The Wind Off the Small Isles Read online

  He grinned. It made him seem all at once much younger. ‘That’d be a bit rough when I’ve only just met you, but if you want the truth, it’s as much as my job’s worth to tell you.’

  No trace of Spanish accent now. I regarded him curiously. ‘Top secret stuff? You mean you’ve actually had instructions not to tell?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m right, they have just bought it? English?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, that lets us both out, doesn’t it? Relations of yours, parents?’

  ‘No. I’m just assistant, looker-upper, apprentice, architect, watchdog, chauffeur and quite often keeper. But I’ll tell you this, there isn’t a chance in a million that my employer would dream of selling. This is his idea of the perfect hideout. I’m supposed to guard the gate like Cerberus and stop everyone coming in except the girl who brings the milk. Hence the strongarm stuff, for which I apologise, but orders is orders.’ He waved a hand to the emptiness in front of us. ‘He sounds like a wanted criminal, but he’s not. All he wants is peace, and he thinks he’s found it here.’

  ‘Then this is where I came in. That’s what my employer says, too, and what’s more, your job sounds very much the same as mine – p.a., chauffeur, dog, devil and dairymaid, and whatever you call the person who is sent out in front to draw the fire. As now.’ I turned away. ‘All right, if you’ve had your orders, this is something she will understand. They’re two of a kind.’

  ‘Mine’s a writer,’ he said apologetically, ‘and more or less mad north-north-west.’

  ‘I was busy guessing that. So’s mine. That’s what I meant. I don’t mean she’s mad – I must admit she’s perfectly sane – but I see what you mean for all that.’ I paused. ‘Well, I’m sorry to have bothered you. Don’t come any further, or you’ll have to turn Spanish again. I can manage the car quite easily. Goodbye.’

  ‘Half a minute, don’t go yet – look, it’s not my fault I’ve had to clam up like this, so won’t you make it good for evil and tell me your name? Where are you staying? The hotel in Arrecife?’

  ‘Yes. But I reckon I don’t owe you my name.’

  ‘Have a heart, I’ll tell you mine. It’s Mike, short for Michael—’

  ‘Michael!’

  We both jumped and spun round. Mrs Gresham was standing at the corner of the house, and as we both gaped at her, she screeched again: ‘Michael!’

  ‘For crying out loud.’ There was more surprise than ecstasy in the young man’s voice, but he advanced to meet her, and submitted cheerfully as she folded him to her.

  Over her head he grinned at me. ‘Well, what do you know? It’s Mum. No wonder you said your employer needed a keeper.’

  Mrs Gresham released him. ‘Did she?’

  ‘Actually, she didn’t. That was me.’

  ‘If there’s one straitjacket I covet more than another,’ said Mrs Gresham, ‘it’s James Blair’s. Perdita, as you’ll have gathered, this is my son Michael.’

  ‘I – is it? I mean, yes, we’ve met. I was just getting my breath back. So it’s James Blair who lives here? I’m afraid he’s beaten you to it, Mrs Gresham. He’s just bought the house, and he’s not parting.’

  ‘You’ve seen him?’

  ‘I have not. Your son said he was out, though I have no means of knowing whether that was the truth, but when you happened along I was being thrown out neck and crop, if that’s the right expression, and you were to go too, but if he’s your son he can’t very well now, can he?’

  ‘Certainly not. He’s going to entertain us to tea,’ said my employer, leading the way smartly towards the chairs under the palm-trees.

  2

  Ay, ages long ago

  These lovers fled away …

  KEATS: The Eve of St Agnes

  ‘Well, now, Mike,’ said Mrs Gresham, settling herself comfortably, ‘what’s all this about? I thought you were in Morocco.’

  ‘Oh, we were. But ever since we stayed here before – in Lanzarote, I mean, the time he had flu and wanted to recoup so that he could finish Tiger Tiger for Julian Gale – he’s talked about getting a place here as a bolt-hole.’

  ‘I know. He told me about it.’

  ‘Well, he’d asked an agent in Arrecife to keep his eyes open and report if anything suitable became vacant, and a couple of months ago it did. So here we are, moving in.’

  It was coming straight now. The younger of Mrs Gresham’s two sons had ambitions himself to be a playwright, and a year or two ago had, so to speak, apprenticed himself as research assistant and jack-of-all-trades to James Blair, one of our leading playwrights and a friend of the family. I had gathered from Michael’s mother that learning, rather than earning, was the object of the job, and from the rare letters she had received it seemed that her son was enjoying himself hugely, the periods of gruelling work no less than the fallow intervals of travel and study. ‘Michael was with him at the time, and raved about the swimming …’ That was probably the letter she had had at Christmas, written from Morocco, and I knew there hadn’t been one since. Well, since I gathered that James Blair worked his assistant as hard as Cora Gresham worked me, Michael Gresham wouldn’t write letters unless he had to. Few men did. Nor had he been home since I had been with his mother, so I had never met him, but now that I came to look at him, I could recognise through the dust and dishevelment the Mike Gresham of the younger photograph which stood in his mother’s study; dark-brown hair, hazel eyes, a face that would have been undistinguished except for its shrewdness and humour and (what the photograph didn’t show) the attractive crease that his sudden smile drove down his cheek.

  He was smiling now. ‘Look, do you really want tea? Won’t you make it wine? It’ll come up good and cold from the cellars. We’re right over a nice holey hunk of lava here, and we’ve a genuine cave. Yes?’

  He vanished into the house, from which he presently emerged carrying a tray with glasses, ice, olives and a bottle of the pale local wine called Chimidas. He set these down on the table, moving the papers on to a chair to make room.

  ‘I know one’s not allowed to notice something that’s only half done,’ I said, ‘but is that his? Another play?’

  ‘We hope so.’ He began to pour the drinks. ‘Only in the thinking stage as yet, and snag-ridden as usual. Ice? Try some soda, it sounds disgusting, but it makes a long cold drink with a mild sparkle, very refreshing when you’re hot. There. Like it?’

  I accepted the long misty glass, and sipped. ‘Mm – yes, it’s rather good.’

  ‘My own invention.’ Then he turned to his mother, and the two of them plunged into a rapid exchange of news, from which I gathered that Michael liked the job very much, and that he didn’t expect the Canary Islands phase to outlast the writing of the play. ‘Though goodness knows how long that will be. He’s been going through a bad period, a more or less complete block since he got Tiger Tiger off his desk. If it’s been anything like as trying for him as it has been for me—’ He grimaced. ‘Still, we may be through it now. Down in the forest something stirs. He’s prowling round and round a new theme, so here’s hoping.’ He raised his glass, drank, and smiled at me. ‘Do you go through this with my mother?’

  I shook my head. ‘Didn’t you know? When she’s stuck I just write them for her.’

  ‘These rarefied agonies are not for me, thank heaven,’ said Mrs Gresham. ‘So he plans to stay here till it’s finished? That could be a long time. What about you?’

  ‘Oh, that’s what he says,’ said Michael, ‘but you know what he’s like, restless as the devil, and uses up about as much energy in a day as keeps most people going for a week. We’ll no sooner get the place straight than he’ll be fretting for London again. Not that I’m grumbling. I’m all for change myself, and let’s face it, there are certain obvious lacks in this paradise of his. Or were … Well, Mother, it’s your turn. What on earth brings you to Lanzarote?’

  ‘Pirates,’ said his mother concisely.

  ‘Not Barbary Bill again? I tho
ught you killed him off at the end of Coast of the Corsairs.’

  ‘Dear boy, I can’t afford to kill off my best-selling buccaneer. Reports of his death were found to be much exaggerated.’ She set down her empty glass. ‘No, no more, thank you. It was delightful. Now, Perdita and I are staying at the hotel in Arrecife, so the next time you can get off the chain, come and have dinner. Now we’ll go. I don’t want James to come back and find us here; I know how I feel about being interrupted myself. Give him my regards and tell him he’d be welcome, too, if he feels like an evening out.’

  ‘For goodness’ sake, don’t go, he won’t mind you,’ said Michael. ‘Some interruptions he minds, and some he doesn’t. I mean it; do stay. I know he’ll be pleased to see you, and you might think of me, marooned here all this time with only the workmen and my revered employer for company! In any case, work’s over for the day … His, that is. Mine goes on.’ He gestured, not to the typewriter, but to the workmen busy along the cliff.

  ‘Good heavens,’ said his mother, apparently seeing them for the first time. ‘What are you doing over there?’

  ‘Saving money and labour. As we demolish the goat-pens or whatever they are, we carry the stones along and use them for the retaining wall.’

  ‘Will it be safe? It’s very near the edge.’

  ‘It’s safe enough where the house is, never fear. I’m not so sure about the sides of the bay, but this centre part is solid. We’re taking the retaining wall a little way along there to the right … Over that way there are one or two cracks in the surface lava, but they only go a short way down, and later eruptions obligingly filled them up with volcanic ash.’

  ‘I see,’ said his mother drily. ‘I was wondering what you’d been doing to your clothes. He interprets “assistant” pretty liberally.’

  Michael laughed. ‘I enjoy it.’

  ‘That I can see. You surely haven’t done the alterations to the house yourself?’

  ‘Oh, no, a real builder made the window, and rebuilt the main fireplace and made the kitchen usable, then he looked at the rest of the job and sold us his advice and the materials. Actually it looks as if we’re doing an awful lot, but all that we’ve done ourselves is pull down the outhouses. They were just about derelict anyway. The builder comes and takes a look at us now and again, and his lads know their stuff … Everyone on this island seems to know all there is to know about working with stone. Have you seen the way they terrace the slopes?’

  He had turned to me with the question, but before I could reply he looked quickly past me towards the house.

  ‘What is it?’ asked his mother.

  I knew already. While he had been speaking I had heard the sound of a car bucketing down the horrible little lane. Now a door slammed, rapid footsteps crossed the yard, and James Blair came round the corner of the house.

  I knew him from his photographs, of course. One’s first impression of the famous playwright was that he looked very like Beethoven. He was a smallish man with deep-set eyes, a wild bush of hair, and a quiet manner which seemed to hide immense reserves of nervous energy. His voice was deep and rather harsh, and he occasionally hung on a word in a way that suggested a stammer overcome. It was only after some time that you realised he was shy.

  He stopped dead when he saw us. Michael got to his feet. Mrs Gresham said:

  ‘Well, James!’

  James Blair’s face changed. ‘Cora Gresham! Well, well …’ He came forward and met her outstretched hand. His look of pleasure was obviously genuine. ‘Looking Mike up? He gave me away, then?’

  ‘Not a word. It’s pure accident that we came across him, believe it or not. This is one of those coincidences that nobody would believe if you or I put it into print – at least, if you did they’d say it was a subtle denial of causality, and if I did they’d say it was romantic nonsense … James, this is Perdita West, who writes all my books and protects me from the world, presumably as Mike does for you.’

  We murmured greetings, and shook hands. Mike said, grinning: ‘Let’s hope she’s a bit more efficient at it than I am, letting my mother loose on you like this. I’m sorry, James.’

  ‘From what I know of your mother, whom I esteem dearly,’ said Mr Blair, ‘Miss West’s job will mainly consist of protecting the world from her, not her from the world. Isn’t that so?’

  I laughed, shaking my head. ‘I want to keep my job.’

  ‘I’ll get you a glass,’ said Mike. He picked up the typewriter and papers to leave the fourth chair vacant for his employer, then vanished with them into the house.

  His mother glanced after him. ‘I’m told we may be going to have a new play from you?’

  ‘It may come to something. At present it’s quite hideously in embryo, all beginning and no end.’ He pulled one of the chairs forward and sat down between us. ‘But at least it has a beginning. I was on the verge of deciding I’d dried for good. You know how it is? For the last few years I’ve been lucky, one thing so to speak begetting the next as I worked, but after Tiger Tiger the vein ran out.’ He spread a broad hand on his knee, regarded it for a moment, then looked up at Mrs Gresham with simplicity. ‘It never happened before, and it frightened me to death.’

  ‘It was probably just the flu.’ Her tone was not unsympathetic, merely matter-of-fact, and it must have touched some common chord of understanding, because he laughed, relaxing back in his chair and stretching his legs in front of him.

  ‘Probably. If so, it wasn’t such an ill wind for me after all – it blew me to Lanzarote to recuperate, and so found me this house, and my story.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  He turned the hand, palm up. ‘The story belongs here. Actually here, to this house. Something that happened here.’

  ‘Then you’ve robbed me twice over,’ said Mrs Gresham.

  ‘Robbed you?’

  ‘Certainly. That’s why we’re here. I’d no idea this was your house, or that my son was here. Perdita and I simply came down to look at the beach, found we couldn’t go any further, and drove into your yard to turn. Thereupon I fell in love with the house and sent her along to find out who owned it, and if there was anything to be done about buying it. She ran across Michael, who was un-cooperative, and would have got rid of her in double-quick time if it hadn’t turned out that I was his long-lost mother. So you see you have robbed me, first of the house, which I envy you bitterly, and now apparently of a story, too. If I had only got here first I would have fallen heir to both.’

  He laughed. ‘I’m very sorry.’

  ‘Well, there’s a divinity that shapes our ends. No doubt the story, whatever it is, will come off rather better as the new James Blair than as the latest adventure of Sockeye the Salmon or the Teenage Pirates. Those,’ added my employer modestly, ‘are two of the world-beaters I am currently engaged with. I can’t expect you to know.’

  ‘I was brought up on Beatrix Potter,’ said Mr Blair, ‘and if I were forty years younger I’d be an ardent fan of Sockeye the Salmon.’

  ‘Aren’t you nice? I suppose we’re not allowed to know this story? I’m afraid I couldn’t help seeing the title, but don’t worry, silent as the grave, and of course Perdita is, too. At least tell us where it comes from? I thought the “small isles” were the Hebrides?’

  ‘Not this time.’ This from Mike, coming out of the house with a glass and another bottle. ‘It’s just a phrase we used translating from the Spanish.’ He spoke a phrase in that language. ‘That just literally means the wind from the little islands – in this case the islands off the north cape, Allegranza, Graciosa and the rest. If you’ve been that way you’ve probably seen them. James?’

  ‘Thank you.’ Mr Blair took the glass. ‘Yes, I suppose the phrase “the small isles” suggested itself because it was familiar, though heaven help us, we might be on a different planet here.’ He sipped the wine absently, both hands cupping the cool glass, his gaze slowly travelling over the green bubbles of cactus, the black basalt, the glittering sea, the cloudless b
lue, focussed seemingly not on them or beyond them but on some sharp point of light thrown by them inward into himself, as by a burning-glass. But his voice was ordinary, even faintly apologetic. ‘The story … As a matter of fact, it’s hardly a story at all, and what there is of it is so ordinary, so much the classic cliché of a love story, that told baldly like this it hardly bears repeating. But there’s something there, if one could find the treatment.’

  We all sat watching him. I thought to myself, there’s always something there, if one can find the treatment. The same old material, the same old line, the same old setting – all that counts is the quality of the mind that processes them. And this was the man – I looked up suddenly and caught Mike Gresham watching me. His eyes flickered and he looked away quickly.

  ‘And I can’t even pretend there was anything exciting or dramatic about the way I found the material,’ James Blair was saying. ‘I suppose you’d gather that this used to be a small farm. It was a rather specialised kind of farm, Lanzarote style … As you can see, there’s nothing in the way of arable, or grazing for anything except goats. It was a cochineal farm.’

  ‘A cochineal farm?’ I exclaimed.

  He smiled. ‘It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? About as ridiculous as a silk-worm farm, only a cochineal farm is far less picturesque. You see those great slopes of prickly pear behind the house? That doesn’t just grow there by chance, it’s been deliberately planted, because it’s the host to the insect from which you get cochineal. It used to be one of the main industries of Lanzarote, but with the introduction of aniline dyes the bottom dropped out of the cochineal market, and the farms which relied simply on the one product went out of business, this one among them. There’s a limit to what can be done with land of this type. This has been nothing but what you might call a small run-down steading now for years, so when the last owner died the farm was put up for sale – very cheaply. The owner was the last of the family who’d lived at Playa Blanca for a couple of hundred years, and the place was sold just as it stood, furniture and all. There was nothing of any particular value, but it’s real Canary Islands stuff and it suits the place and I find it attractive.’