“Look at that!” yelled Bush. “Look at that, sir! We’ve fooled him properly!”
Loire had gone about. There she was, just settling down on the starboard tack. The French captain had been too clever. He had decided that Hotspur would go about when concealed by the squall, and had moved to anticipate her. Hornblower watched the Loire. That French captain must be boiling with rage at having his too-great-cleverness revealed to his ship’s company in this fashion. That might cloud his judgement later. It might make him over-anxious. Even so, he showed little sign of it from here. He had been about to haul his bowlines, but he reached a rapid and sensible decision. To tack again would necessitate standing on for some time on his present course while his ship regained speed and manoeuvrability, so that instead he made use of the turning momentum she still possessed, put up his helm and completed the circle, wearing his ship round so that she momentarily presented her stern to the wind before arriving at last on her original tack again. It was a cool-headed piece of work, making the best of a bad job, but the Loire had lost a good deal of ground.
“Two full points abaft the beam,” said Prowse.
“And he’s farther down to looard, too,” supplemented Bush.
The greatest gain, Hornblower decided, watching her, was that it made possible, and plausible, the long leg to the northward that his plan demanded. He could make a long beat on the port tack without the French captain seeing anything unusual in that.
“Keep her going, there!” he shouted to the wheel. “Let her fall off a little! Steady as you go!”
The race was resumed, both ships plunging along, battling with the unremitting gale. Hornblower could see the wide angle from the vertical described by the Loire’s masts as she rolled; he could see her yards dipping towards the sea, and he could be sure that Hotspur was acting in the same way, rolling even a trifle more deeply, perhaps. So this very deck on which he stood was over at that fantastic angle too; he was proud of the fact that he was regaining his sea legs so rapidly. He could stand balance one knee straight and rigid, the other considerably bent, while he leaned over against the heel, and then he could straighten with the roll almost as steadily as Bush could. And his seasickness was better as well – no; a pity he had let that subject return to his mind, for he had to struggle with a qualm the moment it did so.
“Making a long leg like this gives him a chance, sir,” grumbled Prowse, juggling with telescope and sextant. “He’s drawing up on us fast.”
“We’re doing our best,” answered Hornblower.
His glass could reveal many details of the Loire now, as he concentrated upon her to distract himself from his sea-sickness. Then, as he was about to lower the glass to ease his eye he saw something new. The gun ports along her weather side seemed to change their shape, and as he continued to look he saw, first from one gun-port and then from another and finally from the whole line, the muzzles of her guns come nosing their way out, as the invisible crews strained at the tackles to drag the ponderous weights up against the slope of the deck.
“She’s running out her guns, sir,” said Bush, a little unnecessarily.
“Yes.”
There was no purpose in imitating her example yet. It would be the lee side guns that Hotspur would have to run out. They would increase her heel and render her by that much less weatherly. Lying over as she was she would probably take in water over the port-sills at the low point of her roll. Lastly, even at extreme elevation, they would nearly all the time be depressed by the heel below the horizontal, and would be useless, even with good timing on the part of the gun captains, against a target at any distance.
The look-outs at the fore-topmasthead were yelling something, and then one of them launched himself into the rigging and came running aft to the quarter-deck.