sss Island

Chapter One-1

Chapter One

Shipwrecked

Departure

We set sail from Amsterdam in the Year of our Lord 1636. The vast Pacific Ocean beckoned. The Spanish had been here ahead of us of course, and the Manila Galleons still passed regularly back and forth between the New World and the Philippines, laden with treasure. Yet unless these were blown off course they did little to add to the sum of human knowledge. Our Dutch merchants had visited the northern and western coasts of Australia and the Spice Islands, and we had recently wrested these last from the Portuguese. Various other islands had been visited, and the rudiments of local languages and customs gleaned. Still most of the rest of this immense expanse remains uncharted, much less explored. The race is on in earnest now to discover the great southern continent most are assured still waits, with riches and barbaric civilizations to rival or even top those encountered by the Spaniards.

Naturally it is the lure of gold, silver and spices that draws our Captain Van Der Schaaf, as well as accounting for my wife’s enthusiasm that I join the venture. Maintaining her family’s position requires an overdue infusion of wealth. As a celebrated natural philosopher however (many are the learned treatises bearing my signature) I remain more interested in the amazing flora and fauna waiting to be found. However, on parting with the formidable Lady Abigail I make certain to subordinate my desires to her own – something I am well-practiced at. Though given to proper public deference Dutch women (especially those of a particular status) can be far more forward in private than their contemporaries. My beloved yet feared spouse is of a particularly domineering sort who might be burned at the stake in other locales for her strange (and voracious) appetites and perversions. My backside still smarting from her latest adventurousness I take my leave of her with equal parts depression and anxiety over what pursuits she might engage in during my absence.

“Have a safe expedition, my husband – and a prosperous one. Indeed I doubt your welcome back will be as you would wish should you return empty-handed.”

Lady Abigail’s demeanor is typically stern and yet playful. Remembering the fervor with which she wielded her switch earlier, and the accustomed insatiability with which she took her pleasure, brings heat to my cheeks and causes me to drop my eyes in the most shameful manner. I’m just glad there’s no one here to witness this evidence of my unfortunate subordination.

“Will you not come down to the docks to see me off? It is likely two or even as much as five years may pass before we see one another again.”

It is only for the sake of form that I make this request. The captain and his first officer already consider me something of a weakling given my academic bent and peripheral part in their expedition. The last thing I want is for them or their uncouth crew to get an inkling of where the power lies in my relationship with my own wife. Luckily Lady Abigail has no intention of leaving her chambers, much less the house, a fact I’m fully aware of before I ask. As expected she laughs dismissively at this request.

“I have given you your parting kiss, darling – that and so much more. And while you shall no doubt pine for me on a small ship amidst all the endless leagues of the sea, I have the most open and licentious city in Europe lying at my feet in your accustomed place.”

This mention of my ‘place’ humbly prostrate before her causes me to burn further with humiliation. Yet true distress pricks me like a stiletto to the midsection again at her hint of the dalliances with which she intends to fill it. The sufferings of lonely celibacy ahead of me are not for the Lady Abigail: I know her too well to be deceived about that. I’ll be lucky if I’m not wearing the horns by nightfall. Cruelly twisting this eviscerating blade she alludes to this more directly yet as she lounges naked in the enormous marital bed.

“Don’t tarry overlong now, husband. The needs of the coffers aside, my own needs won’t be denied indefinitely. We have barely begun our own explorations after all. These stories of conjugal practices unearthed in the Orient, the habits of the Japanese in particular titillate me no end. And I thought we were inventive in Amsterdam! If you haven’t returned to submit to them soon there’s no telling what I may be forced to do.”

Still sprawled in post-coital indolence Lady Abigail toys significantly with the riding whip she has lately taken to using on me. Her smile is at once arching, affectionate and infinitely mischievous. Again I’m reminded forcefully of the dictates of Church and State that would surely fall upon her if we lived in less tolerant environs. Still my heart is beholden to her in all her intimidating appeal, and my own position dependent on the status of her family. Though her suggestive speculations wound me far worse than her most vehement flagellation (or most deviant demands) I reply in all honesty.

“That will depend on the vagaries of wind and sea, on fortune and the Almighty. Rest assured though, my love: I will suffer an eternity for each day of our separation.”

With that I can endure the sight of her loveliness and nudity – and the thought of whom she might share them with in my absence – no longer. I take my leave and head down to the harbor, where ship and captain are readying for departure.

The former is the Dolphin, a swift, stable, three-masted galleon. Bankrolled by a consortium of businessmen (including Lady Abigail’s father) independent of the monopolistic Dutch East Indies Company, she is a good ship, if a bit smaller than the state of the art. Armed well enough to protect herself against anything but a ship of the line, she is not so conspicuously weapon-heavy as to seem piratical. Some weight of cannon has necessarily been sacrificed to the needs of provision. After all, once past Australia and into the uncharted vastness of the Pacific we may not find landfall for quite some time. For this reason as well she carries a crew of no more than two dozen men including Captain Van Der Schaaf and his mate.

This captain is reputed to be a tyrannical bastard. But then who has heard of one who is not? Such men are necessary for controlling the verminous and villainous types willing to risk the dangers and privations of the seas. As I arrive at quayside he is supervising the final arrangements for departure with his customary irascibility.

“Jump lively there, Hansen! Tighten that lanyard down properly before I boot your ass sideways. And you, Bester, tell me you’ve got the gentleman’s books and such stowed as ordered because he’s finally here. I want to sail straightaway now!”

As he turns to acknowledge me I note as always the plume of white in his tangled brown hair, and the scar that continues from this down over his face: splitting one eyebrow and lying like a pale seam across his weathered cheek. It’s reputed he received this not in battle with pirates or the English but from a mutinous crew in an assassination attempt. Giving me a grudging nod from high up on the afterdeck he calls down impatiently.

“Well climb aboard then Professor! Clauss here can show you to your stateroom.”

This is the walleyed cabin boy, and as I gain the deck he indeed leads me with almost insolent surliness to my private lodgings – a singular luxury aboard ship and no doubt resented down in the cramped gun deck where the crew quarters. Upon arrival I note with relief that my books, papers, instruments and other gear have indeed been delivered intact, and after dismissing the youth I set about arranging things properly. I’m still at this when the ship lurches free of its moorings and begins to edge its way out of harbor. We’re on our way.

The Voyage

The first leg of our journey passes uneventfully. Curving widely south and west into the Atlantic we pick up the winds necessary to swing us round the southern tip of Africa. Without losing a single crewmember to misfortune or sickness (quite a rarity and greeted as a good omen) we arrive at the Cape of Good Hope. After re-provisioning we strike out north and east toward the Spice Islands as usual. Reaching these with the loss of only three men – one to an infected rat bite and the others to scurvy already – we fill our holds not with pepper and other lucrative tradables but with more fresh provision. Then we head east again.

Still the winds and our good fortune hold. Successfully navigating the dangerous Torres Strait we finally strike out into the vast and unexplored reaches of the Pacific. Predictably enough this is where trouble first arises, though it is of a rather more personal sort, if still one I might have expected due to the privations of a long voyage.

Of necessity I’ve spent most of the journey in study, trying to master as much of the known customs and native languages in this part of the world as possible. I’m afraid I also pass much of the time indulging in memories of my salacious and insatiable wife. These prove more trying and less humiliating with the passage of time.

When first she insisted upon s****l congress in the superior position – sitting atop me and doing the thrusting herself rather than lying decorously submitting beneath me – I was appropriately scandalized and discomfited. Even in our most recent encounter I found it profoundly shaming. Not as shaming as having my backside recreationally whipped of course, but this still seemed a fundamental violation of both nature and propriety. Now however I find the memory of her flushed excitement, alarming cries, and especially the animated dance of her small but protuberant breasts impossible to dispel. I must confess I’ve been driven repeatedly to onanism despite the dangers of such self abuse. Of course, this isn’t the first time. Among her other unbelievable requirements the Lady Abigail has forced me time and again to bring myself off for her own amusement, a far more shaming exercise than any secret and solitary sin. Seeking to distract myself from these memories and temptations, I take myself out upon the deck to examine the unfamiliar stars of this part of the world. Here I’m threatened with a violation of a far more hideous kind.

The crew has been seething with resentment at the brevity of our port calls. Denied the opportunity for dalliance with prostitutes and promiscuous natives, their carnal deprivation must equal or exceed my own. Nor are they content with or even afforded the opportunity for the solitary relief I’ve been indulging in. I shudder to contemplate the crimes against nature surely being committed down below. Such penetrations that have no doubt been occurring call to mind the allusions of the depraved Lady Abigail.

Her words at our parting were not her first suggestion of an interest in the scandalous practices of the Far East, where women are reputed to indulge in far more shocking inversions of the natural order than merely taking the superior position for copulation. Being well acquainted with her usual progression from learning of a certain depravity to idly musing upon it to hints and suggestions to zealously indulging in it, I fear it certain she will eventually obtain one of these dread harigata for herself, and begin subjecting my long-suffering backside to depredations infinitely worse than just her customary flagellation. This necessary estrangement comes as something of a relief in that regard despite the privations of travel and the certainty of cuckoldry. And yet ironically my ill-advised venture topside nearly subjects me to this horror in a far more repellant fashion.

I’m so involved in my fascination with the sky that I fail to take proper note of where my feet are carrying me. As you know, these southern stars are completely different to our familiar northern ones. In particular there is the great swath of dusty brightness that bisects the heavens, looking vaguely like a stretch of vertebrae. This never fails to astound and intrigue me and musing upon it heedless of all else I wander too near the access to the gun deck. The first notice of my peril comes in the form of raspy voices from just behind me.