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“Oh, you poor child,” Sam teased, then walked away, whispering to Grace as she hurriedly dressed.
Alberto saw a possible chance for escape. With two steps of his long legs, he was at the door and out into the hall. But after taking only two more steps, he felt a rushing blow against the back of his skull and was suddenly drifting into a black, swirling mist of nothingness. . . .
Not able to remember anything else, Alberto's mind switched back to the present. The flesh of his face felt on fire. He tried to lick his lips, to moisten them, but nothing. He still couldn't awaken fully enough to arouse Maria, to tell her of his needs. If he didn't get food and water inside him soon … he knew the surety of his fate. His insides were begging for … food . . . and water.. ..
Blinking his eyes, trying to keep the rays of the sun from scorching his eyeballs even more, he felt a sense of relief when tears managed to trickle from the corner of an eye. When Maria began to stir and looked upward onto his face, he waited for her to discover … the tears.. . .
Maria's breath came in quick, short gasps when she saw the first signs of Alberto's possibly coming out of the darkness of near death. His eyes were open as they had been at times, but now there were tears, which had to mean that he was aware of things . . . people . . . around him.
Leaning down into his face, Maria whispered, “Alberto? Sweet Alberto. Do you hear me? Are you going to be all right?” Sobs shook her body as her fingertips ran across his dry, cracked lips. “Please tell me that you are going to be all right. If you die, so must I. We are one . . . you and I.”
Alberto opened his mouth and managed to force three words from between his lips. “Maria . . .” he mumbled. “I'm … hot“
Maria's heart leaped with glee. He was awakening from his long bout of deep sleep. He was going to be all right. “Alberto, Alberto,” she sobbed, wrapping her arms around him.
Alberto strained with all his might and managed to speak some more, saying, “The… heat… Maria“
Hurriedly reaching to pick up the dampened cloth, Maria began to bathe his face. “I know,” she purred. “I know.” A fit of hacking coughs suddenly seized her, along with chills that encompassed her body from her head to her toes. Fear grabbed at her heart. She had seen so many die after many such seizures of coughs. Was .. . it. .. meant that she was now to have the dreaded pneumonia herself… and die … ?
Her eyes searched desperately around her. The heat was the tyrant. She had to remove herself and Alberto from this top deck, or most surely Papa would not have two children to wait for in America. They would be a part of the sea .. . never to rest in a final grave beneath a protective covering of earth.. ..
Alberto's hand reached upward and brushed a few strands away from Maria's face, relishing in the touch of her soft skin. But there was something else this day. There was a clamminess about her. God. She was ill. He wanted to reach for her … protect her .. . when she began coughing violently again.
“Maria . . . ?” he whispered. “You must get . .. help.”
Maria clutched at her chest, feeling pain stabbing the insides of her lungs. The damp, cold night air and the extreme change to hot, dry days had done its damage. “Yes. I know,” she replied. Her gaze settled on the door that led downward, where Michael ate and slept in comfort, but where also .. . she had found Alberto … injured .. . and left to die in a most cruel way.
But Alberto was alive. He was going to be all right. But he would have a much better chance for a complete, healthy survival if she went to Michael and asked for assistance. Reaching up to smooth her hair back from her face, securing it with a comb on each side of her head, she knew what she had to do. “Alberto,” she whispered, licking her lips, trying to wet them. “I know I promised to not leave your side. But I must. For a moment. Then I will return. Do you understand? I am going to seek help. I know . .. of. .. someone who will willingly help. Then you and 1 . . we . .. can be more comfortable .. . and even eat and drink as one should.”
Alberto tried to ra
ise himself upward, but groaned noisily when the pain struck him at the back of his head. “Who .. . ?” he whispered.
“An American,” she answered. “That's all I can tell you now. Just trust me.”
“Can … he … be … ?”
Maria touched Alberto softly on a cheek, smiling. “Yes. He can be trusted, Alberto,” she said, then turned her head to cough once again. The pain was worsening in her chest with each fresh bout of coughs. She knew that she must hurry. If she got too ill to care for Alberto … then she had to be sure there would be someone else who would be willing to. Surely Michael would do this for her. Hadn't he shown such a gentle side to his nature? Hadn't he truly cared for her. . . not just for what she had shared with him? She had seen more than lust in the depth of his blue eyes. She had seen love … compassion… .
Pushing the legs of her breeches back to cover her ankles, she kissed Alberto softly, then rose and began to make her way through the throngs of milling people. Her hair blew in dark streamers behind her and her birthmark seemed larger with the steady rays of the sun seeming to mark her face in even more strawberry reds.
A tightness moved around her chest as she pushed her way onward, then a fresh bout of chills sent bone-aching tremors up and down her legs, chest, and arms. She covered her mouth when she began to cough again, seeing the door that led downward to Michael through a haze as her eyes misted in gray blurs.
Stumbling, she opened the door and almost fell down the stairs. Her knees were growing weak, as was the alertness in her head. She cringed when she began to walk down the narrow, dark passageway, fearing someone might even grab her into one of the rooms, possibly even rape her. When she had been in this passageway before . . . she had been with Michael. But she had to shudder … remembering when she had been alone . .. and had found Alberto. . . .
Chapter Four
Maria turned to lie on her side, sighing leisurely. The splash of the water beneath her had a lulling effect, and the steady movement of the ship made her feel as though she was in a cradle, rocking. Then her eyes moved quickly open, darting around her. Where was she? She didn't recall having been brought here. A long, crimson velveteen curtain hung from the ceiling next to the bed, hiding all else from her eyes.
“A bed,” she thought to herself. “I'm lying on a bed. How?” A slow smile curled her full, sensuous lips upward, now running her fingers across the softness of the sheets beneath her. She had only known one bed. Michael's. And it was his bed that she had somehow become acquainted with once again. Then her fingers began to feel down the full length of her body, relishing in the luxuriousness of Michael's night robe that had again been so generously loaned her.
A slow flush rose upward from her neck, wondering if it had been Michael who had shed her outer and undergarments. If so, had he taken liberties with her body … when she had been unaware of it… ?
Maria closed her eyes and thought hard, trying to remember how and why she had come to be in Michael's cabin this second time on this voyage. She had been … worried . . . about Alberto. . . .
Her eyes flew open again, a slow desperation causing her to push herself upward. Where was Alberto? Was he all right? Feeling a cool sweep of air settle on her breasts that were now fully exposed from Michael's night robe having fallen agape in front, Maria clutched at it, holding it together. Then she slowly pulled one end of the curtain aside, breathing much more easily when she discovered Alberto stretched out in an apparent deep, peaceful sleep on a bunk at the far end of the room, covered with a blanket up to just beneath his chin.
From what Maria could tell, Alberto was all right. But he did need a fresh shave. A thick patch of dark whiskers framed his lips.
