The Gold Eaters Read Online Free PDF

years later, Admiral Columbus found the islands of the Indies across the Ocean Sea. When the Admiral sought men for a second voyage, Francisco Pizarro was on board.
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    The following day, about mid-morning, a lookout sings from the crosstree. He has spied a sail—another caravel—beating towards them from the south. The Pilot orders the man down and goes aloft himself, hoisting his worn body up the shrouds, no easy task for an underfed man of his years. Ruiz has been scrupulous in giving the same rations to all, making no exception for himself—nor for theCommander, however much that mastiff growls. He stays aloft half an hour, until certain the lookout is not mistaken. The unknown ship is still hull-down, but her rig and twin masts must be a caravel’s.
    The Pilot regains the deck in a fury. Not only have they failed in their errand to find the golden land, but the consolation prize of being first to sail these waters has been snatched away. What has he, a devout man, done to so anger the Lord? And who in God’s name could those seafarers be? One of Magellan’s long-lost ships? Some other navigator sent round the Horn by King Charles? Or a Portuguese from the Spice Islands, blown here by storms or—worse—daring to trespass on realms the Pope has given by treaty to the King of Spain?
    He draws the Commander aside, out of earshot from the rest, who might well look on this unwelcome surprise as a deliverance. Pizarro shares the Pilot’s thoughts.
    Their misgivings sharpen when the other ship goes about and falls off, as if to avoid them and run for land. But she is slower. Soon the two close to half a mile, and the sharp-eyed Pilot—again at the crosstree—is more baffled than ever. Though rigged like a caravel, the other ship is long and low on the water, with a house amidships. Unlike any vessel he has seen.
    Drawing nearer, Ruiz sees she is built of buoyant timber like the rafts made by Indians along the coast. But this is far bigger, with two masts, and her sails are indeed as tall and shapely as his own. There are stacks of freight or provisions and some twenty people on deck, watching him as he watches them. What can they be but survivors of some shipwreck—most likely a Spanish wreck—who have made a craft from local timber and their salvaged rig? Yet the striped pennant at her masthead bears no sign of a cross. And the folk aboard are outlandishly dressed in turbans and bright tunics, as if they were Moors or Jews.
    The Pilot runs alongside and hails the strange craft, calling in Spanish and Portuguese to the only figure now on deck—a bear of a man, half naked, at the helm of a long steering oar. This must be the master, for he ordered his shipmates into the deckhouse. Ruiz then tries a few words of the Mexican language, words used both by Indian and Spanish traders on the Isthmus.
    Getting no answer, Ruiz has grappling hooks thrown and winched. The tied ships begin a slow, ungainly dance to the harsh music of scraped wood and clapping sailcloth.
    The Commander takes over from the Pilot, ordering Candía the Greek to man the swivel gun on the foredeck. He picks out a boarding party: García, good with a blade; Molina, who speaks Arabic; and four others.
    â€œSalaam aleikum!”
says Molina, forcing a smile—more a foxy grin—as his feet touch the slatted deck of the unknown ship.
“Kaliméra!”
Candía shouts from the caravel, more warmly, more persuasively.
    Candía should lead the boarding party, Ruiz tells Pizarro. The big Greek is the only man equal in build to the strange helmsman. He is also a friendly fellow by nature, a sunny, carefree soul. Candía would be the best ambassador. The Commander ignores him. This fool would take the gunner off the gun?
    The bronze helmsman with the blue tattoos neither moves nor speaks. Molina strides up and prods the man’s chest lightly with his sword. Stow that! Ruiz calls from the