The Young Hornblower Omnibus Page 29

  The captain had been standing by watching this orderly progress of the ship’s routine. Now he raised his voice.

  “Mr. Buckland!”

  “Sir!”

  The captain mounted a couple of steps of the quarterdeck ladder so that he might be clearly seen, and raised his voice so that as many as possible could hear his words.

  “Rope-yarn Sunday today.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  “And double rum for these good men.”

  “Aye aye, sir.”

  Buckland did his best to keep the discontent out of his voice. Coming on top of the captain’s previous speech this was almost too much. A rope-yarn Sunday meant that the men would spend the rest of the day in idleness. Double rum in that case most certainly meant fights and quarrels among the men. Bush, coming aft along the maindeck, was well aware of the disorder that was spreading among the crew, pampered by their captain. It was impossible to maintain discipline when every adverse report made by the officers was ignored by the captain. Bad characters and idlers were going unpunished; the willing hands were beginning to sulk, while the unruly ones were growing openly restless. “These good men,” the captain had said. The men knew well enough how bad their record had been during the last week. If the captain called them “good men” after that, worse still could be expected next week. And besides all this the men most certainly knew about the captain’s treatment of his lieutenants, of the brutal reprimands dealt out to them, the savage punishments. “Today’s wardroom joint is tomorrow’s lower-deck stew,” said the proverb, meaning that whatever went on aft was soon being discussed in a garbled form forward; the men could not be expected to be obedient to officers whom they knew to be treated with contempt by the captain. Bush was worried as he mounted the quarterdeck.

  The captain had gone in under the half-deck to his cabin; Buckland and Roberts were standing by the hammock nettings deep in conversation, and Bush joined them.

  “These articles apply to my officers,” said Buckland as he approached.

  “Rope-yarn Sunday and double rum,” added Roberts. “All for these good men.”

  Buckland shot a furtive glance round the deck before he spoke next. It was pitiful to see the first lieutenant of a ship of the line taking precautions lest what he should say should be overheard. But Hornblower and Wellard were on the other side of the wheel. On the poop the master was assembling the midshipmen’s navigation class with their sextants to take their noon sights.

  “He’s mad,” said Buckland in as low a voice as the northeast trade wind would allow.

  “We all know that,” said Roberts.

  Bush said nothing. He was too cautious to commit himself at present.

  “Clive won’t lift a finger,” said Buckland. “He’s a ninny if there ever was one.”

  Clive was the surgeon.

  “Have you asked him?” asked Roberts.

  “I tried to. But he wouldn’t say a word. He’s afraid.”

  “Don’t move from where you are standing, gentlemen,” broke in a loud harsh voice; the well-remembered voice of the captain, speaking apparently from the level of the deck on which they stood. All three officers started in surprise.

  “Every sign of guilt,” blared the voice. “Bear witness to it, Mr. Hobbs.”

  They looked round them. The skylight of the captain’s fore cabin was open a couple of inches, and through the gap the captain was looking at them; they could see his eyes and his nose. He was a tall man and by standing on anything low, a book or a footstool, he could look from under the skylight over the coaming. Rigid, the officers waited while another pair of eyes appeared under the skylight beside the captain’s. They belonged to Hobbs, the acting-gunner.

  “Wait there until I come to you, gentlemen,” said the captain, with a sneer as he said the word “gentlemen”. “Very good, Mr. Hobbs.”

  The two faces vanished from under the skylight, and the officers had hardly time to exchange despairing glances before the captain came striding up the ladder to them.

  “A mutinous assembly, I believe,” he said.

  “No, sir,” replied Buckland. Any word that was not a denial would be an admission of guilt, on a charge that could put a rope round his neck.

  “Do you give me the lie on my own quarterdeck?” roared the captain. “I was right in suspecting my officers. Plotting. Whispering. Scheming. Planning. And now treating me with gross disrespect. I’ll see that you regret this from this minute, Mr. Buckland.”

  “I intended no disrespect, sir,” protested Buckland.

  “You give me the lie again to my face! And you others stand by and abet him! You keep him in countenance! I thought better of you, Mr. Bush, until now.”

  Bush thought it wise to say nothing.

  “Dumb insolence, eh?” said the captain. “Eager enough to talk when you think my eye isn’t on you, all the same.”

  The captain glowered round the quarterdeck.

  “And you, Mr. Hornblower,” he said. “You did not see fit to report this assembly to me. Officer of the watch, indeed! And of course Wellard is in it too. That is only to be expected. But I fancy you will be in trouble with these gentlemen now, Mr. Wellard. You did not keep a sharp enough lookout for them. In fact you are in serious trouble now, Mr. Wellard, without a friend in the ship except for the gunner’s daughter, whom you will be kissing again soon.”

  The captain stood towering on the quarterdeck with his gaze fixed on the unfortunate Wellard, who shrank visibly away from him. To kiss the gunner’s daughter was to be bent over a gun and beaten.

  “But later will still be sufficient time to deal with you, Mr. Wellard. The lieutenants first, as their lofty rank dictates.”

  The captain looked round at the lieutenants, fear and triumph strangely alternating in his expression.

  “Mr. Hornblower is already on watch and watch,” he said. “You others have enjoyed idleness in consequence, and Satan found mischief for your idle hands. Mr. Buckland does not keep a watch. The high and mighty and aspiring first lieutenant.”

  “Sir—” began Buckland, and then bit off the words which were about to follow. That word “aspiring” undoubtedly implied that he was scheming to gain command of the ship, but a court-martial would not read that meaning into it. Every officer was expected to be an aspiring officer and it would be no insult to say so.

  “Sir!” jeered the captain. “Sir! So you have grace enough still to guard your tongue. Cunning, maybe. But you will not evade the consequences of your actions. Mr. Hornblower can stay on watch and watch. But these two gentlemen can report to you when every watch is called, and at two bells, at four bells, and at six bells in every watch. They are to be properly dressed when they report to you, and you are to be properly awake. Is that understood?”

  Not one of the dumbfounded trio could speak for a moment.

  “Answer me!”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Buckland.

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Bush and Roberts as the captain turned his eyes on them.

  “Let there be no slackness in the execution of my orders,” said the captain. “I shall have means of knowing if I am obeyed or not.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” said Buckland.

  The captain’s sentence had condemned him, Bush, and Roberts to be roused and awakened every hour, day and night.

  IV

  It was pitch dark down here, absolutely dark, not the tiniest glimmer of light at all. Out over the sea was the moonless night, and here it was three decks down, below the level of the sea’s surface—through the oaken skin of the ship could be heard the rush of the water alongside, and the impact of the waves over which the ship rode; the fabric of the ship grumbled to itself with the alternating stresses of the pitch and the roll. Bush hung on to the steep ladder in the darkness and felt for foothold; finding it, he stepped off among the water barrels, and, crouching low, he began to make his way aft through the solid blackness. A rat squeaked and scurried past him, but rats were only to be expected down
here in the hold, and Bush went on feeling his way aft unshaken. Out of the blackness before him, through the multitudinous murmurings of the ship, came a slight hiss, and Bush halted and hissed in reply. He was not self-conscious about these conspiratorial goings on. All precautions were necessary, for this was something very dangerous that he was doing.

  “Bush!” whispered Buckland’s voice.

  “Yes”

  “The others are here.”

  Ten minutes before, at two bells in the middle watch, Bush and Roberts had reported to Buckland in his cabin in obedience to the captain’s order. A wink, a gesture, a whisper, and the appointment to meet here was made; it was an utterly fantastic state of affairs that the lieutenants of a King’s ship should have to act in such a fashion for fear of spies and eavesdroppers, but it had been necessary. Then they had dispersed and by devious routes and different hatchways had made their way here. Hornblower, relieved by Smith on watch, had preceded them.

  “We mustn’t be here long,” whispered Roberts.

  Even by his whisper, even in the dark, one could guess at his nervousness. There could be no doubt about this being a mutinous assembly. They could all hang for what they were doing.

  “Suppose we declare him unfit for command?” whispered Buckland. “Suppose we put him in irons?”

  “We’d have to do it quick and sharp if we do it at all,” whispered Hornblower. “He’ll call on the hands and they might follow him. And then—”

  There was no need for Hornblower to go on with that speech. Everyone who heard it formed a mental picture of corpses swaying at the yard-arms.

  “Supposing we do it quick and sharp?” agreed Buckland. “Supposing we get him into irons?”

  “Then we go on to Antigua,” said Roberts.

  “And a court-martial,” said Bush, thinking as far ahead as that for the first time in this present crisis.

  “Yes,” whispered Buckland.

  Into that flat monosyllable were packed various moods—inquiry and despair, desperation and doubt.

  “That’s the point,” whispered Hornblower. “He’ll give evidence. It’ll sound different in court. We’ve been punished—watch and watch, no liquor. That could happen to anybody. It’s no grounds for mutiny.”

  “But he’s spoiling the hands.”

  “Double rum. Make and mend. I’ll sound quite natural in court. It’s not for us to criticize the captain’s methods—so the court will think.”

  “But they’ll see him.”

  “He’s cunning. And he’s no raving lunatic. He can talk—he can find reasons for everything. You’ve heard him. He’ll be plausible.”

  “But he’s held us up to contempt before the hands. He’s set Hobbs to spy on us.”

  “That’ll be a proof of how desperate his situation was, surrounded by us criminals. If we arrest him we’re guilty until we’ve proved ourselves innocent. Any court’s bound to be on the captain’s side. Mutiny means hanging.”

  Hornblower was putting into words all the doubts that Bush felt in his bones and yet had been unable to express.

  “That’s right,” whispered Bush.

  “What about Wellard?” whispered Roberts. “Did you hear him scream the last time?”

  “He’s only a volunteer. Not even a midshipman. No friends. No family. What’s the court going to say when they hear the captain had a boy beaten half a dozen times? They’ll laugh. So would we if we didn’t know. Do him good, we’d say, the same as it did the rest of us good.”

  A silence followed this statement of the obvious, broken in the end by Buckland whispering a succession of filthy oaths that could give small vent to his despair.

  “He’ll bring charges against us,” whispered Roberts. “The minute we’re in company with other ships. I know he will.”

  “Twenty-two years I’ve held my commission,” said Buckland. “Now he’ll break me. He’ll break you as well.”

  There would be no chance at all for officers charged before a court-martial by their captain with behaving with contempt towards him in a manner subversive of discipline. Every single one of them knew that. It gave an edge to their despair. Charges pressed by the captain with the insane venom and cunning he had displayed up to now might not even end in dismissal from the service—they might lead to the prison and the rope.

  “Ten more days before we make Antigua,” said Roberts. “If this wind holds fair—and it will.”

  “But we don’t know we’re destined for Antigua,” said Hornblower. “That’s only our guess. It might be weeks—it might be months.”

  “God help us!” said Buckland.

  A slight clatter farther aft along the hold—a noise different from the noises of the working of the ship—made them all start. Bush clenched his hairy fists. But they were reassured by a voice calling softly to them.

  “Mr. Buckland—Mr. Hornblower—sir!”

  “Wellard, by God!” said Roberts.

  They could hear Wellard scrambling towards them.

  “The captain, sir!” said Wellard. “He’s coming!”

  “Holy God!”

  “Which way?” snapped Hornblower.

  “By the steerage hatchway. I got to the cockpit and came down from there. He was sending Hobbs—”

  “Get for’ard, you three,” said Hornblower, cutting into the explanation. “Get for’ard and scatter when you’re on deck. Quick!”

  Nobody stopped to think that Hornblower was giving orders to officers immensely his senior. Every instant of time was of vital importance, and not to be wasted in indecision, or in silly blasphemy. That was apparent as soon as he spoke. Bush turned with the others and plunged forward in the darkness, barking his shins painfully as he fell over unseen obstructions. Bush heard Hornblower say “Come along, Wellard,” as he parted from them in his mad flight with the others beside him.

  The cable tier—the ladder—and then the extraordinary safety of the lower gundeck. After the utter blackness of the hold there was enough light here for him to see fairly distinctly. Buckland and Roberts continued to ascend to the maindeck; Bush turned to make his way aft. The watch below had been in their hammocks long enough to be sound asleep; here to the noises of the ship was added the blended snoring of the sleepers as the close-hung rows of hammocks swayed with the motion of the ship in such a coincidence of timing as to appear like solid masses. Far down between the rows a light was approaching. It was a horn lantern with a lighted purser’s dip inside it, and Hobbs, the acting-gunner, was carrying it, and two seamen were following him as he hurried along. There was an exchange of glances as Bush met the party. A momentary hesitation on Hobbs’ part betrayed the fact that he would have greatly liked to ask Bush what he was doing on the lower gundeck, but that was something no acting-warrant officer, even with the captain’s favour behind him, could ask of a lieutenant. And there was annoyance in Hobbs’ expression, too; obviously he was hurrying to secure all the exits from the hold, and was exasperated that Bush had escaped him. The seamen wore expressions of simple bewilderment at these goings on in the middle watch. Hobbs stood aside to let his superior pass, and Bush strode past him with no more than that one glance. It was extraordinary how much more confident he felt now that he was safely out of the hold and disassociated from any mutinous assembly. He decided to head for his cabin; it would not be long before four bells when by the captain’s orders he had to report again to Buckland. The messenger sent by the officer of the watch to rouse him would find him lying on his cot. But as Bush went on and had progressed as far as the mainmast he arrived in the midst of a scene of bustle which he would most certainly have taken notice of if he had been innocent and which consequently he must (so he told himself) ask about now that he had seen it—he could not possibly walk by without a question or two. This was where the marines were berthed, and they were all of them out of their hammocks hastily equipping themselves—those who had their shirts and trousers on were putting on their crossbelts ready for action.

  “What’s all
this?” demanded Bush, trying to make his voice sound as it would have sounded if he had no knowledge of anything irregular happening in the ship except this.

  “Dunno, sir,” said the private he addressed. “We was just told to turn out—muskets an’ side arms and ball cartridge, sir.”

  A sergeant of marines looked out through the screen which divided the non-commissioned officers’ bay from the rest of the deck.

  “Captain’s orders, sir,” he said; and then with a roar at the men. “Come on! Slap it about, there!”

  “Where’s the captain, then?” asked Bush with all the innocence he could muster.

  “Aft some’eres, sir. ’E sent for the corpril’s guard same time as we was told to turn out.”

  Four marine privates and a corporal supplied the sentry who stood day and night outside the captain’s cabin. A single order was all that was needed to turn out the guard and provide the captain with at least a nucleus of armed and disciplined men ready for action.

  “Very well, Sergeant,” said Bush, and he tried to look puzzled and to hurry naturally aft to find out what was going on. But he knew what fear was. He felt he would do anything rather than continue this walk to encounter whatever was awaiting him at the end of it. Whiting, the captain of marines, made his appearance, sleepy and unshaven, belting on his sword over his shirt.

  “What in hell—?” he began, as he saw Bush.

  “Don’t ask me!” said Bush, striving after that natural appearance. So tense and desperate was he at that moment that his normally quiescent imagination was hard at work. He could imagine the prosecutor in the deceptive calm of a court-martial saying to Whiting, “Did Mr. Bush appear to be his usual self?” and it was frightfully necessary that Whiting should be able to answer, “Yes.” Bush could even imagine the hairy touch of a rope round his neck. But next moment there was no more need for him to simulate surprise or ignorance. His reactions were genuine.

  “Pass the word for the doctor,” came the cry. “Pass the word, there.”