I was unprepared for the change in Felipe’s expression. Fear was clearly to be seen as his lips formed the word “heretic.” Then suddenly that control which was so much a part of his character seemed to desert him. He took me into his arms and held me tightly against him.

“Catalina,” he said, “we are going to Madrid. We must not stay here.”

A terrible fear had begun to overshadow me. When darkness fell I would often fancy I was being watched. I could not specifically say how. It was just that I would hear footsteps which seemed to follow me; or the quiet shutting of a door when I was in a room, so that it seemed that someone had opened it to watch me and then quietly shut it and gone away. On one or two occasions I fancied someone had been in my room. Some familiar object had been moved from its place and I was sure I had not done this.

I admonished myself. I was allowing my imagination to take possession of my good sense. Since Isabella’s death and my marriage—the one a natural sequence of the other—the tension had been gradually rising. I could not forget Pilar’s face when she looked at me and whispered those words: “Witch. Heretic witch” and in my mind had conjured up such horror as I dared not brood on.

It came into my mind that there was hatred around me. Some evil force was trying to destroy me. I knew this was so when I found the image in my drawer.

I had opened it unsuspectingly and there looking up at me was the figure. It was made of wax and represented a beautiful girl with black hair piled high and in that hair was a miniature comb. Her gown was of velvet and the resemblance struck me immediately. Isabella! It could not be meant to resemble anyone else.

I picked it up. What horror possessed me then, for protruding from her gown, at that spot beneath which her heart would have been, was a pin.

Someone had put the thing in my drawer. Who? Someone had made that thing in the image of Isabella. Someone had stuck a pin through the heart and put it in my drawer!

I stood there with it in my hand.

The door had opened. I looked up startled and saw a dark reflection in the mirror.

To my relief I realized that it was only Manuela.

I held the figure crushed in my hand and turned to her. I wondered whether she noticed how shaken I was.

“The children are ready to say good night,” she said.

“I’ll come, Manuela.”

She disappeared and I stood staring at the thing in my hand; then I thrust it to the back of the drawer and went to the nursery.

I could not listen to what the children were saying. I could only think of that horrible thing and its significance.

Who had put it there? Someone who wished me ill. Someone who was accusing me of bringing about Isabella’s death. I must destroy it with all speed. While it was there I was unsafe.

As soon as I had tucked the children in and kissed them good night I went back to my room.

I opened my drawer. The figure had disappeared.

I told Felipe what I had found and I was immediately aware of the terrible fear this aroused in him.

“And it was gone?” he cried. “You should never have put it back in the drawer. You should have destroyed it immediately.”

“It means that someone believes I killed Isabella.”

“It means,” he said, “that someone is trying to prove that you are a witch.”

I did not have to ask him what that meant.

“I was accused of that on the ship,” I said. I shivered. “I came near to a horrible death.”

“Some of the sailors must have talked. We must get away from here quickly.”

He speeded up preparations for our departure.

Fear had certainly entered the Hacienda. The great shadow of the Inquisition hung over us. Sometimes I would awaken shouting, having dreamed I was in that square. I was looking on from the box … looking on at myself in the hideous sanbenito. I could hear the crackle of flames at my feet. I would awake crying out from my dream and Felipe would take me in his arms and comfort me.

“Soon,” he said, “we shall be safe in Madrid.”

“Felipe,” I asked, “what if they should come and take me … how would they come?”

He answered: “They come often at night. There would be the knock on the door. We should hear the words: ‘Open in the name of the Holy Office.’ Those are the words none dare disobey.”

“And they would take me away then, Felipe. They would question me. I should answer their questions. What have I to fear?”

“All have something to fear when they fall into the hands of the Inquisition.”

“The innocent…”

“Even the innocent.”

“If they believe you to be a witch they would take you,” he said. “If they should come by night I shall hide you. We must pretend that you have disappeared, that you are indeed a witch and you have invoked the Devil to aid you. There is a secret door in the bedchamber.” He showed it to me. “You will hide in here until such time as I can save you.”

“Felipe, would Pilar inform against me?”

“It may well be,” he answered. “And if she does they will come for you.”

“Do you believe she has?”

“I cannot say. People are wary of going to the Holy Office even to lay information against others, for it has happened that in so doing they have become involved themselves. We will pray that Pilar has not said to others what she has said to you.”

I trembled in his arms and he said soothingly: “It is not like you to be afraid, my love. We will outwit any who come against us.”

“If you hid me, Felipe,” I said, “would that not be an act against the Inquisition?”

He was silent.

I went on: “You would act against the Inquisition for my sake? You would preserve a heretic in your house because you love her?”

“Hush. Do not say that word, Catalina, even when we are alone. We must be watchful. I will speed on our departure. Once we have left this place we shall be safe.”

The days passed. We were waiting for a ship. When it came we would say good-bye to the Hacienda and Honey, Don Luis and little Edwina. I had prevailed upon Felipe to allow Carlos to come with us. Manuela would accompany us too, with Jennet and young Jacko.

I was desolate at the thought of leaving Honey; but I knew that from now on I was in jeopardy and the tension created by the realization that at any moment there might be that knock on the door was such that one must long to escape from it at all costs.

I heard that Pilar was sick and had taken to her bed. I sent Manuela over to see her. Manuela had been a good and faithful servant and grateful to me for rescuing Carlos whom she adored. I thought that she might discover how far Pilar had gone with her accusations.

When she came back I summoned her to my bedroom where we could talk without being overheard and asked her what she had found.

“Pilar is indeed sick,” she said. “She is sick of heart and sick of body.”

“Did she talk of Isabella?”

“All the time. The maids told me that she wanders about the Casa Azul at night calling for Isabella, that she will not allow them to touch the dolls. She has them there in her room.”

I nodded.

“Manuela, I wish to know all,” I said, “no matter what. I know that she hates me because I married Isabella’s husband. But Isabella was no wife to him. You know that.”

“Always she talks,” said Manuela. “She goes from one thing to another. She curses Edmundo. ‘All for a cross,’ she said, ‘a ruby-studded cross. You remember it, Manuela. She wore it so seldom.’”

“You did remember it, Manuela?”

“Yes, I did. It was a beautiful thing. I noticed it particularly, for I have a special liking for rubies. And it was not found either.”

“Edmundo gave it to someone, I believe that was the assumption. A woman he loved.”

“Who was this woman? They never found her.”

“You would not expect her to come forward. She would be afraid to. Or it may be that he hid the cross somewhere. Perhaps he buried it in the garden. He would have to hide it I suppose. But what does the cross matter?”