Harvest of Fury (43 page)

When they moved apart, Sant was watching her with such stricken pain that she suddenly ached. She could understand that. If he were the one leaving, it would rend the fabric of her life. But they were growing up—she
was
grown up, almost married! She hated to leave the ranch, but women went with their husbands. In spite of this knowledge, in spite of her marriage, she was finding it hard, very hard, to make Fayte's home hers too. She sighed, diverting herself with stories in the sand: dainty leaflike tracks of a lizard, the tail mark of a kangaroo rat hopping along in its search for seeds, myriad quail prints. The angle and depth of the larger tracks cutting across the wash said a deer had run this way. On the slope a black-tailed jackrabbit froze, morning sun showing through his black-tipped long ears, blending perfectly with the sandy bank. Reassured by Chris's lack of menace, he bounded off through the grass. She knelt to examine some coyote droppings, crumbling them in her fingers.

Wild greens mixed with rabbit fur, the vertebrae of a snake, a few ventral scales, the fur of some kind of mouse or rat which might have, of course, been in the snake. Later in the summer coyotes could feast on mesquite beans and watermelons, special favorites, though they'd eat almost anything. Chris loved to hear them at night, shrill yip-yipping that often swelled from a lonely voice into a chorus. She was afraid that Fayte shot them any chance he got.

He was sure they killed newborn calves. Chris argued that most such victims were probably already dead or so weak they were dying. Her grandfather, Patrick, was certain eight rabbits ate as much as a cow and thus were really more of a threat to livestock than predators that kept them in check even if these occasionally did take a calf or kid.

Fayte dismissed her arguments, laughing indulgently as he drew her into his arms and kissed her. “I'm glad you have a tender heart, but suppose you just worry about me?” For a time, fresh-married, intoxicated with each other, such embraces had swept differences out of their minds.

Resting in their big bed, head burrowed into Fayte's shoulder, Chris would trace the lean planes of her husband's face, the joining of strong neck to collarbone, feast her eyes on the wonder of him, feeling blessed that she could see the long mouth, the smoky gold eyes beneath dark gold eyebrows. His skin was brown where sun touched it, his hair the golden dun of winter grama grass.

Tan and gold and brown he was, and she thrilled with joy and pride that he was hers; that she could touch him everywhere, make him gasp with delight, give him peace that drained hardness from his face and left him smiling as he slept, so that she could picture him as a little boy, the way he'd been before his parents died.

At eight Fayte had been shuffled from one set of reluctant, overcrowded relatives to another in various Colorado mining towns where the immigrant Riordans had found work. He ran off when he was eleven, not that anyone cared, and worked in liveries, mercantiles, restaurants, hotels, wherever he could find a place to sleep and earn enough to eat. In spite of his half-starved boyhood, he grew tall early, went to work in the mines when he was fifteen, saved his wages, and went prospecting with an old man who claimed he knew where there was silver.

The vein played out in a few years, but it gave Fayte money to invest, and he bought into flamboyant Col. W. C. Greene's Cananea mining properties in northern Sonora. He was a working partner, though he spent most of his time on the huge ranch acquired from the heirs of Gen. Ignacio Pesqueira, who had been governor of Sonora most of the twenty years before he was forced from power in 1876.

Los Robledos, The Oak Grove, was a dream come true for the orphaned son of immigrants, a small kingdom where his word was law, altogether different from Rancho del Socorro where vaqueros ate with the family, where children of the workers and owners played and went to school together, addressed each other as familiars.

There was none of that at Los Robledos. The women who worked in the big house seemed to hurry to be through with their duties and return to their quarters. The kitchen was presided over by Lee Sung, who worked with his queue tied up around his head to keep it out of the food. He was devoted to Fayte, who'd rescued him from some rough handling back in Denver, but seemed merely to tolerate Chris. She felt excluded from her own kitchen.

Now, approaching her husband's house, she felt a great wave of longing for her family, especially for Sant. His words about her being Fayte's trophy came back with searing force.

Paralyzed by the intensity of her sense of uselessness, she stood still for a moment, gazing at the hills. Then she collected herself and breathed deep as if taking in courage from the sparkling air.

The house wouldn't be hers till she made it so. She was Fayte's wife, not his mistress. High time she acted like it instead of feeling sorry for herself!

Marching into the entry hall, she confronted the bighorn ram's head which was the first thing she'd seen when Fayte carried her proudly into his home. The great horns spiraled back, then curved around toward the front like an almost closed crescent moon. The glass eyes stared at her as she reached up to lift it from its iron peg.

What with the mounting slab, it was heavy. She stood there a moment, wondering what to do with it, then moved down the corridor to Fayte's study. A conquistador's helmet, picked up somewhere in New Mexico, hung between two windows. Setting it carefully on a couch, she put the bighorn in its place, stood back, and thought it fitted the space quite well. She hung the helmet in the entry, nodded with satisfaction, and went back to the kitchen.

“I want to make some panocha,” she told Lee Sung, who was deftly chopping vegetables with a long knife. “The wheat has to be sprouted first, of course, so I'll just put it to soak.”

His voice frowned, though his face was expressionless. “Missy say what she want, I fix.”

“Thanks, Lee Sung, but I like to cook sometimes.” She smiled, trying to soften him. “I won't get in your way.”

“Better one person cook, missy.”

“Please show me where the wheat is.”

Chris thanked him for his help when he was done and went to Fayte's big bedrooms—she still couldn't think of it as hers, too—feeling exhilarated. How silly she'd been, waiting and hoping to feel at home here without doing things to make it so!

Tomorrow she'd go about setting up a little school for the ranch children where she could teach a few hours a day. Fayte had discouraged it when she had wanted to try it earlier. He thought education only made workers discontented and ready to quarrel with their employers. His life had, understandably, hardened him. It was up to her to make him kinder, more trusting. Anyway, how could she expect him to treat her like a woman when she let him dominate her as if she were a not particularly bright child?

She rang the bell four times, the signal that bath water should be brought to the chamber attached to Fayte's room. It opened on the inner patio and could be serviced from the kitchen.

It was the one thing at Los Robledos of which Chris thoroughly approved. An immense copper tub sat on a tiled dais near a long tiled shelf holding French soaps, lotions, brushes, thick towels, and washcloths. One whole side was mostly window, looking into a small garden separated from the main patio by a wall so that it was utterly private except for the birds that came to drink at the fountain where a nymph perpetually eluded a sea god though he had one hand on her shoulder. A pomegranate grew in this protected space, its trumpetlike brilliant red flowers changing almost perceptibly into fruit, and passionflowers and jasmine covered the walls.

Stripping off her dusty walking skirt and high-necked blouse, she tossed them in the hamper with her daintily embroidered camisole and drawers, slipped on a robe, and entered the bathroom. As if by magic, the tub was nearly filled with warm water and a clean mat was placed beside the tub. Tossing the robe to a wicker chair, Chris tied her hair up and stepped into the water, lowering herself with a sigh of contentment, adding a splash of the scented bath oil Fayte himself enjoyed.

He liked her to wear pretty, comfortable clothes for dinner, which they ate in the big dining room with Lee Sung serving. The wine was served in crystal goblets and the serving pieces were of heavy beaten silver.

She was rinsing soap from herself when Fayte came through the door, closed it, and lounged back, arms crossed. Though he was her husband, loved to see her naked, and had made her proud of her body, under his smoky golden stare she suddenly wanted to hide herself. She felt a chill go up her spine.

“I take it you decided to do some rearranging, my love. I should have told you I like things where I have them.”

Stung by her fear as much as by the lazy admonishment, she cradled her knees to her breasts. “Then perhaps you shouldn't have married me! I can't stand looking at that ram every time I come inside. I don't feel at home here at all; it's your house, not mine!” She paused for breath. ‘I'm making panocha tomorrow, and I'm going to start a school and—and if that damned bighorn can't hang someplace but the entry, I'm going home!”

His eyes narrowed. He came a step closer. “That's rather mixed, Christina. But one thing's certain. You are home.”

“I don't feel like it. I don't
do
anything, I'm just here!”

Unable to bear the way his gaze traveled over her, she stood up, in the same motion covering herself with a towel. “If you want everything to stay where it was before I came, if what I want doesn't matter to you, then I'd better go away!”

In one long stride he was beside her. “You're my wife. You're not going anywhere.”

He ripped the towel from her, flung it down, and lifted her out of the tub. Standing her on the mat, he dried her roughly; then, catching her up in his arms, he carried her in to their bed and almost threw her across it.

He kicked off his boots, undid his belt. Chris sprang off the bed on the opposite side and ran for the door, but he caught her and held her with one hand while he finished shucking off his clothes. When he put her on the bed again, he pinioned her hands above her head, lifted her hips with his free hand, and plunged into her.

It was the first time he'd taken her without wooing, caressing, kissing, nipping and fondling and teasing till she could scarcely wait for him. It hurt. He seemed to batter at her. She writhed and fought, afraid of being broken, afraid of this stranger.

Then that crescendo. For a second he seemed to hang frozen above her as she felt that violent pulsing of his seed. A shudder racked him. Usually the force and passion of his loving awed her, made her feel tender, almost pitying, as it drained to leave him quiet, peaceful in her arms. This time, frightened and aching from his assault, she tried to get up when he collapsed beside her, but he pinned her with his knee and long arm, pulled her head to his shoulder.

“My dear little wife, if you don't know where you belong, I'm certainly going to teach you!”

She lay stiff, frightened and angry, aching where he'd rammed her, though the worst pain and confusion was in her mind. How could he love her and, treat her like that?

Shocked, humiliated, she wanted to get away where she could weep out her hurt and disillusionment, but he began to stroke her with his long, skillful hands, fondling, kneading the places where her muscles tensed against him. He nuzzled her breasts in that way that reminded her of a deer feeding sweetly in a grassy meadow, worshiped her so ardently with his lean, strong man's body that she soon wanted him in spite of everything, opened to him with a cry of supplication.

He took her in a way that soothed the earlier hurt, lifting her with him to a wild turbulence that swirled them into an ecstacy so powerful it left them drained, light, tender in each other's arms.

“I love you,” he murmured against her throat. “Little witch, if it disturbs you so, the mount can hang in my study. You're my real prize.”

He rang for more water, bathed her himself this time, rubbed lotions into her flesh with loving possessiveness. Happy at their renewed closeness, she told herself she should have asked to move the bighorn, should have handled the whole thing better.

She had learned; so had he. Now she must learn to be the mistress of Los Robledos, just as she must become Fayte's wife as well as his sweetheart.

He was quick with his bath and was dressed by the time she had brushed her hair. “Don't pin it up,” he said, coming up behind her, his smile reflected in the huge plate-glass mirror, fingers lifting the thick waves of burnished auburn. “Tie it back with that dark green velvet ribbon that matches your eyes.” He laughed, trailing his hand along her shoulder. “Skin of gold, emerald eyes, bronze hair—you're most unusual, my love.”

She shrugged as she tied back the unruly mass. “There's red hair in my family, and yellow, brown, and black. Mix Yaqui, Irish, Scots, Apache, Spanish, German, and Mexican, and I suppose you could get all kinds of results.”

“I like your result!” he said. They smiled at their handsome reflections in the mirror, kissed, and went hand in hand down the corridor.

If Chris put her mind to it, she could explain when copper had become a giant force in industry and finance. Edison had invented his electric lamp in 1879 and the use of copper power lines had greatly increased the need for the ore. Engines, automobiles, farm machinery, pipe, engraving plates, telephones, and telegraphs raised world production of copper from 4,000 metric tons in the 1830s to 240,000 in the '80s.

Chris could remember when electric lights and a telephone were installed at the Socorro and when, last year, her father and mother had driven home from Phoenix in the first automobile to park near the corral and alarm the horses. In spite of all her son's urging, Talitha had refused to set foot in the shiny Packard.

“Yes, I know they're making flying machines, and I suppose these wretched snorting monsters will clutter up the roads till a horse can't travel,” she said. “But thank heaven I'm old enough not to have to learn to live with such ‘progress.' I'd rather remember Mangus and old Fort Buchanan and how it was to ride to Tubac for Colonel Poston's parties.”