21: The Final Unfinished Voyage of Jack Aubrey Read Free Page B

frigate had an uneasy time, mooring in the sullen turbulences this side of the primitive mole – dirty water from some untimely flash-flood.
    “ I once saw a rhea here, some way inland,” observed Stephen, as he and Jacob were walking along the mean street (obscurely strewn with drowned dogs) to speak to the port-captain about water and vegetables. “ The South American ostrich, somewhat smaller than the African bird – a most inferior creature.”
    “Ah?” said Jacob: and then “ I believe this must be the captain’s house.”
    The port-captain half rose when they came in, but he was far from cordial and he said that he could not recommend the town water after this diabolic flood and all the nastiness it brought.
    Stephen spoke about the country inland, a hacienda he had visited, the kindness of the people. He and the others were of course speaking Spanish and after a while the port-captain said that there happened to be a clean spring at no great distance, but they would have to pay the proprietor a fee. “ It is not for myself, you understand. For my own part I am astonishingly generous, generous to a fault, even lavish . . .” He spoke of his faults at some length and then, having called for coffee, he asked in a confidential, almost affectionate tone, “ Why they, obviously old and rancid Christians, consorted with those vile heretics?” And when Stephen made the usual gesture of extreme poverty, rubbing thumb over knuckle, the captain shook his head, saying “ Ah, when the Devil drives . . . I shall send my boy with your men to Anita's spring, but they must be very respectful to her, and pluck off their hats. Her sister, Helena, the werewolf, will provide cabbages.”
    So she did, fine upstanding plants, but without the least appearance of pleasure or (perhaps understandably) of common humanity: and both in these transactions and in a few others along the edge of the market the Surprises noticed a sullenness, a strong inclination to stare, muttering; while after some of their transactions the sellers could be seen to wash the coins or rub them industriously in the grit underfoot.
    Even if the Surprise, with her singularly fine lines and her thirty-six-gun frigate’ s towering mainmast, had not b een so recognizable to a sailor’ s eye, her ensign would have identified her almost anywhere in the world, for on reverting to her function as a surveying-vessel under Admiralty command she had also reverted to the white ensign. At Bahia Blanca, their next port of call, Stephen, who was the natural emissary on such occasions, reported the same sullen antipathy, not unmingled with a reluctance to sell, exorbitant prices and injurious expressions.
    “ Brother, you are playing at least half a tone too high,” said Jack that evening as they sawed away after an early supper.
    “ Am I?” cried Stephen, looking attentively at his fingers and twanging the string. “ So I am. I do beg your pardon. It is the shrill bitterness of my soul that makes its way out, I fear.”
    “ I am so sorry to impose these odious duties upon you, Stephen – pray take a sup of port – but you know, of course you know only too well, that when you and all your people have been without long enough you will descend to the basest means to relieve your wants.”
    “ I am not sure that the response is altogether civil: but be that as it may, I will tell you, Jack, that if they are bad in Port Desire and worse in Bahia, they are likely to be downright outrageous in the River Plate, where we are to meet the South African ships. Yet if I am not mistaken we are likely to be there well before Lord Leyton – well before even your little squadron ….”
    “ What the Devil do you mean by my little squadron? It is a perfectly normal squadron, rather large than otherwise. Two ships of the line apart from Suffolk : a fifty-gun ship, two considerable sloops of war...”
    “ Hush, hush, Jack. Never fly into a passion, soul,” cried Stephen,