“Aye aye, sir.”
She was one of the small craft employed in the pilchard fishery, very similar to those seen off the Cornish coast. She was engaged at the moment in hauling in her seine; as Hotspur approached more closely the telescope made plain the rhythmical movements of the four men.
“Up with the helm a little more, Mr Prowse, if you please. I’d like to pass her closer still.”
Now Hornblower could make out a little area of water beside the fishing-boat that was of a totally different colour. It had a metallic sheen quite unlike the rest of the grey sea; the fishing-boat had found a shoal of pilchards and her seine was now closing in on it.
“Mr Bush. Please try to read her name.”
They were fast closing on her; within a few moments Bush could make out the bold white letters on her stern.
“From Brest, sir. Duke’s Freers.”
With that prompting Hornblower could read the name for himself, the Deux Frères, Brest.
“Back the maintops’l, Mr Young!” bellowed Hornblower to the officer of the watch, and then, turning back to Bush and Prowse, “I want fish for my supper tonight.”
They looked at him in ill-concealed surprise.
“Pilchards, sir?”
“That’s right.”
The seine was close in alongside the Deux Frères, and masses of silver fish were being heaved up into her. So intent were the fishermen on securing their catch that they had no knowledge of the silent approach of the Hotspur, and looked up in ludicrous astonishment at the lovely vessel towering over them in the sunset. They even displayed momentary panic, until they obviously realized that in time of peace a British ship of war would do them less harm than a French one might, a French one enforcing the Inscription Maritime.
Hornblower took the speaking-trumpet from its beckets. He was pulsing with excitement now, and he had to be firm with himself to keep calm. This might be the first step in the making of the history of the future; besides, he had not spoken French for a considerable time and he had to concentrate on what he was going to say.
“Good day, captain!” he yelled, and the fishermen, reassured, waved back to him in friendly fashion. “Will you sell me some fish?”
Hurriedly they conferred, and then one of them replied.
“How much?”
“Oh, twenty pounds.”
Again they conferred.
“Very well.”
“Captain,” went on Hornblower, searching in his mind not only for the necessary French words but also for an approach to bring about the situation he desired. “Finish your work. Then come aboard. We can drink a glass of rum to the friendship of nations.”
The beginning of that sentence was clumsy, he knew, but he could not translate ‘Get in your catch;’ but the prospect of British navy rum he knew would be alluring — and he was a little proud of l’amitié des nations. What was the French for ‘dinghy?’ Chaloupe, he fancied. He expanded on his invitations and someone in the fishing-boat waved in assent before bending to the business of getting in the catch. With the last of it on board two of the four men scrambled into the dinghy that lay alongside the Deux Frères; it was nearly as big as the fishing-boat itself, as was to be expected when she had to lay out the seine. Two oars stoutly handled brought the dinghy rapidly towards Hotspur.
“I’ll entertain the captain in my cabin,” said Hornblower. “Mr Bush, see that the other man is taken forward and well looked after. See he has a drink.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
A line over the side brought up two big buckets of fish, and these were followed by two blue-jerseyed men who scrambled up easily enough despite their sea-boots.
“A great pleasure, captain,” said Hornblower in the waist to greet him. “Please come with me.”
The captain looked curiously about him as he was led up to the quarter-deck and aft to the cabin. He sat down cautiously in the only chair while Hornblower perched on the cot. The blue jersey and trousers were spangled with fish scales — the cabin would smell of fish for a week. Hewitt brought rum and water, and Hornblower poured two generous glasses; the captain sipped appreciatively.
“Has your fishing been successful?” asked Hornblower, politely.
He listened while the captain told him, in his almost unintelligible Breton French, about the smallness of the profits to be earned in the pilchard fishery. The conversation drifted on. It was an easy transition from the pleasure of peace to the possibilities of war — two seamen could hardly meet without that prospect being discussed.
“I suppose they make great efforts to man the ships of war?”
The captain shrugged.
“Certainly.”
The shrug told much more than the word.
“It marches very slowly, I imagine,” said Hornblower, and he captain nodded.
“But of course the ships are ready to take the sea?”
Hornblower had no idea of how to say ‘laid-up in ordinary’ in French, and so he had to ask the question in the opposite sense.
“Oh, no,” said the captain. He went on to express his contempt for the French naval authorities. There was not a single ship of the line ready for service. Of course not.
“Let me refill your glass, captain,” said Hornblower. “I suppose the frigates receive the first supplies of men?”
Such supplies as there were, perhaps. The Breton captain was not sure. Of course there was — Hornblower had more than a moment’s difficulty at this point. Then he understood. The frigate Loire had been made ready for sea last week (it was the Breton pronunciation of that name which had most puzzled Hornblower) for service in Far Eastern waters, but with the usual idiocy of the naval command had now been stripped of most of her trained men to provide nuclei for the other ships. The Breton captain, whose capacity for rum was quite startling, did nothing to conceal either the smouldering Breton resentment against the atheist regime now ruling France or the contempt of a professional user of the sea for the blundering policies of the Republican Navy. Hornblower had only to nurse his glass and listen, his faculties at full stretch to catch all the implications of a conversation in a foreign language. When at last the captain rose to say good-bye there was a good deal of truth in what Hornblower said, haltingly, about his regrets at the termination of the visit.
“Yet perhaps even if war should come, captain, we may still meet again. As I expect you know, the Royal Navy of Great Britain does not make war on fishing vessels. I shall always be glad to buy some of your catch.”
The Frenchman was looking at him keenly now, perhaps because the subject of payment was arising. This was a most important moment, calling for accurate judgement. How much? What to say?
“Of course I must pay for today’s supply,” said Hornblower, his hand in his pocket. He took out two ten-franc pieces and dropped them into the horny palm, and the captain could not restrain an expression of astonishment from appearing in his weather-beaten face. Astonishment, followed instantly by avarice, and then by suspicion, calculation, and finally by decision as the hand clenched and hurried the money into a trouser-pocket. Those emotions had played over the captain’s face like the colours of a dying dolphin. Twenty francs in gold, for a couple of buckets of pilchards; most likely the captain supported himself, his wife and children for a week on twenty francs. Ten francs would be a week’s wage for his hands. This was important money; either the British captain did not know the value of gold or —. At least there was the indubitable fact that the French captain was twenty francs richer, and there was at least the possibility of more gold where this came from.