Seeing the foreigner, he closed the register, rose and drew up a chair. Then, when the other man was seated, he sat down.
Fourteen years had profoundly changed the merchant who, thirty-six years old at the beginning of this story, was now about to reach fifty: his hair was grey, his forehead was lined with anxious furrows and his look, which had once been so firm and confident, had become vague and irresolute, as if it were constantly trying to avoid having to settle on a single idea or a single person.
The Englishman looked at him with curiosity and obvious interest.
‘Monsieur,’ said Morrel, apparently made still more uneasy by this appraisal, ‘you wished to speak to me?’
‘Yes, Monsieur. You know on whose behalf I am here?’
‘The firm of Thomson and French, or so my cashier says.’
‘He informed you correctly, Monsieur. The firm of Thomson and French had some three or four hundred thousand francs to pay in France in the course of this month and the following; so, knowing your reputation for scrupulous punctuality, it collected all the bills that it could find with your signature and requested me to cash these bills successively as they came up for payment and to make use of the funds.’
Morrel gave a deep sigh and drew a hand across a forehead covered in sweat.
‘So, Monsieur,’ he said, ‘you have bills of exchange signed by me?’
‘Yes, Monsieur, for some considerable amount.’
‘For how much?’ Morrel asked, in what he hoped was a confident voice.
‘Well, first of all,’ the Englishman said, taking a sheaf of papers out of his pocket, ‘here is a transfer of two hundred thousand francs made out to the benefit of our firm by Monsieur de Boville, inspector of prisons. Do you acknowledge owing this amount to Monsieur de Boville?’
‘Yes, I do. It was an investment that he made in my company, some five years ago, at four and a half per cent.’
‘To be repaid…’
‘Half on the fifteenth of this month, half on the fifteenth of next month.’
‘That’s right. Then I have here thirty-two thousand francs, for the end of this month: these are bills which you have signed and which have been made out to our order by third parties.’
‘I accept that,’ said Morrel, blushing with shame at the thought that for the first time in his life he might be unable to honour his signature. ‘Is that all?’
‘No, Monsieur. In addition, I have these bills, due at the end of next month, assigned to us by the firms of Pascal and Wild and Turner of Marseille: about fifty-five thousand francs. In all, two hundred and eighty-seven thousand, five hundred francs.’
Poor Morrel’s suffering as all this was being counted out is impossible to describe.
‘Two hundred and eighty-seven thousand, five hundred francs,’ he repeated mechanically.
‘Yes, Monsieur,’ the Englishman replied. Then, after a moment’s silence: ‘I cannot conceal from you, Monsieur Morrel, that even allowing for your probity, which until now has been beyond reproach, the general rumour in Marseille is that you will not be able to meet your debts.’
At this almost brutally direct approach, the colour drained horribly from Morrel’s face.
‘Monsieur,’ he said, ‘so far… and it is now more than twenty-four years since I took over this firm from my father, who had himself managed it for thirty-five years… so far, not a single bill signed by Morrel and Son has been presented at our counter and gone unpaid.’
‘Yes, I know that,’ said the Englishman. ‘But, as one man of honour to another, tell me honestly: will you be able to pay these as promptly?’
Morrel shuddered and looked at the man opposite him with more confidence than he had shown so far.
‘A question which is asked with such frankness,’ he said, ‘deserves an equally frank answer. Yes, Monsieur, I shall pay if, as I hope, my ship arrives safely to port, because its arrival will restore to me the credit that has been lost to me because of a succession of accidents. But if, by misfortune, the Pharaon, which I am counting on as my last resource, were to fail me…’
Tears came to the poor shipowner’s eyes.
‘Well? If this last resource were to fail… ?’
‘Well, Monsieur, it is hard to say it, but… I am already used to misfortune and I must learn to be used to shame… I believe that I should be obliged to withhold payment.’
‘Have you no friends who could help you in these circumstances?’
Morrel smiled sadly and said: ‘In business, Monsieur, as you very well know, one has no friends, only associates.’
‘That is true,’ the Englishman muttered. ‘So you have only one hope left?’
‘Only one.’
‘Your last?’
‘My last.’
‘So that if this hope fails…’
‘I am lost, Monsieur, completely lost.’
‘As I was on my way to see you, a ship was coming into port.’
‘I know. A young man who has remained loyal to me in my misfortune spends part of his time at a lookout on the top floor of the house, hoping to be able to be the first to bring me good news. He told me of this ship’s arrival.’
‘But it is not yours?’
‘No, it is a ship from Bordeaux, the Gironde, also coming from India, but not mine.’
‘Perhaps it encountered the Pharaon and will bring you news.’
‘I must admit, Monsieur, that I am almost as fearful of receiving news of my vessel as of remaining in this uncertainty. At least uncertainty means the continuation of hope.’
And M. Morrel added glumly: ‘This delay is not natural. The Pharaon left Calcutta on February the fifth. It should have been here more than a month ago.’
‘What is that?’ the foreigner said, straining his ears. ‘What is the meaning of that noise?’
‘My God! Oh, my God!’ Morrel exclaimed, becoming pale. ‘What is it now?’
There was a considerable noise on the staircase: comings and goings, even a cry of distress.
Morrel got up to open the door, but his strength failed and he slipped back into his chair. The two men remained facing one another, Morrel shaking uncontrollably, the foreigner studying him with a look of profound pity. The noise had ceased, but Morrel still appeared to be waiting for something: the noise had a cause and must in turn produce some effect. The foreigner thought he could hear the footsteps of several people coming up the stairs and stopping on the landing. A key turned in the first door and it creaked on its hinges.
‘Only two people have the key to that door,’ Morrel muttered, ‘Coclès and Julie.’
At that moment, the second door opened and the young girl appeared, pale, her cheeks bathed in tears. Morrel got up, trembling, and leant against the arm of his chair, because he could not stand up. He wanted to ask a question, but his voice failed him.
‘Oh, father!’ the girl said, clasping her hands. ‘Forgive your child who is the bringer of bad news.’
The colour drained from Morrel’s cheeks and Julie threw herself into his arms.
‘Father! Father!’ she cried. ‘Have courage!’
‘The Pharaon is lost?’ he asked in a strangled voice.
The girl did not reply, but nodded her head, still pressing it against his chest.
‘And the crew?’ Morrel asked.
‘Safe,’ said the girl, ‘saved by the ship from Bordeaux that has just come into port.’
Morrel raised both hands heavenwards with a sublime look of resignation and gratitude.
‘Thank you, Lord!’ he said. ‘At least you have smitten me alone.’
Phlegmatic though the Englishman was, a tear rose to his eye.
‘Come in, come in,’ said Morrel. ‘I suppose you are all there at the door.’
Indeed, no sooner had he spoken these words than Mme Morrel came in, sobbing, followed by Emmanuel. Behind them, in the antechamber, could be seen the rough features of seven or eight half-naked sailors. At the sight of these men, the Englishman star
ted. He took a step as if to approach them, then thought better of it and stepped back into the darkest, most distant corner of the study.
Mme Morrel went and sat down in the armchair, taking one of her husband’s hands in her own, while Julie remained clinging to his breast. Emmanuel had stayed half-way across the room and seemed to link the Morrel family group to the sailors at the door.
‘How did it happen?’ Morrel asked.
‘Come here, Penelon,’ said the young man, ‘and tell us.’
An old sailor, tanned by the equatorial sun, stepped forward, twisting the remains of a hat between his hands.
‘Good day, Monsieur Morrel,’ he said, as if he had left Marseille only the day before and had returned from Aix or Toulon.
‘Good day, my friend,’ the shipowner said, unable to suppress a smile, even through his tears. ‘But where is your captain?’
‘As far as the captain is concerned, Monsieur Morrel, he stayed behind, ill, in Palma. But, God willing, it was nothing and you will see him home in a few days, as fit as you or I.’
‘That’s good. Now speak up, Penelon,’ said M. Morrel.
Penelon switched his quid of tobacco from the right cheek to the left, put his hand in front of his mouth, turned around and spat a long jet of blackish saliva into the antechamber, then stepped forward and, swaying on his hips, began:
‘Well now, Monsieur Morrel, we were near enough between Cape Blanc and Cape Boyador and sailing before a nice south-south-easter after having been well and truly becalmed for a week, when Captain Gaumard came over to me – I should mention I was at the wheel – and said: “Penelon, old boy, what do you think of them there clouds gathering on the horizon?”
‘And I’ll be blowed if I wasn’t looking at them myself.
‘ “What do I think of them, Captain? What I think is they’re coming up a bit faster than they need to and they’re a bit darker than well-meaning clouds have any right to be.”
‘ “I’m thinking the same myself,” said the captain, “and I’m going to take some precautions. We are carrying too much sail for the wind that’s coming. Hey, there! Bring in the royal and furl the flying jib!”
‘It was not before time. Hardly had the order been carried out than we had the wind on our heels and the ship was listing.
‘ “Fair enough!” said the captain. “We’re still carrying too much sail. Furl the mainsail!”
‘Five minutes later, the mainsail was furled and we had only the foresail, the topsails and the topgallants.
‘ “So, tell me, old Penelon,” said the captain. “Why are you shaking your head?”
‘ “Because, in your place, I still wouldn’t be running ahead like that.”
‘ “I think you’re right, old man,” he said. “There’s a puff of wind coming.”
‘ “If that’s how you like to put it, Captain,” I said. “Anyone who bought what’s down there at the price of a puff would make on the bargain. It’s an out-and-out storm, if I’ve ever seen one.”
‘By which I mean you could see the wind coming like you can see the dust rising in Montredon.1 Luckily this storm was up against a man who knew it.
‘ “Double-reef the topsails!” the captain yelled. “Let go the bowlines, to take in the topsails and weigh the yards!” ’
‘That was not enough in those waters,’ said the Englishman. ‘I should have reefed in four times and got rid of the foresail.’
Everyone started at the unexpected sound of this firm, sonorous voice. Penelon shaded his eyes with his hand and looked at the person who was so confidently directing his captain’s manoeuvre.
‘We did better than that, Monsieur,’ the old sailor said, with some respect, ‘because we struck the mizzen and turned into the wind to run before the storm. Ten minutes later, we struck the main topsails and went on with bare masts.’
‘The ship was rather old to risk doing that,’ the Englishman said.
‘Yes, it was indeed! That’s what did for us. After twelve hours of being tossed this way and that, as if the devil was on our tail, we sprang a leak. “Penelon,” the captain told me, “I think we’re going under, old chap. Give me the wheel and go down into the hold.”
‘I gave him the wheel and went below. There was already three feet of water. I came back up, shouting: “All hands to the pump! To the pump!” But it was already too late. We all set to it, but I think the more we put out, the more there was coming in.
‘ “Dammit!” I said after we’d struggled for four hours. “Since we’re sinking, let’s sink; you only die once!”
‘ “Is that how you set an example, Master Penelon?” said the captain. “Well, just you wait there.” And he went to fetch a pair of pistols from his cabin. “The first man who leaves the pump,” said he, “I’ll blow his brains out.” ’
‘That was well done,’ said the Englishman.
‘Nothing inspires a man like a solid argument,’ the sailor went on, ‘and all the more so as meanwhile the weather had lightened and the wind had fallen. But, for all that, the water kept on rising, not much, perhaps two inches an hour, but it did rise. You see, two inches an hour may seem like nothing; but in twelve hours it’s not an inch short of twenty-four, and twenty-four inches are two feet. Those two feet, added to the three we had already, makes five. And when a ship has five feet of water in it, it’s fit to be called dropsical.
‘ “Come on, then,” said the captain. “That’s enough. Monsieur Morrel will have nothing to reproach us for: we’ve done what we could to save the ship; now we must try to save the men. To the boats, boys, and look sharp about it.”
‘Listen, Monsieur Morrel,’ Penelon continued. ‘We loved the Pharaon but, much as a sailor may love his ship, he loves his hide better. So we didn’t wait to be asked twice, especially as the ship itself was groaning as if to say: “Be off with you, be off with you.” And it was telling the truth, the poor old Pharaon, because you could feel it literally going down under our feet. So in a trice the boat was in the sea and all eight of us were in the boat.
‘The captain came down last; or, rather, he didn’t come down, because he didn’t want to leave the ship. I had to seize him myself and throw him after our shipmates, before jumping in myself. It was not too soon. Just after I jumped, the deck burst with a noise which you would have thought was a volley from a forty-eight-gun man-of-war.
‘Ten minutes later, it dipped its bows, then its stern, then started to roll over like a dog chasing its own tail. And finally, heigh-ho, boys! Brrrou… ! Down she went, no more Pharaon!
‘As for us, we were three days with nothing to eat or drink, and we’d even started to talk about drawing lots to see which of us would be food for the rest, when we saw the Gironde. We signalled to her, she saw us, made for where we were, put down her boat and picked us up. That’s how it happened, Monsieur Morrel, on my word! On the word of a sailor! Isn’t that true, you others?’
A general murmur of assent showed that the storyteller had unanimous support for the truth of the basic facts and the picturesque embroidery of the details.
‘Very well, my friends,’ said M. Morrel, ‘you are fine men, and I already knew that no one was responsible for the misfortune that has befallen me other than my own fate. It’s God’s will and not the fault of men. Let us bow to His will. Now, how much pay are you owed?’
‘Oh, no! Let’s not talk about that, Monsieur Morrel.’
‘On the contrary, let’s,’ said the shipowner with a melancholy smile.
‘In that case, we are owed three months…’ said Penelon.
‘Coclès, pay two hundred francs to each of these good men. At any other time, my friends,’ he went on, ‘I should have added: “And give each of them two hundred francs bonus.” But times are bad, and the little money that remains is not mine to give. So accept my regrets, and don’t hold it against me.’
Penelon grimaced with emotion, turned to his companions, said a few words to them and turned back.
‘As far as that
’s concerned, Monsieur Morrel,’ he said, shifting his quid of tobacco to the other side of his mouth and sending a second jet of saliva into the antechamber to balance the first, ‘as far as that’s concerned…’
‘What’s concerned?’
‘The money…’
‘Well?’
‘Well, Monsieur Morrel, my comrades say that for the moment they will have enough with fifty francs each, and they can wait for the rest.’
‘My dear friends!’ exclaimed M. Morrel, deeply moved. ‘Thank you, you are all the best of men. But take it! Take it, and if you find a good owner to sail with, join him, you are free.’
This last remark produced a startling effect on the worthy seamen. They looked at one another aghast. Penelon, as if winded by a blow, almost swallowed his quid; luckily he put a hand to his throat in time.
‘What, Monsieur Morrel!’ he said in a strangled voice. ‘What! You are dismissing us! Are you displeased with us?’
‘No, my children, not at all,’ said the shipowner. ‘I am not displeased, quite the opposite. I am not dismissing you. But what do you expect? I have no more ships, I have no further need of seamen.’
‘What do you mean, you have no more ships?’ said Penelon. ‘Well, have some more built. We’ll wait. Thank God, we know what it is to ride out a spell of bad weather.’
‘I have no money left to build ships, Penelon,’ the shipowner replied, smiling sadly. ‘I can’t accept your offer, generous as it is.’
‘Well, if you have no money, don’t pay us. We’ll just do what the poor old Pharaon did: we’ll keep our sails furled!’
‘Enough, my dear friends, enough!’ M. Morrel exclaimed, stifled with emotion. ‘Go, I beg you. We shall meet again in better times. You go with them, Emmanuel, and see that my wishes are carried out.’
‘At least this is not farewell for ever, is it, Monsieur Morrel?’ said Penelon.
‘No, my friends – at least, I hope not. Goodbye then.’
He signalled to Coclès, who took the lead; the sailors followed the cashier and Emmanuel followed the sailors.
‘Now,’ the shipowner said to his wife and daughter, ‘please leave us alone for a moment. I have to talk to this gentleman.’