‘and I am to tell you that Sir Lindsay will probably sail on the twenty-seventh of this month, calling at Funchal (where his agents, a precious set of boobies, are buying war-surplus arms) and then at Rio. He has received no countenance from the Admiralty, nor of course from the Hydrographical Office, and he comes as a private person invited by a private committee, the Chilean declarations having been neither officially recognised nor even acknowledged. He has acquired a moderate ship-sloop, sold out of the service; and another, called the Asp, is being repaired for him in Rio: his function is to train the Chilean authorities – if such a name can be applied to a disparate, self-elected committee or collection of committees that is likely to split at any moment…”
‘Dear friend, you are in danger of losing yourself.’
‘I ask pardon … to train the infant Chilean navy, since Spain still holds the great Chiloe archipelago in the south; so that the smaller Spanish men-of-war and privateers haunt the Chilean coast; while in the north, just at hand, in the great Peruvian naval base at Callao, they have some quite important vessels.’
Stephen reflected, and then said, ‘It is some considerable time since we have been able to speak confidentially: tell me, have you any recent local information that I should know?
Anything about the nature of the split?’
‘Indeed I have. I was talking to an intelligent Chilean business connection, a jewel-merchant specialising in emeralds, Muzo emeralds – I even bought a small parcel from him – and he told me that the split was imminent. The two main sides live at some distance from one another: Bernardo O’Higgins and his friend San Martin, who beat the Royalists at Chacabuco, as you will remember, and whose associates invited Captain Aubrey in the first place, lead the northern group; while it was those in the south who invited Captain Lindsay.’
‘Could you briefly outline their views?’
‘Not briefly: there are so many of them with such different aims, and they are all so very talkative. But I might hazard the rash generalisation that the southern gentlemen are more idealist, their feet well off the ground, whereas the northerners under O’Higgins and San Martin, with much more limited aims, are very much more efficient. And although they have some lamentable friends I think they are upon the whole very much less self-seeking.’
Stephen sighed. ‘Clearly, it is a deeply complicated situation,’ he said, ‘with infinite possibilities of making grave mistakes. How I wish you could be there well ahead of Lindsay and of us, so that, with no ostensible connection between you and me, the Surprise could sail into a wealth of intelligence. Let us search for some kind of timely packet or returning merchantman …”
‘My dear sir, I believe it can be done without packets or merchantmen. Did Sir Blaine never speak to you of our man in Buenos Aires?’
‘The invaluable Mr. Bridges, of the chancery? He did: but as I recall chiefly with regard to his encyclopaedic knowledge of early music . . . However, Sir Joseph sometimes speaks very low, for emphasis, and I do not always catch what he says: nor do I like to cry “Eh?”, or “What?”‘
‘Well, the gentleman is also a most eminent mountaineer – has climbed some astonishing Andean peaks – and with some chosen friends, Auracanians I believe, of the most ferocious kind, he has rapidly traversed the whole range by unknown or long-deserted passes; and with his help and his guides I could be in Chile long before you have threaded those tedious Straits or rounded a frozen Horn.’
‘Are you serious, Amos?’
‘I am. The mountain is my only mistress: I climb with infinite joy. There is not a peak in the Djebel Druse I do not know.’
‘Have you any luggage … my boat is on its way.’ Jacob nodded. ‘Then pray bring it to the naval depot as discreetly as possible in the morning: say that you belong to Surprise and desire them to roll out seven casks of rhubarb purgative, and I shall have the pleasure of seeing you there when I come with other demands for medical supplies. God bless, now.’
* * *
‘Jack,’ he cried, bursting into the cabin. ‘Oh, I beg your pardon.’
‘Not at all, brother,’ said Captain Aubrey: he closed his book. ‘I was only reading a most uncomfortable piece in Galatians: damned, whatever you do, almost. I am afraid you have torn your stockings.’
‘It was one of those upright things that caught me as I tried to come over the side in a seamanlike manner. Jack, I went ashore, as you know, in the hope of leaving a message for Amos Jacob, in the event of his joining us eventually as Sir Joseph wished. And there he was in the flesh, sitting not ten yards from me! So we met discreetly on the strand. He had already gathered a great deal of prime intelligence, and as my memory is by no means all I could wish I begged him to come aboard and give you all the main points. He will accompany us as far as Rio – and then with the blessing join us overland in Chile. But not to torment you, let me say at once that Sir David does not set out until the twenty-seventh: that he has a “moderate ship-sloop” sold out of the service, with another, called the Asp, being repaired for him in Rio, where he must call, before attempting – if my memory serves – to pass into the Pacific by the Strait. But Jacob will tell it more accurately, together with his detailed information about the various parties in Chile.
Lindsay, by the way, already has agents here, buying used weapons against his arrival.
To avoid any hint of collusion, I have begged Dr. Jacob to repair to the depot with his chest early in the morning, to present himself as one belonging to the Surprise and to ask the people there to have seven barrels of the rhubarb purgative ready to trundle down into the boat that will bring him out to the ship.’
‘God love us all,’ said Jack. ‘Stephen, you quite astonish me with all your tidings – astonish and delight me. I do not know about dear Jacob’s “moderate ship-sloop”, but I do remember the poor tottering old Asp, when I was a boy; and I doubt she could withstand a single one of our broadsides. In any event, we have plenty of time, plenty of time for
making a long southern sweep and steering north and west when the Antarctic weather, the Antarctic ice, are a little less horrible at the beginning of their summer, keeping the Horn way, way to leeward and so to the height of Valparaiso. Unless we have uncommon bad luck in the doldrums, we have time and to spare – just touch at Freetown to refresh, touch and away . . .’
‘Touch and away, Jack?’ asked Stephen. ‘Touch and away? Do you not recall that I have important business there? Enquiries of the very first interest?’
‘To do with our enterprise? To do with this voyage?’
‘Perhaps not quite directly.’
‘I do remember that at one time you did make a particular point of Freetown. You had hoped that we should “slope away for the Guinea Coast” directly from Gibraltar; and at that time I represented to you that the patching we had received in the yard did not prepare the barky for the Chile voyage – that Madeira was essential. Then we found Madeira town and above all Coelho’s yard burnt to a cinder, so we had to go home, where she was thoroughly repaired and manned. But if you still feel strongly about the Guinea Coast and its pottoes, about Sierra Leone and Freetown, it could certainly be more than touch and away. What would you consider an adequate stay?’
After a hesitation Stephen said, ‘Jack, we are very old friends and I do not scruple to tell you, in confidence, that I mean to beg Christine Wood to marry me.’
Aubrey was perfectly taken aback, dumbfounded: he blushed. Yet quite soon his good nature and good breeding enabled him to say ‘that he wished dear Stephen every success
– a most capital plan, he was sure – and that Surprise should lie there until she grounded on her beef-bones, if Stephen so desired.’
‘No, my dear,’ said Stephen. ‘In such a case, and with such a person, I think it would be a plain yes or no. In the event of the first, I believe I should like to stay a week, if a week can be allowed. Otherwise we may sail away that same day, as far as I am concerned.’
They parted for the night with expressions of the utmost good will on either side; and early in the morning Dr. Jacob’s rather frowzy appearance in the great cabin changed the atmosphere quite remarkably. He explained the situation in Chile with a wealth of details (many of which Stephen had forgotten, his mind being elsewhere) which Adams, the captain’s clerk, took down in a shorthand of his own.