50

Three days later, after Bunting and Jakob had recovered from the trek back to the encampment, the group set out to sea for the return voyage north.

‘Turn back,’ shouted Bunting, ‘we must go back.’

Pobasso steered the proa back towards the shore where Bunting jumped down, waded in and ran up to dry sand.

‘I said I would bring holy sand back to Magdeburg for the Archbishop,’ he shouted, smiling, holding up a wooden container.

The return trip was less arduous than the previous journey. Apart from being overturned by a school of whales and a few days stranded on a barren island while Pobasso repaired the vessel, they returned to Lifau thin and exhausted, but no worse for wear than that.

Bunting paid Pobasso far more than had been agreed, since without him, the quest could not have been completed. Philip, Jakob, Amir and Bunting fell back into the Dominican way of life. Friar Taveira, having received word from Rome that his guest was a personal confidant of Pope Gregory, extended his hospitality for the next few months, giving the men time for recovery from their great ordeal.

In April, Captain Serrao returned in the Sao Cristovao with word from Gerard and Cornelis that all was well in Antwerp. Finally in August, with the caravel loaded with nutmeg, sandalwood and mace, the group, this time including Philip, left Timor.

A few weeks later they docked in Zanzibar, along with seafarers from many other nations. Bunting set off by himself as if searching for something or somebody. A few hours later he returned, accompanied by a Turk.

‘Amir, this is Captain Turic. He is returning to Constantinople. I have told him of you, and he is willing to take you with him if you so desire.’ Amir stared at the priest. ‘Yes, you are free to go Amir. You have served me better than any paid servant and deserve your freedom.’

Amir began to talk to Captain Turic in a language he was clearly unpractised in. However, as the conversation progressed, the boy started to smile and the speed of his words increased. ‘Master Bunting, the captain knew my father. He was also at the great battle but survived the Christian onslaught. I do not know what to say, but I want to return and look after my mother and sisters, as my father and brother instructed me to.’

‘Amir, you are now a free man. You do not need to call me Master anymore.’

Amir stepped forward and hugged the priest. Within minutes he had said goodbye to all the others, leaving Jakob in tears as he thought about his own children. ‘I will never forget you and the adventure we had together,’ were his last words as he disappeared into the melee of sailors crowding the docks.

Jakob wiped his eyes. ‘You are a good man, Heinrich.’

‘Well, Pope Gregory helped,’ replied Bunting. ‘I paid Captain Turic with his ring.’

Jakob’s face slowly transformed from tearfulness to laughter as he realised the irony of the situation. ‘You never fail to surprise me. You have given the leader of Christendom’s personal ring to an infidel to pay for the care of another infidel. I’m not sure he would appreciate your gesture.’

‘I don’t think he would be disappointed either,’ said Bunting. ‘He said it would provide safe passage when I needed it most … and so, in a way, it has.’

A few months later, Bunting and Cornelis were seated at the engraver’s table in Gerard’s establishment. Cornelis had grown in size and maturity and had taken on some of the sophistication of his new life.

‘Heinrich, please, you cannot expect me to create such a poor excuse of a map. It is an embarrassment for me. Not only have you insisted that the boot of Italy be reversed and that I should remove the Island of Madagascar, you also require me to make the landmass of Europe appear like a Pope with his full regalia.’

‘This is the way it has to be, Cornelis. I am sorry but all the effort put in by your father and me will come to nothing if the map is not completed in this manner. Remember, I will take the responsibility for it and it will be published in my book of travel and the Holy Land.’

Cornelis, resigned to his fate, stared mournfully at the engraver’s proof plate. ‘What do you want me to do with the very bottom of the undiscovered land you visited?’

‘I’m not sure what you should do,’ said Bunting. ‘I only charted this much of the coastline and we travelled back the way we came, so I am unsure what lies to the south.’

Cornelis, who was clearly out of his comfort zone, having been instructed in the De Jode rules of map accuracy by his uncle, made the only cartographical theoretical decision of his long and illustrious career. ‘In that case, I will bring the coast further south and round it to turn east, before the bottom of the page. It looks more balanced this way.’

‘Oh! And please put in some sea monsters,’ added the priest. ‘Yes, at least two.’

Cornelis stared incredulously at Bunting. ‘Heinrich, you saved my life in Antwerp. I will carry out your bidding this time. Do not ask me for another thing.’

Both men smiled now that the decision had been made.

Cornelis supplied Bunting with one hundred copies of the map, on high-quality paper. Bunting spent many evenings slowly writing details in invisible ink on them using Natron, a natural mineral, supplied by Gerard and found only in Bacs-Kiskun, in the Great Hungarian Plain.

The new Archbishop – as the old one had died – welcomed Bunting back to Magdeburg without the fanfare that may have been expected for a priest returning from a pilgrimage, after almost three years. However, he was gracious enough to accept the ‘holy sand’, which he placed in a special phial, with an inscription arranged by Bunting.

Jakob settled back into his previous life in Magdeburg, regaining his position as bookkeeper to the diocese, his replacement having succumbed to the plague a few weeks prior to his return.

Philip de Freitas, for his part, travelled extensively throughout Europe with the money the Benedictines had paid him to spy on Bunting. He ended up at the Court of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth of England, as Ambassador for his island nation. He subsequently sailed with Walter Raleigh to Virginia in 1584 and then again in 1587, before returning to Timor and establishing the first coffee plantation.

Bunting and Jakob met irregularly to reminisce about their adventure, despite the wagging tongues of the faithful, unhappy about their priest enjoying the company of a Jew. Bunting was still of the view that if Jakob converted to Christianity, his life and the life of his family, would improve immeasurably. ‘Jakob, you must know that by rejecting Christ the Redeemer, your soul is damned for eternity.’

‘Let me worry about my neshama. You have enough concerns with the new Archbishop breathing over your shoulder.’

A few years later, Jakob and his family moved to Antwerp to give the girls a better opportunity to find suitable husbands, and for Jakob and Esther to be closer to Cornelis and his children.

Bunting was dismissed from his post at the Church of St Ulrich and Levin and the Lutheran Ministry, after continuing to publish controversial articles and tracts. He moved to Hanover, where he lived comfortably off the proceeds of the much published and popular Itinerarium Sacrae Scripturae, where he died in 1606.

The two men never met again.