Chapter 22 Columbus by Rafael Sabatini
REHABILITATION
Cristobal Colon stood before their Highnesses in the golden candlelight of the royal pavilion.
Not only would Queen Isabel’s sense of justice brook no delay, but she was moved, too, by her desire to justify her own earlier enthusiasm, which the finding of the junta had made to appear a foolish credulity.
Santangel and Cabrera had come in with Colon. The Marchioness of Moya, as Colon’s sponsor now, stood midway between them and the table at which the Queen remained seated. The King, with Talavera and Fonseca, made a group immediately behind her Highness. The Toscanelli parchments and Colon’s own chart lay on the board before the Queen.
Santangel was speaking, at her Highness’s bidding, to his own share in the recovery of those documents. “The thieves,” he was saying, “were two agents of the Venetian Republic, one of whom had for some time been about your Highnesses’ Court, on a pretence of being attached to Messer Mocenigo, the Republic’s envoy. They were overtaken ten miles from Cordoba, on their way to Malaga, and in order to avoid complications with Venice, the matter was so handled by the Corregidor as to appear an act of banditry.”
The King intervened harshly. “That tale hardly makes sense. What interest could Venice have in this?”
“Whether it makes sense or not, Highness, the facts are as I state them, and as the Corregidor of Cordoba can witness.”
“And with submission, Highness,” Colon added, “so much sense does it make that it begins to explain the influences at work against me in Portugal. The wealth and power of Venice is built upon her commerce with the Indies. She holds the only gateway to Europe for that trade. To reach the Indies by the West is to shatter that monopoly.”
Ferdinand was thoughtful. “Faith, that might be an explanation,” he acknowledged grudgingly.
The Queen looked up from the documents, which she had been studying. “I grieve, sir, that an injustice should have been done you as much as I rejoice that you are fortunately enabled to expose it.”
Fonseca, made daring by chagrin, ventured to interpose. “It might be prudent. Highness, to make quite sure—if, indeed, it is possible to make sure now that Toscanelli is dead—that we are not being imposed upon by forgeries.”
The mockery of the Marchioness’s low laugh brought the blood to his yellow face and fury to his dark eyes. A wave of the Queen’s hand reproved her.
“The writing on the chart is in the same hand as the letter with Toscanelli’s signature, and both bear his seal.”
“These things may be counterfeited, Highness.”
“Faith,” Ferdinand agreed, “that is not to be denied.”
The Queen turned in her chair, and looked up into Fonseca’s face. “Are you suggesting that they have been? Speak up, man. Let us have clarity. The question is serious.”
Emboldened by the King’s support, Fonseca did not hesitate. “As your Highness says. It is in my mind that a man under a cloud, and so expert a penman as Master Colon’s own chart proves him to be, might not be able to resist temptation.”
Colon laughed, which did not please the Queen. “What is amusing you, sir?”
“The manner in which Don Juan covers his innuendo. It is like paint upon rotten timber. Give me leave to speak his mind for him. It is that I Lave forged these documents so as to make good my imposture.”
“And if I were to put it as plainly as that, how should you prove me wrong?”
“I should not. It would not be necessary. I might remind you, for instance, that a forger would have gone before the junta already armed with his forgeries. But I need not even urge that, unless you can show that the Venetian State knew that it was in my mind to commit these forgeries before it dispatched its agents to purloin them.”
Ferdinand loosed his laughter. Even the austere Talavera could not suppress an amusement that was general.
Fonseca’s lips writhed. He bowed to the Sovereigns. “My zeal for your Highnesses makes pitfalls for me sometimes.”
“Oh, and for others,” said Colon, which did not make Fonseca love him any better.
“Hush, sir,” the Queen gently reproved him. “At such a time you can spare some generosity. Take your charts. You have leave to go. But you shall wait on us again to-morrow.”
“I kiss your Highnesses’ feet,” he said, and departed well content.
In all that had passed the deepest impression upon the Queen, deeper even than the production of the Toscanelli chart, had been the Venetian attempt to become possessed of it, and Colon’s explanation. No richer confirmation could have been supplied of her own wisdom in having from the first desired to sponsor the venture.
“They are shrewd, these Venetians,” she told King Ferdinand when they conferred alone. “And they foresee just such an aggrandizement of Spain as Colon promises, an aggrandizement at their own expense.”
“Is there not aggrandizement enough for us in the conquest of Granada?”
She shook her head. “Sovereigns have a sacred trust. It is not for them to pause whilst any channel offers by which to magnify the country over which they have been called to rule.”
“True. But do not let us confuse dreams with realities. The lands to be reached by this western voyage are still no more than a dream.”
“The conquest of Granada was but a dream. Yet now it nears fulfilment.”
“Granada we can see. We know it for a reality, that it exists. We cannot see these lands of Master Colon.”
“Not with the eyes of the flesh. But they are visible to the eyes of Colon’s spirit: to his imagination.”
“It is just of this that I complain. Shall we risk lives and treasure, blood and gold, to prove that his imaginings are not vain?”
“To venture nothing is to accomplish nothing.”
“Yet what have we to venture? This war has drained our treasuries, and it may still drag on for months. We need every maravedi for what is yet to do.”
This, at least, was not to be gainsaid, wherefore the end of the matter was that when, obedient to the summons, Colon waited upon the Sovereigns on the morrow, it was to learn of yet another postponement of his hopes. But now, at least, there was a definite promise.
“We have well considered,” the Queen told him, “and we are resolved to support your undertaking. It must wait, however, until Granada is conquered. Only then will it be possible for us to take order about it. In the meantime Don Alonso de Quintanilla shall have our orders to continue to provide for your subsistence as generously as the state of our treasury will permit.”
It was less than he had hoped from that audience, yet not so little that he need despond.
“After all,” as Santangel told him afterwards, “when a man has waited years, a few added weeks need not exasperate him.”
They sat alone in the Chancellor’s silken tent. They had dined, and were still at table, the Chancellor busy with a dish of cherries. Colon fetched a sigh. “I am still to be accounted young, yet my years have been so chilled by hope deferred that the snows are already settling on my head.” He lowered it to show the strands of grey that began to show in his luxuriant tawny mane.
“Look for no pity from me on that score. I have grown white in the service of princes.”
“A service to break the heart of a man. Granada!” Colon was scornful. “A city. And its conquest is to delay the conquest of a world.”
“Be comforted. It will not delay it long. This war will not last out the year. The Sovereigns are carrying it with method.”
“I’ll go wait the end of it in Cordoba with Beatriz. She will give me patience who has already given me so much.”
Santangel smiled pensively. “More perhaps than you guess. Yes, go to her, Cristobal. She will be waiting for you. And . . .” He broke off, hesitating for a moment. Then added: “Be gentle with the child.”
Colon’s eyes widened in surprise. “You may trust me to be that.”