“Forty of us,” commented a tall, thin, clerkly officer, counting heads. “How many of us will they pass, do you think? Five?”
“To hell with care,” repeated the bibulous voice in the corner, and lifted itself in song. “Begone, dull care; I prithee be gone from me —”
“Cheese it, you fool!” rasped another voice. “Hark to that!”
The air was filled with the long‑drawn twittering of the pipes of the bos’n’s mates, and someone on deck was shouting an order.
“A captain coming on board,” remarked someone.
An officer had his eye at the crack of the door. “It’s Dreadnought Foster,” he reported.
“He’s a tail twister if ever there was one,” said a fat young officer, seated comfortably with his back to the bulkhead.
Again the pipes twittered.
“Harvey, of the dockyard,” reported the lookout.
The third captain followed immediately. “It’s Black Charlie Hammond,” said the lookout. “Looking as if he’d lost a guinea and found sixpence.”
“Black Charlie?” exclaimed someone, scrambling to his feet in haste and pushing to the door. “Let’s see! So it is! Then here is one young gentleman who will not stay for an answer. I know too well what that answer would be. ‘Six months more at sea, sir, and damn your eyes for your impertinence in presenting yourself for examination in your present state of ignorance.’ Black Charlie won’t ever forget that I lost his pet poodle overside from the cutter in Port‑o’‑Spain when he was first of the Pegasus. Good‑bye, gentlemen. Give my regards to the examining board.”
With that he was gone, and they saw him explaining himself to the officer of the watch and hailing a shore boat to take him back to his ship. “One fewer of us, at least,” said the clerkly officer. “What is it, my man?”
“The board’s compliments, sir,” said the marine messenger, “an’ will the first young gentleman please to come along?”
There was a momentary hesitation; no one was anxious to be the first victim.
“The one nearest the door,” said an elderly master’s mate. “Will you volunteer, sir?”
“I’ll be the Daniel,” said the erstwhile lookout desperately. “Remember me in your prayers.”
He pulled his coat smooth, twitched at his neckcloth, and was gone, the remainder waiting in gloomy silence, relieved only by the glug‑glug of the bottle as the bibulous midshipman took another swig. A full ten minutes passed before the candidate for promotion returned, making a brave effort to smile.
“Six months more at sea?” asked someone.
“No,” was the unexpected answer. “Three! . . . I was told to send the next man. It had better be you.”
“But what did they ask you?”
“They began by asking me to define a rhumb line. . . . But don’t keep them waiting, I advise you.” Some thirty officers had their textbooks open on the instant to reread about thumb lines.
“You were there ten minutes,” said the clerkly officer, looking at his watch. “Forty of us, ten minutes each — why, it’ll be midnight before they reach the last of us. They’ll never do it.”
“They’ll be hungry,” said someone.
“Hungry for our blood,” said another.
“Perhaps they’ll try us in batches,” suggested a third, “like the French tribunals.”
Listening to them, Hornblower was reminded of French aristocrats jesting at the foot of the scaffold. Candidates departed and candidates returned, some gloomy, some smiling. The cabin was already far less crowded; Hornblower was able to secure sufficient deck space to seat himself, and he stretched out his legs with a nonchalant sigh of relief, and he no sooner emitted the sigh than he realized that it was a stage effect which he had put on for his own benefit. He was as nervous as he could be. The winter night was falling, and some good Samaritan on board sent in a couple of purser’s dips to give a feeble illumination to the darkening cabin.
“They are passing one in three,” said the clerkly officer, making ready for his turn. “May I be the third.”
Hornblower got to his feet again when he left; it would be his turn next. He stepped out under the halfdeck into the dark night and breathed the chill fresh air. A gentle breeze was blowing from the southward, cooled, presumably, by the snow‑clad Atlas Mountains of Africa across the strait. There was neither moon nor stars. Here came the clerkly officer back again.