The Flesh and the Devil (20 page)

         
‗In time. But now she is coy and tears the slightest
touch-like the dove you caught, remember?‘

         
‗It should not have frightened me! It beat its wings
so-I w-would have been gentle, but-‘

         
‗I know you did not mean to kill it, but you must
remember how easily it broke in your hands when you are dealing with your
wife.‘ Tristán turned away from the window, his hooded green eyes suddenly
compelling on the wavering blue ones. ‗She is ignorant, like the bird,
and too fearful to know that you mean her no harm. You do not mean her harm, do
you?‘

         
The words were lightly but insistently said, and the
Duque's gaze shifted.

         
‗No, only s-stir her - make her love me. And she must
smile at me when we are married. I shall command her to.‘ He finished sullenly.

         
‗It may be worth the trouble to win her smiles.‘
Tristán's tone was reflective, as though he spoke to himself, and as he moved a
shaft of sunlight lit his brilliant hair to the blaze that contrasted so
startlingly with his austere, unrevealing face. Bartolomé stared.

         
‗W-win--?‘

         
‗By gifts and courtesies, all you can devise. It
would be worth a little labour to have her a willing wife.‘

         
It was folly to offer the fool such counsel, Tristán was
thinking, but something drove him to utter the words.

         
The Duque jabbed clumsily at the table-leg once more,
evading his eyes.

         
‗But she must lie down to me whether she is willing
or not. After the wedding I shall do as I list, and she can - cannot say no.‘

         
Tristán shrugged indifferently. ‗If you have a mind
to force her, so. But why not woo her? It would be sweet to have such a proud
one beseeching you to come to her.‘

         
There was a pause as Bartolomé pondered, and then a slow
leer spread over his face. ‗B-beg me - yes! She will be mad for me-she
will...?‘

         
Tristán continued to watch his charge with every sign of
attention, but he was not listening to she stream of filthy speculation that
spewed half-inarticulately from th Duque's lips. He was wondering for the
thousandth time whether this crude animality was the cause of the Duque de Valenzuela‘s
feeble-mindedness or a consequence of it. For hours or days at a time, the
creature would be timid, even childish, pathetic in his ugliness and ignorance;
then, for no reason that Tristán had ever discovered – though wise men
attributed it to Fate, astrologers to the positions of the planets, or clerics
to the malice of witches – the Duque‘s mood would alter, become feverish and
excited, with twitching fingers and restless eyes. Then he would be clamorous
and sometimes violent, and now and again he slipped away from his guardians to
hide in the network of hidden passages that fretted the Castillo. Once, Tristán
remembered, he had not been caught for two hideous days. At such times a sort
of mindless, gloating lechery always came to the surface, dominating his every
waking thought until it was somehow appeased. And as Bartolomé grew older, it
was growing harder and harder to appease him.

         
‗You must win her first.‘ Tristán spoke curtly,
cutting short the flow as few would have dared to do, his gaze resting
dispassionately on the flushed, working features. ‗It may take some care,
but the fruits will be worth a few pains.‘

         
For a moment hot anger sparked in the blue eyes at the
interruption, then Bartolomé‘s brows knitted in perplexity. ‗H-how,
Felipe? Tell-‘

         
‗Most maids are too giddy to know their own minds – ‗Tristán‘s
tone was dry now, and unemotional – ‗and are soon persuaded to give their
affection to any man who has the trick of it. You must bombard this one with
love-letters, tokens, trinkets; write her verses, send her flowers, tell her
that everything you do and say is done for her sake, as any lover would do. She
may even believe it.‘

         
Tristán‘s expression was absent for a moment, and then his
face tightened as though he had caught himself up on an unwelcome memory.

         
Bartolomé, however, had barely comprehended the words, let
alone any subtle meaning. T-trinkets? His mind had fastened on what puzzled him
most.

         
‘I shall tell you what you must send.‘ And make you pas,
the contemptuous flash in Tristán‘s face finished for him. A curious excitement
gripped him: it would be subtle satisfaction to see Juana de Arrelanos decked
out in gifts of his choosing.

         
‗Letter?‘ Bartolomé still frowned. ‗Why should
I write letters when she is hhere, in the house?‘

         
‗It is the custom for lovers. You must write that
although you cannot yet be with her every minute of the day and night, your
thoughts are with her perpetually

         
– your thirst for the sight of her is only eased by pouring
out your heart on paper.

         
‗His toneless voice seemed to mock the passionate
words as they were spoken.

         
‗There are hundreds of such devices that will work
upon her, and she will be flattered – she cannot choose.‘

         
‗You m-may write them.‘ Bartolomé‘s lordly gesture
was an unconscious parody of de Castaneda‘s over-confident command. ‗I do
not trouble myself with su-such matters.‘

         
Tristán bowed in silence. Both men knew that the younger
one could barely scrawled a legible signature, let alone compose a letter.
Tristán was thinking that it would be simple enough to copy out the old letters
that he had kept for so long; they had served well as a reminder of the darkest
time of his life, and now they could be turned to profit. His scared mouth
curved faintly. It seemed appropriate that the words he had written in
passionate sincerity to the woman he had once loved should be sent in another‘s
name, and in crude policy, to win Juana de Arrelanos to look on this disgusting
creature with favour. What would she say, he wondered with grim amusement, if
she knew that once those letters had been thrown in his face with as much
contempt as she had thrown her gloves at his feet?

         
Footsteps clattered through the doorway behind him, but
Tristán did not need to turn to know who had entered; Bartolomé's quick look of
craven apprehension was enough.

         
He rose unhurriedly from his seat on the edge of the
maltreated table and turned, inclining his head with the exaggerated deference that
reminded Eugenio de Castaneda of how far must look up into his servant's face

         
‘Felipe!‘ It was a jubilant crow, and de Castaneda gripped
Tristán by the arms and shook him, ignoring his nephew‘s presence. ‗I
have just seen the girl, and he consents-I swear for a moment I thought you
must have used witchcraft!

        
‗He gave his loud, chortling laugh. ‗So simple,
mmn? And the best is, she dare not tell! She told me plainly she would not
speak of it! You must have had rare sport in the doing – come, tell me how it
was. ‗

         
‗Senor.‘ Tristán‘s eyes flickered to Bartolomé in
unspoken warning.

         
De Castaneda glanced over his shoulder at his nephew, then
snorted. ‗Oh, as to that-no matter.‘ Another triumphant, two-handed
shake. ‗Come to me later and tell me all, if you think he will take
exception to it. I shall devise a fit payment for you, never fear! ‗

         
Tristán stood still, his gaze resting on the crown of de
Castaneda‘s head with a studied patience that held the barest suggestion of
insult. He replied evenly,

         
‗It was simple enough when it confirmed her won
design, senor. There was some farrago of a lost love, but she would not have
come here if she had not been resolved to swallow any carrion that came in
served upon gold.‘

         
Briefly, two pairs of eyes studied the impatiently-shifting
figure of the Duque.

         
De Castaneda gave a little grunt of disgust, the shook his
head. ‗No, you are out there, did I not tell you? She fancied herself in
love with the son of one of her neighbours in Naverre-wrought him to run away
with her, too, before I could have her brought here, but someone discovered the
plot to her father. He did nothing, only intercepted the letter that told him
where to meet her, and now she believes that her love – ‗ his tongue derided
the word – ‗is faithless, and hopes no more of him. Easy, mmn? I fetched
her here the next day.‘

         
A muscle flicked in Tristán's hollowed cheek, but de
Castaneda did not see it. Tristán said, as though he chose his words with
infinite care, I though the hope of a title had won her to it.

         
‗Such a fireband as she? No, no, no ! I doubt she
would accept the King himself without coercion, if he did not accord with her
fancy. You have done better than you knew, Felipe, mmn?‘

         
He tapped Tristán‘s chest as he might have patted a stud
stallion and bustled off, all but smacking his lips. Tristán watched him go
without a change of expression, but as the door slammed he tugged smooth his
crumpled sleeve with a quick, impatient jerk.

         
Juana had take to spending long hours in the great chapel
in a quest for solitude. The haughty Condesa, whose companionship she had
perforce accepted, was adamant that her piety was far in excess of even the
castillo‘s rigid routine, but Juana persisted; Dona Luisa ‗s suggestion
that she should use the tiny private chapel that led off her bedchamber she
simply ignored. There was something about the little room that disturbed her,
and she felt more at ease in the great one, for all its populousness. She was
praying not for acceptance, as her confessor urged her, but for escape; for
some means to avoid a second invasion that so far had not come.