The Wild Cry of Love Read online

  It was spotlessly clean, everything shining with soap and beeswax and through the open windows there was the fragrance of honeysuckle and roses mixed with the tang of salt from the Mediterranean.

  “You can change here,” Madame Porquier said, looking curiously at the brown linen bag Valda carried.

  “Thank you very much,” Valda said. “And would it be possible for you to dry the clothes I am wearing?”

  “But of course, mademoiselle.”

  “Monsieur Sanford did say that you might be kind enough to put me up for the night,” Valda ventured. Madame Porquier looked surprised.

  “You are travelling alone, Mademoiselle Burton?”

  “I have friends whom I am meeting later at Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer,” Valda said. “I thought it would be wise to arrive after the Festival as I am not a gypsy.”

  Madame laughed.

  “It was your clothes that deceived me, mademoiselle. Now that I see your hair and your eyes you don’t look in the least like a caraque!”

  “Then I may stay?” Valda enquired.

  “It will be a pleasure, mademoiselle! Any friend of Monsieur Sanford is always welcome!”

  She spoke with a note of respect in her voice that Valda did not miss.

  “There is water in the jug,” Madame Porquier went on, “and if you will be kind enough to bring your wet clothes down to the kitchen I will hang them in the sunshine. Or, if it is necessary, I will dry them over the stove.”

  “I am sure they will dry very quickly in the sun,” Valda smiled.

  “Please ask for anything you want, mademoiselle,” Madame Porquier said.

  She went from the bedroom, closing the door behind her and Valda heard her footsteps going down the uncovered wooden stairs.

  She slipped off her skirts, glad to be rid of the cold wetness of them.

  She had to take off everything she was wearing and she noticed that the red from her skirt had run a little into the first of the petticoats she wore underneath.

  Her white blouse was stained from the grasses or perhaps from the water itself in the étang into which she had fallen.

  When she was partially re-dressed in fresh underclothes, she carried her blouse to the basin and tried to wash it in cold water.

  It was the first time in her life that she had ever washed anything for herself.

  She thought she was doing it somewhat inadequately and perhaps it would be better to ask Madame Porquier to do it for her.

  ‘I can pay for anything I want,’ she told herself reassuringly.

  Her gypsy skirt had two deep pockets on either side into which she had put her money.

  There had also been some in her linen bag and now, as she looked at it lying on the dressing table, she wondered how she could stow it away in the thin summer dress that she had brought with her.

  When she packed, she had chosen her gowns with great care.

  There would be no lady’s maid to press them if they were creased and, as they had to be very light, it was essential for her to make the right choice.

  She had stood for a long time in front of her wardrobe, which was packed with gowns of all sorts and descriptions.

  Finally she had chosen two simple muslins she thought would not look too expensive, although in fact they had come from a famous Parisian couturier.

  Two day gowns and one for the evening was all Valda had allowed herself. But she had put in one of her thin riding skirts with its light jacket, which she wore in the heat of the summer.

  She debated now as to whether she should put this on. Then she thought that Mr. Sanford would not be expecting her to ride and later she could discuss the possibility of her doing so tomorrow.

  She therefore went downstairs carrying her wet gypsy clothes and wearing a muslin gown with a pattern of small blue flowers and a blue waistband.

  She had also re-arranged her hair, which had been crushed and flattened by the gypsy handkerchief.

  As she walked into the kitchen where Roydon Sanford was sitting talking to Madame Porquier, she saw an irrepressible look of admiration in his eyes as he rose to his feet.

  “I have brought down my wet clothes as you suggested, madame,” Valda said to Madame Porquier. “I tried to wash the stains from my blouse, but I am afraid I have not done it very efficiently.”

  “I will do it for you, mademoiselle,” Madame Porquier replied, taking the clothes from Valda.

  “Thank you,” Valda said and turned to Roydon Sanford to ask, “You have looked at the camera? It is all right?”

  “As far as I can see, not a spot of water has gone through the leather cover,” he replied. “It might be a wise precaution to change the film, but I am almost prepared to swear that it is quite undamaged.”

  “Then I will take your word for it,” Valda said.

  She had deliberately left upstairs the two other films she carried with her, because in the outer boxes that contained them she had hidden most of her money.

  It was impossible now she had no pockets in her skirt to walk about with so many franc notes.

  Instead she had placed the films at the back of the drawer in her dressing table and hidden them under the few things she was not wearing like handkerchiefs and stockings.

  She could not believe that anyone in this house was what her father had always called light-fingered, but at the same time she had to be careful.

  To have all her money stolen at the outset of her adventure would force her to return home before she was ready to do so.

  As an added precaution she put a note of one hundred francs in the bodice of her gown between her small breasts.

  ‘No one’ she told herself with pride, ‘could accuse me of not being sensible and thinking of every detail.’

  “Madame has suggested,” Roydon Sanford was saying, “that you might like a cup of coffee and one of her famous meat pasties. It’s always wise to eat after an accident.”

  “I would like a cup of coffee,” Valda answered, “but I am in fact not very hungry.”

  “You will be, after the first taste of one of Madame Porquier’s pasties!” Roydon Sanford answered.

  He was speaking in French, which Valda knew was out of courtesy to his hostess.

  “I will bring them to you in the salon,” their host said. “We are quite content to have them here,” Roydon Sanford replied.

  “You may eat with us when you are alone, monsieur,” Madame Porquier said in a tone of a reproving nanny, “but when you have company you will eat in the salon. Take Mademoiselle Burton in there and I will bring your coffee within a minute or two.”

  Valda could not help thinking that Madame’s tone towards her had become far more respectful since she had changed and now looked more conventional and certainly more respectable than when she was wearing her gypsy clothes.

  It was strange, she thought, how people despised the gypsies and yet to her they had been everything that was kind, friendly and helpful.

  Roydon Sanford had opened another door off the kitchen for her and she walked through it into the salon, which was a larger and more formal room.

  There was something stiff and rather unlived-in about the furniture stuffed with horsehair. And the aquatints of bulls and horses that could be bought in any provincial town bore very little resemblance to the beautiful wild animals they depicted.

  “I gather you have persuaded Madame to let you stay?” Roydon Sanford said, as he followed Valda across the room to the window, where she stood looking out onto the flower filled garden.

  “She told me that any friend of yours was welcome,” Valda said. “You are obviously persona grata. Why do you come here for your holidays?”

  “I might just as well ask you why you have come to the Camargue,” he answered. “The answer is because it is the most beautiful place either of us is likely to find anywhere in the world.”

  “I have not yet seen very much of it,” Valda admitted, “but I feel what you have said is true.”

  “It has a magic w
hich is indescribable. Once you have been here you long to return. Sometimes I find myself dreaming of the Camargue. Then I know that nothing will stop me coming back.”

  “This is my first visit,” Valda said, “and so only when I have left will I be able to discover if it draws me as it draws you.”

  He did not reply and she knew without looking at him that his eyes were on her face.

  “You are very young to travel alone,” he said after a moment. “Why does your father permit it?”

  “My father is dead!”

  “But surely someone – ?” he began and then stopped. “It’s not my business, but quite frankly you are too pretty not to need someone looking after you.”

  Valda smiled.

  “I can look after myself, except when strange men gallop over me without any warning!”

  “How could I have imagined in a million years,” Roydon Sanford asked, “that the long grass would be concealing a woman, and a gypsy one at that?”

  “I suppose if I really had been a gypsy and you had trampled on me, it would not have mattered.”

  “I see you did not miss Madame Porquier’s dislike of the gypsies,” he said. “It is understandable. At times they can be very difficult in this part of the world when so many of them come on their annual pilgrimage to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer.”

  He paused.

  “But they are colourful and the ceremony in the sea, which is derived from an age old polytheistic religion, is very impressive.”

  He saw Valda was interested and went on,

  “Once a year the Romani or gypsies, in the fifteenth century, took on their shoulders the statue of Ishtar and waded into the sea as an act to promote fertility.”

  “I did not know that.”

  “The gypsies keep their Festival very much to themselves,” Roydon Sanford went on. “But you can understand that the farmers find them a nuisance not only on their way to Saintes-Maries but also on their way back.”

  He smiled as he said,

  “For the past week all the roads converging on the Camargue have been packed with a steady stream of gypsies in caravans of every size, shape and age.”

  “I understand that most landowners are hospitable to the gypsies and allow them to camp for the night or longer if necessary?”

  “It’s not the landowners who suffer from the gypsies,” Roydon Sanford replied, “but the farmers. Chickens mysteriously disappear, even lambs evade the watchful eye of the shepherd.”

  He laughed as he went on,

  “French parents resent the money their daughters pay to the fortune-tellers and their sons expend on games of chance and all the other paraphernalia by which the gypsies going to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer will extract every possible franc from the simple peasants.”

  “I don’t think you know the gypsies as well as I do,” Valda said sharply. “They are not the rogues you think they are! If they take something to eat as they pass, who shall blame them? This is a rich country and they are very poor. It is difficult for any of us to understand why the good things of life are so unevenly distributed.”

  Roydon Sanford laughed.

  “I can see,” he said, “you are one of these new women who are demanding the vote!”

  “Do I sound like a Suffragette?” Valda asked. “Perhaps I shall become one.”

  “You certainly don’t look like one. But I will tell you what you do look like.”

  There was a note in his voice that made her glance at him.

  “On second thoughts,” he said, “I will keep the compliment I was about to pay you until we know each other better.”

  He turned away from the window as he spoke and Valda realised he had heard Madame Porquier at the door. He crossed the room to open it for her.

  She carried in a tray on which reposed a large coffeepot and two big cups.

  There was a dish on which Valda saw a pile of hot meat pasties. There was thick cream for the coffee and, as Madame put the tray down on the table, Valda decided that she was after all quite hungry.

  “You will feel better, mademoiselle,” Madame Porquier said, “When you have had something to eat and drink. Having an accident, however small, is always upsetting.”

  “Thank you,” Valda replied. “I am very grateful.”

  “It is a pleasure,” Madame Porquier replied as she went from the room.

  “I can quite see,” Valda said as she poured out the coffee, “that if I stay here long I shall get as fat as Madame!”

  “Perhaps that is why I work,” Roydon Sanford smiled. “There is nothing like riding to shake down a meal, however large.”

  “Do you think I could ride tomorrow?” Valda asked.

  “I will speak to Monsieur Porquier when he comes in this evening,” Roydon Sanford replied. “I am sure he will let you have one of his horses, although they are in short supply at the moment because the mares are foaling.”

  “Are you speaking of the Camargue horses?” Valda asked quickly.

  “I am,” he answered. “Both wild and tame.”

  “Then I must take pictures of their foals,” Valda cried. “I would like above all things to photograph the foals soon after they are born.”

  “As you can imagine, it’s not easy,” Roydon Sanford answered. “Not only are the mares nervous, but also the stallions who keep guard over them can be very difficult with strangers.”

  He saw the disappointment in Valda’s face and added,

  “At the same time I promise you I will do my best to see that this photographic exhibition of yours is a success and I do agree that pictures of the foals would be a great attraction.”

  “Then can we try tomorrow?” Valda asked excitedly.

  “If that will please you,” he answered. “In the meantime you can take some pictures of the foals on the farm. There are quite a number of them.”

  Valda ate one of the meat pasties and realised that Mr. Sanford had been right in saying they were delicious.

  She then drank her coffee, adding a little more cream to cool it and said,

  “I am ready! Can we go and see the foals?”

  Roydon Sanford rose to his feet.

  “I am sure your pictures will be a success,” he said. “You bring a vitality to everything you do and everything you say. If you can transmit that to a photograph, it will be sensational!”

  “That is what I thought about the exhibition I saw in London,” she said. “There were some beach scenes that were fantastically real.”

  “I think we must have visited the same exhibition!” Roydon Sanford said in amazement. “Were there also some pictures taken at night of the Houses of Parliament?”

  “There were!” Valda said. “I see you know that they were by Paul Martin?”

  “So that is why you have become a photographer!” Roydon Sanford remarked. “I must admit I was tempted myself, but I was too lazy to make the effort.”

  “What do you do when you are not here on holiday?” Valda asked.

  She was walking towards the door as she spoke.

  “I have done a great many things in my life,” Roydon Sanford answered. “In fact I am the proverbial rolling stone. I have been, this past month, examining the different wines in the Rhône district for a friend who is thinking of importing them.”

  “That is most interesting – ”

  But Valda was in fact intent on finding her camera that had been left in the kitchen.

  It was standing on a side table near where Roydon Sanford had been sitting when she had brought her wet clothes down to Madame Porquier.

  She picked it up now, felt the leather case and decided that he was right in thinking it was unlikely that the water on which it had been floating had penetrated the thickness of the leather.

  “I inspected the box carefully,” Roydon Sanford told her, “and even if it was wet, by the time we reached here it was quite dry.”

  “Then I think we will risk the film that is already in it,” Valda said, “because it is a new one.”


  She did not add that she had not changed a film for so long that she was slightly uncertain as to how to do it.

  When the time came, she was determined to be alone to read the instructions carefully.

  “Let’s go and see the foals,” Roydon Sanford suggested. “Do you want a hat?”

  “I did not bring one with me,” Valda answered.

  “You are certainly travelling very light,” he said with a smile, “and in the circumstances your gypsy costume must have been useful.”

  “Especially when I was with the gypsies,” Valda agreed without thinking.

  “You have been with the gypsies?”

  She heard the astonishment in his voice and thought perhaps she had been indiscreet. Then she told herself it had nothing to do with him.

  “I am very fond of the gypsies,” she said almost defiantly, “and the ones who brought me to the Camargue were old friends. I cannot think why you should be so suspicious of them.”

  “I am not,” Roydon Sanford answered. “I am only astonished at the way you move about by yourself. Surely with your looks you must at times find yourself in – shall we say – an uncomfortable situation?”

  “Only when I am taken by surprise, like this afternoon,” Valda retorted.

  “I was not referring to that sort of situation,” he said gravely.

  “As I have told you, I can look after myself,” Valda replied. ‘I think it is a good thing for women to be independent, to make their own minds up about what they want to do.”

  “And what do you want?”

  Valda thought for a moment, then she said,

  “I want to be free – free of restrictions, of being confined or ordered about.”

  “But that is the fate of all young women,” Roydon Sanford argued. “First they must submit to parental authority, then they must be looked after by their husbands.”

  “Why should they be?” Valda asked. “Besides, who wants a husband? There are enough men in the world so that one does not have to marry the first one who comes along.”

  She was thinking of the Marquis d’Artigny as she spoke and she told herself that, although he might be her stepfather’s first choice, it was very unlikely that his second or third would be any more acceptable to her.