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He glanced at the land just in time to see a puff of smoke from the summit of Cape Creux, blown instantly into invisibility by the gale. Where the shots fell he could not tell at all, for he neither saw nor heard them; the sea was too rough for the splashes to be easily seen. But the fact that the battery was firing showed that they must at least be almost in range—they were circling on the very edge of ruin. Nevertheless, the Sutherland was making better speed through the water, and looking aft he could see preparations advancing on the Pluto’s deck for setting up a jury main mast. Any fragment of sail which the Pluto could carry would ease the Sutherland’s task enormously, and in an hour they might have the work completed. Yet in an hour darkness would have come to shield them from the fire of the battery; in an hour their fate would be decided one way or another. Everything depended on the occurrences of the next hour.
The sun had broken through the westerly clouds now, changing the hills and mountains of Spain from grey to gold. Hornblower nerved himself to endure the waiting during the next hour, and the Sutherland and the Pluto came through that hour successfully. At the end of that time they had weathered Cape Creux, and had drawn so far to the northward that the land under their lee had dropped away abruptly from a mile and a half distant to fifteen miles. Night found them safe, and Hornblower very weary.
Chapter XVII
“Captain Hornblower will command the landing party,” said Admiral Leighton, finally.
Elliott and Bolton both nodded in entire agreement as they sat round the council table in the Pluto’s cabin. A landing party six hundred strong, contributed by three ships of the line, was certainly a captain’s command, and Hornblower was equally certainly the best captain to command it. They had been expecting some such move as this ever since the Pluto had returned refitted from Port Mahon, and Leighton had shifted his flag back into her from the Caligula. The coming and going of Colonel Villena from the shore had heralded it, too. For three weeks the Caligula and the Sutherland had ranged along the coast of Catalonia, and the Pluto returning had brought back welcome fresh provisions, the Sutherland’s prize crews, and even a dozen new hands for each ship. With the crews at full strength they might well strike a heavy blow, and the capture of Rosas, if it could be effected, would undoubtedly throw the whole of the French arrangements for the subjection of Catalonia into confusion.
“Now, are there any comments?” asked the admiral. “Captain Hornblower?”
Hornblower looked round the big cabin, the cushioned lockers, the silver on the table, Elliott and Bolton gorged with the vast di
“I think,” he said at length, “that it might be unwise to trust so entirely to the co-operation of the Spanish army.”
“There are seven thousand men ready to march,” said Leighton. “From Olot to Rosas is no more than thirty miles.”
“But Gerona lies between.”
“Colonel Villena assures me that there are bye roads round the town passable to an army without ca
“Yes,” said Hornblower. Sending a single horseman was a different proposition entirely from marching seven thousand men by mountain paths. “But can we be certain of seven thousand men? And can we be sure that they will come?”
“Four thousand men would suffice for the siege,” said Leighton. “And I have General Rovira’s definite promise to march.”
“Still they might not come,” said Hornblower. He realised it was hopeless to try and argue with a man who had not had personal experience of Spanish promises, and who had not imagination enough to visualise the difficulties of arranging combined action between forces separated by thirty miles of mountainous country. The tell-tale groove had appeared between Leighton’s eyebrows.
“What alternative do you suggest then, Captain Hornblower?” he asked, impatience evident at having thus to reopen the whole question.
“I should suggest that the squadron confines itself to actions within its own strength, without having to depend on Spanish help. The coast battery at Llanza has been re-established. Why not try that? Six hundred men ought to be able to storm it.”
“My instructions,” said Leighton ponderously, “are to the effect that I must act in the closest co-operation with the Spanish forces. Rosas has a garrison of no more than two thousand men, and Rovira has seven thousand only thirty miles away. The main body of the French Seventh Corps is to the southward of Barcelona—we have a week at least in which to effect something against Rosas. From the squadron we can supply heavy guns, men to work them, and more men to head a storming column when we have effected a breach. It appears to me to be an eminently suitable opportunity for combined action, and I quite fail to understand your objections, Captain Hornblower. But perhaps they are not so cogent, now?”
“I did no more than to state them at your request, sir.”
“I did not ask for objections, but for comments, or helpful suggestions. I looked for more loyalty from you, Captain Hornblower.”
That made the whole argument pointless. If Leighton only wanted servile agreement there was no sense in continuing. He had clearly made up his mind, and on the face of it he had a very strong case. Hornblower knew that his objections were more instinctive than reasoned, and a captain could not very well put forward a plea of greater experience to an admiral.
“I can assure you of my loyalty, sir.”
“Very well. Captain Bolton? Captain Elliott? No comments? Then we can start work at once. Mr. Sylvester will let you have your orders in writing. I trust that we are on the eve of the most resounding success the east coast of Spain has seen since this Spanish war began.”
The fall of Rosas would indeed be a resounding success if it could be achieved. As a town with practicable communication with the sea it could hardly be retaken by the French now that there was a strong English squadron on the spot to sustain it. It would be a constant threat to the French communications, a base where Spanish armies from anywhere in the Peninsula could be thrown on shore, of such importance that the Seventh Corps would be bound to cease their attempts at the conquest of Catalonia and concentrate all their strength on the task of retaking it or observing it. But it was Spanish information that there was no French field army within reach. It was a Spanish promise to bring Rovira down from Olot to effect a siege, and a Spanish promise to have transport animals ready to drag the siege train from the landing point.
But with Leighton set upon it, there was nothing for it but to go through with the affair wholeheartedly. If everything went right, they would win a great success, and although Hornblower had never yet heard of a combined operation of war in which everything went right, he could still hope for one, and draft his arrangements for the landing of the siege train from the fleet in accordance with that hope.
Two nights later the squadron came gliding in the early darkness, with the hills and cliffs of the Cape Creux peninsula looming faintly in the distance, to drop anchor together off the sand cove beside Selva de Mar which had been agreed upon as the best place for landing. Four miles to the westward was the battery at Llanza; five miles to the east was the battery on the end of Cape Creux, and six miles due southward, across the root of the long peninsula of which Cape Creux forms the tip, lay the town of Rosas.