The Pikeman
Gordon Haber
I learn the news.
The day I learned my friend Claes Rademaker had been murdered, his skull split open by a Lenape axe, began with my son Hendrick and I heaving into our furs to tend to the animals. I saw to the hogs and Hendrick to the chickens. We milked the cows and Hendrick brought the pails inside to his mother. He returned outdoors with our pikes and short swords, and together at we ran through the drills, my voice muted by the winter air as I called the positions: Shoulder your pike. Level your pike. Charge your pike and draw your sword. We ran through the exercises until the sun was high and Hendrick was blinking the sweat from his eyes and the skin beneath my own furs had dampened.
I was proud of Hendrick. He was nearly as tall and broad as I and he would be taller and broader. When younger, he had whined about the cold or the hour, but now at fifteen he ran the drills without complaint, and a certain adeptness had come into his handling of the weapons along with his tolerance for discomfort. Of course, I communicated my pride by saying nothing, expecting him to take my lack of criticism as praise.
I sent him inside, for I wanted a moment with his siblings, whom I had buried on a rise beside the house. I had inexpertly lettered the fieldstones myself: Hier leydt Geertruyt and Hier leydt Nicolaes. Brushing snow from the markers, I considered that while it may be pointless to pray for the dead, one might still hope they rejoiced in Paradise, and lament the holes created by their absence.
It was a cloudy February morning. The banks of the East River were slabbed with ice, the trees of Hog Island fringed with snow. On the isle of Manhatta, a column of smoke rose from some homestead. I listened to the wind, the creaking of river ice, Hendrick's voice calling from the half-door: Come, Father, let's have our breakfast.
Inside, Anneka had set out small beer, bread and butter, cheese for grating, cornmeal porridge with milk. Hendrick applied himself to his food with customary intensity; five-year-old Clara took bites of her bread. Anneka's head was bare this morning, her hair pulled backwards, lending her face the openness and clarity that never failed to move me. When we lost Geertruyt, she had wept for days.
No missing chickens then, she said.
Not a feather, I said.
She was referring to recent troubles in the colony, skirmishes with the Raritans on Staten Island, livestock and such disappearing from farms in our vicinity.
I suspect they let us alone due to your reputation, Anneka said.
What reputation?
Why, that of a warrior fifteen stone in weight who could fillet a man with a pike.
The United Provinces has no more use for pikemen, I said.
So you have related on quite a few occasions, she said, but with kindness. All right, go to your business so I may scour the floors.
I kissed my wife on the forehead and went to use the chamberpot in privacy. Thus relieved, I sat before my writing table to spend time with my account book. Our neighbor, Nicolaes van Wassenaer, had made his library available to Hendrick, and he sat nearby with a Latin grammar. We were wasting daylight, I knew, as we had no end of outdoor chores. But I wanted to review my plans for the coming months. Connick David was due at the port with the thaw, and after she unloaded her cargo of beef and bricks, she would return to Amsterdam with my pelts, to be resold throughout Europe as far as Muscovy. Beforehand I'd have to collect the pelts from the Indians whom I hired to wear them throughout the winter, so they would be supple for the milliners and furriers of Europe. This had been my life for a decade, more or less—trading furs, raising food, and padding our coffers by selling Anneka's cheeses in town. According to the ledger books and various strongboxes secreted throughout my property, I was a prosperous man.
A knock at the door took me from my thoughts. In the front room, Anneka had opened the half-door. It was two fur trappers, an Englishman and a Dutchman renowned for both the low quality of their peltry and their near-constant drunkenness—the very two, in fact, whom I suspected of raiding the coops along our shores.
They doffed their hats and wished us a good day.
You stink, said Clara, who had come up behind.
Clara, Anneka said reprovingly. But they did stink, of strong drink and of the bear fat they smeared on their faces against the cold, and of themselves. I thought it likely they would put the touch on me. Civility costs nothing, however; I wished them a good morning and asked the purpose of their visit.
We come with sad news, the Dutchman said. The wheelwright is dead.
To the wheelwright’s house.
On the path through the wood, I found it impossible to get more information from the trappers. Apparently relaying the news had exhausted their mental resources. God only knew how they had reached my house in the first place, given their profound drunkenness. The Dutchman fell, and as I helped him to his feet, the Englishmen walked into a tree. Who put that there, he said, and I understood that if I were to get to my friend's and back before sundown, I should press on alone.
When I arrived at the little house by the Newtown Creek, the bottom of the half-door was ajar and snow drifted over the threshold. The place had the markings of a ransacking, with overturned tables, emptied shelves, an open strongbox with the lock broken. The wheelwrighting apparatus remained untouched. And here was poor Claes on the floorboards with a gash in his crown and the brains leaking out, his expression frozen in astonishment.
I covered him with a blanket and righted a chair for myself. No man reaches my age without becoming accustomed to death, especially when he had been a soldier. And yet this one stung. Claes drank too much. He managed his affairs poorly. Nevertheless, he had treated everyone, from the most recalcitrant Indian to the grandest poltroon, with the same generosity of spirit. The last time I had seen him alive was a month ago, when Anneka had me bring him a cheese for the New Year. It had been her way of providing me a holiday, given my propensity for work. Claes and I had punished his brandy while discussing the English Civil War.
My money's on the Royalists, he said. They have the resources.
The Roundheads are the better bet, I said. You've run into those Connecticut Puritans. The joy they take in self-denial speaks well for their endurance, if not the quality of their company.
You have a point, Claes said. There is nothing an English ant-fucker enjoys more than denying himself pleasure, except perhaps denying it for others. Anyway, we can agree that however it goes in the end, a nice long English Civil War is a fine thing for the United Provinces.
My remembrance was interrupted by the trappers, who were apparently now sober enough to remain upright and compose appropriate expressions of sorrow.
I asked them to explain how the murder had occurred.
The Dutchman told me they had come to see about a cart. The item was not ready; however, as it was a particularly cold afternoon, Claes had invited them to have a smoke at his fireside. As they prepared their pipes, an Indian entered with an axe at his belt. He had some pelts and such for Claes, and they commenced to trading.
What sort of an Indian was he?
The Dutchman shrugged. An Indian.
Can you be more specific? Was he Mespeatch? Wecquaesgeek? Raritan?
How should I know, mister? An Indian is an Indian.
Christ, man. What did he look like?
His hair was long and black. The sides of his head were shaven. He wore necklaces.
You just described every Lenape between here and Fort Orange.
The Dutchman thought. He said, He was young?
This was more helpful, but seeing his powers of observation were limited, I shifted the line of questioning: How did this young man kill Claes?
It was very quick, mister. One second they was talking. Then the Indian starts yelling and before you know it an axe is in the poor bugger's head.
Did he die quickly?
Very quickly.
Was he in pain?
He was more like surprised, mister.
Meanwhile the Englishman had been nodding along as if corroborating. I asked him in his own language if he had anything to add.
You speak English, sir? That's a relief.
You speak no Dutch?
Not a fucking word. Your language sounds like a duck with the catarrh. No offense, sir.
I was silent for a moment in awed contemplation of his stupidity. But I had more pressing matters—for instance, the possibility, however slim, of these two being murderers, given how frequently white men blamed their own crimes on some fictitious Indian. I had them go through the whole business again, and the Englishman's answers matched those of his friend's, more or less: a young Indian had come to bargain with Claes and murdered him instead.
Meanwhile the Dutchman's affected mournfulness had faded, and his eyes darted about. I felt a flare of rage, and I rose to clout him on the ear.
Ach, mister! What was that for?
Because you let the murderer get away. And then you ransacked my friend's house.
I never.
Empty your pockets.
How dare you accuse me.
I stepped toward him. Empty your pockets.
The Dutchman took loose coins from his pockets and tossed them on the table. The Englishmen understood what was transpiring and did the same, resulting in a considerable mound of sewant and perhaps a hundred guilders.
His relations will get the money, I said. Now go inform the Governor-General.
The Dutchman said, How are we supposed to get across the river?
I’m sure you still have a few of my friend’s coins.
My name is Jacobus de Waard.
And all my life I have longed for open spaces and freedom of movement. I was born in 1601 to a humorless father who ran an inn off the Zeedijk for the more respectable sailors and merchants, meaning they tended not to knife each other when drunk. My mother was adept at sums and balancing salvers laden with tankards, meat pies and pickled herring; she was less adept, or less interested, in minding her children. I had two elder brothers and three younger sisters; we slept above the inn, three to the bed. We didn't want for food, but everything I owned had been owned before and would be again. All my possessions—my spare shirt, my copybook and pen, a lead soldier with a bent pike—took up less than half of the drawer I shared with my sister Griet.
Downstairs the pipesmoke was choking and the benches crammed with hectoring Dutchmen, taciturn Swedes, florid Germans, demonstrative Poles, arrogant Spaniards, and circumspect Jews. Local painters and artisans stopped in for a draught, mingling with salted fish exporters, chandlers, dyers, printers, traders poring over the price lists. I have an early memory of a monkey some sailor had brought from Jakarta biting me on the hand; I recall the sharp pain and feelings of betrayal. More generally I recall a sense of restriction, of being hemmed in on all sides by siblings, and responsibilities, and the ever-encroaching sea.
When I was eleven my father apprenticed me to a cooper, the family business lacking a place for a third brother. The cooper had a heavy fist, but he fed me, and for the first time I slept alone, on a bedroll by the kitchen. Hammering at my hoops, I learned that life imposes its restrictions on you despite your proclivities, sometimes even before you had a chance to discover them.
One afternoon I heard the dogs barking and the ratatat of a drum. Drawn by some urge, I left the workshop to find the source of the sound, risking a beating. In the square, amidst a small crowd, was a drummer boy and a sergeant extolling the soldier's life. I put my name down and received my marching money and swore to obey the Articles of War. I sent a note to my mother and left for training in the clothes I had on.
I fought the English in Batavia and the Portuguese in Malacca under the leadership of Jan Pieterszoon Coen. I grew tired of the tropics and of helping enrich other men via the spice trade, so I returned to the Netherlands, where I fought with Prince Maurice of Nassau, who brought to the armies of the United Provinces revolutionary forms of drill and armament. I was a pikeman, advancing in unison with my comrades to impale Spaniards while the columns of gunners on either side fired then scampered to reload in the rear. In this manner, we chopped up the Papists with blades and lead. If their calvary charged, we skewered their horses. The blood ran down my pike, soaking my gloves and tunic, and field by field we rid the Netherlands of the Spanish.
Mere days after the beginning of the Truce, the Dutch turned on each other. I won't pretend I grasped their doctrinal differences or tried to: the fight was about power, not conscience. When Prince Maurice engineered the beheading of Johan van Oldenbarnevelt, I decided I no longer wanted to be a part of his army.
I had a friend in my regiment, a sinewy old Frisian who taught me how to twist a pike to increase the damage, how to pluck blade fragments from your leg and sew up the wound. When I shared my thoughts, he said he couldn't understand why I cared about politics one way or another, but I absolutely should muster out, there being no fucking way for a man to advance in the Army of the United Provinces if he lacked noble blood or family money, no matter his courage or talent. He said if he were in my shoes, that is, not yet thirty and unencumbered by debt or issue, he would seek a position in the New World. And so I did.
Three Letters.
I returned in the night from my friend Claes Rademaker's house and informed Anneka of all that had occurred, and I managed a little rest. In the morning, Anneka could not to convince me to leave off my training with Hendrick; however, I did obey her in forestalling all chores save the unignorable, which Hendrick considerately volunteered to shoulder, saying, Clara, you must help me feed the chickens, it will be impossible without you.
On his way out, Hendrick tossed me a packet of letters from the stoop. Mostly likely van Wassenaer had dropped them after a visit to town. I made a pipe and opened a letter from my favorite sister Griet, who ran a tavern in the Zeedijk, which she and her husband had named the De Piekenier for reasons that embarrassed me. She wrote pretty details of her children, whom I had never set eyes upon, and she asked if I were being careful among the savages. She commended her love to my wife and to Hendrick, who must be a strapping man like his father by now, and she sent one thousand kisses to Clara. At last, Griet got to the point, which was if I might send a beaverskin for her eldest, Johan, whose facility for mathematics had earned him a place at university, and who needed a good hat against the damp cold of Leiden. I made a note in my ledger to put aside a skin for Johan.
The second letter was from Tijsen, inquiring again if I should like to purchase a slave. I tossed it into the fire.
The final letter was from the Governor-General Kieft.
Claes Rademaker was an honorable man, and I know he was your great friend. I give my word I shall do everything possible to apprehend the murderer, who I am quite sure is a savage. I would remind you, Mister de Waard, that the red man, who when offered a thumb takes an arm, has lately become violently aggressive, most recently on Staten Island, where they slaughtered three of Jacob de Vries's men. As you are familiar with the Indians on your side of the river, I request in the name of the High and Mighty Lords of the Dutch West Indies Company that you parley with the sachem of the Mespeatches, whom I suspect of harboring the criminal, given their village's proximity to the home of your departed friend. I would have the sachem give over the savage, this being the best way to avoid further bloodshed. We request you attempt this errand immediately. Knowing your independent frame of mind, I would remind you of how much your present good fortune is due to the liberal rules of this colony and the Company.
I held the letter from this officious prick between thumb and forefinger, my pipe forgotten on its pipe-rest. And I considered how unlikely it was the Mespeatches would involve themselves in this mess, as they were a small, peaceable tribe; and how I owed Kieft nothing and the High and Mighty Lords of the West India Company even less; and how I was well within my rights to tell Kieft to piss off.
This was this conclusion I shared with Anneka, after she read Kieft's letter, although I elided the profanity.
She replied that indeed we owed them nothing. However, like every other man in the New Netherlands, I had sworn an oath to do the Governor-General's bidding, and thus Kieft had absolute authority over me.
I shrugged. If I ignore the request, what could he do to me?
A look of exasperation crossed Anneka's features. She said although Kieft had worded it as a request, it was quite obviously a command. And if I ignored the command, Kieft might do nothing, or he might levy a fine, or he might make me ride the wooden horse until my pelvis cracked. Also, we shouldn't forget what we owed to Claes.
What do we owe Claes?
Jacobus. You need to ask?
Anneka, I cleaned his corpse. I built him a strong coffin and stopped up the doors and windows to keep the animals off until the thaw, when I will bury him with my own hands. I will see that his relations get his money. What else do I owe him?
Some effort toward finding the man who killed him.
Ah, I said.
Ah, she repeated. Clara and I will go to the van Wassenaers. I won't feel safe here without you. I'll pay one of his men to look after our place, so you and Hendrick may pursue your errand with clear heads.
So I am to take Hendrick.
She reached for my hand.
Yes, she said. You can look after each other.
Visiting the Mespeatches.
Hendrick and I put on our furs again, strapped on our swords and flintlocks, our snowshoes. We thought it best to skirt the English settlement, although it added distance. Kieft had granted land to a group of dissenters, Quakers they were called, due to their predilection of trembling in prayer or some such nonsense. Supposedly they kept to themselves, but I have never met an Englishman who does not believe that all he claps his eyes upon belongs to him.
It was midday when we entered the village, a half-dozen wikiwams on a rise above the marshes by the same creek that ran by Claes's. Dry stalks of winter grains protruded from the snow; by the dwellings the snow was thick with discarded oyster shells. One usually approached such a village to barking dogs and curious children, but there was only an elderly woman mashing something in a copper bowl. She glanced at us and called out one word: Katonah.
A man appeared from a wikiwam—Katonah, the sachem, a man of fifty or so with the sides of his head shaved and wearing a beaver pelt of evident quality. He gestured for us to enter his dwelling. We had to duck through the doorway, although the interior was spacious. Corn stalks and dried squash hung from a strut across the ceiling, as well as decorative oyster shelves suspended from strings. On the shelf along the inside wall, there were various pots and skins.
Most Dutchmen use the words Indian and savage interchangeably. And yet in my experience with them hospitality always came before business. Katonah himself spread out mats and served beans with beaver meat, Hendrick setting upon the food as if he hadn't eaten in weeks. I had brought a pouch of good tobacco as a gift, which we smoked after eating.
All the while Katonah seemed wary. He had one eye on my gun, and I realized too late I should have wrapped it in duffel or the like before entering the village. As I should have known communication would be a difficulty. The pidgin that merchants and Indians had developed, a combination of basic words and hand signals, served well for trading. But I had no way to convey anything of complexity. How was I to ask him: Are you hiding the man who killed Claes Rademaker?
Then something quite astonishing occurred: Hendrick spoke Lenape. It was hesitant, with frequent pauses, but he was communicating. I had known, of course, he was teaching himself Latin, and I had seen him reading French. But he hadn't said anything about Indian languages.
The exchange went on for some time before I cut in.
For God's sake, boy, what is he saying?
Sorry, Father. The sachem expresses his condolences for the death of the wheelwright.
What does he know about the murder?
He claims to know nothing, other than the fact of its occurrence.
Ask him if the murderer is here in the village.
Father, are you sure that is a good idea?
Ask him.
Hendrick asked him, and Katonah again glanced at my gun.
He says they are hiding no one. We may search if we like.
Do you believe him, Hendrick?
Why would I not believe him?
Katonah spoke again, Hendrick listening, nodding, concentrating. This time I knew better than to interrupt, and I listened to my son ask questions, at times what sounded like the same question different ways, perhaps working his way around the vocabulary he had not yet acquired. And while this exchange went on, I wondered why Kieft had sent us here, for the Mespeatches never bothered anybody.
Finally, Hendrick turned to me.
He says he respects you, Father. You trade fairly. Your son (and here Hendrick blushed) gives you credit by learning his language. He said he will forgive your—not-believing? Your suspicion. He doesn't want anger in his home because there is enough anger in the world. The Mahicans are attacking the Tapaen and the Wecquaesgeek, and he believes the swannekens, our people, will wage a war on every Indian in the region.
Why?
This brief question elicited another long back-and-forth.
He says, Father, the Mahicans attack because the other peoples have something they want. What it may be, he doesn't know. He says the swannekens will attack because Governor Kieft senses weakness. And he says in the end the reasons don't matter. War is like a fever that comes on people. It grips them for a time and then it passes.
I thought: That is why the village is deserted. He sent his people into hiding.
Tell him I apologize for questioning his word.
I waited until we were well away before asking my son: Why did I not know you were learning their language?
I'm sorry. I was worried you might think it a waste of time.
A waste of time? On the contrary. Just tell me next time, so I don't feel foolish.
I'm sorry, he said again.
Never mind, Hendrick. Like the sachem said, you give me credit. Now, have you any more surprises? Have you been learning Ancient Greek? Or card tricks?
I can promise no card tricks, Father. So what do we do now?
Now we go to Kieft and tell him what we have learned about Claes. Which is fuck all.
The Atlantic Crossing.
I have never related this to anyone: the first time I set eyes on Anneka, she was on the foredeck of the Rensselaerswyck dumping out a wastebucket, wisely holding the item downwind, so she would remain unsoiled. I was struck by a kind of recognition: not that we were preordained necessarily; but something within her—this blue-eyed, straight-backed woman with an air of competence—called to something within me.
In addition to the crew, thirty-five settlers were making the crossing, three families with small children and the rest unmarried men, mostly farmhands bound for the fields of Kiliaen van Rensselaer. I myself had signed on to be a foreman. Anneka, I learned, would be a house servant. I also learned she was the nearest thing to an orphan, being from a large, impoverished family without the means to raise a dowry. All this was relayed to me by a man named Swenthorst, who himself had signed on so he might afford board for his bastard daughter in an Amsterdam orphanage. Nearly every passenger had some tale of woe, some debt or failure; we were not the cream but the dregs; for who else would leave the comforts of the United Provinces? Not that I placed myself above them, given that my only developed skill was in killing.
From experience I already knew an ocean crossing was much like soldiering: long periods of intense boredom punctuated by sickness and terror. At least shipboard life was more varied in its discomforts. For three months we endured the beans and gray peas, the barley and stockfish. We endured the religious services of the lay preacher who had enthusiasm for his work but no talent. We endured the rats, ants, and roaches, and the worms in the water barrels. In the damp belowdecks, with seawater dripping from between the planks, the pigs and sheep kept up a constant noise alongside the moaning of the gravely ill. The stench was astonishing, even worse after a storm made passengers eject the contents of their bowels and stomachs.
But I had a few tricks. I stayed on deck as much as possible, wearing a broad-brimmed hat to keep the sun off. I had brought my own salted beef, beer, and lemon juice. For diversion I had brought a Bible, which was how Anneka and I struck up a friendship, when she came upon me reading it one morning on the quarterdeck.
You must be very pious, she said.
I don't know about pious, I said. Everyone makes such a fuss about this book, I wondered if it were any good.
She laughed, and I felt relief: I had spoken before thinking, and you could get put in the stocks for such comments.
Some years later she would ask what had drawn me to her, and I would say first it was her blue eyes, and second when I understood we shared a point of view, that just because one made light of certain things did not mean you did not take them seriously. And Anneka said she had taken to me when I stitched up a boy's scalp. He had gashed it against a beam when the ship took a plunge. Kierstede, the ship's surgeon, was too drunk to help. I gave the boy a spoonful of rum, and I kept up a patter as I sewed: There my boy, we are nearly done, my what a brave lad, we could have used you in Jakarta.
We were married by the captain in the clothes we came aboard in, the women having fashioned a laurel of dried flowers for Anneka. And together we worked for van Rensselaer for four years until the Company eased the restrictions on fur trading and I set up in business for myself.
To New Amsterdam with Hendrick.
I was no closer to knowing the full story behind the murder of my friend, and I suspected I never would be. One had to face that life in New Amsterdam was notable for its violence. Last month a watchman had questioned a passerby. Lick my arse, the man replied, and in the ensuing scuffle the watchman put a knife through the loudmouth's heart. The month before on the Broad Way, a Raritan had come upon a lone Dutchman repairing his fencing and shot him dead.
I would see Kieft, and I would convey Katonah's innocence and his warnings, and I would bring my part in this affair to a close.
Hendrick and I were depleted from tramping through the snow, but it was already late afternoon: if we waited any longer the current would shift, and we'd have to put it off for the morning. We fetched the canoe and paddled into the East River. It was hard going, with the bitter wind, and the ice, and the ship heading south for the bay whose wake caused our tiny vessel to wobble alarmingly. But we made it without further incident, and as we approached the shore, people were to-ing and fro-ing in the streets, and I noticed a few more houses than when I had last been to town, with the windmill and the fort looming behind them all.
For Hendrick, this was a moment of excitement, as he saw New Amsterdam as a metropolis. I recalled my own surprise when I first set eyes on it, but for the opposite reason. The Company broadsheets had us expecting gracious merchants parading down tidy streets, not these dank boulevards strewn with clamshells and drunks.
I paid a toothless harborman a few stivers to look after the canoe, and Hendrick and I made for the fort, stepping around animal droppings and piles of rubbish, the walls and doors plastered by Kieft's ordinances. The fort itself had been serviceable in earlier days, with high slanted walls and bastions at each corner; now livestock wandered through the holes, and pigs rooted in the garden beside the Governor-General's residence. Kieft had tried taxing the Indians to pay for repairs, which had caused to them burn settlements on the edge of van Rensselaer's holdings. Another bad idea from a man who produced a surfeit of them.
At the door a guard asked us our business.
I am Jacobus de Waard, here upon the request of the Governor-General.
Oh, you're the famous pikeman. They said you was a big'un.
Please tell the Governor-General I am here.
All right, just a moment.
While we waited, a pig sniffed at Hendrick's boots.
The guard returned. He says he's busy, come back in the morning.
You can't be serious.
Sorry, friend, that's what he said.
Go back and tell him again.
I don't think that's a good idea. With all due respect.
Tell him anyway.
Reluctantly the soldier went back, and with the same air of reluctance he returned.
Don't shoot the messenger, all right?
Go on with it.
He said, Tell Jacobus de Waard to piss off until morning or he'll ride the wooden horse.
In fact, we had to pass it on the way to the inn: a sawhorse such as carpenters use, but the crossbar ten feet from the ground and sharpened at the top. Some poor bastard was on it, slumped, unconscious, hands bound behind, iron ball clamped to each ankle, his trousers wet with blood and other fluids. A sign had been affixed to his coat: I stole chickens. The guard smoked a pipe while children pelted the prisoner with clots of mud.
Hendrick's voice trembled as he spoke: Have you seen this before, Father?
Yes. They did it at Breda to a man who fell asleep on watch.
What happened to him?
He died from poisoning of the blood.
Hendrick said nothing. Frankly, the sight was sobering for me as well, especially after Kieft's threat; and I remembered Anneka's warning. But I thought it better not to make much of it, for Hendrick’s sake.
Kieft will not put me on the horse, I said. He is simply one of those pricks who wants to remind you who is in charge. And if you are wondering if I approve of the punishment, the answer is I never fell asleep on watch. I'd punch myself in the face to stay awake. Or poke the back of my hand with a needle.
That sounds terrible.
It was. But the fellow at Breda? Some Spaniard had slipped by and killed three of our men as they slept. This thief here likely took the chickens from a family in need.
I understand. And yet I can't endorse meeting cruelty with cruelty.
I turned to look at my son, who, despite his matted furs, and the fatigue in his eyes, and the smear of dirt on his cheek, suddenly seemed impossibly wise. It was as if the best parts of his mother had been poured into him.
We could both use a draught, I said.
The Stadt Huys was at the far end of Pearl Street, a large stone building with the river lapping at its doorstep. Inside, the air was thick with tobacco smoke and men sat in groups, the conversation pausing upon our entrance, and resuming as Hendrick and I were recognized, when it was clear we represented no immediate threat or gain. At one table was the Reverend Bogardus, looking like he'd been dragged by an oxcart, accompanied by Kierstede the surgeon, with his glazed eyes and pointed ginger beard. At other tables were two English traders, and a trio of Dutchmen whom I associated with liquor smuggling, and a half-dozen soldiers drinking from tankards.
Bogardus made space for us, and the innkeeper's slave, Anthony Portuguese he was called, brought us beer.
Anthony, we could use something to eat as well, I said.
Right away, Mr. de Waard. We've a decent hotpot tonight.
And brandy for my friends, Bogardus said. On my account.
Very good, Reverend.
I passed the slave a coin, which the man slipped into an inner pocket without acknowledgement. It was not ingratitude; the innkeeper confiscated his tips.
So then, Mr. de Waard, said Bogardus. I assume you and your fine lad are in town on business related to poor Mr. Rademaker.
Word travels quickly, I said.
The smaller the town, Bogardus said, the bigger the gossip.
I wish they had brought his body to me, Kierstede said. I am making a study of wounds.
Shut up, Hans. What he means, Mr. de Waard, is that we extend our condolences. I could never get Mr. Rademaker in a pew, but he evinced the spirit of a good Christian. Like you, in fact.
How do you mean, Reverend?
I mean your generosity toward the slave.
I would not share with Bogardus my distaste for slavery, as every time I had in the past some arsehole provided a dozen spurious reasons in favor of the practice and never the real one: greed. Instead, I reminded him I was the son of an innkeeper, and as a boy I had learned you can judge a man by how well he treats the person who fetches his beer.
An excellent point, Mr. de Waard, Bogardus said. As for Claes Rademaker. He was a kindhearted man, and I think that was his undoing. I think he invited the savage to sit by his fire, and he paid for his hospitality with his life.
The assessment seemed accurate enough, although the whiff of condescension was irritating. Never mind. Claes himself had not given a flea's arse about the opinions of this eminent drunk. I asked Bogardus if he knew anything about Mahican attacks to the north.
The Indians are outside of my purview. I am currently preoccupied by the Governor-General and his many stupidities. Look at those English sodomites in the corner: Kieft lets them tramp through town whilst their settlements encroach on all sides. Did you know he decreed all serving bowls must be of uniform size? I'm not sure why, perhaps some fishwife complained about the potter.
Hendrick and I ate while the Reverend prattled on. I made assenting noises, saying nothing. Kieft was known to put men in jail for speaking ill of him, and Hendrick and I lacked the protection of the surgeon's skills, such as they were, or the Reverend's office.
Hendrick provided a means of extrication by falling asleep with his forehead on the table after his brandy and second hotpot. I thanked Bogardus for the drink and bade him and the surgeon a good night. As I helped Hendrick to his feet, a soldier came up.
Excuse me, sir. We heard you fought with Prince Maurice. Come have a drink and tell us about him.
Another time, thank you. I'm seeing the Governor-General in the morning.
I brought Hendrick upstairs and lay him down on clean straw and pulled off his boots and mine, and I arranged myself beside him. But sleep eluded me; I was, paradoxically, too tired. I lay there cataloguing my aches and pains: my back from rowing, my calves from snowshoeing, my heart from mourning my friend. I had not counted on penetrating the exact circumstances of his death, but I had hoped to be of use for his sake. Instead, tomorrow I had to face the Governor-General, and my conscience, with empty hands.
I thought of Anneka and Clara and how I felt as if I hadn't seen them for weeks, even though we had parted this morning. I thought of the sachem keeping a wary eye on my flintlock. I thought of how I avoided coming to town because I loathed having to guard my own tongue. I thought of the soldiers and why I rarely told war stories: because they wanted tales of astonishing courage, that is, horseshit, which I am constitutionally unable to provide.
Listen: at Breda our gunners fucked off when their ammunition was spent. In desperation, we charged our pikes and ran at the Spanish, the formations slamming together and the men screaming as their bones cracked and the blades pierced their flesh. On both sides men pushed from the rear, which made it impossible to move; grimacing comrades pressed against me; someone's shoulder ground into my spine. But I used my height to keep my arms free, and a pike's length away a young Spaniard had his arms pinned. And it came like the spark of a flint: the Spaniards were exhausted. One bold move and we'd drive them from the field. I maneuvered my pike over the scrum, the blade towards the Spaniard's neck. His comrades tried diverting my weapon with their own pikes, but I had more strength and experience, and the boy screamed as the blade neared him, until, with momentum from behind, I pushed it through his throat, and the blood came out, and his comrades faltered, and we stuck them in their faces and guts.
Later I was given extra meat and rum and the men clapped me on the back saying, Thank God for Jacobus the Pikeman. But I fell asleep that night, and nearly every night since, hearing the boy calling for his mother.
Meeting with the Governor-General.
We waited in a chilly antechamber on a bench that seemed expressly fabricated to insert splinters into a man's behind. From Kieft's meeting room we intermittently heard voices raised in argument. Hendrick passed the time poring over a scrap of paper on which he had written various forms of Latin verbs and eating all the pemmican we had brought. I passed the time mapping out in my head the path I would take up the North River next month to collect my pelts, and how I might get Claes in the ground beforehand.
It was midday when a lackey emerged: The Governor-General will see you now.
In the meeting-room the curtains were drawn, and a heavy table took up most of the space. Kieft was at the head of course, a smallish man with a neat blond beard on his knifeblade face. He wore his finery, his plumed hat and sash and starched collars, likely because his interlocutor was the patroon David Pieterszen de Vries, a confident man of fifty with a youthful bearing. Kieft, in mid-speech, did not acknowledge our presence; de Vries however motioned towards empty chairs.
I have had enough, Kieft was saying. The colonists like fools invite them into their homes and lay napkins before them, pour them wine. They believe such treatment is their due, and they become vindictive without it. We have an opportunity to teach them a lesson, and I shall seize it.
But there is no profit in it, de Vries said. Whenever we provoke the Indians the cost is too high. Have you forgotten when the Company lost that settlement along with thirty-two men? Have you forgotten my own men killed on Staten Island? What did we gain? Have the Indians become more cooperative? Has it helped the business of the colony?
I have an opportunity to wipe their mouths, Kieft said. I shall not waste it.
De Vries, in frustration, turned to me: What do you think, Mr. de Waard?
What do I think about what, Mr. de Vries?
Indians are massing by my estate at Pavonia. They are Wecquaesgeek and Tapaen fleeing Mahicans. The Governor-General wishes to attack them.
Attack the Mahicans?
No, the ones at my estate.
What have they to do with Claes Rademaker?
I suppose no one has informed you, said Kieft, his tone suggesting my ignorance was my own fault. I sent you to the Mespeatches. I sent another man to the Wecquaesgeek. Their sachem said even if he knew the whereabouts of the killer, he would not reveal it, and he regretted only one white man was killed and not twenty. You see, pikeman? They are laughing at us, and I shall make them pay for it.
Not the Mespeatches, Governor-General, I said. Their sachem told me—
I say they are laughing at us, and I shall wipe their mouths for it.
Kieft had rapped at the table to punctuate his pronouncement, rendering his audience into an embarrassed silence, and I thought it a shame I could not render him silent with my fist.
Let us go backwards for a moment, de Vries said. You mentioned the wheelwright.
He had a name, I said.
Pardon. You mentioned Mr. Rademaker. We have reason to believe the murderer was an Indian seeking revenge. A Dutchman killed one of his kinsman and since then he has wanted to kill a white man, any white man. It seems Mr. Rademaker was unlucky.
That’s one way to put it, I said.
De Vries said nothing.
And I thought to myself the story fit what Katonah had told me, but my heart was no easier for it, especially since Kieft was using the murder as a pretext for an attack.
De Vries made one more attempt to sway him.
Governor-General, you are risking a full-on war with every Indian between here and Fort Orange, and the Company shall not come out the better for it, for we are neither as numerous nor as organized as the English. I shall lose my own investments. My cattle and corn and tobacco will be lost. More importantly you will in effect be murdering our own people. The Indians will retaliate, as they always do, and Dutchmen will die. I am sure that Mr. de Waard agrees.
Of course I agree, I said. My family, my home, will be at risk. As for my business, all my pelts are presently in the hands of Indians.
I shall wipe their mouths, Kieft said again. And you, pikeman: you will help. And take this strapping son of yours with you.
To Pavonia.
We were at the beachhead at the edge of the North River where it emptied into the wide bay while the soldiers assembled, with slovenly carriages and carelessly held arms, their boots crunching on the oyster shells. The cold had come in hard, so the men started driftwood fires, and they grouped around them drinking and tossing dice. The highest-ranking man was an ensign who sat alone, wrapped in a blanket, with his back to the largest fire. There were no officers. Meanwhile the good people of New Amsterdam went about their business, with wheelbarrows or baskets of fish, or the merchants in pairs.
I don't want to fight, Hendrick said.
You won't fight.
Is this why we train? So I'd become a soldier like you were?
We train so you can protect yourself.
And now here I am a soldier anyway.
You are not a soldier, and you will not fight. Now let me think.
I wanted to send him back across the river immediately, but then he risked punishment—I had a terrible image of Hendrick strapped to the wooden horse. Of course, he now risked worse fates in battle. And yet, although it may have been stupid of me—his mother would surely think so—I thought his odds were better with me at his side.
I thought: Fuck you, Claes. If you had been more cautious, my son would be home right now. And once again I felt the fool, for I had forgotten to pass along his money.
Enough. I put away my regrets and my fears, and I ran through various scenarios in my mind, and how I would react in each of them, and I pieced together a plan for saving both our arses.
At dusk two small ships appeared. We were rowed out to one and as the sky purpled, we were on our way. The deck was crowded, the soldiers making a fair amount of noise, passing wineskins and bottles. If the enemy was in the smallest way competent, this lot was fucked.
The ensign appeared at my shoulder, reeking of woodsmoke and brandy.
We'll land downstream and march to Pavonia, where we shall catch them unawares. What do you think, pikeman?
Oh, they know we're coming.
How could they know?
How could they not?
He laughed. Fuck off, pikeman.
I drove the wind from his belly with my fist.
Talk to me like that again and I'll separate you from your bollocks.
He nodded and moved away, his eyes wide as dinner plates, the men nearby suddenly quite interested in the rigging.
I turned to Hendrick, who was white as a herring.
I don't want to do this, he said.
Before I could reply, he leaned over the rail to spew. I kept hold of his arm, as much for his comfort as mine.
Night had nearly arrived as we approached the frozen marsh grasses at the shoreline. As the soldiers went into the skiffs, I had Hendrick hang back with me, until we were the last men on the last skiff, the oars in the lapping water, the cold gripping like iron. Then we were splashing through icy water and onto dry ground, the soldiers in file, each man's hand on the shoulder before him. Through the trees, firelight became evident, and at a word from the ensign the men began to run. I pulled Hendrick from the path, and we waited, pressed against each other for warmth. We heard the reports of the guns and shouting, all of which continued for several minutes. But something was off: I heard no war cries or returning fire. The noises seemed one-sided, until the wailing went up, and I grasped it, finally.
I took Hendrick by the arm again, and we advanced through the wood.
Father, what are you doing?
Hush, I said.
We stepped from the wood into the clearing before the de Vries house, with light from a bonfire and flickering torches. Men and women lay in the dirt with hands or legs cut off alongside children hacked to pieces. An infant, impaled by a dagger, was still strapped to its board. A man cradled his own entrails. Other bodies were marked by the blooming holes of gunshot wounds. All were Indians, perhaps fifty or sixty dead or wounded, and there were no warriors here, only women and children and old men who had sought protection from the Mahicans. Kieft had sent us anyway, to teach the savages a lesson.
The soldiers were celebrating their victory with a cask plundered from de Vries's cellar. My eyes landed on the ensign, who beyond the torchlight was preparing to mount a woman. I kicked him in the kidney, and when he rose and came at me, my fist sent his teeth clattering like pebbles. I lifted the woman to her feet.
Run, I said. Hendrick, tell her to run.
While he did so, I found a torch, and I had Hendrick follow me through the wood to where the skiffs had been inexpertly hidden. We climbed into one and took to the oars, Hendrick sobbing as he rowed.
We pulled at the oars, and pulled, and the exhaustion I felt was so profound I had to shake my head to dispel moments of dizziness. With relief I noted the watch lights at the distant fort, so we would not have to navigate without direction.
Hendrick said, We could have helped more of them.
If Kieft's men had seen us interfering, they'd have killed us as well.
I did not add I would let a thousand of any kind die before allowing my son to come to harm.
Hendrick, I said. What do you want from life? What do you want for yourself?
You're asking now?
I am asking now.
All right. I want to study languages.
You already do.
No. I mean at a university.
Ah.
It is a stupid thing to wish for.
On the contrary, I said.
I held my tongue thereafter, to save my strength for the rowing, and for the tasks ahead: auctioning the pelts and the livestock. Preparing the provisions necessary to keep us all healthy on the passage back to the United Provinces. And somehow beforehand, with the ground still frozen, burying Claes. And I wondered how I’d explain it all to Anneka, why we had to leave behind all we’d built together, and Geertruyt and Nicolaes. And I recalled as my arms trembled with each dip of the oar how the shaft of the pike vibrated when you maneuvered it rightly, and the cruel satisfaction in my heart as the blade pierced the Spanish boy’s neck, and the shame still burning in my breast.
Gordon Haber's recent fiction has appeared in Necessary Fiction, Bodega and The Short Story Project. This story arrived when he became curious about the Dutch place names up and down the Hudson Valley in present-day New York State and learned about the tangled and often violent history of the New Netherlands. You can find links to other stories here.
