Madremanya Thursday
THURSDAY 23rd JUNE Posted 3 weeks later.
Madremanya, Catalonia
Blob out day!
We’re going to do nothing, just find the pool and sit by it. Sunny in the morning, so Gwyn goes into La Bisbal d’Emporda to buy bread and briox from Sands, and fill up two 2 litre plastic water bottles with Rosado at €1.20 a litre and Tinto Crianza at €1.60 a litre. Why stint ourselves? Go for the posh stuff. Bought a local map in the bookshop. I tried to buy a duck at three separate butchers but all they had was magret. When my turn came I called for ‘Magret’ but a large, square woman stepped in front claiming she had been there first. She had presumably materialised through a closed door. So instead of getting the prepacked magrets and leaving, a 20 second transaction, I waited while she ordered a rabbit to be skinned, butchered and deboned, then wrapped round some unidentifiable filling and tied up in six separate morsels. Then the butcheress disappeared, came back with a sack of mince, cut it open and started hand rolling meat balls for her. Enough. After 15 minutes of waiting I spoke loudly and forcefully. “Dos magrets, por favor!” The butcheress shrugged, tossed me two vacuum packed magrets, took my €15 and carried on making meat balls — with a 20 second interruption. The square woman glared at me. ‘Arrivederci,” I said. Wrong country, I guess.
Outside in the narrow echoing streets was a small boy with the worst present anyone could possibly have thought of giving to a ten year old — a working toy loudhailer.
Back at the shack it was grey and cloudy. Von had discovered the pool, which she said was fabulous. But she was seriously anxious and worried. The pool is at the top of the hill with a steep drop at its southern end down into woods, and the pool at that end is surrounded by a two foot wall. Milo had run exuberantly into the pool area, seen the low wall and sailed blissfully over it, not knowing there was a 20 foot drop on the other side.
All Von heard was a thump and then — nothing. She ran to the low wall and peered over expecting to see a dead or at least seriously injured dog. As Milo limped back into view she called out to him – and astonishingly he sprinted up the shallow curving steps as though nothing had happened. Do dogs have nine lives too?
Milo demonstrates the depth of his fall
As I walked back down the gravel path from the pool I heard a footfall behind me. I turned with a smile, expecting Von, but there was no one. I must have turned the wrong way. But there was no one on my other side, either. Odd. But then the second time I walked the path I heard the footsteps again, and again I turned and saw no one. This was very strange. The third time I heard the unmistakeable sound of bicycle wheels on gravel, so close I jumped sideways to get out of its way. There was nothing there. This was beginning to get disturbing, and I walked …
As one who looks behind, walks on
And no more turns his head
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread
I made sure I walked with Von the next time. She heard nothing, and as she laughed I heard the footsteps again and glanced at her with eyes wide open. She assumed I was faking it. But I wasn’t. I heard someone. Or some thing. It happened every time I walked down that path, and once it was expected, it ceased to be worrying and simply became a curiosity.
Partly cloudy — but all to ourselves
There was intermittent sun in the afternoon, but it was generally a grey, cloudy day. We stayed by the pool till early evening, then retreated to the shack where Von made a lekker dinner of magret, washed down with the second bottle of Chateau de Java.
