by Gene Wolfe
We unloaded at Coruna and were paid off, each of us going up to the captain one at a time and having the book explained to us before we got our money. That was when I found out that I had worked for a week to pay for two shirts and two pairs of pants.
I will stop here and explain that I still had the little bag I had brought from the monastery, but there was not much in it besides one pair of slop-chest pants and a slop-chest shirt. I had lost my sandals in Havana, kicking them off so I could run faster, and my T-shirt had been worn to rags and thrown away. You know what happened to my jeans.
When the captain had explained everything and paid me, he told me it would probably be a couple of weeks before the next voyage. He would see his family while the ship went into dry dock to get her bottom scraped and so on. But when she was ready to go again, he hoped I would come back and sign on. That made me feel good. I thanked him for it, and I meant it.
After I had been paid, Senor asked me to help him take his parrots to the bird seller. I said sure and off we went, him carrying three cages and me carrying three. The cages were wood, woven out of sticks and tied with twine that the parrots kept picking at with those big strong bills parrots have. They were not heavy, and I had carried and cleaned them many a time.
The bird shop was interesting, and I had plenty of time to look around in it while the bird man and Senor argued over prices. There were three parrots there already, gray ones from Africa that would talk to you and do everything they could think of to keep you with them. They were all hoping to be let out of their cages, but they did not know how to say that. It seemed to me then that it was about the only thing they did not know how to say, and I decided that if I ever had a parrot of my own, I would not cage it. If it stayed with me, fine. If it flew away, that would be fine, too.
Then a young lady came in, wanting to buy a bird. She saw Senor's and got him to take each of them out so she could see it better. The bird seller kept explaining to her that they were new birds who had not been around people much and might die before long, could not talk, and so on. I got one of the redheaded green ones to say, "Pretty miss! Pretty miss!," cocking its head. It was something I had said to all of them sometimes. After that, she had to have that one. She asked Senor how much, and he told her a lot more than he had been trying to get from the bird seller. So everybody argued about that for a while-the lady and an old woman in black who was with her, and Senor.
While all the palaver was going on, her maid and I were looking each other over. She would peek at me, and I would get embarrassed because I had been staring and look away. Then she would look away and I would start staring again. She had been carrying three packages and a shopping basket when she came in, but she put them down and got out her fan, and fanned herself, and looked at me over the top of it. I kept thinking of how it would be if the two of us were out on a little boat of our own, sailing far away to someplace wonderful.
Finally the lady bought the parrot she wanted, and told the girl to take the cage, saying they would go home now.
"Oh, Senora Sabina, I can't possibly carry all this and that heavy cage, too! Couldn't this sailor carry them for us?" So I ended up with the parrot cage and the shopping basket, walking behind the maid. She was round in all the right places, and it was a nice view. We got to the lady's house a lot sooner than I wanted to, and she smiled and thanked me and gave me a little money. The maid gave me a wink, which I liked a lot better.
I went back to the bird shop thinking about a whole lot of things, including a few I was pretty ashamed of. Senor was still there, and eventually we went off to a cantina together, got something to eat, and drank wine. I was scared the whole time, thinking he might want me to pay for us both. Do not get me wrong here. I would not have done it. But he was a ship's officer and I was just a common sailor, and I was afraid he might make trouble for me.
It turned out that I did not know him as well as I had thought. He paid for everything when we split up. He had drunk most of the bottle, but I had drunk a good bit myself, and eaten every bit as much as he had. They had been cooking some kind of fritters in that cantina, and those were the best things I had eaten since the mango in Veracruz.
Probably I do not have to tell you what I did after we split up. I went back to Sabina's house and hung around outside hoping to see her maid again. Finally I went to the door, very polite, and told the manservant who answered it that I was looking for work, any kind of work, and that I had carried things for Senora earlier that day. He said there was nothing and shut the door in my face.
When you read this you will probably say I should have gone away at that point, but I did not. I went around to the back and hung around there some, and finally I saw her looking out of a window. All the windows had iron grilles over them, and big shutters that could be closed over the grilles, too. But the shutters were open, and she blew me a kiss through the grille. I blew her a kiss back, and she went away.
After that, I knew I would not see her again that night. I ran into Vasco and Simon, and asked them where they were putting up. They told me about their inn, saying it was not too big and about as cheap as anything decent and had good food and wine. So I went there. They were splitting a room. I told the innkeeper I wanted a room to myself, but a cheap one. As cheap as I could get it, as long as it was clean. He said fine and put me up in a guardilla, a little attic room with one window high above the street. I would not have wanted to sleep in that room in the winter, and it was up three flights of stairs. But when a man has gotten used to climbing the mast four or five times on his watch, stairs do not bother him. It was quiet and cool, too. I have stayed in better places, but after the forecastle it was just plain wonderful.
In the morning I noticed there was a little church near the inn. I could see a lot of steeples from the window of my new room, and that one looked really close. So after breakfast I went in there and sat down, trying to think things over. When I finally got up, I saw this Spanish priest sitting at the back. He said, "Would you like to talk to someone, my son?"
So I sat down next to him, and told him I was from Cuba, and that I felt like I had left God behind me there.
"You have not. If you had, you would never have come here seeking Him."
I said that did not make sense to me.
"It makes sense to Him, my son. Our foolishness is His wisdom, in this and many other things."
He did not look like the priest in Mexico, or even remind me of him much, but I said I did not have much to do that day and would do some work for him around the church if he wanted me to.
He shook his head. "I cannot pay you, my son."
"I've got money, Padre. Not a lot, but some."
After that we talked a lot more. I told him about being an altar boy, not saying it was at Our Lady of Bethlehem, and he wanted to know if I had ever learned to play the organ.
I said sure.
"Really? Would you play for me, my son, if I find someone to pump for you?"
So he got his servant to pump and I played three or four pieces I knew by heart, trying my best to keep them slow. After that he showed me a lot of church music. The notation was a little different, but he explained that, and I played a couple of the easy ones. That made him really happy, and he made me promise to play for his mass next morning.
"It is a shame, my son, that you cannot play strings as well. You might play and sing beneath the window of the senorita you speak of. It is how women are won here, more often than not."
I said anybody could play the guitar, but that my voice was not much. Which is the truth.
"You err, my son. Few can play a guitar as well as you play this organ. It may be you underrate your voice as well."
After I left there, I looked at guitars in some shops. I did not want a cheap one, and even the cheap ones cost a lot. The good ones cost more than I had, and if I had bought one I would not have been able to eat or pay next day's rent. That night I went back to the house and around to the alley, and waited for three or f
our hours, hoping to see the girl I had carried the parrot for. I never did, and when the lights went out I went back to my room.
Next morning I got up early and went to the padre's church. The padre sang the mass, his servant pumped, and I played whenever the padre told me to. After mass he heard confessions, mine included. You already know everything I confessed to. When he had given me my penance (which was not much) he asked me to wait until he had finished.
I did, of course, and when he had heard the last old lady he wanted to know whether I had a guitar. Of course I said I did not.
"I have my father's. It is precious to me."
"Sure," I said. "I'd love to have anything my father owned."
"But you do not? There were many children?"
I said no, but I did not want to talk about my family. I knew he was about to ask if my father was dead, and I did not want to have to say he had not been born yet, which by then I was pretty sure was the truth.
"Very well, my son, I will ask no more. Will you play my father's guitar for me? I would like very much to hear it sound again."
It was out of tune, which I expected, and I had to tune it by ear. But it was a good one, with a good, rich tone. I played some songs that had been old when I was a kid. He sang a couple of the songs his father used to sing for him and his mother. The tunes were pretty easy, and I could play along without much trouble.
That night I was walking past a cantina when I heard somebody playing a really good guitar inside. So I went in and got a glass of wine, and sat around and listened. He played a song all the customers knew, and they sang it. A lot of them could sing pretty well-more than I would have expected.
After that he passed the hat, and just about everybody put something in. He was a gypsy, and played gypsy style, but I did not know that then.
The next day I played at mass again, and when it was over I asked the padre to loan me his guitar, just for that night, promising to return it the next morning. He would not, and would not even speak to me after that, just going into the confessional and shutting the door.
After that I wandered around quite a bit, wondering how I could get him to lend it. So after mass the next day I waited until he was through hearing confessions. Then I showed him my money-not all of it, but most of it. I said that was all I had, which was pretty close to the truth, and said for him to keep it until I brought his father's guitar back, which I would the next morning.
"I do not want your silver, my son. I want my father's guitar."
"But I want my money, Padre. It's all I've got in the world."
It took a long time, but he finally agreed. I felt guilty as heck, knowing he would be worried to death. But I took the guitar that had been his father's just the same, and played at the back of the house, and sang a little. A fat cook looked out at me, then closed the shutters. I kept playing and sang a little, Spanish and Italian songs.
Finally the girl I wanted looked out of a different window, one up on the third floor, and smiled, and blew me a kiss, and closed the shutters. And I went away feeling absolutely wonderful.
After that I went to three cantinas where nobody was playing, and played and sang in each of them. (Mostly I just played, though.) I did not get as much as the old man had at that one cantina, but it was enough for me to eat next day and pay my rent. I felt like I had done pretty good-and learned a little, too, because when I went into a cantina and somebody good was playing there already, I just sat and listened.
The next day was Sunday. I went to the early mass, just like I had before, and played the organ. But when I tried to give the padre his guitar back he just asked me to play for the next mass, too. Which I did.
There were four that day, and I played at all of them. Then I said, "If you want your dad's guitar, you'd better take it, Padre. If you don't, I'll take it with me."
He smiled, but his eyes were full of tears. "Leaving all your money, my son?"
I shrugged. "I've got some more now. Not a lot, but some."
He pointed to the poor box. "Put the smallest coin you have in there, and I will return your money."
I did, and he gave me all my money back. When I had counted it, I tried to return his father's guitar again.
He would not take it. "Keep the guitar, my son. My father wanted me to give it to my own son. I do so now."
It just about had me crying, too. I swore that when I had enough to buy a good guitar for myself I would return his, and that was where we left it.
After that there is not a lot more to tell about the time I spent in Spain, and I do not enjoy telling what there is. Every morning I played the organ for morning mass, and I generally brought along the padre's guitar so he could see it was okay. (I was also afraid that it would be stolen if I left it in my room.) Then I would go back to the inn and sleep awhile like everybody did, because I would have been up late the night before playing in cantinas. A little after sundown I played for the girl I have been telling about. After a while she started talking to me through a first-floor window, and we held hands through the grille. I told her I was a sailor and I used to live in Havana. One night she came outside to talk to me. She danced when I played-she was a really good dancer-and we kissed and so on.
The next night the fat cook came out. "Master's been screaming to the sky, and Senora has been beaten to a rag because of you. Estrellita, too! Worse, and she can hardly walk. Get out!"
That was that. In the morning I gave the padre his guitar back and went down to the quay. The Santa Charita was out of dry dock and fitting out, and the captain took me back like he said he would. I was glad of it, because I knew that if I went back to my room in the inn I was going to jump. It was four floors up and cobblestones down below, so it would probably have killed me. I had needed a knife before, and I bought a regular sailor's knife with the money I had left-a big folding knife with a straight edge for cutting rope and a folding marlinspike. Every time I looked at the wooden handle of it, I would think of the padre's guitar. They were not really the same, but I did. I lost it when they chained me up on the Weald.
It took us another ten days to finish fitting out and load cargo. The cargo was mostly tools for carpenters and blacksmiths and so on, but there was a lot of classy stuff too, bolts of China silk and good clothes.
We felt pretty classy ourselves, with fresh paint on all over, the ship recaulked, new sails, and new rigging. We shook out for a couple of days to make sure everything worked. I got seasick in the forecastle and got knocked down for it, and when I felt better I had it out with that guy. I was younger and faster, I had more reach, and I meant to kill him. He was stronger and maybe forty pounds heavier, and he just about killed me. Eventually I got him down, and pretty soon he begged for mercy. When he did, I let him up. It takes a lot to make a sailor beg.
5
Pirates!
About halfway across the Atlantic we ran into a storm. Some of the other guys said they had been in worse, and my guess is they were telling the truth. That one was plenty bad enough for me, and I know the captain thought it might sink us. For three days and three nights, it bounced us around and rolled us like a ninepin. One time there was green water three feet deep in the waist. We lost a man overboard, and just about lost another one-the other one being me. Nobody could have slept on that ship, we just passed out when we got into our hammocks. We were dripping wet, but it did not matter because the weather deck was leaking water onto us anyway. Sometimes we got an hour or two of sleep before somebody yelled, "All hands!" Most often it was more like fifteen minutes.
We were under bare poles, but things kept breaking or blowing loose. Whenever a sail came loose, we had to try to furl it again before the storm tore it up. Sometimes we got it in, and sometimes we did not. All the standing rigging got soaked, which made it longer. That meant all the stays were loose, and we might lose one or both our masts when she rolled. We had to try to tighten everything up, working in the dark even when it was daytime, with the rain driving in our faces and breakers
coming over the rail. I do not know how hard that wind blew, but when it got hold of anything you just saw it for an instant before it disappeared forever.
I did not pray then-I was too busy and too tired. I would have let the storm kill me, if it had not been for the other men in our crew. I did not like most of them, and those I liked I did not like much. But there was no time to think about that. We were us, and if our ship went down we would die.
When the storm finally ended in warm weather, blue skies, and sunshine, it was half a day before any of us had energy enough to bring out our hammocks and spare clothes so they could dry. We just slept on deck. That evening we got the first hot food we had seen in four days. It was the best the cook could do, a hash of fresh beef, salt pork, ship's bread, onions, and tomatoes, with a lot of garlic. There was wine, and I remember old Zavala grinning at me over his. He had lost about half his teeth.
A lot of things may have happened between then and the next time I remember, but they cannot be important things or I would be able to think of them. We worked on the ship all watch, every watch, trying to fix up as much of the damage as we could.
One night somebody shook me awake and yelled at me to get out on deck. There was another man with him who had a cutlass in one hand and a lantern in the other, and I did not know either of them. All I could think about was where they might have come from.
