It was morning. Bands of sailors were about already, looking very smart in their clean clothes, singing, beginning already the Sunday holiday.
One breathed a white mist, a damp coldness—a first sensation of winter. Newly-arrived as I was from the Adriatic, where the sun was still shining, the colours of Brest seemed to me greyer than ever.
At number 154—above the sign: À la pensée du beau canonnier—I climbed three flights of stairs in an old wide staircase, and came upon the room of the Kermadecs.
I could hear through the door the regular sound of a cradle. Little Pierre, very spoilt in spite of all, had retained this habit of being rocked to sleep, and Yves, alone with his son, was sitting near him, rocking the cradle with one hand, very slowly.
He raised pathetic eyes, moved at seeing me, but hesitating to come to me, his expression saying:
"Ah, yes, brother, I know. You have come to take me away; it is true that this is what I asked of you; but . . . but I did not expect you perhaps so soon; and to go away . . . that will be very hard to bear. . . ."
Physically, Yves had greatly changed. He had become paler, sheltered as he had been from the tanning of the sea; his expression was different, less assured, almost mournful. It was plain that he had suffered; but on his face, marmorean still and colourless, vice had not succeeded yet in imprinting any trace.
I looked around with an impression of surprise, and a contraction of the heart. I had not, in fact, foreseen what the dwelling of my brother Yves, on shore and in a town, would be like. It was very different from that sea dwelling in which I had so long known him: the masthead, full of wind and sun. Here, now, amid this reality of poverty I felt as he no doubt felt himself, out of place and ill at ease.
Marie was outside, at the pump, and little Pierre was sound asleep, his long baby's eyelashes resting on his cheeks. We were alone together and as he was uncomfortable in my presence, he began hurriedly to talk of embarking, of departure.
A change in the list had called me to Brest prepared for immediate departure: two or three ships were about to be put into commission—for the China station, for the Southern Seas, for the Levant—and it was necessary to hold myself in readiness, from hour to hour, for one of these destinations.