Yiddish for Pirates(75)

“Father,” wailed Pedro. “Father.”

“Climb down the ratlines from that cross, bubeleh, we need such lumber for masts,” Moishe said to the sheygets. “But first greet your papa who filled his britches in fear.”

“My father is a brave and honourable man,” Pedro said.

Ham signalled to Moishe from his station near the boy’s draped progenitor.

“He tells me your father is dead,” Moishe said. “This I knew. Nu, I was ship’s surgeon ere I was captain. Before we left the ship, your father died of fear.”

“You killed him. He had much courage and was not afraid to die.”

“It seems to me, he had no hesitation,” Moishe said. “But I thank you for your cooperation.”

The boy fainted, now realizing he had danced to a gun that had already discharged. He hung limp from the shrouds that bound him to the mast.

“When Spain learns of your infamy, you will be hunted down,” the Capitan said.

“I am glad,” Moishe said. “Prey that seeks me is easier to find.”

The Capitan pursed his lips and launched a slobber of spit onto Moishe’s cheek.

Moishe remained still and expressionless, allowing the bubbling spawn to slowly roll down his face.

“This mamzer suffers an excess of fluid,” he said. “We shall correct this by withholding food and drink while he convalesces in the hold below.” Moishe turned and nodded to Shlomo and Jacome who carried the Capitan to the hatch.

“History will not forget your evil,” the Capitan said as they dropped him into the hold.

“History is a game played with the dead,” Moishe replied. “The present actually happens. And nu, when they balance the scales, they’ll find a few shlog-whomped Spanish on one side, kvetching and moaning. And on the other, a heap of dead Jews and Indians. So, we do what we can to add to the Spanish side.”

Unbound from the shrouds, Fray Juan sat on a barrel on the fo’c’s’le, inhaling the smoky ghost of a large tobacco leaf.

“I, too, wish to do what I can for Los Indios,” he said to Moishe. “Though by word and reason, not by murder. Allow me to return to Hispaniola where I will speak for them. I have letters signed by the King. I seek to save souls.”

“As I, too, seek to save souls,” Moishe said. “Our pirate souls. The Spanish will frack the insides of our mortal flesh as soon as you lead them to us. How then can I release you?”

“Because I believe you also wish to save, if not the souls of Los Indios, then at least their bodies,” the priest said. “And … maybe you will accept a ransom for my freedom. A guarantee of my fidelity. You are not the only one who hostages something valuable aboard your ship.”

“We have searched the vessel,” I said. “What remains?”

“Piss buckets,” Moishe said. “A fen of bilge water, black rats which dine on the wounds of the dead. We have plundered all people and goods of any worth.”

“True,” said Fray Juan. “But perhaps a map may be of use. Such charts have more value than gold, if they are a guide to what you seek.”

“We seek only two things: revenge and gold. And, even without a map, we know how to find them aboard each Iberian sloop we encounter,” Moishe said.

“The Bible commands us to forgive our enemies,” Fray Juan said.

“But nowhere to forgive our friends,” I said with a cynical tweet, climbing aboard Moishe’s shoulder.

“Beyond what is written in the Bible, I understand little,” Fray Juan said. “And even that is often mysterious. But I know you seek certain books. Books such as you would not want found by those who follow Cristóbal Colón. The Colonizers. Conquistadors of space and—if they were to find these books—time.”

The mad monk knew how to get our attention.

“How do you know of them?” I asked.

“I am a priest in a place of few priests. In confession, many secrets are spoken.”

“You are an honest man, if not an honest priest,” Moishe said. “Lead us to these books, then.”

“These books are my ransom and are hidden beyond the distant horizon,” the priest said. “And aboard no ship. The first belonged to the admiral’s brother and you bore it yourself from one to another. The second was given you like a curse by Torquemada, for it had made him lunatic as the vexed sea. He had it bound in the skin of a child, removed before birth from a heretic’s womb. Both mother and child then sacrificed by fire. Miguel Levante, you may dowse this new world searching for this grimoire, this sanguinary, but it would be futile as seeking a camel in a stack of angels.”

“So, Father, where are they?”

“There is a map.” Fray Juan said. “But, ay,” he said, “once you held these books in your arms. Once you caressed their words with your fingertips. Once you gazed at them longingly. But they were taken away.”

Moishe looked to the sea, again gazing with longing.

He held us ransom with his words.

“The first stolen from Columbus when Pinzón first stole away. The second from your sea chest by Pinzón when you fled into Los Indios’ forest. He did not find eternal youth, but eternity. By year’s end, he died of a fever and was buried in the churchyard in Palos. The books became his brother’s and were then passed like unlucky talismen from man to man until word of them became known by the crazed and clever, the short and ravenous governor of Coquibacoa, Francesco de Ojeda, who seeks them still like magic rings, Jewish Grails. And so they were buried by Captain Israel Manos on an island somewhere in this Caribbean sea.”