‘Yes, but—’ Ballista said, and then paused until Majestatis, lying next to her, said bluntly, ‘Look, old worm, we are all doing what you say, but what if they should offer you something you want, if only you keep us quiet and fighting with the rest of the harnessed fellows? We all know they want to hang your captain—What if they should offer you his life?’

Temeraire paused in his turn. ‘Well, I am not going to let them hang Laurence no matter what,’ he said, with a hasty glance to be sure he had not been overheard, ‘but I do see what you mean: they might offer me a very large pavilion, or a great deal of gold.’ He rubbed a talon back and forth over his forehead, thoughtfully. ‘It would not be fair,’ he said at last, ‘if I took anything for myself alone, when I should be getting it, not for my own work but for all of ours: we are sharing. So perhaps,’ he added, ‘one of you had better come along, when I go and talk to the generals again. One of the little ones, who can go all about and let everyone else know what it is they will give us.’

‘I will come along,’ Minnow said. ‘I have never been harnessed, and I don't look to be ever, so no one can say I am inclined to go soft on them. Anyway I would like to see a general, I never have.’

Temeraire stretched his head over to ask Laurence and Admiral Roland who was presently in command, and where the generals might be; which he thought quite a straightforward question. ‘Well, it isn't,’ Admiral Roland answered him. ‘It is still Dalrymple for the moment, I suppose. But he is likely to be replaced as soon as we get to Scotland and the Government have a chance to take him out of harm's way: our harm, that is. If there is a lick of sense among them it shall be Wellesley in his place, but we ought not put our hopes so high.’

‘But then who am I to talk to?’ Temeraire. ‘I do not like to say so, but the others are not quite happy. After all our hard work, we have lost, and have got no treasure, and they would like to know what use it is to keep on. Not,’ he added hastily, in case Laurence or Admiral Roland should think that he was a poor officer, ‘that we have no discipline, but after all, they are not harnessed, so they wonder why they are risking so much.’

Laurence was silent for a moment, and then he said, ‘We may as well speak to Wellesley. It cannot much matter who we make arrangements with, if the war is lost.’