Читать книгу A Voyage to the Island of the Articoles - Andre Maurois - Страница 10

THE FULL STORY of our voyage from San Francisco to Honolulu will, as I have said, appear in another work. It will suffice to note here that the crossing was successful. Our boat, the Allen, sailed well. At first we felt obliged to take watch by turns, but we soon realized that, with the tiller lashed and the helm roped fast, we could sleep through the night and wake to find ourselves still more or less on course. We encountered three storms, including a pretty bad one during which Anne proved her courage.

She was, as I had known since our first meeting, the ideal companion for a voyage. A good organizer, she had bought all our provisions in San Francisco, and, during the crossing, had cooked us simple and wholesome meals. She didn’t know what it was to be bad-tempered. In moments of danger she was levelheaded, her movements precise; I took to calling her “Your Serene Highness.” With much in common we had fallen into an affectionate and familiar relationship. Anne didn’t want to be courted, or protected; it is perhaps something of a letdown to say we lived as brother and sister, but this is the most accurate depiction of our relations. However, I must add, for the record, that my own feelings were more complicated; I often thought I felt tenderness—desire, even—for Anne, but then I hastened to get on with some work or to think about something else.

From the Hawaiian Islands it was my intention to go to Tahiti, making a slight detour to see the Marquesas and the Tuamotu Islands en route. Honolulu had disappointed me—an American Monte Carlo—and it seemed to me that the great rings of white coral glittering above the sea would be some new sights at last. About twenty days out from Honolulu, our instruments showed a longitude of 161.2° west and a latitude of 5.3° north. This meant we were approaching the Line Islands, a group of rocky and barren islands, but on which—according to Findlay’s Almanack—there is an English cable repair station, where I was counting on replenishing our fresh water supply.

Toward evening we ran into an area of dead calm with a rather high sea. Little waves, cresting in foam, snapped at the Allen’s bows in a rapid, irregular rhythm. Then a fresh breeze sprang up and a great bar of cloud, black as ink, formed low on the horizon. The wind soon became strong and the Allen began to list. It was hot as a boiler. We had already seen some nasty squalls, but we quickly realized they had been child’s play compared to this one. The sky was black with clouds, pushed along at great speed by the wind. Huge waves broke on board and the deck was soon under water; we were foundering in the sea. Dousing the sails and lashing the tiller gave us some respite, but still we had to cling to the mast or risk being swept overboard. Standing in the gale, her hair disheveled, but with a calm expression and an almost happy air, Anne was superb—a goddess of the sea. Toward midnight, when it was clear we could do nothing and the waves were even higher, she said, “Let’s go belowdecks and rest.” The hatch covers remained in place, but everything was swimming in water below. Still, we were so exhausted that, after pumping as best we could, we soon fell asleep.

Some hours later a strange noise woke me; it sounded as though something was banging against the Allen’s hull, and with considerable force. Was it day or night? We couldn’t see a thing and our boat was listing like the side of a roof—it was impossible to stand upright. On all fours, I climbed onto the deck. The clouds were so low and so thick that, although it was daylight, we couldn’t see more than thirty meters ahead. The waves were terrifying. Our bowsprit had snapped and was banging against the side of the boat. Why hadn’t I listened when Anne had asked me to do without one! The hatch of the sail locker had been torn off. The Allen was little more than a wreck. I called Anne; the bowsprit was in danger of coming through the hull, and I needed her help to cut it adrift. “I think we’re lost!” I said to her. She took a deep breath of salty air and smiled.

After an hour’s work, during which I was almost thrown overboard all of twenty times, I managed to cut the bowsprit free. That was one less thing to worry about. A hot blinding rain beat down on our faces. We went belowdecks again. Our clothes had been completely torn to pieces in the course of this arduous work, but, when Anne went to change, she found all our cases flooded. More serious was that our instruments were in disarray, my chronometer was nowhere to be found and Anne’s watch was smashed. The Findlay and our nautical charts were a sodden, pulpy mass—if we survived the storm, we would have to navigate by guesswork. But even then, how would we sail our boat? We had lost our bowsprit and our sails were in tatters. It was amid these gloomy thoughts that, mercifully, sleep found us.