THE door giving upon the great corridor opened. One said, “The King,
Madam!” King Ferdinand entered quietly, in the sober fashion of a
sober and able man. He was cool and balanced, true always to his own
conception of his own dues. The Queen rose and stepped to meet him. They
spoke, standing together, after which he handed her to her chair and
took beside her the other great chair which the pages had swiftly
placed. After greeting his daughter and the Archbishop he looked across
to the painter. “Master Manuel Rodriguez, good day!”
There fell a moment of sun-drenched quiet in which they all sat for
their picture. Then said the King, “Madam, we are together, and here are
those who have been our chief advisers in this affair of discoveries.
Master Christopherus is below. We noted him in the court. Let us have
him here and see this too-long-dragging matter finished! Once for all
abate his demands, or once for all let him go!”
They sent a page. Again there was sunny silence, then in at the door
came the tall, muscular, gray-eyed, silver-haired man whom I had met the
day King Boabdil surrendered Granada.
He made reverence to the Queen and the King and to the Archbishop. It
was the Queen who spoke to him and that gently.
“Master Christopherus, we have had a thousand businesses, and so our
matter here has waited and waited. Today comes unaware this quiet hour
and we will give it to you. Here with us are the Archbishop and others
who have been our counsellors, and here is Don Alonzo de Quintantella
who hath always stood your friend. In all the hurly-burly we yet took
time, two days ago, to sit in council and come to conclusion. And now we
give you our determination. In all reason it should give you joy!” She
smiled upon him. “How many years since first you laid your plan before
us?”
He answered her in a deep voice, thrilling and crowded with feeling.
“Seven years, Madam your Highness! Like an infant laid at your feet. And
winter has blown upon it, and sunshine carrying hope has walked around
it, and then again the cold wind rises--”
The King spoke. “Master Christopherus, in war much else has to cease! In
much we have had to find patience, and you have to find it.”
“My lord King, yes!” replied the tall man. “It is eighteen years since
in Lisbon, looking upon the sea one day, I said to myself, ‘Is there a
question that is not to be answered? This ocean is to be crossed. Then
why do not I cross it? There is Cipango, Cathay and India! Gold and
spices are there, and here lie ships, and between, when all is said, is
only sea! God made the sea to be sailed! Yonder they worship idols, here
we worship Christ. There are idols, here is Christ. Once a Christopherus
carried Christ across water!’ Eighteen years ago. I said, ‘I can do it!’
I say it to-day, my lord and my lady. I can do it!”
Of the seated great ones only the Queen’s spirit appeared to answer his.
He seemed to enchant her, to take her with him. But the King’s cool face
regarded him with something like dislike. He spoke in an edged voice.
“Saint Christopher asked no great wage. That is the point, Master
Christopherus, so let us to it! At last the Queen and I say ‘We agree’
to this enterprise, which may bring forth fruit or may not, or may mean
mere empty loss of ships and men and of our monies! Yet we say ‘yea.’
But we do not say ‘yea ‘, Master Christopherus, to the too great ferry
fee which you ask! I say ‘ask’, but verily the tone is of command!”
The man whom they called Master Christopherus made a slow, wide gesture
of deprecation. The Archbishop took the word. “Too much! You ask a
hundred times too much! I must say to you that it is unchristianly
arrogance. You talk like a soldan!” An assenting murmur came from the
other ecclesiastics.
The Queen spoke. “Master Christopherus, if it be a great thing to do, is
not the doing it and thereby blessing yourself no less than others--is
not that reward? Not that Castile shall deny you reward, no! Trust me
that if you bring us the key of India you shall not find us niggardly!
But we and they who advise us stumble at your prescribing wealth, honors
and gifts that they say truly are better fitting a great prince! Trust
us for enrichment and for honor do you come back with the great thing
done! Leave it all now to Time that brings to pass. So you will be
clearer to go forth to the blessed carrying of Christ!”
She spoke earnestly, a Queen, but with much about her of womanly,
motherly sweetness. I saw that she greatly liked the man and somewhere
met his spirit. But the King was gathering hardness. He spoke to a
secretary standing behind him. “Have you it there written down, the
Italian’s demand?”
The man produced a paper. “Read!” But before it could be unfolded,
Master Christopherus spoke.
“‘Italian!’ Seven years in Spain and ten in Portugal, and a good while
in Porto Santo that belongs to Portugal, a little in England and in
Ultima Thule or Iceland, and long, long years upon ships decked and
undecked in all the seas that are known--fourteen years, childhood and
boyhood, in Genoa and at Pavia where I went to school, and all my years
of hope in Christ’s Kingdom, and in the uplands of great doers-and
your Highness says to me for a slighting word, ‘Italian!’ I was born
in Italy, but to-day, for this turn, King Ferdinand, you should call me
‘Spaniard’! As, if King John sends me forth be will call me Portuguese!
Or King Henry will say, ‘Christopher the Englishman’ or King Charles, to
whom verily I see that I may go, shall say, ‘Frenchman, to whom all owe
the marriage of East and West, but France owes Empire!”’
The King said, “It may be so, or it may not be so, Master
Christopherus.--Read!”
The secretary read: The Genoese, Cristoforo Colombo, called in Spain
Cristobal Colon, and in the Latin Christopherus Columbus, states and
demands in substance as follows: Sailing westward he will discover for
the King and Queen of the Spains the Indies and Cathay and Cipango,
to the great glory and enrichment of these Sovereigns and the passing
thereby of Spain ahead of Portugal, and likewise and above all to the
great glory of Christ and of Holy Church. He will do this, having seen
it clear for many years that it is to be done, and he the instrument.
And for the finding by going westward of the said India and all the gain
of the world and the Kingdom of God and of our Sovereigns the King Don
Ferdinand and the Queen Dona Isabella, he bargaineth thus:
“He shall be named Admiral of the Ocean-Sea, whereby he means the
whole water west of the line drawn by the Holy Father for the King of
Portugal. He shall be made Viceroy and Governor of all continents and
islands that he may discover, claim and occupy for the Sovereigns. And
the said Christopherus Columbus’s eldest son shall hold these offices
after him, and the heir of his son, and his heir, down time. He shall be
granted one tenth of all gold, pearls, precious stones, spices, or
other merchandise found or bought or exchanged within his admiralty and
viceroyship, and this tithe is likewise to be taken by his heirs from
generation to generation. He or one that he shall name shall be judge in
all disputes that arise in these continents and islands, so be it that
the honor of the Sovereigns of Spain is not touched. He shall have the
salary that hath the High Admiral of Castile. He and his family shall
be ennobled and henceforth be called Don and Dona. And for the immediate
sailing of ships he may, if he so desire, be at an eighth of the expense
of outfitting, for which he shall be returned an eighth of all the
profit of this the first voyage.”
The secretary did not make the terms less sounding by his reading.
Wind in leaves, went a stir through the room. I heard a page near me
whispering, “O Sancta Maria! The hanger-on, the needy one! Since the
beginning of time I’ve seen him at doors, sunny and cloudy days, the
big, droning bee!” Manuel Rodriguez painted on. I felt his thought. “I
should like to paint _you_, Admiral of the Ocean-Sea!”
The room recomposed itself. Out of silence came the King’s voice, chill
and dry. “We abate so vast a claim for so vast reward! But we would be
naught else but just, and in our ability lavish. Read now what we will
do!”
The secretary read. It had a certain largeness and goodliness, as go
rewards for adventure, even for great adventure, what the sovereigns
would do. The room thought it should answer. The King spoke, “We
can promise no more nor other than this. It contents you, Master
Christopherus?”
The long-faced, high-nosed, gray-eyed man answered, “No, my lord King.”
“Your own terms or none?”
“Mine or none, your Highness.”
The King’s voice grew a cutting wind. “To that the Queen and I answer,
‘Ours or none!’” Pushing back his chair, he glanced at sun out of
window. “It is over. I incline to think that it was at best but an empty
vision. You are dismissed, Master Christopherus!”
The Genoese, bowing, stepped backward from the table. In his face and
carriage was nothing broken. He kept color. The Queen’s glance went
after him, “What will you do now, Master Christopherus?”
He answered, “My lady, your Highness, I shall take horse to-morrow for
France.”
The King said, “France?--King Charles buys ever low, not high!”
The Sovereigns and the great churchmen and the less great went away
together. After them flowed the high attendance. All went, Don Enrique
among the last. Following him, I turned head, for I wished to observe
again two persons, the painter Manuel Rodriguez and the Admiral of the
Ocean-Sea. The former painted on. The latter walked forth quite alone,
coming behind the grinning pages.
In the court below I saw him again. The archway to street sent toward us
a deep wedge of shadow. He had a cloak which he wrapped around him and
a large round hat which he drew low over his gray-blue eyes. With a firm
step he crossed to the archway where the purple shadow took him.
Juan Lepe must turn to his own part which now must be decided. I walked
behind Don Enrique de Cerda through Santa Fe. With him kept Don Miguel
de Silva, who loved Don Enrique’s sister and would still talk of
_devoir_ and of plans, now that the war was ended. When the house was
reached he would enter with us and still adhere to Don Enrique. But at
the stair foot the latter spoke to the squire. “Find me in an hour, Juan
Lepe. I have something to say to thee!” His tone carried, “Do you think
the place there makes any difference? No, by the god of friends!”
I let him go thinking that I would come to him presently. But I, too,
had to act under the god of friends. In Diego Lopez’s room I found
quill and ink and paper, and there I wrote a letter to Don Enrique, and
finding Diego gave it to him to be given in two hours into Don Enrique’s
hand. Then Juan Lepe the squire changed in his own room, narrow and bare
as a cell, to the clothing of Juan Lepe the sailor.