The Sons of Adam: The sequel of The Immortal Collection (A Saga of the Ancient Family Book 2) (13 page)

"And you're telling me this because..."

We were in our favorite tavern in London, The Devil's Tavern, named as such due its dubious reputation. It had had that name for almost a hundred years, although we had originally known it as The Pelican. It was a safe place for us, no one of high moral standing would dare set foot in that dump, and that was always a good thing for us and our plans.

Despite everything, I was not in a good mood that day. I couldn't stop staring at my mug of water.

Of water.

I had sworn to my father and my siblings that I would not drink alcohol again, after they had risked their lives to get me out of that prison. And I hadn't, I had kept my promise... Well, at least, I had not had another drink in front of them.

"I'm telling you all this, son, because this week my friend, John Calvert, has requested a letter from King James to send new colonies to the area of the Plymouth Company to get it set up again. It's a risky investment, but he's managed to get seventy investors to put forward 1800 Pounds to cover the expenses. There is a group of Puritans who are exiled in Leiden, Holland, for their disagreements with the Anglican church, but they haven't managed to fit in there either. They've managed to get involved in the business and each of them has received a share of 10 Pounds, and those who wish to do so are free to buy more shares. The business is as follows: in seven years they have to return the debt and we will split the profit equally between Puritans and investors: land, houses, assets... They have other things in mind besides the financial aspect. They want to found their New Jerusalem there, but there are other adventurers going on the crossing who aren't Puritans.  The company was set up last August. To begin with two boats left, the Speedwell and the Mayflower, headed to the coasts of the Plymouth Company, but the Speedwell ran into problems and they had to turn back mid-voyage. They've been trying to fix it in the port of Southampton, but to no avail, so they're all going to set off again in a few days on the Mayflower. Forty-two crew, a hundred and one passengers in total. And that's where you come in. Here, son," he said, handing me a piece of stamped paper. "Here are your shares. Here's the deal: you go with the Puritans, you make sure that the company is economically viable and when you return we split the profit."

"You're throwing your money away. If the fort in the colony of Popham didn't even manage to survive one year, what makes you think that this time the colony could even bring in a profit?"

"Because I'm sending you. You know the conditions in the New World. We survived Florida and Ponce de León. I'm not concerned about your survival. You know all about the cold and the hunger. What could possible kill you after everything you've been through?”

The ghost of a son I betrayed?
I wanted to answer. But I didn't say anything so as not to hurt him. My father thought that I was pretty much recovered from that unfortunate episode.

"There's another colony to the south, in Jamestown. It belongs to the Virginia Company of London, also privileged by Kind James I. After getting off to a bad start, where hunger killed almost 600 settlers, they seem to have found a good business cultivating a sweet strain of tobacco from the Caribbean. But I'm not sending you to set up a tobacco plantation. What I want is for you to bring me this," he took off his wide brimmed peaked hat and placed it on the table.

"You're sending me to America to become a Hatter?"

"Not exactly. The hats are made here, in London, as they have been since the 14th century. Look around you, don't you see new opportunities around every corner? London has gone from having 60,000 to 300,000 inhabitants in just a few decades. The old rich keep investing in property and land, but the new rich spend all their money on their dazzling suits with beaver skin hats. There are dozens of shops that open every day, sun up to sun down, and the orders keep coming in. Each hatter can make three hats per day, so the demand keeps growing. Beaver skin has to be prepared with certain chemical products, but it's the best there is, it repels water and its finish is as soft as it looks. I want you to make contact with the natives in the north, establish a commercial network with them and help the future colony to send beaver skins to England. There are other possible businesses: sea cow, or cod, as they call it on this island. It's very sought after here in times of Lent, and I have contacts to divert business to Castile. You need to see if it's viable, there's already a lot of competition from the Basques and the French to the north, but it may be a solution that the people in the colony in Jamestown don't have. It's a challenge for you, don't you think it sounds interesting, son?"

I understood my father's motivation, he wanted to get me away from the old Europe, where the bad memories were eating me alive. He wanted to send me far away, to an unlikely company that could keep me occupied on staying alive.  Deep down I knew that the return on his investment mattered less to him than my return to life following my disastrous duel over Gunnarr.

What I hadn't told him is that two decades had done little good. I still saw Gunnarr in every blond man taller than me who walked past me. I saw him behind the crooked smile of the innkeeper, riding a horse crossing the Thames, in uniform in a parade for King James I.

Everyone was him.

"So, son, what do you say? Will you help me with this?" my father insisted, from the other side of the table of the inn, thousands of miles away from my thoughts.

I took the wooden jug of water and toasted with him, forcing a smile and told him exactly what he wanted to hear.

"What the hell! Let's do it, father, let's be business partners once more!"

A week later, having said goodbye to my father in London, I took a horse driven carriage I had hired to the port of Southampton, looking for a boat called the Mayflower. I'd been given instructions to find Adams, the person in charge of the provisions and the passenger list.

I always found the smell of ports hard to stomach. The fish, the rotten food from the crossings that were thrown into the sea right there in the harbor, the vomit from the first time passengers... I wasn't sure I wanted to take this trip.

All of a sudden my horse stopped dead in its tracks and began to whinny in terror, as if it had seen the devil himself. And that's when I saw a tall man with his back to me. He was speaking with a woman in mourning next to the hull of a boat.

Gunnarr, son, is that you?

I jumped down from the cart and ran after him, but when I reached the boat, the huge silhouette had disappeared and there was just a young Puritan woman, dressed in traditional Dutch attire with a white bonnet, a dark wool skirt and a huge lace collar covering her shoulders.

              "Who were you talking to?" I snapped, doubling over and breathing heavily in front of her from my run.

"Sir, do I know you?" she replied.

"No, but I thought I recognized the man you were talking to a moment ago."

"Sir, I've been standing here since dawn with the list of provisions and there are many still to come. I see that you are one of the passengers," she said, pointing to the royal document I was holding in my hand. "Sant or stranger?"

"Are you the wife of Adams, who's in charge of the provisions?" I wanted to know, ignoring her question. My father had already informed me that the Puritans called themselves Sants, holy men, and they referred to the rest of the passengers as strangers.

She looked me up and down. I was dressed as an adventurer, with a doublet, pantaloons, a short cape and a musket, as well as the beaver skin hat to show the Indians. I thought it looked ridiculous, but to the English it was a sign of luxury, and as my father well said, of the new ostentatious rich, so to the Puritans, I looked like a rich, pompous globetrotter.

"My name is Manon Adams, and I am indeed in charge of the passenger and provisions lists. I am recently widowed, and as such, have inherited the debt that my husband so eagerly took on with the Plymouth Company. So there is no longer a Mr. Adams, but there are many Pounds to be returned."

"First off, I'm going to write your name on the passenger list of the Mayflower, this old boat that used to carry wine. Could you show me your credentials?"

I handed her the piece of paper and she frowned when she read my name.

"It only states your first name here, Ely. Don't you have a surname?"

"Just write down Ely. That's sufficient to identify me."

She scribbled down my name, not very convinced, on the tattered piece of paper that never left her hand that day.

And that's what she put, on the famous list of the Mayflower, that so many American scholars would study five centuries later, just one passenger was recorded with no surname. A passenger which the chronicles would soon lose sight of.

"Have you brought the provisions with you?"

"Yes," I said, looking towards the horse and cart. "I'll go and fetch you the stipulated two tones."

Widow Adams helped me to unload the heavy wooden barrels where I had stashed everything that was going to accompany me to the New World.

"Sir, I don't mean to snoop through your belongings, but I have to make an inventory of what you are taking, to make sure that this will be a viable trip and that the passengers do not bring useless things aboard that will not be pertinent to our survival."

She opened one of the barrels and peered inside, with a strange look on her face.

"And your clothes? Aren't you taking any clothes to face the cold coastal winter?"

"There will be natives, I will hunt furs and trade them. I have information about other colonies, the Indians have textile mills in their camps."

"And don't you mind dressing like a native?" asked the widow, twisting her face.

"Their clothing will be more suitable for those extremes. Or do you think that your starched collars and bonnets will be of more use when the first flakes of snow begin to fall?"

"And why so many metal plates? And so much cutlery? Are you thinking of opening an inn?"

I laughed at the thought, that woman only moved within very strict parameters."

"It's my currency with the natives."

How could I tell her that I knew of the fascination that our shiny plates caused in the New World? How could I tell her that a barrel full of plates would practically make me the richest man on the Mayflower?

"Why do you have so much fresh fruit? Wouldn't salted meat be more useful?" she asked, opening a second barrel.

"These lemons will come in very handy if the crew gets sick."

"Rubbish, that's not been proven."

Trust me, I've tried it and it works.

I looked apprehensively at the widow as she began to remove lemons from the top of the barrel.

"Just let me pass, the rest are my things."

But she was wasn't ready to give in. She pulled out one of the bottles that was hidden in the bottom of the barrel.

"What are you planning on doing with so much alcohol?"

"Trade with the natives," I lied.

The truth is that they were reserves, my reserves. I was still on edge and afraid of seeing Gunnarr again. There was only one way of escaping from my ghosts, and that was drowning them out with alcohol. And there was no way that that Dutch or English widow, or whatever she was, was going to change my plans.

"I can't let you aboard with this much alcohol. William Bradford put me in charge of this task and he trusts my judgment. If the crew finds out that there are so many bottles of alcohol on board, this voyage could turn into pure hell."

"Nobody will find out that there are so many bottles, ma'am. You're not going to say anything and I'm a discreet man who doesn't like to share his intentions with anyone. Take another look at the permit stamped by King James I, giving me the freedom to come aboard with the supplies I deem necessary," I said, tired of the formalities.

Widow Adams understood that she had lost the battle, took a step back and let me pass.

During the first dinner, the Puritan families sat on several tables away from the rest of us. I counted a few children and a pregnant woman. That night, the passengers of the unsuccessful Speedwell got together with the Mayflower passengers and they all prayed for the success of the new voyage. But there was barely enough room for everyone and we were going to have to endure many weeks living together in a cramped space, and I could understand the concern of Widow Adams, who was always alert.

That same night the problems started, and I fled from the overwhelming crowd and the stifling heat of human bodies and went to find solitude with a bottle hidden under my cape. The air was far too cold and the lights of Southampton were now just a memory, we had reached the black ocean and the freezing wind greeted us, and it made tears spring to my eyes. It wasn't going to be a pleasant journey, that far north where the Atlantic didn't know summers or falls.

I'm not 100% sure of what happened next. I know that the alcohol wrapped me up in the mist and I felt safe, although that sensation quickly ended, when I felt my body sinking in the sea. I couldn't recall falling over the side, but there I was, in the middle of the Atlantic, trying to stay afloat. I came to my senses in less than a second, conscious of the fact that nobody would come to rescue me, and that the Mayflower was continuing with its route, and the people on board would never know that one of their passengers was going to freeze to death in the freezing ocean waters.