Post Captain (20 page)

even warmer, perhaps, for she moved away from the group to talk with him - a hundred quick, attentive inquiries -and she said 'How we have missed you at Mapes, Aubrey; how I have missed you! A pack of women mewed up together, bottling gooseberries, God help us. There is that odious Mr Dawkins bearing down. We will go and look at Lady Keith's new picture. Here it is. What do you think of her?'

It was clear that the Magdalene had not yet repented: she was standing on a quay with blue ruins in the background - a blue that swept with varying intensities through her robe to the sea - with gold plates, ewers and basins heaped up on a crimson cloth, and an expression of mild complacency on her face. Her blue dress had blown off - a fresh double-reef topsail breeze - and so had a filmy white garment, exposing handsome limbs and a firm, though opulent bosom. Jack had been a long time at sea, and this drew his attention; however, he shifted his gaze after a moment, surveyed the rest of the picture and sought for something appropriate, perhaps even witty, to say. He longed to produce a subtle and ingenious remark, but he longed in vain - perhaps the day had been too full - and he was obliged to fall back on 'Very fine - such a blue.' Then a small vessel in the lower left-hand corner caught his eye, something in the nature of a pink; she was beating up for the harbour, but it was obvious from the direction of the lady's clothes that the pink would be taken aback the moment she rounded the headland. 'As soon as she catches the land-breeze she will be in trouble,' he said. 'She will never stay, not with those unhandy lateens, and there is no room to wear; so there she is on a lee-shore. Poor fellows. I am afraid there is no hope for them.'

'That is exactly what Maturin told me you would say,' cried Diana, squeezing his arm. 'How well he knows you, Aubrey.'

'Well, a man don't have to be a Nostradamus to tell what a sailor will say, when he sees an infernal tub like that laid by the lee. But Stephen is a very deep old file, to be sure,' he added, his good humour returning. 'And a great cognoscento, I make no doubt. For my part I know nothing about painting at all.'

'Nor do I,' said Diana, staring up at the picture. 'She seems to be making a very good thing of it,' - with a chuckle - 'No lack of admirers. Come, let us see if we can find an ice: I am dying of heat and general distress.'

'Look at the outré way Diana has dragged up her hair,' said Mrs Williams as they passed by towards the great drawing-room. 'It is bound to attract attention. It would do Sophie good, to see her walking about like that, as bold as brass, with poor Captain Aubrey. She has positively taken his arm, I protest.'

'Tell me,' said Diana, 'What are your plans? Are you back for good? Shall we see something of you in Sussex?'

'I am not sure,' said Jack. 'Do you see that man saying good-bye to Lady Keith? But you know him - he was talking to you just now. Canning.'

'Yes?'

'He has offered me the command of a - of a letter-of-marque, a private man of war, a thirty-two gun frigate.'

'Oh, Aubrey, how splendid! A privateer is just the thing for you - Have I said something wrong?'

'No. No, not at all - good evening, sir: that was Admiral Bridges - No, it was just the word privateer. But as Stephen is always telling me, one must not be the prisoner of words.'

'Of course not. Besides, what does it signify? It is just like taking service with the native princes in India:

nobody thinks any the less of you and everybody envies the fortune you make. Oh, how well it would suit you -your own master, no fagging up and down to Whitehall, no admirals to make you do tiresome things and snatch great lumps of your prize-money. A perfect idea for a man like you - for a man of spirit. An independent command! A thirty-two gun frigate!'

'It is a magnificent offer: I am in a maze.'

'And in partnership with Canning! I am sure you would get on famously. My cousin Jersey knows him. The Cannings are absurdly rich, and he is very like a native prince; only he is straightforward and brave, which they are not, on the whole.' Her eager face changed, and looking round Jack saw an elderly man standing by him. 'My dear,' said the elderly man, 'Charlotte sends me to tell you she is thinking of going home presently; we have to drop Charles at the Tower before twelve.'

'I shall come at once,' said Diana.

'No, no, you have plenty of time to finish your ice.'

'Have I, truly? May I introduce Captain Aubrey, of the Navy, Admiral Haddock's neighbour? Colonel Colpoys, who is so sweetly kind as to have me to stay.'

Very small talk for a moment, and the colonel went away to see to his horses.

'When shall I see you again? Will you call at Bruton Street tomorrow morning? I shall be alone. You may take me into the park, and to look at the shops.'

'Diana,' said Jack in a low voice, 'there is a writ out against me. I dare not walk about London.'

'You dare not? You are afraid of being arrested?' Jack nodded.

'Afraid? Upon my word, I never expected to hear that from you. What do you think I introduced you for? It was so you might call.'

'Besides, I am under orders for the Admiralty tomorrow.'

'How unfortunate,' said Diana.

'May I come on Sunday?'

'No, sir, you may not. I do not ask men to come to see me so often... No, you must certainly consult your safety: of course you must consult your safety. In any case, I shall no longer be in town.'

'Mr Wells's carriage; Sir John Bridges's carriage; Colonel Colpoys's carriage,' cried a footman.

'Major Lennox,' said Diana, as one of her soldiers went by, 'please be very kind and find me my cloak, will you? I must say good-bye to Lady Keith and my aunt,' she observed to herself, gathering her fan and gloves.

Jack followed the procession of Colonel and Mrs Colpoys, Diana Villiers, the unknown Charles, Lennox and Stephen Maturin, and stood bare-headed, exposed on that brightly-lit pavement while the carriages made their slow way down from the mews: no word, however - not so much as a look. At last the women were handed in and stowed away, the carriage moved off, and Jack walked slowly back into the house with Stephen Maturin.

They went up the broad stairs, making their way against the increasing current of guests who had taken their leave; their conversation was fragmentary and unimportant - a few general remarks - but by the time they had reached the top each knew that their harmony was no longer what it had been these last few months.

'I shall make my farewells,' said Stephen, 'and then I believe I shall walk down to the Physical Society. You will stay a little longer with your friends, I imagine? I do beg you to take a coach from the very door itself and to ride all the way home. Here is the common purse. If you are to see the First Lord in the morning, your mind must be in a condition of easy complaisance, in a placid, rested state. There is milk in the little crock - warmed milk will relax the fibres.'

Jack warmed it, added a dash of rum from his case-bottle, and drank it up; but in spite of his faith in the draught, the fibres remained tense, the placidity of mind a great way off.

Writing a note to tell Stephen that he would be back presently and leaving the candle burning, he walked out on to the Heath. Enough moonlight filtered through the murk to show him his path, pale among the scattered trees; he went fast, and soon he had walked himself into his second wind and a steady rhythm. Into a muck-sweat, too: the cloak became unbearably hot. Steadily on, with the cloak rolled tight under his arm, up hill, down to some ponds, and up again. He almost trod on a courting couple - hard pressed, to lie in such a dismal plash and at such a time -and turned away right-handed, leaving the remote glow of London behind him.

This was the first time in his life he had ever refused a direct challenge. He could hear the whining reasonability of his 'there is a writ out against me' and he blushed in the darkness - pitiful. But how could she have asked him to do such a thing? How could she ask so much? He thought of her with cold hostility. No friend would have done so. She was no fool, no inexperienced girl: she knew what he was risking.

Contempt was very hard to bear. In his place she would have come, bailiffs or no bailiffs; he was sure of that. The Admiralty had sounded a snivelling excuse.

What if he chanced it and appeared at Bruton Street in the morning? If he were to accept the privateer, the appointment in Whitehall would be meaningless. He had been shabbily treated there, more shabbily than any man he could remember, and there was no likelihood, no possibility that tomorrow's meeting would put things right. At the best some unacceptable shore-based post that would salve the First Lord's conscience, that would allow him to say 'We offered him employment, but he did not see fit to accept it.' Conceivably some hulk or storeship; but at all events Lord Melville was not going to make him post and offer him a frigate, the only thing that would do away with the injustice, the only thing that could find him by a sense of proper usage. The recollection of the way he had been treated rose hotter and hotter in his mind: a wretched mean-spirited disingenuous shuffling, and men without a tenth part of his claim being promoted over his head by the dozen. His recommendations ignored, his midshipmen left on the beach.

With Canning as his First Lord, secretary and Board of Admiralty all in one, how different it would be! A well-found ship, a full crew of prime seamen, a free hand, and all the oceans of the world before him - the West Indies for quick returns, the cherished cruising-grounds of the Channel fleet, and if Spain were to come in (which was almost certain), the Mediterranean sea-lanes he knew so well. But even more, far beyond the common range of cruisers and private ships of war, the Mozambique Channel, the approaches to the Isle of France, the Indian Ocean; and eastwards still, the Spice Islands and the Spanish Philippines. South of the Line, right down to the Cape and beyond, there were still French and Dutch Indiamen coming home. And if he were to stretch away on the monsoon, there was Manila under his lee, and the Spanish treasure ships. Even without flying so high, one moderate prize in those latitudes would clear his debts; a second would set him on his feet again; and it would be strange if he could not make two prizes in an almost virgin sea.

The name of Sophia moved insistently up into that part of his mind where words took form. He had repressed it as far as he was able ever since he ran for France. He was not a marriageable man: Sophie was as far out of his reach as an admiral's flag.

She would never have done this to him. In a fit of self-indulgence he imagined that same evening with Sophie- her extraordinary grace of movement, quite different from Diana's quickness, the sweet gentleness with which she would have looked at him - that infinitely touching desire to protect. How would he have stood it in fact, if he had seen Sophie there next to her mother? Would he have turned tail and skulked in the far room until he could make his escape? How would she have behaved?

'Christ,' he said aloud, the new thought striking him with horror, 'what if I had seen them both together?' He dwelt on this possibility for a while, and to get rid of the very unpleasant image of himself, with Sophie's gentle, questioning eyes looking straight at him and wondering, 'Can this scrub be Jack Aubrey?' he turned left and left again, walking fast over the bare Heath until he struck into his first path, where a scattering of birches showed ghastly white in the drizzle. It occurred to him that he should put some order into his thoughts about these two. Yet there was something so very odious, so very grossly indecent, in making any sort of comparison, in weighing up, setting side by side, evaluating. Stephen blamed him for being muddle-headed, wantonly muddle-headed, refusing to follow his ideas to their logical conclusion. 'You have all the English vices, my dear, including muddle-headed sentiment and hypocrisy.' Yet it was nonsense to drag in logic where logic did not apply. To think clearly in such a case was inexpressibly repugnant: logic could apply only to a deliberate seduction or to a marriage of interest.

Taking his bearings, however, was something else again:

he had never attempted to do so yet, nor to find out the deep nature of his present feelings. He had a profound distrust for this sort of exercise, but now it was important - it was of the first importance.

'Your money or your life,' said a voice very close at hand.

'What? What? What did you say?'

The man stepped from behind the trees, the rain glinting on his weapon. 'I said, "Your money or your life," 'he said, and coughed.

Instantly the cloak in his face. Jack had him by the shirt, worrying him, shaking him with terrible vehemence, jerking him high off the ground. The shirt gave way: he stood staggering, his arms out. Jack hit him a great left-handed blow on the ear and kicked his legs from under him as he fell.

He snatched up the cudgel and stood over him, breathing hard and waving his left hand - knuckles split: a damned unhandy blow - it had been like hitting a tree. He was filled with indignation. 'Dog, dog, dog,' he said, watching for a movement. But there was no movement, and after a while Jack's teeth unclenched: he stirred the body with his foot. 'Come, sir. Up you get. Rise and shine.' After a few more orders of this sort, delivered pretty loud, he sat the fellow up and shook him. Head dangling, utterly limp; wet and cold; no breath, no heartbeat, very like a corpse. 'God damn his eyes,' said Jack, 'he's died on me.'

The increasing rain brought his cloak to mind; he found it, put it on, and stood over the body again. Poor wretched little brute - could not be more than seven or eight stone

- and as incompetent a footpad as could be imagined -had been within a toucher of adding 'if you please' to his demand - no notion of attack. Was he dead? He was not:

one hand scrabbled in vague, disordered motion.

Jack shivered: the heat of walking and of the brief struggle had worn off in this waiting pause, and he wrapped his cloak tighter; it was a raw night, with frost a certainty before dawn. More vain, irritated shaking, rough attempts at revival. 'Jesus, what a bore,' he said. At sea there would have been no problem, but here on land it was different - he had a different sense of tidiness ashore -and after a disgusted pause he wrapped the object in his cloak (not from any notion of humanity, but to keep the mud, blood and perhaps worse off his clothes), picked it up and walked off.