Rushing? We have been here three weeks, Castillo, the governor said.
How can we trust what the cacique is telling us? He wants us out of his capital, he will say anything to make us leave.
His deputy said the same thing. As well the servant who was caught alongside them. Do you think they all conferred on what to say beforehand? I will remind you that I had them questioned separately.
Señor Castillo looked around him for support. But, although many of the officers agreed with him, none dared to speak so plainly to the governor and all were quite content to let him argue their case and be reprimanded in their place. His voice rose to a higher register. We cannot take their agreement for proof, he said. Remember, all of the prisoners you questioned said that Apalache had great quantities of gold. And now we know this to be untrue. We should indeed return to the coast, but we should not follow the prisoners’ advice on how to get there.
I have sent three scouting missions, the governor said, and none found a shorter trail to the ocean.
This is why I warned against letting the ships sail away while we went into the interior.
It is easy to criticize a plan when you do not have to make one. And may I add, Castillo, that your behavior since our landing in this territory has been so contrarian as to verge on the mutinous.
The word hung in the air like an accusation — you could almost see it in the way the captains shifted in their seats or looked away from Señor Castillo, as if they might be tainted by the allegation.
Señor Dorantes alone came to his friend’s defense. Don Pánfilo, Castillo was merely offering his opinion, as you yourself asked.
Reluctantly, Señor Castillo said: Don Pánfilo, it was not my intention to dispute your authority. The decision is yours.
You would do well to remember it, the governor said.
With the charge of mutiny averted, the air shifted again. The commissary picked up a walnut from the bowl at the center of the table and used the handle of his knife to crack it open.
The safest thing to do, Señor Cabeza de Vaca said, is to return to Portillo and walk from there to the port. The chief pilot did say that it was no more than twenty leagues from that point.
But Señor Dorantes objected. No, he said. We do not have enough provisions for a return march.
The treasurer picked up a rabbit bone from his plate and held it up like a piece of evidence. We can hunt, he said. There are deer, rabbit, and fowl all about …
What if the hunt does not yield enough food for everyone in the company? Do you want to see three hundred men fight over the meat? If we want to return to the coast swiftly, we need to have enough rations for six weeks at the very least.
Then what do you suggest, Dorantes?
Find a shorter way to the coast.
The governor smiled. That is why I want to go to Aute, he said. It is only eight days from here. Arm yourselves with patience, I beg you. When we return to the ships, we will continue along the coast until we find an area more appropriate for settlement. And I shall not forget those who have served His Majesty loyally.
The governor looked pointedly at Señor Cabeza de Vaca, seeking his endorsement, but the treasurer kept his eyes on his plate and remained silent, as if he feared supporting this new proposal, only to be proven wrong later and be blamed for its failure. Although there was no great enthusiasm for the plan among the captains, I think they all knew that our situation in Apalache was intolerable: we simply could not stay in the city, surrounded by so many people who wanted it back. The Indians feared muskets and were powerless against them, but our reserves of ammunition were not limitless. What would happen when we ran out?
The governor closed the meeting by saying that he would hold another council in a day or two, once all the captains had had a chance to think about the plan. Yet early the next morning, when we were still eating the morning meal, the governor sent his page to inform all the captains that he had made his decision: we were to go to Aute. Once again, I marched behind my master into the unknown, led by a governor who, though he retained the use of one eye, was the blindest man I had ever met.
8. THE STORY OF SEVILLE
All around me, voices rose and fell. Shackled slaves spoke in an overlapping multitude of languages, this one asking after an uncle, this other comforting a child, and yet these others arguing about a piece of moldy bread, their cries periodically interrupted by the bleating of goats from the animal stalls. But for a long time, I kept to my silence, wrapping myself in it like an old, comfortable cloak. I think I was still trying to apprehend the consequences of what I had done. For hours on end, I revisited the long sequence of events that had led me from the soft divans and rhythmic guenbris of my graduation feast to the timber bench and jangling chains of the caravel Jacinta, sailing with frightening speed toward the city of Seville. I had played my part in these events — I had made my decisions freely and independently at each juncture, and yet I was stunned by the turn my life had taken. The elders teach us: give glory to God, who can alter all fates. One day you could be selling slaves, the next you could be sold as a slave.
The hunger I had felt so keenly in Azemmur was tamed now, if not satisfied, by the hard bread the sailors distributed once a day, though it was quickly replaced by a renewed acquaintance with all of my body’s other senses and needs. My head itched from the lice my neighbor, an old man with pockmarks dotting his face, had given me. My soiled clothes stuck to my skin, because I could not bring myself to use, on command and with little notice, the bucket that was passed up and down the gallery twice a day. My limbs grew stiff from sitting in damp and narrow quarters. My throat hurt, my feet swelled, my wrists bled. Above all, my heart ached with longing for my family.
My family. They had, all of them, learned to accept their fates. Without complaint my sister had spent her girlhood watching over our twin brothers, and without protest she had returned home after her divorce. My brothers went to school every day hoping to fulfill my father’s dreams, dreams I had cruelly broken and then bequeathed to them. My mother had left her beloved people and her distinguished hometown in order to follow my father to Azemmur.
As for me, I had made a habit of defying my fate. Perhaps I could do that now and find a way back to my old life. I thought of the elder al-Dib, my employer in Azemmur, who had been born to a slavewoman, but had earned his freedom as a youth. Perhaps I could do the same. Perhaps my talent would be recognized by my master, who would let me purchase my freedom; or perhaps my misery would touch the heart of an Andalusian Muslim, who would free me from bondage in order to earn the favor of our Lord. To overcome my fear, I shackled myself with hope, its links heavier than any metal known to man.
Having convinced myself that my condition was temporary, I set about trying to survive it. I taught myself to ignore the stench of excretions, the moans of delirium, the sight of private parts. I learned to push back into my throat the rising taste of vomit. I tried to watch out for the rats. I slept only when my exhaustion overpowered my discomfort. And I passed the time by listening to the stories the women told their children, after the guards had left and the doors were locked for the night. In the darkness of the lower deck, the women brought to life a world entire, a world where sly girls outwitted hungry ghouls and where simple cobblers saved powerful sultans, so that at times it seemed to me I could see the ghouls’ sharp teeth or the sultan’s embroidered slippers.
Then, early one morning, the anchor was dropped, its tug faintly resonating through the varnished wood under my feet. I listened to the footsteps on the upper deck. Did the customs officer come aboard to greet the captain? Was that the stevedore inquiring about the merchandise? Then at last the deck door was flung wide open. A rush of cold air blasted into the lower deck, where it met with the suppressed heat and terrified silence of two hundred slaves. Row by row, we were unshackled and led up the stairs.