An Iceland Fisherman Part 21

The vessels set off two by two, or four by four, drawn out by the tugs.

As soon as they moved the sailors raised their caps and, full-voiced, struck up the hymn to the Virgin: "_Salut, Etoile-de-la-Mer_!" (All Hail! Star of the Sea!), while on the quay, the women waved their hands for a last farewell, and tears fell upon the lace strings of the caps.

As soon as the _Leopoldine_ started, Gaud quickly set off towards the house of the Gaoses. After an hour and a half's walk along the coast, through the familiar paths of Ploubazlanec, she arrived there, at the very land's end, within the home of her new family.

The _Leopoldine_ was to cast anchor off Pors-Even before starting definitely in the evening, so the married pair had made a last appointment here. Yann came to land in the yawl, and stayed another three hours with her to bid her good-bye on firm land. The weather was still beautiful and spring-like, and the sky serene.

They walked out on the high road arm-in-arm, and it reminded them of their walk the day before. They strolled on towards Paimpol without any apparent object in view, and soon came to their own house, as if unconsciously drawn there; they entered together for the last time.

Grandam Moan was quite amazed at seeing them together again.

Yann left many injunctions with Gaud concerning several of his things in his wardrobe, especially about his fine wedding clothes; she was to take them out occasionally and air them in the sun, and so on. On board ship the sailors learn all these household-like matters; but Gaud was amused to hear it. Her husband might have been sure, though, that all his things would be kept and attended to, with loving care.

But all these matters were very secondary for them; they spoke of them only to have something to talk about, and to hide their real feelings.

They went on speaking in low, soft tones, as if fearing to frighten away the moments that remained, and so make time flit by more swiftly still.

Their conversation was as a thing that had inexorably to come to an end; and the most insignificant things that they said seemed, on this day, to become wondrous, mysterious, and important.

At the very last moment Yann caught up his wife in his arms, and without saying a word, they were enfolded in a long and silent embrace.

He embarked; the gray sails were unfurled and spread out to the light wind that rose from the west. He, whom she still could distinguish, waved his cap in a particular way agreed on between them. And with her figure outlined against the sea, she gazed for a long, long time upon her departing love.

That tiny, human-shaped speck, appearing black against the bluish gray of the waters, was still her husband, even though already it became vague and indefinable, lost in the distance, where persistent sight becomes baffled, and can see no longer.

As the _Leopoldine_ faded out of vision, Gaud, as if drawn by a magnet, followed the pathway all along the cliffs till she had to stop, because the land came to an end; she sat down at the foot of a tall cross, which rises amidst the gorse and stones. As it was rather an elevated spot, the sea, as seen from there, appeared to be rimmed, as in a bowl, and the _Leopoldine_, now a mere point, appeared sailing up the incline of that immense circle. The water rose in great slow undulations, like the upheavals of a submarine combat going on somewhere beyond the horizon; but over the great s.p.a.ce where Yann still was, all dwelt calm.

Gaud still gazed at the ship, trying to fix its image well in her brain, so that she might recognise it again from afar, when she returned to the same place to watch for its home-coming.

Great swells now rolled in from the west, one after another, without cessation, renewing their useless efforts, and ever breaking over the same rocks, foaming over the same places, to wash the same stones.

The stifled fury of the sea appeared strange, considering the absolute calmness of the air and sky; it was as if the bed of the sea were too full and would overflow and swallow up the strand.

The _Leopoldine_ had grown smaller and smaller, and was lost in the distance. Doubtless the under-tow carried her along, for she moved swiftly and yet the evening breezes were very faint. Now she was only a tiny, gray touch, and would soon reach the extreme horizon of all visible things, and enter those infinite regions, whence darkness was beginning to come.

Going on seven o'clock, night closed, and the boat had disappeared. Gaud returned home, feeling withal rather brave, notwithstanding the tears that uncontainably fell. What a difference it would have been, and what still greater pain, if he had gone away, as in the two preceding years, without even a good-bye! While now everything was softened and bettered between them. He was really her own Yann, and she knew herself to be so truly loved, notwithstanding this separation, that, as she returned home alone, she felt at least consoled by the thought of the delightful waiting for that "soon again!" to be realized to which they had pledged themselves for the autumn.

CHAPTER II--THE FIRST OF THE FLEET

The summer pa.s.sed sadly, being hot and uneventful. She watched anxiously for the first yellowed leaves, and the first gathering of the swallows, and blooming of the chrysanthemums. She wrote to Yann several times by the boats bound for Rykawyk, and by the government cruisers, but one never can be sure of such letters reaching their destination.

Towards the end of July, she received a letter from him, however. He told her that his health was good, that the fishing season promised to be excellent, and that he already had 1500 fish for his share. From beginning to end, it was written in the simple conventional way of all these Icelanders' home letters. Men educated like Yann completely ignore how to write the thousand things they think, feel, or fancy. Being more cultivated than he, Gaud could understand this, and read between the lines that deep affection that was unexpressed. Several times in the four-paged letter, he called her by the t.i.tle of "wife," as if happy in repeating the word. And the address above: "_A Madame Marguerite Gaos, maison Moan, en Ploubazlanec_"--she was "Madame Marguerite Gaos" since so short a time.

She worked hard during these summer months. The ladies of Paimpol had, at first, hardly believed in her talent as an amateur dressmaker, saying her hands were too fine-ladyish; but they soon perceived that she excelled in making dresses that were very nice-fitting, so she had become almost a famous dressmaker.

She spent all her earnings in embellishing their home against his return. The wardrobe and old-shelved beds were all done up afresh, waxed over, and bright new fastenings put on; she had put a pane of gla.s.s into their little window towards the sea, and hung up a pair of curtains; and she had bought a new counterpane for the winter, with new chairs and table.

She had kept the money untouched that her Yann had left her, carefully put by in a small Chinese box, to show him when he returned. During the summer evenings, by the fading light, she sat out before the cottage door with Granny Moan, whose head was much better in the warm weather, and knitted a fine new blue wool jersey for her Yann; round the collar and cuffs were wonderful open-work embroideries. Granny Yvonne had been a very clever knitter in her day, and now she taught all she knew to Gaud. The work took a great deal of wool; for it had to be a large jersey to fit Yann.

But soon, especially in the evenings, the shortening of the days could be perceived. Some plants, which had put forth all their blossoms in July, began to look yellow and dying, and the violet scabious by the wayside bloomed for the second time, smaller now, and longer-stalked; the last days of August drew nigh, and the first return-ship from Iceland hove in sight one evening at the cape of Pors-Even. The feast of the returners began.

Every one pressed in a crowd on the cliff to welcome it. Which one was it?

It was the _Samuel-Azenide_, always the first to return.

"Surely," said Yann's old father, "the _Leopoldine_ won't be long now; I know how 'tis out yonder: when one of 'em begins to start homeward, the others can't hang back in any peace."

CHAPTER III--ALL BUT TWO

The Icelanders were all returning now. Two ships came in the second day, four the next, and twelve during the following week. And, all through the country, joy returned with them, and there was happiness for the wives and mothers; and junkets in the taverns where the beautiful barmaids of Paimpol served out drink to the fishers.

The _Leopoldine_ was among the belated; there were yet another ten expected. They would not be long now, and allowing a week's delay so as not to be disappointed, Gaud waited in happy, pa.s.sionate joy for Yann, keeping their home bright and tidy for his return. When everything was in good order there was nothing left for her to do, and besides she could think of nothing else but her husband in her impatience.

Three more ships appeared; then another five. There were only two lacking now.

"Come, come," they said to her cheerily, "this year the _Leopoldine_ and the _Marie-Jeanne_ will be the last, to pick up all the brooms fallen overboard from the other craft."

Gaud laughed also. She was more animated and beautiful than ever, in her great joy of expectancy.

CHAPTER IV--STILL AT SEA

But the days succeeded one another without result. She still dressed herself every day, and with a joyful look, went down to the harbour to gossip with the other wives. She said that this delay was but natural; was it not the same event every year? These were such safe boats, and had such capital sailors.

But when at home alone, at night, a nervous, anxious shiver of anguish would run through her whole frame.

Was it right to be frightened already? Was there even a single reason to be so? But she began to tremble at the mere idea of grounds for being afraid.

CHAPTER V--SHARING THE DREAD

The tenth of September came. How swiftly the days flew by!

One morning, a true autumn morning, with cold mist falling over the earth, in the rising sun, she sat under the porch of the chapel of the shipwrecked mariners, where the widows go to pray, with eyes fixed and gla.s.sy, throbbing temples tightened as by an iron hand.

These sad morning mists had begun two days before, and on this particular day Gaud had awakened with a still more bitter uneasiness, caused by the forecast of advancing winter. Why did this day, this hour, this very moment, seem to her more painful than the preceding? Often ships are delayed a fortnight, even a month, for that matter.

But surely there was something different about this particular morning, for she had come to-day for the first time to sit in the porch of this chapel and read the names of the dead sailors, perished in their prime.

"In memory of GAOS, YVON, Lost at sea Near the Norden-Fjord."

Like a great shudder, a gust of wind rose from the sea, and at the same time something fell like rain upon the roof above. It was only the dead leaves though; many were blown in at the porch; the old wind-tossed trees of the graveyard were losing their foliage in this rising gale, and winter was marching nearer.

"Lost at sea, Near the Norden-Fjord, In the storm of the 4th and 5th of August, 1880."

She read mechanically under the arch of the doorway; her eyes sought to pierce the distance over the sea. That morning it was untraceable under the gray mist, and a dragging drapery of clouds overhung the horizon like a mourning veil.

Another gust of wind, and other leaves danced in in whirls. A stronger gust still, as if the western storm that had strewn those dead over the sea, wished to deface the very inscriptions that remembered their names to the living.