The Flesh and the Devil (14 page)

         
Juana said chokingly, `Why not, senor? A cow in calf is
prized above another.'

         
'Good herdsmen take care to breed true, madam, and a wise
man should do no less. With Your Grace's pardon, it is folly to trust only the
eyes when there are keener senses than sight —'

         
Before she could guess his intention she was held with
casual ease in the crook of his elbow, her arms pinned helplessly to her sides,
while his free hand explored the outline of her body. Shivering with outrage,
she felt his touch rove from her bare throat to her breast, then in ruthlessly
sensual quest amongst the folds of her skirt. She cried out sharply, stiffening
against the undreamed-of touch, and her eyes closed under his relentless gaze.

         
'She is not with child, Felipe? Felipe?' The Duque's tone
was plaintive.

         
'Not yet — she is scarce ripe for Your Grace's purpose.'
Tristán 's hand fell away, and he set her free. 'But she will learn quickly, I
make no doubt of that.'

         
Juana bowed her head, staring doggedly at the floor. She
felt shaken and dizzy, her body on fire from the contemptuous, seeking contact,
and his unemotional tone chilled her fevered flesh like the touch of a
knife-blade. He knew what he had done, she thought suddenly; he had set out to
do it, and now he despised her for the victory he had won over her senses.
Except her sight. She listened to Bartolomé's eager clamour, hearing the sound
of the words without comprehending their meaning.

         
‗. . teach her .

         
. mine, Felipe . . . tell. . .‘

         
'Gently, Your Grace.' Tristán's hand appeared to rest only
lightly on his charge's stiffly-held shoulder, but it checked the ungainly step
forward. 'Haste is not always pod, you remember? When she is your wife she will
be at your command, but until then you should bear her lightly in hand. You
will find her kisses all the sweeter for keeping.'

         
Juana's gaze swept up to meet his, and her eyes were full
of loathing. 'Give me leave to go now, Your Grace.' She spoke to the Duque
without shifting her eyes from Tristán. This honour overwhelms me.'

         
Bartolomé scowled, hesitating, but before he could respond
she had sunk in a full court curtsy, her black head held defiantly high, saying
formally, 'I have the honour to take leave of Your Grace.'

         
Nothing, she vowed inwardly, would induce her to accept the
goldenskinned hand that was punctiliously extended to assist her to her feet;
the mercenary usurped a courtier's privilege even by the offer, so much she
knew. As she rose, staring rigidly before her, Tristán bowed with scrupulous
correctness; when she moved to the door she could sense his presence behind
her, ushering her out with the exaggerated servility of a lackey. He made no
attempt to touch her again, but as she preceded him, with the icy stateliness
of an Infanta, he was still watching her with unnerving steadiness.

         
Dona Beatriz did not spare a glance for the attendant who
brought her niece from the Duque de Valenzuela's presence - one look at the
girl's ashen face made her gesture the woman away and hurry forward to meet her
at the head of the stairs with a cluck of involuntary alarm. Juana looked like
a sombre wraith as she reached the gloomy landing, her hands still unsteady with
shock, her long lashes fluttering as though she tried to blink away some
unbearable memory.

         
'Juana — are you all right? What has happened?' 'Tia. Oh,
Tia!' Juana clutched her aunt's wrist. 'My dear child, what is it? Whatever is
wrong?'

         
'I cannot tell you — I cannot speak of it here. Someone may
hear us.'

         
Juana glanced round her almost furtively. She felt as if
the whole castillo were suddenly full of ears; of anonymous servants who were
no longer faceless but disturbing, inimical, and would spy to report her
anguish to each other and to the world. Beatriz blinked worriedly as she felt
the restless, almost frenzied quality of the grasp on her wrist and patted her
niece's hand.

         
'Very well, come along to your bedchamber and tell me about
it there.'

         
Juana nodded silently. She walked a little way, still
clinging to her aunt, and then burst out as if she could no longer control
herself, 'Tia, I cannot — I will obey my father in anything else, but I cannot
stay here and marry that — that man. I shall write to Zuccaro, explain to him.
I know he would not have made the match if he had known what —'

         
She checked herself as her unseeing gaze focused again on
Beatriz's face, not knowing that the look of stark terror in her eye had
alarmed the elder woman more than anything she had said. Her aunt clucked
soothingly, making little consolatory dabs at Juana's clutching fingers.

         
'There now, there is no need to be so frightened. You must
explain to Senor de Castaneda — ask him to delay the marriage until you have
acquainted your father with— with whatever you have learned. If this match is
so abhorrent he must be told, and then surely some solution can be found. .

         
The women's voices faded as Beatriz led her niece back into
the Duques's apartment, but for safety's sake Eugenio de Castaneda waited a
moment longer before he emerged from his hiding place behind one of the
archways that led from the landing. Then, as the door closed, he hurried back
to the library; there was no trace of a smile on his ruddy face.

         
When he entered he found that his nephew had resumed his
game with the golden globe, jabbing it to make it spin and then watching with a
grin of vacuous glee until it slowed again. Felipe Tristán lounged nearby,
contemplating him, but as de Castaneda came in he straightened to his full,
dominating height. It crossed the elder man's mind that the mercenary was
making deliberate use of his intimidating size to disconcert him; there had
often been times when he realized that he was straining to look up at his own
hired servant. His summons was raspingly curt in consequence, but the prompt
response gratified him and he put the thought aside. No, the man was tame, sure
enough.

         
'Senor?' The look in the green eyes belied the deferential
tone, but de Castaneda did not notice it.

         
'Could you not control that better? I heard the girl with
the old woman just now-she talks of writing to her accursed fether ti stop the
wedding.'

         
A muscle tightened in Tristán's jaw. 'No, she will not,' he
said softly.

         
'I tell you she means to stop it, the little bitch! What
did it do to her, to make her resolve on that?'

         
'No matter, senor, I shall see to it.'

         
The steel in the calm voice made de Castaneda look up
sharply, then his enquiring expression gave way to a slow, delighted grin. 'You
will, eh? You mean-'

         
'I will undertake to get-her consent to marry.' Tristán
spoke levelly, but there was a cynical twist to his mouth. 'That will purchase
some time, at least; after that....' He giggling. There was a taut look about
his black-clad frame for an instant, then it was gone; his face remained secret
and still.

         
De Castaneda eyed him in fascination. 'Do you need my help
for this…plan of yours?‘

         
'My thanks, senor-‗ Tristán shook his head – ‗but
no‘.

         
CHAPTER 4

         
The Duque de Medina de las Torres was reported throughout
Madrid, and beyond, to be reclusive. Men said that he cared only for the
estates he saw so seldom, and for his library, which was rumoured to rival the
King's; it was a universally-known fact that he never stirred abroad without a
procession of carriages bearing his most cherished volumes, together with the
servants he kept to tend them. It was popularly held that a man so dry and
scholarly lacked the necessary ambition to reach high office in King Felipe
IV's court, and Torres himself diligently fostered this belief. Though the
gossips had failed to discover the fact, he was second only to the King's chief
minister, Don Luis de Haro, in his Most Catholic Majesty's favour.

         
Until recently he had counted it as a sinecure, a mere
trifle of preferment, that he had been requested — if the King's cold 'Deal
with it, Torres' could be termed a request — to handle, on the royal behalf,
the correspondence with Eugenio de Castaneda concerning a marriage for his
nephew, the Duque de Valenzuela. He had had one instruction only from the
King's mouth — a total veto, in any circumstances. It had been mildly
intriguing, no more, that Valenzuela himself had never attended court, but
Torres had vaguely supposed the Duque to be a babe in arms; children were not
welcome at a court where the King's sons died. A tentative enquiry to the King,
however, had produced an icy order to consult Olivares's secretary and to keep
silent on the matter on pain of death. Torres, alarmed, had summoned the man
named by the King and begun to dig out this mystery.

         
For mystery it was. For years, it seemed, the King had
placed the Valenzuela affair, along with .almost all the others, in the
grasping hands of his favourite, the Conde-Duque de Olivares. The papers shown
to Torres made it clear that the Conde-Duque, never one to allow any storm that
was not of his own raising to rock the ship of state, had gone circumspectly
about the business; no member of the Duque de Valenzuela's household was
permitted within twenty leagues of the King's court, wherever it might lie, and
communication between the comptroller of His Grace's household — this Senor de
Castaneda — and the Conde-Duque himself had been permitted only thrice a year.
None of de Castaneda's letters had survived, but the copies of Olivares's
replies indicated that they were phrased so obscurely as to be almost
incomprehensible.

         
Torres had felt conscious of a rising annoyance. How was a
man to guess what the matter was? In Olivares's place he would have sent spies
to find out the smallest detail of the. Andalusian business and report it. But
then, he considered, perhaps the Conde-Duque had know what they would find
there; or perhaps he had not dared keep the evidence they might have found for
him. . . .