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More laughter, then a muffled thump as a sea chest slammed shut. “Help me lift it,” said Kinsey.
“Hold your hamsters. Holy fuck, what is this, lined with lead?”
More thumping and cursing, and the voices receded. Jack shook his head. Too many of his officers and men remained unfamiliar to him. He stepped slowly down the companion.
On the spar deck he met Doctor Russ, holding a bundle of clothing tied up with string, fumbling with the latch to the wardroom door. “How do you do, Doctor?” he asked.
Doctor Russ turned and saw Jack, and stood up straight, transferring his bundle under one arm and saluting. “How do you do, Captain,” he said.
“Would you like a hand with the door?” asked Jack, after an uncomfortable silence.
“You are very good, sir, but I’m sure I’m up to the task.”
‘And he fixed me with a cold, dark stare - I never noticed how dark his eyes were before,’ Jack wrote in an email to Jevons later that evening, ‘so although I very much wanted to apologize the words wouldn’t come. And then he formally told me that he had been requested at the hospital, to help in some surgery - and ostomy, or an otomy, some Latin-sounding thing, and as Roth had no one in sick berth might he go? I said yes, of course. Apart from anything else we’re all on leave (except for me, of course, after I crashed the Roth into the warp gate) and he may come and go as he pleases, so I couldn’t say no even if I wanted to. And he thanked me, perfectly civil, but cold, and stood waiting for me to leave.’
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