The Golden Flask

Chapter Eight

While Jake rushes through the rough land of southern Orange County into the hills and barrens of northern Jersey, we will rejoin his friend and late companion, Claus van Clynne, who has been amusing himself by trying to escape the villainous white Indian, Egans.

Kneeling as his canoe flowed from the riverbank, van Clynne picked up a paddle and attempted to accelerate his progress downstream. The Dutchman had lost his weapons and purses, but not his considerable store of passes and pin money, and thus was able to comfort himself with the knowledge that, if he could merely overcome this tiresome interlude, he might yet complete his voyage to General Washington successfully — assuming, of course, he could discover where the general was.

These optimistic thoughts were not the only goad to his progress. Egans followed behind him on the shore, sending bullets so close that his hatless hair fluttered with the passing breeze.

The Oneida was one of those men who learns greatly from his mistakes. When he reloaded and fired again, he was able to correct for his earlier aiming inadequacies, and was rewarded with a direct hit on van Clynne's canoe. The musket ball smashed against the hull with such ferocity that the Dutchman lost his balance and nearly fell over. The bullet sailed through the side into the floor of the canoe and thence into the depths, where it descended with an ominous hiss.

The squire was too busy holding the craft upright at first to realize the import of the noise. But he soon discovered a geyser rising in front of him and noticed at the same time a severe list developing in his vessel, the small hole magnifying steadily.

The Hudson is perhaps the mightiest of our native rivers. Before the war, it was a veritable highway of commerce, as choked with traffic as the streets of New York City or Philadelphia. Even now, no stretch of it is ever completely empty, and as van Clynne began to scream for rescue, there were three or four vessels close enough to hear his call.

Could they reach him in time, though? As his canoe swamped, the Dutchman paddled madly for the nearest craft, a single-masted gondola steered by a large tiller at the rear. Its two sails were filled with the wind, and as it tacked to head toward the floundering canoe, the squire began to feel the icy lap of the waves on his thighs. He pushed his oar violently through the water, his concentration remarkable, his progress less so. As admirable a vessel as the birch canoe may be, it was not designed to operate with a punctured hull.

Van Clynne could not swim, and as the water reached for his chest he feared that he had breathed his final breath of dry air. With heavy heart and a last burst of energy he gave his oar one last brutal push, determined to meet his maker as a brave Dutchman, fighting adversity to the last.

It will be to his credit to note that his usual habit of complaint was not suspended in the moment he interpreted as his last. Indeed, by now his cursing had reached epic proportions, so that, beginning with Egans and ending with the Englishman who had discovered the North River, not a single living being could be truthfully said to have escaped his verbal wrath. His words were not stilled until the water splashed full in his face. He dove forward fitfully, writhing in what he hoped approximated the manner of a fish.

During the Dutchman's struggle, the gondola had managed to slip against the wind, and a sudden trick of the current sent it streaking toward the floundering canoe. A sailor in the bow leaned over and caught van Clynne's coat just before the Dutchman disappeared below the waves. The weight was so great that the poor man fell in with him.

The rest of the small crew quickly hove to. Within a minute, both men had been hauled from the depths and pulled aboard. Van Clynne had temporarily lost consciousness; he was brought around by some vigorous pumping of his chest and a dose of stiff rum.

"That is the most infernal excuse for liquor I have ever tasted," coughed the Dutchman, sitting upright on the deck. He reached up and grabbed hold of a rope ladder that led to the mast above. "Please, don't attempt to poison me further. If you are trying to kill me, send me back into the river. If you want to restore my health, fetch me a good keg of ale."

"We've no ale aboard," said the man in charge of the boat, a thick-chested fellow whose words were punctuated with whistles, owing to the large gaps in his front teeth.

"Porter then, or in a pinch, lager," demanded van Clynne. "Something with body to it. Brewed by a Dutch housewife if possible, or at least a German." He looked around the deck. The gondola was typical of the smaller vessels one finds in various river ports. The deck was well scrubbed and the hull freshly painted yellow, which implied somewhat more flash than the ship actually possessed. But the broad white sheets could hold the wind handily, and the vessel was surprisingly fast and even maneuverable. So much so that it occurred to the Dutchman that this small misadventure might end in his advantage, if only he could persuade the captain to take the craft south.

The direction it was currently heading, however, was west, toward the shore he had so recently vacated.

"I believe, sirs, that I have arrived just in the nick of time," declared the Dutchman, rising to his feet. "I have a business proposition that will do us all very handsomely, indeed. Do I have the honor of addressing the captain?"

The man answered gruffly that he was in charge.

"If I might make a suggestion," said van Clynne graciously, "this shore ahead ought to be avoided for the time being. It is frequented by a dastardly Indian, or I should say a white man painted as an Indian. A renegade, a changeling, a chicken in turkey feathers. He is obviously in the pay of British thieves and villains, and endeavored to murder me here. In fact, the poor condition of my vessel related directly to his actions. He — "

Van Clynne stopped short when he saw Egans climb over the side, a nasty grin on his face and the Dutchman's crumpled beaver hat in his hand.

"You lost your hat," sneered the Oneida. "And I have come to return it."

The Dutchman, finally sensing the wind's direction, reached to the mast and grabbed one of the staves. Three sailors fell upon him as he reared back to throw it. He managed to launch it nonetheless, and despite the interference scored a direct hit on Egans's skull, laying him out.

Van Clynne flicked off one of his assailants as he grabbed for another cudgel. By now the captain had picked up his sword, a fact van Clynne only realized when he felt the sharp blade flick past his face. He fell against the heavy wood of the mast, his weight sending another of the sailors to the deck.

"You will surrender this vessel to me, sir," declared van Clynne, "or I will be forced to vanquish your entire crew."

"Brave words, traitor," said the captain, showing off the gaps in his teeth. "You will not repeat them once I cut out your tongue."

Van Clynne just managed to avoid the slash. He slid well below a second, but the third came remarkably close to his chest.

This was partly by design, however. He had placed himself near the mast, and the swordsman yelped with the vibration as his sharp, heavily weighted sword crashed into the wood. A quick roundhouse blow took care of the captain's chin, and he was next seen sleeping like a baby on the deck, basking in the warm glow of the midday sun.

But van Clynne still had half a dozen men to contend with. Two of these grabbed his legs and were unlikely to let go, despite his best efforts to bruise their arms and fingers. A sailor climbed against the sheet and sprang down at him. The Dutchman felt his knees give way and got his arms up just in time to prevent more than a glancing blow to the nose as he crashed face-first against the deck and an anchor chain. The same chain was quickly wound around his legs, but the redoubtable van Clynne did not admit defeat until Egans's voice, still slightly dazed, ordered the others to leave off hitting his prisoner.

"Anyone who fights this hard will fetch a stiff price below, I warrant," said Egans, pointing his musket at van Clynne. "Surrender, sir, or I'll test the theory that you're worth as much dead as alive."

"Alive would increase the price, I daresay," grunted van Clynne, striking his colors.