Lord of Darkness

by Robert Silverberg

  Under Dona Teresa’s ministrations my captivity was not, then, the most painful of captivities to endure. There were bruises and discomforts aplenty, for sometimes the jailers grew angry with me, or I with them, and they beat me for my insubordinations. Thus I came to lose a forward tooth. Dona Teresa observed that, and asked at once for the name of the man who had injured me, so that she could have him punished for it. “Nay,” I said, “I stumbled and struck my face by accident,” I said, for I feared that the guards might take vengeance on me if I informed, and might even slay me. Other than such little things, though, mine was a comfortable life, with a woman of great qualities to be my consort on many a day, and excellent wine sometimes to drink, and little treats from the finest banquets of the city. Yet for all that I was not born to dwell in an earthen cavern, and I yearned for the sunlight and for freedom.

  How many months had it been? I had lost all count. A season of rain and a dry season, and rain again and drought—was that not the full cycle of the year twice over? Was there yet an England? Was Elizabeth still its Queen, or had the Spaniards come again with a new and less feckless Armada? Anne Katherine, what of her? How fared my brother Henry, and his patron Ralegh, and the great Sir Francis Drake, and did the Thames still run past London to the sea? Lost, lost, all lost to me. Dona Teresa’s supple thighs and bobbling breasts were comfort but not comfort enough, as I raged and paced and suffered in my dungeon, and counselled myself to a philosophic calm, and raged yet again.

  At last she came to me and said, “The new governor is here, Don Francisco d’Almeida. He has come with four hundred and fifty foot-soldiers and fifty African horse, all picked men, and he is full of bold plans. He has a project for an expedition clear across Africa, and a chain of forts to protect the road from here to the sea that lies on the other coast.”

  “Very bold indeed,” I said. “And have you spoken with him, and will he let me from this hole?”

  “I have spoken somewhat with him.”

  “And?”

  “He is a vain and idle man.”

  My spirit, which had briefly soared, plummeted like Lucifer, who tumbled all the day long from heaven. “That is, he will not set me free?”

  “He is occupied with his projects. Chiefly he is in struggle with the Jesuit fathers here. They claim rights in his government, and refuse obedience to the civil powers.”

  “It is ever thus with the Pope’s men. And it is ever thus with these dim-souled governors here. Am I to moulder down here forever, Teresa?”

  “Peace, peace. Having failed to win the ear of Governor d’Almeida, I have turned to Don João de Mendoça.”

  I had long ago lost faith in the powers of this Mendoça. It seemed plain that he himself was unable to gain headway in Angola, in that he had dwelled here at a time of no governor without being able to take command, and had been set aside to some degree by this silly new governor out of Portugal, Don Francisco. But now Dona Teresa had arranged an interview for me with Mendoça, just as I had come to think no action ever would be taken on my behalf. “He will see you tomorrow,” she said, “and he intends to enroll you into his service.”

  “Can he do such a thing?”

  “He can do as he pleases. Now that Governor d’Almeida is here, and stands revealed as a fool, it is Don João’s time to make his reach for power. Be of cheer.”

  “So shall I be.”

  She caught my wrist by her hand and drew me close, ear to her mouth. In a low voice she said, “One thing, only. Give no clue to him that anything has passed between you and me save geographical instruction, or it may go hard for both of us.”

  “Geographical instruction?”

  “Aye. I have come to you all these months to be taught the globe, and the oceans, and the countries of Europe. Nothing more. Nothing more.”

  “Don João de Mendoça is a jealous man?”

  “He is a man of pride.”

  Which confirmed what I had already guessed, that she was this Mendoça’s mistress, that she was using with him that which lay between her thighs as one of the instruments of her ascent. Well, and well, I had not thought her to be a virgin, nor to lie alone on those many nights that she was not with me.

  It did not matter. I was of cheer. With her hand on Mendoça’s privates she might yet be able to squeeze me out my freedom.

  NINE

  IN THE morning there came to me that fancy-breeched captain of the guards, Fernão da Souza, another whom I suspected that Teresa had conquered. As was his custom he was most nobly dressed, all lace and spotless gloves and scented boots, and satin sleeves and pearl-trimmed cuffs of great flare and breadth: a young man, tall for a Portugal, fair-complected, with just enough of a look of shrewdness and ambition in his eyes to take the curse off his foppishness. “You are summoned,” he told me, “to come before Don João de Mendoça, who out of the greatness of his heart has granted you the opportunity to make yourself of use. Clean yourself and put on these garments.”

  No foul-smelling ragabones for Don João! I sponged myself and clad myself in decent simple clothes, and went forth from my cell and out, blinking and astonished, into the huge blaze of daylight. And into the plaza of the town, and beyond the church to one of a small group of houses done in the Portuguese style—that is, fashioned out of boards, and with a second story, instead of being a thing of light framework and mud and thatch. This was the palace of Don João de Mendoça, whom I found already at his midday meal when I was brought in.

  Mendoça was a man of much presence and authority, who in any sort of society would rise to a position of distinction. What he was doing in this remote colony, instead of dwelling at Lisbon and dealing in high affairs of state, I surely could not imagine, though later I found out what should have been evident enough to me: with a Spaniard on the throne of Portugal, Don João saw little hope of advancement in his homeland, nor, as a younger son, had he inherited great lands and wealth. So like so many other men of spirit he had gone to the tropic lands of empire, where all things begin anew for those with zeal and ability.

  He was a man past middle years, forty or somewhat beyond that, which left me wondering how he could cope with the demanding passions of his paramour Dona Teresa. In stature Mendoça was low, but yet his shoulders were of great breadth and his chest was deep, so that when sitting he seemed a person of power and majesty. It was the same with Sir Francis Drake, who was not tall, but dominated by easy force at a counciltable. Don João’s flesh was full but firm, his skin was swarthy in the Portuguese way, his eyes were large and very glistening. He was dressed finely, yet not in the overdone dandified way of Captain da Souza: his was more restrained a costume, in tones of black and gray, with black velvet slippers. The feast that was spread before him was a royal one, I thought, although served on simple pewter dishes rather than fine plate. In many bowls and tankards and platters were the foods of the country, fruits and vegetables that I did not recognize, and meats of several kinds, all in deep and thick sauces, and reeking of the spices that the Portugals so love, their garlics and saffrons and capsicums and the like. Two kinds of wine were on the table, and beakers of beer or ale also. Don João had a platter to his mouth and was sipping of a heavy golden sauce, and with great deliberation he finished his sip, and hacked him a piece of what I took to be mutton or veal, and speared it prettily with his knife and chewed at it most delicately. Then he took a vast deep draught of his pale wine, and wiped his lips, and looked up toward me, and I saw in him a man well satisfied with his meal.

  “Dona Teresa tells me you speak passable Portuguese,” he said without other word of greeting.

  “Aye, that I do.”

  “Where did you come by that skill?”

  “By stages, sir, since I was a boy in England and my brother taught me some.”

  “Your accent is too broad, though you have the words and the sense quite aptly. You speak our words in the flat English way, without music. Speak you more in the throat and in the nose, do you take my meaning? Put some
thunder in your vowels. Put some savory spice in them. I think it is your English food, that is so empty of taste, that causes you English to speak your words in such a flavorless way. How do you say your name?”

  “Andrew Battell, sir.”

  “Sit you down, Andrew Battell. Will you eat?”

  “If it please you.”

  “Eat. There’s enough here for a regiment.” He pushed vessels of meat and gruel toward me, and a goblet and some wine, and other things. I was perplexed by such plenty, having lived so long on foul prison fare leavened only by those tasties that Dona Teresa had smuggled to me. As I hesitated he stabbed a slab of meat and put it before me, and I took of it, for fear of offending against his hospitality. It was meat that looked to be mutton, at a glance of it, but to my tongue it was not in the least muttonous, more in the direction of veal, though not far in that direction, and it was covered with a sauce of hot pepper and onions that was like live coals in my mouth upon first touch, though I quickly grew familiar with it. Don João watched me with curiosity as I ate the strange meat and then a second piece.

  “You like it, then.”

  “Indeed I do. What sort of meat is this, sir?”

  “A vast delicacy. You know not how fortunate you are.”

  “And its name?”

  “It is called in these lands ambize angulo, that is to say, a hog-fish, because it is as fat as a pork.”

  “It has neither the savor nor taste of a fish.”

  “Nay,” said Don João, “for it is no more a fish than you or I, though it lives in the rivers. It is the animal that in the New World the Indians call the manatee, that has two hands, and a tail like a shield. It never goes out from the fresh water, but feeds on the grass that grows on the banks, and has a mouth like the muzzle of an ox.”

  “A creature passing strange.”

  “Indeed. There are of these fishes some that weigh five hundred pounds apiece. The fishermen take them in their little boats, by marking the places where they feed, and then with their hooks and forks striking and wounding them. They draw them forth dead of the water, and in the kingdom of the Kongo all such creatures that are caught must be taken straightaway to the black king, for whosoever does not incurs the penalty of death. Here we suffer under no such restriction, and we eat it often. Will you have more?”

  “In some while, perhaps. This richness of food surfeits me, after so lengthy a captivity.”

  “I see. But it improves your Portuguese. Do you comprehend that this sauce has sharpened your inflection, and made you eloquent?”

  “Not the sauce, I think, but only listening to your words,” I said.

  “Are you a flatterer, then?”

  “Nay, I mean no flattery. It is only that I have a good ear, and in following your way of speech, I improve my own.”

  “Ah. Well said. You are clever, and learn things quickly.”

  To this I made no reply.

  Don João went on, “This meat is of the thigh of elephanto, and this is a porridge, that takes the place of bread in this land. And this is a bean they call nkasa, that they stew. The oil is the oil of the palm-tree, this being no land for olives. And the wines are the good wines of the Canaries. We have not enough salt here, but otherwise we dine well. Why are you a prisoner, Englishman?”

  “For that I was captured.”

  “Yes. Yes, I know that. In Brazil, was it?”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “But prisoners are useless weights. If we did not kill you, we should have put you to some function.”

  “That has been done. Governor Serrão used me in a voyage to the presidio of Masanganu, some two years past. But when I returned I fell ill, and upon my recovery I was jailed, I know not why, and I have languished ever since in one of the dungeons beneath the citadel.”

  “You are a pilot?”

  “That I am.”

  “And willing to serve?”

  “It is not my prime choice, but I prefer it to captivity.”

  “And your prime choice?”

  “To return to my England. I have a betrothed in England, and my only dream is to go back to her and make her my wife, and spend the rest of my life on land.”

  “Yet you were a pirate in Brazil.”

  “A privateer, sir, seeking to win some gold with which to buy my land.”

  “To steal some gold, you mean?”

  “It would not have been the gold of Portugal, Don João, but rather that of Peru, already stolen once by the Spaniards, and not theirs by God’s main design.”

  “Ah,” he said, and said no more a long while, but mopped his bowls and searched in them for more bits of meat. In time he said, “I like you, Battell.”

  “Thank you, Don João.”

  “I do. You have a rough English honesty about you that pleases me. You do not fawn, you do not lick. When I thought you might be flattering me you said, Nay, I am only copying your way of speech, where one of the captains here might have given me a lengthy song about my elegance of style. I will let you go home, I think.”

  I had not expected that. It stunned me so that my tongue was nailed to the roof of my mouth and my jaws hung slack like those of a witless gaffer.

  “If you will do some service here first, that is,” he continued.

  “Name it, sir!”

  “We are shorthanded of mariners here. There is trade to do along this coast, to the kingdom of the Kongo and beyond it northward into Loango, where they have riches that they will exchange for baubles—the teeth and the tails of elephantos, and the oil of palms, and the cloth also that they make of palms, and much more, which we can have for beads and looking-glasses and rough cloth. Of ordinary seamen there are enough, but scarce anyone to command them, and do the navigation, and keep our pinnaces off the reefs. I would have you do some piloting for us, a few voyages, six months’ worth of service, perhaps, or a year, and if you acquit yourself honorably we will put you aboard a ship for Europe, and God go with you.”

  My face grew red and I stammered with joy, for this answered all my prayers.

  “Don João!” I said. “Don João!”

  “Will you serve, then?”

  “Aye. And gladly, if I buy my liberty with it.”

  “Done, then. Take ye another piece of the hog-fish.”

  He shoved the platter at me, and in my delight I cut me a great huge dripping slice, and crammed it down all at once, so that I like to have choked on it but for the gulps of Don João’s precious wine of Lanzarote that I took with easy abandon. He watched me without objection. Already I felt myself halfway back in England, Africa dropping away from me like a sloughed skin, and the morsel of manatee meat in my mouth, strange flavor and fiery of spicing, seemed to me the last strangeness I would have to swallow. O! but I was wrong in that, and strangeness aplenty was waiting for me down the channel of time, and the meat of the gentle sluggish mud-grubbing manatee was hardly the worst of it. But just then I was bound for home, at least in the fancies of my mind, and I thought to myself that this Don João de Mendoça was unlike all other Portugals and Spaniards, a man of sympathy and compassion and true grandeur. I could almost have kissed his boot, but that I have never been the boot-kissing sort to anyone, and might find it hard to make such obeisance even to Her Majesty.

  He said, “Dona Teresa speaks highly of you. I think her judgment is the proper one.”

  “She is a perceptive woman.”

  “Indeed. A rare woman indeed. I have known her many years, Battell. Her father died young and heroically, in the Kongo, and I have been her guardian.”

  And something rather other than a guardian, I told myself, but did not say it. A rough English honesty I might truly have, but rough English honesty does not extend to rash looseness of tongue except among fools.

  Yet I saw Teresa in my mind’s eye, naked in my cell and oiled with sweat, crouching above me and lowering herself to encompass my pestle within her mortar, and then setting up such a grinding as would turn marble to powder; and I knew tha
t if that image were to leap from my mind to Mendoça’s I would find myself no sea-pilot at all, but a galley-slave or something worse. And I saw also Mendoça, naked and sleek and plump, with his knees between Teresa’s thighs and his hands clasping both her breasts, and that image kindled a fire of turmoil in my own breast that was so dismaying that I compelled myself hastily to think of manatees instead, and elephantos, and the shining fishes of the tropic seas. While my head so swam with these pictures, Don João continued to talk, prating of Dona Teresa’s virtues, her wisdom and command of the arts of music and poetry and her shrewdness, which he said was the equal of any man’s, and her beauty, telling me of her keen luminous eyes and supple limbs and cunning lips as though he were describing some woman of a far-off land. Well, and he had good reason to be delighted in her, and to praise his own good fortune by praising her this way to me. I understood his zeal only too clearly.

  It was time now for an end to my audience with him. We had arrived at our compact: I would do some piloting, and then he would turn me loose. It seemed strange to me that the Portugals, who had found all these lands and the far side of Africa as well in the days of Prince Henry the Navigator, these Portugals who had gone off into the misty beyond and discovered even India, would be so reduced as to press an English pilot into their service, in the very seas where Bartholomeu Dias and Vasco da Gama and their other great mariners had won such repute. But evidently the Portugals had fallen upon low times, if they had to have the Spaniard Philip for their king, and why not, then, the English Andrew as their pilot, me who had had only the lightest of training for that task? I thanked Don João de Mendoça once more for his generosity of spirit and also for this meal of rare delicacies.