When the song ended, there was a moment of silence, attentive and awed. Then they all burst out clapping and applauding. 'Oh, well done, lad!' and 'Bravo, Vinny!' Schreuder felt his irritation become unbearable.
The applause went on too long for the liking of the singer, and Vincent rose from the clavichord with a deprecating wave of the hand that begged them to desist.
In the silence that followed, Schreuder said, softly but distinctly, 'Caterwauling? No, sit, that was an insult to the feline species.'
There was a shocked silence in the small cabin. The young man flushed and his hand dropped instinctively to the hilt of the short-bladed dirk that he wore at his jewelled belt, but Llewellyn said sharply, 'Vincent!' and shook his head. Reluctantly he dropped his hand from the weapon and forced himself to smile and bow slightly. 'You have a perceptive ear, sit. I commend your discerning taste.'
He resumed his seat at the board and turned away from Schreuder to engage his neighbour in light-hearted repartee. The awkward moment passed, and the other guests relaxed, smiled and joined in the conversation, which pointedly excluded the Colonel.
Llewellyn's cook had come with him from home, and the ship had been provisioned at Good Hope with fresh meat and vegetables. The meat was as good as any that might be served in the coffee shops and ate-houses of Fleet Street, the conversation as pleasing and the banter nimble and amusing, larded with clever puns, double meanings and fashionable slang. Most of this was above Schreuder's grasp of the language and his resentment built up like the brewing of a tropical typhoon.
He made one contribution to the conversation, a stinging reference to the Dutch victory in the Thames River and the capture of the Royal Charles, the pride of the English navy and the namesake of their beloved sovereign. The conversation froze into silence once more, and the company fixed him with chilly scrutiny, before continuing their conversation as though he had not spoken.
Schreuder consoled himself with the claret, and when the bottle in front of him was exhausted, he reached down the table for a flagon of brandy. His head for liquor was -as adamantine as his pride, but today it seemed only to make him more truculent and angry. By the end of the meal he was spoiling for trouble, and prospecting for some way in which to ease the terrible sense of rejection and hopelessness that overpowered him.
At last Llewellyn stood up to propose the loyal toast. 'Here's health and a long life to the Black Boy!' Everyone rose enthusiastically to their feet, stooping under the low deck timbers overhead, but Schreuder stayed seated.
Llewellyn knocked on the table. 'If you please, Colonel, come to your feet. We are drinking the health of the King of England.'
'I am no longer thirsty, thank you, Captain.' Schreuder folded his arms.
The men growled, and one said loudly, 'Let me at him, Captain.'
'Colonel Schreuder is a guest aboard this ship,' Llewellyn said ominously, 'and none of you will offer him any discourtesy, no matter if he behaves like a pig himself and transgresses all the conventions of decent society.' Then he turned back to Schreuder. 'Colonel, I am asking you for the last time to join the loyal toast. If you do not, we are still within easy range of Good Hope. I will give the orders immediately for this ship to go about and sail back to Table Bay. There I will return your fare money to you, and have you deposited on the beach like a bucketful of kitchen slops.'
Schreuder sobered instantly. This was a threat he had not anticipated. He had hoped to provoke one of these English oafs into a duel. He would then have given them a display of swordsmanship that would have opened their cold-fish eyes and wiped those superior smirks from their faces, but the thought of being taken back to the scene of his crime and delivered into the vengeful hands of Governor van de Velde made his lips go numb and his fingers tingle with dread. He rose slowly to his feet with his glass in his hand. Llewellyn relaxed slightly, they all drank the toast and sat down again in a hubbub of laughter and talk.
'Does anybody fancy a few throws of the dice?' Vincent Winterton suggested, and there was general agreement.
'But not if you wish to play for shilling stakes again,' one of the older officers demurred. 'Last time I lost almost twenty pounds, all the prize money I won when we captured the Buumwn.'
'Farthing stakes and a shilling limit another suggested, and they nodded and felt for their purses.
'Mister Winterton, sir,' Schreuder broke in, 'I will oblige you with whatever stakes your stomach will hold and not puke up again.' He was pale and sweat sheened his forehead, but that was the only visible effect the liquor had upon him.
Once again a silence fell on the table as Schreuder groped under his tunic and brought out a pigskin purse. He dropped it nonchalantly on the table and it clinked with the unmistakable music of gold. Every man at the table stiffened.
'We play in sport and in good fellowship here,' Llewellyn growled.
But Vincent Winterton said lightly, 'How much is in that purse, Colonel?'
Schreuder loosened the drawstring and, with a flourish, poured the coins into a heavy heap in the centre of the table where they sparkled in the lamplight. Triumphantly he looked around the circle of their faces.
They will not take me so lightly now! he thought, but aloud he said, 'Twenty thousand Dutch guilders. That is over two hundred of your English pounds.' It was his entire fortune, but there was a reckless, self-destructive pounding in his heart. He found himself driven on to folly as though he might wipe away the guilt of his terrible murder with gold.
The company was silenced by the size of his purse. It was an enormous sum, more than most of these officers might expect to accumulate in a lifetime of dangerous endeavour.
Vincent Winterton smiled graciously. 'I see you are indeed a sportsman, sir.'
'Ah! So!' Schreuder smiled coldly. 'The stakes are too high, are they?' And he swept the golden coins back into his purse and made as if to rise from the table.
'Hold hard, Colonel.' Vincent stopped him, and Schreuder sank back into his seat. 'I came unprepared, but if you will afford me a few minutes of your time?' He rose, bowed and left the cabin. They all sat in silence until he returned and placed a small teak chest in front of him on the table.
'Three hundred, was it?' He began to count out the coins from the chest. They made a splendid profusion in the centre of the table.
'Will you be kind enough to hold the stakes, Captain?' Vincent asked politely. 'That is, if the colonel agrees?'
'I have no objection.' Schreuder nodded stiffly and passed his purse to Llewellyn. Inwardly the first regrets were assailing him. He had not expected any of them to take up his challenge. A loss of such magnitude must beggar most men, as indeed it would beggar him.
Llewellyn received both purses, and placed them before him. Then Vincent took up the leather dice cup and passed it across to Schreuder.
'We usually play with these, sir.' Vincent said easily. 'Would you care to examine them? If they are not to your liking, perhaps we may be able to find others that suit you better.'
Schreuder shook the dice out of the cup and rolled them across the table. Then he picked up each ivory cube and held it to the lamplight.
'I can see no blemish,' he said, and replaced them in the cup. 'It remains only to agree on the game. Will it be Hazard?'
'English Hazard, 'Vincent agreed. 'What else?'
'What limit on each coup?' Schreuder wanted to know. 'Will it be a pound or five?'
'A single coup only,' said Vincent. 'The shooter to be decided by high dice, and then two hundred pounds on his Hazard.'
Schreuder was stunned by the proposal. He had expected to make his wagers in small increments, which would allow him the possibility of withdrawing with some semblance of grace if the run of the dice turned against him. He had never heard of such an immense sum staked on a single throw of the dice.
One of Vincent's friends chortled delightedly. 'By God's truth, Vinny! That will show up the colour of the cheese head liver.'
Schreuder glared at him, but he knew he was trapped. For a moment longer he sought some escape, but Vincent murmured, 'I do hope I have not embarrassed you, Colonel. I mistook you for a sport. Would you rather call off the whole affair?'
'I assure you,' he said coldly, 'that it suits me very well. One hazard for two hundred pounds. I agree.'
Llewellyn placed one of the dice in the cup and passed it to Schreuder. 'One dice to decide the shooter. High shoots. Is that your agreement, gentlemen?' Both men nodded.
Schreuder rolled the single dice, 'Three!' said Llewellyn, and replaced it in the leather cup.
'Your throw, Mister Winterton.' He placed the cup in front of Vincent, who swept it up and threw in the same motion.
'Five!' said Llewellyn. 'Mister Winterton is the shooter at one coup of English Hazard for a purse of two hundred pounds.' This time he placed both dice in the cup. 'The shooter will throw to decide the main point. If you please, Mister Winterton.'
Vincent took up the cup and rolled it out. Llewellyn read the dice. 'The Main is seven.'
Schreuder's soul quailed.
