‘I’m sorry for this,’ said Creesjie, sitting heavily on the chair and putting her head in her hands.
‘It’s hardly your fault,’ said Sara, confused.
‘The leper was searching for me, Sara. Don’t you see. Old Tom must have sent it.’
Three heavy knocks shuddered the doorframe.
She didn’t need to turn around to know it was Arent. Only his hands could be mistaken for battering rams.
‘Anything?’ asked Sara.
‘No sign,’ he said, still standing in the corridor, shy of entering. ‘I’ve been up and down the weather decks.’
‘Weather decks?’
‘Those the sky can get at. The leper wouldn’t have had time to get by me into the guts of the ship.’ He held out a dagger in its sheath to her. ‘If it appears again, stab it in the face with this.’
Sara took the present gratefully, weighing it in her hand.
‘I swear to you, I saw it,’ she said.
‘That’s why you’re holding my dagger.’
‘It was him: it was Bosey. I know it.’
Arent nodded.
‘We watched him die,’ she said, letting her fear out for the first time. ‘How is that possible?’
Arent shrugged. ‘Sammy once solved a case where a mason’s dead wife asked him to build her a church,’ he said. ‘He investigated a case where two brothers dropped dead of broken hearts at exactly the same time, despite having not spoken to each other for six years. He isn’t called unless the problem is impossible. Luckily for us, he’s on this ship.’
‘He’s a prisoner, Arent. What is he going to do?’
‘He’s going to save us.’
Belief lit those delicate eyes. It was so fierce, it burnt away the arguments brewing within her. Sara had seen the same thing in predikants and mystics, usually before they went marching into harm’s way with only the Lord’s love for a shield.
Arent Hayes was a zealot.
His religion was Samuel Pipps.
20
‘Nerves,’ grumbled a footsore Arent as he crossed the waist, carrying a sack over his shoulder. Van Schooten had given Sara’s tale short shrift, but he hadn’t seen her kneeling by Bosey’s burnt body on the docks. He hadn’t heard her voice when she’d asked Arent to give the leper mercy.
Sara Wessel had seen a man’s flesh melted and it hadn’t made her hysterical. It hadn’t clouded her reason. She’d remained calm and clear-eyed, full of sorrow and compassion.
No, Sara wasn’t one for nerves.
Arent stared at his scar, wondering why he hadn’t told her about his connection to Old Tom. Much as he’d wanted to, the words had refused to pass his lips. Sammy always said to hold on to what you knew until you understood what it meant. It was a fig leaf for Arent’s pride, but he accepted it gratefully.
The bell was ringing for midnight watch, hatches clattering open as sailors came grumbling on to the deck, bleary-eyed and bad-tempered from their bunks. Finding Arent abroad after dark, they glared and cursed under their breath, but they weren’t any more inclined to interrupt him than they had been this afternoon.
Finally he arrived at the compartment under the forecastle, where the crew took their recreation. From inside, he heard a young voice whimpering for mercy.
‘I never, I swear I didn’t, it wasn’t –’
‘Go spilling ship business to strangers, will you?’ responded an angry voice. ‘How much did she pay you?’
There was a thud and a howl of pain.
Squeezing himself inside, Arent entered a room that was low-ceilinged and cheerless, lit by a swaying lantern belching out more smoke than light. Sailors were sitting against the walls, smoking their pipes and watching a young boy being beaten senseless by the slab of gut and shoulders that was Johannes Wyck.
The boy was on the floor, Wyck looming over him, his fists clenched, blood running off his knuckles.
‘No, Mister Wyck, I didn’t, I never –’
‘You’re a damned liar, Henri,’ said Wyck, kicking the boy in the stomach. ‘Where’ve you hid the coin? Where is it?’
This must have been the boy Sara spoke to this morning, Arent realised. She’d paid him three guilders for information on the leper’s true identity.
‘That’s enough of that,’ said Arent in a threatening rumble.
Johannes Wyck glanced over his shoulder, squinting at Arent’s presence.
‘This is ship business,’ he sneered, revealing the rotten teeth in his mouth. ‘Get yourself back where you belong.’
‘And what happens to him when I do?’ said Arent, nodding at the boy.
Wyck reached into his boot, withdrawing a small, rusty dagger. ‘Whatever I damn well please.’
Arent showed no reaction. ‘Is that the same dagger you used to cut out Bosey’s tongue?’
That gave Wyck pause, but only briefly. ‘It is at that,’ he said, pressing his fingertip against the blade. ‘Not the sharpest thing, so I had to saw rather than slice. Took a bit of sweat, but it was a nice enough job in the end.’
‘Was that ship business, as well?’
Wyck spread his arms wide, indicating the breadth of his kingdom. ‘Everything I do is ship business, isn’t it, lads?’ The crew murmured their agreement. Some grudgingly. Others with more enthusiasm. Evidently, ship’s business wasn’t always popular.
Wyck leered at him. ‘And I’ll tell you what else is ship’s business. The disappearance of a passenger who wanders past the mainmast and is cut to ribbons by the crew.’
Steps approached from behind, half a dozen sailors slinking out of the dark, faces full of murder. ‘Nothing but misfortune on a ship like this,’ said Wyck.
Arent stared at him, meeting his one good eye. It seemed to glitter with the remembrance of every dreadful thing it had witnessed.
‘What does Laxagarr mean?’ asked Arent. ‘I heard it was Nornish. They say you speak the language.’
‘Run along now, soldier,’ said Wyck.
‘Not without the boy.’
Wyck squatted next to the stricken lad, driving his dagger into the floorboards beside his head. ‘Did you hear that, young Henri? This nice soldier’s fretting over you; fears for you in nasty Mr Wyck’s company. What do you say to that?’
Wyck’s eye lingered on Arent, as Henri lifted his beaten head from the floor.
‘Cark off, soldier,’ gasped Henri, through bloody teeth. ‘Better dead than …’ He swallowed painfully, ‘… be helped … by you.’
Exhausted, his head thudded back on to the floorboards.
Wyck tapped boy’s cheek. ‘You’re not welcome here, soldier,’ he said in a low, dangerous voice. ‘And this is the only warning you’ll get.’
‘No,’ said Arent in a flat voice. ‘This is the only warning you’ll get. I’ve business at this end of the ship, which means I’ll be passing through this time every night. If any of you bastards makes me lose a single step, I’ll slit your throat and throw you overboard.’
Something savage showed itself in his eyes, and the sailors took a half step back. But, as quickly as it had come, it was gone. Arent lifted the hatch and started down the ladder into the sailmaker’s cabin.
The sailmaker himself was snoring in his hammock, and he didn’t stir as Arent lifted the second hatch, descending into the compartment housing Sammy’s cell. The ladder was as awkward to navigate as it had been that morning, but eventually he managed to wriggle himself down.
As promised, Drecht had stationed a musketeer in the room. To Arent’s surprise, it was Thyman, the one Sammy had accused of cheating his friend that morning. Eggert was guarding the passengers and Thyman was guarding Sammy. Evidently, Drecht wanted the bickering pair as far apart as possible.
Thyman leapt up as Arent entered, but quickly settled back down when he saw who it was.