That might be so, but all the same he was convulsed with anguish. This deep, dark sorrow which was rending him was something beyond his control. He looked across at the dark shape of the Mejidieh, and sorrow was joined to an intense hatred, like some ugly pattern of red and black before his mind’s eye. The vague shape of the Mejidieh was drawing back abaft the Atropos’ quarter—the soft night wind was backing round, as might be expected at this hour, and swinging the ships at their anchors. Overhead there were stars, here and there obscured by patches of cloud whose presence could just be guessed at, moving very slowly over the zenith. And over there, beyond the Mejidieh, the sky was a trifle paler; the moon must be rising above the horizon beyond the mountains. The loveliest night imaginable with the gentle breeze—this gentle breeze! Hornblower glowered round in the darkness as if he feared someone might prematurely guess the thought that was forming in his mind.
“I am going below for a few minutes, Mr. Jones,” he said, softly.
“Aye aye, sir.”
Turner, of course, had been talking. He had told the wardroom all about the quandary in which their captain found himself. One could hear curiosity in the tone of even those three words of Jones’s. Resolution came to lacquer over the pattern of red and black.
Down in the cabin the two candles he sent for lit the whole little space, save for a solid shadow here and there. But the chart that he laid out between them was brightly illuminated. He stooped over it, peering at the tiny figures that marked the soundings. He knew them already, as soon as he came to think about them; there was really no need to refresh his memory. Red Cliff Point, Passage Island, Kaia Rock; Point Sari beyond Kaia Rock—he knew them all. He could weather Kaia Rock with this breeze if it should hold. God, there was need for haste! He blew out the candles and felt his way out of the cabin.
“Mr. Jones! I want two reliable bos’n’s mates. Quietly, if you please.”
That breeze was still blowing, ever so gently, a little more fitful than might be desired, and the moon had not cleared the mountains yet.
“Now, you two, pay attention. Go quietly round the ship and see that every man is awake. Not a sound—you hear me? Topmen are to assemble silently at the foot of the masts. Silently.”
“Aye aye, sir,” was the whispered reply.
“Carry on. Now, Mr. Jones—”
The gentle patter of bare feet on the deck as the men assembled acted as accompaniment to the whispered orders Hornblower was giving to Jones. Over there was the vast bulk of the Mejidieh; two thousand ears which might catch the slightest unusual noise—an axe being laid ready on the deck, for instance, or capstan bars being gently eased into their sockets. The boatswain came aft again to rejoin the little group of officers round Hornblower and to make his report in a whisper that accorded ill with his bulk and power.
“The capstan pawl’s thrown out, sir.”
“Very good. Yours is the first move. Go back, count a hundred, and take up on the spring. Six turns, and hold it. Understand?”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Then off you go. You others are clear about your duties? Mr. Carslake, with the axe at the cable. I’ll attend to the axe at the spring. Mr. Smiley, fore tops’l sheets. Mr. Hunt, main tops’l sheets. Go to your stations.”
The little ship lay there quietly. A tiny rim of the moon came up over the mountains, and broadened momentarily, revealing her lying peacefully at anchor. She seemed inert, incapable of action. Silent men had swarmed up the rigging and were waiting for the signal. There was a gentle creaking as the spring to the cable tightened, but there was no clank from the capstan, for the pawl had been thrown out from the ratchet; the men at the capstan bars walked silently round, and when their six turns had been completed they stood, breasts against the bars, feet braced on the deck, holding the ship steady. Under the pull of the spring she lay at an angle to the breeze, so that when sail should be set not a moment would be wasted gathering stern way and paying off. She would be under command at once.
The moon had cleared the mountains; the seconds went slowly by.
Tingting went the ship’s bell—two bells; the signal.
Feet pattered in unison. Sheaves squealed in blocks, but even as the ear caught that sound topsail yards and forestay had blossomed into sail. Forward and aft came brief sullen thumpings as axe blades cut through cable and spring—with the sudden end of the resistance of the spring the capstan spun round, precipitating the men at the bars to the deck. There were bruises and grazes, but nobody paid attention to the injuries; Atropos was under way. In five seconds, without giving any warning at all, she had transformed herself from something stationary and inert to a living thing, gliding through the water towards the entrance to the Bay. She was clear of the peril of the Mejidieh’s broadside, for the Mejidieh had no spring on her cable to swing her round. She would have to weigh her anchor, or cut or slip her cable; she would have to set sail enough to give her steerage way, and then she would have to yaw round before she could fire. With an alert crew, awake and ready for the summons, it would be at least several minutes before she could turn her broadside upon Atropos, and then it would be at a range of half a mile or more.
As it was Atropos had gathered speed, and was already more than clear before Mejidieh gave her first sign of life. The deep booming of a drum came sounding over the water; not the highpitched rattle of the Atropos’ sidedrum, but the far deeper and slower tone of a bass drum monotonously beaten.
“Mr. Jones!” said Hornblower. “Rig in those boarding nettings, if you please.”
The moon was shining brightly, lighting the water ahead of them.
“Starboard a point,” said Hornblower to the helmsman.
“Starboard a point,” came the automatic reply.
“You’re taking the west pass, sir?” asked Turner.
As sailing master and navigator his station in action was on the quarterdeck beside his captain, and the question he asked was strictly within his province.
“I don’t think so,” said Hornblower.
The booming of the Mejidieh’s drum was still audible; if the sound reached the batteries the guns’ crews there would be on the alert. And when he reached that conclusion there was an orange flash from far astern, as if momentarily a furnace door had been opened and then closed. Seconds later came the heavy report; the Mejidieh had fired a gun. There was no sound of the passage of the shot—but if it had even been a blank charge it would serve to warn the batteries.
“I’m going under Sari Point,” said Hornblower.
“Sari Point, sir!”
“Yes.”
It was surprise and not discipline that limited Turner’s protests to that single exclamation. Thirty years of service in the merchant navy had trained Turner’s mind so that nothing could induce him to contemplate subjecting his ship voluntarily to navigational hazards; his years of service as sailing master in the Royal Navy had done little to change that mental attitude. It was his duty to keep the ship safe from shoal and storm and let the captain worry about cannonballs. He would never have thought for a moment of trying to take Atropos through the narrow channel between Sari Point and Kaia Rock, not even by daylight, and ten times never by night, and the fact thee he had not thought of it left him without words.
Another orange flash showed astern; another report reached their ears.
“Take a night glass and go for’rard,” said Hornblower. “Look out for the surf.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Take a speaking trumpet as well. Make sure I hear you.”
“Aye aye, sir.”