by Josep Pla
A stranger stood next to Baldiri and Saldet by the stove and I assumed he must be the man from La Selva who was familiar with the channels in the Salses Ponds. He was on the old side, gray haired, olive skinned, with a mourning cap that contrasted with a left eye that was white, dead and swollen like a pigeon’s egg. He was tall and stout, and sported a large, drooping, French-style mustache. They told me his name was Quimet, Quimet de la Selva to his friends.
Quimet was holding forth. Baldiri smoked while he listened. Saldet was holding the ladle.
“When you leave El Racó,” he was saying, “you’ll enter the gulf’s big beach, which will seem never ending. Then you must head north, by night, toward the polar star, five or six paternoster lines from the low-set coast. If you meet easterly winds, move away from the beach, because the sandbanks break up and you might be turned over. If you keep on in this direction, on a clear day, you’ll see Cape Leucate, which is white, is not particularly high and looks as if it’s been basted in flour. A semaphore post is located on top of the cape…”
Saldet must have decided the sauce was just right. He threw eight or ten mackerel into the pot with a sprig of parsley and quickly poured water over the lot. Then he put the lid on and took out his tobacco pouch.
The day was struggling to find itself. A white murk floated over the sea. The weather was wet. A mixture of seawater and sand sluiced down the Mestral’s deck. You could see that the wind would either settle in to the south – or drop. The rocky inlet’s silence seemed endlessly deep. Now and then a small fish leaped over the smooth mirror of water.
“Then you’ll sail along this coast,” resumed Quimet, “from Argelès, via Canet, Perpignan’s beach, as far as Barcarès de Sant Llorenç de la Salanca. Although it’s a frighteningly open, exposed stretch of land, you’ll see pairs of oxen moving over the sand. Past Barcarès the coast turns into a thin strip of sand, behind which you’ll find the pond stretching as far as terra firma. It’s a huge pond. The strip of sand to Leucate is some ten miles long and encloses a large expanse of water. It’s an area of shallow water, teeming with fish, a kind of dead sea, unless the north wind is blowing. And for heaven’s sake, steer clear of the north wind!”
“If the water is so shallow, can we sail this boat there?”
“It’ll be hard, particularly if you don’t make sure to keep as close as possible to the far north of the pond, I mean, as close as you can to Cape Leucate. Keep out of the pond itself as much as you can. I should tell you that all the boats used on the pond are flat bottomed, like coffins. The advantage is that if you hug close to the cape and are caught by the cerç – the name the Frenchies give to the north wind – you can escape via the breach in the bank and take shelter in the cape.”
As Quimet de la Selva offered his advice, Baldiri’s scowl darkened. As ever, Saldet nodded, but I couldn’t make out whether in response to what Quimet was saying or his brother-in-law’s anxious expression.
“But is the water really that shallow?” he asked nervously.
“It is shallow. As shallow as you could ever imagine. But if you get good weather and are patient, you’ll find ways through. Sail slowly, test the water with a stick. Sometimes you may touch the muddy, sandy floor and you’ll have to clean the mire off. You’ll not have to do that much if the weather’s fine…Just one question: where are you supposed to meet the man you mentioned?”
“On the sand bed by Cape Leucate.”
“Just what I thought. That’s the only place possible. It’s the only stretch you can reach in this boat, if you’re lucky and have the patience.”
“So how do we enter the pond?”
“Via the breaches in the sandbank. There are a few that are stable. Others that aren’t. Now and then heavy seas breach the sand wall and create a channel – one that may last, or may be filled when the weather changes. The water in the pond can also rise, breach the sandbank and pour into the sea. Winds, currents or the fury of the sea creates these channels. There is a stable one hundred fifty or sixty yards south of Cape Leucate – at least there used to be when I lived in those parts. That’s the entrance you should use.”
“You said a hundred fifty or sixty yards?”
“Yes, go in with a tail wind, a northeasterly, if you can, and head straight for the shelter from the cape.”
“Do people live around there?”
“Not a soul. The people from Leucate fish much farther into the pond, to the east of the village, using their black flatboats. In the place I mentioned you might find a coot or geese hunter at this time of year. Some people spend their lives among the reeds and bamboo, in high rubber boots in the water, taking aim with their guns.”
There was a pause as Saldet lifted the lid over the stew slightly, and a delicious aroma wafted from the pot.
“Quimet,” said Baldiri, “none of this is very good news.”
“Well, I didn’t want to pull the wool over your eyes.”
“I know you didn’t.”
“To be frank, I don’t understand,” the man from La Selva continued jauntily, “why you agreed to collect the goods in that spot…”
“We were given no choice, Quimet! In the first place, the man I have to meet lives in the village of Leucate. There was no way I could persuade him to transport the goods to Port-Vendres or Collioure. As they always sell out, they call the shots. You can be sure that if I hadn’t agreed to pick the stuff up, he wouldn’t have brought it to me.”
“Be that as it may, that spot is no Shangri-la. Luckily you…”
“Quimet, I’m just a beast of burden. And there are still people,” he added, squinting at Saldet, “who throw it in my face if I have a glass to drink…”
Pau Saldet brought out plates and forks, wine and bread, and we ate the tasty mackerel stew. It was spicy and you could feel the impact of a tangy red pepper, but at that time of day with such humidity in the air anything else would have seemed bland. It was October, which meant that the mackerel did not have (nor did any blue fish) the tender meaty flesh of springtime. Still, they were filling and quite delicious. The Roses wine – thirteen-degree proof – they’d brought along would have been unpalatable at any other time, but it slipped down easily. We emerged from breakfast positively revived. A strong, aromatic percolated coffee with a drop of rum put us all in the mood to get a move on.
We set sail. Quimet disembarked on a beach beneath a stone quarry by the entrance to Port de la Selva. We watched him walk off up the path with his basket on his back. When he reached the top, he waved to us.
We hoisted the flag high again, stopped the engine, and turned toward Cape Cerbère. There was a good, if gentle, wind. We were in no hurry. Saldet took the helm. Baldiri stretched out. We gradually left the gulf of La Selva, and its dark geological formations glistening through the damp, opaque air. The Albères massif floated in a misty haze that kept the sun at bay. The Mestral made slow progress. The coast was deserted. It was a Sunday. We had a bite to eat at one and by two were anchored in the southwest corner of Cerbère, opposite some highly colorful closed shops and a café that seemed full of life.
* * *
—
Baldiri said he was thirsty and jumped on land. Saldet, on the other hand, declared he wasn’t intending to leave the boat. I disembarked with a view to taking a short stroll.
If Cervera weren’t a frontier and international station, not a soul would live there. It would be little more than Colera’s beach. It is a dark, charcoal-colored rocky inlet with a funereal, black-pebble beach. At that time – three p.m. – the sun was already behind the mountains, and shadows were engulfing the houses. Tucked in the narrow strait of the inlet, its buildings seemed constricted. The deserted streets had a deadening effect.
Cerbère is a theater curtain. And I don’t say that because of the presence of the railway station, customs and police. Those venerable institutions project reserve an
d chill over the town – a very visible circumspection. Mystery seems to be in the air, as in all frontier settlements. People hide their indifference behind polite gestures. Everyone is lead footed, but going their own way. Everyone is quiet, nosey and playing a secret role distinct from the role they appear to be playing. If you’re not a local, you understand nothing. All frontier towns are the same: sealed boxes. But there seems to be less awareness in Portbou.
No, Cerbère is a theater curtain because people have tried to prove that a frontier really does pass through and really does separate them out, even the locals. No genuine frontier exists between Catalonia and the Roussillon, and that means that a stagey frontier has been created: houses have created a settlement that dramatically signals it is different. As nothing separates them, they have built different houses and roofs. The roofs are really French, I mean from inland France. Farther up they become Catalan again, the tiles are like our tiles. But in Cerbère they just had to be different.
What happened to Cerbère’s roofs and tiles happened to language throughout the Roussillon. The centralizing French state quite deliberately emphasized a dialect with the intention of creating a patois unrelated to the language of the area, aiming to show that the language had been corrupted. The aim was to hollow out the mother tongue of the inhabitants of the Roussillon. If that had disposed them to speak French better, one might understand the state’s actions to a degree. But they can be spotted a mile off when they speak French. Their accent triggers uncontrollable hilarity. Thus, the state has created people deprived of their real, genuine means of expression. It has turned out to be a wretched, antiquated, unnatural linguistic policy, suited only to render people second rate and strip them of their individuality. However, languages, even when they reach extremes of degeneration, are difficult to kill off.
As I had nothing to do in the station, at customs or with the police, a moment came when I felt I was in a Normandy hamlet that had been painted on paper. I spent a while counting train carriages passing by. In such places, there is little else to do. However, after counting the carriages of five or six long trains, I felt bored to death.
When I arrived back at the beach, darkness was falling. I walked past the café door and saw Baldiri speaking excitedly to a man. The latter looked like a grocer, and what’s more a grocer from our country, in the sense that you could see no signs of French cooking about him. If any element has been forged that differentiates Catalans and the inhabitants of the Roussillon, it is their cuisine – much more than any political or administrative measures.
When I walked past Baldiri, he seemed extremely animated. He winked at me. I suspected the shopkeeperly individual at his side, a gray, plump fellow, was saying exactly what he wanted to hear.
When I was back on board, I saw that Saldet was peeling potatoes. He was going to boil up some potatoes and beans. The inevitable winter dinner. Saldet grunted, grinned at me and went on with his task. After a while Baldiri sloped over the wet, black pebbles toward us.
“One job done…” he said, as he jumped aboard, whispering as befitted the spirit that reigns over frontiers.
“Ah!”
“I sold the oil to the man that runs the shop over there. One always does these deals with shops.”
“Did you get a good price?”
“I made a profit. What else can you ask for?”
At that hazy moment, just before the streetlights came on, I spotted a man approaching the breakwater, opposite the Mestral’s stern. It was the shopkeeper. He was wearing a cap and overcoat. Baldiri and Saldet quickly unloaded the drums of olive oil – which anyone might have mistaken for drums of petrol. They carried the dozen eight-liter drums to the nearby shop, the door of which was ajar. No light was on in the shop. Five or six minutes later my colleagues arrived with the empty containers.
“When do you want to have dinner?” I heard Saldet ask.
“We’ll have dinner in Banyuls. Raise the anchor!”
Baldiri started the engine, but only at half speed. It was completely calm. Not a breath of wind. As soon as we left the inlet, a train passed by above the houses along the beach and flashes of light from the Cape Creus lighthouse appeared to the east, distant and submerged in the fog.
Baldiri was whistling. He seemed happy. Perhaps he’d had a drink or two. He took his cap off, unbuttoned his shirt collar and lit a cigarette, exhaling noisily. He was trying to restrain himself, but his bliss was there for all to see.
“The sooner these things are concluded…” he said, as if talking to himself.
Baldiri seemed to be content duty had been done.
We hugged the coast, which was black as a wolf’s maw. The sky was low; the humidity intense. You could hardly hear the sound of the sea on the edge of the coast. Everything seemed swaddled in silence. The air was murky and tepid. Timbers, clothes, hair, all damp.
Would you believe it was my first time in Cerbère? It’s a place where you could easily get lost…
It’s quite a long way from Cerbère to Banyuls. I squeezed into my den in the prow and must have fallen asleep. I slept for hours. When I woke up, I saw the town of Banyuls, the Mestral anchored by the harbor wall and the first light of dawn glimmering. Saldet was boiling up coffee on the stove.
* * *
—
We were anchored by the wall in the east corner of the harbor, the only spot slightly sheltered from the graceful sweep of the bay. The ugly bulk of the Aragó marine biology laboratory stood at the other end of the beach. The town lay in between: opposite us, the fishermen’s quarter was steep, bustling and picturesque; beyond that Banyuls becomes bourgeois, with an array of fine houses and cafés. It seemed to me that the tall plane tree – now rather shabby – in front of Madame Py’s café must provide delightful shade in the summer and be the right place to have an aperitif. Beyond that is the channel made by the riera and several buildings that looked like wine warehouses.
So just as Cerbère is a theatrical backcloth, the part of Banyuls that overlooks the beach is a Catalan town bereft of old features – a community displaced from the interior to the marina when the sea became a safe place.
We drank coffee and I shaved on deck. While shaving, I looked at the mountains surrounding the funnel of Banyuls. The geology of the gulf of La Selva never changes: a scattering of dark slate with a reddish glow, bovine-shaped mountains, long, gentle humps, covered in scree, vineyards beautifully cultivated on terraces supported by drystone walls. When I’d finished my shave, I washed my face in the fountain in the lower part of the harbor wall behind the sardine boats that had been pulled up on the beach. A seventeen-year-old girl stood by the fountain, a splendidly curvaceous young woman. She was waving her hands in the air and her clothing was extremely skimpy.
“Aren’t we cold?” I asked.
“I’m never cold!” she answered, a broad smile on her white teeth, moist lips and almond eyes. She had a magnificent head of dark golden hair that radiated youthful energy. I thought she could have served as the model for the Venus of the Pyrenees that people had always dreamed of. She filled her pitchers while resting her arm on the rim of the fountain, with her back to me. What a marvelous back! What Fustel de Coulanges said about the Venus came to mind: that the whole of ancient culture simmered on her flanks.
I reckoned it was extremely pleasant to be in a country where you encountered a Venus by a fountain in the early morning.
When I returned to the Mestral with the melancholy produced by a vision of total beauty, I found Baldiri and Saldet arguing. Or rather, Baldiri was launching into an angry tirade against his brother-in-law.
“This coffee you’ve made,” he was telling him, “is like bilge water. It’s worthless as coffee. It’s all very well your killing off your wife and children with catarrh so you could buy an olive grove and vineyard, but you should show a little more consideration toward me…”
Sald
et smiled at him in agreement, slyly so; you couldn’t tell if he was actually agreeing with Baldiri or if he was defending himself.
“What’s more,” added Baldiri, “what you’ve cooked so far has been disgusting. You’re a terrible chef. Everything you’ve prepared has been overdone or burnt. You’re a pot burner. Are you trying to save on the water that boils over. What do you think you’re playing at, you miserly sod? I want to eat and drink…If you don’t cook a decent rice dish today, I’ll throw you off the boat and you can walk home…Do you hear what I said? I’ll throw you off…”
I could hear Baldiri’s pontificating from the quayside. It’s quite hopeless; it’s absolutely impossible to imagine two people who must cohabit ever getting along in our country. In this case, Baldiri was right. Saldet was a poor cook, but even if he’d had greater qualities as a cook, Baldiri would have found some other excuse for churlishness in his character. The lengths people in this country go to so they don’t get on are amazing. It’s their favorite pastime.
When I came on board, Baldiri shut up and lit a cigarette. Although it looked as if the day would clear up, I thought I’d need something thicker. I pulled on a sweater. There was a steady breeze but the sea remained calm, and the sky was cloudless. In the autumn, you sometimes get periods like that: no real wind and a becalmed sea. It’s the time when olives are ripening.
“That’s what I like!” shouted Baldiri. “You should go for a stroll now and be a gentleman of leisure. Go and play a hand of fives…I suppose they still play that game in Banyuls. Are you going to jump on land? I’ll keep you company for a moment…”
There was a group of fishermen on the shore, looking as if they’d just eaten breakfast, standing full of good cheer gawping at the Mestral.