The ship escapes the doldrums only to be "taken aback" by a wind that also damages the mainmast.

The ship escapes the doldrums only to be "taken aback" by a wind that also damages the mainmast due to carelessness by Lieutenant Deverel (JJ Field, "Poirot"). Captain Anderson (Jared Harris) places Deverel under arrest. But he is soon free again, with cutlass in hand, when all hands prepare for possible battle against a vessel on the horizon. She proves to be the British warship Alcyone with news that France is defeated. A celebratory ball takes place at which Edmund and Deverel flirt with Marion Chumley (Joanna Page, Love Actually ), protégée of the wife of the Alcyone 's captain, Sir Henry Somerset (Charles Dance, "Bleak House"). Edmund plans for Marion to join his ship for Australia rather than resume her trip to India, but Sir Henry forbids it. When the Alcyone departs, Deverel is traded for Lieutenant Benét (Niall Macgregor, "Monarch of the Glen"), a creative officer who devises a plan to repair the ship's hull to give her more speed - a tactic that almost sinks the vessel and incites an enigmatic suicide.