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Jessie turned to look at him and teased, “Oh, I had heard you have a vessel docked in Southampton, but I didn’t realize you did more than order your crew about when sailing.”
He shot her a rueful glance. “Is that what you think? Well then, necessity will teach me the knack now.” He pinched her pert nose and said, “Come along, brat.” He scooped her up into his arms with some finesse, ignored her squeaking objection, and managed to place her gallantly on the wooden bench in the small boat.
Jessie made no further objection, and instead steadied herself as he clambered onto the bench opposite her, which made the rowboat rock a bit. She found his eyes dark and twinkling at her, and a rush of feeling made her immediately look away. What was wrong with her? She had never been so shy with the bucks who had courted her last year and then again this Season as well.
As he rowed towards the tavern, the fireworks began, and an army of color filled the dusky sky. “It is beautiful, isn’t it?” he said with some appreciation, then because he made the mistake of looking at her, he found himself mesmerized by her innocent face. She was round-eyed and the most captivating woman he had ever come across. It occurred to him that he might be in trouble.
“Faith!” Jessie gasped. “It is absolutely beautiful...don’t you think?”
“Oh, but I do. I most certainly do,” he said on a low note, and there was no mistaking his meaning.
She eyed him and sighed. “Do you always play games?”
“Not always.”
“Then tell me. What are you really thinking now? Be honest.”
“What could I be thinking? What could any man be thinking, sitting here, looking at you? Just as you appreciate the display of color in the darkening sky, so must I. Only for me, you are that color.”
There didn’t seem to be an easy response to this, so she countered by ignoring it and changed the subject. “Don Rodrigo, tell me about your country and your home. I have never heard you speak about it.”
He had rowed out a distance. He slowed his rowing then, and she saw the question seemed to sadden him. He rowed a bit more, sighed, and halted the steady motion of rowing, and allowed the boat to drift as he considered giving her an answer. “My country is a child growing, seeking to better itself.”
“Do you love it? Are you homesick...or are you planning to make England your home?”
He smiled at her. “Sometimes, I am homesick, but I am fortunate to have a great many friends in England, and a home is, after all, where one’s friends and loved ones reside.”
“Yet Argentina is somewhere you consider your real home?” she pursued.
His expression suddenly changed, and he got a faraway look in his eyes as he thought of home. His voice was soft when he spoke. “My homeland is a wild and willful being, a very vibrant, full, and many-faceted place.”
“You speak about it as though it were a woman.” Jessie’s brows drew together.
“She is as capricious as a woman, certainly,” he answered, and gave her a smile.
“Now, that sounds as though you are homesick and lonely for your family,” Jessie said.
“As it happens, I have family—my mother’s people, and as I said, friends in England,” he answered, evading her question skillfully.
“Oh...yes, I had forgotten your mother was English,” she said thoughtfully.
“Yes,” he said curtly, his expression growing stern.
“How wonderful for you to be able to travel and to be at home in two very different worlds,” she said with enthusiasm. “And I must say, you do seem very much at home here in England.”
He agreed to this with a half-smile. “Let us say that I enjoy England when I am here, but for me, there is really only one place I call home—my Argentina, my ranch.”
“Ranch? How exciting you have a ranch. I have read so much about them. Your ranchers, I mean the men who work for you, are called gauchos, aren’t they?”
He was pleased with her genuine interest. He was taken by the wide pools of violet looking at him with innocent curiosity. Bloody hell, he liked this young woman more than he should. “Yes, they—the gauchos, are a breed unto themselves. They are hard-working, hard-living, and if treated well, quite loyal.” He gave her a rueful look. “Even our play is quite, quite dangerous by English standards.”
“What play is that?” She leaned towards him.
“We have a game, a test of skill. It is called pato, and there are some dowagers who dearly wish to outlaw it.” He frowned. “You see, there is a monotony when we work the plains every single day. We herd the sheep, we repair fences...and for a gaucho who is a man determined to experience and live life to the fullest, well, he needs something more than working hard. Pato is more.”
“Tell me about this game.” Jessie was thrilled to learn about new things in a country she knew too little about.
“It cannot be easily explained. Suffice it to say, we choose a field, and at its length, we place a ring. We choose even teams, and for points, we ride at a given pace with a six handled ball. We must attempt to place the ball through the ring while on horseback. Each team member puts himself in jeopardy as he attempts to do this, you see, and it is most definitely done at a speed that is very precarious on rough ground.”
