Spice and the Devil's Cave (15 page)

“It's a message from Master Abraham,” the boy said in a voice thick, Abel knew, with suppressed weeping. “He's – he's gone.”

“Gone?” Abel repeated. “Does Manoel know?”

“Manoel!” Ferdinand burst out. “I hate him! I never did like him, but now I'll never forgive him.”

Abel put his arm around the heaving shoulders. “‘Never' is a long word, lad.”

“Not long enough for me! Look at what your people have done for Portugal, and now how does he repay you?” He broke off to draw his hand across his eyes. “I must give you Master Abraham's message,” he said, with an effort. “He sailed, early this morning, in a packet bound for Tunis. There was no time to see you.”

Abel received the news without surprise. “Did he take leave of the King?”

“Yes. Manoel assured him again he might stay on at the palace, but he wouldn't listen. Afterward I saw him for a minute and he whispered to me, ‘See Abel as soon as possible, and tell him to go at the first chance. Manoel is sure to follow up this edict with forcing baptism on us.'”

“Baptism!” Abel cried, and his voice was full of horror. “That, too? Doesn't Manoel know what that means? “he groaned. Then, as Ferdinand stared, uncomprehendingly, at him, “You must go back to your duties, my boy,” he said in a shaken voice, “and I-I must give Ruth that message at once.”

All the way home the terrible word rang through his brain: Baptism! In letters of blood it seemed to play before his eyes, to mock and to threaten him.

As soon as he entered the court he called to Ruth.

She hurried out to him. “Oh,
Abel-what?”

“Nejmi mustn't hear us,” he warned her.

“Then come in here.” She drew him into the workshop and closed the doors.

Sick at heart, he looked about it. The first time he had entered it, since Bartholomew had told him the worst. There, on the floor, were the shavings he had last made; the compass frame just as he had left it on the bench; the various tools on their shelves.

“Ruth,” he said with an effort, “Abraham's gone,” and he repeated his message.

Ruth's eyes blazed. “Why doesn't Manoel put us all to death, and have done? Do you remember-do you remember, Abel,” she faltered, “what Abraham told us happened in Spain, when they tried to force baptism on our people? That parents killed their children and then themselves rather than be false to our faith? Oh, God above, must that happen here?”

Trembling, she sank on a seat. In silent misery Abel sat beside her, chafed her cold hands.

“If I could only shut it out, forget what he said!” she moaned. “Oh, those poor fathers! Those mothers drowning themselves and their babies!”

“Let Manoel try his baptism on us!” Abel said, vehemently. “Let him see what will happen if his priests come here!” He looked at her with sombre meaning.

For a minute she closed her eyes. When she opened them, they were brave and steady. “Yes, Abel, dear!”

From that day, ready at an instant's notice, there lay, in one of the workshop cupboards two little vials filled with a colourless liquid. Why they were never used, Abel, in the anguished days which followed, forgot to wonder or ask. And Diaz never told him of the exemption which Gama had begged from Manoel, and had received as a special favour.

“As long as we must go,” Ruth said, heavily, “we'd better take Abraham's advice and go as soon as we can find transport.”

“No!” Abel was firm. “Not until we know where we're bound. If it were only you and I, Ruth-”

“You're right,” passionately she agreed. “For
her
sake, poor homeless lamb!”

Abel rose and began restlessly to pace back and forth. The necessity for decision forced itself on his misery like a blade in a mortal wound. He paused to look out of the windows. Could it be that he was to leave it all? The climbing roofs. The blue bowl of Tagus. The bustling harbour front. Oh God, it was too bitter!

Suddenly Ruth's arms were flung about him. “Abel – Abel,” she was stammering between her sobs, “well start over again! There's plenty of time – we're not old!”

“Of course we aren't,” he managed to say. “Not for a long time yet, my dear.”

“If I could only bear it all for you!” Her arms tightened about him. “Ah, Abel, there's no one like you in the whole world!”

“Well, my dear –” there was something like the old twinkle in his eyes –“if I'd thought there was another like you, I'd have been put to it to know which of you to marry!”

Nejmi's steps in the court made him say, quickly, “Go to her, Ruth. She mustn't suspect. And I'll begin right away to inquire about where to go. Rabbi Joseph may have something to suggest.”

Left alone, he turned again to the windows and, standing there, gazing down on his Lisbon, he was seized by the impulse – not merely wish or desire, but consuming necessity – to go to the shipyards. Yes, even in face of engulfing tragedy, in spite of all, he must see those ships – the Expedition of the Spices! And without saying a word to Ruth or Nejmi he hurried out of the house and down the long stairway.

He was not half-way to the water-front, when someone stopped him with a ghastly rumour of a massacre somewhere outside Lisbon. A farmer, on his way to market, had brought the first report. Later, a Jewish lad, spent with hunger and crazed with terror, had staggered into town and gibbered out horrors that were past belief. And even as Abel sought here and there for further details, there arrived a small company of fugitives with a story that took Lisbon's breath: a band of Jews from outlying districts, on their way to embark according to Manoel's order, had been attacked by bandits who, on the strength of a report that the exiles had swallowed jewels and coin, had ripped them open by the hundreds.

In a very sickness of spirit Abel wandered blindly about. What streets he walked he would never know, and passers-by he saw as shadows moving in a sea of sunshine.

At last he became aware of noise, loud and insistent. A strong odour of hemp and resin stung his nostrils. Bewildered, he glanced about, and, with a stab of recognition, saw that he was at the dockyards. He recalled that, some time ago, he had meant to come here; in fact, this very morning, when he was standing at the workshop windows.

In spite of his leaden heart, his numb senses thrilled to the surge of life about him. Near by, carpenters planed huge timbers; over here, coopers were bending hoops; and there, billowed about with seas of canvas, tailors cut and sewed new sails. Caulkers' mallets beat a steady tattoo to the scream of saws; pulleys groaned, windlasses shrieked.

He caught his breath as his eyes rested on three tall caravels that reared against the sky: the ships that John had ordered for the finding of the Way! The ships that Diaz had designed! Well, at least, Bartholomew would have the satisfaction of seeing them put forth on the great adventure, and, undoubtedly, of seeing them return. But he, Abel Za-kuto, where would he be when the Expedition came back? Ah, his compass that was to have guided it . . . his astrolabe! . . .

He walked on to watch a fleet of high prowed fishing boats toss the catch to waiting groups. The river bank swarmed with women and children washing and scaling fish, which others salted and piled. Farther along, he saw men skinning and quartering carcasses. Beyond were rows of barrels ready to receive the cured meat. “Gama's crews must eat and drink,” Abel reflected, as a single-sailed wine carrier passed on her way to the warehouses.

How busy they all were – and how little they needed him! What was it to them that his tools were idle, the workshop silent, the compass unfinished? Well, hadn't he told Diaz that Lisbon would go on just the same, even though half of it lay in its death agony? What cared the other half, going its triumphant way, drunk with the glory of this supreme adventure!

He stepped aside for a boy with a great bundle of flares. Abel watched him plant them at convenient intervals, and then set them afire. Could it be that work would go on after dark? Yes, here were fresh shifts to relieve the day workers.

In the jostle Abel felt a hand on his arm and heard his name spoken.

“Nicolo?”

“You, Master Abel, down here? Why, I was just going up to your house to tell you that I've stopped my own work – loaned my men to Diaz!” There was suppressed excitement in his tone.

“Loaned your men?”

“Haven't you heard, sir? The news came yesterday from England that Cabot is sailing in search of a northwest passage to India!”

Understandingly Abel assented. “So preparations must be rushed to prevent his getting too much of a start on-on Portugal! Is that it?” Almost he had said “on us “-forgetting that Portugal no longer counted him hers.

“And of course,” Nicolo pursued, “it's no secret that Columbus is moving heaven and earth to get off ahead of us. So, yesterday, as soon as we heard this latest news about Cabot, Master Diaz ordered night shifts. The least I could do was to loan him my men – but only on condition that Scander shouldn't be impressed into the Expedition. He's here, you know, at work.”

A moment later, the tanned face peered out of the dusk. This was Scander's first meeting with Abel since the ban against the Jews. For a full minute the small, sunken eyes surveyed him in silence. Then the hairy fist grasped his hand.

“You're hard hit, sir! And I'm sorry – sorrier than I ever expected to be about anything.” He hesitated, shifting from one foot to the other, then, “Odd, this business of religion,” he broke out. “It's like a saw – works both ways. If you happen to touch it –” He clicked his tongue to indicate something swift and final. “It all but did for me once, and I haven't forgotten!”

From anyone else this frank handling of the subject would have rasped Abel, but, as it was, he felt a curious comfort in the simple directness.

“I don't wonder,” he said, “that, after the Aden experience, you're firm on not going with Gama.”

“Lisbon's good enough for me,” Scander meditatively replied. “I'll stick here.” He looked sharply at Abel, as if minded to add something. Evidently thinking better of it, he reiterated, “I'll stick here.”

Long afterward Abel recalled the incident: that starting to speak, that change of mind, that stubborn “I'll stick here.” But, at the time, it made no immediate impression on him, for both Nicolo's and Scander's voices, even the rush and stir around him, seemed to come from very far away. For between him and the roaring shipyards, between him and, indeed, all else, rose up a host of mutilated corpses that would never be avenged, that already were forgotten under a pitiless sky.

“You did right,” he said at last, to Nicolo, “to loan your men.”

He saw Scander go to join a knot of men at work in the light of a flare, and mechanically he turned away with a vague thought of home.

“I'll walk along with you, sir,” he heard Nicolo say, but was not again conscious of his presence until, on the long flight of stairs, he felt a cloak thrown about him. “It's raining so hard, sir!” Nicolo was apologetically explaining.

As the gate swung back, Abel halted, caught his breath. Across the wet flags of the court, streamed light – light that came from the workshop! He was dimly aware that Nicolo walked by his side, and that together they entered the room.

Under the great “lighthouse” lamp, with something in her hands, sat Nejmi, apparently too absorbed in it to notice them. Abel took a step toward her. She looked up at him, nodded absently to Nicolo.

“I've rubbed and rubbed,” she said, anxiously, “but I can't make it shine.”

She laid aside a heavy cloth that Abel used for polishing and held out to him-the compass frame! Incredulously he stared at it; at her who had shrunk from sight and mention of all that had to do with the sea, from all that had to do with the Way and its finding!

“How do you polish it?” she was pleading. “If you'll just show me –”

“Fetch me that bottle of oil, and that box, over there.”

Abel spoke with an effort, and his hands were trembling. In spite of his fondness for her, he was conscious of bewilderment, even of annoyance. Why had she chosen this time to do this thing? Couldn't she see how spent he was? Hadn't she sensed his utter and heart-sick revolt from his instruments – she who was usually as sensitive to the moods of those about her as a flower petal to sun and wind?

But Nejmi, apparently engrossed in the business in hand, gave undivided attention to the oil and rotten stone that he was mixing.

*   *   *

A
BEL LOOKED
up at last, to find himself alone. How had Nicolo gone without his knowing it? Nejmi, most likely, had grown sleepy, and was in bed – Ruth, too.

His eyes returned to the frame in his hand. What a polish! Better even than he had expected; repaid him for that long process of selection from those many samples of wood. A beautiful colour, too, as of deep red roses dipped in wine. That paste he had mixed, he mused, was particularly effective. He took a pinch of it, rubbed it between thumb and forefinger, and smelled it. A good, clean smell it was, so wholesome, so real!

He rose and laid the instrument on its own precious shelf, and stood, looking down on it. Tomorrow he would try more paste, more rubbing. Tomorrow? Ah, God! For the moment he had forgotten! What had he to do with tomorrow or with any part of the future? Despairingly, his eyes sought the compass. That all that beauty of workmanship, of form and colour, should be wasted!… Wasted? He felt himself trembling as something leaped in his breast. Didn't Gama still need a compass? Wasn't the Way still to be found? Well, then, why not
tomorrow?
And as many tomorrows as would fulfill – yes,
his
part in the Way!

But after that? The old agony laid hold of him. Exile. Hunger. Death.

Ah, for something to steady him, to keep that black flood from again engulfing him! His glance fell on the paste, the polishing cloth. He took them in his hands, grasped them in a sort of desperate defense from himself. He would put from him everything but the one thought that tomorrow he would polish. Polish! And so, from hour to hour, not looking ahead. For the present he mustn't reason about the future – he wasn't clear-headed enough. He would hold himself only to taking one step at a time, not thinking of the next.