‘I hope Sigi will telephone.’
‘What do you think? And give me some of that before you finish it!’
Kalmody made Madrid in five and a half hours in spite of mountain roads and taking a lot more care with ox-carts than he would have done in his own country.
‘And a very respectable flat we arrived at, overlooking the Castellana,’ old Mr. Brown said. ‘Pozharski really lived there, and it was Arabian Nights all over again. Kalmody thought it best for me not to go out yet, but he ordered in a procession of barbers, tailors and shirtmakers and by the time of our appointment at the Palace I was the best-dressed man in Madrid—the sober cut and colour of a Spaniard and just enough of English tweediness. Those suits lasted me for years, and I’ve still got the morning coat.’
He was sweating with nervousness and could not help dreading lest one of all those chamberlains and majordomos might run him in before he reached the royal study, though Kalmody was fairly confident of what was going to happen, assuring him that Alfonso only wanted to see what he looked like. When Bernardo was at last in the presence he did whatever Kalmody did half a second later just as in the ghetto of Roman; and as for the rest he was allowed to feel merely one caballero in face of another with normal manners on both sides.
‘He never photographed well, Alfonso. I don’t know how such a lively face could look so sinister. A casual, very courteous fellow, admired by all traditional Spaniards. It was the chaps who took their ideas from abroad who wouldn’t hear of him. It’s the “oughts” rather than plain facts which do so much damage in this world. One “ought” to prefer a Republic to a King who didn’t give a damn for the constitution. So the virtues of Alfonso were out before they were even considered.’
Bernardo was asked to repeat the story of that night at Lequeitio and the climbing of the cliff. He did so in English since Alfonso had decided it was the common language of the three. The King listened with a smile that was wholly charming in spite of his marked Hapsburg lip and told him that his case would be withdrawn from the courts and the extradition order cancelled.
‘All the same I think it would be wise to wait a little before you visit England again. What will you do? Any ideas, Kalmody?’
‘I will see that he has no need to do anything as long as he likes, sire.’
‘And you, what do you think?’ Alfonso asked, switching to Spanish.
‘That it does not suit me to do nothing, Vuestra Majestad.’
‘A job as my vice-consul in Romania?’
‘Impossible! Remembering how I lived, they would never honour Spain as they should.’
‘The yard where your father worked?’
‘I do not know enough for them. Ships built on the Nervion are the best in the world.’
‘Then sell them, hijo mio, if that is what you feel! Sell them! I will see to it. Rogue! Picaro! You belong to us. And what did you find in your cabaret to amuse us at San Sebastian this summer? Kalmody and I have been known to go out incognito.’
‘Only a dancer, Vuestra Majestad, graceful and Byzantine. She has also a great-aunt, outspoken and proud of her descent from a bandit. If she should come as chaperon, ask her about the portrait of her grandfather. I will mention their names in the right quarter. But the count will not be the best of companions. He can see no good in Romanians.’
‘He does not see much good in Spaniards either, Don Bernardo. But a man of exaggerated nobility! You will not lose by your sufferings. That is more than most of us can say.’
So in June Bernardo was back in Bilbao launched on his profitable Anglo-Basque career, dining out on his story and at first somewhat embarrassed by the social consequences of royal favour. He even had a bull dedicated to him and, he said, one could hardly do better than that.
‘Nadya. Yes. Her letters were unreasonably reserved and did not tell me much except that God now agreed with her that it was all O.K. I must admit I was anxious. Sigi Pozharski had taken her down to the South of France to recuperate and I was not ready to trust him that far. I would have liked some reassurance from Kalmody, but he was away in Hungary for a couple of months—clearing his name all round, I think—and I heard nothing from him until he called me from Lequeitio out of the blue. He wanted to know the fastest way to get a truck of flowers from Nice. I said it wasn’t my job any longer and I was not up to date, but I recommended the normal route of Toulouse–Lourdes–Bayonne, making it worth the while of the stationmasters, and asked him why he didn’t get them from Malaga anyway. No, he insisted that Nice was traditional and would I keep Saturday fortnight free and lunch with him at the villa.
‘I went in by the back door, this time saluted by the pair of Civil Guards on the road. After lunch we lurched through the villa on to that fateful terrace all decorated with flowers. Zita’s birthday, I supposed. Blow me down, they like fun, those Hungarians, when there is any sort of excuse for it! Such unbelievable generosity! Even to-day their bloody communism is different to anyone else’s.
‘They had hired the Lequeitio pipes and drums playing Basque war-songs up and down the beach with a crowd which didn’t know what was going on. Zita was there, too. I don’t think she had the foggiest notion what was going on either. I was presented to her. All in black she was like Queen Victoria but a damned sight better looking.
‘And then Sigi Pozharski brought Nadya round from under the trees with a lovely old Russian headdress dangling pearls down her cheeks and a white Parisian afternoon frock with the top cut very like Magda’s when I first saw her. It only occurred to me years afterwards that I might have mentioned it some time or other on our travels. They had even dug up some ferocious Hapsburg who was very drunk and couldn’t keep his eyes off her. She held out her arms to me and gave one almighty squeal when I hugged her. I’d forgotten about the scars. But no complaints since then on either side. No complaints at all except that she will still call me David.’
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1973 by the Estate of Geoffrey Household
Cover design by Drew Padrutt
978-1-4976-4561-5
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The Lives and Times of Bernardo Brown Page 29
