He gagged. The stink of the beakhead wrapping around him.
Something slashed his hand, the pain causing him to drop the saw, as the leper’s bloody bandages appeared in front of him.
It raised its dagger to his face.
66
Screams below and panic above.
Creesjie stopped at the entrance to the great cabin, the hairs standing up on her arms. The burning red light of the Eighth Lantern was spilling through the windows, casting everything in a hellish shade.
‘Old Tom,’ she muttered.
Part of her wanted to run back upstairs and clutch her sleeping boys, but, even as she considered it, a small glow flared in the darkness. It floated towards her, like a spark come loose from a lantern.
Her heart thudded.
‘Reckon you should return to your cabin.’ Guard Captain Drecht emerged into the light with a glowing pipe in his mouth. ‘Something’s afoot.’
‘I must see to the governor general,’ she said. ‘He commands it.’
Drecht considered this, his eyes peering at her from under the brim of his hat. There was something in them, she thought. Some different quality she struggled to name.
He gave no indication of whether he would let her pass, so she simply strode by him and opened the door to the governor general’s cabin.
It was dim inside, only the red light seeping through the door to illuminate it. That was unusual for Jan. Due to his fear of the dark, he never went to sleep without a candle burning.
‘Jan?’
In that hellish bloom, her imagination immediately made monsters of every shape. A hunched beast revealed itself to be a writing desk, the spikes on its back nothing more than bottles of wine.
Jan’s armour stand lurked in the corner, like a footpad in an alley.
A pile of bones on the shelves became scrolls piled clumsily.
Approaching the bunk, she reached out a hand, feeling cold flesh beneath her fingertips.
‘Drecht,’ she called, alarmed. ‘Hurry, something’s amiss.’
The guard captain rushed into the room and over to the governor general. It was too dark to see anything, so he took his hand. It fell limp over the side of the bunk.
‘He’s cold,’ he said. ‘Fetch a light.’
Creesjie trembled, her eyes fixated on the lifeless hand.
‘Fetch a light!’ he screamed, but she was frozen by shock. He darted out of the room and collected a candle from the table. It trembled on its tray as he returned to the cabin.
The flame confirmed what they’d feared. The governor general was long dead, a dagger plunged into his chest.
67
Captain Crauwels took the steps two at a time, running towards the panic below decks.
The Saardam was paralysed, his orders for naught. The Eighth Lantern had been near enough to board, but it had crippled them without firing a shot. Now it had sailed away, its infernal work at an end.
Arriving at the compartment under the half deck, he found the staircase into the orlop deck jammed tight with bodies, as sailors and passengers fought each other to get out.
White smoke billowed past them and up through the grates.
Those who’d escaped were on their knees coughing.
Isaack Larme was helping the crew at the other end of the ship, while Arent Hayes pulled the passengers from the crush. A sickly gleam of sweat still shone on his pallid skin, but it didn’t appear to have diminished his strength.
‘We need to get down there and put the fire out,’ cried Crauwels over the din, eyeing the passengers spilling up the staircase, like ants from a kicked-over nest.
‘Aint fire,’ yelled back Hayes, tugging another passenger free. ‘Aint no flames, aint no heat. Don’t know what it is, but only danger down there is the panic.’
Seeing a small child in the crowd, Arent reached through the press of bodies and scooped him into his arms, delivering him safely on to the deck. His mother leapt forward and clutched the boy tightly, weeping.
‘If it isn’t fire, what is it?’ demanded Crauwels.
‘Was the leper,’ coughed the constable, battling his way up the staircase.
His eyes were raw with smoke, tears running freely. He was still weak from his flogging, but he’d resumed his duties in the gunpowder store. ‘I saw it in the smoke … it killed Wyck and …’ He rushed to the railing, vomiting into the ocean.
Arent immediately began pushing past people, heading down the steps.
Seeing a path emerge, Crauwels followed him down. The smoke was already clearing, swirling tendrils snaking out of the portholes.
A few bodies lay on the ground. Some were unconscious, others groaning, clutching bloodied limbs.
‘These people need tending,’ Crauwels yelled up the stairs, as he pressed further into the chaos.
It didn’t take long to spot Johannes Wyck sprawled backwards over a slab, his face contorted into the last expression it would ever have. He’d been gutted, like the animals in the pen.
‘Heaven on fire, what is Old Tom doing to my ship?’ the captain said, his stomach turning.
He’d seen plenty of dead bodies in the course of his career, but none that had been put to the sword with such relish.
Arent was kneeling by the body, inspecting it thoroughly. He grunted in satisfaction, then got to his feet.
‘Have somebody bring Isabel down here,’ he ordered.
‘Why?’
‘Because Wyck smells of paprika.’
Crauwels couldn’t imagine a more confounding answer, but Arent obviously wasn’t in the mood to explain. He was already stalking across the deck to the far door
‘Where are you going?’ Crauwels called after him.
‘To let Sammy out of his cell. This has gone on long enough. He’s needed.’
68
Sara arrived in the great cabin to find a solitary candle had been lit in the candelabrum, its sombre flame peeking over the edge of the table. Lia was a few steps behind her, racing down from the quarterdeck above. They’d heard Creesjie screaming, but it was sobbing they followed now, straight into the governor general’s cabin.
Their eyes found the body.
He was dressed in the night-shirt Sara had left him in earlier. Only now it was sodden with blood, a wooden-handled dagger protruding from his chest.
She felt nothing. Not even jubilation. There was something pitiful about it all, she realised. In death, without that aura of power cloaking him, he was exposed as a thin, frail old man. All his wealth, all his influence, all his scheming and cruelty, they’d all been for nothing.
Suddenly, she felt very tired.
‘Are you okay, dear heart?’ Sara asked Lia, but her daughter’s face told the story well enough. It glowed with relief; with the knowledge that some terrible ordeal was finally at an end.
This was his legacy, thought Sara. Not his power. Not Batavia. Not a seat among the Gentlemen 17 he would never occupy. His legacy was a family who were glad he was dead. For that, she almost found some pity for him.
Aside from her husband’s body, everything else in the cabin was exactly as it had been. Two mugs of wine sat on the table, one empty and the other full. Between them was a jug and a flickering candle. And on the ground was a tatty flag, the Mark of Old Tom smeared across the lion emblem of the Company.
Her husband’s murder was the third unholy miracle, she realised.
Seeing her, Creesjie flew into her arms and, for a moment, they simply held each other. Neither knew what to say. Commiserations didn’t need to be offered, and there was no hurt to soothe, or tears to wipe away. Their breeding demanded a Christian reverence for the dead, while every memory of the man who’d been murdered demanded they dance and drink.