Patrick O'Brian - Desolation island

"Oh no: just to pick up greenstuff for their voyage home; a day or so, while I see to a few more cases, and then they are homeward-bound. Homeward bound for Nantucket, which is in the Connecticut, I believe."

"Massa - Massachusetts," said Mrs Wogan, and burst into tears. "Forgive me," she said, through her sobs, "forgive me. It must be my pregnancy - I have never been pregnant before. No, pray do not go. Or if you must, send Mr Herapath: I should so like to hear what news he may have."

Stephen withdrew. He felt somewhat more dirty than usual - it had been a dirtying day - but in his diary he

wrote: 'Things seem to be following their train much as I could wish; and yet I am not quite sure. I should carry the poor simple creatures aboard the whaler myself, only that Wogan must not suspect that I am aware of their motions: that would destroy the credibility of her papers, at least if her chief is as intelligent as I suppose. I am tempted to confide in Jack, so that he may withdraw guards, leave boats lying about: anything to facilitate their escape. But he is a wretched hand at playing a part; he would over-act, and she would see through him directly. Yet I may be driven to it at last. Herapath is the most unfortunate accomplice for a conspirator that can well be imagined: true, he possesses that invaluable air of integrity which can so rarely be assumed once its basis is lost; but on the other hand he can control neither his countenance nor his memory. He observed that I was 'a friend to independence', which is very true; but I never told him so and the information can only have reached him through Wogan: a sad gaffe on his part. And then this very integrity may well brlng on an untimely fit of honourable feeling: I dread it. Jack's words about rats were most unhappily chosen. However, I have done all I can, and tonight I shall allow myself just twenty-five drops, which I shall drink to Herapath's felicity. I am much attached to that young man,and although I may not be doing the kindest thing by him in fact - a prolonged association with Wogan may not prove quite what he hopes - yet I wish he may enjoy what there is to be enjoyed: that he may not eat up his youth in longing and hope disappointed, as I have ate mine."

He slept long and deep, and he was woken by the sound of hammers ringing on iron. The forge was already on shore, a white-hot blaze in its heart, and the whalers had returned to the brig.

He had rarely seen Jack happier than he was at breakfast, sitting there in the great cabin drinking coffee, with a spy-glass at hand so that he could watch the beautiful smithy between cups. "There is good even in an American,

he said. "And when I think of that poor skipper with his face-ache, drinking small-beer for his morning draught, I have a mind to send him a sack of coffee-beans."

"There is a proverb in Ireland," said Stephen, "to the effect that there is good to be found even in an Englishman - is minic Gall maith. It is not often used, however."

"Of course there is good in an American," said Jack. "Look at young Herapath yesterday. I told him so, when we had a word first thing this morning. In his place, I should have been strongly tempted to skip. What an amazingly handsome woman she is, upon my word: jolly too, which I love in a girl. She don't look so jolly at the moment, though: I hope he has not said anything impertinent. It looks to me as if he had said something impertinent, and she is bringing him up with a round turn - he hangs his head -ha, ha, the dog. He should not have done so in the morning - the cold dawn is no time for such capers. But I tell you what, Stephen, there are run seamen in that whaler: one I recognized for certain Scanlan, yeoman of the signals in Andromache, always on the quarterdeck, so I could not mistake him. And I am sure there are others."

"I beseech you, Jack," said Stephen wearily, "I beseech you to leave them alone. With things as they now stand, you would do immeasurable harm by stirring it all. Pray, my dear Jack, just sit in your good comfortable chair until they are gone. I speak in sad sober earnest."

"Well," said Jack, "I will do as you say; though you cannot imagine my hunger for men. Prime seamen, whaler's hands, good Lord! Are you away?"

"I go to draw the skipper's teeth."

"They are drawn already," cried Jack. "Ills forge stands there on the beach, ha, ha, ha! What do you say to that, Stephen?"

Stephen said little to that, and less to Herapath as they rowed across to the La Fayette. The whale-boats were putting off for their last few loads of greenstuff and eggs,

and their crews called out, friendly and familiar, as Stephen went aboard. The youngest mate met him with the news that the skipper had only just woken up - they had thought he was dead in the night - and speaking for himself and his fellows, the mate asked whether the Doctor wanted to trade any. Coffee beans for a hog, for example; a prime Marquesas hog of twelve score.

"I have no occasion for a hog, sir; but if you would like some beans, you will find a small sack under the seat in the boat. I will attend to the Captain directly."

Putnam was rapidly coming to life; so was his tooth. But the swelling was less; the tooth was ripe for extraction; and with one long firm twisting wrench Stephen delivered him, leaving him gaping, amazed, staring at the bloody fang. He then moved on to his other patients, and once again he observed that men who would submit to grave surgery, even amputation, with a noble fortitude, and bear the worst with no more than an involuntary groan, grew unaccountably shy when sat in a chair and told to open wide. Unless the pain was urgent, there at the moment of sitting or within the last hour, many would change their minds altogether, grow evasive, and move silently off. The teeth dealt with, he attended to the dressing of yesterday's wounds, again explaining just what should be done: he did not wish to lose any one of these men for want of a clear understanding, and he repeated himself frequently, so frequently that he feared his aim might show through. And it would have shown through, if Hcrapath had not been so absent. "You seem somewhat distraught, colleague," said Stephen. "Be so good as to rehearse the main points I have made."

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Herapath, having done so moderately well. "I slept badly last night, and am stupid."

"Here is a smell will revive you," said Stephen. The whole ship was embalmed with the roasting of coffee, or rather with the parching of the beans in a red-hot skillet.

They finished their dressings, and Stephen made some general observations on the drugs he had provided for the whaler's medicine chest: coming to the antimony, he enveighed against the custom of calling it poison, and of frightening young practitioners: 'Certainly antimony is a poison, when wrongly exhibited. But we must not be the prisoners of words. There are times when it is right to use antimony, and many another thing that has an ugly name. It is very weak to be swayed by a mere word, Mr Herapath, by a categorical imperative imposed from without by those who do not know the inward nature, the full complexity of the case.' He was still speaking of the necessity for a clear head, free of prejudices and of notions preconceived by others, for the mind that could judge for itself, and that, on perceiving two evils, could choose the less, whatever its ugly name, when they were invited to drink coffee with the Captain.

The absence of pain, the presence of coffee, made Mr Putnam a far more agreeable companion; he was very complimentary about Stephen's abilities, and he blessed his stars that he had put into Desolation, though when he saw the Leopard in there, he had very nearly turned about, and would have, too, but that the tide was on the make, the breeze in his teeth, and no other sheltered harbour, with greenstuff at hand, that he knew of anywhere under his lee. He reckoned he would sail on the ebb today, round about moonrise; and he begged Dr Maturin to accept these sea-otter skins, ready dressed, that they had picked up off Kamschatka, this piece of ambergris, and these sperm-whale teeth, as a token of the La Fayette's sense of his kindness and skill.