“Wait!” replied Hornblower.
He looked round him; the three ships locked together, prisoners under guard here, there, and everywhere. Below decks, both in the Bonne Celestine and in the Flame, there were enemies still unsecured, probably many more in total than he had men under his orders. A shattering crash below him, followed by screams and cries; the Flame shook under a violent blow. Hornblower remembered the sound of a cannon-shot striking on his inattentive ears a second before; he looked round. The two surviving gunboats were resting on their oars a couple of cables’ lengths away, their bows pointing at the group of ships. Hornblower could guess they were in shoal water, almost immune from attack. A jet of smoke from one of the gunboats, and another frightful crash below, and more screams. Those twenty-four-pounder balls were probably smashing through the whole frail length of the brig, whose timbers could resist their impact hardly better than paper. Hornblower plunged into the urgency of the business before him like a man into a raging torrent which he had to swim.
“Get those hatches battened down, Brown!” he ordered. “Put a sentry over each. Mr. Gibbons!”
“Sir?”
“Secure your hatches. Get ready to make sail.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“What topmen are there here? Man the halliards. Who can take the wheel? What, none of you? Mr. Gibbons! Have you a quartermaster to spare? Send one here immediately. Mr. Freeman! You can cast off and make sail. Rendezvous at the other prize.”
Another shot from those accursed gunboats crashed into the Flame’s stern below him. Thank God the wind was off shore and he could get clear of them. The Porta Coeli had set her boom-mainsail again and had got clear of the Bonne Celestine; Gibbons was supervising the setting of the latter’s lug-mainsail while half a dozen hands boomed her off from the Flame.
“Hoist away!” ordered Hornblower as the vessels separated. “Hard a-starboard, Quartermaster.”
A sound overside attracted his attention. Men—mutineers or Frenchmen—were scrambling out through the shot-holes and hurling themselves into the sea, swimming towards the gunboats. Hornblower saw the white hair of Nathaniel Sweet trailing on the surface of the water as he struck out, twenty feet away from him. Of all the mutineers he was the one who most certainly must not be allowed to escape. For the sake of England, for the sake of the service, he must die. The seaman acting as sentry at the after hatchway did not look as if he were a capable marksman.
“Give me your musket,” said Hornblower, snatching it.
He looked at priming and flint as he hurried back to the taffrail. He trained the weapon on the white head, and pulled the trigger. The smoke blew back into his face, obscuring his view only for a moment. The long white hair was visible for a second at the surface when he looked again, and then it sank, slowly, out of sight. Sweet was dead. Maybe there was an old widow who would bewail him, but it was better that Sweet was dead. Hornblower turned back to the business of navigating the Flame back to the rendezvous.
Chapter VIII
This fellow Lebrun was an infernal nuisance, demanding a private interview in this fashion. Hornhlower had quite enough to do as it was; the gaping shot-holes in Flame’s side had to be patched sufficiently well to enable her to recross the Channeclass="underline" the exiguous crew of the Porta Coeli–not all of them seamen by any means—had to be distributed through no fewer than four vessels (the two brigs, the India-man, and the chasse-marée), while at the same time an adequate guard must be maintained over more than a hundred prisoners of one nationality or another; the mutineers must be supervised so that nothing could happen to prejudice their trial; worst of all, there was a long report to be made out. Some people would think this last an easy task, seeing that there was a long string of successes to report, two prizes taken, the Flame recaptured, most of the mutineers in irons below decks and their ringleader slain by Hornblower’s own hand. But there was the physical labour of writing it out, and Hornblower was very weary. Moreover, the composition of it would be difficult, for Hornblower could foresee having to steer a ticklish course between the Scylla of open boastfulness and the Charybdis of mock-modesty—how often had his lip wrinkled in distaste when reading the literary efforts of other officers! And the killing of Nathaniel Sweet by the terrible Commodore Hornblower, although it would look well in a naval history, and although, from the point of view of the discipline of the service, it was the best way in which the affair could have ended, might not appear so well in Barbara’s eyes. He himself did not relish the memory of that white head sinking beneath the waves, and he felt that Barbara, with her attention forcibly called to the fact that he had shed blood, had taken a human life, with his own hands (those hands which she said she loved, which she had sometimes kissed), might feel a repulsion, a distaste.
Hornblower shook himself free from a clinging tangle of thoughts and memories, of Barbara and Nathaniel Sweet, to find himself still staring abstractedly at the young seaman who had brought to him Freeman’s message regarding Lebrun’s request.
“My compliments to Mr. Freeman, and he can send this fellow in to me,” he said.
“Aye aye, sir,” said the seaman, his knuckles to his forehead, turning away with intense relief. The Commodore had been looking through and through him for three minutes at least—three hours, it seemed like, to the seaman.
An armed guard brought Lebrun into the cabin, and Hornblower looked him keenly over. He was one of the half-dozen prisoners taken when the Porta Coeli came into Le Havre, one of the deputation which had mounted her deck to welcome her under the impression that she was the Flame coming in to surrender.
“Monsieur speaks French?” said Lebrun.
“A little.”
“More than a little, if all the tales about Captain Hornblower are true,” replied Lebrun.
“What is your business?” snapped Hornblower, cutting short this Continental floweriness. Lebrun was a youngish man, of olive complexion, with glistening white teeth, who conveyed a general impression of oiliness.
“I am adjoint to Baron Momas, Mayor of Le Havre.”
“Yes?” Hornblower tried to show no sign of interest, but he knew that under the Imperial régime the mayor of a large town like Le Havre was a most important person, and that his adjoint–his assistant, or deputy—was a very important permanent official.
“The firm of Momas Frères is one you must have heard of. It has traded with the Americas for generations—the history of its rise is identical with the history of the development of Le Havre itself.”
“Yes?”
“Similarly, the war and the blockade have had a most disastrous effect upon the fortunes both of the firm of Momas and upon the city of Le Havre.”
“Yes?”
“The Caryatide, the vessel that you so ingeniously captured two days ago, monsieur, might have restored the fortunes of us all—a single vessel running the blockade, as you will readily understand, is worth ten vessels arriving in peacetime.”
“Yes?”
“M. le Baron and the city of Le Havre will be desperate, I have no doubt, as the result of her capture before her cargo could be taken out.”
“Yes?”
The two men eyed each other, like duellists during a pause, Hornblower determined to betray none of the curiosity and interest that he felt, and Lebrun hesitating before finally committing himself.