by John Farrow
Eventually, the monks came for him and, in silence, guided him away.
Their travels continued.
He assumed his destination to be the Castellaccio, atop Mount Caputo, about five kilometres farther north, but really was too exhausted to care. Accustomed to command, the captain did not ask questions of lowly monks. The donkey carts headed off in the direction of the fortress castle, yet when they took a circling trail around it, Cartier was not dismayed. Finally, he understood their objective. His friend had chosen to meet him within the safety and privacy of San Martino delle Scale, the Benedictine monastery a few kilometres along.
Night had fallen before they arrived. Weary, disgruntled, Cartier was greeted with surprising warmth by the monks there, shown to his quarters and advised that a meal would presently be served.
After a modest feast, he was led into a small chamber lit by a torch on each of the four walls. He sat before an olivewood table on a monk’s long bench, and waited only a few minutes before his friend, Cardinal Medici, entered alone. Cartier knelt before him, kissed the honoured ring, then was pulled to his feet and the two men kissed each other’s cheeks. They cordially held one another’s elbows to express their pleasure at the reunion. The diminutive but muscular cardinal, who possessed the body of a peasant, barrel-chested and thick-necked, took a seat on the bench opposite Cartier. A monk stepped into the room with port, a bottle and two glasses, served a portion for each man and quietly departed.
The cardinal smiled a moment before his expression turned sombre. He reached under his robes and removed a small leather pouch. Upon the table he spilled out the contents: a half-dozen diamonds and twenty small nuggets of gold.
“As requested,” the cardinal intoned.
“As agreed,” Cartier acknowledged. “Thank you, Your Grace.”
Although he was not an expert with respect to gems, Cartier picked up each of the small pieces and nodded appreciatively.
“You understand …” the cardinal commenced.
“I do,” Cartier assured him.
“My family is large and famous.”
“The name Medici is renowned throughout time and Christendom. I understand the situation.”
“My name, of itself—”
“I understand,” Cartier repeated.
“—might misconstrue—”
“I do understand.”
Medici knit his hands together. “Did you enjoy the cathedral today, Jacques?”
“I have not seen its equal.”
“Sofia, so they say, in Constantinople. Honestly, it’s difficult for me to imagine the possibility, although each in its way, I’m sure, offers its magnificence to God.”
“Magnificence,” Cartier remarked, curious about the conversation’s direction.
“One feels a sense of history, Jacques, here, and in the cathedral. A sense of awe, as though we find ourselves in the presence of our Lord’s majesty. In your explorations, you are privileged to create a history, are you not? Surely you must feel the presence of God’s glory in the New World.” He leaned forward and whispered, “Tell me once more about this island.”
Cartier nodded. The terms of the transaction were yet again being negotiated.
“Hochelaga, the name the Iroquois give to their village, is set upon an island in the middle of a most magnificent river, Your Grace, truly the most immense river yet discovered by man. It has no equal. No corresponding Sofia. The river is navigable into the heart of the continent, until it reaches an island—”
“An island with a mountain!” the cardinal burst out with rare enthusiasm.
“A mountain, such as this one here, at Monreale, yes! There, rivers meet, and the riches of a continent are guarded by this mountain island.”
“Yet you have not yet been there yourself. You have not yet found this river.”
“Savages speak only truths. They have no purpose to lie. The mountain on an island in the middle of the greatest river in the world lies in wait of my voyage. This time I will find it.”
“The mountain island awaits its destiny.”
As the cardinal shifted on his bench, the wood squeaked. Torches flared in a draft, and the shadows cast by the two men’s bodies shook upon the walls of this cool, damp chamber.
“I’ve had a vision,” the cardinal revealed in a soft voice, as if even within these stone walls he might be overheard.
“Your Grace?”
“A great city shall rise upon this island.”
“I understand.”
“A city of churches. I have seen this with my own eyes.”
“Perhaps, one day, a cathedral as magnificent—”
The cardinal held up a hand to caution Cartier before he overstepped a bound. To imagine outdoing the cathedral at Monreale would be impudent, even sacrilegious, which might cause an ill wind to blow across a ship’s course.
“Therefore, the name given to the city will be vital,” the cardinal stressed.
“A name honoured by God, I should say,” Cartier attested.
“In your circumstances, under the stress of your position … other persons of influence … of influence greater than that of my humble station—”
The seafarer, this time, was the one to raise a hand of caution. “I understand explicitly, Your Grace. These matters are to be accomplished with discretion, with care. The power is now in my hands, thanks to you and to the grace of Our Lord.”
“Not without risk, Jacques,” Cardinal Medici de Monreale noted.
“I understand, Your Grace. May God be with us in this affair.”
The cardinal nodded. Then grunted. “Jacques, adieu! And Godspeed.”
The mariner carefully picked up the diamonds and gold nuggets and gave the stones another examination, as though committing their facets to memory, then returned them to the pouch. He placed the pouch in the inner pocket of his vest, and rose, only to kneel as the cardinal came around the table. He bowed, and kissed the ring of his host. As he stood again, the two friends embraced and departed for the night. Cartier was led away by a monk holding a torch, then was released to the moonlit darkness of his chamber, and to the light of his dreams.
By mid-morning, Jacques Cartier was on a different ship, returning to France, his mission completed to his fullest expectation.
Upon entering Domagaya’s rooms at Fontainebleau, Cartier was surprised to find a bevy of young women scurrying into flight. They were fully clothed, so he could not categorically pronounce their activities illicit, but the savage was wearing very little while seated upon his bed, and apparently had been showing his muscles to the young ladies of France.
“White-skinned women like Domagaya,” the lad said in Iroquois.
“Domagaya likes white women,” Cartier candidly observed. The Indians had been brought over specifically to create a stir, to arouse widespread interest in his explorations so that the king might feel obliged to finance his trips. If that attention included winning the affections, or merely the idle curiosity, of women at court, then so be it. “I need to speak with you,” Cartier told him, switching to French.
“You go long time away, Jacques.”
“Far, yes. To another tribe in the white man’s world.”
“Someday Domagaya go with you.”
“First, I need you to do something for me.”
“For you, I do what you want Domagaya do.”
“Most important, never speak of this matter we discuss today to another man or woman—not here, in France, nor to any white man or white woman, here or in your land. This will be an accord between me and you.”
Domagaya looked curiously at him, for he did not understand the French word accord. This required a time spent working through both languages, trying to find a word that would be understood in the bargain being struck. Eventually, after a lengthy pantomime, the two men shook hands, pressed them to their chests to imply the swearing of oaths and settled on the word treaty. Each spoke the word in the other’s language.
Then Cartier
broached the issue that concerned him. From the hidden depths of his garments he brought out the dagger that Domagaya and Taignoagny’s father had given him on the Gaspé shore the summer past.
“Knife, my father,” Domagaya said, curious.
Cartier removed a small sack from under his coat. From it dropped stones that sparkled like starlight on a wave and more stones that seemed to reflect sunlight. “Diamonds, gold,” Cartier said in a hushed tone. He’d taught Domagaya the words before, but now they gazed upon their meaning.
Domagaya remained still, quiet, watching.
“I want you, Domagaya, to attach these stones to your father’s knife, and speak of this to no one. Use only the materials of your world, and only the tools of your world. Deer hide, beaver skin, the thread from a moose tail, and your own knives. We have the materials with us from our last voyage. Your father told me with great pride when he gave me this knife, that it was made for him by his first son, Domagaya. Now I want you to make it a very special knife that will have great magic. Will you do this for me?”
Domagaya looked from the weapon to the captain’s eyes, back to the dagger, and asked, “Why?”
“Domagaya, never ask this question.”
The Indian thought of the women who had recently departed his room, of the marble halls and the golden ceilings of Fontainebleau, of the gardens where the waters danced in peculiar ways and the plants grew in strange designs, and he thought of the animals who lived to die on the white man’s plate and others who lived to pull the white man’s possessions, including his children and his wife, and he considered the many wonders he had seen. “Domagaya make knife, great magic, to give his friend Jacques,” he said. “I will not talk of this.”
Cartier leaned in closer, to whisper. “I have enemies. They must not know that I hold a magic dagger. With this knife I will protect the Iroquois of your world in strong friendship with the Great White King. But I have enemies. Every man of daring does. So you must never speak of this, not even to the young women who share your pillow at night. I know you love your pillow.”
“Domagaya love a pillow.”
“We must remember to take it with you, to Stadacona. Imagine how the women there will want to sleep in the bed of a man with such a pillow.”
The two men smiled. Then a worry crept across Domagaya’s visage.
“What is it?”
“Why,” the Indian began, then paused a moment, “does my brother have wings? Is he to become a bird in the white man’s world?”
“Taignoagny has wings?”
“The man they call Italian man makes the soul of Taignoagny on wall. Soft wall. It moves when he carry it in his hands.”
“A painting. A canvas.”
“On this wall that moves, my brother has wings.”
Cartier smiled again. “You speak of Michelangelo. It is an honour to be drawn by the great artist. Don’t worry, Domagaya. Your brother has wings because Michelangelo can see with his great vision that Taignoagny is loved by God. Someday, when he dies, he will fly to the heaven of our God.”
“Domagaya like wings, too.”
Cartier understood. “I’ll see what I can do. But no word of our treaty. Do a good job on the knife and Michelangelo will draw wings on your back, too.”
A final chore. Now he’d have to haggle with a pesky artist. C’est la vie. At times, there seemed to be no end to his negotiations, and once again he looked forward to being at sea.
Jacques Cartier stood upon his aft deck to survey the final preparations. The provisioning had gone well, although delays were inevitable, and the cause of the latest fiasco had been exasperating. Monsieur Claude Gastineau, the king’s man, had insisted on toting along half his boudoir, as if he expected to be attending an autumnal ball among the Iroquois. He had cases and crates and boxes and attendants—who were not coming. Cartier had exercised his authority on them, much to the relief of the servants. The man was even transporting sheaves of paper and charcoal, for drawing, which could prove a useful contribution on such an enterprise, were it not that he freely admitted to being inept at the craft. Rather, he was bringing the materials to occupy his time. “What else will I do,” he inquired, “in a land that has nothing but trees and heathens?” A pair of the crates wedged into place belowdecks displaced two equivalent cases of raw vegetables, which Cartier had then seen lashed to the deck. One good storm and they’d be gone, if not consumed first by the night watch.
He signalled Petit Gilles to his side. Not yet fourteen, the lad had already crossed the Atlantic. A gangly youth, on even the stormiest nights he was sure to take a turn in the rigging, an able-bodied seaman despite his sparse years.
“Yes, sir?”
“Gastineau is settled below?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Has he spoken, as yet, of certain matters to you?”
“Spoken? He told me where to put his belongings, sir.”
“He will address other issues shortly.”
“Sir?”
Cartier brought the lad nearer to him and spoke into the breeze, that their voices might go unheard.
“You are close to me, Petit Gilles. For this reason, he will want you as his spy.”
“Sir! I would never do that, sir!”
“And betray your king? How could you not spy on me?”
“Sir!”
They were standing side by side, and Cartier pulled him nearer still. “Spy on me, Petit Gilles. I have nothing to hide. If I do, it will encourage his confidence should some indiscreet matter be conveyed to him. Do so with my blessing. The day may come, lad, when I shall involve you in a separate action.”
“An action, sir?”
“I know not what. When that day is upon us, I shall indicate to you that the king’s man does not merit your private counsel. This will afford you the opportunity, Petit Gilles, to demonstrate your loyalty to your captain. In all other matters, trust in yourself, be loyal to your king and forthcoming with his emissary. Do you understand me, good lad?”
“Yes, sir.” He was perplexed as well.
“Fail to comply and you shall fail to see St. Malo again.”
“Out of loyalty to you, Captain, not through any threat!”
“You speak well. I count on you, Petit Gilles. You may now shout the order.”
“The order, sir?” He was bright-eyed, too astonished to hope that he might be granted such an honour. Below them, the town awaited their departure, loved ones still waving to the men upon the ship, knowing they might never return. The boy’s own mother, tears on her cheeks, stood upon the dock. Bobbing on the quiet waters, longboats manned by hefty men awaited the moment they’d pull three ships free of their docking spaces and haul them through the harbour to open water, to raise sail. Up and down the dock, men in the elegance of fine clothing, women brightly adorned in shawls against the chill, and their exuberant children sallied about, fear and excitement commingling, a tangible sense of adventure stirred by a distinct measure of dread.
Cartier smiled. He had no doubt that Petit Gilles would make a fine ship’s captain one day. “Give the order, lad, to cast us off upon the sea.”
Upon stones covered by a thick fall of coloured leaves, Cartier stepped ashore. Set back from the river’s edge amid the trees, Iroquois were observing him, and the crew in the longboats watched also as he tucked his plumed hat under one arm and knelt and kissed the soil. He lifted his head, a smudge of dirt upon his lips. The island had dwelled in his imagination as the door to a magic kingdom. Now that that portal had been attained, his gratitude to God and his appreciation of good fortune had pulled his emotions to the ground. With the aid of his cabin boy he stood again, then waited while his crew hauled the other boats—and themselves—ashore.
First to come down to greet him were Donnacona and his two sons, sent on ahead two hours earlier to alert the people of Hochelaga to the new arrivals, to assure them of the white man’s peaceful intent. They had also to prepare the Iroquois for what might soon transpire. Men
who dwelled over the ocean beyond the clouds, with black beards and skins the colour of beluga whales, had returned, and this time they were arriving down the river. The world they knew, Donnacona explained, was no longer the world they knew. In giving counsel to his friend, the chief of the Hochelaga people, he advised Kamanes-awayga that the cloud-skins were strange creatures who had great powers. He told him also that, for the white-skins, the Iroquois were equally strange and also had great powers.
“Since my sons come back from the land of the pale-skins,” Donnacona explained, “they tell many lies, but they know also the white-skins’ magic. My son speaks to their animals, and they obey him.”
The old chief nodded. “My son,” he said, “calls to the ducks.”
“Your son calls to the ducks,” Donnacona explained, “by quacking like a duck. My son speaks to the white man’s animals by speaking like a pale-skinned man, and the animals of the pale-skinned man obey him.”
“This troubles me,” Kamanesawayga informed him.
“My son will bring to you a French animal,” Donnacona said. “Prepare yourself and your people, for you will be afraid.”
Taignoagny returned down the trail to the place where he had left an animal fastened to a tree. The white man’s beast had been quietly sleeping after another day of hard travel in a longboat, thankful to be on dry land again. It jumped up at the sound of its master and wagged its tail, and the animal and the Indian youth returned to the Iroquois village. As they arrived at the clearing, Indians gasped, the women hid, and a few young men reached for their spears and bows and arrows.
“A wolf!” Kamanesawayga cried out, leaping to his feet.
“Not a wolf,” Donnacona scoffed. “A wolf can eat this beast in the morning and still be hungry. It is a white man’s wolf, and that’s not much of a wolf.”
Taignoagny came towards the circle of men, and the wolf-like animal at his feet scarcely noticed the others, wholly intent on looking up at his master’s eyes. “Watch this!” Donnacona announced, forgetting entirely that when he had first witnessed the demonstration he had been terrified to the bone and had believed that he no longer understood his own name or the difference between the sky and the sweet earth. “My son will talk the talk of the pale faces. The animal will listen.”