The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet (17 page)

“Why didn’t you knock down the doors?” asks Twomey.

“Iron doors an’ guards with nailed truncheons is why.” Grote sweeps head lice from his hair. “Oh, I found ways to live to tell the tale. It’s my chief hobby-hawk is the noble art of survivin’. But on the day that we was marched to the tender what’d take us out to the
Admiral de Ruyter
, roped to the others like prisoners, eh, I swore three oaths to myself. First:
never
credit a company gent who says, ‘We’ve yer interests at heart.’” He winks at Jacob. “Second: never be so poor again, come what may, that human pustules like Van Eys could buy ’n’ sell me like a slave. Third? To get my half-guilder back off of Scabby Grunt before we
reached Curaçao. My first oath I honor to this day; my second oath, well, I have grounds to hope it’ll be no pauper’s grave for Arie Grote when his time is done; and my third oath—oh, yes, I got my half-guilder back that very same night.”

Wybo Gerritszoon picks his nose and asks, “How?”

Grote shuffles the cards. “My deal, shipmates.”

FIVE JARS OF RUM
wait on the shelf. The hands are drinking more than the clerk, but Jacob feels a drunken glow in his legs.
Karnöffel
, he knows,
shall not make me a rich man tonight
. “Letters,” Ivo Oost is saying, “they taught us at the orphanage, an’ arithmetic, an’ Scripture: a powerful dose o’ Scripture, what with chapel twice daily. We was made to learn the gospels verse by verse, an’ one slip’d earn you a stroke o’ the cane. What a pastor
I
might o’ made! But then, who’d take lessons from ‘somebody’s natural son’ on the Ten Commandments?” He deals seven cards to each player. Oost turns over the top card of the remnant pack. “Diamonds is trumps.”

“I heard tell,” says Grote, playing the eight of clubs, “the company shipped some head-shrinker, black as a sweep, to pastor’s school in Leiden. The idea bein’ he’ll go home to his jungle an’ show the cannibals the light o’ the Lord an’ so render ’em more
pacific
, eh? Bibles bein’ cheaper ’n rifles an’ all.”

“Oh, but rifles make f’ better sport,” remarks Gerritszoon. “Bang bang bang.”

“What good’s a slave,” asks Grote, “what’s full o’ bullet holes?”

Baert kisses his card and plays the queen of clubs.

“She’s the only bitch on earth,” says Gerritszoon, “who’ll let yer do
that.”

“With tonight’s winnin’s,” says Baert, “I may order a gold-skinned Miss.”

“Did the orphanage in Batavia give you your name, also, Mr. Oost?”
I would never ask that question sober
, Jacob berates himself.

But Oost, on whom Grote’s rum is having a benign effect, takes no offense. “Aye, it did. ‘Oost’ is from ‘Oost-Indische Compagnie,’ who founded the orphanage, and who’d deny there’s ‘East’ in my blood? ‘Ivo’ is ’cause I was left on the steps o’ the orphanage on the twentieth o’ May, what’s the old feast day of St. Ivo. Master Drijver at the orphanage’d
be kind enough to point out, ev’ry now an’ then, how ‘Ivo’ is the male ‘Eve’ an’ a fittin’ reminder o’ the original sin o’ my birth.”

“It’s a man’s conduct that God is interested in,” avows Jacob, “not the circumstances of his birth.”

“More’s the pity it was wolfs like Drijver an’ not God who reared me.”

“Mr. de Zoet,” Twomey prompts, “your turn.”

Jacob plays the five of hearts; Twomey lays down the four.

Oost runs the corners of his cards over his Javanese lips. “I’d clamber out o’ the attic window, ’bove the jacarandas, an’ there, northward, out past the Old Fort, was a strip o’ blue … or green … or gray … an’ smell the brine ’bove the stink o’ the canals; there was the ships layin’ hard by Onrust, like livin’ things, an’ sails billowin’ … an’ ‘This ain’t my home,’ I told that buildin’, ‘an’ you ain’t my masters,’ I told the wolfs, ‘’cause you’re my home,’ I told the sea. An’ on some days I’d make believe it heard me an’ was answering, ‘Yeah, I am, an’ one o’ these days I’ll send for you.’ Now, I know it
didn’t
speak, but … you carry your cross as best you can, don’t you? So that’s how I grew up through them years, an’ when the wolfs was beatin’ me in the name of rectifyin’ my wrongs … it was the sea I’d dream of, even though I’d never yet seen its swells an’ its rollers … even tho’, aye, I’d never set my big toe on a boat all my life …” He places the five of clubs.

Baert wins the trick. “I may take
twin
gold-skinned Misses for the night.”

Gerritszoon plays the seven of diamonds, announcing, “The devil.”

“Judas
damn
you,” says Baert, losing the ten of clubs, “you damn
Ju
das.”

“So how was it,” asks Twomey, “the sea
did
call you, Ivo?”

“From our twelfth year—that is, whenever the director
decided
we was twelve—we’d be set to ‘fruitful industry.’ For girls, this was sewin’, weavin’, stirrin’ the vats in the laundry. Us boys, we was hired out to crate makers an’ coopers, to officers at the barracks to go-for, or to the docks, as stevedores. Me, I was given to a rope maker, who set me pickin’ oakum out o’ tarry old ropes. Cheaper than servants, us; cheaper than slaves. Drijver’d pocket his ‘acknowledgment,’ he’d call it, an’ with above a hundred of us at it ‘fruitful industry’ it
was
, right enough, for
him
. But what it did do was let us out o’ the orphanage walls. We weren’t guarded: where’d we run to? The jungle? I’d not known
Batavia’s streets much at all, save for the walk from the orphanage to church, so now I could wander a little, takin’ roundabout ways to work an’ back, an’ run errands for the rope maker, through the Chinamen’s bazaar an’ most of all along the wharfs, happy as a granary rat, lookin’ at the sailors from far-off lands …” Ivo Oost plays the jack of diamonds, winning the trick. “Devil beats the pope, but the knave beats the devil.”

“My rotted tooth’s hurtin’,” says Baert, “hurtin’ me frightful.”

“Artful play,” compliments Grote, losing a card of no consequence.

“One day,” Oost continues, “I was fourteen, most like—I was deliverin’ a coil o’ rope to a chandler’s an’ a snug brig was in, small an’ sweet an’ with a figurehead of a … a good woman.
Sara Maria
was the brig’s name, an’ I … I heard a voice,
like
a voice,
without
the voice, sayin’, ‘She’s the one, an’ it’s today.’”

“Well,
that’s
clear,” mutters Gerritszoon, “as a Frenchman’s shit pot.”

“You heard,” suggests Jacob, “a sort of inner prompting?”

“Whatever it was, up that gangplank I hopped, an’ waited for this big man who was doin’ the directin’ an’ yellin’ to notice me. He never did, so I summoned my courage an’ said, ‘Excuse me, sir.’ He peered close an’ barked, ‘Who let
this
ragamuffin on deck?’ I begged his pardon an’ said that I wanted to run away to sea an’ might he speak with the captain? Laughter was the last thing I expected, but laugh he did, so I begged his pardon but said I weren’t jokin’. He says, ‘What’d your ma ’n’ pa think of me for spiritin’ you away without even a by-their-leave? And why d’you suppose you’d make a sailor, with its aches an’ its pains an’ its colds an’ its hots an’ the cargo-master’s moods, ’cause anyone aboard’ll agree the man’s a very devil?’ I just says that my ma ’n’ pa’d not say nothin’, ’cause I was raised in the House of Bastardy, an’ if I could survive
that
, then, no disrespect, but I weren’t afeard o’ the sea nor any cargo-master’s mood … an’ he di’n’t mock or talk snidey like but asked, ‘So do your custodians know you’re arranging a life at sea?’ I confessed Drijver’d flay me alive. So he makes his decision an’ says, ‘My name is Daniel Snitker an’ I am cargo-master of the
Sara Maria
an’ my cabin boy died o’ ship fever.’ They was embarkin’ to Banda for nutmeg the next day, an’ he promised he’d have the captain put me on the ship’s book, but till the
Sara Maria
set sail he bade me hide in the cockpit with the other lads. I obeyed sharpish, but I’d been seen boardin’ the brig an’
right ’nuff the director sent three big bad wolfs to fetch back his ‘stolen property.’ Mr. Snitker an’ his mates pitched ’em in the harbor.”

Jacob strokes his broken nose.
I am convicting the lad’s father
.

Gerritszoon discards an impotent five of clubs.

“I b’lieve”—Baert puts nails in his purse—“the necessessessary house is callin’.”

“What yer takin’ yer winnin’s for?” asks Gerritszoon. “Don’t yer trust us?”

“I’d fry my own liver first,” says Baert, “with cream an’ onions.”

TWO JARS OF RUM
sit on the plank shelf, unlikely to survive the night.

“With the weddin’ ring in my pocket,” sniffs Piet Baert, “I … I …”

Gerritszoon spits. “Oh, quit yer blubbin’, yer pox-livered pussy!”

“
You
say that”—Baert’s face hardens—“’cause
you
’re a cesspool hog what no’un’s ever loved, but my one true love was yearnin’ to marry me, an’ I’m thinkin’,
My evil luck is gone away at long last
. All we needed was Neeltje’s father’s blessin’ an’ we’d be sailin’ down the aisle. A beer porter, her father was, in St.-Pol-sur-Mer, an’ it was there I was headed that night, but Dunkirk was a strange town an’ rain was pissin’ down an’ night was fallin’ an’ the streets led back where they’d come an’ when I stopped at a tavern to ask my way the barmaid’s knockers was two juggly piglets an’ she lights up all witchy an’ says, ‘My oh my, ain’t
you
just strayed to the wrong side o’ town, my poor
lickle
lambkin?’
I
says, ‘Please, Miss, I just want to get to St.-Pol-sur-Mer,’ so
she
says, ‘Why so hasty? Ain’t our ’stablishment to your likin’?’ an’ thrusted them piglets at me, an’
I
says, ‘Your ’stablishment is fine, Miss, but my one true love, Neeltje, is waitin’ with her father so’s I can ask for her hand in marriage an’ turn my back on the sea,’ an’ the barmaid says, ‘So you
are
a sailor?’ an’ I says, ‘I
was
, aye, but no more,’ an’
she
cries out to the whole house, ‘Who’ll not drink to Neeltje, the luckiest lass in Flanders?’ an’ she puts a tumbler o’ gin in my hand an’ says, ‘A little somethin’ to warm your bone,’ an’ promises her brother’ll walk me to St.-Pol-sur-Mer, bein’ as all sorts o’ villains stalk Dunkirk after dark. So I thinks,
Yes, for sure, my evil luck is gone away at long, long last
, an’ I raised that glass to my lips.”

“Game girl,” notes Arie Grote. “What’s that tavern named, by the by?”

“It’ll be named Smokin’ Cinders afore
I
leave Dunkirk again: that gin goes down an’ my head swims an’ the lamps are snuffed out. Bad dreams follow, then I’m wakin’, swayin’ this way an’ that way, like I’m out at sea, but I’m squashed under bodies like a grape in a wine press, and I think,
I’m dreamin’ still
, but that cold puke bungin’ up my earhole weren’t no dream, an’ I cries, ‘Dear Jesus, am I dead?’ an’ some cackly demon laughs, ‘No fishy wriggles free o’
this
hook
that
simple!’ an’ a grimmer voice says, ‘You been crimped, friend. We’re on the
Venguer du Peuple
, an’ we’re in the Channel, sailin’ west,’ an’ I says, ‘The
Venguer du
What?’ an’ then I remember Neeltje an’ shout, ‘But tonight I’m to be engaged to my one true love!’ an’ the demon says, ‘There’s just one engagement
you
’ll see here, matey, an’ that’s a naval one,’ an’ I thinks,
Sweet Jesus in heaven, Neeltje’s ring
, an’ I wriggles my arm to see if it’s in my jacket, but it ain’t. I despair. I weep. I gnash my teeth. But nothin’ helps. Mornin’ comes an’ we’re brought up on deck an’ lined along the gunwale. ’Bout a score of us southern Netherlanders there was, an’ the captain appears. Captain’s an evil Paris weasel; his first officer’s a shaggy hulkin’ bruiser, a Basque. ‘
I
am Captain Renaudin, an’
you
are my privileged volunteers. Our orders are to rendezvous,’ says he, ‘with a convoy bringin’ grain from North America an’ escort her to Republican soil. The British shall try to stop us. We shall blast them to matchwood. Any questions?” One chancer—a Swissman—pipes up, ‘Captain Renaudin: I belong to the Mennonite Church, an’ my religion forbids me to kill.’ Renaudin tells his first officer, ‘We must inconvenience this man o’ brotherly love no longer,’ an’ up the bruiser steps an’ shoves the Swissman overboard. We hear him shoutin’ for help. We hear him beggin’ for help. We hear the beggin’ stop. The captain asks, ‘Any
more
questions?’ Well, my sea legs come back fast ’nough, so when the English fleet is sighted on the first o’ June, two weeks later, I was loadin’ powder into a twenty-four-pounder. The Third Battle of Ushant, the French call what happened next, an’ the Glorious First o’ June, the English call it. Well, blastin’ lagrange shot through each other’s gunports at ten feet off may be ‘glorious’ to Sir Johnny Roast Beef, but it ain’t glorious to me. Sliced-open men writhin’ in the smoke; aye, men bigger an’ tougher ’n
you
, Gerritszoon, beggin’ for their mammies through raggy holes in their throats … an’ a tub carried up from the surgeon’s full o’ …” Baert fills his glass. “Nah, when the
Brunswick
holed us at the waterline an’ we knew we was goin’ down, the
Venguer
weren’t no ship o’ the line no
more: we was an abattoir … an abattoir …” Baert looks into his rum, then at Jacob. “What saved me that terrible day? An empty cheese barrel what floated my way is what. All night I clung to it, too cold, too dead to fear the sharks. Dawn come an’ brought a sloop flyin’ the Union Jack. Its launch hauls me aboard an’ squawks at me in that jackdaw jabber they speak—no offense, Twomey.”

The carpenter shrugs. “Irish would be
my
mother tongue, now, Mr. Baert.”

“This ancient salt translates for me. ‘The mate’s askin’ where you’re from?’ an’ says I, ‘Antwerp, sir: I got pressed by the French an’ I damn their bloods.’ The salt translates that, an’ the mate jabbers some more what the salt translates. Gist was, ’cause I weren’t a Frenchie, I weren’t a prisoner. Nearly kissed his boots in gratefulness! But then he told me if I volunteered for His Majesty’s Navy as an ordinary seaman I’d get proper pay an’ a new set o’ slops—well, almost new. But if I di’n’t volunteer, I’d be pressed anyhow, and paid salty sod-all as a landsman. To keep from despairin’, I asked where we’re bound, thinkin’ I’d find a way to slip ashore in Gravesend or Portsmouth an’ get back to Dunkirk an’ darlin’ Neeltje in a week or two … and the salt says, ‘Our next port o’ call’ll be Ascension Island, for victualin’—not that
you
’ll be settin’ foot ashore—and from there it’s on to the Bay o’ Bengal …’ an’, grown man that I am, I couldn’t keep from weepin’ …”