Hornblower and the Atropos. C. S. Forester

The Ceylonese when they made their appearance on the deck of the Atropos were of an appearance to excite pity. They held their white cotton clothes close about them against the cold; the keen air that blew down from the snow‑clad Spanish mountains set them shivering. They were thin, frail‑looking men, and they looked about them with no curiosity, but with only a dull resignation in their dark eyes. They were of a deep brown colour, so as to excite the interest of the hands who gathered to stare. They spared no glances for the white men, but conversed briefly with each other in high piping musical voices.

“Give them the warmest corner of the ‘tween decks, Mr. Jones,” said Hornblower. “See that they are comfortable. Consult with Mr. McCullum regarding anything they may need. Allow me to present Mr. McCullum — Mr. Jones. I would be greatly obliged if you will extend to Mr. McCullum the hospitality of the wardroom.”

Hornblower had to phrase it that way. The wardroom theoretically was a voluntary association of officers, who could make their own choice as to what members they might admit. But it would be a bold set of officers who decided to exclude a wardroom guest recommended by their captain, as Jones and Hornblower both knew.

“You must provide a cot for Mr. McCullum, too, Mr. Jones, if you please. You can decide for yourself where you will put it.”

It was comforting to be able to say that. Hornblower knew perfectly well — and so did Jones, as his slightly dismayed expression revealed — that in a twenty‑two gun sloop there was not a square foot of deck space to spare. Everyone was already overcrowded, and McCullum’s presence would add seriously to the overcrowding. But it was Jones who would have to find a way round the difficulty.

“Aye aye, sir,” said Jones; the interval that elapsed before he said it was the best indication of the involved train of thought he had been following out.

“Excellent,” said Hornblower. “You can attend to it after we’re under way. No more time to waste, Mr. Jones.”

Minutes were always valuable. The wind might always shift, or drop. An hour wasted now might mean the loss of a week. Hornblower was in a fever to get his ship clear of the Gut and into the wider waters of the Mediterranean, where he would have sea room in which to beat against a head wind should a Levanter come blowing out of the East. Before his mind’s eye he had a picture of the Western Mediterranean; the north‑westerly blowing at present could carry him quickly along the southern coast of Spain, past the dangerous shoal of Alboran, until at Cape de Gata the Spanish coast trended away boldly to the northward. Once there he would be less restricted; until Cape de Gate was left behind he could not be happy. There was also — Hornblower could not deny it — his own personal desire to be up and doing, to find out what was awaiting him in the future, to put himself at least in the possible path of adventure. It was fortunate that his duty and his inclination should coincide in this way; one of the few small bits of good fortune, he told himself with amused grimness, that he had experienced since he had made his original choice of the career of a naval officer.

But at least he had come into Gibraltar Bay after dawn and he was leaving before nightfall. He could not be accused of wasting any time. They had rounded the Rock; Hornblower looked into the binnacle and up at the commission pendant blowing out from the masthead.

“Full and bye,” he ordered.

“Full and bye, sir,” echoed the quartermaster at the wheel.

A keen gust of wind came blowing town out of the Sierra de Ronda, laying the Atropos over as the trimmed yards braced the sails to catch it. Over she lay; a short steep wave came after them, the remnants of an Atlantic roller that had survived its passage through the Gut. Atropos lifted her stern to it, heaving jerkily in this unnatural opposition of wind and wave. Spray burst under her counter, and spray burst round her bows as she plunged. She plunged again in the choppy sea. She was only a little ship, the smallest three‑masted vessel in the service, the smallest that could merit a captain to command her. The lofty frigates, the massive seventy‑fours, could condescend to her. Hornblower looked round him at the wintry Mediterranean, at the fresh clouds obscuring the sinking sun. The waves could toss his ship about, the winds could heel her over, but standing there, braced on the quarter‑deck, he was master of them. Exultation surged within him as his ship hurried forward into the unknown.

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