319Chapter 38: Little Boy Blue
"I now pronounce you man and wife."
There was a short pause as Tom and I exchanged glances.
"You're forgettin' a line, Jack," informed the Irishman, pushing the words through tight, impatient lips.
"What am I missing?" asked our beloved captain, who was candidly acting as priest for the benefit of the rest of our voyage.
"Nothing," I interrupted, my tone cheery out of nervousness. I reached forward, took the Bible from Jack's hands and shut it. Tom scoffed at me.
"How do ye expect t'get married if we don't—"
"I said the 'I do.' Why must I do more?" I argued, baring my teeth slightly at him and swatting him with the small bouquet of flowers Cordelia had given me for the occasion. "It's not like we're legally married anyway."
"If ye read the fine print, you are," explained Jack, pointing at the Bible. I flung the holy book in Hernán's direction, hoping the Catholic Spaniard would catch it. He didn't, and the sacred text flopped to the deck, and I was assured my place in hell. "How your marriage documents come about, however, will be through illegal means."
"In other words, this marriage is essentially null and void," I clarified, confident in my analysis. Tom expelled an exasperated sigh at my stubbornness.
"Kiss the damn man already, bonita!" hooted Guerra, pumping his fist in the air.
"Why don't you kiss him?" I snarled; and suddenly shifting into faux despair, I turned to Jack. "This has been taken clearly out of proportion. You and I both know it was never meant to turn out this way!"
My father looked at me in bewilderment.
"I thought you wanted this wedding," he said.
"I didn't want it. You needed it!" I screeched. I spun around and gestured at the witnesses of my holy vows. "And now the whole bloody crew decides to watch, dabbing at their teary eyes when this is all, really just—"
Hernán shouted something in Spanish, and though I doubted O'Brien understood what he said, it was enough of an excuse for the Irishman to take me in his arms and end my longwinded rant with an even longer kiss.
And that was how I became conjoined with Tom O'Brien in the sacrament of holy matrimony. Fortunately, I didn't have to bear his name and neither did he. We were illegally declared Mr. and Mrs. Lucas, and we were on our way to visit our dear South African cousins for a brief time to mind their newborn son as they attended the funeral of their grandfather. The unnecessary hype concerning my mock wedding was simply that. Give a few pirates an excuse to celebrate and drink, and they will take it, even if the excuse itself is simply a guise; and all of us did, in fact, get very high in altitudes the night Tom and I were "wedded."
"I don't understand how I always get caught up in these things," I muttered to Roland as I packed my belongings in a trunk the following morning. I dumped a few loaded pistols and a dagger in the chest before shutting and locking it.
"Well, as one of the three females on the crew, of course you are going to be singled out to do certain tasks. It gives you plenty of opportunity to prove your worth, sister, or rather, Mrs. Lucas." He ended with a low chuckle.
We were anchored by the South African port of Cape Town, nestled in a calm pool of turquoise waters wreathed in light, white foam. In the distance, the city was visible as a jagged line across the pale horizon, and the masts of docked ships were barely distinguishable as thin wooden spikes. Gulls flew leisurely overhead in the mild, temperate air, congregating in greater numbers above the city and flocking in puffs of white swerving over the Dutch establishment—quiet and subtle in their dissonance. I came up from my cabin heaving my trunk with Roland's assistance. Upon reaching the deck, I gazed out at our close destination.
"It's a beautiful day," my brother commented, letting go of his trunk handle without warning so that he could stretch his arms. The heavy thing dropped to the deck with a clunk and almost pulled my shoulder out of its socket.
"You sound like Grandfather," I remarked, rubbing the sore limb and setting my end of the chest carefully down before going to meet my "husband" by the rail of the Pearl.
He saw me approach and welcomed me with his arms open, expecting an embrace which I hesitantly gave him.
"Well, don't you look nice in your pretty green dress," he teased, lightly pinching my blushing cheek.
"Cord selected it," I allowed, gently pushing his hand away from my face. "She said it would compliment your eyes, even though you're not the one wearing it."
"You are gonna be right by my side, Astrid," he contended. He reached for both my hands and I wasn't quick enough to pull away, resulting in me getting reeled towards him rather than moving backwards.
I didn't argue any further. There I had the perfect excuse to show affection to him and yet nothing came of it, and I did not understand why. After all, we were "married." In that instant, my mind thought up a pretty long list of things we could get away with using such an excuse.
"Ye ready to go, sister?" asked Roland as he called to us from behind. He was preparing to go down into the boat that would take us to shore. Tom and I would not (and, thank God, could not) solely be in charge of the mission. Roland was to accompany us as our "English" friend. We were well aware that there were some British in South Africa, and even though Tom and I were supposed to act as people of Dutch descent, we'd still need Roland and his nationalism to get us by any suspicious Britons.
"She'll be ready in a minute," answered Tom. I glared at him for giving Roland a response for me and he only grinned.
In a matter of minutes, all three of us were sitting in the cutter that would take us to shore, Roland and Tom already with their oars in hand; and after waving a few goodbyes and issuing a few promises to Jack that we would do our jobs as well as we possibly could, we set off, plowing through the tame, blue-green waves. All three of us remained silent on the way to shore, but my ears throbbed with noise. It took a long time for the hoots and cheers of our male-dominated crew to recede from my burning ears, no thanks to cocky Mr. O'Brien. My fingers tapped impatiently against my throbbing lips as I sat there in the boat with the sun shooting down on us in long, straight rays and with my girlish squeals of delight resonating in my head. It was no surprise if I sputtered out a short giggle randomly into the silence. I had every reason to be happy.
We stored and hid our boat in some foliage by the harbor, careful to keep it hidden from the eyes of suspicious sailors and British officers. With that deed done, the three of us ventured into the seaside town, my arm linked with Tom's and Roland walking ahead of us as he scouted the buildings for a good place to take repose and discuss the details of our plan.
We stopped by a tavern that allowed us to eat and sit outside (since it was such a "beautiful day" as dear brother previously proclaimed), and as we took seats at a table bathed in sunshine, Roland took the leadership role and placed a few paper documents on the table, safely away from the plates of stew and tankards of ale we were feasting on.
He looked at Tom and me from the other side of the table and paged through the leaflets.
"I still can't believe that we can actually do this," he said, mostly to himself. "What are the chances of intercepting a mail-ship and finding a letter that gives us the perfect opportunity to seek out a blue diamond in this city?"
Roland found the page he was looking for and brought it out. It was the letter we had stolen from the mail-ship that contained all the information about the situation we were about to immerse ourselves in.
"More so, as soon as we come near the port, we are able to track down the family, find a bit of information about them, and happen to discover that they possess a remarkable heirloom with an uncanny resemblance to the jewel we are seeking." His amazement was impeccably pure. He reminded me of Cavanaugh whenever the doctor made some startling discovery in the specimens he was studying.
"It must be because of Señor Suerte," I opined jokingly, half-believing it myself. What ever would we do without our good luck charm?
"I believe that," allowed Tom as he stroked his goatee. "After all, as soon as he spoke at the wedding yesterday, I took Astrid in a loving embrace and—"
"You've made your point, O'Brien," Roland cut off. Clearly, he didn't need to be reminded of the unneeded display of affection because to him, Tom and I were simply "acting" our parts. "We need to find a carriage that will hold our luggage for us until we arrive at…" He scanned the letter for a name. "… the Van den Akker residence." He paused and scraped his fingers against his scalp. "Well, ain't that a mouthful," he remarked.
The two men drifted off into conversation concerned with finding us a coach, and while they discoursed, I sat leaning against Tom's sturdy arm, my face awash in the intense sunlight and a frail wind blowing about my pinned and curled hair. It honestly was a matter of fortune. On our way back from India, Hernán spotted a ship in the distance. Jack gave the order for Tom and his Frenchies to act as agents of France and demand an inspection. The ship, carrying a hefty amount of mail from South Africa, agreed, as it had only a crew of thirty Dutch sailors. Whilst rummaging through the letters and packages, it was Hernán again who found the letter that would earn us a spot in the home of the Van den Akkers. Mr. Van den Akker apparently was requesting the presence of his brother and his family to take care of his newborn son while he and his wife attended the funeral of their grandfather in the Netherlands. His brother lived in Singapore, and that made him the closest relative. The letter was his brother's reply to the request.
"Here is our invitation," praised Jack. "Let's get rid of it." And he tossed the letter overboard with such careless whimsy that he had us a bit worried.
In the letter's stead, we would compose our own response. Mr. Van den Akker's brother would be "occupied" with the sudden death of a close friend and would be unable to care for the baby. Fortunately, he would send in his place his wife's English cousins (with Dutch descent) who were a newly married couple thinking about raising children of their own. The letter was sent promptly after it was written.
We dawdled for a few weeks at sea, waiting to intercept the next mail-ship, and when we did, we found Mr. Van den Akker's acceptance of his brother's arrangement. From then onward, it was simply some coaching on the part of Sefu to teach Tom and me some words in Afrikaans and some intricate lying to create Tom and mine's false histories.
Upon citing Cape Town some few weeks later, it was off into the city to do some investigation on the family and, possibly, the diamond we were seeking. Once again, it was Hernán who came back to the ship one evening with the important, pivotal news, and he found out that the Van den Akker's themselves possessed a pricey heirloom in their abode. How he found such a discovery, no one knew. He was, plainly, just damned lucky.
So it was with Hernán's prized information that we ventured into town that morning ready to execute our plan.
"Shall we head off then?" asked Roland, plucking me from my daydreams.
"Find a carriage first," I ordered, flicking my eyes towards the large trunk I had had to heave around. "I'll wait here while you two find one."
The men looked questioningly at me before looking at each other and nodding at my proposal.
"Don't run away," Tom commanded, earnestly to my surprise. "A runaway bride is the last thing I need."
I merely smiled at him and gave his rugged face a few pats.
"I'll stay right here," I promised.
At their leave, I reclined back in my chair, soaking in the sunshine and falling back into my warm, tranquil daydreams. I remained alone for only a brief time. Before I knew it, a young man had found me, and I welcomed him with a bright smile and a subtle bat of the eyelashes. Seeing as I was sitting all by me onesies, he took a seat across from me and spoke casually of his recent adventures in the city while I ordered some refreshments for the both of us.
"You're lucky to be alive," I commented, swirling the creamy tea in my cup mindlessly.
"You have no idea," he replied, smirking as if recalling many of his life-or-death situations. "With the job I have, it's expected."
"I can imagine," I smiled, snickering as I bit into a tea biscuit.
My friendly company left before Roland and Tom returned with the sought-after carriage. The Irishman noticed that there were two tea cups and two dishes of half eaten biscuits on the table.
"What's all this?" he asked irritably. We were "married" for barely two days and already he was overprotective.
"Someone nice stopped by," I shrugged, getting up from my seat and giving Tom a well-needed embrace of assurance. Even if I was his false bride, a good wife I'd be to him for as long as I needed to act the part. "I see you found a carriage." I began to pull away, but was stopped halfway through my escape, and there was no way I could avoid (even if I wanted to) the bewitching lure of a genuine Tom O'Brien embrace.
We were taken to the Van den Akker residence without further ado, and the house was certainly not what I expected. It was built in the typical European style, looking misplaced in the foreign territory of South Africa. It was square, white, and of massive proportions. The only startling aspect about it was that it was located within the city itself. It was not situated in the calm, less populated outskirts of the port. Rather, it sat smack in the middle of the bustling city, allowing for any suspicious activity to be documented with strict detail.
"This will prove a predicament," Roland grunted as he stepped out of the carriage and tromped over to the black double doors at the entrance of the building.
Tom helped me out of the coach, and hand-in-hand, we followed Roland's path and stood beside brother dear at the doorstep. We were greeted by a young maid who quickly alerted her Master and Mistress of our arrivals, and we were allowed into the foyer to wait as Mr. and Mrs. Van den Akker abandoned their daily doings to speak with us.
Roland stood prim and neat in his new britches and coat, all courtesy of Captain Jack who used the heaps of gold we gathered from fat sharks to fund the many misadventures we would embark on. Tom was dressed similarly and his discomfort in the garments was apparent. The normally blithe Irishman was presently antsy and aggravated, constantly pulling at the sleeves of his jacket or scratching at the itchy wool stockings he had to wear. He cursed frequently under his breath at the damned clothing.
I had imagined Mr. and Mrs. Van den Akker to be what a typical Dutch couple was in my eyes: tall and blond with blue eyes. The two people that greeted us, however, did not fit my archetype of married Dutch duos. Mr. Van den Akker was a short man with light brown hair and bright grey eyes, and very prominent side-whiskers. His wife, on the other hand, was a very thin, petite woman, with strawberry blond hair and striking blue eyes.
"Welkom!" they cried simultaneously, catching all three of us entirely off guard. It took me a second to remember to curtsy, and I gave both men at my side slight nudges to remind them to bow. Mrs. Van den Akker went to each of us and shook our hands warmly, speaking to us in Dutch (because I could not understand what the hell she was saying). She had gotten to Tom by the time her husband kindly reminded her that, despite her enthusiasm, her guests were Dutch only in ancestry and spoke English.
"Oh," she realized, smiling in her embarrassment. "Pardon me." She stepped back, standing beside her husband again, and patiently waited for her spouse to greet us properly.
"I am very glad that you all are here," he welcomed heartily. "I am very sorry about my brother putting this burden on you, but I suppose both of us are cursed with ill fortune."
"It's our pleasure to be here, Meneer Van den Akker," said Roland, following his proper greeting with another practiced bow. "May I introduce Mr. Hendrik Lucas and his wife, Anna?"
At the announcement of our aliases, Tom and I paid our respects yet again before Mr. and Mrs. Van den Akker invited us into their drawing room for tea and further discussion of the responsibilities expected of us.
We sat for a few hours on their fine, spotless furniture, sipping hot tea from delicate white china and lifting freshly baked biscuits and tarts from gold-rimmed plates with quaint silver tongs. The refinery was making me maddeningly nervous. Tom ate and drank little, seeing as his training did not consist of how to drink and eat tea properly. If he knew how to take anything correctly, it was liquor, not tea. I managed to remain calm for the majority of our lively discussion, only because Roland kept a very casual and friendly mien. If he could do it, then I most surely could, too.
For preparing to leave for a funeral, the Van den Akkers seemed mighty cheery, and the charismatic couple even poked fun at Tom and I being "newly weds," inquiring as to how our honeymoon went and whether or not we agreed on having children any time soon. I let Tom handle those responses even though I knew he would speak crudely, but our hosts found it all enjoyable. Mr. Van den Akker even reminisced on his own newly wed days, which led him to bring up the subject of his infant son.
"Would you like to meet him? He is napping at the moment, but we will be quiet," proposed Mrs. Van den Akker, already getting up from her seat. I gathered that she was very proud of her baby.
All of us followed after her and traveled up a grand, winding staircase with a smooth, varnished railing of mahogany that gleamed in the daylight pouring through the many wide windows. She led us through a series of corridors where elegantly framed paintings hung over the pale green walls, and she stopped before a narrow door sandwiched between two bedrooms.
"This is his room. The rooms you will be staying in are the ones adjacent to it." And with that, she opened the door and revealed a brilliantly lit nursery where smack in the middle of it all was the infant bed, where the baby Tom, Roland and I would be responsible for lay on his back, gurgling and waving his chubby limbs into the air.
His mother greeted him with a string of indecipherable cooing as she picked him up from his bed and cradled him in her arms, making faces and giving kisses to her toothless, pudgy child.
She gestured at me to come forward and hold him, and despite declining, Roland pushed me to do it anyway. With complete and utter trust, she transferred his warm, swaddled little body into my arms and his round plump head turned up to look at me and I was instantly baffled by his eyes. They were a remarkable blue, bluer than I had ever seen in my entire life. Large and hypnotizing—almost as if the very essence of the untainted Caribbean sea was contained in his twinkling cerulean orbs.
He, undoubtedly, was a very beautiful baby.
"He has wonderful eyes," I commented, finding it safe to tap the small squishy nose of the infant.
"That's what everyone says," Mr. Van den Akker replied. "They are spellbound as soon as he looks at them."
"An accurate observation, I would say. What is his name?"
The Dutch couple looked at each other and beamed.
"Jacob."
I tapped impatiently on the glass of the windowpane, staring out into the quiet night of Cape Town, South Africa. The streets were dimly lit and empty save for a few drunken lurkers that stumbled over their steps in the clear, refreshing nocturnal hours. I sat by the window untouched by sleep or weariness, my head resting against the pane and my face bathed in the silvery moonlight that seeped through the limpid glass.
The Van den Akker house was silent for the most part, only to be disturbed by the abrupt murmurings and grunts coming from the bed in the room I was staying in. Tom was an antsy sleeper. He couldn't stay still or be silent for more than fifteen minutes. Whether it was a snore or a sigh, he disrupted the tranquil atmosphere nonetheless. Even the infant Jacob was more behaved than he was in the unconscious state of sleep.
The Van den Akkers departed for the funeral they were to attend three days after Tom, Roland and I made our first visit to their home. For the rest of that visit, they informed us of our responsibilities and what we were forbidden to do; and they also told us that their maid, Lieve, would arrive every morning to make us breakfast, remain during the day to provide additional help, and then would leave at night for her own home unless we requested that she stay. Although we weren't expecting a maid to be present in the house, Roland and Tom were confident in their pilfering abilities to elude her eyes. And if searching during the day failed, we could always search at night, when Lieve went home.
Other than that, we had nothing more to do but mind the house and entertain any callers who came by. Mr. and Mrs. Van den Akker were expected to return home in less than four weeks, and that gave us plenty of time to scour their house for the blue diamond.
The first night there, however, I could not sleep for reasons I would only disclose with a fellow female, and if not that, then with a man who actually had morals. And so I wasted the dying hours sitting by the window, watching the stars and listening to Tom snore behind me, waiting for my cue to move—that cue being Jacob's sudden crying, which did not come. What came was far more frightening.
I had been resting against the windowpane for some two hours, completely lost in a daze and slowly succumbing to sleep, when a face suddenly appeared on the other side of the glass, causing my heart to nearly leap out of my throat as I gasped and backed away in a panic, tripping over my two feet and falling hard on my bum as I gaped in horror at the invader.
The intruder, having witnessed my barefaced display of being scared out of my bloody wits, only laughed and knocked against the window, requesting entrance; and after gathering myself with an angry huff and trudging over to the window with a hiss, I granted his wish and let him in.
"What the bloody hell are you doing here?" I demanded, though at a whisper. I did not want to rouse the baby… or Tom and Roland for that matter.
"To check on you and your husband," answered the Spaniard, his eyes shifting towards Tom's frame lying cozy in the bed we were supposed to share. "I'm surprised you're up."
"But why are you here?"
"Jack sent me."
Of course. Daddy would never find me capable of handling things on my own. For having left me for ten years, I would assume that he'd have no problem with the things I did alone or with men; apparently, proximity played a role in how much of a father he was, which wasn't much to begin with. Though, it was still enough to annoy me.
"You can tell him that we're doing fine, and if it will ease his apprehensions, I am not sleeping with Tom, savvy?"
Hernán shrugged and conceded well enough to my wishes, but not before asking the question I did not want to answer:
"Why not?"
Sadly for him, I was in no mood to be accepting of curiosity and I scowled at him, retreating back to my seat by the window and ignoring the fact that both he and Tom were present in my room. I set my glare on the harmless moon, filling my eyes with its white, celestial light until I felt my anger ebb from my veins. From the reflection in the glass, I could see Hernán standing at the foot of the bed, his arms crossed as he appeared to observe the slumbering Irishman with perceptive concentration. Whatever the Spaniard was thinking, he thought it through and left his spot at the bedpost and proceeded to rummage through the drawers and wardrobe in the room, pulling at handles, digging through cubbies, muttering to himself as the noise from his poking around and Tom's snores began to make my ears twitch.
I knew what he was looking for. Tom and I had already combed through our bedroom before we went to bed, our eyes bent on finding anything blue, crystal, and shiny, but I didn't bother to tell Hernán that we had already looked in all the places he was now looking in. When he yielded no results in my room, he left and ventured into the baby's, which put me slightly on my toes. Even if I had only met the baby once before, I was determined not to make him cry, and if the Spaniard disrupted the child's slumber, Roland and Tom would wake and all the peaceful silence of the night would dissipate like the wispy trail of smoke from a blown out candle.
But Señor Suerte was true to his name and returned to my room some half hour later, his hands empty but still bearing the same silence I wanted to preserve.
"The diamond's not in your brother's room," he whispered, running a hand through his short, brown hair.
"I thought you checked the baby's room," I replied. Any hint of interest was dead in my voice.
"I didn't want to wake him," he admitted, coming towards the window and opening it so he could prepare his leave. "I'll come back tomorrow."
"You're not part of this expedition, Hernán," I told him curtly, getting up from my seat and blocking his exit. He took a step back and folded his arms across his chest, raising his eyebrow at me and smirking. I clenched my fists. "I mean, I know you are, but Tom, Roland and I can handle this ourselves. You said yourself that your particular job for this mission is dangerous. You shouldn't do too much."
His grin would not fade away and it aggravated me. It was the same snide and omniscient curve of the lips so many men showed me when they knew something I didn't, when they knew that they had the upper hand and I was helpless. I hated that smile.
"Why are you angry, Astrid?" he asked, and I thought he had asked it out of spite and I growled at him, appalled at his gall. I was even ready to slap him for it, too. My hand was already up in the air, aimed at making contact with the side of his face.
But then he lost his grin and he took a defensive step forward, letting his folded arms fall to his sides as he looked down at me.
"I am not angry," I answered bitterly. "I just want you to leave. I want you to leave me alone. God, why do you always have to be right? Why are you always so bloody right about everything!"
I sank back in my chair, wiping my eyes quickly before things worsened. I glanced over at Tom, wanting to just lie secure in his arms but he wouldn't give that to me. He just wanted what any selfish man would want in bed, and I was tired of playing the whore. Tired of playing the object. Only, it seemed like that was all I was able to do.
Wordlessly, Hernán shut the window he was going to climb out of and took a seat opposite me and beckoned me to speak. I only glowered at him, having heard of his own reputation as a libertine when at port. He was no different from Tom or any other man.
"You wouldn't understand," I snorted. It was a pathetic excuse, but I didn't want to talk to him.
He sighed and leaned back in his chair, and he peered out the window, his gaze glossing over the moon.
"You're right," he said suddenly, catching me off guard. "I'm no better than Tom or Jack in terms of my behavior in port. I get rum and I get salty wenches. But my morals aren't the issue, I don't think." He paused. "What I think is important is that I'm honest. I don't like you, and I think you are the worst pirate I have ever seen in my entire life, but I trust you. How's that for honesty?"
After a biting comment like that, I was obliged to have him stay the night, which, surprisingly, was not unpleasant. I woke up to the bright morning in the arms of my Irishman, revived by a sweet breeze blowing through my open window. After getting up and throwing on a robe, our temporary maid, Lieve, came into our room, uncannily cheery. Her face was flushed and there was a persistent laughter in her voice.
"Did you have a nice sleep, Mevrouw Lucas?" she asked me, beaming as she set a bowl and pitcher of water on our nightstand.
"I did," I returned, somewhat curious over her behavior. "Did you?"
She sputtered out a giggle at that and blushed furiously.
Ah. No need to explain.
Hernán returned that afternoon, properly disguised as a business caller. Needless to say, Lieve was rather animated during his visit and the Spaniard distracted her quite well while Roland, Tom and I continued to scour the house for the diamond… and mind baby Jacob, of course.
Two weeks passed and still there was no diamond to be found. At that point, we had searched the entire Van den Akker home thrice over to no avail. The ever-prized azure gem was nowhere to be found, and to be honest, I was getting tired of tending to the demands and needs of a baby during all hours of the day. The smell of soiled diapers (which I had had to remove, but not clean, on numerous occasions) seemed permanently adhered to my hair; and Tom remarked, when the two of us prepared for bed at night, that I smelled acutely like "piss and…" Well, you get the idea. And I would come back with:
"Well, you don't exactly smell like a basket of roses, either, ye paddy ragabash."
"Looks as if some poppet's enhanced her vocabulary, eh?" he'd say, taking hold of me and tickling me as punishment for my silly insults until tears leaked out of my eyes. Our gallivanting often attracted the attention of both Roland and baby Jacob, and brother dear would barge into our room, yelling at us to quiet down so he could sleep; his shouts, in turn, would wake our little Jacob and we'd all be obliged to calm the tubby mammothrept before we could settle down into slumber.
Only, one night, Jacob would not stop crying.
The evening the young infant Van den Akker could not cease howling was some three weeks into our stay at the Dutch couple's home; and still, the diamond remained frustratingly hidden. Tom had long since abandoned his fatherly duties and decided, without my agreement, to continue the pitiful search for the cerulean jewel. Roland, opting for the less noisy of the two tasks, joined him despite my commands, promising that he would "come back later" to help me when he had done some sufficient searching.
I did not believe his lies for a second.
And so I was left to battle the cries of the hysterical babe until some miracle moved the child to silence himself. I did not understand why he would be in such a bad temper. I had fed him, I had changed his nappy some five times within the last hour, and I had kept him far from any sharp or dangerous objects that could possibly have scratched or harmed him. Why he was howling as fervently as a lone wolf during a full moon, I did not know; and I was in no mood to find out. My ears were ringing with a passion, and my temples throbbed heatedly against the sides of my pounding skull.
I pleaded to the baby many times already to quiet down, and I was sorely sorry for having sent Lieve home at the moment Jacob woke from his nap. Hernán had gone to escort her to her house and I knew it would be quite a while before I could depend on his assistance (he often stayed with the Dutch servant girl for hours); but on the day when the normally well-behaved baby decided to throw a tantrum, the normally distracted Spaniard returned to his duties earlier than usual. Hernán took one step into the nursery and then pivoted completely on his heel before heading back out, the palms of his hands already pressed against his ears.
"Wait!" I shouted, racing after him with the thrashing Jacob on my hip. "Come back, God dammit!"
He quickened his steps—Ooh, you little fiend!—and hurried down the stairs. I followed him, and the baby's cries echoed with amazing force in the large, nearly empty home as I trailed Hernán through the foyer and into the drawing room, where Tom and Roland happened to be seated, drinking whiskey out of the Van den Akker's fine crystal glasses.
My eyes blazed at their sloth.
"Oh God, Astrid!" whined O'Brien. "I come here to escape that thing's bloody yowls and you bring it all back and ruin my hour of happiness!"
"Shut yer puling, you lout!" I screamed, outraged at the lack of support coming from my crewmates. Tom waved it off with a rude turn of the head, and I had the greatest urge to beat that same head over with the whiskey bottle.
"Just give him a few drops of poteen," he suggested drily. "That'll knock him out, the noisy little bugger."
Without knowing it, I cradled Jacob all the closer to me, and I gawked at Tom with pure, disgusted awe.
"How can you even propose that? He's a baby!"
"A noisy one," Roland put in, sticking a finger in his ear with a grimace.
With a roll of my eyes, I immersed myself fully in their circle of laziness, standing in the middle of the drawing room with the wailing baby on my aching hip. My lecture was already formed in my head, and I was ready to give it, too, but as soon as I opened my mouth, Hernán finally chose to help me in a way that I did not really expect or want.
"I suggest you help her," he said in his usual nonchalant manner. "The serving girl told me some rather disturbing news concerning our stay here, in this home, and I'm not going to tell any of you until that baby is asleep."
The Spaniard's ploy worked well enough, and Roland and Tom, although slightly inebriated from their consumption of the whiskey, assisted me in the mission to calm the difficult child. We did not succeed in getting Jacob to sleep, but we did quiet him for the most part. He still remained slightly on edge, however, and we knew we would have to be very, very careful around the house so as not to agitate the already fussy baby. When Hernán told us the dreadful news he had gathered, Jacob was on his infant bed, gnawing angrily on a biscuit Roland had nabbed from the kitchen.
Upon hearing the information, I scowled and tightened my fists. I would have exploded into a full blown panic if Tom had not kept his arms around me, loosening my taut nerves with a gentle pat and rub on the shoulders.
"They cannot arrive tomorrow afternoon!" I cried, my hands already flying to my face and pulling at the skin under my tired eyes. "We haven't even found the diamond yet! Jack planned for this mission to be simple and harmless."
"We saw how well that turned out," Roland muttered. I shot him a look.
"You do not criticize the ways of my father, Roland," I seethed. "Captain Jack Sparrow is the greatest pirate that ever lived and he doesn't need your pitiful complaining!" And after that rare moment of supporting Jack and his daft ways, I turned to the more important issue at hand.
"We need to find this diamond," I said to the lads, my tone grave. "We need to find it tonight."
"Do we have any clues?" inquired the Spaniard.
"Yes, we do. A clue." I pulled the same piece of paper that came from the Maharaja's diamond's case and handed it to him. "A page from a children's book. We already had it interpreted. Little Boy Blue, it says. Not helpful at all, in my opinion."
Hernán pursed his lips, folded the piece of paper back up and stuck it in his pocket. That disposable grin resurfaced on his face, earning a cold, suspicious and threatening glare from me.
"Let's start searching, shall we?" he proposed innocently. He gestured for me to exit—"Ladies first," he taunted—and I gave him a pinch in the side for his smugness and cheek, which he found as an invitation to irritate me further.
"Your wife is vicious, O'Brien," he chuckled, following me closely and sliding his arm around my waist. I snorted.
"Vicious?" replied Tom, seemingly shocked. "Just wait until you hear what she does in bed!"
Low, manly chortles all around.
"You bastards," I growl. "You bloody bleeding heaps of pestilent cowhearted yeasty codpieces. Damn you all to hell."
We sat defeated in the drawing room, nearly lifeless as we lay splayed out over the furniture, our minds dead and our eyes coated with a film of thick fatigue.
No diamond.
We had torn the place apart without even bothering to put things back in their places. That was how desperate we were, and still, we found nothing. We found mounds of other treasures—pearls, golden jewelry, silver, ivory disks, rubies, emeralds—but no diamond. No damned bloody blue diamond.
Dawn was fast approaching, the sky already lightening to its normal soft, pale violent as the horizon began to glow. I sat on the sofa, leaning mute against Tom who was adequately drowned in his slumber. In my arms was Jacob, who rested his soft, fuzzy little head against my breast, his raw and pink tiny thumb wedged between his small pouting lips. I looked down at the tamed child and his merry blue eyes winked at me, but anything of that hue only moved me to recall our present and very unlucky dilemma.
A sudden dissonance coming from the back of the house jolted us all into conscious states of mind, and we all reacted with some sort of jump into the air before Hernán left his place of repose, a cushy armchair, to investigate. What followed was a feminine shriek, and I knew that it was Lieve, entering the house through the backdoor and being surprised to see her foreign béguin standing groggily in the middle of the kitchen. That was not the first time she screamed, however, as she expelled many more shrill cries upon seeing the state of the house—how all the books were piled up on the floor instead of being neat and tidy on the shelves, how drawers were pulled out, their contents spilling over their edges, how furniture was tipped over or moved, how all the liquor was drunk, how rugs and paintings and curtains were all ripped from their corresponding walls and floors. She must have thought us mad.
She herself was very mad when she found our decaying forms in the drawing room.
"Meneer and Mevrouw Lucas, this is an outrage!" she burst. "My master and mistress will be here by sunset and the state of the house is a catastrophe!"
We said nothing.
"What on earth were you thinking when you did this? Complete disrespect for my master and mistress…" She continued to fume about our indecencies, and she had worked up quite a fit—complete with a cherry red face, throbbing temples and blazing eyes—when Hernán interrupted her with a smooth and calm:
"Do you know where your master and mistress keep their family heirloom?"
"Why?" she asked. For all her doting on Hernán, she was quick to display her suspicions.
"We were occupied last night by a thief," he explained coolly, almost as if it was an unimportant matter. Lieve's eyes grew rounder and larger.
"A thief? Here? Why did you not send for anyone!"
"The thief came in disguise," he said. "Around midnight, we received an odd call at the door. A middle aged man and his young son were there, seemingly in bad shape and seeking our assistance. Of course we provided them with it. We gave them a room and bed, we even had a nice chat and used some spirits to liven their spirits. After we had gone off to bed—this was perhaps around three—we began to hear some commotion going on below, and we woke and found this man and his sun ransacking the house!"
Hernán, at his voice's crescendo at the end of his part of the tale-telling, sent us a look, commanding us to continue his tricksy fib.
"We tried to stop them," I said, adding a touch of dread and panic to my voice. "But they pulled guns out of their jacket sleeves and threatened to harm one of us or the baby if we did not help them!" I heaved a sob out at the "terrible" incident.
"We had no choice but to comply," Roland contributed, convincingly apologetic in his tone. "When they couldn't find what they were looking for, they threatened to harm us anyway. Meneer Lucas took a defensive position, but he was knocked out cold with one of the pistols. We were startled when you arrived because we thought you were the burglars."
Lieve clearly looked sorry for having scolded us for being a bit sloppy.
"I'm asking you where the Lord and Lady keep their heirloom so that we can re-hide it in a safer place should those despicable thieves return. They must have known that the Van den Akkers would be out of town," said Hernán.
"You must tell the authorities about this," suggested Lieve. "We cannot have this happen again."
"The heirloom, Lieve," Hernán reiterated, somewhat harshly. "Where is it?"
After smiling sheepishly and squeaking out a soft and incredulous "Oh," she led us up the stairs and into, of all rooms, the baby's nursery where she pointed to a paperweight sitting on the bookshelf. If anything, it looked like a simple rock with a series of markings engraved into it.
The lads and I stood gawping at the jagged rock as Lieve took it down from the shelf, handing it to her Spaniard first. Hernán ran his fingers over the thing, inspecting it with a furrowed brow and with something short of a grimace on his scrunched-up face. We were not expecting the heirloom to be some dull, brown miniature boulder, that's for sure.
"Th-Thank you, Lieve," Hernán managed to say. He placed it back on the shelf and cut his eyes to me. I read the look and piped out a cheery:
"Why don't you start breakfast, Lieve? I'll set to getting Jacob bathed and ready. We'll meet you downstairs for breakfast in an hour, how is that?"
The Boer girl gave her consent with a curtsy, and as she left, I noticed her give the Dago a slight pinch on the forearm and I smiled at the sneaky action. Hmm. She's going to be cooking something special for you, Donny.
As soon as she was out of the room, down the stairwell and well into making breakfast, I locked the nursery door and faced my male companions with a forced smile.
"Well, gentlemen, this day could not get any worse." I lifted Jacob off my hip and shook my head at him. "And don't you dare go off into one of your tantrums again, lovey," I chided, giving the babe a kiss on the nose as he laughed and gurgled at my empty threat.
"All this time we were lookin' for a bloody rock," mused Tom, scratching his head.
"We still are, in a way," said Roland, beckoning Hernán for the earthy heirloom. "The one we were expecting was just supposed to be… more… shiny-like and… blue."
"Well put, Turner," grunted the Spaniard, ill-amused with the innocent comment.
"Come now, laddies," I began, trying to regain some of my feminine composure. I sauntered over to Tom and slipped my arm around his. "We'll find another way out of this rut, but I think it's best if Jack doesn't know about our inescapable predicament, savvy?" My eyes were set on Hernán when I said the words. He had already acted as Jack's messenger on numerous instances. Their ensuing silence convinced me that they would try and think of something to do, and so I turned my attention back to baby Jacob and gave him a slight bounce.
"Time for a bath, my sweet," I smiled.
"Yes, please," grinned O'Brien. I gave him a playful swat about the gob, and before I could even stand on my tip-toes and greet my Irishman with his morning kiss, Roland let out a gag.
"It's morning, for God's sake. Show some decency to the new day."
I stuck my tongue out at him.
"What are you, Roland? Five?"
The situation remained in its moment of mute and cooperative futility, allowing us to separate in order to let off any resentment we held inside. Hernán found it best to assist his new, lovely Dutch maid, and Roland and Tom went off to make a round about the house, taking note of its many ins and outs should we have to suddenly pull an escape attempt out of the air. Jacob was in my care (as usual) and he did not like the idea of a bath and screamed until I swore the insides of my ears turned to mush. I gave him a variety of trinkets to entertain himself with—What about this wooden horse, eh? Or the rings around my neck? Do you like that? No? Well, how about this?—I turned and grabbed the first object my eyes set on and dropped the precious heirloom of the Van den Akkers into the wet, greedy hands of their son. To my amazement, he quieted, only to want to start gnawing on the chunk of rock. I decided against that idea as it would only make his toothless gums bleed, but he would not be parted from the stone.
"Fine," I scowled. "Go and eat the rock. See how it tastes." As if he understood me, the baby licked the bumpy surface of the heirloom and twitched after tasting it. From then on, he only splashed with it in the basin of water I had sat his soft bottom in.
Jacob was dry and partially wrapped in clean linens when I heard a stomping going up the stairs. I picked the baby up, and he picked up his new best friend, the rock, and we exited and stopped by the top railing of the staircase. Hurrying up them was the Spaniard, looking even more distraught.
"She's gone!" he exclaimed. My lack of expression did not change. To think he'd actually expect me to understand what it was he was shouting about. He caught on quickly and said, "Lieve! She's gone!"
"What do you mean she's gone?" I questioned, taking one step down the stairs. Jacob leaned over the arm that was holding him securely and began to beat the heirloom on the shiny railing.
"I went to the dining room to eat, and when I returned to the kitchen, she wasn't there. I called for her, she didn't answer. I suspect she's gone out on an errand."
I looked curiously at Hernán. He did seem rather worried over a simple servant girl.
"I think she's fine, Hernán. She's probably just gone out to get some ingredients for lunch or supper. Her master and mistress are returning today."
"I've considered that. But she would have invited me. She likes having me around to carry the baskets full of goods that she purchases. I suspect that she's gone out to tell the authorities about the supposed burglary."
My stare grew icy and he noticed it. He took a step backwards on the staircase.
"Why are you still here, then?" I said, affecting calmness in my voice. "Go out and bring her back!"
Jacob dropped the heirloom in that instant, causing me to let out another squeal as the bulky thing dropped from the top of the stairwell and broke apart on the floor. The house went dead silent and Spaniard, baby and stupid Mrs. Lucas stood dumb in their spots, eyes fixed on the crumbled remains of the Van den Akkers' precious possession. Roland and Tom came tumbling into the foyer where they received a good and close view of the now worthless piece of rock, and brother looked up at me, his eyes expressing his disbelief.
All of my companions switched their gazes to me, their faces now firm and grave, and I pointed a finger at the laughing baby in my arms.
"His fault," I blabbered out. "Wot'cha lookin' at me for?"
We all ended up gathering around the broken piece of hard earth, Jacob still clapping his fat hands delightedly in our presence as Roland bent down on one knee and inspected the damage. He brushed away the rubble and debris and…
"Oh, my God," he stammered, his hands now faintly quivering as he removed more pieces of rock. "It's… I see… Blue? Yes! My God!"
"What? What is it?" I demanded, crouching down with him.
And then I saw it. Smack in the midst of its rocky outer shell sat the blue diamond we had long been seeking, a withered piece of paper snug behind it. Roland took the jewel and its remaining rock shell and beat it on the floor until the rest of the stone pieces fell off, leaving just the azure gem and its accompanying piece of paper in the palm of his hands.
"Well, what'd you know?" He gave out a hoot. "It proved to be right after all. Thank you, Baby Jacob."
The wee child bubbled out his snorts and giggles and I could not help but bombard his fat, round face with many wet kisses of joy.
"Oh, you lovely baby, you!" I praised, lifting him up in the air and swinging him about. "How I love thee!"
"Christ, you know she's in love with someone when she starts gettin' poetic!" said Tom, joining in on the celebration and snatching the smiling baby in his arms as he tossed him up in the air, only to catch him safely in his strong arms. "How come you don't use that language with me?" he asked, looking at me as Jacob was flung into the air, shrieking with laughter.
"I don't think you'd appreciate poetry, Tommy," I replied, crossing my arms at having my dear baby taken from me.
"You're right. I hate poetry. You know me too well, bonnie." He winked at me and caught Jacob for the last time when the front doors of the house burst open and in marched Lieve and a team of English officers.
Oh, Lord.
I seized the diamond and paper out of Roland's hands, and, using Tom as a cover, stuffed the objects hastily down the front of my dress. I heard Hernán sniff as I did it.
"Well, that's surely one place these men will not check," he commented quietly, half-smirking.
"Which is exactly why I did it," I huffed, my hands on my chest as I made sure that the diamond was comfortable where it was. "Does it look all right?" I asked him, without thinking. His jaw dropped and after a few silent seconds, he managed to stammer out, "I guess they, I mean, it looks… normal." He cast his eyes away.
"Sorry," I murmured, the heat already painted on my cheeks. I came out of hiding behind Tom and took his arm, greeting Lieve and the officers who now stood in the foyer with us.
"Tell them what happened, Mevrouw Lucas," Lieve prompted. "They will take care of all of this before my master and mistress return."
I stared at her blankly. I couldn't remember the exact sequence of how the "theft" went because all four of us had fabricated a different part of the tale. Great. She had picked on the dumbest of the entire group to regurgitate the story in front of English officers. Splendid.
"Well, around midnight we received a knock on our doors from two men. They were looking for a place to stay and seemed very poor and out of sorts, so my husband and I"—I gestured at Tom, who graced them all with a short nod—"decided to let them stay the night. They seemed harmless and very exhausted, so we did not suspect them of treachery. But later that evening, we heard raucous noises coming from the lower levels and we woke and found them looting the house!"
One of the officers, the most senior and consequently, the leader of the troop, came up to me and took out a pad of paper and a piece of graphite.
"What did these men look like?" he asked, his eyes not leaving the paper as he waited for my response.
"I thought one was a boy. The man's son," intruded Lieve, growing disconcerted.
The officer looked at me and I smiled sheepishly.
"Forgive me. My memory is failing. I did not get any sleep last night." I made my eyes roll slightly back into my head as I pretended to falter a bit, and the officer, had already poised himself to catch me should I swoon. I recovered, however, and went on with the story.
Before I continued, Hernán kindly ushered Lieve out, suggesting that she make some tea and prepare some small cakes for the officers as, more likely than not, they would remain in the house for a good couple of hours discussing the investigation and would need some form of refreshment; and with the servant girl gone, locked up in the kitchen with her favored Spanish company, I could relate the story to my fellow Englishmen as it came to me in my imagination.
"As you can see, the Van den Akker house isn't exactly in good condition," I offered the men seats in the dining hall, as that was the only place in the house with a table and chairs that still stood upright. "So please forgive the informality."
"Easily done, Miss," replied the officer. Tom gave a low growl. "Ah, Missus, my apologies."
And so after munching on some breakfast rolls and coffee whilst chattering with pleasant investigators, my dear English friends decided it was time to actually get started on the hunt for the thieves. They bid us all a fond farewell and wished us a safe journey back to Singapore. Though, before they left, I was sure to ask them if they had come across any of the navy personnel I intimately knew.
"No, Mrs. Lucas," said one. "But I do have a young lieutenant from the late Resolve serving under my command. He is delivering a message for me. Perhaps you may come across him in the city and ask him yourself."
I hoped that it was either Johnson or Kennedy. They would surely know the whereabouts of Roland's and mine's seafaring friends.
The rest of the day commenced smoothly. Lieve and Hernán set to work on making the house presentable again while Tom, Roland and I packed our things. I removed the diamond from its, er, scandalous hiding spot and placed it in a small pouch I used to carry my coins. After that, it was just saying goodbye to the darling baby Jacob and waiting for the Van den Akkers to arrive.
The Dutch couple came home in good spirits, keeping their talk of the funeral brief as they reunited with their happy baby. They did invite us to stay for dinner but Roland insisted that we had a ship to catch. I did make an empty promise to visit them again one day to see how Jacob had grown, and they gladly admitted that they would eagerly await the day. After a few more farewells and many thanks, all of us were off into the carriage and given a ride down to the docks.
I leaned against Tom the entire time, reflecting how bittersweet our stay in South Africa was. As I was helped out of the carriage at the docks, I looked up and was greeted with the same beautiful blue sky, lush breezes and singing seagulls that welcomed me when I arrived.
"I will surely miss that baby, Tom," I said, resting the side of my face against his muscled arm. "Because of him we didn't fail our mission. You realize that, correct?"
"Aye, I do," he said.
"And I will miss his large, bright blue eyes, and his laugh and his tubby hands, and—" My eyes were beginning to water.
"Astrid, if you're hintin' at something, ye can just go ahead and say it," Tom teased, giving me a nudge with the arm I leaned against.
"Wot?" I looked up at him and read his eyes. "Oh, you can't possibly think that, I'd… we'd… You bloody nincompoop!" I gave the top of his head a slap before running my fingers through his bright red hair. And oh, the kiss that would have followed would have been so nice, with the sun shining in our faces and the air calm and warm. But, no. Such a kiss did not happen.
"Miss!" There came a call behind us. "Miss!"
I turned around, my arm still linked with Tom's and my throat tightened. I tried to swallow, but I could not. I tried to breathe, but I forgot how. My arm almost dropped out of Tom's before freezing up and clinging desperately back to him. I choked on the very air in my lungs.
"I believe you dropped your handkerchief, Miss."
In cold, intense fear, I looked down at the hand before me, my handkerchief tightly in its clutch; and when I did not take back the token, the hand withdrew and the body that it belonged to straightened up.
"It's nice to see you, Astrid," he said.
I swallowed down my frenzied heart and cast my pale, ashen face away from the haunting eyes of Lieutenant Victor Griffith.