Hornblower's charitable offering

“Where do you come from?” asked Hornblower, repeating himself in limping French when he saw he was not understood.

The blueeyed one extended an arm like a stick towards the Balearics to windward.

“Cabrera,” he said. “We were prisoners.”

Hornblower and Bush exchanged glances and Bush whistled—Bush could at least understand the gesture and the first word of the reply. Cabrera was a previously uninhabited islet which the Spaniards were using as a camp for their French prisoners of war.

The darkeyed castaway was speaking rapidly in a hoarse voice.

“You won’t send us back there, monsieur?” he said. “Make us your prisoners instead. We cannot—”

He became unintelligible with weakness and excitement. Bush, observant as usual, was yet puzzled by what he could see.

“I can understand their being thirsty,” he said, “but they couldn’t have got as thin as that just coming from Cabrera. They could have paddled that raft of theirs here in a couple of days, even without a wind.”

“When did you leave Cabrera?” asked Hornblower.

“Yesterday.”

Hornblower translated to Bush.

“That sunburn of theirs is months old,” said Bush. “The fellows can’t have worn a pair of breeches in weeks. There must be funny doings in Cabrera.”

“Tell me,” said Hornblower to the castaways, “how did you become—like this?”

It was a long story, the longer as it was interrupted while the castaways ate and drank, and while Hornblower translated the more sensational parts to Bush.

There were twentythousand of the poor devils—mainly the army which had surrendered at Baylen, but prisoners taken in a hundred other skirmishes as well—who had annoyed their Spanish captors inexpressibly while they were kept on the mainland by their continual attempts to escape. Finally the Spaniards had taken the whole twentythousand and dumped them down on the island of Cabrera, a mere rock of only a few square miles. That had been two years ago; there was no need for any Spanish garrison on the island itself—British sea power made it impossible for any French ship to attempt a rescue, and there was nothing with which to make boats except for rare driftwood. For two years these twentythousand miserable wretches had lived on the rock, scraping holes for shelter from the summer sun and winter storms.

“There are only two wells, monsieur,” said the blueeyed Frenchman, “and sometimes they run dry. But often it rains.”

Hornblower’s mathematical mind dealt with the timeproblem of supplying twentythousand men with water from two wells. Each man would be lucky if he got one drink a day, even if the wells never ran dry.

Of course there was no fuel on the island—not one of the twentythousand had seen a spark of fire for two years, and no clothing had survived two years of exposure and wear.

The Spaniards landed food for them at intervals, which was eaten raw.

“It is never enough, monsieur,” explained the Frenchman—Hornblower was acquainted with Spanish methods, and could understand—“and sometimes it does not come at all. Because of the wind, monsieur. When the wind is in the east, monsieur, we starve.”

Bush was looking at the chart and the sailing directions for the Western Mediterranean.

“That’s right, sir,” he announced. “There’s only one landing beach, and that’s on the east. It’s impracticable to land in easterly winds. It mentions the two wells and says there’s no wood.”

“They are supposed to bring food twice a week, monsieur,” said the Frenchman. “But sometimes it has been three weeks before they have been able to put it ashore.”

“Three weeks!”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“But—but—”

“Those of us who are wise have little stores hidden away in the rocks for those times, monsieur. We have to defend them, of course. And as for the others—There is usually plenty of one kind of food for them to eat, monsieur. There are not twentythousand of us by now.”

Hornblower looked out through the cabin window at the dull smudge on the horizon where, in this enlightened nineteenth century, actual cannibalism was still taking place.

“God bless us all!” said Bush, solemnly.

“There had been no food for a week when we escaped yesterday, monsieur. But easterly winds always bring driftwood, as well as famine. We found two treetrunks, Marcel and I. There were many who wanted to take the chance, monsieur. But we are strong, stronger than most on the island.”

The Frenchman looked almost with complacency down at his skinny arms.

“Yes indeed we are,” said Marcel. “Even if your ship had not seen us, we might have reached Spain alive. I suppose our Emperor has now conquered all the mainland?”

“Not yet,” replied Hornblower briefly. He was not prepared at short notice to try to explain the vast chaos which was acquiring the name of the Peninsular War.

“The Spaniards still hold Valencia,” he said. “If you had managed to get there they would only have sent you back to Cabrera.”

The Frenchmen looked at each other; they would have grown voluble again, but Hornblower checked them testily.

“Go and try to sleep,” he said, and he stamped out of the cabin.