She had also somehow assembled and kept a service, though a small and motley one: her two cups were now the handle-less Chinese sort, and the saucers wide and smooth; the sugar bowl was of Portuguese make, evidently acquired in Brazil; the teapot, plain earthenware, had been given her by the American merchant in Nagasaki. She stirred her cup with a chop-stick inverted, and her hands did not shake, though she looked still drawn: it had been only three days since the attack, and those full of wearisome travel.
“I find nothing wanting, I assure you,” Laurence said. “I hope you are recovered?”
“I would be ashamed to be anything else,” she said, “when I was of so little use, and in less danger. I hope I am not so poor-spirited as that.”
“More than a little, of both danger and use, ma’am, I must protest,” Laurence said. “But I am glad if you are well.”
She drew a breath and sighed, then looked away across the camp. “May I confess something to you, Captain?” she said. “I hope it will not make you very angry, but I should like to clear the air, on my side—I should like to be quite frank.”
Laurence paused and set down his cup upon his knee. “By all means; I hope you need never even ask, to speak so,” he said.
“I was shocked, very shocked, when I first understood Emily’s position,” Mrs. Pemberton said, “when I first knew she was an officer. I thought it the most outrageous thing I had ever heard, to see a mere girl imposed upon in such a manner, from childhood; and I must admit, sir, I thought—I assumed—she was surely imposed upon in the other manner, as well.”
“I cannot reproach you,” Laurence said grimly. “What else is anyone to imagine, who knows a little of the world?”
She nodded. “If she had given me the least encouragement, I should have taken her away with me at the first opportunity—the first ship we met—and laid suit in court to see her respectably established,” she said. “I was quite ready to name you a villain, and all the Corps with you.”
Laurence looked at her in surprise, and some respect; he could not fault her impulse, even if he knew it could hardly have found a less willing object. “That encouragement,” he said, “I know very well you did not receive.”
“No,” she said. “She quite abused me for an idiot.”
She laughed and exchanged a rueful glance with Laurence, who could well imagine the nature of Emily’s reaction, and her scornful answer; she had griped to him often enough, in only the last month, about being saddled with a chaperone at all.
“And now instead I must say I do increasingly see the justice of her complaint,” Mrs. Pemberton said, “though I would be sorry to lose my post; I cannot see that I am of the least use to her.”
She fell silent, and after a pause quietly added, “I dare say I would not at all like to be an aviator. But there is nothing quite so unpleasant as to find oneself so wholly dependent on another’s protection, in such dreadfully visceral circumstances. I would cheerfully have exchanged a life of hard service to be able in that moment to defend myself.”
Laurence offered her his handkerchief; she waved it away, and drew out her own to press to her eyes briefly. “I beg your pardon,” she said, “and I am done with being a watering-pot. I will have Emily teach me to fence, if I can learn; and oh! I am sorry now I sold my husband’s guns after he died, for I would be happy indeed to have a pair of pistols of my own.”
“I should be happy to be of service to you in the matter,” Laurence said, “when we next have the opportunity.”
“Thank you, Captain,” she said. “I would be grateful.”
He took his leave of her to return to his own tent, pausing when he saw Temeraire standing watching him, his tail lashing in so uncontrolled a manner as to threaten the supports of his pavilion. “Is there something wrong?” Laurence asked him, in some concern; Granby had given him to understand that the danger he had been under was likely to provoke some long repercussions of watchfulness and anxiety, but Temeraire could hardly suppose him to be in danger from a conversation with Mrs. Pemberton.
“Oh!” Temeraire burst out. “Do you wish me to stay in China, then, and let you go away from me, so you may be married, and have as many children as you like, and a house again?”
Laurence stared, astonished and bewildered. “What?” he said.
Temeraire was nearly trembling with resentment and indignation, which Laurence could scarcely understand. “Her,” Temeraire said. “Whyever are you always speaking with her, and going to her tent? And why has her tent been moved so close to your own?”
“Do you mean Mrs. Pemberton?” Laurence said, in no diminished confusion. “She is under my protection, and was lately abused by ruffians—” He stopped, helplessly: he had not expected to find jealousy in a dragon, and still less so much imagination. “Do you—I beg your pardon, have you any reason for supposing I mean to marry her?” he asked, in sudden alarm. “Had I—before my loss of memory, had I—had I made her any promises, or expressed to you any intentions, in that quarter—”