“Easy!” he hissed at Brown. “Let the current take her.”
The night was absolutely black; seated on the stern thwart he could not even see the surface of the water overside. For that matter, he did not know what river it was. But every river runs to the sea. The sea! Hornblower writhed in his seat in wild nostalgia at a vivid recollection of sea breezes in the nostrils and the feel of a heaving deck under his feet. Mediterranean or Atlantic, he did not know which, but if they had fantastic luck they might reach the sea in this boat by following the river far enough, and the sea was England’s and would bear them home, to life instead of death, to freedom instead of imprisonment, to Lady Barbara, to Maria and his child.
The wind shrieked down on them, driving snow down his neck — thwarts and bottom boards were thick with snow. He felt the boat swing round under the thrust of the wind, which was in his face now instead of on his cheek.
“Turn her head to wind, Brown,” he ordered, “and pull slowly into it.”
The surest way of allowing the current a free hand with them was to try to neutralize the effect of the wind — a gale like this would soon blow them on shore, or even possibly blow them upstream; in this blackness it was impossible to guess what was happening to them.
“Comfortable, Mr Bush?” he asked.
“Aye, aye, sir.”
Bush was faintly visible now, for the snow had driven up already against the grey blankets that swathed him and could just be seen from where Hornblower sat, a yard away.
“Would you like to lie down?”
“Thank you, sir, but I’d rather sit.”
Now that the excitement of the actual escape was over, Hornblower found himself shivering in the keen wind without his cloak. He was about to tell Brown that he would take one of the sculls when Bush spoke again.
“Pardon, sir, but d’you hear anything?”
Brown rested on his oars, and they sat listening.
“No,” said Hornblower. “Yes, I do, by God!”
Underlying the noise of the wind there was a distant monotonous roaring.
“H’m,” said Hornblower, uneasily.
The roar was growing perceptibly louder; now it rose several notes in the scale, suddenly, and they could distinguish the sound of running water. Something appeared in the darkness beside the boat; it was a rock nearly covered, rendered visible in the darkness by the boiling white foam round it. It came and was gone in a flash, the clearest proof of the speed with which the boat was travelling.
“Jesus!” said Brown in the bows.
Now the boat was spinning round, lurching, jolting. All the water was white overside, and the bellowing of the rapid was deafening. They could do no more than sit and cling to their seat as the boat heaved and jerked. Hornblower shook himself free from his dazed helplessness, which seemed to have lasted half an hour and probably lasted no more than a couple of seconds.
“Give me a scull,” he snapped at Brown. “You fend off port side. I’ll take starboard.”
He groped in the darkness, found a scull, and took it from Brown’s hand; the boat spun, hesitated, plunged again. All about them was the roar of the rapid. The starboard side of the boat caught on a rock; Hornblower felt icy water deluge his legs as it poured in over the side behind him. But already he was thrusting madly and blindly with his scull against the rock, he felt the boat slip and swing, he thrust so that the swing was accentuated, and next moment they were clear, wallowing sluggishly with the water up to the thwarts. Another rock slid hissing past, but the roar of the fall was already dwindling.
“Christ!” said Bush, in a mild tone contrasting oddly with the blasphemy. “We’re through!”
“D’you know if there’s a bailer in the boat, Brown?” demanded Hornblower.
“Yessir, there was one at my feet when I came on board.”
“Find it and get this water out. Give me your other scull.”
Brown splashed about in the icy water in a manner piteous to hear as he groped for the floating wooden basin.