Brasyl

“Your service, Fathers. José Bonafacio da Nóbrega. I represent His Excelllency the viceroy. Please, no introduction. Father Qui

Father de Magalhães raised a hand to summon fresh coffee. Nóbrega waved him down. “No coffee if you please, Father. I find it disturbs my sleep. I much prefer this of an evening.” He took a small, flat silver case from his sleeve and set it on the table. Within were small balls of rolled leaf, each the size of the tip of the smallest finger. Never taking his eyes from Luis Qui

“I am unfamiliar with this… refreshment.”

“Oh, it’s the most marvelous stuff. Acculico, the Spaniards call it. The feitores ship it across the Pantanal from Characas. The mines at Cuiabá simply couldn’t function without it. Sharpens the mind most wonderfully, enlarges the faculties, fills body and soul with energy and well-being. Too good for slaves.”

“And excellently potent against the toothache,” Father de Magalhães added. “I do believe it could benefit meditation on all-night vigils and stations.”

“Totally the wrong climate for it here, alas,” said da Nóbrega.

“Thank you, but I will keep my old European ways,” Luis Qui

“Yours is reputed to be a learned order, a scientific order.”

“It’s my particular call to be a linguist, but mathematics and the natural philosophies are widely studied at Coimbra.”

“In the city of Belém do Pará is a madman who intends to take the measure of the world with a pendulum.” Nóbrega leaned toward Luis Qui

“I believe this may be co

“As you say, Father. This man — this mad scientist — is a Dr. Robert Falcon, a geographer, from the French Academy of Sciences in Paris.”

“I understood that Brazil was closed to foreigners, save those in the regular orders. Such as myself, by birth an English subject, if not by inclination.”

“His Excellency finds his presence expedient. He arrived with his brother, one Jean-Baptiste, a self-taught mathematician who was inordinately proud of some device he had invented to take all the drudgery out of weaving. I say that’s what slaves are for — it gives them something to do — but that is your French petty intelligentsia. Jean-Baptiste was repatriated with the bloody flux six weeks ago, but Robert Falcon remains. He is in some desperate race with fellow academicians to precisely measure the circumference of the globe. It seems, like everything else in this modern world, there is profound disagreement on the shape of our terrestrial sphere — or rather, not quite sphere. You still have salt water behind your ears, so you will have a keen appreciation of just how imprecise an art navigation at sea is, and Portugal is a maritime, mercantile empire. We have received informations that the rival expedition, which is to measure the globe by mensuration and trigonometry, has been granted leave of access by Spain to its viceroyalty of Peru and will shortly embark for Cartagena. Dr. Falcon has been cooling his heels in Belém do Pará for five months already.”

“Senhor, with respect, what do you require of me?”

Nóbrega dressed and savored a second acculico. Its effect was almost instantaneous: Qui

“For the most precise measurements, Dr. Falcon must conduct his experiment on the line of the equator. He has picked a spot five hundred miles above São José Tarumás on the Rio Negro as the most favorable, where what he calls ‘continental influences’ are in equilibrium.”

“I understand. I might travel with him.”

“The other way around, Father. He might travel with you. The wrath of the crown is properly turned to the Dutch pirates and adventurers, but the memory of Duguay-Trouin and his pirates strutting around Rio like gamecocks is all too fresh. Has the father-provincial apprised you of the political situation on the Amazon?”

“I understand it is in a state of renegotiation.”

“France has long held ambitions in South America far beyond that plague-hole in the Guianas. An uncertain transfer of territory could hand them their opportunity to a

“You suspect Dr. Falcon is an agent,” Luis Qui

“Versailles would have been insane not to have asked him.”

Magalhães spoke now. “I require you merely to observe and record. I have already alluded to your particular sensory acuity, and your facility at languages … ”

“Was I chosen as an admonitory or a spy?”

“Our duty is of course to the greater glory of God,” de Magalhães said.

“Of course, Father.” Luis Qui

“Excellent,” cried Nóbrega leaping up from his seat, rubbing his hands. “That coca-stuff is all very fine, but it makes you damnable hungry.”

A flurry, a whistle of wings in the night above Luis Qui