The Samurai of Seville

by John Healey

  And yet, he thought, the contents of the letter were curious and had a certain gracia about them. It claimed that a tribe of Asian devils was approaching Spain accompanied by Franciscans from Sevilla and a naval captain by the name of Sebastian Vizcaino, whose name was somehow familiar. The Asians had discovered the truth of Jesus Christ and sought trade. They came from an island nation he remembered being told about one evening some years back at a dinner where he was seated next to a Jesuit with knowledge of the subject. He remembered how the Jesuit told him that before the heathens of that land came to know Christianity, they had worshipped rocks and trees.

  Let them come, he thought. Spain was hungry for new ports as well, new minerals and forests, new converts, new money. It was, after all, their holy obligation as soldiers for Christ. The letter implored him to organize a proper reception for the delegation. It went on to mention that most of the group had been baptized and that the nation they represented was known for its fine arts and exquisite manners.

  He found the matter immensely ironic. Just when the issue of the purity of one’s blood was being so hotly argued, prosecuted, and persecuted by a Holy Inquisition engorged with its own power, when its irons of torture were burning brightest, when only five years had passed since the new King and his disagreeable, arriviste sidekick, the Duke of Lerma, had expelled all of the Moriscos from Spain, just when all this was afoot, he was being asked to unfurl a carpet of welcome to another race of dubious converts. The Duke of Lerma, a thorn he could not remove, whose daughter was married to his oldest son Juan Mañuel who would succeed him someday and become the 8th Duke of Medina-Sidonia. He had given the pair his blessing in a moment of weakness.

  He decided he would show the visitors from Japan and the palace officials asking him to greet them how an old aristocrat responds in times tainted by religious provincialism. He would open the palace in Sanlúcar de Barrameda and have all available carriages dusted and repainted and properly paired with braided steeds to meet and escort the tree-worshippers from their ship. It went without saying he would not be there to receive them in person. There were limits to be respected. He would send Julian, plus a nephew or two, to represent him. It would be a pleasure to have his niece to himself for a spell without the presence of the handsome young husband.

  The pain in his hip continued as he made his way downstairs to his secretary’s quarters. He dictated a response to Sevilla and to Madrid. He composed a separate and detailed letter to his man in Sanlúcar listing all the necessary preparations he could think of for the Asian delegation. He also commended the services of Don Julian and two ne’er-do-well nephews.

  Afterwards he took a strong drink of wine and limped to the stables. As if to further affirm his ties to the land and putting up with considerable discomfort, he mounted his favorite Arabian and went for a ride up into the hills. He rode between hundreds of olive and almond trees. The paths were damp from the early morning rain. From earth the color of dried blood, there rose an odor of renewal, a scent of chthonic gratitude, primary odors the land awards to riders and horses fortunate enough to be out after a long-needed shower. He passed a family of campesinos harvesting potatoes and deigned to recognize their salutations with a brief wave while wistfully entertaining a fantasy he would have been happier born into a family such as theirs. He thought of his mistress from the village, Rosario, whom he had brought into the house to serve as Guada’s chambermaid so that it would be easier to sneak her into his bedroom.

  He reached the ridge and trotted along a goat path to an alberca, an irrigation pool, fed by rivulets from the mountains. He let the reins drop, permitting his horse to lap up the clear cold water. Turning in the saddle with a wince, he took in the view of his house below and its chapel adjacent to the village. The older he became, the closer he felt to this terrain, the more loath he was to make any further journeys away from it.

  He patted the horse’s strong neck, appreciating the warmth of it in the brisk air. Autumn, his favorite season, was imminent. He took a hank of the chestnut-hued mane in his elderly spotted hand, giving it an affectionate tug the horse ignored, but in doing so he awakened a memory he could have done without. An event connected with the dismal demise of the Armada twenty-four years earlier. All had been done to save the fleet. All hope of ferrying Parma’s troops to France had been abandoned. He commanded his ships to flee north, trying to escape Drake’s lighter vessels that persisted in attacking them like angry wasps from a bothered nest. It was September then, as well, but far colder when they rounded Scotland and came about, finally pointing south again. As they sailed along the western coast of Ireland, he tried to keep them well out at sea, but currents and storms that seemed to mock him drove the fleet landward. Many of the ships were damaged. Provisions and water supplies dwindled. Spirits were as foul as the weather. And then there came the moment when he had to order his cavalry officers to drive their mounts into the sea.

  The sight of his sailors screaming aflame from the vile fire ships off of Gravelines, watching his cabin boy expire on deck from a musket wound, living with the ravaged faces of his troops ill with starvation and dysentery, none of these images affected him as much as seeing the horses being forced to dive into the cold sea, seeing their heads bobbing in the rough, deep, foreign waves as he left them behind to drown, so far from their paddocks in Andalusia.

  At the midday meal that afternoon, Don Julian took the news of his being sent to the Medina-Sidonia palace in Sanlúcar with surprising pleasure. The Duke observed how Guada put on a brave smile. She thanked him for showing such confidence in her husband. But he would have sworn the girl was on the verge of tears.

  – XI –

  In which the Samurais reach Spain

  Shiro stood by the bowsprit. The ship moved through the estuary. The shores on either side were gentle and uninhabited. The worst of the crossing was far behind them.

  Sanlúcar de Barrameda in October smelled of whitewash, burning olive twigs, and tall dark sherry barrels rinsed with well water. The sun was clear and crisp, the land and the wide beaches flat against low green hills that beckoned in the distance. Immense white clouds slowly expanded and then dissipated in the breeze, propelling them while a pair of high-flying birds he could not identify soared among them.

  Diego and all the Spaniards aboard were excitedly pointing to this and that from the deck and slapping one another’s backs. Hasekura Tsunenaga appeared on deck wearing one of his better robes, one made from white silk with red cranes sewn into it. All of the Samurai wore black or navy with black lapels and sashes, their swords and scabbards polished for show.

  As Shiro took in the landscape, he felt something he was not prepared for, a familiarity experienced as a trembling lightness within his chest. It was as if some spirit emanating from the land were speaking to him. How, he wondered, could a place so foreign and so unknown feel this way? He could not grasp it and thought at first it might be an effect common to those who travel great distances and spend long periods of time at sea. But the arrival at New Spain after crossing the Pacific, and the arrival in La Habana after crossing the Gulf of Mexico did not feel anything like this.

  He noticed storks nesting atop the bell tower of a Christian church looming in the village ahead. They were birds—Kounotori—highly prized in his country. He bowed toward them and then made his way back to the helm to speak with Hasekura Tsunenaga and the Christian captain.

  ‘May I have a word sir?’

  The Japanese ambassador looked at him with some suspicion, for they had not exchanged a syllable since Shiro had been released from the hold months ago.

  ‘You may.’

  ‘I was wondering, with your permission and that of Señor Capitan Oquendo, if I might stand first watch aboard the ship once we’ve docked.’

  Hasekura raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Are you not as eager as everyone else to step upon the firmament?’

  ‘I am sir, but I am just as glad to wait another day to do so.’

&n
bsp; Once again the young man seemed to be angling for a special status. Hasekura Tsunenaga found it irritating.

  ‘As you wish,’ he said, though he continued to search his mind for some hidden motive. Shiro then repeated the request to the Spanish officer, who had no objection either, but who suggested Shiro present himself the following day to help translate when a representative of the King would arrive from Sevilla.

  The reception at the quay was impeccable except for when Hasekura Tsunenaga tripped on the gangplank and almost lost his balance. Shiro counted fifteen coaches and carriages painted in bright pastel hues with gold edging and bedecked with plumes. The drivers wore pink and sky blue leggings and white powdered wigs. But the three young nobles on horseback did not dismount to receive Date Masamune’s representative. The only deference they showed, clearly something they had discussed and agreed upon ahead of time, was to feign a brief bow from their saddles. Women carried parasols or wore veils and dressed in elaborate skirts and long-sleeved blouses with colorful mantillas on their heads held in place by sturdy combs made from tortoise shell and mother-of-pearl.

  He was relieved when everyone had gone save for a small group of onlookers with nothing better to do than stare and make commentary about the new ship in port. As night fell, these too dispersed, and Shiro, content, walked the length and breadth of the decks as if he owned them. He served himself an extra ration of biscuits with his dried fish and an extra draft of water, and in the blackness afterwards he climbed all the way to the crow’s nest, something he had been wanting to do since leaving Japan.

  Holding on to the circular bannister stained with tern and gull droppings, he looked out upon the village. Many of the houses were dark and shuttered. Others were lit from within by tapers. Smoke wafted from chimneys, and up on a rise he imagined he saw the palace where the festivities were being held, for the lights were brightest in that part of the town, and it was from there that music could be heard that drifted across the rooftops. Turning about, there was nothing but darkness, dark currents running against a dark shore, a sandy strand being overrun by the swift night tide. Above, no moon, and a million stars.

  He awakened two hours later, cramped and startled, cold and ashamed. Sleep was forbidden to the man on watch, and he could easily have fallen to a rude death. He raised his right hand in front of his face, contemplating the extra finger that, despite all that had been said since his birth, bothered him immensely.

  He climbed back down to the deck and knelt by the helm, meditating in the cold, damp air, until dawn light appeared under a thin layer of clouds out by the low dunes and the curving shore. He stripped and lowered himself into the water on the far side of the ship and performed his ablutions and then swam in the cold water as the light increased. Back on board, he dried himself and dressed, just in time to meet the man sent to relieve him. Holding the hilt of his sword in the manner his Lord and uncle Date Masamune had taught him, he walked down the gangplank and for the first time felt the earth of Spain beneath his feet.

  – XII –

  In which a sword is broken and a vision beheld

  Hasekura Tsunenaga preferred Father Sotelo as his principal translator. While Sotelo fawned before the King’s representative and communicated pleasantry after pleasantry between Hasekura Tsunenaga and the heads of noble families, Shiro was left to mediate pointless conversations between merchants and local functionaries who were keen to mingle with the exotic Samurai. He soon realized that had he been a better nephew to his Lord, he would have made an effort during the long crossings to gain Hasekura Tsunenaga’s confidence. Instead, he was being shunned and shut out.

  After dinner Father Sotelo suggested that a gesture of gratitude be offered to the Duke of Medina-Sidonia for preparing such a festive reception in Sanlúcar. Hasekura Tsunenaga agreed and arranged for a gift and ordered Shiro to serve as the courier. Though Sotelo knew how powerful a man the Duke was, neither Hasekura Tsunenaga nor Shiro realized what an opportunity this mission of etiquette represented. Hasekura Tsunenaga was simply pleased to find a way to banish Shiro for a time, and in turn the young Samurai felt even more like an outcast. Diego volunteered to accompany him.

  Before retiring that evening, they were told to visit Don Julian, the young Duke of Denia, in order to obtain a letter of presentation. Thanks to his recent marriage, Julian occupied one of the better apartments on the upper floor of the palace overlooking the bay. When Shiro and Diego were shown in, Marta Vélez was in the sitting room holding a glass of wine. The young Duke appeared and introduced her as his aunt before leaving the three of them to write the letter. At first Marta Vélez was appalled at the idea of having to make conversation with such an odd duo. She ascribed it to the vicissitudes of life in the provinces. In Madrid a small army of servants, starting at the front door of her palacete and ending with her chambermaid, would have formed a wall of protection between such peculiar callers and her person. There in Sanlúcar, the three of them stood in excruciating silence listening to Julian scrawl his quill upon a sheet of parchment.

  She could not deny that the young Samurai was handsome. He was tall and slender but with wide shoulders. He stood up straight and appeared relaxed, wrapped in a robe that was dark and elegant, standing upon a pair of noisy wooden sandals such as she had never seen. His companion however, with his stump and stained breeches and stringy long hair, looked to be the kind of man she spent her life avoiding. But he was Spanish, and it was to him she directed her first words.

  ‘How is the foreigner finding our country?’

  Diego looked down, waiting for Shiro to answer himself.

  ‘I understand your language,’ the Samurai said.

  She looked at him.

  ‘How extraordinary,’ she said. ‘You’ve hardly any accent.’

  ‘And I am very pleased to be here,’ he said. ‘I am very pleased to be back on land.’

  She seemed to find this funny and felt her spirits rising when she realized how this unexpected encounter would provide a delicious anecdote upon her return to Madrid. Diego then noticed that under her dress, she was barefoot.

  ‘I know you have only been here a day,’ she said to Shiro, ‘but what do you most notice that is different for you?’

  ‘Everything, madam,’ he said. ‘The food and how it is eaten, the manner of dress, the variety of faces and colors—the lack of baths.’

  ‘Lack of baths.’

  ‘Yes, madam. In Japan everyone bathes, and here I think not.’

  ‘It is generally believed that water carries disease, entering through the pores of the skin, infecting us with plague.’

  Shiro only smiled politely.

  ‘You don’t agree?’ she asked him.

  Again, he only smiled. She took note of how a Spaniard at this point would be raising his voice and counterarguing with baroque gesticulations. She smiled back at him.

  ‘Well neither do I,’ she said. ‘And where I normally live, in Madrid, I have a room dedicated to bathing. If you come there some-day, I shall show it to you.’

  ‘This I would very much like to see,’ he said.

  It was unclear to all three of them whether there might or might not be some degree of flirtation in the air. Then Julian emerged and handed a sealed missive to Diego, ignoring Shiro completely.

  ‘Here you go then.’

  ‘Sir,’ said Diego, somewhat slavishly, pleasing the young Duke.

  Julian reached into a purse and pulled out three coins he then placed into Diego’s hand that still held the letter. ‘And this is for you if I can have your word no mention will be made of my aunt’s presence here, a matter of some family tension you’ve no need to know about.’

  ‘Not one word, sir,’ Diego said, lowering his head.

  Julian turned briefly to Shiro and bowed his head as he had to Hasekura Tsunenaga the day before. Then he left the room taking his aunt with him. But before Marta Vélez disappeared from view, she turned and gave Shiro a quick conspiratorial smile.

  On
ce they were alone, she took her nephew’s hand. ‘That was rather rude,’ she said.

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Well you might have given the foreigner some coins as well then because he speaks fluent Spanish.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yes.’

  He paused and considered.

  ‘But he won’t say anything about us,’ Julian said with a sneer. ‘He’ll be too busy running from the Duke’s hounds.’

  ‘I found him appealing.’

  ‘That is because you are a loose woman of most unsound judgment. He’s just a heathen, a freakish messenger in women’s garb.’

  ***

  Shiro and Diego left at dawn and reached Jerez in the afternoon, where they changed horses. By the time night was falling, they were still four hours from Medina-Sidonia. They made camp in a grove of pines next to a stream born off the Guadalete River. Shiro was tired of dried fish and cured meats and with his bow went out and downed three wood pigeons on the fly. Diego had never seen such a thing and talked about it ceaselessly while Shiro plucked and cleaned and roasted the birds. The ride thus far had been beautiful. Being on a horse again and hunting, resting like that in a forest by a fire, all of it was a blessing.