“Here, Savage. Take your glass and tell me what you can see.”
Savage dashed up the main rigging at the word.
“Quite right, sir. She’s closehauled again on the starboard tack. We’ll pass her to leeward on this course. She’s wearing French national colours, sir. And she’s signalling now, sir. Can’t read the flags yet, sir, and she’s nearly dead to leeward, now.”
What the devil was the brig up to? She had settled her own fate by standing to windward again; if she had dashed for the land the moment she had sighted the Sutherland she might possibly have escaped. Now she was a certain capture—but why was the French brig signalling to a British ship of the line? Hornblower sprang up on to the rail; from there he could see the brig’s topsails over the horizon, as she held her windward course.
“I can read the signal now, sir. MV.”
“What the devil does MV mean?” snapped Hornblower to Vincent, and then regretted that he had said it. A look would have done as well.
“I don’t know, sir,” said Vincent, turning the pages of the signal book. “It’s not in the code.”
“We’ll know soon enough,” said Bush. “We’re coming up to her fast. Hullo! She’s wearing round again. She’s come before the wind. But it’s no use now, Mongseer. You’re ours. A handsome bit of prize money there for us, my lads.”
The excited chatter of the quarterdeck reached Hornblower’s ears to be unheard. This last attempt at flight on the Frenchman’s part had explained his previous movements. Bush, Gerard, Vincent, Crystal, were all too careless to have thought about it, too excited at the prospect of prize money. Hornblower could guess now what had happened. At first sight of the Sutherland, the brig had turned to fly. Then she had seen the red ensign which the Sutherland had hoisted, and misread it as the French colours—both sides had made the same mistake before this, the red fly both of tricolour and of red ensign led easily to confusion.
It was fortunate this time that Leighton had been Rear-Admiral of the Red, so that the Sutherland had worn his colours. What was more, the Sutherland had the round bow given her by her Dutch builders, the same as nearly every French ship of the line, and unlike every English ship save three or four. So the brig had taken the Sutherland to be French, and as soon as she was sure of this had held to the wind again, anxious to make her offing so as to weather Cape Creux. Then the MV signal which she had flown had been the private French recognition signal—that was something well worth knowing. It was only when the Sutherland did not make the expected conventional reply that the French captain had realised his mistake, and made one last dash for liberty.
A quite unavailing dash, for the Sutherland had cut her off from all chance of escape to leeward. The ships were only two miles apart now, and converging. Once more the brig came round, this time with the very faint hope of clawing away out of range to windward. But the Sutherland was hurtling close upon her.
“Fire a shot near him,” snapped Hornblower.
At that threat the French captain yielded. The brig hove to, and the tricolour came down from her peak. A cheer went up from the Sutherland’s main deck.
“Silence, there!” roared Hornblower. “Mr. Bush, take a boat and board her. Mr. Clarke, you’re prize-master. Take six hands with you and navigate her to Port Mahon.”
Bush was all smiles on his return.
“Brig Amelie, sir. Six days out from Marseilles for Barcelona. General cargo of military stores. Twenty-five tons powder. One hundred and twenty-five tons of biscuit. Beef and pork in casks. Brandy. Admiralty agent at Port Mahon’ll buy her, sure as a gun, ship, stores, and all.” Bush rubbed his hands. “And we the only ship in sight!”
If any other British ship had been in sight she would have shared the prize money. As it was the only shares to be given away were those of the Admiral commanding in the Mediterranean and of Admiral Leighton commanding the squadron. Between them they would have one-third of the value, so that Hornblower’s share would be about two-ninths—several hundred pounds at least.
“Bring the ship before the wind,” said Hornblower. Not for worlds would he give any sign of his delight at being several hundred pounds richer. “We’ve no time to lose.”
He went below to shave, and as he scraped the lather from his cheeks and contemplated the melancholy face in the glass he meditated once more on the superiority of sea over land. The Amelie was a small vessel, almost inconsiderable in size. But she carried between two and three hundred tons of stores; and if the French had tried to send that amount overland to Barcelona it would have called for a first-class military convoy—a hundred or more waggons, hundreds of horses, taking up a mile or more of road and needing a guard of thousands of troops to protect it from the attacks of the Spanish partisans. Troops and horses would have needed food, too, and that would call for more waggons still, all crawling along at fifteen miles a day at most over the Spanish roads. Small wonder, then, that the French preferred to run the risk of sending their stores by sea. And what a blow it would be for the harassed French army to find a British squadron on their flank, and their best route of communication broken.
Walking forward to take his bath with Polwheal in attendance, a new idea struck him.
“Pass the word for the sailmaker,” he said.
Potter the sailmaker came aft and stood at attention while Hornblower rotated himself under the jet of the washdeck pump.
“I want a French ensign, Potter,” said Hornblower. “There’s not one on board?”
“French ensign, sir? No, sir.”
“Then make one. I’ll give you twenty minutes, Potter.”
Hornblower continued to rotate under the jet of the pump, rejoicing in its refreshing impact on this hot morning. The chances were that no Frenchman had observed the capture of the Amelie from Cape Creux, and that was the only land in sight at the time. Even if someone had done so, it would take many hours to warn all the coast line of the presence of a British ship of the line. Having taken the French by surprise, the right game to play was to go on exploiting that surprise to the utmost, making use of every device that would make the blow effective. He went back to his cabin and put on refreshing clean linen, still turning over in his mind the details of his plans which were now losing their nebulousness of the night before and growing more and more clear cut.
“Breakfast, sir?” asked Polwheal, tentatively.
“Bring me some coffee on the quarterdeck,” said Hornblower. He could not bear the thought of food—perhaps because of his present excitement, perhaps because of his vast dinner of the night before.
From the quarterdeck could be seen shadowy blue masses on the horizon right ahead—the peaks of the Pyrenees; between them and the sea crawled the road from France to Spain. The sailmaker’s mate came running aft with his arms full of a vast bundle.
“Mr. Vincent,” said Hornblower. “I’ll have this flag hoisted instead of our own.”
The officers of the quarterdeck eyed the strange tricolour as it rose to the peak, and they looked from the flag to their captain, whispering among themselves. Grouped on the lee side, not one of them dared to try to open a conversation with Hornblower on the weather side. Hornblower exulted both in their excitement and their silence.
“Send the hands to quarters as soon as they have breakfasted, Mr. Bush,” said Hornblower. “Clear for action, but keep the ports shut, I want the long boat and launch ready to be hoisted out at a moment’s notice.”