The Covenant Part 11

Apprehension gripped the tiny group of settlers; as far as they knew, Holland was still at war with England, and since this intruder might be carrying a landing party, a quick muster was called, and Van Riebeeck said, 'We fight. We will never surrender Compagnie property.' But as the men prepared their muskets the lookout cried, 'Good news! It's a Dutch ship!' and all ran from the fort to greet the taut little craft.

Van Riebeeck was waiting when the ship's boat drew alongside the jetty his men were constructing, and as soon as the captain jumped smartly ash.o.r.e the good news was announced: 'Off Angola we ran upon a Portuguese merchant ship headed for Brazil. Short fight. We captured her. A little gold, a little silver, but scores of fine slaves.'

Van Riebeeck could not believe the words; for years he had been imploring his superiors in Java for slaves to work at the Cape, and now the captain was saying, 'We found two hundred and fifty on the Portuguese ship, but seventy-six died in our holds.' Many of the others were seriously ill, and some were boys and girls, of whom Van Riebeeck complained, 'They'll be of little use for the next four or five years.'

'Fetch the big one,' the captain cried. 'You'll want him for yourself, Commander.' Then, lowering his voice: 'In exchange for extra beef?'

When the boat returned, there standing in the bow, shackled heavily, stood the first black from Africa that Willem and the other Dutchmen had ever seen; all previous slaves had been private acquisitions from Madagascar, India or Malaya.

This man must have come from a family of some importance in Angola, for he had what could only be called a n.o.ble bearing: tall, broad-shouldered, wide of face. He was the kind of young man a military leader promotes to lieutenant after three days in the field, and as soon as Van Riebeeck saw him he decided to give him an important a.s.signment. He seemed destined to be the leader of the thousands of future slaves who would soon be joining the community.

'What's his name?' he asked, and a sailor replied, 'Jango.' It was an improbable name, corrupted no doubt from some Angolan word of specific meaning, and Van Riebeeck said, in the Portuguese dialect used by all who worked in the eastern oceans, 'Jango, come with me.' And as the tall black, hefting his chains, followed the commander to the fort, Willem thought: How majestic he is! More powerful than two Malays or three Indians.

For the next few days Commander van Riebeeck was occupied with a.s.signing tasks to his new slaves, reserving eleven of the best for the personal use of his wife, and with the arrival of blacks in force he judged that he had better tidy up the status of the slaves already at the Cape. So he summoned Willem to his quarters and asked, 'Van Doorn, what are we going to do about this girl Deborah?'

'Van Valck wants to marry his Malaccan girl. I want to marry Deborah.'

'That would be most unwise.'

'Why?'

'Because you're the brother of an important official in the Compagnie.'

'She's to have another child.'

'd.a.m.n!' The preoccupied little man strode back and forth. 'Why can't you worthless men control yourselves?' He had brought his wife with him, and two nieces, so that he felt no lack of feminine companionship; he believed that men like Van Doorn and Van Valck should wait until suitable Dutch women arrived from Holland, and if this took nine or ten years, the men must be patient.

'I'm thirty-three,' Willem said. 'And I feel I must marry now.'

'And so you shall,' Van Riebeeck said, whipping around to face his vintner. Reaching out his hands, he grasped Willem's and said, 'You'll be married before the year's out.'

'Why not now?' Van Doorn asked, and he saw Van Riebeeck stiffen.

'You're most difficult. You spoil everything.' And from his desk he produced the copy of a letter he had sent some ten months before to the Lords XVII in Amsterdam, requesting them to find seven st.u.r.dy Dutch girls, no Catholics, and send them south on the next ship. Names of the intended husbands were given, and at the head of the list stood: 'Willem van Doorn, aged thirty-two, born in Java, brother of Karel van Doorn of this Compagnie, reliable, good health, vintner of the Cape.'

'So your wife is on her way,' the commander said, adding lamely, 'I would suppose.'

'I'd rather marry Deborah,' Willem said with that stolid frankness that characterized all he did. A more subtle man would have known that rejecting a woman the commander had taken pains to import, and for a slave, was bound to provoke him; it never occurred to Willem, and when Van Riebeeck pointed out that it would be highly offensive to any Dutch Christian woman to be sent so far and then discarded in favor of a Muslim slave, Willem said, 'But I'm practically married to Deborah.'

Van Riebeeck rose stiffly, went to his window, and pointed down into the fortress yard. Willem, following his finger, saw nothing. 'The horse,' Van Riebeeck said.

'I see no horse,' Willem said in a tone calculated to irritate.

'The wooden horse!' Van Riebeeck shouted.

There it was, a wooden horse of a kind that carpenters use for sawing, except that its legs were so long that it stood much too high to be useful for woodworking. Willem had often heard of this cruel instrument, but it had not seemed a reality until this moment.

Clapping his hands, the commander instructed a servant: 'Tell the captain to proceed.' And from below a prisoner who had transgressed some trivial edict of the Compagnie was led toward the horse, where a bag of lead shot was attached to each ankle. He was then hoisted into the air, poised spread-legged above the horse, and dropped upon it. The fall of the man's body, plus the weight of the lead shot dangling from his ankles, was so powerful that the body was almost broken in half, and he screamed terribly.

'Let him stay there two days,' Van Riebeeck told his orderly, and when the man was gone, he said to Willem, 'That's how we discipline workmen who disobey Compagnie orders. Willem, I'm ordering you to marry the girl I've sent for.'

Van Doorn was transfixed by the hideousness of the event, and that night when guards were asleep and he was supposed to be in his hut at the vineyard, he crept into the punishment area, gave the prisoner a drink of water, and lifted him slightly from the cruel wood, holding him in his arms through the hours. When the sun struck the man he fainted, and remained unconscious till nightfall. This night Van Doorn was kept from administering aid by a guard posted to watch the victim; as Willem stood in the shadows staring at the ugly horse, he understood why its legs were so high: they prevented the two bags of lead from resting on the ground.

Van Riebeeck spent some days pondering the problem of Willem and Deborah, and finally arrived at a solution that left Van Doorn aghast. The commander a.s.signed Jango to the bed next to Deborah: 'Day after day they'll see each other, and I'll have no further problems with Van Doorn.'

But he did. When guards were not looking, Willem slipped into the slave quarters below the grain store to sit with Deborah and Jango, and in broken Portuguese the three discussed their situation. Jango listened briefly, then said, 'I understand. Your baby, when it comes. I care.'

Willem clasped his hand, then added, 'Jango, do nothing to enrage the officers.' He intended that such warning apply only to Jango, for he could not suppose that Deborah would in any way incur Compagnie displeasure. While Willem warned Jango of the horse and other punishments visited upon fractious men, she whispered a song, singing a lullaby as if her baby was already born.

Finally Willem said with a faith that impressed Jango, 'When the predikant arrives with the fleet, I'm sure Van Valck will be allowed to marry his Malaccan girl, and I know I'll get permission, too. Jango, protect her till I do.' The huge black man shifted his chains and nodded.

It was not only slaves that caused Van Riebeeck trouble. The Hottentots gave him no rest, this day smiling and gregarious, the next sullen and contentious, and when one enterprising brown fellow, hungry at the end of a long workday, slipped into the Compagnie kraal and stole a sheep, actual war broke out.

It was not a real war, of course, but when the white population was so small and the native so large, the loss of even one white man posed grave problems. The stolen sheep was soon forgotten, but tempers rose on both sides as cattle were taken, a.s.segais thrown and muskets fired. And the situation was aggravated when many of the new slaves ran away, representing a huge cash loss to the Compagnie.

In the final clash, four men were slain, and then reason prevailed. To the fort came Hottentot messengers, calling, 'Van Doorn! Van Doorn!' He was finally found playing with his son, and Van Riebeeck was irate when Willem, out of breath, finally reported.

'Isn't that thieving Jack's crowd?' the commander asked, pointing to where seven Hottentots stood under a large white flag.

'I don't see Jack,' Willem said.

'Let's talk,' Van Riebeeck said. 'Go bring them in.'

So Willem, unarmed, left the fort and walked slowly toward the Hottentots, and Jack was not among them. 'Where is he?'

'He stay,' replied a man who had helped at the fort.

'Tell him to come see me.'

'He want to know if it is safe?'

'Of course.'

'He want to know from him,' the man said, pointing to the fort.

So a further conflict between Van Doorn and the commander arose when Willem left the Hottentots, returned to the fort, and informed Van Riebeeck that Jack was demanding a guarantee given personally by the commander. Since this seemed an accusation of bad faith, Van Riebeeck refused. 'May I do so on your behalf?' Willem asked. There was a grudging nod.

The Hottentots were invited to approach the outer perimeter of the fort, where Van Doorn a.s.sured them that it would be safe for Jack to join them, but the little brown men still wanted recognition from the commander himself. So Willem again confronted Van Riebeeck, and after much angry discussion, he agreed to the meeting.

When Jack received the safe conduct, he remembered Java, and the way men of importance behaved. Donning his faded uniform and mounting his finest ox, he jammed his c.o.c.kaded hat on his head and rode forth to meet the man whom some of his people were already calling the Exalted One.

The peace negotiations, as Van Riebeeck would grandiloquently call them in his report to the Lords XVII, were protracted.

'You've been taking too much of our land,' Jack said.

'There's room for everyone.'

'As long as we can remember, this was our place. Now you take all the best.'

'We take only what we need.'

'If I went to your house in Holland, would I be allowed to do the same?' Van Riebeeck ignored this rhetorical question. 'Why don't you bring back our slaves when they run away?'

'We tend cattle, not people.'

'Then why do you steal our cattle?'

Jack said, 'We used to come to this valley for bitter almonds. We must have food.'

'You'll find other almonds.'

'They're far away.'

And so it went, until Van Riebeeck said wearily, 'We will draw a paper that says we shall always live in peace.' And that night, when Jack had ridden off on his ox, Van Riebeeck sat alone with his diary. As he had done every day since arriving at the Cape he penned a careful entry, which would be read with rea.s.surance in both Amsterdam and Java: They had to be told that they had now lost the land, as the result of the war, and had no alternative but to admit that it was no longer theirs, the more so because they could not be induced to restore stolen cattle which they had unlawfully taken from us in our defensive war, won by the sword, as it were, and we intended to keep it.

And then the Cape forgot both slaves and Hottentots, for one clear December morning the settlement awakened to a breathtaking sight. In the night hours the ships of a great merchant fleet had moved into the bay and six medium-sized vessels rode tidily near the Groote Hoorn, Groote Hoorn, a magnificent East Indiaman bound for Java. Tall and proud, she displayed her fine woodwork and railings of polished bra.s.s as if she were boasting of the distinguished pa.s.senger who occupied her stateroom, the Honorable Commissioner, personal emissary of the Lords XVII. He came with powers to investigate conditions at the Cape before sailing on to Java, where he would become governor-general: the merchant Karel van Doorn. a magnificent East Indiaman bound for Java. Tall and proud, she displayed her fine woodwork and railings of polished bra.s.s as if she were boasting of the distinguished pa.s.senger who occupied her stateroom, the Honorable Commissioner, personal emissary of the Lords XVII. He came with powers to investigate conditions at the Cape before sailing on to Java, where he would become governor-general: the merchant Karel van Doorn.

When he stepped carefully ash.o.r.e, he looked disdainfully at the slaves who held his pinnace. He was dressed in black, with broad white collar, ribbed hose and brightly buffed shoes. He wore a broad-rimmed hat, carried a lace handkerchief, and guided himself gingerly with a silver-topped cane. He wore his hair in ringlets, which cascaded over his collar, and his beard in a trim point. He was tall and stiff and handsome, and when he was safely ash.o.r.e, he turned to a.s.sist a lady even more carefully dressed than he. She reminded Willem of his mother, for she looked as if she had the same inborn sense of regal command, and he could visualize her occupying the big house in Batavia.

Karel, of course, did not see his brother; his attention was directed solely to Van Riebeeck as the senior Compagnie official, and even when these two had exchanged greetings, no attempt was made to summon Willem, so he stood lost in the small crowd as cheers were given while the entourage marched to the fort. Even there Karel did not ask to see his brother, for as commissioner, he deemed it necessary to impose his authority upon the settlement as promptly as possible.

'What are your major problems?' he asked Van Riebeeck as soon as the door was closed on the watching subordinates.

'Four, Mijnheer.'

Karel was forty-three years old that year, a man burdened with importance, and since Van Riebeeck was only thirty-seven, smaller and less imposing, Karel would normally have been able to lord it over the resident agent, but he had in addition full and sole jurisdiction to look into every aspect of the Cape occupancy and to draft whatever new instructions he deemed prudent.

Placing a sheet of valuable paper before Van Riebeeck, he asked, 'What are the four?'

'There has been no predikant here since the founding. We need marriages and baptisms.'

'Dr. Grotius is on his way to Batavia. He'll come ash.o.r.e tomorrow.'

'The slaves run away constantly.'

'You must guard them more carefully. Remember, they're Compagnie property.'

'We guard them. We punish them if we recover them. We chain them. And still they seek their freedom.'

'This must be stopped, and harshly. The Compagnie does not purchase slaves to have them vanish.'

'But how do we stop them?'

'Every man, every woman must a.s.sume responsibility for keeping the slaves under control. Especially you. The third problem?'

'Desperately we need women. Mijnheer, the workmen cannot live here alone . . . forever.'

'They knew the terms when they signed with us. A place to sleep. Good food. And when they get back to Holland, enough money saved to take a wife.'

'I've begun to think that many of our men may never go back to Holland.'

'They must. There's no future for a Compagnie man here.'

'And this is the fourth problem. I detect an innate restlessness among the free burghers.'

'Rebellion? Against the Compagnie?' Karel rose and stomped about the room. 'That will not be tolerated. That you must knock down immediately.'

'Not rebellion!' Van Riebeeck said quickly, indicating that the commissioner should resume his seat and waiting until he had done so. 'What I speak of, Mijnheer. The men complain of the prices we pay for their corn . . . their expenses . . .' He stopped at the look Van Doorn gave him. 'They sometimes seem driven to probe eastwardon their own, not on Compagnie business at all. As if the dark heart of Africa were summoning them.'

Karel van Doorn leaned back. On three separate occasions the Lords XVII in Amsterdam had detected in Van Riebeeck's voluminous reports hints that the free burghers at the Cape were beginning to look beyond the perimeters set for them at the time of their original grants. This burgher baker had wanted an additional plot for himself. That farmer had suggested moving out to where the lands were more s.p.a.cious. Even Van Riebeeck himself had pet.i.tioned for a hundred acres more so that he might extend his personal garden. On this heresy Commissioner van Doorn knew the Compagnie att.i.tude and his own inclinations; leaning forward so that his words would have more weight, he said, 'Commander, you and your men must understand that you have been sent here not to settle a continent but to run a business establishment.'

'I understand!' Van Riebeeck a.s.sured him. 'You've seen how I protect the smallest stuiver. We waste not a guilder at this post.'

'And you make not a guilder.' Van Doorn did not relax his stern gaze. 'When the Groote Hoorn Groote Hoorn sails we would like to take aboard a large supply of vegetables, mutton, beef and casks of wine. And as of right now, I expect that we shall be disappointed in all four.' sails we would like to take aboard a large supply of vegetables, mutton, beef and casks of wine. And as of right now, I expect that we shall be disappointed in all four.'

'Wait till you see our cauliflower.'

'The wine?'

'The vines do poorly, Mijnheer. The winds, you know. But we've planted a protective hedge, and if the Lords could send us some stronger vines . . .'

'I bring them with me.'

Van Riebeeck, an ardent gardener, showed his joy at this unexpected bounty, but he was brought back to reality by Van Doorn's insolent questioning: 'The mutton and the beef I'm sure you won't have?'

'The Hottentots trade very few beasts with us. Indeed, I sometimes wonder at the ways of the Lord, that he should allow such unworthy people to own so many fine animals.'

Karel rocked back and forth in silence, then stabbed at the items in his dossier. 'You have cauliflower, but nothing else.'

Van Riebeeck laughed nervously. 'When I say cauliflower, I mean, of course, many other vegetables. Mijnheer will be astonished at what we've done.' Without allowing time for the commissioner to rebut this enthusiasm, the lively little man said, 'And of course, Mijnheer, there's a fifth problem, but this is personal.'

'In what way?' Karel asked.

'My letters. My three letters.'

'Concerning what?'

'My a.s.signment to Java. When I accepted this task, and it's not been an easy one I a.s.sure you, it was with the understanding that if I did good work here for one year, I would be promoted to Java. At the end of that year I applied for transfer, but the Lords said I was needed at the Cape. So I stayed a second and pet.i.tioned again. Same answer. I stayed a third, and now it's in the seventh year.' He paused, stared directly at the commissioner, and said, 'You know, Mijnheer, this is no place to leave a man for six years.' When Van Doorn said nothing, the commander added, 'Not when a man has seen Java. Please, Mijnheer. Most desperately I long for Java.'

'On this the Lords gave me specific instructions.' From a leather box made in Italy he produced a sheaf of papers, riffled through them, and found what he wanted. Disdainfully he pushed it toward Van Riebeeck, then sat with his lips against his thumbs as the commander read it a-loud:' "Your strong efforts at the Cape have been noted, as has your repeated request for transfer to Java. For the time being, your skill is needed where you are." ' In a hollow voice Van Riebeeck asked, 'How many years?'

'Until you produce enough meat and wine for our ships.' Van Doorn was quite harsh: 'You must remember, Commander. You and your men are here not to build a village for your own pleasures, but to construct a farm that will feed our ships. Every sign I see about me testifies to the fact that you are wasting your energies on the former and scamping the latter.' With that he reached for a new paper and began reading off the vetoes and decisions of the Lords XVII, none of whom had ever seen South Africa, but all of whom had studied meticulously the detailed reports sent them by Van Riebeeck: 'Item: Hendrick Wouters is not allowed to keep a pig.

'Item: Leopold van Valck is not to plant his corn in the field beyond the river.

'Item: Henricus Faber is to pay nineteen florins for use of the plow.