Over dinner that first night, as the sea closed over the wake of her ship, Cicely prayed with her uncle, Charles Godwin for Edward's soul. "Surprise" was heading north now, and Stephen, having planned to by now be at the Galapagos Islands, was God only knew where. As she walked over the rubber tree planks of her uncle's house, to the bedroom that was to be hers, Cicely resolved to begin her work immediately, not to think on "Surprise" and not to think on Stephen. She was here; it was safe for her here. And there was work to be done.

She was to educate the people here, bring them the knowledge that would help them to make their lives better while her uncle spoke to them of God, and read the gospels to a silent gathering in the shade of mangroves near the shore. God heard you wherever you were: Cicely knew that, and it didn't matter the language. Even in her darkest days the Gospels were her salvation. She had prayed that the Lord was near her and to guide her to her brother when all hope seemed lost. She had fought with strength she never knew she had to honour his life. When Cicely had lost their son, when she had lay bleeding, his tiny lifeless body in Jack Aubrey's hands she told God she wanted to go with him. He had rejected her then from the glorious life onwards, and returned her. She had rebuilt her life. WIth him, her husband, Stephen Matuin.

Cicely had related a good deal of her life since breaking from her father's tyranny to her uncle, as he showed her around the island over weeks that followed, on which he had made his own life. Her tales had been cautious, but she had been honest. Even so, her uncle had shuddered at the life she had led and had, on more than one occasion had taken her hand and given thanks to God that He had safely placed her in his care in this beautiful place.

"You need do nothing more than recline," her uncle had told her, when he had shown her the village in which the native Guineans called home. But Cicely could not countenance that. To teach skills, reading, and to bring the people to God: it was the right thing; it was the only way for her.

"I must be busy," Cicely told him, as they sat, just a few days later on a mangrove branch looking out to sea. "I must work, for His glory. He will reward me with my husband returning safely to me, with the knowlege that he needs."

"You are a good child, Cicely Emma," her uncle had told her, taking in her face, her soft cheeks and defined chin, her fair hair and blue yes. "You always were, though wilful. It is appalling how your father tried to discourage this in you, and chose to see it as rebellion. Yes..." he touched her arm, paternally, "how so very like your dear mother you are."

It turned out that Uncle Godwin had not actually been declared king of the people here but instead, their guide, a kind of protector. The people who lived there here, on an southerly, unnamed Carteret Island positioned on the outer rim of the atoll there, lived people who had accepted him and, in exchange for protection, food and trade, they offered loyalty.

He was humane, kind and loyal to their welfare, seeing off a rival tribe from an adjacent island, introducing a better way to grow fruit and the sugar beet crop, both of which were abundant on the island, and commanding the best price that he could at Bourgaineville Island from merchant and naval vessel alike. When Cicely had awoken on her first morning, to a cool breeze wafting the thin curtains at he windows, her eye followed the curve of the beach south, its yellow-white sand as soft as flour reaching to the forget-me-not sea, catching sight of the building that her uncle had been at pains to describe to her the night before: a bamboo building was the church.

"You will find that none of the people here are servants; none I have compelled to work for me." Her uncle, eating a breakfast of the native fruit with her that morning, discussed the people attending in the house. "They do it in exchange for the trade I can do for them. The island beyond contains a tribe rival to the people here. As such, they prevent these people getting their goods to market. That's where I come in. Is this not so, Ekah?"

A tall, slight man, deep-skinned with white hair stepped forward. He had served their breakfast and was now standing by Charles Godwin, and smiled.

"Indeed, Mister Godwin," he replied, nodding to Cicely. "Your uncle, he says that the best course of action is the best outcome for the most people. We all do indeed all believe this." Cicely was about to ask her uncle about this, but Godwin threw back his head, laughing.

"Oh, my dear Ekah!" he exclaimed. "I should not take this complement from you! For the praise lies with my very dear brother, who I was so very sad to leave behind in Norfolk all those years ago."

"Your brother?" Cicely asked, surprised. "I...have another uncle?"

"You do indeed, my dear!" exclaimed Charles Godwin, "You do indeed! Your uncle William, now," he pointed his breakfast knife in her direction, bobbing it as he thought, "he would have been in France, during the Terror; that is why he is unknown to you! Our dear Edward would have known, of course; your father too..." his brow clouded. "I may have mentioned him when you came to visit with Edward...but of course," he added, "you would have been too young to understand even if you could remember." Godwin leaned forward, as if confiding something grave. "He has led an thorough life - much like yourself, my dear. Oh - " he broke off, putting down his cutlery, then striding over to the bookcase near the door to the hallway. In the case, books were filled on the two shelves, modest, leather-covered titles, and one, her uncle slipped down to her.

"A book he sent me. A friend with similar philosphical tastes." He placed the book next to Cicely. "Thomas Paine: "The Rights of Man"?" Cicely frowned a little as she turned over the pages.

"It is in support of the French Revolutionists," Charles Godwin confided. "Against all hierarchy."

"Anarchy...?" Cicely read. "A rejection of hierarchy and all forms of government?"

"Ha! And I tried it here. These people had free will. And using it, they chose me to represent them? Is there not an irony in that?"

"Yes," agreed Cicely. "May I read it? That I may get to know my other uncle better?"

"My very dear child," Charles Godwin declared, "Bless me, if he is not a published author himself! You may read as many of his works as you wish; I even have a copy of his first wife's book which may be to your taste: "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman"; I do feel sorry for her children." Her uncle looked across to her, his jolly face severe.

"Your uncle married Mary when the man she was living with, and with whom she had a daughter, died. Poor Fanny was taken up by William when they married - he a rejector of marriage too - and Mary had another daughter, Mary. Dear Mary must be eight or nine now; at least they have a stable home together now; William's second wife had the goodness to take on these two girls and raise them as her own with her other children. Ah," he sighed, taking up a tin of chewing tobacco, and looked out to sea. "He is a good man, my brother. Always seeks the right course. His life is such a different one to that he proposes. Though, perhaps his anarchism is one being played out just very slowly over the course of his life, now, eh?" He leaned back and his shoulder and smiled at his niece.

"Have you given any more thought of what I asked of you, Cicely?" She got to her feet, and stood by him. High cloud. That meant good weather. Even now, so early in the morning, little boats belonging to this island's people could be seen dipping between the waves as they fished.

"Yes, uncle. Most grateful that I am to you for offering me a life of comfort, I must indeed teach. I may not lie idle here. My husband, as you know...I married him, for convenience, for Edward's soul to be saved lest he be refused by God for his sin." She lay down her knife, and looked away.

"You never need to feel bad for the life you lived, Cicely."

"And yet," Cicely nodded. "I do. I treated marriage with contempt. And, Uncle, the Lord forgave me! He gave me an opportunity to go on." There were no tears this time in the telling, for it was clear as the bright sun above them what His plan was. "I was to go on, to save lives, to improve lives. It is the only thing that makes sense to me. Steven was so kind...he refused to instruct me as a man would do a wife. He told me my choices were my own and - "

" - well, this is something!" her uncle interjected. "For, this is the embodiment of the notion that Mary Wollstonecraft was at pains to confide in her book!" He leaned across the table to her, his amplitude dropping considerably. "Dear me, it would seem that your husband is a student of hers - you married, and he accepted...encouraged your free will. Did your husband ever live in Paris?" Cicely nodded.

"In the Reign of Terror too. He witnessed the Bastille liberated. Watched the deaths of the KIng and Queen."

"Then, I confide, that you are fortunate in your choice of a husband, niece. You fought for a place beside your brother and God brought you and he to cross paths. I am sure he and I will have much to speak of in common when he at last comes here." Cicely felt her heart race a little as the manly beauty of her husband fickered in her mind.

"Thank you, Uncle," Cicely replied. "God led me here, to hear your words, to witness your goodness to these people."

"It wasn't always like this." Charles Godwin's face darkened quickly. "And the lives lost to war, it - " Then he cut himself short and smiled warmly at Cicely again. "But enough of this. You are here, my darling girl. In my home, which is yours now."

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"My dearest Lieutenant Blakeney," Cicely wrote, as, a fortnight later, the morning sun became the noonday, and she had retreated to the shade of the sitting room on the north side of her uncle's house. "I trust this letter finds you well and that Captain Aubrey is mounting a successful mission in the company of Admiral Pellew."

Cicely picked up her quill, the sun's rays on the sea catching its silver nib. It reflected too off her necklace, the one which Will Blakeney had given to her, which reflected facets of colour. She let go of her pendant, running through the thoughts in her mind, and considering what she may and may not put to her good friend. It would be imprudent to expand on her knowledge of any naval order to which she was privy: the letter may well end in Will's hand, but neither she nor he would know how many it would pass through, like the captain of the "Liberty" on its progress to "Surprise".

"The people come and worship, and then they live in their communities on the other side of their island. They keep themselves in their communities, although sometimes groups of them will come for a marriage agreement and then this is done by some of the family returning with the boat. They adore my uncle, who sees fit to give them the best that he can through the selling of the island's natural products."

Across the sand, a group of natives wandered, one of them detatching themselves from the others and standing abruptly in front of them, folding their arms.

"I officiate at the service at church and they accept it, as they accept baptism, and baptism of their children. Ekah, who's Christian name is Adam, speaks to them about God and brings them to the meeting place. He translates what my uncle says, or at least, that's what he thinks Adam does. Men are respected absolutely - " beyond the little group of people, who seemed to be deep in discussion a lightweght craft bobbed up and down in the channel between this, her uncle's, and that of his people's sworn enemy. How to continue, Cicely wondered. That there were strict rules about births. child-rearing, marriage? No.

"In addition to trade, my uncle has merchant ships and makes a not unreasonable sum for invention of new and good quality watches and chronometers. He trusts Captain Aubrey has put his reconstruction to good use and the device has saved the captain well." Better, Cicely mused, as the sun's rays began to peep over the roof of the house.

"As well as ministering on a Sunday," Cicey continued, replenishing the pen with ink from Uncle Charles's desk, "with my uncle I tend the women both with household jobs." And a birth.

Cicely had walked beside the huts that ranged in an inner circle around the village. On passing one of them, she chanced on a woman, left all alone, on her knees, groaning in agony, sweat glistening in her face. No-one had been with her, to comfort her or attend to her. Cicely could not tell why, nor felt it reasonable to ask.

But it had taken ounce after ounce of her strength to help the woman push, dust and dirt and blood coating her blouson and loose trousers so that they clung to her body in places. The woman was delivered of a healthy baby boy, which she nursed immediately, while Cicely leaned back, panting at the strain as she scooped up the afterbirth into her lap next to her child. A trickle of people began to come to the house on a daily after that, much to the amusement of her uncle.

"I am delighted to be able to provide these people nursing, although I have long wished the good doctor to be here, not only for my part but to care for these people, with injuries and illnesses in a far better manner than I can provide." There, she thought, sealing it after signing the letter "Mrs Maturin," that would get passed along from ship to ship like the world's biggest parlour game, until it reached Jack Aubrey, as sea-letters always did, much to Will Blakeney's consternation.

For it seemed to Cicely that it was common practise for the people to give up after several superficial attempts to provide relief to their suffering. But many were not be cured; animals would be brought and a hut or enclosure surrounded them. If one of the animals sickened and died, then they would nurse the person – they believed the strength of the animal has passed to the person. If not, they would leave the person. That was what, Cicely understood, had happened to the poor woman whose baby she had delivered. She had come back angry to the house that day and Adam had spoken to her, and tried to convey understanding of their practises.

But, more often, as was the way of things, women and children, older people were left – Adam had been left and Uncle Godwin has revived him – a fever - and he had nursed him. Cicely had nursed when the animals could not help them and the people did not make any attempt to stop her and she had returned many people, to the delight of their loved ones, to their families, although there was a large band of orphans who were cared for by some childless women. Not so much cast out, but electively standing aside from the community. They cared for the children and acted like surrogate parents.

One morning, four weeks after Surprise had landed a rowing boat on the east shore came into view. It had caused a stir amongst the people, although to her uncle nothing at all. Instead, her Uncle Godwin had asked, "Are you happy niece? You work hard, tirelessly, for the natives, for God, yet - " Charles Godwin inspected Cicely's face, which was pale, despite the sun, and worn.

"I do miss him, Uncle," Cicely confided. "I knew that I would, and my work here keeps me occupied. But there is a distraction in me. It's as if I would take the nearest ship and sail to be with him. That I would do his work here, towards his Royal Society bid - " she placed a hand over his, " - a volume of work bringing together Stephen's work with the best from Erasmus Darwin's original Zoonomia and, what I believe he is working from, the notes from Alexander von Humboldt's voyages." She put down her quill at the desk at which her uncle had found her. already exhausted from the day's work, her small curled hand shaping the letters, though a little spidery as the ink reservoir was running low. The paper was replete with small amaeturish sketches here and there of some of the animals she had seen so far on this, one of the Carteret Islands. "He knows where I am, and his work is developing." Charles Godwin drew a chair up next to her, and took the quill gently from her hand.

"You told me his trade was espionage," he replied. Behind him, through the glassless window, rain sheeted down vertically as if it were the sky's ardent desire to merge with the ground. It would be over soon, Cicely knew; it was a local weather phenomenon: in a short time the sun would spread itself throught sky and it would be as if the rain had never happened.

"On my marriage, officiated by Nelson, and the death of my father, he gained the Gloucester estate. There is now no need to spy."

"Maybe there are scores to settle." It wasn't a question, and as he spoke, he took his niece's hand. Despite the warmth of the day it was pale and cold. Cicely knew she did not look well, and looked away.

"A fine desire, the Royal Society," Godwin replied, smiling fatherly at her. "Education is next to God, I feel." He looked towards the people's settlement. "I wish to set up a school for the children and for the cast-out women. Eduction for women helps them out of their position, and matters more to the child than if she were not educated.

"Mary Wollestonecraft," Cicely acknowleged. Her uncle gave her an encouraging smile.

"I have seen you reading it. From what my brother says, Mary, her daughter, is coming into the strong temperament of her mother. His wife, her stepmother, does not approve." He inhaled, and smiled at Cicely again. "I am no friend to the Royal Society - our religion bars this." Cicely nodded.

"I favour its ideals. Collaboration to solve difficulties that dog the world. Do write to your husband, Cicely, and welcome him to your home here. Mention that my meagre collection of his books he may have at his disposal. So," Charles Godwin added, "So, Richard Hollum's estate, eh? To a Fenian? You realise that dear Mary would have you know that it is yours?"

"Then I would be very happy to tell her that my only wish would be that my husband had it, for the sake of his work." Uncle Charles smiled at her, tapping her hand.

"Ha, to a Fenian, that godforsaken brother-in-law of mine!" But this was all too much like blasphemy on his tongue, and her uncle quickly added, "Oh I do apologise to you, Cicely, for God forsakes nobody. He would hate it, indeed He would! Please, " he took her hand and led her to the cool of her room.

"Please, do rest, dear Cicely. I will have Adam bring you a meal." He smiled again. "This evening I will write to William and tell him of you, that you live, that you have married." Cicely smiled as she swung her now-inexplicably tired legs onto the bed, thinking again how glad, after all her reservations about coming, she was to be with her family, be useful and wanted. It took away most of the sting of his absence. It would not be forever.

"And you say he is also a surgeon?" Cicely nodded.

"Out of Dublin. He saved my life twice, and countless others. And operated on himself, to remove a bullet from his own abdomen." She knew the last part of her sentence was prideful, but she could not help it.

"Operated on himself," her uncle nodded, impressed. Then, lost in thought, he left Cicely in the sitting room.

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The man, sitting in a hotel in a land soon to be overturned from one colonial power to another, closed his eyes. He was tired, yes. Too tired to move at that particular moment. But it would have to be soon. For there would be an imminent arrival of ships from the country to whom he was traitor to support the overthrow by the East India Company of French traders in the east and in the south.

It had not been safe, his route to India, not safe, and nearly caught. William Wickham - for it was he who had his feet high on a stool sipping a spirit drink diluted with a bitter tonic - thought about his escape from the Scipion as Sir Thomas Baker cut her lines and tethered her to the stern of Phoenix. He had thrown himself into the water then, and had swam east, in the hope that a loyal French fishing boat would pull him out - as had been the case.

Wickham shook his head. At least one thing had been the death of the Lord Admiral. Though that whore of a girl had saved his life on his own flagship, Horatio Nelson had not lived many weeks and had died in Lady Hamilton's bed when the Battle of Austerlitz had been raging. It had been a bitter blow to the mind of the nation - the navy mourned; the women cried in the streets. Pitt was compelled to recall the House and address it. It was a pity that he, or a spy that he had run, had not assassinated the man - he, Wickham, would have been well rewarded.

Instead, he had been condemned to ignominy on an errand in India, in order to use the greed of the British traders against them. The French may fight them in the water but they would never succeed that way – Fouche needed to make sure Bonaparte understood that.

And then, there had been the damned bells! Overland Wickham had travelled, through Spain and into the Mediterranean, through Egypt, down the Red Sea, through Persian Empire and to Jeddah before paying a trader to take him East. It had been a long, laborious and costly route which had taken him the best part of five months. The alternative was Dutch East Indies or Philippines, both of which were allies of Britain But, raise enough interest...

...and that was what he was going to do. Of course, he could slip out now, before the engagement between the English and the French, but there was always risk. Others were following him; he would be pursued by someone at the very least, so he must choose his mode of departure cleverly.

He would be away, and to the biggest intrigue of his career. Should this come off,, then...

No, William Wickham thought to himself, as he drained his glass and held it up for more. He was older now than he had once been. A young Wickham would have continued to raise strike after strike against England as was expected from the Republuc. There had been another failed invasion by the Irish; another in Cumberland, which had resulted in the man being imprisoned in the Tower of London. And John-Paul Jones...all of these, Wickham mused, merely individual bees attacking a suit of armour.

But supposing he, or indeed other spies, of which Wickham knew two, would mobilise the bees into one large swarm. American ships hammering the coastal towns in Cornwall and Devon one at a time did no good. You needed a collective - the whole of Ireland rising up, having brought an alliance of French over to support them. Or seduce the whole of the House of Lords with Pitcairn Island women, as the Bounty had been. Now, there was a thought.

But all those other intrigues were past Wickham - he aimed for the top, the most audacious, one which would involve half a continent. And it would begin with trade disruption just a few miles out there, in the topaz-blue Bay of Bengal. He was playing the long game, just on the very brink of Joseph Fouche's jurisdiction. The thrones of Austria and Spain were unstable; revolution was beginning to grow in South America.

And then there was the sleeping wolf that was Ireland. If it would only act as one, revolutionaries could undermine the will of the people in Great Britain, the wolf being Wolf Tone and the call for home rule. Should the populace feel the pinch in terms of food and foods the Irish might almost convince them that the peerage system could be overthrown. It had been here he had bought the services of Stephen Maturin, aiding proto-revolutionaries in Cork and Tralee. The man had had his head turned by London, now, and was doing his damnedest to convince himself that he was never against the good John Bull. What a waste of talent.

Draining his third glass, William Wickham, master spy, strode to the balustrade that overlooked the sea, watching the cycle of the waves as they receded from the shore.

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It had been the fifth week after leaving the Galapagos Islands and Stephen Maturin had had the fortune to meet a whaler who was putting in due east at Salinas. It had been a joy the day that he realised where it was he actually needed to be and, at the same time, a huge shock. The journey, through jungle terrain, had been laborious, and the naturalist in him had had to be contented knowing that many new species would have to be overlooked until another time, and that his haste was for something much bigger.

It was straighforward for Stephen to charter fishing boat after fishing boat, traversing his way to Darien, where he had crossed the twenty or so miles to the Atlantic very inefficiently. But he had caught up some of his time when he had paid a naval vessel from a kind of navy particular to New Venice which had taken him swiftly along the coast to his destination. Somewhere he should have stayed, and not returned to the Surprise at Christmas.

But, Stephen thought to himself, as he placed one foot onto the bare grey rock at the foot of La Scilla.

At least he had had the opportunity to write to Jack. A British man-o'-war had, just then, come in at Cumana, bringing news of further undermining of Castilian power in Spain; their captain, a Mr. Sweet, had promised to get the letter to Captain Jack Aubrey of "Surprise", for it too was heading to India, but in the clockwise direction. The other, he promised, would wend its way to Burlington House when he, Mr. Sweet, in meeting of another of His Majesty's ships, would entrust it to their captain, should be going to Portsmouth, Plymouth or Chatham.

"Safe is my work aboard your ship," Stephen had closed. "I trust the king's orders keep you hale and hearty. My research has taken me back to my last ending point: thus it ever is."

Back to where he had left von Humbolt's journey, by a clean pool in which the natives bathed, frogs bellowed and echidna lounged, tall trees upon which lizards roamed free.

Why he had never thought of it himself, Stephen hardly knew. But it was the way Cicely had compiled von Humboldt's notes that had made him think - made him know that the place to start was where the man himself had begun. He looked up, to the blue sky, and at the mountain range which did indeed look like a set of knives, all turned blade up and, just then, appearing to be tearing open the clouds as they sailed passed. It was convoluted, but the only other choice Stephen felt he really had was to wrap the message in gull-skin and hope it floated to Britain and up the Thames.

"Friend of Goethe," Stephen read again, dipping his head to his notes and smiling to himself. Well, wasn't every Republucan? "Inspector of mines before inheritance settled..." Stephen once again looked over these facts briefly before scanning over Cicely's curling hand. Rainforests, plains and mountains...New Venice, Peru, Ecuador, Mexico, Cuba - he had had it all before, but the hinge to it all, though she did not know it, was that his brilliant wife had re-mapped it onto one page.

But there was something missing, soemthing he could not help to need to know to progress. Stephen crouched down, watching a parade of red ants, on their way to a sugar paradise, no doubt. It had to be proved, he told himself again. Similar climates, similar altitudes...these caused commonality in species distribution on the planet. Plant Geography. That was von Humboldt's new science. Perhaps it would all be explained when the man published a book of his expedition: after all, he had only returned to Europe last July and had been the toast of Paris, and also London. Nor could he test von Humboldt's theories practically.

Stephen pressed a weary leg against a boulder, glancing up at the mountain range again. What was he mssing? He rubbed the tips of his fingers from his left hand together. They still tingled. And at least he had made an important discovery: electric eels were still able to shock once dissected.

"I, with my companion Aime Bonpland..." Stephen scanned through. "...Joseph Espana...Francisco de Miranda..." Those names Stephen knew. Potential revolutionaries, both.

And then he knew it. But, did he really have to take a job tutoring the brat of a Creole family? It may put him in touch with von Humboldt's guide for mountains. Andreas Bello was said to know Simon Bolivar well. Hm, Stephen reflected. " Seems a lsit of people with revolutionary sympathies lived not a short distance from one another.

Yes, that was it. And yet, he might have to break his promise in his letter to Cicely. He had said at the end of the year. He had also said he had given up espionage.

But Sir Henry had written to him that William Wickham was still alive and it had struck him like a hammer blow. That traitrous man, who had acted against all that was decent of his own volition, using intrigue in the capture of his now-wife to aid an assassination attempt on Lord Nelson. It was repugnant. It was also discourteous, rude and savage.

Stephen ran his tongue over his lips, the faint taste of the cassava drink of which he had partaken in a hostelry just outside the city. Revolution was possible. It was also rather probablt. Yet, the only course of action that made any sense at all was to return and find the young boy to whom von Humboldt had so easily trusted with a nugget of information. And it would help to know that the boy, Bolivar, was a lover of animals.

You canmot wait for revolutions to happen, Stephen knew. There had to be a spark, and then - the strongest survive. But that does not mean all the weak must perish. If you are strong enough to stand up to the oppressor you win because you have the humanity to protect the weak and resist the temptation of savagery. And what you would then have would be a longer- lasting revolution. An evolution.

With one last desiring look at the jagged peaks, Stephen Maturin shouldered his bag and nets, and began to walk towards Cumana.