"Forester, C S - Hornblower 09 - Lord Hornblower" - читать интересную книгу автора (Forester C S)

"Quite so. Quite so."
"But if Your Royal Highness were to intervene on behalf of the men, I might then be able to pardon them without prejudice to discipline, being in a position where I can deny Your Royal Highness nothing."
"And why should I intervene, Sir 'Oratio?"
Hornblower sidestepped the question for the moment.
"Your Royal Highness could take the stand that it would be unfitting that the opening days of the return of the Dynasty to France should be marred by the shedding of the blood of Englishmen, however guilty. It would then be possible for me to pardon them, with a great show of reluctance. Men tempted to mutiny in the future would not have their temptation greatly increased by the hope of a similar event saving them from the consequences of their actions - the world will never again be so fortunate as to see a return of Your Royal Highness's family to its legitimate position."
This last was a clumsy compliment, clumsily worded and susceptible to misunderstanding, but luckily the Duke took it in the spirit in which it was ostensibly meant. Nevertheless, he hardly seemed enthusiastic; he went back to his original point with Bourbon stubbornness.
"But why should I do this, Sir 'Oratio?"
"In the name of common humanity, Your Royal Highness. There are twenty lives to be saved, the lives of useful men."
"Useful men? Mutineers? Presumably Jacobins, revolutionaries, equalitarians - even Socialists!"
"They are men who lie in irons today and expect to be hanged tomorrow, Your Royal Highness."
"As I have no doubt whatever, they deserve, Sir 'Oratio. It would be a fine beginning to the Regency with which His Most Christian Majesty has entrusted me if my first public act should be to solicit the lives of a parcel of revolutionaries. His Most Christian Majesty has not spent the past twenty-one years combating the spirit of revolution for that. The eyes of the world are upon me."
"I have never yet known the world offended by an act of clemency, Your Royal Highness."
"You have strange ideas of clemency, sir. It appears to me as if this remarkable suggestion of yours has some purpose other than is apparent. Perhaps you are a Liberal yourself, one of these dangerous men who consider themselves thinkers. It would be a good stroke of policy for you to induce my family to brand itself by its first act as willing to condone revolution."
The monstrous imputation took Hornblower completely aback.
"Sir!" he spluttered. "Your Royal Highness -"
Even if he had been speaking in English words would have failed him. In French he was utterly helpless. It was not merely the insult, but it was the revelation of the Bourbon narrow-mindedness and suspicious cunning that helped to strike him dumb.
"I do not see fit to accede to your request, sir," said the Duke, his hand on the bellrope.
Outside the audience chamber Hornblower strode past courtiers and sentries, his cheeks burning. He was blind with fury - it was very rarely that he was as angry as this; nearly always his tendency to look at both sides of a question kept him equable and easy-going; weak, he phrased it to himself in moments of self-contempt. He stamped into his office, flung himself into his chair and sprang up from it again a second later, walked round the room and sat down again. Dobbs and Howard looked with astonishment at the thundercloud on his brow, and after their first glance bent their gaze studiously upon the papers before them. Hornblower tore open his neckcloth. He ripped open the buttons of his waistcoat, and the dangerous pressure within began to subside. His mind was in a maelstrom of activity, but over the waves of thought, like a beam of sunshine through a squall at sea, came a gleam of amusement at his own fury. With no softening of his resolution his mischievous sense of humour began to assert itself; it only took a few minutes for him to decide on his next action.
"I want those French fellows brought in here who came with the Duke," he announced. "The equerry, and the chevalier d'honneur, and the almoner. Colonel Dobbs, I'll trouble you to make ready to write from my dictation."
The emigre advisers of the Duke filed into the room a little puzzled and apprehensive; Hornblower received them still sitting, in fact almost lounging back in his chair.
"Good morning, gentlemen" he said, cheerfully. "I have asked you to come to hear the letter I am about to dictate to the Prime Minister. I think you understand English well enough to get the gist of the letter. Are you ready, Colonel?

'To the Right Honourable Lord Liverpool.
My Lord, I find I am compelled to send back to England His Royal Highness the Duke d'Angouleme'."

" Sir!" said the astonished equerry, breaking in, but Hornblower waved him impatiently to silence.
"Go on, Colonel, please.

'I regret to have to inform Your Lordship that His Royal Highness has not displayed the helpful spirit the British nation is entitled to look for in an ally'."

The equerry and the chevalier d'honneur and the almoner were on their feet by now. Howard was goggling at him across the room; Dobbs' face was invisible as he bent over his pen, but the back of his neck was a warm purple which clashed with the scarlet of his tunic.
"Please go on, Colonel.

'During the few days in which I have had the honour of working with His Royal Highness, it has been made plain to me that His Royal Highness has neither the tact nor the administrative ability desirable in one in so high a station'."

"Sir!" said the equerry. "You cannot send that letter."
He spoke first in French and then in English; the chevalier d'honneur and the almoner made bilingual noises of agreement.
"No?" said Hornblower.
"And you cannot send His Royal Highness back to England. You cannot! You cannot!"
"No?" said Hornblower again, leaning back in his chair.
The protests died away on the lips of the three Frenchmen. They knew as well as Hornblower, as soon as they were forced to realise the unpalatable truth, who it was that held the power in Le Havre. It was the man who had under his command the only disciplined and reliable military force, the man who had only to give the word to abandon the city to the wrath of Bonaparte, the man at whose word the ships came in and went out again.
"Don't tell me," said Hornblower with elaborate concern, "that His Royal Highness would physically oppose an order from me consigning him on board a ship? Have you gentlemen ever witnessed a deserter being brought in? The frogmarch is a most undignified method of progression. Painful, too, I am informed."
"But that letter," said the equerry, "would discredit His Royal Highness in the eyes of the world. It would be a most serious blow to the cause of the Family. It might endanger the succession."
"I was aware of that when I invited you gentlemen to hear me dictate it."
"You would never send it," said the equerry with a momentary doubt regarding Hornblower's strength of will.
"I can only assure you gentlemen that I both can and will."
Eyes met eyes across the room, and the equerry's doubt vanished. Hornblower's mind was entirely made up.
"Perhaps, sir," said the equerry, clearing his throat and looking sidelong at his colleagues for their approval, "there has been some misunderstanding. If His Royal Highness has refused some request of Your Excellency's, as I gather has been the case, it must have been because His Royal Highness did not know how much importance Your Excellency attached to the matter. If Your Excellency would allow us to make further representations to His Royal Highness -"
Hornblower was looking at Howard, who very intelligently recognised his cue.
"Yes, sir," said Howard. "I'm sure His Royal Highness will understand."