Kells!
She could not explain it, but it was true. The face she was looking into was his face, the face that had lit up her life and now haunted her restless dreams.
He was not dead, he was alive, he was here in Havana, seated upon a big chestnut horse, staring down at her without any visible sign of recognition!
All the emotions that had torn Carolina since the day Port Royal sank, all the pain and worry and guilt and despair fused for a moment with this shock of discovery that the man she had yearned for and grieved for was not dead after all - and she turned pale and wavered for a moment as if she would fall.
Penny had been striding along in the hot sun in apparent disdain. Now she turned in alarm as her sister stumbled and had a swift glimpse of Carolina, deathly pale, staring up at a tall caballero in black and silver who watched them from astride a chestnut horse. Conscious of the unfriendly crowd about them, she caught her breath in dismay.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Carol, don’t faint!’ she muttered, grasping Carolina’s arm and supporting her as her slight body suddenly sagged. ‘It would be too humiliating!’
Abruptly Carolina got hold of herself. Kells had given no visible sign of recognition but then he was always in control. The very fact that he was here in Havana meant that something was afoot! The divers had lied - they had not seen his body submerged in that drowned cabin. They had lied so that they might swiftly collect their money - or perhaps seize the gold money chains they had brought up from the wreck, and be off to search for loot somewhere else! She and Hawks had both been taken in. The ship she had seen advancing into the harbour when the earthquake struck must not have been the Sea Wolf after all!
Her mind raced ahead. What plot could have brought Kells here? Did he plan to take Havana? Why not? He had raided Cartagena and other Spanish towns! Surely this was some bold enterprise like that. How well he had concealed his surprise at seeing her! She was proud of him - but then, when had she not been proud of him? Her heart swelled and of a sudden the harsh sunlight that poured down over Havana was turned before her eyes into drifting gold, the city air with its myriad scents was suddenly the perfumed air of the tropics; the raucous clamour, joyful; the scene before her colourful and gorgeous. Her head lifted and she took a deep thankful breath and flashed a brilliant smile at Penny.
‘I’m all right,’ she said hastily. ‘Oh, it’s too bad we didn’t have a chance to comb our hair - mine looks terrible and so does yours!’
‘Well, don’t overdo it,’ said Penny in amazement, letting go of her arm. ‘It’s bad enough to be sold but you don’t have to look pleased about it!’
Carolina laughed. It was a beautiful rippling sound, carefree and young. That laugh reached the ears of the portly grey-haired gentleman in the carriage who happened also to be the Governor of Havana. He gazed upon the pair in amazement. What beauties they were, the statuesque redhead and the slender elegant blonde with her delicious laugh!
Beside him, the fact that the attention of both men had centred upon the two captives being marched to the slave mart was not lost on the governor’s daughter.
‘Trash!’ she hissed.
‘Ah, but elegant trash, you will admit, Doña Marina,’ drawled the tall Caballero Carolina had identified instantly as Kells.
Governor Corrubedo murmured an assent and Doña Marina spread a look of anger over each of them. She was young and tempestuous and she had no mother to guide her, for Governor Corrubedo’s wife had died young and he had not remarried. Her elderly duena - her maiden aunt. Doña Merced - could hardly keep up with her and had panted to the governor on several occasions, ‘You must get her married without delay or she will disgrace you!’ But the governor was an indulgent parent and loved his only daughter dearly, allowing Marina a freedom that was unheard of in that day, when Spanish girls of breeding and fortune were kept cloistered behind iron grillework or sitting in sunny courtyards well guarded by watchful duenas.
‘Your Excellency. Doña Marina.’ The tall gentleman on horseback was bowing his good-by as he moved away from them.
‘Don Diego took his leave of us very suddenly,’ said Marina in a spiteful voice as she saw his broad back moving through the crowd away from them.
‘Nonsense, querido mio,' responded the governor absently. ‘He doubtless wishes to view the bidding.’
‘Or perhaps to bid himself!’ snapped his daughter.
That thought had occurred to the governor also. Both the blonde and the redhead had been very ripe. Every male eye had followed them as they passed. His gaze passed thoughtfully to Marina. She also was very ripe. Young still - but ripe. Although but fifteen, her figure was lush and her young breasts strained against her tight bodice. She was thinking thoughts of men now, was Marina. The governor sighed. He had hoped to postpone the day but suitors were already arriving at the big spacious house on the Plaza de Armas that he chose to occupy rather than his official residence in the forbidding fortress of La Fuerza.
Some of the suitors who eyed her as she promenaded sedately around the Plaza on Sundays, some of those who were just beginning to serenade her off-key beneath her window, were wealthy, the sons of rich men who could take her across the ocean sea, away to Spain and even the questionable delights of the Spanish Court. Some were the sons of planters with large holdings. But Marina favoured none of them.
Marina - and her father forgave her for it since she was young and untried - had a talent for looking in the wrong direction. More specifically, in the direction of the tall gentleman who had just left them - a newcomer to Havana, Don Diego Vivar. And what did they really know about Don Diego? A hero, true, if what was said about him was to be believed. But the voices that labelled him a hero had come from Spain. No one here knew anything about him, about his holdings, his prospects - only that he was a king’s favourite sent on a dangerous mission to the New World.
Better far that Marina choose a more suitable mate, the one the governor had already selected for her: Don Ramon del Mundo. He had all the proper qualifications. He was young, handsome, wealthy, and reputedly held vast estates in Spain. The governor had been given to understand that Don Ramon had come here only to prove his valour, preferably in some spectacular way. Certainly his foray into the buccaneer stronghold of Port Royal several months ago had been valorous enough, and the governor had encouraged it. If Don Ramon survived such dangerous inclinations, he would seem glamorous to Marina, who was at a romantic and impressionable age.
But Don Ramon had come home only to learn that the King of Spain preferred someone else to execute the plan to invade Jamaica which Don Ramon had so painstakingly built. A Spanish Court favourite was already being groomed for the mission. He would be dropped off directly at Jamaica, somewhere near Port Royal. Meanwhile if Don Ramon would be good enough to assemble a small force to await the stranger’s instructions? They could be landed by pinnace and there await the commands of the newcomer sent from Spain.
Don Ramon had been sulking ever since.
And a sulky lover is not a successful lover! The governor had begun to wonder if Don Ramon really had any interest in his daughter at all.
And then abruptly - and in the most romantic of circumstances - Don Diego Vivar had appeared upon the scene. Darkly handsome and with a clouded past, and living in the governor’s own house! Small wonder that Marina had become enamoured of him! And how could Marina’s father be certain such a marriage would be suitable?
The Governor of Cuba frowned. The women had stopped streaming past now. The girls were still throwing flowers from the shawl-fringed balconies, and a general air of fiesta held the old city in thrall. Beside him, Marina fretted.
A sudden thought occurred to him - and Governor Corrubedo was a man who, once a thought occurred to him, would promptly put it into action. He leaned towards his driver and instructed him to push the carriage through the crowd; they would view the slave auction.
But getting there through the crush proved impossible. Disgusted with their slow pa
ce, the governor muttered a few words to his driver, who promptly left the carriage and shouldered his way through the crowd on foot.
The governor had put his plan into operation.
Sheltered by the curved arches and pillars of the arcade - and nearly deafened by the discordant clanging of the market bell - Carolina stood with the other women about to be auctioned off, grateful for the shade. Beside her Penny stood regally, looking slightly down her nose at the surging crowd. The rest milled about, muttering, frowning, giggling and one or two making their hips sway invitingly. But Carolina stood out, for she was standing on tiptoe trying to peer over the crowd - ah, there he was; Kells was approaching on horseback, looking cool and in command.
He would buy her! All was right with her world!
Suddenly she thought of Penny. He must buy Penny, too!
‘We are sisters,’ she cried in ringing Spanish. ‘We must be sold together.’
‘What are you shouting about, Carol?’ demanded Penny in amazement, for Penny had no facility for picking up languages.
‘I am saying that we must be sold together - that we are sisters,’ said Carolina.
‘Well, I doubt they will take our desires into consideration!’
‘Someone will,’ said Carolina confidently. ‘You’ll see.’ For although she was dying to tell Penny that Kells was here, that he was even now advancing upon them, studying them gravely with his level grey gaze, she dared not. For Kells could only be here in Havana on some desperate mission and she would not give him away for anything!
‘You have more confidence in this crowd than I have,’ Penny was saying as her gaze raked the front row. ‘I’d say that one over there is a brothel keeper, and those two beside him - God knows what. We’ll be lucky if we get through this night, Carol!’
‘Oh, I’m sure we’ll be bought by someone nice.’ Carolina felt she could give Penny at least this much encouragement without endangering Kells.
Penny peered down at her younger sister in astonishment. Had she taken leave of her senses? Someone nice? They’d be lucky if a whip weren’t lain across their backs before the sun went down! Because neither of them were going to submit very easily.
‘Well, at least we aren’t to be the first ones sold - we’ll get to see what happens to the others,’ she muttered, as a blowzy blonde with broken teeth - got when she stepped in the way of a bottle during a marathon drinking bout in Nassau - was led into the sunlight. ‘The bidding seems brisk,’ muttered Penny. ‘Floss fetched a good price. What was all that talk at the beginning of the auction?’
‘Oh, they were talking about how we were being offered as house servants, most of us not being strong enough for work in the fields,’ Carolina replied cheerfully. She could not resist smiling in Kells’s direction. He was looking straight at her with no expression at all upon his strong features.
‘Housework, ha!’ Penny’s tone was scornful. ‘That fellow who bought Floss is already pinching her bottom - and she’s giggling.’ she added in disgust.
‘Yes, well, maybe she thinks she can avoid doing any work at all if she’s friendly enough!’ Carolina said blithely.
Once again Penny gave her a dazed look. The heat, the strain must have unhinged Carolina’s mind, she was thinking. She hoped the same man would buy them both - her sister was going to need taking care of!
A frowzy redhead was sold to desultory bidding, and a sulky young girl who looked as though she’d been crying was next. After her came a sultry brunette, and the bidding grew more enthusiastic.
‘I think we’re next,’ said Penny, and the crowd parted to let the governor’s driver through.
He moved directly to the auctioneer and muttered in his ear. The auctioneer looked startled, but he nodded. He motioned Carolina and Penny to accompany the man, then turned to the crowd.
‘Two of the women have been withdrawn from the sale,’ he announced, and there was a roar of dismay.
‘What does it mean?’ muttered Penny.
And Carolina, who had glanced quickly at Kells as they were led away and seen a frown cross his face, said anxiously, ‘I don’t know.’ She turned her head and saw that he was turning his mount around and attempting to follow them. ‘I think maybe something’s gone wrong,’ she told Penny.
‘Stop talking in riddles,’ said her sister crossly. ‘Everything has gone wrong or we wouldn’t be here.’
The governor’s driver saw a face he knew in the crowd. ‘Miguel!’ He beckoned to the man and they had a lowvoiced conversation - too low for Carolina to hear, even though she was straining to try to catch the words. The two women were promptly handed over to the newcomer, a short heavyset individual dressed as a servant. He took them each firmly by the wrist and led them away through a crowd that parted to let them pass and stared after them in curiosity.
‘The governor’s servant,’ Carolina heard one of them say, and she froze in fright. Had she been recognized as the Silver Wench? It seemed impossible that she would not be, for so many Spanish prisoners had spent time on Tortuga and then been returned to Havana. Did this mean that she would be imprisoned - and Penny, too, because she had rashly called out that Penny was her sister?
She was somewhat relieved when it was not the portals of one of the forbidding forts, but the portals of a small private house on the Plaza de Armas through which she and Penny were led by their silent guide.
They found themselves in a cool tile-floored hallway, and passed on through a small central courtyard into a rude kitchen. Plainly whoever had built the house had cared more for show and had lavished little thought or money on the back of the house.
Their silent escort called out ‘Juana,’ and there was an answering call from the small courtyard at the back, which they could glimpse from the kitchen.
A moment later a big comfortable woman in an apron lumbered in and surveyed the newcomers. Carolina listened closely to their rapid conversation.
‘What are they saying?’ demanded Penny.
‘They are saying that I am to stay here to await Don Diego’s pleasure and you - you are to go to the governor’s house!’ Carolina gave her sister a blank look.
‘What did I tell you?’ Penny grinned impishly, for these better surroundings had restored her sense of humour, ‘I'll end up the mistress of the governor yet!’
‘Oh Penny!’ Carolina was impatient. ‘How can you make jokes at a time like this?’ She turned again, listening to the conversation, for the big woman seemed to be protesting. ‘She says the governor’s house is next door and why should I be kept here in an empty house? And the man is saying the house will not be empty’ - Carolina’s voice quivered - ‘that the governor has given Don Diego Vivar the house - oh, Penny, the governor has given me to Don Diego!’
‘Ask if he’s handsome,’ Penny said instantly, and then, ‘Well, don’t just stand there looking so stricken, Carolina. What else are they saying?’
‘Oh, nothing. The old woman asked what am I to do here, and the man is saying he does not know, that it is not his business to know, that it is his business only to take orders and that she had better do as she is told or the governor will have her beaten! And she is saying that the governor is too soft-hearted to beat anyone or he would surely have had him beaten long since.’
‘Well, that’s good news,’ Penny said cheerfully. ‘I’d certainly prefer a soft-hearted captor! Things are looking up!’
Their escort pointed to a wooden bench and Carolina sank down. He then seized Penny’s wrist and began marching her back the way they had come.
At the entrance to the inner courtyard Penny turned and her impish smile flashed. ‘Good luck with Don Diego!’ she called.
Carolina gave her a black look and said nothing. Don Diego, indeed! Where was Kells?
At precisely that moment the man Havana knew as Don Diego Vivar had managed, through a crowd of people who were now dancing in the street, to overtake the governor’s carriage which was heading home.
‘Your Excellency. Doña Mar
ina,’ he greeted them. Might I inquire what happened to the two women who were withdrawn from the sale?’
‘Ah, Don Diego, well might you ask!’ He clapped the younger man jovially on the back. ‘Captain Avila, who commanded one of the galleons in the attack on New Providence, has told me that the pair of them are sisters and that the blonde has rendered some assistance to Spain. I thought it merciful to spare them the humiliation of public sale and of possibly finding harsh masters. The tall redhead I will find a place for in my own household. The blonde shall become your house servant, for I saw you eyeing her!’
The grey eyes gave the portly governor an inscrutable, look. ‘But I am living in your house, Your Excellency,’ he protested. ‘In what manner - ’
‘Oh, do not be tedious, Don Diego. I own the small house next door to my own, which has recently become vacant since the Mendoza family left for Spain. It is yours to enjoy until I again find suitable tenants - bachelor quarters, eh?’ He slapped Don Diego on the back again. And you will require more than old Juana to take care of you. True, she will cook your meals, but you will need someone to serve them, someone to tidy up, and make your bed - ’ And sleep in it with you. The inference was clear from the leer on the older man’s countenance. ‘So I have sent the blonde to your new quarters. She now awaits your return.’
‘Ah,’ murmured the tall gentleman. ‘I am indeed beholden.’ He seemed to struggle with himself. ‘Your Excellency,’ he began diffidently, ‘you have been more than a friend to me. Indeed you have treated me as a son.’
‘Now, now, my boy, none of that!’ was the governor’s good-natured response. ‘Had I had a son, I could only hope that he would be as valorous as you.’
‘I am in debt to you for everything I possess,’ continued Don Diego seriously. ‘This horse, the very clothes on my back. And now this generous offer of a house and servants. I can only say that when my funds arrive from Spain, I will reimburse you twice over.’
‘No, no,’ said the governor unhappily, for he had hoped to reduce the gentleman in Marina’s eyes, and Don Diego’s remarks were undermining that purpose. ‘We will speak of it later, Don Diego. Go now and investigate your new home. It is the house just to the right of my own - the one the Mendozas just left.’
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