The Guilty Secret Read Online Free PDF Page B

here.’
    â€˜Another ten years and you probably won’t see it here either. Though what disturbs me most about seeing them on their hands and knees pummelling the clothes on the rocks isn’t the sheer hard work of it.’
    â€˜No?’
    â€˜No. It’s the fact that when they hang the washing out to dry or lay it on the boulders to dry, it’s cleaner than mine is when it comes out of my automatic machine!’
    He laughed. ‘So much for progress. Quick. Look at these three old women walking down the road dressed in black. They look like the original three witches!’
    I smiled and waved and was rewarded by three toothless smiles as they hugged their shawls tighter around their bodies, gazing after the car in disbelief.
    â€˜I don’t think Lamborgini’s are exactly common round here.’
    â€˜My dear Jenny,’ Jonathan said. ‘Lamborgini’s are not common anywhere! ’ And again we were laughing. I was as much at ease in his company as I was in Phil’s. With one important addition. Jonathan’s body next to mine did things to my nervous system that Phil’s could never have done. For the first time I was beginning to understand why Mary waited on Tom hand and foot. It was understandable if he had this effect on her, and if I could keep Jonathan by me, then I would move heaven and earth to do so.
    â€˜This is it,’ he said, waking me from my reverie. ‘Valenca.’
    I looked around in surprise. ‘It doesn’t look medieval to me. It looks just like all the other little villages we’ve passed.’
    The road curved past a handful of houses with their inevitable washing hanging to dry in the sun, then, before we knew it we were out of it amid undulating green fields, the road narrowing alarmingly.
    â€˜We must have taken a wrong turn,’ I said as the track circled a green mound and wound steeply upwards. ‘We’re going into somebody’s back garden!’
    Ahead of us lay an arched stone entrance, barely wide enough to allow a car through.
    â€˜Jonathan, stop! We’re going to be in someone’s house in a moment!’
    He grinned. ‘ I can’t turn round here, there’s nothing for it but to go ahead.’ With a surge the Lamborgini scraped through the momentary darkness of the ornate entrance and out again into brilliant sunshine. We drew in our breaths and stared.
    â€˜Well, I’ll be damned,’ he said in amazement. ‘When Oliveira said it was a toytown he wasn’t kidding.’
    Ahead of us the miniscule cobbled road swept on for a further few yards, steep banks of lush grass falling away at its sides. Then there was another stone arched entrance and through that could be seen a tantalising glimpse of Valenca. Cobbled streets crowded with barefoot children and chattering women, houses crammed together their frontages barely four feet wide. Slowly Jonathan edged the car through the massive protective gates and into Valenca’s main street. As we parked the car among pleased stares, we felt like Gullivers. The church we had passed was like a model church. The square we parked in barely big enough to take the car. Everything had been cut down to fit within the medieval walls. The shops were obviously directed solely at the tourist trade, spilling over with cheap souvenirs and plastic effigies. A fat lady, comfortably seated beneath a gaily striped umbrella shouted gaily:-
    â€˜Frances?’
    â€˜No, Ingles,’ Jonathan shouted back with a smile. She beamed benevolently. Ingles was just as good. The Inglese would spend their money in Valenca just as the French and Germans did. She held out an apronful of apples and oranges, but Jonathan shook his head taking my arm and leading me down the sun-filled street. She smiled. By the time we returned, no doubt we would be grateful of an apple or an orange …
    We walked slowly, his arm pressing against mine, there was the usual