I Like It Here

Mr. Bowen. That’s right. Have a cigarette —no no no no no, have one of mine, you must try them, put those away, Mr. Bowen, please. Alec has a match. You like brandy and soda? You both like brandy and soda? Aha, that’s good. We find it best to have it out here like this on the tray, the bottle and the glasses and the soda, we call it soda but it’s really the natural-gas mineral water they bottle here locally and I’m sure you’ll find it very good—and the ice here in this pretty bowl. Isn’t this a pretty cloth, Mrs. Bowen? It’s the local style of embroidery, you know, all done by hand, of course. Every Portuguese girl learns to do this work as part of her education, just like learning to cook and keep house. Ah good, Alec, you’re a very quick barman, I shall be able to recommend you if you ever want to change your job. There we are, we all have what we want. You talk to Alec now, Mr. Bowen. Edith was telling me about your children, Mrs. Bowen. You have three? So young to have three children, so young. “Holding a gigantic brandy-and-locally-bottled-natural-gas-mineral-water, Bowen did as he had been bidden while Isabella Bannion’s husky, compelling voice ran on in the background. Alec Marchant filled in a few details about the Bannions, who were friends of a friend of his and who, immediately upon meeting him and Edith for the first time, had begun showing them Portugal without any regard for trouble or expense. All four had recently returned from an expedition to Fatima, where the religious festival had been on. The Marchants had personally witnessed a great number of processions, all of them strikingly elaborate, and had attended several full-scale services, two of them at night. Isabella Bannion had taken it upon herself to see that they missed nothing of interest or importance, and had been far more informative than any guidebook could have been on the provenance and significance of all that they saw.

“Well, you certainly made the best possible use of your time,” Bowen said.

“Oh yes, we weren’t idle for a moment. We owe the whole thing to Isabella.”

“It seems to have made a profound impression on you.”

“It’s not the kind of experience you forget in a hurry.”

“I can believe that. I suppose you’ve finished seeing the sights for a bit now?”

“Oh no, there’s a lot of stuff in and around Lisbon we’ve still got to see. This afternoon we all went to Belem. Have you been to Belem?”

“No. What happens there?”

Marchant drained his glass and refilled it. “Well, there’s nothing that actually happens, if you know what I mean. You go and look at the tower, you see. It’s a very nice tower. It was put up in the early sixteenth century, or was it the early fifteenth century? One or the other, I’m pretty sure. Isabella explained it all to me. And then when you’ve finished looking at the tower you go and look at the monastery. I shouldn’t have wanted to miss that. Then tomorrow there’s the Palacio Foz and the art galleries. Or are we going to Sintra to look at the palace there? Either way we’re getting our money’s worth all right. Have another of these, won’t you?”

Marchant went on to say that Isabella Bannion was very devout. She had done a great deal of work for her Church in Goa and had received a personal commendation from Salazar. It appeared that in Armacão, the little town on the south coast of Portugal where they lived, she had continued her activities with the help of her husband. They had adopted as their son a young priest who already occupied an important position in the local hierarchy. From all that he had heard and seen, Marchant had concluded that religion played a large part in the Bannions’ lives.

“You mean they’re always doing good works,” Bowen said.

“It’s far more than that. You see it most with Isabella. She prays a lot.”

“Always popping in and out of churches, that kind of thing?”

“That’s hardly the way to put it. And it isn’t only that. She prays wherever she may happen to be, on the beach, in the car, having dinner and so on. Harry joins in.”

“What do you and Edith do while they’re praying? Do you join in as well?”

“No, we’re not expected to. We just keep quiet. She does it so naturally it’s not in the least embarrassing. You’ll see.”

“How long do they last, these prayers?”

“Never more than about a minute. Sometimes there’s a hymn after it’s over. Edith and I often join in that.”

“I shouldn’t have thought you’d know many Catholic hymns.”

“Oh, they aren’t Catholic hymns. Harry isn’t from the South, you know; he was a Belfast Presbyterian before he was converted. He knows a lot of Moody and Sankey.”

Bowen nodded. “The good old good ones,” he said. “Isabella has a direct personal relationship with the Virgin, actually. She takes care never to ask for anything unless it’s really important and not for herself alone. And the funny thing is that her prayers are always answered. I said I didn’t believe it at first, but she quoted so many instances that I just had to give in. Can I top that up for you?”

Marchant spoke next of Harry Bannion. He had met his wife in India, where he had held a senior post in a foreign bank. He had also been high up in, perhaps even at the very top of, the Indian Boy Scout Movement. On retirement, his wife’s connections with Portugal and the thought of the ravages which British income-tax would inflict on his pension had combined to settle their choice of domicile. Marchant said that Harry Bannion was something of a character, or “card”, while sharing his wife’s kindness and generosity.

Just then a tall, large-featured man appeared at the top of the short flight of steps that led to the nook where they were