"Why?"
"I'm sure I saw high rocks, quite close. It's the Great Hanois."
"What you saw was a thicker patch of fog."
"It is the Great Hanois. For God's sake, go about!"
Clubin gave a pull on the tiller.
V
CLUBIN AT HIS MOST ADMIRED
There was a sharp grating sound. The rending of a ship's side on a sunken rock in the open sea is one of the most sinister sounds that can be imagined. The Durande stopped short. Some of the passengers were thrown sprawling on the deck.
The Guernsey man threw up his hands.
"We're on the Hanois! Just as I said!"
There was a general cry: "We're lost!"
Clubin's voice, sharp and decided, dominated the clamor:
"No one is lost! Keep quiet!"
The black figure of Imbrancam, naked to the waist, emerged from the engine-room hatch and said calmly: "Captain, we're taking in water. The engine is about to stop."
It was a moment of dread.
The crash had been like a suicide. Had it been brought about on purpose it could not have been more terrible. The Durande had thrown itself against the reef as if attacking it. A jagged point of rock had been driven into the vessel like a nail. More than a square toise146 of the inside planking had been shattered, the stem was broken, the rake damaged, the bow stove in; and water was pouring into the hull with a dreadful bubbling sound. The ship had suffered a wound that had brought her to shipwreck. The shock had been so violent that it had broken the pendants of the rudder, which now hung loose, beating against the hull. The bottom had been knocked out of the vessel by the reef, and nothing could be seen around her but the dense, compact fog, now almost black. Night was falling.
The Durande was down by the head. She was like a bullfighter's horse that had been gored by the bull. She was dead.
The sea was at half-tide and rising.
Tangrouille had now sobered up: no one is drunk in a shipwreck. He went down between decks and, coming up again, reported to Clubin: "Captain, the water is filling the hold. In ten minutes it will be up to the scuppers."
The passengers were running frantically around the deck, wringing their hands, leaning overboard, looking at the engine, going through all the pointless motions of terror. The tourist had fainted.
Clubin held up his hand and they all fell quiet. He asked Imbrancam:
"How long can the engines go on working?"
"Five or six minutes."
Then he asked the Guernsey man:
"I was at the tiller. You were looking at the rocks. Which of the Hanois are we on?"
"We are on the Mauve. A few minutes ago, when the fog lifted, I had a clear view of the Mauve."
"Since we are on the Mauve," said Clubin, "we have the Great Hanois to port and the Little Hanois to starboard. We are a mile from land."
The crew and the passengers listened anxiously and intently, their eyes fixed on the captain.
There was nothing to be gained by lightening the ship, and in any case it would have been impossible: in order to get rid of the cargo it would have been necessary to open the ports and allow more water to get in. Nor would it have helped to drop the anchor, for the vessel was already firmly attached to the rock. Besides, on a bottom on which it would be difficult to get a purchase, the chain would probably have fouled. The engines were not damaged and could have been used to work the ship until the fire was extinguished--that is, for a few minutes more. It would thus have been possible to reverse the paddle wheels and back off the rock; but the Durande would then have sunk immediately. The rock was partly stopping up the holes in the ship's hull and reducing the inflow of water. It served as an obstacle to the invading sea. If the gash in the hull had been cleared of the obstruction it would have been impossible to stem the rush of water and work the pumps. If you pull out the dagger that has been plunged into a man's heart, you will kill him at once. Getting clear of the rock would have meant sinking to the bottom.
The water had now reached the cattle in the hold and they were beginning to bellow.
Clubin snapped out an order:
"Lower the longboat."
Imbrancam and Tangrouille hastened to obey and undid the lashings on the boat. The rest of the crew looked on as if petrified.
"All hands to the work!" shouted Clubin.
This time they all obeyed.
Clubin continued, impassively, to issue orders in the old language of command that the seamen of the present day would not understand: "Haul taut!--Use a voyal if the capstan won't work.--Stop heaving!--Slack there!--Keep the blocks clear!--Lower away!--Slack away at both ends, smartly, now!--All together!--Take care she doesn't go down stern first.--It's catching on there!--Get hold of the mast tackle falls!--Watch out!"
The longboat was launched.
At that moment the Durande's wheels stopped turning and the funnel ceased belching smoke. The fires had been extinguished.
The passengers fell rather than climbed down into the boat, sliding down the ladder or clinging to the rigging. Imbrancam picked up the unconscious tourist, carried him into the boat, and returned to the ship.
After the passengers, the crew made a rush for the boat, knocking down the cabin boy and trampling on him. Imbrancam barred their way, saying: "The moco goes first."
He thrust the seamen aside, picked up the boy, and handed him down to the passenger from Guernsey, standing in the boat.
Seeing the cabin boy safe, Imbrancam stood aside and said to the rest of the crew: "Now you can go."
Meanwhile Clubin had gone to his cabin and gathered up the ship's papers and instruments. He then took the compass from the binnacle, handed the papers and instruments to Imbrancam and the compass to Tangrouille, and told them to get into the boat.
They went down into the boat, following the other seamen. The longboat was now full, with water almost up to the gunwale.
"Now," shouted Clubin, "off you go."
There was a general cry from the boat:
"What about you, Captain?"
"I am staying here."
People who suffer shipwreck have little time for thinking and still less time for sentiment; but those who were in the boat, and at least relatively safe, had feelings that were not entirely selfish. All of them joined in the cry: "Come with us, Captain."
"I am staying here."
The Guernsey man, who was familiar with ships and the sea, replied:
"No, no, Captain. You are on the Hanois. From here it is only a mile's swim to Pleinmont. But for a boat the only landing is in Rocquaine Bay, and that is two miles away. We have heavy waves and fog. It will take us at least two hours to get to Rocquaine in the boat. It will be a pitch-black night. The tide is rising and the wind is freshening. There is going to be a squall. We want nothing better than to come back and fetch you, but if dirty weather blows up we shan't be able to. You are done for if you stay here. Come with us."
The man from Paris intervened:
"The boat is full--too full--and one man more will be one man too many. But there are thirteen of us, and that's unlucky for the boat. It's better to overload it with one man than one figure too many. Come along with us, Captain."
Tangrouille added:
"It is all my fault, not yours. It's not right that you should stay."
"I am staying here," said Clubin. "The ship will be torn to pieces by the storm tonight. I will not leave it. When a ship is lost the captain is dead. People will say of me, He did his duty to the end. I forgive you, Tangrouille."
Folding his arms, he cried:
"Carry out my orders. Cast off. Off you go!"
The longboat got under way. Imbrancam was at the tiller. All the hands that were not pulling an oar were raised toward the captain. From every mouth came the cry, "Hurrah for Captain Clubin!"
"There goes a brave man!" said the American.
"The finest man that sails the seas," said the Guernsey man.
Tangrouille was weeping. "If I
had had the courage," he muttered to himself, "I would have stayed with him."
The boat disappeared into the fog and was lost to sight.
Nothing more was to be seen.
The sound of oars grew fainter and finally died away.
Clubin remained alone.
VI
LIGHT THROWN ON AN ABYSS
When this man found himself alone on this rock, in this fog, amid this waste of water, far from any contact with living beings, far from any sound of human life, left for dead--alone between the rising sea and the night that was now coming on--he had a feeling of intense joy.
He had succeeded.
He had realized his dream. The long-term bill of exchange that he had drawn on destiny was about to be met.
For him, to be abandoned was to be saved. He was on the Hanois, a mile from land, and he had seventy-five thousand francs. Never had any shipwreck been so skillfully arranged. No detail had been forgotten; everything had been planned. Since his earliest days Clubin had had one idea: to use honesty as his stake in the roulette game of life, to have the reputation of a man of integrity, to wait for the decisive moment, to allow his stake to accumulate, to find the winning streak, to choose the right moment; he would not fumble about but would seize his opportunity; he would make his coup, and make only one; he would scoop the pool and leave other poor fools behind him. He intended to achieve at one blow what stupid crooks failed to do twenty times in a row; and while they ended up on the gallows he would make his fortune. The meeting with Rantaine had given him the idea, and he had immediately formed his plan. He would relieve Rantaine of his money; he would frustrate any revelations by Rantaine by disappearing; to be believed dead was the best mode of concealment; and to achieve that he was prepared to destroy the Durande. The shipwreck was a necessary part of the scheme; and it had the additional advantage of leaving a good reputation behind him, making his whole life a masterpiece of contrivance. Anyone seeing Clubin in his present situation would have thought him a fiend, but a successful and contented fiend.
He had lived his whole life for this moment.
The whole of his character was summed up in the words "At last!" A frightful serenity settled palely on his dark brow. His expressionless eye, its inmost part seeming blanked off as if by a wall, became fathomless and terrible, reflecting the fire within his soul.
Man's inmost being, like external nature, has its own electric tension. An idea is a meteor: in the moment of success the accumulated meditations that have prepared the way for that success half-open and emit a spark. A man who, like some evil predator, feels a prey within his claws enjoys a happiness that cannot be concealed. An evil thought that has triumphed lights up a face. The success of some scheme, the achievement of some aim, some fierce delectation will momentarily bring to men's eyes somber flashes of illumination. It is like a joyful storm, a menacing dawn. It is an emanation of a man's consciousness, become a thing of darkness and cloud.
This was the gleam in Clubin's eye. It was like no gleam ever seen in the heavens or on earth. The villain who had been pent up within Clubin had now burst forth.
Looking into the vast darkness around him, he could not restrain a burst of low, sinister laughter.
Now he was free! Now he was rich!
His equation was coming out. He had solved his problem.
He had plenty of time. The tide was rising and supporting the Durande, and would eventually lift it off. In the meantime it was firmly lodged on the rock and in no danger of sinking. Besides he had to give the longboat time to get well away, and perhaps to be lost at sea, as Clubin hoped it would be.
Standing on the Durande, he folded his arms, savoring his isolation in the darkness.
For thirty years he had borne the burden of his hypocrisy. Being himself evil, he had coupled with integrity. He hated virtue with the hatred of a man who has married the wrong wife. All his life he had been meditating evil, but since he had reached man's estate he had worn the rigid armor of outward appearance. In his hidden self he was a monster; within his outer semblance of an honest man was the heart of a bandit. He was a pirate with the appearance of a gentleman. He was a prisoner of honesty, shut up in the mummy's casket of innocence; he was graced with the wings of an angel--a backbreaking encumbrance for a rascal. He had a heavy burden of public esteem. Keeping up the reputation of an honest man is a hard task. What a labor it is to maintain the balance between evil thoughts and fair words! He had been at the same time the phantom of uprightness and the specter of crime. This contradiction had been his destiny. He had had to maintain a good appearance, always appear presentable, while seething under the surface, concealing the grinding of his teeth under a smile. Virtue was a thing that stifled him. He had spent his life wanting to bite this hand that was held over his mouth; and, wanting to bite it, had been obliged to kiss it.
To have lied is to have suffered. A hypocrite is of necessity patient, in the double meaning of the term: he must plan the means of achieving his triumph, but while doing so he suffers torments. The long-continued premeditation of some evil deed, accompanied by and mingled with an appearance of austerity; internal infamy coupled with a good reputation; always to be pretending; never to be yourself; to be deceiving people all the time--all this is hard work. To compose an appearance of straightforwardness from all the black substances churning in your brain, to seek to devour those who respect you, to be affectionate, to restrain yourself, to repress your feelings, to be always on the alert, to watch yourself all the time, to put a fair face on your latent crime, to present your deformity as beauty, to fabricate an appearance of perfection from your vileness, to hold a dagger in your hand but use it to caress, to sugar the poison, to watch over the ease of every gesture and the tone of every word, never to have a natural glance: what can be harder than this, or more painful? The odiousness of hypocrisy is felt in some obscure way by the hypocrite himself. To be perpetually ingesting his own imposture brings on nausea. The sweetness that deceit gives to villainy is repugnant to the villain, who is continually forced to have this mixture in his mouth, and there are moments of retching when the hypocrite is on the point of vomiting up his thoughts. To swallow this saliva is revolting. Then, too, there is, deep down, the hypocrite's feeling of pride. There are times when, curiously, he thinks well of himself.
Within a deceitful rogue there is an outsized ego. The worm has the same crawling motion as the dragon, and the same way of raising its head again. The traitor is a despot in trammels, able to achieve his aims only by accepting a secondary role. He is littleness capable of any enormity. The hypocrite is a titan, but a titan who is also a dwarf.
Clubin really believed that he had been ill-used. Why had he not been born rich? He would have liked nothing better than to inherit from his parents an income of a hundred thousand pounds a year. Why had he not? It was not his fault. Why, because he had not been given all the pleasures of life, was he compelled to work: that is, to deceive, and betray, and destroy? Why had he thus been condemned to this torture of flattering, toadying, and trying to please others, of struggling to make himself liked and respected, and of having all the time to wear a false face over his own? Dissimulation is an act of violence against yourself. A man hates those to whom he lies. But now the time had come, and Clubin was taking his revenge.
On whom? On everyone, and on everything.
Lethierry had always treated him well. This was another grievance, and now he was avenging himself on Lethierry.
He was avenging himself on all those in whose presence he had been obliged to constrain himself. Now he was getting his own back. Anyone who had thought well of him was his enemy; he had been captive to such men.
Now he was free. He had made his escape; he had left mankind. What would be seen as his death was in reality his life; he was going to begin again. The real Clubin was shedding the likeness of the false one. He had dissolved everything at a stroke. He had kicked Rantaine into space, Lethierry into ruin, the world's justice into obli
vion, men's minds into error, the whole of humanity away from himself. He had just eliminated the world.
As for God, that word of three letters meant little to him. He had been regarded as a religious man; but what did that matter?
Within the hypocrite there are hidden caverns; or rather a hypocrite is nothing but a cavern. When Clubin found himself alone his cavern opened up. He had a moment of exquisite pleasure; it was oxygen to his soul. He savored his crime to the full.
The depths of evil became visible on Clubin's face. His full personality was now revealed. At that moment, compared with the look on his face, Rantaine would have seemed as innocent as a newborn child.
What a release it was to tear off the mask! He delighted to see himself in all his hideous nakedness and to bathe ignobly in evil. The constraint of keeping up appearances over the years finally excites an intense appetite for shamelessness, a lascivious enjoyment of villainy. In these fearful moral depths, so rarely plumbed, there is a kind of appalling and pleasurable ostentation that is the very obscenity of crime. The insipidity of a false reputation for respectability creates a longing for shame. A man in this situation disdains other men so much that he wants to be despised by them. He is tired of being respected, and enjoys the freedom of action that degradation brings. He hankers after the turpitude that is so much at ease in ignominy. Eyes that have to be kept cast down often have sidelong glances of this kind. Marie Alacoque is not far removed from Messalina. Consider also Cadiere and the nun of Louviers.147 Clubin, too, had lived under a veil. Effrontery had always been his ambition. He envied the whore and the brazen brow of the declared villain; he felt himself to be more of a whore than the whore herself, and had only disgust at having passed for a virgin. He had been the Tantalus of cynicism. And at last, on this rock, in this solitude, he could be frank; and now he was so. What a pleasure it was to feel himself wholeheartedly vile! At this moment Clubin enjoyed all the ecstasies that are possible in Hell. The arrears of debt due to dissimulation had been paid in full. Hypocrisy is a loan, and Satan had paid it back. Now that there was no one else there and he was alone with the sky, Clubin gave himself up to the intoxication of his shamelessness. Saying to himself, "I am a villain!" he was content.