The Pirates of the Levant (2 page)

'Stop the killing!' ordered the captain of the
Mulata.
'Those people are worth money!'

Don Manuel Urdemalas was a man who liked to keep a tight hold on his purse-strings and abhorred any unnecessary waste. And so we obeyed, slowly and reluctantly. Indeed, Captain Alatriste had to grab my arm just as I was about to slit the throat of a Turk who had jumped into the water during the fighting and was now trying to clamber back on board. The fact is that our blood was up, and we had not yet done enough killing to sate our desires. As the two galleys had closed on each other, the Turks — later, we learned that they had a good gunner with them, a Portuguese renegade — had had time to aim and fire their cannon at us, killing two of our men. That's why we had hurled ourselves on them, prepared to give no quarter — all of us shouting, 'Row, row! Ram them! Ram them!' — with our pikes and half-pikes and harquebuses at the ready. Meanwhile, amid lashes from the galleymaster's whip, blasts from his whistle and the clank of chains, the galley-slaves rowed for all they were worth, and our galley struck the galliot, holing its prow. The helmsman, who evidently knew his job, had steered us into exactly the right position, and, within seconds, our three cannon, loaded with nails and tinplate, had cleared half the deck. Then, after a volley of harquebus fire and stones, the first of the boarding parties, with cries of 'Forward, for Santiago and Spain!', scrambled along the ram and onto the galliot's foredeck, killing everyone in their path. Those Turks who did not fling themselves into the water died right there, among the blood- drenched benches, or else retreated to the stern. To be fair, they fought with great courage until our second boarding party reached the bulkhead where the last of the crew were still fighting.

Captain Alatriste and I were in that second party, he — once he had emptied his harquebus — armed with sword and shield, and I wearing a leather corslet and wielding a pike which, halfway through, I swapped for a sharp spear wrenched from the hands of a dying Turk. And thus, always keeping a watchful eye on each other, advancing prudently from bench to bench, leaving not a soul alive behind us just in case, not even those lying on the deck pleading for clemency, we finally reached our comrades in the stern. We continued to press home our advantage until the badly wounded Turkish captain and those survivors who had not jumped into the sea threw down their weapons and begged for mercy. Such mercy, however, was a long time in coming, for what ensued was nothing less than a bloodbath, and it took a repeated command from our captain before we men ceased our labours, infuriated as we were by the pirates' resistance — for along with those killed by their cannon shot, the battle had cost us nine lives and twelve wounded, not counting galley-slaves. Even the Turks in the water were being shot at like ducks, despite their pleas, or lanced or beaten to death with oars when they tried to climb on board.

'Leave it,' said Diego Alatriste.

I turned, still breathless from my exertions. He had cleaned his sword on a piece of cloth — a Moorish turban — picked up from the deck, and was putting it back in its sheath as he watched the unfortunates drowning or swimming, afraid to come too close. The sea was fairly calm, and many of them managed to stay afloat, although the wounded floundered, groaning and gasping for air, water bubbling from their lungs as they died among the red-tinged waves.

'That blood isn't yours, is it?'

I looked at my arms and felt my corslet and my thighs. Not a scratch, I discovered to my joy.

'Everything in its place,' I said, smiling wearily. 'Just like you.'

We surveyed the landscape post-battle: the two ships still locked together, disembowelled bodies sprawled among the benches, the prisoners and the dying, the men trying to climb on board despite the threat of pike and harquebus, and our comrades brazenly plundering the galliot. The easterly breeze dried the Turkish blood on our hands and faces.

'Right, let's see if there are any spoils to be had,' sighed Alatriste.

'Spoils' was what we called the booty from a ship, but this time there was almost nothing. The galley, chartered in
the
pirate port of Saleh, had not yet taken any booty itself when we saw it approaching our convoy; and so, even though we lifted every plank on the deck and smashed all the bulkheads, we found nothing of value, only food and weapons, not even a gold coin to pay the King his wretched quint. I had to make do with a fine cloth tunic — and I almost came to blows over that with another soldier who claimed to have seen it first — and Captain Alatriste found a large damascene knife, with a good blade skilfully worked, which he filched from the belt of one of the wounded. He returned to the
Mulata,
while I continued foraging on the Turkish galley and looking over the prisoners.

Once the galleymaster had, as was the custom, taken the sails from the captured vessel, the only items of any value left were the surviving Turks. Fortunately, there were no Christians at the oars — the corsairs themselves rowed or fought, depending on the circumstances — and when Captain Urdemalas, very sensibly, ordered the killing to stop, there were still some sixty men alive: those who had surrendered, the wounded and the remaining survivors in the sea. On a rough calculation, that meant eighty or a hundred
escudos
each, depending on where the slaves were sold. Once you had subtracted the King's quint and what was due to the captain and the other officers, and when that was shared out among the fifty sailors and seventy soldiers on board — the two hundred or so galley-slaves, of course, got nothing — it certainly wouldn't make us rich, but it was better than nothing. That's why the captain had shouted out, reminding us that the more Turks that were left alive, the greater the profit. Each time we killed one of the men trying to scramble back on board, more than a thousand
reales
went to the bottom of the sea.

'We have to hang the galliot captain,' Captain Urdemalas said.

He murmured this in a low voice, so as to be heard by only a few, namely Ensign Muelas, Sergeant Albaladejo, the galleymaster, the pilot and two trusted soldiers, one of whom was Diego Alatriste. They were gathered in the stern of the
Mulata
, next to the lantern, looking down at the galliot still skewered by the ram of our boat, its oars shattered and with water pouring in through its sides. They all agreed that there was no point in trying to tow it, for at any moment it might sink to the bottom like a stone.

'He's a Spanish renegade,' Urdemalas continued, scratching his beard. 'A Mallorquin called Boix or, to give him his infidel name, Yusuf Bocha.'

'He's wounded,' added the galleymaster.

'All the more reason to string him up before he dies of his own accord.'

Urdemalas glanced at the sun, which was now close to the horizon now. There was perhaps another hour of daylight, thought Alatriste. By nightfall, the prisoners should be chained up on board the
Mulata
and the galley heading off to some

friendly port where they could be sold. The prisoners were currently being questioned to find out which language they spoke and where they came from, so that they could be divided up into renegades, Moriscos, Turks and Moors. Every pirate galley was a Babel full of surprises. It was not uncommon to find renegades of Christian origin, as was the case here, or even Englishmen and Dutchmen. That is why no one disputed the need to hang the corsairs' leader.

'Prepare the noose now and be quick about it.'

The hanging, as Captain Alatriste knew, was inevitable. A gallows death was obligatory for any renegade in charge of a vessel that had put up resistance and caused deaths on a Spanish galley, especially if that renegade was a Spaniard himself.

'You can't hang just
him
,' Ensign Muelas said. 'There are some Moriscos too: the pilot and at least four others. There were more than that — mostly Morisco rebels — but they're all either dead or dying.'

'What about the other captives?'

'Paid oarsmen, Moors the lot of them, and people from Saleh. There are two light-skinned men — we're checking their foreskins now to see whether they've been clipped or are Christians.'

'Well, you know what to do. If they've been clipped, they go straight to the rowing benches, and then we hand them over to the Inquisition. If not, we'll hang them too. How many of our men did they kill?'

'Nine, not counting the galley-slaves. And there are more who won't make it through till morning.'

Urdemalas made an angry, impatient gesture. 'God's teeth!'

He was a blunt old seadog, and his weather-beaten skin and grey beard bore witness to thirty years spent sailing the Mediterranean. He knew exactly how to treat such men, who set sail from the Barbary Coast at night in order to reach the Spanish coast by dawn, where they frequently sacked and plundered villages before returning home to sleep peacefully in their own beds.

'The rope for all six of them. That'll keep the Devil busy.'

A soldier approached with a message for Ensign Muelas, and the latter turned to Urdemalas.

'Apparently the two light-skinned men have been clipped, Captain. One is a French renegade and the other's from Livorno.'

'Right, set them to the oars.'

This explained why the Turkish galliot had fought so long and so hard: its crew knew what the consequences would be. Most of the Moriscos on board had preferred to die fighting rather than surrender; and that, as Ensign Muelas remarked dispassionately, was sure proof that they had been born in Spain, even if they were now corsair dogs. After all, it was common knowledge that no Spanish soldier would respect the life of a renegade compatriot turned corsair captain, nor the lives of their Morisco crew; unless, that is, the latter gave in without a struggle, in which case, they would later be handed over to the Inquisition. The Moriscos — baptised Moors whose Christian faith was suspect ~ had been expelled from Spain eighteen years before, after a great deal of trouble and treachery, and many bloody uprisings and false conversions. Cast out upon the road, they were often ill-treated, murdered, stripped of their possessions, and saw their wives and daughters raped, and when they reached the North African coast, even their brother Moors failed to welcome them. When they finally settled in the pirate ports of Tunis, Algiers and, especially
,
Saleh — the nearest to the Andalusian coast — they became the bitterest and most hated of Spain's enemies, as well as the cruellest in their raids on the Spanish coastal villages, which, with their knowledge of the terrain, they attacked ruthlessly and with the understandable rancour of settling old scores. As Lope de Vega put it in his play
The Good Guard.

And Moors from Algiers — pirates—

Who lurk in coves and bays

From which they later slip

And sail their hidden frigates.

'But don't make a fuss about hanging them,' Urdemalas advised. 'We don't want any trouble from the captives. Wait until they're all safely chained up.'

'We'll lose money by hanging them, Captain,' protested the galleymaster, envisaging more
reales
going to waste on the yard-arm. The galleymaster was even more avaricious than the captain; he had an evil face and a worse soul, and earned a little extra money, which he shared with the overseer, through taking bribes and secret payments exacted from the galley-slaves.

'I piss on your money, sir, and everything you buy with it,' Urdemalas declared, giving the galleymaster a withering look.

Long accustomed to Captain Urdemalas's odd ways, the galleymaster merely shrugged and stalked off down the gangway, asking the under-galleymaster and the overseer to find some ropes. The bodies of the slaves killed during the battle — four Moors, a Dutchman and three Spaniards who had been condemned to row in the galleys — were being unchained and tossed overboard so that their places could be taken by the captured corsairs. Another half-dozen or so badly wounded galley-slaves were sprawled, still in their chains, on the gore-soaked benches, waiting to be seen by the barber, who served as both blood-letter and surgeon and whose treatment for any wound, however terrible, consisted of applying vinegar and salt to it.

Diego Alatriste's eyes met those of Captain Urdemalas.

'Two of the Moriscos are very young,' he said.

This was true. I had noticed them when the galliot's captain was wounded: two boys crouched among the benches at the stern, trying to keep out of the way of all that whirling steel. The captain himself had placed them there, to prevent them having their throats cut.

Urdemalas pulled a surly face. 'How young?'

'Young enough.'

'Born in Spain?'

'I have no idea.'

'Circumcised?'

'I suppose so.'

Urdemalas muttered a few well-turned oaths and regarded the Alatriste thoughtfully. Then he turned to Sergeant Albaladejo.

'See to it, Sergeant. If they've got hair on their tackle, they've enough neck to be hanged; if not, set them to rowing.'

Albaladejo walked reluctantly down the gangway towards the galliot. Pulling down boys' breeches to see if they were man enough for the rope or fodder for the galleys was not exactly his favourite occupation, but it went with the job.

For his part, Urdemalas was still studying Diego Alatriste. His look was inquisitive, as if wondering whether Alatriste's concern for the boys was based on something more than common sense. Even if they were mere boys, born in Spain or elsewhere — the last Moriscos, from Valle de Ricote in the province of Murcia, had left around 1614 — as far as Urdemalas and the vast majority of Spaniards were concerned, there was no room for compassion. Only two months before, on the