captainhornblower | Second Dispatch

Second Dispatch - [written]

December 2nd,

I have asked a few individuals before my time with our [His pen hesitates, but he doesn't know what they can see. Since this book is obviously magical, he may as well be cautious.] hosts, and now, given the task they assigned me, I wish to ask the community at large.

In your harbour, there is a sloop-of-war with British colours on her called Britannia. Does she have a captain here?

I believe, with a bit of work (as she has been adequately maintained but requires attention in a few areas), she would be ready to take to sea come spring, provided there is a crew to do it. I am willing to [eager to, desperate to] take on that responsibility, but I would not wish to interfere with an already-present chain of command.

H. Hornblower

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She's yours, Captain. A young lad saw to take it over for a short stint, and he cared for her well, but you're welcome to her.

[ she's yours.

oh yeah and: ] -- R. SHARPE

[The full weight of those words is... relatively missed by Horatio.

He's still coming to terms with the fact that others know him, that he's apparently been here before, but he doesn't equate the ship with that.

Still. A ship. His.

It takes awhile for the reply to come, mostly because he can't quite figure out how to say what he wants. In the end, it's a rather pathetic thing, but it's there.]

I'll seen her done justice.

Thank you, Major.

...Will you be looking for crew?

Aye. Both to get her into sailing shape and once she's ready to go out to sea. I'd say a dozen would be enough to get her out to sea. More to really run her, but that'd do for a minimum, I should think.

[ he takes his time with every letter, grateful for the lessons given by miss sage: ] Consider yourself in need of only eleven more, Captain.

Thank you, Major. I'm grateful.

[Though, one thing that bears asking, even though this man seems vastly different than the only other army major he's met in his life.]

Have you much experience sailing? I ask only to know what needs be taught.

More than most infantrymen. But still less than you'd likely want. [ ... ] A stint on a Navy ship when I was still an ensign. I was put to work even before we saw battle.

[ odd, really. it should never have happened. sharpe doesn't offer up the story, but it's a good one and he would never resent sharing it. ]

The only men in the army I ever met would've looked like we'd asked them to sacrifice their first born if we'd tried to put them to work.

[He doesn't have much company here, and an infantryman of a similar time is closer than anyone else he's met here. So, he's actually trying to be friendly. In his own way.]

That don't surprise me. Scum, the lot of them. Bloody idlers and ~~waist~~wastrels.

[ but they were his bloody idlers and wastrels, of course. and it made a difference. still, he thought he ought to pass the buck and blame his industrious virtue on something other than himself: ] The Captain was a friend, of sorts. And he saved us from a glum passage between India and England as a French warship's prize.

They weren't bad men. Not seaman, but I bear most of them no ill-will. [Even then, the ones he did still dislike were, on the whole, not British.]

Perhaps you can tell me of the voyage sometime. A bit of conversation can make the work of handling a ship easier.

Most, Captain? And what of the rest?

They were a company of British soldiers and French royalists. A faction of them [The writing stops for a few moments, then:]

I do not mourn their deaths.

[ harsh, he thinks. but he can let it slide. he knows he's had his own absence of grief for certain men.

curiousity does pluck at him, though: ] Where was this?

Muzillac. Part of our forces tried to take the north -- we were to hold the village.

[Muzillac. Mariette. It feels like a lifetime ago. Longer, perhaps. Maybe several lifetimes.]

Muzillac? Where the hell is Muzillac?

[ india he knew. portugal and spain, as well. christ, sharpe could probably still find his way around copenhagen. but brittany is a mystery to him. ]

North-western France. It's a small place, a tiny community, yet one of the commanding royalists was a displaced aristocrat of the region. So, Britain assisted in retaking it, intending to land the main royalist force elsewhere and conquer as they went until they joined us.

You've stepped foot in France.

[ it is something he's sorely wanted to do. ]

I have. It wasn't for long, but I have, at least, seen her countryside.

If they died, they can't have been that successful.

The Republicans flanked the town; they were waiting.

The lord was put to the guillotine -- one he'd brought and set up himself to kill those put in charge of the town by the Republicans. Or anyone he had a past grudge against.

[ makes you wonder whether they were right to depose the sod in the first place...

but that was a risky assertion, really. so more safely: ] Someone tipped them off?

[One Horatio thought but would never say. And the reason he wouldn't mourn the man.

Had it not been for that machine... for seeing it do its work, hearing it nearly all the while he was in that village... Maybe he would have more sympathy for the man.

But in the end? He'd created his death. It couldn't be mourned.]

The Lords of the Admiralty refused to alter their plans, even after they had reason to believe we were compromised.

[A bitter lesson for a young man to learn. One of many that affair taught him.]

Men at walls. [ he does not mean to be cryptic, but merely found himself too unskilled to express himself fully in the written word. but it was a critique levelled against wellington all too frequently: seeing doom ahead, but throwing men at it anyway. hoping to overwhelm the odds by sheer force of numbers. attrition. ] They gamble with lives, not knowing what it's like to lose one.

And offer no apologies when they lose. Sometimes, one must gamble. Even take a loss to allow the odds to right themselves. But they seem not to even consider the cost if their hand is bad.

[He's a gambling man himself, so the analogy comes easily.]

[ aye. losses happen. sharpe had always been the sort of officer who braved those losses alongside his men, except being a major did tend to take him away from the fray more often than he might like. and yet ambition drove him on. ]

Good observations, every one. Your crew is lucky to have you.

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