Hornblower and the Hotspur

Chapter XXI

With the wind dropping Hotspur had swung to her anchors, and now from the stern window of the chart-room USS Constitution was visible, revealed by her lights as she rode idly in slack water.

“If you please, sir,” asked Doughty, as respectful as ever, “what is this place?”

“Cadiz,” replied Hornblower; his surprise was only momentary at the ignorance of a prisoner immured below—it was possible that some even of the crew still did not know. He pointed through the cabin window. “And that’s an American frigate, the Constitution.”

“Yes, sir.”

Until Hornblower had seen the Constitution at anchor he had been visualizing a drab future for Doughty, as a penniless refugee on the waterfront at Cadiz, not daring to ship as a hand before the mast in some merchant ship for fear of being pressed and recognized, starving at worst as a beggar, at best as a soldier enlisted in the ragged Spanish army. A better future than the rope, all the same. Now there was a better one still. Ships of war never had enough men, even if Preble did not need a good steward.

Bailey came in from the cabin with the last bottle of claret.

“Doughty will decant that,” said Hornblower. “And Doughty, see that those glasses are properly clean. I want them to sparkle.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Bailey, get for’ard to the galley. See that there’s a clear fire ready for the marrow bones.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

It was as simple as that as long as each move was well-timed. Doughty applied himself to decanting the claret while Bailey bustled out.

“By the way, Doughy, can you swim?”

Doughty did not raise his head.

“Yes, sir,” his voice was hardly more than a whisper. “Thank you, sir.”

Now the expected knock on the door.

“Boat’s coming alongside, sir!”

“Very well, I’ll come.”

Hornblower hurried out on to the quarter-deck and down the gangway to greet the visitor. Darkness had fallen and Cadiz Bay was quite placid, like a dark mirror.

Mr. Carron wasted no time; he hurried aft ahead of Hornblower with strides that equalled Hornblower’s at his hastiest. When he sat in a chair in the chart-room he seemed to fill the little place completely, for he was a big heavily built man. He mopped his forehead with his handkerchief and then readjusted his wig.

“A glass of claret, sir?”

“Thank you.” Mr. Carron still wasted no time, plunging into business while Hornblower filled the glasses.

“You’re from the Channel Fleet?”

“Yes, sir, under orders from Admiral Cornwallis.”

“You know about the situation then. You know about the flota?” Carron dropped his voice at the last words.

“Yes, sir. I’m here to take back the latest news to the frigate squadron.”

“They’ll have to act. Madrid shows no sign of yielding.”

“Very well, sir.”

“Godoy’s terrified of Boney. The country doesn’t want to fight England but Godoy would rather fight than offend him.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m sure they’re only waiting for the flota to arrive and then Spain will declare war. Boney wants to use the Spanish navy to help out his scheme for invading England.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Not that the Dons will be much help to him. There isn’t a ship here ready for sea. But there’s the Felicite here. Forty-four guns. You saw her, of course?”

“Yes, sir.”

“She’ll warn the flota if she gets an inkling of what’s in the wind.”

“Of course, sir.”

“My last news is less than three days old. The courier had a good journey from Madrid. Godoy doesn’t know yet that we’ve found out about the secret clauses in the treaty of San Ildefonso, but he’ll guess soon enough by the stiffening of our attitude.”

“Yes, sir.”

“So the sooner you get away the better. Here’s the despatch for the officer commanding the intercepting squadron. I prepared it as soon as I saw you coming into the Bay.”

“Thank you, sir. He’s Captain Graham Moore in the Indefatigable.”

Hornblower put the despatch into his pocket. He had been aware for some time of sounds and subdued voices from the cabin next door, and he guessed the reason. Now there was a knock and Bush’s face appeared round the door.

“One moment, please, Mr. Bush. You ought to know I’m busy. Yes, Mr. Carron?”

Bush was the only man in the ship who would dare to intrude at that moment, and he only if he thought the matter urgent.

“You had better leave within the hour.”

“Yes, sir. I was hoping you might sup with me this evening.”

“Duty before pleasure, although I thank you. I’ll cross the bay now and make the arrangements with the Spanish authorities. The land breeze will start to make before long, and that will take you out.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Make every preparation for weighing anchor. You know of the twenty-four hour rule?”

“Yes, sir.”

Under the rules of neutrality a ship of one contending nation could not leave a neutral harbour until one whole day after the exit of a ship of another contending nation.

“The Dons may not enforce it on the Felicite, but they’ll certainly enforce it on you if you give them the opportunity. Two-thirds of Felicite’s crew are in the taverns of Cadiz at this moment, so you must take your chance now. I’ll be here to remind the Dons about the twenty-four hour rule if she tries to follow you. I might delay her at least. The Dons don’t want to offend us while the flota’s still at sea.”

“Yes, sir. I understand. Thank you, sir.”

Carron was already rising to his feet, with Hornblower following his example.

“Call the Consul’s boat,” said Hornblower as they emerged on to the quarter-deck, Bush still had something to say, but Hornblower still ignored him.

And even when Carron had left there was still an order for Bush with which to distract him.

“I want the small bower hove in, Mr. Bush, and heave short on the best bower.”

“Aye aye, sir. If you please, sir—”

“I want this done in silence, Mr. Bush. No pipes, no orders that Felicite can hear. Station two safe men at the capstan with old canvas to muffle the capstan pawls. I don’t want a sound.”

“Aye aye, sir. But—”

“Go and attend to that yourself personally, if you please, Mr. Bush.”

No one else dare intrude on the captain as he strode the quarter-deck in the warm night. Nor was it long before the pilot came on board; Carron had certainly succeeded in hastening the slow process of the Spanish official mind. Topsails sheeted home, anchor broken out, Hotspur glided slowly down the bay again before the first gentle puffs of the nightly land breeze, with Hornblower narrowly watching the pilot. It might be a solution of the Spaniard’s problem if Hotspur were to take the ground as she went to sea, and Hornblower determined that should not happen. It was only after the pilot had left them and Hotspur was standing out to the south westward that he had a moment to spare for Bush.

“Sir! Doughty’s gone.”

“Gone?”

It was too dark on the quarter-deck for Hornblower’s face to be seen, and he tried his best to make his voice sound natural.

“Yes, sir. He must have nipped out of the stern window of your cabin, sir. Then he could have lowered himself into the water by the rudder-pintles, right under the counter where no-one could see him, and then he must have swum for it, sir.”

“I’m extremely angry about this, Mr. Bush. Somebody will smart for it.”

“Well, sir—”

“Well, Mr. Bush?”

“It seems you left him alone in the cabin when the Consul came on board, sir. That’s when he took his chance.”

“You mean it’s my fault, Mr. Bush?”

‘Well, yes, sir, if you want to put it that way.”

“M’m. Maybe you’re right, even if I do say it.” Hornblower paused, still trying to be natural. “God, that’s an infuriating thing to happen. I’m angry with myself. I can’t think how I came to be so foolish.”

“I expect you had a lot on your mind, sir.”

It was distasteful to hear Bush standing up for his captain in the face of his captain’s self-condemnation.

“There’s just no excuse for me. I’ll never forgive myself.”

“I’ll mark him as ‘R’ on the ship’s muster, sir.”

“Yes. You’d better do that.”

Cryptic initials in the ship’s muster rolls told various stories—‘D’ for ‘discharged’, ‘D D’ for ‘dead’, and ‘R’ for ‘run’—deserted.

“But there’s some good news, too, Mr. Bush. In accordance with my orders I must tell you, Mr. Bush, in case of something happening to me, but none of what I’m going to say is to leak out to the ship’s company.”

“Of course, sir.”

Treasure; prize money, doubloons and dollars. A Spanish treasure fleet. If there were anything that could take Bush’s mind off the subject of Doughty’s escape from justice it was this.

“It’ll be millions, sir!” said Bush.

“Yes. Millions.”

The seamen in the five ships would share one quarter of the prize money—the same sum as would be divided between five captains—and that would mean six hundred pounds a man. Lieutenants and masters and captains of marines would divide one eighth. Fifteen thousand pounds for Bush, at a rough estimate.

“A fortune, sir!”

Hornblower’s share would be ten of those fortunes.

“Do you remember, sir, the last time we captured a flota? Back in ‘99, I think it was, sir. Some our Jacks when they got their prize money bought gold watches an’ fried ‘em on Gosport Hard, just to show how rich they were.”

“Well, you can sleep on it, Mr. Bush, as I’m going to try to do. But remember, not a word to a soul.”

“No, sir. Of course not, sir.”

The project might still fail. The flota might evade capture and escape into Cadiz; it might have turned back; it might never have sailed. Then it would be best if the Spanish government—and the world at large—did not know that such an attempt had ever been contemplated.

These thoughts, and these figures, should have been stimulating, exciting, pleasant, but tonight, to Hornblower, they were nothing of the sort. They were Dead Sea fruit, turning to ashes in the mouth. Hornblower snapped at Bailey and dismissed him; then he sat on his cot, too low spirited even to be cheered by the swaying of the cot under his seat to tell him that Hotspur was at sea again, bound on a mission of excitement and profit. He sat with drooping head, deep in depression. He had lost his integrity, and that meant he had lost his self-respect. In his life he had made mistakes, whose memory could still make him writhe, but this time he had done far more. He had committed a breach of duty. He had connived at—he had actually contrived—the escape of a deserter, of a criminal. He had violated his sworn oath, and he had done so from mere personal reasons, out of sheer self-indulgence. Not for the good of the service, not for his country’s cause, but because he was a soft-hearted sentimentalist. He was ashamed of himself, and the shame was all the more acute when his pitiless self-analysis brought up the conviction that, if he could relive those past hours, he would do the same again.

There were no excuses. The one he had used, that the Service owed him a life after all the perils he had run, was nonsense. The mitigating circumstance that discipline would not suffer, thanks to the new exciting mission, was of no weight. He was a self-condemned traitor; worse still, he was a plausible one, who had carried through his scheme with deft neatness that marked the born conspirator. That first word he had thought of was the correct one; integrity, and he had lost it. Hornblower mourned over his lost integrity like Niobe over her dead children.