The Confusion

"Damn all Puritans and their base obsession with how much it costs!" Roger bellowed, shaking a tiny drumstick at Daniel's brow as if it were the club of Hercules. "What matters is that the sentimental value of Météore to the de Lavardac family is very great. And who should be in Dunkirk just now but Eliza de Lavardac." Roger lost focus for some moments. "I hope it is not all true, what people say about her and the pox."

Daniel had seen the only woman he'd ever loved chewed up and vomited out by smallpox, and urgently desired a change of subject. "I begin to understand. The Whigs are seen as the party of the Bank, and of War. The Bank is said to be foundering and the War has ground to a halt."

"Mind you," put in Roger with one more admonitory shake of the drumstick, "the Bank shall succeed immensely, and we shall prevail over the French, all in good time; but it would help us if we could avoid losing the next election to Harley and Bolingbroke and his lot." Meaning the Tories.

"And so you would make some peace-offering to the French. Eliza is seen as a sort of bridge between France and England. You would please her and her husband by returning Météore. And you would like me to go along—?"

"Somewhat as you went to the Hague in the days before the Revolution," said Roger, "as the least likely imaginable diplomat."

"The more often I am sent on such missions the more likely I must seem," said Daniel, "but I shall go and deliver this boat to Eliza if that is what you want. From there it is on to Hanover."

"It is extraordinary you should mention Hanover," said Roger. "I have a message, too sensitive to commit to paper, that I should like you to deliver to our next Queen."

"Are you referring to Sophie of Hanover? You confuse me, for our next Queen is named A

"Syphilitic like her sister and her dad," Roger mumbled, as if Princess A

"How does that follow?"

"Hanovers are natural Whigs," Roger re-iterated. "Keep saying it to yourself, Daniel, an hundred times a day, until you believe it; and then say it to Sophie of Hanover as if you mean it."

"Well, do not look up, Roger, but I phant'sy that some natural Tories are spying on us from the Tower." Daniel cocked his head at a side-window of the cabin, which offered a prospect over the Wharf and the fortifications above and beyond it.

"Really!?"

"Oh yes indeed."

"The curtain-wall or—"

"Farther in, I should say. Do keep in mind that the Tower's a bit crowded with Tories today."

"I suppose it would be," said Roger. "Well done, Daniel! Perhaps you do have some future, after all, as a scheming political hack."

"You forget I used to make my living as one. Excuse me, Roger, but the gastro-colic reflex is having its way with me, and I must to the head."

"In truth or—"

"No, for I am stopped up in the bowels these three days; it is a diversionary ruse. Is there a prospective-glass to be found in this place?"

"Indeed, a lovely one, in that drawer—no, to the left—now down—and down again. There you have it."

"To perfect the illusion, I'll need something in lieu of a turd."

"Spotted Dick!" said Roger instantly, eyeing a brown log on a platter.

"I was thinking bangers," Daniel said, "but in English cuisine there are so many items of about the right size, shape, color and composition that it is easy to be overwhelmed by choices."

"In France, you'll find, there is greater variety in foods."

"So they keep saying." And Daniel, armed with a telescope in a hip-pocket and a length of Spotted Dick palmed in one hand, repaired to the head. In most ships this would have meant going all the way to the other end, and exposing his bum to London; but this being a ship of ducal luxury, there was, attached to this stateroom, a wee compartment, tacked on to the exterior of the hull proper, with a bench, with a hole, and three fathoms of open air between that and the water. Above the bench was a Barock window to admit light and vent fumes. Daniel made himself comfortable, cracked the window, and rested the prospective-glass on its sill, poking it out under the hem of the curtain.

Salt Tower, which anchored the southeastern corner of the fortifications that Henry III had, four hundred and some years ago, put up around what was now called the I