1492 Part 31

He told me with energy. His letter related past events in Hispaniola and the arrival of Bobadilla and all that took place thereupon. He had an eloquence of the pen as of speech, and what he said to Dona Juana de la Torre moved. A high simplicity was his in such moment, an opening of the heart, such as only children and the very great attain. He told his wrongs, and he prayed for just judgment, "not as a ruler of an ordered land where obtain old, known, long-followed laws, and where indeed disorder might cry 'Weakness and Ill-doing!' But I should be judged rather as a general sent to bring under government an enemy people, numerous, heathen, living in a most difficult, unknown and pathless country. And to do this I had many good men, it is true, but also a host that was not good, but was factious, turbulent, sensual and idle.

Yet have I brought these strange lands and naked peoples under the Sovereigns, giving them the lordship of a new world. What say my accusers? They say that I have taken great honors and wealth and n.o.bility for myself and my house. Even they say, O my friend! that from the vast old-and-new and fairest land that I have lately found, I took and kept the pearls that those natives brought me, not rendering them to the Sovereigns. G.o.d judge me, it is not so! Spain becometh vastly rich, and the head of the world, and her Sovereigns, lest they should scant their own n.o.bility, give n.o.bility, place and wage to him who brought them Lordship here. It is all! And out of my gain am I not pledged to gather an army and set it forth to gain the Sepulchre? Have I fallen, now and again, in all these years in my Government, into some error?

How should I not do so, being human? But never hath an error been meant, never have I wished but to deal honestly and mercifully with all, with Spaniards and with Indians, to serve well the Sovereigns and to advance the Cross. I call the saints to witness! All the way has been difficult, thorns of nature's and my enemies' planting, but G.o.d knoweth, I have trodden it steadily. I have given much to the Sovereigns, how much it is future days brighter than these will show! I have been true servant to them. If now, writing in chains, upon the caravel _Santa, Marta_, I cry to them for justice, it is because I do not fear justice!"

He ceased to speak, then presently, "I would that all might see the light that I see over the future!--Thou seest it, Juan Lepe."

"Aye, I see light over the future."

By littles the storm fell. Ere dawn we could say, "We shall outlive it!"

He slept for an hour then waked. "I was dreaming of the Holy Land--but do you know, Juan Lepe, it was seated here in the lands we found!"

"Seated here and everywhere," I said. "As soon as we see it so and make it so."

"Aye, I know that the sea is holy, and so should be all the land! The prophet sees it so--"

The dawn came faintly in upon us. All was quieter, the footing overhead steady, not hasting, frightened. Light strengthened. A boy brought him breakfast. He ate with appet.i.te. "You are better," I said, "and younger."

"It is a strange thing," he answered, "but so it had been from my boyhood. Is the danger close and drear, is the ship upon the reef, then some one pours for me wine! Some one, do I say? I know Whom!"

I began to speak of the Adelantado. "Aye, there he is the same!

'Peril--darkness? Well, let's meet it!' We are alike, we three brothers, alike and different. Diego serves G.o.d best in a monastery, and I serve best in a ship with a book and a map to be followed and bettered.

Bartholomew serves best where he has been, Adelantado and Alcayde. He is powerful there, with judgment and action. But he is a sea master too, and he makes a good map.--I thank G.o.d who gave us good parents, and to us all three mind and a firm will! The inheritance pa.s.ses to my sons.

You have not seen them? They are youths of great promise! A family that is able and at one, loving and aiding each the other, honoring its past and providing for its future, becomes, I tell you, an Oak that cannot be felled--an Ark that rides the waters!"

As he moved, his chains made again their dull noise. "Do they greatly gall you?"

"Yes, they gall! Flesh and spirit. But I shall wear them until the Queen saith, 'Away with them!' But ever after I shall keep them by me! They shall hang in my house where forever men shall see them! In my son's house after me, and in his son's!"

Alonso de Villejo visited him. "The tempest is over, senor. I take it for good augury in your affair!"

Juan Lepe upon the deck found beside him a man whom he knew. "What d'ye think? At the worst, in the middle night, there came to Don Alonso and the master the old seamen and would have him freed so that he might save us! They said that they had seen his double upon the p.o.o.p, looking at the sea and waving his arm. Then it vanished! They wanted the whole man, they wanted the Admiral! The master roared at them and sent them back, but if it had come to the worst--I don't know!"

Cadiz--the _Santa Marta_ came to Cadiz. Before us had arrived Bobadilla's ships, one, two and three. What he found to say through his messengers of the Admiral and Viceroy was in the hands and eyes and ears of all. He said at the height of his voice, across the ocean from Hispaniola, violent and villainous things.

Cadiz--Spain. We crowded to look.. Down plunged anchor, down rattled sails, around us came the boats. The Admiral and the Adelantado rested in chains. The corregidor of Cadiz took them both thus ash.o.r.e and to a house where they were kept, until the Sovereigns should say, "Bring them before us!"

Juan Lepe the physician was let to go in the boat with him. Juan Lepe--Jayme de Marchena. It was eight years since I had quitted Spain. I was older by that, grizzled, bearded and so bronzed by the Indies that I needed no Moorish stain. I trusted G.o.d that Don Pedro and the Holy Office had no longer claws for me.

Cadiz, and all the people out, pointing and staring. I remembered what I had been told of the return from his first voyage, and the second voyage. Then had been bells and trumpets, flowers, banners, grandees drawing him among them, shouts and shouts of welcome!

He walked in gyves, he and the Adelantado, to the house of his detention. Once only a single voice was raised in a shout, "El Almirante!" We came to the house, not a prison, though a prison for him.

In a good enough room the corregidor sought to have the chains removed.

The Admiral would not, keeping back with voice and eye the men who wished to part them from him. When the Sovereigns knew, and when the Sovereigns sent--then, but not before!

Seven days in this house. Then word from the Sovereigns, and it was here indignant, and here comforting. The best was the Queen's word; I do not know if it was so wholly King Ferdinand's. There were letters to the alcalde and corregidor. Release the Admiral of the Ocean-Sea! Don Francisco de Bobadilla had grossly misunderstood! Soothe the Admiral's hurt. Show him trust and grat.i.tude in Cadiz that was become through him a greater city! Fulfill his needs and further him upon the way to Granada. Put in his purse two thousand ducats. But the letter that counted most to Christopherus Columbus was one to himself from the Queen.

Juan Lepe found him with it in his hand. From the wrist yet hung the chain. Tears were running down his cheeks. "You see--you see!" he said.

"I thank thee, Christ, who taketh care of us all!"

They came and took away his chains. But he claimed them from the corregidor and kept them to his death. Came hidalgos of Cadiz and entreated him away from this house to a better one. Outside the street was thronged. "The Admiral! The Admiral! Who gave to Spain the Indies!"

Don Bartholomew was by him, freed like him. And there too moved a slender young man who had come from Granada with the Queen's letter, Don Fernando, his eldest son. A light seemed around them. Juan Lepe thought, "Surely they who serve large purposes are cared for. Even though they should die in prison, yet are they cared for!"

CHAPTER x.x.xVII

JUAN LEPE lay upon the sand beyond Palos. The Admiral was with the court in Granada, but his physician, craving holiday, had borne a letter to Juan Perez, the Prior of _Santa Maria_ de la Rabida.

I thought the Admiral would go again seafaring, and that I would go with him. Up at La Rabida, Fray Juan Perez was kind. I had a cell, I could come and go; he did not tell Palos that here was the Admiral's physician, who knew the Indies from the first taking and could relate wonders. I lived obscure, but in Prior's room, by a light fire, for it was November, he himself endlessly questioned and listened.

Ocean before me, ocean, ocean! Lying here, those years ago, I had seen ocean only. Now, far, far, I saw land, saw San Salvador, Cuba that might be the main, Hayti, Jamaica, San Juan, Guadaloupe, Trinidad, Paria that again seemed main. Vast islands and a world of small islands, vast mainlands. Then no sail was seen on far Ocean-Sea; now out there might be ships going from Cadiz, coming, returning from San Domingo. Eight years, and so the world was changed!

I thought, "In fifty years--in a hundred years--in two hundred? What is coming up the long road?"

Ocean murmured, the tide was coming in. Juan Lepe waited till the sands had narrowed, till the gray wave foamed under his hand. Then he rose and walked slowly to La Rabida.

After compline, talk; Fray Juan Perez, the good man, comfortable in his great chair before the fire. He had hungered always, I thought, for adventure and marvel. Here it happened--? And here it happened--?

To-night we fell to talk of the Pinzons--Martin who was dead, and Vicente who now was on Ocean-Sea, on a voyage of his own--and of others who had sailed, and what they found and where they were. We were at ease about the Admiral. We had had letters.

He was in Granada, dressed again in crimson and gold, towering again with his silver head, honored and praised. When first he came into the Queen's presence she had trembled a little and turned pale, and there was water in her eyes. "Master Christopherus, forgive us! Whereupon,"

said the letter, "I wept with her."

Apparently all honors were back; he moved Admiral and Viceroy. His brothers, his sons, all his house walked in a spring sun. He had been shown the letters from Bobadilla, and he who was not lengthy in speech had spoken an hour upon them. His word rang gold; Christ gave it, he said, that his truth was believed. Don Francisco de Bobadilla would quit Hispaniola--though not in chains.

Fray Juan Perez stirred the fire. Upon the table stood a flask of wine and a dish of figs. We were comfortable in La Rabida.

Days pa.s.sed, weeks pa.s.sed, time pa.s.sed. Word from the Admiral, word of the Admiral, came not infrequently to white La Rabida. He himself, in his own person, stood in bright favor, the Queen treasuring him, loving to talk with him, the Court following her, the King at worst only a cool friend. But his affairs of office, Fray Juan Perez and I gathered, sitting solicitous at La Rabida, were not in so fair a posture. He and his household did not lack. Monies were paid him, though not in full his t.i.the of all gains from his finding. What never shook was his t.i.tle of The Admiral. But they seemed, the Sovereigns, or at least King Ferdinand, to look through "Viceroy" as though it were a shade. And in Hispaniola, though charged, reproved, threatened, still stayed Bobadilla in the guise of Governor!

"They cannot leave him there," I said. "If the Colombos are not men for the place, what then is Bobadilla?"

Fray Juan Perez stirred the fire. "King Ferdinand, I say it only to you and in a whisper, has not a little of the King of the Foxes! Not, till he has made up his mind, doth he wish there a perfect man. When he has made it up, he will cast about--"

"I do not think he has any better than the Adelantado!"

"'Those brothers are one. Leave him out!' saith the King. I will read you his mind! 'Master Christopherus Columbus hath had too much from the beginning. Nor is he necessary as he was. When the breach is made, any may take the fortress! I will leave him and give him what I must but no more!' He will send at last another than Bobadilla, but not again, if he can help it, the old Viceroy! Of course there is the Queen, but she has many sorrows these days, and fails, they say, in health."

"It may be," said Juan Lepe. "I myself were content for him to rest The Admiral only. But his mind is yet a hawk towering over land and sea and claiming both for prize. He mingles the earthly and the heavenly."

"It is true," said Fray Juan Perez, "that age comes upon him. And true, too, that King Ferdinand may say, 'Whatever it was at first, this world in the West becomes far too vast a matter for one man and the old, first, simple ways!'"

"You have it there," I answered, and we covered the embers and went to bed in La Rabida.

Winter pa.s.sed. It was seen that the Admiral could not sail this week nor the next.

Juan Lepe, bearded, brown as a Moor, older than in the year Granada fell, crossed with quietness much of Castile and came on a spring evening to the castle of Don Enrique de Cerda. Again "_Juan Lepe from the hermitage in the oak wood_."