Rembrandt's Ghost Read online

  ‘‘There has to be some kind of catch.’’ His fingers touched a small protuberance in the upper right-hand corner. He pressed firmly and there was an audible click. The back of the wardrobe gave under the pressure of his hand. ‘‘Got it.’’ He pushed through the coats, Finn right behind him. The back of the cupboard swung open and they ducked into a narrow, dusty chamber.

  Finn felt a sudden chill, aware of what she was seeing. To the left was the tall, narrow stained-glass window with the now familiar Boegart crest. Sun shone through, picking up the tiny motes of dust in a golden haze that struck the old rosewood floor in a puddle of golden light. The chill turned into a shiver that ran up her spine. She was standingexactly where Rembrandt Van Rjin had set up his easel three hundred years before to paint the handsome figure of the wealthy merchant and adventurer Willem Van Boegart. The sense of the master and his subject was so strong she could almost see the scene: Rembrandt, with his brushes and palette, poised; the merchant, tall and arrogant, standing proudly against the far wall; the wonderful honeyed light filtered through the stained glass falling across their shoulders like a benediction. It was almost as if she was standing inside Rembrandt’s ghost, his pale shadow, still shimmering there.

  ‘‘Look at the door,’’ said Billy softly.

  Ten feet away, at the far end of the little chamber, was a heavy, dark oak door fitted with massive hinges and an ornate lock and latch.

  ‘‘It was hidden behind the drapery in the painting,’’ said Finn. ‘‘Van Boegart didn’t want anyone to know it was there.’’ She stepped across the little room and tried the latch. It squeaked noisily and the door opened. Finn stepped through the doorway and into the secret room beyond. She stared.

  ‘‘My God!’’ she whispered.

  13

  ‘‘It’s a cabinet of curiosities,’’ said Billy. The small room was jammed with shelves, niches, little tables, and glass display cases, all overflowing with a museum of artifacts arranged in no particular order. Hardwood boxes filled with seashells sat next to a case containing a butterfly or moth with jade and crimson wings as wide as a man’s hand.

  On a shelf they saw a bell jar containing a dried and mummified head that might have been a man’s or a great ape’s. There was also a collection of glass eyes. An alligator hung by wires from the ceiling. Immense twisted narwhal tusks were leaned in a corner together with a half dozen rusted harpoons. They saw an Indian headdress, a lump of rock with one brightly shining facet, a dozen kinds of skeletons, dried bats in flight, a dusty-looking cat with a missing eye, an impossiblemixture of a huge carplike fish and a monkey’s body joined together.

  Animal, vegetable, and mineral—everything was represented, even abstracts, like a half dozen wooden models of geometric designs. There was no surface left uncluttered. Even the walls and the ceiling of the little chamber were a wonder, a masterpiece of the plasterer’s art, intricate designs of flowers, fruit, animals, and birds, a carved, stark white jungle setting for the glorious insanity of the relics on display.

  Billy cleared his throat, then quoted: ‘‘ ‘A goodly, huge cabinet, wherein whatsoever the hand of man by exquisite art or engine has made rare in stuff, form, or motion; whatsoever singularity, chance, and the shuffle of things hath produced; whatsoever Nature has wrought in things that want life and may be kept; shall be sorted and included.’ Sir Francis Bacon, 1594.’’

  ‘‘You’re kidding. You memorized that?’’

  Billy nodded. ‘‘Benefits of a classical education again. Part of Bacon’s well-known monologues from the Gesta Grayorum, the Gray’s Inn guest book.’’

  ‘‘Sure, very well known,’’ laughed Finn.

  ‘‘Look,’’ said Billy, his finger outstretched.

  At the point where the walls met the ceiling above the door, a Latin motto had been carved into the plaster:

  ‘‘Fugio ab insula opes usus venti carmeni,’’ said Finn. ‘‘Escape from my island of treasure . . . and something about wind . . . ‘venti.’ ’’

  ‘‘More like, ‘Escape to my hidden island of treasure on winds of music,’ ’’ said Billy promptly. ‘‘He must mean this room. His hidden island.’’

  In the center of it all was a table covered in ancient, dusty fabric and set out with a scattering of large seashells, as well as a half dozen brass maritime instruments including an astrolabe, precursor to the sextant. Among the instruments was a calfskin-covered book, the same one that had been in Willem Van Boegart’s hand in the Rembrandt portrait. Leaning casually on the table, almost as though it had been left there only moments before, was the basket-hilt rapier that had been in the Dutchman’s other hand. Finn felt the cold chill run down her spine again; the ghostly presence of the man in the painting was so strong that she almost expected him to step into the room and introduce himself. Without thinking she looked back over her shoulder at the open doorway.

  ‘‘Collections of all the things he saw on his travels,’’ said Billy. He stepped forward and carefully picked up the calfskin book from the table. He opened it gently. ‘‘It’s a rutter,’’ he said. He turned another page. ‘‘And it’s in English.’’

  ‘‘What’s a rutter and why is it in English?’’ Finn asked.

  ‘‘A rutter is a book of dead reckoning—point-to-pointnavigation,’’ explained Billy. ‘‘You go from one physical landmark to the next. Rather like hares and hounds again. It’s where the word ‘route’ comes from. The French called it a routier. It’s what they used to navigate before they had proper charts.’’

  ‘‘And the English?’’

  ‘‘Part of the Boegart tradition. They sent all their children to Sherborne School in Dorset and then Cambridge. Me as well.’’ He smiled. ‘‘Except I was a black sheep and went to Oxford afterward instead of Cambridge. That’s how the English side of the family came about.’’

  ‘‘Cambridge again,’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘It made sense in those days to write in English,’’ Billy went on. ‘‘Rutters were worth their weight in gold. You didn’t want other people to know how to get where you were going, so writing in English would have been like writing in code. Not many people could write at all, let alone in another language.’’ He eased over a page in the book and read a little more. ‘‘Good Lord,’’ he whispered. ‘‘This is Van Boegart’s rutter for the first voyage of Vleigende Draeack, the Flying Dragon.’’ He read aloud from the opening page: ‘‘ ‘Being a Journey in Search of the Hidden Islands and the Secret of Bao Tse Tu, the Leopard King.’ ’’

  ‘‘Vleigende Draeack,’’ said Finn. ‘‘The ship in the painting.’’

  ‘‘This book is a treasure map,’’ said Billy, excitementrising in his voice. He flipped through page after page. ‘‘Unbelievable!’’

  ‘‘What are the Hidden Islands?’’ Finn asked. ‘‘Do they actually exist?’’

  ‘‘According to this they do,’’ said Billy, holding up the book. ‘‘They’re a myth, like Neverland in Peter Pan. Islands somewhere in the China Seas populated by lions and tigers and elephants and all sorts of other creatures.’’

  ‘‘And this Leopard King with the Chinese name?’’

  ‘‘Bao Tse Tu. A Chinese Marco Polo who found the Fountain of Youth on one of the Hidden Islands and who stole an Emperor’s treasure for himself.’’

  ‘‘And Willem Van Boegart found it, right?’’

  ‘‘Part of it, or so the legend says,’’ Billy said with a shrug.

  ‘‘Do you believe it?’’ Finn said.

  Billy reached out and plucked a roughly shaped, bloodred crystal from one of the display cases. It was the size of a hen’s egg. ‘‘If this is a ruby, maybe he really did after all.’’

  ‘‘So now what do we do, or need I ask?’’

  ‘‘I think there’s a pretty good chance Pieter Boegart disappeared looking for the treasure his ancestor was after. That’s what this ship, the Batavia Queen, is all about.’’

  ‘‘We’re supposed to follow him?’’
>
  Billy nodded. ‘‘I think that’s the idea.’’

  ‘‘You’d think he would have taken the rutter along with him,’’ said Finn, nodding at the book in Billy’s hand.

  ‘‘He had to leave us something. He probably made a copy.’’

  ‘‘And what if we’re wrong about all of this?’’ Finn said. ‘‘What if we’re overestimating Pieter Boegart? It could be it’s all a coincidence: the painting, the room, the book. Maybe they’re not connected. Maybe this is all a fantasy.’’

  Billy gave her a long look. ‘‘I’m not like some detective on a cop show who doesn’t believe in coincidences. I think they happen all the time, but this . . . ?’’ He held up the book. ‘‘I don’t care if it’s coincidence or if it’s some kind of warning from the heavens. Willem Van Boegart’s blood runs in my veins, and yours as well by the sound of things.’’ His voice was almost pleading in its intensity. ‘‘This is the kind of adventure I’ve been waiting for all my life.’’ He paused and Finn could see the muscles in his jaw working as he tried to keep his emotions in check. ‘‘What do you say?’’

  ‘‘What about those people in London?’’ Finn asked. ‘‘This is no adventure to them. This is serious business. They were out to kill us. They may still be on our tail.’’

  ‘‘Then they’ll still be on our tail whether we run away or not,’’ argued Billy.

  Finn thought about it for a long moment. ‘‘All right,’’ she said at last. ‘‘Let’s go find out what happened to cousin Pieter and his lost treasure.’’

  ‘‘Put this in your bag,’’ said Billy, handing her the rutter. ‘‘Then let’s get out of here.’’

  They found a Kinko’s a few canals away and spent an hour carefully photocopying the old log-book, then shipped it to Tulkinghorn in London for safekeeping. They spent the rest of the day organizing their trip to Singapore, getting the appropriate shots, and shopping for tropical clothes. That done they headed back to Durgerdam to arrange for long-term berthing of the Busted Flush. They got off the bus in front of the Oude Taveerne, then stopped for a bite to eat. After sleeping in the Flush’s narrow bunks for the better part of a week they decided to treat themselves to a pair of rooms above the restaurant for the night. They dropped off their purchases in the rooms, then went down the narrow street along the dike, heading for the marina.

  The setting sun had turned the windows of the little houses on the inland side of the dike into sheets of liquid gold, and the sky over their heads was deepening through purple into the black silk of night. Finn could just make out the turning vanes of an old windmill in the fields behind the village. A faint breeze riffled the water on their left. It was the perfect image of peace and for the first time in days she felt herself truly relaxing. Even Billy fit perfectly into the scene, and watching the wind blowing through his thick blond hair she could easily see his clear-eyed Dutch ancestors as they set sail for distant lands.

  ‘‘I’ve never owned a tramp steamer before,’’ she said as they walked, almost laughing out loud at the thought of it. She’d never even owned a car, let alone a nine-hundred-fifty-ton anything. ‘‘What does nine-hundred-fifty-ton displacement mean?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘It’s not the weight of the vessel. It’s the amount of water she displaces when you put her in the water. Then there’s gross tonnage, which is calculated in multiples of a hundred cubic feet and doesn’t have anything to do with weight, net tonnage, which is useful space for cargo and passengers, and deadweight tonnage, which is the actual weight of the cargo, fuel, passengers, and stores a ship is capable of carrying. The QE2, if memory serves, is about forty-five thousand tons of displacement and seventy thousand gross tonnage. Does that help?’’

  ‘‘Vaguely. Relative to the QE2 the Batavia Queen is pretty small, right?’’

  ‘‘Relative to the Pacific Ocean, it’s tiny,’’ answered Billy. ‘‘But, according to the information Tulkinghorn gave us, she’s got a shallow draft, only eleven feet, which makes it ideal for us. It means she can go almost anywhere, even up a lot of rivers.’’ They reached the yacht basin and went down a short flight of wooden steps to the floating pier. ‘‘Did you ever watch Jacques Cousteau on the telly?’’

  ‘‘Sure. That horrible John Denver song and all those guys in red wool hats.’’

  ‘‘Calypso, his research ship, was a converted minesweeper, almost the same as the Batavia Queen but smaller.’’

  There was almost no activity in the marina; there was a note on the door of the little hut at the foot of the stairs. Lights burned in the big clubhouse farther along the yacht basin. ‘‘Probably having his dinner,’’ said Billy. ‘‘Let’s go check out the Flush and then see if we can find the harbormaster.’’ They turned left along the dock that floated parallel to the dike. It was almost fully dark and the only noise was the lapping of the water against the pier footings and the dull thumping of yacht fenders as they banged against the moorings.

  They reached the berth where they’d tied off the Flush that morning. Billy stepped onto the boat first and Finn followed close behind. The ship rocked slightly as they boarded. Finn heard a sharp clicking sound. Directly in front of her Billy was silhouetted against the mast.

  Suddenly he spun around. ‘‘Do you smell that?’’

  Finn sniffed the air. Faint but there.

  Gasoline.

  Billy threw himself toward Finn, knocking her backward.

  The Busted Flush exploded. The sun rose all around them. There was a terrible noise with a pummeling life of its own. Heat blossomed like a huge bright flower and then there was nothing at all.

  Finn came to less than a minute later, coughing, soaking wet, and terrified. She sat up and realized that she’d been thrown into the tall grass and shallow water between the floating pier and the dike. She could see the burning remains of the Flush fifty feet away, settling into the water on the other side of the pier. She climbed to her knees, muddy sand clinging to her hair. She stood and then staggered toward the dike. ‘‘Billy?’’

  ‘‘Here.’’

  She heard coughing and splashing water. A shadow rose up in front of her, hand extended. She reached out and grabbed it. Together she and Billy made it to the dike and pulled themselves up. They turned and stared. The Busted Flush was a torch on the water. The pier where it had been berthed was on fire as well. They could see people running along the dock from the direction of the clubhouse. Suddenly there was another thunderous roar and a blast of heat as the gas tank on the forty footer that had been berthed two slips down from the Flush exploded. A lurid bright green flare arced crazily out across the water.

  ‘‘What happened?’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘Bomb,’’ answered Billy.

  ‘‘I heard a sound, just before.’’

  ‘‘So did I. A trembler switch, I think it’s called. Some kind of motion sensor anyway.’’

  ‘‘I smelled gas.’’

  ‘‘They cut the fuel line.’’

  ‘‘Make it look like an accident?’’

  ‘‘Maybe,’’ said Billy. He ran his hand through his hair. There was a look of anguish on his face. ‘‘They blew up my boat. The bastards. They blew up my boat.’’ There were tears in his eyes.

  Finn grabbed his arm. The people from the clubhouse were getting close. Finn could hear the screaming of a siren. ‘‘We have to get out of here. There’ll be questions. Questions we can’t answer. We could be held up for days.’’

  ‘‘How could they do that? Blow up the Flush?’’

  ‘‘It could have been worse,’’ said Finn. ‘‘It could have been us. If you hadn’t pushed me off the boat when you did, I’d be dead.’’ She kissed him on the cheek. ‘‘You saved my life, my lord.’’

  ‘‘Don’t be an idiot,’’ he said, but he was smiling now. The light from the burning boats flickered across his face.

  ‘‘We’ll get them for what they did,’’ promised Finn, pulling him away. ‘‘But now we’ve got to get away from here, fa
st.’’

  They vanished into the night.

  14

  The flight to Singapore was a grueling fifteen hours in a brand-new Airbus-A380. The double-decker monster had taken off from Schipol Airport in Amsterdam with air-conditioning problems and all the twelve-wheeled grace of a flying sperm whale. There was supposed to be a gym somewhere on the enormous airliner as well as a coffee shop, but Finn never found either.

  As they flew over all of Europe and most of Southeast Asia, she dozed, swaddled in the sounds of five hundred people chattering in a dozen different languages. She woke up for reheated meals and brief inconsequential conversations with Billy and gave in to the dubious pleasures of watching three John Travolta movies in a row on her little seat-back video screen. After a while being thirty-eight thousand feet in the air and going six hundred miles an hour began to feel almost normal.

  After seven and a half time zones, one rubber omelet, two glasses of second-rate Riesling, and a Hainan chicken snack in puff pastry that looked like a McDonald’s fruit pie, they arrived at Changi Airport in the middle of the night. According to Finn’s and Billy’s body clocks, it was early morning and time for breakfast, but all Finn saw on the way in from the airport was a forest of brightly lit skyscrapers and about ten thousand redbrick apartment buildings. They went down some streets with low-rise buildings containing small shops, but they were few and far between; the entire island of Singapore appeared to be one massive downtown.

  They climbed out of the cab in front of an aristocratic nineteenth-century building surrounded by floodlit palm trees. It looked like something out of a story by Somerset Maugham, which was exactly what it turned out to be. The name in gold written on the stark white portico above the entrance said it all.

  ‘‘Raffles?’’ Finn asked. The most famous hotel in the old British Empire.

  ‘‘The very one.’’ Billy nodded, grabbing their bags. ‘‘Noel Coward, Rudyard Kipling—all that. The last tiger in Malaya was shot under the Raffles bar.’’