Lord of Darkness by Robert Silverberg
So I mutinied no mutinies, not even inward ones. I marched, I ate and drank, I fought. I fought well. It mattered not to me that I was fighting for Portugal. What I was in deepest truth doing was fighting to stay alive. We all every one must do our God-ordained task, whatsoever it may be, and if God in His mysterious wisdom had appointed Andrew Battell of Leigh in Essex to pass certain of his days as a soldier in the armies of Portugal, well, so be it. So be it!
Now and again I suffered a wound for my masters’ sake. These were in the main not serious ones, but the trifling things one collects in battle, a slash here, a bruise there, a twisting of a leg or an ankle that has one hobbling for a week or two, and the like. But in the last of my battles in this region of Ngombe I took an arrow deep within my right thigh, that struck so heavily among the tendons and the thick muscles that I thought the leg was all to destroyed. I heard the dread whistling sound that the arrow’s feathers made as it came toward me, but there was no hiding from its onrushing point, and when it went into me it made a sound like the striking of a hatchet against a tree. A cunning surgeon pried the arrow out, and bound me in such a way that my sundered tissues would quickly knit; but all the same, that put an end to me as an infantryman in that campaign, since that I would not be able to stand or walk for so many months. Along with many other wounded men I was carried to the city of São Paulo de Loanda to be cured. And most grateful was I, both that I was leaving the field of battle and that God had spared my leg, God and that Portuguese surgeon, who did not tell me his name. He had a gray beard and a squinted eye and great skill in his hands, that is all I know of him.
Now did my fortunes take a kinder turn.
As soon as I could leave my bed I was summoned to the palace of the governor to speak with Don João de Mendoça. This was the first meeting I had had with him in long years, seven or eight, since my attempt to sail home on the Dutch ship, and I knew that he was not sending for me merely to chastise me or to renew my banishment.
The sight of him was greatly shocking to me. Don João had grown immensely fat, and it was not the healthy copious flesh of an inveterate glutton, but rather something sickly and evil, a sort of spongy growth of a vegetable kind, that billowed and eddied about him like a vast flabby blanket, with the original man trapped somewhere deep within. The greenish pallor that I had noted on him earlier was now more pronounced, and did make him seem like one from the next world, who has escaped the grave and wanders among us. I could not disguise my horror at the look of him. But he seemed to take no notice of that; he sat in his great chair, slumped and old, and studied me in a most careful way, searching my face as though to read in it all that I had experienced since last we had met. He did not speak, and I dared not. I felt myself to be in the presence of Death himself.
Then Don João shook his head slowly and said, “Andres, Andres, how long has it been?”
“Very long, Don João.”
“It seems forever.” He stared at me interminably in silence, so that I thought he might have fallen to sleep with his eyes not closed, and after a time he did say, “You know I never would have hanged you, don’t you?”
“It was my prayer that you would spare me.”
“It was a bad time, you know. That time when Dona Teresa said you had abused her, and screamed most fiendish, and offered to display her injuries. And Souza was clamoring like a fury for your neck, Souza who never was more than a pimple in fancy dress, and now of a sudden was full of spirit and rage. I might have had to string you up, if Souza had pressed more sternly; but he is a weakling, and the fire went swift from him. And then Teresa admitted it was all a lie about your forcing her, a lie coined out of anger and jealousy, which much abashed her in the telling of how she had slandered you, and—well, Andres, well, it matters very little now, does it not? Nothing matters. I shall soon be dead, I think. I promised to send you home, eh? And I never did. I’m the one going home instead—in a box, d’ye follow, a long box of dark African wood, plainly joined.”
“Good Don João—”
“Nay, say me no kindnesses. Can’t you see the bony hand about my throat? Going home, Andres, taking with me all the elephanto meat and manatee meat and the thick wines of this place and everything else that’s gone into the making of this great vile belly of mine.” He grinned, showing me a gaping snagtoothed hole of a mouth. “You fought well for us, Velloria tells me. You were ever in the midst of it, no mind to the risk. You were one of his most valiant soldiers. I wonder: why did you war so hard for Portugal, eh?”
“I fought because it was my trade, Don João.”
“Ah. I should have foreseen that answer. You always affect the blunt and simple way. But your trade is the sea, so I did believe.”
“When I am at sea, my trade is the sea. When I am a soldier, my trade is war.”
“You say it so calmly. What has happened to you, Andres? Have you no anger in you?”
“Aye. Anger enough, I trow.”
“Then why this doldrum calm? Why not rage and roar, and play the lion? This land has stolen half your life away from you.”
“But it is too late for raging, Don João.”
“Is it? You could leap this room and choke the life from me in a minute, if you could but find my throat beneath all this swaying flesh. You could slit me like a swollen coccodrillo. The way they did in Loango when it ate those slaves, eh?”
“I would not do that,” I said.
“Why not? I am at your mercy.”
“Killing you will not give me back those years, but only cost me the ones I have remaining.”
“Ah. Always the philosopher, Andres!”
“And I bear you no malice, Don João.”
He did look genuinely surprised by that: animation for the first time came into his face, a light did glimmer in his small reddened eyes.
“No malice? No malice? But I could have sent you home, and I did not.”
Sighing, I said, “I soon ceased to think you would. It makes no difference. Would you send me home now?”
“Will you do one more voyage for me, first?”
“I have heard that aforetimes,” I said, with a little laugh.
“Indeed. Well, and I have no ship going to Europe this year. But later there will be one, and we’ll go on it together, eh? I in my coffin, and you to guard it. And in Lisbon they’ll set you free. That I pledge you, and this is a true pledge: by God, who will have the disposal of my soul soon enough, that pledge is true. The next ship to Portugal, for both of us. How do you feel about that, Andres?”
“I feel nothing, sir.”
“Lost interest of going home, have you?”
“Nay, I would never lose my interest of that. But I have lost belief in pledges.”
He nodded solemnly. “As well you might. But this one’s sincere. One more voyage, and then home! By the cross, Andres! By all my hope of heaven, slender though that may be!”
“Just one more voyage?”
“Just one.”
“And where am I to go, then?”
“Southward,” he said. “Benguela, and beyond it. Will you do that?”
“How can I refuse?”
“Nay, do it gladly, Andres!”
“I will do it,” I said. “Let that be sufficient, Don João.”
So it befell that I did go to sea again, in a frigate to the southward with sixty soldiers, on a trading voyage, with all kind of commodities. My assent to this task did gladden Don João greatly, and he pressed my hand between his clammy fleshy ones, and I knew I would never see him alive again, which he also must have known. As for his promise to free me, why, I had heard that music before, and cared not to hum the tune again. I thought only that it was better to go to sea than once more to face the arrows of the blackamoors while wearing Portugal armor under that hot inland sun, and God would bring me to England again in His own good time.
I embraced Matamba, who said, “We are always bidding each other farewell,” and I had no answer to that but to hold her close ag
“You are under the protection of Don João de Mendoça,” I said to her, for so had I engineered it with the governor. “No one will harm you. You will not be forced back into your old sort of life.”
“And when Don João dies, as you say soon will happen?”
“God will provide,” I said, not knowing what else.
She and I did have a most passionate and tempestuous last night together, and by dawn I slipped away in morning mist and down to the docks, thinking the fondest thoughts of this slave-girl who had so deeply entered my soul. I thought of our talking English together, and her learning my bits of poetry, and her devout Christian way, that had her kneeling every day to her little shrine, and her skill at the venereal arts, which she performed with gusto and force and subtlety. And it seemed to me odd that the track of my life should have passed through such diverse women as Rose and Anne Katherine and Dona Teresa and Isabel Matamba, that had so little in common one with the other save their womanhood: yet had I loved them all, and they me, each in a different way.
We rode our frigate easily to the southward until we came into twelve degrees below the Line. The people of this place brought us cows and sheep, Guinea wheat and beans; but we stayed not there, but came to Bay of Vaccas: that is, the Bay of Cows, which the Portugals also call Bahia de Torre, because it hath a rock like a tower. Here we rode on the north side of the rock, in a sandy bay where any ship may ride without danger, for it is a smooth coast. Here all ships that come out of the East Indies refresh themselves. For the great carracks of the Portugals heavily laden with goods now of late come along this coast, to the town called Benguela, to water and refresh themselves.
This province is called Dombe, and it hath a ridge of high serras, or mountains, that stretch from the serras or mountains of Kambambe, wherein are the supposed silver mines, and lie along the coast south and by west. Here is great store of fine copper, if the people would work it in their mines. But these people, who are called Ndalabondos, have no government among themselves, and are very simple folk, though treacherous, and do not do mining, taking no more copper than they wear for a show of bravery. The men of this place wear skins about their middles, and beads about their necks. They carry darts of iron, and bows and arrows in their hands. They are beastly in their way of living, for they have men in women’s apparel, whom they keep among their wives. This I saw, those simpering foolish queans, among the women, which did not please me. Some of the Portugals caught one of these men-women and did strip him of his robes, the silly creature whimpering all the while in fear, and we saw the male parts underneath, just like any other man’s, though we had thought these disguised women might be hermaphrodite.
Their women wear a ring of copper about their necks, which weigheth fifteen pound at the least; about their arms little rings of copper, that reach to their elbows: about their middle a cloth of the bark of the nsanda tree, a kind of wild fig of many slender trunks; on their legs rings of copper that reach to the calves of their legs.
From these folk we bought great store of cows, and sheep—bigger than our English sheep—and very fine copper. Also, we bought a kind of sweet gray wood which the Portugals esteem much for its perfume, and great store of Guinea wheat and beans. And having laded our bark we sent her home; but fifty of us stayed on shore, and made a little fort with rafters of wood, because the people of this place are treacherous, and those that trade with them must stand upon their own guard. In seventeen days we had five hundred head of good brown cattle, which we bought for blue glass beads of an inch long, paying fifteen beads for one cow. The governor sent us three ships, on which we shipped these cattle to São Paulo de Loanda, and then we departed for the town of Benguela.
This is a small outpost that I think will grow important in later years. It lies behind a morro, or great cliff, that rises straight from the sea and is covered by the thick fleshy thorny little trees without leaves that are so common in these dry regions. The bay of the town has good anchoring ground, and on the north side of it stands the fort of Benguela, built square, with palisados and trenches, and surrounded with houses shaded by banana, orange, lemon, and pomegranate trees; and behind the fort is a pond of fresh water. About it are seven villages, which pay the tenth part of all they have, in tribute to the Portugals of Benguela.
The air of Benguela is very bad, and the Portugals who live there look more like ghosts than men. In command of the small garrison was Manoel de Andrade, that had been my companion on several voyages long ago up the coast: he had aged much, and was feeble and loose-jointed. I learned from him that he had committed some grave infraction, that he would not name, and had been sent to Benguela by way of punishment. This was true also of all the other Portugals there.
There was little trading for us at Benguela, the Portugals of the place having been too indolent or too sickly lately to carry on any business. We therefore did not stay long. While we were there Andrade took us to a native town, where I saw a marketplace for dog-flesh.
“In some parts of Angola the people do love dogs’ flesh better than any other meat,” he said, “and for that purpose they feed and fatten them, and then kill them and sell them in an open market of meat.”
In that shambles or market Andrade showed us the different sorts of meat, squeezing and handling them in an expert way, while the vendors did cry out to us in their own language, praising the qualities of their product.
To me Andrade did remark, “They breed their beasts for flavor. Last year a fine sire was sold by exchange for two-and-twenty slaves. Which is to say, at ten ducats the slave, a fortune paid for a single dog!”
“Ah, the meat must be much delectable,” I replied.
Andrade, with a laugh, said, “I would not know. I am no eater of dogs. But you are a man who craves adventure, eh, Piloto? Here, will you sample this meat at your dinner this night?”
“Nay,” I said, “it does not overly tempt me. I think I will live my life without the eating of dog-flesh.”
And I turned away, shuddering a little. Yet dog-eaters would soon seem mild and innocent to me, by comparison with what awaited me just down the coast.
For we did move a short distance beyond Benguela and saw a mighty camp pitched on the south side of the River Kuvu. Being desirous to know what those men were, our commander, one Diogo Pinto Dourado, chose a party to go on shore with our boat, and I was among that party, owing to my skill with the native languages. When we came within close range of the beach I peered forward, and what I saw did make my blood run chilly, for these were naked men, painted here and there in white and well armed, many of them of tall stature and powerful form: I knew them to be Jaqqas.
Catching the wrist of our boatswain, I said, “Let us turn back, for we are traveling to our deaths. Those are the man-eaters!”
“Are you certain of that?”
“As I am a Christian!”
This boatswain, Fernão Coelho by name, was a dark-complected man, but he grew pale as a sheet, and at once signalled for the boat to be swung about, we being a dozen and they on shore at least five hundred. Yet as we rowed back to the frigate, Captain Pinto Dourado appeared on the deck and shouted to us, demanding to know why we had not landed, and when we told him the shore was held by Jaqqas, he said with violent gestures that we must go to them anyway.
“Nay,” said I under my breath, “they will have us boiled in a trice!”
The boatswain had some similar idea, for he continued leading us back toward our frigate; but Pinto Dourado caused muskets to be aimed at us, and, under point of gun, we had no choice but to head once more toward the beach. Silent as ghosts did we take our way thither, and the Portugals crossed themselves often. Yet I did find courage, remembering the Jaqqas who had led me to safety when that I was lost in the desert after the massacre of Kafuche Kambara, and I told myself that these might be merciful. For all that, yet I was in no ch
We came onto the shore and a troop of hundreds of men met us at the waterside. We were armed, but we kept our weapons down to provoke no attack. Fernão Coelho looked to me and I said, “Aye, Jaqqas indeed.”
With a curse, Coelho said, “Then Pinto Dourado has sent us to our doom! Be ye sure?”
“They have the Jaqqa traits. They knock out four of their teeth, as a mark of handsomeness, and they paint their bodies here and there in white patterns, and they carry clusters of weapons by their belts.”
The Jaqqas now circled round us, saying nothing, only staring hard, as if we were men down from the moon for a visit.
Coelho said to me, “Can you speak their language?”
“Nary a word. But I speak other languages, which perhaps they know also. I will essay it.”
I tell you that I fully expected to die that day, perhaps within the hour. Yet was I strangely calm, as I think men often are when they are in the presence of the certainty of death. I looked about me and found the tallest and most awesome of the Jaqqas, and spoke to him in the Kikongo tongue, saying we came in peace, as traders, and were emissaries from the great ship that did lie off shore.
The Jaqqa said nothing, but only looked intently upon me.
Coelho said, “Let us return to the ship, since they will not talk with us.”
“Peace, boatswain. We cannot leave so soon.”
“Why not? We were sent to learn who they were, and now we are certain, and therefore—”
I bade him hush. The tall Jaqqa spoke, most deep and solemnly, in words I did not understand, and then, haltingly, in Kikongo. And what he said was, “What world come you from? Are you spirits?”
“We are men,” said I, “from a land far across the sea.”
The Jaqqa did make a long oration to his fellows in their own tongue, and several of them broke away and ran up the beach to the main camp, as messengers. To me he said, “Are you Portugals?”