The Golden Ocean. Patrick O’Brian

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СКАЧАТЬ you can know nothing—you may have heard, however, of the criminal decision about the invalids?’

      Peter nodded. The squadron was undermanned: seamen could not be had, nor soldiers for the military side, and it was said that Government intended to fill out the numbers with pensioners from the Royal Hospital at Chelsea.

      ‘You have? Well, that is but one of a thousand matters that call for his instant attention. But for all that he knows that his prime duty as captain of the Centurion is the welfare of the ship and her company, and he is certainly informed of all that happens aboard. What kind of opinion will he have of you, Peter? Not only because of this unsuitable friendship, but because of the innumerable scrapes you have got yourself into from the moment you arrived. Do not think to shelter behind my frail protection. I am a very unimportant person here, although Mr Anson honours me with his friendship. But if I were a flag-officer and the Commodore’s own brother, that would avail you nothing if he were to judge you unfit for the service. I put this to you very seriously, Peter; and I put it to you urgently, because at dinner yesterday he mentioned your name: I did not hear what he said; but he mentioned your name.’

      Peter walked soberly away. He wanted to think: but in a ship filled with more than four hundred men, all of them active in one way or another, it is not easy to find a place for quiet meditation. He was wondering whether he might presume to go into the tops, or whether that might be a crime, when he heard his name. It was far off, and mixed with a jumble of sound, but one catches one’s name very quickly. ‘Mr Palafox. Pass the word for Mr Palafox.’ Then another voice, a little nearer, and another. His name, shouted, followed him up the ship, growing vastly in sound, and he hurried aft to report himself. But before he reached the quarterdeck he ran into the Commodore’s steward.

      ‘Wait a minute, young gentleman,’ said the steward. ‘What’s the hurry?’

      ‘The Commodore has passed the word for me,’ said Peter, trying to get by. ‘I must run.’

      ‘You can save your breath, sir,’ said the steward, ‘for I am on the same errand. The Commodore sends his compliments to Mr Palafox and would be glad of his company at dinner today: he regrets the short notice.’

      ‘My compliments to—to the Commodore,’ said Peter, suddenly ill with apprehension, for dinner was no distance away at all, ‘and I shall be most happy.’

      He dashed into the midshipmen’s berth and forward to the odd, dark kind of cupboard against the jear-capstan casing where he and FitzGerald slung their hammocks. He flung off his coat and rummaged wildly among his possessions in the brass-bound sea-chest, found a clean shirt and his best new coat. He dressed with particular care, but it took longer than he thought, for in his haste he was clumsy, and he was still wrestling with a cross-grained buckle when he heard the ship’s bell go ‘One-two, one-two, one’. Certain that he must have miscounted he shouted into the berth, ‘That was four bells, wasn’t it?’

      ‘Why?’ asked a voice.

      ‘I have to dine with the Commodore,’ said Peter, forgetting their dislike in his hurry. He emerged, buttoning his coat.

      ‘It was five bells. You will be late,’ said Elliot coldly.

      ‘Still, he can’t go like that,’ said Hope. ‘You’ve forgotten your dirk and you’ve trailed your coat in the dust. Here, stand while I get it off you.’

      Keppel fetched his dirk and Peter buckled it on while Hope brushed his back. It was kindly done, and although he had barely time to gasp out a thank you before he raced away aft, Peter felt a strong pleasure from it.

      ‘They could have been wicked,’ he thought: but this reflection was instantly effaced by the sight of the first lieutenant at the half-deck. Mr Saunders looked over him quickly. ‘That will do,’ he said, nodding. ‘Come along.’

      It was a defect in Peter’s upbringing that he had rarely, almost never, been used to paying formal visits or to dining out; but it was an unavoidable defect, for not only were his parents too poor to entertain, but in the neighbourhood for fifteen miles around there was nobody to entertain. Lord Magher, who owned a vast tract of land that included Ballynasaggart and seven villages beside, had never even seen his Irish estate; his agent, a Scotch Presbyterian, had alienated the Reverend Mr Palafox by his rigid treatment of the tenants; the squireen of Connveagh was a disreputable creature, permanently drunk and of more than doubtful loyalty; and of the two livings that bounded the parish, one was held by a rich pluralist in Dublin and the other by a clergyman even poorer than Mr Palafox and with a family that outnumbered his by four. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that at first Peter saw little of the noble stateroom, its gleaming cloth and silver, and the decanters glowing in the sun that came pouring through the great stern-gallery. He had a vague impression of being greeted by an expanse of buff waistcoat and a blue coat afire with gold, of being introduced to various people, and then he was sitting down before his plate and scalding his mouth cruelly with boiling soup.

      But he neither dropped his spoon nor hurled his plate into his lap, and in time he began to take more notice of his surroundings. At the head of the table sat Mr Anson: he was a broad, strongly-built man with a fine head, a Roman face accustomed to command: at the moment he was listening to an anecdote of Marlborough’s wars with an expression of polite interest, but his face was tired, and a man who knew him well could have told that his mind was far away. The speaker, on the Commodore’s right hand, was Colonel Cracherode, commanding the land forces: Peter had seen him before. There was another red coat farther down the table—a young officer of the Marines, who was as rigid with awe as Peter, but who, to keep himself in countenance, fiddled incessantly with the stem of his wine-glass and drank such a very large quantity that by the first remove his face was as red as his coat. Next to him was the captain of the Wager, one of the ships of the squadron, and opposite Peter one of the Wager’s midshipmen, Mr Byron. Mr Saunders, first lieutenant of the Centurion, sat at the farther end.

      The Commodore had a French cook on board: the food was excellent—quite unlike the usual fare of midshipmen—and Peter was beginning to enjoy himself in a quiet way when his peace of mind was shattered by his captain’s voice.

      ‘Mr Palafox,’ said the Commodore, ‘a glass of wine with you.’

      Peter bowed and drank to him: he neither choked nor spilt his wine, but now he felt that his security was gone—he might be spoken to and called upon to reply at any moment. His forebodings were right. His neighbour, a post-captain, turned to him and said, ‘Palafox? I know that name. Yes. It was in the year ’21 that Miss Dillon married a gentleman called Palafox, in spite of all that I could say. I was first of the Falkland then and thought no small beer of myself; but the parson carried away the prize.’

      ‘That was my mother, sir,’ cried Peter.

      ‘Indeed? Indeed?’ said the captain, looking at him with lively interest. ‘Then when next you see her, pray mention my name with—what would be proper?—with my kindest regards, and tell your father that I still bear him an undying grudge. I trust they are both very well?’

      ‘Thank you, sir, very well indeed.’

      ‘And where do you live now? I seem to remember that your father had a living somewhere on the west coast. Bally—’

      ‘Ballynasaggart.’

      ‘That was the place. So he is still there. I know just where it is, although I could not precisely recall the name. Terrible great seas, and the current sets inshore round the headland. An ugly place to be caught on a lee-shore with a westerly gale and the tide making.’

      ‘Is СКАЧАТЬ