The gunner was peering down and directing the work below, the passing up of the jeers and their tackle, and between orders he kept up a running grumble – he knew what it would all come to, and always had – and it was a shameful sight, the officer of the watch working like any common sailor – some people there were who kept their beds. ‘Pass that parrel-line,’ he said to Jack. ‘Do you have flannel ears?’ he cried angrily; then, seeing what Jack was staring at, he cried out ‘Oh my God,’ and hurled himself down a rope to the deck.
A moment later the bo’sun’s mate was piping all hands. The captain came running forward, and as he reached the after-ladder he tripped; the head of the ship was right down in the trough of a wave at the moment he fell, so he pitched far and hard – an unlucky fall. Getting up he shouted ‘Sway up the yard and set the foresail. Wear the ship.’ And with this effort he fainted away for a moment, for he had dislocated his shoulder and then in rising had twisted and wrenched the joint most shockingly.
Tobias, running up towards the jeer-capstan, stopped to help him, but Captain Cheap roared out an order to get forward and thrust him away.
‘You will do yourself a mischief,’ said Tobias, as the captain staggered against the fife-rail and nearly fell again. ‘Here, Mr Oakley, bear a hand, if you please.’ Between them they carried him to his cabin, and the army surgeon (being the senior) tried to force the arm back; but he could not manage it, and they were obliged to leave him, wedged into his bunk, half insensible with pain.
Slowly the capstan turned, and at long intervals the pawl went click: this was the ratchet that prevented the capstan from turning back again, and often Jack had heard it ticking as fast as a little loud clock. But now instead of three men to a capstan bar there was only one between two, and it was so hard to turn that Jack feared their strength would give out before the yard was up. He found that the only thing to do was to pay no attention to anything else, but to lean forward on the outermost end of the bar with his head down and his eyes closed and concentrate entirely on getting a good grip with his bare feet on the deck, so as to keep a continual pressure with all his force on the bar. There was a distinct difference as Tobias and Mr Oakley added their weight to the thrust, but Jack did not look up; it was essential to set the foresail for they could not wear the ship without it, and it was essential to set it at the earliest possible moment. Slowly they went round and round, and the pawl went click, click, click; very slowly the heavy yard rose on the mast, swaying wildly with the increasing roll of the ship, while inadequate parties at the yards and braces tried to steady it.
Round and round: with one part of his mind Jack counted the strokes of the pawl, each one a little victory, and with another he tried to account for their situation. The land to the north-west made no sense unless the ship had come so far to the east of her intended course that she now stood right in with the shore, and that she had somehow entered a vast uncharted bay or gulf whose northern arm was that land on the larboard beam – some cape or peninsula that trended far away into the west. That was the only explanation: the current had set them to the east, the variation of the compass had done the same (they had not been able to take an amplitude to check it for weeks) and their underestimated leeway had done the rest: they were entangled with the land and embayed. Their only chance, on this uncharted coast, was to turn about and try to get away by the way they had come in. To do that they must wear the ship, and to wear the ship they must set the foresail: he thrust on and on.
Somebody was banging him on the shoulder. He looked up stupidly and found that the yard was home.
The land was clearly visible from the deck now, the headland with snow on it that he had first seen was there to the larboard, and now a dark line loomed right round the northern horizon and joined a distinct mass of land on the starboard side. From the yard, as they set the foresail, they could see the vast white mountains of the Cordillera, filling the whole of the east. Far over there, to the east, the sky was clear: to the westward, darkness was gathering fast.
With the foresail set the Wager plunged on at a great pace. They wore her at once: she wore easily – it was her one good point – and came up with her head to the south-south-west just as the light of day was fading. She would come up no closer to the wind than that; but if the wind stayed true, and above all if it would allow them to set their main-topsail, they might very well make a comfortable offing by the next day.
‘It all depends on the wind,’ said Jack. The cook, a very old but indomitable man, had somehow managed to give the midshipmen’s berth a hot mess of beef and beans, and stuffed with this Jack was turning in. Tobias, who now lay on a piece of grating between his chest and the bulkhead – the bunk was perpetually awash – still sat up, soaking a biscuit in a mug of their last Madeira: he could no longer chew biscuit, because some of his front teeth had come out with the scurvy, and the others were unsure.
‘It always seems to depend on the wind,’ he said. ‘An uncomfortable dependency, Jack, I believe?’
‘Yes. But we cannot do anything about it, you know,’ said Jack, ‘and in my opinion it is far better to sleep while you can.’
‘Just so,’ said Tobias.
At midnight Jack woke suddenly and completely. The hands were being turned up for the second watch – the graveyard watch – and as he came on deck he was met with a stinging packet of water that was driven on by a stronger wind by far. The big tarpaulined form of Cozens blundered into him, and said, ‘It’s blowing up, mate. It’s blowing up.’ It was indeed: by the light of the top-lantern Jack could see that they had set the fore, main and mizzen staysails, and he wondered they had dared to do it, for the Wager was lying down, and the shrieking of the wind in the rigging was higher than he had ever heard it. She was up as close to the wind as ever she would come, and a wicked cross-sea kept hammering her a little aft of her larboard bow; the torn spray and the rain drove in sideways so thick and hard that the poop-lantern was no more than a dim white blur. She was shipping a great deal of water; the waist of the ship was swirling deep, and it seemed to Jack that she was much heavier, much longer in coming up from her roll.
There were two men at the helm, trying to master the kicking wheel and to keep her from falling off under the thrust of the sea; and by them, under the shelter of the poop, Captain Cheap stood lashed to a stanchion: his face showed ghastly by the binnacle light.
The lieutenant’s watch did not leave the deck, and minute by minute the wind grew louder. There was a prolonged struggle with the staysail sheets, which had to be hauled farther aft, and then the watch regained the shelter: they all, without a word, stood with their backs to the weather staring into the leeward darkness, trying to pierce the thick, black night.
An hour passed: two hours. From time to time the captain gave an order for the trimming of the sails, and the lieutenant relayed it. During the course of the night, as the wind increased, so it veered south and then south-west: it was blowing so hard towards the middle of the watch that a man could scarcely stand the whip of the rain in his face, nor breathe without making a shelter for his mouth. But still they stood, listening with strained attention.
They were all of them listening for a sound that was not the wind, but the roaring crash of breakers. Presently they heard it, and one after another their faces turned to the captain as they were sure of the sound.
‘Mr Bean,’ said the captain, ‘we will throw out the tops’ls.’
‘Aye-aye, sir,’ said the lieutenant. It was their only chance to claw the ship off.
The Wager staggered as the topsails filled, staggered and laid down until the lee gunwale was far under the foam: a still more shocking blast laid her farther still. ‘She’s gone,’ cried Jack, clinging to the yard. But with that the topsails split, flew out cracking in ribbons, and were cut away. The ship righted herself slowly and surged on through the terrifying sea.
Jack found himself on deck again, scarcely knowing how he got there. Many more people had come from below and were
standing on the quarter-deck, the marine officers and the purser. The steadiness of the binnacle-light, the helmsman’s face lit from below, grave, intensely serious, but in no way terrified, entirely wrapped in his task – these things were a comfort, something solid in a dissolving world. The captain had evidently given orders, for the carpenter and his crew were there with broad axes ready.
Half an hour passed: the wind grew higher, and as it mounted the rain stopped; the moon had risen behind the thinning cloud, and the night grew less impenetrable.
He felt a nudge, and there was Cozens next to him, saying, ‘We shall claw off yet,’ joining his hands in a trumpet by Jack’s ear.
Jack nodded. He asked ‘Do you know the time?’ for he was longing for daylight.
Cozens held up four fingers: and at that moment she struck.
The first was no more than the blow of a very strong sea, but the next wave raised her and smashed her down on her beam-ends, right down, and the sea made a fair breach over her.
Now that they were in the white water, the faint light increased, and they could see breakers all round, huge and mounting, a white boiling sea. Every man who could move in the ship was now coming on deck, at least to die in the open: and the deck was canted like the steep roof of a house. The captain was down; the lieutenant had gone forward to cut away the sheet-anchor.
A great thundering sea came roaring in, lifted her up and drove her a long way inshore; she struck with a terrible crash and smashed off her rudder, but she floated – heavy, half settling, but free of the rock, she floated now.
‘Does she steer?’ shouted Mr Jones, the mate of the watch.
Rose, the quartermaster, carefully tried the wheel, then replied ‘No sir, if you please, she don’t.’ But he remained there, grasping the spokes, for he had not been relieved.
‘Come,’ roared Mr Jones to the disorganised mob on the quarter-deck. ‘Don’t be downhearted. Have you never seen a ship amongst breakers before? We can push her through them. Come, lend a hand. Here’s a sheet – here’s a brace. Lay hold. I don’t doubt but we may stick her yet near enough to the land to save our lives.’
His cheerful, confident words brought men to the sheets and the braces at once, and now, through a white sea of destruction, they steered in a break-neck course for a faint gap in the breakers, easing the main sheet as she came to and hauling the fore-sheet aft as she fell off. The ship hurtled through the sea for five minutes, ten minutes more. It was impossible that it should last and yet it seemed to go on for ever: the orders came from the quarter-deck and with perfect co-ordination the men hauled, sometimes smothered in spray, sometimes blown half off the deck, but always there for the next command, as if they were all in a dream, and indestructible.
A huge rock loomed up on the larboard bow, black and sheer: there was another the size of a church to its lee. The captain was on his feet again, holding on to the mate, and pointing, and now the Wager ran for the space between the rocks. She reached it, and struck. She struck there, bilged and grounded. The carpenter instantly cut away the foremast and the mainmast, they let go the sheet-anchor, and there she lay under the shelter of the rock, beating terribly, but upright. Men stared at one another as if they had come out of the grave, and there was a sort of hoarse vague cheer, strangely audible now that some of the wind was cut off by the rock.
The day had begun to break, and there, a few hundred yards away, was the shore.
‘What do you make of it? Take my glass,’ said Captain Cheap.
‘Fairly sheltered, sir,’ replied Jack. ‘Some surf, but a boat could land.’
‘Report on the boats. Ask Mr Bean to come aft.’
The boats were in very fair shape, but to launch them over the gun-wale now that the masts and yards were gone was a long piece of work; and all the time the ship beat so hard that she might go to pieces at any minute. They accomplished it, however, and the barge went off first, and Mr Bean in the yawl after it. ‘They have landed, sir,’ reported Jack. ‘But they are finding it very hard to put the boat through the surf again.’
A very long wait followed, and in this time the scene on deck changed totally: someone had staved in the head of a barrel of brandy, and in the waist of the ship, where Campbell and Cozens were trying to get the cutter over the side, there was a confused roaring, a shouting of contradictory orders and a bellowing song. Jack saw the bo’sun, who had not been on deck for three weeks, springing about with an insane vigour, laughing as the ship beat on the rocks. The gunner went by, scarlet in the face and smelling like a distillery, and with him a little silly man, capering as if he were at a fair.
The barge came alongside: immediately afterwards the cutter was launched: the officers did what they could to get the men decently into them. The disorder grew, not only in itself but because the steadier men were all going out of the ship as the boats plied to and fro.
‘Andrew,’ cried Jack, seizing the loblolly-boy by the arm as he went to go over the side, ‘where is Mr Barrow?’
Andrew pointed to the shore, said something inaudible, and fell bodily into the cutter.
On the quarter-deck the remaining officers stood watching the captain: in the trough of each wave the Wager beat her keel upon the rock and at each stroke the deck jarred shockingly beneath their feet. All this time Captain Cheap had kept Jack beside him to report, transmit orders and describe what was going on: now Jack stepped forward and said, ‘If you please, sir, that is a hundred and seventeen men gone ashore. The rest will not leave the ship while they can stand. Will you step into the barge, sir?’
Captain Cheap had refused before. He refused again – he would be the last man off. In the lee scuppers two seamen and a cooper’s mate, who had drunk themselves insensible, washed to and fro; they would be drowned presently, and already they looked entirely dead.
‘There is no bidding the men, sir,’ said Jack. ‘They will stay while there is any drink.’ It was obviously true: there was a howling, rioting, smashing noise in the cabins. Captain Cheap paused for a long moment, nodded, and walked slowly to the side.
The barge ran in through the surf, and they hauled it up the beach: the feel of solid ground was inexpressibly moving.
‘Do you know where Mr Barrow is?’ asked Jack, pushing through the cold, wet crowd at the landing-place and seizing the first intelligent and sober man he could find.
‘No, sir. He ain’t come ashore,’ said the seaman, with complete certainty.
Mr Bean said, ‘I have not seen him.’
‘But the sick-bay was reported clear,’ cried Jack.
‘Yes,’ said Mr Bean. ‘Perhaps he came ashore in the cutter – I may have missed him.’ He passed the word for Tobias, and half a dozen men called out very loudly for the surgeon’s mate; but there was no reply.
‘I seen him aboard,’ said a heavily-bandaged seaman, who was lying on the ground. ‘I seen him aboard not two boats ago. We was aft of the sick-bay, Joe and me. He cut me out of my hammock and shoved me up the hatch and then went back for Joe. But I think Joe was dead by then. There was four or five feet of water down there, gaining fast.’
Jack, two men of his division and Rose pulled the yawl out in the teeth of a sudden fresh squall of sleet. They searched with furious haste, and there in the echoing thunder they found him quite soon, floating between-decks, buoyed up by some jars that his arms still clasped. He was breathing, but only just; a hatch-cover, dislodged by the beating of the ship, had struck him so cruelly that it scarcely seemed worth handing him down into the boat.
‘But at any rate,’ said one of the men, passing him through the wrecked companion-way, ‘we shall be able to give him a Christian burial.’
Chapter Ten
WHEN TOBIAS WOKE UP he could not tell where he was. He had come from a very deep sleep, floating up to the surface, as it were, from the bottom of some dark profundity, far, far down; now he lay quite still, expecting his recollection to come to him in a minute. But it did not. At the end of half an hour he was still lo
oking upwards, motionless, wondering where he was, who and even what he was: there was some fundamental change in his being; or perhaps in his surroundings. He could not say what it might be, but it filled him with a vague uneasiness. He gazed fixedly at the ceiling. As far as he could make out in the grey light, it was made of blue serge – a most unusual substance for a ceiling. Between him and cloth floated thin layers of smoke, and outside there was the steady drumming of rain.
The nature of the fundamental change came to him very suddenly: the world was no longer in motion – it no longer heaved, rolled or pitched. The bed was as fixed and unmoving as if it had been bolted to a rock. This was horrifying. ‘She’s struck,’ he cried. ‘Oh dear me.’
‘Never mind,’ said Jack’s voice from the shadows; ‘she will float when the tide comes in.’
‘I am amazed,’ said Tobias.
‘I dare say you are, old cock,’ said Jack placidly, and added, ‘I wonder if I can get a little pap into him.’
‘This is not the ship,’ cried Tobias. ‘This is dry land.’
‘Not so dry as you might think,’ said Jack, stirring busily. ‘His Majesty’s ship Wet-as-Hades, Captain J. Byron, R. N., commander. Come, drink that, like a good creature.’ With these words he seized Tobias’ nose in a seamanlike manner, causing his mouth to open, and slid a warm, semi-liquid spoonful in.
‘What are you thinking of, Jack?’ cried Tobias indignantly, when he had done choking.
‘Well, you know my name today,’ said Jack, as if he were speaking to himself. ‘That’s an improvement. But I dare say I shall be Artaxerxes or Eupompus tomorrow. Shall I wash his face? You are very much beslobbered, you know, Toby.’
‘Do you mean to make game of me, Jack?’ asked Tobias, quite vexed. ‘I think it a very great liberty, to pull a man by the nose, without provocation.’ He tried to get up on his elbow, but could not, being strongly lashed to his bed.
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