The Examination For Lieutenant
H.M.S. Indefatigable was gliding into Gibraltar Bay, with Acting-Lieutenant Horatio Hornblower stiff and self-conscious on the quarterdeck beside Captain Pellew. He kept his telescope trained over toward Algeciras; it was a strange situation, this, that major naval bases of two hostile powers should be no more than six miles apart, and while approaching the harbour it was as well to keep close watch on Algeciras, for there was always the possibility that a squadron of Spaniards might push out suddenly to pounce on an unwary frigate coming in.
'Eight ships — nine ships with their yards crossed, sir,' reported Hornblower.
'Thank you,' answered Pellew. 'Hands 'bout ship.'
The Indefatigable tacked and headed in toward the Mole. Gibraltar harbour was, as usual, crowded with shipping, for the whole naval effort of England in the Mediterranean was perforce based here. Pellew clewed up his topsails and put his helm over. Then the cable roared out and the Indefatigable swung at anchor.
'Call away my gig,' ordered Pellew.
Pellew favoured dark blue and white as the colour scheme for his boat and its crew — dark blue shirts and white trousers for the men, with white hats with blue ribbons. The boat was of dark blue picked out with white, the oars had white looms and blue blades. The general effect was very smart indeed as the drive of the oars sent the gig skimming over the water to carry Pellew to pay his respects to the port admiral. It was not long after his return that a messenger came scurrying up to Hornblower.
'Captain's compliments, sir, and he'd like to see you in his cabin.'
'Examine your conscience well,' grinned Midshipman Bracegirdle. 'What crimes have you committed?'
'I wish I knew,' said Hornblower, quite genuinely.
It is always a nervous moment going in to see the captain in reply to his summons. Hornblower swallowed as he approached the cabin door, and he had to brace himself a little to knock and enter. But there was nothing to be alarmed about; Pellew looked up with a smile from his desk.
'Ah, Mr Hornblower, I hope you will consider this good news. There will be an examination for lieutenant to-morrow, in the Santa Barbara there. You are ready to take it, I hope?'
Hornblower was about to say 'I suppose so, sir,' but checked himself.
'Yes, sir,' he said — Pellew hated slipshod answers.
'Very well, then. You report there at three P.M. with your certificates and journals.'
'Aye aye, sir.'
That was a very brief conversation for such an important subject. Hornblower had Pellew's order as acting-lieutenant for two months now. To-morrow he would take his examination. If he should pass the admiral would confirm the order next day, and Hornblower would be a lieutenant with two month's seniority already. But if he should fail! That would mean he had been found unfit for lieutenant's rank. He would revert to midshipman, the two months' seniority would be lost, and it would be six months at least before he could try again. Eight months' seniority was a matter of enormous importance. It would affect all his subsequent career.
'Tell Mr Bolton you have my permission to leave the ship to-morrow, and you may use one of the ship's boats.'
'Thank you, sir.'
'Good luck, Hornblower.'
During the next twenty-four hours Hornblower had not merely to try to read all through Norie's Epitome of Navigation again, and Clarke's Complete Handbook of Seamanship, but he had to see that his number one uniform was spick and span. It cost his spirit ration to prevail on the warrant cook to allow the gunroom attendant to heat a flatiron in the galley and iron out his neck handkerchief Bracegirdle lent him a clean shirt, but there was a feverish moment when it was discovered that the gunroom's supply of shoe blacking had dried to a chip. Two midshipmen had to work it soft with lard, and the resultant compound, when applied to Hornblower's buckled shoes, was stubbornly resistant to taking a polish; only much labour with the gunroom's moulting shoebrush and then with a soft cloth brought those shoes up to a condition of brightness worthy of an examination for lieutenant. And as for the cocked hat — the life of a cocked hat in the midshipman's berth is hard, and some of the dents could not be entirely eliminated.
'Take it off as soon as you can and keep it under your arm,' advised Bracegirdle. 'Maybe they won't see you come up the ship's side.'
Everybody turned out to see Hornblower leave the ship, with his sword and his white breeches and his buckled shoes, his bundle of journals under his arm and his certificates of sobriety and good conduct in his pocket. The winter afternoon was already far advanced as he was rowed over to the Santa Barbara and went up the ship's side to report himself to the officer of the watch.
The Santa Barbara was a prison hulk, one of the prizes captured in Rodney's action off Cadiz in 1780 and kept rotting at her moorings, mastless, ever since, a storeship in time of peace and a prison in time of war. Redcoated soldiers, muskets loaded and bayonets fixed, guarded the gangways; on forecastle and quarterdeck were carronades, trained inboard and depressed to sweep the waist, wherein a few prisoners took the air, ragged and unhappy. As Hornblower came up the side he caught a whiff of the stench within, where two thousand prisoners were confined. Hornblower reported himself to the officer of the watch as come on board, and for what purpose.
'Whoever would have guessed it?' said the officer of the watch — an elderly lieutenant with white hair hanging down to his shoulders — running his eye over Hornblower's immaculate uniform and the portfolio under his arm. 'Fifteen of your kind have already come on board, and — Holy Gemini, see there!'
Quite a flotilla of small craft was closing in on the Santa Barbara. Each boat held at least one cocked-hatted and white-breached midshipman, and some held four or five.
'Every courtesy young gentleman in the Mediterranean Fleet is ambitious for an epaulet,' said the lieutenant. 'Just wait until the examining board sees how many there are of you! I wouldn't be in your shoes, young shaver, for something. Go aft, there, and wait in the portside cabin.'
It was already uncomfortably full; when Hornblower entered, fifteen pairs of eyes measured him up. There were officers of all ages from eighteen to forty, all in their number one's, all nervous — one or two of them had Norie's Epitome open on their laps and were anxiously reading passages about which they were doubtful. One little group was passing a bottle from hand to hand, presumably in an effort to keep up their courage. But no sooner had Hornblower entered than a stream of newcomers followed him. The cabin began to fill, and-soon it was tightly packed. Half the forty men present found seats on the deck, and the others were forced to stand.
'Forty years back,' said a loud voice somewhere, 'my grandad marched with Clive to revenge the Black Hole of Calcutta. If he could but have witnessed the fate of his posterity!'
'Have a drink,' said another voice, 'and to hell with care.'
'Forty of us,' commented a tall, thin, clerkly officer, counting heads. 'How many of us will they pass, do you think? Five?'
'To hell with care,' repeated the bibulous voice in the corner, and lifted itself in song. 'Begone, dull care; I prithee be gone from me—'
'Cheese it, you fool!' rasped another voice. 'Hark to that!'
The air was filled with the long-drawn twittering of the pipes of the bos'n's mates, and someone on deck was shouting an order.
'A captain coming on board,' remarked someone.
An officer had his eye at the crack of the door. 'It's Dreadnought Foster,' he reported.
'He's a tail twister if ever there was one,' said a fat young officer, seated comfortably with his back to the bulkhead.
Again the pipes twittered.
'Harvey, of the dockyard,' reported the lookout.
The third captain followed immediately. 'It's Black Charlie Hammond,' said the lookout. 'Looking as if he'd lost a guinea and found sixpence.'
'Black Charlie?' exclaimed someone, scrambling to his feet in haste and pushing to the door. 'Let's see! So it is! Then here is one young gentleman who will not stay for an answer. I know too well what that answer would be. ''Six months more at sea, sir, and damn your eyes for your impertinence in presenting yourself for examination in your present state of ignorance.'' Black Charlie won't ever forget that I lost his pet poodle overside from the cutter in Port-o'-Spain when he was first of the Pegasus. Good-bye, gentlemen. Give my regards to the examining board.'
With that he was gone, and they saw him explaining himself to the officer of the watch and hailing a shore boat to take him back to his ship. 'One fewer of us, at least,' said the clerkly officer. 'What is it, my man?'
'The board's compliments, sir,' said the marine messenger, 'an' will the first young gentleman please to come along?'
There was a momentary hesitation; no one was anxious to be the first victim.
'The one nearest the door,' said an elderly master's mate. 'Will you volunteer, sir?'
'I'll be the Daniel,' said the erstwhile lookout desperately. 'Remember me in your prayers.'
He pulled his coat smooth, twitched at his neckcloth, and was gone, the remainder waiting in gloomy silence, relieved only by the glug-glug of the bottle as the bibulous midshipman took another swig. A full ten minutes passed before the candidate for promotion returned, making a brave effort to smile.
'Six months more at sea?' asked someone.
'No,' was the unexpected answer. 'Three! I was told to send the next man. It had better be you.'
'But what did they ask you?'
'They began by asking me to define a rhumb line… But don't keep them waiting, I advise you.' Some thirty officers had their textbooks open on the instant to reread about thumb lines.
'You were there ten minutes,' said the clerkly officer, looking at his watch. 'Forty of us, ten minutes each — why, it'll be midnight before they reach the last of us. They'll never do it.'
'They'll be hungry.' said someone.
'Hungry for our blood,' said another.
'Perhaps they'll try us in batches,' suggested a third, 'like the French tribunals.'
Listening to them, Hornblower was reminded of French aristocrats jesting at the foot of the scaffold. Candidates departed and candidates returned, some gloomy, some smiling. The cabin was already far less crowded; Hornblower was able to secure sufficient deck space to seat himself, and he stretched out his legs with a nonchalant sigh of relief, and he no sooner emitted the sigh than he realized that it was a stage effect which he had put on for his own benefit. He was as nervous as he could be. The winter night was falling, and some good Samaritan on board sent in a couple of purser's dips to give a feeble illumination to the darkening cabin.
'They are passing one in three,' said the clerkly officer, making ready for his turn. 'May I be the third.'
Hornblower got to his feet again when he left; it would be his turn next. He stepped out under the halfdeck into the dark night and breathed the chill fresh air. A gentle breeze was blowing from the southward, cooled, presumably, by the snow-clad Atlas Mountains of Africa across the strait. There was neither moon nor stars. Here came the clerkly officer back again.
'Hurry,' he said. 'They're impatient.'
Hornblower made his way past the sentry to the after cabin; it was brightly lit, so that he blinked as he entered, and stumbled over some obstruction. And it was only then that he remembered that he had not straightened his neckcloth and seen to it that his sword hung correctly at his side. He went on blinking in his nervousness at the three grim faces across the table.
'Well, sir?' said a stern voice. 'Report yourself. We have no time to waste.'
'H-Hornblower, sir. H-Horatio H-Hornblower. M-Midshipman — I mean Acting-Lieutenant, H.M.S. Indefatigable.'
'Your certificates, please,' said the right-hand face.
Hornblower handed them over, and as he waited for them to be examined, the left-hand face suddenly spoke. 'You are close-hauled on the port tack, Mr Hornblower, beating up channel with a nor-easterly wind blowing hard, with Dover bearing north two miles. Is that clear?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Now the wind veers four points and takes you flat aback. What do you do, sir? What do you do?'
Hornblower's mind, if it was thinking about anything at all at that moment, was thinking about rhumb lines; this question took him as much aback as the situation it envisaged. His mouth opened and shut, but there was no word he could say.
'By now you're dismasted,' said the middle face — a swarthy face; Hornblower was making the deduction that it must belong to Black Charlie Hammond. He could think about that even if he could not force his mind to think at all about his examination.
'Dismasted,' said the left-hand face, with a smile like Nero enjoying a Christian's death agony. 'With Dover cliffs under your lee. You are in serious trouble, Mr — ah — Hornblower.'
Serious indeed. Hornblower's mouth opened and shut again his dulled mind heard, without paying special attention to it, the thud of a cannon shot somewhere not too far off. The board passed no remark on it either, but a moment later there came a series of further cannon shots which brought the three captains to their feet. Unceremoniously they rushed out of the cabin, sweeping out of the way the sentry at the door. Hornblower followed them; they arrived in the waist just in time to see a rocket soar up into the night sky and burst in a shower of red stars. It was the general alarm; over the water of the anchorage they could hear the drums rolling as all the ships present beat to quarters. On the portside gangway the remainder of the candidates were clustered, speaking excitedly.
'See there!' said a voice.
Across half a mile of dark water a yellow light grew until the ship there was wrapped in flame. She had every sail set and was heading straight into the crowded anchorage.
'Fire ships!'
'Officer of the watch! Call my gig!' bellowed Foster.
A line of fire ships was running before the wind, straight at the crowd of anchored ships. The Santa Barbara was full of the wildest bustle as the seamen and marines came pouring on deck, and as captains and candidates shouted for boats to take them back to their ships. A line of orange flame lit up the water, followed at once by the roar of a broadside; some ship was firing her guns in the endeavour to sink a fire ship. Let one of those blazing hulls make contact with one of the anchored ships, even for a few seconds, and the fire would be transmitted to the dry, painted timber, to the tarred cordage, to the inflammable sails, so that nothing would put it out. To men in highly combustible ships filled with explosives fire was the deadliest and most dreaded peril of the sea.
'You shore boat, there!' bellowed Hammond suddenly. 'You shore boat! Come alongside! Come alongside, blast you!'
His eye had been quick to sight the pair-oar rowing by.
'Come alongside or I'll fire into you!' supplemented Foster. 'Sentry, there, make ready to give them a shot!'
At the threat the wherry turned and glided towards the mizzen chains.
'Here you are, gentlemen,' said Hammond.
The three captains rushed to the mizzen chains and flung themselves down into the boat. Hornblower was at their heels. He knew there was small enough chance of a junior officer getting a boat to take him back to his ship, to which it was his bounden duty to go as soon as possible. After the captains had reached their destinations he could use this boat to reach the Indefatigable. He threw himself off into the sternsheets as she pushed off, knocking the breath out of Captain Harvey, his sword scabbard clattering on the gunwale. But the three captains accepted his uninvited presence there without comment.
'Pull for the Dreadnought,' said Foster.
'Dammit, I'm the senior!' said Hammond. 'Pull for Calypso.'
' Calypso it is,' said Harvey. He had his hand on the tiller, heading the boat across the dark water.
'Pull! Oh, pull!' said Foster, in agony. There can be no mental torture like that of a captain whose ship is in peril and he not on board.
'There's one of them,' said Harvey.
Just ahead, a small brig was bearing down on them under topsails; they could see the glow of the fire, and as they watched the fire suddenly burst into roaring fury, wrapping the whole vessel in flames in a moment, like a set piece in a fireworks display. Flames spouted out of the holes in her sides and roared up through her hatchways. The very water around her glowed vivid red. They saw her halt in her career and begin to swing slowly around.
'She's across Santa Barbara 's cable,' said Foster.
'She's nearly clear,' added Hammond. 'God help 'em on board there. She'll be alongside her in a minute.'
Hornblower thought of two thousand Spanish and French prisoners battened down below decks in the hulk.
'With a man at her wheel she could be steered clear,' said Foster. 'We ought to do it!'
Then things happened rapidly. Harvey put the tiller over. 'Pull away!' he roared at the boatmen.
The latter displayed an easily understood reluctance to row up to that fiery hull.
'Pull!' said Harvey.
He whipped out his sword from its scabbard, and the blade reflected the red fire as he thrust it menacingly at the stroke oar's throat. With a kind of sob, stroke tugged at his oar and the boat leaped forward.
'Lay us under her counter.' said Foster. 'I'll jump for it.'
At last Hornblower found his tongue. 'Let me go, sir. I'll handle her.'
'Come with me, if you like,' replied Foster. 'It may need two of us.'
His nickname of Dreadnought Foster may have had its origin in the name of his ship, but it was appropriate enough in all circumstances. Harvey swung the boat under the fire ship's stern; she was before the wind again now, and just gathering way, just heading down upon the Santa Barbara.
For a moment Hornblower was the nearest man in the boat to the brig and there was no time to be lost. He stood up on the thwart and jumped; his hands gripped something, and with a kick and a struggle he dragged his ungainly body up onto the deck. With the brig before the wind, the flames were blown forward; right aft here it was merely frightfully hot, but Hornblower's ears were filled with the roar of the flames and the crackling and banging of the burning wood. He stepped forward to the wheel and seized the spokes, the wheel was lashed with a loop of line, and as he cast this off and took hold of the wheel again he could feel the rudder below him bite into the water. He flung his weight on the spoke and spun the wheel over. The brig was about to collide; with the Santa Barbara, starboard bow to starboard bow, and the flames lit an anxious gesticulating crowd on the Santa Barbara 's forecastle.
'Hard over!' roared Foster's voice in Hornblower's ear.
'Hard over it is!' said Hornblower, and the brig answered her wheel at that moment, and her bow turned away, avoiding the collision.
An immense fountain of flame poured out from the hatchway abaft the mainmast, setting mast and rigging ablaze, and at the same time a flaw of wind blew a wave of flame aft. Some instinct made Hornblower while holding the wheel with one hand snatch out his neckcloth with the other and bury his face in it. The flame whirled round him and was gone again. But the distractions had been dangerous; the brig had continued to turn under full helm, and now her stern was swinging in to bump against the Santa Barbara 's bow. Hornblower desperately spun the wheel over the other way. The flames had driven Foster aft to the taffrail, but now he returned.
'Hard-a-lee!'
The brig was already responding. Her starboard quarter bumped the Santa Barbara in the waist, and then bumped clear.
'Midships!' shouted Foster.
At a distance of only two or three yards the fire ship passed on down the Santa Barbara 's side; an anxious group ran along her gangways keeping up with her as she did so. On the quarterdeck another group stood by with a spar to boom the fire ship off; Hornblower saw them out of the tail of his eye as they went by. Now they were clear.
'There's the Dauntless on the port bow,' said Foster. 'Keep her clear.'
'Aye, aye, sir.'
The din of the fire was tremendous; it could hardly be believed that on this little area of deck it was still possible to breathe and live. Hornblower felt the appalling heat on his hands and face. Both masts were immense pyramids of flame.
'Starboard a point,' said Foster. 'We'll lay her aground on the shoal by the Neutral Ground.'
'Starboard a point,' responded Hornblower.
He was being borne along on a wave of the highest exaltation; the roar of the fire was intoxicating, and he knew not a moment's fear. Then the whole deck only a yard or two forward of the wheel opened up in flame. Fire spouted out of the gaping seams and the heat was utterly unbearable, and the fire moved rapidly aft as the seams gaped progressively backward.
Hornblower felt for the loopline to lash the wheel, but before he could do so the wheel spun idly under his hand, presumably as the tiller ropes below him were burned away, and at the same time the deck under his feet heaved and warped in the fire. He staggered back to the taffrail. Foster was there.
'Tiller ropes burned away, sir,' reported Hornblower.
Flames roared up beside them. His coat sleeve was smouldering.
'Jump!' said Foster.
Hornblower felt Foster shoving him — everything was insane. He heaved himself over, gasped with fright as he hung in the air, and then felt the breath knocked out of his body as he hit the water. The water closed over him, and he knew panic as he struggled back to the surface. It was cold — the Mediterranean in December is cold. For the moment the air in his clothes supported him, despite the weight of the sword at his side, but he could see nothing in the darkness, with his eyes still dazzled by the roaring flames. Somebody splashed beside him.
'They were following us in the boat to take us off,' said Foster's voice. 'Can you swim?'
'Yes, sir. Not very well.'
'That might describe me,' said Foster; and then he lifted his voice to hail, 'Ahoy! Ahoy! Hammond! Harvey! Ahoy!'
He tried to raise himself as well as his voice, fell back with a splash, and splashed and splashed again, the water flowing into his mouth cutting short something he tried to say. Hornblower, beating the water with increasing feebleness, could still spare a thought — such were the vagaries of his wayward mind — for the interesting fact that even captains of much seniority were only mortal men after all. He tried to unbuckle his sword belt, failed, and sank deep with the effort, only just succeeding in struggling back to the surface. He gasped fair breath, but in another attempt he managed to draw his sword half out of its scabbard, and as he struggled it slid out the rest of the way by its own weight; yet he was not conscious of any noticeable relief.
It was then that he heard the splashing and grinding of oars and loud voices, and he saw the dark shape of the approaching boat, and he uttered a spluttering cry. In a second or two the boat was up to them, and he was clutching the gunwale in panic.
They were lifting Foster in over the stern, and Hornblower knew he must keep still and make no effort to climb in, but it called for all his resolution to make himself hang quietly onto the side of the boat and wait his turn. He was interested in this overmastering fear, while he despised himself for it. It called for a conscious and serious effort of willpower to make his hands alternately release their death-like grip on the gunwale, so that the men in the boat could pass him round to the stern. Then they dragged him in and he fell face downward in the bottom of the boat, on the verge of fainting. Then somebody spoke in the boat, and Hornblower felt a cold shiver pass over his skin, and his feeble muscles tensed themselves, for the words spoken were Spanish — at any rate an unknown tongue, and Spanish presumably.
Somebody else answered in the same language. Hornblower tried to struggle up, and a restraining hand was laid on his shoulder. He rolled over, and with his eyes now accustomed to the darkness, he could see the three swarthy faces with the long black moustaches. These men were not Gibraltarians. On the instant he could guess who they were — the crew of one of the fire ships who had steered their craft in past the Mole, set fire to it, and made their escape in the boat. Foster was sitting doubled up, in the bottom of the boat, and now he lifted his face from his knees and stared round him.
'Who are these fellows?' he asked feebly — his struggle in the water had left him as weak as Hornblower.
'Spanish fire ship's crew, I fancy, sir,' said Hornblower. We're prisoners.'
'Are we indeed!'
The knowledge galvanized him into activity just as it had Hornblower. 'He tried to get to his feet, and the Spaniard at the tiller thrust him down with a hand on his shoulder. Foster tried to put his hand away, and raised his voice in a feeble cry, but the man at the tiller was standing no nonsense, He brought out, in a lightning gesture, a knife from his belt. The light from the fire ship, burning itself harmlessly out on the shoal in the distance, ran redly along the blade, and Foster ceased to struggle. Men might call him Dreadnought Foster, but he could recognize the need for discretion.
'How are we heading?' he asked Hornblower, sufficiently quietly not to irritate their captors.
'North, sir. Maybe they're going to land on the Neutral Ground and make for the Line.'
'That's their best chance,' agreed Foster.
He turned his neck uncomfortably to look back up the harbour.
'Two other ships burning themselves out up there,' he said. 'There were three fire ships came in, I fancy.'
'I saw three, sir.'
'Then there's no damage done. But a bold endeavour. Whoever would have credited the Dons with making such an attempt?'
'They have learned about fire ships from us, perhaps, sir,' suggested Hornblower.
'We may have "nursed the pinion that impelled the steel," you think?'
'It is possible, sir.'
Foster was a cool enough customer, quoting poetry and discussing the naval situation while being carried off into captivity by a Spaniard who guarded him with a drawn knife. Cool might be a too accurate adjective; Hornblower was shivering in his wet clothes as the chill night air blew over him, and he felt weak and feeble after all the excitement and exertions of the day.
'Boat ahoy!' came a hail across the water; there was a dark nucleus in the night over there. The Spaniard in the sternsheets instantly dragged the tiller over, heading the boat directly away from it, while the two at the oars redoubled their exertions.
'Guard boat—' said Foster, but cut his explanation short at a further threat from the knife.
Of course there would be a boat rowing guard at this northern end of the anchorage; they might have thought of it.
'Boat ahoy!' came the hail again. 'Lay on your oars or I'll fire into you!'
The Spaniard made no reply, and a second later came the flash and report of a musket shot. They heard nothing of the bullet, but the shot would put the fleet — towards which they were heading again — on the alert. But the Spaniards were going to play the game out to the end. They rowed doggedly on.
'Boat ahoy!'
This was another hail, from a boat right ahead of them. The Spaniards at the oars ceased their efforts in dismay, but a roar from the steersman set them instantly to work again. Hornblower could see the new boat almost directly ahead of them, and heard another hail from it as it rested on its oars. The Spaniard at the tiller shouted an order, and the stroke oar backed water and the boat turned sharply; another order, and both rowers tugged ahead again and the boat surged forward to ram. Should they succeed in overturning the intercepting boat they might make their escape even now, while the pursuing boat stopped to pick up their friends.
Everything happened at once, with everyone shouting at the full pitch of his lungs, seemingly. There was the crash of the collision, both boats heeling wildly as the bow of the Spanish boat rode up over the British boat but failed to overturn it. Someone fired a pistol, and the next moment the pursuing guard boat came dashing alongside, its crew leaping madly aboard them. Somebody flung himself on top of Hornblower, crushing the breath out of him and threatening to keep it out permanently with a hand on his throat. Hornblower heard Foster bellowing in protest, and a moment later his assailant released him, so that he could hear the midshipman of the guard boat apologizing for this rough treatment of a post captain of the Royal Navy. Someone unmasked the guard boat's lantern, and by its light Foster revealed himself, bedraggled and battered. The light shone on their sullen prisoners.
'Boats ahoy!' came another hail, and yet another boat emerged from the darkness and pulled towards them.
'Cap'n Hammond, I believe!' hailed Foster, with an ominous rasp in his voice.
'Thank God!' they heard Hammond say, and the boat pulled into the faint circle of light.
'But no thanks to you,' said Foster bitterly.
'After your fire ship cleared the Santa Barbara a puff of wind took you on faster than we could keep up with you,' explained Harvey.
'We followed as fast as we could get these rock scorpions to row,' added Hammond.
'And yet it called for Spaniards to save us from drowning,' sneered Foster. The memory of his struggle in the water rankled, apparently. 'I thought I could rely on two brother captains.'
'What are you implying, sir?' snapped Hammond.
'I make no implications, but others may read implications into a simple statement of fact.'
'I consider that an offensive remark, sir,' said Harvey, 'addressed to me equally with Captain Hammond.'
'I congratulate you on your perspicacity, sir,' replied Foster.
'I understand,' said Harvey. 'This is not a discussion we can pursue with these men present. I shall send a friend to wait on you.'
'He will be welcome.'
'Then I wish you a very good night, sir.'
'And I, too, sir,' said Hammond. 'Give way there.'
The boat pulled out of the circle of light, leaving an audience open-mouthed at this strange freak of human behaviour, that a man saved first from death and then from captivity should wantonly thrust himself into peril again. Foster looked after the boat for some seconds before speaking; perhaps he was already regretting his rather hysterical outburst.
'I shall have much to do before morning,' he said, more to himself than to anyone near him, and then addressed himself to the midshipman of the guard boat, 'You, sir, will take charge of these prisoners and convey me to my ship.'
'Aye aye, sir.'
'Is there anyone here who can speak their lingo? I would have it explained to them that I shall send them back to Cartagena under cartel, free without exchange. They saved our lives, and that is the least we can do in return.' The final explanatory sentence was addressed to Hornblower.
'I think that is just, sir.'
'And you, my fire-breathing friend. May I offer you my thanks? You did well. Should I live beyond to-morrow, I shall see that authority is informed of your actions.'
'Thank you, sir.' A question trembled on Hornblower's lips. It called for a little resolution to thrust it out, 'And my examination, sir? My certificate?'
Foster shook his head. 'That particular examining board will never reassemble, I fancy. You must wait your opportunity to go before another one.'
'Aye aye, sir,' said Hornblower, with despondency apparent in his tone.
'Now lookee here, Mr Hornblower,' said Foster, turning upon him. 'To the best of my recollection, you were flat aback, about to lose your spars and with Dover cliffs under your lee. In one more minute you would have been failed — it was the warning gun that saved you. Is not that so?'
'I suppose it is, sir.'
'Then be thankful for small mercies. And even more thankful for big ones.'