The Wildest Heart

Ramon stood back proudly as she linked her arm in mine and drew me forward.

“This is Rowena, of course, who is to be my daughter. Jesus, is she not as lovely as I told you she was?”

The tall, slender man who put aside the guitar he’d been holding and came forward to greet me must be Jesus Montoya, then. The comanchero. The man whom Lucas had fought over Luz. I remembered everything that I had heard about these comancheros, and I suppose my eyes must have seemed guarded when I raised them to his, for I thought he smiled mockingly as he bent over my hand with true Spanish gallantry. He spoke to me in Spanish too.

“I have heard much about you, and you are no disappointment. I can only say that Ramon is an extremely lucky man!”

He straightened, and I met eyes so dark they seemed black. Streaks of white in his hair and moustache only seemed to emphasize the animal good looks of this man. He was neither as old as I had imagined, nor as brutish. And yet, I had sensed the scrutiny of his gaze, and some instinct told me that this was a man I should be very careful with.

I smiled at him in what I hoped was a guileless fashion. “You are a born courtier, señor! But what woman does not appreciate flattery?”

“With your beauty, señorita, you must be a connoisseur. You will let me flatter you again, I hope—later on? With Ramon’s permission, of course!”

“Oh, but Rowena has eyes for no one but Ramon! She had three of my sons to choose from, but the other two she put in their places from the beginning, isn’t that so?”

Elena’s voice was as light as mine had been, and I matched her with my soft laugh.

“Oh, but to be fair you must admit I did not find it hard to choose! Your other sons are committed elsewhere, only Ramon was kind enough to fall in love with me!”

I wondered if we would all have to endure an evening filled with nothing but pretty, insincere speeches.

Ramon led me away, and the vaqueros smiled and nodded to me, each one in turn congratulating us. Jesus Montoya had brought one other man with him, an older man with swarthy, rather flat features, who gazed at me with no expression at all. But he took the guitar that Montoya flung at him laughingly after a while and played it until everyone forgot what he looked like.

“That is Chato,” Ramon whispered to me. “He is the best guitar player I have ever heard. The only thing he does better, I think, is shoot.”

“Well, I hope we do not have an exhibition of that particular skill!” I whispered back a trifle sharply.

I was beginning to wonder—and especially when I saw Elena go up to Lucas, and take his arm, with a laughing apology to Luz. Ramon had already swept me into the steps of a lively dance that I had some difficulty in following at first. Soon afterwards, Jesus Montoya walked over to where Luz sat perched on the low wall, and bowed to her, a trifle exaggeratedly. I expected her to turn away from him, but instead she smiled, and dimpled prettily at something he said as she took his arm with every evidence of enjoyment.

I stole a glance at Lucas, and his face looked grim. His head bent, he was engaged in some kind of low-voiced argument with Elena, whose smile never faltered.

I could not stop myself from glancing upward at Ramon.

“Do you think there will be trouble? There’s Luz

dancing quite unconcernedly with señor Montoya, and I thought she had to be rescued from him not too long ago!”

His fingers squeezed mine reassuringly.

“Do not worry, querìda! Do you not see that my mother has everything well in hand? Luz is taking your advice, I think, and making my brother jealous, which is good for him, you’ll have to admit. And as for Montoya… well,” he shrugged, half-humorously, “only Montoya knows what he thinks! But even he has too much respect for my mother to start any brawl here.”

I told myself that he was right. How innocuous it all seemed on the surface! Even Lucas seemed on his best behavior, in spite of his sullen demeanor, and when he danced with Luz later I could read nothing in his manner that smacked of jealousy, or even anger. We were all so civilized… it was hard to believe that I was not somewhere else; and this not an evening like any other. I missed Julio. He, at least, had been honest, both in his feelings and his dealings with me, and with the others. But Ramon had already told me that Julio had left the valley after speaking with Jesus Montoya. Being all Apache in his thinking, he would not have believed farewells necessary. Still, I wondered what had made him leave so abruptly, and wondered, at the same time, if I would ever have an answer to all the questions that I found were in my mind.

I had some of those answers when, finally, Jesus Montoya asked me to dance with him.

I had already danced, one by one, with the vaqueros, who held me away from them as if I was something fragile, to be handled only with the greatest respect. I had drank at least three glasses of wine—and far too fast. They were all toasting Ramon and me, and I told myself that my flushed cheeks would be put down to the dancing.

“So, now at last it is my turn. Will you dance with me, señorita Rowena?”

He was formal, and I was just as formal, giving him a small curtsy in acceptance.

“You will have to guide me in the steps. I am just starting to learn them.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Shall I have Chato play a waltz? Yes, he can play even that. You have heard already, I think, how he can make the guitar come to life under his fingers.”

And so I found myself dancing the waltz in the open, under a yellow moon, with only a guitar to give us music. But it was enough. Jesus Montoya was a born dancer, I have seldom danced with better.

“How light you are on your feet!” he murmured.