"Where is everyone?" Malcolm wondered aloud: "There should be a watch set, even in this storm."
Kit cupped hands over his eyes to blink them clear of streaming rain. "Probably at the fort," he decided. "The wall's higher, stouter in case of emergencies. We'll try there."
When they stumbled between the houses into "town square" they halted in unison. The residents of Lourengo Marques had set up a crude pillory along one side of the square. Hanging from the stocks was a familiar, grizzled figure. Malcolm and Kit glanced swiftly around but saw no sign that anyone was watching. The whole town was shut up tight against the storm. Malcolm got to him first. Koot van Beek was dead, Had been dead for several hours, maybe as long as a day. Kit was ashen in the wild flares of lighting.
Margo ...
They searched the body for signs of violence, but found no trace of systematic torture. Malcolm swallowed once, then followed Kit through ankle-deep mud past an idle blacksmith's forge, what was clearly a cooper's workshop, and a small gristmill. In the distance, the fort's rough wooden gates were shut.
"Lean against me," Kit muttered from cover of the gristmill.
"You're older, more likely to succumb to exhaustion. You lean against me. I know enough Portuguese to get by until you `come around.' "
Kit didn't argue. He just draped one arm across Malcolm's shoulder and let his weight sag. Malcolm hastily slid an arm around Kit's back. All right, we're shipwrecked Jesuits who've struggled up the coast in a terrible storm ... .
He half carried Kit across the open, muddy ground toward the gates. "Help! Hello inside, help us!" Malcolm shouted in rough Portuguese, heavily accented with Basque pronunciation. "In the name of Christ, help us!"
A suspicious sentry appeared at the top of the wall. "Who are you? Where have you come from?"
"We are Jesuits! Father Francis Xavier sent us to you from Goa. Our ship went down in this storm, south of here! This is Lourengo Marques, is it not? Please God let it be..."
The sentry's eyes had gone wide. A hasty shout relayed Malcolm's message. A moment later the gates creaked open. Then Portuguese traders swarmed outside, lifting Kit's stumbling figure to carry him while others supported Malcolm. He staggered like a man in the final stages of exhaustion and allowed his escort to take most of his weight.
The residents of Lourengo Marques stank of onions, sweat, and dirt. Their voluminous, slashed breeches needed washing. Food and wine stained leather jerkins and slashed velvet doublets. Malcolm saw at least six professional soldiers in leather armor, half of them carrying matchlock arquebus carbines rendered useless by the storm. They'd drawn wicked swords which they now resheathed, but the other half of the military detachment, carrying steel crossbows, remained alert until the gates had been closed and barred once again.
Other men had come running, dressed as rough tradesmen and humble farmers. Many carried long pikes and daggers. One burly bear of a man carried what looked like an honest-to-God wheel lock rifle. Another man carried an enormous, full-length matchlock arquebus. None of these men wore helmets; only a few possessed leather jerkins. Six professional soldiers and a surprisingly well armed auxiliary of tradesmen and farmers. And those fellows over there look like sailors. Malcolm counted five men who had probably been left behind by the last ship, to recover from illness or be buried.
Shortly, Malcolm and Kit found themselves in a grimy, smoke-filled room which was clearly the best accommodation in the fort. Real chairs stood around a scarred wooden table covered with the remains of the evening meal. A real bed stood in the corner. A man in plate armor-at least a chest and back plate -- blinked when they came in, then lowered a "high-tech" wheel lock handgun and carefully pulled back its "dog," making it somewhat safer, although still loaded and ready for use.
"Sergeant Braz, who are these men, where have they come from?"
The sergeant said importantly, "They were sent by Father Francis Xavier to us, Governor, but their ship was wrecked in this storm. I don't know any more than that."
Kit coughed violently and moaned. The soldiers carrying him asked anxiously, "May we put the Father in your bed, Governor?"
"Of course, of course. Hurry, the good Father is exhausted and ill." The governor tucked his pistol into his belt and helped lower Kit into his own bed.
Kit gasped and clutched at his benefactor's hand. "Bless you, my son," he whispered faintly. "God has preserved us in an un-Christian land." Then his eyelids fluttered closed.
Malcolm hastened to his side. He knelt and clutched Kit's hand, giving every evidence of terror. "Father Almada..." Malcolm turned to the anxious Portuguese. "Have you any hot broth? He is exhausted from fighting the sea and then we had to walk miles and miles up your treacherous coast. I feared God would call him away before we saw your walls."
"You sound like a Basque," one of the men dressed as an artisan said excitedly. Another had gone in search of something to feed their unexpected visitors.
"Yes, I am Father Edrigu Xabat. I had the grace to be ordained in Rome by the General of our Order, Father Loyola. Father Almada is ..."
Kit "roused" with a faint moan. "Where ... where are we, Edrigu?"
"God has delivered us safely to these Christian men, Inigo, praised be His name." One of the farmers handed Malcolm a cup. "Oh, bless you, my son ..."
Malcolm held it to Kit's lips and helped him drink hot soup, then consented to eat some himself. It was terrible, no salt, no pepper, watery and thin-but it was hot. Kit struggled to sit up, then begged to know who their rescuers were.
"I am Vilibaldo de Oliveira Salazar, the military governor of Lourengo Marques," the governor introduced himself proudly, sweeping a courtly bow. He was a small man with sharp eyes and a thin face. He wore expensive velvet garments under his armor despite the grime. "This is Joao Braz, the Sergeant of my command, and these are my soldiers, Francisco, Amaro, Lorenco, Mauricio, Ricardo."
The soldiers saluted sharply.
The big man with the wheel lock rifle shuffled forward. "Please, Father, I am Rolando Goulart, a humble blacksmith. I speak for the artisans of Lourengo Marques when I bid you welcome. This is Bastien, my assistant."
Bastien was the man who'd been so excited by Malcolm's Basque name and accent.
"And this is Vincente, our butcher and tanner, Huberto the miller, Nicolau the cooper, Xanti our baker, and Mikel his assistant..." More Basques, Malcolm realized. The farmers and husbands who tended the community's herds also proved to be Basques: Narikis, Mikolas, Peli, Kepa, Posper, and Satordi.
The other five men were stranded sailors, as Malcolm had suspected. Three were Portuguese, introducing themselves shyly as Rodrigo, Adao, and Pedro. Erroman and Zadornin were both Basques. There were no women in evidence.
"Please," Vilibaldo de Oliveira Salazar begged, "if you are strong enough, Father Almada, tell us of yourselves and your misfortunes."
Kit rose to the occasion with wonderfully fluent Portuguese, embroidering on Malcolm's original tale. He described the conditions in Goa and Father Francis Xavier's concern that the men here at this desolate outpost had no priests to confess or shrive them. He elaborated on their harrowing journey back to Africa from India, described the terrifying shipwreck which had drowned all the ship's company sparing only the two of them, spoke with tears in his eyes and a choked voice of reading last rites to the crashing waves, then of their struggle up the coast, praying that they stumbled in the direction of the outpost, not deeper into trackless wilderness ...
Even Malcolm was impressed.
Several of the men cleared their throats and stamped their feet to hide their own emotions. Vilibaldo insisted they change out of their sodden cassocks into something warm and dry, producing good quality, simple tunics and cloaks in which they wrapped themselves. The farmers hung their wet things to dry in one corner of the room. Vilibaldo then broke out wine and shared it around, making certain his new priests were warm and comfortable. The governor spoke of the hardships they had endured in the outpost, the troubles they had with the natives who stole Portuguese cattle or ran their own cattle through the grain fields, destroying the crops utterly, and the illnesses which had befallen them, the men they'd lost.