The extraordinary and most tragically1 poetic3 part of his drama was the manner in which St. Pierre, the lost city, clung to the vision of the woman he loved.
She wore it as a garment; he saw her surrounded by its beauty; dawn lit her in the Street of the Precipice4, morn in the music-haunted Place de la Fontaine; evening in the twilit Jardin des Plantes.
The super-mortal tragedy of the city had raised her image to supernal5 heights. The passion, the agony that lives alone in the highest poetry had mixed itself in this common man’s tragedy. The city obliterated6 from the world was part of his grief.
As he lay like a man fascinated by a serpent, motionless, scarcely seeming to breathe, with eyes fixed7, and pupils dilated8, the roar of the anchor-chain through the hawse pipe shook the vessel9. He sat up, leaning on his elbow, exactly as a man sits up who has been awakened10 suddenly from sleep.
A disc of reflected sunlight, liquid and tremulous as the water from which it was reflected, was cast by the porthole upon the wall of the cabin; it trembled and moved to the motion of the vessel as she rocked at her moorings.
He gazed at it, following it with his eyes as it leapt and quivered; then, slipping from the bunk11 he stood erect12 on the floor of the cabin.
303 He was fully13 dressed and, in the act of stepping from the bunk, his full strength seemed to have returned to him. He opened the door of the cabin and a moment later he was on deck.
All the crew were gathered forward; a boat was rowing away from the ship, Captain Stock and the mate were in it, and they were making for the nearest war-ship. The Anne Martin was close in shore and the vast, formless, blanketed city cast its chill gray reflection on the water of the harbour. Mounds14 of ashes terraced by the heavy rains, wildernesses15 of ashes mounting to wildernesses of ashes, ghosts of buildings vaguely16 outlined beneath their cerement of ashes—cinders17, dust, and ashes, and from all that immensity of desolation not a sound, save now and then a call from one of the working parties, half invisible amidst the ruins.
He cast his eyes over it all and then up to Pelée still fuming18 in the windless blue; like a madman, exhausted19, the great mountain seemed inexpressibly sinister20 above the ruins of the city it had protected for long years, fed with the gouyave water, sheltered from the winds. Gaspard stretched out his arms, his fingers were crooked21, it was as though the man were saying to the mountain, “Ah, what would I not do with you, if I only had you in my grip!”
Then he clambered over the starboard rail.
The men forward did not hear the splash, nor did they notice the black head of the swimmer passing towards the shore.
He had not even kicked off the deck shoes he was wearing, he swam with ease and half unconsciously; in his condition all things were possible to him, he would have guided his way through a turbulent sea just as surely as across this summer-smooth harbour. And now he was clinging304 to the angle of a great block of stone shaken out from the once quay-wall and slobbered round by the tide. He dragged himself on to it, and from it to the next.
The Place Bertine had been here; here in the sunlight the tamarinds had shaken their leaves to the wind and cast dancing shadows on the sun-smitten pavement, the songs of the canotiers had mixed with the sounds of trade—here where tamarind trees would bloom no more; where the blasting scoriae had fused broken stones and broken building; where the sunlight was horrible.
Around him lay nothing but mounds where once the sugar barrels had been piled, where buildings had been. Mounds like the sand dunes22 on a desolate23 coast. A little wind had arisen and, just as amidst the dunes the wind brings the whisper of sand, here, it brought the faint silky whisper of dust.
He had no objective—no object, here, but to feel the ruin; to touch it, walk amidst it, become part of it. To torture his soul. All this was her bed, the dust he trod on her winding24 sheet, the desolation her silence.
He passed amidst the mounds. In the great mountain of ashes before him the rains had washed out what seemed the bed of a mountain torrent26. It had once been a street. He began to climb it. This horrible ravine was tainted27 by a faint sickly smell of corruption28, the crust of the scoriae broke beneath his feet so that he plunged29 sometimes knee-deep, the sweat ran from his brow, and the sun struck fiercely on him. The heat was terrific. Never, even in the old days of the stokehold, had he experienced such heat, yet still he climbed.
He had reached, now, a transverse ravine, a huge donga with steep banks from which here and there broke out the walls of ruined houses. It was the Rue30 Victor Hugo.
305 The silence here was terrible, the silence of Nineveh, the silence of the Nothing, which is at the heart of things. Finotte and Lys; the corrossole sellers; the merchants and traffickers; the coloured crowd; the little children—nothing spoke31 of them here.
And, still, far above him went the mountain of ashes, the broken streets, walls that had once been houses, charred32 stumps33 that had once been palm trees. And still he climbed. He had cast off his coat, never thinking of the treasure in its pocket, he had forgotten all that, even Marie had become vague as a ghost in his mind. One thing only stood clearly before him, half-mesmerised as he was by exhaustion34, heat, and the ruin around him—the beach of Grande Anse. The soot-black beach and the green curling waves where a man might find oblivion. He did not know in the least that it was the vision of Marie that was calling him to the cliffs, where he had first truly met her face to face.
At noon, broken, dazed, grimed with dust, having a dozen times escaped by a miracle from death, he reached the summit of the ruins of St. Pierre, and the path of ashes that had once been the road to Morne Rouge35. Gazing from here, and not glancing at the ruined city, nothing had altered. The sea lay the same as of old, and Dominica shewed ghostly and haze-blue on the far sea line, gulls36 were flying over the bay. Eternal summer sat by the ruined city, voiceless, and lost in eternal sleep. Though the silence of the Rue Victor Hugo had been broken by no sound, up here, could be heard a faint breathing from the sea. The requiem37 of the ocean whose tide was now flooding into the bay.
“Ah, the palms, the coloured houses, the old sea-steps I used to wash—the voices of the canotiers, the tall ships I brought thee, where are they?” Vaguely, like a voice heard in a dream came the whispered lament38 of the sea.
306 Gaspard did not hear it. He paused only to rest and breathe, he had slipped and fallen many times in his ascent39; coatless, his arms were clay-coloured with sweat-caked volcanic40 dust; his face was frightful41; grimed and seamed—it looked as though spat42 upon by Ruin. In a few short hours his eyes had become sunken, his cheeks had fallen in; his lips baked and parched43, and caked with dust were inhuman44, the lips of a tragic2 mask of antiquity45. A frightful thirst filled him, obliterating46 all other feelings. Beneath him lay the city, formless and bulked out with cinders and dust, exactly as the ship of coral had once lain beneath him bulked out with coral in the still lagoon47.
Ah, that night when he had turned with Yves from the vision of the sunken ship, feeling that what he had seen was evil; could he but have seen this greater vision! This greater story of man’s futility48 and the fate of the imaginers of vain things!
He turned, seeing nothing of it all but the great white sheet of light that leapt from the horizon half-way to the zenith, and the dazzle of the sea.
He came along the path of cinders that had once been a road set with grenadillas and palms; merry with mule49 bells and songs of the cane50-cutters by day, drifted over by fireflies at night. The volcanic dust, the sun, the terrible climb amidst the ruins had called up the thirst which is known only in the desert. He walked scarcely knowing where he went, casting his eyes from side to side of the way in search of water. He had forgotten the black beach at Grande Anse and his desire for the oblivion of the sea; he had only one immediate51 desire, to drink.
Thirst in its acutest form like this is quite divorced from the sensation which civilisation52 knows as thirst. It is a passion far stronger than hatred53 or desire, it affects the soul307 no less than the body, it drives all other feelings before it and reigns54 supreme55. The physical pangs56 are nothing compared to the mental desire which drives all other desires away.
As he turned the shoulder of Pelée, the ashes ceased on the road giving place to volcanic dust, for only St. Pierre and the western portion of the island had been exposed to the full blast of the eruption57. The road became a road again, and, had he possessed58 eyes to see, hope might have come to him.
For here, where Marie used to pause of a morning to drink in the view before her, still lay the view as of old. The volcanic dust that had lain grey on tree and shrub59, had been washed away by rains, and the green waving canes60, the palms, and wild pines, the tamarinds, and ceibas, the mornes, mountains, and valleys lay stretched before him; who saw nothing of it all, walking like a somnambulist in the dream of thirst.
He had passed Morne Rouge where there was no sign of life, and the Morne d’Avril was showing green, but unseen, before him when the voice of water, liquid, and laughing, broke the silence. It was a way-side fountain. Crystal water spouting61 from a moss-grown lion-head.
* * * * *
It was like drinking life; the mountains in the distance became mountains again; the wind, the wind; and the sunlight, the sunlight; the world of shadows and semi-delirium through which he had been walking, faded away. Like a good enchantress, the water had washed away the stains of his journey and the thirst from his soul. In that moment, just like one convalescing62 from a severe illness, he felt newborn. He was seated upon a bank, and above him in the trade wind waved the huge fronds63 of ferns, and before him308 lay a field of canes overripe, that had been spared the cane-cutters’ knives.
Half drowsy64, still exhausted, but wrapped in the new feeling of well-being65, like a man who is recovering from an anaesthetic, he noted66 his surroundings; and, as his eyes travelled from point to point, they suddenly came to rest on a spot just before him.
On the dust of the road, sheltered by the bank and the ferns from the wind, lay the imprint67 of a naked foot. A woman’s little foot had pressed the dust of the road but a short time before; the print was warm to the sight and living, one could almost see the fleeting68 figure swiftly moving as the breeze, and graceful69 as the bending palm. The print of the heel was far less marked than that of the fore25 part.
The volcanic dust, though gone from the foliage70, still lay upon the road, and on this dust of ruin lay the woman’s foot mark, vivid, triumphant71 over death. Gaspard gazed at it. He glanced at the fountain beside him singing and laughing beneath the shadow of the ferns, then he remembered. It was here that he had paused that day with Marie; it was here that she had given him the ratifia, it was here—it was here.
He rose to his feet, gazed again at the mark in the road and followed its printing. Farther on he lost it, for the wind had blown the dust across it; further on he found it, very faint, but still discernible.
Then, where a little side path broke off from the road, he found it clearly again.
She had taken the path.
Along the National Road you find many paths like these. Short cuts to villages, paths used by the cane cutters and309 market folk, often mere72 traces half smothered73 by the tropical grasses.
He followed the path which led towards a wood of ceibas and angelines, palms with enormous trunks, thick as the trunks of full grown oak trees; tree ferns and wild pines.
As he came a voice hailed him from the liquid shadow of the trees, it was the voice of the siffleur de montagne; clear, silvery, bell-like, the voice of the bird came through the silence of the sultry noon. There was no other sound but the stirring of the palm fronds in the wind.
Here, amidst the trees, by this old forgotten pathway lay a shrine74 to the Virgin75; one of the thousand shrines76 that are found on the roads and pathways of Martinique. As he pushed the lianas and the air shoots of the wild pine aside, a voice other than the voice of the siffleur de montagne met his ear. The bird had ceased, and through the murmur77 of the wind in the trees came this voice; the voice of a woman, sweeter than the voice of the bird.
* * * * *
Moving silently as a shadow, pushing the leafy veils aside, scarcely breathing, he reached a point from which he could see vaguely in the twilight78 of the trees the shrine and the woman kneeling before it.
Her voice was clear now, and the soft, childish Creole words of the votary79 came to him for whom she was giving thanks.
No supplicatory80 prayer was this, but an assured thanksgiving for the safety of one who had been spared the darkness and the terror of chaos81, the horror of death, the fate of her ruined world, for one who was safe and who would return. “At morning, noon, and evening, I have praised thee on my knees—”
310 It was the noonday prayer—and it passed devoutly82 from a prayer of praise to one of supplication83. Supplication for the souls of the dead and for the living, for Missie Seguin who had been spared even as she had been spared; for herself, a creature not deserving the protection that had saved her, that had led her away to the safety of Grande Anse when Pelée had spoken and the world had fallen in ruins.
Then she rose to her feet, the white magic of Love and Faith still like a light upon her face. As her eyes fell upon the man standing84 beneath the trees, for one divine second she paused with breath caught back, spirit like, and ringed with the twilight as with a charm.
* * * * *
Where the trade wind was blowing and the green waves breaking on the beach of Grande Anse, welcome and a new life were waiting for them.
The man he had saved from the fer de lance had the will and the power to open the doors of a golden future for them, yet they could not break from yesterday so soon.
Heedless of time or place they sat by the road-side fountain, till the shadows were lengthening85 on the road and the valleys humming with night. Darkness found them on the ruined road above the ruined city.
They had come almost unconsciously to look at it again, to breathe the air of the past through which they had so miraculously86 wandered, and, as they stood clasping one another, gazing through the vagueness at the lights of the warships87 in the bay, the sea of a sudden became touched with silver and the rising moon broke above the shoulder of Pelée.
The light flooded across the harbour and struck the shrouded88 city like a tide. The ruins of the Place Bertine311 came into view; its broken and veiled cathedral, the thread of darkness outlining the Rue Victor Hugo.
In the moonlight the desolation became robbed of its terror and all was touched with the poetry of deep antiquity, from the flooding sea to the forms of the lovers set far above the ruins.
The End
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1
tragically
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| adv. 悲剧地，悲惨地 | |
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tragic
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| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
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poetic
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| adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的 | |
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precipice
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| n.悬崖，危急的处境 | |
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supernal
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| adj.天堂的，天上的；崇高的 | |
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obliterated
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| v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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dilated
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| adj.加宽的，扩大的v.（使某物）扩大，膨胀，张大( dilate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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bunk
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| n.(车、船等倚壁而设的)铺位；废话 | |
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erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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mounds
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| 土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆 | |
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wildernesses
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| 荒野( wilderness的名词复数 )； 沙漠； （政治家）在野； 不再当政（或掌权） | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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cinders
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| n.煤渣( cinder的名词复数 )；炭渣；煤渣路；煤渣跑道 | |
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fuming
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| 愤怒( fume的现在分词 )； 大怒； 发怒； 冒烟 | |
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exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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dunes
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| 沙丘( dune的名词复数 ) | |
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desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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fore
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| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
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torrent
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| n.激流，洪流；爆发，(话语等的)连发 | |
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tainted
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| adj.腐坏的；污染的；沾污的；感染的v.使变质( taint的过去式和过去分词 )；使污染；败坏；被污染，腐坏，败坏 | |
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corruption
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| n.腐败，堕落，贪污 | |
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plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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rue
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| n.懊悔，芸香，后悔；v.后悔，悲伤，懊悔 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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charred
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| v.把…烧成炭( char的过去式)；烧焦 | |
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stumps
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| （被砍下的树的）树桩( stump的名词复数 )； 残肢； （板球三柱门的）柱； 残余部分 | |
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exhaustion
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| n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述 | |
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rouge
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| n.胭脂，口红唇膏；v.(在…上)擦口红 | |
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gulls
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| n.鸥( gull的名词复数 )v.欺骗某人( gull的第三人称单数 ) | |
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requiem
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| n.安魂曲，安灵曲 | |
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lament
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| n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹 | |
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ascent
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| n.(声望或地位)提高；上升，升高；登高 | |
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volcanic
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| adj.火山的；象火山的；由火山引起的 | |
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frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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parched
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| adj.焦干的；极渴的；v.（使）焦干 | |
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inhuman
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| adj.残忍的，不人道的，无人性的 | |
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antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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46
obliterating
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| v.除去( obliterate的现在分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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47
lagoon
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| n.泻湖，咸水湖 | |
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futility
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| n.无用 | |
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mule
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| n.骡子，杂种，执拗的人 | |
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50
cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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51
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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civilisation
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| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
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53
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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54
reigns
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| n.君主的统治( reign的名词复数 )；君主统治时期；任期；当政期 | |
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supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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pangs
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| 突然的剧痛( pang的名词复数 )； 悲痛 | |
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eruption
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| n.火山爆发；（战争等）爆发；（疾病等）发作 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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shrub
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| n.灌木，灌木丛 | |
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canes
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| n.（某些植物，如竹或甘蔗的）茎( cane的名词复数 )；（用于制作家具等的）竹竿；竹杖 | |
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spouting
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| n.水落管系统v.（指液体）喷出( spout的现在分词 )；滔滔不绝地讲；喋喋不休地说；喷水 | |
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62
convalescing
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| v.康复( convalesce的现在分词 ) | |
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fronds
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| n.蕨类或棕榈类植物的叶子( frond的名词复数 ) | |
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64
drowsy
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| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
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well-being
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| n.安康，安乐，幸福 | |
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noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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imprint
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| n.印痕，痕迹；深刻的印象；vt.压印，牢记 | |
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68
fleeting
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| adj.短暂的，飞逝的 | |
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69
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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70
foliage
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| n.叶子，树叶，簇叶 | |
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71
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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73
smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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74
shrine
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| n.圣地，神龛，庙；v.将...置于神龛内，把...奉为神圣 | |
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75
virgin
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| n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的 | |
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76
shrines
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| 圣地，圣坛，神圣场所( shrine的名词复数 ) | |
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77
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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78
twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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79
votary
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| n.崇拜者；爱好者；adj.誓约的，立誓任圣职的 | |
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80
supplicatory
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| adj.恳求的，祈愿的 | |
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81
chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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82
devoutly
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| adv.虔诚地，虔敬地，衷心地 | |
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83
supplication
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| n.恳求，祈愿，哀求 | |
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84
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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85
lengthening
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| （时间或空间）延长，伸长( lengthen的现在分词 )； 加长 | |
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86
miraculously
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| ad.奇迹般地 | |
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87
warships
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| 军舰，战舰( warship的名词复数 )； 舰只 | |
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shrouded
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| v.隐瞒( shroud的过去式和过去分词 )；保密 | |
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