Marco and the Devil's Bargain Read Online Free PDF Page B

dropped at his feet, a clear indication that the only one tired and discouraged was Marco. He picked it up and tossed it across the sala , but Chica only looked at him with that evident disdain of cats, as though wondering why her mistress had ever aligned herself with someone so ignorant as the man swigging from a bottle.
    Marco fetched the yarn ball himself, annoyed by the ingratitude of cats. He remembered that when Paloma threw the yarn ball, she always accompanied it with a sound, “Shew!” Feeling supremely silly, he looked around to make sure there were no servants within earshot. “Shew!” he exclaimed, and threw the ball.
    The cat returned it promptly and dropped it at his feet again, even as she glanced here and there for the person obviously better at the game than he was.
    â€œ Looking around won’t do any good,” he told her. “We must be patient, you and I.”
    To his secret delight, Chica heaved herself down against his stocking covered feet and settled in, apparently for as long as he intended to drink in the sala . After another pull, Marco set down the bottle and picked up the cat. He found her purr so soothing. Perhaps if she purred in his ear on Paloma’s pillow, the night wouldn’t seem so long or the bed so empty.

    By keeping her head down and knitting quickly, Paloma finished one sock before Luisa’s housekeeper announced dinner. There was a dining room, of course, but she knew Luisa preferred the kitchen, as her guests did.
    All of her guests except Maria Teresa moved toward the kitchen. Her cousin murmured something about “always eating in our dining room,” low but not quite out of earshot.
    When Maria Teresa said that, in addition to the other not-quite-inaudible pricks and barbs she had delivered sotto voce all afternoon, Paloma watched the others. There was no mistaking that Luisa’s other knitters were ignoring Maria Teresa.
    The worst moment came when they began to file into the kitchen at Luisa’s kind invitation. Teresa sidled up to her, grabbed Paloma’s hand, and placed it on her swelling belly. In a loud voice, she exclaimed, “ Mira , cousin, you can feel my baby!”
    Shocked, the other women looked at each other, as though they had no antidote for such blatant unkindness to a woman—a relative, no less—already whispered about to be barren. Hadn’t Paloma Vega been married to the obviously fertile juez de campo for more than a year? It was not a subject to be discussed, especially when that second wife stood right there.
    Paloma felt the blood drain from her face and saw the triumph in her cousin’s eyes. An afternoon of slights was about to be avenged.
    Only if I allow it, Paloma advised herself. What would Marco have me do? He would have me kill you with kindness.
    She pressed her hand against her cousin’s belly and felt the child within kick back. Paloma smiled, because it was a miracle, no matter how unpleasant the vehicle. She patted Maria Teresa’s obvious evidence of her own fertility. “How sweet. I hope someday that I will be as fortunate as you are. I pray to the Virgin daily over the matter.” Paloma removed her hand and walked into the kitchen with her head held high, even as her heart broke.

    â€œ Such forbearance,” her sister-in-law said much later, as the two of them prepared for bed. “If you had snatched out every hair on her head, you would have had a roomful of willing accomplices.” She unbuttoned Paloma’s dress. “Why oh why did Maria say that?”
    â€œ I would never give my cousin the satisfaction of knowing that her darts struck home,” Paloma replied, pulling on her nightgown. All she wanted to do was crawl into Luisa’s bed and not wake up for three days.
    â€œ Pobrecita ,” Luisa murmured. She pulled back the covers for Paloma. “I didn’t fetch my first son until seven months of marriage, if that is any