The Passengers' Cabins

Stephen stood next to Capitaine des Sablières in companionable silence as the lights of Lisbon faded to a remote glitter. Thank God, he thought with a sigh - his visit to Lisbon as an adolescent had been spent in the water-logged underground prison of the city, but this visit had been far worse. He was sad to say farewell to des Sablières' men; probably for the last time. They had been good men, and kind, save the villain Moreau, and he would harangue Wellesley on their behalf. His thoughts drifted away on the wake, Paix ever on the surface of his reverie, like a heavy foam. But, he thought as he looked up, tonight his own cabin - God bless Crozier! - and a gently swinging cot, and a dose for a dreamless sleep.

He barely noticed as des Sablières was taken away by his self-appointed guard, a midshipman with a touching display of schoolboy French, to see the horses, but watched the flight of a seagull, dipping on the wind currents. It was only when he saw a star glimmer by its tail that he came back to himself- Padstowe! Cursing himself for a selfish, easily-distracted fool he made his unsteady way from the quarterdeck.

Even with the confusion of the arrival of passengers and leaving their moorings in the Tagus, the watch roster rolled on, with the ordinary duties supplemented by those specific to the departure. Lieutenant George had sent Peter to check that the guns were secure "before we reach open sea, boy, and the waves send them clattering around." They were, of course, and the gentle breeze seemed to make it unlikely that there would be waves any bigger than they had experienced while moored. But it was good practice, and the gunner and he had inspected each gun, and checked that they were firmly lashed in place. He stood back to allow someone to descend the ladder from the quarter deck, then reached out a hand to steady him. He recognised the doctor from their strange trio of passengers - the one who had fallen between boat and ship on his first visit. "Sir!" he said, and then stopped looking up at him.

"Hello, hello," Stephen said to the small hand steadying him, and the midshipman attached to it. He straightened his wig. "Thank you, Mister...?"

"Yates, Sir. Peter Yates. I ... Do you need any help?" He glanced up at Mr George, watching from the rail, who nodded approvingly. "Are you going below. I'd be happy to show you the way."

"Ah, thank you, but this ship is like any other I have served in, Mister Yates; I am quite certain I will be able to find my way..." Stephen looked into the midshipman's face: any squeaker's face, a little cleaner than most, and a face built for cheerfulness, but with incongruous violet-rimmed eyes, the corners pink, as though they had been rubbed. He smiled kindly. "But I am going below, sure, and a companion is always welcome on the companionways," he said, hoping to elicit a smile in response to the weak jest. "My name is Maturin."

Peter felt embarrassed: he had of course known that Dr Maturin was used to ships, even if his accident implied that familiarity had not made everything easier. "You are more experienced than I am," he said, smiling dutifully at the grown-up's joke. "But don't you find it hard to remember whether the companionway was facing aft, or forrard, once you're down and can't see the masts and sails..." His voice trailed off, uncertainly.

Stephen looked at the boy with a rictus on his face, caught between the warring forces of pride and compassion. "Sometimes, yes," he compromised, "especially on a new and unfamiliar ship. The Terpsichore is a very fine vessel though," he added hurriedly, lest the boy found any slur in his words; all too often he had accidentally insulted the ship he was sailing in.

"It's my first ship, so I don't know how alike they are - I am sure there must be differences - and some of ours are built by the French, only they can't sail them as well as we can," he said, echoing Chandos in the proud boast. "So they must be different." He patted the hand rail with a sense of ownership, then turned to descend the companionway to the gun deck. "Take careful hold," he said, "she may run into a cross-sea at any moment." He went down holding on, without bravado - his arm might be almost healed, but it wasn't quite as strong yet as it had been.

"I think most of the ships I have sailed in have been French built - save the Polychrest," Stephen said with a small frown. He had noticed the way the boy held his arm. "I heard you were in some action on the way to Lisbon? A very fine victory, by all accounts."

Peter stepped aside to wait for the doctor at the foot of the companionway. He grinned - the prize money was not a lot, but as a foretaste it was very pleasant. "We took the Victorieuse, another frigate, and brought her in to Lisbon, where she is to be bought by the Service! I was - well, I'd fallen and broken my arm, in the storm, so I could not board, but I was on the gun deck, during the action... And when they tried to board us."

"Give you joy of your prize, Mister Yates. The gun-deck, during a boarding, forsooth? You must have seen a great deal of the fighting in that case; was it your first?"

Peter nodded. It had been his first - and almost his last. "We fired at her - I can't remember how many - at first it was organized, but then every gun seemed to fire in its own time, and the noise was shattering. But you'd know that, Sir. And then they tried to board us through the gunports, and .... " He stopped, remembering the cook, cleaving a man's head, little Samuels trying to defend him with a ramrod, and ... "The sailors soon put a stop to that," he said firmly.

Stephen nodded. Perhaps it was simply a melancholy after a first battle, but of an unusual length? It was a simple answers, and the lex parsimoniae suggested that it was the correct one, but Stephen thought there were other factors at play in this boy's case. There was, however, no way in which he could politely put his thoughts into a direct question. "And how is your arm now? Is it healing well?"

Peter looked down at his arm, as the answer would be written on his cuff. "Dr Crozier says it is - that it will be as good as new. If I don't overstrain it now. By trying to slide down companionways on it, he says. Or do too much skylarking. But I can go aloft now, at least. That was a worry, with us being short handed for the voyage back to Lisbon."

"I have absolute confidence in Doctor Crozier," Stephen said reassuringly. "Did you manage to make up your complement in Lisbon, do you know?"

Peter shrugged, not knowing quite how to answer. "Dan Kinsella came back, with Mr Bush - they'd brought the prize in. And we have a new midshipman - Mr Slater - only he's only just joined us..." At least, Peter thought, he hadn't been made to welcome this one: he'd had enough of trying to make friends - at least with boys, who could be even crueller than their elders. "He's replaced Julian - he ... He died, in the battle." He gritted his teeth. "So we're only one down on complement, and if the new boy's good and experienced, we should be all right."

"I am sorry to hear about your loss," said Stephen as they came to the wardroom. He had noticed the small gestures - the boy gritted his teeth, the way he talked, a bitter tone... "Thank you for the company, Mister Yates."

"I miss him - I didn't realize I would, until he died. We'd only known each other since we left England, and he had so much more experience... He'd been round the Horn," Peter said, thinking that that said it all. He was aware that the doctor was observing him, and if he thought that the only trouble was grief, it would stop him asking questions. The officers had decided that was his trouble, after all. He smiled as widely as he could and saluted the doctor. "It has been a pleasure. I hope you enjoy your journey with us... "

"He sounds like a commendable young man. But the pain of passing diminishes with time. I am sorry; that was not what I meant to say," said Stephen, shaking his head at the heartless platitude. "But it is a good thing that you miss him. There is nothing more sad than a soul unmourned."

Stephen had known many melancholy souls in his time - in fact, he spent every breath with one - and he knew the difference between a melancholy soul and a soul made melancholy. The difference between himself and Raoul (for he remained unsure as to Padstowe) - this midshipman was in des Sablières' line. Complex feelings in a child unused to complexity. He could not even offer to see to the boy's arm as a precursor to conversation, for that would be the most shocking professional discourtesy.

He ought not to think on the matter any more: he had Padstowe to think about, and des Sablières, and Paix was dead only two days. Selfishness disguised as selflessness, Maturin, he chided himself - he was not healed, only distracted, and his mind sought more distraction; exploring others' griefs as a means of ignoring his own.

And yet it was not only that. There was compassion in his soul that pain had not killed. He felt it for Raoul, and for Jonathan, and now for this boy as well. But politeness, damned politeness, acted as a barrier. "Should you ever wish to talk again, Mister Yates, I would be glad of the company," Stephen said. He suspected the midshipman would think him a fool, prying and simpering, perhaps lonely, but if it helped him at all to know of a willing ear, one not of his own ship, belonging to someone who would not be present to judge him for a long commission, then he was glad to do it.

It was a kind offer, but Peter did not misunderstand it. Dr Maturin had sailed with Lucky Jack Aubrey, and if Peter had barely noticed the name before, the berth had rung with it since yesterday and knowledge of the Captain's invitation to the doctor. Chandos and Kinsella would love to talk to the doctor - to hear about his adventures, the sea battles, the taking of the Cacafuego. But that was not what the doctor meant.

"Thank you. I do miss him. It will probably be better now we're back at sea. Everything will go back to normal, they say, very quickly." His smiled, but his eyes dropped from the doctor's searching, compassionate gaze. "Perhaps we could ... if my duties allow..." he said quickly and saluted again, turning back up the companionway.

Stephen watched as the boy half-fled him, and turned away, made despondent by the unremitting misery and pain to be found in every varying specimen of the human race. He longed suddenly and painfully for Jack's company, so ready to be happy and spread happiness - a feeling exacerbated by the familiar wooden ceiling, walls and floor, the gentle rocking and the sound of the waves, and the shouts of the sailors. He expected that in the next second he would see the flash of blue and gold and pink and yellow up ahead, or hear "There you are, Stephen!" or "My dear Doctor! What say you to some music?" - any second - he expected it with such force and clarity that the answering smile was already on his lips. But no shout for him, only the men above, and a gaping, yawning, creaking absence around him and in him.

He opened the door to Padstowe's cabin.

"Scuse me, Doctor Maturin sir," Billy said, standing deferentially at the door to the wardroom. He saw that the doctor was about to go into the cabin and added, "Beg pardon, sir, but this were in with them clothes what you brung back, and I think it must be yours." He held up a white shirt, now neatly folded for the guest's inspection.

Stephen took a second to school his face into an expression of relaxed amiability, and turned around. "Ah, Billy Barrows, hello!" he said with the beginning of a genuine smile at meeting his rescuer again. "Oh, that is Captain des Sablières' shirt; thank you very much. I would have been in great trouble if I had lost it, I think."

"Here y'are then, sir," Billy replied with a grin, taking confident and easy steps into the sacred wardroom itself to hand the shirt to him. He walked back to the door where he stood in smiling contemplation for a moment before saying, "My second cousin Bill says you whipped off his leg in less'n a minute, neat as a pin, after it were crushed by one of the guns. You should see him now, running about after a mess of children. Bill Wilson, he is, sir. He'll be right glad to hear I seen you."

Stephen remembered the Byzantine naval rituals, and stepped to the door of the wardroom. "Bill Wilson - was he on the Surprise? I am delighted to hear that he is in good health, in any case."