Poor old Bartoli! Sweat ran down his forehead just thinking about it.
* * * * *
And so, our meals passed in long conversations about the lighthouse, and the sea, with tales of shipwrecks, and Corsican bandits…. Then, as night fell, the keeper of the first watch lit his hand-lamp, took his pipe, flask, and a red-edged, thick volume of Plutarch, which was the sum total of the Sanguinaires' library, and went down out of sight. A moment later, there was a crash of chains, pulleys, and heavy weights as the clock was wound up.
While this was going on, I went to sit outside on the terrace. The sun, already well down, hurried its descent into the water, dragging the whole skyline with it. The wind freshened; the island turned violet. In the sky a big bird passed slowly near me; it was the eagle homing to the Genoese tower…. Gradually, a sea mist got up. Soon, nothing could be seen except a white ridge of sea-fog around the island. Suddenly, a great flood of light emerged above my head from the lighthouse. The clear ray left the island in complete darkness as it fell far out to sea, and I, too, was lost to sight in the night, under the great luminous sweeps which barely caught me as they passed…. But the wind was freshening again. Time to go indoors. I groped to close the huge door, I secured the iron bars, and then, still feeling my way, took the small cast-iron stairs, which trembled and rang under my feet, to the top of the lighthouse. Here, as you can imagine, there was plenty of light.
Picture a gigantic lamp with six rows of wicks with the inner facets of the lantern arranged around them, some with an enormous crystal glass lens, others opened onto a large fixed glass panel which protected the flame from the wind…. When I came in, I was completely dazzled, and the coppers, tins, white metal reflectors, rotating walls of convex crystal glass, with large blue-tinged circles, and all the flickering lights, gave me a touch of vertigo.
However, gradually my eyes got used to it, and I settled down at the foot of the lamp, beside the keeper who was reading his Plutarch—for fear of falling asleep….
Outside, all was dark and desperate. On the small turning balcony, a maddening gust of wind howled. The lighthouse creaked; the sea roared. Out on the point, the breakers on the shoals sounded like cannon shots…. At times, an invisible finger tapped at the panes; it was some bird of the night, drawn by the light, braining itself against the glass….
Inside the sparkling, hot lantern, nothing was heard except the crackling flame, the dripping oil, the chain unwinding and the monotonous intoning of the life of Demetrius of Phaleron….
* * * * *
At midnight, the keeper stood up, took a last peek at the wicks and we went below. We passed the keeper of the second watch, rubbing his eyes as he came up. We gave him the flask and the Petrarch. Then, before retiring, we briefly entered the locker-room below, which was full of chains, heavy weights, metal tanks, and rope. By the light of his small lamp, the keeper wrote in the large lighthouse log, always left open at the last entry: