The Hundred Days (36 page)

Some were drinking the blood, but most were gazing
up, holding out supplicatory hands.

‘Will you answer, Dr Jacob?’ asked Jack.

‘It would wholly compromise my position,’ said
Jacob. ‘Let us wait a little. I believe they have some other resource.’

They had: some moments later a dozen almost naked
powerful seamen, deeply sunburnt, scored with whip lashes but recognizably
white, were pushed forward, and their leader, squaring up to the cliff, called
out in a hoarse Port of London voice, ‘God bless King George. Which we are
British subjects, taken out of the Three Brothers, Trade’s Increase and other
craft: and should be very grateful to your honour for a drop of anything wet.
Amen.’

‘Hear him,’ croaked the others. ‘Right parched we
are. Drinking piss this last week.’

‘Listen,’ said Jack in his strong, carrying voice.
‘You take the Moors’ weapons and pile them at the end of the mole, tie their hands,
and I shall signal the schooner to send in a boat full of fresh water and
something to eat.’

The British subjects uttered a hoarse discordant
cheer; Jack fired three or four times at random to keep up the tension; and the
weapons came piling up on the mole.

Just off the lagoon the Surprises, overflowing with
satisfaction and wit, carried out the small heavy, heavy, wonderfully heavy
little chests from the galley to those places deep in the  Surprise where their weight would be most
useful as ballast. The Moorish prisoners, reasonably fed and watered,were stowed in the cable-tiers. They were, at least for the
time being, very low in their spirits: indeed morally destroyed: but Jack had
seen strange surprising changes in men freed from mortal danger: he reckoned
with the resilience of the human spirit, particularly the maritime human
spirit; and having, with his officers, fixed the ship’s position with the
utmost accuracy he set her course for the nearest point in Africa, where he meant
to put them ashore.

For the moment however he and Stephen were
breakfasting in comfort, gazing with some complacency at the island Cranc.
‘Jacob tells me,’ said Stephen, ‘that in Moorish Arabic the place is now called
Fortnight Island. It had been a moderately
prosperous fishing and corsair port - dates, carobs, pearl oysters, coral - hence the mole and the ruins - until the time of, I
think, Mulei Hassan; but then a new eruption destroyed the few springs, broke
the aqueducts and cisterns and slowly liberated that noxious vapour we
observed. It seems that you can breathe it for fourteen days with nothing but
headaches and gastric pains; but on the fifteenth you die.’

‘I beg pardon for interrupting you, sir,’ said
Harding, ‘but you desired me to tell you when all was aboard. The last chest
has just been handed down.’ As he spoke his usually grave face spread in a most
infectious smile: that last case, carried staggering by strong men, weighed
well over a hundred and twelve pounds, and Harding, though not an avaricious or
grasping man, knew just how many ounces of that mass belonged to him as
prize-money.

Patriotism, promotion, and prize-money have been
described as the three masts of the Royal Navy. It would be illiberal to assert
that prize-money was by any means the most important, but as they left the flat
shore north of Ras Uferni in Morocco, where they had at last
disembarked their prisoners after a tedious voyage with contrary winds, it was
certainly the subject still most frequently discussed.

‘If you people will sail the galley into Gibraltar with us,’ said Captain
Aubrey to the slaves, ‘You shall share as able seamen.

‘Why, thankee, sir,’ said Hallows, their spokesman.
‘We take it uncommon handsome: and I promise we shall do our duty by your
prize.’

‘That’s right,’ said his mates, and indeed they
handled the galley very well. But they did think it part of their duty to run
alongside the frigate on three separate occasions, begging the officer of the
watch to shorten sail. ‘There are too many eggs in this one basket to risk
anything at all,’ was the usual formula, thought to be both conciliating and
witty.

Jack was on deck the last time they did this, and
he said, ‘Hallows, if you do not keep your station I shall turn you ashore,’
with such conviction that although they very nearly came within hail to tell
the frigate that there was an enormous great fire on the very top of Cape
Trafalgar, they thought better of it and kept the news for Ringle.

Indeed there were fires all along the European side
of the Straits, exciting unspeakable wonder aboard the three vessels: but the
sight of Gibraltar itself ablaze with innumerable bonfires, the harbour filled
with ships dressed over all, bands playing, trumpets blowing and drums beating
madly checked all conjecture, and Surprise, having made her number, wafted
silently to her usual place, with her companions.

‘The flag-lieutenant, sir, if you please,’ said a
midshipman at his side.

‘Give you joy of your splendid prize, sir,’ cried
the flag lieutenant. ‘By God, you could never have timed t better.’

‘Thank you, Mr Betterton,’ said Jack. ‘But pray
tell me what is afoot?’

The flag-lieutenant stared for a moment, and then
he gravely replied, ‘Napoleon is beat, sir. There was a great battle at Waterloo in the Low Countries, and the Allies won.’

‘Then it is I that give you joy, sir,’ said Jack,
shaking his hand. ‘Have you any details?’

‘No, sir. But the courier is arrived
and the Commanderin-Chief will have them. When your number was reported he bade
me remind you of your engagement: Lady Barmouth has taken the coach to fetch
the Keiths.’

‘Please tell Lord Barmouth that Dr Maturin and I
shall be charmed to wait upon him, above all on such a day.’

‘There you are at last, Aubrey,’ cried the
Commander-in-Chief, obviously overcome by the events and obviously somewhat
flushed with wine. ‘Doctor, your servant, sir: very happy to
see you. So here you are at last, Aubrey, and with a thundering great
prize at your tail. Give you joy, of course but the fellow must have led you a
most infernal long chase?’

‘He did indeed, my Lord. He went to ground in an
island I had never heard of, called Cranc, an island with a very shallow but
sheltered lagoon - too shallow for Surprise - and I had to winkle him out by a
kind of Diamond Rock caper, getting a gun up a five hundred foot cliff to fire
down on him.’

‘Well, I am sure it was very creditable and I
congratulate you of course; but I wish to God you could have done it under any
other Dey of Algiers - this one has cut up very rough indeed - says it was his
galley and everything in it - sent me a furious note and swears he will take it
out of our merchantmen if there is no restitution, compensation and the rest of
it.’

‘But my Lord, the galley fired on us first. That
made him a pirate and fair game.’

‘That is not what the Dey says.’

 ‘Is the word
of an upstart Dey who was never there and who knows nothing about it to be
taken against that of a sea-officer who was there and who does know all about
it?’

‘...under any other Dey,’ repeated Barmouth. ‘My
politico takes the gloomiest view of the whole situation, and so I fear does
the Ministry. They have a special commission out there, half a dozen men of the
first distinction, to discuss the possibilities of a treaty, Ali Bey having
always been so much in favour of England... Was it a very large sum
of money, Aubrey?’

‘I cannot say, my Lord: it was in the form of very
small gold ingots, about the size of the upper joint of one’s finger. But there
was one chest that must have tipped the scale at eight stone or more.’

‘A hundredweight ... how many chests were there?’

‘I did not count, my Lord.’

‘Well, if there were only eight, my flag-officer’s
third would have amounted to about five thousand. It fairly makes me tear my
hair...’ Jack was tempted to say that he was not acting under Barmouth’s orders
at all, but carrying out Keith’s, which were still valid. However, he kept his
mouth shut: Barmouth muttered under his breath for a while; then, recollecting
himself, he said, ‘But in course it is far worse for you; and how you will ever
explain it to your people without a bloody mutiny I cannot tell. But hush, the
Keiths have just arrived.’

The door opened and in walked the ladies - very
fine ladies indeed, glowing with happiness, victory and all their best jewels,
followed by Lord Keith. ‘Jack!’ cried the one, and ‘Dearest Cousin Jack!’ the
other; and both kissed him   most fondly.

With the utmost affection and the happiest look he
said, ‘Queenie and Isobel, Isobel and Queenie, how very delightful it is to see
you both together, and in such glorious looks, my dears.’

‘Do you remember... ?’ cried the one, and ‘Do you
remember... ?’ cried the other, until the Commander-in-Chief broke up the
unseemly group, insisting in no very urbane or even civil tone, that their
guests should be seated.

He took one end of the table, with Queenie on his
right and Arden, his political adviser (only just not late and still pale with
emotion) on his left; Isobel Barmouth the other end, with Lord Keith on her
right and Cousin Jack on her left.

The politico had been detained by some further
details of the great battle or rather series of battles, and these he related
with a fair degree of precision; but after that the conversation languished.
There had been a very, very great deal of emotion that day, and both admirals
were feeling their age. Queenie and Stephen rambled along pleasantly about the
island; but then she, having tried to move the Commanderin-Chief from his only
too evident ill-humour, fell silent, imitated by Stephen. The only people
really enjoying their meal were Jack and Isobel. Isobel was much younger than
Queenie: the cousins were indeed much of an age and when they were adolescents
there had been a certain degree of ambiguity about the nature of their
friendship: now that ambiguity was distinctly more evident. Isobel was in fine
voice and very high spirits; and it was evident to Stephen, on the other side
of the table, that they were holding hands under the cloth.

She was, he reflected, something of a rake: a very
pretty rake. And it was not improbable that her cross old husband was aware of
it, for when her cousin had said something that moved her to an indecorous fit
of laughter, Lord Barmouth straightened in his chair and called down the table,
‘Aubrey, I have just been thinking that now you have nothing to do with the
Navy, you might be well advised to slip your moorings and sail off to survey
the Horn and plumb the depths of Magellan: the inhabitants may prove grateful,
and I am sure the young ladies would welcome such a very amusing companion.’

This was said in such a tone that Isobel stood up
at once: she and Queenie paced into the drawing-room, leaving an abashed group
of men standing there, all at a moral disadvantage.

The servants were by no means unaccustomed to this,
and the port very soon made its appearance; it had gone round three times when
a servant asked Stephen whether Dr Jacob might have a word with him.

Stephen excused himself and found Jacob in the
hall. ‘I beg pardon for disturbing you,’ he said, ‘but the forerunner of an
Algerine delegation brought me the news of Ali Bey’s deposition - he was
strangled in the slave-market - and since the news of the French defeat reached
Algiers earlier than Spain, the new Dey, Hassan, is sending these people to
congratulate the Commander-in-Chief, to announce his accession, and to annul
his predecessor’s absurd claim on the captured treasure; but he should like the
galley back, as a symbol of his office, and he would be most grateful for an
immediate loan of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds to consolidate his
position in Algiers.’

‘What you say fills me with ease,’ said Stephen.
‘Yet since the Commander-in-Chief, Lord Keith, the politico and Captain Aubrey
and nobody else are in there, I believe you should relate all this to them.’

‘Very well: and I have the head of the English
mission with me to substantiate what I say. Shall I fetch him?’

‘Not if it would take ten minutes. This news must
be eaten hot.’

‘Very well.’

Stephen led him in. ‘My Lord,’ he said to Barmouth,
‘may I introduce my colleague Dr Jacob, a gentleman very well known to Sir
Joseph Blaine?’

‘Hear, hear,’ said the politico.

‘Of course you may,’ said Barmouth. ‘How do you do,
sir? Pray take a seat. May I offer you a glass of wine?’

‘My lords and gentlemen,’ said Jacob, bowing over
his port. ‘I must tell you that one of our most reliable agents in Algiers,
accompanied by a member of the Ministry’s special commission, Mr Blenkinsop,
has just told me that tomorrow morning a delegation from the new Dey, Hassan,
will arrive to congratulate His Majesty on the defeat of Bonaparte, to announce
his own accession, and to settle a point at issue the Algerine galley and its
alleged cargo. He waives his predecessor’s absurd claim, and although he should
like the galley back as a symbol of his office, he fully acknowledges that its
commander, in firing first, deprived all persons other than the captain of His
Britannic Majesty’s ship of any claim to its contents. He should however be
most grateful for an immediate loan of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds to
strengthen his present position - a loan very soon to be repaid.’

There was a silence: then the Commander-in-Chief
said, ‘Dr Jacob, we are very grateful indeed for your good news and your early
warning - at least we shall be able to receive these gentlemen in a suitable
manner. Lord Keith, you are the senior officer present: may
I ask your opinion?’

‘My opinion is that we should welcome this approach
most heartily...’

‘Hear, hear,’ said the politico. Stephen and Jack,
being parties concerned, said nothing; but Jack at all events felt a spring of
delight rising in his heart.