Letters From My Windmill by Alphonse Daudet, Frederick Davies

beyond their grasp. These were men who found the days interminably
long and were ecstatic when their turn came to go ashore. In the warm
season, this great relief came every month. Ten days off after thirty
days on; that was the rule. In the winter, though, in rough weather, no
rules could be enforced. The wind blew strongly, the waves ran high,
the Sanguinaires were shrouded in white sea spray, and they were cut
off for two or three months at a time, sometimes in terrible conditions.
    —I tell you what happened to me, monsieur,—old Bartoli told me one
day, while we were eating,—it was five years ago, at this very table,
one winter evening, just like this one. That night, there were just the
two of us, me and a fellow keeper called Tchéco…. The others were
ashore, or sick, or else on leave…. I can't remember, now…. We were
finishing our dinners, quite contentedly…. Suddenly, my fellow keeper
stopped eating, looked at me with strange eyes, and fell forward onto
the table with outstretched arms. I went to him; I shook him; I called
his name:
    "—Hey Tché!… Hey Tché!…
    "No response! He was dead!… You can't imagine how I felt! I stayed
there, idiot-like and trembling, next to the body for more than an
hour. Then suddenly, I remembered,—The Light!—I only just had time to
climb up to light the lantern—it was already getting dark….
    "What a night, monsieur! The sea and the wind, they just didn't sound
like they usually do. All the time somebody seemed to be calling to me
from down the stairway…. I became frenzied; my mouth dried. But you
couldn't have made me go down there again…. Oh no! I was too scared
of the dead body. However, in the small hours, some of my courage
returned. I went down and carried my mate back to his bed, covered him
over with a sheet, said a short prayer, and then ran to raise the alarm.
    "Unfortunately, the sea was too heavy; I shouted as loudly as I could,
again and again, but to no avail, nobody came…. So, I was alone in
the lighthouse with poor Tchéco, and for God knows how long. I was
hoping to be able to keep him close to me until the boat came, but
after three days that became impossible…. What should I have done?
Carried him outside? Buried him? The rock was too hard and there are
murders of crows on the island. It was a shame to leave a Christian to
them. And then I decided to take him down to one of the lodges in the
lazaretto…. That sad duty lasted a whole afternoon and, yes, it took
some courage…. Look here, Monsieur, even today, when I go down to
that part of the island through an afternoon gale, I feel that the dead
man is still there, on my shoulders…."
    Poor old Bartoli! Sweat ran down his forehead just thinking about it.
    * * * * *
    And so, our meals passed in long conversations about the lighthouse,
and the sea, with tales of shipwrecks, and Corsican bandits…. Then,
as night fell, the keeper of the first watch lit his hand-lamp, took
his pipe, flask, and a red-edged, thick volume of Plutarch, which was
the sum total of the Sanguinaires' library, and went down out of
sight. A moment later, there was a crash of chains, pulleys, and heavy
weights as the clock was wound up.
    While this was going on, I went to sit outside on the terrace. The sun,
already well down, hurried its descent into the water, dragging the
whole skyline with it. The wind freshened; the island turned violet. In
the sky a big bird passed slowly near me; it was the eagle homing to
the Genoese tower…. Gradually, a sea mist got up. Soon, nothing could
be seen except a white ridge of sea-fog around the island. Suddenly, a
great flood of light emerged above my head from the lighthouse. The
clear ray left the island in complete darkness as it fell far out to
sea, and I, too, was lost to sight in the night, under the great
luminous sweeps which barely caught me as they passed…. But the wind
was freshening again. Time to go indoors. I groped to close the huge
door, I secured the iron