Miguel thinks it looks like “the devil’s piss,” but Geertruid tells him it will make both their fortunes. She insists that he take a drink of an uninviting, tarry liquid made from the fruit. His seductive Dutch friend Geertruid Damhuis persuades him that the exotic coffee fruit will provide his answer. He is desperately searching for a way to restore his wealth and his standing on the Exchange. He is deeply in debt and reduced to living in his younger brother Daniel’s damp cellar. In the past Miguel has been prosperous, but as The Coffee Trader opens, Miguel’s fortunes have turned. The business of the Exchange did not require a man to know an item’s nature, only its demand-and sometimes, in the heat of the trade, not even that.” “Miguel had come across coffee once or twice, but only as a commodity traded by East India merchants. Miguel Lienzo, a Portuguese Jew who fled to Amsterdam to escape the Inquisition, is among them, although he is a well-connected trader on the Exchange. Merchants of the Dutch East India Company have done a little trading in coffee, but most residents of Amsterdam have never seen it, let alone tasted it. In Amsterdam in 1659, as in most of Europe, coffee is virtually unknown.
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