The Surgeon's Mate (46 page)

'I now speak for my principal,' said Duhamel in a low voice, moving Stephen to the window-embrasure. A pause. 'As you are aware, the war is no longer an uninterrupted series of victories for the Emperor. There are very high-placed men who feel that a compromise, a negotiated peace, is the best means of avoiding useless bloodshed and they wish their proposals to be carried to the King and the English government. These proposals can be carried only by a man who is trusted by those in power and who has access to their chiefs of intelligence. It seems to my principal that you are ideally suited for the part.'

'What you tell me is of great interest,' said Stephen, watching Duhamel's face with the keenest attention, 'and I most sincerely hope that your principal's project may succeed - that France may be spared as much as possible. But I am afraid I am not your man. As I was telling your friends at the rue Saint-Dominique - ' here he perceived a glow in Duhamel's eye - 'I am a mere naval surgeon, not even a commissioned officer. It is true that I have a certain notoriety as a natural philosopher, but that does not give me access to the great, still less to their chiefs of intelligence: there appears to be a most unfortunate misapprehension on this point.' Duhamel's face betrayed a certain inner amusement, but it became perfectly grave when Stephen went on, 'Besides, my dear sir, would the man your principal takes me for ever be so foolish as to admit his identity? Surely he would be utterly unworthy of the confidence of either side if he were te fling himself into the arms of the first agent-provocateur that accosted him - if he were to enter upon such a very extraordinary undertaking without surrounding himself with equally extraordinary guarantees? It would be mere self-murder: the man would be an ass.'

'I fully take your point,' said Duhamel. 'But for the moment let us presume that such a man were found: what kind of guarantees do you suppose he would require?'

'Do you think it really useful to discuss these remote hypotheses? If you were to ask me about the tertian ague or the osteology of the cassowary I could give you a reasonable answer, but the mental processes of this merely conjectural being... I am afraid you must have embraced the soldiers' wild notion. In spite of my denials they seem convinced that I am - how shall I put it? - a secret agent.'

'Yes, yes, of course,' said Duhamel, drumming his fingers on the packet he held in his left hand. He was very much master of his countenance, but even so the extremity of frustration now showed through: and in the long interval before he spoke Stephen became more nearly persuaded of his good faith. 'I will put the position to you quite plainly,' said Duhamel. 'My principal's organization was convinced of your identity as soon as your description reached Paris from Brest. That is why you were lodged in the Temple.'

'May I ask whose prisoner I am?'

'What's in a name?' replied Duhamel with automatic caution, and then relaxing, 'Ours, for the moment. But to resume: the intention was to invite you, or shall I say the man you were supposed to be, since I see that our conversation must remain upon that level - the intention was to invite you to undertake this mission much earlier, when there would have been time to surround it with all possible guarantees. But the Emperor delayed his departure; and there were other difficulties... In the meanwhile Madame Gros appeared at the Prince de Be'nevent's ball with a most prodigious diamond - a blue diamond -and at the meeting of the Great Council the next day her husband proposed that you should be released, displaying a sudden love for learning and a sensitivity for international scientific opinion.' Stephen felt himself grow pale and he turned aside to hide it. Of course Golconda was not only a general term for wealth: it was the name of the Great Mogul's diamond-mine. 'Gros is no fool, except where his wife is concerned; he made a very able speech - the international character of science, Cook's and Bougainville's immunity and so on - and he very nearly gained his point; but in the end it was decided that the matter should be referred to the Emperor. Now the proceedings of the Great Council are not much more secret than those of your cabinet; your value became obvious to various other bodies, and they are competing for the possession of your person. The army is particularly insistent. This too is to be referred to the Emperor; he is to decide between the claimants, and since the army connect you with Grimsholm - he is furious about that affair - they are likely to succeed. Their messenger is on his way, a particularly influential officer.'

'Did Madame Gros give any account of her diamond?' asked Stephen.

'Oh, some poor thin tale of an inheritance,' said Duhamel, brushing that aside. 'But I must tell you you are in the greatest danger. Quite apart from anything else, if the Empire falls, or even if it looks as though it were about to fall, there are men who are determined that nothing shall survive it, men who will kill without hesitation and bring everything down in the same ruin. My principal has the Emperor's order for your release - '

'How can that be? The Emperor is in Silesia.'

'Come, come, Dr Maturin,' said Duhamel impatiently, 'you know very well how your Sir Smith escaped from this very Temple in ninety-eight: even an amateur can fabricate a convincing order. So as you must see, time presses extremely. You must make up your mind. I beseech you to tell me what conditions the man we take you for would insist upon.'

Stephen stared at the packet that Duhamel was holding: a fraction of his mind observed the familiar covers of the Naval Chronicle and the London Times. The rest was analysing the position, weighing Duhamel's personality and his words, spoken or implied. There was still the possibility of a trap. His instinct was against if, but his instinct was not infallible. 'The man you have in mind,' he said slowly, 'would in the first place require some proof of good faith. He might for example ask you to give him your revolving pistol.'

'Yes,' said Duhamel. He laid it on the table. 'Take care: it is loaded.'

Weighing it in his hand and looking at the ingenious mechanism, Stephen said in a parenthesis, 'It would be too heavy for me.'

'It cocks when you pull the trigger,' said Duhamel in the same curious time out. 'The barrel revolves by itself. You get used to the weight.'

Stephen went on. 'He would insist upon the release of his companions, the restitution of the diamond, and immunity for the original possessor, with liberty to travel, if that should be desired.'

'Your man asks a great deal,' said Duhamel.

'So does your principal,' said Stephen. 'He asks Hypothesis to put his head under the guillotine.'

'Are those the minimal conditions?'

'They would be, I am sure,' said Stephen. 'But you are to observe, that I am speaking of some airy, suppositional being.'

'I cannot engage for so much,' said Duhamel. 'I must refer to my principal. I hope to God there is time - Valencay and back..."

'Valencay?'

'Yes,' said Duhamel, and a look of intelligence passed between them. Talleyrand lived at Valencay much of the time and the perhaps calculated indiscretion might be a further proof of good faith. 'Would you give me back my pistol? I feel naked without it, on a journey; and it would be of no use to you here or at the rue Saint-Dominique - Major Clapier wishes to see you again this afternoon. I could not refuse without exciting comment, but we have them fairly well in hand: you will be treated as an exceptional prisoner and you will be back here before sunset. I have given the strictest orders that you are to be here before sunset.' He looked at his pistol. Stephen gave it to him and Duhamel gave Stephen the little parcel of English papers: 'I thought these might amuse your leisure hours,' he said.

'It was only Duhamel,' said Stephen in answer to the intensely anxious expression on Jack's face. 'He wanted to be dosed, and he has very humanely brought us these publications, to amuse our leisure hours."

'Our leisure hours,' said Jack, laughing in his relief. 'We shall have quite a few of them, I believe. There is not much more I can do in there until we have our block and tackle. Jagiello's dear pretty Poupette may possibly put them in our dinner-basket.'

He took the Naval Chronicle, and after a little while he burst in upon Stephen's ratiocination with a fine exultant cry, 'By God, Stephen, she did it! Ajax came up with the Meduse off La Hogue and beat her into mummy in thirty-five minutes: killed her captain and a hundred and forty-seven of her people. Ardent and Swiftsure in sight to leeward... by God, it was worth it... It was worth running poor dear Ariel ashore.'

Stephen returned to his thoughts. More than nine tenths of his mind accepted Duhamel's words as true: was the remaining area of doubt the effect of years and years of caution and distrust, or had it a sounder basis than mere professional deformation? As time went by, he found it increasingly difficult to believe anyone implicitly. Deformation there was, and graver deformation than he had supposed. He had been wrong about Diana, for example: he had never in his heart believed her capable of love. Of friendship, surely, of fondness and even quite strong affection at times; but never love, above all not for him. Yet now there was the proof in the form of this glorious, loving, hare-brained action. He knew she valued that bauble above her salvation: and even more than that, she had put her head into a noose for him. He felt a great wave of gratitude and admiration warm his heart, and when once again Jack broke in, pacing across the room with the Chronicle open in his hand, Stephen looked up with an extraordinary serenity in his face.

'Look at that,' said Captain Aubrey in a low, awed voice, pointing to the page.

'Marriages,' read Stephen. "Lately, Captain Ross, of La Desiree, to Miss Cockburn, of Kingston, Jamaica.'

'No, no. Lower down.'

'On Wednesday, at Halifax, Nova Scotia, Captain Alexander Lushington, of the Royal Marines, to Miss Amanda Smith, daughter of}. Smith, of Knocking Hall, Rutland, Esquire. I do not believe I know Mr Lushington.'

'Of course you do, Stephen. A great beefy hulk of a man, just like a bull. In Thunderer: she has not been on the North American station above three weeks. God help him. God help us all. Could you believe such a thing? Do you suppose it was all air, that baby?'

'Sure, it may well have been.'

Jack considered, shaking his head: a great smile spread over his face. 'Lord,' he said, 'I do not know I have been so relieved in all my life. Lord, I shall have such a go at that slab - I shall clap on to it so hearty now.' He disappeared into the privy, and could be heard scraping with almost reckless vehemence until their dinner came.

They searched the basket the moment Rousseau was gone, and nothing did they find. Never mind, they said, the double sister-blocks, coaked, would come with their supper.

'So this is a soupe anglaise,' said Jack when they reached their pudding. 'I have often wished to see one.'

'Not quite an orthodox soupe however,' said Stephen. 'This forms no part of the accepted receipt.' He held out the ladle, and in it there lay a little tinned-iron pulley of the kind used for washing-lines: fishing produced its pair. Jack looked at them with wonder. 'How that dear good young woman can conceivably have supposed that these could act as double sister-blocks, I cannot tell. Look - look at their pins! Jagiello, you must signal that what we need is purchase-upon-purchase. Never mind the coaking, so the sheaves run double; but the pins must be at least five times as thick as there.'

'You forget, sir, I told you she should not be here this afternoon, nor tomorrow,' said Jagiello. And in a defensive tone he observed that as far as he could tell, the pulleys were very like what Captain Aubrey had drawn.

'Why, I am no great draughtsman, it is true,' said Jack. 'But I did put a scale, you know. Is that the barber?' he asked, turning his ear towards the door. 'I should like to be trimmed, but I do loathe being trimmed by a deaf-mute. Don't you find it make your flesh creep, Stephen?'

'I do not,' said Stephen. 'And that is no barber, but Rousseau and his soldiers to take me away: I expected them. Do not be concerned,' he said, feeling for his ampulla, 'unless something unexpected should occur, I shall be back at sunset.'

'Before sunset without fail,' said the captain as he signed for his prisoner; for on this journey the captain and lieutenant were his only companions. Little unexpected occurred as they drove through Paris, although Stephen did see Dr Baudelocque as they passed the Hotel de La Mothe; and there was little unexpected in his arrival at the backside of the rue Saint-Dominique. The only change was that soon after he had been put into the barred waiting-room overlooking the stake, the door opened and a man was thrust in so roughly that he fell sprawling on the floor. Stephen helped him up, and he sat wiping the blood from his face and hands, muttering to himself in Catalan, 'O Mother of God, Mother of God, Lady of Consolation save me.' They fell into conversation and the man, speaking heavily-accented, hesitant French, told a very pitiful tale of the persecution he had suffered for the cause of Catalan independence; but he was a clumsy fellow, an obvious plant who had not even learnt his lesson well, and Stephen grew very tired of him and of his little bladders of gore.

The interrogation that followed was of much the same mediocre quality. Major Clapier produced two people, one a sweating minor zoologist, the other a decayed official, who almost in Fauvet's very terms deposed that Dr Maturin had offered to carry messages, had spoken disrespectfully of the Emperor, and had solicited a fee; a clerk from Beauvillier's hotel followed them and quite truthfully stated that Dr Maturin had desired him to change fifty guineas for napoleons. This, said the major as impressively as he could, was a very grave offence indeed; Dr Maturin now stood convicted on all hands, and as a man of sense he must see that the only way of escaping the penalty was cooperation with the authorities. Nobody seemed to believe it however, and Stephen was hoping that he might be dismissed when after a brief silence a sharp-looking man on the left spoke up. 'Can Dr Maturin explain how it came about that a lady should offer the equivalent of at least a million for his release, if neither he nor she is a political agent?'