Journey of Strangers

by Elizabeth Zelvin

  “I cannot,” I said, “although I truly wish to please you. Miguel will not rest until he has spoken to his son.”

  “I fear he is doomed to disappointment,” Joanna said. “Natan took the first opportunity to remake himself in the image of our captors. I suggest we have a strategy for a quick escape if he betrays us.”

  “I cannot tell Miguel that,” I said. “When I proposed this journey, he was in a state of complete despair. Would you deprive him of hope one moment before you had to? What would you wish for your own parents?”

  “My mother is dead,” she said, “and my stepmother could easily bear to lose me, since she did not give a fig for me. My father no doubt despaired when he lost his children, but he would never undertake a journey of thousands of miles on the chance of rescuing us. He was too ineffectual to protect me from her malice, much less from the king of Portugal’s soldiers.”

  “I am sorry,” I said. “I hope one day you will meet my parents, who are otherwise.”

  “If you truly wish that,” Joanna said with a crooked smile, “you will abandon this expedition to the settlement.”

  “I cannot,” I said. “I do not do this only for Miguel. What brought me this long way was a vow to save as many Jewish children as I could.”

  “I think we will find very few survivors,” Joanna said, “and that none of them will wish to be saved.”

  “I hope that you are wrong,” I said. “And I will take to heart your warning that Miguel’s son might betray us. I will insist that Mishambo, Nunke, and the others approach the slaves and you and I, the Jews, before Miguel reveals himself to Natan. Thus little will be lost if we have to get away quickly.”

  We approached the settlement from the rear, circling from the beach into the thick woods beyond the most recently cleared cane fields. As we waited for dark, we observed what appeared, at least on the surface, to be tranquil scenes of plantation life. We saw blacks sweating in the sun amid the cane and booted whites in broad-brimmed hats supervising their labors. The whites held whips but did not use them while we watched. We identified a sawmill and a sugar mill, both powered by the flow of a small river that ran between the fields. The black workers included heavily pregnant women and others with babies on their backs, held safely by a twist of cloth around the mothers’ waists. The babies were evidently accustomed to this position, for many slept, awaking only to suckle at their mothers’ breasts, which the women whipped out casually, swinging them around without ceasing to work the cane.

  We did not see a single young person, black or white, between the ages of six and fifteen.

  “I was the eldest of the children,” Joanna said, “and Natan the next, as far as I know. The Portuguese brought along no children of their own four years ago, nor did the first shiploads of slaves include children, though some of the women were pregnant. What the Portuguese call mestiços, born of mothers impregnated by the masters here, would be no more than three years old and those fathered by Africans on Jewish mothers even younger.”

  “Are you saying that Jewish girls bore children?” In Istanbul, most girls married at twelve or betrothed even younger were allowed to delay the consummation of their marriages. “How could they be old enough to bear?”

  “They were not when I left,” Joanna said, her jaw set. “But not all of them escaped rape. Do not forget that the king’s purpose in transporting us here was not only to rid his kingdom of Jews but to breed us before working us to death.”

  “I am sorry,” I said, spreading my hands in apology for the inadequacy of my words. “You must have endured terrible things.”

  “I might have borne a child to slavery myself,” she said, “if not for the cupidity of the degradada who controlled me and, later, Yenenga’s skill with herbs.”

  I did not let my horror show on my face for fear that she would think I condemned her. No wonder she had difficulty trusting any man. She was younger than Rachel, and her experiences made the dangers Rachel had faced appear trivial in comparison. I doubted that Rachel’s sunny spirit and capacity to trust every soul she met, provided they were not coming at her with a weapon, would have survived the treatment Joanna had undergone. Rachel had courage. Joanna surely had more, for her sufferings had not broken her.

  “You have good reason to be angry,” I said.

  “Anger has kept me strong,” she said.

  “Yet you do not approve of Mishambo’s plan to incite the slaves to rebellion.”

  “I am practical,” she said, “as I have needed to be to survive so long. Having refused to die of despair, I have no desire to throw myself headlong at death as Mishambo intends to, whether or not he knows it. I wish to live, especially now that you offer a way to escape this pestilential island.”

  “I will get you out of here,” I said. “I swear it.”

  Her eyes met mine, still wary but with grim humor lurking in their depths.

  “Then let us make sure not to get ourselves killed before you have a chance to keep your promise.”

  When night fell, we ventured deeper into the settlement, moving as softly as we could. Joanna, who had left the place behind three years before, betrayed by a quick intake of breath or a tightening of her lips signs of how firmly established the settlement had become.

  “The king’s plan prospers,” she said bitterly as we rested briefly, crouched in the cover of a deserted cane field. “Did you see the fine house of the owners of this field? He is a degradado, she a former slave. And did you see the slave huts set apart from the house? This couple has accepted payment in slaves for the sugar they have sold to the Crown.” Lowering her voice so none but I could hear it, she added, “We may find that Natan has done the same.”

  “In Istanbul,” I said, “you will find Jews who hold slaves.”

  “But none who have experienced slavery themselves,” she snapped. “I loathe the very thought.”

  “As do I and all my family,” I said.

  It was nearing dawn when we found Natan at last. As Joanna had predicted, he had a fine house of wood through whose window we could see him sleeping in a great bed with a pregnant black woman beside him. His fields lay relatively close to the center of the settlement, with a well-worn path leading toward it that I judged to have been in daily use for years. Another track led to slave quarters less ramshackle than most we had seen, another sign that the owner’s prosperity was of long duration. On seeing his son, Miguel would have cried out had I not clapped a hand across his mouth as he opened it. Joanna seized his arm, stretched out as if he would have touched his sleeping child through the window. Together, we dragged him back. Crouching low, we withdrew to the shadows.

  “Soon it will be day,” I said. “Miguel, you can do nothing now.”

  “You whites must remain in hiding,” Mishambo said, “while my brothers and I sound out the slaves. We can pass among them freely as long as we can be seen to labor.”

  “Will not the overseers notice unfamiliar faces among their workers?” I asked.

  Nunke responded with a smile that did not reach his eyes.

  “Do you not know that all black men look alike?”

  “They do not to me,” I said. “Will you ask those you speak with about the Jews? If we see no white children again today, it is at least possible that they no longer labor in the fields but can be found within the houses and mills.”

  “You are an optimist,” Joanna said. “I have no reason to believe that swamp fever, snakes, or crocodiles changed their nature when I left.”

  “You may be right,” I said, “but we will not know unless we try. I have come too far to give up now.”

  While Miguel and I waited in hiding for Natan to wake, the Africans canvassed the slave quarters, waking the sleeping slaves and whispering to them of freedom. Joanna elected to remain with us.

  “I do not wish to come face to face with my tormentors,” she said.

  “Do you not fear that those the men approach will raise the alarm?” I asked. “It would only take one
to betray us, and they do not know Mishambo.”

  “Shared suffering makes a bond,” she said, “that resignation is not strong enough to break.” She cast a quick glance at Miguel, who was pacing impatiently, biting at his fingernails, and spoke more softly. “His son is the one I fear will betray us. His loyalty to Adonai broke easily, and at no time did he show a trace of sympathy for anyone else’s pain. If his father ever spoke to him of tikkun olam, he did not listen.”

  “I can only guess at what Miguel was like in happier days,” I said, “but I do not think he taught his son the selfishness you describe by example. It is far more likely that he adored and indulged him, allowing the boy to perceive himself as a little prince.”

  “Had he been a little princess,” Joanna said bitterly, “that illusion would have been shattered on the ship that brought us here. But he managed to escape the worst and quickly ingratiated himself with the masters, climbing on the backs not only of the children but of the degradados to whom we had been given.”

  The beginning of this speech aroused once more my worst imaginings about the horrors that must have befallen her. Since it was clear she would not welcome even the most kindly meant invitation to tell me more, the return of the Africans provided a welcome distraction.

  “Our success has been limited so far,” Mishambo admitted, “though we confined our visits to the huts of those who knew Nunke and Kwaku.”

  “We had no success,” Kwaku said bluntly, “in recruiting rebels for an uprising. The settlement grows, the whites grow rich on slaves and sugar, and ships come from Portugal with weapons and fighting men. If one fazendeiro dies of the fever, two more spring up in his place.”

  “Not many of those we knew still live,” Nunke said, “and those who have replaced them are treated so brutally by the slavers that they are thoroughly cowed by the time they get here. We told them little of our own encampment, since what they do not know, they cannot betray. But a few begged us to take them with us when we leave.”

  “What did you say to that?” Joanna asked.

  “That we would discuss it.”

  “I am against it,” Mishambo said. “These men who are willing to flee but not to fight would mill about and bleat like a flock of sheep and bring the white men down on us.”

  “We were planning to bring children back with us,” I said, “who surely would have been more unruly, so it is not impossible. I do not like to leave men who long for freedom in slavery.”

  “What did they say of the children?” Joanna asked.

  “As we supposed,” Nunke said, “most are dead. The few who remain have been married and manumitted or adopted and treated well enough to forget the past. They go to church on Sunday and cannot be trusted. You must forget them.”

  “Can we not tell those who wish to escape where to find us,” Kwaku asked, “so that they may choose their own moment to make their way to us? Even you, Mishambo, must concede that if they are stalwart and clever enough to reach the encampment through miles of untracked forest, they are worthy to join us.”

  It seemed to me that Mishambo read implied criticism of his simple swim to freedom into this, for he said quickly, “Let us hear what Shanda and Nkonde think. Nkonde? Shanda? Where have they disappeared to?”

  The other two Mbunda were indeed missing.

  “They could not have gone far,” I said. “We must find them quickly, for our time is running out.”

  As I spoke, a shaft of sunlight struck my face, dazzling me so that for a moment, I could see nothing else. Then the sun rose, spilling light everywhere. I saw Shanda and Nkonde running toward us, both laughing. Shanda held something that squealed and squirmed between his hands. Nkonde had his arms wrapped around something inside his shirt that wriggled and grunted.

  “Look!” Shanda cried. “Piglets!”

  “Good eating for us all!” Nkonde tightened his arms around his prize.

  We all stared, openmouthed.

  “You idiots!” Joanna snapped. “Do you want to bring the soldiers down on us? Drop those piglets at once and be silent, or you will get us all killed!”

  I thought her words had gone home, for the two Mbunda’s eyes grew round, and they both dropped their piglets. The little creatures scampered off, still squealing, in the direction they had come from. But Nkonde and Shanda were staring not at us, but at something behind us.

  A cold voice spoke.

  “Do not move. I have an arquebus pointed at your backs, and I will not hesitate to use it.”

  We froze.

  “If I but shoot it in the air, men will come running.”

  Mishambo, Nunke, and Kwaku, closest to our captor, obeyed his command not to move. I slowly turned.

  “Slaves who steal are hanged, but no one will mind if I spare them the trouble. They may even pay me a bounty of slaves to replace you.”

  The speaker was little more than a boy, but he held his arquebus as if he knew how to use it. I had already seen his face in repose, while he slept. Waking, it was stern, as if he were accustomed to authority, and faintly sneering, as if he enjoyed it.

  Joanna pushed past me and stepped forward between Nunke and Mishambo to confront him.

  “Natan. Will you really shoot me or see me hanged?”

  “Joanna! But you are dead.”

  Behind her back, Joanna made a pushing motion with her hand. I caught Mishambo’s eye and jerked my head at the others. I took a stealthy step backward.

  “Am I really?” Joanna said. “Are you sure that is it not you who are dead? Dead to Adonai, to Torah, to humanity?”

  “I have merely seen the truth of our Lord Jesus Christ, who conquers all. Only a fool would cling to the losing side.”

  “Christ in whose name your masters kidnap children. Christ in whose name you have no shame in owning slaves and even in impregnating them.”

  Slowly, we moved backward, away from that menacing gun. Only Miguel stood stock still, staring at Natan. When I put my hand on his arm to draw him backward, he shook it off.

  “Do not blaspheme!” Natan scowled. “And do not presume to speak so of my wife.”

  “Whom you had to marry in order to be manumitted yourself.” Joanna’s voice rang with scorn. “Yet you boast of acquiring yet more slaves. Are you rich yet? Do they pay you in gold for the bloodstained sugar you grow without lifting a finger? Or is all your compensation in human lives? You must be very proud!”

  Natan’s hands trembled, whether with rage or because Joanna’s words cut too close, it was impossible to tell. The arquebus shook, and Joanna reached out and pushed it contemptuously aside. She held Natan’s eyes with hers. I did not want to leave her, but I motioned to the others to get out of sight.

  “Run!” I mouthed.

  All of them took to their heels and ran for the concealing trees at the edge of the field.

  “I am proud!” Natan snapped. “I am a fazendeiro! I am a survivor who had the wit to live when all the others died!”

  “Do you really think it was your wit that caused the fever to pass you by? Do you think your Jesus told the snakes and crocodiles not to bite you? Blind luck saved you, boy, and your own capacity for self-deception and playing the lickspittle did the rest. Jesus may forgive your selfishness, but could you face Adonai with your choices and the deeds you have done? Could you face your father?”

  “Adonai is dead to me, and so is my father!” Natan spat out.

  I pushed Miguel forward. Joanna stepped aside, revealing him to Natan.

  Miguel, his face a mask of tragedy, held out his arms, tears running down his cheeks.

  “Oh, my son, my son!”

  “Papa?”

  Natan’s face went white with shock. The gun dropped from his hands. He started forward as if to submit to Miguel’s embrace, but then dropped to his knees, clutching at the cross around his neck.

  “Pater noster qui es in caelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum. Deliver me from evil, deliver me from evil.” His eyes squeezed shut. His whole body shook. “Je
sus save me, Jesus save me,” he gabbled. “Pater noster qui es in caelis. I am dreaming, I am dreaming. You are not real!”

  “Come!” Joanna said. “Now!”

  Joanna and I each seized one of Miguel’s arms. For a moment he resisted.

  “My son, my son,” he sobbed.

  Then he allowed us to pull him toward the shelter of the forest.

  Chapter 46: Joanna

  When they had withdrawn to a safe distance, Diego called a halt. Mishambo was engaged in giving his compatriots a blistering scold in their own language. Nunke and Kwaku, half disappointed and half relieved that their plan to foment rebellion had come to naught, looked to Diego for direction. Miguel, face averted and back hunched, was sobbing. Diego knelt beside him, his arm around the older man’s heaving shoulders, murmuring words meant to comfort by tone rather than sense, as one would soothe a skittish horse. Joanna stood apart from all of them, arms folded across her chest. Diego cast a puzzled glance at her stony face.

  “His heart is broken,” he said. “Are you not moved by his pain?”

  “My heart turned to ice when I was taken on the Lisbon docks,” she said. “That day I saw thousands of parents bereft as he is without any mitigation of their loss. He at least knows that his son still lives and, moreover, that that son has proved unworthy of his grief. Losing my family is the least of what I have endured since that day. The only emotion that still burns within me is anger, and that is a fire that cannot melt my heart.”

  Mishambo flung himself away from the other Mbunda with an exclamation of disgust.

  “Thanks to these fools,” he said, “we cannot linger here.”

  “We cannot count on Natan not to sound the alarm,” Joanna said, “once he has recovered from the shock.”

  “I agree that you must go, Mishambo,” Diego said. “It is not safe for any of you to stay. Miguel, I am sorry, but you too should leave. There is nothing for you here. For myself, I will always regret it if I do not speak with at least one Jewish child. Joanna, will you remain with me? I will not urge it if you think the danger too great. I can complete my mission alone.”