Lieutenant Hornblower. C. S. Forester

“I’ll be third?” mused Bush, more to himself than to anyone else.

Every lieutenant could at least dream, even lieutenants like Bush with no imagination at all. Promotion was at least theoretically possible; from the caterpillar stage of lieutenant one might progress to the butterfly stage of captain, sometimes even without a chrysalis period as commander. Lieutenants undoubtedly were promoted on occasions; most of them, as was to be expected, being men who had friends at Court, or in Parliament, or who had been fortunate enough to attract the attention of an admiral and then lucky enough to be under that admiral’s command at the moment when a vacancy occurred. Most of the captains on the list owed their promotion to one or other of such causes. But sometimes a lieutenant won his promotion through merit — through a combination of merit and good fortune, at least — and sometimes sheer blind chance brought it about. If a ship distinguished herself superlatively in some historic action the first lieutenant might be promoted (oddly enough, that promotion was considered a compliment to her captain), or if the captain should be killed in the action even a moderate success might result in a step for the senior surviving lieutenant who took his place. On the other hand some brilliant boat‑action, some dashing exploit on shore, might win promotion for the lieutenant in command — the senior, of course. The chances were few enough in all conscience, but there were at least chances.

But of those few chances the great majority went to the senior lieutenant, to the first lieutenant; the chances of the junior lieutenant were doubly few. So that whenever a lieutenant dreamed of attaining the rank of captain, with its dignity and security and prize money, he soon found himself harking back to the consideration of his seniority as lieutenant. If this next commission of the Renown’s took her away to some place where other lieutenants could not be sent on board by an admiral with favourites, there were only two lives between Bush and the position of first lieutenant with all its added chances of promotion. Naturally he thought about that; equally naturally he did not spare a thought for the fact that the man with whom he was conversing was divided by four lives from that same position.

“But still, it’s the West Indies for us, anyway,” said Hornblower philosophically. “Yellow fever. Ague. Hurricanes. Poisonous serpents. Bad water. Tropical heat. Putrid fever. And ten times more chances of action than with the Channel fleet.”

“That’s so,” agreed Bush, appreciatively.

With only three and four years’ seniority as lieutenants, respectively, the two young men (and with young men’s confidence in their own immortality) could face the dangers of West Indian service with some complacence.

“Captain’s coming off, sir,” reported the midshipman of the watch hurriedly.

Hornblower whipped his telescope to eye and trained it on the approaching shore boat.

“Quite right,” he said. “Run for’ard and tell Mr Buckland. Bosun’s mates! Sideboys! Lively, now!”

Captain Sawyer came up through the entry port, touched his hat to the quarterdeck, and looked suspiciously around him. The ship was in the condition of confusion to be expected when she was completing for foreign service, but that hardly justified the sidelong, shifty glances which Sawyer darted about him. He had a big face and a prominent hawk nose which he turned this way and that as he stood on the quarterdeck. He caught sight of Bush, who came forward and reported himself

“You came aboard in my absence, did you?” asked Sawyer.

“Yes, sir,” said Bush, a little surprised.

“Who told you I was on shore?”

“No one, sir.”

“How did you guess it, then?”

“I didn’t guess it, sir. I didn’t know you were on shore until Mr Hornblower told me.”

“Mr Hornblower? So you know each other already?”

“No, sir. I reported to him when I came on board.”

“So that you could have a few private words without my knowledge?”

“No, sir.”

Bush bit off the ‘of course not’ which he was about to add. Brought up in a hard school, Bush had learned to utter no unnecessary words when dealing with a superior officer indulging in the touchiness superior officers might be expected to indulge in. Yet this particular touchiness seemed more unwarranted even than usual.

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