The Pirates of the Levant (21 page)

Alatriste pulled a wry face in response to his friend's broad smile. They left the harbour and proceeded along the esplanade between the Customs house and the imposing moat surrounding Castel Nuovo. The last time Alatriste had seen the Dardanelles was in 1613, when the galley he was sailing in was captured by the Turks near Cape Troya. Many died and the lateen yard bristled with arrows. Gravely wounded in one leg, Alatriste had been liberated along with other survivors when the Turkish ship was, in turn, captured within sight of the fortresses overlooking the strait.

'Do you know who else is going?' he asked, raising one hand to the brim of his hat, to greet a few acquaintances — three harquebusiers and a musketeer on guard at the postern by the ramp leading up to the castle. Contreras did the same.

'According to Machin de Gorostiola, there will be three of our own galleys and two belonging to the Knights. Machin is embarking with his Basques, which is how he knows about the plan.'

They reached the esplanade, where carriages and cavalry and an animated crowd were heading towards the palace square and Trinita dei Spagnuoli, on their way back from the burning of the Moriscos. A dozen or so young lads marched alongside them. They were carrying on a broom handle the tattered, bloody tunic of a corsair.

'The
Mulata
will be carrying extra troops,' Contreras went on. 'I believe Fernando Labajos will be on board along with twenty experienced harquebusiers, all from your company.'

Alatriste nodded, pleased. He got on well with Lieutenant Labajos, a tough, efficient veteran who was accustomed to life on the galleys. As for Captain Machin de Gorostiola, he commanded a company made up entirely of Basques from Vizcaya; sturdy, long-suffering men who were both cruel and unrelenting in combat. It was set to be a serious expedition.

'That's fine by me,' he said.

'Will you take the boy?'

'I suppose so.'

A downcast Contreras twirled his moustache.

'I'd give anything to come with you. I do miss the good old days, my friend. Do you remember how the Turks used to call us the Catholic king's corsairs? And how we would fill our hats to the brim with silver coins? Ah, all those famous battles and beautiful whores! Dear God, I'd give Lampedusa, my Knights Hospitaller's habit and even the play Lope wrote about me, just to be thirty again. What times, eh, those of the great Duke of Osuna!'

They grew serious at the mention of the unfortunate Duke's name, and said nothing more until they reached Via dei Macellai, opposite the gardens belonging to the Viceroy's palace.

The great Duke of Osuna was the same Don Pedro Tellez Giron under whom Alatriste had fought in Flanders, during the siege of Ostend. Later made Viceroy of Naples and then of Sicily, he and the Spanish galleys had sown terror throughout the seas of Italy and the Levant during the reign of Philip III, gaining the respect of Turks, Berbers and Venetians alike. His private life may have been outlandish and scandalous, but the Duke was an efficient statesman and had met with great success as a soldier, always eager for glory and for booty, which he later squandered. He surrounded himself with the best soldiers and sailors and had made many men at Court, including the King, very rich indeed. However, the dazzling rise of his star had inevitably aroused a great deal of resentment and, after the King's death, his life ended in ruin and imprisonment. Subjected to a trial that never reached a conclusion, and refusing to defend himself because, he maintained, his exploits spoke for themselves, the great Duke of Osuna had died a miserable death in prison, to the applause and joy of the enemies of Spain, in particular Turkey, Venice and Savoy, whom he had held at bay during the period when the black flags bearing his ducal coat of arms victoriously ravaged the Mediterranean. His last words were: 'If I have served God as well as I have served my King, then I have been a good Christian.'

Don Francisco de Quevedo had been a close friend — indeed, his friendship with Diego Alatriste dated from that same period in Naples — and he was one of the few who had remained faithful to the Duke, even in misfortune. He wrote some of his finest sonnets by way of an epitaph. These lines, for example:

Although his country has denied him praise,

His deeds will always be his best defence;

Imprison'd by Spain, he died — poor recompense

For one who conquered Fortune all his days.

And this other poem, which reflects, better than any history book, the reward that our wretched Spain all too often gave its best sons:

Though he annulled the marriage of the sea and Venice

And crushed the waves beneath the keels of Spain,

Making shake both Cyprus Isle and Greece,

This conqueror was conquered by the Law's thin cane!

'Speaking of your young companion,' Contreras said suddenly, 'I have news of him.'

'Of Inigo?'

'The very same. But I doubt very much that this news will please you.'

And having said that, Contreras brought Diego Alatriste up to date. In one of those coincidences so common in Naples, a certain acquaintance of his, a chief constable, had been interrogating a ne'er-do-well who frequented the Chorrillo Inn. At the first turn of the screw, the man in question, who was not made of the sternest of stuff, had blabbered everything he knew about man and God. Among other things, he mentioned that a certain Florentine gambler, a regular customer at such places and more astute than brave, was recruiting villains in order to recover — through blood and an ambush — a gaming debt incurred in Piazza dell'Olmo by two young soldiers, one of whom was lodged at Ana de Osorio's inn, in the Spanish quarter.

'Are you sure he was referring to Inigo?'

"Od's blood! The only thing I'm sure about is that one day I'll have to meet my Maker, but the description and the fact that he's lodging at the inn fit like a glove.'

Alatriste smoothed his moustache and instinctively placed his left hand on the hilt of his sword.

'This happened at the Chorrillo, you say?'

'The very place. Apparently, the Florentine frequents the taverns in that area.'

'And did the snitch give the Florentine's name?'

'Yes, Giacomo Colapietra — a rogue and a rascal, by all accounts.'

They walked on in silence, Alatriste frowning beneath his hat, which cast a shadow over his cold, green eyes. When they had gone only a short distance, Contreras gave a chuckle.

'By my troth, my friend, I'm sorry to be leaving tonight. I would swear that the Chorrillo is about to become a very interesting place indeed!'

As it turned out, it was our room at the inn that was about to become a very interesting place, for shortly before the Angelus, just as I was about to go out for the evening, Captain Alatriste came in with a loaf of bread under one arm and a bottle of wine under the other. I was accustomed to divining his thoughts and his mood, and as soon as I saw the way he threw his hat down on the bed and unbuckled his sword, I knew that something was troubling him.

'Are you going out?' he asked, seeing that I was dressed in my street clothes.

I was, it must be said, rather smartly turned out in a shirt with a Walloon collar, a green velvet waistcoat and a fine cloth doublet — the latter bought at the sale of Ensign Muelas' effects after his death in Lampedusa — breeches, stockings and silver-buckled shoes. On my hat, I had a new green silk ribbon. I said that, yes, I was going out; that Jaime Correas was waiting for me at an inn in Via Sperancella, although I spared the Captain the details of our planned expedition, which included a visit to an elegant gaming den in Via Mardones. This would be followed by a supper of roast capon and cherry tart accompanied by a little wine at the house of the
Portuguesa,
a place near the fountain of the Incoronata, where there was music and you could dance the canario and the pavanne.

'And what's in the purse?' he asked, seeing me close it and put it in my pocket.

'Money,' I said curtly.

'It looks like a lot of money for one night.'

'How much I take with me is my business.'

He stood looking at me thoughtfully, one hand on his hip, while he digested my insolent riposte. It was true that our savings were shrinking. His savings, which he had placed with a goldsmith in Via Sant'Anna, would be just enough to pay for our lodgings and to help out the Moor Gurriato, whose sole wealth lay in the silver earrings he wore. The Moor had not yet received his first pay and, as a new soldier, he only had the right to stay in the barracks and eat whatever the troops ate. As for my money, about which the Captain never asked, there had been a number of drains on my purse of late, so much so that I needed a fair wind at the gaming table if I was not to end up without a penny.

'And I suppose getting knifed to death on a street corner is your business too?'

My hand, which had reached out to pick up my sword and my dagger, stopped halfway. I had spent many years by his side, and I knew that tone of voice.

'Are you referring to a possibility, Captain, or to one knife thrust in particular?'

He did not reply at once. He had opened the bottle of wine and poured himself a mugful. He drank a little and peered at the wine, assessing the quality of what the inn-keeper had

sold him. Apparently satisfied, he took another sip.

'There are many reasons for getting yourself killed, but getting yourself killed over a gaming debt is simply shameful.'

He was speaking calmly, still gazing at the wine in his mug. I was about to protest, but he raised his hand to stop me.

'It is,' he concluded, 'unworthy of a true man and of a soldier.'

I scowled, for while the truth may hurt a Basque, it never breaks him.

'I have no debts.'

'That's not what I've heard.'

'Whoever told you that,' I retorted, 'is a lying Judas.'

'What's the problem, then?'

'What problem are you referring to?'

'Explain to me why someone would want to kill you.'

My surprise, which must have been written all over my face, was entirely genuine.

'Kill me? Who?'

'A certain Giacomo Colapietra, a Florentine gamester, and a regular at the Chorrillo and the Piazza dell'Olmo. He's currently hiring some ruffians with sharp knives to finish you off.'

I took a few steps about the room, stunned. I wasn't expecting such news and a wave of embarrassment swept through my body.

'It isn't a debt,' I said. 'I've never had any debts.'

'Tell me what happened.'

I explained as briefly as I could how Jaime Correas and I had been halfway through a card game with the Florentine when he had tried to cheat us by using marked cards, and how we had left without giving him the money he claimed we owed him.

'I'm not a child, Captain,' I said.

He looked me up and down. My account did not seem to have improved his view of the affair. While it was true that the Captain was often quite happy to drink everything that was put in front of him, it was equally true that he had never been seen with a deck of cards in his hand. He despised those who risked money which, in his profession, could pay either for a life or for the sword that took that life away.

'Nor yet a man, it seems.'

That roused my anger. 'No one has the right to say that to me,' I retorted, my pride injured, 'I won't allow it.'

'/ have the right to say it.'

His eyes were as cold as the ice that had crunched beneath our boots in Flanders.

'And you,' he added after a heavy silence, 'will give me that right.'

This wasn't a statement; it was an order. Struggling to find a response that would not prove too humiliating, I glanced at my sword and my dagger, as if appealing to them for help. Like the Captain's weapons, they both bore scratches and dents on the blades and guards. And I had scars on my body, too, although not as many as him.

'I've killed ...'

Several men, I wanted to say, but I held back, out of shame. It sounded like an empty tavern boast spoken by a ruffian.

'Who hasn't?'

He was regarding me ironically, scornfully, in a way that made my gorge rise.

'I'm a soldier,' I protested.

'Even a deserter can say he's a soldier. The gaming dens and taverns and whorehouses are full of them.'

This comment enraged me still further, almost to the point

of tears. It was unfair, a dreadful thing to say, especially since the man saying it had seen me by his side at the Gate of Lost Souls, at the Ruyter Mill, in the barracks at Terheyden, on board the
Niklaasbergen
, on corsair galleys and in many other places.

'You know I'm no deserter,' I stammered. He looked down at the floor, as if aware that he had gone too far. Then he took another sip of wine.