"Aye, and let's all pray it's not true. But we hear the damned London merchants are pushing for it. We've sowed, and now they'd be the ones to reap."
"Do, sir? I'd say there's little we _can _do. The Low Countries don't want war with England. Though that's what it all may lead to if London tries stopping free trade." He glanced around the timbered cabin: there was a sternchaser cannon lashed to blocks just inside the large windows aft and a locked rack of muskets and pistols secured forward. Why had Winston invited him aboard tonight? They had despised each other from the first. "The better part of our trade in the New World now's with Virginia and Bermuda, along with Barbados and St. Christopher down here in the Caribbees. It'll ruin every captain I know if we're barred from ports in the English settlements."
"Well, the way things look now, you'd probably be wise just to weigh anchor and make for open sea, before there's any trouble here. Assuming your sight drafts are all in order. "
"Aye, they're signed. But now I'm wondering if I'll ever see them settled." He leaned back in his chair and ran his fingers through his thinning gray hair. "I've finished scrubbing down the _Zeelander _and started lading in some cotton. This was going to be my best run yet. God damn Cromwell and his army. As long as the Civil War was going on, nobody in London took much notice of the Americas."
"True enough. You Hollanders got rich, since there was scarcely any English shipping. But in a way it'll be your own fault if Barbados has to knuckle under now to England and English merchants."
"I don't follow you, sir." Ruyters regarded him questioningly.
"It'd be a lot easier for them to stand and fight if they didn't have these new slaves you sold them."
"That's a most peculiar idea, sir." He frowned. "How do you see that?"
Winston rose and strolled aft to the stern windows, studying the leaded glass for a moment before unlatching one frame and swinging it out. A gust of cool air washed across his face. "You Hollanders have sold them several thousand Africans who'd probably just as soon see the island turned back to a forest. So they'll be facing the English navy offshore, with a bunch of African warriors at their backs. I don't see how they can man both fronts."