The Confusion

Now the Queen spoke and Dappa translated her words into Sabir: “When we captured the gold-ship with Father Gabriel, Dappa, and Moseh-for Jackshaftoe and the others lacked the courage of those three, and had already lost their nerve, and jumped off into the water like panicked rats-”

Jack bowed low and muttered, “A pleasure to see you as always, Your Majesty.” but the Queen ignored him and continued:

“At any rate, my men were about to put them to death, for they assumed that this would please me. But then Father Gabriel recognized us as Malabari, and spoke to me in a way that pleased me even more, and so I suffered them all to live.”

“What did he say?” asked Enoch Root.

“He said, ‘It is your prerogative to cut my head off, but then I cannot tell you the story of how the Vagabond named Quicksilver achieved his long-planned revenge against a Frankish Duke in Cairo, and stole this hoard of Mexican gold.’ So I commanded him to tell me that tale before he was put to death. And this he did; but what he was really telling me was that he and his companions were worth more to me alive, as slaves, than as headless corpses bobbing in the Gulf of Cambaye.”

“Your Majesty chose wisely,” said Enoch Root.

“Often I have doubted it,” said the Pirate Queen. “Dappa is a linguist, which (he informs me) means a man with an excellent tongue, and he has found more than one way of putting his tongue to work pleasing me. Gabriel Goto makes a good, if peculiar, garden. Moseh seemed like a useless mouth. Many times my advisors urged me to break the group up and sell them at a loss. Indeed I was on the brink of doing so several times in the early going, for there is an excellent slave-market in Goa and another in Malacca. But when Jackshaftoe secured his jagir from the Great Mogul, everything changed, and the construction of the ship began. Lately even my most skeptical captains have been vying with each other for the honor of supplying the ship’s masts.”

“I was wondering where you were going to obtain masts.”

“Come with me, O Bringer of Armaments,” said Queen Kottakkal, and whirled around and stalked out through Gabriel Goto’s paper house. She moved so decisively that the wind of her passage peeled dry palm-leaves from stacks of finished artwork. The men hastened to catch up with her, creating a wind of their own, and gloomy drawings of Hazards to Navigation rose into the air and careered back and forth, spinning and sailing lazily on the heavy air. Among these Jack noticed some letters brushed in what he took to be the Japanese script-these were on rice-paper and had a weather-beaten and well-traveled look about them.

“What news from your brush-buddies in Nippon and Manila?”

Gabriel Goto’s face did not betray any particular reaction, but he turned his head suddenly toward Jack. “Normally I do not look to you to voice any interest in the internal broils of Nippon and the exiled Christian ronin of Manila,” he announced starkly.

“But now that I am a king of sorts I must broaden my interests-so indulge me.”

“The shogun continues to hoard silver for internal use-which amounts to saying that he has been making the Dutch at Nagasaki accept gold coins for the goods that they unload from their ships. But recently the shogun devalued gold to the point that the Dutch are forced to take their compensation in the form of vast quantities of copper coins instead.” He stopped and inspected Jack’s face for signs of incomprehension or boredom. They were following the others across a courtyard where Hindoo statuary lurked in cascades of ripe flowers, and fountains fed melodious brooks.

“Don’t be such a tease!”

“All such matters are now firmly controlled by a family called Mitsui-they have founded what you would call a banking house.”

“I ween you’ve been in touch with your uncle’s people-the miners.”

“How did you know this?”

“Why, it’s obvious that the devaluation of gold had great import for anyone running a copper mine in Nippon.”

Gabriel Goto, seemingly shocked at having been found out, said nothing. They had entered into the Queen’s apartments and were pursuing her down a gallery. She was deep in conversation with Enoch Root, but Jack got the impression that during the pauses, when Dappa was translating, Enoch was cocking an ear towards them.

Gabriel went on: “Since your inexplicable and new-found interest in Nipponese currency fluctuations is so marked, then, Jack, I shall warn you that it is all very complicated. The shogun has actually made several devaluations, trying to draw more metal from the ground and increase the supply of money, which in his view will bring about a corresponding increase in the amount of goods produced. Or so it seems from a miner’s perspective-which, after all, is the only perspective available to me.”

They were ascending a stone staircase, working against a current of cooler salt air. “Tell me of more complications,” Jack said.