The Sail from Rendsburg

By then, people in Rendsburg recognised Aad Fock by his barrels of eels. In 1668 he brought his goods from Fockbek along the Eider to market. The boat that had carried him was already too small for the trade growing around it. For longer journeys he needed a larger one, and a larger boat required a new sail. It called for more cloth, more labour and more money than he possessed on that market day.

A sailmaker by the harbour had suitable cloth and knew how to work it. Aad Fock explained what he needed. He spoke of the broader boat, the barrels it could carry and the routes he meant to travel. Rendsburg was not to be his final market. If the goods remained sound and the passage safe, the trade might reach as far as Kiel.

The sailmaker listened, ran one hand across the stout cloth and named his price. Aad Fock said plainly that he did not yet have enough money. He did not ask the man to lower the price. He wanted the sail at once and proposed to pay for it from the proceeds of journeys still to come.

At that, the sailmaker took his hand from the cloth. The tale of the eel court at the Fockbeker See had long since reached Rendsburg. At market, people called after the villagers, “Aalversuper.” (Eel drowners.) Aad Fock had heard the taunt and had remained in Fockbek all the same. The sailmaker asked, “Am I truly to give an Aalversuper a sail on credit?”

Aad Fock looked towards his barrels. Then he said that a man who believed an eel could be drowned might perhaps also believe in credit without money. He was the first to laugh at the predicament into which his own plan had brought him. The sailmaker’s mouth twitched, but his answer remained no. Cloth could not be bought with hope, he said, nor could good intentions pay for a man’s work.

Aad Fock did not leave. While goods were carried along the bank and ropes cast off, he stayed beside the folded cloth. He asked what the sailmaker’s household needed regularly. The man named firewood, bread and several other things that had little to do with sails. Then his wife called from the back of the workshop. Good eel, she said, never remained long in their house.

Now Aad Fock had something to offer. He did not propose a single meal. For one year, the sailmaker was to receive fresh eels from Fockbek with every agreed delivery. The sail, however, was to be cut and sewn now. The craftsman would receive his price not in coin but in goods that were welcome at his own table.

The sailmaker asked how he could be certain that Aad Fock would return after the first journey. Aad Fock replied that a sail did not merely carry a boat away from the bank. It brought the same boat home again, provided the boatman understood his business. Besides, on every market day the sailmaker could see whether the barrels from Fockbek arrived. If they failed to appear, all Rendsburg would know that Aad Fock had broken his word. The mockery already directed at him would then be deserved.

The sailmaker’s wife joined them. She examined an eel from the goods Aad Fock had brought and told her husband that the cloth had lain in its place long enough. Made into a sail, it would bring work. An eel on the table would at least bring supper. The sailmaker laughed. Then he began to ask how long the deliveries would continue and how the goods were to be handed over.

They bargained without haste. Aad Fock promised no more than his trade could bear. The sailmaker demanded no more than the sail was worth. At last they shook hands. Cloth and labour would be paid for in advance with eels, not all at once, but in regular deliveries through the agreed year. The sail itself was to be finished first, so that the larger boat could begin its journeys.

From then on, the sailmaker worked on the order while Aad Fock prepared his next voyage. The cloth was spread out, cut and joined with strong stitches. Aad Fock took measurements at the boat, brought the fittings and inspected the lines. When something was lacking, he did not wait for a helper who might or might not come. He began the task himself and asked to be shown whatever he did not know.

When the sail was bent on, the sailmaker stood on the bank. His wife accepted the first delivery of eel. The wind filled the new cloth evenly. The larger boat drew away from the shore and found room upon the Eider. It bore more barrels than Aad Fock had been able to carry before and allowed him to extend his trade beyond Rendsburg towards Kiel.

Aad Fock returned. He came not only in kindly weather and not only when the market promised a good price. The agreed eels reached the workshop until the year was fulfilled. The sailmaker received his payment, his wife the fish she valued, and Aad Fock a sail that enlarged his trade.

That handshake became the first settled supply agreement of the house of Aad Fock. It had not begun with a full purse. It began with a boat too small for its work, a refusal of credit and a man who did not wait for the next market day after being told no. He looked at what was already to hand and made it the beginning of his next journey.