20
SHOWDOWN
PAUL, BELIEVING HE had to redeem himself in some way for his comportment during the shooting episode at Papalo, insisted on accompanying the Belauran scouting parties. They were engaged in the risky business of spying on the activities of the Dutch on land and the disposition of the sailboat they used for daily transport. The harassment attack planned by Jack to provoke the enemy could only be successful if they had reliable knowledge of their day-to-day operations.
Jack feared Paul’s desire to prove himself might make him a liability; on the day before the planned raid on the Dutch, he was proven right. Two Belaurans that Paul had accompanied on a reconnaissance trip returned without him. The distraught men explained that they were lying in hiding, observing the prisoner pens, when they were surprised by a Dutch party returning from a foray through the swamp behind them. When it was certain they would be discovered, Paul had leapt to his feet and run out in the open. The Belaurans couldn’t understand what he was saying, but Paul was acting strangely. The armed men took him prisoner but didn’t go searching for others, which seemed odd to the scouts. When the Dutch were out of sight, the Belaurans stayed hidden for some time longer before carefully making their way back.
Jack intently listened to Brown interpreting, trying to comprehend the full meaning of what had happened. He suppressed his panic for Paul’s safety and analyzed the situation. Paul had obviously sacrificed himself to save his native comrades, which Jack could tell greatly moved the men. But like the Belaurans, he was at a loss to explain why the Dutch wouldn’t have sounded a general alarm and searched for the other infiltrators—a one-man reconnaissance in this situation would have made no sense.
None in the Brotherhood uttered a word as Jack sat wrapped in his own thoughts for what seemed hours. Suddenly, he stood and with a grim look of determination announced that they would proceed with their plan despite the possibility that Paul would be tortured into telling what he knew. “For one thing,” he announced, “I quit telling Paul any details of the raid once I knew he was set on taking part in the scouting.” Jack tried to sound businesslike but his heart felt like it was full of lead.
The scruffy party of blackbirders took Paul straight to the man in charge of the camp. They seemed to Paul to be a mixture of Dutch and English with some French thugs thrown in—but the leadership was mainly Dutch.
“This bloke came running out of the bush yelling at us like we was his long-lost cousins, sergeant. Says he’s some kinda Monsieur La Merde—”
Paul fairly screamed in the man’s face, “Le Maire, you blessed idiot! Count Le Maire, and I demand to be taken to a gentleman of substance to whom I may express my gratitude. I will not be spoken to—”
“Now shut yer trap, laddy, lest I knock yer royal teeth outta yer head,” snapped one of his captors.
The sergeant of dragoons raised his hand for silence. He looked Paul over with a stolid face. “Yo spek Anglisch, American?”
“A little,” Paul answered. “I’m French, captured by the Americans and forced to help in their nefarious plots. Parlez-vous français?”
“He’s full of shit to his lyin’ ears,” came a voice from the back of the crowd of dragoons. Paul thought the man sounded British. “He’s one of ’em. Let’s hang ’im from a yardarm of the Stuyvesant so the damn Yanks can see him easy with their scouting parties.”
The sergeant addressed himself to the bunch that had brought Paul in. “You check for others?”
“Well, we… what others?”
“He may or may not be what he says. Go back and check that area thoroughly where you found him, see if there is sign of others.” Then turning to one of his own dragoons, “Take him to Arloon and De Vries.”
The sergeant’s English is quite good after all, thought Paul. Clever man.
Paul was praying his bluff would hold long enough for his friends to escape. He never thought he would be grateful for the association with nobility that came from his father, but being a prig now might just save his life. The blackbirders were suspicious but he could also tell they were unsure: having a French nobleman leaping out of the brush and grabbing their legs in gratitude was not what they expected from a Belauran war party.
De Vries sipped from a cup of steaming chocolate, one arm resting on the poop deck rail of the Stuyvesant, and studied Paul. The day had started hot and humid, and now clouds behind him were threatening, heavy with rain. Captain Arloon had a cup of tea in his own hand. The men had been speaking English in Paul’s presence. Paul knew this was significant. They were buying at least part of his story, that of being a nobleman, and treating him accordingly: Paul had pompously demanded a stool, and De Vries had a servant provide one. But using English also meant they weren’t concerned about how much he knew. Paul hoped that didn’t indicate an intent to do him in forthwith.
Captain Arloon did not speak French but could get by well enough in English. De Vries seemed to want Paul to be witness to the conversation; it was almost as if he felt a kinship with Paul, the only other person present of high birth. Paul had thrown his father’s name around gratuitously and emulated all the mannerisms of the classes he had learned to despise. He believed that De Vries knew vaguely of his father and was considering what sort of reward or favors might be in order for rescuing such a connected person.
Paul believed that none of the Dutch, including De Vries, was convinced he wasn’t in collaboration with the Americans; but it hardly mattered now. Paul’s knowledge of their plans posed no threat a pistol ball couldn’t eliminate and he might even be of some use. It hardly made sense to torture Paul for information, as they found it almost impossible to shut the young man up. He had regaled any of his captors who would listen with stories of atrocities committed by the Americans, particularly one ruthless Jack O’Reilly.
Paul gathered that Arloon had been reluctant to support De Vries’s planned assault; he didn’t like the thought of maneuvering his ship so close to the reef, and the prospect of more bloodshed was not attractive. De Vries’s type seemed to bother him. This fit with what Paul had gleaned from Quince about the Dutch East India Company. Ruthless men were fast dominating the remnants of the trade since the company had turned its assets over to the government. Many of the old hands found their lack of scruples disturbing.
De Vries suddenly directed his conversation almost exclusively to Paul. He described how the blacks were precious cargo that would fetch decent prices in the South Pacific and excellent prices in any of the mainland ports on the way back to Europe. They were semilegitimate cargo, one could argue, for they were not slaves but pressed labor. They were cargo that loaded and unloaded itself without days of docking and handling fees, and it was even unclear that duties need be paid. Paul nodded and shook his head at what he thought were appropriate times. Thanks for the lesson in scurrilous business practices, you incredible ass.
“Best of all,” De Vries went on, “a ship carrying human cargo is too politically awkward a prize, given the winds of war and politics blowing in Europe.”
“Vraiment, vous avez raison,” agreed Paul.
With a sly look on his face, De Vries explained further that a ship carrying human cargo in these times presented enough consternation and distraction to port officials that they rarely spent much time looking for opium. Although the Dutch dared not enter inland waters of China—where there was even a slight chance of being caught with white death by an emperor’s patrol—there were always Chinese shore-runners who would take that risk for them.