Mr. Midshipman Hornblower h-1

by Cecil Scott Forester

  'Take this, Matthews,' he said.

  'Aye aye, sir,' said Matthews, obeying; and then, after a respectful pause, 'Beggin' your pardon, sir, but hadn't you better cock your pistol, sir?'

  'Yes,' said Hornblower, exasperated at his own forgetfulness.

  He drew the hammer back with a click, and the menacing sound made more acute still the French captain's sense of his own danger, with a cocked and loaded pistol pointed at his stomach in a heaving boat. He waved his hands desperately.

  'Please,' he said, 'point it some other way, sir.'

  He drew farther back, huddling against the men behind him.

  'Hey, avast there, you,' shouted Matthews loudly — a French sailor was trying to let go the halliard unobserved.

  'Shoot any man who looks dangerous, Matthews,' said Hornblower.

  He was so intent on enforcing his will upon these men, so desperately anxious to retain his liberty, that his face was contracted into a beast-like scowl. No one looking at him could doubt his determination for a moment. He would allow no human life to come between him and his decisions. There was still a third pistol in his belt, and the Frenchmen could guess that if they tried a rush a quarter of them at least would meet their deaths before they overpowered the Englishmen, and the French captain knew he would be the first to die. His expressive hands, waving out from his sides — he could not take his eyes from the pistol — told his men to make no further resistance. Their murmurings died away, and the captain began to plead.

  'Five years I was in an English prison during the last war,' he said. 'Let us reach an agreement. Let us go to France. When we reach the shore — anywhere you choose, sir — we will land and you can continue on your journey. Or we can all land, and I will use all my influence to have you and your men sent back to England under cartel, without exchange or ransom. I swear I will.'

  'No,' said Hornblower.

  England was far easier to reach from here than from the French Biscay coast; as for the other suggestion, Hornblower knew enough about the new government washed up by the revolution in France to be sure that they would never part with prisoners on the representation of a merchant captain. And trained seamen were scarce in France, it was his duty to keep these dozen from returning.

  'No,' he said again, in reply to the captain's fresh protests.

  'Shall I clout 'im on the jaw, sir?' asked Hunter, at Hornblower's side.

  'No,' said Hornblower again; but the Frenchman saw the gesture and guessed at the meaning of the words, and subsided into sullen silence.

  But he was roused again at the sight of Hornblower's pistol on his knee, still pointed at him. A sleepy finger might press that trigger.

  'Sir,' he said, 'put that pistol away, I beg of you. It is dangerous.'

  Hornblower's eye was cold and unsympathetic.

  'Put it away, please. I will do nothing to interfere with your command of this boat. I promise you that.'

  'Do you swear it?'

  'I swear it.'

  'And these others?'

  The captain looked round at his crew with voluble explanations, and grudgingly they agreed.

  'They swear it too.'

  'Very well, then.'

  Hornblower started to replace the pistol in his belt, and remembered to put it on half-cock in time to save himself from shooting himself in the stomach. Everyone in the boat relaxed into apathy. The boat was rising and swooping rhythmically now, a far more comfortable motion than when it had jerked to a sea-anchor, and Hornblower's stomach lost some of its resentment. He had been two nights without sleep. His head lowered on his chest, and then he leaned sideways against Hunter, and slept peacefully, while the boat, with the wind nearly abeam, headed steadily for England. What woke him late in the day was when Matthews, cramped and weary, was compelled to surrender the tiller to Arson, and after that they kept watch and watch, a hand at the sheet and a hand at the tiller and the others trying to rest. Hornblower took his turn at the sheet, but he would not trust himself with the tiller, especially when night fell; he knew he had not the knack of keeping the boat on her course by the feel of the wind on his cheek and the tiller in his hand.

  It was not until long after breakfast the next day — almost noon in fact — that they sighted the sail. It was a Frenchman who saw it first, and his excited cry roused them all. There were three square topsails coming up over the horizon on their weather bow, nearing them so rapidly on a converging course that each time the boat rose on a wave a considerably greater area of canvas was visible.

  'What do you think she is, Matthews?' asked Hornblower, while the boat buzzed with the Frenchmen's excitement.

  'I can't tell, sir, but I don't like the looks of her,' said Matthews doubtfully. 'She ought to have her t'gallants set in this breeze — and her courses too, an' she hasn't. An' I don't like the cut of her jib, sir. She — she might be a Frenchie to me, sir.'

  Any ship travelling for peaceful purposes would naturally have all possible sail set. This ship had not. Hence she was engaged in some belligerent design, but there were more chances that she was British than that she was French, even in here in the Bay. Hornblower took a long look at her; a smallish vessel, although ship-rigged. Flush-decked, with a look of speed about her — her hull was visible at intervals now, with a line of gunports.

  'She looks French all over to me, sir,' said Hunter. 'Privateer, seemly.'

  'Stand by to jibe,' said Hornblower.

  They brought the boat round before the wind, heading directly away from the ship. But in war as in the jungle, to fly is to invite pursuit and attack. The ship set courses and topgallants and came tearing down upon them, passed them at half a cable's length and then hove-to, having cut off their escape. The ship's rail was lined with a curious crowd — a large crew for a vessel that size. A hail came across the water to the boat, and the words were French. The English seamen subsided into curses, while the French captain cheerfully stood up and replied, and the French crew brought the boat alongside the ship.

  A handsome young man in a plum-coloured coat with a lace stock greeted Hornblower when he stepped on the deck.

  'Welcome, sir, to the Pique,' he said in French 'I am Captain Neuville, of this privateer. And you are—?'

  'Midshipman Hornblower, of His Britannic Majesty's ship Indefatigable,' growled Hornblower.

  'You seem to be in evil humour,' said Neuville. 'Please do not be so distressed at the fortunes of war. You will be accommodated in this ship, until we return to port, with every comfort possible at sea. I beg of you to consider yourself quite at home. For instance, those pistols in your belt must discommode you more than a little. Permit me to relieve you of their weight.'

  He took the pistols neatly from Hornblower's belt as he spoke, looked Hornblower keenly over, and then went on.

  'That dirk that you wear at your side, sir. Would you oblige me by the loan of it? I assure you that I will return it to you when we part company. But while you are on board here I fear that your impetuous youth might lead you into some rash act while you are wearing a weapon which a credulous mind might believe to be lethal. A thousand thanks. And now might I show you the berth that is being prepared for you?'

  With a courteous bow he led the way below. Two decks down, presumably at the level of a foot or two below the water line, was a wide bare 'tweendecks, dimly lighted and scantily ventilated by the hatchways.

  'Our slave deck,' explained Neuville carelessly.

  'Slave deck?' asked Hornblower.

  'Yes. It is here that the slaves were confined during the middle passage.'

  Much was clear to Hornblower at once. A slave ship could be readily converted into a privateer. She would already be armed with plenty of guns to defend herself against treacherous attacks while making her purchases in the African rivers; she was faster than the average merchant ship both because of the lack of need of hold space and because with a highly perishable cargo such as slaves speed was a desirable quality, and she was constructed to carry large num
bers of men and the great quantities of food and water necessary to keep them supplied while at sea in search of prizes.

  'Our market in San Domingo has been closed to us by recent events, of which you must have heard, sir,' went on Neuville, 'and so that the Pique could continue to return dividends to me I have converted her into a privateer. Moreover, seeing that the activities of the Committee of Public Safety at present make Paris a more unhealthy spot even than the West Coast of Africa, I decided to take command of my vessel myself. To say nothing of the fact that a certain resolution and hardihood are necessary to make a privateer a profitable investment.'

  Neuville's face hardened for a moment into an expression of the grimmest determination, and then softened at once into its previous meaningless politeness.

  'This door in this bulkhead,' he continued, 'leads to the quarters I have set aside for captured officers. Here, as you see, is your cot. Please make yourself at home here. Should this ship go into action — as I trust she will frequently do — the hatches above will be battened down. But except on those occasions you will of course be at liberty to move about the ship at your will. Yet I suppose I had better add that any harebrained attempt on the part of prisoners to interfere with the working or wellbeing of this ship would be deeply resented by the crew. They serve on shares, you understand, and are risking their lives and their liberty. I would not be surprised if any rash person who endangered their dividends and freedom were dropped over the side into the sea.'

  Hornblower forced himself to reply; he would not reveal that he was almost struck dumb by the calculating callousness of this last speech.

  'I understand,' he said.

  'Excellent! Now is there anything further you may need, sir?

  Hornblower looked round the bare quarters in which he was to suffer lonely confinement, lit by a dim glimmer of light from a swaying slush lamp.

  'Could I have something to read?' he asked.

  Neuville thought for a moment.

  'I fear there are only professional books,' he said. 'But I can let you have Grandjean's Principles of Navigation, and Lebrun's Handbook on Seamanship and some similar volumes, if you think you can understand the French in which they are written.'

  'I'll try,' said Hornblower.

  Probably it was as well that Hornblower was provided with the materials for such strenuous mental exercise. The effort of reading French and of studying his profession at one and the same time kept his mind busy during the dreary days while the Pique cruised in search of prizes. Most of the time the Frenchmen ignored him — he had to force himself upon Neuville once to protest against the employment of his four British seamen on the menial work of pumping out the ship, but he had to retire worsted from the argument, if argument it could be called, when Neuville icily refused to discuss the question. Hornblower went back to his quarters with burning cheeks and red ears, and, as ever, when he was mentally disturbed, the thought of his guilt returned to him with new force.

  If only he had plugged that shot-hole sooner! A clearer-headed officer, he told himself, would have done so. He had lost his ship, the Indefatigable's precious prize, and there was no health in him. Sometimes he made himself review the situation calmly. Professionally, he might not — probably would not — suffer for his negligence. A midshipman with only four for a prize-crew, put on board a two-hundred-ton brig that had been subjected to considerable taring from a frigate's guns, would not be seriously blamed when she sank under him. But Hornblower knew at the same time that he was at least partly at fault. If it was ignorance — there was no excuse for ignorance. If he had allowed his multiple cares to distract him from the business of plugging the shot-hole immediately, that was incompetence, and there was no excuse for incompetence. When he thought along those lines he was overwhelmed by waves of despair and of self-contempt, and there was no one to comfort him. The day of his birthday, when he looked at himself at the vast age of eighteen, was the worst of all. Eighteen and a discredited prisoner in the hands of a French privateersman! His self-respect was at its lowest ebb.

  The Pique was seeking her prey in the most frequented waters in the world, the approaches to the Channel, and there could be no more vivid demonstration of the vastness of the ocean than the fact that she cruised day after day without glimpsing a sail. She maintained a triangular course, reaching to the north-west, tacking to the south, running under easy sail north-easterly again, with lookouts at every masthead, with nothing to see but the tossing waste of water. Until the morning when a high-pitched yell from the foretopgallant masthead attracted the attention of everybody on deck, including Hornblower, standing lonely in the waist. Neuville, by the wheel, bellowed a question to the lookout, and Hornblower, thanks to his recent studies, could translate the answer. There was a sail visible to windward, and next moment the lookout reported that it had altered course and was running down towards them.

  That meant a great deal. In wartime any merchant ship would be suspicious of strangers and would give them as wide a berth as possible; and especially when she was to windward and therefore far safer. Only someone prepared to fight or possessed of a perfectly morbid curiosity would abandon a windward position. A wild and unreasonable hope filled Hornblower's breast; a ship of war at sea — thanks to England's maritime mastery — would be far more probably English than French. And this was the cruising ground of the Indefatigable, his own ship, stationed there specially to fulfil the double function of looking out for French commerce-destroyers and intercepting French blockade-runners. A hundred miles from here she had put him and his prize crew on board the Marie Galante. It was a thousand to one, he exaggerated despairingly to himself, against any ship sighted being the Indefatigable. But — hope reasserted itself — the fact that she was coming down to investigate reduced the odds to ten to one at most. Less than ten to one.

  He looked over at Neuville, trying to think his thoughts. The Pique was fast and handy, and there was a clear avenue of escape to leeward. The fact that the stranger had altered course towards them was a suspicious circumstance, but it was known that Indiamen, the richest prizes of all, had sometimes traded on the similarity of their appearance to that of ships of the line, and by showing a bold front had scared dangerous enemies away. That would be a temptation to a man eager to make a prize. At Neuville's orders all sail was set, ready for instant flight or pursuit, and, close-hauled, the Pique stood towards the stranger. It was not long before Hornblower, on the deck, caught a glimpse of a gleam of white, like a tiny grain of rice, far away on the horizon as the Pique lifted on a swell. Here came Matthews, red-faced and excited, running aft to Hornblower's side.

  'That's the old Indefatigable, sir,' he said. 'I swear it!' He sprang onto the rail, holding on by the shrouds, and stared under his hand.

  'Yes! There she is, sir! She's loosing her royals now, sir. We'll be back on board of her in time for grog!'

  A French petty officer reached up and dragged Matthews by the seat of his trousers from his perch, and with a blow and a kick drove him forward again, while a moment later Neuville was shouting the orders that wore the ship round to head away directly from the Indefatigable. Neuville beckoned Hornblower over to his side.

  'Your late ship, I understand, Mr Hornblower?'

  'Yes.'

  'What is her best point of sailing?'

  Hornblower's eyes met Neuville's.

  'Do not look so noble,' said Neuville, smiling with thin lips. 'I could undoubtedly induce you to give me the information. I know of ways. But it is unnecessary, fortunately for you. There is no ship on earth — especially none of His Britannic Majesty's clumsy frigates — that can outsail the Pique running before the wind. You will soon see that.'

  He strolled to the taffrail and looked aft long and earnestly through his glass, but no more earnestly than did Hornblower with his naked eye.

  'You see?' said Neuville, proffering the glass.

  Hornblower took it, but more to catch a closer glimpse of his ship than to confirm his observ
ations. He was homesick, desperately homesick, at that moment, for the Indefatigable. But there could be no denying that she was being left fast behind. Her topgallants were out of sight again now, and only her royals were visible.

  'Two hours and we shall have run her mastheads under,' said Neuville, taking back the telescope and shutting it with a snap.

  He left Hornblower standing sorrowful at the taffrail while he turned to berate the helmsman for not steering a steadier course; Hornblower heard the explosive words without listening to them, the wind blowing into his face and ruffling his hair over his ears, and the wake of the ship's passage boiling below him. So might Adam have looked back at Eden; Hornblower remembered the stuffy dark midshipsmen's berth, the smells and the creakings, the bitter cold nights, turning out in response to the call for all hands, the weevilly bread and the wooden beef, and he yearned for them all, with the sick feeling of hopeless longing. Liberty was vanishing over the horizon. Yet it was not these personal feelings that drove him below in search of action. They may have quickened his wits, but it was a sense of duty which inspired him.

  The slave-deck was deserted, as usual, with all hands at quarters. Beyond the bulkhead stood his cot with the books upon it and the slush lamp swaying above it. There was nothing there to give him any inspiration. There was another locked door in the after bulkhead. That opened into some kind of boatswain's store; twice he had seen it unlocked and paint and similar supplies brought out from it. Paint! That gave him an idea; he looked from the door up to the slush lamp and back again, and as he stepped forward he took his claspknife out of his pocket. But before very long he recoiled again, sneering at himself. The door was not panelled, but was made of two solid slabs of wood, with the cross-beams on the inside. There was the keyhole of the lock, but it presented no point of attack. It would take him hours and hours to cut through that door with his knife, at a time when minutes were precious.