Zorro

PART FOUR

Spain, late 1814-early 1815

I now have new goose-quill pens to continue the story of Zorro’s youth. It took our protagonists a month to reach Mexico, and in the meantime I have lost the rhythm of my narration. We shall see whether I can recapture it. We left Diego de la Vega fleeing from Rafael Moncada with the de Romeu girls and Nuria, through a Spain convulsed by political repression, poverty, and violence. Our characters were in a difficult situation, but the gallant Zorro did not lose sleep over external dangers, only the jolts to his surrendered heart. Love is a condition that tends to cloud men’s reason, but it is not fatal. Usually all the patient needs is to have his love returned, and he will snap out of it and begin to sniff the air in search of new prey. As chronicler of this story, I can see that I will have some problem with the classic ending of “and so they were married and lived happily ever after.” In fact, I had best get back to the tale before I fall into a depression. When the hidden door in the library shelves swung shut, Rafael Moncada was alone in the secret chamber. His cries for help were not heard because the thick walls, books, drapes, and carpets all deadened sound. “We will leave as soon as it is dark,” Diego de la Vega told Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria. “And we will take the bare essentials for the journey, as we agreed.”

“Are you sure there is a mechanism to open the door of that chamber from inside?” asked Juliana. “No.”

“This joke has gone too far, Diego. We cannot bear the burden of Rafael Moncada’s death, especially not a slow and horrible death in a sealed tomb.”

“But look at the harm he’s done to us?” exclaimed Isabel. “We are not going to repay him in the same coin, because we are better persons than he is,” was her sister’s categorical reply. Diego laughed. “Don’t worry, Juliana, your suitor will not die of asphyxiation on this occasion.”

“Why not?” Isabel interrupted, disappointed. Diego jabbed her with his elbow and explained that before they left, he would give Jordi a letter to be delivered to Eulalia de Califs in person, within two days. With it she would find the keys to the house and instructions for finding and opening the chamber. In case Rafael had not been able to open the door, his aunt would rescue him. The mansion, like everything else the de Romeu family had owned, now belonged to that grand lady, who would rescue her favorite nephew before he drank all the cognac. To be sure that Jordi would carry out his mission, he would give him a few maravedis, and the hope that Dona Eulalia would give him more when the note was delivered. At nightfall they left in one of the family coaches, driven by Diego. Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria took one last look at the large house where they had spent their lives. They were leaving behind memories of a safe and happy time; behind them, too, was everything that gave witness to Tomas de Romeu’s passage through this world. His daughters had not been able to give him a decent burial; his remains came to rest in a common grave beside other prisoners executed in La Ciudadela. The only thing they kept was a miniature painted by a Catalan artist in which he appeared young, slim, and unrecognizable. The three women sensed that at that moment they were crossing a definitive threshold to begin a new stage in their lives. They were silent, fearful, and sad. Nuria began to recite the rosary in a quiet voice, and the sweet cadence of her prayers accompanied them for a good distance, until they fell asleep. Up on the coachman’s box, Diego urged the horses along and thought about Bernardo, as he did almost every day. He missed him so much that he often found himself talking aloud, as he had always done with his brother. His silent presence, his unflagging protection, guarding his back and defending him from all danger, was just what he needed now. Diego asked himself whether he alone was capable of helping the de Romeu girls or whether, to the contrary, he was leading them into disaster. His plan to travel across Spain might be another of his hare-brained ideas, and he was tormented by doubt. And like his passengers, he was frightened. It was not the delicious fear that preceded the danger of combat, that cold fist in the pit of his stomach, that glacial tingle at the nape of his neck; this was the oppressive weight of a responsibility he was not prepared for. If something should happen to those women, especially Juliana… No, he would not even consider such a possibility. He cried out, calling Bernardo and his grandmother, White Owl, to come to his aid, but his voice was lost in the night, swallowed up in the sound of the wind and the horses’ hooves. He knew that Rafael Moncada would look for them in Madrid and other important cities, that he would have the border with France watched and every boat that left Barcelona or any other Mediterranean port searched, but he hoped that it would not occur to him to pursue them to the other coast. He planned to outsmart Moncada by leaving for America from the Atlantic port of La Coruna, as no one in his right mind would travel away from Barcelona to take a ship. It would be very risky for a captain to shelter fugitives from justice, as Juliana pointed out, but he could think of no other solution. They would resolve the problem of getting across the ocean when they came to that; first they had to deal with the obstacles they might meet on dry land. Diego decided to go as far as they could in the next hours and then get rid of the coach. Someone might have seen them leave Barcelona. After midnight the horses were showing signs of fatigue, and Diego thought that they were far enough away from the city that they could rest. By the light of the moon, he left the road and headed the vehicle into a wood, where he unhitched the horses and let them graze. The night was cold and clear. All four slept inside the coach, bundled in blankets, until Diego waked them a couple of hours later, when it was still dark, to share a meal of bread and sausage. Nuria then gave them the clothing they would wear for the rest of the journey; the pilgrims’ habits that she had made in case Santiago de Compostela saved Tomas de Romeu’s life: tunics that fell to mid-calf, wide-brimmed hats, long pilgrim’s staffs with a curved end to hold a gourd for collecting water. The girls left on their layers of petticoats to combat the cold, and they all wound themselves in scarves and donned heavy wool leggings and gloves. Nuria had also brought a couple of bottles of a potent liquor that was extremely effective for forgetting one’s troubles. The chaperone had never imagined that those rough robes would be used by the remnants of the family to escape, much less that she would end up keeping her vow to the saint when he had not fulfilled his part of the bargain. To her it seemed a deceit unworthy of a man as serious as the apostle James, but she supposed that he had some hidden design that would be revealed at the opportune moment. At first Diego’s idea had seemed wise, but after looking at the map Nuria realized what it meant to cross the widest part of Spain on foot. It was not a journey, it was an epic. Ahead of them lay at least two months of walking through every kind of weather, eating what they could beg, and sleeping beneath the stars. In addition, it was already November, it was raining constantly, and soon they would wake to find the ground covered with ice. None of them was accustomed to walking long distances, and certainly not in a laborer’s sandals. Nuria allowed herself to curse Santiago under her breath, and, in passing, to tell Diego what she thought about his preposterous pilgrimage. Once they had put on their pilgrim’s robes and eaten, Diego decided it was time to abandon the coach. They all took their own belongings, wrapped them in a blanket, and slung the bundle over their shoulders; the rest they loaded onto the horses. Isabel was carrying her father’s pistol hidden among her petticoats. Diego carried his Zorro disguise in his bundle, unable to part with it, and beneath his pilgrim’s robe he had hidden two double-edged Basque daggers a hand’s span long. His whip hung at his waist, as always. Though he had never before been separated from the sword his father had given him in California, he had to leave it behind because it was impossible to disguise. Pilgrims did not carry weapons. There were scoundrels of every ilk along the roads, but usually no one troubled travelers who were going to Compostela, since they took a vow of poverty for the duration of the pilgrimage. No one could imagine that that modest quartet had a small fortune in precious stones sewn into their clothing. They were no different in appearance from the usual penitents on their way to prostrate themselves before the famous Santiago, to whom they attributed the miracle of having saved Spain from the Muslim invaders. For centuries, the Arabs had been victorious in battles, thanks to the invincible arm of Muhammad, their guide, until a shepherd made the timely discovery of the bones of Saint James abandoned in a field in Galicia. How they got there from the Holy Land was part of the miracle. Those relics had the power to unify the small Christian kingdoms of the region, and were so effective in directing the brave Spanish forces that they drove out the Moors and recovered their land for Christianity. Santiago de Compostela became the most important site for pilgrims in all of Europe. At least, that was Nuria’s story, though hers was slightly more embellished. The chaperone believed that the head of the apostle remained intact and every Good Friday shed real tears. The supposed remains lay in a silver coffin beneath the altar of the cathedral, but in his desire to protect them from the raids of the pirate Sir Francis Drake, a bishop had hidden them so well that it was a long time before they were found again. For that reason the war and the lack of faith the numbers of pilgrims had been greatly reduced; previously they had come by the hundreds of thousands. Those who traveled to the sanctuary from France followed the northern route, crossing through Basque country, and that was the one our friends chose. For centuries, churches, convents, hospitals, even the poorest peasants, offered a roof and a meal to the penitents. That hospitable tradition worked in favor of the small group led by Diego; it allowed them to travel without having to carry foodstuffs. Although pilgrims were rare in that season it was easier to travel in the spring and summer they did not expect to attract special attention; religious fervor had increased since the French had been driven out, and the many Spaniards who had promised to visit the saint if they won the war were fulfilling their vows. It was growing light when they took to the road. That first day they walked more than five leagues, until Juliana and Nuria gave up because their feet were bleeding and they were faint from hunger. About four in the afternoon they stopped at a hut whose owner turned out to be a tragic woman who had lost her husband in the war. As she informed them, the French had not killed him; he had been murdered by Spaniards, who had accused him of hiding food instead of giving it to the guerrilla fighters. She knew who the murderers were she had seen their faces clearly, country people like herself who were using the bad times as an excuse to wreak havoc. They were not guerrillas, they were brutes, and they had raped her poor daughter, who had been mad from birth and never harmed anyone, and taken all her animals. Only a nanny goat that had been off wandering in the hills was spared, she said. One of the men’s nose had been eaten away by syphilis, and the other had a long scar on his face. She remembered them very well, and not a day went by that she didn’t curse them and cry out to heaven for revenge, she added. She had no one but her daughter, whom she tied to a chair to keep her from clawing herself. Her home was a stinking, windowless stone and mud cube that mother and daughter shared with a pack of dogs. This woman had very little to give, and she was weary of having beggars stop in, but she did not want to leave them without shelter. Because Saint Joseph and the Virgin Mary could not find a place in the inn, the child Jesus was born in a manger, she said. She believed that refusing a pilgrim was repaid with many centuries of suffering in purgatory. The travelers sat down on the earthen floor, surrounded by flea-bitten dogs, to recover from their exhaustion, while their host cooked a few potatoes on the coals and dug a couple of onions from her wretched garden. “This is all I have. My daughter and I have eaten nothing else for months, but maybe tomorrow I will be able to milk the nanny goat,” she said. “May God repay you, senora,” Diego murmured. The only light in the hut entered through the door opening, which she closed at night with a stiff horse hide, and the glow from the small brazier in which she had roasted the potatoes. While they ate the frugal meal, the peasant observed them from the corner of her rheumy eyes. She drew the obvious conclusions as she took in their soft white hands, their noble features and slim bodies, and remembered that they were traveling with two horses. She did not want to know the details; the less she knew, she reasoned, the fewer problems she would have. These were no days to be asking questions. When her guests had eaten, she gave them half-tanned, smelly sheepskins and led them to a shed where she stored firewood and ears of corn. There they bedded down. Nuria found the shed considerably more welcoming than the hut, with its dog odors and the yowls of the pitiful girl. They chose spaces and skins and got ready for a long night. They were making themselves as comfortable as possible when the peasant woman reappeared carrying a small pot of fat, which she gave them with the recommendation that they rub it on their raw feet. She stood staring at the battered group with a mixture of distrust and curiosity. “Pilgrims indeed. Anyone can see that you are genteel folk. I do not want to know what you are running from, but here is some free advice.

There are wicked men on these roads. You cannot trust anyone. Best if the girls are not seen. Cover their faces, at least,“ she added before she left. Diego did not know how to relieve the women’s discomfort, particularly that of the one most important to him, Juliana. Tomas de Romeu had entrusted his daughters to him, and what would he think if he could see them now? Accustomed to feather mattresses and embroidered sheets, they were resting their bones on a pile of corn and scratching fleas with both hands. Juliana had been admirable: she had not complained once during that arduous day, and even ate the raw onion without comment. In fairness, he had to admit Nuria had not put a bad face on things, either. And as for Isabel, well, she seemed enchanted with the adventure. Diego’s fondness for the women had grown as he saw them so vulnerable and brave. He felt an infinite tenderness for their aching bodies and a tremendous desire to erase their fatigue, to shelter them from the cold, to save them from danger. He was less worried about Isabel, who was frisky as a filly, and Nuria, who was coping by nipping at her restorative liquor. But Juliana… The laborer’s sandals had worn blisters on her feet despite her wool stockings, and the scratchy habit had scoured her skin. And what was Juliana thinking? I cannot say, but I imagine that in the dying light of evening, she found Diego handsome. He hadn’t shaved for a day or two, and the dark shadow of his beard lent a rough, virile air to his looks. He was not the clumsy, skinny boy who had come to their home four years before, all smile and ears. He was a man. In a few months’ time he would celebrate twenty intensely lived years; he had grown tall, and had poise. No, Diego was not bad-looking, and besides, he loved her with the moony loyalty of a pup. Juliana would have had to be made of stone not to soften toward him. The healing lard gave Diego an excuse to rub his beloved’s feet, and in the process forget his gloomy thoughts. Soon his optimistic nature prevailed, and he offered to extend the massage to Juliana’s calves. ”Don’t be depraved, Diego,“ Isabel scolded, breaking the spell. The sisters fell asleep while Diego went back to mulling over his various worries. He concluded that the only good part of this journey would be Juliana; everything else would be struggle and exhaustion. Rafael Moncada and other suitors had been eliminated; finally he had an open field to win the beauty: weeks and weeks in close company. There she was, an arm’s length away, exhausted, dirty, in pain, fragile. He could reach out and touch her cheek, rosy with sleep, but he did not dare. They would sleep side by side every night, like chaste spouses, and share every moment of the day. He was the only protector Juliana had in this world, a situation that favored him enormously. He would never take advantage of that, of course he was a caballero but he could not help but notice that only a single day had worked a change in her. Juliana was seeing him in a different light. She had fallen asleep curled up in a corner of the shed, shivering beneath the sheepskins, but as she got warm and wriggled to find a comfortable spot on the corn, her head emerged. Bluish moonlight filtered through the chinks of the boards and fell on her perfect face, abandoned in sleep. Diego wished that the pilgrimage would never end. He moved so close to her that he could sense the warmth of her breath and the fragrance of her dark curls. The good countrywoman was right; they must hide her beauty and not attract bad luck. If a gang assaulted them, he alone could do little to defend her now that he did not have his sword. There were a hundred reasons to worry, but there was no sin in giving free rein to his fantasy, and he drifted off imagining Juliana exposed to terrible dangers and saved again and again by the invincible Zorro. ”If she does not fall in love with me now, it is because I am a dolt,“ he muttered. At the cock’s crow Juliana and Isabel were shaken awake by Nuria, who had brought them a cup of warm goat’s milk. She and Diego had not rested as peacefully as the girls. Nuria had prayed for hours, terrified of what lay ahead, and Diego had only half slept, aware of Juliana’s closeness and keeping one eye open and a hand on his dagger to defend her, until the timid light of a winter morn put an end to that eternal night. The travelers prepared to begin another day’s journey, but Juliana and Nuria’s legs would scarcely obey them; after a few steps they had to lean on something to keep from falling down. Isabel, on the other hand, demonstrated her physical prowess with a few knee bends, congratulating herself on the endless hours she had spent practicing her fencing in front of the mirror. Diego’s advice to Juliana and Nuria was that if they would start walking, their muscles would warm up and the cramping would pass, but that didn’t happen; the pain only got worse. Finally those two had to ride on the horses while Diego and Isabel carried the bundles. It was an entire week before they could make the six leagues a day that had been their goal when they started. Before they left that day, they thanked the peasant woman for her hospitality and left her a few maravedis, which she stared at with amazement, as if she had never seen a coin before. In stretches, the route was a mule path, in others, nothing but a narrow trail snaking through primeval growth. An unexpected transformation took place among the four false pilgrims. The peace and silence forced them to listen, to look at the trees and the mountains through new eyes, to open their hearts to the unique experience of following in the footsteps of the thousands of pilgrims who had walked that road for nine centuries. Some monks taught them to set their course by the stars, as travelers had done in the Middle Ages, and by the rocks and boundary stones marked with the symbol of Santiago, a scallop shell, left by previous journeyers. In some places they found words carved on pieces of wood or written on stained parchments, messages of hope and wishes for good fortune. That journey to the tomb of the apostle James became an exploration of their own souls. They walked in silence, in pain and weary, but content. They lost their initial fear and soon forgot that they were fleeing. They heard wolves at night and expected to meet highwaymen at every turn of the path, but they went forward with confidence, as if some superior force were protecting them. Nuria began to make her peace with Santiago, whom she had cursed whenTomas de Romeu was executed. They traversed forests, broad plains, lonely mountains, in a changing and always beautiful landscape. They never lacked for a welcome. Sometimes they slept in the houses of peasants, other times in monasteries and convents. And perfect strangers always shared their bread or soup with them. One night they slept in a church and awoke to the sound of Gregorian chants, enveloped in a dense blue mist as if in another world. On another occasion they took their rest in the ruins of a small chapel in which thousands of white doves were nesting, sent, according to Nuria, by the Holy Spirit. Following the counsel of the peasant woman who had sheltered them the first night, the girls covered their faces as they approached populated places. In villages and inns, the sisters lagged behind while Nuria and Diego went ahead to ask for charity, passing themselves off as mother and son. They always referred to Juliana and Isabel as if they were boys, and explained that they hid their faces because they had been disfigured by illness; in that way they did not pique the interest of the bandits, rustics, and army deserters who were wandering the land that no one had cultivated since before the war. Diego calculated how far it was to the port at La Corufia by distance and time, and to that mathematical computation added his progress with Juliana; it had not been spectacular, but at least she seemed to feel safe in his company and was treating him more seriously and with less teasing: she took his arm for support, allowed him to caress her feet, let him prepare her bed, and even let him spoon soup into her mouth when she was too tired to eat. At night Diego waited for the other three to fall asleep before he crawled as close to her as decency allowed. He dreamed of her and waked in glory with his arm across her waist. She pretended not to notice their growing intimacy and during the day acted as if he had never touched her, but in the black of night she invited that contact, and he wondered if it was because she was cold, afraid, or moved by the same passions he felt. He awaited those moments with delirious eagerness, and made the most of what befell him. Isabel was aware of that nocturnal nestling and was not bashful about making jokes on the subject. How the girl found out was a puzzle, since she was always the first to fall asleep and the last to wake up. One day they had walked for hours; they were tired and had also been slowed when one of the horses came up lame. The sun had set, and they still had a way to go before reaching the convent where they planned to spend the night. They saw smoke rising from a nearby house and decided they would try to stop there. Diego went ahead, confident that he would be welcomed because it looked like a rather prosperous place, at least compared with others. Before he knocked at the door, he reminded the girls to cover their faces, even though it was dark. Eyeholes allowed them to see through the cloths, which were so caked with dust that they looked like lepers. A man opened the door; against the light he looked as threatening as an orangutan. They could not see his features, but to judge by his attitude and rude tone he was displeased to see them. At first he refused them shelter, using the excuse that he had no obligation to help pilgrims, that was what monks and nuns and all their wealth were for. He added that if they were traveling with two horses, they must not have taken the vow of poverty and could pay for their own expenses. Diego did not give up, and finally the farmer agreed to give them something to eat and permission to sleep beneath his roof in exchange for a few coins, which he demanded in advance. He led them to a stable that housed a cow and two Percheron plow horses. He pointed to a pile of straw where they could bed down, and told them he would be back with something to eat. In half an hour, after they had begun to lose hope of eating that day, the man reappeared with a companion. The stable was dark as a cave, but they were carrying a lantern. They set down a loaf of black bread and half a dozen eggs, and some porringers containing a hearty country soup. As they bent down, Diego and the women could see in the lantern light that one of them had a scar running from his eye down his cheek, and that the other had no nose. They were short and strong, with bull necks and arms like logs, and their expressions were so formidable that Diego fingered his daggers and Isabel her pistol. The sinister men did not leave all the while his guests spooned their soup and broke bread, watching Juliana and Isabel with malicious curiosity as they tried to eat without removing the face cloths. ”What is the matter with those two?“ one of them asked, pointing to the girls. ”Yellow fever,“ said Nuria, who had heard Diego mention that plague, but had no idea what it was. ”It’s a tropical disease that eats the skin like acid, and rots the tongue and eyes. They should have died, but the Apostle saved them.

That’s why we’re on this pilgrimage to the sanctuary, to give thanks,“ Diego babbled, inventing on the fly. ”Is it catching?“ the host wanted to know. ”Not from a distance, only by contact,“ Diego explained. ”You don’t want to touch them.“ The men did not seem convinced; they could see the girls’ healthy hands and young bodies, which the robes could not conceal. Furthermore, they suspected that these pilgrims carried more money than was usual, and they also had their eyes on the horses. One of them was a little lame, but they were good stock; they would be worth something. Finally they left, taking their lantern and leaving the group in darkness. ”We have to get out of here. Those men are terrifying,“ Isabel whispered. ”We can’t travel at night, and we have to rest. I’ll keep watch,“ Diego replied softly. ”Then,“ Isabel proposed, ”I will sleep a couple of hours and take your place.“ They still had the raw eggs; Nuria poked a hole in four for them to suck, and kept the other two. ”Too bad I have no idea how to milk a cow, otherwise we would have some milk,“ the chaperone sighed. Then she asked Diego to leave for a few minutes so the girls could rinse off with a wet cloth. Finally they lay down on the straw, covered by their blankets, and slept. Three or four hours went by while Diego sat and nodded with his daggers within reach, dead tired, struggling to keep his eyes open. Suddenly he was jarred awake by the barking of a dog and realized that he had dozed off. For how long? He had no idea, but any sleep was a forbidden pleasure under the circumstances. To clear his head he went outside, taking deep breaths of the icy night air. Smoke was still coming from the chimney of the house, and light was shining through the one window in the solid stone wall; that indicated that he had not been asleep as long as he had feared. While he was outside, he walked a little farther away from the shed to relieve himself. As he returned a few moments later, he saw two silhouettes moving toward the stable with suspicious stealth: their villainous hosts. They had something in their hands, perhaps guns or clubs. He knew that his daggers, which were good only in close combat, would be next to useless against those armed brutes. He uncoiled the whip at his waist and immediately felt the cold at the nape of his neck that always preceded a fight. He knew that Isabel had her pistol, but he had left her sleeping, and to add to that, the girl had never fired a weapon. He was counting on the advantage of surprise, but he could do nothing in that dark. Praying not to be betrayed by the dogs, he trailed the men to the stable. For a few minutes there was absolute quiet, as the evildoers checked to be sure that their unwary guests were sound asleep. Once satisfied, they lighted an oil lamp in order to locate the figures on the straw. They were not aware that one of the group was missing, confusing Diego’s mantle for another body. One of the horses neighed and woke Isabel. For a few seconds she could not remember where she was; then she saw the men, understood the situation, and groped for the pistol that she had left beneath her cover. She did not reach it; a couple of roars from the attackers, who were waving thick sticks, froze her in mid-action. By then, Juliana and Nuria were awake. ”What do you want!“ Juliana cried. ”You, you whores, and your money!“ one of them replied, moving toward her with upraised bludgeon. And then in the wavering light of the flame, the blackguards saw the faces of their victims. With a bellow of absolute terror they jumped back, turned to run, and found themselves facing Diego, whose arm was already upraised. Before they could recover, the whip fell with a crack upon the closer of the two, who cried out in pain and dropped his truncheon. The other man lunged toward Diego, who danced aside and kicked him in the stomach, doubling him over. But now the first had recovered from his shock and had leaped toward Diego with an agility unexpected in someone so heavy, falling on top of him like a sack of rocks. The whip was now useless, and the peasant had grabbed Diego by the wrist that held the dagger. He had him pressed flat to the ground, and was reaching for his throat with one hand as with the other he tried to shake loose the dagger. He had a strong grip and exceptional strength. His foul breath and saliva nauseated Diego, who fought back desperately, not understanding how this beast had managed in an instant to do what the expert, Julius Caesar, had not been able to do in La Justicia’s test of courage. Out of the corner of his eye, Diego could see that the other man had struggled to his feet and was reaching for his stick. There was more light now because the oil lamp had rolled across the ground, setting fire to some straw. At that instant a shot sounded, and the man who was on his feet dropped to the ground, roaring like a lion. That distracted the man atop Diego sufficiently that he was able to push him off with a ferocious knee to the groin. The recoil of the gun knocked Isabel off her feet. She had fired almost blindly, holding the weapon with both hands, and by pure luck she had shattered the attacker’s knee. She could not believe it. The idea that the twitch of a finger on a trigger would have such consequences had never entered her head. A sharp command from Diego, who had her victim’s partner immobilized with his whip, roused her from her trance. ”Quick! The stable is on fire! We have to get the animals out!“ The three women sprang up to save the cow and horses, which were bawling and whinnying with terror, while Diego pulled the two miscreants outside, one of whom was still bellowing with pain, his leg crushed to a pulp and slick with blood. The stable went up like an enormous bonfire, lighting the night. Now Diego could see Juliana and Isabel’s faces, which had so frightened their assailants. He, too, yelled with disgust. Their skin, yellow and lumpy like the hide of a crocodile, oozed pus in some places and in others had dried like a scab, tugging at their features. Their eyes were distorted, their lips had disappeared the two girls were monsters. ”What happened to you!“ Diego cried. ”Yellow fever.“ Isabel laughed. It had been Nuria’s idea. The chaperone had suspected that their depraved hosts would return to attack during the night. She knew how evil those men were from the story of the peasant woman whose husband had been killed. She remembered an old egg-based beauty formula that her ancestors had learned from Muslim women, and she had used the two yolks left from supper to paint the girls’ faces. As the eggs dried, they turned into cracked, stinking masks. ”It comes off with water, and it does a lot for the skin,“ Nuria explained, very proud of herself. They bandaged the wound of the bully with the scar who yelled and screamed as if he were being tortured to at least prevent his bleeding to death, though there was little hope the leg could be saved. They left his friend tied to a chair, but did not gag him, so he could call for help. The house was close to the road, and more than one passerby would hear. ”An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth; you pay for everything in this life, or in hell,“ were Nuria’s words of farewell. They took a ham they found hanging from a beam in the house and the two ponderous, heavy-hoofed Percherons. They were not good as mounts, but they would always be better than walking; besides, they did not want to leave the pair of bandits a means of pursuit. The incident with the noseless man and his cohort with the scar served to make the travelers more cautious. From that night on they had decided they would take shelter only in sites designated by pilgrims from time immemorial. After several weeks of following the northern route, all four had lost weight, and were tougher in body and soul. The sun burned their skin, the dry air and freezing weather cracked it. Nuria’s face became a map of fine wrinkles, and she was suddenly old. That once stiff-backed, apparently ageless woman now dragged her feet and was slightly bowed, but far from making her ugly, it made her beautiful. Her grim expression relaxed, and a teasing, grandmotherly humor blossomed forth, something they had never seen before. She also looked better in the simple pilgrim’s robe than she had in the severe black uniform and cap she had worn all her life. Juliana’s curves disappeared; she looked smaller and younger with her enormous eyes and red, chapped cheeks. She rubbed her skin with lanolin as protection against the sun, but she could not escape the onslaught of the weather. Isabel, strong and slender, was the one who suffered least from the journey. Her features sharpened, and she acquired a long, sure stride that made her appear boyish. She had never been happier; she was born for freedom. ”Curses! Why wasn’t I born a man?“ she exclaimed on one occasion. Nuria gave her a good hard pinch, with the warning that such blasphemy could lead straight to the cauldrons of hell, but then she laughed heartily. Had Isabel been born a male, she commented, she would have been another Napoleon, given the battles she was always waging. They all adapted to the routine imposed by the march. Diego assumed command quite naturally; he made the decisions and dealt with strangers. He tried to arrange a bit of privacy for the women’s most personal needs, but they were never out of his sight for more than a few minutes. They drank and washed in rivers; that was why they had brought the gourds, the symbol of a pilgrim. With each league they traveled, they forgot past comforts: a piece of bread tasted like heaven, a sip of wine was a blessing. In one monastery they were given cups of thick, sweet chocolate, which they savored slowly, sitting on a bench outdoors. For several days that was all they could think of; they could not remember a more perfect pleasure than that warm, fragrant drink beneath the stars. During the day they survived on the leftovers of food they were given where they lodged: bread, hard cheese, an onion, a slice of sausage. Diego still had some money for emergencies, but they tried not to use it; pilgrims lived off charity. If they had no choice but to pay for something, he bargained a long time, until what they needed was nearly a gift; that way he avoided raising suspicions. They had traveled across half of the Basque country when winter set in without mercy. Sudden wintry blasts penetrated to the bone, and chill winds kept them shivering beneath wet mantles. The horses, also affected by the cold, seemed phlegmatic. Nights were longer, the fog denser, their progress slower, the frost heavier, and the journey more difficult, but the landscape was breathtakingly beautiful. Green and more green, hills of green velvet, enormous forests in every shade of green, rivers and waterfalls of crystalline, emerald green water. For great distances the track would disappear in the moist soil, only to reappear later as a faint path through the trees or the worn cobblestones of an ancient Roman road. Nuria convinced Diego that it was a good economy to spend money on liquor, the only thing that warmed them at night and made them forget the torment of the day. At times they had to stay two days in a shelter because of the pitiless rain and their need to collect their strength. They used that time to listen to the stories of the other travelers and the monks and nuns who had seen so many sinners on the road to Santiago de Compostela. One day in the middle of December, when they were still a long way from the next village and had not seen a house for a long time, they saw flickering lights through the trees, something like dying bonfires. They approached with caution, thinking it might be army deserters, who were more dangerous than any felon. They tended to travel in groups, ragged and filthy, armed to the teeth and ready for anything. In the best of cases, those war-hardened men hired themselves out as mercenaries and fought for money, to settle arguments, to deliver revenge, and other livelihoods that might be dishonorable but were preferable to life as bandits. Their only skill lay in their swords, and manual labor was unthinkable to them. In Spain only peasants worked; on their backs they bore the enormous weight of the empire, from the king down to the last bailiff, pettifogger, priest, gambler, page, streetwalker, or beggar. Diego left the women behind some shrubs, armed with the pistol, which Isabel had learned to use, to scout out those distant signs of life. At closer range he confirmed that, as he had thought, the light came from several campfires. He did not, nevertheless, think it was a gang of outlaws or deserters because he could hear the soft melody of a guitar. His heart leaped when he recognized the music, a passionate lament that Amalia used to dance to with whirling skirts and clicking castanets while the rest of her tribe kept time with tambourines and clapping hands. It was not unique; all Gypsies played similar songs. He slowly rode on until he reached the clearing with several tents and fires. ”God help me,“ he muttered, ready to shout with relief. These were his friends. No doubt about it, it was the family of Amalia and Pelayo. Several men of the tribe came out to see who the intruder was, and in the gray light of evening they saw an unkempt and unshaven monk coming toward them on a large plow horse. They did not recognize him until he jumped to the ground and ran toward them the last person they expected to see again was Diego de la Vega, and certainly never in a pilgrim’s robe. ”What the devil has happened to you!“ exclaimed Pelayo, clapping him affectionately on the back, and Diego couldn’t tell whether it was tears running down his cheeks, or drops of rain. The Gypsy went back with him to look for Nuria and the girls. Once they were all seated around the fire, the travelers, in broad strokes, painted a picture of their recent adventures, from the execution of Tomas de Romeu to their encounter with Rafael Moncada, omitting the minor twists and turns that added nothing to the story. ”As you see, we are fugitives, not pilgrims. We have to reach La Corufia to see if we can sail from there to America, but we have traveled only halfway, and winter is nipping at our heels. May we travel on with you?“ Diego asked. The Romany had never received a plea of that sort from a gadje. By tradition they distrusted non-Gypsies, especially when they showed good intentions most likely they had a viper up their sleeves but they had had good opportunity to know Diego well, and they respected him. They walked off to consult among themselves, then left the group of gadjes drying their clothes beside the fire while they went to one of the tents. Stitched together from several cloths, ragged and filled with holes, it nevertheless offered shelter against the caprices of the weather. The meeting of the tribe, called a kris, lasted a good part of the night. It was presided over by Rodolfo, the from baro, the eldest of the men, the patriarch, counselor, and judge, who knew the laws of the Roma. Those laws had never been written or codified; they were passed down from generation to generation in the memory of the from baros who interpreted them according to variables in time and place. Only males could participate in decisions, but enforcement of that custom had relaxed during those years of misery, and the women did not stay silent, especially Amalia, who reminded everyone that Diego had saved their necks in Barcelona, and then had given them a pouch of money that allowed them to escape and survive. Even so, some members of the clan voted against Diego’s request; they believed that the prohibition against fraternizing with gadjes was stronger than any amount of gratitude. Only commercial dealings were allowed; anything else led to ma rime or bad luck. Finally they reached an agreement, and Rodolfo cut off discussion with an irrevocable verdict. They had seen much betrayal and evil in their lives, he said, and they should appreciate it when someone held out a hand to them. Let no one say that the Roma were ungrateful. Pelayo left to take the decision to Diego. He found him asleep on the ground beside the women, all of them huddled together because by then the fire had gone out. They looked like a pitiful litter of pups. ”The assembly voted for you to travel with us to the sea,“ he notified them. ”That is, as long as you live like the Roma and do not violate any of our taboos.“ The Gypsies were poorer than ever. They did not have their wagons, which French soldiers had destroyed the year before in the circus fire, and their tents had been replaced by others even more ragged, but they did have horses, as well as forges, pots and pans, and a couple of carts for transporting their belongings. They had suffered want, but they were all together; not even a child had been lost. The only one who was looking bad was Rodolfo, who once had been able to lift a horse and now had symptoms of tuberculosis. Amalia had not changed at all, but Petrina had turned into a fine adolescent who no longer fit into the olive jar, however much she squeezed. She was promised to a distant cousin from another tribe, a youth she had never seen. The wedding would take place in summer, after the family of the groom paid the darro, money to compensate Petrina’s tribe for her loss. Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria were installed in the women’s tent. At first the chaperone was terrified, convinced that the Gypsies would kidnap the de Romeu girls and sell them as concubines to the Moors in North Africa. A whole week went by before she let the girls out of her sight, and still another before she spoke to Amalia, who was in charge of teaching them their Roma customs to prevent offensive breaches of etiquette. She provided them with full skirts, peasant blouses, and fringed scarves from the women’s shared wardrobe, all old and dirty but brightly colored, and in any case more comfortable, and warmer, than the pilgrim’s robes. The Roma believed that women are impure from waist to feet, so that showing any leg was a grave offense; they had to wash downstream, far from the men, especially during days they were menstruating. They were held to be inferior to males, to whom they owed submission. Isabel’s furious arguments had no effect; she, too, had to walk behind the men, never ahead, and she could not touch them because that would contaminate them. Amalia explained that they were always surrounded with spirits, whom they had to pacify with spells. Death was an unnatural event that infuriated the victim, which was why you had to watch out for the vengeance of the dead. Rodolfo clearly seemed to be ill, and that had the clan very worried, especially because recently he had heard the cry of several owls, an augury of death. They had sent messages to distant family members so they could come and say goodbye with the proper respect before he left for the world of spirits. If Rodolfo left unwillingly or with anger, he could be turned into a mulo. Just in case, they had made preparations for the funeral ceremony, even though Rodolfo himself mocked them, convinced that he would live several years more. Amalia taught the women to read the future in palms, in tea leaves, and in crystal balls, but none of the three gadjes showed any signs of being a true drabardi. On the other hand, they did learn the use of certain medicinal herbs, and how to cook Roma style. Nuria added to the tribe’s basic recipes vegetable stew, rabbit, venison, wild boar, porcupine her knowledge of Catalan food, with excellent results. The Roma decried cruelty to animals, killing only what they needed. There were a few dogs in the camp but no cats, for they too were thought to be impure. In the meantime, Diego had to resign himself to observing Juliana from afar; it was considered very bad manners to approach women without a specific purpose. He used the time he had formerly spent contemplating his beloved in learning to ride like a true Roma. He had grown up galloping across the vast plains of Alta California, and he was proud of his horsemanship until he saw the acrobatics of Pelayo and other men of the clan. By comparison, he was almost inept. No one in the world knew more about horses than these people. They not only raised them, they trained them and healed them if they were ill; like Bernardo, they were also able to communicate with them. No Gypsy used a whip; hitting an animal was considered the worst form of cowardice. Within a few weeks, Diego could slide down and touch the ground at a full gallop, bounce, flip in the air, and come down sitting backward in the saddle; he could jump from one horse to another, and also gallop standing on two, with nothing to hold on to but the reins. He tried to perform these feats in front of the women, or, more accurately, where Juliana could see him; that compensated a little for the frustration of being separated from her. Pelayo outfitted him in his clothes: knee-length trousers, high boots, full-sleeved blouse, leather jerkin, kerchief tied around his head which unfortunately revealed his ears and a musket slung over his shoulder. He looked so manly in his new sideburns, with his tanned skin and caramel eyes, that even Juliana admired him from afar. The tribe would camp for several days near a town, where the men offered their services in breaking horses or doing metalwork while the women read fortunes and sold their potions and curative herbs. Once that market was exhausted, they went on to the next town. At night they ate around the fire and then always told stories or had music and dance. When he wasn’t busy, Pelayo fired up the forge and worked on shaping a sword that he had promised to Diego, a very special weapon, better than any Toledo saber, he said; it was made from an alloy of metals, the secret of which was fifteen hundred years old and came from India. ”In olden times the weapons of heroes were tempered by plunging the blade, red hot from the forge, into the body of a prisoner of war,“ said Pelayo. ”I will be content if we temper mine in the river,“ Diego replied. ”It is the most precious gift I have ever received. I will call it Justine, because it will always serve just causes.“ Diego and his friends lived and traveled with the Roma until February. They had two brief encounters with the military, who lost no opportunity to exert authority and harass the Gypsies, but they did not pick up that there were non-Gypsies among the tribe. Diego deduced that no one was looking for them as far away as Barcelona, and decided that his idea of fleeing in the direction of the Atlantic had not been as absurd as it had at first seemed. They spent the worst part of the winter protected from the weather and the dangers of the road in the sheltering arms of the tribe, which took them in as they had never done before for gadjes. Diego did not have to defend the girls from the men because the thought of betrothal to any woman other than a Gypsy never entered their heads. They did not seem impressed with Juliana’s beauty, but they took notice when Isabel practiced fencing and strove to learn to ride like the men. During those weeks, our friends traveled across the remaining part of the Basque country and Galicia, and eventually found themselves at the gates of La Coruna. For sentimental reasons, Nuria asked to be allowed to go into Compostela to see the cathedral and kneel before the sanctuary. She had with time again become friends with the apostle, once she understood his twisted sense of humor. The entire tribe accompanied her. The city, with its narrow alleyways and passages, ancient houses, artisans’ shops, inns, taverns, plazas, and churches, spread out in concentric circles from the sepulcher, one of the spiritual hubs of Christianity. It was a bright day with a cloudless sky, invigoratingly cool. The cathedral, with its arches and slender spires, rose before them in all its millenary splendor, dazzling and proud. The Roma broke the calm hawking their trinkets, their various means of prognostication, and their potions to cure illness and revive the dead. In the meantime, Diego and his friends, like every traveler who reached Compostela, fell to their knees before the central portico of the basilica and placed their hands on the stone foundation. They had completed their pilgrimage; it was the end of a long road. They gave thanks to the apostle for having protected them, and asked him not to abandon them yet but help them cross the ocean safely. Before they had even finished, Diego noticed a man on his knees only a short distance away, praying with extravagant fervor. He knelt in profile, barely lighted by the many-colored reflections of the stained-glass windows, but even though it had been five years, Diego recognized him immediately. It was Galileo Tempesta. He waited until the sailor stopped beating his breast and crossing himself, and then went over to him. Tempesta turned, startled to see himself approached by a Gypsy with long sideburns and mustaches. ”It is I, Senor Tempesta, Diego de la Vega “

“Porca miser ia exclaimed the cook and, muscles bulging, lifted his old friend off the floor in an effusive embrace.

“Sssshhh! More respect, you are in a cathedral,” a monk scolded them.

They went outside, ecstatic, clapping each other on the back, not believing they had been lucky enough to run into each other, although that happenstance was easily explained. Galileo Tempesta was still working as cook on the Madre de Dios, and the ship was anchored in La Coruna harbor, loading on weapons to take to Mexico. Tempesta had used his time on shore to visit the saint and ask him to cure him of an unspeakable illness. In whispers he confessed that he had contracted a shameful illness in the Caribbean, a divine punishment for his sins, especially for having hacked his poor wife with a hatchet years before, an unforgivable outburst, it is true… though she deserved it. Only a miracle could cure him, he added.

“I don’t know whether the saint devotes himself to those kinds of miracles, Senor Tempesta, but it occurs to me that perhaps Amalia could help you.”

“Who is Amalia?”

“She is a drabardi. She was born with the gift of seeing others’ destinies, and of healing sickness. Her remedies are very effective.”

“God bless Santiago, who put her in my path. You see how miracles happen, young de la Vega?”

“And speaking of Santiago, whatever happened to Captain Santiago de Leon?” Diego inquired.

“He is still captain of the Madre de Dios, and more eccentric than ever, but he will be very happy to have news of you.”

“Perhaps not, because I am a fugitive ”

“Even more reason,” the cook interrupted. “What are friends for if not to offer a hand when a person is down on his luck.”

Diego led Tempesta to a corner of the plaza where several Gypsy women were selling fortunes and introduced him to Amalia, who listened to his confession and agreed to treat his malady for a steep price. Two days later, Galileo Tempesta arranged a meeting between Diego and Santiago de Leon in a tavern in La Coruna. As soon as the captain was convinced that this Gypsy was the lad who had been a passenger on his ship in 1810, he was eager to hear his story. Diego gave him a summary of his years in Barcelona and told him about Juliana and Isabel de Romeu.

“There is an order for the arrest of those poor girls. If they are captured, they will end up in prison or deported to the colonies.”

“What offense could those young women have committed?”

“None. They are victims of a heartless villain. Before he died, the girl’s father, Don Tomas de Romeu, asked me to take them to California and place them in the custody of my father, Don Alejandro de la Vega. Can you help us get to America, Captain?”

“I work for the government of Spain, young de la Vega. I cannot transport fugitives.”

“I know that you have done it before, Captain ”

“What, senor, are you insinuating?”

As answer, Diego opened his shirt and showed him the medallion of La Justicia that he always wore around his neck. Santiago de Leon studied the talisman for a few seconds and then for the first time Diego saw him smile. His avian features changed completely, and his tone grew soft as he recognized a brother. Although the secret society was temporarily inactive, both were forever bound by their oath to protect the persecuted. De Leon explained that his ship was scheduled to leave within a few days. Winter was not the best season for crossing the Atlantic, but summer was worse, when the hurricanes raged. He had urgent orders to transport his cargo of weapons to combat insurrection in Mexico: thirty cannons, a thousand muskets, and lead and gunpowder for a million rounds of ammunition. De Leon regretted that his profession, and economic necessity, forced him to that task, because he considered the struggle for independence to be legitimate. Spain, determined to recover its colonies, had sent ten thousand men to America. The royalist forces had retaken Venezuela and Chile in a crushing campaign of blood and atrocities. The Mexican insurrection had similarly been snuffed out. “If it were not for my loyal crew, who have been with me for many years and need this employ, I would leave the sea and devote myself exclusively to my maps,” the captain confided. They agreed that Diego and the women would steal aboard at night and stay hidden until the ship was on the high seas. No one other than the cap tain and Galileo Tempesta would know the identity of the passengers. Diego thanked him with all his heart, but the captain replied that he was merely fulfilling an obligation. Any member of La Justicia would do the same.

The week went by in preparations for the journey. The girls had to rip open their petticoats and take out the gold doubloons because they wanted to leave something to the Roma, who had treated them so well, and they also needed to buy clothing and other indispensables for the crossing. The handful of precious stones was again sewn into their petticoats. As the banker had told them, there was no better way to carry money in times of difficulty. The girls chose simple, practical clothes suitable for the life that awaited them, all black, because at last they could wear mourning for their father. There was not much to choose from in the modest port shops, but they bought a few articles of clothing and accessories on an English ship anchored there. For her part, Nuria had taken a liking to the Gypsies’ gaily colored garments during her time with them, but she, too, wanted to wear black for at least a year, in memory of her deceased master.

Diego and his friends said their goodbyes to the Roma tribe with heavy hearts, but without sentimentality, which would not have been welcomed among those people hardened by the habit of suffering. Pelayo gave Diego the sword he had forged for him, a perfect weapon, strong, flexible, and light, so well balanced that he could throw it up, watch it somersault in the air, and catch it by the hilt with no effort at all. At the last moment Amalia tried to give the pearl tiara back to Juliana, but she refused to take it, saying that she wanted Amalia to have it as a remembrance. “I don’t need that to remember you and your friends,” the Gypsy said with a nearly contemptuous gesture, but she kept it.

The four friends set sail one night in early March, a few hours after the port guards had come aboard to inspect the cargo and authorize the captain to weigh anchor. Galileo Tempesta and Santiago de Leon showed their charges to their assigned cabins. The ship had been refitted two years before and was in better shape than it had been on Diego’s first voyage; now on the poop deck there was space for four passengers in individual cabins on either side of the officers’ mess room. Each minute cabin had a wooden bed strung from the overhead by lines, a table, chair, and trunk, and a small armoire for clothing.

Those compartments were not commodious, but they offered privacy, the greatest luxury on a ship. The three women closed themselves in their cabins during the first twenty-four hours at sea without taking a bite, green with seasickness, sure that they would not survive the horror of rocking on the waves for weeks. As soon as they left the coast of Spain behind, the captain authorized the passengers to come out, but he ordered the girls to maintain a discreet distance from the sailors, to prevent any problems. He did not give any explanations to the crew, and they did not dare ask for them, but behind the captain’s back they muttered that it was not a good idea to bring women aboard.

On the second morning the de Romeu girls and Nuria, their nausea passed, came to life to the muted sounds of the bare feet of the sailors changing watch, and the aroma of coffee. By then they were used to the bells ringing every half hour. They washed with salt water and wiped away the salt with a cloth dampened in fresh water, then dressed and staggered out of their cabins. In the officers’ salon they found a rectangular table with eight chairs, where Galileo Tempesta had set out breakfast. Coffee sweetened with molasses and fortified with a dash of rum restored soul to body. Oats with the spicy scent of cinnamon and clove was served with an exotic American honey, courtesy of the captain. Through the half-open door they could see Santiago de Leon and his two young officers at the worktable, checking the lists of watches and the manifest of the provisions, wood, and water that would have to be distributed prudently until the next port of supply.

On the wall were a compass indicating the ship’s heading and a mercury barometer. On the table, in a beautiful mahogany box, was the chronometer, which Santiago de Leon cared for as if it were a religious relic. He greeted them with a brief good morning, showing no surprise at his guests’ mortal pallor. Isabel asked about Diego, and the captain pointed vaguely in the direction of the deck. “If young de la Vega hasn’t changed over the years, you will find him high up the mainmast or sitting on the figurehead. I don’t think he will be bored, but for you three this journey will be very long.” However, that was not the case; soon each woman found an occupation. Juliana devoted herself to embroidering and to reading the captain’s books, one after the other. In the first pages she found them boring, but then heroes and heroines were introduced, and thus wars, revolutions, and philosophical treatises acquired their own romance. She was free to invent ardent, star-crossed love affairs and choose the ending. She preferred the tragic ones, which made her weep more. Isabel found distraction in helping the captain reproduce his fantasy maps; once she proved her skill at drawing, she asked permission to sketch portraits of the crew. The captain eventually gave his consent, and she won over the sailors. She studied the mysteries of navigation, from the use of the sextant to the way to identify underwater currents by changes of color or the behavior of fish. She made drawings of the sailors’ many duties: caulking the deck seams with fiber oakum and tar, pumping the water that collected in the bilges, mending sail, repairing frayed line, oiling the masts with rancid fat, painting, scraping, and scrubbing decks. The crew worked every minute; only on Sunday was the routine relaxed and approval given to fish, whittle carvings, sew, tattoo, or pick fleas off one another. They stank like wild beasts because they rarely changed clothing, and they considered bathing to be dangerous to the health. They could not understand why the captain bathed once a week, and even less the mania of the four passengers for washing every day. The Madre de Dios was not ruled by the cruel discipline of ships of war: Santiago de Leon demanded respect without resorting to brutal punishments. He allowed games of cards and dice, which were prohibited on other ships, as long as money was not bet; he doubled the rum ration on Sundays; he was never behind in paying his men; and when they anchored in a port, he organized shifts so everyone would have time ashore. Although he had a cat-o‘-nine tails in a red pouch hanging in a visible spot, he had never used it. At most he sentenced men who broke rules to a few days without grog.

Nuria made her presence felt in the kitchen; in her opinion Galileo Tempesta’s dishes left much to be desired. Her culinary innovations, prepared with the usual limited ingredients, were celebrated by everyone from the captain down to the last ship’s boy. The chaperone quickly adjusted to the sickening odor of the provisions, especially the cheeses and salt meat, to cooking with murky water, and to the dead fish Galileo Tempesta laid on the sacks of biscuits to combat weevils.

When the fish were crawling with worms, he replaced them, and in that way kept the biscuits more or less weevil-free. Nuria learned to milk the two goats on board. They were not the only animals; there were also hens, ducks, and geese in cages, and a sow and her piglets in a pen, in addition to the sailors’ pets monkeys and parrots and the irreplaceable cats, without which rats would be lords and masters of the ship. Nuria discovered new ways to combine milk and eggs, so there was dessert daily. Galileo was a grouch, and he resented Nuria’s invasion of his territory, but she found the simplest way to resolve that problem. The first time Tempesta raised his voice to her, she popped him on the head with a cooking spoon and went back to stirring the stew. Six hours later, the crusty old Genoese proposed marriage.

He confessed that Amalia’s remedies were beginning to take effect and that he had saved nine hundred American dollars, enough to open a restaurant in Cuba and live like kings. He had been waiting eleven years to find the right woman, he said, and he didn’t care that Nuria was a little older than he was. Nuria did not dignify this with a reply.

Several sailors who had been on the ship during Diego’s first voyage did not recognize him until he won their handfuls of garbanzo beans playing cards. Time for sailors follows its own laws; the years pass by without leaving a trace on the smooth surfaces of sky and sea, which was why they were surprised that the boy who only yesterday had frightened them with stories of the living dead was today a man. Where had five years gone? It comforted them that even though he had grown and changed, he continued to enjoy their company. Diego spent a good part of the day working with them in duties around the ship, especially the sails, which fascinated him. Only at dusk did he disappear briefly into his stateroom to wash and dress like a caballero to join Juliana.

The sailors realized from the first day that Diego was in love with the girl, and although they sometimes made jokes, they observed his devotion with a mixture of nostalgia for something they would never have and curiosity about the outcome. Juliana to them was as unreal as a mythological siren. That unblemished skin, those liquid eyes, that ethereal grace could not be of this world.

Running with ocean currents and the mandate of the wind, the Madre de Dios headed south along the coast of Africa, passed the Canary Islands without stopping in, and reached Cape Verde to take on water and fresh food before initiating the crossing, which, depending on the weather, might take more than three weeks. It was there they learned that Napoleon Bonaparte had escaped from his exile on Elba and returned in triumph to France. Troops sent to block his march toward Paris had defected to his side, and he had regained power without firing a single shot while the court of Louis XVIII took refuge in Ghent and prepared to conquer Europe for the second time. On Cape Verde the travelers were welcomed by the local authorities, who presented a ball in honor of the captain’s daughters, which is how they introduced the de Romeu girls. Santiago de Leon thought that that would allay suspicions in case the arrest order had traveled that far. Many of the administrative officials were married to tall, proud, beautiful African women who appeared at the party dressed in spectacular finery. By comparison, Isabel looked like a wet dog, and even Juliana seemed nearly mousy. That first impression changed completely when, urged by Diego, she agreed to play the harp. A full orchestra was already providing music, but the moment she began to pluck the strings, a silence fell over the large salon. A couple of time honored ballads were all it took to enchant everyone there. For the rest of the evening, Diego had to stand in line with the other caballeros to win a dance.

Soon after the Madre de Dios unfurled her sails, leaving the island behind, two sailors appeared with a canvas-wrapped bundle and set it down in the officers’ salon: a gift from Captain Santiago de Leon for Juliana. “For you to calm the wind and waves,” he told her, whipping off the cloth with a gallant flourish. It was an Italian harp fashioned in the shape of a swan. From then on, every afternoon they carried the harp out to the deck, and she made the men weep with her melodies. She had a good ear and could play any song they hummed. Soon guitars, harmonicas, flutes, and improvised drums appeared to accompany her. The captain, who kept a violin hidden in his stateroom to console himself in secret during the long nights when the laudanum could not dull the pain of his bad leg, joined the group, and the ship filled with music.

They were in the middle of one of those concerts when the sea breezes brought to their nostrils a stench so nauseating that it could not be ignored. Moments later they glimpsed the silhouette of a ship in the distance. The captain got his spyglass to confirm what he already knew: it was a slave ship. There were two methods of transport among the slave traders, far dos prietos and far dos flojos. In the former, the “tight packers,” the captives were stacked like firewood, one atop another, bound with chains and covered in their own excrement and vomit, healthy mixed with sick, dying, and dead. Half of those Blacks died at sea, but when they arrived in port the traders “fattened” the survivors, and their sales compensated for losses; only the strongest reached their destiny or sold at a good price. The “loose packer” traders carried fewer slaves in more supportable conditions, so as not to lose too many during the crossing.

“That ship has to be far do prieto, that’s why you can smell it several leagues away,” said the captain.

“We have to help those poor people, Captain!” Diego exclaimed, horrified.

“I fear that La Justicia can do nothing in this case, my friend.”

“We are armed, we have a crew of forty. We can attack that ship and free the Blacks.”

“The traffic is illegal, and that cargo is contraband. If we approach, they will throw the chained slaves overboard so they sink to the bottom. And even if we could free them, they have no place to go. They were captured in their own country by African traffickers. Blacks sell other Blacks, didn’t you know that?”

During those weeks at sea, Diego regained some ground in the conquest of Juliana that he had lost during their time with the Gypsies, when they were required to be apart and never had a moment of privacy. It was that way on the ship as well, but there were always sunsets and other new sights when they went up on the quarterdeck to gaze at the sea, as lovers have done through the ages. At those moments Diego would slip his arm around the beauty’s shoulders or waist, very delicately, so as not to startle her. He liked to read love poems aloud not his, which were so mediocre that even he recognized it. He had had the foresight to buy some books in La Coruna before they sailed, which were very helpful. The sweet metaphors would mellow Juliana, preparing her for the moment he took her hand and held it in his. Nothing more than that, sadly. Kisses? Not to be considered.

Not for any lack of initiative on our hero’s part, but because Isabel, Nuria, the captain, and forty sailors never took their eyes off them.

Besides, Juliana did not facilitate little meetings behind a door, partly because there were very few doors on the ship, and also because she was not sure of her sentiments, even though she had lived beside Diego for months and there were no other suitors on the horizon. She had confided that much to her sister in the private conversations they had at night. Isabel kept her opinion to herself, since anything she said might tip the scales of love in Diego’s favor, which she did not want to encourage. In her way, Isabel had loved him since she was eleven, but that had no bearing on anything, since he had never suspected it. Diego continued to think of Isabel as a runny-nosed kid with four elbows and enough hair for two heads, even though her looks had improved over the years; she was fifteen now and looked slightly better than she had at eleven.

On several occasions, other ships could be seen in the distance, which the captain had the good sense to elude because there were many dangers on the high seas, from pirates to swift American brigantines searching for arms shipments. The United States needed every weapon they could get their hands on for the war against England. Santiago de Leon paid very little attention to the flag a ship was flying, as it was often changed to deceive the unwary; he determined her origin from other signs and prided himself on knowing all the ships that plied these routes.

Several winter storms shook the Madre de Dios during those weeks, but they were never a surprise; the captain could smell them before they were announced on the barometer. He would order his crew to shorten the sails, batten down anything loose, and lock up the animals. Within a few minutes the crew would be prepared, and when the wind came and the sea turned rough, everything on board was secured. The women had instructions to close themselves in their cabins to prevent a soaking or an accident. The seas swept over the decks, washing off anything in their path. It was easy to lose one’s footing and end up at the bottom of the Atlantic. After its dunking the ship would be clean, fresh, and smelling of wood; the sea and sky would clear, and the horizon would gleam like pure silver. Different fish would be stranded on the deck, and more than one ended up fried in Galileo and Nuria’s galley. The captain would take his readings and correct the course while the crew repaired minor damages and settled back into their daily routines. The rain collected in canvas awnings and drained into barrels allowed them the luxury of a good bath with soap, something impossible to do in salt water.

Finally they sailed into the waters of the Caribbean. They saw turtles, swordfish, translucent medusas with long tentacles, and gigantic squid. The weather seemed benign, but the captain was nervous. He could feel the change of pressure in his leg. The earlier brief storms had not prepared Diego and his friends for a true tempest.

They were on course to Puerto Rico and from there to Jamaica when the captain told them that they were running into a major challenge. The sky was clear and the sea was smooth, but within thirty minutes heavy black clouds had blotted out the sun, the air became sticky, and the rain came down in torrents. Soon the first lightning flashes split the sky and foam-crested waves rose all around them. The ship creaked, and the masts seemed close to being torn from their fittings. The men barely had time to furl the sails. The captain and the helmsmen tried to control the ship with four hands. Among the steersmen was a husky black man from Santo Domingo, hardened by twenty years at sea, who calmly chewed his tobacco as he struggled with the wheels, indifferent to the buckets of water blinding him. The ship would teeter on the crest of a monstrous wave and seconds later careen to the bottom of a watery abyss. With the buffeting, a pen opened, and one of the goats flew out like a comet and was lost in the sky. The sailors tied themselves down any way they could as they fought the storm; one slip meant sure death. The three women trembled in their cabins, sick with fear and nausea. Even Diego, who prided himself on having a stomach of iron, vomited, but he was not the only one; several members of the crew followed suit. He thought how ludicrous humankind was to dare defy the elements. The Madre de Dios was like a nut that might crack open at any instant.

The captain gave the order to secure the cargo, its loss would mean economic ruin. They withstood the tempest for two full days, and when finally it began to lessen, lightning struck the mainmast. The impact shook the ship like a whiplash. The tall, heavy mast swung back and forth a few minutes eternal for the terrified crew and finally broke off, plummeting with its sail and tangle of line into the sea, dragging with it two sailors who could not be saved. The ship sat listing to one side, in danger of foundering. The captain lurched about, shouting orders. Several sailors immediately came running with hatchets to cut the lines that joined the broken mast to the ship, a task made difficult by the tilting, slippery deck; the wind was buffeting them, the rain blinding them, and waves were washing over the deck. It took a good while, but they were able to free the mast, which floated away as the ship righted herself, rolling from side to side. There was no hope of rescuing the men, who were swallowed up in the black waves.

Finally the wind diminished and the seas were not running as high, but the rain and lightning continued the rest of that night. At dawn, with the light, they could take an inventory of the damages. In addition to the drowned sailors, many had cuts and contusions. Galileo Tempesta seemed to have broken an arm in a fall; the bone had not come through the skin, so the captain did not think he would have to amputate it. He gave the cook a double ration of rum and with Nuria’s help set the bones and stabilized the arm. The crew began pumping water from the bilge and redistributing the cargo while the captain went over the ship from stem to stern to evaluate their situation. The ship was so damaged that it was impossible to make repairs at sea. Since the storm had sent them off course, away from Puerto Rico and to the north, the captain decided that they could reach Cuba with their two masts and remaining sails.

The next days were spent making slow progress without the mainmast, taking on water through several breaches in the hull. Those seasoned sailors had gone through similar situations without losing heart, but when the word spread that it was the women that had brought on their trouble, murmurs began to circulate. The captain gave them a strong dressing down and was able to prevent a mutiny, but discontent was as strong as ever. None of the men thought of the harp concerts; they refused to eat Nuria’s food, and looked the other way when the girls came out on the deck to take the air. At night the ship limped along, heading toward Cuba through dangerous waters. Soon they saw sharks, blue dolphins, giant turtles, gulls, pelicans, and flying fish that dropped like rocks onto the deck, ready to be grilled by Tempesta. The warm breeze and the distant scent of ripe fruit announced the proximity of land.

At dawn, Diego went on deck to get some air. The sky was beginning to show tones of orange, and a veil of fog blurred the world’s outlines.

The ship’s lanterns were hazy in the misty air. The ship sailed softly between two low islets covered with mangrove, and except for the eternal creaking of the wood, everything was quiet. Diego stretched, breathed deeply to clear his head, and saluted the helmsman who was on his way to the bridge, then broke into a run as he did every morning to loosen his tight muscles. His bed was too short for him, and he slept with his knees drawn up; several turns around the deck at a trot served to stimulate his mind and loosen his stiff body. When he reached the bow he leaned over to pat the figurehead, a daily ritual he observed with superstitious punctuality. And that was when he saw something through the fog. It looked like a sailing ship, although he couldn’t be sure. At any rate, as it was close, he needed to advise the captain. Moments later Santiago de Leon came out of his cabin buttoning his trousers, spyglass in hand. One glance, and he raised the alarm and rang the bell, calling all hands, but it was too late: pirates were swarming up the sides of the Madre de Dios.

Diego could see the grappling hooks they were using to climb aboard but had no time to try to cut the ropes. He raced to the cabins on the poop deck, yelling warnings to Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria not to come out for any reason. He grabbed the sword Pelayo had made for him and prepared to defend them. The first attackers, holding their daggers between their teeth, reached the deck. The crew of the Madre de Dios poured out like rats from everywhere, armed with anything they could find, while the captain barked useless orders, for in an instant a battle royal was under way, and no one heard him. Diego and the captain, side by side, fought off a half dozen attackers, terrifying, bald devils marred by horrible scars, with daggers even in their boots, two or three pistols at their waist, and short cutlasses.

They roared like tigers, but they fought with more noise and courage than technique. No one man could stand up to Diego, but several were able to trap him. He broke out of that circle and wounded two of them.

He leaped up for the mizzen shrouds and climbed up the inside of the ratlines, then caught a running backstay and swung across the quarterdeck, all the while never losing sight of the women’s staterooms. The doors were frail and could be opened with one kick. He could only hope that none of the girls would stick her nose outside. He pushed off the pole, swung across the deck, made a formidable leap, and landed in front of a man who was calmly awaiting him, cutlass in hand.

Unlike the others, who were a scruffy crew, this man was dressed like a prince, entirely in black, with a yellow silk sash around his waist, fine lace collar and cuffs, high boots with gold buckles, a gold chain around his neck, and rings on several fingers. He was tall and smooth-shaven, with long, lustrous hair, expressive black eyes, and lips that lifted in a mocking smile that revealed snow-white teeth.

Diego took one quick admiring look but did not pause to establish who he was; from his attire and attitude, he had to be the leader of the pirates. This elegant fellow saluted Diego in French “En garde” and made his first thrust, which Diego avoided by only a hair’s breadth.

They crossed swords and after three or four minutes realized that they were cut from the same cloth, made to challenge one another. Both were excellent swordsmen. Despite the circumstances, they felt a secret pleasure in combating a rival of that stature, and without reaching an accord, each decided his opponent deserved a clean fight, even if it were to the death. The duel was almost a demonstration of the art; it would have filled Maestro Manuel Escalante with pride.

On the Madre de Dios, each man was fighting for his life. Santiago de Leon looked around and in one second evaluated the situation. The pirates were two or three times more numerous than his crew; they were well armed, they knew how to fight, and they had caught them by surprise. His men were peaceable merchant seamen. Several of them were already combing gray hair and dreaming of retiring from the sea and starting a family; it wasn’t fair for them to give their lives defending alien cargo. With a brutal effort the captain broke away from his attackers and in two leaps reached the bell to signal surrender. The crew obeyed and laid down their weapons in the midst of the triumphant yells of the pirates. Only Diego and his elegant adversary ignored the bell and fought on for a few minutes, until the former disarmed his competitor with a reverse stroke. Diego’s victory was shortlived, however, because in an instant he found himself in the center of a circle of swords so tight that some scratched his skin.

“Release him, but do not lose sight of him! I want him alive!” his rival ordered, and then greeted Santiago de Leon in perfect Spanish.

“Jean Lafitte, at your service, Captain.”

“So I feared, senor. It could only be the pirate Lafitte,” de Leon replied, wiping the sweat from his brow.

“Pirate, no, Captain. I have a privateer’s license issued in Cartagena, Colombia.”

“The same thing. What may we expect from you?”

“You may expect fair treatment. We do not kill, unless it cannot be helped, because we prefer a commercial arrangement. I propose that we deal with one another as caballeros. Your name, please.”

“Santiago de Leon, merchant seaman.”

“I am interested only in your cargo, Captain de Leon, which, if I am well informed, is weapons and ammunition.”

“What will happen to my crew?”

“You may use your longboats. With fair winds, you will reach the Bahamas or Cuba in a couple of days; it is all a matter of luck. Is there anything on board that might interest me, aside from weapons?”

“Books and charts,” replied Santiago de Leon.

That was the moment Isabel chose to come out of her cabin in her nightgown, barefoot, and with her father’s pistol in her hand. She had stayed inside, obeying Diego’s order, until the uproar on the deck and the sound of cannons quieted, then she could stem her anxiety no longer and had come out to see how the battle ended.

“Mortdieu! A beautiful lady,” Lafitte exclaimed when he saw her.

Isabel started with surprise and lowered her pistol; that was the first time anyone had ever used that adjective to describe her. Lafitte walked to within a step of her, bowed deeply, held out his hand, and she tamely handed him the gun.

“This complicates matters a little… How many passengers do you have on board?” Lafitte asked the captain.

“Two senoritas and their chaperone, all of whom are traveling with Don Diego de la Vega.”

“Very interesting.”

The two captains went to de Leon’s cabin to discuss the surrender, while on the deck two pirates detained Diego, with their pistols pointed at him, and the rest took possession of the ship. They ordered the vanquished sailors to lie facedown with their hands behind their heads, then searched the ship for booty. They consoled the wounded with rum and threw the dead overboard. They took no prisoners, it was too great a nuisance. Their own wounded were carefully loaded onto their boarding crafts and from there to the corsair. Meanwhile, Diego was planning how he might rescue the de Romeu girls. Even if he reached them, he could not imagine a way to escape. His enemies were a brutal lot; the idea that any of those men might touch the girls drove him mad. He must think coolly, because getting out of this predicament would require cunning and luck; his fencing skills would be of very little help.

Santiago de Leon, his officers, and the surviving crew bought their freedom with a quarter of their year’s pay, the usual fee in these cases. The sailors, as an alternative, were offered the opportunity to join Lafitte’s band, and some did. The privateer knew that the debt of the captain and his men would be paid. It was the honorable thing to do. If they did not, they would be scorned even by close friends. It was a clean and simple transaction. Santiago de Leon had to turn over his four passengers to Jean Lafitte, who planned to demand a ransom for them. The captain explained that the two girls were orphans and had no money, but the pirate decided to take them anyway because there was a great demand for white women in the prestigious bawdy houses of New Orleans. De Leon pleaded with him to respect the virtue of those girls who had suffered so much and did not deserve that horrible fate, but Lafitte explained that such considerations interfered with business, something he could not allow, and that anyway, being a courtesan was a very pleasant fate for most women. The captain was demoralized as he left the meeting. He didn’t care that he was losing the weapons on the contrary, one of the reasons he had surrendered so quickly had been the desire to rid himself of that cargo but he was horrified at the thought that the de Romeu girls, whom he had become truly fond of, would end up in a brothel. He had to inform his passengers of the fate that awaited them, clarifying that the only one with any hope of emerging unharmed was Diego de la Vega, because surely his father would do whatever necessary to save him.

“My father will also pay the ransom for Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria as long as no one lays a finger on them! We will immediately send a letter to California,” Diego assured Lafitte, but the minute he said it he felt a strange pressure in his chest, like a bad presentiment.

“The mail is very slow, so you will be my guests for some weeks, perhaps months, until we receive the ransom. In the meantime, the girls will be respected. For the good of all, I hope that your father does not have to be begged to answer,” the pirate replied, never taking his eyes off Juliana.

The women, who barely had time to dress, nearly swooned when they saw all the blood on the bridge, the wounded, and especially the horrible band of cutthroats. Juliana, however, was not only shivering with horror, as one might have thought, but also from the effect of Jean Lafitte’s gaze.

The pirates maneuvered their schooner alongside, placed planks between the bridges, and formed a human chain to transport the light bounty between ships, including animals, barrels of beer, and hams. They were not in a hurry; the Madre de Dios now belonged to Lafitte. Captain de Leon impassively witnessed the operation, but his heart was racing; he loved his ship as he would love a bride.

Fluttering on the enemy mainmast, beside the flag of Colombia, was another, red, called the jolie rouge; it indicated that the ship freed captives for a price. That calmed the captain a little; he knew the corsair would allow him to save his crew after all. A black pennant, which sometimes carried a skull and crossbones, would have signaled the intention to fight to the last man, and to massacre adversaries.

Once the cargo had been transferred, Lafitte kept his word and authorized Santiago de Leon to supply the longboats with fresh water and provisions, to take his instruments, without which he would not have been able to navigate, and to load on his crew. At that moment, Galileo Tempesta, who using the pretext of his broken arm had managed to remain hidden during the battle, emerged and was one of the first to get into the boats. The captain told Diego goodbye with a firm handshake and kissed the women’s hands with the promise that they would see each other again. He wished them luck and got into one of the boats without a backward look. He did not want to see the spectacle of the Madre de Dios, which had been his only home for three decades, taken away by the pirates.

On the pirate ship, which was loaded to the gunnels, it was difficult to move about. Lafitte was never at sea for more than a couple of days, and for that reason he could pack a crew of a hundred and fifty into a space that normally accommodated no more than thirty. His headquarters were on Grand Island near New Orleans, in the swampy region of Barataria. He sat there until his spies reported the proximity of a possible prey, then sprang to life. He used the cover of fog or darkness of night, when ships trimmed their sails or anchored, and attacked with speed and stealth. Surprise was always his greatest advantage. He used his cannons to intimidate more than to sink an enemy ship; if the ship stayed afloat, he could incorporate her into his fleet, which was composed of thirteen brigantines and assorted schooners, pinnaces, and feluccas.

Jean and his brother Pierre were the most feared corsairs on the seas, but on dry land they could pass for businessmen. The governor of New Orleans, weary of the Lafittes’ smuggling, slave trafficking, and other illegal activities, had put a price of five hundred dollars on their heads. Jean responded by offering fifteen hundred for the head of the governor. That was the culmination of a long hostility. Jean had escaped, but Pierre was held prisoner for months. Grand Island was attacked and all its contraband requisitioned. However, the situation had changed when the Lafittes became allies of the American troops.

General Andrew Jackson had come to New Orleans at the head of a ragtag, malaria-riddled contingent of men with the assignment to defend the vast Louisiana territory against the English. He could not allow himself the luxury of rejecting the aid offered by the pirates. Those bandits, a mixture of black, brown, and white men, became essential to the battle. Jackson confronted the enemy on January 8, 1815 three months before our friends, against their will, came to that region. The war between England and the United States had ended two weeks before, but neither side was aware of that. With a handful of men of various origins, who did not even share a common language, Jackson routed an organized and well-armed English army of twenty thousand. While the men were killing each other in Chalmette, a few leagues from New Orleans, women and children were praying in the Convent of the Ursulines. At the end of the battle, when the bodies were counted, it was found that England had lost two thousand men, while Jackson left only thirteen soldiers on the field. The bravest and most ferocious fighters had been the Creoles, or free men of color, and the pirates. Some days later they celebrated the triumph with arches of flowers and white-gowned damsels from every state of the Union, who crowned General Jackson with a laurel wreath. In the crowd were the Lafitte brothers with their pirates, who had been promoted from outlaws to heroes.

During the forty hours Lafitte’s boat had taken to reach Grand Island, Diego de la Vega was kept in bonds on the deck, and the three women confined to a small cabin beside the captain’s. Pierre Lafitte, who had not taken part in the attack upon the Madre de Dios because he had been left in charge of the pirate ship, turned out to be a very different man from his brother, rougher, more robust, more brutal; unlike his brother, he had light hair, and one side of his face had been paralyzed by a stroke. He liked to eat and drink to excess, and when he saw a young woman, he had to have her. He refrained from molesting Juliana and Isabel, however, because his brother reminded him that business is more important than pleasure. Those girls would bring a good sum of money. Jean veiled his early years in mystery no one knew where he had come from but he confessed to being thirty-five. He was smooth in his dealings and had exquisite manners; he spoke several languages, among them French, Spanish, and English, and he loved music and gave great sums of money to the New Orleans opera. Despite his success with women, he did not just take what he wanted, like Pierre; he preferred to court them with patience. He was gallant, jovial, a fine dancer and teller of tales, most of them invented as he went along. His sympathy for the American cause was legendary; his captains knew that “anyone who attacks an American ship dies.” Under his command he had three thousand men who called him boss, and he moved millions in merchandise on barges and pirogues along the intricate channels of the Mississippi Delta. No one knew that region as well as he and his men; authorities could not control them or capture them.

They sold the gains of their piracy only a few leagues from New Orleans, at an ancient sacred site of the Indians called the Temple.

Plantation owners, rich and not so rich Creoles, even relatives of the governor, bought anything they saw at a reasonable price and in a festive atmosphere, and without paying taxes. That was also the place where they auctioned slaves bought on the cheap in Cuba and sold for high prices in the United States, where traffic in Blacks was illegal though slavery was not. Lafitte advertised his sales in posters on every street corner: “Come One, Come All, to Jean Lafitte’s Slave Auction at the Temple! Clothing, Jewels, Furniture, and Other Articles from the Seven Seas!”

On the ship, Jean had invited his three female hostages to share a small meal on the deck, but they refused to leave their cabin. He sent them a tray of cheeses, cold meats, and a good bottle of Spanish wine from the Madre de Dios, with his respectful greetings. Juliana could not get the man out of her head and was dying with curiosity to know him, but thought it more prudent to stay inside.

Diego spent those forty hours in the open, tied up like a sausage, without food. The pirates took his La Justicia medallion and what few coins he had in his pocket; they gave him a little water from time to time and a kick or two if he seemed too active. Jean Lafitte approached him a couple of times to assure him that once they were on his island he would be more comfortable, and to beg him to forgive his men’s rough manners. They were not used to dealing with refined people, he said. Diego had to swallow the sarcasm, muttering to himself that sooner or later he would cut that reprobate down to size.

The important thing now was to stay alive. Without him the two de Romeu girls would be lost. He had heard of the orgies of alcohol, sex, and blood the pirates threw in their lairs when they returned triumphant from their villainy, of how unfortunate women prisoners suffered terrible abuse, of the raped and mutilated bodies buried in the sand during those bacchanals. He tried not to think of those things, only of how to escape, but he was tormented by those images.

Besides, he could not lose that uncomfortable presentiment he had felt earlier. It had something to do with his father, of that he was certain. It had been weeks since he had communicated with Bernardo, and he decided to use those tedious hours to attempt it. He concentrated on calling his brother, but telepathy was not something they could summon at will; messages came and went following no fixed pattern and without the control of either of them. That long silence between Bernardo and him, so rare, seemed a very bad omen. He wondered what was going on in Alta California and what could have happened to Bernardo and his parents.

Grand Island in Barataria, where the Lafittes had their empire, was large, humid, flat, and, like the rest of the region, distinguished by an aura of mystery and decadence. That capricious and hot climate, which swung between bucolic calm and devastating hurricanes, invited grand passions. Everything decayed rapidly, from vegetation to human souls. In moments of good weather, like that that welcomed Diego and his friends, a warm breeze carried the heavy, sweet scent of orange blossoms, but as soon as the breeze ceased, a sweltering heat descended. The pirates put their prisoners ashore and escorted them to Jean Lafitte’s residence on a promontory surrounded with a forest of palm trees and twisted live oaks, with leaves burned by salt spray. The pirates’ town, protected from the wind by a thicket of shrubs, could barely be seen through the leaves. Oleanders provided notes of color.

Lafitte’s home was two stories high, Spanish style, with latticework at the windows and a broad terrace facing the sea. The house was constructed of brick covered with a mixture of plaster and ground oyster shells. The farthest thing from a cave, as the prisoners had expected, it was clean, organized, even luxurious. The rooms were large and cool, and the views from its balconies were spectacular; the light wooden floors shone, the walls had been freshly painted, and on every table were vases of flowers, trays of fruit, and carafes of wine.

A pair of black slave girls took the women to their rooms. For Diego they produced a pitcher of water for washing up; they gave him coffee, then led him to a veranda where Jean Lafitte, accompanied by two brightly colored parrots, was resting in a red hammock, strumming a stringed instrument with his gaze lost on the horizon. Diego judged that the contrast between the man’s evil reputation and his refined behavior could not be more startling.

“You may choose between being my prisoner and being my guest, Senor de la Vega. As my prisoner you have the right to try to escape, and I have the right to prevent you in any way I can. As my guest you will be treated well until we receive your father’s ransom, but you will be obliged by the laws of hospitality to respect my house and my instructions. Do we understand one another?”

“Before I answer, senor, I must know your plans regarding the de Romeu sisters, who are in my charge,” Diego replied.

“They were, senor; they no longer are. Now they are in my charge. Their fate depends on your father’s response.”

“If I agree to be your guest, how will you know that I will not try to escape anyway?”

“Because you would not do that without the de Romeu girls, and because you will give me your word of honor,” the pirate replied.

“You have it, Captain Lafitte,” said Diego, resigned.

“Very well. Please, join me within the hour to dine with your friends. I believe that you will not be disappointed with my cook.”

In the meantime, Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria were going through some upsetting experiences. Several men had brought tubs to their room and filled them with water; then three young slave girls appeared, equipped with soap and brushes; they were under the direction of a tall, beautiful woman with sculpted features and long neck, a large turban gave her another hand span of height. She introduced herself in French as Madame Odilia and clarified that she was the person who ran the house of Lafitte. She told the prisoners to take off their clothes, that they were going to be bathed. None of the three had ever bathed naked in their lives; they had always washed with great modesty beneath a light cotton tunic. The fuss Nuria kicked up provoked an attack of the giggles in the slave girls, and the madame of the turban dryly commented that no one dies from taking a bath. That sounded reasonable to Isabel, so she took off everything she was wearing. Juliana imitated her, covering her private parts with both hands. This brought on new giggles from the Africans, who compared their own mahogany color with that of this girl who was white as the dining room china. Nuria was another matter. To get her clothes off, she had to be held down, and her screams shook the walls. The young slaves put the women in the tubs and lathered them from head to toe. After the first shock, what they had thought would be an ordeal proved to be not really so bad, and soon Juliana and Isabel began to enjoy it. The slaves took away their clothes without explanation and brought back rich brocade gowns, badly suited for the warm climate. They were in good condition, but it was evident that they had been worn; one had bloodstains on the hem. What had happened to the former wearer? Was she, too, a prisoner? Better not to think of her fate, or the fate that awaited them. Isabel deduced that the haste to get them out of their clothes was in response to specific instructions from Lafitte, who wanted to be sure that they had nothing hidden beneath their skirts. They had prepared for that eventuality.

Diego decided to take advantage of the conditional freedom he had been granted by the corsair, and went out to reconnoiter the grounds in the hour before dinner. The pirate town was made up of vagabonds from every corner of the globe. Some were living with their women and children in palm-thatched huts, though bachelors moved about without a place of their own. Good French and Creole food was available, along with bars, brothels, and artisan’s shops. Those men of many races, languages, creeds, and customs had in common a fierce love of liberty, but they accepted the laws of Grand Island because they seemed reasonable and the system was democratic. Everything was decided by vote; they even had the right to elect and remove their captains. The rules were clear: anyone who molested another man’s woman ended up marooned on a waterless island with one flagon of water and a loaded pistol; theft was disciplined with a lashing, and murder with hanging.

There was no blind submission to a leader, except on shipboard during action, but everyone had to obey the rules or pay the consequences. At one time they had been criminals, adventurers, or deserters from warships; they had always been outsiders, and now they were proud to belong to a community. Only the most capable went to sea; the others worked in smithies, cooked, cared for the stock, repaired ships and small boats, built houses, fished. Diego saw women and children as well as men who were ill or had amputated limbs, and realized that veterans of battles, orphans, and widows were given protection. If a sailor lost a leg or arm at sea, he was compensated in gold. Booty was shared equally among the men, and some was given to widows; the rest of the women mattered very little. They were prostitutes, slaves, captives from assaults, and a few courageous free women not many who had come there of their own will.

On the beach, Diego came across a score of drunks who were punching each other for the pure joy of fighting and chasing after women in the light of bonfires. He recognized several of the crew from the ship that had destroyed the Madre de Dios, and wondered if this was not his opportunity to get back the La Justicia medallion that one of them had taken from him.

“Senores! Listen up!” he yelled.

He gained the attention of the least intoxicated, and they formed a circle around him while the women used the distraction to pick up their clothes and run. Diego looked around at the puffy faces, the bloodshot eyes, the toothless mouths cursing him, the claws reaching for daggers.

He did not give them time to organize.

“I want to have a little fun. Do any of you dare fight me?” he asked.

An enthusiastic chorus answered him, and the circle around Diego tightened; he could smell their sweat and the alcohol, tobacco, and garlic on their breaths.

“One at a time, please. I will begin with the hero who has my medallion; then I will whip each of you, one by one. How does that sound?”

Several pirates fell on their backs in the sand, weak with laughter.

The others consulted among themselves, and finally one opened his filthy shirt and showed Diego the medallion, more than ready to fight this sissified man with woman’s hands who still smelled of his mother’s milk, as he put it. Diego said he wanted to be sure that it was in fact his medallion. The man took it from his neck and dangled it before Diego’s nose.

“Don’t take your eyes off that medallion, friend, because if you are careless for an instant, I will have it.”

The pirate immediately pulled a curved dagger from his waistband and shook off the alcohol fumes, while the others stood back to give them room. The villain threw himself toward Diego, who was waiting with his feet planted firmly in the sand. It was not for nothing that he had learned La Justicia’s secrets. As his opponent rushed him, he made three simultaneous moves: he blocked the hand with the dagger, stepped to one side and crouched, and, using the other man’s momentum, pushed up and flipped the pirate over his back. As soon as he hit the ground, Diego stepped on his wrist and wrested the dagger from his hand. Then he turned toward the spectators with a small bow. “Where is my medallion?” he asked, looking at the pirates one by one. He approached the tallest of them, who was standing a few steps away, and accused him of having hidden it. The man unsheathed his knife, but Diego stopped him with a gesture and told him to take off his cap, because that was where he would find it. Nonplussed, the man obeyed.

Diego reached into the cap and pulled out his jewel. Surprise paralyzed the others, who didn’t know whether to laugh or attack, until they opted for the behavior most appropriate to their temperaments: to give this upstart a good lesson.

“All of you against one? Doesn’t that seem a bit cowardly?” Diego challenged, whirling with knife in hand, ready to leap.

“This caballero is right; that would be cowardice unworthy of you,” came a voice from behind him.

It was Jean Lafitte, amiable and smiling, with the look of a man out for a walk but with his hand on his pistol. He took Diego by one arm and calmly walked away. No one tried to stop them.

“That medallion must be very valuable if you are willing to risk your life for it,” Lafitte commented.

“My grandmother gave it to me on her deathbed,” Diego joked. “With this I can buy my freedom and that of my friends, Captain.”

“I’m afraid it isn’t worth that much.”

“Our ransom may come, and it may not. California is a long way away, and something could happen to our message. If you will allow me, I will go to New Orleans to gamble. I will bet the medallion and win enough to pay for our ransom.”

“And if you lose?”

“In that case, I would have to wait for my father’s money, but I never lose in cards.”

The pirate laughed. “You are an original, all right. I think we have a lot of things in common.”

That night Justine, the beautiful sword Pelayo had made for Diego, was returned to him, along with the trunk containing his clothing, saved from going down with the ship by the greed of a pirate who could not open it but had brought it with him, thinking it contained something of value. The three hostages dined with Lafitte, who looked very elegant, all in black, cleanly shaved and hair recently curled. Diego thought that by comparison his Zorro cape and mask were rather sad-looking; he needed to copy some ideas from the corsair, like the sash and the full sleeves of the shirt. Their meal was a parade of dishes influenced by Africa, the Caribbean, and the Cajuns, the latter being what the immigrants from Canada were called: crab gumbo, red beans and rice, fried oysters, turkey roasted with nuts and raisins, fish with various spices, and the best wines stolen from French galleons, which the host barely tasted. A young black boy was pulling the rope of a cloth fan above the table, meant to stir the air and keep away flies, and on a balcony three musicians were playing an irresistible blend of Caribbean rhythms and slave songs. Silent as a shadow, Madame Odilia stood in the doorway, directing the slave serving girls with her eyes.

For the first time Juliana saw Jean Lafitte at close quarters. When the pirate bent to kiss her hand, she knew that the long journey of recent months that had led her here was at last over. She discovered why she had not wanted to marry any of her suitors; she had rejected Rafael Moncada so many times that he was crazed, and had not responded to Diego’s advances in five years. She had waited her entire lifetime for what her romantic novels described as “Cupid’s arrow.” How else could she describe this sudden love? It was an arrow in her breast, a sharp pain, a wound. (Forgive me, dear readers, for this ridiculous euphemism, but cliches contain great truths.)

Lafitte’s dark gaze sank into the green water of her eyes, and his long-fingered hand took hers. Juliana stumbled as if she were going to fall, nothing new she tended to lose her balance with strong emotion.

Isabel and Nuria believed it was fear at meeting the corsair the symptoms were similar but Diego understood immediately that something irrevocable had changed his destiny. Compared to Lafitte, Rafael Moncada and all Juliana’s other suitors were pesky insects. Madame Odilia, too, noted the corsair’s effect on Juliana, and like Diego, she intuited the gravity of what had happened.

Lafitte led them to the table, and sat at its head to conduct polite conversation. Juliana stared at him, hypnotized, but he purposely ignored her, so much so that Isabel wondered if their host had a problem. Perhaps he had lost his manhood in a battle; these things happened a stray musket ball or a blow and the most interesting part of a man could be reduced to a dried fig. There was no other explanation for his indifference toward her sister.

“We appreciate your hospitality, Senor Lafitte,” Diego said, figuring that he had to get Juliana out of there as quickly as possible. “Even if it is forced upon us. However, it does not seem to me that this community of pirates is an appropriate place for these senoritas.”

“What other solution do you suggest, Senor de la Vega?”

“I have heard of an Ursuline convent in New Orleans. The senoritas can wait there until we receive news from my father ”

“I would rather die than live with those nuns,” Juliana interrupted, with a vehemence they had never known. “I am not leaving here!”

Every eye turned toward her. She was red, feverish, sweating beneath the heavy brocade dress. Her expression left no room for doubt: she was prepared to kill anyone who tried to separate her from her pirate.

Diego opened his mouth, but he did not know what to say, so he closed it, defeated. Jean Lafitte interpreted Juliana’s outburst as the message he desired and feared, almost as a caress. He had tried to stay aloof from the girl, repeating to himself what he always said to his brother Pierre business before pleasure but apparently she was as taken as he was. That devastating attraction confused him, as he prided himself on thinking coolly. He was not an impulsive man, and beautiful women were not new to him. He preferred quadroons, famous for their grace and beauty and trained to satisfy a man’s most secret whims. White women to him had always seemed arrogant and complicated; they were often ill, they didn’t know how to dance, and they were rather useless when it came to making love they did not even like to take their hair down. However, this young Spanish woman with the cat eyes was different. She could hold her own in beauty when compared to the most celebrated Creoles in New Orleans, and it seemed that her limpid innocence did not interfere with a passionate heart. He veiled a sigh, trying not to lose himself in the traps of his imagination.

The rest of the evening went by as if they were all sitting on beds of nails. Conversation was painful. Diego was watching Juliana, she was watching Lafitte, and the rest of the guests were staring at their plates with great attention. The heat inside the house was suffocating, and at the end of the meal the corsair invited them to have a cool drink on the terrace. There a palm fan hung from the ceiling, moved fitfully by a young black slave. Lafitte picked up his guitar and began to sing in a musical, agreeable voice, until Diego announced that they were all exhausted and needed to retire. Juliana sent him a lethal glance but did not dare argue.

No one in the house slept. The night, with its concert of frogs and distant sound of drums, dragged on at a sluggish pace. Unable to contain herself any longer, Juliana confessed her secret to Nuria and Isabel in Catalan, so the slave girl attending them would not understand.

“Now I know what love is. I want to marry Jean Lafitte,” she said.

“Blessed Virgin, save us from such misfortune,” Nuria whispered, crossing herself.

“You are his prisoner, not his sweetheart. How do you plan to resolve that small dilemma?” Isabel asked, rather jealous; she too was quite impressed by the corsair.

“I will do anything. I cannot live without him,” her sister replied, her eyes as wild as a madwoman’s.

“Diego is not going to like that.”

“What does Diego have to do with it? My father must be whirling in his grave, but I don’t care!” Juliana exclaimed.

Helpless, Diego witnessed the transformation of his beloved. Juliana appeared on the second day of captivity on Barataria smelling of soap, with her hair down her back; she was wearing a filmy dress, obtained from the slaves, that revealed her every charm. That was how she presented herself the next day at noon, where Madame Odilia had set out a bountiful lunch. Jean Lafitte was waiting for her, and judging by the gleam in his eyes, there was no doubt that he preferred that informal style to the European mode so ill suited to the climate. Again he kissed her hand, but much more intensely than the night before. The servants brought fruit juices cooled with ice that had been brought downriver in boxes filled with sawdust from distant mountains on the mainland, a luxury only the rich could afford. An excited and talkative Juliana, who ‘was usually a light eater, drank two glasses of the iced beverage and tried everything she saw on the table. Diego’s and Isabel’s hearts were heavy as Juliana and Lafitte chatted almost in whispers. They could capture something of the conversation, and realized that Juliana was exploring the terrain, testing weapons of seduction she had never had occasion to use. She was telling the pirate, with smiles and fluttering eyelashes, that she and her sister would not find certain amenities unwelcome. To begin with, a piano and music scores, some books, preferably novels and poetry, and also summer clothing. Her belongings were all lost, and whose fault was that? she asked with a little pout. She also wanted to be free to take a stroll and to enjoy a little privacy: the constant vigilance of the slave girls bothered her. “And, by the way, Senor Lafitte, I must tell you that I abominate slavery; it is an inhuman practice.” He answered that if they walked around the island alone, they would run into vulgar people who did not know how to treat damsels as delicate as she and her sister. He added that the role of the slaves was not to watch them, but to wait on them and frighten away the mosquitoes, rats, and snakes that made their way into the rooms.

“Give me a broom and I will take care of those problems myself,” she replied with an irresistible smile that Diego had never seen.

“In respect to your other requests, senorita, perhaps we will find what you need in my bazaar. After siesta, when it is a little cooler, we will all go to the Temple.”

“We have no money, but I suppose that you will pay, since you have brought us here against our will,” she replied coquettishly.

“It will be an honor, senorita.”

“You may call me Juliana.”

From a corner of the room, Madame Odilia had followed this flirtatious exchange as attentively as Diego and Isabel. Her presence suddenly reminded Jean Lafitte that he could not continue down that dangerous road, he had inescapable obligations. Drawing strength from he knew not where, he determined to be frank with Juliana. He waved over the beautiful woman in the turban and whispered something in her ear. She disappeared for a few minutes and returned carrying a small bundle.

“Juliana, Madame Odilia is my mother-in-law, and this is my son Pierre,” Lafitte explained, pale as death.

Diego uttered a cry of joy and Juliana one of horror. Isabel stood, and Madame Odilia showed her what she held. Unlike most women, who tend to melt at the sight of a baby, Isabel did not like children; she preferred dogs, but she had to admit that this little one was attractive. He had his father’s eyes and turned-up nose.

“I did not know that you were married, Senor Pirate,” Isabel commented.

“Privateer,” Lafitte corrected.

“Senor Privateer, then. May we meet your wife?”

“I am afraid not. I myself have not been able to visit her for several weeks. She is weak and can see no one.”

“What is her name?”

“Catherine Villars.”

“Forgive me, I feel very tired,” whispered Juliana, near fainting.

Diego pulled back her chair and led her out with an air of sympathy, though he was jubilant at the turn of events. What fabulous luck! Now Juliana had no choice but to reevaluate her feelings. Not only was Lafitte an old man of thirty-five, a womanizer, a criminal, a smuggler, and slave trafficker, all of which a girl like Juliana might easily excuse, but he had a wife and a child. “Thank you, God!” He could not ask for more.

Nuria spent all the afternoon applying cool cloths to Juliana’s fevered brow, while Diego and Isabel accompanied Lafitte to the Temple. Four men rowed them through a labyrinth of foul-smelling swamps, where they saw dozens of alligators and drowsy water snakes sunning themselves on the banks. With the heat, Isabel’s hair went in every direction, kinky and thick as mattress stuffing. The channels all looked the same; the land was flat, with not even a hillock to serve as reference in the high grass. The trees sank roots into the water and had wigs of moss hanging from their branches. The pirates knew every turn, every tree, every rock in that nightmarish landscape, and rowed without a moment’s hesitation. When they reached the Temple, they saw the barges the pirates used to transport merchandise, along with the pirogues and rowboats of clients, although most had come by land on horseback or in shiny carriages. The cream of society had arranged to meet there, from aristocrats to dusky-skinned courtesans. The slaves had set up tents so their masters could rest and eat and drink while the ladies wandered through the bazaar examining the merchandise. The pirates called out their wares: China silk, Peruvian silver pitchers, Viennese furniture, jewels from every part of the world, sweets, articles for the toilette that fair had everything, and bargaining was part of the entertainment.

Pierre Lafitte was already there, holding a teardrop lamp in his hand and proclaiming at the top of his lungs that all prices were reduced:

“Take it away, messieurs, mesdames, you won’t have another opportunity like this.” With the arrival of Jean and his companions, murmurs of curiosity spread through the crowd. Several women came up to the attractive privateer, mysterious beneath their gay parasols, among them the wife of the governor. The caballeros focused their attention on Isabel, amused by her wild mane, reminiscent of the Spanish moss on the trees. Among the whites there were two men for every woman, and any new face was welcome, even one as unusual as Isabel’s. Jean made the introductions, without a word about how he had obtained these new “friends,” and immediately set off to look for the things Juliana had listed, even though he knew that no gift could console her for the blow she had received when he broke the news about Catherine so brutally.

He’d had no other choice; he had to nip that mutual attraction in the bud before it destroyed both of them.

On Barataria, Juliana lay on her bed, sunk in a morass of humiliation and wild love. Lafitte had wakened a diabolical flame in her, and now she had to fight with all her will against the temptation to woo him away from Catherine Villars. The only solution that occurred to her was to enter the Convent of the Ursulines and end her days tending smallpox patients in New Orleans; at least that way she could breathe the same air her man breathed. She could never face anyone again. She was confused, embarrassed, restless, as if a million ants were crawling under her skin; she sat down, she paced, she lay on the bed, she twisted and turned beneath the sheets. She thought of the baby, little Pierre, and wept some more. “There’s nothing so bad it lasts a hundred years, my child; this madness will have to pass. No one in her right mind falls in love with a pirate,” Nuria consoled her. Madame Odilia arrived to ask about the senorita, with a tray of sherry and cookies.

Juliana welcomed this as her one opportunity to get details, and so, swallowing her pride and her tears, she asked her first question.

“Can you tell me, madame, is Catherine a slave?”

“My daughter is free, as I am. My mother was a queen in Sene gal, and there I would have been a queen also. My father, and the father of my children, were white, owners of sugar plantations in Santo Domingo. We had to escape during the revolt of the slaves,” Madame Odilia replied proudly.

“I understand that whites cannot marry people of color,” Juliana insisted.

“White men marry white women, but we are their real wives. We do not need the blessing of a priest; love is enough. Jean and Catherine love one another.”

Juliana burst into tears again. Nuria pinched her to signal that she should control herself, but that only added to the girl’s misery. She asked Madame Odilia if she could see Catherine, thinking that if she did, she would have reason to resist the assault of love.

“That is not possible. Drink your sherry, senorita, it will do you good.” And with that she turned and left.

Juliana, burning with thirst, drank down the sherry in four gulps.

Moments later she fell onto the bed and slept thirty-six hours without moving. The drugged wine did not cure her passion, but as Madame Odilia had expected, it gave her courage to face the future. She awoke with aching bones, but her mind was clear, and she was resolved to renounce Lafitte.

The privateer had similarly decided to tear Juliana from his heart, and to look for somewhere other than his home for the sisters to stay, somewhere her nearness could not torment him. Juliana avoided him; she did not come to meals but he could sense her through the walls. He thought he saw her silhouette in a corridor, heard her voice on the terrace, smelled her scent, but it was only a shadow, a bird, an aroma on the sea breeze. Like a caged animal, his senses were always raw, seeking her. The Convent of the Ursulines, which Diego had suggested, was a bad idea. It would be the same as condemning her to prison. He knew several Creole women in New Orleans who could put her up, but there was always the danger that her situation as a hostage would come out. If that reached the ears of the American authorities, he would be in serious trouble. He could bribe a judge, but not the governor; a slip on his part and there would be a price on his head again. He contemplated the possibility of forgetting the ransom and shipping his captives to California immediately; that would get him out of the mess he was in, but to do that he needed his brother Pierre’s consent, as well as that of other captains and all the pirates; that was the drawback of a democracy. He thought of Juliana, comparing her to the sweet and submissive Catherine, the girl who had been his wife since she was fourteen, and now was the mother of his son. Catherine deserved his unconditional love. He missed her. Only their prolonged separation could explain his enchantment with Juliana; if he were sleeping in his wife’s arms this would never have happened. After the birth of the boy, Catherine had wasted away. Madame Odilia had left her in the care of some African healers in New Orleans. Lafitte had not opposed it because her physicians had given her up for lost. A week after the birth, when Catherine was burning with fever, Madame Odilia insisted that her daughter was under the spell of the evil eye cast by a jealous rival, and that the only remedy was magic. Madame and Jean had taken Catherine, who was not strong enough to stand, to consult Marie Laveau, a high priestess of voodoo. They traveled deep into the woods, far from the sugar plantations of the whites, threading between small islands and through swamps, to the place where drums conjured up the spirits. By the light of bonfires and torches, officiants danced wearing animal and demon masks, their bodies painted with the blood of roosters. The powerful drums throbbed, stirring the forest and heating the blood of the slaves. A prodigious energy connected humans with the gods and with nature; the participants fused into a single being; no one escaped the bewitchment. In the center of a circle, upon a box containing a sacred serpent, danced Marie Laveau, proud, beautiful, covered with sweat, nearly naked and nine months pregnant, about to give birth. When she fell into a trance her limbs jerked uncontrollably, she twisted, her belly swinging from side to side, and she uttered a stream of words in languages no one remembered.

The chant rose and fell like gigantic waves, while vessels containing the blood of sacrificed animals passed from hand to hand, so everyone could drink. The drums picked up tempo; men and women, convulsing, fell to the ground transformed into animals; they ate grass, they bit and clawed, and some fell unconscious, while others ran off in pairs toward the forest. Madame Odilia explained that in the voodoo religion, which came to the New World in the heart of slaves from Dahomey and Yoruba, there were three connected zones: the living, the dead, and the unborn. The ceremonies honored the ancestors, summoned the gods, cried out for freedom. Priestesses like Marie Laveau cast spells, stuck pins in dolls to bring on sickness, and used gris-gris, magic powders, to cure many ills. But nothing worked with Catherine.

Even though he was a prisoner and Lafitte’s rival for Juliana, Diego could not help but admire the man. As a privateer he was unscrupulous and without mercy, but when he posed as a caballero no one could surpass him in good manners, culture, and charm. That double personality fascinated Diego; it echoed his own relationship with Zorro. And besides, Lafitte was one of the finest swordsmen he had ever known. Only Manuel Escalante was on the same level. Diego felt honored when his captor invited him to practice with him. In recent weeks the young man had seen democracy in action, something that until then had been only an abstract concept. In the United States, democracy was controlled by white men; on Barataria it worked for everyone except women, of course. Lafitte’s peculiar ideas seemed worthy of consideration. He maintained that the powerful invented laws to preserve their privileges and to control the poor and discontented; therefore it would be stupid to obey them. For example, taxes, which in the end the poor paid while the rich found ways to avoid it. He believed that no one, least of all the government, could claim a slice of what was his. Diego pointed out certain contradictions to him.

Lafitte punished theft among his men with a lashing, but his financial empire rested on piracy, a higher form of theft. The privateer replied that he never took from the poor, only the powerful. To strip the imperial ships of what they had stolen by blood and whip in the colonies was not a sin but a virtue. He had appropriated the weapons that Captain Santiago de Leon was carrying to royalist troops in Mexico in order to sell them at a reasonable price to the insurgents of the same country.

Lafitte took Diego to New Orleans, a city made to the privateer’s measure, proud of its decadent, adventurous, pleasure-loving, capricious, and tempestuous character. It had survived wars with the English and the Indians, hurricanes, floods, fires, and epidemics, but nothing could squelch its courtly arrogance. It was one of the principal ports of the United States, through which tobacco, indigo, and sugar were exported and every manner of merchandise imported. The cosmopolitan population coexisted with no concern for the heat, mosquitoes, swamps, or especially the law. Music, alcohol, brothels, gambling houses… there was a little of everything in those streets where life began with the setting sun. Diego found a bench in the Plaza de Armas where he could observe the crowd: blacks with baskets of oranges and bananas, women telling fortunes and selling voodoo fetishes, puppet shows, dancers, musicians. Candy vendors wearing turbans and blue aprons carried trays of ginger, honey, and nut sweets.

At food stands one could buy beer, fresh oysters, and plates of shrimp.

There was always some drunk raising a ruckus, side by side with well-dressed caballeros, plantation owners, merchants, and officials.

Nuns and priests crossed paths with prostitutes, soldiers, bandits, and slaves. The celebrated quadroons strolled about the plaza, receiving compliments from the caballeros and hostile glances from their rivals.

They did not wear jewels or hats those adornments had been forbidden to satisfy the white women who could not compete with them but they had no need of them. They had the reputation of being the most beautiful women in the world: golden skin, fine features, large liquid eyes, wavy hair. They were always accompanied by mothers or chaperones, who never took their eyes off them. Catherine Villars was one of these Creole beauties. Lafitte met her at one of the balls the mothers offered to present their daughters to wealthy men, another of the many ways to get around absurd laws, as the corsair explained to Diego. There were few white women and many women of color; it did not take a mathematician to see the solution to the dilemma. However, mixed marriages were forbidden by law. In that way the social order was preserved, the power of the whites guaranteed, and people of color kept subjugated, none of which prevented whites from having Creole concubines. The quadroons found a convenient solution for everyone. They trained their daughters in domestic skills and arts of seduction that no white woman even suspected existed, to create the rare combination of mistress of the house and courtesan. The mothers dressed their daughters opulently but also taught them to make their gowns. They were elegant and hardworking. The mothers used the balls, which only wealthy white men attended, to place their daughters with a man capable of providing well for them. To maintain one of those beautiful girls was considered a mark of distinction for a caballero; celibacy and abstinence were not virtues except among the Puritans, but there were few of those in New Orleans. The quadroons lived in modest houses, but in comfort and style; they had slaves, educated their children in the best schools, and dressed like queens in private, although they were discreet in public. Those arrangements were carried out in accord with unspoken rules, with decorum and etiquette.

“To sum it up, mothers offer their daughters to men,” Diego protested, scandalized.

“Is that not always so? Marriage is an arrangement by which a woman lends her services and gives sons to the man who supports her. Here a white woman has less freedom to choose than a Creole,” Lafitte replied.

“But the Creole loses her protection when her lover decides to marry or replace her with another concubine.”

“The man leaves her with a house and a pension, and also pays the expenses of his children. The woman sometimes forms another family with a Creole man. Many of those Creoles, children of other quadroons, are professionals educated in France.”

“And you, Captain Lafitte, would you have two families?” Diego asked, thinking of Juliana and Catherine.

“Life is complicated anything can happen,” the pirate rejoined.

Lafitte took Diego to the best restaurants, the theater, the opera, and introduced him among his acquaintances as his “friend from California.”

Most were people of color: artisans, merchants, artists, and professionals. He knew a few Americans, who lived apart from the Creole and French population, separated by an imaginary line that divided the city. Lafitte preferred not to cross that boundary, because on the other side there was a moralistic atmosphere that did not sit well with him. He took Diego to several gaming houses, as the latter had requested. It seemed suspicious to him that the youth had such certainty about winning, and he warned him to be careful; in New Orleans cheating was punished with a knife between the ribs.

Diego paid no attention to Lafitte’s counsel; the bad feeling he had had for several days had only grown worse. He needed money. He could not hear Bernardo with the usual clarity, but he felt his milk brother was calling him. He had to go back to California, not only to save Juliana from falling into Lafitte’s hands, but also because he was sure that something had happened there that required his presence. Using the medallion as his initial capital, he gambled in several different houses so as not to raise suspicions with his exceptional winnings. It was very easy for him, trained in tricks of illusion, to replace one card for another, or to make one disappear. In addition, he had a good memory and a talent for numbers; minutes into a game, he could guess his opponents’ cards. As a result, he did not lose the medallion but was filling his money pouch; at that rate he would soon have the eight thousand American dollars of the ransom. He knew how to pace his game.

He began to lose, to give the other players confidence, then set a time to end the game and began winning. He never went too far. As soon as other players got uneasy, he went on to the next place. One day, however, his luck was so good that he didn’t want to quit, and he continued betting. His fellow players had drunk a lot and could barely focus on the cards, but they were still sharp enough to realize that Diego had to be cheating. The game erupted into a squabble that ended in the street, after Diego was pushed and shoved outside with the justifiable intention of beating him up. Diego could barely make himself heard above the shouting, but he challenged his attackers with an original proposition. “One moment, senores! I am prepared to return his money, which I have won honestly, to the man who can split open that door by butting it with his head,” he announced, pointing to the thick wood, metal-studded door of the Presbytery, a colonial building that stood beside the cathedral.

That idea immediately captured the drunks’ attention. They were discussing the terms of the competition when a sergeant appeared and instead of breaking up the wrangle stood aside to watch the action.

Asked to act as judge, he happily accepted. Musicians came out of several locales and began playing lively tunes; in a few minutes the plaza was filled with curious onlookers. It was beginning to get dark, and the sergeant lighted several lamps. Other men who were just passing by and wanted to participate in this new sport gathered around the card players; the idea of splitting open a door with your cranium seemed highly entertaining. Diego decided that the hard heads should pay five dollars each to enter. The sergeant collected forty-five dollars from the contestants in a flash and then made them get in line.

The musicians improvised a drum roll, and the first subject rushed toward the door of the Presbytery with a sash wrapped around his head.

The impact cold-cocked him. A burst of applause, whistles, and laughter greeted his performance. Two beautiful Creoles ran up to comfort the fallen man with a glass of barley water, while the second seized his opportunity to crack his head open, with no better results than the first. Some participants repented at the last moment but did not get their five dollars back. In the end, no one was able to put even a crack in the door, and Diego was left with the money he had won at the gaming table, plus thirty-five dollars from the contest. The sergeant received ten for his trouble, and everyone was happy.

The slaves came to Lafitte’s property by night. The traders beached their boats silently and unloaded, then locked the Blacks in a woodshed: five young men and two older ones, as well as two young girls and a woman with a six-year-old child clinging to her legs and one in her arms. Isabel had gone outside to get a breath of air on the terrace, and in the light of torches saw silhouettes moving through the night. Unable to contain her curiosity, she walked toward the line of pathetic humans in rags. The girls were crying but the mother walked in silence, her eyes straight ahead, like a zombie; all of them dragged their feet, bone-weary and hungry. They were guarded by several pirates under the command of Pierre Lafitte, who left the “merchandise” in the shed and then went to report to his brother Jean, while Isabel ran to tell Diego, Juliana, and Nuria what she had seen. Diego had seen posters in the town, so he knew that a slave auction was scheduled at the Temple within a couple of days.

On Barataria the friends had more than enough time to learn about slavery. Bringing slaves from Africa was illegal, but nevertheless they were sold and “raised” in America. Diego’s first impulse was to try to set them free, but the girls pointed out that even if they could get into the shed, break the chains, and convince the Blacks to run, they had nowhere to go. They would be hunted down with dogs. Their one hope would be to get to Canada, but they could never do it alone.

Diego decided to at least see for himself the conditions in which the prisoners were held. Without saying what he meant to do, he told the girls he would be back, put on his Zorro disguise, and, taking advantage of the darkness, went out. The Lafitte brothers were on the terrace. Pierre had a drink in his hand and Jean was smoking, but Diego could not get close enough to hear them without running the risk of being discovered, so he continued on to the shed. A single torch illuminated a pirate standing guard with his musket over his shoulder.

Zorro approached with the idea of taking him by surprise, but he was the one surprised when another man suddenly spoke at his shoulder.

“Good evening, boss,” he said.

Diego half turned to face him, ready to fight, but the man was relaxed and friendly. He realized that in the shadow the man had taken him for Jean Lafitte, who always dressed in black. The first pirate came over, too.

“We fed them, and they’re resting, boss. Tomorrow we will clean them up and get them clothes. They’re in good shape, except for the baby. It has a fever, and I don’t think it will last long.”

“Open the door,” said Diego in French, imitating the corsair’s tone. “I want to see them.”

He kept his face in the shadow as they pulled back the bolt on the door, an unnecessary precaution because the pirates suspected nothing.

He ordered them to wait outside, and went in. A lantern hanging in one corner shed a faint light, just enough to allow him to see each of the faces staring at him with terror. Everyone except the child and the baby wore iron rings around the neck attached to chains that fastened to posts. Diego went toward them making calming gestures, but when the slaves saw his mask they believed he was a demon, and shrank back as far as their chains permitted. It was futile to try to communicate with them. He realized they had just arrived from Africa; this was “fresh merchandise,” as the traders called them, and they had not had time to learn their captors’ language. Possibly they had been taken to Cuba, where the Lafitte brothers had bought them to resell in New Orleans. They had survived the sea voyage in horrible conditions and suffered mistreatment ashore. Were they from the same village? the same family? In the sale they would be separated and never see one another again. Their suffering had broken their spirit; they seemed on the verge of madness. Diego left them with unbearable sorrow in his heart. Once before, in California, he had felt that same crushing weight in his chest, when he and Bernardo witnessed soldiers attacking an Indian village. He recalled the feeling of impotence he had felt then, identical to what was oppressing him at this moment.

He returned to Lafitte’s house, changed clothes, and went to the de Romeu girls and Nuria to tell them what he had seen. He was desperate.

“How much do slaves cost, Diego?” Juliana asked.

“I don’t know exactly, but I have seen the lists of sales in New Orleans, and as an estimate, I would say that the Lafittes will get a thousand dollars for each young man, eight hundred for the other two, six hundred for each of the girls, and a thousand, more or less, for the mother and her children. I don’t know if they can sell the children separately, since they are less than seven years old.”

“How much would that be altogether?”

“Let’s say about eighty-eight hundred.”

“That is more or less what they want for our ransom.”

“I don’t see the connection,” said Diego.

“We have money. Isabel, Nuria, and I have decided to use it to buy those slaves,” said Juliana.

“You have money?” Diego asked, surprised.

“The precious stones, don’t you remember?”

“I thought the pirates had taken them!”

Juliana and Isabel explained how they had saved their modest fortune.

While they were being taken to the corsairs’ ship, Nuria had a brilliant idea for hiding the stones. She knew that if the pirates suspected they had them, they would lose them forever, so they had swallowed them, one by one, with sips of wine. Sooner than they expected, the diamonds, rubies, and emeralds were eliminated from their digestive systems; all they had to do was inspect their chamber pots and recover them. It was not a pleasant procedure, but it had worked, and now the stones carefully cleaned were again sewed into their petticoats.“

“But with that much you can buy your ransom!” Diego exclaimed. “We know, but we would rather set the slaves free. Even if your father’s money never arrives, we know that you can win it with your ‘skill’ at cards,” Isabel replied. Jean Lafitte was sitting on the terrace before a cup of coffee and a plate of beignets, entering figures in his account book, when Juliana presented herself and set a handkerchief tied by its four corners upon the table. The corsair looked up, and once again his heart turned over at the sight of that young woman who had been in his dreams every night. He untied the packet and could not hold back a grunt of surprise. “How much do you think these are worth?” she asked, blushing, and proceeded to propose the business deal she had in mind. The corsair’s first surprise was that the girls had been able to hide the stones; the second, that they wanted to buy the slaves instead of their own freedom. What would Pierre and the other captains say to all this? The one thing he wanted was to erase the bad impression that piracy, and now the slaves, had made on Juliana. For the first time he felt unworthy, ashamed of his past. He had no plan to win this girl’s love, because he was not free to offer his, but he at least needed her respect. He didn’t care a fig about the money; he could get that back, and besides, he had more than enough to seal the mouths of his colleagues. “These are very valuable, Juliana. There is enough here to buy the slaves, pay for your ransom and that of your friends, and pay your passage to California as well. There is also enough for your and your sister’s dowries,” he said. Juliana had never imagined that those colored pebbles would do so much. She divided them into two piles, one big and another smaller, wrapped the former in the handkerchief, put it into the low neck of her dress, and left the rest on the table. She started to leave but Jean, agitated, stood and took her arm. “What will you do with the slaves?”

“Take off their chains, first of all. Then I will see how we can help them.”

“All right. You are free, Juliana. I will find a way for you to leave as soon as possible. Forgive me for all the unpleasantness I have caused you. You cannot know how much I wish that we had met under different circumstances. Please, accept these as my gift,” said the pirate, and handed her the stones she had left on the table. It had required all Juliana’s strength to confront the man, and now this gesture completely disarmed her. She was not sure what it meant, but her instinct told her that the emotion that had undone her was fully returned by Lafitte: the gift was his declaration of love. The corsair saw her waver, and without thinking took her in his arms and kissed her. It was Juliana’s first kiss, and surely the longest and most intense she would receive in her lifetime. In any case, it was the most memorable, as the first always is. The pirate’s nearness, his arms around her, his breath, his warmth, his manly scent, his tongue in her mouth, stirred her to her bones. She had anticipated this moment after reading hundreds of romantic novels, with years of imagining the gallant predestined for her. She desired Lafitte with a passion she had never known, but also with an ancient and absolute certainty. She would never love another; this forbidden obsession would be the only love she would have in this world. She clung to him, both hands grasping his shirt, and returned the kiss with equal intensity, as her heart shattered inside her because she knew that his caress was a farewell. When at last they broke apart, she leaned her head on the pirate’s chest, dizzy, trying to catch her breath and calm her heart, as he repeated her name Juliana, Juliana in a long murmur. “I must go,” she said, pushing away. “I love you with all my soul, Juliana, but I love Catherine, too. I will never abandon her. Can you possibly understand?”

“Yes, Jean. My misfortune is to have fallen in love with you and to know that we can never be together. But I love you even more for your loyalty to Catherine. May God bless her, and may she soon recover and the two of you be happy…” Jean Lafitte tried to kiss her again, but she turned and ran away. Absorbed as they were, neither of them saw Madame Odilia, who had witnessed the scene from a short distance away. Juliana had no doubt that her life was over. It was not worth the effort to live in this world without Jean. She would rather die, like the heroines in tragic novels, but she had no idea how to contract tuberculosis or any other refined illness; to die of typhus seemed somehow undignified. She eliminated doing away with herself; no matter how deeply she was suffering, she could not condemn herself to hell. Not even Lafitte was worth that sacrifice. Besides, if she committed suicide, Isabel and Nuria would never forgive her. Entering a convent loomed as her only option, however un alluring the thought of wearing a habit in the New Orleans heat might be. She imagined what her father who with God’s favor had always been an atheist-would say if he knew what she was thinking. Tomas de Romeu would rather have seen her married to a pirate than become a nun. Her best choice would be to leave as soon as they could get a passage and end her days caring for Indians under the directions of Padre Mendoza, who according to Diego was a good man. She would treasure the clear and pure memory of that kiss and of Jean Lafitte’s image: impassioned face, jet-black eyes, dark hair combed back from his face, gold chain against his chest at the open collar of his black silk shirt, strong hands embracing her. She did not have the comfort of tears. She was cried out; over the last few days she had spent her complete reserve of tears and believed she would never weep again. She was thinking these things, staring through the window at the beach and silently suffering the pain of her broken heart, when she felt someone behind her. It was Madame Odilia, more spectacular than ever, all in white linen, with a turban of the same color, several amber necklaces, bracelets on her wrists, and gold rings in her ears. A queen of Senegal, like her mother. “You have fallen in love with Jean,” she said in a neutral, but for the first time personal, tone. “Have no fear, madame. I would never stand between your daughter and son-in-law. I will go away, and he will forget me,” Juliana replied. “Why did you buy the slaves?”

“To set them free. Can you help them? I have heard that the Quakers protect slaves and take them to Canada, but I do not know how to contact them.”

“There are many free Negroes in New Orleans. They can find work and live here; I will find them a place,” said the queen. She stood without speaking for a long time, fingering the amber beads of her necklaces, her hazel eyes studying Juliana, calculating. Finally her hard gaze seemed to soften slightly. “Do you want to see Catherine?” she asked point-blank. “Oh, yes, madame. And I would also like to see the child. I want to carry an image of them with me; that way it will be easier for me to visualize Jean’s happiness when I am in California.” Madame Odilia led Juliana to another wing of the house, as clean and well decorated as the rest, where she had set up a nursery for her grandson. It looked like the bedchamber of a small European prince, except for the voodoo fetishes that protected him from the evil eye. Pierre was sleeping in a brass cradle with lace ruffles; in the room with him were his wet nurse, a young black woman with large breasts and languid eyes, and a very young girl in charge of keeping the fans moving. The grandmother pulled back the mosquito netting, and Juliana leaned in to see the baby of the man she adored. She found him precious. She had not seen many infants with whom to compare him, but she would have sworn that there was no child more beautiful in all the world. Clad only in a diaper, he lay on his back, arms and legs outspread, deep in sleep. With a nod, Madame Odilia authorized Juliana to pick him up. She held him in her arms, and as she nuzzled his nearly bald head, saw his gummy smile, and touched fingers plump as little worms, the enormous black stone in her breast seemed to grow smaller, crumble, disappear. She kissed him all over the bare feet, the belly with the protruding navel, the neck wet with sweat and then a trickle of warm tears bathed her face and fell onto the baby. She was not weeping out of jealousy for something she would never have, but from a well of tenderness. The grandmother put Pierre back in the cradle and without a word motioned for Juliana to follow her. They crossed through the garden of orange trees and oleanders, away from the house to the beach, where a rowboat was waiting to take them to New Orleans. There they hurried through the streets of the city center and cut through the cemetery. Floods prevented burial beneath the ground, so the cemetery was a small city of mausoleums, some decorated with marble statues, others with wrought iron, cupolas, and bell towers. They walked a little farther to a street with tall, narrow houses, all identical, with a door in the center and a window on either side. These were called shotgun houses, because a gun fired at the front door passed through the house and out the back door without encountering any walls. Madame Odilia went in without knocking. An indescribable chaos of small children of various ages met their eyes, cared for by two women dressed in calico aprons. The house was crammed with fetishes, bottles of potions, dried herbs hanging from the ceiling, wooden statues studded with nails, masks, and countless articles of the voodoo religion. There was a sweet, clinging odor like molasses. Madame Odilia greeted the women and went right on to one of the small rooms. Juliana followed and found herself facing a dark mulatto woman with long bones and the yellow eyes of a panther, her skin shiny with sweat, her hair pulled into fifty braids decorated with ribbons and colored beads, nursing a newborn child. This was the famous Marie Laveau, the pythoness who on Sunday danced with the slaves in Congo Square and in the sacred ceremonies in the forest fell into a trance and called forth the gods. “I brought her to you for you to tell me if this is the one,” said Madame Odilia. Marie Laveau stood and walked over to Juliana, the babe still at her breast. She was determined to have a child every year as long as her youth lasted, and she now had five. She put three fingers on Juliana’s forehead and looked deep into her eyes. Juliana felt a formidable energy, a surge that shook her from head to foot. A minute went by. “She is the one,” said Marie Laveau. “But she is white,” objected Madame Odilia. “I tell you she is the one,” the priestess repeated, and with that the interview was ended. The queen of Senegal took Juliana back to the dock once again through the cemetery and the Plaza de Armas where they rejoined the boatman, who had waited patiently, smoking his tobacco. He took a different route toward the bayou. Soon they were in the labyrinth of the swamp, with its channels, ponds, lakes, and islets. The absolute solitude of the countryside, the miasma rising from the mud, the sudden slashings of caimans, the cries of the birds, all contributed to an air of mystery and danger. Juliana remembered that she had not told anyone that she was leaving. Her sister and Nuria must be looking for her by now. It occurred to her that this woman might have evil intentions after all, she was Catherine’s mother but she immediately discarded that thought. The journey seemed very long to her, and the heat began to make her sleepy; she was thirsty, it was late afternoon, and the air was filled with mosquitoes. She did not dare ask where they were going. After a long time, as it began to grow dark, they pulled up on a bank. The boatman stayed with the boat, and Madame Odilia lighted a lantern, took Juliana’s hand, and led her through tall grass where not even a track marked a direction. “Take care not to step on a snake,” was all she said. They walked a long way, and finally the queen found what she was looking for: a small clearing identifiable by two tall trees streaming moss and marked with crosses. These were voodoo, not Christian, crosses that symbolized the intersection of two worlds, that of the living and that of the dead. Several masks and carved wood figures of African gods guarded the site. In the light of the lantern and the moon, the scene was terrifying. “There lies my daughter,” said Madame Odilia, pointing to the ground. Catherine Villars had died of puerperal fever five weeks before. Nothing had been able to save her the resources of medical science, Christian prayers, or the spells and herbs of African magic. Her mother and other women had wrapped her body, consumed by infection and hemorrhaging, and transported it to this sacred place in the swamp, where the dead girl would be temporarily buried until she was able to indicate the person destined to replace her. Catherine could not allow her son to fall into the hands of just any woman Jean Lafitte might choose, the queen of Senegal explained. Her own duty as Catherine’s mother was to help her in that task, and that was why she had concealed her death. Catherine was now in an intermediate region; she came and went between two worlds. Had Juliana not heard her footsteps in Lafitte’s house? Had she not seen her standing beside her bed at night? That odor of orange blossoms that floated on the island air was Catherine’s scent, who in her spiritual form was watching over little Pierre and searching for the right stepmother. Madame Odilia was surprised that Catherine had gone to the other side of the world to find Juliana, and she did not like the idea that she had chosen a white woman, but who was she to oppose her? From the region of the spirits, Catherine, better than anyone, could determine what was best, Marie Laveau had assured her. “When the right woman appears, I will know how to recognize her,” the priestess had promised. Madame Odilia had her first suspicion that it might be Juliana when she saw that she loved Jean Lafitte but was ready to give him up out of respect for Catherine. The second indication came when the girl felt pity for the fate of the slaves. Now she was satisfied, Madame Odilia said; her poor daughter could rest easy in heaven and be buried in the cemetery where the floodwaters would not carry her body out to sea. Madame had to repeat several details, because Juliana could not get the story into her head. She could not believe that this woman had hidden the truth from Jean for five weeks. How would she explain that now? Madame Odilia said that there was no reason her son-in-law had to know the truth. The exact date didn’t matter; she would tell him that Catherine had died the day before. “But Jean will demand to see the body!” Juliana contended. “That is not possible. Only we women may see the bodies of the dead.

It is our mission to bring children into the world and to send the dead off to theirs. Jean will have to accept that. After Catherine’s funeral, he will belong to you,“ the queen replied. ”Belong to m-me…“ Juliana stammered, confused. ”All that matters is my grandson Pierre. Lafitte is only the means Catherine used to lead you to her son. She and I will keep watch to see that you meet your obligation. To do that, you must stay close to the child’s father and keep him happy and tranquil.“

“Jean is not the kind of man who can be satisfied and tranquil; he is a corsair, an adventurer ”

“I will give you magic potions and secrets to keep him happy in bed, as I gave them to Catherine when she was twelve.”

“I am not that kind of…” Juliana defended herself, blushing. “Have no worry, you will be, though never as skillful as Catherine. You are a little old to learn, and you have many silly ideas in your head, but Jean will not notice the difference. Men are stupid; desire blinds them, they know very little about pleasure.”

“I cannot use courtesans’ tricks or magic potions, madame!”

“Do you love Jean or not, girl?”

“Yes,” Juliana admitted. “Then you will have to work at it. Leave everything in my hands. You will make him happy, and it is possible that you will be as well, but I warn you that you must think of Pierre as your own son, or you will have to deal with me. Is that clear?” I do not, dear readers, know how to convey the true magnitude of the unhappy Diego de la Vega’s reaction when he learned what had happened. The next boat to Cuba sailed from New Orleans in two days; he had bought the passages and had everything ready to fly out of Jean Lafitte’s hunting preserve, dragging Juliana with him. He was going to save his beloved after all. His soul had been reunited with his body, but then the whole apple cart turned over with the news that his rival was a widower. Diego threw himself at Juliana’s feet to convince her of the stupidity of what she was about to do. Well, that is a manner of speaking. He was on his feet, pacing with long strides, gesticulating, pulling his hair, yelling, while she watched him with a silly smile on her siren’s face. How can you convince a woman in love! Diego believed that in California, far from her pirate, the girl would come to her senses, and he would gain back the ground he had lost. Juliana would have to be a true simpleton to keep loving a man who trafficked in slaves. He was confident that in the end she would learn to appreciate a man like himself, as handsome and brave as Lafitte but much younger, honest, with a good heart and pure intentions, and he could offer her a very comfortable life without murdering innocents to steal their belongings. Diego was nearly perfect, and he adored her. Good God! What more could Juliana want? Nothing was enough for her. She was a bottomless sack. A few weeks in the heat of Barataria had been enough to wipe out at one stroke the advances he had achieved over five years of courting her. A wiser man than he would have come to realize that his darling had a fickle heart, but not Diego. Vanity clouded his eyes, as tends to be the case with ladies’ men like him. Isabel observed the events with awe. In the last forty-eight hours so many things had happened that she was incapable of remembering them in order. Let us say that it was more or less like this: after removing the chains from the slaves, feeding them, providing clothing, and explaining with great difficulty that they were free, they had witnessed a heartrending scene when the baby that had been so ill on arrival died. It took three strong men to pull the lifeless body from its mother’s arms, and there was no way to calm her; they still could hear her howls, chorused by the island dogs. The wretched slaves did not understand what difference it made whether they were free or not if they had to stay in this detestable country. The only thing they wanted was to go back to Africa. How were they going to survive in such a hostile and barbaric land? The black man acting as interpreter tried to soothe them with the promise that they would not lack for a livelihood, that more pirates were always needed on the island, that with a little luck the girls would find a husband and the poor mother could work for a family that would teach her to cook, and she would not have to be separated from her surviving child. It was useless; the miserable group repeated like a litany that they wanted to be sent back to Africa. Juliana returned from her long excursion with Madame Odilia transformed by happiness and telling a story that would curl the hair of any rational being. She made Diego, Isabel, and Nuria swear that they would not repeat a single word and then stunned them with the news that Catherine Villars was not ill but instead a kind of zombie, and more important, she had chosen her, Juliana, to be the stepmother of the tiny Pierre. She would marry Jean Lafitte except he didn’t know that yet; she would tell him after Catherine’s funeral. As a wedding gift she intended to ask him to give up the slave traffic forever, the one thing she could not tolerate; the other skullduggery was not as bad. She also confessed, a little shamefacedly, that Madame Odilia was going to teach her to make love the way the pirate liked. At that point, Diego lost control. Juliana was mad, who could doubt it? There was a fly that transmitted that illness, it must have bitten her. Did she think that he would leave her in the hands of that criminal? Hadn’t he promised Don Tomas de Romeu, may he rest in peace, that he would bring her back safe and sound to California? He would keep his promise if he had to knock her in the head to get her there. Jean Lafitte was suffering an assortment of emotions during that time. The kiss had left him addled. Giving up Juliana was the most difficult thing he had done in his life; he needed all his courage, which was more than a little, to conquer his dejection and frustration. He met with his brother and the other captains to give them their share from the sale of the slaves and the hostages’ ransoms, which they in turn would divide fairly among the rest of the men. The money came from his own funds, was the only explanation he offered. The amazed captains pointed out that from a business point of view, that made no sense at all; why the devil did he transport slaves and hostages, with all the expense and bother, if he meant to let them go free? Pierre Lafitte waited until the others had left before expressing his opinion to Jean. He thought that his brother had lost the ability to conduct business; his brain had gone soft. Perhaps the time had come for him to step down. “Fine, Pierre. We will put it to a vote among the men that is the usual way. Do you want to take my place?” Jean challenged. As if it were a small thing, a few hours later his mother-in-law came to give him the news that Catherine had died. No, he couldn’t see her. The funeral would take place in two days in New Orleans, with the aid of the Creole community. There would be a brief Christian rite, to appease the priest, and then an African ceremony with feasting, music, and dancing, as was fitting. Madame Odilia was sad, but serene, and she had enough fortitude to console Lafitte when he burst out crying like a baby. He adored Catherine, she had been his companion, his only love, he sobbed. Madame Odilia gave him a drink of rum and a few pats on the back. She did not feel any greater than usual compassion for the widower, knowing that very soon he would forget Catherine in the arms of another. Out of decency, Jean Lafitte could not go running to ask Juliana to marry him he would have to wait a prudent amount of time but the idea had already taken shape in his mind and in his heart, though he had not dared put it in words. The loss of his wife was a terrible blow, but it offered him unexpected liberty. Even in her grave, his sweet Catherine was seeing to his most hidden desires. He was willing to mend his ways for Juliana’s sake. The years were racing by, and he was tired of living like an outlaw, with a pistol at his waist and the possibility that at any moment there would be a price on his head. Over the years he had amassed a fortune; Juliana and he could take little Pierre to Texas, where bandits traditionally ended up, and he would devote himself to less dangerous, though naturally still illegal, activities. No trafficking in slaves, of course, since apparently that irritated Juliana’s sensibility. Lafitte had never allowed a woman to stick her nose in his business, and his new love was not going to be the first, but neither would he ruin his marriage fighting over that matter. Yes, they would go to Texas, he had already decided. The West offered many possibilities for a man of flexible morals and adventurous spirit. He was prepared to give up piracy, although that did not mean he would turn into a respectable citizen. No need to go to extremes.