Sea Change (5 page)

'You're a good fisherman, Zuyler. I'll say that.'

'Thank you. It's not often a mere secretary has the chance to save someone's life.'

'If saving me's what you had in mind, I'm afraid your work's not done yet.'

'How so?'

Spandrel sighed. His thoughts were ordered enough now to reveal the bleakness of his plight. He was alive. But, in many ways, he might just as well be dead. De Vries could have had no reason to commission his murder other than as a favour for a friend — his oldest friend, Sir Theodore Janssen. Janssen had wanted Spandrel to deliver the box to de Vries. But he had not wanted him to return with proof that he had done so. That was clearly not part of his plan at all.

'Spandrel?'

'The letter Sir Theodore sent ahead of me to de Vries.' He looked sharply at Zuyler. 'Did you see it?'

'No.'

'So you don't know if, in that letter, Sir Theodore asked his good friend Ysbrand to ensure I didn't leave Amsterdam alive.'

'Do you think he did?'

'What else am I to think?'

'Why would he do that?'

'Because he required the services of a discreet and reliable courier.' Now Spandrel knew why he had been chosen for the mission, rather than Jupe or some other lackey. He was easily suborned and eminently expendable; he was the perfect combination. 'You understand, Zuyler? There's no more discreet kind of courier... than the dead kind.'

Spandrel slept little that night. He and Zuyler sat talking by the sputtering fire into the small hours, and even when Zuyler had retreated to his bed in the back room, leaving Spandrel to find what rest he could on the cot beside the chimney-breast, sleep proved elusive. His ribs pained him and there was no position he lay in that did not chafe a tender spot.

None of that would have kept him awake, however, so physically weary did he feel. It was the whirl of thoughts in his head that would give him no peace. It was the compulsive gaze of his mind's eye into the uncertainty of his future.

He was alive. De Vries, and hence soon Sir Theodore Janssen, must think him dead. But he was not. That represented his one advantage over them. Unhappily, it was outweighed by more profound disadvantages. He had delivered the despatch-box, but the receipt de Vries had signed for it had been stolen, along with all his money. He could not ask de Vries for a replacement without exposing himself to the danger of a second attempt on his life. But he could not return to England and demand Sir Theodore honour their bargain without such a replacement. Not that he supposed Sir Theodore would honour their bargain, under any circumstances. His debts were not going to be cancelled. The map was not going to be finished.

What to do, then? He had no money with which to pay for safe passage out of the city. He scarcely even had clothes to his back, those in which he had been dragged from the canal being so badly soiled by mud and dirty water that it was doubtful he could wear them again, save in dire emergency. Zuyler had lent him a night-shirt, but he could hardly be expected to offer him the run of his wardrobe.

Zuyler had, in truth, already done enough. He had seemed, on first encounter, to be an arid, unbending sort of fellow. But his actions had spoken louder than his cautious words. The account he had given Spandrel of himself had revealed that they were alike in many ways. Educated above his station by a clever but impecunious father, Pieter Zuyler had learned English from the many English students attending the university in his home town of Leiden. He had befriended one of the more prosperous of them, who had offered him employment as a clerk in his father's shipping office in Liverpool. Zuyler had spent three years there before his talents had come to the notice of Ysbrand de Vries through a recommendation from the Dutch East India Company's Liverpool agent. The opportunity to return to the country of his birth had proved irresistible. But he had come to regret seizing that opportunity.

'De Vries is a hard man,' Zuyler had said, his tongue loosened by schnapps. 'Who expects anything else? Not me. But there's hard and hard. De Vries is granite, through and through. Also mean, vicious and cunning. As you've found out.'

'What manner of life does that mean Mrs de Vries leads?'

'I don't know. She never complains. Not to me, at any rate. She behaves as the model wife. And he parades her on his arm as a trophy, to make his rivals hate him the more. I comfort myself with the thought that he would not wish his trophy to be' — Zuyler had cast Spandrel a meaningful glance — 'damaged.'

'You think him capable of that?'

'I think him capable of anything.'

'A formidable enemy, then.'

'Extremely.'

'How can I hope to elude him?'

'By fleeing. And fleeing far. There is no other way.'

'I have to consider my mother.'

'It seems from what you tell me that you'll have to let her think you're dead. Janssen would be sure to hear of any communication between you.'

'Is that what you would do in my position?'

Zuyler had stared long and hard into the fire before replying. 'No. I confess not.'

'Then what would you do?'

'There comes a time, my friend, when a man must turn upon his enemy. I cannot say if that time has come for you. But, for me, in your shoes...'

'It would have done.'

'Yes.' Zuyler had nodded at him. 'I think so.'

And that was what Spandrel thought too as he lay on the cot and gazed sleeplessly into the darkness. If he fled, he fled from everything. There was nothing he could take with him, not even his past. And his future would be a blank sheet, a mapless void. This was his fate at the hands of powerful men. This was as much as he could hope for. Unless....

It was a drizzly dawn in Amsterdam. Spandrel saw the grey sheen of it on the pavement as he looked up through the basement window. He had found a twist of coffee and brewed it in a pot. The aroma woke Zuyler. They sat by the remains of the fire, drinking it, strangely shy of talk at first, perhaps because each of them was waiting for the other to mention the topic they had wrestled with so unavailingly a few hours before.

'I must be gone soon,' said Zuyler eventually, through a thin-lipped smile. 'De Vries does not appreciate lateness.'

'I should be gone soon myself.'

'Take any clothes that you need. Mine are all of a muchness. And all likely to be a little long in the arm and leg for you. I can't help that, I'm afraid. You could do worse than ask my landlord to bandage your ribs.' He nodded upwards. 'Barlaeus is a kindly sort. And a better doctor than many who call themselves doctors. I could spare you a guilder to see you on your way.'

'My way to where?'

'Far from Amsterdam is the only suggestion I can make.'

'You made a different suggestion last night.'

'It's true. I did. Have you decided to act upon it?'

'Yes.'

The two men looked at each other, coolly and soberly acknowledging the momentousness of Spandrel's answer.

'What should I do, Zuyler? How am I to strike back at him?'

'Are you sure you want me to tell you?'

'Oh yes. I'm sure.'

'Very well.' Zuyler leaned forward, an eagerness for intrigue lighting his features. 'Your only chance, as I see it, is to retrieve the box you delivered and find out what it contains. Then you will know why it was deemed necessary to have you killed. And with that knowledge... you may be able to bring down your enemies.'

'De Vries and Janssen?'

'I think they stand or fall together in this.'

'But how am I to lay hands on the box now? De Vries will have it under lock and key.'

'Indeed he will.'

'Well, then?'

'It would be impossible, without the help of someone close to him.'

'Such as his secretary, you mean?'

'Exactly.' Zuyler grinned at him.

'You've risked enough for me already. I can't—'

'You misunderstand, Spandrel. The extreme measures taken against you convince me that the contents of that box can be used to break Mijnheer de Vries. To bring him down. To ruin him. Do you think, after all I have endured as his... creature... that I would baulk at a few small risks to bring about such a satisfying result?' Zuyler's grin broadened. 'Your salvation, my friend. And my pleasure. What say you to that combination?'

Spandrel said yes, of course, as he was bound to. And so Pieter Zuyler and he became co-conspirators. Zuyler had no doubt where the despatch-box was. De Vries kept all his most valuable — and secret — possessions in an iron chest in his study. The key to the chest never left his person, clipped as it was to his watch-chain. It would be necessary to break the chest open. But that was the beauty of Zuyler's plan.

'Tomorrow night,' he gleefully disclosed, 'Mijnheer and Mevrouw de Vries are attending a concert. De Vries wishes to be regarded as a music lover, even though the only music he really enjoys is the chink of coins in his purse. They will be gone from eight o'clock until midnight at least. They will probably go on to a supper party afterwards. De Vries likes me to stay at the house when he's not there. He doesn't think the servants are capable of dealing with any emergency that might arise. Though he's never spoken of it, I suspect burglary is what he truly fears. So, I'll oblige him... by supplying a burglar.'

'Me?'

'Exactly. You will enter at the rear. I can arrange for the gate next to the coach-house to be unlocked. I can also arrange for one of the library windows to be unfastened. There's a ladder in the shed next to the coach-house. You can use that to reach the window. The study is the room directly above the library. You'll have little to fear from the servants. They'll take the opportunity of de Vries's absence to huddle over the fire downstairs and complain about him. On this occasion, I think I'll join them. It would be as well for me to have witnesses to my whereabouts at the time of the burglary.'

'How strong is the chest?'

'I'm not sure.' Zuyler smiled. 'I've never tried to break it open. But by the look of the hasp...' He plucked the poker from the fireplace and weighed it in his hand. 'Not strong enough.'

To avoid evidence being turned up later of complicity between them, the two men agreed that they should part straight away. Zuyler lent Spandrel a suit of clothes, along with enough money to pay for overnight lodgings. He directed him to a discreetly located tavern, the Gouden Vis, where they would meet after the event to examine the contents of the despatch-box. They left separately, Spandrel first, with a farewell handshake to seal their agreement.

Spandrel walked slowly away from Barlaeus's shop that damp winter's morning, his ribs jarring at every step. He would have to buy a bandage for them from some other chemist. But already the pain seemed less intense, dulled as it was by the contemplation of something he would never have expected to be able to inflict on the likes of Sir Theodore Janssen and his very good friend, Ysbrand de Vries: revenge.

Spandrel assumed — as why would he not? — that Sir Theodore was still comfortably installed at his house in Hanover Square, perhaps at that moment perusing his morning newspaper over a cup of chocolate, smug in his certainty that the courier he had chosen to carry the despatch-box and its so very important contents to Amsterdam was dead, his lips sealed for good and all.

Sir Theodore's situation was, in truth, rather different. Robert Knight's failure to appear before the Committee of Inquiry at South Sea House on Monday had led to a convulsion of righteous indignation in the House of Commons and the forced attendance there of those directors of the South Sea Company who were also Members of Parliament, followed shortly afterwards by their committal to the Tower pending further investigations by the committee, now vested with full executive powers. By the following day, the net had been widened to include all directors and officials of the company.

That morning, therefore, found Sir Theodore confined in an admittedly commodious but scarcely elegant chamber in the Tower of London. He had a view from his window of the traffic on the Thames and the wharves of Bermondsey, but the smell of the river at low tide was a heavy price to pay for such a prospect. The furnishings of the chamber might have been described as generous by someone not as accustomed as Sir Theodore was to the best. Happily, he had always possessed a pragmatical disposition and age had taught him patience if nothing else. Chocolate tasted the same wherever it was drunk, even if the Governor did exploit his monopoly on prisoners' supplies to charge scandalous amounts for portage. And though Brodrick and his fellow inquisitors might think they had him at their mercy, Sir Theodore was confident that they would eventually find it was quite the other way about.

There had been no objection to his valet waiting upon him in his altered place of residence and it was certainly a relief to Sir Theodore that he could begin each day with an expert shave. But Jupe's tonsorial talents, though considerable, were not those his employer valued most highly. Jupe's grasp of events was what Sir Theodore wished to call upon, every bit as much as his steady hand with a razor.

'Who is still at liberty, Jupe?' Sir Theodore accordingly enquired as his barber-cum-newsmonger slid the blade over the crown of his head. 'I'm told there are a dozen of us here.'

'That would be correct, sir. And more are sought. I believe there is not yet a warrant out for Deputy Governor Joye, however. The committee must expect to find him particularly helpful.'

'When does he go before them?'

'Today. Along with Sir John Blunt.'

'Blunt will tell them whatever he thinks will serve him best. And that, I suppose, will be nearly everything.'

'But not quite everything, sir?'

'They would need to speak to Knight for that.'

'As they would assuredly like to.'

'Do they know where he is?'

'Brussels has been mentioned.'

'An obvious choice. The Austrian authorities are unlikely to bestir themselves to do the committee's bidding.'

'But the King's bidding, sir?'

'A different matter — should it arise.'

'Rumour has it that the Duke of Wharton means to hire a hearse and drive it through the streets today in a mock funeral procession for the company.'

'The Duke of Wharton is a fool. He and his fellow Jacobites no doubt see this crisis as a gift from the gods. Well, well. Let them stage their funeral. Let them have their fun. What of the Government?'

'Lying low, I rather think, sir. Aislabie is said to be finished and Walpole to be certain of succeeding him as Chancellor.'

'Ah, Walpole. There is a man we must watch.'