The Winding Stair

by Jane Aiken Hodge

  ‘I wonder if that’s it,’ he said. ‘Who wants to compromise you, Juana?’

  ‘No one. Why should they?’

  ‘That’s what I’d like to know.’ He stood up. ‘We’d best find your sisters. Then you can all go home together.’

  It was easier said than done. The fireworks were over now and they had to search the long alleys by the glimmering light of paper lanterns hung here and there more for decoration than use. But then, as Juana pointed out, they would most easily recognise her sisters by ear, since they would be talking in English. ‘It’s very odd that we have not heard either of them.’

  ‘Yes. I don’t like it, Juana.’

  ‘It’s a pity.’ They returned at last to the rose-garden. ‘It’s such a beautiful evening. Shall we give up and just enjoy it?’

  ‘We may have to. Moonlight and roses. What do they remind you of?’

  ‘The night we met, of course. And the first lie you told me.’

  ‘Lie?’

  ‘Don’t you remember? You told me the river was shallow. I’d look a fool, you said, stuck in a foot of mud. Oh dear … do you ever wish you were back in England?’

  ‘Often. And out of this whole business. I hope I may manage it, too, when this job is done.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’ve been wanting a chance to tell you. I saw Canning when I was in England, the new man at the Foreign Office.’

  ‘We thought so. What did you think of him? What did he say?’

  ‘That the Tories’ coming to power would make no difference to my work here. That they had confidence in me and would reward me well if I can bring it to a successful conclusion. It may mean a start for me in England at last.’

  ‘Under the Tories?’

  ‘I don’t see why not. The important thing, for the moment, is to defeat Napoleon, and, frankly, I’m beginning to think the Tories are the ones to do it. They mean business. And I liked what I saw of Canning. He’s a man one can trust. But you can see why I am so anxious that nothing should go wrong here.’

  ‘I can indeed!’ Angrily. ‘What in the world made me imagine you were anxious about me, I wonder?’

  ‘But of course I was. Juana, be fair …’

  ‘Why should I? What’s that?’ A flourish of trumpets had sounded from the house.

  ‘The signal for supper. And for unmasking.’

  ‘So what do we do?’

  ‘There’s nothing we can do, but eat supper and unmask – and watch out, all the time, for traps.’

  ‘What kind of traps?’

  ‘I wish to God I knew.’

  It was a curiously motley crowd that gathered in the big frescoed dining room and spread out on to a wide terrace and into the other public rooms. Members of the nobility had spent the evening assiduously courting tradesmen’s daughters from Lisbon, picked, apparently, for their looks. Now, with the unmasking, the occasion became perceptibly stiffer. The few girls of good family who were present, and the Princess’s acafatas, or ladies-in-waiting, looked sideways at their cavaliers from behind their fans; talk flowed with difficulty and food provided a welcome alternative.

  Princess Carlota Joaquina greeted Juana effusively. ‘There you are, child. Eat well, and get ready to delight us.’

  ‘To – ?’ Juana looked her puzzlement, uncertain how to address this resplendently ugly Princess.

  ‘You’ve not told her!’ The Princess turned towards the door of the room where Pedro had just appeared, with Daisy, flushed and sparkling, on his arm.

  ‘My apologies, your highness. We were separated in the crowd before I could tell her the honour that was in store for her.’

  ‘You’re to sing for us, child,’ the Princess explained. ‘You’ll not refuse my guests the pleasure?’ And then, in a lower voice, ‘You can see they are a mixed lot, and likely to hang heavy in hand now they are unmasked. You’ll not refuse me your help?’

  ‘I shall be delighted.’ What else could she say? ‘But what …?’

  ‘Oh, that’s all arranged for. Your cousin has told me you know the marriage scene from The Groom Deceived. It’s a favourite opera of mine. I’ve had my musicians learn their part. My music master sings the priest; it’s only to find a husband for you. He need not sing, you know. Perhaps your cousin?’

  Juana disliked the whole idea intensely. In the scene the Princess referred to, the heroine of the opera tricked her sister’s lover into marriage with the help of a conniving priest, who performed the actual ceremony on stage. She tried in vain to think of an excuse, but before she could voice her reluctance Pedro had produced an objection of his own. ‘I’m not tall enough to act as foil for my cousin,’ he said. ‘Senhor Varlow’s the man, if he’ll do it.’

  The Princess clapped her hands. ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘You’ll oblige me in this, senhor, as well as in gracing my party?’ It was, Juana realised, her way of reminding Gair that he had not, in fact, been invited.

  ‘I shall be honoured,’ There was nothing else he could say. And then, to Juana, as the Princess moved away to give her orders for the setting up of the stage: ‘Is it very bad?’

  ‘I don’t like it.’

  ‘Better with me—’

  ‘Yes.’ She had to turn away at a summons from the Camareira Mor, who led her off to a private apartment where the complete outfit of a peasant bride was laid out ready for her.

  ‘We were sure you would agree.’ And indeed as an elderly waiting woman helped her into the bride’s tight bodice and full skirt, she realised that it would have been quite impossible to escape this performance. She would just have to make the best of it.

  ‘It suits you.’ The Camareira Mor herself adjusted the flowing veil and handed her a tight bouquet of carnations. ‘Look!’ She led her over to a long glass.

  ‘The skirt is too short!’ Juana protested.

  ‘That’s how they wear them, senhora. And you have as neat an ankle as you could wish. It’s only a play, after all.’

  ‘Yes.’ She could hear the musicians tuning up in the next room. ‘The Princess’s music master: does he sing well?’

  Why did this question seem to disconcert the Camareira Mor? ‘Oh, he’s bound to, or she’d not have given him the part. Yes?’

  One of the Princess’s negro pages had bounced into the room. ‘Her Highness and her guests are ready.’ He made great eyes of admiration at Juana.

  No time at least for stage-fright. Juana gave one last downward twitch to the full, short skirts, and followed the Camareira Mor.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘To the terrace. You’ll see.’ She led the way out on to one end of the big terrace which had been built up into a small stage and curtained off from the rest. Gair was waiting for them there, in the plush breeches and black jacket of a peasant’s best dress, with beside him a short, stout man in the robes and cowl of a friar.

  ‘Excellent. You’re ready!’ The ‘friar’ came forward to greet her in an odd falsetto voice, his face invisible in the shadow of his cowl. ‘You know your part, senhora? Yours is easy, senhor. You are the butt of the piece, and must merely say “yes”, or “no”, as the situation requires.’

  ‘That should be easy enough.’ Gair still looked anything but happy.

  ‘Good. Off you go. We two begin. Your cue is, “Where’s the happy man?”’ He took Juana’s hand and drew her across to the centre of the little stage, then hurried down to the curtain to speak through it to the leader of the small orchestra. ‘The overture’s a short one,’ he reminded Juana as he returned.

  ‘I remember.’ Something familiar about his voice? She wished she could see his face.

  The orchestra played for a few minutes, then the curtains were drawn back by two of the Princess’s negro pages while six more filed on to the sides of the stage with lamps in their hands. So illuminated, Juana could hardly see the audience below her on the terrace. Somewhere, in the valley, a nightingale was singing. She remembered Forland House, had a moment of complete panic,
thinking that even in Portuguese she might find herself stammering, took a deep breath, heard her cue and began to sing.

  She and the friar were conspiring to deceive the unlucky bridegroom, who thought he was marrying her well-dowered older sister. In their first duet they made their plans, congratulated themselves on their ingenuity and wondered whether the groom would recognise her through the veil. The Portuguese composer was largely indebted to the opening scene of Figaro, but the music was none the worse for that, Juana thought, as she began to lose herself in it.

  The ‘friar’s’ voice was something of a disappointment, and he did not seem to know his part very well. Once or twice, she had to whisper to him his cue, and, in helping him, forgot to be nervous for herself. When the duet came to its winding, inconclusive close, a roar of applause from the terrace confirmed her knowledge that she was in good voice.

  Now the ‘friar’ had some comic business arranging a little altar in the centre of the stage and searching his deep pockets for his bible. At last he was ready.

  ‘ “Are you veiled, oh veiled completely?

  Veiled completely as you can?”’

  He came across to pull the veil down over Juana’s face, his own cowl concealing everything but a very bright pair of eyes.

  ‘ “Then we’re ready for the wedding,

  Where oh where’s the happy man?”’

  Juana had the impression that Gair had been talking to someone off-stage; protesting perhaps? Invisible hands seem to push him on, so that he appeared looking quite absurd as the scene required.

  She had forgotten just how exactly the scene that followed was based on the wedding service. In England, she thought, it. would be considered sacrilegious. Odd that the devout Portuguese did not seem to mind it.

  She did not much like it herself. If only she had refused to go beyond the first duet. But how could she? This seemed to be an evening plagued with second thoughts. Someone must have been coaching Gair off-stage. He produced the ring from his breast-pocket and held it out to the ‘friar’, who was now rather chanting than singing in his high voice as he asked whether anyone knew any impediment to the marriage.

  ‘I do!’ The voice came from somewhere below the terrace, in the garden itself. ‘I forbid the banns.’ The speaker pushed forward through the audience, who made way for him, whispering and laughing, convinced that this was part of the show. Only the three of them, who knew it was not, stood as if paralysed while he pushed a guitarist aside, climbed lightly on to the improvised stage and moved forward between Juana and Gair.

  ‘Unless you want to marry this man, cousin?’ Vasco. The pages’ lamps showed him booted from riding, travel-stained, pale with fatigue. He spoke low, so that his words could not be heard by the audience.

  ‘Vasco!’

  ‘And in time, thank God.’ He turned on Gair. ‘As for you, sir, only blood—’ He became aware of the pages watching goggle-eyed. ‘Draw the curtains, for God’s sake.’ Then, catching the arm of the ‘friar’ as he moved away towards the back of the stage: ‘Stay, you, and let’s be sure.’ He pushed the cowl violently back from the man’s face.

  ‘Father Ignatius!’ Juana gasped.

  ‘It was a jest, merely a jest.’ He struggled in Vasco’s furious grasp. ‘I would have seen to it that the marriage was not complete.’

  ‘Would you? I wonder.’ Still holding him in a brutal grasp, Vasco turned back to Gair: ‘And now, sir! As head of this lady’s family, I await your explanation and your humble apology.’

  ‘Do you?’ Gair said coolly. ‘It seems to me that I might well ask you the same thing. You seem to know a good deal more about this affair than I do. And as for you—’ He turned fiercely on Father Ignatius.

  ‘It was a joke, I tell you, merely a joke.’ The friar had given up struggling and stood limply by Vasco, his face sallow in the lamplight.

  ‘Whose joke, I wonder?’ Gair and Vasco were still exchanging savage glances and Juana hurried to intervene: ‘Gair, Vasco.’ She turned from one to the other. ‘There’s not time for this now. Listen!’ Behind the drawn curtains they could hear a growing buzz of sound from the audience. ‘What are we going to do?’

  ‘She’s right.’ Now Gair took command. ‘What’s between you and me, senhor, can be settled at leisure. For a moment, we have Miss Brett to consider. We must think how to keep this quiet. We’ll have to improvise, botch it up as best we may. We must finish the scene.’

  ‘But how?’ Juana asked.

  When the curtain is drawn, you,’ to Vasco, ‘will make an apology, as if you were part of the performance, saying your doubts are satisfied. Then you,’ his tone to Father Ignatius was even sharper, ‘will finish the scene as quickly as possible, making quite sure that there is no possibility of the marriage being valid.’ He forestalled Juana’s protest. ‘No, Juana, we must go through with it. Listen!’ The buzz of the audience was growing into a roar.

  ‘You’re right.’ Juana turned to Father Ignatius. ‘When Senhor de Mascarenhas has made his apology and withdrawn his objection, you will begin at,

  ‘ “Now the knot is tied precisely,

  Now the knot is tightly tied.”

  That leaves out the entire ceremony,’ she explained.

  ‘Good.’ Vasco shouted an order to the pages, the curtains were drawn back and he moved forward to sing a brilliantly improvised recitative in which he suggested that he had mistaken the bride for her sister. Father Ignatius then picked up the plot where Juana had ordered and, miraculously, the opera flowed on to its conclusion and a wild burst of applause.

  Juana had to come forward over and over again to receive the crowd’s ovation and a shower of carnations and rose-petals. Standing at the front of the improvised stage, bowing and smiling, she heard Vasco’s tight whisper behind her. ‘Tomorrow; at first light,’ he said.

  ‘No!’ She turned, gestured to the pages to draw the curtains, and moved back between. Vasco and Gair. ‘You’re wrong, cousin. Mr. Varlow knew no more about it than I did. The last thing he wants is actually to marry me. Courtship is one thing, but he has a career to think of; a fortune to make.’

  ‘It’s true, I’m afraid.’ Gair’s tone was rueful. ‘I cannot afford to think of marriage for many years to come.’

  ‘Not even to an heiress, senhor?’

  ‘She wouldn’t be an heiress long if she married me,’ Gair said. And then: ‘Of course! That’s it. You have your cousins to thank for this, Juana. Where’s the friar?’

  But Father Ignatius had vanished.

  Chapter Seventeen

  ‘What do we do now?’ Juana looked from Gair to Vasco. Beyond the curtains, they could hear the stir as the audience broke up. It would not be long before they were interrupted.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Gair. ‘Anything we do must merely make a bad situation worse. The audience seem to have noticed nothing beyond a brief interruption in the opera. We must leave it like that.’

  ‘He’s right, cousin.’ But Vasco looked at Gair with dislike before turning his velvet brown gaze full on Juana. ‘We have your reputation to think of. All other considerations must give way to that. As to your cousins, leave them to me.’

  ‘No!’ His tone frightened her. ‘I’m sure Father Ignatius was telling the truth. I’m sure it was just a joke that went too far. Please let’s say no more about it? Vasco? Gair? Promise?’ She was thinking of Daisy and Teresa.

  ‘Of course,’ said Gair. ‘It’s merely common sense.’

  Vasco seized her hand and pressed it to his lips. ‘Asked like that,’ he said, ‘I could deny you nothing.’

  ‘Then that’s settled,’ said Gair. ‘But we certainly owe you a debt of thanks, senhor. Your arrival was a timely one for us.’ His tone held more dislike than gratitude.

  ‘Yes, thank God.’ He did not explain how he had learned of the plot. Instead, with the full power of his extraordinary brown eyes on Juana: ‘You have not asked if I have succeeded in my quest, cousin.’

  ‘It’s hardly my affair.�
� Here was the chance she badly wanted to put herself at arm’s length from him again.

  ‘Don’t say that, I beg, since I so much hope to make it so.’ Ignoring Gair, he spoke as if they were alone on the stage. ‘As you know, I have been half way across Europe looking for a vital witness to my parents’ marriage.’

  ‘Have you so?’ To Juana’s relief, Gair interrupted what Vasco had been trying to turn into a tête-à-tête. ‘Then perhaps you can tell us the news from Poland?’

  ‘It’s as bad as can be. Napoleon defeated the Russians at Fried-land at the beginning of June. I’m amazed that the news hasn’t reached here sooner, but it’s all of a piece with the way things are run here in Portugal.’

  ‘Yes? And what now?’ The two men had forgotten Juana.

  ‘Peace. Napoleon and the Tsar Alexander met at Tilsit – or, to be precise, on a barge on the Niemen. They embraced like brothers and made up all their differences – at the expense of the rest of the world. Prussia hardly exists any more, and England is to be destroyed.’ He turned his back to Juana. ‘I don’t think you quite understand the full implications of your cousins’ plot against you. At this point, marriage to an Englishman might well mean loss of property – maybe of liberty as well. England is doomed, cousin. We can only hope that Portugal will manage to survive the storm.’

  ‘You think Napoleon invincible then?’ Gair’s tone was dry.

  In a moment they would be quarrelling again. ‘But did you find your witness, cousin?’ Juana asked, to lower the tension, and thought, with irritation, as she did so, that they would both think it just like a woman to descend thus from the historic to the personal.

  ‘Yes. I’ll tell you about it – ‘ But not now, said his look. ‘Here comes the Princess. Follow my lead, cousin.’

  Carlota Joaquina greeted Vasco warmly, as an old friend. ‘So it was you who took such liberties with my opera, Senhor de Mascarenhas!’

  ‘I hope you agree that I improved it, your highness.’

  To Juana’s relief the party broke up soon afterwards without their having encountered Pedro or Roberto. Gair and Vasco who had both stayed close at her side escorted her to the carriage where they found Teresa already waiting. Roberto, she said, crossly, had had to leave early to go back to Mafra.