Lord of Darkness

by Robert Silverberg

  “What of the new governor?”

  “He is not come. The old one still rules, and it is certain that the new governor comes not this year.”

  At this dreary report, my heart did sink deep.

  Now I was put to my shifts, whether I would go to the city again and be hanged, or to stay and live in the woods. For I had run away before, and they had never treated it lightly; and this time I had done a great crime, Cerveira Pereira having ordered me out to the wars, and I having fled instead. What could I do? Walk into the city and say to him, “I have given half my life to you Portugals, and that is enough. I will no longer do your service, so let me go to my home”? He would laugh in his foul way and reply that I was a fugitive from the conquest of the Jaqqas, and must die. God’s blood, it was enough to drive me to the side of the Jaqqas once again, and aid them in their war against all humankind!

  But I kept my peace, and did none of that.

  So I was forced to live in the woods a month, betwixt the rivers of Dande and Mbengu. Then I went to Mbengu again, and passed over the river near a place called Mani Kaswea, and went to the lake of Kasanza, where I had taken refuge once before. That was upon the time of my escape from Masanganu prison with the gypsy Cristovão, what seemed like eight hundred year before.

  This lake of Kasanza was an easy place to make my habitation, for that such a great store of wild beasts did abound there. About this lake I stayed six months, and hunted the animals with my musket, such creatures as buffaloes, deer, mokokes, impolancas, and roebucks, and other sorts. The mokoke he is a very large gray animal, most graceful and swift, and the impolanca another of these running beasts somewhat similar, of a sort somewhat like a deer. These animals when I had killed them I dried the flesh, as the savages do, upon an hurdle, three feet from the ground, making underneath it a great fire, and laying upon the flesh green boughs, which keep the smoke and the heat of the fire down, and dry it. I made my fire with two little sticks, as the savages do. I had sometimes also Guinea wheat to eat, which one of my Negro boys would get for me of the inhabitants of the town of Kasanza nearby, by exchange for pieces of dried flesh.

  This lake of Kasanza does abound with fish of sundry sorts, that gave me variety of my eating. I took once a fish that had skipped out of the water on shore, four feet long, which the heathen call nsombo. This fish is long and serpent-like, and does give off a sort of emanation, or power, that if you should be so rash as to touch it will feel much like a lightning-bolt. But when the life is gone from the nsombo, so also is its Jove-like force, and its flesh is passing fair to the taste.

  The greatest danger of this lake is not the nsombo-fish but the river-horse, or hippopotamus, that wanders along the shore, especially by night. These creatures feed always on the land, and live only by grass, and they be very perilous in the water, because that their temper is most sharp. I think it is that they suffer from the bigness of their heads, that are heavy in the extreme, and this makes them churlish; for they will snap and snarl and bite at anything, though you would think them otherwise to be as placid as pigs. They are the biggest creature in this country, except the elephanto. The claws of their left forefoot are thought to have great virtue, and the Portugals make rings of them, and they are a present remedy for the flux. I saw many of these beasts and gave them a very wide passage, for I feared them more than coccodrillos, that also are not unknown here.

  After I had lived six months with the dried flesh and fish, sharing my abode with hippopotamus and coccodrillo, and seeing no end to my misery, I wrought means to get away. For though I was dwelling quietly and in peace here, with a strange tranquility of my soul that I think arose from a deep and utter weariness of adventure, yet did I hope for a change of habitance, and perhaps to resume my long-interrupted voyage home. For, like wandering Ulysses, though I might dwell this season among the Lotus-eaters and that season on the isle of Calypso, and in this place and that, yet always did I dream fondly of mine own bed and mine own hearth in the land of my birth, even if that land had become as strange to me as any place in the world.

  So did I make a departure. In the lake of Kasanza are many little islands that are full of trees called bimba, which are as light as cork and as soft. Of these trees I built a jangada or raft with a knife of the savages that I had with me, in the fashion of a box nailed with wooden pegs, and railed round about, so that the sea should not wash me out; and with a blanket that I had, I made a sail, and prepared three oars to row withal.

  This lake of Kasanza is eight miles over, and issueth into the River Mbengu. So I entered into my jangada and my two Negro boys with me, and rowed into the River Mbengu, and so came down with the current twelve leagues to the bar that crosses the rivermouth. Here I was in great danger, because the sea was great, and my boys, seeing the upheaval of the waves, did cry out that their last hour was come.

  “Have no fear,” I told them cheeringly, “for I am Andrew Battell that comes of a great line of mariners, who are pilots of the Trinity House.”

  I will confess long after the event that I, too, knew fear just then; but I could not believe that God my Provider, having sustained me so long and through so much, had it of His plan to drown me in this surf. And I carried my raft safely over the bar and rode into the sea, and then sailed afore the wind along the coast, which I knew well, minding to go to the kingdom of Loango, which is toward the north.

  And why did I not go to São Paulo de Loanda? Ah, but I knew naught of what befell there, except that in all likelihood Manoel Cerveira Pereira was yet governor, and he was mine enemy. It seemed me much wiser to chance the voyage in this little raft of my devising, and be blown along the upper coast, than to put my head back into the jaws of the lion in that city. And if I spent the rest of my days in Loango, never seeing England again, well, so be it, but at the least I would cheat the Portugals of my death.

  So northward aye I went, and the boys with me, all that day and the night. The next day I saw a pinnace come before the wind, which journeyed from the city of São Paulo de Loanda, and she came near to me. There was no escaping from this ship, so I stood by, waiting for her to fall upon me, and ready to sell my life at a very fine price, and it come to that. But when the Portugals drew nigh and hailed me, great was my amaze and joy, for the master of this ship was my great friend Pinto Cabral of old days, elder brother to Nicolau. Who looked at me high and low and said, “Andres? Is this Andres the Piloto, that I shipped with in years gone by, and had the saving of my life when I was drowning upon that devil-shoal?”

  “The same,” said I. “Much changed without and within, and yet somewhat unaltered in essence, I do hope.”

  We embraced, and he gave me wine, in which I greatly joyed, and some beef and biscuit, and fed my boys also. I asked him of the city’s news, which was very little. Cerveira Pereira was yet governor, said he. Pereira Forjaz was said to be sailing soon from Lisbon, but they had been saying that for a year. “I know not this little Cerveira Pereira well,” declared Cabral, “for I have been to the north, in São Tomé, these two years. But he is much hated, and I think will not be lamented when he goes.”

  “Most especially by me,” I said, “for that he did deny me my passage home, after pledging it.”

  Pinto Cabral laughed, and said, “It is ever thus with you, Andres, is it not? But your time will come, and your breeze will waft you homeward at last.”

  “May God grant it, friend,” said I.

  I asked him of his brother Nicolau, my partner. But here the news was grievous: for that faithful man was dead, slain by brawlers in the streets of the city. This left me downcast, both for that I had loved that man in the little time I knew him, and that I had entrusted the major part of my gold to his keeping, which surely was all vanished now. Of my treasure there remained only the pouch at my waist, in which I had prudently taken some pieces of gold when I slipped away from São Paulo de Loanda. And Pinto Cabral, in recognition of my misfortunes, did give me some other gold also.

  He was bound
for São Tomé to do business in slaves. But because that we had been shipmates together, he took me for pity’s sake to Loango, and set me on shore in that port, where I had gone with him in ancient days when I was the pilot of the governor’s pinnace; and there he left me.

  Well did I remember this place, where I had seen the coccodrillo that ate the eight slaves, and the dead Jaqqa that so frighted everyone, and the burial-ground of the kings, and other wonders that struck me so strange when I was new in this land. Now I walked the three miles from the waterside to the town, calm as a tree, and when I saw the people of the place I saluted them and bade them good morrow in their own tongue most fluently, and entered into the city like a townsman coming home. I remembered, as if I had seen it but yesterday, the great house of the Maloango or king, and the wide street to the market, and all the rest. And at audience-time I did go to the Maloango and sit before the king, which was the same king from my past visit, much older and white of hair, and I cried “Nzambi! Ampungu!” in salutation, that is, O Most High God.

  To which he replied with that greeting once so mysterious to me, “Byani ampembe mpolo, muneya ka zinga,” that means, My companion, the white face, has risen from underground and will not live long, which was so strange a thing to hear, though it was but a ritual phrase.

  “Are you come in trade?” said he then.

  “Nay, I am come to take sanctuary here from the fury of the Portugals, who have barred me from my native land. And I have been here before, when my hair was golden.”

  This king the Maloango Njimbe remembered me then, and spoke of the time when I had gone diving in the sea in the hope of recovering the mokisso-idol that they had dropped there. And then came forth another who remembered me, which was his white-skinned ndundu wizard of the red eyes, that had seen me long ago and at that time did send a coldness into my soul. This creature was now of great age, and withered and hideous, and came shuffling forward to inspect me.

  At length he said, “You are the white Jaqqa.”

  “Aye, so you called me once, and I did not understand it.”

  “But now understanding has come into you?”

  “That it has, and burned me deep.”

  “You are a Jaqqa still,” the albino creature said, “and yet there is no danger about you. For you have made your voyage, and you have come to rest, and all is well within you. You are a Jaqqa-ndundu now.”

  Now that is a hard thing to comprehend, a Jaqqa-ndundu, nor did I ask him to spell me the meanings of it. Yet so far as I can fathom, what he was saying was, I was a white man who had turned black inside, and now was white again, but my color now was the whiteness of the albino, the changeling, and not the whiteness of the white man. Well, and I do not pretend to be a penetrating scholar, but I think I have the drift of it. The one thing is certain, that on my first visit here this sorcerer had looked on me with dread and loathing, a monster to be shunned, but now he bade the Maloango make me welcome in this land, as something holy that had been cast up on their shores.

  So it befell me. I remained in Loango three years, and was well beloved of the king, because I killed him deer and fowls with my musket.

  Another thing that I did was go down again in the recovery of that sunken idol, which in all these years they had hoped to bring to the surface. This time I caused to be made a suit of leather all greased and pitched, that no water could enter into it, and I caused a great head to be made all pitched, with a great nose, and at the nose were three bladders, and at the mouth two. Putting on this suit of leather, I had them cast me into the sea in eighteen fathom deep, with a mighty great stone tied about me. The weight of the stone carried me downward, but yet I was able to breathe somewhat, although the air quick became hot and foul. In the depths did I grope about, and lo! there was the leg of the mokisso coming forth from the muck and silt that had enveloped it. I was in much pain by then, for the stone pulled me downward and the air in the head pulled me upward, so that I thought the cord I was tied withal would have cut me in pieces. When I felt myself so tormented, I took a knife that was tied in my hand, and cut the cord, and held fast to the idol. Upward was I carried, and as soon as I came above water, I tore the bladders from my face, and cut my suit before, for I was almost stifled. After this I was greatly dizzied and walked in circles close upon an hour, and did not feel a healthy man for some days or peradventure a week. But I had found them their idol after all so many years, and they hailed me as a great hero for this, and bestowed many rich gifts upon me.

  I think I would have passed all the remainder of my days in Loango. For, as the ndundu said, I had made my voyage, and I had come to rest. Striving was no longer my way. I lived peaceably among them and ate of their foods and went to their festivals, and was not shunned by them. When I passed the house of Kikoko the great mokisso I did clap my hands for good luck, as they did. The king gave me a wife, who was the last of my African wives, whose name was Inizanda, and gentle and tender she was, though she spoke little, and I think regarded herself as my slave rather than my wife. Yet when we lay together she stroked me soothingly and gave me good pleasure, such times as I required it. Which was not so often as in other times, I now being fifty years of age, and a little more. That is a fine full age, and the fires burn a little low when one comes to it, if one has lived as arduously as I have lived. But when I turned to my Inizanda and placed my hand upon her thigh, her legs did open to me and she did take my head against her breasts, and my yard into her warm nest, and that was a great comfort upon me.

  So was I lulled by life in Loango, and one year glided into another. And I thought me of all my struggle and avowal to reach my homeland, and how far from my soul that aim was now; and I smiled over that, to think I now no longer cared. England? What was that, and where? I was in the Lotus-eater land! Be the English nation under the rule of King James, or King Peter, or King Calandola, it meant nothing whatsoever to me. Did Englishmen now dress in Scots garb? Were shilling coins struck these days of clay? Had London slipped into the sea? Why, it was all one to me: foreign, dreamy. I was content. I had made my voyage, and I had come to my rest.

  Then one day a band of Portugals did march into the city of Loango, and at the head of them was Pinto Cabral, who was returning to São Paulo de Loanda from yet another voyage to São Tomé, and who had come to inquire after me.

  I was summoned. I came forth in my palm-cloth skirt and my necklace of shells, which took him somewhat athwart. But he laughed and embraced me and said, “At last we find you! We stopped here coming north, but you were away on a hunt. I carry good news for you, Andres.”

  “And what might that be?”

  “Why, that you are sought, and urged for England, by Governor Pereira Forjaz! Your tale is known to him, and he has sent word along the coast, that your pardon is fully granted.”

  “Nay, it is a jest,” said I. “They will take me, and send me off to make war on King Ngola, or some such service. Or make me pilot on their voyage to the Pole Antarctic. It cannot be that I am pardoned.”

  “You are too much hardened by adversity,” Cabral replied. “This is God’s own truth.”

  I laughed at that.

  “Why do you laugh, Andres?”

  “I laugh because I no longer care,” I replied. “It is ever thus, that we are granted our deepest wishes when they have come to have no weight. I am happy here. My life is quiet. It is a good harbor for me, this place. And now you come, saying, I am pardoned, I am free, the ship is waiting to bear me home. Home? Where is my home? I think sometimes Loango is my home.”

  Pinto Cabral at this grew most solemn, and stared me close, and took my hand.

  “Is this so? Shall I leave you here, old friend?”

  I did not at once answer. I was not sure of my way.

  He said, “It is all the same to me, stay or come, if only you be happy. I would not tear you from this place.”

  “Nay,” I answered, after a long quietness. “Nay, I am old and foolish, and I know not what I say. But it is E
ngland that I want. Take me from hence! Of course, take me, friend Cabral, take me and send me toward England, for that is what I want, and nothing other!”

  “Be you sure?”

  “I am sure,” said I.

  And I was, after that moment of hesitance; for Andrew Battell had awakened in me, that was slumbering, and did say unto me, You are an Englishman, you are no man of this black world, no Jaqqa, no ndundu, you are Andrew Battell of Leigh in Essex, so put off your beads and your palm-cloth, and get you down to the city, and take you home to England where the cold rain does fall all the year long, and sit by the fire and tell your tales to the fairhaired children that crouch wide-eyed at your knees. And I did hear that voice within me say those things, and my strength returned, and my resolve sharpened, and also there came back to me my sense of who I was and where God had designed me to dwell.

  And I gave over my habitation in Loango and went with Pinto Cabral down into São Paulo de Loanda.

  FOUR

  THIS TIME there were no deceptions practiced upon me. This time they meant to deal most honorably with me.

  Governor Cerveira Pereira had gone home to Lisbon to face certain very serious accusations concerning his rule in Angola, and the governor now was Pereira Forjaz. Cabral said that this man was no better admired than his predecessors, for he was laying heavy taxes on the tribal chiefs and draining this money into his purse and those of his favorites. But such things were mere vapors to me; and to me this Pereira Forjaz was a veritable saint and a Solomon of wisdom. For he said to me, “I have looked into your record, and a great injustice has been done upon you these many years. So you are to go home.”

  “And may I have a writ to that effect?”

  “That you may,” said he, and gave me a document in writing, and a purse of gold as well. It was not much money, and little enough recompense for the fortunes I had twice lost in this land, but I would at any rate have some coins to jingle when I set foot in England. There was but a short time to wait, until the next ship departed from Europe for Spain. I was sure that in that short time they would find some means of retracting this gift of my liberty, but it was not so.