The Commodore. C. S. Forester

When next you see your brother, Lord Wellesley, I trust you will give him my duty and respects. For you I reserve my whole love.

Your affectionate husband

HORATIO

Wychwood took the letters Hornblower gave him, and wrote out a receipt on Bush’s desk with Bush’s pen. Then he held out his hand.

“Good-bye, sir,” he said, and hesitated; then, with a rush, he added, “God knows how this war will turn out. I expect the Russians’ll be beaten. But you have done more than any one man to bring the war about. You’ve done your whole duty, sir.”

“Thank you,” said Hornblower.

He was in a disturbed and unsettled mood; he stood on the quarter-deck of the Nonsuch while over his head the ensign was dipped in a parting salute to the Clam, and he watched the cutter sail off towards England. He watched her until she was out of sight, while Nonsuch put up her helm and bore away for Riga and whatever new adventures awaited him there. He knew quite well what was the matter with him; he was homesick, plunged into a storm of emotional disturbance as always was when he wrote home, and, oddly enough, Wychwood’s last words added to his disturbance. They had reminded him of the terrible load of responsibility that he bore. The future of the world and the survival of his country would be profoundly affected by his doings. Should this Russian adventure end in defeat and disaster everyone anxious to shuffle off responsibility would blame him. He would be condemned as inept and shortsighted. He even found himself envying Braun now on his way back to London, under arrest and awaiting probable trial and possible execution, and he remembered with longing his petty troubles at Smallbridge; he smiled at himself when he recalled that his heaviest burden there had been to receive a deputation of welcome from the village. He thought of Barbara’s ready sympathy, of the intense pleasure he had known when it first dawned upon him that Richard loved him, and enjoyed and looked forward to his company. Here he had to be content with Bush’s unthinking loyalty and the precarious admiration of the young officers.

Recalling himself to reality, he forced himself to remember with what a bubble of excitement he had received his orders back to active service, the light heart with which he had left his child, the feeling of – there was no blinking the matter – emancipation with which he had parted from his wife. The prospect of once more being entirely his own master, of not having to defer to Barbara’s wishes, of not being discommoded by Richard’s teeth, had seemed most attractive then. And here he was complaining to himself about the burden of responsibility, when responsibility was the inevitable price one had to pay for independence; irresponsibility was something which, in the very nature of things, could not co-exist with independence. This was all very well and logical, but there was no blinking the fact that he wished he were home; he could conjure up in imagination so vividly the touch of Barbara’s hand on his own that it was an acute disappointment to realize that it was only in imagination. He wanted to have Richard on his knee again, shrieking with laughter over the colossal joke of having his nose pinched. And he did not want to imperil his reputation, his liberty, and his life in combined operations with these unpredictable Russians in a God-forsaken corner of the world like Riga. Yet then and there – his interest rousing itself spontaneously – he decided that he had better go below and re-read the Sailing Directions for Riga; and a close study of the chart of Riga Bay might be desirable, too.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The Northern Continental summer had come speedily, as ever. Last week at Pillau there had still been a decided touch of winter in the air. To-day, with Riga just over the horizon, it was full summer. This blazing heat would have done credit to the doldrums were it not for an invigorating quality which the tropics never knew. A brassy sun shone down from a cloudless sky, although there was just enough mist to leave the distant horizon undefined. There was a gentle two-knot breeze blowing from the south-west, just enough wind to give Nonsuch bare steerage-way with all her canvas set, studding-sails on both sides to the royals. The squadron was making the best speed it could, with Lotus hull-down on the starboard bow, Raven close astern, and the two bomb-ketches trailing far behind; even the clumsy Nonsuch could outsail them in the prevailing conditions.

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