PAPA CAME TO visit me in the convent hospital.
My aunt had insisted on taking me there when I became ill with a fever the doctor could not name. She’d wanted to nurse me personally and dismissed his suspicions that I might have the Plague; I was exhausted and required rest, she declared. She tended me like a sick baby, spooning food into my mouth and listening quietly to my emotional outpourings.
‘You are suffering delayed grief for the loss of your mother,’ she told me plainly. ‘To lose a mother at any time in your life is a dreadful blow, but as you were on the cusp of womanhood it has affected you very deeply. And’ – Aunt Beatriz struggled to express herself without sounding critical of another person – ‘your father’s decision to remarry so quickly has made it extremely difficult for you to find an outlet for this emotion.’ She shivered. ‘Added to which there was the disturbance of our recent visitors.’
I assumed that she meant Father Besian. ‘Bartolomé is no longer the happy boy I once knew,’ I said sadly. ‘I doubt if he will ever recover.’
‘With God’s good grace he will.’ Aunt Beatriz kissed my forehead. ‘And so will you.’
Now, a few weeks later, I was well enough to be taken to sit with my aunt in her parlour when Papa came and stood before me.
‘I hear that you are almost well again, Zarita,’ he said. ‘However, I do not think that you can return to my house.’ He spoke stiffly, not meeting my gaze.
‘Papa!’ I reached for his hand as I tried to rise from my chair but he moved away from me.
‘It’s better this way,’ he went on. He addressed himself to my aunt. ‘I will endow the convent with money. You may name an amount.’
My aunt tried to meet his eye but he looked away from her too. ‘When I accept a novice here it is not a question of money,’ she said. ‘To become a nun a woman should have a true vocation. She must know her own mind. Zarita is very young.’
‘Tsk!’ Papa made a sound of annoyance. ‘Many girls are married and are indeed mothers by her age. I have indulged my daughter in her waywardness, but now is the time to settle things and—’
‘What are you speaking of?’ I looked from one to the other in bewilderment. ‘Is it my future you discuss?’
‘I want you to be safe and secure,’ Papa said firmly. ‘I understand that you might have an aversion to marriage, and this is the only place where I can be assured that you will be taken care of.’
‘No!’ I cried out, for I didn’t want to be walled up inside a convent, even though my aunt and her helpers seemed happy here. The thought of being unable to go freely wherever and whenever I chose, to be denied the joy of walking under the moon at night instead of retiring early to bed – of riding my horse, of singing and dancing when I pleased – horrified me. ‘I have no aversion to marriage,’ I told Papa.
I was thinking that I could wed Ramón: if that happened, then I’d have my own household and some finances to manage. Even a small amount of money would allow me a measure of independence. Papa would have to give me a sizeable dowry. Although of aristocratic lineage, Ramón’s family, like that of Lorena and many of the nobles, had no funds. This was why Lorena had come questing after an older man with money. She had position and a place in society by dint of her father’s name, but couldn’t afford new dresses or jewellery without access to my papa’s money. If Papa himself could marry, then he could easily afford to pay for my wedding.
‘Let me be married.’
‘To whom will you be married, Zarita?’ Papa asked me coldly.
‘Why, to Ramón Salazar,’ I said. ‘We have an understanding.’ I paused as I realized that over the last months Ramón had avoided discussing any plans for our future together.
‘Ramón Salazar—’ Papa began.
My aunt touched my father’s sleeve. ‘Be gentle, good brother, Don Vicente. Zarita has no inkling of recent events.’
‘Of what do I have no knowledge?’ I asked them. ‘What are you saying?’
Impatiently Papa brushed my aunt’s hand away. ‘That’s exactly what I mean. The girl should be a woman now and yet she behaves like a child. And it is my fault – yes, I admit that. I made a pet of her.’ He turned and looked at me, heartache and regret showing on his face. ‘I listened to your mama and I spoiled you, and for that I am sorry. It means I protected you too much, and now you are ignorant of the ways of the world.’
‘Tell me what I should know,’ I said, my breath now coming more rapidly.
Papa spoke brutally. ‘The family of Ramón Salazar want nothing more to do with you.’
‘That can’t be true,’ I replied. ‘Ramón looked at me in a certain way. He still speaks to me . . . frequently.’
It was my turn to falter, for now that it was said out loud I saw that I had to admit to noticing that Ramón had cooled in his attitude to me. ‘I see in his eyes . . .’ I began.
‘What you see in his eyes is desire, the way any man would desire a woman as beautiful as you are.’ My papa spoke more softly. ‘But even if he did hold some affection for you, his family will not permit the marriage now.’
‘Why not? They didn’t object before.’
‘We agreed on an end to any negotiation,’ Papa hesitated and then went on, ‘and I was not unhappy about this. They cited economies and inconvenience. Ramón has gone to the court to be with his uncle, who is in charge of troops taking part in the siege outside Granada, which is where the queen and king hope to finally crush the Moors.’
‘Why would Ramón leave without bidding me farewell? He sent no letter. Why would his family change their mind when it was them who so eagerly sought my hand for their son?’
‘You are despoiled, child.’ Again Papa could not face me as he spoke. ‘The assault of the beggar in the church makes you a less attractive prospect. That’s why I tried to arrange something else. Don Piero said he would welcome a companion. He knew of the assault on your person but believed you were an innocent victim.’
‘But I was!’ I gasped. I recalled Don Piero insisting earnestly that he believed I was a good person. I hadn’t picked up the inference that there was any doubt about that. ‘It isn’t right that a woman’s reputation can be brought down by the actions of another. In any case, the beggar barely touched me!’
Papa shook his head. ‘You mustn’t try to change the story now that it stands in the way of something you want. The damage is done.’
‘There was no damage done to me,’ I said desperately. ‘I tried to explain this to you at the time, but you wouldn’t listen. You were so grief-stricken at losing Mama and the baby—’
Papa held up his hand. ‘Stop!’ he ordered me. ‘The particulars are of no consequence, Zarita. You suffered an assault upon your person. It has changed your personality. It’s made you say and do things you wouldn’t have done before – make threats and strike out at people. The situation is now so serious that you cannot be allowed to roam free as you once did. It’s for your own safety that you must be contained somewhere.’ Then he added, ‘And for the safety of others.’
‘This cannot be!’ I said.
‘It can and it is,’ Papa said grimly. ‘I’ve made a decision and I will not be moved on it. You cannot marry. You cannot come home. Don’t you see? There is nothing else for it, Zarita. You must be shut up in the convent.’