The Intellectual Pineapple.

Every week we buy a pineapple from the Central Market. Every week we take a photograph of our pineapple before we eat it.

This week's pineapple was wearing reading glasses, and looking at the cover of Victor Hugo's Toilers of the Sea. I called it the Intellectual Pineapple.

That was on Friday. Since then, I have found myself reading the final chapters of The Toilers of the Sea through the eyes of the Intellectual Pineapple.

This hasn't been much of a problem as The Intellectual Pineapple and I see pretty much eye to eye on most things.

We worried as Gilliatt faced the dangers of the storm. We trembled as he escaped the clutches of the Giant Squid ( for that is what it was), we shivered as he discovered the skeleton of Captain Clubin in an underwater cave, covered with dead crabs, which had eaten his flesh. We exulted when Gilliatt found the leather belt containing the seventy thousand francs. And we looked forward to his marriage to the beautiful Deruchette on his return home.

But it all went horribly wrong, for Deruchette had meanwhile fallen in love with the handsome new rector, who had just come into a fortune. The Pineapple remained confident. So what, said the Pineapple. She'll marry Gilliatt. She promised.

He couldn't believe it when Gilliatt did the noble thing, helped the young couple marry secretly and sail to England, and then drowned himself.

That's no way to behave, said the Intellectual Pineapple. Dammit, I identified with him!

Horreur!!

The passengers had cast off in the longboat, leaving Clubin alone on the Durande, with seventy five thousand francs in a small iron box attached to the leather belt around his waist. This was his moment of greatest triumph. All he had to do now was swim to the shore which was only a mile away.

Just then the fog lifted a little, and he saw with horror, not the Hanois rocks, as he expected, but the jagged pillars of the twin Douvres! He had steered too far to the west after a passenger from Guernsey had claimed he'd sighted the Hanois through the fog! The dreaded Douvres were the most isolated and terrible of rocks, with a narrow and sinister passageway between their black and dangerous sides. They were five leagues from the shore, an impossible distance for a man to swim.

All his plans had come to nought! He trembled. There was no way out!

But then, he saw a sail on the horizon! He could be rescued after all! But the Durande had foundered on the low rocks of the reef and would not be visible to the other boat. The only thing to do was swim over to the Homme, the highest rocky platform of the reef, climb it, and signal to the other boat from there.

He took off his clothes except for the leather belt with the iron box containing the seventy five thousand francs, and dived head first into the water from the high stern of the Durande. He touched bottom, skirted the underwater rocks, and was just about to kick off for the surface when......

SOMETHING GRABBED HOLD OF HIS FOOT!

The Wrong Rocks

Captain Clubin, had recognised, in St Malo, a certain Rantaine, who had stolen money from the owner of the steamship Durande, Messe Lethierry. Clubin, you will remember, was the captain of the Durande.

Captain Clubin had purchased a revolver. He had followed Rantaine to a remote clifftop where he was waiting to rendezvous with a smugglers' ship that would take him to South America. Clubin had forced Rantaine to hand over a leather belt containing seventy five thousand francs, before embarking. He claimed he was going to return the money to Messe Lethierry.

As Rantaine sailed away he was heard to shout back furiously that he would make sure someone on board his ship wrote to Messe Lethierry to tell him what had happened.

This is why Captain Clubin feared the postbox of the sea. For he had no intention of giving the money back to the owner of the Durande. Instead, he planned to run the Durande aground on the return trip to Guernsey, send the passengers off in a lifeboat, and pretend that he was going down with the ship. But being a good swimmer, his real intention was to swim ashore and start a new life with the money.

Little did he know that due to a set of misunderstandings and a thick fog, he would run the ship aground upon the wrong set of rocks!......

Postbox of the Sea, continued

Mountains to right of you, mountains to left of you; penguins everywhere, and stormy petrels. A fearful place! Mille saints mille singes! What a battering you get there! continued Captain Gertrais.

In other words, it is a devilish coast. Such jagged rocks and reefs ! And then you come to Port Famine, which is the worst of all, with the heaviest breakers you've seen in all your life. And there you see these two words written in red: POST OFFICE .

On a rock a hundred feet high is a tall post with a barrel hanging from it. The barrel is the post box of the sea. Every vessel that passes sends a boat to the barrel with their mail. Ships coming from the Atlantic post their letters for Europe, and ships coming from the Pacific post their letters for America. The barrel is made fast to the post with a chain. It has a good hinged lid, but no lock or padlock. And it rains! And it snows! And it hails! And what a dirty sea.....


So, you get the picture. Victor Hugo's postbox of the sea was certainly a dangerous letterbox. But Captain Clubin had further reason to believe it dangerous, for earlier that morning he had committed a crime, and planned to commit another the following day......

The Postbox of the Sea

It is 1820 or thereabouts. In the downstairs room of an inn in St Malo, Captain Gertrais, an old ocean-going captain, is talking with Captain Clubin of the steamship Durande. Captain Gertrais is telling Captain Clubin about the postbox of the sea.

What do you mean by the postbox of the sea?

You don't know what that is, Captain Clubin?

No.

When you pass the Strait of Magellan ....

Well?

Snow everywhere, always rough weather, vile winds, a foul sea.

What then?

When you have rounded Cape Monmouth ....

Then?

Then you round Cape Valentine.

And then?

Then you round Cape Isidore.

And then?

Then you round Cape Anna.

Alright, but what is the postbox of the sea you talk about?

I'm coming to that.

I have quoted Victor Hugo at length, because he is an excellent writer. He does not hesitate to use over half a page to illustrate the old ocean-going captain's way of building up a story. From here, the old ocean-going captain goes on to explain about the postbox of the sea.....

(I'm coming to that).