Admiral Hornblower

by C. S. Forester

  ‘I wish to speak to the leader of the mutineers.’

  ‘I am captain of this ship. You can address yourself to me, Nathaniel Sweet, sir.’

  ‘I have addressed myself to you as far as I desire, unless you are also the leader of the mutineers.’

  ‘Then if you have done so, you can call back your boat and leave us, sir.’

  An impasse already. Hornblower kept his eyes on the blue ones of the old man. There were several other men within earshot, but he could sense no wavering or doubt among them; they were prepared to support their captain. Yet it might be worth while speaking to them.

  ‘Men!’ said Hornblower, raising his voice.

  ‘Belay that!’ rapped out the old man. He whipped the pistol out of his belt and pointed it at Hornblower’s stomach. ‘One more word out of turn and you’ll get an ounce of lead through you.’

  Hornblower looked steadily back at him and his weapon; he was curiously unafraid, feeling as if he were watching move and counter-move in some chess game, without remembering that he himself was one of the pawns in it with his life at stake.

  ‘Kill me,’ he said with a grim smile, ‘and England won’t rest until you’re swinging on a gallows.’

  ‘England has sent you here to swing me on a gallows as it is,’ said Sweet, bleakly.

  ‘No,’ said Hornblower. ‘I am here to recall you to your duty to King and Country.’

  ‘Letting bygones be bygones?’

  ‘You will have to stand a fair trial, you and your confederates.’

  ‘That means the gallows, as I said,’ replied Sweet. ‘The gallows for me, and I should be fortunate compared with some of these others.’

  ‘A fair and honest trial,’ said Hornblower, ‘with every mitigating circumstance taken into consideration.’

  ‘The only trial I would attend,’ replied the old man, ‘would be to bear witness against Chadwick. Full pardon for us – a fair trial for Chadwick. Those are our terms, sir.’

  ‘You are foolish,’ said Hornblower. ‘You are throwing away your last chance. Surrender now, with Mr Chadwick unbound and the ship in good order, and those circumstances will weigh heavily in your favour at your trial. Refuse, and what have you to look for? Death. That is all. Death. What can save you from our country’s vengeance? Nothing.’

  ‘Begging your pardon, Captain, but Boney can,’ interposed the old man, dryly.

  ‘You trust Bonaparte’s word?’ said Hornblower, rallying desperately before this unexpected counter-attack. ‘He’d like to have this ship, no doubt. But you and your gang? Bonaparte won’t encourage mutiny – his power rests too much on his own army. He’ll hand you back for us to make an example of you.’

  It was a wild shot in the dark, and it missed its bull’s-eye by an unmeasurable distance. Sweet stuck his pistol back into his belt and produced three letters from his pocket, waving them tauntingly in front of Hornblower.

  ‘Here’s a letter from the Military Governor of Harbour-Grace,’ he said. ‘That only promises us welcome. And here’s a letter from the Prefect of the Department of the Inferior Seine. That promises us provisions and water should we need them. And here’s a letter from Paris, sent down to us by post. It promises us immunity from arrest, civil rights in France, and a pension for every man from the age of sixty. That is signed “Marie Louise, Empress, Queen, and Regent”. Boney won’t go back on his wife’s word, sir.’

  ‘You’ve been in communication with the shore?’ gasped Hornblower. It was quite impossible for him to make any pretence at composure.

  ‘We have,’ said the old man. ‘And if you had the chance before you, Captain, of being flogged round the fleet, you would have done the same.’

  It was hopeless to continue the present discussion. At least at the moment, the mutineers were unassailable. The only terms to which they would listen would be their own. There was no sign of doubt or dissension on board. But maybe if they were allowed more time to think about it, maybe if they had a few hours in which to consider the fact that Hornblower himself was on their trail, doubt might creep in. A party might form determined to save their necks by recapturing the ship; they might get at the liquor – Hornblower was completely puzzled by the fact that a mutinous British crew was not all roaring drunk – something might happen. But he must make a fighting retreat, not ignominiously crawl overside with his tail between his legs.

  ‘So you are traitors as well as mutineers?’ he blared. ‘I might have expected it. I might have guessed what kind of curs you are. I won’t foul my lungs by breathing the same air as you.’

  He turned to the side and hailed for his boat.

  ‘We’re the kind of cuts,’ said the old man, ‘who will let you go when we could clap you down below in the orlop with Chadwick. We could give you a taste of the cat, Commodore Sir Horatio Hornblower. How would you like that, sir? Remember, tomorrow, that the flesh is still on your ribs because we spared you. Good morning to you, Captain.’

  There was sting and venom in those last words; they called up pictures in Hornblower’s imagination that made his flesh creep. He did not feel in the least dignified as he wriggled under the boarding-netting.

  The Flame still rode peacefully to the wind as the boat danced back over the waves. Hornblower gazed from the Flame to the Porta Coeli, the two sister-ships, identical in appearance save for the white cross-shaped patch on the Flame’s foretopsail. It was ironical that not even a trained eye could see any difference in appearance between the brig that was loyal to the King and the brig that was in open rebellion against him. The thought increased his bitterness; he had failed, utterly and completely, in his first attempt to win over the mutineers. He did not think there was the least possibility of their abating their terms; he would have to choose between agreeing to them, between promising the mutineers a free pardon and driving them into the hands of Bonaparte. In either case he would have failed in his mission; the merest least experienced midshipman in the Navy could have done as much. There was still some time to spare, for there was still little chance of news of the mutiny leaking out, but unless time brought dissension among the mutineers – and he saw no chance of that – it would be merely wasted time as far as he could see.

  The boat was now half-way between the two brigs; with those two vessels under his command he could wage a lively war against the Normandy coast; he felt in his bones that he could set the whole Seine estuary in an uproar. His bitterness surged up stronger still, and then abruptly checked itself. An idea had come to him, and with the idea all the well-known old symptoms, the dryness in his throat, the tingling in his legs, the accelerated heartbeat. He swept his glance back and forth between the two brigs, excitement welling up inside him; calculations of wind and tide and daylight already formulating themselves, unsummoned, in his mind.

  ‘Pull harder you men,’ he said to the boat’s crew, and they obeyed him, but the gig could not possibly travel fast enough to satisfy him in his new mood.

  Brown was looking at him sidelong, wondering what plan was evoking itself in his captain’s brain; Brown himself – as well aware of the circumstances as Hornblower was – could see no possible way out of the situation. All he knew was that his captain looked back over his shoulder time and time again at the mutinous brig.

  ‘Oars!’ growled Brown to the boat’s crew, as the officer of the watch gave the signal to the boat to come alongside; the bowman hooked on to the chains, and Hornblower went up the brig’s side with a clumsy impetuosity that he could not restrain. Freeman was waiting for him on the quarterdeck, and Hornblower’s hand was still at his hat when he gave his first order.

  ‘Will you pass the word for the sailmaker, Mr Freeman? And I shall want his mates, and every hand who can use a needle and palm.’

  ‘Aye aye, sir.’

  Orders were orders, even when they dealt with such extraneous matters as making sails while negotiating with a mutinous crew. Hornblower stared over at the Flame, still lying hove-to out of gunshot. The mutineers held a
strong, an unassailable position, one which no frontal attack could break, and whose flanks were impregnable. It would be a very roundabout route that could turn such a position; maybe he had thought of one. There were some odd circumstances in his favour, fortunate coincidences. It was his business to seize upon those, exploit them to the utmost. He would have to take reckless chances, but he would do everything in his power to reduce the chances against him. The lucky man is he who knows how much to leave to chance.

  A stoop-shouldered seaman was awaiting his attention, Freeman at his side.

  ‘Swenson, sailmaker’s mate, sir.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Freeman. You see that patched foretops’l? Swenson, look at it well through this glass.’

  The Swedish sailmaker took the telescope in his gnarled hands and levelled it to his eye.

  ‘Mr Freeman, I want Porta Coeli to have a foretops’l just like that, so that no eye can see any difference between the two. Can that be done?’

  Freeman looked at Swenson.

  ‘Aye aye, sir, I can do that,’ said Swenson, glancing from Freeman to Hornblower and back again. ‘There’s a bolt o’ white duck canvas, an’ with the old foretops’l – I can do it, sir.’

  ‘I want it finished and ready to bend by four bells in the afternoon watch. Start work on it now.’

  A little group had formed behind Swenson, those members of the crew whom inquiry had ascertained to have sailmaking experience. There were broad grins on some of their faces; Hornblower seemed to be conscious of a little wave of excitement and anticipation spreading through the crew like a ripple over a pond set up by the stone dropped into it in the form of Hornblower’s unusual request. No one could see clearly as yet what was in Hornblower’s mind, but they knew that he intended some devilment. The knowledge was a better tonic to discipline and the happiness of the ship than any ordinary ship’s routine.

  ‘Now see here, Mr Freeman,’ said Hornblower, moving towards the rail. ‘What I propose is this – Flame and Porta Coeli are as like as two peas and they’ll be liker yet as soon as we have that foretops’l set. The mutineers have been in communication with the shore; they told me so, and, what’s more, Mr Freeman, the place they’ve had dealings with is Le Havre – Harbour-Grace, Mr Freeman. Boney and the governor have promised them money and immunity to bring the Flame in. We’ll go in instead. There’s that West Indiaman we saw come in this morning.’

  ‘We’ll bring her out, sir!’

  ‘Maybe we will. God knows what we’ll find inside, but we’ll go in ready for anything. Pick twenty men and an officer, men you can rely on. Give each one his orders about what he is to do if we have a chance to take a prize – heads’ls, tops’ls, wheel, cutting the cable. You know about all that as well as I do. It’ll be just at dusk that we stand in, if the wind doesn’t change, and I don’t think it will. It’ll be strange if in the dark we don’t contrive something to annoy the Frogs.’

  ‘By God, sir, an’ they’ll think it’s the mutineers! They’ll think the mutiny was just a sham! They’ll—’

  ‘I hope they will, Mr Freeman.’

  VI

  It was late afternoon when the Porta Coeli, apparently unable to reach any decision, stood away from the Flame and crossed the broad estuary with the wind blowing briskly on her port beam. The thick weather still persisted; she was far enough both from Flame and from Le Havre for the details to be quite obscure when she took in her foretopsail and substituted for it the patched one which an enthusiastic gang of toilers had made ready on deck abaft the foremast. Hurried work with paintbrush and paint erased one name and substituted the other; Hornblower and Freeman wore their plain pea-jackets over their uniforms, concealing their rank. Freeman kept his glass trained on the harbour as they stood in.

  ‘That’s the Indiaman, sir. At anchor. And there’s a lighter beside her. O’ course, they wouldn’t unload her at the quay. Not here, sir. They’d put her cargo into lighters an’ barges, and send ’em up the river, to Rouen and Paris. O’ course they would. I ought to ha’ thought o’ that before.’ Hornblower had already thought of it. His glass was sweeping the defences of the town; the forts of Ste Adresse and Tourneville on the steep cliff above the town; the twin lighthouses on Cape de la Hève – which for a dozen years had not shown a light – the batteries on the low ground beside the old jetty. These last would be the great danger to the enterprise; he hoped that the big forts above would not know of what was going on down below in time to open fire.

  ‘There’s a lot of shipping farther in, sir,’ went on Freeman. ‘Might even be ships of the line. They haven’t their yards crossed. I’ve never been in as close as this before.’

  Hornblower turned to look at the western sky. Night was fast falling, and the thick weather on the horizon showed no signs of clearing. He wanted light enough to find his way, and darkness enough to cover him on his way out.

  ‘Here’s the pilot lugger standing out, sir,’ said Freeman. ‘They’ll think we’re Flame all right.’

  ‘Very good, Mr Freeman. Set the men to cheering at the ship’s side. Secure the pilot when he comes on board. I’ll con her in.’

  ‘Aye aye, sir.’

  It was just the sort of order to suit the temperament of British seamen. They entered wholeheartedly into the spirit of the thing, yelling like lunatics along the bulwarks, waving their hats, dancing exuberantly, just as one would expect of a horde of mutineers. The Porta Coeli backed her maintopsail, the lugger surged alongside, and the pilot swung himself into the mainchains.

  ‘Lee braces!’ roared Hornblower, the maintopsail caught the wind again, the wheel went over, and the Porta Coeli stood into the harbour, while Freeman put his shoulder between the pilot’s shoulder blades and shot him neatly down the hatchway where two men were waiting to seize and pinion him.

  ‘Pilot secured, sir,’ he reported.

  He, too, was obviously carried away by the excitement of the moment, infected by the din the hands were making; his pose of amused irony had completely disappeared.

  ‘Starboard a little,’ said Hornblower to the helmsman. ‘Meet her! Steady as you go!’

  It would be the last word in ignominy if all their high hopes were to come to an end on the sandbanks guarding the entrance. Hornblower wondered if he would ever feel cool again.’

  ‘A cutter standing out to us, sir,’ reported Freeman.

  That might be a committee of welcome, or orders telling them where to berth – both at once, probably.

  ‘Set the hands to cheering again,’ ordered Hornblower. ‘Have the boarding-party secured as they come on board.’

  ‘Aye aye, sir.’

  They were nearing the big Indiaman; she lay, her sails loose, swinging to a single anchor. There was a lighter beside her, but obviously little enough had been done so far towards unloading her. In the fading light Hornblower could just make out a dozen of her seamen standing at the ship’s side gazing curiously at them. Hornblower backed the main-topsail again, and the cutter came alongside, and half a dozen officials climbed on to the Porta Coeli’s deck. Their uniforms proclaimed their connection with the navy, the army, and the customs service, and they advanced slowly towards Hornblower, looking curiously about them as they did so. Hornblower was giving the orders that got the Porta Coeli under way again, and as she drew away from the cutter in the gathering darkness he wore her round and headed her for the Indiaman. Cutlasses suddenly gleamed about the new arrivals.

  ‘Make a sound and you’re dead men,’ said Freeman.

  Somebody made a sound, beginning to protest volubly. A seaman brought a pistol butt down on his head and the protests ended abruptly as the protester clattered on the deck. The others were hustled down the hatchway, too dazed and startled to speak.

  ‘Very well, Mr Freeman,’ said Hornblower, drawling the words so as to convey the impression that he felt perfectly at home here in the middle of a hostile harbour. ‘You may hoist out the boats. Maintops’l aback!’

  The shore authorities would b
e watching the brig’s movements by what little light was left. If the Porta Coeli did anything unexpected, they would wonder idly what unknown condition on board had caused the harbourmaster’s representative – now gagged and bound under hatches – to change his plans. The Porta Coeli’s motion died away; the sheaves squealed as the boats dropped into the water, and the picked crews tumbled down into them. Hornblower leaned over the side.

  ‘Remember men, don’t fire a shot!’

  The oars splashed as the boats pulled over to the Indiaman. It was practically dark by now; Hornblower could hardly follow the boats to the Indiaman’s side fifty yards away, and he could see nothing of the men as they swarmed up her side. Faintly he heard some startled exclamations, and then one loud cry; that might puzzle the people on shore, but would not put them on their guard. Here were the boats returning, each pulled by the two men detailed for the work. The tackles were hooked on and the boats swayed up; as the sheaves squealed again Hornblower heard a crunching sound from the Indiaman, and a dull thump or two – the hand detailed to cut the cable was doing his work, and had actually remembered to carry the axe with him when he went up the ship’s side. Hornblower felt the satisfaction of a job well done; his careful instruction of the boarding-party in the afternoon, his methodical allocation of duties to each individual man, and his reiteration of his orders until everyone thoroughly understood the part he had to play were bearing fruit.

  Against the misty sky he saw the Indiaman’s topsails changing shape; the men allotted to the task were sheeting them home. Thank God for a few prime seamen who, arriving in darkness in a strange ship, could find their way to the right places and lay their hands on the right lines without confusion. Hornblower saw the Indiaman’s yards come round; in the darkness he could just see a black blur detach itself from her side, the lighter, cut adrift and floating away.

  ‘You can square away, Mr Freeman, if you please,’ he said. ‘The Indiaman will follow us out.’

  The Porta Coeli gathered way and headed for the south-eastern exit of the harbour, the Indiaman close at her stern. For several long seconds there was no sign of any interest being taken in these movements. Then came a hail, apparently from the cutter which had brought the officials aboard. It was so long since Hornblower had heard or spoken French that he could not understand the words used.