Bush’s glance was more direct even than usual when he came to make his report.
“We’re still sighting Naiad now and then, sir, but not a chance of signals being read.”
This was the day when by Captain Chambers’s orders they were free to run for harbour.
“Yes. I don’t think we can bear away in this wind and sea.”
Bush’s expression revealed a mental struggle. Hotspur‘s powers of resistance to the present battering were not unlimited, but on the other hand to turn tail and run would be an operation of extreme danger.
“Has Huffnell reported to you yet, sir?”
“Yes,” said Hornblower
There were nine hundred-gallon casks of freshwater left down below, which had been standing in the bottom tier for a hundred days. And now one of them had proved to be contaminated with seawater and was hardly drinkable. The others might perhaps be even less so.
“Thank you, Mr Bush,” said Hornblower, terminating the interview. “We’ll remain hove-to for today at least.”
Surely a wind of this force must moderate soon, even though Hornblower had a premonition that it would not.
Nor did it. The slow dawn of the new day found Hotspur still labouring under the dark clouds, the waves still as wild, the wind still as insane. The time had come for the final decision, as Hornblower well knew as he came out on deck in his clammy clothes. He knew the dangers, and he had spent a large part of the night preparing his mind to deal with them.
“Mr Bush, we’ll get her before the wind.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
Before she could come before the wind she would have to present her vulnerable side to the waves. There would be seconds during which she could be rolled over on to her beam ends, beaten down under the waves, pounded into a wreck.
“Mr Cargill!”
This was going to be a moment far more dangerous than being chased by the Loire, and Cargill would have to be trusted to carry out a similar duty as on a tense occasion then. Face close to face, Hornblower shouted his instructions.
“Get for’ard. Make ready to show a bit of the fore-topmast stays’l. Haul it up when I wave my arm.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Get it in the moment I wave a second time.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Mr Bush! We shall need the fore-tops’l.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Goose-wing it.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Stand by the sheets. Wait for me to wave my arm the second time.”
“The second time. Aye aye, sir.”
Hotspur‘s stern was nearly as vulnerable as her side. If she presented it to the waves while stationary she would be ‘pooped’ — a wave would burst over her and sweep her from stern to stem, a blow she would probably not survive. The fore-topsail would give her the necessary way, but spreading it before she was before the wind would lay her over on her beam ends. ‘Goose-winging it’ — pulling down the lower corners while leaving the centre portion still furled — would expose less canvas than the reefed sail; enough in that gale to carry her forward at the necessary speed.
Hornblower took his station beside the wheel, where he could be clearly seen from forward. He ran his eyes aloft to make sure that the preparations for goose-winging the fore-topsail were complete, and his gaze lingered for a while longer as he observed the motion of the spars relative to the wild sky. Then he transferred his attention to the sea on the weather side, to the immense rollers hurrying towards the ship. He watched the roll and the pitch; he gauged the strength of the howling wind which was trying to tear him from his footing. That wind was trying to stupefy him, to paralyse him, too. He had to keep the hard central core of himself alert and clear thinking while his outer body was numbed by the wind.
A rogue wave burst against the weather bow in a huge but fleeting pillar of spray, the green mass pounding aft along the waist, and Hornblower swallowed nervously while it seemed as if Hotspur would never recover. But she did, slowly and wearily, rolling off the load from her deck. As she cleared herself the moment came, a moment of regularity in the oncoming waves, with her bow just lifting to the nearest one. He waved his arm, and saw the slender head of the fore-topmast stay-sail rising up the stay, and the ship lay over wildly to the pressure.
“Hard-a-port,” he yelled to the hands at the wheel.
The enormous leverage of the stay-sail, applied to the bowsprit, began to swing the Hotspur round like a weather vane; as she turned, the wind thrusting more and more from aft gave her steerage way so that the rudder could bite and accelerate the turn. She was down in the trough of the wave but turning, still turning. He waved his arm again. The clews of the fore-topsail showed themselves as the hands hauled on the sheets, and Hotspur surged forward with the impact of the wind upon the canvas. The wave was almost upon them, but it disappeared out of the tail of Hornblower’s eye as Hotspur presented first her quarter and then her stern to it.
“Meet her! Midships!”
The tug of the sail on the foremast would put Hotspur right before the wind without the use of the rudder; indeed the rudder would only delay her acquiring all the way she could. Time enough to put the rudder to work again when she was going at her fastest. Hornblower braced himself for the impact of the wave now following them up. The seconds passed and then it came, but the stern had begun to lift and the blow was deprived of its force. Only a minor mass of water burst over the taffrail, to surge aft again as Hotspur lifted her bows. Now they were racing along with the waves; now they were travelling through the water ever so little faster. That was the most desirable point of speed; there was no need to increase or decrease even minutely the area of canvas exposed to the goose-winged fore-topsail. The situation was safe and yet unutterably precarious, balanced on a knife edge. The slightest yawing and Hotspur was lost.
‘Keep her from falling off!’ Hornblower yelled to the men at the wheel, and the grizzled senior quartermaster, his wet grey ringlets flapping over his cheeks from out of his sou’wester, nodded without taking his eyes from the fore-topsail. Hornblower knew — with his vivid imagination he could feel the actual sensation up his arms — how uncertain and unsatisfactory was the feel of wheel and rudder when running before a following sea, the momentary lack of response to the turning spokes, the hesitation of the ship as a mounting wave astern deprived the fore-topsail of some of the wind that filled it, the uncontrolled slithering sensation as the ship went down a slope. A moment’s inattention — a moment’s bad luck — could bring ruin.
Yet here they were momentarily safe before the wind, and running for the Channel. Prowse was already staring into the binnacle and noting the new course on the traverse board, and at a word from him Orrock and a seaman struggled aft to cast the log and determine the speed. And here came Bush, ascending to the quarter-deck, grinning over the success of the manoeuvre and with the exhilaration of the new state of affairs.
“Course nor’east by east, sir,” reported Prowse. “Speed better than seven knots.”