Patrick O`Brian - THE REVERSE OF THE MEDAL

'I am so sorry, Maturin,' he said, returning to the room, 'it was inhuman of Lowndes to go on so long. He might have been settling a treaty with a hostile power rather than• - how I hope he did not destroy your appetite. Knowing that you people of the old faith are required to mortify your flesh today, I went down early and found some really fresh oysters, a couple of hen lobsters, and such a bold turbot! If he is overcooked I shall never forgive the Foreign Office, never as long as I live.' He poured two glasses of sherry. 'But I must say I did admire your tenacity about the financial side.'

'It is wealth that does it,' said Stephen. 'Ever since I had a great deal of money I have found that I much dislike being parted from it, particularly in a sharp or overbearing manner. Whereas formerly I would meekly allow myself to be choused or bullied or put down, I now counter-attack with a confidence and an asperity that quite surprises me and that nearly always answers.' He raised, his glass and said 'I drink to your complete and early success.'

'Thank you,' said Blaine. 'Warren and I believe we are fairly close behind our fox. It is very high treason indeed and only about twenty men are capable of committing it I mean, are in a position to commit it. This twentieth man is very wary and cunning, but I think Warren, with all the resources at his disposal, will find him out. Warren is much more intelligent than you might suppose from his military face and his shape; he is a eunuch, you know, and a man without -,

'If you please, sir,' said Mrs Barlow severely, at the door, and Sir Joseph, blushing, led Stephen to the dining-room. 'What news of poor Aubrey?' he asked, as they sat down.

'He has all the hands he wants - has turned many away and has accepted others only on liking - and means to make a short cruise in the Bay for a month or so, to see how they shake down and whether any fail to give satisfaction. I am to join him on Saturday, taking the early coach tomorrow.'

'I am glad he is so fortunate with his crew: the cleverer men would of course come in droves to sail with such a captain, such a prize-taker. A wonderful change from having to rely on the receiving-ships! He does deserve some good luck after so much wretchedness. And yet, you know, that vile job did the ministry no good. Quinborough is perhaps the most unpopular man in the nation at present; he is hooted in the street, and the Radicals are clean forgotten in the general outcry against the sentence and the conduct of the trial. The town is full of praise for the officers and men at the Exchange and their cheering: Government completely mistook the feeling of the country. People enjoy seeing a short-weight baker pilloried, or a fraudulent stock-jobber, but they could not bear a naval officer being set up in the machine.'

'The seamen were indeed a glorious sight. I was astonished and delighted to see so many.' 'Government could scarcely have mismanaged the business worse. They delayed the execution of the sentence until the whole island was filled with indignation and until there happened to be a strong squadron in the Downs and several ships at the Nore, together with far more than usual in the Medway and the upper reaches of the Thames. All these ships present, to say nothing of the large floating population of seamen, at a time when tide and wind were perfect for bringing them up the river and taking them down again. Of course many officers came up and of course large parties were given leave - I am told that even the press-tender's crew appeared, on the pretence of looking for deserters. And now Quinborough and his friends are reduced to having pamphlets written to defend their conduct.'

The bold turbot came in, together with a bottle of Montrachet, and after a busy pause Stephen said 'I believe you may forgive Mr Lowndes after all.'

'A wordy animal,' said Sir Joseph, but without animosity; and then, 'Speaking of pamphlets, what did you think of your friend's? Of Mr Martin's?'

'Faith,' said Stephen, 'I have not read it. A packet came from the remote waste where he lives, the creature, just before I left for Bury. I saw from his note that all was well - a pretty wound and the stitches firm - so put it by to look into later. I imagine it is the paper on the True Weevils that he has been intending to write for some time.'

'Oh no, dear me no. Its title is A statement of Certain Immoral Practices prevailing in the Royal Navy, together with some remarks upon Flogging and Impressment.'

Stephen laid down his fork and his piece of bread. 'Is it very severe?' he asked.

'Scorpions ain't in it. He excepts the frigate S- under the honourable conduct of Captain A- from charges of whoredom, sodomy, and cruel capricious tyrannical punishment, but he comes down on the rest like a thousand of bricks. And on the system of recruiting. Happily for him he can afford to do so, since as I understand it he has married and settled down on his living in the country.'

'He has no living in the country or anywhere else. He meant to go on sailing with Aubrey and me as a naval chaplain.'

'Well, I am heartily sorry for it, he being such a capital entomologist and a friend of yours; for after this outburst, however moral, however true, he will never get another ship. He would have been far better advised to keep to his True Weevils, or even better his New World Cicindelidae. However, let us hope that his wife brought him a reasonable fortune, so that he may continue to indulge in the luxury of telling his betters of their faults. Cicindelidae, those glorious beetles! I have not yet arranged or even classed above half the collection you was so very kind as to bring me, though I often sit up with them till one in the morning. But oh, Maturin, I blush to admit it, seeing that he was the rarest of the rare - an awkward movement sent duodecimpunctatus to the ground, and an even unhappier lurch, trying to save him, set my foot square on his back. If you should happen to pass by the shores of the Orinoco, I should be infinitely obliged…'

Beetles, the Entomological Association, and the Royal Society carried them to their cheese, and when Mrs Barlow brought in the coffee she said 'Sir Joseph, I have put the gentleman's bones under his hat on the chair in the hall.'

'Oh yes,' said Blaine, 'Cuvier sent Banks a parcel of bones for you, and Banks, knowing you would be here today, gave them to me.'

'They are probably those of a solitaire,' said Stephen, palping the parcel as he took his leave. 'How very kind and thoughtful in Cuvier.'

He walked fast to Black's, hurried upstairs to where all his possessions lay scattered abroad, waiting to be packed, and undid his packet. They were not the bones of a solitaire, far less those of a dodo, as he had half hoped, hut a mixed set of commonplace storks, cranes, and possibly one brown pelican. The bones were loosely wrapped in a gannet's skin, reasonably well preserved but in no way extraordinary. Any naturalist's shop near the Jardin des Plantes could have supplied it. Yet it did not seem likely that anyone would have carried a witless joke so very far and Stephen began examining the bones one by one. Nothing there: but on the inside of the skin there was a message. It looked like a taxidermist's notes but in fact it read Si la personne qui s 'intйresse au pavilion de partance voudrait bien donner rendez-vous en laissant un snot chez Jules, traiteur a Frith Street, elle en aurait des nouvelles.

'Pavilion de partance,' said Maturin aloud, frowning. He tried a number of recombinations but still it came out as pavilion de partance; and the more he repeated it the more it seemed to him that perhaps he had heard it long ago in France.

He walked down the stairs towards the library, still muttering; but at their foot he met the amiable Admiral Smyth. 'Good evening to you, sir,' he said. 'I was on my way to find a naval encyclopaedia, but now I may cut my journey short, I find. Pray what is meant by a pavilion de partance?'