The Seven Serpents Trilogy Read Online Free PDF Page A

started up the rope ladder, followed by a half-dozen of his naked retainers. Esteban, prompted by Don Luis, held up his hand and commanded the cacique to halt and advance with only three of his servants.
    The cacique brought gifts of fruit, varieties I had never seen before, and the three servants carried large gourds filled with painted objects. Don Luis examined the trinkets but, finding them made of base metal, shook his head and pointed to a gold ornament that the chieftain wore suspended from a gold chain around his neck. At the same time he held out a double handful of hawk’s bells, lively little bells fashioned for horses to wear.
    The cacique, who had a strong, unpleasant smell about him, shook his head and motioned toward a brass bombard that Captain Roa had set up on the main deck, ready to fire should the Caribs decide to attack us. In turn Don Luis shook his head, and the two men stood staring at each other until Captain Roa produced a small copper pot.
    This the chieftain seized and put it to his nose. We were told by Esteban that he was sniffing it to see if it was made of copper, since the Indians deemed copper more valuable than gold. He then handed over a small gold object that looked like two snakes twined together.
    â€œAsk him,” Captain Roa said to Esteban, “how close we are to land.”
    The cacique answered by pointing westward, telling Esteban that it was close. “A big island, very close.”
    â€œAsk him,” said Don Luis, “where the gold in the necklace he wears about his neck comes from.”
    The cacique pointed westward again. It was another island, he told Esteban, far bigger than the first he had spoken of. And farther away; five days’ journey away. But there we would find much gold, cities made of gold.
    The cacique went on talking, making many gestures with his dimpled hands, but Esteban for some reason of his own did not translate what he said, other than to say that it was about the far-off golden cities.
    There were more small trades, but being eager to make a landfall before dark descended, Captain Roa gave orders to hoist sail. The Indians trooped down the ladder and, hailing us with happy cries, disappeared un der our stern.
    A sailor, Juan Sosa, a native of Arroyo, was climbing the mainmast with three of the crew when he suddenly paused. At the same moment I heard a whisper, as if a breeze had sprung up, and a flight of arrows passed over my head. Clutching himself, Juan fell backward into the sea. A command went aft to the helmsman and we began to circle back toward our fallen comrade, but the savages reached him first. They pulled him from the sea and flung his body among the pile of bound cap tives. A round of musketry from our deck did them no harm apparently, for they fast disappeared.
    Near dusk we came upon a large island, presumably the one the cacique had spoken of. Captain Roa could not find it on his chart and admitted, after Don Luis had pinned him down, that he did not know exactly where we were; probably near the Caribbean island of San Salvador, which he presumed we had passed in the night.
    Don Luis promptly named it Isla Arroyo and asked me to call upon God to bless the island. Captain Roa marked it down on his chart, making the area somewhat larger than it seemed to be.
    Isla Arroyo was heavily wooded, with tall trees grow ing right down to the shore and a curving bay tucked in behind a jutting, rugged promontory. As he stood look ing at the calm water, Captain Roa said that when the stars came out, he’d take readings that would show him our location. No one, he said, except Christopher Co lumbus ever made accurate sightings from the deck of a bobbing caravel. And the great admiral himself always trusted his instincts more than the sightings.
    Evening light fell upon the placid bay, the strip of white sand that fringed it. Cries of “ashore, ashore” from soldiers and bowmen and crew rose in a chorus as the anchors