2

Frozen by the stark question that forced its way into her consciousness, Mercy’s heart constricted and she felt for a moment as if she could not breathe. Of course she loved Philip! He was her husband. Things would be different if he’d been able to finish his education in law and go into practice.

If it hadn’t been for the war …

What? inquired the suppressed and terrifying part of her. Other men, most men, had gritted their teeth, tempered their pride with patience, and set about the task of redeeming their lives and homeland. Robert E. Lee had refused to seek refuge, saying that he preferred to struggle for the country’s restoration and share its fate, that Virginia needed all her sons.

No, men had taken defeat in ways as varied as they’d gone to war. Philip chose to hate the North and pursue any desperate measure that would save him from accepting reality. He saw himself as a cavalier. Mercy fought back tears but could no longer lie to herself.

She saw him as a spoiled boy. And she didn’t want a boy especially not one she had to cajole and humor, one who’d leave her standing on a darkening street in a strange town. If she must have anything at all to do with the male sex, she wanted a man.

The street blurred. She blinked rapidly, trying not to remember her father in this public place, for she missed him terribly. He’d been gentle and kind and strong. His letters were among the few precious things she’d brought with her. She was brushing tears away with her sleeve when a carriage, one of the high four-wheelers common to Mérida, drew up and a darkly handsome man smiled and said something in Spanish. Mercy gave him a frosty stare and turned to go to her lodgings.

She couldn’t wait any longer. Men could scarcely be blamed for thinking she was for hire. Philip would be angry, but she was angry, too! And now that she’d finally confronted the bitter truth of their relationship, she meant to have a long talk with him, this very night, if he came in sober! They were married. She’d stay with him and do her best if he’d try.

Otherwise …

She took a deep breath. Otherwise, she’d leave him! She didn’t know how she’d manage. Perhaps she could find work as a nurse-companion here in, Mérida till she saved enough for her trip home. But she could not, would not, go on as they were.

Could not. The words drummed in her ears like a marching rhythm so that she didn’t really hear the carriage till it stopped.

“Mrs. Cameron?”

An almost Texas-sounding voice, deep and pleasant. Even as she whirled, afraid that Philip had met with some disaster, she was resentfully aware of the strain of male curiosity and speculation in the stranger’s tone.

Swinging down from the high, little carriage, he closed the distance between them with one long stride, gave her a sweeping glance, which, in spite of its rapidity, did not miss much, and bowed so low that she suspected mockery. Even in the failing light, she could see he had a lean, tanned face, eyes of some shade between gray and black, and a long, rather grim, mouth.

“Forgive my addressing you without an introduction,” he said almost brusquely. “The circumstances are most unusual.”

“My … my husband?”

“You needn’t fear for him, Mrs. Cameron. His health is good.” The tall man paused, then gave a harsh laugh. “Better than his judgment.”

Bewildered, thoroughly alarmed, Mercy swallowed to get command of her voice before she spoke. “I don’t understand, sir. My husband sent you to meet me?”

It might have been the shadows, but something like pity seemed to soften his face for a second before he shrugged and slipped his hand beneath her arm. “He sent me. If you’ll get into the carriage, I’ll explain.”

Mercy resisted his lightly insistent grasp. “Indeed, sir, you must explain here and now! How am I to know that you haven’t murdered my husband and now plan to … to …”

“An entrancing prospect, madam.” Though he chuckled, there was an undercurrent of sympathy or embarrassment in his tone. Reaching into his coat, he produced a folded piece of paper. “If you like, you may take this back to the light of the church to examine. But perhaps even here you can make out the signature. It’s a note from your husband entitling me, Zane Falconer, to your services in settlement for a high loss at cards.”

Mercy felt as if the earth had opened up and she was falling into a chasm where no one could hear her cries. She stared blindly at the paper, wanting to say it wasn’t true, wanting to scream and call for help.

But to whom could she call, anyway, with her husband selling her?

The ugly word brought a purging reality to the melodrama. Assuring herself that it was indeed Philip’s signature scrawled at the bottom of a single paragraph, she gave the note back to the stranger.

“You can’t fool me, sir. Even though my husband may have been drunk or desperate enough to sign this absurd bond, it can’t have validity. Slavery is forbidden in Mexico.”

“But debt bondage is not, dear Mrs. Cameron. If a man makes a loan he can’t repay, he and his children and their children may become what amounts to slaves, because they’re charged for food, clothing, and shelter at a rate that keeps them permanently indebted. I do assure you that I can enforce what’s written on that paper.”

Numb with shock, Mercy stood silent, motionless. “Get into the carriage,” ordered Falconer. He added more gently, “You look weary, Mrs. Cameron, and I believe your husband was to take you to dinner. Let me find you a meal and we’ll discuss this reasonably.”

“Reasonably!”

“I won’t drag you off willy-nilly,” he promised roughly. “But you have to be someplace, and presumably you won’t want to return to your husband. The next man he lost you to might not care about your objections.”

“And you do?” she demanded scornfully.

“My household’s harmonious, and I intend to keep it that way.” His tone was cool. “Have no fear, Mrs. Cameron. If, after a pleasant dinner discussion of what I require of you, you prefer to take another course, I’ll deliver you at whatever address you desire, wish you luck, and trouble you no more.”

Whatever address?

Where could she go? Returning to Philip was unthinkable. Making a tremendous effort to hold her head high and check the trembling of her lips, Mercy let Falconer help her into the jaunty little high-wheeled vehicle and climb up beside her.

“Please,” she said, “I … I don’t wish to see Mr. Cameron again, but my things are at an inn a few streets away. Could we collect them now while there’s little chance of encountering him?”

“Distress doesn’t unbalance you,” Falconer said. “I admire that. The name of your inn?”

An hour later the carriage had been dismissed after the driver deposited Mercy’s baggage in the entrance hall of a spaciously simple house, and she sat with her host in a courtyard scented with flowers and canopied by trees and vines. A dark young man named Vicente brought plates of chicken and rice and a basket of tortillas, thin corn cakes that Mercy had first found tasteless but was now beginning to relish. There was a small dish of spicy sauce that Falconer advised her to use with caution, plus the most delicious, frothy, hot chocolate she’d ever tasted.

Too hungry to make conversation even if she’d had the slightest notion of what to say in this incredible circumstance, Mercy concentrated on the tasty food. By the time Vicente brought melon and crisp, little honeynut cakes, she was feeling more prepared to face whatever Zane Falconer might propose.

He’d talked easily through the meal, explaining that this house belonged to a friend who was abroad and who insisted that Zane stay here when in Mérida.

“Which isn’t often,” said Falconer with a note of warning. “My place, La Quinta Dirección, is a hundred fifty miles from here, close to Tihosuco, the outpost whose liberation is being so ardently—and, I fear, unjustifiably—celebrated right now.”

“But surely the Indians were defeated.”

Falconer shook his head. “They abandoned the siege and faded back into territory they’ve dominated for almost twenty years in spite of countless campaigns and the official end of the War of the Castes. The Cruzob Mayas have their own sacred city, Chan Santa Cruz, where white slaves work for Indian masters and the Talking Cross issues judgments, plans raids, and even, as a sovereign power, makes treaties with the British.”

“The Talking Cross? What is that?”

“A cross that first appeared and comforted the Mayas when their rebellion seemed crushed back in 1850. Probably by use of ventriloquism or a sound box, it inspired them to keep fighting, and its guardian, or tatich, is what the pope is to Catholics. Of course, the Cruzob are Catholic, but while other Mayas still need priests and rely on the whites, or ladinos, for them, the Cruzob have their own priests, or maestros cantors, at their own shrine. They aren’t dependent on the white world for anything but guns and ammunition, and these they get from the British in Belize. That’s a region south of Yucatán that the English crown has claimed from Elizabeth’s time, when it was settled by part-time pirates, or extremely casual members of the British Navy, depending on one’s view.”

“The British supported the Mayan revolt, then?”

“Certainly not,” said Zane with a lift of one dark eyebrow. When his face relaxed its stern expression, it was singularly appealing, and Mercy decided he wasn’t as old as she’d originally judged. There was no gray in his thick, black hair, and the lines at the corners of his eyes seemed the result of sun-squint rather than age. “Our British neighbors only supplied the weapons they were paid for. Besides, plenty of Yucatecan whites have lived off selling arms to the Cruzob.”

Confusing, dismaying, but the overall message was clear even to a newcomer. “Yucatán’s not really at peace? There’s no chance of Maximilian salvaging his empire here?”

“Yucatán became a part of the empire early in 1864 when the French fleet sailed into Campeche and found troops from Mérida attacking the city. Though neither could whip the Mayas, those two cities have constantly wrangled, especially since Sisal began to rival Campeche’s importance as a port.” Zane looked somber. “So the French merely took over wanting to make Yucatán the base, for a French-Mexican empire. But that’s a pipe dream. Maximilian had better abdicate and get out of Mexico while he can. I don’t think anyone can unify Yucatán inside the next score of years, much less build an empire from it.”

As if reading her mind, Falconer looked across the stone table, his features rendered even craggier by lantern light. “It may have been useless, but I left Mr. Cameron enough money for passage to New Orleans.”

Mercy stared, unable to guess the workings of this man’s mind. If he had, in effect, paid cash for her, as well as forgiven a gambling debt, would he really let her go? Had he beguiled her to avoid a scene in the street?

Gripped with panic, she was unable to speak for a few minutes. When she did, her voice sounded hoarse. “That was very generous of you.”

He smiled. “It would be awkward to have your husband drinking himself into all kinds of stupid embroglios, or, worse, repent his novel method of payment and disturb the hacienda. But don’t worry, Mrs. Cameron, if you refuse my offer, I’ll bestow you and your belongings wheresoever you will.”

Filling the cordial glass, he helped himself to brandy with a deliberation that tautened Mercy’s nerves to screaming. “What,” she demanded in a tone that shook in spite of herself, “is this offer?”

“I want an English-speaking woman to see that my daughter is properly brought up.” At Mercy’s surprised glance, Falconer added coldly, “My wife is dead. Jolie, the child, is eight now, and I wish her to grow up under the influence of a … lady.”

Mercy flushed. “Do you doubt that I am a lady, sir?”

His eyes went over her so slowly that her breath caught painfully. “If I weren’t easy about that, madam, be sure you would have met with a very different proposal.”

“Indeed?” She flushed.

“Indeed.”

The calm flatness of his voice belied his eyes, which had just then a glow of banked embers. With a thrill of danger and awareness of him as a powerful and exciting man, Mercy resolved to have all the facts out before she made a decision that would determine the rest of her life.

“You mean you’d have made me your mistress?” She had never used the word before, but she did it now without quivering.

Their gazes clashed. Mercy found it hard to bear the impact of those strange gray eyes; they overwhelmed her, probing mercilessly to depths that Philip had never touched.

During that silent battle while she labeled him an arrogant freebooter and cynical user of women, she recognized in the core of her being that this was a man. He was a complete person, not a petulant, changeable boy.

“Yes,” he agreed, not the least abashed. “Your husband assured me that you were beautiful and refined. It’s hard to find such a woman who’ll live on the frontier.” His laugh was coarse, grating. “You are beautiful, Mrs. Cameron. Since you’re undeniably a lady, I could wish that you were plainer.”

Resisting the tide that swelled through her blood, Mercy looked him straight in the face. “Let’s be clear, Mr. Falconer. I will not be your mistress.”

He bowed mockingly. “Let me be equally clear. Even if your marriage is ended by divorce or the death of your regrettable husband, I won’t marry you.” She gasped at this calm affront as he went on equably. “No need for offense, Mrs. Cameron. I won’t marry anyone.”

“I share that sentiment,” she retorted.

“But you are married.”

“I don’t consider myself so after my … Mr. Cameron’s behavior.” Mercy drew herself up proudly. “You know my situation. I’m penniless and without friends in a strange country.”

He tilted his head and surveyed her with an infuriating smile. “That seems an accurate, though somewhat dramatic, way of putting it,” he agreed.

No help, not even in discussing her problem, was going to be volunteered by him. Detestable, cocksure, unchivalrous! He stifled a yawn. Mercy gritted her teeth.

“If you’ll loan me enough money to get home, I vow to pay it back with whatever interest you stipulate.”

His eyes moved over her in a way that both shamed and aroused her. “An intriguing proposition. What if my interest, payable on the spot, was a night with you?”

Her blood pounded, thick and suffocating in her throat. He came around, drew her up, and, in spite of her frightened struggles, found her mouth. At first his lips were hard, savage, hurting, and she fought him with all her strength till the irresistible force of his arms held her so close to him that his body muted her hands. His kiss changed; he was not compelling now so much as wooing. Sweet, wild flame ran through her. In spite of all she could do, her body went soft, feeling as if it had no bones. She almost fell when he drew abruptly away.

“Well, Mrs. Cameron?”

Shaken, angrily horrified at the certainty that if he’d gone on holding her like that, worked on her senses and need, he could have taken what he now so tauntingly requested, Mercy turned away so that he couldn’t read her face.

“Interest on money is paid with money, sir.”

“Sorry.” He shrugged and fished out a long, slim cigar. “I only make loans I consider good risks.”

Mercy clenched her hands. “You mean the question about … interest … was just to humiliate me?”

He studied a curl of aromatic smoke. “Let’s say I wanted to know how firm your virtuous convictions are.”

“If you won’t loan me the money, you know I’ve no choice but to accept the position you offer and pray you have the decency not to further insult a woman in your power.”

“Mrs. Cameron!” His eyes glimmered and a corner of his long mouth curved down. “I could have sworn that toward the end you returned my ardor.”

“You didn’t pay the slightest attention to my feelings! You … you’re as bad as a Yankee!”

“Your husband, of course, is a model of Southern gallantry.”

Mercy glared. Because of what Falconer knew about Philip, she’d never be able to complain much of his behavior—he knew she’d been exposed to worse. Philip had never struck her or been physically cruel apart from his sexual bunglings, but to hand her over for a gambling debt as if she’d been a horse or dog—the way he had lost Star.

Oh, she couldn’t bear living with this cool, hatefully courteous man who knew how little her husband had cherished her! Her lip quivered. She bit it savagely, blinking back tears of desolated exhaustion.

A strong hand fitted under her arm and led her into a small, clean room with a dresser, chair, washstand, and hammock hung from pegs in the wall. Her bags were in a corner. “You need a good rest,” Zane Falconer told her. “You’ll feel better in the morning.” When she didn’t answer, he said testily, “I admit my thrust about your husband was foul. Pardon me.”

“I shouldn’t have likened you to a Yankee,” she muttered.

He chuckled. “A deadly insult, I’m sure, but quite lost on me, dear lady, because my father and mother were from New Orleans. There’s water in the pitcher. If you need anything, pull the bell-rope and Vicente will come.” He started for the door but stopped when he saw she was staring helplessly at the hammock. “Know how to get into it?”

She shook her head. “No, and I don’t think I could sleep in it, anyway.”

“Hammocks are really very comfortable, though there are several beds at La Quinta.” He sat in the hammock, well toward the middle, lay back, and lifted his legs at the same time. “Do this and you won’t get dumped out.”

Even rising from a hammock, he managed to be graceful. “Sleep well,” he counseled. “Our two nights on the road won’t be so luxurious.” At her dismayed look, he gave her a pat on the shoulder, as if he were encouraging an anxious child. “Don’t worry about the future. Rest and restore yourself. If, tomorrow, you decide you’ve no taste for my offer, you may withdraw. I’ve business to transact and there’s a formal dance tomorrow night. But once we start that journey the day after tomorrow, there’ll be no turning back.”

“I can’t see that I have any choice.”

“There’s always a choice, at least in how one meets a thing.” His jaw hardened. “Make no mistake—I won’t force you to my bed, won’t force you to fulfill Cameron’s bond. But if you come with me, I’ll have no sulks, indignation, and die-away airs.”

“You want a happy slave!”

“Drivel! You’re damned lucky to be rid of that worthless drunkard in a way that’ll provide for you very handsomely. Further, if you perform your duties as well as you must to be kept on, when my daughter’s eighteen I’ll pay your passage back to the United States and give you a generous settlement.”

“Ten years.”

“You won’t be much older than I am right now.” When that failed to console her, he turned on his heel. “Good night, Mrs. Cameron.”

‘She wanted to hurl accusations and upbraidings after him, but the sane part of her mind insisted that, odious as he was, he’d behaved far better than any other man would have. Philip was the cause of her desperate position, but there was no use in thinking about that or bewailing her current predicament.

She barred the heavy door before undressing, washed at the brass basin, wrapped herself in a cotton spread she found on a chest near the hammock, and cautiously eased into that pecular bed. She had to squirm about considerably and shift her weight several times before, with the help of a pillow, she was reasonably comfortable.

She had not expected to sleep, but she did, almost at once.