Gladly removing his helmet, Bernal entered the spacious house of roughhewn wood, which he thought would have fit some Visigoth lord better than a governor in the service of King Charles. The place was well-constructed to take advantage of the prevailing wind, not being nearly so squalorous as it might have been. The house was so open as to be indefensible, but by eschewing such concerns had been made comfortably habitable.

Three brutish swordsmen lounged about. He stood now before his cousin, who was seated between two grinning cross-eyed devils who Bernal knew well, and liked far less. Not wanting to emulate the rude men who had risen to positions of trust in his cousin’s company, he bowed without a word for the fattest man in Cuba, dressed like a lord’s woman-chasing son and seated like a Moorish money-changer between the two reddish-skinned heathens.

As much as he should have been focused on his cousin, Bernal could not help but gaze at the oddly corrupt transformation of the two heathens. The men were squat and dark ochre in color, with foreheads flattened into an unnatural slant beneath oiled and combed hair of a woman’s luxurious quality, braided each into a single horse’s tail. They wore fine Andalusian linens fringed with wool of Navarre, without a shred of their more practical cotton attire hanging from their bodies. The most noteworthy and disturbing aspect of these apparitions—quite apart from their Christian affectations—was their crossed eyes, beadily regarding him from their sunken vantages from within their prominently nosed faces.

Bernal focused with knowing eyes on his cousin, and acknowledged his station, “Governor.”

His scheming cousin, Governor Diego Valazquez, greeted him with a wide smile and narrow eyes, remaining seated all the while, “Cousin, how goes the haggling merchant’s life?”

Without awaiting an answer he continued, “Not well, I see. Was it goats, pigs, cows—whores perhaps?”

Bernal bit his lip and stood like stone, looking his cousin searchingly in the eyes. This had the desired effect, and Diego unlaced his fingers into a pantomime of forgiveness as he spoke, “The prodigal cousin returns—helmet in hand—a soldier again. It is good enough. Your services are required.”

Bernal relaxed, let out a slight breath and spoke with confidence, “I will hunt down the rest of the heathens. They could not be so formidable as the lot we took these two dogs from.”

Diego grinned and leaned back—creaking—upon his wicker chair, folded his conspiratorial hands under his double chin, and smirked, “Dogs? Why cousin, these dear Christian souls are Julian and Melchior, newly baptized and conversant in Catholicism up to the salient points of the *Requirement. As for the local heathens they are well in hand. Their chief contemplates a life dragging about on his knees just outside this very door.”

One of the brutish swordsmen grunted with satisfaction and Diego leaned forward to emphasize his next point. “Cousin, he who presides over the Royal Council for the Indies, was greatly impressed with my discovery of the Yucatan, and has directed me to consolidate my hold upon its heathen inhabitants and bring them to the universal faith under the rule of The Emperor King Charles.”

Bernal was beside himself, “Yucatan—that’s absurd. That is their word for cassava. Do you actually suppose they named their land after the root their women grind to make their bread?”

The red heathen named Melchior spoke up, “Yucatan is good—well and true named by our good Governor!”

The room seemed to spin as Diego grinned and went on. “Cousin, my learned advisors,” this he said as he nodded to the two Franciscan scribes scribbling away out under the morning sun on the western veranda, “have determined that, in light if the fine workmanship of the idols, the neat planning of the spacious towns you reported visiting, and the high-minded intelligence of Julian and Melchior, that the people of Yucatan are indeed the lost tribes of Isrаel, expelled by Titus and Vespasian after the siege of Jerusalem to wander the seas!”

Bernal was dumfounded, found himself standing before a mad man who held him in his power and also in his debt, and said nothing, only clenched his jaw.

Diego went on, “Cousin, I have contracted with a captain of note, valor and means to lead an expedition back to the lands I discovered at such pains and costs, in order to recoup my vast financial losses. I find myself in need of trusted officers with experience in these lands.”

Bernal was approaching deep anger, but managed to remain calm, grinding out between clenched teeth, “And the vast expense incurred by the governor for providing us with a leaking barque and un-caulked casks that nearly saw us thirsty to hell, will be recouped how?”

Diego sat back with a sigh and casually mentioned, “Julian and Melchior assure us that gold mines in abundance dot the Yucatan, from which we shall exact our due.”

Bernal burst out, “This is madness. There is not a hill let alone a mountain in that land, and not a river to speak of, only seeps and sinks.”

Diego “tisked” at him and motioned to the grinning devil named Melchior, who if he had been one of the three wise men come to visit the Christ child in his manger would have surely given the Son of God up to King Herod. The heathen in Christian guise then mouthed, “Yucatan, land of gold!”

Resolved to another fool’s errand, if only to feed on the sure-to-be-meager ship’s stores in the process, Bernal steeled himself and stood strong, making one last plea for careful, balanced judgment. “Governor, it was I who held Our Captain as he died from his wounds, wounds that I share. These devils knew we were coming, knew from whence we had come, laid country-wide traps for us, and so much as let us carry these two off. They are surely spies. We suffered every hardship and received more hurt than all of the expeditions in the Indies have since the beginning. As he passed the Captain expressed hope that no such hastily planned expedition would be launched again, into those savage and strange lands, but that military care be applied to the marshalling of such a force and that—”

The haughty governor cut him off as he poured wine—a substance Bernal had not tasted in over a year and which beckoned like the milk of some bloodthirsty pagan goddess—into two glasses, “Indeed, Brave Cousin, this is why I have enlisted your expert services and send you hence into my expanded domain with the guiding counsel of Julian and Melchior! Here, Soldier, drink to the honor and riches you shall earn by braving the hardships that an explorer must expect when he journeys into new lands!”

And so Bernal Diaz, named by ancient Fortune and cursed by the beady crossed eyes of two dark devils of this land all at once, at the greedy hands of his smiling cousin, drank his draught.

This ends Part 1: The Expedition of Francisco Hernandez de Cordoba

To be continued in A Sickness of the Heart, Part 2: The Expedition of Juan de Grijalva

*The Spanish Requirement of 1513 ("El Requerimiento") was a declaration in the name of the King of Spain of his divinely ordained right to take possession of the territories that the listeners happened to be standing on, and to subjugate, exploit and, when necessary, to slaughter them. The Requirement was read in Spanish to Natives to inform them of Spain’s rights to conquest. Those who subsequently resisted conquest were considered to harbor evil intentions and therefore brought the impending disaster implemented with Spanish steel upon themselves! This document would be read by a friar or priest while the conquistadors prepared with well-imagined impatience for the work they had come to do.

The two Indian prisoners, Julian and Melchior, were baptized, named, and questioned about gold in their country.

This gold mine as a willow-the-wisp was pursued by Spaniards for the next 50 years, with duplicitous Indians constantly saying it was just over the horizon, afraid to be the man to stand in front of a Christian and claim there was no gold to be had in his land.