“Why and when?”

“Many years ago at one of the first meetings I had with those who had suffered from Alejo’s tyranny and injustices.”

“What happened?”

“The lady in question disagreed with me for personal reasons. ‘Don’t listen to him,’ she cried. ‘He speaks like the Devil, he looks like the Devil, he makes love like the Devil – in fact he is the Devil!’”

“What happened then?”

“She tried to knife me. When I prevented her from doing so, she threw her arms around my neck and kissed me.”

“Was that all?”

“The meeting cheered vociferously.”

“Because she kissed you?”

“Because I had the power to make her want to. The Devil’s power, of course!” he added mockingly.

“Of course!”

“A power that has proved effective with everyone, it seems, but you. Why is that?”

Skye shrugged her shoulders.

“Perhaps I am specially protected by Heaven!”

“I doubt it! Come here!”

She had glanced at him anxiously. He was lying back in an armchair, seemingly relaxed and at ease. She wanted to refuse his command, but she knew only too well by now that resistance was useless.

Slowly she rose to her feet and walked across the cave to stand in front of him. The light from the candles was on her hair, on the white beauty of her shoulders and the proud indifference of her little face, which would not betray the sudden tension of her nerves.

His eyes appraised her, taking in every detail of her appearance.

“I am looking for flaws,” he said at length.

“Like a slave in the marketplace!” Skye stormed at him, forgetting all caution in her anger. “Would you like to see my teeth? The buyers always look at them, I believe.”

“If we are to be historically accurate,” El Diablo said slowly, “you have forgotten one important fact.”

“What is that?”

“The slaves were naked!”

There was a sudden silence. Then, as the blood rose crimson in her face, Skye’s face fell before his.

“You are aptly named,” she had cried furiously, hating him because as usual he was teasing her, torturing her in his own strange inexplicable fashion.

Now she put her hands for a moment to her eyes, trying to think clearly, trying to formulate to herself why his nationality should make so much difference and should make everything about their relationship seem even more intolerable and more insupportable than it had seemed before.

Then hurriedly, as if action was an escape from her thoughts, she took all the papers out of the drawer.

One legal document had a heavy seal to it. It was written in Spanish and was difficult to translate. Finally she realised that it referred to El Diablo’s change of citizenship. He had become a subject of Mariposa.

Skye read the document through several times, but still the full meaning of it eluded her. “Being of Mariposan blood,” it said in one place.