IV

The person greeted by such a meaningful and delightful appellation reddened deeply, stopped at the entrance, laughed, waved a greeting, and went to the captains’ table. He was a well-built person of no more than thirty, not tall, and with a pleasant, open face that expressed tenderness and strength. There was a calm liveliness in his eyes, while his facial features, his figure, and all his movements were notable for their dignity, which was more a reflection of an inner calm than an habitual assertion of character. His thoughtful voice was extremely distinct but not loud.

Bitt-Boy wore a pilot’s cap, a brown jersey, a blue belt, and heavy-looking shoes; a raincoat was thrown over his arm.

Bitt-Boy shook dozens and hundreds of hands… His smiling glance moved freely about the circle of friendly grins; wreaths of pipe smoke, the white glitter of teeth in coffee-coloured faces, and a multi-hued fog of eyes surrounded him for several minutes – the vibrant cloud of a cordial meeting. He finally disentangled himself and fell into Duke’s embrace. Even Chinchar’s mournful eye cheered up, as did his caustic jaw. The stolid, ox-like Renior softened, and the tough, egotistical Estamp gave a slight but childlike smile. Bitt-Boy was everyone’s favourite.

“You, fortune’s drummer!” said Duke. “Haven’t seen hide nor hair of you! You weren’t perhaps some modern Jonah in the belly of a nasty whale? Where did you disappear to? What d’you know? Take your pick: the whole damn fleet’s on hand. But we’re stuck, like a wedge driven into some blockhead. Save the Marianne.”

“You mean the privateer, do you?” asked Bitt-Boy. “I saw him. A short tale, lads, is better than long interrogations. Here’s the story; yesterday I took a yawl in Zurbagan and sailed to Liss; it was a dark night. I’d heard about the privateers; therefore I stole along the shore behind the rocks, where the cliffs are overgrown with moss. I was protected by their colour. Twice the search light of an unfriendly cruiser passed by me; the third time something made me lower the sail. In an instant… the yawl and I were illuminated like a fly on a plate. Because of the rocks, the shadows, the moss, and the clefts, I couldn’t be distinguished from the emptiness, but had I not lowered the sail… And so Bitt-Boy got here safe and sound. Renior, do you remember the firm Heaven and Co.? It sells tight shoes with nails driven right through; I bought a pair yesterday, and now my heels are all bloody.”

“Aye-aye, Bitt-Boy,” said Renior, “but you’re a courageous person. Bitt-Boy, pilot my President, if you were married… ”

“No, the Hermit,” declared Chinchar. “I know you, Bitt-Boy. I’m rich now.”

“Why not the Aramea?” asked the stern Estamp. “I’m prepared to defend my right to leave with a knife. With Bitt-Boy it’s a sure thing.”

The young pilot was about to say something else when he suddenly became grimly serious. With his chin propped on his small hand he looked at the captains, quietly smiled with his eyes, and, out of consideration for the mood of others, got control over himself. He took a drink, tossed up the empty glass, caught it, lit a cigarette, and said:

“I thank you; I thank you for your kind words, for your confidence in my luck… I do not seek it. I can’t give you my answer now; that is, a definite one. There is a certain circumstance.”

“Although I’ve already spent all the money I earned in the spring, nonetheless… Besides, how can I choose among you? Duke?… Oh, dear old fellow! One would have to be near-sighted not to see your secret tears for wide-open space and your desire to tell everyone: ‘Watch me do it!’ The sea agrees with you, old fellow, as it does with me; I like you, Duke. And you, Estamp? Who hid me from the foolish Sepoys in Bombay when I saved the rajah’s pearls? I also like Estamp; he has a warm spot in his heart. Renior lived at my place for two months, and when I broke a leg his wife fed me for half a year. And you, ‘I know you’, Chinchar, you inveterate sinner, how you cried in church over a meeting with an old woman… You had been separated by twenty years and unintentional bloodshed. I’ve had a drink and I’m jabbering, captains; I like all of you. The privateer, to be sure, is no joking matter, but how can I make a choice? I can’t even imagine.”

“Lots,” said Estamp.

“Lots! Lots!” the table began to shout. Bitt-Boy looked around. People had long since moved in from the corners and were following the conversation; many elbows rested on the table, and behind those who were close others stood and listened. Then Bitt-Boy’s glance passed to the window, beyond which the harbour was shining serenely. The evening, giving off vapours, descended on the water. With a glance Bitt-Boy asked the mysterious Felicity about something comprehensible only to himself and said:

“That’s quite an imposing brigantine, Estamp. Who’s commanding it?”

“Some lout of an ignoramus. Only nobody’s seen him.”

“And its cargo?”

“Gold, gold, gold,” Chinchar began to mutter, “sweet gold…”

And several people on the side corroborated this:

“That’s what they say.”

“A vessel with gold was supposed to pass by here. That must be the one.”

“The watch on board is scrupulous.”

“They don’t let anyone on board.”

“It’s quiet on it… ”

“Captains!” Bitt-Boy began to speak. “I’m embarrassed by my strange reputation, and the hopes placed in me throw my heart into confusion, really and truly. Listen: cast lots provisionally. You don’t have to roll scraps of paper into little tubes. In a lively matter something living will watch over us. I’ll go with whoever wins out, if a certain circumstance doesn’t change.”

“Let them have it, Bitt-Boy!” cried out someone who had just woken up in the corner.

Bitt-Boy laughed. He would have liked to have already been far from Liss by now. The noise and jokes amused him. He started up the “lots” business in order to drag out the time so that he could imbibe as much as possible of the strange, bustling influences and diffusions of this crush of sailors and their affairs. However, he would have religiously kept his word should a “certain circumstance” have changed. But now, while he looked at the Felicity, this circumstance was still too vague to himself and in mentioning it he was guided only by his amazing instinct. Thus a sensitive person, expecting a friend, is reading or working, and then suddenly stands up, goes to the door and opens it: the friend is coming, but the person who opened the door has already shaken off his absentmindedness and is surprised at the correctness of his action.

“Blast your circumstance!” said Duke. “All right – we’ll draw lots! But you didn’t finish what you were saying, Bitt-Boy.”

“Yes. Evening’s falling,” Bitt-Boy continued, “the person who wins me, a paltry pilot, will not have long to wait. At midnight I’ll send a lad with tidings to the boat of the one with whom it falls to my lot to travel. The fact of the matter is that I might refuse outright. But all the same, for the time being, go ahead.”

Everyone turned towards the window into whose variegated distance Bitt-Boy was peering intently, apparently seeking some natural sign, indication, or chance portent. All the ships were clearly visible, as plain as on the palm of one’s hand: the graceful Marianne; the long President with its tall bowsprit; the bulldog-like gloomy Hermit with the figure of a monk on its prow; the tall, light Aramea; and that nobly imposing Felicity with its powerful, well-proportioned body that had the neatness of a yacht, an elongated stern, and jute rigging, that Felicity about which they had argued in the tavern as to whether it had a cargo of gold on board.

How sad are summer evenings! Their regular penumbra that has embraced the weary sun wanders over the hushed land; their echo is drawn-out and sadly delayed; their distant vistas wane in silent melancholy. To the eye everything around is still brisk and full of life and activity, but the rhythm of an elegy already holds sway over a saddened heart. Whom do you pity? Yourself? Do you hear a previously inaudible moaning from the earth? Are the dead clustering around us at that perspicacious hour? Are memories subconsciously straining in some lonely soul and seeking an expressive song?

…But you are overwhelmed by pity, as for someone who is lost in the wilderness… And many moments of decision fall in the untranquil circle of these evenings.

“Look, a cormorant’s flying,” said Bitt-Boy, “soon it will land on the water. Let’s see which ship it lands closest to. Is that all right, captains? Now,” he continued after receiving the approval of all, “that’s how we’ll decide. This very night I’ll pilot whichever one it lands closest to, if… as I’ve said. Well, well, my thick-winged one!”

At this our four captains exchanged glances, and not even the devil himself, the father of fire and torment, could have sat at the intersection of those glances without being burned through. One has to know how superstitious sailors are in order to understand them at that moment.

Meanwhile the cormorant, ignorant of this, described several ponderous figure-eights among the ships and landed right between the President and the Marianne, so close to the middle of the distance that Bitt-Boy and everyone else grinned.

“The bird is taking us both in tow,” said Duke. “So well? We’ll weave floormats together, Renior my friend, eh?”

“Wait!” Chinchar shouted. “The cormorant can swim, can’t it? Where will he swim now? An excellent question!”

“All right, the one to which it swims,” agreed Estamp.

Duke covered his face with his hand, as though he were dozing; however, secretly he watched the cormorant malevolently. The Aramea was lying ahead of the others, closer to the Felicity. The cormorant headed that way, diving now and then and staying somewhat closer to the brigantine. Estamp straightened up and his eyes glittered defiantly.

“There!” was his concise judgment. “Did everyone see?”

“Yes, yes, Estamp, everyone!”

“I’m going,” said Bitt-Boy, “goodbye for now; I’m expected. My dear captains! The cormorant is a stupid bird, but I swear to you that if I could have torn myself into four I would have done so. And so, farewell! Well then, Estamp, you’ll hear from me. We’ll sail together or… we’ll part ‘once and for all’, lads.”

He uttered the last words under his breath – and was not clearly heard or understood. Three of the captains were sunk morosely into their chagrin.

Estamp had bent over to pick up his pipe, and thus no one caught the moment of parting. Bitt-Boy stood up, waved his cap, and walked quickly to the exit.

“Bitt-Boy!” they began to shout after him.

The pilot did not turn around and hurriedly ran down the steps.