CHAPTER VI
NEWS FROM HOME
About a month later, around Iceland, the weather was of that rare kind
that the sailors call a dead calm; in other words, in the air nothing
moved, as if all the breezes were exhausted and their task done.
The sky was covered with a white veil, which darkened towards its
lower border near the horizon, and gradually passed into dull gray
leaden tints; over this the still waters threw a pale light, which
fatigued the eyes and chilled the gazer through and through. All at
once, liquid designs played over the surface, such light evanescent
rings as one forms by breathing on a mirror. The sheen of the waters
seemed covered with a net of faint patterns, which intermingled and
reformed, rapidly disappearing. Everlasting night or everlasting day,
one could scarcely say what it was; the sun, which pointed to no
special hour, remained fixed, as if presiding over the fading glory of
dead things; it appeared but as a mere ring, being almost without
substance, and magnified enormously by a shifting halo.
Yann and Sylvestre, leaning against one another, sang "Jean-Francois
de Nantes," the song without an end; amused by its very monotony,
looking at one another from the corner of their eyes as if laughing at
the childish fun, with which they began the verses over and over
again, trying to put fresh spirit into them each time. Their cheeks
were rosy under the sharp freshness of the morning: the pure air they
breathed was strengthening, and they inhaled it deep down in their
chests, the very fountain of all vigorous existence. And yet, around
them, was a semblance of non-existence, of a world either finished or
not yet created; the light itself had no warmth; all things seemed
without motion, and as if chilled for eternity under the great ghostly
eye that represented the sun.
The /Marie/ projected over the sea a shadow long and black as night,
or rather appearing deep green in the midst of the polished surface,
which reflected all the purity of the heavens; in this shadowed part,
which had no glitter, could be plainly distinguished through the
transparency, myriads upon myriads of fish, all alike, gliding slowly
in the same direction, as if bent towards the goal of their perpetual
travels. They were cod, performing their evolutions all as parts of a
single body, stretched full length in the same direction, exactly
parallel, offering the effect of gray streaks, unceasingly agitated by
a quick motion that gave a look of fluidity to the mass of dumb lives.
Sometimes, with a sudden quick movement of the tail, all turned round
at the same time, showing the sheen of their silvered sides; and the
same movement was repeated throughout the entire shoal by slow
undulations, as if a thousand metal blades had each thrown a tiny
flash of lightning from under the surface.
The sun, already very low, lowered further; so night had decidedly
come. As the great ball of flame descended into the leaden-coloured
zones that surrounded the sea, it grew yellow, and its outer rim
became more clear and solid. Now it could be looked straight at, as if
it were but the moon. Yet it still gave out light and looked quite
near in the immensity; it seemed that by going in a ship, only so far
as the edge of the horizon, one might collide with the great mournful
globe, floating in the air just a few yards above the water.
Fishing was going on well; looking into the calm water, one could see
exactly what took place; how the cod came to bite, with a greedy
spring; then, feeling themselves hooked, wriggled about, as if to hook
themselves still firmer. And every moment, with rapid action, the
fishermen hauled in their lines, hand overhand, throwing the fish to
the man who was to clean them and flatten them out.
The Paimpol fleet were scattered over the quiet mirror, animating the
desert. Here and there appeared distant sails, unfurled for mere
form's sake, considering there was no breeze. They were like clear
white outlines upon the greys of the horizon. In this dead calm,
fishing off Iceland seemed so easy and tranquil a trade that ladies'
yachting was no name for it.
"Jean Francois de Nantes;
Jean Francois,
Jean Francois!"
So they sang, like a couple of children.
Yann little troubled whether or no he was handsome and good-looking.
He was boyish only with Sylvestre, it is true, and sang and joked with
no other; on the contrary, he was rather distant with the others and
proud and disdainful--very willing though, when his help was required,
and always kind and obliging when not irritated.
So the twain went on singing their song, with two others, a few steps
off, singing another, a dirge--a clashing of sleepiness, health, and
vague melancholy. But they did not feel dull, and the hours flew by.
Down in the cabin a fire still smouldered in the iron range, and the
hatch was kept shut, so as to give the appearance of night there for
those who needed sleep. They required but little air to sleep; indeed,
less robust fellows, brought up in towns, would have wanted more. They
used to go to bed after the watch at irregular times, just when they
felt inclined, hours counting for little in this never-fading light.
And they always slept soundly and peacefully without restlessness or
bad dreams.
"Jean Francois de Nantes;
Jean Francois,
Jean Francois!"
They looked attentively at some almost imperceptible object, far off
on the horizon, some faint smoke rising from the waters like a tiny
jot of another gray tint slightly darker than the sky's. Their eyes
were used to plumbing depths, and they had seen it.
"A sail, a sail, thereaway!"
"I have an idea," said the skipper, staring attentively, "that it's a
government cruiser coming on her inspection-round."
This faint smoke brought news of home to the sailors, and among
others, a letter we wrote of, from an old grandam, written by the hand
of a beautiful girl. Slowly the steamer approached till they perceived
her black hull. Yes, it was the cruiser, making the inspection in
these western fjords.
At the same time, a slight breeze sprang up, fresher yet to inhale,
and began to tarnish the surface of the still waters in patches; it
traced designs in a bluish green tint over the shining mirror, and
scattering in trails, these fanned out or branched off like a coral
tree; all very rapidly with a low murmur; it was like a signal of
awakening foretelling the end of this intense torpor. The sky, its
veil being rent asunder, grew clear; the vapours fell down on the
horizon, massing in heaps like slate-coloured wadding, as if to form a
soft bank to the sea. The two ever-during mirrors between which the
fishermen lived, the one on high and the one beneath, recovered their
deep lucidity, as if the mists tarnishing them had been brushed away.
The weather was changing in a rapid way that foretold no good. Smacks
began to arrive from all points of the immense plane; first, all the
French smacks in the vicinity, from Brittany, Normandy, Boulogne, or
Dunkirk. Like birds flocking to a call, they assembled round the
cruiser; from the apparently empty corners of the horizon, others
appeared on every side; their tiny gray wings were seen till they
peopled the pallid waste.
No longer slowly drifting, for they had spread out their sails to the
new and cool breeze, and cracked on all to approach.
Far-off Iceland also reappeared, as if she would fain come near them
also; showing her great mountains of bare stones more distinctly than
ever.
And there arose a new Iceland of similar colour, which little by
little took a more definite form, and none the less was purely
illusive, its gigantic mountains merely a condensation of mists. The
sun, sinking low, seemed incapable of ever rising over all things,
though glowing through this phantom island so tangible that it seemed
placed in front of it. Incomprehensible sight! no longer was it
surrounded by a halo, but its disc had become firmly spread, rather
like some faded yellow planet slowly decaying and suddenly checked
there in the heart of chaos.
The cruiser, which had stopped, was fully surrounded by the fleet of
Icelanders. From all boats were lowered, like so many nut-shells, and
conveyed their strong, long-bearded men, in barbaric-looking dresses,
to the steamer.
Like children, all had something to beg for; remedies for petty
ailments, materials for repairs, change of diet, and home letters.
Others came, sent by their captains, to be clapped in irons, to
expiate some fault; as they had all been in the navy, they took this
as a matter of course. When the narrow deck of the cruiser was
blocked-up by four or five of these hulking fellows, stretched out
with the bilboes round their feet, the old sailor who had just chained
them up called out to them, "Roll o' one side, my lads, to let us
work, d'ye hear?" which they obediently did with a grin.
There were a great many letters this time for the Iceland fleet. Among
the rest, two for "/La Marie/, Captain Guermeur"; one addressed to
"Monsieur Gaos, Yann," the other to "Monsieur Moan, Sylvestre." The
latter had come by way of Rykavyk, where the cruiser had taken it on.
The purser, diving into his post-bags of sailcloth, distributed them
all round, often finding it hard to read the addresses, which were not
always written very skilfully, while the captain kept on saying: "Look
alive there, look alive! the barometer is falling."
He was rather anxious to see all the tiny yawls afloat, and so many
vessels assembled in that dangerous region.
Yann and Sylvestre used to read their letters together. This time they
read them by the light of the midnight sun, shining above the horizon,
still like a dead luminary. Sitting together, a little to one side, in
a retired nook of the deck, their arms about each other's shoulders,
they very slowly read, as if to enjoy more thoroughly the news sent
them from home.
In Yann's letter Sylvestre got news of Marie Gaos, his little
sweetheart; in Sylvestre's, Yann read all Granny Moan's funny stories,
for she had not her like for amusing the absent ones you will
remember; and the last paragraph concerning him came up: the "word of
greeting to young Gaos."
When the letters were got through, Sylvestre timidly showed his to his
big friend, to try and make him admire the writing of it.
"Look, is it not pretty writing, Yann?"
But Yann, who knew very well whose hand had traced it, turned aside,
shrugging his shoulders, as much as to say that he was worried too
often about this Gaud girl.
So Sylvestre carefully folded up the poor, rejected paper, put it into
its envelope and all in his jersey, next his breast, saying to himself
sadly: "For sure, they'll never marry. But what on earth can he have
to say against her?"
Midnight was struck on the cruiser's bell. And yet our couple remained
sitting there, thinking of home, the absent ones, a thousand things in
reverie. At this same moment the everlasting sun, which had dipped its
lower edge into the waters, began slowly to reascend, and lo! this was
morning.
