soon.”
The carriage turned a corner, and they were left behind. I was alone, to wonder anxiously about the welcome that awaited me at the Quinta dos Castanheiros.
I tried to take an intelligent interest in the scene around me, but my mind insisted on wandering. All I received was a series of confused impressions in no coherent order—a great arched aqueduct spanning a valley ... quaint little windmills, sometimes singly, sometimes clustered upon a hilltop, their white canvas sails drifting lazily in the barely perceptible breeze ... a bent old man in a black hat leading a donkey bearing great panniers of cabbages ... a ragged child in a cottage doorway, thumb in mouth, dark eyes watching solemnly as the carriage went past. Growing amid the fields of young corn were huge spiny cactuses and ancient, gnarled trees with silvery leaves that I guessed must be olives, and here and there a grove of cork oaks, their trunks a bright orange color where the bark had been stripped off. I remember thinking how hot it seemed, coming straight from the east winds and April showers of England.
Ahead a range of hills rose up, their craggy peaks almost completely enshrouded in mist. The open heathland, patterned with moon daisies and wild orchids, gave way to trees and verdant shrubs, and waterfalls plunged from rock to rock, catching the sunlight. I felt upon my cheeks the refreshing touch of cooler mountain air. We passed many fine residences set in their shady gardens, and I endeavored to put a name to the flowering trees and the climbing plants that trailed over lichen-crusted walls—magnolia, oleander, lilac, daphne, clematis montana, and fuchsia—but others were new and exotic to me.
In Cintra’s pretty square we stopped for Sancho to inquire the way from a man with a string of saddled donkeys for hire. I looked at the Royal Summer Palace—I recognized it at once from the engraving in my guidebook with its two great Moorish chimneys that thrust up from the roof like dunce caps. I wondered if Dom Luis and his queen were in residence.
We continued on our way, the road winding now through trees that branched overhead to form a leafy tunnel. At last, after another mile or so, we halted before a pair of tall iron gates with gilded ornamentation. An elderly lodge keeper emerged from his small roundhouse and opened up for us.
The broad carriageway led through an avenue of dark-green cypress trees, so evenly spaced, so identically matched in rows that they might have been guardsmen in bearskins standing stiffly to attention. At the far end rose a great pink and white mansion. The central pediment, in Grecian style, was flanked by two balustraded wings presenting a wide facade with many tall windows, each one elaborately decorated with whorls and curlicues of carved stonework. Before the house were formal knot gardens, dwarf box hedges trimmed to precise geometric patterns, with enclosed flower beds and smooth graveled walks between. In the center, a circular fountain of nymphs and tritons sent dancing jets of spray high into the air.
Skirting these gardens, the coachman drew to a halt by a wide apron of steps. In the stillness and silence, broken only by the musical whispering of the fountain, the noonday sun beat down hotly. Glancing up, I saw that at every window the green shutters were firmly closed. There was no sign of life anywhere. If I had not known that I was expected today, if the carriage had not been freely admitted by the man at the gate lodge, I would have imagined that the Quinta dos Castanheiros was empty and deserted.
Chapter 3
I was conducted into the mansion by a young manservant attired in a braided livery of green and gold, with a black mourning armband. I followed him across an antechamber into a great hall, where slender pale pink columns, carved in the form of twisted ropes, gave support to an arched gallery. A pair of magnificent crystal chandeliers hung from the intricately molded ceiling, and the
The carriage turned a corner, and they were left behind. I was alone, to wonder anxiously about the welcome that awaited me at the Quinta dos Castanheiros.
I tried to take an intelligent interest in the scene around me, but my mind insisted on wandering. All I received was a series of confused impressions in no coherent order—a great arched aqueduct spanning a valley ... quaint little windmills, sometimes singly, sometimes clustered upon a hilltop, their white canvas sails drifting lazily in the barely perceptible breeze ... a bent old man in a black hat leading a donkey bearing great panniers of cabbages ... a ragged child in a cottage doorway, thumb in mouth, dark eyes watching solemnly as the carriage went past. Growing amid the fields of young corn were huge spiny cactuses and ancient, gnarled trees with silvery leaves that I guessed must be olives, and here and there a grove of cork oaks, their trunks a bright orange color where the bark had been stripped off. I remember thinking how hot it seemed, coming straight from the east winds and April showers of England.
Ahead a range of hills rose up, their craggy peaks almost completely enshrouded in mist. The open heathland, patterned with moon daisies and wild orchids, gave way to trees and verdant shrubs, and waterfalls plunged from rock to rock, catching the sunlight. I felt upon my cheeks the refreshing touch of cooler mountain air. We passed many fine residences set in their shady gardens, and I endeavored to put a name to the flowering trees and the climbing plants that trailed over lichen-crusted walls—magnolia, oleander, lilac, daphne, clematis montana, and fuchsia—but others were new and exotic to me.
In Cintra’s pretty square we stopped for Sancho to inquire the way from a man with a string of saddled donkeys for hire. I looked at the Royal Summer Palace—I recognized it at once from the engraving in my guidebook with its two great Moorish chimneys that thrust up from the roof like dunce caps. I wondered if Dom Luis and his queen were in residence.
We continued on our way, the road winding now through trees that branched overhead to form a leafy tunnel. At last, after another mile or so, we halted before a pair of tall iron gates with gilded ornamentation. An elderly lodge keeper emerged from his small roundhouse and opened up for us.
The broad carriageway led through an avenue of dark-green cypress trees, so evenly spaced, so identically matched in rows that they might have been guardsmen in bearskins standing stiffly to attention. At the far end rose a great pink and white mansion. The central pediment, in Grecian style, was flanked by two balustraded wings presenting a wide facade with many tall windows, each one elaborately decorated with whorls and curlicues of carved stonework. Before the house were formal knot gardens, dwarf box hedges trimmed to precise geometric patterns, with enclosed flower beds and smooth graveled walks between. In the center, a circular fountain of nymphs and tritons sent dancing jets of spray high into the air.
Skirting these gardens, the coachman drew to a halt by a wide apron of steps. In the stillness and silence, broken only by the musical whispering of the fountain, the noonday sun beat down hotly. Glancing up, I saw that at every window the green shutters were firmly closed. There was no sign of life anywhere. If I had not known that I was expected today, if the carriage had not been freely admitted by the man at the gate lodge, I would have imagined that the Quinta dos Castanheiros was empty and deserted.
Chapter 3
I was conducted into the mansion by a young manservant attired in a braided livery of green and gold, with a black mourning armband. I followed him across an antechamber into a great hall, where slender pale pink columns, carved in the form of twisted ropes, gave support to an arched gallery. A pair of magnificent crystal chandeliers hung from the intricately molded ceiling, and the
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