‘And are you then glad?’ Godscalc said. ‘What have you learned?’
‘About Katelina?’ she said. Her eyes gleamed.
Nicholas was far ahead, in the bows, in the sun. ‘About this young man,’ Godscalc said, ‘who meant her no harm.’
‘That is the refrain Diniz sings me,’ she said. ‘Did you not ask yourself, before you came here, how many would die because of Nicholas? Is it an excuse you would permit, that sometimes it happens by accident?’
If she were less clever, he supposed, she would be happier. And those around her as well. He said, ‘But at least you accept, then, that your sister’s death was an accident? For if you do, your duty must be forgiveness. Does he not grieve, do you suppose? Does he not grieve for his friend at this moment?’
‘You trust him,’ she said.
He wondered what to say, for she was waiting, amused, for a lie. One could never trust Nicholas, not entirely. Nicholas himself had told Lopez not to trust him, and Lopez had not. It made no difference, in the end. Nicholas had made his way to the silent market for gold. Doria and Lopez and Jorge had taken the risks. It was not because of bad planning that the gold had not been there.
But that was nonsense. Godscalc said, ‘I trust him in the things he believes in, which are not, in my view, to be despised. Ask Mistress Bel.’
‘Yes,’ said Gelis. ‘He is afraid of her. So, are we close?’
‘I think,’ said Father Godscalc, ‘that we have come two-thirds of the way.’
The last two hundred miles were not difficult, which Nicholas found irritating, being a person who derived satisfaction from problems. He was not unaware of the murmur of gossip under the hood, and took it as evidence that his charges were rested and fed and recovering. He exchanged pleasantries with them all – which he could hardly avoid, even with fifty feet of timber to roam through – and they always ate under the hood, especially when the gnats hummed and whined in the evening. They had always been apt to afflict him but, shrouded as they all were in cotton, he did well enough.
In any case, once they found the river again, they were able to move much more swiftly. Sooner than he expected, he began to see dunes on the left bank, and although there were still patches of green, and the right bank was florid as ever, there was no doubt that they had come far north as well as far to the east, and very soon now would be touching the desert.
It was cooler again, and he slept better. That was to say, he never slept a great deal, but latterly had found the knack of resting elude him. Now he fell once or twice into thorough slumber, from which he awoke with a headache. The only person who noticed was Bel, who spent her days peacefully under the hood, reduced in size and in colour but not in spirit. ‘What’s the matter?’ she said. She had cultivated the company of the chicken the crew kept for good luck, and it sat on her lap, making messes.
‘Too much sunshine,’ he said. ‘We are having lungfish. Vito caught one.’
‘Are you sure?’ said Bel.
‘Yes,’ said Nicholas. ‘Well, he says so.’ He moved away, training his mind on other things. The flood. The flood they said reached Timbuktu during January, and carried the river, or a channel of it, up to the depot. If there was a wharf, there would be a picket of animals. He could get one for Bel. The men and Gelis could probably walk, depending on distance. Depending on distance, they would need packmules for the goods. The upshot was he had better leave them on board and go with Saloum first of all, to look about and call on the headman, who was said to be a Tuareg and unpopular.
Nevertheless, they might qualify for some sort of shelter until he worked out how long they would be staying. How much gold there was, or wasn’t, and how long a wait it would mean to acquire it. He wondered if it was February yet, and was amazed to find that he had lost track of the calendar. It occurred to him that the stores ought to be checked ready for disembarking, and he went off to see Vito and Diniz. They were excited, and therefore talkative, which he found painful.
He realised what was happening. There was nothing he could do about it.
The arrangements seemed to take a long time to make, and he went outside again, where it was fresher. He saw the shore was sandier, although there were bushes. He saw a great silk-cotton tree upholding a snowdrift of slumbering ospreys. He saw some birds from the crane-wheel in Bruges. He began writing things down.
That night, he dreamed he was in a boat. He probably was, for Loppe was rowing. The first time they met, he was swimming. He tried to remember his face, but could only remember how black it was. Black, with a nose as long as a Nubian’s, and black fingers turning the ledger. The sugarcane has done well. Of course it has. But what will you do with no hands?
Someone said, ‘Nicholas?’ and he woke.
The hired boatmen knew, too, that they were getting close to the terminus and a dispute began, which Saloum had to interpret. They wanted money to take them back home. They wanted the boat, perhaps. Nicholas got hold of Diniz and they agreed terms, with a small show of force. If they got the gold, they might have to store it. If they got a lot of gold, he might split the party and send Diniz back to the Niccolò, although he didn’t want to mention that yet. Assuming Godscalc was bent on Ethiopia. Assuming Ethiopia wasn’t where he was beginning to suspect it was. He wondered what to do about Gelis, and then thought he could leave that to Bel and to Godscalc. He remembered that he’d written down none of his plans for the Ghost. He thought he had better lie down, but not yet.
He said to Godscalc, ‘I want to take Saloum ashore and then come back for you. If I don’t, tell the men to row out. I’ve paid them to wait, and they’re due more if they do what I’ve asked them.’ Soon, they all went to sleep, and so did he.
The trouble was Raffaelo Doria, and the child he had snared for his bed in the Ghost. Except that the name of the ship was the Doria, which meant Raffaelo could claim her, unless a black boy could be found to cut his head off. Then old Jordan claimed her instead, and laughed, and hit Nicholas in the face, and took Marian away. Sent Marian away, so that she died of starvation in Cyprus, and her son was killed in a tournament. Although he was so young. He was too young, far too young for a tournament.
Someone said, ‘It’s all right. He’s dreaming.’
Diniz. Then the voice of Gelis said, ‘Really?’
‘Wake up, Nicholas,’ Diniz said. ‘We’ve arrived.’
The water had reached far up to the terminus, but there was no view of the place, only dunes behind the ramshackle buildings of the wharf. Under a few dusty trees, everyone including the curs seemed to be sleeping, and the empty boats rocked in the heat, reeking of stale nut oil and ordure and fish. Everything stank.
There was a last-minute quarrel, once they had wakened people and hired mules and a couple of porters, because Diniz announced he was coming. It was not expedient. Nicholas couldn’t remember why it wasn’t expedient, except that Saloum said so. He wondered if it was Saloum, in the first place, who had suggested they go first together. He left Diniz behind, scarlet and fuming, with Godscalc and the women and Vito. He was himself worried, for they couldn’t manage without him. He couldn’t manage, either, without them. He had to get the gold back to the Gambia.
The ride was not long, which was fortunate. He had an impression of gaining a rise and seeing a sheet of water before him with the walls of the chief’s house beyond it, made of whitened mud bricks and not brushwood. He thought that this was certainly wise, in a place where goods were stored in the compound. He had heard that the caravans lodged to the north, in sandy plains outside the depot.
He found he and Saloum had arrived at a pair of vast timber gates, studded with iron. One of their porters banged on it, and a voice enquired who they were. It spoke in Arabic. Saloum replied, ‘It is the marabout Saloum ibn Hani.’ He spoke in Arabic, too.
The gates opened. There were armed men inside, with caps and white shirts and trousers, and slippers on their feet. They were black. Saloum said, ‘Send word. Quickly.’ No one asked w
ho Nicholas was. They rode through.
Because of the buildings there was shade, which was a relief, but chilled the sweat on the skin. Nicholas shivered, and opened his eyes. Buildings. That was what was strange. He was riding through the dark of a street, with buildings rising high on either side of him, and lanes running to right and to left, also lined with houses of two or three storeys. Ornate dwellings, with doorsteps and windows; and a glimpse of green courtyards, and curious pyramids stuck over with quills. A square opened out, and another.
There were few people about, with the sun at its height, but those he saw paid them little attention. They seemed well dressed, their garments spotless, their heads covered. They were all black. A carnival, he realised. Was it Lent? Was it February? They passed San Marco. Not San Marco: it was smaller, and had a wall, and gardens, and its towers were red and white and had no mosaic. If it was San Marco, he would be in a boat, and not riding a mule rather badly. In Venice, the streets were not made of sand. They came to a palace.
Here, there were people awake. They ran to take the mules, and lead the porters away. Saloum let them, and Nicholas didn’t complain. It was hard enough to dismount, although someone helped him. They walked up steps between pillars. He thought at first it was going to be like Trebizond, and he would meet the Emperor, and someone would take him to the baths. He thought they might do him some good.
Then he saw that the portico opening ahead of him was more like a pavilion in Castile or Granada, as travellers described them. He had seen something like it in Málaga, but not so magnificent. The floor was of marble, a little untidy with sand, and above the masts … above a harbour full of unmoving columns there rose arches of fragile white stucco-work. He had never had a sugar-cook who could create a masterpiece of that order, or finish it before it had melted.
Between the columns, now he looked, he could see men in robes, some watching, some moving slowly. He thought he saw a woman among them, although she was veiled. Saloum turned from a quick conversation. Speaking, he hid his mouth, Nicholas noticed, to catch the spit from the gaps in his teeth. Saloum said, ‘The governor was to have received you, my lord Niccolò, but that has been put off until later. A house is being prepared.’
‘You speak Arabic,’ Nicholas said. It surprised him that Saloum hadn’t tried it before. He found he fell into it himself very well, as he should.
Saloum said, ignoring this, ‘I shall take you to the court of the judges. It would be better for you to rest there. Or Umar will take you. He belongs there.’
‘Umar?’ said Nicholas.
‘Myself. Umar ibn Muhammad al-Kaburi,’ said Loppe.
Chapter 26
THE PRESENCE OF Loppe was in no way surprising to Nicholas who had, after all, been conversing with him under somewhat obscure circumstances for several days. Huddled shivering upon a cedarwood bed in a large, darkened room, Nicholas was content that Loppe’s face, its features satisfactorily reassembled, appeared from time to time among the many other black and brown faces which accompanied him from the palace of pillars to the house where he now lay. He talked to them all, but especially to Loppe, whose alternative names escaped his memory. He had always disliked even calling him Lopez.
He heard other conversations, but did not take part in them. The first might even have been a dream. It began with the violent opening of both leaves of the door of his room. Through half-open lids he saw the servant behind it stagger back, and two others jump. Loppe, who had been sitting beside him, stood up in his white robe and cap.
It was Father Godscalc who came in, bringing the same cold voice and high anger he had shown the other day in the boat outside Murano, but now very wild in appearance, with curling black and grey face-hair tangled amongst the long hair that fell back from his brow, and his cotton cape and pantaloons filthy. After his first hasty steps to the bed, made in silence, he appeared to swing round and address Loppe. ‘So! It is true!’
‘That I am alive? You might say so, Father. I asked Saloum ibn Hani to beg you to wait until I had seen to Ser Niccolò’s comfort.’
‘He has marsh-fever. As he had in the Abruzzi. In Trebizond. I thought you called him Nicholas,’ Godscalc said. ‘You might as well call him Nicholas, now you have become a trickster, as he is.’
‘He intended to stop here. I know what sickness he has. He is being treated for it. I shall explain to you shortly,’ said Loppe. When he restrained himself, his voice became deeply musical, like a chant.
‘Will you,’ said Godscalc. It was not a question. ‘You’ll tell us how you came to stay behind on the Niccolò, but were the only man to escape. How you led Raffaelo Doria to the Joliba so that the Wangara miners could kill him and his men – and again, you were the only man to escape. How you ensured that Nicholas would follow, believing you were in danger, and instructed Saloum to gull Jorge da Silves and send him and his men to their deaths. Did you mean Diniz to go with Jorge and die? Did you mean us all to die except Nicholas?’
Nicholas heard his own name. The servants seemed to have left the room, including the one who had been fanning him. The bed linen was heavy and wet, but his body was weightless. Loppe said, ‘It is a perilous journey to Timbuktu. The most capricious danger is greed.’
‘And you think Nicholas free of it?’ Godscalc said. ‘Diniz was not.’
Loppe said, ‘I am glad the boy survived.’
‘Are you. And who are you,’ Godscalc said, ‘to tempt men to sin and then punish them for it?’
‘Did they need tempting?’ said Loppe. ‘I led Doria away from Wangara. If he had gone there, you would have followed. You would all have been killed. And I, too.’
Godscalc said, ‘But you did not tell us your plan.’
‘No,’ said Loppe.
The conversation stopped. Nicholas drifted towards another dream. Loppe spoke again, slowly. ‘Perhaps he can hear me. It is only right if he does. Nicholas came to Africa for the secret of Wangara. It was the only way to keep him from it.’
‘At the cost of how many souls?’ Godscalc said. ‘And will he stop now?’
‘Look about you,’ said Loppe. Or perhaps, since it didn’t make much sense, he didn’t say it, but it was merely part of the next dream. The next nightmare.
There was a lot of shouting in that, but Nicholas didn’t recognise either Loppe’s voice or Godscalc’s and wondered if Jordan had found him again. His teeth drummed through his head, sticks on skins, sticks on ivory, shell upon shell. Instead of shouting, he spoke with his teeth, but no one listened.
Gelis said, ‘I am frightened.’
No one answered her. They were in Timbuktu, and had spent their first night there. Now it was early morning and she and Bel, Father Godscalc and Diniz found themselves in a courtyard, about to ride out from the house of two storeys to which the tall Negro stranger had brought them. The tall Negro who, frighteningly in the half-light, proved to be no stranger at all, but Lopez in life again.
Arriving weary and late, they had found the transformation hard to assimilate. Last night, they had barely noticed where they were staying, being concerned only with Nicholas, who had been conveyed there already, and was sleeping. Lopez had seen them settled and then returned to the sickroom. The building, they gathered, was borrowed, and Lopez, but for tonight, lived elsewhere. There was no sign of Saloum, but many servants were at hand, attentive and smiling. None of them spoke a familiar tongue.
It was not surprising. They were in limbo. They were in the legendary entrepôt where, in due season, the salt from the Sahara was transferred from camel to boat and made its way up the Joliba to the silent place where it was replaced by gold. They were in Timbuktu, and Nicholas had successfully brought them there.
Last night they had been exhausted. Today they awoke to the reality of Loppe’s living presence; of his transformation from Negro slave to a man named Umar ibn Muhammad al-Kaburi who, captured and sold to the Portuguese, had not lied when he said he had no father or mother, brother or sisters or wife, but who had n
ot confided in them his identity. And who had let them mourn him for dead.
They were disturbed because the deception was too great for them to trust him. They had heard Godscalc’s account of his interview. Diniz, confused and angry, had tried to resume that confrontation, but Godscalc had stopped him. Whatever had caused Loppe’s – Umar’s – actions; the key lay with Nicholas and nothing more should be done until Nicholas was able to speak.
Meanwhile, Godscalc found himself avoiding the man he had known for so long, and Gelis maintained a pointed van Borselen silence. Only Bel, perhaps recalling the slave-laden Niccolò, spoke to Loppe-Umar naturally – indeed much as she had talked to her chicken. His eyes showed his gratitude.
For the rest, the former Lopez accepted it all as if well prepared for their censure and puzzlement. Only the condition of Nicholas had clearly startled and worried him: he clung to the sickroom, they saw, as if willing Nicholas to awake. But Nicholas, burning with fever, had retreated currently into a separate world and could not recognise his former companions, much less communicate usefully with them.
Last night Diniz, too, had lingered frustrated at his bedside, but had learned nothing from Nicholas, and less than nothing from his physician. The man was a Negro.
‘From Kabura,’ Umar-Lopez had answered, when fiercely questioned. ‘Of my own race, many of whom live in this quarter. He is a master of medicine, as fully qualified as your friend Abul Ismail of the Mameluke army. Would I offer Nicholas less?’ He had paused, and seemed to brace himself to make an effort. ‘You are about to say that, but for me, his journey here would not have been so impetuous, or so damaging. It is true. I am sorry.’
‘Nicholas didn’t have marsh-fever in Cyprus,’ Diniz said. ‘On that occasion, he gave himself other punishments. He is going to be very angry, I think, when he understands you are not dead, or a dream.’
‘I am sure of it,’ said Umar-Lopez. After a moment he said, ‘It is unusual, to interpret even so much of how Nicholas thinks. But of course, you are of his blood. Of his colour.’