The Prospector

by J. M. G. Le Clézio

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  I’ve been in this valley for a long time. How many days, months? I should have kept a calendar like Robinson Crusoe, whittling notches into a piece of wood. In this lonely valley I’m as lost as I was in the immensity of the sea. Days follow nights, each new day erases the preceding one. That’s why I take notes in the tablets bought in the Chinaman’s shop in Port Mathurin, so there will be a trace of the time gone by.

  What else is there? There are repetitive gestures as I roam the valley bottom every day in search of landmarks. I rise before daybreak to take advantage of the cool hours. At dawn the valley is extraordinarily beautiful. At the first blush of day the blocks of lava and schist glitter with dew. The bushes, the tamarind trees and the screw pines are still dark, numb with the chill of night. There is barely a breath of wind and beyond the uniform line of coconut trees I can see the still sea, of a deep blue with no reflections, holding its roar in check. It’s the moment I love most, when everything is suspended, as if in waiting. Always that very pure, blank sky, where the first seabirds pass, boobies, cormorants, frigates flying across English Bay and heading for the islands in the north.

  They are the only living things I’ve seen since I arrived, except for a few land crabs that dig their holes in the dunes of the estuary and the throngs of tiny sea crabs that run over the silt. When the birds fly back over the valley I know it is day’s end. I feel as if I know each one of them, and that they know me too, this ridiculous black ant crawling around on the bottom of the valley.

  Every morning I start exploring again, using the plans I drew up the day before. I go from one landmark to another, measuring the valley with my theodolite, then I come back, plotting an ever larger semicircle in order to examine every inch of the terrain. Soon the sun is out, firing bright sparkles on the sharp rocks, delineating the shadows. In the noon sun the valley looks completely different. At that time of day it’s a very harsh, hostile place, bristling with spines and thorns. Due to the reflecting sunlight it grows ever hotter in spite of the strong winds. The heat bounces back on my face like an oven and I stumble over the floor of the valley, eyes streaming with tears.

  I have to stop, wait. I go over to the river to drink a little water out of the palm of my hand. I sit down in the shade of a tamarind tree, leaning against its roots, which the floodwaters have laid bare. I wait, sitting still, not thinking about anything, as the sun revolves around the tree and begins its descent towards the black hills.

  Sometimes I still think I see those shadows, those fleeting figures on the hilltops. I walk along the riverbed, eyes stinging. But the shadows fade away, go back to their hiding place, melt in with the black trunks of the tamarind trees. This is the time of day I dread most, when the silence and the light bear down upon my head and the wind is like a red-hot knife.

  I remain in the shade of the old tamarind tree by the river. It’s the first thing I saw when I awoke up there on the promontory. I made my way over to it and maybe I was thinking of the letter about the treasure that mentions this tamarind tree, near the source. But at the time it seemed it was the true master of this valley. It isn’t very tall and yet when you are in the shelter of its branches, in its shade, a profound feeling of peace comes over you. Now I’m very familiar with its gnarled trunk, blackened with time, with sun and with drought, its tortured branches decked with fine, lacey foliage, so very delicate, so very tender. Strewn about on the ground around it are the long golden pods swollen with seeds. Every day I come here with my notebooks and my pencils and I suck on the sour seeds as I think of new plans, far from the torrid heat filling my tent.

  I try to situate the parallel lines and the five points that served as landmarks on the Corsair’s map. The points were undoubtedly the mountain peaks that are visible at the entrance to the bay. In the evening, before nightfall, I go down to the mouth of the river and see the mountain peaks still lit up by the sun, and I feel that thrill of eagerness again, as if something were going to appear.

  I keep drawing the same lines on the paper: the curve of the river that I’m familiar with, then the straight valley that penetrates deep into the mountains. The hills on either side are basalt fortresses above the valley.

  Today, when the sun goes down, I decide to climb up the hill on the east, searching for the ‘anchor ring’ marks left by the Corsair. If he really did come here, as it seems to be becoming clearer and clearer, it would have been impossible for the seafarer not to leave these kinds of permanent marks on the side of the cliff or on some rock. The incline of the slope is easier to climb on this side but, the more I climb, the more the summit recedes. That which, seen from a distance, seemed to be a smooth rock face is a series of steps that disorient me. Soon I am so far away from the other side of the valley that it’s difficult for me to make out the white splotch of sailcloth that serves as my shelter. The floor of the valley is a grey-and-green desert scattered with black blocks that hide the riverbed. At the entrance to the valley I see the high cliff of Venus Point. I’m so alone out here, even though there are people nearby! Perhaps that’s what worries me the most. I could die here, no one would notice. Maybe some day someone fishing for octopuses would see the remains of my bivouac and come looking. Or maybe everything would be swept away in the water and the wind, mingled with the stones and the scorched trees.

  I examine the western hill, facing me, attentively. Is it an illusion? I see a capital ‘M’ carved into the rock just above Venus Point. In the slanting twilight it appears very clearly, as if it had been etched into the mountain by some giant hand. Farther off, at the tip of a sharp peak, there is a half-tumbled-down stone tower that I hadn’t seen when I set up camp just below it.

  The discovery of these two landmarks exhilarates me. Without wasting a second I rush down the slope of the hill and run across the valley to reach there before nightfall. I cross the Roseaux River, making great splashes of fresh water, and climb up the hill on the west by way of the rock slide that I’d used the first time.

  Once at the top of the hill I search in vain for the carved ‘M’: it has come undone before my very eyes. The spans of rock that formed the legs of the ‘M’ have grown farther apart and, in the centre there is a sort of plateau where wind-worn bushes grow. As I move forward, bent over, struggling against the gusting wind, the sound of tumbling stones alerts me. I believe I see some brown shapes fleeing between the euphorbia and the screw pines. They are goats, perhaps escaped from a Manaf herd.

  I finally come up in front of the tower. It stands at the top of the cliff overlooking the valley already plunged in shadow. Why hadn’t I seen it when I first arrived? It’s a tower made of large blocks of basalt assembled without mortar that has crumbled down on one side. On the other side there are the remnants of a door or a loophole. I go inside the ruin and squat down to get out of the wind. I can observe the sea through the opening. It stretches out infinitely in the twilight, its blue hue fraught with anger. Out on the horizon grey mists veil it, blending it in with the sky.

  Up on the cliff top you can take in the seascape from the harbour of Port Mathurin all the way to the eastern point of the island. Then I realize that this hastily built tower was only here in order to keep a lookout on the sea and give the alert in case of an enemy approach. Who had built the watchtower? It couldn’t have been the British Admiralty, which had nothing more to fear from the sea, since it controlled the route to the Indies. In fact, neither the English navy nor that of the King of France would have built such a precarious, isolated construction. Pingré doesn’t mention the construction in his travel log when he made the first observation of the transit of Venus in 1761. On the other hand, I now recall the first English camp on Venus Point in 1810 set up on the site of the future observatory, exactly where I’m standing. The Mauritius Almanac, which I read at the Carnegie Library, spoke of a small ‘outpost’ built inside the gorge, overlooking the sea. As night falls, my mind races nervously, I’m in a state resembling the wakeful dreams that precede sleep. Just
for myself, I recite out loud the sentences that I had read so often in Nageon de Lestang’s letter, written in long, slanting script on a torn piece of paper:

  Right at the moment I’m sitting in the ruins of the watchtower of the Commander’s Garret as darkness fills the valley. I no longer feel the exhaustion or the cold blasts of wind or the loneliness. I’ve just discovered the Mysterious Corsair’s first landmark.

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  The days following the discovery of the Commander’s Garret, I roam the floor of the valley consumed with a feverishness that sometimes slips into delirium. I remember (though it grows blurry and elusive like a dream) those burning hot days in the April sun during the cyclone season, I remember it as you would a sudden fall through a vertical void, and the burn of the air when my chest lifts laboriously. From dawn to dusk I follow the path of the sun in the sky, from the solitary hills in the east all the way out to the mountains overlooking the centre of the island. I move, as does the sun, in a semicircle, with the pick on my shoulder, measuring the relief of the terrain – my only point of reference – with the theodolite. I see the shadows of the trees wheel slowly round, grow longer on the ground. The heat of the sun burns through my clothing and continues burning throughout the night, preventing me from sleeping, mingling with the cold rising from the earth. On some evenings I’m so weary from walking that I lie down wherever I am at nightfall, between two blocks of lava, and sleep until morning, when hunger and thirst awaken me.

  One night I wake up in the middle of the valley, I can feel the breath of the sea upon me. There is still the blinding spot of the sun in my eyes, on my face. It’s a dark moon night as my father used to say. The sky is filled with stars and, in the grip of that madness, I contemplate them. I talk out loud, saying: I can see the pattern, it’s there, I can see it. The Corsair’s map is none other than the pattern of the Southern Cross and its ‘followers’, the Belles de nuit. Over the vast stretch of the valley I can see the lava stones shimmering. They are lit up like stars in the dusty darkness. I walk towards them, keeping my eyes wide, I can feel their gleaming light on my face. Thirst, hunger, loneliness are whirling around inside me, faster and faster. I can hear someone speaking in the same tone of voice as my father. At first it reassures me, but then makes me shudder, for I realize I’m the one who is speaking. To avoid falling I sit on the ground, near the big tamarind tree that shelters me during the day. The waves of the shudder continue to move over my body, I feel the chill of the earth and of space penetrating me.

  How long have I remained sitting here? When I open my eyes, first I see the foliage of the tamarind tree above me and the dappled sunshine through the leaves. I am lying between the roots. A child and a young girl with dark faces, dressed in rags like Manafs, are sitting beside me. The young girl is holding a piece of cloth in her hands that she is twisting to make drops of water fall on my lips.

  The water runs into my mouth, over my swollen tongue. Every swallow I take is painful.

  The child walks away, comes back carrying a piece of cloth soaked with water from the river. I drink some more. Every drop awakens my body, awakens a pain, but it is good.

  The young girl talks to the little boy in a Creole I barely understand. I’m alone with the young Manaf girl. When I attempt to lift myself, she helps me to sit up. I want to talk to her, but my tongue still refuses to move. The sun is already high in the sky, I can feel the heat rising in the valley. Beyond the shade of the tamarind tree, the landscape is blinding, cruel. Just the thought that I will have to cross that sunlit area makes me nauseous.

  The child comes back, he’s carrying a hot pepper cake in his hand, he offers it to me with such ceremony that it makes me want to laugh. I eat the cake slowly and the hot pepper feels good in my sore mouth. I share out what is left of the cake, offer some to the young girl and to the boy, but they refuse.

  ‘Where do you live?’

  I didn’t speak in Creole, but the young Manaf girl seems to understand. She points to the high mountains at the back of the valley.

  I think she says, ‘Up there.’

  She’s a true Manaf, quiet, guarded. Since I have sat up and begun talking, she’s backed away, she’s poised to turn and go. The child has also stepped back, he’s watching me furtively.

  All of a sudden they’re off. I want to call out to them, hold them back. They’re the first human beings I’ve seen in months. But what good would it do to call to them? They’re moving away unhurriedly, but without turning back, jumping from stone to stone, they disappear into the underbrush. I see them a moment later on the flank of the hill to the west, just like two young goats. They disappear high up in the valley. They saved my life.

  I remain in the shade of the tamarind tree until evening, almost without moving. Large black ants run tirelessly along the roots in vain. Near the end of the day I hear the cries of the seabirds flying over English Bay. The mosquitoes are dancing. As cautiously as an old man, I set off across the valley, go back to my camp. Tomorrow I’ll go to Port Mathurin to wait for the first boat to sail out. Maybe it will be the Zeta?

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  There were the days in Port Mathurin, far from English Bay, the days in the hospital – the Head Doctor, Camal Boudou, who said only these words to me, ‘You could have died of exposure.’ Exposure, it’s a word that has stuck in my mind, it seems like none other could better express what I felt on that night, before the Manaf children gave me the water to drink. Yet I can’t make up my mind to leave. It would be a terrible failure; the house in Boucan, Laure and I would be losing our whole life.

  So this morning, before daybreak, I leave the hotel in Port Mathurin and go back to English Bay. I don’t need a cart this time: all my things have remained at my camp, wrapped in the sailcloth, secured with a few stones.

  I’ve decided to hire a man to help me with my explorations. In Port Mathurin I was told about the Castel farm, behind the Cable & Wireless buildings, where I could certainly find someone.

  I arrive before English Bay as the sun is rising. In the morning crispness, with the smell of the sea, everything seems new, transformed. The sky over the hills in the east is a very soft shade of pink, the sea is shining like an emerald. In the dawn light the forms of the trees and screw pines seem unfamiliar.

  How could I have forgotten this beauty so quickly? The exaltation I feel today has nothing to do with the fever that drove me mad and made me go running around in the valley. Now I understand what I’ve come in search of: it is a force much greater than my own, a memory that began before I was born. For the first time in months it seems as if Laure has drawn nearer, as if the distance between us doesn’t count any more.

  I think of her, prisoner to the Forest Side house, and I gaze at the dawn landscape in order to send this beauty and serenity to her. I remember the game we used to play sometimes up in the attic of the Boucan house; each of us at one end of the dark attic with an issue of the Illustrated London News open in front of us, we would try our best to send each other images or words by telepathy. Will Laure win at the game once again, just as she used to? I send her all of this: the pure line of the hills standing against the pink sky, the emerald-green sea, the wind, the slow flight of the seabirds coming from Lascars Bay and heading towards the rising sun.

  Around noon, having climbed up to the Commander’s Garret in the Corsair’s ruined watchtower, I discover the ravine. At the upper end of the valley. It hadn’t been visible because of a rockslide that is hiding its entrance. In the light of the sun at its zenith I can clearly see the dark gash it makes in the flank of the hill to the east.

  I carefully note its location in regard to the trees in the valley. Then I go and talk to the farmer, near the telegraph buildings. His farmhouse, as I was able to see when I arrived on the road from Port Mathurin, is a rather precarious shelter from the wind and rain, half-hidden in a declivity in the land. As I draw near a great dark shape stands up, grunting, a half-wild pig. Then it’s a dog, fangs bared. I recall Denis’s lessons in
the old days, out in the fields: a stick, a stone are useless. You need two stones, one you throw and the other you threaten with. The dog backs away, but defends the door to the house.

  ‘Mister Castel?’

  A man appears, bare-chested, wearing fishermen’s trousers. He’s a tall, strong black man with a scarred face. He pushes the dog aside and invites me to come in.

  The inside of the farmhouse is dark, smoke-filled. The furniture consists of a table and two chairs. At the back of the only room, a woman dressed in a faded dress is cooking. At her side is a little girl with light skin.

  Mr Castel invites me to sit down. He remains standing, listens to me politely as I explain what I’ve come for. He nods his head. He’ll come and help me from time to time, and his adopted son Fritz will bring me a meal every day. He doesn’t ask me why we are going to dig up the ground. He doesn’t ask a single question.

  This afternoon I’ve decided to continue my explorations further south at the upper end of the valley. I leave the shelter of the tamarind tree, where I’ve now set up camp, and follow the Roseaux River upstream. The river winds along on the sandy bed, forms meanders, islands, a narrow stream of water that is only the exterior aspect of an underground river. Higher up, the river is a mere trickle running over a bed of black shingles in the middle of the gorge. I am already very near the foothills of the mountains. The vegetation is even sparser, thorn bushes, acacias and the ever-present screw pines with leaves like cutlass blades.

  The silence is heavy up here and I try to walk, making as little noise as possible. At the foot of the mountains the stream splits into several sources in schist and lava gullies. Suddenly the sky grows dark, it’s going to rain. The drops come large and cold. In the distance, down at the very bottom of the valley, I notice the sea veiled in the storm. Standing under a tamarind tree I watch the rain making its way up the narrow valley.