by kps
wine?" And when she hesitated, "Oh, have no fear, Dona Carolina, I am not speaking of some filthy cantina on the Xanja Canal-there is a respectable tavern close by that serves an excellent Malaga."
She dimpled at him. "Spanish ladies do not frequent taverns, Don Ramon!"
"Ah, but you are not Spanish," he said caressingly. "And the day is hot. Would you not care to relax beneath cool archways with a tall drink before you attempt the hot walk home in your new high heels?"
Thus reminded of his kindness, she began to laugh. "I would indeed, Don Ramon,"
she said, inspired by the thought that if she strolled home late, Don Diego would be there to see her escorted home by the commander of EI Morro!
Just why was it so important to her to arouse jealousy in Don Diego's broad breast?
she now asked herself. Was it because of-his striking resemblance to Kells? Was that what she was doing, assuaging the grief of Kells's loss by imagining Don Diego actually to be Kells?
She put the thought away from her and hurried along beside Don Ramon, who cut a handsome figure as he escorted her into the dim interior of a nearby tavern where he ordered Malaga for both of them-and wine for old Juana, too, who sat impassively nearby, as if she were in truth a duena for a beautiful senorita.
"Perhaps now you will tell me no tall tales about being a Frenchman fresh from New Providence," Carolina suggested with a wicked look at Don Ramon as she sipped her wine. "But tell me the truth about Don Ramon del Mundo!"
Thus encouraged by a beautiful woman, Don Ramon leaned back expansively and his voice rang softly through the coolness of the almost empty tavern. He told her about his homeland-and through his eyes she could see it shining golden in the sun.
He told her about his family estancias, the beautiful but dilapidated hacienda, the tawny pastures with clumps of evergreen oaks surrounded by rooting black pigs. He described rushing streams tumbling by weird rock formations, terraced gardens, and sweeping groves of olive trees with thick gnarled trunks and lovely feathery branches stretching on, it would seem, forever, toward the blue backdrop of the Guadalupe mountains. She saw it as he saw it: a land of sun-bronzed peasants and peaceful herds of cattle and goats, moving through the grassy summer pastures to the sound of tinkling bells.
"A paradise," she murmured and his eyes kindled.
"I have found it so," he said.
"And yet you are here?"
Don Ramon winced. Was he to tell this beautiful clear-eyed girl who sat across from him that he had come to Havana to make the world ring with his valorous deeds-so that he could find himself a rich wife?
Instead he launched into the sad tale of Dona Ana of Austria, daughter of that Don John of Austria who had led the Christians to victory against the Turks in the Battle of Lepanto. Dona Ana had the misfortune to fall in love with the son of Prince Juan of Portugal. Which would have been all right save that Prince Juan of Portugal had two handsome and reckless sons who looked so alike that no one could tell them apart.
One son was named Sebastian-and he was by Prince Juan's rightful wife. The other son was named Gabriel Espinosa-and he was by a pastry cook's beautiful daughter.
Sebastian, he told her, succeeded to the throne of Portugal.
"And did he marry Dona Ana, then?" wondered Carolina, fascinated by this look-alike tale. "Or was it the pastry cook's grandson she loved?"
"Who knows who she loved?" shrugged Don Ramon. "But it is certain that neither of them married Dona Ana. Against all advice, taking Espinosa with him, Sebastian went off to campaign in Africa-and only one of these two look-alikes returned from that catastrophe. At first everyone believed Sebastian the new king had been killed, but after a time, the one who had returned claimed he was indeed Sebastian and alive after all-he claimed he was so bowed down by his defeat in Africa that he had been ashamed to admit his true identity."
"How confusing!" murmured Carolina, a little curious as to why Don Ramon had told her this story. "Did they ever sort it all out?"
The tall Spaniard gave her a grim smile. "Oh, they sorted it out, all right. Philip II was Dona Ana's uncle and he had the man who now claimed to be Sebastian arrested.
He was brought to trial and condemned- whereupon Dona Ana threw herself before her uncle, the king, and wept, appealing for mercy for the condemned man. Her appeal was refused and the condemned man-whether king or commoner-was garroted. "
"And Dona Ana?" He grimaced. "Her uncle the king was furious with her, feeling she had disgraced him by fancying a pastry cook's grandson. He locked her in a convent, she was allowed to speak to no one, her privileges of rank were stripped away, and on Fridays she was reduced to bread and water."
Carolina shuddered at Dona Ana's fate, but her mind was on the look-alikes. "Was the truth about Sebastian and his brother ever known?"
"Never. It is one of the great mysteries of my country. Was it a commoner who died or was it a king?"
"And which one did Dona Ana love?" murmured Carolina, as if to herself. Or, she asked herself, startled, did Dona Ana love them both? Was the resemblance so striking-both in appearance and character-that she was unable to separate them in her mind? The thought brought a sudden staining to her cheeks. "It is hard to imagine that they were so-alike," she said haltingly.
"And yet they were. All who knew them said so. Identical sons of different mothers."
"Perhaps they were really twins--but one of them was spirited away because of trouble over succession to the throne," she suggested.
"Perhaps." Don Ramon gave her a sunny smile. "Perhaps Dona Ana was the only one who knew the truth. Perhaps she loved a king or perhaps a pastry cook's grandson."
"A pastry cook's grandson who was nevertheless of royal blood-perhaps Dona Ana sympathized with him, a man never able to claim his birthright." She thought of Kells, never able to claim his own birthright, and a trace of bitterness tinged her voice. "Don Ramon"-she shook off those shadows of the past-"it is pleasant to while away the day with you, but I must get me home."
"Of course, Dona Carolina." He rose and gravely offered her his arm.
He is careful not to call me "Senora," thought Carolina. It is because he chooses not to recognize my marriage to Kells! In Port Royal that might have irritated her-here, oddly enough, it did not.
Perhaps because, like tragic Dona Ana, she was suspended in a great confusion of the spirit. She had lost the man she loved-and he had reappeared but from another life, with other memories.
A double, she told herself firmly. No more than that. Just one of fate's odd prankish tricks: a double.
She bade Don Ramon good-by at her door and felt his hot lips brush the back of her hand as he made her a most elegant bow and said his good-bys.
"I will take you riding with me," he promised. "Do you like to ride?"
Carolina admitted she did.
"And you have seen but half the city," he added. "I would show you the rest!"
"Later perhaps." His interest in her was more than apparent. Carolina wondered if Don Diego was watching from a window.
But he was still out, presumably entertaining the governor's daughter.
Not till dinner did she face him.
"I have new shoes," she greeted him, twirling about so that her high-heeled slippers showed to advantage. "So I see," he said sternly. "A gift of Don Ramon del Mundo, one would imagine?"
"Oh, Don Ramon said he would return and pay for them," Carolina said with a shrug,
"even though I protested. But I thought you might prefer to pay the bootmaker yourself."
"You are correct," he said crisply, frowning down at her from his great height. "And while you are a guest in my house you will observe certain rules of propriety. I am told that before I arrived in Havana, the governor's daughter smiled upon Don Ramon del Mundo. It would please me to have her smile on him again. You will not stand in the way of it."
Carolina hid a grin. So he found Marina's hot pursuit a bit tiresome-s-it did not surprise her!
"Don Ramon is an old friend," she said carelessly.
He gave her an astonished look.
"Well, at least I met him before I came here," she amended. "He dined with me in Port Royal." "He dined with you and your buccaneer?" Don Diego asked in astonishment.
"No, with me alone. Kells was away up the Cobre, seeking to buy a plantation." She studied his face as she spoke, hoping to jog his memory-if indeed he had such a memory-but there was no spark of recognition.
"You are renewing a friendship, then, begun in Port Royal," he said slowly. "I think I begin to understand."
"No, you do not understand," she said, her voice sharpened by disappointment. "Don Ramon treats me as a lady, which the rest of Havana does not!"
"Do I not-" he began. "You bore me to the mattress at first sight!" she flashed. "I seem to recall that ,you were more than willing," he drawled. "You must have known I mistook you for somebody else-e-you should be ashamed!"
His hard gaze raked over her. "I find it hard to be ashamed of enjoying such a beautiful body," he murmured.
That was what she was to him-a beautiful female body to be enjoyed! Not Carolina Lightfoot, who had loved to distraction a man who was breath of his breath!
Carolina felt as if he had struck her a blow. Blindly she turned and would have fled the dining table but that his voice stopped her. "You will stay at table throughout the meal, Mistress Lightfoot. I have no wish to dine alone."
Sulkily, Carolina sat back and stared rebelliously down at her plate.
He began to talk then-e-companionably, as if he had known her always. His lazy voice lulled her as he spoke of the day's doings, how he had spent some time with the governor, how he was being considered to command the inner fortress of La Fuerza in case new orders failed to come from Spain. He was every inch the Spanish gentleman even though out of courtesy he spoke to her in English. She could not fault him.
It is true, she thought, and felt an infinite sadness steal over her. This man is who he claims to be-Don Diego Vivar, late of Castile. Her heart bled a little at the thought for her rebellious spirit had never really accepted it.
Had it been like this for Dona Ana? she asked herself suddenly. Had she loved the real thing and accepted the counterfeit? Or had the counterfeit seemed as good as the real?
The glow of candlelight showed pain in her lovely eyes as she tried to reconcile the present with the past. "Will you not miss Spain?" she asked him wistfully.
"Will not Havana seem like exile to you?"
"Odd that you should ask that," he said thoughtfully. "I think that I was cast here by fate, which undoubtedly has some purpose in foiling me of my objective, although I cannot for the life of me imagine just what it is."
"You speak in riddles," she said stiffly.
"Yes, I suppose I do. I was born yesterday, Senorita Lightfoot-although I am indeed Diego Vivar," he hastened to add, remembering her earlier outburst.
"And what does that mean?" she inquired.
"It means that I was on a delicate mission for the King of Spain when the Santo Domingo, the galleon on which I was traveling, was blown from the water by buccaneers. I was hurt somehow in the fighting a head wound." He touched a red scar that came down a shade below his hairline-something she had not noticed before.
"A head wound?" she asked, suddenly intent.
"Yes, it has interfered with my memory."
"You have trouble remembering things?"
He sighed. "Of the present, I remember everything, but of the past I remember nothing. I seem to have been born fully grown here in Havana for I have no memory of how I came here nor where I was before. But of course," he added with a shrug,
"much is known of me. The governor has a letter describing me. And those who brought me here were fully satisfied of my identity."
Carolina's heart seemed to miss a beat at this admission, and she looked up at him on a caught breath. "So," she said slowly, "there is something that you had not told me, Don Diego. Your life began, as you say, 'yesterday'-you know only what others have told you-you yourself have no idea who you really are!"
THE GOVERNOR'S PALACE HAVANA, CUBA
Chapter 22
With her regal carriage and daunting manner, red-haired Penny had established herself overnight as being "in charge" of the governor's great house on the Plaza de Annas. The governor had been so delighted with her that he had supped with her privately that first night (which had so infuriated Marina that she had refused her own dinner and stomped off to bed). Since the governor spoke excellent English, Penny had talked a great deal and charmed him further with her unbridled view of life. This morning as he left for his office in La Fuerza he had told her that henceforth she would sup "with the family," and Penny had been wondering how Marina would take that!
With the governor gone, she had spent the morning intimidating the servants, who had been inclined at first to view her as one of themselves-they must be set straight on that point! Hampered by having little command of Spanish, for she had none of Carolina's facility with languages, she was frowning over how to explain what she wanted to one of the serving girls when the front door knocker sounded.
Impulsively she opened it herself and was confronted by a heavyset olive-skinned gentleman in military uniform who blinked at the sight of her, but recovered and said in a surprised tone, "Ah, one of the English ladies!"
Relieved that he should speak to her in English, Penny gave him her most winning smile and said, "Whoever you are, please do come in at once. I am at my wits' end trying to tell the servants what to do, and you can translate for me!"
If he was a trifle dazed to be thus energetically addressed, the military gentleman recovered very well. "Captain Juarez, senorita, at your service!" He swept her a courteous bow.
Pleased both by his respectful mien and by his willingness to serve, Penny swept him into the courtyard and gave half a dozen servants orders-all translated gravely by Captain Juarez.
"Now then," she told him gaily when that was done, "instruct this one-her name is Zita-to bring us something cool to drink. The governor has some fine Malaga. Would you like that?"
Captain Juarez was familiar with the governor's Malaga. He coughed discreetly and asked if the governor was about.
"Oh, no, he just went out. To La Fuerza, I think." Penny led her guest to a grouping of stone seats in the cool shadows of the colonnade, for the heat today was blistering, and even the palm fronds in the courtyard were blinding when the sun struck them. "I am surprised you did not meet him on your way in," she added.
Captain Juarez flushed ever so slightly, a condition that only darkened the weathered olive of his skin. In point of fact he had lurked about across the street until he had seen the portly governor stroll out on his way to his office in La Fuerza. Only when the governor was out of sight had he hurried over to bang the iron knocker of the governor's house. "And Dona Marina?" he asked diffidently. "Is she about?"
Penny, just settling her wide skirts on the stone bench, looked up quickly. From her guest's look of sudden discomfiture, his abrupt loosening of his neckpiece, she guessed shrewdly that he had not come to see the governor at all but to pay a call on the governor's ripe young daughter.
"No, Dona Marina went out much earlier with her duena," she told him carelessly. "I am not sure when she will be back." Her eyes twinkled. "I expect she is riding through the town in some excitement, for last night she was serenaded for the first time below her balcony. The governor fears that now there will be a constant succession of suitors, caterwauling beneath Marina's window every night until he can get her married!"
Captain Juarez gave the magnificent redhead across from him a wounded look. It pained him to hear her speak so lightly of his wonderful Marina, the light of his life!
And most especially it pained him to hear that suitors were already serenading young Marina, who, in accordance with Spanish custom, now occupied the front bedroom of the house overlooking the street, so that bedazzled suitors could strum and sing
love songs beneath her window and entreat the marriageable young lady above to have mercy and toss down a rose or a lock of her hair. It pained him even more since he was afraid to become one of those caterwauling suitors; the governor had never given him any encouragement and indeed might consider it impudence for him to aspire to Marina's hand, for how could he, living on a captain's pay, support a wife in the grand style to which the governor's daughter was accustomed?
"I had come to inquire about the state of Don Diego's health," he explained, for it alarmed him that he might leave the impression that he had been calling on Marina.
"Don Diego now lives next door," Penny informed him.
"Oh?" In his embarrassment, he had forgotten that.
The Malaga was brought just then, and Captain Juarez quaffed a glass while a pair of sapphire eyes studied him. "Don Diego's health seems to be excellent. Why should you inquire?" Penny could not resist asking.
"Ah, senorita," smiled Captain Juarez, the wine warming him and loosening his tongue. "I have good reason to inquire for I am the man who brought him out of the hell of Port Royal!"
"Indeed?" Penny had heard nothing of this from the governor. She would have something to tell Carolina! She settled herself more comfortably upon the stone bench. "It sounds like a valorous tale. You must tell me about it-so that I can regale Marina with it!"
Marina had already heard it-several times-but Captain Juarez was flattered. Such a tale could scarcely be heard too often.
"But so that you willtruly understand, senorita," he explained, "I must go far back."
"Oh, go as far as you like," Penny said carelessly, and poured her guest another glass of wine.
Somewhat dazzled by all this attention, for he was not a man who got along well with women, Captain Juarez leaned forward and began to talk.
Through his eyes she relived his whole mad adventure, which had begun not in Port Royal but in Havana.