Patrick O'Brian: The far side of the world

'It is like being in a prison-ship,' said George Abel, bowoar in Johnson's absence, 'only worse. "Jump to it, you idle lubber. Quick's the word and sharp's the action, damn your eyes." What has come over him, topping it the slave-driver?'

'Perhaps this will pacimollify him,' said Plaice, spitting towards the moderate-sized shark towing behind, pursued by its kin.

'Rowed off all!' cried Bonden, and the launch ran crunching up the strand. Abel instantly leapt out and seized not the painter but the stout line hitched round the shark's tail, with which he and half a dozen others hauled the creature from the sea, its followers rushing in so close for a last bite that they were only just awash.

Abel and his mates cut the shark's head off with the carpenter's axe and looked up for approval - a fish just the size required, and hardly bitten at all. This was no time for idle gaping, they were told; this was not Bartholomew Fair; they might join Mr Blakeney's party and run, run, not waddle, to the north-east point of the island, where there were still coconuts to be found. Any man that did not bring back twenty would curse the day he was born.

They left at the double, passing the forge among the trees, where the bellows wheezed and the sweating armourer hammered, naked but for an apron; and they met files of worriedlooking men running down from the ruins of the hut with loads of timber, while others, equally anxious, brought in faggots of pike-staves as straight and knot-free as they could find.

So they spent the day, never sitting down, never merely walking; but that was not enough. They were divided into watches as though they were on board, and each watch spent part of the night turning the long strips of shark's flesh on the framework by the fire and teasing coconut-fibre into oakum for caulking the lengthened boat; and it was striking to see how much their sleeping minds returned to shipboard time and its four-hour rhythm - each watch relieved the other almost as regularly as though the bell had been struck throughout the night. It was as well that there was a watch on deck as it were, for at two in the morning a curious wind got up and for three or four hours it blew hard from the north-west, working up a heavy short sea against the swell and endangering the fire, the unsavoury, glue-smelling food, and the new pitched tents.

It was a sea that drove straight into the lagoon through the two channels; it came on the flood-tide, hissing far up the beach, and there was not a sailor who did not know that it must work upon the wrecked frigate. The Norfolks themselves were not very early risers in general but a little after sunrise, when the Surprises were at their breakfast, a small part of them crossed the stream and hurried along the tide-line, on their way to the beginning of the reef. Although it was understood on both sides that they had a right of way they did not care to go by in the presence of many of the Surprises and their officers and most pretended not to notice them, though two of the more friendly, the more conversable, uttered a discreet howl and gave a jerk of the thumb.

Although in fact the wreck had not yet opened to any significant extent and although the red-bearded midshipman reported this to Captain Palmer, more men went by in the course of the morning; but it was not until half past eleven that they came back, twenty-five or thirty of them, dragging the Norfolk's larboard headrails and some of her forecastle planking. By this time most of the Surprises were scattered about the island, engaged on various urgent tasks, and the carpenters were almost alone, busily sawing the launch in two: though Mr Lamb himself had retired privately into the bushes. The only other man on the beach was Haines, a cooper by trade, who had won a kind of half-acceptance by making himself useful to Mr Martin, and who was now attending to the very troublesome barrels. He ran away as soon as he saw the Norfolks, pursued by shouts of 'Judas'; but there were no former Hermiones among the band and they did not pursue him for any distance - a few made as if to catch him, but only for the fun. Another group came up to the carpenters and asked them what they were doing - commended their tools, their workmanship - said they too would presently be building their own boat, now the wreck was breaking up - and talked on at some length in spite of surly answers or none at all. Then suddenly their leader cried 'Look! Look!' pointing inland. The carpenters turned their heads. The Norfolks seized a compass-saw, a sheet of the launch's copper, a handful of spikes, a pair of pincers, a small auger and a rasp and ran away laughing. It was a laughing matter for a hundred yards or so: one man tripped and lost his rasp, and another threw down his awkward sheet of copper to run faster; but by the time Choles overtook the man with the compass-saw he was already among his fellow Norfolks. Choles tried to snatch the saw, but they flung him down: Choles' friends came to his help, one hitting out with a carpenter's maul, breaking an arm directly, and Mr Lamb came running from the wood with a dozen Surprises. At this the Norfolks all drew together, wielding pieces of wood, and withdrew steadily across the water into their own territory, leaving most of their timber on the bank. The Surprises had two carpenter's axes and an adze and they would have gone on to recover the tools if they had not been stopped this side of the water by an enormous roar of 'Belay, there' from Captain Aubrey, some way up the hill.

They hurried back to him, the carpenters all talking together, calling for an instant raid with the pikemen to recover the tools.

'Mr Lamb,' he asked, 'how necessary are the lost tools for the immediate work in hand?' But he was obliged to shake the carpenter by the shoulder before Lamb's face, pale with fury, showed much sense, and shake him again before he made a coherent reply to the effect that the compass-saw would be needed tomorrow.

'Well then,' said Jack, 'get on with your work until dinnertime. I shall attend to the matter in the afternoon.'

He ate his own dinner - a discouraging piece of shark, grilled, and coconut for pudding - in company with Stephen and Martin. They talked in a general way about flightless birds and the colonization of remote oceanic islands, and he followed fairly well; but by far the greater part of his mind was taken up with his forthcoming interview with Palmer.

This morning's incident had to be dealt with, of that there was no doubt. Anything more of this kind would lead to open bloody battle, and although with his pikemen and axes he could probably sustain it, continual open violence would delay the launching of the boat intolerably and even perhaps make it impossible. There was not only the lengthening but the re-rigging, the caulking, the victualling and a thousand other things. A final attack, an attempt at taking the launch once it was ready - that was another matter, and if it could not be avoided by the various stratagems he had in mind he was reasonable confident that it could be dealt with by main force, particularly if the pikes could be kept in reserve, for the full daunting effect of surprise. What he must aim at was comparative tranquillity for three days, and then, before she was obviously ready, they could run her down to the beach before moonrise on Thursday night, pull out into the lagoon, lie there at a grapnel, step the masts, complete the re-rigging and the half-deck, out of reach from the shore, and sail on the evening tide. The question was, how much command did Palmer have over his men? He had lost almost all his officers either by drowning or by being sent away in prizes - no doubt many of his best seamen too - and he was very much alone, unseconded. How much were the former Hermiones an integral part of the Norfolk's crew? Could they draw many of the others with them? How much was Palmer influenced by his remaining officers, the surgeon and the shadowy master or lieutenant who kept so very much out of sight? These were questions whose answers he should have to read on Palmer's hairy enigmatic face that afternoon.