Batavia (51 page)

In an instant, thus, the situation has changed, and for the most part both sides recognise it immediately. Now, the victor of this day’s great battle will not be the one who possesses the High Islands, for that is no longer relevant. The winner will be the one who can get to the yacht first to either – in the case of the Defenders – warn them of the situation and get them to bring their guns to bear, or – in the case of the Mutineers – attempt to seize control of her. If the Defenders win, Loos and his men will die. If the Mutineers win, they will at last have a means of escape from these infernal climes and terrible times, and have a chance to live out their lives as floating kings of the Indies, complete with their great treasures.

On the High Islands, out on the right flank, Otto Smit looks to Wiebbe Hayes for his reaction but is amazed. For Wiebbe has already gone. Within seconds of seeing the sail, Hayes grabbed the four men closest to him and is now running along the rough track that leads along the spine of the western high island and down to the beach on the isolated northern side of the isle, undiscovered by the Mutineers. It is here that, many weeks before, Hayes secreted the precious yawl taken from the Mutineers in
a safe place secure from any nightly incursions
. In fact, if the very worst had come in the battle with the Mutineers, this boat was to be their last recourse, enabling them to slip away, likely to
het Zuidland
. A good soldier, with a sound grasp of tactics, Hayes already had an alternative plan in place if the first plan didn’t work. Now,
hallelujah
, the yawl can be used for a different purpose.

Wouter Loos’s reaction to the yacht, however, is surprising. At the mere sight of the sail, all the fight seems to go out of him. Of all people, it is Jan Pelgrom who recognises the urgency of the situation and the need for instant action. ‘Come now,’ he says to Loos, ‘won’t we now seize the
jacht
?’

‘No,’ replies Loos, slumping a little and looking wan. ‘
I have given up the idea
.’

Well, the other Mutineers have not. Led by Stonecutter, and leaving Loos behind, they do what they can to get quickly back to their own boat, though speed is a problem. While it is less than a mile away, it is a hard mile to travel, through mudflats dotted with tripping rocks and gashing coral shards.

But Stonecutter ignores all pain and all exhaustion against the need to get himself and the ten men he has taken with him into the fastest boat they have on hand and start rowing towards the yacht, as behind them all vestiges of the battle have entirely stopped.

They
must
get there first!

CHAPTER TEN

In Justice Reunited

Everything that has been done is not my fault . . .

Jeronimus Cornelisz

What a Godless life it was that has been lived here.

Francisco Pelsaert

17 September 1629, just off the High Islands

On the
Sardam
, Pelsaert is for a short time feeling as good as he has at any time in the last four months. At last, after four wretched weeks of zigzagging back and forth in the very area Jacobsz reckoned they left in early June, they have not only found the infernal isles where the
Batavia
went down but are also seeing signs of life! To their south, they suddenly see thin, improbably blue plumes of smoke seared against an impossibly blue sky. As before, for Pelsaert, this can only mean one thing: people! And if some have survived, why not all of them?

For all Pelsaert’s joy, however, he is soon flooded with a fury of frustration. This is focused on the wretched Ariaen Jacobsz, whose calculations as to the site of the shipwreck placed it no less than 30 miles to the north of where they have now actually found it! The time they wasted on the search was unbearable, and now Pelsaert is intent on not wasting a minute more of it.

After Skipper Jacob Jacobsz navigates through the dangerous shoals, constantly shouting orders to Claas Gerritsz and the sailors to sound for depth beneath the keel, they drop anchor just off the nearest island to the ship, which Pelsaert now recognises as the same island he visited three months earlier, straight before departing for the mainland. He decides to go ashore in the yawl and quickly explore this closest island for signs of life, before heading towards the promising smoke on the other island. The yawl is taken from the deck of the
Sardam
, thus, and Pelsaert and six of the crew climb aboard and head to the shore.

Row faster! From two directions, the boats of Hayes and Stonecutter race towards the yacht. Though the occupants of both boats know roughly where that yacht is situated, because they can at least see the top of her sail in the distance, peeking over the top of the eastern island, neither Pelsaert nor his men – who cannot see the boats as they start off – have any idea that they are the finishing point for this race.

They are not long in finding out, however. As soon as the
Commandeur
and his men land on the beach, they are startled to see a boat with five men in it being rowed frantically towards them from around the northern promontory of the far island. Wonderful! People
are
alive. But why are they rowing with such terrible energy, as if pursued by a shark?

Pelsaert’s crew stiffen and instinctively grip more tightly to their weapons, not knowing what to expect. The makeshift boat now lands on the beach and a man jumps out and rushes towards them.

Why . . . why . . . it is Wiebbe Hayes, the soldier, who Pelsaert remembers was so helpful on the day immediately following the shipwreck. The Hayes of that time, though, had the sallow complexion and slight frame of one who had barely seen the sun for months, as he had spent most of his time cooped up on the orlop deck. This Hayes is burned brown by this southern sun and looks as strong as a bull, even if he is dressed in a combination of rags and some kind of animal fur, while his feet seem to be bound with strips of ragged cloth to give them protection from the sharp coral.

‘Welkom, welkom!’
the soldier cries. ‘But you must return on board as quickly as you can, for there is a band of villains on the islands near the wreck of the
Batavia
.
They have a sloop
and intend to seize your vessel!’

Rough parts of the wider story now babble out of Hayes as he tries to communicate the gravity of what has happened in recent months and the urgency of the current situation.

The
Commandeur
can only just follow the thread of it, but even that thread is clearly bathed in blood, as Hayes gives scant details of what has occurred. There is staggering talk of over a hundred men, women, cabin boys and children being miserably murdered by drowning as well as by strangling, hacking and throat-cutting, and much of it on the orders of none other than the
Onderkoopman
, Jeronimus Cornelisz, who, apparently, they have captured.

Hayes also speaks of how he has become ‘
the captain of 47 people
, who, to save their lives, have taken refuge on this island’, how they have been under attack this very morning and how the whole thing now lies in the balance, depending on how quickly he can convince the
Commandeur
to take urgent action to defend themselves and the yacht.

‘Hurry . . . we must hurry!’ Hayes finishes, exhorting Pelsaert to move.

Reeling as he is from the news, and the fact that the
Onderkoopman
– the
Onderkoopman!
– appears to be involved in it, Pelsaert decides to believe him. The fact that Hayes and his men have come unarmed is as clear an indication as any that they bear the newcomers no ill will and all they want for the moment is for them to get back to their yacht and prepare for a possible attack by the villains. Pelsaert agrees to do exactly that and orders Hayes in the meantime to go back in his yawl and bring the bound Jeronimus to him on the yacht.

As it turns out, Pelsaert is only just able to get back on the yacht before, exactly as Hayes has said would happen, he and his crew on the
Sardam
suddenly see a boat fast approaching them, coming around the southerly point of the westernmost High Island. In total, there are 11 men in the boat. Sharply giving orders, Pelsaert makes sure that all those on the
Sardam
are ready for their potentially villainous visitors.

As the boat comes close, he can see they are nearly all in clothes of the finest red cloth, all of it trimmed with golden lace, that is,
Company
lace, and they have no right to it! – something that further confirms things are amiss. The men in the boats are heavily armed, with everything from swords and daggers to muskets.

As they pull alongside the yacht, Pelsaert greets them but comes straight to the point: why have they approached the yacht so heavily armed? It is Stonecutter who speaks in reply, saying that they will explain everything once they are on board and even makes to climb up onto the yacht without first being bidden.

There is an insolence in this huge, red-garbed man’s reply and subsequent action that gives Pelsaert final confirmation that everything Wiebbe Hayes has told him is true, and that the men in this boat are dangerous enemies of the Company.

At Pelsaert’s sudden signal, thus, all of those with guns on the
Sardam
instantly reveal them and train them on the boat of Mutineers. Included in those guns is nothing less than one of the ship’s cannons, packed, primed and ready to fire.

The moment of stunned silence that follows is broken by Pelsaert as he orders all the Mutineers in the boat to throw their weapons into the sea and to carefully come aboard unarmed. As all the Mutineers now discover, the only thing blacker than the blackness of the muzzle of a musket pointed straight at you is the blackness of the barrel of a cannon pointing the same – and in this case it is as black as the Devil’s very soul. Now, like Loos, all of the fight goes out of them. It is Stonecutter who breaks the impasse by slowly standing and doing exactly as Pelsaert has bidden – throwing first his sword, then his dagger and then finally his musket in the water. In short order, all the other Mutineers follow suit and then carefully, oh so carefully, climb the sides of the yacht to the deck, where, with no fewer than ten muskets trained upon them, they are clapped in irons in the ship’s hold for their trouble.

It is over.

Pelsaert ensures the prisoners are securely guarded as he begins to question the villains one by one, right there and then, to get at the truth.

It is, quite surprisingly, the Mutineer Jan Hendricxsz – wild-eyed and desperate to cooperate with the new power – who proves particularly forthcoming. He not only exposes the
Onderkoopman
, Jeronimus Cornelisz, together with the skipper Ariaen Jacobsz and the bosun Jan Evertsz in their monstrous scheme to seize the
Batavia
– to kill Pelsaert and everyone else bar those they needed to run the ship before going off pirating – but also confesses to personally murdering and assisting in the murder of 17 to 20 people. All by order of, that man again, Jeronimus Cornelisz, whom he refers to as
Kapitein-Generaal.
Pelsaert winces to hear Jeronimus so described but for the moment allows it to pass. A man who has confessed to so many murders could be fairly relied on to be telling the truth about everything else, and Hendricxsz’s outpourings have the air of a purging of what remains of his soul.

And so Hendricxsz continues and Pelsaert continues to listen, appalled, as the width and terrible depths of the whole plot become clear. All of Hendricxsz’s initial testimony points in the same direction: Jeronimus Cornelisz is the Devil incarnate. At least heartening, though, is the story of
the heroism of Wiebbe Hayes
and his men, confirmation that somehow, through it all, some goodness, decency and loyalty to the Company have prevailed.

Evening is falling on this same day as Wiebbe Hayes boards the
Sardam
with the prisoner he has held captive for the past 15 days. It is Jeronimus, bound in chains and barely recognisable in Pelsaert’s tattered red clothes, unwashed and with his hair matted with filth.

Pelsaert takes pause, and would later record his thoughts in his journal:

Click Here

Somehow, despite the lowly circumstances of Jeronimus, his eyes still burn strong, the more so the instant they light upon the
Commandeur
.

‘Jeronimus Cornelisz,’ Pelsaert begins, ‘why have you allowed the Devil to lead you so far astray from all human feelings to do that which has never been so cruelly perpetrated among Christians – yet without any noticeable hunger or thirst but solely out of cool bloodthirstiness to attain your wicked ends? How have you allowed yourself to be so denuded of all humanity, to be changed into a tiger animal, to let flow so much innocent blood, and also have had the same intention to do that with us?’