David Mitchell - The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

‘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 offence. ‘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.’

‘Its 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, northwards, out past the Old Fort, was a strip o’ blue… or green… or grey… 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 Judas.’

‘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 “acknowledgement”, he’d call it, an’ with above an 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 din’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’ 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 harbour.’

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 cess-pool 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.’