The Following Wind

by Peter Smalley

  A sniff. ‘Perhaps it may. Perhaps it may not. I think it will not trouble us, James.’

  ‘The future ?’

  ‘Ships without canvas. Ships that do not harness the wind. Fffff, it may be the future, as Milson believed but I shall not see it, I think. Nor do I wish to.’

  They walked on, and as they reached Charing Cross, James:

  ‘Why not ask Sylvia to join you at Portsmouth?’

  ‘Well well, I could ask her to come, I expect.’ A nod. ‘Yes, I will.’

  They crossed over and came into the Strand, and walked toward Bedford Street.

  ‘Will you go home, James? Or stay on in London?’

  ‘I will go home, I think. My future lies there, in Dorset.’

  At the hotel they went exhausted up to their rooms and spent the remainder of the day sleeping.

  At seven in the evening Rennie boarded the night mail coach for Portsmouth at the Sussex Tavern in Fleet Street. James saw him away, and walked back to the hotel, intending to spend the night there, then return to Melton on the morrow.

  All the way back to the hotel as he walked past lighted chophouses and taverns, with the noise of laughter and talk and the rich smells of cooking, and threaded his way through eager people on the pavement, all intent on going somewhere, on some welcome evening diversion he felt increasingly lost and melancholy, as if the great tribulation of the past days and weeks, and the desperate events of the past twenty-four hours, had meant nothing, and been for nothing. It was if the whole commission had vanished like a dream or a waft of smoke on the early evening air. He came to Bedford Street and turned toward the hotel.

  As he stepped inside a few moments after, he saw the figure of a woman standing near the desk in the subdued light.

  ‘Catherine ?’

  The figure turned toward him, and he saw that it was not Catherine, but a handsome woman in early middle life, who looked at him slightly puzzled, then turned away and went upstairs. That decided him.

  ‘Mrs. Peebles!’ Striding toward the desk.

  Mrs. Peebles emerged from behind the desk into the passage.

  ‘Sir James ?’ A politely inquiring smile.

  ‘Send the boy for a post-chaise, if you please. I return to Dorset tonight.’

  ‘Tonight, Sir James?’

  ‘Aye, by God. Tonight.’

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