16 The Wine-Dark Sea - Libro della tutto

Patrick O'Brian The Wine-Dark Sea
almost theoretical pieces of paper, are to be
called grasping. There had been the sound of
chuckling throughout the ship ever since Oracle
Killick let it be known 'that the skipper had
got round to it at last', and a boat carrying Mr
Reade, Mr Adams and Mr Dutourd's servant
had pulled across to the Franklin, returning
with a heavy chest that came aboard not indeed
to cheers, for that would not have been
manners, but with great cheerfulness, good
will, and anxious care while it hung in the
void, and witticisms as it swung inboard, to be
lowered as handsomely as a thousand of
eggs.
Even until the next day, however, Stephen
Maturin remained unaware of all this, for not
only had he dined by himself in the cabin,
Jack Aubrey being aboard the Franklin, but his
mind was almost entirely taken up with cephalopods;
and as far as he took notice of the