Hornblower ran his eyes over Brown’s bulging muscles as he stood before him.
‘Brown,’ he said, ‘I’ve selected you to heave a line to the flagship as we go down past her. D’you know anyone in the ship who could do it better? Frankly, now.’
‘No, sir. I can’t say as I do, sir.’
Brown’s cheerful self confidence was like a tonic.
‘What are you going to use, then?’
‘One o’ them belayin’ pins, sir, an’ a lead line, if I can have one, sir.’
Brown was a man of instant decision – Hornblower’s heart warmed to him, not for the first time.
‘Make ready, then. I shall lay our stern as close to the flagship’s bows as is safe.’
At the moment the Sutherland was forging slowly ahead under storm jib and close reefed topsails, two hundred yards to windward of the Pluto. Hornblower’s mind became a calculating machine again, estimating the Sutherland’s relative drift down upon the Pluto, the latter’s drunken reelings and plungings, the Sutherland’s present headway, the send of the waves and the chances of a cross-wave intervening. He had to wait for two long minutes before the moment for which he was waiting should arrive, his eyes glued upon the Pluto until their relative positions should be exactly what he wanted.
‘Mr Gerard,’ said Hornblower – his mind was too busy for him to be afraid. ‘Back the main tops’l.’
The Sutherland’s way was checked. At once the gap between the two ships began to narrow, as the Sutherland drifted down upon the Pluto – a gap of grey angry water with bearded waves. Fortunately the Pluto was lying fairly constantly in the trough without yawing, only surging forward or back as some unexpected sea struck her. Brown was standing statuesquely on the taffrail, balancing superbly. The lead line was coiled on the deck at his side, attached to the belaying pin which he swung pendulum fashion, idly, from his fist. He made a magnificent picture there against the sky, with no hint of nervousness as he watched the distance dwindle. Even at that moment Hornblower felt a hint of envy of Brown’s physique and robust self-confidence. The Sutherland was coming down fast upon the Pluto – upon the latter’s wave-swept forecastle Hornblower could see a group of men waiting anxiously to catch the line. He looked to make sure that Brown’s assistants were ready with the stouter line to bend on the lead line.
We’ll do it, by God!’ said Gerard to Crystal.
Gerard was wrong – at the present relative rate of drift the ships would pass at least ten yards farther apart than Brown could be expected to throw the belaying pin and its hampering trailer of line.
‘Mr Gerard,’ said Hornblower coldly. ‘Back the mizzen tops’l.’
The hands were ready at the braces; the order was hardly given before it was executed. The Sutherland was making a tiny trifle of sternway now, and the gap was closing farther still. The Pluto’s towering bow, lifting to a wave, seemed right upon them. Gerard and Crystal were swearing softly in unison, without the slightest idea of what they were saying, as they watched, fascinated. Hornblower felt the wind blowing cold about his shoulders. He wanted to call to Brown to throw, and with difficulty checked himself. Brown was the better judge of what he could do. Then he threw, with the Sutherland’s stern lifting to a wave. The belaying pin flew with the line wavering behind it in the wind. It just reached the Pluto’s beak-head bows and caught round a remnant of the standing rigging of the bowsprit, where a ragged sailor astride the spar seized it with a wave of his arm. Next moment a wave broke clean over him, but he held on, and they saw him pass the end of the line up to the waiting group on the forecastle.
‘Done it!’ shrieked Gerard. ‘Done it, done it, done it!’
‘Mr Gerard,’ said Hornblower. ‘Brace the mizzen tops’l sharp up.’
The line was uncoiling fast from the deck as the Pluto hauled it in; soon the heavier line was on its way out to the dismasted ship. But they had not long to spare; with their different rates of drift it was impossible for Hornblower in that gale to keep the two ships that same distance apart – impossible and dangerous. The Sutherland hove-to went to leeward faster than the Pluto; closehauled she forged ahead, and it was Hornblower’s task to combine these two factors so that the increasing distance between the ships was kept down to a minimum – a nice algebraic problem in convergent series which Hornblower had to convert into mental arithmetic and solve in his head.
When suddenly the Pluto decided irrationally to rush forward upon the Sutherland he found himself recasting his estimates at the very moment when everyone else was holding their breath and waiting for the collision. Gerard had a couple of parties standing by with spars to try to bear the Pluto off – not that they could have achieved much against her three thousand tons deadweight – and the bight of an old sail filled with hammocks as a fend-off, and there was wild activity on the forecastle of the Pluto as well, but at the very last moment, with blasphemy crackling all round, the dismasted ship suddenly sheered off and everyone breathed again more freely, except Hornblower. If the Pluto could surge in that fashion towards the Sutherland, she could surge away from her also, and if she were to do so while the line was hauling in the twenty-three inch cable she would part the line for certain and leave the whole business to be done again – and Cape Creux was looming very near now.
‘Caligula signalling, sir,’ said Vincent. ‘How can I help?’
‘Reply “Wait”, said Hornblower over his shoulder to him; he had actually forgotten the Caligula’s existence. Bolton would be a fool if he came down unnecessarily to leeward, towards a hostile lee shore.
A mighty splash over the stern indicated that Bush down below was paying out some of the hawser through the after-port so as to provide some slack if the Pluto surged away, but the process might be overdone – it was a hemp cable, which sank in water, and to have out too much would imperil the line which was drawing it in. Hornblower leaned over the heaving stern.
‘Mr Bush!’ he bellowed.
‘Sir!’ said Bush’s voice from below through the open port.
‘Avast there, now!’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
The line was taking the strain now, and the cable was creeping slowly out towards the Pluto like some sea worm. Hornblower watched as it straightened – this was a business demanding calculation as close as any so far. He had to shout his orders for Bush to pay out more cable, or to wait, his eyes on the ships, on the sea, on the wind. The cable was two hundred yards long, but fifty of these lay in the Sutherland herself – the job had to be completed before the ships were a hundred and fifty yards apart. Hornblower only began to feel relieved when he saw the end of the cable curve up out of the sea on to the Pluto’s bows, and the waving of flags told him that the end had been taken inboard and made fast.
Hornblower looked at the nearing land, felt the wind on his cheek. His earlier calculations were proving correct, and if they held on this tack they would be drifted into Rosas Bay even if they cleared the land.
‘Mr Vincent,’ he said. ‘Signal to the Flagship “I am preparing to go about on the other tack”.’
Gerard looked his amazement. It appeared to him that Hornblower was going to unnecessary trouble and imperilling both ships by this manoeuvre – he could see no farther than Cape Creux, only the friendly sea and the dangerous land. With a seamen’s instinct he wanted to get both ships comfortably under control with sea room under their lee, and he did not stop to consider beyond that. He could see the land and feel the wind, and his reaction to those circumstances was instinctive.
‘Mr Gerard,’ said Hornblower. ‘Go to the wheel. When the strain comes on the hawser—’
Gerard did not need to be told about that. With three thousand tons trailing on her stern the Sutherland would behave unlike any ship the quartermasters had ever steered, and extraordinary and unexpected measures would have to be taken to keep her from flying up into the wind. The hawser was tightening already. The bight of it rose slowly out of the sea, straightening like a bar, the water spouting
out of it in fountains, while a thunderous creaking below told how the bins were feeling the strain. Then the cable slackened a trifle, the creaking diminished, and the Sutherland had got the Pluto under way. With every yard they went, and every bit of way the Pluto received, the latter sagged less and less to leeward. As soon as she could answer the helm the strain on the Sutherland’s quartermasters would be eased.
Bush came up on the quarterdeck again, his task below completed.
‘I want you to work the ship, Mr Bush, when we go about.’
‘Aye aye, sir,’ said Bush. He looked at the land, and felt the wind, and his thoughts followed an exact parallel to Gerard’s, but Bush by now never dreamed of doubting his captain’s judgment in a matter of seamanship. His mental state was now that if Hornblower thought it right, it must be so, and there was no need to wonder about it.
‘Send the hands to the braces. It must be like lightning when I give the word.’
‘Aye aye, sir.’
The Pluto was gathering way, and every yard after this that they made in a southerly direction would be a dead loss when they turned northerly.
‘Back the mizzen tops’l,’ said Hornblower.
The Sutherland lost way, and the Pluto came steadily forging down upon her. Hornblower could actually see Captain Elliott come running forward to see for himself what was happening. He could not guess what Hornblower was intending.
‘Have the signal “Tack” bent and ready to send up, Mr Vincent.’
The Pluto was very near now.
‘Brace the mizzen tops’l up, Mr Bush.’
The Sutherland gathered speed again – she had just the distance allowed by the slackening of the hawser in which to gather way and go about before the two began to interfere. Hornblower watched the cable and estimated the speed of the ship through the water.
‘Now, Mr Bush! That signal, Mr Vincent!’
The helm was put down, the yards braced up, with Rayner forward attending to the fore topmast staysail. She was coming round, her canvas volleying as she came into the wind; on board the Pluto as they read the signal they had the sense to put their own helm down too, and with steerage way upon her she began to come round a little and allow Hornblower a little more room for his manoeuvres. Now the Sutherland was over on the opposite tack, and gathering way, but the Pluto was only half way round. There would be a terrific jerk in a moment. Hornblower watched the tightening cable rising from the sea.
‘Stand by, Mr Gerard!’
The jerk came, and the Sutherland shuddered. The drag of the cable across her stern was doing the most fantastic things to her – Hornblower could hear Gerard volleying orders to the quartermasters at the wheel and down the grating to the men at the relieving tackles below. For one palpitating second it seemed as if she must be dragged back and thrown in irons, but Gerard at the wheel and Bush at the braces and Rayner forward fought her tooth and nail. Shuddering, she paid off again, and the Pluto followed her round. They were over on the other tack at least heading northwards towards the comparative safety of the Gulf of the Lion.
Hornblower looked at the green-topped Cape Creux, close in now, and a little forward of the port beam. It was going to be a very near-run thing, for besides her own natural leeway the Sutherland was being dragged to leeward by the dead weight of the Pluto, and her speed through the water towards safety was diminished by the same dead weight. It was going to be a very near thing indeed. Hornblower stood with the wind howling round him, his busy mind plunged into calculations of drift and distance again. He looked back at the Pluto, not rolling so badly now that she had way on her. The towrope was at an angle to the length of the Sutherland, and the Pluto was at a further angle to the towrope. He could rely on Elliott to make the most economical use of his helm, but the drag on the Sutherland must be tremendous. He ought to try to get a little more speed out of the Sutherland, but with a full gale blowing it was dangerous to spread any more canvas. If a sail were to split or a spar carry away they would be on the shore in no time.
He looked towards the land again, to measure the diminishing distance, and as he looked a warning rose out of the sea a cable’s length away like a ghost. It was a pillar of water six feet high, which rose from the breast of a wave and vanished as quickly and as mysteriously as it had risen. Hornblower could hardly believe he had seen it, but a glance at Crystal’s and Bush’s faces, intentionally immobile, assured him that he had. A cannon ball had plunged into the water there, calling up that splash, although in the high wind he had neither heard the shot nor seen the smoke from the land. The battery on Cape Creux was firing at him, and he was nearly in range. Soon there would be forty-two-pounder balls coming about his ears.
‘Flagship’s signalling, sir,’ said Vincent.
On board the Pluto they had managed to attach a block to the top of the stump of the foremast and sent up a signal; the fluttering flags could be seen clearly from the Sutherland’s quarterdeck.
‘ “Flag to Sutherland,” ’ read Vincent. ‘ “Cast off – two – if necessary”.’
‘Reply “Submit not necessary”.
They must make more speed through the water, there was no doubt about that. It was an interesting problem in chances, but more of the sort to appeal to a player of hazard than a whist player. To set more sail increased the danger to both ships at the same time as it gave them a greater chance of reaching safety. Yet if he set more sail and lost a spar he still might possibly struggle with the Sutherland out of danger, and the Pluto would be no more lost than she would be if he cast her off ignominiously now.
‘Mr Bush, I’ll have the reefs shaken out of the fore tops’l.’
‘Aye aye, sir,’ said Bush. He had anticipated the necessity for it, and he had guessed that his captain would choose the bolder course – he was learning fast, even at his age, was Bush.
The topmen went running up the rigging and out along the fore topsail yard; standing on the swaying foot ropes with the gale howling round them, holding on by their elbows over the yard, they struggled with the reef points. The sail shook itself out with a loud flap, and the Sutherland heeled sharply over under the increased pressure. Hornblower noticed the flat catenary curve of the heavy cable astern flatten itself a trifle more, but the rope gave no sign of breaking under the strain. Despite the increased heel of the ship the men at the wheel were actually finding their task a little easier, for the leverage of the big fore topsail forward tended to balance the ternal drag of the tow aft.
He glanced at the land just in time to see a puff of smoke from the summit of Cape Creux, blown instantly into invisibility by the gale. Where the shots fell he could not tell at all, for he neither saw nor heard them; the sea was too rough for the splashes to be easily seen. But the fact that the battery was firing showed that they must at least be almost in range – they were circling on the very edge of ruin. Nevertheless, the Sutherland was making better speed through the water, and looking aft he could see preparations advancing on the Pluto’s deck for setting up a jury main mast. Any fragment of sail which the Pluto could carry would ease the Sutherland’s task enormously, and in an hour they might have the work completed. Yet in an hour darkness would have come to shield them from the fire of the battery; in an hour their fate would be decided one way or another. Everything depended on the occurrences of the next hour.
The sun had broken through the westerly clouds now, changing the hills and mountains of Spain from grey to gold. Hornblower nerved himself to endure the waiting during the next hour, and the Sutherland and the Pluto came through that hour successfully. At the end of that time they had weathered Cape Creux, and had drawn so far to the northward that the land under their lee had dropped away abruptly from a mile and a half distant to fifteen miles. Night found them safe, and Hornblower very weary.
XVII
‘Captain Hornblower will command the landing party,’ said Admiral Leighton, finally.
Elliott and Bolton both nodded in entire agreement as they sat round the council t
able in the Pluto’s cabin. A landing party six hundred strong, contributed by three ships of the line, was certainly a captain’s command, and Hornblower was equally certainly the best captain to command it. They had been expecting some such move as this ever since the Pluto had returned refitted from Port Mahon, and Leighton had shifted his flag back into her from the Caligula. The coming and going of Colonel Villena from the shore had heralded it, too. For three weeks the Caligula and the Sutherland had ranged along the coast of Catalonia, and the Pluto returning had brought back welcome fresh provisions, the Sutherland’s prize crews, and even a dozen new hands for each ship. With the crews at full strength they might well strike a heavy blow, and the capture of Rosas, if it could be effected, would undoubtedly throw the whole of the French arrangements for the subjection of Catalonia into confusion.
‘Now, are there any comments?’ asked the admiral. ‘Captain Hornblower?’
Hornblower looked round the big cabin, the cushioned lockers, the silver on the table, Elliott and Bolton gorged with the vast dinner they had consumed, Sylvester with paper and ink before him, Villena in his gaudy yellow uniform staring idly about him while the English conversation which he did not understand went on round him. On the bulkhead opposite him hung a portrait of Lady Barbara, a likeness so good as to be startling – Hornblower felt as if he might hear her voice at any moment. He caught himself wondering what they did with it when they cleared for action, tore his thoughts away from Lady Barbara with an effort, and tried as tactfully as he could to show his distaste for the whole scheme.
Captain Hornblower R. N. Page 72