The Dragon's Cave

by Isobel Chace

  Inez made a face at him, her full lips pouting with dismay. ‘I think you are very unkind to me,’ she complained.

  ‘Some of us have to earn a living,’ Tony retorted.

  ‘That is no excuse for being unkind,’ she argued.

  ‘I am not unkind! You can stay if you want and finish your orange, taking as long as you want to about it, but Megan and I have to go across to the hall now. We have to arrange what numbers we’re going to do, for one thing, and for another, the boys will want to see her again. They were disappointed when they found out she’d left us.’

  ‘Espere un momento,’ Inez begged prettily. ‘I am coming, Tony. I am coming quickly, only I can’t get out!’ She sounded pathetic and very anxious to please, smiling at the English tourists and apologising for disturbing them as she wriggled past them, clutching her oranges in her hands as though nothing would part her from them.

  It had started to rain outside, a gentle spray of silver rain descended from the lowering black clouds that hung in the sky, hiding the moon and the stars. A distant roll of thunder echoed round the hills and the accompanying lightning lit up the surrounding almond orchards in a bright white light, highlighting the fragile tracery of the ghostly blossom.

  ‘Oh, I have no coat! I shall get wet!’ Inez complained.

  ‘We’ll have to run for it!’ said Megan, determined to be cheerful at all costs. She wanted this evening to be over—nothing more than that.

  ‘Come, the quickest way is through the courtyard and round the back!’ Tony instructed them. He took both girls by the hand and hurried them out into the rain towards the newly built dancing hall in the distance.

  They arrived in a flurry of laughter, shaking the damp off their clothes and out of their hair. The hall was empty as yet, an enormous building built of brick, with high wooden rafters hung about with old-fashioned farming objects to give an illusion of age and authenticity. Down one side there was a bar, waiting to supply the dancers with refreshments during the next couple of hours. At one end was a high platform, the enormous amplifiers standing on each other at either side, completely dwarfing the space in the middle. Megan’s lips twisted at the sight of them. It was obvious that it was the beat that was wanted here, not the gentle, subtle rhythms of the songs that she sang best.

  ‘Well, darling, how do you like it?’ Tony asked her.

  Megan was conscious of Inez’s curious eyes, resenting the endearment and yet excited by it. The Spanish girl was clearly expecting Megan to respond in kind, but Megan felt only sad and tired. She wished she hadn’t come. She didn’t want to sing. That was the truth of the matter, and that was the worst thing of all. There had never been a time in her whole life when she hadn’t wanted to sing and hear the applause of an audience, and sing again. And now, quite suddenly, she was revolted by the whole idea of it. No, she thought, trying hard to be fair, it was not the singing in itself, it was the simple fact that she knew that Carlos wouldn’t approve. Botheration take Carlos! She’d sing whenever she wanted to sing, and he could like it or lump it! It was silly to quiver inside whenever she thought of him. He never would approve of her, no matter what she did, so she might just as well please herself.

  This conclusion did little to fortify her resolve, however, as she mounted the steps on to the platform and looked out across the large hall. Tables and chairs were placed in groups all round the dancing space, empty from the moment, but already peopled in her imagination with hostile stooges of Carlos, brought there by him, all of them waiting for her to make a fool of herself.

  ‘It’s better than the Witch’s Cauldron!’ Tony said, well satisfied. ‘And the people are easily pleased. You’ll knock them out, my love! I’m quite jealous at the thought of your success!’

  ‘I don’t want to sing!’ Megan said through dry lips.

  Tony looked at her in astonishment. ‘Don’t be silly, love,’ he advised.

  ‘You don’t understand—’ she began.

  But he cut her off with an angry look. ‘It’s you who doesn’t understand,’ he said with a touch of menace. ‘We’re making out here, no more than that. If you don’t sing with us, we’ll go back to England as second rate in everybody’s opinion as when we came! We need a good vocalist to show just how good we are, and that vocalist is going to be you. It was fate that made you come to this barbecue, my pet, and it’s fate that you’re going to sing with us tonight. You walked out on me once before and you’re not going to do it again. Is that understood?’

  Megan winced. ‘I’ve said I will sing, haven’t I?’ she said proudly. ‘But I don’t want to!’

  ‘Who cares what you want?’ Tony exclaimed.

  The rest of the band came into the hall at that moment and their delight at seeing Megan did something to assuage the tumult of emotions within her. She shook hands with them, touched by their open delight that she should be singing with them again.

  ‘We’ve needed you, Megan Meredith,’ said one longhaired young man. ‘Did Tony tell you?’

  ‘I suppose he did,’ Megan admitted.

  ‘Well, I’m telling you! We wouldn’t be here if we were on the up and up, now would we?’

  Megan looked concerned. ‘But surely, I thought it was a step up for you to be here?’

  The young man shook his head, plunking a note or two out of his guitar. ‘Who is going to discover us here?’

  ‘Anybody could!’ Megan insisted. ‘Look at all the people who come here for their holidays. Some of them must be in the music business.’

  ‘We’re not that good. It’s as simple as that. When you get up on to that platform, you watch the atmosphere change. They really listen to you, honey. We’re merely noises off!’

  Even so, Megan found it hard to believe him. She looked round to see where Inez was and saw that the Spanish girl had seated herself at one of the far tables in the hall with Tony in close attendance. Megan hoped that she wouldn’t find Tony too attractive, as he could be when he wanted to be, for she didn’t trust Tony not to try for a quick kiss, and that, she thought, would be the next best thing to a total disaster!

  Then suddenly the doors were opened and the people came flooding into the hall, their coats hitched over their shoulders, and their evening sandals wet from the unexpected puddles outside. The women exclaimed shrilly, gasping with horror at the drenched hems of their long skirts; the men, in lower key, grumbled good-naturedly as the thunder rumbled overhead, finding themselves a table and settling their parties in congenial groups.

  Tony came up to the platform, swinging himself up onto it with a single athletic stride.

  ‘Good evening, ladies and gentlemen! Does anyone here not understand English? No? Good! Then we can get going with the old favourites and get into the swing of things. We have a surprise for you tonight. Have I caught your interest? Well, she’ll catch your hearts, ladies and gentlemen, in a special appearance, by very special request—Miss Megan Meredith!’

  Short, sporadic applause greeted the announcement. Megan frowned at him. She knew that many of the people there thought that they ought to have heard of her and were applauding accordingly. It was a confidence trick, Megan thought indignantly. She would have preferred the applause to have come after she had sung, when she had earned it, but Tony only winked at her, grasped her hand and pulled her to the edge of the platform.

  ‘What are you going to sing?’ he asked in an undertone.

  Megan swallowed. What was she going to sing? She couldn’t think of a single song. Worse still, the faces upturned to look at her dissolved into blobs, and all of them looked angry, annoyed at being kept waiting when they had come there to dance. Tony’s grip on her wrist tightened. ‘Hurry up!’ he warned her.

  Megan tried to pull herself together. ‘They want to dance,’ she whispered back.

  ‘They won’t. Not once you open your mouth!! What are you going to sing, Megan?’

  She swallowed again. ‘I’d like to sing a traditional song,’ she heard herself say in a quietly confide
nt voice that was so foreign to her actual feelings as to be ridiculous. ‘Perhaps you know it. It’s an old Scottish, or some say Irish, air, called “I know where I’m going ”.’

  The desultory applause came again, stiffening Megan’s pride in her own ability. She nodded to the band and waited, almost placidly, while they began to play, lost the melody and found it again. Then, at exactly the right moment, she opened her mouth and began to sing, holding the microphone very close to her lips so that her quiet, intimate style would be heard right at the back of the hall.

  The lilting sound rose and fell until all else had fallen away. The band behind her had gained confidence now and they made fewer mistakes, not that anyone there cared much whether they played or not. They were carried away by the soft, liquid notes of Megan’s voice that suited the music exactly.

  ‘I know where I’m going,

  And I know who’s going with me,

  I know who I love—

  But the dear knows who I’ll marry’

  Her voice died away and there was complete silence in the hall for a long, devastating second, and then the applause came thundering, bringing the colour into her cheeks and a pleasurable light into her eyes.

  ‘What did I tell you?’ Tony whispered triumphantly. ‘We’ll get them dancing now! Mustn’t give them too much of a good thing! We’ll wait for them to ask for you again.’

  Megan nodded quietly. She went to the side of the platform and waited for the band to break into a modern dance rhythm that crashed resoundingly about her and then slipped anonymously into the crowd below. Inez was still sitting at the same table at the far end of the hall and Megan hurried across to join her. But Inez was no longer alone. Megan came to a full stop several feet away from the table, wondering how best she could escape, but she was already too late. Carlos looked up and saw her and rose leisurely to his feet.

  ‘Won’t you join us?’ he said pleasantly enough.

  Completely tongue-tied, Megan sat as quickly as she could in the chair that was the furthest away from him.

  ‘Carlos heard you sing,’ said Inez.

  Megan’s eyes widened. She cast a quick look at Carlos, to find him studying her thoughtfully, and she could feel the hot, uncomfortable colour sliding up her cheeks.

  ‘You look guilty,’ he observed. ‘I wonder why?’

  Megan had no intention of telling him. She wished that her heart wouldn’t beat faster every time she set eyes on him, giving her a breathless feeling of frustration that she could very well do without. When he was out of sight, she was able to forget how attractive he was to her. It was unkind, she thought, that he should have such an effect on her, when she apparently had no effect on him whatsoever.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded, at her most unwelcoming. She knew that she sounded childish and tears of chagrin flooded into her eyes. She didn’t want him to think of her as young and brash, or, worse still, gauche. She wished urgently that she was stunningly beautiful and as sophisticated as any of the other women he knew and admired.

  His eyes scarcely blinked as he regarded her. ‘I heard you were here,’ he answered quietly.

  ‘But who could have told you?’ Inez put in. She put out a possessive hand and stroked the sleeve of Carlos’ coat. ‘Surely you were not worried about us?’

  Carlos shrugged her away. ‘About you? Certainly not.’

  Inez pouted, looking so completely crestfallen that Megan would have laughed, if she had not been so frightened at the same time.

  ‘You’d better get your coats,’ Carlos went on. ‘I am taking you both home.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Megan, ‘but I’ve agreed to sing again. Tony—’

  ‘Ah yes, Tony! I thought you might find out that he was here and that you wouldn’t be able to resist seeing him again. How much is he paying you, Megan?’

  ‘Paying me?’ she asked, puzzled. ‘I—I don’t think he is,’ she stammered.

  ‘Then you are singing for him for love?’ he suggested.

  She stared at him, stricken. ‘Margot told you!’ she said.

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed unpleasantly, ‘Margot told me, as you might have known that she would. Get your coat, Megan, you’re going home. And don’t argue any more! Dios mio! Do you think my patience is inexhaustible?’

  Megan stood up unsteadily. ‘I’m not going with you,’ she said. ‘I can’t! I promised—’

  ‘Then it looks as if you will find yourself forsworn, doesn’t it?’

  She might have argued further, even then, but the gleam of sudden amusement in his eyes prevented her. Her heart hammered against her ribs and she was afraid that he would guess at her feelings if she stayed there another moment. Without a word, she picked up her coat and rested it on her shoulders, following him meekly across the hall and out into the damp night.

  CHAPTER IX

  It had stopped raining, but the floodlighting picked out the moisture in the drive, making it glisten like diamonds in amongst the pebbles. Megan tried to pretend to herself that she was not nervous and that she had only given in to Carlos because of Inez. If it wasn’t quite true, it helped her to think that it was, and she was smiling as they approached Carlos’ car.

  ‘You will come with me, Inez,’ Carlos directed, his voice stem and hard. ‘Megan will have to drive Margot’s car home.’

  ‘Oh, but—’ Megan protested.

  Carlos glared at her. ‘The traffic will not be so heavy now. It is your own fault, however. I told you not to drive the car until I have seen how well you drive!’

  ‘I drive very adequately,’ Megan retorted.

  ‘Yes, she does, she does,’ Inez put in, licking her lips with sheer nervousness as Carlos’ uncompromising expression was shown up by a nearby light.

  ‘She had better,’ he said. ‘You may go first, Megan, leading the way, and I shall follow. I shall be watching you the whole way.’

  Megan’s heart sank. ‘Couldn’t Inez come with me?’

  ‘No, she will be safer with me.’

  He was as good as his word. He held the door of the tiny Seat open for her and shut it firmly on her as soon as she had got in. Megan took a deep breath, bitterly aware that her hands were trembling. Why did he have to be so unkind? Why shouldn’t she sing if she wanted to?

  She tried to start the engine without turning the ignition key. She didn’t dare look at Carlos. The engine started at a touch once she had turned the key, but she stalled it by letting in the clutch with a jerk that she had never done before, at least not since the very earliest days of her driving lessons. It was his fault! She clenched her jaw and started the engine again. She felt sick with nerves, and that was his fault too!

  Carlos wrenched open the door again, his eyes glittering in the beam from the floodlighting.

  ‘Get out,’ he said briefly.

  Megan was not Welsh for nothing. In complete silence she pulled the door shut again, let in the clutch and drove off without a backward look. Sheer fury made her blind to everything else but the one object of wiping that superior expression off Carlos’ face. If he thought she couldn’t drive, she would show him that she could—that she could drive magnificently!

  She barely hesitated at the entrance, turning into the road with a panache that made her hope he was close enough behind to see. She even remembered to stay on the right-hand side of the road, pushing the little car into a speed that made the bodywork rattle. A bicycle, without any lights, appeared suddenly in front of her, and she was obliged to swerve to avoid it. Its closeness to her wheels made her gasp and slow down a little. Some of her anger left her, allowing the nervous fright that Carlos inspired in her to reassert itself. She took a deep breath and tried to concentrate on what she was doing, but, at that moment, Carlos’ car flashed past her and drew in in front of her, making it impossible for her to go on. She came to a reluctant stop and braced herself to meet his anger.

  He got out of his car almost languidly. Megan had a horrid feeling that she was going to cry, but she
bit her lip until it hurt, and waited. He stood for a long moment, looking down at her.

  ‘Well, go on, say it!’ she dared him, breaking the unbearable silence.

  ‘I think from here it would be better if you were to follow me,’ he said quite gently.

  ‘I won’t!’ she snapped.

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘Just as you like, but you can scarcely sit by the side of the road all night.’

  ‘I shall go back to the farmhouse!’ she threatened.

  He shrugged his shoulders. ‘At least, this time, you will not have Inez with you!’

  The tears gushed into Megan’s eyes, blinding her for a moment. ‘That’s all you care about, isn’t it? Well, let me tell you, Inez would have been quite all right with me! I know what she means to you! I would have looked after her!’

  ‘I know you would, if you could,’ he said.

  Megan stared at him, forgetting that she hadn’t wanted him to see her tears.

  ‘I wasn’t doing any harm. The band isn’t anything if I don’t sing with them. I thought I owed them that much.’

  ‘We’ll talk about it later,’ Carlos answered. He sounded quite kind and that upset Megan more than ever.

  ‘I don’t think I can see to drive!’ she complained, and sniffed.

  Silently, he took a handkerchief out of his pocket and handed it to her.

  She blew her nose violently. ‘Doesn’t Inez drive?’ she asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Doesn’t she do anything?’

  He smiled slowly. ‘She expects to have a man around her to do it for her most of the time.’

  ‘How—how restful!’ Megan said nastily.

  ‘You would do well to learn from her,’ he answered sternly. ‘She doesn’t rush from scrape to scrape, getting herself talked about.’

  ‘How dull!’ Megan objected, but his words hurt all the same. ‘She is older than I am,’ she excused herself.

  ‘Is she?’ He sounded surprised. He was silent for a moment. ‘Feel better?’ he asked her. She nodded bleakly. ‘And you will follow me to Palma?’ Again she nodded. If she did go back to the farmhouse, she thought, she would only have to explain her absence to Tony, and that was impossible. He wouldn’t understand any more than she did. Live your own life, pet, he would say, and he would be right. Only how did one live one’s own life when faced with the whole weight of Carlos’ disapproval? That might not matter to Tony, but it mattered to her! It mattered to her more than she would have believed possible.