Inquisition

by David Gibbins

  Ismail opened his eyes. “I am ready,” he said.

  Pepys was aware of Booth having entered the room, standing in the shadows by the door, and he knew that Ismail would have seen him too. “The Alcaïd has not kept to the terms of our ceasefire,” he said with admonishment. “The firebombs have still been falling.”

  “It was the action of my cousin, Abdullah-ibn-Ali ibn Hassn, who three days ago brought up his men and two Turkish siege mortars from Rabat, intent on sharing the spoils of Tangier. He needed to show his strength, and with the evacuation imminent he was fearful that he would not otherwise have the opportunity. Princes should show their strength. Your King Charles would understand.”

  Pepys had a fleeting vision of the last time he had seen King Charles, dressed up in feathers and powder like one of Mrs. Kirke’s retainers, heading off to yet another masked ball with his army of dandies and courtesans. “Yes, indeed,” he said. “The King himself has thought of coming to Tangier after the evacuation, not to land but to bombard the city after the Moorish army has lodged itself here, with each of his twenty ships mounting thirty-six guns to a broadside. He too would be showing his strength.”

  Ismail was quiet for a moment. “For now my cousin has run out of ammunition, but he will soon acquire more from the Turks.”

  “English gunpowder is the finest in the world,” Booth said, coming forward from the shadows. “Much better than Turkish powder. English powder is made with saltpetre harvested by the agents of the East India Company from the bat caves of eastern Bengal, far superior to the pigeon guano used by the Turks.”

  “Who is this man?” Ismail said.

  “Mr. Booth, my assistant,” Pepys replied. “I brought him along because he is highly knowledgeable in such matters.”

  Ismail curled his lip. “He does not look like a warrior to me.”

  “He was a soldier in his youth, and has killed many with the musket and the pike; he is a man who would understand the way of the desert.”

  Pepys’s heart sank slightly as he watched what Ismail did next, though he had guessed what was coming. The younger man reached into a bag on the side of his belt and took out a hand grenade, its wooden fuse plug sticking out and a length of about two feet of wick extending from that. A year earlier, the Moors had liberated a large cache of grenades from the ordnance stores of Fort Charles, one of the outlying bastions of Tangier, which had been taken after a bloody fight, leaving not a single English soldier alive. King Charles himself had confided in Pepys that he could not bear to maintain Tangier knowing that the fort bearing his name—his name—had been captured and would forever be there under the Moorish flag as a taunt and a humiliation; but for the remaining English soldiers of the garrison, Pepys knew, far more difficult to bear was an enemy that was returning their own ordnance to them, fuses lit and with murderous intent.

  For the sons of the Alcaïd and the other young bloods, the grenades had become playthings of chance, frequently with fatal results, and they had settled on them as a necessity of any parlay, extending the wick to allow a sufficiency of time for the participants to come to some meaningful conclusion, but keeping it short enough to restrict the sometimes endless sessions of their elders. Should the wick burn into the fuse, it would be the elders who would be least likely to run off in time, a further incentive to keep talks short. It had a certain charm to it, Pepys admitted to himself, but now was hardly the time for young men’s games, even though he knew that he was going to have to go along with it.

  Ismail took out a flint and steel and cupped his hands over the wick, lighting it with a spark. “Five minutes by your timepiece, Mr. Pepys, if you are lucky.”

  “You have the artifact with you?”

  Ismail reached into a pouch on the other side of his belt and took out a swaddled package about the size of a large cup. The leather looked very old indeed, and Pepys could see on it faded lettering that looked as if it might be Latin. He had sworn to João that if it came into his hands he would not open it; but João had also told him the sign to look for to prove its authenticity, according to a tradition passed down from the earliest Christian Jews, who had protected it at the time of the Roman emperors. He leaned forward, peering at it, and then motioned with his hand for Ismail to turn it. And there it was: the unmistakable sign of the fish, the symbol that the early Christians had used for their faith, with the Greek letters alpha and omega on either side of it.

  He breathed out slowly, hardly daring to believe it. “And what would the Alcaïd your father have in return?” he asked, anxiously watching the wick, now already a quarter-way advanced.

  Ismail placed the package in his lap, and put his hands on his thighs. “The corsairs of Sale acquired this from the Knights of Malta in return for freeing some of their number who had become hostage. This grieved and angered the Sultan, as the Knights are the only Christian forces who dare oppose us at sea, and to return them to the fray seemed the height of folly. Seeing the Sultan’s displeasure, the Bey of Sale sent this package to him, thinking that he might use it to trade something in return from the Christians, and the Sultan thought of Tangier and sent it to the Alcaïd. To us, what is in here is only of as much value as its ability to hold water, for that is how we would use it. We are not people of material possessions, nor do we need symbols of our faith. God is everywhere, within and around us. But knowing it has value for you, our price is high.”

  Pepys pursed his lips, glancing at Booth, and then nodded, mainly in assurance to himself that there was no turning back now. “You know that I was authorized by the governor and the Lord High Admiral, my Lord Dartmouth, to offer the Alcaïd all the remaining gunpowder of the garrison in Tangier in return for the cessation of artillery bombardment, and also to promise a lessening of the destruction by our sappers of the main fortifications of the city, though not of the Mole. This has been done, and the gunpowder is being delivered as we speak, to be left in barrels outside Henry Fort before we depart the port.”

  “And what in addition for this object?” Ismail said, eyeing Pepys coolly.

  Pepys hesitated, and then took a deep breath. “Unbeknownst to the Alcaïd, a larger than necessary amount of the powder was to be used in the final destruction of the Mole, to effect a decisive breach but also to limit the amount left for you. It was not to be in breach of the agreement, but was not a ploy made in good faith, I hazard. Hearing of this, I made my way to the Mole yesterday afternoon and obliged the chief engineer to portion out one third of the powder in the main charge, which I presently have stored under lock and key in another warehouse of Senhor Brandão, near the eastern wharf. It amounts to thirty-two barrels, enough to fill the magazine of Alcazar and make the Alcaïd and his sons the envy of the Barbary shore. I hold the key to the storeroom on my person. Hand me that package, and we shall exchange; do not, and that store too will be blown sky high as we depart Tangier. The decision is yours.”

  Pepys felt as if a burden had been lifted from him, one that had plagued him since he had put it in process, that had darkened his mind and led him to the previous evening’s debauch; and yet what he had done was an act tantamount to high treason, which should see him condemned and beheaded in the Tower. He glanced at Booth with some trepidation, but the other man did not bat an eyelid, and then he recalled that, of course, Booth knew everything he did, and had probably even followed him down to the Mole.

  The wick was now well over halfway burned. Pepys looked at Ismail, awaiting a response. Suddenly there was a commotion at the entrance and two men strode in, both holding pistols, one aimed at Pepys and the other at Booth. Pepys’s heart was hammering, but he tried to keep his composure. “Who, pray, are you? And I would favor you to hold those pistols away, if you please, gentlemen.”

  The nearest man continued to aim at his head. “We are the Altamanus, the Black Hand, and we work for the Inquisition of the Holy See in Portugal. Our mission is to retrieve for the Church of Rome what is rightfully ours; to take it from the hands of heathens and apo
states and those who do not follow the True Cross. We have been on the trail of the heretic Brandão for some time, and our source among the Knights of Malta has led us here. And you have been most easy to follow, Mr. Pepys. You are not cut out for intrigue.”

  Pepys stared at the man, astonished. João had mentioned these people, the name, their special mark, their infiltration of the priesthood of the Inquisition, the spread of their tentacles as far as the Portuguese colony of Brazil and even beyond that. It had hardly seemed credible when he had heard it, but now, with the muzzle of a pistol in his face, it was another matter.

  Booth turned to the man, his face serious. “If, sir, you mean those who follow the Church of England, or the Protestant faith, then you are sore mistook if you think that we do not as well follow the True Cross, as the Lord Jesus Christ is our witness.”

  Pepys drew himself up. “Furthermore, know you that I am an emissary of His Britannic Majesty King Charles the Second of England, Scotland, and Ireland, and as such am immune from the edicts of the Inquisition or any of their sundry affiliations, as is my assistant Mr. Booth.”

  The man gave a humorless smile. “It is a pretty plea, Mr. Pepys, but in this chamber there is nobody to hear it except these four walls, and this barbarous Moor.”

  “What is it that you want, pray?”

  “Do not play the fool with us, Mr. Pepys; it ill suits you. We want what the Moor is holding.”

  Pepys glanced at Ismail, who was motionless, sitting upright, staring at the other man. Pepys knew that Ismail’s pistol was cocked, as it always was; for the men of the desert, there was no half-cock, no middle ground. He had seen Ismail and his brothers shoot in competition, when they drew with lightning speed, but it was in parlay with other chieftains that they were most likely to have to show their skill, to shoot the other man before he could shoot them, when negotiation failed and white suddenly turned to black. Ismail’s hands were still resting on his thighs. He was ready, like a lion about to pounce.

  Pepys’s mind raced. He needed a pretext, something that would cause a distraction, however momentary. Then he remembered again what João had told him about the Altamanus, about their mark. He turned to the man. “Pray, sir, show me your hands.”

  “Why do you wish this?” the man replied, looking at him scornfully.

  “Because I know about the mark of the Altamanus. When I see it, I will believe you and I will know that we are defeated. Show it to me, both of you, and what you want will be yours.”

  The man glanced at his companion and grunted. They both turned their hands palms outward, still holding their pistols but dangling them, showing the distinctive tattoo of a black hand. At that moment, Ismail’s gun cracked deafeningly and the first man went down, falling backward and hitting his head on the floor. As he did so, his pistol discharged, and Ismail fell back, shot through the chest. Booth raised his own weapon at the other man and fired, the puff of smoke from the primer followed by a jet of flame from the muzzle. The man staggered back, a spreading patch of red on his chest, but then lurched forward again. Booth clicked out the blade on the barrel, leaped on the man, and drove it into the side of his neck, twisting and turning it as they crashed to the floor. He pulled out the blade and pushed back to his knees as the man frothed and gargled, blood splattering from his mouth, and then went still, his eyes wide open.

  Another gun discharged, and Pepys saw that the man on the floor had raised a second pistol and leveled it at Booth, who dropped to the ground clutching his leg. Pepys took his own pistol from his pocket, fumbled with the safety lever, and then aimed it at the man, pulling the trigger. The flint snapped against the steel, but there were no sparks. A misfire. The face of the steel must somehow have got damp in his pocket, from the perspiration on his hand, perhaps. He pulled back the cock and frantically wiped the steel dry with his shirtsleeve, his hands shaking. The man lurched upright, dropped his pistol and came for him, reaching out just as Pepys pulled the trigger again. This time the gun fired, the ball going through the man’s stomach and out of his back, impacting on the wall behind in a spray of blood and bile.

  The man staggered back, his chest soaked red from Ismail’s bullet, holding the second wound in his stomach, the blood pulsing out between his fingers. Pepys realized that none of them any longer had a charged weapon. He looked at the blade on his own pistol barrel, but felt frozen, unable to open it. Pulling a trigger was one thing; doing what Booth had done was another. But the man of the Altamanus was in no fit condition to fight any further, and he knew it. He staggered to the entrance, where he turned, pointing a bloodied hand at Booth, swaying as he spoke.

  “You,” he snarled, spitting blood. “We will find you, and you will pay for this.” He turned to Pepys, pointing at the package. “And you. Don’t think that we will give up. We have been searching for that for a thousand years, and we will have it.” He made the sign of the cross on his chest, dripping blood as he did so, and then was gone, leaving a room filled with gore and bodies, with Pepys the only man left standing.

  He suddenly remembered the grenade. To his horror, he saw that the wick had disappeared into the fuse and sparks were flying out of the hole. He looked around, desperately searching for water, a bottle of wine, anything to douse it with, but there was nothing. They had only seconds to spare. He lurched over, slapped Booth hard on the face to waken him and grabbed him by the shoulders, dragging him toward the entrance. Booth, coming round groggily, saw what was happening and crawled the remainder of the way himself, his bleeding leg dragging behind him.

  At the last moment, Pepys remembered something else, something crucial. The package. He lurched back to Ismail, lifting it from his lap. Ismail’s head was lolling, his face deathly pale, but he opened his eyes and looked at Pepys. “It is my time,” he whispered, blood tricking from his mouth. “Allah calls me. Go.”

  Pepys staggered back to the entrance, falling through it just as the grenade detonated behind him with an immense crack, sending shards of red-hot metal into the wall opposite and covering him in a cloud of sulfurous smoke. He picked himself up, his ears ringing, then pulled Booth to his feet and helped him out of the smoke and debris, looking around to see if there was any sign of the man who had escaped, but seeing nothing. Out in the alley, he tucked the precious package into the inside pocket of his coat, coughing and blinking away the smoke as he tried to see ahead.

  He had a sudden thought. If those men had known to come to João’s warehouse in Tangier, they would know to look for him in Portugal. If the wounded man somehow made it out of here, if he passed on word of what had happened, then João would be in mortal danger. Pepys could only pray that he would remain free until the fleet arrived off Porto, when they could carry out their plan to send the package away and he could spirit the merchant and his family out of Portugal and the clutches of the Inquisition.

  He turned to Booth. “We have no time to lose,” he said, his voice hoarse from the smoke. “We must get to the Schiedam. Now.”

  10

  Coimbra, Portugal, the Court of the Inquisition, 25 April 1684

  A scream rent the air, a hollow, piercing sound that reverberated off the walls of the audience chamber, rising from the dungeons below as if from the fires of hell itself. The man in the soiled robe stood motionless, waiting for the screaming to stop, as indifferent by now to the sounds of suffering as were the priests who sat in judgment in front of him. It ended as abruptly as it had started, and for a few moments all he could hear was the cooing and flapping of a dove that had made its way into the chamber from the courtyard outside. He stared up, straining against the weight of the chains that shackled his legs, and spotted the bird far above, a flickering phantasm of white against the metal grille that was the only source of light in the chamber. The symbolism seemed lost on the priests, or they were ignoring it, but to the man it was as if Christ Himself had come to cast judgment on the priests, to witness the torment they were inflicting in his name, in this place that seemed as far from God
as it was possible to get. The man looked back at the row of cassocked figures in front of him. He would tell them nothing of his secret, even if they took him to the rack and tore him limb from limb. He might not be of their faith, he might not believe in their Savior, but his God was their God and he would not let this abomination of divine will snatch from humanity all shreds of succor and hope, take from those who most needed it the greatest lost treasure of Christendom itself.

  The priest who acted as president of the court raised his spectacles on their handle and peered at the codex on the lectern in front of him. He was clean-shaven, gaunt, and austere, like the others of the tribunal, in contrast to the prisoners who came before them, with their bedraggled beards and filthy rags. “The Conselho Geral do Santo Oficio, the General Council of the Holy Office of the Inquisition, calls forth João Rodrigues Brandão, of Viseu and Porto.”

  The man in the robe remained still for a moment, staring at the Grand Seal of the Inquisition that hung down in front of the lectern, at the image of the wooden cross with the olive branch on one side and the sword on the other. The priest had spoken in Portuguese rather than Latin, the language of the Church, the language in which he had delivered judgment on the emaciated, pitiful wretch who had just been dragged outside to undergo his auto-da-fé, his act of penance. None who came before the Inquisition for their processo, their trial, knew whether they were to live or to die, whether the auto-da-fé was to be a mere public confession or an execution, but the smell of burning that seeped in from the courtyard showed that the fires had been stoked and that today was not to be a day of mercy.

  The man shuffled forward to the designated spot, the chains clanking heavily around his ankles, and stood in the shaft of sunlight that came from the grille in the tower above. “I am João Rodrigues Brandão, of Viseu and Porto.”