“All your friends feel as I do, Abel! There’s nothing we wouldn’t have foregone to prevent this. Nothing! And I doubt if there’s a soul in Lisbon or in Portugal who wouldn’t abolish this cursed edict. Manoel, himself, never would have consented to it, if the Spanish sovereigns hadn’t made it the condition to his marriage. But of course it’s no secret that the great thing with him is a Spanish alliance.”
“Why couldn’t I have foreseen this, after what they did to us in Spain?” Abel groaned. “But I was so sure of Manoel—oh, God, so sure!”
“To do him justice, I don’t believe he had an inkling of what they were going to demand of him as the Infanta’s price. He seemed really sorrowful when he talked with us about it; said, repeatedly, that Portugal owed her financial prosperity to her Jews.”
“And it’s nothing to what we’ve planned: new branch houses and agencies abroad, and Lisbon the commercial center of Europe.… But what’s the use of talking about it now?” Abel turned his head away and Diaz heard his stifled voice: “We must leave it all—all!”
“It’s taken the heart out of everything for me. This Expedition that we’d all revolved around for so long is ashes in my mouth.”
“Yet Lisbon will go on just the same,” Abel bitterly predicted. “The Expedition will sail, and who will ever remember the part the Jews have had in it? Who gives a thought as to how Columbus’ expeditions were financed?”
“It’s cold comfort,” said Diaz, “but the King himself was speaking to Gama and me of what your people have done for exploration. He even reminded us that it was Rabbi Joseph who brought back Covilham’s great message from Cairo.”
“Yes!” Abel passionately broke in. “He’s taken all we could give of brains and wealth, just as Spain did of the Moors and of us; and now, because we don’t worship as he does, he casts us out like chaff!” His face dropped between his hands, and Diaz, himself rent with grief, heard a sound of anguish: “My garden…this workshop… Ruth and I exiles! And my poor Abraham…”
After some moments he raised his head. “How did the King take Abraham’s advice about the Way of the Spices?”
“Just like a boy! Couldn’t wait to start preparations. He promised Abraham his reward should be a Court residence for life.”
“What will his word ever mean more than that—now?” Contemptuously Abel snapped his fingers. He looked steadily at Diaz as if he were forcing himself to some dreaded issue. “When—must we go?”
“In ten months,” was the almost inaudible reply.
Neither spoke until Diaz rose, and then Abel faltered out, “With all you have on your mind, Bartholomew, it was good of you—”
“Abel—Abel—don’t!” And as if unable to trust himself, Diaz rushed from the workshop and out of the gate.
It was characteristic of Abel that, without delay, and briefly, he told Ruth the news that Diaz had brought. She listened to him with a blank look in her bright, inquisitive eyes.
“But Abel,” she gasped, “you said—you said—we were too useful to Manoel to have him treat us as they did our people in Spain.”
“I thought we were! I thought we were, my poor, poor Ruth. But it seems he needs Spain more than he does us, and so he must take Spain’s orders.”
She staggered back against the wall. “It can’t be—can’t be true! He wouldn’t be so cruel!”
He put his arms around her with a feeling that but for them she would fall. Ah, that out of his own misery he could find some barest shred of comfort for her!
“Where does he want us to go?” she shuddered out at last.
Even in his despair the pathetic irony of her question struck him. As if the least qualm about the future of his Jewish subjects would ever cross Manoel’s mind!
He saw her turn a stricken face to the court; watched her eyes travel its sunny length; watched them come back to the workshop to linger, with tragic scrutiny, on the shelves, the bench, the table. He felt her suddenly quiver, felt her arms flung around him, and her cheek pressed to his.
“Abel, my poor Abel!”
He could only say her name, with a vague sense that somehow she was the comforter, he the comforted. They stood so, clinging to each other.
“We’ll go together, Abel!”
“Together, Ruth.”
“And Nejmi will go with us.”
“Heaven be praised!”
“She’s like balm to a hurt,” Ruth sobbed, under her breath.
“A light in the dark—like her name!”
Ruth’s arms tightened around Abel. “We must—must begin to plan—where to go,” she got out in a voice that tried to be steady.
Instantly he understood what she meant. “For Nejmi’s sake?”
She nodded. “After all she’s gone through we can’t let her think she’s to be again a—wanderer.”
“Wanderer!” The word seared itself into Abel’s misery. He had thought he understood, when Abraham had tried to tell him of that terrible exodus from Spain. He knew now he had not. His gaze turned achingly to the massive walls of the court and the house. How impregnably they had seemed to shield him from all that was without, and now—“Wanderer!”
“No, Ruth, we won’t let her be that,” he said as calmly as he could. “I’ll begin right away to plan.”
“I wish we needn’t tell her just yet, poor lamb!”
But, as it happened, at that moment, Nejmi came into the workshop, and clinging to her in a passion of gratefulness at her physical nearness, they poured out their misery to her.
Half-way through Abel’s explanation she broke in: “You must go because your God is different from your King’s?”
Almost he could have smiled at the innocent directness. “That’s it, my child. That’s the whole case in a nutshell.”
He saw the old fear creep into her eyes, and knew that she was looking at their impending disaster in the light of her own tragic exile.
“Ah, the trouble that it makes to call Him by different names,” she cried under her breath, “when, after all, he’s the same Allah!”
“We didn’t want to tell you, my child,” Ruth sobbed, “until we knew where we were going.”
“As if that made a difference!” She knelt between them, fondled their hands. “We have each other, wherever we go!”
* * * *
When Nicolo came, that evening, he found Abel sitting on the bench under the grey old fig tree.
“I didn’t know whether you’d care to see me so soon, sir. If you’d rather be alone—”
Silently, Abel drew him down beside him.
“Isn’t it chilly out here for you, sir?” Nicolo ventured. “Shall we go into the workshop?”
He felt Abel wince as if he had been struck.
“We’ll stay here—if you don’t mind?”
Nicolo glanced toward the workshop. It was unlighted. There were lights in the other rooms. Had the great “lighthouse” lamp perhaps been forgotten? He shivered as his gaze lingered on the dim outlines of the room that had been the glowing heart of Abel’s house.
For a while neither spoke, and then Nicolo choked out, “I can’t tell you the first word of my grief, sir. To stand by and not be able to lift a finger for you—”
“If it were my trouble alone!” Abel groaned. “But the thousands of us, that, tonight, are asking ourselves the same question: ‘Where to go?’ The business that we’ve built up here, our homes, all to be—” there was a sound of stifled agony as when a wound is probed—“to be as if they had not been!”
“I’ve been wondering, sir, if—if—I could help you find—a place—” He felt Abel’s hand close convulsively on his, but no word was spoken.
“I’ve friends in Venice, you know, sir,” Nicolo went on, “who’d do all they could if you wished to settle there. And Amsterdam—had you thought of it? They’re progressive up there, I’ve heard, and they’d appreciate brains like yours. Some day,” he broke out passionately, “Manoel will wake up to what he’s lost!”
“If he would at least let us take our possessions with us!” Abel’s gaze, as it travelled the length of the court, was a mute caress for each object that it touched. “But it will be as it was in Spain. We shall have to leave everything behind. Even our money—they will contrive to take that, too.”
“That’s something I wanted to speak of, sir. I was wondering if you’d care to invest your capital in my business. In that way no one could get hold of it, and it should grow with the business.”
“My boy, I—I didn’t look for anything like this!”
“Why, Master Abel, you’re the heart of all this great future that is bound to come to Portugal. Why, in heaven’s name, shouldn’t you share in it?”
He started to mention Nejmi. But what was there to say? Should he ask if they would take her when they went? As if he didn’t know without asking! The very thought was like a cold hand on his heart.
At last he got up, and gently asked if Abel would go in, for the night air was sharp.
No, Abel said, he would sit here a while longer. Chilly, was it? No matter. Almost it seemed as if he wished to be alone.
So Nicolo tiptoed away, shivering as he passed the silent workshop and let himself out of the gate.
CHAPTER 12
The Lighted Workshop
It was Abel’s last day at his bank. The final meeting had been held, the investors refunded, and inevitable losses divided between the bank officials.
The bank was now, in Abel’s own words, as if it had not been. He had come to the building this morning only to take away his private papers, and now, with them in his hand, he sought, for the last time, the little side door which he had liked for its privacy.
As he opened it, someone on the threshold turned.
“Ferdinand—you?”
It was their first meeting since the pronouncement of the edict.
“I knew I’d find you here, sir. I came to give you a message from—from—” He bit his lips to hide their quivering, and Abel saw his shoulders heave.
“Come inside.” Abel drew him within, and closed the door. “We can be alone here.”
“It’s a message from Master Abraham,” the boy said in a voice thick, Abel knew, with suppressed weeping. “He’s—he’s gone.”
“Gone?” Abel repeated. “Does Manoel know?”
“Manoel!” Ferdinand burst out. “I hate him! I never did like him, but now I’ll never forgive him.”
Abel put his arm around the heaving shoulders. “‘Never’ is a long word, lad.”
“Not long enough for me! Look at what your people have done for Portugal, and now how does he repay you?” He broke off to draw his hand across his eyes. “I must give you Master Abraham’s message,” he said, with an effort. “He sailed, early this morning, in a packet bound for Tunis. There was no time to see you.”
Abel received the news without surprise. “Did he take leave of the King?”
“Yes. Manoel assured him again he might stay on at the palace, but he wouldn’t listen. Afterward I saw him for a minute and he whispered to me, ‘See Abel as soon as possible, and tell him to go at the first chance. Manoel is sure to follow up this edict with forcing baptism on us.’”
“Baptism!” Abel cried, and his voice was full of horror. “That, too? Doesn’t Manoel know what that means?” he groaned. Then, as Ferdinand stared, uncomprehendingly, at him, “You must go back to your duties, my boy,” he said in a shaken voice, “and I—I must give Ruth that message at once.”
All the way home the terrible word rang through his brain: Baptism! In letters of blood it seemed to play before his eyes, to mock and to threaten him.
As soon as he entered the court he called to Ruth.
She hurried out to him. “Oh, Abel—what?”
“Nejmi mustn’t hear us,” he warned her.
“Then come in here.” She drew him into the workshop and closed the doors.
Sick at heart, he looked about it. The first time he had entered it, since Bartholomew had told him the worst. There, on the floor, were the shavings he had last made; the compass frame just as he had left it on the bench; the various tools on their shelves.
“Ruth,” he said with an effort, “Abraham’s gone,” and he repeated his message.
Ruth’s eyes blazed. “Why doesn’t Manoel put us all to death, and have done? Do you remember—do you remember, Abel,” she faltered, “what Abraham told us happened in Spain, when they tried to force baptism on our people? That parents killed their children and then themselves rather than be false to our faith? Oh, God above, must that happen here?”
Trembling, she sank on a seat. In silent misery Abel sat beside her, chafed her cold hands.
“If I could only shut it out, forget what he said!” she moaned. “Oh, those poor fathers! Those mothers drowning themselves and their babies!”
“Let Manoel try his baptism on us!” Abel said, vehemently. “Let him see what will happen if his priests come here!” He looked at her with sombre meaning.
For a minute she closed her eyes. When she opened them, they were brave and steady. “Yes, Abel, dear!”
From that day, ready at an instant’s notice, there lay, in one of the workshop cupboards two little vials filled with a colourless liquid. Why they were never used, Abel, in the anguished days which followed, forgot to wonder or ask. And Diaz never told him of the exemption which Gama had begged from Manoel, and had received as a special favour.
“As long as we must go,” Ruth said, heavily, “we’d better take Abraham’s advice and go as soon as we can find transport.”
“No!” Abel was firm. “Not until we know where we’re bound. If it were only you and I, Ruth—”
“You’re right,” passionately she agreed. “For her sake, poor homeless lamb!”
Abel rose and began restlessly to pace back and forth. The necessity for decision forced itself on his misery like a blade in a mortal wound. He paused to look out of the windows. Could it be that he was to leave it all? The climbing roofs. The blue bowl of Tagus. The bustling harbour front. Oh God, it was too bitter!
Suddenly Ruth’s arms were flung about him. “Abel—Abel,” she was stammering between her sobs, “we’ll start over again! There’s plenty of time—we’re not old!”
“Of course we aren’t,” he managed to say. “Not for a long time yet, my dear.”
“If I could only bear it all for you!” Her arms tightened about him. “Ah, Abel, there’s no one like you in the whole world!”
“Well, my dear—” there was something like the old twinkle in his eyes—“if I’d thought there was another like you, I’d have been put to it to know which of you to marry!”
Nejmi’s steps in the court made him say, quickly, “Go to her, Ruth. She mustn’t suspect. And I’ll begin right away to inquire about where to go. Rabbi Joseph may have something to suggest.”
Left alone, he turned again to the windows and, standing there, gazing down on his Lisbon, he was seized by the impulse—not merely wish or desire, but consuming necessity—to go to the shipyards. Yes, even in face of engulfing tragedy, in spite of all, he must see those ships—the Expedition of the Spices! And without saying a word to Ruth or Nejmi he hurried out of the house and down the long stairway.
He was not half-way to the water-front, when someone stopped him with a ghastly rumour of a massacre somewhere outside Lisbon. A farmer, on his way to market, had brought the first report. Later, a Jewish lad, spent with hunger and crazed with terror, had staggered into town and gibbered out horrors that were past belief. And even as Abel sought here and there for further details, there arrived a small company of fugitives with a story that took Lisbon’s breath: a band of Jews from outlying districts, on their way to embark according to Manoel’s order, had been attacked by bandits who, on the strength of a report that the exiles had swallowed jewels and coin, had ripped them open by the hundreds.
In a very sickness of spirit Abel wandered blindly about. What streets he walked he would never know, and pas
sersby he saw as shadows moving in a sea of sunshine.
At last he became aware of noise, loud and insistent. A strong odour of hemp and resin stung his nostrils. Bewildered, he glanced about, and, with a stab of recognition, saw that he was at the dockyards. He recalled that, some time ago, he had meant to come here; in fact, this very morning, when he was standing at the workshop windows.
In spite of his leaden heart, his numb senses thrilled to the surge of life about him. Near by, carpenters planed huge timbers; over here, coopers were bending hoops; and there, billowed about with seas of canvas, tailors cut and sewed new sails. Caulkers’ mallets beat a steady tattoo to the scream of saws; pulleys groaned, windlasses shrieked.
He caught his breath as his eyes rested on three tall caravels that reared against the sky: the ships that John had ordered for the finding of the Way! The ships that Diaz had designed! Well, at least, Bartholomew would have the satisfaction of seeing them put forth on the great adventure, and, undoubtedly, of seeing them return. But he, Abel Zakuto, where would he be when the Expedition came back? Ah, his compass that was to have guided it…his astrolabe!…
He walked on to watch a fleet of high prowed fishing boats toss the catch to waiting groups. The river bank swarmed with women and children washing and scaling fish, which others salted and piled. Farther along, he saw men skinning and quartering carcasses. Beyond were rows of barrels ready to receive the cured meat. “Gama’s crews must eat and drink,” Abel reflected, as a single-sailed wine carrier passed on her way to the warehouses.
How busy they all were—and how little they needed him! What was it to them that his tools were idle, the workshop silent, the compass unfinished? Well, hadn’t he told Diaz that Lisbon would go on just the same, even though half of it lay in its death agony? What cared the other half, going its triumphant way, drunk with the glory of this supreme adventure!
He stepped aside for a boy with a great bundle of flares. Abel watched him plant them at convenient intervals, and then set them afire. Could it be that work would go on after dark? Yes, here were fresh shifts to relieve the day workers.
The Young Adult Award-Winners Megapack Page 85
