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again be the undisputed mistress of the hacienda .’
    Catherine drew in a sharp breath.
    ‘Surely that’s your uncle’s affair,’ she suggested. ‘If he’s in love with her he’ll want to marry her.’
    ‘Jaime isn’t in love with anyone—yet. He has still to get over his first disappointment with women,’ Teresa declared, sounding much too old for her years. ‘Would you like to hear about it?’
    A faint colour stained Catherine’s cheeks.
    ‘I’ve listened to enough family gossip for one morning,’ she declared more hastily than she realised. ‘It doesn’t concern me, Teresa.’
    ‘It might,’ Teresa suggested slowly, ‘if you were to fall in love with Jaime.’
    ‘That would be ridiculous!’ The colour in Catherine’s cheeks deepened. ‘Anyway, here he comes! Please don’t repeat what you’ve just said,’ she added hastily.
    Don Jaime strode towards them.
    ‘Have you had enough culture for one day?’ he asked, glancing at the pictured group they had been studying. ‘A cruel portrait,’ he observed, ‘but it was a degenerate age.’ He looked at his watch to check the time, dismissing the royal husband and his faithless wife with a shrug. ‘Where would you like to eat?’
    ‘Surprise us,’ Teresa suggested. ‘You know all the best places.’
    They went in search of his parked car and he drove them along the Castellana to a secluded restaurant on the top floor of one of the higher buildings where Catherine could enjoy a panoramic view of the city while they ate, and somehow he seemed more mellow as he ordered their sherries, naming points of interest for her benefit as he stood at her shoulder to point them out.
    Turning suddenly, she caught an amused twinkle in Teresa’s eyes, but for once she refrained from her usual sly observation and kept silent.
    ‘What do you intend to do with the remainder of the afternoon?’ Jaime asked when he had ordered for them. ‘Go shopping?’
    ‘I have to be measured for a pair of shoes,’ Teresa explained carefully, ‘and I will collect my shirts from Antonio.’
    ‘And spend a great deal of money in the boutiques,’ he suggested good-humouredly. ‘I’m sorry I can’t collect you later in the day as I have an appointment in Toledo, but I believe you are going on to the Vegas for an evening meal.’
    Teresa nodded somewhat hastily.
    ‘That is what has been arranged,’ she agreed.
    Jaime looked pointedly at Catherine.
    ‘I will leave her in your care, Miss Royce,’ he said formally. ‘I hope you will enjoy the rest of the day.’
    ‘I’ve enjoyed it, very much up till now,’ Catherine told him. ‘Thank you for a pleasant lunch.’
    Teresa was laughing as they turned away.
    ‘You and Jaime are so formal!’ she declared. ‘Perhaps it is because he does not trust you.’
    ‘Why should you think such a thing?’ Catherine protested. ‘I’m trying to do my job to the best of my ability, and you could help enormously by not being so facetious.’
    ‘That’s an interesting word,’ Teresa declared. ‘Can you please tell me what it means?’
    ‘Broadly speaking, it means “waggish”, which in turn means jesting. You don’t mean what you say half the time, especially about Don Jaime.’
    ‘Oh, but I do! He can be stern and quite heartless when he feels justified, and at Soria, you will discover, his word is law.’
    ‘Supposing he decides that I shouldn’t go to the hacienda, after all,’ Catherine suggested in an odd sort of panic. ‘It’s quite on the cards, you know.’
    ‘H’mm! Yes, I suppose it is, but I think you will go, all the same. The Marquesa will send you because she thinks you might be good for Soria.’
    ‘Where do you want to shop?’ Catherine asked because she could find nothing to say to Teresa’s final declaration.
    It was now well after three o’clock and they walked briskly through the crowded streets which were coming to life again after the siesta hour. On Velazquez Teresa was measured for her