Spanish Serenade (29 page)

“Of course not, not by choice,” Pilar said with a tired sigh. “But the alternative is obvious. You can take me with you.”

Refugio's face was like hammered bronze in the afternoon light coming through the open floor-to-ceiling windows of the dining room. “I have given you my answer.”

“And you have mine.”

“It would be a pity,” he said, “if it became necessary to prevent you by force.”

Pilar got to her feet, pushing back her chair. “It would be worse than that; it would be criminal. But I should have expected no less.”

If the taunt touched him, he did not flinch from it, but neither did he attempt to stop her as she turned and left the table.

He walked outside the house, moving along the side gallery to the far end, well away from the dining room. The day was warm, with a soft wind out of the south. A honeysuckle vine twining around one of the columns of the house was laden with small white and yellow blossoms that spread their perfume on the air. In the yard below was a red and brown hen surrounded by chicks like yellow puffballs that ran hither and yon among the decaying leaves of the previous winter and the clumps of dark green spring grass. She stood for long moments, breathing deep of the soft air as she tried to control the erratic pounding of her heart.

The peaceful scene before her turned suddenly grim as the long blade of shadow, of a hawk came sweeping over the ground. The hen squawked and the baby chicks came running to shelter under her spread wings. The hen crouched low and motionless except for a faint trembling. The hawk flitted on past. It circled and passed again. Finally, it swept away. Pilar stood clenching the gallery railing, watching the flight of the hawk until it disappeared over the treetops. It was some time before she left the gallery and went to her room.

Refugio made no immediate effort to carry out his threat. He and the others remained in the dining room for hours; the sound of their voices could be heard, a low rumble, as they made their plans. As the time crept by, Pilar began to wish she had not been so impetuous. She was so used to being involved in all their discussions and plotting; she did not like feeling left out in this way.

Refugio was being so unreasonable. Why would he not permit her to lend her help? He pretended that it was concern for her that was at the bottom of his refusal, but was it? Or was it simply that he did not want her in his way?

She should not have spoken as she had, should not have suggested that he was a criminal. But his implacable attitude, his calm assumption that he had the right to dictate her actions, was infuriating. The fact that she had shared his bed did not make him her master. She was her own person, and must act for her own benefit. She could depend on no one else.

The men left the house again toward the middle of the afternoon. A short time later Pilar heard Isabel moving about in the next room and went to join her.

She had grown to like Isabel, in spite of the disjointed history of her past, and had done her best to befriend the girl on the long voyage. However, her purpose in seeking her out now was a shameless quest for information.

The other girl could tell her little. She had left the table shortly after Pilar to go and inspect the kitchen with Doña Luisa. She did say that Refugio had assigned Enrique the task of hanging around the taverns and drinking houses near the river levee in order to discover when the next ship would be sailing for Spain. Enrique was also to search out a contact with the smugglers said to operate among the bayous and bays of the gulf, importing goods into New Orleans without paying the official tariffs. These contacts could be important since it might be necessary to make a hasty departure once they had Vicente safe. Governor Miro could not be depended on to see the justice of their attack on his newest regidor, especially if the governor came to accept Don Esteban's word for Refugio's identity.

It was far into the night when Refugio and the others returned, and then they came with the squeak of cartwheels and the braying of mules. It gave Pilar a certain grim pleasure to realize that they had been out collecting the means to use her idea for entry to Don Esteban's house. She lay listening as they led the animals to a shed on the back of the property. A short time later they returned to the house.

The door of the bedchamber creaked a little as it swung open. Refugio carried no candle, but moved with soft, sure footsteps in the dark. There came the rustle of his clothing as he undressed, then the bed yielded to his weight as he settled upon it.

Pilar lay stiff and still and well on her side of the mattress. She kept her eyes tightly closed and breathed in a slow, steady rhythm, in and out, in and out. She need not have bothered. He made no move to reach for her. Within minutes his own breathing grew deep and regular. By degrees she allowed her muscles to relax. She was relieved. Of course she was. At last she slept.

When she awoke, he was gone.

It was difficult to realize that the holy season of Easter was upon them. The time spent at sea had drifted past, hardly seeming to count, and yet the winter was gone. It was Good Friday. Doña Luisa was going to morning mass at the church of St. Louis, after which she would see the governor as arranged. A rather worn cabriolet had been found in the back of the shed, and a horse had been discovered pastured behind the ramshackle building. She meant to have herself driven into town. Pilar, she said, might join her if she wished.

Pilar was delighted at the opportunity. She dressed circumspectly in a gown of gray with a white bodice and threw a white mantilla over her head. With her face set in lines of determination, she climbed into the two-wheeled carriage beside Doña Luisa.

There were no church bells ringing to draw the faithful to mass on this day; by hallowed custom, they were silent in reverence for its holiness. Pilar said her prayers with due devotion but could not concentrate on the sanctity of the occasion. She hardly heard the words of the service, scarcely noticed the rather primitive interior of the church except for the carved figures decorated in the French manner, which seemed too brightly colored, too overblown and worldly to her eyes.

As they left the church, Pilar parted from Doña Luisa. She had a few errands to take care of, she told her, and would see the other woman back at her house, in time for a late luncheon. Doña Luisa was inclined to protest, demanding to know precisely where Pilar was going. Pilar only shook her head and walked away with a cheerful wave.

It was good to be doing something, finally, about her stepfather. At the same time, it felt strange to be nearing the end of her quest after so long a time spent traveling toward it. It was peculiar, but she wasn't afraid to confront him. Don Esteban had committed many crimes and had ordered others done, but he had never offered her violence with his own hands. It was not that he was incapable of it, she thought, but merely that he was prudent. He preferred that someone else perform such chores requiring violence, and do it well away from him. He had no taste for physical danger to himself, but most of all, he meant to provide no evidence of his direct involvement in the crimes. The merest hint of such a thing could be ruinous to his chances for advancement; this was why he had been at such pains to remove Pilar and those who might help her prove the cause of her mother's death. Pilar trusted that such wariness would be her protection still.

His house, pointed out to her by a passerby, was much as Refugio, had said, with whitewashed walls, a roof of weathered wood shingles, and shutters at the windows painted green. The street in front of it was a quagmire of mud, centered by a gutter filled with water in which floated kitchen refuse and the emptyings of chamber pots. There was no sign of Don Esteban, and the window shutters that were firmly closed against the fresh and balmy south wind seemed to indicate no one was at home.

Pilar walked slowly past the house along the raised wooden sidewalk as she considered what she must do. She must move with care for, in spite of what Refugio had said, she had no intention of endangering Vicente. Not again.

Just down from the house of the don she had to pause as a man emerged from a doorway. He was obviously a town official of some importance, for he not only bore himself with immense dignity, but carried in his hand the tall gold-headed cane that was his badge of office. He turned back to speak to a woman who must have been his wife, from her velvet dress, fine lace cap, and the rings on her fingers. Behind the plump housewife and to the right could be glimpsed the doorway leading to a small private chapel. Inside it, in honor of the holy day, the altar was laid with a cloth of lace. Tall wax, candles in candelabras of silver burned there, while behind it was a fine crucifix of carved and painted wood framed on either side by lace curtains. This was plainly the more wealthy section of the town.

Regardless, just a little farther along the street was an apothecary shop with its mortar and pestles and bottles of odd mixtures. Beyond it Pilar skirted the tables that spilled out of a wine shop where bottles were ranked against a back wall that contained Catalonian wine, the Cuban brandy called
aguardiente
, and also the French brandy known as
eau-de-vie
. Next to the wine shop was the window of a jeweler.

She wandered inside to look at a tray displaying buttons in bone and gold and ivory, fans with ivory and gold sticks, rings and earrings with stones that the shopkeeper swore were from Thrace, and also point-lace veils and walking sticks with gold heads. Most of the shopkeepers lived either behind or above their businesses, for from these quarters came the cries of babies and raised voices of mothers calling to playing children. Between the buildings could just be seen the gardens in the rear, where trees lifted new green leaves to the sun and plots of flowers, herbs, and vegetables flourished in the dark, moist soil.

The language heard everywhere was French, with only a smattering of Spanish filtering through now and then. Shop signs were in French, the music that came from street musicians or drifted from open windows was French, and the food that could be smelled cooking for the noon meal had a distinctly French aroma. The reason for the lack of Spanish influence was not difficult to comprehend. Three-quarters of the population were, even after twenty-five years of Spanish dominion, still of French extraction. The majority of those of Spanish blood who had come to the colony were men, men who had since married French women; even the governor had a French wife. Children in their cradles were taught French, fed French food, sent to schools with French teachers. Added to this was the fact that the Spanish regime had begun with a revolution of the French populace that had been put down with bloody force. In order to prevent the same thing happening again, and to keep peace in this distant yet strategic outpost, the Spanish had adopted a policy of benevolence, going to unusual extremes to placate the people. The fiery residents descended from the original adventurers and malcontents who had settled Louisiana, feeling their French pride was at stake, had made little effort to adapt themselves to Spanish ways. The result was an entirely different kind of Spanish colonial town. Certainly New Orleans bore little resemblance to Havana.

As she came to the end of the street called Chartres, Pilar could see little ahead of her. In one direction was what she took to be the powder magazine, while in the other was the custom house. Directly opposite where she stood was the palisade, the thick pole walls that surrounded the town on three sides, but left the riverfront open. The street that she must cross to reach any of these other points was standing in muddy ooze. She tarried for a long moment, enjoying the warmth of the day and the strong south wind that caressed her face, fluttered her lashes, and tugged fine tendrils of hair loose from her tight chignon. It brought the smell of flowers blooming and green growing things, a fecund miasma straight from the swamps about the town, one that was foreign yet enticing. She breathed deep of it and felt an easing somewhere deep inside.

There was no point in going on, she decided; she had seen enough. She turned and began to retrace her steps.

As she neared the house of the town official again, she saw a familiar figure approaching. Her stepfather was dressed in black and wore a bag wig that shone with powder, and his coat buttons and shoe buckles gleamed silver in the sun. He strode along, giving way to none, his face set in grim and haughty lines.

He had not seen her, but he would at any moment.

An odd dismay gripped Pilar. She was not ready. She was assailed by a sudden doubt that she was doing the right thing, by a conviction that once she stood before her stepfather, she would find nothing to say to him and the whole interview would go wrong. So great was the feeling of impending disaster that she stopped where she stood. Ahead of her lay a cross street, the last before the block where Don Esteban's house was located. Forcing herself to move with normal strides, she walked toward that thoroughfare, then swung quickly to the left, crossing the muddy intersection and heading the opposite way from the house.

The relief at being out of sight was so great that she took several deep breaths and wiped at the perspiration on her forehead with the back of one hand. She could not linger, however. At any moment Don Esteban would reach the cross street also and might look down it in her direction. Picking up her skirts, she walked on at a faster pace. If she could reach the next street, or even an alleyway between the houses, she would be all right. There was one of the latter ahead of her.

She looked back over her shoulder at the intersection some yards behind her. Any moment now her stepfather would appear. There were only a few more steps to go. A few more. There he was!