ace of hearts. 'From what I am told by Mr Pellworm, an old experienced Baltic pilot, it is more likely to be next year.'
'But I have heard of the passage made in four days - we came very quickly - and the wind is now blowing towards England. Mr Pellworm is trying to make our meat creep: he told me the same thing.'
'Certainly there is a very vicious tendency in Mr Pellworm and in many other mariners to terrify the landsman; and to be sure the wind blows from the north-east. But you are to consider that we are not yet out of the Sleeve; we have yet to weather the Skaw, and the wind is coming more northward still.'
'Oh, indeed,' said Jagiello, looking perfectly blank.
'As a cavalry officer,' said Stephen, 'you have perhaps not fully appreciated the importance, the primordial importance of the breeze in maritime affairs. Even I was not wholly imbued with it until I had been many years at sea. Let us suppose that this three-shilling piece represents the Skaw, that notorious headland, innocent in appearance but death to ships,' he said, placing a coin on the left-hand side of the table. 'And this,' placing another on the right, 'Gothenburg, on the Swedish main, with some ten leagues between them. And here, with the island of Lesso somewhat behind us, or abaft, as we say, is the convoy, represented by these pennies and ha'pence. Now you must know that a ship's head can be usefully pointed no nearer the wind than six points of the compass, or sixty-seven and a half degrees; and although she may appear to be travelling that close to the origin of the breeze, in fact her true course is by no means the same, for there is also a lateral motion, execrated by the seamen, known as leeway. This depends on the impetuosity of the billows and a host of other factors, but I believe I may say that in the present conditions it must amount to two points. That is to say, we are really moving at right angles to the wind.'
'Then all is well,' cried Jagiello, 'because the wind being in the north-east we clear the Skaw.'
'With all my heart,' said Stephen, 'but if it moves to the north, if it moves the four points between north-east and north, then the other arm of the angle inevitably moves a corresponding distance south; and you will readily perceive that the arm strikes the headland as soon as it has passed through fifteen degrees, or considerably less than the four points of which I speak. Furthermore, Mr Jagiello, furthermore, even if we do creep round the Skaw, Mr Pellworm promises us the wind is likely to shift even west of north, perhaps even into the dreaded west itself, growing more violent as it does so; and once the breeze rises to a gale, the leeway to which I referred increases, so that when topsails are obliged to be taken in, or handed, we reckon at least four points. So that once we are round the Skaw we have Jammer Bay under our lee, with the wind blowing directly upon it: we no longer travel at right angles to the wind but at some hundred and twenty degrees from it, gradually slanting towards the hostile coast and its mortal breakers. We may throw out anchors; but there is little confidence to be placed in anchors during a gale of wind. They drag; the ship drives; and in the hours that follow we have ample time to deplore our ineluctable fate, regretting, no doubt, lost opportunities of pleasure, even of reform. Such, Mr Jagiello, are what a former shipmate of mine called the impervious horrors of a leeward shore. Small wonder that Captain Aubrey regards the coast as being far too near at twenty miles away; small wonder that Mr Pellworm, who has seen the ships of a numerous convoy together with two great men-of-war miserably shattered along the reefs of Jammer Bay, should wish to bear up, or down, or away, and run for Kungsbacka.'
Twice in what was left of the night he heard Jack come below and move quietly about, drinking from the jug of negus or groping for a piece of Swedish bun; but having fallen into a deep sleep a little after dawn he did not see him until breakfast.
Captain Aubrey's face, though pink and freshly shaved, showed marks of a long active anxious night; it was comparatively thin, and he was setting about his meal with a wolfish appetite. 'There you are, Stephen,' he cried. 'Good morning to you. I did not look to see you yet awhile, and I am sorry to say I have ate the last of the bacon. The dish was empty before I was aware.'
'It is always the same old squalid tale,' said Stephen. 'May I at least hope there is a tint of coffee left?'
'Had you shown a leg sooner, you would have saved your bacon,' said Jack. 'Ha, ha, ha, Stephen: did you hear that? Saved your bacon: it came to me in a flash.'
'Sure there is nothing like spontaneous wit,' said Stephen: and after a pause. 'Tell me, what of the night? And how do we stand?'
'It was tolerably rough, but consummate seamanship brought us through, and we just weathered the Skaw in the middle watch, though with precious little to spare -five miles at the most.'
'So we are round?' said Stephen, rasping his three days' beard. He was still stupid from his heavy sleep; the memory of an erotic dream (the first since his renewed acquaintance with Diana) was still strong in his mind. He was a frowzy, unwashed object, his wits not yet gathered into an orderly troop, whereas Jack was in the full tide of daily life.
'Yes and we are bowling along under all plain sail at a good seven knots, the breeze at north by east. When you come on deck you will see the Holmes six or seven leagues on the larboard beam. But poor Maudsley had to bear up, with his merchantmen sagging to leeward so. The convoy has run for Kungsbacka.'
'Do not tell me the transports have turned back, God forbid - oh surely the transports are round?'
'Of course they are. What a fellow you are, Stephen: how could I have possibly left them in the Sleeve? They may not be much to look at, but they are good weatherly ships and they came round as well as the Ariel. Good officerlike captains, too: I shall invite them to dinner, as soon as the weather moderates.'
'So Pellworm's west wind did not eventuate, at all?'
'Not so far, at any rate.'
'And there was I, telling Jagiello of the perils of a leeward shore with a wealth of technical detail that would have amazed you.' Jack smiled. 'I say the accuracy of my account would have amazed you,' said Stephen. 'And I flatter myself that even you would have found no fault in my description of the long-drawn-out horror of a vessel so situated, or entrapped.'
'I am sure I should not,' said Jack gravely. 'You could not exaggerate it if you tried.'
'Why I did so I cannot tell,' observed Stephen, more human now that he had absorbed his morning draught. 'Perhaps it was some obscure derangement of my humours. My intention was certainly malignant: I wished to make him uneasy, to take away from his superabundant cheerfulness. I believe I succeeded: I certainly brought truth and deep conviction to the task. I regret it now.'
'Never be so concerned. If you frightened him, the effect wore off in the night; I saw him running about on deck before I came below, laughing like a holiday.'
'What a daedal maze,' said Stephen, referring to the workings of his mind and holding up a piece of toast as
