Seas of Fortune(168)

The passengers decided to lay out their village, which they named “Maruya” after the Virgin, on a low rise that overlooked the last bend in the Carmel River, a bit over half a mile from the shoreline. As a symbol of their thanks to God for their safe voyage, on the bank of the Carmel they erected a giant cross, twenty feet high, made of native pine.





Maruya/Carmel





The fishermen and samurai of Maruya milled about the Cross of Thanksgiving, erected when the colony was founded a week earlier. An early bird among them had been heading down to where his boat had been left the day before when he noticed something odd about the cross. He walked over for a closer look, then ran back to the village to report.

They had yet to see a single Indian. But there were arrows planted in a circle around the cross, and strings of shells hung on the arms. Were the arrows a challenge, a warning to stay where they were, or a sign of peace, being directed into the ground?

A messenger was sent over the hill country to Andoryu, and from there to the little castle at Kawa Machi/Salinas.

Date Masamune asked First-to-Dance, who had spent the previous winter with the Japanese, and was now the “speaker” for her tribelet, to go to Maruya and advise what the Japanese should do next.





October 1635,

Kodachi Machi/Santa Cruz





The overseer scowled at the new colonists. “You’ve gawked and lazed around long enough, it’s time for you to get to work.

“If you knew how to fish, you’d be down here.” He gestured south, toward the water. “And if you knew how to farm, you’d be out there.” He gestured east. “Jesu help me, you’re a bunch of peddlers and shopkeepers and artisans from Nagasaki and other towns, with no useful skills. Not useful here yet, at any rate.”

He spat. “So permit me to introduce you to your new friends, Father Axe and his brother, Uncle Shovel.”

* * *

Yamaguchi Takuma’s fingers flew, shifting the beads on his abacus, calculating the supplies they would be needing the next day. Occasionally, he glanced at the perspiring laborers. Preparing the ground for a yamashiro, a mountain fortress, in the hills above Santa Cruz, was hard work, and he was glad that he had a skill that freed him from the obligation of manual labor.

One of Date Masamune’s advisors, the old battle-horse Katakura Shigetsuna, had picked the site. It was a long ridge, partially protected by creek gorges. The laborers would clear off the trees and level the ridge; the timber and earth would be used to construct a palisade and rampart.

Takuma had sat in on one meeting in which Shigetsuna explained the project to his foremen and Kodachi Machi’s guard commander, Kanno Shigenari. The site included a small spring, and the water supply could be augmented by building cisterns or digging wells. It was more than a mile from the coast; that distance, plus the elevation, meant that it was safe from bombardment by Spanish warships. The Spanish could drag the guns into firing range, but it would take time, and the Japanese would express their disapproval with their own weapons: cannon, handguns, bows, and even ballistas and catapults. They, at least, didn’t require precious gunpowder.

Given time, the Japanese would strengthen the defenses: add lookout towers, top the walls with thatch or shingles to protect them from the weather; dig trenches for rolling stones down upon the enemy; and turn neighboring hilltops into additional baileys.

Takuma thought it sad to think that the Spanish, who had helped introduce the Christian faith to Japan, might attack the kirishitan of Kodachi Machi. He had, very politely, suggested to Shigetsuna that a large cross be erected on the watch tower, so that if the Spanish came by, they would know that the town was Christian and not shoot at them. Shigetsuna had thanked Takuma for his suggestion, and asked him whether Buddhists ever made war on fellow Buddhists. Takuma had to admit that they did.

But he still thought it might cause the Spanish to hesitate. So why not?





Date Masamune’s Yashiki (Fortified House),

Kawa Machi/Salinas





First-to-Dance was studying her appearance in the mirror that Chiyo had lent her. She wanted to look her best before she met the messenger from Maruya/Carmel. First impressions mattered.

“This is foolish,” said Swims-Like-Seal. He was one of First-to-Dance’s tribesmen, and had been one of the Indian guests at the feast welcoming the Second Fleet.

“Why do you say that?”

“You should be here, with the leader of these strangers—”

“The Guardians of the Dead,” First-to-Dance reminded him.

“If you say so.” Swims-Like-Seal was one of the tribal skeptics, which was probably one of the reasons he had been sent. There was a faction within the tribe that didn’t much like First-to-Dance. “But my point is that you should be with their big chief, the One Eye, bargaining for concessions for our people. Not gallivanting around looking for the people of the south.”