Martin spun on his heels and marched back towards the boat. How was it Martin was so sure everyone in his town was innocent? They had been through quite a traumatic experience, so it wasn’t hard to imagine one of them letting their anger drive them to murder.
And yet Martin was trying very hard to steer him away from the pueblo by directing his attention to the army company. It suggested that either Martin might know something about the murder he wasn’t saying or he had something to hide. Or both. There was no reason yet to even rule out Martin as a suspect, for Armada had little doubt Martin owned a harquebus.
“You leave me no choice, alcalde,” Armada said to Martin’s back. “I will have to interrogate the families who lost children as well as perform a village-wide search for illegal firearms. This may take some time, however, so perhaps you can suggest somewhere my page and I can rent a room from?”
This got Martin’s attention, and he turned to scowl at Armada.
“Do you have any idea what it is like to have a constable from the Holy Brotherhood in your town? Your brothers have a nasty reputation for abusing their power. Cutting off hands or feet, hanging people for the slightest offence. The stories we’ve all grown up with are frightening. And these people have been through enough.”
Armada was well aware of the Brotherhood’s reputation. It had proven to be an obstacle in almost every case he had ever worked.
“It is unfortunate,” Armada said. “But I’m still the only chance you have of stopping a killer in your town.”
Martin sighed. “All right. If you insist on intervening into these people’s lives, then I think the best thing is to collect them altogether at the town hall so you can interview them there. It’s how these things are done anyway, right?”
It wasn’t the result Armada had been hoping for. Martin was right in that many constables of the Brotherhood, most law enforcement officers in fact, interviewed suspects and witnesses in a very public way. It involved the whole family or the whole pueblo gathered around to hear the proceedings, with each shouting their own contributions in the process.
And Armada hated it. He never got any useful information from such a spectacle. It almost always descended into an airing of grievances between neighbours and family that would go long into the night.
It was why Armada preferred to have conversations privately, away from shouting neighbours, where the person being questioned could relax and not worry about what might be heard. The truth came much easier this way.
But it was a start. He could get to know the families well enough to perhaps follow up later if he needed anything else. The disadvantage was it also gave Martin time to tell the families what to say and what not to say. But Armada saw little way around that. He would have to do his best to see through it.
“Very well,” Armada said.
“I’ll be in touch,” Martin said as he walked back towards the boat. “They’re good people,” he said over his shoulder.
“Most of them, yes,” Armada said but was doubtful Martin had heard it.
Chapter Four
Lucas had more than enough to do that morning. There were clothes to wash, a mule to feed and care for, and provisions to sort out, as well as meals to keep on hand for when Armada returned.
But it was tedious work. Armada couldn’t expect his mind not to wander a little. And when it did, it went to the watchtower. There was something almost mythical about the killer lighting the signal fire after a dramatic murder as if they were a Greek god from the underworld, seeking vengeance after being wronged by a lover.
Lucas would have given anything to climb up there and have a look round. There could be clues up there. But something about the height made him hesitant. It was dizzying just to stand at the bottom and gaze up at the entrance. The rope ladder looked old and frayed, having been left baking in the sun for so long that thick strands of it were sprouting away. And the noise it made was unsettling, all that creaking. The thought of being up there made Lucas feel queasy even though the soldiers seemed to have no fear at all.
Lucas returned to his duties, pushing the prospect from his mind. But the thought wouldn’t leave him alone. Eventually, his instincts told him, he would have to climb that ladder. There was no other way.
A few hours later, after all his chores had been completed, Lucas found Armada still had not returned. It was getting towards midday, and the camp had little in the way of shade. Pedro had begun his shift in the tower that morning, relieving an exhausted Barros who now snoozed in the crook of a dead olive tree. Salinas had gone hunting, leaving Lucas with little to do except find a way to escape the merciless afternoon sun.
Lucas could stand it no more. For the good of the case and his own sanity, he marched to the watchtower and gazed up the rope ladder. It seemed to grow taller before his eyes.
Lucas wasn’t sure what his plan was. He knew he wasn’t allowed up there, but Pedro seemed the sort of soldier who wasn’t concerned about rules. He just wanted a quick look, maybe up to the roof as well. Then he would come back down before Salinas returned from hunting. No one, including Armada, need ever know he was there.
Unless, of course, he found something useful.
Gripping the rope ladder, Lucas put one foot on the bottom rung and hoisted himself up. The stones in the wall were becoming hot to the touch, causing Lucas to sweat under his tunic.
Lucas took it slowly at first, one rung at a time and trying not to look down. He was not yet halfway up when the wind caught the rope and it swayed against the stone wall. Lucas’s heart raced, and he regretted having come up. He locked his elbow around the rung in front of him and tried to calm his breathing.
But the wind wouldn’t stop. It was cool and carried with it the smell of the beach, which would normally be soothing. But it blasted him in powerful gales that made the ladder sway more. Lucas glanced down to the ground and felt as though he’d climbed up into the clouds. A fall from here would mean instant death.
Lucas’s throat tightened. He couldn’t breathe. He was growing dizzy and had to shut his eyes tight to keep his balance. He was in no condition to climb anymore, and he found himself stuck. There was nothing left to do.
“Help!” he cried.
A head popped out of the entrance above him. Pedro stared down at him with a confused smile.
“What are you doing, joven?” Pedro said.
“Help! I can’t…I can’t get down.”
“Hold on.”
Pedro swung his body out of the entrance and shot down the ladder until he was just above Lucas, hanging by the crook of his elbow.
“It’s all right. I’m right here,” Pedro said. “I’m going to climb past you, then we’ll go down together. You ready?”
Pedro manoeuvred his way until he was clinging with one hand next to Lucas, and he put his arm on his shoulder. “Nice and slow. Don’t look down. There’s nothing to see down there. Go on.”
Lucas could feel his hands shaking and worried they wouldn’t be able to grip the ladder. But he focused on Pedro’s voice, and he went down one rung and then the next until he found himself back on the ground.
Lucas planted his feet on the dusty earth and felt a huge relief sweep over him. He found himself shaking and had to sit.
Pedro smiled at him. “What were you doing up there? You know you’re not allowed in the tower.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I shouldn’t have…I shouldn’t have tried…”
“Don’t call me ‘sir.’ I hate it. Call me Pedro. And you need some water.”
Soon Lucas and Pedro were relaxing in front of Esteban’s shelter as Lucas drank most of a bucket of water.
“Thank you, but…” Lucas began, “I shouldn’t keep you from the tower.”
“Salinas won’t be back for hours. And no pirate would be foolish enough to come in the daylight. So it’s fine. Now answer my question, joven.”
Lucas drank more water while Pedro sipped from a clay jug of something pungent that made him grimace with e
very mouthful.
“I just…wanted to see if there were any clues up there. Something that might help Armada with the case.”
Pedro grinned. “But you’re just a page. Armada doesn’t pay you for that kind of work.”
“No. But I like to help.”
“You are mad, joven. I saw the fear in your eyes up there.”
“That’s never happened to me before,” Lucas said. “I knew I was a little nervous about it, but I thought I could make it.”
Pedro took a sip, wiped his mouth, then sat up. “Look, I know that tower better than the men who built it. Just tell me what you’re looking for, and I’ll tell you if it’s there.”
Lucas hesitated. Armada had impressed upon him once how it was important for an investigator to look upon the evidence with their own eyes. But if there was a clue to be found up there, was it not better to risk trusting Pedro than to not know about it at all?
There was always the possibility that Pedro had been the one to kill Esteban, but Lucas saw this as unlikely. The man didn’t have the motivation.
Besides, any suspicion of Pedro was eclipsed by his desire not to admit to Armada what had happened here today. How could he look the old man in the eye again, knowing he was so frightened from something as simple as climbing a ladder? It was humiliating.
“Well...one part of the story doesn’t make sense,” Lucas began. “Salinas said in his letter that the night Esteban was killed the rope ladder had been pulled up. Is that right?”
“Barros and I had to run to town to get the other ladder. I remember well.”
“But before that, you ran into the killer on his way back through the camp. Which I’m assuming happened somewhere around here?”
“Just over there under the trees,” Pedro said, pointing off to a grove of eucalyptus trees swaying on the hillside just under the western face of the tower.
“Do you see? That’s what doesn’t make sense. How did the killer get out of the tower if the ladder was up? Is there another ladder on the other side?”
“No.”
“How about stairs? Or footholds? Maybe they scaled the wall?”
“That tower was made so no one could ever do that,” Pedro said, taking another mouthful of his drink. “And there are stairs, but they are inside. They go up to the roof and down to the shed below. That’s it.”
“There is a shed below?” Lucas asked. “You mean in the bottom of the tower?”
“Yes. It’s full of provisions in case the tower comes under siege,” Pedro said.
“Could someone hide in there?”
“Perhaps, if the captain wants them to. The door is locked, and he has the only key. There’s a rumour there is rum in there, and the captain doesn’t trust us. Probably for the best.”
“You see? So how…?”
Lucas was lost in his thoughts. He stood and marched back to the base of the tower, gazing at the top. He walked all the way around it, braving the prickly weeds and jagged boulders it was built upon, letting his eyes wander over every bit of it, looking for anything that stood out to him.
Pedro came up behind him. “You are a strange one, joven. Why does this concern you so much? Come, have a drink with me. Let’s have some fun before Salinas gets back. Usually there is nothing for me to do on an afternoon like this except listen to Barros snore. I have cards in my shack.”
Lucas’s attention remained focused on the top of the tower. “What about that observation port?”
He pointed to a tiny window at the top of the tower on the western face that he could barely see. It looked out over the coast that stretched west towards Ponte Torres, the tiny town of Naixa, and a bit beyond, hidden by the haze that was always rolling in from the sea, the sprawling city of Malaga.
“What about it?” Pedro asked in a cool tone.
“Could someone have gotten out that way? Perhaps they jumped onto something below or had a rope…”
“No, no way,” Pedro said. “The port is too small for a man to fit through. Especially the big man I tangled with.”
Lucas stared at the port, but it was too far away to judge how big it was for himself.
Lucas sighed. “So how did he get out?”
“I don’t know, joven. Perhaps if we played cards for a while, it would help. And maybe a bit more of that sherry from your master’s barrel too.”
Chapter Five
October 1562 - Mencía Marañón knew she should stop wringing her hands. Her knuckles were beginning to ache from the constant squeezing. But she couldn’t help it. She was too angry.
The storm outside was getting worse and pelting the thin glass of the window of her cabin with water whenever the wind changed. She could feel the hull of the massive galleon being shoved back and forth by the choppy waves, always ending with a violent lurch as it tugged at the anchor chain.
Outside it was dark with just a bit of moonlight peeking out from behind the rain clouds to reveal the faint outlines of the twenty-seven other ships in the fleet. Above her head, Mencía heard the shouts and frantic footsteps of the sailors racing about as they pulled the sails down before the storm had a chance to rip them.
Mencía hoped the storm would never pass. Then they would never have to leave this place, never reach Oran and the fate that awaited her there. She’d overheard the men call this bay La Herradura, a Spanish name, which meant they hadn’t yet crossed the Mediterranean. They were still on the Andalusian coast. She was still close enough to…
Mencía fought to push those thoughts from her mind. She was weary from fighting the battle. There was nothing she could do now. She was just making it harder on herself.
Mencía rubbed her belly, which had grown a lot in the past few weeks. It was really starting to show now. Her baby was coming. And it was a boy. She could feel it.
But what kind of a life did he have to look forward to? And what would he think of her? Would he ever understand why his mother wasn’t in his life?
Mencía fumed at the thought of having to give him up. It wasn’t fair. Why wasn’t she allowed to make this decision? Her father said it was because of her attempting to get away from him.
Mencía smiled. She’d made it almost a year this time. She had gotten better at it. But her father’s trackers had still found her. But she’d made it harder for them. All the tricks she’d learned since her first attempt when she was fourteen had begun to pay off. She’d stuck to using disused roads, clambering over large boulders when possible to leave fewer footprints, crossing streams to throw dogs off her scent, not letting passersby get a good look at her face, and travelling at night. It was a miracle how those men found her so far out in the countryside outside Valencia in that rundown little finca she shared with the only man she’d ever loved.
Less than a year. That’s how long she’d had with Anton. Just long enough to get pregnant. And then her dreams of happiness were shattered once again. And it wasn’t fair. Her parents, although far from happy, had been married over ten years before her mother died. Why couldn’t Mencía at least have that? Just ten years? Enough so her baby would at least remember her.
Mencía knew why. Her father was an ambitious man. Coming from noble stock, having long ago made his fortune as a landowner and having been made a knight of the prestigious Order of Santiago, he dreamed of increasing his wealth and status. When Mencía was born, he saw her as just another opportunity to grow his empire. While she was still a baby, he was already negotiating with a local duke for her to marry his eldest son, who was also a baby. Contracts were signed, agreements were made, and expensive sherry was drunk. Her entire life planned out.
And now the very year she was contracted to marry she went and ruined his plans by getting pregnant by a man she felt true affection for.
She had intended to marry Anton. How she wished she had! Then there would be nothing her father could do. Why had they waited? If she had just known those men were coming and that her time was so short. She could have been so happy.
The
wind threw itself against the window, making it bulge and listing the ship again, as if echoing the rage that boiled in the pit of her stomach.
A nunnery in the tiny Spanish colony of Oran. That was the fate her father had chosen for her. That would be her punishment, her prison cell. It was somewhere on the African coast, but she wasn’t sure where. But she knew it was far away from anybody who could damage her father’s impeccable reputation. Mencía had heard what life was like in a nunnery. It meant long hours spent scrubbing floors, washing linens, cooking, and cleaning. She would be expected to use all her spare time praying while boarding in a tiny stone room where the door was locked from the outside at night.
And what of her baby?
Her father said if it was a girl, the nuns would raise it. Which meant a childhood of servitude. And once she was too old to be of use to the nuns, what then? Cast out into the street to be a beggar or a prostitute, which was how most orphans ended up.
And what if it was a boy? Her father had offered to put him up with the family of one of the workers in his silk factory in Seville. Mencía had seen how those workers lived. Crowded into rat-infested hovels, working long hours, never having enough to eat, and paid a pittance. Little more than a slave.
Her father never considered the idea of her raising her own child. He was too worried about saving her honour, by which he meant his own. Mencía knew he couldn’t risk letting her escape without punishment. What would people think of him? No, there had to be atonement. She had to pay for her mistake. And he’d allowed no more discussion on the issue.
Weeks later, she was here in a tiny cabin on a galleon, part of a twenty-eight-strong fleet. One of the soldiers on board had told her Oran had been under siege by the Ottomans for months and they were on their way to relieve them. One sight of this fleet and the Ottomans would give up, he’d said. For the first time in many years, Mencía prayed that night. She prayed the Ottomans would not be impressed by the fleet and that her arrival to the nunnery would be indefinitely delayed.
The Domingo Armada Mysteries Box Set Page 33
