Serpent (with Paul Kemprecos) by Clive Cussler

Author:Clive Cussler [Cussler, Clive]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Thriller
ISBN: 9780743423076
Publisher: Unknown
Published: 1999-01-14T16:00:00+00:00

May 25, 1506

Took fix on north star; maintaining southwest direction . . . . .

May 30, 1506

Stayed on course SW , as calculated by quadrant . . . .

It was almost as if Columbus wanted to be precise because he knew his exact destination. Not as on his first trip, when he thought from earlier charts that he would run into the huge land mass of China or India, and a few degrees of latitude either way wouldn't make a difference.

More evidence that Columbus was apparently following a predetermined course was his frequent reference to the ship's torleta.

I steered to the WSW more or less, steering first one way and then the other, for the winds are contrary, but still making sixty six miles and sailing according to the torleta of the ancients.

Perlmutter put the document aside and, with unerring accuracy, navigating by his own kind of dead reckoning, made his way to a wall shelf crammed with books and plucked out a volume on medieval navigation. He knew that torleta referred to torleta del marteloio, “the table of the bell,” the plotting board used to mark each day's position. The bell was rung as the hourglass was turned. The torleta went back to the thirteenth century and was actually an analog computer used to solve trigonomic problems. It was made in the form of a grid and kept by the pilot, who drew a line between the start and the end of each day's travel. The pilot factored in his observations of wind and current and leeway and basically took an educated guess.

Perlmutter puzzled over the expression “torleta of the ancients.” Maybe it was a loose translation, meaning that the plotting board was an old one, which would fit if it were the original on the Nina.

He went on with his reading. Columbus had made a smooth Atlantic crossing. By June 26, he was south of Hispanola, one day to become the countries of Haiti and the Dominican Republic with its capital at the settlement of Santo Domingo, which Columbus founded. Perlmutter again saw the problem Ortega had with the document. Columbus was supposedly cruising the Caribbean at a time he had been dead for more than a month. Perlmutter grinned with pleasure. He wasn't going to let a small technicality spoil his enjoyment of this wonderful yarn just as things were getting interesting.

He unrolled a map of the Caribbean next to the letter to trace the ship's course. The Nina threaded Hispanola and Cuba and sailed toward Jamaica, where Columbus had been stranded with his crew on his previous voyage. The log jumped back to a description of that unhappy time.

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