The Spanish Promise Read online

  He looked at her intently, beginning to seem reassured. ‘Okay, so they’ve protected one hundred million. But what about the rest of it – if and when my father wakes up and finishes what he’s started . . . What then? There’s half a billion euros still at stake.’

  ‘Well that’s why they’ve brought me in. If the lawyers and the bankers can’t stop your father from giving the money, I can work to stop her wanting it.’

  He looked confused. ‘I don’t understand. How can you do that?’

  ‘There’s a thing called sudden wealth syndrome. You tend to see it in people who experience sudden windfalls – lottery winners for example. Almost without exception, a few years down the line, they’ll be divorced where they were previously happily married, lonely when they were previously sociable, suspicious where they were previously open. Because what people don’t realize is wealth doesn’t change attitudes to money, it exaggerates them. You’ve heard of the saying “caught, not taught”?’

  He gave a shrug. ‘Sure.’

  ‘Well for someone like Marina, who has always had to dig in for what she’s got, had to get her hands dirty and fight . . . becoming rich overnight is not going to be the answer to all her problems, it’ll be the start of them. For someone who’s grown up having to take to survive, how will she cope with friends asking her to help them out, family members wanting her to pay off their mortgages, buy them a car? She doesn’t know how to be a donor, a benefactor. It doesn’t matter how good her intentions start out, in no time she’s going to become resentful that they’re asking, embittered that she feels guilty for saying no, suspicious they all want more from her, paranoid they’re only with her for the money, isolated because who can she trust . . . It happens all the time. Living happily with wealth is something that has to be caught, but from what I can glean from the report, she has no one to guide her, no examples to follow.’ She gave a pitying shrug. ‘She has no idea how difficult her life would become.’

  ‘I’m beginning to wonder how I’ve struggled through,’ Mateo said wryly.

  ‘Ah, but you’re third-generation rich, that’s different; you’re native to it and that makes all the difference in the world. Did you know that ninety per cent of families fail to pass down their money beyond three generations?’

  He looked less glib about that fact. ‘Well, we may yet conform to that stereotype then.’

  ‘No, this is by no means a done deal.’ She shook her head firmly. ‘I’m going to start by introducing myself. Get to know her. See what makes her tick.’

  ‘But why should she believe what you say? For someone in her position, these are pennies from heaven. She will take her chances, no matter what you say. You can’t talk her out of becoming a multimillionaire.’

  ‘Quite right. But I’m hopeful that once she’s been shown the full reality of what that amount of money can do, we can perhaps negotiate her down to a token amount that will prove to be in everyone’s best interests – manageable for her, palatable for you.’

  ‘You really think you can do that?’

  She nodded. ‘I know better than anyone how money screws people up, Mr Mendoza, and it’s my job to highlight these pitfalls to her.’

  He sighed, looking only vaguely mollified. He sipped his drink, looking out over the lawns, and she let the silence settle; there was a lot for him to digest. ‘. . . If I could just speak to him. If he could just tell me why he was doing this,’ he murmured. ‘It’s the not knowing anything that makes it so hard. Why would he give everything to this woman no one’s ever met or heard of? Carmen, I could understand, but why her? Who is she? When did she come into his life? And why is she more important to him than everyone else? We are his family.’

  Charlotte was quiet for a moment longer. ‘Well, perhaps this isn’t about Marina, per se; maybe it’s about him. The urge for philanthropy can become increasingly strong as people approach the end of their lives, particularly when they’ve enjoyed such . . . ease. I’ve seen it happen before, almost as a barter, a way to minimize the guilt that’s almost inevitable when one has so much and others so little. Equally, other people can feel a sense of guilt for the way the fortune was created – historic Nazi collaboration, arms dealing, the tobacco industries . . . Feelings of guilt are particularly prevalent in inheritors, rather than the first-generation wealth creators.’

  ‘But my father has worked hard all his life,’ Mateo said defensively. ‘He wasn’t just some spoilt little rich boy. It was he who diversified the business after the war; he who foresaw the end of bullfighting and predicted the rise of large-scale fruit farming.’

  ‘I’m not disputing it. I’m just saying he was born into money too. His starting point was different from most people’s and the guilt of having been “born lucky” into the right family may be an impetus in all this.’ She gave a sigh. ‘But as you rightly say, he was also a wealth creator and perhaps his drive to give back is originating from there . . .’ She trailed off. How could they possibly know which way to turn with this? The man’s reasons were his own secrets, zipped shut in a frail and unconscious body. An idea came to her. ‘You know, perhaps that’s where we should be concentrating our efforts.’

  Rather than just looking at a cure for this problem that Marina Quincy presents, we should be looking for the source of it – investigating the root cause of your father’s urgent need to divest himself of his fortune.’

  ‘But how? He is unconscious in hospital. None of us can ask him anything right now.’

  ‘I know, but we could engage the services of a research specialist.’

  ‘That’s already been done. We employed our own researchers.’

  ‘Yes, your investigators built up a profile on Marina Quincy, but let’s forget her for a moment. I’m talking about calling in a historian – someone at PhD level who can sift through the layers of your family’s history and go right back to how the fortune was amassed in the beginning.’

  ‘We know how. Bulls. Our family grew rich from breeding bulls.’

  ‘Things are never that linear though, are they, Mr Mendoza? There are always digressions, transgressions . . . Something might have happened in the past that could account for your father’s sense of guilt – if that’s what it is.’

  He looked offended by the insinuation. ‘So you want to look for dirt on my family? Bring out the skeletons in their closet? Absolutely not.’

  ‘I’m not saying there are necessarily any skeletons, and anyway, it may not even be required. Who knows? Marina might turn out to be conducive to an offer and this can all go away.’ Mateo looked sceptical. ‘But if it does drag on and she holds out for the full gift, we’ll need to consider alternative strategies that probe your father’s motivations. I’ve worked with a history professor at Carlos III University a couple of times. He’s very professional, very discreet. I could set up an initial meeting so you can meet and get a sense of him first if you like. When I’ve commissioned these searches in the past, it’s been to help families appreciate and understand what it took to create their fortunes – the personal journeys their forebears took, their struggle, setbacks, risks and break-throughs, the human story behind the bank balance if you like. But in this instance, where the head of the family is seeking to rid himself of that very privilege . . . I do think we need to examine the reasons why that may be.’ She shook her head. ‘Because something’s not adding up. No matter which way we turn it, this just doesn’t feel like a straightforward sugar-daddy story to me.’

  ‘No?’ He frowned. ‘What does it feel like?’

  It took her a moment to find the right word. ‘A purge.’

  ‘A purge? But why?’

  ‘At this point, there’s really only one reason I can think of.’ She sat back in the chair and inhaled slowly. ‘Shame.’

  Chapter Three

  Ronda, Andalusia, August 1932

  She sat in the cradle of her favourite tree, back braced against the mighty trunk and one leg stretched out on the branch, the other dangling,
kicking back and forth, back and forth. She was watching the farmers peel the oaks, their axes swinging into the bark with just the right amount of force so as not to damage the inner living tissue, the outer layers coming away in great curved sheets to reveal tender, terracotta-tinted cores.

  ‘Give me some more,’ Santi shouted up.

  She ignored him. She was watching his father, Juan Espe-ranza, climbing higher into the tree, the fabric of his trousers flapping around his thin legs, his rope-soled shoes finding grip on the bark. It was always a spectacle to her, seeing how the men moved so confidently without ropes, balancing on branches and swinging their axes through the air. Three years ago there had been a nasty accident when old Pablo Morales had slipped, his axe falling after him into a soft landing. The ensuing tales of gore had been enough to get her brothers here to watch with her for the next two seasons, just in case, but to their disgust, the men were more careful than ever and there had been not so much as a broken fingernail since.

  It wasn’t why she came though. She loved the sound of the harvests: the axes thunking in rhythm, the farmers’ chatter and songs, the creak of the bark as it split and gave, the melancholic haw of the donkeys as their backs were laden with the fresh cargo; but more than anything, she loved watching the spectacle of the old cork oak forest changing colour, the newly reddened trunks like sunburnt arms, matching the brick earth. In the distance, where the land rose up from these gentle slopes, she could see the pueblo blanco in the valley, its tiny, primitive houses little more than white dots from here. Her own house was out of sight from here, hidden in the shade of—

  ‘Nene!’

  She looked down. Santi was on the bough below, his hand outstretched for another segment. He had already eaten all three of the oranges she had dared to pilfer from the grove for him on the way through, and now he wanted the last of hers. But his limbs were so skinny, his brown eyes so big in his face, how could she refuse? She tossed the rest of the orange down to him, seeing how his face split into that signature grin which always spelled trouble, his oversized teeth bright against his tawny skin.

  ‘I’m bored. Let’s go,’ he said, juice dribbling down his chin and onto his shirt as he crammed the orange into his mouth, a half at a time.

  ‘And do what?’

  ‘Go swimming,’ he managed, the words muffled.

  ‘Swimming?’ she scoffed, even though her skin felt tight and dusty. ‘You’re a fool, Santi Esperanza, the lake is dry. And you know we can’t go near the house. Papa is home.’

  ‘So then let’s see Leviatan again. I bet I can make him chase me this time.’

  ‘Ha! You’re so small, you’re not worth the effort. He may as well toss a grasshopper as you.’ But she climbed down from the tree anyway, her skirts tucked into her knickers to free her legs. She detested wearing dresses – they were hot and got in the way; the only thing they were good for was hiding the scabs on her knees from when she fell during their races.

  ‘Santi, where are you going?’ his father called after him as they jumped to the ground.

  ‘We are just taking a walk.’

  His father hesitated, looking first at his son and then at her. An uncertain look flickered in his kind eyes. ‘You must stay near, you hear me? I will need you shortly.’

  ‘I will, Papa. We won’t be long.’

  His father looked unconvinced, concern still stretched across his lined face, but he gave a polite nod as his eyes met hers.

  ‘I’ll make sure he comes straight back, Señor Esperanza,’ Nene smiled at him, and it must have been infectious for his face split into a friendly grin too, as though suddenly reassured.

  ‘Thank you, Nene, you are a good girl,’ he nodded, pretending, like the other farmers, not to notice her unladylike, leggy display.

  That was another reason she loved hiding out up here, she didn’t have to be something she wasn’t. She could be free, be herself for once.

  ‘Why does he always look so worried?’ she asked as they walked off. ‘Does he think I will hurt you?’

  ‘He knows you could never hurt me! You’re a girl!’ Santi scoffed.

  ‘I’m bigger than you!’ she said scornfully. Her shadow was taller than his now, even though he was already thirteen by four months and it would be another season before it was her turn. But her shape was changing faster than his, becoming more rounded, undulating whilst he remained stick-thin and twiggy. Santi had pointed and mocked her when he had glimpsed the hair under her arms the last time they had swum together – it was after the last rain in May, when the lake was still full and the almond trees shook with pink blossom – and she hadn’t spoken to him for a full eight days afterwards. But she never could stay mad at him for long and she knew his contrition was sincere when he left, in their secret hiding hole in the jacaranda tree, his most treasured possession – a shark’s tooth given to him by a passing-through fisherman. She wasn’t sure she particularly wanted it, for it had given him the ambition to see the sea one day and that always made her stomach feel funny. What if he sailed away and never came back? They were of the earth, both of them, scrambling up trees, racing in the dust—

  ‘Anyway, it’s not you. He’s always worried,’ he said, looking wistfully out to the horizon, arms swinging high as they strode through the long grass. He paused, hesitated, as though he had something to say but didn’t know how. ‘. . . He says I must go to live with my cousins in Oviedo.’

  ‘Oviedo?’ she cried, her feet coming to a stop. ‘But that is almost another country! Why must you go there?’

  He gave a hapless shrug. ‘Because they have rain. And crops. And land we can work. He says I must learn.’

  She stared at his face – that impish, thin, naughty face that belonged to the joint-first most important person in the world to her. ‘You must say no!’

  He arched an eyebrow. ‘Like you do to your father?’ They both knew first-hand how savage his temper could be when he was defied. The last time he’d caught them playing together, he had boxed Santi so hard around the ears he had been deaf for three days afterwards, and she had been birched and quarantined in her room for all meals for a week.

  She picked up an acorn and threw it at him. As ever, she scored a bullseye, hitting him straight between the eyes.

  ‘Ow!’ He rubbed his head, glancing over at her, but he didn’t throw anything back, seeming to know that behind her anger there was pain. Real pain in her heart.

  He turned and began walking again, taking extra slow steps as she stared after him, her shoulders heaving up and down with silent despair, before she began following after him.

  They fell into step again, Santi grabbing at a tall blade of grass and pulling it through his palm. ‘He says it is only for a few years. Just until I become a man and then I can come back here and look after my mother.’ He glanced back at her, his eyes adding something silently that didn’t need to be said.

  Nene didn’t reply. It would be an epoch before he became a man but they were both powerless to stop it. ‘. . . When will you go?’ Her voice sounded funny.

  ‘Before the leaves turn. He says they will need me for the harvest.’

  She turned her head away, not wanting to discuss it further. She couldn’t imagine her life here at La Ventilla without him. He was the only person who could make her laugh, the only one who could run faster than her. Other girls her age simply wanted to play with hair ribbons or dolls, and her brothers were brutes who were good only for shooting rabbits. Who would she talk to? Who would she test her jokes on? Who would leave surprises in the jacaranda tree whenever they had a fight?

  They wandered through the cork oak fields in distracted silence, deliberately meandering beneath the heavy-headed canopies for moments of shaded relief, their hands still absently grabbing at long blades of grass as they walked down the hill.

  They covered the rough ground at an idle pace. There was never any point in arriving anywhere early here, it would only hasten the next question: ‘What now?’ But as they w
alked, gradually the landscape changed beneath their feet, levelling out and becoming greener – the tangled cork oak forest where the older Mala Fes bulls rooted for acorns replaced by neat rows of orchards, olive, orange, peach and lemon trees planted in strict lines, leading up to the low stone walls that heralded the grazing fields where the famed, gleaming herds roamed. The bulls’ hides glistened like velvet in the sun, rich shades of chestnut, dove grey and a blacker-than- black black. They moved their great bulks slowly, nosing the ground unperturbed, their distinctive horns pointing ever upwards in silent warning.

  The saying went that second-generation matadors were always terrified of the bulls, but in their family – who simply bred them – there was no such weakness, her three brothers, Montez, Vale and even Arlo, charging around them on horseback with a fearlessness that left their poor mother shaking.

  For Nene, though, it was the horses she loved most: their soft whinnies in the stables, combing out their manes, the way they picked their hooves high in the training ring. But more than anything, she loved the feeling of freedom she felt whenever she slid her foot into the stirrup – not riding side-saddle like the grand Amazonas Españolas her father wanted her to ape, but (out of sight) astride, like a real warrior: muscles braced, the hot air streaming over her as she galloped through the woods and outfields. Her best moments were always the hidden ones.