The Last Jew (24 page)

To his delight he found that the horse had been well trained to obey these very instructions. Yonah practiced again and again, learning to float with the rise and fall of the gallop, to anticipate the quick stop, to retreat at a walk.

He felt like a squire in training to become a knight.

*

Yonah had been an apprentice through the late summer, the fall, and the winter. This far south, spring came early. On a day of sunshine and soft air, Manuel Fierro examined each piece of the Count Vasca armor and instructed Luis Planas to assemble it.

It stood in the courtyard next to a fine sword made by Paco Parmiento, and the sun turned the burnished metal into a blaze of glory. The maestro said he planned to send a party of men to deliver the armor to the nobleman in Tembleque, but it could not leave until other urgently needed work had been completed.

So the armory banged and clanked with the renewed energy of the metalworkers. Both the completing of projects and the coming of spring energized Fierro, and he announced that before the departure of the delivery party there would be another game.

On the next two Sunday mornings, Yonah rode out into a deserted field and practiced riding with the lance firmly held at the ready, its balled point steadily directed as the Arab horse galloped toward a bush that served as target.

On several different evenings Vicente came very late to the hut, where he dropped to his pallet and at once snored in a drunken stupor. In the chandlery shop Tadeo Deza spoke scornfully of his cousin Vicente. 'He grows drunk quickly and unpleasantly, rewarding with the wildest stories those who ply him with the cheapest drink.'

'What manner of wild stories?' Yonah asked.

'Claims to be one of God's chosen. Says he has found the bones of a saint. Says soon he will make a generous donation to Holy Mother Church, yet never has he money even to pay for his wine.'

'Ah, well,' Yonah said uncomfortably. 'He harms no one save perhaps himself.'

'I believe in the end my cousin Vicente will kill himself with strong drink,' Tadeo said.

Manuel Fierro asked Yonah if he would participate in the new game, again to face Angel Costa on horseback. Even as Yonah agreed, he wondered if perhaps the maestro wished to see if he had profited from being allowed to practice with the Arab horse.

So two days later, in the coolness of morning Paco Parmiento helped him into the battered test armor once again, while at the far end of the jousting pit Luis laughed as he played squire and groom, dressing Costa.

'Ah, Luis!' Costa cried, pointing at Yonah in mock alarm. 'See his size? Alas, he is a giant. Oh, woe! What shall we do?' And shook with laughter when Luis Planas placed his palms together and raised them to the sky as if praying for mercy.

Parmiento's usually placid face glowed with anger. 'They are scum, he said.

Each of the contestants had help in mounting. Costa had done it before and seated his horse in a few moments. Yonah was clumsier; he found it hard to raise his leg to throw it across the gray Arabian and made a mental note to describe the difficulty to the maestro, although perhaps that was unnecessary, for Fierro watched as he stood with the workers, and usually he noted a great deal.

When they were mounted, the two combatants turned their horses to face each other. Yonah took care to appear nervous, clutching the reins in his left hand and holding the lance loosely in his right, its balled point waggling to the side.

But when the maestro let his kerchief fall to start the game, Yonah dropped the reins and took a firm grip on the lance as the Arab horse lunged forward. He had become accustomed to riding at a target and it was unnerving to see the target hurtling toward him, but he kept the lance pointed at the oncoming horseman. His balled tip found the very center of Angel's breastplate. Costa's lance slid harmlessly off his shoulder and for one brief moment Yonah was certain he had won, but his lance bowed and snapped, and Costa kept his seat as they moved past one another at a gallop.

Both of them turned their horses at the end of the wall. The maestro showed no sign of declaring the tourney over, so Yonah threw away the stub of the broken lance and rode weaponless to meet Angel.

The tip of Costa's lance grew larger as they rode at one another, but when Costa was two hoofbeats away, Yonah pressed his knees into the gray Arab's sides, and the horse stopped at once.

The lance missed Yonah only by a span, close enough to allow him to grasp it and jerk hard, even as his knees were signaling the good horse to move backward. Angel Costa was pulled almost out of the saddle, retaining his seat only because he let go of the lance as his horse continued to move past. Yonah retained a tight grip on the captured lance as he rode away. Now when they turned to face each other it was he who was armed and Angel who was defenseless.

The cheers of the workers were welcome music to him, but his exultation was quenched when the maestro signaled an end to the tourney.

'You did well. Wonderfully well!' Paco said as he helped Yonah out of his armor. 'I think the maestro stopped it to save his champion from humiliation.'

Yonah looked across the pit to where Luis was disencumbering Angel. Costa was no longer laughing. Luis was protesting to the maestro, who stood and regarded him coolly.

'Oh, it is a bad day for our master-at-arms,' Paco said softly.

'Why? He was not unseated. The game ended with no winner.'

'It is why he is angry, Ramón Callicó. To a savage bastard such as Angel Costa, not to win is to lose. He will bear you no love for this day's work,' the sword maker said.

No one was in Yonah's hut when he returned. He was disappointed, because he hadn't seen Vicente among those who witnessed the tourney, and he wanted the enjoyment of talking about it in detail.

The wearing of armor and the tension of combat had drained him, and weariness pulled him into sleep as soon as he lay on his pallet. He didn't wake until morning. He was still alone, and it appeared to him that Vicente hadn't been there during the night.

Paco and Manuel Fierro were already at work when he reached the sword maker's shed.

'It was done well, yesterday,' the maestro said, and smiled at him.

'Thank you, señor,' Yonah said with pleasure.

He was put to work sharpening dirks. 'Have you seen Vicente?' he asked.

Both men shook their heads.

'He did not come to our hut to sleep.'

'He is a drinker, no doubt deep in a drunkard's sleep behind some bush or tree,' Paco said. He broke off, doubtless remembering that the old man was a favorite of Fierro's.

'I hope his illness has not returned, and that he has not met with some other misfortune,' Fierro said.

Yonah nodded, troubled.

'I would like to be informed when next you see him,' the maestro said, and Yonah and Paco said they would do so.

If Fierro had not run out of ink powder while working on the armory's accounts, Yonah would not have been in the village when Vicente was found. He was approaching the chandler's shop when a hue and cry was raised from the wharf below the main street.

'A drowned man! A drowned man!'

Yonah joined those running to the wharf and arrived to see them raising Vicente from the strait, water pouring from him.

His thin hair was plastered, revealing an old man's scalp and a gash on the side of his head. His eyes stared sightlessly.

'His face is so bruised,' Yonah said.

'No doubt he has been bumping against rocks and the wharves,' José Gripo said gently.

Tadeo Deza came from the chandlery to see what the noise was about. He sank to his knees next to the body and cradled Vicente's wet head against his chest. 'My cousin ... my cousin ...'

'Where shall we take him?' Yonah asked.

'Maestro Fierro liked him,' Gripo said. 'Perhaps he will allow Vicente to be buried on the property behind the armory.'

Yonah walked with Gripo and Tadeo behind the body as Vicente was borne away. Tadeo was shaken. We were playmates as boys. We were inseparable friends ... As a man he had faults but his heart was good.' Vicente's cousin, who had spoken so badly of him when he was alive, burst into tears.

Gripo had guessed correctly that in Fierro's kindness toward Vicente the maestro would agree to a final act of charity. Vicente was buried in a small grassy place behind the sword maker's shack. Workers were released from their duties long enough to gather together in the hot sun and see the body interred and hear the funeral blessings of Padre Vasquez. Then everyone returned to work.

Death cast its pall. The hut where Yonah slept was empty and silent with Vicente gone. For several nights Yonah slept fitfully, waking to lie in the dark and listen to the scratching of mice.

Everyone in the armory worked hard, seeking to finish whatever orders could be fulfilled before the delivery party would leave to bring Count Vasca's new sword and armor to Tembleque. It was why Manuel Fierro frowned when a boy came with a message that a kinsman of Ramón Callicó had arrived in Gibraltar and desired Señor Callicó to come to the tavern in the village.

'You must go, of course,' Fierro told Yonah, who was edging swords. 'But mind that you return at once after you have seen him.'

Yonah thanked him numbly and left. He walked toward the village with extra slowness, his mind in turmoil. The man who waited was not Uncle Aron, that was clear. Ramón Callicó was an invented name Yonah had pulled from his mind when a name was needed. Could it be that there was a Ramón Callicó somewhere nearby, and that Yonah Toledano was about to meet the man's kinsman?

Two men waited in front of the tavern with the boy who had brought the message. Yonah saw the boy point him out to the men and then accept a coin and scamper away.

As he walked up to them he noted that one was dressed like a gentleman, in a mail vest and clothing of quality. He had a small spade beard, carefully tended. The other man had a scraggly beard and rougher clothing, but he wore a sword, too. A pair of fine horses were tied to the tavern's postern gate.

'Señor Callicó?' the man with the spade beard said.

'Yes.'

'Let us walk a bit while we converse, for we are saddle weary.'

'What are your names, señores? And which of you is my kinsman?'

The man smiled. 'All men under God are as kinsmen, is it not so?'

Yonah watched them.

'I am Anselmo Lavera.'

Yonah remembered the name. Mingo had spoken of Lavera as the man who controlled the sale of stolen relics in southern Spain.

Lavera didn't introduce the other man, who remained silent. 'We were asked by Señor Vicente Deza to see you.'

'Vicente Deza is dead.'

'How unfortunate. An accident?'

'He drowned and was recently buried.'

'So unfortunate. He had told us you know the whereabouts of a certain cave.'

Yonah knew with certainty that they had killed Vicente. 'You seek one of the caves in the Gibraltar rock?' he said.

'It is not in the rock. We are certain from what Deza said that it is somewhere away from Gibraltar.'

'I don't know of such a cave, señor.'

'Ah, I understand, it is sometimes difficult to remember. But we shall encourage you to remember. And we shall handsomely reward your remembering.'

'If Vicente gave you my name, why did he not give you the directions you seek?'

'As I said, his death was unfortunate. He was being encouraged to remember, and the encouragement was clumsy and too enthusiastic.'

Yonah was chilled by the fact that Lavera could make such a terrible admission so calmly.

'I was not there, you understand. I would have been better at it. By the time Vicente was willing to give the directions, he was unable. But when he was encouraged to tell who else might help us, he uttered your name at once.'

'I shall enquire to see if anyone else has knowledge of a cave Vicente knew,' Yonah said.

The man with the short beard nodded. 'Did you have opportunity to see Vicente before he was buried?'

'Yes.'

'Poor drowned fellow. Was he badly used?'

'Yes.'

'Terrible. The sea has no pity.'

Anselmo Lavera looked at Yonah. 'We are needed elsewhere quickly, but we will pass here again in ten days. Think about rewards, and what poor Vicente would want you to do.'

Yonah was aware he would have to be far from Gibraltar when they returned. He knew if he didn't reveal the location of the saint's cave they would kill him, and if he did, they would kill him because he could bear witness against them.

It saddened him, because for the first time since leaving Toledo, he liked where he was and what he was doing. Fierro was a good and kind man, the sort of master who was extremely rare.

'We wish you to ponder, so you will remember what we must learn. Is it agreed, my friend?'

Lavera's voice had never been less than pleasant, but Yonah was recalling the wound in Vicente's head and the terrible condition of his face and his body.