Patrick O'Brian - The surgeon's mate

Stephen could have retorted that he intended to do away with these difficulties by marrying Diana and making her a British subject again; but he preferred keeping his own council. In any case, he was very, very tired, both from the extraordinary exertions at the time of his escape and from his almost continual surgical activity aboard both ships ever since the battle. He made no reply, therefore, and after a short silence Beck said, 'I believe, sir, you mentioned a request?'

'I did. It is that you will authorize the paymaster to accept a draft on my London banking-house. I have an immediate and pressing need for money.'

'Oh, as for money, Dr Maturin,' cried Major Beck, 'I beg you will not trouble with the paymaster and his seven and a half per cent and all the paper-work. I have funds here at my disposal that can deal with any difficulty of that kind at once. They are intended to procure information, and for a single one of these documents, I should be fully justified in ...'

'You are very good, sir,' said Stephen, 'but I must tell you that from the very beginning of my connexion with the department I have never accepted a Brummagem ha'penny for anything that I was able to do, or to produce. No. A note to the paymaster will answer perfectly, if you will be so kind. And perhaps you would let me have a couple of discreet able-bodied men: the frontier is no great way off, and until you have dealt with the agents named in Mr Johnson's list, I should not choose to wander about Halifax alone.'

Preceded by one discreet man, six foot tall, followed by another, and accompanied by a third, Stephen walked to the paymaster's office, transacted his business, came out with a comfortable bulge in his pocket, and stood for a while in thought. Then, followed by his companion, he took a few irresolute steps down the street before stopping at a corner. 'I am at a stand," he said.

'Sir?' said his guardian.

'I am at a stand. I do not know where I lodge.'

The street was almost empty, since all -those who could get away were down at the harbour, staring at the Shannon and the Chesapeake: in this virtual desert the two other men did their best to be inconspicuous, loitering in negligent attitudes, quite detached; but they soon caught their colleague's nod, and joined him on the corner. 'The gentleman is at a stand,' he said. 'He does not know where he is staying.'

They all looked at Stephen. 'Has he forgot the name of his hotel?' suggested one.

'Have you forgot the name of your hotel, sir?' asked the first man, bending down to speak in Stephen's ear. Stephen ran his hand along his bristly jaw, deep in thought, trying to overcome his weariness of mind.

'He is probably staying at Bailey's,' said another. 'That is where most of the physical gentlemen put up.'

'Is it Bailey's, sir?' asked the first, bending again.

'White's? Brown's? The Goat and Compasses?' said the others, addressing not Dr Maturin but their companion.

'I have it,' cried Stephen. 'I have the solution. Pray conduct me to the place where the officers receive their letters.'

'We must hurry, then,' said the first man. 'We must even run, sir. They will be closed, else.' And some minutes, some few hundred yards later he said, panting, 'There. I was afraid of it. The blinds are drawn.'

The blinds were drawn, but the door was on the jar; and even if it had been tightly shut Captain Aubrey's strong sea-going voice would still have spread far out into the street. 'What the devil do you mean with your "after hours", you idle young hound?' he was asking. 'As God's my life ..."

When Stephen opened the door the sound increased, and he perceived that Jack had the young man by the frill of his shirt, that he was shaking him to and fro and calling him 'an infernal b - .'

The shirt frill came adrift and Jack turned to Stephen. 'He says it is after hours,' he cried.

'It is not only that, sir,' said the clerk to Stephen, as to a saviour, 'but Mr Gittings has the keys. There ain't nothing in the waiting rack and I can't open the strong-box without I have the keys, it stands to reason.' He wiped his tears on his sleeve and added, 'And there's nothing in it for Captain Aubrey neither, I could pledge my sacred word: though always willing to oblige any gentleman that treats us civil.'

Stephen contemplated the strong-box. It was an old-fashioned affair with a common tumbler lock and it would probably not resist his solicitations more than a few minutes; but this was neither the time nor the place to display his talents. He said, 'I am happy to find you, Captain Aubrey. The name of our inn, or hotel, has escaped my mind, and I am mortally fatigued. I would give all I possess to go to bed.'

'You certainly look uncommonly fagged,' said Jack, dropping the shirt-frill. 'Quite done up. We are at the Goat, and I will take you there directly. Harkee, sir,' to the clerk, in a last burst of disappointed fury, 'I shall be here first thing tomorrow, d'ye hear me, there?'

In the street Stephen thanked his escort, sending him back with his best compliments to Major Beck, and he and Jack walked on alone.

'A miserable goddam afternoon,' said Jack. 'Disappointments at every turn - a heroes' welcome, truly. The town is crammed with soldiers, and I could only get one room between us at the Goat.'

'That is bad,' said Stephen, who had often shared a cabin with Captain Aubrey, perhaps the most resounding snorer in the service.

'Then when I went up the hill to report, the Commissioner was not in the way. There were a good many men waiting for him: we gossiped for a while and I learnt a damned unpleasant thing or two. Harte is back on the Board of Admiralty, and that fellow Wray is made acting second secretary.'

'Mother of God,' said Stephen to himself, and well he might: Jack, as a lively bachelor in Minorca, had cuckolded Mr Harte repeatedly, and cuckolds were likely to use their horns even long after their receipt; while Jack had also publicly, justly, accused Mr Wray, a person even then high in Government employ, of cheating at cards. It was an accusation that Wray had not seen fit to resent in the usual manner at the time, but it was not likely that he would stomach it for ever.

'I waited as long as I could, but then when I reached the office at a brisk run - and I can tell you, Stephen, that brisk running, at my age, ain't what it used to be - all I found was another disappointment. A miserable goddam afternoon.'

'Ooh-hoo, husband,' said a pretty whore in the twilight. 'Come with me and I will give you a kiss.'

Jack smiled, shook his head, and walked on. 'Did you notice she called me husband?' he said after a few paces. 'They often do. I suppose marriage is the natural state, so that makes it seem less - less wrong.'

The word marriage reminded Stephen that he had meant to take Beck's certificate, that necessary document, to a priest and arrange for his wedding with Diana; but he could at present scarcely drag himself along - all the weariness of the last few days was rising in him like an overwhelming fog, now that the interminable crisis was past. All that survived was the spirit of contradiction. He said, 'Not at all. On the contrary, as one of your great men of the past age observed, it is so far from natural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage, that we find all the motives which they have for remaining in that connection, and the restraints which civilized society imposes to prevent separation, are hardly sufficient to keep them together.'

'Hark,' said Jack, pausing in his stride. Down by the harbour a band had begun Heart of Oak, and a great concourse of people were either chanting the words or cheering. Smoke and the rosy glow of torches could be seen above the roofs, and suddenly the flames themselves came into sight, crossing the far end of their street - an unofficial procession of seamen and civilians, leaping and capering as they passed the narrow gap, and on every hand more people were hurrying down to join it, among them the pretty whore.