to Malta and eastwards: though indeed he is to be reinforced in two or three weeks, or perhaps earlier. They too were much delayed by the weather, carrying the C-in-C’s new wife, and had to put back into Lisbon.’
Jack drank his own sherry with satisfaction and they sat down to a remarkably copious supper. Picking up his fork he said, ‘Did you say that Lord Barmouth was remarried? I heard nothing about it.’
‘He was, though. To Admiral Horton’s remarkably handsome young widow. It is her absence that makes him crosser than usual.’
Jack nodded vaguely, and in the pause between the pair of fowls and the sucking-pig he asked, ‘Did you wait on Lord Keith?’
‘Yes, I did,’ said Dundas. ‘I had a message for him from my father; but I should have gone in any case. I have a great respect for the Admiral.’
‘So have I. How was Lady Keith?’
‘As lovely, and kind, and learned as ever: she was good enough to ask me to dinner, and she and the chaplain of one of the seventy-fours prattled away about some peculiarities of the Hebrew used in the Jewish community on the Rock.’
‘Do they indeed use a colloquial Hebrew?’ asked Stephen. ‘I had always supposed that they kept to their archaic Spanish.’
‘From what I gathered they spoke Hebrew when Jews from remote countries appeared - countries where Arabic or Persian took the place of Spanish. Rather as those more learned than I am use Latin when they are in Poland or, God preserve us, Lithuania.’
‘As I remember,’ said Jack, ‘they meant to stake a house somewhere near the Governor’s cottage.’
‘Just so: Ballinden. It is a little higher up, but somewhat closer to the town. A charming place, with a prodigious view of the Straits and a fine garden kept by a Scorpion: perhaps rather large for them and I am afraid the apes are a nuisance at times. But they both seem very happy there.’
‘Bless them,’ said Jack, raising his glass. ‘They were both most uncommon kind to me.’
Pudding came on almost as soon as they had drunk the Keiths’ health, a fine honest naval pudding of the kind that Jack and Dundas loved, and to which Stephen (unlike Jacob) had become inured. ‘Thank you very much,’ said Dundas, refusing a second piece, ‘and I am afraid I must...’ Before he could utter the words ‘tear myself away’ the Surprise’s bell struck eight times, the cabin door opened and the midshipman in charge of Captain Dundas’ barge said, ‘Sir, you told me to ..
‘Very true, Simmons,’ said Dundas. ‘Jack, thank you many, many times for a splendid supper; but if I do not speed on my way, I shall be flogged round the fleet. Gentlemen’ - bowing to Stephen and Jacob - ‘your servant.’
All was over, the table cleared, all but for the brandy. Jacob had said good night, and a curious silence filled the cabin.
‘Seeing Dundas hurry off in such a dutiful, truly naval fashion,’ said Stephen, ‘puts me in mind of an indiscreet question that I have often been tempted to ask you: and since after all I too am essentially concerned in our voyage, I shall venture upon it now. If Heneage Dundas is in danger of being flogged round the fleet for dillying and dallying on his way, may you not run the same risk, when at last your snail’s pace brings you to Gibraltar and the Commander-inChief, who is not your very closest friend?’
‘Stephen,’ said Jack, ‘I dare say you have noticed that the moon changes both her shape and her hours of rising and setting from time to time?’
‘Indeed I have - a most inconstant orb. Sometimes a mere sickle facing left, sometimes right; and sometimes, as I have no doubt you have observed yourself, no moon at all. The dark of the moon! I remember you once landed me on the French coast at just such a time. Yet I am no great lunarian: a priest in the County Clare explained her motions to me, but I am afraid I did not fully retain his words.’
‘He did persuade you that it was a regular process - that the changes could be foretold?’
‘I am sure he did, at least to his own satisfaction.’
‘It is the case, I do assure you, Stephen: and the very first appearance of the new moon at certain seasons is of the utmost consequence to Jews and Muslims. Now you are aware that the commander of the Arzila galley must be either the one or the other - almost certainly a Muslim - and in any case a sailor. Furthermore he is presumably a sailor in his right mind, so wind and weather permitting he must necessarily pass through the Strait at the dark of the moon or as near as ever he can get to it, a night that he can foretell as well as we can. So seeing that both he and I think alike, I hope to give him the meeting somewhere south of Tarifa.’
‘To be sure, that puts a different complexion on
