To Die a Dry Death: The True Story of the Batavia Shipwreck (25 page)

“Ah, well,” Cornelisz said. “What is it now? July twenty-first. Captain Jacobsz should be on his way back soon. Perhaps he is already.”

Lucretia sipped and listened to the noises beyond the canvas. Still she heard splashing, people wading in the shallows and voices calling to each other, the sound carrying clearly across the water.

“
Hij heves al wel
,” somebody said. He’s had it.

The splashing ended, replaced with laughter and the sounds of revelry, men celebrating a job well done.

At last the dinner fiasco was over. Cornelisz stood and thanked his host as formally as a Lord of the Manor. Judyck was as pale as her father.

“Thank you for a pleasant evening, Coenraat,” said Cornelisz. A hand on her arm, he guided Lucretia the short distance back to their tent. A lamp glowed somewhere beyond the settlement and she caught a glimpse of figures.

“What have you done?” she asked.

“I? I have done nothing, Creesje.” Smiling, he put out an arm as if to embrace her.

She stepped back, out of his reach. “Murder. Murder happened out there. Mayken? I heard her name. And Aris. And who else? The predikant’s maid?”

A howl split the night, anguished, painful as a tortured hound.

“That was the predikant,” Lucretia said. Oh God. Oh, God in heaven, what evil has been done this night? She swayed, her heart squeezed in a gauntlet of fear and loathing. Surely not Maria?

Evading Cornelisz’s clutching hand, Lucretia darted to one side. The Stonecutter’s tent glowed with light, illuminating the shadow figures of men drinking and laughing. A cheerful fire burned. Someone played a merry tune on a flute. Voices joined in, then a fiddle. The predikant’s tent stood dark. Sobs, racking sobs, emanated from it.

Cornelisz appeared beside her. “Come, Creesje. There’s nothing to see.”

She whirled. “They’re all dead, aren’t they?”

“Then they are with God,” he answered, leading her inside.

She drew away from him, dragging her arm from his fingers. “How many more? How many more, Jeronimus?”

He stared down at her, his eyes hooded. “They like to kill. How can I stop them? These were no orders from me. I merely ensure that the people here obey our laws.”

“And Maria? Willemientje? Roelant? What have they stolen? How have they disobeyed your law?”

He sighed. “You must understand. I do God’s will. God acts through me and I have no choice. Therefore, God must have wanted to take them to him.”

“You are not God, Jeronimus.”

She’d gone too far. A spark of anger glowed.

“Go to your bed,” he snapped. “But be warned, madam. I grow tired of this.”

25

Cornelisz lay on his back, jaw loose, whiffling through his moustache. He’d gone off to roister with the others and returned, stumbling and weaving, late in the night. Lucretia had feared he’d forget himself in his drunken state and force himself upon her but he’d fallen onto his mattress and was asleep in moments. With luck, his band of followers would be in the same state. As she laced her bodice Lucretia thought about the first man to die. Some soldier—she’d forgotten his name—executed for stealing wine. It seemed so long ago. And so trivial to what happened last night. Pray God her fears were groundless. But in her heart she knew that was not to be.

She made her way through the silent settlement, hurrying past the stonecutter’s tent. Snores emanated from within and the remains of a fire still burned outside, sending a wavering column of smoke into a sky as blue and clear as a summer’s day in Holland. For once, even the breeze was still.

The rest of the settlement was silent. No one moved. No one was about. An icy trickle ran down her spine. Maybe it was even worse than she thought.

Two bodies lay on the ground outside the predikant’s tent.

Lucretia’s heart froze in her chest. She crept forward, dreading yet compelled. Judyck and her father, lying beside a spent fire. She knelt beside the girl and put out a tentative hand. No sign of injury, no slash across the throat, nor a strangling cord.

Judyck eyes snapped open.

Lucretia stumbled backwards as the girl sat up.

“Lucretia,” whispered Judyck.

“Are you… are you all right?”

Tears trickled from eyes red with too many tears already. “They’re all gone. All of them. Mother, Roelant, Agnete… they killed the maid, too. When we got back, they were dragging mother away. Dragging her by the arms like some dead beast.”

“Where?”

Judyck wrapped her arms around herself and began to rock. Backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards. “They dug a pit. In the middle of the island. I went with father and watched them cover it over. Father fell on his knees, crying and sobbing. They… they laughed. Said he shouldn’t, that they were gone to God and wasn’t that a good thing?”

Bastiaensz rolled over in his sleep, moaning. “No,” he muttered, “no, no.”

Judyck laid a hand on his arm and shook. “Father?”

He jerked awake, glassy-eyed. He looked empty, drained of all life, all happiness. “Hell,” he said. “The Devil has unleashed his demons upon this land. Nothing can save us but God and his angels.”

“We couldn’t sleep inside,” said Judyck. “The tent is full of blood. On the walls, the ground. See there?” She pointed.

Brown stains had soaked into the coral, spattered the ground and a double groove marked the path of a body being taken away, heels dragging through the dirt.

“I close my eyes and I see Roelant and Agnete, Mien, Mother…” Judyck sobbed again.

Lucretia put an arm around the girl. Bastiaensz sat lost in his own thoughts, staring into a space that no one else shared. She didn’t think Judyck would find much consolation from her father.

A red-coated soldier wandered past, scratching his belly. He grinned as he approached, clearly about to say something. Lucretia stood and caught his eye. He faltered and dragged his cap off. “Lady.”

She nodded, aloof and regal. And knew that without Jeronimus, she was as much a target as anyone else.

*

“A boat, Wiebbe. The lookouts have seen a boat on its way,” said Allert Jansz. “I thought I’d better tell you. It could be some sort of trick.”

Hayes stood. No one had ever crossed over in a boat before. It had always been rafts or driftwood. “Where is it headed?”

“The High Island. It looks like just one person but it’s hard to tell in the dark.”

“Come with me,” Hayes said, a hand on Jansz’s arm. “We’ll meet it there.”

They pushed out one of the rafts they kept at the shore to make the crossing between the islands. Hayes, still uncomfortable despite the shallow water, crouched in the middle while Jansz poled the vessel across the reef flats to the High Island. From there they hurried, running with practised ease along familiar tracks to where the lookouts lay on top of the hill.

Eyes straining in the darkness before the dawn, Hayes watched the little yawl’s erratic approach. At last it drifted into the shallows. A man staggered out and waded towards the shore, hand on the boat’s gunwale.

“He doesn’t look too well,” Jansz said.

“No,” said Hayes. “Come on. He looks like he may need some help.”

The new arrival stumbled forward as they came down the hill, and fell to his knees on the ground, tears in his eyes. “Thank the good Lord.”

Hayes helped the man to his feet. Cold and damp though he was, the shivers that racked him were more than physical. His shoulder sported an oozing sword cut, shallow and bruised, as if made with a blunt weapon. “They tried to kill you?”

The fellow nodded, throat muscles working. “I’m Aris, Aris Jansz. The madness has taken them. The Devil walks on that island. God was with me. I hid in the shallow water and they couldn’t find me in the dark.”

“Here, sit. You’re safe now.”

Jansz handed Aris a jug of water. He gulped a few mouthfuls then stopped. “You have enough?” He gestured with the half-empty pot.

“Plenty. Drink. Then tell us.”

They sat while Aris drank the rest of the water.

“Murder,” he said at last, wiping his mouth with a sleeve. “Murder in the night. We all live in fear. They come with their weapons and their lanterns and people vanish. Any night they might come. Last night I heard sounds. So many sounds. Screams, shouts from the predikant’s tent. They called Mayken Cardoes out and… and. And then Allert Janssen came to me and said the Merchant wanted us to catch birds. It was dark. I knew it couldn’t be. But I had to go with him. He swung a sword at me.” He pointed at his shoulder. “And then another man came out and swung at me. I ran and hid in the water until they went away, off to join the party. They laughed and drank for what seemed like hours as if the Devil and his demons had possessed them all.” He licked his lips. “I took a chance and stole one of their boats,” he gestured at the yawl, now drifting at anchor, “and made off as fast as I could.”

“Come, Aris, we’ll help you to our camp on the other island. You look like you could use some food, too. Would you like some roast meat?” Hayes slipped an arm around the man’s bony body and helped him up.

“Meat?” Aris said, eyes round.

“Meat.”

Hayes and Jansz each took an oar and rowed the boat back to their island. Aris was left to the care of one of Jansz’s team.

“I think they must all be mad,” said Jansz. “Pregnant women, little children. It’s all one to them.”

“So it seems. They kill as foxes do. For sport,” said Hayes. “But did you see? The sword they used was blunt. They are over-confident.”

“Yes. And now we have a boat,” said Jansz.

“They won’t like that,” Hayes said. “It will be our turn before too long.”

26

He was gone. Lucretia heard Cornelisz’s footsteps receding, out of the tent and away amid a murmur of voices. She’d pretended to be asleep and he’d left her alone. Now she rose and put on her dress. Not that he’d ever tried to force himself upon her.

The breeze had picked up and white clouds hurried across the sky to the north-east. A few rafts drifted on the reef flats, their occupants fishing. The predikant sat hunched on the beach, his back to her, black hat as ever on his head. The poor man. She despised his weakness, yet how he must suffer. His whole family—except Judyck—slaughtered like so many sheep. But at least Judyck was safe with van Huyssen to protect her. If she continued to please him.

She also had little to fear for herself. Cornelisz kept her well enough but still he strove to seduce her. The words of the sonnet he’d written drifted through her mind.
Flee not from me nor from me turn away For ardently I do for you so long;
She marvelled that even now, in spite of everything, he thought she would come to him willingly. And congratulated herself on being able to continue the pretence, whatever revulsion she might feel. Her safety, after all, depended on him believing that in time, she would succumb to his blandishments.

Yet fear stalked the tiny island. Cornelisz’s followers in their absurd red coats strutted around, hands on sword hilts, parading like young blades in the streets of Amsterdam. Absurd they might look, with their ragged breeches and dirty shirts draped with fine red laken but the merest look, the merest hint was enough to provoke violence or death. That they enjoyed killing was obvious. Surely none could argue any longer that more had to die so that the few could survive. They murdered for fun.

A voice rose, high-pitched, jubilant, cheerful. “Who wants to be stabbed to death? I can do that very beautifully.”

Jan Pelgrom, former cabin boy on the
Batavia
, now servant to Cornelisz. His coat flicking around his hips, he brandished his sword as he swaggered between the tents. Such a stupid boy. And yet with power enough to point out a person for death. She gazed north. Far away lay Batavia. Would the longboat have reached the city? Was a ship, even now, on the way back? She had to hope so. Hope was all that was left.

Red on the shoreline drew her eye. Cornelisz, distinctive in his ostrich feathered hat, and flanked, as always, by his armed guard, stood with Davidt Zevanck. They gazed north, too. But not, she thought, to Batavia. A column of smoke rose from the High Island. Perhaps hope lay there, as well.

*

“It must have been Aris. We saw blood stains next to the drag marks where the boat was pulled into the water. Janssen and Cornelis admitted they hadn’t killed him.” Zevanck’s voice dripped disapproval.

“So now they have a boat, as well as rafts,” said Cornelisz. Which meant he could no longer ignore them. He wondered how many men were over there, now. With the escapees from Seals’ there must be at least thirty.

“We should attack,” said Zevanck, staring across the water. “Let me take some men in both boats. It’ll be like Seals’ Island all over again.”

“No, not like Seals’. They are soldiers,” said Cornelisz.

“But we have the muskets and the swords. They have no weapons—thanks to you.”

Always violence with Zevanck. He certainly had an appetite for it. Which was useful, provided it was controlled. “Not yet. First we try to reduce the odds. As we did when we took control of the council. We try persuasion.”

“Persuasion? You can’t be serious.”

“We play on the divisions. There are more than just soldiers on the island now and we know the soldiers hate the sailors. The French soldiers, in particular, will feel no obligation to the Company. I have written a letter, in French, explaining that the sailors plan to betray them, take the boat and sail for the South Land.”

“How are you going to get a letter to them?” asked Zevanck.

They had no imagination, these men, thought Cornelisz. “They’re accepting new people who escape from us. We send them a new escapee. I thought Daniel would be suitable.”

He waited while Zevanck processed the plan. “So he wins their confidence and takes the letter to the Frenchies?”

“That’s right. They start a fight on the island, Daniel sends us a smoke signal and we go over to help.”

Zevanck shrugged. “I suppose it’s worth trying.” He chewed at his lip. “Will they believe it, though? The Frenchies?”

“Why would they not, Davidt? They are mercenaries. They fight for money,” said Cornelisz. He had written the letter himself, using all his powers of persuasion. How could they not agree? “Come, I’ll give you the letter.”