The Surgeon's Mate (16 page)

'Are they a coherent political body, a single organization? Did they form a unified movement in Catalonia? What were their aims, with regard to Madrid?'

'There you have me,' said Sir Joseph. 'I could have given you a tolerably exact account some days ago, but this wonderful new haul,' - patting Johnson's papers -'has driven the details out of my mind. My memory is not what it was: the files are at the office. But I do remember very clearly that the First Lord held this up as one of the most striking instances of a situation where five minutes of explanation, eclaircissement, persuasion, call it what you like, could do more than a powerful squadron, with all the loss of life and ships and treasure an action may entail, and that with no guarantee of success against such a fortress, in such dangerous waters: an action not unlike a somewhat smaller Copenhagen, without the benefit of surprise and without the presence of a Nelson. Five minutes of plain, truthful statement would open their deluded eyes, and save a very costly, bloody, and uncertain battle. Of course, very, very few men could do it: the emissary would have to be a man they knew and trusted and believed, and your name instantly occurred to both of us. You would have been the perfect choice. And I am sure, from your previous form, that you would not only have convinced them, but that you would have induced them to turn their guns against the French.'

'Much would depend on the leaders, in such a case,' said Stephen. There were many currents in the general Catalan movement for autonomy, many shades of opinion, many separate organizations, each with its own chief, sometimes bitterly opposed to one another. He knew nearly all of them, some from his childhood; many were friends he had worked with, and although others seemed to him wrong-headed they were men he respected; but some he did not trust at all.

'Yes,' said Blaine. 'Certainly. I wish... but you shall have all the details tomorrow, as soon as I can consult the files. Obviously, you will have to know them; yet I hope and trust that the knowledge will be of no more than historical importance - that the mission will have been successfully accomplished in the next week or so, if indeed it has not already been settled. Since we could not lay our hands on you, and since speed was essential, we confided it to Ponsich."

'Pompeu Ponsich?'

Sir Joseph nodded. 'He went into the matter very thoroughly; he studied all our information; and in spite of his age he agreed to go. He said that he was confident of success.'

'If En Pompeu was confident, then I am quite happy,' said Stephen. 'You could not have chosen better.' Pompeu Ponsich was a poet, a scholar and a philologist known throughout Catalonia, a universally respected patriot.

'I am relieved to hear you say that,' said Sir Joseph. 'There were times when I doubted the wisdom of sending an elderly man of letters, however eminent. Though indeed for the right man the thing in itself is simple: it requires no extraordinary feats, such as you accomplished aboard the Leopard and just now in Boston, but merely a convinced, convincing statement of the truth, supported, if necessary, by the documents we have provided. There was no lack of them, God knows, to prove Buonaparte's total bad faith with regard to Catalonia: or to any other country at all, for that matter.'

'I am glad the matter is in such good hands,' said Stephen. 'And although I should have been happy to go, I am just as pleased you have found a better man. I have been invited to address the Institut on the seventeenth, and unless there is any particularly urgent need for my presence here, I should very much like to do so.'

'To address the Institut, indeed? There's glory for you, upon my word'. Pray what is your subject?'

'The extinct avifauna of Rodriguez; but I may diverge a little. I may just touch upon the ratites of New Holland.'

'Certainly you must go: we had not thought of asking you to leave for the Mediterranean before Fanshaw returns. Certainly you must go. Apart from anything else you will meet so many interesting men - pray remember me very kindly to the Cuviers and to Saint-Hilaire - and you will have the most perfect, most Heaven-sent opportunity for entering into direct contact with - ' He caught Stephen's cold, pale eye, realized that port, enthusiasm, and professional zeal had very nearly hurried him into a grave indiscretion, a serious error of judgment, and searched quickly for a way to come off with some degree of credit' - with former acquaintances,' he ended, lamely enough.

'With former scientific acquaintances, certainly,' said Stephen, fixing him still. 'I particularly look forward to seeing Dupuytren again, for although he sees fit to accept Buonaparte as a patient I love him; to hearing Corvisart on auscultation, that interesting probe, and the artificial anus; and to making many fresh acquisitions of a purely scientific nature.'

In spite of their mutual esteem, even their mutual affection, there was a slight awkwardness for a moment; but then, in an entirely different tone, Blaine broke the silence by saying, 'And yet even though the purpose of your voyage is entirely innocent, as of course it will be, might not there be some danger of your being recognized? You have done them great damage, and it would not be wise to place any very great reliance on a safe-conduct: not many men concerned with intelligence possess your scruples.'

'I have considered that, but it appears to me that at present the danger is negligible. The only Frenchmen who knew me for certain, by name and by appearance, were Dubreuil and Pontet-Canet; and as you know, both are dead. Their followers, who might possibly have some vague notion of my identity, are still in America; and even in the most unlikely event of their having been recalled at once, our brave packet made such an extraordinarily rapid passage that they cannot be in France until several weeks after my return to England.'

'That is true,' said Blaine.

'Furthermore,' said Stephen, 'I also look upon this journey as a kind of insurance: if any suspicions attach to my name, they are likely to be done away with by a public assertion of my scientific role - and I think I may venture to say without excessive vanity, that no man in Europe knows more of the anatomy of Pezophaps solitarius - and by my placing myself in the enemy's power, in the lion's mouth, of my own free will, and by my conscious innocence of any evil intent.'

'True again,' said Sir Joseph. 'And I have no doubt that your paper on the solitaire will make a great deal of noise, establishing you, if that were necessary, as the foremost authority on the subject. Still, I shall be glad to have you back as soon as may be, before there is the least possibility of any agent's return from America. And in any case I dare say you would like to go without delay. Brisk action is called for. Should you wish me to take the necessary steps for official permission, and for transport? We have a cartel sailing on the twelfth, which should answer very well.'

'If you please,' said Stephen. 'And since you are so very kind, I will allow myself to make two other requests.'

'I am delighted to hear it,' said Sir Joseph. 'There is little enough that you have ever allowed us to do for you; and what with the Leopard and now this Boston coup, we are so very much in your debt.'

Stephen bowed, hesitated for a moment, and said, 'The first concerns Mrs Villiers. As you will have seen from my report, it was largely by her means that I acquired these papers: yet at the same time she has remained in ignorance of my connection with the Department. For obvious reasons she accompanied me in the packet. But since she is technically an enemy alien she was detained on our arrival.' 'Yes?' said Sir Joseph, his head on one side. 'As you may remember,' said Stephen deliberately, 'the last time we spoke of her you were not altogether happy in your mind about her relationship with Mrs Wogan.'

'I remember,' said Sir Joseph. 'And I remember the lady too. I remember her perfectly. I had the pleasure of meeting her at Lady Jersey's, and again at the Pavilion. But if I do not mistake, you were no easier in your mind than I, at the time of her sudden departure for the States.'

'I was not, and I am very happy indeed to say that I was wholly wrong. Her loyalty to this country was entirely unaffected by her passing connexion with Mr Johnson, or by any papers she may have signed. That I will guarantee unconditionally. My request is that she may be released.'

'Very well,' said Sir Joseph, writing on a slip of paper. 'I shall attend to it myself: there will be no difficulty. The lady may set her heart at rest.' He paused a moment, but finding that Stephen did not intend to go any farther he continued, 'You mentioned a second request, I believe?'

'So I did, too. But this is a purely personal matter; it has nothing to do with the Department. I have a friend, a sea-officer, who was on shore for a while between commands and who succeeded in getting himself into very deep waters there. During a prolonged absence the water grew deeper still, and now I am very much afraid that it may close over his head, unless expert legal advice can extricate him. May I therefore beg you to tell me the name of the most eminent lawyer now in practice?'

'Would you be prepared to let me know the nature of your friend's trouble? Upon that depends the kind of adviser I should recommend. For a dispute over prize-money, it would be Harding, of course, unless he already acts for the other side; for criminal conversation or anything in the matrimonial line, for example, no doubt he should consult Hicks.'

'I will lay the case before you, as far as I understand it. My friend fell into the hands of a projector, a man more modest than the usual run, since he promised to turn my friend's lead not into gold but only into silver - there are disused lead-mines on my friend's estate. He was delighted with the scheme, delighted with the man, and in his simplicity he signed papers without reading them.'

'Signed papers without reading them?' cried Sir Joseph.

'I am afraid so. He had been appointed to a ship. It seems that he did not wish to lose the tide.'

'Good God! Yet really I should not be surprised: the imbecility of your sailor ashore passes all belief. I have seen countless examples of it, in all ranks, even in very able men, capable of leading a fleet and of conducting difficult diplomatic negotiations with real finesse. Only last week a distinguished officer I know assigned his half-pay for a lump sum: with this sum in his pocket in the form of negotiable bills he walks into a coffee-house. There he falls into conversation with a stranger: the stranger proposes an infallible scheme for multiplying capital by seven and a quarter without the slightest risk: the officer hands over his bills, and only when the stranger has been gone for some time does he realize that he does not even know the fellow's name, far less his dwelling-place. But to return to your unhappy friend: has he any clear notion of the import of these papers?'

'He fears that one may have been a power of attorney: though on the other hand he had already given his wife just such a document. But at all events, on his return he found that the projector, the thaumaturge, had plunged into wild expense, carrying out vast operations, even digging the traditional canal.'

'Yes, yes, of course, the canal,' said Sir Joseph, and Stephen, seeing the knowing look in his eye, said, 'It would be idle to pretend that I am not speaking of Jack Aubrey. I dare say you have seen the monstrous ditch in Hampshire?'

'I have, indeed,' said Sir Joseph. 'It has caused a deal of comment.'

'And that is not all. This reptile Kimber, for Kimber is the projector's name, now conceals himself behind a cloud of confederates, or rather of accomplices, to whom he has conveyed his ambiguous powers. Some of them are lawyers of the vilest kind, and they threaten proceedings. I am exceedingly concerned for Aubrey. I am very much attached to him and to his wife, and as you know I am under very great obligations to him.'

'You have nearly always sailed with him, I recall.'

'Ever since I took to the sea: and what is more, what is infinitely more, he plucked me from the hands of the French when I was taken at Mahon - a brilliant raid, carried out at great personal risk.'

'Certainly he has every claim on my gratitude,' said Sir Joseph. 'I have never met the gentleman, though you have often mentioned him. I know him by reputation, of course: a most dashing resourceful commander, the very type of fighting captain. Lord Keith thought very highly of him. And very fortunate by sea: indeed, they call him Lucky Jack Aubrey in the service. He must have made a vast deal of money at Reunion and the He de France. How such a man, whose parts enable him to bring a long and difficult campaign to a successful conclusion, can play ducks and drakes with his hard-earned fortune, launching blindfold into chimerical schemes, signing unread documents, trusting his fellow-men, is beyond my comprehension.' Sir Joseph shook his head, trying to enter into the mind of one who trusted his fellow-men without long and repeated proof of their integrity: he could not manage it, and he went on, 'Lucky at sea, perhaps: less so by land. He was certainly not at all fortunate in his choice of a father. Have you met General Aubrey, Maturin?'

'I have, alas,' said Stephen.

'Now that he has espoused the Radical cause, it is worse than ever. He and his disreputable friends are a grave embarrassment to the ministry, and after his speech at Spitalfields there was some question as to the wisdom of appointing his son to a command. And in fact Acasta, which was designed for Captain Aubrey, was given elsewhere: as Mr Wray pointed out, there are so many distinguished officers unemployed, whose appointment would strengthen the Government side. Much the same applies to honours. It was in contemplation to recommend a knighthood or even a baronetcy in acknowledgement of your friend's sinking the Waakzaamheid when he had the Leopard; but I very much fear that it will come to nothing. If you value Aubrey, pray do tell him to keep his father quiet, if it is at all possible. But that is neither here nor there. Our present task is to decide upon the lawyer who is to preserve Captain Aubrey from the consequences of his folly. He must be a keen fellow, thoroughly accustomed to dealing with clever rogues, and not over-nice..." Sir Joseph turned the legal talent of the town over in his mind, and as he did so he sang 'Coll' astuzia, coll' arguzia, col giudizio, col criterio... con un equivoco, con un sinonimo, qualche garbuglio si trovera,' in a fruity, knowing undertone. 'Yes,' he said at last, 'Yes, I believe I have our true London Bartolo, the sharpest of them all. His name is Skinner, Wilbraham Skinner, and he lives in Lincoln's Inn.'