by Tim Severin
‘What must I do?’ he asked.
Mansur was regarding him seriously. ‘When a man wishes to marry, he sends to the woman a coin. But first he chooses which side of the coin represents their future together. If she returns the coin correctly – that is, with the proper face showing – then fortune will smile on their union and the Sultan will approve their marriage. If not, the man must wait for another day, or the woman has rejected him.’
‘But that leaves everything to chance,’ Hector blurted.
‘To chance and a woman’s intuition,’ answered the chamberlain gravely. ‘If the woman truly understands her suitor and wants to marry him, she will know which face of the coin to select. If she rejects him, she can always blame it on bad luck, and thus she causes no offence.’ He held out the tray. ‘Now you must decide your side of the coin.’
Hector picked up the coin and took a closer look. It was older than he had first supposed. One face was stamped with the shield bearing the castles and lions of Spain and had the words ‘CAROLVS : ET : IOHANA : REGES’ around the rim. He turned the coin over in his fingers. The reverse bore an image of two pillars standing on waves and the legend ‘HISPANIARVM : ET : INDIARVM’ – ‘Spain and the Indies’ – around the edge. Written across the centre between the pillars were the letters ‘PLVS VLTR’. He guessed there had been no space for the final a.
He hesitated. It seemed nonsense to have to make a choice, but he could see no other way. ‘I choose the side with the two pillars on it,’ he said.
Without a word Mansur replaced the cloth and went towards the group of veiled women. Silently, the crowd parted to allow him through.
Hector looked on. It was difficult to see exactly what was happening at the far end of the hall. He had a brief glimpse as the chamberlain delivered the tray to the group of women gathered in a tight cluster. Then the crowd pushed forward and his view was completely blocked.
Beside him Dan made an effort to distract him. ‘Wonder how that coin got all the way here?’ he said.
‘Probably sent from New Spain to Manila to pay for the China trade and then onwards,’ Hector replied, trying to conceal his concern. It occurred to him that Maria would choose the side with the shield, because it was the emblem of her country.
The chamberlain was coming back, tray in hand. He went straight to the Sultan, gave a low bow and murmured a few words and proffered the tray. The old man lifted the cloth and looked beneath it and gave a barely perceptible nod. Beside him, Prince Jainalabidin broke into a wide smile. Mansur turned back to Hector. ‘His Majesty the Sultan approves,’ he announced.
Hector’s heart leaped and he took a pace towards the palace women, until Dan’s hand on his shoulder restrained him. The old Sultan was being helped to his feet, and the spectators were waiting in respectful silence while he tottered from the audience chamber. The old man and his son finally passed from view and Hector turned back to find that Maria and her companions had vanished. The audience was at an end, and everyone was leaving the audience chamber. They streamed out through double doors that led to the rear of the palace. For as long as he dared, he waited, but still there was no sign of Maria. Soon he and his comrades were the only guests remaining in the room, and one of the palace guards appeared and insisted that they rejoin the rest of the company. As they emerged from the Kedatun sultan and out into the fresh air, the reason for the crowd’s enthusiasm was evident. Carpets had been spread on the ground and large green leaves set out as plates. On them were piled fish and shrimps, yams, sweet potatoes, bananas, coconuts, unknown vegetables. Sago was offered in every form imaginable: buns, cakes, porridge, biscuits, skewered on bamboo sticks or wrapped in leaves, fried and steamed. The crowd of the Sultan’s guests were already seated and helping themselves to the feast.
Musallam had kept a space for them. He was in great good humour. ‘I’ll be happy to purchase your bird skins from you. They’re very valuable,’ he said as Hector and his friends joined him cross-legged on the carpet.
Hector found it impossible to concentrate on the food or the bantering conversation of his companions. Only the Omoro menfolk sat down to eat. Their wives had withdrawn to a discreet distance and were standing, looking on. Occasionally one of them might come forward to help the women from the palace kitchens, who were replenishing the piles of food.
‘Hello, what’s this?’ said Jacques. He reached forward and picked up a dark-purple fruit from a pile in front of him. It was the size of an apple and had a smooth, glossy skin. He turned it over in his hand and looked enquiringly at the Malaccan.
‘Don’t eat the rind,’ advised Musallam. He beckoned to one of the servants hovering in the background, took a short knife from her and cut the fruit in half. ‘Here, try the white part in the middle,’ he said, using the point of the knife to prise out a chunk of creamy-white pulp.
Jacques popped it in his mouth and chewed thoughtfully. ‘Remarkable. Sweet and sour at the same time. Somewhere between a peach and a lemon.’
‘Mangosteen,’ said Musallam. He leaned back with a contented sigh. ‘The four of you have proved the truth of an old saying that we have at home, “When the junk is wrecked, the shark gets his fill”, though in your case you wrecked your ship deliberately.’
Hector was aware that serving women were passing behind the line of guests, offering bowls of water in which to wash their hands and a towel to dry them. He wondered where and when he would be allowed to meet Maria.
‘We say “It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good”,’ he remarked. The silk sash around his waist was uncomfortable. It had ridden up his waist when he sat down, and he paused to adjust it. A serving woman was at his elbow, kneeling, and had placed a bowl of water before him. Absent-mindedly he rinsed his fingers and then she handed him a small towel. As he took it, his fingers felt a small, hard object within the cloth. He shook it out and the two-real coin fell into his palm. Startled, he swung around. The serving woman was modestly dressed in Omoro style in a plain green sarong and a short overjacket, her features concealed by a long white veil. He reached out tentatively and, when the woman did not withdraw, lifted aside the veil.
Maria’s eyes regarded him, mischievously.
He lurched to his feet, his heart pounding. His mouth was dry and he felt unsteady, as if he was not in full control of his legs. The others looked up from their meal, and Jacques waved his mangosteen, the juice leaking down his chin. ‘Off you go. You have your whole future to discuss,’ he grinned.
Hector took Maria by the hand. He held on as if she would disappear again if he released his grip. By unspoken agreement they slipped away from the assembled company and, with Maria leading the way, hurried through the Kedatun sultan and out on to the portico in front of the palace. The guards ignored them as they made their way to the edge of the hill and stopped at last, looking out at the harbour. Hector could see Musallam’s jong far below.
‘I should have recognized you sooner,’ he confessed, turning towards her. ‘The costume suits you.’
‘As does yours,’ she said with a smile. He glanced down at his own white pantaloons and silk belt, and realized he was still holding the Spanish silver coin in his other hand.
‘How did you know which side to select?’ he asked.
‘At first I nearly chose the side that had the names of the rulers, Charles and Johanna. I imagined you’d have picked them because you thought them to be a couple, King and Queen, man and wife as you want us to be. Then I realized and changed my mind.’
‘Realized what?’ he asked, though he had a shrewd idea.
‘Charles and Johanna were not man and wife, but son and daughter. She was Johanna the Mad and he ruled in her name while she was still alive.’
‘So you chose the two pillars?’
She looked at him seriously. ‘For a good reason.’
For a moment Hector was at a loss. ‘You mean “Spain and the Indies” because we find ourselves in the Orient?’
She shook her head. ‘Every
child in Spain knows that the two pillars are those that Hercules set up at the Straits of Gibraltar to mark the end of the world. But Charles, when he came to the throne, changed that. He took the two pillars as his emblem, and added the motto “plus ultra” – “more beyond”.’ She paused. ‘I thought there could be no better watchword for our future.’
Hector looked at her admiringly. Maria was so calm and so certain. ‘That ship down there,’ he said, ‘it sails tomorrow for Malacca. The captain has offered to take us with him.’
‘I know,’ she said simply. ‘There’s not much that escapes the ears of the harem.’
‘In Malacca we’ll be able to find someone who can marry us properly, if that’s what you want.’
‘And what happens then? Where do we go?’ Maria asked softly.
‘I don’t know,’ Hector answered truthfully.
Maria regarded him with her large dark, solemn eyes. ‘If you’re caught and identified in the Spanish territories, you’ll be arrested, tried and executed as a pirate. My testimony won’t save you a second time.’
‘I’m willing to take that risk.’
She gave a small, tender smile. ‘But I love you too much to let you.’
His heart went out to her. He gazed over the harbour. The sea beyond had turned a deep indigo-blue in the afternoon sun, and on the horizon a procession of low clouds, touched with grey, drifted southwards. He thought of the impending monsoon winds, which Musallam had promised would carry them to Malacca. ‘Somewhere out there must be a place where we can live together, where we’ll be left alone,’ he said.
Maria lifted her chin defiantly. ‘Together we can find it. When I was a child back in Andalusia, my father used to encourage me by translating the words on the coin as “ever further”. Let that be our private motto.’
Hector slipped an arm around her waist and held her closer. Already, in the back of his mind, an idea had begun to take shape. He squeezed the silver coin tightly, felt the edge bite into his palm. ‘The waves beneath the pillars represent the vastness of the ocean,’ he said. ‘It will mean another voyage and, this time, to sanctuary.’
HISTORICAL NOTE
Several of the sea robbers whom Hector Lynch encounters in his Pacific adventure are known to history. So too are three of the ships on which he sails. The Bachelor’s Delight was particularly notorious, and her picture has been identified on an early eighteenth-century map of the Americas. Originally a Danish slave ship, she was seized in 1684 off the West African coast by John Cook, a seasoned buccaneer. The Delight was then adapted as a pirate raider by reducing her upper works so that she sailed more handily. Under Cook she was taken round the Horn and into the Pacific to begin four years of piratical cruising. When Cook died of scurvy off the island of Juan Fernandez, Edward Davis took command. He had already taken part in the overland raid into the South Sea in 1680 (see Hector Lynch’s adventures in Corsair) and proved to be one of the most competent buccaneer captains. In May 1688 Davis brought the Delight to Philadelphia, where she was sold, only to begin a second stint as a pirate ship. She reappeared in the Indian Ocean commanded by yet another sea robber, John Kelly. Based in the pirate havens of Madagascar, the Delight cruised for prey off the African coast before returning to New York.
The Cygnet also appears in the public records. Spelt Signett, she was ‘a ship of 180 tunns and 16 guns, formerly called the Little England’ and on 1 October 1683 sailed from the Downs bound for the South Sea with a cargo worth £5,000. Her captain, as Hector finds, was Charles Swan, who intended to open trade with the Spanish colonists in Peru. They rebuffed him at Valdivia when there was a skirmish and two members of the landing party were killed. Thwarted and aggrieved, Swan and his men eventually turned pirate and looted and pillaged the Spanish colonies and shipping until, in April 1686, the Cygnet headed west across the Pacific. On board was William Dampier, later renowned for his circumnavigations and scientific observations on the winds and ocean currents. The Cygnet visited the Thief Islands and then went on to Mindanao in the Philippines. There her crew mutinied. They deposed Swan and left him behind. The Cygnet spent some time voyaging in South East Asian waters – Dampier left the ship in the Nicobar Islands – and made her final landfall in Madagascar. There she sank on her moorings, her hull eaten through by teredo worm, in St Augustine’s Bay.
The Nicholas, twenty-six guns, was also a real vessel. Commanded by John Eaton, she reached the Pacific in January 1685 and operated with little success until her captain decided to head west and try to intercept the Manila Galleon. When she called at Guam in the Thief Islands, there was a brush with the Chamorro. As in Hector’s fictional adventures, a letter was received in French, Spanish, Dutch and Latin from the Governor of the Ladrones, Damian de Esplana, asking who they were. A brief alliance was formed between the pirates and the Spaniards, with the Nicholas supplying the Spanish garrison with gunpowder (not the other way round, as in Hector’s adventure). The Nicholas sailed on to China, but her poor luck continued. She chased (but failed to catch) a Chinese vessel laden with silver, and the ship’s master deserted in Timor. The Nicholas was last reported near Jakarta, Indonesia. Then she vanishes from history.
Swan, Cook, Dampier, Eaton – all were true-life sea robbers. Damian de Esplana, who governed the Thief Islands from 1683 to 1694, gained a reputation as an excellent soldier, but was less honest than he appeared. He accumulated so much wealth by selling government stores at 500 per cent mark-up, and investing the profits in shady commerce with Manila, that his heirs spent ten years quarrelling over the division of his fortune.
Hector’s adventures on the unnamed island subject to the Satsuma clan and then among the Chamorro are purely fictitious, but with regard to the assistance rendered to the Sultan of Omoro (an imaginary petty kingdom) it is worth noting that several late seventeenth-century sea robbers finished up as professional gunners in the armies of eastern potentates.
The bizarre story of the ice-shrouded vessel entombed on an iceberg is adapted from a later, nineteenth-century tradition. The San Telmo, a seventy-four-gun ship of the line, was purchased from Russia by the Spanish government in 1819 and sent to Peru by way of Cape Horn. Most of her escorting vessels arrived safely, but the San Telmo vanished. Her fate was a complete mystery. Then, according to one report, an Italian vessel negotiating Cape Horn met with a huge iceberg on which was observed the stranded hulk of a great black ship, dismasted. Going on board, the visitors were able to identify the San Telmo, and found the ship’s commander frozen to death in his cabin. Beside him lay the corpse of his dog.