THE SULKIEST NAVAL OFFICER.

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Good Mundane,

Glad though I am to be held in your high esteem, I am... concerned about your intentions for me.

Do not forget that I am first and foremost, an officer of His Majesties Royal Navy. I have a duty to my country and to my captain, and I cannot have you pursuing some alternate commission for me beyond the navigations of the heavens! Not any more than I could stand idle while you linger upon your indecision of my fate.

Will all due respect, you could offer me no landscape so wondrous as the sand and sea of the Indies, no adventure so great as the war on France, and no duty more honorable than my service to my country! I must insist that you allow me to return to it at once!

Now please, let's have no more of this talk. I wish to return at once to my ship.

Yours
Lt. Horatio Hornblower

Comments

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[There's a sort of... dreadful calm that threatens to settle over Horatio's expression, like he's trying to decide for the moment if he's dealing with another mad captain. Something wavers in his gaze though, and finally his forehead knits into something like concern. You do look a little older, is the thing, Mister Bush, and Horatio doesn't know exactly what to do with that fact.]

You were my senior Lieutenant on the Renown, under Captain Sawyer. I have lately been reprimanded, and assigned watch and watch by our Captain.

I... fear that he does not know that I would never desert.

[shakenandlimp]

Ah, I know how I can prove it. Look you here: this never healed up in a few moments when you weren't looking. [Bush leans down to rap his knuckles on his wooden leg.]

That is-- yes, I think it is more than ten years, that was the year '02. Twelve years, then.

Have you not been told, then? Did your mundane not tell you? Oh, it's dreadful how times get all ahoo. Why, where I am stationed, the only man from near our time at all is a mad old French Marquis who writes dirty books.

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[And, okay, you are rewarded with just immediate alarm, Bush!]

What-- Sir, your leg!

[He looks open mouthed, from Bush's leg, to his face, and back again, as shocked as if the injury had this minute been sustained, and remains a raw wound.]

Forgive me, Mister-- Captain, but she had told me nothing of the sort! Certainly she did not prepare me for this...

[His gaze returns to THE LEG.]

How did it happen, Sir? If it is as you say, and yet to come for me, then perhaps it need not befall you at all?

[shakenandlimp]

It's nothing. Why, didn't I get a ship just the same?

You mustn't worry about it, Horatio. [Which is rudely intimate but calling him 'sir' is odd and 'Mister Hornblower' hasn't felt right in his mouth for twelve years.] Or about Captain Sawyer. It'll come out all right with Sawyer in the end, we'll all come out all right.

Don't you go worrying about me, now.

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It is far from nothing, Sir! Able as you may be, to be so injured is a wrong that should never have befallen you.

[And... Horatio. It's odd to hear Bush call him by his first name. Odder still is the sense that he's being placated. He doesn't like feeling like he can't do anything about that leg issue.]

How could I not worry about you now? Even if I am able to return I will be on eggshells, for fear of your lower extremities, Sir.

[shakenandlimp]

No, not for years. This was in the year eleven-- in action. You've no idea-- my God the things we'll see before that!

The leg, it's only what comes in action. There was four French ships of the line against your one and you crippled three of'm and had the fourth dismasted-- you did all you could. You had me sent below yourself to keep me out of the action, after the foot had gone, and I nearly damned you for it, too.

Begging your pardon.

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[Horatio is very calm and very composed for this conversation, which is impressive considering his heart did a little flip flop when Bush began talking about the things awaiting them.

Then another little flip flop at a later point in the tale...]

I... I sent you below, Captain?

[The title of Commodore begins to dance in his head again.]

[shakenandlimp]

I was first lieutenant, then. You were commanding, of course.

[Of course. That has seemed very natural to Bush since before it was appropriate to think in such a fashion, in fact.]

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But Captain you... even, prior to your becoming a Captain, you were my superior?

[He kind of gets it, but... maybe you could just say it a few more times, Bush? Just for him? Tell him he's good?]

[shakenandlimp]

Superior? Not in years. Only till you were promoted commander right over my head, at the end of our tour in Renown.

[Bush's eyes twinkle because Horatio deserved it. He really did. He was amazing through it all and he's been a splendid captain, when he wasn't too melancholy.]

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[Don't smile. Being promoted over the lieutenant two positions your superior might be great for you, but it's practically an insult to them, don't smile Horatio, don't smile, don't--

There's nothing for it, his eyes are sparkling with barely restrained glee, and he finally breaks into an uncontainable little grin.]

After this tour? That's-- I'm fifth Lieutenant, Mister Bush, it doesn't even seem possible!

[shakenandlimp]

[Bush sees that smile so infrequently, and it charms him like a snake handler his beast.]

I cannot tell how how you earned it, lest it be some sort of ... Conundrum. [He has learned and forgotten 'paradox'.]

But I can tell you I called you 'sir' without a qualm and had the good fortune to keep doing so for more tours under your command than otherwise.

I can't say how I've missed you on that damned heap! Surrounded by Americans and rude sorts and ladies in clothing that would make you blush to the top of your head. I've missed you so badly.

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[The smile doesn't entirely fade, but Horatio is... quite taken aback by the intensity of Bush's fondness for him.]

I... well, Sir, it has only been a few days since last we spoke for me, but I am sure that I would miss you too, under such conditions...

[It's a polite lie, at this point. He's too young, and doesn't know Bush well enough to really miss him yet, and the fact that the other man holds him in such obvious high regard makes him a little uncomfortable.]

It is a prison vessel, though? Pardon me Sir, but such a place sounds to me like a waste of your talents...

[shakenandlimp]

[Bush is hurt momentarily, but regains himself. Even in the wordless and unexamined depths of his mind he realizes that a Horatio only having known him a few days is not even the Horatio who held his face with gentle hands as he lay blood on the deck of Renown, and is easy again.]

There's a fortune-- an impossible fortune to be had if I can coax one sullen prisoner into good behavior. You shouldn't be able to credit it, all the things the Admiral offers. But it is such sorry work all the time. No real discipline; suggested a flogging for a mutineer-- only a flogging, mind you-! and the look of dismay I received, as if I had suggested something really unreasonable.

It's good of you to say, though, sir.

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[Horatio's expression remains carefully controlled, to the point where it's impossible to tell if he harbors any secret relief at the sound of a place where mutineers aren't flogged.]

That... sounds like an environment fit for the breeding of more mutineers, if I may say so, Sir.

[shakenandlimp]

Yes, if it were normal service. But you're meant to redeem them, one by one. To make them behave like gentlemen and ladies again, and turn away from their bad ways. Which is all well and good and explains why there ain't hanging-- nobody dies forever, you see-- but just that bit of discipline would do a world of good, I feel.