Waiting For Columbus (46 page)

“Columbus, he’s a bright man,” Strabo says. “He knows things he has not shared with anyone.”

“Like what?” Juan lights another beedi.

Strabo smiles like this is an incredibly stupid question. “Well, he has not shared it with anyone.”

“So how do you know it exists?”

“Because it must. There must be evidence from beyond the limits of our travels across the Western Sea. He’s not suicidal.”

“Yes, but is he sane?”

“You think he’s crazy?”

“I just asked the question.”

“It is, I think, too late for such questions, my friend. You’ve signed up. We sail west in a few hours.”

“To Columbus, then,” Juan says, raising his cup.

“To us, my friend.” And Strabo touches his cup to Juan’s.

They continue to drink. They drink the Scottish beverage neat, and as the light offers long strands of orange and pink in the eastern sky, the bottle is nearly empty. Juan has smoked nearly a whole pack of his beedies. It is not a solid line of smoking but, rather, a dotted line through the night.

Juan is not sure why he joined the crew. Friendship? He doesn’t wholly believe. He does not believe in what they’re about to try to do, but for some reason, he feels obliged to take Columbus up on his offer. Perhaps it’s as simple as having enough faith to do something he doesn’t understand.

Juan hesitated over Columbus’s offer, and then said yes to himself and got on board. What if this dreamer is right? He’s not right, but what if he is? What if? What if they sail right into history by finding the Indies, China, Japan? The implications of being the first to discover such a route are beyond what he can imagine.

The garden is a fragrant treat—an olfactory gift. They walk along the stone pathway and cannot help but step on a variety of thyme, and the smell is delightful. It fills Consuela with hope. It feels to her as if she is breathing green sunlight.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “Help me understand this. You put Juan on a ship? The guy knows nothing about sailing. Doesn’t that seem a bit absurd?”

“Yes. It was a matter of friendship. And Juan is somebody who is not afraid to tell the truth, even if the truth is not what I want to hear.”

“You invited a one-handed ex-soldier who likes to paint on a voyage that’s going to require sailing expertise.” She sits on a stone bench and Columbus sits next to her. He looks smaller today. His hair is pulled back as usual, but his face is narrower, his eyes sunken, his skin sallow. Has this been an evolution she didn’t notice because she’s too close, or is this sudden? Regardless, Columbus has become diminutive.

“He’ll be fine. I trust he’ll find a way to contribute.” He sighs heavily. “Columbus needed someone who would see things with new eyes and speak the truth.”

“By Columbus, you mean you.”

“I mean Columbus. Something happens, Consuela. Something happened.”

“What happened?”

“It goes bad. First, a woman is found floating in the harbor. The morning before the voyage. She’s floating naked and dead. Only her face, torso, and legs are visible above water. People gathered in Palos for the launch looked down and saw this armless woman. The water is black and thick around her. It is as if her arms have been cut off. It was in the papers. They thought she was a prostitute.”

“That’s what happened?”

“No. It’s one thing that happened. Not a good omen, this dead
woman floating faceup in the harbor. I should know who she is. I can see her face and I know it, but I cannot give her a name. Not a good sign for Columbus.”

Consuela takes his hand in hers. She looks at him. He’s unshaven, frail, lost. “Do you know who you are?” she says.

“Today, right now?”

“Yes, right now.”

“I have no clue.”

He clams up. He asks for and then demands sleeping pills. Consuela
prompts him a couple of times. He deflects, feigns a cold, or a sore throat, or fatigue. He is amused at small things. He finds the sky—cloud formations—fascinating. Sparrows mesmerize. Flowers delight. All these things have become more important than stories.

“I want to give him a bottle of wine,” she says. “I want to loosen him up and persuade him to finish.”

“We have medications for that, Consuela.” Dr. Balderas stands. Looks out the window.

“Check,” Consuela says, sliding her bishop into position. “I’d rather not drug him up when he’s so close.”

Dr. Balderas smiles, sits down, looks at the board. He hadn’t seen this coming. It’s aggressive and risky, which is a style of play he’s not witnessed in his favorite nurse.

“Okay. But it’s got to be private. That’s an interesting move.”

“Columbus taught me. It’s a derivation of something called a gambit.”

On a day when the sky is ripped with gray and cool breezes arrive in blusters from the Atlantic, Consuela tells Columbus she’s procured a bota of wine and asks if he’d like a drink.

“Ah, you are seducing me,” he says. “This behavior is not unappealing. It’s about time you tried to take advantage of me.”

“I am not seducing you,” she whispers. “I just want to share a bottle of wine with my … friend.” She almost said favorite patient but that would be too outlandish for her to handle. Feeding patients booze is forbidden. It’s against the rules. Even though she has permission, this goes against everything she knows about being a nurse. “Not here, though. Meet me at the pool.”

“It’s been a while since I had a drink of wine with a beautiful woman,” Columbus says. He’s sitting on the edge of the pool, presiding over the pool, with his back to the doorway. She has grown to love the way he always knows when she is in the room. No matter how quiet she is or how careful she is about her scent, he knows.

“I saw this coming days ago,” he says.

“What did you see?” Jesus, this isn’t going to work, she thinks. She starts to panic.

“The weather. Cooler weather. I adjusted the temperature of the water.”

Consuela dips her toes into the pool and she finds the water is hot. They decide to move their deck chairs so they can put their feet in the water. Consuela passes the bota to him and he sprays a long stream of wine into his mouth. They pass the bota back and forth. If this first bota doesn’t do the trick, there’s another just inside the pool-room archway, which she dropped off as she came in.

“So what’s going on in that head of yours, Columbus? Do you know who you are today?”

“The ugly dreams are back. I can’t seem to dream about anything
pleasant.” He stops. Takes a couple of barely controlled breaths. “Butterflies would be nice. Puppies. Kittens. Anything but what I find in my sleep …”

“Do you want to talk about your dreams?”

“We have talked about them. They’re ugly things. Horrifying. And I am here with a beautiful woman, and the wine is good. So no, I don’t want to talk about them.”

“Thank you, by the way.”

He looks at her, perplexed, then nods. “Well, you are a beautiful woman, regardless of what you may believe or think.”

They finish the bota and Consuela stands.

“Where are you going?”

“Do you think I would bring just one bottle of wine?”

“Nurse Consuela, you little vixen. I’d offer to get up and help you find that bottle but I’m not entirely certain I can.”

“We will taste the Pesquera now. I’m told it is an excellent Spanish wine. One of the best.”

“And the first bottle?”

“A bordeaux,” she says matter-of-factly.

That’s enough to push him back into the story. His eyes become sad and dark, edged with pain. The creases on his forehead deepen. He clears his throat and sighs heavily, then leans back in his chair and begins. “Ah, yes, the Café Bordeaux. This is where things go terribly wrong …”

Columbus arrives at the Café Bordeaux a few minutes early. There’s a lovely warmth to this place. Brownish, reddish, orange colors permeate the room and give it a comfort beyond its plush chairs and thick carpets. Selena wants to say good-bye, he thinks. This is her kind of café. It feels like Selena. It has the feel of privacy regardless of how public it may be.

He passes a table of four monks, hoods up, heads down, focused
on the mastication of their food. He and Juan drank at least a bottle of wine each at the previous café, and upon sitting down, Columbus immediately orders another. The waiter is a small ferret of a man with a slender mustache. He is not friendly but his efficiency makes up for this. The wine is presented, uncorked, and poured with little fanfare. Columbus appreciates this man’s sharp-edged professionalism. If he hadn’t already filled his roster of sailors, he’d have invited this man along.

At the next table, separated from his by a dwarf palm tree, a mother and her two daughters, young girls about ten and twelve years old, are having dinner. The daughters have long dark hair, brushed and shining. They are so well behaved. Their mother, a woman who has a knowing smile, seems pleased, proud to be out with her daughters. Her smile makes Columbus feel she understands her daughters, that she listens with love. Columbus cannot help but overhear their conversation. They are discussing what they will wear the next day to watch the ships set sail. This pleases him. The youngest daughter talks excitedly about starting school in the fall. The oldest rolls her eyes.