Free Spice and the Devil's Cave by Agnes Danforth Hewes

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    At this point in his reflections, he saw the men put up their tools and prepare to leave. He nodded to one of them whom he remembered hiring a few weeks ago, a short, wiry chap with a deeply tanned face and small, black eyes that looked like burnt gimlet holes in brown parchment. A rolling gait and an air of cat-like agility made one immediately visualize him as thoroughly at home at all heights and angles. Nicolo had hired him because the fellow had looked so in need, and because there was a haunting familiarity about him.
    â€œIs she going ahead to suit you, sir? “he inquired, as he stopped at Nicolo’s side to survey the caravel.
    â€œI’m satisfied,” Nicolo told him, “though I’m not as used to the Portuguese type of craft as I am to the Venetian.”
    At once the other looked interested. “You’ve been to sea, have you, sir?”
    â€œI know the Mediterranean pretty well,” Nicolo admitted. He scrutinized the tanned face. . . . Where had he seen it before? “You’ve had considerable experience at sea,
    â€œAll over!” grinned the other. “Up and down the Red Sea, and across to India, and over by Malacca.”
    â€œSo! Some sight-seeing! How do you come to be in a dockyard at this end of the world?”
    â€œOh – everybody likes a change,” the man evasively returned. “What trade are you reckoning on, sir?”
    â€œMadeira lumber and sugar and wine till I can do better. Spices, eventually, I hope-if Portugal ever finds the sea route to them.”
    â€œHumph!” There was frank defiance in the grunt.
    â€œWhy, there’s more in spice than in anything else,” Nicolo remonstrated.
    â€œYou’re right there is! You’d be surprised if you only knew how much of a ‘more’ it is!”
    Nicolo studied the sailor with curiosity. Almost he appeared to bear a grudge against spice. “How do you come to know so much about it, then?” he demanded.
    â€œOh-worked for years on ships that carried it. What between hauling on board and heaving over rail I reckon I’ve handled more pounds of the stuff than you’re days old!”
    â€œYou haven’t by any chance been where the spices grow?” Nicolo ventured.
    â€œOver Ceylon way, you mean? And Penang, and Banda?
    â€œBanda!” Nicolo seized on the name so familiar to him through the cherished Conti letters, “How’d you get over there?”
    The brown parchment face wrinkled into a grin. “I took to the sea from pretty near the time I was born-and I suppose I just kept on!”
    Nicolo laughed. “And where were you born?”
    â€œDown river – at Belem. 1 My father was a bar pilot and he taught me his calling. I cut my teeth, you might say, on the Cachopos! 2
    Nicolo eyed him with fresh interest. “Belem and the Orient are some distance apart!” he suggested.
    The other nodded. “After my father was lost at sea, and my mother died, I quit the land for good. I got to know every port in the Mediterranean. One day, in Alexandria, I saw a caravan starting but for the Red Sea, and I took a notion to go along. Everybody said there was plenty of work down that way, and they were right, too. The harbour at Aden’s just chock-a-block with craft coming and going!”
    Nicolo felt his pulses leap-the very East seemed to drip off this fellow’s tongue! “Where does all that traffic come from?”
    â€œEverywhere; mostly from India, Cathay, the mess of islands betwixt and beyond; in Arab bottoms of course. They do all the carrying, and I’ll tell you they keep the ocean churning!”
    Nicolo impetuously started on more questions, but suddenly checked himself: this first hand experience belonged to the workshop! “Would you be willing to talk to some of my friends about these places where you’ve seen the spices growing?”
    The man silently eyed him, and Nicolo again