‘Let us start with the sturgeon, and if you put the ducks down to the fire this very minute, they will be ready by the time we have done. What are you drinking, Stephen?’
‘Gin and water, cold.’
‘What a God-forsaken melancholy tope. Let us call for champagne it is not every day we get a ship, and such a ship I will tell you all about it ‘He gave Stephen a detailed account of his interview, drawing the Polychrest’s curious shape in watered gin ‘She is a vile job, of course, and how she survived Old Jarvie’s reforms I cannot conceive When I looked at her sheer-plan, and when I thought of Canning’s frigate, building under his eye according to the draught of the Bellone – why, it made me feel very strange, for a moment. But I have scarcely had time to tell you of the handsome offer he made me. Forgive me for a moment while I write him a note to say I regret extremely that official business makes it impossible,
and so on: turn it in the most obliging way I can manage, very civil and friendly, and get it into the penny post tonight;
for really, it was the handsomest, most flattering offer. I took to Canning amazingly; I hope to see him again. You would like him, Stephen. Full of life, intelligent, gets the point at once, interested in everything – civil, too, delicate and modest; perfectly gentlemanlike; you would swear he was an Englishman. You must meet.’
‘That is a recommendation, to be sure; but I am already acquainted with Mr Canning.’
‘You know him?’
‘We met at Bruton Street today.’ In a flash Jack understood why the sound of Bruton Street had run so unpleasantly just now. ‘I called on Diana Villiers after walking with Sophie in the park.’
A look of intense pain came over Jack’s face. ‘How was Sophie?’ he asked, looking down.
‘She was not looking well. Thinner, unhappy. But she has grown up: I think her more beautiful now than when we knew her in Sussex.’
Jack leant over the back of his chair, saying nothing. A clatter of plates and dishes, a busy waving of table-cloth and napkins, and the sturgeon and the champagne came in. They ate, with a few generalities about sturgeon – a fish-royal – the first time Jack had eaten it –
a rather insipid, disappointing fish – and then he said, ‘How was Diana?’
‘Her spirits appeared sometimes elated and sometimes oppressed; but she was in splendid looks; and she too was full of life.’ He might have added, ‘And of wanton unkindness.’
Jack said, ‘I had no notion you would call at Bruton Street.’ Stephen made no reply other than a bend of his head. ‘Were there many other people?’
‘Three soldiers, an Indian judge, and Mr Canning.’
‘Yes. She told me she knew him. Here come the ducks. They look famous, do they not?’
he cried with a show of spirit. ‘Pray carve them, Stephen. You do it so cleverly. Shall we send some down to Scriven? What do you make of him, by the bye?’
‘He is a man, like another. I feel a certain sympathy for him.’
‘Do you mean to keep him?’
‘I might, too. Will I help you to some stuffing?’
‘As much as ever you like. When shall we eat sage and onions again? When he has eaten his duck, do you think Scriven could cut along and take our places on the mail, while we are packing at Hampstead? He might still get insides.’
‘It would be safer for you to go post, Jack. The papers have an account of Lady Keith’s reception, and your name is in the Chronicle, if not the rest: your creditors must have taken notice of it. Their agents in Portsmouth are perfectly capable of meeting the coach.
Mr Scriven is thoroughly acquainted with their ingenious devilish malignity: he tells me they are as watchful and eager as thief-takers. You must drive straight to the yard in a post-chaise and go aboard. I will attend to your dunnage and send it down by the waggon.’
‘Ain’t you coming, Stephen?’ cried Jack, pushing his plate away and staring across the table, perfectly aghast.
‘I had not thought of going to sea at present,’ said Stephen. ‘Lord Keith offered me the flagship as physician, but I begged to be excused. I have many things that call for my attention here; and it is a long while since I was in Ireland -,
‘But I had taken it absolutely for granted that we were to sail together, Stephen,’ cried Jack. ‘And I was so happy to bring you these orders. What shall I . . . ‘He checked himself, and then in a much lower tone he said, ‘But of course, I had not the least right to make such an assumption. I do beg your pardon; and I will explain to the Admiralty at once –
entirely my fault. A flagship, after all, by God! It is not more than you deserve. I am afraid I have been very presumptuous.’
‘No, no, no, my dear,’ cried Stephen. ‘It is nothing to do with the flagship. I do not give a fig for a flagship. Put
that clear out of your mind. I should far prefer a sloop or a frigate. No. It is that I had not quite made up my mind to a cruise just now. However, let us leave things as they stand for the moment. Indeed, I should not like to have the name of a take-it-and-drop it, shilly-shallying, missish “son of a bitch” at the Navy Board,’ he said with a smile. ‘Never be so put about, joy: it was only the abruptness that disturbed me – I am more deliberate in my motions than you sanguine, briny creatures. I am engaged until the end of the week, but then, unless I write, I will join you with my sea-chest on Monday. Come, drink up your wine
– admirable stuff for a little small shebeen – and we will have another bottle. And before we put you aboard your chaise, I will tell you what I know about the English law of debt.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
My dear Sir,
This is to tell you that I have reached Portsmouth a day earlier than I had proposed; to solicit the indulgence of not reporting aboard until this evening; and to beg for the pleasure of your company at dinner.
I am, my dear Sir,
Your affectionate humble servant,
Stephen Maturin
He folded the paper, wrote ‘Captain Aubrey, RN, HM Sloop Polychrest’, sealed it and rang the bell. ‘Do you know where the Polychrest lies?’ he asked.
‘Oh, yes, sir,’ replied the man with a knowing smile. ‘She’s getting her guns in at the Ordnance; and a rare old time of it she had, last tide.’
‘Then be so good as to have this note taken to her directly. And these other letters are to be put into the post.’
He turned back to the table, and opening his diary he wrote, ‘I sign myself his affectionate humble servant; and affection it is that brings me here, no doubt. Even a frigid, self-sufficing man needs something of this interchange if he is not to die in his unmechanical part: natural philosophy, music, dead men’s conversation, is not enough. I like to think, indeed I do think, that JA has as real an affection for me as is consonant with his unreflecting, jovial nature, and I know mine for him – I know how moved I was by his distress; but how long will this affection withstand the attrition of mute daily conflict? His kindness for me will not prevent him from pursuing Diana. And what he does not wish to see, he will not see: I do not imply a
conscious hypocrisy, but the quod volunt credere applies with particular force to him. As for her, I am at a loss -this kindness and then the turning away as though from an enemy.
It is as though in playing with JA she had become herself entangled. (Yet would she ever part with her ambition? Surely not. And he is even less marriageable than I; less a lawful prize. Can this be a vicious inclination? JA, though no Adonis by my measure, is well-looking, which I am not.) It is as though his ludicrous account of my wealth, passing through Mrs Williams and gathering force by the conviction in that block-head’s tone, had turned me from an ally, a friend, even an accomplice, into an opponent. It is as though –
oh, a thousand wild possibilities. I am lost, and I am disturbed. Yet I think I may be cured; this is a fever of the blood, and laudanum will cool it, distance will cool it, business and action will do the same. What I dread is the contrary heating effect of jealousy: I had never felt jealousy before this, and although all knowledge of the world, all experience, literature, history, common observation told me of its strength, I had no sense of its true nature at all.