The ceremony came to its invariable end with the first lieutenant stepping across the deck, taking off the hat that he had put on for the purpose, reporting noon to Captain Aubrey and receiving the reply ‘Make it so, Mr Fielding,’ which gave the new naval day its legal existence. And immediately after this, as eight bells was struck and the hands were piped to dinner with the usual roaring and trampling, he noticed Jack and the master exchange a nod of satisfaction, from which he concluded without much difficulty that the Nutmeg, racing
along in this spirited way, her bow-wave flung white and wide, was doing so on the right parallel.
Their own dinner, which again they took by themselves in the austere, echoing great cabin, was barely edible, Wilson having lost his head in the excitement, but apart from observing ‘Well, at least the wine goes down well; and I believe there is rice pudding to come,’ Jack took little notice. After a glass or two he said ‘You do understand, Stephen, do you not, that all this is merely provisional, just in the event that the Cornélie has done exactly what I want her to have done?’ Stephen smiled and nodded, reflecting ‘And I do understand how the evil eye can be attempted to be averted.’ Jack went on ‘This morning I did not tell you about my sequence of events, though it is of the very first importance. To begin with, I must raise the island at first light to make sure whether the Cornélie is there or not: it would be absurd to carry out some of the more extravagant capers I have in mind until that is decided. I am reasonably confident that we can do so, and with most of the night to spare: the master and I and Dick Richardson all agree very closely in our reckoning, and we should have a very good lunar observation tonight with this clear sky. If it tells us that we are where I think we are, I shall reduce sail and draw in gently until dawn, when I hope Nil Desperandum will be in sight, away to leeward.’
‘Ha, ha,’ said Stephen, fired for once with a kind of martial fervour. ‘I shall desire Welby to give me a call at – at four bells, would it be? He sleeps next door: sleeps, that is to say, when he is not trying to learn French, poor soul.’
‘I shall send the mate of the watch,’ said Jack. ‘Then suppose she is there, we strike topgallantmasts down on deck, dip below the horizon, carry out my other capers, and stand in under topsails, quite leisurely, you understand, because if circumstances are not right – and everything depends on circumstances – or if my direct attack fails, I must entice her out a little after noon, so that we may run through the Passage in the night; and after moonset I can draw ahead, put the helm hard over, nip behind my island, showing neither a glim nor a scrap of canvas and lying to a drift-anchor till she passes,
chasing the lights of the boat we have sent on. And once she is, once she is to leeward –
why, there we are. We have the weather-gage!’
‘Ah? Very good. Will I pour you some wine?’
‘If you please. Capital port: have rarely drunk better. Stephen, you are aware of the importance of the weather-gage, are you not? I do not have to explain that a better sailer who has the weather-gage can force an action as and when she chooses? The Nutmeg cannot play at long bowls with the Cornélie, cannot keep up a broadside battle at long range; but coming up fast in her wake she can range alongside, hammer her and board her. Though of course I do not have to tell you that.’
‘It would be strange if the weather-gage had to be explained to so old a sea-dog; though I must confess that there was a
time when I confused it with that thing which creaks on the roof, showing which way the wind is blowing. Yet could you not obtain this valuable gage by some less arduous means than running a hundred miles and hiding behind a more or less mythical island which no one has ever seen, and that in the dark, a perilous proceeding if ever there was one?’
‘Why, no. I cannot work to windward of him without exposing myself to his broadside at a distance, which our ship cannot stand: and if I reduce sail to let him come up he will very naturally decline, put his helm down and batter me from beyond the effective range of carronades. For I cannot go on the assumption that the Cornélie has no more powder than the Alkmaar’s four barrels. And as for the island, it is not mythical at all. There are two of them, rising steep-to from fifty fathom and well surveyed. The Dutch used the Passage a great deal, and Raffles gave me an excellent chart. But even so, let us hope that the first plan of running in and boarding her straight away comes to root. That is to say . . .’ He paused, frowning.
‘Rules the roost?’
‘No. . . no.’
‘Takes fruit?’
‘Oh be damned to it. The trouble with you, Stephen, if you do not mind my saying so, is that although you are the best
linguist I was ever shipmates with, like the Pope of Rome that spoke a hundred languages
– Pentecost come again . .
‘Would it be Magliabechi you have in mind?’
‘I dare say: a foreigner, in any case. And I am sure you speak quite as many, and like a native, or better; but English is not one of them. You do not get figures quite right, and now you have put the word clean out of my head.’
The old sea-dog appeared on deck next day at dawn, looking as some other old dogs do when they are roused untimely from their pad: uncombed, unbrushed, matted. He was not
exceptional. Nearly all the officers were in their oldest working clothes and some had been up much longer. Yet even if Dr Maturin had been tarred and feathered he would have excited no remark. All eyes were fixed on the lookout at the jackcrosstrees, and the lookout’s eyes were fixed on an island sharp on that pure horizon to the east-north-east.
The sun was up, quite clear of the sea, an incandescent ball already, and its rays lit almost all the island’s upper part: those on deck could see no more; only the telescope high above could make out that distant shore. The breeze was now right aft; it had diminished, and there was little sound from the rigging. They stood there in silence, the whole ship’s company, as the sunlight travelled down the south-west side of Nil Desperandum.
Warren the master uttered a thundering fart. No one smiled, frowned or took his eyes from the masthead. At long, regular intervals the ship passed through the peaks of the south-west swell, her cutwater making a sound like shshsh.
The cry came down, shaky with emotion: ‘On deck there.’ A pause for two waves. ‘She’s there, sir. I mean I see a ship, yards across, lying perhaps half a mile offshore: topsails loosed to dry.’
‘Hard over,’ said Jack to the man at the wheel; and raising his voice, ‘Very good, Mr Miller: jump down on deck now. Mr Fielding, we will strike topgallantmasts directly, if you please.’
With the topgallantmasts on the booms and the Nutmeg safely out of sight of the land, Jack said, ‘When we have furled everything but topsails and forestaysail, we may proceed with
our painted strips. But furled in the loose bunt, swagging horribly, with gaskets all ahoo, d’ye hear me there, Mr Seymour,’ – directing his voice nominally to Seymour on the forecastle but in fact to the ship’s company, who had hitherto been encouraged to furl with exact precision, as taut and trim as in a royal yacht, and who now gazed at one another with wondering grins; for in spite of all that had gone before this was a degree of impropriety that even the boldest minds had not conceived.
The strips of which Captain Aubrey had spoken were lengths
•
of sailcloth with gunports painted on them, strips of the kind that many merchantmen with few or no actual cannon wore
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along their sides in the hope of deterring pirates. They took up a great deal of space on deck while they were being prepared, as Stephen knew very well, having seen Jack use them before; but this time, with a crew not used to Captain Aubrey’s ways, they took even more and he retreated farther and farther. On reaching the taffrail he decided that he was really too much in the way and that he should retire, in spite of the extraordinary beauty of the sea and sky and the champagne quality of the air, uncommon between the tropics and almost unknown to Dr Maturin, never an early riser.