“I heard you the first time. So it’s off to Arnhem Land. And then?”
Enoch paused to check the progress of the boat-loading, and seeing that he still had a minute or two, related the following: “You know that our entire Enterprise hinges on our being able to corrupt certain Spanish officials and sea-captains, which is not inherently difficult. But we have had to spend countless hours wining and dining them, and listening to their interminable yarns and sea-fables. Most of these are tedious and unremarkable. But I heard one that interested me. It was told me by one Alfonso, who was first mate aboard a galleon that left Manila for Acapulco some years ago. As usual they attempted to sail north to a higher latitude where they could get in front of the trade wind to California. Instead they were met by a tempest that drove them to the south for many days. The next time they were able to make solar observations, they discovered that they had actually crossed the Line and were several degrees south. Now the storm had washed away all of the earth that they had packed around their hearth in the galley, making it impossible for them to light a cook-fire without setting the whole galleon ablaze. So they dropped anchor near an island (for they’d come in sight of a whole chain of ’em, populated by people who looked like Africans) and gathered sand and fresh water. The water they used to replenish their drinking-jars. The sand they packed around their hearth. Then they continued their journey. When they arrived at Acapulco, the better part of a year later, they discovered nuggets of gold under the hearth—evidently that sand was auriferous and the heat of the fire had melted the gold and separated it from the sand. Needless to say, the Viceroy in Mexico City—”
“The same?”
Enoch nodded. “The very same from whom you stole the gold before Bonanza. He was informed of this prodigy, and did not delay in sending out a squadron, under an admiral named de Obregon, to sail along that line of latitude until they found those islands.”
“Would those be the Solomon Islands?”
“As you know, Jack, it has long been supposed that Solomon—the builder of the Temple in Jerusalem, the first Alchemist, and the subject of Isaac Newton’s obsessions for lo these many years, departed from the Land of Israel before he died, and journeyed far to the east, and founded a kingdom among certain islands. It is a part of this legend that this kingdom was fabulously wealthy.”
“Funny how no one ever makes up legends concerning wretchedly poor kingdoms—”
“It matters not whether this legend is true, only that some people believe it,” Enoch said patiently. He had begun to do tricks with the yo-yo now, making it fly around his hand like a comet whipping around the sun.
“Such as this Newton fellow? The one who reckoned the orbits of the planets?”
“Newton is convinced that Solomon’s temple was a geometrickal model of the solar system—the fire on the central altar representing the sun, et cetera.”
“So he would fain know about it, if the Islands of Solomon were discovered…”
“Indeed.”
“...and no doubt he has already perused the chronicles of that expedition that was sent out by our friend in Bonanza.”
Enoch shook his head. “There are no such chronicles.”
“The expedition was shipwrecked?”
“Shipwrecked, killed by disease…the vectors of disaster were so plentiful that the accounts cannot be reconciled. Only one ship made it to Manila, half of her crew dead and the rest dying of some previously unheard-of pestilence. The only one who survived was one Elizabeth de Obregon, the wife of the Admiral who had commanded the squadron.”
“And what does she have to say for herself?”
“She has said nothing. In a society where women cannot own property, Jack, secrets are to them what gold and silver are to men.”
“Why did the Viceroy not then send out another squadron?”
“Perhaps he did.”
“You have grown coy, Enoch, and time grows short.”
“It is not that I am coy, but that you are lazy in your thinking. If such expeditions had been sent out, and found nothing, what would the results be?”
“Nothing.”
“If an expedition had succeeded, what result then?”
“Some chronicle, kept secret in a Spanish vault in Mexico or Seville, and a great deal of gold…” Here Jack faltered.
“What did you expect to find in the hold of the Viceroy’s brig?”
“Silver.”
“What found you instead?”
“Gold.”
“But the mines of Mexico produce only silver.”
“It is true…we never solved the mystery of the origin of that gold.”
“Do you have any idea, Jack, how many alchemists are numbered among the ruling classes of Christendom?”