The Seven Serpents Trilogy (59 page)

On the fourth and fifth days after leaving San Miguel, the country changed. We went through a series of wild ravines so steep that the horsemen had to dismount and walk, then crossed a river where we lost two horses. On the fifth day, noting that some of his men had lost their enthusiasm for the journey and had begun to complain among themselves, Pizarro called a halt.

“A crisis,” he said, “has arisen that demands all our courage. No man should think of going forward in the expedition who cannot do so with his whole heart. If any of you have mis givings it is not too late to turn back. San Miguel is poorly garrisoned and I would be glad to see it in greater strength.”

It was a bold challenge and a desperate one, for he had no way of knowing how many of his army would choose to leave. Six, a dozen, more? It reminded me of Cortés's rash act on the beach at Vera Cruz, when in front of his men he set fire to his ships, thus cutting off all chance of retreat, and set their faces toward Tenochtitlán and Moctezuma.

There were nine in all who chose to return to San Miguel. We set off without them, reaching on the next day a place called Zaran, situated in a fruitful valley among the moun tains. Its narrow streets were almost deserted, due, according to the Indians who remained, to a levy Atahualpa had made upon them.

We took a southerly course, which led through a succession of hamlets, also deserted, and came to a wide river. Fearing an ambush on the far side, Pizarro sent his half brother Hernán under cover of night to secure a safe landing. The next morning we hewed timber and built a floating bridge, and by nightfall the whole company passed over it, the horses swim ming, led by the bridle.

Before us, outlined against the fading sky, rose the Andes, so far into the heavens that the snow covering their crests must have lain upon them for centuries, never melting from one year to the next.

“They shut out half the sky,” Pizarro gasped, and we all gasped with him.

His half brother said, “It will take us years to climb the
bastardos
.”

“We'll be old before we ever see Cajamarca,” Hernán de Soto said.

“Not old,” said Felipillo, Pizarro's Indian interpreter, who complained even when the trail was level. “Dead. Dead, and our white bones scattered everywhere.”

“Yours,” Pizarro said, “will not be white.”

“Why do you say that?” Felipillo asked.

“Because you're a little savage,” Pizarro said. “Savage bones are always brown, not white.”

Father Valverde, a Dominican who had attached himself to us at San Miguel, pointed to a broad causeway. “That friendly road lined with trees takes us to Cuzco,” he said.

“Cuzco in Inca words means ‘navel,' ” Felipillo added. “The navel is where the gold hides.”

“Indians have told me the same,” I said, loud enough for Pizarro to hear.

“How do you know what the Indians say?” he asked me. “You don't speak Inca.”

“I've learned much on the journey.”

“From me,” Felipillo said, pointing to himself. “I am the best teacher of those who know nothing.”

Pizarro said, “We have proclaimed to everyone that we in tend to visit the Inca's camp in Cajamarca. If we turn away now, he would accuse us of cowardice and treat us with contempt. Take heart. Doubt not that God will humble the pride of the heathen and bring him to the knowledge of the true faith, the great end and object of our conquest.”

I was surprised that he had decided upon a different appeal from any he had used before. He spoke not a word about the great adventure we were embarked upon. He gave no hint that we were conquistadores sent out to conquer half the world. There was no mention of the fabulous treasures that lay beyond the mountains. Suddenly we were God's soldiers fighting a war against the savage.

It rang false to me—this sudden interest in God and faith—but not at all to my comrades. “Lead on,” they answered from their hearts, “lead wherever you think best.”

Near dawn we set off to climb the soaring cordillera. I rode in the lead, carrying the black eagle flag to impress any In dians we might encounter. The way was tortuous—rocky hills piled upon rocky hills, ravines aslant deep ravines; the trail, strewn with flintlike stone that cut the horses' hooves, so narrow that three of our mounts tumbled to their deaths.

On the second day the wind grew sharp. Father Valverde, who was not a young man, fell ill from the thin air. Wishing to appear humble, he had walked each step of the way since we left the sea. I gave him my horse and, fearful that he would fall off the trail, walked beside him and held the reins.

“That is a beautiful ring you wear,” he said before we had gone far. “It reminds me of a ring my dear friend Bishop Pedroza wore when I saw him last. In Spain, it was, just before he embarked upon his last journey. A great man, Pedroza.”

Father Valverde intended to say more, but he ran out of breath, wheezed a few words that I couldn't catch, and became silent. He did not mention the ring again until weeks later.

We reached the summit after two days and started down the far side of the cordillera. We had not gone far when a noble appeared with a number of lordly attendants, bearing a gift of jars of a heady perfume made from dried goose fat. While he was bragging about Atahualpa and quaffing
chicha
from a golden goblet, an Indian messenger Pizarro had sent to the Inca returned to say that he had been poorly received, told that he could not see the Inca, and barely allowed to es cape with his life. The city was all but deserted, he said.

At this news, Pizarro stormed at the envoy, upbraiding him for the Inca's bad manners. For which the envoy coldly apolo gized, informing the general that this was the season when the Inca was occupied with solemn religious duties and could see no one. The city was deserted because the Inca wished to make room for the white men who were about to occupy it.

Pizarro took these words gracefully and apologized in turn, but underneath he was greatly disturbed, as we all were. We had distrusted Atahualpa. This latest incident added fuel to our suspicions.

The descent of the wild cordillera began at once.

 

A
FTER SEVEN DAYS OF HARD TRAVEL ON TRAILS NEARLY AS TORTUOUS AS
those we had encountered on our ascent of the cordillera, our little band came in view of Cajamarca. The morning was cloudless. The approaches to the city stood out sharply under a bright Inca sun.

We looked down upon a valley round in shape, five leagues in length and nearly five in breadth. The river we had followed out of the mountains flowed down through this large expanse in a series of loops, and from it a network of canals branched off into green fields and orchards.

Beyond the valley, in a declivity surrounded by low hills, lay Cajamarca. Its flat-roofed houses, washed with coatings of lime, all more or less the same, like cells in a honeycomb, were not impressive. It was what lay beyond the city that made us gape.

For most of two leagues, well past the range of our eyes, stretched symmetrical rows of tents and pavilions in different, barbaric colors with flags flying above them, and above them birdlike kites twisting high in the air. It was the encampment of Inca Atahualpa and his legions.

Our band halted. For a while no one spoke. Then Pizarro said in a quiet voice, “Close your eyes to what you behold. It is far too late to turn back.”

He said no more. Dividing the band into three divisions, he sent us forward at a military pace down the slopes to the gates of the city.

No one came to greet us except one small, pink-eyed dog, who attached himself to my horse. As we passed through the gates I saw that the streets were deserted. I heard no sounds save a few scattered bird calls, now an owl, then a blue jay, sounds that I could tell came not from birds but from human throats.

The day had started off cloudless. Now a gray sky pressed down upon the deserted city, giving it a desolate look, even though fountains were spouting everywhere around the sides of an immense plaza and in its center. Triangular in shape, the plaza was fronted by low buildings with large wooden doors. These, we learned, were used as barracks for the Inca's men.

On its far side was a stairway leading to a stone fortress. Beyond, commanding the city, stood a second fortress with a high stone wall that spiraled around it. Over the top of the wall, I caught a glimpse of Atahualpa's tents in the distance, ranged among the hills.

The sky opened and freezing rain began to fall, then the rain changed to hail that bounced on the cobblestones. Despite the storm, Pizarro decided to send emissaries to meet with Atahualpa. He chose for this Hernán de Soto, his most dependable captain, and fifteen horsemen, who started off at once. He then decided that this band was too small, should the Inca prove unfriendly, and ordered twenty more of us to follow.

A league beyond the city we came to the first of the Inca's strongholds—a line of warriors standing in front of their colored tents, long spears fixed in the ground. There were no signs from them as we trotted past with friendly waves and a blast of trumpets.

We came to a wide stream that appeared to be the second of the Inca's defenses. It was spanned by a wooden bridge, but distrusting its safety, de Soto took us through the stream at a gallop. On the far bank we were met by a squad of heavily armed Indians, too astonished by our appearance to reply to questions. At last, emboldened by our captain's smiles, one of their number pointed out the imperial camp.

It was a rambling pleasure retreat, not a camp or fortress, of many galleries leading into a spacious courtyard with a large pool from which hot vapor rose in clouds. At one end of the courtyard, as we rode through the gateway, was a cluster of nobles. In their midst, under a canopy that protected him from the storm, sat Atahualpa.

In Spain I had seen a picture of a Moorish potentate seated among cushions, surrounded by his courtly attendants. It was this picture that leaped to mind as I stood looking down upon the Inca.

Pizarro had chosen me over Felipillo, since I was a towering Spaniard, to translate his greetings. Which I did by getting down from my horse and saying that we had come in peace, sent hither by a mighty king to offer him blessings and to impart the doctrines of the true faith.

“Also,” I said in closing my little speech, “the king's emis sary, Francisco Pizarro, wishes to invite you to the quarters he presently occupies in the city of Cajamarca.”

The words had barely left my mouth when Felipillo burst forth to correct a mistake I had made with my tenses.

The Inca answered neither of us. He sat among his cushions looking off at the sky, which was now beginning to clear. He was a young man and very handsome. In contrast to his nobles, who looked like tropical birds in their finery, he was dressed in a simple white garment. The only mark of his kingship was a crimson fringe, which he wore on his forehead.

At last one of the nobles standing at his side said, “It is well.”

I translated the words for our captain, de Soto, who received them with some confusion, not knowing what they meant, whether they were friendly or not. He then asked me to tell the Inca to speak not through the mouth of someone else, but through his own mouth.

The Inca roused himself. ‘Tell your captain,” he said to me, speaking with the faintest of smiles, “that I am keeping a fast, which will end tomorrow. I will then visit him with my chief tains. In the meantime, let him occupy the public buildings on the square, and no other, till I come, when I will order what shall be done.”

De Soto was angry at this reply. There was an awkward silence as the two men stared at each other. To ease the situation and in doing so to impress Atahualpa, de Soto put spurs to his horse, circled the courtyard at a reckless pace, sped through the gateway, came back, and wheeled his mount around, finally bringing him to a rearing halt in front of the monarch, so close that flecks of foam spattered the royal garments.

While this took place, my eye was caught by a girl of fifteen or sixteen who stood to one side of the seated monarch, hold ing a woman's hand. There were a dozen or more women clustered to one side of him—all of them Atahualpa's wives, I was to learn—but the woman nearest him was his favorite, and the girl his most beloved daughter.

She seemed more like the Inca than her mother. She had his eyes, dark and deeply set above wide cheekbones, yet her glance was not imperious like his.

When de Soto was finished with his antics and had rejoined our ranks, Atahualpa ordered refreshments to be served to all our men, including warm
chicha
in gold goblets so huge that they were difficult to hold and drink from.

Indeed, I was more interested in the goblet than I was in the
chicha.
Shaped like an alligator, the long tail serving as a handle and the open jaws as the bowl, it was a bizarre yet beautiful object. But more remarkable than its beauty was its size. It must have weighed all of twenty pounds.

Each time I lifted it to my mouth, I paused, overcome by its weight. There were nearly forty men in our little army, and every one of them had a heavy alligator goblet. What munificence! What stocks of gold the Inca must have hidden away in his secret storehouses!

The girl with her father's dark eyes, but not his imperious look, whose black hair was combed into ringlets and tied with golden bells, kept watching me as I toyed with the
chicha.
She seemed amused.

Embarrassed, I finally drank down the
chicha
in one long gulp, wiped my mouth, and returned her look. During this time Atahualpa, who had been chewing on a mouthful of pink nuts, decided that it was time to spit. He motioned to his favorite wife, who came forward and held out her open hand for him to spit into.

While this intimate act took place, emboldened by the fiery
chicha,
I approached the girl, made a deep genuflection copied from the Inca bows I had observed—I even touched my fore head to the stones—and asked her name.