The Unknown Shore

by Patrick O'Brian

  And now more news had come: the Severn and the Pearl were not lost, but only disabled; they had put back, and had reached the coast of Brazil in safety, if not exactly in comfort. But, on the other hand, of all the powerful Spanish squadron not one single ship had yet been able to round the Horn for the defence of the Pacific: they had lost the Guipuscoa, their 74, the Hermiona, 54, the Sant’ Esteban, 40, and a twenty-gun sloop in the attempt; and the Asia, the flagship, lay, a dismasted hulk, in the River Plate. Only the Esperanza, of fifty guns, could be patched up well enough for a further essay; she was now at sea, presumably somewhere south of latitude 60, and the Spanish admiral, with many of his officers, had come overland to await her arrival in the Southern Sea. It was they who had brought the news, a few days before Pedro reached Santiago with his charges.

  ‘They have walked here,’ said Captain Cheap, with marked satisfaction, as he told them about it all. ‘Not that I blame Pizarro, you understand: but it does not allow the Spaniards to crow over us.’

  So they had very good, reassuring, comforting news of their friends – news that also tended to restore them in their battered self-esteem – as well as unlimited good food and soft lying, in the world’s most agreeable climate: it seemed that they were doomed to obey the orders of the enemy, to enjoy themselves as much as possible. Then, in an unusually brisk turn of fortune’s wheel, all was changed; where there had been gaiety there was consternation; bitter repining took the place of carefree song; and Dr Gedd’s house became a place of angry mourning.

  “What is the matter?’ asked Tobias, as Jack came running into the stable-yard, his poncho flapping with his haste and pale despair on his countenance.

  ‘Don José has asked us to dinner,’ cried Jack furiously.

  ‘Very civil in him. Shall be most happy,’ said Tobias, helping a pair of turtle-doves to arrange their eggs.

  ‘To dinner to meet the Spanish admiral and his officers,’ said Jack. ‘Oh, strike me down,’ he cried, with a low howl, ‘to think of appearing at such a do, in front of the Spanish navy, in this rig. Toby, you are a mighty philosophical cove, but I do not think I can bear the humiliation. Nor can the others. They are all dreadfully moved.’

  Even in this century, when clothes mean comparatively little, it is very disagreeable to find oneself in an ordinary jacket when everybody else is in tails: at that time men’s clothes were gorgeous, costly and important; and the chasm between a poncho and the proper dress for an official dinner was immeasurably vast.

  Ceremonial clothes were nowhere cheap, and in Chile clothes of European cloth and cut were exceedingly expensive. Dr Gedd was far from rich, and he was known to have lent all his loose money to an apothecary on the edge of insolvency. They were already under such great obligations to him that they could not increase them; and in any case he was away for the next few days, which made the thing materially impossible.

  They walked gloomily out into Santiago, spreading melancholy abroad in the quiet, tree-lined streets, and Jack by way of overcoming any philosophy that might linger in Tobias’ mind, explained to him, at considerable length, that it would on the one hand be totally impossible, unheard-of and even cowardly to refuse the invitation; and, on the other, quite unspeakable to accept it. For his part, Tobias would have been content to go in a sack, or even (the weather being what it was) nothing at all; for he had both a humbler and a prouder mind than Jack – humbler in that he did not suppose that anyone would notice him at any time, and prouder in that he did not suppose that he could be improved in any way by gold lace and taffety. But he was very much concerned at Jack’s distress, and he racked his brain to find some cure for it. ‘Suppose,’ he said, ‘I were to teach doña Francisca’s boy Greek, as she desired me to do, that would be six reals a week; and suppose she had the goodness to pay in advance …’

  ‘My poor Toby,’ said Jack, ‘at that rate it would take two years’ lessons for a coat for one of us. The boy would be a doddering greybeard before his Greek could set us all up in coats, waistcoats, breeches, shirts, shoes, wigs… Come this way.’

  They were in the Calle de Santander, and two turns brought them into the Plaza Real. The crowd was beginning to thin, for noon was approaching, but under the shade of the arcade that bordered the south side of the square, opposite the palace, there were hundreds of people still. ‘There,’ said Jack, stopping outside a tailor’s shop, ‘do you see that? Quite ordinary broadcloth, Toby – just good enough for the country. Eleven pieces of eight a yard. Oh strike me down,’ he cried, and stepping back in the violence of his indignation, he fell into the arms of a very splendid Spanish officer.

  ‘Sir,’ he said, recovering his balance, ‘I beg your pardon.’

  ‘Sir,’ said the Spanish officer, withdrawing to give himself room for the complex pacing and sweeping necessary to a high Spanish bow, ‘I beg you will have the goodness to accept my excuses. Guiro.’

  Jack responded with what elegance his poncho would allow (not very much), and having exhausted his stock of Castilian civilities, merely smiled.

  ‘Guiro,’ repeated the other. ‘Manuel de Guiro.’

  ‘Do you think he is swearing at me, Toby?’ whispered Jack.

  ‘I think it is his name,’ said Tobias. ‘I believe it is a form of introduction: try saying your own.’

  ‘Byron,’ said Jack, without much conviction, and at once the Spaniard’s face, which had grown a little sombre, brightened: he presented himself to Tobias in the same manner, and invited them to drink chocolate with him. They never let slip any opportunity of nourishment, and accepted in unison.

  ‘I am the seventh lieutenant of the Asia, Admiral Pizarro’s flagship,’ he said, as they sat down. ‘I believe that we are to have the honour of meeting you at don José's on Saturday.’

  ‘In effect,’ said Jack, ‘don José has had the extreme – what shall I say?’

  ‘Benevolence,’ said Tobias.

  ‘– the extreme benevolence to invite us.’

  Don Manuel noticed the lack of enthusiasm: he gazed at Jack and Tobias and said ‘Ahem.’ After a short pause he said that he was particularly happy to have encountered them, and that he had intended to call at Dr Gedd’s house in any case, because he felt a strong inclination to offer them his services. His mother and his two sisters had been taken by the Centurion in their voyage from Callao to Valparaiso (his family lived in Chile); and they had been restored to their friends quite charmed by their adventure. ‘They expected to be murdered, of course,’ said don Manuel, ‘but it seems that the officers were put out of their cabins to make room for them, and the midshipmen taught Maruja, the small one, how to knit, and sent her ashore with a tame penguin. She continually speaks of them – the aspirant don Augusto Keppel, the aspirant don Guillermo Ransome, the aspirant don Pedro Palafox.’

  ‘Ha, ha,’ cried Jack, quite shining with delight, ‘so the mouldy old swab has survived. Sir,’ he said, returning to Spanish, ‘you could not have given us greater pleasure.’

  ‘You are a most amiable and deserving creature,’ Tobias assured him, shaking him warmly by the hand. They now fell into an easy and unrestrained conversation, and don Manuel told them of three months he had spent in England – he had been in one of the first Spanish men-of-war to be taken, and he had had to wait until the Spanish captured some English officers before he could be exchanged. He said that until he had been able to make some arrangements with a neutral merchant, he had been painfully short of money: it was, he thought, a very usual experience; and it was certainly a very disagreeable one.

  Yes, said Jack, it was unpleasant, infernally unpleasant. ‘And,’ said he in a low voice, shifting his chair nearer to don Manuel’s and privately nodding towards Tobias, who had fallen into a brown study, ‘it is all the worse, because that fellow there, do you see, is so vain. The thought of being obliged to present himself at the palace dressed as he is makes him quite wretched.’

  ‘I entirely sympathise with your friend,’ said don Manuel, looking compass
ionately upon the unconscious Tobias, ‘I can imagine nothing worse – would prefer a dozen battles. And yet I should never have supposed that he paid any attention to dress. He has none of the air, if I may say so, of a man of the world.’

  ‘Yet it would amaze you to know how his mind is taken up with lace, brocade and embroidered waistcoats.’

  ‘Very well,’ said don Manuel, ‘we must not let the poor gentleman suffer any longer.’ And with this he offered Jack two thousand pieces of eight.

  ‘Come sir,’ said Jack, half rising, ‘it is scarcely handsome to make game of us – if I knew Spanish well enough,’ he added in English, ‘I would tell you it was a mighty scrubbish thing to do, after such candour; and if I could afford a sword, I should call you out.’

  ‘It is a sum that I happen to have by me,’ said don Manuel, ‘in a box. And I have no use for it, I assure you: you would put me very much in your debt if you would accept it,’ he said, placing his hand upon his heart in a very graceful manner. ‘It may help to keep you in little pleasures until you are exchanged,’ he added, with a sincere benignity that carried entire conviction.

  Jack was not accustomed to swallowing his words, but he did so now, and he did it handsomely, acknowledging his obligation to the utmost extent of his Spanish. Then, his eyes gleaming with a variety of strong emotions – among them relief from impending humiliation, but even more pleasure at don Manuel’s magnanimity – he called Tobias out of his stupor, saying, ‘don Manuel has offered us two thousand pieces of eight: it is the noblest thing I ever heard of.’

  ‘Ay?’ said Tobias. ‘You are very good, sir,’ – inclining his head towards don Manuel – ‘but do you see that man with serpents, near the brass fountain?’

  ‘Come, Toby,’ cried Jack, ‘do not be clownish, if you please. Two thousand pieces of eight. Think. Reflect.’

  ‘What are these pieces of eight you are always talking about?’ asked Tobias, withdrawing his eyes reluctantly from the throng about the snake-charmer. ‘Eight what?’

  ‘Eight reals, booby.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Do you know what Dr Gedd’s best horse cost?’ cried Jack, much provoked by this lumpish stolidity. ‘It cost four pieces of eight. Do you know what Paquita pays for a sheep? Four reals. Don Manuel offers us five hundred horses, four thousand sheep – an immense herd. An’t you amazed, Toby?',

  ‘Why does he think we want four thousand sheep?’ asked Tobias, peering with some curiosity at the Spanish officer.

  ‘Oh, bah. You must excuse my companion, don Manuel. His parts could never have recommended him at any time; but now, with his sufferings, he has grown quite beastish. For my part …’

  ‘Or such a great many horses? One or perhaps two apiece would be enough,’ murmured Tobias. ‘Five hundred would be ostentatious – excessive.’

  ‘For my part,’ continued Jack, taking no notice, ‘I shall be happier than I can express …’ and he went on to suggest various arrangements, such as a draft upon London, or a letter of credit to an agent in Lisbon.

  But although a sudden, brisk comprehension was not always characteristic of Tobias when his mind was engaged elsewhere, yet nevertheless understanding did seep in, given time, and now he interrupted Jack by rising up, and with the greatest solemnity he addressed don Manuel in the following terms, ‘Sir, you will allow me to say, that you not only reconcile me with your nation, but you oblige me to think more highly of mankind in general: sir, you may turn the pages of your Plutarch from the beginning to the end, without finding a more shining example of humanity to a captured enemy. Sir, we are told by Herodotus – we read in the learned Josephus …’

  Don Manuel, being of Mediterranean origin, was accustomed to eloquence, but the spate of Tobias’ gratitude (once it started to flow) quite stunned him, particularly as most of it was in Greek and nearly all the rest in Latin (all one to don Manuel).

  ‘Oh,’ said he, faintly, escaping in a pause between Hermippus and Agathemeros, ‘it is just that it might serve to make your stay more agreeable until you are exchanged. Gentlemen,’ he said, taking his leave, ‘your servant.’

  ‘Don Manuel,’ they cried, sweeping their ponchos in the dust, ‘yours – most humble and obliged.’

  Chapter Fifteen

  UNTIL they should be exchanged. It was an expression that was always coming up at first; as often as the words when we are exchanged. ‘I shall not classify my molluscs until we are exchanged,’ said Tobias. And ‘When we are exchanged,’ said Jack. ‘I shall send don Manuel an English repeating watch. English repeating watches are the only tolerable repeating watches, it seems.’ ‘The lower reptiles may stay in your bedroom until we are exchanged,’ said Tobias. ‘They may be a little crowded, but it is not for long.’ And Jack said, ‘There is no point in being foolishly economical – it is not as though we had to make the money last. We shall soon be exchanged, and then we shall have a fresh supply – how delightful. So I believe I shall buy Juanita’s brother’s chestnut mare after all, and tell Sanchez to make me a long black velvet cloak with a crimson lining, for the carnival. This will be a great saving, in point of fact, as it will also serve for doña Isabel’s party.’

  Yet time went on; the months followed after one another; the oranges in the streets and gardens changed from green bronze to gold and were followed by heavy-scented flowers again: the orange-flowers dropped, the oranges formed and still the prisoners were there, a part of the permanent scenery of Santiago. Nobody noticed them in the streets any more, whereas at one time the belief that Englishmen had tails provided them with a train of idle boys, and even of people old enough to know better; and for their part they no longer noticed the intense fieriness of Chilean cookery that had once rendered them speechless and scarlet through long dinner-parties.

  They began to mention exchange less often – indeed, they hardly thought of it for weeks on end. Tobias helped Dr Gedd in his morning rounds, botanised and collected in the afternoon, and in the evening applied himself to Spanish: Jack spent his time in a wholly useless and dissipated manner, rising late and going out almost every night to the parties, assemblies and balls that enlivened Santiago throughout the whole year, except in Lent, or making prolonged visits to friends who invited him to taste the delights of the Chilean countryside. He paid no attention to his Spanish, which, although it became very fluent, remained totally inaccurate; but, on the other hand, he learnt to handle the lasso, to smoke long green cigars and to dance the fandango until the morning sun put out the candle-light.

  France entered the war. Captain Cheap and Mr Hamilton became uncommonly excited when this news reached Chile, told one another that they had always foreseen it, called upon all hands to support the statement and to listen to their further predictions. Captain Cheap interrupted the long and circumstantial account that he was writing for the Lords of the Admiralty (an account intended to hang any surviving mutineers, for although he had changed in many ways he remained bitterly vindictive towards the authors of his miseries) in order to send strong remonstrances to don José about the length of their captivity and their right to be exchanged, and for several weeks they lived in excited anticipation.

  But gradually this faded away, and in time they heard the news of the distant battles with the calmness of the inhabitants of another sphere. Campbell, whose mind had turned very much to religion, became a Catholic, and moved away to Lima, in Peru; and on almost the same day as his departure they heard that the Centurion, half the world away by now, had taken the great Acapulco galleon, bound for Manilla with an enormous treasure aboard – a million pieces of eight, said some, and others, better informed, said nearer two. Tobias got into sad trouble with the Inquisition for carrying Mr Eliot’s theories rather too far, in the shape of fourteen white mice and a young female owl, all from the one patient: he came so close to the stake that he smelt of singeing for weeks after, and Dr Gedd was obliged to dispense with his assistance. ‘Go and stay with the Mendozas for a while,’ he said. ‘You can find where the
condors nest not far from there, and you can take the opportunity to bring your friend into a more serious state of mind – he is but a poor flibberty-gibberty loon at present, I’m thinking. Runs about at random with no thought of his profession nor the cultivation of his intellect.’

  No sober person could approve Jack’s course of life, which was both frivolous and dissipated: yet had it not been for Jack they might never have been exchanged at all. Don José had a daughter, a plain girl, unreasonably proud, who had recently (to the great relief of the nuns) left the convent in which she had been educated: her name was Luisa, and there was no one in Santiago good enough for her. That is to say, none of the younger officials or officers who attended the governor’s levees and who depended on her father would do at all; but she made an exception in favour of Jack, who naturally differed from them in every way, and she distinguished him by a great deal of notice. He had no intention of engaging the young woman’s affections, but he was naturally polite and amiable; he also considered that a high degree of gallantry was called for, in foreign parts; and presently Luisa supposed herself to be afire with a high romantic passion.

  Don José got wind of this somewhat later than he could have wished: he read an intercepted note, sighed at his daughter’s spelling and the banality of her sentiments, and frowned at the nature of the message. His powers were very considerable indeed: he had but to give the word for Jack to be hanged by the neck, to be filled with leaden bullets, or to be separated from his head by means of an axe. He rather liked Jack, however, and he thought Luisa far too tiresome and silly a girl for such extremities: yet, on the other hand, he valued his domestic peace; and within half an hour of reading Luisa’s note he had taken his measures. A messenger rode, with a cloud of dust behind him, northwards to Peru, galloping through the heat of the day, galloping by moonlight – fresh horses – poste-haste over the burning desert – post-haste in the name of the King – fresh horses – letters for the viceroy himself – letters for the viceroy at Lima. ‘Dear me,’ said the viceroy, leaning back in the viceregal throne and putting the letter (which was very private) into his breeches pocket, ‘dear me, who would have thought it?’