A Masque of Chameleons

by Joan Van Every Frost

  She was quite right, for at several of the tables the breakfasters were openly drinking.

  “Though I hardly think,” she went on, “we need be afraid for our own lives. Who knows what really happened to Roger or who his enemies might have been? I prefer to think that his death resulted from a vendetta for love. He wooed the wrong wife, or perhaps seduced the wrong sister, who knows? It was love letters the thief was after the other night,” she pronounced triumphantly, “and now the wench is revenged and all will be well. Aren’t I right, Will, sweet William, conqueror of my heart? You know all about seductions — tell them I’m right.”

  “Come, Jessie,” Will said gently. “It's time to go to bed, my dear. Here, let me help you.” Will got her to her feet and with an arm about her waist to support her, managed to start her toward the door.

  “The grave's a fine and quiet place,

  But none I think do there embrace.”

  “Right, Willy my lad? Yes, by all means let us off to bed. What a splendid idea! Did I ever tell you I married you because you had such splendid ideas? ’Strue, my love. Ask the steward to bring a bottle of brandy, Will darling. I can’t fly on one wing, and you haven’t even got one yet, do you? Here we go; farewell all, fare thee very well.”

  Though they could no longer distinguish the words, they could hear her singing growing fainter as she gave a hearty rendition of “The Foggy, Foggy Dew.” Roberta agonized for Will. He was so gentle and tender with Jessica when all the time he must be suffering terrible shame. Maybe if he weren’t so patient she wouldn’t drink so much. If something were to happen to Jessica, Will was still young enough to have a whole new life ahead of him. She looked up to find Jason watching her. Damn him, it wasn’t any of his business.

  The day dragged by with neither Jessica nor Will making another appearance. “If you c-can’t lick’em, j-join’em,” Guy remarked unsympathetically, and Roberta found herself hating him for it. Later that afternoon a little red and black land bird circled the ship once and landed low on the rigging. He seemed fearless, and several of the passengers threw crumbs of bread on the deck for him.

  By that time the Spaniards, who had been drinking all day, had become very boisterous. One of them disappeared below and came back with a pistol, which he brandished importantly about. When the first officer beckoned to several sailors looking on and put out his hand for the gun, the Spaniard quickly swung about and aimed at the little bird picking up bread crumbs from the deck. Before the first officer could grab the hand with the pistol, the weapon went off with a flash and a roar, and the little bird disintegrated in a cloud of red and black feathers.

  Sick at heart, Roberta turned away from the struggling group of sailors and Spaniards to perceive on Jason’s face a look of such murderous rage that she involuntarily put her hand on his arm, hoping to stop him from whatever rash action he was contemplating. At her touch his face turned to stone, the scar making a livid track down the whiteness of his cheek.

  Suddenly he relaxed. “Thank you. I was about to strangle that bastard, and it wouldn’t have been worth it.”

  “I imagine you have a lot of company. The captain had better lock him up for his own protection.”

  Sure enough, a number of men milled about muttering ominously. It was just as well that the seamen by that time had managed to subdue the Spaniards and took them forcibly down toward the cabin they all shared.

  “What else can happen?” Daphne wailed. “This is a jinxed ship, there is a curse on us all.”

  “For heaven’s sake, Daphne,” Hugh said irritably, “don’t make it worse than it is.” He then broke into a French so low and rapid that Roberta couldn’t catch the words, but Daphne looked suitably cowed.

  A steward swept up the pathetic remains of the little bird and deposited them over the lee rail. Jason was talking to Guy now, and Roberta wandered disconsolately downstairs, thinking she might lie down and read despite the mustiness and the smell; at least it would be quiet and she would be alone. In the silent passageway she became aware of the murmur of voices growing louder as she made her way toward her cabin.

  She knew whose voices they had to be, and afterward she could never tell if she had deliberately stopped to overhear them or whether what they were saying made her stop.

  “Ah, Jessie,” Will was saying in a thick voice, “there never was anyone like you. For God’s sake don’t stop what you’re doing.”

  “Can that little Mexican hussy do this, Will darling, or this? Can she?”

  “No one can, no one in this whole world. Oh God, Jessie, you could get blood out of a stone.” He groaned in an agony of mixed pleasure and pain. “I love you, Jess, you know that. I may wander, but I’ll always come back, always.” He groaned again. “Don’t ever leave me, love. Promise, promise you’ll always be here waiting?”

  “I promise, my love, my own sweet William. As long as you always come back, I’ll always be here for you. If ever you don’t come back, I’ll cut out your unfaithful heart and cast it into the sea. Now quickly, quickly, my sweet — there, yes, like that, now and now and now.”

  This time there was a mingled shout of joy from both of them, and Roberta fled, her heart squeezed into a sharp hurting lump. She wept for a long time and finally drifted off to sleep to dreams of blood dripping down white walls and the tolling of a mournful bell from a black church tower in an unknown land.

  CHAPTER IV

  It was their last night aboard the Priscilla. During the previous several days they had passed the Pan of Matanzas and the Muertos Keys with that skull-like black rock known as the Death’s-Head. Arriving off Havana well after dark, the ship heaved to, waiting for dawn to negotiate the passage past Morro Castle and into the protected bay where the ships anchored.

  A glowing cigar revealed Jason as he stood alone looking placidly out toward the lights of Havana.

  “Jason, I must talk to you.”

  “I’m surprised you haven’t before this,” came his calm rejoinder.

  “You know I’m going to have to change my story,” she said, not looking at him.

  “I’d hoped you wouldn’t,” he replied mildly.

  “Then where were you that night?”

  “Do you know who Zaragoza is?” he countered. “No, of course you don’t.”

  “Is he something other than what he seems? And yet he was on deck then, I saw him with Carmelita.”

  “He is the head of Santa Anna’s secret police.”

  “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

  “These agents, directly responsible only to El Presidente himself, are the most feared men in Mexico. They are without scruple and without mercy. I had no way of connecting Zaragoza, a common name after all, with the Zaragoza who built Santa Anna’s killing machine. He is also said to be a sadist. For instance, Zaragoza must have known from your innocent prattle about your background that you weren’t involved in anything, but he very nearly talked you overboard just for laughs. The idea of an innocent young woman struggling in the water while she watched the ship sail away from her must have tickled his fancy. Moreover, I’d be willing to wager that Ainsley was thoroughly tortured before they threw him overboard.”

  “Who was Roger Ainsley then?”

  “A secret agent for a group in the United States who wish to see Santa Anna deposed.”

  “And you?”

  “Let’s say I am after the same end as Ainsley, but with different employers.” He turned to look at her. “I’m only telling you this much because I must. With Ainsley dead it is more important than ever that I remain not only free but under no suspicion.”

  “If I’m to stick to my story, you’ll have to convince me.” Just the vision of the ship.leaving her in that lonely moonlit waste of water had been enough to convince her, but she felt compelled to know it all. “Why do you and your, er, employers want Santa Anna deposed?”

  “Because that is the only way to avoid war.”

  “War? With whom?”

  “
In case you haven’t noticed, there is a squabble over admitting Texas to the Union and over what land constitutes Texas as well.”

  “But Texas isn’t in the United States yet.”

  “Ah, but they will be. Sooner or later they will be. And take it or leave it, New Mexico and California will be, too. Either Mexico sells them to the United States or the United States will take them by force just as the Texans took Texas by force.”

  “But that’s not right, that we should force Mexico to sell her land.”

  “It’s far beyond right or wrong now. No matter who’s elected in 1844, he’ll go on pressing for those territories, and he’ll go to war if he can’t get them otherwise. Manifest Destiny, they’re already calling it.”

  “So what has all this got to do with Santa Anna?”

  “Santa Anna lost Texas eight years ago, and though he would dearly love the money, his machismo won’t allow him to let one square meter of territory go, even if it means sinking Mexico beneath the waves. What Ainsley’s employers and my employers want to do is to get rid of Santa Anna and put in a man who can be trusted to negotiate for those territories.”

  “I think that’s despicable!” Roberta said indignantly. “Why, you’re scheming for nothing more or less than cheating Mexico out of her land.”

  He sighed. “I know you’re right and so do my employers — at least some of them — but have you thought of the alternative? We’ll tease and feint until we get the Mexican Army to attack, and then we’ll take what we want with or without paying for it.”

  “That’s just rationalizing.”

  “I realize it’s a rhetorical question, but have you ever seen a war?”

  She shook her head.

  He was silent for a moment, and she could hear the dark water below slopping against the side of the ship and the homey creak of the masts in their steps.

  “It was at a place in Texas named Goliad,” he said slowly at last, “that we were forced to surrender to the Mexicans. I was pretty hotheaded in those days, and some of us, even unarmed as we were, tried to escape. They were mounted, and they rode us down like greyhounds coursing rabbits. Between the bullets and the sabers, we didn’t stand a chance. I was left for dead for a day, maybe a couple of days, until one of the Mexican camp followers heard me groan. I don’t know why she risked her life to save me. She said she started out to see if there was anything on me worth taking, but then she liked the color of my eyes. She dressed me in pieces of Mexican uniform and nursed me through the wounds and a whopping case of typhus. Her name, she told me, was Marla Sucia, Dirty Mary, and she didn’t even have a steady benefactor. When I finally came out of the fever, the whole thing was long over. Santa Anna had ordered the lot of them shot, and shot they were. Including my brother Toby, who was only seventeen.”

  “How awful for you.” Roberta’s words seemed grossly inadequate.

  “I wouldn’t let him join those of us who tried to escape, so they slaughtered him like a steer instead.”

  “You couldn’t know, and he’d have died anyway, wouldn’t he?”

  “Ah, but not like that. Not alone and knowing what was going to happen. I thought he’d be safe if he stayed with the others. I should have let him come with me. I should have — Oh hell, what difference does it make? There’s your glorious war for you. Shooting unarmed men, raping women, murdering children. Can you see why I’m against another? I don’t give a damn about who cheats whom out of what. There’s not all of that worth the little finger of a man who’s going to die in a war over it.”

  “Did you kill Roger Ainsley to avoid a war?”

  “He was on my side, I tell you.” He paused. “But I would have if he’d been against me.”

  “Why were you in such a rage with him then? Everyone saw you arguing with him that evening.”

  “He was too impatient. He wanted to smoke the other side out in the open, and smoke them out he did, all right. Now he’s dead and Carmelita and I are thoroughly compromised.” Jason’s tone was bitter. “I wouldn’t be telling you all this even now only I don’t think it makes much difference anymore.”

  “But Zaragoza was with her that night, I saw them.”

  “He’s probably got agents scattered all over the ship. We were compromised before we ever sailed, yet I don’t think Zaragoza was sure then exactly which of us were involved.”

  “What will you do now?”

  He shrugged. “Play out the game, I suppose. I’ll try to get word to the powers that be to replace us, but it won’t be easy.”

  “Surely they can find someone else who speaks Spanish; they’d be better off with a Mexican anyway.”

  “They chose me because I am like an adopted son to Alarcon, who they hope will succeed Santa Anna. He’s not really all sparked up about going into the running, and they want me to try to keep him in line. When he still had his lands in Texas, it was Alarcon who sent me to school in England. He’s always had a soft spot for me, I suppose because I was the kind of son he never had. And Carmelita — Carmelita is his daughter.”

  “Great heavenly days,” Roberta murmured.

  “Now you begin to see the coils within coils of this master plot.” Jason’s tone was disdainful. As Roberta pieced it all together from what followed, it seemed that Santa Anna had literally ruined the Mexican economy, never more than shaky at best, and stolen her blind besides. The cities especially were therefore ripe for revolt, and Jason’s employers had picked Alarcon as being the only man in Mexico capable of holding the country together. On his part, Alarcon hoped to salvage what was left of the Mexican economy and rebuild the country with the money he received for the territories, not a bad bargain at that.

  “But what is Alarcon’s daughter doing in all this?” Roberta asked, puzzled.

  “Alarcon refuses to go behind Santa Anna’s back because he took an oath of loyalty. God preserve us from Mexican honor. Carmelita hasn’t taken any oath of loyalty, however, and she’s been away in the United States since she was thirteen to keep her from Alarcon’s political enemies. She’ll provide an ideal rallying force if she goes from city to city and does Alarcon’s campaigning for him.”

  “If Alarcon doesn’t care that much for his daughter, I’d think you would care more for your wife.”

  “She isn’t my wife, thank God, or I’d have had to fight at least two duels just in the last three weeks.” Roberta gasped, but Jason went on, “She’s a grown woman, though, and she wants her father President of Mexico.”

  “Why would she be going under her own name then? Isn’t that announcing who she is?”

  Jason started to say something, then broke off. “We never thought anyone would be looking for her in a traveling theatrical company. You’ve seen her act — do you really think she could bring off even something as simple as a change of name?”

  “I’m glad it’s you and not me who will have to carry out this preposterous scheme.”

  “Does that mean you won’t turn me in?” He was smiling again.

  “No, I won’t turn you in — but only because you’ve convinced me you had nothing to do with Roger’s death. Where were you, by the way?”

  His smile broadened. “I was in Zaragoza’s cabin going through his papers. The locks on those doors are downright simpleminded. That’s how I know who he is.”

  “The fox will rob the chicken coop once too often, Jason — you’d better look out.”

  “Well, none of it’s anything you have to worry about, Robbie. You can be a — a silent partner.”

  He held out his hand and she took it, surprised at its warm firmness. The scar and the limp had always led her to think of him as something of an invalid, but he transmitted through his touch a tremendous vitality.

  Afterward she began to have a strange feeling as she thought back over the conversation. She remembered the burning intensity with which he'd said, “I don't give a damn about who cheats whom out of what. There's not all of that worth the little finger of a man who's going to die in a war over
it.” Was there something wrong with her that she seemed unwilling to take so strong a stand on anything? For instance, she thought slavery wrong and war wrong, and yet the people deeply involved in these questions made her feel uncomfortable, as if to them human beings were less important than causes, and the end always justified the means.

  As she stood at the rail alone wrestling with these thoughts, staring with unseeing eyes at the distant lights of Havana, she felt an arm encircle her waist. “Gavin!” she exclaimed. “You startled me.”

  “What were you talking to Old Sourpuss about?” “Oh,” she replied carelessly, “he was talking about Mexican politics, which I must say seem terribly messy.” “Robbie,” his tone was pleading, “I've not pressed you or nagged at you the whole voyage, and I haven't said anything when I’ve seen you laughing and talking with everyone but me...”

  “Gavin, Gavin, what can I tell you? I can't turn my feelings on and off like a water tap. Just right now I don’t want to love anybody, I can't — I won't — ever be at anyone's mercy like that.”

  If she had been completely honest with him, she would have said, “I don't want ever again to be at anyone's mercy like that.” Because she was still at Will's mercy, God help her, even after hearing that telling exchange between him and Jessica. Only now she struggled grimly against it, shutting off with what determination she could muster the fictional scenes beside wild brooks.

  “You've got to fall in love sometime,” Gavin said doggedly.

  “Oh? And why is that?” she asked coolly.

  “Well, just about everyone does, don't they? Even the ones who never marry loved someone once. If you don’t ever want to give yourself, you’ll end up being damned lonely.”

  “Better lonely than a serf, at the beck and call of whatever oaf I’ve been silly enough to fall in love with, and a gaggle of snotty-nosed children besides.” She knew what Will’s and her children would look like, red-haired with gray eyes, handsome and laughing...