Caray, Caray!

Juancho is complaining to one of his buds that Foreman is a total ingrate for bringing in El Chino to run the new operation considering how well Juancho has run things up to now. As far as he’s concerned there ain’t room enough for the both of them at La Paisana’s. His bud suggests they can always kill him.

LaFont walks out to visit with Juancho and the other pirate. He commiserates with Juancho about being dumped as leader for the likes of the oriental. Juancho gripes that Foreman always has preferred types from the upper class and puts down the regular stiffs in the group. His bud asks if he really considers El Chino to be upper class, and Juancho says El Chino thinks he is, the same way El Antillano fancies himself to be.

Alberto pricks up his ears when he hears this little tidbit from Juancho. According to Juancho and his buddy, El Antillano is just a guy from La Mariana who is one of Foreman’s favorites since he can read and write but also can fight with the best of them and got hold of a couple of boats for himself. Juancho remarks that they hardly recognized him the last time he showed up because he’d cut his hair short. He was there puttin’ on airs and asking about his two chests that were apparently stolen during the last caravan heist. Bouffy asks about Antillano's real name, but they tell him that they don't know, nobody knows.

Back inside the pub area La Paisana mentions to Jorge that the guy who usually takes their contraband goods and sells them is named Castillo, from a town near Salvatierra. Jorge wants to do away with the middlemen and take the merchandise to sell directly, i.e., from Uriel’s newly “acquired” store. Foreman agrees. LaFont walks back in and Jorge asks him how things are coming along with his petition to annex Salvatierra to his San Fernando holdings. Bouffy says his chances are pretty good provided the judge doesn’t find there is a legitimate heir to it. (Not that that should matter once Bouffy offed him to clear the way for Jorge.) Jorge asks El Chino to change his appearance so that he looks Western when he arrives in San Fernando to do business with him later on. El Chino agrees and Foreman toasts with them all to their new business partnership.

While Mario and Ric are on their way to give the lawyer Ric’s copy of Timoteo’s will, the two discuss the likelihood of his hearing from the courts that Cami is being sued over the validity of the will. Ric again says they’ve no doubt held off till Foreman’s left or they’d have been served by now.

Foreman and La Paisana say good-bye to Jorge and his posse. Foreman assures Jorge that he'll do something in order to avoid the pirates attacking future caravans and murdering the inhabitants of the various country-houses in the area. (Apparently he cannot prohibit the pirates from attacking around the area because it is the means by which they maintain their families that live there.) Jorge suggests they set sail for somewhere else. Foreman cannot, but says he’ll think of something. They agree that La Paisana and El Chino will be their means of keeping in contact with each other.

Meanwhile back at the palace the women are all being entertained with Fortunata’s gossip about Gonzo’s death and how the archbishop, Ric’s godfather, insisted that Mario be let free under justified circumstances. Sofia sides with Cami and Jime. Ursula figures Daddy will have a difference of opinion with the archbishop’s methods once he gets back to town.

Back at La Paisana’s Pub, she says if Foreman disbands the pirates they’ll end up being killed, imprisoned or hung. They may be dogs, but they’re decent people with families to feed and as part of the team they deserve better. Maybe he could use them somehow since they are loyal men. Foreman gets angry and says there are way more people than he needs there and he’s not the King of England and isn’t obligated to feed and clothe the hordes. El Chino offers to take them in his boat to some other island where they can go their own way afterward. Foreman says it is all the same to him, they (we assume he, Jorge and Bouffy) just don’t want them around those parts any longer. Then La Paisana asks what’s up with El Antillano. Foreman answers he doesn’t know but suspects they cannot count on him any longer.

Ric gives his attorney, Castulo, a copy of his Uncle Tim's will so that he can study it and suggest a way to give the money to Lis without Cami being accused of noncompliance with its terms. He explains Cami never agreed with Tim’s giving her his fortune and denying his daughter even a dime of it. He asks Castulo to see if there is some loophole they can use to get a friend or a relative to receive it as a donation and avoid any unseen danger. Castulo says he’ll look through it and get back to him the next day.

On the ride back to San Fernando LaFont informs Jorge about his suspicions that Ric is “El Antillano” and one of the pirates, which means that Foreman knows very well exactly who Ric is: de Salamanca a.k.a. Lopez de Carvejal. Bouffy explains that El Antillano was there a few days back, and that although they never mentioned his name, they know now that it has to be him. Jorge notes that being the case, then Cami’s marriage is invalid. Bouffy says that’s not so important.

On the way back from Castulo’s Mario and Ric discuss their next step. Mario must go bring back La Salamandra and anchor it in the little inlet they saw on the map when they first arrived. This is where he and Cami will hide.

Mario comes to say good-bye to Jime. He tells her that he is going for La Salamandra and why. He tells her also that he’s asked Ric to allow him to take Jime along unless she’d rather stay. She says she wants to leave with them. He smiles just a bit and tells her that they’ll be seeing each other again in a few days. Slowly he moves in towards her. After a painful attempt to kiss because of Jime’s sore mouth, they finally embrace and kiss each other passionately.

Mario turns to leave, but looks at the ring on his finger and begins to play with it. He removes it finally and places it on Jime’s finger. He has had a difficult life, he says, but that she should give him a little room and not ask too much of him, as he kisses her hand and tells her that very soon she’ll have him eating out of it. Jime is speechless for once in her life as Mario cavalierly turns and goes out the doorway.
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While Ines is helping Vasco dress for Gonzo’s wake she complains about GRita having gone completely off the deep end over Camila with her foolish, constant jealous accusations. Vasco defends her and says they aren’t that much off the mark since everyone knows Santi is still pining away for Cami. Ines says, well hey, a love like his doesn’t simply disappear overnight. Anyway, they didn’t continue to see each other or to pursue the relationship. So, there’s just no reason for GRita to go on and on with those jealous rants like she does.

A few seconds afterward Ines starts to worry about him and questions Vasco about Ursula and whether he has seen her recently. He smiles charmingly and says, “What do you think, woman? Of course not,” then kisses her good-bye as he and Justo head off for Gonzo’s wake.

Speaking of Gonzo’s wake, suddenly we are there and we see him all laid out like a pig on a platter. The only thing missing is the apple. Ursula sees Vasco arrive and she cannot stop staring at him. His willpower is practically non-existant. He returns the stare, licking his lips and looking just as eager as she. Ursula gives him a signal she’s horny as heck and they go out into the back hallway corridor. Their intense desire gives way and the two kiss passionately. (So much for respecting the dead. Being that it’s Gonzo’s wake, is there any wonder the guests would rather mate like a couple of minks than mourn?)

Meanwhile, in Cami’s bedroom at the hacienda, she and Jime are having a heart-to-heart over what Mario just did. Jime admits she’s fallen in love with Mario, but is worried that when he says he’s got a woman in every port he meant it, even if it was a joke. She whines that he is not the marrying kind. Cami tries to cheer her up by telling her that she isn’t married like she’d expected either. She hugs her friend and says that single men always have their affairs, but eventually settle down and it could be that Jime and Mario will end up married in time.

Cami suddenly suggests Ascanio for Jime if the relationship with Mario doesn’t work out. Jime says she thought at one time in the beginning there was a little something, but somebody else must have caught his eye because she really desn’t grab his attention. She wonders what women he does have in mind. Cami says she hasn’t a clue since he’s always been rather mysterious. “In fact,” she tells Jime, “did you know that Ascanio knew beforehand who Ric was but never bothered to tell me?” They both wonder why he would keep quiet.

After her chat with Jime, Cami goes to speak with Ric who is writing in his journal about the history of piracy and using some of his personal experiences to illustrate the life. She tells him her gossip about Jimena’s falling in love with Mario. Ric answers that Mario is a good man with a noble heart. Cami tells him that Jime’s worried he’s such a playboy, and Ric says just like any man is until he falls in love. He wonders if Jime’s upset that Mario’s a pirate, but Cami says no, and that even she is getting used to the idea of Ric’s being a pirate too.

Cami brings up the business about Ric’s using the boat for them to escape if things go haywire. Ric says it’s just a precaution, but she says she figured everything would be solved once Lis agreed to her giving back the inheritance. She says she’s tired of one shock after another in her life. Ric says only saints resign themselves to their fate. Ordinary people like themselves, he says, are faced with challenges daily and fight to overcome them. He reminds her that she is a fighter, too. All she has to do is think about what she’s done since she was kidnapped and after she returned. “The important thing is never to let oneself become defeated, because only with that kind of fighting spirit can you manage to achieve what otherwise seems unattainable.”

Back at the wake in the rear hallway Ursula and Vasco make plans to go somewhere else to be together to finish what they’ve so unceremoniously just started.

Across town, there ain’t no way, no how that Santi is going to waste either his time or his breath praying for Gonzo’s safe passage through the pearly gates, knowing first hand it’s a lost cause. Instead of attending the wake he and Ascanio go out to eat supper at the local tavern --no doubt thinking somewhere along the line it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy. Ascanio is in the mood to talk for once. Santi has questions about his past so Ascanio gives him a rundown of everything that happened during his earlier life. Santi listens as Ascanio tells him how he murdered a man from an influential family who raped and nearly killed his sister; how Timoteo bribed the guards in the prison to change his crime from murder to debt, and then brought him home as a slave, that since the murdered man’s family swore vengeance he never heard from his sister again because she ran away, that his mother had eventually died and that he never saw either of them again.

Talk turns to the subject of the ED letter. Santi confides that if the matter doesn't manage to get resolved, then Lis will have no evidence against Cami. Ascanio tells him that Lis is not the sweet, helpless thing she pretends to be; but rather she uses her blindness to gain the sympathy of others in order to get her way. He says he doesn't blame her completely since her childhood was pretty miserable, considering the way her father treated her because of her disability. As far as the aunt who raised her, he says, the woman is wickedly harmful. The thought occurs to Ascanio that Santi is probably the only person who can help Cami regarding the letter by speaking with his father, Don Jorge. Santi winces more than a little at the thought of that.

In bed that night next to Cami, Ric has a hard time sleeping. He is upset with himself for not having taken precautions and perhaps asked for some quick cash from his godfather. He figures he’s got to hit a couple of merchant ships and if Cami leaves him because of it well, then let God figure it out. He wakes her up and they make love under the covers.
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The next morning Jorge and posse arrive back in San Fernando. Marcel and Dali (Uriel and Matteo) are assured they’re going to be a part of this new operation and ride off satisfied. LaFont tells Jorge he’s going to check with the judge to see about any progress there might be with ED letter investigations. Jorge wants to talk about that with Bouffy first but he refuses and says that he’s promised Lis and he’s going through with it. Jorge worries they’ll have trouble with Ric. Bouffy sneers and asks what’s Ric going to do, run to Foreman over it? All they have to do is claim he’s El Antillano and problem solved. Bouffy rides off then, leaving Jorge in the dust mulling it over.

When Jorge arrives home, the guard tells him that a Mario Fuentes, one of Ric’s men, killed Gonzalo and that Sofia went to the wake the night before. Jorge finds Sofia in her bedroom complaining about her (tired?) eyes making her look like an owl. (The comparison is lost on me.) Jorge says he heard that one of Ric’s men murdered Gonzo. Sofia proceeds to explain what happened and adds that it wasn’t murder but a justified killing instead with plenty of witnesses. He asks after Gonzo’s dad, and Sofia says of course he’s sad, inconsolable, etc., and drunk as ever.

Jorge is upset to find out that Mario was set free and wonders what Marcelino was thinking to have done that without waiting for him to return to determine things and the witnesses be damned. Sofia then explains who Archbishop Don Gaspar is, and how powerfully and politically well-connected, and explains how he was in town visiting Ric and that it was his decision to intervene. Jorge seems to want to leave it alone and accepts the archbishop’s ruling in his absence.

That same morning Ramona tells Santi at breakfast all the gory details of the sword fight between Gonzo and Mario. She adds that if it weren’t for Mario, Vasco would be dead. Ofelia comes out of the house with the baby. Santi chats a minute or two about godparents for little Ana and then he tells his mom that he’s pretty much finished with GRita. She offers to talk with GRita but he says she’s already done that numerous times. Ofelia then suggests being stricter with his wife, but he says beating her like other husbands is not going to work, either. Besides, he’s not that kind of person. Ofelia thinks it’s because he’s still in love with Cami, but he says even so, it is not that. It is that he simply cannot stand her any longer and he’s lost all patience. He’s decided to sleep separately from GRita in his own room from now on. That’s the way they leave it and he goes into town.

GRita comes out of the house after Santi leaves. In what passes for an apology, she admits to perhaps being a bit excitable the day before, but doesn't feel she deserved her father slapping her. Ofelia says let’s talk openly without any hemming and hawing. Ofelia accuses her of wanting Santi for herself, even when he was dating Cami. GRita says, so what. It’s not her fault, conveniently forgetting about her sister’s letter begging to be ransomed that GRita tore to pieces and buried. “I saw my opportunity and I took it. Is that a crime? Why rebuke me for it?” Ofelia says she isn’t complaining, but her attitude has driven Santi away.

GRita says she hasn’t driven Santi away at all. The problem is that Camila came back. “Even though she tells the whole world about her terrible misfortune, all she did was marry an old rich man. You know why? To get his money. She came back to town thinking she’d go after Santiago but when she realized he was married now, she up and marries another rich man, Ricardo. However, she’s determined to have my husband. She’s just like Ursula, sleeping around with any man at all.”

Ofelia just listens and shakes her head in amazement. GRita says that since Ofelia hasn’t said anything she must disagree. Ofelia snickers and says it doesn’t matter to GRita whether she might agree with her or not. What matters to Ofelia, though, is how GRita is turning her son’s life into one big tragedy, and to think she approved of their marrying once! She deeply regrets it now but she is refusing to let her destroy his life so completely.

Ofelia takes the baby from GRita and orders her to tell Ramona to bring the water into her bedroom because she is going to bathe the little one herself. GRita seethes as Ofelia walks away because again she’s been given what for and told to follow orders from her MIL. She starts griping to herself, “Who the heck does she think she is? She’s nothing more than a midwife and a quack medicine woman.” All of a sudden she starts to think that Ofelia, being a quack doctor, will try to poison her.

At the same time, Ric has gone to see Castulo. The lawyer says the question of the will is taking longer than he thought. Ric loses patience and wonders if Castulo is procrastinating in order to get Jorge’s consent. Castulo says no, it’s because he simply cannot find a loophole to keep Cami from being sent back into slavery. Ric says then find one ‘cause that’s what lawyers get the big bucks for. He leaves and makes his way over to the palace to speak with Lis.

At the palace Ric asks his cousin if their agreement is still standing as Fran listens. Lis says yes. He emphasizes that the only thing he worries about is not seeing Cami lose her liberty. Lis says rather snidely that she already understood that was the case, so Ric says, “Then in case the lawyer cannot find a proper way to resolve the problem, I’m going to tell you that we will leave things as they are and in one way or another you will have your money.” Lis says fine with her and Ric leaves.

Tia Fran begins to think of her and Timoteo doling out blood money to Bermejo way back when. She tells Lis that she thinks she should accept Ric’s proposition or otherwise if she displeases him he could take it out on Fran for being involved in the plot that forced him into piracy. Lis is unsympathetic. “Sooner or later if you make a mistake you pay for it, Auntie.” “—Do you want to see me in jail or on the gallows? I swear I had nothing to do with that. I swear! Frannie is desperate. “I raised you like a mother, was your eyes, I protected you!”

Lis says she is grateful, but nevertheless she will never forgive her and her father for being the cause of Ric’s feeling forced to flee and taking up a life of piracy. (It should be obvious by now that Lis comes by her nasty trait of holding grudges, quite naturally.) Fran loses patience and carelessly yells at Lis that even if Ric had stuck around and none of this had taken place, he still would have married anyone but a blind woman! Just then Sofia and Fortunata appear behind them on the stairs. They’re back from Gonzo’s funeral but obviously overheard something.

Upstairs Fortunata speculates with Sofia about who the man is that Lis and Fran were arguing over. She says it must be somebody from back in La Mariana. Sofia suggests it could very well be somebody right there in San Fernando. Fortunata’s light bulb finally goes off. “Ah! Ricardo!” Sofia and Fortunata begin looking for Ursula in her room, but the maid says she came in only to quickly change her clothes then left to visit Manuela. Sofia sends Fortunata off to check if Ursula really did go to Manuela’s.

At the same time Justo and Paco come to the mill to see Vasco. Higinio tells Justo that Vasco is there but that he has a visitor, Ursula. Justo doesn’t like what he’s just heard, expecting the worst. Instead of going up to the office, Justo leaves a message with Higinio that as soon as Vasco’s visitor has gone he’s to come to the house to talk with him.

Ric returns to speak with Cami at his hacienda. He tells her that the lawyer was not too encouraging. He’s stuck depending on Lis’ good will, but he doesn’t trust Lis not to change her mind at anytime and says until the business is resolved he’s not going to believe anybody, and that’s why he gave Mario the order to fetch the boat. Cami is definitely upset by this. “If she wants the money I’ll give it to her, but why is she so brutal with me? Her father deceived me and told me he’d never leave her unprotected and as far as I was concerned, the only thing I ever wanted was to be free again and to return here. Your cousin must understand?” “—Surely she does,” he agrees. “—Then what else could it be? A-hah! She is in love with you!” Finally the awful truth.

Ric denies it, but Cami says Lis has always loved him and certainly she thought that sooner or later he would marry her. “She knows your name is de Salamanca and that because of that our marriage is a sham! Why doesn’t she declare it publically? I’ll tell you why. She is in love with you and doesn’t want to harm you, but me she does! Because of jealousy, anger, envy! Because she still has hopes!” Ric says, “Alright, supposing she does, the only thing that is important to me is that nothing bad happens to you.” Cami asks him if the easy answer is to flee. He says the only other option is to kill Mancera, LaFont and whoever else comes after which would be useless, so in the end the only thing they can do is to escape from there.

Ric sees that cami is against it and asks what she prefers to do. Cami says that the most prudent thing might be to wait. Perhaps they’re conjuring up too much and all for nothing if LaFont really doesn’t have the letter after all. “—But if he does?” “—The fact is I am not to blame for what happened. Look, we cannot fight like this. The lawyer should allege that Timoteo did this of his own free will and even though old, he still was in his right mind. Ascanio can testify.” Ric says Ascanio’s testimony is worthless going up against LaFont. Cami says perhaps something might influence the outcome. The next thing she worries about is someone getting even with her by harming her family. Ric tells her to give him a bit to think about this and to see what they can do.