Book 16 - The Wine-Dark Sea

by Patrick O'Brian

  'I remember having received a letter from the Minister of Marine wishing me every happiness on my voyage: perhaps that would answer?'

  'I am afraid not, sir. Your happiness has included the taking of several prizes, I collect?'

  'Why, yes, sir. You will not think me impertinent if I observe that our countries, alas, are in a state of war.'

  'So I understand. But wars are conducted according to certain forms. They are not wild riots in which anyone may join and seize whatever he can overpower; and I fear that if you can produce nothing better than the recollection of a letter wishing you every happiness you must be hanged as a pirate.'

  'I am concerned to hear it. But as for prizes, as for the merely privateering aspects of the voyage, Mr Chauncy, my sailing-master, has a paper from his government. We sailed under American colours, you will recall. It is in a cover marked Mr Chauncy's qualifications and references in my writing-desk.'

  'You did not bring it?'

  'No, sir. The young gentleman with one arm told me there was not a moment to be lost, so I abandoned all my personal property.'

  'I shall send for it. Pray describe the writing-desk.'

  'An ordinary brass-bound walnut-tree writing-desk with my name on the plate; but there can be very little hope of finding it now.'

  'Why do you say that?'

  'My dear sir, I have seen sailors at work aboard a captured ship.'

  Jack made no reply but glancing through the scuttle he saw that Bulkeley and his men had now raised a spar on the stump of her mizzenmast, and that with an improvised lugsail she was lying with her head to the sea, lying much easier. The Surprise would be alongside in a few minutes.

  'Have you any officer surviving unhurt?' he asked.

  'None, sir. They were both killed.'

  'A servant?'

  'Yes, sir. He hid below, with the ransomers.'

  'Killick. Killick, there. Pass the word for Captain Pullings.'

  'Aye aye, sir: Captain Pullings it is,' replied Killick, who could give a civil answer when guests or prisoners of rank were present: but instead of Pullings there appeared young Norton, who said, 'I beg pardon, sir, but Captain Pullings and Mr Grainger are at the masthead, getting the top over. May I carry them a message?'

  'Are they got so far so soon? Upon my word! Never worry them at such a delicate point, Mr Norton. Jump up on deck yourself, borrow a speaking-trumpet and hail the Franklin, telling Bonden and Plaice to have Mr Dutourd's servant, sea-chest and writing-desk ready to be brought across as soon as there is a moment to spare. But first take this gentleman into the gun-room and tell the steward to bring him whatever he calls for. I am going into the foretop.'

  'Aye aye, sir. Mr Dutourd's servant, sea-chest and writing-desk as soon as there is a moment; and Mr Dutourd to the gun-room.'

  Dutourd opened his mouth to speak, but it was too late. Jack, throwing off his coat, sped from the cabin, making the deck tremble as he went. Norton said, 'This way, sir, if you please,' and some minutes later the message reached Bonden's ear as he and his mates were hauling an uninjured topmast aboard by its shrouds. He in turn hailed the bosun: 'Mr Bulkeley, there. I must take Mr Dutourd's servant, chest and writing-desk across. May I have the skiff?'

  'Yes, mate,' replied the bosun, his mouth filled with rope-yarns, 'unless you had sooner walk. And bring me back a pair of girt-lines and two long-tackle blocks. And the coil of one-and-a-half-inch manila abaft the fore hatchway.'

  Jack returned to the cabin with the liveliest satisfaction: in spite of the absence of Mr Bulkeley and many very able seamen the Surprise had made an extraordinary recovery. It was true that she had at least half a dozen forecastlemen who, apart from the paper-work, could have served with credit as bosun in a man-of-war, and it was true that as Jack was wealthy she was uncommonly well supplied with stores; yet even so the change from the chaos of first light to the present approach to trim efficiency was very striking. At this rate the frigate, with four new pairs of preventer-stays set up in the morning, would be able to carry on under topsails and courses tomorrow; for the trades were already steadying over a more nearly normal sea.

  'Pass the word for Mr Dutourd,' he called.

  'Which his name is really Turd,' observed Killick to his mate Grimshaw before making his way to the gun-room to wake the red-eyed Frenchman.

  'There you are, sir,' said Jack, as he was led into the cabin. 'Here is your sea-chest, and here is what appears to be your writing-desk,' pointing to a box whose brass plate, already automatically polished by Killick, bore the name Jean du Tourd clear and plain.

  'I am amazed,' cried Dutourd. 'I never thought to see them again.'

  'I hope you will be able to find the cover you spoke of.'

  'I am sure I shall: the desk is still locked,' said Dutourd, feeling for his keys.

  'I ask pardon, sir,' said Mr Adams, Jack's highly-valued clerk, 'but it wants less than a minute to the hour.'

  'Forgive me, Monsieur,' cried Jack, leaping from his seat. 'I shall be back in a few moments. Pray search for your paper.'

  He and Adams had been carrying out a chain of observations, always made at stated intervals: wind direction and strength, estimated current, barometrical pressure, compasss variations, humidity, temperature of the air (both wet bulb and dry) and of the sea at given depths together with the salinity at those depths, and the blueness of the sky, a series that was to be carried round the world and communicated to Humboldt on the one hand and the Royal Society on the other. It would be a great pity to break its exact sequence at such a very interesting point.

  A long pause; nautical cries; the click-click-click of capstan-pawls as a great spar rose up: and almost immediately after the cry of 'Belay!' Captain Aubrey returned.

  'I have found the certificate,' said Dutourd, starting up from his half-doze and handing him a paper.

  'I rejoice to hear it,' said Jack. He sat down at his desk; but having read the letter attentively he frowned and said, 'Yes, this is very well, and it allows Mr William B. Chauncy, who was I presume your sailing-master, to take, burn, sink or destroy ships or vessels belonging to His Britannic Majesty or sailing under British colours. But it makes no mention of Mr Dutourd. No mention at all.'

  Dutourd said nothing. He was yellow-pale by now: he put his hand to his bandaged head, and Jack had the impression that he no longer cared whether he was to be hanged as a pirate or not, so long as he was allowed to lie down in peace for a while.

  Jack considered for some moments and then said, 'Well, sir, I must say you are an anomalous kind of prisoner, rather like the creature that was neither flesh nor fowl nor good red herring but partook of each: the Sphinx. You are a sort of owner, a sort of commander, though absent from the muster-roll, and a sort of what I can only call a pirate. I am not at all sure what I ought to do with you. As you have no commission I cannot treat you as an officer: you cannot berth aft.' Another pause, during which Dutourd closed his eyes. 'But fortunately the Surprise is a roomy ship with a small company, and right forward on the lower deck we have made cabins for the gunner, the bosun and the carpenter. There are still two to spare and you shall have one of them. Since you have no surviving officers you will have to mess by yourself, but I dare say the gun-room will invite you quite often; and of course you may have the liberty of the quarterdeck.'

  Dutourd made no acknowledgement of this offer. His head drooped, and the next roll pitched him right out of his seat, head first. Jack picked him up, laid him on the cushioned stern lock and called for Killick.

  'What are you a-thinking of, sir?' cried his steward. 'Don't you see he is bleeding like a pig from under his bandage?' Killick whipped into the quarter-gallery for a towel and thrust it under Dutourd's head. 'Now I must take all them covers off and soak them this directly minute in cold fresh water and there ain't no cold fresh water, which the scuttle-butt is empty till Chips comes back and shifts the hand-pump.'

  'Never you mind the bloody covers,' said Jack, suddenly so angry with extreme wea
riness that it cowed even Killick. 'You and Grimshaw jump forward to the cabin next the bosun's: get a bed from Mr Adams, sling a hammock, and lay him in it. And have his sea-chest lighted along, d'ye hear me, there?'

  Extreme weariness: it pervaded both ships, evening out the gloom of the defeated and the elation of the conquerors. Both sets of men would have resigned prize-money or freedom to be allowed to go below and take their ease. But it was not to be: the few able-bodied prisoners had to pump steadily to keep their ship clear, or haul on a rope at the word of command; and in both ships it was all hands on deck until enough canvas could be spread to allow them at least to lie to in something like safety if it came on to blow; for the glass was far from steady, and neither the midday nor the present evening sky was at all certain.

  The only apparently idle hands in either ship were the medical men. They had returned to the frigate some time before; they had made the rounds of the sick-berth and its extensions and now they were waiting for a pause in the general activity, when someone would have time to pull Martin, who was to spend the night in the Franklin, across the lane of choppy water that separated the ships. Although both medicoes could row, after a fashion, neither could afford to have inept, clumsy fingers with so strong a likelihood of further surgery.

  They were watching the extraction of the Franklin's broken lower masts and their replacement by a jury-rig, and from time to time Stephen explained the various operations. 'There, do you see,' he said, 'those two very long legs joining at the top with a pair of stout pulleys at the juncture and their feet resting on planks either side of the deck, are the sheers I was speaking about. See, the men haul them upright by a rope, perhaps even a hawser, running through yet another pulley, or block as I should say, to the capstan; while at the same time any undue motion is restrained by the—Mr Reade, what is the name of those ropes fore and aft and sideways?'

  'Guys, sir; and those at the bottom of the sheers are tail-tackles.'

  'Thank you, my dear. Let me advise you not to run in that impetuous manner, however.'

  'Oh sir, if I did not run in this impetuous manner . . .'

  'Mr Reade, there. Have you gone to sleep again?' called Pullings, very hoarse, very savage.

  'Now, as you see, Martin, the sheers are quite upright: they let down the lower pulley—the bosun attaches it to the broken mast by a certain knot—he bids them heave, or haul—he encourages them with cries—with blows. Those must be the idle prisoners. The stump rises—it is detached, cast off—they bring the new spar—I believe it is one of our spare topmasts—they make it fast—up it rises, up and up and up until it dangles over the very hole, the partners as the mariner calls it—and yet with the motion of the ship how it wanders!—Mr Bulkeley seizes it—he cries out—they lower away and the mast descends—it is firm, pinned no doubt and wedged. Someone—it is surely Barret Bonden—is hoisted to the trestle-trees to place the rigging over the upper end in due order.'

  'If you please, sir,' said Emily, 'Padeen says may Willis have his slime-draught now?'

  'He may have it at the third stroke of the bell,' said Stephen. She ran off, her slim black form weaving unnoticed through gangs of seamen intent upon a great variety of tasks, too weary to be jocular, and Stephen said, 'If one, then all; and we have mere chaos.'

  He had often said this before, and Martin only nodded. They watched in silence as the sheers moved forward to the stump of the Franklin's mainmast, fitting to it a curious object made up of yet another spare topmast and a hand-mast, the two coupled athwartships by two lower caps and a double upper cap above the refashioned maintop.

  Stephen did not attempt to explain the course of this particular operation, which he had never seen before. Until now neither had spoken of West's death apart from their brief exchange in the sick-berth, but during a short pause in the hammering behind them and the repeated shouts from the Franklin Stephen said, 'I am of opinion that there was such damage to the brain that an even earlier, more skilful intervention would have made no difference.'

  'I am certain of it,' said Martin.

  'I wish I were,' thought Stephen. 'Yet then again, what is gratifying to self-love is not necessarily untrue.'

  The arduous fitting of the double cap went on and on: they watched in stupid, heavy-headed incomprehension.

  'Such news, sir,' cried Reade, flitting by. 'The Captain is going to send up a lateen on her mizzen. What a sight that will be! It will not be long now.'

  The sun was nearly touching the horizon, and both over the water and in the Surprise the people could be seen coiling down and clearing away; the carpenters were collecting their tools; Stephen, sunk in melancholy thought, recalled his motions with that singular clarity which comes with certain degrees of tiredness and in some dreams. He could feel the vibration of his trephine cutting through the injured skull, an operation he had carried out many, many times without failure, the raising of the disk of bone, the flow of extravasated blood.

  They were both far away in their reflexions and Stephen had almost forgotten that he was not alone when Martin, his eyes fixed on the prize, said, 'You understand these things better than I do, for sure: pray which do you think the better purchase for a man in my position and with my responsibilities, the Navy Fives or South Sea stock?'

  Stephen was called out only twice that night; and his third sleep was of the most delicious kind, changing, evolving, from something not unlike coma to a consciousness of total relaxation, of mental recovery and physical comfort; and so he lay, blinking in the early light and musing on a wide variety of pleasant things: Diana's kindness to him when he was ill in Sweden; goshawks he had known; a Boccherini 'cello sonata; whales. But a steady, familiar, discordant noise pierced through this amiable wandering: several times he dismissed his identification as absurd. He had known the Navy for many years; he was acquainted with its excesses; but this was too wild entirely. Yet at last the combination of sounds, grinding, scrubbing, bucket clashing, water streaming, swabs driving the tide into the scuppers, bare feet padding and hoarse whispers just over his head could no longer be denied: the larboard watch and the idlers were cleaning the deck, getting all the volcanic dust and cinders from under gratings, gun-carriages and such unlikely places as the binnacle drawers.

  Yet as his conscious mind accepted this so yesterday came flooding back, and the extravagance of the sailors' activity disappeared. Mr West had died. He was to be buried at sea in the forenoon watch, and they were seeing to it that he should go over the side from a ship in tolerably good order. He was not an outstandingly popular officer; nor was he very clever, either, and sometimes he did tend to top it the knob, being more quarterdeck than tarpaulin; but he was not in the least ill-natured—never had a man brought up before the Captain as a defaulter—and there was no question at all of his courage. He had distinguished himself when the Surprise cut the Diane out at St Martin's, while in this last affair at Moahu he had done everything a good, active officer could do. But above all they were used to him: they had sailed with him for a great while now: they liked what they were used to; and they knew what was due to a shipmate.

  If there had been any danger of Stephen's forgetting, then the appearance of the deck when he came up into the sparkling open air and the brilliant light after his long morning round would have brought it all to mind. Quite apart from the fact that the waist of the ship, the part between the quarterdeck and the forecastle, where ordinarily he saw a mass of spare masts, yards and spars in general covered with tarpaulins on the booms, the boats nestling among them, was now quite clear, the spars nearly all used and the boats either busy or towing astern, which gave her a singular clean-run austerity—quite apart from this there had been an extraordinary change from the apparent confusion and real filth of yesterday to a Sunday neatness, falls flemished, brass flaming in the sun, yards (such as there were) exactly squared by the lifts and braces. But there was an even greater change in the atmosphere, a formality and gravity shown at one end of the scale by Sarah and Emily, w
ho had finished their duties in the sick-berth half an hour before and who were now standing on the forecastle in their best pinafores looking solemnly at the Franklin, and at the other by Jack Aubrey, who was returning from her in the splendour of a post-captain, accompanied by Martin and rowed with great exactness by his bargemen.

  'There, sir,' said Reade at Stephen's side. 'That is what I meant by a splendid sight.'

  Stephen followed his gaze beyond the Captain's boat to the Franklin. She had cast off her tow and she was sailing along abreast of the Surprise, making a creditable five knots under her courses, with the great triangular lateen drum-taut on her mizzen gleaming in the sun. 'Very fine, indeed,' he said.

  'She reminds me of the old Victory,' observed Reade after a moment.

  'Surely to God the Victory has not been sunk, or sold out of the service?' asked Stephen, quite startled. 'I knew she was old, but thought her immortal, the great ark of the world.'

  'No, sir, no,' said Reade patiently. 'We saw her in the chops of the Channel, not two days out. What I mean is in ancient times, in the last age, before the war even, she used to have a mizzen like that. We have a picture of her at home: my father was her second lieutenant at Toulon, you know. But come, sir, you will have to shift your coat or go below. The Captain will be aboard any minute now.'

  'Perhaps I should disappear,' said Stephen, passing a hand over his unshaven chin.

  The Surprise, having checked her way, received her Captain with all the ceremony she could manage in her present state. The bosun's mates piped the side; Tom Pullings, acting as first lieutenant, Mr Grainger, the second, Mr Adams, the clerk and de facto purser, and both midshipmen, all in formal clothes, took off their hats; and the Captain touched his own to the quarterdeck. Then with a nod to Pullings he went below, where Killick, who had been watching his progress from the moment he left the Franklin, had a pot of coffee ready.

  Attracted by the smell, Stephen walked in, holding a sharpened razor in his hand; but perceiving that Jack and Pullings meant to talk about matters to do with the ship he drank only two cups and withdrew to the fore-cabin in which he usually had his being. Jack called after him 'As soon as Martin has changed his clothes, he will be on deck, you know,' and at the same time Killick, whose never very amiable character had been soured still further by having to look after both Captain and Doctor for years and years, burst in at the forward door with Stephen's good coat over his arm. In a shrill, complaining voice he cried, 'What, ain't you even shaved yet? God love us, what a disgrace it will bring to the ship.'