by David Liss
We retired to a dining room, which could have used a few more candles in the sconces and upon the low-hanging chandelier. The table was unsteady, and tilted precariously at one end. The food was served by the same mulatto. In Lisbon, where servants and slaves were extraordinarily cheap by London standards, and even middling people employed several, Settwell appeared to have been reduced to but one.
The wine poured freely, though mainly into Settwell’s goblet. I drank enough to avoid the appearance of abstemiousness, for a man with a mind to drink can take offense when his companion desires sobriety.
“Your letter from London was vague to the extreme,” Settwell said at last, “and while I understood you meant to visit Lisbon, I could not glean your reasons.”
I dared not risk being direct in writing, but now, face-to-face, there was no point obfuscating my purpose. “I’ve come to find the priest responsible for the deaths of my parents and to kill him.”
Settwell said nothing for a long moment. He took another long drink of his wine and looked up at me, measuring my seriousness. “Gad, you mean it. Why should you attempt such a thing? You escaped! You did what so few can ever hope to do, and now you come back on some foolish quest. You will never leave the country alive.”
“I left my parents behind, and they died here,” I said. “I have an obligation.”
“No!” Settwell hit the table. Knives and goblets danced. The man’s face had quickly grown red with drink or fury or both. “I shall not have it! Your father knew his ruin at the hands of the Inquisition was a risk, and he begged me to make you safe should the worst happen. I did so because he was my friend and it was what he wanted. Do you think you honor him by returning here to throw your life away?”
I took a breath and leaned back. I wanted to explain myself, if only to this one man. “Everything that my parents did to save me, that you did to save me, was intended to give me a better life, but the life I have is broken. I am broken. I have become something my parents would have despised.”
“I can never believe that Weaver would have raised you up to be something so terrible.”
“Mr. Weaver did his best for me, I assure you. I have never blamed him. For a long time, I blamed myself, but of late I’ve come to understand that it is not my fault either. I have this anger inside me, and it burns every moment. It leads me to do awful things. This dark seed was planted by the Inquisition. I cannot destroy the institution, so I must destroy the man. Then, perhaps, the sacrifices made by my parents and by you will not have been wasted.”
Settwell studied me for a long time. “Is there nothing I can say to dissuade you from this course?”
“No.”
Settwell sighed. “Then there is something you should know. If you have come to address old wrongs, then you will want to hear of it.”
“Is this something to do with my father?”
Settwell nodded, and then fortified himself with a gulp of wine. “You have seen how it is with me now. I am ruined, my boy. There have been reversals, and not honest ones either. Yes, my fortunes suffered with my conversion, but I believe I have been deliberately ruined because I began to ask questions about your father. There were rumors about him—rumors that his arrest was not what it seemed.”
“Explain,” I said. No matter how quickly Settwell spoke, it would not be quickly enough.
“In the space of but a few months, I heard the same rumor twice—from two unrelated and unconnected sources. It concerns your father and the fact that he may have been betrayed.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. This was nothing. Settwell, in his comfortable world of English merchants, could never know what it meant to be a New Christian. “The Inquisition has made betrayal as much a part of life as breathing. I do not wish to know who informed against my father. How can I hate a man who had to choose between my father’s life and his family? It is the Inquisition’s fault, not its victims’.”
“You are a wise young man, and I will not dispute what you say, but I learned that your father was not simply a victim of the Inquisition. There were others, outside the New Christian community, who manipulated him. The Inquisition never found his money. Your father was not betrayed by a neighbor who gave up a name in order to preserve himself. No, I fear he was the victim of a plot to take his wealth and throw him to the dogs that he might not expose the crime.”
There were, Settwell said, two sources. One was a merchant, a member of the Factory, who had mentioned, in passing, that he had heard it was possible to deceive a New Christian into bringing hidden money—converted into a foreign currency and stored elsewhere—back into the country and then to steal it just before the Inquisition takes the man. This merchant had not done it himself, but he had heard rumors of past success, and thought it a remarkably clever exploitation of the natural order. “He’d said that as it was inevitable the New Christians were going to be arrested and have their property seized, it was better we should get the money than the Inquisition.”
I said nothing of this logic. It had no bearing upon the matter at hand. “The other source?”
“An overheard snippet of conversation between two Inquisitors. One was the priest you have come here to kill, the Jesuit Pedro Azinheiro. He spoke of money that had never been recovered, how it rankled him still. The name he spoke was Raposa.”
I said nothing for some moments. I did not trust myself to speak, for if I were to let one thing out, how could I stop the flow of words, end the tumult of thought. Better to stay bottled up than to erupt. At last, when I felt I could control myself, I said, “It was an Englishman who betrayed him?”
“It seems so, though I cannot be certain.”
“You inquired into this?”
Settwell held out his hands, gesturing toward the room. “I made the attempt, and you see the results around you. It is true that I had suffered some ill fortune before this, but once I began asking questions, my enemies moved in for the final blow.”
“You said the Factory men did not care,” I observed.
“The leadership,” he corrected. “But there are people within its protection who were willing to pounce upon me when they believed me vulnerable. I was ill used, and yet I cannot have my grievances redressed. I find myself penniless and without influence simply because I asked the wrong questions about your father.”
I did not know what to think about this intelligence. Everything buzzed inside my head like a thousand mosquitoes. I had come here with a simple goal: to kill one man. Now, it appeared things were to be far more complicated.
“I wish I could help you learn more, Mr. Foxx, but I cannot even help myself. Worse, I cannot help my daughter. I have not enough money to flee Lisbon, and flee I must. Mariana is now seven years old, the age of religious consent in the Catholic Church. Priests have already come to see me with questions about the manner in which I raise her, for in truth, I am a poor Catholic. I fear they will take her from me, and if they do, I will never see her again. They will tell me she has chosen to live with a devout family, and I will have no recourse. None. More influential Englishmen than myself have had children spirited away by the Church, and once they are taken, they are gone forever.”
I swallowed. Here, at least, was something I could do. “How much do you need? I will find you the money to flee Lisbon. I’ll shake it out of Jesuits on the street if I must.”
Settwell rose and embraced me, throwing too much weight upon me as he did so. He blasted sour breath in my face. Drink had made him unsteady and sentimental, and his eyes glistened in the candlelight. “I hardly know what to say. That my daughter might be made safe would mean more to me than I can say. I shall not forget this generosity.”
“Only tell me what you need, and when you need it.”
“I’ll not have you robbing Jesuits, of course.”
“I spoke figuratively,” I said. “Such money as you might need is already in my possession.” In truth, I had little enough for my own ventures, but I would find what money he needed if his
wants exceeded my supply. The option of stealing from Jesuits was certainly not to be eliminated. In fact, it was to be embraced.
“I must have some time, perhaps a few weeks, to settle my affairs. Of course, I will have to be very subtle. If the Inquisition should suspect I plan to leave, they might come for Mariana.”
“If you believe her to be in any danger, you must put her in my care. I shall defend her with my life.”
“I do believe you mean it, sir.”
“Do not doubt it.”
Our meeting over, I took Settwell’s hand. “You’ve been most generous, but now it is time to take my leave.”
Settwell stepped forward too quickly for a man who had been drinking without restraint. He nearly fell over, and reached out to the wall to steady himself. “You’ll go nowhere. You can see it’s dark outside. ’Tis no trouble for you to stay here until morning.”
I bowed. “I should very much prefer to sleep at the inn, though I thank you for your hospitality.”
Settwell laughed indulgently. “You have been away a long time, so I remind you that this is not London. A man does not walk the streets at night. Honest Portuguese remain within doors after the sun goes down, and there is no one about but Gypsies and escaped slaves and renegados—if you are lucky. If you are not, it will be a pack of drunken fidalgos, who will slit your nose for the delight in watching you bleed. You’ll not go ten feet before you are assaulted.”
“I well recall the dangers of the city,” I said, heading toward the door. “Ten feet is a bit of an exaggeration.”
Settwell followed after me, catching his foot upon a threadbare rug and stumbling two or three steps. “Then fifty feet. A hundred. Regardless, there is little chance of you returning to your inn unmolested.” He flushed. “I know my house is none the best, but we are hard by the Alfama, and this street is unsafe once the sun goes down.”
I turned to Settwell. “Do not think I refuse to stay because your hospitality is insufficient. Such a suggestion insults me.”
Settwell bowed. “You are quite correct. I apologize.”
Honor was satisfied, and no more needed be said on the subject. “Then I shall go. I have affairs to which I must attend.”
“You can hardly have any affairs on these streets at this hour. In fact, I shall not let you go. I am your elder, and I forbid you to—”
“You have a daughter,” I said quietly. “If the Inquisition comes for you, you must tell them whatever they wish, because your first duty is to protect her. Therefore the less you know about how I do my business, the better off we both shall be.”
Settwell swallowed and nodded. The heat had gone out of his argument. “Your point is well taken, but even so, damn it. Do you know what you are doing, going out in the black of night? Are you truly aware of what awaits you?”
I had listened to stories about how my father had been sold to the Inquisition for profit, and how a kind man had been ruined simply for inquiring into the truth of it. My muscles were coiled and tight, and I could feel my rage, like a living thing, pulsing in my veins. I did not fear that thieves might set upon me. I craved it.
“I know what’s out there,” I said. “Indeed, I mean to find it.”
Chapter 5
For a man who is patient and careful, it is entirely possible to remain invisible in a city at night. I knew how to cling to shadow, how to walk without making a sound, how to vanish into darkness and silence. Many London streets are lit with lanterns and patrolled by parish watchmen, which could make remaining unseen occasionally difficult, but Lisbon, by comparison, posed little in the way of a challenge. Outside of the English neighborhoods, most men did not visit public houses or taverns to pass the night in drink and companionship. Such businesses closed their doors at nightfall. There were no pleasure gardens or theaters or outdoor concerts or firework displays or other nighttime amusements of any variety. The streets belonged to the poor and luckless, the drunk and the thieves who preyed upon them, and the well-armed privileged of the city who targeted all. For the unfortunates who could not escape indoors, night was a time of violence and hunger, of desperate struggle.
Those who chose to venture out upon the streets for sport took pleasure in that struggle. Noblemen patrolled the city in packs like wolves, stalking thieves for amusement and hunting one another in contests of bravado. I vanished into shadows as one such group passed, too drunk and boisterous to notice me even if I had stood in the open, arms wide. This group had dressed entirely in white, no doubt a taunt to a rival band of fidalgos. These grudge matches often ended in disfiguration or death. Sometimes these parties would stumble upon a Gypsy or mulatto who had strayed from his fellows, and they would set upon him mercilessly, offering no more quarter than do huntsmen when they corner the fox. Other times a nobleman would fall behind only to become prey himself. Settwell had not exaggerated the dangers that awaited the unwary.
Nowhere was this more true than in the Alfama, the oldest and poorest part of the city. Here, the streets were so narrow that two men upon opposing balconies could share a bottle of wine without difficulty. Every passageway was winding, steep, and labyrinthine, often encased in tunnels or ending abruptly. A wrong turn could mean a dead end, quite literally.
I ignored the fidalgos who stumbled past me. I had no use for them. I continued my patrol, and within an hour I found what I sought in a brutally inclining alley behind the massive gothic cathedral of Santa Maria Maior. There were four of them, dressed in the loose and brightly colored shirts of Gypsies. Four if you didn’t count the boy—perhaps thirteen or fourteen at the most, dark-skinned, with wide eyes. It was the boy who interested me. He was with them, but I did not believe he was one of them.
Off to the side, wearing ragged breeches and a vest cut out of a burlap bag, was the group’s evident leader. He was tall, thickly muscled in the arms and broad in the belly, and perhaps he had earned his swagger. To me he appeared a buffoon, drinking from his bottle of wine as he strode boisterously along the street, like a child’s rendering of a hero. Occasionally he raised his bottle in a toast to a woman he called his Beatrice, whom he credited as the finest whore in the city. I suspected the pool from which he chose was none the best, and the lack of leprosy was apt to elevate a woman into the highest ranking.
I moved swiftly to place myself perhaps thirty paces in front of the Gypsies, and then slowed, coughed, and allowed my boots to scrape the ground. In response the thieves grew suddenly quiet. I heard them moving to the sides of the street, pressing themselves against the buildings, and then falling in behind me. They likely imagined they were being stealthy, and perhaps they were, but I followed their every movement. Using nothing but the noise they made to guide my hand, I could have tossed a knife and had a reasonable chance of striking one of them.
The men did not long hesitate. To do so would have been foolish. Their victim was alone and evidently drunk. If they waited, another band of thieves might appear and claim me for themselves. Within minutes of making myself known, the thieves rushed at me. I felt a hand upon my shoulder whip me around. A man grabbed my arms, and the leader stepped out of the darkness, his wine forgotten. He now held a long knife almost casually, letting it half dangle and catch the light of the handful of stars that peered through the clouds.
He stood in front of me, claiming the higher ground on the steep hill. He had, at least, the sense to do that. Shifting the knife from hand to hand, he grinned, and in the dim light, there was no mistaking the pleasure upon his face. This was the sort of man who relishes power over the helpless. He was imposing in his person, no doubt used to giving orders and having them obeyed, and wore the groomed oiled beard of a fidalgo. I supposed he imagined he belonged to a kind of royalty among his tribe, and that sort of prominence set him outside the laws of man and God.
In addition to the leader, and the man who held me in place, there were the two other thieves. They stood back and watched, passing a bottle back and forth. I ignored them. What little fight they had was
weakened with every swallow of wine. Near those two stood the boy, who looked at the other men with the cautious gaze of a dog regularly beaten by his master.
It took but a glance to know his story, or at least a reasonably accurate version of it. He was an orphan of the streets, taken in by the thieves as their slave and their amusement, to be used as they wished. If he was loyal and obedient and of some service, and if he lived so long, he might eventually become one of their number. The boy would not wish for it now, but someday it would become the only life he could imagine. Perhaps long ago he had dreamed of escape, but there was no escape for such as he, and at his age he would know that. His eyes set upon me, and he watched with wary interest, taking no pleasure in my capture, merely assessing the situation for how it might help or hurt his station. I knew then that he was desperate, but he was not broken. Not yet.
How many such boys were there in Lisbon? Hundreds certainly. Perhaps thousands. I could not save them all, but I could save this one, as someone had once saved me. Whatever else I did in the city, whatever crimes I contemplated, I would do some good here and now.
“What have we here?” the leader of the thieves said in a singsong voice of heavily accented English. “A Factory man out upon the street at night? It is not wisest.”
Perhaps I should have been afraid. I was outnumbered quite significantly, and while I was confident in my abilities, I knew nothing of these men. Each of them might have been my match or more. I felt no fear, however, merely the excitement of the moment and the promise of violence. Once, long ago, in such moments, I had searched for fear, as a sign that I was yet unbroken, but I had long since stopped looking. I was what I was, what circumstances had made me. I wished to change all that, but not just yet. For the moment, I was content with my advantages.