Pastwatch

by Orson Scott Card

  Ah, Kemal. She had prepared the ground for him by saying that a person of power might come, a silent man, who would do marvelous things but would keep to himself. Leave him alone, she said in all her telling of this tale. All this time, she had no idea whether he would come or not—for all she knew, she had been the only one to succeed in reaching her destination. It was such a relief when word reached her that the Silent Man was living in the forest near the seashore. For several days she toyed with the idea of going to see him. He had to be even lonelier than she was, disconnected from her own time, from all the people she had loved. But it wouldn’t do. When he succeeded in his work, he would be perceived by the Spanish as their enemy; she could not be linked with him, even in Indie legend, for soon enough all those stories would reach Spanish ears. So she let it be known that she wanted to know all about his movements—and that she thought it would be wise to leave him alone. Her authority wasn’t all-pervasive, but Sees-in-the-Dark was regarded with enough awe, even by far-off villagers who had never spoken with her, that her advice concerning this strange bearded man was taken seriously.

  Someone clapped outside her house.

  “Be welcome,” she said.

  The woven reed flap was lifted aside, and Chipa came in. She was a young girl, perhaps ten years old, but smart, and Diko had chosen her to be her messenger to Cristoforo.

  “Estás pronta?” Diko asked her.

  “Pronta mas estoy con miedo.” I’m ready but I’m afraid.

  Chipa’s Spanish was solid. Diko had taught her for two years now—the two of them never spoke any other language between each other anymore. And of course Chipa was already fluent in the Taino language that was the lingua franca on Haiti, even though the villagers of Ankuash often spoke a different and much older language among each other, especially on solemn or sacred occasions. Language came easily to Chipa. She would do well as an interpreter.

  Interpretation was the one thing that Cristoforo had never had on his first voyage. What could be communicated by hand signs and pointing and facial expressions wasn’t much. The lack of a common language had forced both the Indies and the Europeans to depend on guesswork about what the other side really meant. It made for ludicrous misunderstandings. Any syllable that sounded like khan sent Cristoforo chasing after Cathay. And at this moment, in Guacanagarí’s main village, Cristoforo was no doubt asking where more gold could be found; when Guacanagarí pointed up the mountain and said Cibao, Cristoforo would hear it as a version of Cipangu. If it really had been Cipangu, the samurai would have made short work of him and his men. But the most disturbing thing was that in the prior history it never crossed Cristoforo’s mind that he didn’t have the right to go straight to any gold mine he might find on Haiti and take possession of it.

  She remembered what Cristoforo wrote in his log when Guacanagarí’s people worked long and hard to help him load all his equipment and supplies off the wrecked Santa Maria: “They love their neighbor as themselves.” He was capable of thinking of them as having exemplary Christian virtues—and then turn right around and assume that he had the right to take from them anything they owned. Gold mines, food, even their freedom and their lives—he was incapable of thinking of them as having rights. After all, they were strangers. Dark of skin. Unable to speak any recognizable language. And therefore not people.

  It was one of the hardest things for novices in Pastwatch to get used to, in studying the past—the way that most people in most times were able to speak to people of other nations, treat with them, make promises to them, and then go off and act as if those very people were beasts. What were promises made to beasts? What respect did you owe to property claimed by animals? But Diko had learned, as most did in Pastwatch, that for most of human history, the virtue of empathy was confined to one’s kinship group or tribe. People who were not members of the tribe were not people. Instead they were animals—either dangerous predators, useful prey, or beasts of burden. It was only now and then that a few great prophets declared people of other tribes, even of other languages or races, to be human. Guest- and host-rights gradually evolved. Even in modern times, when such attractive notions as the fundamental equality and fraternity of humankind were preached in every corner of the world, the idea that the stranger is not a person still remained just under the surface.

  What am I expecting of Cristoforo, really? Diko wondered. I am asking him to learn a degree of empathy for other races that would not become a serious force in human life until nearly five hundred years after his great voyage, and did not prevail worldwide until many bloody wars and famines and plagues after that. I am asking him to rise out of his own time and become something new.

  And this girl, Chipa, will be his first lesson and his first test. How will he treat her? Will he even listen to her?

  “You are right to be afraid,” said Diko in Spanish. “The white men are dangerous and treacherous. Their promises mean nothing. If you don’t want to go, I won’t compel you.”

  “But why else did I learn Spanish?” she asked.

  “So you and I could tell secrets.” Diko grinned at her.

  “I’ll go,” said Chipa. “I want to see them.”

  Diko nodded, accepting her decision. Chipa was too young and ignorant to understand the real danger that the Spanish would mistreat her; but then, most adults made most of their decisions without a clear understanding of the possible consequences. And Chipa was both clever and good-hearted—the combination would probably serve her well enough.

  An hour later, Chipa was out in the center of the village, plucking at the woven-grass shift that Diko had made for her. “It feels awful,” said Chipa in Taino. “Why should I wear such a thing?”

  “Because in the white men’s country, it is a shameful thing for people to be naked.”

  Everybody laughed. “Why? Are they so ugly?”

  “It’s very cold there sometimes,” said Diko, “but even in the summer they keep their bodies covered. Their God commanded them to wear things like this.”

  “It’s better to sacrifice blood to the gods a few times a year, as the Taino do,” said Baiku, “than for everybody to have to wear such ugly small houses on their bodies all the time.”

  “They say,” said the boy Goala, “that the white men wear shells like a turtle.”

  “Those shells are strong, and spears don’t go through them very easily,” said Diko.

  The villagers fell silent then, thinking about what this might mean if it ever came to battle.

  “Why are you sending Chipa to these turtle men?” asked Nugkui.

  “These turtle men are dangerous, but they’re also powerful, and some of them have good hearts if we can only teach them how to be human. Chipa will bring the white men here, and when they’re ready to learn from me, I’ll teach them. And the rest of you will teach them, too.”

  “What can we teach to men who can build canoes as big as a hundred of ours?” asked Nugkui.

  “They’ll teach us, too. But not until they’re ready.”

  Nugkui still looked skeptical.

  “Nugkui,” said Diko, “I know what you’re thinking.”

  He waited to hear what she would say.

  “You don’t want me to send Chipa as a gift to Guacanagarí, because then he’ll think that this means he rules over Ankuash.”

  Nugkui shrugged. “He already thinks that. But why should I make him sure?”

  “Because he’ll have to give Chipa to the white men. And once she’s with them, she’ll serve Ankuash.”

  “She’ll serve Sees-in-the-Dark, you mean.” It was a man’s voice, from behind her.

  “Your name may be Yacha,” she said without turning around, “but you are not always wise, my cousin. But if I’m not a part of Ankuash, tell me now, and I’ll go to another village and let them become the teachers of the white men.”

  The uproar among the villagers was immediate. A few moments later, Baiku and Putukam were leading Chipa down the mountain, out of Ankuash, out of
Ciboa, to begin her moment of peril and greatness.

  Kemal swam under the hull of the Niña. He had more than two hours’ breathing mixture left in the tanks, which was five times longer than he would need, if everything went as he had practiced it. It took a little longer than he had expected to chip away the barnacles from a strip of hull near the waterline—you couldn’t build up much momentum wielding a chisel under water. But the job was done soon enough, and then from his belly pouch he drew out the array of shaped incendiaries. He put the heating surface of each one against the hull, and then tripped the automatic self-driving staples that would hold them tight to the wood. When they were all in place, he pulled the cord at the end. At once he could feel the water growing warmer. Despite being shaped to put most of their energy into the wood, they still gave off enough heat into the water that before long it would be boiling. Kemal swam quickly away, back toward his boat.

  In five minutes, the wood inside the hull burst into fierce flames. And still the heat from the incendiaries continued, helping the fire to spread rapidly.

  The Spanish would have no idea how a fire could have started in the bilge. Long before they could get near the Niña again, the wood that the incendiaries were attached to would be ash, and the metal shells of the charges would drop to the bottom of the sea. They would give off a faint sonar pulse for several days, allowing Kemal to swim back and retrieve them later. The Spanish would have no idea that the burning of the Niña was anything but a terrible accident. Nor would anyone else who searched the site of the wreck in future centuries.

  Now everything depended on whether Pinzón remained true to character and brought the Pinta back to Haiti. If he did, Kemal would blow the last caravel to bits. There would be no way to believe it an accident. Everyone would look at the ship and say, An enemy has done this.

  11

  _____

  Encounters

  Chipa was frightened when Guacanagarí’s women brought her forward. Hearing about the bearded white men was different from coming into their presence. They were large men, and they wore the most fearsome clothing. Truly it was as if each of them wore a house on his shoulders—and a roof on his head! The metal of the helmets shone so brightly in the sunlight. And the colors of their banners were like captured parrots. If I could weave a cloth like that, thought Chipa, I would wear their banners and live under a roof made of the metal they put on their heads.

  Guacanagarí was busy plying her with last-minute instructions and warnings, and she had to pretend to listen, but she already had her instructions from Sees-in-the-Dark, and once she was speaking Spanish with the white men, it would hardly matter what Guacanagarí’s plans might be.

  “Tell me exactly what they really say,” said Guacanagarí. “And don’t add a single word to what I say to them beyond what I tell you. Do you understand me, you little snail from the mountains?”

  “Great Cacique, I will do all that you say.”

  “Are you sure you can really speak their awful language?”

  “If I can’t, you’ll soon see it by their faces,” Chipa answered.

  “Then say this to them: The great Guacanagarí, cacique of all of Haiti from Cibao to the sea, is proud to have found an interpreter.”

  Found an interpreter? Chipa was not surprised by his attempt to cut Sees-in-the-Dark out of things, but she was disgusted by it. Nevertheless, she turned to the white man in the most flamboyant costume and started to speak. But she had hardly got a sound from her mouth when Guacanagarí pushed her from behind with his foot, throwing her facedown on the ground.

  “Show respect, mountain slug!” shouted Guacanagarí. “And that’s not the chief, anyway, stupid girl. It’s that man, the white-haired one.”

  She should have known—it wasn’t by the volume of his clothing, it was by his age, by the respect his years had earned, that she could recognize the one that Sees-in-the-Dark had called Colón.

  Lying on the ground, she began again, stammering a bit at first, but still making the Spanish words very clearly. “My Lord Cristobal Colón, I have come here to interpret for you.”

  She was answered by silence. She raised her head to see the white men, in wide-eyed astonishment, conferring among themselves. She strained to hear, but they spoke too rapidly.

  “What are they saying?” asked Guacanagarí.

  “How can I hear when you’re talking?” answered Chipa. She knew she was being impudent, but if Diko was right, Guacanagarí would soon have no power over her.

  Colón finally stepped forward and spoke to her.

  “How did you learn Spanish, my child?” he asked.

  He spoke rapidly, and his accent was different from Sees-in-the-Dark, but this was exactly the question that she had been told to expect.

  “I learned this language so that I might learn about Christ.”

  If they had been flustered before by her command of Spanish, these words brought consternation upon the white men. Again there was a flurry of whispered conversation.

  “What did you say to him?” demanded Guacanagarí.

  “He asked me how I came to speak his language, and I told him.”

  “I told you not to speak of Sees-in-the-Dark!” Guacanagarí said angrily.

  “I didn’t,” she said. “I spoke of the God they worship.”

  “I think you’re betraying me,” said Guacanagarí.

  “I’m not,” said Chipa.

  Now when Colón stepped forward, the man in the voluminous clothing was beside him.

  “This man is Rodrigo Sánchez de Segovia, the royal inspector of the fleet,” said Colón. “He would like to ask you a question.”

  The titles meant nothing to Chipa. She had been told to talk to Colón.

  “How do you know of Christ?” asked Segovia.

  “Sees-in-the-Dark told us to look for the coming of a man who would teach us about Christ.”

  Segovia smiled. “I am that man.”

  “No sir,” said Chipa. “Colón is the man.”

  It was easy to read the expressions on the white men’s faces—they showed everything they were feeling. Segovia was very angry. But he stepped back, leaving Colón alone in front of the other white men.

  “Who is this Sees-in-the-Dark?” asked Colón.

  “My teacher,” Chipa answered. “She sent me as a gift to Guacanagarí, so he would bring me to you. But he is not my master.”

  “Sees-in-the-Dark is your mistress?”

  “No one is my master but Christ,” she said—exactly the statement that Sees-in-the-Dark had told her was the most important she could make. And now, with Colón looking at her, speechless, she said the one sentence that she did not understand, for it was in another language. The language was Genovese, and therefore only Cristoforo understood her as she said words that he had heard before, on a beach near Lagos: “I saved you alive so you could carry the cross.”

  He sank to his knees. He said something that sounded like the same strange language.

  “I don’t speak that language, sir,” she said.

  “What’s happening?” demanded Guacanagarí.

  “The cacique is angry at me,” said Chipa. “He will beat me for not saying what he told me to say.”

  “Never,” said Colón. “If you give yourself to Christ, then you are under our protection.”

  “Sir, don’t provoke Guacanagarí for my sake. With both your ships destroyed, you need to keep his friendship.”

  “The girl is right,” said Segovia. “It won’t be the first time she’s been beaten.”

  But it would be the first time, thought Chipa. In the white men’s land, were they accustomed to beating children?

  “You could ask for me as a gift,” said Chipa.

  “Are you a slave, then?”

  “Guacanagarí thinks so,” said Chipa, “but I never was. You won’t make me a slave, will you?” Sees-in-the-Dark had told her that it was very important that she say this to Colón.

  “You will never be a slave,” s
aid Colón. “Tell him that we are very pleased, and we thank him for his gift to us.”

  Chipa had expected him to ask for her. But she saw at once that his way was much better—if he assumed that the gift was already given, Guacanagarí could hardly take it back. So she turned to Guacanagarí and prostrated herself before him as she had done only yesterday, when she first met the cacique of the coastlands. “The great white cacique, Colón, is very pleased with me. He thanks you for giving him such a useful gift.”

  Guacanagarí showed nothing on his face, but she knew that he was furious. That was all right with her—she didn’t like him.

  “Tell him,” said Colón behind her, “that I give him my own hat, which I would never give to any man but a great king.”

  She translated his words into Taino. Guacanagarí’s eyes widened. He reached out a hand.

  Colón took the hat from his head and, instead of putting it in the cacique’s hand, placed it on Guacanagarí’s head himself. Guacanagarí smiled. Chipa thought he looked even stupider than the white men did, wearing such a roof on his head. But she could see that the other Tainos around Guacanagarí were impressed. It was a good exchange. A powerfully talismanic hat for a troublesome disobedient mountain girl.

  “Rise to your feet, girl,” said Colón. He gave her his hand to help her up. His fingers were long and smooth. She had never touched such smooth skin, except on a baby. Did Colón never do any work? “What is your name?”

  “Chipa,” she said. “But Sees-in-the-Dark said you would give me a new name when I was baptized.”