The Young Hornblower Omnibus

by C. S. Forester

  And this was luxury, this was affluence, this was the most superlative good fortune. Nine days ago – no, ten days, now – he had been a half-pay lieutenant, under stoppage of pay because the Peace of Amiens had resulted in his promotion not being confirmed. He had been doubtful where his next meal would be coming from. A single night had changed all this. He had won forty-five pounds at a sitting of whist from a group of senior officers, one of them a Lord of Admiralty. The King had sent a message to Parliament announcing the government’s decision to set the Navy on a war footing again. And he had been appointed Commander and given the Hotspur to prepare for sea. He could be sure now of his next meal, even though it would be salt beef and biscuit. And – not so much as a coincidence, but rather as a sequel to all this – he had found himself betrothed to Maria and committed to an early marriage.

  The fabric of the ship transmitted the sound of one of the nine-pounders being dragged aft; Bush was a fast worker. Bush had been a half-pay lieutenant too, ten days ago, and senior to Hornblower. It was with diffidence that Hornblower had asked him if he would care to serve as first lieutenant – as the only lieutenant allowed on the establishment of a sloop of war – of the Hotspur, under Hornblower’s command. It had been astonishing, and extremely flattering, to see the delight in Bush’s face at the invitation.

  ‘I’d been hoping you’d ask me, sir,’ said Bush. ‘I couldn’t really think you’d want me as a first lieutenant.’

  ‘Nobody I’d like better,’ Hornblower had replied.

  At this moment he nearly lost his footing as Hotspur heaved up her bows, rolled, and then cocked up her stern in the typical motion of a ship close-hauled. She was out now from the lee of the Wight, meeting the full force of the Channel rollers. Fool that he was! He had almost forgotten about this; on the one or two occasions during the past ten days when the thought of sea-sickness had occurred to him he had blithely assumed that he had grown out of that weakness in eighteen months on land. He had not thought about it at all this morning, being too busy. Now with his first moment of idleness here it came. He had lost his sea-legs – a new roll sent him reeling – and he was going to be sick. He could feel a cold sweat on his skin and the first wave of nausea rising to his throat. There was time for a bitter jest – he had just been congratulating himself on knowing where his next meal was coming from, but now he could be more certain still about where his last meal was going to. Then the sickness struck, horribly.

  Now he lay face downward across his cot. He heard the rumble of wheels, and cleared his thoughts sufficiently to make the deduction that, with the guns brought aft, Bush was bringing the gun-carriages aft as well. But he hardly cared. His stomach heaved again and he cared even less. He could think about nothing but his own misery. Now what was that? Someone pounding vigorously on the door, and he realised that the pounding had grown-up from an earlier gentle tapping that he had ignored.

  ‘What is it?’ he called, croaking.

  ‘Message from the master, sir,’ said an unknown voice. ‘From Mr Prowse.’

  He had to hear what it was. He dragged himself from his cot, and staggered over and dumped himself into his chair, hunching his shoulders over his desk so that his face could not be seen.

  ‘Come in!’ he called.

  The opening of the door admitted considerably more of the noise that had been more and more insistently making itself heard.

  ‘What is it?’ repeated Hornblower, hoping that his attitude indicated deep concentration upon the paper-work of the ship.

  ‘Message from Mr Prowse, sir,’ said a voice that Hornblower could hardly place. ‘Wind’s freshening an’ hauling forward. Course will have to be altered sir.’

  ‘Very well. I’ll come.’

  ‘Aye aye, sir.’

  He certainly would have to come. He stood up, holding on to the desk with one hand while he adjusted his clothes with the other. He braced himself, and then he plunged out on to the quarter-deck. He had forgotten all these things; he had forgotten how fresh the wind blew at sea, how the rigging shrieked in a gust, how the deck heaved under unwary feet. As the stern rose he was hurried forward, struggling vainly to retain his dignity, and just managed to fetch up without disaster against the hammock netting. Prowse came up at once.

  ‘Course is sou’west by south, now, sir,’ he said. ‘I had to let her fall off a couple of points. Wind’s still backing westerly.’

  ‘So I see,’ said Hornblower. He looked at sky and sea, making himself think. ‘How’s the glass?’

  ‘Hardly fallen at all, sir. But it’s going to blow harder before nighfall, sir.’

  ‘Perhaps you’re right.’

  Bush appeared at this moment, touching the hat that was now pulled down hard on to his head.

  ‘The guns are shifted aft, sir. The lashings are bowsed up taut.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Hornblower kept his hands on the hammock netting, and his gaze steadily forward, so that, by not turning either to Bush on one side or to Prowse on the other, the whiteness of his land-lubber’s face might not be noticed. He struggled to picture the chart of the Channel that he had studied so carefully yesterday. There was the twenty-league gap between the Casquets and the Start; an incorrect decision now might keep them windbound for days inside it.

  ‘We might just weather the Start on this course, sir,’ prompted Prowse.

  Unexpected nausea suddenly welled up in Hornblower, and he moved restlessly as he fought with it. He did not want Prowse to prompt him, and as he swung about he caught sight of Cargill standing by the wheel. It was still Cargill’s watch – that was one more factor to bring Hornblower to a decision, along with Bush’s report and Prowse’s prompting.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘We’ll put the ship about.’

  ‘Aye aye, sir,’ said Prowse, in reluctant agreement.

  Hornblower looked towards Cargill, summoning him with a glance; he did not wish to leave the comforting support of the hammock netting.

  ‘Mr Cargill,’ said Hornblower. ‘Let’s see you tack the ship again, now that we’ve altered her trim.’

  ‘Aye aye, sir,’ answered Cargill. That was the only thing the poor devil could say in any case, in reply to a direct order. But he was clearly nervous. He went back to the wheel and took the speaking trumpet from its beckets – the freshening wind made that necessary.

  ‘Hands ’bout ship!’ he called, and the order was instantly underlined by the calls of the bos’n’s mates and the bellowings of Mr Wise. The hands ran to their stations. Cargill stared round at wind and sea; Hornblower saw him swallow as he nerved himself. Then he gave the order to the wheel; this time it was the fingers of his left hand that drummed upon his thigh, for his right was occupied by the speaking-trumpet. Hotspur rose to an even keel while sheets and braces were being handled. She was turning – she was turning.

  ‘Let go and haul!’ yelled Cargill into the speaking-trumpet. Hornblower felt he would have waited three or four more seconds before giving that order, but he knew that he might be wrong; not only was sea-sickness dulling his judgement but, standing as he did, looking aft, he did not have the ‘feel’ of the ship. Events proved that Cargill did, or else was lucky, for Hotspur came on round without hesitation.

  ‘Hard-a-lee!’ snapped Cargill to the helmsman, and the wheel spun round in a blur of spokes, catching Hotspur at the moment when she was beginning to fall off. A straining group of men hauled out the fore-tack; others tailed on to the bowlines. Hotspur was on the new tack, having handled as sweetly, apparently, as anyone could ask.

  Hornblower walked up to the wheel.

  ‘Does she gripe?’ he asked the quartermaster.

  The quartermaster eased off the wheel a couple of spokes, squinting up at the leech of the main-topsail, and then brought her up to the wind again.

  ‘Can’t say that she does, sir,’ he decided. ‘Mebbe she does, a trifle. No, sir, I can’t say that she gripes. Just a touch of weather helm’s all she needs now, sir.’

&
nbsp; ‘That’s as it should be,’ said Hornblower. Bush and Prowse had not spoken a word, and there was no need even for a glance to underline the situation, but a word to Cargill would not be out of place. ‘You can go off watch feeling better pleased with yourself now, Mr Cargill.’

  ‘Yes, sir, thank you, sir,’ said Cargill.

  Cargill’s round red face split into a grin. Hotspur rose to a wave, lay over, and Hornblower, taken by surprise, staggered down the deck on to Cargill’s broad chest. Luckily Cargill was a heavyweight and fast of footing; he took the shock without staggering – otherwise he and his captain might have gone reeling across the deck into the scuppers. Hornblower felt a burst of shame. He had no more sea-legs than the merest landlubber; his envy of Cargill and Bush and Prowse, standing firm and swaying easily with the send of the ship, amounted to positive dislike. And his stomach was about to betray him again. His dignity was in peril, and he summoned up all that was left of it, turning to Bush stiff-legged and stiff-necked.

  ‘See that I am called when any alteration of course is necessary, if you please, Mr Bush,’ he said.

  ‘Aye aye, sir.’

  The deck was heaving, but he knew it was not heaving as much as his distorted mind told him it was. He forced himself somehow to walk aft to his cabin; twice he had to stop and brace himself, and when Hotspur rose to a wave he was nearly made to run – certainly he had to walk faster than a captain should – past the sentry, and he fetched up against the door with some little violence. It was no comfort – in fact it added to his distress – to see that the sentry had a bucket on the deck beside him. He wrenched open the door, hung suspended for a moment as Hotspur completed her pitch, with her stern in the air, and then crashed down groaning on to his cot, his feet dragging on the deck as the cot swung.

  IV

  Hornblower sat at his desk in his cabin holding a package in his hand. Five minutes earlier he had unlocked his chest and taken this out; in five minutes more he would be entitled to open it – at least, that was what his dead reckoning indicated. It was a remarkably heavy package; it might be weighted with shot or scrap metal, except that Admiral Cornwallis was hardly likely to send shot or scrap metal to one of his captains. It was heavily sealed, in four places, and the seals were unbroken. Inked upon the canvas wrapper was the superscription:

  ‘Instructions for Horatio Hornblower, Esq., Master and Commander, H.M. Sloop Hotspur. To be opened on passing the Sixth Degree of Longitude West of Greenwich.’

  Sealed orders. Hornblower had heard about such things all his professional life, but this was his first contact with them. They had been sent on board the Hotspur on the afternoon of his wedding day, and he had signed for them. Now the ship was about to cross the sixth meridian; she had come down-Channel with remarkable ease; there had been only one single watch when she had not been able to make good her direct course. Putting her about in order to restore Cargill’s self-confidence had been extraordinarily fortunate. The wind had hardly backed westerly at all, and only momentarily even then. Hotspur had escaped being embayed in Lyme Bay; she had neatly weathered the Casquets, and it all stemmed from that fortunate order. Hornblower was aware that Prowse was feeling a new respect for him as a navigator and a weather prophet. That was all to the good, and Hornblower had no intention of allowing Prowse to guess that the excellent passage was the result of a fortunate fluke, of a coincidence of circumstances.

  Hornblower looked at his watch and raised his voice in a shout to the sentry at the door.

  ‘Pass the word for Mr Bush.’

  Hornblower could hear the sentry shouting, and the word being passed on along the quarter-deck. Hotspur rose in a long, long pitch with hardly any roll about it. She was meeting the long Atlantic swell now, changing her motion considerably, and all for the better, in Hornblower’s opinion – and his sea-sickness was rapidly coming under control. Bush was taking a long time to respond to the call – he obviously was not on the quarter-deck, and the chances were he was taking a nap or was engaged on some other private business. Well, it would do him no harm and cause him no surprise to be summoned from it, for that was the way of the Navy.

  At last came the knock on the door, and Bush entered.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Ah, Mr Bush,’ said Hornblower pedantically. Bush was the closest friend he had, but this was a formal matter, to be carried through normally. ‘Can you tell me the ship’s position at this moment?’

  ‘No, sir, not exactly, sir,’ replied the puzzled Bush. ‘Ushant bears ten leagues to the east’ard, I believe, sir.’

  ‘At this moment,’ said Hornblower, ‘we are in longitude six degrees and some seconds west. Latitude 48° 40’, but we do not have to devote any thought to our latitude at present, oddly enough. It is our longitude that matters. Would you be so kind as to examine this packet?’

  ‘Ah. I see, sir,’ said Bush, having read the superscription.

  ‘You observe that the seals are unbroken?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Then perhaps you will have the further kindness, when you leave this cabin, to make sure of the ship’s longitude so that, should it become necessary, you can bear witness that I have carried out my orders?’

  ‘Yes, sir, I will,’ said Bush, and then, after a pause long enough for him to realise that Hornblower intended the interview to be at an end, ‘Aye aye, sir.’

  The temptation to tease Bush was a very strong one, Hornblower realised as Bush left the cabin. It was a temptation he must resist. It might be indulged to the extent of causing resentment; in any case, Bush was too easy a target – he was a sitting bird.

  And thinking along those lines had actually delayed for several seconds the exciting moment of opening the orders. Hornblower took out his penknife and cut the stitching. Now the weight of the packet was explained. There were three rolls of coins – golden coins. Hornblower spilt them out on to his desk. There were fifty small ones, about the size of sixpences; twenty larger ones, and ten larger still. Examination revealed that the medium-sized ones were French twenty-franc pieces, exactly like one he had seen in Lord Parry’s possession a week or two ago, with ‘Napoleon First Consul’ on one side and ‘French Republic’ on the other. The small ones were ten franc pieces, the larger ones forty francs. Altogether it made a considerable sum, over fifty pounds without allowing for the premium on gold in an England plagued by a depreciating paper currency.

  And here were his supplementary instructions, explaining how he should employ the money. ‘You are therefore required—’ said the instructions after the preliminary sentences. Hornblower had to make contact with the fishermen of Brest; he had to ascertain if any of them would accept bribes; he had to glean from them all possible information regarding the French fleet in that port; finally he was informed that in case of war information of any kind, even newspapers, would be acceptable.

  Hornblower read his instructions through twice; he referred again to the unsealed orders he had received at the same time; the ones that had sent him to sea. There was need for thought, and automatically he rose to his feet, only to sit down again, for there was no chance whatever of walking about in that cabin. He must postpone his walk for a moment. Maria had stitched neat linen bags in which to put his hair brushes – quite useless, of course, seeing that he always rolled his brushes in his housewife. He reached for one, and swept the money into it, put the bag and the orders back into his chest and was about to lock it when a further thought struck him, and he counted out ten ten-franc pieces and put them into his trouser pocket. Now, with his chest locked, he was free to go on deck.

  Prowse and Bush were pacing the weather side of the quarter-deck in deep conversation; no doubt the news that their captain had opened his sealed orders would spread rapidly through the ship – and no one on board save Hornblower could be really sure that Hotspur was not about to set course for the Cape and India. It was a temptation to keep them all on tenterhooks, but Hornblower put the temptation aside. Besides, it would be to no pu
rpose – after a day or two of hanging about outside Brest everyone would be able to guess Hotspur’s mission. Prowse and Bush were hurriedly moving over to the lee side, leaving the weather side for their captain, but Hornblower halted them.

  ‘Mr Bush! Mr Prowse! We are going to look into Brest and see what our friend Boney is up to.’

  Those few words told the whole story to men who had served in the last war and who had beaten about in the stormy waters off the Brittany coast.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Bush, simply.

  Together they looked into the binnacle, out to the horizon, up to the commission pendant. Simple enough to set a course; Bush and Prowse could do that easily, but it was not so simple to deal with problems of international relations, problems of neutrality, problems of espionage.

  ‘Let’s look at the chart, Mr Prowse. You can see that we’ll have to keep well clear of Les Fillettes.’

  The islands of the Little Girls, in the middle of the fairway into Brest; it was a queer name for rocks that would be sites for batteries of guns.

  ‘Very well, Mr Prowse. You can square away and set course.’

  There were light airs from the northwestward today, and it was the easiest matter in the world to stand down towards Brest; Hotspur was hardly rolling at all and was pitching only moderately. Hornblower was fast recovering his sea-legs and could trust himself to walk the deck, and could almost trust his stomach to retain its contents. There was a certain feeling of well-being that came with a remission from sea-sickness. The April air was keen and fresh, but not paralysingly cold; Hornblower’s gloves and heavy coat were barely necessary. In fact Hornblower found it hard to concentrate on his problems; he was willing to postpone their consideration, and he halted his step and looked across at Bush with a smile that brought the latter over with hurried steps.

  ‘I suppose you have plans for exercising the crew, Mr Bush?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Bush did not say, ‘Of course, sir,’ for he was too good a subordinate. But his eyes lit up, for there was nothing Bush enjoyed more than reefing topsails and unreefing them, sending down topgallant yards and sending them up again, rousting out cables and carrying them to a stern port in readiness to be used as a spring, and in fact rehearsing all the dozens – hundreds – of manoeuvres that weather or war might make necessary.