A week was enough to show me that my task was impossible, and I warned Christopher, “There are more islands in the sea than birds in the air, and they’re as hard to get hold of.”

  He replied that so far as the number went, I was only saying the same as Ptolemy and Marco Polo, and this great number was good news; the more havens we had, the less dangerous the passage between them would be. As for the difficulty of getting hold of islands, how did I come by that far-fetched idea? No doubt it just showed my famous laziness when I was asked to do work of any difficulty.

  The rest of our discussion casts light on both my brother’s madness and the beauty of his character, the main reason why he carried out projects on a scale impossible for other mortals to realize or even to envisage.

  As I was patiently explaining to him that no cartographer with any regard for the truth could draw up a reliable, exact inventory of the islands in the ocean, since most of them were imaginary, he looked at me uncomprehendingly before uttering the following words, which I consider his motto.

  “Well, what about it? Where does what’s imaginary come from, if not those countries still unknown to us?”

  I went to work again without bothering any more about the factual nature of the ideas I put forward. I felt that I was following in my father’s footsteps. On Saturday evenings, to send us to sleep, he used to tell us improbable stories that passed into our dreams and made Mass next morning a very dull and dismal affair.

  I copied his method.

  My brother and I shared a room rented to us by Master Andrea. I would wait until we were lying in bed with the candles blown out.

  “Christopher, did you know that Roderick was the last Visigoth king of Spain? He held out for a long time, but in the end he was defeated by the Arab leader Tarik ibn Ziyad. After that the whole of the peninsula, including Portugal, was occupied by the Muslims. Many Christians, feeling that they could not live under Muslim rule, tried to flee, and that was why the Bishop of Porto put to sea, accompanied by six other prelates and a large company of faithful believers. For a long time, Christopher, they followed your future route, sailing west. It’s said that they went far beyond the Azores. When at last they saw land on the horizon, some of them called it Ante ilia, the island ahead, which soon became Antilla. Others called it the Island of Seven Cities, because each of the bishops built his own city there.

  Christopher never tired of hearing this legend, and was never satisfied with that outline of it but kept asking me for further and more precise details. As I didn’t know any, I made them up. I drew a map to help me with my idyllic descriptions and I have always kept it like a talisman. Why am I so fond of this parchment island, the creation only of my own brain and thus without any reality at all? Today it is dirty, torn and almost illegible. But every time I look at it, which is daily, I feel the same astonishment to see how much the Antilla that I dreamed up is to the real Hispaniola.

  I could almost believe that my brother was right: God has installed a miniature version of his entire Creation in our heads. It is up to us to explore that part of it in which we are interested.

  Christopher’s other favourite story was the tale of St Brendan.

  This story gave me a rest, because I didn’t have to tell it myself. A man by the name of Benedeit wrote it down in the twelfth century, so I had only to read aloud in a voice suitable for legends – adopting a monotonous and distant tone as if it came from very far away.

  Brendan, God’s saint, was born of the royal line in the country of Ireland. As he was of high descent, he well knew that Scripture says: “He who flees the joys of this world will have all the joy he could ever desire with God hereafter.” This son of kings therefore forsook false honours for those that are true; he took monastic vows in order to be humble and, as it were, an exile from his own time. He was soon chosen abbot of his monastery, acquitting himself so well in that office that many joined him and remained faithful to his rule. The pious Brendan had three thousand monks under him, living in many places, and they all took his great virtue as their example.

  Now he had one great wish: he often prayed to God to show him Paradise, the place where Adam first lived, the inheritance from which we were cast out …

  He chose, first, to make confession to a servant of God, a hermit called Barin, a man of virtuous customs and a holy life. This devout believer in the Lord lived in a wood with three hundred monks. It was his advice that Brendan asked, wishing for his opinion. And Barin told him in fair words, with many examples and maxims, all that he had seen on land and sea when he went in search of his godson Mernoc.

  On hearing this tale, Brendan took fresh heart. The good abbot made his preparations; he chose fourteen of his monks, all of them excellent men, and told them what he meant to do to find out whether they approved. The brothers talked it over two by two, and they all with one accord told their holy father that he should undertake the venture boldly and begged him to take them with him as his true and faithful sons.

  “If I speak to you of this,” said Brendan, “it is so that I may have confidence in those whom I take, and so that I will not be sorry for it later.”

  They all assured him that nothing would hinder him by their fault. So having heard their reply, the abbot took his chosen companions with him to the chapterhouse, and as a man of good sense, he said to them:

  “Brothers, we do not know the dangers of the venture upon which we set out. Let us pray to God to teach us and, by His good will, to guide us by His hand; and let us pray for forty days, fasting every three days.”

  None of them hesitated to do as he required them. The abbot did not desist from his prayers until God sent an angel from heaven, who instructed him in the subject of the voyage. The angel revealed to him in his heart that God would willingly consent to his putting out to sea.

  So Brendan went out towards the high seas, where he knew from God that he must sail. He did not turn aside to visit his family, he was bound for a place dearer to him. He walked as long as there was firm land underfoot, never stopping to rest, until he reached the rock called by the common folk Brendan’s Leap. This rock goes far out into the ocean like a promontory, and has a harbour in the cliff where the sea makes a very narrow little gulf; I do not think that anyone before Brendan ever reached the far end of it. It was here that he had timber of the kind used by coopers brought to build his ship. He made all the inside of it from pine wood, and covered it on the outside with ox skins; the hull was well tarred with pitch, so that the ship would glide smoothly over the waves. Then Brendan placed in it all the necessary tools that the new ship could hold and the provisions that they had brought: victuals to last forty days at the most.

  Then he said to the brothers: “Go on board the ship and give thanks to God; we have a favouring wind!”

  They all went aboard, and Brendan followed them.

  The monks raised the mast and hoisted the sail. Those devout men went on at a good speed. The wind blowing from the east carried them westward. They also rowed with all their might, never fearing to exert their bodies in order to reach the end of their voyage.

  Always going west, the monks kept coming upon islands, each separated from the next by a dangerous and interminable distance for them to navigate.

  They included the Devil’s Island, where the Evil One has a palace made of marble and crystal set in gold. This is where he devises temptations to corrupt human beings.

  The Island of Sheep, which are the size of stags there.

  The Moving Island, which turned out to be the back of a vast whale.

  The Island of Talking Birds, who said that they were fallen angels, cast down from heaven for following the Evil One in his rebellion against the Most High.

  The Island of the Monastery of St Albinus, where no one lives except for the monks of an abbey whose needs are miraculously provided for by the grace of God.

  The Island of the Fountain of Sleep, where those who drink too freely from that fountain risk never waking again.

  The Island of the Golden Pavilion, dominated by a huge pillar the colour of sapphire.

  The Island of Hell, where fire rises from incandescent rocks, and a demon blacksmith appeared to them. He was brandishing a gigantic hammer, pincers, and a red-hot sword blade.

  The Island of Judas, where Judas was chained alone to undergo a thousand fascinating torments, which he describes:Near this place is the land of devils, and I am within earshot of it; near this place there are two hells; to suffer there is to pay a heavy price. Near to this place are two hells which last both winter and summer. Even the less painful is terrible for those who are in it: they think that it is impossible to suffer more than they do anywhere. Except for me, no one knows which of the two is the more painful, for no one else suffers in both; but I, wretched creature that I am, undergo both those hells. The first is above, the second below and a sea of salt separates them. It is a marvel that the sea itself does not burn. The hell up above is the more painful, the hell down below the more horrible; the hell close to the air is stifling and burning, the hell close to the sea is icy and stinks. I spend a day and a night up above and then the same time down below. One day I go up, the next I come down; there is no other end to my torment. I do not change from one hell to the other for relief, but to undergo yet more torment.

  On Monday, night and day, I am tied to a wheel and turn in the wind, which carries the wheel furiously through the sky. I come and go unceasingly all the time.

  On Tuesday, crossing the sea, I am flung into the other hell where I suffer just as much. I am strongly bound and the devils howl imprecations at me; I am placed on a bed of thorns and I am crushed down on it with stones and lead; I am pierced by swords so often that you can see my body full of holes.

  On Wednesday I am taken up again and now the tortures are changed. I spend part of the day boiling in pitch, which has made me the colour you see me today. Then I am taken out and put to roast between two braziers, tied to a stake placed there especially for me. It is red, as if it had been held for ten years in a roaring furnace. Then I am thrown back into the pitch so that I will burn better. There is no marble so hard that it will not melt in that fire, but its blazing heat has made me such that my body cannot perish. And although that pain overwhelms me, I suffer it for a whole day and a night.

  On Thursday I am taken down to suffer the opposite torment; I am shut up in a frozen, dark and shadowy place. I am so cold that I long to return to the fire that burns so fiercely. At the time I think there can be no worse torment than the cold, and every torture seems to me the most cruel as I endure it.

  On Friday I go back up above, where I have died so many painful deaths. The devils flay me alive until I have no skin left and then they bury me, impaled on a red-hot stake, in salt and sweat. As I suffer this torment I grow a new skin. The devils flay me like this and force me into the salt ten times a day, and then they make me drink molten lead and copper.

  On Saturday they throw me down to undergo new pains. I am put in a prison; there is none more terrible and repugnant in all of hell. I am cast down into it without a cord, and there I lie in the dark, with no light, and in such a stench that I fear my heart will burst, but I cannot vomit because of the copper I have been made to drink. I swell, my skin stretches, I fear that it will crack. Cold, heat, that stench, those are the torments suffered by Judas. Yesterday was Saturday; I come here between nones and noon; today I rest. Soon I shall have a cruel hour when a thousand devils come and will leave me no peace.

  At last, after visiting a hermitage to see a hermit called Paul, who was one hundred and forty years old, and who explained his amazingly good health and unusual longevity by the nature of his diet – he had spent thirty years living on nothing but fish and the following fifty years on nothing but pure water – Brendan and his sailor monks approached their destination, Paradise.

  Then the brothers saw a handsome young man, a messenger from God, coming to meet them. He called to them to land on the shore, welcomed them, calling each by his real name and then kissed them with kindness. He calmed the dragons, who were lying docile on the ground and offered no resistance. At his command an angel removed the flaming sword, the gate to Paradise was opened and the pilgrims all entered into its glory.

  The young man led them into Paradise. That land was well provided with very fine trees and rivers, the countryside was a garden always in flower and the fragrance of those flowers scented the place fittingly all the time the pious monks stayed there. In every season Paradise had excellent fruits and wonderful scents; you found no brambles or thistles or stinging nettles there; every tree and herb provided delicious things; flowers lasted in bloom and trees in leaf all the year round. It was always summer in Paradise, with the trees covered with fruits and flowers, the woods full of game. Rivers of milk teemed with good fish; there was abundance everywhere. The dew that fell from the sky turned to honey, the mountains were made of gold, the rocks themselves were worth a fortune. The clear sun always shone, not a breath of wind stirred a single hair, no cloud tarnished the clarity of the sky. Anyone living there was protected from all harm and knew that none could come to him; he knew nothing of heat, cold, sickness, hunger, thirst and pain. He had all he could desire in great abundance and would not lose heaven, for he was sure of living in Paradise for ever.

  On seeing such felicity, Brendan found the time passed quickly. He would have liked to stay a long time in that place … The handsome young man went ahead of him and told him many things. He described, in fair words, the rewards destined for everyone. Brendan followed him up a hill as high as a cypress tree, and from the summit they saw marvels that can hardly be understood. They contemplated the angels and heard them rejoice at their coming. They heard the great melody they made, but they could bear no more of it. Their human nature could not stand up to the spectacle of that glory.

  So then their guide said, “Let us go back; I will take you no further, for you are not capable of it. Brendan, here is Paradise that you prayed to God to show you. Before you, down below, there is a hundred thousand times more glory than you have yet seen. But you cannot know more about it until you return, for you have come to this place in flesh and blood, but you will soon return to it in spirit. Go now, turn home and you will be back to await Judgement Day. And as a memento take these golden stones to give you courage!”

  Christopher, usually so reserved, clapped his hands.

  “There, you see, Bartholomew, the accounts all agree. When will you stop being so sceptical? There are islands to the west, and they will be scattered along my route all the way to India!”

  At the end of every story he hugged me. I had never seen him so happy before, and I provided him with other legends, linking them to his future voyage.

  “There are some islands that no one can see, Christopher. Do you remember the seven bishops who would not submit to Arab rule? God gave those brave prelates magic powers. They could make the island where they had found shelter disappear whenever they liked. What better protection could there be against the Muslims who would have wished to pursue them? There’s nothing to suggest that those islands are real – apart from a flock of birds circling endlessly over a part of the ocean that looks deserted. Watch the birds, Christopher, there’s an island under them, I assure you, so don’t worry if your eyes do not see any land, trust the birds! The writers state categorically that from time immemorial there has been profound complicity between birds and islands. And what’s more, Christopher, now that I come to think of it, are not birds, which last longer than clouds, islands in the sky?”

  He listened to me, open-mouthed. Those who did not know Christopher are unaware that in some ways he never ceased to be a child, loving distances, brilliance and showy costumes, as children do. And as a child does, he sought first for the love of his father and mother, only this time not of Domenico and Susanna but of the king and queen, Ferdinand and Isabella.

  It is in the long childhood of the little Genoese boy that the wellsprings of his soul are to be found.

  Those few people who still take an interest in me, and come to my retreat to ask my news, always ask me why I chose an island for my last home.

  Las Casas is no exception. I look at him, I smile, and by way of thanking him for his attention to my story, I carefully explain my way of approaching death.

  Everyone is an island, wouldn’t you agree? An island surrounded by other islands, separated from them by currents that are sometimes easy to cross and sometimes difficult. It varies from day to day.

  What is old age?

  The island that I am is beginning to shrink, eroded further every year by the pitiless sea of time. One by one, whole parts of my life have fallen into the water: laughter, love, a taste for wine. I move less and less far as time goes by. I meet people less often, I eat and sleep and dream and remember less and less. I hear more faintly and see more dimly all the time. The shadows are laying siege to me. Soon they will swallow me up.

  Now you understand why I chose an island for my last home: the island reminds me that I resemble it. Like the island, I am fragile; like the island, I am under threat. The sight of the island teaches me how to die.

  Las Casas will go back, delighted, and tell everyone that the former governor, Bartholomew, has achieved wisdom and is awaiting his last hour in peace.

  Absolute nonsense!

  I don’t talk to anyone about the real war I am waging.

  The more we shrink with age, the more room in us is taken up by our ghosts. I know them. They take their time. They are preparing for the last assault. Listen: the dogs are barking.

  Suddenly, and there was no advance notice of this whim, my brother decided that it was time for him to take a wife.

  Was it the daily work on our parchments that had aroused such a wish in him? They used to say that our inks gave off vapours making cartographers indulge in the unhealthy practice of solitary pleasure. They also used to say that the constant scratching of our pens on the maps irritated the nerves to the point of madness. And that narrowing our eyes so much to write out, in fine calligraphy, tiny names of ports and capes all along the coastlines gave cartographers hallucinations that usually involved naked women …

 

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