by Josep Pla
A boat must carry rigging and masts. When the hull is finished, they must be hoisted. Getting that right is a matter of grace and style: each boat is different and, consequently, its tackle is distinct.
I stayed on my balcony and gazed down at the Mestral until the light faded altogether. The presence of that fine, elegant craft reminded me of my stay in L’Escala, the long periods I had spent in the small docks of La Punta, when she was being built. So many enjoyable hours! The building of the Mestral still brings me so much pleasure! Now I was watching her slender silhouette in the crepuscular light of the bay, a whitish patch on water tinged with gentle twilight purple. I reflected how the Mestral had vanished from my life as that glow faded from the absolute, rocky stillness of Cadaqués Bay.
* * *
—
Back on the settee – which was so pleasant! – more memories surged that were extraordinarily precise.
We launched the boat in Perris harbor with quite a bit of difficulty, because it’s a filthy area with very little water. But the experienced Vadoret managed all that. We decided to make our first crossing to Cadaqués to test her out. She was still unnamed. The fact was I hadn’t a clue what to call her.
We enjoyed a few very agreeable days. A moment comes at the height of summer when, even though you know you’re taking a real risk, you feel a tremendous desire to do nothing at all. Sky and earth, sea and mountain, wind and calm, urge you to spend your time on less painful occupations than filling page after page with petty, even irritating, paragraphs. There is this contradiction: the best way to while the time away is to do nothing. Writing is a complicated trifle that in the end wears you down to the bone. Any excuse is good to put it aside for a period. Intellectual work has that drawback: it can be very taxing, but it doesn’t make you sweat and never eliminates the excess toxins from the body’s tissues. Your inevitable, sad mental imaginings wear out the fibers but don’t restore vitality: physical effort rejuvenates; mental effort ages. You feel an irrepressible urge to sweat, to pull on a rope, to lift paternoster lines, to row. At night you’re sleepy; the brain repels all obsessions, you sink into a blissful swoon. You can’t wish for a more useful form of escape than a boat.
When I was walking along La Riba in Cadaqués, I saw Senyor Víctor Rahola coming toward me, with that quiet, unbelligerent air of his. An older gentleman, over sixty, who radiates a wondrously iridescent warmth of feeling. He was dressed in nineteenth-century fashion: buttery drill and a perfectly starched shirt. When I see this gentleman, my memory springs into action. We were blessed by so many friends in common (many now dead), loved so many remote, solitary heaths on this and other coasts, and are united by such a love of the sea that I spur on his imagination and he sparks a wealth of memories and experiences in me. His character combines, on the one hand, insights from the his most complex medical knowledge and, on the other, from the most appealing poetry. I’m thrilled to meet him; it’s a genuine pleasure. His character allows him to be totally natural with unlettered people and always suggests a vast expanse of uncharted territory.
“So then, it seems we have a boat…” he told me, with a laugh.
“Yes, senyor, I have a boat we can use to go wherever you want.”
“And what name have you given her?”
“It doesn’t have one yet. I don’t know what to christen her.”
“Why don’t you call her ‘Mestral’?”
“That’s a name with a certain pedigree.”
“It’s a lovely name. It’s the name of the healthiest of winds. Personally, it cures all my aches and pains. People across the Mediterranean use this name; it’s part of the lingua franca. That’s what it is in Catalan and Spanish. In Provençal and Occitan, it’s mistral. In Italian, maestrale. The same, in modern Greek. I believe the word is very similar in Turkish and Slavic languages. ‘Mistral’ is even used by the English. I’ve never understood why club boats are given such rare or exotic names. Names in French are the most common.”
“It really is a lovely name…”
“Besides, the word ‘mestral’ brings to mind one of the most extraordinary crossings I ever made. It was a dangerous, rapid, astonishing crossing. You’ll probably not believe me if I tell you that I went from Cadaqués to Civitavecchia in under forty-eight hours in a schooner. It was because the mistral blew us along.”
“Tell me more, Senyor Víctor…”
“When I was young, my health was poor, so my parents decided to put me on one of their sailing boats that went to Italy. They generally went to Anzio to transport chestnut wood used in making wine vats. I’ve known Anzio for over fifty years. My parents thought a sea voyage would strengthen me and give me an appetite. So I embarked. We left Cadaqués in a family schooner with a crew of excellent local sailors. It was winter and we hoisted the sails with a sharp mistral – the best wind, as you know, to leave this bay on. By the Cucurucuc in S’Arenella all the sails had been spread and the vessel advanced at a swift pace. Once out of the bay, the skipper asked his crew, as usual: ‘What shall we do? Straight on?’
“In the winter, with tail winds from land, it wasn’t usual to cross the sea in a straight line from one side to the other. Our destination was Civitavecchia. We could go straight, via Boques de Bonifaci, running off the wind or head northward, via the Hiéres. The crew replied: ‘Straight on!’ And the skipper agreed. So we headed toward Boques de Bonifaci. I was a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old youngster and it all seemed wonderful. We gradually left the coast. Then the wind picked up. Small ragged clouds scudded across the cold, blue-black sky over Pení. A moment came when the white blotch of the Sant Sebastià hermitage seemed to float on the waves. Given the weather and the wind’s gathering strength, the skipper ordered all topsails to be furled and strapped down. They dropped in turn with a din: the main jib, inner jib and forestaysails. However, as there were still too many sails, the main and mizzen sails fell too. The brig looked like a huge, plucked bird. We were sailing only with the square sail, to keep the prow up and nimble. It was such a smooth ride: the waves pushed us strongly, sped us rapidly forward; the tensed masts and rigging whistled, seemingly overwhelmed by a nervous, crackling energy. Water surged over the stern; salty spray drenched us. The piercing whistle of the wind on the shroud, stays, rigging and topsails remains etched on my mind to this day as one of my most vivid memories from those years. The brig proceeded, its prow digging two huge furrows of foamy water, now this side, now that. I wasn’t at all safe or stable on deck and the skipper locked me in the cabin. It had a lamp in one corner – we had set out in the afternoon and it was dark now – and soon it was as dark down below as in the sky. The brig swayed and pitched violently along. But what I remember most clearly from the first part of the voyage are the waves, the wild horses of the Gulf of Lion, waves shaped like caverns, inky black and crowned by tall, fast, furious crests of white foam. They rushed at our stern and seemed about to engulf us, but the vessel was well steered – the skipper didn’t budge from the helm until we reached the end of our voyage – and always flew in a cloud of spray, on the edge of a breaking wave, to the din of bubbling, roiling water. The wind was taking us away. We sailed past Boques, and the lighthouses of Corsica and Sardinia paraded by and were out of sight amazingly quickly. The wind was less impetuous in the shelter of the Sardinian coast. Forty-eight hours after leaving Cadaqués we anchored in Civitavecchia, holding our watches. The effort of keeping on course and the nervous tension had exhausted the crew, but the second they saw the first tavern, they all revived…”
“No need to say another word, Senyor Víctor. The keelboat will be called Mestral in remembrance of your voyage.”
So that was why the little boat – which had just arrived in Cadaqués – was called “Mestral.”
* * *
—
I’d just finished supper. There was a knock at the door. Baldiri Cremat walked into the dining room accompanied by a m
an he introduced as his brother-in-law, Pau Saldet. Baldiri was as open and chatty as Saldet was reserved and deadpan. Baldiri came in still wearing a cap; the other man was holding his.
“Have you had dinner?” I asked.
“Yes, senyor, we have.”
“What can I offer you?”
“Whatever is to hand…We don’t want to cause you any bother…”
“Are you planning to go fishing in the Mestral?”
“No, senyor, we’re off to France.”
“She’s a good little boat to go anywhere, as you well know.”
They sat around the table: Baldiri, comfortably; Saldet, with a bit of his rump up against the back of the chair. I brought in coffee and white rum.
“We’d like to have a word,” said Baldiri, lighting a cigar.
“Fire ahead…”
“Would you fancy a trip to France? We’d thought, ‘Perhaps he’d like to go to France and then write one of his witty chronicles.’ ”
“Of course…”
“We’ve loaded up with cans of olive oil here in Cadaqués. You know how it’s the best…We’ll transport it hereabouts to pay for the voyage. On the way back, we’ll load up with bicycle parts, valuable stuff that takes up no room. We have to meet a man in the Salses Ponds. You could say it’s a business matter. In fact, we’re just going for a laugh…”
Baldiri was doing the talking. His brother-in-law stared at the ground. He sometimes nodded in a way that suggested he was in agreement. Pau Saldet seemed misanthropic and self-absorbed.
“I don’t understand what my role might be on such a trip…” I said, after a lull in the conversation.
“I’m not suggesting you should have one…” interjected Baldiri abruptly. “You should come as a man of leisure. You’ll be there to put people on the wrong track. We’ll say you’re the owner of the Mestral and you hired it out to us to sail along the Roussillon coast as far as Leucate. Do you understand? You should act as the owner, go to the café and read the newspaper…We’ll be your crew, if you like, your servants…”
“Baldiri, you’re a wily old fox. Tell me the truth: what are you really after in France?”
“What I said. Just what I said. I’m not lying. Or shall we say I’m not lying on purpose…though on this occasion it amounts to much the same thing. What do you expect? We all have our ways of working.” “That’s fine, and thanks for being so candid…How long will the trip be?”
“If everything goes to plan, let’s say a week. Today is Saturday. We must reach the Salses Ponds in a week’s time, next Saturday at dusk. Once we’ve loaded up, we’ll head fast round Cape Creus.”
“If the weather is fine…”
“It will be…In the meantime, you’ll have all that time to visit the Roussillon. If you don’t know the place, you’ll like it. If you’re agreeable, we’re all set.”
“When do you intend on leaving?”
“We’re ready. Right now, if possible. We’ve got to see a lad from Port de la Selva early tomorrow morning. He’ll be by Prona Cove with his longboat.”
“So who is he? Baldiri, I know you’re sensible and a live wire, but I get the impression lots of people are involved…”
“The lad from La Selva deserted when he was a youngster and has fished for years around Leucate. He’s a pilot. He’ll inform us about the channels.”
“What channels?”
“The ones into the ponds.”
“Will he come with us?”
“No, senyor. He’ll just give us the info…Do you own a gun?”
“And why would you need a gun?”
“Because there are lots of geese and coots in the ponds, and all kinds of birds are passing through at this time of year. We can say we’re going to shoot geese in the ponds, if the French challenge us.”
“I see you’d like to turn me into a true hunting gentleman. But the truth is I’ve never shot a gun.”
“If you own a gun, don’t worry, I’ll shoot it.”
The truth was I didn’t own a gun and wouldn’t have known how to find one in Cadaqués at that time of day.
I’d known Baldiri all my life. Hermós had introduced me to him years ago. Hermós thought he was one of the cleverest, most courageous youngsters in the port of Roses. Perhaps he was a man who liked to overindulge – too fond of women, booze and cards. But Hermós said he was a dab hand in the stern of a ship. When Hermós said anyone in any trade was a dab hand, you could rely on that person.
The Mestral’s presence in Cadaqués, after such a long separation, had set me thinking. I was really delighted by the idea of spending a few days aboard her beloved timbers. Though we weren’t connected in any way now, I’d never been able to forget her. Besides, I’d nothing else to do in the coming week. There was nothing urgent…So I said I’d go with them to the Salses Ponds.
“What should I bring, Baldiri?” I asked.
“We have all we need on board. Bring a couple of blankets because it gets coldish at night. And some money, of course…We don’t want to look stupid, you know? You won’t be wasting your time…If everything goes well, we’ll even have a little present for you…”
“Bah!”
When I walked into the street, with blankets under my arm and a small suitcase with my personal things, it was a damp, misty night, cloudless and windless. If there was a breeze, it came from the south, was very gentle and was ideal for sailing. Total silence reigned over Cadaqués. Streetlights were flickering like exhausted fireflies. There wasn’t a soul about. The church’s cracked bell rang ten o’clock. The Cadaqués church bell doesn’t ring solemnly and slowly; it chimes too quickly and skips a few beats.
When we reached El Pianc beach, a young lad emerged from under a skiff and joined us. It was a friend of Baldiri’s, probably the one who’d supplied the olive oil he’d bought. He seemed half-asleep. He said hello and didn’t say another word. This lad rowed us silently to the Mestral in his skiff without lifting his oars out of the water. When he’d dropped us off, he grabbed his oars and left, also without a word.
“It’s so nice to meet someone around here who doesn’t talk nonstop,” I told Baldiri.
“That lad is a one-off. He’s an ace when it comes to working at night.”
Hermós would have said he was a dab hand.
We raised the anchor, started the engine and left.
It was a noisy engine. A wonky car engine. Baldiri took the tiller and turned the prow toward the small Calanans lighthouse, no doubt to make people think he was going back to Roses. Although there was no danger in Cadaqués, his prudence reassured me. We sailed like that for a while. As soon as we were in the mouth of the bay, Baldiri told Saldet: “Hoist the sail!”
While the sail went up, Baldiri raised the tiller and pointed the boat toward the Cape Creus lighthouse. There was still a gentle breeze, the sail swelled slightly, just enough to take out the side sheet. But the Mestral responded gratefully, and though that helped only a little, we were happy. She was built to sail and a little breeze was enough to display her excellent qualities. When sailing, she always carried her head high, her prow straight and slender.
I glanced over my old keelboat. She wasn’t as clean as when I left her, naturally enough. She could have done with a lick of paint. The to-and-fro of fishing gear had left its mark. However, the boat was intact and seemed to have gained to a degree: she seemed more shipshape and used.
Once past Port Lligat and Guillola Bay, Baldiri hugged the coastline. He knew the lay of the land. It was a pitch-black night, but he moved along it with the eyes of a cat. We found a calm sea by Claveguera, though the current was coming from Mar d’Avall, and the Mestral quickly left the rocks behind. The splendid glow from the indistinguishable beams of light from Cape Béar appeared in the northwest.
When we had navigated Cape Creus, the boat entered the gulf o
f La Selva, where the water seemed clearer and deeper, the winds stronger, and nature freer and more powerful than anywhere else along our coast. Past the inhospitable plain of Tudela, the wind seemed to pick up. Sailing with the lateen over placid waters barely ruffled by the breeze, the Mestral carried herself wonderfully. You could hear the glug-glug of the water splashing against the bow.
We reached Prona Cove at two a.m. Paraffin lamps were burning on a rowing boat outside the inlet. A man was there with his jacket collar up, holding oars, lit up by the bluish-white light. A boat was anchored right behind the rocky entrance to the inlet. As we passed close by, the light from the greasy lamps allowed us to see people asleep on deck, wrapped in thick blankets. We anchored next to their boat.
It was so humid, the damp penetrated our sheets and blankets. I thought it was high time to retreat to my cot under the prow. I squeezed onto the thin mattress and was soon comfortingly warmed. I must have fallen asleep quickly. When I woke up, the sun was already high in the sky.
The moment I poked my head up above the bow, my bones felt depressed by that measly mattress. I saw the sea was still calm and that the longboat had gone. Prona Cove is perhaps the most characteristic geological incision in the gulf of La Selva. It is a purely rocky inlet. There’s no trace of vegetation, only a tragic-looking, derelict shack. The sea was growing lively with a strong swell. The geological blackness seemed to turn gray in the damp, dense air. I spotted a motionless seagull, looking slightly shrunken, silhouetted on the rock in the entrance to the inlet.
My companions had lit the stove and were preparing garlic and onion sauce for a fish stew. The stove was giving off smoke. The onion smell was delicious. A dozen mackerel lay by the side of the stove with the electric-blue lines they have when they’ve just been fished out of the water. They must have been a present from the lad in the longboat. Mackerel isn’t a fish you’d want to eat every day. It’s too oily. But if you eat it now and then in a stew on board ship, when you’re feeling ravenous, it’s pleasant fare. Mackerel stew makes an excellent second supper and, if you’re an early riser, a succulent breakfast.