By Fire, By Water (20 page)

W
ALKING HIS BAY STALLION
, King Fernando surveyed a sea of canvas lodgings, festooned with yellow and red ribbons, coats of arms, and banners in vermilion, emerald, and royal blue. Twenty-five thousand troops had gathered from all over Iberia, and others from as far as England and Helvetia. Scents of charred suckling pigs, goats, and rosemary filled the air. Quails and apples roasted over firepots. In a clearing, a bearded lutenist sang of love and war.

A man of average height with a high forehead and slanted eyes, Fernando wore breeches of yellow satin, a crimson doublet, and a mantle of rich brocade. Behind him rode a half-dozen equestrian heroes with their brightly liveried pages. Wherever Fernando passed, wealthy barons and their servants cheered. When the king and his attendants came to a stop in the center of the encampment, a trumpet blasted. The lutenist ceased singing. The tent-builders stopped hammering.

“Brave knights of Christ,” shouted Fernando, “our most hearty thanks to you for assisting in this holy endeavor.” The soldiers cheered. “The battle in which we shall soon be engaged will bring to an end, once and for all, the presence of an infidel nation on this continent.” Again, the crowd roared. Halberds and shields clanged. “It will be grueling. It may take years. Many of you will spill blood for God and your land.” The clamor grew deafening. King Fernando held up his palm. “But in the end,” he bellowed, “we will prevail!” He continued over the din, “Europe will be united, once again, under the banner of Christ!”

While the king rallied his troops, Luis de Santángel walked his horse to the royal tents. He introduced himself to the queen’s guards and produced a letter of summons. Her majesty’s sentries, though illiterate, recognized the official stamp. One of them ushered him inside.

Fine silk-and-wool rugs from Tabriz covered the dirt floor. Sumptuous tapestries from Bruges enlivened the walls, keeping the noise and, at night, the cool autumn air outside. Rosewood partitions separated the large volume into distinct spaces. A servant showed Santángel into the tight, dignified receiving chamber. The room smelled musty, as if the stale air inside had been transported along with the heavy fabrics of the shelter.

When Queen Ysabel finally entered, she smiled to Santángel as if offering him a precious gift, her friendship. He knew it was not truly a gift at all but a loan to be paid back with usurious interest. Like the debtor with a pocket of gold coins, Santángel enjoyed the illusion of possessing the queen’s affection.

Despite the contrary opinion of courtiers and the citizenry, she was not beautiful. Small in stature, with round arms, puffy cheeks, small eyes, and lazy lips, she could have passed for a peasant working in the onion fields near Sevilla. What she lacked in pulchritude, she made up for in mystique. Her gold-flecked eyes and thick, rust-blond hair infused her artful demeanor with a touch of wildness.

She greeted him not in an elegant robe but in an ornate dressing gown, its high collar half-concealing a goiter the size of a mouse. Like her smile, the choice of attire was meant to convey that she considered Santángel an intimate acquaintance rather than merely an administrative counselor.

“Señor de Santángel, you must have some hot mulled wine. You’ve been riding for days.” With a wave of her hand, she commanded a lady-in-waiting to serve him.

“Thank you, Your Highness. What a sight, the army you and King Fernando have raised.”

“We’ve set up a tent for you nearby,” the queen replied. “I hope you find it to your liking.”

“I have no doubt but that I shall, Your Highness. Your consideration in such matters has never disappointed me.” He sipped his beverage, a precious melange of local wine with spices imported on the backs of camels and on trading ships from the Indias. “But tell me, how may I be of service to you?”

“You have relations in Granada, do you not?” The queen drank from a silver goblet filled with sweetened orange blossom water.

“Would the emir, or his vizier, remember me? I suspect they would.” Santángel had visited Granada more than once on diplomatic missions, but wished to dispel any suggestion that he casually consorted with the infidel.

“You do speak their tongue, do you not?”

“My father tax-farmed the Arabic-speaking community of Valencia. He made sure I was thoroughly trained to take up his mantle.”

“But your brother, as I understand, took up the mantle instead. Estefan.” The queen took pride in her ability to call to mind such details about her highest-ranking attendants, and her husband’s.

“Absolutely correct, as always, my lady,” replied the courtier between sips of wine.

“We want you to travel to Granada. Warn him that his nephew, Abu Abdullah, is fomenting rebellion in Malaga. In the interest of stability, we would like to help protect the emir and his kingdom.”

“How?”

The queen smiled, fingering her dress. “That ship you procured for us. The
Giustizia
. It could be quite useful against a rebellious coastal city.”

Santángel smiled—a forced, ironic, bitter smile. He knew the emir’s nephew had raised an army in Malaga. He doubted, however, that the emir would allow a Christian battleship into his waters.

“He has no choice,” said Ysabel. “He is vulnerable. We’re offering protection.”

Santángel felt he understood Ysabel’s true intent, and that she was asking him to destroy a bond of confidence he had worked hard to fashion. What was in it for him? An opportunity, once again, to prove his allegiance.

“Can you accomplish that, señor?”

“I would be honored, Your Majesty.”

Ysabel turned to a maidservant. “Elena, please show our guest to his quarters.” To Santángel, she added, “You’ll need rest if you’re going to join us in the parade this evening.”

Luis de Santángel bowed and followed the pretty, young attendant out of the royal tent.

Watching him leave, Ysabel found the
converso’s
dignified manner vaguely discomfiting. True, as an advocate of the Crown, the man was redoubtable. True, her husband Fernando greatly appreciated him. Santángel had helped smooth the way financially and politically for his ascension to the throne of Aragon. Was not that, paradoxically, the problem with people like Luis de Santángel? Was it right that a king should depend so openly on the support of families that, two or three generations earlier, had dwelt among the moral and social dregs of society, families that had built their fortunes through the base occupations of trading, tax collecting, and usury? Had Luis de Santángel not himself added the “de” between his first and last names to suggest a patrician lineage? To the queen’s aristocratic mind, where noble blood carried with it an imponderable measure of responsibility and purpose, the very existence of powerful upstart families like that of Luis de Santángel was menacing. What propelled such men through life was neither love of their land nor personal conviction, but an inordinate lust for self-promotion. Such men delighted in shattering the social barriers that had held her society together for uncounted generations.

Ysabel withdrew to her private quarters to prepare for public appearances with her husband. She loathed dressing up in jeweled gowns and fancy boots, but her soldiers believed they were fighting on behalf of a beautiful, benevolent, imperiously remote queen. One of her royal duties was to nourish those convictions.

    
CHAPTER TEN

F
UAN
R
ODRÍGUEZ TOLD HIMSELF
to concentrate on the task at hand, the assignment the inquisitor general had so generously entrusted to him. He would make it a mission of expiation.

On a chilly autumn morning, he mobilized the constables of the Holy Office in Zaragoza. He instructed them to search the houses and stables of New Christians. “If there’s any doubt as to their ancestry, or the beliefs of their grandparents,” Rodríguez told his little army in the cathedral plaza, his breath visible in the air, “investigate anyway.” Their mission was to look for a roan mare with a black stripe along its spine.

They fanned out through the city. Rodríguez visited the highest officials, those who dwelt in sprawling houses near the palace. When he arrived at the wrought-iron gates of Luis de Santángel’s manor, at the end of the second day, Leonor was washing her master’s roan mare. She looked well fed and comely. Pouring a bucket of water over the horse’s back, she saw the officer approaching and called out, “What can we do for you, constable?”

“You can begin by opening these gates.”

“And what business, if I may, brings you here?”

“I’m an officer of the Holy Inquisition of Zaragoza. I come here on orders of Tomás de Torquemada.”

Leonor smiled awkwardly, a wet towel in her hand. “I am most sorry, constable, but I know of no one by that name.”

“Do you refuse to let me enter, then?”

As Rodríguez pronounced these words, louder than he intended, Santángel’s horse lurched backward and to the side. From its mane to its tail stretched a long black stripe.

“I haven’t refused you anything,” protested Leonor. “But how am I to know you’re really who you say you are? These days, anyone can strap on a short sword and call himself an enforcer of the law.”

“Enough of this. I’ll return with plenty of proof.” Rodríguez kicked his horse and rode away.

When Juan Rodríguez returned several hours later with Torquemada and two soldiers of the Holy Brotherhood, they found the gates open and the front door unlocked. They wandered through the house’s deserted rooms until they happened upon Gabriel’s tutors, García and Pablo, playing a card game in their compact, unadorned quarters. When the two seminarians saw the inquisitor, they stiffened, embarrassed to be caught at such a frivolous pastime.

“Where is the chancellor?” Torquemada demanded.

“He’s gone, Father,” answered Pablo. “On an errand for the Crown.”

The inquisitor felt a knot tightening in his chest. He reminded himself not to let his passions rule him. “And when did he leave?”

“More than a week ago.”

“What, if I may, is the nature of your concern, Father?” asked García.

Torquemada ignored the question. “How long have you been in Señor Santángel’s employ?”

“He hired us when his son was five. Now his son is twelve.”

“Have you heard or seen any heresy?”

“Heavens, no.”

“We would have brought such a matter to the tribunal,” said Pablo.

“The night of Canon Arbués’s assassination, were you aware of it?”

Pablo crossed himself. “The next morning, we heard the bells.”

“We went to La Seo,” added García.

“Was Señor Santángel home that night?” pursued Torquemada. “Did you know where he was?”

Pablo and García exchanged a glance. Before either had a chance to provide further information, the voice of Leonor, tentative but urgent, emerged from the doorway behind the inquisitor general: “Father?”

Torquemada slowly turned. “Yes, my daughter?”

“Father, that night …”

“And you are …?”

“Leonor.” She curtsied. “The daughter of Béatriz and Enrique Domínguez y Blanco, of Tortosa.” The girl who went by that name, whom she had known as a child, had disappeared one day, probably eaten by wolves.