“Have the signal ‘Tack’ bent and ready to send up, Mr. Vincent.”
The Pluto was very near now.
“Brace the mizzen tops’l up, Mr. Bush.”
The Sutherland gathered speed again—she had just the distance allowed by the slackening of the hawser in which to gather way and go about before the two began to interfere. Hornblower watched the cable and estimated the speed of the ship through the water.
“Now, Mr. Bush! That signal, Mr. Vincent!”
The helm was put down, the yards braced up, with Rayner forward attending to the fore topmast staysail. She was coming round, her canvas volleying as she came into the wind; on board the Pluto as they read the signal they had the sense to put their own helm down too, and with steerage way upon her she began to come round a little and allow Hornblower a little more room for his manoeuvres. Now the Sutherland was over on the opposite tack, and gathering way, but the Pluto was only half way round. There would be a terrific jerk in a moment. Hornblower watched the tightening cable rising from the sea.
“Standby, Mr. Gerard!”
The jerk came, and the Sutherland shuddered. The drag of the cable across her stern was doing the most fantastic things to her—Hornblower could hear Gerard volleying orders to the quartermasters at the wheel and down the grating to the men at the relieving tackles below. For one palpitating second it seemed as if she must be dragged back and thrown in irons, but Gerard at the wheel and Bush at the braces and Rayner forward fought her tooth and nail. Shuddering, she paid off again, and the Pluto followed her round. They were over on the other tack at least heading northwards towards the comparative safety of the Gulf of the Lion.
Hornblower looked at the green-topped Cape Creux, close in now, and a little forward of the port beam. It was going to be a very near-run thing, for besides her own natural leeway the Sutherland was being dragged to leeward by the dead weight of the Pluto, and her speed through the water towards safety was diminished by the same dead weight. It was going to be a very near thing indeed. Hornblower stood with the wind howling round him, his busy mind plunged into calculations of drift and distance again. He looked back at the Pluto, not rolling so badly now that she had way on her. The towrope was at an angle to the length of the Sutherland, and the Pluto was at a further angle to the towrope. He could rely on Elliott to make the most economical use of his helm, but the drag on the Sutherland must be tremendous. He ought to try to get a little more speed out of the Sutherland, but with a full gale blowing it was dangerous to spread any more canvas. If a sail were to split or a spar carry away they would be on the shore in no time.
He looked towards the land again, to measure the diminishing distance, and as he looked a warning rose out of the sea a cable’s length away like a ghost. It was a pillar of water six feet high, which rose from the breast of a wave and vanished as quickly and as mysteriously as it had risen. Hornblower could hardly believe he had seen it, but a glance at Crystal’s and Bush’s faces, intentionally immobile, assured him that he had. A cannon ball had plunged into the water there, calling up that splash, although in the high wind he had neither heard the shot nor seen the smoke from the land. The battery on Cape Creux was firing at him, and he was nearly in range. Soon there would be forty-two-pounder balls coming about his ears.
“Flagship’s signalling, sir,” said Vincent.
On board the Pluto they had managed to attach a block to the top of the stump of the foremast and sent up a signal; the fluttering flags could be seen clearly from the Sutherland’s quarterdeck.
“’Flag to Sutherland’,” read Vincent. “’Cast off—two—if necessary’.”
“Reply ‘Submit not necessary’.”
They must make more speed through the water, there was no doubt about that. It was an interesting problem in chances, but more of the sort to appeal to a player of hazard than a whist player. To set more sail increased the danger to both ships at the same time as it gave them a greater chance of reaching safety. Yet if he set more sail and lost a spar he still might possibly struggle with the Sutherland out of danger, and the Pluto would be no more lost than she would be if he cast her off ignominiously now.
“Mr. Bush, I’ll have the reefs shaken out of the fore tops’l.”
“Aye aye, sir,” said Bush. He had anticipated the necessity for it, and he had guessed that his captain would choose the bolder course—he was learning fast, even at his age, was Bush.
The topmen went running up the rigging and out along the fore topsail yard; standing on the swaying foot ropes with the gale howling round them, holding on by their elbows over the yard, they struggled with the reef points. The sail shook itself out with a loud flap, and the Sutherland heeled sharply over under the increased pressure. Hornblower noticed the flat catenary curve of the heavy cable astern flatten itself a trifle more, but the rope gave no sign of breaking under the strain. Despite the increased heel of the ship the men at the wheel were actually finding their task a little easier, for the leverage of the big fore topsail forward tended to balance the ternal drag of the tow aft.
He glanced at the land just in time to see a puff of smoke from the summit of Cape Creux, blown instantly into invisibility by the gale. Where the shots fell he could not tell at all, for he neither saw nor heard them; the sea was too rough for the splashes to be easily seen. But the fact that the battery was firing showed that they must at least be almost in range—they were circling on the very edge of ruin. Nevertheless, the Sutherland was making better speed through the water, and looking aft he could see preparations advancing on the Pluto’s deck for setting up a jury main mast. Any fragment of sail which the Pluto could carry would ease the Sutherland’s task enormously, and in an hour they might have the work completed. Yet in an hour darkness would have come to shield them from the fire of the battery; in an hour their fate would be decided one way or another. Everything depended on the occurrences of the next hour.
The sun had broken through the westerly clouds now, changing the hills and mountains of Spain from grey to gold. Hornblower nerved himself to endure the waiting during the next hour, and the Sutherland and the Pluto came through that hour successfully. At the end of that time they had weathered Cape Creux, and had drawn so far to the northward that the land under their lee had dropped away abruptly from a mile and a half distant to fifteen miles. Night found them safe, and Hornblower very weary.
Chapter XVII
“Captain Hornblower will command the landing party,” said Admiral Leighton, finally.
Elliott and Bolton both nodded in entire agreement as they sat round the council table in the Pluto’s cabin. A landing party six hundred strong, contributed by three ships of the line, was certainly a captain’s command, and Hornblower was equally certainly the best captain to command it. They had been expecting some such move as this ever since the Pluto had returned refitted from Port Mahon, and Leighton had shifted his flag back into her from the Caligula. The coming and going of Colonel Villena from the shore had heralded it, too. For three weeks the Caligula and the Sutherland had ranged along the coast of Catalonia, and the Pluto returning had brought back welcome fresh provisions, the Sutherland’s prize crews, and even a dozen new hands for each ship. With the crews at full strength they might well strike a heavy blow, and the capture of Rosas, if it could be effected, would undoubtedly throw the whole of the French arrangements for the subjection of Catalonia into confusion.