The Secret of Zorro
Clementia's Wedding
Chapter Four through Chapter Six
by Ella Christian @1999-2001
Contact author at EllaChristian@aol.com

Chapter Four - "Here's to the Fox"

Sunday evenings were generally quiet around the pueblo, especially in summer. Though Juan Bottega kept his tavern open, no musicians or dancers were hired to entertain guests on Sundays or Mondays, making the Tavern a quiet, lightly-frequented place.  On this particular Sunday, things livened up in the mid-afternoon when Benicio Bocca, surrounded by a small entourage of the younger and unattached ladies of the pueblo, plus a few vaqueros, darkened the Tavern door. It was Bocca's first visit in nearly four years. Juan Bottega had seen him enter the square after church that morning. He knew it would not take long for Benicio to find his way to the Tavern. He approached Bottega with his easy smile.

"Don Benicio," Juan nodded, not returning the grin.

Benicio shrugged. "I do not deserve that title," he replied. "Ever since my father disinherited me." He looked around the Tavern. "The place looks good, Juan. Business must be all right."

"The pueblo continues to grow," Juan answered, polishing his bartop with a soft cloth.  

"Si, even Diego has helped increase the population!" Benicio joked. He tapped the wood with his forefinger, indicating he wanted a drink. "How about something strong?"

Juan did not reply, but continued to polish the beautiful, shining wood of the hand-made bar. "It took me six months to complete all the repairs and restore this bartop after your last visit," he finally said. He pulled out a bottle of whiskey and poured his customer a shot.

"You should have sent the bill to El Zorro," Benicio told him. He tossed the shot back and gulped it down, then winced. "That is better whiskey than you had last time I was here."

Juan Bottega shrugged.

"Please, pour glasses for these ladies," Benicio told him, waving behind him.

Juan counted and then pulled up seven wine glasses from under his counter. "You will pay for this?" he asked cautiously.

Benicio frowned. "Of course!" He reached into his vest pocket and retrieved several pesos, placing them on the bar. "I may not be my father's heir, but that does not mean I am worthless!" He looked at the shining wood under his hand. "It is impossible to keep off the dust at this time of year, eh?"

"Play another song for us, Benicio," Seņorita Martina called to him from her table.  

Benicio smiled again at Juan Bottega. "You have no objection?" he asked. "It is hot outside, you see. For the ladies."

"It is getting warm in here, too," the bartender replied, wishing he could close the bar and go home to his wife.  He looked into the young Bocca's eyes. "No fights, Benicio," he said. "Having El Zorro's blood all over my bartop once is quite enough." He leaned over and added softly, "You are a fool to return. We all heard what he said to you that night."

"I have only come back for my sister's wedding," Benicio answered.

"She was not engaged when you arrived," Juan reminded him.

Benicio smiled, his lips curling ever so slowly. "It would be interesting, wouldn't it, to make every man in the pueblo remove his shirt to see if anyone has a scar..." he ran his forefinger across his middle near his navel. Then he stepped back, satisfied with his point. "I have heard El Zorro moved to Monterey. It is all the way up and down the Camino Real, all the way to Mexico."

Juan Bottega shook his head slowly. "Then on the Camino, they are wrong," he said. "Perhaps he went to Monterey for a while, getting over Seņora de la Vega. But he is back. We have seen him here this summer. And he will remember what he told you. Zorro remembers everything."

Benicio's eyebrows raised slightly.  "Seņora de la Vega?" he asked.

Juan turned his back, having had enough of the exchange. Benicio took his shoulder and pulled him back. "What did you say, about Seņora de la Vega?" he asked.  

Juan faced Benicio, who still had his hand on the bartender's shoulder. "Before she married Don Diego...and they say for some time after..." he paused, suddenly uncomfortable with repeating the lore around Elizabeth and El Zorro. He sighed. "But she almost died when she had the little girl. Some say she did die, and Don Diego brought her back."

"Brought her back?" Benicio repeated, mystified.

Juan nodded. "And she has not been seen with El Zorro since." He shrugged.  

Benicio let go of him, pondering this information. "Zorro and Seņora de la Vega," he muttered.  "This I had not heard."

"Benicio!" Seņorita Martina called to him again.

"Sí, sí," he waved at her, smiling his sultry smile. Clementia could certainly tell him all about the mystery of El Zorro and the pretty Doņa Elizabeth.  He tapped his glass against the bartop again, and watched as Juan poured another shot. He held the glass up briefly and said, "Here's to the Fox."  He threw his head back and swallowed it in on one gulp. Then he set the glass down and turned his attentions to the ladies.

*****

In the de la Vega hacienda that evening, dinner hour began festively. Don Alejandro invited Don Carlos, Don Francisco, Doņa Leonora, Clementia, Consuelo and of course the groom-to-be and his constant companion Corporal Reyes.  The invitation was also extended to Benicio, who did not appear because he never returned from his midday visit to the pueblo. Everyone arrived talking all at once. Esperanza was handed around before her bedtime, and the meal was animated as the women discussed the coming nuptials while the men debated the true origins of Capitan Vilaro's banking plan. Don Francisco was unshakeably convinced that his son was behind it. Don Alejandro was inclined to agree. Don Carlos believed a bank in Los Angeles was a good idea, and began to suggest - with his usual subtlety - that the parties here present might be good backers for a private venture. "With Miguel, of course," he added, not wishing to leave the Cahuenga family out.  

Diego had a different analysis of the situation, believing that this had all the characteristics of a new ploy from Governor Pena himself. "Think about it!" he said to the older men. "He would be secure no matter what happens with Spain and Mexico!"

Sergeant Garcia was uncharacteristically silent during the meal, his eyes moving back and forth between Clementia and the men. "I felt out of place in general and in particular," he later remarked to Corporal Reyes on their ride home.  

After supper the men retired to the patio for cigars, the women to the upstairs parlor adjacent to Diego and Elizabeth's room where Elizabeth could nurse the baby. The men had just lit up their cigars when the outer gate opened and Benicio Bocca stepped into their midst. The energy of the group instantly shifted to a state of wariness.

"Benicio, I am glad you could join us after all," Don Alejandro said, attempting to be gracious and gesturing him to the table.

Don Francisco let out a disgusted sigh.

Diego stood up, lifting a bottle of wine in one hand, and holding a fresh cigar in the other. "May we tempt you?" he asked.

Benicio smiled, looking around the courtyard. Then his smile faded slightly.

"Oh, they are all upstairs," Diego said, reading his mind.  

Benicio chuckled sheepishly, holding his hands partway in the air in a gesture of being found out. He joined the men, sitting down and nodding at the wine bottle Diego held. Diego poured him a glass.

"We can have some tapas brought out, if you are hungry," Alejandro offered.

"Thank you, Don Alejandro, I have already eaten," Benicio answered, savoring the wine.

Don Francisco sighed again. He tried to keep quiet but could not resist saying, "You might have come here in time to eat!"

Benicio ignored his father, lifting his glass to the men. "To the good health of those we love," he said.

The others raised their glasses and they all drank.  

"So tell us how you are finding things in Mexico," Diego ventured.  

"Disorganized and poor," Benicio replied. "But it will not stay that way." 

"Oh?" Diego said. "How so?"

"They believe there is money to be had from Alta California," he answered. "Money, and land."

Carlos, Alejandro and Francisco all said, "Land?" at the same time.

"Are you saying the Mexicans will not honor our land grants from the King of Spain?" Alejandro asked.

"Or legal purchases made?" Carlos added.

"It is hard to know what they will do," Benicio answered, taking another sip of his wine. "But I think they will make their own laws, once they are in charge."

All the men looked at each other. Sergeant Garcia shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Diego raised his eyebrows, and then looked down into his glass. It was indeed time for El Zorro to have an exchange with Benicio.

*****

Upstairs, Elizabeth was feeding her daughter while Consuelo, Doņa Leonora and Clementia took their evening coffee and ate tiny, sweet pastries made that afternoon by the marvelous de la Vega cook, Conchita.

"Lemony," Clementia announced. She consumed another of the little round cookies, nodding again. "I wonder, Elizabeth, if you would let me borrow Conchita to help with the food for my wedding week? She is the best cook in Los Angeles."

"You insult our Pilar!" Doņa Leonora exclaimed.

Consuelo sighed.

"Pilar is very good, Mama, but she does not make magic with her cakes and cookies and stews and lamb the way Conchita does," Clementia said.

"But who will cook for us?" Elizabeth asked, trying to concentrate. For some reason Esperanza's nursing, was stirring her deep in her womb tonight. Everything deep in her center was churned up. It was all she could do to refrain from telling the ladies to kindly go away so she could summon her husband, lock the door, throw away the key, and beg him to ravish her.

"How about a trade?" Clementia asked.  

"A trade?" Elizabeth blurted, her mind still on Diego.  

Clementia frowned. "Si, for two weeks we get Conchita and you get Pilar."

"Oh," Elizabeth said. "I cannot say how my father-in-law would take to that." She saw Consuelo's eyes glued on Esperanza's face where her mouth met Elizabeth's breast. Elizabeth squinted, annoyed. Then she said, "Consuelo, would you check to see how far into their cigars the men are? I am really becoming quite tired..." 

Consuelo started at the instruction, but ever fearful of Diego's wife, she got up and left the room.

"Ask Alejandro for me, Elizabeth," Clementia wheedled. "We could send Conchita down to San Juan Capistrano and she could bake everything ahead of time."

"San Juan Capistrano?" Elizabeth echoed.

"The wedding will take place at Rancho Verbena," Doņa Leonora stated.  

*****

Downstairs, the men saw Consuelo coming and all stood up immediately. Her eyes went first to Benicio, who gave her a half-smile, and then to Diego.

"Is something wrong?" he asked her.

She shrugged. "Elizabeth is tired," she said.

"It is time for us all to leave," Don Francisco announced. "Go tell your mother and your cousin to come down." He glanced at Benicio. "We shall all go home together."

"I must make a call, Father," Benicio said, putting down his glass.  

Consuelo returned and went back up the stairs.  

"At this hour?" Don Francisco asked.  

"Si, it is just a little matter I must attend to," he explained. "I will be home before long." He headed for the gate. "Don Alejandro, Don Diego, thank you for the hospitality." He was soon and mysteriously gone. Diego observed this with interest. Benicio was up to something.    

The women soon appeared on the stairs, the men made parting comments. When they were all departed Diego hurriedly told Bernardo to saddle Tornado immediately. He wanted to catch Benicio on the road to the pueblo, but was not sure he could do it given Bocca's head start. He hurried upstairs, came into the bedroom, and headed straight for the door to the secret room and Zorro's passage to Tornado's cave.

"Where are you going?" Elizabeth asked, sounding urgent. 

He looked over at her, to see her sitting in candlelight, naked on the bed. She tilted her head in a summoning way. Esperanza was nowhere to be seen or heard. "Oh!" he said, his eyes taking her in. Instantly he was torn. Finding Benicio and getting him in line was necessary. On the other hand, Elizabeth had not done something quite so inviting, and on her own initiative, since the baby was born. "But...I must..." his hand was on the ring that opened the secret passage door.

Elizabeth attempted to head him off further by swiftly getting off the bed and throwing herself into his arms. "I need you," she whispered, pressing herself against him.

"But..." he said.  She stopped him with a kiss.

His arms came around her and he gave in to it momentarily, tasting her mouth and feeling her soft warmth against him. He groaned into the kiss. "No, sweetheart, I really must go out," he said, pulling her arms from his neck.

"For what?" she asked, instantly cross.

"I will return," he promised. He kissed her cheek and gave her a squeeze. "Soon."

She marched back to the bed and got into it, yanking the covers up to her neck. Diego shook his head and then turned, opening the door and disappearing beyond it, pulling it shut behind him. Immediately he heard a thud against the wall, and realized a heavy pillow had just been flung across the room in his direction.

*****

El Zorro rode Tornado to the crossing where the Cahuenga Road met the de la Vega road and pondered which path Benicio might have taken. Not home this early, he thought. That ruled out a turn northwards to the Cahuenga Pass. Instead Zorro continued east, suspecting that Benicio was on his way back to the pueblo, perhaps for a nightcap with Capitan Vilaro. Riding silently into the back of town, he dismounted Tornado behind the cuartel and climbed the outer wall. Then, with his customary sure-footedness, he made his way across the rooftops in the garrison to peer down over the front wall. Sure enough, Bocca's horse was hitched near the closed cuartel gate. Benicio you are becoming predictable, Zorro thought. He straightened up to survey the scene of the quiet pueblo square. He was about to turn around to look at the garrison yard when he felt a sharp point at his back.

"Seņor Zorro, we meet again," came a voice behind him.

The night went silent as the two men stood on the red tiled roof.

El Zorro raised his hands away from his waist slowly, indicating no wish to fight. "Don Benicio," he said softly.

"How did you know it was me, after all this time?" Benicio asked, pushing his knifepoint deeper into Zorro's shirt.

"I always recognize the blade of a knife that has drawn my blood," Zorro replied. "Call it a flesh memory. Tell me, what brought you back to Los Angeles, after the warning you received on your last visit?"

Bocca took Zorro by the shoulder, keeping the knife against his lower back with the other hand. He snorted. "I am the one with the knife, and you are questioning me?" 

Zorro shrugged lightly. "The roof is not flat."

"You are a persistent fellow," Bocca observed.  

At that moment the loud and unexpected screech of a mockingbird pierced the silence of the dark night.  Benicio started at it, which gave Zorro the chance to elbow his attacker and give him a shove. The knife broke his Zorro's skin, though not deeply, as Benicio slipped and tumbled several feet on the tile, then slid over the edge and rolled off the roof. Zorro winced as he heard his attacker hit the stairwell with a thud. Stepping down slowly, Zorro lowered himself to his stomach and peered over the roof's edge. Benicio was on his stomach, the knife nearby, panting. The wind was knocked out of him.  

"As I say, the roof is not flat," Zorro repeated. He stood up, the wind capturing an edge of his cape so that it fluttered slightly around his legs. "And Seņor, remember what I told you. Consider this your only warning."

Bocca struggled to his hands and knees, groaning. Then he looked up to see the man in black still standing above him on the roof. "Circumstances have changed since our last encounter," he said.

"Not enough," El Zorro replied. He pointed his gloved finger. "Remember!" He warned. With that he whirled around and bounded off the roof to the cuartel wall, and then dropped out of sight.

Benicio pulled himself to his feet, and retrieved his knife where it lay on the ground. He peered carefully at it, and saw the evidence of blood on the tip. "Ah, you are in for a surprise, Senor Zorro," he said softly, his half-smile curling.

*****

When at last he entered his bedroom, Diego was stripped of everything except the black pants. The ride back plus bounding up the stairs left him a little breathless and he felt slightly light-headed. He leaned over the bed to see Elizabeth's back to him, apparently asleep. Everything was quiet. He waited for a moment, frowning. Then he went to Elizabeth's side of the bed, to find that Esperanza's cradle was empty. He frowned. He rested his hand on his wife's shoulder.

"Liz," he said. "Where is the baby?"

Elizabeth blinked, and then rolled away from him. "She is with Conchita," came the muffled, sniffly reply. "I just fed her a little while ago."

Diego pulled off his trousers and sidled into the bed beside her, trying to put his arms around her. This produced a near-snarl and yanking away from him.

He sighed, sitting up and putting his elbows on his knees. It made him wince. He realized that he was feeling increasing, sharp pain from where Bocca's knife had broken the skin on his back, near his right kidney. He waited. After a silence he said, "Will you just say it and get it over with?"

At first she just lay there. Then she said, "You should have stayed here with me."

"You don't even know what I was doing," he answered. "And besides, I'm here with you now." An even sharper pain radiated across his lower back. In spite of himself he groaned, silently reaching for it.

"What's wrong?" Elizabeth asked, turning to look at him.

Diego looked at his hand to see blood. The small wound had reopened. He sighed.

Elizabeth sat up, looking at him. Then she saw his hand and the blood. "Diego!" she exclaimed. She could see no wound on him. "Turn around."

He did, and she gasped. "My God!" she said, getting out of bed. "You're hurt, you're bleeding!" She hurriedly lit two candles.  

He put his hand back on the small wound, which now hurt much more than it should. "It's just a silly scratch," he said. Getting the words out was suddenly hard. His light-headedness was getting worse.

"No, it's not!" she exclaimed, pulling his hand away. "It's bleeding and weeping and the skin around it looks funny."

"What do you mean?" he asked, realizing he was beginning to feel very strange.

"It's all red and puckered," she said. She looked at him in sudden horror.

Diego felt suddenly overcome with wooziness. "I must have...the knife must have...been..." he tried to finish but couldn't.

"Diego," Elizabeth said, grabbing his shoulders. "What knife? What happened? Who did this? Have you been poisoned?"

Everything in the room began to swirl. "It barely broke...the skin..." he muttered, falling slowly back onto the bed.  "Get...Bernardo...."

"Lie down, lie back down," Elizabeth said, trying to help him lie back against their pillows.  

"Damned...Mexican...poi...." he muttered, and then he passed out.

*****

The days that followed were a nightmare. Frightened as she had never been in her life, Elizabeth raced first to Alejandro and then to Bernardo that night, summoning them to Diego's side. Unable to revive him, Bernardo departed immediately for San Pedro for Lolita, while Elizabeth and Alejandro made a hot poultice to try to draw the poison out of Diego's system. He was unresponsive. Lolita arrived with Bernardo at dawn, instantly confirming that some sort of poison was at work in his bloodstream. After a thorough examination she was not able to identify exactly what it was, but she had guesses. If it was related to the bitterberry from the Mexican mountains in Baja, she said that Diego had several days of fever and delirium ahead. She refused to say what might happen after that, but did assure them that if it were going to kill him it would have by now.  

By mid-morning he was sweating profusely and mumbling incoherently. He would drift into sleep, drenched, and then awaken in cold shivers, then fall asleep again. It was at noontime that Elizabeth, Alejandro, Bernardo and Lolita were finally able to confer about the situation. Elizabeth, who had not slept at all, sat in her chair feeding her hungry daughter. The quartet's shared problem did not end at attempting to cure Diego by finding the exact nature of the poison and thus, perhaps, an antidote. They also had to keep the word of his injury from leaking beyond the room in which they were all cloistered, Diego in a troubled sleep.

"Someone in the pueblo did this to Zorro last night," Alejandro said. "Whoever it is will surely be interested in the setback of any man within 50 miles!"

Bernardo nodded.

"There is no hiding it," Lolita said. "He is too sick to stand up. I fear it is still spreading, into his muscles and joints."

"Oh, God," Elizabeth whispered, stroking Esperanza's soft, dark hair. "Can't you find the remedy? He looks like he is in so much pain."

"Not until I know exactly what it is," Lolita answered. "I could end up doing more harm than good."

Elizabeth fought back tears. "But...you think you know? It is this berry from Mexico? Isn't there some cure?" She wiped her eyes, frightened and furious. "It had to have been Vilaro...or that Benicio Bocca!"

Alejandro shook his head dismissively. "Benicio was here last night, I do not believe he went back to the pueblo."

"Whoever poisoned him probably knows what the antidote is!" Elizabeth exclaimed. Her agitation rattled Esperanza, who coughed and began to cry. Elizabeth tried to readjust, patting the baby against her shoulder and trying to find some comfort from her daughter. "Oh, sweet Ranza," she said, continuing to barely contain her own tears.

Across the room, Diego moaned. Lolita went to check on him.

"We cannot keep up this charade of acting as if everything is normal beyond that door," Elizabeth said as the baby calmed. "It is impossible."

They all stood there in silence.

"Can we move him?" Elizabeth asked Lolita.

"Move him?" Alejandro repeated.

"Si," Elizabeth said. "To somewhere that works for us and makes sense to others, somewhere he can be that won't arouse suspicion, among the household servants or in town."

They all looked at Lolita.

"I do not advise moving him," she said. "But I suppose we could take him down to San Pedro."

Diego groaned again. "Move me," he whispered raspily.

Everyone hurried to his bedside, Elizabeth still holding the baby. Diego did not look at his wife, but instead grabbed Bernardo's sleeve, staring wildly at his servant. Bernardo leaned over and Diego muttered something in his ear. Bernardo looked at him and frowned. Diego began to shiver.

"Oh, God," Elizabeth said, handing Esperanza to Lolita. She took her husband's hand. "Diego, Diego," she said. He was out of his mind again, shivering and shaking. She looked at Bernardo. "What did he say?"

Bernardo pointed at himself and then outside towards the stable.

"Did he tell you who did this?" Alejandro asked.

Bernardo frowned, looking slightly confused. Then he shrugged.

"Well if whatever he told you will help him, go do it!" Elizabeth snapped.

Diego's hand grabbed for her wrist. His body stopped shaking.

"What, sweetheart?" she asked, leaning over him. "Oh, Diego, tell me what happened. Tell me what to do."

"Move me," he groaned again. "The cabin...in the hills..."

Bernardo slipped out the door and headed for the stables.

"Diego it is too dangerous," Elizabeth said to him gently, her face near his.  "Lolita does not think we should try it."

"No one...must know...." he gasped. His eyes went to his father. "Today..." he added. Then he began shaking again.

Alejandro looked to Lolita. "Surely there is something you can do, to help control this! We cannot possibly move him in this condition! Look at him!"

Elizabeth stood back for a moment, thinking. Then she stepped forward again. "We must trust him," she said. "He says we should move him. Lolita, you will have to help us, you will have to go up there with us. And you, too, Alejandro.  Tonight, after nightfall, we will prepare a carriage and take him up there. It is a full moon, we can travel quickly.  Esperanza and I will go too. We can tell the servants we made a sudden decision to take the baby up into the hills for some mountain air. I will tell Maria to stay here. She will not want to come, thanks to Corporal Reyes."

"Elizabeth, he needs a doctor, not a three hour journey in the middle of the night!" Alejandro exclaimed.

"It is what he wants."

"He is delirious!"

"Not all the time," Elizabeth replied. "He must have good reason for wanting us to do it. Whoever did this to him will figure out who he is if we do not get him away.  If they learn he is Zorro, he will be in even greater danger. So will I. So will our baby. Diego knows that." She looked at him lying helpless on the bed. Her resolve deepened and she took his hand in hers again. "We will move you, Diego," she said to him. "Tonight. Esperanza and I will come with you. We will all be together, up in the mountains." She felt his hand squeeze hers.

Elizabeth took Esperanza from Lolita and stepped back. The curandera leaned over him now, touching his forehead with her palm. "Bernardo will find the antidote, Don Diego," she said. "We will protect your secret. And your family will be safe." She looked at Elizabeth and Alejandro. "His temperature must be carefully monitored. Do not let him eat. It could close up his throat and air passage. Just a little water every hour."

Elizabeth kissed Esperanza's head gently, her eyes shutting in worry. She nodded.

"Aren't you staying here with him?" Alejandro asked Lolita.

"I must go into the arroyos and try to find a certain root that grows in the dry stream beds," she answered. "It is fairly common along the coast in San Pedro, I shall hope it is here as well. It will slow down what the poison is doing to him, and may ease the pain in his joints."

Tears rose in Elizabeth's eyes. Seeing Diego lying there so helpless and in such pain made her heart stop. Despite her determination, she was terrified.

*****

Bernardo was gone for many hours. Lolita returned with success in her hands. It took little time for her to transform the snaky root she had retrieved into a pulp, which she fed very slowly to Diego along with tiny sips of water. As she predicted, he stabilized, getting neither better nor worse. He did seem to be in less pain, though he continued to be in and out of a sort of delirium that prevented consistent rest. "I will give him more just before we leave, along with an herb that will help numb him," Lolita told Elizabeth. "It will help him on the journey."

In her effort to keep up appearances, Elizabeth came and went from the bedroom, overseeing servant activities and playing with Esperanza on the patio. She still had not slept by the time she sat down beside Diego in the late afternoon, relieving Alejandro of the vigil. Diego was drifting in and out of consciousness mumbling names and cursing Monastario. Elizabeth wiped his forehead with a damp cloth and tried to comfort him, though she was not sure he knew she was there.

"No...ah, Monastario!..." he groaned.  He grabbed his thigh. Elizabeth imagined he was reliving the injury inflicted there by his old nemesis. She put her hand over his.

"Diego, it is all right," she said. "He is gone. You are here at home with me. Our baby is asleep in the room next door, darling.  You are right here at Rancho de la Vega."

"Marta..." he whispered.  "Oh, Marta...."

Elizabeth's eyes widened.

"Don't....don't...." he said.  He shoved at the covers, anxious. "Impossible...." he said.  

Elizabeth took his hands in hers. "Diego, it is Elizabeth. I am here," she said.

He jerked, half sitting up, and then fell back again, moaning. "Elizabeth?" he sighed. He took a deep breath. "She is my sweetheart," he seemed to say to someone else. Then he looked at her. "Are you still mine?" he asked.

"Yes, darling, yours forever," she assured him.

He shook briefly. "Oh, no, Liz...don't go..." he pleaded. 

"No, Diego, I'm right here."

"Esperanza and I need you...." he murmured. "Don't go, Elizabeth, you have to stay here with us. She is so little...." he begged.

Elizabeth realized he was in that moment when she had just given birth. "Diego, I am all right, I am fine. Esperanza is fine," she said gently, stroking his hands. "She is getting to be a big girl, she is almost six months old. She laughs for you when you pick her up."

He shook again, and then his eyes opened. He looked at her clearly for a moment. "This is very bad," he said. "It might kill me."

"Do not say that, it will not kill you," she said, unsure if he knew what he was talking about or not. She put her finger on his lips. He tried to kiss her finger.

"We have a baby," he told her, his eyes closed. His hand came up and he took hers, holding it.

"Sí, sweetheart, our beautiful Esperanza," she agreed.

"I thought she would look like you."  

"She looks like both of us, Diego. She came from both of us."

He nodded, opening his eyes and looking into hers. "She looks like my mother," he said earnestly.  Then he began shaking again. His head fell back on the pillow and his eyes closed again.  "Oh," he muttered, "when will she come home?"

"Who, Diego?"

"Mamma. When will she come home?"

Elizabeth squeezed his hand. "She is here, Diego," she told him. "Always."

"Mamma?"

"Everything is all right."

"I miss you," he said mournfully, still shaking. "Oh, Mamma, I miss you."

"I am with you all the time," Elizabeth said, her eyes brimming with tears.

"Why did you go away? Why won't you come home?"

Elizabeth stroked his brow gently, and then his cheeks. "I cannot explain, Diego, but you must trust that I am with you all the time, and that I love you very much, and that I am very proud of you and what you are doing with your life," she told him. 

"You think Zorro was a good idea," he whispered.

"Yes, Diego, he has helped so many people who needed a champion. Please go to sleep now. Go to sleep and do not worry any more. I am always with you. Always."

"Elizabeth?" he asked.

Elizabeth paused, unsure if he was speaking to her or asking his mother for an opinion. She leaned over and kissed his cheek.

"Do you love Elizabeth?" he asked.

"She is a very good wife for you, Diego," Elizabeth answered. "She loves you so very much."

"Sometimes I do not know what to do with her," he confessed.

Elizabeth smiled through her tears. "You will always find a way with her," she said softly.

"She makes me feel...so much," Diego went on. "She...she is in my heart," he mumbled. "I do not understand how that can be, but Mamma she is in my heart."

"I am sure that you are in hers, too," Elizabeth told him, wiping tears from her face.

"Our baby too," he added. "We have a baby, Mamma. She is such a pretty little girl. She looks...like you."

"I know, Diego. I watch over her, just as I watch over you."

He seemed calmer. "I love you, Mamma," he said softly. "I am glad you visited me."

Elizabeth ran her fingers through his hair lightly. "I love you, Diego," she said. "Forever and ever. No matter what."

He seemed, then, to go to sleep without shivering or shaking. Elizabeth waited for several minutes, feeling an overwhelming mix of tenderness and agony for her beloved where he lay pale on their bed. His breathing deepened. She stroked his face gently for a while, trying to soothe him further. His sleep became peaceful. She put her head on the covers beside his arm and at last fell into her own troubled sleep.

Chapter Five - Fall and Recovery

Bernardo finally returned to the hacienda at sunset, with no new information.  He spent most of the day in the Tavern and around the garrison, but had not encountered anything unusual.  Benicio was nowhere to be found.  Capitan Vilaro was conducting his usual fastidious routine around the pueblo. Upon his return to Rancho de la Vega, following Alejandro's directions, he quietly assembled a variety of goods, several horses and a long wagon in Tornado's corral.  Then he made as comfortable a bed of straw and blankets as he could for Diego.  It was around 9:00 p.m. when he, Lolita, and Alejandro carefully lifted the fitful Diego from his bed and transported him down the spiral stairs in the secret passage, through Tornado's cave, and out into the moonlit night.  Elizabeth accompanied them, carrying Esperanza.  Once they made Diego as comfortable as they could, Elizabeth sitting on the straw with his head in her lap, the journey proceeded.  Thankfully Esperanza slept in Lolita's arms through most of it, so her cries did not pierce the night air.

It was deep in the early hours of the morning when they finally arrived at the little cabin by the creek.  It was much colder in the mountains, but they transported Diego successfully to the bed.  Elizabeth lay down beside him; the baby nestled between them, and tried to sleep.  Alejandro made the exhausting decision to return to the Rancho alone, feeling it would be important for him to be there when the household began stirring at dawn.  Bernardo and Lolita slept under the stars in the wagon.  

They awoke in bright, early sunshine.  Lolita immediately went in to check Diego, to find that Elizabeth was already up and had managed to fill a kettle with fresh water from the stream.    

"He actually slept for several hours," Elizabeth said.  "I must make some hot water for him, for coffee, for some rice for Esperanza..." Suddenly she was crying.

Lolita took her young friend in her arms and held her as she wept.

"I am so afraid for him," Elizabeth said.  "He still does not always know who I am, he is so weak...."

"I promise you that if the poison were going to kill him it would have by now," Lolita said, stroking Elizabeth's back reassuringly.  "The first 24 hours usually tell the tale. He is past that now."

"But look at him, how he twitches and shakes," Elizabeth wept.  "He is still in so much pain.  Can you give him more of that root?  It seems to help him."

"I will try to give him more later this morning.  It is not good to administer it more than twice in one day.  Dealing with poisons is a very delicate matter, Doņa Elizabeth."

Elizabeth nodded, trying to pull herself together.  "We just have to take care of him one day at a time," she said.  

"That is right," Lolita agreed, smiling.  "And you must get more sleep for yourself, you have your baby to take care of as well as Diego.  It will not do for you to become ill as well."

Elizabeth nodded, sniffling.  "I am so used to Diego being here to take care of me when I am upset, I do not know what to do when he....he always manages to make me feel that everything will be all right..." she teared up again, her hand coming over her mouth.

Lolita took her by the shoulders.  "Elizabeth," she said, "Esperanza is still asleep. I will tend to Diego right now.  Go outside and be in the sunshine for a little while, let your head clear a little.  I will make rice for the baby. Go on."

Elizabeth hesitated for a moment, but then nodded and went outside.  The ground was rough and brown and parched, sagebrush rolling about. The water in the creek was flowing from its source in the higher elevations.  Beyond the stream were the pine and juniper trees leading further up the mountain, towards the lake they so loved. She walked over to the spot near where Diego had accepted her into his arms on the morning after he revealed himself as Zorro, and where the mountain lion had fallen when he shot it only two months ago.  Looking down into the streambed she could see the shards of the platter that had tumbled into the creek the night they ate the fish after making love all day long.  You have to be all right, you have to get well, she thought to her husband. We still have so much of our lives ahead of us. You have to be here to watch Esperanza grow up. I want to grow old with you. I want to waltz with you under these trees when we are seventy.  Then she began to cry anew, letting her exhaustion and tears overcome her.  

*****

In the Tavern at the pueblo, Sergeant Garcia was attempting to persuade Juan Bottega to provide him with a drink for old times sake.  He had no money, as usual.

"You should put some money together, Sergeant, not only for your drinking but for your bride," Juan Bottega told him, denying him the much-anticipated glass of wine.

"I will repay you, once our payday comes?" Garcia pleaded.  "Or at least after I get...married?"

"Ah, because then you will have some money, thanks to Seņorita Clementia's dowry?" Bottega said, his eyebrows raised.

Garcia looked decidedly humiliated.  He had been on duty for 14 hours and it was now quite late at night.  He was, to his way of thinking, a desperate man.  "Please?" he asked.

"Oh, give the Sergeant a drink," came a voice from across the room.  Benico Bocca stepped up to the bar and plunked several pesos down.

"Why, thank you, Don Benicio!" Garcia said gratefully.  Juan Bottega poured the wine into a glass before the Sergeant.

"We are to be brothers, Sergeant, it is a small thing for me to do considering that," Benicio said.

"Si, brothers," Garcia agreed, taking a long swig from the glass.

Bocca looked around.  "Another quiet night at the Tavern," he observed.  "So few men are here on these summer evenings.  Where is Don Miguel?  What happened to that poker game he and Don Alejandro and my father used to host here every Friday night?"

"Oh, they have not played poker here in several months," Sergeant Garcia explained.  "Not since little Esperanza was born.  Don Alejandro stays home much more often now.  He is very attached to his granddaughter."  He took another draught of wine and then eyed Benicio.  "As I recall, it was that poker game that got you into so much trouble with El Zorro."

Benicio smiled.  "He did not approve of my approach to the game," he agreed.  "But as I recall it was his blood on the bar, not mine."

"Si....but you were the one run out of town, not him," Garcia said.

Benicio snorted.  "He is in a great deal of trouble now, I will tell you."

Garcia looked at him.  "What do you mean?"

Benicio shrugged.  "I had a feeling he would try to find me, and he did.  On Sunday night.  But I gave him a little surprise."

"Surprise?"

"Si, a touch of poison on a blade....I daresay that El Zorro, whoever he is, is delirious and having a great deal of difficulty standing up right now."

"You poisoned El Zorro?" Garcia said, incredulous.  

Benicio looked at the Sergeant.  "He is an outlaw, is he not?  If he is revealed I will get the 3,000 pesos offered for his capture.  If he lives, of course."

"'If he...'" the Sergeant was horrified.  "When did you do this thing?"

"On Sunday night," Benicio smirked.  "It is Thursday.  He could be dead by now.  The poison was from a berry that grows only in northern Mexico."

"Is there a cure?" Garcia asked, not sure what he would do with the information should he gain it.

"The antidote is simple," Benicio answered.  "Wait.  And then learn to walk again!"  He laughed.  "El Zorro will have some difficulty without his legs underneath him! Ha ha ha ha ha."

Sergeant Garcia stared at Bocca, finding nothing at all funny about what he was saying.  He thought immediately of Doņa Elizabeth, and the moment in her garden that he had witnessed so many months ago, when she danced in the moonlight with El Zorro.  It made him glad that she and Don Diego had gone away together to their cabin in the mountains, she would be spared this news when it reached the streets of the pueblo.  He shook his head, and took a last gulp of wine.  How could Zorro do his good deeds if he could not walk?

*****

The young de la Vegas stayed at the cabin in the mountains through mid-September, sending messages down to the town via Bernardo from time to time.  Elizabeth wrote regularly to Clementia about wedding plans, agreeing to the exchange of Conchita for Pilar, but insisting that she needed the time with her family and would not return to Los Angeles until they were ready to come home.  Clementia, who longed for more conversation with Elizabeth about conjugal bliss, speculated that her friend was having difficulty weaning Esperanza and wanted to deal with the adjustment in private. "It is hard for me to imagine how Diego takes care of her sometimes," she said to her mother.  "Do you think he...comforts her when Esperanza is not hungry? I mean, helps her? What did Papa do for you when you were weaning us?"   This question shocked Doņa Leonora so much that she had to retire to her room for the remainder of the day.

Consuelo suffered in the belief that Diego and Elizabeth so enjoyed their daughter that they were spending their many hours together on the mountainside in the throes of fresh, procreative passion. She longed for Diego's return but also dreaded it, in the fear that soon thereafter he and Elizabeth would announce that another baby was on the way.

Don Alejandro had his hands full trying to keep Don Carlos from making a visit to the cabin to visit his daughter and his granddaughter. His excuses ranged from insisting that his son and family were making a journey south to the inland sea and would not be there if Carlos went, to insisting that the little family deserved some extended time away from the cares that the larger world put upon them.  As time passed, more and more eyebrows in the pueblo were raised. Sergeant Garcia was so traumatized by the approaching wedding date that he, too, was increasingly worried about the absence of his mentor in matters of married life.  He wrote a letter to Diego, delivered by Bernardo, pleading with him to kindly come home.  Diego wrote back saying he would return as soon as he could, but that in any case, "if you will trust Clementia, my good Sergeant, and trust your own instincts and love for her, your honeymoon will be a joyous time."  This was not the detail the Sergeant sought.

*****

The actual events taking place on the mountainside were far from the imaginings of those who speculated at sea level.  After three days of delirium and extreme pain, Diego finally broke free of the fevers and chills.  Lolita continued to administer the roots to him, and began flushing his system out with as much water as he would drink.  He began to get out of bed regularly, but they then discovered that his joints were not cooperating with him.  He could not entirely control the movement of his limbs.  His arms would sometimes flop beside him and he could not trust carrying his own weight on his legs.  Elizabeth, Bernardo and Lolita helped him shuffle about.  His energy was gone.  Even a brief conversation exhausted him.  He had no memory of the days he had spent in bed, nor did he even remember being transported from Rancho de la Vega to the cabin.  If he remembered who had put the knife in his back, he did not admit it. After a week, he began holding Esperanza on his lap briefly each day, but the baby was inclined to play and crawl all over him.  It meant that someone else had to be there to make sure she did not fall out of his lap.  He did not have the strength to manage her, much less catch her if she started to tumble. This humiliation depressed him greatly, as did his inability to hold his wife in his arms every night.  Instead it was Elizabeth who would lay her head on his shoulder, or hold him, and plant a kiss on his cheek, as they fell asleep each night.   

The days turned into weeks.  Two, then three.  He began regaining the full use of his hands and arms, thus allowing him to reply to letters that were piling up on the table.  Elizabeth no longer needed to feed him, though she rarely left his side.  She agonized over his dropping weight and required Bernardo to bring beef and tortillas and tomatillos and rice from the ranch to "fatten him up," as she tried to joke.  She walked with him slowly beside the creek, feeling his weight heavy against her. Some days his hips would cooperate but his knees would buckle. Sometimes he could barely walk, assisted, to the privy.  Still he pushed himself, insistent.  Bernardo was with them most of the time, as Diego was in no condition to protect his family from bears, mountain lions or other unexpected guests.  

Lolita departed after almost a month, with the best instructions she could offer about his recovery.  "It will take time," she said. "He is already progressing faster than I would have imagined, if this is from the Mexican bitterberry. Usually men cannot walk for months after they are touched with it.  The dose he got must have been mild."  Then she added an ominous warning.  "There is no antidote for it.  If he ever encounters that poison again, it will probably be his doom."

******

At the beginning of September he tried to mount a horse for the first time. It was a disaster.  After three attempts, he finally pulled himself into the saddle, but the moment that Apache moved he slid off and crashed to the ground, the wind knocked out of him. Elizabeth and Bernardo got him back into the cabin and onto the bed, where he lay there in his own astonishment.

"Unbelievable," he said, catching his breath.  "That has never happened to me."  He looked at Bernardo.  "Go back home.  Bring Tornado up here."

"Tornado!" Elizabeth exclaimed.  "Diego you cannot possibly get on Tornado!"  

"I want him up here," Diego said, his breathing returning to normal.  "Bring the epees and the sabers, too," he told Bernardo.

"Diego you cannot fence, you can barely walk!"

"I have to try," he said.  "Otherwise I am only the weak Diego de la Vega everyone thinks me to be." He sighed, and then struggled to sit up.  Elizabeth helped.  "I can't even hold my own child," he said miserably.

"You are holding her more and more, you tickle her here in the bed with us, you play with her....darling we must take this slowly."

"Everyone is suspicious that we are not coming home."

"It is our lives, it is no one's business."

"We have high profiles in the community, Elizabeth!  Look at these letters!" he replied testily, nodding in the direction of the table. He looked at Bernardo again.  "Go.  Leave us.   I want to talk with her for a while."

Bernardo shrugged and then left, heading for his horse.

"Why are you sending him away?" Elizabeth asked.  

"He will be back in a few hours," Diego said.  He looked into Elizabeth's eyes, revealing a mix of misery and determination.  "This is...terrible," he said.  

She nodded.  "You have been very brave," she said softly, her hand coming over his.  "We have to believe you will be yourself again."

"Come here," he said, pulling her towards him.  She climbed onto the bed next to him and snuggled up beside him.  He held her against his chest, his arms enfolding her. "I am not doing so badly this morning, in spite of falling off that horse," he said, his lips in her hair.

Elizabeth began to weep, feeling his arms around her, holding her tightly, for the first time in many weeks.  "I miss our life," she wept.  "I miss our house, I miss..." she sobbed. 

He stroked her hair gently. "Don't cry, little kitten," he said.  "We have gotten through everything else, we will get through this too. It is hard not to be discouraged, isn't it?"

She nodded.  

"I am discouraged too, but that is why I want Tornado, and the swords.  I have to start reviving El Zorro too."  

She nodded again, sniffling.  

"I wish we could make love," he said softly, holding her head against his shoulder.

Her shoulders shook anew, hearing that.  

"Sweet kitten," he whispered into her ear, stroking her back.  "I just can't, I know I can't."

"I know," she said.  

He held her for a while.  Then he said, "go get Esperanza, let's all be together."  

Elizabeth climbed out of the bed and got their daughter, who was in her own little bed beneath the window, wide awake.  "Do you want to snuggle with Mommie and Daddy?" she asked.  Esperanza broke into a smile.  "Oh, do you? That is good, because I think we need you with us right now."  She lifted the baby and brought her to the bed.  Diego reached for her and sat her in his lap, then gestured for Elizabeth, who again cuddled up next to him, resting her arm across his stomach and her head on his shoulder.

"Now, Ranza, I want you to think about a time in your life when you were sad and then something made you happy," Diego said to his daughter.  He tapped the tip of her nose with his finger.

Esperanza giggled.  

"Oh, I see you are thinking of something!" he said.  "So we will play a guessing game and try to guess what it is."

Esperanza patted his leg with her hand and bounced up and down.

"Ah, perhaps you are thinking of a time when Mommie and Daddy took you on a ride, and you didn't like it?"

"That cannot be it, she always likes to be on a horse," Elizabeth interjected.

"That is true," Diego agreed.  He looked back at his daughter.  "Perhaps...oh, I know what it might be!  Perhaps you are thinking of the day that Mommie let you play with her bracelets on the patio."

Elizabeth gave the baby a bright smile. "Ohhhh, now that could be it, you were a very fussy girl until we went outside and I gave you all those pretty, shiny baubles.  That made you laugh."

Esperanza giggled again, adoring the attention of both her parents.  She gave a little squeal of delight.

"No, no squealing," Elizabeth said playfully, poking the baby's tummy.  "You will make Mommie and Daddy deaf with that."  She leaned over and showered her hair all over Esperanza's face.  The baby laughed again.

Diego chuckled.  "Some day she is going to give it a good yank," he warned.

"She already has, more than once," Elizabeth said.  "But so far you have not made me squeal!" she told Esperanza.  "Do you want some warm rice, muchacha?" she asked.  "I can heat some up for you.  And a little bit of milk..."

Diego watched as Elizabeth got off of the bed and went to the stove.  The baby continued to crawl over him, and to his relief he was able to manage her.  "She is drinking out of that bottle more now," he said.

"Si," Elizabeth agreed.  "And more and more solid food....she is getting big. I cannot believe how she grows."

"So..." Diego said cautiously, "do you think you will continue to nurse her much longer?"  Esperanza grabbed his hand and took one of his fingers in her mouth.

Elizabeth's back was to him and she didn't answer right away.  Then she said, casually, "She still seems to enjoy it."

Diego winced, for the baby was half-chewing and half sucking on his finger.  "She is getting teeth!" He continued to watch Elizabeth.  "Doesn't it...hurt?"

The fire lit, Elizabeth returned to sit beside him.  Esperanza was patting his face and chest with her hand, then patting her own face.  "I love nursing her," she said.

"Si, you have loved nursing her since you had her," Diego agreed, deciding the conversation was not going to lead to any decisions about weaning.  He blinked as the baby's hands came close to his eyes.  "No, sweetheart, not Daddy's eyes," he said to her, pulling her hands away.  "Her fingernails are sharp!" he said, feeling the scratch on his cheek.  

"I need to cut them back," Elizabeth said.  "They grow so fast."

"We have a child....ow, Esperanza!...who can do some damage...." he said, rearranging.  Esperanza sat up on her own on the bed.  "There," he said to her.  "You seem to like just sitting there."  He folded his arms.  Esperanza burst into a smile.  He grinned back and made a face.  

Elizabeth looked over at them, feeling a wave of relief.  He was acting like himself.  He caught her eye and held it for a moment.  

"Help me try to get up again," he said to her.

"I think you should rest some more," she said.

"No, I think not," he answered.  "Take the baby, Liz, and then help me get up.  I just need to stand."

"Diego..." she pleaded.

"Elizabeth!" he said.  The commanding tone in his voice was something she had not heard since he was stabbed.

She got up and took the baby, and carried her back to her own little bed, which Bernardo had brought up from the Rancho.  "Just for a moment, Ranzita," she said.  "Let me help Daddy."  Esperanza made a few sounds of protest, but then sat cheerfully on her bed and began playing with the cloth dolly Clementia had made for her.

"Look at how she sits up," Diego said proudly.

Elizabeth came back to him and took his arm, putting it over her shoulder.  "I will remember this morning not as the one when you fell off Apache," she said to him.

"Oh?" he said, as he pulled to his feet and, as Elizabeth stepped back, stood before her.  

"I will remember it as the morning when I finally believed you will get well," Elizabeth said, looking up at him.  

"And how do you know this?" he asked.

"Because you are bossing me around again!" she exclaimed, returning to the stove.

"I am bossing you?" he laughed.  He took a step towards her, and then another.  He was doing it, and his legs were taking his signals without wobbling.  He took another step and then put his arms around her, pulling her back against his chest.  "Ah, Seņora de la Vega," he said, feeling her body against his.  "I remember this."

She leaned against him cautiously, then with a little more weight.  "I almost feel as if I am getting a visit from Seņor Zorro," she said.

"You will, my love," he said into her ear. "One day soon." 

Watching her parents across the room, Esperanza squealed.

******

By mid-September, Diego was mobile enough that they agreed it was time to return to Rancho de la Vega and resume their involvement in the household and pueblo life.  He and Bernardo fenced every day, and Diego began riding Tornado along the trails in the hills.  He admitted he was not in his normal condition, but he was sufficiently in control to feel he could ride into town and walk across the pueblo square without attracting any attention. He remained cautious, however.  He would not hold the baby when he was standing up, for fear of dropping her.  And he deflected Elizabeth's occasional hints at resuming physical intimacy.  He simply was not up to it.

Aside from some modest progress in the small romance between Corporal Reyes and Maria, they found little in Los Angeles changed upon their return.  Vilaro backed away from his banking scheme for the time being, giving Don Carlos a chance to move quietly forward with his own.  Benicio was still lurking around the pueblo, though he was not gambling and spent most of his time at Rancho Bocca, presumably trying to win back his father's trust and therefore be returned to the will.  

Clementia, thrilled that Elizabeth was home, was in a tizzy over her wedding plans, the dress, her entire trousseau, and Sergeant Garcia's nervousness.  "He sometimes avoids me!" she exclaimed within ten minutes of her first visit with Elizabeth in nearly six weeks.  "I do not understand it!  You would think I was the enemy!"

Diego and Elizabeth focused on renewing contact with their friends, and resuming their life on the ranch. Thus after weeks of being inseparable while he recovered, they saw little of one another.  Diego was exhausted every night and was usually asleep by the time his wife came in. She set up a bedroom for Esperanza next to theirs, and often stayed with the baby until she fell asleep.  Diego knew this was Elizabeth's way of letting him know she wanted their room to be their room again.  After so many tiffs over this very subject earlier in the summer, he now faced the irony of her cooperation and his own inability to make the most of it.

A week after they returned to the rancho, a turn of events occurred which offered Diego some relief from his immediate worries.  Alejandro received word that Governor Peņa was summoning numerous landowners to Monterey for meetings regarding the land grants and transfer of deeds between the Spanish and Mexican authorities.  His letter indicated the need for representatives from all families possessing land grants to appear in Monterey during the second half of September to submit copies of deeds and verify the exact property lines of their grants.  The summons greatly distressed Alejandro.  Diego advocated to his father that it was an opportunity to learn more about the status of relations between the two governments, and volunteered to go.  After further persuasion that his son's health was now stable, Alejandro agreed.  Diego took the news to his wife that night on the patio, after everyone else had gone to bed.  

Elizabeth protested.  Diego resisted, insisting it was better for him to go than his father.  "I will take two vaqueros with me," he said.  "Bernardo can stay here with you and accompany you to Rancho Verbena when it is time for the wedding.  I can join you there, darling."

"But that is another two weeks, perhaps three!" she exclaimed.  "All that riding, you will be exhausted...and I...I need you here."  She watched his face, and could see that she had already lost, that he was going.  "Diego," she said miserably. "You will see Marta there."

Just hearing the name made him wince.  "She is unworthy of mention," he admonished her. "And she may not be there.  Do not worry." He clasped her hands in his.  "You have plenty to keep you occupied, sweetheart, between the big wedding and taking care of our little muchacha."

"I do not want to be away from you for that long," she said unhappily.  "Take me with you."

"Liz, you cannot leave the baby and we cannot take her on such a journey.  Days and days on the Camino. You know I am right."

"You are not up to it physically."

"I think it will be good for me."

She sighed, faced with a new round of misery.  They retired soon thereafter, but it was a night in which they could not take much comfort from one another because of their respective distresses.

So it was that Diego, with two vaqueros, departed the next morning for the journey to the capital.  Elizabeth was left to help Clementia with wedding plans, watch out for the baby, and worry over her absent husband.

Chapter Six - Rancho Verbena

That evening, Doņa Leonora and Don Francisco presided over the growing wedding party.  The early arrival of the soldiers and Benicio created a considerable stir in the household, but the sturdy Conchita rose to the occasion with her customary creativity in the kitchen. She, Bernardo, and several other servants slaughtered extra chickens and scurried into the pueblo of San Juan Capistrano for more vegetables and tortillas.  Extra pots were stirred and more cakes were baked.  Tables were arranged and covered with white clothes.  By the time everyone arrived for supper freshly bathed, torches were lit along the interior walls of the hacienda patio and everything had a glow.  

Clementia fluttered around the guests during the early courses of the meal, and gave servants contradictory instructions.  This brought about chaos behind the scenes.  Midway through the evening, Elizabeth retired briefly to the pantry to nurse Esperanza.  Conchita, knowing her mistress was near, stuck her head into the small room and said flatly, "If you ever make me do something like this again I will cut my hands off.  Pilar is going to owe me for the rest of her life."

Elizabeth chuckled as the head around the corner disappeared.  "I think Conchita would like to have stayed at Rancho de la Vega to cook for your grandpapa," she told Esperanza.  The baby kept sucking.  Elizabeth watched as she nursed, enjoying the sensation of her daughter's feeding.  She knew Esperanza was more interested in solid food now than she was in her mother's milk.  Still, when it was offered she usually took it and, usually, it calmed and comforted her.  The bonding still did much for her mother as well.

The pantry door creaked open again and Elizabeth looked up, expecting to receive another admonition from Conchita.  Instead a tall, dark figure entered and she gasped.  Then she looked around rapidly and, seeing a dishtowel on a shelf, pulled it over Esperanza's head at her bare breast.

"Oh, Seņora, I did not realize why you had left the table," came the deep, slow voice.

Elizabeth began to feel rather warm. "I had hoped no one would notice I left, Seņor," she said.

"Please, you must call me Benicio," he said softly, his eyes on the towel covering the baby.  

"Well, you have found out why I left, so now I suppose you can return to what you were doing," Elizabeth said, attempting to dismiss him.  The room felt smaller and smaller.

"Your husband is not here yet," Benicio went on, ignoring her effort.  "In fact we did not see him for weeks, in August and September.  Then I think he went to Monterey?"

"Si," Elizabeth answered, "We took a holiday at a little place up in the mountains that Diego's father owns, and as soon as we got back he learned he had to go to Monterey on business."

Benicio nodded. "He was in the Tavern the night before he left, watching the new gypsy girls dance."

"He likes to see the dancers," Elizabeth agreed.  Esperanza began sucking especially hard.  Elizabeth began to feel stirred up.  

"Do you think he will return in time for my sister's wedding?" Benicio asked.

"I expect him any day," she answered.  "Seņor...I mean, Benicio, I think you should go, this pantry suddenly feels crowded.  I will be back to the table as soon as she finishes and I can put her in her bed."

He smiled, looking her up and down.  Esperanza moved her head and the dishtowel slipped away briefly. Elizabeth grabbed the towel and replaced it, momentarily flustered.  

"Your little girl, she is very busy right now," Benicio said.

"Very busy," Elizabeth agreed, wishing sorely that he would leave.

Esperanza moved her head again, coughing.  This time Elizabeth managed to catch the towel, at the same moment that Benicio reached for it and re-situated it on her shoulder.  Their eyes met for a long moment.  Then he smiled again, nodded at her, and backed away to leave her alone.

Elizabeth waited, not moving.  She felt shaken and very strange, overheated, invaded upon and at the same time aroused.  "Oh, Ranzita, I miss Daddy," she whispered. "He always knows what to do."

She took a deep breath and then pulled the towel away.  Esperanza was finished and dozing.  Elizabeth decided to take her up the back stairs to put her to bed.  

******

The festivities continued until well after midnight.  Elizabeth was among the first to retire, and heard the carrying on of the men in the courtyard for some time.  She fell asleep, Esperanza in the bed with her.  He was awakened several times by laughter and clapping.  Finally she heard heavy boots on the stairs and knew that they were turning in at last. She heard Vilaro and Benicio talking on the other side of the thick wooden door of her room, but could not make out what they were saying.  They parted and moments later she heard doors shut, which told her that their rooms were both in the same hallway as hers.  She fell asleep again.

*****

An hour or so later, a dark figure on a black horse rode up to the hacienda walls at Rancho Verbena.  After riding back and forth to size up the entry options, the rider stood up on the horse's back and lifted himself onto the wall, walked several steps, and reached to pull himself up onto the long balcony that followed across the center of the house. He silently entered through the first door and found his way down the back stairs and to the entrance of the servants' quarters.  There Bernardo met him.

"What rooms are they all in? In which wing?" came the question from El Zorro.

Bernardo gestured in two directions and then laid out the order of bedrooms and who was in them.  "All the women on that side...except Elizabeth?" He did a double take. "They have Elizabeth over here with Vilaro and Benicio....and the Boccas?"

Bernardo nodded, shrugging.  Then he pointed to Zorro.

"Ah, you think it is because this is the men's side and Diego will be coming, so she should be on the side where they would put him."

Bernardo nodded.

"And Elizabeth, and Esperanza? Are they...?"

Bernardo nodded again.  He looked up at Zorro, squinting.

"What?" Zorro asked.  "You want to know if I am all right?"

Bernardo nodded.

Zorro lifted his arms up, his cape spreading as it fell from his shoulders.  "Like new," he answered.  Then he grinned.  "In every way.  That is why I want to know where she is.  But first I need to pay a little visit to Benicio."

Bernardo's eyes widened and he shook his head.

"No, I must, it is important that he learn that his attempt to eliminate Zorro failed."

Bernardo shook his head and re-gestured the hallway, pointing at the room where he had indicated Vilaro was staying.  

"Vilaro?" Zorro said.  "No, my friend, I have not wanted to say it, but it was Benicio."

Bernardo shook his head and crossed his fingers in front of Zorro's face.

Zorro frowned, and then his eyes widened.  "You are telling me they were in it together."

Bernardo nodded.  

Zorro patted the servant's shoulders.  "I shall remember that when I go upstairs." He turned to go, but then stopped.  "Bernardo, I may need to find you later, will you be down here?'

Bernardo nodded.  

*****

Only a few minutes later, Benicio Bocca was rolling over in his bed, still fully-dressed and half-drunk from the evening's festivities.  He was dreaming about Diego's pretty seņora when he felt a sword point at his back stop his turn. His eyes opened instantly.  He turned his head to see El Zorro standing before him, his sword drawn and pointed.

"Zorro!" he cried, pulling away from the sword tip and sitting up in bed.  

Zorro smiled, nodding.  "Benicio," he said, giving a flourish of his sword.  

"But..." Benicio started.  "It is impossible!"  He looked towards the door.

Zorro wagged his finger.  "Do not think about trying to get away.  And do not bother attempting to find your knife."  He held it up, strode to the open window, and threw it out. Then he turned and faced the man in the bed.  "Now you must listen to me carefully.  I will not disrupt your sister's wedding."

"How gentlemanly," Benicio observed.

"On the condition," Zorro continued, "that you do no harm to any person in this hacienda or anyone attending the wedding. You are to be a model of good behavior, befitting a don in this community.  And once it is finished and your sister and the fat Sergeant are on their way to their honeymoon, I expect you to make yourself scarce again, for another few years.  Perhaps you would simply like to stay here in San Juan Capistrano and see to your mother's ranch.  What I do not wish to see is your face anywhere near Los Angeles."

"My father and I are close to reconciling, surely you would not deny me that, Seņor," Benicio said. 

"I do not deny you that, I only say that you must enjoy your reconciliation somewhere other than Los Angeles," Zorro answered.  "You surprised me on the roof that night, Benicio.  But now I am surprising you.  Do not forget what I have said tonight!"

With that, Zorro bounded across the room and hauled Benicio from the bed, gagging him rapidly and dumping him on the floor.  Then he tied his wrists and feet and left him lying there in his long johns.  "Enjoy the rest of your night's sleep," Zorro said, bowing.  Then he went out the door and into the dark hallway.

*****


Elizabeth woke up because she heard something that sounded suspiciously like a scuffle in the room next to hers.  A scuffle and then a thud.  Esperanza did not stir.  Elizabeth sat up.  Then she heard a dragging sound.  She got out of bed and lit a candle. Then she went to a door.  She heard nothing.  She waited a few moments, and then opened her own door to peer out into the dark hallway. It was silent.  She took a step out into the hallway, and looked both ways.  Everything was quiet, except for the sound of snoring from across the hall, Sergeant Garcia's room.  A creaking sound told her that another door was opening nearby.  It was Benicio's room.  She started to step back, but then she gasped and stopped.

Into the hallway stepped El Zorro.  He looked one way and then the other.  There, a few feet away, in her long white nightgown, was his beloved.  He looked both ways again and, seeing no one, reached over and grabbed Elizabeth's hand, pulling her into a shadowy alcove several steps from her doorway.  There, he pulled her into his arms and gave her two short kisses followed by a long, deep, rousing one.  Then he held her tightly against his chest.

"Oh, I have missed you," he whispered in her ear.

She tightened her grip around his neck in reply.  What she felt was him, all of him, strong and on his feet and totally in control.  Tears welled up in her throat.

"Are you all right?" he asked.  "Is Esperanza?"

She nodded against his shoulder.  He could feel her shoulders shake in a silent sob.

"Do not cry, sweet seņora," he whispered.  He held her in silence for a moment.  "Lord, it feels good to hold you again," he whispered.

She nodded against his shoulder again.

"I must go," he said softly.

"I know," she whispered back, clinging to him.

"Every minute that I stay is another minute they could find me.  Us."

"Si," she agreed, holding on , burying herself in his warm embrace.

He kissed her again.  "Your husband will be with you soon, seņora," he promised.

She nodded against him, her hands gripping his upper arms tightly.

He held her head against his shoulder for a moment, and then let go of her, almost pushing her away, and turned to head down the hallway.

At that moment, a door opened exactly where they had been standing and Capitan Vilaro bounded out, his sword in hand.   "Zorro!" he barked. He grabbed Elizabeth fiercely, his free arm wrapping around her neck.

Zorro stopped and whirled around, his eyes widening on seeing that Seņora de la Vega was held against the Capitan in a lock that could easily strangle her.  "Let her go!" he said, his hand on his sword hilt.

"Do not touch that sword!" Vilaro hissed, his grip on Elizabeth tightening.  

Zorro stopped cold, his hands going into the air.

"Ah, so you will surrender yourself on the seņora's behalf?" Vilaro said.  "She must be dear to you indeed, stolen kisses in the hallway, and now surrender?" He inched closer to the masked man, pulling Elizabeth with him.  

"Your quarrel is not with her, Commandante," Zorro said quietly, keeping his hands raised.  "Release her and I will cooperate with you."

"Surely you do not expect me to believe that!"

"Perhaps this will persuade you."  Zorro carefully lifted his sword from its sheath and laid it on the floor in front of him.

Vilaro's eyes glittered.

"Please..." Elizabeth gasped, pulling at Vilaro's arm.  She could barely breath.

Zorro's eyes widened and he took a step towards them, prompting Vilaro to raise his sword.  "I shall let her go only if you do one thing," he hissed.

"Name it," Zorro said.

"Remove your mask and stand before me as who you really are," Vilaro said, squeezing Elizabeth even more tightly.  She began to gag, clawing at his arm and trying to say "No!" to Zorro.

Seeing this, Zorro reached back and loosened his mask, pulling it down around his neck.

"De la Vega!" Vilaro gasped, so shocked that his grip on Elizabeth released enough that she was able to pull away from him, elbowing him in the ribs.  It knocked the wind out of him enough to make him bend over.  Zorro leaped towards him and, grabbing a candlestick from the chest to his right, walloped the Commandante on the head.  He crumpled to the floor unconscious.

"Oh, no!" Elizabeth whispered, holding her neck and staring down at him.  "What are we going to do?!"

"Get him back to his room!" Zorro said, pulling his mask back up over his eyes.  

"No, my door is right here, get him out of the hallway!" Elizabeth said, pointing at the door they now stood in front of.  

Zorro took the commandante by the feet and dragged him into Elizabeth's room, shutting and locking the door.  They looked down at the unconscious Capitan, and then at one another.

"Are you all right?" Zorro asked, going to her and looking carefully at her neck. Pulling his gloves off he touched her skin, trying to brush away the red marks.  He kissed her neck lightly.

"Si, si," she said, pushing him away.  "Diego, what are we going to do?  He saw you, he knows you are Zorro!  He is going to wake up!"

Zorro looked back down at Vilaro, satisfied that his beloved was no worse for being nearly strangled.  "I am not sure what to do!" he said.  "I have never had this problem before!"

They stared at the still form on the floor.  

Esperanza, awakening on the bed, made a murmuring, near-cry sound.  Her parents looked over at her and hurried to her side.  Zorro pulled his hat and mask off, and reached down to lift his daughter from the bed..  "Oh, little one," he whispered to her, rocking her gently.  She hiccupped twice and then fell back asleep, her dark head on El Zorro's strong, caped shoulder.

Elizabeth looked at the two of them and then went back to peer at the Capitan on the rug.  "What are we going to do?" she asked again desperately.