Caribbean (18 page)

“Then you hold that white men are wrong in making blacks their slaves?”

“Yes. It would be better if they treated them as brothers.”

“Then you condemn our king and queen for having slaves?”

“I do.”

“But if by making these savages slaves, we are able to bring them into the sheepfold of the Good Shepherd Jesus, is that not a path to salvation?”

Father Gaspar studied this neat dilemma for some moments, then conceded: “If that is the only avenue to salvation, yes, it would be justified. But I would think that as soon as the black man or the Indian became a Christian, he would have to be released from his bondage.”

“To get back to my original question. Do you really believe that black men and Indians have souls, like you and me?”

“I do. Else, by what means could they see the light of Christianity? Through their eyes? Their ears? Their stomachs? It can only be apprehended through their souls.”

This gave Ocampo trouble, and after a while he asked, almost tentatively: “You know, I suppose, that many learned doctors of theology deny that savages have souls?”

“I’ve heard that argument, and all who make it have a lot to explain.”

“I make it. I have tried incessantly since landing on this island to understand how the savage Indians I see, the ones our Great Admiral had to chastise so harshly, could possibly have souls. Nor can they be classified as human.” He said this forcefully, then asked: “I suppose, then, you consider them human beings?”

“I do,” and before Ocampo could respond, he added: “And I do for this reason. I cannot believe that the uninstructed Indian standing over there under his tree has no soul, but if he comes over here and listens to my instruction and accepts baptism that somehow I confer a soul upon him. How? In the water I pour over him? I think not.”

“What do you think?”

Very humbly Father Gaspar said: “Excellency, I do honestly believe that at birth every human being on earth arrives with a God-bestowed soul which can remain hidden in darkness until someone
like our noble Queen Isabella, may God grant her peace in heaven, sends someone like Admiral Colón aided by men like you and me to explain Christianity and salvation to them.”

“But at the beginning of our talk, you were very harsh with Colón.”

“He lost sight of his primary mission. He was satisfied to become a killer, not a savior.”

“Are you still as harsh … after this exploration we’ve had?”

When the young man nodded, unwilling to yield an iota to his superior, Ocampo rose in some agitation, walked about his office, and stopped at a window that looked out upon the busy street, where his eyes fell upon an unfamiliar and startling sight—a big, handsome black man, his sweaty skin glistening in the sunlight as he strode along behind his master. The slave had come to Española on a Spanish trading ship, having been bought in a Portuguese port on the African coast since at this time only the Portuguese were engaged in that trade. From his viewpoint Ocampo had a sudden vision of what was to come—turbulent days when the streets of the town and the roadways of this island would be crowded with such black men and their women, and he was both fascinated and disturbed by this prospect.

In real perplexity he summoned Father Gaspar to stand beside him, and when he pointed to the black man, he asked: “Father, do you really believe that that one, the big black fellow … does he have a soul like you and me?”

“Yes,” Father Gaspar answered, and then the gift of prophecy came upon him, for he had brooded upon this matter since the day Admiral Colón started massacring the Tainos because they did not conform to his idea of what a subservient people should be, and he predicted: “The history of this island, and all of the islands Spain has captured in this lovely sea, will involve the slow and even reluctant admission that the big black man down there has a soul.”

Ocampo, in no way convinced by the young priest, now turned his attention to the most difficult part of the investigation, this matter of the great indignity Francisco de Bobadilla, his distinguished predecessor as special investigator, had visited upon Admiral Colón. As he started his intensive study, he felt like Bobadilla—both had been dispatched with roughly the same kind of commission—but Bobadilla’s
task had been much the more difficult, and Ocampo realized that, so he started gingerly, and the testimony of the early witnesses was reported succinctly by the scribes:

Melchior Sánchez, an unpleasant man and an avowed enemy of Colón, gave it as his opinion that Bobadilla had arrived three years too late, had performed brilliantly in clearing up the mess, and had treated Colón justly and even mercifully. Sánchez thought that Bobadilla would have been justified in hanging the admiral, but this evidence was neutralized by Ocampo’s discovery that Colón had justly hanged the oldest Sánchez boy for repeated theft.

Alvaro Abarbanel, a responsible merchant in goods imported from Spain, whose trade the admiral had assisted by bringing in merchandise in government ships, said briefly and harshly: “Bobadilla should have been horse-whipped for treating a great man as he did. The admiral would have been justified in shooting him, and I came close to doing so.”

And so it went, back and forth. After some sixteen witnesses had split about nine in favor of Bobadilla, seven supporting Colón, Ocampo told his scribes: “We had now better get some rational statements, no opinions, no heated animosities, as to what actually happened,” and an official who had served each of the viceroys of the island, one Paolo Carvajal of good family and better reputation, laid out the facts: “Francisco de Bobadilla arrived here on 23 August 1500, bringing with him a complete set of papers from the king awarding him plenipotentiary powers, but the important thing was, none of us knew the extent of these powers, and Bobadilla conducted himself, I must say, brilliantly. No general, master of strategy, ever did better.

“First he called us together and had the notary read out what one might call a standard commission to look into things generally. Men like that with letters like that visit Spanish territories, here and at home, frequently, so we thought little of it, and we helped him as he made routine examinations, which did not focus on the admiral at all. In fact, Colón showed his disgust for the whole affair by stalking out of town in the middle of the investigation. ‘I’m off to chase down Tainos,’ he said with an insolence that infuriated Bobadilla.

“What did he do? Nothing vengeful, but he did summon the people again to hear the reading of his second letter, and I remember standing in the sunlight beside him as citizens gathered in the square before the church, all three hundred of them. The fat fellow climbed
onto the church steps, a rickety affair, for we didn’t even have a steeple in those days, and in a surprisingly strong voice, read words which shocked us all. They came from Ferdinand and Isabella: ‘Our good and faithful servant, Francisco de Bobadilla, is herewith appointed governor of Española.’

“Well, that created a storm, but the arrogant Colón brothers, and they were Italians, mind you, refused to obey him, and again Bobadilla was all patience, but on the next day he had the notary read his third letter, which gave him power over all military establishments in the island, and under this edict he began to assemble power about him. But it was the reading of his fourth letter, on the next day, that gave him the power to strangle the three Colóns. Again I hear the notary’s voice, for its message affected me personally: ‘Our loyal and trusted friend and brother, Francisco de Bobadilla, shall have the power to pay all loyal subjects who have wages coming to them but have had them sequestered.’ You can see what this meant. Men like me would now get, immediately that we applied to Bobadilla, all the money that the Great Admiral had kept from us. Naturally, we became outspoken supporters of Bobadilla, and when Colón finally returned to the town, all were against him.

“And then came the crushing blow, for with this support behind him, Bobadilla revealed the most powerful letter of all, the one which gave him complete power to make whatever changes in administration and arrests he saw fit. And before its words had died in the tropic air, the three Colón brothers were grabbed by Bobadilla’s police, thrown into jail, and forced to undergo the indignity of holding out their arms and ankles while the blacksmith fastened iron fetters about their extremities, with heavy chains linking wrist to wrist, leg to leg.”

At this point the
licenciado
interrupted: “You mean like common criminals? Like robbers or smugglers or murderers?”

“The same.”

“Not the admiral?”

“Especially the admiral, and in that condition the three were unceremoniously dragged down to the waterfront, tossed onto a small ship, and sent off to trial in Spain.”

Here Carvajal paused, looked at his interrogator and made a cruel and telling point: “I was commissioned by Bobadilla to accompany the Colóns to Spain and see that they were delivered over to the proper authorities, and on my own responsibility, as soon as the ship
had left the shadow of Española, I took into the hold, where the Great Admiral huddled against the rough planking, my blacksmith, and I said: ‘Admiral, it’s not proper that a man of your dignity, a viceroy no less, should remain in chains during this long voyage. Pedro here will strike them off and we’ll replace them just as we arrive in Sevilla.’ But with difficulty Colón rose and said: ‘These chains were thrown upon me by the king and queen, and I shall wear them until they personally give the order to have them removed,’ and he refused to allow Pedro to touch them. When he sank once more onto the floor, his chains clanking as he did so, tears came to my eyes, and when he saw them he told me: ‘You do well to weep, Don Paolo, for you see the man whose courage alone gave Spain all of Japan and China, wealth unmeasured for all time. And his reward?’ He held up his manacled arms and cried: ‘These chains! This great indignity!’

“I visited with him often on that long trip and in time I became accustomed to seeing him in his bondage, for he wore the chains as a badge of honor, and I developed immense respect for this fighting hero. One thing, however, perplexed me, and still does.”

Ocampo, much moved by this portrait of a stubborn hero fighting the world, said: “Don Paolo, you speak of him as if you loved him.” And Carvajal reflected on this before answering, which he did in slow, carefully chosen words: “Love is not the word you’d use for him, because lovable he was not.” He stopped, then started brightly, as if opening a wholly new conversation: “One noon when I took him his bowl of gruel he pushed it away and said almost pleadingly, as if eager to convince me who needed no convincing: ‘They never understood, Carvajal. They didn’t send me to serve as viceroy in Sicily, settled for a thousand years with roads and men who could reason. No! I was sent to where no man had ever been before.’ And I protested: ‘The Indians were here, of course,’ and he snapped: ‘I was speaking of Christians.’ ”

When this revealing narrative ended, Ocampo and Carvajal sat in silence, staring at the floor as if afraid to look at each other and acknowledge the terrible wrong that had been done Cristóbal Colón, discoverer of new worlds, new opportunities and new ideas. After a while, Ocampo said: “Strange how fate teases us. As I prepared the final pages of my report last night I was haunted by what had happened to Bobadilla when he finished
his
report back in 1500. It was voluminous and supported by sheaves of documents and individual statements. They tell me that it took three men to carry the whole
affair onto the ship bound for Spain. But the ship had barely left harbor, when it sank, taking Bobadilla and all his papers to the bottom of the sea. That might have been God’s judgment on the whole sad affair.”

Before Ocampo left Española with his amazingly even-handed report on the behaviors and misbehaviors of the Great Admiral, he had two additional interviews, each accidental, each compelling. The first involved an ordinary sailor, an illiterate, who brought with him his priest, who could read, a man Ocampo had not seen before. And the sailor said: “I heard people were telling you bad things about the admiral and I was afraid you might take them as truth. I wanted you to hear the real truth. Colón was a sailor, first and last, and a better never sailed. I was with him on two voyages, but the one I’ll never forget, nor none of us, was the last, after he got out of his chains, that was.”

“No one has told me of that,” the
licenciado
said, leaning forward as he always did when he suspected that something he was about to hear might be of more than usual interest, and the sailor said: “It was a disappointing sail. Nothing new in the little islands, but when we reached the shores of Asia
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we did find some gold but hardly worth the trip, and we lost a lot of men in the fighting.”

It was a dreary tale of meaningless forays and repeated disappointments, and Ocampo, losing interest, began to fidget and seek some way to get the sailor out of there, but then the narrative caught fire, and in its blaze the
licenciado
saw the ghostly figure of the real admiral: “On the way back to this island, with little to show for our troubles, we were seized by violent storms that seemed never to relent and that punished our two old and creaking ships, driving their timbers apart and allowing great waves to wash aboard. Only by the most diligent effort did the admiral keep us afloat and together, and in this pitiful condition we staggered onto the north shore of Jamaica, an island we had discovered years earlier on his second trip, but still settled only by Indians. There we beached the two ships and built over them a kind of roof to protect us from sun and storms. Dreadful situation, for we now had no means of sailing on, since the ships were beyond
repair. What made it worse, there was no way by which anyone on Española could know that we had been marooned or where we were, and each morning when we woke someone would lament: ‘How will we ever get out of here?’ and we could think of no way.

“To tell the truth, Excellency, I thought we’d perish there and that no one would ever know how we died, for no ships would come to Jamaica.”