"Are you alright, Juliana?" The Count asked one January morning as he found the young woman standing behind a wall as if trying to avoid someone.
She watched him in terror, then slightly glanced into the library. "That man… He knows me!" The young woman explained.
He smiled at her after noticing who was in the library. "Do not worry about him. I'll see what he wants, and, in the meantime, you can bring us both some fresh orange juice!" He kindly replied.
She nodded and headed for the kitchen, head bowed, while the Count entered the room. His guest hurriedly stood up at noticing him.
"Jacopo!"
"Your Excellency!" The man said, slightly bowing his head.
"Is there something wrong?"
"I was just laid off. I came to tell you." The man said quite abruptly.
"Risendo suspected you were working for me?"
"No, Your Excellency… I don't think so. He just said that he won't need me anymore, considering he had just sold most of his horses." Jacopo replied. "I am sorry to have failed you, Your Excellency…"
The nobleman smiled as he answered. "How many animals does he have left?"
"Only two. From what I overheard him say, he had sold the others for about four thousand pesos."
"Did he happen to mention what he was going to do with the money?"
"No. But I overhead him say he had debts he needed to settle with the tailor and the innkeeper in San Diego."
"So, he sold his horses because he needed money…" "I think so…"
"If that is the case, you haven't failed me, my friend. Not in the slightest..." The Count assured Jacopo, a smile on his lips.
Juliana showed up at that point, bringing them the glasses of juice her master had asked for. Head bowed as if fearing to be recognized, she left them on a small table and shyly rushed away.
"She's Rafael's widowed cousin. I just hired her." The Count explained at noticing Jacopo's dumbfounded glance.
"She's also the woman who had claimed to be carrying Don Gilberto's child…" His man replied. "The one I had mentioned in my latest message to you."
"Yes… But that is not for others to know." The nobleman uttered. "He may not want anything to do with her, but I will not allow for another innocent to suffer at Risendo's hands."
"Don Gilberto doesn't know about her pregnancy, Patron. Nor does he know that she is here, in Los Angeles."
"Are you certain of that?"
"Si. Doña Inez received the Señorita when she came to the hacienda, and she lied about her son not wanting to see her. He wasn't home at the time, and she did not tell him after his return…"
"He didn't reject her, then?"
"No, he didn't."
"I see…" The Count said pensively. "You didn't mention that in your message."
"No… I… I had written that message in a hurry. Don Gilberto was away, in San Bernardino, and I had left it for you before he returned. I had thought Doña Inez would tell him about the young woman as soon as he'd be back, but she didn't. I'm sorry for not mentioning that, Your Excellency."
"That's alright. I appreciate all your hard work, Jacopo." The nobleman said, handing him a glass of orange juice. "Now, drink up! You must be parched." He urged him, smiling kindly.
While Jacopo gratefully finished the glass he was offered, the nobleman headed for a small desk and took a small purse out of a drawer. "The money I had promised you," he uttered, handing it to his man.
"Gracias," Jacopo said, putting the glass on a table and accepting the money.
"Now, since your work here is done, I think it would be best if you'd stay at the abbot's house for a couple of nights. In three days' time, I want you ready to leave for Monterey. My house there is in need of a mayordomo, and I want someone able to also keep an eye out for some acquaintances of mine – the Moncadas*. Rafael will give you all the proper instructions."
"Si, Patron. I will do my best to follow your instructions to the letter." The man said. Then, since there was nothing more to say, he bowed his head, took his goodbye, and headed for the door.
ZZZ
Don Alejandro found his host in the library a while later, pensively staring at a wall… or through it… The elderly man wasn't completely sure.
"Let us pay them a visit…" The young man said as he just seemed to remark that Don Alejandro had joined him.
"Pay who a visit?" The older man asked.
"The Risendos. Right now! Let's pay them a visit!" The Count said, his words sounding almost like an order.
"Why? The man hates me, and I can't stand the sight of him."
"Because I need to make sure…"
"Of what?"
"Of who his mother is."
"I don't understand..."
"You might, should you agree to accompany me. It's to your benefit, after all. You must want to know what drives this man's actions against you!"
Don Alejandro silently agreed. After taking a sip of the coffee he was holding, he left the cup on a table and followed the Count, who was already on his way to the coach waiting outside the main gate.
Some twenty minutes later, they were stopping in front of Hacienda Risendo.
"I haven't been here since I was… eighteen," Don Alejandro uttered as he glanced at the house. "This hacienda used to belong to the father of my first sweetheart, Mercedita…"
The Count glanced at him and smiled. "Perhaps you'll tell me about her one day…"
The elderly man nodded with a smile.
Risendo soon opened the door, and they were invited inside, where his mother received their guests rather coldly.
"What brings you to our humble hacienda today, Your Excellency?" Gilberto asked as he invited the two to sit down.
"Well, you see, Don Alejandro remembered, a few days ago, having met your mother while in Madrid. So, naturally, when he told me, I insisted we come to pay our respects," the nobleman said.
"You knew my mother when you were in Spain?" Gilberto asked the elderly don, trying to seem natural.
Don Alejandro glanced a little dumbfounded at the Count. He had the strange sensation that he had accidentally walked into a lion's den and was standing between two Alpha males, ready to start a fight to the death at any moment. "Yes… She was our midwife when my son, Diego, was born," he answered. "I didn't know her well, of course, since I was mostly away during that time, at Cadiz. Which was why it took me so long to remember having met you, Doña Inez!"
Gilberto glanced at his mother, who took off her veil and stared defiantly at the elderly don. "I didn't think you would remember me at all," she said.
"As you can see, I do. Though, I might have realized who you were sooner, had I not remembered you had told my wife that you couldn't have children. The fact that your son seems to be about as old as my own did confuse me, I must say."
"I hear your son is dead," she retorted.
Don Alejandro gave her a spiteful look but was not taken aback. "There is something that always nagged at me, Señora," He uttered. "I could never understand why you decided to leave my father-in-law's house so suddenly, just after Diego was born, without even a word of goodbye. I was told you didn't even claim your last payment," the don said rather bluntly.
"You had to be told that? Weren't you right there?" Gilberto asked, staring spitefully at the old don.
"I was in Cadiz at the time, unfortunately." Don Alejandro replied, glancing at him. "I had been recalled there just a few days before my wife gave birth. By the time I returned home to meet my son, Diego was already a month old, and your mother had departed my father-in-law's house weeks earlier."
"That's not true! You were in Madrid at the time. I very well remember it!" Inez contradicted him. "And you well know why I left as I did.
"Now, if you don't mind," the woman continued before Don Alejandro had a chance to deny her statement, "I believe I have endured your presence here for long enough. Gilberto, will you help me to my room? I am not feeling well." She then addressed her son, feigning she had trouble standing up and was about to faint.
"Of course, Mother." He uttered, hurrying to catch her. "Seeing how I have no servant to escort you out, I hope you will find the door by yourselves," he then addressed his guests, before lifting Inez into his arms and carrying her to her bedroom.
ZZZ
"Are they gone?" Inez inquired as soon as he laid her on her bed.
Gilberto headed for the window, and glanced outside to see the coach departing. "Yes. They're gone!" He confirmed.
"The nerve of the man! Lying to my face. Pretending he doesn't already know who you are! Trying to distort the truth again, like he always did. You must find a way, Son! You must find a way to bring about his demise, whatever the cost."
Gilberto watched her pensively. Something about the entire affair seemed off to him, but he still did not believe even one word coming out Don Alejandro's mouth. For all he knew, the man was nothing but a deceiver.
ZZZ
"Those people are as rude as they are deceitful!" Don Alejandro said as soon as they were back in the coach.
"Yes…" The Count said pensively.
"Did you, at least, find out what you were hoping to find out?" Don Alejandro asked, rather angrily.
"More than I would have expected but less than I had hoped…" the young man said pensively. "Whatever happened between you and that woman, Don Alejandro, she is the one pushing Gilberto to act against you."
"Nothing happened between me and that woman! I hardly knew her. I saw her a couple of times when I as home on leave, after my wife decided to give birth in Madrid. I did nothing to hurt that woman.
"True, my wife had her suspicions about her. She always said that Inez was hiding something. But I never thought it opportune to ask for clarifications. And I surely didn't insult or mistreat that woman in any way."
The Count nodded. "Why did you wife believe Señora Risendo was hiding something?"
"I don't know… She also use to say that the woman was obsessed with listening to her belly… But I doubt that was what she was referring to."
"Obsessed… Did your wife use precisely that word?"
"Yes. But why… Why does that matter?"
"Because, for some reason, it seems to me that it all has to do with the birth of your son… Something happened back then; something she is lying to Gilberto about. Why else would she have told him you were in Madrid at the time, when she knew very well you were not?"
"How should I know? The woman is clearly mad…"
"Perhaps… I remember you once mentioned to me that a servant had also gone missing from your father-in-law's house at the same time…"
"Did I?" The caballero wondered, trying to remember. "Well… Yes… A young woman… But I don't remember her name."
"Was she pregnant by any chance?"
"Pregnant? No… I don't' believe she was…"
The Count didn't say another thing after that, wondering how the information he had fit together.
For a few moments, he had considered that the young servant might have been pregnant at the time of her disappearance. That she could have been Gilberto's real mother. If Inez could not have children of her own, she could have adopted her son, and the servant's disappearance could be explained thus. Yet, thinking better, he remembered that the young woman had been found dead in the woods not long after she had gone missing, meaning she could not have been Gilberto's real mother.
ZZZ
"What are you thinking about?" Emmanuel asked his friend later, at finding him in the cave, sitting at his desk.
"Inez Risendo… There's something about that woman… Something… Something that doesn't fit…
"I am certain she had told Gilberto that my father was in Madrid when I was born. But why would she tell him that when she clearly knew it was a lie? To what end? And in what context would it even matter?
"I only looked into Risendo's past, not into his mother's. Now, I find that I should have investigated her all along."
"Perhaps the abbot's servants might help."
"They already told us all they know, Emmanuel."
"Then, maybe, there are papers at Risendo's hacienda. Papers Zorro might be able to find."
"If Jacopo didn't find them, I doubt Zorro might, especially considering that the woman never leaves the house. But, perhaps, it wouldn't hurt to try. Before that, however, I need to have a conversation with Juliana…" Diego said as he stood up, and slowly headed towards the house.
ZZZ
"You wanted to see me, Patron?" Juliana shyly asked as she found the Count in the garden, cutting the dry leaves and flowers off of a rose bush.
"Yes." He replied, pointing towards a nearby bench.
Understanding that he expected her to sit down, she did, then took a deep breath in anticipation of what he was to say to her. The young woman didn't know what to expect, for it was highly unusual that the nobleman would invite a servant for a private conversation. At least, that was what Maria had told her.
"There is something Jacopo, Risendos' former servant, mentioned a while earlier." He said.
"He recognized me, didn't he?" The young woman inquired.
"Yes…"
"Please don't send me away, Patron! Please!" She begged him, falling to her knees, expecting to be sacked because someone else knew the truth about her, and her presence there could stain the Count's good name.
He hurried to help her up and guided her to a nearby bench. "I'm not going to send you away. You must never fear that!" He assured her.
"But that man knows who I am…"
"It doesn't matter. Jacopo works for me. He's always worked for me. And he will not say a word to anyone about the true paternity of your child."
"I don't understand…" She replied dumbfounded. "How can he work for you if he was Risendos' servant?"
"He… He was there at my orders… I needed someone to keep an eye on Gilberto." He admitted. "Risendo is not a good man. He's responsible for all Don Alejandro has been through this past year… And for much more. Things I cannot share with you at this time."
Juliana didn't say anything, just nodded.
"But there is something of which he is not responsible. And I thought you should know that." He continued, standing up and taking a few steps away.
"What, Patron?"
"He did not send you away, Juliana. It was not him but his mother who denied you a place in their household. He doesn't know about you and your pregnancy." He explained, turning to look straight at her.
"How do you…" She asked.
"Jacopo told me. He said Gilberto's mother never told him about you, and I trust his words."
The young woman stared at him, then stood up, as well, turning her head to the side, pensive.
"He doesn't know about our baby?" She asked.
"No."
"That doesn't mean he'd want it."
"No… But –"
"Then it doesn't matter." She interrupted him to say. "Thank you for telling me, Patron, but it doesn't matter."
"Are you sure?"
"As you said, he's not a good man. I think I always knew that as well… Deep inside of me, I knew a good man doesn't behave as he did towards me. But I hoped… I don't know what I was thinking… I didn't really expect him to want me. Yes, I did imagine him marrying me, and offering me the kind of life women such as I can only dream of. But I never truly believed he would… And I refuse to start now."
The Count nodded his understanding. "Very well. If that is how you feel…"
"It is. And, if there's nothing more…"
"You may return to your work," the Count agreed.
"Gracias, Patron!" The young woman uttered before heading back towards the house.
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZz
*The Moncadas are as per my other stories the De la Vegas relatives in Monterey. I invented them for the Of Men and Legends series and I guess I include them in others. After all, why invent OCs if not to use them, right? They are mentioned to have helped Don Alejandro in this story, so, I though, of course Diego woudl look out for them. Right?