Red Leopard (The Vistaria Affair Series) (13 page)

The valley they were in tucked into a fold of the mountains, thick with trees. Surprisingly, a number of houses hugged the steep valley walls, dotted on either side of the road, some of them large, expensive-looking establishments, others barely more than two-room cottages with the traditional Vistarian gate and courtyard tacked onto the front.

“What is this place?” Calli asked Duardo.

“Dominio de Leo.” He pointed back towards the Pacific, hidden by the sheer mountain beside them. “The army base is down there. Many senior officers up here. It is very...rich.”

“Expensive,” Calli said.

“Yes, so.”

“But some houses here don’t look that expensive.”

“They were here before. Before the army base was built and the officers found the valley.”

“Dominio de Leo,” Calli pronounced experimentally.

“
No
,” Harry said from his corner. “
El dominio de Leo de príncipe
is right name. But not used.”

“
El dominio de Leo de...
” Calli shook her head. “What does it mean?”

Duardo frowned. He seemed to be struggling to translate the name.

“It means the domain of Prince Leo,” Minnie said unexpectedly. “Some Spanish prince probably took a fancy to the place. It’s pretty nice.”

“Yes,” Duardo said, nodding. “Prince Leopold. He sailed here, long ago. Built a big house.” He pointed further into the valley. “Gone now, but it was over there, they say.”

The truck lurched to the left as it turned into a rutted, bumpy side road and came to a slow halt, with a squeal of brakes. The engine quit with what sounded like a heavy sigh of relief.

The silence that fell seemed almost profound.

Everyone got to their feet, stretching, wriggling, rubbing their legs and butts. The wooden floor was not the most forgiving surface in the world.

“
Hola!
” The shout came from the other side of the boards Calli leaned against.

She got to her feet and saw over the sides of the truck that they had pulled up beside a modest house—more extensive than the two-room cottages she had seen, but not palatial by any stretch of the imagination. A bungalow like most houses here, with adobe walls, it had an elegant arch over the gate into the front courtyard. People emerged from the gate, shouting greetings at the new arrivals, including one very pregnant woman, who walked slowly but wore a very large smile. They waved, calling to each other as they spilled out of the truck and moved toward the house.

Calli looked around from her vantage point on the back of the truck. The trees crowded close here and the ground dipped sharply from the nose of the truck forward. The truck stood at the end of a narrow, rutted path clearly used as a driveway. In another driveway on the far side of the house, three sedans had been parked behind the tail end of a fourth just visible behind the corner of the house.

“Come.”

Calli turned around. Pietro stood at the end of the truck. With a smile he beckoned her towards him. “You come. We eat, no?”

“Sure,” she agreed and moved to the edge of the truck. He stepped back and let her jump down by herself, then motioned that she should precede him toward the house.

Nearly everyone else had walked inside and the noise level already spiraled, even from out here. The party had begun.

The front courtyard was paved in terracotta tiles. The front door, a massive wooden thing decorated with metal studs and a wrought iron grill, stood open, revealing a passage that ran through the middle of the house. Calli looked up as they moved into the passage and saw a roof of exposed tiles resting on timber framing. On either side of her, rooms stood open to her sight, the fourth wall that would have lined the passage was simply not there. It made a charming and intriguing open style of house.

At the end of the passage, more daylight beckoned. A kitchen area on the right gave her a startling glimpse of an extremely modern-looking stainless steel stove top and range hood, a wide wall-oven and a double-doored fridge behind an island counter. On the counter sat a wooden chopping board, surrounded by tantalizing fresh produce. Out beyond the passage, she stopped to draw a second surprised breath.

Another courtyard, but with knee-high walls surrounding this one. They had been clearly built so low to take full advantage of the view, which took in the trees carpeting the valley. The land dropped nearly the full thousand feet to sea level before climbing up again to the other side. The courtyard extended twenty feet from house to wall and easily twice that from wall to wall—running the width of the house. Deep reddish-brown colored terracotta tiles paved the whole area. Colored and patterned tiles in deep blues, olive greens and yellows were embedded in odd places throughout the paving.

Trees that had had been trimmed and trained to provide shade leaned over the walls. One of them stood at the far corner of the courtyard, its gnarled trunk made up of numerous thick cables. Most of the trunk easily measured fifteen feet across. The base of the tree flared even wider. The thick strands spread, burrowing into the earth. It looked like it had been there forever and the wall had been built right up to the trunk, incorporating the tree into the walls. Calli had seen many trees like this in the city. Uncle Josh had called them Banyan trees. They had been imported to the island from African territories by the Spanish. But none of them had been this big or this old.

While Calli paused to admire the view, three men helped the pregnant woman sink into an armchair sitting in the kitchen corner of the courtyard. Chairs and stools surrounded three low round tables, grouped across the courtyard and everyone settled into them, chatting like long-lost friends. Clearly, everyone knew each other.

Movement to her right made her turn and check over her shoulder. Three men stood in the kitchen, one of them at the island, chopping a handful of herbs, while another one dug through the interior of the refrigerator. The third set out glasses.

The wall of the kitchen looking out onto the courtyard was made up of three big glass panels. Two of them had been pushed along tracks to slide behind the third, leaving the kitchen open to the courtyard.

She checked over her left shoulder. The wall there was the same, pushed back to reveal an indoor lounge area, furnished with overstuffed sofas and spice-colored cushions.

People put plates and bowls of food out upon the tables. Colorful salsas, rolled tortillas, and many more dishes she could not name, made her mouth water just looking at them, with their sprinkling of fresh herbs and garnishes of hibiscus and cucumbers.

Minnie came across to her, carrying two glasses. “It’s some sort of punch. Alcoholic,” she told Calli, offering her one.

Calli shrugged and sipped. The sweet-and-sour tang held a pleasant, rum-like flavor. “And strong.”

“It’s good,” Minnie declared. “Come and sit with us.” She led Calli over to the table closest to the edge of the courtyard. Beyond the knee-high wall, the ground plunged.

Elvira sat at the table and Pietro had just set down another steaming dish.

“Eat,” Elvira said, handing Calli a large, bright napkin as she sat down.

Duardo brought the short man who had just been standing at the chopping block in the kitchen over to their table. “Calli, Minnie, this is Hernandez Mendosa, whose house this is. Hernandez is marshal at Lozano base.”

Hernandez bowed to them, the hand gripping a tea towel held to his chest. “I welcome you to my home,” he said formally. “I regret, my wife Menaka, she cannot stand with me. She is being comfortable.” He waved to the armchair in the corner by the kitchen window, where Menaka sat rubbing her swollen stomach. “She is very tired.”

“I’m sure,” Minnie agreed. “It’s very nice to meet you, Hernandez. You have a lovely home and thank you for welcoming us into it. We appreciate your hospitality.”

“Thank you,” he said and bowed again. “Will you excuse me, please? I must go back. These soldiers...they eat much.”

Pietro chuckled and Hernandez waved a hand at him, before heading back to his kitchen. Duardo dropped into a chair and reached for a plate.

“Is everyone here a soldier?” Calli asked, looking around.

“Yes, all,” Pietro agreed. He ate busily. Elvira had risen from her chair and wandered over to the other table to select food from dishes there, talking and laughing with the people on that table.

A very fat man came to their table and selected one of the tortillas.

“And this is Pav,” Duardo said.

The man laughed and nodded at them.

“‘Pavarotti,’” Pietro explained and patted the man’s distended stomach.

“Right.”

Pav moved away and Calli leaned forward to examine the dishes. Duardo and Pietro immediately began explaining each one, the degree of spiciness, the ingredients. Elvira came back to the table and added her own knowledge about the preparation of the dishes.

Pietro refilled their glasses of punch.

Calli ate and drank, laughed and relaxed in the security of being surrounded by people that enjoyed life and welcomed her. They were a lively group. As the pace of eating slowed, guitars were picked up. At first the music was slow and coaxing. But soon, one of the men stood up with a shout and stamped his feet, throwing his hands up in the air. It was a declaration. An entrance.

The guitar players picked up the pace. The dancer moved out onto the clear space at the end of the courtyard, tapping his way with expert steps, while the others cheered him on with claps and whistles.

Elvira got to her feet and ran over to him, then lifted her skirt a little to reveal her knees and tapped out intricate steps that sent up a cheer of encouragement.

“Elvira!” someone called and two small brown objects flew through the air. She caught them deftly and paused to fiddle with them. Then she lifted her hand, with a graceful flick and the castanets rattled out a tattoo. She stamped her feet in time.

A couple of people got to their feet, clapping along with the guitars and another woman who had not been on the truck joined Elvira, her hands lifted in the same graceful motions as she began stepping out different steps.

“They seem to just do their own thing,” Minnie murmured.

“Whatever the music tells them to do,” Calli said. “They look great.” She heard, with wry resignation, the touch of envy in her tone. That sort of seductive gracefulness had always been beyond her capabilities.

“You can do that,” Pietro told Calli.

She laughed a little. “Not me.”

“Yes, most certainly,” Duardo added. He picked up Minnie’s hand. “You, too. Come.”

“Me?” Minnie asked.

He nodded.

Minnie let herself be led over to the other dancers and Duardo placed her next to Elvira. Elvira picked up her skirt again and tapped out a very simple, half-speed set of steps and Minnie followed. After a couple of repetitions, she got it down with a big smile and a laugh. Then Elvira repeated the step at the proper speed, rapping it out with a very Spanish-looking flourish, the castanets adding their compulsive rattle. Then she paused and waited for Minnie to repeat it.

Minnie repeated the pattern, with almost the same flourish and Calli laughed aloud with sheer joy.

Elvira repeated the pattern again. Minnie immediately followed with her own repetition. Then they both danced out the pattern, keeping it going continuously and Duardo began to clap out the rhythm, encouraging them. Elvira showed Minnie how to turn and move while keeping the beat and Minnie followed, her hips swaying with the same elegant motion as Elvira. Slowly, she added arm movements.

Calli smiled, exuberance bubbling through her veins. Apart from the incongruous denim skirt and short hair, Minnie looked like any of the other women dancing there—flirtatious, seductive. Duardo moved around her with the strutty motion the men made as they preened beside the woman. They sent smoldering glances at the women over their shoulders, while their hips echoed the movements the women made. It was as sexy a dance as any tango Calli had ever seen and she tapped her own feet, her hips twitching in time.

“Now you will know how,” Pietro said and picked up her hand. “You understand.”

Calli willingly followed him to the group of dancers and Elvira flashed her a wide smile when she saw her. She showed Calli the step and Calli surprised herself when she executed it perfectly. It made sense to her, the beat and the motion falling into place along with the music. Except that the flat, rubber-soled sandals she wore wouldn’t move easily on the tiles.

Elvira frowned and, over the music, called out something to Menaka, who sat in her armchair clapping as enthusiastically as anyone standing around the dancers.

Menaka nodded and called back. Elvira slipped between the bordering ring of spectators and disappeared inside the house. In a moment, she returned with a pair of black heeled shoes in her hand, each with a fine strap over the instep. Dancing shoes.

She thrust them at Calli. “Easier for—” and she stamped out a step or two, the heels of her own shoes rapping on the tiles.

Calli took them doubtfully and slipped out of her sandals and put them on. They fit, which surprised her, for her feet were in proportion with her height, and Vistarian women seemed uniformly petite. She stood up and gave an experimental stamp and immediately sensed the improvement. Her blood beating a tattoo in time with the guitars and the clapping, she moved to stand between Elvira and Minnie and picked up the pattern they followed. Excitement flooded her as the flow of the dance became clear. She relaxed her concentration, letting her instinct guide her instead and the pattern came easily, naturally. Did she have a latent talent for this? Or had she simply been immersed in this culture for long enough to absorb the attitude, the...sexiness?