Paradise & More (Torres Family Saga) (51 page)

      
“You are a good and true friend and do me great honor, Guacanagari,” Aaron said as he sat beside the
cacique
. They were alone in Guacanagari's private retiring room. Magdalena was with the village women, bathing and refreshing herself after their long, arduous journey from Xaragua. Although healing nicely, Aaron's arm still ached abominably after the long ride from Roldan's stronghold.

      
“Aliyah was buried according to your customs, with the full honors due a royal princess. I watched the elders in Xaragua do it properly.”

      
“You do me great honor, too, my friend,” Guacanagari said. “We have spoken enough of sad things. Let us now plan how we may find Navaro.” He clapped his hands and summoned several nobles.

      
Finding the beautiful babe did not prove an easy task. No one in even the remotest village had heard about or seen a blue-eyed Taino boy. Aaron and his Taino friends traveled the length and breadth off Española, from village to village. Since the great battle in the Vega, the countryside was mostly pacified. The searchers were accepted freely everywhere they went as emissaries of the great
cacique
of Marien, but no one could aid them in their quest for the boy.

      
Perhaps Aliyah lied. Magdalena may have been right when she voiced her fear that Aliyah had killed her own child. This dying tale was merely her way of leaving me to hope for the impossible for the rest of my life.
Aaron rode into Guacanagari's village, more dispirited and exhausted than he had felt since learning the fate of his family.

      
Magdalena watched him dismount at the fenced-in area where the horses were kept. He began to unsaddle Rubio and rub him down. She knew his search had been in vain. Sighing, she clutched the missive she had been carrying to her breast. Perhaps it and her other news might hearten him. She called out his name just as he gave Rubio an affectionate swat and released the great bay into the confines of the enclosure.

      
He turned at once and opened his arms to embrace her, crushing her to him and burying his face in her fragrant hair. “Magdalena, I have missed you so, my heart,” he murmured. Then, feeling the paper she held crushed between them, he held her at arm's length and asked, “What have you here?”

      
She smiled. “Something to cheer you, I hope, for I know the search goes ill. Tis a letter from your uncle Isaac, all the way from France.”

      
“Have you read it?” he asked eagerly, taking it from her.

      
“Of course not. Twas addressed to you,” she replied primly.

      
He returned her smile, broke the seal, and unrolled the parchment. Quickly he scanned the contents, then his smile broadened. “He has Mateo's son Alejandro safely out of Barcelona now. Isaac and Ruth will raise the boy and Ana's little Olivia with all the love and care they lavish on their own grandchildren.”

      
“I am so happy for them. Part of Benjamin and Serafina lives on in those children,” she said, working up her courage for her next announcement.

      
He again pulled her to him and they began to stroll leisurely toward the village. “Uncle Isaac also says he wants us to return to live with them. There is wealth aplenty and much I could do to help him with the importing business he has begun.”

      
“Us? I know you wrote to him of our marriage, but word of it cannot have reached him yet. And besides,” she added uneasily, “I am outside their faith. Somehow I suspect Isaac is not as tolerant as his brother.”

      
“Isaac and Ruth will love you, I promise. The life there would be much more comfortable than here, Magdalena. You and I cannot return to Castile, but in France we would be safe—able to live with all the amenities of wealth that you gave up to pursue me.”

      
She touched his lips with her fingertips to silence him as they paused in the middle of the open clearing, a man, sun-bronzed and dressed as a Taino warrior, and a woman with loose, flowing hair spilling over her shoulders, robed in soft folds of gold cotton cloth. “I was raised with few of the amenities—only stubborn Castilian pride and it takes naught of wealth for me to keep that! When I lived at court, amid all the finery my father's stolen money could buy, I was most desperately unhappy. Aaron, I—”

      
A loud cry of greeting and the pounding of hooves cut short her words as Francisco Roldan galloped up to the embracing couple and swung down from his heaving mount. He made what passed as a courtly bow to her, then clapped Aaron on the back heartily. “God's bones, I am mightily weary. Tis good to see you safe returned. My Taino friends to the south said you were making for Guacanagari's village.”

      
“Yes, again without a word of Navaro,” Aaron replied soberly.

      
Roldan shook his great shaggy head in sorrow. “I, too, must report that my search the length and breadth of the peninsula of Xaragua has yielded nothing. I am certain the boy is not here. If Aliyah sent him away, she sent him to a tribe far distant.”

      
Magdalena watched Aaron control his emotions with great effort. He, too, had noted Roldan's use of the word “if.” “We are grateful for your aid in the search,” she said, then added, “Please, I go to prepare our evening meal. You will sup with us and I will have Guacanagari's servants prepare you a
bohio
in which to sleep.”

      
“And any other accoutrements you may need will be readily available—if you but ask the women of the village yourself,” Aaron added as the two men led Roldan's horse to be rubbed down and put to pasture.

      
As Magdalena walked toward the village, both men's eyes followed her. “I envy you your lady, my friend.”

      
“Would you turn from your roistering ways and settle down to honest toil and matrimony?” Aaron asked half in disbelief.

      
“I would have a measure of peace, yes. I grow weary of the bloodshed. Once I thought I could protect the Indians who allied with me because as a white
cacique
the government would respect my claims, but even if I could keep the Colons out, I cannot maintain peace. Each month more ships arrive filled with gold seekers.” He sighed heavily.

      
Aaron watched Roldan work the big chestnut with powerful strokes of the rub rag. “Are you saying you will agree to my good offices as mediator with the Colons?”

      
Francisco paused and turned, his shrewd brown eyes glowing as they met Aaron's level blue ones. “Back in Xaragua you offered such, and I said I would think on it...and I have. Yes, I would make peace with the Admiral of the Ocean Sea and his
adelantado
, if they will hear reasonable terms.”

      
“Which are?” Aaron prompted.

      
Roldan rubbed his neck. “First, I would value not having this stretched. I hear they have kept the gallows in Ysabel quite busy here of late. And...” he hesitated as he resumed rubbing down the horse, “I have two caravels loaded with prime brazilwood—which as you know I cannot sell in any port in Castile unless I give over a share to the governor and he allows the ships to sail.”

      
“There is also the royal fifth to be paid,” Aaron reminded him.

      
“Done—if I am allowed to keep the ships for future ventures. The crews are loyal to me.”

      
“They mutinied when sent from Cadiz to supply the colonists at Ysabel,” Aaron said.

      
“You know how unpopular the Genoese are and what chaos reigned in Ysabel when first they arrived. But I have kept the ships safe and gathered a highly profitable cargo in the meanwhile. Surely that should give me a share of ownership.” He waited, his shrewd gaze studying his companion.

      
“You drive a hard bargain,” Aaron replied grudgingly.

      
Roldan laughed. “That should make the Genoese admire my skills all the more!”

      
Together the two men returned to the village for food and rest, but a runner from Ysabel had arrived just before them and Guacanagari summoned him to his audience chamber. After all the introductions were completed, Aaron read the missive from Cristobal.

      
A frown marred his forehead as he said, “Hojeda has escaped to the interior, where he will doubtless stir up more grief.”

      
“This news distresses you, my friend. Surely one man, even one such as this can do no harm before he is captured by Don Cristobal,” Guacanagari said.

      
“Let us hope so, but we must act quickly before he can break the peace so hard won in the interior.” Aaron's gaze shifted from Guacanagari to Roldan and then a smile twitched at the corners of his lips. “Perhaps this is your means to redeem yourself. You know Alonso well.”

      
“A cocky little bastard but a hell of a man to have on your side in a fight,” Francisco replied.

      
“I would as leave never turn my back to his blade, but if he trusts you...” Aaron let his words fade suggestively.

      
“I catch the drift of your idea. Yes, I suppose I might convince Alonso that service under the Colons is to be preferred to service over a gallows. If I can be pardoned, mayhap so can he.”

      
“Only if he will cease his butchering of Tainos. I think it best if he sailed for Cadiz as soon as he is properly received back into the good graces of the governor. I shall send Magdalena ahead to treat with Cristobal and Bartolome. She has more influence with them than anyone. If we bring Alonso to heel, I think things will go well for you both.”

      
“I believe Alonso will be delighted with the prospect of returning home. He can wring little gold from the Tainos and since Caonabo, Behechio, and even the formidable Roldan are all brought to recognize the crown and its representatives, he will find Española a tame and useless place indeed!” Roldan replied in the Taino tongue.

      
Even Guacanagari joined their jovial smiles.

      
If the men were all well pleased with their plan, Magdalena was not. When they returned to their
bohio
, Aaron sat down and extracted his writing instruments from his saddle bags. Before he could begin to pen a letter to Cristobal, Magdalena rounded on him.

      
“Men, pah! You and Francisco will go off chasing that vicious little cur while I must lobby for him with the governor. Let Francisco risk his life on Hojeda. Why should you?”

      
He looked up at her in surprise. “You were fortunate that Roldan championed you against Guzman and Guerra. Do you not wish to see him pardoned?”

      
Magdalena knelt by his side, earnest entreaty in her eyes. “Of course I do. I am most grateful for his help, but I do not see why we must include Alonso Hojeda in the bargain—or why you must go chasing after him. He is dangerous, Aaron.”
And there is so much else I long to share with you, if only the time is right
.

      
“I am the commandant of the interior, at least for now. 'Tis my duty to apprehend an escaped prisoner.”

      
Magdalena signed. “I suppose you must do this, but what after? I would have you resign as commandant.” She held her breath.

      
“I owe Cristobal much. Let me think on it. Will you to Ysabel to plead Roldan's cause?”

      
Her soft smile was his answer as she framed his face with her hands and kissed him. “Tomorrow you will ride after Hojeda. Tonight I will ride you.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

      
Cristobal Colon was a weary man. He sat at the heavy wooden table in his private office, staring at the charts and navigational instruments as he ran his gnarled fingers over the smooth pages of his log book from the first voyage. “Such beauty, such strange lands we chart among these islands, but where lies Cathay? Where Cipangu? Where is the great mainland of Asia?”

      
He ached to feel the rolling rhythm of ship's planks beneath his feet. How he hated the flat calm of the cold stone floor upon which he now spent his days. The letters and instructions arriving with disturbing regularity from the Majesties indicated their extreme displeasure with the fiscal return from his explorations, and more particularly their displeasure with his colonial policies in governing Española.

      
The enslaved, rebellious Tainos sent as tribute to the monarchy mostly died enroute. They made poor servants, being of weak physical constitutions in the colder climates of Europe. Everywhere, in Castile and on Española, they perished from the most minor of European diseases. The queen had been able to send pitifully few clergy to convert them to the true faith. He sighed, recalling the butchery when men with cannon and arbalest fired into the human walls of Tainos armed only with puny darts and wooden spears. “We offer them only death and that without salvation for their souls.”

      
If only he could find the mainland with its vast wealth, great cities, and brilliant civilizations. Then all his failure here on Española would be forgotten, but as long as the contentious Castilian nobility poured in and out of Ysabel, fighting among themselves and abusing the Indians, he was chained to his civil post.

      
His eyes, red-rimmed from a recent bout of inflammation, again scanned the royal missive. Soon his enemies at court would be gratified, for a royal chamberlain, Juan Aguado, was on his way to investigate all the claims of malfeasance laid by Buil, Margarite and a host of other Castilians against the Colon family and most especially against him as governor. He had already sent his youngest brother back to plead his case at court, but it seemed Diego had little effect on the royal politics.