Hornblower and the Atropos h-6

by Cecil Scott Forester

  “I’ll return the full hogsheads gladly, sir,” said Hornblower. “I’ll send them over to you in the lighter that brings the other stores over.”

  “That might do very well,” said the superintendent.

  “I am delighted, and, as I said, intensely obliged to you, sir. I’ll have my launch over here with a working party in ten minutes.”

  Hornblower bowed with all the unction he could command; this was not the moment to spoil the ship for a ha’porth of tar. He bowed himself out before the discussion could be reopened. But the superintendent’s last words were:

  “Remember to return those hogsheads, captain.”

  The powder hulk had been warped back to her moorings; the other ordnance stores that were being taken on board seemed trifling in appearance, bundles of wads, and bales of empty serge cartridges, a couple of sheaves of flexible rammers, spare gun trucks, reels of slow-match—the multifarious accessories necessary to keep twentytwo guns in action. Hornblower sent off Midshipman Smiley with the working party promised to the Victualling Yard.

  “Now I’ll have those condemned hogsheads got up on deck, Mr. Carslake. I must keep my promise to return them.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Carslake.

  Carslake was a bullheaded, youngish man with expressionless pale-blue eyes. Those eyes were even more expressionless than usual. He had been a witness of the interview between Hornblower and the superintendent, and he did not allow his feelings to show. He could not guess whether as a purser he thoroughly approved of saving the stores to be fobbed off on another ship or whether as a sailor certain to endure privations at sea he despised Hornblower’s weakness in agreeing to the superintendent’s demands.

  “I’ll mark ‘em before I return ‘em,” said Hornblower.

  He had thought of paint when he had been so accommodating towards the superintendent, but was not quite happy in his mind about it, for turpentine would remove paint fast enough. A better idea occurred to him, marvellously, at that very moment.

  “Have the cook relight the fire in the galley,” he ordered. “I’ll have—I’ll have a couple of iron musket ramrods heated in the fire. Get them from the armourer, if you please.”

  “Aye aye, sir. If you please sir, it’s long past the hands’ dinnertime.”

  “When I’ve time for my own dinner the hands can have theirs,” said Hornblower.

  He was glad that the deck was crowded so that those words of his could be overheard, for he had had the question of the men’s dinnertime in his mind for some time although he was quite resolved not to waste a moment over it.

  The first of the condemned hogsheads came creaking and swaying up from the hold and was lowered to the deck. Hornblower looked round him; there was Horrocks with the young prince, quite bewildered with all the continuous bustles trailing after him.

  “You’ll do, Mr. Horrocks. Come here,” said Hornblower. He took the chalk from beside the slate at the binnacle; and wrote with it, in large letters diagonally round the hogshead, the word “CONDEMNED.” “There are two irons heating in the galley fire. You and Mr. Prince can spend your time branding these hogsheads. Trace out those letters on every one. Understand?”

  “Er—yes, sir.”

  “Good and deep, so there is no chance of planing it off. Look sharp about it.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  The next lighter for the Dockyard was alongside now, at the port side recently vacated by the powder hulk. It was full of boatswain’s stores, cordage, canvas, paint; and a weary party of men were at work swaying the bundles up. There seemed no end to this business of getting Atropos fully equipped for sea. Hornblower himself felt as legweary as a foundered horse, and he stiffened himself up to conceal his fatigue. But as he looked across the river he could see the Victualling Yard’s lighter already emerging from the Creek. Smiley had his men at work on the sweeps, straining to row the ponderous thing across the ebbing tide.

  Prom the quarterdeck he could see the lighter was crammed with the hogsheads and kegs and biscuit bags. Soon Atropos would be full-gorged. And the acrid smell of the redhot irons burning into the brine-soaked staves of the condemned hogsheads came to his nostrils. No ship would ever accept those stores. It was a queer duty for a Serene Highness to be employed upon. How had those orders read? “You will employ your diligence in instructing His Serene Highness in his new profession.” Well, perhaps it was not a bad introduction to the methods of fighting men and civilian employees.

  Later—ever so much later, it seemed—Mr. Jones came up and touched his hat.

  “The last of the stores are on board, sir,” he said. “Mr. Smiley’s just returning the Victualling Yard’s lighter.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Jones. Call away my gig, please.”

  Hornblower stepped down into the boat conscious of many weary eyes on him. The winter afternoon was dissolving in a cold and gloomy drizzle as a small rain was beginning to fall. Hornblower had himself rowed round his ship at a convenient distance to observe her trim. He looked at her from ahead, from broadside on, from astern. In his mind’s eye he was visualizing her underwater lines. He looked up at the spread of her lower yards; the wind would be pressing against the canvas there, and he worked out the balance of the forces involved, wind against lateral resistance, rudder versus headsails. He had to consider seaworthiness and handiness as well as speed. He climbed back on deck to where Jones was awaiting him.

  “I want her more down by the head,” he announced. “I’ll have those beef casks at the for’rard end of the tier, and the shot for’rard of the magazine. Get the hands to work, if you please.”

  Once more the pipes shrilled through the ship as the hands began to move the stores ranged upon the deck. It was with anxiety that Hornblower’s return was awaited from his next pull round the ship.

  “She’ll do for the present,” said Hornblower.

  It was not a casual decision, no stageeffect. The moment Atropos should clear the land she would be in danger, she might find herself in instant action. She was only a little ship; even a well found privateer might give her a hard battle. To overtake in pursuit; to escape in flight; to handle quickly when manoeuvring for position in action; to claw off to windward should she be caught on a lee shore; she must be capable of all this, and she must be capable of it today, for tomorrow, even tomorrow, might be too late. The lives of his crew, his own life, his professional reputation, could hang on that decision.

  “You can strike everything below now, Mr. Jones.”

  Slowly the littered decks began to clear, while the rain grew heavier and the night began to close in round the little ship. The tiers of great casks, down against the skin of the ship, were squeezed and wedged into position; the contents of the hold had to be jammed into a solid mass, for once at sea Atropos would roll and pitch, and nothing must budge, nothing must shift, lest the fabric of the ship be damaged or even perhaps the ship might be rolled completely over by the movement of an avalanche of her cargo. The Navy still thought of Sir Edward Berry as the officer who, when captain of Nelson’s own Vanguard, allowed the masts of his ship to be rolled clear out of her in a moderate gale of wind off Sardinia.

  Hornblower stood aft by the taffrail while the rain streamed down on him. He had not gone below; this might be part of the penance he was inflicting on himself for not having sufficiently supervised the management of his ship.

  “The decks are cleared, sir,” said Jones, looming up in the wet darkness before him.

  “Very well, Mr. Jones. When everything is swabbed down the men can have their dinners.”

  The little cabin down below was cold and dark and cheerless. Two canvas chairs and a trestletable stood in the day cabin; in the night cabin there was nothing at all. The oil lamp shone gloomily over the bare planks of the deck under his feet. Hornblower could call for his gig again; it would whisk him fast enough half a mile downstream to Deptford Hard, and there at the “George” were his wife and his children. There would be a roaring fire of sea coal, a
spluttering beef steak with cabbage, a feather bed with the sheets made almost too hot to bear by the application of a warming pan. His chilled body and aching legs yearned inexpressibly for that care and warmth. But in his present mood he would have none of them. Instead he dined, shivering, off ship’s fare hastily laid out for him on the trestletable. He had a hammock slung for himself in the night cabin, and he climbed into it and wrapped himself in clammy blankets. He had not lain in a hammock since he was a midshipman, and his spine had grown unused to the necessary curvature. He was too numb, both mentally and physically, to feel any glow of conscious virtue.

  Chapter VIII

  Fog in the Downs, cold, dense, and impenetrable over the surface of the sea. There was no breath of air to set it stirring; overside the surface of the sea, just visible when Hornblower looked down at it from the deck, was black and glassy. Only close against the side could be detected the faintest of ripples, showing how the tide was coursing beside the ship as she lay anchored in the Downs. Condensing on the rigging overhead the fog dripped in melancholy fashion on to the deck about him, an occasional drop landing with a dull impact on his cocked hat; the heavy frieze peajacket that he wore looked as if it were frosted with the moisture that hung upon it. Yet it was not freezing weather, although Hornblower felt chilled through and through inside his layers of clothing as he turned back from his gloomy contemplation of the sea.

  “Now, Mr. Jones,” he said, “we’ll start again. We’ll have topmasts and yards struck—all top hamper down and stowed away. Order ‘out pipes’, if you please.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Jones.

  The hands had already spent half the morning at sail drill; Hornblower was taking advantage of the fogbound calm to exercise his ship’s company. With so many landsmen on board, with officers unfamiliar with their divisions, this fog actually could be used to advantage; the ship could be made more of a working, fighting unit during this interval of grace before proceeding down Channel. Hornblower put his cold hand inside his coat and brought out his watch; as if the gesture had called forth the sound five bells rang out sharply from beside the binnacle, and from the thick fog surrounding them came the sound of other bells—there were many ships anchored in the Downs all about them, so many that it was some minutes before the last sound died away; the sandglasses on board the ships were by no means in agreement.

  While the bells were still sounding Hornblower took note of the position of the minute hand of his watch and nodded to Jones. Instantly came a roar of orders; the men, already called to attention after their brief standeasy came pouring aft with their petty officers urging them on. Watch in hand, Hornblower stood back by the taffrail. From where he stood only the lower part of the main rigging was visible; the foremast was completely hidden in fog. The hands went hurrying up the ratlines, Hornblower watching keenly to see what proportion of them were vague about their stations and duties. He could have wished that he could see all that was going on—but then if there had been no fog there would have been no sail drill, and Atropos would have been making the best of her way down Channel. Here was the Prince, hurried along by Horrocks with a hand at his shoulder.

  “Come on,” said Horrocks, leaping at the ratlines.

  The Prince sprang up beside him. Hornblower could see the bewildered expression on the boy’s face. He had small enough idea of what he was doing. He would learn, no doubt—he was learning much even from the fact that the bloodroyal, the King’s nephew, could be shoved about by the plebeian hand of a midshipman.

  Hornblower got out of the way as the mizzen topsail came swaying down. A yelping master’s mate came running up with a small pack of waisters at his heels; they fell upon the ponderous roll and dragged it to the side. The mizzen mast hands were working faster than the mainmast, apparently—the main topsail was not lowered yet. Jones, his head drawn back so that his Adam’s apple protruded apparently by inches, was bellowing the next orders to the masthead. A shout from above answered him. Down the ratlines came a flood of men again.

  “Let go! Haul! Lower away!”

  The mizzen topsail yard turned in a solemn arc and made its slow descent down the mast. There was an exasperating delay while the mainstay tackle was applied—organization at this point was exceedingly poor—but at last the yard was down and lying along the booms beside its fellows. The complicated and difficult business of striking the topmasts followed.

  “An hour and a quarter, Mr. Jones. More nearly an hour and twenty minutes. Far too long. Half an hour—half an hour with five minutes’ grace; that’s the longest you should ever take.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Jones. There was nothing else he could say.

  As Hornblower was eyeing him before giving his next orders a faint dull thud came to his ears, sounding flatly through the fog. A musket shot? A pistol shot? That was certainly what it sounded like, but with the fog changing the quality of all the sounds he could not be sure. Even if it were a shot, fired in one of the numerous invisible ships round about, there might be endless innocent explanations of it; and it might not be a shot. A hatch cover dropped on a deck—a grating being pushed into place—it could be anything.

  The hands were grouped about the deck, looming vaguely in the fog, awaiting further orders. Hornblower guessed that they were sweating despite the cold. This was the way to get that London beer out of them, but he did not want to drive them too hard.

  “Five minutes standeasy,” said Hornblower. “And, Mr. Jones, you had better station a good petty officer at that mainstay tackle.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  Hornblower turned away to give Jones an opportunity to arrange his reorganization. He set himself to walk the deck to bring some life back into his cold body; his watch was still in his hand through sheer forgetfulness to replace it in his pocket. He ended his walk at the ship’s side, glancing over into the black water. Now what was that floating down beside the ship? Something long and black; when Hornblower first caught sight of it it had bumped one end against the ship’s side under the main chains, and as he watched it swung solemnly round, drawn by the tide, and came down towards him. It was an oar. Curiosity overcame him. In a crowded anchorage like this there was nothing very surprising about a floating oar, but still—

  “Here, quartermaster,” said Hornblower. “Get down into the mizzen chains with a line to catch that oar.”

  It was only an oar; Hornblower looked it over as the quartermaster held it for his inspection. The leather button was fairly well worn—it was by no means a new oar. On the other hand, judging by the fact that the leather was not entirely soaked through, it had not long been in the water, minutes rather than days, obviously. There was the number “27” burned into the loom, and it was that which caused Hornblower to look more sharply. The “7” bore a crossbar. No Englishman ever wrote a “7” with a crossbar. But everyone on the Continent did; there were Danes and Swedes and Norwegians, Russians and Prussians, at sea, either neutrals in the war or allies of England. Yet a Frenchman or a Dutchman, one of England’s enemies, would also write a “7” in that way.

  And there had certainly been something that sounded like a shot. A floating oar and a musket shot made a combination that would be hard to explain. Now if they had been connected in causation—! Hornblower still had his watch in his hand. That shot—if it was a shot—had made itself heard just before he gave the order for standeasy, seven or eight minutes ago. The tide was running at a good two knots. If the shot had caused the oar to be dropped into the water it must have been fired a quarter of a mile or so—two cables’ length—upstream. The quartermaster still holding the oar was looking at him curiously, and Jones was waiting, with the men poised for action, for his next orders. Hornblower was tempted to pay no more attention to the incident.

  But he was a King’s officer, and it was his duty to make inquiry into the unexplainable at sea. He hesitated in inward debate; the fog was horribly thick. If he sent a boat to investigate it would probably lose itself; Hornblower had had m
uch experience of making his way by boat in a fogridden anchorage. Then he could go himself. Hornblower felt a qualm at the thought of blundering about trying to find his way in the fog—he could make a fool of himself so easily in the eyes of his crew. Yet on the other hand that was not likely to be as exasperating as fuming on board waiting for a dilatory boat to return.

  “Mr. Jones,” he said, “call away my gig.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Jones, the astonishment in his voice hardly concealed at all.

  Hornblower walked to the binnacle and took a careful reading of how the ship’s head lay. It was the most careful reading he could possibly take, not because his comfort or his safety but because his personal dignity depended on getting that reading right. North by East half East. As the ship lay riding to her anchor bows to the tide he could be sure that the oar had come down from that direction.

  “I want a good boat compass in the gig, Mr. Jones, if you please.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  Hornblower hesitated before the last final order, which would commit him to a public admission that he thought there was a chance of something serious awaiting him in the fog. But not to give the order would be to strain at a gnat and swallow a camel. If that had really been a musket shot that he had heard there was a possibility of action; there was a likelihood that at least a show of force would be necessary.

  “Pistols and cutlasses for the gig’s crew, Mr. Jones, if you please.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Jones, as if nothing could astonish him again.

  Hornblower turned back as he was about to step down into the boat.

  “I shall start timing you from this moment, Mr. Jones. Try to get those tops’l yards across in half an hour from now—I’ll be back before then.”