the forehead, Sundays.'--'Are you afraid of him?'--'Ah, no, no; isn't
he my godfather? he wouldn't have anybody but me bring him his food.'
Perotte declares that he smiles when she comes; but you might as well
say the sun shines in a fog; he's as gloomy as a cloudy day."

"But," I said to him, "you excite our curiosity without satisfying it.
Do you know what brought him there? Was it grief, or repentance; is it
a mania; is it crime, is it--"

"Eh, monsieur, there's no one but my father and I who know the real
truth. My late mother was servant in the family of a lawyer to whom
Cambremer told all by order of the priest, who wouldn't give him
absolution until he had done so--at least, that's what the folks of
the port say. My poor mother overheard Cambremer without trying to;
the lawyer's kitchen was close to the office, and that's how she
heard. She's dead, and so is the lawyer. My mother made us promise, my
father and I, not to talk about the matter to the folks of the
neighborhood; but I can tell you my hair stood on end the night she
told us the tale."

"Well, my man, tell it to us now, and we won't speak of it."

The fisherman looked at us; then he continued:

"Pierre Cambremer, whom you have seen there, is the eldest of the
Cambremers, who from father to son have always been sailors; their
name says it--the sea bends under them. Pierre was a deep-sea
fisherman. He had boats, and fished for sardine, also for the big
fishes, and sold them to dealers. He'd have charted a large vessel and
trawled for cod if he hadn't loved his wife so much; she was a fine