sensation of fear and nocturnal mystery, despite the rays of sunlight
that came filtering in through the skylights; but he began to enjoy
this solitude when he found that he could people it to his fancy. Real
beings soon annoyed him like the inopportune sounds that sometimes
awoke him from beautiful dreams. The garret was a world several
centuries old that now belonged entirely to him and adjusted itself to
all his fancies.

Seated in a trunk without a lid, he made it balance itself, imitating
with his mouth the roarings of the tempest. It was a caravel, a
galleon, a ship such as he had seen in the old books, its sails painted
with lions and crucifixes, a castle on the poop and a figure-head
carved on the prow that dipped down into the waves, only to reappear
dripping with foam.

The trunk, by dint of vigorous pushing, could be made to reach the
rugged coast at the corner of the old chest, the triangular gulf made
of two chests of drawers, and the smooth beach formed by some bundles
of clothes. And the navigator, followed by a crew as numerous as it was
imaginary, would leap ashore, sword in hand, scaling some mountains of
books that were the Andes, and piercing various volumes with the tip of
an old lance in order to plant his standard there. Oh, why had he not
been one of the conquerors?...

Fragments of a conversation between his godfather and his father, who
believed everything was already known regarding the surface of the
earth, left him unconvinced. Something must still be left for him to
discover! He was the meeting point of two families of sailors. His
mother's brothers had ships on the coast of Catalunia. His father's
ancestors had been valorous and obscure navigators, and there in the