The Snow Gypsy(26)
He set her down among the throng of sandy-limbed people preparing to follow Saint Sara up the beach. Gunesh, who had clambered out after them, shook himself violently, spraying Cristóbal all over.
He spluttered and laughed. “Good job! I’m already wet!” She melted inside as he took her hand. “Shall we finish the pilgrimage? I’m going to need all the blessings I can get to stand a chance in that competition tonight.”
Rose looked around, suddenly uncomfortable at the thought of Nieve seeing what had happened in the sea. “Where’s Lola?”
“She’s gone back,” Cristóbal replied. “Nieve has a new dress—she didn’t want to get it wet.” He rolled his eyes.
Drum beats echoed across the sand, and the crowd pressed in around them. Soon they were being jostled along, away from the sea and back toward the village. Rose could hear the distant peal of church bells above the cacophony of sound around her. No wonder she hadn’t spotted Jean among the pilgrims—he must have stayed behind to ring out the saint’s return to the shrine.
It was a relief to know that he hadn’t seen her kissing Cristóbal. It would have made her seem like a liar after her flat denial that there was anything between them. And she didn’t want to hurt Jean by flaunting this newfound . . . She pulled herself up short. What was it, exactly? The warmth of Cristóbal’s hand on her skin sent pulses of desire shooting through her body. In the wild, joyful fever of the fiesta, it seemed like the most natural thing in the world to give in to what she was feeling. But should she even contemplate giving herself to a man she’d known for less than twenty-four hours? A man who would be gone for good when the celebrations ended? This wasn’t what she was here for. She should be making plans for the journey ahead—looking at maps, consulting train timetables, working out how to get to the place that Lola had put a name to.
The procession came to a sudden halt. They were in the village square, shaded from the baking sun by the great edifice of the church. Rose’s skirt, still damp from the sea, hung limply around her legs. She shivered as the bishop raised his hand in the final act of blessing.
“I’d better go and change out of these clothes,” she said, breaking away from Cristóbal as the wooden statue disappeared through the doors of the church.
He gave her a lingering look, as if he was about to offer to help her out of them. But he said nothing.
“I suppose you have to get ready for the competition?” She heard herself trying to sound brisk and matter of fact.
He nodded. The change in his expression was subtle, almost imperceptible. “It’s not for a couple of hours yet. Why don’t you come and eat with us—when you’ve changed? There’s a special meal—seafood paella—do you like that?”
“I’ve never had it—it sounds delicious.” Rose smiled, surprised by how hungry she felt. There was nothing wrong with a last meal with all three of them, was there? It would give her a chance to thank Lola and say goodbye. “I’ll have to pack first, though,” she said. “The bus leaves for Arles at four o’clock.”
“You’re not going already?” He spread his hands, palms to the sky. “What difference will another day make? You can’t miss tonight—there’s going to be a wedding after the competition: music and dancing all night.”
“I . . .” She felt her resolve melt away in the white heat of his gaze.
Chapter 10
Lola sat on a threadbare cushion at the edge of the wagon, watching a woman with no teeth throwing mussels into the cauldron of paella. Sitting cross-legged on the hard ground, this matriarch of the Granada clan was cleaning the shells with a knife, which she occasionally wiped on an apron stained red and orange from the paprika and cayenne pepper that had already gone into the pot. Another woman of a similar age was stirring the mixture, her sleeves rolled up to reveal arms as brown and sinewy as tree roots in a dried-up riverbed.
The smell of the raw seafood made Lola want to gag. She was the only woman in the group who had not played some part in preparing the coming feast. Others had peeled the onions and garlic, chopped tomatoes and peppers, gone to the harbor to bargain with the fishermen for prawns and mussels and squid. Lola had learned from bitter experience that it was pointless to offer to help. They didn’t want her. She was regarded as an outsider—not just because she lived in a house rather than a vardo, but because she wanted no husband.
Every single Gypsy family from the Granada area had a male relative who, during the past five or six years, had come forward with a proposal of marriage. But Lola had rejected them all. She hadn’t realized how much the women despised her for it. But they had made their feelings plain on the journey to France. However much she tried, however well she danced, she was tolerated but not wanted.
She sometimes caught these women watching Nieve—waiting for her to misbehave, get food down her clothes, or any other kind of evidence of Lola’s shortcomings as a substitute mother. Lola could just imagine what they were saying behind her back. That someone in her position should be grateful to any man who offered marriage; that she had no right to be so fussy; that the child was most likely hers—not adopted but conceived out of wedlock. In Granada she had learned to close her ears to such talk, to ignore the sidelong looks and the upturned noses. But on the road, it had not been so easy.