The Fête At Coqueville | Page 7

cargoes of liquor and fine wines.
Little by little the day faded and the people were withdrawn into
shadow. But La Queue remained absorbed, tormented by an idea which
he no longer expressed. He stopped, he listened a last time to Delphin,
whom they were carrying along, and who was repeating in his
sing-song voice: "Little casks--little casks--little casks--if you want
some, there are more!"

III
That night the weather changed completely. When Coqueville awoke

the following day an unclouded sun was shining; the sea spread out
without a wrinkle, like a great piece of green satin. And it was warm,
one of those pale glows of autumn.
First of the village, La Queue had risen, still clouded from the dreams
of the night. He kept looking for a long time toward the sea, to the right,
to the left. At last, with a sour look, he said that he must in any event
satisfy M. Mouchel. And he went away at once with Tupain and
Brisemotte, threatening Margot to touch up her sides if she did not
walk straight. As the "Zéphir" left the harbor, and as he saw the
"Baleine" swinging heavily at her anchor, he cheered up a little saying:
"To-day, I guess, not a bit of it! Blow out the candle, Jeanetton! those
gentlemen have gone to bed!"
And as soon as the "Zéphir" had reached the open sea, La Queue cast
his nets. After that he went to visit his "jambins." The jambins are a
kind of elongated eel-pot in which they catch more, especially lobsters
and red garnet. But in spite of the calm sea, he did well to visit his
jambins one by one. All were empty; at the bottom of the last one, as if
in mockery, he found a little mackerel, which he threw back angrily
into the sea. It was fate; there were weeks like that when the fish
flouted Coqueville, and always at a time when M. Mouchel had
expressed a particular desire for them. When La Queue drew in his nets,
an hour later, he found nothing but a bunch of seaweed. Straightway he
swore, his fists clenched, raging so much the more for the vast serenity
of the ocean, lazy and sleeping like a sheet of burnished silver under
the blue sky. The "Zéphir," without a waver, glided along in gentle ease.
La Queue decided to go in again, after having cast his nets once more.
In the afternoon he came to see them, and he menaced God and the
saints, cursing in abominable words. In the meanwhile, Rouget,
Fouasse, and Del-phin kept on sleeping. They did not succeed in
standing up until the dinner hour. They recollected nothing, they were
conscious only of having been treated to something extraordinary,
something which they did not understand. In the afternoon, as they
were all three down at the harbor, the Emperor tried to question them
concerning the liquor, now that they had recovered their senses. It was
like, perhaps, eau-de-vie with liquorice-juice in it; or rather one might

say rum, sugared and burned. They said "Yes"; they said "No." From
their replies, the Emperor suspected that it was ratafia; but he would
not have sworn to it. That day Rouget and his men had too many pains
in their sides to go a-fishing. Moreover, they knew that La Queue had
gone out without success that morning, and they talked of waiting until
the next day before visiting their jambins. All three of them, seated on
blocks of stone, watched the tide come in, their backs rounded, their
mouths clammy, half-asleep.
But suddenly Delphin woke up; he jumped on to the stone, his eyes on
the distance, crying: "Look, Boss, off there!"
"What?" asked Rouget, who stretched his limbs.
"A cask."
Rouget and Fouasse were at once on their feet, their eyes gleaming,
sweeping the horizon.
"Where is it, lad? Where is the cask?" repeated the boss, greatly moved.
"Off there--to the left--that black spot."
The others saw nothing. Then Rouget swore an oath. "Nom de Dieu!"
He had just spotted the cask, big as a lentil on the white water in a
slanting ray of the setting sun. And he ran to the "Baleine," followed by
Delphin and Fouasse, who darted forward tapping their backs with their
heels and making the pebbles roll.
The "Baleine" was just putting out from the harbor when the news that
they saw a cask out at sea was circulated in Coqueville. The children,
the women, began to run. They shouted: "A cask! a cask!"
"Do you see it? The current is driving it toward Grandport."
"Ah, yes! on the left--a cask! Come, quick!"
And Coqueville came; tumbled down from its rock; the children arrived

head over heels, while the women picked up their skirts