The Devil on Her Tongue (77 page)

Even one whole seed, if ingested, would almost immediately, Rafaela had said, cause difficulty breathing, followed by muscle
tremors and convulsions, culminating in the heart stopping. It would be a rapid, ugly and painful death.

I could tell myself it was Dona Beatriz I was helping, that she depended on me to ensure Abílio would never again be a threat to her in any way. But I also knew that with this help she would forgive me, and so I would be doing it for myself, for the security she promised.

Unbidden came the image of Abílio as a young man, his smile true and tender as he held out the ribbons he’d bought for my hair.

I shook my head to push away the old memories, then rose and went to the table, and added the ground seeds to the wine.

Cristiano and the younger children had already had their dinner when Abílio entered the dining room that evening with Samuel behind him. Dona Beatriz and I were waiting for him, seated across from each other at the table. It was decked with a damask tablecloth and glowing candelabra.

“This is a comfortable scene,” he said. “It appears you two share many secrets.” He sat as Samuel pulled out his chair. “Do you discuss me, and compare your experiences?” He leaned back as Samuel placed a heavy napkin on his lap.

“You may bring the first course, Samuel,” Dona Beatriz said. Then she asked Abílio, “You said you leave for Oporto tomorrow?”

“Yes,” he said, looking at the sideboard. “Why is there no wine?”

“Samuel will bring it. I plan to stay here for now,” she said. “Until I can get passage to Funchal. I am thinking of moving back to Quinta Isabella with Leandro.”

“Beatriz. Did you not understand what I told you earlier today?” He shook his head and glanced at me with a wry expression, as if we shared some measure of mirth at his wife’s expense. “It’s all gone, Beatriz. This house, the business, the quinta. I’ve been paid in full.”

“It’s not gone,” Dona Beatriz said calmly.

“I think Plácido Lajes would disagree with you, my dear.”

“You had all the papers drawn up?”

“Of course. I am owner of everything Martyn Kipling once owned.
We both have always known that was the reason I married you.”

“And killed my father,” Dona Beatriz said.

I counted two heartbeats, and then Abílio lifted his shoulders in a careless shrug. “And who would believe you about that long-ago event?” he asked. “Another secret disclosed, I see, Diamantina.” He looked at me, then back to Dona Beatriz. “My dealings with Lajes were completed at exactly the right moment. The papers were all signed and the money in my hand the day before the earthquake. God was on my side. Who knows how the land is damaged on Madeira, and how long it will be before the vines are again fruitful?” He picked up the bell beside his plate and rang it. “Where is Samuel with the wine? Come now, Beatriz. You’ll be able to make a good life in Oporto. All you need is your finery, and the church. That’s all your life is about.”

“And Leandro,” she added. “My life is about my son. No, Abílio. I will not come to Oporto. I will return to the quinta, and run Kipling’s.”

Abílio put his head back and laughed as if delighted. “How do you propose to do that?”

“I have the deed.”

Abílio stopped laughing. He blinked, and then frowned. “Deed?” he said, for the first time losing a modicum of his cockiness. His pupils grew in the candlelight, but he immediately covered his discomfort by standing and ringing the bell loudly. He set it down and looked at Beatriz. “Use caution, Beatriz. The wife of a man with power should not become hungry for power of her own. Are you truly imagining you can intimidate me with such a lie?”

“It isn’t a lie. My father had the deed drawn up long ago, foreseeing this circumstance. I hold the deed to Kipling’s. To the quinta and this house, which belonged to my mother’s family. My father’s deed states that no one has the right to sell any of it. It will all go to Leandro.”

“You expect me to believe this? Produce this deed, and let me see it.” His face darkened.

“Do you really think I would put it in your possession? I’m keeping it to show Senhor Lajes.”

“You’ll give it to me now,” Abílio said, his tone threatening. I glanced at the row of knives laid out to the right of my plate.

Samuel entered with a gleaming tray. Abílio sat down. Samuel lowered the tray onto a side table, and then set a covered dish in front of each of us.

He stood behind Dona Beatriz and removed her silver cover with a slight flourish. “As you requested, Dona Beatriz. Waterfowl stewed with quinces, as well as pastries filled with marrow, to start. Fish will be the main course.” He uncovered my plate, and then Abílio’s.

“The wine, Samuel,” Abílio demanded. “Why have you kept me waiting?”

As Samuel reached for the opened bottle on the tray, my heart thudded.
No
, I thought.
No
.

Dona Beatriz stood and took the bottle from him. “That’s all for now, Samuel. I will pour my husband’s wine.” She wanted to do this herself. She did not have the capability to poison the wine, but she would pour it, and watch Abílio drink it.

As Samuel left, Abílio looked up at her. “This behaviour is not becoming, Beatriz. All these lies about a phantom deed are making you even more unravelled than usual.”

I saw that her hands trembled, and I tensed. Dona Beatriz tipped the bottle forward and poured, but the ruby liquid ran over the side of the glass and onto the white tablecloth.

“Give it to me,” Abílio said crossly, and reached for the bottle.

In that instant, I knew what I must do. I rose and wrenched the bottle from Dona Beatriz’s hand before Abílio could take it. I stepped backwards, lifting the bottle, and I smashed it against the edge of the marble side table. Dona Beatriz cried out as Abílio jumped up, looking at the rich burgundy liquid running down my skirt and pooling on the floor at my feet, and then at the jagged neck of the bottle I still held.

There was a moment of silence. “One of Kipling’s better blends,” Abílio said then, but his voice held the smallest note of alarm. “What a waste.”

“You’re not worth it,” I said.

Dona Beatriz’s mouth was open, shock and puzzlement on her face.

“Do you suppose I can’t call for another bottle?” Abílio said. “This is simply a disgusting display of your true character, Diamantina.”

I aimed the sharp edge of the broken bottle at the scar on his neck. “Just get out. Go to Oporto.”

He shook his head, disbelieving. “You? Ordering me out of my own home?” He laughed, a strange, coarse sound. “You love to threaten, don’t you, Diamantina? More proof of your low beginnings.” He threw his napkin onto his plate. “I will leave the table, but not because of your ridiculous attempt at intimidation. I’ve lost my appetite. And so I bid you both good evening, ladies,” he said, with an exaggerated bow first at me, then at Beatriz. “I will go to Oporto in the morning, and you will follow, as I told you, Beatriz.”

“I’m not coming to Oporto, Abílio,” Dona Beatriz said, her whole body shaking. “I’m going to Madeira.”

“Fine. But you have nothing there.”

When the door closed behind him, Dona Beatriz turned to me. “Why did you break the bottle?” she cried. “If you’d let me pour him the wine, he would have been out of my life—our lives—forever, Diamantina. We agreed. We want him dead. With all the good people who lost their lives in the
terremoto
, he should not have been spared.” She sat down, staring at me. “You said you would help me. You said you would do as I asked.”

I set the jagged bottle top on the table. I couldn’t speak for a moment, and then I managed to say, “What you say about Abílio is true. But as you started to pour the wine, I thought of your father, and how Abílio had so easily ended his life with no thought but to further his own. And I … I don’t want to think of myself as being of the same calibre. I would like to think I am a better person than Abílio.”

The door swung open, and we both jumped. “There’s just one more thing, Beatriz,” Abílio said. “I really don’t care what
you
do, but I will be coming back for my son. You won’t know when it will happen, but I will take him.” Then he came towards me, and leaned close. “And my daughter. I may decide to take my daughter as well.”

When he had left again, I picked up a sharp knife from the table. “Take Leandro to your bedroom,” I said. “I’ll bring Candelária there, and we’ll spend the night together.” I put the knife to my waist, only to realize, as I did, that my silk frock did not have a waistband, but a delicate lilac ribbon.

T
he night was long and restless. Even with Dona Beatriz’s bedroom door firmly bolted, we both sat up at each small noise. Candelária and I shared layers of feather-filled comforters on the thick carpet, and Leandro slept under a heavy satin cover beside his mother on the large and elegant bed. A golden rosary was draped on the headboard, and Dona Beatriz’s embroidered silk slippers sat on the step that assisted in climbing onto the tall bed.

With weary relief, I watched the first weak light come through the long windows, festooned with curtains of crimson damask trimmed with rich lace. As I rose on one elbow, Candelária stirred, and Dona Beatriz roused Leandro.

When we all went downstairs, Samuel told us that Abílio had driven off earlier with two carriages piled with cases, and Dona Beatriz closed her eyes for a moment. She had Neves take the children to give them breakfast.

“Thank God he left without any more threats,” she said to me when they were gone. “But you won’t leave me yet, will you, Diamantina? I’d like you here when I face Plácido Lajes. And knowing Abílio may return at any time and try to take Leandro … I don’t know how we’ll stop him if he does, but …”

“I’ll stay with you,” I told her.

“My life …” she said, looking to one side. “I thought about it all night. Today it feels … as though it’s over, in a way. I will never allow Abílio back into my life, but I will be tied to him forever.
Married but alone. I will be alone for the rest of my life, save Leandro, if I can protect him from being taken.”

Was my situation not exactly the same? But it was not my time to speak of this.

The smell of the foliage outside the open windows wafted in, reminding me of the scents of the flowers surrounding the summer house. “There are things we can’t know with complete certainty. There is sometimes the unexpected,” I said.

Two days later, when the afternoon shadows were deepening across the garden, I sat with Neves and watched Candelária and Leandro play while Dona Beatriz rested in her room. Cristiano sat in a patch of sunshine and read.

I heard the ringing of the bell at the entrance, and went back into the house. Samuel was admitting Senhor Plácido Fernandez Lajes.

“Please ask Dona Beatriz to come downstairs. Tell her Senhor Lajes has arrived,” I told Samuel.

As he left, Senhor Lajes looked at me in surprise. “You came to my house, the night before the earthquake,” he stated. He had a deep, raw gash on one cheek, and his hands were wrapped in gauze.

“Yes. I told you I was a friend to Dona Beatriz.”

“I now own this house, and I came to view it as soon as I could get away from Lisboa.”

I nodded. “You were hurt in the earthquake?” I asked, gesturing at his bandaged hands.

“As many able-bodied men as possible were called upon to help find bodies and …” He stopped. “My injuries are from digging through the burning rubble. There’s no telling how many are still buried beneath the ruins. And the looting has become rampant.” I remembered the grisly grave robbers I’d passed. “The Marquês de Pombal has erected gallows, and is having looters hung as a deterrent to others.”

“And those who survived?” I asked.

“They’re carrying on with great difficulty. But every day more is being done. The Marquês de Pombal is very capable, and has already done so much to organize the city to assist the destitute and the injured. King José is lucky to have him as his Secretary of the Kingdom.”

“So little news comes to us. What of the rest of Portugal?”

“Much of the western coast was damaged, and south, along the Algarve, the coastal towns and villages were flooded. The earthquake didn’t affect only Portugal—it was felt across many countries. Parts of Spain and North Africa saw thousands dead.”