From This Day Forward (26 page)

Again men disembarked one after the other and were greeted by elated family members. Ignacio stepped ashore, and his wife and son embraced him immediately. His expression when he pulled away from them and spotted her made her breath catch. She glanced up the river for the last boat, only to find the river empty.

Her pleading gaze followed Ignacio as he walked wearily toward her, his hat in his hand, his head bowed.

"I am sorry,
Senhora
,"
he said as he came to stand before her, his eyes reflecting some of the pain in her heart. "He would not come."

"Where is he?" she asked, struggling to keep her voice from shaking.

"We left him in Manaus," Ignacio told her.

"But what...?" A faintness washed over her; her body swayed slightly, trembling with dread that he might never come back as long as she remained here. "Why? When?"

"He will come home," Ignacio assured her as if reading her thoughts. "He cannot bear the city. He will grow weary of it and return soon."

Caroline lifted her chin high, her lower lip trembling with the tears that threatened to humiliate her. There was nothing left to say. A persistent pain burned inside her soul, but she beat it down, substituting anger for the hurt that she could not, would not allow to devour her. She walked slowly back to the house with all the dignity at her command.

"What are you doing,
Senhora
?"

Caroline gazed up from the papers spread on top of the mahogany desk to see Ignacio staring at her from the doorway in openmouthed astonishment.

"What does it look like?" she asked, smiling in order to cushion the harshness of her words.

What she'd been doing was staring at stacks of papers and ledger books without comprehension. She'd hoped keeping busy would take her mind off of Jason, but all she could think of was Jason sending his men back and remaining in Manaus. She had half a mind to jump on a boat and go after him herself.

Ignacio's brow furrowed in suspicion. "What have you done with
Senhor
Aveiro?"

Caroline laughed softly past the persistent pain in her heart. "What do you think, Ignacio? How could you think I would do anything to that kind old man?"

"I didn't mean...." he began, removing his hat and stepping cautiously into the room.

"He received word on the last mail boat that his father is ill, so he
left immediately for Portugal, j
udging by
Senhor
Aveiro's advanced age, I can only imagine that his father must be over a hundred years old."

"But,
Senhora
,"
Ignacio said, twisting his hat nervously. "What are you doing?"

"I'm keeping the books," she replied impatiently. He acted as if he'd caught her with her hand in the till.

"You can't!" he insisted vehemently.

"Why not?"

"Because... because..."

"Because I'm a woman?" she asked angrily.

She'd received the same reaction from men in New Orleans when they learned that her position at the Sinclair Coffee Company entailed a little more than smiling and looking pretty. Filling her lungs with air, Caroline launched into her defense. "I kept the books for the Sinclair Coffee Company for a year. I paid the bills, placed the orders—"

"No,
Senhora
,"
Ignacio managed to interrupt. "Because... well, you know the
patrao,
how he is. He likes to make all the decisions."

Caroline settled back into the comfortable leather chair. "Well, then he shouldn't stay away so long."

"I told him the same thing," Ignacio assured her. "When he finds out what you've done, he will—"

"He will be angry, I know!" Caroline rolled her eyes and gazed toward the ceiling as if beseeching heaven. "Everything I do or say or even think about doing or saying makes the
patrao
angry. I don't care! He's not here and I'm not as confident as you are that he will ever come back as long as—"

She cut her speech short before she blurted
as long as I'm here.

"I must write to the
patrao
and tell him so he can hire another man while he is in Manaus," Ignacio told her, turning to leave.

"Wait!" Caroline cried, coming to her feet once again. How could she explain her need to keep busy? The opportunity to keep the books had come at a time when she desperately needed something to occupy her mind.

"Ignacio, please," she pleaded, trying to keep the urgency
from her voice, "let me do it. G
ive me a month. If I don't do a good job, you can take a boat and go to Manaus to find someone yourself."

Ignacio scratched his head in indecision. "I don't like it. You should not anger the
patrao."

"I only have to breathe to anger the
patrao.
Please, Ignacio. Maybe he won't be angry. Maybe he'll be glad I'm so resourceful. Besides, it'll save him money. He'll be happy about that, especially since I had to order a new water pump tor the
beneficio."

"You did what?"

Stunned by the horror on Ignacio's face, Caroline felt a prickling of apprehension and prepared
to
defend her position once again. "It stopped working, so I sent an order back with the last mail boat. In the meantime, they've had to use a hand pump."

"Oh,
Senhora
,
you shouldn't have done that!" Ignacio said, making the sign of the cross in front of his chest.

"Stop it!" Caroline snapped, anger pushing the momentary fear from her mind. "I had to. The
fazenda
can't operate without water power."

"
Senhora
, it is an old pump."

"Yes, I know," Caroline said, settling in her chair once again. "High time it was replaced."

"It breaks all the time."

Caroline nodded agreement. "My point exactly."

"It breaks, Luis fixes it. Master Jason isn't a man who spends money freely. He has had that pump for nine years."

"Freely? Surely he knows there are things he has to spend money on to keep the
fazenda
running?" Stony silence met her words. Gazing at the horrified Ignacio, her temper rose steadily. "Luis wasn't here to fix it this time!"

Caroline watched Ignacio's inner struggle as the clock on the study wall ticked away the seconds. Surely he could see her point. Why continue to fix a piece of equipment that broke regularly? It took time away from harvesting the coffee, which was the main occupation of th
e
fazenda
.
There was plenty of money in the plantation account to cover a new pump.

"Maybe you're
right," Ignacio said unconvinc
ingly. "That pump was old and worn out."

"Of course I'm right," Caroline said with a smile of relief. If Ignacio agreed with her, it must have been the right thing to do. "We had no choice."

Swallowing the nagging doubt in the back of her mind, Caroline added, "Besides, I'll take full responsibility."

"The boat,
Senhora
!"
Ines called. "It is coming!"

Caroline stopped in the motion of snipping a parsley stem and came to her feet, lifting her head to listen as the sound of a steam whistle rent the air.

Her whole being trembled as she walked slowly along the narrow path between the well-defined rows of Ines's herb garden, the handle of a wicker basket draped over her arm.

Finally, he'd come home. Finally, the waiting was over, the wondering, the frustration. Her heart faint with dread, she remembered how they'd parted more than five months ago. Was he still angry about the letters? Was he ready to face his past and the fact that she knew much of it so that they could get on with their lives?

Uneasiness
settled in her chest every time she considered that Jason, who had built his life in such a way that he could completely avoid contact with civilization, had spent so much time in the city. No matter how much he hated the city, he'd chosen it over her. How would he react when he found her still here? The thought filled her with dread.

At the edge of the garden nearest the kitchen, she stopped in indecision. Should she rush down to the pier to greet her husband with open arms or ignore his arrival and continue with the day as she'd planned it? She'd made a fool of herself once, running down to meet him, only to find that he hadn't returned with his men.

How dare he just float home on a Tuesday morning and expect her to be waiting eagerly?

Her bottom lip quivered and she cursed herself for allowing the pain of rejection to seep through her control. She took a ragged breath as another whistle blast sounded.

"Come,
Senhora
!
"
Ines called, running across the patio, her face beaming with delight. "Master Jason is back! Let's go meet the boat!"

Ines grabbed her arm, but Caroline remained immobile. "No. You go on."

"But
Senhora
! Master Jason—don't you want to see him after so long?"

"Not particularly." If only it were true, Caroline mused, trying not to meet Ines's gaze for fear the other woman would read something in her eyes.

"But why not?"

"Go, Ines! Meet the boat. I have a garden to tend."

Ines called after Caroline as she turned to go. "But you can do that later! I will help."

"Ines! I am not going to run down to the pier like some silly girl! Go if you like. I'm staying here."

Her face a twisted mask of confusion and hurt, Ines tried to reason with her. "Maybe he will not be still angry."

"I don't care," Caroline said tiredly.

"But—"

Caroline walked away, back down the garden path to the place she'd left when the steam whistle had sounded. There were herbs to be cut and weeds to be pulled. Life went on, in spite of Jason Sinclair.

Three mail boats had come and gone in Jason's absence, and Caroline had come close to boarding each and just sailing away from this place and her unreasonable, heartless husband. He didn't want her; he would never want her. Even if his anger had cooled during his prolonged visit to Manaus, he would never forgive her for the letters. Those damned letters!

She snipped a sprig of basil and placed it neatly in her basket, careful not to mix the herbs together.

He'd arrived for the final battle, she knew, the last skirmish in the war they'd been waging since the day she stepped off the mail boat. They'd each had ample time to assemble their resources and formulate a plan of attack. Now all that remained was for one or the other of them to open fire.

Pushing with the back of her hand at an errant curl that had slipped out from under her wide hat, she settled back on her heels, listening for another whistle blast in spite of her resolve.

With a determined sigh, Caroline deposited her small scissors in the basket and stood up, wiping her dirty hands on her skirt. She'd take the herbs to the kitchen and then occupy herself elsewhere. This time, she would not be the one to seek him out.