Scales of Gold - Dorothy Dunnett [194]
There followed a curious two weeks. The sun blazed; the city seethed with activity; and no one now slept even at noon at Kabara its port, for the linking pool and canal were already shrinking, and soon the river would fall, and all the easy trading would cease.
The rains that formed the Joliba fell from February to July upon the distant hills at its source and took a year to creep along its full length. By July the height of the flood had reached the low-lying land two hundred miles before Timbuktu and turned it into the single vast lake they had crossed, weakening and slowing the surge so that Kabara did not enjoy true high water till January. Then from April to July, the river diminished to its lowest, most difficult level. So the harvests by the Joliba took their season from the flux of the river, and so did the gold-mining, confined to the space between January and May, between the fall and rise of the flood. By summer, the city would pant and crumble in silence.
Umar was prepared to talk of these things, and Godscalc listened. The rift between Umar and Nicholas had ended, and the friendship between them, always positive, seemed heightened by the past contemplation of loss.
It was more difficult to persuade Umar to talk about Prester John, and when he did so, the news always seemed to be bad. The travellers who crossed the desert to Cairo spoke of the way to Ethiopia as a hopeless journey through waterless sands or, further south, of dripping, shuddering rainforests full of animals and of heathens who ate human flesh. Beyond that were terrible mountains, terrible even for travellers, and impassable for a Christian army.
‘Is that what you fear?’ Godscalc said to Umar, when for the second time he had heard such a tale. ‘Yet you knew I had sworn to find my way there if possible. I have undertaken to you and the Koy not to parade my faith, or attempt to obtain converts here. Those heathens you speak of are the ones I must see. And if, as you say, the way is too hard, then I shall bring back notice of that, and you will be spared visits from others less amenable. I think I am being fair.’
‘You are never less than fair,’ had said Umar gently. ‘If you wish to go, none will stop you.’
They had seen the gold. It lay with other goods behind locked doors in the large storeyed warehouses where the resident merchants had their homes, and where the traders came to stay and to buy. The central courtyards were full of roaring camels, and scavenging birds jostled about on the roof-tops. There was, as Umar had said, a reasonable amount. There was enough to make a return trip to Lagos worth while, if they wanted to make it. They entered into the first preliminary talks that might, in time, lead to a bargain; and, before he left, Nicholas sometimes mended their pumps.
It amused Gelis, Godscalc saw, this eternal preoccupation of Nicholas’s with the practical. The rusting machinery of the palace gave him pain, and he arranged twice to go there, and spent a contented few hours in some courtyard. He was not excluded from the public part of the harem, although Gelis had never returned. The day after their audience, the Timbuktu-Koy had sent young girl slaves to serve Diniz and Nicholas.
They were older than Tati had been, and experienced. Nicholas did what Godscalc had given him leave to do, and the priest hardly knew whether to be glad or sorry. He was sorry that Diniz, too, should find restraint impossible, but he kept silent. They were neither of them promiscuous, and the governor had had his reasons. If Bel and Gelis also noticed, they had said nothing to him.
Umar had thought he was referring to it when, walking in the street with him one day, Godscalc mentioned slaves. They were talking Flemish and could not be understood, but even so, Umar slowed a little before he spoke. ‘They are both young men, Father; and without