by Ross King
'The Sacra Familia,' I prompted when she paused.
She nodded slowly. 'At first the galleon seemed no more than an apparition. As the Sidney drew closer the strange scent grew stronger and the mariners could see that she looked golden in colour, as if her mast-heads and yard-arms were glowing in the sun or lit by St. Elmo's Fire. Only the threat of keelhauling could convince the most superstitious of the sailors to stay at their posts. But Sir Ambrose knew the smell almost at once. It was not perfume, he realised, but sandalwood, a tree whose oil is used to make soaps and incense. A tree whose golden heartwood King Solomon is said to have used to build his Temple in Jerusalem.'
'The Sacra Familia was carrying a load of sandalwood?' I was puzzled but also disappointed by the revelation, by the reduction of this magical vessel, the subject of so many myths, to a cargo ship, a mere transatlantic mule.
'Not a load, though at first Sir Ambrose thought as much. But then he saw that, despite her list, the galleon was riding high in the water. He realised that the Sacra Familia carried no sandalwood and no silver or gold from the mines of New Spain; no load of any kind, even though she was sailing with the Mexican fleet. You see, the smell was coming from the galleon herself,' she explained, 'from her planks and masts. She had been built from stem to stern of sandalwood, exactly like Solomon's Temple. And so at once Sir Ambrose forgot about the other thirteen ships in the fleet and gave the order to pursue the galleon instead.'
Thirteen ships gorged with silver from the Mexican mines, or perhaps gold bullion, or bales of Chinese silk from Manila. I tried to imagine the scene. The wealthiest convoy on earth bound unescorted across five thousand miles of treacherous ocean for the Gulf of Cádiz. Yet Sir Ambrose forsakes them-and forsakes his holy mission-to pursue another ship, one with an empty hold. A galleon made from sandalwood.
'Such wood may have been fine for Solomon's Temple,' Alethea had resumed, 'but it's hardly suitable for ships. The heartwood is so heavy it barely floats. This must explain why she was lagging so far behind the other ships. It also explains why the Philip Sidney caught her so easily. It was like an Arabian stallion overtaking a mule.'
'But why sandalwood? Why not oak or teak?'
'That is precisely what Sir Ambrose had asked himself. And then he realised. He realised that the Sacra Familia had not sailed from Veracruz with the rest of the fleet. He knew at once that she had travelled from much farther afield.'
'The Pacific,' I murmured, thinking of Biddulph's bamboo rats, his belief that the ship had come through the Strait of Magellan, that narrow passage of shoals and islands at the bottom of the globe.
'He knew that the galleon must have been built from oak once upon a time,' she was continuing, 'because the shipwrights in La Coruña would never have built a ship from sandalwood, no matter how badly their timber stocks were depleted. But at some point a shipwright must have found himself with no choice in the matter. Sir Ambrose understood that the Sacra Familia had been wrecked and then rebuilt by her carpenters in a land where no oak trees grew, a land where sandalwood was the only timber to hand. This must have been on one of the islands of the Pacific, which is the only place where one finds sandalwood forests.'
Yet not even Sir Ambrose realised the significance of this fact until the galleon was overtaken in the hour before dusk. This had been a league off the desolate eastern shore of the Cabo Maisí. The Sacra Familia stood no chance at all, even without a cargo, for the Philip Sidney was the most formidable man-o'-war ever to sail the seas, and her crew was well prepared for battle. At Sir Ambrose's command the soldiers began tallowing the ends of their pikes and the marksmen scrambled into the fighting-tops with their muskets and serpentines. Below decks the gunners filled the wooden cartridges with powder and primed the cannons before roasting fireballs on the brazier like so many enormous chestnuts. But the battle was over almost before it started, because the Sacra Familia was unable either to fight or to flee. Her powder was still wet from the storm and her bottom was barnacled and so fouled with the weed the Portuguese call sargaço that her rudder budged only with the greatest effort. The English ship had come within cannon-range barely an hour after sighting her, at which point a 32-pounder was sent careering across the galleon's beak-head. There was no reply, so two rounds of grapeshot shredded her sails, to say nothing of what they did to the yardmen putting on more canvas in a vain attempt to hoist sail and escape.
The remainder of the battle lasted less than an hour. The marksmen opened fire from above, while fire-pikes were thrown from the decks and flaming arrows shot from slurbows. One of the arrows sailed through a scuttle and started a fire in the forward deckhouse, from which sailors could be seen leaping into the sea. Then more men jumped as the fire spread rapidly through the hull. By this time the galleon was being driven towards the cape, towards a coral reef on which sat, like a gibbeted corpse, the battered shell of an ancient galleon whose name, Emperador, was still legible on her rotting escutcheon. The Sacra Familia joined her soon afterwards and then broke apart in several fathoms of water just as the longboats of the Philip Sidney were being despatched with a boarding party of fifty soldiers carrying rope-ladders and grappling-hooks. The few Spaniards who didn't drown were eaten by the sharks, though not before they were seen throwing overboard or into the flames the galleon's log, her collection of portolan charts, the wooden traverse board, a derroterro-everything that might have betrayed the secret of her voyage. In the end, only the rats survived the wreck, enormous bamboo rats that deserted the ship and swam for the banana plantations along the shoreline.
'Dusk had fallen at this point, and a bright sunset foretold the end of the storms. Sir Ambrose took soundings and ordered his men to drop anchor a mile off the cape, where the Sidney rode out the last of the storm. The galleon burned all night on the reef, and in the morning a party was sent to survey the wreckage and scavenge what was left of her. They were forced to work quickly. The flames would have been seen from the shore and word of the wreck would soon reach Santiago if the smell had not warned the Spaniards already, for by sunrise the wind had turned to the southeast and now the smoke was flowing inland with the smell of sandalwood.'
'And was anything found?'
'For several hours, almost nothing. Nothing that might have rewarded the men for their dangerous work in the shark-infested waters. There was no sign of the log and portolan charts, documents for which the Navy Office would have paid a handsome sum. By noon there was little left of the galleon but her keel, and what the fire had spared the wind and waves dispersed. Sir Ambrose was about to order his men to return-a Spanish frigate had been spotted along the coast-but then a party of them raised something from the shallows. It was scorched and waterlogged but still intact.'
'Yes?' I was holding my breath. 'What was it?'
'A sea-chest,' she replied. 'But not just any sea-chest, for it was made of the same wood as the ship. Carved on one of the sides was the coat of arms of a man named Pinzón.'
'The captain,' I said eagerly.
She shook her head. 'Francisco Pinzón was the navigator, and a famous one at that, a graduate of the School of Navigation and Cartography in Seville. He had been the pilot of the Quirós expedition in search of the Solomon Islands in 1606. He must have thrown the chest overboard with all else, but it survived both the fire and the wreck, because sandalwood is as durable as it is beautiful. Once opened, it was found to be filled with books, for the distinguished Señor Pinzón was apparently an avid reader. Most were stories of knightly endeavour, but there was another book inside the chest besides these tales of chivalry, one that told its own tale of a dangerous and impossible quest.'
'The copy of Ortelius.'
'Yes. The Prague edition of the Theatrum orbis terrarum, a book so rare that in those days not even Sir Ambrose had seen a copy. He had just opened the cover when suddenly one of the salvors rushed into the cabin. Something else had been found in the water.'
It was another clue: dozens of scraps of paper from a log or jo
urnal that someone had attempted to shred before throwing overboard. The pieces were painstakingly collected from the water, then Sir Ambrose dried the scraps and carefully reassembled them on the desk in his cabin. The task took the better part of the afternoon and was made difficult because many of the scraps were missing or else illegible. At first he could take his bearings from only a few words: TOLEDO, LONGITUDO, IUPITER. By this time the Spanish frigate was scarcely a league away, and a larger fleet had been sighted off the coast of Hispaniola. But the Philip Sidney would not be caught. She weighed anchor and soon after nightfall had reached the islands of the Bahamas. And so it was there among the palmed cays, in dark waters infested with both sharks and pirates, that Sir Ambrose finished assembling what remained of the scraps and, with them, the secret of the Sacra Familia.
'Was it another map?' I asked.
'No,' she replied. 'Something much more intricate than a map. Perhaps you wish to see it?' She had risen to her feet. 'What remains is still quite legible.'
I too found my feet, but the motion seemed to unsettle me and I felt dizzy once again. I wavered on my feet as I followed her across the tiles into the atrium, which was filled with an eerie storm light. The rain on the windows seemed louder now, and the chandelier was chiming noisily overhead. Water had begun trickling down the marble staircase, dripping from the banisters and puddling on the floor, but Alethea was either oblivious or apathetic, for she guided me past the little waterfall, tugging gently at my arm and saying something about an almanac. Her voice was half muffled by the rain. The floor seemed to tremble underfoot as we picked our way along the corridor, passing the Great Room and the breakfast parlour. Suddenly the crypt plunged abysmally beneath us.
'… transits, eclipses, occultations,' her voice was echoing against the copper-sheathed walls as we descended into the entombed air. As we reached the bottom of the stairs I felt water beneath my feet. It seemed to be flowing down the walls, for when I brushed against one of them my shoulder came away wet to the touch. Oily-looking waves streamed past us. Alethea was walking more swiftly now, splashing along in her buskins, still apparently oblivious to the conditions.
'Everything in the tables has been calculated with the utmost precision.' Her voice seemed distant as she strode into the darkness ahead of me, hoisting aloft the creaking lantern. From all round came the sounds of invisible water lisping and hissing as it coursed swiftly along the rocky striations. 'The almanac was compiled, you see, by Galileo himself.'
***
So it was that I found myself back inside the muniment room, the place where I first encountered, through his many fragments, the mysterious Sir Ambrose Plessington. I lingered on the threshold. The floor, like that in the corridor, was running with water. The sodden rushes squelched as Alethea picked her way across to the coffin, which still sat on the trestle-table, safe for the time being. As she hooked the lamp to the wall sconce I was surprised to see how the water was almost crimson in colour. A droplet of what looked like blood fell from the ceiling and spattered my knuckles.
'Venetian red,' she explained. 'I've been using it in my search for the underground waterways. I pour dye into the cress-pond in order to determine what course it takes. I suppose I might have used a colour that was less gruesome, but as it happens the dye has done its work and I've managed to track down a number of the hidden channels. An engineer is laying pipes and building drains so that the springs can be tamed and the water diverted for use in fountains.'
I wiped my hand on my doublet and stood in silence as she creaked open the lid of the coffin and began to rummage among the papers. I could hear the dull roar of the water as it carved its mysterious channel behind the stone. Tame such waters? I had to admire her optimism, the unfailing buoyancy of her dreams. Even in the midst of such wreckage she could still cling to her grandiose visions of the house. But I had to admire her, I supposed, in other ways as well. For I had come to Pontifex Hall in anger and hatred but now found, almost to my chagrin, that it was impossible to dislike her. Perhaps I was as deluded as she was; perhaps I too was dreaming and desiring even as I trod the rising waters.
'Here it is.'
Her voice startled me from my reverie. She had turned round and was extending in her hand a piece of paper, or some other backing, on to which dozens of scraps had been pasted. Yet another text, another scrap to tell the story of her father's life. As she angled it into the light of the lamp I could see three or four columns of figures, each broken by an occasional gap.
'The puzzle of the Sacra Familia,' she was saying, 'fitted together by Sir Ambrose. Can you read it? The tables predict the eclipses of each one of the Jovian satellites.'
I blinked hard at this piece of handiwork, still perplexed. 'The Jovian satellites? But I fail to understand what they have to do with-'
And then suddenly I did. The print jumped into focus and seemed to detach itself from the page. The paper was spattered with Venetian red, but I had just made out the words IUPITER and LONGITUDO, when a stone burst from the wall like the stopper from the bung-hole of a cask, followed by a reddish tide.
I stumbled backwards a step, feeling the ice-cold water seep through my boots. Another stone broke free and even more water spilled inside, unfurling like tumbling bolts of russet to curl round our feet. The cataclysm had begun. For a paralysing moment I imagined the entire wall buckling and the pair of us crushed to death beneath tons of water and shattered masonry. Then I splashed forward and snatched Alethea's hand.
'Come,' I said. 'Quickly-or we'll drown!'
But she broke my grasp and scooped an armful of papers at random from the coffin, which now balanced precariously on its stand. 'The papers,' she said. 'Help me!'
But I was not going to drown for the sake of Sir Ambrose Plessington. I stepped forward and, seizing her arm, pulled her towards the threshold. The papers clutched to her chest spilled into the water, then the ink blurred and ran on the parchment, effacing itself in the eddying current. I could see among those sodden scraps the paper recovered from the galleon-the secret of the Sacra Familia once more cast upon the waters.
It would not be retrieved a second time. I reached down the lantern and, still clutching Alethea's arm, forced the door a few inches wider. The water must have broken through elsewhere in the crypt, for in the corridor it was two feet deep and flowing in a torrent from the direction of the staircase. Thrusting the lantern aloft I tried to make out the distant stairs. Already my feet were numb. I could hear the water whorling in the corners and slapping against the copper-sheathed walls. I swung round to face her.
'Is there another way out?'
'No.' She was still struggling to salvage what remained of her father's papers, which now flowed past like trout in a brook, trailing seals and ribbons. 'Only the way we came!'
I dragged her away and waded knee-deep into the current. The water was black now instead of red. After a few steps I heard the coffin fall from the trestle-table and overturn. I pressed forward. When I raised the lantern I saw that the other doors in the tunnel had burst open under the tremendous force of the waters. Their tributaries deepened and quickened the flow. Soon the fragments of wooden barrels and hanks of old rope were washed into our path, followed by the bone-urns from some ancient ossuary. Then came the bones themselves, bobbing skulls and femurs, the jumbled remains of a hundred monks shifting and sliding towards us.
I picked my way round the grotesque flotsam with Alethea still in tow. We had no more than a minute, I reckoned, to make our escape, before the crypt filled with water. When the water reached the middle of my thighs I heard another noise, a frantic squeaking which I mistook for the hinges of the lantern until I saw dozens of rats-fat, matted creatures-swimming against the tide and using the floating casks and skulls as stepping-stones. I lost my footing, then my grip on the lantern, which toppled into the water and extinguished with a hiss. I could see nothing in the darkness but, far in the distance, a weak light from the hatchway glowing overhead. I began struggling towa
rds it, but so weakened was I when we reached the stairs that I could barely stand. The water had risen to my chest; it took three attempts before I finally found purchase on a submerged tread. Then I gripped the banister and climbed hand over hand until, exhausted and frozen, followed by Alethea, I breasted the hatch.
The corridor was running with water, adding to the torrent in the crypt below. We staggered towards the atrium, passing on the way the breakfast parlour and the Great Room. In the latter the cornices and their brackets were streaming, as were the stalactites of lime-washed plasterwork. A segment had fallen from the centre of the ceiling exposing the laths and joists beneath. Cracks like lightning-strokes had begun appearing on the walls, spilling yet more plaster in the water. Then, over the rush of water, we heard a desperate voice-that of Phineas-summoning Lady Marchamont.
'The books!' Alethea was saying over the roar of the water behind us. 'We must rescue the books!'
But we were not to reach the library, or not just yet. For on stumbling into the atrium we discovered Phineas with his back turned towards us, endeavouring to block the entrance door as he had done against me. It was shaking in its frame under some furious assault from the outside. He had no better luck the second time, for after another blow the door burst wide with a shriek of tortured wood and a gust of wind. I heard the crystal pendants of the chandelier chiming high overhead and felt Alethea's frigid hand in mine. Our visitors had arrived at last.
It was their coach, framed in the doorway, that I noticed first: a fleet-looking vehicle with a domed roof and four horses stamping and foaming in their traces. Then I heard a crunch of gravel and a broad figure stepped through the splintered frame, followed swiftly by three men in black-and-gold livery.
