The Day of Atonement

by David Liss

  “I would not let them keep me,” I said. “Who else would make certain you did not return to your criminal ways?”

  “You’re the one planning to rob a vault,” Enéas said. He grinned as he spoke, but then studied my face to make certain he had not insulted me.

  I smiled just enough to let him know he was not in trouble.

  “After you have taken the gold and done what you need to do, you’ll leave Lisbon?”

  I nodded. “I can’t stay. I’ve taken too many risks.”

  Enéas cast his eyes down.

  “You will have to learn much better English if you are to do well in London.”

  The boy’s eyes lit up. “Of course. I will work very hard. I will learn the language and I will be the best English servant in London. And when I am older, we will go deer hunting together. It is what Englishmen like to do, is it not? We will ride through London, shooting deer, and it will be a very good time.”

  I nodded again. “It will be a very good time,” I agreed.

  Chapter 22

  All was prepared, and I needed only darkness. I sat in my room without troubling myself to light a lamp until I felt it was time to go. Then I slipped noiselessly through the Lisbon streets.

  It was after midnight. Most renegados had long since fallen into drunkenness or violence. But I did not take unnecessary risks. On every street, I clung to the shadows. I turned corners with silent caution. The sky was domed with heavy, gray clouds, but it was nearly a full moon, and occasionally its light pierced through.

  Down the street from the nondescript building that held the vaults, I reviewed my plan and scouted the area for any unexpected travelers. On the far end, Enéas would meet the mule cart that Inácio had secured. Once the cart was in place and loaded, we would have to drive it through the streets quickly; the trick then would be getting it to Luis Nobreza without attracting the notice of any soldiers. There were few patrols at night, but it would only take one. Any Portuguese soldier we might encounter would be inclined to inspect the cart. If he discovered several thousand pounds’ worth of gold, he might choose to keep it.

  There was nothing for it. I could not steal gold and transport it across the city without taking risks. I approached the building’s door. No sign of movement, no sound of footsteps. I was alone. I had just heard the bells chime midnight not five minutes before. It was time to begin.

  The door was heavy and the lock solid, but it was no more complicated than other locks I had dealt with before. I took from my pocket a leather roll that contained my picks and went to work. The tapping of the picks echoed through the streets, though only a trained ear would know the sounds for what they were. A passerby would think it nothing more than the tap of rat claws on a tin roof. More importantly, almost anyone out at night would have his own secrets to attend.

  At last the tumblers turned and the lock’s bolt retracted. I pushed the door, wincing at its long and mournful groan, and stepped into the foyer, where I faced the second door and its locks. These were trickier, but at least now I could work without fear of discovery. I set to it, not troubling myself with the noise or how much time I took, and within ten minutes the door was open and I looked into the long hallway. I moved forward, my soft leather boots making only the occasional hissing scrape.

  At the end of the hallway, I came to the door of the vaults. This was the most dangerous part of the operation. If there were guards who would be in a position to surprise me, they would be on the other side. This door had three more locks, each as complex as those on the front doors. I could not hope to gain access in less than five minutes, and picking these locks, I would generate far more noise than I would like. Unfortunately, it was my only option.

  Beginning at the top, I began to prod and poke the first lock’s interior, and it clicked open in less than a minute and with little noise. This, I hoped, was an omen of good things to come—but it was not. The second lock was sluggish and awkward. Once I dropped a pick, and the metallic clink might as well have been a cannon roar. Shortly after that, I momentarily lost my footing as I leaned forward, and my elbow thudded against the door. I cursed myself and proceeded. Finally it gave, and the third lock offered far less resistance. It had taken closer to ten minutes than five, but I now slowly opened the door.

  No one awaited me at the head of the dark stairwell, but I had no way to be sure what lay below. The blackness might contain any number of men waiting for me. I had seen no dogs during my visit with Roberta, but that did not mean they were not there after hours; silence meant nothing, as dogs could be trained not to bark. There was no dog smell, however. Only the cool and damp of stone, and a tang like old piss.

  I began to descend the stone staircase, taking each step with deliberate slowness. The stairs were steep and narrow by English standards, and there was no railing but the rough wall. I tried to control my breathing and commanded my eyes to adapt to the gloom. To adapt there had to be light, however. Here there was none.

  When I reached the foot of the stairs, I turned in the direction I was reasonably certain was north and began to move toward the last door. There was still no sign of any guardians, which did not comfort me. Far better to deal with the protectors now than to wait for them to emerge. Although if I was lucky, it might well be that Roberta and the others who stored gold here were deceived, and the space was far less well protected than they imagined.

  At last I had groped my way to the final door, to the room with the vaults. Here would be the most difficult lock of all, and I knew I was already behind schedule. I had to act quickly if I was to get the gold. Once more I cleared my head, thinking of nothing, letting my hands do the work.

  At last the bolt turned and the door swung open with the sonorous groan of old iron. I was in. I waited a moment, listening for any signs of movement. Nothing. I was alone. I wished I had known it earlier, since I could have struck a light. Now I took from my leather bag a torch and kindling box. After several false tries, I managed to spark a flame.

  There it all lay before me. Ten cages on the left and ten on the right. Now that I had light, I fished into my coat to look at my watch. I had under half an hour before Enéas was due to arrive with the mule cart. Seeking out the Carvers’ vault, I stepped forward, raising the torch. The cage contained six crates, each with fifty pounds of gold bouillon. All told, three hundred pounds to carry, but worth just over fifteen thousand pounds sterling. I could, without too much difficulty, carry one box at a time up the stairs and toward the door. Then Enéas and I could get the crates on the cart. The first box, and maybe the second, would not be overly taxing, but I knew my legs would begin to weaken from the climb. I needed to give myself sufficient time to take quick rests before each load.

  As I calculated the difficulty, I saw a shadow rise above me from behind. I dropped the torch and began to turn, but then felt a tremendous amount of pain.

  The room now stank of wine and rotten breath. And my head hurt. How long had I been insensible? I didn’t think very much time had passed, but there was no way to be certain.

  I opened my eyes just enough to make out the scene. I was still near the vault, on the floor where I had fallen. Two men stood over me, one drinking from a wineskin. He took a long gulp while his fellow looked on anxiously.

  “Not so much, you greedy son of a whore. That’s our last one.”

  The man with the wineskin swallowed and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and then spoke with a Spaniard’s accent. “I know it is the last one, which is why I mean to savor it. Good Rioja wine. Not your Portuguese piss.” He took another drink.

  “Save some for me, Jorge.” The second man, whom I could see better, was a little slip of a thing, hardly taller than a boy, and very skinny. He hopped about as he spoke, and he had a small, sharp nose and protruding lips—a birdlike man indeed.

  The Spaniard, however, was big enough, with huge hands and a massive nose. It had been broken in the past, likely more than once, and now it sat round and wide atop hi
s face, like a great turnip. “Quiet. If you could take the wine from me, you would, but you can’t and so you won’t. If you ruin these last few sips, I’ll kill you like I did the thief.”

  I felt contentment overtake the throbbing pain in my head. If a man is to be waylaid while going about his business, he can only hope to be waylaid by drunkards such as these. They thought me dead, when I had only taken a lump and a headache for my pains. With my eyes still slits, I continued to watch and wait, but I could see I would need little art. As drunk and foolish as these two men were, I might as well have been sitting up and watching them openly.

  The Spaniard took one more long gulp and handed the skin to the smaller man. “Not too much, now. A little girl like you don’t need so much as a man.”

  The Portuguese lifted the skin, and I saw his hands were shaking. He swallowed and then began to drink more. The Spaniard snatched the skin away.

  “That’s enough for you, missy.”

  “I never seen a man murdered before,” the Portuguese said.

  “You haven’t seen no one murdered yet,” the Spaniard snapped back. “He was a thief, and killing a thief is no crime. It’s what we get paid for. But we’re going to have to move him, otherwise we’ll need to explain how he got so far inside without us noticing. We’ll dump the body on the street and be done with it.”

  “I don’t want to touch him. It will anger his ghost.”

  “His ghost won’t care, but yours will if I kill you for refusing to help. Grab hold of one arm, I’ll grab the other. He’s a big fellow.”

  The Spaniard moved toward me and staggered. He grabbed onto the little Portuguese to regain his balance, but overcorrected, and the two of them nearly fell to the floor together. While they tottered comically about like a pair of clowns at a country fair, I launched myself to my feet and struck out at the Spaniard. I knew I had to dispatch him, or nearly so, with the first strike. It was always dangerous to attack so large a man, even if he was drunk and unskilled. I put my shoulder into the blow, driving my fist forward as Mr. Weaver had taught me, connecting with the man’s jaw and never slowing, never relenting, until I had completed the arc.

  Time seemed to stop, so perfect was the punch. Blood shot out of the Spaniard’s mouth, splattering the face of the Portuguese behind him. That tiny man stood frozen with terror as I stepped forward. The Portuguese raised his arms to protect his face and cried out, “Jesus, save me from the ghost!” I hated to be cruel to so harmless a man, but I had not time for kindness. I struck the little man in his stomach. The Portuguese’s arms came down, and I saw his eyes were wide, his mouth open, his teeth already flecked with blood. The poor fellow had only been doing his business, and it was a hard trick of fate that such business should put him at odds with my own. Still, it had, and there was no doing things by halves. I struck again, this time to the side of his head, knocking him so hard that he bounced, like a child’s plaything, into the wall and then collapsed upon the floor, motionless and broken.

  A fraction of a second later and I would have been dead, but I saw the shadows shift in the flickering lantern light, and I dodged as the Spaniard wildly swung a shovel at me. He had not been dispatched. He had apparently not even gone down. He was bloodied, but also now crazed and determined. He waved the shovel like it was a magic sword. “You think I can’t take a punch or two? Haven’t you seen my face, thief?”

  I grunted in dismay and jumped back as the Spaniard swung again. The shovel struck the dirt floor so hard that it was momentarily stuck. I rushed forward and, using my momentum, brought both my hands down, clamped together, upon the soft part of the Spaniard’s temple. The big man looked up just in time to see the blow, but not in time to move. I hit hard and true, and the Spaniard staggered, his eyes rolling toward the ceiling. He fell, face forward, to the floor.

  I paused only long enough to regret doing harm to men merely fulfilling their duty, and then I took the lantern and went to work at once upon the vault door. I had it open in less than five minutes and grabbed the first crate. I had not accounted for the weight of the wood, which added a good ten pounds to my load. I was already tired from the exertions of fighting the guards, and my head throbbed painfully, but none of that mattered. It couldn’t. Struggling for balance, I began the painful climb up the narrow stairs.

  As predicted, I began to struggle by the third crate. Stars swirled before my eyes. I wondered if I had been more seriously hurt than I had first allowed. My arms grew leaden and the muscles in my thighs spasmed with each step. But though my chest heaved and sweat poured down my face, stinging my eyes, I pressed on. I would slow but I would not stop. Fifteen thousand pounds’ worth of gold was enough money to right a wrong, to save a family, to soothe the sting of a debt too great to ever be paid.

  I was halfway up the stairs with the final box when I felt my foot slip in something wet—my sweat, possibly my blood. The box fell and I stumbled. I could see it all: I would crash to the floor below, striking my head, the gold box landing atop me. Perhaps I would die in the accident, or perhaps be hurt and live to be discovered in the morning. I would then find myself under arrest, facing the royal authorities and the Inquisition.

  Somehow I steadied myself. As though operating under its own volition, one of my arms shot sideways, striking the wall and reversing my momentum. I caught the box that had eluded my grip. The incident had lasted only a few seconds from beginning to end—my life seemed to be over, and then all was as it had been.

  I finished the climb, taking each step just a little more slowly.

  I had stacked the crates in two rows of three near the front door. I now peered outside and there, as I had planned, and as I had hoped, was the mule cart. Enéas sat slumped over with the reins.

  “All is well?” I murmured.

  “Well,” came the response in a nervous whisper, hardly recognizable as a human voice.

  It might have gone faster with two men loading, but Enéas was small, and I did not want to risk one of the crates dropping and breaking. The cart was only ten feet from the front door. After hauling the crates up from the subterranean vault, this last stretch would be easy, almost a rest.

  It took only a few minutes for me to load the crates. And there it was. Settwell’s money. Settwell’s revenge. Justice served and a debt paid—if not in full, then at least in part. With this task completed, there was nothing to stay my hand. Azinheiro would die, and I could extricate myself from this cursed city before anyone else came to harm.

  I jumped on the cart and said, “Let’s go.”

  The cart did not move.

  “Go,” I hissed.

  Enéas sat still.

  I leaned forward and tapped the boy’s shoulder. Before I saw Enéas’s head fall heavily to the side, I felt the hot liquid on my hand. Even in the dim light, I saw the black blood everywhere. Enéas’s throat had been sliced open.

  He had not been the one to whisper.

  The moment I realized what had happened, I also knew someone came toward me from behind. I could not move to either side, for I was pinned in place by the crates, so I dove down and forward, grabbing a pair of legs, and feeling a body tumble before me. The man was only on the ground for an instant before he leapt like an acrobat to his feet.

  Dim moonlight pierced the clouds and I saw a bald head, mustaches, and a scar. I saw the flash of teeth and a dagger in the man’s hand, silver-handled, laced with gold and glittering with rubies.

  Inácio.

  My vision clouded. Blood pounded in my ears.

  “You owe me,” Inácio said, reading the question on my face. “You thought we could be friends again after your father destroyed mine? You were gone too long, Sebastião. You made the mistake of thinking I was precisely what I appeared to be.”

  I was surprised, and not surprised. All along I had known I could not trust Inácio. I had suspected him of playing his own game and seeking his own angle, but I had not anticipated this cold hatred. I had not imagined, for a moment, that I could
be for him what the priest was to me.

  “My father didn’t destroy yours,” I said, my voice low. “They were both destroyed by the Inquisition. How can you not understand that?”

  “Your father seduced him with his Jew charm. He said, ‘Come work for me. It will be easy money. We will both benefit.’ And my father believed it. He believed it, and he died for it.”

  I held myself in readiness, but still I could not credit what I had witnessed. Inácio had been toying with me since our first meeting. He had told me Gabriela was dead for the pleasure of seeing my distress and then sent me to Eusebio—why? To further confound me? For the simple pleasure of twisting my feelings? Now he had killed Enéas and planned to rob me. I had never trusted him entirely, but I cursed myself for having been blind enough to trust him at all.

  “It is a fool who blames another victim rather than his enemy,” I said.

  “What? I should be like you and try to take revenge on the Inquisition? That is absurd. Instead, by putting you and Nobreza together, I’ve given them reason to take notice of your precious Gabriela. Now, that is revenge. You can think on that when I kill you with your father’s dagger and take this gold, which has been a nice surprise. It will be no more than a week before Gabriela is in chains in the Palace.”

  Inácio raised his knife, expecting me to charge him, but I did not move.

  “They’re going to rape her, you know,” Inácio said. “All the pretty ones are raped. Maybe not in the first few weeks, but after a while the guards can’t resist the temptation.”

  Inácio stood, the mule cart to his back. He could not escape with the gold unless I was dead, and I knew it. Inácio needed to force a fight, to put me at a disadvantage. But I would not take the bait. He would either have to flee without the gold or face me directly.