The King's Gold (6 page)

The captain shot me a glance. I had, of course, told him of my encounter with Gualterio Malatesta outside the royal palace, although I had made no mention of the carriage and the blue eyes I thought I had glimpsed in the queen’s retinue. Guadalmedina and Quevedo, who were, in turn, studying the captain, exchanged a look.

“The plan,” said the count, “is this: Before unloading officially in Cádiz or Seville, the
Virgen de Regla
will anchor at Barra de Sanlúcar. The captain and the admiral of the fleet have both been bribed to anchor the ships there for at least one night on the pretext of bad weather or the English or whatever. Then the contraband gold will be transferred to another galleon waiting there—the
Niklaasbergen
, a Flemish
urca
from Ostend, with an irreproachably Catholic captain, crew, and owner, which is free to come and go between Spain and Flanders under the protection of our king’s flag.”

“Where will the gold be taken?”

“Medina Sidonia’s share and that of the others will go to Lisbon, where the Portuguese banker will keep it in a safe place. The rest will be sent straight to the rebel provinces.”

“That’s treason,” said Alatriste. His voice was quite calm, and the hand that raised his mug to his lips, wetting his mustache with wine, remained perfectly steady, but I saw his pale eyes grow strangely dark.

“Treason,” he said again.

The tone in which he said the word revived recent memories. The ranks of the Spanish infantry standing undaunted on the plain surrounding the Ruyter mill, with the drums beating at our backs, awakening a nostalgia for Spain in those about to die. The good Gallego Rivas and the ensign Chacón, who had died trying to save the blue-and-white-checkered flag beside the Terheyden redoubt. The cry from a hundred men as they emerged at dawn from the canals for the assault on Oudkerk. The men whose eyes were gritty with dirt after fighting hand-to-hand in the narrow mining and antimining tunnels. Suddenly, I, too, felt a desire to drink, and I emptied my mug of wine in one gulp.

Quevedo and Guadalmedina exchanged another look.

“That’s how Spain is, Captain Alatriste,” said don Francisco. “You seem to have forgotten during your time in Flanders.”

“It’s a purely commercial matter,” explained Guadalmedina. “And this certainly isn’t the first time it’s happened. The only difference now is that the king and, even more so, Olivares both distrust Medina Sidonia. The welcome they received two years ago on his estate in Doña Ana, and the lavish hospitality bestowed on them during this present visit, make it clear that don Manuel de Guzmán, the eighth duke, has become a little king of Andalusia. From Huelva to Málaga to Seville, his word is law, and that, with the Moor just across the water, and with Catalonia and Portugal held together with pins, makes for a highly dangerous situation. Olivares fears that Medina Sidonia and his son Gaspar, the Conde de Niebla, are preparing a move that will give the Crown a real fright. Normally, these things would be resolved by holding a trial in keeping with their social status and then slitting their throats. The Medina Sidonia family, however, is very high up the scale indeed, and Olivares—who, despite being a relative of theirs, loathes them—would never dare involve their name in a public scandal without solid proof.”

“And what about Alquézar?”

“Not even the royal secretary is easy prey now. He has prospered at court, he has the support of the Inquisitor Bocanegra and of the Council of Aragon. Besides, Olivares, with his dangerous taste for double-dealing, considers him to be useful.” Guadalmedina gave a scornful shrug. “And so he has opted for a discreet and effective solution that will please everyone.”

“He is to be taught a lesson,” said Quevedo.

“Exactly. This includes snatching the contraband gold from underneath Medina Sidonia’s nose and placing it instead in the royal coffers. Olivares himself has planned it all with the approval of the king, and that is the reason behind this royal visit to Seville. Our fourth Philip wishes to see the show himself, and then, with his usual impassivity, to bid farewell to the old duke by folding him in an embrace, tight enough for him to be able to hear the duke’s teeth grinding. The problem is that the plan Olivares has come up with has two parts, one semiofficial and somewhat delicate, and the other official and more . . . difficult.”

“The precise word is ‘dangerous,’” said Quevedo, always exact when it came to language.

Guadalmedina leaned across the table toward the captain.

“As you will have gathered, the accountant Olmedilla is involved in the first part.”

My master nodded slowly. Now all the pieces were slotting into place.

“And I,” he said, “am involved in the second.”

Guadalmedina calmly stroked his mustache. He was smiling. “That’s what I like about you, Alatriste, there’s never any need to explain things twice.”

It was already dark when we set off along the narrow, ill-lit streets. The waning moon filled the hallways of the houses with a lovely milky light, bright enough for us to be able to see one another silhouetted beneath the eaves and the shady tops of the orange trees. Occasionally, we passed dark shapes, which scurried away when they saw us, for at that hour of night, Seville was as dangerous as any other city. As we emerged into a small square, a figure swathed in a cloak and leaning at a window, whispering, suddenly drew back and the window slammed shut, and as well as that black, male shadow, we saw a precautionary glint of steel. Guadalmedina gave a reassuring laugh and bade the motionless figure good night, and we continued on our way. The sound of our footsteps preceded us down alleyways and along the paths around the city walls. Now and then, the light from an oil lamp could be seen through the shutters behind the grilles at windows, and candles or cheap tin lanterns burned at the corners of certain streets, beneath an image, made from glazed tiles, of Our Lady, or of Christ in torment.

As we walked, Guadalmedina explained that the accountant Olmedilla might be a mere faceless official, a creature of figures and files, but he had a real talent for his job. He enjoyed the complete confidence of the Conde-Duque de Olivares, whom he advised on all accounting matters. And just so that we could get an idea of his character, he added that Olmedilla had acted not only in the investigation that had led Rodrigo Calderón to the scaffold, but also in the cases brought against the Duques de Lerma and Osuna. More than that, he was held to be an honest man, something almost unheard of in his profession. His sole passions were addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, and the one goal of his life was to make the books balance. All the information they had received about the contraband gold came from reports compiled by the count-duke’s spies, and these had been confirmed by several months of patient research by Olmedilla in the relevant offices, cabinets, and archives.

“All that remains for us now is to ascertain the final details,” concluded the count. “The fleet has been sighted, and so we do not have much time. Everything has to be resolved tomorrow during a visit that Olmedilla will pay Garaffa, the man who chartered the galleon, so that he can clarify certain points concerning the transfer of the gold to the
Niklaasbergen
. The visit, of course, is an unofficial one, and Olmedilla has no document or letter of authority.” Guadalmedina raised his eyebrows ironically. “So Garaffa will probably refuse to talk.”

We passed a tavern. The window was lit and from inside came the strumming of a guitar. A gust of laughter and singing emerged as the door opened. On the threshold, a man vomited loudly before staggering homeward to sleep off the wine he had drunk. Between retches, we heard his hoarse cries invoking God, although not exactly prayerfully.

“Why don’t you just arrest this Garaffa?” asked Alatriste. “A dungeon, a scribe, and a bit of strappado can work wonders. All you have to do is call on the king’s authority.”

“It’s not that easy. There’s a dispute over who holds sway in Seville, whether the Audiencia Real or the Cabildo, and the archbishop has a finger in every pie. Garaffa is well connected with the Church and with Medina Sidonia. There would be a huge scandal, and meanwhile the gold would have vanished. No, everything must be done as discreetly as possible. And once Garaffa has told us what he knows, he will have to disappear for a few days. He lives alone with just the one servant, so no one would mind very much if he disappeared forever.” He paused significantly. “Not even the king.”

After saying this, Guadalmedina walked a little way in silence. Quevedo was lagging slightly behind me, limping along in dignified fashion, one hand on my shoulder as if, in a way, he was trying to keep me out of the whole business.

“In short, Alatriste, it’s up to you how you play the cards.”

I couldn’t see the captain’s face, only his dark silhouette ahead of me, his hat, and the tip of his sword, which glinted in the rectangles of moonlight that slipped through the gaps between the eaves. After a moment, I heard him say, “Getting rid of the Genoese gentleman is easy enough, but as for the other business . . .”

He paused, then stood still. We caught up with him. He had his head slightly bowed, and when he looked up, his pale eyes glittered in the darkness.

“I don’t like torturing people.”

He said this quite simply, bluntly, and undramatically. It was an objective fact spoken out loud. He didn’t like sour wine either, or stew with too much salt in it, or men who were incapable of sticking to the rules, even if those rules were personal, individual, and apparently unimportant. There was a silence, and Quevedo removed his hand from my shoulder. Guadalmedina gave an awkward little cough.

“That’s not my business,” he said at last, somewhat embarrassed. “Nor do I wish to know anything about it. How you get the information we need is a matter for Olmedilla and for you. He does his job and you get paid for helping him.”

“Besides, dealing with Garaffa is the easy part,” said Quevedo, in a placatory tone.

“It is,” agreed Guadalmedina, “because once Garaffa has given us the final details of the plan, there is another minor matter, Alatriste.”

He was standing opposite the captain, and any awkwardness he may have felt before had vanished. I couldn’t see his face clearly, but I’m sure he was smiling.

“The accountant Olmedilla will provide you with money to recruit a select group of men, old friends and so on—professional swordsmen, to put it bluntly. The best you can find.”

There came the singsong voice of a beggar standing at the end of the street, an oil lamp in his hand, calling on us to pray for the souls in Purgatory. “Remember the dead,” he was saying. “Remember.” Guadalmedina watched the light from the lamp until it was swallowed up by the darkness, and then he turned again to my master.

“Then you will have to board that wretched Flemish ship.”

Still talking, we reached the part of the city wall near El Arenal, by the little archway known as El Golpe, with its image of the Virgin of Atocha on the whitewashed wall above. El Golpe provided access to the famous Compás de la Laguna bawdy house. When the gates of Triana and El Arenal were closed, that archway and the bawdy house were the easiest way to slip out of the city. And as he hinted to us, Guadalmedina had an important appointment in Triana, at La Gamarra tavern, on the other side of the pontoon bridge that linked the two banks of the river. La Gamarra stood next to a convent whose nuns had all reputedly been sent there against their will. The Sunday-morning mass attracted even larger crowds than the latest play at the playhouse; it positively seethed with people; there were wimples and white hands on one side of the grille and young men sighing on the other. And, or so they said, such was the fervor of certain gentlemen from the best society—including distinguished strangers to the city, such as our king—they even came to worship there during the hours of darkness.

As for the bawdy house, a popular expression of the day,
más puta que la Méndez
—more of a whore than La Méndez herself—referred to a real woman called Méndez, whose name was used by don Francisco de Quevedo in his famous ballads about a celebrated figure from the criminal classes called Escarramán, as well as by other men of letters. She had worked as a prostitute in the bawdy house, which offered to the travelers and merchants staying in nearby Calle de Tintores and in other city inns—as well as to locals—gaming, music, and women of the kind described by the great Lope de Vega thus:

How foolish, how mad of a silly young man
To chase, helter-skelter (how he pants and drools),
After one of those women who’ve already been
Bait to a thousand other young fools.

And which the no less great don Francisco finished off in his own inimitable style:

Stupid the man who trusts in whores
And stupid the man who wants them;
Stupid the money handed over
To pay for whorish flotsam.
Stupid the desire, stupid the delight
The whorish moment imparts,
And stupid the man who doesn’t believe—
Madam—you’ re the queen of tarts!

The bawdy house was run by one Garciposadas, from a family notorious in Seville for two of its brothers: one was a poet at court—a friend of Góngora’s, as it happens—who had been burned that very year for sodomizing a mulatto, Pepillo Infante, also a poet and a servant of the Admiral of Castile, and the other had been burnt three years before in Málaga as a Judaizer; and since misfortunes always come in threes, these antecedents had earned Garciposadas the nickname of El Tostao, or Garciposadas the Scorched. This worthy fellow performed the duties of pimp or father of the bawdy house with great aplomb: he kept the authorities suitably lubricated to ensure that his business ran smoothly; and so as not to contravene the regulations laid down by the city’s
corregidor,
or governor, he always ensured that weapons of any kind were deposited in the hallway and he forbade entry to any customers under the age of fourteen. The said Garciposadas was also on good terms with the constables and catchpoles, who quite blatantly protected him and his business, a situation that can be aptly summed up in these words: