The Confusion

Now the so-called idlers, who really had been idle for most of the last several weeks, worked night and day re-making Minerva for a coastal voyage. The anchors were brought up out of the hold and hung on the ship’s bow. Likewise cannons were hoisted up from storage and settled on their carriages. The longboat was re-assembled and put on the upperdeck, an obstruction to the men of the watch but a welcome one. While these things were being done Minerva could not come too near the coast, and so they put the distant mountains of California to larboard and coasted southwards for two days, sieving kelp up out of the water and trying to find some way to make it palatable. There were clear signs of an approaching storm, but as luck had it, they were just drawing abreast of the entrance to the great bay of California. As the wind began to blow hard off the Pacific they scudded between two mighty promontories that were lit up by golden sunlight gliding in beneath the storm-clouds. Changing course to the south, they were then able to navigate between a few steep rocky islands and get through a sort of bottle-neck. Beyond it the bay widened considerably. It was lined with salt-pans reminiscent of those at Cadiz, though of course no one was exploiting these. They dropped anchor in the deepest water they could find and readied the ship to wait out the storm.

WHEN THE WEATHER lifted three days later they found that they had dragged their anchor for a short distance. But not far enough to put them in danger, for the bay behind the Golden Gate was vast. Its southern lobe extended south as far as the eye could see, bounded on both sides by swelling hills, just turning from green to brown. The crew of Minerva now embarked on a strange program of eating California, beginning with the seaweed that floated off-shore, working their way through the mussel-beds and crab-flats of the intertidal zone, chewing tunnels into the scrub that clung to the beach-edge and perpetrating massacres of animals and birds. Foraging-parties would go out one after the next in the longboat, and half of them would stand guard with muskets and cutlasses while the others ransacked the place for food. Certain parts of the shoreline were defended by Indians who were not very happy to see them, and it took a bit of experimentation to learn where these were. The most dangerous part was the first five minutes after the longboat had been pulled up on the beach, when the men felt earth beneath their feet for the first time in four months, and stood there dumbfounded for several minutes, their ears amazed by the twittering of birds, the buzzing of insects, the rustle of leaves. Said Edmund de Ath: “It is like being a newborn babe, who has known nothing but the womb, suddenly brought forth into an unimagined world.”

Elizabeth de Obregon emerged from her cabin for the first time since Jack had carried her in there, all wet and cold from the Pacific, on the night the Galleon burned. Edmund de Ath took her for a feeble promenade around the poop deck. Jack, lying on his bed directly beneath them, overheard a snatch of their conversation: “Mira, the bay seems to go on forever, no wonder they believed California was an island.”

“It was your husband who proved them wrong, was it not, my lady?”

“You are too flattering, even for a Jesuit, Father Edmund.”

“Pardon me, my lady, but I am a Jansenist.”

“Yes, I meant to say Jansenist-my mind is still addled, and I cannot tell waking from dreaming sometimes.”

“That promontory to the south of the Gate would be a brave place to build a city,” said Edmund de Ath. “A battery there could control the narrows, and make this entire Bay into a Spanish lake, dotted with missions to convert all of these Indians.”

“America is vast, and there are many nice places to build cities,” said Elizabeth de Obregon dismissively.

“I know, but just look at this place! It’s as if God put it here to be built on!”

They tottered onwards and Jack heard no more. Which was just as well-he’d heard enough. It was a type of clever, courtly conversation the likes of which he had not been forced to listen to since he’d left Christendom behind, and it filled him with the same old desire to run abovedecks and throw those people overboard.

As Elizabeth de Obregon ate of the fruits and greens of California and recovered her strength, she began to emerge from her cabin more frequently and even to join them in the officers’ mess from time to time.

After Jack had related certain things to his partners, and after they’d allowed a day or two to pass, Moseh turned to Elizabeth one evening as they were dining, and remarked, “The situation of this Bay seems so fair that it will probably attract simpletons from all over the world…doubtless the Russians will throw up a fort on that promontory any year now.”