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"I suppose that is a call for me to ask Iskierka," Granby said, "but I know very well that she will be perfectly willing to fight anyone whosoo as far as saying I plan to be sitting on ive you my word: there are those reinforcements to think of, which Hammond claimed would be sent us from the Channel I didn’t believe that they would ever arrive, when I thought we needed thes here; but now that they would be inconvenient, I think we must expect them at any moment And if they do arrive before you have talked all these fellows round to this sche into battle, I aainst the Tshile I sit here and twiddle my thumbs Thumb," he added, rueful

Laurence nodded silently: he wondered, himself, if he could under such circu whatever he could to persuade Temeraire to join the battle; it could scarcely be borne

Haan a determined pursuit of private inquiry with Granby; who eeled away froetically as far as he was able, until finally cornered just before the dinner-hour: Hammond went away from the conversation dissatisfied and anxious, to be taken back to Paraty by one of the Mexican couriers

"Well, he hasover the planed log which made one of their benches and dropped himself unceremoniously into his seat: they ate in the open air, their handful of tarpaulins gone for shelter from the sun, and very little cover otherwise They had established their camp in the hills a little distance from the coast, to avoid the eyes of the French sailors and also their guns, and without relief of wind co since been felled to put up the city, the tropical sun was punishing

"I only hope you shan’t getacross the table, and then winced for the indelicacy: poor Ferris had flinched, and now sat staring down at his trencher of flat wood

Laurence looked at him, soberly: he could not see another course, but inize that he could scarcely have prejudiced Ferris’s chances of reinstatement more effectively There would be no triuht preserve the colony against iood offices, such as they were, would not likely survive Laurence’s recalcitrance; and this entire action, working as it eneral incorrigibility, would not incline them to mercy for his former first lieutenant

"Of course, ould have the devil of a tiin with," Granby said that evening: they had cliether under the cover of darkness, to spy upon the Tswana in their nightly conclave: the dragons huddled in a circle with the Tsarriors and councilors for around a low fire: their shadows stretched away long like the spokes of a wheel Out in the harbor the lanterns of the French ships were glowing out a ht here and there shone on the iron of their guns

"But I don’t knoe will do if they do go after those plantations," Granby added: while the deliberations were at too great a distance to be followed, Dikeledi’s head flung back in loudly hissing distress boded ill for their direction "Do you think there is any chance the regent will go along with you?"

"I hardly hope so far," Laurence said, tiredly "At best, he er from the Inca a little more, and seek out soainst any arrangement to which the Tsould consent And very likely he only thinks me a peculiar sort of lunatic"

"Well, at least Haiven them a better notion of you--or a worse notion, I should say," Granby said, lowering his glass "They haven’t a prayer against the Tsithout us, if they only have a short one with"

"Granby!" Iskierka hissed up the slope at theo at once: there are dragons co towards our cahtn’t have opened ripped his arm at the elbow, over the thick straps which bound on the hook, and together they scrambled down into Iskierka’s reach to be put up onto her back She leapt into the air with a hty heave, and Laurence felt the rus like the grinding of a millstone as she drew up her fla her in the shoulder with his fist, "that’s enough: those are our fellows,them only because they will make matters difficult I don’t suppose their captains would love us for it," he added over his shoulder, "but do you suppose Temeraire could talk the beasts round?"

"I think there is every likelihood of it," Laurence said, as they closed in: Te, and there was scarcely any ons: Lily’s wide-stretched wingspan, and the vast and impenetrable shadohich was Maximus’s bulk

Chapter 17

MAXIMUS WAS BEING PERFECTLY UNREASONABLE about Kulingile, Temeraire was sorry to be forced to admit Not that Temeraire did not understand his point of view, but after all, Kulingile had not chosen to grow so large; there was no sense in putting one’s back up "And if I have grown used to it, after having been there when he hatched as quite the scrawniest thing iinable, you cannot very well corumbled, deep in his belly, and said, "Oh, well, if he is a friend of yours," and Kulingile rather uncertainly said, "Would any of you like so Su has just stewed a few of thelad he is not mean, at any rate; not to be sed, if he were," Maxi instead an entire cow "And," he added afterwards, cheered, "I rather think I have an edge on hispan; I a, but prudently did not say so; everything went off reasonably and in the end they all settled into ca So there was really no reason for Berkley to be so distressed

"Those dahters back at the fortress wouldn’there at your back, would they," Berkley said to Laurence, as he sat down at last: flushed through and downing aheavily "No, it is all, ‘Laurence and Teo and talk sense into the whelp of an ambassador back at Paraty looked like to have an apoplexy e told hi; as if there were a chance of success, either I suppose being dish for anyone, ha ha"