Patrick O'Brian: H.M.S. Surprise

If she was what he hoped she was, he would give her such a broadside in the first moment, and before the surprise was over he would cross under her stern and rake her twice, perhaps three times, and then lie upon her quarter. Closer, closer: he heard her bell; seven bells in the graveyard watch, and still no hail. Closer, and the sky was lightening in the east.

‘Stand by the clew-​lines,’ he called softly. ‘Bellow, mind your priming.’ Still closer: his heart was pounding like a mallet. ‘Let fall,’ he cried. The topsails flashed out, they were sheeted home in an instant and the Surprise surged forward, racing up on the stranger’s quarter.

Shouts and bellowing ahead. ‘What ship is that?’ he roared into the confusion. ‘What ship is that?’ And over his shoulder, ‘Back foretops’l. Man clew-​garnets.’

The Surprise was within pistol-​shot, all her guns bearing, and he heard the returning hail ‘Euryalus. What ship is that?’

‘Surprise. Heave to or I sink you,’ he replied; but the true fire had gone. Under his breath he said, ‘God damn you all to hell, for a set of lubbers.’ Yet hope said it might still be a ruse, and as the ships came up into the wind he stood there still, twice his natural size and all aglow.

But Euryalus she was, and there was Miller in his nightshirt on the quarterdeck: Miller, far senior to him. He pitied the officer of the watch, the lookouts; there

would be the devil to pay - many a bloody back in the morning. ‘Aubrey,’ hailed Miller, ‘where the devil do you come from?’

‘East Indies, sir. Last from the Island.’

‘Why the devil did you not make the night-​signal like a Christian? If this is a joke, sir, a God-​damned pleasantry, I am not amused. Where the hell is my cloak? I am getting wet. Mr Lemmon, Mr Lemmon, I will have a word with you presently, Mr Lemmon. Aubrey, instead of arsing about like a jack-​in-​the-​box, just you run down to Ethalion and tell him to mend his pace. Good day to you.’ He disappeared with a savage growl; and from the bow port under Jack’s feet a voice said ‘Euryalus?’

‘What?’ said an answering voice from Euryalus’s after-​most port.

‘Ballocks to you.’

The Surprise bore up, ran leisurely down to the straggling Ethalion in the growing light - a shamefully great way off - made the private signal and repeated Captain Miller’s order.

The Ethalion acknowledged, and Jack was laying the course for Finisterre when Church, the signal midshipman this watch, and an inexpert one, too, said, ‘She is signalling again, sir.’ He stared through his telescope, struggled with the leaves of his book, and with the help of the yeoman he slowly read it off. ‘Captain Surprise I have two wool -no, women for you. Next hoist. One young. Please come to breakfast.’

Jack took the wheel, bawling out, ‘Make sail, bear a hand, bear a hand, bear a hand, look alive.’

The Surprise shot across the Ethalion’s bows and rounded to under her lee. He gazed across with a look of extreme apprehension, trying to believe and to disbelieve; and Heneage Dundas called out from her quarterdeck, ‘Good morning, Jack; I have Miss Williams here. Will you come across?’

The boat splashed down, half-​filling in the choppy sea; it pulled across; Jack leapt for the side, raced up, touched his hat to the quarterdeck, crushed Dundas in his arms, and was led to the cabin, unshaved, unwashed, wet, ablaze with joy.

Sophie curtseyed, Jack bowed; they both blushed extremely, and Dundas left them, saying he would see to breakfast.

Endearments, a hearty kiss. Endless explanations, perpetually interrupted and re-​begun - dear Captain Dundas, so infinitely considerate, had exchanged into this ship -had been away on a cruise - and they had been obliged to chase a privateer almost to the Bahamas, and had very nearly caught him. Several shots had been fired!

‘I tell you what it is, Sophie,’ cried Jack, ‘I have a parson aboard! I have been cursing him up hill and down dale for a Jonah, but now how glad I am: he shall marry us this morning.’

‘No, my dear,’ said Sophia. ‘Properly, and at home, and with Mama’s consent, yes - whenever you like. She will never refuse now; but I did promise it. The minute we get home, you shall marry me in Champflower church, if you really wish it. But if you don’t, I will sail round and round the world with you, my dear. How is Stephen?’

‘Stephen? Lord, sweetheart, what a selfish brute I am -a most shocking damned thing has happened. He thought he was to marry her, he longed to marry her - it was quite understood, I believe. She was coming home in an Indiaman, and at Madeira she left her and bolted with an American, a very rich American, they say. It was the best thing that could possibly have happened for him, but I would give my right hand to have her back, he looks so low. Sophie, it would break your heart to see him. But you will be kind, I know.’

Her eyes filled with tears, but before she could reply her maid came in, bobbed severely to Jack, and said breakfast was ready. The maid disapproved of the whole proceeding; and from the frightened, deprecating look of the steward behind her, it was clear that she disapproved of sailors, too.

Breakfast, with Dundas giving Jack a circumstantial account of his exchange and of the privateer and insisting on a rehearsal of the action with Linois, was a long, rambling meal, with dishes pushed aside and pieces of toast representing ships, which Jack manoeuvred with his left hand, holding Sophia’s under the table with his right, and showing the disposition of his line at different stages of the battle, while she listened with eager intelligence and a firm grasp of the weather-​gauge. A rambling, exquisite meal, that was brought to a close by the fury of Captain Miller’s repeated guns.

They came on deck; Jack called for a bosun’s chair to be rigged, and while it was preparing Stephen and Sophie waved to one another without a pause, smiling and crying out, ‘How are you, Stephen?’ ‘How are you, my dear?’ Jack said, ‘Heneage, I am so very much obliged to you, so deeply obliged. Now I have but to run Sophie and my treasure home, and the future is pure Paradise.’

The End