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if one might call it that, had gone all the distance to the governor's mansion now, and seemed so far as Temeraire could see it to be quite reduced in scope; there was very little fighting, and the soldiers who had stood in the way now seemed to be walking with the rest, except for the small company of Marines, who had fled. There was singing going on, and a great many of the townspeople had come out with lanterns and also flagons and bottles: one could see the light shining on the glass as they drank and cheered, and pistols were shot off into the air.

Laurence closed the glass and gave it to Roland. "Caesar," Rankin said, "put me up."

"Temeraire," Laurence said, "you will not permit him to go aloft, if you please. Sir," he said to Rankin, "the event has run past you: you will not turn your beast against a crowd of civilians. God knows there has been enough of that in this war: I will not see it done again."

Rankin's face went very pale with anger, and his hand clenched upon the straps of his carabiners, which he held ready. "Mr. Laurence, if you should dare interfere - "

"I do," Laurence said flatly, and whatever Rankin might have said foundered: there was no threat he could offer.

"If you had the least ambition of pardon," he said after a stifled, furious struggle briefly contorted his narrow, aristocratic mouth, "you may leave it aside forever; if you think the account I shall give of you will not suffice, Governor Macquarie will surely damn you as thoroughly."

"I have no doubt of it," Laurence said, and turned away; he did not care to give Rankin his face.

Epilogue

"OF COURSE it is not a real rebellion," MacArthur said, handing Laurence a glass of the cool sillery; the heat had broken at last, and the autumnal air was pleasant as the small bats cried and flung themselves among the trees along the border of his gardens. "I don't see any reason we ought to behave like those Yankee Doodles, cutting off our nose to spite our face; but it is unreasonable to be governed at eight months' distance and guesswork. Their Lordships cannot have known they were asking for a war we cannot win: what should we do if China sent over a dozen of these albatross creatures, which they do not even know existed, and ran them over our heads with sacks full of bombs? No, plainly we must manage ourselves; but certainly I do not mean to forswear my loyalty to the King. Never that."

By which, Laurence supposed, MacArthur meant that he did not mean to forswear himself for at least the next year and a half, before some fresh answer came; if the ministers should not choose at that time to recognize his new self-declared position as First Minister of Australia, Laurence suspected MacArthur's feelings on the matter would prove somewhat more malleable.

"Now then," MacArthur said, "this Rankin fellow: I cannot see how he can continue the commander of our little aerial force here - "

"I should be surprised if you had much success in persuading him to undertake it," Laurence said dryly. He had rather expected Rankin to return to England, with Macquarie: the deposed governor had no notion of lingering as Bligh had, but meant at once to leave by the same frigate which had brought him, when that ship was ready.

"You would be surprised, I think," MacArthur said. "He is a little stiff-necked, there is no denying it, but his beast is a reasonable creature; I have found it work well enough when I have a word in his ear beforehand to any discussion with his captain. But it is no use saying Rankin has charge of the covert, under the circumstances: you are the man we want for the business. I have written you a pardon; there may be a little irregularity about it, of course, but it must do for now - "

"Sir," Laurence said, "I am obliged to you; I must call it more than a little irregular."

"Well," MacArthur said, waving a hand to leave this minor quibble in the air, "we are all irregular here, more or less, and we shan't grow less so for a good long time: I do not think, sir, you are inclined to sit in a corner until we get back some word: you are not made to moulder in some forgotten corner of the world. And