"My mother started,and,staring at me,she exclaimed:
"‘You must be crazy!Give ten cents to that man,to thatvagabond-’
"She stopped at a look from my father,who was pointing at his son-in-law.Then everybody was silent.
"Before us,on the distant horizon,a purple shadow seemed to rise out of the sea.It was Jersey.
"As we approached the breakwater a violent desire seized me once more to see my Uncle Jules,to be near him,to say to him something consoling,something tender.But as no one was eating any more oysters,he had disappeared,having probably gone below to the dirty hold which was the home of the poorwretch."