The covenant - James A. Michener [105]
The fact that he had said this made Katje suspect that he would not, so she forced her way into the commander's office and said, 'You're killing him, and Karel van Doorn will learn of this.'
'Are you threatening me?'
'I am indeed. I am the niece of Claes Danckaerts, and he's a man of some importance in Amsterdam. Take my husband down.'
The commander knew enough of Compagnie politics to appreciate the influences that might be brought against him if a determined Dutch family declared war upon a German hireling, and from the manner in which Katje spoke, he suspected that she would pursue her threat, so against his own best judgment he put on a cloak and went out into the storm.
He found Willem unconscious, his body trembling with fever, and when he twice failed to rouse him, he gave the brusque order: 'Cut him down.'
The stiff body was carried to the garden-hut and placed on the dung-polished floor, where Katje brought him slowly back to consciousness: 'You're home. It's over, Willem.' And their love, awkward and strained as it would always be, dated from that moment.
The ordeal of the wooden horse had a powerful impact on Willem van Doorn. For one thing, it crippled him; he would always walk with his body slightly twisted, his left leg not functioning like his right. And he would be susceptible to colds, a deep bronchial malaise affecting him each winter. An even more powerful result, however, was that he began to frequent the smithy in the fort, stealing pieces of equipment, which he kept sequestered behind the shed in which the vines were grafted.
One evening, when he had assembled a heavy hammer, a chisel and a bar for prying, he grasped Jango's arm as he dragged his chains homeward. Without speaking, he kicked aside a covering of grass, displaying the cache. Jango said nothing, but his eyes showed Willem his gratitude.
It was not easy to look at Jango. Instead of ears he had lumpy wounds. His face, lacking a nose, lost all definition. And the three bold scars on forehead and cheeks imprisoned the glance of anyone who saw that ugly, repulsive face. Willem looked only at the eyes, which glowed.
The two men never confided in each other. Jango refused to tell Willem what his precise plans were, or how he would carry out his final attempt. The instruments for his freedom lay there under the grape cuttings and would be called upon when time was proper, but how and where he would cut away his chains and Deborah's, neither man knew.
Then one afternoon, half an hour before sunset, Jango quietly quit his work and dragged his chains to the grafting shed, removed the covering grass and wrapped the chisel in a canvas bag. With strong blows, well muffled, he cut the chains that bound his legs, then tied them inconspicuously back together. Secreting the tools under his sweaty shirt, he walked unconcernedly past Willem, as he always did at close of day, and for a brief moment the two men looked at each other, one with face terribly scarred, the other with heart in turmoil. It was the last time they would ever be in contact, black and white, and tears came to Willem's eyes, but Jango refused to allow emotion to touch him. Clutching his tools, he moved toward the fort.
'You're very nervous,' Katje said when her husband limped in to supper, and when he stayed for a long time reading his Bible, she said, 'Willem, come to bed.' Desperately he wanted to go to the fort, to stand upon the wall, to witness how Jango and Deborah and the boys made their escape, and where her chains would be struck off, but he knew that he must betray nothing. He was not afraid of the punishment that would be meted out to him if the commander deduced his role in this escape; he was afraid only for Jango and Deborah and his sons. At nine, when Katje went to bed, she saw her