At two o'clock on this same day on which he had concluded his bargain
with Captain Kerjean, Yves, having bought some ordinary seaman's
clothes, and changed clandestinely in a tavern on the quay, went on
board the _Belle-Rose._
He went all over the ship, which was badly kept and had aspects of
primitive roughness, but which nevertheless seemed a stout and handy
vessel, built for speed and the hazards of the sea.
Compared with the ships of the navy it looked small, short, and, above
all, empty; an air of abandonment with scarce a soul on board; even at
anchor this kind of solitude struck a chill to the heart. Three or four
rough-looking seamen lounged about the deck; they composed the whole
crew, and were about to become, for some years perhaps, Yves' only
companions.
They began by staring at one another before speaking.
Throughout the day the fine weather continued, warm and peaceful; a sort
of melancholy summer persisting into the autumn and bringing with it a
kind of tranquillity. And on Yves, too, his decision irrevocably taken,
a calm descended.
They showed him his little locker, but he had scarcely anything to put
in it. He washed himself in cold water, adjusted his new clothes, with
an air of something like vanity; he wore no longer the livery of the
state which he had often found so irksome; he felt at ease, freed from
all the bonds of the past, almost as much as by death itself. He began
to rejoice in his independence.
On the following morning, with the tide, the _Belle-Rose_ was going to
put off. Yves scented the ocean, the life of the sea which was about to
commence in the new fashion so long desired. For years this idea of
deserting had obsessed him in a strange way, and now it was a thing
accomplished. The decision he had taken raised him in his own eyes; he
grew bigger as he felt himself outside the law; he was no longer
ashamed, now that he was a deserter, of presenting himself before his
wife; he even told himself that he would have the coinage to go to her
that very night, before he went away, if only to take her the money he
had received.
At certain moments, when the face of little Pierre passed before his
eyes, his heart ached horribly; it seemed to him that this ship, silent
and empty, was as it were a bier on which he was about to be carried
living to his grave; he almost choked, tears welled into his eyes, but
he checked them in time, with his strong will, by thinking of something
else; and quickly he began to talk to his new-found friends. They
discussed the method of manœuvring the ship with so small a crew, and
the working of the large pulleys which had been multiplied everywhere to
replace the arms of men, and which, so Yves thought, made the gear of
the _Belle-Rose_ unduly heavy.
In the evening, when it was dark, he went to Recouvrance and climbed
noiselessly to his door.
He listened first before opening it; there was no sound. He entered
softly.
A lamp was burning on the table. His son was alone, asleep. He leaned
over his wicker cradle, which had the scent of a bird's nest, and placed
his lips very gently on those of his child in order to feel once more
his soft breathing. Then he sat down near him and remained still, so
that his face might be calm again when his wife should enter.