The Letter of Marque, page 16
'You acted for the best, sure: men will go to the stake for names much less respectable than Seth,' said Stephen. 'So you mean to put to sea, I find?'
'Yes. Because it seems to me that the best thing to do is to cut her out - to try to cut her out - by night. You can cruise for a ship very assiduously indeed quite well in with the shore and still miss her; but if you run into her port before she has sailed you are at least sure of finding her, which is the necessary beginning for any sort of battle.'
'I should never deny it, brother.'
'So, do you see, I mean to weigh tomorrow at the latest, tell the people what we are about, make them understand the shape, nature, soundings and bearings of St Martin's on a thundering great chart I shall draw, showing just where the Diane lies and where we shall lie, and then run down to Polcombe or any of those little lonely coves, according to the weather, moor the ship, and practise cutting her out with the boats night after night, till every man knows exactly where he is to be and what he is to do.'
'I applaud your design extremely,' said Stephen. 'And if during these exercises the ship could refrain from any communication with the shore, how very charming that would be: schemes of this kind are so very easily blown upon, particularly on a smuggling coast, with much going to and fro. Perhaps it would be out of place to suggest the hiring of some fine stout desperate fellows just for this operation?'
'I quite take your point about no communication, and I had it in mind myself; but as for your hired ruffians, I am sure William and his companions will provide us with all the volunteers their boats can hold - men accustomed to naval discipline. My only dread is -' he coughed'- that there may be too many, and that they may talk or make a noise.'
Even a little wine, as he had said earlier in the day, could affect a man's judgment, and he had been on the point of saying that he was most horribly afraid Babbington's zeal and friendship (infinitely mistaken friendship in this case) would lead him to join the expedition: for then in the event of success the Diane would have been 'cut out by Captain Babbington of HMS Tartarus, with the help of boats from the other men-of-war under his command, and from a privateer'. The offer he dreaded could not be refused, since if the Diane were captured the action would make William Babbington, now only a commander, a post-captain, the essential step to a flag and high command. Jack had been on the point of telling Stephen this: but it would not do. William must see it for himself or not at all. Jack had not the slightest doubt of William's affectionate loyalty - it had been most amply proved - but an excellent heart did not necessarily argue a brilliant intelligence, capable of instantly assessing the relative value of the near-certainty of promotion on the one hand and the remote possibility of reinstatement on the other. Yet Babbington, well-connected, with strong parliamentary interest, was pretty well sure of promotion soon in any event, whereas such an opportunity as this might never come Jack's way again in a lifetime. He looked across the table at Stephen, who said 'These night exercises of yours are a most capital notion.'
'I hope they may prove so. At least it is better than rushing at a bull in a china-shop without a plan. The Spartan was different. There it was simply a question of hammering the enemy hand to hand. Here we must not only hammer the enemy but sail his ship out of the harbour too, under the fire of his batteries and whatever men-of-war may be present. It has to be done neatly or not at all. Tell me, Stephen, would you say that William Babbington had a quick, lively apprehension?'
Stephen almost laughed: wheezing with amusement he said, 'I love William Babbington, but I do not think anyone could call his apprehension, his grasp, his intellection, quick or lively, except perhaps Mrs Wray. In the rough sports of war and in the immediate perils of the ocean, no doubt he is eminently quick; but for a rapid appreciation of more complex issues perhaps it would be better to look elsewhere. For these night-exercises of yours, however, springing from one clearly-defined point to another in the wet and the dark, with an express purpose, he would be most admirably suited. As I said, I think them a capital notion.'
Dr Maturin's views were shared by all hands. They studied the great chart that Jack had chalked out between the mizen-mast and the taffrail with the utmost attention as the ship ran down under easy sail to Polcombe; several of the hands had been in St Martin's during the peace, and they confirmed the unchanging general disposition of the port, the yard, and the navigable channels. And they, together with all the seamen present, took Jack's point that the one anxious part of the approach was the breakwater that guarded the harbour from westerly seas; it ran out from the south side, under the lighthouse cliff, and sentries patrolled its rampart. The boats necessarily had to pass within hail. But fortunately, the Surprise had two Jerseymen, Duchamp and Chevenement, 'And if we are challenged,''said Jack, 'they can sing out something short and quick, like "hands and supplies for Diane",'
When they reached Polcombe the breeze failed them, but they towed her in at slack water, so far in that they would certainly have to tow her out again, since the high cliffs cut off every breeze that would allow her to sail, while the ebb set hard against the reefs of Old Scratch, the rocky island that guarded the mouth of the cove - it might almost have been called a little bay - sheltering it from the heavy southern and south-western seas. Here, watched by a thousand sheep peering from the turfy brink so high above and by a moon-struck shepherd, they moored her with springs to her cables and began to lay out buoys limiting the harbour of St Martin's by the distances and angles that Lieutenant Aubrey had measured so exactly so many years before. They were even able to place tolerably accurate marks representing the tip of the cape with the lighthouse on it and the breakwater with the awkward rampart: by this time it was well on in the evening, but the men's spirits were so high that the boats gathered round Jack's launch, and with a liberty arising from the general good humour, the growing darkness and their distance from the ship, the hands urged him to let them pull out to the point where the ship would lie in the offing and then 'let them have a go'.
'Very well,' said he. 'But it must be done thorough-pace: a line from stern to stem; pull easy, and all hands to row soft and row dry, not to wet your mates' priming; not a word, no not a single goddamned whisper; this is not Bartholomew Fair, and the first man to speak may swim home on his own.'
The boats stood out to sea until it appeared to Jack that they were just where he would wish to anchor the ship off Cape Bowhead. Here he gave a clear account, three times repeated without the slightest variation, of where each boat was to board and what each group of men was to do; and he repeated his words about silence with even greater emphasis. The stars were already pricking out in the clear sky, and with Vega and Arcturus as his compass above he guided the line back to the mark for the headland and then after a dog-leg turn at the breakwater, where Duchamp called out 'New hands for the Diane', straight for the unsuspecting ship. They pulled smooth, mile after mile, they pulled away - the quiet tide was just making- until at last Jack murmured 'Cast off and stretch out' and the boats, freed from the line that had kept them together, dashed to the points of attack, the beakhead, the forechains, the mainchains, the mizenchains and the stern-ladder, and invaded the ship simultaneously with a horrible roar. A party of the most active young topmen raced aloft to loose the courses and topsails; Padeen and an equally powerful black man flew to the cables and stood over them each with a hypothetical axe; two quartermasters seized the helm; Jack Aubrey darted into the cabin, not so much to go through the motions of seizing the captain, his civilians and their papers as to check the time. 'I think it was an hour and forty-three minutes,' he said. 'But I could not be sure of the start. Next time I shall take a dark lantern. Was our howl unexpected?"
'Entirely,' said Stephen.
'A complete surprise,' said Martin.
'Was you terrified?'
'Perhaps we should have been if there had been less merriment. Old Plaice's hoarse chuckle could be recognized a great way off."
Martin said 'Might not a sudden silent attack be even more disconcerting? An unprovoked, unheralded violence contradicting all social contract, which calls for at least a cry of challenge or defiance? But even as it was, the assault terrified your new cook, sir. We were talking to him about a pilaff for your supper when the howl broke out: he uttered a cry in what may have been Armenian and ran from the room, crouched inhumanly low.'
'A pilaff? What an admirable notion. I dearly love a good pilaff. You will give us the pleasure of your company, Mr Martin?'
The next few days were quite remarkably happy. The ordinary routine was cut to a minimum, and apart from attacking the ship twice a night, the hands spent a great deal of earnest, concentrated effort in cutlass or boarding-axe practice and in pistol-fire. The rest of the time - for these were sunny days -they lay about the forecastle or gangways with an easy lack of restraint rarely to be seen in a man-of-war, public or private. It astonished the watchers who had come to join the sheep high above, and the nearby hamlets learnt that a pirate was moored in Polcombe cove, intending to ravish the countryside, carrying off the maidens to Barbary. At this the young women for some miles around hurried to the edge of the precipice, to view their ravishers, and perhaps to implore their mercy; while a revenue cutter, suspecting uncustomed goods, ran in and had to submit to the ultimate humiliation of being heaved off the tail of the Old Scratch reef by two cables, spliced end to end and carried out to the Surprise's capstan.
Jack was physically extremely active, which suited him through and through: during the night attacks he often took Stephen's personal skiff and accompanied the line of boats, paying close attention to the style of pulling in each and timing the various stages of the operation to the second. And after the first assault, which had been carried out mostly for the fun, he organized a kind of resistance. The defenders were allowed nothing more lethal than swabs, but the delay they were able to cause gave him a somewhat better estimate of the probable duration. In common justice the teams were changed and mingled, half-watch by half-watch, and twice a night Jack Aubrey either attacked or defended. All hands expended an immense amount of energy, and their captain, as was but right, expended even more. He was a powerful swimmer and during his naval career scarcely a commission had passed by without his having saved some Marine or seaman from drowning, so that there were at least half a dozen old Surprises now aboard who would have perished but for him; but at present he far outdid the past, for in repelling boarders he and his mates often flung them backwards into the sea and in one night alone he plucked out five - no fuss: simply an ape-like arm reaching down from the chains or a boat's gunwale and heaving them bodily up.
This intense physical activity did him a great deal of good, of course - his powerful great body called for much more than shipboard life could ordinarily give him - but it did even more good to his wounded heart and mind, since there was no time for the misery of retrospection nor for the corresponding phantasms of unrealistic success that so very often struggled for expression.
The combination brought back something of the appetite he had had before his trial: it would have been a shame if it had not done so, for Killick had laid in captain's stores on a scale he thought suitable to their new-found wealth, and the captain's cook, Adi, would have graced Lucullus' flagship. He was a gentle timid little greyish-brown man, round and greasy, easily moved to tears: he was utterly useless as a combatant, since no words, good or bad, could induce him either to attack or defend the ship; but he understood the whole range of naval cookery from Constantinople to Gibraltar; and although his maids of honour brought Rosia Bay to mind rather than Richmond Hill, they went down wonderfully well; while he could also turn out a creditable suet pudding.
From Maturin's point of view also these days were a blessed holiday. He could do nothing about his future plans, being as far out of touch with London as if he were in the Pacific; and although Diana was never far from his mind - he carried her talisman in his breeches pocket - his chief present occupation was to take in as much sun as his meagre form could absorb. He had been starved of it so long during the English winter that in these brilliant days he grudged every moment spent between decks or in the shade.
Fortunately for him and Martin, who formed no part of the boarding or defending teams and who otherwise would have been left to mope, there was Old Scratch, a delight for both the naturalist and the sun-worshipper. At one time sheep and rabbits had been introduced: the sheep had long since vanished but the rabbits were still there, and it was on their close-clipped southern lawns that Stephen basked when he and Martin were not taken up with the many other delights - the tide-pools, the seals that bred in the northern sea-caves, the uncommon plants such as bishop's snodgrass, the puffins nesting in rabbit-burrows, and the stormy petrels, which could be heard chur-ring in their companionable way, far down in their musky holes.
It was on one of those perfect afternoons, with a long south-western swell beating with slow, deep, measured strokes on the seaward face of Old Scratch, that they sat on the grass, watching the series of small waves that followed each impact and that ran into the cove in spreading half-circles, diminishing with perfect regularity until they lapped against the ship, a fan-like pattern of quite unusual beauty.
'That ship," observed Martin, 'contains a surprising number of beliefs. No doubt others of her size contain as many, but surely not quite so various, for I must confess that although I was prepared for Gnostics, Anabaptists, Sethians, Muggleton-ians and even those who follow Joanna Southcott, as well as the odd Jew or Mahometan, I was quite taken aback to find we have a Devil-worshipper aboard.'
'A true, literal, open worshipper of the Devil?'
'Yes. He does not like to mention the fiend's name, except in a hand-shaded whisper, but refers to him as the Peacock. They have an image of a peacock in their temples.'
'Would it be indiscreet to ask which of our shipmates holds these eccentric views?'
'Not at all, not at all. He did not speak in confidence. It is Adi, the Captain's cook.'
'I had supposed he was an Armenian, a Gregorian Christian.'
'So had I; but it appears that in fact he is a Dasni, from the country lying between Armenia and Kurdistan.'
'Does he not believe in God at all, the animal?'
'Oh yes. He and his people believe that God made the world; they look upon our Lord as having a divine nature; they acknowledge Mahomet as a prophet and Abraham and the patriarchs; but they say God forgave the fallen Satan- and restored him to his place. In their view it is therefore the Devil who rules as far as worldly matters are concerned, so it would be a waste of time to worship anyone else."
'Yet he seems a mild, amiable little man; and he is certainly the cook of the world.'
'Yes: he was showing me how to prepare the true Turkish delight - Deborah is almost sinfully fond of it - in the kindest way while he told me all this. He also spoke of the desolate mountains of the Dasni country, where the people live in partially subterranean houses, persecuted by the Armenians on the one hand and the Kurds on the other. But the families seem very loving and united, and they are sustained by a strong affection that extends to the remotest kinsman. It is evident that the Dasni do not practise what they preach.'
'Who does, indeed? If Adi had an accurate knowledge of the creed we profess to follow and if he compared it with the way we live, he might look at us with as much surprise as we look at him.' Stephen thought of asking Martin whether he did not perceive a certain analogy between the Dasnis' and the Sethians' opinion of angels, but he was stupid with comfort and the warmth of the sun and he only said 'There is a puffin flying with three fishes in his bill: I cannot make out how he manages to take the second and the third."
Martin had no useful suggestion to offer and they sat on in silence watching the sun until it sank behind the far headland; then they turned with one accord to gaze at the ship, which was going through one of the strangest manoeuvres known to seafaring man. Getting boats over the side, first hoisting them up from the skid-beams, heaving them outboard, and then lowering them down by tackles on the fore and main yardarms had always been a laborious business, accompanied time out of mind by a great deal of shouting, rumbling and splashing, compounded in this case by the Shelmerstonians' habit of yeo-heave-hoeing loud and clear whenever they clapped on to a fall. On a quiet night, with the air drifting landwards, it was possible that even from far out in the offing this din might wreck the most carefully prepared and otherwise silent raid, and Jack Aubrey was trying to make the operation noiseless; but it went strangely against the grain, against all known habits and customs, and it rendered the hands slow, nervous and awkward - so awkward indeed that the stern of the launch came down with a horrid splash while its bows were still a fathom from the sea, and the captain's enormous roar of 'Forward, there. Let go that goddam fall,' filled the cove until it was drowned by an even greater howl of laughter, at first choking and repressed, then spreading uncontrollably, so that all hands staggered again.
This was almost the last sun Stephen saw in Polcombe cove, and almost the last laughter he heard. Foul weather came up from the south-west, bringing rain, sometimes heavy, sometimes very heavy, almost blinding; heavy seas, too, which grew into solemn great rollers with the making tide, and cut up into a nasty short chopping surface on the ebb. Throughout this period the Surprises and their officers continued to attack or defend their ship twice a night: but boarding in oilskins or tarpaulins, with scarcely a gleam of light, after having pulled out and back over such an uneasy sea, was no small matter; and after several accidents and one near-drowning Jack was obliged to diminish both the outward voyage and the defence. Yet even so the casualties increased, strains, cruelly barked shins and cracked ribs mostly, from falling back into the boats from the wet and slippery sides, but also some badly broken bones like young Thomas Edwards' femur, a compound fracture that made Stephen and Martin very thoughtful indeed. He was one of the topmen whose duty it was to lay aloft the moment they were aboard, run out on the yard and loose the topsails: but he had not expected the defenders to strap up the foot-ropes and he had pitched backwards, falling headlong until the mizenstay checked him just above the quarterdeck, saving his life but breaking his leg.
