A Flower for the Queen: A Historical Novel (18 page)

“That is quite something,” Thunberg said, admiring the drawing Masson had made of a species of erica.

“It’s nothing, it’s just a tool,” Masson replied closing the journal, suddenly self-conscious.

“It’s more than that, Masson, it’s a veritable talent!”

“A talent is only worth something if it can help you.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Thunberg reflected. “Come to think of it, both of my draughtsmen were killed on my previous expeditions. One lost his footing and fell into a ravine, and the other was taken by a buffalo he was trying to draw.”

“Banks’s draughtsman died of malaria — do you think there’s a pattern?” Masson asked, managing a smile.

After some time, Thunberg asked, “What do you say we have a decent meal this evening to go with that wine?”

Masson looked across at Thunberg and followed his gaze to a grassy patch some distance away, where a number of medium-sized bontebok, a chocolate-brown antelope with vivid splashes of white, were grazing.

“Eulaeus does an excellent bontebok stew. Come on, take the spare rifle from the back of the cart and join me in a bit of shooting.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know how.”

“You’re joking, of course?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“You mean to say that they sent you out here with no firearms training at all?”

“There isn’t much call to fire a rifle when you’re working in a greenhouse,” replied Masson without a trace of sarcasm.

“Well, this is no greenhouse,” Thunberg chuckled before dismounting his horse and adopting the tone of a company sergeant major.

“Whilst you may wield a mighty pen you’ll need more than that if you’re to be of much use. I’ll make you a deal: I’ll teach you how to shoot, and you teach me how to draw. I want to be able to capture the world in all its splendour.”

“And then blow it all to smithereens,” quipped Masson.

Thunberg retrieved a rifle and some ammunition from the cart and turned to his acolyte to begin his lecture. “Always keep your powder dry. Moisture is your enemy and will cause a misfire — or worse, the powder might smoulder and cause an accidental discharge, which could result in you losing any one of a number of appendages.”

“Right,” Masson repeated, as if taking notes. “Dry powder equals no lost limbs.”

With a look of stern concentration, he then watched Thunberg tear off the top of the paper ammunition cartridge with his teeth and spit it out before pulling back on the hammer, which was beautifully fashioned to resemble a long-necked bird that held the flint between beak-shaped jaw screws. With the rifle half-cocked, Thunberg then placed a small amount of powder onto the pan and closed the frizzen, the hinged metal strike-plate that covered the pan and prevented the powder from being blown away. The remaining powder was then poured down the barrel, and the lead ball, together with the rest of the paper cartridge, was rammed down right into the end of the barrel with a slender rod that was fitted into a slot in the stock.

The whole operation had been performed in less than a minute, but to Masson, who imagined himself in the path of a charging lion, it seemed to take an age.

With rifle still half-cocked and safe, Thunberg offered it to Masson, who gingerly accepted it. He eased the stock onto his shoulder, taking aim at a large boulder about twenty paces distant.

“You want to keep steady and ease the shot off, no jerking. The key thing to remember is that there’s a slight delay between the flint coming down and the powder igniting behind the shot, so you must keep your eye on the target, even after pulling the trigger. You will know well enough that the shot has been fired because the rifle will deafen you and want to tear your shoulder off in the process.”

“Pull trigger and await deafness and maiming. Understood,” replied Masson drily.

“Now, take aim over the sights, give yourself a good wide stance, feet planted hip width apart, solidly on the ground. When you’re ready, cock the rifle fully and then breathe in, breathe out, hold — and fire.”

Masson stared down the barrel at the boulder, imagining it to be a lion charging directly at him. He pulled the hammer all the way back so that it clicked into place and took a deep breath in, slowly exhaled, and then, holding his breath, he pulled the trigger.

The flint snapped down against the frizzen, igniting the powder in the pan, which in turn lit the main charge in the barrel. To Masson, the eruption of smoke and flame that followed was every bit as fearsome as the imaginary lion, which in his mind’s eye now lay slain on the ground before him. His arm felt as if it had been wrenched from its socket and with his ears still ringing, he turned to Thunberg, who gave him a consoling pat on the shoulder.

“Excellent, Masson, excellent. Don’t worry, the first shot almost never hits. Don’t be discouraged, it’s a lot to take in, but there’s plenty of time.”

For the rest of the afternoon, as Eulaeus took the cart and followed in the day-old tracks of Schelling’s caravan, Masson and Thunberg practised shooting until Masson’s shoulder was numb from the effort and at last the boulder was peppered with lead.

After Masson’s last shot struck the mark, Thunberg slapped him on the back in hearty congratulation. “Well, at least we know we have nothing to fear from boulders!”

Thunberg and Masson then went in search of game and it did not take long for them to chance upon a duiker, grazing in a small clearing out in the open, away from the natural cover of the bush.

As Masson primed and loaded his rifle, Thunberg told him to aim for a spot just behind the shoulder. With the blood pounding in his ears, the bush seemed to fall completely silent as Masson squeezed the trigger, sending the stock of the gun into his shoulder and breaking the silence with a deafening boom.

Although the smoke that erupted from the barrel obscured Masson’s view, he could still see that the buck had fallen almost instantly.

The men scampered through the bush towards the still animal and as they approached, Masson saw that he had shot it clean through the heart, just as Thunberg had instructed. Thunberg explained that the Khoisan people always gave thanks to the spirit of the dead animal for being generous enough to give of its body so that they might not starve to death.

“You can see it as a prayer of thanks,” Thunberg explained. “And I suppose that what with all the beasts out here that could so easily dispatch us, it can’t do any harm to be thankful for being on the winning side.”

After Thunberg gutted the animal, he cut out the liver and after dipping his thumb in the gore, passed it across Masson’s forehead, explaining that before he could be considered a real African hunter, it was an obligatory rite of passage that he eat the liver raw.

After much persuasion, Masson cut a small piece of the slimy organ which he presumed he could swallow without difficulty or chewing. But the sliver lodged in his throat, and any remaining dignity was abandoned as he retched and heaved before finally getting the thing down.

With the ceremony completed, Masson slung the carcass over his shoulders and they returned to the camp, where Eulaeus sat tending the fire. He looked up as the men approached. Seeing the stripe on Masson’s forehead, he half-smiled and said something to Thunberg.

“What did he say?” asked Masson.

“He said that you had redeemed me. You see, he still thinks badly of me for never having eaten the liver raw.”

That evening, as they ate the stew that Eulaeus had prepared, Masson looked into the flames, enjoying the combined warmth of the food, wine and fire, and then asked Thunberg, “Just so that we are clear: are you Dutch or Swedish?”

“Dutch,
mynheer
!” replied Thunberg, saluting Masson.

“Ah.”

“No, actually I’m Swedish. Did I fool you?”

“Yes — no … What?” asked Masson, who was becoming very confused and began to regret opening the second — or was it the third? — bottle of wine.

“But if you were the Japanese emperor, I bet I would have fooled you,” continued Thunberg, who seemed to have fallen into a melancholic stupor and as Masson wrapped himself in a
kaross
, a blanket of patchwork hides, he looked up at the cloudless sky and continued his conversation with the stars. “I have done everything anyone could do to become a proper Dutchman. I talk like them, I eat like them, I dress like them, I even, well, you get my meaning — I do everything like them.”

Masson closed his eyes to stop the stars from spinning and asked, “Why would you ever want to become a Dutchman?”

“It was Linnaeus’s idea. But we didn’t count on van Plettenberg. He just won’t see me as a Dutchman. He wants me to be more Dutch than Dutch, the old goat. Language, dress and manners are not enough for him, it seems.”

Masson opened his eyes once more and tried to focus on Thunberg, cursing the French Huguenots for ever setting foot on this blasted rock and then again for bringing their vines with them.

“Linnaeus sent you to Africa to become Dutch?”

“No, no, no. He sent me first to Paris to become a surgeon so that I could then go to Africa to become Dutch.”

“But what on earth for?”

“Oh, nothing much except the single greatest opportunity available to any botanist alive today — Japan!” Thunberg said this so loudly that even the horses were startled and Masson was left convinced that the wine Thunberg had imbibed had completely unhinged him.

“But, Doctor,” started Masson.

“Please, call me Carl,” Thunberg said, a mad glint still lingering in his eye.

“All right, Carl. But you’re making no sense at all. At Kew we received plants and seeds from all over the known world, but never from Japan — not a thing. No one is allowed into Japan.”

“That’s right, no one. Except a small group of Dutch traders, handpicked by van Plettenberg, who go once a year on a Company vessel. And on that ship, they need a surgeon.” Finally Masson understood.

“And so I spent two years in Paris and two more years here doing everything in my power to earn my place. Ask anyone who counts and they’ll tell you that I am Dutch. But not according to Baron Joachim van Plettenberg. Oh, no. For him, it seems I have yet to do something more.”

“Like what?”

“That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to work out for the last two years. Two years, Masson. That’s two Company ships I’ve seen sail away without me. And now there’s a rumour that the Japanese emperor is about to refuse access even to them.”

Thunberg brought the wine bottle to his lips, but finding it empty, tossed it dejectedly into the crate at his side.

“Japan … Can you imagine? Not just an unimaginable treasure of flowers and plants seen by only a small group of Europeans, but think of the scholarship, think of the vast canons of knowledge that must be contained on that tiny island. Thousands of years of experimenting with and discovering materials that we don’t even know exist. And no one can go … except me. Maybe.”

“I can’t imagine that being caught with an English spy will do your cause much good.”

“Please don’t trouble yourself on my account, Mr Masson. The one thing that my time here has taught me is that if you wait long enough, the right opportunity will present itself eventually.”

“So it’s just a matter of waiting?” Masson smiled to himself. “When — if — I get back, I plan to plant my own trees. If I bring back the flower, there’s a reward of land waiting for me.”

“And a reward of marriage?” asked Thunberg.

“Yes, that too.”

“And that’s what you want, to be tied down to a piece of land, a wife and a brood of screaming whelps?”

“What I want has nothing to do with it. It’s what has to be done.”

“You don’t believe you can choose your own path?”

Masson remained silent.

“I have always avoided the tyranny of kings and gardens,” Thunberg mused, looking up at the stars, although more to himself than for Masson’s benefit. “In fact, I have always tried to avoid tyranny of any kind. And yet,” he looked up and gestured at the night sky, “this is also one. It seems that no matter how far we travel, there will always be one more horizon, one more thing to discover. The search is endless, is it not? Masson?”

But Masson had fallen fast asleep. Thunberg sighed, and then he too fell into slumber, leaving only Eulaeus to keep watch, his back turned to a fire that had been reduced to a mass of glowing embers, sending the last of its heat into the vastness of the African night.

C
ANADA
, 21 N
OVEMBER
, 1805

The wind rattled the panes in the windows, and small flurries of snow puffed from the gaps between the sills and the bottom of the sashes, vaporising in the warm air before they could settle onto the floorboards.

“I was so preoccupied with the search for the Queen’s flower and with the hundreds of new plants that we were discovering every day that I failed to look a little closer at the man that shared our journey rather than the plants we found along our path.

“I had managed to learn little more about Eulaeus than what Thunberg had told me already and perhaps because of the language, or perhaps because he had little reason to communicate with me directly, Eulaeus spoke only to Thunberg. He was neither sullen nor morose, but instead existed in a state of more or less constant equilibrium between the two, almost as if fearing that any expression of emotion might have to be explained or accounted for.

“Thunberg’s earlier observation seemed confirmed, as the further we got from Cape Town, the lighter Eulaeus’s mood appeared. He still went about his work preparing the camp and driving the cart without complaint and in silence, but often I would see the afterglow of a smile on his face as we passed a herd of antelope or after he succeeded in chasing off a band of monkeys that yelled abuse back at him from the safety of their retreats at the tops of the trees.

“For his part, Thunberg seemed at ease with his surroundings, as though he had lived there all his life. He and Eulaeus would spend hours discussing the ways of the animals and the peoples of the land and Thunberg not only absorbed everything he was told but seemed to take strength and confidence from the knowledge, almost like a tree that sends its roots deep into the ground in order to take purchase so that it is not blown over by the storm.