“I’ll change,” she told her mother, and rushed to her room.
She pinned her hair up and slipped into another dress as quickly as she could. Then she knocked on the door to Arturo’s room.
They went to the stables. Alba found her horse and turned to her uncle, trying to keep her tone casual, trying not to let anxiety infect her throat.
“I know you don’t like to ride, Uncle, so you need not go with me,” she said.
“I’ve told you I can ride,” he replied, and stretched out a hand,tipping her chin up as if to take a better look at her. “Besides, fresh air will do both of us good.” His thumb brushed her cheek. “Your mother is correct: you have dark circles under your eyes.”
“An owl has kept me up at night,” she lied. She did not want to speak of the dream that had made her weep.
“We must chase that naughty bird away, mustn’t we? Otherwise sleeplessness might mar this beautiful face.”
She looked down, bit her lip, and busied herself with the saddle of her horse, wishing he would have left her alone. She might have moved faster that way. Besides, she wouldn’t be able to talk properly to Valentín with Arturo standing at her side. What a mess this was. Yet she needed to see Valentín that day.
They followed the wide road that led to the Molinas’ farm. Her uncle kept a leisurely pace and more than once she tried to hasten him, only to be told there was no rush. Finally, they reached the farm. Arturo offered to take the horses to the stables and Alba quickly dismounted and knocked on the front door of the house. She was surprised when Mrs. Molina opened the door. The woman let out a soft sound that was not a word.
“Mrs. Molina,” Alba said, smiling. “I’m sorry to come uninvited. Valentín was supposed to procure a tonic for me and I’m here to fetch it.”
Mrs. Molina clasped Alba’s shoulder. Her mouth trembled and then she spoke. “I am so sorry. He passed away half an hour ago.”
Alba’s smile melted like hot wax. She stared at the woman. She was invited inside and numbly stepped into the sitting room. At some point, Arturo walked in, and an explanation was offered, but Alba did not hear the whole of it. Mere fragments reached her ears.
A wild animal. Alone. Out riding.
—
Belisario drove the wagoninto town. As Arturo helped her up into it, she thought, rather somberly, that at least they all still had proper mourning attire.
Valentín’s kin looked at Alba and her family with wary faces as they walked into the church. So did other people from town. Therealready had been rumors involving the Quirogas flying around. Now they multiplied. People whispered as they sat down.
Behind the black veil, the same one Alba had worn for her father’s funeral, her eyes were wide and dry. Sorrow had manifested as a bitter silence. She had not cried, though she feared that this stoicism would not last.
Alba took her seat, bowed her head, trying to keep her mind blank, trying not to sob. She looked at the Christ on the cross behind the pulpit, at her gloves, at the Bible between her hands.
When the priest spoke Valentín’s name, she stood up and stepped outside through a side door.
Outside it was no better. She felt breathless and peeled her gloves off. Valentín’s medallion hung heavy around her neck and in her right hand she clutched his handkerchief.
She heard Belisario’s voice and that of a groom of the Molinas’; both of them were lounging against the wagon and had not seen her.
“A mountain lion wouldn’t have clawed him like that,” the groom said. “You should have seen it. His guts were nearly outside his body.”
“Then what could it have been?”
“You know what. It’s witchcraft, plain and simple. The Quirogas’ land is cursed.”
“He wasn’t that close to Piedras Quebradas.”
“He was on the road that leads to it. Where else would he have been going? There’s nothing that way except Piedras Quebradas.”
“What would he have been doing there at night?”
“Maybe he was going to see Alba. The poor devil was in love with her.”
She pressed the handkerchief against her mouth to muffle a sob and hurried away from the church. She ran down an alley, down narrow streets with houses that had flowerpots at their windows, past a plaza with a broken fountain until, breathless, she stopped in front of the gates of an old, abandoned house. She tossed the handkerchief away and might have pulled off the medallion fromaround her neck and also flung it aside, but as soon as her hands touched the locket she slid down to the ground and lay there sobbing.
“Alba!” a voice cried out. “Alba!”
