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XVI

Abdul leaned over his tankard of English beer, and spoke softly to Harry and Geoffrey.

'As you know I have tracked this man, this Cristobal Colon, since he first came to the attention of the Inquisition. His career since then has done nothing to dissuade me that he is indeed the man of whom your Testament speaks.'

Posing as a mudejar Muslim, Abdul continued to work with Diego Ferron. He had come to England once more, this time as part of Ferron's retinue. Now he had met Harry Wooler and Geoffrey Cotesford in this small tavern in the town of Buxton – which he said he had heard of; it was a spa town the Romans had called Aquae Arnemetiae. They all spoke quietly, as if one of the gawping locals might be a spy for the Spanish Inquisition.

They were all growing older, Harry thought, the three of them, filling out, their necks thickening and hair greying. He was in his thirties himself. And yet here they were furtively huddled once again, still pursuing the obscure project that had obsessed them for years.

Abdul went on, 'You know that Colon has been refused several times already. I was there when Colon gave a grand presentation of his case in the ancient Moorish university of Salamanca. But in January of last year they turned him down again.'

Geoffrey said, 'And still he doesn't give up?'

'Not at all. He hangs around the court, begging for audiences, assembling more evidence from legend, sea-farers' tales, Arab geographies and the works of the ancients. To the rest of the court he has become a comical figure, I think. A bore and a charlatan. Yet he still seems to appeal to Isabel. She has even been paying him living expenses.

'But you must understand that all this time the monarchs have been prosecuting their war against the Moors. It's been a bloody summer,' Abdul said, remembering. 'I saw too much of it. Malaga's resistance was strong. When the fortress fell at last, the population was divided up among the Spanish nobles for slavery, like so many cattle. The emirate at Granada, divided against itself, could do nothing… I think it's clear to everyone that if Fernando and Isabel ever do support Colon's venture overseas, it will only be after the conclusion of the war with the Moors.

'But Colon's time may be running out. Just this month he has been in Portugal to hear the testament of Bartolomeo Dias, who has sailed down the coast of Africa past the equator, proving by the way there is no Torrid Zone, and discovering a cape where he was able to turn east.'

Geoffrey frowned. 'I'm no geographer. I'm not sure I see the significance.'

Harry said, 'Dias believes he has discovered a sea route to the spice islands by sailing east around the southern tip of Africa, rather than west across the Ocean Sea.'

'Ah,' said Geoffrey. 'So Colon's voyage west would have no purpose.'

'Worse,' Abdul said with a smile. 'Dias is a hero. He is getting the attention and fame Colon craves! I told you Colon is a shallow man.'

'And that's why he has sent his brother to sound out the King of England,' Geoffrey said.

'Yes. Even the dogged Colon is despairing of the Spanish monarchs.'

'But he mustn't be allowed to give up,' Geoffrey said. 'Let's hope our "man from Cathay" works his magic.'

Harry frowned. 'A man from Cathay?'

Abdul grinned. 'Actually it was my idea.'

Geoffrey said, 'We have been trying to support Colon's case by feeding his camp selected bits of scholarship on the size of the earth, what might lie beyond the sea, and so on. Colon's ally Friar Antonio de Marchena of Palos is a fellow Franciscan, and I was able to use him as a conduit to reach Colon. But we thought we needed something more dramatic to impress the monarchs.'

Abdul said, 'One of Colon's sea stories is that when he voyaged to Iceland, he was told of corpses, washed up on a western shore of Ireland, strange men with yellow skin and dark hair, in a boat that was a hollowed-out log. Colon never saw these corpses. Yet he believed they must have come from China, washed across the ocean by a current.'

'So,' Geoffrey said, 'Abdul suggested repeating the trick.'

'I arranged for a corpse to be dumped on the shore near Palos. As it happens,' Abdul said grimly, 'the south of Spain has not been short of corpses these last few years. I ensured the man, a Christian, had drowned. I dyed his skin yellow-brown with tea, and added some tattoos for good measure. And I cut him around his eyes, for everybody knows that the Chinese have odd narrow eyes with folds of skin across the corners. Such a corpse at Palos was bound to come to Colon's attention, and so it did. Now he parades around the court with diagrams of the wretched man, and even dried bits of flayed skin to show off my fake tattoos.'

Geoffrey laughed. 'Gruesome but ingenious.'

'But will it be enough?' Harry said gloomily. 'All we have to turn Colon's head is a bit of scholarship and a dubious corpse, against Grace Bigod's engines…'

'It will have to be enough,' Geoffrey said.

Abdul said with a trace of bitterness, 'Of course Grace and Ferron do not admit to their clients how much Bacon's work was helped by the studies performed for my ancestress Subh by Moorish scholars and artisans. After all, Sihtric took his designs to al-Andalus because he knew the best scholarship in Europe was available there. When Joan of the Outremer took possession of the Codex, she plundered what had been achieved there as well, though all Subh's Moorish workers had fled from the approach of the Christians. It is part of a wider story, as Christendom plunders al-Andalus of learning as well as gold-'

'And thereby rediscovers its own lost past,' Geoffrey said gently. 'Can that be such a bad thing, Abdul?'

'Yes, if Moorish scholarship is now to be turned against the Moors!'

Geoffrey pulled his lip. 'Well, we must have patience. We will watch Grace Bigod's display of fire, and see what we can learn. Now. Who can spare a penny for more of this filthy beer?'