Part 5 (1/2)

Bristling, Bligh turned his attention to Brob. ”Well?” he snarled. ”What're you waiting for, Mr. Christian? Turn out the crew. Put 'em to work like a proper bucko mate. We've the tide to make, and a fair wind for Spain.”

”But, but I don't know how,” Brob stammered.

”Don't try to cozen me with your sly ways, Fletcher Christian!” Bligh shouted. ”Out on deck with you and get us moving!”

”Excuse me,” Alex said. ”I know this man of old, Captain. I can explain.” He stepped forth, drew Brob aside, and whispered: ”Listen, this is typical Hoka dramatics. The crew are perfectly competent. They don't expect anything but a show out of the officers, as far as actual seamans.h.i.+p goes. You need only stand around, look impressive, and issue an occasional order-any order that comes to mind. They'll interpret it as being a command to do the right thing. Meanwhile I'll handle the details for both of us.” Luckily, he reflected, that need not include rations. He could eat Tokan food, though it was preferable to supplement it with a few Terrestrial vitamin pills from his kit. He always carried some on his person. Brob had eaten before they left Mixumaxu, and one of his nuclear meals kept him fueled for weeks.

Bemused, the alien wandered off after Bosun Bush, rather like an ocean liner behind a small tugboat. Alex was taken to a vacant cabin and installed. It was reasonably comfortable, except that a human given a Hoka bed must sleep sitting up. One by one, the s.h.i.+ps warped from the docks, set sail, and caught the breeze. When Alex re-emerged, Victory was rolling along over chill greenish waters, under a cloud of canvas like those that elsewhere covered the sea. Air sang in the rigging and carried a tang of salt. Crewmen went about their tasks-which included, ominously, the polis.h.i.+ng of cannon as heavy as Brob himself-or, off watch, sat around telling each other how French blood would redden the ocean. Land was already low on the northern horizon.

Alex didn't stay topside long. He had had a difficult time of late, and faced a dinner with Lord Nelson, Captain Bligh, and heaven knew who else, in his role as Hornblower. Let him get some rest while he was able.

Shouts, trumpet calls, drumbeats, the thud of running feet roused him from an uneasy night's sleep. He stumbled forth in his pajamas. Pandemonium reigned, Hokas scurrying everywhere to and fro. Aloft, a lookout cried, ”Thar she blows-I mean to say, Frogs ahead, two p'ints t' starboard!”

”Stand by to engage!” yelled Captain Bligh from the quarterdeck.

Alex scrambled up the ladder to join him. Nelson was there already, the empty sleeve of his dressing gown aflap in the wind, a telescope clapped to his patchless eye. ”We've the weather gauge of them,” he said. ”They'll not escape us, I trow. Run up the signal flags: England expects every man will do his duty.”

Aghast, Alex stared forward, past the bowsprit and across the whitecaps. Dawnlight showed him three large sailing vessels on the rim of sight. Despite the distance, he identified the Tricolor proudly flying at each staff. Louis XIV had built a navy too. (The Hoka France had never had a Revolution, merely an annual Bastille Day fete. At the most recent of these, Napoleon had taken advantage of the usual chaos to depose the king, who cooperated because it would be more fun being a field marshal. The excitement delighted the whole nation and charged it with enthusiasm. Only in Africa was this ignored, the Foreign Legion preferring to stay in its romantic, if desolate, outposts.) ”No danger of their escape, milord.” Bligh rubbed his hands. ”See, they're coming about. They mean to meet us. We outnumber 'em, aye, but those are three capital s.h.i.+ps. Ah, a jolly little fight it'll be.”

Down on the main deck, and on the gun decks below, sailors were readying their armament. The sardonic old prayer drifted thence to Alex's ears: ”For that which we are about to receive, Lord, make us duly grateful.” Marine sharpshooters swarmed into the masts. He shuddered. Like children at play, the Hokas had no idea what shot and sh.e.l.l would inflict on them. They would find out, once the broadsides began, but then it would be too late. Nor would they recoil. He knew well how much courage dwelt in them.

Feeling ill, he mumbled, ”Admiral, wouldn't it be best if we-er-avoided commitment in favor of proceeding on our mission? Preserve the King's property, you know.”

Nelson was shocked. ”Commodore Hornblower! Do you imagine British seamen would turn tail like a . . . like a . . . like a crew of tailturners? Egad, no! Britannia rules the waves! Westminster Abbey or victory!”

Captain Bligh smiled. ”I'm sure the Commodore is no craven, but has some ruse in mind,” he said cunningly. ”What is it, sir?”

”I-well, I-” Desperate, Alex looked downward from the rail which his white-knuckled hands gripped. Brob stood like a rock in a surf of Hokas. ”Can you do anything, anything at all?” the human wailed to him.

”As a matter of fact,” Brob responded diffidently, ”I believe I may see a perhaps useful course of action.”

”Then for mercy's sake, do it! Though . . . we can't take French lives either, do you realize?”

”I would never dream of it.” Brob fanned himself, as if the very thought made him feel faint. ”You shall have to lower me over the side.” He looked around him. ”Possibly with one of those-er-spars to keep me afloat.”

”Do you hear that?” Alex exclaimed to Nelson and Bligh. ”Brob-uh, Mr. Christian can save the day.” They stared blankly at him. He saw he must give them an impression of total calm, complete mastery of the situation. Somehow, he grinned and winked. ”Gentlemen, I do indeed have a ruse, but there isn't time now to explain it. Please ready a cargo boom and drop the mate overboard.”

Nelson grew distressed. ”I do not recall, sir, that any precedent exists in the annals of war for jettisoning the mate. If we should be defeated, it would count heavily against us at our courts martial.”

Bligh was quicker-witted. ”Not if he's mutinied,” he said. ”Do you follow me, Christian, you treacherous scoundrel? Don't just stand there. Do something mutinous.”

”Well, er-” With a mighty effort, against his every inclination, Brob raised a cable-thick middle finger in the air. ”Up yours, sir. A rusty grapnel, sir, sideways. I do require a grapnel.”

”Ah, hah! D'ye hear what he was plotting? Next thing we knew, we'd be adrift in an open boat 4000 miles from Timor. Overboard he goes!” bellowed Bligh in his shrill soprano.

A work detail was promptly organized. To the sound of a l.u.s.ty chanty, Brob, a spar firmly lashed to his ma.s.sive body and carrying his implement, went on high, swung above the gunwale, and dropped into the waves. An enormous splash followed. Fearful of the outcome, yet intensely curious himself, Alex watched his friend swim off to meet the French.

They were still well out of gunshot range. Windjammers can't maneuver fast. The sight of the monster nearing them alarmed the crews, who opened fire on him. Two of the cannonb.a.l.l.s struck, but bounced harmlessly off.

Coming to the nearest vessel, Brob trod water while he whirled his hook at the end of a long chain. He let fly. It bit hard into a mast and snugged itself against a yard. Brob dived and began to haul. Drawn by the chain, the s.h.i.+p canted over-and over-and over-The sea rushed in through gunports and hatches.

Brob came back to the surface. A deft yank on the chain dislodged the grapnel and brought it to him again, along with a portion of the mast that he had snapped across. The warcraft wallowed low. It was not sinking, quite, and n.o.body had been hurt, but its powder was drenched, leaving it helpless.

Brob gave a similar treatment to the next. The third showed a clean pair of heels, followed by hoots of British derision.

Brob returned to the Victory, where his sailors winched him on deck to the tune of ”Way, hey, and up he rises, ear-lie in the morning.” Lord Nelson magnanimously issued him a pardon for his insubordinate conduct and Captain Bligh ordered an extra ration of grog for everybody.

Indeed, beneath their boasting, the Hokas seemed glad to have avoided combat. That gave Alex a faint hope.

Whether or not the entire naval strength available to France in these parts at this time had been routed, none was on hand when the flotilla from England dropped anchor two days afterward. Sunset light streamed over a hush broken only by the mildest of breezes and the squeals of leathery-winged seafowl. The bay here was wide and calm. Above it loomed the Iberian peninsula. Like its namesake on Earth, this land was rugged, though lushly green. A village, whitewashed walls and red tile roofs, nestled behind a wharf where fis.h.i.+ng boats lay moored.

Also red were the coats of marines ash.o.r.e. They had occupied the place as a precaution against anyone going off to inform the enemy of their arrival. It turned out that there was no danger of that. These isolated local folk were unconcerned about politics. Rather, they were overjoyed to have another set of foreign visitors. They had already seen Napoleon's Grand Army pa.s.s through.

Indeed, that host was encamped about ten kilometers off, beyond a high ridge to the southeast, alongside a river which emptied into the bay. Alex supposed the Emperor had chosen that site in order to be safe from surprise attack and bombardment out of the sea. He saw the smoke of campfires drift above trees, into the cool evening air.

Standing on the quarterdeck between Nelson and Bligh, he said fervently, ”Gentlemen, I thank you for your cooperation in this secret mission of mine. Tonight I'll go ash.o.r.e, alone, to, er, get the cut of the Frenchman's jib. Kindly remain while I'm gone, and please refrain from any untoward action that might warn him.”

His plan was to steal into yonder camp, find Napoleon, identify himself, and demand a ceasefire (not that firing had begun, except for target practice, but the principle was the same). It should be less risky than an outsider would think. Hokas would scarcely shoot at a human, especially one whom various among them would recognize as the plenipotentiary. Instead, they would take him to their leader, who if nothing else would respect his person and let him go after they had talked.

This was the more likely because he had had the sailmaker sew him an impressive set of clothes. Gold braid covered his tunic, gold stripes went down his trousers, his boots bore spurs and his belt a saber. From the c.o.c.ked hat on his head blossomed fake ostrich plumes. From his shoulders, unfastened, swung a coat reaching halfway down his calves, whose elbow-deep pockets sported huge bra.s.s b.u.t.tons. Borrowed medals jingled across his left breast.

The main hazard was that the subversives would discover his presence before he had had his meeting.

To minimize this chance, he meant to sneak as far as he could.

He might actually make it undetected to the Emperor's tent. On such short notice as they had had, even fast-learning Hokas could not have developed a very effective military tradition. Sentries would tend to doze at their posts, or join each other for a swig of ordinaire and a conversation about the exploits of Brigadier Gerard.

Nelson frowned around his eyepatch. ”Chancy,” he said. ”Were it anybody but you, milord, I'd forbid it, I would. Still, I expect Your Grace knows what he's about.”

”My Grace?” Alex asked, bewildered. ”But I haven't been made a lord yet-that is, I'm plain Commodore Hornblower-” Seeing the look on the two furry faces, he gulped. ”I am. Am I not?”

Captain Bligh chuckled. ”Ah, milord, you're more than the bluff soldier they think of when they say 'Wellington.' That's clear. You couldn't have routed 'em as you did-as you're going to do, here in the Peninsula and so on till Waterloo-you couldn't do that if your mind weren't shrewd.”

Admiration shone in Nelson's eyes. ”I'll wager the playing fields of Eton had somewhat to do with that,” he said. ”Have no fears, Your Grace. Your secret is safe with us, until you've completed your task of gathering intelligence and are ready to take command of your troops.”

”Sc.u.m of the earth, they are,” Bligh muttered. ”Just like my sailors. But we'll show those Frenchies what Britons are worth, eh, milord?”

Alex clutched his temples. ”Omigawd, no!” He stifled further groans. Whether Oakheart had included the a.s.sertion in his letter, or whether these officers had concluded on their own account, now that he was going ash.o.r.e in his gaudy uniform, that he must really be the Duke of Wellington, traveling under the alias of Horatio Hornblower-did it make any difference?

To be sure, somewhere in England, a Hoka bore the same name. Tanni had mentioned him. That mattered naught, in his absence, to the elastic imaginations of the natives.