Counterfeit Bride(19)

Going through Teresita's dresses and choosing those that could be  adapted to her needs filled in the time before lunch quite adequately.  Maria bloomed with new importance. She sighed with admiration over the  colour of Nicola's hair, but shook her head at its condition. She also  hinted that Nicola was too thin. Perhaps the Señor Don Luis' taste ran  to plumper women, Nicola deduced with exasperation from the girl's  demure smile.

She told herself that it was a matter of indifference to her what his  tastes in that direction might be, but believing it was a different  matter. Unwillingly she remembered that first evening at the motel-the  way those women tourists had watched him-the odd pang she had felt ...

Resolutely, Nicola closed her mind against that. All she needed to  recall now was that he was the man who was forcing her into an unwanted  loveless marriage to satisfy his injured pride. Not that that was the  sole satisfaction he required, she thought, suddenly dry-mouthed as she  remembered the searing effect of his lips and hands, the little shaken  storm of desire he had so effortlessly aroused in her.

And Maria had her orders, she thought, to make sure that the bride was  desirable at all times because the dueno's will was paramount.

She had no wish at all to go down to lunch, but nor did she wish to face  the inevitable questions, probably from Don Luis himself, if she  remained in her room. Her blue dress had been returned, freshly  laundered and pressed, and she changed into it with a feeling of relief.

When she entered the comedor, an instant silence fell, forcing her to  the conclusion that she had been the subject under discussion, and she  checked for a moment, flushing a little, until Ramon's friendly smile  welcomed her.

Luis wasn't there, she discovered, looking round her.

'My cousin apologises for his tardiness,' Ramon told her in an  undertone. 'He is interviewing one Pablo who drivers a truck.' He gave  her a conspiratorial side-glance. 'A truck driver?' Pilar's ears were as  sharp as her voice apparently. 'Why doesn't Juan Hernandez speak to  such people?'                       
       
           



       

Ramon shrugged, clearly wishing he had said nothing. 'Because this is a matter which Luis prefers to deal with himself.'

Pilar subsided, but there was a speculative look in her eyes.

Thoroughly embarrassed, Nicola looked round her, and saw the portrait  which had so intrigued her earlier. Surely it wasn't just a trick of the  light that put such an expression of dancing mischief in the dark eyes  as she surveyed her descendants.

'You are admiring Dona Manuela, little cousin?' Ramon leaned forward.

'Ramon!' his mother snapped. 'Please remember that there is as yet no  established relatvonship between our family and-Señorita Tarrant.'

Ramon jerked a shoulder unabashed. 'The relationship will be established  soon enough,' he said with an ill-concealed grin. If I were in Luis'  shoes I would wait no longer than it takes for Father Gonzago to get  here from the mission.'

'Well, you are not in his shoes, and never will be,' Dona Isabella's  voice was even snappier, 'I must apologise for my son, señorita. His  manners have apparently deserted him.'

'On the contrary,' Nicola said sweetly, 'Don Ramon has been all that is kind ever since I arrived here.'

Dona Isabella's frankly fulminating glance indicated that Don Ramon was an idiot, but she said nothing.

The door swung open and Luis strode in. 'My regrets for having kept you waiting. You should have told Carlos to begin serving.'

'It was of no importance,' Dona Isabella assured him with an acid smile.

'Why have you been talking to a truck driver?' Pilar demanded.

Luis lifted a shoulder in a cool shrug. 'I found myself in his debt, and preferred to repay him in person. I am

grateful to you, Pilar, for this concern, in my affairs,' he added silkily. 'But perhaps we can now consider the matter closed.'

Pilar's eyes flashed mutinously, but she said nothing as the door opened to admit Carlos bearing a large silver tureen of soup.

It was a delicious meal from the soup itself, full of spicy meatballs  and aromatic with herbs, to the pork cooked with chili and vegetables  and served on a heaped bed of rice, and ending with cocada-a concoction  of syrupy, sherry-flavoured coconut.

Many more meals like that, and all Maria's wishes about her figure would  be fulfilled, Nicola thought wryly as she put down her napkin.

'You like Mexican cooking, Señorita Tarrant?' Pilar leaned forward,  smiling with patent insincerity. 'I thought our food would have been too  warm, too highly spiced for pallid Anglo-Saxon tastes.'

If food were all that she was talking about, Nicola thought with sudden  anger. She said, 'Bat you forget that I've been in Mexico for more than a  year. I've had plenty of time to accustom myself.' She turned to Ramon,  smiling at him. 'Please don't forget you promised to show me the  hacienda.'

'Certainly.' Ramon rose gallantly. He looked at Luis, leaning back in  his chair at the head of the table, his dark face enigmatic. 'You  permit, Luis?'

'You are the expert on the house, amigo.' His tone sounded bored, but  Nicola sensed that he was not pleased, and found it oddly exciting.

As they crossed the hall, Ramon said with a trace of awkwardness, 'You  may think it strange that my mother did not offer to act as your guide,  but...'

'I don't find it strange at all,' she returned drily. 'I'm sure that she  and your sister would much prefer to continue their listing of all the  ways in which I fall short of being a suitable bride for your cousin.'

He sighed. 'So they make it so obvious? Nicola, I am truly sorry. In  truth, my mother has become so accustomed to being the mistress here  that she will find it hard to take second place to another woman-to any  woman. It is not a personal thing, believe me.'

Nicola wasn't so sure, but she smiled at him. Thank you for the  reassurance.' They were in the salon, and she glanced around, wanting to  turn the conversation from the personal to the general for Ramon's sake  as much as anything. He couldn't be blamed for his mother and sister's  behaviour.

'What a beautiful room this is.' She made her words deliberately conventional. 'The furniture is very old, I suppose.'

'Most of it was brought from Spain on sailing ships and then hauled here  on waggons drawn by mules.' He grimaced comically. 'What a journey!  What an undertaking! It makes one feel ill to contemplate it even in  these modern times.' He smiled. 'Dona Manuela must have had a singularly  persuasive way with her.'

Nicola remembered- that he had referred to the portrait she had admired earlier as Dona Manuela.

'Then it was all her doing?' She gestured round her.

'To a great extent,' Ramon nodded in confirmation. 'It is a romantic  story. I am surprised that Luis himself did not wish to tell it to you.  She was a great beauty and an heiress, but she fell in love with a  soldier who had little but his own courage, so her family forbade her to  think of him. She could have married anyone, it was said. She was used  to court life, crowded gatherings, balls and festivals. She was a  wonderful dancer, so light on her feet that she was called La Mariposa,  the Butterfly.'                       
       
           



       

'Then the hacienda was named after her?'

'Si. Her lover became a conquistador and made himself a fortune. This  time when he sought her hand, her family did not refuse, although they  begged her not to come to this wild and primitive land-not to leave  Spain. And she laughed, and said that she would take a little of Spain  with her.'

'She certainly did that.' Nicola's fingers moved appreciatively over the  ancient, heavily carved wood. She wondered if the hacienda had altered  very much from those days. It had developed, and become more luxurious  with succeeding generations, but if Dona Manuela were here at this  moment, walking beside them with her silk skirts rustling, it would  probably still be familiar to her.

What could she have thought, coming from her pampered and cossetted  background in Spain to this wilderness! Compared to a castle in Spain,  the hacienda would have seemed primitive indeed to the conquistador's  bride. Had she still smiled as she rode in her waggon with her servants  and outriders to protect her from the hostile Indians, or had even her  lively spirit quailed as she contemplated what lay in front of her?

She asked, 'Was she happy here- after all that?'

Ramon shrugged. 'She did not have long to enjoy her happiness. She died  in childbirth about a year after the portrait of her was completed, and  her husband nearly went mad with grief. It was only the son she had  borne him that saved his sanity.'

Nicola shivered. 'You said it was a romantic story. I think it's a sad one.'

He looked faintly surprised. 'Cannot it be both? To love and be beloved  in return-isn't that what every woman secretly desires, no matter how  short such happiness may be?'