Lieutenant Hornblower

by Forester Cecil

“Post four sentries. Give ‘em beats on all four sides. No one to pass that line on any account whatever.”

“Yessir.”

“Let the rest of your men sit down. You gun’s crew! Sit there, and don’t chatter like Portuguese bumboat men.”

The sun was very hot, and the rasprasprasp of Berry’s file was, if anything, soothing. Bush had hardly ceased speaking when fatigue and sleepiness demanded their due; his eyes closed and his chin sank on his breast. In one second he was asleep; in three he was awake again, with the world whirling round him as he recovered himself from falling over. He blinked at the unreal world; the blink prolonged itself into sleep, and again he caught himself up on the point of keeling over. Bush felt that he would give anything at all, in this world or the next, to sink quietly on to his side and allow sleep to overwhelm him. He fought down the temptation; he was the only officer present and there might be an instant emergency. Straightening his back, he glowered at the world, and then even with his back straight he went to sleep again. There was only one thing to do. He rose to his feet, with his weary joints protesting, and began to pace up and down beside the gun platform, up and down in the sunshine, with the sweat pouring off him, while the gun’s crew quickly subsided into the sleep he envied them—they lay like pigs in a sty, at all angles—and while Berry’s file went whitwhitwhit on the ventfitting. The minutes dragged by and the sun mounted higher and higher. Berry paused in his work to gauge the fitting against the touchhole, and then went on filing; he paused again to clean his file, and each time Bush looked sharply at him, only to be disappointed, and to go back to thinking how much he wanted to go to sleep.

“I have it to size now, sir,” said Berry at last.

“Then fit it, damn you,” said Bush. “You gun’s crew, wake up, there! Rise and shine! Wake up, there!”

While Bush kicked the snoring men awake Berry had produced a length of twine from his pocket. With a slowness that Bush found maddening he proceeded to tie one end into a loop and then drop the loop in through the touchhole. Then he took the wadhook, and, walking round to the muzzle of the gun and squatting down, he proceeded to push the hook up the eightfoot length of the bore and try to catch the loop on it. Over and over again he twisted the hook and withdrew it a little with no corresponding reaction on the part of the twine hanging from the touchhole, but at last he made his catch. As he brought the hook out the twine slid down into the hole, and when the wadhook was withdrawn from the muzzle the loop was hanging on it. Still with intense deliberation Berry calmly proceeded to undo the loop and pass the end of the twine through the hole in the ventfitting, and then secure the end to a little toggle which he also took from his pocket. He dropped the ventfitting into the muzzle and walked round to the breech again, and pulled in on the twine, the ventfitting rattling down the bore until it leaped up to its position under the touchhole with a sharp tap that every ear heard. Even so it was only after some minutes of fumbling and adjustment that Berry had the ventfitting placed to his satisfaction with its small end in the hole, and he gestured to the gun captain to hold it steady with the twine. Now he took the rammer and thrust it with infinite care up the muzzle, feeling sensitively with it and pressing down upon the handle when he had it exactly placed. Another gesture from Berry, and a seaman brought a hammer and struck down upon the handle which Berry held firm. At each blow the ventfitting showed more clearly down in the touchhole, rising an eighth of an inch at a time until it was firmly jammed.

“Ready?” asked Bush as Berry waved the seaman away.

“Not quite, sir.”

Berry withdrew the rammer and walked slowly round to the breech again. He looked down at the ventfitting with his head first on one side and then on the other, like a terrier at a rathole. He seemed to be satisfied, and yet he walked back again to the muzzle and took up the wadhook. Bush glared round the horizon to ease his impatience; over towards where the fort lay a tiny figure was visible coming towards them. Bush clapped a telescope to his eye. It was a whitetrousered individual, now running, now walking, and apparently waving his arm as though to attract attention. It might be Wellard; Bush was nearly sure it was. Meanwhile Berry had caught the twine again with the wadhook and drawn it out again. He cut the toggle free from the twine with a stroke of his sheath knife and dropped it in his pocket, and then, once more as if he had all the time in the world, he returned to the breech and wound up his twine.