Clarissa Oakes (9 page)

   'Thank you, Mr Oakes: pray let the bosun know.' Jack came on deck and found M'Mullen poised to go, the
Eclair
lying to within pistol-shot.

   'I thank you very heartily indeed, sir,' he said, 'and give you joy of the finest sixth-rate I have ever seen, finer even than my father told me.'

   They parted on the kindest terms: the cutter put before the wind and spread her wings. When last seen she was setting topgallant studdingsails, tearing away to a young woman in the suburbs of Sydney. But long before this Jack had returned to the great cabin, followed by all the officers, and when he had handed round their post he said 'Gentlemen: although Mr Oakes may leave us at the next convenient port in South America, since the
Surprise
carries no wives, in the meantime he remains a midshipman and must be treated by all hands with the respect due to anyone who walks the quarterdeck. The same of course applies to Mrs Oakes. I intend inviting them to dinner and I look forward to the pleasure of your company.'

   They all bowed, said they would be charmed, delighted, very happy, and hurried off to read their letters. Jack, having passed the massive enclosures to Stephen, went back to his sleeping cabin; and he was about to return to Ashgrove Cottage and this question of Diana when the Governor's envelope, addressed to Captain Aubrey, Royal Navy, MP, FRS, etc. etc., struck him as larger than usual for even very flowery compliments.

   Yes, indeed. These were orders, wholly official and direct; and like most orders they left the door ajar, so that the man who carried them out could be blamed for either closing or opening it. There had been trouble in Moahu, an island to the south of the Sandwich group: British ships had been detained and British mariners misused. It appeared that there was a war in progress between the queen of the southern part and a rival from the north: Captain Aubrey would proceed to Moahu without a moment's loss of time and take appropriate measures to secure the release of the ships and their crews. It appeared that the forces were evenly balanced. The presence of His Majesty's ship would no doubt decide the issue. On mature consideration Captain Aubrey would decide which side was the more likely to acknowledge British sovereignty and receive a resident counsellor with an adequate guard, and he would bring his influence to bear in favour of that side: it was desirable that there should be only one ruler for Government to deal with. Although any unnecessary bloodshed was to be deprecated, if moral force proved insufficient to induce compliance, Captain Aubrey would consider other arguments. Moahu was of course British, Captain Cook having taken possession of the archipelago in 1779; and Captain Aubrey would bear in mind the importance of the island as a base for the fur-trade between north-west America and Canton on the one hand and for a potentially far more important commerce with Korea and Japan on the other. He would also reflect upon the benefits likely to accrue to the inhabitants from British protection, a settled administration . . . superstition, barbarous customs, undesirable practices . . . medical instruction . . . enlightenment . . . missionary stations . . . commercial development. Jack's eye skimmed over the usual set piece at the end, but he did notice that it had been written in haste and that although the variation about
the end justifying the means
had been thought better of, there had been no time to write the whole afresh and the words had been attempted to be scratched out, which gave them a ghostly emphasis.

   Moahu. Jack walked into the great cabin, to the chart table, and having pored over it he returned to the quarterdeck and said 'Mr Davidge, we will alter course, if you please: north-north-east. Spritsail and spritsail topsail; the staysails I need not name.'

The guests—there were only seven of them—gathered in the coach, normally Stephen's sleeping-cabin when he did not prefer to go down to his little booth opening off the gun-room and at all times his study, but now tweaked and scrubbed into the likeness of an ante-room; and when Stephen himself appeared Martin said to him 'I am so sorry about Easter Island.'

   'So am I,' said Stephen. 'I was vexed to the heart when first the Captain told me, but now I count it as just one more disappointment in a radically miserable life; and I console myself that the ornithology of these new islands has barely been touched upon. I understand that Moahu is no great way from Hawaii, which is known to possess a wide variety of honeysuckers and even a gallinule with a scarlet forehead.'

   'Yes. And presently you will also have the consolation of seeing Mrs Oakes in the remarkable scarlet gown I told you about.'

   The door opened, but no scarlet gown appeared. The blue cotton that protected Jack's bolt of silk had been transformed by Heaven knows what ingenuity and pains into a dress that looked very well with a seaman's black shore-going Barcelona handkerchief worn over it as a fichu. Jack stepped forward to welcome Mrs Oakes and her husband, and in due course he led her, followed by all the rest, into the great cabin: it was more than usually splendid, for although the long table, ablaze with silver, was laid for eight, and they spread well apart, there was still a great deal of space on every hand, a space filled with the sun reflected from the wake and the dancing sea, vivid and full of life, flooding in through the stern sash-lights, a range of windows running across the whole width, a fourth and inwardly slanting wall of bright glass panes that made the cabin the most beautiful room in the world. Clarissa Oakes looked about her with evident pleasure, but she said nothing as he sat her on his right hand and the other chairs began to fill: Davidge was opposite her and Reade was on her right with Martin over against him. Tom Pullings was of course at the foot of the table with Oakes on his right hand and Stephen on his left. There were few seamen servants and no red-coated Marines, only Killick behind Jack's chair and his mates to carry dishes and bottles, Padeen behind Stephen's, and a young foretopman each for Pullings and Davidge, but the scene had a seamanlike grandeur in which a twelve-pounder on either side did not look at all out of place.

   'We had an agreeable visitor this morning, ma'am,' said Jack, helping her to soup. 'The captain of the
Eclair
. He was most uncommon eager to see the ship, because his father had served in her in ninety-nine, the year of her famous action at Puerto Cabello. Well, I say famous—a trifle of sherry, ma'am? It is a very innocent little wine—because it made a great deal of noise in the service; but I do not suppose you ever heard of Puerto Cabello or the
Hermione
by land?'

   'I do not believe I ever did, sir, though naval actions have fascinated me ever since I was a child. Please would you tell me about Puerto Cabello? A first-hand account of a battle at sea would be of the very first interest.'

   'Alas, I was not there. How I regret it! I was indeed a midshipman in the
Surprise
at one time, but that was some years before. However, I will give you a bald statement of the facts. Mr Martin, the bottle stands by you, sir. Well, the
Hermione
was in the hands of the Spaniards, who at that time were our enemies, allied to the French: I will not go into how they came to have her because it is not to the point, but there she was, lying in Puerto Cabello on the Spanish Main, moored head and stern between two very powerful batteries at the mouth of the harbour, yards crossed, sails bent and all ready for sea.

   'Captain Hamilton—Edward Hamilton, not his brother Charles—who then had the
Surprise
, took her in to have a look at the
Hermione
. She was a thirty-two gun frigate and 365 men aboard: the
Surprise
had twenty-eight guns and 197 men and boys: but he decided to cut her out, and his people agreed. He had room for only 103 in his six boats, so he made a very careful plan of attack and explained it as clearly as ever he could. An hour or so after sunset, and all wearing blue—not a scrap of white anywhere—they set off in two divisions, the captain in the pinnace with the gunner, a mid and sixteen hands; the launch with the first lieutenant—who was the first of the
Surprise
at Puerto Cabello, Captain Pullings?'

   'Frederick Wilson, sir: and the midshipman was Robin Clerk, now master of the
Arethusa
.'

   'Aye. And then there was the jolly-boat with another mid, the carpenter and eight men. The next division was made up of the gig, commanded by the surgeon, our friend M'Mullen's father, and sixteen men . . . but I must not be too particular. Six boats in all, counting the two cutters. So they pulled along, each division in tow, and each boat with a distinct task. The jolly-boat for example was to board on the starboard quarter, cut the stern cable and send two men aloft to loose the mizzen topsail. It was a dark night with a smooth sea and a breeze off the land and all went swimmingly until they were within a mile of the
Hermione
, when they were seen by two Spanish gunboats rowing guard. "Be damned to them," said Hamilton. He cut the tow, gave three cheers and dashed straight for the frigate, confident that all the rest would follow him. But some of them, eager to be knocking Spaniards on the head, set about these wretched gunboats and Captain Hamilton and his boat's crew found themselves almost alone when they boarded on the starboard bow and cleared the forecastle. There was a tremendous din going on and they found to their astonishment that the Spaniards were at quarters below them blazing away with the great guns at some imaginary foe that had not yet arrived. So the Surprises made their way aft along the gangway for the quarterdeck, where they met with violent resistance. By now the Doctor and the gig's crew had boarded on the larboard bow, but forgetting that they were to rendezvous on the quarterdeck they went for the Spaniards on the gangway and cut them up most dreadfully; but this left Hamilton alone on the quarterdeck and four Spaniards knocked him down. Happily some Surprises darted aft and rescued him and a moment later the Marines boarded on the larboard gangway, formed, fired a volley down the after hatchway and then charged with fixed bayonets. But there were a very great many Spaniards aboard and it was still nip and tuck until the Surprises managed to cut the bower cable, whereupon they loosed the foretopsail and with the boats towing the
Hermione
stood out to sea. The batteries fired at her of course as long as she was in gunshot, but they only knocked away the gaff and some rigging; and by two in the morning she was out of range with all prisoners secured. In that bout the
Surprise
had no one killed and only twelve wounded, though the poor gunner—I knew him well—who steered the
Hermione
as she made her offing, was shockingly knocked about. The Spaniards, out of 365, had 119 killed and ninety-seven wounded. Captain Hamilton was knighted, and after that the
Surprise
was nearly always allowed a third lieutenant, an unofficial but a customary indulgence.'

   'Heavens, sir, that was a famous victory,' cried Mrs Oakes, clasping her hands.

   'So it was, ma'am,' said Jack. 'Allow me to carve you a little of this soused hog's face. Mr Martin, the bottle stands by you, sir. But in a way your running fight, tearing down the Channel for example in a heavy sea with all possible sail aboard, a lee-shore within pistol-shot, both sides evenly matched and both blazing away like Guy Fawkes' night is even finer. Mr Davidge, could you tell about the
Amethyst
and the
Thétis
in the year eight, do you think? Lord, that was such an action!'

   'Pray do, Mr Davidge,' said Mrs Oakes. 'Nothing could please me more.'

   'A glass of wine with you, Mr Davidge, while you collect your mind,' said Jack, at the same time filling Mrs Oakes'.

   'Well, ma'am,' said Davidge, wiping his mouth, 'in the autumn of that year we were close in with the coast of Brittany, the wind at east-north-east, a topgallant breeze, when late in the evening we saw a ship—a heavy frigate she proved to be—slip out of Lorient, steering west by south. We instantly wore in chase . . .'

   The tales followed one another, each amplified with details, names, accounts of various officers by the rest of the table, a fine general hum of talk accompanying but never breaking the central theme; and all this time Jack, true to the naval tradition, filled and refilled his guest's wineglass. While he was calling down the table, asking Pullings who it was that had taken the
Eclair
in the first place, she said privately, 'Mr Reade, I am sadly ignorant, but I have never dined with the Royal Navy before, and I do not know whether ladies usually retire.'

   'I believe they do, ma'am,' whispered Reade, smiling at her, 'but not until we have drunk the King; and, you know, we drink him sitting down.'

   'I hope I shall hold out till then,' she said; and in fact she was still upright, steady, hardly flushed at all and by no means too talkative (which could not be said for her husband) when the port came round and Jack, with a formal cough, said 'Mr Pullings, the King.'

   'Madam and gentlemen,' said Pullings, 'the King.'

   'Well, sir,' said Clarissa Oakes, turning to Jack when she had done her loyal duty, 'that was a delightful dinner, and now I shall leave you to your wine; but before I go may I too give a toast? To the dear
Surprise
, and may she long continue to
astonish
the King's enemies.'