Fields of Gold: A steampunk adventure novel (Magnificent Devices Book 12) Read online

  Chapter 6

  Evan could not decide which he wanted most—to run for the train station, or to run for the water closet where he might vomit in peace.

  Captain Fremont hoisted the Viceroy to a sitting position, and jerked his chin at Evan. “Get his other side. I’m sure you’ve helped a friend or two back to their rooms after they’ve had a drop too much.”

  He had—once. And he could not call those lads friends. They were laboratory assistants and nothing of a warmer nature had ever developed among them. Evan had always supposed this to be because of his diffidence and studious habits. If those lads could see him now…

  Gloria and Joe waited until they were well along the colonnade before strolling behind them in the direction of the dining room. “You are supposed to be ill,” Evan heard Gloria say. “Can you be proud and sick at the same time? We must have your recovery appear in stages. I do not wish to be responsible for miracles as well as dreams.”

  Evan couldn’t hear Joe’s reply, but he was sure it wasn’t fit for the ears of a lady. Then again, Gloria had quite the vocabulary, so perhaps it was nothing she hadn’t said herself.

  Their little group parted ways at the main house. Joe moved as though to open the door, but Gloria clutched him back just in time for the majordomo to bow low and usher them through. That worthy individual gazed somewhere above their heads as Evan and the captain shared a sheepish grin and hustled the semiconscious prince up the staircase as best they could.

  It wasn’t easy. Evan was breathing hard by the time they were safely in his room and the Viceroy was laid out upon the bed with a pillow under his head.

  “What if he comes around?” the captain said, hands on hips, as he gazed down at him, frowning. “What shall we do then?”

  “If he did not during that confounded effort, then it is not likely he will in the next few minutes.” Evan checked his traveling bundle, which contained nothing but his old prison clothes wrapped around some food he had secured just after dawn. “And once he does, he may not be up to much. Even walking might be difficult.”

  “On the bright side, anything he says may be put down to the ramblings of an ill man. Even if he declares himself a prince.” The captain seemed to be talking himself into a positive view. This observation was confirmed when he ran a hand over his face. “Evan, what are we doing? Are we utterly mad?”

  “Yes,” Evan said bluntly. “We cannot possibly pull it off. But we are committed now—they will be going into the dining room at this moment.”

  “He is a good man, is he not?” the captain went on after a moment. “Joe?”

  Evan saw at once the thicket the captain’s emotions were leading him into, and dropped his bundle near the door. “I would trust him with my life, and in fact have done. Between him and Ella, she has just the friends about her that she needs.”

  “I know you are right. But the thought of leaving her in such a snake pit of dangers makes me ill.”

  Evan was not the sort of man to offer comfort of the physical kind, but he had learned a thing or two on this confounded voyage. He gripped the captain’s shoulder, offering a sympathy he could not put into words. Especially to a man only yesterday he had resented and disliked. “She is the bravest, most capable woman I know, save one. If anyone can carry out a mad plan and make a success of it, it is she.”

  “That’s not what you said a moment ago.” With a wry smile, the captain moved, but not to reject Evan’s offer of comfort. He gripped his hand instead in a firm shake. “But I appreciate the thought.”

  Evan had learned what friendship felt like. Could this be the unlikely beginning of another such friendship? Somehow the knowledge that the captain loved Gloria, and that she returned his regard, had changed his own feelings toward the man.

  “Somehow, both are true,” he confessed. “That we cannot succeed, yet if it is possible, Gloria will do it. My professors would be ashamed of me for such a featherheaded assessment.”

  “Your professors have not seen what you have accomplished.” The captain smiled, though his eyes still held pain in their depths. “You had best get yourself downstairs to find your young lady and secure her assistance. The sooner we are on our way to the train, the better I will feel.”

  Your young lady.

  There was no time to correct him, so Evan had a few stolen moments to savor the words as he hurried downstairs to the dining room. Isabela could never be his young lady. He had sense enough to know that. A country, a culture, an impending marriage all stood in the way, to say nothing of her own preference. She had been very candid about what she wanted from life, and every detail was so foreign to Evan that they may as well have been standing on opposite shores of the ocean.

  If Gloria’s plan worked, they would be, and that was as it should be.

  But that did not stop another tiny, warm flame that flickered into life inside him, fed by the knowledge that someone had seen and understood Evan’s shy, wordless regard for her. Her dark eyes and practical mind. Her humor. Her intelligence, hidden so carefully under her curls and silk. Her friendship.

  But he could not think of all that now. What he needed from Isabela was her help—specifically, a horse and cart. He must focus his energies on practical things or the plan would be scotched before it even got under way.

  He arrived at the dining-room doorway in time to see Joe clutch the back of the chair at the head of the table with one hand, as though to steady himself, and take Gloria’s hand with the other.

  “My most esteemed host and hostess,” he said, not in the Californio tongue as might have been expected in the bosom of the rancho family, but in English, for Gloria’s sake. “I have news of a most wonderful and personal nature.”

  “Your health is improving, Your Serene Highness?” Isabela’s mother asked anxiously. “You seem better this morning.”

  “I am indeed better, kind lady.” Joe inclined his head. “And part of the reason for that stands next to me.”

  All eyes turned to Gloria, who blushed and looked at the floor.

  “Your Serene Highness?” Senor Ignatio, the head of the household, looked as though he didn’t know whether to be embarrassed or delighted. Evan realized with a tingle of shock that they thought the prince had taken her—a married woman—as his mistress. Even for a people whose marriages and children and romantic entanglements were the currency of social interaction, this would be a bit much to announce at the breakfast table.

  “Senora Fremont has discovered her marriage is not what it ought to be,” Joe explained with aplomb. “I am having it annulled, and once that is done, she has agreed to marry me.”

  Dead silence fell, except for the clink of a fruit fork as it dropped from Beatriz’s nerveless fingers.

  “Sire?” Senor Ignatio choked. “Marry?”

  “But she is not a woman of the gente de razón!” Beatriz blurted before her mother turned on her in a fury and shushed her.

  Joe lifted his chin imperiously, and Evan could not help but admire him. “My intended is a gentlewoman of immense wealth and intelligence. In the Fifteen Colonies, she moves in the most exalted circles, and numbers among her friends those who enjoy the high regard of a queen. If this does not define a woman of the gente de razón, I do not know what will.”

  “Of course, Your Serene Highness.” Senor Ignatio had finally recovered his voice—and his composure. “Allow us to be the first to offer you our congratulations and our most sincere wishes for your mutual happiness.”

  “Thank you,” Joe said, and Gloria echoed him in a murmur that was most unlike her. “Until I have the bull of annulment in hand from Nuestra Senora de los Angeles, we will keep this secret, just among ourselves. It would not do for my lady’s reputation to be sullied before she is free to accept my suit.”

  “Of course not, Your Serene Highness,” Senor Ignatio managed. “You may be assured of our complete cooperation.”

  Again the regal inclination of the head. “And now, if you will send a collation to my s
uite, I wish to rest a little in the company of my intended bride. Dearest, do you prefer coffee or chocolate?” He lowered his voice tenderly.

  “Coffee, if you please.” Gloria clung to his arm like a morning glory. Joe, it was clear, was not the only one who had missed a calling upon the stage.

  The family leaped to their feet as Joe and Gloria sailed out of the room, and Evan caught just the hint of a wink as the couple passed him in the doorway.

  In the babble of shock and speculation that broke out the moment they were out of sight, Evan remembered that he had a job to do. He knelt next to Isabela’s chair.

  “Why, Senor Douglas. It seems you as well as I have been privy to a thunderbolt from the sky this morning.”

  “Yes,” he said for want of anything better. “May I ask for your help with a certain difficulty?”

  “Of course,” she said instantly. “You have but to name it.”

  “My translator seems to be suffering from a complaint of the head, characterized by loss of the ability to walk or speak. I must take him to the apothecary. Might I borrow a cart and horse for an hour?”

  “Apothecary? Are you sure he has not simply had too much to drink?”

  Evan did his best to smile. “That could be—in which case the apothecary can help him. But I suspect it is something else.”

  Her smooth brow furrowed with concern. “May not one of His Serene Highness’s physicians treat him? They are certainly closer to hand.”

  “I would not presume to ask His Serene Highness’s staff for such a thing.” Evan thought quickly. “He will be more comfortable at the apothecary’s. He has but recently been awarded his citizenship after having been a vagabond and a prisoner. And beyond that, he is a man who does not like to cause a fuss.”

  “I had noticed,” she said, nodding. “Come. We will go at once.”

  When her duenna rose with them, laying her fork down on a plate that had hardly been touched, Isabela waved her into her seat. With a rapid explanation in the Californio tongue that was mostly ignored in the spirited family discussion of the thunderbolt, Isabela ushered him out of the room.

  Though small and encumbered by skirts, she was still quick, her shoes tapping on the flagstones as they crossed the courtyard. It was all Evan could do to keep up. At the stables, she gave the order to the groom in a tone that somehow managed to command as well as convey respect for him and the work he did for her family, though Evan could only understand about one word in three.

  She turned to him and, slower now, walked beside him out of the stable block. “They will have the horse harnessed and in front of the garden gate in ten minutes. There is a track that leads into town without having to enter the mission gates or make a spectacle of oneself along the avenue. The servants come and go that way.”

  “You think of everything,” he said with admiration. “Thank you.”

  “It is the least I can do for a guest who has fallen ill under our roof,” she said with no little gravity. “We take the responsibilities of hospitality very seriously here.”

  “Then allow me to offer my thanks for that, too,” he said, seizing her warm hand in both his cold ones. “For our business here is completed, and I return to the southeast of the kingdom on the noon train.”

  She stopped beneath an olive tree that provided a welcome, feathery shade. He should release her hand. She should release his. Both of them, it seemed, were perfectly aware of the shoulds of the case. And paid no attention whatsoever.

  “You are leaving? This very day?”

  “I am afraid so. Commander de Sola has given me my travel papers, and I have given him my word that I will return to assist with the work on the dam.” Well, it wasn’t a falsehood, exactly. He did plan to return, after the Viceroy was safe with the witches.

  “But—but—” Now she did release his hand, to pace this way and that in the pool of shade cast by the tree, her skirts twitching like the tail of a cat. “It is so sudden. Why did you not tell us sooner? One cannot simply leave without a farewell dinner, or prayers to the saints in church for a safe journey, or—”

  “Isabela—senorita—forgive me.” He did not care about the farewell dinner, or the saints, but he did care about the disappointment and dismay in her eyes. “I am not familiar with the customs of this country. I merely thought to cause as little inconvenience as possible.”

  “You are a guest,” she managed with some dignity. “Guests are never inconvenient. Besides, how can you leave your friend Senora Fremont when she—well, there will be much to celebrate in three days’ time, once the bull of annulment comes through and we have had time to recover from the shock. Surely you can put off Commander de Sola until then?”

  “Perhaps, but I cannot put off Joe. He needs care, and with medicine from the apothecary I hope he will be up to the journey.”

  “Is he going back to San Gregorio?”

  Evan cast about for a suitable fabrication. “I imagine so, but he wished to visit friends first. To tell them the good news of his citizenship, I imagine.”

  “Oh, of course.” She nodded, then her face clouded again. “But there is no urgency in that. He has friends here, too. Oh, senor—Evan—please do not rush off in this way. I—we may never see you again.”

  “If my friend is to marry your prince, there is every possibility we might see each other again.”

  It was all he could do not to repossess her hand. For that hand was all but spoken for by the Ambassador’s pimply son, and he must not lose his head a second time in five minutes.

  Five minutes.

  The cart would be waiting at the gate in five minutes, and he still had to help the captain get the Viceroy downstairs and out the door.

  “Please convey my heartfelt thanks to your parents for their hospitality,” he said. Time, which had plodded so slowly in prison that every second became an eternity, seemed to be rushing past him with a sound he could almost hear. “Tell them that I must see to my translator, and that our business calls us away to the south.”

  “I will tell them no such thing.” She folded her arms and pouted, which act was slightly marred by the trembling of her lower lip. “You must tell them yourself.”

  “Isabela, if we are to get to the apothecary and then to the station by noon, there is no time for protracted good-byes. And it is not as though we are the heirs to a rancho. They cannot care if two erstwhile prisoners depart their house. I should think they would be relieved.”

  She lifted her chin. “Then you cast aspersions upon their good character, and I am sorry I arranged the wretched cart for you.”

  That did it—he lost his head and took both her hands this time. “You do not mean that. Isabela, it is difficult for me to say good-bye. You have been so kind. At times your presence was all that kept me going.”

  “Was it?” Her frank gaze examined his face, searching out the truth.

  Well, he could give her the truth of that, at least. He nodded, not daring to say more.

  “Then kiss me good-bye properly,” she said suddenly. Her fingers tightened on his as instinctively he drew back. “That is the price of my cooperation. If you are to leave like a thief in the night, then I will be a thief, too—and steal a kiss while I can.”

  “That would be—what about San Gregorio’s heir?” For all he knew, a kiss was a contract, and she could be disgraced if it were discovered. Though no one besides themselves seemed to be in this narrow stretch of garden between the stable block and the house.

  “I wish to be kissed by a man before I am sentenced to marry a boy,” she said fiercely.

  “Sentenced? But I thought you wanted to marry him. Didn’t you say your ambition was to be second lady in the land?”

  Her eyes compelled him to step closer, and she lowered her voice. “Now that Senora Fremont is to be the first lady, do you not think that things will change? The moment the royal heir is conceived, San Gregorio will return to what it has been for centuries—a rancho sleeping on the edge of the sea, with no pret
ensions to a throne at all.”

  “And where does that leave you?”

  “Where I have also been for centuries—at my father’s command,” she said with some bitterness. “Do not mistake me—I have no wish to be allied with de Aragon and his warmongering, but as politics stand, Papa has no choice but to seek the alliance. As for me, I must go on acting the part of the butterfly among strangers.”

  “Am I a stranger still?”

  Her skirts pushed softly at his legs as she gazed up at him. “I would never kiss a stranger—save for a dashing criminal who stole my heart and rode away.”

  “Now you are playacting again,” he told her, a genuine smile coming unbidden to his mouth.

  “Am I?”

  She seized the embroidered lapels of his short jacket and pulled him toward her, rising on her toes. Her lips met his—so soft, so sweet—and parted just long enough for him to wonder if it were possible to become drunk on a kiss.

  For he had never kissed a woman before. Oh, he had idly speculated, dreamed once or twice, but opportunities along that line had never exactly flung themselves at him. Not until now, with a girl he might not meet again until she was married.

  When she released him, he dragged in a breath and wondered that his knees had not given out. “You—you seem to be quite skilled at stealing kisses,” he finally said, when speech was possible.

  “That was my first time. Was it acceptable?” she asked a little anxiously.

  Her honesty took his breath away once more. “It was my first time, too, so I am no authority. But I can say that it was not at all like kissing my cousins. In fact, I … I believe I shall never be the same again.”

  “Truly?” Anxiety turned to a glow of delight in a second. “Shall we make a second attempt?”

  The Viceroy—the captain—the horse and cart—all his most pressing concerns vanished like a wisp of mist under the heat of blinding day as her lips met his once more. An aeon passed in which stars whirled and galaxies formed … and he realized that he must breathe or he would be the one lying unconscious in the bottom of the cart.