Every Secret Thing

by Susanna Kearsley

  So I stopped in the Cathedral square, and tried to think. It was a contemplative place, not large, with lovely older buildings all around a quiet stand of mottled plane trees and some other lace-like trees whose name I didn’t know. And, framed by these, at the square’s farther end, there rose a ruined Roman temple.

  It was an unexpected sight. The great Cathedral, with its towers and its turrets and its deeply carved front entrance, had been built to impress; to dominate the square, but the little Roman temple, with its fallen, broken columns, stole the eye, and the imagination.

  It drew me to it, making me forget, for just that moment, why I’d come here, and the weariness I felt, and all my troubles.

  I had always had a love of ancient history – of heroic deeds and tales of war and gods of old mythology – and I felt like a child, filled with wonder and awe, as I tipped my head back… far, far back, to stare upwards.

  The temple soared above me, high on its stone podium, its fluted columns standing like a skeleton against the early evening sky. The south colonnade was entirely gone, but the three sides remaining were remarkably untouched, the long flat fascia stones still resting on the fancy upturned capitals. I only had to squint, and I could picture it intact. In this light, I could even imagine the ghosts of the Romans who’d worshipped there, moving among the long shadows.

  And then, in one breath of the breeze, the ghosts vanished, chased off by the modern-day sounds of more people approaching. Another tour group – Evora appeared to be a magnet for them – poured into the little square and gathered at the temple’s base expectantly, their faces upturned, as was mine, with obvious appreciation.

  A good-looking young man with very tight trousers pushed through to the front of the group, where he turned to address them. ‘OK, everyone, I’m going to ask you please to come closer, otherwise I’ll be shouting. Now, we are standing at the main religious centre of Evora, from the Roman times till nowadays. Behind me what you have now is the Roman temple, called sometimes the Temple of Diana. We are lucky to have such a temple here, is very rare, because the Roman temples often disappear. This is a small one, from the first century before Christ, and was saved because they used it from the late years of the thirteenth century till the nineteenth century, it was used as a slaughterhouse, so it was entirely covered with walls, with mortar and brick walls. Then came the nineteenth century, and it was a very romantic time, you know, when people were dreaming of the old civilisations like Greece and Rome, and they had just discovered a short time ago the ruins of Pompeii, and they were so enthusiastic with that, they started to imitate the old styles of art. The same movement in Portugal, and we paid more attention to these ruins, and so it was discovered that we had this precious monument beneath the bricks.’

  Which only went to show, again, I thought, that things weren’t always what they seemed to be.

  I was listening to the young guide explaining the finer points of Roman temple architecture, pointing out how granite had been used to build the lower parts, the columns, while the finer, more delicate detailing on the Corinthian capitals had been done in marble, when I spotted, with surprise, a now-familiar face among the tourists.

  He had seen me, too. His brown eyes smiled at me above the crowd, as though he found the constant crossing of our paths amusing.

  When the tour group shuffled off to the Cathedral, the American stayed put.

  ‘Hello,’ he said, as if our meeting here were natural. He was reaching for his camera, with his eyes fixed on the temple, but he stopped me when I would have moved. ‘No, stay,’ he said. ‘If you don’t mind. It helps to give a sense of scale.’ He took the shot, and, lowering the camera, closed the space between us, coming over. ‘Look, if we’re going to keep this up, we should probably introduce ourselves. I’m Matt.’

  I hesitated. Shook the hand he offered. ‘Katherine.’

  ‘Katherine. Hi.’ He wasn’t really flirting. It was friendliness, I thought, and nothing more. It was one of the truisms of travel that people on vacation in a foreign land would always tend to bond with the familiar.

  I felt something of the same bond, too. I’d been so on edge all day, between the drive down and my sense of being followed in the streets and that strange woman who had spoken to me – everything had left me feeling painfully aware of how alone I was, how isolated; so there was a definite appeal in standing here, now, in the company of somebody I recognised, whose eyes held no agenda.

  I felt safe. And I was in no rush to lose that feeling, so instead of pointing out that his tour group was now nearly at the Cathedral, I asked, ‘So, what brings you to Evora?’

  ‘Romans. I can’t resist places like this.’ He pushed his hands deep in his pockets and nodded upwards at the ruined temple. ‘You?’

  ‘Oh, just a day trip.’

  ‘Then you’re heading back to Lisbon? When, tonight?’

  I shook my head. ‘Tomorrow.’ I’d intended, when I’d first set out this morning, to just come here, do my interview, and turn around as quickly as I could, but that had been before my close encounter with the Renault Clio. I had taken a hotel because there wasn’t any force that would have driven me back out onto that highway, after dark. I’d wait until the morning. Wait for light.

  He said, ‘Then let me buy you dinner. If you don’t have any plans, that is.’ I hadn’t expected the smile. I hadn’t thought that he would look at me that way, not in my current incarnation, with my mouse-brown hair and glasses and my ordinary clothes. My disguise had been designed to not attract attention, after all, and I’d have thought that, to a man like Matt, I’d scarcely register.

  ‘Don’t you eat with your group?’ I asked.

  ‘What? Oh, them.’ He looked, as I was looking, at the people who were clustered now around their guide outside the steps of the Cathedral. ‘No, I’m not with them. I’m here on my own. They were just standing here when I came out, you know, so I thought I’d stay and listen.’

  I glanced around. ‘When you came out of where?’

  ‘I’m staying right here, at the pousada – like a state-run bed and breakfast, in the old monastery.’ He pointed to the long white building stretching low behind him. ‘I’ve got a great view of this temple from my window.’ Then he asked, ‘What about you? Where are you staying?’

  ‘Nowhere like this. Just a hotel.’ I considered his offer as I took a long look round the emptying square. The tour group was moving into the Cathedral. That left just a few people wandering round, and in the waning light the place had taken on a sense of loneliness. I couldn’t shake the memory of those footsteps, sure and certain, coming after me this afternoon, through narrow winding streets, and of the woman who had told me that some creatures didn’t know when they’d been caught.

  I hadn’t seen her since, though I’d been searching every sidewalk for her face. But that meant nothing. She might well be watching me, and waiting for another opportunity to get me on my own.

  I looked at Matt, and borrowed courage from his air of rugged capability. ‘I don’t have any plans,’ I said. ‘I’d love to go for dinner.’

  ‘Great. I saw this little place around the corner, it’s not far.’

  Walking beside him, I knew I had chosen my bodyguard wisely. He walked on the street side, to guard me from traffic. I couldn’t remember the last time a man under fifty had done that. Later, I knew, when our dinner was done, he would likely be one of those men who would walk me back down to my hotel, with no expectations. And if anybody did step from a shadowy corner, he looked like he could handle it.

  I never would remember, after, much about the restaurant that he took me to, except that it was small, and very crowded, and alive with conversation. I felt warm. There were warm smells of food around me, and warm light reflecting through glasses of red wine, and warm bodies packed to the rough-plastered walls. And there was a piano. An older piano, a small one, that seemed to be there for the ambiance. No one was playing. I noticed it only because it was near us, and because
I had such trouble holding Matt’s gaze while we talked – I needed something else to focus on, to help me keep my balance.

  He spoke Portuguese, and read it well enough to tell me what was on the menu, and to carry on an easy conversation with the waiter, when we ordered.

  So I asked him, ‘Have you been to Portugal before?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘This is a first for me.’

  ‘Oh. I thought maybe you had family here.’

  ‘Because I speak the language, you mean? No, I don’t know anybody, here. All my family connections outside of the States are in South America. My mother’s from Brazil,’ he said. ‘That’s how I learnt my Portuguese.’

  ‘And you’re from…where? From Boston?’

  ‘Near there.’ His slanted a look at me. ‘Accent gave me away, did it? I get ribbed about it at work, a lot. People tell me I sound like a Kennedy.’

  I smiled. ‘You don’t work in Boston, then?’

  ‘No.’ I caught the flash of humour in his eyes, and realised I was asking questions in the same efficient way I ran an interview. I couldn’t help it. That was how I’d learnt to interact with people, working at the Sentinel. Besides, I’d spent this afternoon exploring Deacon’s past, and I was still in journalistic mode. Except, nobody was supposed to know I was a journalist.

  I reached for my water glass, glancing around at the tables close by us. Nobody looked threatening, though there was one middle-aged woman two tables over with whom I would not have enjoyed crossing swords. She was sitting with an older couple – her parents, I presumed, from her resemblance to the man. They looked, all three of them, a little out of sorts, as though they’d only just been arguing.

  Matt was asking, ‘So what about you? Where are you from? Your accent’s Canadian, isn’t it?’

  I brought my attention back. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I knew a guy in college, came from Canada. From Renfrew, Ontario. Do you know where that is?’

  ‘No,’ I lied. ‘I’m from Vancouver.’

  ‘Oh. And what do you do?’

  I was ready for that. Tony’d coached me very well, and I had chosen as my cover occupation something I’d spent several summers doing – working at the checkout of a grocery store. It might not be too glamorous, but nobody could trip me up on the details. And I’d travelled enough on the West Coast to answer any question he might ask about Vancouver with authority.

  I found it a relief, though, when the talk swung back around to him.

  Matt proved to be good company, and good at conversation. I learnt he was a lawyer, never married, with no children; that he owned an Airedale terrier named Reuben, who was staying with the neighbours; that he was an only child. His parents lived in Arizona.

  ‘I find they’re getting crankier with age,’ he said, and grinned. ‘Are yours like that?’

  ‘No.’ I looked again towards the little family group two tables over. The older of the two women, the mother, would have been about my Grandma Murray’s age, and with that realisation I felt, suddenly, the crushing weight of what I’d lost. Felt the urge, too, to go tell the grumpy daughter not to waste her time in petty quarrels. Life was never long enough.

  The old man at that table stood, and, heedless of the protests of the women, made his way to the piano, where he sat, and set his shoulders, and began to play. He played quite well, from memory.

  Matt was watching too. ‘He’s very good.’

  I nodded. I could not have done more then, than nod, because I’d recognised the song. It had been Grandma Murray’s favourite: ‘Make Believe’.

  Had I been a person of more faith, I might have thought that she was trying to communicate, to comfort me. But even though I didn’t, in my heart, believe that possible, and even though I knew that I was utterly alone, I closed my eyes and felt her spirit with me, briefly, in this far-off, foreign place.

  Deacon couldn’t see the soldier playing the piano on account of all the girls who’d gathered round the young man, laughing, pressing closer, each one urging him to play a tune especially for them.

  Across the table, Cayton-Wood, filling his pipe, said, ‘He’s good, isn’t he? Came in last Saturday week. I’m debriefing him. Tea?’

  Deacon accepted the offer, and settled himself in his chair, waiting. He hadn’t been keen to come back here, to Caldas da Rainha, any more than he had wanted to have lunch with Cayton-Wood, but the request had been official.

  He had thought, at first, that he was being set up for a reprimand, but Cayton-Wood was acting in an unexpected manner. If Deacon hadn’t known any better, he’d have said the other man was getting ready to apologise.

  The tea came, and was poured, and Cayton-Wood glanced over. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I may have been a little heavy-handed, when I ordered you to stay clear of Garcia. You were using your best judgement, as you said.’

  Deacon, hiding his surprise, said nothing.

  Cayton-Wood went on, ‘In fact, given our latest position with Spain, it appears to me your friendship with Garcia could be useful.’

  ‘Oh? How so? I thought he’d already been turned.’

  ‘He has been. But this situation with our cutting off petroleum supplies, it’s having a tremendously destabilising effect in Spain. Franco won’t say it, of course, but his people are suffering great deprivation. He’s desperate for petroleum, from any source, at any price. We’ve noticed no fewer than three Spanish agents, new agents, in Lisbon.’ His empty teacup rattled in the saucer as he set it down. ‘Garcia’s not a bad man, and he’s helped us willingly enough, but there will be new pressure on him now, from Madrid, and I’m not sure how he will weather it.’

  Deacon acknowledged this. ‘And I’m to do what, exactly?’

  ‘Observe him. Just that. Take your drives in the country, the way you were doing. Have dinner at his house, invite him to yours. Be as sociable as you like with the Garcias, provided you keep your eyes open. Let us know who comes and goes, and what his state of mind is. We need to be certain he’s still on our side.’

  ‘Understood.’ Deacon’s own tea had grown cold in the cup. He looked toward the corner, where the young soldier playing piano was still holding court with his girlish admirers.

  Cayton-Wood followed his gaze. ‘I rather think the uniform is much of the attraction.’ He spoke lightly, but the slight edge to his voice reminded Deacon that Cayton-Wood had worn a uniform himself once, and would still be in one now if fate had not decided otherwise. The dragon’s-head walking stick stabbed at the floor as he stood. ‘I’ll go see what’s become of our driver. Wait here.’

  Deacon sat for a moment in silence, then reached for his cigarette case. Catching the eye of the waitress, he motioned her over. ‘That chap at the piano, does he take requests?’

  She shrugged. ‘I can ask him. What song would you like?’

  Deacon told her.

  He watched her approach the young soldier, and ask. The music stopped a moment, then the soldier raised his head and gave a friendly nod to Deacon, and began to play.

  It sounded no less beautiful in this small, rustic room than it had sounded in New York:

  We could make believe I love you,

  Only make believe that you love me.

  Others find peace of mind in pretending;

  Couldn’t I? Couldn’t you? Couldn’t we…?

  Deacon might have closed his eyes if he had been alone, but he was not. Instead he looked towards the window without seeing it, and lit his cigarette.

  Evora felt different in the dark.

  Within the walls, the town took on a cloistered feel, medieval – yellow lights from tavern doorways slanting out across the rough-edged granite cobblestones; little huddled groups of people clopping past us down a narrow curve of street, beneath the tightly shuttered windows of the silent, sleeping houses. Again, if I just squinted, I could half believe I’d been transported back in time, expecting to hear wagon wheels creak by instead of, every now and then, the quiet thrumming of a car that made us press against t
he buildings as it slowly slipped on past.

  Matt walked again on the outside, to shield me. His shoulder almost brushed mine with each step. I was aware of him, and fighting the sensation.

  We had reached the small Cathedral square. The Temple of Diana rose majestically in floodlights, soaring high on its stone podium, its fluted columns standing like a skeleton beneath the cloud-chased moon.

  The moon was perfect – pale and full, and great black sections of the clearing sky were deep with stars. As settings went, it was incredibly Romantic, in the true sense of the word. I could easily imagine some great poet – Byron, maybe – sitting musing in the ruins, and I felt a primal pull to do the same.

  Matt must have felt it too. ‘You want to have a closer look?’

  ‘All right.’ I made my own way up, climbing the uneven, crumbling edge of the podium, scrambling over the great blocks of granite, finding my footholds with care in the stone, and enjoying the view that I gained over Evora, little lights spreading out far and below me, and close in the foreground the huge rounded columns, half shadow, half bright in the wash of the floodlights. Nearby a section of column had toppled to lie on its side like a giant stone log, and I perched on it, soaking up atmosphere, while Matt explored.

  Even derelict, this ancient spot felt sacred, and protective. Surely nothing could come near me here, to do me harm. I felt removed from danger.

  So it gave me an unpleasant jolt to hear the footsteps coming through the square towards the temple, sure and certain. Some startled creature – a bat or a nightbird – shot suddenly out of the temple above me, in panic. I stood up myself, and turned.

  Nothing was there. Only the empty square, with its tall army of rustling trees, and the watchful Cathedral.

  ‘It’s quite a place, isn’t it?’ Matt stepped clear of the columns and into the glare of the floodlights, that cast him in shadow, enormous, against the pale stone. Then he looked at me properly. ‘Are you OK?’