An Agent of Note

...when their business was over the agent said, 'I suppose you have seen Mr Baldick?'

'The Sophie's lieutenant?'

'Just so.'

'But he has gone with Captain Allen - he is aboard the Pallas.'

'There, sir, you are mistaken, if I may say so, in a manner of speaking. He is in the hospital.'

'You astonish me.'

The agent smiled, raising his shoulders and spreading his hands in a deprecating gesture: he possessed the true word and Jack had to be astonished; but the agent begged pardon for his superiority.

(Patrick O'Brian "Master and Commander")