Patrick O'Brian - The fortune of war

He turned his attention to the desk. None of the keys fitted it, which was significant. But roll-top desks in general presented no great difficulty to one who was used to these things, and once Stephen had found which of the ornamental knobs controlled the back-bar, one firm thrust of his catling released the bolt and the top rolled back.

The first thing he saw was the blaze of Diana's rivi� in its open case, blazing even in this pale ghostly light, and beside it, under the heavy obsidian phallus that acted as a paperweight, a letter addressed to himself. The seal had been raised and he was not the first to read:

Dearest Stephen - I heard you talking and I expected you but I saw you go away without coming to me. Oh what can it mean? Have I vexed you? I did not give you a clear answer - we were interrupted - and perhaps you thought I refused your offer. But I did not, Stephen. I will marry you whenever you wish and oh so gladly. You do me too much honour, Stephen dear. I should never have refused you in India - it went against my heart - but now, such as I am alas, I am entirely yours - Diana. PS That gross fellow is taking his trollop into the country: come and see me we shall have all Sunday together. Remember me to Cousin Jack.

He had barely grasped the full implication of this before he heard a sound at the door, a slight metallic grating at the lock. It was certainly not Diana. He seized the paperweight, silently closed the desk, and stepped behind the opening door.

It was Pontet-Canet, on the same errand as himself. The Frenchman obviously knew the place, and he was better equipped than Stephen. He selected one of the many skeleton keys on his ring and opened the strong-box, took out a book and carried it to the desk. His practised hand went straight to the master-knob, the top rolled back, and he sat down to copy from the book. He moved the diamond necklace to make room for the paper he brought from his pocket and in doing so he saw the letter. 'Oh, oh, la garce,' he whispered as he read it. 'Oh, la garce.'

Stephen had his pistol ready, 'but although this was an inside room, enclosed, he wished to avoid the noise. Pontet-Canet stiffened, uneasy, raising his head as though he felt the threat. Stephen strode forward and as the Frenchman turned he brought the massive obsidian down on his head, breaking both. Pontet-Canet was on the floor, limp but breathing. Stephen bent over him, catling in hand, felt for the still beating common carotid, severed it, and stood back from the jet of blood. Then he pulled the body to the hip-bath, placed towels and mats to prevent the blood soaking through to the floor below, and went through the dead man's pockets. Nothing of significance, but he did take Pontet-Canet's pistol and, since he did not possess one, his watch, a handsome Breuguet very like that which had been taken from him years ago, when he was captured by the French off the coast of Spain.

Changing the bloody chair for another, he sat down to the open book. Memoranda of Johnson's conversations with Dubreuil, copies of his letters to his political chief, day-by-day transactions, future projects, uncoded, perfectly frank: no wonder Pontet-Canet had gone straight to it. With this book before him he had his ally's secret mind wide open, without the last reserve.

On the most recent page, after a complaint about the Frenchmen's attack on Dr Maturin, Johnson had written, 'I shall have a further interview with him on Monday, when I propose to bring greater pressure to bear; if however he should still prove obdurate, I believe he must be discreetly resigned to Dubreuil in exchange for a free hand with Lambert and Brown, preferably in a place where this will excite no public comment. I have already repatriated virtually all the fit prisoners, to prevent any unpleasant incident.'

Had Johnson written this before or after he had read Diana's letter? If before, had he then given Dubreuil leave to go ahead, or had the Frenchman, fearing that Stephen would yield on Monday, decided to confront Johnson with a fait accompli once again? They were interesting points; but purely academic at this stage. He returned to the study of the book. It was easier to read now, the midday sun having partially dispersed the fog; and with the greater light the town had woken up - the noise of traffic in the Street had reached something near its usual pitch, and someone at no great distance was letting off fireworks. Was this perhaps a holiday? Another American victory at sea? The pain in his head was growing and in spite of the greater light his eyes would not keep their focus long.

Lost in his reading and his conjectures and his pain he did not perceive the opening of the door that Pontet-Canet had left unlocked until it was already on the jar. 'Tu es l�Jean-Paul?' whispered Dubreuil.

No choice this time; no question of silence now. Stephen rose, whipping round with the pistol already in his hand, thrust it against Dubreuil's recoiling chest and fired. The man jerked back against the edge of the open door and as it slowly yielded so he fell, the expression of amazement and malignity lasting until his head was quite down, dull and indifferent at last.

Stephen stood with the smoking pistol in his hand, listening to the immense report that seemed to fill the room and his head so lastingly. The smell of powder and scorched cloth. Slow, slow, the minutes passed; yet no one seemed to have heard the shot. No running feet, no hammering on the outer doors, no sound at all but for the clock striking the quarter; and outside some kind of a procession was passing the hotel - remote cheers, laughter, a squib or two.

The tension diminished to a tolerable pitch. He put the pistol down and dragged Dubreuil to the privy, to the hipbath. 'This is like the end of Titus Andronicus,' he said, with an affectation of callous brutality, as he heaved the body in.

But he was, he found, seriously disturbed, and he wondered why. He had not even searched Dubreuil. Why not? Corpses he had seen by the score, even by the hundred, in open and clandestine battle, yet this killing sickened him. It was unreasonable: he had had to kill or be killed, and Dubreuil was the man who misused Carrington and Vargas so inhumanly until they died. Yet there it was, and he found that he could do no more than read mechanically, scarcely retaining anything of significance... the squalor of his own conduct and of his enemies', all for the best of motives. The extreme violence of this morning, the physical and perhaps moral exhaustion, were obvious causes for his state, yet it was strange that he could not master his thinking mind and compel it to answer the question, What was he to do next? He posed the question again and again and the only answer was that it was impossible to leave the hotel with the Frenchmen waiting in the hail; that he must nevertheless get these documents and Diana clear; and that the Asclepia could be no sort of refuge once Johnson was back. A string of negatives, no more.

He heard Diana return. She was talking and for a moment he thought it must be Johnson, back before his time, perhaps warned by the traitor Peg; but then he realized that the other voice was Herapath's.

He went towards her, door after door, and she met him in the dining-room. Her face was anxious and downcast and as soon as she saw him she said, 'I am so sorry, so very sorry, Stephen darling, but Andrews was not there. He is gone back to Halifax in the cartel, with nearly all the prisoners of war.'

'Never mind it, my dear,' said Stephen gently - he felt an immense pity for her, he could hardly tell why. 'Herapath is with you?'

'In the drawing-room.'

'Were there any Frenchmen in the hall?'

'Yes, quite a crowd, laughing and talking, some in uniform; but neither Pontet-Canet nor Dubreuil.'

They walked into the drawing-room. Herapath greeted Stephen with a look of deep concern, but Stephen only gave him a vague how-d'ye-do and said he must write a note. 'There is a writing-table in my room,' said Diana, opening the door and pointing.