He did not complete the sentence, but rose on his toes, appearing to wait, before letting himself drop back on his heels, for the passenger to give him an explanation. But the man remained silent.

‘Besides,’ said the captain, ‘it’s none of my business.…’

He gave a shrug of his shoulders and turned his back on the passenger. The man withdrew.

II

In spite of the roughness of the sea, a considerable cargo of raw materials assured the Bonne Espérance an almost perfect stability and, under threatening skies, she went her way heavily and slowly, but steadily.

The first days were rather painful for the passenger. He was nothing of a sailor. One might even doubt, seeing his uncertain step and anxious air, whether he had ever before set foot on a ship’s deck. The greater part of the day he remained in his cabin, where he seemed to enjoy himself. Certain men have the faculty of being able to settle down anywhere in such a way that they seem to be permanently located. How they manage it is a mystery; but all they have to do is to change the place of a few things and, in an inexplicable manner, the hotel room where they pass the night appears to have been theirs for a long time and to be a home which they will never leave. There must be something in them opposed to the idea of change which tends to give everything about them a certain aspect of permanence.

It was, perhaps, an instinctive impulse of this kind which made the passenger on the Bonne Espérance modify as much as possible the appearance of his cabin. He had thrown over his berth a beige blanket belonging to him, thus hiding the quilt that bore the monogram of the company. He had also removed from the back of the arm-chair the antimacassar which displayed the same monogram embroidered in bright colours. There were a few books on a little shelf originally intended for shoes. Finally, the table was now in a corner which was manifestly not designed to receive it, as was evident from the big bright spot its leg had left on the carpet where it had been before. Where the table was now, a single roll of the boat somewhat more severe than the others would not fail to tip it over, but the traveller had only a limited knowledge of the sea.

Almost at the start of the voyage, torrential rains poured down upon the Bonne Espérance with such violence that one would have thought they were intent on making the boat return to port. But was there ever a case of a boat turning back because of rain? The captain laughed at the awful weather.

‘You’re the cause of this,’ he would say, insolently, to the traveller when they happened to meet in the passageway. Then the tall man would readjust his glasses and give a mirthless laugh resembling a cough. One day the captain remarked, brusquely, in a jocose manner:

‘You’re my guest, you know. You will have to take your meals at my table.’

He put his little fat hands behind his back and resumed, in a tone which he intended to be humorous:

‘That annoys you, eh?’

The man shook his head in protest.

‘Say,’ said the captain, abruptly, ‘do you ever talk?’

Three days before he would not have risked so familiar and impertinent a question, but, as he gained the high seas, he felt more and more his importance. Such jokes were permissible four hundred miles from the French coast. The man made a sort of grimace in an attempt at a smile and retired with a bow.