The Flesh and the Devil (64 page)

         
‗Nonsense, this is exactly what you need. Swallow it
down before we go downstairs. Every drop, mind.‘

         
Juana was lifting the cup to her lips when the maid
returned, breathless, with the chain, and simple distaste made her lower it
untouched. She thought wryly that Felipe Tristan‘s child promised to prove as
sober and coldblooded as his father - already he disliked it when his mother
drank wine. Swiftly, while Doña Jerónima was rating the maid for letting the
chain become tangled in her hands, Juana tipped most of the wine into the jug
that had held her water for washing, then put down the almost empty cup.

         
‗Look, this will be ideal.‘ Doña Jerónima turned with
the now untangled chain. You can wear it over one shoulder, so. As she spoke
she allowed her eyes to travel to the contents of the cup, and Juana caught the
glance.

         
‗I could not drink all of it, señora - I beg your
pardon.‘

         
‗No matter, that should serve.‘ Doña Jerónima patted
her cheek. In another hour, the widow was thinking, the blood would begin to
burn, the girl become peevish and discontented, shifting restlessly. Then she
would grow dazed and her senses would wander, and that would be the time to get
her out of sight. In two hours the drug would have her wholly in its grip. It
was to be hoped that Don Diego would keep his vow to arrive punctually tonight.

         
‗Now let us go down.‘ Doña Jerónima was smiling with
unusual warmth. ‗I have thrown open the great room for tonight - I hope
you appreciate, Margarita, the pains I have taken for this last feast in your
honour.‘

         
By a little after nine the Casa de Herreros was crowded,
and Doña Jerónima, lingering at the head of the stairs to receive the last
latecomers, allowed herself an instant of regret. Inwardly she damned
Margarita's unknown lover. But for him it need not have ended so soon, this
most successful of all her schemes. She could have played these gaping fish for
another month without trouble, pretending that her protegée was hesitating over
the choice of her first lover. The contenders‘

         
bounty would have restored all her lost fortunes, double
what she had had from the Andalusian. Now....

         
The thought broke off as another couple ascended the steps towards
her, and her fingers tightened on the sticks of her fan as she watched their
approach. There was an appreciative gleam in her tiger-yellow eyes, and she
took a pace forward without being aware of it.

         
‗Elena, my dear, how good to see you! And Señor
Stanford - that is a bold choice for one of your colouring, señor, but it
becomes you. Is it the English mode to take such risks?‘

         
‗No, señora, it is my own.‘ Tristan bowed over her
extended hand, and Elena gave a husky laugh.

         
‗I thought he must be mad when he insisted upon that
colour, but Felipe is always right, as you see! I would not dare for myself.‘

         
‗You are very wise, Elena. When a woman passes a
certain age it is best not to be too reckless. Señor, perhaps you and I could
speak later?‘ Doña Jerónima's tone lowered and became veiled. ‗I have
some gauds here in the house that you may care to see - they are not to every
idle undiscriminating taste, but I think you might approve them.‘ She looked
upward through her lashes at his expressionless face.

         
‗I shall be honoured,‘ he returned levelly. ‗From
what I have seen already 1

         
would judge that there is much here that I might covet.‘

         
‗Felipe!‘ Elena had moved ahead under the sting of
her hostess's tongue and now called back with a hint of pettishness.

         
Tristan, with a brief inclination of his red head, moved
unhurriedly after her.

         
Doña Jerónima watched him go rather thoughtfully. She would
never have suspected that big, cold-faced man of the necessary flamboyance to
wear purple velvet that should have clashed hideously with his flame-red hair.
For all his great height and magnificent physique, despite that outrageous
colouring, Elena‘s Englishman had always seemed somehow withdrawn; as though he
declined to use the magnetism he possessed, or perhaps was not even aware of
it. But now, dressed to draw the eye, he had assumed a charm that overbore his
normal mask of cold courtesy and made him - she admitted with an unusual quickening
of her pulse - twice as exciting.

         
Elena had tried to match her companion's audacity by
wearing a gown of amethyst, which with her pale skin and fox-coloured hair was
probably a wiser choice; the deeper shade would have drained her of all colour,
and what on the Englishman looked startling would merely look lurid. Doña
Jerónima allowed herself one last, contemplative look at Tristan's broad back,
noting how the breadth of his shoulders and the fire of his hair was enhanced
by the black cloak which matched the trimmings on the purple doublet, and
decided not to linger for more than another few minutes. Besides delivering
Margarita to Don Diego's embraces without attracting notice, she saw no reason
why she should not use the evening to seek some amusement on her own account.

         
It seemed to Juana that Don Diego Ruiz's attentions were
verging on the distasteful that evening. Whatever she did failed to rid her of
him, and he was behaving as though he had been chained to her side. He had
several times warned off other admirers who had approached her, as if he had
the right, she thought resentfully; as they talked his hands hovered over her,
lingering over her shape without touch ing her as though he were allowing his
imagination free rein, and there was an intent look in his eyes that Juana
mistrusted: she had learned to recognize desire in a man's expression. She felt
inclined to turn away and then, when he persisted, to round upon him with the
anger born of fright. She was trying in vain to catch Doña Jerónima‘s eye and
signal for help, but Don Diego, who had had warning that his prize might seem
coy and fractious in her first shyness after yielding, was not deterred.

         
‗I know you cannot mean to be so cruel, señorita,‘ he
told her softly, ‗for you know how deeply your unkindness wounds me. I
shall hope for more grace later.‘

         
‗Then you had best seek it from another lady.‘ Juana
stared coldly into the brown eyes almost on a level with her own. ‗I can
assure you that
my
resolution is fixed.‘

         
‗So I hope,‘ he returned promptly, with a laugh that
mystified her.

         
Doña Jerónima, watching from a distance with one eye on the
clock, was well pleased: things were proceeding exactly as she had foreseen.
She beckoned Don Bautista, massive in skin-tight azure silk and what she
recognized contemptuously as paste diamonds, and he approached her with an
anxious look.

         
‗Is everything arranged, Jerónima? My house has been
a madhouse all day today. People coming and going, and letters despatched all
over the town,‘ he added gloomily. ‗All my servants have been obeying
that man's behests and leaving me to fend for myself.‘

         
Doña Jerónima's lips twitched. ‗Be quiet! Of course
everything is arranged, do you think I am a fool? Keys, opportunity,
everything. Look.‘ She nodded across the room to where Don Diego had moved
possessively close to Juana. ‗It goes well.‘

         
‗It looks to me as though she disdains him still.‘

         
‗A little longer and she will not be able to resist
him.‘

         
Or any man, her thoughts added, but Bautista had best not
know that. She plied her fan expertly, sending a cooling breeze to her hollow
cheeks.

         
‗He knows not to heed any peevish humours of hers,
and - Señor Stanford,‘

         
she broke off with a small, complacent smile, ‗you
are prompt to take me at my word.‘

         
Tristan greeted Don Bautista, then said lightly, ‗I
have not yet paid my respects to Señorita Armendariz, but it seems that I would
not be welcomed.‘

         
His gaze rested thoughtfully on the slender figure in blue
and gold, his slanting eyes unreadable. Doña Jerónima's expression as she
followed his stare was a masterpiece of maternal indulgence.

         
‗No, I fear you are right! It would be a pity to
interrupt the young lovers tonight.‘ Sudden determination hardened her smile as
she glanced up with a provocative tilt of her head but could not interpret the
look in those unnervingly expressionless eyes. ‗There is still a scruple
or two on Margarita‘s part,‘ she added almost briskly, ‗but young girls
are apt to fear for no better reason than that they are afraid. A first venture
always cures a maid of that.‘

         
The red head swung round sharply, and she saw that he was
intrigued; at least it had taken his eyes off that wretched girl, but the
brilliant glitter in them disconcerted her for a moment. Then he said calmly, ‗I
have known it otherwise, but you must know her better than I; she may break
well to bridle. When do you mean to set her on?‘

         
‗Why, tonight.‘

         
Doña Jerónima‘s brows lifted at the directness of the
question but she answered automatically, basking in the enigmatic Englishman‘s
close regard. He was watching her lips as if their movement fascinated him,
with a tautness about his tall lean frame quite different from his usual
relaxed stillness, and the skin round his scar had whitened.

         
‗Don Diego there is to undertake the business in a
littles room I keep for such matters, at the end of my picture-gallery,‘ she
heard herself say, ‗and once he has schooled her there will be the end of
her coldness.‘

         
‗Is she cold, then?‘

         
‗Oh, I was never so deceived, I swear. When she first
came to me I thought she promised well - she said she was to have been
married-but if the nunlike humours she has shown me are honest, her husband
would have had a frosty time of it.‘

         
She bit her thin lower lip, regretting her unwontedly frank
speech, but something in the tall man‘s expression as he watched the girl had
irritated her beyond caution, and she had taken the first stratagem to turn his
interest away.

         
‗She is green, señor,‘ she added with deliberate
spite. ‗Too faint-hearted to go to hazard for any pleasure. If Don Diego
can strike any spark from her tonight, I wish him joy with all my heart.‘

         
Tristan did not answer. His gaze had travelled back to
where Juana was circling slowly with Don Diego, her fingers resting almost
insensibly on the sleeve of his brocade doublet. Stance and expression were
unchanged, but Doña Jerónima realized with a stab of annoyance that she had
lost his attention.
Onemore score to settle with that wretched girl
, she
thought. She laid a whitened hand on the tall man's sleeve, drawing her
fingertips down a little way and then checking as if she were alarmed at her
own temerity. It was a device that had done excellent service in the past, and
she was gratified to feel the tightening of powerful muscles beneath the
velvet. So, she thought, this one was not as indifferent to women as he chose
to appear....