The Surgeon's Mate (30 page)

The true cold fear, the doubt of total failure, did not come to him until much later, when the setting sun began to swallow the breeze and the Minnie drew perceptibly ahead. She had been within very long gunshot this last hour and he had cleared away the bow-chasers long since; but at no time had he been willing to maul a ship that he would have to use, and now there was a likelihood that gunfire would stun the remaining wind. Yet it might be the right solution; for if the Minnie gained like this, and if the breeze kept light and tnue, she might waft into Grimsholm before him - the island was directly in her path, and by now it was no great way off: a night's sail, perhaps.

Having ordered the perilous expedient of a skysail on the main - perilous, because the Ariel's royal-mast had been sprung when the sail blew out - he turned the question over in his mind. The little quarterdeck was crowded, all the officers and young gentlemen having been there with scarcely a break since the beginning of the chase, but if they spoke at all it was in low voices: now they were all silent, waiting for what would happen when the skysail was sheeted home. The only sound that reached Jack in his holy area of deck by the starboard rail was the conversation between Dr Maturin and Jagiello: the significance of the skysail escaped them entirely, and they talked away with the freedom of perfect ignorance.

'Pray, Mr Jagiello,' said Stephen, 'what is the coast we see? Would it be part of Courland, or perhaps of Pomerania, or am I much astray?'

'I am totally in the sea,' said Jagiello cheerfully. 'It might be anywhere. All this part of the Baltic coast is much the same - flat, with immense sand-dunes for miles and miles, and shallow water. It is sterile, barren, no good to anybody, but Poles and Swedes and Russians and Germans have fought for it for hundreds of years. I can see a ruined castle with the telescope: but I cannot tell what it is.' He passed the glass, adding, 'The only thing it does produce is amber.'

'Amber?' cried Stephen: and at the same time a collective sigh rose from the professional part of the quarterdeck; the skysail held, and the scrap of canvas - for it was no more - gave the Ariel a slightly greater thrust, just enough to prevent the chase from gaining. This did not resolve Jack's problem, however, and he found himself wishing, with uncommon vehemence and a vexation of spirit rare in him, that the talk about amber, its origin, its electrical properties, it uses in classical antiquity, Thales of Miletus on amber, might stop.

'Mr Hyde, let the water be..." he began, his eyes fixed on the Minnie: but to his astonishment he saw her shift her helm, altering course to larboard until she had the breeze three points abaft the beam. He cut his sentence short and gave out a volley of orders - driver, mizen topsail, topgallant and royal, forecourse, foretopsail, together with the crowd of studdingsails and staysails that had been useless with the wind dead aft. And now the Ariel's strong crew of man-of-war's men showed to full advantage: this cloud of canvas broke out with astonishing rapidity - sheets were tallied aft and belayed before the Minnie had spread more than half of hers.

But even before this was done, even before Stephen and Jagiello had been tumbled about more than twice by racing groups of men, Jack had sent a midshipman to the masthead. The Minnie'& change of course seemed mere suicide; not only had she proved that the Ariel outpaced her sailing large like this - proved it much earlier in the day - but now she had lost a cable's length in the last few minutes. On such a course she must lose close on a mile in an hour even with all the sail she possessed abroad; and the sun was still a handsbreadth from the horizon. The only explanation he could think of was that she had seen an ally inshore or an enemy in the offing.

'On deck, there,' hailed the midshipman. 'A sail, sir, a sail two points on the starboard bow.'

'Do you make out a pennant?' he called. It was an idle question: if the Minnie had not seen the pennant, the mark of a man-of-war, she would never have sheered off. But he wanted confirmation of his joy.

'Oh yes, sir. And I believe I know her. Hermaphrodite on the starboard tack - she's coming about - yes, sir, I recognize her for sure.'

'What is she?'

'Humbug, sir,' said the midshipman, in a rather hesitant roar.

Jack could not believe he had heard aright. 'What did you say?' he cried.

'Humbug, sir.' And from the bows came a peal of honest mirth, while within arm's reach of the Captain three young gentlemen writhed in an effort to contain themselves, and all the officers were on the grin. It was a current Baltic joke, but one that newcomers could not know: just before the Russians joined the Allies a facetious captain of the Royal Navy had captured one of their vessels, a very distinctive Tyne-built hermaphrodite, a fine sailer on a bowline, and he had changed her impossible Russian name to this, the only Humbug ever known or likely to be known in the Navy list.

Humbug, by God. The word had been used to him, publicly, on his own quarterdeck: the boy must be drunk. For a moment Jack's face took on a most forbidding look, and the grins died away. But then his pomp, his righteous indignation dissolved and he said 'Very well, Mr Jevons. You will stay there till I call you.' He gazed at the Minnie: she was jammed in a clinch like Jackson. 'Let us take in the sky sail, Mr Hyde,' he said. 'There is no point in endangering the mast.' He was convinced that he could give the Minnie royals on this tack and even the foretopgallant, and still lay her aboard within the hour. He would not have to use his bowchasers.

'Yes, sir,' said Mr Hyde. 'No, sir: no point at all. And by the way, sir, the hermaphrodite really is called Humbug. Jevons meant no disrespect.'

'Is that so? Well, well. Then he may come down again. Where is the signal midshipman? To Humbug, since that is her name, Enemy in sight. Chase to east-south-east, and give her a gun. Mr Jagiello, I am sorry they knocked you down. You are all right now, are you not?'

'Oh, perfectly well, sir,' said Jagiello, laughing, 'it was nothing at all. My spurs caught in the rope. I believe I shall take them off.'

'I beg your pardon, sir,' said Mr Pellworm, 'but she is heading for the Forten bank. Indeed, she is almost on the tail of the Kraken already, if I do not mistake.'

'Is she, though?' cried Jack. The Forten was a series of shoals a few miles off the flat sandy shore, and its winding channel was very little frequented. The Minnie, riding light, would draw two feet less water than the Ariel: her hope, her last hope, was to lead her pursuer over a bank where the Minnie would pass and the Ariel stick tight. That was one of the reasons for her sudden turn. 'The fox. Light along the lead, there. Mr Pellworm, can you carry us through?'

'I believe so, sir,' said Pellworm, glancing significantly at the vast spread of canvas overhead.

'Then she is yours. Reduce sail as soon as you please.'

The sun dipped. The pink sails came in one by one; the Ariel fetched the Minnie's wake and glided along, no longer gaining, with the lead going on either side and the pilot, grave and concentrated, at the con, now fixing his sea-marks, a tower on the shore and a distant spire, with his azimuth compass, now staring at the ship ahead to catch the least motion of her helm.

It moved often as she pursued her dog-legged course, apparently quite at home; with a fifteen-minute interval the Ariel's rudder made the same motion as she glided over the seemingly innocent sea in the twilight. It was a strange procession: all the flying speed and excitement was gone, replaced by quite a different tension. Her bower anchors were ready, a-cockbill at the catheads, with a kedge at the stern-davits and hands stationed to let them go at the word: there was silence fore and aft, not a sound but the pilot's orders and the leadsman's chant: 'By the deep six, by the deep six: by the mark five; and a half five..." and so it went, until the leadsman's voice rose in a sharp emphasis 'And a half three, and a half three!' To a man the Ariels pursed their lips: precious little water under them now.

'Back the foretopsail,' called the pilot, taking the wheel.

'And a half three. By the mark three. A quarter less five. By the deep six; and a half six.' They were in the deep channel once more.

Jack breathed out at last. Water under his keel, thank God. But the Minnie was turning again, turning three points to starboard: there was ugly stuff coming, for sure. He must not worry the pilot, but Lord how he longed...

'She's struck,' came a bellowing mooncalf roar from the bows. 'She's grounded herself, the bloody old fatherlasher, hor, hor!' A quartermaster choked him short, a midshipman beat him with a speaking-trumpet; but what he said was true. The Minnie came gently to a halt in the sea: all her masts gave an easy lean forwards, and then a most furious lean as her captain dropped and sheeted home all his clewed-up sails in an attempt at driving her over the bank. A vain attempt: nor could he back her off. She was held fast, lying there on an even keel, as motionless as though she were moored head and stern: more so, since she did not even rock.

'Briskly with the lead, there,' cried Jack. 'Can you lay her alongside, Mr Pellworm?'

'Close on, sir,' said the pilot, chuckling.

'By the mark seven,' chanted the leadsman. 'And a half seven.'

'This is the Kraken channel,' observed Mr Pellworm. 'Stand by the kedge.'

The Minnie was coming nearer: nearer and nearer. Her people's faces could be seen, white blobs in the twilight, their voices heard. They were launching a boat over the stern, a little gig: Jack saw uniformed figures on her deck, French officers without a doubt. 'That will do, Mr Pellworm,' he said within a cable's length of the immobile chase: he did not wish the boat to be masked by the ship for any length of time: he did not wish to come too close, spoiling his line of fire. 'Let go the kedge. Let go the best bower. Brail up, clew up.' He took a speaking-trumpet and hailed 'Minnie, hoist in that boat or I shall blow you out of the water.'

No response, but a furious altercation and a pistol-shot aboard the chase.

'Mr Jagiello,' he called, 'pray hail them in Danish and repeat what I said. Mr Hyde, a spring to the cable.'

Jagiello shouted the message high and clear over the two hundred yards of sea, shouted it in different languages. The boat splashed down into the calm water: the French officers jumped into it and at the same moment, as though by an afterthought, the Minnie struck her colours. The boat vanished along her starboard side.

'Quarters,' said Jack, and in a moment the gun-crews were at their stations: the guns themselves had been run out long ago. 'Mr Hyde, three quarters on, then full.'

The Ariel turned on her spring, then steadied, almost as firm as the Minnie. When the boat reappeared, crossing the Minnie's stem and pulling inexpertly for the land, it was directly in the starboard bow-chaser's line of fire: another turn of the capstan would bring the whole broadside to bear, and at point-blank range. From a steady platform, an unmoving ship, a crew far less skilled than the Ariels could scarcely miss.

'Mr Nuttall,' he said to the gunner, 'single round-shot, and pitch it beyond them.'

The gunner laid his piece: fired: the ball struck fifty yards beyond the boat, in a true line, and went skipping across the sea in a series of enormous bounds. The boat rowed on.

'Again,' said Jack.

This time the smoke obscured the fall of the shot, but as it cleared there was the boat, still heading for the shore. 'Full on, Mr Hyde,' said Jack in a harsh voice: it was a sickening business but his carronades would not reach much farther and no single gun could be perfectly relied upon. He must get it over at once. The ship was broadside on, the gun-crews poised about their carronades. 'From forward aft,' he said, 'deliberate fire; wait for the smoke to clear. Fire one.' The first shot pitched a little wide; the second rocked the boat, and in the eddying smoke he saw a man stand up. Was he waving a handkerchief? In the split second of his thought the third gun fired, striking the boat fair and square. Planks flew up, and something like an arm. A savage cheer all along the deck, and the gun-crews turned their beaming faces, clapping one another on the back.

'House your guns,' said Jack. 'Cutters away. Mr Fenton, see if there are any survivors. Mr Hyde, take possession of the prize, and make the master lighten her at once. Anderson will interpret for you. Mr Grimmond, a light in the maintop to guide the Humbug, and rouse out an eight-inch hawser. We must heave her off at once; there is not a minute to be lost.'

Every minute was indeed irreplaceable, yet they flowed away by the score and by the hundred. The Minnie would not move. The channels were so narrow, the navigation so intricate, that a vessel of Ariel's draught could not move with any freedom, could not take up a proper station; with infinite labour they laid out anchors by means of the launch, dragging the heavy cables behind them, and every time the capstan turned, taking the full strain and transmitting it to the Minnie, the anchors came home again.

The situation was already difficult by the time Fenton returned with the one survivor, a youth of about seventeen, wounded in the leg and head, unconscious. It was far more complicated some time later, when Stephen came up from the sick-bay, there were ropes leading in every direction, stretching out into the darkness; in the glow of the lantern the faces of the men at the capstan-bars looked worn and jaded, all excitement gone. Jack had just finished a roared series of instructions to some distant boat when Stephen appeared. 'How does he come along?' he asked in a hoarse voice.

'I believe we may save him,' said Stephen. 'The ligature seems to hold, and the young are wonderfully resilient. You seem in a sad way, brother?'

'Tolerably so, tolerably so. Her after-bitts gave way, and we have lost our small bower, parted at the ring; but it could be worse, and I dare say Humbug will be here presently. She don't draw more than a few feet.' He sounded cheerful, and in fact the incessant activity kept the surface of his mind from brooding on the prospect of the hours ahead; but at no great depth he was aware that dirty weather was brewing in the north, that the Humbug, creeping over the shoals from the other side, creeping over the far extremity five miles away, had missed the channel and had already grounded twice; and that if anything of a sea got up he should be obliged to slip his cables and run, abandoning the Minnie and perhaps the whole enterprise, so promising not long ago. 'Were you able to get anything out of him?'