Truth and Beauty 1-5

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Jevons squeezed his eyes shut and after a moment the urge passed. “Yesh,” he said, putting his hands down on the bar to steady himself, “bad luck till my next promo, promoshu, shun, and who knows when that will be. Or if. Damn’ my father for supporting the radical intrest.”

Jack pulled his own hands back, accidentally knocking over his drink as he did so. “Damn,” he said, watching the whiskey run down onto the sawdust-laden floor. He was starting to feel the effects of the whiskey himself and he shook his head to clear it.

“Not that I don’t love him,” said Jevons.

“Of course you do.”

“But why did he have to be sho, so vocal? He could have thought what that would do to my career. Ah, well. To family, and where we would be, where would we be, without them,” he tipped his empty glass back into his mouth. “It appears that my glass is empty. Ah, well,” he picked up his cigar again, “perhaps they’re wet enough.” He puffed at his cigar and fell to smiling at his epaulets, even more beautiful than he remembered them.

Jack stared at the epaulets, too. A small, mean, jealous part of him reflected that while Jevons might have received his promotion before Jack, appointment to a transport meant that no further promotion was likely; Jevons would die a lieutenant. Whereas if Uncle Rufus came through, Jack would be appointed to a warship - a sloop, or maybe even command of a brig - with all of the liklihood of further promotion: Commander, Captain, and ultimately, maybe, Admiral. He forced his eyes from Jevons’ epaulets and they wandered around the room, the bottles on the shelves with their shiny spouts, the beer taps with their coats of frost, the peculiar clock behind the bar with its swinging pendulum. “What a peculiar clock that is,” he said to Jevons, “with a pendul - a swingy thingy.”

Jevons carefully turned to face the clock and they stared at it for a while.

“It’s fast, too,” said Jack. “Decoration, I suppose it’s for.”

Jevons felt his pockets for his phone. “No, it’s just about on, Jack,” he said, staring at its screen, “coming up on seven bells - eleven-thirty.”

“No,” said Jack, plunging his hand into his jacket pocket. He pulled his phone free and turned it right-side up, “No!” he cried, “I’m late!” He pulled a fistful of coins from his pocket, tossed several of them on the bar, made hurried apologies to Jevons, and ran out the door.

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