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mind.
    His indecisive treatment of her left her feeling frustrated. Yet she knew she would have felt just as stricken (in all honesty, more stricken) if he’d forced his way into her room and made passionate love to her. How could she call him when she shared his feelings? When she didn’t know what she wanted herself.
    On entering her room, the first thing she noticed was the enormous bouquet of cellophane-wrapped carnations. She stripped off the wrapping and buried her face deeply into their fragrance. She didn’t look for a card. She felt she didn’t need to. They could only be from Edward.
    The maid who had brought the flowers had also thoughtfully provided a container, a jug of local pottery, filled almost to its rim with water. She tipped a little of the water out and plunged in the flowers, dividing and tweaking until she began to feel satisfied with the arrangement.
    She still held a carnation in her fingers when the sound of music distracted her attention. It seemed to be coming from immediately below her window. She pulled aside the shutters and stepped out on the tiny balcony. A man stood below. He wore a long black cape and a wide-brimmed sombrero and he was playing a guitar. As soon as Anita appeared, he began to sing an old Spanish love song. It was one she had heard her mother sing. It was plaintive and sweet and infinitely sad. The gay rhythm of the guitar seemed at odds with the young man’s melancholy rendering of this story of love and jealousy, passion and death.
    She pillowed her arms on the iron railings and her heart knew a great ache. Could not true love be achieved without sadness and pain? A last violent strum and the guitar stopped; his throat closed on the last dulcet note. Now the young caballero looked up and waved to her, confirming her first pleasant suspicion that he was indeed serenading her. As she did not know the young man, she rightly assumed he was a paid serenader. The tantalising question was, who had hired him to play beneath her balcony?
    Her eyes pierced the darkness for some moments before a figure detached itself from one of the deeper shadows. She still could not identify the man, but recklessly she leaned over the hierro , the iron railing, and tossed the carnation to him. He caught it, pressed it to his lips, and turned his face up to her. As she recognized Felipe, her breath caught in her throat.
    â€œThe night is young, señorita,” he invited. She must have nodded, although she wasn’t aware of doing so. “Five minutes?” he said.
    â€œThree,” she said.
    A smile twitched up the corners of his mouth. “Bring a coat. Towards dawn it tends to get cold.”
    It was madness; rash, exhilarating madness. She combed and pinned her fair hair, outlined her mouth with rich pink overtones. She didn’t know him. True, she had spent the night with him in involuntary exile and he had conducted himself in an exemplary manner, but she still did not know him.
    Forgetful of her hurt ankle, her feet clattered down the stairs like lively castanets. She might not have inherited her mother’s dark and sensuous beauty, but she was her mother’s daughter. On such a night, who could expect her to employ caution?
    He tucked his arm through hers with an amazing lack of self-consciousness. She couldn’t help but compare his ease of manner with Edward’s stiff formality, compare it, respond to it. Edward set her apart, gave her queenly treatment; Felipe saw her in a more down-to-earth manner. He wouldn’t give with no thought of return. She would not dare say a quarter of the things to him that she said to Edward. And his mouth had a decidedly cruel twist to it, now that she came to think about it. “Did you like being serenaded?”
    â€œYes. But don’t do it again.”
    His eyes sparked wickedly. “I always find negations challenging. I’m half tempted to re-engage the services of my