The King's Fifth (2 page)

"None, sir."

"If I left the ship and set out to the east, the chart would be of no help?"

"No, sir."

"Go on with your work," Mendoza said. "The map is important. Without maps, what would we explorers do? But tell me, Señor Cartographer, about this country marked unknown. Does it not interest you to know what lies there? What glittering cities of gold and treasure?"

I nodded my head.

"But you will never see this country which is bigger than the whole of Spain or be able to draw it on a map, if you sit here in the cabin of the galleon
San Pedro.
"

"I draw the coast and the islands we pass."

"The map has been drawn before. By Admiral Ulloa."

"His map I correct."

"Then you are not a maker of maps. You are one who corrects maps. A copyist."

"We sail north," I said, "perhaps into seas never charted before."

"You sail only until the moment when you sight Coronado's army. As you well know, the three galleons of this fleet are filled with supplies for that army. You also know that Coronado is marching northward along the coast, parallel to the course we follow by sea. In time, it is hoped, Admiral Alarcón shall overtake him. The ships then will pull into shore, the supplies will be unloaded and given to Coronado. You know the plan. What you do not know is this. Even if the supplies are handed over, the ships—and you with them—sail south not north. Back to Culiacán. Not into the uncharted seas you speak of."

"Alarcón may have other ideas," I said. "He may explore the Island of California and its waters."

"No, señor. He is under orders to return to Culiacán."

I could not gainsay him in this, therefore I was silent. But I began to wonder about it. I wondered about everything he had said. Why did Blas de Mendoza, a Captain in Coronado's army, who had never spoken more than a dozen words to me during the voyage, now stand in my cabin, talking as if I were a confidant?

"Here is something else you do not know, but should," he said. "Alarcón and Coronado will never meet, because the plan for their meeting is unsound. It was unsound from the start. You can see this for yourself. Many times, to avoid reefs and shallows, the ships have had to sail far from shore. True?"

"Yes, sir."

"Is it also true that because of mountains and swamps Coronado has been forced to march inland, out of sight of the sea?"

"Yes, sir."

"Is it possible that while one of these things took place, or both at the same time, Coronado marching inland and the ships far at sea, that the two could pass without sighting each other?"

"Yes, sir."

"It is not only possible, but it is exactly what has happened. Sometime during the last week, we have overtaken and passed Coronado. He is behind us, and yet Alarcón sails on. He sails to nowhere." Mendoza grunted in disgust. "How simple it would have been if at the start the two men had decided upon a place to meet. If Alarcón had said, 'I will sail for five days and anchor.' If Coronado had said, 'Since you sail as much in one day as my army marches in twelve, be certain that you do wait for us.'"

Mendoza was a tall man, ten years or more older than I. His eyes were dark and deep-set in a face the color of Cordovan leather, where all the bones of jaw, cheek and brow stood clear, as if after a long vigil. His clothes were elaborate. They were the furnishings of a dandy, yet beneath the lace-trimmed doublet, the fancy breeches, the shining boots was a body supple and strong as the best steel.

He gave me a searching look. "Did you sign with Alarcón to sail back and forth looking for a lost army?"

"No, sir."

"Nor did I. Yet that is our fate, unless we act."

Mendoza turned and listened at the door a moment. "Tomorrow I go ashore. I shall seize the ship and put
the Admiral in chains. I go in search of the Seven Golden Cities of Cíbola. In that search I have need of a good cartographer. Of someone who can take readings from the sun and stars, and thus direct our steps."

He paused and again listened at the door. "Do you join me in that search?"

I was silent.

"Or do you wish to sail back and forth in a tub?"

"I am a member of Admiral Alarcón's staff," I said.

Mendoza pretended not to hear me. He said, "Do you wish to see the Seven Cities of Cíbola? Do you wish to share in the treasure we shall find there? The gold and turquoise and silver? Surely you have heard of these fabulous riches. Or do you prefer to remain cooped in a cabin the rest of your youth while others grow rich as the richest
duque?
"

"I am a member of the crew," I said stubbornly.

"Soon there will be no crew." He opened the door and glanced fore and aft of the ship's deck. He looked back at me. "What I have said, do not repeat. But give it your thought."

With this he went on deck. Too disturbed to continue with the map I soon followed.

Under a green and gilt canopy that shielded him from the sun, Admiral Alarcón sat eating breakfast at a table spread with silver and fine linen. He was in a happy mood. He took a long drink from a flagon of Jerez. Tossing a chicken leg to the dog that lay at his feet, he raised a spyglass to look at the coast.

There was no sign he knew that a mutinous plan to
seize his ship was afoot. And yet, watching him, I wondered. Was he only biding his time?

That the ship was restless anyone could see. For more than a week it had been so. There were sailors who predicted that the
San Pedro
would sail northward to the very marge of the sea and never overtake Coronado. Some said that Admiral Alarcón had no thought of meeting him. Instead, using the supplies meant for Coronado's army, he planned to sail on to California and there search for black pearls, in which that mysterious island was rich. Bolder men said that the Admiral was a braggart, who thought more of his magnificent bronze beard than he did of his crew.

At this moment, as Admiral Alarcón sat under the green and gilt canopy enjoying his breakfast, a knot of sailors was gathered at the rail. In their midst stood Mendoza. They seemed to be scanning the coast, but from time to time I saw them glance toward the Admiral. These glances Alarcón must have noticed, but he gave no sign. He ate roundly, washing down his chicken with Jerez. At last he threw the carcass to the dog and disappeared.

I went back to my chart. But now and again I paused to watch the coastline moving past. Through the small transom I could see rust-colored hills stretching away to the east and far off against the horizon the dim shape of a mountain range. This was the country marked unknown. Beyond it somewhere to the east lay the land called Cíbola, the country of the Seven Cities about which Captain Mendoza had spoken.

Cíbola I had heard of many times before. Aboard ship there was talk of little else, and in the City of Mexico, and in Seville, even in the town of Ronda men spoke of cities where the houses were fashioned of gold and the streets themselves paved with it, street after street. But these tales had meant little to me. The making of maps was the only thing I had thought of.

It was the only thing I thought of now as I sat at my table. Yet as the day wore on and the ship bore northward to the straining of blocks and the play of dolphins around us, my mind must have wandered. In less than an hour I made two unaccountable mistakes which took me long after suppertime to correct.

Night had come and the ship was quiet. The lantern swung gently in its gimbals. The map was again going well when the door opened and Captain Mendoza slipped quietly into the cabin. It was a hot night but he was muffled to the chin.

"You did not come to supper," he said, "so I bribed the cook, a greedy fellow as you know, and brought along a lamb shank."

From the folds of his cape he drew forth a well-larded bone, for which I thanked him, of a sudden very hungry.

Closing the door, he turned to look over my shoulder. "The map progresses, I see. But more than half of it, all eastward from the ocean, still remains a blank."

"It will remain so, I fear. For a time."

"You might draw in a mountain or two, at least." Mendoza said. "A few wild animals and an Indian. A river. It would make things look better all around."

"Perhaps there are no Indians there, or rivers or mountains," I said. "Possibly it is an ocean sea, like the one we sail."

Mendoza reached up and adjusted the lantern wick. I waited, thinking that he was about to speak again of the Seven Cities, new tales that I had not heard, though I had heard many.

"If I were you, if I were a cartographer," he said, "I could not rest until I beheld that vast country which you have marked with the word
UNKNOWN.
It would haunt me day and night, just to look at it and think that no white man had set foot there."

"It does not haunt me," I said. "But I think of it. I would like to travel and see it."

"If you do," he replied, "then no longer will it be unknown. For the map you would make of it would be published in Seville. In Paris. And Amsterdam. And London. Everywhere. Overnight you would win renown. A boy of sixteen, yet renowned in all the world."

He looked down at the map.

"What you do now has been done before," he said. "You add a little. You take away a little. Put in an island. A windrose. But still the map is much like the one made months ago during the voyage of Admiral Ulloa."

"It will be better than his," I answered, boasting.

"Yes,
señor.
But your map still remains a copy, which you must acknowledge when you come to sign your name to it."

Mendoza drew the cape around his chin. "Enjoy your
lamb shank," he said. "As you do, consider my advice." He opened the door, scanned the deck fore and aft, then looked at me. "And make your choice quickly, by tomorrow at the latest."

While I ate a tardy supper, the click of his heels sounded on the deck, to and fro. When I snuffed out the lantern and lay down in my bunk, I still could hear them. They were the steps of one who heeded nothing, who would grapple with anything or with anyone, be it a ship or an officer of the King. They were the steps of a man who would walk through the fires of hell to reach that which he coveted.

M
ORNING DAWNED CLEAR
with a light wind at our stern. In the night the hills had given way to a line of jagged headlands. Black tailings seemed to flow from them into the sea to rise there in reefs and rocky mounds and pinnacles. It was a desolate scene that met our eyes, and awesome to behold.

About an hour after dawn, Admiral Alarcón ordered the
San Pedro
brought up into the wind. The other two galleons of the fleet, as I remember, were astern and out of sight. He then ordered everyone to gather in the waist of the ship, those on duty and those sleeping.

With his bronze beard blowing in the wind, hands on hips, his countenance without any emotion that I could note, he faced us.

"Captain-General Coronado and his army," he said, "escape our watchful eye. Therefore, I am sending ashore a band of men to seek them out wherever they may be, east or south or north. The leader of this band is Bias de Mendoza, a captain of that lost army." He paused and made a slight bow toward Mendoza, then again addressed
the crew. "All those of you who wish to join the brave captain, step forward."

I glanced at Captain Mendoza. He did not betray any emotion.

A moment before, as on the days just past, the men had been alive and restless. But now every eye among them was fixed upon the nearby coast. They stared at the angry surf, the black mounds and pinnacles, the jagged headland, and beyond at the plain that stretched endlessly away to the horizon. Down the length of the deck there was not a sound. On their faces was the look of those who for the first time gaze upon the very entrance to Inferno.

Then four stepped out, all of them soldiers who were bound to Captain Mendoza. One, Torres, was the keeper of his horses. The other three were his personal musicians, Lunes, Roa and Zuñiga. Not one of the crew followed after them.

Alarcón repeated his command, "Those who wish to join Captain Mendoza, step forward." His eyes ran through the ranks, man by man, and at last rested upon me.

For myself, I stood rooted on the deck, too surprised to move. I was not surprised that the Admiral had learned of Mendoza's plan to seize the ship. What did surprise me was that he had taken this cunning way to forestall it.

Once more, for the third time, Alarcón repeated his command. As he slowly spoke the words in a bull-like
voice, his gaze ran through the ranks and again rested upon me.

Uneasily I shifted my weight. Sweat gathered on my forehead and ran down my face. I looked away from him, along the ranks of unmoving men. Gladly would I have leaped the rail into the sea.

By chance, then, my eyes met those of Captain Mendoza. He stood stiffly beside Alarcón, watching me from under his heavy lids. Of a sudden I was in the cabin and he was speaking. I heard his words clearly, as if he were speaking to me at this moment. "...the map you would make would be published in Seville ... Everywhere. Overnight you would win renown. A boy of sixteen, yet renowned in all the world."

I gathered myself, and almost against my will, took one step forward.

There was a long moment of silence. Then Alarcón doffed his plumed hat, bowed low in the direction of Captain Mendoza, and strode off along the deck.

A
T NOON OUR LITTLE BAND
, six in all, moved away from the galleon
San Pedro.
We would have left much sooner except for the business of the horses and Captain Mendoza's clothes.

The Captain owned many changes, each of different color and cut, entire from boots to plumed hats. Each needed to be carefully packed, as well as breastplates and morions. For myself, I took only a set of instruments, cartographer's supplies, a journal, and the clothes I stood in, knowing that I must carry everything on my back.

Loading of the two horses, a blue roan from Barbary and her foal of three months, required care. Many times they were lowered over the side of the ship, up and then down, suspended from the slings in which they had traveled from Acapulco, before they were secure in the longboat. Yet they and Torres, their keeper, were safely ashore and the boat was returning as we made ready to leave the galleon.