A Matter of Souls

by Denise Lewis Patrick

  Here was the devil again. Did demons have teeth? Joachim Rodrigo felt fingers of pain pressing against his temples. A haze seemed to fill the small space. Images tumbled in his mind. Black crows flying over blue waters. Doña Filomena, rubbing her body against him … And he was certain that God was calling, calling out to him. He heard shouts and fighting … but why was the old Padre hitting him?

  No. It must be a dream. A fevered brain …

  “No,” Don Joachim said aloud. The pirate laughed at him.

  “Blimey, you’ve addled his senses, Crighton!”

  Don Joachim’s head still hurt him terribly, but slowly his mind cleared.

  “I am quite sensible,” he finally said. “What has happened to the previous captain?”

  The new captain rolled his eyes and leaned in until he was offensive.

  “What do you think? Same’ll happen to you, lest you tell me why I ought spare yer life. Travelin’ spartan-like, but yer ain’t no man of the cloth. Them don’t carry silver daggers.” He held up Don Joachim’s property, tilting and turning it in the candlelight.

  “Got money somewhere, y’do, or somebody’s got it for yer. Tell it, then!”

  The words came to Don Joachim instantly, words that were not his own. He spoke with confidence: “The Lord has anointed me. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives …”

  “What?” The pirate captain shook with laughter. “Maybe ’e is a man of God! Either way, lock ’im up with the darkies ’til we figure out what ’e’s worth!”

  Joachim Rodrigo was at that moment seized by an emotion unlike any he had felt before. Everything he had known and been fell away, leaving him hanging only by the Word of God.

  He lunged for his dagger and twisted it against the pirate’s forearm, carving a bleeding quarter moon. The man backhanded him across the tiny room. Joachim and the stool bounced off the wall; he slid down, and the stool splintered.

  The captain laughed, stanching the trickle of blood on his arm with a dirty kerchief. He laughed hard and then narrowed his eyes.

  “Yer ain’t worth as much as that, priest. I’ll ransom yer if I can, kill yer if I can’t.” He nodded to the crewman. “Haul ’im out to the stern and shackle ’im with his captives.”

  On the deck, Don Joachim Rodrigo could feel the constant salt mist cover his body like another layer of skin. It stung the bruise at the back of his head. The leg iron clanged shut.

  Joachim Rodrigo had never used violence to settle any argument. He was shaken to his core, confused over how he dared to grab for the knife. But the insult! The insult to his faith! And the insult to the slim young African man, who would have done such a thing, and more! For he was a man.

  And more than anything, Don Joachim Rodrigo was deeply saddened that a man had taken his own life, lost his soul, rather than submit to this enslavement. There was the tragedy and truth of it.

  It was a matter of souls.

  He shivered and pulled his cloak closer around himself. He wanted to pray, but he could not. The aching in his head and neck seeped into his shoulders first. In time, the aching consumed his entire body, and he could not identify its source. He was extremely tired. He shivered cold and then flushed hot, then cold again. Was it night? He heard the sound of chains settling wearily against wood.

  “We…are…all…dead.” An odd voice dropped the words, one at a time. The voice spoke in French. No, perhaps it was Arabic …

  Don Joachim let his eyes close, clasping his beads. Now he knew: the slaves had faces. The slaves had souls. And he must let Manolo know. Where was God?

  It is your crimes that separate

  you from your God, it is

  your sins that make Him hide

  His face so that he will not

  hear you…

  Joachim Rodrigo lay in the clouds, no longer sickened by rolling seas. He was in a still place. Heaven.

  “No worry.”

  A gentle voice with strange cadence sang near him. He opened his eyes. He was not in the hereafter, but resting upon white sheets and surrounded by white hangings. He had no strength to move his heavy limbs.

  A dark spot appeared.

  Don Joachim’s weakened eyes fluttered. It was a hand, sweeping back the mosquito netting on the bed. He sensed a woman, but he had no strength to be anxious as the black hand came nearer, attached to a like arm and torso and face.

  Don Joachim was soon able to see her eyes, and he was stricken by them. They answered his gaze; they were clear, and deep, and full of compassion.

  In her closeness, Don Joachim smelled sweat and spice. The hot, soul-wrenching sands of the African coast floated past his present. His head was gripped by a sudden pain so great that he thought he must die.

  She pulled away, and Don Joachim Rodrigo was afraid to be alone. He groped for her with his fingers, his heart racing. Then her shadow covered him again, sweet wine touched his lips. He tried to take the drink, feeling its warmth soak into him. His muscles eased.

  He willed himself to stare upon his benefactor, trying to see beyond her face.

  “No worry.” She bathed his brow with cool water. “Rest,” she said.

  Rest. But he could not rest from disturbing dreams of Manolo in chains, of pure Rosalinda wrenched away from her brother, of Manolo diving perfectly over the side of a treacherous rowboat, of Manolo sinking slowly into blue-black waves.

  Joachim Rodrigo moaned for his loss.

  In time, though he knew not the measure, Don Joachim Rodrigo’s brown nurse disappeared. Other voices buzzed around him.

  “He has lost his mind,” someone was whispering. Don Joachim was awake, though he could not discern who was speaking beyond the white curtains.

  “The injury to his head, I fear it may have grave consequences…”

  “But can he be moved?” Don Joachim thought he recognized that one. It was … the gentleman from the ship, from the African shore, wasn’t it? And to whom did he speak? A physician…?

  “Perhaps, but a long voyage …” The physician took no responsibility in his tentative murmuring.

  “I have sent letters!” The gentleman was urgent. “He is a man of wealth; he will be ransomed. I have paid it already. He must return to Spain alive. I cannot lose my investment!”

  Joachim Rodrigo breathed deeply and slowly. He parted his lips, yet in his weakness could not speak out on his own behalf. It made no difference, he thought.

  He was chattel to this man, to this stranger. What was important was that he might return to those he loved, to those who loved him. Details made no difference.

  He could return.

  Don Joachim’s mind wandered back to those sick and dying wretches in the hold of the ship, those lovers held separate on the sands of Africa by irons, and to his nurse here, who cared for him in his illness as if he were her own—none of them could go back.

  Later, as the gentle black hands shaved him and fed him and turned him, he understood that he was the receiver of more than he had ever in his life given.

  Don Joachim Rodrigo spent the following days giving up command of his body, for he realized it would never be robust again. He could barely croak; no words would come when he wished. He found his vision slow to mend, and even growing dimmer. His mind, however, became sharper. The course he must pursue became clearer.

  Joachim Rodrigo began to understand that the New World, and all its beguiling lures, was of no consequence to his future. The loss of this venture might ruin the business. Manolo would be tested to his limits. But that made no difference. The sum of his ransom could likewise leave their fortunes in a very precarious position. He worried for Doña Filomena and Rosalinda, but what was the worth of one man? Nothing, and everything …

  One day, strong hands lifted Don Joachim Rodrigo onto a swaying pallet and carried him to a coach. He kept his eyes closed in the extreme intensity of the exotic air; the Benezvelan sun caused his body great discomfort. He longed to be at home.

  Don Joachim was carried aboar
d a sailing vessel, though no one spoke to him of the arrangement. The gentleman with no name had apparently seen to everything.

  What could he do, in his condition, except submit?

  On the voyage back, there were spacious quarters alone. He lay, wrapped in quiet feebleness and considerate warmth, ever praying. Meals were brought to him, though he barely consumed them. His hands shook, and he crept around the cabin once each day, clinging to the walls.

  All the while his mind strengthened even more. Determination kept him going. How was he to do it? How was he to prove to his kinsmen the truth that he had seen with his own eyes? He must convince them that their notions were wrong, their judgments unfounded. How would he prove what he now knew with his own heart?

  Don Joachim Rodrigo kept praying and receiving no answer.

  And weeks later, when Joachim Rodrigo tentatively stepped onto the firmness of Spanish soil, his legs trembled. The world seemed to be made of so many colors! He could hardly bear it. The sky was brilliant blue, the sails were so white! He breathed the scent of olives.

  He knew that they were all there before him, faces shining with love. He could not move for a moment, weakened by the magnificence of God’s return to him. Or had he returned to God?

  Manolo rushed to support him on one side, kissing him, speaking in low tones that Don Joachim did not fully understand. He smiled. He knew there was time, the right time, to tell Manolo that Benezvela might fill his coffers, but would surely drain his accounts in Heaven.

  Claudio was as quickly on Joachim’s other side. Don Joachim leaned heavily against his son’s shoulder, shutting his aching eyes against the strong sun. He did not see, but he could feel the crinkle of Rosalinda’s silks as she embraced him. He did not see, but he could smell … oh, he could smell! … the sweetness of his beloved Filomena’s perfumed breasts as she enveloped him.

  And when he reopened his eyes, Don Joachim Rodrigo could see nothing earthly at all. Forever after, he could see only souls. Each that he encountered, he saw as it must have been born: as a beautiful and amazing and perfect breath of God.

  Acknowledgments

  My cousin Ruth had a saying: “If it’s on you, tell it.” Meaning, if something is always on your mind, or heavy on your heart, speak on it. What’s constantly on my mind are the questions of who we all are and why we humans are thrown together in these crazy ways, with the pains and joys and fears and triumphs that we have. I’ve truly come to believe that, when stripped bare, humanity is really a matter of souls.

  So I’m telling you the stories of people who love and want to be loved; who have faith, lose it, and sometimes find it again. They hope and long and fight and dream for particular kinds of freedom that we today may have forgotten. As separated, segregated, distanced as we may appear to be by time or experience, I’m telling you that our souls remain connected. Our souls remain alive, always and everywhere.

  Without my connections to these people, I would never have trusted myself: Austin, Mommie, Matthew, Bobbie, Mary Jack, Danah, Sharon, Sally, Hector, Deryck, Carol, Wise Andrew. And thanks to everyone else who listened to ideas, read, or has otherwise been bombarded by the details of this collection.

  Jill, you deserve a stand-alone shout-out.

  About the Author

  Denise Lewis Patrick was born in Natchitoches, Louisiana. She attended local schools and earned a degree in journalism from Northwestern State University of Louisiana in 1977. That same year, she moved to New York City. She has been both a writer and editor in various areas of the publishing industry, particularly for children. Denise has published more than thirty-five picture books, biographies, and historical novels for young readers.

  In addition to being a published author, Denise is an adjunct professor of writing at a local college. She has also worked with budding writers in an after-school program, and has managed middle and high school writing programs.