Hornblower in the West Indies

over-driven schooner worked her seams open in the heavy swell. The hourly casting of the log, the daily calculation of the ship’s run, were eagerly anticipated by men who usually displayed all the fatalistic indifference towards these matters of the hardened sailor.

“I am shortening the water allowance, My Lord,” said Harcourt to Hornblower the first morning out.

“To how much?” Hornblower asked the question trying to appear as if he were really interested in the answer, so that his misery over something else should not be apparent.

“To half a gallon, My Lord.”

Two quarts of fresh water a day per man—that would be hardship for men labouring hard in the tropics.

“You are quite right, Mr. Harcourt,” said Hornblower.

Every possible precaution must be taken. It was impossible to predict how long the voyage would last, nor how long they would have to remain on patrol without refilling their water casks; it would be absurd if they were driven prematurely into port as a result of thoughtless extravagance.

“I’ll instruct Giles,” went on Hornblower, “to draw the same ration for me.”

Harcourt blinked a little at that; his small experience with Admirals led him to think they led a life of maximum luxury. He had not thought sufficiently far into the problem to realise that if Giles had a free hand as regards drinking water for his Admiral, Giles, and perhaps all Giles’s friends, would also have all the drinking water they needed. And there was no smile on Hornblower’s face as he spoke; Hornblower wore the same bleak and friendless expression that he had displayed towards everyone since reaching his decision when they went to sea.

They sighted Cape San Antonio one afternoon, and knew they were through the Yucatan Channel; not only did this give them a fresh departure, but they knew that from now on it would not be extremely unlikely for them to sight Daring at any moment; they were pursuing very much the same course as she would be taking, from this point onwards. Two nights later they passed Grand Cayman; they did not sight it but they heard the roar of the surf on one of the outlying reefs. That was a proof of how closely Harcourt was cutting his corners; Hornblower felt that he would have given Grand Cayman a wider berth than that—it was a moment when he chafed more than usual at the convention which prohibited an Admiral from interfering in the management of his flagship. The following night they picked up soundings on the Pedro Bank, and knew that Jamaica and Kingston were a scant hundred miles to windward of them. From this new departure Harcourt could set a fresh course, direct for the Tobago Channel, but he could not hold it. The trade wind took it into its head to veer round south of east, as was not surprising with midsummer approaching, and it blew dead foul. Harcourt laid Crab on the starboard tack—never voluntarily would any captain worth his salt yield a yard to the southward in the Caribbean—and clawed his way as close to the wind as Crab would lie.

“I see you’ve taken in the tops’ls, Mr. Harcourt,” remarked Hornblower, venturing on ticklish ground.

“Yes, My Lord.” In response to his Admiral’s continued enquiring glance Harcourt condescended to explain further. “A beamy schooner like this isn’t intended to sail on her side, My Lord. We make less leeway under moderate sail like this, My Lord, as long as we’re close-hauled with a strong breeze.”

“You know your own ship best, of course, Mr. Harcourt,” said Hornblower, grudgingly.

It was hard to believe that Crab was making better progress without her magnificent square topsails spread to the breeze. He could be sure that Daring would have every stitch of canvas spread—perhaps a single reef. Crab thrashed on her way, once or twice shipping it green over her starboard bow; those were the moments when it was necessary for every man to grab and hold on. At dawn next morning there was land right ahead, a blue line on the horizon—the mountains of Haiti. Harcourt held on until noon, raising them farther and farther out of the water, and then he went about. Hornblower approved—in an hour or two the land breeze might set in and there was Beata Point to weather. It was maddening that on this tack they would actually be losing a little ground, for it was perfectly possible that Daring, wherever she was, might have the wind a point or two more in her favour and could be able to hold her course direct. And it was quite remarkable to see the foremast hands raising wetted fingers to test the wind, and studying the windward horizon, and criticising the way the quartermaster at the tiller struggled to gain every yard to windward that he could.

For a day and a half the wind blew foul; in the middle of the second night Hornblower, lying sleepless in his cot, was roused by the call for all hands. He sat up and reached for his dressing-gown while feet came running above his head. Crab was leaping madly.

“All hands shorten sail!”

“Three reefs in the mains’l!” Harcourt’s voice was pealing out as Hornblower reached the deck.

The wind blew the tails of Hornblower’s dressing-gown and nightshirt up round him as he stood out of the way by the taffrail; darkness was roaring all round him. A midsummer squall had come hurtling at them in the night, but someone had had a weather eye lifting and had been prepared for it. Out of the southward had come the squall.

“Let her pay off!” shouted Harcourt. “Hands to the sheets!”

Crab came round in a welter of confused water, plunged and then steadied. Now she was flying along in the darkness, belying her unlovely name. She was gaining precious distance to the northward; an invaluable squall this was, as long as it permitted them to hold this course. The roaring night was hurrying by; Hornblower’s dressing-gown was whipping about his legs. It was impossible not to feel exhilarated to stand thus, compelling the elements to work in their favour, cheating the wind that thought to take them by surprise.

“Well done, Mr. Harcourt,” shouted Hornblower into the wind as Harcourt came and stood beside him in the darkness.

“Thank you, sir—My Lord. Two hours of this is what we need.”

Fate granted them an hour and a half at any rate, before the squall died away and the trade wind pigheadedly resumed its former direction of east by south. But next morning at breakfast Giles was able to report good news.

“Wind’s backing to the nor’rard, My Lord,” he said—Giles was as interested as everyone else in the vessel’s progress.

“Excellent,” said Hornblower; it was only some seconds later that the dull pain grew up again inside him. That wind would bear him more swiftly to his fate.

As the day wore on the trade wind displayed some of its midsummer freakishness. It died away, died away more and more, until it blew only in fitful puffs, so that there were intervals when Crab drifted idly over the glassy blue sea, turning her head to all points of the compass in turn, while the vertical sun blazed down upon a deck in whose seams the pitch melted. Flying fish left fleeting dark tracks upon the enamel surface of the sea. No one cared; every eye was scanning the horizon for the first hint of the next cat’s-paw of wind creeping towards them. Perhaps, not too far away in this moody Caribbean, Daring was holding her course with all sail set and drawing. The day ended and the night went by, and still the trade wind did not blow; only occasionally would a puff send Crab ghosting along momentarily towards the Tobago Channel. The sun blazed down, and men limited to two quarts of water a day were thirsty, thirsty all the time.

They had seen very few sail, and the ones they saw were of no use in furthering Hornblower’s plans. An island schooner bound to Belize. A Dutchman homeward bound from Curacao, no one with whom Hornblower could entrust a letter, and no ship of his own squadron—that was something almost beyond the bounds of possibility. Hornblower could only wait, as the days went by, in grim, bleak patience. At last the freakish wind blew again, from one point north of east, and they were able to hold their course, with topsails set again, heading steadily for the Antilles, reeling off as much as six knots hour after hour. Now as they approached the islands they saw more sails, but they were only inter-island sloops trading between the Leeward Islands and Trinidad. A square rigger seen on the horizon roused momentary excitement, but she was not the Daring. She flew the red and gold of Spain—a Spanish frigate heading for the Venezuelan coast, presumably to deal with the insurgents. The voyage was nearly completed; Hornblower heard the cry of land from the masthead lookout, and it was only a moment before Gerard came into the cabin.

“Grenada in sight, My Lord.”

“Very well.”