He turned back and made his way down the stream again. Were those bees, beating the air above the scarlet flowers? Rich looked at them more closely. They were tiny birds, brilliant in their colouring. He thought they were the most lovely things he had ever seen in his life. He plunged into the thorns in order to view them more closely, but they flew away, erratically, at his slow approach, and would not return. With a twinge of real regret he continued his way. A loud challenge greeted him at the edge of the wood, and he replied, a little self-consciously, ‘Friend.’ It was the first time in his life a sentinel had ever challenged him.
The crossbowman lowered his weapon and allowed him to pass, blinking in the sunshine. Someone was kneeling at the water’s edge, above the point where the men were filling their barrels. He had a fiat pan in his hand, which, with a gentle rocking motion, he was holding at the surface of the water. There was gravel in the bottom of the pan, and under the influence of the current and of the man’s raking fingers it was gradually being swept away. Rich recognized the man and guessed what he was doing-it was-Diego Alamo the assayer, who had sailed in the caravel Santa Anna along with them. Alamo had dealt in gold and precious stones; he was learned in the languages of the East and with his knowledge of Hebrew and Chaldean might be useful when they made contact with Asiatic civilization. Under suspicion of being a crypto-Jew he had thought it well to accept the appointment of Royal Assayer to escape the attention of the Holy Office.
Alamo with a skilful jerk flirted the remaining water from the pan and studied the layer of sediment closely, inclining the pan to this side and to that so as to catch the faintest gleam of colour. Then he shrugged his shoulders and washed the pan clean, looking up to meet Rich’s eyes upon him.
‘Ha, good day, Don Narciso,’ he said, white teeth showing in a smile.
‘Good day,’ said Rich. ‘Are there signs of gold?’
‘Not so far. The country looks as if it might bear gold, but I’ll certify that this stream has none.’
Rich forgot any disappointment he might feel at that statement in the pleasure of this re-encounter with a friend--Alamo and he were old acquaintances. He made the conventional enquiries as to whether Alamo had enjoyed his passage across the ocean-conventional and yet sincere. It was odd to ask those questions here, on the shores of the Indies.
‘Well enough, thank you,’ answered Alamo. There was a wry smile on his dark intelligent face; Rich guessed that Alamo was as much out of place among the seamen and gentlemen-adventurers of the Santa Anna as he himself was in the Holy Name.
Alamo rose to his feet, brushing his hands clean. The beach was a scene of animation now, with three boats lying in the shallows and a score of men carrying water casks. The two caravels lay beyond, black upon the blue, and farther out the Holy Name rode to her anchor.
‘Have you been into the forest?’ asked Alamo.
‘Yes.’
‘Did you see any animals? Any rocks?’
‘Only the pebbles and boulders of the stream bed. The forest is too thick to see more.’
Alamo was looking around the beach.
‘Over there,’ he said, pointing. ‘The rock comes down to the sea there.’
They walked over the sand to the place he had indicated, and Alamo ran his hands over the rocky ledges.
‘Gold is unlikely here,’ he announced. ‘These rocks are dead. They are smooth and lifeless-feel them for yourself, Don Narciso. It is the spirited, lively rocks which bear the noble metals.’
He climbed over the ridge and dropped on to the sand the other side. There were more rocks beyond, running out to the water.
‘Now this is strange,’ announced Alamo.
He went down on to his knees to examine his find more closely. Among the brown rocks there were patches and dabs and seams of black, and he pawed at them, clearly puzzled.
‘This appears to be pitch,’ he said. ‘Bitumen. I have seen specimens brought from the Holy Land, but never before have I seen it in situ. Now how comes it here?’
He looked up at the forest and out at the sea.
‘It is found on the shores of the Dead Sea,’ he explained, ‘at the foot of arid cliffs. It was with fiery pitch that God overwhelmed Sodom and Gomorrah, but the Moslems believe it to be formed by the great excess of salt in the water, under the influence of a burning sun. Now, is the ocean here more salt than usual?’
‘It is not dead, at least,’ said Rich. ‘There is weed growing. And the gulls prove that there must be fish.’
‘Quite right. I should have thought of that. Yet it is hard to think of any other explanation of this pitch. The Dead Sea lies in the midst of deserts. There is no life, no plants, no birds, although I am assured by credible authority that the story is incorrect that birds drop dead who fly over its mephitic surface. Two places more unlike than that and this it is hard to imagine.’
‘Very hard,’ agreed Rich, thinking of the lush vegetation and the teeming bird life around them.
‘Has a Sodom been overwhelmed here, too?’ asked Alamo.
‘Not unless the name of God has penetrated here,’ answered Rich, fairly sure of his theology on this point.
‘Exactly. That is why I sought for a naturalistic explanation.’
Alamo walked on among the rocks of the beach, Rich straying a little apart from him along the water’s edge. It was he who made the final discovery, and his sharp cry brought Alamo hurrying back to him. There was a little stretch of smooth sand here, at which Rich was staring; in the sand was a wide, shallow groove, and around it were the half-obliterated prints of bare feet. Rich had already made the deductions from the appearances.
‘No ship’s boat made that mark,’ he said. ‘There is no sign of a keel.’
Alamo nodded agreement, stooping to peer at the footprints.
‘There is little enough left to see,’ he said. ‘But I should think that the feet that made those marks were longer and narrower than any Spaniard’s.’
‘Yes.’
‘And how long ago were they made? An hour? Two hours?’
They looked at each other, a little helpless. Neither of them had the faintest idea.
‘We can be sure of one thing at least,’ said Rich. ‘The people here are not as eager to meet us as were those of Cuba and Espanola.’
A bellowing behind them made them turn; the watering party was waving arms to them in recall. They picked their way back over the rocks.
4
The squadron was still sailing westward along the south coast of Trinidad, while the Admiral listened to Rich’s report. His face fell a little when he heard that Alamo had found no sign of gold, but he grew cheerful again over the undoubted evidence that the island was inhabited, and over the other details which Rich conveyed.
‘Pitch?’ he said. ‘Bitumen?’
He ran his fingers through his beard as he pondered the phenomenon.
‘What did Alamo say about it?’
‘He said that it was found beside the Dead Sea,’ said Rich. He was a little shocked to notice an inward quaver as he said it; he was actually dreading some new theory as to the fleet’s whereabouts.
‘That is so. It is found in Egypt, too, in the deserts that border the Nile.’
‘There is no desert here, Your Excellency,’ said Rich, stoutly.
‘No.’ The Admiral looked over at the luxurious green coast. ‘Yet it makes me more sure of the Earthly Paradise being at hand--I shall write to Their Highnesses to that effect-but perhaps I shall have more evidence still by the time I can spare a ship to return to Spain.’
‘I have no doubt you will, sir,’ said Rich, strangely sick at heart.
The armoured men were lounging about the deck. Spallanzani had his lute, and was singing Italian love-songs to the accompaniment of soft chords from it, to an audience of hidalgos. They had eaten their meal of weevilly biscuits and rancid cheese with its flavour of cockroach. Rich remembered with regret the roast sucking pig on which he had dined his last day on shore, and wa
s quite startled to note that all the same he did not wish himself home. This crushing heat, this wearisome armour, the foul food, the wild talk of Ophir and the Earthly Paradise-notwithstanding all these things he was happier where he was, here in the New World, than sitting in his furred robe in the admiralty hall in Barcelona listening to the crooked pleadings of crooked lawyers paid by crooked merchants. Seventeen years of it-the Consulate of the Sea, the Laws of Oleron, and the Code of Wisby, Justinian and the fueros of Barcelona; it was better to be able to raise his head and sniff the scented air of Trinidad.
A loud cry from a look-out brought everybody to their feet again. There was a canoe, a black speck under the glaring sun, full in sight as they rounded a headland. It was well out to sea, on passage between cape and cape; they could see the flash of the paddles as the men bent to their work. With the wind right aft the squadron overhauled it fast; it turned frantically to make for the shore, but the Santa Anna was there, cutting it off, and it headed back. Fifty yards from the Holy Name the paddles ceased work, and the canoe drifted idly on the blue.
Brown and naked, with streaming black hair, the Indians stared with frightened eyes at the huge hull drifting down upon them. One of them stood up, overcome with curiosity, in the desire to see better, revealing herself as a woman, quite naked save for her necklace. A loud roar of laughter burst from the ship--a naked woman was so rare a sight as naturally to excite laughter. She sat down abruptly, with hands over her face, and in her place a man rose to his feet, balancing precariously in the rocking canoe. He set an arrow to the string of the bow he held, raised the weapon and drew it to his breast, and loosed off the shaft.
Rich saw the arrow in the air; it struck his breastplate with a slight tap, and dropped on the deck with a faint clatter. It was effort as feeble as a child’s-the shaft was already spent in its fifty yards’ flight by the time it reached him. His furred judicial robe would have been as effective protection as his steel. breastplate. The arrow was merely a thin cane, crudely sharpened at one end, and with a single parrot’s feather at the other. But the gesture had excited the Spaniards. A crossbowman lifted his lumbering weapon to reply, and lowered it again at a hasty order from the Admiral.
‘Put that crossbow down!’ he called in his high tenor. ‘We are at peace with them. Hey, Diego, there, beat your tambourine, and you boys dance to it. Show them that we mean no harm.’
It was a ludicrous scene, the ship’s boys capering on the forecastle, and the sullen Indians gazing up at them uncomprehending. The canoe was in the lee of the Holy Name now, and the wind was gradually drifting the big ship down upon it. The Admiral himself was up on the bulwark, jingling hawk’s bells-hawk’s bells had been found to be an unfailing attraction in the other Indian islands-and Alonso Perez was beside him, a red woollen cap in either hand held temptingly towards them
‘Jorge,’ muttered the Admiral out of the corner of his mouth to a seaman close at hand. ‘Strip off your coat and make ready to upset the canoe.’
The canoe was close alongside as Jorge swung himself over the bulwark and dropped amid a wild scream from the Indians. The canoe overturned, and the occupants were flung into the sea. They were glad to clutch the ropes thrown to them and to be pulled on deck, where they stood, dripping water, with the Spaniards clustered round them. Four of them were men and two women, the women quite naked, but three of the men were wearing cloths of coarse cotton about their shoulders-Rich examined the material. It was of poorer weave than any he had ever seen.
‘Make fast the canoe!’ called the Admiral over the bulwark. ‘Put those paddles back in her!’
The Indians made a frightening group, their arms about each other and their teeth chattering in fright, while the Spaniards pushed and elbowed to see more closely these strange humans, who felt no shame at nudity, who had never heard the name of God, who knew nothing of steel or gunpowder. Someone stretched out a hand and stroked a woman’s shoulder; she shrank from the touch at first, but when it was renewed she gradually recovered from her shyness and smiled a little over her shoulder at the man who caressed her, like a child, but a new bellow of laughter made her seek safety again beside her fellows.
The Admiral pushed through the mob, resplendent in his scarlet velvet with his glittering helmet and armour; the Spaniards falling back to make room for him revealed him and his position of authority to the Indians. He was uttering strange words learned in Cuba and Espanola, and they responded to his soothing tone of voice even though they clearly could not understand what he said.
‘Guanahani,’ said the Admiral. ‘Cibao. Cuba. Hayti.’
The names of these places meant nothing to them.
‘Canoa,’ said the Admiral, pointing overside.
That they understood; they nodded and smiled.
‘Canoa,’ they said, in chorus, and one of them went on to say more, in a singsong tune.
It was the Admiral’s turn to shake his head.
‘Their speech is not unlike that of Espanola,’ he said to Rich. ‘But it is not the same, save for a few words, like canoa.’
‘Canoa,’ repeated one of the Indians, parrot fashion.
The Admiral jingled one of his hawk’s bells enticingly, and they eyed it with wonder. He offered it, and they shrank back a little. He took the hand of one of the men and put the bell into it, shutting his fingers over it, and then setting the bell a-rattle again by shaking the man’s fist. An awed expression crept over the man’s face as he realized that this bell was actually to be his. He could hardly credit his good fortune, cautiously opening his hand and finally jingling the bell delightedly. All the Indians were smiling broadly now.
Rich’s eyes were on the necklace worn by the woman in the background. He stretched out his hand to examine it; she shrank away for a moment, and he tried to make soothing noises. But immediately she understood what he wanted, and stepped forward, proffering a loop of the necklace to him. He examined it closely. It was a string of pearls-two yards of pearls. The other Spaniards noticed what he was doing, and surged towards them, frightening her; a score of hands were stretched out for the necklace, when the Admiral turned fiercely upon them and they dropped back again.
‘They are pearls,’ said the Admiral after examination. He took one of the red woollen caps from Alonso Perez and offered it to her with a gesture of exchanging it for the necklace. She did not understand. He jingled a hawk’s bell, and reached for the necklace again. Suddenly her expression changed to one of comprehension, and with two swift movements she uncoiled the necklace from her neck and thrust it, a great double handful, into his hands. Her puzzled look as he proffered the cap in exchange revealed that she had intended the necklace as a gift.
‘It is the same as in Espanola,’ said the Admiral. ‘The heathen have no notion of barter. They think that because a stranger wants a thing that is sufficient reason for giving it.’
The surging Spaniards round laughed at such folly.
‘She does not know what that cap is for, either, Your Excellency,’ remarked someone in the background.
‘True,’ said the Admiral.
At his order Perez took of his helmet and the Admiral perched the cap on top of his mass of hair, stood back with a gesture of admiration, took the cap again and put it on the head of the trembling woman. The other Indians chattered at the sight, teeth flashing in smiles.
‘And look at this, Your Excellency. Look!’ said a Spaniard, loudly.
One of the Indian men had something hanging on a string round his neck, a little fleck of something with a yellow glint. It was a tiny fragment of gold, smaller than half a castellano but gold all the same. Rich heard the quick intake of breath all round the ring. Gold! The Admiral strode up, his expression so hard and fierce that the Indian raised his arm to ward off a blow.
‘Where did you get this?’ demanded the Admiral.
The Indian still cowered away, and the Admiral, with an obvious effort at self-control, changed his tone.
‘Send for Alamo from
the Santa Anna,’ he said, aside, and then, turning back to the Indian, he smiled winningly. He raised his eyebrows in an obvious question, pointed to the bit of gold, and then away to the island. The Indian thought for a moment and pointed westward. There was a general murmur from the crowd-there was gold in the west.
‘Much?’ asked the Admiral, making a gesture with widespread arms. ‘Much?’
The Indian after a moment of puzzlement extended his arms in agreement, to the sound of a renewed murmur from the crowd. There was much gold to be found; but Rich, watching the by-play, was not quite sure. The Indian was clearly doubtful of the significance of the question asked him. He might be meaning that the gold was far away, or even, conceivably, that it was hard to come by. Years of sifting evidence had given Rich an insight into the extraordinary ways in which misunderstandings can arise.
The Admiral was jingling another hawk’s bell and offering to barter it for the gold, and the Indian made the exchange gladly as soon as he grasped what the Admiral wanted.
‘This piece of gold would buy five hundred hawk’s bells,’ commented the Admiral; he reached for another scarlet cap and set it on the Indian’s head, to the accompaniment of a renewed chorus of admiration from the others.
The Earthly Paradise Page 4