Taino (23 page)

None had thoughts of farming at that moment, and I certainly don't believe anymore that even one of them had the Christian mission in mind. Father Buil, the ranking cleric, was an ornery, gnarled man. Nothing kind or inspired came out of him, though he talked incessantly, particularly at the admiral, who heard him out with absent mind. Buil, the buzzard, we called him, talked a lot about the Grand Khan and dreamed of establishing relations for his order of the Benedictines.

It was late November 1493 when we came upon the Navidad coast. As always, canoes from small fishing villages came out to greet us. The admiral meant to press on, but for several days the winds strongly disfavored us. One canoe that circled the admiral's ship I recognized. It had the three-line mark of Guacanagari's
caciquedom
. Two of the men seated in it were uncles of the young
cacique
.

“Taíno-ti, uncles of our great
cacique
friend,” I greeted them as they came within earshot. “Can you see that the covered men from Heaven have returned?”

They nodded at me and paddled close to where I stood on deck. “We are glad to see the double tongue,” they said and fell silent. They asked not for the Guamíquina, and their silence was ominous. I threw them a line of rope that they could hold. The older subchief stood in the canoe. “We would speak with the young Taíno two-tongue,” he said. “Quietly, let us converse a day ourselves.”

I sat in the low hold, the rope in my hand. “A horrible fight has taken place,” the elder said, beginning a story that lasted all afternoon and ended with the words: “The covered men left by the Guamíquina are all dead.”

One hundred five.
How Fort Navidad was overrun by
Cacique
Caonabó.

Here I will relate the story as told by Guacanagari's subchief, whose name was Guababo and who stood in his canoe as he said these words that are still clear in my memory. Guababo talked all afternoon. Several times he cried. I will write his own words as much as I remember them.

“As we promised the Guamíquina: after you left in the giant canoes, the people of our two villages nearby to Navidad supplied the covered men with food. We had agreed in my village that every day, men and women of my
guaxeri
would go to the covered men's houses carrying pack-baskets of fruit and our
ñames
, stacks of fresh
cassabe
bread, and at least two hand counts of fish or lobster caught that very morning. My village was one of two compromised to feed half of the men, which was the count of my fingers twice. This we performed for fourteen days without incident and were quite willing to continue, and more than that, it was a happiness for us to perform this task for our cacique,
Guacanagari
.

“My
guaxeri
group of ten assigned to this task started with the sun, sang
areitos
to bless the food gathered, and even paraded formally through my
yukaieke
, walking in the four directions of our sacred ritual, which is the design of our villages, before taking the trail to Navidad.

“I say to you now, a ceremony we established to feed the guests of our
cacique
, and this would have lasted right to today. I say happy we were to take this distinction for our beloved young
cacique
and our council, on which I, too, have a seat.

“Now, give me your ears, my relative. On the night of the fifth day, two loud thunders from the camp at Navidad we heard. Scouts were sent and much shouting they reported among the covered men.

“On the fifteenth day, our
guaxeri
their foods delivered to the Castilian camp. A man had been killed, they reported back to us. It was the young one we knew as Jácome. His body was layed out in a hut, showing blood and stab wounds, and the covered men had gathered at two ends of the camp. One group called themselves Biscayans while the others said they were true Castilian.

“On the seventh day, precisely while our
guaxeri
were at the camp, two men fought suddenly with sharp sabers, and one was cut badly in the arm and retreated. The victor, whose name was Pedro Gutiérrez, said: ‘Now I do as I please.'

“Among our
guaxeri
food suppliers were a mother and a daughter, both healthy women. The father in that family was a fisherman who was one of the suppliers of the food, though he was not a carrier to the camp. The soldier Gutiérrez took both women and had his men hold them. Pointing to the women, he said, ‘
Daca
,
daca
,' meaning “I am” in our language, but by which he meant “you are mine.” That done, the women cried out, and all my
guaxeri
ran for home.

“On the eigth day, the woman's husband and his brother went to the camp. Behind them, our
guaxeri
feeders, still carrying their baskets of food, hid in the forest as the two men entered the Castilian camp. To demand his wife and daughter, the husband went to Gutiérrez and pleaded. Without speaking, Gutiérrez stabbed him. The brother another Castilian cut. The brother ran but our
guaxeri
husband dropped and bled and died.”

This was the beginning of many horrors, according to the subchief. Every one of the covered men then took women—sisters, daughters, and mothers together—and they used them in coitus, and harshly. The men hoarded three or four, even five women each. Husbands and brothers who demanded their families were cut and stabbed at will in the weeks that followed, and the people were angered.

“No more would we feed the Castilians, and a council was called with Guacanagari,” said Guababo, who stood in the canoe, straight as a pole, despite the roll of waves, but trembling slightly all the time. “Our
cacique
attended. He heard the stories of the killing and cried with us. Then he and all his wise ones reminded us of our promise to the Guamíquina. ‘They are men from Heaven,' he insisted to us. ‘Let us continue as before until the Guamíquina returns.'

“In all truth, we tried. Our ways you know, young two-tongue. We ni-Taíno tried to forget the atrocity, but none of our people would go near the covered men. The Castilians fought among themselves, again and again, until finally they broke up in three groups, two of which left, one to the Magua of our uncle,
Cacique
Guarionex, and the other to Maguana, the region of
Cacique
Caonabó, titled by Taíno but a Ciguayo warrior man nonetheless, not to be disturbed.”

Guababo related that both groups took women and food along the way and cut down any man that objected. Thus, the word spread of their marauding, and the chiefs admonished all to stay away from them.

“Their comings and goings we tracked with scouts and runners,” Guababo continued. “They were two small groups and they moved fast. Our people are very good at disappearing in the trees, and some were still surprised in their daily chores. Without warning, then, more and more, the covered men attacked and killed the Taíno men, took the women, and chased off the children. We heard the stories as our runners returned, telling of each incident. Caught with gold on his neck, an old man they tortured, gouging his eyes when he could not turn up more gold.

“Three moons passed and our
cacique
received a messenger from the Ciguayo
cacique
, Caonabó, anouncing a visit. Caonabó, who I say is a Ciguayo and only by marriage a Taíno, only now learning our ways, soon himself arrived at our own
cacique
's village. He demanded to know who these men were that were doing such terrible things to his people. Soon, he said, his many warriors would destroy these men.

“Our beloved Guacanagari argued with Caonabó against attacking the Castilians. Caonabó told him: ‘Cousin: if you are host to these people, why are they so mean to my own? As for you, man-boy, you are a little thing. Cousin: understand, the deed is for me to do.'

“Two more moons passed. It is known that one group of the Castilians went through the country of Guarionex, then in time it passed as well into Caonabó's villages. We did not hear from Guarionex, our revered grandfather, until much later, but then we learned that he had gone in retreat over the news of the Castilians and that, like Guacanagari, he ordered his warriors to avoid contact with the roamers. Over these news of covered men, seven days twice, Guarionex fasted, and many times at his runners' descriptions of the covered men he cried.”

At that point, standing in his canoe, the old subchief cried, too. And as I write now, I, too, cry, remembering the jolt of his tale upon my eager ears. It was the most horrible thing he was telling me—not the many abuses Guababo's people had suffered, which already in my mind I felt would be remedied by the admiral's presence, but I feared I was about to hear of a retaliation, of an ill deed committed against Castilian men by our island people, and that shook me to the bone.

“By his
cacique
permission, Caonabó's fighters took down the Castilian covered men,” the subchief said. “By ones and by twos, arrows they shot into them, and from behind trees they clubbed them. When most had suffered wounds and other Castilians panicked, our warriors rushed them and finished them off.”

“Killed all were they?” I asked in our common tongue.

“Every one, yes. Then to Navidad Caonabó came, and the fort he burned. To the sea the Castilians rushed, swinging swords, as foolishly they fled into the waters, where no match were they for Caonabó's men.”

One hundred six.
The story denied.

At the end of the tale, the elders would not stay. They would come back later, they said, with presents for the admiral.

That evening (November 27) they did return and the admiral they greeted by candlelight, seeking out his face in the dark. They talked a long time as I waited anxiously for the story of the killings to emerge, but it did not. Instead, the admiral was told by the uncles that the Navidad fort was still well, reporting a few deaths due to illness and nothing else. A gift of gold they gave Don Christopherens, two gold masks of beautiful workmanship, for which they took back, and happily, a dozen hawk's bells.

Out of sight were they in their canoes when I told the admiral the truth of the situation, how Caonabó and others had killed off all thirty-nine Castilians left behind. He yelled at me. “Liar!” And he was much angered, calling me a dog and a braggart, loudly, and I believe he might have struck me, but the shriek in his own voice stopped him. He was already fatigued of mind in a long season that would take him into the next September, the first full cycle of Castilian inhabitation in our islands.

Earfuls he got now daily from the large number of men onboard the ships, crowded and indisposed these many weeks. The heady boasting of great wealth to come, easy servants, and nubile maidens, bragging lies of Barcelona and Seville would now catch up with him (and me). Complaints there were and already accusations. They were quiet yet, murmurs, but they were constant.

I slept outside Don Christopherens's cabin door that evening. I heard him cry, and that's when I knew that he knew. Next morning, we came upon the site of Fort Navidad. Bodies were found, first two, then eleven, even more later. The fort was burned to the ground, no notes or messages of any kind left behind.

Numbly, over the charred ground, the admiral walked, then he directed a search for gold, digging out the well now covered with stones and turning over other likely sites as well. But no gold was found. “Damned barbarians!” was a favorite expression, spat often from those days.

I remember Father Buil. All were angry at the deed of violence, but Father Buil was maniacal. Face contorted, he walked to and fro. “They should hang for killing Christians. They should burn,” he demanded, although he officiated not even one burial of his people, a strange act I never understood.

The admiral led us away, to a place up the coast where he would found a new town, which he called Isabela, in honor of the queen. For eight days we fought contrary winds before landing the armada (a word I would come to understand) at his chosen site.

One hundred seven.
Isabela is built, the first metropolis.

I remember now the building of Isabela, where I learned to pound nails and size up planks. I remember Columbus talking again with Guacanagari, how his people still helped the Castilians build and how they marveled at the cows and pigs, chickens, sheep, and horses that came off the ships. I remember Father Buil crying for blood, Hojeda angered, and how everybody in that first town seemed irritated all the time. They were angry at our ni-Taíno, whom they were, for the moment, obliged to respect; they insulted our
guaxeri
their lack of building skills; they quickly abused our
naboria
, assuming a complete superiority toward our simpler cousins; they were angry at our trees, which were so big and hard to cut. They prayed to the Virgin Mary and the Holy Infant, Jesus; they prayed to the Holy Trinity; they prayed to the pope and the queen and the king. But right from that moment, as they fixed their corrals and their mills, as they planted new seeds brought over from their world, they cursed everything ours. They cursed at our insects, they cursed at our foods, they blasphemed our spirits and
cemis
, they even cursed at the mother sea.

A deep sadness settled over my spirit as we built Isabela, one I had held at bay, I realize now, even since the intimations of my father-uncles that first night at Guanahaní, what the
cohoba
had shown them. All we Indians could see, for one thing, the Castilians were building Isabela on a pestilent swamp, where no good water was to be had. For all their mountains of knowledge, we were learning that the covered men are often blind to the simplest, most obvious things. Any simple
naboria
can tell you a village must be built near good water.