The Surgeon's Mate Read Free Page B

Seeing that this concerned his own field, Beck was officially acquainted with it; but he had also heard vaguer, less official accounts of other equally remarkable coups in Spain and France, and he found that he was most illogically disappointed by the meagre, shabby, undistinguished man who sat on the other side of the desk, slowly undoing a sailcloth parcel. Against all reason Beck had expected a more heroic figure: certainly not one who wore blue spectacles against the sun.
    Stephen's reflexions were equally unflattering. He observed that Beck was an obscurely misshapen fellow with watery goggling eyes, spare sandy hair, no chin, a prominent Adam's apple, and, in spite of an intelligent forehead, the settled look of a man who fitted nowhere. 'Are we all, always, so distorted?' he wondered, thinking of some of his other colleagues.
    They talked for a while about the victory, Beck speaking with an enthusiasm that brought colour to his unhealthy thin-skinned yellow face and Stephen steadily disclaiming any particular knowledge of the action: he had been below from the first gun to the last: he knew nothing of the evolutions, nor was he able to speak to the number of British deserters serving in the American ship or of the means employed to seduce them. Beck seemed disappointed.
    'I received your warning about the Frenchmen in Boston,' said Stephen, struggling with a knot, 'and I thank you for it. I was able to meet them with a mind prepared.'
    'I trust there was no unpleasantness, sir? Durand is said to be a most unscrupulous, determined officer.'
    Tontet-Canet was worse: a busy, troublesome fellow that gave me real uneasiness for a while. But, however, I clapped a stopper over his capers.' Dr Maturin was proud of his nautical expressions: sometimes he got them right, but right or wrong he always brought them out with a slight emphasis of satisfaction, much as others might utter a particularly apt Greek or Latin quotation. 'And brought him up with a round stern,' he added. 'Would you have a knife, at all? This string is really not worth the saving.'
    'How did you do that, sir?' asked Beck, passing a pair of scissors.
    'I cut his throat,' said Maturin, shearing through the string. Major Beck was used to bloodshed in open and in clandestine war, but his visitor's everyday, unemphatic tone struck a chill to his heart, the more so as Maturin happened to take off his spectacles at this moment, glancing at Beck with his expressionless pale eyes, the only remarkable thing about him.
    'Now, sir,' said Stephen, the documents unwrapped at last, 'you are no doubt acquainted with Mr Harry Johnson's role in American intelligence?'
    'Oh yes, indeed.' Beck could not be unaware of his chief opponent's activities in Canada: from the first days of his appointment he had been struggling against Johnson's well-organized, well-supplied network of agents.
    'Very well. These are papers that I took from his desk and strong-box in Boston. The Frenchmen were consulting them when I put an end to their machinations."He laid them one by. one on the major's desk: a list of American agents in Canada and the West Indies, with comments; ciphers to be used on various occasions; letters to the Secretary of State containing a detailed account of the past and present relationships between the French and American intelligence services; remarks on his French colleagues' characters, abilities, and intentions; projects for future operations; a full appreciation of the British position on the Great Lakes...
    By the time the last document took its place on the desk Dr Maturin had reached and surpassed the heroic stature expected of him. Major Beck gazed over the heap of papers with deep respect, with something not far removed from awe. 'It is the completest thing,' he said, 'the completest thing that ever I heard tell of. A clean sweep, by God! This first list alone will keep a firing-squad busy for weeks. I must digest the whole mass. These will be my bedside