by Laila Lalami
Apalache, Dulchanchellin repeated, as if he wanted to be quite sure before he replied. He looked beyond the governor, at the hundreds of Castilians who were assembled in the clearing. They were all standing, having abandoned their meals or their naps, and some had instinctively clutched their weapons, but the music had put them in a celebratory mood. In addition, the elaborate hairstyles and clothing of Dulchanchellin’s retinue, and the formal way in which they had made their entrance, generated a mild curiosity among the Castilians, quite different from the hostility with which they had greeted the Indians of the Río Oscuro. After a moment, the cacique pointed to where the sun would set.
It is in that direction, Señor Narváez said triumphantly, as if he alone could understand the chief’s gesture.
Dulchanchellin beckoned the governor to follow him.
He will take us there. Now the governor spoke directly to his captains for the first time. Gather your men. Tell them we are leaving.
We marched behind this cacique and his men for three leagues. The land around these parts was denser than before, with trees as tall as minarets, but the Indians led us through this wilderness the way one leads a blinkered donkey through a crowded market—carefully and with a great deal of patience. At length, we reached a river, so wide and so deep that new rafts would have to be built in order to cross it. The governor asked for his carpenters, but only Fernándes came forward, and it was to say that it was already the middle of the afternoon; the rafts would not be ready before nightfall.
That is not good enough, Fernándes, the governor said. You should recruit more men or build bigger rafts.
Don Pánfilo, this is not about the men. I cannot recruit more if I do not have enough tools to give them. I can build larger rafts, but as I said they will not be ready before the end of the day.
How long did it take you to build rafts at the Río Oscuro? Not more than three hours, as I recall.
Aye, three hours. But we are already losing light, Don Pánfilo.
Well, I think it can be done.
The governor was eager to cross the river, a sentiment that many of us shared; we were all impatient of the future that had been promised to us.
Dulchanchellin, who was watching these palavers from his seat under the shade of a tree, came to offer his canoes. But one of the horsemen, not having heard the offer or perhaps not believing it, decided to cross the river anyway. His name was Juan Velázquez. He was a jovial man, I remember, quite popular among the soldiers, whom he entertained with his songs and riddles. Now holding the reins with one hand and a long staff with the other, he nudged his horse into the river. It is not too deep, he cried.
The other horsemen lined along the riverbank to watch him. One of them said, See, we have no need for the savages’ help. Yet he waited and watched.
Velázquez waded deeper. The water was gray, reflecting the fading afternoon light, but closer to the other bank, where cypress trees provided their shade, it was brown and green. Come, compadres, he called, his voice merging with that of the tumbling water below. Then the horse lost its footing and Velázquez dropped his staff and threw his arm out for balance. The horse raised its head out of the water, struggling to breathe, struggling with the weight of the rider on its back, but in a moment, just like that, the water surged around them and swept them downstream, as effortlessly as it carried twigs and leaves.
Velázquez, the soldiers cried as they ran down the riverbank. Velázquez!
Señor Narváez, who was still speaking to Dulchanchellin, heard the commotion and came to the riverbank. What happened? he asked. Find him.
A group of soldiers brought the body back sometime later, carrying it on their shoulders and hauling the dead horse as well. No one spoke. We all parted to let the procession through until it reached Señor Narváez. It was as though the soldiers were bringing a sacred offering to the governor, but he looked at them glumly and turned to his page. What are you waiting for? he asked. Have the men dig a grave.
IT WAS FATHER ANSELMO who delivered the graveside prayer, his voice trembling but unhurried. He spoke of Juan Velázquez as a simple man with simple concerns: a native of Cádiz, a devoted husband to his wife, and a father to three children. He was also a soldier, Father Anselmo said, a man who served his country faithfully in the battle of Pavia, who loved to sing and enjoyed his wine. Sometimes a bit too much. The soldiers nodded knowingly, repressing smiles. What I mean to say, the friar added, is that he was like all of us—an ordinary man caught in extraordinary circumstances.
The words of Father Anselmo, so different in tone from those of the commissary at the Río Oscuro, had a great effect upon the soldiers. Instead of accepting the death of one of their own as the inevitable price of conquest, they began to complain about the governor. Why had he not listened to the advice of the carpenter and waited until morning? He had been in too much of a rush to cross the river. If only he had given the order to wait, Velázquez would still be alive.
But, as I said, the governor knew how to handle the soldiers. Immediately after the funeral, he ordered the dead horse slaughtered and portions of meat served to every man in the company, including the porters and slaves. Until then, our rations had consisted of the corn looted from the last village, so everyone was exceedingly grateful for the meat, even as we hated the way in which it had come to be in our possession. And the governor announced that he had named this river in honor of the dead man: Río Velázquez. Thus the grumbling died out.
In the morning, Dulchanchellin’s men shuttled all of us from one bank to the other in their handsomely painted dugouts, their oars dipping rhythmically against the current. The water ran fast and clear, but around the boulders that sat here and there in the riverbed, it turned white with foam. With the sun still in the east, the sky was a darker shade of blue, enclosed in all directions by the deep green of pine trees. When it was time for the governor to board, Dulchanchellin came forward and pointed to the ostrich feathers. Oh, the governor said. You want this? With a laugh, he plucked the loose feather off his helmet and handed it to the cacique, who stuck it among the other bright feathers in his headdress, like a king adding another jewel to his crown. At last, Dulchanchellin raised his hand to bid us farewell. He stood with his retinue, watching, until the very last one of us had departed from his kingdom.
We had gone only about a league in the direction of Apalache when two soldiers came to see the governor, dragging a young settler between them. He had been caught stealing a basketful of corn; the soldiers wanted him punished. The governor said that the sentence would be commensurate with this grave crime, but there was no time to apply it now. We can put him in irons, he said, when we reach Apalache.
Over the next ten days, this became a refrain among the men. When we reach Apalache, the thief will be punished. When we reach Apalache, the Indians will offer no resistance. When we reach Apalache, there will be plenty of food to eat and water to drink. When we reach Apalache, there will be time to rest. When we reach Apalache, we will build a settlement. When we reach Apalache, we will be made sergeants. When we reach Apalache, we will receive one bag of gold and two of silver. When we reach Apalache, my master will be rich. When we reach Apalache, I will be free.
6.
THE STORY OF THE SALE
The end of our happiness came in the year 928 of the Hegira. It was often said that the soil of Dukkala was so rich it could grow the hardy wheat as well as the fragile artichoke, but that year there was no rain at all and the harvests were poor. The elders clucked their tongues and said they had never seen a drought like this in their lifetimes. Men and women came to Azemmur from every part of the province, to borrow money, to look for work, or to sell the sheep and cows they could no longer feed. My uncles noticed that they had far fewer commissions than usual; they spent long afternoons sweeping floors and shooing flies. Before long, our streets filled with beggar children, their bellies distended and their hair the color of copper.
But our ill fortune did not afflict
the Portuguese in our town: they still shipped gold and wool to Porto and still sent hanbals, kiswas, and other woven goods to Guinea. If anything, the drought and famine we were experiencing had only made their trade more profitable, because the price of wool had fallen so low that they could purchase larger quantities of it. That year, a strange thing happened. The farmers who had neither the funds to pay the Portuguese tax nor grain to sell at market had to give their children as payment. Girls of marriageable age were worth two arrobas of wheat; boys, twice that. A customs official of my acquaintance swore that he had seen three Portuguese caravels leave Azemmur, each carrying two hundred girls and women, who would be transported to Seville, where they would be sold as domestics and concubines. From that blighted time came the saying: when bellies speak, reason is lost.
There came a day when the sons of al-Dib let me go in order to hire one of their relatives, a young lad freshly arrived from the countryside, and I had to join the growing ranks of the idle in Azemmur. Just as I had taken excessive pride in my accomplishments, I found excessive shame in this failure. I did not tell my family about the loss of my employment. Instead, I spent my time going from merchant to merchant, hoping to interest them in my skills. My connections did little to help me, however, for many of my peers were in the same predicament.
To add to my worries, my father fell ill once again. He had trouble taking the stairs up to the roof, from which he liked to watch the ships in the harbor, and the muscles on his arms and legs often twitched uncontrollably. Sometimes, he had such terrible cramps that my mother had to hold his limbs down to calm his movements. I brought him two different doctors, but no one knew what was wrong with him. Soon, he stopped working altogether and the loss of his earnings, however meager, was cruelly felt at home. My mother went to Mawlay Abu Shuaib’s tomb every week, to ask for the saint’s intercession, but my father only regressed with each passing day. In just a few months he needed help to get in and out of bed or to use the water closet.
We all hoped that the following year would bring some mercy, but in the year 929 of the Hegira the drought persisted and the harvest was scant. This time, the elders clucked their tongues and said that the famine was a punishment for our failings. They complained about the greed of men, the looseness of women, the insolence of children, the inns that served wine. Just as God had punished Pharaoh and his people with starvation, they said, so too had He brought down this scourge upon us. In all the mosques of Azemmur, fiery sermons became a habit, each preacher finding a new sin where before there had been nothing but pleasure.
The imam warned about excessive adornment, I said to my mother as I walked in one day.
Every story needs a villain, she said grimly. She was stirring salt and cumin into a boiling pot of water and chicken bones; this would be our meal.
But surely you do not favor prideful adornment, I replied. I remembered how much she had enjoyed her work as a bridal attendant and how much my father had disapproved of it. My years of religious training had left their mark on me after all, for here I was, reproaching her about it while neglecting my own violations.
I favor not pointing fingers, she said, lest they point to me someday.
She ladled some soup into a bowl and walked past me, through the sunny courtyard, to my father’s bedroom. He had started to refuse the scarce food we had, insisting that it should go to my young brothers, whose figures had grown dangerously gaunt over the summer. Every day my mother sat by his side holding his hand, cajoling him to eat or drink, but his lips remained shut.
The inevitable end came in Ramadan of that year. We washed him, carried his cloaked body to the mosque, read Surat Yasin over him, but it was not until the first shovelful of dry earth fell over my father’s immaculate white shroud that the truth of his death tore into me like a dagger. My wails were so sudden and so loud that my uncles, perhaps fearing I might throw myself into the grave after him, restrained me. Be sensible, they said. Death is a part of life.
But I continued screaming and beating my chest until they took me home, carrying me through the creaky blue door of the house, the way they had when I was an infant. I felt as if my very life had been taken from me. I hardly left our house during the forty days of mourning; I read from the Holy Qur’an and I prayed for my father’s soul. He had died without ever telling me what he thought of the choice I had made that fateful day in the courtyard of our house, surrounded by the remnants of our celebrations. About my conversion from scholar to merchant, he had offered neither reproach nor compliment, and I had been so pleased with myself that I had never sought his opinion about it. For years, I had resented his counsel, and now that he was gone I longed to hear it more than anything.
After the forty days of mourning were over, Zainab returned home with her daughter. Zainab’s husband claimed he had divorced her because she did not bear him any sons, but my mother and I knew that he did it because he would not have to support her or her child any longer. My uncle Abdullah and my aunt Aisha went to live with their eldest daughter, the second wife of a wealthy customs official, leaving us alone to face our troubles. When my uncle Omar left town with one of his friends, our ruin was complete. Our family broke apart so swiftly after my father’s death that I often wondered if he had been the fragile thread that held us together for so long.
In our house, there now lived five hungry, miserable souls, all of them under my charge. I could no longer keep the truth from my mother. But when I went to make my confession, she was not surprised, for our neighbor Moussa had already brought her the news of my deceit, just as, years ago, he had brought her the news of my visits to the red house at the edge of town. The disappointment I saw in her eyes was a painful blow. I felt as if I were the embodiment of every evil against which my father and my mother had warned: a trader of flesh and a traitor to my faith.
To atone for my sins, I tried to provide, in the only way I knew. I sold the rugs and the chests I had bought with such pride only years earlier. I helped my mother sell her gold bracelets and my sister the hanbal it had taken her two years to weave. Each time, the money lasted a few days, sometimes weeks, and then we went back to scouring our house for something I could sell or trade. I was so preoccupied by my transactions that news of the earthquake in Fes did not reach me until refugees appeared on the other side of the Umm er-Rbi’ River, setting up their tents on the riverbank. They jostled for work, crowded our markets, and begged at our mosques.
I began to wander the alleys of the medina alone, as if the solution to my family’s plight lay hidden somewhere, waiting to be found. The city was quiet—dogs and cats had long ago been caught and shamelessly eaten. Even vermin was a rare sight inside the city walls. I was on the lookout for anything: food I could eat, goods I could trade, rich people I could beg for mercy. Yet all I saw were people like me, their faces haggard, their bodies so distorted by hunger and disease that they looked like jinns. So great was my despair that I would have readily gone to the gates of hell if I knew it could save my family from starvation.
I MADE MY WAY through the crowds gathered on the quay. The Umm er-Rbi’ was tranquil, the fading light of the day turning its water the color of shadows, and the sky was a mackerel gray. Soldiers watched from their posts as servants and slaves carried crates on or off the Portuguese ships. I held on to my twin brothers’ hands, in fear that I might lose them in the flowing multitude of people. I felt as if I had already lost myself. My poor mother had spoken to me that morning with words that still rang in my ears. Mustafa, she had said. No. Not this.
But it was my fate to discard her advice, just as I had discarded my father’s. Mother, I said, there is no other way.
There is a way, she said. There is always a way, if you will yourself to dream it.
May God forgive me, I thought she spoke soothing nonsense. My eyes must have betrayed my feelings, for she looked at me sadly and began to tell me the Story of My Birth. This time she told it to steel her own heart against the pain of losing me—it was easi
er to let go if she believed that my departure had been ordained. I listened patiently, the way I had always listened to her, but when she was finished I did not think about the story or its meaning. Instead, I thought about how I had broken my father’s heart and how my sacrifice might redeem me, even if he was no longer there to see it. When I finally got up to leave, my mother stood in the doorway, silhouetted by the light from the courtyard. This is the image of her that I still carry with me, all these years later. She was still calling my name when I closed the blue door behind me.
On the dock, I saw a fidalgo I recognized—he had been a regular visitor to my uncles’ workshop, buying chests or chairs or corner tables for his household in Lisbon. Senhor, I called. Senhor Affonso. He was a short man, with a prominent nose and a tight mouth. He wore a red vest and dark hose tucked inside freshly shined boots, and his right hand rested on the pommel of his sword. I knew exactly the price I could have fetched for each of these items of clothing, had they been mine to sell. The vest and hose were made of cotton—they would only interest a clerk or a notary—but the sword would have been worth at least twenty reais. When I realized what I had been doing, I wanted to turn around, but Affonso had already seen me. A hint of surprise lit his eyes. His gaze traveled from me to my twin brothers, and then back to me. I think he understood, without my saying a word, what it was I wanted from him. He did not ask me if I knew what life would be like once the ship crossed the river, once it had left Azemmur and traveled along the coast to the Land of the Christians. Instead he asked: Are you sure this is what you want?
I looked at my twin brothers. Their hair had started to turn orange and their cheekbones protruded under their frightened eyes. They looked at me uncomprehendingly. Yes, I said. I am sure.