space beside him.
“There’s something I have to tell you,” he said. “Maria asked me to do it because she couldn’t face giving you the news herself.”
Rose felt as if an icy hand had gripped her heart. “Nathan’s dead, isn’t he?”
“I’m so sorry, Rose.” Zoltan took her hand, the calluses on his palm rubbing against her fingers.
“H . . . how?” she whispered.
“He was caught up in a mass execution staged by a gang of fascist thugs called the Escuadra Negra.”
Rose stared at him, motionless, not even breathing. The Black Squad. The same men who had taken Lola’s mother and brother.
“Maria said it happened in the spring of ’38,” he went on. “It must have been soon after he sent that last letter. She remembers that it was snowing, and he’d come to see her, early in the morning, to ask if she wanted anything from the village. An hour or so later, she heard gunfire down in the valley. When some of the other partisans came for food the next day, they told her that your brother had been on his way to his fiancée’s house, but the fascists had arrested her and were marching her through the village to be executed. When he tried to rescue her, they killed him, too.”
Silent tears coursed down Rose’s face. It was what she had known, deep down, all along. But no amount of expectation could soften the blow. Until this moment, there had always been that flicker of hope.
Zoltan wrapped his arms around her, pulling her to him.
“I . . . I’m sorry,” she mumbled into his shoulder.
“Shhh.” He stroked her hair. “Don’t try to talk. We can just stay here for a while.”
Rose closed her eyes tight, aware that her tears were making his shirt wet. She could hear the babble of the stream through the gaping windows, the calling of birds in the trees that overhung the tumbledown roof. It seemed wrong that the world outside could just go on, exactly as before, when for her, things would never be the same again.
She could feel the rise and fall of Zoltan’s chest, the throb of his heart. It should have been a comforting thing—but all she could think about was Nathan lying on the ground with the life ebbing out of his body.
“Would it be easier if you came to my place instead of going back to the village?” Zoltan whispered the question into her hair. “I could go and fetch your daughter from school and fix us something to eat.”
The mention of Nieve tipped Rose over the edge of the precipice of grief and shock. She felt as if the grindstone beneath her were disintegrating, and she were falling into some dark abyss beneath the mountain.
“She’s not my daughter.” She heard the words, not fully aware that they had come from her own mouth.
Zoltan remained silent for a while. Then he said, “You don’t have to explain if you don’t want to.”
Rose raised her head from his shoulder. His eyes were the clear, pale blue of the meltwater from the mountain glaciers. Something in the way he looked at her made a dam burst in her heart. She began to pour out the story of Lola and the harrowing rescue of the baby from the massacre in the snow.
“Is Lola the friend you mentioned to Maria? The one whose family was shot for sheltering partisans?”
Rose nodded. “She’s the one who told me about this place. I only knew Nathan was here because she recognized his description of the fountain in Pampaneira.”
“And now she’s facing a murder charge?”
“I’ve written letters to the authorities,” Rose said. “I can’t think what else to do. I can’t go back to Granada.” She hesitated, drawing in a breath to keep her voice steady. “I mean, there’s no reason for me to stay here now—but it would be too dangerous for Nieve.”
“I can believe that,” Zoltan replied. “I have a radio in the cottage—I’ve heard reports of children being taken from their parents and put into monasteries and convents. They call it trasplante—transplantation—as if they were vegetables being uprooted from poor soil.”
“I haven’t known Nieve for long,” Rose went on, “but she’s very precious to me.” She checked herself, aware now that she had already let out far more than she had intended. But she felt compelled to tell him what had been on her mind even before the night in the tavern when the swift had landed in her lap. “I know it sounds fanciful,” she said, “but I’d almost allowed myself to believe that she might be Nathan’s child.”
Zoltan pursed his lips. “It’s not impossible, is it? You know she was born near here, at around the same time that your brother died. What if the woman Lola found dying was his fiancée?”
“I thought of that before, but . . .” It was painful to spell out exactly what was going through her mind. “I don’t think Lola’s mother and brother were killed at the same time as my brother. Lola described exactly what she saw that day. She said her brother was the only male victim. All the others were women. So Nieve couldn’t be Nathan’s child, could she? If she was, he would have been there, too.”
“I don’t want to give you false hope,” Zoltan said, “but there’s a chance your brother was killed before the others. Maria said he died trying to protect his fiancée. She didn’t say where he died. Forgive me for being so blunt, but if he was shot in the street, his body wouldn’t have been with the others, would it?”
“How can I ever know that?” Fresh tears stung the back of Rose’s eyes.
“Someone in Pampaneira must know. And Maria knows who knows.”
“But she wouldn’t even tell me about Nathan,” Rose whispered.
“I know,” Zoltan replied. “She might come across as a tough old crow, but actually she’s very sensitive. She just couldn’t bear the thought of hurting you.”
“So you think we should go back there?” Rose gripped the rough edges of the millstone. She wasn’t sure she could face it.
“Another day maybe.” Zoltan put his hand on hers. “But we will find out what happened—I promise you that.”
Chapter 25
Rose hadn’t intended to stay the night at Zoltan’s cottage. She barely remembered the walk back there from the ruined mill. She had nodded off in an armchair, and he had left her while he went to collect Nieve from school, waking her only when the evening meal was ready. And then—the minute they’d finished eating—Nieve had curled up with Gunesh on the wolf-skin rug and fallen fast asleep.
“There’s no point disturbing her,” Zoltan had said when Rose went to rouse her. “Why don’t you stay? We can be up in plenty of time to get her to school.” He had offered to give up his bed for them, but Rose had been happy to settle down under a blanket next to Nieve and the dog.
She had lain awake for a while, listening to the night sounds of the mountain. In her bed in the village, the only thing she could hear was the rush of water and the clucking of the chickens. But up here there were wild animals. She’d heard the haunting cry of a fox and the hoot of a hunting eagle owl. There was the snuffling, grunting sound of a wild boar and the distant howl of a wolf. And somewhere close to the cottage there were toads, whose croaking songs had lulled her into unconsciousness even though she hadn’t felt particularly tired.
Rose woke at first light. For a while she lay where she was on the rug, gazing at Nieve’s sleeping face, searching for traces of the woman whose image had lain hidden in a box in this house for all the years that Nieve had been growing up. Could she be Adelita’s child? Were those long dark eyelashes and that perfect little mouth inherited from her or someone else? The longer she looked, the more convinced she became of a resemblance. But as a sci
entist, Rose knew that it was all too easy to get the answer that you wanted from a few unsubstantiated facts. She was letting her heart rule her head. There was no more evidence that Nieve’s looks came from Adelita than that her love of animals came from Nathan.
Rolling silently off the rug, Rose stood up and stretched her aching limbs. Holding a corner of the curtain, she peered through the window to see the mist rolling back from the mountain, like a dancer slowly raising the hem of her skirt. There was a deep-red glow in the eastern horizon. As the sun began to climb, it turned a shoal of high clouds into charcoal embers, red beneath and dark gray on top. Within minutes the great ball of the sun had changed from scarlet to pale yellow, and the clouds skimming the hillside were bleached white.
She let Gunesh out for a walk and watched him run up the side of the mountain, chasing half a dozen wild ibex. But they were too quick for him. When he came back, his coat smelled of the aromatic plants growing on the hillside—mint, fennel, rosemary, and thyme.
Zoltan insisted on accompanying them down to the village despite Rose’s protests. He brought bread and cheese for them to eat on the way down, and when Nieve was safely inside school, he bent down to plant a kiss on Rose’s forehead.
“You know where to find me.” That was all he said. And Rose stood watching until the trees swallowed him up.
“Why do we have to live here?” Nieve threw her bag onto the bed when she got back from school. “Why can’t we go and live in Uncle Zoltan’s house?”
Rose smiled to herself. She hadn’t told the child to call Zoltan uncle. But it had been clear from the moment Nieve walked through the door of the cottage that she was smitten. Perhaps it was because Zoltan had promised to make migas for the evening meal. Or maybe it was because he had let her help with feeding and grooming the mules.
“I thought you liked it here,” Rose said. “You wouldn’t be able to play with Alonso if we moved somewhere else.”
Nieve’s mouth turned down at the edges. “I don’t like him anymore. He pulled my hair on the playground today.” She sat down on the bed and pulled off her boots. “I’ve got a new friend. Her name’s Pilar. She says I can sleep at her house on Saturday night.”
“Saturday? But that’s when you’re doing the dancing for San Juan.”
Nieve nodded. “She wants me go home with her afterward. There’s going to be a big party. All her cousins and aunts and uncles are going to be there.”
Rose hesitated. Was it all right to let Nieve go to this house on her own? She told herself she was being overly protective. It was a fiesta—something that Nieve should be allowed to enjoy with her new friend. “Well, yes, of course you can go.” Rose hadn’t intended it to sound grudging, but Nieve picked up on her mood in a flash.
“Maybe Uncle Zoltan will have a party at his house.”
“I don’t think so.” Rose reached across and gathered her up in a hug. “Don’t you worry about me—I’ll be just fine with Gunesh.”
Later, when Nieve was asleep, Rose sat sewing. The school had given instructions that the girls performing the dances at the San Juan fiesta were to wear blue dresses with white aprons and mantillas of white lace. Nieve didn’t possess a blue dress, so Rose was making one from one of her own skirts. The apron she had made from a couple of handkerchiefs. As for the lace, she would have to try and buy some at the market.
When the light grew too dim for sewing, she went outside and spread a blanket on the ground in the orchard. She lay gazing up at the sky, watching the first stars appear as the light faded. She thought of Nathan doing the same thing on summer nights on the mountain. Had he tracked the constellations on those endless nights in the trenches? Had he and Adelita lain together outside on a blanket the night their baby was conceived?
To think of such things was pure torture. There were so many unanswered questions. She had vowed not to leave Spain without at least finding Nathan’s grave and marking it in some way. But she didn’t know exactly where he had died, and there seemed little chance of finding that out. And then there was the agonizing puzzle of the baby. Was there the slightest possibility that Adelita had been the woman Lola had found in the snow? Rose was desperate to know. It was the one glimmer of hope she was clinging to.
Zoltan had said they should go back to see Maria, but Rose wasn’t sure she could face it. How long would it be before she could talk about Nathan’s death without crying? There was no answer to that question. But what was the alternative? How long could she stay in this village, seeing people on the street, wondering if this man or that woman held the key to what she ached to know?
Rose was no less confused the next morning. She decided to go for a long walk after she’d dropped Nieve off at school—but not in the direction of Zoltan’s cottage or to Maria’s farm. She didn’t want to pester Zoltan, when he had already given her so much of his time—and she didn’t feel mentally strong enough to visit Maria without him. What she needed was some time alone. Walking had always helped her clear her mind.
Before they reached the school, she passed the postman. He had got used to her stopping him each morning to ask if there was anything for her. She didn’t trust Señora Carmona to pass on mail that arrived at the mill. But there had been no reply so far to any of the letters she had sent to Granada, and this morning the postman’s response was no different.
“Why doesn’t Mama send us a letter?” Nieve twisted her head around, following the man with her eyes as they walked on.
“She would if she could. But she can’t buy stamps at the place where she’s staying.” Rose cast about for some means of distracting Nieve. The child hadn’t mentioned Lola for a few days. Rose needed to change the subject or Nieve would be going to school in tears. “Oh look,” Rose said, “there’s that cat again!”
“Which cat?” Nieve spun around.
“The fluffy ginger one that drinks water from the stream running down the street.” Rose pointed to the place where she had seen the animal a few days before. The trick worked. Nieve ran on ahead, looking up the alleyways between the houses for the nonexistent cat, and by the time Rose caught up with her, the business of Lola and the stamps was forgotten.
When they reached the school, a tall girl with skinny black plaits came running up to them.
“This is Pilar.” Nieve dropped Rose’s hand to link arms with her new friend. “Goodbye, Au . . . Mama.”
Rose sucked in a breath. Nieve had almost given the game away. It was so hard for a child of only eight years old to keep up such a pretense. But there was no alternative. Rose felt bad enough about having told Zoltan. No one else must be let in on the secret.
She decided to take the right-hand fork in the track up the mountain—the one that led to Capileira. She would try to find the blacksmith’s forge where Lola had lived as a child. The route took Rose through a very different landscape from the one she had encountered on the walk to Zoltan’s cottage. After a few minutes’ walk through sparse woodland, the track wound along the edge of a deep, wide gorge. The river was far below, like a ribbon of turquoise silk. She almost tripped as she looked at it. There were rocks jutting up along the path. After that, she kept her eyes on the ground. Gunesh was more sure-footed, jumping over the rocks without a moment’s hesitation.
There was something about the gorge that filled Rose with a sense of foreboding. It wasn’t just the thought of tumbling over the edge. The steep, almost vertical cliffs, bare of vegetation apart from the odd clump of thistles, had a stark, harsh look to them. As she climbed higher, it dawned on her that this could be the place Lola had described—the ravine she had scrambled down in the snow. It wasn’t difficult to imagine murder on such a scale taking place in a spot like this. People rounded up and herded along the valley like animals, to be slaughtered in a volley of gunfire. The killing would be heard but not seen, the bodies hidden from view by the great outcrops of limestone on the valley sides.
Rose stopped, crouching down to get closer to the edge of the gorge without the da
nger of losing her balance. The idea of Lola scaling these treacherous rocks in a blizzard was almost beyond comprehension. And how on earth would she have got back up again with a baby in her arms? Perhaps this wasn’t the place. And yet . . . the more Rose looked, the more intense the feeling of menace became. It wasn’t just her—she could feel the hackles rising on Gunesh’s neck.
Capileira was not far away. The sound of shooting would have traveled miles, up beyond the village to the mountain pastures above. It all fit exactly with what Lola had described. And she wouldn’t have had to climb back up the side of the gorge with the baby—she could have followed the course of the river up the mountain until she reached a place where the valley was not so deep and the terrain easier to negotiate.
Rose’s legs felt stiff as she got up from the crouching position. She walked on, trying to dispel the images that crowded in on her—of Lola lying in the snow between the corpses of her mother and brother, wanting to die alongside them; of Nieve’s tiny blood-smeared body, fighting for life, wrapped in her dying mother’s peacock shawl.
Adelita.
Rose shook her head. She mustn’t allow herself to believe that Nieve’s mother was Nathan’s fiancée.
But what if she was . . .
The muttering inside her head wouldn’t stop.
If she was, Nathan couldn’t be far away, could he? Perhaps they didn’t shoot him in the street. Perhaps they marched him to the gorge with the others, but he tried to make a break for it and they shot him farther down the valley. That would explain why Lola didn’t see his body. His bones might be in the river. What if that river runs into the one beside the mill in Pampaneira?
She clamped her hands over her ears. This must be what it felt like to lose your mind.
It was a relief when the track veered around to the left, away from the ravine and into a broad, gently sloping meadow dotted with scarlet poppies, purple-blue lavender, and amber marigolds. She collapsed onto the grass and lay there with her eyes closed, breathing in the scent of the earth and the wildflowers.
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