s, the
wind slashes the ears. Nevertheless, thanks to the vigor of their
arms, they were going quickly and well, when suddenly appeared in the
obscurity something like a monster gliding on the waters. Bad business!
It is the patrol boat which promenades every night. Spain's customs
officers. In haste, they must change their direction, use artifice, lose
precious time, and they are so belated already.

At last they have arrived without obstacle near the Spanish shore, among
the large fishermen's barks which, on stormy nights, sleep there on
their chains, in front of the "Marine" of Fontarabia. This is the
perilous instant. Happily, the rain is faithful to them and falls still
in torrents. Lowered in their skiff to be less visible, having ceased
to talk, pushing the bottom with their oars in order to make less noise,
they approach softly, softly, with pauses as soon as something has
seemed to budge, in the midst of so much diffuse black, of shadows
without outlines.

Now they are crouched against one of these large, empty barks and almost
touching the earth. And this is the place agreed upon, it is there that
the comrades of the other country should be to receive them and to
carry their boxes to the receiving house--There is nobody there,
however!--Where are they?--The first moments are passed in a sort of
paroxysm of expectation and of watching, which doubles the power of
hearing and of seeing. With eyes dilated, and ears extended, they watch,
under the monotonous dripping of the rain--But where are the Spanish
comrades? Doubtless the hour has passed, because of this accursed custom
house patrol which has disarranged the voyage, and, believing that the
undertaking has failed this time, they have gone back--

Several minutes flow, in the same immobility and the same silence. They
distinguish, around them, the large, inert barks, similar to floating
bodies of beasts, and then, above the waters, a mass of obscurities
denser than the obscurities of the sky and which are the houses, the
mountains of the shore--They wait, without a movement, without a word.
They seem to be ghosts of boatmen near a dead city.

Little by little the tension of their senses weakens, a lassitude comes
to them with the need of sleep--and they would sleep there, under this
winter rain, if the place were not so dangerous.

Itchoua then consults in a low voice, in Basque language, the two
eldest, and they decide to do a bold thing. Since the other