"Bienvenu, M'sieur Recamier," he said, though, putting his best face of ignorant affability on, and extending a proper Republican hand to shake. "I trust you'll enjoy our offerings for supper."

They had sailed with an extensive wine cellar, and the casks and crates had been ashore long enough for ship-stirred lees to settle, or be carefully filtered when decanted, so Choundas set a good table. Lt. Hainaut saw to that. The soup was a bland, cool celery broth, the fish a fresh-caught pompano served with a local delicacy, crabes farcis. A locally grown salad course with onions, cucumbers, and carrots, zested with vinaigrette and lime juice. The main course chickens were on the tough, small, and stringy side, on a rice pilaf, still on the bone, but for Choundas's plate, which had been picked off and diced for easier one-handed eating. A touch dry and over-cooked, pan-fried, but enlivened with enough exotic hot sauces and Caribbean spices to make an equivalent to a Hindee curry, normally used to mask a tainted dish.

Hainaut, Griot, Desplan, and MacPherson dug in with a will, delighted with fresh shore viands after weeks of salt-meat junk, sending servants back for more crisp and piping-hot baguettes time after time, after the dreary monotony of stale or weeviled ship's biscuit.

Choundas occupied the head of the table, with Capitaine Desplan in the place of honour to his right, and Griot to his left. Recamier was to Griot's left, opposite Hainaut, and-two empty chairs down- at the foot of the table sat poor clerk Etienne de Gougne.

The little clerk abstemiously took wee bites, then chewed seemingly forever before swallowing, before the tiniest sips of wine.

Hainaut had seen to it that his dishes had been over-seasoned, knowing the timid little clerk's penchant for the blander and creamier Parisian cooking. Each bite seemed a torture of Hell-fire, though he would be loath to do or say a thing about it. And if he pushed his plate away, he wouldn't get anything else!