“You’ve told me that before,” said Bren.
“And it bears repeating!” he snapped, standing up as if he might strike Bren, if it wouldn’t require setting down his drink.
“Careful now, Mr. Richter,” said the admiral, who had been trying to read. “If our Master Owen can fell Otto, I like his chances against you.”
The admiral winked at Bren, who tried not to smile as the company man fumed and sat back down with a thump.
“Luck,” scoffed Mr. Richter, but the admiral was having none of it.
“Luck is nothing to scoff at, Mr. Richter. Do you curse the gods or count yourself lucky that you’re not an Iberian prisoner—or dead? Besides, I like to think that luck is the happy consequence of hard work and planning. That it is earned in its own way.”
Later that night in his cabin, Bren replayed the fable over and over in his mind, searching for clues, and he decided he would take all the luck he could get, earned or not. Three days had passed since Mouse’s bird returned, and not knowing where they were made it hard for Bren to sleep. Once, Mr. Black, in trying to discourage Bren’s wanderlust, had recounted the horrors of being lost at sea . . . scurvy, cabin fever, ghosts in the rigging, maddening thirst, starvation . . .
“You think the only thing standing in your way of fame and fortune is pirates or angry natives,” Mr. Black had said. “But the real obstacles come from within.”
Bren climbed to the poop deck for fresh air and discovered that Mr. Tybert couldn’t sleep, either. He was staring out to sea but heard Bren walk up.
“Come over here, jongen, you need to know this.”
Bren stood next to him at the rail and the navigator pointed to a star near the horizon.
“The North Star?” said Bren.
“You see how low it is?” said Mr. Tybert. “We’re close to the equator now, and when we cross it that’s the last we’ll see of her.”
“Can we not figure our longitude by the stars?” said Bren. “Don’t we have star charts that show where the other stars should be, around the North Star, depending on how far east or west we are?”
Mr. Tybert looked at him in mock surprise. “You may be a navigator yet! The problem is, we can’t figure it close enough that way. Not with the records we have. But I do know this—I’ve been navigating Far Easters twenty years now, and I know with my own eye that we’re not looking at the right sky.”
“So we’re lost,” said Bren.
“We’ve become too reliant on maps and gadgets,” said Mr. Tybert. “In olden times, real sailors knew where they were going by the waves and the winds. By the schools of fish that ran by their boats and knowing that the sun would rise and set on one side of the horizon or the other depending on the time of year. I sailed with a man once could tell how tall and fast the waves were supposed to be in any part of the North Sea. He knew the colors of the sea and sky from one place to another, and how clouds would gather over certain islands. Instinct, jongen! Instinct!”
“Maybe that’s what the admiral meant by saying Mouse talks to birds?” said Bren, but Mr. Tybert just snorted.
“All that bird told us was that we’re not near land. I could’ve told you that, and I don’t crap on the deck.”
Bren got the creeping sensation that a story was coming.
“I ever tell you how Polaris came to be fixed in the night sky?”
“No, sir.”
“It was back when Apollo was tending his sheep. One of his flock ran off up a tall mountain, but when he made it to the top, he couldn’t figure out how to get down and had to stand stock-still lest he plummet to his woolly death. So Apollo turned him into the North Star.”
“Why didn’t Apollo just go get him?” said Bren. “Wasn’t he a god? And don’t gods have better things to do than tend sheep?”
“They were Olympic sheep!” Mr. Tybert said, and he cuffed Bren on the ear.
The watch bell rang and Bren returned to his cabin, taking great pains to make sure Otto was nowhere nearby as he changed decks. He reread the tale of the cloud maiden and the plowman. He knew the admiral must be right, that Marco Polo had coded the location of the island in the folktale, but how? Was it a rural area, furrowed by plows? Was there a place where the Chinese sent young women away if they got themselves “in trouble”? He thought the biggest clue was probably the “Silver River.” He would have to dig through more of the admiral’s books to learn if there was a major river in the East that went by that name. But then there were Mr. Tybert’s doubts about the point of it all, which Bren had tried to suppress, but couldn’t.
The next morning it became even harder to focus on lost treasure. When Bren helped Mouse carry breakfast to the officers’ saloon, they walked in on an argument between the first mate and Mr. Richter.
“What does that mean?” said Mr. van Decken, his cold eyes on Mr. Richter. When the company man didn’t answer right away, the first mate grabbed him by the lapels of his fancy waistcoat and jerked him out of his chair. “Unless your money floats it won’t keep you from drowning when I throw you off this ship, you worthless patroon!”
Mr. Richter looked to the admiral for help, but none was coming.
“Answer him,” said the admiral.
“We’re only supplied for the Amsterdam to Cape Colony leg.”
The first mate looked as if he couldn’t believe his ears, while Mr. Tybert mumbled something under his breath. Sean and Mr. Leiden sat stone-still, and Bren and Mouse just stood there dumbly, holding everyone’s breakfast.
Mr. van Decken shoved Mr. Richter back into his chair and then removed his hat, running the fingers of his right hand through his hair. As he did so, his soiled sleeve fell away from his wrist, and Bren noticed for the first time that his entire right forearm was badly scarred, as if it had been held over an open fire long ago.
“Pull your jaw up, van Decken,” said Mr. Richter. “The company has had to streamline costs since the tulip market collapsed.”
“By not supplying its ships with enough food and water?”
“Plenty of food and water, for the first leg,” said Mr. Richter. “Why carry a year’s worth of supplies, much of which will go bad, when we figured we could get more at Cape Colony? Besides, supplies are half as expensive in the colonies as back home.”
“A lovely plan—assuming we can ever find Cape Colony,” said Mr. van Decken. “Do the brilliant minds at the Dutch Bicycle and Tulip Company ever consider that a Dutch ship might be at the mercy of the wind and waves, like any other?”
“Admiral Bowman’s record is unsurpassed,” said Mr. Richter. Bren looked at the admiral, who just sat calmly at the table, as if they were discussing a small matter.
“We’re going to run out of food?” said Bren. The admiral finally noticed them and motioned for them to set their trays down.
“Is there no other place we can restock?” said Mr. Richter.
“Look at the charts for yourself,” said the admiral.
Bren didn’t have to look. He had seen enough maps to know that below the equator between South America and Africa there was nothing but blue sea. Of course, what the admiral had told him was true—there were miles of ocean yet to be explored. There could be a paradise a day away. Except that Mouse’s bird had come back empty-mouthed.
“So, east or west?” said Mr. van Decken, trying to control his anger. “We can figure our latitude, so we need to decide, which is the shortest way to land?”
The admiral and Mr. Richter looked at each other. Bren didn’t have to ask to know what they were thinking. Even if South America were closer than Africa, the detour would put them off schedule by weeks—maybe even months. There was also the danger of finding more Iberian warships if they sailed toward the New World.
“I can’t believe we’re that far west,” said the admiral, looking at Mr. Tybert.
“We’re not,” said Mouse, and everyone looked at her in astonishment.
“Not what?” said the admiral.
“Not that far wes
t. Those birds there wouldn’t be flying that direction if we weren’t closer to the sun.” She was at one of the windows, pointing toward a distant flock of white birds, barely visible.
“You mean in the eastern Atlantic?” said the admiral. Mouse nodded again.
They left breakfast uneaten and gathered in the chart room, huddled around their routing map. “Show me.”
Mouse drew imaginary lines with her index finger around the map, circling the continents. What she was suggesting was that birds migrating to or around Africa stuck to the eastern side of the Atlantic, while those going around South America stuck to their side.
“So a flock of ’em going south-southwest this time of year would have to be this side,” said Mr. Tybert.
“Fascinating,” said the admiral.
“Birds have the whole bloody sky to work with!” said Mr. van Decken.
“No,” said Mouse. “Same routes always, like ships.”
The first mate was fuming. Everyone looked at Mr. Tybert, who rubbed his one good eye with a filthy knuckle. “I don’t know what to tell you, Admiral. I don’t know birds, only this,” he said, rapping the maps with the back of his hand.
The admiral walked slowly over to his desk and perched on the edge. “East-southeast it is, then. We’ll make the cape or die trying.”
“We still need wind,” said Mr. van Decken, who didn’t wait for a rebuttal. He slammed the cabin door behind him, leaving an uncomfortable silence in his wake. Mr. Tybert stared at the map, Mr. Richter stared at his whisky glass, and Bren stared at Mouse, hoping very much that she knew what she was talking about.
CHAPTER
21
THE SLUGGISH SEA
They crossed the equator, and true to maps ancient and modern, the wind died and the humidity rose. It was too hot to enjoy even the few hours of sleep you were allowed. The admiral had tried at first to keep the men from knowing they were off course, but as one stifling day passed into another, that became impossible. To make matters worse, with a food and water shortage weighing on his mind, the admiral cut daily rations in half to conserve supplies. Men’s tempers grew short.
On days when there was no wind, the sea had no swells—the clear sky was perfectly reflected in the water, erasing the horizon, making it difficult even to measure the sun’s height with the backstaff. At night, it was as if the ship were floating in space . . . eerily alone, in a dark, endless void. Were it not for Mr. Tybert turning his sandglass and the ringing of the bells during watch, Bren would have had no sense of time moving whatsoever on calm days. He began to understand Mr. Black’s warnings about losing your mind at sea. And the more days that passed, the more men became convinced there was a real chance they would run out of food and water.
Sean had predicted that Bren would eventually come to depend on spirits as much as the next man, and one night, after checking the schedule to make sure Otto would be above on duty, he decided he would pass the time as the other hobs did—drinking and talking of better days. The men had been much more accepting of Bren ever since the fight, but it wasn’t merriment he overheard as he approached the crew’s saloon.
“He’ll push us hard to make up for this delay,” said one man.
“In league with the Devil, that one,” said another. “He claims to have made it from Amsterdam to Batavia in three months once!”
“Aye, three months, ten days to be exact,” said the first man. Bren recognized Sean’s Eirish brogue. “I was on that trip. Bowman delivered a stack of sealed letters to the colony’s governor to prove his time. And a speedy trip is nothing to gripe about.”
“Lot of good it does us,” came another voice. “We don’t get paid for how fast we go. Even if it is the lost treasure of Marco Polo we’re aiming for.”
Bren realized the last voice was Otto’s, and he froze outside the saloon door. It was the last place he wanted to be now. Had the schedule been wrong? Or did he not know what day it was anymore? He knew he should leave immediately, but he couldn’t make his legs work. From what little more he heard, it was obvious Mr. Tybert wasn’t the only man who had doubts about the admiral’s “special” mission. And that their first goal now should be to make sure they could port safely somewhere—anywhere.
Suddenly there was the scrape of a chair on the floor and the door opened, with Sean coming out.
“Bren?”
“I was just . . . jenny,” he managed to say, before seeing Otto’s hateful eyes behind Sean.
“Did you catch a rat?” said Otto. A few other men, curious now, leaned over to see who Sean was talking to.
“It’s nothing,” said Sean. “Get back to the grog.” He shut the door and put his hand on Bren’s shoulder. “Come on, I’ll walk you back to the caboose.”
They walked through the ship without speaking until they reached Bren’s cabin door. “I wasn’t spying, honest,” said Bren.
“I know,” said Sean. “Grumbling about the admiral is normal, you know. Just something the men do. Hobs get only ten guilders a month. And you don’t get paid until your five-year commission is over—after all you’ve eaten, drunk, and worn has been deducted by the purser. That’s what the bloke meant by saying we don’t get paid by how fast we go.”
Bren had never even thought about whether he was expected to earn wages. In Map his father or Black provided everything he needed, and on the ship he had been given his bed and his clothes, and Cook provided his meals. He didn’t realize he was being charged for it all! Besides, weren’t they all going to be paid a hundred times over in treasure? Isn’t that what the admiral had promised him? Or was it something Bren had invented in his childish imagination?
“Sean, I did overhear something . . . something Mr. Tybert said, too . . . about why we’re doing this. The lost treasure not being worth it, I mean.”
Sean let out a deep sigh and looked around, to make sure they were alone. “Just between you and me, lad, I’ve seen the account statements of the Dutch Bicycle and Tulip Company. Marco Polo couldn’t have had enough ships in the thirteenth century to carry everything the company makes today.”
When Bren’s face betrayed all the confusion he was feeling, Sean added, “A story like that gains a sort of legendary status. It’s no ordinary lost voyage, for sure. Marco Polo? Solving an age-old mystery? Getting there first when so many have tried, or dreamt of it? I suppose in Bowman’s mind there’s a fame that comes with such a discovery that can’t be bought with gold and silver.”
Bren nodded. “If you get the chance,” he said, “will you please tell the men I wasn’t spying? Otto already hates me.”
He was expecting Sean to reassure him, to tell him not to worry, but he didn’t. He just patted Bren’s shoulder and turned to go. Bren stopped him.
“Sean, do you believe the admiral is . . .”
“In league with the Devil?” said Sean, laughing. “I think he wants us to believe it. He’s taken a strong interest over the years in Eastern magic, if you consider that deviltry.” He shrugged. “I don’t see as it matters. Admiral can kill me with a dagger or hang me from the yardarm as easily as he can magick me to death. Now—off to bed. I’ve duties elsewhere.”
Bren said good night, and when he lit his candle he saw that The Book of Songs had been left open on his pillow, turned to a different page from what Bren was last reading. It was a poem called “Cold Mountain,” and it began,
A curtain of pearls hangs before the hall of jade
And within is a lovely lady
Fairer in form than the gods and immortals
Her face like a blossom of peach or plum
Spring mists will cover the eastern mansion
Autumn winds blow from the western lodge
And after many years have passed . . .
He looked at Mouse’s empty cot, wanting to ask if she had left this here, or the admiral. She should have been in bed, by his reckoning, so he decided to dress and go look for her. Maybe because he had learned she was a girl, he felt like he should tr
y and protect her. Then he laughed at his own “chivalry.” Mouse was about the last person who needed protecting.
It was amidships, on the storage deck, that he saw them—Otto and Mouse, with Otto grabbing Mouse by the collar, dragging her toward the hatch leading below. Bren started to shout at him, but kept quiet and followed instead.
Otto dragged Mouse to the hatch leading down to the hold.
“Open it,” he snarled, pointing to the padlock. Bren could see the effects of his half rations, even though it had only been a couple of weeks. Otto was still a powerful-looking man, but leaner. Less like a wolf now than a wild dog.
“I don’t have a key,” said Mouse. “Honest.”
“I’ve seen you!” said Otto, bending over to put his unshaven face near hers. “Coming out of the hold.”
Bren’s first instinct was to run away. Otto had already caught him lurking once, and Sean wasn’t here to protect him. But the terrified look on Mouse’s face changed his mind. He bent down and touched his boot, then cursed himself for leaving Mr. Tybert’s knife under his bed.
“Otto! Mouse doesn’t have a key,” said Bren, forcing himself to step forward, keeping his voice and his knees steady. “You know that.”
Otto spat at him. “I know what I’ve seen . . . he’s a lock-pick or something. Aren’t you, little one? A little orphan thief.” He grabbed Mouse’s hair and threw her down against the floor. “Open it!”
“Otto, I don’t know what you saw,” said Bren. “Maybe Cook sent him down for something. Is that what happened, Mouse? And you gave the key right back?”
She nodded.
Otto stepped toward Bren, his marble-dark eyes reflecting the glow from the paddy lamps. “Where’s yer loggerhead, jongen? You think you can take me man to man?”
His face was on top of Bren’s, his breath fetid with drink. Bren could only imagine how much Otto wanted to tear him apart, to avenge his humiliation, and all he could hope for was that the paiza would protect him.
“We’re bound to get more wind soon,” said Bren, speaking softly, the way you would to try to calm an animal. “We’ll be at Cape Colony in no time . . . everything will be better.”
The Vanishing Island Page 15
