Under guard in Lisbon

Padstowe closed his eyes in despair.

"I suspected as much."

The watch had been a gift on his coming of age. He never travelled anywhere without it, and it was as familiar to him as his own hand. And now it was gone.

Stephen saw Padstowe's distraught look, and stared down at his hands. Maybe if he had left earlier, he would have been able to...

"Was it the watch?" He couldn't imagine Padstowe had been carrying enough for it to be the purse.

"Yes. It had some... sentimental value."

Which could possibly be a huge understatement, but there was nothing he could do about it now. It was gone.

Stephen looked sympathetic. "I had a watch, once. A Brequet. It was taken from me. But it is eminently possible that he also intended to take your life, and he did not do so. And that is of infinitely greater value."

"I suppose so."

Padstowe gazed back up at the ceiling, mindful of the discomfort and depression of spirits he was experiencing. Somehow it would have been better had he just been given a very thorough beating; the theft ofthe watch just added insult to injury.

Stephen watched as Padstowe looked away, despondent; he searched for something to distract him. "The orderly here brought you some broth - will you have it? Or some water?"

Padstowe did not feel any desire to eat, even something as light as soup. He did however, still have a thirst, though Dr. Whiting had gone some way to quenching it earlier.

"Some water, if you please."

Stephen poured out some water, glad to be doing something. "No, no, do not try to sit up." He moved around to the head of the bed, and slid his hand beneath the pillow. "When you are strong enough, you can be moved into one of the officers' rooms, and then back to your own lodgings."

Padstowe again drank greedily, eager to get the water down his throat. Most of what Stephen said did not register, except perhaps 'officers' rooms' and 'lodgings'.

"Well, you look better for that," said Stephen, lowering Padstowe back onto the bed. "Some more?"

"Please."

Another cup ought to do it, and then he would have enough. He was almost feeling like one of the living again, instead of merely death slightly warmed-up.

Once Stephen had put the cup down again, satisfied with Padstowe's response, he picked up the bowl. "And a little broth, now? It will do you the world of good, and it will go down as easily as water."

"Thank you, no." He really did not feel he could face food now, in any form.

"Will you vomit if you do, do you think?"

"I do not know," Padstowe looked at the bowl stephen was holding and felt his stomach revolt. "But I certainly feel as if I could not hold it."

Stephen put the bowl down with a sigh. "Were your chest not in the state it is I would risk it anyway - you have not eaten in two days, in addition to your already desanguinated state: you are very weak. We will try again in an hour or two; you must tell immediately, or an orderly if I am not here, whenever you feel at all hungry, or even able to stomach food. I suspect that you will soon find that you raven, when you become more accustomed to the current sensations of pain."

Padstowe felt that perhaps he should feel a little moreworried by that information, but right now he had neither the inclination nor the energy to eat.

"Stephen," he asked hesitantly, changing the subject to one of genuine concern for him. "My shoulder... Do you think I will be able to use my arm again?"

Stephen poked Padstowe's injured shoulder.

Padstowe yelped in pain.

"Doctor!"

"My apologies - I needed a genuine reaction, without you steadying yourself or trying to be brave or concentrating on what it felt like. The nerves seem undamaged - if it had been numb, then I would be worried; while the clavicle is broken and the scapula is cracked, there is minimal damage to the actual joint. You will use you arm again, soul, with the blessing."

He sank back into his chair. "If there is no infection, that is. Well, if there is, you will die - one cannot amputate a shoulder. That is why I wish to have you moved back to your own lodgings as soon as possible."

Somehow the captain, still smarting from the sharp jab into sensitive flesh, did not find this very reassuring.

"How long will that be?"

"However long it takes for you to feel well enough to make the attempt. I will organise a cart, and I will ask Senhora Santana to bring a bed downstairs, so that we will not have to try bringing you up. You will feel stronger if you eat," he finished pointedly.

"And before I can be moved to another room?" he asked, ignoring the doctor's point about food. He was a little disgruntled that he had not been put straight into one of the officers' rooms - Hakeswill had not stolen his sash, after all.

"If one is available..." Stephen looked around, but the ward was dark, and he had not really expected Whiting to be there. "It will be painful to be moved onto a stretcher, and then from the stretcher to the bed, let alone the inevitable jolting from the journey there."

"I may persuade myself to endure it," he muttered. It was not only for reasons of snobbishness, but the sooner he was moved from a public ward the lesser the chances of his shoulder becoming infected.