'An American gives a girl a ring - if he loves her.' She slipped free of her guardian's hold on her and jumped to her feet. 'I'm going now, senor. Kent will be waiting for me.
'Where does he wait, Yvain?' Don Juan poured himself another cup of coffee with deliberate movements of his lean hands that were so strong in dealing with a woman, so caressing when it came to music.
'We meet by the catalpa tree above the beach, where he moors the launch.'
'I see that you have chosen an appropriate trysting place.' Don Juan looked at her with the smile that seemed to soften his eyes to velvet. 'We call the catalpa the tree of heaven. Enjoy the fiesta, nina. I take it you will be at the farewell party on the
young man's yacht?'
'Yes, senor.' Her fingers clenched the velvet of her skirt. 'Are you going to be there?'
'Mrs. Grayson has been kind enough to invite me. Yes, Yvain, I shall come to the party. I think I must meet these friends of yours.'
'I hope you and Raquel enjoy the fiesta.' She turned then and hurried away to meet Kent. The sun was warm on her hair and she could smell the scent of the carnation Don Juan had cut for her. She had meant to wear a mantilla, but it was in her room and she wanted to get away quickly from the castle. She wanted to be with Kent who was uncomplicated and so unlike a Spaniard. She wanted to lose herself at the fiesta with him; to laughs and be gay and not have to think about tomorrow.
There he waited, smoking a cigarette beneath the catalpa that leaned over the path to the beach. The air was filled with the tang of the sea, and she told herself it was the vivid sparkle that made her eyes sting.
She ran down the path as if in flight, and Kent's cigarette went flying as he held open his arms to catch her and hold her. 'Oh ...' She was half laughing, breathless and a little tearful. 'Have I kept you waiting?'
'I'd wait all day,' he said extravagantly. 'You look more than ever like a girl out of a folk tale ... Rapunzel who has managed to escape from her tower to be with her sweetheart.'
He held her and looked down into her eyes. 'Have we only today, Yvain, or have we tomorrow and all the days that come after?'
'Let's go to the fiesta and make the most of today.' Still she couldn't commit herself in words, though in her heart she had decided. 'We don't want to miss anything.'
In town they found that every balcony had been banked with flowers and hung with gay Spanish rugs and silken shawls, and upon them families were clustered in their fiesta clothes, laughing, strumming guitars, and throwing carnations
to the people on the pavements below.
Fishing boats in the harbour were gaily decorated and the women and girls were clad in charming costumes of blue or crimson, and their necklaces and long earrings glittered in the sunshine as they turned their heads with flirting awareness of male admiration. Their fluttering fans of lace or silk were like wings in the air; the women were like butterflies beside the lean Spaniards in their dark suits, ruffled shirts and black, broad-rimmed hats. Some of the gayer younger men wore a scarlet or blue cummerbund, and the whiteness of their smiling teeth matched the whiteness of their shirts.
The bells of the church went on pealing above the laughter and the gay affection of the fiesta crowds. Children ran about holding the hoops of flowers they would try to throw over the heads of the pretty girls selected to ornament the procession of Adam and Eve. Street vendors were selling marzipan cakes, crisp churros, and drinks of iced horchata.
Yvain and her escort paused beside a stall on which the horchata was being sold. They clinked their glasses and watched a traditional jig danced to the music of drums, tambourines and a curious sort of bagpipes. In another corner of the plaza gipsies were whirling, and flower-hung carts were coming in from the hills, filled with more people in gay costume. Wicker-covered garafas of wine were slung over the backs of donkeys, and girls riding pillion behind handsome horsemen had flowers in their hair and the sleeves of their blouses were a mass of huge starched frills.
It was like a pageant out of the past and Yvain was entranced and eager to see everything. Kent lifted her to the high stone window-sill of one of the plaza houses, from which she would have a good view of the procession when it passed by. She felt his warm shoulder beneath her hand and at the same time she felt a sudden compulsion to glance up at one of the flower-hung balconies of a tall palacio in the square.
Don Juan was there, tall and dark beside Raquel and her father. Raquel was wearing a lovely dress of pale blue lace and her glossy dark hair was covered by a white lace mantilla in which diamonds caught the sun. Yvain's heart seemed to turn over. There was a small carnation in her guardian's lapel, and Raquel looked just like a bride.
'Is that him?'
She glanced dazedly downwards into Kent's blue eyes.
'Is that the guardian, the tall magnifico standing beside the dazzling Dona Raquel?'
She nodded.
Kent turned again to look at Don Juan. 'Yes, he is much younger than I had thought him. He and Raquel make a striking couple ... say, who's the other Spaniard standing a little way behind her? He's dressed like a matador!'
Yvain studied the good-looking Spaniard who was indeed dressed in matador costume. He was laughing and waving to the crowd below the balcony, and Yvain remembered what Raquel had once said ... that she had a suitor who was a famous bullfighter, and that now and again he paid a visit to the island. Raquel had smiled, as if to add without words that he paid those visits in order to propose to her. As Yvain watched the group on the palacio balcony, Don Juan bent his tall head to say something to Raquel. She smiled, glanced at the matador and put a slender hand on Don Juan's sleeve. The sun-flashed and burned in the diamonds of the bracelet Raquel was wearing. They were like fire against the dark, masculine sleeve.
Yvain glanced away. Only that morning at breakfast her guardian had told her that a man of the island still gave to the girl he loved a wrist chain or bracelet to let everyone know that he laid claim to her. Raquel would want diamonds because they suited her, and Don Juan would give generously to the woman to whom he said, 'Te quiero.'
There came the sound of a band being played and a buzz of expectation ran round the plaza. The procession was heading this way and children were lifted on to their fathers' shoulders so they could aim their hoops of flowers. Girls danced at the young men ... eternal Eves tempting them.
Yvain felt a touch on her wrist, fingers on her bracelet of charms, but she didn't dare to look at Kent. This fiesta was a celebration of love! Temptation was in the air, and something whispered that she might as well surrender now and tell him she is his to carry away from the island.
She was about to speak when someone cried out: 'Yoohoo!' It was Bettina Grayson with several friends. 'My dears, we've been looking all over for you both! Isn't this a lot of fun? They tell me we're about to see Adam and Eve!'
The procession arrived and flowers rained upon the figures of Adam and Eve, and upon their entourage of angels and dancers. What struck Yvain was that the man chosen to represent Adam was a mature man rather than a young one. The girlish Eve carried a white bouquet and a basket of oranges (believed by the people of southern countries to be the fruit of temptation) and her long white dress was utterly simple and enhanced by a golden girdle in the shape of a serpent. Her hair was encircled by a white silk ribbon. She smiled at Adam and offered him an orange from her basket. He shook his head emphatically and shot a smile at the crowd. Everyone laughed.
When Yvain again glanced up at the palacio balcony, the mayor and his party had gone inside. As the procession moved on, the crowd began to break up into groups. Yvain was carried off by the Graysons and their friends and the rest of the fiesta day passed for her in a kind of dream.
She joined in the laughter and the dancing, ate melon and sugary churros and let the gaiety sweep over her like a wave of forgetfulness. The hours slipped away, and when the coloured lights began to bloom along the harbour, the Graysons said it was time to make for the launch.
'T
here's the Blue Dolphin!' As they made their way down the steps of the harbour Kent caught at Yvain's arm and pointed out the yacht to her. Its strings of coloured lights had been lit and it rocked on the darkening water like some fairy craft. For a second or two Yvain was enchanted by the picture it made, and then all at once she realized that she couldn't face going aboard the yacht. She couldn't face any more people, any more music and wine, any more of her own false gaiety.
'I'm sorry, Kent!' She dragged her arm free of his and felt the charm bracelet become unclasped. She scrambled up the steps of the jetty and fought her way through the crowd thronging the harbour to see the fireworks. She heard Kent calling her name, but she ran on. She didn't look back, or pause, not even when she knocked her arm against the harbour wall. She hurried on, biting her lip with pain and feeling the bareness of her wrist from which the bracelet had been wrenched. She couldn't hear Kent's voice any more and she hoped he would forgive her for her irrational behaviour. She must be alone! The thought of having to smile and be gay for another three or four hours was more than she could bear. She wanted to feel the sea wind against her face, but not on the deck of a crowded yacht. She wanted to listen to the whisper of the surf and find a little ease for her heart that had been aching all day beneath her carefree mask.
She paused at last, breathless, and found herself alone on the beach. The lights of the town were a long way behind her, looking from this distance like a chain of diamonds. Soon the firework display would begin and she would watch it from here.
The sea breezes blew her hair back from her temples, cooling them. The stars were very bright and they cast a shimmer of silver over the sea. The beauty of the night plucked at her heart strings and she walked to the edge of the water, where it rippled in small waves and lipped the tiny stones and seashells.
All at once she longed to feel the cool caress of the water against her skin and she took off her shoes and nylons and stepped into the starlit surf. Her bare feet in the water looked like small white crabs, and her nerves felt soothed. Was she a
little crazy to prefer this to dance music, wine and laughter?
All alone on the seashore when she could be aboard a fairy lit yacht being made a fuss of by a blue-eyed young man. He would be annoyed that she had run away from him, and Don Juan would be angry that she was not present at the party when the glasses of wine were raised to wish him happiness with Raquel.
She fingered the bruise on her arm and stood lost in her thoughts as the waves lapped about her ankles. Her back was to the rocky shore that slanted upwards to the roadway, running from the town and growing steeper as it cut into the hills. Not many cars passed this way, but Yvain didn't hear the one that came to a halt on the far side of the road. The lights dimmed. The driver stepped out of the car and began to cross the road. Being on a slant it overlooked the beach and the girl standing barelegged in the surf could be plainly seen. The wind played with her long hair, and she looked lonely and somehow lost.
Everything was quiet, and then a voice spoke her name. 'Yvain ... is that you, child?'
She heard her name as if in a dream, as if for a moment she believed the sea had made the sound of it. Then slowly she turned and there on the shore above the sands stood a tall, dark figure. There was no one else who could make her pulses race as he did. No one else who dominated with a glance, beckoned without words, sensed her own needs before she realized them herself.
'Don Juan!'
She heard the scrape of his stick against rock and realized that he was coming down to her. The shore was uneven, he might hurt his leg, and suddenly she was running to him across the sands and they met with mutual anxiety, a reaching out that was wordless. His hands gripped her around the waist, her hands found his shoulders.
'It's you!'
'Yes.' She gave a husky laugh. 'Who else but your crazy
ward?'
'I thought it! Who else but Yvain would go paddling all alone, the wind in her hair, not caring about parties and making her guardian anxious?'
'I hoped you wouldn't be anxious.' She looked into his eyes and saw that they were glittering. 'I thought you would have other things on your mind, tonight of all nights. Why should you give a thought to me?'
'Why indeed?' he mocked. He stroked her hair back from her eyes, and she shivered at the caress in his finger tips. 'Are you cold, child? You must be, with bare feet! Where are your shoes, and your stockings?'
'Somewhere.' She pointed vaguely along the beach. 'Won't Raquel mind that you have left the party in order to come and look for your truant ward?'
'Why should Raquel mind?' His hand was beneath her long switch of hair, cradling the nape of her neck, making her look up at him.
'She was wearing a betrothal bracelet. I saw her at the fiesta with you. She looked like a bride. . . .'
'Soon she will be a bride.'
A shudder ran through Yvain. She tried to pull away from him, but he held her firmly, and his face in the starlight was a lean sculpture with a lock of windblown hair across his forehead. 'Does it make you jealous to hear that Raquel is to be married? Do you wish you were in her shoes?'
'No. . . .'
'No, my little sea-urchin.' Suddenly the glitter in his eyes was one of laughter. 'Because Raquel is to marry a young matador who has pursued her so relentlessly that in the end she couldn't resist him. Did I not tell you that a Spaniard says te quiero? What woman can resist being wanted? Can you resist it?'
'Who wants me?' Yvain felt as weak as water in his arms. So it was the matador Raquel was marrying? Not her guardian! He was here and he was teasing her . . . as if he knew how she felt about him . . . and she was fired to temper by the amusement in his dark eyes. 'I ran away from Kent in front of his friends, and Rique found out that we spent the night of the fog alone together . . . at least he found out that I was with a man.'
'Did you not tell him that I was that man?'
'How could I? The whole island would expect you to . . . to marry me.'
'And you would not like that . . . to be married to me?'
'Don Juan ...' Suddenly she could bear no more. 'I want to go away - please let me go!'
'And where would you go?'
'To Madrid. Or America as the companion of Mrs. Grayson.'
'She is quite a pleasant woman, but after a while you would be fetching and carrying for her, and each time her son looked at you she would get a little more jealous and in the end she would insist that you bundle up your lovely hair and hide your honey-brown eyes behind a pair of spectacles. No!' His arm was suddenly like steel around her. 'Not while I live and breathe! You stay with me, Yvain. I am honour bound to make you an honest woman, remember?'
'But no one knows ... that it was you at the cottage with me.'
'If you don't agree here and now to marry me, I shall see to it that the whole island knows.'
'But why ...?' She couldn't speak for the beating of her heart.
'You are such an innocent.' He laughed low and savagely. 'Because I want you. Because for me you are all the wonder of the world. I love your faun's face, the little ways you have of coming close and then retreating from me. At first I told myself that I had no right to you because I am older, because I have this leg that makes me limp, but if I don't take you, you will drift back into servitude to some domineering woman and, nina, it is far more exciting to be domineered over by a man who loves you to distraction.'
'Me?' she whispered, while the earth shook.
'You, Yvain. I might even bear not being loved in return for a while, but I mean to make you love me.' And he gathered her close to him and his first lesson was a tender and lingering kiss. 'Te quiero, querida. I want you for my companion. To hold, to cherish, for always. For a Spaniard those words are absolute.'
'But a marques doesn't marry a maid.'
'This one does exactly what he wants to do.' The old note of arrogance rang in his deep voice. 'You were made to live in a castle, my Rapunzel, and the castle and I waited such a long time f
or you to come and brighten it with your youth and laughter. Yvain, would you condemn the Lion to be alone again?'
'Oh no!' Her arms tightened about his neck and she buried her face against his heart. 'If you want me, then I'm yours. You have no need, Don Juan, to teach me how to love.
If there were times when I retreated from you, it was because I wanted so much to come close to you.'
He stroked her hair with his lean, strong fingers. 'Did you think that Raquel was about to become my bride?'
'You seemed to have so much in common.'
'Much, but never love, nina.' He raised her face to him and he smiled in the way that melted her heart. 'Shall we go home to our castle, nina mia?'
She nodded, for her heart was too full for further words. She thought of Kent, who would sail away tomorrow without her, leaving her where her heart was, where her heart longed to stay, for always. The pilgrim had come home, and home was the castle of her beloved Don Juan.
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