Patrick O'Brian - The Hundred Days

Stephen liked the young man, open, friendly and candid, and one day, as they were sitting up there, he said, ‘Mr Daniel, I believe you attach a particular importance to number?’

‘Yes, sir, I do. Number seems to me to be at the heart of everything.’

‘I have heard others say so: and one gentleman I knew in India told me that there was a very special quality in primes.’

‘To be sure,’ said Daniel, nodding. ‘They give one great pleasure.’

‘Can you explain the nature of that pleasure?’

‘No, sir: but I feel it strongly.’

‘Number as the perception of quantity is no doubt a pitifully limited aspect of its true nature; but how many feet, would you say, is it from here to the deck?’

‘Why, sir,’ said Daniel, glancing down, ‘I should reckon a hundred and twelve. Or shall I say a hundred and thirteen, which is prime?’ He looked at Stephen’s face, expecting the pleasure he felt himself; but Stephen only shook his head.

‘There are some unfortunates to whom music brings no sort of delight: I fear that I am excluded not only from the joy of prime numbers and surds but from the mathematics as a whole. I could wish it were otherwise. I should like to join the company of mathematicians, of people like Pascal, Cardan...’

‘Oh, sir,’ cried Daniel, ‘I am no mathematician in that glorious sense. I just like to play with numbers - fix the ship’s position from a quantity of observations, with as small a cocked hat of error as possible, calculate the rate of sailing, the compound interest on ten pounds invested at two and three quarters per cent a thousand years ago, and games like that.’

‘In an early bestiary,’ said Stephen after a long pause, ‘an antiquarian of my acquaintance once showed me a picture of an amphisbaena, a serpent with a head at each end. I forget its moral significance but I do remember its form - its immensely enviable power of looking fore and aft’ - he slightly emphasized the nautical term and went on, ‘All this bell I have been twisting and turning like a soul in torment, trying to make out the Pomone behind and the Ringle, God bless her, together with the fabled city of Spalato in front. My buttocks are a grief to me.’

‘Well, sir,’ said Daniel. ‘I believe I could suggest a solution, was you to tell me which you had rather see first.’

‘Oh, Ringle without a doubt.’

‘Then I will turn about, facing aft; and should Pomone heave in sight before sunset, or whenever you choose to go down on deck, I will give you the word. But before I turn let me beg you to look at Brazza again, the big island well beyond the point of Lesina: then to the left of Brazza you have some low-lying land: and when we are a little closer you will see a narrow passage between it and Brazza. Indeed, you could see it now, with your glass.’

‘So I can: very dark and very narrow.’

‘Well, from the way he is trimming sail, I believe Mr Woodbine means to take us through in spite of the wind abeam. He knows these waters uncommon well. It is not

very long, thanks be, and we are a weatherly ship: and when you are through, there is Spalato right before you.’

There indeed was Spalato right before them, the horrors of the very dark and very narrow passage forgotten and the setting sun casting an indistinct but wonderfully moving glory on the enormous rectangle of Diocletian’s palace.

And before Surprise was wholly clear of the channel the immense voice of the lookout at the foremasthead called, ‘On deck, there. On deck. Ringle fine on the starboard bow.’

Jack instantly gave a series of orders: before she reached the open water the frigate was under bare poles, riding to a kedge in the gentle outward current. By the time Ringle was alongside and Reade aboard Surprise with Dr Jacob, darkness had fallen, and fireflies could be seen drifting across the strait.

Jack took them both below, but Jacob was bleeding so profusely from a wound that he had contrived to inflict upon himself as he came up the side, probably on a shattered length of the gunwale, that Stephen had to lead him away, send his breeches to be soaked in cold water at once, sew up the gash, and then ask Poll to bandage it and to find a pair of clean duck trousers that would fit. While this was doing, Jacob asked, ‘You did not receive my dispatches, I suppose?’

‘Never a one. Have the Brotherhood’s messengers left?’

‘Three days ago. Your friends in Kutali received me nobly and told me a great deal: let me summarize. In the very first place the Sheikh of Azgar has promised the sum required for the mercenaries: the news came more than a week ago. The Russians and Austrians are still dawdling - there is said to be suspicion, ill-will, on both sides. Zeal among the Moslem Bonapartists reached a feverish point when a pilgrim back from one of the Shiite shrines in the farther Atlas reported seeing the gold being weighed out in the presence of Ibn Hazm as he passed through Azgar. The heads of the Brotherhood met in a Moslem village, resolved all difficulties to do with personal dislikes and rivalries and appointed five of their most considerable members, two of them influential figures in Constantinople. They are riding by the pashas’ relays to Durazzo and there they will take one of Selim’s fast-sailing houarios for Algiers. There they are to beg the Dey to transport the money, the treasure, promised by the Sheikh. It may be possible to intercept them between Pantellaria and Kelibia.’

Jack opened the door of the sick-bay and looked in. ‘Forgive me for interrupting you,’ he said, ‘but I just wanted to ask Dr Jacob where the French frigate is lying.’

‘Over by the Marsa, sir, the broad northern end. There are some merchantmen from the Barbary Coast fairly near.’

‘How many guns does she carry?’

‘I am sorry to say that I never noticed, sir, but so many, according to his secretary, that he could not decently surrender to a little nine-pounder frigate.’

‘I see,’ said Jack. ‘Thank you, Doctor.’

‘I am afraid I offended him,’ said Jacob, when the door had closed.

‘Never in life, colleague,’ said Stephen. ‘Pray go on.’

But Jacob had been shaken by that cold look of dislike that it took him some moments to collect his ideas. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘well, I took it upon myself to send word to our friend in Ancona and to arrange a meeting with the heads of the Carbonari as soon as you should appear. I hope this does not embarrass you?’

‘Not in the least. Has a time been named?’

‘Just after the rising of the moon.’

‘At what o’clock would that be?’

‘I took it to be at night, of course, but I am sorry to say I cannot be more precise.’

‘I have seen the moon by day, looking very whimsical in the presence of the sun. However. I shall ask the Commodore.’

‘Commodore, dear,’ he said some moments later, ‘would you know when the moon rises tonight?’

‘At thirty-three minutes after midnight; and she is just five degrees below the planet Mars. And Stephen, let me tell you something: Pomone is in this channel, no great way astern. If I were on my own I should send a French-speaking officer aboard the French frigate to tell her captain that Pomone, a thirty-gun eighteen-pounder frigate, and the twelve-pounder Surprise would enter the harbour at first light tomorrow, that they would fire half a dozen blank broadsides at close range, to which he would respond, also with blanks; and that then, decencies preserved, we should all make sail, leaving by the broad north-west passage if this leading wind holds as I expect, and proceed to Malta. But would this interfere with your plans?’

‘Not in the least: and if you wish I will carry your proposal over to the Cerbère.’