Red Lotus

by Catherine Airlie

  The silence in the car had grown oppressive, and suddenly Felicity saw Philip's bands tighten on the wheel, the knuckles standing out white against the bronzed flesh as he slowed the car down at the junction with a narrow road which went off into a ravine. Yet she knew, even before Sisa told her, that it wasn't the effort of driving nor the need for concentration which had forced the colour from his face and made him look oddly grey beneath his coating of tan.

  "We are always made sad when we come this way," Sisa whispered at her elbow. "It was very near here that Maria died."

  It was the only road, Felicity realized, the only way

  Philip could have taken them from San Lozaro in order to reach The Peak.

  She turned her head away, unable to look at him again. How often had he come this way since that dreadful day of tragedy when he had lost his love? How often had he been forced to live it all again because he had to pass near to where Maria had died in the way of duty? Because there was no other way.

  She closed her eyes until she was sure that the ravine was far behind them, and when she opened them again the scene had changed.

  They were high on a wide plateau now and there were no trees. The sun poured straight down out of a sky so blue that it seemed incredible at first. Julio had opened the side-screens and she could feel the heat of the sun on her skin, warm and caressing, like the touch of a lover.

  Ahead of them, old bent tamarisk bushes crouched by the wayside, and far in the distance the white sand of Las Canadas lay shimmering at the feet of El Teide.

  It was a scene straight out of Africa, a sight so surprising, so utterly unexpected to Felicity that she drew in a long, quivering breath of delight.

  Philip turned from the wheel as he slowed the car. "Well," he asked, "what do you think of it?"

  "I—had no idea!"

  It was suddenly as if they were alone in the car, the revelation of beauty and splendour standing between them like a bond. The white sand stretched everywhere, dominated, guarded, silenced by the omnipotent presence of The Peak. El Teide was indeed magnificent. If he was frightening and remote in some moods, he was kind and wise and gentle, too. His hoary old head rose far into the blue, and within an hour or two she would be on her way to the summit with Philip Arnold by her side!

  "We get out here," Julio said abruptly. "It is the end of the carriageway."

  A spell seemed to have been broken, and coldly a little wind came slipping through between the tamarisks. Was it a place of meeting, too? Felicity wondered. Was it the likely place for Isabella's black Mercedes to be sheltering in the shadow of the grey stone wall ahead of them that surrounded the only human habitation within sight?

  Great boulders lay scattered all about the sand, and

  beneath one of these Philip spread the rug he had taken from the car. Felicity and Sisa knelt on it to unpack the picnic hampers, while Conchita wandered away in the

  direction of the house.

  Presently a strange old couple came round the end of the wall bearing a brown jug full of goat's milk and a farmhouse cheese, which Philip paid for with a great show of gratitude that evidently pleased their visitors because they backed away with toothless smiles, opening the iron gates in the wall so that he might drive the car through into the courtyard beyond and leave it there for the night.

  Still there was no sign of the Mercedes, and almost guiltily Felicity drew a deep breath of relief. Why should she care whether Isabella came or not? If Isabella wanted to climb to the top of El Teide with Philip it was surely no affair of hers, only--only the thought sent her heart hammering wildly in her breast and a mad protest rose stranglingly in her heart.

  "We must eat in the shade," Sisa said. "Soon it will be very warm and we will rest until Philip says it is time to go on. I wish," she added eagerly, "that we had time to go and see the goats."

  The little brown mountain goats of El Teide had been part of the landscape all the way up, but evidently the ones Sisa wished to see were special ones.

  "There are some like them," she confided when Philip had moved away out of earshot to find a cooler spot for the wine, "at Lozaro Alto. Maria used to send them, and now Philip keeps them in memory of her. They are pure white."

  It did not sound like the gesture of a man who had deliberately killed the woman who loved him, Felicity thought, the pain in her heart growing as she imagined Philip alone in his silent valley among the mountains. If he went there often, might it not even be on some sort of pilgrimage?

  How much, she wondered, did she really know about him? She had heard what Sisa had to say about him, and Julio's opinion, and Rafael's, but was she ever likely to discover the whole truth?

  She saw him as an enigma, as a man whose life had been darkened by a tragedy not long past, but she could not begin to guess what kind of a man he really was.

  Conchita came back and they ate their lunch, seated with their backs against the sun-warmed rocks until Sisa, from force of habit, fell asleep. Philip, who did not seem to need sleep, went in search of the horses that were to take them on the first stage of the ascent, and Conchita followed him after a few minutes, slim and dark and lovely in her white jodhpurs and scarlet shirt.

  "When we get to the refuge," Julio said, stretching himself lazily on the sand at Felicity's feet, "I shall play for you on my guitar."

  She smiled down at him where he lay with his dark head cradled in his arms and his long, supple body taut in the sun. His eyes were slumbrous, black and reflective as he watched the sunlight on her hair.

  "You are beautiful, Felicity," he said.

  "And you are an abject flatterer!" she responded.

  "That is not so!" He rolled over on to his side as she began to re-pack the picnic basket with suddenly nervous hands. "I only speak the truth," he declared with a touch of resentment. "You are the same as the lotus that grows only rarely here—the white lotus. Its petals are tipped with pink."

  She thought of the red lotus, the blossom that the natives called the "flower of love," and looked away from Julio's sultry eyes.

  "It is because I am English and my skin is so fair," she said. "But soon I shall be almost as brown as Sisa." She thrust out her bare arm towards him where she had rolled up her sleeves. "See, it is covered in freckles already!"

  In an instant he had seized her hand and pressed burning lips to her exposed flesh.

  "No, Julio—you must not!"

  She tried to drag her arm away, but he would not let her go, looking up at her with a flare of swift passion in his eyes.

  "Why do you say I must not?" he demanded. "I must love you if I will."

  "Julio, be sensible. This is all—rather ridiculous, isn't it?"

  " 'Julio, be sensible!' " he mocked. " 'Julio, you must not love me!' Why must I not love you? Because you are my cousin? But cousins can be in love."

  "Not cousins who hardly know each other." Felicity

  had tried to keep her voice light, but she felt that the situation was getting beyond her. The calmness at which she clutched was no match for Julio's determination. "Besides," she added almost desperately, "the others will soon be here—"

  "The others? Do you mean Philip? He is the only one you care about. Is it not so? You are afraid of Philip. You will do only what he says, and soon he will tell you to go away from San Lozaro because he has no use for you there."

  "You know that isn't true," she protested. "Philip has asked me to help him."

  "To help him?" He sat up, releasing her and hugging his knees as his brows drew together in a quick frown. "In what way could you help Philip?" he demanded.

  "By helping you and Sisa and Conchita."

  He laughed outright as Philip came towards them. "That is very funny," he said.

  "We'll start in half an hour, Julio," Philip announced. "I'm not quite sure about Sisa," he added, looking down at the small, sleeping figure in the shadow of the rock. "Do you think she can make the summit?"

  "Better than Conchita will," Julio decided. "It i
s Conchita who will fail us more easily than Sisa."

  The horses were brought, small, patient creatures so used to the ascent that they could have done it blindfold, and they began to penetrate the Vast circus of Las Canadas.

  High above the tableland the great peak looked down on their small company as it wound across the sand, as remote and unperturbed by their presence as a giant who watches flies crawling at his feet. With one blow he could smother them all.

  But to-day El Teide was smiling. No storm-cloud ruffled his brow. The face of the mountain was serene.

  Soon they were on the rocky, pine-bordered path of Loma Tieso, winding and zig-zagging up towards the refuge of Altavista. It was after five o'clock before they reached the refuge and they were all fairly tired by the ride, although the excitement of the final climb kept them awake and curiously alert. Julio strummed on his guitar, seemingly at peace with the world, and, in fact, here in the mountains, he seemed a different being. Sisa was far

  too excited, but finally she slept again, after Philip had given her his firm promise to waken her at midnight.

  Conchita prowled restlessly. She did not really want to climb El Teide, but she had been unwilling to stay behind. Perhaps she had expected to find the de Barrios' Mercedes at Portillo de las Canadas and Rafael there with it.

  Felicity thrust the suspicion from her and helped Philip to make coffee over a wood fire which they built in the wide stone grate.

  At midnight the guide lanterns were ready and they set out in a ragged little group, Julio and Philip with torches held high above their heads for the first yard or two to give Felicity and Sisa confidence.

  The path rose in a series of uneven lengths, rough and precipitous in places where it was hewn out of the volcanic rock itself, and soon Felicity could feel the piercing chill of these upper regions reaching her bones. Sisa, who had kept up a spate of talk and laughter on the first lap of the journey, fell silent, and Conchita's teeth began to chatter. The whole world seemed suddenly very dark and full of discomfort as the cutting air put an end to conversation and they plodded on to the sound of their own laboured breathing.

  The sharp, staccato cry of a night creature, disturbed and fleeing before them into the shadowed crevices of the rock, rent the night, shattering its stillness, and great black pinnacles rose on either side of them, dark and forbidding, piercing the sky wherever they looked. Suddenly Conchita gave up.

  "I hate this place!" she gasped. "I'm going back. I am dead of cold!"

  Philip came back, holding his torch high, looking at them in the flaring light it gave.

  "What do you think?" he asked. "Are we to abandon it?"

  Felicity's immediate reaction was acute disappointment. In spite of her physical discomfort, she wanted to go on, she wanted to reach the top, but if Conchita had to go back then perhaps they should all return.

  "I knew you would not climb to the top!" Julio said scathingly. "You are too soft, Conchita, and too afraid!"

  "And you are a devil!" Conchita spat at him. "You do not know how it is to feel cold!" She was very near to tears. "I hate to come here!" she cried. "I hate El Teide

  and the long climb it is to reach the top, with nothing to see there but a great empty crater all burned up with the fury of a stupid mountain hundreds and hundreds of years ago! I shall go down alone," she decided petulantly. "I shall wait at the refuge till you come. It is warm there."

  She could not go alone. Philip would not permit it.

  "What would you like to do, Felicity?" he asked. "Would you like to go on?"

  "Not if the others feel that they want to turn back."

  "It is only Conchita," Sisa pointed out with stark disappointment in her voice. "Julio could go with her back to Altavista and climb up again behind us."

  Philip hesitated.

  "What do you think, Julio?" he asked.

  "I think Conchita is a great nuisance!"

  "So!" Conchita said. "And you are a great fool! I shall return alone!"

  "No, you won't!" Philip laid an arresting hand on her arm as she flung away. "Wait for Julio."

  The lantern and its accompanying torch began to go slowly downhill. Philip stood waiting until they had disappeared round the first bend in the path before he spoke.

  "Are you sure you want to go on, Felicity?" he asked. "It's a stiff climb."

  "Yes," she said, "if you think I can make it."

  She thought that he smiled, but she could not be sure.

  It was, indeed, a difficult climb. They passed La Rambletta, hardly exchanging a word because their breaths seemed to be cutting into their throats, and soon they were climbing what appeared to be a sugar loaf of black rock. Philip was helping Sisa now, and once or twice he put out a hand to Felicity. She gripped it strongly and held on until he had to turn to Sisa again.

  Somewhere behind them a faint glimmer seemed to quiver, of a sudden, in the sky. It was the first moment of light. Slowly the mountain masses began to take shape, but the path was still dark ahead. The curious half-light was more treacherous than the true darkness, Felicity thought, and then, with a little, despairing cry, she had stumbled and fallen. Her foot twisted beneath her and a wrenching pain shot straight to her heart.

  Philip was beside her in an instant.

  "All right, querida," he said. "I've got you!"

  He lifted her, holding her close, and in the strengthening light of the new day she looked at him and knew herself in love.

  The fiery disc of the sun rose suddenly from out of the east, lighting up a panorama composed only of elements and simple nature. The whole world was of a uniform, reddish-brown colour, which seemed to absorb everything it touched—the sea, the rocks, the still-distant summit of the volcano, the very atmosphere which surrounded them. They were in a place apart, a strange new world which held all the mystery of the beginning of time.

  Felicity lay still in Philip's arms, feeling her heart pounding against his in repeated hammer-blows, feeling his nearness and his arms about her as if they had always been there; wanting them to be there for the rest of her life.

  Slowly the contours and profiles of the island began to show themselves, and Sisa, who had climbed a little way ahead, ran back with her useless lantern to hold it anxiously near Felicity's ravaged face.

  "What has happened?" she cried. "Philip, what has happened to Felicity? She has hurt herself, falling against the rock!"

  Felicity tried to smile. It was no physical pain, such as Sisa might have known, that had suddenly shattered her peace of mind. Her heart, after that first moment of ecstasy in Philip's arms, lay still and bruised. How could she have come to love this man, so swiftly, so unpredictably? One touch—the physical contact in a moment of uncertainty—had been the igniting spark, but what did she really know of him? There were the things she had heard, the wild rumours which might bear no resemblance to the truth, and there was her own estimate of him Steady, reliable, true. That was what, in three weeks, she had come to consider him, but was it not already the promptings of love?

  Her mind veered away from reasoning as Philip set her on her feet again.

  "We're almost at the top," he said. "If we could make the crater we could shelter up there and you could rest for a while before we attempt to go down. It's too exposed here."

  His words were an encouragement, and she had wanted so much to reach the top of their mountain!

  She tried to walk and he put his arm about her to steady her while Sisa took both lanterns. They were almost ineffective now except in the shadows of the giant rocks, dimmed into pale imitations of light by the strengthening glory in the east.

  She bit her teeth into her lower lip when the pain in her foot became intense and limped on, feeling that it was not quite so bad when Philip was supporting her.

  In the strong, unshaded light the contours of the island began to show themselves, the land beneath them lying at first like a colossal slab of grey granite before it gradually turned into a relief map of deeply indented bar
rancos and steep, precipitous mountain peaks. The strong basalt wall of the road from Santa Cruz to San Andres marched towards them, and far, far on the distant sea a steamer made for the harbour, the column of its white smoke like a gay plume rising against the deepening blue.

  Beyond it, where the sun rose, Grand Canary lay in a bath of light, guarded by two enormous serpent islands lying watchfully along the horizon.

  "Lanzarote and Fuerteventura," Philip said, pretending not to look at her too closely. "The islands are very clear to-day."

  They had halted on a ledge almost at the summit and he knelt down to inspect her foot. Wreaths of smoke and sulphur vapour emerged from the soil all about them, yet the stones which lay across their path appeared to be coated with ice. It was a strange, weird place for the revelation of love, Felicity thought with a small, painful smile which twisted her lips without rising to her eyes.

  "There don't appear to be any broken bones," Philip said, "but I'll see what I can do with a bandage and then we'll begin to go down. We ought to meet Julio about half way."

  "It isn't very painful," Felicity managed as she tried to stand again. "I feel so badly about it—spoiling your climb like this."

  Instantly the blue eyes were full on hers with a strange, almost angry light in them.

  "It was your day," he said. "I have climbed to the top many times."

  "I can come again, perhaps," she said in swift confusion.

  "But you may not want to trust me a second time—after this."

  Still the blue eyes held hers, gently probing.

  "Should it be a question of trust, Felicity?" he asked. When she could not reply he added on a drier note: "It's the one instinct that goes wrong most often. We

  trust like fools and are betrayed."

  The underlying note of bitterness seemed harsher and stronger than ever in these primitive surroundings. Felicity pressed her hand to a fissure in the frozen rock to find that what she thought would be ice-like was boiling vapour, like the breath of a wild beast. They were nearly four thousand metres above sea level, on a great, snow-crested peak at dawn, yet the earth beneath them boiled in a turmoil of heaving, volcanic fire.