The Ghost Of Villa Winter

2. The Journey South-1

2

THE JOURNEY SOUTH

Four days earlier, and a current of intrigue pulsed through her as the tour bus swung into the bus station’s service road, coming to a sudden stop in the drop-off area. She was standing on the concourse, about ten paces back. Nearby, a small group comprising the tour party were gathered. It was eight o’clock and the sun already had a bit of a sting to it. There was no shade. A trickle of people wandered past and headed through the entrance of the rather grand bus station building to her rear. All of the public buses that entered the service road went around to the parking bays at the back. The tour bus didn’t belong in the station, that much was clear. Clarissa shot a look behind her. Judging by the puzzled and annoyed looks the officials inside the building were giving the invading vehicle, she anticipated a fracas at any moment and wondered why the tour operator hadn’t arranged an alternative pick-up location.

Leaving the engine running, the driver stepped out of the vehicle which, on reflection, could scarcely be called a regular bus. It was a minibus painted to look like a zebra and set high off the ground on large wheels, and appeared to seat about sixteen passengers. No wonder the leaflet had mentioned the need to book early. In the absence of a photo of the bus, when she’d first read the leaflet, Clarissa had imagined a standard sized, luxury coach, not a van. Taking in the dusty, beat-up vehicle, she began to wonder what she’d paid for, indeed what sort of adventure altogether lay in store.

Misgivings crowded around her. She should have paid attention to the planetary alignment taking place that weekend. No good would come of that particular arrangement of Saturn, Pluto and Mars, not when a Scorpio Moon was involved. Back in her apartment she’d taken another look at the stars, this time at the positions of all the heavenly spheres. She’d noted Venus and Mercury were favourably placed near Neptune. Astrology was all about balance and the weight of possibilities. She’d ignored the heavyweights and gone with Venus. Get out of Puerto del Rosario, Claire had said. What’s the point of coming here on holiday and corralling yourself in that dusty port town when there’s the whole island to enjoy? Claire, as usual, had a point. It was an ironically Venusian point.

Clarissa had arrived on the island three weeks before, escaping a dreary, wet winter after the slew of Christmas and New Year social obligations was over, obligations that encroached on much of January due to her friends’ birthdays and a number of funerals. She’d already taken advantage of the public bus service and had lunch in half a dozen villages, inland and coastal, and was rather tiring of playing tourist when her sole reason for the trip, other than her niece, was to visit that poor man Trevor in prison in Lanzarote and see what could be done about his release. So far, not much. With her trip coming to an end, frustration and impatience had put her in ill humour, ill humour reinforced by a dull cramp in her hip, the result of misplacing her foot in a dip in the sand when she was walking along the beach at El Cotillo the other day. She should have taken a couple of anti-inflammatories before setting off this morning but she’d forgotten. A quick rummage in her canvas bag and she found she’d also forgotten to bring any with her.

She hung back as she waited to board the bus, assessing the other passengers, hopeful of decent company. Perhaps it was her jaundiced mood, but not one of them held any appeal, not the dreadlocked and evenly tanned young man in his sleeveless t-shirt or his equally tanned companion – they’d evidently left behind their surfboards – not the pigeon pair of plump, nondescript women of middle age and Anglo-Saxon appearance, not the pale and frail, sparrow of a woman with legs so spindly they appeared like sticks beneath her loose capris, and especially not the rather tall and undeniably handsome man with come-hither eyes who would have been a real a charmer, no doubt, in his day. He looked about a decade younger than herself and seemed to exude the kind of unjustified self-assurance of the overly pampered. He, she decided, was trouble. Always trouble, those who stand out in a crowd, and she was not disposed to accommodate his sort of company. She determined to sit well away from him, preferably at the opposite end of the so-called tour bus which, she thought, would likely have a series of single seats along one side and if that were the case, she would choose one of those.

The wind picked up a little, parting the bottom edge of her blouse below the last button, a disconcerting tendency of loose blouses designed to hang over trousers, especially when the designer skimped on length. Manufacturers ought to include an additional button nearer the hem for women like her, women of a certain age, women who didn’t want the world to see any portion of their midriff. She’d have worn a spencer had she realised, but then again, it was too darn warm for that. The lack of a button was just another minor irritation adding to an already irritable humour.

She was in half a mind to march off, forfeiting her ticket in favour of a quiet day in her apartment. As if in agreement, the sky to the east had turned milky. She knew what that meant. The island was in for another dust storm, or calima, as it was known locally. Not ideal, but you couldn’t arrange your activities around the dust. You’d never do anything. Hopefully, it wouldn’t be too bad.

In the three weeks of her stay, the dust had come and gone and come and gone and she had been untroubled by it. Only, this particular day would be somewhat ruined if that easterly air flow strengthened. Still, she reminded herself she would happily put up with a bit of dust in preference to the British cold and damp that seeped into her bones and made her joints ache. She was not getting any younger. And in a sudden revolt against her jaundice, she determined to make the most of the day, regardless of the dust, regardless of the van-c*m-bus and the motley passengers, regardless of the stars, regardless. This was Fuerteventura, and she was going to do her absolute best to enjoy what remained of her time here even if it killed her.

She’d come to favour Fuerteventura as her holiday destination ever since Claire tempted her here with talk of her haunted house. After three visits to Claire’s mansion in Tiscamanita, she’d taken to booking a city apartment eager for a different sort of experience to the almost cloistered existence Claire seemed bent on leading with her photographer husband Paco. They’d become stay-at-homes and Clarissa suspected it was the influence of that ruin she’d restored with most of its rooms looking inwards on the patio. An ancient house with some ancient ghosts rattling around inside. She’d stopped telling Claire the place still had some unearthly visitors after Paco told her in a private moment to drop the subject. They’d done all they could to expunge the supernatural elements and whatever vestiges remained were best left unacknowledged. Clarissa took no offence. Instead, she switched focus and booked an apartment in Puerto del Rosario, the better to pursue her own interests away from judgemental eyes. The close proximity of the various offices of government and law were also beneficial when it came to Trevor and her campaign for his freedom. Besides, since they’d started hosting a writing group and a book group and running short courses in photography, there were evenings when Claire and Paco’s historic house lost its monastic air and transformed into a drop-in centre for friends and neighbours. In the evenings, Clarissa favoured her privacy.

The apartment was situated above a bakery opposite a much-used plaza and there was every amenity close to hand. The owners had decked the rooms out with antique looking furniture which appealed to her. The place was spotless too, something she had come to expect from the Spanish. She also enjoyed the cosmopolitan atmosphere of the tiny city, the presence of Moroccans and Venezuelans, and the absence of tourists except when a cruise ship docked at the port. Yes, the city had been a wise choice. After all, she would never have come across the leaflet advertising a fascinating tour of Villa Winter otherwise.

It had been an odd moment of happenstance that she was departing her table in a busy café the other week as a woman came in hoping to sit down. It was as Clarissa was standing up and the woman was sitting down that the leaflet tumbled from the woman’s hand and fell to the floor and Clarissa picked it up. The woman thanked her and insisted she keep it. A spare, and the tour was really very good, she’d said. Lunch at a restaurant in the small village of Cofete was included in the price, making the outing rather a bargain.

She was jolted out of her reflections when one of the officials in the bus station called out. Eager to avoid a confrontation with the two uniformed men staring him down from inside the bus station and another who looked to be heading his way, the driver – a tall, suave man decked in an oversized safari-suit – flung open the van’s side door and began hurrying the passengers aboard.

Clarissa edged closer and noted his small, penetrating eyes, the flaring nostrils of his meaty nose, a nose dominating his face, and his thick-lipped mouth that was stretched into a most disagreeably insincere smile. There was something askew in his visage, the result of a distorted bone structure – congenital or accidental Clarissa couldn’t decide – with his left cheek a fraction smaller than his right and a touch sunken, rendering a subtle lop-sidedness to his lips. In all, he had an unpleasant face, no doubt an indication of an unpleasant character, the type of shifty individual that would be cast in the role of antagonist in every film ever made. It didn’t help that he spoke with a French accent. Perhaps he hailed from Senegal or from one of the other West African nations that were former French colonies. It seemed impolite to pry. He sure was capitalising on the mystique with Zebra Tours plastered across his zebra-striped bus.

Perhaps she was being unfair, viewing him through the lens of her shrewish mood which refused to abate. She had to wrestle with herself again. Her cynical attitude really was unbecoming. If anyone were to read her mind, they would accuse her of being a racist. But skin colour had nothing to do with the matter. The man just looked plain mean.

As she took a step forward a sharp pain darted through her hip, and she put her negative attitude down to that, since the twinges always seemed to make her critical of others and she reminded herself to be more accommodating.

The bronzed duo dived into the van first and went straight to the back. The matronly pair heaved themselves inside and took the front seats behind the driver. The bird-woman was next, requiring the driver’s assistance to make it up the two steps. She sat in the first single seat to the left of the door. That left Mr Suave and herself. Sensing he was about to turn and do the gentlemanly thing, she lowered her gaze and fumbled with her bag. When she looked up, she had a full view of his backside as he got inside the van. She was disappointed to see him sit down behind the sparrow. There were three double seats remaining. Shooing away the driver’s hand, she climbed into the van and went straight to the middle of the three empty double seats, a safe distance from the surfers and the matrons, but, annoyingly, alongside Mr Suave. She took the window seat, hoping he was not about to use the opportunity of their proximity to strike up a conversation.

The two women talked quietly. Behind her, the lads were laughing and chatting in what she now heard was German. Miss Sparrow – a miss, surely – stared out the window, her face turned away from Clarissa’s view.