Seas of Fortune(87)
The Patientia’s captain held out until the end of the week.
African Market Village
Maria Vorst spoke. “I understand you’re running a witness protection program, Maurício.”
“Maria, you’re back!” They embraced. “What in the name of all the saints is a ‘witness protection program’?” Maurício inquired.
“Something I heard about when I was living in Grantville. I understand that since a certain gold rush started, you’ve had the three principals in hiding.”
“I do.”
“I’d like to speak to them.”
* * *
“I wish we had never found the gold, Maria,” said Coqui. “It drives your people crazy.” Kojo vigorously agreed.
“Sorry about that.” Maria noticed that Tetube was standing protectively close to Coqui. “I see you have a girlfriend.”
Coqui grinned and put an arm around Tetube. “I have a wife, once it’s safe for me to leave Maurício’s village and bring her home for a proper ceremony.”
“I am glad you mentioned that,” said Maria. “Henrique and I would like to help you do just that. Take you by ship to Fort Kyk-Over-Al, and then you can paddle back from there. You remember the way?”
Coqui nodded curtly, and Maria blushed. She realized that it was the equivalent of asking a burgher from Amsterdam if he remembered how to get to church. Or to the neighborhood tavern.
“Excellent. I think you told me that the trees with the sticky milk, the ones that we saw near Marshall’s Creek, also grow near your own village.”
“Cousin trees. Not quite the same. But they have the sticky milk inside.”
“I understand. We would like you and your people to collect the seeds for us, and cover them with banana leaves, or something similar.” The banana had been brought to Brazil from West Africa in the sixteenth century. “And keep them dry, very dry, but without putting them in fire.
“We will come get them, and give you and your people something nice in exchange. What do you think they might like?”
Coqui considered this. “Steel knives and axes. Iron fishhooks. Glass beads.”
“What about me?” asked Kojo. “Should I go with you, or stay here?”
“Stay here. Captain de Vries will return, soon enough, and I have letters for him about your situation. You have your gold, so you can buy back your children. But we need to find a trustworthy Spanish agent to handle the matter, and that’s best done in Europe. You’ll go to Hamburg with him.”
“I am sorry I told the others, Maria,” said Kojo sorrowfully. “I was afraid you would punish me.”
“Some secrets are too big to be kept.”
Near the River Lawa, Eastern Guiana
The Ashanti continued to work the creeks along the Lawa. They had decided that they would wait at least for the middle of the wet season before heading back to their village on the banks of the Suriname. In Ghana, their homeland, it was customary for whole households, even whole villages, to relocate to the goldfields when the rains began. They would loosen the deposits in the streams, making them easier to work, whether by panning or the usually more productive shallow pit mining. But later in the rainy season, the pits would be flooded and unworkable, and at that point they would take advantage of the higher water level to paddle back the way that had come.
Some of the Ashanti thought that there was no point in heading back, that they should found a new village here on the Lawa, or at least somewhere nearby. But the chief decided that they couldn’t do this without at least giving some kind of notice to Gustavus. After all, they had agreed to help the colonists mine bauxite.
“Dammabo” Creek
They heard it over the rustlings of the leaves and the gurglings of the water: “Kro kro kro kro ko kyini kyini kyini kro kyini ka ka ka kyini kyini kyini kyini ka.” The Ashanti froze for an instant, then the men set down their tools and reached for their weapons, as the women took cover in the vegetation lining the Dammabo. What they had heard was the call of the kokokyinaka, the “blue plantain-eater,” the “clockbird” that greeted the morning, the “drummer’s child.” It was a bird of their forest homeland, and in the two years they had lived in Suriname, they had never seen one.
To hear it now, late in the day and far from Ghana, could mean only one thing: the lookout they had posted where the creek waters mingled with those of the Lawa had spotted hostile, or potentially hostile, intruders.
Most of the Ashanti men crouched behind the boles of the great trees, with muskets or bows readied. Owisu and another man crawled through the jungle wall and headed down toward the Marowijne, seeking more information.