VOYAGE OF STRANGERS (15 page)

“Now, Diego, what is the meaning of this? This is no time to play tricks. We must get the fleet underway before the season for favorable winds is past. Explain yourself and this young lady, who I surmise is closely related to you.”

“Oh!” Rachel said, crestfallen. “You have guessed that I am not a boy.” She brightened as she added, “But neither the ship’s chandler nor the two gentlemen noticed anything out of the ordinary.”

“Excellency, I must apologize for my sister Raquel’s boldness.”

“Excellency,” Rachel cut in, “our case is desperate. I must leave Spain. My parents have told me that you knew me as an infant. For their sake, I—we hoped that you would stand our friend.”

“
I
would not so presume, Excellency,” I said. “But I prefer that my sister not appear publicly in her own guise at this time. And when we came upon you—”

“He promised I could make my own petition,” Rachel said.

I groaned inwardly. I didn’t wish him to think that I claimed influence with him as a kind of coin. Neither did I think he would be impressed by childish exclamations of “I did not!” from me and “You did so!” from Rachel.

“What gave us away, Excellency?” I asked. “Does she so resemble me? For if she does, we are lost, as none must know who she is.”

The Admiral smiled, his eyes at their most kindly, to my great relief.

“No, but she greatly resembles your mother.”

Rachel fell to her knees and clasped her hands, her brown eyes huge and pleading.

“Oh, please, Excellency, let me serve you. Indeed I write a fair hand, and I will do any task you set me. I am not afraid of rough work or dirt.”

“Nor the unknown dangers of the Ocean Sea?” he asked.

“Not while you are with us, Excellency,” she said. “For you have navigated to the other side and know the way.”

The Admiral laughed aloud.

“I am tempted to offer you passage,” he said, “if only to have at hand one soul whose confidence in me is absolute.”

“Then you agree?” Rachel glowed with satisfaction until she saw that the Admiral was shaking his head.

“I am sorry, child,” he said, still kindly. “I cannot.”

“Oh, Excellency, are you
sure
?” Rachel’s eyes filled with tears.

My own heart sank, even though I had desired this refusal and was relieved that the request had not earned us the Admiral’s ill will. However, now I had no alternative but to find Rachel passage to Italy, and speedily, too. In truth, the best ships and captains had already signed on to sail with the Admiral.

“Come, Raquel,” I said, grasping her hand. She let me draw her away, but continued to look back over her shoulder. “We must not take up any more of the Admiral’s time.”

“Believe me, my dear,” he said, meeting her eyes, “it is for the best. You will see.”

“It is
not
. I will
not
.” She had just enough propriety to mutter it under her breath.

None of us had mentioned the Inquisition.

Chapter Eighteen

Cadiz, September 25, 1493

All Andalusia, it seemed, flocked to the docks to witness our departure. It was a sparkling day, sea and sky competing for the crown for bravest shade of blue. Pennons fluttered and sails bellied in the breeze, flashing colors as bright as parrots in the forests of the Indies. Along with my fellows, I was kept so busy hauling sheets, taking my turn at the capstan to weigh anchor, and otherwise playing my part in the complex dance that getting a great ship underway entailed that I hardly heard the boom of cannon, the blare of trumpets, or the excited shouts of the spectators that accompanied our departure.

At least I no longer had to worry about Rachel. For three weeks, while I sought passage to Italy for her not only in Cadiz but in Palos and the surrounding seaside hamlets, she had stayed mostly out of sight. Perhaps she had slipped out to explore Cadiz on her own once or twice. Without admitting it, she assured me she was working hard to perfect her performance as a boy, so that no one would be able to penetrate her disguise as Don Rodrigo and the Admiral had. She had not sulked for more than a day or two after the Admiral’s refusal. She always showed me a cheerful face when I came back tired and hungry from another long day’s toil in preparation for the fleet’s departure.

The Admiral, the Archdeacon, and all those charged with outfitting the ships had become increasingly frenzied as our sailing day approached. It seemed that they had requisitioned every coil of rope and square yard of sail for twenty miles each way along the coast. I made many such requests myself and became skilled at smoothing the ruffled feathers of the shipmasters and chandlers so importuned with silver and promises of vicarious glory.

Between my duties and my private mission, I inspected every unseaworthy tub and interviewed every old salt too crippled by arthritis to be tempted by the lure of the Indies. The few sound vessels and competent seamen who chose to ply the Mediterranean as they always had all told me that they would not embark on their own ventures until the Admiral’s fleet was well away. So I was much relieved to strike a bargain with a Genoese captain who declared he was ready to sail at once, but preferred not to risk his little vessel on the Ocean Sea. The Strega rode at anchor off a hamlet five miles east of where the fleet lay. The captain planned to catch the same tide as the fleet, then make for Livorno via Marseille and Genoa. My young brother, Captain Olivero assured me, would dine at the captain’s table. For the fee I offered, he would not have to share a berth nor turn a hand to any work, and at Livorno he could hire a mule to carry him inland to Firenze.

I was not so foolish as to pay Captain Olivero in advance, nor did I allow him to meet Rachel until our common sailing day dawned. Mist still clung to the docks when we arrived, and the air was cool, although those who remained ashore would be sweating under a scorching sun by midday. The captain looked less than prepossessing in the morning light, with his blue-stubbled chin, broken teeth, and food-stained jacket trimmed in tarnished gilt. But Rachel squared her jaw and shook his hand firmly when I introduced her as Rafael Mendes.

I could not embrace her under the captain’s eye, so I clapped her on the shoulder with what words of cheer I could muster and bade her kiss my parents and sisters for me when she reached Firenze. I watched as she marched up the gangplank, looking small and forlorn with her knobby bundle over her shoulder. When she reached the deck she turned to give me a smile and raise her hand in farewell. I waved back, turning away before I dashed a tear from my eye. Then I mounted my mule, slapped the mule Rachel had ridden with its reins so it would follow apace, and rode hell for leather back to Cadiz, where I was lucky to arrive on the deck of Mariagalante before anyone had a chance to miss me.

The Admiral, to his own disgust and the disappointment of the crowd, had taken ill the night before and remained in his cabin. He was attended by Dr. Chanca, a physician from Seville who had formerly attended Their Majesties and had joined the expedition to care for the company’s health. We had had none on the first voyage but had been blessed with general good health throughout and a minimum of wounds. I wondered if we would be so lucky this time. If not, we would see how effective Dr. Chanca’s remedies proved to be. 

So neither the Admiral nor I was on deck when, as seamen prepared to raise the gangplank, a slender boy with a knobby bundle bouncing on his back came pelting toward Mariagalante, shouting at them to stop. When he introduced himself as Rafael Mendes, hired on by the Admiral himself to serve as his page, the sailors shrugged and pulled him aboard, their burly arms making the task no harder than pulling on the sheets to bring the great mainsail a point or two further into the wind.

Rachel, as she told me later, kept demanding to be taken to the Admiral until someone pointed the way. Dr. Chanca at once pressed her into service, pleased with an intelligent, biddable servant who comprehended orders quickly, obeyed them cheerfully, and was not too squeamish to scurry back and forth between the Admiral’s cabin and the lee rail bearing basins of blood and vomitus. By the time the Admiral, slightly revived after being bled, caught sight of her face, the ship had passed Gibraltar.

The gromets looked askance at her, suspicious of her cheerful self-confidence. They were wary of each other on this first day, no doubt wondering who would be the leaders, the bullies, and the scapegoats of their company, like any group of boys. Yet for the moment, they left Rachel in peace, perhaps deterred by the fact that she was armed with bodily fluids that might be used as an impromptu and very unpleasant weapon.

I myself was similarly deterred from grabbing her shoulders and shaking her hard when, not long before sunset, I caught sight of the self-assured young page’s face. Once she had emptied the basin and rinsed it in the spray that splashed constantly on the bow, I got hold of her and demanded an explanation, keeping my voice low with an effort.

“What happened? What were you thinking?”

Rachel’s chin jutted out, and her eyes filled with tears, which disconcerted me as she knew it would.

“What were
you
thinking? That horrible man was a pirate!”

“What!” I forgot to be quiet, which gave Rachel the opportunity to shush me and put me even more in the wrong.

“Don’t worry,” she said, “he didn’t have a chance to harm me. Once you were gone, he bade me stay in what he called a cabin. It smelled vile, and a good-sized mule would not have room to lie down in it. So I crept out and overheard him laughing about me with the pilot. They planned to take my gold, which they knew I must have to get from Livorno to Firenze, and throw me overboard to drown.”

“The villains!”

“Yes, and first I thought they would be thwarted if they seized my bundle, for you know I carry the gold on my person.” She patted her waist, around which she had wrapped a sash that she had stitched into a hidden purse during those last days of waiting in the lodging in Cadiz. “But they had thought of that. They said that as long as they must search my body for coin, they might as well use me for a bum boy. What is a bum boy?”

“Never mind that. I am sorry, Rachel, indeed I am. I thought it would be all right, but I was mistaken. What did the Admiral say?”

“Very little, for he was throwing up when I arrived.” Rachel grinned. “When he realized it was I, he tried to be stern, but I believe he wanted to laugh. He said I am to sleep on the floor in his cabin. I am to work hard, and I am not to make trouble even for you.” She paused to consider her words. “To be honest, he said, ‘You are not to make trouble for anyone on board, your brother least of all.’”

I clutched my hair in my hands and tugged on it. My hair would grow long enough on the voyage to express any amount of frustration. But I would prefer that Rachel obeyed the Admiral’s command.

“I sent a letter to Firenze by the Archdeacon’s own courier bound for Rome,” I said, “telling Papa and Mama to expect you. Papa might even travel to Livorno to meet the Strega. They will think you drowned when you don’t arrive. And don’t say that I worry too much!”

“Truly, I am sorry, Diego,” Rachel said. “I paid a boy to deliver a note to Doña Marina at the Espinosas’ when she returns from Malaga. A
nice
boy, not a pirate, who thanked me for the silver coin I gave him and swore he would not fail me. Doña Marina will find a way to get word to Papa and Mama. It will be all right. It
must
be. I am glad that I am with you.”

Night had fallen. I glanced all around to make sure no eyes were upon us. Then I put my arms around her and hugged her close to my heart. She clung to me. After a moment, she let go, nodding to show me that, like me, she understood our need for discretion.

“Oh, Rachel, it is hard not to be afraid, but I am glad you are with me too.”

“Would you like to see what I wrote? I copied it out in a fair hand and kept the draft.” She pressed it into my hand. “You can keep it if you like. I must go now. The Admiral needs me.”

To Doña Marina Torres y Mendes

My dear Aunt,

I have gone with Admiral Columbus and Diego. Diego did his best to send
me to Italy, but it didn’t work. We thank you with all our hearts for your great kindness to us.

Please send word to Papa and Mama so they will know I am not lost at sea. Please give them all my love and Diego’s too. He and Admiral Columbus will keep me safe.

Your dutiful and affectionate niece,

Raquel (Rachel Mendoza)

Part Three
: THE INDIES

Chapter Nineteen

San Sebastian, Canary Isles, October 5-6, 1493

By the time we reached the Canaries, Rachel had won over almost all on board who at the outset had considered her unfairly favored by the Admiral and useless as a comrade. None suspected she was not a boy, although on first impression a prissy one, as she was a
lways neatly groomed and, unlike the gromets, did not attempt to emulate the coarse language of the older sailors. When not attending the Admiral, she took her turn on watch and never shirked the endless tasks of mending, scrubbing, and bailing. She expected no one, including the Admiral and me, to fight her battles.