The Fortune of War by Patrick O’Brian Read Free Book Online Page B

friend, was a grey, severe disciplinarian who took it very ill that the squid should leave a long greenish-yellow trail on his topsail, his main-course, and the attendant rigging, and that a wombat should have forgotten itself on the quarterdeck; and here what he had always feared would happen did in fact take place - in the darkness of the forepeak the seamen got at the double-rectified spirits of wine in which his specimens were preserved, and presently their mirth increased extremely, while at the same time their dexterity diminished. At one point Forshaw plucked him by the sleeve and told him to come and say goodbye -they were off, they were homeward bound. He scrambled up from the gloom to the brilliant sunshine, and there, broad on the starboard beam, lay the poor battered old ship that had so very nearly been their coffin. She was already further off, and as La Flèche sheeted home her topsails the remaining Leopards uttered a thin cheer. 'Huzzay, huzzay, and give them our love on Portsmouth Hard.' Stephen waved his wig - his hat had long been lost from sight - and watched her as the turn swept her aft and far astern; then he plunged below. It was worse than ever; the smell was like Gin Row, mingled with something of Billingsgate (many of the specimens being fish); the voices were louder; the fooling more evident. Two ship's boys were openly playing tug-of-war with a sealskin. By a violent exercise of authority, together with a few hearty kicks and blows, Stephen rescued the skin and a basket of albatross eggs that was within an ace of being trampled underfoot as La Flèche, under topgallants now, heeled to the monsoon. Yet no sooner had he preserved one basket, one penguin, one blue-eyed shag but another was in danger, either from mere levity or from mistaken blundering goodwill; and now the ship was out of the sheltered anchorage - now she was taking the swell on her larboard bow, so that the forepeak and all within it was in a state of perpetual motion. In his anguish Stephen did not hear the tall master's mate say, 'The Captain's compliments, sir, and he begs the favour of your company at dinner.
    'Silence, fore and aft,' roared the young man, and in the pause he repeated the invitation, adding, 'That will be in three and twenty minutes, sir.'
    'I cannot conceivably leave my collections tossing to and fro; they cannot possibly be secured before nightfall. Pray tell the Captain, with my compliments, that I shall be glad to wait upon him at any other time. Honoured. Happy. You, sir!' - projecting his voice into the darkest corner - 'Put it down this minute.'
    Five minutes later the grey lieutenant appeared. When he could command Dr Maturin's attention he said, 'There must be some mistake, sir. The Captain invites you to dinner. It is the Captain who invites you to dinner.' He had changed his fine coat for a round working jacket, and in the gloom Stephen did not recognize him. 'My dear sir,' he said. 'You see the state of affairs in this Bedlam, this Purgatory. Surely you must perceive that it is impossible for me to abandon even what is already here, let alone all that is still upstairs. First things must come first.'
    Mr Warner remonstrated, spoke of 'an appearance of disrespect - unintentional, he was sure', and referred to 'natural curiosities' in an unfortunate manner. The tone rose, until Stephen, having himself cracked one of his very few whale-bird's eggs, turned on him and said, 'You are importunate, sir. You are indiscreet. You oppress me with your civilities. I beg you will go about your affairs, and leave me to mine.'
    'Very good, sir. Very good, Mr - ,' said the first lieutenant, swelling and at the same time growing even more rigid. 'Your blood be upon your own head.'
    'What blood, now, I wonder?' muttered Stephen, returning to his fragile crates. 'Double, double, toil and trouble. Oh, you infernal set of maniacs - brute-beasts.'
    The next to interrupt his anxious busyness, his inefficient attempts at