The Legacy, page 9
part #1 of New World Series
She raised a brow. “You now support the lawsuit?”
“Well—“
Chris entered the room juggling several heavy platters. “Two lawyers in one room? What are you plotting?” he teased.
Diego hurried over to help him. “Actually, I was apologizing to Renee about last night.” He arranged the platters in the center of the table. “In my defense, I was rather taken aback since I believed we had discarded the idea of a lawsuit a long time ago.”
Chris looked uncomfortable. “Renee is an expert. I wanted a second opinion.”
“I understand,” Diego said. “But it would have been wise for the two of us to talk before you raised the issue with her.”
The two men exchanged a look she could not decipher. “You don’t owe me an apology, Diego,” she said, “I understand the need to protect someone you love.”
They took their seats just as Cesar walked in the room holding a bottle of red wine as if it were a rare treasure. “I’ve found an excellent Château Margaux,” he announced to no one in particular.
“You plan to drink with breakfast?” Diego asked.
“Why not?” Cesar said. “We’re celebrating.”
An uncomfortable silence descended on the room. Diego reached for one of the platters and began serving.
The tantalizing aroma was enough to send her stomach into overdrive. She hadn’t eaten since lunch yesterday, now her stomach grumbled hungrily. She focused on her plate, cutting a generous slice of steak and smothering it in sauce before taking a bite. The explosion of flavor in her mouth nearly made her groan in pleasure.
Diego grinned at her reaction. “Chris is an amazing cook, isn’t he?”
“He does seem to know his way around the kitchen,” she said, then nearly bit off her tongue in embarrassment.
Diego mercifully broke the charged silence. “Chris’s mother was the best cook in our village. He learned from her. He was such a Mama’s Boy—always clinging to her apron strings. We gave him hell—”
“I remember,” Chris interjected.
Diego chuckled. “I think you learned to cook just to be close to her.”
“I learned to cook because I wanted to make hotdogs and hamburgers,” he corrected. The two men burst into laughter.
“I don’t understand,” she said.
“We used to beg my mother to make us hotdogs and hamburgers—the things we saw on American television,” Chris explained. “But she would always say, ‘Why not eat what the ancestors ate? It was made for you.’”
Cesar reached for the bottle of Château Margaux and filled his glass, catching his father’s ire in the process.
“Forget the alcohol and focus on your meal,” Diego said. “It’s quite good.”
Cesar pushed the food around on his plate. “I’m not hungry.” He dropped his fork and picked up his wine glass instead.
“I thought my barbecue was your favorite?” Chris said in an obvious attempt to lighten the mood.
“It is,” Cesar said. He picked up a hunk of meat with his hand and plopped it in his mouth.
“This generation is Ita,” Diego said to Chris.
“I hate when you do that.” Cesar defiantly raised his glass and downed its contents.
“Do what?” Diego’s eyes glittered with disapproval.
“You know I don’t speak Taino. You’re making me feel like a kid—like you’re spelling out the words you don’t want me to understand.”
“Taíney wahián wahiákawo.” Diego’s knife sliced through a chunk of beef. “Let us speak our language. I have tried many times to teach you, but you refuse to learn.”
“It’s too hard.”
“It’s your own language!”
Cesar sighed. “What I mean is—“
“How can you understand your culture if you don’t speak the language?” Diego interrupted. “How can you be a leader if you’re disconnected from your own people?”
“Am I under cross-examination?”
“I wish you had some answers for me, but I’d like it even more if you had some answers for yourself.”
Cesar glared at his father for a moment then pushed back his chair and walked out of the room.
Another awkward silence descended on the table. Finally, Chris spoke. “You can’t force this on him, Diego. It has to be his choice.”
“We didn’t have a choice,” Diego said.
“We promised it would be different for him.”
Diego carefully rested his silverware on the side of his plate. “The best thing that happened to me was learning to accept responsibility. It’s time for him to do the same.”
Despite the silent admonition to herself to stay out of it, she couldn’t help defending Cesar. “What do you want him to do? He’s young, and you’re asking him to take on a lot of responsibility.”
Diego looked at her as if calculating how much he was willing to share. “When they dragged Chris off to Belleville, I was just a stupid kid, barely older than Cesar. My father blamed himself. It was his job to keep Chris safe, and he had failed. One day, he walked into his bathroom and shot himself dead.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. A snippet of memory flashed in her mind of finding her own father, motionless and unresponsive, when she was only five years old. She shoved the memory aside.
He inclined his head. “It was a terrible moment, of course, but it was also the day that I accepted responsibility. I did what I had to do.”
“He’s being modest,” Chris said, resting a hand on Diego’s shoulder. “I don’t know where I’d be without this man. He has given me more than I deserve, and certainly more than I can ever repay.”
Diego brushed aside the compliment. “The Pinzóns have stood with the Colóns for generations.” He turned to her. “My ancestor, Martin Alonso Pinzón, traveled with Columbus on that very first voyage. He was—”
“—captain of the Pinta,” she interjected. “I didn’t make the connection before now.”
“You know your Columbian history.” Diego said, looking at her approvingly for the first time.
“Didn’t King Ferdinand argue that Martin Pinzón was the first to site land, and not Columbus? I seem to remember that was a big issue in the lawsuit Columbus’s son brought against the Crown.”
Diego looked surprised. “Very few people know about the Pleitos Colombinos,” he said.
She shrugged. “It’s hard to write a thesis on Columbus and not talk about a forty year lawsuit between his descendants and the Spanish monarchy.”
“You’re a Columbus scholar? I’m impressed.”
“Thank you, but at this point I would say I’m more of an interested student,” she said.
“Well, you are right. The Spanish did try to drive a wedge between the Pinzóns and Columbus. It is easy to do in a culture that values gold over people. I am grateful that my Taino heritage teaches me otherwise.” Diego glanced at his watch. “Cesar and I should get going.”
“You’re leaving?” Somehow, she had assumed they would all be staying together—she had counted on it, in fact.
“We’ll be back in a day or two,” Diego replied.
“Let’s get your coats,” Chris said, heading to the entryway with Diego following behind him shouting for Cesar.
Cesar emerged from the kitchen moments later. He walked over to give her a kiss on the cheek.
“I didn’t realize you were leaving,” she said, slightly embarrassed at the plaintive note in her voice.
He immediately recognized her disquieted, though he mistook the reason. “Don’t worry, you’ll be safe here. Chris won’t let anything happen to you.”
“Maybe it would be better for the two of you stay?” It would certainly be better for her.
“Chris asked me to finish my investigation before we lea—” Cesar cleared his throat. “I mean, he really wants you to have some answers about your father’s death as soon as possible. I’m headed to Belleville. I’m still a part of the security team down there, and I know some people who could help.”
“I didn’t know he asked you to do that,” she said. “Please be careful. Belleville will be crawling with cops and investigators by now.”
“Don’t worry about me.” He put an arm around her shoulder, and they headed to the entryway together.
“Everything should be in place in just a few days,” she heard Diego say as he shrugged into his coat.
“I need some time,” Chris replied.
Diego furrowed his brow. “The window is small. We need to move fast.”
“I know,” Chris said.
Moments later, father and son disappeared—leaving her all alone with Chris.
15
Artifacts
“I’m going to wash the dishes,” Renee squeaked. Chris had closed the front door, and she felt as if the three thousand foot cabin had suddenly shrunk down to a matchbox. She couldn’t stay in this room with him.
“We have a dishwasher,” Chris pointed out.
She scurried to the dining table and began haphazardly stacking plates and glasses in her arms. “These can’t go in the dishwasher. They might get damaged.” She hurried to the kitchen and dumped her load in the sink, turning the water on full blast.
What was wrong with her? She stood there, helplessly gripping the edge of the counter, trying to get her bearings.
Chris entered the kitchen carrying a stack of dishes. “Is everything alright?”
“I’m fine.” She grabbed a wine glass and began vigorously scrubbing.
“Let me help. You probably don’t know this, but I hold the world record for Belleville’s most efficient washer-of-dishes.” He put the dishes in the sink and picked up a towel with a flourish, bowing from the waist in imitation of a butler.
She bit back an unexpected bark of laughter. “I’m fine on my own.”
“But we are better together,” he insisted. “It will be much faster this way.”
There was nothing left to do but wash the dishes with him standing less than three feet away. They worked in silence for a time, the sound of gushing water and clinking glasses providing the soundtrack for their work.
“Do you remember when you tried to get Belleville’s residents to go on a hunger strike?” Chris suddenly asked.
She gave him a quizzical look. “What made you think of that?”
“It is an important memory for me. I have never forgotten it.”
Her lips curled in a hint of a smile. “It was a mess. The Prozac patients got so hungry they raided the Thorazine patients’ stash, and we had an epic candy riot on our hands.”
“You were extraordinary,” he said. “You told them that we were a family, and we would stand or fall together. You gave them hope.”
“We were a family.” She had practically grown up in Belleville. Some of the old timers had known her since she was five years old, and they had served as loving—if slightly addled—aunts and uncles. “Tell me what happened to your family,” she blurted out.
He began drying one of the expensive-looking goblets. “Diego could not keep his mouth shut, I see.”
“He only told me they were murdered.”
“Is that not enough? It was a long time ago.”
“No. I need to understand why.”
“You always did.” He wiped his hands and threw the dishtowel on the counter. “Let’s go, then.”
“Where?”
“You want to know my life story? I am not sharing it with you over a sink full of dirty dishes.” He walked out of the kitchen without another word.
She rinsed off the last of the glasses before making her exit. “Where are you?” she called out when she couldn’t find him in the Great Room.
“Back here.”
She followed the sound of his voice to a spacious office at the back of the house. The room was overdone, as was everything else in the cabin, boasting rows of bookshelves, an enormous desk, and a leather executive chair that could easily double as an imperial throne.
“What is this?” she asked.
He stood at an open wall safe holding a gray, metal box. “This is Diego’s office, but it is at your disposal.” He waved toward a row of shelves covered in books. “Diego has been working on this case for years, so you will have all that you need for your research. And there is also a computer and a telephone for your use.”
“I meant what are you holding in your hand?” She walked over for a closer look.
“Please have a seat,” he said.
She gave the imperial chair a dismissive glance, then made a beeline for a black leather couch pushed up against the opposite wall. Chris sat beside her and dropped the box between them.
“My family was killed because of the contents of this box. This is all the proof I have of the claims I am making to you.” He opened the box, but made no move to touch its contents.
After a few minutes of stillness, she reached in the box herself and pulled out a small coin encased in protective glass. She flipped open the case and took out the coin for a closer look. It was made of copper and resembled an American penny in size and weight. She peered at it more closely and noticed the letter “F” stamped in the middle.
“What does the ‘F’ mean?” she asked.
“It is the symbol for King Ferdinand,” he replied. “What do you see when you look at that coin?”
She hefted the coin in her hand. It felt solid, not hollow and light like an American penny. “I see something old and probably rare. It is in excellent condition—almost as if it hasn’t been touched since it was minted. It is dated 1492, the year Columbus sailed to the New World, so that may increase its value. I wonder how much it’s worth?”
“Is that all? You see only facts and figures?”
“I didn’t realize I was being tested,” she bristled.
He took the coin from her and held it in the palm of his hand. “When I see this coin, I wonder where it has been. I ask myself what stories it has to tell me.”
“Stories?”
“Everything has a story, even this one small thing.” He traced the edges of the coin with a finger. “It is a Spanish maravedi coin. There were millions of them minted over the centuries, but how did this one come to be here with me? I know that it traveled across the sea in one of Columbus’ three ships. It came to my ancestors because Columbus had a habit of gifting Taino women with these coins. He would arrive on one of the Caribbean islands, and he would send his men in search of a local woman—any woman would do. They would kidnap her, and Columbus would shower her with coins and other gifts before returning her to her people.”
“Why?” she asked in bewilderment.
“He believed these women would praise his generosity to their men, and they would welcome him on the island with open arms.”
“It doesn’t sound like a pleasant experience for the women,” she said.
“Probably not,” he agreed. “But this coin is different. It has been in my family for generations. It was part of a bride price Columbus paid to King Guacanagari for his daughter Yaguana’s hand in marriage. It is priceless to me and to my people because it was a gift—and because it represents five hundred years of our lost history.”
She winced at the gentle rebuke. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound insensitive. I was just thinking that a rare and valuable Columbian coin might help make our case.”
“I do not understand your value system, Renee. I can only tell you mine.”
“I could check with my old professors at Brooklyn College. They are some of the leading experts in Caribbean history.”
His eyes twinkled in a way she had not seen in a long time. “You’re supposed to be dead, remember?”
She slapped a hand to her forehead in mock surprise. “Let me see what I can do from beyond the grave. But we have to resolve the question of my death very soon.”
He nodded. “There is as yet an even more important piece of evidence still in the box.”
She peered inside and found an old, battered journal. “What is it?
“This is Columbus’ journal. It is a full account of his first voyage—at least as he saw it.”
“I’ve read the journal before,” she said.
“You have never read this one. The journal you have read is not original. It is based on the work of one man, the priest Bartolomé de las Casas.”
“Yes, I know,” she said. “Columbus’ original journal is lost to us. What survives is only a remnant of his words preserved by de las Casas.”
“This is no remnant,” Chris insisted, tapping the book’s cover for emphasis. “What you hold in your hand is a full and complete accounting written by Columbus himself.”
“That’s impossible,” she said. “Are you trying to tell me this is his original journal?”
“It is a copy,” he admitted. “But my people have preserved the original for five hundred years, and it remains with us still. We will protect it with our lives.”
Her head was spinning with fragments of old learning butting up against these new, fantastical claims. “Columbus kept two journals that we know of. One was meant to appease his men. He recorded false information on their coordinates because he was afraid they would mutiny if they knew how far they had traveled from Spain—or from any known land mass for that matter. The second journal was the authentic one, and he gave that to Queen Isabella. But both of those journals were lost.”
Chris's eyes were a study in skepticism, but his voice carried little inflection. “How could that happen?”
As a college student, she had absorbed the story of the disappearance of Columbus’ journals without question. It had seemed uncontroversial. But now, she wasn’t so sure. “Queen Isabella gave the journal to her scribes to reproduce copies. I remember learning that it had simply disappeared.”
“Does this not seem strange to you? The Spaniards believed Columbus had discovered an entirely new world. This was a historic achievement. What scribe would simply lose such an important document?”
“Maybe it was lost later on.” Even to her own ears, her rebuttal sounded weak.
He raised an eyebrow. “Maybe. And what of the second journal?”
