The Devil and the Dark Water

46

Captain Crauwels stared out of one of the great cabin’s windows, his hands clasped behind his back, his fingers dancing in impatience. It was mid-morning, but the Saardam, along with the rest of the fleet, remained at anchor.

The sea was growing rougher by the minute. Rain was tapping the glass, as lightning danced malevolently on the horizon. They couldn’t be at anchor when it fell on them, they’d be torn apart before they could get the sails up.

By rights, they should already had been trying to outrun it, but Van Schooten was adamant they were returning to Batavia. For that they needed the governor general’s wave, but he’d evidently decided to sleep in. The situation was so unusual that Chamberlain Vos had poked his head into his bedchamber a few times to make sure there was breath in him still.

The other captains had reacted with predictable fury to the order. Aside from sighting the Eighth Lantern, the rest of the fleet hadn’t reported any strange occurrences since departing Batavia, and they were eager to be on their way. They earned what they delivered to Amsterdam and if they returned to Batavia, the cargo would spoil.

From behind him, Crauwels heard Vos cross the great cabin to knock on the governor general’s door, but it opened before he got there. Jan Haan emerged, blinking, into the light. He looked awful. Only four of the six leather buckles had been fastened on his breastplate, which hung crookedly over a shirt that hadn’t been tucked in. His bows were uneven, his hose rode up and sleep sat in the corners of his red eyes.

‘My lord.’

‘Governor General …’

‘Sir, we need to –’

Holding up a hand, he pointed to Vos groggily.

‘Summarise,’ he demanded in a voice that still hadn’t risen from bed.

‘Captain Crauwels and Chief Merchant van Schooten wish to return the ship to Batavia, my lord.’

‘No,’ said the governor general, yawning. ‘Have some breakfast sent up, Vos.’

Vos bowed and left the room.

‘My lord,’ interjected Van Schooten. ‘Last night the Eighth Lantern appeared again. When we tried to put a yawl in the water as you ordered, it slaughtered all our livestock.’

He spoke quickly, but clearly. He was sober for once, realised Crauwels. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Van Schooten without a jug in his hand. Must have been about a week before they departed, when Guard Captain Drecht came aboard to do his inspection. Van Schooten was normally a lively sort of soul. Irritating, but often charming. He wondered what had happened to sour his disposition so.

The governor general dropped into a chair, rubbing the bald patch on the top of his head. He was still half asleep. ‘How were the livestock killed?’ he asked.

‘The leper, sir,’ said Crauwels. ‘It slit their bellies open. Lieutenant Hayes found an altar it had built in the cargo hold yesterday. It’s already recruiting followers among the crew.’

‘And how does returning to Batavia help us battle it?’

‘We need to empty the ship,’ said Crauwels. ‘Search every part of –’

‘If we do as you suggest, our cargo will spoil and this entire voyage will have been for naught,’ interjected the governor general. ‘I return to Amsterdam to join the Gentlemen 17, and I will do so in triumph. Not with an empty hold and a surplus of excuses.’

‘Surely, sir, there are times when –’

‘A few dead chickens and you’re ready to fly back to the nest?’ interrupted the governor general contemptuously. ‘From our past exploits together, I would not have believed you so poor-hearted, Captain Crauwels.’

Crauwels bridled, but the governor general tapped the table with his fingernail, ignoring him.

‘If there is a demon stalking this ship, Arent will find it.’

The ship lurched beneath their feet, knocking the governor general out of his chair and sending Crauwels and Van Schooten banging into the table. No sooner had they picked themselves up, then it happened again, but Crauwels was already stumbling towards the windows.

The ocean was choppy and white-tipped. The sky was roiling.

‘What’s happening?’ demanded the governor general angrily, as if his authority was being disrespected.

‘It’s the storm I’ve been warning you about,’ growled Crauwels. ‘It’s bearing down fast.’

‘Then I suggest you raise sails and point us in the opposite direction, Captain,’ he said.

Seeing the argument was lost, Crauwels strode out into the helm, snuffing out the candle in the alcove with his thumb and finger.

‘Douse every light,’ he commanded, as Isaack Larme barrelled through from the opposite direction. ‘Last thing we want is a fire needs fighting while we’re trying to keep the ship afloat.’

‘What’s your order, Captain?’

‘Full sail. We’re going to try and outrun the storm.’

The tempest stalked them like a wolf.

All day long, the Saardam tacked and jibbed, before hoisting full sail to career recklessly forward. So erratic was their course Isaack Larme compared their route to a tangle of string carelessly thrown down on a chart. But no matter their efforts, the storm was always at their back, its black mouth agape, lightning crackling.

The seas were rough and the weather foul, and even the sailors struggled to keep their footing. The nobles were ordered into their cabins and told to remain there until they were safely beyond the bad weather. The passengers on the orlop deck were banned from coming on deck, for fear the sea would drag them over the side.

One day became another, and another, and another. Crauwels was skilled enough to keep them just out of the storm’s jaws, but he couldn’t put it distant.

For two weeks, the tempest chased them with such an unerring fury that the crew began to see malice in it. Exhausted after their exertions, they would slump against the rigging at change of watch, fingering their charms, hoping this was the day they lost sight of the storm, as they’d lost sight of another ship in the fleet.

Their trepidation was felt in every corner of the Saardam. In the orlop deck, deadlights blinding the portholes, the passengers pressed themselves together and murmured prayers, while the nobles fretted in their cabins, their chests tight with worry.

On the quarterdeck, Captain Crauwels hurled curses into the wind, his anger growing in proportion to his fear. No matter how reckless the seafaring, no matter how brave the course taken, their pursuer was always at the same distance.

It was as if the storm had their scent, he raged.

The old sailors recognised it as something called down upon them. A curse that wouldn’t be satisfied until the whisper had its pound of flesh. No wonder Sander Kers had been taken, they claimed. They had no love of holy men, but it couldn’t be a coincidence that he’d vanished moments before the storm hit. Arent Hayes had searched for him for three days, even as the unsteady ship knocked him over and hurled him into walls.

He could find no sign. Kers had disappeared as surely as if he’d never boarded.

The sailors thought the whisper had offered somebody a fortune to hack the predikant into pieces and give him to the ocean. Almost everybody had heard its jagged voice by now, offering its bargains in the night. Their heart’s desire for a favour, it had promised. They were simple things for some. More dangerous for others. There seemed no pattern to what was asked, and what was offered.

When they spoke of their offers in the morning, a few gripped tight their charms, warding off evil, but others went thoughtful, their eyes full of dreams. Why not? they wondered under their breath. What cost could be greater than what this life already asked of them? From their duty stations, they stared at the aft of the ship, to the cabins where the nobles slept. What had they done to earn such plenty? They didn’t know how to stitch a sail or tack the ship. They were rich because their families were rich. Their children would be rich because they were rich. On and on in an endless loop.

By contrast, they were poor because they’d always been poor. They had nothing to look forward to and nothing to pass along. Wealth was a key and poverty was a prison, and they’d been born shackled through no fault of their own.

It was senseless and unfair, and mankind could withstand almost anything except unfairness.

Back and forth, they complained, stoking each other’s ire.

If this was God’s plan, then maybe Old Tom was worth listening to, because it couldn’t ask a greater sum for less reward than this. Besides, they might not have a choice.

It had called the Eighth Lantern to torment them, and now this storm was roaring at their backs. Even if they could outrun it, a leper roamed the cargo hold endlessly, scratching his mark into the crates. They’d caught glimpses of it. Tattered robes and bloody bandages. A solitary candle that would lead sailors through the labyrinth to an altar at the heart of the ship. No matter how many times the captain ordered it destroyed, the leper would rebuild it.

It was Bosey, they said. Others spat at that. Bosey was dead. They’d seen him on the docks. Watched him catch flame and be run through by Arent Hayes. But didn’t he drag his leg and smell of the privy? Didn’t he have business with this ship after what they’d done to him? After what Johannes Wyck had done to him?

Bosey or not, everybody was agreed that bad fortune followed in its wake. A cabin boy, an apprentice sailmaker and a hornblower had already died in the dark. The cabin boy tumbled off a ladder and snapped his neck. The sailmaker and hornblower died bloody. Slashed to pieces by each other’s daggers. Their hate had simmered for a while but it was all coming out now.

Sailors who spent too long in the cargo hold came back different, they claimed. Distant, somehow. Odd.

Course, some had boarded like that. Not that it mattered. Rumour twisted tight around them, all the same. It said they’d knelt at the altar and spoke their devotions.

Nobody would go near them.

Something was stirring in the dark water, the old sailors claimed. Something that called itself Old Tom.