Hornblower 05 - Hornblower and the Atropos (23 page)

“I see, sir.”

“You're quite sure you do?”

“Yes, sir.”

It was irksome being dependent on Turner to interpret for him. With Spanish authorities, or French, Hornblower could have conducted his own negotiations, but not with Turks.

“Remember, that's the first thing you ask, the very first. Have two French ships touched here? Then you can go on to get permission to fill the water casks. We'll buy fresh vegetables, too, and a couple of bullocks, if we can.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Keep it in your mind all the time that we're scouting for Admiral Harvey. Don't forget it for a moment, and then everything will be all right.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

The lateen boat was nearing them fast, making surprising speed with the small evening wind; there was a respectable bubble of foam under her bow. She came running close alongside and hove-to, the lateen sail flapping until they brailed up the upper portion.

“Turks, sir, not Greeks,” said Turner.

Hornblower could have guessed that without Turner's help; the boat's crew was dressed in dirty white gowns; they wore on their heads round red hats wreathed in dirty white turbans. The gray-bearded man who stood up in the stern wore a red sash about his waist, from which hung a curved sword. He hailed Atropos in a thin high voice. Turner hailed back; the jargon he spoke was the lingua franca of the Levant, and Hornblower tried to guess at what was being said. Italian, French, English, Arabic, Greek, all contributed to the language, he knew. It was a little strange to hear the words “Horatio Hornblower” come clearly through the incomprehensible remainder.

“Who is this fellow?” he asked.

“The Mudir, sir. The local Jack-in-office. Harbour master — preventive officer. He is asking about our bill of health, sir.”

“Don't forget to ask about the French ships,” said Hornblower.

“Aye aye, sir.”

The shouted conversation went on; Hornblower caught the word “fregata” more than once. The gray-beard in the boat extended his hands in a negative gesture and went on to supplement it with a further sentence.

“He says there have been no French ships in here for years, sir,” said Turner.

“Ask him if he has heard about any along the coast or in the islands?”

The gray-beard clearly disclaimed all knowledge.

“Tell him,” said Hornblower, “I'll give him five pieces of gold for news of the French.”

There was something infectious in the atmosphere, in this Oriental talk — that was the only explanation Hornblower could think of for his using the outlandish expression “pieces of gold”. There was no reason why he should not have said “guineas” to Turner. The gray-beard shook his head again; Hornblower, looking keenly at him fancied that the offer impressed him nevertheless. He asked another question and Turner answered.

“I've told him about the British squadron in the offing, sir,” he reported.

“Good.”

There was no harm in having the Turks believe he had a powerful force to back him up. Now the gray-beard was gesturing with the fingers of one hand outstretched as he answered some question of Turner's.

“He says he wants five piastres a hogshead for us to fill our water casks, sir,” said Turner. “That's a shilling each.”

“Tell him — tell him I'll give him half.”

The conversation continued; the western sky was beginning to redden with the sunset as the sun sank lower. At last the gray-beard waved in farewell, and the boat turned away and unfurled her sail to the dying wind.

“They've gone back to spread their mats for the evening prayer, sir,” said Turner. “I've promised him ten guineas for everything. That gives us the right to land at the jetty over there, to fill our water casks, and to buy in the market that he'll open in the morning. He'll take his share of what we pay there, you can be sure, sir.”

“Very well, Mr. Turner. Mr. Jones!”

“Sir!”

“With the first light in the morning I'm going to start sweeping for the wreck. I'll have the sweep prepared now.”

“Er — aye aye, sir.”

“A hundred fathoms of one-inch line, if you please, Mr. Jones. Two nine-pounder shot. Have a net made for each, and attach them ten fathoms apart at equal distances from the ends of the line. Is that clear?”

“Not—not quite, sir.”

Because he was honest about it Hornblower refrained from remarking on his slowness of comprehension.

“Take a hundred fathoms of line and attach one shot forty-five fathoms from one end and another forty-five fathoms from the other end. Is that clear now?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You can get the launch and long boat into the water now, ready for the morning. They'll carry the sweep between them, dragging the bottom for the wreck. Tell off the boats' crews for duty. I want to start work at first dawn, as I said. And we'll need grapnels and buoys to mark what we find. Nothing conspicuous — planks will do, with seventeen fathoms of line to each. You understand all that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Carry on, then, Mr. Turner, report in my cabin in fifteen minutes' time, if you please. Messenger! My compliments to the doctor, and I'd like to see him in my cabin immediately.”

Hornblower felt like a juggler at a fair, keeping half a dozen balls in the air at once. He wanted to hear from the doctor how McCullum was progressing after the operation; he wanted to discuss with Turner the question of what local authorities might be likely to be present in Marmorice to interfere with his work there; he wanted to make all preparations for the next morning; he wanted to be ready with his own plans for raising the treasure if McCullum was unable to give advice; and night orders for the care of the ship in this harbour of doubtful neutrality had to be written; it was only late in the evening that he remembered something else — something of which he was reminded only by a suddenly noticed feeling of emptiness inside him. He had eaten nothing since breakfast. He ate biscuit and cold meat, crunching the flinty fragments hurriedly at his cabin table before hurrying on deck again into the darkness.

It was a chilly night, and the young moon had already set. No breath of air now ruffled the black surface of the water of the bay, smooth enough to bear faint reflections of the stars. Black and impenetrable was the water, beneath which lay a quarter of a million pounds sterling. It was as impenetrable as his future, he decided, leaning on the bulwark. An intelligent man, he decided, would go to bed and sleep, having done all that his forethought and ingenuity could devise, and an intelligent man would worry no further for the moment. But he had to be very firm with himself to drive himself to bed and allow his utter weariness of body and mind to sweep him away into unconsciousness.

It was still dark when he was called, dark and cold, but he ordered coffee for himself and sipped it as he dressed. Last night when he had given the time for his being called he had allowed for a leisurely dressing before daylight, but he felt tense and anxious as he got out of bed, much as he had felt on other occasions when he had been roused in the night to take part in a cutting-out expedition or a dawn landing, and he had to restrain himself from putting on his clothes in haphazard fashion and hurrying on deck. He forced himself to shave, although that was an operation which had mostly to be carried out by touch because the hanging lamp gave almost no illumination to the mirror. The shirt he pulled on felt clammy against his ribs; he was struggling with his trousers when a knock at the door brought in Eisenbeiss, reporting in obedience to overnight orders.

“The patient is sleeping well, sir,” he announced.

“Is his condition good?”

“I thought I should not disturb him, sir. He was sleeping quietly, so I could not tell if he had fever nor could I examine the wound. I can wake him if you wish, sir —”

“No, don't do that, of course. I suppose it's a good symptom that he's sleeping in any case?”

“A very good one, sir.”

“Then leave him alone, doctor. Report to me if there is any change.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

Hornblower buttoned his trousers and thrust his feet into his shoes. His eagerness to be on deck overcame his self-restraint to the extent that he was still buttoning his coat as he went up the companion. On deck as well the atmosphere seemed to be charged with that feeling of impending attack at dawn. There were the dimly-seen figures of the officers, silhouetted against the sky. To the east there was the faintest illumination, a little light reaching half-way up to the zenith, so faint as almost to be unnoticed, and its colour, in its turn, was so faint a shade of pink as hardly to be called that.

“Morning,” said Hornblower in response to the touched hats of his subordinates.

In the waist he could hear orders being quietly given — just like manning the boats for a cutting-out expedition.

“Longboat's crew starboard side,” said Smiley's voice.

“Launch's crew port side.” That was the Prince's voice. He was acquiring a better accent than Eisenbeiss's.

“There's some surface mist, sir,” reported Jones. “But it's very patchy.”

“So I see,” replied Hornblower.

“Last night we were lying two cables' lengths from the wreck as near as makes no matter, sir,” said Turner. “We've swung during the night, with the wind dropping, but little enough.”

“Tell me when it's light enough for you to get your bearings.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

In that short time the eastern sky had changed. One might almost have said it had darkened, but perhaps that was because with the tiny increase in the general illumination the contrast was not so marked.

“You took a third bearing at the time when Speedwell went down, Mr. Turner?”

“Yes, sir. It was —”

“No matter.”

Turner could be relied upon to manage a simple piece of business of that sort.

“I don't expect the wreck has moved an inch, sir,” said Turner. “There's no tide here. No scour. The two rivers that run into the Bay don't set up any current you can measure.”

“And the bottom's firm sand?”

“Firm sand, sir.”

That was something to be thankful for. In mud the wreck might have sunk beyond discovery.

“How the devil did Speedwell come to capsize?” asked Hornblower.

“Sheer bad luck, sir. She was an old ship and she'd been at sea a long time. The weeds and the barnacles were thick along her waterline — she wasn't coppered high enough, sir. So they were heeling her, cleaning her port side, with the guns run out to starboard and all the weights they could shift over to starboard too. It was a still day, baking hot. Then, before you could say Jack Robinson, there came a gust out of the mountains. It caught her square on the port beam and laid her over before she could pay off. The gun ports were open and the water came up over the sills. That laid her over still more — at least, that's what the court of inquiry found, sir — and with her hatchways open the water rose over the coamings and down she went.”

“Did she right herself as she sank?”

“No, sir. I looked over at her when I heard the shout, and I saw her keel. Bottom upwards she went. Her top-masts were snapped clean off. They came up soon enough, main and fore top-masts still anchored to the wreck by a shroud or two. That was a help when it came to taking the bearings.”

“I see,” said Hornblower.

Dawn was coming up fast. It actually seemed — an optical illusion, of course — as if great arms of colour were climbing up the sky from the eastern horizon at a pace perceptible to the eye.

“It's light enough now, sir,” said Turner.

“Thank you. Mr. Jones! You can carry on.”

Hornblower watched them go, Turner leading the way in the gig with his instruments and compass, Still following behind in the launch with Smiley in the longboat attached to the launch by the sweep. Hornblower became acutely aware that despite the cup of coffee he had drunk he wanted his breakfast. It seemed almost against his will that he lingered. This dead still calm at dawn was the ideal time for an operation of this sort; it enabled the gig to take up and maintain a position with the least possible effort. The ripples caused by the boat's passage, slow though it was, spread far over the glassy surface of the Bay before dying out at last. He saw the gig stop, and clearly over the water came the sound of Turner's voice as he spoke through his speaking trumpet to the other boats. They jockeyed round into position awkwardly, like two beetles tied together with a thread, and then they paid out the sweep between them, manoeuvred awkwardly again for a moment as they laid themselves exactly upon the correct bearing, and then the oars began to swing rhythmically, slowly, like the pendulum of Fate, as the boats began to sweep the area ahead of them. Hornblower's heart beat faster despite himself, and he swallowed with excitement. Around him the ship was beginning her normal life. Amid the peculiar patter of bare feet on wooden planking — a sound unlike any other on earth — the watch below were bringing their hammocks to stow in the nettings. Swabs and holystones, buckets and pump; the hands not at work in the boats began the eternal daily routine of washing down the decks. Not for the first time on the voyage Hornblower found himself experiencing a momentary envy of the seamen at their work. Their problems were of the simplest, their doubts were minute. To holystone a portion of planking to the whiteness demanded by a petty officer, to swab it off, to swab it dry, working in amicable companionship with friends of long standing, dabbling their naked feet in the gush of clear water — that was all they had to do, as they had done for an infinity of mornings in the past and would do for an infinity of mornings in the future. He would be glad to exchange with them his loneliness, his responsibility, the complexity of his problems; so he felt for a moment before he laughed at himself, knowing perfectly well he would be horrified if some freak of Fate forced such an exchange on him. He turned away, changing the subject of his thoughts; a generous slice of fat pork, fried to a pale brown — there had been a leg in soak for him for the past two days, and the outside cut would be not too salty now. It would smell delicious — he could almost smell it at this very moment. Holy Jerusalem, unless it was still spluttering on his plate when it was put before him despite the journey from galley to cabin he'd make someone wish he had never been born. And he would have biscuit crumbs fried with it, and he would top it off with black treacle smeared on a biscuit, thick. That was a breakfast worth thinking about.