LA SCIMMIA UBRIACA INN

DUCHY OF MILAN, NORTHERN ITALY

Don Alfonso Villanueva y Santiago sipped his wine with a confident smile as he placed his feet up on his table. Life had been good to him so far. Fairly recently, the former Spanish soldier had been granted an encomienda or fief in the Viceroyalty of New Spain for his help in putting down a major insurrection in the Philippine Islands. For his service to the crown, he was put in charge of a vast tract of land on an island called Panay. Among his responsibilities as an encomendero for this land were the conversion of the natives to Catholicism, protection of the land from pirates and brigands, the propagation of Spanish culture and influence, and the exploitation of any natural resources. He devoted himself the most to this last duty.

Europe at this time was always hungry for new things from the new world that Spain had opened up for her – figuratively and literally. Spices, new fruits, animals, and vegetables flowed from the Americas and the East Indies into the markets of Europe and fetched hefty prices. Many enterprising Spaniards had been making substantial wealth from trading goods that were only produced in their new world possessions, like chili, potatoes, corn, and tomatoes – especially tomatoes. These would be planted and harvested by their native workers, given to their master as tribute, and loaded onto a Spanish galleon for transport to the markets of Europe.

For Don Alfonso, his encomienda produced sugarcane. Sugar was a luxury – sweetness was the one taste that the human tongue craved the most. The magical plant that was sugarcane, more grass than crop, grew like a weed in its native habitat.

The difference between a Spanish encomienda and a regular European fief was that the land actually belonged to the people living on it; however, the people owed service to their encomendero. Don Alfonso had put a humble and trustworthy native by the name of Gurung-Gurung in charge of the cultivation, harvest, and transport of the crop to Spain. If he did well, Don Alfonso promised him a substantial cut of the earnings – as soon as he returned from Europe.

Although he loved adventure, Don Alfonso despised the tropical heat of the East Indies. It frequently made him ill while he was there, and he was advised by his physician to return to Europe, where he would not have to endure the blistering tropical sun or the humid afternoons in the jungle.

Before leaving, the don instructed Gurung-Gurung to update him with quarterly progress reports, something the native had been doing with great efficiency and regularity. The native complied, sending letters to Europe without fail every four months – the time it took to get from the East Indies to Spain – for almost a year. The last progress report came about a month ago. It simply said “Los barcos han salido del puerto.” the ships have left port.

Anticipating a gigantic windfall, the don left for Milan, one of Spain's possessions in northern Italy, not before notifying the House and Audience of the Indies, also known as the Casa de Contratacion of his change of address. This was where he would sell his goods. The Italians were the master merchants of Europe. They would give him the best prices on the continent, and there would be no 20% tariff on precious metals that he would have to pay to the crown, unlike those other Spaniards who wished to flood the European market with gold from the New World.

Everything had fallen into place. God was good. In anticipation of his wealth, Don Alfonso had been issuing promissory notes to every shopkeeper, cobbler, tailor, and metalsmith he passed by, regaling them with tales of the massive income he would receive from his sugar shipment. The don had purchased a new suit of clothes, a dozen silk stockings, and a finely crafted spontoon and sword along with a full set of halberdier's armor, out of nostalgia for his old profession. He had even paid extra to have the armor delivered to the Scimmia Ubriaca Inn, where he was currently staying. The armor and weapons now rested up in his room – the finest room in the inn – in a rack he had custom-built for himself just the other day. It even had his name engraved on it on a large brass plate.

The Don looked up from his wine to notice a man had just entered the tavern. Much like the don, he looked out of place; another Spaniard in Italy, from his manner of dress. He seemed slightly lost, turning his head left and right, scanning every face in the tavern with a worried urgency.

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“Amigo.” called out the don, “Come join me – perhaps I can help you?”

The man breathed a sigh of relief and weaved through the tables in the tavern to make it towards Don Alfonso.

“Are you Don Alfonso Villanueva y Santiago?” asked the man, seemingly out of breath.

“Yes.” replied the don, his smile becoming wider. “Am I to assume that you are a courier from the Casa de Contratacion?”

“Yes, señor.” the courier said with a bow. “I am a messenger of the House and Audience of the Indies, and I have a message for you from the company.”

Don Alfonso nearly snatched the letter out of the courier's hand in excitement. He peeled open the seal of the company to smell the letter. It was freshly written, and to him, it smelled like money. He opened the letter slowly, savoring his financial victory. His eyes widened as he read the letter:

Don Alfonso Villanueva y Santiago,

Esteemed señor, we at the House and Audience of the Indies seek to inform you that your ship designated as “La Bailarina del Mar”, berthed at the port of Bobog, Island of Panay, chartered on a course from Bobog to Manila to Acapulco, with a final destination of the port of Cadiz, Spain, duly inspected and approved by the port authorities of the Audience in the Viceroyalty of New Spain, has delivered a cargo of spoiled goods in the form of 500 tons of rotten sugar cane to the receiving shipping authorities at the port of Acapulco.

There was more to the letter, detailing the weight of the cargo and the state of the ship and other damages, but don Alfonso's heart stopped at the word 'spoiled', and he could not read any longer. He had spent a substantial amount of money to grow the cane but had failed to realize that all of the other encomenderos who transported sugar refined their product in a sugar mill to prevent spoilage before sending it over to Europe. Knowing nothing about sugar, and with Gurung-Gurung not knowing the distance between Bobog and Spain, he had skipped this crucial step and had paid for it dearly.

This was all the Indio's fault, he thought. If they had only calculated for how much time... no. It was his fault too. Plunging headfirst into a business he knew nothing about doomed him from the moment he stepped off the metaphorical plank. His accounts now suffered from a potentially life-ruining deficit thanks to all the frivolous spending he had done before his ship had come in, and for that, he could blame no one but himself.

If he had not been sitting down, the don's legs would've given way. Already he felt his palms moisten, and he started to tremble slightly. As the messenger walked away, he began to wonder what would happen to him. With a debt the size of the monthly income of a large village, authorities from the Audience would surely be after him. How would he settle his debts, where would his next meal come from... would he get in trouble with the law? Would he spend the rest of his life rotting in jail? What was he going to do? Where would he go?

Spain's possessions in both the old world and the new world were vast. There was nowhere he could go without running into a representative of the crown's law. Even here in northern Italy, he was unsafe. No Spanish citizen could step on a boat without the Casa de Contratacion knowing about it. He would be arrested the moment he stepped foot on any boat that flew the Spanish colors. The only options left were to leave Spanish-controlled lands. Travel to the wild lands of the east – Bohemia, perhaps even Poland or Russia. There he would live out his days as a fur trader…

Suddenly the sound of drums interrupted the don's spiraling thoughts. A gang of military recruiters had just walked into the tavern. Local Italians by the look of them. It seemed that God had placed a solution in his lap. Go to war or go to jail – the weighty decision rested on his shoulders.

“Friends and comrades, my name is Captain Emilio Toscana,” said a recruiter, as he sat at a table while his companion played the drum beside him, “We of the honorable Talbot Company will pay a sum of four florins a month to any man who wishes to take up arms with us, in addition to any spoils you take for yourself! A life of adventure and excitement awaits you! You will never have to worry about your next meal or where you will rest your head at night when you enlist with the company.”

People were beginning to mill around the recruiter's table at the sound of four florins a month. The pay sounded fair to Don Alfonso, and he had done soldier work before, so this was by no means an alien profession to him. He had decided. It was time to enlist with this 'Talbot Company' – since, realistically, the alternative was imprisonment and death. Better to die by the sword than by the slow, lonely and excruciating death of starvation.

Just as the don rose from his seat, the tavern doors swung open. A figure dressed in a very colorful blue, white, and red doublet entered the tavern, exhausted and panting. A rapier, leather kidney belt, and a steel breastplate made this person look like a mercenary, but something was amiss.