“If they saw an angel… they would think it a devil and try to kill it?”
“Yes.”
At Harriot’s answer, full of conviction, Raleigh merely snorted.
“Hah, what a ridiculous thing to say. You speak so boldly, as if you’ve met an angel yourself. When you’ve never had any such experience.”
“Of course I’ve never seen anything like an angel. I doubt I ever will.”
Thomas Harriot only shrugged at Raleigh’s sarcasm.
“But I have seen more than enough people to be sick of them. Christians, non-Christians, Englishmen, Spaniards, Frenchmen, Algonquians, and all manner of others.”
“Ha! And that is the result of your grand observation of mankind?”
“Yes.”
“…”
Raleigh shook his head at his old friend’s bluster.
“No. You… know nothing. A man cannot behold a noble being of Heaven with his own eyes and deem it a devil.
Rather, even men with crooked thoughts like yours would change if they met an angel in person. They would be utterly crushed by its overwhelming presence, by its holiness, and never be able to break free.”
“…”
“Even if they suspected it as a devil at first, after speaking with it a few times, they would change. Everyone would alter their attitude and praise the merciful Lord who had sent an angel down to them.”
“Pfft.”
“…Are you laughing?”
“Yes, I am.”
A bitter sneer settled on Thomas Harriot’s face.
“If a person were to meet something like a ‘real angel,’ he would not be able to endure it. Especially if he were someone with power.”
“Why?”
“Because people cannot endure a being above them. Because they cannot tolerate a being they can do nothing about, one they can only obey.”
The smile gradually vanished from Harriot’s face.
“If Jesus Christ returned to the Holy See, the pope and the cardinals would unanimously kill him and nail him to a cross. It would be the same even if Muslims witnessed the return of Muhammad.”
“…”
“I am certain of it. Even if it were a true angel—no, precisely because it was a true angel—people would turn away from the truth all the more.”
For a moment, a cloud covered the sunlight.
As the sunlight entering through the cabin window disappeared, shadows fell across both their faces.
***
“…But are we truly allowed to kill him?”
The assassin, pretending to be a shoeshine boy as he sharpened a shoe knife, asked. At that, the captain, who had been dozing alone with his arms crossed in a corner of the cabin, answered.
“What is it?”
“We are… Englishmen, are we not?”
“We are.”
“The Lord told us from birth to serve His Majesty the King of England, so we must be Englishmen.”
“What nonsense are you suddenly spouting? Get to the point.”
“…No, everyone was so excited, saying that if this colony opens, we can put Spain’s nose out of joint, and that it’ll be easier to strike at the Spanish colonies. Are we not about to ruin all that?”
“…”
At that instant, the surroundings all fell silent. All the assassins who had been sharpening and swinging their blades stopped moving and glared only at that fake shoeshine boy.
“It’s just… my conscience pricks me a little. They say the colonial venture was about to fail and all the colonists were on the verge of going to Heaven, but that Indian emperor saved them, didn’t he? He saved our countrymen, and what we give him in return is a knife… It sits rather ill with me…”
“We.”
The captain cut off the fake shoeshine boy’s words and spoke.
“We took the money.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
“Did you alone not take the money?”
“I-I did. I did take it, but…”
“Did you throw the purse into the Thames?”
“I did not…”
“Then shut up and kill him.
Think of money as your Lord, your conscience, and His Majesty the King.”
At the light blasphemy, the assassins in the cramped cabin snickered softly. The assassin acting as their captain, however, still spoke without a trace of a smile.
“Even if the Lord Himself came back to life, if you were paid to kill Him, you must kill Him. That is your trade.”
“…That is a bit much.”
“One more word, and know that you will die before the Indian emperor does.”
“…”
Only then did the fake shoeshine boy resume sharpening his shoe knife.
He sharpened it with such diligence that it could slit a man’s throat.
***
“People see what they want to see, and they see things in whatever way benefits them. That is my view.”
“…”
“Did you say everyone would change if they saw an angel in person? Then why did the Pharisees who saw Jesus Christ act as they did? Shouldn’t all the Jews who met Jesus have converted?”
“That is…”
“But what was the result? They all went to Pontius Pilate and begged him to have Jesus killed. And their descendants still do not believe in Jesus.”
“…”
“I think this. If people were to see an angel in person, and if that angel uttered even a single word that displeased them…
People would try to kill the angel.
I am certain of it.”
“…”
“…”
In the silence, the sound of waves echoed. As the ship moved, the creaking of planks rubbing against one another tickled the ear.
“…You are wrong.”
Annoyed by that silence, Sir Walter Raleigh finally added one more remark.
“I beg your pardon?”
“I said you are wrong.”
As an accomplished poet, Raleigh considered several beautiful words and rhetorical expressions… and then simply gave up.
He decided to speak more crudely, more directly.
“You have never met an angel in person, have you?”
Yes. You have never seen one.
You have never seen an angel.
“What do you mean by that?”
“With a true angel… there comes a moment when you cannot help but be certain merely by looking upon it.
I am saying such a moment comes. A moment when all doubt in your heart is erased, and you cannot help but be certain that the being before your eyes is truly a holy being of Heaven.”
“…”
“…Do you understand?”
“I do not.”
“That is why you are an atheist.”
“And Sir Raleigh speaks as if he has seen an angel in person…”
Just as Harriot was answering curtly, the cabin door flew open. An excited sailor shouted to the two men.
“We-we’ve arrived! We’ll soon be at Chesapeake Bay!”
“At last… Good God, we have finally arrived.”
For some reason, Sir Raleigh rose from his seat with a solemn and heavy expression. Then he called over a servant who had been waiting far down the corridor and asked,
“Where is the crown?”
“Here, sir.”
“Good. And the Bible?”
“That is here as well.”
Thus, holding in one hand the box containing the crown made for this day, and in the other a Bible splendidly gilded with gold leaf, Raleigh walked down the corridor. Harriot, too, followed quickly after him.
When Raleigh reached the deck, he could immediately see, beyond the railing, people gathered like grains of sand upon the shore.
There were thousands of nearby natives, seemingly more than last time, and among them gathered over a hundred Englishmen.
And there, among them, stood Lord Nemo once again.
Right before the harbor where they were about to dock. Around him, people were gathered with particular density, like clouds. Some must see him as something like the governor of Croatoan, and others as a great chief.
And Walter Raleigh saw him as an angel.
Merely looking upon that sight made Raleigh swallow.
Before long, the ship reached the hastily constructed harbor, and while the passengers’ movements were being controlled, Walter Raleigh and Thomas Harriot were the first to disembark and set foot on the floating bridge.
Still holding in one hand the box containing the crown, and in the other the Bible.
The holiest—or most blasphemous—moment of his life was approaching.
He would personally set a crown upon an angel’s head, make the angel place his hand upon the Bible and swear loyalty, and make the angel himself confess that he was a subject of the Kingdom of England.
At the crushing weight that thought brought, Raleigh could not move his feet properly.
His hands began to tremble. His breath gradually quickened. His vision blurred from the edges.
But one step at a time, he moved.
Because this was his duty.
Before he knew it, as he walked slowly, the seven hundred or so Englishmen who had divided themselves among more than a dozen ships had also disembarked behind him. The thousands gathered here were watching Nemo, and Walter Raleigh as he made his way toward Nemo.
It was a historic… moment.
In a sense, it was the moment he had longed for so desperately.
To evangelize the New World, to bring the monarch of a strange land to his knees, and to establish an immortal achievement that would remain forever.
That moment had come.
At last, Walter Raleigh stood before Nemo. Harriot stood far behind him.
“…”
“Sir Walter Raleigh?”
It was that voice again.
“Hold the Bible forward. I must take my oath, must I not?”
“…”
“Sir Raleigh?”
The angel urged him in every language he knew. As Sir Raleigh slowly extended the Bible forward, Nemo placed his hand upon it.
Thump.
“…Do you.”
“…”
“You, Nemo, great chief of the Pamlico, the Chowanoke, the Croatoan, the Chesapeake, and others… now seek to swear loyalty, under God’s blessing, to Elizabeth, rightful Queen of England, France, and Ireland, and Defender of the Faith.
Will you follow God’s law and spread God’s word far and wide?”
“I will.”
“Will you be faithful in serving the rightful sovereign of England, France, and Ireland?”
“I will.”
“Will you protect your people from all manner of evil and rule them according to just law?”
“I will.”
“…”
“…”
In silence, Raleigh opened the box. Then the splendid crown adorned with gold and jewels glittered within it.
Yet it was nothing but the product of folly. No splendid object made by man could compare to the holy radiance emanating from this being’s very existence.
Though he knew that, Raleigh…
Set the crown upon Nemo’s head.
Then everyone gathered there knelt at once, as if they had rehearsed it in advance.
Raleigh, too, albeit belatedly, stretched one leg far back to kneel…
“Aaaaah!”
Someone’s sudden scream.
Raleigh, despite himself, turned back at the sound of that scream. In that moment, what entered his eyes was Harriot’s horrified face and Englishmen scattering in all directions in utter panic.
And.
A shoeshine boy, a cleaner, and a servant came running. At first, he could not grasp the situation and wondered what all the commotion was about.
Then, a moment later, he saw the blades springing from their hands. They moved as one, cutting off his retreat and closing in from every side.
It felt as if he were seeing teeth approaching while half-swallowed in a shark’s maw. Raleigh froze instantly.
There was nothing he could do.
“Farewell. Don’t hold it against us.”
Countless blades rushing toward him.
…Who? Whose doing was this?
The Earl of Essex? Or Sir Walsingham? No. There were too many candidates. Too many had mocked him, despised him, and hated him for him to single out any one of them.
…And they were too close for him to avoid.
And if he did avoid them, Lord Nemo, who had just knelt and was now rising, would be hurt.
“God… Almighty.”
Those would likely be his last words.
Raleigh closed his eyes and recited the Lord’s Prayer.
Waiting for the daggers to tear his body apart.
And then.
“Sir Raleigh.”
Whoooosh!
Something suddenly pulled his body. When he hurriedly opened his eyes, he himself was still unharmed.
Instead, he saw someone else being shredded by the shark’s teeth. The throat, the chest, the waist, the shoulder, the thigh—all were hacked to pieces.
In other words, the one struck by the blades in his place was…
“Aaaaaah!”
“G-God Almighty! The Indian emperor has been stabbed!”
Ah.
A body clad in white collapsed, drenched in blood.
The most noble being in this world collapsed.
“Ah, aaah!”
Thud.
From the fallen body, words would not come properly.
—“I have not come to punish you. The Lord has prepared no curse for you, but glory and bliss.”
—“The Lord will raise you up and make great use of you.”
All the words he had left him scattered and vanished like a mirage. It was as if all the light in the world had been torn into a thousand, ten thousand pieces.
“Ahh, ah, ah…”
Ruin.
—“From now on, countless bloodshed and injustices will flow across this land like a river.”
—“Millions will be slaughtered in the Lord’s name, and they will die crying out the Lord’s name in hatred.”
Was that… what it meant?
Is this how it comes to pass?
Ah, aaah…
Feeling utterly wretched, Raleigh turned his eyes.
While everyone fled, only the people of Croatoan remained kneeling and praying. What are you doing? Why are you leaving the angel alone? He was about to shout those words… when he felt something was strange and turned forward again.
And then, that person…
“Ah, ahh…?”
That person…
Was rising from death.