The Devil and the Dark Water

by Stuart Turton

  Tentative footsteps sounded on the wood, a young, nervous face appearing at the door.

  “Go fetch Wyck for me,” commanded the constable. “He’ll be in his cabin. Tell him the constable needs him, urgent business.”

  “What’s your notion?” asked Arent while they waited, but the constable shook his head, practicing what he was going to say when Wyck arrived.

  They didn’t have to wait long.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” screamed Wyck from halfway along the orlop deck, his steps thudding through the wood. “You don’t ever summon me! You don’t—­”

  Wyck stormed into the gunpowder store in a towering fury, his fists clenched and shoulders heaving. When Arent had confronted Wyck last night, the gloom had helped conceal his size, but in the light of the orlop deck, he was enormous. While not Arent’s height, he was about his width, with thick arms and legs, a bald head, and round body. He was a rockslide in piss-­stained slops.

  Taking fright, the constable leaped up from his stool and scrambled backward into the wall, holding his hands up defensively.

  Before Wyck could wring the poor man’s throat, Arent slammed the door shut behind him.

  “He didn’t summon you,” he said. “I did.”

  Wyck spun, withdrawing a dagger quicker than a wolf could bare its teeth.

  “There’s no need of that, Johannes,” implored the constable, who was still trying to put as much distance as he could between himself and the enraged boatswain.

  Arent’s eyes traveled from Wyck’s pitted face down to the dagger, then back again. “What does ‘Laxagarr’ mean?” he asked. “And why did you cut out Bosey’s tongue?”

  Wyck blinked at him, then considered the constable in confusion. “You woke me up for this?”

  “I woke you up because I’ve got an idea,” said the constable.

  “You’re wasting my time.”

  “You’re going to fight, and Arent’s going to lose.”

  Arent’s eyes narrowed in surprise. The constable finally came away from the wall, trying to soothe Wyck like he was a bull gone mad in the field.

  “Boatswain’s a position you take by force, not promotion, and I’ve heard there’s a couple of lads with an eye on your throat.” The constable licked his lips nervously. “What you need is a show of force. Lay Arent low in a fight, and everybody will fall in line, you know they will.”

  Wyck’s expression flickered. He was tempted, it was obvious.

  “This is your last voyage. You said it yourself,” pressed the constable. “You’ve got a family depending on you and not enough money to keep them.”

  “Spill more of my business and your blood will follow,” growled Wyck, but it was obvious some internal scale was tilting.

  Arent knew the effect his size had on people and had learned to spot whether somebody would be cowed, or become belligerent, as if offended by his refusal to shrink in their presence.

  Wyck’s calculating eyes were running him up and down, noticing how he had to hunch to even fit in the room, and how he was so wide, he blocked the door entirely. “In return for losing our fight, I assume you want your questions answered,” he said, scratching his ear with a grubby finger.

  Arent nodded.

  “And what else?”

  “Nothing else,” said Arent. “I’ll pay for answers in humiliation.”

  Wyck turned his glare on the constable. “And what do you get out of this, you greedy old sod?”

  “I’m going to bet against Arent,” he laughed. “I guarantee, nobody else will be doing that.”

  Wyck grunted, nodding slyly. “Ain’t no fights on this ship allowed without a grievance,” he said. “Otherwise, it’s a flogging. Give me a few hours and I’ll come up with something you can take to Larme.” He withdrew a blob of wax from his ear and flicked it away. “If either of you bastards tries to betray me, I’ll gut you.”

  Wyck stomped out of the store into the orlop deck, almost colliding with Dorothea, who was looking around frantically. Upon seeing Arent in the gunpowder store, relief washed over her face. “Lieutenant Hayes, I’ve been searching for you. My mistress has news about the leper.”

  30

  Suspended by a rope tied to the mizzenmast, Crauwels emerged onto the roof of the governor general’s cabin, foamy water rushing by beneath him. He’d been inspecting the lower half of the hull for any traces of the leper’s passing.

  “Well, Captain?” asked Sara Wessel, calling down to him from the poop deck.

  “They run all the way from the railing down to the waterline,” he hollered, sticking his fingers into the holes left by the leper’s ascent. “You were right, my lady. For any doubts I harbored last night, I apologize.”

  Sara wasn’t typically vindictive, but the memory of Reynier van Schooten’s sneer rankled her still. She spun on him. “And you, Chief Merchant? Do you still think I imagined the leper at my porthole?”

  “No,” he grunted, kicking his own ankle. He was already swaying drunk, and though his clothes were on the right body parts, that was the best that could be said for them.

  Last night, Creesjie had claimed the chief merchant was in pain. Sara wondered what was causing it. He was coming apart at the seams.

  “You accused my wife of hysteria, van Schooten,” said Haan sternly, earning a sharp glance from Sara, who remembered her husband agreeing with the chief merchant’s assessment. “And now you can’t even stand here sober. An apology is in order.”

  Van Schooten shifted miserably. “I apologize, my lady,” he mumbled.

  Ashamed of her pettiness, Sara looked toward the taffrail, where Arent was helping Crauwels over the side. The captain immediately inspected his beautiful clothes for marks and smudges, tutting at a tar blot on his shirt with profound regret.

  “Your apology is welcome, Chief Merchant,” she said. “But of greater concern is what you plan to do next.”

  “This isn’t a matter for you, Sara,” interrupted Haan, waving her away with those sharp fingernails. “I’m certain you have other duties to attend.”

  “Husband—­”

  Haan gestured to Guard Captain Drecht. “Escort my wife back to her cabin,” he commanded.

  “Come, my lady,” said Drecht, adjusting his sword.

  Frustrated, Sara reluctantly fell in step behind the guard captain. She’d only bothered calling everybody onto the deck because she wanted to watch their reaction to the handprints being discovered. Her husband had been startled, while Vos had waited quietly by the animal pens, obviously annoyed at being dragged from his work. If the handprints disturbed him, he didn’t show it. Drecht—­who had so stridently claimed not to believe in devils—­had blanched, but otherwise kept his own counsel.

  Arent had loomed over them, listening to her story the way a mountain must listen to the wind howling around it. He’d been impossible to read. He didn’t fidget; he didn’t pace. His face was as expressive as armor. She supposed that was what happened when you worked with a man who could read your every thought from a twitch of the lips.

  Drecht was moving languidly down the steps to the quarterdeck, and Sara had to fight the urge to push by him. Instead, she watched as storied ranks of his musketeers slashed at the air with their blades. It was a curious sight, like they were beating back an invisible army.

  “This is your investigation, Arent,” came Haan’s voice from behind her. “What do you recommend we do next?”

  “We should search the ship for leper’s rags,” he responded.

  “You saw the handprints,” replied Vos. “They climbed out of the water, straight up the hull to the porthole. Likely, the leper went back the same way. That’s why we didn’t catch sight of it.”

  “Maybe, but Sammy Pipps suggested we search the ship, and he’s right more often than he’s wrong.”

  At the bottom of t
he steps, Drecht opened the red door into the passenger cabins and politely gestured Sara to go ahead.

  Lifting the hem of her dress, she stepped into the gloom.

  A commotion erupted from the ranks of the musketeers, interrupting the conversation above. Two of them were fighting, the others immediately forming a whistling, jeering circle around them.

  “That’s Thyman,” snarled Drecht, already taking a step toward them. “He can’t seem to keep himself out of trouble lately. With your permission, my lady?”

  “Of course,” she said, glad to watch him rush into the fray.

  Sara slipped into her cabin and latched the door before flying to the porthole. The poop deck was directly above her, and as she’d expected, she could hear everything they were saying.

  “Captain, organize the search for the leper’s rags,” said her husband. “I want this ship shaken out like a pocket.”

  “Yes, my lord.” Footsteps carried him away. A moment later, he was hollering for Isaack Larme.

  “Do you truly believe somebody on this ship is pretending to be a dead leper?” asked van Schooten doubtfully.

  “Sammy does,” corrected Arent. “And whoever it is, they’ve put a great deal of effort into the charade.”

  “Then how can Pipps be so certain this isn’t Bosey returned?” wondered van Schooten, sounding worried. “When I was a boy, a witch visited unholy terrors upon my village. Every evening, the children gathered in the woods, singing her name. Tame animals went rabid. Milk soured and crops blighted.”

  There was a contemplative pause, then her husband’s voice rang out.

  “What’s your thinking on this matter, Vos?”

  “There are powers upon this earth Samuel Pipps is hardly the equal of, and I’ll confess, they make more sense to me than his far-­flung theory.” There was a tremor in his usually dull monotone. “Those handprints charred the wood. The leper’s fingers were strong enough to puncture the hull. Disguised or nay, that’s not a human feat.”

  Arent made a sound to object, but Vos spoke over him. “And if it’s a disguise, it’s a damn poor one,” he added. “A leper arouses terror and rage wherever it goes. Where’s the benefit of dressing like one?”

  “Those are the questions Sammy usually asks…and answers,” remarked Arent. “Whatever his crimes in Batavia, they’re of no importance now.”

  “An easy assertion for somebody who doesn’t know what they are,” replied her husband. She knew this contemplative tone. He’d have closed his eyes and would be massaging his brow, trying to coax his thoughts forward. When he spoke again, it was with the authority of somebody hearing God’s words in his ear. “I’m calling the fleet to a halt, Chief Merchant,” he ordered. “Have the captains of every ship scour their hulls for any sign of this leper’s passing, and tell them to search their vessels for these rags. They will report to me personally at eight bells. Is that understood?”

  The company murmured its assent.

  “Then you’re dismissed. Vos, abide a moment. We must speak.”

  The wind came blowing into Sara’s cabin, the breeze strong enough to urge a note from her harp. Steps thudded across the deck above, the animals making a racket in their pens. The stairs cracked, voices fading.

  Sara waited expectantly, her heart racing. She couldn’t imagine what her husband would do if he caught her eavesdropping, but the act was thrilling. There were so few ways to defy him safely, but somehow, she’d managed it twice today.

  “You did well back there,” he complimented Vos.

  “Thank you, my lord.”

  There was a pause. It drew on and on. Sara would have believed they’d left, but she could hear her husband’s long fingernails scratching the wood—­a sure sign that he was worried.

  “Do you know the problem with summoning a devil, Vos?” he said at last.

  Sara’s breath lodged in her throat.

  “I can imagine one or two, sir,” Vos responded dryly.

  “They get loose.” Her husband sighed, troubled. “Old Tom made me into the man I am”—­Sara had to cover her mouth to stifle a gasp of shock—­“and now it appears somebody else on this ship has brought it aboard. The question is who’s behind it, and what do they want?”

  “Everything is occurring exactly as it did thirty years ago, my lord. I would suggest a bargain will be offered soon. For our part, we must anticipate what it will demand, and what we’re willing to pay.”

  “I’d prefer not to pay at all. It’s been a long time since anybody forced me to do anything. Did you assemble the names I asked for?”

  “As far as I could remember them. It’s been some time since we set Old Tom loose. They’re on your desk, though…if I might be so bold…”

  “What is it, Vos?”

  “There appears, if I may say, one obvious candidate.”

  “Arent,” supplied Haan.

  “It can’t be a coincidence that the mark appeared when he returned.”

  “I understand the implications, though I struggle to see a reason.”

  “Perhaps he finally remembers what happened to him in the forest, and why the mark of Old Tom now scars his wrist. Perhaps, my lord, he knows what price you had to pay to summon your demon.”

  31

  The ship reverberated with the sound of the search for the leper’s rags. Crates were being torn open, the crew complaining as their possessions were upended. The sails were furled and the anchors dropped, yawls bobbing near the waist, the fleet captains climbing up the rope ladders. They were a sour bunch, full of complaint. Larme was making himself scarce until they were gone.

  He hacked at his carving sourly.

  He was sitting on the lion figurehead, which stuck out of the very front of the ship, his short legs swinging in the air as he whittled a piece of wood with his knife. Nobody else came up this far. They didn’t have his agility.

  Also, it stank.

  The beakhead was behind him. It was a small grated deck where the crew relieved themselves into the water below, smearing the entire prow of the ship. The smell made his eyes water, but it seemed a small price to pay to be left alone.

  He twisted his knife, trying to dislodge a stubborn shard from the block. He was in a rotten mood. He usually was, but this one had a cause. It was bad luck to tarry when the seas were fair, in case the wind got the impression they weren’t in need of it any longer. Even worse than that was the threat of pirates. They prowled these waters, and they’d make good sport of a heavily laden merchant fleet caught at anchor.

  “Lepers,” he spat, tearing the shard loose. “As if you don’t have enough troubles.” He patted the hull, the way somebody would a beloved pet.

  The Saardam wasn’t just nails and wood, no more than an ox was just muscles and sinew. She had a belly full of spice, great white wings on her back, and a huge horn pointing them home. Each day, they smoothed her coat with tar and mended her torn flesh. They put stitches in those delicate hemp wings and guided her gently through hazards she was too blind to see.

  Wasn’t a man aboard who didn’t love her. How they could not? She was their home, their livelihood, and their protector. It was more than any other bastard had ever given them.

  Larme hated the world beyond these decks. On the streets of Amsterdam, he was something to be beaten, robbed, and laughed at. He’d been kicked from pillar to post, then told to cartwheel so he’d entertain people while doing it.

  The second he’d set foot on an Indiaman, he knew he was home.

  Here was a world built to his size. Didn’t matter if he was half everybody else’s height when he knew how to tack and jibe. Aye, the crew laughed at him behind his back, but they laughed at everybody. It was what they did to keep from going mad five months into an eight-­month voyage.

  If a storm was blowing him overboard, he’d trust any of these lads to put their hand out
and catch him. If he was being kicked to death in Amsterdam, he’d trust five others to come and join in.

  A chunk fell from his carving. He wasn’t sure what it would be yet. He didn’t have skill enough to make such bold declarations, but it had legs. Four of them, admittedly, but it was still further than he’d ever gotten before.

  Hearing steps behind him, he turned his head to see Drecht pushing a musketeer and a sailor up the staircase to the forecastle deck.

  Larme knew the boy to be one of the carpenter’s mates, Henri. Johannes Wyck had put some hurt on him after discovering he’d told tales to Sara Wessel. His face was swollen like an old turnip.

  The musketeer was Thyman. He’d antagonized Arent Hayes by hurling the thief taker onto the floor during boarding. He’d gotten off lightly with it that morning, though not so today. He was growing a black eye. Henri and Thyman had obviously been fighting.

  Larme swung himself off the figurehead, then balanced along the smeared edge of the beakhead before leaping over the railing onto the forecastle deck.

  From under the brim of his hat, Drecht’s eyes narrowed. He adjusted his sword.

  Larme didn’t take fright easily—­most of a first mate’s job was to be hated in place of the captain—­but he gripped his knife a little tighter than he had done.

  “That you, Larme?” asked Drecht.

  “Aye, it’s me,” he said, not bothering to hide his contempt.

  “I never forget a scowl,” Drecht said with a grin, the smile dropping from his face when it wasn’t returned.

  “They been fighting?” asked Larme, rubbing the half-­faced charm around his neck. Not that it seemed to do much good. Or at least it hadn’t for Bosey, who’d kept the other half. Never did have much sense, but he deserved more than to be incinerated on the docks.

  “I heard there’s some special way you deal with that on this ship,” replied Drecht.

  “Grievances on the Saardam are settled by fists on the forecastle deck,” explained Larme. “What’s the trouble?”