On Parole in Lisbon

"I can tell you nothing to help you," Raoul said, knowing that it was in one way the truth - he could not in honour help Dr Maturin.

"In that case, I shall be about my business. I apologise for waking you so early in the day." He stood up, wincing, his hand pressed to his side.

"Doctor..." Raoul saw the wince, but realized from Maturin's reactions that his concern was unwelcome. He could presumably have bought his way back into the doctor's favour by betraying Delaporte, and Garnier and friendly Joubert. He stood and waited silently for the doctor to leave him alone.

"I can show myself out," Stephen said, suddenly feeling pained, and so weary of it all. His body was torn - leg, side, hand, skull, and the bruises on his face and neck and chest and arms were only now fading from Obidos and Brissac - one week ago. And so much had happened since then - so many people dead, and injured, and... He turned and left.

[Stephen's story continues here.]

Dr Maturin had gone. Raoul sat down, suddenly, as if all life had left him. What he had done was right, the thing that least damaged whatever honour he was clinging to. He knew that, and so this feeling would pass, was probably due only to his being very, very tired.

Raoul heard the outside door close, and shortly afterwards Dawson came in, asking if he wanted breakfast now, since the doctor had not stayed even for coffee. Raoul shook his head, unable to face food, or the worried look on his landlord's face.

Raoul thought about this, and that it would offer the chance to set the record straight. "The doctor may return. Will you tell him I will be back this evening." He thought about leaving some information about where he had gone, but since he did not know where he was going himself... The doctor would find out if the Frenchmen had gone. If they had, he would come back with more questions.

Once out of the house Raoul turned into the main street. He remembered Maturin's warning, not to stray from crowded places. The avenue was busy enough, and for a time he strolled along, looking at the stalls set out outside the shops, with ordinary everyday items - glazed pots, and knives and bolts of cloth. As he dawdled along, he looked around to see if anyone else was behaving suspiciously, but it was not possible in so busy a place. If he was to find out if he was being followed again, he would need to get away from the crowd.

Raoul walked uphill, towards the cathedral. He stopped in a quiet street bounded by tall houses, blocking his view of the church but no one seemed to be following him, and he began to relax. The steps eventually came out onto a square, in front of the church.

He sat on a bench outside a bar, drinking coffee and regretting that he had not breakfasted before leaving Mr Dawson's - this brew was not to his taste at all, thick and dark and bitter. Eventually, he drew out his sketch book, not to sketch the cathedral itself, but the houses around the square, an interesting mix of ages and styles, with visible reminders of the earthquake fifty years earlier. The wooden gables of the bar itself, intricately carved, made a pleasant subject. He was engrossed in this, and in listening to the English voices that came from just behind him.

"So she told him, Of course I remember you. But your daughter doesn't." There was burst of laughter from the group of sailors. "And neither does your son!"

"Is that true?"

"It's what he said!"

"Same woman!" Billy laughed incredulously before devouring another piece of sausage.

"Barman! More beer. Mucho beer for nos!"

"He ain't Spanish, mate."

"Same thing."

Raoul half turned. English sailors, drinking and talking too loudly. They were well turned out too, from a decent ship by the look of it, and in good spirits. They were welcome here, not just for their money but as allies. He sighed, and started slightly as a shadow fell across him. A Portuguese - dark eyed, dark haired and with a dark growth of beard unshaven for several days.

"Monsieur?" The man's accent was terrible, and for a second Raoul did not understand, or appreciate that no one knew he was French, not here. And those who did could only have found him by following him. He stood up, startled, as the man slid a hand into the pocket of his dusty black coat. Not the man who had attacked Dr Maturin last night, but another of the same type. Raoul stepped back, away from the expected knife, and onto the foot of one of the English sailors.

"Hey, hoy, careful there, mate!" Billy cried as he stepped back, sloshing beer on Tommy Dunnett as well as the stranger. "Oh, sorry, Tom. Senhor, um, sorry - obrigado," he muttered in confusion.

Raoul glanced down. "Sorry," he said, and stepped back. The Portuguese was still there, and Raoul felt his hand grasping the arm. "No trouble, Monsieur," the man said in execrable French. "Come. Your friends..." Raoul pulled his arm away, and felt the prick of a knife in his side. "Come." the man repeated.

The man had apologized in English. Was he English? Or maybe he was a local who had picked up some English words.

"Johnny Lawford come back once to find three lasses with babies sayin' they were his own."

"Three?"

"Three babies."

"That's nothing. I knew a caulker's mate on the Poly what claimed he had twenty children from Stromness to Sydney."

Raoul tensed. If he called out, the man might use the knife, or not. But he would definitely use it if he could get Raoul to somewhere less public. "My friends," he responded, remembering what Dr Maturin had said. "Captain Delaporte? Of course." He started to allow the man to pull him away, but then turned back, saying, in a voice that sounded stupid to his own ears: "But I must first settle..." The change was enough and for a moment he could no longer feel the knife in his side. He brought his arm down and round in a sweeping gesture, and stepped away from the man, knocking into the English sailor with the long pigtail, whose foot he had stood on earlier. He felt the knife catch in his coat.

"What - ?" Billy caught the stranger who stumbled into him, and then grabbed at the man in the black coat. "What's going on?"

"Look out, Billy!"

"He's got a knife!"

"Get off!"

Someone had struck blackcoat in the head, and someone else grabbed the younger stranger's collar.

Raoul was being held by one of the sailors, and another was grappling with the Portuguese, hitting him with a tankard. Raoul had felt the knife catch in his coat and then with a sharp pain across his arm as he pushed the man aside. "Thank you," he breathed, and "Hold him," as the man jabbed with the knife at the man who had struck him.

Billy easily twisted the knife out of the man's hand and let it clatter harmlessly to the floor. "What's your game, mate? Get out!"

"Throw him out!"

"No, throw him in the fountain! That'll cool him off!"

"Stinking little vermin..."

Billy took hold of the man's collar and turned him to face the English-speaking stranger, still keeping him out of arm's reach. "This your friend, mate? What you want us to do with him?"

They should hand him over to someone - English or Portuguese, it didn't matter. And for a moment he was tempted. The man was a danger to him. But if he did that...

He stared at the man who met his eyes and then spat deliberately. "Your friends are worried about you," the man said in French. "They need not be," Raoul said wearily. He turned to the sailors. "Let him go," he said. "He made a mistake."

With a shrug, Billy pushed him out into the street, kicking his knife out after him. When the man stumbled to his feet and hesitated, Tommy called out, "Get lost before we change our mind," with the universal language of a raised fist.

"Thank you." Raoul watched the man leave, and grimaced as the stinging cut began to ache in earnest. "Please, allow me to replace your drinks." He wondered if the man would lie in wait for him, and what he could do about it if he did.

"Well thank you very much!" Billy replied with a grin, finishing his beer and waving it at the barman once again. "You all right there? Friend with the knife didn't get you?"

"A scratch," Raoul reached into his pocket with his other hand, to pay for the drinks. "I did not wish to become involved with the Guarda Civil. But I am grateful for your help."

"Cheers. You sure you're all right? Want us to walk with you? Is he gonna bother you again?"

Raoul sank down onto the bench beside them. "I do not know. I never saw him before in my life, But there was a man - a Portuguese - who attacked an English friend of mine - an English Naval surgeon and physician - not a few minutes from the Avenue Innominata. It was not the same man, but.... I do not know if he wished to take to my friends, with the knife just to reinforce the invitation: or to kill me, using my friends as a lure..."

The seamen immediately grew sober at the news. Any man who would buy them a round deserved not to be killed by strangers. "Who are these friends of yours?" Dunnett grumbled.

One of the sailors ran out into the square, rounding the corner where the man had disappeared.

"And your surgeon friend, what ship was he from?" Billy asked. "Was he all right?"

"Hey, hey, you're bleedin' here!"

Raoul looked at the blood on his sleeve. The cut was just below the elbow, and now that the sailor had noticed it, Raoul twisted his arm to look at it, and clamped his hand over it.

The examination gave him a moment to think more clearly, and he said: "I do not truly know who he meant. There are people I know here, but they would not have sent a man like that to find me. I would not trust such a man." He shrugged, and wondered it the sailor would catch him, and what he would do with him.

"And my surgeon friend is not with a ship at the moment, while his Captain is on shore. But he is here with the Army Medical Services - as an advisor. He has been treating my men at the Hospital in Belem. He was attacked yesterday evening by a man with two knives. He survived, and was not badly wounded."

"That's a lucky man," one of the seamen commented. "And a good kind of friend to have, surgeon."

Their friend who had run after the stranger returned with a shake of his head. "Couldn't find him again. Bugger'd run off too quick."

Billy had a sudden thought. "Say, Army Headquarters ain't far from here, and we could take you and your surgeon friend could... Wait, we helped a bloke what got nobbled t'other night, and he was... Maybe same fellow, maybe not. Little foreign looking cove, beggin' yer pardon. Nice enough manners when he were more himself. But c'mon, mate, we'll help you along, won't we lads?"

"Oh aye. Don't you worry, senhor sir. We'll see you right."