The Bunting Quest

by Steven Marcuson

  ‘Did Dom Montano return safely to Monte Cassino?’ asked Dom Letizia, peering into the black leather satchel Paulo had placed between them.

  ‘Yes. He delivered the map to Roberto.’

  ‘Good. That is good news. These men are desperate and will do anything to get what they want.’

  ‘They killed the girl in London.’

  ‘I know,’ said the monk, shaking his head sadly. ‘What are your plans, Paulo? Are you leaving Perth today?’

  ‘No, not for a couple of days. Tonight I will attend the Sabbath evening service at the local synagogue and then join my Australian cousins for a traditional meal.’

  Dom Letizia and Paulo stopped talking for a few seconds while a group of runners jogged past them.

  ‘I did not know you were a Jew, Paulo. How did a Spanish Jew get involved with the monks of Monte Cassino?’

  Paulo considered his answer before responding. ‘As you know, the Jews of Spain suffered terribly during the Inquisition. King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella eventually decreed that they either convert to Catholicism or be expelled from the country. Tens of thousands decided to convert. Some secretly held on to their Jewish beliefs, but most grabbed the opportunity to become good Catholics and progress in trades and professions previously denied to them. Many even joined the clergy and rose to the highest positions, themselves becoming part of the Inquisitorial system, persecuting conversos for secretly practising their religion. My family did neither. They held on to their faith and although life was very difficult, they survived.’

  ‘Yes, I think I read that some of these new Christians rose to positions of great influence,’ said Dom Letizia, ‘but, you still haven’t answered me about your connection to the Benedictines.’

  ‘Ah … it is not so simple a thing to explain. However, let me say that as I grew into adulthood I noticed that some people exhibited similar characteristics to me and my family. It may have been the way they looked or the way they expressed themselves, and I realised that the conversos’ genetics were still apparent.’

  ‘What? Even after many generations?’

  ‘Yes, I believe this to be true. I was attracted to these types as I felt they held a secret they themselves never even knew. I graduated in Islamic and Semitic Studies at the University Complutense in Madrid where I met many members of the clergy who felt similarly towards me as I to them.’

  ‘That is fascinating. I had no idea …’

  ‘Eventually I was hired by the Church to carry out duties where the clergy felt uncomfortable, shall we say … utilising a Jew to do things they felt they could not. A few years later I came to the attention of the Abbot Primate who had heard of my reputation of being one of them … but not. He called me to Monte Cassino. The rest is history.’

  ‘And do you have a family, Paulo?’

  ‘This is an area I will keep private,’ said Paulo, rising to his feet. ‘Good luck in your endeavours. Hopefully we will meet again in better times,’ and he walked away in the opposite direction to the gate Dom Letizia had come from.

  Dom Letizia bided his time and watched as Paulo disappeared into the distance. He found himself thinking of the words of St Benedictine’s Rule: ‘Keep death daily before your eyes to live life to the fullest’, then took another look inside the leather bag that had been left behind, closed the zip, hung the strap over his shoulder and walked back out of Queens Gardens the way he had entered.

  A short while later, he had completed the formalities at the car hire. He gave a wry smile to himself as the voice-activated GPS in the Toyota Prado gave the first navigations out of the city for his ninety-minute journey to New Norcia, instructing him to turn right from Wellington Street onto Lord Street.

  Well, at least the Lord was still with him for the present.

  40

  Nick and Verity spent the day at the hotel going over all the strands of information. It was a typical northern European late-autumn day, with low dark cloud and continual rain. Even with lamps and overhead lights switched on to combat the dreary conditions, Nick and Verity found that their spirits had dropped.

  ‘It’s understandable, Nick. You’ve been through the mill the last few days. You’ve seen your best friend’s sister murdered, your gallery ransacked and my dad thrown into a mystery of stolen maps, Protestant extremists, black-robed monks and you’re now dealing with the German police. No wonder you’re feeling flat today!’

  Nick appreciated Verity’s empathy, but he could not shake off the nagging feeling that they were both out of their depth and that things would end up badly.

  ‘A large whiteboard would have been better,’ said Verity, ‘but let’s lay out everything we know and try and make some sense of it.’ She had set out numerous A4 sheets of paper, sticky-taped them in groups of six and started to write on them with a black marker pen. Nick looked on, intrigued but not quite sure if there was any point in the exercise.

  ‘We often use this method in academia,’ she said, noticing Nick’s doubting demeanour. ‘You might be surprised.’

  Three hours later, the office floor was strewn with sheets of paper all covered in lists, arrows and question marks. They had phoned both Julius and Bronte to involve them in the process and slowly, with the help of pots of black coffee, a picture was emerging.

  Nick contemplated for a moment. ‘Okay, for reasons unknown Jaeger and Robertson, pretending to be police, are desperate to gain the World Map by Bunting. Either they, or the black monks – equally desperate – stole the map from the gallery. We can assume that one of them is also responsible for the theft of the map at Sotheby’s, Amsterdam.’

  ‘They could be working together, Nick.’

  ‘Yes, but unlikely. Jaeger appeared genuinely perturbed when I mentioned the monks to him the morning after the theft. I don’t think he was play-acting.’

  ‘Both groups are only interested in the Antwerp edition. The other editions are numerous and generally available. The Antwerp edition seems to have been missed by all the cartographic catalogues. It simply does not get a mention in any of the standard reference publications, even though they were published by the renowned De Jode family.’

  ‘Why isn’t there a reference? It doesn’t make sense to me,’ said Verity, looking quizzically at Nick.

  ‘Well, there can only be one reason it has not been referenced and that is due to its rarity. Clearly, there have been few, if any, Antwerp editions on the market, so it has seldom been catalogued. Or, if it has been on the market – once in a blue moon – nobody has picked up on the fact of the different publishing house.’

  ‘So, what if it is rare? If there are no differences in the actual map, why go to such extreme lengths to procure them?’

  ‘I agree, but there must be a difference between the standard copy and the Antwerp edition, or all this chaos would not be happening. Hopefully the Duke Humfrey edition will help us when it arrives tomorrow.’

  ‘Okay, so if the map – the Antwerp map – holds the key … what does it hold the key to?’

  ‘Well, this part is where Professor Schroeder sheds some light … he believes that …’

  Nick stopped mid-sentence and stared at Verity. ‘What did you just say?’

  ‘Uh, what makes the Antwerp map different?’

  ‘No you said something else.’ Nick gathered his thoughts. ‘That’s it! You said, “The Antwerp map may hold the key”.’

  ‘So what?’ said Verity, confused by Nick’s sudden reaction.

  Nick rummaged around on the floor looking for a specific sheet of paper. ‘It’s in the piece discovered by Julius: He who was the keeper, no longer holds the key / The map is the guide to the place across the sea. It clearly says it: the map is the guide to the place across the sea. Somebody – the keeper – no longer has something and the map shows the way.’

  Verity’s eyes lit up. ‘I see what you’re saying. If Professor Schroeder’s research and theory is correct, then the keeper must mean the Pope, and the key is the written words of
Jesus. And, if in some way the mystery of the Antwerp map can be solved, it will show the way to the place … what does he say next?’

  Nick read the next lines in the strange paragraph: ‘In a land beyond the faith where no cross has shined / The Words are hidden in this Godforsaken land. And this is definitely not the Holy Land, but probably somewhere in Australia, in fact, Western Australia. And if you read the next two lines: Where few trees can grow and no water runs / God has cursed the animal with two heads to bound, it makes total sense now.

  However, I’ve no idea about the last couple of lines: One who knows, he will never reveal / His soul was damned for eternity.’

  ‘So why are Protestant extremists involved and what has it to do with monks?’ said Verity, searching for her phone which had started to ring. ‘It’s Julius. I’ll put him on loudspeaker … Hi, Dad, I’m just putting you on loudspeaker so Nick, uh, Nicholas …’ she smiled at Nick, ‘… can also hear you.’

  ‘Ho ho, it’s all about research!’ shouted an excited Julius.

  ‘Just speak normally, Dad. We can hear you fine.’

  ‘I was hunting around, examining the different expeditions that had used Timor and I ended up reading the account of Captain George Grey. It was published in London in 1841 and recounts him making landfall on the Kimberley coast in north-west Australia and sending the supply boat back to Timor for horses and provisions. Now this is where it gets very interesting …’

  Verity and Nick could hear Julius chortling in the background. ‘Yes very, very interesting. Well, Grey and his men were exploring the Glenelg River, when they stumbled across a cave filled with the most amazing paintings. And I don’t mean paintings on canvas as we know them, but paintings on the cave walls: rock paintings by Aborigines. The Englishmen were quite taken aback by them and Grey copied them all into his notebook. Three years later they were published in colour in his book.’

  ‘What does this have to do with Heinrich Bunting?’ said Verity, frustrated.

  ‘Don’t be so impatient my dear … you were always in such a rush to do everything, you sometimes missed the important things.’

  This time it was Nick’s turn to smile.

  ‘Well,’ said Julius, ‘these rock paintings are now heritage-listed and are world famous. They are known as The Wandjinas. I have sent all of them to your email, Nicholas; one of them in particular will interest you.’ The old professor then hung up.

  Nick quickly accessed his email and opened the attachments. The first five images were typical of what they might have expected to be on the walls of a cave in remote north-western Australia. However, they had not expected the last image.

  ‘Look at this! No wonder your Dad was excited.’

  On the screen was a fully robed standing figure, with arms to the side and feet splayed apart, an oval white face with two staring eyes, no nose or mouth. Surrounding the head was something that looked like a halo or a wide-brimmed hat. The contrast between it and the other Wandjina paintings was considerable. Most were obvious native figures, some carrying wallabies or kangaroos around their shoulders, others in traditional dress with ceremonial face paint.

  ‘Could that really be a monk or a priest? It certainly looks like one,’ said Verity.

  ‘Maybe it could. Your father is a research genius!’

  ‘Mmm, I’m not so sure. This could be another of my dad’s “hunches”. You know the ones he is always getting into trouble for. He has also attached an article by a Rupert Gerritsen. I’ll read it out.

  ‘Later analysis of historical records by Professor Campbell MacKnight and others suggested these visits to Marege (Arnhem Land) and Kayu Jama (Kimberley Coast) had commenced in the 1720s. More recent historical information indicates the Macassans may have been coming as early as 1640. Some radiocarbon dating carried out by MacKnight at three Macassan campsites produced dates from 1170–1520.’

  Verity quickly read the rest of the article to herself. ‘The gist of the rest is that archaeological programs dating rock paintings of Macassan boats called proas have a range from 1517 to 1664 and although it is not absolute proof that the Macassans or other mariners were sailing to Australia before Europeans, it certainly provides strong circumstantial evidence.’

  ‘And listen to this,’ said Nick, looking at his screen.

  ‘Wandjina paintings adorn rock galleries and caves in the north-west Kimberley. The figures are ancestral beings to the Worrorra, Ngarinyin and Woonambal tribes and are believed to have emanated from the clouds and the sea. These ancestral beings are powerful figures. They control the weather and lightning, as well as bringing the monsoonal rain that maintains the fertility of land and animals. According to Aboriginal history, it is the Wandjina that left themselves as ochre paintings on rock walls throughout the Kimberley. The images are now cared for and repainted by their descendants.’

  ‘Do you really think it is possible that the Aborigines saw Bunting over four hundred years ago and drew him on their cave walls, thinking he was one of their ancestral beings?’ asked Verity.

  ‘Well, if he really did sail to Australia in a Macassan boat and land on their shore wearing robes and hat, and they had never seen anything like him before, then I suppose they could have thought he was a spirit or a god in the same way the Incas of South America considered the Spanish and Portuguese soldiers to be gods.’

  Both of them were silent as they stared at the ancient image of the European man, frozen in time, in a cave in remote north-western Australia … and Heinrich Bunting stared back, wide-eyed in ceremonial robes as if saying, ‘Yes, it is me, I was here.’

  41

  With favourable winds due to the north-west monsoon, they made steady progress from Lifau, the single masted proa with its unequal-length and parallel hulls dealing easily with the occasional squalls. Pobasso, the Macassan owner of the vessel, explained through Philip that he and his ancestors had been travelling these waters for generations, fishing for trepang or sea cucumbers off the great southern land they called ‘Marege’.

  ‘No need to worry, Master Bunting,’ said Philip. ‘Pobasso agrees with me that no European has ever been to this land. It is a rugged and inhospitable place and the inhabitants are warlike and cannot be trusted. The only reason the Macassan go is to fish for trepang. The Chinese will pay a pretty penny for them.’

  At the mention of the Chinese, Pobasso laughed and gesticulated with crude movements of his hand near his cloth-covered genitals.

  ‘Ah,’ said Philip coyly, ‘he says that the Chinese believe the dried and smoked trepang help them … how do you say … get it up. He says that the Macassans don’t need any help in that area.’

  Jakob looked at Bunting’s face and burst out into laughter. ‘Heinrich, your face is a study. We have similar things back in Germany.’

  ‘Oh, very interesting,’ said Bunting uneasily, not really wanting the conversation to continue.

  For Bunting, life on the ocean was a pleasant change from the regular mass, matin and lauds in the Church of Saint Joseph. Friar Taveira’s suspicious and piercing eyes had followed his every liturgical utterance, always looking for him to slip up and reveal his heresy.

  Philip had spoken to him in the milling crowd after the Sunday morning service, gathered outside the whitewashed building. ‘The answer is yes. I will organise a boat and captain. Your payment will be to take me with you back to Europe. I have a wish to see the cities and homes of these men who keep coming in greater and greater numbers to our islands.’ He smiled as if it was a normal genial conversation. ‘We cannot leave until the winds change in December, so keep saying your prayers, Master Bunting … Dominican style.’

  There was plenty of company for the first few days of the voyage. Scores of proas lined the horizon. Mostly single sails but occasionally larger double-masted boats with twenty or more crew skipped past them.

  ‘They are all heading the same way as us to make landing on Marege,’ said Philip, pointing out to sea at the sails in the distance. ‘There
they will make camp, for up to four months, while they gather the trepang before returning with their bounty. We will change direction soon and head west into the sinking sun to a land we call Kayu Jama. It is far less hospitable and only a few adventurous vessels will venture there. From there it is up to you, Master Bunting. Pobasso will do as you wish. His fee will make him the rich man in his village and he will have no need to make the journey to this land for the next few years.’

  Philip spoke the truth. As they changed direction westwards, the number of other proas thinned out and by the time they started to head south, with the coastline to the east, there were no other boats in sight. Amir had made it his business to catch fish for the voyagers and had become quite expert at it. Bunting, using his recently acquired navigation expertise – learned from Martin Cortes on the Sao Cristovao – diligently recorded their speed and position using a crude cross-staff, whilst Jakob, also utilising skills from the great voyage from Europe, took it upon himself to keep the proa shipshape.

  ‘Who will believe our story, Heinrich?’ asked Jakob, marvelling at the vast blueness around them. ‘A priest, a Jew and a Moor boy travel the world together.’

  ‘It is a story without an ending as yet. Only God knows what challenges are in front of us.’

  ‘Well, so far Hashem has kept his eye on us.’

  ‘And Allah too!’ said Amir, head over the side of the proa, pulling up another struggling fish.

  Jakob and Bunting gave each other a sidelong glance, both surprised to hear their young companion refer to his background for the first time.

  ‘I remember my father would say: “He who has drunk the sea does not choke on a brook.” I understand what it means now.’ Then quietly, almost to himself, ‘In the end, he did drink the sea.’

  The older men remained silent as Amir continued in a mournful trance-like state, sometimes in the present and sometimes in the past.

  ‘Father, Father, let me join you on the galley. Piri, my brother, is allowed. He is only five years older than me. Let me come too and prove myself worthy of the Fehad name. Mother, dear mother, please no tears for I am a man now. I am twelve years old … Müezzinzade Ali Pasha, I beg of you, Amir is too young. Let him stay with me … Your husband, my dear old friend, has sailed with our invincible fleet since he was a boy and is now a captain of his own galley. Amir will glorify the Fehad name once again … Do not cry, dear mother. This is the greatest fleet the world has ever seen. Allah has made his will known that the Mediterranean should no longer be infested with the infidel. Father, where should I go? What should I do? Yes, if it be your wish for me to climb to the topmast, then I shall climb.’