The Gold Eaters Page 5

  Within a fortnight the prisoner suddenly falls ill, racked by sweats and chills, babbling deliriously, his life running from every pore and orifice. Each day he is thinner and weaker. The Commander begins to fear he won’t pull through. How easily these Indians die! Everywhere Spaniards have been in the Indies—the Caribbean, Mexico, Panama—it’s as though the mere smell of a Christian is enough to kill the natives. Measles, mumps, chickenpox, even a cold, cut healthy men and women down like babes. To say nothing of smallpox, the deadliest plague of all, but luckily Felipillo does not seem to have that.

  “Well, Father?” Pizarro asks the camp’s priest, who has spent much time on this expedition ministering to the sick. “What’s wrong with my interpreter? Will he live? If he won’t, give him the rites. But first baptise him. Christen him Felipe.”

  “Why Felipe, Commander? We’re nowhere near Saint Philip’s Day.”

  Pizarro shoots a withering glance at the weedy, black-frocked young churchman—how dare he question an order—then relents.

  “He’s been called Felipillo ever since we found him. He may as well come by the name honestly. And mind you pray well for his life—for your sake as much as his. Christen him now.”

  —

  Waman slowly crawls back from the borderland of death. All his life he has enjoyed good health. Now he knows what it is to feel old, to be weak and worn, to be sucked like a drowning dog into the underworld. Sometimes he woke from his delirium to moonlight falling from a window, burning his eyes like the sun no matter how tightly he shut them. His skin was on fire. His hands looked unfamiliar, like another’s; or some animal’s claw, a bear’s, a crab’s. He willed them to leap at his throat but they wouldn’t stir. He begged Mother Moon to take him: Mama Killa, yanarimuway, wañuchirimuway. Hina kachun. Please help me, please kill me. May it be so.

  Now he is glad Lady Moon didn’t heed his prayers, that he lives after all, in rekindled hope of going home, of killing these barbarians or at least escaping before they make him lead them back to the World. Dimly he recalls one in a black gown like a widow coming to his bedside, uttering long incantations, sprinkling him with water, saying Pilipi. A sorcerer? Is that what brought him back to life?

  The Old One was there too. ¿Cómo te llamas? he kept saying. Why was he speaking of llamas? They have none.

  But now he knows.

  Wamanmi sutiy. My name is Waman.

  ¡No! The Old One again. A curse, a cuff on the head. ¿Cómo te llamas?

  Pi-li-pi my name.

  Better. Say it better, Felipillo!

  I am called Felipe.

  To himself he adds, Qanllarayku. Only by you.

  The lessons resume with Candía, the big man with the thicket of raven beard, and with Tomás the cookboy. Molina sometimes comes too, good-humouredly correcting their pronunciation. Soon Waman has a smattering of the barbarian tongue. His first words are questions. Where are his shipmates? What happened after he blacked out? His teachers try to be evasive, but the Greek and the Spaniard are talkative by nature. Little by little Waman learns something of that day.

  He is healthier now, built up with extra rations. But when the Old One at last unbolts the chain and lets him walk outside—unsteady on weak legs, yet still with a heavy shackle on one ankle—Waman sees that most of the barbarians look as underfed as they did when he got here. One-Eye still raids the mainland if the winds are fair, but each time he comes back with less food. And with fewer men and horses.

  On the island itself there is nothing to eat but crabs and limpets and mangrove nuts, a seal if they are lucky, or a thin broth of barnacles and seaweed. Waman is set to work digging shellfish or casting his net from the small boat, chained to a thwart and rowed out to likely spots. But the weather is seldom good enough to go to sea. For weeks they are stranded by thunderstorms and drenching rains, by great waves crashing on reefs and headlands. The days crawl as if the sun were slowing in the sky. Men die—three or four taken each week by fever, scurvy, knife fights, festered wounds. Waman hopes some of these deaths are his own work, for when he can he befouls the food he brings them, adding seal dung, even his own filth, and bad herbs that he has seen the horses never touch. Once, he believes, he killed in a manly way—hurling a stone at the head of one foraging in a pool among the rocks. Waman did not linger to make sure, but he heard a sound like the cracking of an egg, saw the man pitch forward into the water. With that deed he has begun to fulfill his vow.

  Even though the Old One allows himself more food than his men, Pizarro is growing hollow-faced and sickly, the whites of his eyes almost as yellow as the irises, the beard sparser and greyer. How old can he be: fifty? sixty? Waman can’t easily tell, and those he asks don’t seem to know. Certainly much older than all except Almagro, who has about the same years. But One-Eye seems more vigorous, as if feeding on his anger. The Old One is withdrawn by nature, stern, saying little, watching all. At first Waman took him to be better bred—a man in command of himself, as those who lead must be. But now Pizarro’s temper is no better than Almagro’s. The two leaders snap at each other like hounds, slapping the hilts of their great knives, shouting torrents of harsh words.

  In desperation, for it is risky on many counts, Pizarro sends one ship back to Panama with Almagro and Pilot Ruiz to resupply and recruit fresh men.

  They are gone more than a month.

  Sight of the returning sail sparks jubilation in the camp. All rush to the beach to greet them, even the lame and sick. But once Almagro lands, the Commander hears his news in wrath and disbelief. The ship brings food, but no reinforcements, no new men, no horses. Worst, Almagro comes with strict orders from the Governor of Panama: all who wish to leave Pizarro’s failing enterprise must be allowed to sail home without delay.

  Home? Not mine, Waman thinks. Now the barbarians don’t need him, they will kill him. Or maroon him here to starve. His parents will never know what befell him, or even where to find his bones. And he will never be able to make amends to them and Tika.

  He wishes he had killed the Commander before things came to this, had crushed the Old One’s head with a stone in the night.

  —

  Two days later, at dawn, Pizarro summons the men to the bay where both ships ride at anchor. When all have assembled—what a sorry lot in rags and rust!—he draws his sword and holds it high, the risen sun flashing from its blade into the sunken eyes around.

  “Friends and comrades. In His mercy the Lord God has looked kindly on us, and His weather smiles at last. You have all suffered. And I no less than you.” Hearing a snort, a guffaw, Pizarro halts and searches the faces like a bird of prey. “We have all suffered,” he goes on. “But our suffering is not in vain. You have seen the wealth we took from the Indian ship—gold, silver, silk, plump bags of jewels. Such goods and riches have never been seen in the Indies before, not even in Mexico. The Indian boy Felipillo can now speak. He tells of a southern kingdom with many ships, much gold, great cities, and strange camels like those on the drawings we saw years ago in Panama. What else can this be but the golden kingdom of Peru? That land still has her maidenhead. Let us go there and take it!”

  Another murmur from the men. Sounds of doubt, unrest.

  Enough! some call. No more of your dreams, Pizarro.

  The Commander lowers his sword and scratches a line on the beach. Then shakes his blade at the north.

  “That way, men, lies Panama. Panama—and poverty.”

  He turns to the south and strides across his line.

  “This way lies risk—and riches. One ship will go north. The other south. Let each man choose. I choose Peru.”

  Pilot Ruiz is first to join him. Not because he trusts the Commander—far from it—but because he believes most firmly that the golden land is there. He will not let the honour of finding it fall to another. Candía and Molina follow (even though Felipe has said less about his homeland than Pizarro cl
aims). Several more break from their fellows and shuffle, almost apologetically, across the line. All but a few are men who were on the Santa Elena when she met the trading vessel, men who not only have seen pieces of gold and silver produced from a strongbox but who saw in that strange ship, as big as their own, a sighting of Peru.

  Pizarro waits in silence. No others come. With small nods he counts them. Only a dozen. Too few to fight. But enough to explore.

  4

  The Santa Elena runs fleeter than before, cleaving the waves with a hull newly scraped and tarred. And this time there’s enough to eat on board, a share of the food from Panama.

  Late one afternoon about a month out from Gallo Island, Waman sees a familiar smudge of land beneath the white crest of the highlands floating on the haze. That night he smells the World on the wind. In the morning he guides Pilot Ruiz up a mangroved channel, into the harbour from which he ran to sea. The caravel drops anchor, away from any freighters and the Empire’s troopships.

  So strange to be home, thinks Waman. And home so strange. On the rise are the buildings of Tumbes, layered streets and houses crowned by the great temple with its steep roof flashing golden in the sun. Only months ago he left this place, walked its streets, yet each month seems a year. Tumbes was never his city. But this is his land, his country—a notion new to him. The smells of home are overwhelming now: tarred ships, dunged fields, cooking fires, baked fish, steamed corn. And sounds. A crowd has gathered on beach and jetty and rooftops; above the din of voices drifts the music he most loves—flutes, drums, tambourines, and the breathy rasp of great pan-pipes as long as the men who play them.

  Could anyone he knows be here? Only by chance. Little River is three days away and the Santa Elena could not have been sighted until yesterday. Yet Waman cups his eyes and scans the onlookers until clothes and faces all begin to seem the same, till he doubts he can remember what his parents and his cousin even look like. Mother, Father, Tika, Grandfather . . . have they forgiven him? And will they know him after all he’s done and seen? The Old One has dressed him in Spanish clothes, in a loose white shirt, green velvet cap, leather britches buttoned down the side. But it is more than a matter of clothing. Perhaps, Waman fears, the new growth in him contains too much of these barbarians. He knows them now. He can speak their tongue, if badly. He can even play a little of their music. A few he has come to regard as friends. Candía the Greek, Tomás the slave, Molina. How is that possible when he has also killed some of them, or tried to? It’s as if he was some other youth back then when he last saw Tumbes, someone who shares his body and his boyhood but is no longer himself.

  Waman or Felipe? First he received his grown-up name from his grandfather. Now he has become Felipe also, a name that has something to do with their god. A god perhaps as mighty as they say, for this Tius has given them many fine things. Yet also a cruel god, for he makes them suffer so. Waman has grown used to his Christian name, though it took him a long time to pronounce it. He only wishes they would call him that and nothing more. It is Felipillo he detests—Little Philip—as if he were still a child.

  Waman is a man’s name. Hawk. Nothing little about that.

  He takes off his cap and waves it. He searches the crowd again. A few wave back, but not as if they know him.

  Tomás comes up, sheepish, holding shackle and chain. “The Commander thinks you might be tempted by a swim.” Indeed. Waman hasn’t changed so much he wouldn’t run from the bearded ones at the first chance. Before sinking into the dank hold, he looks around once more at the painted houses, the busy streets, the Emperor’s great buildings—the stone bulk of the fortress, the gilded temple. His dread of what might happen next is as strong now as his joy at coming home.

  Commander Pizarro casts a sour eye over his dozen men. Hotheads and rogues. Mere youngsters with nanny-goat beards. And these the best, the quickest: those bold enough to turn their backs on Panama and their eyes to Peru. His first move, he decides, is to send one man ashore with gifts for the ruler of the city: a red velvet cap, a Venetian goblet, a pair of trussed hogs. He picks Molina for this task. Not the most dependable fellow, but the most expendable.

  Molina is gone for some hours. His shipmates wait uneasily on deck, Candía at the guns, a small brazier on hand to light the matchcords if need be. It is mid-afternoon before they see Molina shouting and waving from the beach, then wading out to the ship like a madman in a lather until chest deep in soupy water.

  “Lower the tender,” Pizarro orders, “and fish out that fool before he drowns.”

  Molina comes aboard like Neptune, trailing weed and foam, raving of the comeliness of the women, the friendliness of the men, the wealth of a “mosque” he has seen—adorned with gold, silver, precious stones.

  Before he can be calmed and questioned thoroughly, there is movement on the water. A raft is punting out to the ship, a raft with a white awning and a man seated in its shade.

  “Tomás,” Pizarro calls, “bring up Felipillo. Mind you put that heavy doublet on him, the one with the weights sewn in.”

  Waman emerges from below, blinking in the light, sweating from sudden heat and heavy clothes. The Old One inspects him, checking the jacket is tightly fastened. “That stays on whenever you’re on deck,” Pizarro warns. “You jump, you sink.”

  The raft is alongside now, and Waman sees it is laden with mouth-watering things from home: fruit, vegetables, a heap of roasted meat steaming on a salver. Under the canopy sits a high official of the Empire, wearing a tightly wound red turban, golden discs covering his ears, and a splendid tunic of many-coloured frets.

  Accepting Pizarro’s outstretched hand, the official climbs nimbly aboard the Santa Elena. He is in middle years, finely lined about the eyes, his chin furrowed and freshly tweezered; about the same height as the Old One, yet stockier, more strongly built, with the barrel chest of a highlander. The short haircut of the Empire’s lords shows grey at his temples below the headcloth.

  Candía keeps an arquebus trained on the visitor from the poop deck. Pizarro seems ill at ease, stroking his beard, probing an ear with his finger.

  “Little Philip! Greet this Indian warmly. Welcome him aboard. Tell him I come to kiss the hands of his king. If he’s the king himself, I’ll kiss them now.”

  When the official hears the boy—whom he took from his clothing to be one of the outlanders—addressing him in the Empire’s language, surprise ripples the mask of his face. The ripple is instantly smoothed, the mask restored. He leans in closely to Waman.

  “So you know their tongue?”

  The interpreter nods, struggling to find voice before this nobleman, fighting a tightness in his chest at the first words from home he’s heard in months.

  “Good. You will tell me everything they say. Exactly as they say it. But everything I say, on the other hand, you will convey with the greatest courtesy their barbarous tongue allows. You will speak sweetly. If I ask when they’ll be going back where they came from, you will say, for example, ‘How long will our esteemed visitors have the kindness to favour us with their presence.’ Always like that.”

  Waman does his best, unsure whom he fears more: the Old One or this Emperor’s man. He knows his Castilian is still flawed. And his Quechua leaves much to be desired, lacking the polish and crisp accent of this highland lord. Still, he speaks it better than most in Little River, because his mother and Tika, having come from the highlands, sometimes spoke it at home—especially when they didn’t want him to overhear.

  The official thanks Pizarro for the gifts sent with Molina, then strides casually about the deck of the strange ship, beguiling the foreigners with an easy manner, asking about her construction and her gear like one seaman to another. He is also curious about the animals, the swine, the ship’s cat—the only Spanish animal not eaten on the island—who is sunning herself on the rail. Are there bigger animals below, creatures like llamas on which, he’s heard, these idlers rid
e?

  Waman says he saw such beasts at the barbarian camp in the hotlands but they all died and there are none on board.

  So much is impossible to render. How to translate compass, cannon? Even hog and cat aren’t easy. Eventually he recalls words for the wild swine and small spotted cats of the jungle.

  After a long inspection, the Emperor’s man comes to the point. “Three things. Where have these vagabonds come from? Why are they here? What do they want? Be sure to ask sweetly.”

  “This lord asks from what land the esteemed Christians hail. To what end do they favour his humble city with their visit? And in what way can he best fulfill their needs?”

  “Tell him we come in friendship,” Pizarro replies. “We bring him greetings from King Charles, the greatest prince in the world, and we bring him good news of the True Faith, so his soul may live forever.”

  At this, Pilot Ruiz steps forward, tapping Pizarro on the shoulder. “Let’s not forget the Requirement, Don Francisco. We must read it to him now. Before . . . anything happens. Anything that might stain the blessed soul of His Majesty. To say nothing of your soul and mine. I’ll fetch it.” Ruiz goes briskly to his cabin.

  “Now, Felipillo,” Pizarro says. “Ask this Indian where we are and who he is. What rank does he hold? Is he a king? What land is this? Have we reached Peru?”

  Waman has never been able to answer them about their imaginary land of Peru. He knows the name of his hometown and of this port. Also the capital, the great city of Cusco—far to the south and high in the mountains—and a few other places he’s heard his family and others speak of. But he has never heard of anywhere called Peru. Or even that his country has a name. As far as he knows, it is simply the Empire. Or the World.