by Scott O'Dell
A woman was carrying a jar balanced on her head down a flight of stairs that led to the plaza. Four men were about to cast a net from the shore, swinging it be tween them, and singing in low voices.
At the moment our anchors struck the water, the fish ermen cast their net, and it went out in a wide circle and settled. They did not pull it in. At sight of the caravel they raised their hands and began to run. The woman dropped her jar and disappeared.
“We have surprised the lordly Tikans,” the nacom shouted.
He stood beside me on the afterdeck, in a fresh coat of black soot and a hawk mask instead of the jaguar mask he had worn the night before. A vain young man, he wore a different nose plug, a different set of earrings, and gold anklets instead of silver.
“The city sleeps,” he said.
Cantú the dwarf laughed. “He, he, he. Shall we roust them out?” “Now,” said the nacom. “Without delay!”
We were moored broadside to the city, anchored fore and aft, headed north the way we had come in, and at tended by canoes that were ready to move us should the wind fail. The nacom raised his hand. On the deck below the gunners caught the sign.
Six cannon boomed, one after the other, each spaced at the slow count often, exactly as planned. There was a short silence. From afar I heard the screech of conch-shell horns.
“Our warriors are at the gates,” the nacom said.
Through the swirling smoke I had followed the paths of the six cannonballs. All had landed in the plaza be tween the two temples, which were our targets.
As far as I could see they had done no damage, but this was of small importance. In the hearts of those who had heard nothing louder than the whine of arrows, the sudden, horrendous crash must have struck the utmost fear. I had once seen this fear, among the Indians of Isla del Oro when Don Luis had used his cannon, these very cannon, against them.
Across the water in Tikan, Don Luis by this time must have come awake and scrambled to his feet. He would have jumped into his clothes and buckled on his sword. Yes, his sword, because he would not have left it behind when he swam away from the wreck. It was a part of him, like an arm. He slept with it.
He would hurry into the street. At this moment, from some vantage point, he might be staring down at the Santa Margarita.
Was she, he would wonder, a phantom ship that had sailed out of a nightmare he had dreamed? Knuckling his eyes, he would stare at her until certain at last that she was not an apparition, but a real ship, a weathered, storm-beaten Spanish caravel.
I spoke to the nacom, who signaled the gunners. Six explosions rent the quiet. Six more cannonballs leaped over the bay into the city. One ball toppled the god house from one of the temples. Another bounced off its blood red walls.
On the wind, from beyond the glittering temples came the throb of many drums, the sounds of horns and musket fire, and above all the roar of voices rising and fall ing as our warriors fought at the city gates.
At the second round from our cannon, as shot struck and spun crazily away, a lone figure appeared in the plaza. He must have come from one of the temples, per haps out of a secret door that opened from some under ground passage.
He shaded his eyes against the sun. For a moment he gazed down at the caravel. Then he removed his head dress, tossed it on the stones, and started down a flight of stairs that led to the beach.
Since the man was some distance from me, I could not make out his features. But from his arrogant walk, which looked as if he were marching to a drum, I thought he must be Don Luis de Arroyo. I was certain of it when the sun flashed on the blade of a sword buckled at his waist.
He came to a terrace near the top of the stairs, a para pet guarded on each side by two stone figures, which I took to be crouching alligators.
Here he paused. Again he shaded his eyes against the sun and gazed down upon the caravel. He would miss the great Spanish crosses that once had covered the sails, for we had not had time to paint new ones. Yet he could not help but see, in Mayan red across her bow, the name Santa Margarita.
Don Luis was still too far away for me to make out his features, but I imagined with what consternation and disbelief he now looked down upon the ship he once had owned.
He stood high above us, erect and unmoving, as if he were not the least disturbed by our presence, as if smoke from the cannon were not hanging in the air and there were no sounds of armies fighting, as if it were a peace ful morning and he had come out to look at the sea.
The dwarf was uneasy. “It’s a ruse,” he said. “A thou sand warriors are behind him somewhere waiting for a signal to fall upon us.”
“Twice a thousand,” the nacom said.
“It’s an old trick,” said the dwarf. “As old as the Greeks.”
The six cannon that faced the temples were loaded and primed. The ship was surrounded by a swarm of canoes manned by warriors armed with spears and heavy bows. We were prepared for any surprise.
Don Luis did not move from the parapet. He stood with his feet thrust apart, a hand on the hilt of his sword, as if he had gone as far as his Spanish pride would allow—not quite halfway.
On an impulse, I went to the main deck, where I ordered the cannoneer to hold our fire. Hearing my order, the two men followed me.
The nacom shook his head. “If you go onshore,” he said gravely, “if you are captured, the battle is over. When the leader is taken prisoner and he no longer can command his warriors, this is the end. It is the custom in our land.”
“The Feathered Serpent,” Cantú said, turning on the nacom, “knows well that it’s a Mayan custom. I need not remind you that it was he who gave birth to it.”
The nacom bowed and was silent at this rebuke.
The dwarf tried to press his sword into my hand. I re fused it.
“Gods are brave by nature,” he said, speaking in Spanish since the nacom was listening, “which is good, but they are also blessed with common sense. What do you gain by this foolish act?”
He was right, it was foolish to confront Don Luis in the midst of a battle that we had not yet won, to expose myself to an expert swordsman, to risk the chance of bringing defeat upon the army should I be killed. Or worse, to be captured by his cohorts, who were surely waiting only for his signal.
The dwarf was angry. “Is it pride that leads you into this trap?” he demanded. “Is it hatred of Don Luis de Arroyo? Is it a display of courage? Or is it something else? A wish, perhaps, to test a Christian truth?”
I did not answer, for it was all of these things and more.
The dwarf shook his head in disgust. “Then, Lord of the Northern Skies and Lord of Folly, may you go with God.”
I spoke to the cannoneer. “Watch for a signal,” I told him. “If I raise my hand, fire.” To the nacom I said, “Have your warriors ready to attack.”
Climbing down the ladder into the nearest canoe, I was rowed toward shore.
From the shadow of the canopy that stretched above my head I watched Don Luis. He did not move. He seemed to be enjoying the bright morning and his thoughts.
There were some twenty men at the paddles, all well armed. However, before we reached the shore, I in structed them not to follow me, yet to be ready should the need arise. Not waiting to be carried, I waded ashore and started up the winding stairs.
I greeted Don Luis in Maya.
He replied in the same language, in such a bad accent that I had much difficulty understanding him. I did un derstand that he had no idea that he was speaking to the god Kukulcán, for he addressed me as an enemy cap tain, curtly but with respect.
There was no reason why he should recognize me. According to our weasels, the people of Tikan knew nothing about the return of the god Kukulcán. If they did know, then being Mayan themselves they would never march against me. Nor did they know about the raising of the Santa Margarita our spies attested to this.
Don Luis had changed little in the months since I had seen him last. He squinted, raising an eyebrow, and smiled. He
could smile and thrust a blade into your side, both at the same time, as I have noted before.
The sun was hot. He wiped his face with the back of a hand and turned toward the west, where the sounds of fighting now seemed closer.
“You are losing the battle,” I said, saying the words slowly, again in Maya.
He turned his back upon the sounds. He fixed his eyes upon my mask and headdress. We stood confronting each other in silence.
I heard musket fire. Then the warriors swarming around the ship set up an angry chant. There was still no sign that he knew who I was.
I repeated my words, holding out my hand to accept his sword.
His manner changed. His shoulders stiffened. His grip tightened on the sword. It was the same sword that his father had owned, the one I had often seen before. He would rather part with his life than with this weapon. I could see him swimming away from the wreck with it buckled to his side, floundering along because it was heavy, yet not giving it up to the waves. He would not give it up now or ever, not willingly.
“Don Luis de Arroyo,” I said, speaking in Spanish, in the rolling accent of a Sevillano, “either you surrender or I give the signal for the hundreds of warriors you see on the ship and in the canoes to come ashore. We have, as you well know, a dozen cannon and an ample supply of powder. My soldiers are at your gates this moment. Many are armed with Spanish muskets.”
Don Luis heard my words without changing his expression. He still did not seem to know that behind the feathered mask was an old enemy.
Yet something must have stirred his memory—my height, my voice, the accent of Seville. For I noticed that as I spoke he took a firmer grip on the sword.
The warriors waiting in the canoes kept up their angry chant. The fighting at the gates had grown louder. Don Luis looked at me steadily, holding fast to his sword. Now was the moment for him to use it and thus, by the rites of Maya warfare, end the battle.
Clammy fear seized me. I was tempted to give the sig nal that would send a volley of shot crashing down upon the temples and hundreds of warriors storming into the streets.
I glanced at the caravel. I could see the gun ports, the black maws of the cannon leveled upon the city. The cannoneer would be standing ready. Nearby the nacom and Cantú, the dwarf, were waiting for my signal.
Don Luis gripped his sword. Something held him back. It was not fear, because he was fearless. Nor was it any feeling of concern for my life, because he had no conscience about such matters.
“What lies beneath the mask?” he said, speaking in tones he commonly used with servants. “What do you hide under the feathers, señor?”
My moment of panic passed. I turned my back upon the caravel and faced him.
“We are Spaniards,” he said, “not savages. Let us talk together like Spaniards. The fighting at the gates will continue while we talk. And for many days, if I choose, since I have a large army and many reserves.”
As he spoke, a loud, angry buzzing started up behind us, a sound that I had heard several times while I stood there. The buzzing grew louder for a few moments. Then two small clouds rose up from somewhere, ap parently out of a hole, and swept past us toward the sea.
“You may have a large army,” I said, “but they fight with clubs and hornets.” A third angry cloud hovered over us as I spoke. “You can’t win a battle with insects,” I said.
Don Luis smiled but did not answer.
CHAPTER 9
IT SEEMED IMPOSSIBLE THAT ATTHIS MOMENT HE WAS NOT SUSPICIOUS, for I stood not two paces away, towering over him by a head, a young Spaniard with a metal crucifix around his neck.
And yet I, Julián Escobar, once a worker in his vine yards, musician and seminarian who had followed him blindly to the New World, must have been the farthest from his mind.
Surely he thought that I had long been dead, drowned with the rest of the crew, my bones picked clean. For when I took off the serpent mask and dropped it on the stones between us he uttered a cry of surprise and horror, as if a watery ghost had risen up from the wreck of the Santa Margarita to question him about his crimes against God.
Since he stood openmouthed, staring at me, I broke the silence.
There was no time to recount what had happened from the day we had parted in the storm. And there was no reason to do so. He would believe nothing of what I told him, and certainly not that at this moment he was in the presence of the Feathered Serpent, the god Kukulcán.
“Call off your warriors,” I said. “I have an army at your gates, as you can hear, and another army waiting in the harbor, as you can see.
The Santa Margarita you know well from other days—the powder she carries and the cannon she mounts.”
His mouth closed at the sound of the name Santa Margarita. His whole manner changed. He took his hand from the sword and for a moment seemed about to clasp me in a tight abrazo. He glanced toward the ship. “The gold?” he stammered. “Is it safe?”
“Safe. In the hold, where you left it,” I said.
“A miracle,” he said and laughed, acting as if we were seated comfortably at a table somewhere, not standing on a battlement with fighting behind us and an armed ship riding at anchor.
The sounds had grown louder. They came now from streets just beyond the temples, not more than half a league away.
“Call an end to the fighting,” I said. “My warriors have breached the walls. The Santa Margarita has her cannon trained on the city. You have lost the battle.”
“On the contrary, señor, it’s just beginning. I have a horde of warriors in reserve, waiting to surround you. I’ll block the mouth of the estuary with a hundred canoes so you can’t reach the sea. I’ll capture the Santa Margarita and slaughter your army, every one, if need be.”
He paused, fingered the hilt of his sword for a mo ment, and then gave me a friendly glance.
“But there is no need for this,” he said. “I don’t know what your position may be in the place you come from. But whatever it is, señor, it’s temporary, as is mine. We are the first small wave of a tide that will soon engulf this savage world. It behooves us both to give careful thought to our fortunes. The conquistadores who will descend upon us by the hundreds, by the thousands, will not look kindly upon us, their brothers, who go about dressed in rings, anklets, masks, and feathers. We’ll be killed or driven into the jungle to die slowly in any num ber of ways.”
The sounds of fighting abruptly ended. A band of warriors appeared on the terrace of the temple our can non had not hit. Don Luis glanced up at them and then at me.
“There are more where they came from,” he said. “But why should I call upon them when we can settle matters between us? Forget what has happened in the past. Working together we can accomplish wonders. We’ll join our two towns, which now are weak, into one powerful city. We will ask the king for all necessary titles. When the flood of conquistadores descends upon us, we’ll greet them not as savages dressed in paint and feathers, but as Spanish gentlemen, proprietors of a thriving empire, duly blessed by governor and king, under the banner of God.”
The fighting had not started again. More warriors came out and stood on the terrace. I heard the cry of a conch-shell horn. In the silence that followed there drifted up to me from the caravel a neigh, twice repeated.
Don Luis turned pale. “Bravo?” he said. I nodded. “Thanks to God!”
He crossed himself and stood quiet, waiting for the stallion to neigh again. I think that he loved this animal more than anything in the world, next to his Toledo sword.
The warriors who had gathered on the terrace—there were several hundred by now—began to chant, one word over and over. The word had a warlike sound, but I could not tell what it meant.
I glanced at Don Luis. He was no longer thinking about the stallion. He, too, was listening to the chant. I had a strong urge to raise my hand and signal the nacom to unloose our cannon.
Don Luis went on about the miracle we would per form together, talking in his most gentle
manly voice, with an eye on the warriors who stood above us. Then there came from somewhere beyond the plaza the screech of conch-shell trumpets. This was followed by the beat of drums. Suddenly, from between the two temples, a phalanx of Tikan warriors came into view.
They swarmed out of the morning shadows, marching slowly. They came to the center of the plaza and stopped. Those on the terrace descended the long flight of stairs. Together they crossed the plaza and moved in my direction.
There was not a sound except the shuffle of sandaled feet. The silence was menacing. I turned and glanced down at the caravel with its cannon trained on the city, at the warriors waiting on the shore.
Don Luis had always had a habit of drawing his lips together when he was about to issue a command. He pursed them now and said, speaking in the formal tone he used with inferiors, “Señor Escobar, late citizen of the village of Arroyo in the Spanish province of Andalusia...”
His words were lost in a blare of trumpets that came from somewhere beyond the glittering temples.
The warriors were still advancing toward me. They walked slowly, shoulder to shoulder, less than a dozen men, though they seemed like a thousand in their armor of quilted cotton, carrying tortoise shields and obsidian clubs.
They came to the edge of the terrace and stopped, not ten paces away.
Here they dropped their weapons and bowed, touch ing their foreheads to the stones, and spoke my name in hushed voices, over and over. From our warriors they had somehow learned of my presence. The God of the Evening Star and the Four Directions, Kukulcán him self, stood before them.
Trumpets blared again. Black-painted warriors surged out of the secret passageways where they had been hidden. They began to chant to the beat of wooden drums.
Don Luis glanced at his kneeling warriors, then at the caravel and the fleet of canoes. At last he looked at me.
There was no sign of fear or surprise in his gaze. At that moment I doubt that he had the least idea of what was taking place. I doubt that he had ever heard the name Kukulcán.
“Don Luis Arroyo,” I said, speaking in a voice that I did not recognize as wholly mine, a tone that had come upon me of late, “You are in the presence of a god, the Mayan god Kukulcán. It is customary to bow and touch your forehead to the earth, to rise, and as you do so, to lower your eyes in reverence.”