style="font-size:15px;"> “I can feel the heart of old Spain throbbing in my veins whispering her secrets.” She sat back again, taking everything in. “If I lived here, I’d never want to leave.”
“I try to stay here as much as possible.”
In a small voice she said, “I take it something of vital importance brought you out of seclusion the other day.”
“Correct, Senora.”
It had been a day like none other. One moment Remi was driving along trying to absorb the first good news in two years, in the next he was plunged into a life and death situation with this remarkable woman whose inner strength continued to humble him.
He drove them to the front of the main house where he parked the car. “Welcome to La Rosaleda, Jillian,” he said, helping her from the car.
She turned to him. “What does Rosaleda mean exactly?”
“The rose garden. The house has been called that for almost four hundred years. The indoor rose garden serves as an oasis in this dry heat.”
His housekeeper opened the double doors and stepped forward to greet them.
“Maria? Meet Senora Jillian Gray from New York City,” he said in English. “Jillian? Maria runs this house. She and her husband Paco live upstairs.”
“Welcome, Senora.” They shook hands.
“Gracias, Maria. It’s a great pleasure for me.”
“I prepared your room. Follow me.”
“Just a moment, Maria.”
To Remi’s surprise his guest hurried around to the back of the car. Before he could warn her not to bend over, she’d retrieved her brother’s bouquet. She walked toward the housekeeper and handed the carnations to her.
“Knowing the Senor and how good he has been to me since the accident, I have no doubts he’s asked you to go to a lot of trouble for me. I want you to have these as my way of saying thank you. If my brother were here, he would thank you too.”
At Jillian’s explanation Remi couldn’t have been any more surprised than Maria. Her mouth suddenly broadened into a wide smile at their visitor. “Muchas gracias, Senora.”
“Call me Jillian, por favor.”
“J-Jil-yan?”
“That’s good.”
Both women laughed in the face of Jillian’s lie before Maria disappeared with the flowers.
Remi’s mouth curved upward. “Flowers for Maria from a guest? That’s a first for her. She won’t forget your generosity.”
“I’m the one imposing.”
“Let’s get you out of this heat, shall we? You’ll find the thick walls keep house much cooler.”
She accompanied him inside, but only took a few more steps before she let out another gasp and came to a halt.
Alarmed, he reached for her in case she was feeling light headed. “What’s wrong? Are you ill?”
“No.” She turned toward him. “Forgive me for startling you,” she said, slowly easing her arm from his grasp. Every time he touched her now, he started a small fire.
“It’s just that I’ve known private homes with honeycomb vaulting such as this existed, but I’ve only seen the rare pictures of them in books. Outside of the Alhambra I’ve explored, I never thought I’d be privileged to experience a true Spanish treasure first hand. It’s like coming upon a mystical kingdom where Othello and Don Quixote would be at home.”
Her explanation helped his muscles to relax. The description of his birthplace was very moving. Indeed it paralleled his own thoughts formed from the cradle, but never expressed aloud.
“When you’ve freshened up, we’ll eat lunch in the patio room.”
“That sounds lovely. For the first time in several days I’m actually hungry.”
She followed him down a passageway of glazed, multicolored tiles to the right of the arched foyer. They had to be four hundred years old yet still retained their brilliant colors of blue, red, orange and green. Fabulous!
He came to a set of carved double doors with brass studs and opened them, revealing a magnificent room befitting a nobleman’s house.
“The bathroom is through that door on the left. Make yourself at home. I’ll be back with your suitcase. In case you’ve forgotten, it’s time for your eyedrops.”
He left her standing there bemused by her surroundings. In the midst of this kind of splendor, she had forgotten. A huge chandelier with real candles hung from the stalactite ceiling. At her feet lay an intricately inlaid wood floor in a striped Moorish design, making it difficult to know where to look first.
The big canopied bed of white lace would have dominated a smaller room. Her fascinated gaze passed from the brass wall sconces to the massive armoires and writing desk. The dark wood had been inlaid with mother-of-pearl, a long lost art.
In one end of the room she spied a round table of an unusual shade of yellow wood tinted with darker veining. Several ornately upholstered chairs in jewel tones surrounded it. At the other end she saw a grouping of damask love seats and an ottoman arranged around a fireplace.
Above the elaborately carved mantel hung an immense oil painting of a mature olive tree in full flower, its trunk gnarled and twisted. There was a plaque at the bottom. She moved closer to read it.
Gat Shemanim. The words were in Hebrew. What did they mean?
Her gaze flicked to the olive groves she could see from the window, then shifted back to the painting again. She could almost hear its silvery leaves rustling in the breeze, never realizing how fascinating an olive tree could be.
Senor Goyo had been tending them from boyhood, extracting the rich oil from their fruit revered by men over the centuries. The thought of him engaged in something so important throughout his whole life had a strange effect on her, moving her to tears for a reason she couldn’t comprehend.
To her dismay he’d come back in the room with her suitcase and his flowers, catching her in another emotional moment.
She heard him pause before he lowered her bag to the floor and walked over to her. “What am I going to do with you?” he asked in a husky tone.
Jillian knew what she wanted him to do, but that would be the worst thing she could do for herself, and it would only embarrass him.
“Great beauty always makes me emotional.” She tried to resist looking at him. “Tell me the meaning on the plaque of the painting.”
He studied her face briefly before he said, “The Garden of Gethsemane. Several olive trees still growing there would have witnessed the Lord’s suffering. My grandmother, devout in the faith, had it painted as a first anniversary gift for my grandfather. He insisted it hang in their bedroom. My
