Pedro Gutierrez had been a courtier, and had
the vices of that life, together with a daredevil recklessness
and a kind of wild wit. I had liking and admiration for
Fray Ignatio, but careful indeed was I when I spoke with
him!
The wind blew unchanging, the stark blue shield of sea, a
water-world, must be taken in the whole, for there was no
contrasting point in it to catch the eye. Sancho, forward,
in a high sweet voice like a jongleur's voice, was singing to
the men an endless ballad. Upon the poop deck Escobedo
and Gutierrez, having diced themselves to an even wealth
or poverty, turned to further examination of the Admiral's
ways. Endlessly they made him and his views subject of
talk. Roderigo Sanchez listened with a face like an owl,
Diego de Arana with some irony about his lips. I came and
stood beside the latter.
They were upon the beggary of Christopherus Columbus.
"How did the Prior of La Rabida--?"
"I'll tell you, for I heard it. One evening at vesper
bell comes our Admiral--no less a man!--to Priory gate
with a young boy in his hand. Not Fernando his love-child,
but Diego the elder, who was born in Lisbon. All dusty
with the road, like any beggar you see, and not much better
clad, foot-sore and begging bread for himself and the boy.
And because of his white hair, and because he carried himself
in that absurd way that makes the undiscerning cry,
`Ah, my lord king in disguise!' the porter must have him
in, and by and by comes the prior and stands to talk with
him, `From where?' `From Cordova.
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