Chapter 51: Teresa Again

And then I found the lovely Teresa, my gorgeous, gold-haired girl. I had rescued her from a dock in New York, loved her until we both were senseless, saved her from a burning shack after she had been repeatedly raped by a score of militiamen, and then sent her on to her faux diplomat-father, hoping she would mend and he would properly care for her. That was where I found her, at her father's fine, tall, brick house. (See Rebel #8)

One of my contacts told me that there was a wealthy Spanish trader of some sort who might be useful. It turned out he was Se–or De La C-, and he did not care who won the fight for independency as long as he profited. He had neither morals nor scruples.

When I had first met the girl, he was selling muskets and ammunition to our side; now, my sources told me, he was supplying the occupying British. I stood across from his house one cool day until the girl appeared, accompanied by an old women in black. Teresa walked toward the market swinging a basket. I followed, my member atingle with remembrance. She seemed to walk well, steady and quick, her head erect, back straight, hips and buttocks rolling pleasantly to and fro, long legs swinging freely, breasts jiggling. The young recover quickly from injury, I told myself, feeling rather ancient with all my aches and scrapes.

I edged up beside her as she looked at some onions and greens and whispered my name in her ear, noting she still wore small rubies on her lobes. She whipped around, put a hand to her mouth, backed up three steps, almost turning over a stand, found her ancient duena and fled, glancing back over her shoulder twice as she disappeared with the poor woman in dingy black almost trotting to keep up.

Two days later she reappeared, again with a basket on her arm but no chaperone in sight. She looked about, smiled, and stalked off toward the market, impressive chest high, hips rolling like a ship on the high seas. I intercepted her before she got there, pulled her into a doorway and bent to kiss her. She clamped her mouth closed, struggled in my arms and kicked at me.

"What's wrong?" I asked, confused, seeing pain in her cobalt eyes

"Let me go, fool." She struggled, twisting in my hands. I released her.

"Teresa, don't you remember me?"

She nodded and slowed her struggling. "I remember," she said, "of course I remember," and then the tears came, she put her head on my chest, and I held her while she sobbed, her belly throbbing against me. We found a coffee house and a small table. The place was almost empty so we talked quietly. It took an hour or so.

The rape, she said, her eyes closed and her hand on mine, had ruined her. She could no longer serve her father as he wished. She could no longer swive men and give them pleasure to help his business. It hurt too much, even caused her to bleed, and, besides, she hated it, even the thought of it. She was, she said, wrinkling her forehead, dead inside, numb, insensitive.

"I can still feel them poking me, now I mean, today," she said, "but then I remember things tearing apart; I become numb and can only pretend. I'm not good at that. There is no pleasure in the act, none, nunca, not for me."

I kissed her fingers and held her hand while she told me that she had seen several doctors but that none knew anything about such a problem, two would not even discuss it with her and suggested that her lack of feeling was perfectly normal. A British surgeon had removed the stitches from deep between her legs where she had been mended and taken the one from her eyebrow. She touched that spot and smiled at me. There was a small, white scar.

"I'm sorry," I said, unable to say how sorry I was since she had been truly wonderful in bed, a memorable and satisfying tempest.

"I'm much more sorry, amigo," she sighed. "Now I am just a maid in my father's house, the lowest of the low among the servants, in the scullery. I sleep in the attic. And I think he is in trouble, my father, no longer in favor. He has two girls that he uses, but he seldom brings men home for them to serve."

"What's happening?" I asked.

"I'm not sure. Lord Howe is in the center of it, but, well, it's very confused just now. Money is involved, por su - of course, much money."

"Is your father home?" I asked.

She shook her head.

"Do you trust your servants?"

"Mostly," she said. "Si."

"May I come visit you, in your bedroom, in your bed?"

"No, no, please." She shook her head, dislodging dark gold curls. "I don't have a bedroom; we all sleep together in one bed. The girls, they have tried to pleasure me, fingers, tongues, sabé, but there is nothing they can do."

"Then come with me before they send out searchers for you." She let me take her arm and lead her to my small, basement hideaway. I held her and we exchanged kisses, warm kisses and caresses until she wept again. Then I led her to my narrow bed, convinced her to lie down, brought the lamp near and asked her to raise her skirts.

I certainly knew very little about female anatomy, then or now, but I wanted to see how her torn body had healed, if she had healed, to look at her scars. I touched the puckered cicatrix deep between her legs while she covered her face with her forearm and slowed her breathing. I had her raise her leg and turn it out, exposing the insides of her soft, pink lips. I explored her curly, gold hair with my fingers and found a narrow, tight-closed slit buried in her curls, a fold where I expected to discover her tiny, hooded prick. I rubbed at that area with my thumb.

She moaned.

"How does that feel?" I asked, keeping the pressure very light, just up and back.

"Muy inter'sante," she gasped out. "It's warm."

"I think you had another knot here, stitches, knots, understand, perhaps two small ones," I said. "You were torn both north and south." I kept rubbing, now in a circular fashion, and she lowered her leg and pressed her thighs together, wiggling under my hand.

"Is it still there?" she asked. "I can't recall him taking out a thread, a stitch. I felt the others pull loose."

"I can't feel it," I said, "but you seem glued together where you should not be. There's lump here, a hard one."

"I'd better go," she said, tossing down her petticoat and skirt. I helped her up, kissed her gently, and then walked her home, leaving her a block from her house.

"Tomorrow?" I asked.

She nodded and then walked quickly away. I went to visit a friend of mine, a young doctor who had many women patients, a man recommended to me by Madame Von R--, the master spy, one who had passed on some valuable insights to British intentions. He shook his head and said he would have to see the girl. I told him she had been violently raped by many men, torn open. He just grimaced.

I widened my area of questioning about the Spanish merchant-trader but was not able to discover any dark secrets in his affairs. I did hear that he, and many of his compatriots in trade, were planning to return to New York.

I greeted Teresa in the market and walked her quickly to the doctor's home, entering at the basement level with her hat brim pulled low. She spent perhaps a half-hour with the man and emerged looking very serious. He came and took my arm.

"She is a very brave young woman," he said, "And I think she can be made whole. I have removed another suture; one that was forgotten perhaps, covered up, hard to see in her thick hair. I had to cut her to do it. She is very brave, hardly whimpered. But it will take time and some effort for her to heal. Help her all you can. I gave her some medicine; make her use it." We shook hands, he refused payment and we hurried to my dingy digs.

"Look," said the beautiful girl, holding up a polished rod of blue-veined marble. "He gave me this and some ointment. I have, what did he call it, yes, adhering places where my skin has grown together, both inside and out." She handed me the prod. It was cool, about as big around as my thumb and as long as my forefinger. Then she removed a small, dark jar from her bag. "Smell," she said.

I sniffed. It was pungent, like a lubricant we used on wagon axles or to keep rust from our weapons. It bubbled from the ground in places, sometimes burned like coal. Some people used it as medicine, ate it; others rubbed it on leather or on burns. It felt greasy, slick. I did not know what to call it.