“What are we to do?” Ilse asked him.
“It’s three miles to my villa. I’d rather not walk.”
“Are you going there?”
“Yes.” Beecher wanted to wash the grime from his hands and face and put on clean clothes before giving himself over to Don Julio. Don Julio wouldn’t be at his office now; he would be at home, and Beecher didn’t intend to present himself there looking like a skid-row derelict. “You won’t need to come with me,” he said to Ilse. “You know where the road goes up to my villa? Beyond the railroad track?”
She nodded and smiled slowly at him, and Beecher realized that she would probably behave in exactly the same fashion if he had told her to go to hell or jump in the lake. She was smiling at the image she had drawn of him, the shining picture in her mind; and her smile was like that of someone lost in a dream.
“Now listen,” he said, and rubbed her cheek gently with the back of his fist. “There’s a tiny bar called the Quita Pena; it’s right on the road beside the railroad track. It’s a fishermen’s hangout, very dark and very quiet. No one from Mirimar goes there. I’ll leave you on the terrace. It’s not lighted. No one can see you. Drink a glass of wine and wait for me.”
“Yes, Mike,” she said, still smiling at him. “But you must tell me what to think about while you are gone. And when to smile or frown, and when to sip my drink. I will be like a child without you.”
“Well, just enjoy the glass of wine and the fishermen’s singing,” Beecher said. “And look at the moon.”
“No, I will wait until you come back before I enjoy anything,” Ilse said.
Beecher sighed faintly. She couldn’t accept the present as a goal; it had to be the perfect future, with everything neatly and blissfully laid on in some rosy never-never land. He turned as a shrill and familiar laugh sounded from the opening doors of the clubhouse. Old Polly Soames, whom he had known and liked all the time he had been in Spain, was making her exit; she descended the flatstone steps with an air of precarious dignity, placing each plump foot out and down with tentative confidence, and gripping the iron railing tightly with one gloved hand. She wore a red and gold dress, which fluttered preposterously about her short, heavy body, and her wispy red hair flickered like a fading, uncertain torch in the moonlight. She was chuckling and chattering to herself as she started for her car, her voice sounding like that of a confused but belligerent crow. Something had gone wrong at her villa, it was evident from her muttered diatribe against maids, agents, gardeners, and plumbers. “Take my money and break things instead of fixing them. Put them all in the cesspool, serve the lot right,” she cried cheerfully, as she found the door handle of her car.
Beecher took Ilse’s arm. “Come on,” he said, and led her through the shadows toward Polly’s car. Polly would take them into Mirimar. She enjoyed helping people. But most importantly, she wouldn’t remember doing it. And it was a solid bet that she wouldn’t know anything of Beecher’s trouble, not even if she had heard the inevitable gossip a dozen times a day. Polly Soames was a grand and generous old rake, but after four marriages, a dozen children, and thousands of fiestas, affairs, and intrigues, she had given up trying to keep anything straight in her head; all the fine wires up there had melted together in the heat of her enthusiastic passions, so that now her thoughts raced wildly and cheerfully from past to present to future, with old husbands and new gigolos, remembered hang-overs and anticipated ones, all blurring together in scenes of spastic and brilliant irrelevance.
Beecher called to her while she tugged at the handle of her car. “Goddamn Stutz, no good at all,” she was muttering as she tried to pry open the door of her Mercedes. She turned and stared at him, her eyes flashing weakly in her deliciously ravaged face. “Goddamn, Mike Beecher!” she said. “I thought you’d gone. Off to Palm Beach. Somebody said Palm Beach. Ridiculous place. Full of Italian golfers.”
Beecher asked her if she would drive them into town, and Polly said, “Sure, sure, hop in. Goddamn.” She cocked her head to one side like an inquisitive bird, and a frown of painful intensity clouded her forehead. “It wasn’t Palm Beach. It was something quite delightful. It cheered me up, I remember.” Suddenly she poked a finger against his chest. “You stole an airplane, that’s what you did.” She put her head back and laughed shrilly. “Delightful! Bored waiting for it to take off, I imagine.”
“Polly, you know how these rumors get around.”
“No, it wasn’t you.” She shook her head crossly. “It was Massimo. My first husband. In Italy. Took a plane and ran into a sweet little church in Sicily. Left me the most marvelous collection of books. All decorated in gold. Very religious. Eve with a gold fig leaf. Sold ’em all to the Vatican. Who’s that with you?”
“You remember Ilse, Polly.”
“Of course. Cannes. Before the war.” She laughed heartily and slapped Beecher on the back. “Gold fig leaves, my boy, you don’t know the half of it. Come! Crisis at the villa. All the drains stopped up, all maids pregnant. Hah! They’re stopped up too. Get in...”
Beecher left Ilse on the terrace of the Quita Pena, at a table far from the faint beams of yellow light falling through the doorway from the bar. The fishermen were singing in the back room, their voices rising mournfully with the wind, and a burro passing on the highway clicked out a rhythmic accompaniment to their songs. When Beecher crossed the road he turned and waved to her. But he didn’t know whether she saw him, or whether or not she returned his wave; in the gloom of the terrace she had become a blurred and indistinct figure, her particular form and identity lost among the shadows.
Beecher climbed the winding dirt road that led to the villa. The moonlight was filtering through light gray fog, but he could see the massive bulk of the mountains against the sky, and slender trees twisting in the wind. He was very tired. His legs ached with each step, and he had to breathe deeply to get enough air into his lungs. But his body seemed separate from him, as if it were some large and clumsily wrapped package which he had been carrying an intolerable distance.
His villa loomed ahead of him, silent and completely dark; not a crack of light showed from any window or door. He stopped to get his breath. The wind across the garden was heavy and fragrant with the scent of flowers, and below him he heard the faint noise of traffic on the coastal road. Beecher felt abandoned and homeless; it had been foolish to expect that Adela and Encarna would be here to greet him, but that had been his hope nonetheless, that they would answer the door, and weep over him and rush about to make him a cup of tea.
But after this first, reflexive twist of disappointment, Beecher realized that he had learned his lesson well; he didn’t need these pretty vignettes of future pleasure any more. He preferred reality. Shrugging, he walked down the narrow pathway and tried the side door of the villa. It was locked. He went around to the terrace and glanced down into the garden. The pale, graveled walks, and the tiny pool were shining in the moonlight. Turning, he saw that one of the terrace doors was open, and this made him smile. He was back in Spain, all right. The landlord had undoubtedly padlocked every window, chained the garden furniture together, and then, smiling efficiently, had hurried off leaving the terrace doors wide open. Beecher walked into the living room and made an effort to adjust his eyes to the gloom. A lamp with a tall white shade stood beside the fireplace like some neat cylindrical ghost. Beecher was groping clumsily toward it when a switch clicked sharply; the overhead bulbs seemed to explode against his eyes, flooding the room with brilliant confusing light.
Don Julio Cansana, the police constable of Mirimar, stood in the terrace doorway, ominously correct and formal in his green twill uniform and shining black boots. The strong light gleamed on his silver-gray hair, and drew deep shadows beneath his cold blue eyes. When he smiled and inclined his head, the small twist of his lips did nothing to relieve his austerely formal manner.