Dear Conquistador

by Margery Hilton

  During the visit Juanita was to be introduced to the man who might become her husband.

  ‘His name is Carlos. His father owns the Hacienda Ariposa

  - they are distantly linked by marriage to my grandmother’s side of the family. ’ Juanita wandered to Hilary’s bed and sank down on it, her small oval face a study of despair. ‘He has just come home from university. Ay de mi! If only he had stayed

  there!’

  Hilary was silent, concern clouding her eyes as she considered the best way of consoling without encouraging the outright defiance she suspected was very near the surface. At last she said slowly: ‘How can you be sure that they’re going to arrange this marriage? After all, you haven’t even met him. Your grandmother may hope that you’ll like him and it’ll lead to marriage. But if you don’t... ’

  ‘They will.’

  ‘Did your uncle say so?’

  ‘No, but I could tell.’

  ‘Now how?’ Hilary instilled lightness into her tone. ‘How could you tell if he didn’t say so?’

  ‘Because he tell me to go shopping today - I am to take you with me to help me choose dresses - and I say I do not want any new dresses just now,’ Juanita said brokenly. ‘And then he laugh and say, “Oh yes. Who knows? You may come back “prometidal" ’

  Still convinced that Juanita was over-dramatizing something that might never happen, Hilary shook her head. ‘He was teasing you. Even if Carlos does fall violently in love with you he’s hardly likely to propose marriage at first sight. How do you know he didn’t meet a girl at university and have her in mind for his bride?’

  ‘No! Oh, you do not understand!’ Juanita flung out her hands. ‘Tio was not teasing. How can I explain how it happens with us? No one will say: “Yes, you must marry Carlos, and he must marry you.” It is more subtle than that. But in a hundred different ways they will convey to us that our marriage would be eminently suitable and make both families supremely happy if we chose one another. Till we know we will hurt them and bitterly disappoint them if we refuse, and so, because we love them and we have been brought up to believe that they know best for our happiness, we conform. And everyone is so happy we believe we are happy too. That is how it is, my Hilary.’ Juanita got up and went sadly to the window. She stared out and repeated tonelessly, ‘No, Tio was not teasing.’

  ‘I see.’ Hilary sighed, at a loss to know what to say. ‘When are you going?’

  ‘We are flying down tomorrow evening. Tio is returning next week, but I have to stay with Grandmother until -until—’ Juanita’s voice broke, and she whirled round. ‘Oh, please! Can you not help me?’

  Startled, Hilary backed a pace. ‘But how can I? You know I’d do anything I could. But what can I do?’

  ‘You could talk to Tio. Tell him you have something planned.’ Juanita was improvising desperately. ‘Tell him you have planned something educational for me and Joaquin. And

  - and it is too late to cancel it, so that I have to come back with Tio. And then—’

  ‘Juanita!’ It was Hilary’s turn to make an impassioned gesture. ‘How can I? I can’t interfere in your personal family affairs. As for that little idea ... do you really think he would buy it?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes, he would,’ Juanita said feverishly. ‘He would take notice of you.’

  ‘Me?’ exclaimed Hilary incredulously. ‘Not in this case, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But he has told me so. He told me I must be tolerant of differences I would find in your outlook because despite this you possessed certain admirable qualities I might learn much from. ’

  ‘Really!’ Hilary did not know whether to laugh or be affronted. In her mental ear she could almost hear those autocratic tones and picture his expression. ‘And what are these qualities he’s suddenly discovered in me?’ she could not resist asking.

  ‘You are calm in face of emergency—’

  —What emergency? thought Hilary. Must have been during some of Joaquin’s tantrums.

  —‘but you have much courage and honesty.’

  ‘Have I?’ Hilary pretended amusement, but not very successfully. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I can’t remember any more.’ Juanita’s dark eyes narrowed. ‘Your cheeks are very pink. I should not have told you these things. But I wish to make you understand that Tio will listen to you. ’

  ‘It wouldn’t say much for my honesty were I to tell him a pack of lies,’ she said flatly.

  Juanita’s shoulders rose and fell with her sigh. ‘It would not be lies if we did arrange something.’

  For a moment Hilary studied her, and then she shook her head. ‘It wouldn’t work, and even if it convinced your uncle he would simply expect us to cancel it. ’

  ‘I see.’ Juanita’s head came up and she turned stiffly. ‘You

  do not wish to help me.’

  Hilary sighed, knowing that Juanita’s idea was utterly futile, and as for the possibility of the Conde taking any notice of herself, should she summon the temerity to question his decision regarding his niece, well, it was so remote as to be impossible. The impulse came to tell Juanita of two occasions when she had ventured to air her opinions to the Conde; neither of them could be said to have been exactly successful in selling him a picture of liberated womanhood, she thought wryly, especially the most recent occasion.

  The pink deepened to scarlet as the recollection of his kiss came back so vividly she could almost experience the touch of his mouth on her own, and she knew she could never bring up the subject of his plans for Juanita. His answer was almost predictable, but the outcome regarding herself was not... She looked at Juanita and took a deep breath.

  ‘Listen,’ she said firmly, ‘you’re taking this far too seriously. You’re barely seventeen. Go and stay with your grandmother and meet this Carlos and enjoy yourself. He might be gorgeous for all you know. You might have forgotten Ramon by the time you come back. ’

  ‘Never.’ Juanita’s mouth curled with scorn. She flounced to the door and cried, ‘You don’t care! Nobody cares!’ before she slammed it behind her.

  For the rest of the morning Juanita stayed in her room, pleading a headache, and when she did emerge, mute and wan-faced, she took herself to the seclusion of a shaded arbour in the most remote part of the villa grounds where she was not discovered until it was almost sundown.

  Hilary, even while she was deeply sympathetic, suspected that Juanita’s malaise was due more to temper and sulks than actual physical cause, and it seemed she was not the only one with that suspicion.

  The opportunity that might have been golden presented itself late that afternoon when Hilary was on her way to the pool. A gay towelling jacket demurely covering her bikini-clad figure, she was slipping out the side door when a shadow barred her path. The Conde did not immediately stand aside. His brows arched. ‘You are going to swim?’

  ‘Yes, senor.’ She thought of the unhappy Juanita and wondered if she dared broach an appeal, and her heart began to beat uncomfortably fast. While she hesitated, he said: ‘Was the shopping expedition successful?’

  ‘N-no.’ There was no option but to explain - without adding that at present poor Juanita was refusing to speak to her at all.

  The Conde’s brows narrowed. ‘I have a suspicion that my niece is not relishing this visit to her grandmother. Is this so?’

  Suddenly Hilary knew that far from being courageous she was utterly craven at that moment. ‘I - I think she would prefer to be here while the preparations are going on for the party,’ she said after an agonized pause.

  ‘Is that all?’

  She could only make a helpless gesture, and he smiled grimly. ‘I do not think so, senorita.’

  The return to the polite formality brought an absurd stiffness into Hilary’s throat.

  Her head came up proudly. ‘You are quite right, Senor Conde. Your niece is not very happy, and you seem to forget that she is still sad at the loss of her mother. She needs love and understanding - lots of it. ’

  She turned away
abruptly, but not swiftly enough to escape steely fingers that closed round her wrist.

  ‘One moment, senorita. I feel it is time we reached understanding on the matter of my niece.’

  His tone had sharpened with the hardness of frost, and the line of his jaw was taut. His gaze held her as unrelentingly as the hard grasp about her wrist while he went on: ‘I am well aware of the lack of discipline among the young of your society, even as I am aware of the self-confidence and ability you undoubtedly possess, but I should be extremely angry if I discovered this to be influencing my niece towards disobedience.’

  ‘She is not disobedient!’ Hilary flashed. ‘Nor would I dream of encouraging her to be so. Is it disobedient to desire a little say in one’s own life?’

  ‘In the case of my niece - at present: yes,’ he said coldly, ‘and unless I’m greatly mistaken she has already acquainted you with a certain fact concerning this visit to Valparaiso.’

  At the small gasp Hilary could not repress he gave a grim, humourless smile and released her wrist. ‘I thought so. And as we have already had discussions regarding this certain aspect I am well acquainted with your feelings on the subject. I may also add that I am not entirely blind to a certain romantic interest harboured by my niece for some time, nor to the identity of the object of it and it is not one I wish to encourage.’ He paused and looked down at the pallor of shock his icy statements had brought to her face. ‘Have I made myself perfectly clear, Miss Martin?’

  ‘Perfectly clear.’ It was an effort to force the words past her trembling lips while her brain reiterated the words: he knows! He knows!

  ‘Therefore I do not need to add that any further encouragement of that interest is strictly forbidden?’

  A whisper of wind tugged at the scarlet creeper behind the Conde’s dark head and made soft rustlings amid the blossoms. Then the little wind-whisper fell silent and the blossoms drooped again in the still, humid air, and the heavy stillness seemed to emphasize the leonine power in the man. She forced her petrified limbs into motion and backed a pace. From some deep hidden source she found strength and that same courage he had once apparently been moved to commend. Facing him, she said quietly:

  ‘There is one thing you have forgotten, Senor Conde: Sometimes it is only the forbidden things that are most desired. Once they are attained they are no longer wanted. Your niece is waking to love, and to forbid that awakening is akin to trying to turn back the tide. To the only eligible subject within your household is a predictable step. Had you not considered this?’

  ‘Not, it seems, until it was almost too late, but it will most certainly be taken care of now. And you, I trust, will remember that, senorita?’

  He inclined his head with that icily controlled salute and stepped to one side.

  All desire to swim had gone now, but she would not turn to precede him indoors. She heard the patio door close behind him with a soft click, and she ran blindly to the edge of the pool. She plunged in, almost as though the waters closing over her could quench all memory of that interlude for which she had been totally unprepared. But there was no such magical assuagement and when she climbed out she was biting her lip to control its trembling, while the droplets glistening on her wet cheeks intermingled with escaping tears.

  The Conde and his niece departed on the evening flight to Valparaiso the following day. Juanita was mute and sullen, and the Conde grim of visage. Ramon drove them to the airport and returned with the car, and a message to the effect that Hilary was to call upon him for any assistance she might need in coping with the preparations for Joaquin’s party.

  Ramon looked moody and unhappy, and Hilary could only guess at what the Conde might have ordained now that he was aware of the situation between his secretary and his niece.

  The days dragged by miserably. A curious sad tranquillity descended over the villa and even Joaquin lost interest in the party, now only a week away. There was no word from Valparaiso, and no one knew if the Conde and his niece would be returning in time for the celebration.

  Hilary iced the cake, adding Joaquin’s name and seven small blue candles, and wrapped up his gift and after that there was nothing to do but wait. She wished she could confide in Dona Elena, but despite the shrewdness of those keen eyes searching her unhappy face reserve and pride kept her silent, and Dona Elena did not ask. Probably she guessed, Hilary thought, and there was little likelihood of sympathy forthcoming, even though her manner remained kindly and unchanged. Even Bruce’s consolation was denied her.

  At the end of the week he rang up, full of apologies, to cry off the trip planned earlier.

  ‘I’m terribly sorry, honey, but something unforeseen cropped up, and I’ve a whole list of things to clear up before my leave.’

  ‘Leave?’ she echoed, her eyes shadowed above the receiver. ‘What leave?’

  ‘Didn’t I tell you? My long vacation’s due next month. Three months.’

  She gasped softly, and he chuckled. ‘Hey! It’s the first in two years. I reckon I’ve earned it.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ She swallowed hard and forced lightness into her words. ‘I expect you’re planning to go on the razzle. Where are you going?’

  ‘Don’t know yet. Miami, maybe. I’ve friends there. Or I may even go home.’ He paused, as though he had heard her silent sigh, and exclaimed: ‘What’s the matter? You sound down.’

  ‘Yes, I am a bit, but I can’t tell you over the phone.’

  ‘Bad as that! Never mind, it’ll soon be fiesta - we’ll take a ride on top of the world. Is that a date?’

  Panic stirred in her, and a sick sense of disappointment. She needed someone now, even though she knew that no one could do anything other than give the solace of friendly

  companionship.

  An unutterable sense of loneliness closed in on her as she stood in the dim, oak-lined alcove under the staircase. For the first time since her arrival she felt lost in an alien atmosphere and conscious that outside the Conde’s household and acquaintances linked to his circle she knew no one except Bruce.

  She said, ‘But Joaquin’s party ... have you forgotten?’

  A muffled expletive at the other end of the line told her he had. He said ruefully, ‘It had gone right out of my head. Yes, of course I’ll be there. Anyway, I think I promised to escort the girls - there’s some frolic for the oldies as well, I believe.’

  This was the first Hilary had heard of it, but she made no comment, and after a few more of the aimless pleasantries that tend to creep into phone conversations she rang off and went sadly in search of Joaquin.

  Two days later there was a letter from Juanita. It was rather stilted and somewhat guarded in content, but it brought a measure of warmth to Hilary. She would not have been human if she had remained unhurt by Juanita’s sulky silence, but deeper perception told her that Juanita was similar in one respect to herself; when she was hurt or angry she was incapable of putting on a false face. However, she was obviously capable of the non-committal phrase on paper, and Hilary smiled wryly over the long, rather wooden account of the events and people amid which she had arrived and the mention of a certain Don Carlos was given no more emphasis than a casual reference to an elderly Senor Lorenz who had distinguished himself by falling asleep during liqueurs and a rather specialized discussion on Chilean contemporary art, which had not exactly amused the Condesa, who was something of an authority on the subject. The Condesa ...

  Hilary reached the final paragraph in Juanita’s small, neat script and gave a small exclamation. At least Juanita would be back in time for Joaquin’s party, as would the Conde. They were returning on the eve of that day - and the Condesa was coming back with them.

  This news wrought a startling effect on the household.

  The air of tranquillity vanished overnight; the maids stopped gossiping, the cook ceased her arguments with old Ernesto, the portero, and a frenzied spate of activity swept through villa and gardens. Lawns took on the soft smoothness of a sheet of velvet newly unrolle
d, the odd creeper with a tendency to stray free was ruthlessly pruned, and the tiles of the patio floor shone as though they’d been polished. Indoors it was exactly the same. The scent of waxes emanated from dark carved oak and the crisp honey and tan and sepia of marquetry. Silver and copper sent warm glowing rays from alcove and corner, and the great mirrors in sala and hall reflected the burnish of gilded frescoes and the dark sweep of polished parquet.

  All this for one person! Hilary thought as she surveyed the setpiece below from the vantage point of the gallery outside her room. The exclamations of ‘The Condesa will ... ’ ‘The Condesa won’t ... ’ had ceased to float anxiously from various lips and the staff were now gowning themselves in freshly starched aprons so white they dazzled and newly cleaned livery.

  Joaquin and Ramon went to the airport to meet the returning family and Hilary felt tension grip her as the moment approached for their arrival. She had helped Dona Elena to her chair on the patio and now stood by her side, a little uncertain. Dona Elena propped her silver-knobbed cane in a niche conveniently within reach and glanced up at the silent girl A quirk of humour touched her mouth.

  ‘Do not look so concerned, my dear. She cannot eat you!’

  ‘Does she usually eat people?’ Hilary asked wryly.

  ‘My sister-in-law?’ Dona Elena permitted herself a somewhat enigmatic smile. ‘No, but she has a way of dismissing those who displease her with a mere glance that makes them cease to exist in her presence - though I suppose I should not say it. ’

  Hilary sighed. It did not sound very propitious for the future. Then she sensed the older woman’s glance and turned her head, to read something not unlike sympathy in those fine dark eyes.

  ‘It sometimes helps, when one is vulnerable, to forge the shield of forewarning,’ Dona Elena said softly. She nodded as a small exclamation formed on Hilary’s lips, and went on: ‘Yes, I have watched you during these past days and I understand. It has been difficult for you. You have a kindness and the kinship of youth which would make you indulge Juanita against the sense of duty you feel towards our wishes. I’m afraid my nephew is unsparing of censure should his wishes be ignored, and I think, perhaps, you have taken it a