Anatomy of a heretic, p.16
Anatomy of a Heretic, page 16
I am so full of thoughts and questions, my love. I shall ask Zwaantie to bring warm wine and I shall endeavour to take comfort in sleep. Tomorrow we reach what my dining companions refer to as the “open ocean”, and I know that upon sighting the horizon I shall experience the greatest thrill, safe in the knowledge that there is now nothing between you and I, save time and the will of the tides.
With a richness of love,
Creesje
20
It’s dark on the orlop deck whatever the hour. Dark and dank and putrid. The gloom conceals a scene of truly biblical suffering. Men lie upon their mats clutching at seasick guts, puking where they lie, voiding their insides upon their bellies and thighs. Untreated wounds begin to fester; teeth begin to slop loose from swollen, bleeding gums. Sweat drips in a greasy, foul-smelling rain from the wooden ribs of the low ceiling; endless hammocks and canvas sacks dangling from iron nails studding the joists, bulging egg cases within the tangled webs of some vast spider. This is a place of waste and pestilence; the air so thick with stench it seems to cling to the skin like damp cloth.
In the darkness, muttered conversations, quiet groans, offers of favours and the collections of debt. There have been no deaths in the darkness, but the soldiers’ quarters are rife with sin. Friendships of convenience are forged in the blackness; men willing to watch one another’s possessions as they snatch rare moments of sleep; men who will offer quiet words of comfort to one another when the nightmares descend.
Nicolaes de Pelgrom clings to the hem of the creaking hammock, sweating and shivering, the heel of his hand stuffed into his mouth. He bites down, tasting old blood, new blood, fishmeal and vinegary ale. Biting at himself briefly arrests the paroxysms of sickness that have been grinding their boot-heel into his belly since the ship left Texel. He has spent much of recent days in a state of true misery, lost in fever, grief and the kind of seasickness that can make a man put a pistol ball in his own brains.
At his side, Otto, damnably cheerful, is talking to himself in the dark.
‘A fine ship, Wiebbe. A satisfactory skipper, even if he does have all the grace of a blind pig. And the women? Oh believe me when I vouchsafe that I have spied a true pearl amid the swine. So I do not begrudge the Almighty for neglecting to make me too comfortable as I while away my days and nights in a state of terminable indolence. But were I feeling impudent, I would enquire why He has robbed me of the conversation, jest and welcome geniality of my most particular friend.’
Nicolaes manages a snore. Regrets it as hot bile rushes up his throat. Growls a curse and swallows, eyes watering.
‘I know you’re listening, Wiebbe,’ persists Otto, adopting a schoolboy tone and doing his damnedest to be as irritating as possible. ‘You’ve changed your breathing. Come on, I’m doing all the heavy lifting here. I know you’re a quiet man but if you don’t at least tell me something interesting I’m going to go bunk up with the French, which will hurt me a lot more than it hurts you.’
It takes Nicolaes de Pelgrom a moment to realise that the name Wiebbe is one to which he should respond. He stares, bleary-eyed and muddle-headed, at the mound of tanned, scarred skin with whom he shares his hammock. Envies his newfound friend. Otto has a stomach for sea travel. He tucks into his mealtime rations with such gusto that he has been warned there are harsh punishments for biting through a VOC spoon. Nicolaes, meanwhile, is discovering that both he and his assumed identity share a similar aversion to the rise and sway of the ocean. He has thrown up so many times that he would not be unduly surprised to see his intestines coiling around the deck like lengths of rope.
‘What are you muttering?’ he growls, over the top of his knuckles – his hand pressed against his mouth in case he vomits up the last trickle of water that Otto eased between his lips. He tries to remember how to speak as a common soldier. ‘You dragged me from a dream, you bastard. Flaxen-haired she was, and nipples that stood up high enough to hang your hat.’
‘Lucky you,’ sighs Otto, his hands behind his head. ‘You’ve been muttering, that’s for certain. I tried to keep myself entertained by asking you questions in between your ramblings. “Tell me,” I said to thee – “which of the maidens you have bedded would you consider your true love”. Your reply involved a rooster and a pear tree. I made myself laugh for a while but then you spoiled it by puking on my chest.’
Otto is gazing up at the low roof – the very picture of a man at peace. He seems entirely comfortable in this sweat-box of filth and has already bulked up a little, having feasted on rations refused by the other sea-sickened soldiers. Otto has stripped down to his breeches but his skin is still greased with a thick sheen of sweat. There is no fresh air in this rank space. Their quarters are so close to the waterline that they are permitted neither portholes nor windows. There isn’t so much as a breath of breeze to stir the gathering stench. Nicolaes is already growing used to this fug of grimy men and filthy clothes, of raw sewage and acid puke: the mingled reeks of festering men as they squirm deeper into the ship’s hold like maggots into putrid flesh.
Nicolaes is shivering, his belly hollow, eyes sunk deep in their sockets, his body racked by tremors and great tugs of sickness. He has not stripped out of his uniform and the sodden material clings to him like a second flesh. He prefers it to the problems he would face should he elect to disrobe. Although his body carries scars, his skin does not look like the whipped, grimy flesh of the other men aboard the Batavia. He looks better fed and noticeably cleaner than his fellows. He may have wounds, but his body is that of an officer who has seen action, rather than a battle-hardened conscript.
‘It will pass,’ says Otto, rolling over and giving his friend a consolatory smile. ‘You’ve gone a kind of green colour. It’s nice. Matches the uniform.’
Nicolaes tries to make a witty reply but is overcome by another surge of nausea. He huddles in on himself, his clammy forehead pressing against Otto’s shoulder. They are stuffed together as close as lovers: two caterpillars bound in a chrysalis. Nicolaes is grateful to have found such a companion before setting sail. The soldiers of the VOC are a disparate bunch: a straggle of tough and desperate men drawn from across Europe. Nicolaes, with his ear for language, has identified accents from across the United Provinces, from Germany and France; even catching the echo of a conversation between an Englishman and a Scotsman climbing into the same hammock and promising to watch out for the other amid this rabble of “foreigners”. Here, one hundred and eighty unwashed men are crammed into less than seventy feet of deck, scattered and squeezed around sea chests, a dozen heavy guns and several miles of cable.
The air is heavy with the weight of temper and untapped violence. Nobody yet knows who to trust. Any alliances forged this early on the voyage will be sorely tested before they can even begin their five years of garrison duty in the Indies. Those who have signed up together tend to cling to one another as if sprung from the same womb, but little factions and breakaway groups are beginning to form. They are marriages of convenience. There is no shared fraternal spirit here. The soldiers remain individuals: here for their own reasons and primarily concerned for their own welfare. Otto, with his friendly smile and lust for life, is proving to be an unusually fine companion. Nicolaes, who has barely stopped vomiting since the ship left Texel, is proving far less entertaining for his bedfellow.
‘At least you’re not the only one,’ says Otto, as the repulsive sound of vomit splattering against wood provokes a chorus of disgusted outbursts from further aft.
Nicolaes recognises one of the angry voices as belonging to an ugly brute called Cornelis, a thick-set lump from Utrecht who has already left a stream of bloody noses and broken ribs among the rank and file. Nicolaes has marked him out as somebody to be wary of. He has asked him twice already where he is from, having been told that the handsome fellow with the fine features is claiming to be from Groningen – an area he knows. Nicolaes has managed to avoid speaking too much as yet: his sickness also serving to keep others away. He barely has the strength to stand, let alone defend himself if anybody were to take a dislike to him.
‘Think cheerful thoughts.’ Otto laughs and smacks his lips. ‘This isn’t forever. A few months and we’ll be under blue skies staring at coffee-coloured women who’ll stare at us as if we’re made of gold, I swear it.’
Nicolaes doesn’t reply. Wishes he could lose himself in imagining what lies ahead. In truth, he’s barely given the true reason for his voyage a second thought. To think upon the killings is to think of Buckingham, and to do so is to fill himself up with bile and the icy fire of true grief. He no longer feels as though he is wearing a costume. Here, in this grotesque place in the bowels of a great ship, he fancies that Nicolaes de Pelgrom is fast becoming a hallucination. Perhaps he has simply imagined the years of service to the English court: the assassinations and seductions and thefts on the orders of a king’s favourite. With the death of his uncle there is nobody who could vouch for him as a servant of the Crown. He is a Dutchman, aboard a Dutch ship, bound for the Indies. He has no proof he is anything other than that which he pretends to be. He takes no comfort in the thought.
‘Poor companions, you say?’ stammers Nicolaes, weakly, trying to distract himself. ‘Would you have me dance for you? Perhaps sing…’
‘Not you, you fool.’ Otto smiles, giving him a nudge and readjusting his position in the hammock. ‘No, you’ll be a proper friend once you’ve got the sickness under control. No, I mean the ill luck of getting stuck with Stonecutter.’
Nicolaes screws up his features. He’s heard the name before but much of the last three days has been a blur of cramps, chills and explosive sickness. Has Otto mentioned the name as they were boarding? Nicolaes has little memory of the chaos of loading the mighty behemoth with the provisions needed for the long voyage. He can recall the frenzied bellowing of a huge prize bull being winched into the hold; its song drowning out the frenzied squealing of a pregnant sow preparing to give birth to hungry piglets in its bed of shit and straw. He remembers taunts and jeers from the sailors as they climbed up and down the rigging with the ease of monkeys, all telling the soldiers that they had best keep away from them, from their possessions – that they should remember their place. Soldiers at sea were less use than women, or so they claimed.
Ah, women, thinks Nicolaes, wistfully. He had glimpsed an elegant neck or two; fine dresses and curves; well-fed women milling around the well-dressed merchants who in turn orbited the weak-chinned, shabbily dressed predikant. Nicolaes recalls a shared smile with a brown-eyed maid. White teeth and a mischievous look about her that counselled him to keep his hand upon his coin purse. And then Otto had been dragging him down to their quarters, thrusting a bottle into his hands, kicking out at men with German accents as they fought over bunks and kit, hammocks and sleeping pads: cursing the passengers, the officers, the cadets and commandeur – all enjoying superior accommodation.
‘Stonecutter,’ remarks Nicolaes, and his head fills with a hazy recollection. ‘Lance corporal? Lashed my back?’
‘Jacop Pietersz,’ confirms Otto, in his ear. ‘Amsterdammer. Told you at the time but you were too drunk to remember. Tough as horseflesh. Made this journey twice already. Prefers the sea to the land, or so they say. This is his third term for the VOC. Can’t deal with any other life than soldiering. He’s in this for the chance to hurt people. They reckon he was let loose on some of the Spaniards after Grolle. Took them apart a piece at a time. Keeps a little cadre of thugs about him and knows how to win a fight. Got his own way of keeping order and I tell you, last thing you want is to be his favourite, if you understand my meaning. Got an eye for the raw recruit. It’s against the rules but there’s never been anybody brave enough to give him a flogging for having his way with whoever takes his fancy. There’s a young lad from Bremen already looking longingly at the sea because of what Stonecutter’s making him do.’
Nicolaes rubs his hand over his bristled face. Tongues his dry lips. Closes his eyes. Feels the world spin and sway and does his damnedest to overcome the feeling of gut-rot that climbs up his throat. ‘What about the corporal?’
‘Jacobszoon?’ Otto shrugs. ‘Nothing much to tell you save he’s shit-scared of Stonecutter. He used up his one favour with the Company when they agreed he could bring his wife on board. The skipper’s spitting teeth about the number of women we’re carrying. Corporal’s got a three-year posting at the fortress and his good lady’s going to be billeted with him. I saw her coming on board. Nice to look at though every woman will look good by the time we’ve been at sea for a few weeks.’ He grins: a curve of yellowing teeth emerging from the gloom. ‘Even the predikant’s wife.’
Nicolaes manages a smile. Raises his head and takes the cup of warm water that Otto holds out for him. Takes a couple of sips and lies back down. Otto shifts his bulk to better accommodate him. From somewhere nearby comes the sound of violence: men roaring encouragement as boots and fists meet skin and bone. Otto grins.
‘A few of the lads who were at Grolle are having a bit of a barney with those who weren’t,’ he explains. ‘If I get bored I might go and join in but it’s too bloody warm as it is. Worst of the worst – that’s what they give the soldiers, though we’re the most important cargo. Without us to support the fortress there’ll be no Dutch interests in the Indies. They can hand the whole bloody lot over to the Portuguese, the Spanish, even the bloody English next time we have a falling-out. But the merchants get the fine cabins and the good food and a chance to look at the lovely Lucretia every mealtime. Not that you’re not pretty, Wiebbe – but she and that little maid could give a fellow a prick he could hang a sail from.’
Nicolaes listens as Otto talks, providing sufficient gossip and rumour to keep the pamphleteers amused for a year. Otto, he has discovered, would make for a first-class agent of the Crown. He has a genial harmlessness about him – an air of ebullience and eagerness to please that seems to soften the hardest of hearts. People tell him things, and he is happy to share his repository of secrets with anybody willing to repay him with some intriguing tale of their own. His manner reminds Nicolaes of a noblewoman he had bedded upon Buckingham’s orders. When the deed was complete she liked nothing more than to lie in the sweat-soaked silks and tell her young lover a host of scandalous secrets regarding great men at court. All he had to do was lie back, stroke her shoulders, and let her destroy Buckingham’s enemies with every word that spilled from her mouth.
‘…Pelsaert, well – you saw him, as we boarded,’ says Otto, teasing something out of a risen red welt upon his chest. He squeezes the offending tick between finger and thumb then wipes the mess upon his breeches. ‘Red cloak and a feather in his hat. He and the skipper have already been at it. They’re sharing the Great Cabin but I doubt either of them’s sleeping with both eyes closed. Proper hatred there. Did you feel the crash when we grounded off Texel? Christ, Pelsaert behaved like the ship was on fire. Skipper refloated us in a matter of hours but that Pelsaert’s not got a head for command. Gives more of a damn about the riches in the hold than he does about the men and it’s an arrogant bastard who parades his wealth like that when everybody knows he’s made his money in illegal trade. It’s a relief he’s retired to his bunk. Sick as a dog, apparently, though I’ve heard that haughty lass with the swan neck is helping him feel better.’
Nicolaes breathes out, slowly. Feels his insides settle. Props himself up and stares into the fetid, shimmering air. He can hear the waves slapping against the hull but it is little compared to the crash and roar of the hundred men sharing this putrid, stinking space. Occasionally he hears snorts of laughter, but the conversations are abrupt and rude, littered with curses, threats and suggestions about what they would like to do if given a few moments alone with the haughty bitch berthed in the cabin next to the under-merchant.
‘Under-merchant?’ asks Nicolaes, drily. ‘Skin and bone? Scars on his face?’
‘Saw him, did you?’ asks Otto. ‘Looks like a gust of wind would knock him over, doesn’t he? Those scars – I can’t tell if they’re old or fresh but I swear they give his mood away as clear as a dog’s tail or a horse’s ears. Got his eye on that beauty, I guarantee it. He’s lusting after her same as the rest of us. I saw him, last patrol, hiding behind a coil of rope like a naughty child. Watching her like a cat watches a bird and I swear, those scars on his face turned red as fire while I stared at him. By Christ, if Pelsaert drops dead of the flux we’ll have him in charge of the ship! Seems tight with the skipper though. Had him roaring with laughter at something he whispered in his ear. Pelsaert wasn’t happy about it; you could see that. He’ll have his eyes on Lucretia too, and the skipper will want her just to piss Pelsaert off. Keeping order on this ship will be like herding cats, you mark my words.’
Nicolaes is about to ask him what he has heard about the mysterious passenger aboard the Buren, but a burst of angry chatter from further down the deck forces him to hold his tongue. A group of men jostle and shove one another: two loose semi-circles forming around a tangle of limbs doing battle on the wooden floor. Over the jeers and cheers, Nicolaes hears the ugly, high-pitched shriek of an animal in pain.
Otto turns his head, craning to see between the jostling bodies. ‘One of the posh boys has caught a rat,’ he says, bright-eyed. ‘Coenraat. You’ll know the type – from money but likes the rough and tumble of the ranks. Close with Stonecutter too. Spends more time down here than he does in the saloon with the other cadets. By the looks of things he’s come down for a little sport.’
