All of Winge’s day has been spent tracing the cotton fabric. This has taken some time. The merchants have outdone themselves in their effusiveness in speaking to him about wares that are their own rather than someone else’s. The best piece of information he has received sent him to an English trader who may or may not have left Stockholm yet. Where the ship was located, no one could tell him, and Winge’s only way to find an answer is to look through the registers himself.
The lower floors of the Customs House are a flurry of various goods and languages. Officials scurry back and forth, pursued by clerks with pencils and ledgers. Merchants, shipowners, and ship captains are negotiating their tax obligation, questioning the accuracy of the scales and integrity of their operators. Those who are not able to make themselves understood simply repeat themselves at a higher volume. It takes Winge hours before he can slip a small sum to one of the customs officers to see the lists of the ships that have arrived in the harbor. The ship in question is called the Sophie and its home base is Southampton. She has been assigned a docking spot alongside the Orpheus Quarter, close to Castle Hill. Her departure status is noted as awaiting the right wind to carry her out.
It is starting to get dark when Winge leaves the Customs House and hurries along the quay past the stairs that lead down to the water. The Quayside is still marked by the traces of the Michaelmas autumn market, strewn with litter. He looks anxiously out at the sea, but no ships appear to be on their way out. It is already too late in the day and the wind hardly manages to flutter the pennants strung on the masts.
He feels a cough in his throat, irritated by the dampness of the sea and his exertions. The cramp in his side feels like a tiepin lodged between his ribs. Reluctantly he has to slow down and when he has to place more of his weight on the silver-tipped cane, the bowing of the wood reminds him that it was carved more for decoration than support.
Winge sighs with relief when he reads the name Sophie on the stern of a ship. She, a schooner, her foremast shorter than her mainmast, is still tied with her starboard side to the quay. There is no activity that he can see. Evening flâneurs are visiting coffeehouses and wine cellars, loaders and quay laborers have returned home, the sailors have disappeared up the Stadsholmen alleys in search of company and entertainment. He walks by the gangway. Only one man can be seen on deck. With a look of concentration, he is lowering a lead weight into an ironclad casket.
“Joseph Satcher?”
The man replies in French. He has a powerful build, dressed in a reinforced seaman’s coat, three-cornered hat, sturdy boots, and a beard that reaches far down his waistcoated chest.
“My name is Thatcher. It is as poorly suited to trade with Sweden as my goods. I assume that you do not speak my language?”
Winge speaks excellent French, good German, has a working knowledge of Greek, and reads Latin with ease, but he lacks a deeper grasp of English. Thatcher nods without surprise.
“My Swedish is also not what it should be. So, French, then. What is your business with me?”
“My name is Cecil Winge. You are said to be an authority on fabrics made of cotton.”
Thatcher sits down on his casket and indicates to Winge where he can sit on a deck hatch. Winge hands him the black cloth. Thatcher studies it in silence.
“My fingers already tell me a great deal, but to say anything definitive I need to fetch my lantern. But first, will you share with me the reason for asking?”
“This cloth was found wrapped around the body of a mutilated and drowned man whose fate I am trying to discern.”
Thatcher stares back at him for a while, then leaves and returns from the cabin with a lighted lantern. He examines the fabric again in all of its seams and corners while Winge waits quietly. Finally, Thatcher picks up a simple wooden pipe and lights it on the lantern before he speaks.
“Tell me, Mr. Winge, does the expression homo homini lupus est mean anything to you?”
“Plautus wrote it during the Punic Wars: ‘Like a wolf is man to other men.’ ”
“Forgive a simple merchant who has not had the benefit of a classical education. I know the words from Voltaire, but with a mind to the meaning of them, it doesn’t surprise me that they are older than that. And what is your view on the matter? Are we wolves to one another, always on the lookout for the least sign of weakness before we choose our moment of attack?”
“We have laws and rules to contain such urges in those who nurture them.”
Thatcher laughs from his cloud of smoke.
“The system is working poorly in that case, Mr. Winge. I myself am a good example. Your country is bankrupt, Mr. Winge, and if tidings could only be carried more swiftly, I would perhaps have become aware of this in time to avert my doom. Here no one wants my wares, and in order to avoid having to return home with unfinished business, I have had to part with my goods at a loss. Add to that the greedy palms of the customs officers, where many a ducat stick; the cleverness of my competitors; and my debt to my creditors, and I am lost, Mr. Winge. Did you happen to see what I was doing before you interrupted me?”
“Yes, you were loading weights into a case that appears to be your strongbox.”
“And can you guess why I would do something like that?”
Winge nods and averts his gaze. He wonders if death has a smell or another characteristic that makes it so easy for him to perceive its presence, and if his sensitivity is a result of the work that he does or of his own condition.
“You are going to throw it overboard. Since a man’s papers are often worth more than his life, I imagine that you are planning to hold it in your arms and accompany it over the railing, and that the additional weight was intended as a means to shorten your suffering.”
Thatcher blows a beautiful ring of smoke over the water where it dissolves in a gust of wind.
“I am personally responsible for my goods. All that I own is mortgaged. The fine gentlemen who invested money in me in hopes of a return will tear me into pieces. Everything will be taken from me upon my return. I can achieve the same thing before I leave Stockholm and be spared a tiring journey and more troubles. My journey will be shortened to twenty feet and ends in the mud under the Sophie’s hull. With my papers in my arms, I lessen the risk that my debts will be inherited.”
Thatcher puffs on his pipe. Something mean-spirited appears in his eyes when he calmly fastens them on Winge through the whirling smoke.
“Why should I aid you? Why should I, as my last act in this life, once again vainly place obstacles in the way of the one who has already shown himself to be the better of two wolves? If only I had been a better wolf myself, this hour would not be my last. What kind of wolf are you, then, Mr. Winge? A good wolf? A skilled hunter?”
“No wolf at all, I’m afraid. What I do, I do not undertake in order to satisfy my bloodlust. Nonetheless, I will succeed in my endeavors whether you decide to help me or not.”
Thatcher suddenly shivers and rubs his arms, the pipe still hanging from his mouth. In that frame of mind, in which he has already made his fateful decision, he seems halfway to another world.
“You are unnaturally pale and thin, Mr. Winge. What ails you?”
“My lungs. I have consumption. I will not survive you by any significant margin.”
Thatcher laughs loudly, a thundering cheerful sound that rolls out over the railing towards the sea.
“Why didn’t you say so at once? What would the world be if us dying sods couldn’t stick together? There is something I can do for you, because it may be that the cloth you have shown me in fact does contain the secret for which you hope.”
He signals to Winge to come closer and holds the fabric under the lantern’s light.
“See here. The cotton has been sewn in a double layer. This seam tells me something very clearly, especially since it has been ripped out along one side: someone has turned this thing inside out. Let’s see.”
Thatcher reaches his rough hand through the hole where the seam has been removed, grabs the opposite side, and turns the black cloth inside out as if it were a large bag.
“Voilà! There’s something you don’t see every day.”
Along the edge of the cloth there is a wide border printed in a gold color that the water of the Larder has not managed to erase. The pattern depicts human figures in groups of four, entwined in poses depicting pleasures of the flesh. The men’s members are grotesquely enlarged, as are the women’s bosoms. Ecstasy is on their faces. The quartet is repeated again and again up and down the edge of the cloth.
“As an expert, I can add that both the fabric and printing are of the finest quality, even if I have to admit that I hope the artist has exercised a certain freedom and has not been using actual models. Well, not that it makes any difference now. My own exploits in that area lie behind me. May my children do better than I have, though I doubt it. Naive as I was, I raised them to become good men, and I expect them to be as easy a prey for others as I have been.”
Thatcher starts to dig the ashes from his pipe but then stops and throws it overboard. He brings his heavy body to his feet and lifts the lid of the casket in which the lead weight is resting on a pile of papers. There is room for more.
“So, Mr. Winge, if you will excuse me, I have things yet to pack before my journey. Now I have helped you pick up the scent, all you have to do is follow it out into the forest to find your mark. I see how your expression has changed. You can’t fool me! You are indeed a wolf after all. I’ve seen enough to know and, even if I am wrong, you will soon become one. No one can run with the wolf pack without accepting its terms. You have both the fangs and the glint of the predator in your eye. You deny your blood thirst but it rises around you like a stench. One day your teeth will be stained red and then you’ll know with certainty how right I was. Your bite will be deep. Maybe you will prove the better wolf, Mr. Winge, and on that note I bid you good night.”