Turchino had saluted him abruptly, with a gesture that neither word nor smile softened, as if no event whatever, however unusual and extraordinary it might be, would have the power to interrupt even for a second the terrible preoccupation that appeared on his terrene face, almost chinless, scarcely larger than a fist, with a long, prominent nose, pointed like the snout of a pike, between two small, glittering eyes.
The same preoccupation was legible in the faces of his two sons, who also saluted in silence, and resumed their work without laying aside their immutable sadness. They were boys of over twenty, fleshless, sunburnt, agitated by a continual muscular restlessness, like demoniacs. All their movements had an air of convulsive contraction, of starts; and beneath the skin of their chinless faces the muscles could be seen, at moments, trembling.
"Is the fishing good?" asked George, pointing to the large, immerged net, whose corners could be seen at the surface of the water.
"Nothing to-day, signor," murmured Turchino, in a tone of suppressed anger.
After a pause, he added:
"Who knows? Perhaps you've brought us good luck."
"Draw up the net. Let's see."
His sons began to manoeuvre the capstan.
Through the interstices of the planks could be seen the reflecting and foaming waves. In a corner of the platform stood a low cabin with a straw roof, the summit of which had a layer of red tiles, and decorated with a piece of sculptured oak in the form of a bull's head with two large, connecting horns—a charm against witchcraft. Other amulets were suspended from the roof, mingled with wooden disks, on which were glued with pitch pieces of mirror, round as eyes; and a bunch of four-pronged rusty forks lay before the low door. To right and left, two large vertical masts were erected, fixed on the rock, fastened at their bases by stakes of all dimensions, that intercrossed and mingled, riveted to one another by enormous nails, bound by iron wire and cordage, strengthened in a thousand ways against the rage of the sea. Two other horizontal masts crossed the first two and stretched out like bowsprits beyond the rocks, over the deep water teeming with fish. At the forked extremities of the four masts hung pulleys provided with cords corresponding to the corners of the square net. Other cords passed through other pulleys, at the end of smaller spars; as far a the most distant rocks, the stakes driven in sustained the re-enforced cables; innumerable planks, nailed on the beams, strengthened the weakest points. The long and obstinate struggle against the fury and treacherousness of the waves was as if written on this enormous carcass by means of these knots, these nails, this machinery. The machine seemed to have a life of its own, to have the air and figure of an animated body. The wood, exposed for years to sun, rain, and tempest, showed all its fibres, exhibited all its rugosities and knottiness, revealed every part of its resistant structure, was denuded, was consumed, was white like a tibia, or shining like silver, or grayish like silex, acquired a special character and significance, an imprint just as distinct as that of a person on whom old age and suffering have achieved their cruel work.
The capstan creaked as it turned by the impulsion of the four bars, and the whole machine trembled and creaked under the effort, while the vast net gradually emerged with golden reflections from the green depth.