inconsiderate step into the fetid mud of ages, yet it scarcely disturbed any but the nearest. These were of the plumed kind known as . . .'
At the beginning of his account of the Maltese annelids he noticed that her bosom was heaving. He knew very well that it was not heaving for him but he did not realize that grief was the cause until he reached the bizarre mating habits of Polychaeta rubra, when to his intense embarrassment and distress he saw tears coursing down her cheeks. His exposition faltered; their eyes met; she gave him a painfully artificial smile and then her chin trembled and she broke into passionate weeping at last.
He took her hand, saying meaningless comforting words: for an instant she was on the point of snatching it away but then she clung hard and between her sobs she said 'Must I go down on my knees? How can you be so hard? Cannot I make you love me?'
He did not answer until she was calmer, and then said 'Of course you cannot. How can you be so simple, my dear? Surely you must know that these things are reciprocal or they are nothing. It is not possible that you should be enamoured of my person. You may have kindly feelings for me - I hope so, indeed - but as for love or desire or anything of a stronger nature, sure there is not a breath of it in you.'
'Oh but there is, there is! And I will prove it.'
'Listen,' he said firmly, patting her knee with an authoritative hand, 'I am a medical man, and I know for a fact that you are quite unmoved.'
'How can you tell?' she cried, blushing violently.
'Never mind. It is a fact; and I can measure the degree of your indifference by the strength of my own desire. Believe me, believe me, I do most ardently wish to enjoy the last favours, to possess you, as people so absurdly say; but not on those terms.'
'Not at all?' she asked, and when he shook his head she wept even more bitterly; but still she clung to his hand as if it were her only anchor. She made no coherent reply when he said 'It is clear that you wish me to do something of a particular nature. For a woman of your kind to propose such a sacrifice it must be unusually important and certainly most confidential. Will you tell me now what it is?'
All he could gather from her disconnected words was that she could not - she dared not - it was too dangerous - there was nothing to tell.
He was sitting in a somewhat cramped position in the corner of the sofa, with his stockinged foot tucked under him and Mrs Fielding pressed against his side, trembling convulsively from time to time. His crooked knee was cruelly uncomfortable and he longed to reach out for the glass of wine; but he felt that the crisis might well come in the next few minutes and he continued to wonder aloud what the nature of the service might be. His words about medical certificates, supplies, the release of impressed men and so on were meant to provide little more than a comforting thorough-bass or continue: his mind was much more taken up with gauging his patient's state of mind and body, because quite apart from Jack's remark and the absence of the picture he was almost sure that he had the solution. Her sobbing stopped; she sniffed, breathing easier but by no means quite evenly. 'Would it be to do with your husband, my dear?' he asked.
'Oh yes,' she cried despairingly, and her tears ran fast again. Yes - they had him in prison - they would kill him if she did not succeed- she dared not tell them she had failed - they had been pressing her to move quickly - oh would not dear Dr Maturin be kind to her? - they would kill him otherwise.
'Nonsense,' said Stephen, standing up. 'They will do nothing of the kind. They have been deceiving you. Listen, have you any coffee in the kitchen?'
Over their pot of coffee and rather stale pieces of bread and olive oil the miserable story came out piece by piece: Charles Fielding's unfortunate position - his letters - her collecting of information (nothing wicked: only to do with marine insurance: but confidential) - the sudden much graver mission, on which her husband's life depended - they told her that Dr Maturin had connexions in France with whom he corresponded in code - it was all concerned with finance and perhaps smuggling - she was to win his confidence and obtain the addresses and the codes. Yes, she knew the name of the man who had brought her Charles's last letter: he was Paolo Moroni, a Venetian, and she had seen him from time to time in Valletta - she thought he was a merchant. But she neither knew the names nor the appearance of the other men who spoke to her. They changed: there were perhaps three or four of them. Sometimes she was sent for, and she could get into touch with them by leaving a paper with the time on it at a wine-merchant's house. She was always required to go to St Simon's, to the third confessional on the left, at a stated hour, there to give her information and to receive her letters if there were any; the man in the confessional did not pull back the little door like a priest but spoke through the lattice, so she never saw his face. There was one she did know, however, because she had seen him talking with Moroni, a man who spoke good but not quite perfect Italian with a strong Neapolitan accent. He was often in the confessional. Yes, she thought he knew that she knew him. Certainly she could describe him, but she never would while Charles was in their hands: it might be unlucky. She would never do anything that might do Charles any harm. She was worried about his letters, however; they had been strange these last weeks, as though he were unwell, or unhappy. What did Dr Maturin think? There was nothing private- they had to be sent unsealed - and she did not mind showing them.
Mr Fielding wrote a clear strong hand, and his style was equally straightforward; although his letters were necessarily discreet they gave a sense of powerful, direct, uncomplicated affection; Stephen had not read two before he felt a liking for him. But as Laura had said, the more recent were shorter, and in spite of the fact that they used many of the same phrases and expressions they seemed laboured. Could he be writing against his will, from dictation? Or is it not himself at all? wondered Stephen. If he has died, or if they have killed him, Laura Fielding's life will not be worth a Brummagem groat, once she knows it for a fact. No chief of intelligence could let her run about Malta, knowing what she knows, without he has a very strong hold over her; and a woman is so easy to kill without a hidden motive being suspected, since it can always be coupled with a rape. Aloud he said, 'Clearly, I do not know him as you know him, but a cold or a slight indisposition or a lowness of spirits could answer for all this and more.'
'I am so happy you think so,' she said. 'I am sure you are right: a cold, or a slight indisposition.'
'But attend to me now,' he said after a long pause. 'This Moroni and his friends have been led into the strangest mistake: I have nothing whatever to do with finance or smuggling or insurance by land or sea. I give you my sacred word of honour, I swear by the four Gospels and my hope of salvation that you might have searched my papers for ever without finding a smell of a code or an address in France.'
'Oh,' she said, and he knew that although his words were literally true, she had pierced through to their essential falsity and that she did not believe him.
'But, however,' he went on, 'I believe I know how this mistake has arisen. I have a friend whose occupation brings him into touch with confidential affairs; we have very often been seen together, and these men, or more probably their informants, have confounded us, taking the one for the other. Yet there is something so amiable about a lady's concern for her husband, and he a prisoner, that I am persuaded my friend will furnish us with what
