Yet another posada in Lisbon

"I think you've had enough to drink, once you've finished that mug, sir. Or you'll wake up with a head like a blacksmith's forge and a mouth like the backside of a dog, if you ain't careful." Though if it came to Cotton helping him back to his room, he wasn't sure who would end up supporting who.

Padstowe glanced somewhat reproachfully at Cotton. All two of him.

"I paid for the damn stuff, so I'm drinkin'ing. It."

He paused. That sentance had not sounded quite right to his ear, and what's more his head was swimming.

"Perhaps I might retire now, on seconds thought," he murmured, pushing back his chair, intending to get up... but somehow found himself looking at the underside of the table. He blinked.

"How did I get down here?"

"Oops. Not quite what you had in mind, Captain, I'm sure," Cotton said, looking under the table to find where the redcoat officer had disappeared to. He straightened up and looked at Sharpe. "It's easier with two. Would you mind helpin' me, sir?"

"'Course I'll help. What with?" Sharpe realised that Padstowe had disappeared, and bent to look under the table. "Oh."

"'m alrigh'," Padstowe eased himself up onto his elbows, trying to get his barings and refocus his vision. He hadn't been here a moment ago.

"No you ain't. And I'm a Rifleman, so I should know."

Cotton moved a couple of chairs aside so he could reach the officer before looking back at Sharpe. "If you'm ready, sir."

"Ready? Ready for what?" What the hell was going on?

"We're going to find you somewhere more comfortable than the floor to go to sleep. If you don't mind, sir." How he hadn't spilled his cup all down him was a miracle, Cotton thought.

Oh, so he definitely was on the floor. That explained a lot.

"Who said anything about going to sleep?"

Sleep? Yes, he had mentioned the word. Oops. "I did, sir. Sorry, sir. I just meant, we'll find you somewhere more comfortable. Silly of me, sir. Now, if you think you can stand..." He put one of Padstowe's arms across his shoulders, and put an arm around the officer's waist. "Now then, sir, easy does it."

"Stand... Yes, I think I can. I have a pair of legs..."

He let Cotton ease him up, doing his best to help, but his legs would not co-operate. "Oh. Well, I did have a pair of legs. Wonder where they've gone?"

"They haven't walked off without you, Jon. Now, I think we'd best get you to somewhere you can lie down without getting dirty. I don't know what's on the floor here, but you'd certainly end up living up to the name Dirty Half Hundred if you lie down here any longer than a few seconds."

He sounded practically sober to himself. Not quite what the doctor ordered, that.

"Half Hundred? I couldn't, there's only one of me." He gazed up at Sharpe's face, his eyes unfocussed. "Not seeing double, are you?"

"No, but I think you are." Sharpe came round to Padstowe's other side to help Cotton. "We'd best get you back to your room, I think."

It was somewhat uncomfortable, being shifted between two men trying to keep him upright, especially as one was much taller than the other. He tried to gets his legs to do something, but to no avail, so he sighed heavily and rested his head on a shoulder, closing his eyes.

"Bloody legs..." he murmured into whoever's neck.

[OOC: Night. xx. Take good care of the captain, now.]

"I think it'd be easier if I took him, sir," Cotton said over the captain's head. "I'm more his height." Besides, he's snuggling into my neck!

"Come on, then, sir, nice and easy. It's not far, really." Which was rather a good thing; he had some... interesting... memories of trying to get Captain Vickery across Lisbon at Christmastime, from a bar in one part of the city to his billet halfway across the city.

Perhaps closing his eyes had been a mistake, because it had suddenly become very difficult to open them again, and when he did finally manage it the world was so distorted that it hardly seemed worth the effort.

"Wherr' we goin'?" he slurred.

"Back to your billet, sir, where it's nice and quiet."

Somehow Cotton got the officer moving, though it seemed to him that he was the one doing all the work. It didn't help that when Padstowe spoke, he got a faceful of alcohol-laden breath. Ah well; he'd put up with worse before now.

"You'll be all right, sir, just see if you won't," he said, guiding him out into the street.

"'S no' quiet. Got landlady." Some interfering Portugeuse woman who took it upon herself to fuss over him. Very loudly. "'ll get what-for for lass' night..."

"Ah. I've got one of those, too. We'll make sure she shuts up, though." Though by the time we get you laying down, you won't notice if the Guards' band starts up right outside the window, the way you look, he thought.

Sharpe followed them out, snaffling the second bottle on the way. There was no point in leaving it; it was still just over half-full and had been paid for fair and square.

Cotton had stopped, whether to adjust his grasp on Padstowe or to find his bearings, Sharpe didn't know. "Come on, Rifleman, his billet's this way," he said, gesturing with the bottle.

Something suddenly occured to Padstowe.

"My hat! And m' files..."

His notebook was still safely in his breast pocket, but he wasn't holding his two thin case files, which might mean somebody else wasn't holding them.

"Oops." Sharpe looked at Cotton, who just looked back. He thrust the bottle into the Rifleman's free hand - well the hand that was least occupied in supporting Padstowe, anyway - and went back into the taproom. Two files and a hat... There they were. He picked them up and made his way back outside, concerned that he had to hold on to things to remind himself what 'upright' looked like.

"Got 'em, Jon, no need to panic," he said, emerging into sunlight that surely should not be allowed to be that bright.

"Good," Padstowe would have smiled, but for some reason his face seemed to have lost the co-ordination to do so. "Thass' good..."

He lifted his head and blinked at his surroundings.

"Why'm I not moving? Was movin' a minute ago."

"'Cause I'm a-holdin' you up, and I wasn't sure where your billet is, sir," Cotton said. "If you're ready, though." He started moving in the direction Sharpe had indicated, hoping that Padstowe's body would remember how to walk, even if Padstowe himself couldn't.