And while padre Benitez interrogates Diego, what are the girls doing?
Chapter 16. Call me Victoria.
Alicia and Pilar didn't want to leave at nap time, they approached Victoria looking like they were up to something.
Victoria looked at them suspiciously. "What do you want now?"
"We want to see your dress." said Pilar excitedly.
"You'll be able to see it when I wear it tomorrow."
"But we want to see it now." Alicia insisted.
Victoria didn't look convinced. "We won't tell anyone what it looks like." said Pilar trying to sound convincing.
Marina looked at them and couldn't help but smile at their enthusiasm. Victoria saw her and decided to ask her to join them.
"All right, you busybodies, you can come upstairs for a moment, but wash your hands lest you stain it."
The two girls clapped enthusiastically. Victoria looked at Marina.
"Would you like to come up too?"
She looked a little self-conscious. "I don't want to intrude."
Pilar looked a little quizzical, and whispered in Victoria's ear. "Why are you inviting her? She's de Soto's girlfriend."
"She's a nice girl, de Soto tricked her." replied Victoria.
"He made her a son and jilted her, that was tricking her pretty good." said Alicia.
"If she doesn't go upstairs, you won't either," said Victoria emphatically.
Marina looked at them suspiciously, she knew they were talking about her, and she supposed it was for the worse, not because she was distrustful by nature, but because that had been her experience in the last few months.
Pilar turned to her. "Come on, come upstairs with us. We'll talk about girl stuff."
Victoria wanted to encourage her. "Come on, you know more about elegant fashion than we do."
"That's for sure." said Alicia comparing the lady's clothes with hers at a glance.
Marina got up not very convinced and followed them upstairs.
Victoria opened the door to her room and her two assistants came in after her. Marina stood in the doorway, somewhat hesitant.
"Come, come in and close the door. Sit on the bed, the dress is here." said Victoria heading for a closet. She pulled out from inside a light blue dress with embroidered bodice.
"It's beautiful." said Pilar. Marina reached over and touched the fabric delicately. "It's a nice fabric." she said smiling.
"Thank you, that's what the saleswoman told me." replied Victoria.
"Are you going to try it on?" asked Alicia.
"Now?"
"Yes, if it needs any simple adjustments I'm not bad at it." said Alicia.
"I'm pretty bad at it," said Pilar.
"I've sewn many dresses for the orphanage, I know how to make different seams." interjected Marina.
"Come on Victoria, put it on." said Pilar enthusiastically.
"All right." she said, but only the dress, I'm not changing my corset.
"Do you have a new corset?" asked Alicia.
Victoria blushed.
"Is it that your fiancé had already seen the others?" asked Pilar.
"Of course not." said Victoria. "How mean you are." she said giving her a little tap on the shoulder. Then she opened the closet door to change where they couldn't see her.
"It wouldn't have been that big of a deal either, if you're getting married." said Alicia. Marina looked at her puzzled and Alicia noticed.
"Don't look at me like that, it's quite often that a bride and groom have to get married in a hurry."
"Why?" asked the girl letting her confusion show.
"Because there's already a child on the way." answered Alicia, surprised that she was asking that question.
"Well of course, it's one of the favorite pastimes of the town's comadres, counting from the wedding to the birth of the first child." said Pilar.
"Yes, more than one baby is born too robust to be premature." added Alicia.
"Does it really happen often?" said Marina in amazement.
"I myself was born less than eight months after the wedding. And don't you see how my mother watched over me until I married Venancio. She told me she didn't want me to make the same mistakes she did, and the bad thing is that she knew all the tricks men use to stay alone with their girlfriend." she said laughing.
"Well, but that's not my case." said Victoria coming out from behind the door.
"You never told us how Don Diego convinced you to leave El Zorro and accept his proposal."
"El Zorro and I grew apart because he couldn't take off his mask and be my husband. Diego realized this and asked me to marry him and start a family."
"I guess that was pretty convincing, aren't you going to give us the details, like how that mysterious mark got on his neck?"
"Come on, button my dress." she said avoiding answering.
Pilar fastened the buttons on the back of the dress. Then they looked her up and down.
"The color looks great on you, but it's a little big in the waist."
"I think I've lost some weight, with this hot weather I've lost my appetite."
Marina walked over. "You have just a little left over; if I pinch it here it will be perfect." she said pinching the fabric.
"You're right, it looks much better." said Pilar.
"Can you have it for tomorrow?"
"If you have thread and needle I can have it for this very afternoon, señorita Escalante. Do you have some pins to mark the seam you need?"
Victoria reached over to her dresser and pulled out a sewing box. She held it out to Marina, who took some pins and carefully placed them.
"Thank you so much, but if you're going to do me this favor you'll have to call me Victoria."
"I'll be delighted if you call me Marina."
"Well, you've seen the dress. Now unbutton me and everyone out, I have a lot of things to do."
Pilar unbuttoned the back of the dress and the girls left the room. Minutes later Victoria brought the dress and the sewing kit downstairs to offer them to Marina.
"It will look great. You're going to look beautiful for your groom."
Victoria looked at her and smiled, "Thank you so much. I'm sure you will too when you get married."
Marina nodded somewhat absently. "In my case it doesn't matter much. señor de Soto would marry me if I had a horse's blanket over me."
"Don't you want to marry him?"
"It's too late not to."
"And there is no other choice?"
"I'm afraid it's either him or marrying another man who is uglier and only wants my money. At least Ignacio..." Marina blushed. "He was interested in me in another way before he knew how much my fortune amounted to."
"Maybe there is something that can be done." said Victoria with a worried face.
"I thank you Victoria. I don't know why you are so kind to me."
"I run a tavern, if I'm not nice I'll run out of customers." she said playing it down.
Marina spoke with a more thoughtful tone than usual for her. "It's more than that. All my life people have been nice out of obligation, but you're good to me." she thought for a moment before asking. "You girls really don't think it's that bad what happened to me?"
"You've heard them, it's more frequent than you think. Only in your case since he didn't tell you who he was it took you a long time to find him."
"Well, not only that. I didn't know there was a baby on the way."
Victoria remembered the conversation she had overheard, but didn't want to admit that she had been eavesdropping.
"Didn't they ever tell you how babies come into the world?"
Marina shook her head. "The truth is, I had no idea. Do you know even though you're single?"
"Well, here in a village, with the animals around..." said Victoria laughing.
Marina made an astonished face. "Sure, animals have babies too. But how?"
Victoria realized she had gotten herself into a mess. Then she remembered something and burst out laughing. At the look on the other girl's face she decided to tell her something.
"I just remembered that the first time someone explained to me what animals do to have offpring, I was a little girl. I saw a horse and thought there was something wrong with it." she laughed again.
"And what was wrong with it?"
"That he was in heat, and that part that men have and we don't..." Victoria looked at the girl seriously. "...I guess you know what I mean."
Marina nodded. "Yes, I do now." she said somewhat embarrassed but with a smile.
"You don't usually see it, but when you do see it, it's very big, and I didn't know what it was. I asked my brothers, who of course didn't want to tell me anything, and since Diego was the smartest kid in town and always knew more than the others I asked him. He couldn't help explaining it to me, because he even then loved to share what he knew with others, but he turned very red."
"Well, at least someone told you, and now that we're talking about these things. Would you mind telling me why they call it lying with a man?"
Victoria blushed. "Don't you know? But you have a baby."
"Well, yes, but when they use that word I think it has to be lying on a bed, and he and I were never alone in any bedroom. We were sitting up."
"Let's take it piecemeal." said Victoria somewhat astonished. "As far as I know from my married friends, the most usual way is on a bed, with the woman lying on her back."
Marina narrowed her eyes in deep concentration. Victoria had a feeling the girl was getting a headache. "She lies down and then he..." she tilted her head to the side as she imagined what might happen, a few moments later she nodded and Victoria could see her put on a triumphant expression. "I think I get it."
"Great." said Victoria, relieved that she didn't have to give any more details, and even though she was the one who was curious now she didn't dare ask her friend. However Marina wanted to continue the conversation. Again her face reflected concern.
"Do you think my friend knew what could happen if she left me alone with señor de Soto?"
Victoria was saddened to hear that. She didn't think there could be two such innocent women in the same town, but she couldn't rule it out either. "I can't know, maybe she thought you would set boundaries and nothing bad would happen."
"She told me that her friend Diego was very interested in meeting me, that he had found me a fascinating woman and wanted to talk to me in the library. I asked her to stay with us to keep up appearances, but she said she had something to do and would be right back. After the visit I confided in her, told her what had happened, but she said that this was not bad and that it was his way of showing his interest in me, so she managed to get us alone several times. He also told me that a woman can grant certain liberties to the man she is going to marry."
"Did that happen at your aunt and uncle's house?" said Victoria in astonishment.
"No, she is the daughter of some friends of my uncles and through them we became friends. I was visiting at their house for two weeks. She told me that Leandra, my lady-in-waiting, was unfriendly to her and that there was no need for her to come with us, that we would keep each other company."
Victoria was very serious. She could clearly see that her so-called friend had conspired against her, but she didn't know how to tell her. "I can't be sure, but I think she had some interest in your falling from grace."
Marina frowned, but she looked more sad than angry.
"A gentleman took an interest in me before I met Ignacio. He was very shy and hardly spoke to me, but he looked at me a lot and asked me for a dance on several occasions we overlapped. Last I heard, he had asked for my friend's hand." Marina looked devastated. "Is it always going to be like this, am I going to have to be suspicious of everyone?"
"I hope not. You say your lady-in-waiting was unpleasant to your friend, surely she saw that your friend was untrustworthy and tried to protect you."
"Leandra was very disappointed in me when she found out."
"Did you tell her the whole story?"
"No, she told me she already knew what had happened." she said sadly.
"Maybe you could try again, tell her what you told me, that you really didn't know what you were doing was wrong."
She sighed. "I don't know if he'll listen to me, but I can at least try." she looked at Victoria and smiled sheepishly. "Thank you so much, we hardly know each other and you're already behaving so much better than the people I thought were my friends."
"It's nothing, we can talk whenever you need to." Victoria replied feeling a little sad for the other girl.