Papillon

Five days we sailed on with nothing happening. The east-west passage of the sun acted as my compass by day: by night I used the compass itself. On the morning of the sixth day we were greeted by a brilliant sun; the sea had suddenly calmed, and flying-fishes went by not far away. I was destroyed with fatigue. During the night Maturette had kept wiping my face with a wet cloth to keep me from sleeping; but even so I went off, and Clousiot had had to burn me with his cigarette. Now it was dead calm, so I decided to get some sleep. We lowered the mainsail and the jib, keeping just the staysail, and I slept like a log in the bottom of the boat, the sail spread to keep me from the sun.

I woke up with Maturette shaking me. He said, ‘It’s noon or one o’clock, but I’m waking you because the wind is getting stronger and on the horizon where it’s coming from, everything’s black.’ I got up and went to my post. The one sail we had set was carrying us over the unruffled sea. In the east, behind me, all was black, and the breeze was strengthening steadily. The staysail and the jib were enough to make the boat run very fast. I furled the mainsail against the mast, carefully, and made all tight. ‘Look out for yourselves, because what’s coming is a storm.’

Heavy drops began to fall on us. The darkness came rushing forwards at an astonishing speed, and in a quarter of an hour it had spread from the horizon almost as far as us. Now here it came: an incredibly strong wind drove straight at us. As if by magic the sea got up faster, waves with foaming white tops: the sun was wiped right out, rain poured down in torrents, we could see nothing, and as the seas hit the boat so they sent packets of water stinging into my face. It was a storm all right, my first storm, with all the terrific splendour of nature unrestrained – thunder, lightning, rain, waves, the howling of the wind over and all around us.

The boat was carried along like a straw; she climbed unbelievable heights and ran down into hollows so deep you felt she could never rise up again. Yet in spite of these astonishing depths she did climb up the side of the next wave, go over the crest, and so begin once more – right up and down again and again. I held the tiller with both hands; and once, when I saw an even bigger wave coming I thought I should steer a little against it. No doubt I moved too fast, because just as we cut it, I shipped a great deal of water. The whole boat was aswim. There must have been about three foot of water aboard. Without meaning to I wrenched the boat strongly across the next wave – a very dangerous thing to do – and she leant over so much, almost to the point of turning turtle, that she flung out most of the water we had shipped.

‘Bravo!’ cried Clousiot. ‘You’re a real expert, Papillon! You emptied her straight away.’

I said, ‘You see now how it’s done, don’t you?’

If only he’d known that my lack of experience had very nearly turned us upside down, right out in the open sea! I decided not to struggle against the thrust of the waves any more, not to worry about what course to steer, but just to keep the boat as steady as possible. I took the waves three-quarters on; I let the boat run down and rise just as the sea would have it. Very soon I realized that this was an important discovery and that I’d done away with ninety per cent of the danger. The rain stopped: the wind was still blowing furiously, but now I could see clearly in front and behind. Behind, the sky was clear; in front it was black. We were in the middle of the two.

By about five it was all over. The sun was shining on us again, the breeze was its usual self, the sea had gone down: I hoisted the mainsail and we set off once more, pleased with ourselves. We baled the boat with the saucepans and we brought out the blankets to dry them by hanging them to the mast. Rice, flour, oil and double-strength coffee: a comforting shot of rum. The sun was about to set, lighting up the blue sea and making an unforgettable picture – reddish-brown sky, great yellow rays leaping up from the half-sunk orb and lighting the sky, and the few white clouds, and the sea itself. As the waves rose they were blue at the bottom, then green; and their crests were red, pink or yellow, according to the colour of the rays that hit them.

I was filled with a wonderfully gentle peace; and together with the peace a feeling that I could rely upon myself. I had stuck it out pretty well; this short storm had been very valuable to me. All by myself I had learnt how to handle the boat in such circumstances. I’d look forward to the night with a completely easy mind.

‘So you saw how to empty a boat, Clousiot, did you? You saw how it was done?’

‘Listen, brother, if you hadn’t brought it off, and if another wave had caught us sideways, we’d have sunk. You’re all right.’

‘You learnt all that in the navy?’ said Maturette.

‘Yes. There’s something to be said for a naval training, after all.’

We must have made a great deal of leeway. Who could tell how far we had drifted during those four hours, with a wind and waves like that? I’d steer north-west to make it up: that’s what I’d do. The sun vanished into the sea, sending up the last flashes of its firework display – violet this time – and then at once it was night.

For six more days we sailed on with nothing to worry us except for a few squalls and showers – none ever lasted more than three hours and none were anything like that first everlasting storm.

Ten o’clock in the morning and not a breath of wind: a dead calm. I slept for nearly four hours. When I woke my lips were on fire. They had no skin left; nor had my nose either; and my right hand was quite raw. Maturette was the same; so was Clousiot. Twice a day we rubbed our faces and hands with oil, but that was not enough – the tropical sun soon dried it.

By the sun it must have been two o’clock in the afternoon. I ate, and then, seeing it was dead calm, we rigged the sail as an awning. Fish came round the boat where Maturette had done the washing-up. I took the jungle-knife and told Maturette to throw in some rice – anyhow it had begun to ferment since the water had got at it. The fish all gathered where the rice struck the water, all on the surface; and as one of them had his head almost out of the water I hit at him very hard. The next moment there he was, belly up. He weighed twenty pounds: we gutted him and cooked him in salt water. We ate him that evening with manioc flour.

Now it was eleven days since we had set out to sea. In all that time we had only seen one ship, very far away on the horizon. I began to wonder where the hell we were. Far out, that was for sure; but how did we lie in relation to Trinidad or any of the other English islands? Speak of the devil … and indeed there, right ahead, we saw a dark speck that gradually grew larger and larger. Would it be a ship or a deep-sea fishing boat? We’d got it all wrong: it was not coming towards us. It was a ship: we could see it clearly now, but going across. It was coming nearer, true enough, but its slanting course was not going to bring us together. There was no wind, so our sails drooped miserably: the ship would surely not have seen us. Suddenly there was the bowl of a siren and then three short blasts. The ship changed course and stood straight for our boat.

‘I hope she doesn’t come too close,’ said Clousiot.

‘There’s no danger: it’s as calm as a millpond.’

She was a tanker. The nearer she came, the more clearly we could make out the people on deck. They must have been wondering what this nutshell of a boat was doing there, right out at sea. Slowly she approached, and now we could see the officers and the men of the crew. And the cook. Then women in striped dresses appeared on deck, and men in coloured shirts. We took it these were passengers. Passengers on a tanker – that struck me as odd. Slowly the ship came close and the captain hailed us in English, ‘Where do you come from?’

‘French Guiana.’

‘Do you speak French?’ asked a woman.

‘Oui, Madame.’

‘What are you doing so far out at sea?’

‘We go where God’s wind blows us.’

The lady spoke to the captain and then said, ‘The captain says to come aboard. He’ll haul your little boat on deck.’

‘Tell him we say thank you very much but we’re quite happy in our boat.’

‘Why don’t you want help?’

‘Because we are on the run and we aren’t going in your direction.’

‘Where are you going?’

‘Martinique or even farther. Where are we?’

‘Far out in the ocean.’

‘What’s the course for the West Indies?’

‘Can you read an English chart?’

‘Yes.’

A moment later they lowered us an English chart, some packets of cigarettes, a roast leg of mutton and some bread. ‘Look at the chart.’

I looked and then I said, ‘I must steer west by south to hit the British West Indies, is that right?’

‘Yes.’

‘About how many miles?’

‘You’ll be there in two days,’ said the captain.

‘Good-bye! Thank you all very much.’

‘The captain congratulates you on your fine seamanship.’

‘Thank you. Good-bye!’

The tanker moved gently off, almost touching us; I drew away to avoid the churning of the propellers and just at that moment a sailor tossed me a uniform cap. It dropped right in the middle of the boat; it had a gold band and an anchor, and it was with this cap on my head that we reached Trinidad two days later, with no further difficulty.

Trinidad

Long before we saw it, the birds had told us land was near. It was half-past seven in the morning when they began to circle round us. ‘We’re getting there, man! We’re getting there! The first part of the break, the hardest part – we’ve brought it off. Freedom, freedom, freedom for ever!’ Joy made us shout like schoolboys. Our faces were plastered with the coconut-butter that the tanker had given us for our sunburn. At about nine o’clock we saw the land. A breeze carried us in quite fast over a gentle sea. It was not until four in the afternoon that we could make out the details of a long island, fringed with little clumps of white houses and topped with great numbers of coconut-palms. So far we could not tell whether it was really an island or a peninsula, nor whether these houses were lived in. We had to wait another hour and more before we could distinguish people running towards the beach where we were going to land. In under twenty minutes a highly-coloured crowd had gathered. The entire little village had come out on to the shore to welcome us. Later we learnt that it was called San Fernando.

Three hundred yards from the beach I dropped the anchor: it bit at once. I did so partly to see how the people would take it and partly so as not to damage my boat when it grounded, supposing the bottom was coral. We furled the sails and waited. A little boat came towards us. Two blacks paddling and one white man with a sun-helmet on.

‘Welcome to Trinidad,’ said the white man in perfect French. The black men laughed, showing all their teeth.

‘Thank you for your kind words, Monsieur. Is the bottom coral or sand?’