Brazillian Affiar Part 10

"We're lucky," Lucas shouted above the whirring of the propeller. "In the old days the only means of getting up-country was by boat. And the journey would have taken at least three days."

"I was looking forward to it," she shouted back. "All those monkeys and tropical flowers and rare birds."

"Not to mention the bugs and snakes and man- eating piranhas!"

The city fell away behind them, and Philippa saw the whole expanse of the delta spread out beneath her like a child's jigsaw puzzle. At the mouth of the river, which was two hundred miles wide, the island of Marajo - larger than Switzerland - was set like a jewel. Then as they turned inland, she saw the network of tributaries, and beyond that nothing for mile after interminable mile but the vast, grey-green, impenetrable wall of the Amazon jungle.

Just when it was beginning to seem as if the jungle Would go on for ever, there was a break in the dense ceiling of foliage, and then a spread of clear ground as surprising as a bare patch on a thick animal pelt. The helicopter skimmed the treetops and began its vertical descent. Gradually the features of the landscape became life-size and what had seemed to Philippa like a doll's house was revealed as a graceful, colonial-style mansion.

The jungle had been cleared around the house and some effort made at cultivation. There was a small garden and bungalows for the servants, while to one side were stables and a large paddock where horses were being exercised.

With a last whirl of the propeller the helicopter came to rest. Unsteadily, Philippa followed Lucas down the rope ladder to the ground. Air thick as treacle hit them in the face as they crossed the compound fronting the house, but the moment they entered it everything was cool with air-conditioning, and soft-spoken, white-clad Amerindian servants waited to take their bags and show them to their rooms.

"I expected a primitive ranch," Philippa said. "This is more like a four-star hotel."

"It's a private house and the owners are friends of Rodriguez. I'll tell you about it later," Lucas said, and left her outside her room.

Philippa unpacked and showered and was trying to do something with her hair, when there was a knock on the door and a darkly handsome, middle- aged woman came in and introduced herself as Senhora Guimaraes, wife of the owner. Her English was fluent, though accented, and she had an elegance that was easier to understand when she explained she had lived her early life in America.

"You must find it very different here," Philippa said.

"Different but rewarding. When my husband came into his property he was not content to be an absentee landlord like so any Brazilians."

"I never expected to see such a beautiful house in the middle of the jungle."

"It was not as beautiful as this in the beginning." Senhora Guimaraes smiled at the memory. "Every single thing had to be brought up-river by steamer. Building materials, furniture, chandeliers - even the plumbing! But later I will show you for yourself. Lunch will soon be served."

"I'll be ready in ten minutes," Philippa replied, and reached the patio some eight minutes later.

Lucas was already there, immaculate in white silk s.h.i.+rt and brown jodhpurs. "The only way to get to the site is on horseback," he explained.

"I didn't bring any jodhpurs at all!"

"Can you ride?"

"Only a donkey on the beach!"

"Then you won't be able to come to the site. The journey's too tough."

"I'm sure I'll be able to manage," she protested.

"No." His tone was final. "I've enough on my mind without worrying about you taking a toss. I'll go alone and you can rest up."

Their host and hostess joined them and lunch was served in a large, panelled dining-room. The food was simply cooked, unlike the exotic dishes Philippa had grown used in Rio: freshwater fish in place of lobster, followed by a ca.s.soulet called fetjuada and ending with coffee and a drink called batida, a mixture of sugar-cane brandy and lemon juice.

As soon as lunch was over, Lucas and Senhor Guimaraes left for the site and Senhora Guimaraes invited Philippa to see the house.

Despite her efforts to appear interested, her attention soon wandered and she yawned.

"I'm tiring you," the senhora exclaimed. "We have few visitors out here, so I always talk too much. A fellow countryman of yours stayed here last week and I nearly talked his head off."

"An Englishman?" queried Philippa, an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach.

"Mr. Masterson," the woman replied. "He is also tendering for the dam. You have met, perhaps?"

"Yes." Philippa frowned. "Was it his first visit?"

"No, he was here some months ago. As a matter of fact, if you know him, you can do me a favour. I found an envelope with some papers in his room after he'd left. He must have dropped them when he was packing. I was going to post them to him, but as you are returning to Rio in the morning, perhaps you could take them for me. The post in this part of the country is very unreliable."

Having seen the land they had travelled over. Philippa considered this the understatement of the year. There seemed no reason for refusing the woman's request, though she wished Roland's path would not keep crossing hers.

In the library, Senhora Guimaraes took an envelope from the desk and handed it to her. "There, that's off my mind. Now I'll take you upstairs and leave you to enjoy a siesta."

Alone in her room Philippa turned the envelope over in her hand. Roland's address was on the front, but it was unsealed, and for a moment she was tempted to look inside. Suppose it contained some information which could help Lucas? Her thoughts stopped abruptly She must be mad to think of prying into another person's private papers She thrust the envelope into her case and slammed the lid, as if to shut herself off from temptation. She undressed and climbed between the cool linen sheets. To her surprise she drifted off to sleep as soon as her head touched the pillow, and it was late evening before she awoke. Outside, the darkness was like a solid wall, and she s.h.i.+vered, remembering the jungle that lay all around them.

But when she came downstairs the scene was so ordinary she had to laugh at her own fears. The drawing-room blazed with lights, well-trained servants moved un.o.btrusively about their duties, and Lucas, in impeccable white dinner jacket, was talking to his hostess, a tall, frosted gla.s.s in his hand. For some reason she could not understand, it annoyed her that after an afternoon trekking through jungle and marshland, in an atmosphere calculated to reduce the average man to a sticky rag, should look as though he had done nothing more strenuous than attend a board meeting.

He rose at her entry and she was surprised by the courteous gesture which, more than anything he could have said, placed her in the position of fellow guest rather than secretary. His first words, however, betrayed the illusion.

"Now I've seen the site I have a completely different slant on things. As soon as dinner's over I'd like to start work with you."

Guimaraes, coming in, overheard the remark and laughed. "All the other contractors who visited the site were glad of their beds the minute they got back. What are you, Senhor Paget, a business man or a machine?"

"Both," Lucas smiled. "A machine by day and a man by night!"

"A man after my own heart," the Brazilian laughed. "It is not my business to say this, but I hope you get the contract."

"I intend to get it," Lucas said, and the determination in his voice made Philippa s.h.i.+ver.

The determination was still there - filling him to the exclusion of all other emotions - when later that evening they sat together in the room Guimaraes had placed at their disposal. Ignoring all previous specifications, Lucas dictated steadily for hour after hour, his only reference some scribbled notes and intricate diagrams on a sheet of paper. Yet as the pages of her notebook filled, Philippa saw he had worked out a revolutionary method of building the dam; making full use of the natural contours of the site he had seen that afternoon.

Midnight struck from the old French clock on the mantelpiece, but he went on talking, and it was after two before he finally threw aside his notes and yawned.

"That's it." He gave a sigh of satisfaction. "At a rough estimate I'd say this will knock eighteen per cent off my original price. I'll be able to judge it better when you've typed out the figures."

"I'll do it now," she said, "and you can read them over breakfast."

He hesitated only fractionally before nodding agreement. "Under normal circ.u.mstances I wouldn't ask you to work through the night, but I want those figures urgently."

"Will three copies be enough?"

"Yes. And don't bother about mistakes. If necessary it can all be retyped in Rio." He moved to the door. "I'll see if any servants are still about. I'm sure you could do with some coffee."

Fifteen minutes later he came back carrying a tray with a coffee pot and two cups. "There wasn't anyone awake, but I found the kitchen and made myself at home there."

He filled a cup and pa.s.sed it to her, and she could not help wondering how many other women he had made coffee for at this hour of the morning - and under what circ.u.mstances. She pushed the thought quickly away and drank the scalding liquid so quickly that she choked.

He patted her back, and hastily she moved away.

"If you feel too tired, give it up and go to bed," he said.

"You know you don't mean that!"

He grinned. "You're right!"

"Then leave me alone to get on with it. I can always sleep on the plane going back to Rio tomorrow."

"You can't. I've got more dictation for you."

She glanced at him and, seeing he was quite serious, laughed. "Then I'll sleep when we get back to England!"

He drained his coffee and set down the cup. "One thing I am going to do when we get home is make you a present of some shares in Langlands. You'll have earned them, Philippa, whether we land this contract or not."

He left the room and she heard his footsteps cross the hall and mount the stairs. In the silence that followed she stared at the paper in her typewriter and a tear splashed on to one of the keys. "If this is what it means to be a career woman," she thought, "you can keep it. I want a man in my arms, not dividends in my bank account."

Dawn had caressed the dark to pink before the last page was typed, and she went to the window and pulled aside the curtains, breathing in the cool air for a moment before crossing the hall to the staircase. She had to pa.s.s Lucas's room on the way and she hesitated, then pushed the folder with the new tender under his door where he would see it when he awoke.

In her own room she cast a longing eye at the bed before deciding that one hour's sleep would be worse than nothing. Instead she showered, changed into fresh clothes and went downstairs again.

Breakfast was already being served when she entered the morning-room and Senhora Guimaraes rang for fresh coffee and said her husband was showing Lucas around the estate.

"It's a pity you have seen nothing while you were here," the Senhora said. "I hope you will be back again."

"I doubt it."

"But if Mr Paget gets the contract..."

"I may not be working for him by then."

The dark eyes were curious. "I would have said he is an excellent person for whom to work. He is not a man one would ever find boring."

"He's an excellent employer," Philippa said stiffly.

"He is not your employer when you look at him. If I am wrong, I apologise."

The cup in Philippa's hand trembled and she set it down. "It's not how I look at him that's important. It's how he looks at me. And as far as Mr. Paget is concerned I'm just his secretary."

The woman sighed gustily. "Men are blind. It is the women who must make them see."

Philippa nodded, not trusting herself to reply. The sleepless night she had spent made it difficult for her to think clearly. Her brain was a whirl of figures and data and the last thing she wanted was a discussion about Lucas and what she felt for him.

Quickly she swallowed the rest of her coffee, and pleading packing still to be done, returned to her room.

She stared at herself in the mirror. Her eyes showed a misting of tears and heavy shadows from lack of sleep. Was she so transparent that a stranger knew in one day where her heart had been given? Darn these emotional Latins! There was a lot to be said for English reticence.

Angrily she collected her belongings and dumped them into her case. But she had packed too clumsily and the lid would not close. Muttering, she tipped everything out on the bed and started again. The envelope Senhora Guimaraes had given her to deliver to Roland, slipped to the floor, its contents half spilled out and as she picked it up she found herself looking at a creased letter and the back of a photograph. There was foreign writing on both sides of the letter and as she returned it to its envelope she idly turned over the photograph.

At the sight of the face staring back at her, she knew a physical sense of shock. The strength left her body and she sank to the bed. Why was Roland carrying a picture of Maya ?

She looked at the envelope again and slowly, disliking herself for what she was doing but determined to do it, she took out the letter and read it. Her knowledge of Portuguese was negligible but she could make out a few words - enough to tell her she was not holding a business letter or social acknowledgement - but a pa.s.sionate display of love.

"Are you ready, Philippa?" Lucas was calling from outside her door. "The helicopter's leaving in fifteen minutes."

Hastily she stuffed the letter and photograph in the envelope and put it into her handbag.

"I'm almost ready," she said, and squashed her clothes back in the case, uncaring of the way they would crease.

The return journey to Rio held no memory for her. All her thoughts were centred on the photograph and letter, and all it implied. Roland and Maya. The two names hammered in her brain. Why should they both have denied knowing each other - when they were obviously on terms of intimacy?

Thinking about it, she could see why Maya did not want Lucas to suspect she had once been in love with the man who was now his keenest business compet.i.tor. What was less clear was why Roland had pretended. After all, he knew it would not matter to herself if he had had a love affair with another woman, yet he had not only tried to make her believe he was on superficial terms with Maya, but that he actually disliked her.

Or was his dislike real? Had Maya thrown him over for someone else? Even this did not account for his secrecy about her. No matter how she puzzled over it, Philippa could make no sense of his behaviour and instead began to concentrate on Maya again.

The woman had gone out of her way to stress to Lucas that Roland had a roving eye and that it was attracted to Philippa. She had also built up an elaborate pretence of barely knowing Roland, and one would only go to such lengths if there was a present to hide as well as a past.

Of course - that was the answer. Maya and Roland had not discarded each other. Their love affair was still going on and it was Roland himself who wanted to hide this fact.

Determined for Lucas not to learn of his past and use it against him, he had felt that the only way to ensure Philippa's silence was to pretend he still loved her. Philippa stirred in her seat. This did not ring true either. Roland knew perfectly well that as long as his mother was alive, his secret was safe.

Again Philippa was back where she had started: unable to find any sense in either Maya's or Roland's behaviour, But there must be a reason.

Suddenly it seemed to her that Lucas was the key to the whole situation. Lucas and the contract for building the dam!

Feeling as though she were Maigret coming towards the end of a case, she forced herself to think logically.

Roland was pretending to be in love with her in order to make Lucas have doubts about her loyalty. She burned with shame as she remembered the things she had said to Lucas when he had asked her not to see the man who was his main compet.i.tor. Hard on this thought came another. Why did Roland want Lucas to doubt her loyalty? The answer was so obvious she was disgusted for not seeing it before: she was meant to be the scapegoat. There was no need to ask herself for what. The answer was as clear as the blue sky she could see through the window of the aircraft. Roland - despite his a.s.sertion that the contract was already his - had not been as sure of it as he had pretended, and had decided - by fair means or foul - to make sure no one else undercut him in price. Heaven alone knew what means he had used to discover what his other compet.i.tors were doing, but meeting Philippa again that night in the garden had shown him an easy way of finding out what Lucas had in mind.

She tried to recollect the questions he had asked her about Lucas that first evening, but all she could remember was that she had made it plain she never gossiped about her employer. Was it then that Roland had decided to use Maya in order to pump Lucas, or had Maya herself been the one to suggest it? The answer did not matter either way. Only the outcome was important.

Philippa glanced at the man by her side, wondering what he would say if he knew what she was thinking.

The plane lurched and burning ash from the cigarette in Lucas's hand scorched her leg. With a muttered apology he dabbed at it.

"Another pair gone," he said with mock resignation. "You'll have to put it on your expense account!"

She smiled, but the accident - so trivial in itself - had done more than spark a ladder in her tights. It had sparked off a train of thought that made everything horrifyingly clear.

She knew why Roland had put in a second bid for the contract - a bid considerably lower than the one Lucas had worked so hard to produce. She looked at Lucas. Would he think her crazy if she told him she was convinced Maya had copied out the prices and given them to Roland? The first thing to have was proof, and her only answer was a bottle of nail varnish...

Yes, there was no doubt of it. Maya had deliberately laddered her tights in order to get Philippa out of the room and so give herself time to copy out the figures in the folder on the desk.

She glanced across the aisle to where her handbag rested on an empty seat. All she had to do was show Lucas the letter from Maya to Roland.

She leaned towards her handbag, stopping as Lucas touched her arm and pointed to the light that had flashed on at the end of the cabin.

"We're coming in to land," he said. "Fasten your seat-belt."

As she did so the whine of the engines increased and they started their descent towards Rio. The warmth of the rising air made the plane lurch and she clutched the side of her seat and desperately hoped she would not be sick. Warm fingers clasped hers and she opened her eyes to see Lucas's face almost touching her own.