“Sister Isabel, am I now.”
“Pardon. Sister Isabel. But I have been mindful of our love, and the sweetness of it. Is it a blasphemy to think of such things now? Now that you are—”
“Nay,” she said. “It was true, and real. It need not be denied. I gloried in your embrace, Andres.”
“And I in yours.”
“And we had our time, and a fine time it was, and now we have moved on into other worlds, and so be it. What will you do now?”
“Return to England at long last.”
“Ah. When is that?”
“A few days, no more.”
“The Lord go with you, and speed your journey, and give you a happy return.”
“So pray I also, Sister Isabel.”
“You go alone?”
“I have two boys, slaves. I will ask them to accompany me, for I know not what will become of them here, and they are fond of me, and I of them.”
“There was a Portugal woman once—”
“Dona Teresa, yes. The Jaqqas slew her.” And I looked away of a sudden, for that terrible scene awoke in my mind, and I heard sounds and saw sights that I fain would not have had recalled to me.
In my anguish Sister Isabel did draw close beside me and say, “You loved her greatly, I know.”
“I will not deny that.”
“It does not matter. I know that you loved me, and you loved also her, and there was room in your heart for us both.” With a laugh that was almost girlish she said, “Do you remember, when she and I did fight like wild beasts, and claw and scratch each other naked for jealousy?”
“And how could I forget that?”
“Nor I. She was like a demon. But I gave her as good as I received. I think that woman was a witch, Andres, and I think she is suffering for that.”
“She prayed God for forgiveness, at the end, and she prayed sincerely. I was with her.”
“So long ago, Andres, so very long ago.”
“There were good times, then, when we were together.”
“There were. Without shame I tell you, I had great joy of your body.”
“And I of yours,” I told her. “Dare I say such things, with a holy sister?”
“In that time, it was rightful that we did what we did, and our joy was the measure of its rightfulness. I am so pleased, at seeing you this last time, and looking back upon all of those things with you.” There was a deep glow in her eyes, of remembrance of things past, that was altogether radiant. Then she stood to her feet. “Come. I have my duties, and I must not shirk them.”
“But a minute more with you,” said I.
“Of course.”
I looked toward her. A fantastic scheme then did blaze into being in my mind, that she should come back to England with me, and we live together—chastely, that is, she and I—in the renewal of the love we bore one another. For we were the only survivors of the past time, and it was pity that we should part, having found one another again at this latter day.
But that scheme, which for an instant did seem so valuable to me, decayed into absurdity the moment after, as I considered the madness of it, that I should set up housekeeping in England—chastely or no— with a black Catholic nun in that Protestant land. It could not be done. Nor was she likely, even for love of me, to follow me away from her devotions and her native continent. So I did swallow back the words even as they were rising in me, and said nothing, and only pressed my hand to hers in all of love.
Then said I at last, “Farewell, Matamba Sister Isabel.”
“Farewell, Andres. God’s love go with you. You know that mine own does.”
And she made with her lips the little shape of a kiss, that never was part of her lovemaking craft when we were lovers; and then she was gone from me, most serenely gliding toward the door of the church and into the bright blaze of sunlight without.
5
Soon after, a messenger from the governor came to me at my lodging, and said that the ship was ready, and that I should prepare myself to go. Which I could scarce believe, after having dreamed of this day so long. For when we dream too long upon a thing, the coming of it becomes indistinguishable from the dream, and loses the power to sustain. I thought I would weep for joy when the day came when they told me I could go; but the day had come, and I did not weep. Joy indeed I felt, but of a subdued sort; one does not weep for joy when one has rehearsed in one’s mind that very weeping. It must take one unawares, I do believe.
I gathered my few things, and my bit of gold, and walked one last time about the city of São Paulo de Loanda under the hot African sun. That sun was descending, and in the west a stain like blood lay upon the horizon, of terrible fine beauty. I felt a strange sorrow rising in me that I should be leaving this place, that I had so unwillingly entered. It had become my home, in these twenty years.
But England is ever the greater and truer home, no matter how wide we stray. And the ship was waiting, and I had no farewells to pay, having taken already my leave of Matamba, and Pinto Cabral being abroad on a slaving journey, and most everyone else of my African life being now in the next world: Dona Teresa, Don João, Serrão, Barbosa, Nicolau Cabral, Kinguri, and all those many others, save only, I think, the Imbe-Jaqqa Calandola, who would not die. And of him there was no leavetaking never: he rides forever in my soul, like a black fog that rises unbidden out of the depths by night.
The ship was a merchant-carrack of six hundred tons, the Santa Catalina, that was richly laden with a cargo of elephanto teeth and other such African treasure, with a mixed crew of Portugals and Spaniards. She was bound for Cadiz and then Lisbon, where I was assured of obtaining a passage to England. Her captain was a Pedro Teixeira, of great courtesy and kindness to me, who offered me a good cabin that gave me comfort. “You are old,” he said, “and they tell me you have given great service to Portugal, and I would have you sleep well of these nights.” Which was a statement that struck me deeply in two ways: for I did not inwardly comprehend that I had become old, nor would I say of myself that I had given great service to Portugal, that was my country’s enemy so long. Yet those two things were altogether true, whether I like it or like it not.
I took me only one of my blackamoor boys to accompany me, that was twelve years old; for he was greatly desirous of seeing England, but the other would not go at all, and begged to be sold in Angola, which I granted him. This boy that I took with me had no name whatever, he having forgotten it in his captivities, and I now gave him one, which was Francis, in honor of the great Drake.
On a March day of superb brilliance of the sun in Anno 1610 did we hoist our sails and make our way past the isle of Loanda and into the open sea. And I did turn, and look back at the baked earth and thick trees of Angola, and at the fortress of the city atop its hill, where I had lain prisoner. And it was as though all my life in Africa did pass in review before mine eyes at once, my warfares and my servitudes and my injuries, and my dealings with the Portugals and with the Jaqqas, and my wives and beloved women, and all of that, in one great flash that dizzied me and made me grasp at a spar to hold me upright. And a Spaniard sailor did leap toward me and say, “Lean on me, old man, and I will bear you safe.”
“I am not so old,” said I, pained to hear that word twice in the same hour, velho from the captain’s lips and viejo from the other, but the meaning being identical, and cutting identically deep. To which the boy smiled, for he was no more than three-and-twenty, and I old enough to be his father with some years to spare. In my own mind I was yet the golden-haired lad that had come out of England, but to his eyes, I fear, I seemed much parched by time, and whitened and shrunken. Well, and he smiled at me, but he did not laugh. And I said, “It was the rush of memory that unsteadied me, for I leave a land that I have dwelled in for a very great long while.”