Patrick O'Brian - H.M.S. Surprise

The dinner was a splendid affair, eaten off a blaze of gold; and without reflecting he swallowed a pound or two of some animal aswim in a fiery sauce. His neighbours were affable, but after they had exhausted the common topics they gave him up as a heavy fellow, and he made his way mutely through the succeeding courses, each with its own wine. In the comparative silence he heard the conversation of the two civilians opposite, the one a deaf and aged judge with green spectacles and a braying voice, the other a portly member of council: towards the end of dinner they were both flushed, and far from steady. Their subject was Canning, his unpopularity, his bold and independent activity. ‘From all I hear,’ said the judge, ‘you gentlemen will be inclined to present the survivor with a pair of gold-​inlaid pistols, if not a service of plate.’

‘I do not speak for myself,’ said the member of council, ’since Madras is the scene of my labours, but I believe there are some here who will shed no tears in their mourning-​coaches.’

‘And what about the woman? Is it true they mean to expel her as an undesirable person? I should prefer to see a good old-​fashioned flogging at the cart’s tail; it is many years since I have had that pleasure, sir. Should you not itch to hold the whip? For undesirable person is only to be construed in the administrative sense, in this case.’

‘Buller’s wife called to see how she was supporting her misfortune; she was not admitted, however.’

‘Prostrated, of course; quite prostrated, I am sure. But tell me about the fire-​eating Irish sawbones. Was the woman his. .

An aide-​dc-​camp came up behind them and whispered between their heads. The judge cried, ‘What? Eh? Oh I was not aware.’ He brought his spectacles some way down his nose and peered at Jack, who said, ‘You are speaking of my friend Dr Maturin, sir. I trust the woman to whom you have referred is in no way connected with the lady who honours Maturin and me with her acquaintance.’

No, no, they assured him - they meant not the least offence to the gentleman - would be happy to withdraw any facetious expression - would never dream of speaking of a lady known to Captain Aubrey with disrespect -they hoped he would drink a glass of wine with them. By all means, said he; and presently the judge was led away.

The next day, on the padded quarterdeck of the Surprise, Jack received Diana with less rigour than she had expected. He told her that Maturin was sleeping at the moment, but if she chose to sit below with Mr. M’Alister she would learn all that could be learnt about his state, and if Stephen woke, M’Alister might let her in. He sent down all that the Surprise could offer in the way of refreshments, and when she went away at last, after a long vain wait, he said, ‘I hope you will have better luck another time; but indeed this sleep is the greatest blessing: it is the first he has had.’

‘Tomorrow I cannot get away; there is so much to be done. On Thursday, if I may?’

‘Certainly; and if any of my officers can be of use, we should be most happy. Pullings and Babbington you know. Or Bonden for an escort? These docks are hardly the place for a lady.’

‘How kind. I should be glad of Mr Babbington’s protection.’

‘Lord, Braithwaite,’ said Friday’s Babbington, double-​shaved, shining in his gold-​laced hat, ‘how I love that Mrs Villiers.’

Braithwaite sighed and shook his head. ‘She makes the rest look like brutes from Portsmouth Point.’

‘I shall never look at another woman again, I am sure. Here she comes! I see her carriage beyond the dhow.’

He ran to hand her up the gangway and to the quarterdeck. ‘Good day to you, ma’am,’ said Jack. ‘He is considerably better, and I am happy to say he has ate an egg. But there is still a great deal of fever, and I beg you will not upset or cross him in any way. M’Alister says it is most important not to cross him in any way.’

‘Dear Maturin,’ she said, ‘how glad I am to see you sitting up. Here are some mangosteens; they are the very thing for a fever. But are you sure you are well enough to see visitors? They frighten me so, Aubrey, Pullings, Mr M’Alister, and now even Bonden, telling mc not to tire you or vex you, that I think I should go almost at once.’

‘I am as strong as an ox, my dear,’ said he, ‘and infinitely recovered by the sight of you.’

‘At all events, I shall try not to upset you or cross you in any way. First let mc thank you for your dear note. It was a great comfort, and I am following your directions.’

He smiled, and said in a low voice. ‘How happy you make me. But Diana, there is the sordid aspect - common requirements - bread and butter. In this envelope -’

‘Stephen, dear, you are the best of creatures. But I have bread and butter, and jam too, for the moment. I sold a thumping great emerald the Nizam gave mc, and I have booked the only decent cabin in the Lushington. I shall leave everything else behind - just abandon it where it lies. The underbred frumps of Calcutta may call me names, but they shall not say I am interested.’

‘No. No indeed,’ said Stephen. ‘The Lushington: roomy, comfortable, twice our size, the best sherry I have ever drunk. Yet I wish - you know, I wish you could have come home in the Surprise. It would have meant waiting another month or so, but . . . You did not think to ask Jack?’

‘No, my dear,’ she said tenderly. ‘I did not: how stupid of me. But then there are the maids, you know; and I should hate you to see me seasick, green, squalid and selfish. It will make little odds in the long run, however. I dare say you will catch us up - we shall see one another at Madeira; or at all events in London. It will not be long. I low parched you look. Let me give you something to drink. Is this barley-​water?’

They talked quietly - barley-​water, mangosteens, eggs, the tigers of the Sunderbands - or rather she talked and he lay there looking grave, transparent, but deeply happy, uttering a word or two. She said, ‘Aubrey will certainly take great care of you. Will he make as good a husband as he does a friend, I wonder? I doubt it; he knows nothing whatsoever about women. Stephen, you are growing very tired. I shall go now. The Lushington sails at some impossible hour of the morning- at high tide. Thank you for my ring. Good-​bye, my dear.’ She kissed him, and her tears dropped on his face.

The fetid ooze of the Hooghly gave way to the clearer sea of the Bay of Bengal, to the right dark blue of the Indian Ocean; the Surprise, homeward-​bound at last, spread her wings to the monsoon and raced away south-​westwards in the track of the Lushington, now two thousand miles ahead.

She carried a sodden, disgruntled, flabby crew, a steel box filled with rubies, sapphires, and pearls in chamois bags, a raving surgeon, and an anxious commander.

He sat the night-​watches through by Stephen’s cot ever since the fever had reached its present shocking height: M’Alister would have spelled him, or any one of the gunroom, but delirium had unlocked Stephen’s secret mind and although much of what he said was in French or Catalan, or meaningless except in the context of his private nightmare, much was direct, clear and specific. A less secret man might not have been so communicative: it poured out of Stephen’s unconscious mouth in a torrent.

Quite apart from official secrets, there were things Jack did not want any other man to hear. He was ashamed to hear them himself - for a man as proud as Stephen (and Lucifer could not hold a candle to him) it would be death to know that even the closest friend had heard his naked statements of desire and all his weaknesses laid as bare as Judgment Day. Discourses on adultery and fornication; imagined conversations with Richard Canning on the nature of the marriage-​bond; sudden apostrophes -’Jack Aubrey, you, too, will pierce yourself with your own weapon, I fear. A bottle of wine inside you, and you will go to bed to the next wench that shows a gleam, quit with regretting it all your days. You do not know chastity.’ Embarrassing words: ‘Jew is an unearned distinction; bastard is another. They should be brothers: both at least are difficult friends, if not impossible, since both are sensitive to pricks unknown to the general.’