Disappeared: MANTEQUERO BOOK 2 (6 page)

“When did you go shopping?”
“I knew you were going to have to eat something, so I left you with Johan and went to the minimarket in Orgiva.”

Alison had a vague recollection of sitting at a café table with a tall man with grey hair who kept trying to feed her sardines, or maybe it was anchovies.

“Didn’t we eat at the bar?” she mumbled.

“I did. And Johan did. But you refused to eat anything. They were really nice tapas too.” She smiled reflectively. “And they were free here, too. I thought you said it was only in Granada.”

“Granada
Province
,” Alison said, thickly. “Not just the city.”
“Oh, right,” Heather said, cutting herself a generous chunk of bread, lathering it with margarine and adding a healthy portion of cheese. “Brilliant.”

****

When she woke up the first thing she saw were pink mountains. Not an alcohol-induced hallucination, she decided, but the dawn light.

“Oh my God!” she cried, sitting up in bed. “I must have slept right through. I’ve wasted a whole day.”
The door opened a crack and Heather’s face appeared. “It’s all right,” she said. “It’s only seven o’clock. In the
evening,
” she added. “I’m making coffee. Do you want some?”
The smell of real coffee came floating up the stairs. “Oh yes, please,” Alison cried, leaping out of bed, surprised to find she was still wearing the clothes she had travelled in.

On reflection, she was also surprised to find she felt neither drunk nor hung-over.

“I feel all right,” she said, over a mug of steaming coffee.

“Hangover preventative,” Heather said. “One of the many benefits of living with an alcoholic. You learn how to deal with its effects.”
“You live with an alcoholic?” Alison suddenly realised she knew nothing about Heather’s private life.

“Used to. He’s dead now. Alcoholic liver.” Heather smiled. “He died happy, though.”

“How awful for you,” Alison said.

“Awful that he was an alcoholic, or awful that he died?”

“Well, I meant the alcoholic bit really, but of course, both things are awful.”

“Yeah,” Heather said, taking a sip of her coffee and following it up with some sort of cake. “It was hard work while it lasted, but it didn’t last very long, and when he died I was devastated.” A slow tear trickled down her cheek.

“I’m so sorry:” Alison leaned over and gave her friend an impulsive hug.

“I didn’t used to be this fat.” Heather looked down at her enormous tummy, hardly disguised at all by the loose top she was wearing. “Comfort eating. Only, after a while it doesn’t feel very comfortable.”

She wiped her eyes on the back of her hand and picked up another cake. “I just can’t seem to get out of the habit somehow.”

“Come on,” Alison said, draining her coffee cup and standing up from the table. “Let’s put our glad rags on and hit the town.”

Heather gave her a wan smile.

****

It was cold outside now the sun had gone down and they wrapped themselves in fleeces before tottering down the uneven cobbled street to the plaza. The door to the bar stood wide open, despite the chill of the evening and what few customers there were were wearing heavy overcoats and clustered round a wood burning stove in the corner, playing dominoes.

There was a huge man behind the bar. He would have been tall for an Englishman. For a Spaniard he was a giant. He turned, with the beginning of a smile on his face, and then his expression changed as he saw who was coming in. The people gathered round the stove all turned at once and stared at the two girls. A feeling of hostility fairly radiated off them.
Alison understood completely Johan’s Wild West analogy. She felt Heather stiffen beside her. Then she plastered a smile on her face and marched up to the bar.

“Hello,” she said. “I’m Alison and this is my friend Heather. We’re from England.” All eyes swivelled to Heather and seemed, if anything, to become even more unfriendly. One old chap actually made the sign to ward off the evil eye.

Undeterred, Alison beamed at them, then turned her attention back to the enormous barman. “Two glasses of house red, please.”
The barman nodded and turned to get the glasses. The old men round the stove were still mumbling. Alison strained to hear what they were saying, but the only snippet she could pick up was, “The fat one should not have come. She will call him.”

Call who?
Hadn’t Johan said something about the Englishwoman calling him? She couldn’t remember exactly what he’d said. Something about a grocer. She’d meant to look it up and forgot.

The girls took their drinks to a table as near the stove as they could get and engaged in idle chatter whilst Alison tried to listen to the conversation at the next table.

“What are they saying?” Heather whispered.

“Nothing I can understand,” Alison lied. It didn’t seem very politic to repeat what she’d heard about the fat one. “Just keep chattering away and I’ll try and tune in.”

It was easier than she had thought. The accent wasn’t that difficult, once you got your ear in. At first they said very little as they continued their game of dominoes. There were occasional cries of, “Oh, no, I didn’t see that coming”, “Can’t follow that”, “You sly bastard. I know what you’re up to.”  Exactly the same, in fact, as the listening to old men playing dominoes in an English pub.

The barman came over with a plate of tapas – pickled anchovies and olives with slices of bread. “Thank you,” said Alison, giving him her sweetest smile. He almost smiled back, but caught himself just in time.
He’s a natural smiler,
Alison thought,
a nice, friendly man. He’s just really worried about something. Or afraid. I think he’s afraid.

The conversation at the next table was beginning to get interesting and she found she could understand most of it.

“I told him to make sure he locked all the doors and windows and not to invite anyone in, even if he knows them.”
“That’s not true about he has to be invited. My granny told me about her sister who was got by the grocer and she never invited him. He just came.”

The word he used for grocer was ‘mantequero’ which meant someone who purveyed fat. As he said it, she heard a distant penny drop.
I’ve come across this in a different context.
But whatever it was, she couldn’t remember it and she went back to concentrating on what they were saying.
Heather was being very patient. Alison wanted to translate for her, but she was afraid she might miss something whilst she was doing so.

“He likes the fat ones, that’s what they say, and by God that woman was fat. I’ve never seen anyone that fat in my life before.”

“My aunt Carmen was nearly as fat,” one of them remarked. “and he never came for her.”

“Yes, but she was very old and stank of wee. Even the mantequero would be put off.”

There was an outburst of laughter and Alison found herself joining in. It stopped immediately and they turned to stare at her.

“I also had a very fat aunt who stank of wee,” she said. This was only partly true. Her aunt hadn’t been
very
fat. “It was worse when she sat by the fire.”

At this they all burst out laughing again, Alison included.

Unable to contain herself any longer, Heather grabbed Alison’s arm. “What did you say?” she demanded.

This time Alison did stop to interpret and Heather laughed as well. The old man with the fat aunt lifted his hand to the barman and ordered more drinks. When they came there was more wine for Alison and Heather as well. And more tapas. In no time the conversation had turned to searching questions about the girls. Where did they live? How old were they? What did they do for a living? Why had they chosen to visit their village in February?

Alison answered as best she could, except for the last one, of course. She said it was a holiday for schools in England and she felt she needed to brush up on her Spanish.

After a while, the barman, who was called Rafa, Alison discovered, came to join them, bringing with him a whole carafe of wine and a huge plate of bread, cheese and ham, which Heather attacked with gusto.

The evening began to settle into an atmosphere of almost maudlin’ bonhomie - one old chap leapt to his feet and burst into a particularly mournful flamenco song and the rest clapped and stamped their feet. Alison joined in with the rest of them, although she wasn’t particularly fond of flamenco singing, preferring the guitar playing and dancing.

It was several hours later when somebody said he’d better be going and that seemed to act as a signal for the rest of them. People reluctantly scraped their chairs away from the table and got up to leave, pulling their coat collars up against the cold night air.

“Wait a minute,” Rafa said, “Who is going to the top barrio? You, José, and you, Paco. You’d better walk these girls home.”

“No, really, we’re all right,” Alison protested, but Rafa silenced her. “Nobody is all right,” he said, “and especially not your fat friend. Get her indoors and make sure you lock all the windows and doors. And do not open them for anyone,
anyone at all,
until the sun comes up.”

Alison felt a thrill of fear.
These are just superstitious peasants,
she told herself.
There’s nothing to be afraid of.
But, even so, as they walked back up the street, accompanied by the reluctant José and Paco, she found herself looking over her shoulder all the time and seeing things in the shadows. There was very little street lighting and it was easy to imagine things flitting about just on the edge of her vision. Twice she thought she saw a young man with a wide-brimmed hat, carrying a bag. But when she looked again there was nothing there.

She kept hearing things as well. A man’s voice calling, “Juno, where are you? Beautiful, my beautiful goddess, where are you?”

And over and over again, “Beautiful, so beautiful.”

She was glad when they got to the house and she bid goodnight to their reluctant chaperones and closed the door on the disturbing night.

IV

Alison slept fitfully. She kept thinking she could hear someone scrabbling at the window and once or twice she was convinced she saw a face peering in.
It’s my imagination,
she told herself -
a tree outside with its branches rubbing against the glass. Moonlight in the branches forming a pattern that looks like a face.
But she didn’t – quite – believe it.

The older part of her brain, the part that knew nothing of logic, knew there was someone out there trying to get in - someone scratching on the window-pane. And, right on the edge of her hearing, she could hear a voice calling, “Let me in, Juno. Let me in.”

By the small hours she had reached such a state of panic that she was ready to run from the room. She lay on the bed, filled with pent-up energy and fired up ready to go. She had a vivid memory of lying in her room as a child, knowing that something was under the bed and that if she could just get to her parents’ room she would be safe. But it was a long way across to the bedroom door and it would catch her before she could escape.

She felt like that now. If she could just get to Heather’s room, be with another human being, everything would be all right.

She tried to persuade herself that she stayed where she was because of her iron will and strength of character, but really it was because she suspected that whatever it was out there had already got into the room, was waiting for her to move, waiting to pounce.

When she finally slept, it was to dream of running down dark, cobbled, twisting streets, pursued by a man wearing a big hat, calling after her. “Hello, Beautiful. Hola, Guapa.”

Waking to a gloriously sunny day, she felt vaguely ridiculous. She had allowed the old men in the bar to spook her with their silly superstitions. What was the matter with her? “Grow up, Alison,” she told herself in her sternest teacher’s voice. “Get a grip.”

Flinging off the covers, she went over to the window, opened it wide and breathed in the wonderful mountain air. She looked down below the balcony at the dizzying drop to the ravine below. The house was built right on the edge! She hadn’t noticed that yesterday. Feeling slightly vertiginous, she withdrew her head. Well, so much for something scratching at her window. Nothing could get up this high. This was followed closely by the troubling thought that there were no trees either. No branches to brush across the glass or cast face-like shadows.

Pulling on her dressing gown, she slipped across the corridor and knocked on Heather’s door. “Are you awake? It’s a beautiful day out there.” A sleepy voice said, “Come in.”

She pushed the door open. Heather had her back to her - a vast bulk under the covers.

“Come on, wake up,” Alison cried, going over and giving her a shake. “Seize the day!”

Heather rolled over and stretched. “God, I had the most amazing dream. I dreamt I saw a face at the window, a beautiful young man, and he was calling to me - Let me in - over and over again. So I got up and opened the window and he took me in his arms and kissed me. And I was so slim, Alison. Just like I used to be before – you know.” Her face was flushed with happiness.

Alison felt her eyes being drawn to the balcony window. The curtains were fluttering in the slight morning breeze.

“Your window’s open.”

Heather sat up in bed and stared at the window. “How odd! I could have sworn I locked it last night.”

So could Alison. After Rafa’s admonitions the night before and the spooky walk up to the house, she had become so paranoid she’d checked every single door and window in the
house, including the tiny bathroom windows and the little vent in the boiler room, before she went to bed.

She remained staring at it a little while, fighting down the panicky feeling that seemed to be taking her over.
She must have done it before she got into bed,
she told herself
, after I’d already locked it -
and then she forgot.

She walked over to the balcony and looked down. Not on a precipice on this side, but still quite a climb. Maybe not too difficult for a young, fit man though.
What was she thinking!
The whole idea was preposterous.

“Come on,” she said. “Get up. I’ll put the coffee on and then we can explore the village.”

****

Actually, they didn’t get out till nearly an hour later. Heather insisted on having a huge English breakfast. Alison just had a piece of toast. Watching Heather eat was making her lose her appetite.

But they got out at last and walked two streets over to the street where Miss Blacker had stayed. This wasn’t as easy as you might think. All the streets went up and down, rather than from side to side and to get to a parallel street you had to go down steps or through narrow alleys which came out in unexpected places. But at last Heather announced they were in the right street and they climbed back up to the top.

“It would have been quicker to go down to the plaza and then back up,” Heather said, pu
lling at her trousers which kept slipping down as she walked.

“Well never mind,” said Alison, smiling at her. “We’re here now, and I rather enjoyed seeing all those little secret nooks and crannies, didn’t you?”
“I did rather.”

The last house was in a similar position to the one they were staying in, right at the top of the street, clinging to the edge of the precipice. This house, however, was tiny compared to theirs. It had two storeys and, Alison guessed, just one room on each floor. Oddly, the front door was decorated with flowers and there was a large red cross painted on it.

“Whatever do you think that means?” Heather demanded, as Alison went up to the door to examine it more closely.

“God knows. It’s reminiscent of the plague, isn’t it?”

“Do you think June got something infectious and they locked her in there to quarantine her? Maybe she’s still there.” Raising her voice, she shouted, “June, are you in there? June?”

A door on the balcony of the next house flew open and a small dark woman shot out and began screaming something in rapid Andalusian Spanish.

“What is she saying?” Heather whispered.

“She said, ‘What do you think you’re doing? Can’t you see the sign on the door? This place is cursed.’ Sorry, didn’t get the next bit. Then ‘Go away- Go on – shoo!’ I think she means business.”

The woman disappeared and a moment later emerged from the front door brandishing a broom. She bore down upon the two girls, making wild, sweeping movements and the two turned tail and fled down the street to the plaza.

“Bloody hell,” Heather said, taking a large gulp from a glass of lager. “I thought she was going to beat us to a pulp.”
Alison was still laughing at the sight of her friend’s ignominious flight – huge legs wobbling and loose top flapping in the breeze of her own passage, stopping every so often to hoist up her trousers, which seemed determined to fall down.

“We could have taken her on, no trouble,” she said, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “She just took us by surprise, that’s all – Bloody hell!” She stopped, her eyes wide, as she suddenly remembered. “Mantequero. She said the house had been cursed by the Mantequero. And I’ve just remembered where I’ve seen it before.”

Heather put down her glass and gave Alison her full attention.

“Have you ever read the books by Gerald Brennan?” Heather shook her head. “Well, he was an Englishman who came to live in Spain after the First World War. He lived near here, as it happens, in Bubión. And he had lots of aristocratic arty-farty types coming to visit him. People like Virginia Woolf. Anyway, one of his cronies wandered off by himself one day and nearly got himself killed by a bunch of peasants who thought he was a mantequero, which was a creature
that sucked the fat from your bones
.” She said this last bit in an urgent whisper. “That’s what it is. That’s what they’re on about. Not a grocer at all. It’s a kind of – well – vampire.”

Heather, who had been listening in fascination, cracked out laughing. “It’s a bogeyman. Bloody hell, I wouldn’t have thought anyone would have believed anything like that in this day and age.”

“But something must have happened,” Alison insisted. “Something must have happened to make them think it was the mantequero. And it must have had something to do with Miss Blacker.”

She fell silent, thinking of the house at the top of the hill, decorated with flowers, like the scene of a murder or a fatal accident. And that huge red cross painted on the door, marking it as a plague house.

“Oh Heather, I’m really afraid someone may have killed her and they thought it was the mantequero.”

“Rubbish,” Heather said cheerfully.
“She probably got some bug that made her lose a lot of weight and they thought it was this bogeyman chap who sucks your fat off, and they sealed up the house to stop him getting back in. Christ, she might still be in there. Still recovering,”

Alison gave her a withering look. “What, after six weeks? I don’t think so.”
Unabashed, Heather went on. We should try to get in and see whether she’s there.”

“What? What do you mean - break in?”

Heather shifted uncomfortably on her seat. “Well, not break in, exactly. Just, you know, have a look around, see if there’s a window open or a door round the back.”

“And break in,” Alison finished for her. “There won’t be, anyway. It’s not possible to break into a Spanish house. Look at them. All the windows have iron grills. And I can tell you now” - she was waving her hand wildly about and Heather, afraid she would knock the glasses over, leaned forward and grabbed them – “all these houses only have one door. The back is built into the mountain. I lived in one just like that in Granada. If you locked yourself out you either had to wait for someone with a key to turn up or call the locksmith.”
“There’s a balcony, though, isn’t there?” Heather said, looking back up the street. “You could climb onto the balcony and get through the window.”

“What? Me? I can’t believe you’re saying this. I’m a teacher for God’s sake. I can’t go around housebreaking. And what about the nosy neighbour? Do you think we’d get away with climbing up the front of the house without her raising the alarm? It’s insane.”
“I just thought” –

“Well, you can think again. You want to break in, you do it yourself. I’m having nothing to do with it.”
They relapsed into sullen silence just as a large ginger cat strolled into the square. Alison felt a sudden overwhelming longing for Jessica.
Will she remember me when I get back?
she wondered miserably.

Then, just when she was feeling at her lowest ebb, she had a sudden image of the enormous Heather shinning up a drainpipe and started laughing again. Heather joined in.

“You’re right,” she said. “I’m an idiot. There won’t be anything there worth seeing anyway. We’d do much better chatting up the old geezers in the bar. Come on, let’s get some lunch.”

She stood up, tugging at her trousers again. “I don’t know what’s the matter with these. The elastic must have gone.”

****

That evening, they once more repaired to the bar. It looked exactly the same as before, the door wide open to the elements, the old men hunched round the stove, playing
dominoes. But this time when they walked in, Rafa greeted them with a smile and the old men gave them curt nods of greeting.

“Same again?” said Rafa.

This time the girls joined in the game of dominoes and Heather, to the surprise and delight of the old boys, demonstrated an unexpected flair for the game. There were cries of ‘Olé’ and ‘Bravo’ as she triumphantly laid down the winning domino for the second time. “Where did you learn that?” Alison demanded. Heather shrugged. “I’ve never played it before. It just seems sort of obvious. Maybe it’s beginner’s luck.”

As it turned out it wasn’t
that
lucky. The winner was expected to buy a celebratory drink. Alison narrowed her eyes. Maybe they were letting her win? But that was uncharitable. She was sure they were not so devious as that.

Eventually the conversation veered round to the mantequero again and Alison strained to concentrate on what they were saying, which had a disastrous effect on her game.

“Paco Cubano said he heard him calling again, but he didn’t try to get in.”

One of the other old men, the one who had made the sign of the evil eye the night before, said, “I didn’t hear anything.”

“Well, you’re deaf, aren’t you, and anyway, it was at the other end of the village. Up the top end.” Alison tried to catch Heather’s eye, but she was selecting the next domino, blithely unaware of the turn the conversation had taken.

“Near us?” she asked, unable to keep the nervous quaver out of her voice.

“Aye, muchacha. Up there. Near where he was before.” He glowered at her from under bushy grey eyebrows. “You did heed what Rafa said last night, didn’t you? You locked all the windows and doors?”
“Oh yes,” Alison hastened to reassure him, remembering uncomfortably the open window in Heather’s room. “What do you mean, where he was before?”
“When the fat English lady was here.” He looked meaningfully at Heather. “The
other
fat English lady.”