Sea of Poppies

'Is he not on the ship then?'

'No,' said Zachary. 'None of us are. The Ibis is in dry dock and we're all liberty-men in the meantime. I've moved into a boarding house.'

'Really? Where?'

'In Kidderpore – Watsongunge Lane. Jodu found it for me.'

'Oh?' Paulette glanced over her shoulder to make sure that no one else had heard Jodu's name, and turned back to Zachary reassured.

Recently, Mr Burnham had installed a new fixture to cool the dining room. Known as a Thermantidote, the device was a winnowing machine that had been fitted with a propeller and a thick mat of fragrant khus-khus. The men who had once pulled the ropes of the overhead punkahs were now employed in operating the Thermantidote: while one wetted the machine's rush screen the other turned the propeller by means of a handle, forcing a constant stream of air through the dampened mat. Thus, by means of evaporation, the machine was supposed to create a wonderfully cooling breeze. Such at least was the theory – but in rainy weather the Thermantidote added greatly to the humidity, making everyone sweat even more than usual, and it also produced a loud, grinding noise that often drowned the conversation. Mr Burnham and Mr Doughty were among the few who could make themselves heard effortlessly, above the machine – but those with feebler voices often had to shout, which only added to the prevailing sweatiness. In the past, when seated beside deaf colonels and infirm accountants, Paulette had often had cause to regret the introduction of the new machine – but today she was unreservedly glad of its presence, since it allowed her to speak with Zachary without fear of being overheard.

'If I may ask, Mr Reid,' she said, 'where is Jodu now? What has become of him?'

'He's trying to earn a little money while the Ibis is being refitted,' said Zachary. 'He asked me for a small loan so he could rent a little ferry-boat. He'll be back on board when we're ready to sail.'

Paulette thought back to the lazy days when she and Jodu had sat in the trees of the Botanical Gardens, watching the ships on the Hooghly. 'So he is to have his wish then? He will be on your crew?'

'That's right: just as you wanted. He will be going to Port Louis with us when we sail in September.'

'Oh? He will go to the Mauritius?'

'Yes,' said Zachary. 'Do you know the islands?'

'No,' said Paulette, 'I have never been there, although it was once my family's home. My father was a botanist, you see, and in the Mauritius there is a very famous botanical garden. It was there that my father and mother were married. That is why I have a great envy to go there…' She broke off: suddenly it seemed intolerably unjust that Jodu should be able to go to this island while she, Paulette, with all her prior claims, could not.

'Is something the matter?' Zachary said, alarmed by her pallor. 'Are you all right, Miss Lambert?'

'An idee came to my mind,' said Paulette, trying to make light of her sudden turn of thought. 'It struck me that I too would love to go to the Mauritius on the Ibis. Just like Jodu, working on a ship.'

Zachary laughed. 'Believe me, Miss Lambert, a schooner's no place for a woman – lady, I mean, begging your pardon. Especially not someone who is accustomed to living like this…' He made a gesture in the direction of the loaded table.

'Is that indeed so, Mr Reid?' said Paulette, raising her eyebrows. 'So it is not possible, according to you, for a woman to be a marin?'

Often, when at a loss for a word, Paulette would borrow a term from the French, trusting that it would pass for English if pronounced exactly as it was spelled. This strategy worked well enough to provide reason to persist, but every once in a while it produced unexpected results: from the look on Zachary's face, Paulette knew that this was one such occasion.

'Marine?' he said in surprise. 'No, Miss Lambert, there sure aren't any woman marines that I ever heard of.'

'"Sailor",' said Paulette triumphantly. 'That is what I meant. You think it is not possible for a woman to sail under a mast?'

'As a captain's wife, perhaps,' said Zachary, shaking his head. 'But never as a member of the crew: not a sailor worth his salt would put up with that. Why, there's many a sailor won't so much as utter the word "woman" at sea, for fear of bad luck.'

'Ah!' said Paulette. 'But then it is clear, Mr Reid, that you have never heard of the famous Madame Commerson!'

'Can't say as I have, Miss Lambert,' said Zachary with a frown. 'What flag does she fly?'

'Madame Commerson was not a ship, Mr Reid,' said Paulette. 'She was a scientist: to be precise, she was my own grand-aunt. And I beg to inform you that she was but a young woman when she joined a ship and sailed all around the world.'

'Is that a fact?' said Zachary sceptically.

'Yes, indeed it is,' said Paulette. 'You see, before she was married, my grand-aunt's name was Jeanne Baret. Even as a girl, she had a passion most heated for science. She read about Linnaeus, and the many new species of plants and animals that were being named and discovered. These diverse facts made her burn with the volontee to see for herself the riches of the earth. What should happen then, Mr Reid, but that she should learn of a great expedition, being organized by Monsieur de Bougainville, with the intention of doing exactly that which she wished? This idee set her afire and she decided that she too, by all hasard, would be an expeditionnaire. But of course it was not to be expected that the men would permit a woman to join the ship… so can you imagine, Mr Reid, what my grand-aunt did?'

'No.'

'She did the simplest thing, Mr Reid. She tied up her hair like a man and applied to join under the name of Jean Bart. And what is more, she was accepted – by none other than the great Bougainville himself! And it was none too hard, Mr Reid – this I would have you know: it was no more than a matter of wearing a tight band over her chest and lengthening her stride when she walked. Thus she set sail, wearing trowsers, just like you, and not one of the sailors or scientists guessed her secret. Can you but imagine, Mr Reid, all those savants, so knowledgeable about the anatomy of animals and plants? – not one of them knew that there was a fillie among them, so completely was she male? It was only after two years that she was undone, and do you know how, Mr Reid?'

'Wouldn't like to guess, Miss,' said Zachary.

'In Tahiti, when the expeditionnaires went ashore, the people took but one look and they knew! The secret that no Frenchman had guessed through two years of living on the same ship, day in, day out, the Tahitians knew tootsweet. But now it did not matter, for of course, Monsieur de Bougainville could not abandonne her so he agreed to let her come along. They say it was she who, out of gratitude, named the flower that is called after the admiraclass="underline" bougainvillea. This was how it happened that Jeanne Baret, my grand-aunt, became the first woman to sail around the earth. And this too was how she found her husband, my grand-uncle, Philippe Commerson, who was among the expeditionnaires and a great savant himself.'

Pleased to have trumped Zachary, Paulette treated him to a beaming smile. 'So you see, Mr Reid, sometimes it happens after all that a woman does indeed join a crew.'

Zachary took a long sip from his wineglass, but the claret was not of much help in digesting Paulette's tale: he tried to think of a woman attempting a similar impersonation on the Ibis and was certain that she would be detected within days if not hours. He remembered the hammocks, hung so close that one man's tossing would set the whole fo'c'sle astir and a-shake; he thought of the boredom of the small hours, and those contests where the men of the watch would open their trowsers to leeward to see how much of the sea's phosphorescence they could light up; he thought of the ritual of the weekly bath, on deck, by the lee scuppers, with every tar's body bared to the waist and many having to strip naked to wash their one pair of under-clothes. How could a woman join in any of this? Perhaps on a shipful of frog-eating crappos – who knew what devilment they got up to? – but a Baltimore clipper was a man's world and no true salt would want it otherwise, no matter how great his love of women.