The two men gazed at her again: she was lively, beautiful, serene, and self-assured.
As she picked up the food bowls, Mar looked back at them.
Her body was already that of a woman: it was curved and shapely, and her breasts were beginning to show underneath her smock. She was fourteen.
Mar glanced at them again, and saw them staring openmouthed at her. This time instead of smiling she looked embarrassed, if only momentarily.
“What are you two staring at?” she bridled. “Don’t you have anything better to do?” she said, standing in front of them defiantly.
They both nodded as one. There was no doubt about it: she had turned into a woman without their even noticing it.
When they were safely in the countinghouse, Arnau said: “She’ll have a princess’s dowry. Money, clothes, a house ... no, a palace!” At this, he turned toward his companion. “What has happened about the Puig family?”
“That means she’ll leave us,” said Guillem, as if he had not heard Arnau’s question.
The two men sat for a while in silence.
“She’ll give us grandchildren,” Arnau said eventually.
“Don’t fool yourself. She’ll give her husband children. Besides, if we slaves cannot have children, we have even less right to grandchildren.”
“How often have I offered to free you?”
“What would I do with freedom? I’m fine as I am. But Mar ... a married woman! I don’t know why, but I’m already beginning to hate her husband, whoever he may be.”
“Me too,” Arnau admitted.
They turned toward each other, and both of them burst out laughing.
“But you didn’t answer my question,” said Arnau once they had recovered their composure. “What’s happened with the Puig family? I want that palace for Mar.”
“I sent instructions to Filippo Tescio in Pisa. If anyone can achieve what you are after, he’s the one.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That he was to pay pirates if necessary, but that the Puigs’ commissions were not to reach Barcelona, and those that had left the port should not arrive at their destinations. That he should steal the goods or set fire to them if need be, but that none of them should arrive.”
“Did he reply?”
“Filippo? No, he would never do that. He will not put anything in writing or entrust the affair to anyone else. If it got out... We have to wait for the end of the seagoing season. That will be in less than a month. If the Puig family’s commissions have not returned by then, they won’t be able to pay their debts. They’ll be ruined.”
“Have you bought up their credit notes?”
“You are Grau Puig’s main creditor.”
“They must be suffering by now,” Arnau muttered to himself.
“Haven’t you seen them?” Arnau turned sharply to him. “They’re down at the beach all the time. Before it was the baroness and one of her children; now that Genis is back from Sardinia, he has joined them. They spend hours scanning the horizon in search of a mast... and when a ship appears and comes into port but isn’t one of theirs, the baroness curses the waves. I thought you knew...”
“No, I didn’t know.” Arnau said nothing for a few moments. “Tell me when one of our ships is due in port.”
“SEVERAL SHIPS ARE coming in together,” Guillem told him one morning as they were walking back from the Consulate of the Sea.
“Is the Puig family there?”
“Of course. The baroness is so close to the water the waves are licking her shoes...” Guillem fell silent. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ...”
Arnau smiled.
“Don’t worry,” he said, reassuring him. Then he went up to his bedroom, where he slowly put on his finest clothes, the ones Guillem had finally convinced him he should buy.
“A man in your position,” he had argued, “cannot appear badly dressed at the exchange or the consulate. That is what the king decrees, and so do your saints; Saint Vincent, for example ...”
Arnau made him be quiet, but listened to his advice. Now he donned a white sleeveless shirt made of the finest malines cloth and trimmed with fur, a red silk damascene doublet that came down to his knees, black hose, and black silk shoes. He fastened the doublet round his waist with a wide belt that had gold threads and was studded with pearls. Arnau completed his attire with a marvelous black cloak that Guillem had discovered in one of their ships’ expeditions beyond Dacia. It was lined with ermine and embroidered with gold and precious stones.
When he stepped into the countinghouse, Guillem nodded his approval. Mar was about to say something, but changed her mind. She watched as Arnau went out of the door: she ran to it and from the street outside saw him walk down to the beach, his cloak rippling in the sea breeze and the precious stones sparkling all round him.
“Where’s Arnau going?” she asked Guillem, coming back into the countinghouse and sitting opposite him in one of the clients’ chairs.
“To collect a debt.”
“It must be a very important one.”
