Hornblower in the West Indies h-12

by Cecil Scott Forester

  And he knew he was going to change them. He had yearned so desperately for a chance to guess whither Daring would head after calling at Corpus Christi. Now he could intervene. Now he had a chance to preserve the peace of the world. With his eyes, unseeing, focused upon an infinite distance, he stood in the swaying cabin calling up into his mental sight the charts of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean. The North-east Trades blew across them, not quite as reliably at this time of year as during the winter, but constantly enough to be a calculable factor. A ship bound for the South Atlantic—for St. Helena—from Corpus Christi would be bound to take the Yucatan Channel. Then—especially if her business were such as not to invite attention—she would head for the shoulder of South America, down the centre of the Caribbean, with scores of miles of open sea on either beam. But she would have to pass through the chain of the Antilles before breaking through into the Atlantic.

  There were a hundred passages available, but only one obvious one, only one route that would be considered for a moment by a captain bound for St. Helena and with the trade winds to contend with. He would round Galera Point, the northernmost extremity of Trinidad. He would give it as wide a berth as possible, but he could not give it a very wide berth because to the northward of Galera Point lay the island of Tobago, and the Tobago Channel between the two was no more than—Hornblower could not be sure exactly—certainly no more than fifty miles wide. In favourable conditions a single ship could patrol that channel and make certain that nothing passed through unsighted. It was a typical example of maritime strategy on a tiny scale. Sea power made its influence felt all over the wide oceans, but it was in the narrow seas, at the focal points, that the decisive moments occurred. The Yucatan Channel would not be nearly as suitable as the Tobago Channel, for the former was more than a hundred miles wide. Crab would get there first; that could be taken for granted seeing that Daring would have two sides of a triangle to cover, calling at Corpus Christi, and with a long beat to windward as a result. It would be best to employ the advantage so gained to hasten to the Tobago Channel. There would be just time to anticipate Daring there—just time—and there was a substantial chance that on the way he might meet some ship of his squadron, to take her along with him. A frigate, now. That would give him all the force he needed. He made his resolve at that moment, conscious as he did so of his quickened heartbeat.

  “Giles!” shouted Hornblower.

  Giles reappeared, and within the wide discretion of a spoiled servant displayed shocked disapproval at the sight of him still in his wet shirt and ducks.

  “My compliments to Mr. Harcourt, and I would be glad to see him here as quickly as is convenient to him.”

  That was very quickly, naturally, when an Admiral needed the presence of a lieutenant.

  “Mr. Harcourt, I have decided on a change of plan. There is no time to be lost. Kindly set a course for Cape San Antonio.”

  “Cape San Antonio. Aye aye, sir.”

  Harcourt was a good officer. There was neither surprise nor doubt in his voice as he heard the surprising order.

  “When we are on the new course I will explain what I intend to do, if you will have the goodness to report to me with the charts, Mr. Harcourt. Bring Mr. Gerard with you.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  Now he could take off his wet shirt and trousers, and dab himself dry with a towel. Somehow the little cabin did not seem so oppressively hot; perhaps because they were out at sea, perhaps because he had reached a decision. He was putting on his trousers at the moment when Harcourt had the helm put down. Crab came round like a top, with lusty arms hauling in on the sheets. She lay far over to starboard, with the wind abeam, and Hornblower, one leg in his trousers, after a frantic hop, trying to preserve his balance, fell on his nose across his cot with his legs in the air. He struggled to his feet again; Crab still heeled over to starboard, farther and then less, as each roller of the beam sea passed under her, each roll taking Hornblower by surprise as he tried to put his other leg into his trousers so that he sat down twice, abruptly, on his coat before he managed it. It was as well that Harcourt and Gerard re-entered the cabin only after he had succeeded. They listened soberly while Hornblower told them of his deductions regarding Daring’s plans and of his intention to intercept her at the Tobago Channel; Harcourt took his dividers and measured off the distances, and nodded when he had finished.

  “We can gain four days on her to San Antonio, My Lord,” he said. “That means we’ll be three days ahead of her there.”

  Three days should be just enough start for Crab in the long, long race down the length of the Caribbean.

  “Could we call at Kingston on our way, My Lord?” asked Gerard.

  It was tempting to consider it, but Hornblower shook his head. It would be no use calling at headquarters, telling the news, possibly picking up reinforcements, if Daring slipped past them as they were doing so.

  “It would take too long to work in,” he said. “Even if we had the sea breeze. And there would be delay while we were there. We’ve nothing to spare as it is.”

  “I suppose not, My Lord,” agreed Gerard, grudgingly. He was playing the part of the staff officer, whose duty it was to be critical of any suggested plan. “Then what do we do when we meet her?”

  Hornblower met Gerard’s eyes with a steady glance; Gerard was asking the question that had been already asked and left unanswered.

  “I am forming plans to meet that situation,” said Hornblower, and there was a rasping tone in his voice which forbade Gerard to press the matter.

  “There’s not more than twenty miles of navigable water in the Tobago Channel, My Lord,” said Harcourt, still busy with his dividers.

  “Then she can hardly pass us unobserved even by night,” said Hornblower. “I think, gentlemen, that we are acting on the best possible plan. Perhaps the only possible plan.”

  “Yes, My Lord,” said Harcourt; his imagination was hard at work. “If Boney once gets loose again—”

  He could not go on. He could not face that appalling possibility.

  “We have to see to it that he does not, gentlemen. And now that we have done all that we can it would be sensible if we took some rest. I don’t think any one of us has had any sleep for a considerable time.”

  That was true. Now that he had made up his mind upon a course of action, now that he was committed to it, for good or ill, Hornblower felt his eyelids drooping and sleep overcoming him. He lay down on his cot after his officers had left him. With the wind on the port beam and the cot against the bulkhead to starboard he could relax completely with no fear of rolling out. He closed his eyes. Already he had begun to form the answer to the question Gerard had asked. The answer was a hideous one, something horrible to contemplate. But it seemed to be inevitable. He had his duty to do, and now he could be sure that he was doing it to the best of his ability. With his conscience clear, with a reassuring certainty that he was using the best of his judgment, the inevitability of the rest of the future reinforced his need for sleep. He slept until dawn; he even dozed for a few minutes after that, before he began to think clearly enough again in the daylight for that horrible thought to begin to nag at him again.

  That was how the Crab began her historic race to the Tobago Channel, over a distance nearly as great as the Atlantic is wide, with the brave trade wind laying her over as she thrashed along. All hands on board knew that she was engaged in a race, for in a little ship like Crab nothing could be kept secret; and all hands entered into the spirit of the race with the enthusiasm to be expected of them. Sympathetic eyes were turned towards the lonely figure of the Admiral standing braced on the tiny quarterdeck with the wind singing round him. Everyone knew the chances he was taking; everyone thought that he deserved to win, and no one could guess at his real torment over the certainty that was crystallising in his mind that this was the end of his career, whether he should win the race or lose it.

  No one on board begrudged the constant labour involved in getting eve
ry yard of speed out of Crab, the continual hauling in and letting out of the sheets as the sails were trimmed to the least variation of the wind, the lightening and urgent shortening of canvas at the last possible moment as squalls came hurtling down upon them, the instant resetting as the squalls passed on their way. All hands constituted themselves as unofficial lookouts; there was really no need for the Admiral to have offered a golden guinea to the man who should first sight Daring—there was always the chance of an encounter even before reaching the Tobago Channel. Nobody minded wet shirts and wet beds as the spray burst over Crab’s bows in dazzling rainbows and found its way below through the deck as the over-driven schooner worked her seams open in the heavy swell. The hourly casting of the log, the daily calculation of the ship’s run, were eagerly anticipated by men who usually displayed all the fatalistic indifference towards these matters of the hardened sailor.

  “I am shortening the water allowance, My Lord,” said Harcourt to Hornblower the first morning out.

  “To how much?” Hornblower asked the question trying to appear as if he were really interested in the answer, so that his misery over something else should not be apparent.

  “To half a gallon, My Lord.”

  Two quarts of fresh water a day per man—that would be hardship for men labouring hard in the tropics.

  “You are quite right, Mr. Harcourt,” said Hornblower.

  Every possible precaution must be taken. It was impossible to predict how long the voyage would last, nor how long they would have to remain on patrol without refilling their water casks; it would be absurd if they were driven prematurely into port as a result of thoughtless extravagance.

  “I’ll instruct Giles,” went on Hornblower, “to draw the same ration for me.”

  Harcourt blinked a little at that; his small experience with Admirals led him to think they led a life of maximum luxury. He had not thought sufficiently far into the problem to realise that if Giles had a free hand as regards drinking water for his Admiral, Giles, and perhaps all Giles’s friends, would also have all the drinking water they needed. And there was no smile on Hornblower’s face as he spoke; Hornblower wore the same bleak and friendless expression that he had displayed towards everyone since reaching his decision when they went to sea.

  They sighted Cape San Antonio one afternoon, and knew they were through the Yucatan Channel; not only did this give them a fresh departure, but they knew that from now on it would not be extremely unlikely for them to sight Daring at any moment; they were pursuing very much the same course as she would be taking, from this point onwards. Two nights later they passed Grand Cayman; they did not sight it but they heard the roar of the surf on one of the outlying reefs. That was a proof of how closely Harcourt was cutting his corners; Hornblower felt that he would have given Grand Cayman a wider berth than that—it was a moment when he chafed more than usual at the convention which prohibited an Admiral from interfering in the management of his flagship. The following night they picked up soundings on the Pedro Bank, and knew that Jamaica and Kingston were a scant hundred miles to windward of them. From this new departure Harcourt could set a fresh course, direct for the Tobago Channel, but he could not hold it. The trade wind took it into its head to veer round south of east, as was not surprising with midsummer approaching, and it blew dead foul. Harcourt laid Crab on the starboard tack—never voluntarily would any captain worth his salt yield a yard to the southward in the Caribbean—and clawed his way as close to the wind as Crab would lie.

  “I see you’ve taken in the tops’ls, Mr. Harcourt,” remarked Hornblower, venturing on ticklish ground.

  “Yes, My Lord.” In response to his Admiral’s continued enquiring glance Harcourt condescended to explain further. “A beamy schooner like this isn’t intended to sail on her side, My Lord. We make less leeway under moderate sail like this, My Lord, as long as we’re close-hauled with a strong breeze.”

  “You know your own ship best, of course, Mr. Harcourt,” said Hornblower, grudgingly.

  It was hard to believe that Crab was making better progress without her magnificent square topsails spread to the breeze. He could be sure that Daring would have every stitch of canvas spread—perhaps a single reef. Crab thrashed on her way, once or twice shipping it green over her starboard bow; those were the moments when it was necessary for every man to grab and hold on. At dawn next morning there was land right ahead, a blue line on the horizon—the mountains of Haiti. Harcourt held on until noon, raising them farther and farther out of the water, and then he went about. Hornblower approved—in an hour or two the land breeze might set in and there was Beata Point to weather. It was maddening that on this tack they would actually be losing a little ground, for it was perfectly possible that Daring, wherever she was, might have the wind a point or two more in her favour and could be able to hold her course direct. And it was quite remarkable to see the foremast hands raising wetted fingers to test the wind, and studying the windward horizon, and criticising the way the quartermaster at the tiller struggled to gain every yard to windward that he could.

  For a day and a half the wind blew foul; in the middle of the second night Hornblower, lying sleepless in his cot, was roused by the call for all hands. He sat up and reached for his dressing-gown while feet came running above his head. Crab was leaping madly.

  “All hands shorten sail!”

  “Three reefs in the mains’l!” Harcourt’s voice was pealing out as Hornblower reached the deck.

  The wind blew the tails of Hornblower’s dressing-gown and nightshirt up round him as he stood out of the way by the taffrail; darkness was roaring all round him. A midsummer squall had come hurtling at them in the night, but someone had had a weather eye lifting and had been prepared for it. Out of the southward had come the squall.

  “Let her pay off!” shouted Harcourt. “Hands to the sheets!”

  Crab came round in a welter of confused water, plunged and then steadied. Now she was flying along in the darkness, belying her unlovely name. She was gaining precious distance to the northward; an invaluable squall this was, as long as it permitted them to hold this course. The roaring night was hurrying by; Hornblower’s dressing-gown was whipping about his legs. It was impossible not to feel exhilarated to stand thus, compelling the elements to work in their favour, cheating the wind that thought to take them by surprise.

  “Well done, Mr. Harcourt,” shouted Hornblower into the wind as Harcourt came and stood beside him in the darkness.

  “Thank you, sir—My Lord. Two hours of this is what we need.”

  Fate granted them an hour and a half at any rate, before the squall died away and the trade wind pigheadedly resumed its former direction of east by south. But next morning at breakfast Giles was able to report good news.

  “Wind’s backing to the nor’rard, My Lord,” he said—Giles was as interested as everyone else in the vessel’s progress.

  “Excellent,” said Hornblower; it was only some seconds later that the dull pain grew up again inside him. That wind would bear him more swiftly to his fate.

  As the day wore on the trade wind displayed some of its midsummer freakishness. It died away, died away more and more, until it blew only in fitful puffs, so that there were intervals when Crab drifted idly over the glassy blue sea, turning her head to all points of the compass in turn, while the vertical sun blazed down upon a deck in whose seams the pitch melted. Flying fish left fleeting dark tracks upon the enamel surface of the sea. No one cared; every eye was scanning the horizon for the first hint of the next cat’s-paw of wind creeping towards them. Perhaps, not too far away in this moody Caribbean, Daring was holding her course with all sail set and drawing. The day ended and the night went by, and still the trade wind did not blow; only occasionally would a puff send Crab ghosting along momentarily towards the Tobago Channel. The sun blazed down, and men limited to two quarts of water a day were thirsty, thirsty all the time.

  They had seen very few sail, and the ones they saw were of no use i
n furthering Hornblower’s plans. An island schooner bound to Belize. A Dutchman homeward bound from Curaçao, no one with whom Hornblower could entrust a letter, and no ship of his own squadron—that was something almost beyond the bounds of possibility. Hornblower could only wait, as the days went by, in grim, bleak patience. At last the freakish wind blew again, from one point north of east, and they were able to hold their course, with topsails set again, heading steadily for the Antilles, reeling off as much as six knots hour after hour. Now as they approached the islands they saw more sails, but they were only inter-island sloops trading between the Leeward Islands and Trinidad. A square rigger seen on the horizon roused momentary excitement, but she was not the Daring. She flew the red and gold of Spain—a Spanish frigate heading for the Venezuelan coast, presumably to deal with the insurgents. The voyage was nearly completed; Hornblower heard the cry of land from the masthead lookout, and it was only a moment before Gerard came into the cabin.

  “Grenada in sight, My Lord.”

  “Very well.”

  Now they were entering the waters where they could really expect to meet Daring; now the direction of the wind was of more importance than ever. It was blowing from the northeast, now, and that was helpful. It extinguished the very faint possibility that Daring might pass to the northward of Tobago instead of through the Tobago Channel.

  “Daring’s,bound to make the same landfall, My Lord,” said Gerard, “and by daylight if she can.”

  “We can hope for it, at least,” said Hornblower.

  If Daring had been as long out of sight of land as had Crab, in the fluky winds and unpredictable currents of the Caribbean, her captain would certainly take all precautions in his approach.