there are likely to be bandits, are there not? One hears sad tales of the Arabs: and I well remember that in the Holy Land, where people were no doubt a great deal better than they are now, the Good Samaritan came upon a poor fellow beaten, wounded and robbed on the highway. While a little later in this watch I am going to send off two convoys, heavily armed, to see some merchantmen safe into London river, laden with no more than Smyrna figs and the like – never so much as a pearl or a diamond between the lot of them.
For my part I should never dare wander about a desert carrying a stock of gem-stones without a troop of horse at my back.’
‘Nor, unless I had a soul triply bound in brass, should I ever dare to put to sea in a frail wooden affair drifting as the wind chooses: but as you know, sir, better than I, a little use makes it seem almost safe, even commonplace. To be sure, both mountain and desert can be mortal for one not brought up to them; but after some generations they seem little more dangerous than a journey to Brighton.’
A midshipman came, walked to Commodore Aubrey’s side and discreetly conveyed Mr Harding’s duty together with the news that the officer commanding the convoy desired leave to part company.
‘Forgive me, gentlemen,’ said Jack, rising. ‘I shall not be long.’
Long he was not, but already the talk had flowed on, and Jacob was repeating the word ‘Mzab’ with some emphasis to Mr Wright, who leant forward, one hand cupping his ear.
‘Forgive me, sir,’ said Jacob, ‘I was just explaining how generations of nomadic jewel-trading teach one to survive – the network of trusted associates, often related – the custom of travelling in small family groups – middle-aged women, young children – few guards and those few at a distance –
a modest drove of indifferent horses or camels as ostensible 87
property. I particularly stressed the young and preferably dirty, shabby children: they do away with any idea of wealth. And I did so partly to explain to Dr Maturin how I came to be acquainted with the Zeneta dialect of Berber and the archaic Hebrew of Mzab.’
‘An acquaintance I envy you,’ said Jack.
Jacob bowed and continued, ‘I had been taken along by some Alexandrian cousins, playing the part of unwashed child to perfection; but when we came to their usual resting place among the Beni Mzab a camel gave me so severe a bite – a bite that would not heal
– that they were obliged to leave me and a great-aunt and travel on to an important
rendezvous a great way off. It was there that I learnt the double guttural of the Beni Mzab Hebrew and that I became thoroughly at home with the triliteral roots of the Berber.’ He gave a good many examples of the Hebrew in question and of Berber grammar, illustrating them with quotations from Ibn Khaldun.
‘By your leave, sir,’ cried Killick, to Jack’s relief, for not only was he thoroughly set-up for a reasonable quantity of spotted dog, but he was afraid that Mr Wright’s interest in archaic Hebrew, never very strong, was waning fast.
His interest in food, however, was as eager as Jack’s, in spite of his age; and after a while he said in a voice of real authority, ‘The French may say what they please, and Apicius, with his slave-fed moray eels, was no doubt very well; but it seems to me that civilization reaches its very height in the glistening, gently mottled form of just such a pudding as this, bedewed with its unctuous sauce.’
‘How wholly I agree with you, sir,’ cried Jack. ‘Allow me to cut you a slice from the translucent starboard end.’
‘Well, if I must, I must,’ said Mr Wright, eagerly advancing his plate.
Gradually the pudding diminished; the decanters made their stately round; and Jack Aubrey brought up the subject
of music. ‘Until a little while ago,’ he observed, ‘I had never heard of a Bohemian composer called Zelenka.’
‘Dismas,
I
believe.’
Jack bowed and went on, ‘But then I was given a copy of his Ricercare for Three Voices, which we have now played several times and which I thought we might offer you with your coffee: unless indeed you would prefer the Locatelli C major trio.’
‘To tell you the truth, dear Commodore, I should prefer the Locatelli. There is something truly dispassionate and as it were geometrical in the trio that touches me, in something of the same manner as your paper on nutation and the precession of the equinoxes, considered from the navigator’s point of view, in the Transactions. But before that, may I beg Dr Maturin to show me his horn? Then while I am listening, being at the same time in physical contact with the problems posed by this improbable tooth, perhaps intuition may lead me to the solution, as it has done on three or four very happy occasions.’
Jack Aubrey had spoken of coffee, and to be sure it was as inevitable as the setting of the sun; but at present the stronger constitutions were still engaged with the remains of the spotted dog, and all hands were still drinking madeira
– most emphatically all hands, since Killick, his mate and the boy, third class, who helped him in the background, were very fond of this ancient and generous wine and had perfected a way of substituting a full for a half-emptied decanter at the end of each passing: the dwarvish third-class boy wafted the first decanter out, emptied it entirely into tumblers which the three then drained in hurried gulps as opportunity offered.
Stephen had been aware of their motions for some little while – he was, in any case, well acquainted with Killick’s tendency to finish anything that was left and indeed to encourage the leaving, though rarely to this remarkable extent: Stephen had little to say about it on moral grounds,
but it appeared to him that the third-class boy, a weedy little villain of about five feet, was very near his limit – he had had more opportunity than the other two and of
course much less stamina. It was therefore something of a relief to Stephen when the last decanter, which had furnished the loyal toast, was removed, and Jack, Mr Wright and Jacob looked expectantly at him. ‘Killick,’ he said, ‘pray be so good as to step into my cabin and bring the bow-case hanging behind the door.’
‘Aye-aye, sir,’ cried Killick, paler than Stephen could have wished, and apt to stare.
‘Bow-case it is.’
But bow-case it was not. Killick had seen fit to take the horn out and now he could be seen for a moment in the light of the open door, making antic gestures with its point at the third-class boy, who was draining the last of the wine. ‘Oh, oh,’ cried the boy, choking, and he plunged forward in a paroxysm of adolescent drunkenness, spewing improbable jets of madeira, grasping Killick’s knees and bringing him down. He fell flat on the deck, holding the horn close to his chest. It broke in the middle with a sharp crack, sending off a long sliver that shot into the great cabin.
These things took place in the coach, the small apartment forward and to larboard, generally used on such occasions. Jack strode through it over the two bodies, calling very loud and clear for his bosun, swabbers and the master-at-arms.
Bonden took in the situation at once and in a cold, silent fury he ran the now speechless Killick away forward, while the master-at-arms dragged the limp wretched boy to the nearest pump. The swabbers, old hands at this job, set to without a word: and with extraordinary speed – no comments whatsoever – the frigate’s people cleaned up, cleared away, and even before the deck was quite dry, restored the cabin to a wholly clean and civilized condition.
Mr Wright was sitting on the broad locker that ran across the Surprise’s great cabin, just by the sweep of stern windows, when Stephen came back, carrying his ‘cello and 90the scores. The old gentleman had the pieces of narwhal horn carefully arranged by his side, the broken parts set together and the eighteen-inch splinter laid so exactly in place that at first sight the horn looked whole. ‘Dear Dr Maturin,’ he said, ‘I fear you must be grievously distressed.’
‘No, sir,’ said Stephen. ‘I do not mind it.’
Wright hesitated for a moment and then went on, ‘But believe me, this is one of the few things I can do really well. The providential splinter has shown me the nature of the inner substance; the breaks are perfectly clean; and I have a cement that will knit them so firmly that the tooth will retain all its original strength: a cement that would make dentists’