The Snow Gypsy(3)

When Rose had kissed him goodbye, she had made herself smile. They had joked about the presents he would bring home. He had promised to buy her castanets so she could learn to dance like a Gypsy.

Over the next two years, there had been a handful of letters, the last one—the one she had in her pocket—was dated March 14, 1938. Then months had gone by with no word from him. When two years had elapsed with no contact from Nathan, their father had set out in search of him. But neither of them had returned. Rose glanced out the train window at a blur of fields and trees. She had promised herself she wouldn’t cry. But the faces were always there, behind her eyes. Her father, her mother, and Nathan.

That summer morning when he came to say goodbye seemed like another lifetime. She had loved living alone, happy and free, when she had had a family. How hollow that freedom felt now.

Where are you going, Rose?

Her mother’s voice echoed through her head. Standing by the door, her bag packed, Rose had been about to set off in search of her brother. Numb with grief at the death of her father, she felt impelled to follow the trail that he had taken. But she had been hopelessly naive. It was the summer of 1940. Hitler’s army had already taken France.

Where are you going?

Six years on, the truth was she didn’t know. But she was on her way to find the one person who could point the way.





Chapter 3

Spain: May 2, 1946

In a tavern in the shadow of the Alhambra palace, Lola Aragon lifted her arms above her head. When they could go no higher, she turned the backs of her wrists together, twisting long brown fingers into miniature antlers.

Her eyes were as black as poppy seeds in the glimmering lamplight. She glanced at Cristóbal, who stretched a long-nailed thumb over the strings of his guitar. The three children sitting beside him were watching for the signal. Without even looking at each other, they began clapping out a fast staccato beat. Nieve, the youngest, had hands no bigger than hens’ eggs, but she clapped as if the rhythm were a secret language she’d learned in the womb.

Lola moved across the room, her body as slender as esparto grass in a tight-fitting green dress and a shawl the vivid scarlet of pomegranate flowers. Her long dark hair was coiled at the nape of her neck, adorned with sprigs of white jasmine. She snaked her arms, head erect, hips swaying while her feet bombarded the wooden floor.

The people gathered in the tavern had been passing the wine around since the sun had dropped below the terracotta walls of the palace. But they were not too drunk to recognize star quality. Some clapped along with the children, shouting “?Olé!” as each sequence ended. Others just watched, spellbound, their drinks forgotten. There was one man in particular. He followed her with hungry eyes. She could feel them even when she had her back to him.

At the end of the second fandango, the tempo changed. Cristóbal let out the first mournful notes of the cante jondo. The deep song. Tortured and passionate, he sang as if blood, not music, were coming from his mouth. Lola’s dancing echoed the melancholy sound. Her body told a story of betrayal and lost love. She moved like someone possessed.

When the applause died down, she slipped out the back door to get changed, then hurried back to take the children out into the palace gardens for a late-night picnic of lemonade, cherries, bread, and goat cheese. They sat on blankets under a hazy crescent moon, listening to the crickets making music. Far below them dogs were barking on the banks of the Darro River. The children pinched their noses when the whiff of tainted water drifted up on the breeze.

“It was good tonight.” Cristóbal squeezed her arm when he came to join them. “Antonio Lopez couldn’t take his eyes off you. He came to talk to me while you were getting changed.”

“Please don’t tell me it was about marriage again!”

Cristóbal gave a helpless shrug. “What was I supposed to say? He’s not a bad man. He has half a dozen mules and a shed full of chickens. You’d never go hungry.”

“I never go hungry now!” Lola bit into a cherry and spat out the stone.

“But wouldn’t you like a child of your own one day?” He glanced at Nieve, who had fallen asleep on a blanket, one hand still clutching a hunk of bread.

Lola shook her head. “I have a daughter.” She reached across to stroke Nieve’s hair. “And I have you and Juanita and your kids—that’s all the family I need.” She tossed the bag of cherries into his lap. “And how could I dance if I was pregnant? It’s taken me years to get this far. You know how hard I have to practice. If I stopped for even just a week or two, I’d lose all the energy. Imagine what would happen if I had a baby to look after . . .” She glanced back at him. “Remember, I know what it’s like.”

“I do understand.” He picked out a cherry and studied it for a moment before popping it in his mouth. “But it’s not normal for a woman to be without a man.”

“Says you!” Lola huffed. “I’ve never met a man I liked well enough to want to get married. Not here in Granada or back home.”

“Well, Antonio asked me to ask you again. I think he’s worried you’re going to come back from Provence with some French troubadour for a husband.”

Lola threw a cherry stone at him. It bounced off his nose and landed in the jug of lemonade. It was eight days until they were due to set off for France, and she couldn’t wait. Quite apart from the excitement of performing at the biggest Gypsy fiesta in Europe, it would be pure bliss to escape from all the people who—like Antonio Lopez—kept telling her that a girl of her age had better get married before it was too late.