‘Cam…the fridge is empty. There’s no orange juice,’ this vision said plaintively, wafting down the steps that connected the terrace and garden.
‘I know. I’ll get some from the shop. I didn’t expect you to get up until later.’ He introduced them. ‘Mrs Harris…this is my house guest, Fiona Lincoln. Fiona, this is my neighbour from over the wall. Mrs Harris keeps the garden in order.’
Liz removed the cotton gardening glove from her right hand. She was not surprised to find that Fiona had a limp handshake. She didn’t look the sort of person who would shake hands firmly. Glamorous women hardly ever did, in Liz’s experience. Perhaps they thought it was unfeminine to exert any pressure.
‘I thought you had a maid to look after things,’ Fiona said to Cam.
Despite not being dressed for the day, she was already fully made up, Liz noticed.
‘I have a cleaning lady, but it doesn’t look as if she’s been in recently,’ he answered. ‘Do you know my home help, Mrs Harris? Is she ill or something?’
‘Beatrice mentioned that you had help…someone called Alicia. But we don’t run into each other,’ Liz told him. ‘I’m usually here before breakfast or in the late afternoon. I expect she comes in the middle of the day.’
‘I know where she lives. I’ll call round there. Now we’ll leave you in peace while we get ourselves organised. Catch you later.’ As they turned away, he put a possessive hand on the other woman’s slender waist.
Watching Fiona leaning against him as far as the foot of the steps, Liz felt a moment of envy. She would have given a lot to have a man in her life against whom she could lean like that. At the same time she knew that a relationship such as theirs—she felt sure it wasn’t ‘serious’ and would probably end as casually as it had begun—would not satisfy her. She could never take a lover purely for physical pleasure, or be a temporary girlfriend.
The stairs to the terrace were narrow, with succulents growing in clay pots placed at the outer edge of each tread. Before mounting them, Fiona furled her floating layers of chiffon, wrapping the garment more closely around her and, in so doing, drawing Fielding’s attention to the curves of her shapely bottom.
Watching him admiring it, Liz wondered how men like him and her father could be satisfied with making love to women for whom they felt no real affection or even liking. To her, the idea of going to bed with someone you didn’t love was repugnant.
Because she had married so young, she had missed the sexual freedom enjoyed by most of her generation. Duncan had been her first boyfriend and her only lover. That she might marry again seemed doubtful. Unattached men of the right age were thin on the ground. And anyway did she want to marry a second time? Marriage was such a huge risk.
With a sigh, she resumed her planting.
After lunch, Liz went for a walk on the dirt lanes and narrow tarmacked roads criss-crossing the vineyards that stretched from the edge of the village to the far side of the valley. When she arrived the grapes had been tiny, no larger than orange pips. She had seen them grow and ripen until they were ready to be picked. Now the vine leaves were turning red or purple.
On the way back, she followed a lane that gave her an overall view of Valdecarrasca. Its clustered rooftops were dominated by the church and a sloping line of cypress trees leading up to the small white-walled cemetery where coffins were placed in banks of narrow vaults marked by their occupants’ photographs as well as their names and dates.
Even for an outsider, it was a comfortable feeling to be part of a small close-knit community where each generation had been at school together and had many shared memories.
The rest of the afternoon was spent working on a design for a tablecloth and matching napkins for a ‘garden lunch’ feature scheduled for publication the following summer.
At six o’clock she went downstairs to fix herself a gin and tonic and started preparing the salad she would eat at seven. Some of the foreigners who lived here had adapted to Spanish meal times and had a siesta after lunch. For the time being, in her own home, she was sticking to the timetable she had always been used to.
She was about to halve one of the avocado pears that were so much cheaper here than in London, when someone knocked on her front door. To her surprise, when she opened it, she found Cameron Fielding standing on the narrow pavement outside.
‘I hope this isn’t an inconvenient moment to call. Do you have five minutes to spare?’
‘Of course. Come in.’
She stood back while he ducked his head to avoid cracking it on the rather low lintel. Two of the things that had put her parents-in-law off the house were the absence of a hall and the lack of light in the room facing the street. It only had one small window guarded by an iron reja as was standard in Spanish houses whether they were palaces or cottages.
‘Come through to the kitchen,’ she said, after closing the door.
Fielding waited for her to lead the way. Perhaps it was the first time he had been here, she thought. Because Beatrice had been to his house it didn’t mean he had been to hers.
But a moment later he corrected this assumption by saying, ‘You’ve had the kitchen altered. It’s much better now…much lighter.’
‘Beatrice wasn’t keen on cooking. I enjoy it,’ said Liz. ‘I’m having a gin-tonic.’ This, she had read, was what trendy young Spaniards called what her parents called a G and T. ‘Can I offer you one?’
‘Thank you. Ice but no lemon, please.’
Liz fixed the drink and, with a gesture, waved him to the basket chair in the corner. ‘What did you want to see me about?’
‘I’ve always suspected that not a lot of cleaning went on when I wasn’t around. This unexpected visit has confirmed it. The house obviously hasn’t been touched since the last time I was here.’ His powerful shoulders lifted in a philosophical shrug. ‘Well, that’s not unusual. It happens in lots of countries where foreigners have vacation houses. Incomers are usually regarded as suckers with more money than sense. Cheers!’ He raised his glass to her.
‘Cheers!’ she echoed. Was he going to ask her to take on the housework as well as the garden? Surely not.
‘Alicia is not a bad worker when she gets down to it, but she needs keeping an eye on,’ he went on. ‘I was wondering if you would be willing to provide that supervision…to make sure she does what she’s supposed to do. Also I’d like to have someone I can rely on to stock the fridge and maybe arrange some flowers. But perhaps you’re far too busy with your own work to tackle anything more?’
Liz had been preparing a frosty answer if he asked her to take over the cleaning. Not because she considered housework beneath her, but because she resented him thinking her own work was little more than a hobby.
While she was rethinking what she had intended to say, he went on, ‘By the way, it’s obvious that you’re doing far more in the garden than Beatrice did. I don’t think I’m paying you enough. If you were willing to oversee Alicia’s work, I’d be happy to increase your fee.’
He then suggested an amount, in pesetas. It seemed such a massive increase that, at first, Liz thought she must have made a mistake converting it into pounds. Even after six months here, she still tended to think in sterling except with small everyday transactions.
‘If you feel that isn’t enough, I’m open to negotiation,’ he said, watching her with those curiously penetrating grey eyes.
‘It’s enough…more than enough. But I need time to think it over. I’m not sure I want to take on the double commitment. For one thing, my Spanish is still pretty basic. I get by with the man at