Michael Pearce - A dead man of Barcelona

‘I am sorry, I am sorry. They caught me just as I was leaving the office and said that something had come through about that spoiled cargo.’

‘Abou has been helping me on the business side,’ said Senora Lockhart, ‘ever since-’

‘You don’t need help, really,’ said Abou.

‘Not now, perhaps,’ said Senora Lockhart, ‘but at first-’

‘I couldn’t leave you on your own,’ said Abou. ‘It wouldn’t be right. What is a brother for?’

‘He had come over from Algiers just before,’ said Senora Lockhart. ‘Just for a short visit. But then he decided to stay.’

‘I couldn’t do anything else, could I? Not with you left alone.’

‘Ah, family, family!’ said Senora Lockhart. She put her hand on her brother’s arm. ‘But I am glad you did stay,’ she said softly.

‘And now she wants to get rid of me!’

‘No, no!’ laughed Senora Lockhart.

‘Send me back to Algiers.’

‘You are needed there, too. And, anyway, you suggested it. We agreed to divide the management,’ she said to Seymour. ‘He would look after the marine side while I concentrated on the financial side.’

‘It is better like that,’ Abou said. ‘It is harder to accept a woman in Algeria than it is in Spain.’

‘This is Senor Seymour,’ said Senora Lockhart. ‘He is a policeman. And he has come out from London to look into Lockhart’s death.’

‘Really?’ said Abou, surprised. ‘From England?’ Then he laughed. ‘England doesn’t think the Spanish police are up to it?’

‘No, no-’

‘Nor do I,’ he said drily. ‘Well, I hope you get somewhere. It hangs over us, it hangs over us. Among my people these things cannot be left. They have to be resolved, one way or another. I wish you success.’

He shook hands and started off up the stairs. As he did so he appeared to register, for the first time, Chantale’s presence.

‘Senora! I beg your pardon.’

He gave her a little, quick, formal, Spanish bow.

‘Mademoiselle de Lissac,’ said Senora Lockhart.

‘A thousand pardons, Mademoiselle.’

He seemed to see her properly for the first time. And then there was the start back that Seymour had become used to.

‘Mademoiselle…’ he said, slightly puzzled, looking at his sister.

‘Mademoiselle de Lissac is from Tangier,’ she said.

‘Ah! You are, perhaps,’ he said hesitantly, ‘a friend of Senor Lockhart’s?’

‘No,’ said Senora Lockhart firmly.

To his surprise, that afternoon he saw someone he recognized at the Pension Francia. It was Nina, the anarchist schoolteacher. At first he thought he must be mistaken. Wasn’t this term-time and wouldn’t Nina have been at her school on the other side of Spain? But, no, it definitely was her, and Chantale confirmed it.

She was with an older lady and they were standing at the other end of the corridor. A moment later they disappeared into a room.

He hesitated, and then went along the corridor. The door of the room was open and he looked inside. It led into a small sitting room, one reserved for the use of guests. He hesitated again and then went in.

Nina and the older lady were sitting together on a sofa. They obviously knew each other well: but there was clearly a tension between them. It was almost as if Nina was glowering at the other woman. Certainly the relationship seemed prickly, but then, thought Seymour, that could well have been true of most of Nina’s relationships with people.

She looked up in surprise when he and Chantale came in and gave them, if not, perhaps, a welcoming smile, at least an indication of recognition.

‘Senor-’

‘Senorita!’

‘And Senora!’ said Nina, looking at Chantale. Wrongly, because Chantale was still a senorita; unless being slightly older than Nina entitled her to extra respect.

She turned to the woman sitting beside her. ‘These are friends who came to the school.’

‘Ah, yes?’ said the lady.

‘And this is my mother.’

‘Your mother?’ said Seymour, slightly surprised; slightly surprised, in fact, that Nina had a mother, or was prepared to acknowledge one. But if she was her mother that probably accounted for the tension.

‘ Si. I am visiting her.’

‘I expect you don’t often get a chance to see your daughter, Senora, with her living in Barcelona.’

‘Once or twice a year,’ said the woman. ‘Which is not nearly enough.’

Nina gave a sort of petulant shrug.

‘And you, Senor?’ said the mother. ‘You are not from Spain, I think?’

‘From England,’ said Nina. ‘He is a policeman. He has come out to investigate Lockhart’s death.’

Her mother seemed to flinch.

‘My mother knew Lockhart,’ said Nina.

‘Did you, Senora?’

‘Yes,’ she said, unwillingly. ‘Yes. I have known him for a long time. Ever since he came over to Spain, in fact. From when he first came to Gibraltar.’

‘He was very good to my mother when my father died,’ said Nina.

‘Yes,’ said her mother; again, almost reluctantly.

‘My father was in the Spanish Customs Office. Here in Gibraltar. And Lockhart and he were great friends.’

‘Yes,’ said her mother.

‘It was hard for her when my father died. Especially at first, before the pension came through. He paid the rent, and other things.’

‘Yes,’ said her mother. ‘He was always generous in that way.’

‘And took an interest in me as I grew up. He was a sort of — godfather? Is that the right word?’

‘Yes, I think so,’ said Seymour.

‘He was the only one who was kind to me at the convent.’

‘Nina!’ protested her mother. ‘That is not true!’

‘It is!’ said Nina fiercely. ‘The nuns were horrible old women, and I hated them!’

‘Nina-’

‘Well, it’s true!’ Nina insisted. ‘They used to beat me.’

‘Nina-’

“They liked it, I think.’

‘Nina, that is not true. They may have seemed hard, been a little hard to you, but you were unruly and perhaps sometimes you deserved it.’

‘I always said that when I grew up, I would fight them,’ said Nina. ‘And I have.’

Her mother gave a little, despairing shrug. ‘It is wrong to bear hatred in your heart, Nina.’

‘It is better to bear hatred than to let them do what they want with you!’

Her mother shrugged again, but looked sad. This was probably familiar ground to her.

‘And, perhaps your school, as opposed to their school, was a way of fighting back?’ suggested Seymour.

Nina beamed.

‘That is precisely so!’ she said.

‘And was that why Lockhart helped the school? Gave money to start it and support it?’

‘Yes, for me, yes. And because he wanted children to be free.’

‘He should have wanted them to be good,’ said her mother.

‘Good, yes, perhaps,’ said Nina. ‘But free first!’

‘Anyway, it was right that he came to see you at the convent,’ said her mother.

‘It was, yes. Otherwise I think I might have died.’

‘Nina-’

‘Killed myself.’

‘Nina, Nina! That would be a sin!’

‘I wanted to sometimes. There was no escape. Either from them or from the place. I felt suffocated. For years I seemed to live in endless darkness.’

‘It was, perhaps, a mistake to send you to that one,’ her mother admitted. ‘I should have chosen another. Where it was less harsh. But at the time-’

Nina put her hand on her mother’s arm.

‘I understand that,’ she said, with awkward tenderness, ‘but-’

‘I am glad that at any rate he came to see you.’

‘He was a candle in the darkness,’ said Nina. “The only ray of light!’