The first day there was nobody there. The second day a child came to look at us. The third day about ten children stood around asking for sous. I was foolish enough to give them some, and the following day there was a crowd of twenty or thirty boys, some of them from sixteen to eighteen years old.
I had the ugly band routed by Claude and the lighthouse keeper and as they took to throwing stones at us I pointed my gun at the little troop. They fled howling. Only two boys, of six and ten years of age, stayed. We did not take any notice of them and I installed myself a little farther on, sheltered by a rock which kept the wind away. The two boys followed. Claude and the lighthouse keeper were on the lookout to see that the boys did not come back. They were stooping down over the extreme point of the rock which was above our heads. They seemed peaceful, when suddenly my young maid jumped up: “Horrors! Madame! Horrors! They are throwing lice down on us!” And, in fact, the two little good-for-nothings had been for the last hour searching for all the vermin they could find on themselves and throwing them on us.
I had the two little beggars seized and they got a well-deserved correction.
There was a crevasse which was called the “Enfer du Plogoff.” I had a wild desire to go down this crevasse, but the guardian dissuaded me, constantly giving as objections the danger of slipping and his fear of responsibility in case of accident. I persisted, nevertheless, in my intention, and after a thousand promises, in addition to a certificate to testify that notwithstanding the supplications of the guardian and the certainty of the danger that I ran, I had persisted all the same, etc., and after having made a small present of ten louis to the brave man, I obtained the facilities for descending the “Enfer du Plogoff”—that is to say a wide belt to which a strong rope was fastened. I buckled this belt round my waist, which was then so slender (forty-three centimeters) that it was necessary to make additional holes in order to fasten it.
Then the guardian put on each of my hands a wooden shoe, the sole of which was bordered with big nails jutting out two centimeters. I stared at these wooden shoes and asked for an explanation before putting them on.
“Well,” said the guardian Lucas, “when I let you down, as you are no fatter than a herringbone, you will get shaken about in the crevasse and will risk breaking your bones; while if you have the sabots on your hands you can protect yourself against the walls by putting out your arms to the right and the left, according as you are shaken up against them. I do not say that you will not have a few—bangs—but that is your own fault, you will go. Now, listen, my little lady: when you are at the bottom, on the rock in the middle, mind you don’t slip, for that is the most dangerous of all; if you fell in the water I might pull the rope, for sure, but I don’t answer for anything. In that cursed whirlpool of water you might be caught between two stones and it would be no use for me to pull—I should break the rope and that would be all.”
Then the man grew pale and making the sign of the cross, he leaned toward me, murmuring in a faint voice: “It is the shipwrecked ones who are there, under the stones, down there. It is they who dance in the moonlight on the shore of the dead (‘Trépassés’). It is they who put the slippery seaweed on the little rock, down there, in order to make travelers slip, and then they drag them to the bottom of the sea.” Then, looking me in the eyes, he said: “Will you go down all the same?”
“Yes, certainly, Père Lucas, I will go down at once.”
My little boy was building forts and castles on the sand with Félicie. Only Claude was with me. He did not say a word, knowing my unbridled desire to meet danger. He looked to see if the belt was properly fastened, and asked my permission to tie the tongue of the belt firmly, then he passed a strong cord several times around to strengthen the leather, and I was let down, suspended by the rope in the blackness of the crevasse. I extended my arms to the right and the left, as the guardian had told me to do, and even then I got my elbows scraped. At first I thought that the noise I heard was the reverberation of the echo of the blows of the wooden shoes against the edges of the crevasse but suddenly a frightful din filled my ears: successive firings of cannon, strident, ringing, crackings of a whip, plaintive howlings and repeated monotonous cries as of a hundred fishermen drawing up a net filled with fish, seaweed, and pebbles. All the noises mingled under the mad violence of the wind. I became furious with myself, for I was really afraid. The lower I went, the louder the howlings became in my ears and my brain; and my heart beat the order of retreat. The wind swept through the narrow tunnel and blew in all directions round my legs, my body, my neck. A horrible fear took possession of me. I descended slowly and at each little shock I felt that the four hands holding me above had come to a knot. I tried to remember the number of knots, for it seemed to me that I was making no progress. Then, filled with terror, I opened my mouth to call out to be drawn up again, but the wind, which danced in mad folly around me, filled my mouth and drove back the words. I was nearly suffocated. Then I shut my eyes and ceased to struggle. I would not even put out my arms. A few moments after I pulled up my legs in unspeakable terror. The sea had just seized them in a brutal embrace which had wet me through. However, I recovered courage, for now I could see clearly. I stretched out my legs and found myself upright on the little rock. It is true it was very slippery. I took hold of a large ring fixed in the vault which overhung the rock and looked round. The long and narrow crevasse grew suddenly larger at its base and terminated in a large grotto which looked out over the open sea; but the entrance of this grotto was protected by a quantity of both large and small rocks which could be seen for a distance of a league in front on the surface of the water—which explains the terrible noise of the sea dashing into the labyrinth and the possibility of standing upright on a rock with the wild dance of the waves all around.
However, I saw very plainly that a false step might be fatal in the brutal whirl of waters which came rushing in from afar with dizzy speed and broke against the insurmountable obstacle, and in receding dashed against other waves which followed them. From this cause proceeded the perpetual fusillade of waters which rushed into the crevasse without danger of drowning me.