The Spanish Promise

by Karen Swan

  ‘. . . Probably for the best,’ Marina said finally, looking for a positive outcome.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘It’s such a shame though, about your wedding. Just when you’d got yourself sorted again. Why would your fiancé think you did it deliberately?’

  ‘He’s a very organized man. He thinks I must have known the divorce hadn’t come through but that I just didn’t want to marry him and this was my way out.’

  ‘Pretty dramatic way out!’ Marina scoffed.

  ‘I know.’ She saw that Señora Quincy was still watching her, as though assessing her, and she forced a smile. ‘Anyway, that is quite enough about me and my disastrous life. We are here to get yours sorted out, at least. Are you ready to see your brother again, señora?’

  The old lady nodded, taking a breath that swelled her up. As if on cue – had they been listening? – two orderlies came into the room and helped her into the wheelchair.

  As she rose, a couple of objects fell from the folds of her dress.

  ‘Oh, I’ll get them,’ Charlotte said, stepping forward to retrieve them. She held up a worn-smooth, pale stone. At a certain angle, it looked heart-shaped.

  ‘Childhood relics,’ the old lady said, taking it quickly, possessively.

  ‘Is this a shark’s tooth?’ Charlotte asked with a surprised smile.

  She nodded again, taking that too.

  ‘Yours?’ She watched as the señora anxiously smoothed her fingers over its glossy surface.

  ‘It belonged to my best friend. It was the most precious thing he owned. I always promised I would bring it back to him.’

  ‘Oh, he lives in Madrid now?’ Marina asked.

  ‘No. He’s long dead.’

  Charlotte and Marina shared confused looks.

  ‘What about the stone?’ Marina asked. ‘Was that his too?’

  ‘No. Arlo found it in the river in the gorge. It was in the pair of trousers I stole from him the night I left here.’

  ‘And you kept it all this time?’ Marina asked, smiling and placing a hand fondly on her shoulder. ‘Abuela, you do love him.’

  Señora Quincy turned her head away, as though trying to deny the words, but Marina met Charlotte’s gaze and gave her a hopeful look.

  ‘Charlotte would understand,’ the old woman said quietly. ‘We understand one another, you and I. We are cut from the same cloth. We have both come from money. We have both, in our different ways, run from it.’ She looked straight at her then. ‘And we have both loved men we have tried our best to hate. Isn’t that right?’

  Charlotte didn’t reply. She didn’t know how on earth the old woman knew but . . . She could see Marina’s head turning left and right, trying to look at them both, to find a clue that could help her understand what was passing silently between them. But love stories like theirs were caught, not taught; they couldn’t possibly be explained.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  ‘Do you want us to wait outside?’ Marina asked as they stopped outside the bedroom. They all stared at the closed door. On the other side of it was a dying man who had everything but peace. A rich man who had offered up his fortune for a final goodbye.

  The moment was upon them. Destiny was here.

  ‘No, come with me. I’m not ready yet. I need to be sure.’ The old lady held her hand up; it was trembling, and Marina squeezed it.

  ‘I’m here, Abuela. I won’t leave you.’

  The door was opened and the orderlies went to wheel her in. Charlotte stepped back, away. ‘And you, Charlotte,’ the señora added. ‘I will value your support.’

  They walked into the room. It was not large and it was surprisingly spare. Like their old childhood bedrooms, nothing was superfluous or fancy, just a vast, four-poster bed pushed against one wall and some handsome chests of drawers. A picture of the Madonna and Child was framed above the bed with just one glinting curved estoque sword hanging on a wall. On the surfaces were old pictures – a sepia-toned portrait of a family in formal Spanish dress, photographs of Mateo and his sister growing up, his many grandchildren. And one which was larger than the rest: a photograph of a young girl on horseback, sitting side-saddle on a magnificent black horse; she looked very like the young woman in the portrait in the drawing room. Almost the same but not quite, her cool, grey-green eyes looking detached from the camera’s hungry gaze. She was already beautiful, already wilful, already strong . . .

  Mateo was sitting in a chair beside his father’s bed. He looked up as they entered and walked over to them. ‘Aunt.’ There was respect in his voice and Charlotte knew that what they had just learnt had changed everything. She was no Judas or Lazarus.

  She squeezed his hand affectionately, looking for – and finding – the resemblance to his father. ‘My nephew.’

  At the first sound of her voice—

  ‘Nene.’ It came from the bed, beneath the blankets which, in spite of the heat, were heavy. He was rigged up to a heart monitor and blood pressure machine, a drip dangling beside him.

  ‘Arlo.’ She was wheeled beside him, the same pale arm Charlotte had seen earlier as he was carried off the helicopter, stretching out again now.

  Marina and Charlotte hung back, giving them privacy as they took in the sight of each other for the first time in eighty-two years: their once-plump skin now crepey and loose, strong limbs thin and spotted, the sumptuous Mendoza manes now wispy and sparse. But the eyes – had they diminished? Charlotte couldn’t see him from here but Señora Quincy still had the same, challenging stare apparent in her childhood picture.

  ‘I thought you would be fat,’ the señora said finally.

  ‘I thought you would be ugly,’ he replied.

  Charlotte smiled to herself. Insults were the best start. It was manners that would be the concern.

  ‘Still got your teeth?’

  He laughed, the sound breathy and light. ‘Barely got gums.’

  The señora laughed too, her eyes raking over her big brother – older by six minutes. They were still clasping one another’s hands.

  Marina jogged Charlotte with her elbow, casting her an excited sideways glance.

  ‘. . . Eighty-two years, Nene.’

  ‘I know.’ She closed her eyes and nodded. Silence filled the room. Sometimes words really couldn’t say what needed to be said. Eyes did the talking. Hands.

  As if remembering them, she turned slightly, beckoning. ‘Come, Marina, meet your great-uncle. Arlo.’

  Marina stepped forward, hesitantly offering a hand to one of the most powerful men in the country.

  ‘Come here, child.’

  She leant down as he kissed her on the forehead and clasped her face between cool hands, regarding her close-up. ‘I can see him in you.’

  ‘Who?’ Marina asked.

  ‘Your grandfather.’

  ‘Me too. Every time,’ the señora agreed, smiling warmly and reaching over for her own kiss on her granddaughter’s cheek. ‘And you too, Charlotte. Come here. Meet my brother.’

  She limped forward, feeling intrusive in the family scene. She slipped her hand into the one he was holding out but he did not shake it, merely holding it with the other one too, like the pope to a child. ‘A pleasure, sir.’

  He was diminished, it was clear. His hands tremored slightly and there was a gentle droop to the left side of his face. He was almost completely bald, with even his snow-white eyebrows meagre, a wan yellowish tint to his complexion. But his eyes were the same as his sister’s: bright and direct and challenging, and from them she could superimpose who he had once been over the frail body in the bed here now.

  ‘Charlotte works with the bank. She has been advising us, trying to make me want to be rich again,’ the señora said wryly, meeting Charlotte’s eyes with amusement. ‘But she has also been helping Marina adjust to the idea of having Mendoza blood – and for that I am grateful. Perhaps there will be some advantages.’

  Charlotte smiled and hobbled back. The old man looked weaker than she had been led to b
elieve by Mateo’s reports. This reunion surely couldn’t be a long one.

  Carlos looked back at his twin again. ‘You made it almost impossible, Nene. I had all but given up. I thought you must be dead. I never would have thought to look for that name.’

  ‘I know . . .’

  Charlotte cocked an eyebrow.

  ‘But still you found me,’ the señora shrugged, almost carelessly, as though it had been a game of hide and seek. She tipped her head to the side. ‘How did you do it?’

  ‘Sheer luck. Or perhaps serendipity?’ His voice was raspy and weak. ‘We were in Bilbao, for a gala at the Guggenheim. A tyre on the car burst.’

  ‘Ah,’ she nodded, seeing immediately.

  ‘We called out a mechanic and I saw the name on his van: S. Quincy. I had never considered it and yet – how could I ever forget it?’

  She stared straight at him, both of them remembering something shared, a common memory. ‘No.’

  ‘After that, it was easy. The lawyers had it done in a day.’

  ‘And now here we are,’ she said, patting his hand affectionately again.

  Charlotte watched on, their half conversation weaving in and out of public comprehension. Was it a twin thing? She could feel the past pulsing in the room with them. It clung to every word, look.

  There was a sound of footsteps, bounding up the stairs as though at two at a time, striding down the hall.

  ‘I . . . Oh.’

  She turned. Nathan was standing in the doorway, his fist held up ready to knock. He looked into the room with dawning realization. ‘My apologies . . . Sorry. I came to say goodbye.’

  ‘As have we all,’ Señora Quincy smiled.

  ‘I’m leaving now. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were—’

  Charlotte felt her heart race as she watched him, the embarrassment evident on his face. It made him look young, boyish, innocent. The earnest academic she had first met. Forever the odd one out with his hand-knit jumpers, regional accent, true heart.

  ‘Please come in,’ Señora Quincy said. ‘Before you leave, you should at least meet the man who has been behind your hard work.’

  Nathan set down his bag by the door and walked in. He had changed into jeans and a t-shirt, already off-duty; in his head, she knew, he had already left. Charlotte watched his every footstep, feeling her heart might leap out of her chest. These were their dying moments. Their final few minutes. She knew when he left here, she would never see him again.

  ‘A pleasure, sir,’ he said, gently shaking Carlos Mendoza’s hand.

  ‘The professor has been researching us, Arlo,’ her voice almost teasing, as though she was reverting to the girl she had once been, the naughty little sister. ‘Digging into our pasts.’

  ‘Then I pity you,’ Carlos replied. ‘That must have made for difficult reading.’

  ‘In places, yes,’ Nathan replied with characteristic directness.

  ‘. . . Try living it,’ the old man replied, a half-smile on his lips.

  Nathan shook his head. ‘I can’t. It’s impossible to imagine. War makes ordinary lives extraordinary in a way that’s impossible to understand during times of peace. But in some ways, you’re almost lucky. You have lived harder, lived bigger lives as a consequence.’

  ‘I like that. I have lived hard,’ Carlos said, looking at the young academic intently. ‘I would agree with it. Perhaps they should put it on my tombstone.’

  ‘I hope not for a long while yet.’ Nathan smiled and held out his hand to shake it again. ‘It’s a pleasure to have been able to meet you in person, señor.’ He looked at his twin. ‘Señora, I hope we part as friends? I wish you well.’

  ‘Goodbye, professor, you have made this last week very . . . interesting.’

  Nathan turned away, stopping in front of Marina and Charlotte too. ‘Marina, the best of luck. I think you’re in for a hell of a ride.’

  ‘I think you’re right,’ she grinned. ‘Let’s have that drink sometime.’

  ‘Yes.’ He nodded, his eyes sliding slowly to Charlotte. ‘Charlotte.’

  ‘Nathan.’

  They stared at one another, both stripped of platitudes as they wordlessly uttered their final goodbye before an audience. But what more was there to say between them anyway? Over the course of their relationship they had run the gamut and said it all: I love you; I hate you. What else was left?

  ‘I will walk you out,’ Mateo said politely.

  Nathan held her gaze for another moment more, then turned and left. Charlotte felt the air leave the room with him but somehow she continued to stand, she continued to breathe. After a moment, she realized the señora was watching her and a tiny beat of understanding flickered between them. ‘I’ll give you some privacy,’ she smiled.

  ‘Nene, would you leave us now too?’ the Señora said to her granddaughter. ‘There are some things I wish to say to Arlo alone.’

  ‘Of course, Abuela,’ Marina nodded. ‘Can I get you anything?’

  ‘Just ask the orderlies to come in and help me up onto the bed. I want to be closer to my brother.’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘You are the sweetest girl,’ Señora Quincy smiled, reaching up to kiss her on the cheek, before she and Charlotte left the room.

  ‘Help my grandmother onto the bed, please,’ Marina said as they passed the two men waiting patiently outside.

  Together, they headed downstairs – Charlotte shuffling on her bottom – automatically heading for the cool terrace. After the intensity of that cloistered room, they both needed some fresh air.

  ‘Well, I think that went better than expected,’ Marina murmured.

  But her voice sounded far away. Charlotte could see the dust plumes billowing up from the distant estate road and knew the red jeep was heading for the airport, taking him far away from here. ‘. . . Yes. Very positive.’

  ‘He’s not at all what I expected. I was thinking he would be . . . grand.’

  Charlotte glanced at her. ‘That’s one of the assumptions people make with great wealth. You’ll have to start getting used to people foisting expectations on you too.’

  Marina’s face fell. ‘I suppose so. It’s hard to imagine.’

  Mayra came out with a tray of drinks. ‘Iced coffee?’

  ‘Thank you,’ Charlotte murmured, taking hers, grateful not to have even had to make a choice.

  They sipped in silence for a few minutes. ‘What do you think they’re talking about?’

  ‘Who knows? I don’t think they’ll be short of conversation. Eighty-two years is a long time to have to catch up on.’

  ‘It was sweet he called her Nene. She always called me that growing up. I didn’t know it was her nickname too.’

  ‘I’ve never heard it before. What does it mean?’

  ‘It’s more a term of affection. Darling. Baby.’

  ‘Ah.’ Charlotte stared ahead, watching as one of the groundsmen worked in the flowerbed around the jacaranda tree. He was digging slowly, making shallow cuts into the hard earth.

  She gave a small gasp of recognition, remembering something suddenly. ‘Oh . . . That must be what the initials were.’

  ‘What initials?’

  ‘In that tree over there, someone’s carved some initials into the bark: NM and SE. I couldn’t work out who NM was. But it must be her – Nene Mendoza.’

  ‘Oh. I guess so.’ Marina looked over at the tree curiously. ‘What about SE?’

  ‘I don’t kn—’ Charlotte shrugged. But as she did so, a name floated to her as though brought on the breeze. ‘. . . Santiago Esperanza.’

  Marina looked sharply at her. ‘The man who—?’

  Had murdered her family? Had died beside her grandfather? Had been killed by her great-uncle? Nathan’s words reverberated in Charlotte’s head: This was personal.

  ‘It can’t be,’ Marina said dismissively. ‘Why would his initials be beside my grandmother’s? He was one of the workers. They can’t have been friends.’

  ‘No,’ Charlotte
murmured, even as her brain asked, couldn’t they? The señora had mentioned her best friend lived in the mercadillo – but that was the peasant district of the town. And the . . . the shark’s tooth she had been holding. A childhood relic, she had called it. Her best friend’s. It was the most precious thing he owned. Was that what she had retrieved from the tree, the first day here? Wasn’t it extraordinary she should have even remembered it after so many years? Charlotte could still see how she had pressed it to her lips and kissed it as she was driven back to the house again. It meant a lot to her. I promised to bring it back to him.

  Charlotte shifted uneasily in her chair. Something was nagging at her.

  ‘Charlotte?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  Marina was looking thoughtful. ‘. . . Do you think it was strange that she said “this last week”—?’

  ‘Huh?’ On the table Charlotte’s phone rang.

  ‘As opposed to “this past week”?’

  ‘Hang on—’ She answered it.

  ‘Charlotte, it’s me.’

  ‘Nathan?’ Her heart broke into a gallop. ‘Where are you?’ She closed her eyes, willing him to say he was sorry, for all of it, that he loved her and only her, that he was coming back. In the background she could hear the sound of the car engine, the radio playing quietly. But which way was he going – to or from her?

  ‘Something’s been bothering me since the talk with Mateo earlier. It’s made me wonder something.’

  Despair washed over her. ‘. . . Wonder what?’

  ‘The woman that was taken hostage in the church, the night Quincy was killed.’

  She closed her eyes. ‘. . . What about her?’

  ‘What if it was Marina?’

  They flew open again. ‘What?’ She frowned, lost. ‘. . . What on earth would make you think that?’

  ‘Because I think she was in the church that night, not because she’d been taken hostage – but because she was getting married.’

  Charlotte froze. ‘You’re saying Carlos killed his sister’s husband at their wedding?’

  ‘Yes. Except I don’t think it was Quincy she was marrying. He was marrying her.’

  She wasn’t marrying him but he was marrying her? She squinted her eyes shut again, tired of his theories, tired of trying to keep up. ‘You’re not making sense.’ Why couldn’t he let this go now? They’d done their jobs. It was over, all of it.