Eight Quebecois Surnames

Francisco García González
Translated by Bradley J. Nelson

The ship is the San José.

The language is French.

The flag that waves on the mast is the insignia of Quebec.

The story takes place in the future. Proximate. So close that it seems as if it has already happened.

The trawler from the Grande Riviére corporation, under the command of Captain Guy Tremblay, is a twenty-ton fishing vessel. There was a time when it was dedicated to hunting whales and immigrants in the Saint Lawrence.

Today, the San José is busy fishing for an extinct and invaluable product: plastic. The only complications are the incrustations of fish and shellfish on the payload captured by the drag net. A contaminated ton loses zero-point two percent on the Montreal stock market. Never mind the health risks involved in scraping and suctioning off the sticky adhesions.

It’s a foggy night. A high chop on the seas. Nothing that the undaunted Captain Tremblay can’t cope with. As incredible as it may appear, he wears a patch on one eye and a parrot perched on his shoulder. The blindness is fake. However, Charles Benoit, the bird, is a graduate of the Quebec School of Fishing. Both accessories instill confidence in the crew.

The rest of the sailors have retired to their berths after dinner. The poutine prepared by Louis Pelletier, cook and experienced fisherman, has unleashed sleep among the crewmen. The meal, accompanied by generous quantities of provincial wine, is heavy to digest. Hence the uncontrollable yawns and desire to lie down.

The fearless captain watches rabbits as they leap over some brambles in the middle of the ocean. The vision distracts him from his duty at the helm. Jesus Christ! God’s piles! The swear words originating in the Catholic liturgy are an example of the richness of speech in this part of the world. The parrot is pecking at his head. Cripes, he’s fallen asleep, an infrequent occurrence in the discharge of his duties maintaining the course of whatever ship he happens to be steering.

Now he remembers, the rabbits were speaking English.

The captain observes the sonar, the compass, the screens relaying his heartbeat and his rectal temperature. All is in order. It was the poutine. He needs a cup of coffee. That bean which, ground together with an equal amount of fleur de lis, sweetens and embitters Quebec mornings and afternoons.

The astute pilot releases the rudder, stretches his arms upward and forward. He takes off his cap and scratches his forehead.

—Gagnon!—he yells into the intercom—For Christ’s sake! (Again, the Catholic jargon.) Bring me up a coffee, I’m dead tired, Godammit!

Gagnon is startled awake. Was it a dream? A nightmare more likely. They were in school and had to pass an English exam, a language they detest and barely master. The moment the teacher announces that the ones who fail will be sent to hell and down there, if they didn’t already know it, only English is spoken, Tremblay’s voice bellows from the horn in the berth. Of course, it was the poutine and the wine, they’re thinking while getting dressed.

Gagnon removes the foil from a tablet of tobacco and slowly begins to chew it, and then heads to the kitchen through the narrow passage. Gluing an ear to the door of Étienne Paquette’s berth. Silence. The giant sleeps. Gagnon sighs, and quietly swears: Dammit! Gagnon is a woman and secretly loves Paquette, the big bear of a man whose nose one day she’ll break.

The crewmember who chews tobacco and blasphemes is not the case of a woman mistaken for a terrifying exemplar of the opposite sex. Nor is she the crude girl who wins a job after beating the seafaring crew at arm wrestling in some portside bar. Monique Gagnon secured her position on the fishing trawler thanks to her victory in a beauty contest. Last year’s Miss Chicoutimi received the highest award in the contest: an assignment on one of the ships of the Great River. And that’s how the grateful woman discovered her capabilities for grappling with males. —Just ask Paquette!— and her talent for bringing in plastic.

In the kitchen she fills the coffee pot. Suddenly she turns around. Leaning on the top of the door frame is Paquette.

—… I didn’t mean to follow you—unlike his anatomy his voice is quiet, plaintive—… I couldn’t sleep, I had a nightmare…

Gagnon turns her back on him. She closes her eyes, touched. The coffeepot teeters due to her carelessness.

—Again? That stupid dream about the English exam and hell?

—Uh-huh …—Paquette sputters, rubbing his deformed nose.

The afternoon when Miss Chicoutimi introduced herself to the crew and extended her hand to Paquette, the giant dared to attempt to kiss it and received a clean punch. Lots of blood. And as so often happens with those who can’t stand the sight of blood, the sailor fainted. Later, between one task and another, in some convoluted fashion, the woman fell in love with Paquette. It’s a tacit love. Reciprocal.

—It’s a silly dream—she says shortly—My grandmother used to say that Quebec men over thirty-five are the only ones who have that nightmare.

—Uh huh…—murmurs the guilty beefcake—And if it’s true that they only speak English in hell and if by chance I end up there … and can’t understand what they’re saying to me …

Gagnon laughs. She spits darkly into the sink.

—If we’re going to hell, Céline Dion will be waiting for us, our punishment will be nothing but music in French. Don’t you forget it.

—I think you’re confusing hell with paradise …—Paquette says, ashamed that he’s contradicting Gagnon.

—In any case, we’ll be dead—Gagnon teases him.

—Don’t say that …,—he doesn’t know what to call her, until he blurts out—partner.

The woman’s hand experiences a slight tremor. She manages to get hold of herself in spite of the turmoil in her stomach. She finishes making the coffee. Gagnon breathes in the aroma of the steaming brew. Good and strong, just as the captain likes it, the watchful old wolf with a craving for mounds of plastic.

—Come with me on deck, if you’re not sleepy, of course.

Paquette nods and they head back down the narrow passageway in search of the tiny stairway.

In the berth next to the bulkhead, Yves Belanger is still awake. His insomnia is proof positive of the triumvirate that governs life on the San José: poutine, alcohol, and exhaustion. It’s been a hard day. For the maestro of operating winches and cables, every night is an ordeal of sleeplessness.

While others endured their nightmares, Belanger was reading a strange story published in Obscene (keep your distance from the fair sex), a popular men’s magazine published in Montreal in the first half of the nineteenth century, in barbarous times. When women were discriminated against and had few, if any, rights that didn’t include being exploited in both tongues. The periodical, in addition to explicit comics, gathered together articles on the epic history of French in the province. This story is about the first time that the use of French was brought to a vote.

Madame Odette Marois, a unionized professional for a brothel in Montreal, was not just any worker. The plump Marois had two vaginas. Rare, but nature can be capricious like that. Said endowment wouldn’t have caused a fuss had they not boasted the gift of speech. One in French, the other in English. During Marois’s breaks, both organs constantly argued, neither one understanding the other. The subject: the tense relation between the two languages that divided Quebec. A matter that was about as interesting to her as a summer excursion to the Sahara.

Since Marois was the main attraction in the neighborhood, she had a lot of work and constantly needed to replenish her strength. Which was impossible due to the vaginal diatribe. Thus, her performance began to lapse and, faced with the fear of finding herself on the street with no money, she consulted the owner of the house, a pimp of the worst sort, and said pimp came up with the idea to call a repugnant referendum. The goon chose seven clients who were to vote for their favorite vagina. The language question was kept a secret. The francophone came out the winner by a close four to three vote, and her neighbor had to abide by the result as agreed.

Marois, who didn’t speak English, saw in the triumph a lesson in legitimacy. Now the conversations took place between the professional woman and her francovagina. Meanwhile, the loser was resigned to reciting Hamlet’s monologue to herself.

The story moves Belanger. Was this a true occurrence, or was it invented by the hack who signed the article? What a life the woman had led, he would gladly have rescued her from her fate. He puts down the magazine. Outside, Gagnon and Paquette were talking. All at once he’s overcome by a strange urge: he’d love to have a vagina that spoke the purest Quebecois French.

—God, how happy I’d be!—he says, and checks his watch. He can still sleep for four hours. He turns off the lamp. He hears Gagnon and Paquette close the hatch.

Gagnon and Paquette enter the bridge. The captain gives a start. God’s bollocks! He’s fallen asleep again. He’d dreamt he was in some kind of school and it was exam period … What luck. His sailors have saved him from what could have been a catastrophe.

—Now, let’s have that coffee.

Gagnon hands him the drink. The intrepid captain revels in its fragrance.

—Tannins! Amino acids!—the parrot bellows, and before Tremblay can take a sip, he dips his beak into the cup and takes several gulps.

—Thank you, crewmen, you’re excused.

The seamen abandon the wheelhouse.

Tremblay savors the brew. At last, he’ll vigilantly guide the fishing vessel through the night and the fog. He takes another sip … There’s something even Gagnon isn’t aware of, let alone the captain. The coffee is decaffeinated. Benoit drinks. He shakes his head dubiously.

—Methylene chloride! methylene chloride!—the bird squawks alluding to the solvent used to separate the bean from the caffeine.

The captain grabs him by the throat. The parrot stops talking.

Outside it’s freezing. Paquette’s desire to cloak Gagnon with his overcoat is discarded for fear of contracting pneumonia and receiving yet another crushing fist. They walk along the bow. Enjoying each other’s company. Without thinking Gagnon pulls the he-man towards the end of the trawler. Paquette’s heartbeat is running amok.

—Help me!

Paquette grabs her by the torso. The woman leans over the railing, opening her arms to the mist. The brute holds her underneath her breasts. Gagnon spits. She lets fly a mixture of tobacco and saliva.

—You know I love you—she’s about to say to Paquette when something immense, invisible in the fog, slams into the San José’s hull.

The sailor hoists the woman’s body back over the railing.

—What happened?

What has transpired is that the coffee, stripped of its active principles, has had an inverse effect. The instruments are flashing, warning, but Tremblay is sitting at a school desk. Yes, without a doubt, what he has before him is an English exam … Suddenly, the terrible collision jolts him awake.

No, it’s not the treasonous iceberg you are imagining. The fishing trawler has crashed into the Marriot hotel, the Gaspeciana, unmoored by the shifting of a tectonic plate under the mouth of the Saint Lawrence. If there’s something that should never get distracted, it’s a tectonic plate. The hotel has been adrift for three days.

Recovered from his insomnia, Tremblay immediately realizes the magnitude of the danger. He consults with the parrot. Conclusion: before assessing the damage, they need to ready the lifeboat.

—Everyone on deck!—shriek both man and bird.

The spectacular collision ejects Pelletier from his cot. The corner of the Gaspeciana’s parking garage perforates the San José fuselage right smack in his berth. The water enters in an overwhelming torrent.

—On deck! Quickly!—Benoit yells, behind him you can hear Tremblay in the grip of a coughing fit.

The cook manages to open the door slammed shut by the current. He enters the passageway. He runs into Belanger. It’s impossible for them move at the same time. They exchange various Jesus Christs and Godammits. It’s not the time for niceties. Finally prevailing after a withering sequence of three quick chess moves, Belanger reaches the deck.

Below, in the flooded hold, the plastic has returned to its natural state. Along the corridors, amongst the crew’s belongings, floats the copy of Obscene (keep your distance from the fair sex). Madame Marois, the champion of Quebecois nationalism, drifts next to Tutorial for understanding the provincial tongue geared towards the fauna of Gaspesie.

The crew awaits its orders. The protocol instructs that, in cases like this, Paquette’s in charge of lowering the lifeboat. Before executing the maneuver, he takes his companions by surprise and asks Gagnon to marry him. The woman accepts. The ring has been crafted by the boyfriend during his nights of insomnia using the neck of an old water bottle as a mold.

—I knew it! I knew it!—Benoit cries out.

—Please, we want to get married—Gagnon pleads.

The dour seaman acquiesces. The laws of the Quebec Navy confer such authority. Kisses. Applause.

After the simple ceremony, Tremblay executes the requisite distress calls.

Paquette attempts to lower the lifeboat. The mechanism gets stuck. The just-married man manages to contain his emotions and nervousness. He commences whacking the crane with a hatchet. His powerful blows destroy the winch, along with the chains that raise and lower the landing and, incidentally, the boat.

His wife is the first one to curse him. Followed by the rest of the seamen. The parrot calls for restraint. Thanks to the advances in rescue and relief measures, they’ll be saved long before going under.

An embarrassed Paquette proposes boarding the Marriot and abandoning the trawler with the double aim of saving himself and enjoying his honeymoon next to his wife. But swimming there would be suicide. They would die of hypothermia before ever reaching the hotel lobby.

The San José takes on water faster than anticipated. And when the crew thinks they’ve reached the end, several powerful searchlights sweep the deck. Before them appears the frigate Floreal, from the French Navy of War, famous in San Pedro and Miquelón. The commanding officer, flanked by various subordinates, stands on the prow. The official is holding a loudspeaker, as is Tremblay.

Gallic commander: I see you’re going under! Do you need a lift?!

Tremblay: I don’t understand! What language are you speaking?! English?!

Commander: The water has breached the float line! I’d better send you a boat!

Tremblay: I don’t understand that gibberish! What the hell do you want?!

Benoit: Yeah, sounds like a bunch of faggots! They must be French!

Tremblay: If they’re French, they can go to hell! Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!

Chorus of sailors from the San José: That’s right, go to hell!

Commander: What’s that language they’re speaking?! Anyone speak French over there?!

Tremblay: Go away, for fucking God’s sake!

Benoit: Let us go down in peace!

Chorus: Yes, let us go down in peace!

Benoit: Sonsabitches, they’ve never supported our sovereigntist aspirations!

Tremblay and chorus: Never!

Commander: I’d better send you the boat!

Benoit: Piss off! We have Céline Dion!

Tremblay and chorus: Right, we have Céline Dion!

Belanger: And Odette Marois! (The rest turn to look at him intrigued.)

Commander: I’ve got it, they’re Quebecois!

Crew of the San José: Yesssss!!!

Commander: Then we’re leaving!

Crew of the San José: Yesssss!!!

Tremblay keeps his spirits high. The collision with the Marriot will be nothing more than an entertaining anecdote.

—A Quebecois ship has never failed to answer the S.O.S of a sister ship.

The newlyweds Gagnon-Paquette hold each other’s hand. The water continues to rise without pity. The catch from five days of fishing floats in the hold.

Who is this Odette Marois?—Pelletier asks Belanger, at the same time as an appalling siren is heard.

Tremblay raises his eye patch and sees the outline of a ship through the fog.

—I told you, boys, here come our countrymen.

Just in time—Pelletier confesses—because this was starting to look like that movie about the ship that runs into an ice floe and sinks without anyone rescuing them.

—Ah! I saw that one,—Belanger says—and frankly, the only thing worthwhile was the part with Céline Dion.

Another massive siren. Captain Tremblay keeps a sharp lookout and … The first thing he sees is the flag with a maple leaf billowing on the mast of the scientific vessel Sir John Franklin, of the Canadian Coast Guard. The captain is on the starboard side, accompanied by a sailor with two small phosphorescent flags. The seaman carries out various pinwheel motions.

Tremblay laughs sardonically. He raises the bullhorn.

—Get out of here, you fucking Canadians!

Signal flags: We’re sending you a boat immediately!

—Turn around, we don’t need you!—Benoit squawks.

—Only French spoken here!—the valiant captain bellows.

A new series of signal flags: Lower the gangway, we’re sending the boat right away!

—If you guys have Leonard Cohen, we’ve got Céline Dion!—the parrot croaks.

—And Odette Marois!—Belanger chimes in. (The rest look over at him intrigued.)

Signal flags: What the devil is wrong with you?!

—Fucking multiculturalists!—the bird and captain roar.

The fishing boat begins to disappear, swallowed by the waters of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence under the gaze of the astonished captain of the Sir John Franklin.

—Boys,—Tremblay speaks with the water up to his chin—it has been an honor sailing with you.

The rest don’t have time to respond. All they see is Benoit taking flight towards the Canadian ship. The parrot lands on the pole where the maple leaf flag is waving.

—Jesus Christ!—he squawks, and watches the point of the San José’s mast disappear.

Montreal, June-July, 2022