Papillon (14 page)

“Thank you,” Maturette said. “Thank you both for having confidence in me in spite of my age and the way I am. I’ll try to live up to it.”

Then I said, “And François Sierra—I wish he could have been with us. And Galgani …”

“As things turned out, Papillon, it couldn’t have been done. If Jésus had been straight with us and given us a good boat, we could have waited for them in our hiding place. Jésus could have helped them escape, we would have done the rest. At least they know you and realize that if you didn’t try, it was because it was impossible.”

“While we’re on the subject, Maturette, why were you in the maximum-security room in the hospital?”

“I didn’t know I’d been interned. I went to the doctor’s because I had a sore throat and also I wanted to take a look around. When the doctor saw me, he said, ‘It says here on your form that you’re to be interned on the islands. Why?’ ‘I don’t know why, Doctor. What does interned mean?’ ‘Never mind, it doesn’t mean anything. Go to the hospital.’ And so I ended up in the hospital.”

“He was doing you a favor,” Clousiot said.

“You figure out his motives. But he must be saying to himself now, ‘My little friend with the choirboy’s face wasn’t such a loser after all. He had the guts to leave
en cavale
.’”

We talked a lot of nonsense. I said, “Who knows, we may run into Julot. He must be a long way away, unless he’s still hiding in the bush.” Clousiot said, “When I left, I put a note under my pillow: ‘Moved, leaving no forwarding address.’” We burst out laughing.

We sailed without incident for five days. During the day we took our position from the sun. At night we used the compass. On the morning of the sixth day a brilliant sun greeted us, the sea suddenly grew calm and flying fish passed near us. I was exhausted. That night, to keep me from falling asleep, Maturette wet my face with a cloth soaked in sea water, but I fell asleep all the same. Then Clousiot burned me with a cigarette. Now, since we were in a dead calm, I decided I could really sleep. We let down the sail and the jib, leaving only the spinnaker up. I slept like a rock in the bottom of the boat, protected from the sun by the sail which was stretched above me. Maturette shook me awake. “It’s only around noon, but I’m waking you because the wind is picking up. And on the horizon where it’s coming from, everything’s black.” I got up and took the tiller. The lone spinnaker carried us rapidly over the flat sea. Behind me in the east it was black, and the wind was picking up force. The two jibs were enough to maintain speed. I rolled the sail around the mast.

“Hold tight. A storm’s coming.”

Big drops of rain began to fall. An ugly black mass was surging toward us; in less than fifteen minutes it had caught up with us. A violent wind beat down on us. As if mesmerized, the waves responded, their crests exploding with spray. The sun disappeared, it rained torrents, we couldn’t see a thing; and as the waves hit the boat, the stinging spray peppered my face. It was a hurricane, my first hurricane, with all the forces of nature unleashed: thunder, lightning, rain, waves, and the wind howling around us.

Like a piece of straw, the boat was tossed about from great heights into chasms so deep I thought we’d never climb out. And yet, in spite of the fantastic plunges, we climbed up and over each new crest. I was holding the tiller with both hands, and, thinking I should try to resist a deep swell that was on the point of breaking, I aimed the boat to cut through it. I had probably maneuvered too fast because I took in a huge amount of water. The entire boat was flooded. We must have taken in thirty inches. My nerves were on edge and, without meaning to, I courted disaster by taking the next wave broadside. The boat tipped so far over that it spilled most of the water we had taken in.

“Bravo!” Clousiot shouted. “You really know the ropes, Papillon! You made short work of emptying the boat.”

“Didn’t I, though!” I answered.

If he’d only known that my lack of experience had almost drowned us! I decided to stop fighting the waves or trying to maintain a direction; I would concentrate on keeping the boat as steady as possible. I took the waves at a slight angle, letting the boat go to the bottom of the trough and then climb up. I quickly realized that I’d made an important discovery and that 90 percent of the danger had been eliminated. The rain stopped although the wind continued to blow with fury, but I could now see clearly in front and in back. Behind it was clear, in front it was black; we were between the two extremes.

By five o’clock it was over. The sun was shining again, the wind was back to normal, the waves had calmed down. I put up the sail and we set off once more, very pleased with ourselves. What water remained in the boat we bailed out with our cooking pot. We hung the blankets to the mast, where the wind soon dried them. Then we made a meal of rice, flour, oil, some strong coffee and a good swallow of rum. The sun, about to set, spread a fiery light over the blue sea. It was beautiful: the sky a reddish brown, the sun half sunk into the sea, licking with great yellow tongues at the sky, the few white clouds and the sea itself. The waves were blue at the bottom, then green and red, pink or yellow on the crests, depending on the color of the sun’s ray that touched them.

I felt an uncommon peace and with this peace, self-confidence. I had managed things well and the brief storm had taught me a lot. All by myself I had learned how to maneuver in a rough sea. I could greet the night with serenity.

“So, Clousiot, you liked the way I emptied the boat?”

“Pal, if you hadn’t done it and a new wave had hit us broadside, we would have been finished. You’re a champ.”

“Did you learn that in the navy?” Maturette asked.

“Yes. The navy’s good for something after all.”

We must have been driven far off course. It wasn’t surprising after four hours in that wind and those waves. I had to correct it by going northwest. Night swept down on us as the sun disappeared into the sea, leaving a last few violet sparks in farewell.

We sailed for six more days without incident: only a few gusts of wind and rain that never lasted more than three hours and certainly never approached the eternity of the first storm.

It was now ten o’clock in the morning. Not a breath of wind; the sea was like glass. I slept almost four hours. When I woke up, my face was burning. The skin was gone from my lips and nose. My right hand was raw. It was the same with Maturette and Clousiot. We spread oil on our hands and faces twice a day, but it wasn’t enough: the tropical sun dried it up in no time.

From the sun’s position, it was now two in the afternoon. I had something to eat and then, since the sea was a millpond, we arranged the sail to give us some shade. Fish came alongside where Maturette had washed the dishes. I took out our machete and told Maturette to throw them a few grains of rice. The rice had got wet in the storm and had begun to ferment. The fish gathered where the rice fell and, as one of them stuck its head almost out of water, I gave it a great whack with the machete. Immediately it turned its belly in the air. That fish must have weighed twenty-five pounds. We cleaned it and cooked it in salted water, and ate it that night with tapioca flour.

We had now been at sea for eleven days. During the entire time we had seen only one boat, far off on the horizon. I was beginning to ask myself where the hell we were. That we were on the high seas was obvious, but in what relation to Trinidad or the other British islands? Speak of the devil … There straight ahead of us was a black dot that was growing bigger and bigger. Was it a small boat or a big steamer? It was a boat, but it wasn’t coming toward us. We could see it clearly now, moving across our path. Actually it was coming nearer, but at an angle. Its route would not bring it close. Since there was no wind, our sails hung limp, so they must not have seen us. Then suddenly we heard the wail of a siren, followed by three more. The boat changed its course and came straight for us.

“So long as we don’t collide,” said Clousiot.

“There’s no danger. The sea is as smooth as glass.”

It was an oil tanker. As it came nearer, we could see the crowd on the bridge. They must be wondering what these madmen were doing in their cockleshell in the middle of the ocean. They approached us cautiously and we could make out the ship’s officers, some members of the crew, then women in print dresses and men in colored shirts arriving on the bridge. Obviously they were passengers. Passengers on an oil tanker? That seemed odd. The tanker was now very close and the captain called out in English:

“Where are you from?”

“French Guiana.”

“Do you speak French?” asked a woman.

“Yes, madame.”

“What are you doing in the middle of the sea?”

“The Lord knows …”

The woman spoke to the captain and said, “The captain invites you to come aboard. He’ll pull your boat up on deck.”

“Tell him thanks, but we’re very comfortable on our boat.”

“Why don’t you want help?”

“Because we’re escaped convicts and we’re not going in your direction.”

“Where are you going?”

“To Martinique and beyond. We have no idea where we are. Can you tell us what direction to take for the Antilles?”

“Can you read an English nautical map?”

“Yes.”

A few moments later they let down an English map, cartons of cigarettes, some bread and a roast of lamb.

“Look at the map.” I looked, then said, “I have to make a quarter turn west for the British Antilles, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“About how many miles is it?”

“You’ll make it in two days,” the captain said.

“Good-by, and thanks for everything!”

“The captain congratulates you on your sailor’s courage!”

“Thank you again. Good-by!” And the tanker moved off gently, almost grazing us. I steered us as far away as I could to avoid the backwash. Just then a sailor threw his cap overboard—it fell right in the middle of the boat. I was wearing this cap with its gold braid and anchor when we arrived in Trinidad two days later.

Long before we could see it, a flight of birds announced our landfall. It was seven-thirty in the morning when they came wheeling over us. “We’ve made it!
Mecs
, we’ve made it! The first part of the
cavale
is over. The hardest part.
Vive la liberté
!” In our joy we behaved like children. Our faces were covered with the cocoa butter which the tanker people had given us to soothe our sunburn. Toward nine o’clock we sighted land. A fresh wind pushed us along at a good clip on a gently rolling sea. But not until four in the afternoon were we close enough to make out the details: clusters of white houses studded the shore of the long island and coconut trees crowned its summit. We couldn’t yet see whether it was really an island or a peninsula, or whether the houses were inhabited. It was another hour before we could distinguish people running toward the beach where we were heading. In less than twenty minutes a crowd had assembled. The little village had spilled over onto the edge of the sea to receive us. We learned later that the place was called San Fernando.

Three hundred yards from shore I dropped anchor; it caught immediately. I did this partly to watch the people’s reaction, partly to keep from scraping the boat if the bottom turned out to be coral. We let down the sails and waited. A small canoe came toward us. In it were two blacks paddling a white man in a colonial cap.

“Welcome to Trinidad,” the white man said in pure French. The blacks laughed, showing pearly white teeth.

“Thank you, sir. Is the bottom here coral or sand?”

“It’s sand. You can go up on the beach without danger.”

We pulled up the anchor and the waves pushed us gently to the beach. We had barely touched when ten men ran into the water and, with one heave, pulled the canoe up on land. They looked us over, they caressed us, and the women—black, Chinese and Hindu—made appreciative gestures. The white man explained that everybody wanted us to stay with them. Maturette picked up a handful of sand and made as if to kiss it. This enthralled our audience. I explained Clousiot’s condition to the white man, and he had him carried to his house near the beach. He told us that we could leave everything in the boat until morning, that no one would touch a thing. Everyone called me “captain” and this sudden baptism made me laugh. They said in English, “Good captain, long ride on small boat!”

Night came. I asked if our boat could be pushed up a little farther and tied to a bigger boat for safety. Then I followed the Englishman to his house. It was a bungalow, like those you see everywhere on English soil: a few wooden steps and a screen door. I entered after the Englishman with Maturette behind me. As I came in, there was Clousiot sitting in an armchair, his leg resting on another, basking in the attentions of two women.

“My wife and daughter,” the Englishman said. “I have a son in school in England.”

“Welcome to our house,” his wife said in French.

“Please sit down, sir,” the girl said as she brought up two rattan chairs.

“Thank you. Please don’t put yourselves out for us.”

“Why not? Don’t worry, we know where you’ve come from, and I repeat: Welcome to our house.”

The man was a lawyer and his name was Bowen. He had his office in Port of Spain, the capital of Trinidad, about twenty-five miles away. They served us tea with milk, toast, butter and jam. It was our first evening as free men and I shall never forget it. Not a word about our past, no indiscreet questions: only how many days we had been at sea and how the trip had gone; if Clousiot was in pain, and did we want to advise the police of our arrival tomorrow or wait another day; had we parents, wives, or children. If we wanted to write to them, they would mail the letters. How shall I say it—it was an extraordinary reception for three fugitives, both on the part of the people on the beach and this English family.