Marco and the Devil's Bargain (20 page)

In the frigid hall of the guest house, they said goodnight to each other. Paloma put her arms around Marco's neck as soon as he closed their door. “You had better tell me!”

“
Of course. I think I can trust you,” he said, which earned him a jab in the ribs from his loving wife.

“
What was that all about?” she asked, shedding her cloak because the charcoal brazier had been lit and burned down to coals that warmed the little room. “Tell me now, or I won't ….”

“
Won't what, my dove?” he teased.

“
Oh, you know.” Funny how the dratted man could still make her blush.

“
Only if it goes no farther than these walls.” He unbuttoned her basque and cupped his hands around her breasts. “My hands are cold.”

Paloma turned her face into his chest so she would not shriek. His hands
were
cold, no denying. Apparently it was her task to warm them, even though she had planned to do precisely that, once they were in bed.

“
All right, you scoundrel, they're warm enough!” she said. “You and Luz Mendoza were talking so privately and I'll admit it gave me a twinge.” She frowned. “Rico didn't seem too worried, though. Oh, please! What happened?”

She shucked off her basque and skirt and darted under the covers, where she wriggled out of her chemise and removed her wool stockings. The smile on her husband's face, where earlier he had been so glum, cheered her heart. When he was bare and beside her, he kissed her shoulder and pulled her close, serious again even though they were in bed, a time when he usually was not so serious.

“
Luz told me she was just barely with child, and begged my understanding that she still wanted to be inoculated. She thought I would object, because I am an agent of the crown. Bless her simple, honest heart. Dear God, objection was the farthest thing from my mind! I'll leave that to priests and popes. God forgive me if I have sinned.”

Paloma heard the wonder in his voice. “I assured her that I dealt in brands and inspections, and neighbors' quarrels, and served as the law where there was none, but there my power ended. I told her whatever she decided was between her and
el padre eternal
, no one else. She believed me, because she wanted to. Paloma, Father Francisco must never hear of this.”

He rolled over on his back and pulled her with him, his arms tight around her. “And who knows? Perhaps their tiny child will be unaffected by what we did tonight.” He kissed Paloma. “All she wants to do is raise her children. Is God so unmerciful as to prevent that? I doubt it supremely. Love me, Paloma.”

“
That's easy,” she assured him, kissing his chest. “So you nearly married her?”

He laughed and rolled her over again. “I sat in her father's
sala
for a few nights, until she kindly told me she was desperately in love with Rico the tinsmith. Even if I was a rich landowner, I was too old.” His hands on her breasts were warm now. “Am I too old,
chiquita mia
?

“
Silly man,” she said.

T
hey left for the Double Cross at noon the next day, after Antonio insisted on another, more rapid tour of the village, checking everyone he and Paloma had inoculated the day before. One stubborn jailer had changed his mind. Blushing, he asked Paloma to do the honors. Her face warm, too, she did as he asked, then impulsively kissed his forehead. Tears came to his eyes.

“
No one has ever been so kind, señora,” he said. “How can I thank you?”

“
Don't beat your prisoners,” she replied. “I am certain they are miserable enough, already.”

“
You have a soft heart, my love,” Marco told her as they rode toward home. “I fear our trip to the
llano
is going to toughen you.”

She nodded, uncertain what to say, so she said nothing.
It's all part of the adventure,
she wanted to tell her husband
.
As she mulled over that idea, another thought struck her with more force—maybe all of life was part of the adventure, the good times and the bad ones, the terror and peace, joy and sorrow.
If I look on it all as an adventure, I hope it makes me kinder, not tougher
, she told herself. Maybe she could explain this to her man some day.

He had turned to talk to Antonio, riding on the other side of him, so she slowed her horse and waited for Toshua, riding behind and watchful. She realized with a start that it was the first time in their many months' acquaintance that she had sought him out. He must have had the same thought, because he looked surprised.

“
Would you be disappointed in me if I told you that I am afraid of this journey to the Llano Estacado?” she asked, wondering why she hadn't been brave enough to tell Marco the same thing. She knew Toshua would not answer quickly, and was patient.

“
I am afraid, too, little one.”

She looked at him with perfect understanding. “You just made me a little less afraid, Toshua. If I am afraid and you are afraid, we will be more watchful. Thank you.”

He grinned like a boy then reached over, pulled down the hood of her cloak, ruffled her hair, and pulled the hood up again, so fast she might have thought it never happened at all, except that her hair was now a mess. He spurred his horse ahead, and she could see his shoulders shaking, which made her laugh, too.

Then he stopped and rejoined her, his face serious. “There is one thing: you have to trust me, Paloma.”

Toshua had also never called her Paloma before. Always it was señora. She nodded, knowing he was right.

“
I will trust you.”

She knew she spoke too quickly when he gave her a stare. “I will try,” she amended.

Home had never looked so good to Paloma. Although Marco had assured her over and over that everything she saw now was hers, too, she still couldn't grasp the idea, not after years of discomfort and fear in Santa Fe with her relatives. Once the gates swung shut, she looked around, pleased, already picturing flowers in the porch's hanging baskets and tender shoots to coax along in the kitchen garden. In a mere two months, if God was good, the
acequia
would gurgle with water again, and the summer birds would return.

Even now, in the clutch of winter, the Double Cross was all she could ask for. Marco still wouldn't let her curry and grain her own horse, so Paloma sat on the railing in the horse barn and watched him. She contemplated the capable way he stroked the horses and thought for a moment—before it made her blush—how capable those same hands felt on her body.
Dios mio, Paloma
, she warned herself.
Someone would think you had only been married two weeks, and not nearly a year and a half
.

“
A peso for your thoughts,” Marco said.

She could lie and giggle, but why? She hung onto the post and leaned closer. “I was just thinking about your hands and how nice they feel.”

“
Just my hands?” he teased.

She did put her hand to her mouth and giggle, even though Antonio watched them both from the next stall. “Be quiet, Marco.”

A slow wink from her lord and master followed, and then he turned back to the business at hand. In another minute, he was whistling like a boy, and not a
juez de campo
with huge responsibilities. She watched him seriously now, grateful beyond measure, wishing her parents could know how well things turned out for her.

She asked Marco about that, several hours later when they were in bed and winding down for sleep. “Father Eusebio would probably say, ‘Thilly girl, you are no Bible thscholar,' but Marco, do you think the dead have any way of knowing how things are going, here on earth?”

“
I hope they do,” her husband said as he settled into his favorite position, with her back tucked up close to his chest. He kissed several vertebrae on that back, and she felt a little fizz, even as her eyes closed. “It would be a fine thing if Felicia knows I am happy. I wasn't, for eight years.”

“
And I would like my parents to know that their daughter is alive and well and content.”

“
Very content, I think.” He kissed her again, but he yawned, too. He ran his hand along the ridge of her hip. “It begins tomorrow, Paloma. We'll prepare for our trip. You and your kitchen ladies will make
carne seca
, and Toshua and I will consider which pack horses to take.”

“
And our little
médico
?”

“
He told me he's going to harvest some more scabs.” Marco shuddered. “I'll find him warmer clothes, but how do you think he will fare?”

“
He got
here
, didn't he?”

Marco chuckled. “I'm a dolt! Paloma, it's your fault. Loving you must addle my wits. He's probably tougher than we are.”

Paloma settled in for the night, secure in her husband's arms. “Maybe rage has kept him alive. It kept me going in Santa Fe.” She kissed his arm. “Now love sustains me. Good night.”

Marco stayed awake long after Paloma slept, his satisfied body reminding him that nature had taken its course and he should sleep now, but his mind paying no attention. He knew how to make plans; he knew that when they saddled up and rode east into the most dangerous place in all of King Carlos's New World domains, he would be ready. What his mind couldn't agree to was taking his wife with them, simply because she refused to stay behind.

He knew he could order Emiliano, his old steward, to lock her in a room and not let her out for three or four days. By then, he and Antonio and Toshua would either be dead or swallowed up by the Staked Plains. Paloma would not know where to look or how to begin, all by herself. What nagged him was that he did not know what she would do. His head told him that a sensible woman would remain at the Double Cross and give him the scold of his life when or if he returned. His heart told him that this complicated, tough-beyond-fear woman he had married would follow anyway. He dared not take that chance.

The moon was high, so he moved carefully to his side and watched her sleep. She was right—his eyelashes were longer than hers, a fact that she frowned about, when she slowed down long enough to look at herself in the mirror. He could find no fault with her anywhere, from her brown hair, to her freckles here and there, to her graceful shape. Not for the first time, he wondered what was going on inside her body to keep a baby from beginning. It was a mystery and it chafed him. He needed sons and daughters for all this land. He craved another little one or two—oh, the twins!—crawling around his stocking feet in the office and trying out a new tooth on his big toe. He never minded the burp smell, or the other odors of little bodies. And there was Felicia with her deep brown eyes, loving every moment of their constant needs. He closed his eyes in utter pain, and must have cried out, because Paloma opened her eyes.

She seemed to know his sorrow, because her eyes filled with tears, too—something he never wanted to see, and never wanted to cause. His insides writhed.

“
Maybe one of us can work up the nerve to talk to
el
médico
,” she whispered into his neck. “Marco, I am so, so sorry.”

What could he say? He hugged her tight.

Paloma woke up early, sad to her heart's core, knowing that somewhere deep down in her husband and lover's generous heart, there was a spot she could not fill. She dressed quietly, not bothering with shoes, and let herself out of their room. Dark shadows filled the corridor, but she paid them no mind as she tiptoed to the chapel.

The benches again replaced the pallets, now that everyone was recovered from inoculation. She knew her way around the chapel, even in the dark, so she walked to the front, genuflected, and found the row with the candles. Pleased with Marco for being so up-to-date, she found one of the newfangled lucifers and scratched it against the railing. The little flare and the smell of sulfur brightened the space and briefly drowned out the incense. She lit a candle and knelt there, praying for what, she did not know.

It was wrong of her to think that Felicia would disappear from Marco's heart—she knew that—so Paloma pleaded with the Virgin to ask her Son to forgive that vanity on her part. There must be a saint somewhere for barren women, but Paloma didn't know who it might be. Instead, she pressed her forehead against the smooth rail and wept for herself.

She knew she dared not bargain with the Virgin Mary or promise the Lord that she would never ask for anything else, because she already asked for nothing, except for a child. She had so much—a loving husband, a beautiful home, food, warmth, clothing. It was more than she ever thought would be hers. She closed her eyes tighter and pressed her lips even tighter, remembering that eternity of lying scrunched into the corner under her mother's bed, terrified almost to the point of madness, as death ruled her peaceful home and slammed down her parents. She remembered wanting desperately for everything to be exactly the same as it had been earlier that morning, except that she knew it never would be again.

She whispered the
Ave
over and over until her mind calmed, until she could reflect on that long-ago day with a certain detachment, and not horror. She considered what it was that had kept her from crawling out and surrendering herself to the Comanches. Something had kept her where she was, even when the building caught fire and flames crackled in the
vigas
high overhead. She had heard no voice, no miraculous reprieve from a saint or
Padre Eternal
Himself, who obviously had bigger fish to fry elsewhere, even as her entire world crumbled. What was it?