diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/old-2024-02-03')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.txt | 13930 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.zip | bin | 0 -> 267136 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 280800 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h/6378-h.htm | 16670 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old-2024-02-03/6378.txt | 13930 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old-2024-02-03/6378.zip | bin | 0 -> 266085 bytes |
6 files changed, 44530 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.txt b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e70ee62 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,13930 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Victory, by Joseph Conrad + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost +no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use +it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this +eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Victory + +Author: Joseph Conrad + +Release Date: January 9, 2006 [EBook #6378] +Last Updated: March 2, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VICTORY *** + + + + +Produced by Tracy Camp and David Widger + + + + + +VICTORY: AN ISLAND TALE + +By Joseph Conrad + + + +Contents + + +NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + + +PART ONE + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + + +PART TWO + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +CHAPTER EIGHT + + + + + + + + + + + + +PART THREE + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +CHAPTER NINE + +CHAPTER TEN + + +PART FOUR + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +CHAPTER NINE + +CHAPTER TEN + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + + + + + +NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION + +The last word of this novel was written on 29 May 1914. And that last +word was the single word of the title. + +Those were the times of peace. Now that the moment of publication +approaches I have been considering the discretion of altering the +title-page. The word “Victory” the shining and tragic goal of noble +effort, appeared too great, too august, to stand at the head of a mere +novel. There was also the possibility of falling under the suspicion of +commercial astuteness deceiving the public into the belief that the book +had something to do with war. + +Of that, however, I was not afraid very much. What influenced my +decision most were the obscure promptings of that pagan residuum of +awe and wonder which lurks still at the bottom of our old humanity. +“Victory” was the last word I had written in peace-time. It was the last +literary thought which had occurred to me before the doors of the Temple +of Janus flying open with a crash shook the minds, the hearts, the +consciences of men all over the world. Such coincidence could not be +treated lightly. And I made up my mind to let the word stand, in the +same hopeful spirit in which some simple citizen of Old Rome would have +“accepted the Omen.” + +The second point on which I wish to offer a remark is the existence (in +the novel) of a person named Schomberg. + +That I believe him to be true goes without saying. I am not likely to +offer pinchbeck wares to my public consciously. Schomberg is an old +member of my company. A very subordinate personage in Lord Jim as far +back as the year 1899, he became notably active in a certain short story +of mine published in 1902. Here he appears in a still larger part, true +to life (I hope), but also true to himself. Only, in this instance, his +deeper passions come into play, and thus his grotesque psychology is +completed at last. + +I don't pretend to say that this is the entire Teutonic psychology; but +it is indubitably the psychology of a Teuton. My object in mentioning +him here is to bring out the fact that, far from being the incarnation +of recent animosities, he is the creature of my old deep-seated, and, as +it were, impartial conviction. + +J. C. + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + +On approaching the task of writing this Note for Victory, the first +thing I am conscious of is the actual nearness of the book, its nearness +to me personally, to the vanished mood in which it was written, and to +the mixed feelings aroused by the critical notices the book obtained +when first published almost exactly a year after the beginning of the +war. The writing of it was finished in 1914 long before the murder of an +Austrian Archduke sounded the first note of warning for a world already +full of doubts and fears. + +The contemporaneous very short Author's Note which is preserved in this +edition bears sufficient witness to the feelings with which I consented +to the publication of the book. The fact of the book having been +published in the United States early in the year made it difficult +to delay its appearance in England any longer. It came out in the +thirteenth month of the war, and my conscience was troubled by the awful +incongruity of throwing this bit of imagined drama into the welter +of reality, tragic enough in all conscience, but even more cruel than +tragic and more inspiring than cruel. It seemed awfully presumptuous to +think there would be eyes to spare for those pages in a community which +in the crash of the big guns and in the din of brave words expressing +the truth of an indomitable faith could not but feel the edge of a sharp +knife at its throat. + +The unchanging Man of history is wonderfully adaptable both by his power +of endurance and in his capacity for detachment. The fact seems to +be that the play of his destiny is too great for his fears and too +mysterious for his understanding. Were the trump of the Last Judgement +to sound suddenly on a working day the musician at his piano would go on +with his performance of Beethoven's sonata and the cobbler at his +stall stick to his last in undisturbed confidence in the virtues of the +leather. And with perfect propriety. For what are we to let ourselves be +disturbed by an angel's vengeful music too mighty for our ears and too +awful for our terrors? Thus it happens to us to be struck suddenly +by the lightning of wrath. The reader will go on reading if the book +pleases him and the critic will go on criticizing with that faculty of +detachment born perhaps from a sense of infinite littleness and which is +yet the only faculty that seems to assimilate man to the immortal gods. + +It is only when the catastrophe matches the natural obscurity of our +fate that even the best representative of the race is liable to lose his +detachment. It is very obvious that on the arrival of the gentlemanly +Mr. Jones, the single-minded Ricardo, and the faithful Pedro, Heyst, the +man of universal detachment, loses his mental self-possession, that fine +attitude before the universally irremediable which wears the name of +stoicism. It is all a matter of proportion. There should have been a +remedy for that sort of thing. And yet there is no remedy. Behind this +minute instance of life's hazards Heyst sees the power of blind destiny. +Besides, Heyst in his fine detachment had lost the habit of asserting +himself. I don't mean the courage of self-assertion, either moral or +physical, but the mere way of it, the trick of the thing, the readiness +of mind and the turn of the hand that come without reflection and lead +the man to excellence in life, in art, in crime, in virtue, and, for the +matter of that, even in love. Thinking is the great enemy of perfection. +The habit of profound reflection, I am compelled to say, is the most +pernicious of all the habits formed by the civilized man. + +But I wouldn't be suspected even remotely of making fun of Axel Heyst. I +have always liked him. The flesh-and-blood individual who stands +behind the infinitely more familiar figure of the book I remember as a +mysterious Swede right enough. Whether he was a baron, too, I am not so +certain. He himself never laid claim to that distinction. His detachment +was too great to make any claims, big or small, on one's credulity. I +will not say where I met him because I fear to give my readers a +wrong impression, since a marked incongruity between a man and his +surroundings is often a very misleading circumstance. We became very +friendly for a time, and I would not like to expose him to unpleasant +suspicions though, personally, I am sure he would have been indifferent +to suspicions as he was indifferent to all the other disadvantages of +life. He was not the whole Heyst of course; he is only the physical and +moral foundation of my Heyst laid on the ground of a short acquaintance. +That it was short was certainly not my fault for he had charmed me by +the mere amenity of his detachment which, in this case, I cannot help +thinking he had carried to excess. He went away from his rooms without +leaving a trace. I wondered where he had gone to--but now I know. +He vanished from my ken only to drift into this adventure that, +unavoidable, waited for him in a world which he persisted in looking +upon as a malevolent shadow spinning in the sunlight. Often in the +course of years an expressed sentiment, the particular sense of a phrase +heard casually, would recall him to my mind so that I have fastened on +to him many words heard on other men's lips and belonging to other men's +less perfect, less pathetic moods. + +The same observation will apply mutatis mutandis to Mr. Jones, who is +built on a much slenderer connection. Mr. Jones (or whatever his name +was) did not drift away from me. He turned his back on me and walked out +of the room. It was in a little hotel in the island of St. Thomas in +the West Indies (in the year '75) where we found him one hot afternoon +extended on three chairs, all alone in the loud buzzing of flies to +which his immobility and his cadaverous aspect gave a most gruesome +significance. Our invasion must have displeased him because he got off +the chairs brusquely and walked out, leaving with me an indelibly weird +impression of his thin shanks. One of the men with me said that the +fellow was the most desperate gambler he had ever come across. I said: +“A professional sharper?” and got for an answer: “He's a terror; but I +must say that up to a certain point he will play fair. . . .” I wonder +what the point was. I never saw him again because I believe he went +straight on board a mail-boat which left within the hour for other +ports of call in the direction of Aspinall. Mr. Jones's characteristic +insolence belongs to another man of a quite different type. I will say +nothing as to the origins of his mentality because I don't intend to +make any damaging admissions. + +It so happened that the very same year Ricardo--the physical +Ricardo--was a fellow passenger of mine on board an extremely small and +extremely dirty little schooner, during a four days' passage between two +places in the Gulf of Mexico whose names don't matter. For the most part +he lay on deck aft as it were at my feet, and raising himself from time +to time on his elbow would talk about himself and go on talking, not +exactly to me or even at me (he would not even look up but kept his +eyes fixed on the deck) but more as if communing in a low voice with +his familiar devil. Now and then he would give me a glance and make the +hairs of his stiff little moustache stir quaintly. His eyes were green +and every cat I see to this day reminds me of the exact contour of his +face. What he was travelling for or what was his business in life he +never confided to me. Truth to say, the only passenger on board that +schooner who could have talked openly about his activities and purposes +was a very snuffy and conversationally delightful friar, the superior +of a convent, attended by a very young lay brother, of a particularly +ferocious countenance. We had with us also, lying prostrate in the dark +and unspeakable cuddy of that schooner, an old Spanish gentleman, owner +of much luggage and, as Ricardo assured me, very ill indeed. Ricardo +seemed to be either a servant or the confidant of that aged and +distinguished-looking invalid, who early on the passage held a long +murmured conversation with the friar, and after that did nothing but +groan feebly, smoke cigarettes, and now and then call for Martin in a +voice full of pain. Then he who had become Ricardo in the book would go +below into that beastly and noisome hole, remain there mysteriously, +and coming up on deck again with a face on which nothing could be read, +would as likely as not resume for my edification the exposition of his +moral attitude towards life illustrated by striking particular instances +of the most atrocious complexion. Did he mean to frighten me? Or seduce +me? Or astonish me? Or arouse my admiration? All he did was to arouse my +amused incredulity. As scoundrels go he was far from being a bore. +For the rest my innocence was so great then that I could not take his +philosophy seriously. All the time he kept one ear turned to the cuddy +in the manner of a devoted servant, but I had the idea that in some way +or other he had imposed the connection on the invalid for some end of +his own. The reader, therefore, won't be surprised to hear that one +morning I was told without any particular emotion by the padrone of the +schooner that the “rich man” down there was dead: He had died in the +night. I don't remember ever being so moved by the desolate end of a +complete stranger. I looked down the skylight, and there was the devoted +Martin busy cording cowhide trunks belonging to the deceased whose white +beard and hooked nose were the only parts I could make out in the dark +depths of a horrible stuffy bunk. + +As it fell calm in the course of the afternoon and continued calm during +all that night and the terrible, flaming day, the late “rich man” had +to be thrown overboard at sunset, though as a matter of fact we were in +sight of the low pestilential mangrove-lined coast of our destination. +The excellent Father Superior mentioned to me with an air of immense +commiseration: “The poor man has left a young daughter.” Who was to look +after her I don't know, but I saw the devoted Martin taking the trunks +ashore with great care just before I landed myself. I would perhaps have +tracked the ways of that man of immense sincerity for a little while, +but I had some of my own very pressing business to attend to, which in +the end got mixed up with an earthquake and so I had no time to give +to Ricardo. The reader need not be told that I have not forgotten him, +though. + +My contact with the faithful Pedro was much shorter and my observation +of him was less complete but incomparably more anxious. It ended in a +sudden inspiration to get out of his way. It was in a hovel of sticks +and mats by the side of a path. As I went in there only to ask for a +bottle of lemonade I have not to this day the slightest idea what in +my appearance or actions could have roused his terrible ire. It became +manifest to me less than two minutes after I had set eyes on him for the +first time, and though immensely surprised of course I didn't stop +to think it out I took the nearest short cut--through the wall. This +bestial apparition and a certain enormous buck nigger encountered in +Haiti only a couple of months afterwards, have fixed my conception of +blind, furious, unreasoning rage, as manifested in the human animal, to +the end of my days. Of the nigger I used to dream for years afterwards. +Of Pedro never. The impression was less vivid. I got away from him too +quickly. + +It seems to me but natural that those three buried in a corner of my +memory should suddenly get out into the light of the world--so natural +that I offer no excuse for their existence, They were there, they had to +come out; and this is a sufficient excuse for a writer of tales who had +taken to his trade without preparation, or premeditation, and without +any moral intention but that which pervades the whole scheme of this +world of senses. + +Since this Note is mostly concerned with personal contacts and the +origins of the persons in the tale, I am bound also to speak of Lena, +because if I were to leave her out it would look like a slight; and +nothing would be further from my thoughts than putting a slight on Lena. +If of all the personages involved in the “mystery of Samburan” I have +lived longest with Heyst (or with him I call Heyst) it was at her, whom +I call Lena, that I have looked the longest and with a most sustained +attention. This attention originated in idleness for which I have a +natural talent. One evening I wandered into a cafe, in a town not of the +tropics but of the South of France. It was filled with tobacco smoke, +the hum of voices, the rattling of dominoes, and the sounds of strident +music. The orchestra was rather smaller than the one that performed +at Schomberg's hotel, had the air more of a family party than of an +enlisted band, and, I must confess, seemed rather more respectable than +the Zangiacomo musical enterprise. It was less pretentious also, more +homely and familiar, so to speak, insomuch that in the intervals when +all the performers left the platform one of them went amongst the +marble tables collecting offerings of sous and francs in a battered +tin receptacle recalling the shape of a sauceboat. It was a girl. +Her detachment from her task seems to me now to have equalled or even +surpassed Heyst's aloofness from all the mental degradations to which +a man's intelligence is exposed in its way through life. Silent and +wide-eyed she went from table to table with the air of a sleep-walker +and with no other sound but the slight rattle of the coins to attract +attention. It was long after the sea-chapter of my life had been closed +but it is difficult to discard completely the characteristics of half +a lifetime, and it was in something of the Jack-ashore spirit that +I dropped a five-franc piece into the sauceboat; whereupon the +sleep-walker turned her head to gaze at me and said “Merci, Monsieur” + in a tone in which there was no gratitude but only surprise. I must have +been idle indeed to take the trouble to remark on such slight evidence +that the voice was very charming and when the performers resumed +their seats I shifted my position slightly in order not to have that +particular performer hidden from me by the little man with the beard who +conducted, and who might for all I know have been her father, but whose +real mission in life was to be a model for the Zangiacomo of Victory. +Having got a clear line of sight I naturally (being idle) continued to +look at the girl through all the second part of the programme. The shape +of her dark head inclined over the violin was fascinating, and, while +resting between the pieces of that interminable programme she was, in +her white dress and with her brown hands reposing in her lap, the very +image of dreamy innocence. The mature, bad-tempered woman at the +piano might have been her mother, though there was not the slightest +resemblance between them. All I am certain of in their personal relation +to each other is that cruel pinch on the upper part of the arm. That I +am sure I have seen! There could be no mistake. I was in too idle a mood +to imagine such a gratuitous barbarity. It may have been playfulness, +yet the girl jumped up as if she had been stung by a wasp. It may have +been playfulness. Yet I saw plainly poor “dreamy innocence” rub gently +the affected place as she filed off with the other performers down the +middle aisle between the marble tables in the uproar of voices, the +rattling of dominoes through a blue atmosphere of tobacco smoke. I +believe that those people left the town next day. + +Or perhaps they had only migrated to the other big cafe, on the other +side of the Place de la Comedie. It is very possible. I did not go +across to find out. It was my perfect idleness that had invested the +girl with a peculiar charm, and I did not want to destroy it by +any superfluous exertion. The receptivity of my indolence made the +impression so permanent that when the moment came for her meeting with +Heyst I felt that she would be heroically equal to every demand of the +risky and uncertain future. I was so convinced of it that I let her go +with Heyst, I won't say without a pang but certainly without misgivings. +And in view of her triumphant end what more could I have done for her +rehabilitation and her happiness? + +1920. J. C. + + + + +VICTORY: AN ISLAND TALE PART ONE + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +There is, as every schoolboy knows in this scientific age, a very +close chemical relation between coal and diamonds. It is the reason, I +believe, why some people allude to coal as “black diamonds.” Both these +commodities represent wealth; but coal is a much less portable form +of property. There is, from that point of view, a deplorable lack of +concentration in coal. Now, if a coal-mine could be put into one's +waistcoat pocket--but it can't! At the same time, there is a fascination +in coal, the supreme commodity of the age in which we are camped like +bewildered travellers in a garish, unrestful hotel. And I suppose +those two considerations, the practical and the mystical, prevented +Heyst--Axel Heyst--from going away. + +The Tropical Belt Coal Company went into liquidation. The world of +finance is a mysterious world in which, incredible as the fact may +appear, evaporation precedes liquidation. First the capital evaporates, +and then the company goes into liquidation. These are very unnatural +physics, but they account for the persistent inertia of Heyst, at which +we “out there” used to laugh among ourselves--but not inimically. An +inert body can do no harm to anyone, provokes no hostility, is scarcely +worth derision. It may, indeed, be in the way sometimes; but this could +not be said of Axel Heyst. He was out of everybody's way, as if he +were perched on the highest peak of the Himalayas, and in a sense as +conspicuous. Everyone in that part of the world knew of him, dwelling on +his little island. An island is but the top of a mountain. Axel Heyst, +perched on it immovably, was surrounded, instead of the imponderable +stormy and transparent ocean of air merging into infinity, by a tepid, +shallow sea; a passionless offshoot of the great waters which embrace +the continents of this globe. His most frequent visitors were shadows, +the shadows of clouds, relieving the monotony of the inanimate, brooding +sunshine of the tropics. His nearest neighbour--I am speaking now of +things showing some sort of animation--was an indolent volcano which +smoked faintly all day with its head just above the northern horizon, +and at night levelled at him, from amongst the clear stars, a dull red +glow, expanding and collapsing spasmodically like the end of a gigantic +cigar puffed at intermittently in the dark. Axel Heyst was also a +smoker; and when he lounged out on his veranda with his cheroot, the +last thing before going to bed, he made in the night the same sort of +glow and of the same size as that other one so many miles away. + +In a sense, the volcano was company to him in the shades of the +night--which were often too thick, one would think, to let a breath of +air through. There was seldom enough wind to blow a feather along. On +most evenings of the year Heyst could have sat outside with a naked +candle to read one of the books left him by his late father. It was not +a mean store. But he never did that. Afraid of mosquitoes, very likely. +Neither was he ever tempted by the silence to address any casual remarks +to the companion glow of the volcano. He was not mad. Queer chap--yes, +that may have been said, and in fact was said; but there is a tremendous +difference between the two, you will allow. + +On the nights of full moon the silence around Samburan--the “Round +Island” of the charts--was dazzling; and in the flood of cold light +Heyst could see his immediate surroundings, which had the aspect of +an abandoned settlement invaded by the jungle: vague roofs above low +vegetation, broken shadows of bamboo fences in the sheen of long grass, +something like an overgrown bit of road slanting among ragged thickets +towards the shore only a couple of hundred yards away, with a black +jetty and a mound of some sort, quite inky on its unlighted side. But +the most conspicuous object was a gigantic blackboard raised on two +posts and presenting to Heyst, when the moon got over that side, the +white letters “T. B. C. Co.” in a row at least two feet high. These were +the initials of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, his employers--his late +employers, to be precise. + +According to the unnatural mysteries of the financial world, the T. B. +C. Company's capital having evaporated in the course of two years, the +company went into liquidation--forced, I believe, not voluntary. There +was nothing forcible in the process, however. It was slow; and while the +liquidation--in London and Amsterdam--pursued its languid course, Axel +Heyst, styled in the prospectus “manager in the tropics,” remained at +his post on Samburan, the No. 1 coaling-station of the company. + +And it was not merely a coaling-station. There was a coal-mine there, +with an outcrop in the hillside less than five hundred yards from the +rickety wharf and the imposing blackboard. The company's object had been +to get hold of all the outcrops on tropical islands and exploit them +locally. And, Lord knows, there were any amount of outcrops. It was +Heyst who had located most of them in this part of the tropical belt +during his rather aimless wanderings, and being a ready letter-writer +had written pages and pages about them to his friends in Europe. At +least, so it was said. + +We doubted whether he had any visions of wealth--for himself, at any +rate. What he seemed mostly concerned for was the “stride forward,” + as he expressed it, in the general organization of the universe, +apparently. He was heard by more than a hundred persons in the islands +talking of a “great stride forward for these regions.” The convinced +wave of the hand which accompanied the phrase suggested tropical +distances being impelled onward. In connection with the finished +courtesy of his manner, it was persuasive, or at any rate silencing--for +a time, at least. Nobody cared to argue with him when he talked in this +strain. His earnestness could do no harm to anybody. There was no danger +of anyone taking seriously his dream of tropical coal, so what was the +use of hurting his feelings? + +Thus reasoned men in reputable business offices where he had his entree +as a person who came out East with letters of introduction--and modest +letters of credit, too--some years before these coal-outcrops began to +crop up in his playfully courteous talk. From the first there was +some difficulty in making him out. He was not a traveller. A traveller +arrives and departs, goes on somewhere. Heyst did not depart. I met a +man once--the manager of the branch of the Oriental Banking Corporation +in Malacca--to whom Heyst exclaimed, in no connection with anything in +particular (it was in the billiard-room of the club): + +“I am enchanted with these islands!” + +He shot it out suddenly, a propos des bottes, as the French say, and +while chalking his cue. And perhaps it was some sort of enchantment. +There are more spells than your commonplace magicians ever dreamed of. + +Roughly speaking, a circle with a radius of eight hundred miles drawn +round a point in North Borneo was in Heyst's case a magic circle. It +just touched Manila, and he had been seen there. It just touched Saigon, +and he was likewise seen there once. Perhaps these were his attempts to +break out. If so, they were failures. The enchantment must have been +an unbreakable one. The manager--the man who heard the exclamation--had +been so impressed by the tone, fervour, rapture, what you will, or +perhaps by the incongruity of it that he had related the experience to +more than one person. + +“Queer chap, that Swede,” was his only comment; but this is the origin +of the name “Enchanted Heyst” which some fellows fastened on our man. + +He also had other names. In his early years, long before he got so +becomingly bald on the top, he went to present a letter of introduction +to Mr. Tesman of Tesman Brothers, a Sourabaya firm--tip-top house. Well, +Mr. Tesman was a kindly, benevolent old gentleman. He did not know what +to make of that caller. After telling him that they wished to render his +stay among the islands as pleasant as possible, and that they were +ready to assist him in his plans, and so on, and after receiving Heyst's +thanks--you know the usual kind of conversation--he proceeded to query +in a slow, paternal tone: + +“And you are interested in--?” + +“Facts,” broke in Heyst in his courtly voice. “There's nothing worth +knowing but facts. Hard facts! Facts alone, Mr. Tesman.” + +I don't know if old Tesman agreed with him or not, but he must have +spoken about it, because, for a time, our man got the name of “Hard +Facts.” He had the singular good fortune that his sayings stuck to him +and became part of his name. Thereafter he mooned about the Java Sea in +some of the Tesmans' trading schooners, and then vanished, on board an +Arab ship, in the direction of New Guinea. He remained so long in that +outlying part of his enchanted circle that he was nearly forgotten +before he swam into view again in a native proa full of Goram vagabonds, +burnt black by the sun, very lean, his hair much thinned, and a +portfolio of sketches under his arm. He showed these willingly, but +was very reserved as to anything else. He had had an “amusing time,” he +said. A man who will go to New Guinea for fun--well! + +Later, years afterwards, when the last vestiges of youth had gone off +his face and all the hair off the top of his head, and his red-gold +pair of horizontal moustaches had grown to really noble proportions, +a certain disreputable white man fastened upon him an epithet. Putting +down with a shaking hand a long glass emptied of its contents--paid +for by Heyst--he said, with that deliberate sagacity which no mere +water-drinker ever attained: + +“Heyst's a puffect g'n'lman. Puffect! But he's a ut-uto-utopist.” + +Heyst had just gone out of the place of public refreshment where this +pronouncement was voiced. Utopist, eh? Upon my word, the only thing +I heard him say which might have had a bearing on the point was his +invitation to old McNab himself. Turning with that finished courtesy of +attitude, movement voice, which was his obvious characteristic, he had +said with delicate playfulness: + +“Come along and quench your thirst with us, Mr. McNab!” + +Perhaps that was it. A man who could propose, even playfully, to quench +old McNab's thirst must have been a utopist, a pursuer of chimeras; for +of downright irony Heyst was not prodigal. And, may be, this was the +reason why he was generally liked. At that epoch in his life, in the +fulness of his physical development, of a broad, martial presence, with +his bald head and long moustaches, he resembled the portraits of Charles +XII., of adventurous memory. However, there was no reason to think that +Heyst was in any way a fighting man. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +It was about this time that Heyst became associated with Morrison on +terms about which people were in doubt. Some said he was a partner, +others said he was a sort of paying guest, but the real truth of the +matter was more complex. One day Heyst turned up in Timor. Why in Timor, +of all places in the world, no one knows. Well, he was mooning about +Delli, that highly pestilential place, possibly in search of some +undiscovered facts, when he came in the street upon Morrison, who, in +his way, was also an “enchanted” man. When you spoke to Morrison of +going home--he was from Dorsetshire--he shuddered. He said it was dark +and wet there; that it was like living with your head and shoulders in +a moist gunny-bag. That was only his exaggerated style of talking. +Morrison was “one of us.” He was owner and master of the Capricorn, +trading brig, and was understood to be doing well with her, except for +the drawback of too much altruism. He was the dearly beloved friend of a +quantity of God-forsaken villages up dark creeks and obscure bays, where +he traded for produce. He would often sail, through awfully dangerous +channels up to some miserable settlement, only to find a very hungry +population clamorous for rice, and without so much “produce” between +them as would have filled Morrison's suitcase. Amid general rejoicings, +he would land the rice all the same, explain to the people that it was +an advance, that they were in debt to him now; would preach to them +energy and industry, and make an elaborate note in a pocket-diary which +he always carried; and this would be the end of that transaction. +I don't know if Morrison thought so, but the villagers had no doubt +whatever about it. Whenever a coast village sighted the brig it would +begin to beat all its gongs and hoist all its streamers, and all its +girls would put flowers in their hair and the crowd would line the river +bank, and Morrison would beam and glitter at all this excitement through +his single eyeglass with an air of intense gratification. He was tall +and lantern-jawed, and clean-shaven, and looked like a barrister who had +thrown his wig to the dogs. + +We used to remonstrate with him: + +“You will never see any of your advances if you go on like this, +Morrison.” + +He would put on a knowing air. + +“I shall squeeze them yet some day--never you fear. And that reminds +me”--pulling out his inseparable pocketbook--“there's that So-and-So +village. They are pretty well off again; I may just as well squeeze them +to begin with.” + +He would make a ferocious entry in the pocketbook. + +Memo: Squeeze the So-and-So village at the first time of calling. + +Then he would stick the pencil back and snap the elastic on with +inflexible finality; but he never began the squeezing. Some men grumbled +at him. He was spoiling the trade. Well, perhaps to a certain extent; +not much. Most of the places he traded with were unknown not only to +geography but also to the traders' special lore which is transmitted by +word of mouth, without ostentation, and forms the stock of mysterious +local knowledge. It was hinted also that Morrison had a wife in each and +every one of them, but the majority of us repulsed these innuendoes +with indignation. He was a true humanitarian and rather ascetic than +otherwise. + +When Heyst met him in Delli, Morrison was walking along the street, +his eyeglass tossed over his shoulder, his head down, with the hopeless +aspect of those hardened tramps one sees on our roads trudging from +workhouse to workhouse. Being hailed on the street he looked up with a +wild worried expression. He was really in trouble. He had come the week +before into Delli and the Portuguese authorities, on some pretence +of irregularity in his papers, had inflicted a fine upon him and had +arrested his brig. + +Morrison never had any spare cash in hand. With his system of trading +it would have been strange if he had; and all these debts entered in +the pocketbook weren't good enough to raise a millrei on--let alone a +shilling. The Portuguese officials begged him not to distress himself. +They gave him a week's grace, and then proposed to sell the brig at +auction. This meant ruin for Morrison; and when Heyst hailed him across +the street in his usual courtly tone, the week was nearly out. + +Heyst crossed over, and said with a slight bow, and in the manner of a +prince addressing another prince on a private occasion: + +“What an unexpected pleasure. Would you have any objection to drink +something with me in that infamous wine-shop over there? The sun is +really too strong to talk in the street.” + +The haggard Morrison followed obediently into a sombre, cool hovel which +he would have distained to enter at any other time. He was distracted. +He did not know what he was doing. You could have led him over the edge +of a precipice just as easily as into that wine-shop. He sat down like +an automaton. He was speechless, but he saw a glass full of rough red +wine before him, and emptied it. Heyst meantime, politely watchful, had +taken a seat opposite. + +“You are in for a bout of fever, I fear,” he said sympathetically. + +Poor Morrison's tongue was loosened at that. + +“Fever!” he cried. “Give me fever. Give me plague. They are diseases. +One gets over them. But I am being murdered. I am being murdered by the +Portuguese. The gang here downed me at last among them. I am to have my +throat cut the day after tomorrow.” + +In the face of this passion Heyst made, with his eyebrows, a +slight motion of surprise which would not have been misplaced in a +drawing-room. Morrison's despairing reserve had broken down. He had been +wandering with a dry throat all over that miserable town of mud hovels, +silent, with no soul to turn to in his distress, and positively +maddened by his thoughts; and suddenly he had stumbled on a white man, +figuratively and actually white--for Morrison refused to accept the +racial whiteness of the Portuguese officials. He let himself go for the +mere relief of violent speech, his elbows planted on the table, his +eyes blood-shot, his voice nearly gone, the brim of his round pith hat +shading an unshaven, livid face. His white clothes, which he had not +taken off for three days, were dingy. He had already gone to the bad, +past redemption. The sight was shocking to Heyst; but he let nothing +of it appear in his bearing, concealing his impression under that +consummate good-society manner of his. Polite attention, what's due from +one gentleman listening to another, was what he showed; and, as usual, +it was catching; so that Morrison pulled himself together and finished +his narrative in a conversational tone, with a man-of-the-world air. + +“It's a villainous plot. Unluckily, one is helpless. That scoundrel +Cousinho--Andreas, you know--has been coveting the brig for years. +Naturally, I would never sell. She is not only my livelihood; she's my +life. So he has hatched this pretty little plot with the chief of the +customs. The sale, of course, will be a farce. There's no one here to +bid. He will get the brig for a song--no, not even that--a line of a +song. You have been some years now in the islands, Heyst. You know us +all; you have seen how we live. Now you shall have the opportunity +to see how some of us end; for it is the end, for me. I can't deceive +myself any longer. You see it--don't you?” + +Morrison had pulled himself together, but one felt the snapping strain +on his recovered self-possession. Heyst was beginning to say that +he “could very well see all the bearings of this unfortunate--” when +Morrison interrupted him jerkily. + +“Upon my word, I don't know why I have been telling you all this. I +suppose seeing a thoroughly white man made it impossible to keep my +trouble to myself. Words can't do it justice; but since I've told you so +much I may as well tell you more. Listen. This morning on board, in my +cabin I went down on my knees and prayed for help. I went down on my +knees!” + +“You are a believer, Morrison?” asked Heyst with a distinct note of +respect. + +“Surely I am not an infidel.” + +Morrison was swiftly reproachful in his answer, and there came a pause, +Morrison perhaps interrogating his conscience, and Heyst preserving a +mien of unperturbed, polite interest. + +“I prayed like a child, of course. I believe in children praying--well, +women, too, but I rather think God expects men to be more self-reliant. +I don't hold with a man everlastingly bothering the Almighty with his +silly troubles. It seems such cheek. Anyhow, this morning I--I have +never done any harm to any God's creature knowingly--I prayed. A sudden +impulse--I went flop on my knees; so you may judge--” + +They were gazing earnestly into each other's eyes. Poor Morrison added, +as a discouraging afterthought: + +“Only this is such a God-forsaken spot.” + +Heyst inquired with a delicate intonation whether he might know the +amount for which the brig was seized. + +Morrison suppressed an oath, and named curtly a sum which was in itself +so insignificant that any other person than Heyst would have exclaimed +at it. And even Heyst could hardly keep incredulity out of his politely +modulated voice as he asked if it was a fact that Morrison had not that +amount in hand. + +Morrison hadn't. He had only a little English gold, a few sovereigns, on +board. He had left all his spare cash with the Tesmans, in Samarang, to +meet certain bills which would fall due while he was away on his cruise. +Anyhow, that money would not have been any more good to him than if it +had been in the innermost depths of the infernal regions. He said all +this brusquely. He looked with sudden disfavour at that noble forehead, +at those great martial moustaches, at the tired eyes of the man sitting +opposite him. Who the devil was he? What was he, Morrison, doing there, +talking like this? Morrison knew no more of Heyst than the rest of us +trading in the Archipelago did. Had the Swede suddenly risen and hit +him on the nose, he could not have been taken more aback than when this +stranger, this nondescript wanderer, said with a little bow across the +table: + +“Oh! If that's the case I would be very happy if you'd allow me to be of +use!” + +Morrison didn't understand. This was one of those things that don't +happen--unheard of things. He had no real inkling of what it meant, till +Heyst said definitely: + +“I can lend you the amount.” + +“You have the money?” whispered Morrison. “Do you mean here, in your +pocket?” + +“Yes, on me. Glad to be of use.” + +Morrison, staring open-mouthed, groped over his shoulder for the cord of +the eyeglass hanging down his back. When he found it, he stuck it in his +eye hastily. It was as if he expected Heyst's usual white suit of the +tropics to change into a shining garment, flowing down to his toes, +and a pair of great dazzling wings to sprout out on the Swede's +shoulders--and didn't want to miss a single detail of the +transformation. But if Heyst was an angel from on high, sent in answer +to prayer, he did not betray his heavenly origin by outward signs. +So, instead of going on his knees, as he felt inclined to do, Morrison +stretched out his hand, which Heyst grasped with formal alacrity and a +polite murmur in which “Trifle--delighted--of service,” could just be +distinguished. + +“Miracles do happen,” thought the awestruck Morrison. To him, as to +all of us in the Islands, this wandering Heyst, who didn't toil or spin +visibly, seemed the very last person to be the agent of Providence in +an affair concerned with money. The fact of his turning up in Timor or +anywhere else was no more wonderful than the settling of a sparrow on +one's window-sill at any given moment. But that he should carry a sum of +money in his pocket seemed somehow inconceivable. + +So inconceivable that as they were trudging together through the sand +of the roadway to the custom-house--another mud hovel--to pay the +fine, Morrison broke into a cold sweat, stopped short, and exclaimed in +faltering accents: + +“I say! You aren't joking, Heyst?” + +“Joking!” Heyst's blue eyes went hard as he turned them on the +discomposed Morrison. “In what way, may I ask?” he continued with +austere politeness. + +Morrison was abashed. + +“Forgive me, Heyst. You must have been sent by God in answer to my +prayer. But I have been nearly off my chump for three days with worry; +and it suddenly struck me: 'What if it's the Devil who has sent him?'” + +“I have no connection with the supernatural,” said Heyst graciously, +moving on. “Nobody has sent me. I just happened along.” + +“I know better,” contradicted Morrison. “I may be unworthy, but I have +been heard. I know it. I feel it. For why should you offer--” + +Heyst inclined his head, as from respect for a conviction in which he +could not share. But he stuck to his point by muttering that in the +presence of an odious fact like this, it was natural-- + +Later in the day, the fine paid, and the two of them on board the brig, +from which the guard had been removed, Morrison who, besides, being a +gentleman was also an honest fellow began to talk about repayment. He +knew very well his inability to lay by any sum of money. It was partly +the fault of circumstances and partly of his temperament; and it would +have been very difficult to apportion the responsibility between the +two. Even Morrison himself could not say, while confessing to the fact. +With a worried air he ascribed it to fatality: + +“I don't know how it is that I've never been able to save. It's some +sort of curse. There's always a bill or two to meet.” + +He plunged his hand into his pocket for the famous notebook so well +known in the islands, the fetish of his hopes, and fluttered the pages +feverishly. + +“And yet--look,” he went on. “There it is--more than five thousand +dollars owing. Surely that's something.” + +He ceased suddenly. Heyst, who had been all the time trying to look +as unconcerned as he could, made reassuring noises in his throat. +But Morrison was not only honest. He was honourable, too; and on this +stressful day, before this amazing emissary of Providence and in the +revulsion of his feelings, he made his great renunciation. He cast off +the abiding illusion of his existence. + +“No. No. They are not good. I'll never be able to squeeze them. Never. +I've been saying for years I would, but I give it up. I never really +believed I could. Don't reckon on that, Heyst. I have robbed you.” + +Poor Morrison actually laid his head on the cabin table, and remained +in that crushed attitude while Heyst talked to him soothingly with the +utmost courtesy. The Swede was as much distressed as Morrison; for he +understood the other's feelings perfectly. No decent feeling was ever +scorned by Heyst. But he was incapable of outward cordiality of manner, +and he felt acutely his defect. Consummate politeness is not the right +tonic for an emotional collapse. They must have had, both of them, a +fairly painful time of it in the cabin of the brig. In the end Morrison, +casting desperately for an idea in the blackness of his despondency, +hit upon the notion of inviting Heyst to travel with him in his brig and +have a share in his trading ventures up to the amount of his loan. + +It is characteristic of Heyst's unattached, floating existence that he +was in a position to accept this proposal. There is no reason to think +that he wanted particularly just then to go poking aboard the brig into +all the holes and corners of the Archipelago where Morrison picked up +most of his trade. Far from it; but he would have consented to almost +any arrangement in order to put an end to the harrowing scene in the +cabin. There was at once a great transformation act: Morrison raising +his diminished head, and sticking the glass in his eye to look +affectionately at Heyst, a bottle being uncorked, and so on. It was +agreed that nothing should be said to anyone of this transaction. +Morrison, you understand, was not proud of the episode, and he was +afraid of being unmercifully chaffed. + +“An old bird like me! To let myself be trapped by those damned +Portuguese rascals! I should never hear the last of it. We must keep it +dark.” + +From quite other motives, among which his native delicacy was the +principal, Heyst was even more anxious to bind himself to silence. A +gentleman would naturally shrink from the part of heavenly messenger +that Morrison would force upon him. It made Heyst uncomfortable, as it +was. And perhaps he did not care that it should be known that he had +some means, whatever they might have been--sufficient, at any rate, to +enable him to lend money to people. These two had a duet down there, +like conspirators in a comic opera, of “Sh--ssh, shssh! Secrecy! +Secrecy!” It must have been funny, because they were very serious about +it. + +And for a time the conspiracy was successful in so far that we all +concluded that Heyst was boarding with the good-natured--some said: +sponging on the imbecile--Morrison, in his brig. But you know how it +is with all such mysteries. There is always a leak somewhere. Morrison +himself, not a perfect vessel by any means, was bursting with gratitude, +and under the stress he must have let out something vague--enough to +give the island gossip a chance. And you know how kindly the world is +in its comments on what it does not understand. A rumour sprang out that +Heyst, having obtained some mysterious hold on Morrison, had fastened +himself on him and was sucking him dry. Those who had traced these +mutters back to their origin were very careful not to believe them. The +originator, it seems, was a certain Schomberg, a big, manly, bearded +creature of the Teutonic persuasion, with an ungovernable tongue which +surely must have worked on a pivot. Whether he was a Lieutenant of the +Reserve, as he declared, I don't know. Out there he was by profession a +hotel-keeper, first in Bangkok, then somewhere else, and ultimately in +Sourabaya. He dragged after him up and down that section of the tropical +belt a silent, frightened, little woman with long ringlets, who smiled +at one stupidly, showing a blue tooth. I don't know why so many of us +patronized his various establishments. He was a noxious ass, and he +satisfied his lust for silly gossip at the cost of his customers. It +was he who, one evening, as Morrison and Heyst went past the hotel--they +were not his regular patrons--whispered mysteriously to the mixed +company assembled on the veranda: + +“The spider and the fly just gone by, gentlemen.” Then, very important +and confidential, his thick paw at the side of his mouth: “We are among +ourselves; well, gentlemen, all I can say is, don't you ever get mixed +up with that Swede. Don't you ever get caught in his web.” + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +Human nature being what it is, having a silly side to it as well as +a mean side, there were not a few who pretended to be indignant on no +better authority than a general propensity to believe every evil report; +and a good many others who found it simply funny to call Heyst the +Spider--behind his back, of course. He was as serenely unconscious of +this as of his several other nicknames. But soon people found other +things to say of Heyst; not long afterwards he came very much to the +fore in larger affairs. He blossomed out into something definite. He +filled the public eye as the manager on the spot of the Tropical Belt +Coal Company with offices in London and Amsterdam, and other things +about it that sounded and looked grandiose. The offices in the two +capitals may have consisted--and probably did--of one room in each; +but at that distance, out East there, all this had an air. We were more +puzzled than dazzled, it is true; but even the most sober-minded among +us began to think that there was something in it. The Tesmans appointed +agents, a contract for government mail-boats secured, the era of steam +beginning for the islands--a great stride forward--Heyst's stride! + +And all this sprang from the meeting of the cornered Morrison and of the +wandering Heyst, which may or may not have been the direct outcome of a +prayer. Morrison was not an imbecile, but he seemed to have got himself +into a state of remarkable haziness as to his exact position towards +Heyst. For, if Heyst had been sent with money in his pocket by a direct +decree of the Almighty in answer to Morrison's prayer then there was no +reason for special gratitude, since obviously he could not help himself. +But Morrison believed both, in the efficacy of prayer and in the +infinite goodness of Heyst. He thanked God with awed sincerity for his +mercy, and could not thank Heyst enough for the service rendered as +between man and man. In this (highly creditable) tangle of strong +feelings Morrison's gratitude insisted on Heyst's partnership in the +great discovery. Ultimately we heard that Morrison had gone home through +the Suez Canal in order to push the magnificent coal idea personally +in London. He parted from his brig and disappeared from our ken; but +we heard that he had written a letter or letters to Heyst, saying that +London was cold and gloomy; that he did not like either the men or +things, that he was “as lonely as a crow in a strange country.” In +truth, he pined after the Capricorn--I don't mean only the tropic; I +mean the ship too. Finally he went into Dorsetshire to see his people, +caught a bad cold, and died with extraordinary precipitation in the +bosom of his appalled family. Whether his exertions in the City of +London had enfeebled his vitality I don't know; but I believe it was +this visit which put life into the coal idea. Be it as it may, the +Tropical Belt Coal Company was born very shortly after Morrison, +the victim of gratitude and his native climate, had gone to join his +forefathers in a Dorsetshire churchyard. + +Heyst was immensely shocked. He got the news in the Moluccas through the +Tesmans, and then disappeared for a time. It appears that he stayed with +a Dutch government doctor in Amboyna, a friend of his who looked after +him for a bit in his bungalow. He became visible again rather suddenly, +his eyes sunk in his head, and with a sort of guarded attitude, as if +afraid someone would reproach him with the death of Morrison. + +Naive Heyst! As if anybody would . . . Nobody amongst us had any +interest in men who went home. They were all right; they did not count +any more. Going to Europe was nearly as final as going to Heaven. It +removed a man from the world of hazard and adventure. + +As a matter of fact, many of us did not hear of this death till months +afterwards--from Schomberg, who disliked Heyst gratuitously and made up +a piece of sinister whispered gossip: + +“That's what comes of having anything to do with that fellow. He +squeezes you dry like a lemon, then chucks you out--sends you home to +die. Take warning by Morrison!” + +Of course, we laughed at the innkeeper's suggestions of black mystery. +Several of us heard that Heyst was prepared to go to Europe himself, +to push on his coal enterprise personally; but he never went. It wasn't +necessary. The company was formed without him, and his nomination of +manager in the tropics came out to him by post. + +From the first he had selected Samburan, or Round Island, for the +central station. Some copies of the prospectus issued in Europe, having +found their way out East, were passed from hand to hand. We greatly +admired the map which accompanied them for the edification of the +shareholders. On it Samburan was represented as the central spot of the +Eastern Hemisphere with its name engraved in enormous capitals. Heavy +lines radiated from it in all directions through the tropics, figuring a +mysterious and effective star--lines of influence or lines of distance, +or something of that sort. Company promoters have an imagination of +their own. There's no more romantic temperament on earth than the +temperament of a company promoter. Engineers came out, coolies were +imported, bungalows were put up on Samburan, a gallery driven into the +hillside, and actually some coal got out. + +These manifestations shook the soberest minds. For a time everybody in +the islands was talking of the Tropical Belt Coal, and even those who +smiled quietly to themselves were only hiding their uneasiness. Oh, yes; +it had come, and anybody could see what would be the consequences--the +end of the individual trader, smothered under a great invasion of +steamers. We could not afford to buy steamers. Not we. And Heyst was the +manager. + +“You know, Heyst, enchanted Heyst.” + +“Oh, come! He has been no better than a loafer around here as far back +as any of us can remember.” + +“Yes, he said he was looking for facts. Well, he's got hold of one that +will do for all of us,” commented a bitter voice. + +“That's what they call development--and be hanged to it!” muttered +another. + +Never was Heyst talked about so much in the tropical belt before. + +“Isn't he a Swedish baron or something?” + +“He, a baron? Get along with you!” + +For my part I haven't the slightest doubt that he was. While he was +still drifting amongst the islands, enigmatical and disregarded like an +insignificant ghost, he told me so himself on a certain occasion. It +was a long time before he materialized in this alarming way into the +destroyer of our little industry--Heyst the Enemy. + +It became the fashion with a good many to speak of Heyst as the Enemy. +He was very concrete, very visible now. He was rushing all over the +Archipelago, jumping in and out of local mail-packets as if they had +been tram-cars, here, there, and everywhere--organizing with all his +might. This was no mooning about. This was business. And this sudden +display of purposeful energy shook the incredulity of the most +sceptical more than any scientific demonstration of the value of these +coal-outcrops could have done. It was impressive. Schomberg was the +only one who resisted the infection. Big, manly in a portly style, +and profusely bearded, with a glass of beer in his thick paw, he would +approach some table where the topic of the hour was being discussed, +would listen for a moment, and then come out with his invariable +declaration: + +“All this is very well, gentlemen; but he can't throw any of his +coal-dust in my eyes. There's nothing in it. Why, there can't be +anything in it. A fellow like that for manager? Phoo!” + +Was it the clairvoyance of imbecile hatred, or mere stupid tenacity of +opinion, which ends sometimes by scoring against the world in a most +astonishing manner? Most of us can remember instances of triumphant +folly; and that ass Schomberg triumphed. The T.B.C. Company went into +liquidation, as I began by telling you. The Tesmans washed their hands +of it. The Government cancelled those famous contracts, the talk died +out, and presently it was remarked here and there that Heyst had faded +completely away. He had become invisible, as in those early days when +he used to make a bolt clear out of sight in his attempts to break away +from the enchantment of “these isles,” either in the direction of New +Guinea or in the direction of Saigon--to cannibals or to cafes. The +enchanted Heyst! Had he at last broken the spell? Had he died? We were +too indifferent to wonder overmuch. You see we had on the whole liked +him well enough. And liking is not sufficient to keep going the interest +one takes in a human being. With hatred, apparently, it is otherwise. +Schomberg couldn't forget Heyst. The keen, manly Teutonic creature was a +good hater. A fool often is. + +“Good evening, gentlemen. Have you got everything you want? So! Good! +You see? What was I always telling you? Aha! There was nothing in it. I +knew it. But what I would like to know is what became of that--Swede.” + +He put a stress on the word Swede as if it meant scoundrel. He detested +Scandinavians generally. Why? Goodness only knows. A fool like that is +unfathomable. He continued: + +“It's five months or more since I have spoken to anybody who has seen +him.” + +As I have said, we were not much interested; but Schomberg, of course, +could not understand that. He was grotesquely dense. Whenever three +people came together in his hotel, he took good care that Heyst should +be with them. + +“I hope the fellow did not go and drown himself,” he would add with a +comical earnestness that ought to have made us shudder; only our crowd +was superficial, and did not apprehend the psychology of this pious +hope. + +“Why? Heyst isn't in debt to you for drinks is he?” somebody asked him +once with shallow scorn. + +“Drinks! Oh, dear no!” + +The innkeeper was not mercenary. Teutonic temperament seldom is. But he +put on a sinister expression to tell us that Heyst had not paid perhaps +three visits altogether to his “establishment.” This was Heyst's crime, +for which Schomberg wished him nothing less than a long and tormented +existence. Observe the Teutonic sense of proportion and nice forgiving +temper. + +At last, one afternoon, Schomberg was seen approaching a group of his +customers. He was obviously in high glee. He squared his manly chest +with great importance. + +“Gentlemen, I have news of him. Who? why, that Swede. He is still +on Samburan. He's never been away from it. The company is gone, +the engineers are gone, the clerks are gone, the coolies are gone, +everything's gone; but there he sticks. Captain Davidson, coming by from +the westward, saw him with his own eyes. Something white on the wharf, +so he steamed in and went ashore in a small boat. Heyst, right enough. +Put a book into his pocket, always very polite. Been strolling on +the wharf and reading. 'I remain in possession here,' he told Captain +Davidson. What I want to know is what he gets to eat there. A piece of +dried fish now and then--what? That's coming down pretty low for a man +who turned up his nose at my table d'hote!” + +He winked with immense malice. A bell started ringing, and he led the +way to the dining-room as if into a temple, very grave, with the air +of a benefactor of mankind. His ambition was to feed it at a profitable +price, and his delight was to talk of it behind its back. It was very +characteristic of him to gloat over the idea of Heyst having nothing +decent to eat. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +A few of us who were sufficiently interested went to Davidson for +details. These were not many. He told us that he passed to the north of +Samburan on purpose to see what was going on. At first, it looked as if +that side of the island had been altogether abandoned. This was what he +expected. Presently, above the dense mass of vegetation that Samburan +presents to view, he saw the head of the flagstaff without a flag. Then, +while steaming across the slight indentation which for a time was known +officially as Black Diamond Bay, he made out with his glass the white +figure on the coaling-wharf. It could be no one but Heyst. + +“I thought for certain he wanted to be taken off, so I steamed in. He +made no signs. However, I lowered a boat. I could not see another living +being anywhere. Yes. He had a book in his hand. He looked exactly as we +have always seen him--very neat, white shoes, cork helmet. He explained +to me that he had always had a taste for solitude. It was the first I +ever heard of it, I told him. He only smiled. What could I say? He isn't +the sort of man one can speak familiarly to. There's something in him. +One doesn't care to. + +“'But what's the object? Are you thinking of keeping possession of the +mine?' I asked him. + +“'Something of the sort,' he says. 'I am keeping hold.' + +“'But all this is as dead as Julius Caesar,' I cried. 'In fact, you have +nothing worth holding on to, Heyst.' + +“'Oh, I am done with facts,' says he, putting his hand to his helmet +sharply with one of his short bows.” + +Thus dismissed, Davidson went on board his ship, swung her out, and as +he was steaming away he watched from the bridge Heyst walking shoreward +along the wharf. He marched into the long grass and vanished--all but +the top of his white cork helmet, which seemed to swim in a green sea. +Then that too disappeared, as if it had sunk into the living depths of +the tropical vegetation, which is more jealous of men's conquests than +the ocean, and which was about to close over the last vestiges of the +liquidated Tropical Belt Coal Company--A. Heyst, manager in the East. + +Davidson, a good, simple fellow in his way, was strangely affected. It +is to be noted that he knew very little of Heyst. He was one of those +whom Heyst's finished courtesy of attitude and intonation most strongly +disconcerted. He himself was a fellow of fine feeling, I think, though +of course he had no more polish than the rest of us. We were naturally +a hail-fellow-well-met crowd, with standards of our own--no worse, I +daresay, than other people's; but polish was not one of them. Davidson's +fineness was real enough to alter the course of the steamer he +commanded. Instead of passing to the south of Samburan, he made it his +practice to take the passage along the north shore, within about a mile +of the wharf. + +“He can see us if he likes to see us,” remarked Davidson. Then he had an +afterthought: “I say! I hope he won't think I am intruding, eh?” + +We reassured him on the point of correct behaviour. The sea is open to +all. + +This slight deviation added some ten miles to Davidson's round trip, but +as that was sixteen hundred miles it did not matter much. + +“I have told my owner of it,” said the conscientious commander of the +Sissie. + +His owner had a face like an ancient lemon. He was small and +wizened--which was strange, because generally a Chinaman, as he grows in +prosperity, puts on inches of girth and stature. To serve a Chinese firm +is not so bad. Once they become convinced you deal straight by them, +their confidence becomes unlimited. You can do no wrong. So Davidson's +old Chinaman squeaked hurriedly: + +“All right, all right, all right. You do what you like, captain--” + +And there was an end of the matter; not altogether, though. From time to +time the Chinaman used to ask Davidson about the white man. He was still +there, eh? + +“I never see him,” Davidson had to confess to his owner, who would peer +at him silently through round, horn-rimmed spectacles, several sizes too +large for his little old face. “I never see him.” + +To me, on occasions he would say: + +“I haven't a doubt he's there. He hides. It's very unpleasant.” Davidson +was a little vexed with Heyst. “Funny thing,” he went on. “Of all the +people I speak to, nobody ever asks after him but that Chinaman of +mine--and Schomberg,” he added after a while. + +Yes, Schomberg, of course. He was asking everybody about everything, and +arranging the information into the most scandalous shape his imagination +could invent. From time to time he would step up, his blinking, +cushioned eyes, his thick lips, his very chestnut beard, looking full of +malice. + +“Evening, gentlemen. Have you got all you want? So! Good! Well, I am +told the jungle has choked the very sheds in Black Diamond Bay. Fact. +He's a hermit in the wilderness now. But what can this manager get to +eat there? It beats me.” + +Sometimes a stranger would inquire with natural curiosity: + +“Who? What manager?” + +“Oh, a certain Swede,”--with a sinister emphasis, as if he were saying +“a certain brigand.” “Well known here. He's turned hermit from shame. +That's what the devil does when he's found out.” + +Hermit. This was the latest of the more or less witty labels applied +to Heyst during his aimless pilgrimage in this section of the tropical +belt, where the inane clacking of Schomberg's tongue vexed our ears. + +But apparently Heyst was not a hermit by temperament. The sight of his +land was not invincibly odious to him. We must believe this, since +for some reason or other he did come out from his retreat for a while. +Perhaps it was only to see whether there were any letters for him at the +Tesmans. I don't know. No one knows. But this reappearance shows that +his detachment from the world was not complete. And incompleteness of +any sort leads to trouble. Axel Heyst ought not to have cared for his +letters--or whatever it was that brought him out after something more +than a year and a half in Samburan. But it was of no use. He had not the +hermit's vocation! That was the trouble, it seems. + +Be this as it may, he suddenly reappeared in the world, broad chest, +bald forehead, long moustaches, polite manner, and all--the complete +Heyst, even to the kindly sunken eyes on which there still rested the +shadow of Morrison's death. Naturally, it was Davidson who had given him +a lift out of his forsaken island. There were no other opportunities, +unless some native craft were passing by--a very remote and +unsatisfactory chance to wait for. Yes, he came out with Davidson, to +whom he volunteered the statement that it was only for a short time--a +few days, no more. He meant to go back to Samburan. + +Davidson expressing his horror and incredulity of such foolishness, +Heyst explained that when the company came into being he had his few +belongings sent out from Europe. + +To Davidson, as to any of us, the idea of Heyst, the wandering drifting, +unattached Heyst, having any belongings of the sort that can furnish a +house was startlingly novel. It was grotesquely fantastic. It was like a +bird owning real property. + +“Belongings? Do you mean chairs and tables?” Davidson asked with +unconcealed astonishment. + +Heyst did mean that. “My poor father died in London. It has been all +stored there ever since,” he explained. + +“For all these years?” exclaimed Davidson, thinking how long we all had +known Heyst flitting from tree to tree in a wilderness. + +“Even longer,” said Heyst, who had understood very well. + +This seemed to imply that he had been wandering before he came under our +observation. In what regions? And what early age? Mystery. Perhaps he +was a bird that had never had a nest. + +“I left school early,” he remarked once to Davidson, on the passage. “It +was in England. A very good school. I was not a shining success there.” + +The confessions of Heyst. Not one of us--with the probable exception of +Morrison, who was dead--had ever heard so much of his history. It +looks as if the experience of hermit life had the power to loosen one's +tongue, doesn't it? + +During that memorable passage, in the Sissie, which took about two days, +he volunteered other hints--for you could not call it information--about +his history. And Davidson was interested. He was interested not because +the hints were exciting but because of that innate curiosity about our +fellows which is a trait of human nature. Davidson's existence, too, +running the Sissie along the Java Sea and back again, was distinctly +monotonous and, in a sense, lonely. He never had any sort of company on +board. Native deck-passengers in plenty, of course, but never a white +man, so the presence of Heyst for two days must have been a godsend. +Davidson was telling us all about it afterwards. Heyst said that his +father had written a lot of books. He was a philosopher. + +“Seems to me he must have been something of a crank, too,” was +Davidson's comment. “Apparently he had quarrelled with his people in +Sweden. Just the sort of father you would expect Heyst to have. Isn't +he a bit of a crank himself? He told me that directly his father died he +lit out into the wide world on his own, and had been on the move till he +fetched up against this famous coal business. Fits the son of the father +somehow, don't you think?” + +For the rest, Heyst was as polite as ever. He offered to pay for his +passage; but when Davidson refused to hear of it he seized him heartily +by the hand, gave one of his courtly bows, and declared that he was +touched by his friendly proceedings. + +“I am not alluding to this trifling amount which you decline to take,” + he went on, giving a shake to Davidson's hand. “But I am touched by your +humanity.” Another shake. “Believe me, I am profoundly aware of having +been an object of it.” Final shake of the hand. All this meant that +Heyst understood in a proper sense the little Sissie's periodic +appearance in sight of his hermitage. + +“He's a genuine gentleman,” Davidson said to us. “I was really sorry +when he went ashore.” + +We asked him where he had left Heyst. + +“Why, in Sourabaya--where else?” + +The Tesmans had their principal counting-house in Sourabaya. There had +long existed a connection between Heyst and the Tesmans. The incongruity +of a hermit having agents did not strike us, nor yet the absurdity of a +forgotten cast-off, derelict manager of a wrecked, collapsed, vanished +enterprise, having business to attend to. We said Sourabaya, of course, +and took it for granted that he would stay with one of the Tesmans. +One of us even wondered what sort of reception he would get; for it was +known that Julius Tesman was unreasonably bitter about the Tropical +Belt Coal fiasco. But Davidson set us right. It was nothing of the +kind. Heyst went to stay in Schomberg's hotel, going ashore in the hotel +launch. Not that Schomberg would think of sending his launch alongside +a mere trader like the Sissie. But she had been meeting a coasting +mail-packet, and had been signalled to. Schomberg himself was steering +her. + +“You should have seen Schomberg's eyes bulge out when Heyst jumped in +with an ancient brown leather bag!” said Davidson. “He pretended not +to know who it was--at first, anyway. I didn't go ashore with them. We +didn't stay more than a couple of hours altogether. Landed two thousand +coconuts and cleared out. I have agreed to pick him up again on my next +trip in twenty days' time.” + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +Davidson happened to be two days late on his return trip; no great +matter, certainly, but he made a point of going ashore at once, during +the hottest hour of the afternoon, to look for Heyst. Schomberg's hotel +stood back in an extensive enclosure containing a garden, some large +trees, and, under their spreading boughs, a detached “hall available +for concerts and other performances,” as Schomberg worded it in his +advertisements. Torn, and fluttering bills, intimating in heavy red +capitals CONCERTS EVERY NIGHT, were stuck on the brick pillars on each +side of the gateway. + +The walk had been long and confoundedly sunny. Davidson stood wiping his +wet neck and face on what Schomberg called “the piazza.” Several doors +opened on to it, but all the screens were down. Not a soul was in sight, +not even a China boy--nothing but a lot of painted iron chairs and +tables. Solitude, shade, and gloomy silence--and a faint, treacherous +breeze which came from under the trees and quite unexpectedly caused the +melting Davidson to shiver slightly--the little shiver of the tropics +which in Sourabaya, especially, often means fever and the hospital to +the incautious white man. + +The prudent Davidson sought shelter in the nearest darkened room. In the +artificial dusk, beyond the levels of shrouded billiard-tables, a white +form heaved up from two chairs on which it had been extended. The middle +of the day, table d'hote tiffin once over, was Schomberg's easy time. He +lounged out, portly, deliberate, on the defensive, the great fair beard +like a cuirass over his manly chest. He did not like Davidson, never a +very faithful client of his. He hit a bell on one of the tables as he +went by, and asked in a distant, Officer-in-Reserve manner: + +“You desire?” + +The good Davidson, still sponging his wet neck, declared with simplicity +that he had come to fetch away Heyst, as agreed. + +“Not here!” + +A Chinaman appeared in response to the bell. Schomberg turned to him +very severely: + +“Take the gentleman's order.” + +Davidson had to be going. Couldn't wait--only begged that Heyst should +be informed that the Sissie would leave at midnight. + +“Not--here, I am telling you!” + +Davidson slapped his thigh in concern. + +“Dear me! Hospital, I suppose.” A natural enough surmise in a very +feverish locality. + +The Lieutenant of the Reserve only pursed up his mouth and raised his +eyebrows without looking at him. It might have meant anything, but +Davidson dismissed the hospital idea with confidence. However, he had to +get hold of Heyst between this and midnight: + +“He has been staying here?” he asked. + +“Yes, he was staying here.” + +“Can you tell me where he is now?” Davidson went on placidly. Within +himself he was beginning to grow anxious, having developed the affection +of a self-appointed protector towards Heyst. The answer he got was: + +“Can't tell. It's none of my business,” accompanied by majestic +oscillations of the hotel-keeper's head, hinting at some awful mystery. + +Davidson was placidity itself. It was his nature. He did not betray his +sentiments, which were not favourable to Schomberg. + +“I am sure to find out at the Tesmans' office,” he thought. But it was +a very hot hour, and if Heyst was down at the port he would have learned +already that the Sissie was in. It was even possible that Heyst had +already gone on board, where he could enjoy a coolness denied to the +town. Davidson, being stout, was much preoccupied with coolness and +inclined to immobility. He lingered awhile, as if irresolute. Schomberg, +at the door, looking out, affected perfect indifference. He could not +keep it up, though. Suddenly he turned inward and asked with brusque +rage: + +“You wanted to see him?” + +“Why, yes,” said Davidson. “We agreed to meet--” + +“Don't you bother. He doesn't care about that now.” + +“Doesn't he?” + +“Well, you can judge for yourself. He isn't here, is he? You take my +word for it. Don't you bother about him. I am advising you as a friend.” + +“Thank you,” said, Davidson, inwardly startled at the savage tone. “I +think I will sit down for a moment and have a drink, after all.” + +This was not what Schomberg had expected to hear. He called brutally: + +“Boy!” + +The Chinaman approached, and after referring him to the white man by a +nod the hotel-keeper departed, muttering to himself. Davidson heard him +gnash his teeth as he went. + +Davidson sat alone with the billiard-tables as if there had been not a +soul staying in the hotel. His placidity was so genuine that he was not +unduly, fretting himself over the absence of Heyst, or the mysterious +manners Schomberg had treated him to. He was considering these things in +his own fairly shrewd way. Something had happened; and he was loath to +go away to investigate, being restrained by a presentiment that somehow +enlightenment would come to him there. A poster of CONCERTS EVERY +EVENING, like those on the gate, but in a good state of preservation, +hung on the wall fronting him. He looked at it idly and was struck by +the fact--then not so very common--that it was a ladies' orchestra; +“Zangiacomo's eastern tour--eighteen performers.” The poster stated +that they had had the honour of playing their select repertoire before +various colonial excellencies, also before pashas, sheiks, chiefs, H. H. +the Sultan of Mascate, etc., etc. + +Davidson felt sorry for the eighteen lady-performers. He knew what that +sort of life was like, the sordid conditions and brutal incidents of +such tours led by such Zangiacomos who often were anything but musicians +by profession. While he was staring at the poster, a door somewhere at +his back opened, and a woman came in who was looked upon as Schomberg's +wife, no doubt with truth. As somebody remarked cynically once, she was +too unattractive to be anything else. The opinion that he treated her +abominably was based on her frightened expression. Davidson lifted his +hat to her. Mrs. Schomberg gave him an inclination of her sallow head +and incontinently sat down behind a sort of raised counter, facing the +door, with a mirror and rows of bottles at her back. Her hair was very +elaborately done with two ringlets on the left side of her scraggy neck; +her dress was of silk, and she had come on duty for the afternoon. For +some reason or other Schomberg exacted this from her, though she added +nothing to the fascinations of the place. She sat there in the smoke and +noise, like an enthroned idol, smiling stupidly over the billiards from +time to time, speaking to no one, and no one speaking to her. Schomberg +himself took no more interest in her than may be implied in a sudden +and totally unmotived scowl. Otherwise the very Chinamen ignored her +existence. + +She had interrupted Davidson in his reflections. Being alone with her, +her silence and open-eyed immobility made him uncomfortable. He was +easily sorry for people. It seemed rude not to take any notice of her. +He said, in allusion to the poster: + +“Are you having these people in the house?” + +She was so unused to being addressed by customers that at the sound of +his voice she jumped in her seat. Davidson was telling us afterwards +that she jumped exactly like a figure made of wood, without losing her +rigid immobility. She did not even move her eyes; but she answered him +freely, though her very lips seemed made of wood. + +“They stayed here over a month. They are gone now. They played every +evening.” + +“Pretty good, were they?” + +To this she said nothing; and as she kept on staring fixedly in front +of her, her silence disconcerted Davidson. It looked as if she had not +heard him--which was impossible. Perhaps she drew the line of speech +at the expression of opinions. Schomberg might have trained her, for +domestic reasons, to keep them to herself. But Davidson felt in honour +obliged to converse; so he said, putting his own interpretation on this +surprising silence: + +“I see--not much account. Such bands hardly ever are. An Italian lot, +Mrs. Schomberg, to judge by the name of the boss?” + +She shook her head negatively. + +“No. He is a German really; only he dyes his hair and beard black for +business. Zangiacomo is his business name.” + +“That's a curious fact,” said Davidson. His head being full of Heyst, it +occurred to him that she might be aware of other facts. This was a very +amazing discovery to anyone who looked at Mrs. Schomberg. Nobody had +ever suspected her of having a mind. I mean even a little of it, I mean +any at all. One was inclined to think of her as an It--an automaton, a +very plain dummy, with an arrangement for bowing the head at times +and smiling stupidly now and then. Davidson viewed her profile with a +flattened nose, a hollow cheek, and one staring, unwinking, goggle eye. +He asked himself: Did that speak just now? Will it speak again? It was +as exciting, for the mere wonder of it, as trying to converse with a +mechanism. A smile played about the fat features of Davidson; the smile +of a man making an amusing experiment. He spoke again to her: + +“But the other members of that orchestra were real Italians, were they +not?” + +Of course, he didn't care. He wanted to see whether the mechanism would +work again. It did. It said they were not. They were of all sorts, +apparently. It paused, with the one goggle eye immovably gazing down +the whole length of the room and through the door opening on to the +“piazza.” It paused, then went on in the same low pitch: + +“There was even one English girl.” + +“Poor devil!”--said Davidson, “I suppose these women are not much better +than slaves really. Was that fellow with the dyed beard decent in his +way?” + +The mechanism remained silent. The sympathetic soul of Davidson drew its +own conclusions. + +“Beastly life for these women!” he said. “When you say an English girl, +Mrs. Schomberg, do you really mean a young girl? Some of these orchestra +girls are no chicks.” + +“Young enough,” came the low voice out of Mrs. Schomberg's unmoved +physiognomy. + +Davidson, encouraged, remarked that he was sorry for her. He was easily +sorry for people. + +“Where did they go to from here?” he asked. + +“She did not go with them. She ran away.” + +This was the pronouncement Davidson obtained next. It introduced a new +sort of interest. + +“Well! Well!” he exclaimed placidly; and then, with the air of a man who +knows life: “Who with?” he inquired with assurance. + +Mrs. Schomberg's immobility gave her an appearance of listening +intently. Perhaps she was really listening; but Schomberg must have been +finishing his sleep in some distant part of the house. The silence was +profound, and lasted long enough to become startling. Then, enthroned +above Davidson, she whispered at last: + +“That friend of yours.” + +“Oh, you know I am here looking for a friend,” said Davidson hopefully. +“Won't you tell me--” + +“I've told you” + +“Eh?” + +A mist seemed to roll away from before Davidson's eyes, disclosing +something he could not believe. + +“You can't mean it!” he cried. “He's not the man for it.” But the last +words came out in a faint voice. Mrs. Schomberg never moved her head the +least bit. Davidson, after the shock which made him sit up, went slack +all over. + +“Heyst! Such a perfect gentleman!” he exclaimed weakly. + +Mrs. Schomberg did not seem to have heard him. This startling fact did +not tally somehow with the idea Davidson had of Heyst. He never talked +of women, he never seemed to think of them, or to remember that they +existed; and then all at once--like this! Running off with a casual +orchestra girl! + +“You might have knocked me down with a feather,” Davidson told us some +time afterwards. + +By then he was taking an indulgent view of both the parties to that +amazing transaction. First of all, on reflection, he was by no means +certain that it prevented Heyst from being a perfect gentleman, as +before. He confronted our open grins or quiet smiles with a serious +round face. Heyst had taken the girl away to Samburan; and that was +no joking matter. The loneliness, the ruins of the spot, had impressed +Davidson's simple soul. They were incompatible with the frivolous +comments of people who had not seen it. That black jetty, sticking out +of the jungle into the empty sea; these roof-ridges of deserted houses +peeping dismally above the long grass! Ough! The gigantic and funereal +blackboard sign of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, still emerging from a +wild growth of bushes like an inscription stuck above a grave figured by +the tall heap of unsold coal at the shore end of the wharf, added to the +general desolation. + +Thus was the sensitive Davidson. The girl must have been miserable +indeed to follow such a strange man to such a spot. Heyst had, no doubt, +told her the truth. He was a gentleman. But no words could do justice to +the conditions of life on Samburan. A desert island was nothing to it. +Moreover, when you were cast away on a desert island--why, you could not +help yourself; but to expect a fiddle-playing girl out of an ambulant +ladies' orchestra to remain content there for a day, for one single day, +was inconceivable. She would be frightened at the first sight of it. She +would scream. + +The capacity for sympathy in these stout, placid men! Davidson was +stirred to the depths; and it was easy to see that it was about Heyst +that he was concerned. We asked him if he had passed that way lately. + +“Oh, yes. I always do--about half a mile off.” + +“Seen anybody about?” + +“No, not a soul. Not a shadow.” + +“Did you blow your whistle?” + +“Blow the whistle? You think I would do such a thing?” + +He rejected the mere possibility of such an unwarrantable intrusion. +Wonderfully delicate fellow, Davidson! + +“Well, but how do you know that they are there?” he was naturally asked. + +Heyst had entrusted Mrs. Schomberg with a message for Davidson--a few +lines in pencil on a scrap of crumpled paper. It was to the effect: that +an unforeseen necessity was driving him away before the appointed time. +He begged Davidson's indulgence for the apparent discourtesy. The woman +of the house--meaning Mrs. Schomberg--would give him the facts, though +unable to explain them, of course. + +“What was there to explain?” wondered Davidson dubiously. + +“He took a fancy to that fiddle-playing girl, and--” + +“And she to him, apparently,” I suggested. + +“Wonderfully quick work,” reflected Davidson. “What do you think will +come of it?” + +“Repentance, I should say. But how is it that Mrs. Schomberg has been +selected for a confidante?” + +For indeed a waxwork figure would have seemed more useful than that +woman whom we all were accustomed to see sitting elevated above the two +billiard-tables--without expression, without movement, without voice, +without sight. + +“Why, she helped the girl to bolt,” said Davidson turning at me his +innocent eyes, rounded by the state of constant amazement in which +this affair had left him, like those shocks of terror or sorrow which +sometimes leave their victim afflicted by nervous trembling. It looked +as though he would never get over it. + +“Mrs. Schomberg jerked Heyst's note, twisted like a pipe-light, into my +lap while I sat there unsuspecting,” Davidson went on. “Directly I had +recovered my senses, I asked her what on earth she had to do with it +that Heyst should leave it with her. And then, behaving like a painted +image rather than a live woman, she whispered, just loud enough for me +to hear: + +“I helped them. I got her things together, tied them up in my own shawl, +and threw them into the compound out of a back window. I did it.” + +“That woman that you would say hadn't the pluck to lift her little +finger!” marvelled Davidson in his quiet, slightly panting voice. “What +do you think of that?” + +I thought she must have had some interest of her own to serve. She was +too lifeless to be suspected of impulsive compassion. It was impossible +to think that Heyst had bribed her. Whatever means he had, he had +not the means to do that. Or could it be that she was moved by +that disinterested passion for delivering a woman to a man which in +respectable spheres is called matchmaking?--a highly irregular example +of it! + +“It must have been a very small bundle,” remarked Davidson further. + +“I imagine the girl must have been specially attractive,” I said. + +“I don't know. She was miserable. I don't suppose it was more than +a little linen and a couple of those white frocks they wear on the +platform.” + +Davidson pursued his own train of thought. He supposed that such a thing +had never been heard of in the history of the tropics. For where could +you find anyone to steal a girl out of an orchestra? No doubt fellows +here and there took a fancy to some pretty one--but it was not for +running away with her. Oh dear no! It needed a lunatic like Heyst. + +“Only think what it means,” wheezed Davidson, imaginative under his +invincible placidity. “Just only try to think! Brooding alone on +Samburan has upset his brain. He never stopped to consider, or he +couldn't have done it. No sane man . . . How is a thing like that to go +on? What's he going to do with her in the end? It's madness.” + +“You say that he's mad. Schomberg tells us that he must be starving on +his island; so he may end yet by eating her,” I suggested. + +Mrs. Schomberg had had no time to enter into details, Davidson told us. +Indeed, the wonder was that they had been left alone so long. The +drowsy afternoon was slipping by. Footsteps and voices resounded on the +veranda--I beg pardon, the piazza; the scraping of chairs, the ping of +a smitten bell. Customers were turning up. Mrs. Schomberg was begging +Davidson hurriedly, but without looking at him, to say nothing to +anyone, when on a half-uttered word her nervous whisper was cut short. +Through a small inner door Schomberg came in, his hair brushed, his +beard combed neatly, but his eyelids still heavy from his nap. He looked +with suspicion at Davidson, and even glanced at his wife; but he was +baffled by the natural placidity of the one and the acquired habit of +immobility in the other. + +“Have you sent out the drinks?” he asked surlily. + +She did not open her lips, because just then the head boy appeared with +a loaded tray, on his way out. Schomberg went to the door and greeted +the customers outside, but did not join them. He remained blocking +half the doorway, with his back to the room, and was still there when +Davidson, after sitting still for a while, rose to go. At the noise +he made Schomberg turned his head, watched him lift his hat to Mrs. +Schomberg and receive her wooden bow accompanied by a stupid grin, and +then looked away. He was loftily dignified. Davidson stopped at the +door, deep in his simplicity. + +“I am sorry you won't tell me anything about my friend's absence,” he +said. “My friend Heyst, you know. I suppose the only course for me now +is to make inquiries down at the port. I shall hear something there, I +don't doubt.” + +“Make inquiries of the devil!” replied Schomberg in a hoarse mutter. + +Davidson's purpose in addressing the hotel-keeper had been mainly to +make Mrs. Schomberg safe from suspicion; but he would fain have heard +something more of Heyst's exploit from another point of view. It was +a shrewd try. It was successful in a rather startling way, because the +hotel-keeper's point of view was horribly abusive. All of a sudden, in +the same hoarse sinister tone, he proceeded to call Heyst many names, of +which “pig-dog” was not the worst, with such vehemence that he actually +choked himself. Profiting from the pause, Davidson, whose temperament +could withstand worse shocks, remonstrated in an undertone: + +“It's unreasonable to get so angry as that. Even if he had run off with +your cash-box--” + +The big hotel-keeper bent down and put his infuriated face close to +Davidson's. + +“My cash-box! My--he--look here, Captain Davidson! He ran off with a +girl. What do I care for the girl? The girl is nothing to me.” + +He shot out an infamous word which made Davidson start. That's what the +girl was; and he reiterated the assertion that she was nothing to him. +What he was concerned for was the good name of his house. Wherever he +had been established, he had always had “artist parties” staying in his +house. One recommended him to the others; but what would happen now, +when it got about that leaders ran the risk in his house--his house--of +losing members of their troupe? And just now, when he had spent seven +hundred and thirty-four guilders in building a concert-hall in his +compound. Was that a thing to do in a respectable hotel? The cheek, the +indecency, the impudence, the atrocity! Vagabond, impostor, swindler, +ruffian, schwein-hund! + +He had seized Davidson by a button of his coat, detaining him in +the doorway, and exactly in the line of Mrs. Schomberg's stony gaze. +Davidson stole a glance in that direction and thought of making some +sort of reassuring sign to her, but she looked so bereft of senses, and +almost of life, perched up there, that it seemed not worth while. +He disengaged his button with firm placidity. Thereupon, with a last +stifled curse, Schomberg vanished somewhere within, to try and compose +his spirits in solitude. Davidson stepped out on the veranda. The party +of customers there had become aware of the explosive interlude in the +doorway. Davidson knew one of these men, and nodded to him in passing; +but his acquaintance called out: + +“Isn't he in a filthy temper? He's been like that ever since.” + +The speaker laughed aloud, while all the others sat smiling. Davidson +stopped. + +“Yes, rather.” His feelings were, he told us, those of bewildered +resignation; but of course that was no more visible to the others than +the emotions of a turtle when it withdraws into its shell. + +“It seems unreasonable,” he murmured thoughtfully. + +“Oh, but they had a scrap!” the other said. + +“What do you mean? Was there a fight!--a fight with Heyst?” asked +Davidson, much perturbed, if somewhat incredulous. + +“Heyst? No, these two--the bandmaster, the fellow who's taking these +women about and our Schomberg. Signor Zangiacomo ran amuck in the +morning, and went for our worthy friend. I tell you, they were rolling +on the floor together on this very veranda, after chasing each other all +over the house, doors slamming, women screaming, seventeen of them, in +the dining-room; Chinamen up the trees. Hey, John? You climb tree to see +the fight, eh?” + +The boy, almond-eyed and impassive, emitted a scornful grunt, finished +wiping the table, and withdrew. + +“That's what it was--a real, go-as-you-please scrap. And Zangiacomo +began it. Oh, here's Schomberg. Say, Schomberg, didn't he fly at you, +when the girl was missed, because it was you who insisted that the +artists should go about the audience during the interval?” + +Schomberg had reappeared in the doorway. He advanced. His bearing +was stately, but his nostrils were extraordinarily expanded, and he +controlled his voice with apparent effort. + +“Certainly. That was only business. I quoted him special terms and +all for your sake, gentlemen. I was thinking of my regular customers. +There's nothing to do in the evenings in this town. I think, gentlemen, +you were all pleased at the opportunity of hearing a little good music; +and where's the harm of offering a grenadine, or what not, to a lady +artist? But that fellow--that Swede--he got round the girl. He got round +all the people out here. I've been watching him for years. You remember +how he got round Morrison.” + +He changed front abruptly, as if on parade, and marched off. The +customers at the table exchanged glances silently. Davidson's attitude +was that of a spectator. Schomberg's moody pacing of the billiard-room +could be heard on the veranda. + +“And the funniest part is,” resumed the man who had been speaking +before--an English clerk in a Dutch house--“the funniest part is that +before nine o'clock that same morning those two were driving together +in a gharry down to the port, to look for Heyst and the girl. I saw them +rushing around making inquiries. I don't know what they would have +done to the girl, but they seemed quite ready to fall upon your Heyst, +Davidson, and kill him on the quay.” + +He had never, he said, seen anything so queer. Those two investigators +working feverishly to the same end were glaring at each other with +surprising ferocity. In hatred and mistrust they entered a steam-launch, +and went flying from ship to ship all over the harbour, causing no end +of sensation. The captains of vessels, coming on shore later in the day, +brought tales of a strange invasion, and wanted to know who were the two +offensive lunatics in a steam-launch, apparently after a man and a girl, +and telling a story of which one could make neither head nor tail. Their +reception by the roadstead was generally unsympathetic, even to the +point of the mate of an American ship bundling them out over the rail +with unseemly precipitation. + +Meantime Heyst and the girl were a good few miles away, having gone in +the night on board one of the Tesman schooners bound to the eastward. +This was known afterwards from the Javanese boatmen whom Heyst hired +for the purpose at three o'clock in the morning. The Tesman schooner had +sailed at daylight with the usual land breeze, and was probably still in +sight in the offing at the time. However, the two pursuers after their +experience with the American mate, made for the shore. On landing, they +had another violent row in the German language. But there was no second +fight; and finally, with looks of fierce animosity, they got together +into a gharry--obviously with the frugal view of sharing expenses--and +drove away, leaving an astonished little crowd of Europeans and natives +on the quay. + +After hearing this wondrous tale, Davidson went away from the hotel +veranda, which was filling with Schomberg's regular customers. Heyst's +escapade was the general topic of conversation. Never before had that +unaccountable individual been the cause of so much gossip, he judged. +No! Not even in the beginnings of the Tropical Belt Coal Company when +becoming for a moment a public character was he the object of a silly +criticism and unintelligent envy for every vagabond and adventurer in +the islands. Davidson concluded that people liked to discuss that sort +of scandal better than any other. + +I asked him if he believed that this was such a great scandal after all. + +“Heavens, no!” said that excellent man who, himself, was incapable of +any impropriety of conduct. “But it isn't a thing I would have done +myself; I mean even if I had not been married.” + +There was no implied condemnation in the statement; rather something +like regret. Davidson shared my suspicion that this was in its essence +the rescue of a distressed human being. Not that we were two romantics, +tingeing the world to the hue of our temperament, but that both of us +had been acute enough to discover a long time ago that Heyst was. + +“I shouldn't have had the pluck,” he continued. “I see a thing all +round, as it were; but Heyst doesn't, or else he would have been scared. +You don't take a woman into a desert jungle without being made sorry for +it sooner or later, in one way or another; and Heyst being a gentleman +only makes it worse.” + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +We said no more about Heyst on that occasion, and it so happened that +I did not meet Davidson again for some three months. When we did come +together, almost the first thing he said to me was: + +“I've seen him.” + +Before I could exclaim, he assured me that he had taken no liberty, +that he had not intruded. He was called in. Otherwise he would not have +dreamed of breaking in upon Heyst's privacy. + +“I am certain you wouldn't,” I assured him, concealing my amusement at +his wonderful delicacy. He was the most delicate man that ever took a +small steamer to and fro among the islands. But his humanity, which was +not less strong and praiseworthy, had induced him to take his +steamer past Samburan wharf (at an average distance of a mile) every +twenty-three days--exactly. Davidson was delicate, humane, and regular. + +“Heyst called you in?” I asked, interested. + +Yes, Heyst had called him in as he was going by on his usual date. +Davidson was examining the shore through his glasses with his unwearied +and punctual humanity as he steamed past Samburan. + +I saw a man in white. It could only have been Heyst. He had fastened +some sort of enormous flag to a bamboo pole, and was waving it at the +end of the old wharf. + +Davidson didn't like to take his steamer alongside--for fear of being +indiscreet, I suppose; but he steered close inshore, stopped his +engines, and lowered a boat. He went himself in that boat, which was +manned, of course, by his Malay seamen. + +Heyst, when he saw the boat pulling towards him, dropped his +signalling-pole; and when Davidson arrived, he was kneeling down engaged +busily in unfastening the flag from it. + +“Was there anything wrong?” I inquired, Davidson having paused in his +narrative and my curiosity being naturally aroused. You must remember +that Heyst as the Archipelago knew him was not--what shall I say--was +not a signalling sort of man. + +“The very words that came out of my mouth,” said Davidson, “before I +laid the boat against the piles. I could not help it!” + +Heyst got up from his knees and began carefully folding up the flag +thing, which struck Davidson as having the dimensions of a blanket. + +“No, nothing wrong,” he cried. His white teeth flashed agreeably below +the coppery horizontal bar of his long moustaches. + +I don't know whether it was his delicacy or his obesity which prevented +Davidson from clambering upon the wharf. He stood up in the boat, +and, above him, Heyst stooped low with urbane smiles, thanking him and +apologizing for the liberty, exactly in his usual manner. Davidson had +expected some change in the man, but there was none. Nothing in him +betrayed the momentous fact that within that jungle there was a girl, a +performer in a ladies' orchestra, whom he had carried straight off the +concert platform into the wilderness. He was not ashamed or defiant +or abashed about it. He might have been a shade confidential when +addressing Davidson. And his words were enigmatical. + +“I took this course of signalling to you,” he said to Davidson, “because +to preserve appearances might be of the utmost importance. Not to me, of +course. I don't care what people may say, and of course no one can hurt +me. I suppose I have done a certain amount of harm, since I allowed +myself to be tempted into action. It seemed innocent enough, but all +action is bound to be harmful. It is devilish. That is why this world +is evil upon the whole. But I have done with it! I shall never lift a +little finger again. At one time I thought that intelligent observation +of facts was the best way of cheating the time which is allotted to us +whether we want it or not; but now I, have done with observation, too.” + +Imagine poor, simple Davidson being addressed in such terms alongside +an abandoned, decaying wharf jutting out of tropical bush. He had +never heard anybody speak like this before; certainly not Heyst, whose +conversation was concise, polite, with a faint ring of playfulness in +the cultivated tones of his voice. + +“He's gone mad,” Davidson thought to himself. + +But, looking at the physiognomy above him on the wharf, he was obliged +to dismiss the notion of common, crude lunacy. It was truly most unusual +talk. Then he remembered--in his surprise he had lost sight of it--that +Heyst now had a girl there. This bizarre discourse was probably the +effect of the girl. Davidson shook off the absurd feeling, and asked, +wishing to make clear his friendliness, and not knowing what else to +say: + +“You haven't run short of stores or anything like that?” + +Heyst smiled and shook his head: + +“No, no. Nothing of the kind. We are fairly well off here. Thanks, all +the same. If I have taken the liberty to detain you, it is not from any +uneasiness for myself and my--companion. The person I was thinking of +when I made up my mind to invoke your assistance is Mrs. Schomberg.” + +“I have talked with her,” interjected Davidson. + +“Oh! You? Yes, I hoped she would find means to--” + +“But she didn't tell me much,” interrupted Davidson, who was not averse +from hearing something--he hardly knew what. + +“H'm--Yes. But that note of mine? Yes? She found an opportunity to give +it to you? That's good, very good. She's more resourceful than one would +give her credit for.” + +“Women often are--” remarked Davidson. The strangeness from which he had +suffered, merely because his interlocutor had carried off a girl, wore +off as the minutes went by. “There's a lot of unexpectedness about +women,” he generalized with a didactic aim which seemed to miss its +mark; for the next thing Heyst said was: + +“This is Mrs. Schomberg's shawl.” He touched the stuff hanging over +his arm. “An Indian thing, I believe,” he added, glancing at his arm +sideways. + +“It isn't of particular value,” said Davidson truthfully. + +“Very likely. The point is that it belongs to Schomberg's wife. That +Schomberg seems to be an unconscionable ruffian--don't you think so?” + +Davidson smiled faintly. + +“We out here have got used to him,” he said, as if excusing a universal +and guilty toleration of a manifest nuisance. “I'd hardly call him that. +I only know him as a hotel-keeper.” + +“I never knew him even as that--not till this time, when you were so +obliging as to take me to Sourabaya, I went to stay there from economy. +The Netherlands House is very expensive, and they expect you to bring +your own servant with you. It's a nuisance.” + +“Of course, of course,” protested Davidson hastily. + +After a short silence Heyst returned to the matter of the shawl. He +wanted to send it back to Mrs. Schomberg. He said that it might be very +awkward for her if she were unable, if asked, to produce it. This had +given him, Heyst, much uneasiness. She was terrified of Schomberg. +Apparently she had reason to be. + +Davidson had remarked that, too. Which did not prevent her, he pointed +out, from making a fool of him, in a way, for the sake of a stranger. + +“Oh! You know!” said Heyst. “Yes, she helped me--us.” + +“She told me so. I had quite a talk with her,” Davidson informed him. +“Fancy anyone having a talk with Mrs. Schomberg! If I were to tell the +fellows they wouldn't believe me. How did you get round her, Heyst? +How did you think of it? Why, she looks too stupid to understand human +speech and too scared to shoo a chicken away. Oh, the women, the women! +You don't know what there may be in the quietest of them.” + +“She was engaged in the task of defending her position in life,” said +Heyst. “It's a very respectable task.” + +“Is that it? I had some idea it was that,” confessed Davidson. + +He then imparted to Heyst the story of the violent proceedings following +on the discovery of his flight. Heyst's polite attention to the tale +took on a sombre cast; but he manifested no surprise, and offered no +comment. When Davidson had finished he handed down the shawl into +the boat, and Davidson promised to do his best to return it to Mrs. +Schomberg in some secret fashion. Heyst expressed his thanks in a few +simple words, set off by his manner of finished courtesy. Davidson +prepared to depart. They were not looking at each other. Suddenly Heyst +spoke: + +“You understand that this was a case of odious persecution, don't you? I +became aware of it and--” + +It was a view which the sympathetic Davidson was capable of +appreciating. + +“I am not surprised to hear it,” he said placidly. “Odious enough, I +dare say. And you, of course--not being a married man--were free to step +in. Ah, well!” + +He sat down in the stern-sheets, and already had the steering lines in +his hands when Heyst observed abruptly: + +“The world is a bad dog. It will bite you if you give it a chance; but I +think that here we can safely defy the fates.” + +When relating all this to me, Davidson's only comment was: + +“Funny notion of defying the fates--to take a woman in tow!” + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +Some considerable time afterwards--we did not meet very often--I asked +Davidson how he had managed about the shawl and heard that he had +tackled his mission in a direct way, and had found it easy enough. At +the very first call he made in Samarang he rolled the shawl as tightly +as he could into the smallest possible brown-paper parcel, which he +carried ashore with him. His business in the town being transacted, +he got into a gharry with the parcel and drove to the hotel. With his +precious experience, he timed his arrival accurately for the hour of +Schomberg's siesta. Finding the place empty as on the former occasion, +he marched into the billiard-room, took a seat at the back, near the +sort of dais which Mrs. Schomberg would in due course come to occupy, +and broke the slumbering silence of the house by thumping a bell +vigorously. Of course a Chinaman appeared promptly. Davidson ordered a +drink and sat tight. + +“I would have ordered twenty drinks one after another, if necessary,” + he said--Davidson's a very abstemious man--“rather than take that parcel +out of the house again. Couldn't leave it in a corner without letting +the woman know it was there. It might have turned out worse for her than +not bringing the thing back at all.” + +And so he waited, ringing the bell again and again, and swallowing two +or three iced drinks which he did not want. Presently, as he hoped it +would happen, Mrs. Schomberg came in, silk dress, long neck, ringlets, +scared eyes, and silly grin--all complete. Probably that lazy beast had +sent her out to see who was the thirsty customer waking up the echoes of +the house at this quiet hour. Bow, nod--and she clambered up to her post +behind the raised counter, looking so helpless, so inane, as she sat +there, that if it hadn't been for the parcel, Davidson declared, he +would have thought he had merely dreamed all that had passed between +them. He ordered another drink, to get the Chinaman out of the room, and +then seized the parcel, which was reposing on a chair near him, and +with no more than a mutter--“this is something of yours”--he rammed it +swiftly into a recess in the counter, at her feet. There! The rest +was her affair. And just in time, too. Schomberg turned up, yawning +affectedly, almost before Davidson had regained his seat. He cast about +suspicious and irate glances. An invincible placidity of expression +helped Davidson wonderfully at the moment, and the other, of course, +could have no grounds for the slightest suspicion of any sort of +understanding between his wife and this customer. + +As to Mrs. Schomberg, she sat there like a joss. Davidson was lost in +admiration. He believed, now, that the woman had been putting it on +for years. She never even winked. It was immense! The insight he had +obtained almost frightened him; he couldn't get over his wonder at +knowing more of the real Mrs. Schomberg than anybody in the Islands, +including Schomberg himself. She was a miracle of dissimulation. No +wonder Heyst got the girl away from under two men's noses, if he had her +to help with the job! + +The greatest wonder, after all, was Heyst getting mixed up with +petticoats. The fellow's life had been open to us for years and nothing +could have been more detached from feminine associations. Except that he +stood drinks to people on suitable occasions, like any other man, this +observer of facts seemed to have no connection with earthly affairs and +passions. The very courtesy of his manner, the flavour of playfulness in +the voice set him apart. He was like a feather floating lightly in +the workaday atmosphere which was the breath of our nostrils. For this +reason whenever this looker-on took contact with things he attracted +attention. First, it was the Morrison partnership of mystery, then +came the great sensation of the Tropical Belt Coal where indeed varied +interests were involved: a real business matter. And then came this +elopement, this incongruous phenomenon of self-assertion, the greatest +wonder of all, astonishing and amusing. + +Davidson admitted to me that, the hubbub was subsiding; and the affair +would have been already forgotten, perhaps, if that ass Schomberg +had not kept on gnashing his teeth publicly about it. It was really +provoking that Davidson should not be able to give one some idea of the +girl. Was she pretty? He didn't know. He had stayed the whole afternoon +in Schomberg's hotel, mainly for the purpose of finding out something +about her. But the story was growing stale. The parties at the tables on +the veranda had other, fresher, events to talk about and Davidson shrank +from making direct inquiries. He sat placidly there, content to be +disregarded and hoping for some chance word to turn up. I shouldn't +wonder if the good fellow hadn't been dozing. It's difficult to give you +an adequate idea of Davidson's placidity. + +Presently Schomberg, wandering about, joined a party that had taken the +table next to Davidson's. + +“A man like that Swede, gentlemen, is a public danger,” he began. “I +remember him for years. I won't say anything of his spying--well, he +used to say himself he was looking for out-of-the-way facts and what is +that if not spying? He was spying into everybody's business. He got hold +of Captain Morrison, squeezed him dry, like you would an orange, and +scared him off to Europe to die there. Everybody knows that Captain +Morrison had a weak chest. Robbed first and murdered afterwards! I don't +mince words--not I. Next he gets up that swindle of the Belt Coal. You +know all about it. And now, after lining his pockets with other people's +money, he kidnaps a white girl belonging to an orchestra which is +performing in my public room for the benefit of my patrons, and goes +off to live like a prince on that island, where nobody can get at him. A +damn silly girl . . . It's disgusting--tfui!” + +He spat. He choked with rage--for he saw visions, no doubt. He jumped up +from his chair, and went away to flee from them--perhaps. He went into +the room where Mrs. Schomberg sat. Her aspect could not have been very +soothing to the sort of torment from which he was suffering. + +Davidson did not feel called upon to defend Heyst. His proceeding was to +enter into conversation with one and another, casually, and showing no +particular knowledge of the affair, in order to discover something about +the girl. Was she anything out of the way? Was she pretty? She couldn't +have been markedly so. She had not attracted special notice. She was +young--on that everybody agreed. The English clerk of Tesmans remembered +that she had a sallow face. He was respectable and highly proper. He +was not the sort to associate with such people. Most of these women were +fairly battered specimens. Schomberg had them housed in what he called +the Pavilion, in the grounds, where they were hard at it mending and +washing their white dresses, and could be seen hanging them out to dry +between the trees, like a lot of washerwomen. They looked very much +like middle-aged washerwomen on the platform, too. But the girl had +been living in the main building along with the boss, the director, the +fellow with the black beard, and a hard-bitten, oldish woman who took +the piano and was understood to be the fellow's wife. + +This was not a very satisfactory result. Davidson stayed on, and even +joined the table d'hote dinner, without gleaning any more information. +He was resigned. + +“I suppose,” he wheezed placidly, “I am bound to see her some day.” + +He meant to take the Samburan channel every trip, as before of course. + +“Yes,” I said. “No doubt you will. Some day Heyst will be signalling to +you again; and I wonder what it will be for.” + +Davidson made no reply. He had his own ideas about that, and his silence +concealed a good deal of thought. We spoke no more of Heyst's girl. +Before we separated, he gave me a piece of unrelated observation. + +“It's funny,” he said, “but I fancy there's some gambling going on +in the evening at Schomberg's place, on the quiet. I've noticed men +strolling away in twos and threes towards that hall where the orchestra +used to play. The windows must be specially well shuttered, because I +could not spy the smallest gleam of light from that direction; but I +can't believe that those beggars would go in there only to sit and think +of their sins in the dark.” + +“That's strange. It's incredible that Schomberg should risk that sort of +thing,” I said. + + + + + +PART TWO + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +As we know, Heyst had gone to stay in Schomberg's hotel in complete +ignorance that his person was odious to that worthy. When he arrived, +Zangiacomo's Ladies' Orchestra had been established there for some time. + +The business which had called him out from his seclusion in his lost +corner of the Eastern seas was with the Tesmans, and it had something +to do with money. He transacted it quickly, and then found himself with +nothing to do while he awaited Davidson, who was to take him back to his +solitude; for back to his solitude Heyst meant to go. He whom we used +to refer to as the Enchanted Heyst was suffering from thorough +disenchantment. Not with the islands, however. The Archipelago has a +lasting fascination. It is not easy to shake off the spell of island +life. Heyst was disenchanted with life as a whole. His scornful +temperament, beguiled into action, suffered from failure in a subtle way +unknown to men accustomed to grapple with the realities of common human +enterprise. It was like the gnawing pain of useless apostasy, a sort of +shame before his own betrayed nature; and in addition, he also suffered +from plain, downright remorse. He deemed himself guilty of Morrison's +death. A rather absurd feeling, since no one could possibly have +foreseen the horrors of the cold, wet summer lying in wait for poor +Morrison at home. + +It was not in Heyst's character to turn morose; but his mental state was +not compatible with a sociable mood. He spent his evenings sitting +apart on the veranda of Schomberg's hotel. The lamentations of string +instruments issued from the building in the hotel compound, the +approaches to which were decorated with Japanese paper lanterns strung +up between the trunks of several big trees. Scraps of tunes more or +less plaintive reached his ears. They pursued him even into his bedroom, +which opened into an upstairs veranda. The fragmentary and rasping +character of these sounds made their intrusion inexpressibly tedious in +the long run. Like most dreamers, to whom it is given sometimes to hear +the music of the spheres, Heyst, the wanderer of the Archipelago, had +a taste for silence which he had been able to gratify for years. The +islands are very quiet. One sees them lying about, clothed in their dark +garments of leaves, in a great hush of silver and azure, where the sea +without murmurs meets the sky in a ring of magic stillness. A sort of +smiling somnolence broods over them; the very voices of their people are +soft and subdued, as if afraid to break some protecting spell. + +Perhaps this was the very spell which had enchanted Heyst in the early +days. For him, however, that was broken. He was no longer enchanted, +though he was still a captive of the islands. He had no intention to +leave them ever. Where could he have gone to, after all these years? +Not a single soul belonging to him lived anywhere on earth. Of this +fact--not such a remote one, after all--he had only lately become aware; +for it is failure that makes a man enter into himself and reckon up his +resources. And though he had made up his mind to retire from the world +in hermit fashion, yet he was irrationally moved by this sense of +loneliness which had come to him in the hour of renunciation. It hurt +him. Nothing is more painful than the shock of sharp contradictions that +lacerate our intelligence and our feelings. + +Meantime Schomberg watched Heyst out of the corner of his eye. +Towards the unconscious object of his enmity he preserved a distant +lieutenant-of-the-Reserve demeanour. Nudging certain of his customers +with his elbow, he begged them to observe what airs “that Swede” was +giving himself. + +“I really don't know why he has come to stay in my house. This place +isn't good enough for him. I wish to goodness he had gone somewhere else +to show off his superiority. Here I have got up this series of concerts +for you gentlemen, just to make things a little brighter generally; and +do you think he'll condescend to step in and listen to a piece or two of +an evening? Not he. I know him of old. There he sits at the dark end of +the piazza, all the evening long--planning some new swindle, no doubt. +For two-pence I would ask him to go and look for quarters somewhere +else; only one doesn't like to treat a white man like that out in the +tropics. I don't know how long he means to stay, but I'm willing to bet +a trifle that he'll never work himself up to the point of spending the +fifty cents of entrance money for the sake of a little good music.” + +Nobody cared to bet, or the hotel-keeper would have lost. One evening +Heyst was driven to desperation by the rasped, squeaked, scraped +snatches of tunes pursuing him even to his hard couch, with a mattress +as thin as a pancake and a diaphanous mosquito net. He descended among +the trees, where the soft glow of Japanese lanterns picked out parts of +their great rugged trunks, here and there, in the great mass of darkness +under the lofty foliage. More lanterns, of the shape of cylindrical +concertinas, hanging in a row from a slack string, decorated the doorway +of what Schomberg called grandiloquently “my concert-hall.” In his +desperate mood Heyst ascended three steps, lifted a calico curtain, and +went in. + +The uproar in that small, barn-like structure, built of imported +pine boards, and raised clear of the ground, was simply stunning. An +instrumental uproar, screaming, grunting, whining, sobbing, scraping, +squeaking some kind of lively air; while a grand piano, operated upon +by a bony, red-faced woman with bad-tempered nostrils, rained hard notes +like hail through the tempest of fiddles. The small platform was filled +with white muslin dresses and crimson sashes slanting from shoulders +provided with bare arms, which sawed away without respite. Zangiacomo +conducted. He wore a white mess-jacket, a black dress waistcoat, and +white trousers. His longish, tousled hair and his great beard were +purple-black. He was horrible. The heat was terrific. There were perhaps +thirty people having drinks at several little tables. Heyst, quite +overcome by the volume of noise, dropped into a chair. In the quick time +of that music, in the varied, piercing clamour of the strings, in the +movements of the bare arms, in the low dresses, the coarse faces, +the stony eyes of the executants, there was a suggestion of +brutality--something cruel, sensual and repulsive. + +“This is awful!” Heyst murmured to himself. + +But there is an unholy fascination in systematic noise. He did not +flee from it incontinently, as one might have expected him to do. He +remained, astonished at himself for remaining, since nothing could have +been more repulsive to his tastes, more painful to his senses, and, +so to speak, more contrary to his genius, than this rude exhibition +of vigour. The Zangiacomo band was not making music; it was simply +murdering silence with a vulgar, ferocious energy. One felt as if +witnessing a deed of violence; and that impression was so strong that it +seemed marvellous to see the people sitting so quietly on their +chairs, drinking so calmly out of their glasses, and giving no signs +of distress, anger, or fear. Heyst averted his gaze from the unnatural +spectacle of their indifference. + +When the piece of music came to an end the relief was so great that he +felt slightly dizzy, as if a chasm of silence had yawned at his feet. +When he raised his eyes, the audience, most perversely, was exhibiting +signs of animation and interest in their faces, and the women in white +muslin dresses were coming down in pairs from the platform into the body +of Schomberg's “concert-hall.” They dispersed themselves all over the +place. The male creature with the hooked nose and purple-black beard +disappeared somewhere. This was the interval during which, as the astute +Schomberg had stipulated, the members of the orchestra were encouraged +to favour the members of the audience with their company--that is, such +members as seemed inclined to fraternize with the arts in a familiar and +generous manner; the symbol of familiarity and generosity consisting in +offers of refreshment. + +The procedure struck Heyst as highly incorrect. However, the impropriety +of Schomberg's ingenious scheme was defeated by the circumstance that +most of the women were no longer young, and that none of them had ever +been beautiful. Their more or less worn cheeks were slightly rouged, but +apart from that fact, which might have been simply a matter of routine, +they did not seem to take the success of the scheme unduly to heart. +The impulse to fraternize with the arts being obviously weak in the +audience, some of the musicians sat down listlessly at unoccupied +tables, while others went on perambulating the central passage: arm in +arm, glad enough, no doubt, to stretch their legs while resting their +arms. Their crimson sashes gave a factitious touch of gaiety to the +smoky atmosphere of the concert-hall; and Heyst felt a sudden pity for +these beings, exploited, hopeless, devoid of charm and grace, whose fate +of cheerless dependence invested their coarse and joyless features with +a touch of pathos. + +Heyst was temperamentally sympathetic. To have them passing and +repassing close to his little table was painful to him. He was preparing +to rise and go out when he noticed that two white muslin dresses and +crimson sashes had not yet left the platform. One of these dresses +concealed the raw-boned frame of the woman with the bad-tempered curve +to her nostrils. She was no less a personage than Mrs. Zangiacomo. She +had left the piano, and, with her back to the hall, was preparing the +parts for the second half of the concert, with a brusque, impatient +action of her ugly elbow. This task done, she turned, and, perceiving +the other white muslin dress motionless on a chair in the second row, +she strode towards it between the music-stands with an aggressive and +masterful gait. On the lap of that dress there lay, unclasped and idle, +a pair of small hands, not very white, attached to well-formed arms. +The next detail Heyst was led to observe was the arrangement of the +hair--two thick, brown tresses rolled round an attractively shaped head. + +“A girl, by Jove!” he exclaimed mentally. + +It was evident that she was a girl. It was evident in the outline of the +shoulders, in the slender white bust springing up, barred slantwise by +the crimson sash, from the bell-shaped spread of muslin skirt hiding the +chair on which she sat averted a little from the body of the hall. Her +feet, in low white shoes, were crossed prettily. + +She had captured Heyst's awakened faculty of observation; he had +the sensation of a new experience. That was because his faculty of +observation had never before been captured by any feminine creature in +that marked and exclusive fashion. He looked at her anxiously, as no man +ever looks at another man; and he positively forgot where he was. He had +lost touch with his surroundings. The big woman, advancing, concealed +the girl from his sight for a moment. She bent over the seated youthful +figure, in passing it very close, as if to drop a word into its ear. +Her lips did certainly move. But what sort of word could it have been +to make the girl jump up so swiftly? Heyst, at his table, was surprised +into a sympathetic start. He glanced quickly round. Nobody was looking +towards the platform; and when his eyes swept back there again, the +girl, with the big woman treading at her heels, was coming down the +three steps from the platform to the floor of the hall. There she +paused, stumbled one pace forward, and stood still again, while +the other--the escort, the dragoon, the coarse big woman of the +piano--passed her roughly, and, marching truculently down the centre +aisle between the chairs and tables, went out to rejoin the hook-nosed +Zangiacomo somewhere outside. During her extraordinary transit, as if +everything in the hall were dirt under her feet, her scornful eyes met +the upward glance of Heyst, who looked away at once towards the girl. +She had not moved. Her arms hung down; her eyelids were lowered. + +Heyst laid down his half-smoked cigar and compressed his lips. Then he +got up. It was the same sort of impulse which years ago had made him +cross the sandy street of the abominable town of Delli in the island of +Timor and accost Morrison, practically a stranger to him then, a man in +trouble, expressively harassed, dejected, lonely. + +It was the same impulse. But he did not recognize it. He was not +thinking of Morrison then. It may be said that, for the first time +since the final abandonment of the Samburan coal mine, he had completely +forgotten the late Morrison. It is true that to a certain extent he +had forgotten also where he was. Thus, unchecked by any sort of self +consciousness, Heyst walked up the central passage. + +Several of the women, by this time, had found anchorage here and there +among the occupied tables. They talked to the men, leaning on their +elbows, and suggesting funnily--if it hadn't been for the crimson +sashes--in their white dresses an assembly of middle-aged brides +with free and easy manners and hoarse voices. The murmuring noise +of conversations carried on with some spirit filled Schomberg's +concert-room. Nobody remarked Heyst's movements; for indeed he was not +the only man on his legs there. He had been confronting the girl for +some time before she became aware of his presence. She was looking down, +very still, without colour, without glances, without voice, without +movement. It was only when Heyst addressed her in his courteous tone +that she raised her eyes. + +“Excuse me,” he said in English, “but that horrible female has done +something to you. She has pinched you, hasn't she? I am sure she pinched +you just now, when she stood by your chair.” + +The girl received this overture with the wide, motionless stare of +profound astonishment. Heyst, vexed with himself, suspected that she did +not understand what he said. One could not tell what nationality these +women were, except that they were of all sorts. But she was astonished +almost more by the near presence of the man himself, by his largely +bald head, by the white brow, the sunburnt cheeks, the long, horizontal +moustaches of crinkly bronze hair, by the kindly expression of the man's +blue eyes looking into her own. He saw the stony amazement in hers +give way to a momentary alarm, which was succeeded by an expression of +resignation. + +“I am sure she pinched your arm most cruelly,” he murmured, rather +disconcerted now at what he had done. + +It was a great comfort to hear her say: + +“It wouldn't have been the first time. And suppose she did--what are you +going to do about it?” + +“I don't know,” he said with a faint, remote playfulness in his tone +which had not been heard in it lately, and which seemed to catch her +ear pleasantly. “I am grieved to say that I don't know. But can I do +anything? What would you wish me to do? Pray command me.” + +Again, the greatest astonishment became visible in her face; for she now +perceived how different he was from the other men in the room. He was as +different from them as she was different from the other members of the +ladies' orchestra. + +“Command you?” she breathed, after a time, in a bewildered tone. “Who +are you?” she asked a little louder. + +“I am staying in this hotel for a few days. I just dropped in casually +here. This outrage--” + +“Don't you try to interfere,” she said so earnestly that Heyst asked, in +his faintly playful tone: + +“Is it your wish that I should leave you?” + +“I haven't said that,” the girl answered. “She pinched me because I +didn't get down here quick enough--” + +“I can't tell you how indignant I am--” said Heyst. “But since you are +down here now,” he went on, with the ease of a man of the world speaking +to a young lady in a drawing-room, “hadn't we better sit down?” + +She obeyed his inviting gesture, and they sat down on the nearest +chairs. They looked at each other across a little round table with a +surprised, open gaze, self-consciousness growing on them so slowly that +it was a long time before they averted their eyes; and very soon they +met again, temporarily, only to rebound, as it were. At last they +steadied in contact, but by that time, say some fifteen minutes from the +moment when they sat down, the “interval” came to an end. + +So much for their eyes. As to the conversation, it had been perfectly +insignificant because naturally they had nothing to say to each other. +Heyst had been interested by the girl's physiognomy. Its expression was +neither simple nor yet very clear. It was not distinguished--that could +not be expected--but the features had more fineness than those of any +other feminine countenance he had ever had the opportunity to observe so +closely. There was in it something indefinably audacious and infinitely +miserable--because the temperament and the existence of that girl were +reflected in it. But her voice! It seduced Heyst by its amazing quality. +It was a voice fit to utter the most exquisite things, a voice which +would have made silly chatter supportable and the roughest talk +fascinating. Heyst drank in its charm as one listens to the tone of some +instrument without heeding the tune. + +“Do you sing as well as play?” he asked her abruptly. + +“Never sang a note in my life,” she said, obviously surprised by the +irrelevant question; for they had not been discoursing of sweet sounds. +She was clearly unaware of her voice. “I don't remember that I ever had +much reason to sing since I was little,” she added. + +That inelegant phrase, by the mere vibrating, warm nobility of the +sound, found its way into Heyst's heart. His mind, cool, alert, watched +it sink there with a sort of vague concern at the absurdity of +the occupation, till it rested at the bottom, deep down, where our +unexpressed longings lie. + +“You are English, of course?” he said. + +“What do you think?” she answered in the most charming accents. Then, as +if thinking that it was her turn to place a question: “Why do you always +smile when you speak?” + +It was enough to make anyone look grave, but her good faith was so +evident that Heyst recovered himself at once. + +“It's my unfortunate manner--” he said with his delicate, polished +playfulness. “Is is very objectionable to you?” + +She was very serious. + +“No. I only noticed it. I haven't come across so many pleasant people as +all that, in my life.” + +“It's certain that this woman who plays the piano is infinitely more +disagreeable than any cannibal I have ever had to do with.” + +“I believe you!” She shuddered. “How did you come to have anything to do +with cannibals?” + +“It would be too long a tale,” said Heyst with a faint smile. Heyst's +smiles were rather melancholy, and accorded badly with his great +moustaches, under which his mere playfulness lurked as comfortable as a +shy bird in its native thicket. “Much too long. How did you get amongst +this lot here?” + +“Bad luck,” she answered briefly. + +“No doubt, no doubt,” Heyst assented with slight nods. Then, still +indignant at the pinch which he had divined rather than actually seen +inflicted: “I say, couldn't you defend yourself somehow?” + +She had risen already. The ladies of the orchestra were slowly regaining +their places. Some were already seated, idle stony-eyed, before the +music-stands. Heyst was standing up, too. + +“They are too many for me,” she said. + +These few words came out of the common experience of mankind; yet by +virtue of her voice, they thrilled Heyst like a revelation. His feelings +were in a state of confusion, but his mind was clear. + +“That's bad. But it isn't actual ill-usage that this girl is complaining +of,” he thought lucidly after she left him. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +That was how it began. How it was that it ended, as we know it did end, +is not so easy to state precisely. It is very clear that Heyst was not +indifferent, I won't say to the girl, but to the girl's fate. He was +the same man who had plunged after the submerged Morrison whom he +hardly knew otherwise than by sight and through the usual gossip of the +islands. But this was another sort of plunge altogether, and likely to +lead to a very different kind of partnership. + +Did he reflect at all? Probably. He was sufficiently reflective. But +if he did, it was with insufficient knowledge. For there is no evidence +that he paused at any time between the date of that evening and the +morning of the flight. Truth to say, Heyst was not one of those men +who pause much. Those dreamy spectators of the world's agitation are +terrible once the desire to act gets hold of them. They lower their +heads and charge a wall with an amazing serenity which nothing but an +indisciplined imagination can give. + +He was not a fool. I suppose he knew--or at least he felt--where this +was leading him. But his complete inexperience gave him the necessary +audacity. The girl's voice was charming when she spoke to him of her +miserable past, in simple terms, with a sort of unconscious cynicism +inherent in the truth of the ugly conditions of poverty. And whether +because he was humane or because her voice included all the modulations +of pathos, cheerfulness, and courage in its compass, it was not disgust +that the tale awakened in him, but the sense of an immense sadness. + +On a later evening, during the interval between the two parts of the +concert, the girl told Heyst about herself. She was almost a child +of the streets. Her father was a musician in the orchestras of small +theatres. Her mother ran away from him while she was little, and the +landladies of various poor lodging-houses had attended casually to her +abandoned childhood. It was never positive starvation and absolute rags, +but it was the hopeless grip of poverty all the time. It was her father +who taught her to play the violin. It seemed that he used to get drunk +sometimes, but without pleasure, and only because he was unable to +forget his fugitive wife. After he had a paralytic stroke, falling +over with a crash in the well of a music-hall orchestra during the +performance, she had joined the Zangiacomo company. He was now in a home +for incurables. + +“And I am here,” she finished, “with no one to care if I make a hole in +the water the next chance I get or not.” + +Heyst told her that he thought she could do a little better than that, +if it was only a question of getting out of the world. She looked at him +with special attention, and with a puzzled expression which gave to her +face an air of innocence. + +This was during one of the “intervals” between the two parts of the +concert. She had come down that time without being incited thereto by a +pinch from the awful Zangiacomo woman. It is difficult to suppose that +she was seduced by the uncovered intellectual forehead and the long +reddish moustaches of her new friend. New is not the right word. She had +never had a friend before; and the sensation of this friendliness going +out to her was exciting by its novelty alone. Besides, any man who did +not resemble Schomberg appeared for that very reason attractive. She was +afraid of the hotel-keeper, who, in the daytime, taking advantage of the +fact that she lived in the hotel itself, and not in the Pavilion with +the other “artists” prowled round her, mute, hungry, portentous behind +his great beard, or else assailed her in quiet corners and empty +passages with deep, mysterious murmurs from behind, which, not +withstanding their clear import, sounded horribly insane somehow. + +The contrast of Heyst's quiet, polished manner gave her special delight +and filled her with admiration. She had never seen anything like that +before. If she had, perhaps, known kindness in her life, she had never +met the forms of simple courtesy. She was interested by it as a very +novel experience, not very intelligible, but distinctly pleasurable. + +“I tell you they are too many for me,” she repeated, sometimes +recklessly, but more often shaking her head with ominous dejection. + +She had, of course, no money at all. The quantities of “black men” all +about frightened her. She really had no definite idea where she was on +the surface of the globe. The orchestra was generally taken from the +steamer to some hotel, and kept shut up there till it was time to go on +board another steamer. She could not remember the names she heard. + +“How do you call this place again?” she used to ask Heyst. + +“Sourabaya,” he would say distinctly, and would watch the discouragement +at the outlandish sound coming into her eyes, which were fastened on his +face. + +He could not defend himself from compassion. He suggested that she might +go to the consul, but it was his conscience that dictated this advice, +not his conviction. She had never heard of the animal or of its uses. A +consul! What was it? Who was he? What could he do? And when she learned +that perhaps he could be induced to send her home, her head dropped on +her breast. + +“What am I to do when I get there?” she murmured with an intonation so +just, with an accent so penetrating--the charm of her voice did not fail +her even in whispering--that Heyst seemed to see the illusion of human +fellowship on earth vanish before the naked truth of her existence, and +leave them both face to face in a moral desert as arid as the sands of +Sahara, without restful shade, without refreshing water. + +She leaned slightly over the little table, the same little table at +which they had sat when they first met each other; and with no other +memories but of the stones in the streets her childhood had known, in +the distress of the incoherent, confused, rudimentary impressions of her +travels inspiring her with a vague terror of the world she said rapidly, +as one speaks in desperation: + +“You do something! You are a gentleman. It wasn't I who spoke to you +first, was it? I didn't begin, did I? It was you who came along and +spoke to me when I was standing over there. What did you want to speak +to me for? I don't care what it is, but you must do something.” + +Her attitude was fierce and entreating at the same time--clamorous, in +fact though her voice had hardly risen above a breath. It was clamorous +enough to be noticed. Heyst, on purpose, laughed aloud. She nearly +choked with indignation at this brutal heartlessness. + +“What did you mean, then, by saying 'command me!'?” she almost hissed. + +Something hard in his mirthless stare, and a quiet final “All right,” + steadied her. + +“I am not rich enough to buy you out,” he went on, speaking with an +extraordinary detached grin, “even if it were to be done; but I can +always steal you.” + +She looked at him profoundly, as though these words had a hidden and +very complicated meaning. + +“Get away now,” he said rapidly, “and try to smile as you go.” + +She obeyed with unexpected readiness; and as she had a set of very good +white teeth, the effect of the mechanical, ordered smile was joyous, +radiant. It astonished Heyst. No wonder, it flashed through his mind, +women can deceive men so completely. The faculty was inherent in them; +they seemed to be created with a special aptitude. Here was a smile +the origin of which was well known to him; and yet it had conveyed a +sensation of warmth, had given him a sort of ardour to live which was +very new to his experience. + +By this time she was gone from the table, and had joined the other +“ladies of the orchestra.” They trooped towards the platform, driven in +truculently by the haughty mate of Zangiacomo, who looked as though +she were restraining herself with difficulty from punching their backs. +Zangiacomo followed, with his great, pendulous dyed beard and short +mess-jacket, with an aspect of hang-dog concentration imparted by his +drooping head and the uneasiness of his eyes, which were set very close +together. He climbed the steps last of all, turned about, displaying +his purple beard to the hall, and tapped with his bow. Heyst winced in +anticipation of the horrible racket. It burst out immediately unabashed +and awful. At the end of the platform the woman at the piano, presenting +her cruel profile, her head tilted back, banged the keys without looking +at the music. + +Heyst could not stand the uproar for more than a minute. He went out, +his brain racked by the rhythm of some more or less Hungarian dance +music. The forests inhabited by the New Guinea cannibals where he had +encountered the most exciting of his earlier futile adventures were +silent. And this adventure, not in its execution, perhaps, but in its +nature, required even more nerve than anything he had faced before. +Walking among the paper lanterns suspended to trees he remembered with +regret the gloom and the dead stillness of the forests at the back of +Geelvink Bay, perhaps the wildest, the unsafest, the most deadly spot +on earth from which the sea can be seen. Oppressed by his thoughts, +he sought the obscurity and peace of his bedroom; but they were not +complete. The distant sounds of the concert reached his ear, faint +indeed, but still disturbing. Neither did he feel very safe in there; +for that sentiment depends not on extraneous circumstances but on our +inward conviction. He did not attempt to go to sleep; he did not even +unbutton the top button of his tunic. He sat in a chair and mused. +Formerly, in solitude and in silence, he had been used to think clearly +and sometimes even profoundly, seeing life outside the flattering +optical delusion of everlasting hope, of conventional self-deceptions, +of an ever-expected happiness. But now he was troubled; a light veil +seemed to hang before his mental vision; the awakening of a tenderness, +indistinct and confused as yet, towards an unknown woman. + +Gradually silence, a real silence, had established itself round him. The +concert was over; the audience had gone; the concert-hall was dark; and +even the Pavilion, where the ladies' orchestra slept after its noisy +labours, showed not a gleam of light. Heyst suddenly felt restless in +all his limbs, as this reaction from the long immobility would not be +denied, he humoured it by passing quietly along the back veranda and out +into the grounds at the side of the house, into the black shadows under +the trees, where the extinguished paper lanterns were gently swinging +their globes like withered fruit. + +He paced there to and fro for a long time, a calm, meditative ghost in +his white drill-suit, revolving in his head thoughts absolutely novel, +disquieting, and seductive; accustoming his mind to the contemplation +of his purpose, in order that by being faced steadily it should appear +praiseworthy and wise. For the use of reason is to justify the obscure +desires that move our conduct, impulses, passions, prejudices, and +follies, and also our fears. + +He felt that he had engaged himself by a rash promise to an action big +with incalculable consequences. And then he asked himself if the girl +had understood what he meant. Who could tell? He was assailed by all +sorts of doubts. Raising his head, he perceived something white flitting +between the trees. It vanished almost at once; but there could be no +mistake. He was vexed at being detected roaming like this in the middle +of the night. Who could that be? It never occurred to him that perhaps +the girl, too, would not be able to sleep. He advanced prudently. Then +he saw the white, phantom-like apparition again; and the next moment +all his doubts as to the state of her mind were laid at rest, because he +felt her clinging to him after the manner of supplicants all the world +over. Her whispers were so incoherent that he could not understand +anything; but this did not prevent him from being profoundly moved. He +had no illusions about her; but his sceptical mind was dominated by the +fulness of his heart. + +“Calm yourself, calm yourself,” he murmured in her ear, returning her +clasp at first mechanically, and afterwards with a growing appreciation +of her distressed humanity. The heaving of her breast and the trembling +of all her limbs, in the closeness of his embrace, seemed to enter his +body, to infect his very heart. While she was growing quieter in his +arms, he was becoming more agitated, as if there were only a fixed +quantity of violent emotion on this earth. The very night seemed +more dumb, more still, and the immobility of the vague, black shapes, +surrounding him more perfect. + +“It will be all right,” he tried to reassure her, with a tone of +conviction, speaking into her ear, and of necessity clasping her more +closely than before. + +Either the words or the action had a very good effect. He heard a light +sigh of relief. She spoke with a calmed ardour. + +“Oh, I knew it would be all right from the first time you spoke to me! +Yes, indeed, I knew directly you came up to me that evening. I knew it +would be all right, if you only cared to make it so; but of course I +could not tell if you meant it. 'Command me,' you said. Funny thing for +a man like you to say. Did you really mean it? You weren't making fun of +me?” + +He protested that he had been a serious person all his life. + +“I believe you,” she said ardently. He was touched by this declaration. +“It's the way you have of speaking as if you were amused with people,” + she went on. “But I wasn't deceived. I could see you were angry with +that beast of a woman. And you are clever. You spotted something at +once. You saw it in my face, eh? It isn't a bad face--say? You'll never +be sorry. Listen--I'm not twenty yet. It's the truth, and I can't be so +bad looking, or else--I will tell you straight that I have been worried +and pestered by fellows like this before. I don't know what comes to +them--” + +She was speaking hurriedly. She choked, and then exclaimed, with an +accent of despair: + +“What is it? What's the matter?” + +Heyst had removed his arms from her suddenly, and had recoiled a little. +“Is it my fault? I didn't even look at them, I tell you straight. Never! +Have I looked at you? Tell me. It was you that began it.” + +In truth, Heyst had shrunk from the idea of competition with fellows +unknown, with Schomberg the hotel-keeper. The vaporous white figure +before him swayed pitifully in the darkness. He felt ashamed of his +fastidiousness. + +“I am afraid we have been detected,” he murmured. “I think I saw +somebody on the path between the house and the bushes behind you.” + +He had seen no one. It was a compassionate lie, if there ever was one. +His compassion was as genuine as his shrinking had been, and in his +judgement more honourable. + +She didn't turn her head. She was obviously relieved. + +“Would it be that brute?” she breathed out, meaning Schomberg, of +course. “He's getting too forward with me now. What can you expect? Only +this evening, after supper, he--but I slipped away. You don't mind him, +do you? Why, I could face him myself now that I know you care for me. +A girl can always put up a fight. You believe me? Only it isn't easy to +stand up for yourself when you feel there's nothing and nobody at your +back. There's nothing so lonely in the world as a girl who has got to +look after herself. When I left poor dad in that home--it was in the +country, near a village--I came out of the gates with seven shillings +and threepence in my old purse, and my railway ticket. I tramped a mile, +and got into a train--” + +She broke off, and was silent for a moment. + +“Don't you throw me over now,” she went on. “If you did, what should +I do? I should have to live, to be sure, because I'd be afraid to kill +myself, but you would have done a thousand times worse than killing a +body. You told me you had been always alone, you had never had a dog +even. Well, then, I won't be in anybody's way if I live with you--not +even a dog's. And what else did you mean when you came up and looked at +me so close?” + +“Close? Did I?” he murmured unstirring before her in the profound +darkness. “So close as that?” + +She had an outbreak of anger and despair in subdued tones. + +“Have you forgotten, then? What did you expect to find? I know what sort +of girl I am; but all the same I am not the sort that men turn their +backs on--and you ought to know it, unless you aren't made like the +others. Oh, forgive me! You aren't like the others; you are like no one +in the world I ever spoke to. Don't you care for me? Don't you see--?” + +What he saw was that, white and spectral, she was putting out her arms +to him out of the black shadows like an appealing ghost. He took her +hands, and was affected, almost surprised, to find them so warm, so +real, so firm, so living in his grasp. He drew her to him, and she +dropped her head on his shoulder with a deep-sigh. + +“I am dead tired,” she whispered plaintively. + +He put his arms around her, and only by the convulsive movements of her +body became aware that she was sobbing without a sound. Sustaining her, +he lost himself in the profound silence of the night. After a while she +became still, and cried quietly. Then, suddenly, as if waking up, she +asked: + +“You haven't seen any more of that somebody you thought was spying +about?” + +He started at her quick, sharp whisper, and answered that very likely he +had been mistaken. + +“If it was anybody at all,” she reflected aloud, “it wouldn't have been +anyone but that hotel woman--the landlord's wife.” + +“Mrs. Schomberg,” Heyst said, surprised. + +“Yes. Another one that can't sleep o' nights. Why? Don't you see why? +Because, of course, she sees what's going on. That beast doesn't even +try to keep it from her. If she had only the least bit of spirit! She +knows how I feel, too, only she's too frightened even to look him in the +face, let alone open her mouth. He would tell her to go hang herself.” + +For some time Heyst said nothing. A public, active contest with the +hotel-keeper was not to be thought of. The idea was horrible. Whispering +gently to the girl, he tried to explain to her that as things stood, an +open withdrawal from the company would be probably opposed. She listened +to his explanation anxiously, from time to time pressing the hand she +had sought and got hold of in the dark. + +“As I told you, I am not rich enough to buy you out so I shall steal you +as soon as I can arrange some means of getting away from here. Meantime +it would be fatal to be seen together at night. We mustn't give +ourselves away. We had better part at once. I think I was mistaken just +now; but if, as you say, that poor Mrs. Schomberg can't sleep of nights, +we must be more careful. She would tell the fellow.” + +The girl had disengaged herself from his loose hold while he talked, and +now stood free of him, but still clasping his hand firmly. + +“Oh, no,” she said with perfect assurance. “I tell you she daren't open +her mouth to him. And she isn't as silly as she looks. She wouldn't give +us away. She knows a trick worth two of that. She'll help--that's what +she'll do, if she dares do anything at all.” + +“You seem to have a very clear view of the situation,” said Heyst, and +received a warm, lingering kiss for this commendation. + +He discovered that to part from her was not such an easy matter as he +had supposed it would be. + +“Upon my word,” he said before they separated, “I don't even know your +name.” + +“Don't you? They call me Alma. I don't know why. Silly name! Magdalen +too. It doesn't matter; you can call me by whatever name you choose. +Yes, you give me a name. Think of one you would like the sound +of--something quite new. How I should like to forget everything that has +gone before, as one forgets a dream that's done with, fright and all! I +would try.” + +“Would you really?” he asked in a murmur. “But that's not forbidden. I +understand that women easily forget whatever in their past diminishes +them in their eyes.” + +“It's your eyes that I was thinking of, for I'm sure I've never wished +to forget anything till you came up to me that night and looked me +through and through. I know I'm not much account; but I know how to +stand by a man. I stood by father ever since I could understand. He +wasn't a bad chap. Now that I can't be of any use to him, I would just +as soon forget all that and make a fresh start. But these aren't things +that I could talk to you about. What could I ever talk to you about?” + +“Don't let it trouble you,” Heyst said. “Your voice is enough. I am in +love with it, whatever it says.” + +She remained silent for a while, as if rendered breathless by this quiet +statement. + +“Oh! I wanted to ask you--” + +He remembered that she probably did not know his name, and expected the +question to be put to him now; but after a moment of hesitation she went +on: + +“Why was it that you told me to smile this evening in the concert-room +there--you remember?” + +“I thought we were being observed. A smile is the best of masks. +Schomberg was at a table next but one to us, drinking with some Dutch +clerks from the town. No doubt he was watching us--watching you, at +least. That's why I asked you to smile.” + +“Ah, that's why. It never came into my head!” + +“And you did it very well, too--very readily, as if you had understood +my intention.” + +“Readily!” she repeated. “Oh, I was ready enough to smile then. That's +the truth. It was the first time for years I may say that I felt +disposed to smile. I've not had many chances to smile in my life, I can +tell you; especially of late.” + +“But you do it most charmingly--in a perfectly fascinating way.” + +He paused. She stood still, waiting for more with the stillness of +extreme delight, wishing to prolong the sensation. + +“It astonished me,” he added. “It went as straight to my heart as though +you had smiled for the purpose of dazzling me. I felt as if I had never +seen a smile before in my life. I thought of it after I left you. It +made me restless.” + +“It did all that?” came her voice, unsteady, gentle, and incredulous. + +“If you had not smiled as you did, perhaps I should not have come out +here tonight,” he said, with his playful earnestness of tone. “It was +your triumph.” + +He felt her lips touch his lightly, and the next moment she was gone. +Her white dress gleamed in the distance, and then the opaque darkness of +the house seemed to swallow it. Heyst waited a little before he went the +same way, round the corner, up the steps of the veranda, and into his +room, where he lay down at last--not to sleep, but to go over in his +mind all that had been said at their meeting. + +“It's exactly true about that smile,” he thought. There he had spoken +the truth to her; and about her voice, too. For the rest--what must be +must be. + +A great wave of heat passed over him. He turned on his back, flung his +arms crosswise on the broad, hard bed, and lay still, open-eyed under +the mosquito net, till daylight entered his room, brightened swiftly, +and turned to unfailing sunlight. He got up then, went to a small +looking-glass hanging on the wall, and stared at himself steadily. It +was not a new-born vanity which induced this long survey. He felt +so strange that he could not resist the suspicion of his personal +appearance having changed during the night. What he saw in the glass, +however, was the man he knew before. It was almost a disappointment--a +belittling of his recent experience. And then he smiled at his +naiveness; for, being over five and thirty years of age, he ought to +have known that in most cases the body is the unalterable mask of the +soul, which even death itself changes but little, till it is put out of +sight where no changes matter any more, either to our friends or to our +enemies. + +Heyst was not conscious of either friends or of enemies. It was the very +essence of his life to be a solitary achievement, accomplished not by +hermit-like withdrawal with its silence and immobility, but by a system +of restless wandering, by the detachment of an impermanent dweller +amongst changing scenes. In this scheme he had perceived the means of +passing through life without suffering and almost without a single care +in the world--invulnerable because elusive. + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +For fifteen years Heyst had wandered, invariably courteous and +unapproachable, and in return was generally considered a “queer chap.” + He had started off on these travels of his after the death of his +father, an expatriated Swede who died in London, dissatisfied with his +country and angry with all the world, which had instinctively rejected +his wisdom. + +Thinker, stylist, and man of the world in his time, the elder Heyst +had begun by coveting all the joys, those of the great and those of the +humble, those of the fools and those of the sages. For more than sixty +years he had dragged on this painful earth of ours the most weary, the +most uneasy soul that civilization had ever fashioned to its ends of +disillusion and regret. One could not refuse him a measure of greatness, +for he was unhappy in a way unknown to mediocre souls. His mother Heyst +had never known, but he kept his father's pale, distinguished face +in affectionate memory. He remembered him mainly in an ample blue +dressing-gown in a large house of a quiet London suburb. For three +years, after leaving school at the age of eighteen, he had lived with +the elder Heyst, who was then writing his last book. In this work, at +the end of his life, he claimed for mankind that right to absolute moral +and intellectual liberty of which he no longer believed them worthy. + +Three years of such companionship at that plastic and impressionable age +were bound to leave in the boy a profound mistrust of life. The young +man learned to reflect, which is a destructive process, a reckoning +of the cost. It is not the clear-sighted who lead the world. Great +achievements are accomplished in a blessed, warm mental fog, which the +pitiless cold blasts of the father's analysis had blown away from the +son. + +“I'll drift,” Heyst had said to himself deliberately. + +He did not mean intellectually or sentimentally or morally. He meant +to drift altogether and literally, body and soul, like a detached leaf +drifting in the wind-currents under the immovable trees of a forest +glade; to drift without ever catching on to anything. + +“This shall be my defence against life,” he had said to himself with a +sort of inward consciousness that for the son of his father there was no +other worthy alternative. + +He became a waif and stray, austerely, from conviction, as others +do through drink, from vice, from some weakness of character--with +deliberation, as others do in despair. This, stripped of its facts, had +been Heyst's life up to that disturbing night. Next day, when he saw the +girl called Alma, she managed to give him a glance of frank tenderness, +quick as lightning and leaving a profound impression, a secret touch on +the heart. It was in the grounds of the hotel, about tiffin time, while +the Ladies of the orchestra were strolling back to their pavilion after +rehearsal, or practice, or whatever they called their morning musical +exercises in the hall. Heyst, returning from the town, where he had +discovered that there would be difficulties in the way of getting away +at once, was crossing the compound, disappointed and worried. He had +walked almost unwittingly into the straggling group of Zangiacomo's +performers. It was a shock to him, on coming out of his brown study, to +find the girl so near to him, as if one waking suddenly should see the +figure of his dream turned into flesh and blood. She did not raise her +shapely head, but her glance was no dream thing. It was real, the most +real impression of his detached existence--so far. + +Heyst had not acknowledged it in any way, though it seemed to him +impossible that its effect on him should not be visible to anyone who +happened to be looking on. And there were several men on the +veranda, steady customers of Schomberg's table d'hote, gazing in his +direction--at the ladies of the orchestra, in fact. Heyst's dread arose, +not out of shame or timidity, but from his fastidiousness. On getting +amongst them, however, he noticed no signs of interest or astonishment +in their faces, any more than if they had been blind men. Even Schomberg +himself, who had to make way for him at the top of the stairs, was +completely unperturbed, and continued the conversation he was carrying +on with a client. + +Schomberg, indeed, had observed “that Swede” talking with the girl in +the intervals. A crony of his had nudged him; and he had thought that it +was so much the better; the silly fellow would keep everybody else off. +He was rather pleased than otherwise and watched them out of the corner +of his eye with a malicious enjoyment of the situation--a sort of +Satanic glee. For he had little doubt of his personal fascination, and +still less of his power to get hold of the girl, who seemed too ignorant +to know how to help herself, and who was worse than friendless, since +she had for some reason incurred the animosity of Mrs. Zangiacomo, a +woman with no conscience. The aversion she showed him as far as she +dared (for it is not always safe for the helpless to display the +delicacy of their sentiments), Schomberg pardoned on the score of +feminine conventional silliness. He had told Alma, as an argument, that +she was a clever enough girl to see that she could do no better than to +put her trust in a man of substance, in the prime of life, who knew +his way about. But for the excited trembling of his voice, and the +extraordinary way in which his eyes seemed to be starting out of his +crimson, hirsute countenance, such speeches had every character of calm, +unselfish advice--which, after the manner of lovers, passed easily into +sanguine plans for the future. + +“We'll soon get rid of the old woman,” he whispered to her hurriedly, +with panting ferocity. “Hang her! I've never cared for her. The climate +don't suit her; I shall tell her to go to her people in Europe. She will +have to go, too! I will see to it. Eins, zwei, march! And then we shall +sell this hotel and start another somewhere else.” + +He assured her that he didn't care what he did for her sake; and it +was true. Forty-five is the age of recklessness for many men, as if in +defiance of the decay and death waiting with open arms in the sinister +valley at the bottom of the inevitable hill. Her shrinking form, her +downcast eyes, when she had to listen to him, cornered at the end of an +empty corridor, he regarded as signs of submission to the overpowering +force of his will, the recognition of his personal fascinations. For +every age is fed on illusions, lest men should renounce life early and +the human race come to an end. + +It's easy to imagine Schomberg's humiliation, his shocked fury, when +he discovered that the girl who had for weeks resisted his attacks, his +prayers, and his fiercest protestations, had been snatched from under +his nose by “that Swede,” apparently without any trouble worth speaking +of. He refused to believe the fact. He would have it, at first, that +the Zangiacomos, for some unfathomable reason, had played him a scurvy +trick, but when no further doubt was possible, he changed his view of +Heyst. The despised Swede became for Schomberg the deepest, the most +dangerous, the most hateful of scoundrels. He could not believe that the +creature he had coveted with so much force and with so little effect, +was in reality tender, docile to her impulse, and had almost offered +herself to Heyst without a sense of guilt, in a desire of safety, and +from a profound need of placing her trust where her woman's instinct +guided her ignorance. Nothing would serve Schomberg but that she must +have been circumvented by some occult exercise of force or craft, by the +laying of some subtle trap. His wounded vanity wondered ceaselessly at +the means “that Swede” had employed to seduce her away from a man +like him--Schomberg--as though those means were bound to have been +extraordinary, unheard of, inconceivable. He slapped his forehead openly +before his customers; he would sit brooding in silence or else would +burst out unexpectedly declaiming against Heyst without measure, +discretion, or prudence, with swollen features and an affectation of +outraged virtue which could not have deceived the most childlike of +moralists for a moment--and greatly amused his audience. + +It became a recognized entertainment to go and hear his abuse of Heyst, +while sipping iced drinks on the veranda of the hotel. It was, in a +manner, a more successful draw than the Zangiacomo concerts had ever +been--intervals and all. There was never any difficulty in starting the +performer off. Anybody could do it, by almost any distant allusion. +As likely as not he would start his endless denunciations in the very +billiard-room where Mrs. Schomberg sat enthroned as usual, swallowing +her sobs, concealing her tortures of abject humiliation and terror under +her stupid, set, everlasting grin, which, having been provided for her +by nature, was an excellent mask, in as much as nothing--not even death +itself, perhaps--could tear it away. + +But nothing lasts in this world, at least without changing its +physiognomy. So, after a few weeks, Schomberg regained his outward calm, +as if his indignation had dried up within him. And it was time. He was +becoming a bore with his inability to talk of anything else but Heyst's +unfitness to be at large, Heyst's wickedness, his wiles, his astuteness, +and his criminality. Schomberg no longer pretended to despise him. He +could not have done it. After what had happened he could not pretend, +even to himself. But his bottled-up indignation was fermenting +venomously. At the time of his immoderate loquacity one of his +customers, an elderly man, had remarked one evening: + +“If that ass keeps on like this, he will end by going crazy.” + +And this belief was less than half wrong. Schomberg had Heyst on the +brain. Even the unsatisfactory state of his affairs, which had +never been so unpromising since he came out East directly after the +Franco-Prussian War, he referred to some subtly noxious influence of +Heyst. It seemed to him that he could never be himself again till he had +got even with that artful Swede. He was ready to swear that Heyst had +ruined his life. The girl so unfairly, craftily, basely decoyed away +would have inspired him to success in a new start. Obviously Mrs. +Schomberg, whom he terrified by savagely silent moods combined with +underhand, poisoned glances, could give him no inspiration. He had grown +generally neglectful, but with a partiality for reckless expedients, as +if he did not care when and how his career as a hotel-keeper was to be +brought to an end. This demoralized state accounted for what Davidson +had observed on his last visit to the Schomberg establishment, some two +months after Heyst's secret departure with the girl to the solitude of +Samburan. + +The Schomberg of a few years ago--the Schomberg of the Bangkok days, +for instance, when he started the first of his famed table d'hote +dinners--would never have risked anything of the sort. His genius ran to +catering, “white man for white men” and to the inventing, elaborating, +and retailing of scandalous gossip with asinine unction and impudent +delight. But now his mind was perverted by the pangs of wounded vanity +and of thwarted passion. In this state of moral weakness Schomberg +allowed himself to be corrupted. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +The business was done by a guest who arrived one fine morning by +mail-boat--immediately from Celebes, having boarded her in Macassar, +but generally, Schomberg understood, from up China Sea way; a wanderer +clearly, even as Heyst was, but not alone and of quite another kind. + +Schomberg, looking up from the stern-sheets of his steam-launch, which +he used for boarding passenger ships on arrival, discovered a dark +sunken stare plunging down on him over the rail of the first-class part +of the deck. He was no great judge of physiognomy. Human beings, for +him, were either the objects of scandalous gossip or else recipients of +narrow strips of paper, with proper bill-heads stating the name of his +hotel--“W. Schomberg, proprietor, accounts settled weekly.” + +So in the clean-shaven, extremely thin face hanging over the mail-boat's +rail Schomberg saw only the face of a possible “account.” The +steam-launches of other hotels were also alongside, but he obtained the +preference. + +“You are Mr. Schomberg, aren't you?” the face asked quite unexpectedly. + +“I am at your service,” he answered from below; for business is +business, and its forms and formulas must be observed, even if one's +manly bosom is tortured by that dull rage which succeeds the fury of +baffled passion, like the glow of embers after a fierce blaze. + +Presently the possessor of the handsome but emaciated face was seated +beside Schomberg in the stern-sheets of the launch. His body was long +and loose-jointed, his slender fingers, intertwined, clasped the leg +resting on the knee, as he lolled back in a careless yet tense attitude. +On the other side of Schomberg sat another passenger, who was introduced +by the clean-shaven man as-- + +“My secretary. He must have the room next to mine.” + +“We can manage that easily for you.” + +Schomberg steered with dignity, staring straight ahead, but very much +interested by these two promising “accounts.” Their belongings, a couple +of large leather trunks browned by age and a few smaller packages, +were piled up in the bows. A third individual--a nondescript, hairy +creature--had modestly made his way forward and had perched himself on +the luggage. The lower part of his physiognomy was over-developed; +his narrow and low forehead, unintelligently furrowed by horizontal +wrinkles, surmounted wildly hirsute cheeks and a flat nose with wide, +baboon-like nostrils. There was something equivocal in the appearance of +his shaggy, hair-smothered humanity. He, too, seemed to be a follower of +the clean-shaven man, and apparently had travelled on deck with native +passengers, sleeping under the awnings. His broad, squat frame denoted +great strength. Grasping the gunwales of the launch, he displayed a +pair of remarkably long arms, terminating in thick, brown hairy paws of +simian aspect. + +“What shall we do with the fellow of mine?” the chief of the party asked +Schomberg. “There must be a boarding-house somewhere near the port--some +grog-shop where they could let him have a mat to sleep on?” + +Schomberg said there was a place kept by a Portuguese half-caste. + +“A servant of yours?” he asked. + +“Well, he hangs on to me. He is an alligator-hunter. I picked him up in +Colombia, you know. Ever been in Colombia?” + +“No,” said Schomberg, very much surprised. “An alligator-hunter? Funny +trade! Are you coming from Colombia, then?” + +“Yes, but I have been coming for a long time. I come from a good many +places. I am travelling west, you see.” + +“For sport, perhaps?” suggested Schomberg. + +“Yes. Sort of sport. What do you say to chasing the sun?” + +“I see--a gentleman at large,” said Schomberg, watching a sailing canoe +about to cross his bow, and ready to clear it by a touch of the helm. + +The other passenger made himself heard suddenly. + +“Hang these native craft! They always get in the way.” + +He was a muscular, short man with eyes that gleamed and blinked, a harsh +voice, and a round, toneless, pock-marked face ornamented by a thin, +dishevelled moustache, sticking out quaintly under the tip of a rigid +nose. Schomberg made the reflection that there was nothing secretarial +about him. Both he and his long, lank principal wore the usual white +suit of the tropics, cork helmets, pipe-clayed white shoes--all correct. +The hairy nondescript creature perched on their luggage in the bow had a +check shirt and blue dungaree trousers. He gazed in their direction from +forward in an expectant, trained-animal manner. + +“You spoke to me first,” said Schomberg in his manly tones. “You were +acquainted with my name. Where did you hear of me, gentlemen, may I +ask?” + +“In Manila,” answered the gentleman at large, readily. “From a man with +whom I had a game of cards one evening in the Hotel Castille.” + +“What man? I've no friends in Manila that I know of,” wondered Schomberg +with a severe frown. + +“I can't tell you his name. I've clean forgotten it; but don't you +worry. He was anything but a friend of yours. He called you all the +names he could think of. He said you set a lot of scandal going about +him once, somewhere--in Bangkok, I think. Yes, that's it. You were +running a table d'hote in Bangkok at one time, weren't you?” + +Schomberg, astounded by the turn of the information, could only throw +out his chest more and exaggerate his austere Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve +manner. A table d'hote? Yes, certainly. He always--for the sake of white +men. And here in this place, too? Yes, in this place, too. + +“That's all right, then.” The stranger turned his black, cavernous, +mesmerizing glance away from the bearded Schomberg, who sat gripping +the brass tiller in a sweating palm. “Many people in the evening at your +place?” + +Schomberg had recovered somewhat. + +“Twenty covers or so, take one day with another,” he answered feelingly, +as befitted a subject on which he was sensitive. “Ought to be more, +if only people would see that it's for their own good. Precious little +profit I get out of it. You are partial to tables d'hote, gentlemen?” + +The new guest made answer that he liked a hotel where one could find +some local people in the evening. It was infernally dull otherwise. The +secretary, in sign of approval, emitted a grunt of astonishing ferocity, +as if proposing to himself to eat the local people. All this sounded +like a longish stay, thought Schomberg, satisfied under his grave air; +till, remembering the girl snatched away from him by the last guest who +had made a prolonged stay in his hotel, he ground his teeth so audibly +that the other two looked at him in wonder. The momentary convulsion +of his florid physiognomy seemed to strike them dumb. They exchanged a +quick glance. Presently the clean-shaven man fired out another question +in his curt, unceremonious manner: + +“You have no women in your hotel, eh?” + +“Women!” Schomberg exclaimed indignantly, but also as if a little +frightened. “What on earth do you mean by women? What women? There's +Mrs. Schomberg, of course,” he added, suddenly appeased, with lofty +indifference. + +“If she knows how to keep her place, then it will do. I can't stand +women near me. They give me the horrors,” declared the other. “They are +a perfect curse!” + +During this outburst the secretary wore a savage grin. The chief guest +closed his sunken eyes, as if exhausted, and leaned the back of his head +against the stanchion of the awning. In this pose, his long, feminine +eyelashes were very noticeable, and his regular features, sharp line of +the jaw, and well-cut chin were brought into prominence, giving him a +used-up, weary, depraved distinction. He did not open his eyes till +the steam-launch touched the quay. Then he and the other man got ashore +quickly, entered a carriage, and drove away to the hotel, leaving +Schomberg to look after their luggage and take care of their strange +companion. The latter, looking more like a performing bear abandoned by +his show men than a human being, followed all Schomberg's movements step +by step, close behind his back, muttering to himself in a language +that sounded like some sort of uncouth Spanish. The hotel-keeper felt +uncomfortable till at last he got rid of him at an obscure den where +a very clean, portly Portuguese half-caste, standing serenely in the +doorway, seemed to understand exactly how to deal with clients of every +kind. He took from the creature the strapped bundle it had been hugging +closely through all its peregrinations in that strange town, and cut +short Schomberg's attempts at explanation by a most confident-- + +“I comprehend very well, sir.” + +“It's more than I do,” thought Schomberg, going away thankful at being +relieved of the alligator-hunter's company. He wondered what these +fellows were, without being able to form a guess of sufficient +probability. Their names he learned that very day by direct inquiry “to +enter in my books,” he explained in his formal military manner, chest +thrown out, beard very much in evidence. + +The shaven man, sprawling in a long chair, with his air of withered +youth, raised his eyes languidly. + +“My name? Oh, plain Mr. Jones--put that down--a gentleman at large. And +this is Ricardo.” The pock-marked man, lying prostrate in another long +chair, made a grimace, as if something had tickled the end of his nose, +but did not come out of his supineness. “Martin Ricardo, secretary. You +don't want any more of our history, do you? Eh, what? Occupation? Put +down, well--tourists. We've been called harder names before now; it +won't hurt our feelings. And that fellow of mine--where did you tuck him +away? Oh, he will be all right. When he wants anything he'll take it. +He's Peter. Citizen of Colombia. Peter, Pedro--I don't know that he ever +had any other name. Pedro, alligator hunter. Oh, yes--I'll pay his board +with the half-caste. Can't help myself. He's so confoundedly devoted to +me that if I were to give him the sack he would fly at my throat. Shall +I tell you how I killed his brother in the wilds of Colombia? Well, +perhaps some other time--it's a rather long story. What I shall always +regret is that I didn't kill him, too. I could have done it without any +extra trouble then; now it's too late. Great nuisance; but he's useful +sometimes. I hope you are not going to put all this in your book?” + +The offhand, hard manner and the contemptuous tone of “plain Mr. Jones” + disconcerted Schomberg utterly. He had never been spoken to like this +in his life. He shook his head in silence and withdrew, not exactly +scared--though he was in reality of a timid disposition under his manly +exterior--but distinctly mystified and impressed. + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +Three weeks later, after putting his cash-box away in the safe which +filled with its iron bulk a corner of their room, Schomberg turned +towards his wife, but without looking at her exactly, and said: + +“I must get rid of these two. It won't do!” + +Mrs. Schomberg had entertained that very opinion from the first; but she +had been broken years ago into keeping her opinions to herself. Sitting +in her night attire in the light of a single candle, she was careful not +to make a sound, knowing from experience that her very assent would be +resented. With her eyes she followed the figure of Schomberg, clad in +his sleeping suit, and moving restlessly about the room. + +He never glanced her way, for the reason that Mrs. Schomberg, in +her night attire, looked the most unattractive object in +existence--miserable, insignificant, faded, crushed, old. And the +contrast with the feminine form he had ever in his mind's eye made his +wife's appearance painful to his aesthetic sense. + +Schomberg walked about swearing and fuming for the purpose of screwing +his courage up to the sticking point. + +“Hang me if I ought not to go now, at once, this minute, into his +bedroom, and tell him to be off--him and that secretary of his--early in +the morning. I don't mind a round game of cards, but to make a decoy of +my table d'hote--my blood boils! He came here because some lying rascal +in Manila told him I kept a table d'hote.” + +He said these things, not for Mrs. Schomberg's information, but simply +thinking aloud, and trying to work his fury up to a point where it would +give him courage enough to face “plain Mr. Jones.” + +“Impudent overbearing, swindling sharper,” he went on. “I have a good +mind to--” + +He was beside himself in his lurid, heavy, Teutonic manner, so unlike +the picturesque, lively rage of the Latin races; and though his eyes +strayed about irresolutely, yet his swollen, angry features awakened in +the miserable woman over whom he had been tyrannizing for years a fear +for his precious carcass, since the poor creature had nothing else but +that to hold on to in the world. She knew him well; but she did not know +him altogether. The last thing a woman will consent to discover in a man +whom she loves, or on whom she simply depends, is want of courage. And, +timid in her corner, she ventured to say pressingly: + +“Be careful, Wilhelm! Remember the knives and revolvers in their +trunks.” + +In guise of thanks for that anxious reminder, he swore horribly in +the direction of her shrinking person. In her scanty nightdress, and +barefooted, she recalled a mediaeval penitent being reproved for her +sins in blasphemous terms. Those lethal weapons were always present to +Schomberg's mind. Personally, he had never seen them. His part, ten +days after his guests' arrival, had been to lounge in manly, careless +attitudes on the veranda--keeping watch--while Mrs. Schomberg, provided +with a bunch of assorted keys, her discoloured teeth chattering and her +globular eyes absolutely idiotic with fright, was “going through” the +luggage of these strange clients. Her terrible Wilhelm had insisted on +it. + +“I'll be on the look-out, I tell you,” he said. “I shall give you a +whistle when I see them coming back. You couldn't whistle. And if he +were to catch you at it, and chuck you out by the scruff of the neck, it +wouldn't hurt you much; but he won't touch a woman. Not he! He has told +me so. Affected beast. I must find out something about their little +game, and so there's an end of it. Go in! Go now! Quick march!” + +It had been an awful job; but she did go in, because she was much more +afraid of Schomberg than of any possible consequences of the act. Her +greatest concern was lest no key of the bunch he had provided her with +should fit the locks. It would have been such a disappointment for +Wilhelm. However, the trunks, she found, had been left open; but her +investigation did not last long. She was frightened of firearms, and +generally of all weapons, not from personal cowardice, but as some women +are, almost superstitiously, from an abstract horror of violence and +murder. She was out again on the veranda long before Wilhelm had any +occasion for a warning whistle. The instinctive, motiveless fear being +the most difficult to overcome, nothing could induce her to return to +her investigations, neither threatening growls nor ferocious hisses, nor +yet a poke or two in the ribs. + +“Stupid female!” muttered the hotel-keeper, perturbed by the notion +of that armoury in one of his bedrooms. This was from no abstract +sentiment, with him it was constitutional. “Get out of my sight,” he +snarled. “Go and dress yourself for the table d'hote.” + +Left to himself, Schomberg had meditated. What the devil did this mean? +His thinking processes were sluggish and spasmodic; but suddenly the +truth came to him. + +“By heavens, they are desperadoes!” he thought. + +Just then he beheld “plain Mr. Jones” and his secretary with the +ambiguous name of Ricardo entering the grounds of the hotel. They had +been down to the port on some business, and now were returning; Mr. +Jones lank, spare, opening his long legs with angular regularity like +a pair of compasses, the other stepping out briskly by his side. +Conviction entered Schomberg's heart. They were two desperadoes--no +doubt about it. But as the funk which he experienced was merely +a general sensation, he managed to put on his most severe +Officer-of-the-Reserve manner, long before they had closed with him. + +“Good morning, gentlemen.” + +Being answered with derisive civility, he became confirmed in his sudden +conviction of their desperate character. The way Mr. Jones turned his +hollow eyes on one, like an incurious spectre, and the way the other, +when addressed, suddenly retracted his lips and exhibited his teeth +without looking round--here was evidence enough to settle that point. +Desperadoes! They passed through the billiard-room, inscrutably +mysterious, to the back of the house, to join their violated trunks. + +“Tiffin bell will ring in five minutes, gentlemen.” Schomberg called +after them, exaggerating the deep manliness of his tone. + +He had managed to upset himself very much. He expected to see them come +back infuriated and begin to bully him with an odious lack of restraint. +Desperadoes! However they didn't; they had not noticed anything unusual +about their trunks and Schomberg recovered his composure and said +to himself that he must get rid of this deadly incubus as soon as +practicable. They couldn't possibly want to stay very long; this was not +the town--the colony--for desperate characters. He shrank from action. +He dreaded any kind of disturbance--“fracas” he called it--in his hotel. +Such things were not good for business. Of course, sometimes one had to +have a “fracas;” but it had been a comparatively trifling task to seize +the frail Zangiacomo--whose bones were no larger than a chicken's--round +the ribs, lift him up bodily, dash him to the ground, and fall on +him. It had been easy. The wretched, hook-nosed creature lay without +movement, buried under its purple beard. + +Suddenly, remembering the occasion of that “fracas,” Schomberg groaned +with the pain as of a hot coal under his breastbone, and gave himself up +to desolation. Ah, if he only had that girl with him he would have been +masterful and resolute and fearless--fight twenty desperadoes--care +for nobody on earth! Whereas the possession of Mrs. Schomberg was no +incitement to a display of manly virtues. Instead of caring for no one, +he felt that he cared for nothing. Life was a hollow sham; he wasn't +going to risk a shot through his lungs or his liver in order to preserve +its integrity. It had no savour--damn it! + +In his state of moral decomposition, Schomberg, master as he was of the +art of hotel-keeping, and careful of giving no occasion for criticism +to the powers regulating that branch of human activity, let things take +their course; though he saw very well where that course was tending. +It began first with a game or two after dinner--for the drinks, +apparently--with some lingering customer, at one of the little tables +ranged against the walls of the billiard-room. Schomberg detected the +meaning of it at once. “That's what it was! This was what they were!” + And, moving about restlessly (at that time his morose silent period had +set in), he cast sidelong looks at the game; but he said nothing. It was +not worth while having a row with men who were so overbearing. Even when +money appeared in connection with these postprandial games, into which +more and more people were being drawn, he still refrained from raising +the question; he was reluctant to draw unduly the attention of “plain +Mr. Jones” and of the equivocal Ricardo, to his person. One evening, +however, after the public rooms of the hotel had become empty, Schomberg +made an attempt to grapple with the problem in an indirect way. + +In a distant corner the tired China boy dozed on his heels, his back +against the wall. Mrs. Schomberg had disappeared, as usual, between ten +and eleven. Schomberg walked about slowly in and out of the room and +the veranda, thoughtful, waiting for his two guests to go to bed. Then +suddenly he approached them, militarily, his chest thrown out, his voice +curt and soldierly. + +“Hot night, gentlemen.” + +Mr Jones, lolling back idly in a chair, looked up. Ricardo, as idle, but +more upright, made no sign. + +“Won't you have a drink with me before retiring?” went on Schomberg, +sitting down by the little table. + +“By all means,” said Mr. Jones lazily. + +Ricardo showed his teeth in a strange, quick grin. Schomberg felt +painfully how difficult it was to get in touch with these men, both +so quiet, so deliberate, so menacingly unceremonious. He ordered the +Chinaman to bring in the drinks. His purpose was to discover how long +these guests intended to stay. Ricardo displayed no conversational vein, +but Mr. Jones appeared communicative enough. His voice somehow matched +his sunken eyes. It was hollow without being in the least mournful; +it sounded distant, uninterested, as though he were speaking from the +bottom of a well. Schomberg learned that he would have the privilege of +lodging and boarding these gentlemen for at least a month more. He could +not conceal his discomfiture at this piece of news. + +“What's the matter? Don't you like to have people in your house?” asked +plain Mr. Jones languidly. “I should have thought the owner of a hotel +would be pleased.” + +He lifted his delicate and beautifully pencilled eyebrows. Schomberg +muttered something about the locality being dull and uninteresting to +travellers--nothing going on--too quiet altogether, but he only provoked +the declaration that quiet had its charm sometimes, and even dullness +was welcome as a change. + +“We haven't had time to be dull for the last three years,” added plain +Mr. Jones, his eyes fixed darkly on Schomberg whom he further more +invited to have another drink, this time with him, and not to worry +himself about things he did not understand; and especially not to be +inhospitable--which in a hotel-keeper is highly unprofessional. + +“I don't understand,” grumbled Schomberg. “Oh, yes, I understand +perfectly well. I--” + +“You are frightened,” interrupted Mr. Jones. “What is the matter?” + +“I don't want any scandal in my place. That's what's the matter.” + +Schomberg tried to face the situation bravely, but that steady, black +stare affected him. And when he glanced aside uncomfortably, he met +Ricardo's grin uncovering a lot of teeth, though the man seemed absorbed +in his thoughts all the time. + +“And, moreover,” went on Mr. Jones in that distant tone of his, “you +can't help yourself. Here we are and here we stay. Would you try to +put us out? I dare say you could do it; but you couldn't do it without +getting hurt--very badly hurt. We can promise him that, can't we, +Martin?” + +The secretary retracted his lips and looked up sharply at Schomberg, as +if only too anxious to leap upon him with teeth and claws. + +Schomberg managed to produce a deep laugh. + +“Ha! Ha! Ha!” + +Mr Jones closed his eyes wearily, as if the light hurt them, and looked +remarkably like a corpse for a moment. This was bad enough; but when he +opened them again, it was almost a worse trial for Schomberg's nerves. +The spectral intensity of that glance, fixed on the hotel-keeper (and +this was most frightful) without any definite expression, seemed to +dissolve the last grain of resolution in his character. + +“You don't think, by any chance, that you have to do with ordinary +people, do you?” inquired Mr. Jones, in his lifeless manner, which +seemed to imply some sort of menace from beyond the grave. + +“He's a gentleman,” testified Martin Ricardo with a sudden snap of the +lips, after which his moustaches stirred by themselves in an odd, feline +manner. + +“Oh, I wasn't thinking of that,” said plain Mr. Jones, while Schomberg, +dumb and planted heavily in his chair looked from one to the other, +leaning forward a little. “Of course I am that; but Ricardo attaches +too much importance to a social advantage. What I mean, for instance, is +that he, quiet and inoffensive as you see him sitting here, would think +nothing of setting fire to this house of entertainment of yours. It +would blaze like a box of matches. Think of that! It wouldn't advance +your affairs much, would it?--whatever happened to us.” + +“Come, come gentlemen,” remonstrated Schomberg, in a murmur. “This is +very wild talk!” + +“And you have been used to deal with tame people, haven't you? But we +aren't tame. We once kept a whole angry town at bay for two days, and +then we got away with our plunder. It was in Venezuela. Ask Martin +here--he can tell you.” + +Instinctively Schomberg looked at Ricardo, who only passed the tip of +his tongue over his lips with an uncanny sort of gusto, but did not +offer to begin. + +“Well, perhaps it would be a rather long story,” Mr. Jones conceded +after a short silence. + +“I have no desire to hear it, I am sure,” said Schomberg. “This isn't +Venezuela. You wouldn't get away from here like that. But all this is +silly talk of the worst sort. Do you mean to say you would make deadly +trouble for the sake of a few guilders that you and that other”--eyeing +Ricardo suspiciously, as one would look at a strange animal--“gentleman +can win of an evening? Isn't as if my customers were a lot of rich men +with pockets full of cash. I wonder you take so much trouble and risk +for so little money.” + +Schomberg's argument was met by Mr. Jones's statement that one must do +something to kill time. Killing time was not forbidden. For the rest, +being in a communicative mood, Mr. Jones said languidly and in a voice +indifferent, as if issuing from a tomb, that he depended on himself, as +if the world were still one great, wild jungle without law. Martin was +something like that, too--for reasons of his own. + +All these statements Ricardo confirmed by short, inhuman grins. +Schomberg lowered his eyes, for the sight of these two men intimidated +him; but he was losing patience. + +“Of course, I could see at once that you were two desperate +characters--something like what you say. But what would you think if +I told you that I am pretty near as desperate as you two gentlemen? +'Here's that Schomberg has an easy time running his hotel,' people +think; and yet it seems to me I would just as soon let you rip me open +and burn the whole show as not. There!” + +A low whistle was heard. It came from Ricardo, and was derisive. +Schomberg, breathing heavily, looked on the floor. He was really +desperate. Mr. Jones remained languidly sceptical. + +“Tut, tut! You have a tolerable business. You are perfectly tame; you--” + He paused, then added in a tone of disgust: “You have a wife.” + +Schomberg tapped the floor angrily with his foot and uttered an +indistinct, laughing curse. + +“What do you mean by flinging that damned trouble at my head?” he cried. +“I wish you would carry her off with you some where to the devil! I +wouldn't run after you.” + +The unexpected outburst affected Mr. Jones strangely. He had a horrified +recoil, chair and all, as if Schomberg had thrust a wriggling viper in +his face. + +“What's this infernal nonsense?” he muttered thickly. “What do you mean? +How dare you?” + +Ricardo chuckled audibly. + +“I tell you I am desperate,” Schomberg repeated. “I am as desperate as +any man ever was. I don't care a hang what happens to me!” + +“Well, then”--Mr. Jones began to speak with a quietly threatening +effect, as if the common words of daily use had some other deadly +meaning to his mind--“well, then, why should you make yourself +ridiculously disagreeable to us? If you don't care, as you say, you +might just as well let us have the key of that music-shed of yours for +a quiet game; a modest bank--a dozen candles or so. It would be greatly +appreciated by your clients, as far as I can judge from the way they +betted on a game of ecarte I had with that fair, baby-faced man--what's +his name? They just yearn for a modest bank. And I am afraid Martin here +would take it badly if you objected; but of course you won't. Think of +the calls for drinks!” + +Schomberg, raising his eyes, at last met the gleams in two dark caverns +under Mr. Jones's devilish eyebrows, directed upon him impenetrably. He +shuddered as if horrors worse than murder had been lurking there, and +said, nodding towards Ricardo: + +“I dare say he wouldn't think twice about sticking me, if he had you at +his back! I wish I had sunk my launch, and gone to the bottom myself +in her, before I boarded the steamer you came by. Ah, well, I've been +already living in hell for weeks, so you don't make much difference. +I'll let you have the concert-room--and hang the consequences. But +what about the boy on late duty? If he sees the cards and actual money +passing, he will be sure to blab, and it will be all over the town in no +time.” + +A ghastly smile stirred the lips of Mr. Jones. + +“Ah, I see you want to make a success of it. Very good. That's the way +to get on. Don't let it disturb you. You chase all the Chinamen to bed +early, and we'll get Pedro here every evening. He isn't the conventional +waiter's cut, but he will do to run to and fro with the tray, while +you sit here from nine to eleven serving out drinks and gathering the +money.” + +“There will be three of them now,” thought the unlucky Schomberg. + +But Pedro, at any rate, was just a simple, straightforward brute, if +a murderous one. There was no mystery about him, nothing uncanny, no +suggestion of a stealthy, deliberate wildcat turned into a man, or of an +insolent spectre on leave from Hades, endowed with skin and bones and +a subtle power of terror. Pedro with his fangs, his tangled beard, and +queer stare of his little bear's eyes was, by comparison, delightfully +natural. Besides, Schomberg could no longer help himself. + +“That will do very well,” he asserted mournfully. “But if you gentlemen, +if you had turned up here only three months ago--ay, less than three +months ago--you would have found somebody very different from what I am +now to talk to you. It's true. What do you think of that?” + +“I scarcely know what to think. I should think it was a lie. You were +probably as tame three months ago as you are now. You were born tame, +like most people in the world.” + +Mr Jones got up spectrally, and Ricardo imitated him with a snarl and a +stretch. Schomberg, in a brown study, went on, as if to himself: + +“There has been an orchestra here--eighteen women.” + +Mr Jones let out an exclamation of dismay, and looked about as if the +walls around him and the whole house had been infected with plague. Then +he became very angry, and swore violently at Schomberg for daring to +bring up such subjects. The hotel-keeper was too much surprised to get +up. He gazed from his chair at Mr. Jones's anger, which had nothing +spectral in it but was not the more comprehensible for that. + +“What's the matter?” he stammered out. “What subject? Didn't you hear me +say it was an orchestra? There's nothing wrong in that. Well, there was +a girl amongst them--” Schomberg's eyes went stony; he clasped his hands +in front of his breast with such force that his knuckles came out white. +“Such a girl! Tame, am I? I would have kicked everything to pieces about +me for her. And she, of course . . . I am in the prime of life . . . +then a fellow bewitched her--a vagabond, a false, lying, swindling, +underhand, stick-at-nothing brute. Ah!” + +His entwined fingers cracked as he tore his hands apart, flung out his +arms, and leaned his forehead on them in a passion of fury. The other +two looked at his shaking back--the attenuated Mr. Jones with mingled +scorn and a sort of fear, Ricardo with the expression of a cat which +sees a piece of fish in the pantry out of reach. Schomberg flung himself +backwards. He was dry-eyed, but he gulped as if swallowing sobs. + +“No wonder you can do with me what you like. You have no idea--just let +me tell you of my trouble--” + +“I don't want to know anything of your beastly trouble,” said Mr. Jones, +in his most lifelessly positive voice. + +He stretched forth an arresting hand, and, as Schomberg remained +open-mouthed, he walked out of the billiard-room in all the uncanniness +of his thin shanks. Ricardo followed at his leader's heels; but he +showed his teeth to Schomberg over his shoulder. + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +From that evening dated those mysterious but significant phenomena in +Schomberg's establishment which attracted Captain Davidson's casual +notice when he dropped in, placid yet astute, in order to return +Mrs. Schomberg's Indian shawl. And strangely enough, they lasted +some considerable time. It argued either honesty and bad luck or +extraordinary restraint on the part of “plain Mr. Jones and Co.” in +their discreet operations with cards. + +It was a curious and impressive sight, the inside of Schomberg's +concert-hall, encumbered at one end by a great stack of chairs piled up +on and about the musicians' platform, and lighted at the other by two +dozen candles disposed about a long trestle table covered with green +cloth. In the middle, Mr. Jones, a starved spectre turned into a banker, +faced Ricardo, a rather nasty, slow-moving cat turned into a croupier. +By contrast, the other faces round that table, anything between twenty +and thirty, must have looked like collected samples of intensely +artless, helpless humanity--pathetic in their innocent watch for the +small turns of luck which indeed might have been serious enough for +them. They had no notice to spare for the hairy Pedro, carrying a tray +with the clumsiness of a creature caught in the woods and taught to walk +on its hind legs. + +As to Schomberg, he kept out of the way. He remained in the +billiard-room, serving out drinks to the unspeakable Pedro with an air +of not seeing the growling monster, of not knowing where the drinks +went, of ignoring that there was such a thing as a music-room over there +under the trees within fifty yards of the hotel. He submitted himself +to the situation with a low-spirited stoicism compounded of fear and +resignation. Directly the party had broken up, (he could see dark +shapes of the men drifting singly and in knots through the gate of +the compound), he would withdraw out of sight behind a door not quite +closed, in order to avoid meeting his two extraordinary guests; but he +would watch through the crack their contrasted forms pass through the +billiard-room and disappear on their way to bed. Then he would hear +doors being slammed upstairs; and a profound silence would fall upon the +whole house, upon his hotel appropriated, haunted by those insolently +outspoken men provided with a whole armoury of weapons in their trunks. +A profound silence. Schomberg sometimes could not resist the notion that +he must be dreaming. Shuddering, he would pull himself together, +and creep out, with movements strangely inappropriate to the +Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve bearing by which he tried to keep up his +self-respect before the world. + +A great loneliness oppressed him. One after another he would extinguish +the lamps, and move softly towards his bedroom, where Mrs. Schomberg +waited for him--no fit companion for a man of his ability and “in the +prime of life.” But that life, alas, was blighted. He felt it; and never +with such force as when on opening the door he perceived that woman +sitting patiently in a chair, her toes peeping out under the edge of her +night-dress, an amazingly small amount of hair on her head drooping +on the long stalk of scraggy neck, with that everlasting scared grin +showing a blue tooth and meaning nothing--not even real fear. For she +was used to him. + +Sometimes he was tempted to screw the head off the stalk. He imagined +himself doing it--with one hand, a twisting movement. Not seriously, of +course. Just a simple indulgence for his exasperated feelings. He wasn't +capable of murder. He was certain of that. And, remembering suddenly the +plain speeches of Mr. Jones, he would think: “I suppose I am too tame +for that”--quite unaware that he had murdered the poor woman morally +years ago. He was too unintelligent to have the notion of such a crime. +Her bodily presence was bitterly offensive, because of its contrast with +a very different feminine image. And it was no use getting rid of her. +She was a habit of years, and there would be nothing to put in her +place. At any rate, he could talk to that idiot half the night if he +chose. + +That night he had been vapouring before her as to his intention to face +his two guests and, instead of that inspiration he needed, had merely +received the usual warning: “Be careful, Wilhelm.” He did not want to be +told to be careful by an imbecile female. What he needed was a pair of +woman's arms which, flung round his neck, would brace him up for the +encounter. Inspire him, he called it to himself. + +He lay awake a long time; and his slumbers, when they came, were +unsatisfactory and short. The morning light had no joy for his eyes. +He listened dismally to the movements in the house. The Chinamen were +unlocking and flinging wide the doors of the public rooms which opened +on the veranda. Horrors! Another poisoned day to get through somehow! +The recollection of his resolve made him feel actually sick for a +moment. First of all the lordly, abandoned attitudes of Mr. Jones +disconcerted him. Then there was his contemptuous silence. Mr. Jones +never addressed himself to Schomberg with any general remarks, never +opened his lips to him unless to say “Good morning”--two simple words +which, uttered by that man, seemed a mockery of a threatening character. +And, lastly, it was not a frank physical fear he inspired--for as to +that, even a cornered rat will fight--but a superstitious shrinking awe, +something like an invincible repugnance to seek speech with a wicked +ghost. That it was a daylight ghost surprisingly angular in his +attitudes, and for the most part spread out on three chairs, did +not make it any easier. Daylight only made him a more weird, a more +disturbing and unlawful apparition. Strangely enough in the evening when +he came out of his mute supineness, this unearthly side of him was less +obtrusive. At the gaming-table, when actually handling the cards, it was +probably sunk quite out of sight; but Schomberg, having made up his mind +in ostrich-like fashion to ignore what was going on, never entered the +desecrated music-room. He had never seen Mr. Jones in the exercise of +his vocation--or perhaps it was only his trade. + +“I will speak to him tonight,” Schomberg said to himself, while he drank +his morning tea, in pyjamas, on the veranda, before the rising sun had +topped the trees of the compound, and while the undried dew still +lay silvery on the grass, sparkled on the blossoms of the central +flower-bed, and darkened the yellow gravel of the drive. “That's what +I'll do. I won't keep out of sight tonight. I shall come out and catch +him as he goes to bed carrying the cash-box.” + +After all, what was the fellow but a common desperado? Murderous? Oh, +yes; murderous enough, perhaps--and the muscles of Schomberg's stomach +had a quivering contraction under his airy attire. But even a common +desperado would think twice or, more likely, a hundred times, before +openly murdering an inoffensive citizen in a civilized, European-ruled +town. He jerked his shoulders. Of course! He shuddered again, and +paddled back to his room to dress himself. His mind was made up, and he +would think no more about it; but still he had his doubts. They grew and +unfolded themselves with the progress of the day, as some plants do. At +times they made him perspire more than usual, and they did away with +the possibility of his afternoon siesta. After turning over on his couch +more than a dozen times, he gave up this mockery of repose, got up, and +went downstairs. + +It was between three and four o'clock, the hour of profound peace. The +very flowers seemed to doze on their stalks set with sleepy leaves. Not +even the air stirred, for the sea-breeze was not due till later. The +servants were out of sight, catching naps in the shade somewhere behind +the house. Mrs. Schomberg in a dim up-stair room with closed jalousies, +was elaborating those two long pendant ringlets which were such a +feature of her hairdressing for her afternoon duties. At that time no +customers ever troubled the repose of the establishment. Wandering about +his premises in profound solitude, Schomberg recoiled at the door of the +billiard-room, as if he had seen a snake in his path. All alone with the +billiards, the bare little tables, and a lot of untenanted chairs, Mr. +Secretary Ricardo sat near the wall, performing with lightning rapidity +something that looked like tricks with his own personal pack of cards, +which he always carried about in his pocket. Schomberg would have backed +out quietly if Ricardo had not turned his head. Having been seen, the +hotel-keeper elected to walk in as the lesser risk of the two. The +consciousness of his inwardly abject attitude towards these men caused +him always to throw his chest out and assume a severe expression. +Ricardo watched his approach, clasping the pack of cards in both hands. + +“You want something, perhaps?” suggested Schomberg in his +lieutenant-of-the-Reserve voice. + +Ricardo shook his head in silence and looked expectant. With him +Schomberg exchanged at least twenty words every day. He was infinitely +more communicative than his patron. At times he looked very much like +an ordinary human being of his class; and he seemed to be in an amiable +mood at that moment. Suddenly spreading some ten cards face downward in +the form of a fan, he thrust them towards Schomberg. + +“Come, man, take one quick!” + +Schomberg was so surprised that he took one hurriedly, after a very +perceptible start. The eyes of Martin Ricardo gleamed phosphorescent +in the half-light of the room screened from the heat and glare of the +tropics. + +“That's the king of hearts you've got,” he chuckled, showing his teeth +in a quick flash. + +Schomberg, after looking at the card, admitted that it was, and laid it +down on the table. + +“I can make you take any card I like nine times out of ten,” exulted the +secretary, with a strange curl of his lips and a green flicker in his +raised eyes. + +Schomberg looked down at him dumbly. For a few seconds neither of them +stirred; then Ricardo lowered his glance, and, opening his fingers, +let the whole pack fall on the table. Schomberg sat down. He sat down +because of the faintness in his legs, and for no other reason. His mouth +was dry. Having sat down, he felt that he must speak. He squared his +shoulders in parade style. + +“You are pretty good at that sort of thing,” he said. + +“Practice makes perfect,” replied the secretary. + +His precarious amiability made it impossible for Schomberg to get away. +Thus, from his very timidity, the hotel-keeper found himself engaged +in a conversation the thought of which filled him with apprehension. It +must be said, in justice to Schomberg, that he concealed his funk very +creditably. The habit of throwing out his chest and speaking in a severe +voice stood him in good stead. With him, too, practice made perfect; and +he would probably have kept it up to the end, to the very last moment, +to the ultimate instant of breaking strain which would leave him +grovelling on the floor. To add to his secret trouble, he was at a loss +what to say. He found nothing else but the remark: + +“I suppose you are fond of cards.” + +“What would you expect?” asked Ricardo in a simple, philosophical tone. +“It is likely I should not be?” Then, with sudden fire: “Fond of cards? +Ay, passionately!” + +The effect of this outburst was augmented by the quiet lowering of the +eyelids, by a reserved pause as though this had been a confession of +another kind of love. Schomberg cudgelled his brains for a new topic, +but he could not find one. His usual scandalous gossip would not serve +this turn. That desperado did not know anyone anywhere within a thousand +miles. Schomberg was almost compelled to keep to the subject. + +“I suppose you've always been so--from your early youth.” + +Ricardo's eyes remained cast down. His fingers toyed absently with the +pack on the table. + +“I don't know that it was so early. I first got in the way of it playing +for tobacco--in forecastles of ships, you know--common sailor games. We +used to spend whole watches below at it, round a chest, under a +slush lamp. We would hardly spare the time to get a bite of salt +horse--neither eat nor sleep. We could hardly stand when the watches +were mustered on deck. Talk of gambling!” He dropped the reminiscent +tone to add the information, “I was bred to the sea from a boy, you +know.” + +Schomberg had fallen into a reverie, but without losing the sense of +impending calamity. The next words he heard were: + +“I got on all right at sea, too. Worked up to be mate. I was mate of a +schooner--a yacht, you might call her--a special good berth too, in the +Gulf of Mexico, a soft job that you don't run across more than once in a +lifetime. Yes, I was mate of her when I left the sea to follow him.” + +Ricardo tossed up his chin to indicate the room above; from which +Schomberg, his wits painfully aroused by this reminder of Mr. Jones's +existence, concluded that the latter had withdrawn into his bedroom. +Ricardo, observing him from under lowered eyelids, went on: + +“It so happened that we were shipmates.” + +“Mr Jones, you mean? Is he a sailor too?” + +Ricardo raised his eyelids at that. + +“He's no more Mr. Jones than you are,” he said with obvious pride. “He a +sailor! That just shows your ignorance. But there! A foreigner can't be +expected to know any better. I am an Englishman, and I know a gentleman +at sight. I should know one drunk, in the gutter, in jail, under the +gallows. There's a something--it isn't exactly the appearance, it's +a--no use me trying to tell you. You ain't an Englishman, and if you +were, you wouldn't need to be told.” + +An unsuspected stream of loquacity had broken its dam somewhere deep +within the man, had diluted his fiery blood and softened his pitiless +fibre. Schomberg experienced mingled relief and apprehension, as if +suddenly an enormous savage cat had begun to wind itself about his legs +in inexplicable friendliness. No prudent man under such circumstances +would dare to stir. Schomberg didn't stir. Ricardo assumed an easy +attitude, with an elbow on the table. Schomberg squared his shoulders +afresh. + +“I was employed, in that there yacht--schooner, whatever you call it--by +ten gentlemen at once. That surprises you, eh? Yes, yes, ten. Leastwise +there were nine of them gents good enough in their way, and one +downright gentleman, and that was . . .” + +Ricardo gave another upward jerk of his chin as much as to say: He! The +only one. + +“And no mistake,” he went on. “I spotted him from the first day. How? +Why? Ay, you may ask. Hadn't seen that many gentlemen in my life. Well, +somehow I did. If you were an Englishman, you would--” + +“What was your yacht?” Schomberg interrupted as impatiently as he dared; +for this harping on nationality jarred on his already tried nerves. +“What was the game?” + +“You have a headpiece on you! Game! 'Xactly. That's what it was--the +sort of silliness gentlemen will get up among themselves to play at +adventure. A treasure-hunting expedition. Each of them put down so much +money, you understand, to buy the schooner. Their agent in the city +engaged me and the skipper. The greatest secrecy and all that. I reckon +he had a twinkle in his eye all the time--and no mistake. But that +wasn't our business. Let them bust their money as they like. The pity of +it was that so little of it came our way. Just fair pay and no more. And +damn any pay, much or little, anyhow--that's what I say!” + +He blinked his eyes greenishly in the dim light. The heat seemed to +have stilled everything in the world but his voice. He swore at large, +abundantly, in snarling undertones, it was impossible to say why, then +calmed down as inexplicably, and went on, as a sailor yarns. + +“At first there were only nine of them adventurous sparks, then, just a +day or two before the sailing date, he turned up. Heard of it somehow, +somewhere--I would say from some woman, if I didn't know him as I do. He +would give any woman a ten-mile berth. He can't stand them. Or maybe in +a flash bar. Or maybe in one of them grand clubs in Pall Mall. Anyway, +the agent netted him in all right--cash down, and only about four and +twenty hours for him to get ready; but he didn't miss his ship. Not he! +You might have called it a pier-head jump--for a gentleman. I saw him +come along. Know the West India Docks, eh?” + +Schomberg did not know the West India Docks. Ricardo looked at him +pensively for a while, and then continued, as if such ignorance had to +be disregarded. + +“Our tug was already alongside. Two loafers were carrying his dunnage +behind him. I told the dockman at our moorings to keep all fast for a +minute. The gangway was down already; but he made nothing of it. Up he +jumps, one leap, swings his long legs over the rail, and there he is +on board. They pass up his swell dunnage, and he puts his hand in his +trousers pocket and throws all his small change on the wharf for them +chaps to pick up. They were still promenading that wharf on all fours +when we cast off. It was only then that he looked at me--quietly, you +know; in a slow way. He wasn't so thin then as he is now; but I noticed +he wasn't so young as he looked--not by a long chalk. He seemed to touch +me inside somewhere. I went away pretty quick from there; I was wanted +forward anyhow. I wasn't frightened. What should I be frightened for? I +only felt touched--on the very spot. But Jee-miny, if anybody had told +me we should be partners before the year was out--well, I would have--” + +He swore a variety of strange oaths, some common, others quaintly +horrible to Schomberg's ears, and all mere innocent exclamations of +wonder at the shifts and changes of human fortune. Schomberg moved +slightly in his chair. But the admirer and partner of “plain Mr. Jones” + seemed to have forgotten Schomberg's existence for the moment. The +stream of ingenuous blasphemy--some of it in bad Spanish--had run dry, +and Martin Ricardo, connoisseur in gentlemen, sat dumb with a stony gaze +as if still marvelling inwardly at the amazing elections, conjunctions, +and associations of events which influence man's pilgrimage on this +earth. + +At last Schomberg spoke tentatively: + +“And so the--the gentleman, up there, talked you over into leaving a +good berth?” + +Ricardo started. + +“Talked me over! Didn't need to talk me over. Just beckoned to me, and +that was enough. By that time we were in the Gulf of Mexico. One night +we were lying at anchor, close to a dry sandbank--to this day I am not +sure where it was--off the Colombian coast or thereabouts. We were +to start digging the next morning, and all hands had turned in early, +expecting a hard day with the shovels. Up he comes, and in his quiet, +tired way of speaking--you can tell a gentleman by that as much as by +anything else almost--up he comes behind me and says, just like that +into my ear, in a manner: 'Well, what do you think of our treasure hunt +now?' + +“I didn't even turn my head; 'xactly as I stood, I remained, and I spoke +no louder than himself: + +“'If you want to know, sir, it's nothing but just damned tom-foolery.' + +“We had, of course, been having short talks together at one time or +another during the passage. I dare say he had read me like a book. There +ain't much to me, except that I have never been tame, even when walking +the pavement and cracking jokes and standing drinks to chums--ay, and to +strangers, too. I would watch them lifting their elbows at my expense, +or splitting their side at my fun--I can be funny when I like, you bet!” + +A pause for self-complacent contemplation of his own fun and generosity +checked the flow of Ricardo's speech. Schomberg was concerned to keep +within bounds the enlargement of his eyes, which he seemed to feel +growing bigger in his head. + +“Yes, yes,” he whispered hastily. + +“I would watch them and think: 'You boys don't know who I am. If you +did--!' With girls, too. Once I was courting a girl. I used to kiss her +behind the ear and say to myself: 'If you only knew who's kissing you, +my dear, you would scream and bolt!' Ha! ha! Not that I wanted to +do them any harm; but I felt the power in myself. Now, here we sit, +friendly like, and that's all right. You aren't in my way. But I am not +friendly to you. I just don't care. Some men do say that; but I really +don't. You are no more to me one way or another than that fly there. +Just so. I'd squash you or leave you alone. I don't care what I do.” + +If real force of character consists in overcoming our sudden weaknesses, +Schomberg displayed plenty of that quality. At the mention of the fly, +he re-enforced the severe dignity of his attitude as one inflates a +collapsing toy balloon with a great effort of breath. The easy-going, +relaxed attitude of Ricardo was really appalling. + +“That's so,” he went on. “I am that sort of fellow. You wouldn't think +it, would you? No. You have to be told. So I am telling you, and I dare +say you only half believe it. But you can't say to yourself that I am +drunk, stare at me as you may. I haven't had anything stronger than a +glass of iced water all day. Takes a real gentleman to see through a +fellow. Oh, yes--he spotted me. I told you we had a few talks at sea +about one thing or another. And I used to watch him down the skylight, +playing cards in the cuddy with the others. They had to pass the time +away somehow. By the same token he caught me at it once, and it was then +that I told him I was fond of cards--and generally lucky in gambling, +too. Yes, he had sized me up. Why not? A gentleman's just like any other +man--and something more.” + +It flashed through Schomberg's mind: that these two were indeed well +matched in their enormous dissimilarity, identical souls in different +disguises. + +“Says he to me”--Ricardo started again in a gossiping manner--'I'm +packed up. It's about time to go, Martin.' + +“It was the first time he called me Martin. Says I: + +“'Is that it, sir?' + +“'You didn't think I was after that sort of treasure, did you? I wanted +to clear out from home quietly. It's a pretty expensive way of getting a +passage across, but it has served my turn.' + +“I let him know very soon that I was game for anything, from pitch and +toss to wilful murder, in his company. + +“'Wilful murder?' says he in his quiet way. 'What the deuce is that? +What are you talking about? People do get killed sometimes when they get +in one's way, but that's self-defence--you understand?' + +“I told him I did. And then I said I would run below for a minute, to +ram a few of my things into a sailor's bag I had. I've never cared for +a lot of dunnage; I believed in going about flying light when I was at +sea. I came back and found him strolling up and down the deck, as if +he were taking a breath of fresh air before turning in, like any other +evening. + +“'Ready?' + +“'Yes, sir.' + +“He didn't even look at me. We had had a boat in the water astern ever +since we came to anchor in the afternoon. He throws the stump of his +cigar overboard. + +“'Can you get the captain out on deck?' he asks. + +“That was the last thing in the world I should have thought of doing. I +lost my tongue for a moment. + +“'I can try,' says I. + +“'Well, then, I am going below. You get him up and keep him with you +till I come back on deck. Mind! Don't let him go below till I return.' + +“I could not help asking why he told me to rouse a sleeping man, when +we wanted everybody on board to sleep sweetly till we got clear of the +schooner. He laughs a little and says that I didn't see all the bearings +of this business. + +“'Mind,' he says, 'don't let him leave you till you see me come up +again.' He puts his eyes close to mine. 'Keep him with you at all +costs.' + +“'And that means?' says I. + +“'All costs to him--by every possible or impossible means. I don't want +to be interrupted in my business down below. He would give me lots +of trouble. I take you with me to save myself trouble in various +circumstances; and you've got to enter on your work right away.' + +“'Just so, sir,' says I; and he slips down the companion. + +“With a gentleman you know at once where you are; but it was a ticklish +job. The skipper was nothing to me one way or another, any more than you +are at this moment, Mr. Schomberg. You may light your cigar or blow your +brains out this minute, and I don't care a hang which you do, both or +neither. To bring the skipper up was easy enough. I had only to stamp on +the deck a few times over his head. I stamped hard. But how to keep him +up when he got there? + +“'Anything the matter; Mr. Ricardo?' I heard his voice behind me. + +“There he was, and I hadn't thought of anything to say to him; so I +didn't turn round. The moonlight was brighter than many a day I could +remember in the North Sea. + +“'Why did you call me? What are you staring at out there, Mr. Ricardo?' + +“He was deceived by my keeping my back to him. I wasn't staring at +anything, but his mistake gave me a notion. + +“'I am staring at something that looks like a canoe over there,' I said +very slowly. + +“The skipper got concerned at once. It wasn't any danger from the +inhabitants, whoever they were. + +“'Oh, hang it!' says he. 'That's very unfortunate.' He had hoped that +the schooner being on the coast would not get known so very soon. +'Dashed awkward, with the business we've got in hand, to have a lot of +niggers watching operations. But are you certain this is a canoe?' + +“'It may be a drift-log,' I said; 'but I thought you had better have a +look with your own eyes. You may make it out better than I can.' + +“His eyes weren't anything as good as mine. But he says: + +“'Certainly. Certainly. You did quite right.' + +“And it's a fact I had seen some drift-logs at sunset. I saw what they +were then and didn't trouble my head about them, forgot all about it +till that very moment. Nothing strange in seeing drift-logs off a coast +like that; and I'm hanged if the skipper didn't make one out in the +wake of the moon. Strange what a little thing a man's life hangs on +sometimes--a single word! Here you are, sitting unsuspicious before me, +and you may let out something unbeknown to you that would settle your +hash. Not that I have any ill-feeling. I have no feelings. If the +skipper had said, 'O, bosh!' and had turned his back on me, he would not +have gone three steps towards his bed; but he stood there and stared. +And now the job was to get him off the deck when he was no longer wanted +there. + +“'We are just trying to make out if that object there is a canoe or a +log,' says he to Mr. Jones. + +“Mr Jones had come up, lounging as carelessly as when he went below. +While the skipper was jawing about boats and drifting logs. I asked by +signs, from behind, if I hadn't better knock him on the head and drop +him quietly overboard. The night was slipping by, and we had to go. It +couldn't be put off till next night no more. No. No more. And do you +know why?” + +Schomberg made a slight negative sign with his head. This direct appeal +annoyed him, jarred on the induced quietude of a great talker forced +into the part of a listener and sunk in it as a man sinks into slumber. +Mr. Ricardo struck a note of scorn. + +“Don't know why? Can't you guess? No? Because the boss had got hold of +the skipper's cash-box by then. See?” + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + + “A common thief!” + +Schomberg bit his tongue just too late, and woke up completely as he saw +Ricardo retract his lips in a cat-like grin; but the companion of “plain +Mr. Jones” didn't alter his comfortable, gossiping attitude. + +“Garn! What if he did want to see his money back, like any tame +shopkeeper, hash-seller, gin-slinger, or ink-spewer does? Fancy a mud +turtle like you trying to pass an opinion on a gentleman! A gentleman +isn't to be sized up so easily. Even I ain't up to it sometimes. For +instance, that night, all he did was to waggle his finger at me. The +skipper stops his silly chatter, surprised. + +“'Eh? What's the matter?' asks he. + +“The matter! It was his reprieve--that's what was the matter. + +“'O, nothing, nothing,' says my gentleman. 'You are perfectly right. A +log--nothing but a log.' + +“Ha, ha! Reprieve, I call it, because if the skipper had gone on with +his silly argument much longer he would have had to be knocked out +of the way. I could hardly hold myself in on account of the precious +minutes. However, his guardian angel put it into his head to shut up and +go back to his bed. I was ramping mad about the lost time.” + +“'Why didn't you let me give him one on his silly coconut sir?' I asks. + +“'No ferocity, no ferocity,' he says, raising his finger at me as calm +as you please. + +“You can't tell how a gentleman takes that sort of thing. They don't +lose their temper. It's bad form. You'll never see him lose his +temper--not for anybody to see anyhow. Ferocity ain't good form, +either--that much I've learned by this time, and more, too. I've had +that schooling that you couldn't tell by my face if I meant to rip you +up the next minute--as of course I could do in less than a jiffy. I have +a knife up the leg of my trousers.” + +“You haven't!” exclaimed Schomberg incredulously. + +Mr Ricardo was as quick as lightning in changing his lounging, idle +attitude for a stooping position, and exhibiting the weapon with one +jerk at the left leg of his trousers. Schomberg had just a view of it, +strapped to a very hairy limb, when Mr. Ricardo, jumping up, stamped his +foot to get the trouser-leg down, and resumed his careless pose with one +elbow on the table. + +“It's a more handy way to carry a tool than you would think,” he went +on, gazing abstractedly into Schomberg's wide-open eyes. “Suppose some +little difference comes up during a game. Well, you stoop to pick up a +dropped card, and when you come up--there you are ready to strike, or +with the thing up you sleeve ready to throw. Or you just dodge under the +table when there's some shooting coming. You wouldn't believe the damage +a fellow with a knife under the table can do to ill-conditioned skunks +that want to raise trouble, before they begin to understand what the +screaming's about, and make a bolt--those that can, that is.” + +The roses of Schomberg's cheek at the root of his chestnut beard faded +perceptibly. Ricardo chuckled faintly. + +“But no ferocity--no ferocity! A gentleman knows. What's the good of +getting yourself into a state? And no shirking necessity, either. No +gentleman ever shirks. What I learn I don't forget. Why! We gambled +on the plains, with a damn lot of cattlemen in ranches; played fair, +mind--and then had to fight for our winnings afterwards as often as not. +We've gambled on the hills and in the valleys and on the sea-shore, and +out of sight of land--mostly fair. Generally it's good enough. We began +in Nicaragua first, after we left that schooner and her fool errand. +There were one hundred and twenty-seven sovereigns and some Mexican +dollars in that skipper's cash-box. Hardly enough to knock a man on the +head for from behind, I must confess; but that the skipper had a narrow +escape the governor himself could not deny afterwards. + +“'Do you want me to understand, sir, that you mind there being one life +more or less on this earth?' I asked him, a few hours after we got away. + +“'Certainly not,' says he. + +“'Well, then, why did you stop me?' + +“'There's a proper way of doing things. You'll have to learn to be +correct. There's also unnecessary exertion. That must be avoided, +too--if only for the look of the thing.' A gentleman's way of putting +things to you--and no mistake! + +“At sunrise we got into a creek, to lie hidden in case the treasure hunt +party had a mind to take a spell hunting for us. And dash me if they +didn't! We saw the schooner away out, running to leeward, with ten pairs +of binoculars sweeping the sea, no doubt on all sides. I advised the +governor to give her time to beat back again before we made a start. So +we stayed up that creek something like ten days, as snug as can be. On +the seventh day we had to kill a man, though--the brother of this Pedro +here. They were alligator-hunters, right enough. We got our lodgings in +their hut. Neither the boss nor I could habla Espanol--speak Spanish, +you know--much then. Dry bank, nice shade, jolly hammocks, fresh fish, +good game, everything lovely. The governor chucked them a few dollars to +begin with; but it was like boarding with a pair of savage apes, anyhow. +By and by we noticed them talking a lot together. They had twigged +the cash-box, and the leather portmanteaus, and my bag--a jolly lot of +plunder to look at. They must have been saying to each other: + +“'No one's ever likely to come looking for these two fellows, who seem +to have fallen from the moon. Let's cut their throats.' + +“Why, of course! Clear as daylight. I didn't need to spy one of them +sharpening a devilish long knife behind some bushes, while glancing +right and left with his wild eyes, to know what was in the wind. Pedro +was standing by, trying the edge of another long knife. They thought we +were away on our lookout at the mouth of the river, as was usual with us +during the day. Not that we expected to see much of the schooner, but +it was just as well to make certain, if possible; and then it was cooler +out of the woods, in the breeze. Well, the governor was there right +enough, lying comfortable on a rug, where he could watch the offing, but +I had gone back to the hut to get a chew of tobacco out of my bag. I had +not broken myself of the habit then, and I couldn't be happy unless I +had a lump as big as a baby's fist in my cheek.” + +At the cannibalistic comparison, Schomberg muttered a faint, sickly +“don't.” Ricardo hitched himself up in his seat and glanced down his +outstretched legs complacently. + +“I am tolerably light on my feet, as a general thing,” he went on. “Dash +me if I don't think I could drop a pinch of salt on a sparrow's tail, +if I tried. Anyhow, they didn't hear me. I watched them two brown, hairy +brutes not ten yards off. All they had on was white linen drawers rolled +up on their thighs. Not a word they said to each other. Antonio was +down on his thick hams, busy rubbing a knife on a flat stone; Pedro was +leaning against a small tree and passing his thumb along the edge of his +blade. I got away quieter than a mouse, you bet.” + +“I didn't say anything to the boss then. He was leaning on his elbow +on his rug, and didn't seem to want to be spoken to. He's like +that--sometimes that familiar you might think he would eat out of your +hand, and at others he would snub you sharper than a devil--but always +quiet. Perfect gentleman, I tell you. I didn't bother him, then; but +I wasn't likely to forget them two fellows, so businesslike with their +knives. At that time we had only one revolver between us two--the +governor's six-shooter, but loaded only in five chambers; and we had no +more cartridges. He had left the box behind in a drawer in his cabin. +Awkward! I had nothing but an old clasp-knife--no good at all for +anything serious. + +“In the evening we four sat round a bit of fire outside the +sleeping-shed, eating broiled fish off plantain leaves, with roast yams +for bread--the usual thing. The governor and I were on one side, and +these two beauties cross-legged on the other, grunting a word or two +to each other, now and then, hardly human speech at all, and their eyes +down, fast on the ground. For the last three days we couldn't get them +to look us in the face. Presently I began to talk to the boss quietly, +just as I am talking to you now, careless like, and I told him all I had +observed. He goes on picking up pieces of fish and putting them into his +mouth as calm as anything. It's a pleasure to have anything to do with a +gentleman. Never looked across at them once. + +“'And now,' says I, yawning on purpose, 'we've got to stand watch at +night, turn about, and keep our eyes skinned all day, too, and mind we +don't get jumped upon suddenly.' + +“'It's perfectly intolerable,' says the governor. 'And you with no +weapon of any sort!' + +“'I mean to stick pretty close to you, sir, from this on, if you don't +mind,' says I. + +“He just nods the least bit, wipes his fingers on the plantain leaf, +puts his hand behind his back, as if to help himself to rise from the +ground, snatches his revolver from under his jacket and plugs a bullet +plumb centre into Mr. Antonio's chest. See what it is to have to do with +a gentleman. No confounded fuss, and things done out of hand. But he +might have tipped me a wink or something. I nearly jumped out of my +skin. Scared ain't in it! I didn't even know who had fired. Everything +had been so still just before that the bang of the shot seemed +the loudest noise I had ever heard. The honourable Antonio pitches +forward--they always do, towards the shot; you must have noticed that +yourself--yes, he pitches forward on to the embers, and all that lot of +hair on his face and head flashes up like a pinch of gunpowder. Greasy, +I expect; always scraping the fat off them alligators' hides--” + +“Look here,” exclaimed Schomberg violently, as if trying to burst some +invisible bonds, “do you mean to say that all this happened?” + +“No,” said Ricardo coolly. “I am making it all up as I go along, just to +help you through the hottest part of the afternoon. So down he pitches +his nose on the red embers, and up jumps our handsome Pedro and I at the +same time, like two Jacks-in-the-box. He starts to bolt away, with his +head over his shoulder, and I, hardly knowing what I was doing, spring +on his back. I had the sense to get my hands round his neck at once, and +it's about all I could do to lock my fingers tight under his jaw. You +saw the beauty's neck, didn't you? Hard as iron, too. Down we both went. +Seeing this the governor puts his revolver in his pocket. + +“'Tie his legs together, sir,' I yell. 'I'm trying to strangle him.' + +“There was a lot of their fibre-lines lying about. I gave him a last +squeeze and then got up. + +“'I might have shot you,' says the governor, quite concerned. + +“'But you are glad to have saved a cartridge, sir,' I tell him. + +“My jump did save it. It wouldn't have done to let him get away in +the dark like that, and have the beauty dodging around in the bushes, +perhaps, with the rusty flint-lock gun they had. The governor owned up +that the jump was the correct thing. + +“'But he isn't dead,' says he, bending over him. + +“Might as well hope to strangle an ox. We made haste to tie his elbows +back, and then, before he came to himself, we dragged him to a small +tree, sat him up, and bound him to it, not by the waist but by the +neck--some twenty turns of small line round his throat and the trunk, +finished off with a reef-knot under his ear. Next thing we did was to +attend to the honourable Antonio, who was making a great smell frizzling +his face on the red coals. We pushed and rolled him into the creek, and +left the rest to the alligators. + +“I was tired. That little scrap took it out of me something awful. The +governor hadn't turned a hair. That's where a gentleman has the pull +of you. He don't get excited. No gentleman does--or hardly ever. I fell +asleep all of a sudden and left him smoking by the fire I had made +up, his railway rug round his legs, as calm as if he were sitting in a +first-class carriage. We hardly spoke ten words to each other after +it was over, and from that day to this we have never talked of the +business. I wouldn't have known he remembered it if he hadn't alluded to +it when talking with you the other day--you know, with regard to Pedro.” + +“It surprised you, didn't it? That's why I am giving you this yarn of +how he came to be with us, like a sort of dog--dashed sight more useful, +though. You know how he can trot around with trays? Well, he could bring +down an ox with his fist, at a word from the boss, just as cleverly. And +fond of the governor! Oh, my word! More than any dog is of any man.” + +Schomberg squared his chest. + +“Oh, and that's one of the things I wanted to mention to Mr. Jones,” he +said. “It's unpleasant to have that fellow round the house so early. He +sits on the stairs at the back for hours before he is needed here, and +frightens people so that the service suffers. The Chinamen--” + +Ricardo nodded and raised his hand. + +“When I first saw him he was fit to frighten a grizzly bear, let alone +a Chinaman. He's become civilized now to what he once was. Well, that +morning, first thing on opening my eyes, I saw him sitting there, tied +up by the neck to the tree. He was blinking. We spent the day watching +the sea, and we actually made out the schooner working to windward, +which showed that she had given us up. Good! When the sun rose again, I +took a squint at our Pedro. He wasn't blinking. He was rolling his eyes, +all white one minute and black the next, and his tongue was hanging out +a yard. Being tied up short by the neck like this would daunt the arch +devil himself--in time--in time, mind! I don't know but that even a +real gentleman would find it difficult to keep a stiff lip to the end. +Presently we went to work getting our boat ready. I was busying myself +setting up the mast, when the governor passes the remark: + +“'I think he wants to say something.' + +“I had heard a sort of croaking going on for some time, only I wouldn't +take any notice; but then I got out of the boat and went up to him, with +some water. His eyes were red--red and black and half out of his +head. He drank all the water I gave him, but he hadn't much to say for +himself. I walked back to the governor. + +“'He asks for a bullet in his head before we go,' I said. I wasn't at +all pleased. + +“'Oh, that's out of the question altogether,' says the governor. + +“He was right there. Only four shots left, and ninety miles of wild +coast to put behind us before coming to the first place where you could +expect to buy revolver cartridges. + +“'Anyhow,' I tells him, 'he wants to be killed some way or other, as a +favour.' + +“And then I go on setting up the boat's mast. I didn't care much for the +notion of butchering a man bound hand and foot and fastened by the neck +besides. I had a knife then--the honourable Antonio's knife; and that +knife is this knife. + +“Ricardo gave his leg a resounding slap. + +“First spoil in my new life,” he went on with harsh joviality. “The +dodge of carrying it down there I learned later. I carried it stuck in +my belt that day. No, I hadn't much stomach for the job; but when you +work with a gentleman of the real right sort you may depend on your +feelings being seen through your skin. Says the governor suddenly: + +“'It may even be looked upon as his right'--you hear a gentleman +speaking there?--'but what do you think of taking him with us in the +boat?' + +“And the governor starts arguing that the beggar would be useful in +working our way along the coast. We could get rid of him before coming +to the first place that was a little civilized. I didn't want much +talking over. Out I scrambled from the boat. + +“'Ay, but will he be manageable, sir?' + +“'Oh, yes. He's daunted. Go on, cut him loose--I take the +responsibility.' + +“'Right you are, sir.' + +“He sees me come along smartly with his brother's knife in my hand--I +wasn't thinking how it looked from his side of the fence, you know--and +jiminy, it nearly killed him! He stared like a crazed bullock and began +to sweat and twitch all over, something amazing. I was so surprised, +that I stopped to look at him. The drops were pouring over his eyebrows, +down his beard, off his nose--and he gurgled. Then it struck me that he +couldn't see what was in my mind. By favour or by right he didn't like +to die when it came to it; not in that way, anyhow. When I stepped round +to get at the lashing, he let out a sort of soft bellow. Thought I was +going to stick him from behind, I guess. I cut all the turns with one +slash, and he went over on his side, flop, and started kicking with his +tied legs. Laugh! I don't know what there was so funny about it, but I +fairly shouted. What between my laughing and his wriggling, I had a job +in cutting him free. As soon as he could feel his limbs he makes for the +bank, where the governor was standing, crawls up to him on his hands and +knees, and embraces his legs. Gratitude, eh? You could see that being +allowed to live suited that chap down to the ground. The governor gets +his legs away from him gently and just mutters to me: + +“'Let's be off. Get him into the boat.' + +“It was not difficult,” continued Ricardo, after eyeing Schomberg +fixedly for a moment. “He was ready enough to get into the boat, +and--here he is. He would let himself be chopped into small pieces--with +a smile, mind; with a smile!--for the governor. I don't know about him +doing that much for me; but pretty near, pretty near. I did the tying up +and the untying, but he could see who was the boss. And then he knows a +gentleman. A dog knows a gentleman--any dog. It's only some foreigners +that don't know; and nothing can teach them, either.” + +“And you mean to say,” asked Schomberg, disregarding what might have +been annoying for himself in the emphasis of the final remark, “you mean +to say that you left steady employment at good wages for a life like +this?” + +“There!” began Ricardo quietly. “That's just what a man like you would +say. You are that tame! I follow a gentleman. That ain't the same thing +as to serve an employer. They give you wages as they'd fling a bone to +a dog, and they expect you to be grateful. It's worse than slavery. You +don't expect a slave that's bought for money to be grateful. And if you +sell your work--what is it but selling your own self? You've got so many +days to live and you sell them one after another. Hey? Who can pay me +enough for my life? Ay! But they throw at you your week's money and +expect you to say 'thank you' before you pick it up.” + +He mumbled some curses, directed at employers generally, as it seemed, +then blazed out: + +“Work be damned! I ain't a dog walking on its hind legs for a bone; I am +a man who's following a gentleman. There's a difference which you will +never understand, Mr. Tame Schomberg.” + +He yawned slightly. Schomberg, preserving a military stiffness +reinforced by a slight frown, had allowed his thoughts to stray away. +They were busy detailing the image of a young girl--absent--gone--stolen +from him. He became enraged. There was that rascal looking at him +insolently. If the girl had not been shamefully decoyed away from him, +he would not have allowed anyone to look at him insolently. He would +have made nothing of hitting that rogue between the eyes. Afterwards he +would have kicked the other without hesitation. He saw himself doing it; +and in sympathy with this glorious vision Schomberg's right foot, and +arm moved convulsively. + +At this moment he came out of his sudden reverie to note with alarm the +wide-awake curiosity of Mr. Ricardo's stare. + +“And so you go like this about the world, gambling,” he remarked +inanely, to cover his confusion. But Ricardo's stare did not change its +character, and he continued vaguely: + +“Here and there and everywhere.” He pulled himself together, squared his +shoulders. “Isn't it very precarious?” he said firmly. + +The word precarious--seemed to be effective, because Ricardo's eyes lost +their dangerously interested expression. + +“No, not so bad,” Ricardo said, with indifference. “It's my opinion that +men will gamble as long as they have anything to put on a card. Gamble? +That's nature. What's life itself? You never know what may turn up. The +worst of it is that you never can tell exactly what sort of cards you +are holding yourself. What's trumps?--that is the question. See? Any man +will gamble if only he's given a chance, for anything or everything. You +too--” + +“I haven't touched a card now for twenty years,” said Schomberg in an +austere tone. + +“Well, if you got your living that way you would be no worse than you +are now, selling drinks to people--beastly beer and spirits, rotten +stuff fit to make an old he-goat yell if you poured it down its throat. +Pooh! I can't stand the confounded liquor. Never could. A whiff of neat +brandy in a glass makes me feel sick. Always did. If everybody was like +me, liquor would be going a-begging. You think it's funny in a man, +don't you?” + +Schomberg made a vague gesture of toleration. Ricardo hitched up his +chair and settled his elbow afresh on the table. + +“French siros I must say I do like. Saigon's the place for them. I see +you have siros in the bar. Hang me if I ain't getting dry, conversing +like this with you. Come, Mr. Schomberg, be hospitable, as the governor +says.” + +Schomberg rose and walked with dignity to the counter. His footsteps +echoed loudly on the floor of polished boards. He took down a bottle, +labelled “Sirop de Groseille.” The little sounds he made, the clink of +glass, the gurgling of the liquid, the pop of the soda-water cork had +a preternatural sharpness. He came back carrying a pink and glistening +tumbler. Mr. Ricardo had followed his movements with oblique, coyly +expectant yellow eyes, like a cat watching the preparation of a saucer +of milk, and the satisfied sound after he had drunk might have been a +slightly modified form of purring, very soft and deep in his throat. It +affected Schomberg unpleasantly as another example of something inhuman +in those men wherein lay the difficulty of dealing with them. A +spectre, a cat, an ape--there was a pretty association for a mere man to +remonstrate with, he reflected with an inward shudder; for Schomberg had +been overpowered, as it were, by his imagination, and his reason could +not react against that fanciful view of his guests. And it was not only +their appearance. The morals of Mr. Ricardo seemed to him to be pretty +much the morals of a cat. Too much. What sort of argument could a mere +man offer to a . . . or to a spectre, either! What the morals of a +spectre could be, Schomberg had no idea. Something dreadful, no +doubt. Compassion certainly had no place in them. As to the ape--well, +everybody knew what an ape was. It had no morals. Nothing could be more +hopeless. + +Outwardly, however, having picked up the cigar which he had laid aside +to get the drink, with his thick fingers, one of them ornamented by a +gold ring, Schomberg smoked with moody composure. Facing him, Ricardo +blinked slowly for a time, then closed his eyes altogether, with the +placidity of the domestic cat dozing on the hearth-rug. In another +moment he opened them very wide, and seemed surprised to see Schomberg +there. + +“You're having a very slack time today, aren't you?” he observed. “But +then this whole town is confoundedly slack, anyhow; and I've never faced +such a slack party at a table before. Come eleven o'clock, they begin to +talk of breaking up. What's the matter with them? Want to go to bed so +early, or what?” + +“I reckon you don't lose a fortune by their wanting to go to bed,” said +Schomberg, with sombre sarcasm. + +“No,” admitted Ricardo, with a grin that stretched his thin mouth from +ear to ear, giving a sudden glimpse of his white teeth. “Only, you see, +when I once start, I would play for nuts, for parched peas, for any +rubbish. I would play them for their souls. But these Dutchmen aren't +any good. They never seem to get warmed up properly, win or lose. I've +tried them both ways, too. Hang them for a beggarly, bloodless lot of +animated cucumbers!” + +“And if anything out of the way was to happen, they would be just +as cool in locking you and your gentleman up,” Schomberg snarled +unpleasantly. + +“Indeed!” said Ricardo slowly, taking Schomberg's measure with his eyes. +“And what about you?” + +“You talk mighty big,” burst out the hotel-keeper. “You talk of ranging +all over the world, and doing great things, and taking fortune by the +scruff of the neck, but here you stick at this miserable business!” + +“It isn't much of a lay--that's a fact,” admitted Ricardo unexpectedly. + +Schomberg was red in the face with audacity. + +“I call it paltry,” he spluttered. + +“That's how it looks. Can't call it anything else.” Ricardo seemed to +be in an accommodating mood. “I should be ashamed of it myself, only you +see the governor is subject to fits--” + +“Fits!” Schomberg cried out, but in a low tone. “You don't say so!” He +exulted inwardly, as if this disclosure had in some way diminished the +difficulty of the situation. “Fits! That's a serious thing, isn't it? +You ought to take him to the civil hospital--a lovely place.” + +Ricardo nodded slightly, with a faint grin. + +“Serious enough. Regular fits of laziness, I call them. Now and then +he lays down on me like this, and there's no moving him. If you think I +like it, you're a long way out. Generally speaking, I can talk him over. +I know how to deal with a gentleman. I am no daily-bread slave. But when +he has said, 'Martin, I am bored,' then look out! There's nothing to do +but to shut up, confound it!” + +Schomberg, very much cast down, had listened open-mouthed. + +“What's the cause of it?” he asked. “Why is he like this? I don't +understand.” + +“I think I do,” said Ricardo. “A gentleman, you know, is not such a +simple person as you or I; and not so easy to manage, either. If only I +had something to lever him out with!” + +“What do you mean, to lever him out with?” muttered Schomberg +hopelessly. + +Ricardo was impatient with this denseness. + +“Don't you understand English? Look here! I couldn't make this +billiard table move an inch if I talked to it from now till the end of +days--could I? Well, the governor is like that, too, when the fits are +on him. He's bored. Nothing's worthwhile, nothing's good enough, that's +mere sense. But if I saw a capstan bar lying about here, I would soon +manage to shift that billiard table of yours a good many inches. And +that's all there is to it.” + +He rose noiselessly, stretched himself, supple and stealthy, with +curious sideways movements of his head and unexpected elongations of his +thick body, glanced out of the corners of his eyes in the direction of +the door, and finally leaned back against the table, folding his arms on +his breast comfortably, in a completely human attitude. + +“That's another thing you can tell a gentleman by--his freakishness. +A gentleman ain't accountable to nobody, any more than a tramp on the +roads. He ain't got to keep time. The governor got like this once in a +one-horse Mexican pueblo on the uplands, away from everywhere. He lay +all day long in a dark room--” + +“Drunk?” This word escaped Schomberg by inadvertence at which he became +frightened. But the devoted secretary seemed to find it natural. + +“No, that never comes on together with this kind of fit. He just lay +there full length on a mat, while a ragged, bare-legged boy that he had +picked up in the street sat in the patio, between two oleanders near the +open door of his room, strumming on a guitar and singing tristes to him +from morning to night. You know tristes--twang, twang, twang, aouh, hoo! +Chroo, yah!” + +Schomberg uplifted his hands in distress. This tribute seemed to flatter +Ricardo. His mouth twitched grimly. + +“Like that--enough to give colic to an ostrich, eh? Awful. Well, there +was a cook there who loved me--an old fat, Negro woman with spectacles. +I used to hide in the kitchen and turn her to, to make me dulces--sweet +things, you know, mostly eggs and sugar--to pass the time away. I am +like a kid for sweet things. And, by the way, why don't you ever have +a pudding at your tablydott, Mr. Schomberg? Nothing but fruit, morning, +noon, and night. Sickening! What do you think a fellow is--a wasp?” + +Schomberg disregarded the injured tone. + +“And how long did that fit, as you call it, last?” he asked anxiously. + +“Weeks, months, years, centuries, it seemed to me,” returned Mr. Ricardo +with feeling. “Of an evening the governor would stroll out into the sala +and fritter his life away playing cards with the juez of the place--a +little Dago with a pair of black whiskers--ekarty, you know, a +quick French game, for small change. And the comandante, a one-eyed, +half-Indian, flat-nosed ruffian, and I, we had to stand around and bet +on their hands. It was awful!” + +“Awful,” echoed Schomberg, in a Teutonic throaty tone of despair. “Look +here, I need your rooms.” + +“To be sure. I have been thinking that for some time past,” said Ricardo +indifferently. + +“I was mad when I listened to you. This must end!” + +“I think you are mad yet,” said Ricardo, not even unfolding his arms or +shifting his attitude an inch. He lowered his voice to add: “And if +I thought you had been to the police, I would tell Pedro to catch +you round the waist and break your fat neck by jerking your head +backward--snap! I saw him do it to a big buck nigger who was flourishing +a razor in front of the governor. It can be done. You hear a low crack, +that's all--and the man drops down like a limp rag.” + +Not even Ricardo's head, slightly inclined on the left shoulder, had +moved; but when he ceased the greenish irises which had been staring out +of doors glided into the corners of his eyes nearest to Schomberg and +stayed there with a coyly voluptuous expression. + + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +Schomberg felt desperation, that lamentable substitute for courage, +ooze out of him. It was not so much the threat of death as the weirdly +circumstantial manner of its declaration which affected him. A mere +“I'll murder you,” however ferocious in tone, and earnest, in purpose, +he could have faced; but before this novel mode of speech and procedure, +his imagination being very sensitive to the unusual, he collapsed as if +indeed his moral neck had been broken--snap! + +“Go to the police? Of course not. Never dreamed of it. Too late now. +I've let myself be mixed up in this. You got my consent while I wasn't +myself. I explained it to you at the time.” + +Ricardo's eye glided gently off Schomberg to stare far away. + +“Ay! Some trouble with a girl. But that's nothing to us.” + +“Naturally. What I say is, what's the good of all that savage talk to +me?” A bright argument occurred to him. “It's out of proportion; for +even if I were fool enough to go to the police now, there's nothing +serious to complain about. It would only mean deportation for you. They +would put you on board the first west-bound steamer to Singapore.” He +had become animated. “Out of this to the devil,” he added between his +teeth for his own private satisfaction. + +Ricardo made no comment, and gave no sign of having heard a single word. +This discouraged Schomberg, who had looked up hopefully. + +“Why do you want to stick here?” he cried. “It can't pay you people +to fool around like this. Didn't you worry just now about moving your +governor? Well, the police would move him for you; and from Singapore +you can go on to the east coast of Africa.” + +“I'll be hanged if the fellow isn't up to that silly trick!” was +Ricardo's comment, spoken in an ominous tone which recalled Schomberg to +the realities of his position. + +“No! No!” he protested. “It's a manner of speaking. Of course I +wouldn't.” + +“I think that trouble about the girl has really muddled your brains, +Mr. Schomberg. Believe me, you had better part friends with us; for, +deportation or no deportation, you'll be seeing one of us turning up +before long to pay you off for any nasty dodge you may be hatching in +that fat head of yours.” + +“Gott im Himmel!” groaned Schomberg. “Will nothing move him out? Will +he stop here immer--I mean always? Suppose I were to make it worth your +while, couldn't you--” + +“No,” Ricardo interrupted. “I couldn't, unless I had something to lever +him out with. I've told you that before.” + +“An inducement?” muttered Schomberg. + +“Ay. The east coast of Africa isn't good enough. He told me the other +day that it will have to wait till he is ready for it; and he may not be +ready for a long time, because the east coast can't run away, and no one +is likely to run off with it.” + +These remarks, whether considered as truisms or as depicting Mr. +Jones's mental state, were distinctly discouraging to the long-suffering +Schomberg; but there is truth in the well-known saying that places +the darkest hour before the dawn. The sound of words, apart from the +context, has its power; and these two words, 'run off,' had a special +affinity to the hotel-keeper's, haunting idea. It was always present +in his brain, and now it came forward evoked by a purely fortuitous +expression. No, nobody could run off with a continent; but Heyst had run +off with the girl! + +Ricardo could have had no conception of the cause of Schomberg's changed +expression. Yet it was noticeable enough to interest him so much that +he stopped the careless swinging of his leg and said, looking at the +hotel-keeper: + +“There's not much use arguing against that sort of talk--is there?” + +Schomberg was not listening. + +“I could put you on another track,” he said slowly, and stopped, as if +suddenly choked by an unholy emotion of intense eagerness combined with +fear of failure. Ricardo waited, attentive, yet not without a certain +contempt. + +“On the track of a man!” Schomberg uttered convulsively, and paused +again, consulting his rage and his conscience. + +“The man in the moon, eh?” suggested Ricardo, in a jeering murmur. + +Schomberg shook his head. + +“It would be nearly as safe to rook him as if he were the Man in the +moon. You go and try. It isn't so very far.” + +He reflected. These men were thieves and murderers as well as gamblers. +Their fitness for purposes of vengeance was appallingly complete. But he +preferred not to think of it in detail. He put it to himself summarily +that he would be paying Heyst out and would, at the same time, relieve +himself of these men's oppression. He had only to let loose his natural +gift for talking scandalously about his fellow creatures. And in this +case his great practice in it was assisted by hate, which, like love, +has an eloquence of its own. With the utmost ease he portrayed for +Ricardo, now seriously attentive, a Heyst fattened by years of private +and public rapines, the murderer of Morrison, the swindler of many +shareholders, a wonderful mixture of craft and impudence, of deep +purposes and simple wiles, of mystery and futility. In this exercise of +his natural function Schomberg revived, the colour coming back to his +face, loquacious, florid, eager, his manliness set off by the military +bearing. + +“That's the exact story. He was seen hanging about this part of the +world for years, spying into everybody's business: but I am the only +one who has seen through him from the first--contemptible, double-faced, +stick-at-nothing, dangerous fellow.” + +“Dangerous, is he?” + +Schomberg came to himself at the sound of Ricardo's voice. + +“Well, you know what I mean,” he said uneasily. “A lying, circumventing, +soft-spoken, polite, stuck-up rascal. Nothing open about him.” + +Mr Ricardo had slipped off the table, and was prowling about the room in +an oblique, noiseless manner. He flashed a grin at Schomberg in passing, +and a snarling: + +“Ah! H'm!” + +“Well, what more dangerous do you want?” argued Schomberg. “He's in no +way a fighting man, I believe,” he added negligently. + +“And you say he has been living alone there?” + +“Like the man in the moon,” answered Schomberg readily. “There's no +one that cares a rap what becomes of him. He has been lying low, you +understand, after bagging all that plunder.” + +“Plunder, eh? Why didn't he go home with it?” inquired Ricardo. + +The henchman of plain Mr. Jones was beginning to think that this was +something worth looking into. And he was pursuing truth in the manner +of men of sounder morality and purer intentions than his own; that is he +pursued it in the light of his own experience and prejudices. For facts, +whatever their origin (and God only knows where they come from), can be +only tested by our own particular suspicions. Ricardo was suspicious all +round. Schomberg, such is the tonic of recovered self-esteem, Schomberg +retorted fearlessly: + +“Go home? Why don't you go home? To hear your talk, you must have made +a pretty considerable pile going round winning people's money. You ought +to be ready by this time.” + +Ricardo stopped to look at Schomberg with surprise. + +“You think yourself very clever, don't you?” he said. + +Schomberg just then was so conscious of being clever that the snarling +irony left him unmoved. There was positively a smile in his noble +Teutonic beard, the first smile for weeks. He was in a felicitous vein. + +“How do you know that he wasn't thinking of going home? As a matter of +fact, he was on his way home.” + +“And how do I know that you are not amusing yourself by spinning out +a blamed fairy tale?” interrupted Ricardo roughly. “I wonder at myself +listening to the silly rot!” + +Schomberg received this turn of temper unmoved. He did not require to be +very subtly observant to notice that he had managed to arouse some sort +of feeling, perhaps of greed, in Ricardo's breast. + +“You won't believe me? Well! You can ask anybody that comes here if +that--that Swede hadn't got as far as this house on his way home. Why +should he turn up here if not for that? You ask anybody.” + +“Ask, indeed!” returned the other. “Catch me asking at large about a man +I mean to drop on! Such jobs must be done on the quiet--or not at all.” + +The peculiar intonation of the last phrase touched the nape of +Schomberg's neck with a chill. He cleared his throat slightly and looked +away as though he had heard something indelicate. Then, with a jump as +it were: + +“Of course he didn't tell me. Is it likely? But haven't I got eyes? +Haven't I got my common sense to tell me? I can see through people. By +the same token, he called on the Tesmans. Why did he call on the Tesmans +two days running, eh? You don't know? You can't tell?” + +He waited complacently till Ricardo had finished swearing quite openly +at him for a confounded chatterer, and then went on: + +“A fellow doesn't go to a counting-house in business hours for a chat +about the weather, two days running. Then why? To close his account with +them one day, and to get his money out the next! Clear, what?” + +Ricardo, with his trick of looking one way and moving another approached +Schomberg slowly. + +“To get his money?” he purred. + +“Gewiss,” snapped Schomberg with impatient superiority. “What else? That +is, only the money he had with the Tesmans. What he has buried or put +away on the island, devil only knows. When you think of the lot of hard +cash that passed through that man's hands, for wages and stores and all +that--and he's just a cunning thief, I tell you.” Ricardo's hard stare +discomposed the hotel-keeper, and he added in an embarrassed tone: “I +mean a common, sneaking thief--no account at all. And he calls himself a +Swedish baron, too! Tfui!” + +“He's a baron, is he? That foreign nobility ain't much,” commented Mr. +Ricardo seriously. “And then what? He hung about here!” + +“Yes, he hung about,” said Schomberg, making a wry mouth. “He--hung +about. That's it. Hung--” + +His voice died out. Curiosity was depicted in Ricardo's countenance. + +“Just like that; for nothing? And then turned about and went back to +that island again?” + +“And went back to that island again,” Schomberg echoed lifelessly, +fixing his gaze on the floor. + +“What's the matter with you?” asked Ricardo with genuine surprise. “What +is it?” + +Schomberg, without looking up, made an impatient gesture. His face was +crimson, and he kept it lowered. Ricardo went back to the point. + +“Well, but how do you account for it? What was his reason? What did he +go back to the island for?” + +“Honeymoon!” spat out Schomberg viciously. + +Perfectly still, his eyes downcast, he suddenly, with no preliminary +stir, hit the table with his fist a blow which caused the utterly +unprepared Ricardo to leap aside. And only then did Schomberg look up +with a dull, resentful expression. + +Ricardo stared hard for a moment, spun on his heel, walked to the end +of the room, came back smartly, and muttered a profound “Ay! Ay!” above +Schomberg's rigid head. That the hotel-keeper was capable of a +great moral effort was proved by a gradual return of his severe, +Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve manner. + +“Ay, ay!” repeated Ricardo more deliberately than before, and as if +after a further survey of the circumstances, “I wish I hadn't asked you, +or that you had told me a lie. It don't suit me to know that there's a +woman mixed up in this affair. What's she like? It's the girl you--” + +“Leave off!” muttered Schomberg, utterly pitiful behind his stiff +military front. + +“Ay, ay!” Ricardo ejaculated for the third time, more and more +enlightened and perplexed. “Can't bear to talk about it--so bad as that? +And yet I would bet she isn't a miracle to look at.” + +Schomberg made a gesture as if he didn't know, as if he didn't care. +Then he squared his shoulders and frowned at vacancy. + +“Swedish baron--h'm!” Ricardo continued meditatively. “I believe the +governor would think that business worth looking up, quite, if I put it +to him properly. The governor likes a duel, if you will call it so; but +I don't know a man that can stand up to him on the square. Have you ever +seen a cat play with a mouse? It's a pretty sight!” + +Ricardo, with his voluptuously gleaming eyes and the coy expression, +looked so much like a cat that Schomberg would have felt all the alarm +of a mouse if other feelings had not had complete possession of his +breast. + +“There are no lies between you and me,” he said, more steadily than he +thought he could speak. + +“What's the good now? He funks women. In that Mexican pueblo where we +lay grounded on our beef-bones, so to speak, I used to go to dances of +an evening. The girls there would ask me if the English caballero in +the posada was a monk in disguise, or if he had taken a vow to the +sancissima madre not to speak to a woman, or whether--You can imagine +what fairly free-spoken girls will ask when they come to the point of +not caring what they say; and it used to vex me. Yes, the governor funks +facing women.” + +“One woman?” interjected Schomberg in guttural tones. + +“One may be more awkward to deal with than two, or two hundred, for that +matter. In a place that's full of women you needn't look at them unless +you like; but if you go into a room where there is only one woman, young +or old, pretty or ugly, you have got to face her. And, unless you are +after her, then--the governor is right enough--she's in the way.” + +“Why notice them?” muttered Schomberg. “What can they do?” + +“Make a noise, if nothing else,” opined Mr. Ricardo curtly, with the +distaste of a man whose path is a path of silence; for indeed, nothing +is more odious than a noise when one is engaged in a weighty and +absorbing card game. “Noise, noise, my friend,” he went on forcibly; +“confounded screeching about something or other, and I like it no more +than the governor does. But with the governor there's something else +besides. He can't stand them at all.” + +He paused to reflect on this psychological phenomenon, and as no +philosopher was at hand to tell him that there is no strong sentiment +without some terror, as there is no real religion without a little +fetishism, he emitted his own conclusion, which surely could not go to +the root of the matter. + +“I'm hanged if I don't think they are to him what liquor is to me. +Brandy--pah!” + +He made a disgusted face, and produced a genuine shudder. Schomberg +listened to him in wonder. It looked as if the very scoundrelism, of +that--that Swede would protect him; the spoil of his iniquity standing +between the thief and the retribution. + +“That's so, old buck.” Ricardo broke the silence after contemplating +Schomberg's mute dejection with a sort of sympathy. “I don't think this +trick will work.” + +“But that's silly,” whispered the man deprived of the vengeance which he +had seemed already to hold in his hand, by a mysterious and exasperating +idiosyncrasy. + +“Don't you set yourself to judge a gentleman.” Ricardo without anger +administered a moody rebuke. “Even I can't understand the governor +thoroughly. And I am an Englishman and his follower. No, I don't think I +care to put it before him, sick as I am of staying here.” + +Ricardo could not be more sick of staying than Schomberg was of seeing +him stay. Schomberg believed so firmly in the reality of Heyst as +created by his own power of false inferences, of his hate, of his love +of scandal, that he could not contain a stifled cry of conviction +as sincere as most of our convictions, the disguised servants of our +passions, can appear at a supreme moment. + +“It would have been like going to pick up a nugget of a thousand pounds, +or two or three times as much, for all I know. No trouble, no--” + +“The petticoat's the trouble,” Ricardo struck in. + +He had resumed his noiseless, feline, oblique prowling, in which an +observer would have detected a new character of excitement, such as a +wild animal of the cat species, anxious to make a spring, might betray. +Schomberg saw nothing. It would probably have cheered his drooping +spirits; but in a general way he preferred not to look at Ricardo. +Ricardo, however, with one of his slanting, gliding, restless glances, +observed the bitter smile on Schomberg's bearded lips--the unmistakable +smile of ruined hopes. + +“You are a pretty unforgiving sort of chap,” he said, stopping for a +moment with an air of interest. “Hang me if I ever saw anybody look so +disappointed! I bet you would send black plague to that island if you +only knew how--eh, what? Plague too good for them? Ha, ha, ha!” + +He bent down to stare at Schomberg who sat unstirring with stony eyes +and set features, and apparently deaf to the rasping derision of that +laughter so close to his red fleshy ear. + +“Black plague too good for them, ha, ha!” Ricardo pressed the point on +the tormented hotel-keeper. Schomberg kept his eyes down obstinately. + +“I don't wish any harm to the girl--” he muttered. + +“But did she bolt from you? A fair bilk? Come!” + +“Devil only knows what that villainous Swede had done to her--what he +promised her, how he frightened her. She couldn't have cared for him, +I know.” Schomberg's vanity clung to the belief in some atrocious, +extraordinary means of seduction employed by Heyst. “Look how he +bewitched that poor Morrison,” he murmured. + +“Ah, Morrison--got all his money, what?” + +“Yes--and his life.” + +“Terrible fellow, that Swedish baron! How is one to get at him?” + +Schomberg exploded. + +“Three against one! Are you shy? Do you want me to give you a letter of +introduction?” + +“You ought to look at yourself in a glass,” Ricardo said quietly. “Dash +me if you don't get a stroke of some kind presently. And this is the +fellow who says women can do nothing! That one will do for you, unless +you manage to forget her.” + +“I wish I could,” Schomberg admitted earnestly. “And it's all the doing +of that Swede. I don't get enough sleep, Mr. Ricardo. And then, to +finish me off, you gentlemen turn up . . . as if I hadn't enough worry.” + +“That's done you good,” suggested the secretary with ironic seriousness. +“Takes your mind off that silly trouble. At your age too.” + +He checked himself, as if in pity, and changing his tone: + +“I would really like to oblige you while doing a stroke of business at +the same time.” + +“A good stroke,” insisted Schomberg, as if it were mechanically. In his +simplicity he was not able to give up the idea which had entered his +head. An idea must be driven out by another idea, and with Schomberg +ideas were rare and therefore tenacious. “Minted gold,” he murmured with +a sort of anguish. + +Such an expressive combination of words was not without effect upon +Ricardo. Both these men were amenable to the influence of verbal +suggestions. The secretary of “plain Mr. Jones” sighed and murmured. + +“Yes. But how is one to get at it?” + +“Being three to one,” said Schomberg, “I suppose you could get it for +the asking.” + +“One would think the fellow lived next door,” Ricardo growled +impatiently. “Hang it all, can't you understand a plain question? I have +asked you the way.” + +Schomberg seemed to revive. + +“The way?” + +The torpor of deceived hopes underlying his superficial changes of mood +had been pricked by these words which seemed pointed with purpose. + +“The way is over the water, of course,” said the hotel-keeper. “For +people like you, three days in a good, big boat is nothing. It's no more +than a little outing, a bit of a change. At this season the Java Sea +is a pond. I have an excellent, safe boat--a ship's life-boat--carry +thirty, let alone three, and a child could handle her. You wouldn't get +a wet face at this time of the year. You might call it a pleasure-trip.” + +“And yet, having this boat, you didn't go after her yourself--or after +him? Well, you are a fine fellow for a disappointed lover.” + +Schomberg gave a start at the suggestion. + +“I am not three men,” he said sulkily, as the shortest answer of the +several he could have given. + +“Oh, I know your sort,” Ricardo let fall negligently. “You are like most +people--or perhaps just a little more peaceable than the rest of the +buying and selling gang that bosses this rotten show. Well, well, +you respectable citizen,” he went on, “let us go thoroughly into the +matter.” + +When Schomberg had been made to understand that Mr. Jones's henchman was +ready to discuss, in his own words, “this boat of yours, with courses +and distances,” and such concrete matters of no good augury to that +villainous Swede, he recovered his soldierly bearing, squared his +shoulders, and asked in his military manner: + +“You wish, then, to proceed with the business?” + +Ricardo nodded. He had a great mind to, he said. A gentleman had to be +humoured as much as possible; but he must be managed, too, on occasions, +for his own good. And it was the business of the right sort of +“follower” to know the proper time and the proper methods of that +delicate part of his duty. Having exposed this theory Ricardo proceeded +to the application. + +“I've never actually lied to him,” he said, “and I ain't going to now. +I shall just say nothing about the girl. He will have to get over the +shock the best he can. Hang it all! Too much humouring won't do here.” + +“Funny thing,” Schomberg observed crisply. + +“Is it? Ay, you wouldn't mind taking a woman by the throat in some dark +corner and nobody by, I bet!” + +Ricardo's dreadful, vicious, cat-like readiness to get his claws out at +any moment startled Schomberg as usual. But it was provoking too. + +“And you?” he defended himself. “Don't you want me to believe you are up +to anything?” + +“I, my boy? Oh, yes. I am not that gentleman; neither are you. Take 'em +by the throat or chuck 'em under the chin is all one to me--almost,” + affirmed Ricardo, with something obscurely ironical in his complacency. +“Now, as to this business. A three days' jaunt in a good boat isn't a +thing to frighten people like us. You are right, so far; but there are +other details.” + +Schomberg was ready enough to enter into details. He explained that he +had a small plantation, with a fairly habitable hut on it, on Madura. He +proposed that his guest should start from town in his boat, as if going +for an excursion to that rural spot. The custom-house people on the quay +were used to see his boat go off on such trips. + +From Madura, after some repose and on a convenient day, Mr. Jones +and party would make the real start. It would all be plain sailing. +Schomberg undertook to provision the boat. The greatest hardship the +voyagers need apprehend would be a mild shower of rain. At that season +of the year there were no serious thunderstorms. + +Schomberg's heart began to thump as he saw himself nearing his +vengeance. His speech was thick but persuasive. + +“No risk at all--none whatever.” + +Ricardo dismissed these assurances of safety with an impatient gesture. +He was thinking of other risks. + +“The getting away from here is all right; but we may be sighted at sea, +and that may bring awkwardness later on. A ship's boat with three white +men in her, knocking about out of sight of land, is bound to make talk. +Are we likely to be seen on our way?” + +“No, unless by native craft,” said Schomberg. + +Ricardo nodded, satisfied. Both these white men looked on native life as +a mere play of shadows. A play of shadows the dominant race could +walk through unaffected and disregarded in the pursuit of its +incomprehensible aims and needs. No. Native craft did not count, of +course. It was an empty, solitary part of the sea, Schomberg expounded +further. Only the Ternate mail-boat crossed that region about the eighth +of every month, regularly--nowhere near the island though. Rigid, his +voice hoarse, his heart thumping, his mind concentrated on the success +of his plan, the hotel-keeper multiplied words, as if to keep as many +of them as possible between himself and the murderous aspect of his +purpose. + +“So, if you gentlemen depart from my plantation quietly at sunset on the +eighth--always best to make a start at night, with a land breeze--it's a +hundred to one--What am I saying?--it's a thousand to one that no +human eye will see you on the passage. All you've got to do is keep her +heading north-east for, say, fifty hours; perhaps not quite so long. +There will always be draft enough to keep a boat moving; you may reckon +on that; and then--” + +The muscles about his waist quivered under his clothes with eagerness, +with impatience, and with something like apprehension, the true nature +of which was not clear to him. And he did not want to investigate it. +Ricardo regarded him steadily, with those dry eyes of his shining more +like polished stones than living tissue. + +“And then what?” he asked. + +“And then--why, you will astonish der herr baron--ha, ha!” + +Schomberg seemed to force the words and the laugh out of himself in a +hoarse bass. + +“And you believe he has all that plunder by him?” asked Ricardo, rather +perfunctorily, because the fact seemed to him extremely probable when +looked at all round by his acute mind. + +Schomberg raised his hands and lowered them slowly. + +“How can it be otherwise? He was going home, he was on his way, in this +hotel. Ask people. Was it likely he would leave it behind him?” + +Ricardo was thoughtful. Then, suddenly raising his head, he remarked: + +“Steer north-east for fifty hours, eh? That's not much of a sailing +direction. I've heard of a port being missed before on better +information. Can't you say what sort of landfall a fellow may expect? +But I suppose you have never seen that island yourself?” + +Schomberg admitted that he had not seen it, in a tone in which a +man congratulates himself on having escaped the contamination of an +unsavoury experience. No, certainly not. He had never had any business +to call there. But what of that? He could give Mr. Ricardo as good a +sea-mark as anybody need wish for. He laughed nervously. Miss it! He +defied anyone that came within forty miles of it to miss the retreat of +that villainous Swede. + +“What do you think of a pillar of smoke by day and a loom of fire at +night? There's a volcano in full blast near that island--enough to guide +almost a blind man. What more do you want? An active volcano to steer +by?” + +These last words he roared out exultingly, then jumped up and glared. +The door to the left of the bar had swung open, and Mrs. Schomberg, +dressed for duty, stood facing him down the whole length of the room. +She clung to the handle for a moment, then came in and glided to her +place, where she sat down to stare straight before her, as usual. + + + + + +PART THREE + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +Tropical nature had been kind to the failure of the commercial +enterprise. The desolation of the headquarters of the Tropical Belt Coal +Company had been screened from the side of the sea; from the side where +prying eyes--if any were sufficiently interested, either in malice or +in sorrow--could have noted the decaying bones of that once sanguine +enterprise. + +Heyst had been sitting among the bones buried so kindly in the grass of +two wet seasons' growth. The silence of his surroundings, broken only by +such sounds as a distant roll of thunder, the lash of rain through the +foliage of some big trees, the noise of the wind tossing the leaves of +the forest, and of the short seas breaking against the shore, favoured +rather than hindered his solitary meditation. + +A meditation is always--in a white man, at least--more or less an +interrogative exercise. Heyst meditated in simple terms on the mystery +of his actions; and he answered himself with the honest reflection: + +“There must be a lot of the original Adam in me, after all.” + +He reflected, too, with the sense of making a discovery, that this +primeval ancestor is not easily suppressed. The oldest voice in the +world is just the one that never ceases to speak. If anybody could have +silenced its imperative echoes, it should have been Heyst's father, with +his contemptuous, inflexible negation of all effort; but apparently he +could not. There was in the son a lot of that first ancestor who, +as soon as he could uplift his muddy frame from the celestial mould, +started inspecting and naming the animals of that paradise which he was +so soon to lose. + +Action--the first thought, or perhaps the first impulse, on earth! The +barbed hook, baited with the illusions of progress, to bring out of the +lightless void the shoals of unnumbered generations! + +“And I, the son of my father, have been caught too, like the silliest +fish of them all.” Heyst said to himself. + +He suffered. He was hurt by the sight of his own life, which ought to +have been a masterpiece of aloofness. He remembered always his last +evening with his father. He remembered the thin features, the great mass +of white hair, and the ivory complexion. A five-branched candlestick +stood on a little table by the side of the easy chair. They had been +talking a long time. The noises of the street had died out one by one, +till at last, in the moonlight, the London houses began to look like the +tombs of an unvisited, unhonoured, cemetery of hopes. + +He had listened. Then, after a silence, he had asked--for he was really +young then: + +“Is there no guidance?” + +His father was in an unexpectedly soft mood on that night, when the moon +swam in a cloudless sky over the begrimed shadows of the town. + +“You still believe in something, then?” he said in a clear voice, +which had been growing feeble of late. “You believe in flesh and blood, +perhaps? A full and equable contempt would soon do away with that, too. +But since you have not attained to it, I advise you to cultivate +that form of contempt which is called pity. It is perhaps the least +difficult--always remembering that you, too, if you are anything, are as +pitiful as the rest, yet never expecting any pity for yourself.” + +“What is one to do, then?” sighed the young man, regarding his father, +rigid in the high-backed chair. + +“Look on--make no sound,” were the last words of the man who had spent +his life in blowing blasts upon a terrible trumpet which filled heaven +and earth with ruins, while mankind went on its way unheeding. + +That very night he died in his bed, so quietly that they found him +in his usual attitude of sleep, lying on his side, one hand under his +cheek, and his knees slightly bent. He had not even straightened his +legs. + +His son buried the silenced destroyer of systems, of hopes, of beliefs. +He observed that the death of that bitter contemner of life did not +trouble the flow of life's stream, where men and women go by thick as +dust, revolving and jostling one another like figures cut out of cork +and weighted with lead just sufficiently to keep them in their proudly +upright posture. + +After the funeral, Heyst sat alone, in the dusk, and his meditation took +the form of a definite vision of the stream, of the fatuously jostling, +nodding, spinning figures hurried irresistibly along, and giving no sign +of being aware that the voice on the bank had been suddenly silenced . +. . Yes. A few obituary notices generally insignificant and some grossly +abusive. The son had read them all with mournful detachment. + +“This is the hate and rage of their fear,” he thought to himself, “and +also of wounded vanity. They shriek their little shriek as they fly +past. I suppose I ought to hate him too . . .” + +He became aware of his eyes being wet. It was not that the man was his +father. For him it was purely a matter of hearsay which could not in +itself cause this emotion. No! It was because he had looked at him so +long that he missed him so much. The dead man had kept him on the bank +by his side. And now Heyst felt acutely that he was alone on the bank of +the stream. In his pride he determined not to enter it. + +A few slow tears rolled down his face. The rooms, filling with shadows, +seemed haunted by a melancholy, uneasy presence which could not express +itself. The young man got up with a strange sense of making way for +something impalpable that claimed possession, went out of the house, and +locked the door. A fortnight later he started on his travels--to “look +on and never make a sound.” + +The elder Heyst had left behind him a little money and a certain +quantity of movable objects, such as books, tables, chairs, and +pictures, which might have complained of heartless desertion after many +years of faithful service; for there is a soul in things. Heyst, our +Heyst, had often thought of them, reproachful and mute, shrouded and +locked up in those rooms, far away in London with the sounds of the +street reaching them faintly, and sometimes a little sunshine, when +the blinds were pulled up and the windows opened from time to time in +pursuance of his original instructions and later reminders. It seemed +as if in his conception of a world not worth touching, and perhaps not +substantial enough to grasp, these objects familiar to his childhood and +his youth, and associated with the memory of an old man, were the only +realities, something having an absolute existence. He would never have +them sold, or even moved from the places they occupied when he looked +upon them last. When he was advised from London that his lease had +expired, and that the house, with some others as like it as two peas, +was to be demolished, he was surprisingly distressed. + +He had entered by then the broad, human path of inconsistencies. Already +the Tropical Belt Coal Company was in existence. He sent instructions +to have some of the things sent out to him at Samburan, just as any +ordinary, credulous person would have done. They came, torn out from +their long repose--a lot of books, some chairs and tables, his father's +portrait in oils, which surprised Heyst by its air of youth, because he +remembered his father as a much older man; a lot of small objects, such +as candlesticks, inkstands, and statuettes from his father's study, +which surprised him because they looked so old and so much worn. + +The manager of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, unpacking them on the +veranda in the shade besieged by a fierce sunshine, must have felt like +a remorseful apostate before these relics. He handled them tenderly; +and it was perhaps their presence there which attached him to the island +when he woke up to the failure of his apostasy. Whatever the decisive +reason, Heyst had remained where another would have been glad to be off. +The excellent Davidson had discovered the fact without discovering the +reason, and took a humane interest in Heyst's strange existence, while +at the same time his native delicacy kept him from intruding on the +other's whim of solitude. He could not possibly guess that Heyst, alone +on the island, felt neither more nor less lonely than in any other +place, desert or populous. Davidson's concern was, if one may express it +so, the danger of spiritual starvation; but this was a spirit which had +renounced all outside nourishment, and was sustaining itself proudly on +its own contempt of the usual coarse ailments which life offers to the +common appetites of men. + +Neither was Heyst's body in danger of starvation, as Schomberg had so +confidently asserted. At the beginning of the company's operations the +island had been provisioned in a manner which had outlasted the need. +Heyst did not need to fear hunger; and his very loneliness had not been +without some alleviation. Of the crowd of imported Chinese labourers, +one at least had remained in Samburan, solitary and strange, like a +swallow left behind at the migrating season of his tribe. + +Wang was not a common coolie. He had been a servant to white men before. +The agreement between him and Heyst consisted in the exchange of a few +words on the day when the last batch of the mine coolies was leaving +Samburan. Heyst, leaning over the balustrade of the veranda, was looking +on, as calm in appearance as though he had never departed from the +doctrine that this world, for the wise, is nothing but an amusing +spectacle. Wang came round the house, and standing below, raised up his +yellow, thin face. + +“All finished?” he asked. Heyst nodded slightly from above, glancing +towards the jetty. A crowd of blue-clad figures with yellow faces and +calves was being hustled down into the boats of the chartered steamer +lying well out, like a painted ship on a painted sea; painted in crude +colours, without shadows, without feeling, with brutal precision. + +“You had better hurry up if you don't want to be left behind.” + +But the Chinaman did not move. + +“We stop,” he declared. Heyst looked down at him for the first time. + +“You want to stop here?” + +“Yes.” + +“What were you? What was your work here?” + +“Mess-loom boy.” + +“Do you want to stay with me here as my boy?” inquired Heyst, surprised. + +The Chinaman unexpectedly put on a deprecatory expression, and said, +after a marked pause: + +“Can do.” + +“You needn't,” said Heyst, “unless you like. I propose to stay on +here--it may be for a very long time. I have no power to make you go if +you wish to remain, but I don't see why you should.” + +“Catchee one piecee wife,” remarked Wang unemotionally, and marched off, +turning his back on the wharf and the great world beyond, represented by +the steamer waiting for her boats. + +Heyst learned presently that Wang had persuaded one of the women of +Alfuro village, on the west shore of the island, beyond the central +ridge, to come over to live with him in a remote part of the company's +clearing. It was a curious case, inasmuch as the Alfuros, having been +frightened by the sudden invasion of Chinamen, had blocked the path over +the ridge by felling a few trees, and had kept strictly on their own +side. The coolies, as a body, mistrusting the manifest mildness of these +harmless fisher-folk, had kept to their lines, without attempting to +cross the island. Wang was the brilliant exception. He must have been +uncommonly fascinating, in a way that was not apparent to Heyst, or else +uncommonly persuasive. The woman's services to Heyst were limited to +the fact that she had anchored Wang to the spot by her charms, which +remained unknown to the white man, because she never came near the +houses. The couple lived at the edge of the forest, and she could +sometimes be seen gazing towards the bungalow shading her eyes with her +hand. Even from a distance she appeared to be a shy, wild creature, +and Heyst, anxious not to try her primitive nerves unduly, scrupulously +avoided that side of the clearing in his strolls. + +The day--or rather the first night--after his hermit life began, he was +aware of vague sounds of revelry in that direction. Emboldened by the +departure of the invading strangers, some Alfuros, the woman's friends +and relations, had ventured over the ridge to attend something in the +nature of a wedding feast. Wang had invited them. But this was the only +occasion when any sound louder than the buzzing of insects had troubled +the profound silence of the clearing. The natives were never invited +again. Wang not only knew how to live according to conventional +proprieties, but had strong personal views as to the manner of arranging +his domestic existence. After a time Heyst perceived that Wang had +annexed all the keys. Any keys left lying about vanished after Wang had +passed that way. Subsequently some of them--those that did not belong +to the store-rooms and the empty bungalows, and could not be regarded +as the common property of this community of two--were returned to Heyst, +tied in a bunch with a piece of string. He found them one morning +lying by the side of his plate. He had not been inconvenienced by their +absence, because he never locked up anything in the way of drawers and +boxes. Heyst said nothing. Wang also said nothing. Perhaps he had always +been a taciturn man; perhaps he was influenced by the genius of the +locality, which was certainly that of silence. Till Heyst and Morrison +had landed in Black Diamond Bay, and named it, that side of Samburan had +hardly ever heard the sound of human speech. It was easy to be taciturn +with Heyst, who had plunged himself into an abyss of meditation over +books, and remained in it till the shadow of Wang falling across the +page, and the sound of a rough, low voice uttering the Malay word +“makan,” would force him to climb out to a meal. + +Wang in his native province in China might have been an aggressively, +sensitively genial person; but in Samburan he had clothed himself in +a mysterious stolidity and did not seem to resent not being spoken to +except in single words, at a rate which did not average half a dozen per +day. And he gave no more than he got. It is to be presumed that if he +suffered he made up for it with the Alfuro woman. He always went back to +her at the first fall of dusk, vanishing from the bungalow suddenly at +this hour, like a sort of topsy-turvy, day-hunting, Chinese ghost with a +white jacket and a pigtail. Presently, giving way to a Chinaman's ruling +passion, he could be observed breaking the ground near his hut, between +the mighty stumps of felled trees, with a miner's pickaxe. After a +time, he discovered a rusty but serviceable spade in one of the empty +store-rooms, and it is to be supposed that he got on famously; but +nothing of it could be seen, because he went to the trouble of pulling +to pieces one of the company's sheds in order to get materials for +making a high and very close fence round his patch, as if the growing +of vegetables were a patented process, or an awful and holy mystery +entrusted to the keeping of his race. + +Heyst, following from a distance the progress of Wang's gardening and of +these precautions--there was nothing else to look at--was amused at +the thought that he, in his own person, represented the market for +its produce. The Chinaman had found several packets of seeds in the +store-rooms, and had surrendered to an irresistible impulse to put them +into the ground. He would make his master pay for the vegetables which +he was raising to satisfy his instinct. And, looking silently at the +silent Wang going about his work in the bungalow in his unhasty, +steady way; Heyst envied the Chinaman's obedience to his instincts, the +powerful simplicity of purpose which made his existence appear almost +automatic in the mysterious precision of its facts. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +During his master's absence at Sourabaya, Wang had busied himself with +the ground immediately in front of the principal bungalow. Emerging +from the fringe of grass growing across the shore end of the coal-jetty, +Heyst beheld a broad, clear space, black and level, with only one or two +clumps of charred twigs, where the flame had swept from the front of his +house to the nearest trees of the forest. + +“You took the risk of firing the grass?” Heyst asked. + +Wang nodded. Hanging on the arm of the white man before whom he stood +was the girl called Alma; but neither from the Chinaman's eyes nor from +his expression could anyone have guessed that he was in the slightest +degree aware of the fact. + +“He has been tidying the place in his labour-saving way,” explained +Heyst, without looking at the girl, whose hand rested on his forearm. +“He's the whole establishment, you see. I told you I hadn't even a dog +to keep me company here.” + +Wang had marched off towards the wharf. + +“He's like those waiters in that place,” she said. That place was +Schomberg's hotel. + +“One Chinaman looks very much like another,” Heyst remarked. “We shall +find it useful to have him here. This is the house.” + +They faced, at some distance, the six shallow steps leading up to the +veranda. The girl had abandoned Heyst's arm. + +“This is the house,” he repeated. + +She did not offer to budge away from his side, but stood staring fixedly +at the steps, as if they had been something unique and impracticable. He +waited a little, but she did not move. + +“Don't you want to go in?” he asked, without turning his head to look at +her. “The sun's too heavy to stand about here.” He tried to overcome +a sort of fear, a sort of impatient faintness, and his voice sounded +rough. “You had better go in,” he concluded. + +They both moved then, but at the foot of the stairs Heyst stopped, while +the girl went on rapidly, as if nothing could stop her now. She crossed +the veranda swiftly, and entered the twilight of the big central room +opening upon it, and then the deeper twilight of the room beyond. She +stood still in the dusk, in which her dazzled eyes could scarcely make +out the forms of objects, and sighed a sigh of relief. The impression +of the sunlight, of sea and sky, remained with her like a memory of a +painful trial gone through--done with at last! + +Meanwhile Heyst had walked back slowly towards the jetty; but he did not +get so far as that. The practical and automatic Wang had got hold of +one of the little trucks that had been used for running baskets of coal +alongside ships. He appeared pushing it before him, loaded lightly with +Heyst's bag and the bundle of the girl's belongings, wrapped in Mrs. +Schomberg's shawl. Heyst turned about and walked by the side of the +rusty rails on which the truck ran. Opposite the house Wang stopped, +lifted the bag to his shoulder, balanced it carefully, and then took the +bundle in his hand. + +“Leave those things on the table in the big room--understand?” + +“Me savee,” grunted Wang, moving off. + +Heyst watched the Chinaman disappear from the veranda. It was not till +he had seen Wang come out that he himself entered the twilight of the +big room. By that time Wang was out of sight at the back of the house, +but by no means out of hearing. The Chinaman could hear the voice of +him who, when there were many people there, was generally referred to +as “Number One.” Wang was not able to understand the words, but the tone +interested him. + +“Where are you?” cried Number One. + +Then Wang heard, much more faint, a voice he had never heard before--a +novel impression which he acknowledged by cocking his head slightly to +one side. + +“I am here--out of the sun.” + +The new voice sounded remote and uncertain. Wang heard nothing more, +though he waited for some time, very still, the top of his shaven poll +exactly level with the floor of the back veranda. His face meanwhile +preserved an inscrutable immobility. Suddenly he stooped to pick up +the lid of a deal candle-box which was lying on the ground by his foot. +Breaking it up with his fingers, he directed his steps towards the +cook-shed, where, squatting on his heels, he proceeded to kindle a small +fire under a very sooty kettle, possibly to make tea. Wang had some +knowledge of the more superficial rites and ceremonies of white men's +existence, otherwise so enigmatically remote to his mind, and containing +unexpected possibilities of good and evil, which had to be watched for +with prudence and care. + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +That morning, as on all the others of the full tale of mornings since +his return with the girl to Samburan, Heyst came out on the veranda and +spread his elbows on the railing, in an easy attitude of proprietorship. +The bulk of the central ridge of the island cut off the bungalow from +sunrises, whether glorious or cloudy, angry or serene. The dwellers +therein were debarred from reading early the fortune of the new-born +day. It sprang upon them in its fulness with a swift retreat of the +great shadow when the sun, clearing the ridge, looked down, hot and dry, +with a devouring glare like the eye of an enemy. But Heyst, once the +Number One of this locality, while it was comparatively teeming with +mankind, appreciated the prolongation of early coolness, the subdued, +lingering half-light, the faint ghost of the departed night, the +fragrance of its dewy, dark soul captured for a moment longer between +the great glow of the sky and the intense blaze of the uncovered sea. + +It was naturally difficult for Heyst to keep his mind from dwelling on +the nature and consequences of this, his latest departure from the part +of an unconcerned spectator. Yet he had retained enough of his wrecked +philosophy to prevent him from asking himself consciously how it would +end. But at the same time he could not help being temperamentally, from +long habit and from set purpose, a spectator still, perhaps a little +less naive but (as he discovered with some surprise) not much more far +sighted than the common run of men. Like the rest of us who act, all he +could say to himself, with a somewhat affected grimness, was: + +“We shall see!” + +This mood of grim doubt intruded on him only when he was alone. There +were not many such moments in his day now; and he did not like them when +they came. On this morning he had no time to grow uneasy. Alma came out +to join him long before the sun, rising above the Samburan ridge, swept +the cool shadow of the early morning and the remnant of the night's +coolness clear off the roof under which they had dwelt for more than +three months already. She came out as on other mornings. He had heard +her light footsteps in the big room--the room where he had unpacked the +cases from London; the room now lined with the backs of books halfway up +on its three sides. Above the cases the fine matting met the ceiling of +tightly stretched white calico. In the dusk and coolness nothing gleamed +except the gilt frame of the portrait of Heyst's father, signed by a +famous painter, lonely in the middle of a wall. + +Heyst did not turn round. + +“Do you know what I was thinking of?” he asked. + +“No,” she said. Her tone betrayed always a shade of anxiety, as though +she were never certain how a conversation with him would end. She leaned +on the guard-rail by his side. + +“No,” she repeated. “What was it?” She waited. Then, rather with +reluctance than shyness, she asked: + +“Were you thinking of me?” + +“I was wondering when you would come out,” said Heyst, still without +looking at the girl--to whom, after several experimental essays in +combining detached letters and loose syllables, he had given the name of +Lena. + +She remarked after a pause: + +“I was not very far from you.” + +“Apparently you were not near enough for me.” + +“You could have called if you wanted me,” she said. “And I wasn't so +long doing my hair.” + +“Apparently it was too long for me.” + +“Well, you were thinking of me, anyhow. I am glad of it. Do you know, +it seems to me, somehow, that if you were to stop thinking of me I +shouldn't be in the world at all!” + +He turned round and looked at her. She often said things which surprised +him. A vague smile faded away on her lips before his scrutiny. + +“What is it?” he asked. “Is it a reproach?” + +“A reproach! Why, how could it be?” she defended herself. + +“Well, what did it mean?” he insisted. + +“What I said--just what I said. Why aren't you fair?” + +“Ah, this is at least a reproach!” + +She coloured to the roots of her hair. + +“It looks as if you were trying to make out that I am disagreeable,” she +murmured. “Am I? You will make me afraid to open my mouth presently. I +shall end by believing I am no good.” + +Her head drooped a little. He looked at her smooth, low brow, the +faintly coloured cheeks, and the red lips parted slightly, with the +gleam of her teeth within. + +“And then I won't be any good,” she added with conviction. “That I +won't! I can only be what you think I am.” + +He made a slight movement. She put her hand on his arm, without raising +her head, and went on, her voice animated in the stillness of her body: + +“It is so. It couldn't be any other way with a girl like me and a man +like you. Here we are, we two alone, and I can't even tell where we +are.” + +“A very well-known spot of the globe,” Heyst uttered gently. “There +must have been at least fifty thousand circulars issued at the time--a +hundred and fifty thousand, more likely. My friend was looking after +that, and his ideas were large and his belief very strong. Of us two it +was he who had the faith. A hundred and fifty thousand, certainly.” + +“What is it you mean?” she asked in a low tone. + +“What should I find fault with you for?” Heyst went on. “For being +amiable, good, gracious--and pretty?” + +A silence fell. Then she said: + +“It's all right that you should think that of me. There's no one here to +think anything of us, good or bad.” + +The rare timbre of her voice gave a special value to what she uttered. +The indefinable emotion which certain intonations gave him, he was +aware, was more physical than moral. Every time she spoke to him she +seemed to abandon to him something of herself--something excessively +subtle and inexpressible, to which he was infinitely sensible, which he +would have missed horribly if she were to go away. While he was looking +into her eyes she raised her bare forearm, out of the short sleeve, and +held it in the air till he noticed it and hastened to pose his great +bronze moustaches on the whiteness of the skin. Then they went in. + +Wang immediately appeared in front, and, squatting on his heels, began +to potter mysteriously about some plants at the foot of the veranda. +When Heyst and the girl came out again, the Chinaman had gone in his +peculiar manner, which suggested vanishing out of existence rather than +out of sight, a process of evaporation rather than of movement. They +descended the steps, looking at each other, and started off smartly +across the cleared ground; but they were not ten yards away when, +without perceptible stir or sound, Wang materialized inside the empty +room. The Chinaman stood still with roaming eyes, examining the walls as +if for signs, for inscriptions; exploring the floor as if for pitfalls, +for dropped coins. Then he cocked his head slightly at the profile of +Heyst's father, pen in hand above a white sheet of paper on a crimson +tablecloth; and, moving forward noiselessly, began to clear away the +breakfast things. + +Though he proceeded without haste, the unerring precision of his +movements, the absolute soundlessness of the operation, gave it +something of the quality of a conjuring trick. And, the trick having +been performed, Wang vanished from the scene, to materialize presently +in front of the house. He materialized walking away from it, with no +visible or guessable intention; but at the end of some ten paces he +stopped, made a half turn, and put his hand up to shade his eyes. The +sun had topped the grey ridge of Samburan. The great morning shadow was +gone; and far away in the devouring sunshine Wang was in time to see +Number One and the woman, two remote white specks against the sombre +line of the forest. In a moment they vanished. With the smallest display +of action, Wang also vanished from the sunlight of the clearing. + +Heyst and Lena entered the shade of the forest path which crossed the +island, and which, near its highest point had been blocked by felled +trees. But their intention was not to go so far. After keeping to the +path for some distance, they left it at a point where the forest was +bare of undergrowth, and the trees, festooned with creepers, stood clear +of one another in the gloom of their own making. Here and there great +splashes of light lay on the ground. They moved, silent in the great +stillness, breathing the calmness, the infinite isolation, the repose of +a slumber without dreams. They emerged at the upper limit of vegetation, +among some rocks; and in a depression of the sharp slope, like a small +platform, they turned about and looked from on high over the sea, +lonely, its colour effaced by sunshine, its horizon a heat mist, a mere +unsubstantial shimmer in the pale and blinding infinity overhung by the +darker blaze of the sky. + +“It makes my head swim,” the girl murmured, shutting her eyes and +putting her hand on his shoulder. + +Heyst, gazing fixedly to the southward, exclaimed: + +“Sail ho!” + +A moment of silence ensued. + +“It must be very far away,” he went on. “I don't think you could see it. +Some native craft making for the Moluccas, probably. Come, we mustn't +stay here.” + +With his arm round her waist, he led her down a little distance, and +they settled themselves in the shade; she, seated on the ground, he a +little lower, reclining at her feet. + +“You don't like to look at the sea from up there?” he said after a time. + +She shook her head. That empty space was to her the abomination of +desolation. But she only said again: + +“It makes my head swim.” + +“Too big?” he inquired. + +“Too lonely. It makes my heart sink, too,” she added in a low voice, as +if confessing a secret. + +“I'm afraid,” said Heyst, “that you would be justified in reproaching me +for these sensations. But what would you have?” + +His tone was playful, but his eyes, directed at her face, were serious. +She protested. + +“I am not feeling lonely with you--not a bit. It is only when we come up +to that place, and I look at all that water and all that light--” + +“We will never come here again, then,” he interrupted her. + +She remained silent for a while, returning his gaze till he removed it. + +“It seems as if everything that there is had gone under,” she said. + +“Reminds you of the story of the deluge,” muttered the man, stretched at +her feet and looking at them. “Are you frightened at it?” + +“I should be rather frightened to be left behind alone. When I say, I, +of course I mean we.” + +“Do you?” . . . Heyst remained silent for a while. “The vision of a +world destroyed,” he mused aloud. “Would you be sorry for it?” + +“I should be sorry for the happy people in it,” she said simply. + +His gaze travelled up her figure and reached her face, where he seemed +to detect the veiled glow of intelligence, as one gets a glimpse of the +sun through the clouds. + +“I should have thought it's they specially who ought to have been +congratulated. Don't you?” + +“Oh, yes--I understand what you mean; but there were forty days before +it was all over.” + +“You seem to be in possession of all the details.” + +Heyst spoke just to say something rather than to gaze at her in silence. +She was not looking at him. + +“Sunday school,” she murmured. “I went regularly from the time I +was eight till I was thirteen. We lodged in the north of London, off +Kingsland Road. It wasn't a bad time. Father was earning good money +then. The woman of the house used to pack me off in the afternoon with +her own girls. She was a good woman. Her husband was in the post office. +Sorter or something. Such a quiet man. He used to go off after supper +for night-duty, sometimes. Then one day they had a row, and broke up the +home. I remember I cried when we had to pack up all of a sudden and go +into other lodgings. I never knew what it was, though--” + +“The deluge,” muttered Heyst absently. + +He felt intensely aware of her personality, as if this were the first +moment of leisure he had found to look at her since they had come +together. The peculiar timbre of her voice, with its modulations of +audacity and sadness, would have given interest to the most inane +chatter. But she was no chatterer. She was rather silent, with a +capacity for immobility, an upright stillness, as when resting on the +concert platform between the musical numbers, her feet crossed, her +hands reposing on her lap. But in the intimacy of their life her grey, +unabashed gaze forced upon him the sensation of something inexplicable +reposing within her; stupidity or inspiration, weakness or force--or +simply an abysmal emptiness, reserving itself even in the moments of +complete surrender. + +During a long pause she did not look at him. Then suddenly, as if +the word “deluge” had stuck in her mind, she asked, looking up at the +cloudless sky: + +“Does it ever rain here?” + +“There is a season when it rains almost every day,” said Heyst, +surprised. “There are also thunderstorms. We once had a 'mud-shower.'” + +“Mud-shower?” + +“Our neighbour there was shooting up ashes. He sometimes clears his +red-hot gullet like that; and a thunderstorm came along at the +same time. It was very messy; but our neighbour is generally well +behaved--just smokes quietly, as he did that day when I first showed +you the smudge in the sky from the schooner's deck. He's a good-natured, +lazy fellow of a volcano.” + +“I saw a mountain smoking like that before,” she said, staring at the +slender stem of a tree-fern some dozen feet in front of her. “It wasn't +very long after we left England--some few days, though. I was so ill at +first that I lost count of days. A smoking mountain--I can't think how +they called it.” + +“Vesuvius, perhaps,” suggested Heyst. + +“That's the name.” + +“I saw it, too, years, ages ago,” said Heyst. + +“On your way here?” + +“No, long before I ever thought of coming into this part of the world. I +was yet a boy.” + +She turned and looked at him attentively, as if seeking to discover some +trace of that boyhood in the mature face of the man with the hair +thin at the top and the long, thick moustaches. Heyst stood the frank +examination with a playful smile, hiding the profound effect these +veiled grey eyes produced--whether on his heart or on his nerves, +whether sensuous or spiritual, tender or irritating, he was unable to +say. + +“Well, princess of Samburan,” he said at last, “have I found favour in +your sight?” + +She seemed to wake up, and shook her head. + +“I was thinking,” she murmured very low. + +“Thought, action--so many snares! If you begin to think you will be +unhappy.” + +“I wasn't thinking of myself!” she declared with a simplicity which took +Heyst aback somewhat. + +“On the lips of a moralist this would sound like a rebuke,” he said, +half seriously; “but I won't suspect you of being one. Moralists and I +haven't been friends for many years.” + +She had listened with an air of attention. + +“I understood you had no friends,” she said. “I am pleased that there's +nobody to find fault with you for what you have done. I like to think +that I am in no one's way.” + +Heyst would have said something, but she did not give him time. +Unconscious of the movement he made she went on: + +“What I was thinking to myself was, why are you here?” + +Heyst let himself sink on his elbow again. + +“If by 'you' you mean 'we'--well, you know why we are here.” + +She bent her gaze down at him. + +“No, it isn't that. I meant before--all that time before you came across +me and guessed at once that I was in trouble, with no one to turn to. +And you know it was desperate trouble too.” + +Her voice fell on the last words, as if she would end there; but there +was something so expectant in Heyst's attitude as he sat at her feet, +looking up at her steadily, that she continued, after drawing a short, +quick breath: + +“It was, really. I told you I had been worried before by bad fellows. +It made me unhappy, disturbed--angry, too. But oh, how I hated, hated, +hated that man!” + +“That man” was the florid Schomberg with the military bearing, +benefactor of white men ['decent food to eat in decent company')--mature +victim of belated passion. The girl shuddered. The characteristic +harmoniousness of her face became, as it were, decomposed for an +instant. Heyst was startled. + +“Why think of it now?” he cried. + +“It's because I was cornered that time. It wasn't as before. It was +worse, ever so much. I wished I could die of my fright--and yet it's +only now that I begin to understand what a horror it might have been. +Yes, only now, since we--” + +Heyst stirred a little. + +“Came here,” he finished. + +Her tenseness relaxed, her flushed face went gradually back to its +normal tint. + +“Yes,” she said indifferently, but at the same time she gave him a +stealthy glance of passionate appreciation; and then her face took on a +melancholy cast, her whole figure drooped imperceptibly. + +“But you were coming back here anyhow?” she asked. + +“Yes. I was only waiting for Davidson. Yes, I was coming back here, to +these ruins--to Wang, who perhaps did not expect to see me again. It's +impossible to guess at the way that Chinaman draws his conclusions, and +how he looks upon one.” + +“Don't talk about him. He makes me feel uncomfortable. Talk about +yourself!” + +“About myself? I see you are still busy with the mystery of my existence +here; but it isn't at all mysterious. Primarily the man with the quill +pen in his hand in that picture you so often look at is responsible for +my existence. He is also responsible for what my existence is, or +rather has been. He was a great man in his way. I don't know much of his +history. I suppose he began like other people; took fine words for good, +ringing coin and noble ideals for valuable banknotes. He was a great +master of both, himself, by the way. Later he discovered--how am I to +explain it to you? Suppose the world were a factory and all mankind +workmen in it. Well, he discovered that the wages were not good enough. +That they were paid in counterfeit money.” + +“I see!” the girl said slowly. + +“Do you?” + +Heyst, who had been speaking as if to himself, looked up curiously. + +“It wasn't a new discovery, but he brought his capacity for scorn to +bear on it. It was immense. It ought to have withered this globe. I +don't know how many minds he convinced. But my mind was very young then, +and youth I suppose can be easily seduced--even by a negation. He was +very ruthless, and yet he was not without pity. He dominated me without +difficulty. A heartless man could not have done so. Even to fools he was +not utterly merciless. He could be indignant, but he was too great for +flouts and jeers. What he said was not meant for the crowd; it could not +be; and I was flattered to find myself among the elect. They read his +books, but I have heard his living word. It was irresistible. It was +as if that mind were taking me into its confidence, giving me a special +insight into its mastery of despair. Mistake, no doubt. There is +something of my father in every man who lives long enough. But they +don't say anything. They can't. They wouldn't know how, or perhaps, +they wouldn't speak if they could. Man on this earth is an unforeseen +accident which does not stand close investigation. However, that +particular man died as quietly as a child goes to sleep. But, after +listening to him, I could not take my soul down into the street to fight +there. I started off to wander about, an independent spectator--if that +is possible.” + +For a long time the girl's grey eyes had been watching his face. She +discovered that, addressing her, he was really talking to himself. Heyst +looked up, caught sight of her as it were, and caught himself up, with a +low laugh and a change of tone. + +“All this does not tell you why I ever came here. Why, indeed? It's like +prying into inscrutable mysteries which are not worth scrutinizing. A +man drifts. The most successful men have drifted into their successes. +I don't want to tell you that this is a success. You wouldn't believe +me if I did. It isn't; neither is it the ruinous failure it looks. It +proves nothing, unless perhaps some hidden weakness in my character--and +even that is not certain.” + +He looked fixedly at her, and with such grave eyes that she felt obliged +to smile faintly at him, since she did not understand what he meant. Her +smile was reflected, still fainter, on his lips. + +“This does not advance you much in your inquiry,” he went on. “And in +truth your question is unanswerable; but facts have a certain positive +value, and I will tell you a fact. One day I met a cornered man. I use +the word because it expresses the man's situation exactly, and because +you just used it yourself. You know what that means?” + +“What do you say?” she whispered, astounded. “A man!” + +Heyst laughed at her wondering eyes. + +“No! No! I mean in his own way.” + +“I knew very well it couldn't be anything like that,” she observed under +her breath. + +“I won't bother you with the story. It was a custom-house affair, +strange as it may sound to you. He would have preferred to be killed +outright--that is, to have his soul dispatched to another world, rather +than to be robbed of his substance, his very insignificant substance, in +this. I saw that he believed in another world because, being cornered, +as I have told you, he went down on his knees and prayed. What do you +think of that?” + +Heyst paused. She looked at him earnestly. + +“You didn't make fun of him for that?” she said. + +Heyst made a brusque movement of protest + +“My dear girl, I am not a ruffian,” he cried. Then, returning to his +usual tone: “I didn't even have to conceal a smile. Somehow it didn't +look a smiling matter. No, it was not funny; it was rather pathetic; he +was so representative of all the past victims of the Great Joke. But it +is by folly alone that the world moves, and so it is a respectable thing +upon the whole. And besides, he was what one would call a good man. I +don't mean especially because he had offered up a prayer. No! He was +really a decent fellow, he was quite unfitted for this world, he was a +failure, a good man cornered--a sight for the gods; for no decent mortal +cares to look at that sort.” A thought seemed to occur to him. He turned +his face to the girl. “And you, who have been cornered too--did you +think of offering a prayer?” + +Neither her eyes nor a single one of her features moved the least bit. +She only let fall the words: + +“I am not what they call a good girl.” + +“That sounds evasive,” said Heyst after a short silence. “Well, the good +fellow did pray and after he had confessed to it I was struck by the +comicality of the situation. No, don't misunderstand me--I am not +alluding to his act, of course. And even the idea of Eternity, Infinity, +Omnipotence, being called upon to defeat the conspiracy of two miserable +Portuguese half-castes did not move my mirth. From the point of view of +the supplicant, the danger to be conjured was something like the end +of the world, or worse. No! What captivated my fancy was that I, Axel +Heyst, the most detached of creatures in this earthly captivity, the +veriest tramp on this earth, an indifferent stroller going through the +world's bustle--that I should have been there to step into the situation +of an agent of Providence. I, a man of universal scorn and unbelief. . . +.” + +“You are putting it on,” she interrupted in her seductive voice, with a +coaxing intonation. + +“No. I am not like that, born or fashioned, or both. I am not for +nothing the son of my father, of that man in the painting. I am he, all +but the genius. And there is even less in me than I make out, because +the very scorn is falling away from me year after year. I have never +been so amused as by that episode in which I was suddenly called to act +such an incredible part. For a moment I enjoyed it greatly. It got him +out of his corner, you know.” + +“You saved a man for fun--is that what you mean? Just for fun?” + +“Why this tone of suspicion?” remonstrated Heyst. “I suppose the sight +of this particular distress was disagreeable to me. What you call fun +came afterwards, when it dawned on me that I was for him a walking, +breathing, incarnate proof of the efficacy of prayer. I was a little +fascinated by it--and then, could I have argued with him? You don't +argue against such evidence, and besides it would have looked as if +I had wanted to claim all the merit. Already his gratitude was simply +frightful. Funny position, wasn't it? The boredom came later, when we +lived together on board his ship. I had, in a moment of inadvertence, +created for myself a tie. How to define it precisely I don't know. One +gets attached in a way to people one has done something for. But is that +friendship? I am not sure what it was. I only know that he who forms a +tie is lost. The germ of corruption has entered into his soul.” + +Heyst's tone was light, with the flavour of playfulness which seasoned +all his speeches and seemed to be of the very essence of his thoughts. +The girl he had come across, of whom he had possessed himself, to whose +presence he was not yet accustomed, with whom he did not yet know how to +live; that human being so near and still so strange, gave him a greater +sense of his own reality than he had ever known in all his life. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +With her knees drawn up, Lena rested her elbows on them and held her +head in both her hands. + +“Are you tired of sitting here?” Heyst asked. + +An almost imperceptible negative movement of the head was all the answer +she made. + +“Why are you looking so serious?” he pursued, and immediately thought +that habitual seriousness, in the long run, was much more bearable than +constant gaiety. “However, this expression suits you exceedingly,” he +added, not diplomatically, but because, by the tendency of his taste, +it was a true statement. “And as long as I can be certain that it is not +boredom which gives you this severe air, I am willing to sit here and +look at you till you are ready to go.” + +And this was true. He was still under the fresh sortilege of their +common life, the surprise of novelty, the flattered vanity of his +possession of this woman; for a man must feel that, unless he has ceased +to be masculine. Her eyes moved in his direction, rested on him, +then returned to their stare into the deeper gloom at the foot of the +straight tree-trunks, whose spreading crowns were slowly withdrawing +their shade. The warm air stirred slightly about her motionless head. +She would not look at him, from some obscure fear of betraying herself. +She felt in her innermost depths an irresistible desire to give herself +up to him more completely, by some act of absolute sacrifice. This was +something of which he did not seem to have an idea. He was a strange +being without needs. She felt his eyes fixed upon her; and as he kept +silent, she said uneasily--for she didn't know what his silences might +mean: + +“And so you lived with that friend--that good man?” + +“Excellent fellow,” Heyst responded, with a readiness that she did not +expect. “But it was a weakness on my part. I really didn't want to, only +he wouldn't let me off, and I couldn't explain. He was the sort of man +to whom you can't explain anything. He was extremely sensitive, and it +would have been a tigerish thing to do to mangle his delicate feelings +by the sort of plain speaking that would have been necessary. His +mind was like a white-walled, pure chamber, furnished with, say, six +straw-bottomed chairs, and he was always placing and displacing them +in various combinations. But they were always the same chairs. He was +extremely easy to live with; but then he got hold of this coal idea--or, +rather, the idea got hold of him, it entered into that scantily +furnished chamber of which I have just spoken, and sat on all the +chairs. There was no dislodging it, you know! It was going to make his +fortune, my fortune, everybody's fortune. In past years, in moments of +doubt that will come to a man determined to remain free from absurdities +of existence, I often asked myself, with a momentary dread, in what way +would life try to get hold of me? And this was the way. He got it into +his head that he could do nothing without me. And was I now, he asked +me, to spurn and ruin him? Well, one morning--I wonder if he had gone +down on his knees to pray that night!--one morning I gave in.” + +Heyst tugged violently at a tuft of dried grass, and cast it away from +him with a nervous gesture. + +“I gave in,” he repeated. + +Looking towards him with a movement of her eyes only, the girl noticed +the strong feeling on his face with that intense interest which his +person awakened in her mind and in her heart. But it soon passed away, +leaving only a moody expression. + +“It's difficult to resist where nothing matters,” he observed. “And +perhaps there is a grain of freakishness in my nature. It amused me +to go about uttering silly, commonplace phrases. I was never so well +thought of in the islands till I began to jabber commercial gibberish +like the veriest idiot. Upon my word, I believe that I was actually +respected for a time. I was as grave as an owl over it; I had to be +loyal to the man. I have been, from first to last, completely, utterly +loyal to the best of my ability. I thought he understood something about +coal. And if I had been aware that he knew nothing of it, as in fact he +didn't, well--I don't know what I could have done to stop him. In one +way or another I should have had to be loyal. Truth, work, ambition, +love itself, may be only counters in the lamentable or despicable game +of life, but when one takes a hand one must play the game. No, the shade +of Morrison needn't haunt me. What's the matter? I say, Lena, why are +you staring like that? Do you feel ill?” + +Heyst made as if to get on his feet. The girl extended her arm to arrest +him, and he remained staring in a sitting posture, propped on one arm, +observing her indefinable expression of anxiety, as if she were unable +to draw breath. + +“What has come to you?” he insisted, feeling strangely unwilling to +move, to touch her. + +“Nothing!” She swallowed painfully. “Of course it can't be. What name +did you say? I didn't hear it properly.” + +“Name?” repeated Heyst dazedly. “I only mentioned Morrison. It's the +name of that man of whom I've been speaking. What of it?” + +“And you mean to say that he was your friend?” + +“You have heard enough to judge for yourself. You know as much of our +connection as I know myself. The people in this part of the world +went by appearances, and called us friends, as far as I can remember. +Appearances--what more, what better can you ask for? In fact you can't +have better. You can't have anything else.” + +“You are trying to confuse me with your talk,” she cried. “You can't +make fun of this.” + +“Can't? Well, no I can't. It's a pity. Perhaps it would have been the +best way,” said Heyst, in a tone which for him could be called gloomy. +“Unless one could forget the silly business altogether.” His faint +playfulness of manner and speech returned, like a habit one has schooled +oneself into, even before his forehead had cleared completely. “But why +are you looking so hard at me? Oh, I don't object, and I shall try not +to flinch. Your eyes--” + +He was looking straight into them, and as a matter of fact had forgotten +all about the late Morrison at that moment. + +“No,” he exclaimed suddenly. “What an impenetrable girl you are Lena, +with those grey eyes of yours! Windows of the soul, as some poet has +said. The fellow must have been a glazier by vocation. Well, nature has +provided excellently for the shyness of your soul.” + +When he ceased speaking, the girl came to herself with a catch of her +breath. He heard her voice, the varied charm of which he thought he knew +so well, saying with an unfamiliar intonation: + +“And that partner of yours is dead?” + +“Morrison? Oh, yes, as I've told you, he--” + +“You never told me.” + +“Didn't I? I thought I did; or, rather, I thought you must know. It +seems impossible that anybody with whom I speak should not know that +Morrison is dead.” + +She lowered her eyelids, and Heyst was startled by something like an +expression of horror on her face. + +“Morrison!” she whispered in an appalled tone. “Morrison!” Her head +drooped. Unable to see her features, Heyst could tell from her voice +that for some reason or other she was profoundly moved by the syllables +of that unromantic name. A thought flashed through his head--could she +have known Morrison? But the mere difference of their origins made it +wildly improbable. + +“This is very extraordinary!” he said. “Have you ever heard the name +before?” + +Her head moved quickly several times in tiny affirmative nods, as if she +could not trust herself to speak, or even to look at him. She was biting +her lower lip. + +“Did you ever know anybody of that name?” he asked. + +The girl answered by a negative sign; and then at last she spoke, +jerkily, as if forcing herself against some doubt or fear. She had heard +of that very man, she told Heyst. + +“Impossible!” he said positively. “You are mistaken. You couldn't have +heard of him, it's--” + +He stopped short, with the thought that to talk like this was perfectly +useless; that one doesn't argue against thin air. + +“But I did hear of him; only I didn't know then, I couldn't guess, that +it was your partner they were talking about.” + +“Talking about my partner?” repeated Heyst slowly. + +“No.” Her mind seemed almost as bewildered, as full of incredulity, as +his. “No. They were talking of you really; only I didn't know it.” + +“Who were they?” Heyst raised his voice. “Who was talking of me? Talking +where?” + +With the first question he had lifted himself from his reclining +position; at the last he was on his knees before her, their heads on a +level. + +“Why, in that town, in that hotel. Where else could it have been?” she +said. + +The idea of being talked about was always novel to Heyst's simplified +conception of himself. For a moment he was as much surprised as if he +had believed himself to be a mere gliding shadow among men. Besides, +he had in him a half-unconscious notion that he was above the level of +island gossip. + +“But you said first that it was of Morrison they talked,” he remarked to +the girl, sinking on his heels, and no longer much interested. “Strange +that you should have the opportunity to hear any talk at all! I was +rather under the impression that you never saw anybody belonging to the +town except from the platform.” + +“You forget that I was not living with the other girls,” she said. +“After meals they used to go back to the Pavilion, but I had to stay in +the hotel and do my sewing, or what not, in the room where they talked.” + +“I didn't think of that. By the by, you never told me who they were.” + +“Why, that horrible red-faced beast,” she said, with all the energy of +disgust which the mere thought of the hotel-keeper provoked in her. + +“Oh, Schomberg!” Heyst murmured carelessly. + +“He talked to the boss--to Zangiacomo, I mean. I had to sit there. That +devil-woman sometimes wouldn't let me go away. I mean Mrs. Zangiacomo.” + +“I guessed,” murmured Heyst. “She liked to torment you in a variety +of ways. But it is really strange that the hotel-keeper should talk of +Morrison to Zangiacomo. As far as I can remember he saw very little of +Morrison professionally. He knew many others much better.” + +The girl shuddered slightly. + +“That was the only name I ever overheard. I would get as far away from +them as I could, to the other end of the room, but when that beast +started shouting I could not help hearing. I wish I had never heard +anything. If I had got up and gone out of the room I don't suppose the +woman would have killed me for it; but she would have rowed me in a +nasty way. She would have threatened me and called me names. That sort, +when they know you are helpless, there's nothing to stop them. I don't +know how it is, but bad people, real bad people that you can see are +bad, they get over me somehow. It's the way they set about downing one. +I am afraid of wickedness.” + +Heyst watched the changing expressions of her face. He encouraged her, +profoundly sympathetic, a little amused. + +“I quite understand. You needn't apologize for your great delicacy in +the perception of inhuman evil. I am a little like you.” + +“I am not very plucky,” she said. + +“Well! I don't know myself what I would do, what countenance I would +have before a creature which would strike me as being evil incarnate. +Don't you be ashamed!” + +She sighed, looked up with her pale, candid gaze and a timid expression +on her face, and murmured: + +“You don't seem to want to know what he was saying.” + +“About poor Morrison? It couldn't have been anything bad, for the poor +fellow was innocence itself. And then, you know, he is dead, and nothing +can possibly matter to him now.” + +“But I tell you that it was of you he was talking!” she cried. + +“He was saying that Morrison's partner first got all there was to get +out of him, and then, and then--well, as good as murdered him--sent him +out to die somewhere!” + +“You believe that of me?” said Heyst, after a moment of perfect silence. + +“I didn't know it had anything to do with you. Schomberg was talking +of some Swede. How was I to know? It was only when you began telling me +about how you came here--” + +“And now you have my version.” Heyst forced himself to speak quietly. +“So that's how the business looked from outside!” he muttered. + +“I remember him saying that everybody in these parts knew the story,” + the girl added breathlessly. + +“Strange that it should hurt me!” mused Heyst to himself; “yet it does. +I seem to be as much of a fool as those everybodies who know the story +and no doubt believe it. Can you remember any more?” he addressed the +girl in a grimly polite tone. “I've often heard of the moral advantages +of seeing oneself as others see one. Let us investigate further. Can't +you recall something else that everybody knows?” + +“Oh! Don't laugh!” she cried. + +“Did I laugh? I assure you I was not aware of it. I won't ask you +whether you believe the hotel-keeper's version. Surely you must know the +value of human judgement!” + +She unclasped her hands, moved them slightly, and twined her fingers as +before. Protest? Assent? Was there to be nothing more? He was relieved +when she spoke in that warm and wonderful voice which in itself +comforted and fascinated one's heart, which made her lovable. + +“I heard this before you and I ever spoke to each other. It went out of +my memory afterwards. Everything went out of my memory then; and I was +glad of it. It was a fresh start for me, with you--and you know it. I +wish I had forgotten who I was--that would have been best; and I very +nearly did forget.” + +He was moved by the vibrating quality of the last words. She seemed to +be talking low of some wonderful enchantment, in mysterious terms of +special significance. He thought that if she only could talk to him +in some unknown tongue, she would enslave him altogether by the sheer +beauty of the sound, suggesting infinite depths of wisdom and feeling. + +“But,” she went on, “the name stuck in my head, it seems; and when you +mentioned it--” + +“It broke the spell,” muttered Heyst in angry disappointment as if he +had been deceived in some hope. + +The girl, from her position a little above him, surveyed with still +eyes the abstracted silence of the man on whom she now depended with +a completeness of which she had not been vividly conscious before, +because, till then, she had never felt herself swinging between the +abysses of earth and heaven in the hollow of his arm. What if he should +grow weary of the burden? + +“And, moreover, nobody had ever believed that tale!” + +Heyst came out with an abrupt burst of sound which made her open her +steady eyes wider, with an effect of immense surprise. It was a purely +mechanical effect, because she was neither surprised nor puzzled. In +fact, she could understand him better then than at any moment since she +first set eyes on him. + +He laughed scornfully. + +“What am I thinking of?” he cried. “As if it could matter to me what +anybody had ever said or believed, from the beginning of the world till +the crack of doom!” + +“I never heard you laugh till today,” she observed. “This is the second +time!” + +He scrambled to his feet and towered above her. + +“That's because, when one's heart has been broken into in the way you +have broken into mine, all sorts of weaknesses are free to enter--shame, +anger, stupid indignation, stupid fears--stupid laughter, too. I wonder +what interpretation you are putting on it?” + +“It wasn't gay, certainly,” she said. “But why are you angry with me? +Are you sorry you took me away from those beasts? I told you who I was. +You could see it.” + +“Heavens!” he muttered. He had regained his command of himself. “I +assure you I could see much more than you could tell me. I could see +quite a lot that you don't even suspect yet, but you can't be seen quite +through.” + +He sank to the ground by her side and took her hand. She asked gently: + +“What more do you want from me?” + +He made no sound for a time. + +“The impossible, I suppose,” he said very low, as one makes a +confidence, and pressing the hand he grasped. + +It did not return the pressure. He shook his head as if to drive away +the thought of this, and added in a louder, light tone: + +“Nothing less. And it isn't because I think little of what I've got +already. Oh, no! It is because I think so much of this possession of +mine that I can't have it complete enough. I know it's unreasonable. You +can't hold back anything--now.” + +“Indeed I couldn't,” she whispered, letting her hand lie passive in his +tight grasp. “I only wish I could give you something more, or better, or +whatever it is you want.” + +He was touched by the sincere accent of these simple words. + +“I tell you what you can do--you can tell me whether you would have gone +with me like this if you had known of whom that abominable idiot of a +hotel-keeper was speaking. A murderer--no less!” + +“But I didn't know you at all then,” she cried. “And I had the sense to +understand what he was saying. It wasn't murder, really. I never thought +it was.” + +“What made him invent such an atrocity?” Heyst exclaimed. “He seems +a stupid animal. He is stupid. How did he manage to hatch that pretty +tale? Have I a particularly vile countenance? Is black selfishness +written all over my face? Or is that sort of thing so universally human +that it might be said of anybody?” + +“It wasn't murder,” she insisted earnestly. + +“I know. I understand. It was worse. As to killing a man, which would be +a comparatively decent thing to do, well--I have never done that.” + +“Why should you do it?” she asked in a frightened voice. + +“My dear girl, you don't know the sort of life I have been leading in +unexplored countries, in the wilds; it's difficult to give you an idea. +There are men who haven't been in such tight places as I have found +myself in who have had to--to shed blood, as the saying is. Even the +wilds hold prizes which tempt some people; but I had no schemes, no +plans--and not even great firmness of mind to make me unduly obstinate. +I was simply moving on, while the others, perhaps, were going somewhere. +An indifference as to roads and purposes makes one meeker, as it were. +And I may say truly, too, that I never did care, I won't say for life--I +had scorned what people call by that name from the first--but for being +alive. I don't know if that is what men call courage, but I doubt it +very much.” + +“You! You have no courage?” she protested. + +“I really don't know. Not the sort that always itches for a weapon, for +I have never been anxious to use one in the quarrels that a man gets +into in the most innocent way sometimes. The differences for which +men murder each other are, like everything else they do, the most +contemptible, the most pitiful things to look back upon. No, I've never +killed a man or loved a woman--not even in my thoughts, not even in my +dreams.” + +He raised her hand to his lips, and let them rest on it for a space, +during which she moved a little closer to him. After the lingering kiss +he did not relinquish his hold. + +“To slay, to love--the greatest enterprises of life upon a man! And I +have no experience of either. You must forgive me anything that may have +appeared to you awkward in my behaviour, inexpressive in my speeches, +untimely in my silences.” + +He moved uneasily, a little disappointed by her attitude, but indulgent +to it, and feeling, in this moment of perfect quietness, that in holding +her surrendered hand he had found a closer communion than they had ever +achieved before. But even then there still lingered in him a sense of +incompleteness not altogether overcome--which, it seemed, nothing ever +would overcome--the fatal imperfection of all the gifts of life, which +makes of them a delusion and a snare. + +All of a sudden he squeezed her hand angrily. His delicately playful +equanimity, the product of kindness and scorn, had perished with the +loss of his bitter liberty. + +“Not murder, you say! I should think not. But when you led me to talk +just now, when the name turned up, when you understood that it was of me +that these things had been said, you showed a strange emotion. I could +see it.” + +“I was a bit startled,” she said. + +“At the baseness of my conduct?” he asked. + +“I wouldn't judge you, not for anything.” + +“Really?” + +“It would be as if I dared to judge everything that there is.” With her +other hand she made a gesture that seemed to embrace in one movement the +earth and the heaven. “I wouldn't do such a thing.” + +Then came a silence, broken at last by Heyst: + +“I! I! do a deadly wrong to my poor Morrison!” he cried. “I, who could +not bear to hurt his feelings. I, who respected his very madness! Yes, +this madness, the wreck of which you can see lying about the jetty of +Diamond Bay. What else could I do? He insisted on regarding me as his +saviour; he was always restraining the eternal obligation on the tip of +his tongue, till I was burning with shame at his gratitude. What could I +do? He was going to repay me with this infernal coal, and I had to join +him as one joins a child's game in a nursery. One would no more have +thought of humiliating him than one would think of humiliating a child. +What's the use of talking of all this! Of course, the people here +could not understand the truth of our relation to each other. But what +business of theirs was it? Kill old Morrison! Well, it is less criminal, +less base--I am not saying it is less difficult--to kill a man than to +cheat him in that way. You understand that?” + +She nodded slightly, but more than once and with evident conviction. His +eyes rested on her, inquisitive, ready for tenderness. + +“But it was neither one nor the other,” he went on. “Then, why your +emotion? All you confess is that you wouldn't judge me.” + +She turned upon him her veiled, unseeing grey eyes in which nothing of +her wonder could be read. + +“I said I couldn't,” she whispered. + +“But you thought that there was no smoke without fire!” the playfulness +of tone hardly concealed his irritation. “What power there must be in +words, only imperfectly heard--for you did not listen with particular +care, did you? What were they? What evil effort of invention drove them +into that idiot's mouth out of his lying throat? If you were to try to +remember, they would perhaps convince me, too.” + +“I didn't listen,” she protested. “What was it to me what they said of +anybody? He was saying that there never were such loving friends to +look at as you two; then, when you got all you wanted out of him and got +thoroughly tired of him, too, you kicked him out to go home and die.” + +Indignation, with an undercurrent of some other feeling, rang in these +quoted words, uttered in her pure and enchanting voice. She ceased +abruptly and lowered her long, dark lashes, as if mortally weary, sick +at heart. + +“Of course, why shouldn't you get tired of that or any other--company? +You aren't like anyone else, and--and the thought of it made me unhappy +suddenly; but indeed, I did not believe anything bad of you. I--” + +A brusque movement of his arm, flinging her hand away, stopped her +short. Heyst had again lost control of himself. He would have shouted, +if shouting had been in his character. + +“No, this earth must be the appointed hatching planet of calumny enough +to furnish the whole universe. I feel a disgust at my own person, as if +I had tumbled into some filthy hole. Pah! And you--all you can say is +that you won't judge me; that you--” + +She raised her head at this attack, though indeed he had not turned to +her. + +“I don't believe anything bad of you,” she repeated. “I couldn't.” + +He made a gesture as if to say: + +“That's sufficient.” + +In his soul and in his body he experienced a nervous reaction from +tenderness. All at once, without transition, he detested her. But only +for a moment. He remembered that she was pretty, and, more, that she +had a special grace in the intimacy of life. She had the secret of +individuality which excites--and escapes. + +He jumped up and began to walk to and fro. Presently his hidden fury +fell into dust within him, like a crazy structure, leaving behind +emptiness, desolation, regret. His resentment was not against the girl, +but against life itself--that commonest of snares, in which he felt +himself caught, seeing clearly the plot of plots and unconsoled by the +lucidity of his mind. + +He swerved and, stepping up to her, sank to the ground by her side. +Before she could make a movement or even turn her head his way, he took +her in his arms and kissed her lips. He tasted on them the bitterness +of a tear fallen there. He had never seen her cry. It was like another +appeal to his tenderness--a new seduction. The girl glanced round, +moved suddenly away, and averted her face. With her hand she signed +imperiously to him to leave her alone--a command which Heyst did not +obey. + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +When she opened her eyes at last and sat up, Heyst scrambled quickly to +his feet and went to pick up her cork helmet, which had rolled a little +way off. Meanwhile she busied herself in doing up her hair, plaited on +the top of her head in two heavy, dark tresses, which had come loose. He +tendered her the helmet in silence, and waited as if unwilling to hear +the sound of his own voice. + +“We had better go down now,” he suggested in a low tone. + +He extended his hand to help her up. He had the intention to smile, +but abandoned it at the nearer sight of her still face, in which was +depicted the infinite lassitude of her soul. On their way to regain the +forest path they had to pass through the spot from which the view of +the sea could be obtained. The flaming abyss of emptiness, the liquid, +undulating glare, the tragic brutality of the light, made her long for +the friendly night, with its stars stilled by an austere spell; for the +velvety dark sky and the mysterious great shadow of the sea, conveying +peace to the day-weary heart. She put her hand to her eyes. Behind her +back Heyst spoke gently. + +“Let us get on, Lena.” + +She walked ahead in silence. Heyst remarked that they had never been +out before during the hottest hours. It would do her no good, he feared. +This solicitude pleased and soothed her. She felt more and more like +herself--a poor London girl playing in an orchestra, and snatched out +from the humiliations, the squalid dangers of a miserable existence, +by a man like whom there was not, there could not be, another in this +world. She felt this with elation, with uneasiness, with an intimate +pride--and with a peculiar sinking of the heart. + +“I am not easily knocked out by any such thing as heat,” she said +decisively. + +“Yes, but I don't forget that you're not a tropical bird.” + +“You weren't born in these parts, either,” she returned. + +“No, and perhaps I haven't even your physique. I am a transplanted +being. Transplanted! I ought to call myself uprooted--an unnatural state +of existence; but a man is supposed to stand anything.” + +She looked back at him and received a smile. He told her to keep in the +shelter of the forest path, which was very still and close, full of heat +if free from glare. Now and then they had glimpses of the company's old +clearing blazing with light, in which the black stumps of trees stood +charred, without shadows, miserable and sinister. They crossed the open +in a direct line for the bungalow. On the veranda they fancied they had +a glimpse of the vanishing Wang, though the girl was not at all sure +that she had seen anything move. Heyst had no doubts. + +“Wang has been looking out for us. We are late.” + +“Was he? I thought I saw something white for a moment, and then I did +not see it any more.” + +“That's it--he vanishes. It's a very remarkable gift in that Chinaman.” + +“Are they all like that?” she asked with naive curiosity and uneasiness. + +“Not in such perfection,” said Heyst, amused. + +He noticed with approval that she was not heated by the walk. The drops +of perspiration on her forehead were like dew on the cool, white petal +of a flower. He looked at her figure of grace and strength, solid and +supple, with an ever-growing appreciation. + +“Go in and rest yourself for a quarter of an hour; and then Mr. Wang +will give us something to eat,” he said. + +They had found the table laid. When they came together again and sat +down to it, Wang materialized without a sound, unheard, uncalled, and +did his office. Which being accomplished, at a given moment he was not. + +A great silence brooded over Samburan--the silence of the great heat +that seems pregnant with fatal issues, like the silence of ardent +thought. Heyst remained alone in the big room. The girl seeing him +take up a book, had retreated to her chamber. Heyst sat down under +his father's portrait; and the abominable calumny crept back into his +recollection. The taste of it came on his lips, nauseating and corrosive +like some kinds of poison. He was tempted to spit on the floor, naively, +in sheer unsophisticated disgust of the physical sensation. He shook his +head, surprised at himself. He was not used to receive his intellectual +impressions in that way--reflected in movements of carnal emotion. He +stirred impatiently in his chair, and raised the book to his eyes with +both hands. It was one of his father's. He opened it haphazard, and +his eyes fell on the middle of the page. The elder Heyst had written of +everything in many books--of space and of time, of animals and of stars; +analysing ideas and actions, the laughter and the frowns of men, and the +grimaces of their agony. The son read, shrinking into himself, composing +his face as if under the author's eye, with a vivid consciousness of +the portrait on his right hand, a little above his head; a wonderful +presence in its heavy frame on the flimsy wall of mats, looking exiled +and at home, out of place and masterful, in the painted immobility of +profile. + +And Heyst, the son, read: + +Of the stratagems of life the most cruel is the consolation of love--the +most subtle, too; for the desire is the bed of dreams. + +He turned the pages of the little volume, “Storm and Dust,” glancing +here and there at the broken text of reflections, maxims, short phrases, +enigmatical sometimes and sometimes eloquent. It seemed to him that he +was hearing his father's voice, speaking and ceasing to speak again. +Startled at first, he ended by finding a charm in the illusion. He +abandoned himself to the half-belief that something of his father dwelt +yet on earth--a ghostly voice, audible to the ear of his own flesh and +blood. With what strange serenity, mingled with terrors, had that man +considered the universal nothingness! He had plunged into it headlong, +perhaps to render death, the answer that faced one at every inquiry, +more supportable. + +Heyst stirred, and the ghostly voice ceased; but his eyes followed the +words on the last page of the book: + +Men of tormented conscience, or of a criminal imagination, are aware of +much that minds of a peaceful, resigned cast do not even suspect. It is +not poets alone who dare descend into the abyss of infernal regions, or +even who dream of such a descent. The most inexpressive of human beings +must have said to himself, at one time or another: “Anything but this!” + . . . + +We all have our instants of clairvoyance. They are not very helpful. +The character of the scheme does not permit that or anything else to +be helpful. Properly speaking its character, judged by the standards +established by its victims, is infamous. It excuses every violence of +protest and at the same time never fails to crush it, just as it +crushes the blindest assent. The so-called wickedness must be, like the +so-called virtue, its own reward--to be anything at all . . . + +Clairvoyance or no clairvoyance, men love their captivity. To the +unknown force of negation they prefer the miserably tumbled bed of their +servitude. Man alone can give one the disgust of pity; yet I find it +easier to believe in the misfortune of mankind than in its wickedness. + +These were the last words. Heyst lowered the book to his knees. Lena's +voice spoke above his drooping head: + +“You sit there as if you were unhappy.” + +“I thought you were asleep,” he said. + +“I was lying down right enough, but I never closed my eyes.” + +“The rest would have done you good after our walk. Didn't you try?” + +“I was lying down, I tell you, but sleep I couldn't.” + +“And you made no sound! What want of sincerity. Or did you want to be +alone for a time?” + +“I--alone?” she murmured. + +He noticed her eyeing the book, and got up to put it back in the +bookcase. When he turned round, he saw that she had dropped into the +chair--it was the one she always used--and looked as if her strength had +suddenly gone from her, leaving her only her youth, which seemed very +pathetic, very much at his mercy. He moved quickly towards the chair. + +“Tired, are you? It's my fault, taking you up so high and keeping you +out so long. Such a windless day, too!” + +She watched his concern, her pose languid, her eyes raised to him, +but as unreadable as ever. He avoided looking into them for that very +reason. He forgot himself in the contemplation of those passive arms, of +these defenceless lips, and--yes, one had to go back to them--of these +wide-open eyes. Something wild in their grey stare made him think of +sea-birds in the cold murkiness of high latitudes. He started when she +spoke, all the charm of physical intimacy revealed suddenly in that +voice. + +“You should try to love me!” she said. + +He made a movement of astonishment. + +“Try,” he muttered. “But it seems to me--” He broke off, saying to +himself that if he loved her, he had never told her so in so many words. +Simple words! They died on his lips. “What makes you say that?” he +asked. + +She lowered her eyelids and turned her head a little. + +“I have done nothing,” she said in a low voice. “It's you who have been +good, helpful, and tender to me. Perhaps you love me for that--just +for that; or perhaps you love me for company, and because--well! But +sometimes it seems to me that you can never love me for myself, only +for myself, as people do love each other when it is to be for ever.” + Her head drooped. “Forever,” she breathed out again; then, still more +faintly, she added an entreating: “Do try!” + +These last words went straight to his heart--the sound of them more than +the sense. He did not know what to say, either from want of practice in +dealing with women or simply from his innate honesty of thought. All +his defences were broken now. Life had him fairly by the throat. But he +managed a smile, though she was not looking at him; yes, he did manage +it--the well-known Heyst smile of playful courtesy, so familiar to all +sorts and conditions of men in the islands. + +“My dear Lena,” he said, “it looks as if you were trying to pick a very +unnecessary quarrel with me--of all people!” + +She made no movement. With his elbows spread out he was twisting the +ends of his long moustaches, very masculine and perplexed, enveloped in +the atmosphere of femininity as in a cloud, suspecting pitfalls, and as +if afraid to move. + +“I must admit, though,” he added, “that there is no one else; and I +suppose a certain amount of quarrelling is necessary for existence in +this world.” + +That girl, seated in her chair in graceful quietude, was to him like a +script in an unknown language, or even more simply mysterious, like +any writing to the illiterate. As far as women went he was altogether +uninstructed and he had not the gift of intuition which is fostered in +the days of youth by dreams and visions, exercises of the heart fitting +it for the encounters of a world, in which love itself rests as much +on antagonism as on attraction. His mental attitude was that of a man +looking this way and that on a piece of writing which he is unable to +decipher, but which may be big with some revelation. He didn't know what +to say. All he found to add was: + +“I don't even understand what I have done or left undone to distress you +like this.” + +He stopped, struck afresh by the physical and moral sense of the +imperfections of their relations--a sense which made him desire her +constant nearness, before his eyes, under his hand, and which, when +she was out of his sight, made her so vague, so elusive and illusory, a +promise that could not be embraced and held. + +“No! I don't see clearly what you mean. Is your mind turned towards the +future?” he interpellated her with marked playfulness, because he +was ashamed to let such a word pass his lips. But all his cherished +negations were falling off him one by one. + +“Because if it is so there is nothing easier than to dismiss it. In our +future, as in what people call the other life, there is nothing to be +frightened of.” + +She raised her eyes to him; and if nature had formed them to express +anything else but blank candour he would have learned how terrified +she was by his talk and the fact that her sinking heart loved him more +desperately than ever. He smiled at her. + +“Dismiss all thought of it,” he insisted. “Surely you don't suspect +after what I have heard from you, that I am anxious to return to +mankind. I! I! murder my poor Morrison! It's possible that I may be +really capable of that which they say I have done. The point is that I +haven't done it. But it is an unpleasant subject to me. I ought to be +ashamed to confess it--but it is! Let us forget it. There's that in you, +Lena, which can console me for worse things, for uglier passages. And if +we forget, there are no voices here to remind us.” + +She had raised her head before he paused. + +“Nothing can break in on us here,” he went on and, as if there had been +an appeal or a provocation in her upward glance, he bent down and took +her under the arms, raising her straight out of the chair into a sudden +and close embrace. Her alacrity to respond, which made her seem as light +as a feather, warmed his heart at that moment more than closer caresses +had done before. He had not expected that ready impulse towards himself +which had been dormant in her passive attitude. He had just felt the +clasp of her arms round his neck, when, with a slight exclamation--“He's +here!”--she disengaged herself and bolted, away into her room. + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +Heyst was astounded. Looking all round, as if to take the whole room +to witness of this outrage, he became aware of Wang materialized in the +doorway. The intrusion was as surprising as anything could be, in view +of the strict regularity with which Wang made himself visible. Heyst +was tempted to laugh at first. This practical comment on his affirmation +that nothing could break in on them relieved the strain of his feelings. +He was a little vexed, too. The Chinaman preserved a profound silence. + +“What do you want?” asked Heyst sternly. + +“Boat out there,” said the Chinaman. + +“Where? What do you mean? Boat adrift in the straits?” + +Some subtle change in Wang's bearing suggested his being out of breath; +but he did not pant, and his voice was steady. + +“No--row.” + +It was Heyst now who was startled and raised his voice. + +“Malay man, eh?” + +Wang made a slight negative movement with his head. + +“Do you hear, Lena?” Heyst called out. “Wang says there is a boat in +sight--somewhere near apparently. Where's that boat Wang?” + +“Round the point,” said Wang, leaping into Malay unexpectedly, and in a +loud voice. “White men three.” + +“So close as that?” exclaimed Heyst, moving out on the veranda followed +by Wang. “White men? Impossible!” + +Over the clearing the shadows were already lengthening. The sun +hung low; a ruddy glare lay on the burnt black patch in front of +the bungalow, and slanted on the ground between the straight, tall, +mast-like trees soaring a hundred feet or more without a branch. The +growth of bushes cut off all view of the jetty from the veranda. Far +away to the right Wang's hut, or rather its dark roof of mats, could +be seen above the bamboo fence which insured the privacy of the Alfuro +woman. The Chinaman looked that way swiftly. Heyst paused, and then +stepped back a pace into the room. + +“White men, Lena, apparently. What are you doing?” + +“I am just bathing my eyes a little,” the girl's voice said from the +inner room. + +“Oh, yes; all right!” + +“Do you want me?” + +“No. You had better--I am going down to the jetty. Yes, you had better +stay in. What an extraordinary thing!” + +It was so extraordinary that nobody could possibly appreciate +how extraordinary it was but himself. His mind was full of mere +exclamations, while his feet were carrying him in the direction of the +jetty. He followed the line of the rails, escorted by Wang. + +“Where were you when you first saw the boat?” he asked over his +shoulder. + +Wang explained in Malay that he had gone to the shore end of the wharf, +to get a few lumps of coal from the big heap, when, happening to raise +his eyes from the ground, he saw the boat--a white man boat, not a +canoe. He had good eyes. He had seen the boat, with the men at the oars; +and here Wang made a particular gesture over his eyes, as if his vision +had received a blow. He had turned at once and run to the house to +report. + +“No mistake, eh?” said Heyst, moving on. At the very outer edge of the +belt he stopped short. Wang halted behind him on the path, till the +voice of Number One called him sharply forward into the open. He obeyed. + +“Where's that boat?” asked Heyst forcibly. “I say--where is it?” + +Nothing whatever was to be seen between the point and the jetty. The +stretch of Diamond Bay was like a piece of purple shadow, lustrous and +empty, while beyond the land, the open sea lay blue and opaque under the +sun. Heyst's eyes swept all over the offing till they met, far off, the +dark cone of the volcano, with its faint plume of smoke broadening and +vanishing everlastingly at the top, without altering its shape in the +glowing transparency of the evening. + +“The fellow has been dreaming,” he muttered to himself. + +He looked hard at the Chinaman. Wang seemed turned into stone. Suddenly, +as if he had received a shock, he started, flung his arm out with a +pointing forefinger, and made guttural noises to the effect that there, +there, there, he had seen a boat. + +It was very uncanny. Heyst thought of some strange hallucination. +Unlikely enough; but that a boat with three men in it should have sunk +between the point and the jetty, suddenly, like a stone, without leaving +as much on the surface as a floating oar, was still more unlikely. The +theory of a phantom boat would have been more credible than that. + +“Confound it!” he muttered to himself. + +He was unpleasantly affected by this mystery; but now a simple +explanation occurred to him. He stepped hastily out on the wharf. The +boat, if it had existed and had retreated, could perhaps be seen from +the far end of the long jetty. + +Nothing was to be seen. Heyst let his eyes roam idly over the sea. He +was so absorbed in his perplexity that a hollow sound, as of somebody +tumbling about in a boat, with a clatter of oars and spars, failed to +make him move for a moment. When his mind seized its meaning, he had +no difficulty in locating the sound. It had come from below--under the +jetty! + +He ran back for a dozen yards or so, and then looked over. His sight +plunged straight into the stern-sheets of a big boat, the greater part +of which was hidden from him by the planking of the jetty. His eyes +fell on the thin back of a man doubled up over the tiller in a queer, +uncomfortable attitude of drooping sorrow. Another man, more directly +below Heyst, sprawled on his back from gunwale to gunwale, half off +the after thwart, his head lower than his feet. This second man glared +wildly upward, and struggled to raise himself, but to all appearance was +much too drunk to succeed. The visible part of the boat contained also +a flat, leather trunk, on which the first man's long legs were tucked +up nervelessly. A large earthenware jug, with its wide mouth uncorked, +rolled out on the bottom-boards from under the sprawling man. + +Heyst had never been so much astonished in his life. He stared dumbly at +the strange boat's crew. From the first he was positive that these +men were not sailors. They wore the white drill-suit of tropical +civilization; but their apparition in a boat Heyst could not connect +with anything plausible. The civilization of the tropics could have +had nothing to do with it. It was more like those myths, current in +Polynesia, of amazing strangers, who arrive at an island, gods or +demons, bringing good or evil to the innocence of the inhabitants--gifts +of unknown things, words never heard before. + +Heyst noticed a cork helmet floating alongside the boat, evidently +fallen from the head of the man doubled over the tiller, who displayed +a dark, bony poll. An oar, too, had been knocked overboard, probably +by the sprawling man, who was still struggling, between the thwarts. +By this time Heyst regarded the visitation no longer with surprise, but +with the sustained attention demanded by a difficult problem. With one +foot poised on the string-piece, and leaning on his raised knee, he +was taking in everything. The sprawling man rolled off the thwart, +collapsed, and, most unexpectedly, got on his feet. He swayed dizzily, +spreading his arms out and uttered faintly a hoarse, dreamy “Hallo!” His +upturned face was swollen, red, peeling all over the nose and cheeks. +His stare was irrational. Heyst perceived stains of dried blood all over +the front of his dirty white coat, and also on one sleeve. + +“What's the matter? Are you wounded?” + +The other glanced down, reeled--one of his feet was inside a large pith +hat--and, recovering himself, let out a dismal, grating sound in the +manner of a grim laugh. + +“Blood--not mine. Thirst's the matter. Exhausted's the matter. Done up. +Drink, man! Give us water!” + +Thirst was in the very tone of his words, alternating a broken croak and +a faint, throaty rustle which just reached Heyst's ears. The man in the +boat raised his hands to be helped up on the jetty, whispering: + +“I tried. I am too weak. I tumbled down.” + +Wang was coming along the jetty slowly, with intent, straining eyes. + +“Run back and bring a crowbar here. There's one lying by the coal-heap,” + Heyst shouted to him. + +The man standing in the boat sat down on the thwart behind him. A +horrible coughing laugh came through his swollen lips. + +“Crowbar? What's that for?” he mumbled, and his head dropped on his +chest mournfully. + +Meantime, Heyst, as if he had forgotten the boat, started kicking hard +at a large brass tap projecting above the planks. To accommodate ships +that came for coal and happened to need water as well, a stream had +been tapped in the interior and an iron pipe led along the jetty. It +terminated with a curved end almost exactly where the strangers' boat +had been driven between the piles; but the tap was set fast. + +“Hurry up!” Heyst yelled to the Chinaman, who was running with the +crowbar in his hand. + +Heyst snatched it from him and, obtaining a leverage against the +string-piece, wrung the stiff tap round with a mighty jerk. “I hope that +pipe hasn't got choked!” he muttered to himself anxiously. + +It hadn't; but it did not yield a strong gush. The sound of a thin +stream, partly breaking on the gunwale of the boat and partly +splashing alongside, became at once audible. It was greeted by a cry of +inarticulate and savage joy. Heyst knelt on the string-piece and peered +down. The man who had spoken was already holding his open mouth under +the bright trickle. Water ran over his eyelids and over his nose, +gurgled down his throat, flowed over his chin. Then some obstruction in +the pipe gave way, and a sudden thick jet broke on his face. In a moment +his shoulders were soaked, the front of his coat inundated; he streamed +and dripped; water ran into his pockets, down his legs, into his shoes; +but he had clutched the end of the pipe, and, hanging on with both +hands, swallowed, spluttered, choked, snorted with the noises of a +swimmer. Suddenly a curious dull roar reached Heyst's ears. Something +hairy and black flew from under the jetty. A dishevelled head, coming on +like a cannonball, took the man at the pipe in flank, with enough force +to tear his grip loose and fling him headlong into the stern-sheets. He +fell upon the folded legs of the man at the tiller, who, roused by the +commotion in the boat, was sitting up, silent, rigid, and very much like +a corpse. His eyes were but two black patches, and his teeth glistened +with a death's head grin between his retracted lips, no thicker than +blackish parchment glued over the gums. + +From him Heyst's eyes wandered to the creature who had replaced the +first man at the end of the water-pipe. Enormous brown paws clutched it +savagely; the wild, big head hung back, and in a face covered with a wet +mass of hair there gaped crookedly a wide mouth full of fangs. The water +filled it, welled up in hoarse coughs, ran down on each side of the jaws +and down the hairy throat, soaked the black pelt of the enormous chest, +naked under a torn check shirt, heaving convulsively with a play of +massive muscles carved in red mahogany. + +As soon as the first man had recovered the breath knocked out of him +by the irresistible charge, a scream of mad cursing issued from the +stern-sheets. With a rigid, angular crooking of the elbow, the man at +the tiller put his hand back to his hip. + +“Don't shoot him, sir!” yelled the first man. “Wait! Let me have that +tiller. I will teach him to shove himself in front of a caballero!” + +Martin Ricardo flourished the heavy piece of wood, leaped forward with +astonishing vigour, and brought it down on Pedro's head with a crash +that resounded all over the quiet sweep of Black Diamond Bay. A crimson +patch appeared on the matted hair, red veins appeared in the water +flowing all over his face, and it dripped in rosy drops off his head. +But the man hung on. Not till a second furious blow descended did the +hairy paws let go their grip and the squirming body sink limply. Before +it could touch the bottom-boards, a tremendous kick in the ribs from +Ricardo's foot shifted it forward out of sight, whence came the noise of +a heavy thud, a clatter of spars, and a pitiful grunt. Ricardo stooped +to look under the jetty. + +“Aha, dog! This will teach you to keep back where you belong, you +murdering brute, you slaughtering savage, you! You infidel, you robber +of churches! Next time I will rip you open from neck to heel, you +carrion-eater! Esclavo!” + +He backed a little and straightened himself up. + +“I don't mean it really,” he remarked to Heyst, whose steady eyes met +his from above. He ran aft briskly. + +“Come along, sir. It's your turn. I oughtn't to have drunk first. 'S +truth, I forgot myself! A gentleman like you will overlook that, I +know.” As he made these apologies, Ricardo extended his hand. “Let me +steady you, sir.” + +Slowly Mr. Jones unfolded himself in all his slenderness, rocked, +staggered, and caught Ricardo's shoulder. His henchman assisted him +to the pipe, which went on gushing a clear stream of water, sparkling +exceedingly against the black piles and the gloom under the jetty. + +“Catch hold, sir,” Ricardo advised solicitously. “All right?” + +He stepped back, and, while Mr. Jones revelled in the abundance of +water, he addressed himself to Heyst with a sort of justificatory +speech, the tone of which, reflecting his feelings, partook of purring +and spitting. They had been thirty hours tugging at the oars, he +explained, and they had been more than forty hours without water, except +that the night before they had licked the dew off the gunwales. + +Ricardo did not explain to Heyst how it happened. At that precise moment +he had no explanation ready for the man on the wharf, who, he guessed, +must be wondering much more at the presence of his visitors than at +their plight. + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +The explanation lay in the two simple facts that the light winds and +strong currents of the Java Sea had drifted the boat about until they +partly lost their bearings; and that by some extra-ordinary mistake +one of the two jars put into the boat by Schomberg's man contained salt +water. Ricardo tried to put some pathos into his tones. Pulling for +thirty hours with eighteen-foot oars! And the sun! Ricardo relieved +his feelings by cursing the sun. They had felt their hearts and lungs +shrivel within them. And then, as if all that hadn't been trouble +enough, he complained bitterly, he had had to waste his fainting +strength in beating their servant about the head with a stretcher. The +fool had wanted to drink sea water, and wouldn't listen to reason. +There was no stopping him otherwise. It was better to beat him into +insensibility than to have him go crazy in the boat, and to be obliged +to shoot him. The preventive, administered with enough force to brain +an elephant, boasted Ricardo, had to be applied on two occasions--the +second time all but in sight of the jetty. + +“You have seen the beauty,” Ricardo went on expansively, hiding his lack +of some sort of probable story under this loquacity. “I had to hammer +him away from the spout. Opened afresh all the old broken spots on his +head. You saw how hard I had to hit. He has no restraint, no restraint +at all. If it wasn't that he can be made useful in one way or another, I +would just as soon have let the governor shoot him.” + +He smiled up at Heyst in his peculiar lip-retracting manner, and added +by way of afterthought: + +“That's what will happen to him in the end, if he doesn't learn to +restrain himself. But I've taught him to mind his manners for a while, +anyhow!” + +And again he addressed his quick grin up to the man on the wharf. His +round eyes had never left Heyst's face ever since he began to deliver +his account of the voyage. + +“So that's how he looks!” Ricardo was saying to himself. + +He had not expected Heyst to be like this. He had formed for himself +a conception containing the helpful suggestion of a vulnerable point. +These solitary men were often tipplers. But no!--this was not a drinking +man's face; nor could he detect the weakness of alarm, or even the +weakness of surprise, on these features, in those steady eyes. + +“We were too far gone to climb out,” Ricardo went on. “I heard you +walking along though. I thought I shouted; I tried to. You didn't hear +me shout?” + +Heyst made an almost imperceptible negative sign, which the greedy eyes +of Ricardo--greedy for all signs--did not miss. + +“Throat too parched. We didn't even care to whisper to each other +lately. Thirst chokes one. We might have died there under this wharf +before you found us.” + +“I couldn't think where you had gone to.” Heyst was heard at last, +addressing directly the newcomers from the sea. “You were seen as soon +as you cleared that point.” + +“We were seen, eh?” grunted Mr. Ricardo. “We pulled like +machines--daren't stop. The governor sat at the tiller, but he couldn't +speak to us. She drove in between the piles till she hit something, and +we all tumbled off the thwarts as if we had been drunk. Drunk--ha, +ha! Too dry, by George! We fetched in here with the very last of our +strength, and no mistake. Another mile would have done for us. When I +heard your footsteps, above, I tried to get up, and I fell down.” + +“That was the first sound I heard,” said Heyst. + +Mr Jones, the front of his soiled white tunic soaked and plastered +against his breast-bone, staggered away from the water-pipe. Steadying +himself on Ricardo's shoulder, he drew a long breath, raised his +dripping head, and produced a smile of ghastly amiability, which was +lost upon the thoughtful Heyst. Behind his back the sun, touching the +water, was like a disc of iron cooled to a dull red glow, ready to start +rolling round the circular steel plate of the sea, which, under the +darkening sky, looked more solid than the high ridge of Samburan; more +solid than the point, whose long outlined slope melted into its own +unfathomable shadow blurring the dim sheen on the bay. The forceful +stream from the pipe broke like shattered glass on the boat's gunwale. +Its loud, fitful, and persistent splashing revealed the depths of the +world's silence. + +“Great notion, to lead the water out here,” pronounced Ricardo +appreciatively. + +Water was life. He felt now as if he could run a mile, scale a ten-foot +wall, sing a song. Only a few minutes ago he was next door to a corpse, +done up, unable to stand, to lift a hand; unable to groan. A drop of +water had done that miracle. + +“Didn't you feel life itself running and soaking into you, sir?” he +asked his principal, with deferential but forced vivacity. + +Without a word, Mr. Jones stepped off the thwart and sat down in the +stern-sheets. + +“Isn't that man of yours bleeding to death in the bows under there?” + inquired Heyst. + +Ricardo ceased his ecstasies over the life-giving water and answered in +a tone of innocence: + +“He? You may call him a man, but his hide is a jolly sight tougher than +the toughest alligator he ever skinned in the good old days. You don't +know how much he can stand: I do. We have tried him a long time ago. +Ola, there! Pedro! Pedro!” he yelled, with a force of lung testifying to +the regenerative virtues of water. + +A weak “Senor?” came from under the wharf. + +“What did I tell you?” said Ricardo triumphantly. “Nothing can hurt him. +He's all right. But, I say, the boat's getting swamped. Can't you turn +this water off before you sink her under us? She's half full already.” + +At a sign from Heyst, Wang hammered at the brass tap on the wharf, then +stood behind Number One, crowbar in hand, motionless as before. Ricardo +was perhaps not so certain of Pedro's toughness as he affirmed; for he +stooped, peering under the wharf, then moved forward out of sight. The +gush of water ceasing suddenly, made a silence which became complete +when the after-trickle stopped. Afar, the sun was reduced to a red +spark, glowing very low in the breathless immensity of twilight. Purple +gleams lingered on the water all round the boat. The spectral figure in +the stern-sheets spoke in a languid tone: + +“That--er--companion--er--secretary of mine is a queer chap. I am afraid +we aren't presenting ourselves in a very favourable light.” + +Heyst listened. It was the conventional voice of an educated man, +only strangely lifeless. But more strange yet was this concern for +appearances, expressed, he did not know, whether in jest or in earnest. +Earnestness was hardly to be supposed under the circumstances, and no +one had ever jested in such dead tones. It was something which could not +be answered, and Heyst said nothing. The other went on: + +“Travelling as I do, I find a man of his sort extremely useful. He has +his little weaknesses, no doubt.” + +“Indeed!” Heyst was provoked into speaking. “Weakness of the arm is not +one of them; neither is an exaggerated humanity, as far as I can judge.” + +“Defects of temper,” explained Mr. Jones from the stern-sheets. + +The subject of this dialogue, coming out just then from under the +wharf into the visible part of the boat, made himself heard in his own +defence, in a voice full of life, and with nothing languid in his manner +on the contrary, it was brisk, almost jocose. He begged pardon for +contradicting. He was never out of temper with “our Pedro.” The +fellow was a Dago of immense strength and of no sense whatever. This +combination made him dangerous, and he had to be treated accordingly, in +a manner which he could understand. Reasoning was beyond him. + +“And so”--Ricardo addressed Heyst with animation--“you mustn't be +surprised if--” + +“I assure you,” Heyst interrupted, “that my wonder at your arrival +in your boat here is so great that it leaves no room for minor +astonishments. But hadn't you better land?” + +“That's the talk, sir!” Ricardo began to bustle about the boat, talking +all the time. Finding himself unable to “size up” this man, he was +inclined to credit him with extraordinary powers of penetration, which, +it seemed to him, would be favoured by silence. Also, he feared some +pointblank question. He had no ready-made story to tell. He and his +patron had put off considering that rather important detail too +long. For the last two days, the horrors of thirst, coming on them +unexpectedly, had prevented consultation. They had had to pull for +dear life. But the man on the wharf, were he in league with the devil +himself, would pay for all their sufferings, thought Ricardo with an +unholy joy. + +Meantime, splashing in the water which covered the bottom-boards, +Ricardo congratulated himself aloud on the luggage being out of the way +of the wet. He had piled it up forward. He had roughly tied up Pedro's +head. Pedro had nothing to grumble about. On the contrary, he ought to +be mighty thankful to him, Ricardo, for being alive at all. + +“Well, now, let me give you a leg up, sir,” he said cheerily to +his motionless principal in the stern-sheets. “All our troubles are +over--for a time, anyhow. Ain't it luck to find a white man on this +island? I would have just as soon expected to meet an angel from +heaven--eh, Mr. Jones? Now then--ready, sir? one, two, three, up you +go!” + +Helped from below by Ricardo, and from above by the man more unexpected +than an angel, Mr. Jones scrambled up and stood on the wharf by the side +of Heyst. He swayed like a reed. The night descending on Samburan turned +into dense shadow the point of land and the wharf itself, and gave a +dark solidity to the unshimmering water extending to the last faint +trace of light away to the west. Heyst stared at the guests whom the +renounced world had sent him thus at the end of the day. The only other +vestige of light left on earth lurked in the hollows of the thin man's +eyes. They gleamed, mobile and languidly evasive. The eyelids fluttered. + +“You are feeling weak,” said Heyst. + +“For the moment, a little,” confessed the other. + +With loud panting, Ricardo scrambled on his hands and knees upon the +wharf, energetic and unaided. He rose up at Heyst's elbow and stamped +his foot on the planks, with a sharp, provocative, double beat, such +as is heard sometimes in fencing-schools before the adversaries engage +their foils. Not that the renegade seaman Ricardo knew anything of +fencing. What he called “shooting-irons,” were his weapons, or the still +less aristocratic knife, such as was even then ingeniously strapped +to his leg. He thought of it, at that moment. A swift stooping motion, +then, on the recovery, a ripping blow, a shove off the wharf, and no +noise except a splash in the water that would scarcely disturb the +silence. Heyst would have no time for a cry. It would be quick and neat, +and immensely in accord with Ricardo's humour. But he repressed this +gust of savagery. The job was not such a simple one. This piece had to +be played to another tune, and in much slower time. He returned to his +note of talkative simplicity. + +“Ay; and I too don't feel as strong as I thought I was when the first +drink set me up. Great wonder-worker water is! And to get it right here +on the spot! It was heaven--hey, sir?” + +Mr Jones, being directly addressed, took up his part in the concerted +piece: + +“Really, when I saw a wharf on what might have been an uninhabited +island, I couldn't believe my eyes. I doubted its existence. I thought +it was a delusion till the boat actually drove between the piles, as you +see her lying now.” + +While he was speaking faintly, in a voice which did not seem to belong +to the earth, his henchman, in extremely loud and terrestrial accents, +was fussing about their belongings in the boat, addressing himself to +Pedro: + +“Come, now--pass up the dunnage there! Move, yourself, hombre, or I'll +have to get down again and give you a tap on those bandages of yours, +you growling bear, you!” + +“Ah! You didn't believe in the reality of the wharf?” Heyst was saying +to Mr. Jones. + +“You ought to kiss my hands!” + +Ricardo caught hold of an ancient Gladstone bag and swung it on the +wharf with a thump. + +“Yes! You ought to burn a candle before me as they do before the saints +in your country. No saint has ever done so much for you as I have, you +ungrateful vagabond. Now then! Up you get!” + +Helped by the talkative Ricardo, Pedro scrambled up on the wharf, where +he remained for some time on all fours, swinging to and fro his shaggy +head tied up in white rags. Then he got up clumsily, like a bulky animal +in the dusk, balancing itself on its hind legs. + +Mr Jones began to explain languidly to Heyst that they were in a pretty +bad state that morning, when they caught sight of the smoke of the +volcano. It nerved them to make an effort for their lives. Soon +afterwards they made out the island. + +“I had just wits enough left in my baked brain to alter the direction +of the boat,” the ghostly voice went on. “As to finding assistance, +a wharf, a white man--nobody would have dreamed of it. Simply +preposterous!” + +“That's what I thought when my Chinaman came and told me he had seen a +boat with white men pulling up,” said Heyst. + +“Most extraordinary luck,” interjected Ricardo, standing by anxiously +attentive to every word. “Seems a dream,” he added. “A lovely dream!” + +A silence fell on that group of three, as if everyone had become afraid +to speak, in an obscure sense of an impending crisis. Pedro on one side +of them and Wang on the other had the air of watchful spectators. A few +stars had come out pursuing the ebbing twilight. A light draught of air +tepid enough in the thickening twilight after the scorching day, struck +a chill into Mr. Jones in his soaked clothes. + +“I may infer, then, that there is a settlement of white people here?” he +murmured, shivering visibly. + +Heyst roused himself. + +“Oh, abandoned, abandoned. I am alone here--practically alone; but +several empty houses are still standing. No lack of accommodation. We +may just as well--here, Wang, go back to the shore and run the trolley +out here.” + +The last words having been spoken in Malay, he explained courteously +that he had given directions for the transport of the luggage. Wang had +melted into the night--in his soundless manner. + +“My word! Rails laid down and all,” exclaimed Ricardo softly, in a tone +of admiration. “Well, I never!” + +“We were working a coal-mine here,” said the late manager of the +Tropical Belt Coal Company. “These are only the ghosts of things that +have been.” + +Mr Jones's teeth were suddenly started chattering by another faint puff +of wind, a mere sigh from the west, where Venus cast her rays on the +dark edge of the horizon, like a bright lamp hung above the grave of the +sun. + +“We might be moving on,” proposed Heyst. “My Chinaman and +that--ah--ungrateful servant of yours, with the broken head, can load +the things and come along after us.” + +The suggestion was accepted without words. Moving towards the shore, +the three men met the trolley, a mere metallic rustle which whisked past +them, the shadowy Wang running noiselessly behind. Only the sound of +their footsteps accompanied them. It was a long time since so many +footsteps had rung together on that jetty. Before they stepped on to the +path trodden through the grass, Heyst said: + +“I am prevented from offering you a share of my own quarters.” The +distant courtliness of this beginning arrested the other two suddenly, +as if amazed by some manifest incongruity. “I should regret it more,” + he went on, “if I were not in a position to give you the choice of those +empty bungalows for a temporary home.” + +He turned round and plunged into the narrow track, the two others +following in single file. + +“Queer start!” Ricardo took the opportunity for whispering, as he fell +behind Mr. Jones, who swayed in the gloom, enclosed by the stalks of +tropical grass, almost as slender as a stalk of grass himself. + +In this order they emerged into the open space kept clear of vegetation +by Wang's judicious system of periodic firing. The shapes of buildings, +unlighted, high-roofed, looked mysteriously extensive and featureless +against the increasing glitter of the stars. Heyst was pleased at +the absence of light in his bungalow. It looked as uninhabited as +the others. He continued to lead the way, inclining to the right. His +equable voice was heard: + +“This one would be the best. It was our counting-house. There is some +furniture in it yet. I am pretty certain that you'll find a couple of +camp bedsteads in one of the rooms.” + +The high-pitched roof of the bungalow towered up very close, eclipsing +the sky. + +“Here we are. Three steps. As you see, there's a wide veranda. Sorry to +keep you waiting for a moment; the door is locked, I think.” + +He was heard trying it. Then he leaned against the rail, saying: + +“Wang will get the keys.” + +The others waited, two vague shapes nearly mingled together in the +darkness of the veranda, from which issued a sudden chattering of Mr. +Jones's teeth, directly suppressed, and a slight shuffle of Ricardo's +feet. Their guide and host, his back against the rail, seemed to have +forgotten their existence. Suddenly he moved, and murmured: + +“Ah, here's the trolley.” + +Then he raised his voice in Malay, and was answered, “Ya tuan,” from an +indistinct group that could be made out in the direction of the track. + +“I have sent Wang for the key and a light,” he said, in a voice +that came out without any particular direction--a peculiarity which +disconcerted Ricardo. + +Wang did not tarry long on his mission. Very soon from the distant +recesses of obscurity appeared the swinging lantern he carried. It cast +a fugitive ray on the arrested trolley with the uncouth figure of the +wild Pedro drooping over the load; then it moved towards the bungalow +and ascended the stairs. After working at the stiff lock, Wang applied +his shoulder to the door. It came open with explosive suddenness, as if +in a passion at being thus disturbed after two years' repose. From the +dark slope of a tall stand-up writing-desk a forgotten, solitary sheet +of paper flew up and settled gracefully on the floor. + +Wang and Pedro came and went through the offended door, bringing the +things off the trolley, one flitting swiftly in and out, the other +staggering heavily. Later, directed by a few quiet words from Number +One, Wang made several journeys with the lantern to the store-rooms, +bringing in blankets, provisions in tins, coffee, sugar, and a packet of +candles. He lighted one, and stuck it on the ledge of the stand-up desk. +Meantime Pedro, being introduced to some kindling-wood and a bundle of +dry sticks, had busied himself outside in lighting a fire, on which he +placed a ready-filled kettle handed to him by Wang impassively, at arm's +length, as if across a chasm. Having received the thanks of his guests, +Heyst wished them goodnight and withdrew, leaving them to their repose. + + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +Heyst walked away slowly. There was still no light in his bungalow, and +he thought that perhaps it was just as well. By this time he was much +less perturbed. Wang had preceded him with the lantern, as if in a hurry +to get away from the two white men and their hairy attendant. The light +was not dancing along any more; it was standing perfectly still by the +steps of the veranda. + +Heyst, glancing back casually, saw behind him still another light--the +light of the strangers' open fire. A black, uncouth form, stooping over +it monstrously, staggered away into the outlying shadows. The kettle had +boiled, probably. + +With that weird vision of something questionably human impressed upon +his senses, Heyst moved on a pace or two. What could the people be who +had such a creature for their familiar attendant? He stopped. The vague +apprehension, of a distant future, in which he saw Lena unavoidably +separated from him by profound and subtle differences; the sceptical +carelessness which had accompanied every one of his attempts at action, +like a secret reserve of his soul, fell away from him. He no longer +belonged to himself. There was a call far more imperious and august. He +came up to the bungalow, and at the very limit of the lantern's light, +on the top step, he saw her feet and the bottom part of her dress. The +rest of her person was suggested dimly as high as her waist. She sat +on a chair, and the gloom of the low eaves descended upon her head and +shoulders. She didn't stir. + +“You haven't gone to sleep here?” he asked. + +“Oh, no! I was waiting for you--in the dark.” + +Heyst, on the top step, leaned against a wooden pillar, after moving the +lantern to one side. + +“I have been thinking that it is just as well you had no light. But +wasn't it dull for you to sit in the dark?” + +“I don't need a light to think of you.” Her charming voice gave a value +to this banal answer, which had also the merit of truth. Heyst laughed +a little, and said that he had had a curious experience. She made no +remark. He tried to figure to himself the outlines of her easy pose. +A spot of dim light here and there hinted at the unfailing grace of +attitude which was one of her natural possessions. + +She had thought of him, but not in connection with the strangers. She +had admired him from the first; she had been attracted by his warm +voice, his gentle eye, but she had felt him too wonderfully difficult to +know. He had given to life a savour, a movement, a promise mingled with +menaces, which she had not suspected were to be found in it--or, at any +rate, not by a girl wedded to misery as she was. She said to herself +that she must not be irritated because he seemed too self-contained, and +as if shut up in a world of his own. When he took her in his arms, she +felt that his embrace had a great and compelling force, that he was +moved deeply, and that perhaps he would not get tired of her so very +soon. She thought that he had opened to her the feelings of delicate +joy, that the very uneasiness he caused her was delicious in its +sadness, and that she would try to hold him as long as she could--till +her fainting arms, her sinking soul, could cling to him no more. + +“Wang's not here, of course?” Heyst said suddenly. She answered as if in +her sleep. + +“He put this light down here without stopping, and ran.” + +“Ran, did he? H'm! Well, it's considerably later than his usual time +to go home to his Alfuro wife; but to be seen running is a sort of +degradation for Wang, who has mastered the art of vanishing. Do you +think he was startled out of his perfection by something?” + +“Why should he be startled?” + +Her voice remained dreamy, a little uncertain. + +“I have been startled,” Heyst said. + +She was not listening to him. The lantern at their feet threw the +shadows of her face upward. Her eyes glistened, as if frightened and +attentive, above a lighted chin and a very white throat. + +“Upon my word,” mused Heyst, “now that I don't see them, I can hardly +believe that those fellows exist!” + +“And what about me?” she asked, so swiftly that he made a movement like +somebody pounced upon from an ambush. “When you don't see me, do you +believe that I exist?” + +“Exist? Most charmingly! My dear Lena, you don't know your own +advantages. Why, your voice alone would be enough to make you +unforgettable!” + +“Oh, I didn't mean forgetting in that way. I dare say if I were to +die you would remember me right enough. And what good would that be to +anybody? It's while I am alive that I want--” + +Heyst stood by her chair, a stalwart figure imperfectly lighted. The +broad shoulders, the martial face that was like a disguise of his +disarmed soul, were lost in the gloom above the plane of light in which +his feet were planted. He suffered from a trouble with which she had +nothing to do. She had no general conception of the conditions of the +existence he had offered to her. Drawn into its peculiar stagnation she +remained unrelated to it because of her ignorance. + +For instance, she could never perceive the prodigious improbability of +the arrival of that boat. She did not seem to be thinking of it. Perhaps +she had already forgotten the fact herself. And Heyst resolved suddenly +to say nothing more of it. It was not that he shrank from alarming her. +Not feeling anything definite himself he could not imagine a precise +effect being produced on her by any amount of explanation. There is a +quality in events which is apprehended differently by different minds +or even by the same mind at different times. Any man living at all +consciously knows that embarrassing truth. Heyst was aware that this +visit could bode nothing pleasant. In his present soured temper +towards all mankind he looked upon it as a visitation of a particularly +offensive kind. + +He glanced along the veranda in the direction of the other bungalow. The +fire of sticks in front of it had gone out. No faint glow of embers, not +the slightest thread of light in that direction, hinted at the presence +of strangers. The darker shapes in the obscurity, the dead silence, +betrayed nothing of that strange intrusion. The peace of Samburan +asserted itself as on any other night. Everything was as before, +except--Heyst became aware of it suddenly--that for a whole minute, +perhaps, with his hand on the back of the girl's chair and within a foot +of her person, he had lost the sense of her existence, for the first +time since he had brought her over to share this invincible, this +undefiled peace. He picked up the lantern, and the act made a silent +stir all along the veranda. A spoke of shadow swung swiftly across her +face, and the strong light rested on the immobility of her features, as +of a woman looking at a vision. Her eyes were still, her lips serious. +Her dress, open at the neck, stirred slightly to her even breathing. + +“We had better go in, Lena,” suggested Heyst, very low, as if breaking a +spell cautiously. + +She rose without a word. Heyst followed her indoors. As they passed +through the living-room, he left the lantern burning on the centre +table. + + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +That night the girl woke up, for the first time in her new experience, +with the sensation of having been abandoned to her own devices. She woke +up from a painful dream of separation brought about in a way which she +could not understand, and missed the relief of the waking instant. +The desolate feeling of being alone persisted. She was really alone. +A night-light made it plain enough, in the dim, mysterious manner of a +dream; but this was reality. It startled her exceedingly. + +In a moment she was at the curtain that hung in the doorway, and raised +it with a steady hand. The conditions of their life in Samburan would +have made peeping absurd; nor was such a thing in her character. This +was not a movement of curiosity, but of downright alarm--the continued +distress and fear of the dream. The night could not have been very far +advanced. The light of the lantern was burning strongly, striping the +floor and walls of the room with thick black bands. She hardly knew +whether she expected to see Heyst or not; but she saw him at once, +standing by the table in his sleeping-suit, his back to the doorway. +She stepped in noiselessly with her bare feet, and let the curtain fall +behind her. Something characteristic in Heyst's attitude made her say, +almost in a whisper: + +“You are looking for something.” + +He could not have heard her before; but he didn't start at the +unexpected whisper. He only pushed the drawer of the table in and, +without even looking over his shoulder, asked quietly, accepting her +presence as if he had been aware of all her movements: + +“I say, are you certain that Wang didn't go through this room this +evening?” + +“Wang? When?” + +“After leaving the lantern, I mean.” + +“Oh, no. He ran on. I watched him.” + +“Or before, perhaps--while I was with these boat people? Do you know? +Can you tell?” + +“I hardly think so. I came out as the sun went down, and sat outside +till you came back to me.” + +“He could have popped in for an instant through the back veranda.” + +“I heard nothing in here,” she said. “What is the matter?” + +“Naturally you wouldn't hear. He can be as quiet as a shadow, when he +likes. I believe he could steal the pillows from under our heads. He +might have been here ten minutes ago.” + +“What woke you up? Was it a noise?” + +“Can't say that. Generally one can't tell, but is it likely, Lena? You +are, I believe, the lighter sleeper of us two. A noise loud enough to +wake me up would have awakened you, too. I tried to be as quiet as I +could. What roused you?” + +“I don't know--a dream, perhaps. I woke up crying.” + +“What was the dream?” + +Heyst, with one hand resting on the table, had turned in her direction, +his round, uncovered head set on a fighter's muscular neck. She left his +question unanswered, as if she had not heard it. + +“What is it you have missed?” she asked in her turn, very grave. + +Her dark hair, drawn smoothly back, was done in two thick tresses for +the night. Heyst noticed the good form of her brow, the dignity of its +width, its unshining whiteness. It was a sculptural forehead. He had a +moment of acute appreciation intruding upon another order of thoughts. +It was as if there could be no end of his discoveries about that girl, +at the most incongruous moments. + +She had on nothing but a hand-woven cotton sarong--one of Heyst's few +purchases, years ago, in Celebes, where they are made. He had forgotten +all about it till she came, and then had found it at the bottom of an +old sandalwood trunk dating back to pre-Morrison days. She had quickly +learned to wind it up under her armpits with a safe twist, as Malay +village girls do when going down to bathe in a river. Her shoulders and +arms were bare; one of her tresses, hanging forward, looked almost black +against the white skin. As she was taller than the average Malay woman, +the sarong ended a good way above her ankles. She stood poised firmly, +half-way between the table and the curtained doorway, the insteps of her +bare feet gleaming like marble on the overshadowed matting of the floor. +The fall of her lighted shoulders, the strong and fine modelling of +her arms hanging down her sides, her immobility, too, had something +statuesque, the charm of art tense with life. She was not very +big--Heyst used to think of her, at first, as “that poor little +girl,”--but revealed free from the shabby banality of a white platform +dress, in the simple drapery of the sarong, there was that in her form +and in the proportions of her body which suggested a reduction from a +heroic size. + +She moved forward a step. + +“What is it you have missed?” she asked again. + +Heyst turned his back altogether on the table. The black spokes of +darkness over the floor and the walls, joining up on the ceiling in a +path of shadow, were like the bars of a cage about them. It was his turn +to ignore a question. + +“You woke up in a fright, you say?” he said. + +She walked up to him, exotic yet familiar, with her white woman's face +and shoulders above the Malay sarong, as if it were an airy disguise, +but her expression was serious. + +“No,” she replied. “It was distress, rather. You see, you weren't there, +and I couldn't tell why you had gone away from me. A nasty dream--the +first I've had, too, since--” + +“You don't believe in dreams, do you?” asked Heyst. + +“I once knew a woman who did. Leastwise, she used to tell people what +dreams mean, for a shilling.” + +“Would you go now and ask her what this dream means?” inquired Heyst +jocularly. + +“She lived in Camberwell. She was a nasty old thing!” + +Heyst laughed a little uneasily. + +“Dreams are madness, my dear. It's things that happen in the waking +world, while one is asleep, that one would be glad to know the meaning +of.” + +“You have missed something out of this drawer,” she said positively. + +“This or some other. I have looked into every single one of them and +come back to this again, as people do. It's difficult to believe the +evidence of my own senses; but it isn't there. Now, Lena, are you sure +that you didn't--” + +“I have touched nothing in the house but what you have given me.” + +“Lena!” he cried. + +He was painfully affected by this disclaimer of a charge which he had +not made. It was what a servant might have said--an inferior open +to suspicion--or, at any rate, a stranger. He was angry at being so +wretchedly misunderstood; disenchanted at her not being instinctively +aware of the place he had secretly given her in his thoughts. + +“After all,” he said to himself, “we are strangers to each other.” + +And then he felt sorry for her. He spoke calmly: + +“I was about to say, are you sure you have no reason to think that the +Chinaman has been in this room tonight?” + +“You suspect him?” she asked, knitting her eyebrows. + +“There is no one else to suspect. You may call it a certitude.” + +“You don't want to tell me what it is?” she inquired, in the equable +tone in which one takes a fact into account. + +Heyst only smiled faintly. + +“Nothing very precious, as far as value goes,” he replied. + +“I thought it might have been money,” she said. + +“Money!” exclaimed Heyst, as if the suggestion had been altogether +preposterous. She was so visibly surprised that he hastened to add: “Of +course, there is some money in the house--there, in that writing-desk, +the drawer on the left. It's not locked. You can pull it right out. +There is a recess, and the board at the back pivots: a very simple +hiding-place, when you know the way to it. I discovered it by accident, +and I keep our store of sovereigns in there. The treasure, my dear, is +not big enough to require a cavern.” + +He paused, laughed very low, and returned her steady stare. + +“The loose silver, some guilders and dollars, I have always kept in that +unlocked left drawer. I have no doubt Wang knows what there is in it, +but he isn't a thief, and that's why I--no, Lena, what I've missed is +not gold or jewels; and that's what makes the fact interesting--which +the theft of money cannot be.” + +She took a long breath, relieved to hear that it was not money. A great +curiosity was depicted on her face, but she refrained from pressing him +with questions. She only gave him one of her deep-gleaming smiles. + +“It isn't me so it must be Wang. You ought to make him give it back to +you.” + +Heyst said nothing to that naive and practical suggestion, for the +object that he missed from the drawer was his revolver. + +It was a heavy weapon which he had owned for many years and had never +used in his life. Ever since the London furniture had arrived in +Samburan, it had been reposing in the drawer of the table. The real +dangers of life, for him, were not those which could be repelled +by swords or bullets. On the other hand neither his manner nor his +appearance looked sufficiently inoffensive to expose him to light-minded +aggression. + +He could not have explained what had induced him to go to the drawer +in the middle of the night. He had started up suddenly--which was very +unusual with him. He had found himself sitting up and extremely wide +awake all at once, with the girl reposing by his side, lying with her +face away from him, a vague, characteristically feminine form in the dim +light. She was perfectly still. + +At that season of the year there were no mosquitoes in Samburan, and the +sides of the mosquito net were looped up. Heyst swung his feet to the +floor, and found himself standing there, almost before he had become +aware of his intention to get up. + +Why he did this he did not know. He didn't wish to wake her up, and +the slight creak of the broad bedstead had sounded very loud to him. He +turned round apprehensively and waited for her to move, but she did not +stir. While he looked at her, he had a vision of himself lying there +too, also fast asleep, and--it occurred to him for the first time in his +life--very defenceless. This quite novel impression of the dangers of +slumber made him think suddenly of his revolver. He left the bedroom +with noiseless footsteps. The lightness of the curtain he had to lift +as he passed out, and the outer door, wide open on the blackness of +the veranda--for the roof eaves came down low, shutting out the +starlight--gave him a sense of having been dangerously exposed, he could +not have said to what. He pulled the drawer open. Its emptiness cut his +train of self-communion short. He murmured to the assertive fact: + +“Impossible! Somewhere else!” + +He tried to remember where he had put the thing; but those provoked +whispers of memory were not encouraging. Foraging in every receptacle +and nook big enough to contain a revolver, he came slowly to the +conclusion that it was not in that room. Neither was it in the other. +The whole bungalow consisted of the two rooms and a profuse allowance of +veranda all round. Heyst stepped out on the veranda. + +“It's Wang, beyond a doubt,” he thought, staring into the night. “He has +got hold of it for some reason.” + +There was nothing to prevent that ghostly Chinaman from materializing +suddenly at the foot of the stairs, or anywhere, at any moment, and +toppling him over with a dead sure shot. The danger was so irremediable +that it was not worth worrying about, any more than the general +precariousness of human life. Heyst speculated on this added risk. How +long had he been at the mercy of a slender yellow finger on the trigger? +That is, if that was the fellow's reason for purloining the revolver. + +“Shoot and inherit,” thought Heyst. “Very simple.” Yet there was in his +mind a marked reluctance to regard the domesticated grower of vegetables +in the light of a murderer. + +“No, it wasn't that. For Wang could have done it any time this last +twelve months or more--” + +Heyst's mind had worked on the assumption that Wang had possessed +himself of the revolver during his own absence from Samburan; but at +that period of his speculation his point of view changed. It struck him +with the force of manifest certitude that the revolver had been taken +only late in the day, or on that very night. Wang, of course. But why? +So there had been no danger in the past. It was all ahead. + +“He has me at his mercy now,” thought Heyst, without particular +excitement. + +The sentiment he experienced was curiosity. He forgot himself in it: it +was as if he were considering somebody else's strange predicament. But +even that sort of interest was dying out when, looking to his left, he +saw the accustomed shapes of the other bungalows looming in the night, +and remembered the arrival of the thirsty company in the boat. Wang +would hardly risk such a crime in the presence of other white men. It +was a peculiar instance of the “safety in numbers,” principle, which +somehow was not much to Heyst's taste. + +He went in gloomily, and stood over the empty drawer in deep and +unsatisfactory thought. He had just made up his mind that he must +breathe nothing of this to the girl, when he heard her voice behind him. +She had taken him by surprise, but he resisted the impulse to turn round +at once under the impression that she might read his trouble in his +face. Yes, she had taken him by surprise, and for that reason the +conversation which began was not exactly as he would have conducted it +if he had been prepared for her pointblank question. He ought to have +said at once: “I've missed nothing.” It was a deplorable thing that he +should have let it come so far as to have her ask what it was he missed. +He closed the conversation by saying lightly: + +“It's an object of very small value. Don't worry about it--it isn't +worth while. The best you can do is to go and lie down again, Lena.” + +Reluctant she turned away, and only in the doorway asked: “And you?” + +“I think I shall smoke a cheroot on the veranda. I don't feel sleepy for +the moment.” + +“Well, don't be long.” + +He made no answer. She saw him standing there, very still, with a frown +on his brow, and slowly dropped the curtain. + +Heyst did really light a cheroot before going out again on the veranda. +He glanced up from under the low eaves, to see by the stars how the +night went on. It was going very slowly. Why it should have irked him he +did not know, for he had nothing to expect from the dawn; but everything +round him had become unreasonable, unsettled, and vaguely urgent, laying +him under an obligation, but giving him no line of action. He felt +contemptuously irritated with the situation. The outer world had broken +upon him; and he did not know what wrong he had done to bring this on +himself, any more than he knew what he had done to provoke the horrible +calumny about his treatment of poor Morrison. For he could not forget +this. It had reached the ears of one who needed to have the most perfect +confidence in the rectitude of his conduct. + +“And she only half disbelieves it,” he thought, with hopeless +humiliation. + +This moral stab in the back seemed to have taken some of his strength +from him, as a physical wound would have done. He had no desire to do +anything--neither to bring Wang to terms in the matter of the revolver +nor to find out from the strangers who they were, and how their +predicament had come about. He flung his glowing cigar away into the +night. But Samburan was no longer a solitude wherein he could indulge in +all his moods. The fiery parabolic path the cast-out stump traced in the +air was seen from another veranda at a distance of some twenty yards. It +was noted as a symptom of importance by an observer with his faculties +greedy for signs, and in a state of alertness tense enough almost to +hear the grass grow. + + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +The observer was Martin Ricardo. To him life was not a matter of +passive renunciation, but of a particularly active warfare. He was +not mistrustful of it, he was not disgusted with it, still less was he +inclined to be suspicious of its disenchantments; but he was vividly +aware that it held many possibilities of failure. Though very far from +being a pessimist, he was not a man of foolish illusions. He did +not like failure, not only because of its unpleasant and dangerous +consequences, but also because of its damaging effect upon his own +appreciation of Martin Ricardo. And this was a special job, of his own +contriving, and of considerable novelty. It was not, so to speak, in his +usual line of business--except, perhaps, from a moral standpoint, about +which he was not likely to trouble his head. For these reasons Martin +Ricardo was unable to sleep. + +Mr Jones, after repeated shivering fits, and after drinking much hot +tea, had apparently fallen into deep slumber. He had very peremptorily +discouraged attempts at conversation on the part of his faithful +follower. Ricardo listened to his regular breathing. It was all very +well for the governor. He looked upon it as a sort of sport. A gentleman +naturally would. But this ticklish and important job had to be pulled +off at all costs, both for honour and for safety. Ricardo rose quietly, +and made his way on the veranda. He could not lie still. He wanted to +go out for air, and he had a feeling that by the force of his eagerness +even the darkness and the silence could be made to yield something to +his eyes and ears. + +He noted the stars, and stepped back again into the dense darkness. +He resisted the growing impulse to go out and steal towards the other +bungalow. It would have been madness to start prowling in the dark on +unknown ground. And for what end? Unless to relieve the oppression. +Immobility lay on his limbs like a leaden garment. And yet he was +unwilling to give up. He persisted in his objectless vigil. The man of +the island was keeping quiet. + +It was at that moment that Ricardo's eyes caught the vanishing red +trail of light made by the cigar--a startling revelation of the man's +wakefulness. He could not suppress a low “Hallo!” and began to sidle +along towards the door, with his shoulders rubbing the wall. For all he +knew, the man might have been out in front by this time, observing the +veranda. As a matter of fact, after flinging away the cheroot, Heyst +had gone indoors with the feeling of a man who gives up an unprofitable +occupation. But Ricardo fancied he could hear faint footfalls on the +open ground, and dodged quickly into the room. There he drew breath, and +meditated for a while. His next step was to feel for the matches on +the tall desk, and to light the candle. He had to communicate to his +governor views and reflections of such importance that it was absolutely +necessary for him to watch their effect on the very countenance of the +hearer. At first he had thought that these matters could have waited +till daylight; but Heyst's wakefulness, disclosed in that startling way, +made him feel suddenly certain that there could be no sleep for him that +night. + +He said as much to his governor. When the little dagger-like flame had +done its best to dispel the darkness, Mr. Jones was to be seen reposing +on a camp bedstead, in a distant part of the room. A railway rug +concealed his spare form up to his very head, which rested on the +other railway rug rolled up for a pillow. Ricardo plumped himself down +cross-legged on the floor, very close to the low bedstead; so that Mr. +Jones--who perhaps had not been so very profoundly asleep--on opening +his eyes found them conveniently levelled at the face of his secretary. + +“Eh? What is it you say? No sleep for you tonight? But why can't you let +me sleep? Confound your fussiness!” + +“Because that there fellow can't sleep--that's why. Dash me if he hasn't +been doing a think just now! What business has he to think in the middle +of the night?” + +“How do you know?” + +“He was out, sir--up in the middle of the night. My own eyes saw it.” + +“But how do you know that he was up to think?” inquired Mr. Jones. “It +might have been anything--toothache, for instance. And you may have +dreamed it for all I know. Didn't you try to sleep?” + +“No, sir. I didn't even try to go to sleep.” + +Ricardo informed his patron of his vigil on the veranda, and of the +revelation which put an end to it. He concluded that a man up with a +cigar in the middle of the night must be doing a think. + +Mr Jones raised himself on his elbow. This sign of interest comforted +his faithful henchman. + +“Seems to me it's time we did a little think ourselves,” added Ricardo, +with more assurance. Long as they had been together the moods of his +governor were still a source of anxiety to his simple soul. + +“You are always making a fuss,” remarked Mr. Jones, in a tolerant tone. + +“Ay, but not for nothing, am I? You can't say that, sir. Mine may not be +a gentleman's way of looking round a thing, but it isn't a fool's way, +either. You've admitted that much yourself at odd times.” + +Ricardo was growing warmly argumentative. Mr. Jones interrupted him +without heat. + +“You haven't roused me to talk about yourself, I presume?” + +“No, sir.” Ricardo remained silent for a minute, with the tip of +his tongue caught between his teeth. “I don't think I could tell you +anything about myself that you don't know,” he continued. There was a +sort of amused satisfaction in his tone which changed completely as he +went on. “It's that man, over there, that's got to be talked over. I +don't like him.” + +He, failed to observe the flicker of a ghastly smile on his governor's +lips. + +“Don't you?” murmured Mr. Jones, whose face, as he reclined on his +elbow, was on a level with the top of his follower's head. + +“No, sir,” said Ricardo emphatically. The candle from the other side of +the room threw his monstrous black shadow on the wall. “He--I don't know +how to say it--he isn't hearty-like.” + +Mr Jones agreed languidly in his own manner: + +“He seems to be a very self-possessed man.” + +“Ay, that's it. Self--” Ricardo choked with indignation. “I would soon +let out some of his self-possession through a hole between his ribs, if +this weren't a special job!” + +Mr Jones had been making his own reflections, for he asked: + +“Do you think he is suspicious?” + +“I don't see very well what he can be suspicious of,” pondered Ricardo. +“Yet there he was doing a think. And what could be the object of it? +What made him get out of his bed in the middle of the night. 'Tain't +fleas, surely.” + +“Bad conscience, perhaps,” suggested Mr. Jones jocularly. + +His faithful secretary suffered from irritation, and did not see the +joke. In a fretful tone he declared that there was no such thing as +conscience. There was such a thing as funk; but there was nothing to +make that fellow funky in any special way. He admitted, however, that +the man might have been uneasy at the arrival of strangers, because of +all that plunder of his put away somewhere. + +Ricardo glanced here and there, as if he were afraid of being overheard +by the heavy shadows cast by the dim light all over the room. His +patron, very quiet, spoke in a calm whisper: + +“And perhaps that hotel-keeper has been lying to you about him. He may +be a very poor devil indeed.” + +Ricardo shook his head slightly. The Schombergian theory of Heyst had +become in him a profound conviction, which he had absorbed as naturally +as a sponge takes up water. His patron's doubts were a wanton denying +of what was self-evident; but Ricardo's voice remained as before, a soft +purring with a snarling undertone. + +“I am sup-prised at you, sir! It's the very way them tame ones--the +common 'yporcrits of the world--get on. When it comes to plunder +drifting under one's very nose, there's not one of them that would keep +his hands off. And I don't blame them. It's the way they do it that sets +my back up. Just look at the story of how he got rid of that pal of his! +Send a man home to croak of a cold on the chest--that's one of your tame +tricks. And d'you mean to say, sir, that a man that's up to it wouldn't +bag whatever he could lay his hands in his 'yporcritical way? What was +all that coal business? Tame citizen dodge; 'yporcrisy--nothing else. +No, no, sir! The thing is to extract it from him as neatly as possible. +That's the job; and it isn't so simple as it looks. I reckon you have +looked at it all round, sir, before you took up the notion of this +trip.” + +“No.” Mr. Jones was hardly audible, staring far away from his couch. “I +didn't think about it much. I was bored.” + +“Ay, that you were--bad. I was feeling pretty desperate that afternoon, +when that bearded softy of a landlord got talking to me about this +fellow here. Quite accidentally, it was. Well, sir, here we are after a +mighty narrow squeak. I feel all limp yet; but never mind--his swag will +pay for the lot!” + +“He's all alone here,” remarked Mr. Jones in a hollow murmur. + +“Ye-es, in a way. Yes, alone enough. Yes, you may say he is.” + +“There's that Chinaman, though.” + +“Ay, there's the Chink,” assented Ricardo rather absentmindedly. + +He was debating in his mind the advisability of making a clean breast of +his knowledge of the girl's existence. Finally he concluded he wouldn't. +The enterprise was difficult enough without complicating it with an +upset to the sensibilities of the gentleman with whom he had the honour +of being associated. Let the discovery come of itself, he thought, +and then he could swear that he had known nothing of that offensive +presence. + +He did not need to lie. He had only to hold his tongue. + +“Yes,” he muttered reflectively, “there's that Chink, certainly.” + +At bottom, he felt a certain ambiguous respect for his governor's +exaggerated dislike of women, as if that horror of feminine presence +were a sort of depraved morality; but still morality, since he counted +it as an advantage. It prevented many undesirable complications. He did +not pretend to understand it. He did not even try to investigate +this idiosyncrasy of his chief. All he knew was that he himself was +differently inclined, and that it did not make him any happier or safer. +He did not know how he would have acted if he had been knocking about +the world on his own. Luckily he was a subordinate, not a wage-slave but +a follower--which was a restraint. Yes! The other sort of disposition +simplified matters in general; it wasn't to be gainsaid. But it was +clear that it could also complicate them--as in this most important and, +in Ricardo's view, already sufficiently delicate case. And the worst of +it was that one could not tell exactly in what precise manner it would +act. + +It was unnatural, he thought somewhat peevishly. How was one to reckon +up the unnatural? There were no rules for that. The faithful henchman +of plain Mr. Jones, foreseeing many difficulties of a material order, +decided to keep the girl out of the governor's knowledge, out of his +sight, too, for as long a time as it could be managed. That, alas, +seemed to be at most a matter of a few hours; whereas Ricardo feared +that to get the affair properly going would take some days. Once well +started, he was not afraid of his gentleman failing him. As is often the +case with lawless natures, Ricardo's faith in any given individual was +of a simple, unquestioning character. For man must have some support in +life. + +Cross-legged, his head drooping a little and perfectly still, he might +have been meditating in a bonze-like attitude upon the sacred syllable +“Om.” It was a striking illustration of the untruth of appearances, for +his contempt for the world was of a severely practical kind. There was +nothing oriental about Ricardo but the amazing quietness of his pose. +Mr. Jones was also very quiet. He had let his head sink on the rolled-up +rug, and lay stretched out on his side with his back to the light. In +that position the shadows gathered in the cavities of his eyes made +them look perfectly empty. When he spoke, his ghostly voice had only to +travel a few inches straight into Ricardo's left ear. + +“Why don't you say something, now that you've got me awake?” + +“I wonder if you were sleeping as sound as you are trying to make out, +sir,” said the unmoved Ricardo. + +“I wonder,” repeated Mr. Jones. “At any rate, I was resting quietly!” + +“Come, sir!” Ricardo's whisper was alarmed. “You don't mean to say +you're going to be bored?” + +“No.” + +“Quite right!” The secretary was very much relieved. “There's no +occasion to be, I can tell you, sir,” he whispered earnestly. “Anything +but that! If I didn't say anything for a bit, it ain't because there +isn't plenty to talk about. Ay, more than enough.” + +“What's the matter with you?” breathed out his patron. “Are you going to +turn pessimist?” + +“Me turn? No, sir! I ain't of those that turn. You may call me hard +names, if you like, but you know very well that I ain't a croaker.” + Ricardo changed his tone. “If I said nothing for a while, it was because +I was meditating over the Chink, sir.” + +“You were? Waste of time, my Martin. A Chinaman is unfathomable.” + +Ricardo admitted that this might be so. Anyhow, a Chink was neither +here nor there, as a general thing, unfathomable as he might be; but a +Swedish baron wasn't--couldn't be! The woods were full of such barons. + +“I don't know that he is so tame,” was Mr. Jones's remark, in a +sepulchral undertone. + +“How do you mean, sir? He ain't a rabbit, of course. You couldn't +hypnotize him, as I saw you do to more than one Dago, and other kinds +of tame citizens, when it came to the point of holding them down to a +game.” + +“Don't you reckon on that,” murmured plain Mr. Jones seriously. + +“No, sir, I don't, though you have a wonderful power of the eye. It's a +fact.” + +“I have a wonderful patience,” remarked Mr. Jones dryly. + +A dim smile flitted over the lips of the faithful Ricardo who never +raised his head. + +“I don't want to try you too much, sir, but this is like no other job we +ever turned our minds to.” + +“Perhaps not. At any rate let us think so.” + +A weariness with the monotony of life was reflected in the tone of this +qualified assent. It jarred on the nerves of the sanguine Ricardo. + +“Let us think of the way to go to work,” he retorted a little +impatiently. “He's a deep one. Just look at the way he treated that chum +of his. Did you ever hear of anything so low? And the artfulness of the +beast--the dirty, tame artfulness!” + +“Don't you start moralizing, Martin,” said Mr. Jones warningly. “As far +as I can make out the story that German hotel-keeper told you, it seems +to show a certain amount of character;--and independence from common +feelings which is not usual. It's very remarkable, if true.” + +“Ay, ay! Very remarkable. It's mighty low down, all the same,” muttered, +Ricardo obstinately. “I must say I am glad to think he will be paid off +for it in a way that'll surprise him!” + +The tip of his tongue appeared lively for an instant, as if trying for +the taste of that ferocious retribution on his compressed lips. For +Ricardo was sincere in his indignation before the elementary principle +of loyalty to a chum violated in cold blood, slowly, in a patient +duplicity of years. There are standards in villainy as in virtue, and +the act as he pictured it to himself acquired an additional horror +from the slow pace of that treachery so atrocious and so tame. But +he understood too the educated judgement of his governor, a gentleman +looking on all this with the privileged detachment of a cultivated mind, +of an elevated personality. + +“Ay, he's deep--he's artful,” he mumbled between his sharp teeth. + +“Confound you!” Mr. Jones's calm whisper crept into his ear. “Come to +the point.” + +Obedient, the secretary shook off his thoughtfulness. There was a +similarity of mind between these two--one the outcast of his vices, the +other inspired by a spirit of scornful defiance, the aggressiveness of +a beast of prey looking upon all the tame creatures of the earth as its +natural victim. Both were astute enough, however, and both were aware +that they had plunged into this adventure without a sufficient scrutiny +of detail. The figure of a lonely man far from all assistance had +loomed up largely, fascinating and defenceless in the middle of the sea, +filling the whole field of their vision. There had not seemed to be any +need for thinking. As Schomberg had been saying: “Three to one.” + +But it did not look so simple now in the face of that solitude which was +like an armour for this man. The feeling voiced by the henchman in his +own way--“We don't seem much forwarder now we are here” was acknowledged +by the silence of the patron. It was easy enough to rip a fellow up or +drill a hole in him, whether he was alone or not, Ricardo reflected in +low, confidential tones, but-- + +“He isn't alone,” Mr. Jones said faintly, in his attitude of a man +composed for sleep. “Don't forget that Chinaman.” Ricardo started +slightly. + +“Oh, ay--the Chink!” + +Ricardo had been on the point of confessing about the girl; but no! He +wanted his governor to be unperturbed and steady. Vague thoughts, +which he hardly dared to look in the face, were stirring his brain in +connection with that girl. She couldn't be much account, he thought. She +could be frightened. And there were also other possibilities. The Chink, +however, could be considered openly. + +“What I was thinking about it, sir,” he went on earnestly, “is +this--here we've got a man. He's nothing. If he won't be good, he can be +made quiet. That's easy. But then there's his plunder. He doesn't carry +it in his pocket.” + +“I hope not,” breathed Mr. Jones. + +“Same here. It's too big, we know, but if he were alone, he would not +feel worried about it overmuch--I mean the safety of the pieces. He +would just put the lot into any box or drawer that was handy.” + +“Would he?” + +“Yes, sir. He would keep it under his eye, as it were. Why not? It is +natural. A fellow doesn't put his swag underground, unless there's a +very good reason for it.” + +“A very good reason, eh?” + +“Yes, sir. What do you think a fellow is--a mole?” + +From his experience, Ricardo declared that man was not a burrowing +beast. Even the misers very seldom buried their hoard, unless for +exceptional reasons. In the given situation of a man alone on an island, +the company of a Chink was a very good reason. Drawers would not be +safe, nor boxes, either, from a prying, slant-eyed Chink. No, sir, +unless a safe--a proper office safe. But the safe was there in the room. + +“Is there a safe in this room? I didn't notice it,” whispered Mr. Jones. + +That was because the thing was painted white, like the walls of the +room; and besides, it was tucked away in the shadows of a corner. Mr. +Jones had been too tired to observe anything on his first coming ashore; +but Ricardo had very soon spotted the characteristic form. He only +wished he could believe that the plunder of treachery, duplicity, and +all the moral abominations of Heyst had been there. But no; the blamed +thing was open. + +“It might have been there at one time or another,” he commented +gloomily, “but it isn't there now.” + +“The man did not elect to live in this house,” remarked Mr. Jones. “And +by the by, what could he have meant by speaking of circumstances which +prevented him lodging us in the other bungalow? You remember what he +said, Martin? Sounded cryptic.” + +Martin, who remembered and understood the phrase as directly motived by +the existence of the girl, waited a little before saying: + +“Some of his artfulness, sir; and not the worst of it either. That +manner of his to us, this asking no questions, is some more of his +artfulness. A man's bound to be curious, and he is; yet he goes on as if +he didn't care. He does care--or else what was he doing up with a cigar +in the middle of the night, doing a think? I don't like it.” + +“He may be outside, observing the light here, and saying the very same +thing to himself of our own wakefulness,” gravely suggested Ricardo's +governor. + +“He may be, sir; but this is too important to be talked over in the +dark. And the light is all right, it can be accounted for. There's a +light in this bungalow in the middle of the night because--why, because +you are not well. Not well, sir--that's what's the matter, and you will +have to act up to it.” + +The consideration had suddenly occurred to the faithful henchman, in the +light of a felicitous expedient to keep his governor and the girl apart +as long as possible. Mr. Jones received the suggestion without the +slightest stir, even in the deep sockets of his eyes, where a steady, +faint gleam was the only thing telling of life and attention in his +attenuated body. But Ricardo, as soon as he had enunciated his happy +thought, perceived in it other possibilities more to the point and of +greater practical advantage. + +“With your looks, sir, it will be easy enough,” he went on evenly, as +if no silence had intervened, always respectful, but frank, with +perfect simplicity of purpose. “All you've got to do is just to lie down +quietly. I noticed him looking sort of surprised at you on the wharf, +sir.” + +At these words, a naive tribute to the aspect of his physique, even more +suggestive of the grave than of the sick-bed, a fold appeared on that +side of the governor's face which was exposed to the dim light--a deep, +shadowy, semicircular fold from the side of the nose to bottom of the +chin--a silent smile. By a side-glance Ricardo had noted this play of +features. He smiled, too, appreciative, encouraged. + +“And you as hard as nails all the time,” he went on. “Hang me if anybody +would believe you aren't sick, if I were to swear myself black in +the face! Give us a day or two to look into matters and size up that +'yporcrit.” + +Ricardo's eyes remained fixed on his crossed shins. The chief, in his +lifeless accents, approved. + +“Perhaps it would be a good idea.” + +“The Chink, he's nothing. He can be made quiet any time.” + +One of Ricardo's hands, reposing palm upwards on his folded legs, made +a swift thrusting gesture, repeated by the enormous darting shadow of an +arm very low on the wall. It broke the spell of perfect stillness in +the room. The secretary eyed moodily the wall from which the shadow had +gone. Anybody could be made quiet, he pointed out. It was not anything +that the Chink could do; no, it was the effect that his company must +have produced on the conduct of the doomed man. A man! What was a man? A +Swedish baron could be ripped up, or else holed by a shot, as easily as +any other creature; but that was exactly what was to be avoided, till +one knew where he had hidden his plunder. + +“I shouldn't think it would be some sort of hole in his bungalow,” + argued Ricardo with real anxiety. + +No. A house can be burnt--set on fire accidentally, or on purpose, while +a man's asleep. Under the house--or in some crack, cranny, or crevice? +Something told him it wasn't that. The anguish of mental effort +contracted Ricardo's brow. The skin of his head seemed to move in this +travail of vain and tormenting suppositions. + +“What did you think a fellow is, sir--a baby?” he said, in answer to Mr. +Jones's objections. “I am trying to find out what I would do myself. He +wouldn't be likely to be cleverer than I am.” + +“And what do you know about yourself?” + +Mr Jones seemed to watch his follower's perplexities with amusement +concealed in a death-like composure. + +Ricardo disregarded the question. The material vision of the spoil +absorbed all his faculties. A great vision! He seemed to see it. A few +small canvas bags tied up with thin cord, their distended rotundity +showing the inside pressure of the disk-like forms of coins--gold, +solid, heavy, eminently portable. Perhaps steel cash-boxes with a chased +design, on the covers; or perhaps a black and brass box with a handle +on the top, and full of goodness knows what. Bank notes? Why not? The +fellow had been going home; so it was surely something worth going home +with. + +“And he may have put it anywhere outside--anywhere!” cried Ricardo in a +deadened voice, “in the forest--” + +That was it! A temporary darkness replaced the dim light of the room. +The darkness of the forest at night and in it the gleam of a lantern, by +which a figure is digging at the foot of a tree-trunk. As likely as not, +another figure holding that lantern--ha, feminine! The girl! + +The prudent Ricardo stifled a picturesque and profane exclamation, +partly joy, partly dismay. Had the girl been trusted or mistrusted by +that man? Whatever it was, it was bound to be wholly! With women there +could be no half-measures. He could not imagine a fellow half-trusting +a woman in that intimate relation to himself, and in those particular +circumstances of conquest and loneliness where no confidences could +appear dangerous since, apparently, there could be no one she could +give him away to. Moreover, in nine cases out of ten the woman would be +trusted. But, trusted or mistrusted, was her presence a favourable or +unfavourable condition of the problem? That was the question! + +The temptation to consult his chief, to talk over the weighty fact, and +get his opinion on it, was great indeed. Ricardo resisted it; but the +agony of his solitary mental conflict was extremely sharp. A woman in +a problem is an incalculable quantity, even if you have something to go +upon in forming your guess. How much more so when you haven't even once +caught sight of her. + +Swift as were his mental processes, he felt that a longer silence was +inadvisable. He hastened to speak: + +“And do you see us, sir, you and I, with a couple of spades having to +tackle this whole confounded island?” + +He allowed himself a slight movement of the arm. The shadow enlarged it +into a sweeping gesture. + +“This seems rather discouraging, Martin,” murmured the unmoved governor. + +“We mustn't be discouraged--that's all!” retorted his henchman. “And +after what we had to go through in that boat too! Why it would be--” + +He couldn't find the qualifying words. Very calm, faithful, and yet +astute, he expressed his new-born hopes darkly. + +“Something's sure to turn up to give us a hint; only this job can't be +rushed. You may depend on me to pick up the least little bit of a hint; +but you, sir--you've got to play him very gently. For the rest you can +trust me.” + +“Yes; but I ask myself what YOU are trusting to.” + +“Our luck,” said the faithful Ricardo. “Don't say a word against that. +It might spoil the run of it.” + +“You are a superstitious beggar. No, I won't say anything against it.” + +“That's right, sir. Don't you even think lightly of it. Luck's not to be +played with.” + +“Yes, luck's a delicate thing,” assented Mr. Jones in a dreamy whisper. + +A short silence ensued, which Ricardo ended in a discreet and tentative +voice. + +“Talking of luck, I suppose he could be made to take a hand with +you, sir--two-handed picket or ekkarty, you being seedy and keeping +indoors--just to pass the time. For all we know, he may be one of them +hot ones once they start--” + +“Is it likely?” came coldly from the principal. “Considering what we +know of his history--say with his partner.” + +“True, sir. He's a cold-blooded beast; a cold-blooded, inhuman--” + +“And I'll tell you another thing that isn't likely. He would not be +likely to let himself be stripped bare. We haven't to do with a young +fool that can be led on by chaff or flattery, and in the end simply +overawed. This is a calculating man.” + +Ricardo recognized that clearly. What he had in his mind was something +on a small scale, just to keep the enemy busy while he, Ricardo, had +time to nose around a bit. + +“You could even lose a little money to him, sir,” he suggested. + +“I could.” + +Ricardo was thoughtful for a moment. + +“He strikes me, too, as the sort of man to start prancing when one +didn't expect it. What do you think, sir? Is he a man that would prance? +That is, if something startled him. More likely to prance than to +run--what?” + +The answer came at once, because Mr. Jones understood the peculiar idiom +of his faithful follower. + +“Oh, without doubt! Without doubt!” + +“It does me good to hear that you think so. He's a prancing beast, +and so we mustn't startle him--not till I have located the stuff. +Afterwards--” + +Ricardo paused, sinister in the stillness of his pose. Suddenly he +got up with a swift movement and gazed down at his chief in moody +abstraction. Mr. Jones did not stir. + +“There's one thing that's worrying me,” began Ricardo in a subdued +voice. + +“Only one?” was the faint comment from the motionless body on the +bedstead. + +“I mean more than all the others put together.” + +“That's grave news.” + +“Ay, grave enough. It's this--how do you feel in yourself, sir? Are you +likely to get bored? I know them fits come on you suddenly; but surely +you can tell--” + +“Martin, you are an ass.” + +The moody face of the secretary brightened up. + +“Really, sir? Well, I am quite content to be on these terms--I mean as +long as you don't get bored. It wouldn't do, sir.” + +For coolness, Ricardo had thrown open his shirt and rolled up his +sleeves. He moved stealthily across the room, bare-footed, towards the +candle, the shadow of his head and shoulders growing bigger behind him +on the opposite wall, to which the face of plain Mr. Jones was turned. +With a feline movement, Ricardo glanced over his shoulder at the thin +back of the spectre reposing on the bed, and then blew out the candle. + +“In fact, I am rather amused, Martin,” Mr. Jones said in the dark. + +He heard the sound of a slapped thigh and the jubilant exclamation of +his henchman: + +“Good! That's the way to talk, sir!” + + + + + +PART FOUR + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +Ricardo advanced prudently by short darts from one tree-trunk to +another, more in the manner of a squirrel than a cat. The sun had +risen some time before. Already the sparkle of open sea was encroaching +rapidly on the dark, cool, early-morning blue of Diamond Bay; but the +deep dusk lingered yet under the mighty pillars of the forest, between +which the secretary dodged. + +He was watching Number One's bungalow with an animal-like patience, if +with a very human complexity of purpose. This was the second morning +of such watching. The first one had not been rewarded by success. Well, +strictly speaking, there was no hurry. + +The sun, swinging above the ridge all at once, inundated with light the +space of burnt grass in front of Ricardo and the face of the bungalow, +on which his eyes were fixed, leaving only the one dark spot of the +doorway. To his right, to his left, and behind him, splashes of gold +appeared in the deep shade of the forest, thinning the gloom under the +ragged roof of leaves. + +This was not a very favourable circumstance for Ricardo's purpose. He +did not wish to be detected in his patient occupation. For what he was +watching for was a sight of the girl--that girl! just a glimpse across +the burnt patch to see what she was like. He had excellent eyes, and +the distance was not so great. He would be able to distinguish her face +quite easily if she only came out on the veranda; and she was bound +to do that sooner or later. He was confident that he could form some +opinion about her--which, he felt, was very necessary, before venturing +on some steps to get in touch with her behind that Swedish baron's back. +His theoretical view of the girl was such that he was quite prepared, +on the strength of that distant examination, to show himself +discreetly--perhaps even make a sign. It all depended on his reading of +the face. She couldn't be much. He knew that sort! + +By protruding his head a little he commanded, through the foliage of a +festooning creeper, a view of the three bungalows. Irregularly disposed +along a flat curve, over the veranda rail of the farthermost one hung a +dark rug of a tartan pattern, amazingly conspicuous. Ricardo could see +the very checks. A brisk fire of sticks was burning on the ground in +front of the steps, and in the sunlight the thin, fluttering flame had +paled almost to invisibility--a mere rosy stir under a faint wreath of +smoke. He could see the white bandage on the head of Pedro bending over +it, and the wisps of black hair standing up weirdly. He had wound that +bandage himself, after breaking that shaggy and enormous head. The +creature balanced it like a load, staggering towards the steps. Ricardo +could see a small, long-handled saucepan at the end of a great hairy +paw. + +Yes, he could see all that there was to be seen, far and near. Excellent +eyes! The only thing they could not penetrate was the dark oblong of the +doorway on the veranda under the low eaves of the bungalow's roof. And +that was vexing. It was an outrage. Ricardo was easily outraged. Surely +she would come out presently! Why didn't she? Surely the fellow did not +tie her up to the bedpost before leaving the house! + +Nothing appeared. Ricardo was as still as the leafy cables of creepers +depending in a convenient curtain from the mighty limb sixty feet above +his head. His very eyelids were still, and this unblinking watchfulness +gave him the dreamy air of a cat posed on a hearth-rug contemplating the +fire. Was he dreaming? There, in plain sight, he had before him a white, +blouse-like jacket, short blue trousers, a pair of bare yellow calves, a +pigtail, long and slender-- + +“The confounded Chink!” he muttered, astounded. + +He was not conscious of having looked away; and yet right there, in the +middle of the picture, without having come round the right-hand corner +or the left-hand corner of the house, without falling from the sky or +surging up from the ground, Wang had become visible, large as life, +and engaged in the young-ladyish occupation of picking flowers. Step +by step, stooping repeatedly over the flower-beds at the foot of the +veranda, the startlingly materialized Chinaman passed off the scene in +a very commonplace manner, by going up the steps and disappearing in the +darkness of the doorway. + +Only then the yellow eyes of Martin Ricardo lost their intent fixity. He +understood that it was time for him to be moving. That bunch of +flowers going into the house in the hand of a Chinaman was for the +breakfast-table. What else could it be for? + +“I'll give you flowers!” he muttered threateningly. “You wait!” + +Another moment, just for a glance towards the Jones bungalow, whence +he expected Heyst to issue on his way to that breakfast so offensively +decorated, and Ricardo began his retreat. His impulse, his desire, was +for a rush into the open, face to face with the appointed victim, for +what he called a “ripping up,” visualized greedily, and always with +the swift preliminary stooping movement on his part--the forerunner of +certain death to his adversary. This was his impulse; and as it was, so +to speak, constitutional, it was extremely difficult to resist when his +blood was up. What could be more trying than to have to skulk and dodge +and restrain oneself, mentally and physically, when one's blood was up? +Mr. Secretary Ricardo began his retreat from his post of observation +behind a tree opposite Heyst's bungalow, using great care to remain +unseen. His proceedings were made easier by the declivity of the ground, +which sloped sharply down to the water's edge. There, his feet feeling +the warmth of the island's rocky foundation already heated by the sun, +through the thin soles of his straw slippers he was, as it were, sunk +out of sight of the houses. A short scramble of some twenty feet brought +him up again to the upper level, at the place where the jetty had its +root in the shore. He leaned his back against one of the lofty uprights +which still held up the company's signboard above the mound of derelict +coal. Nobody could have guessed how much his blood was up. To contain +himself he folded his arms tightly on his breast. + +Ricardo was not used to a prolonged effort of self-control. His craft, +his artfulness, felt themselves always at the mercy of his nature, which +was truly feral and only held in subjection by the influence of the +“governor,” the prestige of a gentleman. It had its cunning too, but it +was being almost too severely tried since the feral solution of a growl +and a spring was forbidden by the problem. Ricardo dared not venture out +on the cleared ground. He dared not. + +“If I meet the beggar,” he thought, “I don't know what I mayn't do. I +daren't trust myself.” + +What exasperated him just now was his inability to understand +Heyst. Ricardo was human enough to suffer from the discovery of his +limitations. No, he couldn't size Heyst up. He could kill him with +extreme ease--a growl and a spring--but that was forbidden! However, he +could not remain indefinitely under the funereal blackboard. + +“I must make a move,” he thought. + +He moved on, his head swimming a little with the repressed desire of +violence, and came out openly in front of the bungalows, as if he had +just been down to the jetty to look at the boat. The sunshine enveloped +him, very brilliant, very still, very hot. The three buildings faced +him. The one with the rug on the balustrade was the most distant; next +to it was the empty bungalow; the nearest, with the flower-beds at the +foot of its veranda, contained that bothersome girl, who had managed +so provokingly to keep herself invisible. That was why Ricardo's eyes +lingered on that building. The girl would surely be easier to “size up” + than Heyst. A sight of her, a mere glimpse, would have been something to +go by, a step nearer to the goal--the first real move, in fact. Ricardo +saw no other move. And any time she might appear on that veranda! + +She did not appear; but, like a concealed magnet, she exercised her +attraction. As he went on, he deviated towards the bungalow. Though his +movements were deliberate, his feral instincts had such sway that if he +had met Heyst walking towards him, he would have had to satisfy his +need of violence. But he saw nobody. Wang was at the back of the house, +keeping the coffee hot against Number One's return for breakfast. Even +the simian Pedro was out of sight, no doubt crouching on the door-step, +his red little eyes fastened with animal-like devotion on Mr. Jones, who +was in discourse with Heyst in the other bungalow--the conversation of +an evil spectre with a disarmed man, watched by an ape. + +His will having very little to do with it, Ricardo, darting swift +glances in all directions, found himself at the steps of the Heyst +bungalow. Once there, falling under an uncontrollable force of +attraction, he mounted them with a savage and stealthy action of his +limbs, and paused for a moment under the eaves to listen to the silence. +Presently he advanced over the threshold one leg--it seemed to stretch +itself, like a limb of india-rubber--planted his foot within, brought up +the other swiftly, and stood inside the room, turning his head from side +to side. To his eyes, brought in there from the dazzling sunshine, all +was gloom for a moment. His pupils, like a cat's, dilating swiftly, he +distinguished an enormous quantity of books. He was amazed; and he was +put off too. He was vexed in his astonishment. He had meant to note the +aspect and nature of things, and hoped to draw some useful inference, +some hint as to the man. But what guess could one make out of a +multitude of books? He didn't know what to think; and he formulated his +bewilderment in the mental exclamation: + +“What the devil has this fellow been trying to set up here--a school?” + +He gave a prolonged stare to the portrait of Heyst's father, that severe +profile ignoring the vanities of this earth. His eyes gleamed sideways +at the heavy silver candlesticks--signs of opulence. He prowled as a +stray cat entering a strange place might have done, for if Ricardo had +not Wang's miraculous gift of materializing and vanishing, rather than +coming and going, he could be nearly as noiseless in his less elusive +movements. He noted the back door standing just ajar; and all the time +his slightly pointed ears, at the utmost stretch of watchfulness, kept +in touch with the profound silence outside enveloping the absolute +stillness of the house. + +He had not been in the room two minutes when it occurred to him that he +must be alone in the bungalow. The woman, most likely, had sneaked out +and was walking about somewhere in the grounds at the back. She had +been probably ordered to keep out of sight. Why? Because the fellow +mistrusted his guests; or was it because he mistrusted her? + +Ricardo reflected that from a certain point of view it amounted nearly +to the same thing. He remembered Schomberg's story. He felt that +running away with somebody only to get clear of that beastly, tame, +hotel-keeper's attention was no proof of hopeless infatuation. She could +be got in touch with. + +His moustaches stirred. For some time he had been looking at a closed +door. He would peep into that other room, and perhaps see something more +informing than a confounded lot of books. As he crossed over, he thought +recklessly: + +“If the beggar comes in suddenly, and starts to prance, I'll rip him up +and be done with it!” + +He laid his hand on the handle, and felt the door come unlatched. Before +he pulled it open, he listened again to the silence. He felt it all +about him, complete, without a flaw. + +The necessity of prudence had exasperated his self-restraint. A mood +of ferocity woke up in him, and, as always at such times, he became +physically aware of the sheeted knife strapped to his leg. He pulled at +the door with fierce curiosity. It came open without a squeak of hinge, +without a rustle, with no sound at all; and he found himself glaring at +the opaque surface of some rough blue stuff, like serge. A curtain was +fitted inside, heavy enough and long enough not to stir. + +A curtain! This unforeseen veil, baffling his curiosity checked his +brusqueness. He did not fling it aside with an impatient movement; he +only looked at it closely, as if its texture had to be examined before +his hand could touch such stuff. In this interval of hesitation, he +seemed to detect a flaw in the perfection of the silence, the faintest +possible rustle, which his ears caught and instantly, in the effort of +conscious listening, lost again. No! Everything was still inside and +outside the house, only he had no longer the sense of being alone there. + +When he put out his hand towards the motionless folds it was with +extreme caution, and merely to push the stuff aside a little, advancing +his head at the same time to peep within. A moment of complete +immobility ensued. Then, without anything else of him stirring, +Ricardo's head shrank back on his shoulders, his arm descended slowly to +his side. There was a woman in there. The very woman! Lighted dimly +by the reflection of the outer glare, she loomed up strangely big and +shadowy at the other end of the long, narrow room. With her back to +the door, she was doing her hair with bare arms uplifted. One of them +gleamed pearly white; the other detached its perfect form in black +against the unshuttered, uncurtained square window-hole. She was there, +her fingers busy with her dark hair, utterly unconscious, exposed and +defenceless--and tempting. + +Ricardo drew back one foot and pressed his elbows close to his sides; +his chest started heaving convulsively as if he were wrestling or +running a race; his body began to sway gently back and forth. The +self-restraint was at an end: his psychology must have its way. The +instinct for the feral spring could no longer be denied. Ravish or +kill--it was all one to him, as long as by the act he liberated the +suffering soul of savagery repressed for so long. After a quick glance +over his shoulder, which hunters of big game tell us no lion or tiger +omits to give before charging home, Ricardo charged, head down, straight +at the curtain. The stuff, tossed up violently by his rush, settled +itself with a slow, floating descent into vertical folds, motionless, +without a shudder even, in the still, warm air. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +The clock--which once upon a time had measured the hours of philosophic +meditation--could not have ticked away more than five seconds when Wang +materialized within the living-room. His concern primarily was with the +delayed breakfast, but at once his slanting eyes became immovably fixed +upon the unstirring curtain. For it was behind it that he had located +the strange, deadened scuffling sounds which filled the empty room. The +slanting eyes of his race could not achieve a round, amazed stare, but +they remained still, dead still, and his impassive yellow face grew all +at once careworn and lean with the sudden strain of intense, doubtful, +frightened watchfulness. Contrary impulses swayed his body, rooted to +the floor-mats. He even went so far as to extend his hand towards the +curtain. He could not reach it, and he didn't make the necessary step +forward. + +The mysterious struggle was going on with confused thuds of bare feet, +in a mute wrestling match, no human sound, hiss, groan, murmur, or +exclamation coming through the curtain. A chair fell over, not with a +crash but lightly, as if just grazed, and a faint metallic ring of the +tin bath succeeded. Finally the tense silence, as of two adversaries +locked in a deadly grip, was ended by the heavy, dull thump of a soft +body flung against the inner partition of planks. It seemed to shake +the whole bungalow. By that time, walking backward, his eyes, his +very throat, strained with fearful excitement, his extended arm still +pointing at the curtain, Wang had disappeared through the back door. +Once out in the compound, he bolted round the end of the house. Emerging +innocently between the two bungalows he lingered and lounged in the +open, where anybody issuing from any of the dwellings was bound to see +him--a self-possessed Chinaman idling there, with nothing but perhaps an +unserved breakfast on his mind. + +It was at this time that Wang made up his mind to give up all connection +with Number One, a man not only disarmed but already half vanquished. +Till that morning he had had doubts as to his course of action, but this +overheard scuffle decided the question. Number One was a doomed man--one +of those beings whom it is unlucky to help. Even as he walked in the +open with a fine air of unconcern, Wang wondered that no sound of any +sort was to be heard inside the house. For all he knew, the white woman +might have been scuffling in there with an evil spirit, which had of +course killed her. For nothing visible came out of the house he watched +out of the slanting corner of his eye. The sunshine and the silence +outside the bungalow reigned undisturbed. + +But in the house the silence of the big room would not have struck an +acute ear as perfect. It was troubled by a stir so faint that it could +hardly be called a ghost of whispering from behind the curtain. + +Ricardo, feeling his throat with tender care, breathed out admiringly: + +“You have fingers like steel. Jimminy! You have muscles like a giant!” + +Luckily for Lena, Ricardo's onset had been so sudden--she was winding +her two heavy tresses round her head--that she had no time to lower her +arms. This, which saved them from being pinned to her sides, gave her a +better chance to resist. His spring had nearly thrown her down. Luckily, +again, she was standing so near the wall that, though she was driven +against it headlong, yet the shock was not heavy enough to knock all the +breath out of her body. On the contrary, it helped her first instinctive +attempt to drive her assailant backward. + +After the first gasp of a surprise that was really too over-powering for +a cry, she was never in doubt of the nature of her danger. She defended +herself in the full, clear knowledge of it, from the force of instinct +which is the true source of every great display of energy, and with a +determination which could hardly have been expected from a girl who, +cornered in a dim corridor by the red-faced, stammering Schomberg, had +trembled with shame, disgust, and fear; had drooped, terrified, before +mere words spluttered out odiously by a man who had never in his life +laid his big paw on her. + +This new enemy's attack was simple, straightforward violence. It was not +the slimy, underhand plotting to deliver her up like a slave, which +had sickened her heart and had made her feel in her loneliness that her +oppressors were too many for her. She was no longer alone in the world +now. She resisted without a moment of faltering, because she was no +longer deprived of moral support; because she was a human being who +counted; because she was no longer defending herself for herself alone; +because of the faith that had been born in her--the faith in the man of +her destiny, and perhaps in the Heaven which had sent him so wonderfully +to cross her path. + +She had defended herself principally by maintaining a desperate, +murderous clutch on Ricardo's windpipe, till she felt a sudden +relaxation of the terrific hug in which he stupidly and ineffectually +persisted to hold her. Then with a supreme effort of her arms and of +her suddenly raised knee, she sent him flying against the partition. +The cedar-wood chest stood in the way, and Ricardo, with a thump which +boomed hollow through the whole bungalow, fell on it in a sitting +posture, half strangled, and exhausted not so much by the efforts as by +the emotions of the struggle. + +With the recoil of her exerted strength, she too reeled, staggered back, +and sat on the edge of the bed. Out of breath, but calm and unabashed, +she busied herself in readjusting under her arms the brown and yellow +figured Celebes sarong, the tuck of which had come undone during the +fight. Then, folding her bare arms tightly on her breast, she leaned +forward on her crossed legs, determined and without fear. + +Ricardo, leaning forward too, his nervous force gone, crestfallen like a +beast of prey that has missed its spring, met her big grey eyes looking +at him--wide open, observing, mysterious--from under the dark arches of +her courageous eyebrows. Their faces were not a foot apart. He ceased +feeling about his aching throat and dropped the palms of his hands +heavily on his knees. He was not looking at her bare shoulders, at her +strong arms; he was looking down at the floor. He had lost one of his +straw slippers. A chair with a white dress on it had been overturned. +These, with splashes of water on the floor out of a brusquely misplaced +sponge-bath, were the only traces of the struggle. + +Ricardo swallowed twice consciously, as if to make sure of his throat +before he spoke again: + +“All right. I never meant to hurt you--though I am no joker when it +comes to it.” + +He pulled up the leg of his pyjamas to exhibit the strapped knife. +She glanced at it without moving her head, and murmured with scornful +bitterness: + +“Ah, yes--with that thing stuck in my side. In no other way.” + +He shook his head with a shamefaced smile. + +“Listen! I am quiet now. Straight--I am. I don't need to explain +why--you know how it is. And I can see, now, this wasn't the way with +you.” + +She made no sound. Her still, upward gaze had a patient, mournfulness +which troubled him like a suggestion of an inconceivable depth. He added +thoughtfully: + +“You are not going to make a noise about this silly try of mine?” + +She moved her head the least bit. + +“Jee-miny! You are a wonder--” he murmured earnestly, relieved more than +she could have guessed. + +Of course, if she had attempted to run out, he would have stuck the +knife between her shoulders, to stop her screaming; but all the fat +would have been in the fire, the business utterly spoiled, and the rage +of the governor--especially when he learned the cause--boundless. A +woman that does not make a noise after an attempt of that kind has +tacitly condoned the offence. Ricardo had no small vanities. But +clearly, if she would pass it over like this, then he could not be so +utterly repugnant to her. He felt flattered. And she didn't seem afraid +of him either. He already felt almost tender towards the girl--that +plucky, fine girl who had not tried to run screaming from him. + +“We shall be friends yet. I don't give you up. Don't think it. Friends +as friends can be!” he whispered confidently. “Jee-miny! You aren't a +tame one. Neither am I. You will find that out before long.” + +He could not know that if she had not run out, it was because that +morning, under the stress of growing uneasiness at the presence of the +incomprehensible visitors, Heyst had confessed to her that it was his +revolver he had been looking for in the night; that it was gone, that he +was a disarmed, defenceless man. She had hardly comprehended the meaning +of his confession. Now she understood better what it meant. The effort +of her self-control, her stillness, impressed Ricardo. Suddenly she +spoke: + +“What are you after?” + +He did not raise his eyes. His hands reposing on his knees, his drooping +head, something reflective in his pose, suggested the weariness of a +simple soul, the fatigue of a mental rather than physical contest. He +answered the direct question by a direct statement, as if he were too +tired to dissemble: + +“After the swag.” + +The word was strange to her. The veiled ardour of her grey gaze from +under the dark eyebrows never left Ricardo's. + +“A swag?” she murmured quietly. “What's that?” + +“Why, swag, plunder--what your gentleman has been pinching right and +left for years--the pieces. Don't you know? This!” + +Without looking up, he made the motion of counting money into the +palm of his hand. She lowered her eyes slightly to observe this bit +of pantomime, but returned them to his face at once. Then, in a mere +breath: + +“How do you know anything about him?” she asked, concealing her puzzled +alarm. “What has it got to do with you?” + +“Everything,” was Ricardo's concise answer, in a low, emphatic whisper. +He reflected that this girl was really his best hope. Out of the unfaded +impression of past violence there was growing the sort of sentiment +which prevents a man from being indifferent to a woman he has once held +in his arms--if even against her will--and still more so if she has +pardoned the outrage. It becomes then a sort of bond. He felt positively +the need to confide in her--a subtle trait of masculinity, this almost +physical need of trust which can exist side by side with the most brutal +readiness of suspicion. + +“It's a game of grab--see?” he went on, with a new inflection of +intimacy in his murmur. He was looking straight at her now. + +“That fat, tame slug of a gin-slinger, Schomberg, put us up to it.” + +So strong is the impression of helpless and persecuted misery, that the +girl who had fought down a savage assault without faltering could not +completely repress a shudder at the mere sound of the abhorred name. + +Ricardo became more rapid and confidential: + +“He wants to pay him off--pay both of you, at that; so he told me. He +was hot after you. He would have given all he had into those hands of +yours that have nearly strangled me. But you couldn't, eh? Nohow--what?” + He paused. “So, rather than--you followed a gentleman?” + +He noticed a slight movement of her head and spoke quickly. + +“Same here--rather than be a wage-slave. Only these foreigners aren't to +be trusted. You're too good for him. A man that will rob his best +chum?” She raised her head. He went on, well pleased with his progress, +whispering hurriedly: “Yes. I know all about him. So you may guess how +he's likely to treat a woman after a bit!” + +He did not know that he was striking terror into her breast now. Still +the grey eyes remained fixed on him unmovably watchful, as if sleepy +under the white forehead. She was beginning to understand. His words +conveyed a definite, dreadful meaning to her mind, which he proceeded to +enlighten further in a convinced murmur. + +“You and I are made to understand each other. Born alike, bred alike, I +guess. You are not tame. Same here! You have been chucked out into this +rotten world of 'yporcrits. Same here!” + +Her stillness, her appalled stillness, wore to him an air of fascinated +attention. He asked abruptly: + +“Where is it?” + +She made an effort to breathe out: + +“Where's what?” + +His tone expressed excited secrecy. + +“The swag--plunder--pieces. It's a game of grab. We must have it; but it +isn't easy, and so you will have to lend a hand. Come! is it kept in the +house?” + +As often with women, her wits were sharpened by the very terror of the +glimpsed menace. She shook her head negatively. + +“No.” + +“Sure?” + +“Sure,” she said. + +“Ay! Thought so. Does your gentleman trust you?” + +Again she shook her head. + +“Blamed 'yporcrit,” he said feelingly, and then reflected: “He's one of +the tame ones, ain't he?” + +“You had better find out for yourself,” she said. + +“You trust me. I don't want to die before you and I have made friends.” + This was said with a strange air of feline gallantry. Then, tentatively: +“But he could be brought to trust you, couldn't he?” + +“Trust me?” she said, in a tone which bordered on despair, but which he +mistook for derision. + +“Stand in with us,” he urged. “Give the chuck to all this blamed +'yporcrisy. Perhaps, without being trusted, you have managed to find out +something already, eh?” + +“Perhaps I have,” she uttered with lips that seemed to her to be +freezing fast. + +Ricardo now looked at her calm face with something like respect. He was +even a little awed by her stillness, by her economy of words. Womanlike, +she felt the effect she had produced, the effect of knowing much and of +keeping all her knowledge in reserve. So far, somehow, this had come, +about of itself. Thus encouraged, directed in the way of duplicity, the +refuge of the weak, she made a heroically conscious effort and forced +her stiff, cold lips into a smile. + +Duplicity--the refuge of the weak and the cowardly, but of the disarmed, +too! Nothing stood between the enchanted dream of her existence and +a cruel catastrophe but her duplicity. It seemed to her that the man +sitting there before her was an unavoidable presence, which had attended +all her life. He was the embodied evil of the world. She was not ashamed +of her duplicity. With a woman's frank courage, as soon as she saw +that opening she threw herself into it without reserve, with only one +doubt--that of her own strength. She was appalled by the situation; but +already all her aroused femininity, understanding that whether Heyst +loved her or not she loved him, and feeling that she had brought this on +his head, faced the danger with a passionate desire to defend her own. + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +To Ricardo the girl had been so unforeseen that he was unable to bring +upon her the light of his critical faculties. Her smile appeared to him +full of promise. He had not expected her to be what she was. Who, from +the talk he had heard, could expect to meet a girl like this? She was +a blooming miracle, he said to himself, familiarly, yet with a tinge +of respect. She was no meat for the likes of that tame, respectable +gin-slinger. Ricardo grew hot with indignation. Her courage, her +physical strength, demonstrated at the cost of his discomfiture, +commanded his sympathy. He felt himself drawn to her by the proofs +of her amazing spirit. Such a girl! She had a strong soul; and her +reflective disposition to throw over her connection proved that she was +no hypocrite. + +“Is your gentleman a good shot?” he said, looking down on the floor +again, as if indifferent. + +She hardly understood the phrase; but in its form it suggested some +accomplishment. It was safe to whisper an affirmative. + +“Yes.” + +“Mine, too--and better than good,” Ricardo murmured, and then, in a +confidential burst: “I am not so good at it, but I carry a pretty deadly +thing about me, all the same!” + +He tapped his leg. She was past the stage of shudders now. Stiff all +over, unable even to move her eyes, she felt an awful mental tension +which was like blank forgetfulness. Ricardo tried to influence her in +his own way. + +“And my gentleman is not the sort that would drop me. He ain't no +foreigner; whereas you, with your baron, you don't know what's before +you--or, rather, being a woman, you know only too well. Much better +not to wait for the chuck. Pile in with us and get your share--of the +plunder, I mean. You have some notion about it already.” + +She felt that if she as much as hinted by word or sign that there was no +such thing on the island, Heyst's life wouldn't be worth half an hour's +purchase; but all power of combining words had vanished in the tension +of her mind. Words themselves were too difficult to think of--all except +the word “yes,” the saving word! She whispered it with not a feature of +her face moving. To Ricardo the faint and concise sound proved a cool, +reserved assent, more worth having from that amazing mistress of herself +than a thousand words from any other woman. He thought with exultation +that he had come upon one in a million--in ten millions! His whisper +became frankly entreating. + +“That's good! Now all you've got to do is to make sure where he keeps +his swag. Only do be quick about it! I can't stand much longer this +crawling-on-the-stomach business so as not to scare your gentleman. What +do you think a fellow is--a reptile?” + +She stared without seeing anyone, as a person in the night sits staring +and listening to deadly sounds, to evil incantations. And always in her +head there was that tension of the mind trying to get hold of something, +of a saving idea which seemed to be so near and could not be captured. +Suddenly she seized it. Yes--she had to get that man out of the +house. At that very moment, raised outside, not very near, but heard +distinctly, Heyst's voice uttered the words: + +“Have you been looking out for me, Wang?” + +It was for her like a flash of lightning framed in the darkness which +had beset her on all sides, showing a deadly precipice right under her +feet. With a convulsive movement she sat up straight, but had no power +to rise. Ricardo, on the contrary, was on his feet on the instant, as +noiseless as a cat. His yellow eyes gleamed, gliding here and there; +but he too seemed unable to make another movement. Only his moustaches +stirred visibly, like the feelers of some animal. + +Wang's answer, “Ya tuan,” was heard by the two in the room, but more +faintly. Then Heyst again: + +“All right! You may bring the coffee in. Mem Putih out in the room yet?” + +To this question Wang made no answer. + +Ricardo's and the girl's eyes met, utterly without expression, all their +faculties being absorbed in listening for the first sound of Heyst's +footsteps, for any sound outside which would mean that Ricardo's retreat +was cut off. Both understood perfectly well that Wang must have gone +round the house, and that he was now at the back, making it impossible +for Ricardo to slip out unseen that way before Heyst came in at the +front. + +A darkling shade settled on the face of the devoted secretary. Here was +the business utterly spoiled! It was the gloom of anger, and even of +apprehension. He would perhaps have made a dash for it through the back +door, if Heyst had not been heard ascending the front steps. He climbed +them slowly, very slowly, like a man who is discouraged or weary--or +simply thoughtful; and Ricardo had a mental vision of his face, with its +martial moustache, the lofty forehead, the impassive features, and the +quiet, meditative eyes. Trapped! Confound it! After all, perhaps the +governor was right. Women had to be shunned. Fooling with this one had +apparently ruined the whole business. For, trapped as he was he might +just as well kill, since, anyhow, to be seen was to be unmasked. But he +was too fair-minded to be angry with the girl. + +Heyst had paused on the veranda, or in the very doorway. + +“I shall be shot down like a dog if I ain't quick,” Ricardo muttered +excitedly to the girl. + +He stooped to get hold of his knife; and the next moment would have +hurled himself out through the curtain, nearly, as prompt and fully as +deadly to Heyst as an unexpected thunderbolt. The feel more than the +strength of the girl's hand, clutching at his shoulder, checked him. He +swung round, crouching with a yellow upward glare. Ah! Was she turning +against him? + +He would have stuck his knife into the hollow of her bare throat if +he had not seen her other hand pointing to the window. It was a long +opening, high up, close under the ceiling almost, with a single pivoting +shutter. + +While he was still looking at it she moved noiselessly away, picking +up the overturned chair, and placed it under the wall. Then she looked +round; but he didn't need to be beckoned to. In two long, tiptoeing +strides he was at her side. + +“Be quick!” she gasped. + +He seized her hand and wrung it with all the force of his dumb +gratitude, as a man does to a chum when there is no time for words. Then +he mounted the chair. Ricardo was short--too short to get over without a +noisy scramble. He hesitated an instant; she, watchful, bore rigidly on +the seat with her beautiful bare arms, while, light and sure, he used +the back of the chair as a ladder. The masses of her brown hair fell all +about her face. + +Footsteps resounded in the next room, and Heyst's voice, not very loud, +called her by name. + +“Lena!” + +“Yes! In a minute,” she answered with a particular intonation which she +knew would prevent Heyst from coming in at once. + +When she looked up, Ricardo had vanished, letting himself down outside +so lightly that she had not heard the slightest noise. She stood up +then, bewildered, frightened, as if awakened from a drugged sleep, with +heavy, downcast, unseeing eyes, her fortitude tired out, her imagination +as if dead within her and unable to keep her fear alive. + +Heyst moved about aimlessly in the other room. This sound roused her +exhausted wits. At once she began to think, hear, see; and what she +saw--or rather recognized, for her eyes had been resting on it all the +time--was Ricardo's straw slipper, lost in the scuffle, lying near the +bath. She had just time to step forward and plant her foot on it when +the curtains shook, and, pushed aside, disclosed Heyst in the doorway. + +Out of the appeased enchantment of the senses she had found with him, +like a sort of bewitched state, his danger brought a sensation of warmth +to her breast. She felt something stir in there, something profound, +like a new sort of life. + +The room was in partial darkness, Ricardo having accidentally swung +the pivoted shutter as he went out of the window. Heyst peered from the +doorway. + +“Why, you haven't done your hair yet,” he said. + +“I won't stop to do it now. I shan't be long,” she replied steadily, and +remained still, feeling Ricardo's slipper under the sole of her foot. + +Heyst, with a movement of retreat, let the curtain drop slowly. On the +instant she stooped for the slipper, and, with it in her hand, spun +round wildly, looking for some hiding-place; but there was no such spot +in the bare room. The chest, the leather bunk, a dress or two of hers +hanging on pegs--there was no place where the merest hazard might not +guide Heyst's hand at any moment. Her wildly roaming eyes were caught +by the half-closed window. She ran to it, and by raising herself on her +toes was able to reach the shutter with her fingertips. She pushed it +square, stole back to the middle of the room, and, turning about, swung +her arm, regulating the force of the throw so as not to let the slipper +fly too far out and hit the edge of the overhanging eaves. It was a +task of the nicest judgement for the muscles of those round arms, still +quivering from the deadly wrestle with a man, for that brain, tense with +the excitement of the situation and for the unstrung nerves flickering +darkness before her eyes. At last the slipper left her hand. As soon as +it passed the opening, it was out of her sight. She listened. She did +not hear it strike anything; it just vanished, as if it had wings to fly +on through the air. Not a sound! It had gone clear. + +Her valiant arms hanging close against her side, she stood as if turned +into stone. A faint whistle reached her ears. The forgetful Ricardo, +becoming very much aware of his loss, had been hanging about in great +anxiety, which was relieved by the appearance of the slipper flying from +under the eaves; and now, thoughtfully, he had ventured a whistle to put +her mind at ease. + +Suddenly the girl reeled forward. She saved herself from a fall only by +embracing with both arms one of the tall, roughly carved posts holding +the mosquito net above the bed. For a long time she clung to it, with +her forehead leaning against the wood. One side of her loosened sarong +had slipped down as low as her hip. The long brown tresses of her hair +fell in lank wisps, as if wet, almost black against her white body. Her +uncovered flank, damp with the sweat of anguish and fatigue, gleamed +coldly with the immobility of polished marble in the hot, diffused +light falling through the window above her head--a dim reflection of the +consuming, passionate blaze of sunshine outside, all aquiver with the +effort to set the earth on fire, to burn it to ashes. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +Heyst, seated at the table with his chin on his breast, raised his head +at the faint rustle of Lena's dress. He was startled by the dead pallor +of her cheeks, by something lifeless in her eyes, which looked at +him strangely, without recognition. But to his anxious inquiries she +answered reassuringly that there was nothing the matter with her, +really. She had felt giddy on rising. She had even had a moment of +faintness, after her bath. She had to sit down to wait for it to pass. +This had made her late dressing. + +“I didn't try to do my hair. I didn't want to keep you waiting any +longer,” she said. + +He was unwilling to press her with questions about her health, since she +seemed to make light of this indisposition. She had not done her hair, +but she had brushed it, and had tied it with a ribbon behind. With her +forehead uncovered, she looked very young, almost a child, a careworn +child; a child with something on its mind. + +What surprised Heyst was the non-appearance of Wang. The Chinaman had +always materialized at the precise moment of his service, neither too +soon nor too late. This time the usual miracle failed. What was the +meaning of this? + +Heyst raised his voice--a thing he disliked doing. It was promptly +answered from the compound: + +“Ada tuan!” + +Lena, leaning on her elbow, with her eyes on her plate, did not seem to +hear anything. When Wang entered with a tray, his narrow eyes, tilted +inward by the prominence of salient cheek-bones, kept her under stealthy +observation all the time. Neither the one nor the other of that white +couple paid the slightest attention to him and he withdrew without +having heard them exchange a single word. He squatted on his heels on +the back veranda. His Chinaman's mind, very clear but not far-reaching, +was made up according to the plain reason of things, such as it appeared +to him in the light of his simple feeling for self-preservation, +untrammelled by any notions of romantic honour or tender conscience. His +yellow hands, lightly clasped, hung idly between his knees. The graves +of Wang's ancestors were far away, his parents were dead, his elder +brother was a soldier in the yamen of some Mandarin away in Formosa. No +one near by had a claim on his veneration or his obedience. He had been +for years a labouring restless vagabond. His only tie in the world +was the Alfuro woman, in exchange for whom he had given away some +considerable part of his hard-earned substance; and his duty, in reason, +could be to no one but himself. + +The scuffle behind the curtain was a thing of bad augury for that Number +One for whom the Chinaman had neither love nor dislike. He had been awed +enough by that development to hang back with the coffee-pot till at last +the white man was induced to call him in. Wang went in with curiosity. +Certainly, the white woman looked as if she had been wrestling with +a spirit which had managed to tear half her blood out of her before +letting her go. As to the man, Wang had long looked upon him as being in +some sort bewitched; and now he was doomed. He heard their voices in +the room. Heyst was urging the girl to go and lie down again. He was +extremely concerned. She had eaten nothing. + +“The best thing for you. You really must!” + +She sat listless, shaking her head from time to time negatively, as if +nothing could be any good. But he insisted; she saw the beginning of +wonder in his eyes, and suddenly gave way. + +“Perhaps I had better.” + +She did not want to arouse his wonder, which would lead him straight to +suspicion. He must not suspect! + +Already, with the consciousness of her love for this man, of that +something rapturous and profound going beyond the mere embrace, there +was born in her a woman's innate mistrust of masculinity, of that +seductive strength allied to an absurd, delicate shrinking from the +recognition of the naked necessity of facts, which never yet frightened +a woman worthy of the name. She had no plan; but her mind, quieted down +somewhat by the very effort to preserve outward composure for his sake, +perceived that her behaviour had secured, at any rate, a short period of +safety. Perhaps because of the similarity of their miserable origin in +the dregs of mankind, she had understood Ricardo perfectly. He would +keep quiet for a time now. In this momentarily soothing certitude her +bodily fatigue asserted itself, the more overpoweringly since its cause +was not so much the demand on her strength as the awful suddenness of +the stress she had had to meet. She would have tried to overcome it +from the mere instinct of resistance, if it had not been for Heyst's +alternate pleadings and commands. Before this eminently masculine +fussing she felt the woman's need to give way, the sweetness of +surrender. + +“I will do anything you like,” she said. + +Getting up, she was surprised by a wave of languid weakness that came +over her, embracing and enveloping her like warm water, with a noise in +her ears as of a breaking sea. + +“You must help me along,” she added quickly. + +While he put his arm round her waist--not by any means an uncommon thing +for him to do--she found a special satisfaction in the feeling of being +thus sustained. She abandoned all her weight to that encircling and +protecting pressure, while a thrill went through her at the sudden +thought that it was she who would have to protect him, to be the +defender of a man who was strong enough to lift her bodily, as he was +doing even then in his two arms. For Heyst had done this as soon as they +had crept through the doorway of the room. He thought it was quicker +and simpler to carry her the last step or two. He had grown really too +anxious to be aware of the effort. He lifted her high and deposited her +on the bed, as one lays a child on its side in a cot. Then he sat down +on the edge, masking his concern with a smile which obtained no response +from the dreamy immobility of her eyes. But she sought his hand, seized +it eagerly; and while she was pressing it with all the force of +which she was capable, the sleep she needed overtook her suddenly, +overwhelmingly, as it overtakes a child in a cot, with her lips parted +for a safe, endearing word which she had thought of but had no time to +utter. + +The usual flaming silence brooded over Samburan. + +“What in the world is this new mystery?” murmured Heyst to himself, +contemplating her deep slumber. + +It was so deep, this enchanted sleep, that when some time afterwards he +gently tried to open her fingers and free his hand, he succeeded without +provoking the slightest stir. + +“There is some very simple explanation, no doubt,” he thought, as he +stole out into the living-room. + +Absent-mindedly he pulled a book out of the top shelf, and sat down with +it; but even after he had opened it on his knee, and had been staring +at the pages for a time, he had not the slightest idea of what it was +about. He stared and stared at the crowded, parallel lines. It was only +when, raising his eyes for no particular reason, he saw Wang standing +motionless on the other side of the table, that he regained complete +control of his faculties. + +“Oh, yes,” he said, as if suddenly reminded of a forgotten appointment +of a not particularly welcome sort. + +He waited a little, and then, with reluctant curiosity, forced himself +to ask the silent Wang what he had to say. He had some idea that the +matter of the vanished revolver would come up at last; but the guttural +sounds which proceeded from the Chinaman did not refer to that delicate +subject. His speech was concerned with cups, saucers, plates, forks, and +knives. All these things had been put away in the cupboards on the +back veranda, where they belonged, perfectly clean, “all plopel.” Heyst +wondered at the scrupulosity of a man who was about to abandon him; +for he was not surprised to hear Wang conclude the account of his +stewardship with the words: + +“I go now.” + +“Oh! You go now?” said Heyst, leaning back, his book on his knees. + +“Yes. Me no likee. One man, two man, three man--no can do! Me go now.” + +“What's frightening you away like this?” asked Heyst, while through his +mind flashed the hope that something enlightening might come from that +being so unlike himself, taking contact with the world with a simplicity +and directness of which his own mind was not capable. “Why?” he went on. +“You are used to white men. You know them well.” + +“Yes. Me savee them,” assented Wang inscrutably. “Me savee plenty.” + +All that he really knew was his own mind. He had made it up to withdraw +himself and the Alfuro woman from the uncertainties of the relations +which were going to establish themselves between those white men. It +was Pedro who had been the first cause of Wang's suspicion and fear. The +Chinaman had seen wild men. He had penetrated, in the train of a Chinese +pedlar, up one or two of the Bornean rivers into the country of the +Dyaks. He had also been in the interior of Mindanao, where there are +people who live in trees--savages, no better than animals; but a +hairy brute like Pedro, with his great fangs and ferocious growls, was +altogether beyond his conception of anything that could be looked upon +as human. The strong impression made on him by Pedro was the prime +inducement which had led Wang to purloin the revolver. Reflection on +the general situation, and on the insecurity of Number One, came later, +after he had obtained possession of the revolver and of the box of +cartridges out of the table drawer in the living-room. + +“Oh, you savee plenty about white men,” Heyst went on in a slightly +bantering tone, after a moment of silent reflection in which he had +confessed to himself that the recovery of the revolver was not to be +thought of, either by persuasion or by some more forcible means. “You +speak in that fashion, but you are frightened of those white men over +there.” + +“Me no flightened,” protested Wang raucously, throwing up his +head--which gave to his throat a more strained, anxious appearance than +ever. “Me no likee,” he added in a quieter tone. “Me velly sick.” + +He put his hand over the region under the breast-bone. + +“That,” said Heyst, serenely positive, “belong one piecee lie. That +isn't proper man-talk at all. And after stealing my revolver, too!” + +He had suddenly decided to speak about it, because this frankness could +not make the situation much worse than it was. He did not suppose for a +moment that Wang had the revolver anywhere about his person; and after +having thought the matter over, he had arrived at the conclusion that +the Chinaman never meant to use the weapon against him. After a slight +start, because the direct charge had taken him unawares, Wang tore open +the front of his jacket with a convulsive show of indignation. + +“No hab got. Look see!” he mouthed in pretended anger. + +He slapped his bare chest violently; he uncovered his very ribs, all +astir with the panting of outraged virtue; his smooth stomach heaved +with indignation. He started his wide blue breeches flapping about his +yellow calves. Heyst watched him quietly. + +“I never said you had it on you,” he observed, without raising his +voice; “but the revolver is gone from where I kept it.” + +“Me no savee levolvel,” Wang said obstinately. + +The book lying open on Heyst's knee slipped suddenly and he made a +sharp movement to catch it up. Wang was unable to see the reason of +this because of the table, and leaped away from what seemed to him a +threatening symptom. When Heyst looked up, the Chinaman was already at +the door facing the room, not frightened, but alert. + +“What's the matter?” asked Heyst. + +Wang nodded his shaven head significantly at the curtain closing the +doorway of the bedroom. + +“Me no likee,” he repeated. + +“What the devil do you mean?” Heyst was genuinely amazed. “Don't like +what?” + +Wang pointed a long lemon-coloured finger at the motionless folds. + +“Two,” he said. + +“Two what? I don't understand.” + +“Suppose you savee, you no like that fashion. Me savee plenty. Me go +now.” + +Heyst had risen from his chair, but Wang kept his ground in the doorway +for a little longer. His almond-shaped eyes imparted to his face an +expression of soft and sentimental melancholy. The muscles of his throat +moved visibly while he uttered a distinct and guttural “Goodbye” and +vanished from Number One's sight. + +The Chinaman's departure altered the situation. Heyst reflected on what +would be best to do in view of that fact. For a long time he hesitated; +then, shrugging his shoulders wearily, he walked out on the veranda, +down the steps, and continued at a steady gait, with a thoughtful mien, +in the direction of his guests' bungalow. He wanted to make an important +communication to them, and he had no other object--least of all to give +them the shock of a surprise call. Nevertheless, their brutish henchman +not being on watch, it was Heyst's fate to startle Mr. Jones and his +secretary by his sudden appearance in the doorway. Their conversation +must have been very interesting to prevent them from hearing the +visitor's approach. In the dim room--the shutters were kept constantly +closed against the heat--Heyst saw them start apart. It was Mr. Jones +who spoke: + +“Ah, here you are again! Come in, come in!” + +Heyst, taking his hat off in the doorway, entered the room. + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +Waking up suddenly, Lena looked, without raising her head from the +pillow, at the room in which she was alone. She got up quickly, as if +to counteract the awful sinking of her heart by the vigorous use of her +limbs. But this sinking was only momentary. Mistress of herself from +pride, from love, from necessity, and also because of a woman's +vanity in self-sacrifice, she met Heyst, returning from the strangers' +bungalow, with a clear glance and a smile. + +The smile he managed to answer, but, noticing that he avoided her eyes, +she composed her lips and lowered her gaze. For the same reason she +hastened to speak to him in a tone of indifference, which she put on +without effort, as if she had grown adept in duplicity since sunrise. + +“You have been over there again?” + +“I have. I thought--but you had better know first that we have lost Wang +for good.” + +She repeated “For good?” as if she had not understood. + +“For good or evil--I shouldn't know which if you were to ask me. He has +dismissed himself. He's gone.” + +“You expected him to go, though, didn't you?” + +Heyst sat down on the other side of the table. + +“Yes. I expected it as soon as I discovered that he had annexed my +revolver. He says he hasn't taken it. That's untrue of course. A +Chinaman would not see the sense of confessing under any circumstances. +To deny any charge is a principle of right conduct; but he hardly +expected to be believed. He was a little enigmatic at the last, Lena. He +startled me.” + +Heyst paused. The girl seemed absorbed in her own thoughts. + +“He startled me,” repeated Heyst. She noted the anxiety in his tone, and +turned her head slightly to look at him across the table. + +“It must have been something--to startle you,” she said. In the depth +of her parted lips, like a ripe pomegranate, there was a gleam of white +teeth. + +“It was only a single word--and some of his gestures. He had been making +a good deal of noise. I wonder we didn't wake you up. How soundly you +can sleep! I say, do you feel all right now?” + +“As fresh as can be,” she said, treating him to another deep gleam of +a smile. “I heard no noise, and I'm glad of it. The way he talks in his +harsh voice frightens me. I don't like all these foreign people.” + +“It was just before he went away--bolted out, I should say. He nodded +and pointed at the curtain to our room. He knew you were there, of +course. He seemed to think--he seemed to try to give me to understand +that you were in special--well, danger. You know how he talks.” + +She said nothing; she made no sound, only the faint tinge of colour +ebbed out of her cheek. + +“Yes,” Heyst went on. “He seemed to try to warn me. That must have been +it Did he imagine I had forgotten your existence? The only word he said +was 'two'. It sounded so, at least. Yes, 'two'--and that he didn't like +it.” + +“What does that mean?” she whispered. + +“We know what the word two means, don't we, Lena? We are two. Never +were such a lonely two out of the world, my dear! He might have tried +to remind me that he himself has a woman to look after. Why are you so +pale, Lena?” + +“Am I pale?” she asked negligently. + +“You are.” Heyst was really anxious. + +“Well, it isn't from fright,” she protested truthfully. + +Indeed, what she felt was a sort of horror which left her absolutely +in the full possession of all her faculties; more difficult to bear, +perhaps, for that reason, but not paralysing to her fortitude. + +Heyst in his turn smiled at her. + +“I really don't know that there is any reason to be frightened.” + +“I mean I am not frightened for myself.” + +“I believe you are very plucky,” he said. The colour had returned to her +face. “I” continued Heyst, “am so rebellious to outward impressions +that I can't say that much about myself. I don't react with sufficient +distinctness.” He changed his tone. “You know I went to see those men +first thing this morning.” + +“I know. Be careful!” she murmured. + +“I wonder how one can be careful! I had a long talk with--but I don't +believe you have seen them. One of them is a fantastically thin, long +person, apparently ailing; I shouldn't wonder if he were really so. He +makes rather a point of it in a mysterious manner. I imagine he must +have suffered from tropical fevers, but not so much as he tries to make +out. He's what people would call a gentleman. He seemed on the point of +volunteering a tale of his adventures--for which I didn't ask him--but +remarked that it was a long story; some other time, perhaps. + +“'I suppose you would like to know who I am?' he asked me. + +“I told him I would leave it to him, in a tone which, between gentlemen, +could have left no doubt in his mind. He raised himself on his elbow--he +was lying down on the camp-bed--and said: + +“'I am he who is--'” + +Lena seemed not to be listening; but when Heyst paused, she turned her +head quickly to him. He took it for a movement of inquiry, but in this +he was wrong. A great vagueness enveloped her impressions, but all her +energy was concentrated on the struggle that she wanted to take upon +herself, in a great exaltation of love and self-sacrifice, which is +woman's sublime faculty; altogether on herself, every bit of it, leaving +him nothing, not even the knowledge of what she did, if that were +possible. She would have liked to lock him up by some stratagem. Had +she known of some means to put him to sleep for days she would have used +incantations or philtres without misgivings. He seemed to her too good +for such contacts, and not sufficiently equipped. This last feeling had +nothing to do with the material fact of the revolver being stolen. She +could hardly appreciate that fact at its full value. + +Observing her eyes fixed and as if sightless--for the concentration on +her purpose took all expression out of them--Heyst imagined it to be the +effect of a great mental effort. + +“No use asking me what he meant, Lena; I don't know, and I did not +ask him. The gentleman, as I have told you before, seems devoted to +mystification. I said nothing, and he laid down his head again on +the bundle of rugs he uses for a pillow. He affects a state of great +weakness, but I suspect that he's perfectly capable of leaping to his +feet if he likes. Having been ejected, he said, from his proper social +sphere because he had refused to conform to certain usual conventions, +he was a rebel now, and was coming and going up and down the earth. As +I really did not want to listen to all this nonsense, I told him that +I had heard that sort of story about somebody else before. His grin is +really ghastly. He confessed that I was very far from the sort of man he +expected to meet. Then he said: + +“'As to me, I am no blacker than the gentleman you are thinking of, and +I have neither more nor less determination.'” + +Heyst looked across the table at Lena. Propped on her elbows, and +holding her head in both hands, she moved it a little with an air of +understanding. + +“Nothing could be plainer, eh?” said Heyst grimly. “Unless, indeed, this +is his idea of a pleasant joke; for, when he finished speaking, he burst +into a loud long laugh. I didn't join him!” + +“I wish you had,” she breathed out. + +“I didn't join him. It did not occur to me. I am not much of a +diplomatist. It would probably have been wise, for, indeed, I believe +he had said more than he meant to say, and was trying to take it back by +this affected jocularity. Yet when one thinks of it, diplomacy without +force in the background is but a rotten reed to lean upon. And I don't +know whether I could have done it if I had thought of it. I don't know. +It would have been against the grain. Could I have done it? I have lived +too long within myself, watching the mere shadows and shades of life. +To deceive a man on some issue which could be decided quicker, by his +destruction while one is disarmed, helpless, without even the power to +run away--no! That seems to me too degrading. And yet I have you here. +I have your very existence in my keeping. What do you say, Lena? Would I +be capable of throwing you to the lions to save my dignity?” + +She got up, walked quickly round the table, posed herself on his knees +lightly, throwing one arm round his neck, and whispered in his ear: + +“You may if you like. And may be that's the only way I would consent to +leave you. For something like that. If it were something no bigger than +your little finger.” + +She gave him a light kiss on the lips and was gone before he could +detain her. She regained her seat and propped her elbows again on the +table. It was hard to believe that she had moved from the spot at all. +The fleeting weight of her body on his knees, the hug round his neck, +the whisper in his ear, the kiss on his lips, might have been the +unsubstantial sensations of a dream invading the reality of waking life; +a sort of charming mirage in the barren aridity of his thoughts. He +hesitated to speak till she said, businesslike: + +“Well. And what then?” + +Heyst gave a start. + +“Oh, yes. I didn't join him. I let him have his laugh out by himself. He +was shaking all over, like a merry skeleton, under a cotton sheet he was +covered with--I believe in order to conceal the revolver that he had in +his right hand. I didn't see it, but I have a distinct impression it was +there in his fist. As he had not been looking at me for some time, but +staring into a certain part of the room, I turned my head and saw a +hairy, wild sort of creature which they take about with them, squatting +on its heels in the angle of the walls behind me. He wasn't there when +I came in. I didn't like the notion of that watchful monster behind my +back. If I had been less at their mercy, I should certainly have changed +my position. As things are now, to move would have been a mere weakness. +So I remained where I was. The gentleman on the bed said he could assure +me of one thing; and that was that his presence here was no more morally +reprehensible than mine. + +“'We pursue the same ends,' he said, 'only perhaps I pursue them with +more openness than you--with more simplicity.' + +“That's what he said,” Heyst went on, after looking at Lena in a sort of +inquiring silence. “I asked him if he knew beforehand that I was living +here; but he only gave me a ghastly grin. I didn't press him for an +answer, Lena. I thought I had better not.” + +On her smooth forehead a ray of light always seemed to rest. Her loose +hair, parted in the middle, covered the hands sustaining her head. She +seemed spellbound by the interest of the narrative. Heyst did not pause +long. He managed to continue his relation smoothly enough, beginning +afresh with a piece of comment. + +“He would have lied impudently--and I detest being told a lie. It makes +me uncomfortable. It's pretty clear that I am not fitted for the affairs +of the wide world. But I did not want him to think that I accepted his +presence too meekly, so I said that his comings or goings on the +earth were none of my business, of course, except that I had a natural +curiosity to know when he would find it convenient to resume them. + +“He asked me to look at the state he was in. Had I been all alone here, +as they think I am, I should have laughed at him. But not being alone--I +say, Lena, you are sure you haven't shown yourself where you could be +seen?” + +“Certain,” she said promptly. + +He looked relieved. + +“You understand, Lena, that when I ask you to keep so strictly out of +sight, it is because you are not for them to look at--to talk about. My +poor Lena! I can't help that feeling. Do you understand it?” + +She moved her head slightly in a manner that was neither affirmative nor +negative. + +“People will have to see me some day,” she said. + +“I wonder how long it will be possible for you to keep out of sight?” + murmured Heyst thoughtfully. He bent over the table. “Let me finish +telling you. I asked him point blank what it was he wanted with me; he +appeared extremely unwilling to come to the point. It was not really +so pressing as all that, he said. His secretary, who was in fact his +partner, was not present, having gone down to the wharf to look at +their boat. Finally the fellow proposed that he should put off a certain +communication he had to make till the day after tomorrow. I agreed; +but I also told him that I was not at all anxious to hear it. I had no +conception in what way his affairs could concern me. + +“'Ah, Mr. Heyst,' he said, 'you and I have much more in common than you +think.'” + +Heyst struck the table with his fist unexpectedly. + +“It was a jeer; I am sure it was!” + +He seemed ashamed of this outburst and smiled faintly into the +motionless eyes of the girl. + +“What could I have done--even if I had had my pockets full of +revolvers?” + +She made an appreciative sign. + +“Killing's a sin, sure enough,” she murmured. + +“I went away,” Heyst continued. “I left him there, lying on his side +with his eyes shut. When I got back here, I found you looking ill. What +was it, Lena? You did give me a scare! Then I had the interview with +Wang while you rested. You were sleeping quietly. I sat here to consider +all these things calmly, to try to penetrate their inner meaning and +their outward bearing. It struck me that the two days we have before +us have the character of a sort of truce. The more I thought of it, the +more I felt that this was tacitly understood between Jones and myself. +It was to our advantage, if anything can be of advantage to people +caught so completely unawares as we are. Wang was gone. He, at any rate, +had declared himself, but as I did not know what he might take it into +his head to do, I thought I had better warn these people that I was no +longer responsible for the Chinaman. I did not want Mr. Wang making some +move which would precipitate the action against us. Do you see my point +of view?” + +She made a sign that she did. All her soul was wrapped in her passionate +determination, in an exalted belief in herself--in the contemplation +of her amazing opportunity to win the certitude, the eternity, of that +man's love. + +“I never saw two men,” Heyst was saying, “more affected by a piece of +information than Jones and his secretary, who was back in the bungalow +by then. They had not heard me come up. I told them I was sorry to +intrude. + +“'Not at all! Not at all,' said Jones. + +“The secretary backed away into a corner and watched me like a wary cat. +In fact, they both were visibly on their guard. + +“'I am come,' I told them, 'to let you know that my servant has +deserted--gone off.' + +“At first they looked at each other as if they had not understood what I +was saying; but very soon they seemed quite concerned. + +“'You mean to say your Chink's cleared out?' said Ricardo, coming +forward from his corner. 'Like this--all at once? What did he do it +for?' + +“I said that a Chinaman had always a simple and precise reason for what +he did, but that to get such a reason out of him was not so easy. All he +told me, I said, was that he 'didn't like'. + +“They were extremely disturbed at this. Didn't like what, they wanted to +know. + +“'The looks of you and your party,' I told Jones. + +“'Nonsense!' he cried out, and immediately Ricardo, the short man, +struck in. + +“'Told you that? What did he take you for, sir--an infant? Or do you +take us for kids?--meaning no offence. Come, I bet you will tell us next +that you've missed something.'” + +“'I didn't mean to tell you anything of the sort,' I said, 'but as a +matter of fact it is so.' + +“He slapped his thigh. + +“'Thought so. What do you think of this trick, governor?' + +“Jones made some sort of sign to him, and then that extraordinary +cat-faced associate proposed that he and their servant should come out +and help me catch or kill the Chink. + +“My object, I said, was not to get assistance. I did not intend to chase +the Chinaman. I had come only to warn them that he was armed, and that +he really objected to their presence on the island. I wanted them to +understand that I was not responsible for anything that might happen. + +“'Do you mean to tell us,' asked Ricardo, 'that there is a crazy Chink +with a six-shooter broke loose on this island, and that you don't care?' + +“Strangely enough they did not seem to believe my story. They were +exchanging significant looks all the time. Ricardo stole up close to +his principal; they had a confabulation together, and then something +happened which I did not expect. It's rather awkward, too. + +“Since I would not have their assistance to get hold of the Chink +and recover my property, the least they could do was to send me their +servant. It was Jones who said that, and Ricardo backed up the idea. + +“'Yes, yes--let our Pedro cook for all hands in your compound! He isn't +so bad as he looks. That's what we will do!' + +“He bustled out of the room to the veranda, and let out an ear-splitting +whistle for their Pedro. Having heard the brute's answering howl, +Ricardo ran back into the room. + +“'Yes, Mr. Heyst. This will do capitally, Mr. Heyst. You just direct +him to do whatever you are accustomed to have done for you in the way of +attendance. See?' + +“Lena, I confess to you that I was taken completely by surprise. I had +not expected anything of the sort. I don't know what I expected. I am so +anxious about you that I can't keep away from these infernal scoundrels. +And only two months ago I would not have cared. I would have defied +their scoundrelism as much as I have scorned all the other intrusions of +life. But now I have you! You stole into my life, and--” + +Heyst drew a deep breath. The girl gave him a quick, wide-eyed glance. + +“Ah! That's what you are thinking of--that you have me!” + +It was impossible to read the thoughts veiled by her steady grey eyes, +to penetrate the meaning of her silences, her words, and even her +embraces. He used to come out of her very arms with the feeling of a +baffled man. + +“If I haven't you, if you are not here, then where are you?” cried +Heyst. “You understand me very well.” + +She shook her head a little. Her red lips, at which he looked now, her +lips as fascinating as the voice that came out of them, uttered the +words: + +“I hear what you say; but what does it mean?” + +“It means that I could lie and perhaps cringe for your sake.” + +“No! No! Don't you ever do that,” she said in haste, while her eyes +glistened suddenly. “You would hate me for it afterwards!” + +“Hate you?” repeated Heyst, who had recalled his polite manner. “No! +You needn't consider the extremity of the improbable--as yet. But I will +confess to you that I--how shall I call it?--that I dissembled. First I +dissembled my dismay at the unforeseen result of my idiotic diplomacy. +Do you understand, my dear girl?” + +It was evident that she did not understand the word. Heyst produced his +playful smile, which contrasted oddly with the worried character of his +whole expression. His temples seemed to have sunk in, his face looked a +little leaner. + +“A diplomatic statement, Lena, is a statement of which everything is +true, but the sentiment which seems to prompt it. I have never been +diplomatic in my relation with mankind--not from regard for its +feelings, but from a certain regard for my own. Diplomacy doesn't go +well with consistent contempt. I cared little for life and still less +for death.” + +“Don't talk like that!” + +“I dissembled my extreme longing to take these wandering scoundrels +by their throats,” he went on. “I have only two hands--I wish I had a +hundred to defend you--and there were three throats. By that time +their Pedro was in the room too. Had he seen me engaged with their two +throats, he would have been at mine like a fierce dog, or any other +savage and faithful brute. I had no difficulty in dissembling my longing +for the vulgar, stupid, and hopeless argument of fight. I remarked that +I really did not want a servant. I couldn't think of depriving them of +their man's services; but they would not hear me. They had made up their +minds. + +“'We shall send him over at once,' Ricardo said, 'to start cooking +dinner for everybody. I hope you won't mind me coming to eat it with +you in your bungalow; and we will send the governor's dinner over to him +here.' + +“I could do nothing but hold my tongue or bring on a quarrel--some +manifestation of their dark purpose, which we have no means to resist. +Of course, you may remain invisible this evening; but with that +atrocious-brute prowling all the time at the back of the house, how long +can your presence be concealed from these men?” + +Heyst's distress could be felt in his silence. The girl's head, +sustained by her hands buried in the thick masses of her hair, had a +perfect immobility. + +“You are certain you have not been seen so far?” he asked suddenly. + +The motionless head spoke. + +“How can I be certain? You told me you wanted me to keep out of the way. +I kept out of the way. I didn't ask your reason. I thought you didn't +want people to know that you had a girl like me about you.” + +“What? Ashamed?” cried Heyst. + +“It isn't what's right, perhaps--I mean for you--is it?” + +Heyst lifted his hands, reproachfully courteous. + +“I look upon it as so very much right that I couldn't bear the idea of +any other than sympathetic, respectful eyes resting on you. I disliked +and mistrusted these fellows from the first. Didn't you understand?” + +“Yes; I did keep out of sight,” she said. + +A silence fell. At last Heyst stirred slightly. + +“All this is of very little importance now,” he said with a sigh. +“This is a question of something infinitely worse than mere looks and +thoughts, however base and contemptible. As I have told you, I met +Ricardo's suggestions by silence. As I was turning away he said: + +“'If you happen to have the key of that store-room of yours on you, +Mr. Heyst, you may just as well let me have it; I will give it to our +Pedro.' + +“I had it on me, and I tendered it to him without speaking. The hairy +creature was at the door by then, and caught the key, which Ricardo +threw to him, better than any trained ape could have done. I came away. +All the time I had been thinking anxiously of you, whom I had left +asleep, alone here, and apparently ill.” + +Heyst interrupted himself, with a listening turn of his head. He had +heard the faint sound of sticks being snapped in the compound. He rose +and crossed the room to look out of the back door. + +“And here the creature is,” he said, returning to the table. “Here he +is, already attending to the fire. Oh, my dear Lena!” + +She had followed him with her eyes. She watched him go out on the front +veranda cautiously. He lowered stealthily a couple of screens that hung +between the column, and remained outside very still, as if interested +by something on the open ground. Meantime she had risen in her turn, to +take a peep into the compound. Heyst, glancing over his shoulder, saw +her returning to her seat. He beckoned to her, and she continued to +move, crossing the shady room, pure and bright in her white dress, her +hair loose, with something of a sleep-walker in her unhurried motion, in +her extended hand, in the sightless effect of her grey eyes luminous in +the half-light. He had never seen such an expression in her face +before. It had dreaminess in it, intense attention, and something like +sternness. Arrested in the doorway by Heyst's extended arm, she seemed +to wake up, flushed faintly--and this flush, passing off, carried away +with it the strange transfiguring mood. With a courageous gesture +she pushed back the heavy masses of her hair. The light clung to her +forehead. Her delicate nostrils quivered. Heyst seized her arm and +whispered excitedly: + +“Slip out here, quickly! The screens will conceal you. Only you must +mind the stair-space. They are actually out--I mean the other two. You +had better see them before you--” + +She made a barely perceptible movement of recoil, checked at once, and +stood still. Heyst released her arm. + +“Yes, perhaps I had better,” she said with unnatural deliberation, and +stepped out on the veranda to stand close by his side. + +Together, one on each side of the screen, they peeped between the edge +of the canvas and the veranda-post entwined with creepers. A great heat +ascended from the sun-smitten ground, in an ever-rising wave, as if from +some secret store of earth's fiery heart; for the sky was growing cooler +already, and the sun had declined sufficiently for the shadows of Mr. +Jones and his henchman to be projected towards the bungalow side by +side--one infinitely slender, the other short and broad. + +The two visitors stood still and gazed. To keep up the fiction of his +invalidism, Mr. Jones, the gentleman, leaned on the arm of Ricardo, the +secretary, the top of whose hat just came up to his governor's shoulder. + +“Do you see them?” Heyst whispered into the girl's ear. “Here they +are, the envoys of the outer world. Here they are before you--evil +intelligence, instinctive savagery, arm in arm. The brute force is at +the back. A trio of fitting envoys perhaps--but what about the welcome? +Suppose I were armed, could I shoot these two down where they stand? +Could I?” + +Without moving her head, the girl felt for Heyst's hand, pressed it and +thereafter did not let it go. He continued, bitterly playful: + +“I don't know. I don't think so. There is a strain in me which lays me +under an insensate obligation to avoid even the appearance of murder. +I have never pulled a trigger or lifted my hand on a man, even in +self-defence.” + +The suddenly tightened grip of her hand checked him. + +“They are making a move,” she murmured. + +“Can they be thinking of coming here?” Heyst wondered anxiously. + +“No, they aren't coming this way,” she said; and there was another +pause. “They are going back to their house,” she reported finally. + +After watching them a little longer, she let go Heyst's hand and moved +away from the screen. He followed her into the room. + +“You have seen them now,” he began. “Think what it was to me to see them +land in the dusk, fantasms from the sea--apparitions, chimeras! And they +persist. That's the worst of it--they persist. They have no right to +be--but they are. They ought to have aroused my fury. But I have +refined everything away by this time--anger, indignation, scorn itself. +Nothing's left but disgust. Since you have told me of that abominable +calumny, it has become immense--it extends even to myself.” He looked up +at her. + +“But luckily I have you. And if only Wang had not carried off that +miserable revolver--yes, Lena, here we are, we two!” + +She put both her hands on his shoulders and looked straight into his +eyes. He returned her penetrating gaze. It baffled him. He could not +pierce the grey veil of her eyes; but the sadness of her voice thrilled +him profoundly. + +“You are not reproaching me?” she asked slowly. + +“Reproach? What a word between us! It could only be myself--but the +mention of Wang has given me an idea. I have been, not exactly cringing, +not exactly lying, but still dissembling. You have been hiding +yourself, to please me, but still you have been hiding. All this is very +dignified. Why shouldn't we try begging now? A noble art? Yes. Lena, +we must go out together. I couldn't think of leaving you alone, and +I must--yes, I must speak to Wang. We shall go and seek that man, who +knows what he wants and how to secure what he wants. We will go at +once!” + +“Wait till I put my hair up,” she agreed instantly, and vanished behind +the curtain. + +When the curtain had fallen behind her, she turned her head back with +an expression of infinite and tender concern for him--for him whom she +could never hope to understand, and whom she was afraid she could never +satisfy, as if her passion were of a hopelessly lower quality, unable +to appease some exalted and delicate desire of his superior soul. In a +couple of minutes she reappeared. They left the house by the door of +the compound, and passed within three feet of the thunderstruck Pedro, +without even looking in his direction. He rose from stooping over a fire +of sticks, and, balancing himself clumsily, uncovered his enormous fangs +in gaping astonishment. Then suddenly he set off rolling on his bandy +legs to impart to his masters the astonishing discovery of a woman. + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +As luck would have it, Ricardo was lounging alone on the veranda of the +former counting-house. He scented some new development at once, and ran +down to meet the trotting, bear-like figure. The deep, growling noises +it made, though they had only a very remote resemblance to the Spanish +language, or indeed to any sort of human speech, were from long +practice quite intelligible to Mr. Jones's secretary. Ricardo was rather +surprised. He had imagined that the girl would continue to keep out of +sight. That line apparently was given up. He did not mistrust her. How +could he? Indeed, he could not think of her existence calmly. + +He tried to keep her image out of his mind so that he should be able +to use its powers with some approach to that coolness which the complex +nature of the situation demanded from him, both for his own sake and as +the faithful follower of plain Mr. Jones, gentleman. + +He collected his wits and thought. This was a change of policy, probably +on the part of Heyst. If so, what could it mean? A deep fellow! Unless +it was her doing; in which case--h'm--all right. Must be. She would +know what she was doing. Before him Pedro, lifting his feet alternately, +swayed to and fro sideways--his usual attitude of expectation. His +little red eyes, lost in the mass of hair, were motionless. Ricardo +stared into them with calculated contempt and said in a rough, angry +voice: + +“Woman! Of course there is. We know that without you!” He gave the tame +monster a push. “Git! Vamos! Waddle! Get back and cook the dinner. Which +way did they go, then?” + +Pedro extended a huge, hairy forearm to show the direction, and went off +on his bandy legs. Advancing a few steps, Ricardo was just in time to +see, above some bushes, two white helmets moving side by side in the +clearing. They disappeared. Now that he had managed to keep Pedro from +informing the governor that there was a woman on the island, he could +indulge in speculation as to the movements of these people. His attitude +towards Mr. Jones had undergone a spiritual change, of which he himself +was not yet fully aware. + +That morning, before tiffin, after his escape from the Heyst bungalow, +completed in such an inspiring way by the recovery of the slipper, +Ricardo had made his way to their allotted house, reeling as he ran, +his head in a whirl. He was wildly excited by visions of inconceivable +promise. He waited to compose himself before he dared to meet the +governor. On entering the room, he found Mr. Jones sitting on the camp +bedstead like a tailor on his board, cross-legged, his long back against +the wall. + +“I say, sir. You aren't going to tell me you are bored?” + +“Bored! No! Where the devil have you been all this time?” + +“Observing--watching--nosing around. What else? I knew you had company. +Have you talked freely, sir?” + +“Yes, I have,” muttered Mr. Jones. + +“Not downright plain, sir?” + +“No. I wished you had been here. You loaf all the morning, and now you +come in out of breath. What's the matter?” + +“I haven't been wasting my time out there,” said Ricardo. “Nothing's the +matter. I--I--might have hurried a bit.” He was in truth still panting; +only it was not with running, but with the tumult of thoughts and +sensations long repressed, which had been set free by the adventure of +the morning. He was almost distracted by them now. He forgot himself in +the maze of possibilities threatening and inspiring. “And so you had a +long talk?” he said, to gain time. + +“Confound you! The sun hasn't affected your head, has it? Why are you +staring at me like a basilisk?” + +“Beg pardon, sir. Wasn't aware I stared,” Ricardo apologized +good-humouredly. “The sun might well affect a thicker skull than mine. +It blazes. Phew! What do you think a fellow is, sir--a salamander?” + +“You ought to have been here,” observed Mr. Jones. + +“Did the beast give any signs of wanting to prance?” asked Ricardo +quickly, with absolutely genuine anxiety. “It wouldn't do, sir. You must +play him easy for at least a couple of days, sir. I have a plan. I have +a notion that I can find out a lot in a couple of days.” + +“You have? In what way?” + +“Why, by watching,” Ricardo answered slowly. + +Mr Jones grunted. + +“Nothing new, that. Watch, eh? Why not pray a little, too?” + +“Ha, ha, ha! That's a good one,” burst out the secretary, fixing Mr. +Jones with mirthless eyes. + +The latter dropped the subject indolently. + +“Oh, you may be certain of at least two days,” he said. + +Ricardo recovered himself. His eyes gleamed voluptuously. + +“We'll pull this off yet--clean--whole--right through, if you will only +trust me, sir.” + +“I am trusting you right enough,” said Mr. Jones. “It's your interest, +too.” + +And, indeed, Ricardo was truthful enough in his statement. He did +absolutely believe in success now. But he couldn't tell his governor +that he had intelligences in the enemy's camp. It wouldn't do to tell +him of the girl. Devil only knew what he would do if he learned there +was a woman about. And how could he begin to tell of it? He couldn't +confess his sudden escapade. + +“We'll pull it off, sir,” he said, with perfectly acted cheerfulness. +He experienced gusts of awful joy expanding in his heart and hot like a +fanned flame. + +“We must,” pronounced Mr. Jones. “This thing, Martin, is not like our +other tries. I have a peculiar feeling about this. It's a different +thing. It's a sort of test.” + +Ricardo was impressed by the governor's manner; for the first time a +hint of passion could be detected in him. But also a word he used, the +word “test,” had struck him as particularly significant somehow. It was +the last word uttered during that morning's conversation. Immediately +afterwards Ricardo went out of the room. It was impossible for him to +keep still. An elation in which an extraordinary softness mingled with +savage triumph would not allow it. It prevented his thinking, also. He +walked up and down the veranda far into the afternoon, eyeing the other +bungalow at every turn. It gave no sign of being inhabited. Once or +twice he stopped dead short and looked down at his left slipper. Each +time he chuckled audibly. His restlessness kept on increasing till at +last it frightened him. He caught hold of the balustrade of the veranda +and stood still, smiling not at his thought but at the strong sense of +life within him. He abandoned himself to it carelessly, even recklessly. +He cared for no one, friend or enemy. At that moment Mr. Jones called +him by name from within. A shadow fell on the secretary's face. + +“Here, sir,” he answered; but it was a moment before he could make up +his mind to go in. + +He found the governor on his feet. Mr. Jones was tired of lying down +when there was no necessity for it. His slender form, gliding about the +room, came to a standstill. + +“I've been thinking, Martin, of something you suggested. At the time it +did not strike me as practical; but on reflection it seems to me that +to propose a game is as good a way as any to let him understand that the +time has come to disgorge. It's less--how should I say?--vulgar. He will +know what it means. It's not a bad form to give to the business--which +in itself is crude, Martin, crude.” + +“Want to spare his feelings?” jeered the secretary in such a bitter tone +that Mr. Jones was really surprised. + +“Why, it was your own notion, confound you!” + +“Who says it wasn't?” retorted Ricardo sulkily. “But I am fairly sick of +this crawling. No! No! Get the exact bearings of his swag and then a rip +up. That's plenty good enough for him.” + +His passions being thoroughly aroused, a thirst for blood was allied in +him with a thirst for tenderness--yes, tenderness. A sort of anxious, +melting sensation pervaded and softened his heart when he thought of +that girl--one of his own sort. And at the same time jealousy started +gnawing at his breast as the image of Heyst intruded itself on his +fierce anticipation of bliss. + +“The crudeness of your ferocity is positively gross, Martin,” Mr. Jones +said disdainfully. “You don't even understand my purpose. I mean to +have some sport out of him. Just try to imagine the atmosphere of the +game--the fellow handling the cards--the agonizing mockery of it! Oh, +I shall appreciate this greatly. Yes, let him lose his money instead of +being forced to hand it over. You, of course, would shoot him at once, +but I shall enjoy the refinement and the jest of it. He's a man of the +best society. I've been hounded out of my sphere by people very much +like that fellow. How enraged and humiliated he will be! I promise +myself some exquisite moments while watching his play.” + +“Ay, and suppose he suddenly starts prancing. He may not appreciate the +fun.” + +“I mean you to be present,” Mr. Jones remarked calmly. + +“Well, as long as I am free to plug him or rip him up whenever I think +the time has come, you are welcome to your bit of sport, sir. I shan't +spoil it.” + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +It was at this precise moment of their conversation that Heyst had +intruded on Mr. Jones and his secretary with his warning about Wang, as +he had related to Lena. When he left them, the two looked at each other +in wondering silence. My Jones was the first to break it. + +“I say, Martin!” + +“Yes, sir.” + +“What does this mean?” + +“It's some move. Blame me if I can understand.” + +“Too deep for you?” Mr. Jones inquired dryly. + +“It's nothing but some of his infernal impudence,” growled the +secretary. “You don't believe all that about the Chink, do you, sir? +'Tain't true.” + +“It isn't necessary for it to be true to have a meaning for us. It's the +why of his coming to tell us this tale that's important.” + +“Do you think he made it up to frighten us?” asked Ricardo. + +Mr Jones scowled at him thoughtfully. + +“The man looked worried,” he muttered, as if to himself. “Suppose that +Chinaman has really stolen his money! The man looked very worried.” + +“Nothing but his artfulness, sir,” protested Ricardo earnestly, for the +idea was too disconcerting to entertain. “Is it likely that he would +have trusted a Chink with enough knowledge to make it possible?” he +argued warmly. “Why, it's the very thing that he would keep close about. +There's something else there. Ay, but what?” + +“Ha, ha, ha!” Mr. Jones let out a ghostly, squeaky laugh. “I've never +been placed in such a ridiculous position before,” he went on, with a +sepulchral equanimity of tone. “It's you, Martin, who dragged me into +it. However, it's my own fault too. I ought to--but I was really +too bored to use my brain, and yours is not to be trusted. You are a +hothead!” + +A blasphemous exclamation of grief escaped from Ricardo. Not to be +trusted! Hothead! He was almost tearful. + +“Haven't I heard you, sir, saying more than twenty times since we got +fired out from Manila that we should want a lot of capital to work the +East Coast with? You were always telling me that to prime properly all +them officials and Portuguese scallywags we should have to lose heavily +at first. Weren't you always worrying about some means of getting hold +of a good lot of cash? It wasn't to be got hold of by allowing yourself +to become bored in that rotten Dutch town and playing a two-penny game +with confounded beggarly bank clerks and such like. Well, I've brought +you here, where there is cash to be got--and a big lot, to a moral,” he +added through his set teeth. + +Silence fell. Each of them was staring into a different corner of the +room. Suddenly, with a slight stamp of his foot, Mr. Jones made for the +door. Ricardo caught him up outside. + +“Put an arm through mine, sir,” he begged him gently but firmly. “No use +giving the game away. An invalid may well come out for a breath of fresh +air after the sun's gone down a bit. That's it, sir. But where do you +want to go? Why did you come out, sir?” + +Mr Jones stopped short. + +“I hardly know myself,” he confessed in a hollow mutter, staring +intently at the Number One bungalow. “It's quite irrational,” he +declared in a still lower tone. + +“Better go in, sir,” suggested Ricardo. “What's that? Those screens +weren't down before. He's spying from behind them now, I bet--the +dodging, artful, plotting beast!” + +“Why not go over there and see if we can't get to the bottom of this +game?” was the unexpected proposal uttered by Mr. Jones. “He will have +to talk to us.” + +Ricardo repressed a start of dismay, but for a moment could not speak. +He only pressed the governor's hand to his side instinctively. + +“No, sir. What could you say? Do you expect to get to the bottom of his +lies? How could you make him talk? It isn't time yet to come to grips +with that gent. You don't think I would hang back, do you? His Chink, of +course, I'll shoot like a dog the moment I catch sight of him; but as +to that Mr. Blasted Heyst, the time isn't yet. My head's cooler just now +than yours. Let's go in again. Why, we are exposed here. Suppose he +took it into his head to let off a gun on us! He's an unaccountable, +'yporcritical skunk.” + +Allowing himself to be persuaded, Mr. Jones returned to his seclusion. +The secretary, however, remained on the veranda--for the purpose, he +said, of seeing whether that Chink wasn't sneaking around; in which +case he proposed to take a long shot at the galoot and chance the +consequences. His real reason was that he wanted to be alone, away from +the governor's deep-sunk eyes. He felt a sentimental desire to indulge +his fancies in solitude. A great change had come over Mr. Ricardo since +that morning. A whole side of him which from prudence, from necessity, +from loyalty, had been kept dormant, was aroused now, colouring +his thoughts and disturbing his mental poise by the vision of such +staggering consequences as, for instance, the possibility of an active +conflict with the governor. The appearance of the monstrous Pedro with +his news drew Ricardo out of a feeling of dreaminess wrapped up in a +sense of impending trouble. A woman? Yes, there was one; and it made all +the difference. After driving away Pedro, and watching the white +helmets of Heyst and Lena vanishing among the bushes he stood lost in +meditation. + +“Where could they be off to like this?” he mentally asked himself. + +The answer found by his speculative faculties on their utmost stretch +was--to meet that Chink. For in the desertion of Wang Ricardo did not +believe. It was a lying yarn, the organic part of a dangerous plot. +Heyst had gone to combine some fresh move. But then Ricardo felt sure +that the girl was with him--the girl full of pluck, full of sense, full +of understanding; an ally of his own kind! + +He went indoors briskly. Mr. Jones had resumed his cross-legged pose at +the head of the bed, with his back against the wall. + +“Anything new?” + +“No, sir.” + +Ricardo walked about the room as if he had no care in the world. He +hummed snatches of song. Mr. Jones raised his waspish eyebrows, at the +sound. The secretary got down on his knees before an old leather trunk, +and, rummaging in there, brought out a small looking-glass. He fell to +examining his physiognomy in it with silent absorption. + +“I think I'll shave,” he decided, getting up. + +He gave a sidelong glance to the governor, and repeated it several times +during the operation, which did not take long, and even afterwards, when +after putting away the implements, he resumed his walking, humming more +snatches of unknown songs. Mr. Jones preserved a complete immobility, +his thin lips compressed, his eyes veiled. His face was like a carving. + +“So you would like to try your hand at cards with that skunk, sir?” said +Ricardo, stopping suddenly and rubbing his hands. + +Mr Jones gave no sign of having heard anything. + +“Well, why not? Why shouldn't he have the experience? You remember in +that Mexican town--what's its name?--the robber fellow they caught in +the mountains and condemned to be shot? He played cards half the night +with the jailer and the sheriff. Well, this fellow is condemned, too. +He must give you your game. Hang it all, a gentleman ought to have some +little relaxation! And you have been uncommonly patient, sir.” + +“You are uncommonly volatile all of a sudden,” Mr. Jones remarked in a +bored voice. “What's come to you?” + +The secretary hummed for a while, and then said: + +“I'll try to get him over here for you tonight, after dinner. If I ain't +here myself, don't you worry, sir. I shall be doing a bit of nosing +around--see?” + +“I see,” sneered Mr. Jones languidly. “But what do you expect to see in +the dark?” + +Ricardo made no answer, and after another turn or two slipped out of the +room. He no longer felt comfortable alone with the governor. + + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +Meantime Heyst and Lena, walking rather fast, approached Wang's hut. +Asking the girl to wait, Heyst ascended the little ladder of bamboos +giving access to the door. It was as he had expected. The smoky interior +was empty, except for a big chest of sandalwood too heavy for hurried +removal. Its lid was thrown up, but whatever it might have contained was +no longer there. All Wang's possessions were gone. Without tarrying in +the hut, Heyst came back to the girl, who asked no questions, with her +strange air of knowing or understanding everything. + +“Let us push on,” he said. + +He went ahead, the rustle of her white skirt following him into the +shades of the forest, along the path of their usual walk. Though the air +lay heavy between straight denuded trunks, the sunlit patches moved on +the ground, and raising her eyes Lena saw far above her head the +flutter of the leaves, the surface shudder on the mighty limbs extended +horizontally in the perfect immobility of patience. Twice Heyst looked +over his shoulder at her. Behind the readiness of her answering smile +there was a fund of devoted, concentrated passion, burning with the hope +of a more perfect satisfaction. They passed the spot where it was their +practice to turn towards the barren summit of the central hill. Heyst +held steadily on his way towards the upper limit of the forest. The +moment they left its shelter, a breeze enveloped them, and a great +cloud, racing over the sun, threw a peculiar sombre tint over +everything. Heyst pointed up a precipitous, rugged path clinging to the +side of the hill. It ended in a barricade of felled trees, a primitively +conceived obstacle which must have cost much labour to erect at just +that spot. + +“This,” Heyst, explained in his urbane tone, “is a barrier against the +march of civilization. The poor folk over there did not like it, as it +appeared to them in the shape of my company--a great step forward, as +some people used to call it with mistaken confidence. The advanced foot +has been drawn back, but the barricade remains.” + +They went on climbing slowly. The cloud had driven over, leaving an +added brightness on the face of the world. + +“It's a very ridiculous thing,” Heyst went on; “but then it is the +product of honest fear--fear of the unknown, of the incomprehensible. +It's pathetic, too, in a way. And I heartily wish, Lena, that we were on +the other side of it.” + +“Oh, stop, stop!” she cried, seizing his arm. + +The face of the barricade they were approaching had been piled up with a +lot of fresh-cut branches. The leaves were still green. A gentle breeze, +sweeping over the top, stirred them a little; but what had startled the +girl was the discovery of several spear-blades protruding from the mass +of foliage. She had made them out suddenly. They did not gleam, but she +saw them with extreme distinctness, very still, very vicious to look at. + +“You had better let me go forward alone, Lena,” said Heyst. + +She tugged, persistently at his arm, but after a time, during which +he never ceased to look smilingly into her terrified eyes, he ended by +disengaging himself. + +“It's a sign rather than a demonstration,” he argued, persuasively. +“Just wait here a moment. I promise not to approach near enough to be +stabbed.” + +As in a nightmare she watched Heyst go up the few yards of the path as +if he never meant to stop; and she heard his voice, like voices heard +in dreams, shouting unknown words in an unearthly tone. Heyst was only +demanding to see Wang. He was not kept waiting very long. Recovering +from the first flurry of her fright, Lena noticed a commotion in the +green top-dressing of the barricade. She exhaled a sigh of relief when +the spear-blades retreated out of sight, sliding inward--the horrible +things! in a spot facing Heyst a pair of yellow hands parted the leaves, +and a face filled the small opening--a face with very noticeable eyes. +It was Wang's face, of course, with no suggestion of a body belonging to +it, like those cardboard faces at which she remembered gazing as a child +in the window of a certain dim shop kept by a mysterious little man in +Kingsland Road. Only this face, instead of mere holes, had eyes which +blinked. She could see the beating of the eyelids. The hands on each +side of the face, keeping the boughs apart, also did not look as if they +belonged to any real body. One of them was holding a revolver--a weapon +which she recognized merely by intuition, never having seen such an +object before. + +She leaned her shoulders against the rock of the perpendicular hillside +and kept her eyes on Heyst, with comparative composure, since the spears +were not menacing him any longer. Beyond the rigid and motionless back +he presented to her, she saw Wang's unreal cardboard face moving its +thin lips and grimacing artificially. She was too far down the path to +hear the dialogue, carried on in an ordinary voice. She waited patiently +for its end. Her shoulders felt the warmth of the rock; now and then a +whiff of cooler air seemed to slip down upon her head from above; the +ravine at her feet, choked full of vegetation, emitted the faint, drowsy +hum of insect life. Everything was very quiet. She failed to notice +the exact moment when Wang's head vanished from the foliage, taking the +unreal hands away with it. To her horror, the spear-blades came gliding +slowly out. The very hair on her head stirred; but before she had +time to cry out, Heyst, who seemed rooted to the ground, turned round +abruptly and began to move towards her. His great moustaches did not +quite hide an ugly but irresolute smile; and when he had come down near +enough to touch her, he burst out into a harsh laugh: + +“Ha, ha, ha!” + +She looked at him, uncomprehending. He cut short his laugh and said +curtly: + +“We had better go down as we came.” + +She followed him into the forest. The advance of the afternoon had +filled it with gloom. Far away a slant of light between the trees closed +the view. All was dark beyond. Heyst stopped. + +“No reason to hurry, Lena,” he said in his ordinary, serenely polite +tones. “We return unsuccessful. I suppose you know, or at least can +guess, what was my object in coming up there?” + +“No, I can't guess, dear,” she said, and smiled, noticing with +emotion that his breast was heaving as if he had been out of breath. +Nevertheless, he tried to command his speech, pausing only a little +between the words. + +“No? I went up to find Wang. I went up”--he gasped again here, but this +was for the last time--“I made you come with me because I didn't like +to leave you unprotected in the proximity of those fellows.” Suddenly he +snatched his cork helmet off his head and dashed it on the ground. “No!” + he cried roughly. “All this is too unreal altogether. It isn't to be +borne! I can't protect you! I haven't the power.” + +He glared at her for a moment, then hastened after his hat which had +bounded away to some distance. He came back looking at her face, which +was very white. + +“I ought to beg your pardon for these antics,” he said, adjusting his +hat. “A movement of childish petulance! Indeed, I feel very much like a +child in my ignorance, in my powerlessness, in my want of resource, in +everything except in the dreadful consciousness of some evil hanging +over your head--yours!” + +“It's you they are after,” she murmured. + +“No doubt, but unfortunately--” + +“Unfortunately--what?” + +“Unfortunately, I have not succeeded with Wang,” he said. “I failed to +move his Celestial, heart--that is, if there is such a thing. He told me +with horrible Chinese reasonableness that he could not let us pass the +barrier, because we should be pursued. He doesn't like fights. He gave +me to understand that he would shoot me with my own revolver without +any sort of compunction, rather than risk a rude and distasteful +contest with the strange barbarians for my sake. He has preached to the +villagers. They respect him. He is the most remarkable man they have +ever seen, and their kinsman by marriage. They understand his policy. +And anyway only women and children and a few old fellows are left in the +village. This is the season when the men are away in trading vessels. +But it would have been all the same. None of them have a taste for +fighting--and with white men too! They are peaceable, kindly folk and +would have seen me shot with extreme satisfaction. Wang seemed to think +my insistence--for I insisted, you know--very stupid and tactless. But a +drowning man clutches at straws. We were talking in such Malay as we are +both equal to. + +“'Your fears are foolish,' I said to him. + +“'Foolish? of course I am foolish,' he replied. 'If I were a wise man, +I would be a merchant with a big hong in Singapore, instead of being a +mine coolie turned houseboy. But if you don't go away in time, I will +shoot you before it grows too dark to take aim. Not till then, Number +One, but I will do it then. Now--finish!' + +“'All right,' I said. 'Finish as far as I am concerned; but you can have +no objections to the mem putih coming over to stay with the Orang Kaya's +women for a few days. I will make a present in silver for it.' Orang +Kaya, is the head man of the village, Lena,” added Heyst. + +She looked at him in astonishment. + +“You wanted me to go to that village of savages?” she gasped. “You +wanted me to leave you?” + +“It would have given me a freer hand.” + +Heyst stretched out his hands and looked at them for a moment, then let +them fall by his side. Indignation was expressed more in the curve of +her lips than in her clear eyes, which never wavered. + +“I believe Wang laughed,” he went on. “He made a noise like a +turkey-cock.” + +“'That would be worse than anything,' he told me. + +“I was taken aback. I pointed out to him that he was talking nonsense. +It could not make any difference to his security where you were, because +the evil men, as he calls them, did not know of your existence. I did +not lie exactly, Lena, though I did stretch the truth till it cracked; +but the fellow seems to have an uncanny insight. He shook his head. He +assured me they knew all about you. He made a horrible grimace at me.” + +“It doesn't matter,” said the girl. “I didn't want--I would not have +gone.” + +Heyst raised his eyes. + +“Wonderful intuition! As I continued to press him, Wang made that +very remark about you. When he smiles, his face looks like a conceited +death's head. It was his very last remark that you wouldn't want to. I +went away then.” + +She leaned back against a tree. Heyst faced her in the same attitude of +leisure, as if they had done with time and all the other concerns of the +earth. Suddenly, high above their heads the roof of leaves whispered at +them tumultuously and then ceased. + +“That was a strange notion of yours, to send me away,” she said. “Send +me away? What for? Yes, what for?” + +“You seem indignant,” he remarked listlessly. + +“To these savages, too!” she pursued. “And you think I would have gone? +You can do what you like with me--but not that, not that!” + +Heyst looked into the dim aisles of the forest. Everything was so still +now that the very ground on which they stood seemed to exhale silence +into the shade. + +“Why be indignant?” he remonstrated. “It has not happened. I gave up +pleading with Wang. Here we are, repulsed! Not only without power to +resist the evil, but unable to make terms for ourselves with the worthy +envoys, the envoys extraordinary of the world we thought we had done +with for years and years. And that's bad, Lena, very bad.” + +“It's funny,” she said thoughtfully. “Bad? I suppose it is. I don't know +that it is. But do you? Do you? You talk as if you didn't believe in +it.” + +She gazed at him earnestly. + +“Do I? Ah! That's it. I don't know how to talk. I have managed to refine +everything away. I've said to the Earth that bore me: 'I am I and you +are a shadow.' And, by Jove, it is so! But it appears that such words +cannot be uttered with impunity. Here I am on a Shadow inhabited +by Shades. How helpless a man is against the Shades! How is one to +intimidate, persuade, resist, assert oneself against them? I have lost +all belief in realities . . . Lena, give me your hand.” + +She looked at him surprised, uncomprehending. + +“Your hand,” he cried. + +She obeyed; he seized it with avidity as if eager to raise it to his +lips, but halfway up released his grasp. They looked at each other for a +time. + +“What's the matter, dear?” she whispered timidly. + +“Neither force nor conviction,” Heyst muttered wearily to himself. “How +am I to meet this charmingly simple problem?” + +“I am sorry,” she murmured. + +“And so am I,” he confessed quickly. “And the bitterest of this +humiliation is its complete uselessness--which I feel, I feel!” + +She had never before seen him give such signs of feeling. Across his +ghastly face the long moustaches flamed in the shade. He spoke suddenly: + +“I wonder if I could find enough courage to creep among them in the +night, with a knife, and cut their throats one after another, as they +slept! I wonder--” + +She was frightened by his unwonted appearance more than by the words in +his mouth, and said earnestly: + +“Don't you try to do such a thing! Don't you think of it!” + +“I don't possess anything bigger than a penknife. As to thinking of it, +Lena, there's no saying what one may think of. I don't think. Something +in me thinks--something foreign to my nature. What is the matter?” + +He noticed her parted lips, and the peculiar stare in her eyes, which +had wandered from his face. + +“There's somebody after us. I saw something white moving,” she cried. + +Heyst did not turn his head; he only glanced at her out-stretched arm. + +“No doubt we are followed; we are watched.” + +“I don't see anything now,” she said. + +“And it does not matter,” Heyst went on in his ordinary voice. “Here we +are in the forest. I have neither strength nor persuasion. Indeed, it's +extremely difficult to be eloquent before a Chinaman's head stuck at +one out of a lot of brushwood. But can we wander among these big trees +indefinitely? Is this a refuge? No! What else is left to us? I did think +for a moment of the mine; but even there we could not remain very long. +And then that gallery is not safe. The props were too weak to begin +with. Ants have been at work there--ants after the men. A death-trap, at +best. One can die but once, but there are many manners of death.” + +The girl glanced about fearfully, in search of the watcher or follower +whom she had glimpsed once among the trees; but if he existed, he had +concealed himself. Nothing met her eyes but the deepening shadows of the +short vistas between the living columns of the still roof of leaves. +She looked at the man beside her expectantly, tenderly, with suppressed +affright and a sort of awed wonder. + +“I have also thought of these people's boat,” Heyst went on. “We could +get into that, and--only they have taken everything out of her. I have +seen her oars and mast in a corner of their room. To shove off in an +empty boat would be nothing but a desperate expedient, supposing even +that she would drift out a good distance between the islands before the +morning. It would only be a complicated manner of committing suicide--to +be found dead in a boat, dead from sun and thirst. A sea mystery. +I wonder who would find us! Davidson, perhaps; but Davidson passed +westward ten days ago. I watched him steaming past one early morning, +from the jetty.” + +“You never told me,” she said. + +“He must have been looking at me through his big binoculars. Perhaps, if +I had raised my arm--but what did we want with Davidson then, you and +I? He won't be back this way for three weeks or more, Lena. I wish I had +raised my arm that morning.” + +“What would have been the good of it?” she sighed out. + +“What good? No good, of course. We had no forebodings. This seemed to be +an inexpugnable refuge, where we could live untroubled and learn to know +each other.” + +“It's perhaps in trouble that people get to know each other,” she +suggested. + +“Perhaps,” he said indifferently. “At any rate, we would not have gone +away from here with him; though I believe he would have come in eagerly +enough, and ready for any service he could render. It's that fat man's +nature--a delightful fellow. You would not come on the wharf that time +I sent the shawl back to Mrs. Schomberg through him. He has never seen +you.” + +“I didn't know that you wanted anybody ever to see me,” she said. + +He had folded his arms on his breast and hung his head. + +“And I did not know that you cared to be seen as yet. A misunderstanding +evidently. An honourable misunderstanding. But it does not matter now.” + +He raised his head after a silence. + +“How gloomy this forest has grown! Yet surely the sun cannot have set +already.” + +She looked round; and as if her eyes had just been opened, she perceived +the shades of the forest surrounding her, not so much with gloom, but +with a sullen, dumb, menacing hostility. Her heart sank in the engulfing +stillness, at that moment she felt the nearness of death, breathing on +her and on the man with her. If there had been a sudden stir of leaves, +the crack of a dry branch, the faintest rustle, she would have screamed +aloud. But she shook off the unworthy weakness. Such as she was, a +fiddle-scraping girl picked up on the very threshold of infamy, she +would try to rise above herself, triumphant and humble; and then +happiness would burst on her like a torrent, flinging at her feet the +man whom she loved. + +Heyst stirred slightly. + +“We had better be getting back, Lena, since we can't stay all night in +the woods--or anywhere else, for that matter. We are the slaves of +this infernal surprise which has been sprung on us by--shall I say +fate?--your fate, or mine.” + +It was the man who had broken the silence, but it was the woman who +led the way. At the very edge of the forest she stopped, concealed by a +tree. He joined her cautiously. + +“What is it? What do you see, Lena?” he whispered. + +She said that it was only a thought that had come into her head. She +hesitated for a moment giving him over her shoulder a shining gleam in +her grey eyes. She wanted to know whether this trouble, this danger, +this evil, whatever it was, finding them out in their retreat, was not a +sort of punishment. + +“Punishment?” repeated Heyst. He could not understand what she meant. +When she explained, he was still more surprised. “A sort of retribution, +from an angry Heaven?” he said in wonder. “On us? What on earth for?” + +He saw her pale face darken in the dusk. She had blushed. Her whispering +flowed very fast. It was the way they lived together--that wasn't right, +was it? It was a guilty life. For she had not been forced into it, +driven, scared into it. No, no--she had come to him of her own free +will, with her whole soul yearning unlawfully. + +He was so profoundly touched that he could not speak for a moment. To +conceal his trouble, he assumed his best Heystian manner. + +“What? Are our visitors then messengers of morality, avengers of +righteousness, agents of Providence? That's certainly an original view. +How flattered they would be if they could hear you!” + +“Now you are making fun of me,” she said in a subdued voice which broke +suddenly. + +“Are you conscious of sin?” Heyst asked gravely. She made no answer. +“For I am not,” he added; “before Heaven, I am not!” + +“You! You are different. Woman is the tempter. You took me up from pity. +I threw myself at you.” + +“Oh, you exaggerate, you exaggerate. It was not so bad as that,” he said +playfully, keeping his voice steady with an effort. + +He considered himself a dead man already, yet forced to pretend that +he was alive for her sake, for her defence. He regretted that he had +no Heaven to which he could recommend this fair, palpitating handful of +ashes and dust--warm, living sentient his own--and exposed helplessly to +insult, outrage, degradation, and infinite misery of the body. + +She had averted her face from him and was still. He suddenly seized her +passive hand. + +“You will have it so?” he said. “Yes? Well, let us then hope for mercy +together.” + +She shook her head without looking at him, like an abashed child. + +“Remember,” he went on incorrigible with his delicate raillery, “that +hope is a Christian virtue, and surely you can't want all the mercy for +yourself.” + +Before their eyes the bungalow across the cleared ground stood bathed in +a sinister light. An unexpected chill gust of wind made a noise in the +tree-tops. She snatched her hand away and stepped out into the open; +but before she had advanced more than three yards, she stood still and +pointed to the west. + +“Oh look there!” she exclaimed. + +Beyond the headland of Diamond Bay, lying black on a purple sea, great +masses of cloud stood piled up and bathed in a mist of blood. A crimson +crack like an open wound zigzagged between them, with a piece of dark +red sun showing at the bottom. Heyst cast an indifferent glance at the +ill-omened chaos of the sky. + +“Thunderstorm making up. We shall hear it all night, but it won't visit +us, probably. The clouds generally gather round the volcano.” + +She was not listening to him. Her eyes reflected the sombre and violent +hues of the sunset. + +“That does not look much like a sign of mercy,” she said slowly, as if +to herself, and hurried on, followed by Heyst. Suddenly she stopped. “I +don't care. I would do more yet! And some day you'll forgive me. You'll +have to forgive me!” + + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +Stumbling up the steps, as if suddenly exhausted, Lena entered the room +and let herself fall on the nearest chair. Before following her, Heyst +took a survey of the surroundings from the veranda. It was a complete +solitude. There was nothing in the aspect of this familiar scene to tell +him that he and the girl were not as completely alone as they had been +in the early days of their common life on this abandoned spot, with only +Wang discreetly materializing from time to time and the uncomplaining +memory of Morrison to keep them company. + +After the cold gust of wind there was an absolute stillness of the +air. The thunder-charged mass hung unbroken beyond the low, ink-black +headland, darkening the twilight. By contrast, the sky at the zenith +displayed pellucid clearness, the sheen of a delicate glass bubble which +the merest movement of air might shatter. A little to the left, between +the black masses of the headland and of the forest, the volcano, a +feather of smoke by day and a cigar-glow at night, took its first fiery +expanding breath of the evening. Above it a reddish star came out like +an expelled spark from the fiery bosom of the earth, enchanted into +permanency by the mysterious spell of frozen spaces. + +In front of Heyst the forest, already full of the deepest shades, stood +like a wall. But he lingered, watching its edge, especially where it +ended at the line of bushes, masking the land end of the jetty. Since +the girl had spoken of catching a glimpse of something white among the +trees, he believed pretty firmly that they had been followed in their +excursion up the mountain by Mr. Jones's secretary. No doubt the fellow +had watched them out of the forest, and now, unless he took the trouble +to go back some distance and fetch a considerable circuit inland over +the clearing, he was bound to walk out into the open space before the +bungalows. Heyst did, indeed, imagine at one time some movement between +the trees, lost as soon as perceived. He stared patiently, but nothing +more happened. After all, why should he trouble about these people's +actions? Why this stupid concern for the preliminaries, since, when +the issue was joined, it would find him disarmed and shrinking from the +ugliness and degradation of it? + +He turned and entered the room. Deep dusk reigned in there already. +Lena, near the door, did not move or speak. The sheen of the white +tablecloth was very obtrusive. The brute these two vagabonds had tamed +had entered on its service while Heyst and Lena were away. The table was +laid. Heyst walked up and down the room several times. The girl remained +without sound or movement on the chair. But when Heyst, placing the two +silver candelabra on the table, struck a match to light the candles, +she got up suddenly and went into the bedroom. She came out again almost +immediately, having taken off her hat. Heyst looked at her over his +shoulder. + +“What's the good of shirking the evil hour? I've lighted these +candles for a sign of our return. After all, we might not have been +watched--while returning, I mean. Of course we were seen leaving the +house.” + +The girl sat down again. The great wealth of her hair looked very dark +above her colourless face. She raised her eyes, glistening softly in +the light with a sort of unreadable appeal, with a strange effect of +unseeing innocence. + +“Yes,” said Heyst across the table, the fingertips of one hand resting +on the immaculate cloth. “A creature with an antediluvian lower jaw, +hairy like a mastodon, and formed like a pre-historic ape, has laid this +table. Are you awake, Lena? Am I? I would pinch myself, only I know that +nothing would do away with this dream. Three covers. You know it is the +shorter of the two who's coming--the gentleman who, in the play of his +shoulders as he walks, and in his facial structure, recalls a Jaguar. +Ah, you don't know what a jaguar is? But you have had a good look at +these two. It's the short one, you know, who's to be our guest.” + +She made a sign with her head that she knew; Heyst's insistence brought +Ricardo vividly before her mental vision. A sudden languor, like the +physical echo of her struggle with the man, paralysed all her limbs. +She lay still in the chair, feeling very frightened at this +phenomenon--ready to pray aloud for strength. + +Heyst had started to pace the room. + +“Our guest! There is a proverb--in Russia, I believe--that when a +guest enters the house, God enters the house. The sacred virtue of +hospitality! But it leads one into trouble as well as any other.” + +The girl unexpectedly got up from the chair, swaying her supple figure +and stretching her arms above her head. He stopped to look at her +curiously, paused, and then went on: + +“I venture to think that God has nothing to do with such a hospitality +and with such a guest!” + +She had jumped to her feet to react against the numbness, to discover +whether her body would obey her will. It did. She could stand up, and +she could move her arms freely. Though no physiologist, she concluded +that all that sudden numbness was in her head, not in her limbs. Her +fears assuaged, she thanked God for it mentally, and to Heyst murmured a +protest: + +“Oh, yes! He's got to do with everything--every little thing. Nothing +can happen--” + +“Yes,” he said hastily, “one of the two sparrows can't be struck to the +ground--you are thinking of that.” The habitual playful smile faded on +the kindly lips under the martial moustache. “Ah, you remember what you +have been told--as a child--on Sundays.” + +“Yes, I do remember.” She sank into the chair again. “It was the only +decent bit of time I ever had when I was a kid, with our landlady's two +girls, you know.” + +“I wonder, Lena,” Heyst said, with a return to his urbane playfulness, +“whether you are just a little child, or whether you represent something +as old as the world.” + +She surprised Heyst by saying dreamily: + +“Well--and what about you?” + +“I? I date later--much later. I can't call myself a child, but I am so +recent that I may call myself a man of the last hour--or is it the hour +before last? I have been out of it so long that I am not certain how far +the hands of the clock have moved since--since--” + +He glanced at the portrait of his father, exactly above the head of the +girl, as if it were ignoring her in its painted austerity of feeling. He +did not finish the sentence; but he did not remain silent for long. + +“Only what must be avoided are fallacious inferences, my dear +Lena--especially at this hour.” + +“Now you are making fun of me again,” she said without looking up. + +“Am I?” he cried. “Making fun? No, giving warning. Hang it all, whatever +truth people told you in the old days, there is also this one--that +sparrows do fall to the ground, that they are brought to the ground. +This is no vain assertion, but a fact. That's why”--again his +tone changed, while he picked up the table knife and let it fall +disdainfully--“that's why I wish these wretched round knives had some +edge on them. Absolute rubbish--neither edge, point, nor substance. I +believe one of these forks would make a better weapon at a pinch. But +can I go about with a fork in my pocket?” He gnashed his teeth with a +rage very real, and yet comic. + +“There used to be a carver here, but it was broken and thrown away a +long time ago. Nothing much to carve here. It would have made a noble +weapon, no doubt; but--” + +He stopped. The girl sat very quiet, with downcast eyes. As he kept +silence for some time, she looked up and said thoughtfully: + +“Yes, a knife--it's a knife that you would want, wouldn't you, in case, +in case--” + +He shrugged his shoulders. + +“There must be a crowbar or two in the sheds; but I have given up all +the keys together. And then, do you see me walking about with a crowbar +in my hand? Ha, ha! And besides, that edifying sight alone might start +the trouble for all I know. In truth, why has it not started yet?” + +“Perhaps they are afraid of you,” she whispered, looking down again. + +“By Jove, it looks like it,” he assented meditatively. “They do seem to +hang back for some reason. Is that reason prudence, or downright fear, +or perhaps the leisurely method of certitude?” + +Out in the black night, not very far from the bungalow, resounded a loud +and prolonged whistle. Lena's hands grasped the sides of the chair, but +she made no movement. Heyst started, and turned his face away from the +door. + +The startling sound had died away. + +“Whistles, yells, omens, signals, portents--what do they matter?” he +said. “But what about the crowbar? Suppose I had it! Could I stand +in ambush at the side of the door--this door--and smash the first +protruding head, scatter blood and brains over the floor, over these +walls, and then run stealthily to the other door to do the same +thing--and repeat the performance for a third time, perhaps? Could I? On +suspicion, without compunction, with a calm and determined purpose? No, +it is not in me. I date too late. Would you like to see me attempt this +thing while that mysterious prestige of mine lasts--or their not less +mysterious hesitation?” + +“No, no!” she whispered ardently, as if compelled to speak by his +eyes fixed on her face. “No, it's a knife you want to defend yourself +with--to defend--there will be time--” + +“And who knows if it isn't really my duty?” he began again, as if he had +not heard her disjointed words at all. “It may be--my duty to you, to +myself. For why should I put up with the humiliation of their secret +menaces? Do you know what the world would say?” + +He emitted a low laugh, which struck her with terror. She would have got +up, but he stooped so low over her that she could not move without first +pushing him away. + +“It would say, Lena, that I--the Swede--after luring my friend and +partner to his death from mere greed of money, have murdered these +unoffending shipwrecked strangers from sheer funk. That would be +the story whispered--perhaps shouted--certainly spread out, and +believed--and believed, my dear Lena!” + +“Who would believe such awful things?” + +“Perhaps you wouldn't--not at first, at any rate; but the power of +calumny grows with time. It's insidious and penetrating. It can even +destroy one's faith in oneself--dry-rot the soul.” + +All at once her eyes leaped to the door and remained fixed, stony, a +little enlarged. Turning his head, Heyst beheld the figure of Ricardo +framed in the doorway. For a moment none of the three moved, then, +looking from the newcomer to the girl in the chair, Heyst formulated a +sardonic introduction. + +“Mr Ricardo, my dear.” + +Her head drooped a little. Ricardo's hand went up to his moustache. His +voice exploded in the room. + +“At your service, ma'am!” + +He stepped in, taking his hat off with a flourish, and dropping it +carelessly on a chair near the door. + +“At your service,” he repeated, in quite another tone. “I was made aware +there was a lady about, by that Pedro of ours; only I didn't know I +should have the privilege of seeing you tonight, ma'am.” + +Lena and Heyst looked at him covertly, but he, with a vague gaze +avoiding them both, looked at nothing, seeming to pursue some point in +space. + +“Had a pleasant walk?” he asked suddenly. + +“Yes. And you?” returned Heyst, who had managed to catch his glance. + +“I haven't been a yard away from the governor this afternoon till +I started for here.” The genuineness of the accent surprised Heyst, +without convincing him of the truth of the words. + +“Why do you ask?” pursued Ricardo with every inflection of perfect +candour. + +“You might have wished to explore the island a little,” said Heyst, +studying the man, who, to render him justice, did not try to free his +captured gaze. “I may remind you that it wouldn't be a perfectly safe +proceeding.” + +Ricardo presented a picture of innocence. + +“Oh, yes--meaning that Chink that has ran away from you. He ain't much!” + +“He has a revolver,” observed Heyst meaningly. + +“Well, and you have a revolver, too,” Mr. Ricardo argued unexpectedly. +“I don't worry myself about that.” + +“That's different. I am not afraid of you,” Heyst made answer after a +short pause. + +“Of me?” + +“Of all of you.” + +“You have a queer way of putting things,” began Ricardo. + +At that moment the door on the compound side of the house came open with +some noise, and Pedro entered, pressing the edge of a loaded tray to his +breast. His big, hairy head rolled a little, his feet fell in front of +each other with a short, hard thump on the floor. The arrival changed +the current of Ricardo's thought, perhaps, but certainly of his speech. + +“You heard me whistling a little while ago outside? That was to give him +a hint, as I came along, that it was time to bring in the dinner; and +here it is.” + +Lena rose and passed to the right of Ricardo, who lowered his glance for +a moment. They sat down at the table. The enormous gorilla back of Pedro +swayed out through the door. + +“Extraordinary strong brute, ma'am,” said Ricardo. He, had a propensity +to talk about “his Pedro,” as some men will talk of their dog. “He ain't +pretty, though. No, he ain't pretty. And he has got to be kept under. I +am his keeper, as it might be. The governor don't trouble his head much +about dee-tails. All that's left to Martin. Martin, that's me, ma'am.” + +Heyst saw the girl's eyes turn towards Mr. Jones's secretary and rest +blankly on his face. Ricardo, however, looked vaguely into space, +and, with faint flickers of a smile about his lips, made conversation +indefatigably against the silence of his entertainers. He boasted +largely of his long association with Mr. Jones--over four years now, he +said. Then, glancing rapidly at Heyst: + +“You can see at once he's a gentleman, can't you?” + +“You people,” Heyst said, his habitual playful intonation tinged with +gloom, “are divorced from all reality in my eyes.” + +Ricardo received this speech as if he had been expecting to hear +those very words, or else did not mind at all what Heyst might say. +He muttered an absent-minded “Ay, ay,” played with a bit of biscuit, +sighed, and said, with a peculiar stare which did not seem to carry any +distance, but to stop short at a point in the air very near his face: + +“Anybody can see at once you are one. You and the governor ought to +understand each other. He expects to see you tonight. The governor isn't +well, and we've got to think of getting away from here.” + +While saying these words he turned himself full towards Lena, but +without any marked expression. Leaning back with folded arms, the girl +stared before her as if she had been alone in the room. But under +that aspect of almost vacant unconcern the perils and emotion that had +entered into her life warmed her heart, exalted her mind with a sense of +an inconceivable intensity of existence. + +“Really? Thinking of going away from here?” Heyst murmured. + +“The best of friends must part,” Ricardo pronounced slowly. “And, as +long as they part friends, there's no harm done. We two are used to be +on the move. You, I understand, prefer to stick in one place.” + +It was obvious that all this was being said merely for the sake of +talking, and that Ricardo's mind was concentrated on some purpose +unconnected with the words that were coming out of his mouth. + +“I should like to know,” Heyst asked with incisive politeness, “how you +have come to understand this or anything else about me? As far as I can +remember, I've made you no confidences.” + +Ricardo, gazing comfortably into space out of the back of his chair--for +some time all three had given up any pretence of eating--answered +abstractedly: + +“Any fellow might have guessed it!” He sat up suddenly, and uncovered +all his teeth in a grin of extraordinary ferocity, which was belied by +the persistent amiability of his tone. “The governor will be the man +to tell you something about that. I wish you would say you would see my +governor. He's the one who does all our talking. Let me take you to him +this evening. He ain't at all well; and he can't make up his mind to go +away without having a talk with you.” + +Heyst, looking up, met Lena's eyes. Their expression of candour seemed +to hide some struggling intention. Her head, he fancied, had made an +imperceptible affirmative movement. Why? What reason could she have? Was +it the prompting of some obscure instinct? Or was it simply a delusion +of his own senses? But in this strange complication invading the +quietude of his life, in his state of doubt and disdain and almost of +despair with which he looked at himself, he would let even a delusive +appearance guide him through a darkness so dense that it made for +indifference. + +“Well, suppose I do say so.” + +Ricardo did not conceal his satisfaction, which for a moment interested +Heyst. + +“It can't be my life they are after,” he said to himself. “What good +could it be to them?” + +He looked across the table at the girl. What did it matter whether she +had nodded or not? As always when looking into her unconscious eyes, he +tasted something like the dregs of tender pity. He had decided to go. +Her nod, imaginary or not imaginary, advice or illusion, had tipped the +scale. He reflected that Ricardo's invitation could scarcely be anything +in the nature of a trap. It would have been too absurd. Why carry subtly +into a trap someone already bound hand and foot, as it were? + +All this time he had been looking fixedly at the girl he called Lena. In +the submissive quietness of her being, which had been her attitude ever +since they had begun their life on the island, she remained as secret +as ever. Heyst got up abruptly, with a smile of such enigmatic and +despairing character that Mr. Secretary Ricardo, whose abstract gaze had +an all-round efficiency, made a slight crouching start, as if to dive +under the table for his leg-knife--a start that was repressed, as soon +as begun. He had expected Heyst to spring on him or draw a revolver, +because he created for himself a vision of him in his own image. Instead +of doing either of these obvious things, Heyst walked across the +room, opened the door and put his head through it to look out into the +compound. + +As soon as his back was turned, Ricardo's hand sought the girl's arm +under the table. He was not looking at her, but she felt the groping, +nervous touch of his search, felt suddenly the grip of his fingers above +her wrist. He leaned forward a little; still he dared not look at her. +His hard stare remained fastened on Heyst's back. In an extremely low +hiss, his fixed idea of argument found expression scathingly: + +“See! He's no good. He's not the man for you!” + +He glanced at her at last. Her lips moved a little, and he was awed +by that movement without a sound. Next instant the hard grasp of his +fingers vanished from her arm. Heyst had shut the door. On his way back +to the table, he crossed the path of the girl they had called Alma--she +didn't know why--also Magdalen, whose mind had remained so long in doubt +as to the reason of her own existence. She no longer wondered at that +bitter riddle, since her heart found its solution in a blinding, hot +glow of passionate purpose. + + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +She passed by Heyst as if she had indeed been blinded by some secret, +lurid, and consuming glare into which she was about to enter. The +curtain of the bedroom door fell behind her into rigid folds. Ricardo's +vacant gaze seemed to be watching the dancing flight of a fly in mid +air. + +“Extra dark outside, ain't it?” he muttered. + +“Not so dark but that I could see that man of yours prowling about +there,” said Heyst in measured tones. + +“What--Pedro? He's scarcely a man you know; or else I wouldn't be so +fond of him as I am.” + +“Very well. Let's call him your worthy associate.” + +“Ay! Worthy enough for what we want of him. A great standby is Peter in +a scrimmage. A growl and a bite--oh, my! And you don't want him about?” + +“I don't.” + +“You want him out of the way?” insisted Ricardo with an affectation +of incredulity which Heyst accepted calmly, though the air in the room +seemed to grow more oppressive with every word spoken. + +“That's it. I do want him out of the way.” He forced himself to speak +equably. + +“Lor'! That's no great matter. Pedro's not much use here. The business +my governor's after can be settled by ten minutes' rational talk +with--with another gentleman. Quiet talk!” + +He looked up suddenly with hard, phosphorescent eyes. Heyst didn't move +a muscle. Ricardo congratulated himself on having left his revolver +behind. He was so exasperated that he didn't know what he might have +done. He said at last: + +“You want poor, harmless Peter out of the way before you let me take you +to see the governor--is that it?” + +“Yes, that is it.” + +“H'm! One can see,” Ricardo said with hidden venom, “that you are a +gentleman; but all that gentlemanly fancifulness is apt to turn sour on +a plain man's stomach. However--you'll have to pardon me.” + +He put his fingers into his mouth and let out a whistle which seemed to +drive a thin, sharp shaft of air solidly against one's nearest ear-drum. +Though he greatly enjoyed Heyst's involuntary grimace, he sat perfectly +stolid waiting for the effect of the call. + +It brought Pedro in with an extraordinary, uncouth, primeval +impetuosity. The door flew open with a clatter, and the wild figure it +disclosed seemed anxious to devastate the room in leaps and bounds; +but Ricardo raised his open palm, and the creature came in quietly. +His enormous half-closed paws swung to and fro a little in front of his +bowed trunk as he walked. Ricardo looked on truculently. + +“You go to the boat--understand? Go now!” + +The little red eyes of the tame monster blinked with painful attention +in the mass of hair. + +“Well? Why don't you get? Forgot human speech, eh? Don't you know any +longer what a boat is?” + +“Si--boat,” the creature stammered out doubtfully. + +“Well, go there--the boat at the jetty. March off to it and sit there, +lie down there, do anything but go to sleep there--till you hear my +call, and then fly here. Them's your orders. March! Get, vamos! No, not +that way--out through the front door. No sulks!” + +Pedro obeyed with uncouth alacrity. When he had gone, the gleam of +pitiless savagery went out of Ricardo's yellow eyes, and his physiognomy +took on, for the first time that evening, the expression of a domestic +cat which is being noticed. + +“You can watch him right into the bushes, if you like. Too dark, eh? Why +not go with him to the very spot, then?” + +Heyst made a gesture of vague protest. + +“There's nothing to assure me that he will stay there. I have no doubt +of his going, but it's an act without guarantee.” + +“There you are!” Ricardo shrugged his shoulders philosophically. “Can't +be helped. Short of shooting our Pedro, nobody can make absolutely sure +of his staying in the same place longer than he has a mind to; but I +tell you, he lives in holy terror of my temper. That's why I put on my +sudden-death air when I talk to him. And yet I wouldn't shoot him--not +I, unless in such a fit of rage as would make a man shoot his favourite +dog. Look here, sir! This deal is on the square. I didn't tip him a wink +to do anything else. He won't budge from the jetty. Are you coming along +now, sir?” + +A short-silence ensued. Ricardo's jaws were working ominously under his +skin. His eyes glided: voluptuously here and there, cruel and dreamy, +Heyst checked a sudden movement, reflected for a while, then said: + +“You must wait a little.” + +“Wait a little! Wait a little! What does he think a fellow is--a graven +image?” grumbled Ricardo half audibly. + +Heyst went into the bedroom, and shut the door after him with a bang. +Coming from the light, he could not see a thing in there at first; yet +he received the impression of the girl getting up from the floor. On +the less opaque darkness of the shutter-hole, her head detached itself +suddenly, very faint, a mere hint of a round, dark shape without a face. + +“I am going, Lena. I am going to confront these scoundrels.” He was +surprised to feel two arms falling on his shoulders. “I thought that +you--” he began. + +“Yes, yes!” the girl whispered hastily. + +She neither clung to him, nor yet did she try to draw him to her. Her +hands grasped his shoulders, and she seemed to him to be staring into +his face in the dark. And now he could see something of her face, +too--an oval without features--and faintly distinguish her person, in +the blackness, a form without definite lines. + +“You have a black dress here, haven't you, Lena?” he asked, speaking +rapidly, and so low that she could just hear him. + +“Yes--an old thing.” + +“Very good. Put it on at once.” + +“But why?” + +“Not for mourning!” There was something peremptory in the slightly +ironic murmur. “Can you find it and get into it in the dark?” + +She could. She would try. He waited, very still. He could imagine +her movements over there at the far end of the room; but his eyes, +accustomed now to the darkness, had lost her completely. When she spoke, +her voice surprised him by its nearness. She had done what he had told +her to do, and had approached him, invisible. + +“Good! Where's that piece of purple veil I've seen lying about?” he +asked. + +There was no answer, only a slight rustle. + +“Where is it?” he repeated impatiently. + +Her unexpected breath was on his cheek. + +“In my hands.” + +“Capital! Listen, Lena. As soon as I leave the bungalow with that +horrible scoundrel, you slip out at the back--instantly, lose no +time!--and run round into the forest. That will be your time, while we +are walking away, and I am sure he won't give me the slip. Run into the +forest behind the fringe of bushes between the big trees. You will know, +surely, how to find a place in full view of the front door. I fear for +you; but in this black dress, with most of your face muffled up in that +dark veil, I defy anybody to find you there before daylight. Wait in the +forest till the table is pushed into full view of the doorway, and you +see three candles out of four blown out and one relighted--or, should +the lights be put out here while you watch them, wait till three candles +are lighted and then two put out. At either of these signals run back as +hard as you can, for it will mean that I am waiting for you here.” + +While he was speaking, the girl had sought and seized one of his +hands. She did not press it; she held it loosely, as it were timidly, +caressingly. It was no grasp; it was a mere contact, as if only to make +sure that he was there, that he was real and no mere darker shadow in +the obscurity. The warmth of her hand gave Heyst a strange, intimate +sensation of all her person. He had to fight down a new sort of emotion, +which almost unmanned him. He went on, whispering sternly: + +“But if you see no such signals, don't let anything--fear, curiosity, +despair, or hope--entice you back to this house; and with the first sign +of dawn steal away along the edge of the clearing till you strike the +path. Wait no longer, because I shall probably be dead.” + +The murmur of the word “Never!” floated into his ear as if it formed +itself in the air. + +“You know the path,” he continued. “Make your way to the barricade. Go +to Wang--yes, to Wang. Let nothing stop you!” It seemed to him that the +girl's hand trembled a little. “The worst he can do to you is to shoot +you, but he won't. I really think he won't, if I am not there. Stay with +the villagers, with the wild people, and fear nothing. They will be more +awed by you than you can be frightened of them. Davidson's bound to turn +up before very long. Keep a look-out for a passing steamer. Think of +some sort of signal to call him.” + +She made no answer. The sense of the heavy, brooding silence in the +outside world seemed to enter and fill the room--the oppressive infinity +of it, without breath, without light. It was as if the heart of hearts +had ceased to beat and the end of all things had come. + +“Have you understood? You are to run out of the house at once,” Heyst +whispered urgently. + +She lifted his hand to her lips and let it go. He was startled. + +“Lena!” he cried out under his breath. + +She was gone from his side. He dared not trust himself--no, not even to +the extent of a tender word. + +Turning to go out he heard a thud somewhere in the house. To open the +door, he had first to lift the curtain; he did so with his face over his +shoulder. The merest trickle of light, coming through the keyhole and +one or two cracks, was enough for his eyes to see her plainly, all +black, down on her knees, with her head and arms flung on the foot of +the bed--all black in the desolation of a mourning sinner. What was +this? A suspicion that there were everywhere more things than he +could understand crossed Heyst's mind. Her arm, detached from the bed, +motioned him away. He obeyed, and went out, full of disquiet. + +The curtain behind him had not ceased to tremble when she was up on her +feet, close against it, listening for sounds, for words, in a stooping, +tragic attitude of stealthy attention, one hand clutching at her breast +as if to compress, to make less loud the beating of her heart. Heyst +had caught Mr. Jones's secretary in the contemplation of his closed +writing-desk. Ricardo might have been meditating how to break into it; +but when he turned about suddenly, he showed so distorted a face that +it made Heyst pause in wonder at the upturned whites of the eyes, which +were blinking horribly, as if the man were inwardly convulsed. + +“I thought you were never coming,” Ricardo mumbled. + +“I didn't know you were pressed for time. Even if your going away +depends on this conversation, as you say, I doubt if you are the men to +put to sea on such a night as this,” said Heyst, motioning Ricardo to +precede him out of the house. + +With feline undulations of hip and shoulder, the secretary left the +room at once. There was something cruel in the absolute dumbness of the +night. The great cloud covering half the sky hung right against one, +like an enormous curtain hiding menacing preparations of violence. As +the feet of the two men touched the ground, a rumble came from behind +it, preceded by a swift, mysterious gleam of light on the waters of the +bay. + +“Ha!” said Ricardo. “It begins.” + +“It may be nothing in the end,” observed Heyst, stepping along steadily. + +“No! Let it come!” Ricardo said viciously. “I am in the humour for it!” + +By the time the two men had reached the other bungalow, the far-off +modulated rumble growled incessantly, while pale lightning in waves of +cold fire flooded and ran off the island in rapid succession. Ricardo, +unexpectedly, dashed ahead up the steps and put his head through the +doorway. + +“Here he is, governor! Keep him with you as long as you can--till you +hear me whistle. I am on the track.” + +He flung these words into the room with inconceivable speed, and stood +aside to let the visitor pass through the doorway; but he had to wait +an appreciable moment, because Heyst, seeing his purpose, had scornfully +slowed his pace. When Heyst entered the room it was with a smile, the +Heyst smile, lurking under his martial moustache. + + + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +Two candles were burning on the stand-up desk. Mr. Jones, tightly +enfolded in an old but gorgeous blue silk dressing-gown, kept his +elbows close against his sides and his hands deeply plunged into the +extraordinarily deep pockets of the garment. The costume accentuated his +emaciation. He resembled a painted pole leaning against the edge of the +desk, with a dried head of dubious distinction stuck on the top of it. +Ricardo lounged in the doorway. Indifferent in appearance to what +was going on, he was biding his time. At a given moment, between two +flickers of lightning, he melted out of his frame into the outer +air. His disappearance was observed on the instant by Mr. Jones, who +abandoned his nonchalant immobility against the desk, and made a few +steps calculated to put him between Heyst and the doorway. + +“It's awfully close,” he remarked + +Heyst, in the middle of the room, had made up his mind to speak plainly. + +“We haven't met to talk about the weather. You favoured me earlier in +the day with a rather cryptic phrase about yourself. 'I am he that is,' +you said. What does that mean?” + +Mr. Jones, without looking at Heyst, continued his absentminded +movements till, attaining the desired position, he brought his shoulders +with a thump against the wall near the door, and raised his head. In +the emotion of the decisive moment his haggard face glistened with +perspiration. Drops ran down his hollow cheeks and almost blinded the +spectral eyes in their bony caverns. + +“It means that I am a person to be reckoned with. No--stop! Don't put +your hand into your pocket--don't.” + +His voice had a wild, unexpected shrillness. Heyst started, and there +ensued a moment of suspended animation, during which the thunder's +deep bass muttered distantly and the doorway to the right of Mr. Jones +flickered with bluish light. At last Heyst shrugged his shoulders; he +even looked at his hand. He didn't put it in his pocket, however. Mr. +Jones, glued against the wall, watched him raise both his hands to +the ends of his horizontal moustaches, and answered the note of +interrogation in his steady eyes. + +“A matter of prudence,” said Mr. Jones in his natural hollow tones, and +with a face of deathlike composure. “A man of your free life has surely +perceived that. You are a much talked-about man, Mr. Heyst--and though, +as far as I understand, you are accustomed to employ the subtler +weapons of intelligence, still I can't afford to take any risks of +the--er--grosser methods. I am not unscrupulous enough to be a match for +you in the use of intelligence; but I assure you, Mr. Heyst, that in +the other way you are no match for me. I have you covered at this +very moment. You have been covered ever since you entered this room. +Yes--from my pocket.” + +During this harangue Heyst looked deliberately over his shoulder, +stepped back a pace, and sat down on the end of the camp bedstead. +Leaning his elbow on one knee, he laid his cheek in the palm of his hand +and seemed to meditate on what he should say next. Mr. Jones, planted +against the wall, was obviously waiting for some sort of overture. +As nothing came, he resolved to speak himself; but he hesitated. For, +though he considered that the most difficult step had been taken, he +said to himself that every stage of progress required great caution, +lest the man in Ricardo's phraseology, should “start to prance”--which +would be most inconvenient. He fell back on a previous statement: + +“And I am a person to be reckoned with.” + +The other man went on looking at the floor, as if he were alone in the +room. There was a pause. + +“You have heard of me, then?” Heyst said at length, looking up. + +“I should think so! We have been staying at Schomberg's hotel.” + +“Schom--” Heyst choked on the word. + +“What's the matter, Mr. Heyst?” + +“Nothing. Nausea,” Heyst said resignedly. He resumed his former attitude +of meditative indifference. “What is this reckoning you are talking +about?” he asked after a time, in the quietest possible tone. “I don't +know you.” + +“It's obvious that we belong to the same--social sphere,” began Mr. +Jones with languid irony. Inwardly he was as watchful as he could be. +“Something has driven you out--the originality of your ideas, perhaps. +Or your tastes.” + +Mr Jones indulged in one of his ghastly smiles. In repose his features +had a curious character of evil, exhausted austerity; but when he +smiled, the whole mask took on an unpleasantly infantile expression. A +recrudescence of the rolling thunder invaded the room loudly, and passed +into silence. + +“You are not taking this very well,” observed Mr. Jones. This was +what he said, but as a matter of fact he thought that the business +was shaping quite satisfactorily. The man, he said to himself, had no +stomach for a fight. Aloud he continued: “Come! You can't expect to have +it always your own way. You are a man of the world.” + +“And you?” Heyst interrupted him unexpectedly. “How do you define +yourself?” + +“I, my dear sir? In one way I am--yes, I am the world itself, come to +pay you a visit. In another sense I am an outcast--almost an outlaw. +If you prefer a less materialistic view, I am a sort of fate--the +retribution that waits its time.” + +“I wish to goodness you were the commonest sort of ruffian!” said Heyst, +raising his equable gaze to Mr. Jones. “One would be able to talk to you +straight then, and hope for some humanity. As it is--” + +“I dislike violence and ferocity of every sort as much as you do,” Mr. +Jones declared, looking very languid as he leaned against the wall, but +speaking fairly loud. “You can ask my Martin if it is not so. This, Mr. +Heyst, is a soft age. It is also an age without prejudices. I've heard +that you are free from them yourself. You mustn't be shocked if I tell +you plainly that we are after your money--or I am, if you prefer to make +me alone responsible. Pedro, of course, knows no more of it than +any other animal would. Ricardo is of the faithful-retainer +class--absolutely identified with all my ideas, wishes, and even whims!” + +Mr Jones pulled his left hand out of his pocket, got a handkerchief out +of another, and began to wipe the perspiration from his forehead, neck, +and chin. The excitement from which he suffered made his breathing +visible. In his long dressing-gown he had the air of a convalescent +invalid who had imprudently overtaxed his strength. Heyst, +broad-shouldered, robust, watched the operation from the end of the camp +bedstead, very calm, his hands on his knees. + +“And by the by,” he asked, “where is he now, that henchman of yours? +Breaking into my desk?” + +“That would be crude. Still, crudeness is one of life's conditions.” + There was the slightest flavour of banter in the tone of Ricardo's +governor. “Conceivable, but unlikely. Martin is a little crude; but you +are not, Mr. Heyst. To tell you the truth, I don't know precisely +where he is. He has been a little mysterious of late; but he has my +confidence. No, don't get up, Mr. Heyst!” + +The viciousness of his spectral face was indescribable. Heyst, who had +moved a little, was surprised by the disclosure. + +“It was not my intention,” he said. + +“Pray remain seated,” Mr. Jones insisted in a languid voice, but with a +very determined glitter in his black eye-caverns. + +“If you were more observant,” said Heyst with dispassionate contempt, +“you would have known before I had been five minutes in the room that I +had no weapon of any sort on me.” + +“Possibly; but pray keep your hands still. They are very well where they +are. This is too big an affair for me to take any risks.” + +“Big? Too big?” Heyst repeated with genuine surprise. “Good Heavens! +Whatever you are looking for, there's very little of it here--very +little of anything.” + +“You would naturally say so, but that's not what we have heard,” + retorted Mr. Jones quickly, with a grin so ghastly that it was +impossible to think it voluntary. + +Heyst's face had grown very gloomy. He knitted his brows. + +“What have you heard?” he asked. + +“A lot, Mr. Heyst--a lot,” affirmed Mr. Jones. He was vying to recover +his manner of languid superiority. “We have heard, for instance, of a +certain Mr. Morrison, once your partner.” + +Heyst could not repress a slight movement. + +“Aha!” said Mr. Jones, with a sort of ghostly glee on his face. + +The muffled thunder resembled the echo of a distant cannonade below the +horizon, and the two men seemed to be listening to it in sullen silence. + +“This diabolical calumny will end in actually and literally taking my +life from me,” thought Heyst. + +Then, suddenly, he laughed. Portentously spectral, Mr. Jones frowned at +the sound. + +“Laugh as much as you please,” he said. “I, who have been hounded out +from society by a lot of highly moral souls, can't see anything funny in +that story. But here we are, and you will now have to pay for your fun, +Mr. Heyst.” + +“You have heard a lot of ugly lies,” observed Heyst. “Take my word for +it!” + +“You would say so, of course--very natural. As a matter of fact I +haven't heard very much. Strictly speaking, it was Martin. He collects +information, and so on. You don't suppose I would talk to that Schomberg +animal more than I could help? It was Martin whom he took into his +confidence.” + +“The stupidity of that creature is so great that it becomes formidable,” + Heyst said, as if speaking to himself. + +Involuntarily, his mind turned to the girl, wandering in the forest, +alone and terrified. Would he ever see her again? At that thought he +nearly lost his self-possession. But the idea that if she followed +his instructions those men were not likely to find her steadied him a +little. They did not know that the island had any inhabitants; and he +himself once disposed of, they would be too anxious to get away to waste +time hunting for a vanished girl. + +All this passed through Heyst's mind in a flash, as men think in moments +of danger. He looked speculatively at Mr. Jones, who, of course, had +never for a moment taken his eyes from his intended victim. And, the +conviction came to Heyst that this outlaw from the higher spheres was an +absolutely hard and pitiless scoundrel. + +Mr Jones's voice made him start. + +“It would be useless, for instance, to tell me that your Chinaman has +run off with your money. A man living alone with a Chinaman on an island +takes care to conceal property of that kind so well that the devil +himself--” + +“Certainly,” Heyst muttered. + +Again, with his left hand, Mr. Jones mopped his frontal bone, his +stalk-like neck, his razor jaws, his fleshless chin. Again his voice +faltered and his aspect became still more gruesomely malevolent as of a +wicked and pitiless corpse. + +“I see what you mean,” he cried, “but you mustn't put too much trust +in your ingenuity. You don't strike me as a very ingenious person, Mr. +Heyst. Neither am I. My talents lie another way. But Martin--” + +“Who is now engaged in rifling my desk,” interjected Heyst. + +“I don't think so. What I was going to say is that Martin is much +cleverer than a Chinaman. Do you believe in racial superiority, Mr. +Heyst? I do, firmly. Martin is great at ferreting out such secrets as +yours, for instance.” + +“Secrets like mine!” repeated Heyst bitterly. “Well I wish him joy of +all he can ferret out!” + +“That's very kind of you,” remarked Mr. Jones. He was beginning to +be anxious for Martin's return. Of iron self-possession at the +gaming-table, fearless in a sudden affray, he found that this rather +special kind of work was telling on his nerves. “Keep still as you are!” + he cried sharply. + +“I've told you I am not armed,” said Heyst, folding his arms on his +breast. + +“I am really inclined to believe that you are not,” admitted Mr. Jones +seriously. “Strange!” he mused aloud, the caverns of his eyes turned +upon Heyst. Then briskly: “But my object is to keep you in this room. +Don't provoke me, by some unguarded movement, to smash your knee or do +something definite of that sort.” He passed his tongue over his lips, +which were dry and black, while his forehead glistened with moisture. “I +don't know if it wouldn't be better to do it at once!” + +“He who deliberates is lost,” said Heyst with grave mockery. + +Mr Jones disregarded the remark. He had the air of communing with +himself. + +“Physically I am no match for you,” he said slowly, his black gaze fixed +upon the man sitting on the end of the bed. “You could spring--” + +“Are you trying to frighten yourself?” asked Heyst abruptly. “You don't +seem to have quite enough pluck for your business. Why don't you do it +at once?” + +Mr Jones, taking violent offence, snorted like a savage skeleton. + +“Strange as it may seem to you, it is because of my origin, my breeding, +my traditions, my early associations, and such-like trifles. Not +everybody can divest himself of the prejudices of a gentleman as easily +as you have done, Mr. Heyst. But don't worry about my pluck. If you were +to make a clean spring at me, you would receive in mid air, so to speak, +something that would make you perfectly harmless by the time you landed. +No, don't misapprehend us, Mr. Heyst. We are--er--adequate bandits; and +we are after the fruit of your labours as a--er--successful swindler. +It's the way of the world--gorge and disgorge!” + +He leaned wearily the back of his head against the wall. His vitality +seemed exhausted. Even his sunken eyelids drooped within the bony +sockets. Only his thin, waspish, beautifully pencilled eyebrows, drawn +together a little, suggested the will and the power to sting--something +vicious, unconquerable, and deadly. + +“Fruits! Swindler!” repeated Heyst, without heat, almost without +contempt. “You are giving yourself no end of trouble, you and your +faithful henchman, to crack an empty nut. There are no fruits here, as +you imagine. There are a few sovereigns, which you may have if you like; +and since you have called yourself a bandit--” + +“Yaas!” drawled Mr. Jones. “That, rather than a swindler. Open warfare +at least!” + +“Very good! Only let me tell you that there were never in the world two +more deluded bandits--never!” + +Heyst uttered these words with such energy that Mr. Jones, stiffening +up, seemed to become thinner and taller in his metallic blue +dressing-gown against the whitewashed wall. + +“Fooled by a silly, rascally innkeeper!” Heyst went on. “Talked over +like a pair of children with a promise of sweets!” + +“I didn't talk with that disgusting animal,” muttered Mr. Jones +sullenly; “but he convinced Martin, who is no fool.” + +“I should think he wanted very much to be convinced,” said Heyst, with +the courteous intonation so well known in the Islands. “I don't want to +disturb your touching trust in your--your follower, but he must be the +most credulous brigand in existence. What do you imagine? If the story +of my riches were ever so true, do you think Schomberg would have +imparted it to you from sheer altruism? Is that the way of the world, +Mr. Jones?” + +For a moment the lower jaw of Ricardo's gentleman dropped; but it came +up with a snap of scorn, and he said with spectral intensity: + +“The beast is cowardly! He was frightened, and wanted to get rid of +us, if you want to know, Mr. Heyst. I don't know that the material +inducement was so very great, but I was bored, and we decided to accept +the bribe. I don't regret it. All my life I have been seeking new +impressions, and you have turned out to be something quite out of +the common. Martin, of course, looks to the material results. He's +simple--and faithful--and wonderfully acute.” + +“Ah, yes! He's on the track--” and now Heyst's speech had the character +of politely grim raillery--“but not sufficiently on the track, as +yet, to make it quite convenient to shoot me without more ado. Didn't +Schomberg tell you precisely where I conceal the fruit of my rapines? +Pah! Don't you know he would have told you anything, true or false, from +a very clear motive? Revenge! Mad hate--the unclean idiot!” + +Mr Jones did not seem very much moved. On his right hand the doorway +incessantly flickered with distant lightning, and the continuous rumble +of thunder went on irritatingly, like the growl of an inarticulate giant +muttering fatuously. + +Heyst overcame his immense repugnance to allude to her whose image, +cowering in the forest was constantly before his eyes, with all the +pathos and force of its appeal, august, pitiful, and almost holy to him. +It was in a hurried, embarrassed manner that he went on: + +“If it had not been for that girl whom he persecuted with his insane and +odious passion, and who threw herself on my protection, he would never +have--but you know well enough!” + +“I don't know!” burst out Mr. Jones with amazing heat. “That +hotel-keeper tried to talk to me once of some girl he had lost, but I +told him I didn't want to hear any of his beastly women stories. It had +something to do with you, had it?” + +Heyst looked on serenely at this outburst, then lost his patience a +little. + +“What sort of comedy is this? You don't mean to say that you didn't know +that I had--that there was a girl living with me here?” + +One could see that the eyes of Mr. Jones had become fixed in the depths +of their black holes by the gleam of white becoming steady there. The +whole man seemed frozen still. + +“Here! Here!” he screamed out twice. There was no mistaking his +astonishment, his shocked incredulity--something like frightened +disgust. + +Heyst was disgusted also, but in another way. He too was incredulous. +He regretted having mentioned the girl; but the thing was done, his +repugnance had been overcome in the heat of his argument against the +absurd bandit. + +“Is it possible that you didn't know of that significant fact?” he +inquired. “Of the only effective truth in the welter of silly lies that +deceived you so easily?” + +“No, I didn't!” Mr. Jones shouted. “But Martin did!” he added in a faint +whisper, which Heyst's ears just caught and no more. + +“I kept her out of sight as long as I could,” said Heyst. “Perhaps, with +your bringing up, traditions, and so on; you will understand my reason +for it.” + +“He knew. He knew before!” Mr. Jones mourned in a hollow voice. “He knew +of her from the first!” + +Backed hard against the wall he no longer watched Heyst. He had the air +of a man who had seen an abyss yawning under his feet. + +“If I want to kill him, this is my time,” thought Heyst; but he did not +move. + +Next moment Mr. Jones jerked his head up, glaring with sardonic fury. + +“I have a good mind to shoot you, you woman-ridden hermit, you man in +the moon, that can't exist without--no, it won't be you that I'll shoot. +It's the other woman-lover--the prevaricating, sly, low-class, amorous +cuss! And he shaved--shaved under my very nose. I'll shoot him!” + +“He's gone mad,” thought Heyst, startled by the spectre's sudden fury. + +He felt himself more in danger, nearer death, than ever since he had +entered that room. An insane bandit is a deadly combination. He did not, +could not know that Mr. Jones was quick-minded enough to see already the +end of his reign over his excellent secretary's thoughts and feelings; +the coming failure of Ricardo's fidelity. A woman had intervened! +A woman, a girl, who apparently possessed the power to awaken +men's disgusting folly. Her power had been proved in two instances +already--the beastly innkeeper, and that man with moustaches, upon whom +Mr. Jones, his deadly right hand twitching in his pocket, glared more in +repulsion than in anger. The very object of the expedition was lost from +view in his sudden and overwhelming sense of utter insecurity. And +this made Mr. Jones feel very savage; but not against the man with the +moustaches. Thus, while Heyst was really feeling that his life was +not worth two minutes, purchase, he heard himself addressed with +no affectation of languid impertinence but with a burst of feverish +determination. + +“Here! Let's call a truce!” said Mr. Jones. + +Heyst's heart was too sick to allow him to smile. + +“Have I been making war on you?” he asked wearily. “How do you expect +me to attach any meaning to your words?” he went on. “You seem to be a +morbid, senseless sort of bandit. We don't speak the same language. If I +were to tell you why I am here, talking to you, you wouldn't believe +me, because you would not understand me. It certainly isn't the love +of life, from which I have divorced myself long ago--not sufficiently, +perhaps; but if you are thinking of yours, then I repeat to you that it +has never been in danger from me. I am unarmed.” + +Mr Jones was biting his lower lip, in a deep meditation. It was only +towards the last that he looked at Heyst. + +“Unarmed, eh?” Then he burst out violently: “I tell you, a gentleman is +no match for the common herd. And yet one must make use of the brutes. +Unarmed, eh? And I suppose that creature is of the commonest sort. You +could hardly have got her out of a drawing-room. Though they're all +alike, for that matter. Unarmed! It's a pity. I am in much greater +danger than you are or were--or I am much mistaken. But I am not--I know +my man!” + +He lost his air of mental vacancy and broke out into shrill +exclamations. To Heyst they seemed madder than anything that had gone +before. + +“On the track! On the scent!” he cried, forgetting himself to the point +of executing a dance of rage in the middle of the floor. + +Heyst looked on, fascinated by this skeleton in a gay dressing-gown, +jerkily agitated like a grotesque toy on the end of an invisible string. +It became quiet suddenly. + +“I might have smelt a rat! I always knew that this would be the danger.” + He changed suddenly to a confidential tone, fixing his sepulchral stare +on Heyst. “And yet here I am, taken in by the fellow, like the veriest +fool. I've been always on the watch for some beastly influence, but here +I am, fairly caught. He shaved himself right in front of me and I never +guessed!” + +The shrill laugh, following on the low tone of secrecy, sounded so +convincingly insane that Heyst got up as if moved by a spring. Mr. Jones +stepped back two paces, but displayed no uneasiness. + +“It's as clear as daylight!” he uttered mournfully, and fell silent. + +Behind him the doorway flickered lividly, and the sound as of a naval +action somewhere away on the horizon filled the breathless pause. +Mr. Jones inclined his head on his shoulder. His mood had completely +changed. + +“What do you say, unarmed man? Shall we go and see what is detaining +my trusted Martin so long? He asked me to keep you engaged in friendly +conversation till he made a further examination of that track. Ha, ha, +ha!” + +“He is no doubt ransacking my house,” said Heyst. + +He was bewildered. It seemed to him that all this was an +incomprehensible dream, or perhaps an elaborate other-world joke, +contrived by that spectre in a gorgeous dressing gown. + +Mr Jones looked at him with a horrible, cadaverous smile of inscrutable +mockery, and pointed to the door. Heyst passed through it first. His +feelings had become so blunted that he did not care how soon he was shot +in the back. + +“How oppressive the air is!” the voice of Mr. Jones said at his elbow. +“This stupid storm gets on my nerves. I would welcome some rain, though +it would be unpleasant to get wet. On the other hand, this exasperating +thunder has the advantage of covering the sound of our approach. The +lightning's not so convenient. Ah, your house is fully illuminated! +My clever Martin is punishing your stock of candles. He belongs to the +unceremonious classes, which are also unlovely, untrustworthy, and so +on.” + +“I left the candles burning,” said Heyst, “to save him trouble.” + +“You really believed he would go to your house?” asked Mr. Jones with +genuine interest. + +“I had that notion, strongly. I do believe he is there now.” + +“And you don't mind?” + +“No!” + +“You don't!” Mr. Jones stopped to wonder. “You are an extraordinary +man,” he said suspiciously, and moved on, touching elbows with Heyst. + +In the latter's breast dwelt a deep silence, the complete silence of +unused faculties. At this moment, by simply shouldering Mr. Jones, he +could have thrown him down and put himself, by a couple of leaps, beyond +the certain aim of the revolver; but he did not even think of that. His +very will seemed dead of weariness. He moved automatically, his head +low, like a prisoner captured by the evil power of a masquerading +skeleton out of a grave. Mr. Jones took charge of the direction. They +fetched a wide sweep. The echoes of distant thunder seemed to dog their +footsteps. + +“By the by,” said Mr. Jones, as if unable to restrain his curiosity, +“aren't you anxious about that--ouch!--that fascinating creature to whom +you owe whatever pleasure you can find in our visit?” + +“I have placed her in safety,” said Heyst. “I--I took good care of +that.” + +Mr Jones laid a hand on his arm. + +“You have? Look! is that what you mean?” + +Heyst raised his head. In the flicker of lightning the desolation of the +cleared ground on his left leaped out and sank into the night, together +with the elusive forms of things distant, pale, unearthly. But in the +brilliant square of the door he saw the girl--the woman he had longed to +see once more as if enthroned, with her hands on the arms of the chair. +She was in black; her face was white, her head dreamily inclined on her +breast. He saw her only as low as her knees. He saw her--there, in the +room, alive with a sombre reality. It was no mocking vision. She was not +in the forest--but there! She sat there in the chair, seemingly without +strength, yet without fear, tenderly stooping. + +“Can you understand their power?” whispered the hot breath of Mr. Jones +into his ear. “Can there be a more disgusting spectacle? It's enough to +make the earth detestable. She seems to have found her affinity. Move +on closer. If I have to shoot you in the end, then perhaps you will die +cured.” + +Heyst obeyed the pushing pressure of a revolver barrel between his +shoulders. He felt it distinctly, but he did not feel the ground under +his feet. They found the steps, without his being aware that he was +ascending them--slowly, one by one. Doubt entered into him--a doubt of +a new kind, formless, hideous. It seemed to spread itself all over him, +enter his limbs, and lodge in his entrails. He stopped suddenly, with +a thought that he who experienced such a feeling had no business to +live--or perhaps was no longer living. + +Everything--the bungalow, the forest, the open ground--trembled +incessantly, the earth, the sky itself, shivered all the time, and the +only thing immovable in the shuddering universe was the interior of the +lighted room and the woman in black sitting in the light of the eight +candle-flames. They flung around her an intolerable brilliance which +hurt his eyes, seemed to sear his very brain with the radiation of +infernal heat. It was some time before his scorched eyes made out +Ricardo seated on the floor at some little distance, his back to the +doorway, but only partly so; one side of his upturned face showing the +absorbed, all forgetful rapture of his contemplation. + +The grip of Mr. Jones's hard claw drew Heyst back a little. In the roll +of thunder, swelling and subsiding, he whispered in his ear a sarcastic: +“Of course!” + +A great shame descended upon Heyst--the shame of guilt, absurd and +maddening. Mr. Jones drew him still farther back into the darkness of +the veranda. + +“This is serious,” he went on, distilling his ghostly venom into Heyst's +very ear. “I had to shut my eyes many times to his little flings; but +this is serious. He has found his soul-mate. Mud souls, obscene and +cunning! Mud bodies, too--the mud of the gutter! I tell you, we are +no match for the vile populace. I, even I, have been nearly caught. He +asked me to detain you till he gave me the signal. It won't be you +that I'll have to shoot, but him. I wouldn't trust him near me for five +minutes after this!” + +He shook Heyst's arm a little. + +“If you had not happened to mention the creature, we should both have +been dead before morning. He would have stabbed you as you came down +the steps after leaving me and then he would have walked up to me and +planted the same knife between my ribs. He has no prejudices. The viler +the origin, the greater the freedom of these simple souls!” + +He drew a cautious, hissing breath and added in an agitated murmur: “I +can see right into his mind, I have been nearly caught napping by his +cunning.” + +He stretched his neck to peer into the room from the side. Heyst, too, +made a step forward, under the slight impulse of that slender hand +clasping his hand with a thin, bony grasp. + +“Behold!” the skeleton of the crazy bandit jabbered thinly into his ear +in spectral fellowship. “Behold the simple, Acis kissing the sandals +of the nymph, on the way to her lips, all forgetful, while the menacing +fife of Polyphemus already sounds close at hand--if he could only hear +it! Stoop a little.” + + + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +On returning to the Heyst bungalow, rapid as if on wings, Ricardo +found Lena waiting for him. She was dressed in black; and at once his +uplifting exultation was replaced by an awed and quivering patience +before her white face, before the immobility of her reposeful pose, the +more amazing to him who had encountered the strength of her limbs and +the indomitable spirit in her body. She had come out after Heyst's +departure, and had sat down under the portrait to wait for the return of +the man of violence and death. While lifting the curtain, she felt the +anguish of her disobedience to her lover, which was soothed by a feeling +she had known before--a gentle flood of penetrating sweetness. She +was not automatically obeying a momentary suggestion, she was under +influences more deliberate, more vague, and of greater potency. She had +been prompted, not by her will, but by a force that was outside of her +and more worthy. She reckoned upon nothing definite; she had calculated +nothing. She saw only her purpose of capturing death--savage, sudden, +irresponsible death, prowling round the man who possessed her, death +embodied in the knife ready to strike into his heart. No doubt it had +been a sin to throw herself into his arms. With that inspiration +that descends at times from above for the good or evil of our common +mediocrity, she had a sense of having been for him only a violent and +sincere choice of curiosity and pity--a thing that passes. She did not +know him. If he were to go away from her and disappear, she would utter +no reproach, she would not resent it; for she would hold in herself the +impress of something most rare and precious--his embraces made her own +by her courage in saving his life. + +All she thought of--the essence of her tremors, her flushes of heat, and +her shudders of cold--was the question how to get hold of that knife, +the mark and sign of stalking death. A tremor of impatience to clutch +the frightful thing, glimpsed once and unforgettable, agitated her +hands. + +The instinctive flinging forward of these hands stopped Ricardo dead +short between the door and her chair, with the ready obedience of a +conquered man who can bide his time. Her success disconcerted her. She +listened to the man's impassioned transports of terrible eulogy and even +more awful declarations of love. She was even able to meet his eyes, +oblique, apt to glide away, throwing feral gleams of desire. + +“No!” he was saying, after a fiery outpouring of words in which the most +ferocious phrases of love were mingled with wooing accents of entreaty. +“I will have no more of it! Don't you mistrust me. I am sober in my +talk. Feel how quietly my heart beats. Ten times today when you, you, +you, swam in my eye, I thought it would burst one of my ribs or leap +out of my throat. It has knocked itself dead and tired, waiting for this +evening, for this very minute. And now it can do no more. Feel how quiet +it is!” + +He made a step forward, but she raised her clear voice commandingly: + +“No nearer!” + +He stopped with a smile of imbecile worship on his lips, and with the +delighted obedience of a man who could at any moment seize her in his +hands and dash her to the ground. + +“Ah! If I had taken you by the throat this morning and had my way with +you, I should never have known what you are. And now I do. You are a +wonder! And so am I, in my way. I have nerve, and I have brains, too. +We should have been lost many times but for me. I plan--I plot for my +gentleman. Gentleman--pah! I am sick of him. And you are sick of yours, +eh? You, you!” + +He shook all over; he cooed at her a string of endearing names, obscene +and tender, and then asked abruptly: + +“Why don't you speak to me?” + +“It's my part to listen,” she said, giving him an inscrutable smile, +with a flush on her cheek and her lips cold as ice. + +“But you will answer me?” + +“Yes,” she said, her eyes dilated as if with sudden interest. + +“Where's that plunder? Do you know?” + +“No! Not yet.” + +“But there is plunder stowed somewhere that's worth having?” + +“Yes, I think so. But who knows?” she added after a pause. + +“And who cares?” he retorted recklessly. “I've had enough of this +crawling on my belly. It's you who are my treasure. It's I who found you +out where a gentleman had buried you to rot for his accursed pleasure!” + +He looked behind him and all around for a seat, then turned to her his +troubled eyes and dim smile. + +“I am dog-tired,” he said, and sat down on the floor. “I went tired this +morning, since I came in here and started talking to you--as tired as if +I had been pouring my life-blood here on these planks for you to dabble +your white feet in.” + +Unmoved, she nodded at him thoughtfully. Woman-like, all her faculties +remained concentrated on her heart's desire--on the knife--while the man +went on babbling insanely at her feet, ingratiating and savage, almost +crazy with elation. But he, too, was holding on to his purpose. + +“For you! For you I will throw away money, lives--all the lives but +mine! What you want is a man, a master that will let you put the heel of +your shoe on his neck; not that skulker, who will get tired of you in a +year--and you of him. And then what? You are not the one to sit still; +neither am I. I live for myself, and you shall live for yourself, +too--not for a Swedish baron. They make a convenience of people like you +and me. A gentleman is better than an employer, but an equal partnership +against all the 'yporcrits is the thing for you and me. We'll go on +wandering the world over, you and I both free and both true. You are no +cage bird. We'll rove together, for we are of them that have no homes. +We are born rovers!” + +She listened to him with the utmost attention, as if any unexpected +word might give her some sort of opening to get that dagger, that awful +knife--to disarm murder itself, pleading for her love at her feet. Again +she nodded at him thoughtfully, rousing a gleam in his yellow eyes, +yearning devotedly upon her face. When he hitched himself a little +closer, her soul had no movement of recoil. This had to be. Anything +had to be which would bring the knife within her reach. He talked more +confidentially now. + +“We have met, and their time has come,” he began, looking up into her +eyes. “The partnership between me and my gentleman has to be ripped up. +There's no room for him where we two are. Why, he would shoot me like a +dog! Don't you worry. This will settle it not later than tonight!” + +He tapped his folded leg below the knee, and was surprised, flattered, +by the lighting up of her face, which stooped towards him eagerly and +remained expectant, the lips girlishly parted, red in the pale face, and +quivering in the quickened drawing of her breath. + +“You marvel, you miracle, you man's luck and joy--one in a million! No, +the only one. You have found your man in me,” he whispered tremulously. +“Listen! They are having their last talk together; for I'll do for your +gentleman, too, by midnight.” + +Without the slightest tremor she murmured, as soon as the tightening of +her breast had eased off and the words would come: + +“I wouldn't be in too much of a hurry--with him.” + +The pause, the tone, had all the value of meditated advice. + +“Good, thrifty girl!” he laughed low, with a strange feline gaiety, +expressed by the undulating movement of his shoulders and the sparkling +snap of his oblique eyes. “You are still thinking about the chance of +that swag. You'll make a good partner, that you will! And, I say, what a +decoy you will make! Jee-miny!” + +He was carried away for a moment, but his face darkened swiftly. + +“No! No reprieve. What do you think a fellow is--a scarecrow? All hat +and clothes and no feeling, no inside, no brain to make fancies for +himself? No!” he went on violently. “Never in his life will he go again +into that room of yours--never any more!” + +A silence fell. He was gloomy with the torment of his jealousy, and did +not even look at her. She sat up and slowly, gradually, bent lower and +lower over him, as if ready to fall into his arms. He looked up at last, +and checked this droop unwittingly. + +“Say! You, who are up to fighting a man with your bare hands, could +you--eh?--could you manage to stick one with a thing like that knife of +mine?” + +She opened her eyes very wide and gave him a wild smile. + +“How can I tell?” she whispered enchantingly. “Will you let me have a +look at it?” + +Without taking his eyes from her face, he pulled the knife out of its +sheath--a short, broad, cruel double-edged blade with a bone handle--and +only then looked down at it. + +“A good friend,” he said simply. “Take it in your hand and feel the +balance,” he suggested. + +At the moment when she bent forward to receive it from him, there was +a flash of fire in her mysterious eyes--a red gleam in the white mist +which wrapped the promptings and longings of her soul. She had done it! +The very sting of death was in her hands, the venom of the viper in her +paradise, extracted, safe in her possession--and the viper's head all +but lying under her heel. Ricardo, stretched on the mats of the floor, +crept closer and closer to the chair in which she sat. + +All her thoughts were busy planning how to keep possession of that +weapon which had seemed to have drawn into itself every danger and +menace on the death-ridden earth. She said with a low laugh, the +exultation in which he failed to recognize: + +“I didn't think that you would ever trust me with that thing!” + +“Why not?” + +“For fear I should suddenly strike you with it.” + +“What for? For this morning's work? Oh, no! There's no spite in you for +that. You forgave me. You saved me. You got the better of me, too. And +anyhow, what good would it be?” + +“No, no good,” she admitted. + +In her heart she felt that she would not know how to do it; that if it +came to a struggle, she would have to drop the dagger and fight with her +hands. + +“Listen. When we are going about the world together, you shall always +call me husband. Do you hear?” + +“Yes,” she said bracing herself for the contest, in whatever shape it +was coming. + +The knife was lying in her lap. She let it slip into the fold of her +dress, and laid her forearms with clasped fingers over her knees, which +she pressed desperately together. The dreaded thing was out of sight at +last. She felt a dampness break out all over her. + +“I am not going to hide you, like that good-for-nothing, finicky, sneery +gentleman. You shall be my pride and my chum. Isn't that better than +rotting on an island for the pleasure of a gentleman, till he gives you +the chuck?” + +“I'll be anything you like,” she said. + +In his intoxication he crept closer with every word she uttered, with +every movement she made. + +“Give your foot,” he begged in a timid murmur, and in the full +consciousness of his power. + +Anything! Anything to keep murder quiet and disarmed till strength had +returned to her limbs and she could make up her mind what to do. Her +fortitude had been shaken by the very facility of success that had come +to her. She advanced her foot forward a little from under the hem of her +skirt; and he threw himself on it greedily. She was not even aware of +him. She had thought of the forest, to which she had been told to run. +Yes, the forest--that was the place for her to carry off the terrible +spoil, the sting of vanquished death. Ricardo, clasping her ankle, +pressed his lips time after time to the instep, muttering gasping words +that were like sobs, making little noises that resembled the sounds of +grief and distress. Unheard by them both, the thunder growled distantly +with angry modulations of it's tremendous voice, while the world outside +shuddered incessantly around the dead stillness of the room where the +framed profile of Heyst's father looked severely into space. + +Suddenly Ricardo felt himself spurned by the foot he had been +cherishing--spurned with a push of such violence into the very hollow of +his throat that it swung him back instantly into an upright position on +his knees. He read his danger in the stony eyes of the girl; and in +the very act of leaping to his feet he heard sharply, detached on the +comminatory voice of the storm the brief report of a shot which half +stunned him, in the manner of a blow. He turned his burning head, and +saw Heyst towering in the doorway. The thought that the beggar had +started to prance darted through his mind. For a fraction of a second +his distracted eyes sought for his weapon all over the floor. He +couldn't see it. + +“Stick him, you!” he called hoarsely to the girl, and dashed headlong +for the door of the compound. + +While he thus obeyed the instinct of self-preservation, his reason was +telling him that he could not possibly reach it alive. It flew open, +however, with a crash, before his launched weight, and instantly he +swung it to behind him. There, his shoulder leaning against it, his +hands clinging to the handle, dazed and alone in the night full of +shudders and muttered menaces, he tried to pull himself together. He +asked himself if he had been shot at more than once. His shoulder was +wet with the blood trickling from his head. Feeling above his ear, he +ascertained that it was only a graze, but the shock of the surprise had +unmanned him for the moment. + +What the deuce was the governor about to let the beggar break loose like +this? Or--was the governor dead, perhaps? + +The silence within the room awed him. Of going back there could be no +question. + +“But she knows how to take care of her self,” he muttered. + +She had his knife. It was she now who was deadly, while he was disarmed, +no good for the moment. He stole away from the door, staggering, the +warm trickle running down his neck, to find out what had become of the +governor and to provide himself with a firearm from the armoury in the +trunks. + + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +Mr Jones, after firing his shot over Heyst's shoulder, had thought it +proper to dodge away. Like the spectre he was, he noiselessly vanished +from the veranda. Heyst stumbled into the room and looked around. All +the objects in there--the books, portrait on the wall--seemed shadowy, +unsubstantial, the dumb accomplices of an amazing dream-plot ending in +an illusory effect of awakening and the impossibility of ever closing +his eyes again. With dread he forced himself to look at the girl. Still +in the chair, she was leaning forward far over her knees, and had hidden +her face in her hands. Heyst remembered Wang suddenly. How clear all +this was--and how extremely amusing! Very. + +She sat up a little, then leaned back, and taking her hands from her +face, pressed both of them to her breast as if moved to the heart by +seeing him there looking at her with a black, horror-struck curiosity. +He would have pitied her, if the triumphant expression of her face had +not given him a shock which destroyed the balance of his feelings. She +spoke with an accent of wild joy: + +“I knew you would come back in time! You are safe now. I have done it! +I would never, never have let him--” Her voice died out, while her eyes +shone at him as when the sun breaks through a mist. “Never get it back. +Oh, my beloved!” + +He bowed his head gravely, and said in his polite. Heystian tone: + +“No doubt you acted from instinct. Women have been provided with their +own weapon. I was a disarmed man, I have been a disarmed man all my life +as I see it now. You may glory in your resourcefulness and your profound +knowledge of yourself; but I may say that the other attitude, suggestive +of shame, had its charm. For you are full of charm!” + +The exultation vanished from her face. + +“You mustn't make fun of me now. I know no shame. I was thanking God +with all my sinful heart for having been able to do it--for giving you +to me in that way--oh, my beloved--all my own at last!” + +He stared as if mad. Timidly she tried to excuse herself for disobeying +his directions for her safety. Every modulation of her enchanting voice +cut deep into his very breast, so that he could hardly understand the +words for the sheer pain of it. He turned his back on her; but a sudden +drop, an extraordinary faltering of her tone, made him spin round. On +her white neck her pale head dropped as in a cruel drought a withered +flower droops on its stalk. He caught his breath, looked at her closely, +and seemed to read some awful intelligence in her eyes. At the moment +when her eyelids fell as if smitten from above by an the gleam of +old silver familiar to him from boyhood, the very invisible power, he +snatched her up bodily out of the chair, and disregarding an unexpected +metallic clatter on the floor, carried her off into the other room. The +limpness of her body frightened him. Laying her down on the bed, he +ran out again, seized a four-branched candlestick on the table, and ran +back, tearing down with a furious jerk the curtain that swung stupidly +in his way, but after putting the candlestick on the table by the bed, +he remained absolutely idle. There did not seem anything more for him +to do. Holding his chin in his hand he looked down intently at her still +face. + +“Has she been stabbed with this thing?” asked Davidson, whom suddenly he +saw standing by his side and holding up Ricardo's dagger to his sight. +Heyst uttered no word of recognition or surprise. He gave Davidson only +a dumb look of unutterable awe, then, as if possessed with a sudden +fury, started tearing open the front of the girls dress. She remained +insensible under his hands, and Heyst let out a groan which made +Davidson shudder inwardly the heavy plaint of a man who falls clubbed in +the dark. + +They stood side by side, looking mournfully at the little black hole +made by Mr. Jones's bullet under the swelling breast of a dazzling and +as it were sacred whiteness. It rose and fell slightly--so slightly that +only the eyes of the lover could detect the faint stir of life. Heyst, +calm and utterly unlike himself in the face, moving about noiselessly, +prepared a wet cloth, and laid it on the insignificant wound, +round which there was hardly a trace of blood to mar the charm, the +fascination, of that mortal flesh. + +Her eyelids fluttered. She looked drowsily about, serene, as if fatigued +only by the exertions of her tremendous victory, capturing the very +sting of death in the service of love. But her eyes became very +wide awake when they caught sight of Ricardo's dagger, the spoil of +vanquished death, which Davidson was still holding, unconsciously. + +“Give it to me,” she said. “It's mine.” + +Davidson put the symbol of her victory into her feeble hands extended to +him with the innocent gesture of a child reaching eagerly for a toy. + +“For you,” she gasped, turning her eyes to Heyst. “Kill nobody.” + +“No,” said Heyst, taking the dagger and laying it gently on her breast, +while her hands fell powerless by her side. + +The faint smile on her deep-cut lips waned, and her head sank deep into +the pillow, taking on the majestic pallor and immobility of marble. +But over the muscles, which seemed set in their transfigured beauty for +ever, passed a slight and awful tremor. With an amazing strength she +asked loudly: + +“What's the matter with me?” + +“You have been shot, dear Lena,” Heyst said in a steady voice, while +Davidson, at the question, turned away and leaned his forehead against +the post of the foot of the bed. + +“Shot? I did think, too, that something had struck me.” + +Over Samburan the thunder had ceased to growl at last, and the world of +material forms shuddered no more under the emerging stars. The spirit +of the girl which was passing away from under them clung to her triumph +convinced of the reality of her victory over death. + +“No more,” she muttered. “There will be no more! Oh, my beloved,” she +cried weakly, “I've saved you! Why don't you take me into your arms and +carry me out of this lonely place?” + +Heyst bent low over her, cursing his fastidious soul, which even at that +moment kept the true cry of love from his lips in its infernal mistrust +of all life. He dared not touch her and she had no longer the strength +to throw her arms about his neck. + +“Who else could have done this for you?” she whispered gloriously. + +“No one in the world,” he answered her in a murmur of unconcealed +despair. + +She tried to raise herself, but all she could do was to lift her head +a little from the pillow. With a terrible and gentle movement, Heyst +hastened to slip his arm under her neck. She felt relieved at once of +an intolerable weight, and was content to surrender to him the infinite +weariness of her tremendous achievement. Exulting, she saw herself +extended on the bed, in a black dress, and profoundly at peace, while, +stooping over her with a kindly, playful smile, he was ready to lift +her up in his firm arms and take her into the sanctuary of his innermost +heart--for ever! The flush of rapture flooding her whole being broke out +in a smile of innocent, girlish happiness; and with that divine radiance +on her lips she breathed her last--triumphant, seeking for his glance in +the shades of death. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + + “Yes, Excellency,” said Davidson in his placid voice; “there are more dead in this affair--more white people, I mean--than have been killed in many of the battles in the last Achin war.” + +Davidson was talking with an Excellency, because what was alluded to in +conversation as “the mystery of Samburan” had caused such a sensation in +the Archipelago that even those in the highest spheres were anxious to +hear something at first hand. Davidson had been summoned to an audience. +It was a high official on his tour. + +“You knew the late Baron Heyst well?” + +“The truth is that nobody out here can boast of having known him well,” + said Davidson. “He was a queer chap. I doubt if he himself knew how +queer he was. But everybody was aware that I was keeping my eye on him +in a friendly way. And that's how I got the warning which made me turn +round in my tracks. In the middle of my trip and steam back to Samburan, +where, I am grieved to say, I arrived too late.” + +Without enlarging very much, Davidson explained to the attentive +Excellency how a woman, the wife of a certain hotel-keeper named +Schomberg, had overheard two card-sharping rascals making inquiries from +her husband as to the exact position of the island. She caught only a +few words referring to the neighbouring volcano, but there were enough +to arouse her suspicions--“which,” went on Davidson, “she imparted to +me, your Excellency. They were only too well founded!” + +“That was very clever of her,” remarked the great man. + +“She's much cleverer than people have any conception of,” said Davidson. + +But he refrained from disclosing to the Excellency the real cause which +had sharpened Mrs. Schomberg's wits. The poor woman was in mortal terror +of the girl being brought back within reach of her infatuated Wilhelm. +Davidson only said that her agitation had impressed him; but he +confessed that while going back, he began to have his doubts as to there +being anything in it. + +“I steamed into one of those silly thunderstorms that hang about the +volcano, and had some trouble in making the island,” narrated Davidson. +“I had to grope my way dead slow into Diamond Bay. I don't suppose that +anybody, even if looking out for me, could have heard me let go the +anchor.” + +He admitted that he ought to have gone ashore at once; but everything +was perfectly dark and absolutely quiet. He felt ashamed of his +impulsiveness. What a fool he would have looked, waking up a man in the +middle of the night just to ask him if he was all right! And then the +girl being there, he feared that Heyst would look upon his visit as an +unwarrantable intrusion. + +The first intimation he had of there being anything wrong was a big +white boat, adrift, with the dead body of a very hairy man inside, +bumping against the bows of his steamer. Then indeed he lost no time in +going ashore--alone, of course, from motives of delicacy. + +“I arrived in time to see that poor girl die, as I have told your +Excellency,” pursued Davidson. “I won't tell you what a time I had with +him afterwards. He talked to me. His father seems to have been a crank, +and to have upset his head when he was young. He was a queer chap. +Practically the last words he said to me, as we came out on the veranda, +were: + +“'Ah, Davidson, woe to the man whose heart has not learned while young +to hope, to love--and to put its trust in life!' + +“As we stood there, just before I left him, for he said he wanted to be +alone with his dead for a time, we heard a snarly sort of voice near the +bushes by the shore calling out: + +“'Is that you, governor?' + +“'Yes, it's me.' + +“'Jeeminy! I thought the beggar had done for you. He has started +prancing and nearly had me. I have been dodging around, looking for you +ever since.' + +“'Well, here I am,' suddenly screamed the other voice, and then a shot +rang out. + +“'This time he has not missed him,' Heyst said to me bitterly, and went +back into the house. + +“I returned on board as he had insisted I should do. I didn't want +to intrude on his grief. Later, about five in the morning, some of my +calashes came running to me, yelling that there was a fire ashore. I +landed at once, of course. The principal bungalow was blazing. The +heat drove us back. The other two houses caught one after another like +kindling-wood. There was no going beyond the shore end of the jetty till +the afternoon.” + +Davidson sighed placidly. + +“I suppose you are certain that Baron Heyst is dead?” + +“He is--ashes, your Excellency,” said Davidson, wheezing a little; “he +and the girl together. I suppose he couldn't stand his thoughts before +her dead body--and fire purifies everything. That Chinaman of whom I +told your Excellency helped me to investigate next day, when the +embers got cooled a little. We found enough to be sure. He's not a bad +Chinaman. He told me that he had followed Heyst and the girl through the +forest from pity, and partly out of curiosity. He watched the house till +he saw Heyst go out, after dinner, and Ricardo come back alone. While he +was dodging there, it occurred to him that he had better cast the boat +adrift, for fear those scoundrels should come round by water and bombard +the village from the sea with their revolvers and Winchesters. He judged +that they were devils enough for anything. So he walked down the wharf +quietly; and as he got into the boat, to cast her off, that hairy man +who, it seems, was dozing in her, jumped up growling, and Wang shot him +dead. Then he shoved the boat off as far as he could and went away.” + +There was a pause. Presently Davidson went on, in his tranquil manner: + +“Let Heaven look after what has been purified. The wind and rain will +take care of the ashes. The carcass of that follower, secretary, or +whatever the unclean ruffian called himself, I left where it lay, to +swell and rot in the sun. His principal had shot him neatly through the +head. Then, apparently, this Jones went down to the wharf to look for +the boat and for the hairy man. I suppose he tumbled into the water by +accident--or perhaps not by accident. The boat and the man were gone, +and the scoundrel saw himself alone, his game clearly up, and fairly +trapped. Who knows? The water's very clear there, and I could see him +huddled up on the bottom, between two piles, like a heap of bones in a +blue silk bag, with only the head and the feet sticking out. Wang was +very pleased when he discovered him. That made everything safe, he said, +and he went at once over the hill to fetch his Alfuro woman back to the +hut.” + +Davidson took out his handkerchief to wipe the perspiration off his +forehead. + +“And then, your Excellency, I went away. There was nothing to be done +there.” + +“Clearly!” assented the Excellency. + +Davidson, thoughtful, seemed to weigh the matter in his mind, and then +murmured with placid sadness: + +“Nothing!” + +October 1912--May 1914 + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Victory, by Joseph Conrad + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VICTORY *** + +***** This file should be named 6378-0-h.htm or 6378-0-h.zip ***** This and +all associated files of various formats will be found in: http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/7/6378/ + +Produced by Tracy Camp and David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be +renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one +owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and +you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission +and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in +the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and +distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the +PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a +registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, +unless you receive specific permission. If you do not charge anything +for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You +may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative +works, reports, performances and research. They may be modified and +printed and given away--you may do practically ANYTHING with public +domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license, +especially commercial redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU +DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project +Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full +Project Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree +to and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all the +terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy all +copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be used +on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who agree +to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few things that +you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works even without +complying with the full terms of this agreement. See paragraph 1.C +below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement and help +preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. +See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the Foundation” + or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in +the collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you +are located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent +you from copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating +derivative works based on the work as long as all references to Project +Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the +Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic +works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with +the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name +associated with the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this +agreement by keeping this work in the same format with its attached +full Project Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with +others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing +or creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase “Project +Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost +no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use +it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this +eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work with +the phrase “Project Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, +you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through +1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute +this electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other +than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official +version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site +(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense +to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means +of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain +Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the full +Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing access +to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, “Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.” + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth +in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from both the +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael Hart, the +owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the Foundation as +set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm collection. +Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, and the +medium on which they may be stored, may contain “Defects,” such as, but +not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription +errors, a copyright or other intellectual property infringement, a +defective or damaged disk or other medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right +of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal fees. +YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, +BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE PROVIDED IN +PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE TRADEMARK OWNER, AND +ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR +ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES +EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a defect +in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a written +explanation to the person you received the work from. If you received +the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with your +written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with the +defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, +the trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will remain +freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure and +permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. To +learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and +how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 and the +Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the state +of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal Revenue +Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification number +is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, +email business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official page +at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide spread +public support and donations to carry out its mission of increasing +the number of public domain and licensed works that can be freely +distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest array +of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations ($1 to +$5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt status with +the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND +DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state +visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make any +statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from outside +the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other ways +including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To donate, +please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. unless +a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily keep eBooks +in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, including +how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to subscribe to +our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + + diff --git a/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.zip b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..513f48d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-0.zip diff --git a/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h.zip b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..83d57ee --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h.zip diff --git a/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h/6378-h.htm b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h/6378-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..82b71c6 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378-h/6378-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,16670 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Victory: an Island Tale, by Joseph Conrad + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Victory, by Joseph Conrad + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Victory + +Author: Joseph Conrad + +Release Date: January 9, 2006 [EBook #6378] +Last Updated: March 2, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VICTORY *** + + + + +Produced by Tracy Camp and David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h1> + <a href="#linkmain">VICTORY: AN ISLAND TALE</a> + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Joseph Conrad + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p class="toc"> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> AUTHOR'S NOTE </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART1"> <big><b>PART ONE</b></big> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER ONE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER TWO </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER THREE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER FOUR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER FIVE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER SIX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER SEVEN </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART2"> <big><b>PART TWO</b></big> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER ONE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER TWO </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER THREE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER FOUR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER FIVE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER SIX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER SEVEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER EIGHT </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART3"> <big><b>PART THREE</b></big> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER ONE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER TWO </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER THREE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER FOUR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER FIVE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER SIX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER SEVEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER EIGHT </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER NINE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER TEN </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PART4"> <big><b>PART FOUR</b></big> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER ONE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER TWO </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER THREE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER FOUR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER FIVE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0031"> CHAPTER SIX </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0032"> CHAPTER SEVEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0033"> CHAPTER EIGHT </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0034"> CHAPTER NINE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0035"> CHAPTER TEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0036"> CHAPTER ELEVEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0037"> CHAPTER TWELVE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0038"> CHAPTER THIRTEEN </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0039"> CHAPTER FOURTEEN </a> + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION + </h2> + <p> + The last word of this novel was written on 29 May 1914. And that last word + was the single word of the title. + </p> + <p> + Those were the times of peace. Now that the moment of publication + approaches I have been considering the discretion of altering the + title-page. The word “Victory” the shining and tragic goal of noble + effort, appeared too great, too august, to stand at the head of a mere + novel. There was also the possibility of falling under the suspicion of + commercial astuteness deceiving the public into the belief that the book + had something to do with war. + </p> + <p> + Of that, however, I was not afraid very much. What influenced my decision + most were the obscure promptings of that pagan residuum of awe and wonder + which lurks still at the bottom of our old humanity. “Victory” was the + last word I had written in peace-time. It was the last literary thought + which had occurred to me before the doors of the Temple of Janus flying + open with a crash shook the minds, the hearts, the consciences of men all + over the world. Such coincidence could not be treated lightly. And I made + up my mind to let the word stand, in the same hopeful spirit in which some + simple citizen of Old Rome would have “accepted the Omen.” + </p> + <p> + The second point on which I wish to offer a remark is the existence (in + the novel) of a person named Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + That I believe him to be true goes without saying. I am not likely to + offer pinchbeck wares to my public consciously. Schomberg is an old member + of my company. A very subordinate personage in Lord Jim as far back as the + year 1899, he became notably active in a certain short story of mine + published in 1902. Here he appears in a still larger part, true to life (I + hope), but also true to himself. Only, in this instance, his deeper + passions come into play, and thus his grotesque psychology is completed at + last. + </p> + <p> + I don't pretend to say that this is the entire Teutonic psychology; but it + is indubitably the psychology of a Teuton. My object in mentioning him + here is to bring out the fact that, far from being the incarnation of + recent animosities, he is the creature of my old deep-seated, and, as it + were, impartial conviction. + </p> + <p> + J. C. <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + AUTHOR'S NOTE + </h2> + <p> + On approaching the task of writing this Note for Victory, the first thing + I am conscious of is the actual nearness of the book, its nearness to me + personally, to the vanished mood in which it was written, and to the mixed + feelings aroused by the critical notices the book obtained when first + published almost exactly a year after the beginning of the war. The + writing of it was finished in 1914 long before the murder of an Austrian + Archduke sounded the first note of warning for a world already full of + doubts and fears. + </p> + <p> + The contemporaneous very short Author's Note which is preserved in this + edition bears sufficient witness to the feelings with which I consented to + the publication of the book. The fact of the book having been published in + the United States early in the year made it difficult to delay its + appearance in England any longer. It came out in the thirteenth month of + the war, and my conscience was troubled by the awful incongruity of + throwing this bit of imagined drama into the welter of reality, tragic + enough in all conscience, but even more cruel than tragic and more + inspiring than cruel. It seemed awfully presumptuous to think there would + be eyes to spare for those pages in a community which in the crash of the + big guns and in the din of brave words expressing the truth of an + indomitable faith could not but feel the edge of a sharp knife at its + throat. + </p> + <p> + The unchanging Man of history is wonderfully adaptable both by his power + of endurance and in his capacity for detachment. The fact seems to be that + the play of his destiny is too great for his fears and too mysterious for + his understanding. Were the trump of the Last Judgement to sound suddenly + on a working day the musician at his piano would go on with his + performance of Beethoven's sonata and the cobbler at his stall stick to + his last in undisturbed confidence in the virtues of the leather. And with + perfect propriety. For what are we to let ourselves be disturbed by an + angel's vengeful music too mighty for our ears and too awful for our + terrors? Thus it happens to us to be struck suddenly by the lightning of + wrath. The reader will go on reading if the book pleases him and the + critic will go on criticizing with that faculty of detachment born perhaps + from a sense of infinite littleness and which is yet the only faculty that + seems to assimilate man to the immortal gods. + </p> + <p> + It is only when the catastrophe matches the natural obscurity of our fate + that even the best representative of the race is liable to lose his + detachment. It is very obvious that on the arrival of the gentlemanly Mr. + Jones, the single-minded Ricardo, and the faithful Pedro, Heyst, the man + of universal detachment, loses his mental self-possession, that fine + attitude before the universally irremediable which wears the name of + stoicism. It is all a matter of proportion. There should have been a + remedy for that sort of thing. And yet there is no remedy. Behind this + minute instance of life's hazards Heyst sees the power of blind destiny. + Besides, Heyst in his fine detachment had lost the habit of asserting + himself. I don't mean the courage of self-assertion, either moral or + physical, but the mere way of it, the trick of the thing, the readiness of + mind and the turn of the hand that come without reflection and lead the + man to excellence in life, in art, in crime, in virtue, and, for the + matter of that, even in love. Thinking is the great enemy of perfection. + The habit of profound reflection, I am compelled to say, is the most + pernicious of all the habits formed by the civilized man. + </p> + <p> + But I wouldn't be suspected even remotely of making fun of Axel Heyst. I + have always liked him. The flesh-and-blood individual who stands behind + the infinitely more familiar figure of the book I remember as a mysterious + Swede right enough. Whether he was a baron, too, I am not so certain. He + himself never laid claim to that distinction. His detachment was too great + to make any claims, big or small, on one's credulity. I will not say where + I met him because I fear to give my readers a wrong impression, since a + marked incongruity between a man and his surroundings is often a very + misleading circumstance. We became very friendly for a time, and I would + not like to expose him to unpleasant suspicions though, personally, I am + sure he would have been indifferent to suspicions as he was indifferent to + all the other disadvantages of life. He was not the whole Heyst of course; + he is only the physical and moral foundation of my Heyst laid on the + ground of a short acquaintance. That it was short was certainly not my + fault for he had charmed me by the mere amenity of his detachment which, + in this case, I cannot help thinking he had carried to excess. He went + away from his rooms without leaving a trace. I wondered where he had gone + to—but now I know. He vanished from my ken only to drift into this + adventure that, unavoidable, waited for him in a world which he persisted + in looking upon as a malevolent shadow spinning in the sunlight. Often in + the course of years an expressed sentiment, the particular sense of a + phrase heard casually, would recall him to my mind so that I have fastened + on to him many words heard on other men's lips and belonging to other + men's less perfect, less pathetic moods. + </p> + <p> + The same observation will apply mutatis mutandis to Mr. Jones, who is + built on a much slenderer connection. Mr. Jones (or whatever his name was) + did not drift away from me. He turned his back on me and walked out of the + room. It was in a little hotel in the island of St. Thomas in the West + Indies (in the year '75) where we found him one hot afternoon extended on + three chairs, all alone in the loud buzzing of flies to which his + immobility and his cadaverous aspect gave a most gruesome significance. + Our invasion must have displeased him because he got off the chairs + brusquely and walked out, leaving with me an indelibly weird impression of + his thin shanks. One of the men with me said that the fellow was the most + desperate gambler he had ever come across. I said: “A professional + sharper?” and got for an answer: “He's a terror; but I must say that up to + a certain point he will play fair. . . .” I wonder what the point was. I + never saw him again because I believe he went straight on board a + mail-boat which left within the hour for other ports of call in the + direction of Aspinall. Mr. Jones's characteristic insolence belongs to + another man of a quite different type. I will say nothing as to the + origins of his mentality because I don't intend to make any damaging + admissions. + </p> + <p> + It so happened that the very same year Ricardo—the physical Ricardo—was + a fellow passenger of mine on board an extremely small and extremely dirty + little schooner, during a four days' passage between two places in the + Gulf of Mexico whose names don't matter. For the most part he lay on deck + aft as it were at my feet, and raising himself from time to time on his + elbow would talk about himself and go on talking, not exactly to me or + even at me (he would not even look up but kept his eyes fixed on the deck) + but more as if communing in a low voice with his familiar devil. Now and + then he would give me a glance and make the hairs of his stiff little + moustache stir quaintly. His eyes were green and every cat I see to this + day reminds me of the exact contour of his face. What he was travelling + for or what was his business in life he never confided to me. Truth to + say, the only passenger on board that schooner who could have talked + openly about his activities and purposes was a very snuffy and + conversationally delightful friar, the superior of a convent, attended by + a very young lay brother, of a particularly ferocious countenance. We had + with us also, lying prostrate in the dark and unspeakable cuddy of that + schooner, an old Spanish gentleman, owner of much luggage and, as Ricardo + assured me, very ill indeed. Ricardo seemed to be either a servant or the + confidant of that aged and distinguished-looking invalid, who early on the + passage held a long murmured conversation with the friar, and after that + did nothing but groan feebly, smoke cigarettes, and now and then call for + Martin in a voice full of pain. Then he who had become Ricardo in the book + would go below into that beastly and noisome hole, remain there + mysteriously, and coming up on deck again with a face on which nothing + could be read, would as likely as not resume for my edification the + exposition of his moral attitude towards life illustrated by striking + particular instances of the most atrocious complexion. Did he mean to + frighten me? Or seduce me? Or astonish me? Or arouse my admiration? All he + did was to arouse my amused incredulity. As scoundrels go he was far from + being a bore. For the rest my innocence was so great then that I could not + take his philosophy seriously. All the time he kept one ear turned to the + cuddy in the manner of a devoted servant, but I had the idea that in some + way or other he had imposed the connection on the invalid for some end of + his own. The reader, therefore, won't be surprised to hear that one + morning I was told without any particular emotion by the padrone of the + schooner that the “rich man” down there was dead: He had died in the + night. I don't remember ever being so moved by the desolate end of a + complete stranger. I looked down the skylight, and there was the devoted + Martin busy cording cowhide trunks belonging to the deceased whose white + beard and hooked nose were the only parts I could make out in the dark + depths of a horrible stuffy bunk. + </p> + <p> + As it fell calm in the course of the afternoon and continued calm during + all that night and the terrible, flaming day, the late “rich man” had to + be thrown overboard at sunset, though as a matter of fact we were in sight + of the low pestilential mangrove-lined coast of our destination. The + excellent Father Superior mentioned to me with an air of immense + commiseration: “The poor man has left a young daughter.” Who was to look + after her I don't know, but I saw the devoted Martin taking the trunks + ashore with great care just before I landed myself. I would perhaps have + tracked the ways of that man of immense sincerity for a little while, but + I had some of my own very pressing business to attend to, which in the end + got mixed up with an earthquake and so I had no time to give to Ricardo. + The reader need not be told that I have not forgotten him, though. + </p> + <p> + My contact with the faithful Pedro was much shorter and my observation of + him was less complete but incomparably more anxious. It ended in a sudden + inspiration to get out of his way. It was in a hovel of sticks and mats by + the side of a path. As I went in there only to ask for a bottle of + lemonade I have not to this day the slightest idea what in my appearance + or actions could have roused his terrible ire. It became manifest to me + less than two minutes after I had set eyes on him for the first time, and + though immensely surprised of course I didn't stop to think it out I took + the nearest short cut—through the wall. This bestial apparition and + a certain enormous buck nigger encountered in Haiti only a couple of + months afterwards, have fixed my conception of blind, furious, unreasoning + rage, as manifested in the human animal, to the end of my days. Of the + nigger I used to dream for years afterwards. Of Pedro never. The + impression was less vivid. I got away from him too quickly. + </p> + <p> + It seems to me but natural that those three buried in a corner of my + memory should suddenly get out into the light of the world—so + natural that I offer no excuse for their existence, They were there, they + had to come out; and this is a sufficient excuse for a writer of tales who + had taken to his trade without preparation, or premeditation, and without + any moral intention but that which pervades the whole scheme of this world + of senses. + </p> + <p> + Since this Note is mostly concerned with personal contacts and the origins + of the persons in the tale, I am bound also to speak of Lena, because if I + were to leave her out it would look like a slight; and nothing would be + further from my thoughts than putting a slight on Lena. If of all the + personages involved in the “mystery of Samburan” I have lived longest with + Heyst (or with him I call Heyst) it was at her, whom I call Lena, that I + have looked the longest and with a most sustained attention. This + attention originated in idleness for which I have a natural talent. One + evening I wandered into a cafe, in a town not of the tropics but of the + South of France. It was filled with tobacco smoke, the hum of voices, the + rattling of dominoes, and the sounds of strident music. The orchestra was + rather smaller than the one that performed at Schomberg's hotel, had the + air more of a family party than of an enlisted band, and, I must confess, + seemed rather more respectable than the Zangiacomo musical enterprise. It + was less pretentious also, more homely and familiar, so to speak, insomuch + that in the intervals when all the performers left the platform one of + them went amongst the marble tables collecting offerings of sous and + francs in a battered tin receptacle recalling the shape of a sauceboat. It + was a girl. Her detachment from her task seems to me now to have equalled + or even surpassed Heyst's aloofness from all the mental degradations to + which a man's intelligence is exposed in its way through life. Silent and + wide-eyed she went from table to table with the air of a sleep-walker and + with no other sound but the slight rattle of the coins to attract + attention. It was long after the sea-chapter of my life had been closed + but it is difficult to discard completely the characteristics of half a + lifetime, and it was in something of the Jack-ashore spirit that I dropped + a five-franc piece into the sauceboat; whereupon the sleep-walker turned + her head to gaze at me and said “Merci, Monsieur” in a tone in which there + was no gratitude but only surprise. I must have been idle indeed to take + the trouble to remark on such slight evidence that the voice was very + charming and when the performers resumed their seats I shifted my position + slightly in order not to have that particular performer hidden from me by + the little man with the beard who conducted, and who might for all I know + have been her father, but whose real mission in life was to be a model for + the Zangiacomo of Victory. Having got a clear line of sight I naturally + (being idle) continued to look at the girl through all the second part of + the programme. The shape of her dark head inclined over the violin was + fascinating, and, while resting between the pieces of that interminable + programme she was, in her white dress and with her brown hands reposing in + her lap, the very image of dreamy innocence. The mature, bad-tempered + woman at the piano might have been her mother, though there was not the + slightest resemblance between them. All I am certain of in their personal + relation to each other is that cruel pinch on the upper part of the arm. + That I am sure I have seen! There could be no mistake. I was in too idle a + mood to imagine such a gratuitous barbarity. It may have been playfulness, + yet the girl jumped up as if she had been stung by a wasp. It may have + been playfulness. Yet I saw plainly poor “dreamy innocence” rub gently the + affected place as she filed off with the other performers down the middle + aisle between the marble tables in the uproar of voices, the rattling of + dominoes through a blue atmosphere of tobacco smoke. I believe that those + people left the town next day. + </p> + <p> + Or perhaps they had only migrated to the other big cafe, on the other side + of the Place de la Comedie. It is very possible. I did not go across to + find out. It was my perfect idleness that had invested the girl with a + peculiar charm, and I did not want to destroy it by any superfluous + exertion. The receptivity of my indolence made the impression so permanent + that when the moment came for her meeting with Heyst I felt that she would + be heroically equal to every demand of the risky and uncertain future. I + was so convinced of it that I let her go with Heyst, I won't say without a + pang but certainly without misgivings. And in view of her triumphant end + what more could I have done for her rehabilitation and her happiness? + </p> + <p> + 1920. J. C. <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART1" id="link2H_PART1"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> <br /> <br /> <a name="linkmain" id="linkmain"></a> + <br /> + </p> + <h1> + VICTORY: AN ISLAND TALE + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + PART ONE + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER ONE + </h2> + <p> + There is, as every schoolboy knows in this scientific age, a very close + chemical relation between coal and diamonds. It is the reason, I believe, + why some people allude to coal as “black diamonds.” Both these commodities + represent wealth; but coal is a much less portable form of property. There + is, from that point of view, a deplorable lack of concentration in coal. + Now, if a coal-mine could be put into one's waistcoat pocket—but it + can't! At the same time, there is a fascination in coal, the supreme + commodity of the age in which we are camped like bewildered travellers in + a garish, unrestful hotel. And I suppose those two considerations, the + practical and the mystical, prevented Heyst—Axel Heyst—from + going away. + </p> + <p> + The Tropical Belt Coal Company went into liquidation. The world of finance + is a mysterious world in which, incredible as the fact may appear, + evaporation precedes liquidation. First the capital evaporates, and then + the company goes into liquidation. These are very unnatural physics, but + they account for the persistent inertia of Heyst, at which we “out there” + used to laugh among ourselves—but not inimically. An inert body can + do no harm to anyone, provokes no hostility, is scarcely worth derision. + It may, indeed, be in the way sometimes; but this could not be said of + Axel Heyst. He was out of everybody's way, as if he were perched on the + highest peak of the Himalayas, and in a sense as conspicuous. Everyone in + that part of the world knew of him, dwelling on his little island. An + island is but the top of a mountain. Axel Heyst, perched on it immovably, + was surrounded, instead of the imponderable stormy and transparent ocean + of air merging into infinity, by a tepid, shallow sea; a passionless + offshoot of the great waters which embrace the continents of this globe. + His most frequent visitors were shadows, the shadows of clouds, relieving + the monotony of the inanimate, brooding sunshine of the tropics. His + nearest neighbour—I am speaking now of things showing some sort of + animation—was an indolent volcano which smoked faintly all day with + its head just above the northern horizon, and at night levelled at him, + from amongst the clear stars, a dull red glow, expanding and collapsing + spasmodically like the end of a gigantic cigar puffed at intermittently in + the dark. Axel Heyst was also a smoker; and when he lounged out on his + veranda with his cheroot, the last thing before going to bed, he made in + the night the same sort of glow and of the same size as that other one so + many miles away. + </p> + <p> + In a sense, the volcano was company to him in the shades of the night—which + were often too thick, one would think, to let a breath of air through. + There was seldom enough wind to blow a feather along. On most evenings of + the year Heyst could have sat outside with a naked candle to read one of + the books left him by his late father. It was not a mean store. But he + never did that. Afraid of mosquitoes, very likely. Neither was he ever + tempted by the silence to address any casual remarks to the companion glow + of the volcano. He was not mad. Queer chap—yes, that may have been + said, and in fact was said; but there is a tremendous difference between + the two, you will allow. + </p> + <p> + On the nights of full moon the silence around Samburan—the “Round + Island” of the charts—was dazzling; and in the flood of cold light + Heyst could see his immediate surroundings, which had the aspect of an + abandoned settlement invaded by the jungle: vague roofs above low + vegetation, broken shadows of bamboo fences in the sheen of long grass, + something like an overgrown bit of road slanting among ragged thickets + towards the shore only a couple of hundred yards away, with a black jetty + and a mound of some sort, quite inky on its unlighted side. But the most + conspicuous object was a gigantic blackboard raised on two posts and + presenting to Heyst, when the moon got over that side, the white letters + “T. B. C. Co.” in a row at least two feet high. These were the initials of + the Tropical Belt Coal Company, his employers—his late employers, to + be precise. + </p> + <p> + According to the unnatural mysteries of the financial world, the T. B. C. + Company's capital having evaporated in the course of two years, the + company went into liquidation—forced, I believe, not voluntary. + There was nothing forcible in the process, however. It was slow; and while + the liquidation—in London and Amsterdam—pursued its languid + course, Axel Heyst, styled in the prospectus “manager in the tropics,” + remained at his post on Samburan, the No. 1 coaling-station of the + company. + </p> + <p> + And it was not merely a coaling-station. There was a coal-mine there, with + an outcrop in the hillside less than five hundred yards from the rickety + wharf and the imposing blackboard. The company's object had been to get + hold of all the outcrops on tropical islands and exploit them locally. + And, Lord knows, there were any amount of outcrops. It was Heyst who had + located most of them in this part of the tropical belt during his rather + aimless wanderings, and being a ready letter-writer had written pages and + pages about them to his friends in Europe. At least, so it was said. + </p> + <p> + We doubted whether he had any visions of wealth—for himself, at any + rate. What he seemed mostly concerned for was the “stride forward,” as he + expressed it, in the general organization of the universe, apparently. He + was heard by more than a hundred persons in the islands talking of a + “great stride forward for these regions.” The convinced wave of the hand + which accompanied the phrase suggested tropical distances being impelled + onward. In connection with the finished courtesy of his manner, it was + persuasive, or at any rate silencing—for a time, at least. Nobody + cared to argue with him when he talked in this strain. His earnestness + could do no harm to anybody. There was no danger of anyone taking + seriously his dream of tropical coal, so what was the use of hurting his + feelings? + </p> + <p> + Thus reasoned men in reputable business offices where he had his entree as + a person who came out East with letters of introduction—and modest + letters of credit, too—some years before these coal-outcrops began + to crop up in his playfully courteous talk. From the first there was some + difficulty in making him out. He was not a traveller. A traveller arrives + and departs, goes on somewhere. Heyst did not depart. I met a man once—the + manager of the branch of the Oriental Banking Corporation in Malacca—to + whom Heyst exclaimed, in no connection with anything in particular (it was + in the billiard-room of the club): + </p> + <p> + “I am enchanted with these islands!” + </p> + <p> + He shot it out suddenly, a propos des bottes, as the French say, and while + chalking his cue. And perhaps it was some sort of enchantment. There are + more spells than your commonplace magicians ever dreamed of. + </p> + <p> + Roughly speaking, a circle with a radius of eight hundred miles drawn + round a point in North Borneo was in Heyst's case a magic circle. It just + touched Manila, and he had been seen there. It just touched Saigon, and he + was likewise seen there once. Perhaps these were his attempts to break + out. If so, they were failures. The enchantment must have been an + unbreakable one. The manager—the man who heard the exclamation—had + been so impressed by the tone, fervour, rapture, what you will, or perhaps + by the incongruity of it that he had related the experience to more than + one person. + </p> + <p> + “Queer chap, that Swede,” was his only comment; but this is the origin of + the name “Enchanted Heyst” which some fellows fastened on our man. + </p> + <p> + He also had other names. In his early years, long before he got so + becomingly bald on the top, he went to present a letter of introduction to + Mr. Tesman of Tesman Brothers, a Sourabaya firm—tip-top house. Well, + Mr. Tesman was a kindly, benevolent old gentleman. He did not know what to + make of that caller. After telling him that they wished to render his stay + among the islands as pleasant as possible, and that they were ready to + assist him in his plans, and so on, and after receiving Heyst's thanks—you + know the usual kind of conversation—he proceeded to query in a slow, + paternal tone: + </p> + <p> + “And you are interested in—?” + </p> + <p> + “Facts,” broke in Heyst in his courtly voice. “There's nothing worth + knowing but facts. Hard facts! Facts alone, Mr. Tesman.” + </p> + <p> + I don't know if old Tesman agreed with him or not, but he must have spoken + about it, because, for a time, our man got the name of “Hard Facts.” He + had the singular good fortune that his sayings stuck to him and became + part of his name. Thereafter he mooned about the Java Sea in some of the + Tesmans' trading schooners, and then vanished, on board an Arab ship, in + the direction of New Guinea. He remained so long in that outlying part of + his enchanted circle that he was nearly forgotten before he swam into view + again in a native proa full of Goram vagabonds, burnt black by the sun, + very lean, his hair much thinned, and a portfolio of sketches under his + arm. He showed these willingly, but was very reserved as to anything else. + He had had an “amusing time,” he said. A man who will go to New Guinea for + fun—well! + </p> + <p> + Later, years afterwards, when the last vestiges of youth had gone off his + face and all the hair off the top of his head, and his red-gold pair of + horizontal moustaches had grown to really noble proportions, a certain + disreputable white man fastened upon him an epithet. Putting down with a + shaking hand a long glass emptied of its contents—paid for by Heyst—he + said, with that deliberate sagacity which no mere water-drinker ever + attained: + </p> + <p> + “Heyst's a puffect g'n'lman. Puffect! But he's a ut-uto-utopist.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst had just gone out of the place of public refreshment where this + pronouncement was voiced. Utopist, eh? Upon my word, the only thing I + heard him say which might have had a bearing on the point was his + invitation to old McNab himself. Turning with that finished courtesy of + attitude, movement voice, which was his obvious characteristic, he had + said with delicate playfulness: + </p> + <p> + “Come along and quench your thirst with us, Mr. McNab!” + </p> + <p> + Perhaps that was it. A man who could propose, even playfully, to quench + old McNab's thirst must have been a utopist, a pursuer of chimeras; for of + downright irony Heyst was not prodigal. And, may be, this was the reason + why he was generally liked. At that epoch in his life, in the fulness of + his physical development, of a broad, martial presence, with his bald head + and long moustaches, he resembled the portraits of Charles XII., of + adventurous memory. However, there was no reason to think that Heyst was + in any way a fighting man. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TWO + </h2> + <p> + It was about this time that Heyst became associated with Morrison on terms + about which people were in doubt. Some said he was a partner, others said + he was a sort of paying guest, but the real truth of the matter was more + complex. One day Heyst turned up in Timor. Why in Timor, of all places in + the world, no one knows. Well, he was mooning about Delli, that highly + pestilential place, possibly in search of some undiscovered facts, when he + came in the street upon Morrison, who, in his way, was also an “enchanted” + man. When you spoke to Morrison of going home—he was from + Dorsetshire—he shuddered. He said it was dark and wet there; that it + was like living with your head and shoulders in a moist gunny-bag. That + was only his exaggerated style of talking. Morrison was “one of us.” He + was owner and master of the Capricorn, trading brig, and was understood to + be doing well with her, except for the drawback of too much altruism. He + was the dearly beloved friend of a quantity of God-forsaken villages up + dark creeks and obscure bays, where he traded for produce. He would often + sail, through awfully dangerous channels up to some miserable settlement, + only to find a very hungry population clamorous for rice, and without so + much “produce” between them as would have filled Morrison's suitcase. Amid + general rejoicings, he would land the rice all the same, explain to the + people that it was an advance, that they were in debt to him now; would + preach to them energy and industry, and make an elaborate note in a + pocket-diary which he always carried; and this would be the end of that + transaction. I don't know if Morrison thought so, but the villagers had no + doubt whatever about it. Whenever a coast village sighted the brig it + would begin to beat all its gongs and hoist all its streamers, and all its + girls would put flowers in their hair and the crowd would line the river + bank, and Morrison would beam and glitter at all this excitement through + his single eyeglass with an air of intense gratification. He was tall and + lantern-jawed, and clean-shaven, and looked like a barrister who had + thrown his wig to the dogs. + </p> + <p> + We used to remonstrate with him: + </p> + <p> + “You will never see any of your advances if you go on like this, + Morrison.” + </p> + <p> + He would put on a knowing air. + </p> + <p> + “I shall squeeze them yet some day—never you fear. And that reminds + me”—pulling out his inseparable pocketbook—“there's that + So-and-So village. They are pretty well off again; I may just as well + squeeze them to begin with.” + </p> + <p> + He would make a ferocious entry in the pocketbook. + </p> + <p> + Memo: Squeeze the So-and-So village at the first time of calling. + </p> + <p> + Then he would stick the pencil back and snap the elastic on with + inflexible finality; but he never began the squeezing. Some men grumbled + at him. He was spoiling the trade. Well, perhaps to a certain extent; not + much. Most of the places he traded with were unknown not only to geography + but also to the traders' special lore which is transmitted by word of + mouth, without ostentation, and forms the stock of mysterious local + knowledge. It was hinted also that Morrison had a wife in each and every + one of them, but the majority of us repulsed these innuendoes with + indignation. He was a true humanitarian and rather ascetic than otherwise. + </p> + <p> + When Heyst met him in Delli, Morrison was walking along the street, his + eyeglass tossed over his shoulder, his head down, with the hopeless aspect + of those hardened tramps one sees on our roads trudging from workhouse to + workhouse. Being hailed on the street he looked up with a wild worried + expression. He was really in trouble. He had come the week before into + Delli and the Portuguese authorities, on some pretence of irregularity in + his papers, had inflicted a fine upon him and had arrested his brig. + </p> + <p> + Morrison never had any spare cash in hand. With his system of trading it + would have been strange if he had; and all these debts entered in the + pocketbook weren't good enough to raise a millrei on—let alone a + shilling. The Portuguese officials begged him not to distress himself. + They gave him a week's grace, and then proposed to sell the brig at + auction. This meant ruin for Morrison; and when Heyst hailed him across + the street in his usual courtly tone, the week was nearly out. + </p> + <p> + Heyst crossed over, and said with a slight bow, and in the manner of a + prince addressing another prince on a private occasion: + </p> + <p> + “What an unexpected pleasure. Would you have any objection to drink + something with me in that infamous wine-shop over there? The sun is really + too strong to talk in the street.” + </p> + <p> + The haggard Morrison followed obediently into a sombre, cool hovel which + he would have distained to enter at any other time. He was distracted. He + did not know what he was doing. You could have led him over the edge of a + precipice just as easily as into that wine-shop. He sat down like an + automaton. He was speechless, but he saw a glass full of rough red wine + before him, and emptied it. Heyst meantime, politely watchful, had taken a + seat opposite. + </p> + <p> + “You are in for a bout of fever, I fear,” he said sympathetically. + </p> + <p> + Poor Morrison's tongue was loosened at that. + </p> + <p> + “Fever!” he cried. “Give me fever. Give me plague. They are diseases. One + gets over them. But I am being murdered. I am being murdered by the + Portuguese. The gang here downed me at last among them. I am to have my + throat cut the day after tomorrow.” + </p> + <p> + In the face of this passion Heyst made, with his eyebrows, a slight motion + of surprise which would not have been misplaced in a drawing-room. + Morrison's despairing reserve had broken down. He had been wandering with + a dry throat all over that miserable town of mud hovels, silent, with no + soul to turn to in his distress, and positively maddened by his thoughts; + and suddenly he had stumbled on a white man, figuratively and actually + white—for Morrison refused to accept the racial whiteness of the + Portuguese officials. He let himself go for the mere relief of violent + speech, his elbows planted on the table, his eyes blood-shot, his voice + nearly gone, the brim of his round pith hat shading an unshaven, livid + face. His white clothes, which he had not taken off for three days, were + dingy. He had already gone to the bad, past redemption. The sight was + shocking to Heyst; but he let nothing of it appear in his bearing, + concealing his impression under that consummate good-society manner of + his. Polite attention, what's due from one gentleman listening to another, + was what he showed; and, as usual, it was catching; so that Morrison + pulled himself together and finished his narrative in a conversational + tone, with a man-of-the-world air. + </p> + <p> + “It's a villainous plot. Unluckily, one is helpless. That scoundrel + Cousinho—Andreas, you know—has been coveting the brig for + years. Naturally, I would never sell. She is not only my livelihood; she's + my life. So he has hatched this pretty little plot with the chief of the + customs. The sale, of course, will be a farce. There's no one here to bid. + He will get the brig for a song—no, not even that—a line of a + song. You have been some years now in the islands, Heyst. You know us all; + you have seen how we live. Now you shall have the opportunity to see how + some of us end; for it is the end, for me. I can't deceive myself any + longer. You see it—don't you?” + </p> + <p> + Morrison had pulled himself together, but one felt the snapping strain on + his recovered self-possession. Heyst was beginning to say that he “could + very well see all the bearings of this unfortunate—” when Morrison + interrupted him jerkily. + </p> + <p> + “Upon my word, I don't know why I have been telling you all this. I + suppose seeing a thoroughly white man made it impossible to keep my + trouble to myself. Words can't do it justice; but since I've told you so + much I may as well tell you more. Listen. This morning on board, in my + cabin I went down on my knees and prayed for help. I went down on my + knees!” + </p> + <p> + “You are a believer, Morrison?” asked Heyst with a distinct note of + respect. + </p> + <p> + “Surely I am not an infidel.” + </p> + <p> + Morrison was swiftly reproachful in his answer, and there came a pause, + Morrison perhaps interrogating his conscience, and Heyst preserving a mien + of unperturbed, polite interest. + </p> + <p> + “I prayed like a child, of course. I believe in children praying—well, + women, too, but I rather think God expects men to be more self-reliant. I + don't hold with a man everlastingly bothering the Almighty with his silly + troubles. It seems such cheek. Anyhow, this morning I—I have never + done any harm to any God's creature knowingly—I prayed. A sudden + impulse—I went flop on my knees; so you may judge—” + </p> + <p> + They were gazing earnestly into each other's eyes. Poor Morrison added, as + a discouraging afterthought: + </p> + <p> + “Only this is such a God-forsaken spot.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst inquired with a delicate intonation whether he might know the amount + for which the brig was seized. + </p> + <p> + Morrison suppressed an oath, and named curtly a sum which was in itself so + insignificant that any other person than Heyst would have exclaimed at it. + And even Heyst could hardly keep incredulity out of his politely modulated + voice as he asked if it was a fact that Morrison had not that amount in + hand. + </p> + <p> + Morrison hadn't. He had only a little English gold, a few sovereigns, on + board. He had left all his spare cash with the Tesmans, in Samarang, to + meet certain bills which would fall due while he was away on his cruise. + Anyhow, that money would not have been any more good to him than if it had + been in the innermost depths of the infernal regions. He said all this + brusquely. He looked with sudden disfavour at that noble forehead, at + those great martial moustaches, at the tired eyes of the man sitting + opposite him. Who the devil was he? What was he, Morrison, doing there, + talking like this? Morrison knew no more of Heyst than the rest of us + trading in the Archipelago did. Had the Swede suddenly risen and hit him + on the nose, he could not have been taken more aback than when this + stranger, this nondescript wanderer, said with a little bow across the + table: + </p> + <p> + “Oh! If that's the case I would be very happy if you'd allow me to be of + use!” + </p> + <p> + Morrison didn't understand. This was one of those things that don't happen—unheard + of things. He had no real inkling of what it meant, till Heyst said + definitely: + </p> + <p> + “I can lend you the amount.” + </p> + <p> + “You have the money?” whispered Morrison. “Do you mean here, in your + pocket?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, on me. Glad to be of use.” + </p> + <p> + Morrison, staring open-mouthed, groped over his shoulder for the cord of + the eyeglass hanging down his back. When he found it, he stuck it in his + eye hastily. It was as if he expected Heyst's usual white suit of the + tropics to change into a shining garment, flowing down to his toes, and a + pair of great dazzling wings to sprout out on the Swede's shoulders—and + didn't want to miss a single detail of the transformation. But if Heyst + was an angel from on high, sent in answer to prayer, he did not betray his + heavenly origin by outward signs. So, instead of going on his knees, as he + felt inclined to do, Morrison stretched out his hand, which Heyst grasped + with formal alacrity and a polite murmur in which “Trifle—delighted—of + service,” could just be distinguished. + </p> + <p> + “Miracles do happen,” thought the awestruck Morrison. To him, as to all of + us in the Islands, this wandering Heyst, who didn't toil or spin visibly, + seemed the very last person to be the agent of Providence in an affair + concerned with money. The fact of his turning up in Timor or anywhere else + was no more wonderful than the settling of a sparrow on one's window-sill + at any given moment. But that he should carry a sum of money in his pocket + seemed somehow inconceivable. + </p> + <p> + So inconceivable that as they were trudging together through the sand of + the roadway to the custom-house—another mud hovel—to pay the + fine, Morrison broke into a cold sweat, stopped short, and exclaimed in + faltering accents: + </p> + <p> + “I say! You aren't joking, Heyst?” + </p> + <p> + “Joking!” Heyst's blue eyes went hard as he turned them on the discomposed + Morrison. “In what way, may I ask?” he continued with austere politeness. + </p> + <p> + Morrison was abashed. + </p> + <p> + “Forgive me, Heyst. You must have been sent by God in answer to my prayer. + But I have been nearly off my chump for three days with worry; and it + suddenly struck me: 'What if it's the Devil who has sent him?'” + </p> + <p> + “I have no connection with the supernatural,” said Heyst graciously, + moving on. “Nobody has sent me. I just happened along.” + </p> + <p> + “I know better,” contradicted Morrison. “I may be unworthy, but I have + been heard. I know it. I feel it. For why should you offer—” + </p> + <p> + Heyst inclined his head, as from respect for a conviction in which he + could not share. But he stuck to his point by muttering that in the + presence of an odious fact like this, it was natural— + </p> + <p> + Later in the day, the fine paid, and the two of them on board the brig, + from which the guard had been removed, Morrison who, besides, being a + gentleman was also an honest fellow began to talk about repayment. He knew + very well his inability to lay by any sum of money. It was partly the + fault of circumstances and partly of his temperament; and it would have + been very difficult to apportion the responsibility between the two. Even + Morrison himself could not say, while confessing to the fact. With a + worried air he ascribed it to fatality: + </p> + <p> + “I don't know how it is that I've never been able to save. It's some sort + of curse. There's always a bill or two to meet.” + </p> + <p> + He plunged his hand into his pocket for the famous notebook so well known + in the islands, the fetish of his hopes, and fluttered the pages + feverishly. + </p> + <p> + “And yet—look,” he went on. “There it is—more than five + thousand dollars owing. Surely that's something.” + </p> + <p> + He ceased suddenly. Heyst, who had been all the time trying to look as + unconcerned as he could, made reassuring noises in his throat. But + Morrison was not only honest. He was honourable, too; and on this + stressful day, before this amazing emissary of Providence and in the + revulsion of his feelings, he made his great renunciation. He cast off the + abiding illusion of his existence. + </p> + <p> + “No. No. They are not good. I'll never be able to squeeze them. Never. + I've been saying for years I would, but I give it up. I never really + believed I could. Don't reckon on that, Heyst. I have robbed you.” + </p> + <p> + Poor Morrison actually laid his head on the cabin table, and remained in + that crushed attitude while Heyst talked to him soothingly with the utmost + courtesy. The Swede was as much distressed as Morrison; for he understood + the other's feelings perfectly. No decent feeling was ever scorned by + Heyst. But he was incapable of outward cordiality of manner, and he felt + acutely his defect. Consummate politeness is not the right tonic for an + emotional collapse. They must have had, both of them, a fairly painful + time of it in the cabin of the brig. In the end Morrison, casting + desperately for an idea in the blackness of his despondency, hit upon the + notion of inviting Heyst to travel with him in his brig and have a share + in his trading ventures up to the amount of his loan. + </p> + <p> + It is characteristic of Heyst's unattached, floating existence that he was + in a position to accept this proposal. There is no reason to think that he + wanted particularly just then to go poking aboard the brig into all the + holes and corners of the Archipelago where Morrison picked up most of his + trade. Far from it; but he would have consented to almost any arrangement + in order to put an end to the harrowing scene in the cabin. There was at + once a great transformation act: Morrison raising his diminished head, and + sticking the glass in his eye to look affectionately at Heyst, a bottle + being uncorked, and so on. It was agreed that nothing should be said to + anyone of this transaction. Morrison, you understand, was not proud of the + episode, and he was afraid of being unmercifully chaffed. + </p> + <p> + “An old bird like me! To let myself be trapped by those damned Portuguese + rascals! I should never hear the last of it. We must keep it dark.” + </p> + <p> + From quite other motives, among which his native delicacy was the + principal, Heyst was even more anxious to bind himself to silence. A + gentleman would naturally shrink from the part of heavenly messenger that + Morrison would force upon him. It made Heyst uncomfortable, as it was. And + perhaps he did not care that it should be known that he had some means, + whatever they might have been—sufficient, at any rate, to enable him + to lend money to people. These two had a duet down there, like + conspirators in a comic opera, of “Sh—ssh, shssh! Secrecy! Secrecy!” + It must have been funny, because they were very serious about it. + </p> + <p> + And for a time the conspiracy was successful in so far that we all + concluded that Heyst was boarding with the good-natured—some said: + sponging on the imbecile—Morrison, in his brig. But you know how it + is with all such mysteries. There is always a leak somewhere. Morrison + himself, not a perfect vessel by any means, was bursting with gratitude, + and under the stress he must have let out something vague—enough to + give the island gossip a chance. And you know how kindly the world is in + its comments on what it does not understand. A rumour sprang out that + Heyst, having obtained some mysterious hold on Morrison, had fastened + himself on him and was sucking him dry. Those who had traced these mutters + back to their origin were very careful not to believe them. The + originator, it seems, was a certain Schomberg, a big, manly, bearded + creature of the Teutonic persuasion, with an ungovernable tongue which + surely must have worked on a pivot. Whether he was a Lieutenant of the + Reserve, as he declared, I don't know. Out there he was by profession a + hotel-keeper, first in Bangkok, then somewhere else, and ultimately in + Sourabaya. He dragged after him up and down that section of the tropical + belt a silent, frightened, little woman with long ringlets, who smiled at + one stupidly, showing a blue tooth. I don't know why so many of us + patronized his various establishments. He was a noxious ass, and he + satisfied his lust for silly gossip at the cost of his customers. It was + he who, one evening, as Morrison and Heyst went past the hotel—they + were not his regular patrons—whispered mysteriously to the mixed + company assembled on the veranda: + </p> + <p> + “The spider and the fly just gone by, gentlemen.” Then, very important and + confidential, his thick paw at the side of his mouth: “We are among + ourselves; well, gentlemen, all I can say is, don't you ever get mixed up + with that Swede. Don't you ever get caught in his web.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER THREE + </h2> + <p> + Human nature being what it is, having a silly side to it as well as a mean + side, there were not a few who pretended to be indignant on no better + authority than a general propensity to believe every evil report; and a + good many others who found it simply funny to call Heyst the Spider—behind + his back, of course. He was as serenely unconscious of this as of his + several other nicknames. But soon people found other things to say of + Heyst; not long afterwards he came very much to the fore in larger + affairs. He blossomed out into something definite. He filled the public + eye as the manager on the spot of the Tropical Belt Coal Company with + offices in London and Amsterdam, and other things about it that sounded + and looked grandiose. The offices in the two capitals may have consisted—and + probably did—of one room in each; but at that distance, out East + there, all this had an air. We were more puzzled than dazzled, it is true; + but even the most sober-minded among us began to think that there was + something in it. The Tesmans appointed agents, a contract for government + mail-boats secured, the era of steam beginning for the islands—a + great stride forward—Heyst's stride! + </p> + <p> + And all this sprang from the meeting of the cornered Morrison and of the + wandering Heyst, which may or may not have been the direct outcome of a + prayer. Morrison was not an imbecile, but he seemed to have got himself + into a state of remarkable haziness as to his exact position towards + Heyst. For, if Heyst had been sent with money in his pocket by a direct + decree of the Almighty in answer to Morrison's prayer then there was no + reason for special gratitude, since obviously he could not help himself. + But Morrison believed both, in the efficacy of prayer and in the infinite + goodness of Heyst. He thanked God with awed sincerity for his mercy, and + could not thank Heyst enough for the service rendered as between man and + man. In this (highly creditable) tangle of strong feelings Morrison's + gratitude insisted on Heyst's partnership in the great discovery. + Ultimately we heard that Morrison had gone home through the Suez Canal in + order to push the magnificent coal idea personally in London. He parted + from his brig and disappeared from our ken; but we heard that he had + written a letter or letters to Heyst, saying that London was cold and + gloomy; that he did not like either the men or things, that he was “as + lonely as a crow in a strange country.” In truth, he pined after the + Capricorn—I don't mean only the tropic; I mean the ship too. Finally + he went into Dorsetshire to see his people, caught a bad cold, and died + with extraordinary precipitation in the bosom of his appalled family. + Whether his exertions in the City of London had enfeebled his vitality I + don't know; but I believe it was this visit which put life into the coal + idea. Be it as it may, the Tropical Belt Coal Company was born very + shortly after Morrison, the victim of gratitude and his native climate, + had gone to join his forefathers in a Dorsetshire churchyard. + </p> + <p> + Heyst was immensely shocked. He got the news in the Moluccas through the + Tesmans, and then disappeared for a time. It appears that he stayed with a + Dutch government doctor in Amboyna, a friend of his who looked after him + for a bit in his bungalow. He became visible again rather suddenly, his + eyes sunk in his head, and with a sort of guarded attitude, as if afraid + someone would reproach him with the death of Morrison. + </p> + <p> + Naive Heyst! As if anybody would . . . Nobody amongst us had any interest + in men who went home. They were all right; they did not count any more. + Going to Europe was nearly as final as going to Heaven. It removed a man + from the world of hazard and adventure. + </p> + <p> + As a matter of fact, many of us did not hear of this death till months + afterwards—from Schomberg, who disliked Heyst gratuitously and made + up a piece of sinister whispered gossip: + </p> + <p> + “That's what comes of having anything to do with that fellow. He squeezes + you dry like a lemon, then chucks you out—sends you home to die. + Take warning by Morrison!” + </p> + <p> + Of course, we laughed at the innkeeper's suggestions of black mystery. + Several of us heard that Heyst was prepared to go to Europe himself, to + push on his coal enterprise personally; but he never went. It wasn't + necessary. The company was formed without him, and his nomination of + manager in the tropics came out to him by post. + </p> + <p> + From the first he had selected Samburan, or Round Island, for the central + station. Some copies of the prospectus issued in Europe, having found + their way out East, were passed from hand to hand. We greatly admired the + map which accompanied them for the edification of the shareholders. On it + Samburan was represented as the central spot of the Eastern Hemisphere + with its name engraved in enormous capitals. Heavy lines radiated from it + in all directions through the tropics, figuring a mysterious and effective + star—lines of influence or lines of distance, or something of that + sort. Company promoters have an imagination of their own. There's no more + romantic temperament on earth than the temperament of a company promoter. + Engineers came out, coolies were imported, bungalows were put up on + Samburan, a gallery driven into the hillside, and actually some coal got + out. + </p> + <p> + These manifestations shook the soberest minds. For a time everybody in the + islands was talking of the Tropical Belt Coal, and even those who smiled + quietly to themselves were only hiding their uneasiness. Oh, yes; it had + come, and anybody could see what would be the consequences—the end + of the individual trader, smothered under a great invasion of steamers. We + could not afford to buy steamers. Not we. And Heyst was the manager. + </p> + <p> + “You know, Heyst, enchanted Heyst.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, come! He has been no better than a loafer around here as far back as + any of us can remember.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, he said he was looking for facts. Well, he's got hold of one that + will do for all of us,” commented a bitter voice. + </p> + <p> + “That's what they call development—and be hanged to it!” muttered + another. + </p> + <p> + Never was Heyst talked about so much in the tropical belt before. + </p> + <p> + “Isn't he a Swedish baron or something?” + </p> + <p> + “He, a baron? Get along with you!” + </p> + <p> + For my part I haven't the slightest doubt that he was. While he was still + drifting amongst the islands, enigmatical and disregarded like an + insignificant ghost, he told me so himself on a certain occasion. It was a + long time before he materialized in this alarming way into the destroyer + of our little industry—Heyst the Enemy. + </p> + <p> + It became the fashion with a good many to speak of Heyst as the Enemy. He + was very concrete, very visible now. He was rushing all over the + Archipelago, jumping in and out of local mail-packets as if they had been + tram-cars, here, there, and everywhere—organizing with all his + might. This was no mooning about. This was business. And this sudden + display of purposeful energy shook the incredulity of the most sceptical + more than any scientific demonstration of the value of these coal-outcrops + could have done. It was impressive. Schomberg was the only one who + resisted the infection. Big, manly in a portly style, and profusely + bearded, with a glass of beer in his thick paw, he would approach some + table where the topic of the hour was being discussed, would listen for a + moment, and then come out with his invariable declaration: + </p> + <p> + “All this is very well, gentlemen; but he can't throw any of his coal-dust + in my eyes. There's nothing in it. Why, there can't be anything in it. A + fellow like that for manager? Phoo!” + </p> + <p> + Was it the clairvoyance of imbecile hatred, or mere stupid tenacity of + opinion, which ends sometimes by scoring against the world in a most + astonishing manner? Most of us can remember instances of triumphant folly; + and that ass Schomberg triumphed. The T.B.C. Company went into + liquidation, as I began by telling you. The Tesmans washed their hands of + it. The Government cancelled those famous contracts, the talk died out, + and presently it was remarked here and there that Heyst had faded + completely away. He had become invisible, as in those early days when he + used to make a bolt clear out of sight in his attempts to break away from + the enchantment of “these isles,” either in the direction of New Guinea or + in the direction of Saigon—to cannibals or to cafes. The enchanted + Heyst! Had he at last broken the spell? Had he died? We were too + indifferent to wonder overmuch. You see we had on the whole liked him well + enough. And liking is not sufficient to keep going the interest one takes + in a human being. With hatred, apparently, it is otherwise. Schomberg + couldn't forget Heyst. The keen, manly Teutonic creature was a good hater. + A fool often is. + </p> + <p> + “Good evening, gentlemen. Have you got everything you want? So! Good! You + see? What was I always telling you? Aha! There was nothing in it. I knew + it. But what I would like to know is what became of that—Swede.” + </p> + <p> + He put a stress on the word Swede as if it meant scoundrel. He detested + Scandinavians generally. Why? Goodness only knows. A fool like that is + unfathomable. He continued: + </p> + <p> + “It's five months or more since I have spoken to anybody who has seen + him.” + </p> + <p> + As I have said, we were not much interested; but Schomberg, of course, + could not understand that. He was grotesquely dense. Whenever three people + came together in his hotel, he took good care that Heyst should be with + them. + </p> + <p> + “I hope the fellow did not go and drown himself,” he would add with a + comical earnestness that ought to have made us shudder; only our crowd was + superficial, and did not apprehend the psychology of this pious hope. + </p> + <p> + “Why? Heyst isn't in debt to you for drinks is he?” somebody asked him + once with shallow scorn. + </p> + <p> + “Drinks! Oh, dear no!” + </p> + <p> + The innkeeper was not mercenary. Teutonic temperament seldom is. But he + put on a sinister expression to tell us that Heyst had not paid perhaps + three visits altogether to his “establishment.” This was Heyst's crime, + for which Schomberg wished him nothing less than a long and tormented + existence. Observe the Teutonic sense of proportion and nice forgiving + temper. + </p> + <p> + At last, one afternoon, Schomberg was seen approaching a group of his + customers. He was obviously in high glee. He squared his manly chest with + great importance. + </p> + <p> + “Gentlemen, I have news of him. Who? why, that Swede. He is still on + Samburan. He's never been away from it. The company is gone, the engineers + are gone, the clerks are gone, the coolies are gone, everything's gone; + but there he sticks. Captain Davidson, coming by from the westward, saw + him with his own eyes. Something white on the wharf, so he steamed in and + went ashore in a small boat. Heyst, right enough. Put a book into his + pocket, always very polite. Been strolling on the wharf and reading. 'I + remain in possession here,' he told Captain Davidson. What I want to know + is what he gets to eat there. A piece of dried fish now and then—what? + That's coming down pretty low for a man who turned up his nose at my table + d'hote!” + </p> + <p> + He winked with immense malice. A bell started ringing, and he led the way + to the dining-room as if into a temple, very grave, with the air of a + benefactor of mankind. His ambition was to feed it at a profitable price, + and his delight was to talk of it behind its back. It was very + characteristic of him to gloat over the idea of Heyst having nothing + decent to eat. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FOUR + </h2> + <p> + A few of us who were sufficiently interested went to Davidson for details. + These were not many. He told us that he passed to the north of Samburan on + purpose to see what was going on. At first, it looked as if that side of + the island had been altogether abandoned. This was what he expected. + Presently, above the dense mass of vegetation that Samburan presents to + view, he saw the head of the flagstaff without a flag. Then, while + steaming across the slight indentation which for a time was known + officially as Black Diamond Bay, he made out with his glass the white + figure on the coaling-wharf. It could be no one but Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “I thought for certain he wanted to be taken off, so I steamed in. He made + no signs. However, I lowered a boat. I could not see another living being + anywhere. Yes. He had a book in his hand. He looked exactly as we have + always seen him—very neat, white shoes, cork helmet. He explained to + me that he had always had a taste for solitude. It was the first I ever + heard of it, I told him. He only smiled. What could I say? He isn't the + sort of man one can speak familiarly to. There's something in him. One + doesn't care to. + </p> + <p> + “'But what's the object? Are you thinking of keeping possession of the + mine?' I asked him. + </p> + <p> + “'Something of the sort,' he says. 'I am keeping hold.' + </p> + <p> + “'But all this is as dead as Julius Caesar,' I cried. 'In fact, you have + nothing worth holding on to, Heyst.' + </p> + <p> + “'Oh, I am done with facts,' says he, putting his hand to his helmet + sharply with one of his short bows.” + </p> + <p> + Thus dismissed, Davidson went on board his ship, swung her out, and as he + was steaming away he watched from the bridge Heyst walking shoreward along + the wharf. He marched into the long grass and vanished—all but the + top of his white cork helmet, which seemed to swim in a green sea. Then + that too disappeared, as if it had sunk into the living depths of the + tropical vegetation, which is more jealous of men's conquests than the + ocean, and which was about to close over the last vestiges of the + liquidated Tropical Belt Coal Company—A. Heyst, manager in the East. + </p> + <p> + Davidson, a good, simple fellow in his way, was strangely affected. It is + to be noted that he knew very little of Heyst. He was one of those whom + Heyst's finished courtesy of attitude and intonation most strongly + disconcerted. He himself was a fellow of fine feeling, I think, though of + course he had no more polish than the rest of us. We were naturally a + hail-fellow-well-met crowd, with standards of our own—no worse, I + daresay, than other people's; but polish was not one of them. Davidson's + fineness was real enough to alter the course of the steamer he commanded. + Instead of passing to the south of Samburan, he made it his practice to + take the passage along the north shore, within about a mile of the wharf. + </p> + <p> + “He can see us if he likes to see us,” remarked Davidson. Then he had an + afterthought: “I say! I hope he won't think I am intruding, eh?” + </p> + <p> + We reassured him on the point of correct behaviour. The sea is open to + all. + </p> + <p> + This slight deviation added some ten miles to Davidson's round trip, but + as that was sixteen hundred miles it did not matter much. + </p> + <p> + “I have told my owner of it,” said the conscientious commander of the + Sissie. + </p> + <p> + His owner had a face like an ancient lemon. He was small and wizened—which + was strange, because generally a Chinaman, as he grows in prosperity, puts + on inches of girth and stature. To serve a Chinese firm is not so bad. + Once they become convinced you deal straight by them, their confidence + becomes unlimited. You can do no wrong. So Davidson's old Chinaman + squeaked hurriedly: + </p> + <p> + “All right, all right, all right. You do what you like, captain—” + </p> + <p> + And there was an end of the matter; not altogether, though. From time to + time the Chinaman used to ask Davidson about the white man. He was still + there, eh? + </p> + <p> + “I never see him,” Davidson had to confess to his owner, who would peer at + him silently through round, horn-rimmed spectacles, several sizes too + large for his little old face. “I never see him.” + </p> + <p> + To me, on occasions he would say: + </p> + <p> + “I haven't a doubt he's there. He hides. It's very unpleasant.” Davidson + was a little vexed with Heyst. “Funny thing,” he went on. “Of all the + people I speak to, nobody ever asks after him but that Chinaman of mine—and + Schomberg,” he added after a while. + </p> + <p> + Yes, Schomberg, of course. He was asking everybody about everything, and + arranging the information into the most scandalous shape his imagination + could invent. From time to time he would step up, his blinking, cushioned + eyes, his thick lips, his very chestnut beard, looking full of malice. + </p> + <p> + “Evening, gentlemen. Have you got all you want? So! Good! Well, I am told + the jungle has choked the very sheds in Black Diamond Bay. Fact. He's a + hermit in the wilderness now. But what can this manager get to eat there? + It beats me.” + </p> + <p> + Sometimes a stranger would inquire with natural curiosity: + </p> + <p> + “Who? What manager?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, a certain Swede,”—with a sinister emphasis, as if he were + saying “a certain brigand.” “Well known here. He's turned hermit from + shame. That's what the devil does when he's found out.” + </p> + <p> + Hermit. This was the latest of the more or less witty labels applied to + Heyst during his aimless pilgrimage in this section of the tropical belt, + where the inane clacking of Schomberg's tongue vexed our ears. + </p> + <p> + But apparently Heyst was not a hermit by temperament. The sight of his + land was not invincibly odious to him. We must believe this, since for + some reason or other he did come out from his retreat for a while. Perhaps + it was only to see whether there were any letters for him at the Tesmans. + I don't know. No one knows. But this reappearance shows that his + detachment from the world was not complete. And incompleteness of any sort + leads to trouble. Axel Heyst ought not to have cared for his letters—or + whatever it was that brought him out after something more than a year and + a half in Samburan. But it was of no use. He had not the hermit's + vocation! That was the trouble, it seems. + </p> + <p> + Be this as it may, he suddenly reappeared in the world, broad chest, bald + forehead, long moustaches, polite manner, and all—the complete + Heyst, even to the kindly sunken eyes on which there still rested the + shadow of Morrison's death. Naturally, it was Davidson who had given him a + lift out of his forsaken island. There were no other opportunities, unless + some native craft were passing by—a very remote and unsatisfactory + chance to wait for. Yes, he came out with Davidson, to whom he volunteered + the statement that it was only for a short time—a few days, no more. + He meant to go back to Samburan. + </p> + <p> + Davidson expressing his horror and incredulity of such foolishness, Heyst + explained that when the company came into being he had his few belongings + sent out from Europe. + </p> + <p> + To Davidson, as to any of us, the idea of Heyst, the wandering drifting, + unattached Heyst, having any belongings of the sort that can furnish a + house was startlingly novel. It was grotesquely fantastic. It was like a + bird owning real property. + </p> + <p> + “Belongings? Do you mean chairs and tables?” Davidson asked with + unconcealed astonishment. + </p> + <p> + Heyst did mean that. “My poor father died in London. It has been all + stored there ever since,” he explained. + </p> + <p> + “For all these years?” exclaimed Davidson, thinking how long we all had + known Heyst flitting from tree to tree in a wilderness. + </p> + <p> + “Even longer,” said Heyst, who had understood very well. + </p> + <p> + This seemed to imply that he had been wandering before he came under our + observation. In what regions? And what early age? Mystery. Perhaps he was + a bird that had never had a nest. + </p> + <p> + “I left school early,” he remarked once to Davidson, on the passage. “It + was in England. A very good school. I was not a shining success there.” + </p> + <p> + The confessions of Heyst. Not one of us—with the probable exception + of Morrison, who was dead—had ever heard so much of his history. It + looks as if the experience of hermit life had the power to loosen one's + tongue, doesn't it? + </p> + <p> + During that memorable passage, in the Sissie, which took about two days, + he volunteered other hints—for you could not call it information—about + his history. And Davidson was interested. He was interested not because + the hints were exciting but because of that innate curiosity about our + fellows which is a trait of human nature. Davidson's existence, too, + running the Sissie along the Java Sea and back again, was distinctly + monotonous and, in a sense, lonely. He never had any sort of company on + board. Native deck-passengers in plenty, of course, but never a white man, + so the presence of Heyst for two days must have been a godsend. Davidson + was telling us all about it afterwards. Heyst said that his father had + written a lot of books. He was a philosopher. + </p> + <p> + “Seems to me he must have been something of a crank, too,” was Davidson's + comment. “Apparently he had quarrelled with his people in Sweden. Just the + sort of father you would expect Heyst to have. Isn't he a bit of a crank + himself? He told me that directly his father died he lit out into the wide + world on his own, and had been on the move till he fetched up against this + famous coal business. Fits the son of the father somehow, don't you + think?” + </p> + <p> + For the rest, Heyst was as polite as ever. He offered to pay for his + passage; but when Davidson refused to hear of it he seized him heartily by + the hand, gave one of his courtly bows, and declared that he was touched + by his friendly proceedings. + </p> + <p> + “I am not alluding to this trifling amount which you decline to take,” he + went on, giving a shake to Davidson's hand. “But I am touched by your + humanity.” Another shake. “Believe me, I am profoundly aware of having + been an object of it.” Final shake of the hand. All this meant that Heyst + understood in a proper sense the little Sissie's periodic appearance in + sight of his hermitage. + </p> + <p> + “He's a genuine gentleman,” Davidson said to us. “I was really sorry when + he went ashore.” + </p> + <p> + We asked him where he had left Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “Why, in Sourabaya—where else?” + </p> + <p> + The Tesmans had their principal counting-house in Sourabaya. There had + long existed a connection between Heyst and the Tesmans. The incongruity + of a hermit having agents did not strike us, nor yet the absurdity of a + forgotten cast-off, derelict manager of a wrecked, collapsed, vanished + enterprise, having business to attend to. We said Sourabaya, of course, + and took it for granted that he would stay with one of the Tesmans. One of + us even wondered what sort of reception he would get; for it was known + that Julius Tesman was unreasonably bitter about the Tropical Belt Coal + fiasco. But Davidson set us right. It was nothing of the kind. Heyst went + to stay in Schomberg's hotel, going ashore in the hotel launch. Not that + Schomberg would think of sending his launch alongside a mere trader like + the Sissie. But she had been meeting a coasting mail-packet, and had been + signalled to. Schomberg himself was steering her. + </p> + <p> + “You should have seen Schomberg's eyes bulge out when Heyst jumped in with + an ancient brown leather bag!” said Davidson. “He pretended not to know + who it was—at first, anyway. I didn't go ashore with them. We didn't + stay more than a couple of hours altogether. Landed two thousand coconuts + and cleared out. I have agreed to pick him up again on my next trip in + twenty days' time.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FIVE + </h2> + <p> + Davidson happened to be two days late on his return trip; no great matter, + certainly, but he made a point of going ashore at once, during the hottest + hour of the afternoon, to look for Heyst. Schomberg's hotel stood back in + an extensive enclosure containing a garden, some large trees, and, under + their spreading boughs, a detached “hall available for concerts and other + performances,” as Schomberg worded it in his advertisements. Torn, and + fluttering bills, intimating in heavy red capitals CONCERTS EVERY NIGHT, + were stuck on the brick pillars on each side of the gateway. + </p> + <p> + The walk had been long and confoundedly sunny. Davidson stood wiping his + wet neck and face on what Schomberg called “the piazza.” Several doors + opened on to it, but all the screens were down. Not a soul was in sight, + not even a China boy—nothing but a lot of painted iron chairs and + tables. Solitude, shade, and gloomy silence—and a faint, treacherous + breeze which came from under the trees and quite unexpectedly caused the + melting Davidson to shiver slightly—the little shiver of the tropics + which in Sourabaya, especially, often means fever and the hospital to the + incautious white man. + </p> + <p> + The prudent Davidson sought shelter in the nearest darkened room. In the + artificial dusk, beyond the levels of shrouded billiard-tables, a white + form heaved up from two chairs on which it had been extended. The middle + of the day, table d'hote tiffin once over, was Schomberg's easy time. He + lounged out, portly, deliberate, on the defensive, the great fair beard + like a cuirass over his manly chest. He did not like Davidson, never a + very faithful client of his. He hit a bell on one of the tables as he went + by, and asked in a distant, Officer-in-Reserve manner: + </p> + <p> + “You desire?” + </p> + <p> + The good Davidson, still sponging his wet neck, declared with simplicity + that he had come to fetch away Heyst, as agreed. + </p> + <p> + “Not here!” + </p> + <p> + A Chinaman appeared in response to the bell. Schomberg turned to him very + severely: + </p> + <p> + “Take the gentleman's order.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson had to be going. Couldn't wait—only begged that Heyst + should be informed that the Sissie would leave at midnight. + </p> + <p> + “Not—here, I am telling you!” + </p> + <p> + Davidson slapped his thigh in concern. + </p> + <p> + “Dear me! Hospital, I suppose.” A natural enough surmise in a very + feverish locality. + </p> + <p> + The Lieutenant of the Reserve only pursed up his mouth and raised his + eyebrows without looking at him. It might have meant anything, but + Davidson dismissed the hospital idea with confidence. However, he had to + get hold of Heyst between this and midnight: + </p> + <p> + “He has been staying here?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, he was staying here.” + </p> + <p> + “Can you tell me where he is now?” Davidson went on placidly. Within + himself he was beginning to grow anxious, having developed the affection + of a self-appointed protector towards Heyst. The answer he got was: + </p> + <p> + “Can't tell. It's none of my business,” accompanied by majestic + oscillations of the hotel-keeper's head, hinting at some awful mystery. + </p> + <p> + Davidson was placidity itself. It was his nature. He did not betray his + sentiments, which were not favourable to Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + “I am sure to find out at the Tesmans' office,” he thought. But it was a + very hot hour, and if Heyst was down at the port he would have learned + already that the Sissie was in. It was even possible that Heyst had + already gone on board, where he could enjoy a coolness denied to the town. + Davidson, being stout, was much preoccupied with coolness and inclined to + immobility. He lingered awhile, as if irresolute. Schomberg, at the door, + looking out, affected perfect indifference. He could not keep it up, + though. Suddenly he turned inward and asked with brusque rage: + </p> + <p> + “You wanted to see him?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, yes,” said Davidson. “We agreed to meet—” + </p> + <p> + “Don't you bother. He doesn't care about that now.” + </p> + <p> + “Doesn't he?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, you can judge for yourself. He isn't here, is he? You take my word + for it. Don't you bother about him. I am advising you as a friend.” + </p> + <p> + “Thank you,” said, Davidson, inwardly startled at the savage tone. “I + think I will sit down for a moment and have a drink, after all.” + </p> + <p> + This was not what Schomberg had expected to hear. He called brutally: + </p> + <p> + “Boy!” + </p> + <p> + The Chinaman approached, and after referring him to the white man by a nod + the hotel-keeper departed, muttering to himself. Davidson heard him gnash + his teeth as he went. + </p> + <p> + Davidson sat alone with the billiard-tables as if there had been not a + soul staying in the hotel. His placidity was so genuine that he was not + unduly, fretting himself over the absence of Heyst, or the mysterious + manners Schomberg had treated him to. He was considering these things in + his own fairly shrewd way. Something had happened; and he was loath to go + away to investigate, being restrained by a presentiment that somehow + enlightenment would come to him there. A poster of CONCERTS EVERY EVENING, + like those on the gate, but in a good state of preservation, hung on the + wall fronting him. He looked at it idly and was struck by the fact—then + not so very common—that it was a ladies' orchestra; “Zangiacomo's + eastern tour—eighteen performers.” The poster stated that they had + had the honour of playing their select repertoire before various colonial + excellencies, also before pashas, sheiks, chiefs, H. H. the Sultan of + Mascate, etc., etc. + </p> + <p> + Davidson felt sorry for the eighteen lady-performers. He knew what that + sort of life was like, the sordid conditions and brutal incidents of such + tours led by such Zangiacomos who often were anything but musicians by + profession. While he was staring at the poster, a door somewhere at his + back opened, and a woman came in who was looked upon as Schomberg's wife, + no doubt with truth. As somebody remarked cynically once, she was too + unattractive to be anything else. The opinion that he treated her + abominably was based on her frightened expression. Davidson lifted his hat + to her. Mrs. Schomberg gave him an inclination of her sallow head and + incontinently sat down behind a sort of raised counter, facing the door, + with a mirror and rows of bottles at her back. Her hair was very + elaborately done with two ringlets on the left side of her scraggy neck; + her dress was of silk, and she had come on duty for the afternoon. For + some reason or other Schomberg exacted this from her, though she added + nothing to the fascinations of the place. She sat there in the smoke and + noise, like an enthroned idol, smiling stupidly over the billiards from + time to time, speaking to no one, and no one speaking to her. Schomberg + himself took no more interest in her than may be implied in a sudden and + totally unmotived scowl. Otherwise the very Chinamen ignored her + existence. + </p> + <p> + She had interrupted Davidson in his reflections. Being alone with her, her + silence and open-eyed immobility made him uncomfortable. He was easily + sorry for people. It seemed rude not to take any notice of her. He said, + in allusion to the poster: + </p> + <p> + “Are you having these people in the house?” + </p> + <p> + She was so unused to being addressed by customers that at the sound of his + voice she jumped in her seat. Davidson was telling us afterwards that she + jumped exactly like a figure made of wood, without losing her rigid + immobility. She did not even move her eyes; but she answered him freely, + though her very lips seemed made of wood. + </p> + <p> + “They stayed here over a month. They are gone now. They played every + evening.” + </p> + <p> + “Pretty good, were they?” + </p> + <p> + To this she said nothing; and as she kept on staring fixedly in front of + her, her silence disconcerted Davidson. It looked as if she had not heard + him—which was impossible. Perhaps she drew the line of speech at the + expression of opinions. Schomberg might have trained her, for domestic + reasons, to keep them to herself. But Davidson felt in honour obliged to + converse; so he said, putting his own interpretation on this surprising + silence: + </p> + <p> + “I see—not much account. Such bands hardly ever are. An Italian lot, + Mrs. Schomberg, to judge by the name of the boss?” + </p> + <p> + She shook her head negatively. + </p> + <p> + “No. He is a German really; only he dyes his hair and beard black for + business. Zangiacomo is his business name.” + </p> + <p> + “That's a curious fact,” said Davidson. His head being full of Heyst, it + occurred to him that she might be aware of other facts. This was a very + amazing discovery to anyone who looked at Mrs. Schomberg. Nobody had ever + suspected her of having a mind. I mean even a little of it, I mean any at + all. One was inclined to think of her as an It—an automaton, a very + plain dummy, with an arrangement for bowing the head at times and smiling + stupidly now and then. Davidson viewed her profile with a flattened nose, + a hollow cheek, and one staring, unwinking, goggle eye. He asked himself: + Did that speak just now? Will it speak again? It was as exciting, for the + mere wonder of it, as trying to converse with a mechanism. A smile played + about the fat features of Davidson; the smile of a man making an amusing + experiment. He spoke again to her: + </p> + <p> + “But the other members of that orchestra were real Italians, were they + not?” + </p> + <p> + Of course, he didn't care. He wanted to see whether the mechanism would + work again. It did. It said they were not. They were of all sorts, + apparently. It paused, with the one goggle eye immovably gazing down the + whole length of the room and through the door opening on to the “piazza.” + It paused, then went on in the same low pitch: + </p> + <p> + “There was even one English girl.” + </p> + <p> + “Poor devil!”—said Davidson, “I suppose these women are not much + better than slaves really. Was that fellow with the dyed beard decent in + his way?” + </p> + <p> + The mechanism remained silent. The sympathetic soul of Davidson drew its + own conclusions. + </p> + <p> + “Beastly life for these women!” he said. “When you say an English girl, + Mrs. Schomberg, do you really mean a young girl? Some of these orchestra + girls are no chicks.” + </p> + <p> + “Young enough,” came the low voice out of Mrs. Schomberg's unmoved + physiognomy. + </p> + <p> + Davidson, encouraged, remarked that he was sorry for her. He was easily + sorry for people. + </p> + <p> + “Where did they go to from here?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “She did not go with them. She ran away.” + </p> + <p> + This was the pronouncement Davidson obtained next. It introduced a new + sort of interest. + </p> + <p> + “Well! Well!” he exclaimed placidly; and then, with the air of a man who + knows life: “Who with?” he inquired with assurance. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Schomberg's immobility gave her an appearance of listening intently. + Perhaps she was really listening; but Schomberg must have been finishing + his sleep in some distant part of the house. The silence was profound, and + lasted long enough to become startling. Then, enthroned above Davidson, + she whispered at last: + </p> + <p> + “That friend of yours.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you know I am here looking for a friend,” said Davidson hopefully. + “Won't you tell me—” + </p> + <p> + “I've told you” + </p> + <p> + “Eh?” + </p> + <p> + A mist seemed to roll away from before Davidson's eyes, disclosing + something he could not believe. + </p> + <p> + “You can't mean it!” he cried. “He's not the man for it.” But the last + words came out in a faint voice. Mrs. Schomberg never moved her head the + least bit. Davidson, after the shock which made him sit up, went slack all + over. + </p> + <p> + “Heyst! Such a perfect gentleman!” he exclaimed weakly. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Schomberg did not seem to have heard him. This startling fact did not + tally somehow with the idea Davidson had of Heyst. He never talked of + women, he never seemed to think of them, or to remember that they existed; + and then all at once—like this! Running off with a casual orchestra + girl! + </p> + <p> + “You might have knocked me down with a feather,” Davidson told us some + time afterwards. + </p> + <p> + By then he was taking an indulgent view of both the parties to that + amazing transaction. First of all, on reflection, he was by no means + certain that it prevented Heyst from being a perfect gentleman, as before. + He confronted our open grins or quiet smiles with a serious round face. + Heyst had taken the girl away to Samburan; and that was no joking matter. + The loneliness, the ruins of the spot, had impressed Davidson's simple + soul. They were incompatible with the frivolous comments of people who had + not seen it. That black jetty, sticking out of the jungle into the empty + sea; these roof-ridges of deserted houses peeping dismally above the long + grass! Ough! The gigantic and funereal blackboard sign of the Tropical + Belt Coal Company, still emerging from a wild growth of bushes like an + inscription stuck above a grave figured by the tall heap of unsold coal at + the shore end of the wharf, added to the general desolation. + </p> + <p> + Thus was the sensitive Davidson. The girl must have been miserable indeed + to follow such a strange man to such a spot. Heyst had, no doubt, told her + the truth. He was a gentleman. But no words could do justice to the + conditions of life on Samburan. A desert island was nothing to it. + Moreover, when you were cast away on a desert island—why, you could + not help yourself; but to expect a fiddle-playing girl out of an ambulant + ladies' orchestra to remain content there for a day, for one single day, + was inconceivable. She would be frightened at the first sight of it. She + would scream. + </p> + <p> + The capacity for sympathy in these stout, placid men! Davidson was stirred + to the depths; and it was easy to see that it was about Heyst that he was + concerned. We asked him if he had passed that way lately. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes. I always do—about half a mile off.” + </p> + <p> + “Seen anybody about?” + </p> + <p> + “No, not a soul. Not a shadow.” + </p> + <p> + “Did you blow your whistle?” + </p> + <p> + “Blow the whistle? You think I would do such a thing?” + </p> + <p> + He rejected the mere possibility of such an unwarrantable intrusion. + Wonderfully delicate fellow, Davidson! + </p> + <p> + “Well, but how do you know that they are there?” he was naturally asked. + </p> + <p> + Heyst had entrusted Mrs. Schomberg with a message for Davidson—a few + lines in pencil on a scrap of crumpled paper. It was to the effect: that + an unforeseen necessity was driving him away before the appointed time. He + begged Davidson's indulgence for the apparent discourtesy. The woman of + the house—meaning Mrs. Schomberg—would give him the facts, + though unable to explain them, of course. + </p> + <p> + “What was there to explain?” wondered Davidson dubiously. + </p> + <p> + “He took a fancy to that fiddle-playing girl, and—” + </p> + <p> + “And she to him, apparently,” I suggested. + </p> + <p> + “Wonderfully quick work,” reflected Davidson. “What do you think will come + of it?” + </p> + <p> + “Repentance, I should say. But how is it that Mrs. Schomberg has been + selected for a confidante?” + </p> + <p> + For indeed a waxwork figure would have seemed more useful than that woman + whom we all were accustomed to see sitting elevated above the two + billiard-tables—without expression, without movement, without voice, + without sight. + </p> + <p> + “Why, she helped the girl to bolt,” said Davidson turning at me his + innocent eyes, rounded by the state of constant amazement in which this + affair had left him, like those shocks of terror or sorrow which sometimes + leave their victim afflicted by nervous trembling. It looked as though he + would never get over it. + </p> + <p> + “Mrs. Schomberg jerked Heyst's note, twisted like a pipe-light, into my + lap while I sat there unsuspecting,” Davidson went on. “Directly I had + recovered my senses, I asked her what on earth she had to do with it that + Heyst should leave it with her. And then, behaving like a painted image + rather than a live woman, she whispered, just loud enough for me to hear: + </p> + <p> + “I helped them. I got her things together, tied them up in my own shawl, + and threw them into the compound out of a back window. I did it.” + </p> + <p> + “That woman that you would say hadn't the pluck to lift her little + finger!” marvelled Davidson in his quiet, slightly panting voice. “What do + you think of that?” + </p> + <p> + I thought she must have had some interest of her own to serve. She was too + lifeless to be suspected of impulsive compassion. It was impossible to + think that Heyst had bribed her. Whatever means he had, he had not the + means to do that. Or could it be that she was moved by that disinterested + passion for delivering a woman to a man which in respectable spheres is + called matchmaking?—a highly irregular example of it! + </p> + <p> + “It must have been a very small bundle,” remarked Davidson further. + </p> + <p> + “I imagine the girl must have been specially attractive,” I said. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know. She was miserable. I don't suppose it was more than a + little linen and a couple of those white frocks they wear on the + platform.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson pursued his own train of thought. He supposed that such a thing + had never been heard of in the history of the tropics. For where could you + find anyone to steal a girl out of an orchestra? No doubt fellows here and + there took a fancy to some pretty one—but it was not for running + away with her. Oh dear no! It needed a lunatic like Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “Only think what it means,” wheezed Davidson, imaginative under his + invincible placidity. “Just only try to think! Brooding alone on Samburan + has upset his brain. He never stopped to consider, or he couldn't have + done it. No sane man . . . How is a thing like that to go on? What's he + going to do with her in the end? It's madness.” + </p> + <p> + “You say that he's mad. Schomberg tells us that he must be starving on his + island; so he may end yet by eating her,” I suggested. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Schomberg had had no time to enter into details, Davidson told us. + Indeed, the wonder was that they had been left alone so long. The drowsy + afternoon was slipping by. Footsteps and voices resounded on the veranda—I + beg pardon, the piazza; the scraping of chairs, the ping of a smitten + bell. Customers were turning up. Mrs. Schomberg was begging Davidson + hurriedly, but without looking at him, to say nothing to anyone, when on a + half-uttered word her nervous whisper was cut short. Through a small inner + door Schomberg came in, his hair brushed, his beard combed neatly, but his + eyelids still heavy from his nap. He looked with suspicion at Davidson, + and even glanced at his wife; but he was baffled by the natural placidity + of the one and the acquired habit of immobility in the other. + </p> + <p> + “Have you sent out the drinks?” he asked surlily. + </p> + <p> + She did not open her lips, because just then the head boy appeared with a + loaded tray, on his way out. Schomberg went to the door and greeted the + customers outside, but did not join them. He remained blocking half the + doorway, with his back to the room, and was still there when Davidson, + after sitting still for a while, rose to go. At the noise he made + Schomberg turned his head, watched him lift his hat to Mrs. Schomberg and + receive her wooden bow accompanied by a stupid grin, and then looked away. + He was loftily dignified. Davidson stopped at the door, deep in his + simplicity. + </p> + <p> + “I am sorry you won't tell me anything about my friend's absence,” he + said. “My friend Heyst, you know. I suppose the only course for me now is + to make inquiries down at the port. I shall hear something there, I don't + doubt.” + </p> + <p> + “Make inquiries of the devil!” replied Schomberg in a hoarse mutter. + </p> + <p> + Davidson's purpose in addressing the hotel-keeper had been mainly to make + Mrs. Schomberg safe from suspicion; but he would fain have heard something + more of Heyst's exploit from another point of view. It was a shrewd try. + It was successful in a rather startling way, because the hotel-keeper's + point of view was horribly abusive. All of a sudden, in the same hoarse + sinister tone, he proceeded to call Heyst many names, of which “pig-dog” + was not the worst, with such vehemence that he actually choked himself. + Profiting from the pause, Davidson, whose temperament could withstand + worse shocks, remonstrated in an undertone: + </p> + <p> + “It's unreasonable to get so angry as that. Even if he had run off with + your cash-box—” + </p> + <p> + The big hotel-keeper bent down and put his infuriated face close to + Davidson's. + </p> + <p> + “My cash-box! My—he—look here, Captain Davidson! He ran off + with a girl. What do I care for the girl? The girl is nothing to me.” + </p> + <p> + He shot out an infamous word which made Davidson start. That's what the + girl was; and he reiterated the assertion that she was nothing to him. + What he was concerned for was the good name of his house. Wherever he had + been established, he had always had “artist parties” staying in his house. + One recommended him to the others; but what would happen now, when it got + about that leaders ran the risk in his house—his house—of + losing members of their troupe? And just now, when he had spent seven + hundred and thirty-four guilders in building a concert-hall in his + compound. Was that a thing to do in a respectable hotel? The cheek, the + indecency, the impudence, the atrocity! Vagabond, impostor, swindler, + ruffian, schwein-hund! + </p> + <p> + He had seized Davidson by a button of his coat, detaining him in the + doorway, and exactly in the line of Mrs. Schomberg's stony gaze. Davidson + stole a glance in that direction and thought of making some sort of + reassuring sign to her, but she looked so bereft of senses, and almost of + life, perched up there, that it seemed not worth while. He disengaged his + button with firm placidity. Thereupon, with a last stifled curse, + Schomberg vanished somewhere within, to try and compose his spirits in + solitude. Davidson stepped out on the veranda. The party of customers + there had become aware of the explosive interlude in the doorway. Davidson + knew one of these men, and nodded to him in passing; but his acquaintance + called out: + </p> + <p> + “Isn't he in a filthy temper? He's been like that ever since.” + </p> + <p> + The speaker laughed aloud, while all the others sat smiling. Davidson + stopped. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, rather.” His feelings were, he told us, those of bewildered + resignation; but of course that was no more visible to the others than the + emotions of a turtle when it withdraws into its shell. + </p> + <p> + “It seems unreasonable,” he murmured thoughtfully. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, but they had a scrap!” the other said. + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean? Was there a fight!—a fight with Heyst?” asked + Davidson, much perturbed, if somewhat incredulous. + </p> + <p> + “Heyst? No, these two—the bandmaster, the fellow who's taking these + women about and our Schomberg. Signor Zangiacomo ran amuck in the morning, + and went for our worthy friend. I tell you, they were rolling on the floor + together on this very veranda, after chasing each other all over the + house, doors slamming, women screaming, seventeen of them, in the + dining-room; Chinamen up the trees. Hey, John? You climb tree to see the + fight, eh?” + </p> + <p> + The boy, almond-eyed and impassive, emitted a scornful grunt, finished + wiping the table, and withdrew. + </p> + <p> + “That's what it was—a real, go-as-you-please scrap. And Zangiacomo + began it. Oh, here's Schomberg. Say, Schomberg, didn't he fly at you, when + the girl was missed, because it was you who insisted that the artists + should go about the audience during the interval?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg had reappeared in the doorway. He advanced. His bearing was + stately, but his nostrils were extraordinarily expanded, and he controlled + his voice with apparent effort. + </p> + <p> + “Certainly. That was only business. I quoted him special terms and all for + your sake, gentlemen. I was thinking of my regular customers. There's + nothing to do in the evenings in this town. I think, gentlemen, you were + all pleased at the opportunity of hearing a little good music; and where's + the harm of offering a grenadine, or what not, to a lady artist? But that + fellow—that Swede—he got round the girl. He got round all the + people out here. I've been watching him for years. You remember how he got + round Morrison.” + </p> + <p> + He changed front abruptly, as if on parade, and marched off. The customers + at the table exchanged glances silently. Davidson's attitude was that of a + spectator. Schomberg's moody pacing of the billiard-room could be heard on + the veranda. + </p> + <p> + “And the funniest part is,” resumed the man who had been speaking before—an + English clerk in a Dutch house—“the funniest part is that before + nine o'clock that same morning those two were driving together in a gharry + down to the port, to look for Heyst and the girl. I saw them rushing + around making inquiries. I don't know what they would have done to the + girl, but they seemed quite ready to fall upon your Heyst, Davidson, and + kill him on the quay.” + </p> + <p> + He had never, he said, seen anything so queer. Those two investigators + working feverishly to the same end were glaring at each other with + surprising ferocity. In hatred and mistrust they entered a steam-launch, + and went flying from ship to ship all over the harbour, causing no end of + sensation. The captains of vessels, coming on shore later in the day, + brought tales of a strange invasion, and wanted to know who were the two + offensive lunatics in a steam-launch, apparently after a man and a girl, + and telling a story of which one could make neither head nor tail. Their + reception by the roadstead was generally unsympathetic, even to the point + of the mate of an American ship bundling them out over the rail with + unseemly precipitation. + </p> + <p> + Meantime Heyst and the girl were a good few miles away, having gone in the + night on board one of the Tesman schooners bound to the eastward. This was + known afterwards from the Javanese boatmen whom Heyst hired for the + purpose at three o'clock in the morning. The Tesman schooner had sailed at + daylight with the usual land breeze, and was probably still in sight in + the offing at the time. However, the two pursuers after their experience + with the American mate, made for the shore. On landing, they had another + violent row in the German language. But there was no second fight; and + finally, with looks of fierce animosity, they got together into a gharry—obviously + with the frugal view of sharing expenses—and drove away, leaving an + astonished little crowd of Europeans and natives on the quay. + </p> + <p> + After hearing this wondrous tale, Davidson went away from the hotel + veranda, which was filling with Schomberg's regular customers. Heyst's + escapade was the general topic of conversation. Never before had that + unaccountable individual been the cause of so much gossip, he judged. No! + Not even in the beginnings of the Tropical Belt Coal Company when becoming + for a moment a public character was he the object of a silly criticism and + unintelligent envy for every vagabond and adventurer in the islands. + Davidson concluded that people liked to discuss that sort of scandal + better than any other. + </p> + <p> + I asked him if he believed that this was such a great scandal after all. + </p> + <p> + “Heavens, no!” said that excellent man who, himself, was incapable of any + impropriety of conduct. “But it isn't a thing I would have done myself; I + mean even if I had not been married.” + </p> + <p> + There was no implied condemnation in the statement; rather something like + regret. Davidson shared my suspicion that this was in its essence the + rescue of a distressed human being. Not that we were two romantics, + tingeing the world to the hue of our temperament, but that both of us had + been acute enough to discover a long time ago that Heyst was. + </p> + <p> + “I shouldn't have had the pluck,” he continued. “I see a thing all round, + as it were; but Heyst doesn't, or else he would have been scared. You + don't take a woman into a desert jungle without being made sorry for it + sooner or later, in one way or another; and Heyst being a gentleman only + makes it worse.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SIX + </h2> + <p> + We said no more about Heyst on that occasion, and it so happened that I + did not meet Davidson again for some three months. When we did come + together, almost the first thing he said to me was: + </p> + <p> + “I've seen him.” + </p> + <p> + Before I could exclaim, he assured me that he had taken no liberty, that + he had not intruded. He was called in. Otherwise he would not have dreamed + of breaking in upon Heyst's privacy. + </p> + <p> + “I am certain you wouldn't,” I assured him, concealing my amusement at his + wonderful delicacy. He was the most delicate man that ever took a small + steamer to and fro among the islands. But his humanity, which was not less + strong and praiseworthy, had induced him to take his steamer past Samburan + wharf (at an average distance of a mile) every twenty-three days—exactly. + Davidson was delicate, humane, and regular. + </p> + <p> + “Heyst called you in?” I asked, interested. + </p> + <p> + Yes, Heyst had called him in as he was going by on his usual date. + Davidson was examining the shore through his glasses with his unwearied + and punctual humanity as he steamed past Samburan. + </p> + <p> + I saw a man in white. It could only have been Heyst. He had fastened some + sort of enormous flag to a bamboo pole, and was waving it at the end of + the old wharf. + </p> + <p> + Davidson didn't like to take his steamer alongside—for fear of being + indiscreet, I suppose; but he steered close inshore, stopped his engines, + and lowered a boat. He went himself in that boat, which was manned, of + course, by his Malay seamen. + </p> + <p> + Heyst, when he saw the boat pulling towards him, dropped his + signalling-pole; and when Davidson arrived, he was kneeling down engaged + busily in unfastening the flag from it. + </p> + <p> + “Was there anything wrong?” I inquired, Davidson having paused in his + narrative and my curiosity being naturally aroused. You must remember that + Heyst as the Archipelago knew him was not—what shall I say—was + not a signalling sort of man. + </p> + <p> + “The very words that came out of my mouth,” said Davidson, “before I laid + the boat against the piles. I could not help it!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst got up from his knees and began carefully folding up the flag thing, + which struck Davidson as having the dimensions of a blanket. + </p> + <p> + “No, nothing wrong,” he cried. His white teeth flashed agreeably below the + coppery horizontal bar of his long moustaches. + </p> + <p> + I don't know whether it was his delicacy or his obesity which prevented + Davidson from clambering upon the wharf. He stood up in the boat, and, + above him, Heyst stooped low with urbane smiles, thanking him and + apologizing for the liberty, exactly in his usual manner. Davidson had + expected some change in the man, but there was none. Nothing in him + betrayed the momentous fact that within that jungle there was a girl, a + performer in a ladies' orchestra, whom he had carried straight off the + concert platform into the wilderness. He was not ashamed or defiant or + abashed about it. He might have been a shade confidential when addressing + Davidson. And his words were enigmatical. + </p> + <p> + “I took this course of signalling to you,” he said to Davidson, “because + to preserve appearances might be of the utmost importance. Not to me, of + course. I don't care what people may say, and of course no one can hurt + me. I suppose I have done a certain amount of harm, since I allowed myself + to be tempted into action. It seemed innocent enough, but all action is + bound to be harmful. It is devilish. That is why this world is evil upon + the whole. But I have done with it! I shall never lift a little finger + again. At one time I thought that intelligent observation of facts was the + best way of cheating the time which is allotted to us whether we want it + or not; but now I, have done with observation, too.” + </p> + <p> + Imagine poor, simple Davidson being addressed in such terms alongside an + abandoned, decaying wharf jutting out of tropical bush. He had never heard + anybody speak like this before; certainly not Heyst, whose conversation + was concise, polite, with a faint ring of playfulness in the cultivated + tones of his voice. + </p> + <p> + “He's gone mad,” Davidson thought to himself. + </p> + <p> + But, looking at the physiognomy above him on the wharf, he was obliged to + dismiss the notion of common, crude lunacy. It was truly most unusual + talk. Then he remembered—in his surprise he had lost sight of it—that + Heyst now had a girl there. This bizarre discourse was probably the effect + of the girl. Davidson shook off the absurd feeling, and asked, wishing to + make clear his friendliness, and not knowing what else to say: + </p> + <p> + “You haven't run short of stores or anything like that?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst smiled and shook his head: + </p> + <p> + “No, no. Nothing of the kind. We are fairly well off here. Thanks, all the + same. If I have taken the liberty to detain you, it is not from any + uneasiness for myself and my—companion. The person I was thinking of + when I made up my mind to invoke your assistance is Mrs. Schomberg.” + </p> + <p> + “I have talked with her,” interjected Davidson. + </p> + <p> + “Oh! You? Yes, I hoped she would find means to—” + </p> + <p> + “But she didn't tell me much,” interrupted Davidson, who was not averse + from hearing something—he hardly knew what. + </p> + <p> + “H'm—Yes. But that note of mine? Yes? She found an opportunity to + give it to you? That's good, very good. She's more resourceful than one + would give her credit for.” + </p> + <p> + “Women often are—” remarked Davidson. The strangeness from which he + had suffered, merely because his interlocutor had carried off a girl, wore + off as the minutes went by. “There's a lot of unexpectedness about women,” + he generalized with a didactic aim which seemed to miss its mark; for the + next thing Heyst said was: + </p> + <p> + “This is Mrs. Schomberg's shawl.” He touched the stuff hanging over his + arm. “An Indian thing, I believe,” he added, glancing at his arm sideways. + </p> + <p> + “It isn't of particular value,” said Davidson truthfully. + </p> + <p> + “Very likely. The point is that it belongs to Schomberg's wife. That + Schomberg seems to be an unconscionable ruffian—don't you think so?” + </p> + <p> + Davidson smiled faintly. + </p> + <p> + “We out here have got used to him,” he said, as if excusing a universal + and guilty toleration of a manifest nuisance. “I'd hardly call him that. I + only know him as a hotel-keeper.” + </p> + <p> + “I never knew him even as that—not till this time, when you were so + obliging as to take me to Sourabaya, I went to stay there from economy. + The Netherlands House is very expensive, and they expect you to bring your + own servant with you. It's a nuisance.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course, of course,” protested Davidson hastily. + </p> + <p> + After a short silence Heyst returned to the matter of the shawl. He wanted + to send it back to Mrs. Schomberg. He said that it might be very awkward + for her if she were unable, if asked, to produce it. This had given him, + Heyst, much uneasiness. She was terrified of Schomberg. Apparently she had + reason to be. + </p> + <p> + Davidson had remarked that, too. Which did not prevent her, he pointed + out, from making a fool of him, in a way, for the sake of a stranger. + </p> + <p> + “Oh! You know!” said Heyst. “Yes, she helped me—us.” + </p> + <p> + “She told me so. I had quite a talk with her,” Davidson informed him. + “Fancy anyone having a talk with Mrs. Schomberg! If I were to tell the + fellows they wouldn't believe me. How did you get round her, Heyst? How + did you think of it? Why, she looks too stupid to understand human speech + and too scared to shoo a chicken away. Oh, the women, the women! You don't + know what there may be in the quietest of them.” + </p> + <p> + “She was engaged in the task of defending her position in life,” said + Heyst. “It's a very respectable task.” + </p> + <p> + “Is that it? I had some idea it was that,” confessed Davidson. + </p> + <p> + He then imparted to Heyst the story of the violent proceedings following + on the discovery of his flight. Heyst's polite attention to the tale took + on a sombre cast; but he manifested no surprise, and offered no comment. + When Davidson had finished he handed down the shawl into the boat, and + Davidson promised to do his best to return it to Mrs. Schomberg in some + secret fashion. Heyst expressed his thanks in a few simple words, set off + by his manner of finished courtesy. Davidson prepared to depart. They were + not looking at each other. Suddenly Heyst spoke: + </p> + <p> + “You understand that this was a case of odious persecution, don't you? I + became aware of it and—” + </p> + <p> + It was a view which the sympathetic Davidson was capable of appreciating. + </p> + <p> + “I am not surprised to hear it,” he said placidly. “Odious enough, I dare + say. And you, of course—not being a married man—were free to + step in. Ah, well!” + </p> + <p> + He sat down in the stern-sheets, and already had the steering lines in his + hands when Heyst observed abruptly: + </p> + <p> + “The world is a bad dog. It will bite you if you give it a chance; but I + think that here we can safely defy the fates.” + </p> + <p> + When relating all this to me, Davidson's only comment was: + </p> + <p> + “Funny notion of defying the fates—to take a woman in tow!” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SEVEN + </h2> + <p> + Some considerable time afterwards—we did not meet very often—I + asked Davidson how he had managed about the shawl and heard that he had + tackled his mission in a direct way, and had found it easy enough. At the + very first call he made in Samarang he rolled the shawl as tightly as he + could into the smallest possible brown-paper parcel, which he carried + ashore with him. His business in the town being transacted, he got into a + gharry with the parcel and drove to the hotel. With his precious + experience, he timed his arrival accurately for the hour of Schomberg's + siesta. Finding the place empty as on the former occasion, he marched into + the billiard-room, took a seat at the back, near the sort of dais which + Mrs. Schomberg would in due course come to occupy, and broke the + slumbering silence of the house by thumping a bell vigorously. Of course a + Chinaman appeared promptly. Davidson ordered a drink and sat tight. + </p> + <p> + “I would have ordered twenty drinks one after another, if necessary,” he + said—Davidson's a very abstemious man—“rather than take that + parcel out of the house again. Couldn't leave it in a corner without + letting the woman know it was there. It might have turned out worse for + her than not bringing the thing back at all.” + </p> + <p> + And so he waited, ringing the bell again and again, and swallowing two or + three iced drinks which he did not want. Presently, as he hoped it would + happen, Mrs. Schomberg came in, silk dress, long neck, ringlets, scared + eyes, and silly grin—all complete. Probably that lazy beast had sent + her out to see who was the thirsty customer waking up the echoes of the + house at this quiet hour. Bow, nod—and she clambered up to her post + behind the raised counter, looking so helpless, so inane, as she sat + there, that if it hadn't been for the parcel, Davidson declared, he would + have thought he had merely dreamed all that had passed between them. He + ordered another drink, to get the Chinaman out of the room, and then + seized the parcel, which was reposing on a chair near him, and with no + more than a mutter—“this is something of yours”—he rammed it + swiftly into a recess in the counter, at her feet. There! The rest was her + affair. And just in time, too. Schomberg turned up, yawning affectedly, + almost before Davidson had regained his seat. He cast about suspicious and + irate glances. An invincible placidity of expression helped Davidson + wonderfully at the moment, and the other, of course, could have no grounds + for the slightest suspicion of any sort of understanding between his wife + and this customer. + </p> + <p> + As to Mrs. Schomberg, she sat there like a joss. Davidson was lost in + admiration. He believed, now, that the woman had been putting it on for + years. She never even winked. It was immense! The insight he had obtained + almost frightened him; he couldn't get over his wonder at knowing more of + the real Mrs. Schomberg than anybody in the Islands, including Schomberg + himself. She was a miracle of dissimulation. No wonder Heyst got the girl + away from under two men's noses, if he had her to help with the job! + </p> + <p> + The greatest wonder, after all, was Heyst getting mixed up with + petticoats. The fellow's life had been open to us for years and nothing + could have been more detached from feminine associations. Except that he + stood drinks to people on suitable occasions, like any other man, this + observer of facts seemed to have no connection with earthly affairs and + passions. The very courtesy of his manner, the flavour of playfulness in + the voice set him apart. He was like a feather floating lightly in the + workaday atmosphere which was the breath of our nostrils. For this reason + whenever this looker-on took contact with things he attracted attention. + First, it was the Morrison partnership of mystery, then came the great + sensation of the Tropical Belt Coal where indeed varied interests were + involved: a real business matter. And then came this elopement, this + incongruous phenomenon of self-assertion, the greatest wonder of all, + astonishing and amusing. + </p> + <p> + Davidson admitted to me that, the hubbub was subsiding; and the affair + would have been already forgotten, perhaps, if that ass Schomberg had not + kept on gnashing his teeth publicly about it. It was really provoking that + Davidson should not be able to give one some idea of the girl. Was she + pretty? He didn't know. He had stayed the whole afternoon in Schomberg's + hotel, mainly for the purpose of finding out something about her. But the + story was growing stale. The parties at the tables on the veranda had + other, fresher, events to talk about and Davidson shrank from making + direct inquiries. He sat placidly there, content to be disregarded and + hoping for some chance word to turn up. I shouldn't wonder if the good + fellow hadn't been dozing. It's difficult to give you an adequate idea of + Davidson's placidity. + </p> + <p> + Presently Schomberg, wandering about, joined a party that had taken the + table next to Davidson's. + </p> + <p> + “A man like that Swede, gentlemen, is a public danger,” he began. “I + remember him for years. I won't say anything of his spying—well, he + used to say himself he was looking for out-of-the-way facts and what is + that if not spying? He was spying into everybody's business. He got hold + of Captain Morrison, squeezed him dry, like you would an orange, and + scared him off to Europe to die there. Everybody knows that Captain + Morrison had a weak chest. Robbed first and murdered afterwards! I don't + mince words—not I. Next he gets up that swindle of the Belt Coal. + You know all about it. And now, after lining his pockets with other + people's money, he kidnaps a white girl belonging to an orchestra which is + performing in my public room for the benefit of my patrons, and goes off + to live like a prince on that island, where nobody can get at him. A damn + silly girl . . . It's disgusting—tfui!” + </p> + <p> + He spat. He choked with rage—for he saw visions, no doubt. He jumped + up from his chair, and went away to flee from them—perhaps. He went + into the room where Mrs. Schomberg sat. Her aspect could not have been + very soothing to the sort of torment from which he was suffering. + </p> + <p> + Davidson did not feel called upon to defend Heyst. His proceeding was to + enter into conversation with one and another, casually, and showing no + particular knowledge of the affair, in order to discover something about + the girl. Was she anything out of the way? Was she pretty? She couldn't + have been markedly so. She had not attracted special notice. She was young—on + that everybody agreed. The English clerk of Tesmans remembered that she + had a sallow face. He was respectable and highly proper. He was not the + sort to associate with such people. Most of these women were fairly + battered specimens. Schomberg had them housed in what he called the + Pavilion, in the grounds, where they were hard at it mending and washing + their white dresses, and could be seen hanging them out to dry between the + trees, like a lot of washerwomen. They looked very much like middle-aged + washerwomen on the platform, too. But the girl had been living in the main + building along with the boss, the director, the fellow with the black + beard, and a hard-bitten, oldish woman who took the piano and was + understood to be the fellow's wife. + </p> + <p> + This was not a very satisfactory result. Davidson stayed on, and even + joined the table d'hote dinner, without gleaning any more information. He + was resigned. + </p> + <p> + “I suppose,” he wheezed placidly, “I am bound to see her some day.” + </p> + <p> + He meant to take the Samburan channel every trip, as before of course. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” I said. “No doubt you will. Some day Heyst will be signalling to + you again; and I wonder what it will be for.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson made no reply. He had his own ideas about that, and his silence + concealed a good deal of thought. We spoke no more of Heyst's girl. Before + we separated, he gave me a piece of unrelated observation. + </p> + <p> + “It's funny,” he said, “but I fancy there's some gambling going on in the + evening at Schomberg's place, on the quiet. I've noticed men strolling + away in twos and threes towards that hall where the orchestra used to + play. The windows must be specially well shuttered, because I could not + spy the smallest gleam of light from that direction; but I can't believe + that those beggars would go in there only to sit and think of their sins + in the dark.” + </p> + <p> + “That's strange. It's incredible that Schomberg should risk that sort of + thing,” I said. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART2" id="link2H_PART2"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PART TWO + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER ONE + </h2> + <p> + As we know, Heyst had gone to stay in Schomberg's hotel in complete + ignorance that his person was odious to that worthy. When he arrived, + Zangiacomo's Ladies' Orchestra had been established there for some time. + </p> + <p> + The business which had called him out from his seclusion in his lost + corner of the Eastern seas was with the Tesmans, and it had something to + do with money. He transacted it quickly, and then found himself with + nothing to do while he awaited Davidson, who was to take him back to his + solitude; for back to his solitude Heyst meant to go. He whom we used to + refer to as the Enchanted Heyst was suffering from thorough + disenchantment. Not with the islands, however. The Archipelago has a + lasting fascination. It is not easy to shake off the spell of island life. + Heyst was disenchanted with life as a whole. His scornful temperament, + beguiled into action, suffered from failure in a subtle way unknown to men + accustomed to grapple with the realities of common human enterprise. It + was like the gnawing pain of useless apostasy, a sort of shame before his + own betrayed nature; and in addition, he also suffered from plain, + downright remorse. He deemed himself guilty of Morrison's death. A rather + absurd feeling, since no one could possibly have foreseen the horrors of + the cold, wet summer lying in wait for poor Morrison at home. + </p> + <p> + It was not in Heyst's character to turn morose; but his mental state was + not compatible with a sociable mood. He spent his evenings sitting apart + on the veranda of Schomberg's hotel. The lamentations of string + instruments issued from the building in the hotel compound, the approaches + to which were decorated with Japanese paper lanterns strung up between the + trunks of several big trees. Scraps of tunes more or less plaintive + reached his ears. They pursued him even into his bedroom, which opened + into an upstairs veranda. The fragmentary and rasping character of these + sounds made their intrusion inexpressibly tedious in the long run. Like + most dreamers, to whom it is given sometimes to hear the music of the + spheres, Heyst, the wanderer of the Archipelago, had a taste for silence + which he had been able to gratify for years. The islands are very quiet. + One sees them lying about, clothed in their dark garments of leaves, in a + great hush of silver and azure, where the sea without murmurs meets the + sky in a ring of magic stillness. A sort of smiling somnolence broods over + them; the very voices of their people are soft and subdued, as if afraid + to break some protecting spell. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps this was the very spell which had enchanted Heyst in the early + days. For him, however, that was broken. He was no longer enchanted, + though he was still a captive of the islands. He had no intention to leave + them ever. Where could he have gone to, after all these years? Not a + single soul belonging to him lived anywhere on earth. Of this fact—not + such a remote one, after all—he had only lately become aware; for it + is failure that makes a man enter into himself and reckon up his + resources. And though he had made up his mind to retire from the world in + hermit fashion, yet he was irrationally moved by this sense of loneliness + which had come to him in the hour of renunciation. It hurt him. Nothing is + more painful than the shock of sharp contradictions that lacerate our + intelligence and our feelings. + </p> + <p> + Meantime Schomberg watched Heyst out of the corner of his eye. Towards the + unconscious object of his enmity he preserved a distant + lieutenant-of-the-Reserve demeanour. Nudging certain of his customers with + his elbow, he begged them to observe what airs “that Swede” was giving + himself. + </p> + <p> + “I really don't know why he has come to stay in my house. This place isn't + good enough for him. I wish to goodness he had gone somewhere else to show + off his superiority. Here I have got up this series of concerts for you + gentlemen, just to make things a little brighter generally; and do you + think he'll condescend to step in and listen to a piece or two of an + evening? Not he. I know him of old. There he sits at the dark end of the + piazza, all the evening long—planning some new swindle, no doubt. + For two-pence I would ask him to go and look for quarters somewhere else; + only one doesn't like to treat a white man like that out in the tropics. I + don't know how long he means to stay, but I'm willing to bet a trifle that + he'll never work himself up to the point of spending the fifty cents of + entrance money for the sake of a little good music.” + </p> + <p> + Nobody cared to bet, or the hotel-keeper would have lost. One evening + Heyst was driven to desperation by the rasped, squeaked, scraped snatches + of tunes pursuing him even to his hard couch, with a mattress as thin as a + pancake and a diaphanous mosquito net. He descended among the trees, where + the soft glow of Japanese lanterns picked out parts of their great rugged + trunks, here and there, in the great mass of darkness under the lofty + foliage. More lanterns, of the shape of cylindrical concertinas, hanging + in a row from a slack string, decorated the doorway of what Schomberg + called grandiloquently “my concert-hall.” In his desperate mood Heyst + ascended three steps, lifted a calico curtain, and went in. + </p> + <p> + The uproar in that small, barn-like structure, built of imported pine + boards, and raised clear of the ground, was simply stunning. An + instrumental uproar, screaming, grunting, whining, sobbing, scraping, + squeaking some kind of lively air; while a grand piano, operated upon by a + bony, red-faced woman with bad-tempered nostrils, rained hard notes like + hail through the tempest of fiddles. The small platform was filled with + white muslin dresses and crimson sashes slanting from shoulders provided + with bare arms, which sawed away without respite. Zangiacomo conducted. He + wore a white mess-jacket, a black dress waistcoat, and white trousers. His + longish, tousled hair and his great beard were purple-black. He was + horrible. The heat was terrific. There were perhaps thirty people having + drinks at several little tables. Heyst, quite overcome by the volume of + noise, dropped into a chair. In the quick time of that music, in the + varied, piercing clamour of the strings, in the movements of the bare + arms, in the low dresses, the coarse faces, the stony eyes of the + executants, there was a suggestion of brutality—something cruel, + sensual and repulsive. + </p> + <p> + “This is awful!” Heyst murmured to himself. + </p> + <p> + But there is an unholy fascination in systematic noise. He did not flee + from it incontinently, as one might have expected him to do. He remained, + astonished at himself for remaining, since nothing could have been more + repulsive to his tastes, more painful to his senses, and, so to speak, + more contrary to his genius, than this rude exhibition of vigour. The + Zangiacomo band was not making music; it was simply murdering silence with + a vulgar, ferocious energy. One felt as if witnessing a deed of violence; + and that impression was so strong that it seemed marvellous to see the + people sitting so quietly on their chairs, drinking so calmly out of their + glasses, and giving no signs of distress, anger, or fear. Heyst averted + his gaze from the unnatural spectacle of their indifference. + </p> + <p> + When the piece of music came to an end the relief was so great that he + felt slightly dizzy, as if a chasm of silence had yawned at his feet. When + he raised his eyes, the audience, most perversely, was exhibiting signs of + animation and interest in their faces, and the women in white muslin + dresses were coming down in pairs from the platform into the body of + Schomberg's “concert-hall.” They dispersed themselves all over the place. + The male creature with the hooked nose and purple-black beard disappeared + somewhere. This was the interval during which, as the astute Schomberg had + stipulated, the members of the orchestra were encouraged to favour the + members of the audience with their company—that is, such members as + seemed inclined to fraternize with the arts in a familiar and generous + manner; the symbol of familiarity and generosity consisting in offers of + refreshment. + </p> + <p> + The procedure struck Heyst as highly incorrect. However, the impropriety + of Schomberg's ingenious scheme was defeated by the circumstance that most + of the women were no longer young, and that none of them had ever been + beautiful. Their more or less worn cheeks were slightly rouged, but apart + from that fact, which might have been simply a matter of routine, they did + not seem to take the success of the scheme unduly to heart. The impulse to + fraternize with the arts being obviously weak in the audience, some of the + musicians sat down listlessly at unoccupied tables, while others went on + perambulating the central passage: arm in arm, glad enough, no doubt, to + stretch their legs while resting their arms. Their crimson sashes gave a + factitious touch of gaiety to the smoky atmosphere of the concert-hall; + and Heyst felt a sudden pity for these beings, exploited, hopeless, devoid + of charm and grace, whose fate of cheerless dependence invested their + coarse and joyless features with a touch of pathos. + </p> + <p> + Heyst was temperamentally sympathetic. To have them passing and repassing + close to his little table was painful to him. He was preparing to rise and + go out when he noticed that two white muslin dresses and crimson sashes + had not yet left the platform. One of these dresses concealed the + raw-boned frame of the woman with the bad-tempered curve to her nostrils. + She was no less a personage than Mrs. Zangiacomo. She had left the piano, + and, with her back to the hall, was preparing the parts for the second + half of the concert, with a brusque, impatient action of her ugly elbow. + This task done, she turned, and, perceiving the other white muslin dress + motionless on a chair in the second row, she strode towards it between the + music-stands with an aggressive and masterful gait. On the lap of that + dress there lay, unclasped and idle, a pair of small hands, not very + white, attached to well-formed arms. The next detail Heyst was led to + observe was the arrangement of the hair—two thick, brown tresses + rolled round an attractively shaped head. + </p> + <p> + “A girl, by Jove!” he exclaimed mentally. + </p> + <p> + It was evident that she was a girl. It was evident in the outline of the + shoulders, in the slender white bust springing up, barred slantwise by the + crimson sash, from the bell-shaped spread of muslin skirt hiding the chair + on which she sat averted a little from the body of the hall. Her feet, in + low white shoes, were crossed prettily. + </p> + <p> + She had captured Heyst's awakened faculty of observation; he had the + sensation of a new experience. That was because his faculty of observation + had never before been captured by any feminine creature in that marked and + exclusive fashion. He looked at her anxiously, as no man ever looks at + another man; and he positively forgot where he was. He had lost touch with + his surroundings. The big woman, advancing, concealed the girl from his + sight for a moment. She bent over the seated youthful figure, in passing + it very close, as if to drop a word into its ear. Her lips did certainly + move. But what sort of word could it have been to make the girl jump up so + swiftly? Heyst, at his table, was surprised into a sympathetic start. He + glanced quickly round. Nobody was looking towards the platform; and when + his eyes swept back there again, the girl, with the big woman treading at + her heels, was coming down the three steps from the platform to the floor + of the hall. There she paused, stumbled one pace forward, and stood still + again, while the other—the escort, the dragoon, the coarse big woman + of the piano—passed her roughly, and, marching truculently down the + centre aisle between the chairs and tables, went out to rejoin the + hook-nosed Zangiacomo somewhere outside. During her extraordinary transit, + as if everything in the hall were dirt under her feet, her scornful eyes + met the upward glance of Heyst, who looked away at once towards the girl. + She had not moved. Her arms hung down; her eyelids were lowered. + </p> + <p> + Heyst laid down his half-smoked cigar and compressed his lips. Then he got + up. It was the same sort of impulse which years ago had made him cross the + sandy street of the abominable town of Delli in the island of Timor and + accost Morrison, practically a stranger to him then, a man in trouble, + expressively harassed, dejected, lonely. + </p> + <p> + It was the same impulse. But he did not recognize it. He was not thinking + of Morrison then. It may be said that, for the first time since the final + abandonment of the Samburan coal mine, he had completely forgotten the + late Morrison. It is true that to a certain extent he had forgotten also + where he was. Thus, unchecked by any sort of self consciousness, Heyst + walked up the central passage. + </p> + <p> + Several of the women, by this time, had found anchorage here and there + among the occupied tables. They talked to the men, leaning on their + elbows, and suggesting funnily—if it hadn't been for the crimson + sashes—in their white dresses an assembly of middle-aged brides with + free and easy manners and hoarse voices. The murmuring noise of + conversations carried on with some spirit filled Schomberg's concert-room. + Nobody remarked Heyst's movements; for indeed he was not the only man on + his legs there. He had been confronting the girl for some time before she + became aware of his presence. She was looking down, very still, without + colour, without glances, without voice, without movement. It was only when + Heyst addressed her in his courteous tone that she raised her eyes. + </p> + <p> + “Excuse me,” he said in English, “but that horrible female has done + something to you. She has pinched you, hasn't she? I am sure she pinched + you just now, when she stood by your chair.” + </p> + <p> + The girl received this overture with the wide, motionless stare of + profound astonishment. Heyst, vexed with himself, suspected that she did + not understand what he said. One could not tell what nationality these + women were, except that they were of all sorts. But she was astonished + almost more by the near presence of the man himself, by his largely bald + head, by the white brow, the sunburnt cheeks, the long, horizontal + moustaches of crinkly bronze hair, by the kindly expression of the man's + blue eyes looking into her own. He saw the stony amazement in hers give + way to a momentary alarm, which was succeeded by an expression of + resignation. + </p> + <p> + “I am sure she pinched your arm most cruelly,” he murmured, rather + disconcerted now at what he had done. + </p> + <p> + It was a great comfort to hear her say: + </p> + <p> + “It wouldn't have been the first time. And suppose she did—what are + you going to do about it?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know,” he said with a faint, remote playfulness in his tone which + had not been heard in it lately, and which seemed to catch her ear + pleasantly. “I am grieved to say that I don't know. But can I do anything? + What would you wish me to do? Pray command me.” + </p> + <p> + Again, the greatest astonishment became visible in her face; for she now + perceived how different he was from the other men in the room. He was as + different from them as she was different from the other members of the + ladies' orchestra. + </p> + <p> + “Command you?” she breathed, after a time, in a bewildered tone. “Who are + you?” she asked a little louder. + </p> + <p> + “I am staying in this hotel for a few days. I just dropped in casually + here. This outrage—” + </p> + <p> + “Don't you try to interfere,” she said so earnestly that Heyst asked, in + his faintly playful tone: + </p> + <p> + “Is it your wish that I should leave you?” + </p> + <p> + “I haven't said that,” the girl answered. “She pinched me because I didn't + get down here quick enough—” + </p> + <p> + “I can't tell you how indignant I am—” said Heyst. “But since you + are down here now,” he went on, with the ease of a man of the world + speaking to a young lady in a drawing-room, “hadn't we better sit down?” + </p> + <p> + She obeyed his inviting gesture, and they sat down on the nearest chairs. + They looked at each other across a little round table with a surprised, + open gaze, self-consciousness growing on them so slowly that it was a long + time before they averted their eyes; and very soon they met again, + temporarily, only to rebound, as it were. At last they steadied in + contact, but by that time, say some fifteen minutes from the moment when + they sat down, the “interval” came to an end. + </p> + <p> + So much for their eyes. As to the conversation, it had been perfectly + insignificant because naturally they had nothing to say to each other. + Heyst had been interested by the girl's physiognomy. Its expression was + neither simple nor yet very clear. It was not distinguished—that + could not be expected—but the features had more fineness than those + of any other feminine countenance he had ever had the opportunity to + observe so closely. There was in it something indefinably audacious and + infinitely miserable—because the temperament and the existence of + that girl were reflected in it. But her voice! It seduced Heyst by its + amazing quality. It was a voice fit to utter the most exquisite things, a + voice which would have made silly chatter supportable and the roughest + talk fascinating. Heyst drank in its charm as one listens to the tone of + some instrument without heeding the tune. + </p> + <p> + “Do you sing as well as play?” he asked her abruptly. + </p> + <p> + “Never sang a note in my life,” she said, obviously surprised by the + irrelevant question; for they had not been discoursing of sweet sounds. + She was clearly unaware of her voice. “I don't remember that I ever had + much reason to sing since I was little,” she added. + </p> + <p> + That inelegant phrase, by the mere vibrating, warm nobility of the sound, + found its way into Heyst's heart. His mind, cool, alert, watched it sink + there with a sort of vague concern at the absurdity of the occupation, + till it rested at the bottom, deep down, where our unexpressed longings + lie. + </p> + <p> + “You are English, of course?” he said. + </p> + <p> + “What do you think?” she answered in the most charming accents. Then, as + if thinking that it was her turn to place a question: “Why do you always + smile when you speak?” + </p> + <p> + It was enough to make anyone look grave, but her good faith was so evident + that Heyst recovered himself at once. + </p> + <p> + “It's my unfortunate manner—” he said with his delicate, polished + playfulness. “Is is very objectionable to you?” + </p> + <p> + She was very serious. + </p> + <p> + “No. I only noticed it. I haven't come across so many pleasant people as + all that, in my life.” + </p> + <p> + “It's certain that this woman who plays the piano is infinitely more + disagreeable than any cannibal I have ever had to do with.” + </p> + <p> + “I believe you!” She shuddered. “How did you come to have anything to do + with cannibals?” + </p> + <p> + “It would be too long a tale,” said Heyst with a faint smile. Heyst's + smiles were rather melancholy, and accorded badly with his great + moustaches, under which his mere playfulness lurked as comfortable as a + shy bird in its native thicket. “Much too long. How did you get amongst + this lot here?” + </p> + <p> + “Bad luck,” she answered briefly. + </p> + <p> + “No doubt, no doubt,” Heyst assented with slight nods. Then, still + indignant at the pinch which he had divined rather than actually seen + inflicted: “I say, couldn't you defend yourself somehow?” + </p> + <p> + She had risen already. The ladies of the orchestra were slowly regaining + their places. Some were already seated, idle stony-eyed, before the + music-stands. Heyst was standing up, too. + </p> + <p> + “They are too many for me,” she said. + </p> + <p> + These few words came out of the common experience of mankind; yet by + virtue of her voice, they thrilled Heyst like a revelation. His feelings + were in a state of confusion, but his mind was clear. + </p> + <p> + “That's bad. But it isn't actual ill-usage that this girl is complaining + of,” he thought lucidly after she left him. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TWO + </h2> + <p> + That was how it began. How it was that it ended, as we know it did end, is + not so easy to state precisely. It is very clear that Heyst was not + indifferent, I won't say to the girl, but to the girl's fate. He was the + same man who had plunged after the submerged Morrison whom he hardly knew + otherwise than by sight and through the usual gossip of the islands. But + this was another sort of plunge altogether, and likely to lead to a very + different kind of partnership. + </p> + <p> + Did he reflect at all? Probably. He was sufficiently reflective. But if he + did, it was with insufficient knowledge. For there is no evidence that he + paused at any time between the date of that evening and the morning of the + flight. Truth to say, Heyst was not one of those men who pause much. Those + dreamy spectators of the world's agitation are terrible once the desire to + act gets hold of them. They lower their heads and charge a wall with an + amazing serenity which nothing but an indisciplined imagination can give. + </p> + <p> + He was not a fool. I suppose he knew—or at least he felt—where + this was leading him. But his complete inexperience gave him the necessary + audacity. The girl's voice was charming when she spoke to him of her + miserable past, in simple terms, with a sort of unconscious cynicism + inherent in the truth of the ugly conditions of poverty. And whether + because he was humane or because her voice included all the modulations of + pathos, cheerfulness, and courage in its compass, it was not disgust that + the tale awakened in him, but the sense of an immense sadness. + </p> + <p> + On a later evening, during the interval between the two parts of the + concert, the girl told Heyst about herself. She was almost a child of the + streets. Her father was a musician in the orchestras of small theatres. + Her mother ran away from him while she was little, and the landladies of + various poor lodging-houses had attended casually to her abandoned + childhood. It was never positive starvation and absolute rags, but it was + the hopeless grip of poverty all the time. It was her father who taught + her to play the violin. It seemed that he used to get drunk sometimes, but + without pleasure, and only because he was unable to forget his fugitive + wife. After he had a paralytic stroke, falling over with a crash in the + well of a music-hall orchestra during the performance, she had joined the + Zangiacomo company. He was now in a home for incurables. + </p> + <p> + “And I am here,” she finished, “with no one to care if I make a hole in + the water the next chance I get or not.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst told her that he thought she could do a little better than that, if + it was only a question of getting out of the world. She looked at him with + special attention, and with a puzzled expression which gave to her face an + air of innocence. + </p> + <p> + This was during one of the “intervals” between the two parts of the + concert. She had come down that time without being incited thereto by a + pinch from the awful Zangiacomo woman. It is difficult to suppose that she + was seduced by the uncovered intellectual forehead and the long reddish + moustaches of her new friend. New is not the right word. She had never had + a friend before; and the sensation of this friendliness going out to her + was exciting by its novelty alone. Besides, any man who did not resemble + Schomberg appeared for that very reason attractive. She was afraid of the + hotel-keeper, who, in the daytime, taking advantage of the fact that she + lived in the hotel itself, and not in the Pavilion with the other + “artists” prowled round her, mute, hungry, portentous behind his great + beard, or else assailed her in quiet corners and empty passages with deep, + mysterious murmurs from behind, which, not withstanding their clear + import, sounded horribly insane somehow. + </p> + <p> + The contrast of Heyst's quiet, polished manner gave her special delight + and filled her with admiration. She had never seen anything like that + before. If she had, perhaps, known kindness in her life, she had never met + the forms of simple courtesy. She was interested by it as a very novel + experience, not very intelligible, but distinctly pleasurable. + </p> + <p> + “I tell you they are too many for me,” she repeated, sometimes recklessly, + but more often shaking her head with ominous dejection. + </p> + <p> + She had, of course, no money at all. The quantities of “black men” all + about frightened her. She really had no definite idea where she was on the + surface of the globe. The orchestra was generally taken from the steamer + to some hotel, and kept shut up there till it was time to go on board + another steamer. She could not remember the names she heard. + </p> + <p> + “How do you call this place again?” she used to ask Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “Sourabaya,” he would say distinctly, and would watch the discouragement + at the outlandish sound coming into her eyes, which were fastened on his + face. + </p> + <p> + He could not defend himself from compassion. He suggested that she might + go to the consul, but it was his conscience that dictated this advice, not + his conviction. She had never heard of the animal or of its uses. A + consul! What was it? Who was he? What could he do? And when she learned + that perhaps he could be induced to send her home, her head dropped on her + breast. + </p> + <p> + “What am I to do when I get there?” she murmured with an intonation so + just, with an accent so penetrating—the charm of her voice did not + fail her even in whispering—that Heyst seemed to see the illusion of + human fellowship on earth vanish before the naked truth of her existence, + and leave them both face to face in a moral desert as arid as the sands of + Sahara, without restful shade, without refreshing water. + </p> + <p> + She leaned slightly over the little table, the same little table at which + they had sat when they first met each other; and with no other memories + but of the stones in the streets her childhood had known, in the distress + of the incoherent, confused, rudimentary impressions of her travels + inspiring her with a vague terror of the world she said rapidly, as one + speaks in desperation: + </p> + <p> + “<i>You</i> do something! You are a gentleman. It wasn't I who spoke to + you first, was it? I didn't begin, did I? It was you who came along and + spoke to me when I was standing over there. What did you want to speak to + me for? I don't care what it is, but you must do something.” + </p> + <p> + Her attitude was fierce and entreating at the same time—clamorous, + in fact though her voice had hardly risen above a breath. It was clamorous + enough to be noticed. Heyst, on purpose, laughed aloud. She nearly choked + with indignation at this brutal heartlessness. + </p> + <p> + “What did you mean, then, by saying 'command me!'?” she almost hissed. + </p> + <p> + Something hard in his mirthless stare, and a quiet final “All right,” + steadied her. + </p> + <p> + “I am not rich enough to buy you out,” he went on, speaking with an + extraordinary detached grin, “even if it were to be done; but I can always + steal you.” + </p> + <p> + She looked at him profoundly, as though these words had a hidden and very + complicated meaning. + </p> + <p> + “Get away now,” he said rapidly, “and try to smile as you go.” + </p> + <p> + She obeyed with unexpected readiness; and as she had a set of very good + white teeth, the effect of the mechanical, ordered smile was joyous, + radiant. It astonished Heyst. No wonder, it flashed through his mind, + women can deceive men so completely. The faculty was inherent in them; + they seemed to be created with a special aptitude. Here was a smile the + origin of which was well known to him; and yet it had conveyed a sensation + of warmth, had given him a sort of ardour to live which was very new to + his experience. + </p> + <p> + By this time she was gone from the table, and had joined the other “ladies + of the orchestra.” They trooped towards the platform, driven in + truculently by the haughty mate of Zangiacomo, who looked as though she + were restraining herself with difficulty from punching their backs. + Zangiacomo followed, with his great, pendulous dyed beard and short + mess-jacket, with an aspect of hang-dog concentration imparted by his + drooping head and the uneasiness of his eyes, which were set very close + together. He climbed the steps last of all, turned about, displaying his + purple beard to the hall, and tapped with his bow. Heyst winced in + anticipation of the horrible racket. It burst out immediately unabashed + and awful. At the end of the platform the woman at the piano, presenting + her cruel profile, her head tilted back, banged the keys without looking + at the music. + </p> + <p> + Heyst could not stand the uproar for more than a minute. He went out, his + brain racked by the rhythm of some more or less Hungarian dance music. The + forests inhabited by the New Guinea cannibals where he had encountered the + most exciting of his earlier futile adventures were silent. And this + adventure, not in its execution, perhaps, but in its nature, required even + more nerve than anything he had faced before. Walking among the paper + lanterns suspended to trees he remembered with regret the gloom and the + dead stillness of the forests at the back of Geelvink Bay, perhaps the + wildest, the unsafest, the most deadly spot on earth from which the sea + can be seen. Oppressed by his thoughts, he sought the obscurity and peace + of his bedroom; but they were not complete. The distant sounds of the + concert reached his ear, faint indeed, but still disturbing. Neither did + he feel very safe in there; for that sentiment depends not on extraneous + circumstances but on our inward conviction. He did not attempt to go to + sleep; he did not even unbutton the top button of his tunic. He sat in a + chair and mused. Formerly, in solitude and in silence, he had been used to + think clearly and sometimes even profoundly, seeing life outside the + flattering optical delusion of everlasting hope, of conventional + self-deceptions, of an ever-expected happiness. But now he was troubled; a + light veil seemed to hang before his mental vision; the awakening of a + tenderness, indistinct and confused as yet, towards an unknown woman. + </p> + <p> + Gradually silence, a real silence, had established itself round him. The + concert was over; the audience had gone; the concert-hall was dark; and + even the Pavilion, where the ladies' orchestra slept after its noisy + labours, showed not a gleam of light. Heyst suddenly felt restless in all + his limbs, as this reaction from the long immobility would not be denied, + he humoured it by passing quietly along the back veranda and out into the + grounds at the side of the house, into the black shadows under the trees, + where the extinguished paper lanterns were gently swinging their globes + like withered fruit. + </p> + <p> + He paced there to and fro for a long time, a calm, meditative ghost in his + white drill-suit, revolving in his head thoughts absolutely novel, + disquieting, and seductive; accustoming his mind to the contemplation of + his purpose, in order that by being faced steadily it should appear + praiseworthy and wise. For the use of reason is to justify the obscure + desires that move our conduct, impulses, passions, prejudices, and + follies, and also our fears. + </p> + <p> + He felt that he had engaged himself by a rash promise to an action big + with incalculable consequences. And then he asked himself if the girl had + understood what he meant. Who could tell? He was assailed by all sorts of + doubts. Raising his head, he perceived something white flitting between + the trees. It vanished almost at once; but there could be no mistake. He + was vexed at being detected roaming like this in the middle of the night. + Who could that be? It never occurred to him that perhaps the girl, too, + would not be able to sleep. He advanced prudently. Then he saw the white, + phantom-like apparition again; and the next moment all his doubts as to + the state of her mind were laid at rest, because he felt her clinging to + him after the manner of supplicants all the world over. Her whispers were + so incoherent that he could not understand anything; but this did not + prevent him from being profoundly moved. He had no illusions about her; + but his sceptical mind was dominated by the fulness of his heart. + </p> + <p> + “Calm yourself, calm yourself,” he murmured in her ear, returning her + clasp at first mechanically, and afterwards with a growing appreciation of + her distressed humanity. The heaving of her breast and the trembling of + all her limbs, in the closeness of his embrace, seemed to enter his body, + to infect his very heart. While she was growing quieter in his arms, he + was becoming more agitated, as if there were only a fixed quantity of + violent emotion on this earth. The very night seemed more dumb, more + still, and the immobility of the vague, black shapes, surrounding him more + perfect. + </p> + <p> + “It will be all right,” he tried to reassure her, with a tone of + conviction, speaking into her ear, and of necessity clasping her more + closely than before. + </p> + <p> + Either the words or the action had a very good effect. He heard a light + sigh of relief. She spoke with a calmed ardour. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I knew it would be all right from the first time you spoke to me! + Yes, indeed, I knew directly you came up to me that evening. I knew it + would be all right, if you only cared to make it so; but of course I could + not tell if you meant it. 'Command me,' you said. Funny thing for a man + like you to say. Did you really mean it? You weren't making fun of me?” + </p> + <p> + He protested that he had been a serious person all his life. + </p> + <p> + “I believe you,” she said ardently. He was touched by this declaration. + “It's the way you have of speaking as if you were amused with people,” she + went on. “But I wasn't deceived. I could see you were angry with that + beast of a woman. And you are clever. You spotted something at once. You + saw it in my face, eh? It isn't a bad face—say? You'll never be + sorry. Listen—I'm not twenty yet. It's the truth, and I can't be so + bad looking, or else—I will tell you straight that I have been + worried and pestered by fellows like this before. I don't know what comes + to them—” + </p> + <p> + She was speaking hurriedly. She choked, and then exclaimed, with an accent + of despair: + </p> + <p> + “What is it? What's the matter?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst had removed his arms from her suddenly, and had recoiled a little. + “Is it my fault? I didn't even look at them, I tell you straight. Never! + Have I looked at you? Tell me. It was you that began it.” + </p> + <p> + In truth, Heyst had shrunk from the idea of competition with fellows + unknown, with Schomberg the hotel-keeper. The vaporous white figure before + him swayed pitifully in the darkness. He felt ashamed of his + fastidiousness. + </p> + <p> + “I am afraid we have been detected,” he murmured. “I think I saw somebody + on the path between the house and the bushes behind you.” + </p> + <p> + He had seen no one. It was a compassionate lie, if there ever was one. His + compassion was as genuine as his shrinking had been, and in his judgement + more honourable. + </p> + <p> + She didn't turn her head. She was obviously relieved. + </p> + <p> + “Would it be that brute?” she breathed out, meaning Schomberg, of course. + “He's getting too forward with me now. What can you expect? Only this + evening, after supper, he—but I slipped away. You don't mind him, do + you? Why, I could face him myself now that I know you care for me. A girl + can always put up a fight. You believe me? Only it isn't easy to stand up + for yourself when you feel there's nothing and nobody at your back. + There's nothing so lonely in the world as a girl who has got to look after + herself. When I left poor dad in that home—it was in the country, + near a village—I came out of the gates with seven shillings and + threepence in my old purse, and my railway ticket. I tramped a mile, and + got into a train—” + </p> + <p> + She broke off, and was silent for a moment. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you throw me over now,” she went on. “If you did, what should I do? + I should have to live, to be sure, because I'd be afraid to kill myself, + but you would have done a thousand times worse than killing a body. You + told me you had been always alone, you had never had a dog even. Well, + then, I won't be in anybody's way if I live with you—not even a + dog's. And what else did you mean when you came up and looked at me so + close?” + </p> + <p> + “Close? Did I?” he murmured unstirring before her in the profound + darkness. “So close as that?” + </p> + <p> + She had an outbreak of anger and despair in subdued tones. + </p> + <p> + “Have you forgotten, then? What did you expect to find? I know what sort + of girl I am; but all the same I am not the sort that men turn their backs + on—and you ought to know it, unless you aren't made like the others. + Oh, forgive me! You aren't like the others; you are like no one in the + world I ever spoke to. Don't you care for me? Don't you see—?” + </p> + <p> + What he saw was that, white and spectral, she was putting out her arms to + him out of the black shadows like an appealing ghost. He took her hands, + and was affected, almost surprised, to find them so warm, so real, so + firm, so living in his grasp. He drew her to him, and she dropped her head + on his shoulder with a deep-sigh. + </p> + <p> + “I am dead tired,” she whispered plaintively. + </p> + <p> + He put his arms around her, and only by the convulsive movements of her + body became aware that she was sobbing without a sound. Sustaining her, he + lost himself in the profound silence of the night. After a while she + became still, and cried quietly. Then, suddenly, as if waking up, she + asked: + </p> + <p> + “You haven't seen any more of that somebody you thought was spying about?” + </p> + <p> + He started at her quick, sharp whisper, and answered that very likely he + had been mistaken. + </p> + <p> + “If it was anybody at all,” she reflected aloud, “it wouldn't have been + anyone but that hotel woman—the landlord's wife.” + </p> + <p> + “Mrs. Schomberg,” Heyst said, surprised. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Another one that can't sleep o' nights. Why? Don't you see why? + Because, of course, she sees what's going on. That beast doesn't even try + to keep it from her. If she had only the least bit of spirit! She knows + how I feel, too, only she's too frightened even to look him in the face, + let alone open her mouth. He would tell her to go hang herself.” + </p> + <p> + For some time Heyst said nothing. A public, active contest with the + hotel-keeper was not to be thought of. The idea was horrible. Whispering + gently to the girl, he tried to explain to her that as things stood, an + open withdrawal from the company would be probably opposed. She listened + to his explanation anxiously, from time to time pressing the hand she had + sought and got hold of in the dark. + </p> + <p> + “As I told you, I am not rich enough to buy you out so I shall steal you + as soon as I can arrange some means of getting away from here. Meantime it + would be fatal to be seen together at night. We mustn't give ourselves + away. We had better part at once. I think I was mistaken just now; but if, + as you say, that poor Mrs. Schomberg can't sleep of nights, we must be + more careful. She would tell the fellow.” + </p> + <p> + The girl had disengaged herself from his loose hold while he talked, and + now stood free of him, but still clasping his hand firmly. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, no,” she said with perfect assurance. “I tell you she daren't open + her mouth to him. And she isn't as silly as she looks. She wouldn't give + us away. She knows a trick worth two of that. She'll help—that's + what she'll do, if she dares do anything at all.” + </p> + <p> + “You seem to have a very clear view of the situation,” said Heyst, and + received a warm, lingering kiss for this commendation. + </p> + <p> + He discovered that to part from her was not such an easy matter as he had + supposed it would be. + </p> + <p> + “Upon my word,” he said before they separated, “I don't even know your + name.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't you? They call me Alma. I don't know why. Silly name! Magdalen too. + It doesn't matter; you can call me by whatever name you choose. Yes, you + give me a name. Think of one you would like the sound of—something + quite new. How I should like to forget everything that has gone before, as + one forgets a dream that's done with, fright and all! I would try.” + </p> + <p> + “Would you really?” he asked in a murmur. “But that's not forbidden. I + understand that women easily forget whatever in their past diminishes them + in their eyes.” + </p> + <p> + “It's your eyes that I was thinking of, for I'm sure I've never wished to + forget anything till you came up to me that night and looked me through + and through. I know I'm not much account; but I know how to stand by a + man. I stood by father ever since I could understand. He wasn't a bad + chap. Now that I can't be of any use to him, I would just as soon forget + all that and make a fresh start. But these aren't things that I could talk + to you about. What could I ever talk to you about?” + </p> + <p> + “Don't let it trouble you,” Heyst said. “Your voice is enough. I am in + love with it, whatever it says.” + </p> + <p> + She remained silent for a while, as if rendered breathless by this quiet + statement. + </p> + <p> + “Oh! I wanted to ask you—” + </p> + <p> + He remembered that she probably did not know his name, and expected the + question to be put to him now; but after a moment of hesitation she went + on: + </p> + <p> + “Why was it that you told me to smile this evening in the concert-room + there—you remember?” + </p> + <p> + “I thought we were being observed. A smile is the best of masks. Schomberg + was at a table next but one to us, drinking with some Dutch clerks from + the town. No doubt he was watching us—watching you, at least. That's + why I asked you to smile.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah, that's why. It never came into my head!” + </p> + <p> + “And you did it very well, too—very readily, as if you had + understood my intention.” + </p> + <p> + “Readily!” she repeated. “Oh, I was ready enough to smile then. That's the + truth. It was the first time for years I may say that I felt disposed to + smile. I've not had many chances to smile in my life, I can tell you; + especially of late.” + </p> + <p> + “But you do it most charmingly—in a perfectly fascinating way.” + </p> + <p> + He paused. She stood still, waiting for more with the stillness of extreme + delight, wishing to prolong the sensation. + </p> + <p> + “It astonished me,” he added. “It went as straight to my heart as though + you had smiled for the purpose of dazzling me. I felt as if I had never + seen a smile before in my life. I thought of it after I left you. It made + me restless.” + </p> + <p> + “It did all that?” came her voice, unsteady, gentle, and incredulous. + </p> + <p> + “If you had not smiled as you did, perhaps I should not have come out here + tonight,” he said, with his playful earnestness of tone. “It was your + triumph.” + </p> + <p> + He felt her lips touch his lightly, and the next moment she was gone. Her + white dress gleamed in the distance, and then the opaque darkness of the + house seemed to swallow it. Heyst waited a little before he went the same + way, round the corner, up the steps of the veranda, and into his room, + where he lay down at last—not to sleep, but to go over in his mind + all that had been said at their meeting. + </p> + <p> + “It's exactly true about that smile,” he thought. There he had spoken the + truth to her; and about her voice, too. For the rest—what must be + must be. + </p> + <p> + A great wave of heat passed over him. He turned on his back, flung his + arms crosswise on the broad, hard bed, and lay still, open-eyed under the + mosquito net, till daylight entered his room, brightened swiftly, and + turned to unfailing sunlight. He got up then, went to a small + looking-glass hanging on the wall, and stared at himself steadily. It was + not a new-born vanity which induced this long survey. He felt so strange + that he could not resist the suspicion of his personal appearance having + changed during the night. What he saw in the glass, however, was the man + he knew before. It was almost a disappointment—a belittling of his + recent experience. And then he smiled at his naiveness; for, being over + five and thirty years of age, he ought to have known that in most cases + the body is the unalterable mask of the soul, which even death itself + changes but little, till it is put out of sight where no changes matter + any more, either to our friends or to our enemies. + </p> + <p> + Heyst was not conscious of either friends or of enemies. It was the very + essence of his life to be a solitary achievement, accomplished not by + hermit-like withdrawal with its silence and immobility, but by a system of + restless wandering, by the detachment of an impermanent dweller amongst + changing scenes. In this scheme he had perceived the means of passing + through life without suffering and almost without a single care in the + world—invulnerable because elusive. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER THREE + </h2> + <p> + For fifteen years Heyst had wandered, invariably courteous and + unapproachable, and in return was generally considered a “queer chap.” He + had started off on these travels of his after the death of his father, an + expatriated Swede who died in London, dissatisfied with his country and + angry with all the world, which had instinctively rejected his wisdom. + </p> + <p> + Thinker, stylist, and man of the world in his time, the elder Heyst had + begun by coveting all the joys, those of the great and those of the + humble, those of the fools and those of the sages. For more than sixty + years he had dragged on this painful earth of ours the most weary, the + most uneasy soul that civilization had ever fashioned to its ends of + disillusion and regret. One could not refuse him a measure of greatness, + for he was unhappy in a way unknown to mediocre souls. His mother Heyst + had never known, but he kept his father's pale, distinguished face in + affectionate memory. He remembered him mainly in an ample blue + dressing-gown in a large house of a quiet London suburb. For three years, + after leaving school at the age of eighteen, he had lived with the elder + Heyst, who was then writing his last book. In this work, at the end of his + life, he claimed for mankind that right to absolute moral and intellectual + liberty of which he no longer believed them worthy. + </p> + <p> + Three years of such companionship at that plastic and impressionable age + were bound to leave in the boy a profound mistrust of life. The young man + learned to reflect, which is a destructive process, a reckoning of the + cost. It is not the clear-sighted who lead the world. Great achievements + are accomplished in a blessed, warm mental fog, which the pitiless cold + blasts of the father's analysis had blown away from the son. + </p> + <p> + “I'll drift,” Heyst had said to himself deliberately. + </p> + <p> + He did not mean intellectually or sentimentally or morally. He meant to + drift altogether and literally, body and soul, like a detached leaf + drifting in the wind-currents under the immovable trees of a forest glade; + to drift without ever catching on to anything. + </p> + <p> + “This shall be my defence against life,” he had said to himself with a + sort of inward consciousness that for the son of his father there was no + other worthy alternative. + </p> + <p> + He became a waif and stray, austerely, from conviction, as others do + through drink, from vice, from some weakness of character—with + deliberation, as others do in despair. This, stripped of its facts, had + been Heyst's life up to that disturbing night. Next day, when he saw the + girl called Alma, she managed to give him a glance of frank tenderness, + quick as lightning and leaving a profound impression, a secret touch on + the heart. It was in the grounds of the hotel, about tiffin time, while + the Ladies of the orchestra were strolling back to their pavilion after + rehearsal, or practice, or whatever they called their morning musical + exercises in the hall. Heyst, returning from the town, where he had + discovered that there would be difficulties in the way of getting away at + once, was crossing the compound, disappointed and worried. He had walked + almost unwittingly into the straggling group of Zangiacomo's performers. + It was a shock to him, on coming out of his brown study, to find the girl + so near to him, as if one waking suddenly should see the figure of his + dream turned into flesh and blood. She did not raise her shapely head, but + her glance was no dream thing. It was real, the most real impression of + his detached existence—so far. + </p> + <p> + Heyst had not acknowledged it in any way, though it seemed to him + impossible that its effect on him should not be visible to anyone who + happened to be looking on. And there were several men on the veranda, + steady customers of Schomberg's table d'hote, gazing in his direction—at + the ladies of the orchestra, in fact. Heyst's dread arose, not out of + shame or timidity, but from his fastidiousness. On getting amongst them, + however, he noticed no signs of interest or astonishment in their faces, + any more than if they had been blind men. Even Schomberg himself, who had + to make way for him at the top of the stairs, was completely unperturbed, + and continued the conversation he was carrying on with a client. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, indeed, had observed “that Swede” talking with the girl in the + intervals. A crony of his had nudged him; and he had thought that it was + so much the better; the silly fellow would keep everybody else off. He was + rather pleased than otherwise and watched them out of the corner of his + eye with a malicious enjoyment of the situation—a sort of Satanic + glee. For he had little doubt of his personal fascination, and still less + of his power to get hold of the girl, who seemed too ignorant to know how + to help herself, and who was worse than friendless, since she had for some + reason incurred the animosity of Mrs. Zangiacomo, a woman with no + conscience. The aversion she showed him as far as she dared (for it is not + always safe for the helpless to display the delicacy of their sentiments), + Schomberg pardoned on the score of feminine conventional silliness. He had + told Alma, as an argument, that she was a clever enough girl to see that + she could do no better than to put her trust in a man of substance, in the + prime of life, who knew his way about. But for the excited trembling of + his voice, and the extraordinary way in which his eyes seemed to be + starting out of his crimson, hirsute countenance, such speeches had every + character of calm, unselfish advice—which, after the manner of + lovers, passed easily into sanguine plans for the future. + </p> + <p> + “We'll soon get rid of the old woman,” he whispered to her hurriedly, with + panting ferocity. “Hang her! I've never cared for her. The climate don't + suit her; I shall tell her to go to her people in Europe. She will have to + go, too! I will see to it. Eins, zwei, march! And then we shall sell this + hotel and start another somewhere else.” + </p> + <p> + He assured her that he didn't care what he did for her sake; and it was + true. Forty-five is the age of recklessness for many men, as if in + defiance of the decay and death waiting with open arms in the sinister + valley at the bottom of the inevitable hill. Her shrinking form, her + downcast eyes, when she had to listen to him, cornered at the end of an + empty corridor, he regarded as signs of submission to the overpowering + force of his will, the recognition of his personal fascinations. For every + age is fed on illusions, lest men should renounce life early and the human + race come to an end. + </p> + <p> + It's easy to imagine Schomberg's humiliation, his shocked fury, when he + discovered that the girl who had for weeks resisted his attacks, his + prayers, and his fiercest protestations, had been snatched from under his + nose by “that Swede,” apparently without any trouble worth speaking of. He + refused to believe the fact. He would have it, at first, that the + Zangiacomos, for some unfathomable reason, had played him a scurvy trick, + but when no further doubt was possible, he changed his view of Heyst. The + despised Swede became for Schomberg the deepest, the most dangerous, the + most hateful of scoundrels. He could not believe that the creature he had + coveted with so much force and with so little effect, was in reality + tender, docile to her impulse, and had almost offered herself to Heyst + without a sense of guilt, in a desire of safety, and from a profound need + of placing her trust where her woman's instinct guided her ignorance. + Nothing would serve Schomberg but that she must have been circumvented by + some occult exercise of force or craft, by the laying of some subtle trap. + His wounded vanity wondered ceaselessly at the means “that Swede” had + employed to seduce her away from a man like him—Schomberg—as + though those means were bound to have been extraordinary, unheard of, + inconceivable. He slapped his forehead openly before his customers; he + would sit brooding in silence or else would burst out unexpectedly + declaiming against Heyst without measure, discretion, or prudence, with + swollen features and an affectation of outraged virtue which could not + have deceived the most childlike of moralists for a moment—and + greatly amused his audience. + </p> + <p> + It became a recognized entertainment to go and hear his abuse of Heyst, + while sipping iced drinks on the veranda of the hotel. It was, in a + manner, a more successful draw than the Zangiacomo concerts had ever been—intervals + and all. There was never any difficulty in starting the performer off. + Anybody could do it, by almost any distant allusion. As likely as not he + would start his endless denunciations in the very billiard-room where Mrs. + Schomberg sat enthroned as usual, swallowing her sobs, concealing her + tortures of abject humiliation and terror under her stupid, set, + everlasting grin, which, having been provided for her by nature, was an + excellent mask, in as much as nothing—not even death itself, perhaps—could + tear it away. + </p> + <p> + But nothing lasts in this world, at least without changing its + physiognomy. So, after a few weeks, Schomberg regained his outward calm, + as if his indignation had dried up within him. And it was time. He was + becoming a bore with his inability to talk of anything else but Heyst's + unfitness to be at large, Heyst's wickedness, his wiles, his astuteness, + and his criminality. Schomberg no longer pretended to despise him. He + could not have done it. After what had happened he could not pretend, even + to himself. But his bottled-up indignation was fermenting venomously. At + the time of his immoderate loquacity one of his customers, an elderly man, + had remarked one evening: + </p> + <p> + “If that ass keeps on like this, he will end by going crazy.” + </p> + <p> + And this belief was less than half wrong. Schomberg had Heyst on the + brain. Even the unsatisfactory state of his affairs, which had never been + so unpromising since he came out East directly after the Franco-Prussian + War, he referred to some subtly noxious influence of Heyst. It seemed to + him that he could never be himself again till he had got even with that + artful Swede. He was ready to swear that Heyst had ruined his life. The + girl so unfairly, craftily, basely decoyed away would have inspired him to + success in a new start. Obviously Mrs. Schomberg, whom he terrified by + savagely silent moods combined with underhand, poisoned glances, could + give him no inspiration. He had grown generally neglectful, but with a + partiality for reckless expedients, as if he did not care when and how his + career as a hotel-keeper was to be brought to an end. This demoralized + state accounted for what Davidson had observed on his last visit to the + Schomberg establishment, some two months after Heyst's secret departure + with the girl to the solitude of Samburan. + </p> + <p> + The Schomberg of a few years ago—the Schomberg of the Bangkok days, + for instance, when he started the first of his famed table d'hote dinners—would + never have risked anything of the sort. His genius ran to catering, “white + man for white men” and to the inventing, elaborating, and retailing of + scandalous gossip with asinine unction and impudent delight. But now his + mind was perverted by the pangs of wounded vanity and of thwarted passion. + In this state of moral weakness Schomberg allowed himself to be corrupted. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FOUR + </h2> + <p> + The business was done by a guest who arrived one fine morning by mail-boat—immediately + from Celebes, having boarded her in Macassar, but generally, Schomberg + understood, from up China Sea way; a wanderer clearly, even as Heyst was, + but not alone and of quite another kind. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, looking up from the stern-sheets of his steam-launch, which he + used for boarding passenger ships on arrival, discovered a dark sunken + stare plunging down on him over the rail of the first-class part of the + deck. He was no great judge of physiognomy. Human beings, for him, were + either the objects of scandalous gossip or else recipients of narrow + strips of paper, with proper bill-heads stating the name of his hotel—“W. + Schomberg, proprietor, accounts settled weekly.” + </p> + <p> + So in the clean-shaven, extremely thin face hanging over the mail-boat's + rail Schomberg saw only the face of a possible “account.” The + steam-launches of other hotels were also alongside, but he obtained the + preference. + </p> + <p> + “You are Mr. Schomberg, aren't you?” the face asked quite unexpectedly. + </p> + <p> + “I am at your service,” he answered from below; for business is business, + and its forms and formulas must be observed, even if one's manly bosom is + tortured by that dull rage which succeeds the fury of baffled passion, + like the glow of embers after a fierce blaze. + </p> + <p> + Presently the possessor of the handsome but emaciated face was seated + beside Schomberg in the stern-sheets of the launch. His body was long and + loose-jointed, his slender fingers, intertwined, clasped the leg resting + on the knee, as he lolled back in a careless yet tense attitude. On the + other side of Schomberg sat another passenger, who was introduced by the + clean-shaven man as— + </p> + <p> + “My secretary. He must have the room next to mine.” + </p> + <p> + “We can manage that easily for you.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg steered with dignity, staring straight ahead, but very much + interested by these two promising “accounts.” Their belongings, a couple + of large leather trunks browned by age and a few smaller packages, were + piled up in the bows. A third individual—a nondescript, hairy + creature—had modestly made his way forward and had perched himself + on the luggage. The lower part of his physiognomy was over-developed; his + narrow and low forehead, unintelligently furrowed by horizontal wrinkles, + surmounted wildly hirsute cheeks and a flat nose with wide, baboon-like + nostrils. There was something equivocal in the appearance of his shaggy, + hair-smothered humanity. He, too, seemed to be a follower of the + clean-shaven man, and apparently had travelled on deck with native + passengers, sleeping under the awnings. His broad, squat frame denoted + great strength. Grasping the gunwales of the launch, he displayed a pair + of remarkably long arms, terminating in thick, brown hairy paws of simian + aspect. + </p> + <p> + “What shall we do with the fellow of mine?” the chief of the party asked + Schomberg. “There must be a boarding-house somewhere near the port—some + grog-shop where they could let him have a mat to sleep on?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg said there was a place kept by a Portuguese half-caste. + </p> + <p> + “A servant of yours?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “Well, he hangs on to me. He is an alligator-hunter. I picked him up in + Colombia, you know. Ever been in Colombia?” + </p> + <p> + “No,” said Schomberg, very much surprised. “An alligator-hunter? Funny + trade! Are you coming from Colombia, then?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but I have been coming for a long time. I come from a good many + places. I am travelling west, you see.” + </p> + <p> + “For sport, perhaps?” suggested Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Sort of sport. What do you say to chasing the sun?” + </p> + <p> + “I see—a gentleman at large,” said Schomberg, watching a sailing + canoe about to cross his bow, and ready to clear it by a touch of the + helm. + </p> + <p> + The other passenger made himself heard suddenly. + </p> + <p> + “Hang these native craft! They always get in the way.” + </p> + <p> + He was a muscular, short man with eyes that gleamed and blinked, a harsh + voice, and a round, toneless, pock-marked face ornamented by a thin, + dishevelled moustache, sticking out quaintly under the tip of a rigid + nose. Schomberg made the reflection that there was nothing secretarial + about him. Both he and his long, lank principal wore the usual white suit + of the tropics, cork helmets, pipe-clayed white shoes—all correct. + The hairy nondescript creature perched on their luggage in the bow had a + check shirt and blue dungaree trousers. He gazed in their direction from + forward in an expectant, trained-animal manner. + </p> + <p> + “You spoke to me first,” said Schomberg in his manly tones. “You were + acquainted with my name. Where did you hear of me, gentlemen, may I ask?” + </p> + <p> + “In Manila,” answered the gentleman at large, readily. “From a man with + whom I had a game of cards one evening in the Hotel Castille.” + </p> + <p> + “What man? I've no friends in Manila that I know of,” wondered Schomberg + with a severe frown. + </p> + <p> + “I can't tell you his name. I've clean forgotten it; but don't you worry. + He was anything but a friend of yours. He called you all the names he + could think of. He said you set a lot of scandal going about him once, + somewhere—in Bangkok, I think. Yes, that's it. You were running a + table d'hote in Bangkok at one time, weren't you?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, astounded by the turn of the information, could only throw out + his chest more and exaggerate his austere Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve + manner. A table d'hote? Yes, certainly. He always—for the sake of + white men. And here in this place, too? Yes, in this place, too. + </p> + <p> + “That's all right, then.” The stranger turned his black, cavernous, + mesmerizing glance away from the bearded Schomberg, who sat gripping the + brass tiller in a sweating palm. “Many people in the evening at your + place?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg had recovered somewhat. + </p> + <p> + “Twenty covers or so, take one day with another,” he answered feelingly, + as befitted a subject on which he was sensitive. “Ought to be more, if + only people would see that it's for their own good. Precious little profit + I get out of it. You are partial to tables d'hote, gentlemen?” + </p> + <p> + The new guest made answer that he liked a hotel where one could find some + local people in the evening. It was infernally dull otherwise. The + secretary, in sign of approval, emitted a grunt of astonishing ferocity, + as if proposing to himself to eat the local people. All this sounded like + a longish stay, thought Schomberg, satisfied under his grave air; till, + remembering the girl snatched away from him by the last guest who had made + a prolonged stay in his hotel, he ground his teeth so audibly that the + other two looked at him in wonder. The momentary convulsion of his florid + physiognomy seemed to strike them dumb. They exchanged a quick glance. + Presently the clean-shaven man fired out another question in his curt, + unceremonious manner: + </p> + <p> + “You have no women in your hotel, eh?” + </p> + <p> + “Women!” Schomberg exclaimed indignantly, but also as if a little + frightened. “What on earth do you mean by women? What women? There's Mrs. + Schomberg, of course,” he added, suddenly appeased, with lofty + indifference. + </p> + <p> + “If she knows how to keep her place, then it will do. I can't stand women + near me. They give me the horrors,” declared the other. “They are a + perfect curse!” + </p> + <p> + During this outburst the secretary wore a savage grin. The chief guest + closed his sunken eyes, as if exhausted, and leaned the back of his head + against the stanchion of the awning. In this pose, his long, feminine + eyelashes were very noticeable, and his regular features, sharp line of + the jaw, and well-cut chin were brought into prominence, giving him a + used-up, weary, depraved distinction. He did not open his eyes till the + steam-launch touched the quay. Then he and the other man got ashore + quickly, entered a carriage, and drove away to the hotel, leaving + Schomberg to look after their luggage and take care of their strange + companion. The latter, looking more like a performing bear abandoned by + his show men than a human being, followed all Schomberg's movements step + by step, close behind his back, muttering to himself in a language that + sounded like some sort of uncouth Spanish. The hotel-keeper felt + uncomfortable till at last he got rid of him at an obscure den where a + very clean, portly Portuguese half-caste, standing serenely in the + doorway, seemed to understand exactly how to deal with clients of every + kind. He took from the creature the strapped bundle it had been hugging + closely through all its peregrinations in that strange town, and cut short + Schomberg's attempts at explanation by a most confident— + </p> + <p> + “I comprehend very well, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “It's more than I do,” thought Schomberg, going away thankful at being + relieved of the alligator-hunter's company. He wondered what these fellows + were, without being able to form a guess of sufficient probability. Their + names he learned that very day by direct inquiry “to enter in my books,” + he explained in his formal military manner, chest thrown out, beard very + much in evidence. + </p> + <p> + The shaven man, sprawling in a long chair, with his air of withered youth, + raised his eyes languidly. + </p> + <p> + “My name? Oh, plain Mr. Jones—put that down—a gentleman at + large. And this is Ricardo.” The pock-marked man, lying prostrate in + another long chair, made a grimace, as if something had tickled the end of + his nose, but did not come out of his supineness. “Martin Ricardo, + secretary. You don't want any more of our history, do you? Eh, what? + Occupation? Put down, well—tourists. We've been called harder names + before now; it won't hurt our feelings. And that fellow of mine—where + did you tuck him away? Oh, he will be all right. When he wants anything + he'll take it. He's Peter. Citizen of Colombia. Peter, Pedro—I don't + know that he ever had any other name. Pedro, alligator hunter. Oh, yes—I'll + pay his board with the half-caste. Can't help myself. He's so confoundedly + devoted to me that if I were to give him the sack he would fly at my + throat. Shall I tell you how I killed his brother in the wilds of + Colombia? Well, perhaps some other time—it's a rather long story. + What I shall always regret is that I didn't kill him, too. I could have + done it without any extra trouble then; now it's too late. Great nuisance; + but he's useful sometimes. I hope you are not going to put all this in + your book?” + </p> + <p> + The offhand, hard manner and the contemptuous tone of “plain Mr. Jones” + disconcerted Schomberg utterly. He had never been spoken to like this in + his life. He shook his head in silence and withdrew, not exactly scared—though + he was in reality of a timid disposition under his manly exterior—but + distinctly mystified and impressed. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FIVE + </h2> + <p> + Three weeks later, after putting his cash-box away in the safe which + filled with its iron bulk a corner of their room, Schomberg turned towards + his wife, but without looking at her exactly, and said: + </p> + <p> + “I must get rid of these two. It won't do!” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Schomberg had entertained that very opinion from the first; but she + had been broken years ago into keeping her opinions to herself. Sitting in + her night attire in the light of a single candle, she was careful not to + make a sound, knowing from experience that her very assent would be + resented. With her eyes she followed the figure of Schomberg, clad in his + sleeping suit, and moving restlessly about the room. + </p> + <p> + He never glanced her way, for the reason that Mrs. Schomberg, in her night + attire, looked the most unattractive object in existence—miserable, + insignificant, faded, crushed, old. And the contrast with the feminine + form he had ever in his mind's eye made his wife's appearance painful to + his aesthetic sense. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg walked about swearing and fuming for the purpose of screwing his + courage up to the sticking point. + </p> + <p> + “Hang me if I ought not to go now, at once, this minute, into his bedroom, + and tell him to be off—him and that secretary of his—early in + the morning. I don't mind a round game of cards, but to make a decoy of my + table d'hote—my blood boils! He came here because some lying rascal + in Manila told him I kept a table d'hote.” + </p> + <p> + He said these things, not for Mrs. Schomberg's information, but simply + thinking aloud, and trying to work his fury up to a point where it would + give him courage enough to face “plain Mr. Jones.” + </p> + <p> + “Impudent overbearing, swindling sharper,” he went on. “I have a good mind + to—” + </p> + <p> + He was beside himself in his lurid, heavy, Teutonic manner, so unlike the + picturesque, lively rage of the Latin races; and though his eyes strayed + about irresolutely, yet his swollen, angry features awakened in the + miserable woman over whom he had been tyrannizing for years a fear for his + precious carcass, since the poor creature had nothing else but that to + hold on to in the world. She knew him well; but she did not know him + altogether. The last thing a woman will consent to discover in a man whom + she loves, or on whom she simply depends, is want of courage. And, timid + in her corner, she ventured to say pressingly: + </p> + <p> + “Be careful, Wilhelm! Remember the knives and revolvers in their trunks.” + </p> + <p> + In guise of thanks for that anxious reminder, he swore horribly in the + direction of her shrinking person. In her scanty nightdress, and + barefooted, she recalled a mediaeval penitent being reproved for her sins + in blasphemous terms. Those lethal weapons were always present to + Schomberg's mind. Personally, he had never seen them. His part, ten days + after his guests' arrival, had been to lounge in manly, careless attitudes + on the veranda—keeping watch—while Mrs. Schomberg, provided + with a bunch of assorted keys, her discoloured teeth chattering and her + globular eyes absolutely idiotic with fright, was “going through” the + luggage of these strange clients. Her terrible Wilhelm had insisted on it. + </p> + <p> + “I'll be on the look-out, I tell you,” he said. “I shall give you a + whistle when I see them coming back. You couldn't whistle. And if he were + to catch you at it, and chuck you out by the scruff of the neck, it + wouldn't hurt you much; but he won't touch a woman. Not he! He has told me + so. Affected beast. I must find out something about their little game, and + so there's an end of it. Go in! Go now! Quick march!” + </p> + <p> + It had been an awful job; but she did go in, because she was much more + afraid of Schomberg than of any possible consequences of the act. Her + greatest concern was lest no key of the bunch he had provided her with + should fit the locks. It would have been such a disappointment for + Wilhelm. However, the trunks, she found, had been left open; but her + investigation did not last long. She was frightened of firearms, and + generally of all weapons, not from personal cowardice, but as some women + are, almost superstitiously, from an abstract horror of violence and + murder. She was out again on the veranda long before Wilhelm had any + occasion for a warning whistle. The instinctive, motiveless fear being the + most difficult to overcome, nothing could induce her to return to her + investigations, neither threatening growls nor ferocious hisses, nor yet a + poke or two in the ribs. + </p> + <p> + “Stupid female!” muttered the hotel-keeper, perturbed by the notion of + that armoury in one of his bedrooms. This was from no abstract sentiment, + with him it was constitutional. “Get out of my sight,” he snarled. “Go and + dress yourself for the table d'hote.” + </p> + <p> + Left to himself, Schomberg had meditated. What the devil did this mean? + His thinking processes were sluggish and spasmodic; but suddenly the truth + came to him. + </p> + <p> + “By heavens, they are desperadoes!” he thought. + </p> + <p> + Just then he beheld “plain Mr. Jones” and his secretary with the ambiguous + name of Ricardo entering the grounds of the hotel. They had been down to + the port on some business, and now were returning; Mr. Jones lank, spare, + opening his long legs with angular regularity like a pair of compasses, + the other stepping out briskly by his side. Conviction entered Schomberg's + heart. They <i>were</i> two desperadoes—no doubt about it. But as + the funk which he experienced was merely a general sensation, he managed + to put on his most severe Officer-of-the-Reserve manner, long before they + had closed with him. + </p> + <p> + “Good morning, gentlemen.” + </p> + <p> + Being answered with derisive civility, he became confirmed in his sudden + conviction of their desperate character. The way Mr. Jones turned his + hollow eyes on one, like an incurious spectre, and the way the other, when + addressed, suddenly retracted his lips and exhibited his teeth without + looking round—here was evidence enough to settle that point. + Desperadoes! They passed through the billiard-room, inscrutably + mysterious, to the back of the house, to join their violated trunks. + </p> + <p> + “Tiffin bell will ring in five minutes, gentlemen.” Schomberg called after + them, exaggerating the deep manliness of his tone. + </p> + <p> + He had managed to upset himself very much. He expected to see them come + back infuriated and begin to bully him with an odious lack of restraint. + Desperadoes! However they didn't; they had not noticed anything unusual + about their trunks and Schomberg recovered his composure and said to + himself that he must get rid of this deadly incubus as soon as + practicable. They couldn't possibly want to stay very long; this was not + the town—the colony—for desperate characters. He shrank from + action. He dreaded any kind of disturbance—“fracas” he called it—in + his hotel. Such things were not good for business. Of course, sometimes + one had to have a “fracas;” but it had been a comparatively trifling task + to seize the frail Zangiacomo—whose bones were no larger than a + chicken's—round the ribs, lift him up bodily, dash him to the + ground, and fall on him. It had been easy. The wretched, hook-nosed + creature lay without movement, buried under its purple beard. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly, remembering the occasion of that “fracas,” Schomberg groaned + with the pain as of a hot coal under his breastbone, and gave himself up + to desolation. Ah, if he only had that girl with him he would have been + masterful and resolute and fearless—fight twenty desperadoes—care + for nobody on earth! Whereas the possession of Mrs. Schomberg was no + incitement to a display of manly virtues. Instead of caring for no one, he + felt that he cared for nothing. Life was a hollow sham; he wasn't going to + risk a shot through his lungs or his liver in order to preserve its + integrity. It had no savour—damn it! + </p> + <p> + In his state of moral decomposition, Schomberg, master as he was of the + art of hotel-keeping, and careful of giving no occasion for criticism to + the powers regulating that branch of human activity, let things take their + course; though he saw very well where that course was tending. It began + first with a game or two after dinner—for the drinks, apparently—with + some lingering customer, at one of the little tables ranged against the + walls of the billiard-room. Schomberg detected the meaning of it at once. + “That's what it was! This was what they were!” And, moving about + restlessly (at that time his morose silent period had set in), he cast + sidelong looks at the game; but he said nothing. It was not worth while + having a row with men who were so overbearing. Even when money appeared in + connection with these postprandial games, into which more and more people + were being drawn, he still refrained from raising the question; he was + reluctant to draw unduly the attention of “plain Mr. Jones” and of the + equivocal Ricardo, to his person. One evening, however, after the public + rooms of the hotel had become empty, Schomberg made an attempt to grapple + with the problem in an indirect way. + </p> + <p> + In a distant corner the tired China boy dozed on his heels, his back + against the wall. Mrs. Schomberg had disappeared, as usual, between ten + and eleven. Schomberg walked about slowly in and out of the room and the + veranda, thoughtful, waiting for his two guests to go to bed. Then + suddenly he approached them, militarily, his chest thrown out, his voice + curt and soldierly. + </p> + <p> + “Hot night, gentlemen.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones, lolling back idly in a chair, looked up. Ricardo, as idle, but + more upright, made no sign. + </p> + <p> + “Won't you have a drink with me before retiring?” went on Schomberg, + sitting down by the little table. + </p> + <p> + “By all means,” said Mr. Jones lazily. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo showed his teeth in a strange, quick grin. Schomberg felt + painfully how difficult it was to get in touch with these men, both so + quiet, so deliberate, so menacingly unceremonious. He ordered the Chinaman + to bring in the drinks. His purpose was to discover how long these guests + intended to stay. Ricardo displayed no conversational vein, but Mr. Jones + appeared communicative enough. His voice somehow matched his sunken eyes. + It was hollow without being in the least mournful; it sounded distant, + uninterested, as though he were speaking from the bottom of a well. + Schomberg learned that he would have the privilege of lodging and boarding + these gentlemen for at least a month more. He could not conceal his + discomfiture at this piece of news. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter? Don't you like to have people in your house?” asked + plain Mr. Jones languidly. “I should have thought the owner of a hotel + would be pleased.” + </p> + <p> + He lifted his delicate and beautifully pencilled eyebrows. Schomberg + muttered something about the locality being dull and uninteresting to + travellers—nothing going on—too quiet altogether, but he only + provoked the declaration that quiet had its charm sometimes, and even + dullness was welcome as a change. + </p> + <p> + “We haven't had time to be dull for the last three years,” added plain Mr. + Jones, his eyes fixed darkly on Schomberg whom he further more invited to + have another drink, this time with him, and not to worry himself about + things he did not understand; and especially not to be inhospitable—which + in a hotel-keeper is highly unprofessional. + </p> + <p> + “I don't understand,” grumbled Schomberg. “Oh, yes, I understand perfectly + well. I—” + </p> + <p> + “You are frightened,” interrupted Mr. Jones. “What is the matter?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't want any scandal in my place. That's what's the matter.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg tried to face the situation bravely, but that steady, black + stare affected him. And when he glanced aside uncomfortably, he met + Ricardo's grin uncovering a lot of teeth, though the man seemed absorbed + in his thoughts all the time. + </p> + <p> + “And, moreover,” went on Mr. Jones in that distant tone of his, “you can't + help yourself. Here we are and here we stay. Would you try to put us out? + I dare say you could do it; but you couldn't do it without getting hurt—very + badly hurt. We can promise him that, can't we, Martin?” + </p> + <p> + The secretary retracted his lips and looked up sharply at Schomberg, as if + only too anxious to leap upon him with teeth and claws. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg managed to produce a deep laugh. + </p> + <p> + “Ha! Ha! Ha!” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones closed his eyes wearily, as if the light hurt them, and looked + remarkably like a corpse for a moment. This was bad enough; but when he + opened them again, it was almost a worse trial for Schomberg's nerves. The + spectral intensity of that glance, fixed on the hotel-keeper (and this was + most frightful) without any definite expression, seemed to dissolve the + last grain of resolution in his character. + </p> + <p> + “You don't think, by any chance, that you have to do with ordinary people, + do you?” inquired Mr. Jones, in his lifeless manner, which seemed to imply + some sort of menace from beyond the grave. + </p> + <p> + “He's a gentleman,” testified Martin Ricardo with a sudden snap of the + lips, after which his moustaches stirred by themselves in an odd, feline + manner. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I wasn't thinking of that,” said plain Mr. Jones, while Schomberg, + dumb and planted heavily in his chair looked from one to the other, + leaning forward a little. “Of course I am that; but Ricardo attaches too + much importance to a social advantage. What I mean, for instance, is that + he, quiet and inoffensive as you see him sitting here, would think nothing + of setting fire to this house of entertainment of yours. It would blaze + like a box of matches. Think of that! It wouldn't advance your affairs + much, would it?—whatever happened to us.” + </p> + <p> + “Come, come gentlemen,” remonstrated Schomberg, in a murmur. “This is very + wild talk!” + </p> + <p> + “And you have been used to deal with tame people, haven't you? But we + aren't tame. We once kept a whole angry town at bay for two days, and then + we got away with our plunder. It was in Venezuela. Ask Martin here—he + can tell you.” + </p> + <p> + Instinctively Schomberg looked at Ricardo, who only passed the tip of his + tongue over his lips with an uncanny sort of gusto, but did not offer to + begin. + </p> + <p> + “Well, perhaps it would be a rather long story,” Mr. Jones conceded after + a short silence. + </p> + <p> + “I have no desire to hear it, I am sure,” said Schomberg. “This isn't + Venezuela. You wouldn't get away from here like that. But all this is + silly talk of the worst sort. Do you mean to say you would make deadly + trouble for the sake of a few guilders that you and that other”—eyeing + Ricardo suspiciously, as one would look at a strange animal—“gentleman + can win of an evening? Isn't as if my customers were a lot of rich men + with pockets full of cash. I wonder you take so much trouble and risk for + so little money.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg's argument was met by Mr. Jones's statement that one must do + something to kill time. Killing time was not forbidden. For the rest, + being in a communicative mood, Mr. Jones said languidly and in a voice + indifferent, as if issuing from a tomb, that he depended on himself, as if + the world were still one great, wild jungle without law. Martin was + something like that, too—for reasons of his own. + </p> + <p> + All these statements Ricardo confirmed by short, inhuman grins. Schomberg + lowered his eyes, for the sight of these two men intimidated him; but he + was losing patience. + </p> + <p> + “Of course, I could see at once that you were two desperate characters—something + like what you say. But what would you think if I told you that I am pretty + near as desperate as you two gentlemen? 'Here's that Schomberg has an easy + time running his hotel,' people think; and yet it seems to me I would just + as soon let you rip me open and burn the whole show as not. There!” + </p> + <p> + A low whistle was heard. It came from Ricardo, and was derisive. + Schomberg, breathing heavily, looked on the floor. He was really + desperate. Mr. Jones remained languidly sceptical. + </p> + <p> + “Tut, tut! You have a tolerable business. You are perfectly tame; you—” + He paused, then added in a tone of disgust: “You have a wife.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg tapped the floor angrily with his foot and uttered an + indistinct, laughing curse. + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean by flinging that damned trouble at my head?” he cried. + “I wish you would carry her off with you some where to the devil! I + wouldn't run after you.” + </p> + <p> + The unexpected outburst affected Mr. Jones strangely. He had a horrified + recoil, chair and all, as if Schomberg had thrust a wriggling viper in his + face. + </p> + <p> + “What's this infernal nonsense?” he muttered thickly. “What do you mean? + How dare you?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo chuckled audibly. + </p> + <p> + “I tell you I am desperate,” Schomberg repeated. “I am as desperate as any + man ever was. I don't care a hang what happens to me!” + </p> + <p> + “Well, then”—Mr. Jones began to speak with a quietly threatening + effect, as if the common words of daily use had some other deadly meaning + to his mind—“well, then, why should you make yourself ridiculously + disagreeable to us? If you don't care, as you say, you might just as well + let us have the key of that music-shed of yours for a quiet game; a modest + bank—a dozen candles or so. It would be greatly appreciated by your + clients, as far as I can judge from the way they betted on a game of + ecarte I had with that fair, baby-faced man—what's his name? They + just yearn for a modest bank. And I am afraid Martin here would take it + badly if you objected; but of course you won't. Think of the calls for + drinks!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, raising his eyes, at last met the gleams in two dark caverns + under Mr. Jones's devilish eyebrows, directed upon him impenetrably. He + shuddered as if horrors worse than murder had been lurking there, and + said, nodding towards Ricardo: + </p> + <p> + “I dare say he wouldn't think twice about sticking me, if he had you at + his back! I wish I had sunk my launch, and gone to the bottom myself in + her, before I boarded the steamer you came by. Ah, well, I've been already + living in hell for weeks, so you don't make much difference. I'll let you + have the concert-room—and hang the consequences. But what about the + boy on late duty? If he sees the cards and actual money passing, he will + be sure to blab, and it will be all over the town in no time.” + </p> + <p> + A ghastly smile stirred the lips of Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + “Ah, I see you want to make a success of it. Very good. That's the way to + get on. Don't let it disturb you. You chase all the Chinamen to bed early, + and we'll get Pedro here every evening. He isn't the conventional waiter's + cut, but he will do to run to and fro with the tray, while you sit here + from nine to eleven serving out drinks and gathering the money.” + </p> + <p> + “There will be three of them now,” thought the unlucky Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + But Pedro, at any rate, was just a simple, straightforward brute, if a + murderous one. There was no mystery about him, nothing uncanny, no + suggestion of a stealthy, deliberate wildcat turned into a man, or of an + insolent spectre on leave from Hades, endowed with skin and bones and a + subtle power of terror. Pedro with his fangs, his tangled beard, and queer + stare of his little bear's eyes was, by comparison, delightfully natural. + Besides, Schomberg could no longer help himself. + </p> + <p> + “That will do very well,” he asserted mournfully. “But if you gentlemen, + if you had turned up here only three months ago—ay, less than three + months ago—you would have found somebody very different from what I + am now to talk to you. It's true. What do you think of that?” + </p> + <p> + “I scarcely know what to think. I should think it was a lie. You were + probably as tame three months ago as you are now. You were born tame, like + most people in the world.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones got up spectrally, and Ricardo imitated him with a snarl and a + stretch. Schomberg, in a brown study, went on, as if to himself: + </p> + <p> + “There has been an orchestra here—eighteen women.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones let out an exclamation of dismay, and looked about as if the + walls around him and the whole house had been infected with plague. Then + he became very angry, and swore violently at Schomberg for daring to bring + up such subjects. The hotel-keeper was too much surprised to get up. He + gazed from his chair at Mr. Jones's anger, which had nothing spectral in + it but was not the more comprehensible for that. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter?” he stammered out. “What subject? Didn't you hear me + say it was an orchestra? There's nothing wrong in that. Well, there was a + girl amongst them—” Schomberg's eyes went stony; he clasped his + hands in front of his breast with such force that his knuckles came out + white. “Such a girl! Tame, am I? I would have kicked everything to pieces + about me for her. And she, of course . . . I am in the prime of life . . . + then a fellow bewitched her—a vagabond, a false, lying, swindling, + underhand, stick-at-nothing brute. Ah!” + </p> + <p> + His entwined fingers cracked as he tore his hands apart, flung out his + arms, and leaned his forehead on them in a passion of fury. The other two + looked at his shaking back—the attenuated Mr. Jones with mingled + scorn and a sort of fear, Ricardo with the expression of a cat which sees + a piece of fish in the pantry out of reach. Schomberg flung himself + backwards. He was dry-eyed, but he gulped as if swallowing sobs. + </p> + <p> + “No wonder you can do with me what you like. You have no idea—just + let me tell you of my trouble—” + </p> + <p> + “I don't want to know anything of your beastly trouble,” said Mr. Jones, + in his most lifelessly positive voice. + </p> + <p> + He stretched forth an arresting hand, and, as Schomberg remained + open-mouthed, he walked out of the billiard-room in all the uncanniness of + his thin shanks. Ricardo followed at his leader's heels; but he showed his + teeth to Schomberg over his shoulder. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SIX + </h2> + <p> + From that evening dated those mysterious but significant phenomena in + Schomberg's establishment which attracted Captain Davidson's casual notice + when he dropped in, placid yet astute, in order to return Mrs. Schomberg's + Indian shawl. And strangely enough, they lasted some considerable time. It + argued either honesty and bad luck or extraordinary restraint on the part + of “plain Mr. Jones and Co.” in their discreet operations with cards. + </p> + <p> + It was a curious and impressive sight, the inside of Schomberg's + concert-hall, encumbered at one end by a great stack of chairs piled up on + and about the musicians' platform, and lighted at the other by two dozen + candles disposed about a long trestle table covered with green cloth. In + the middle, Mr. Jones, a starved spectre turned into a banker, faced + Ricardo, a rather nasty, slow-moving cat turned into a croupier. By + contrast, the other faces round that table, anything between twenty and + thirty, must have looked like collected samples of intensely artless, + helpless humanity—pathetic in their innocent watch for the small + turns of luck which indeed might have been serious enough for them. They + had no notice to spare for the hairy Pedro, carrying a tray with the + clumsiness of a creature caught in the woods and taught to walk on its + hind legs. + </p> + <p> + As to Schomberg, he kept out of the way. He remained in the billiard-room, + serving out drinks to the unspeakable Pedro with an air of not seeing the + growling monster, of not knowing where the drinks went, of ignoring that + there was such a thing as a music-room over there under the trees within + fifty yards of the hotel. He submitted himself to the situation with a + low-spirited stoicism compounded of fear and resignation. Directly the + party had broken up, (he could see dark shapes of the men drifting singly + and in knots through the gate of the compound), he would withdraw out of + sight behind a door not quite closed, in order to avoid meeting his two + extraordinary guests; but he would watch through the crack their + contrasted forms pass through the billiard-room and disappear on their way + to bed. Then he would hear doors being slammed upstairs; and a profound + silence would fall upon the whole house, upon his hotel appropriated, + haunted by those insolently outspoken men provided with a whole armoury of + weapons in their trunks. A profound silence. Schomberg sometimes could not + resist the notion that he must be dreaming. Shuddering, he would pull + himself together, and creep out, with movements strangely inappropriate to + the Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve bearing by which he tried to keep up his + self-respect before the world. + </p> + <p> + A great loneliness oppressed him. One after another he would extinguish + the lamps, and move softly towards his bedroom, where Mrs. Schomberg + waited for him—no fit companion for a man of his ability and “in the + prime of life.” But that life, alas, was blighted. He felt it; and never + with such force as when on opening the door he perceived that woman + sitting patiently in a chair, her toes peeping out under the edge of her + night-dress, an amazingly small amount of hair on her head drooping on the + long stalk of scraggy neck, with that everlasting scared grin showing a + blue tooth and meaning nothing—not even real fear. For she was used + to him. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes he was tempted to screw the head off the stalk. He imagined + himself doing it—with one hand, a twisting movement. Not seriously, + of course. Just a simple indulgence for his exasperated feelings. He + wasn't capable of murder. He was certain of that. And, remembering + suddenly the plain speeches of Mr. Jones, he would think: “I suppose I am + too tame for that”—quite unaware that he had murdered the poor woman + morally years ago. He was too unintelligent to have the notion of such a + crime. Her bodily presence was bitterly offensive, because of its contrast + with a very different feminine image. And it was no use getting rid of + her. She was a habit of years, and there would be nothing to put in her + place. At any rate, he could talk to that idiot half the night if he + chose. + </p> + <p> + That night he had been vapouring before her as to his intention to face + his two guests and, instead of that inspiration he needed, had merely + received the usual warning: “Be careful, Wilhelm.” He did not want to be + told to be careful by an imbecile female. What he needed was a pair of + woman's arms which, flung round his neck, would brace him up for the + encounter. Inspire him, he called it to himself. + </p> + <p> + He lay awake a long time; and his slumbers, when they came, were + unsatisfactory and short. The morning light had no joy for his eyes. He + listened dismally to the movements in the house. The Chinamen were + unlocking and flinging wide the doors of the public rooms which opened on + the veranda. Horrors! Another poisoned day to get through somehow! The + recollection of his resolve made him feel actually sick for a moment. + First of all the lordly, abandoned attitudes of Mr. Jones disconcerted + him. Then there was his contemptuous silence. Mr. Jones never addressed + himself to Schomberg with any general remarks, never opened his lips to + him unless to say “Good morning”—two simple words which, uttered by + that man, seemed a mockery of a threatening character. And, lastly, it was + not a frank physical fear he inspired—for as to that, even a + cornered rat will fight—but a superstitious shrinking awe, something + like an invincible repugnance to seek speech with a wicked ghost. That it + was a daylight ghost surprisingly angular in his attitudes, and for the + most part spread out on three chairs, did not make it any easier. Daylight + only made him a more weird, a more disturbing and unlawful apparition. + Strangely enough in the evening when he came out of his mute supineness, + this unearthly side of him was less obtrusive. At the gaming-table, when + actually handling the cards, it was probably sunk quite out of sight; but + Schomberg, having made up his mind in ostrich-like fashion to ignore what + was going on, never entered the desecrated music-room. He had never seen + Mr. Jones in the exercise of his vocation—or perhaps it was only his + trade. + </p> + <p> + “I will speak to him tonight,” Schomberg said to himself, while he drank + his morning tea, in pyjamas, on the veranda, before the rising sun had + topped the trees of the compound, and while the undried dew still lay + silvery on the grass, sparkled on the blossoms of the central flower-bed, + and darkened the yellow gravel of the drive. “That's what I'll do. I won't + keep out of sight tonight. I shall come out and catch him as he goes to + bed carrying the cash-box.” + </p> + <p> + After all, what was the fellow but a common desperado? Murderous? Oh, yes; + murderous enough, perhaps—and the muscles of Schomberg's stomach had + a quivering contraction under his airy attire. But even a common desperado + would think twice or, more likely, a hundred times, before openly + murdering an inoffensive citizen in a civilized, European-ruled town. He + jerked his shoulders. Of course! He shuddered again, and paddled back to + his room to dress himself. His mind was made up, and he would think no + more about it; but still he had his doubts. They grew and unfolded + themselves with the progress of the day, as some plants do. At times they + made him perspire more than usual, and they did away with the possibility + of his afternoon siesta. After turning over on his couch more than a dozen + times, he gave up this mockery of repose, got up, and went downstairs. + </p> + <p> + It was between three and four o'clock, the hour of profound peace. The + very flowers seemed to doze on their stalks set with sleepy leaves. Not + even the air stirred, for the sea-breeze was not due till later. The + servants were out of sight, catching naps in the shade somewhere behind + the house. Mrs. Schomberg in a dim up-stair room with closed jalousies, + was elaborating those two long pendant ringlets which were such a feature + of her hairdressing for her afternoon duties. At that time no customers + ever troubled the repose of the establishment. Wandering about his + premises in profound solitude, Schomberg recoiled at the door of the + billiard-room, as if he had seen a snake in his path. All alone with the + billiards, the bare little tables, and a lot of untenanted chairs, Mr. + Secretary Ricardo sat near the wall, performing with lightning rapidity + something that looked like tricks with his own personal pack of cards, + which he always carried about in his pocket. Schomberg would have backed + out quietly if Ricardo had not turned his head. Having been seen, the + hotel-keeper elected to walk in as the lesser risk of the two. The + consciousness of his inwardly abject attitude towards these men caused him + always to throw his chest out and assume a severe expression. Ricardo + watched his approach, clasping the pack of cards in both hands. + </p> + <p> + “You want something, perhaps?” suggested Schomberg in his + lieutenant-of-the-Reserve voice. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo shook his head in silence and looked expectant. With him Schomberg + exchanged at least twenty words every day. He was infinitely more + communicative than his patron. At times he looked very much like an + ordinary human being of his class; and he seemed to be in an amiable mood + at that moment. Suddenly spreading some ten cards face downward in the + form of a fan, he thrust them towards Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + “Come, man, take one quick!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg was so surprised that he took one hurriedly, after a very + perceptible start. The eyes of Martin Ricardo gleamed phosphorescent in + the half-light of the room screened from the heat and glare of the + tropics. + </p> + <p> + “That's the king of hearts you've got,” he chuckled, showing his teeth in + a quick flash. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, after looking at the card, admitted that it was, and laid it + down on the table. + </p> + <p> + “I can make you take any card I like nine times out of ten,” exulted the + secretary, with a strange curl of his lips and a green flicker in his + raised eyes. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg looked down at him dumbly. For a few seconds neither of them + stirred; then Ricardo lowered his glance, and, opening his fingers, let + the whole pack fall on the table. Schomberg sat down. He sat down because + of the faintness in his legs, and for no other reason. His mouth was dry. + Having sat down, he felt that he must speak. He squared his shoulders in + parade style. + </p> + <p> + “You are pretty good at that sort of thing,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “Practice makes perfect,” replied the secretary. + </p> + <p> + His precarious amiability made it impossible for Schomberg to get away. + Thus, from his very timidity, the hotel-keeper found himself engaged in a + conversation the thought of which filled him with apprehension. It must be + said, in justice to Schomberg, that he concealed his funk very creditably. + The habit of throwing out his chest and speaking in a severe voice stood + him in good stead. With him, too, practice made perfect; and he would + probably have kept it up to the end, to the very last moment, to the + ultimate instant of breaking strain which would leave him grovelling on + the floor. To add to his secret trouble, he was at a loss what to say. He + found nothing else but the remark: + </p> + <p> + “I suppose you are fond of cards.” + </p> + <p> + “What would you expect?” asked Ricardo in a simple, philosophical tone. + “It is likely I should not be?” Then, with sudden fire: “Fond of cards? + Ay, passionately!” + </p> + <p> + The effect of this outburst was augmented by the quiet lowering of the + eyelids, by a reserved pause as though this had been a confession of + another kind of love. Schomberg cudgelled his brains for a new topic, but + he could not find one. His usual scandalous gossip would not serve this + turn. That desperado did not know anyone anywhere within a thousand miles. + Schomberg was almost compelled to keep to the subject. + </p> + <p> + “I suppose you've always been so—from your early youth.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo's eyes remained cast down. His fingers toyed absently with the + pack on the table. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know that it was so early. I first got in the way of it playing + for tobacco—in forecastles of ships, you know—common sailor + games. We used to spend whole watches below at it, round a chest, under a + slush lamp. We would hardly spare the time to get a bite of salt horse—neither + eat nor sleep. We could hardly stand when the watches were mustered on + deck. Talk of gambling!” He dropped the reminiscent tone to add the + information, “I was bred to the sea from a boy, you know.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg had fallen into a reverie, but without losing the sense of + impending calamity. The next words he heard were: + </p> + <p> + “I got on all right at sea, too. Worked up to be mate. I was mate of a + schooner—a yacht, you might call her—a special good berth too, + in the Gulf of Mexico, a soft job that you don't run across more than once + in a lifetime. Yes, I was mate of her when I left the sea to follow him.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo tossed up his chin to indicate the room above; from which + Schomberg, his wits painfully aroused by this reminder of Mr. Jones's + existence, concluded that the latter had withdrawn into his bedroom. + Ricardo, observing him from under lowered eyelids, went on: + </p> + <p> + “It so happened that we were shipmates.” + </p> + <p> + “Mr Jones, you mean? Is he a sailor too?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo raised his eyelids at that. + </p> + <p> + “He's no more Mr. Jones than you are,” he said with obvious pride. “He a + sailor! That just shows your ignorance. But there! A foreigner can't be + expected to know any better. I am an Englishman, and I know a gentleman at + sight. I should know one drunk, in the gutter, in jail, under the gallows. + There's a something—it isn't exactly the appearance, it's a—no + use me trying to tell you. You ain't an Englishman, and if you were, you + wouldn't need to be told.” + </p> + <p> + An unsuspected stream of loquacity had broken its dam somewhere deep + within the man, had diluted his fiery blood and softened his pitiless + fibre. Schomberg experienced mingled relief and apprehension, as if + suddenly an enormous savage cat had begun to wind itself about his legs in + inexplicable friendliness. No prudent man under such circumstances would + dare to stir. Schomberg didn't stir. Ricardo assumed an easy attitude, + with an elbow on the table. Schomberg squared his shoulders afresh. + </p> + <p> + “I was employed, in that there yacht—schooner, whatever you call it—by + ten gentlemen at once. That surprises you, eh? Yes, yes, ten. Leastwise + there were nine of them gents good enough in their way, and one downright + gentleman, and that was . . .” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo gave another upward jerk of his chin as much as to say: He! The + only one. + </p> + <p> + “And no mistake,” he went on. “I spotted him from the first day. How? Why? + Ay, you may ask. Hadn't seen that many gentlemen in my life. Well, somehow + I did. If you were an Englishman, you would—” + </p> + <p> + “What was your yacht?” Schomberg interrupted as impatiently as he dared; + for this harping on nationality jarred on his already tried nerves. “What + was the game?” + </p> + <p> + “You have a headpiece on you! Game! 'Xactly. That's what it was—the + sort of silliness gentlemen will get up among themselves to play at + adventure. A treasure-hunting expedition. Each of them put down so much + money, you understand, to buy the schooner. Their agent in the city + engaged me and the skipper. The greatest secrecy and all that. I reckon he + had a twinkle in his eye all the time—and no mistake. But that + wasn't our business. Let them bust their money as they like. The pity of + it was that so little of it came our way. Just fair pay and no more. And + damn any pay, much or little, anyhow—that's what I say!” + </p> + <p> + He blinked his eyes greenishly in the dim light. The heat seemed to have + stilled everything in the world but his voice. He swore at large, + abundantly, in snarling undertones, it was impossible to say why, then + calmed down as inexplicably, and went on, as a sailor yarns. + </p> + <p> + “At first there were only nine of them adventurous sparks, then, just a + day or two before the sailing date, he turned up. Heard of it somehow, + somewhere—I would say from some woman, if I didn't know him as I do. + He would give any woman a ten-mile berth. He can't stand them. Or maybe in + a flash bar. Or maybe in one of them grand clubs in Pall Mall. Anyway, the + agent netted him in all right—cash down, and only about four and + twenty hours for him to get ready; but he didn't miss his ship. Not he! + You might have called it a pier-head jump—for a gentleman. I saw him + come along. Know the West India Docks, eh?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg did not know the West India Docks. Ricardo looked at him + pensively for a while, and then continued, as if such ignorance had to be + disregarded. + </p> + <p> + “Our tug was already alongside. Two loafers were carrying his dunnage + behind him. I told the dockman at our moorings to keep all fast for a + minute. The gangway was down already; but he made nothing of it. Up he + jumps, one leap, swings his long legs over the rail, and there he is on + board. They pass up his swell dunnage, and he puts his hand in his + trousers pocket and throws all his small change on the wharf for them + chaps to pick up. They were still promenading that wharf on all fours when + we cast off. It was only then that he looked at me—quietly, you + know; in a slow way. He wasn't so thin then as he is now; but I noticed he + wasn't so young as he looked—not by a long chalk. He seemed to touch + me inside somewhere. I went away pretty quick from there; I was wanted + forward anyhow. I wasn't frightened. What should I be frightened for? I + only felt touched—on the very spot. But Jee-miny, if anybody had + told me we should be partners before the year was out—well, I would + have—” + </p> + <p> + He swore a variety of strange oaths, some common, others quaintly horrible + to Schomberg's ears, and all mere innocent exclamations of wonder at the + shifts and changes of human fortune. Schomberg moved slightly in his + chair. But the admirer and partner of “plain Mr. Jones” seemed to have + forgotten Schomberg's existence for the moment. The stream of ingenuous + blasphemy—some of it in bad Spanish—had run dry, and Martin + Ricardo, connoisseur in gentlemen, sat dumb with a stony gaze as if still + marvelling inwardly at the amazing elections, conjunctions, and + associations of events which influence man's pilgrimage on this earth. + </p> + <p> + At last Schomberg spoke tentatively: + </p> + <p> + “And so the—the gentleman, up there, talked you over into leaving a + good berth?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo started. + </p> + <p> + “Talked me over! Didn't need to talk me over. Just beckoned to me, and + that was enough. By that time we were in the Gulf of Mexico. One night we + were lying at anchor, close to a dry sandbank—to this day I am not + sure where it was—off the Colombian coast or thereabouts. We were to + start digging the next morning, and all hands had turned in early, + expecting a hard day with the shovels. Up he comes, and in his quiet, + tired way of speaking—you can tell a gentleman by that as much as by + anything else almost—up he comes behind me and says, just like that + into my ear, in a manner: 'Well, what do you think of our treasure hunt + now?' + </p> + <p> + “I didn't even turn my head; 'xactly as I stood, I remained, and I spoke + no louder than himself: + </p> + <p> + “'If you want to know, sir, it's nothing but just damned tom-foolery.' + </p> + <p> + “We had, of course, been having short talks together at one time or + another during the passage. I dare say he had read me like a book. There + ain't much to me, except that I have never been tame, even when walking + the pavement and cracking jokes and standing drinks to chums—ay, and + to strangers, too. I would watch them lifting their elbows at my expense, + or splitting their side at my fun—I <i>can</i> be funny when I like, + you bet!” + </p> + <p> + A pause for self-complacent contemplation of his own fun and generosity + checked the flow of Ricardo's speech. Schomberg was concerned to keep + within bounds the enlargement of his eyes, which he seemed to feel growing + bigger in his head. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, yes,” he whispered hastily. + </p> + <p> + “I would watch them and think: 'You boys don't know who I am. If you did—!' + With girls, too. Once I was courting a girl. I used to kiss her behind the + ear and say to myself: 'If you only knew who's kissing you, my dear, you + would scream and bolt!' Ha! ha! Not that I wanted to do them any harm; but + I felt the power in myself. Now, here we sit, friendly like, and that's + all right. You aren't in my way. But I am not friendly to you. I just + don't care. Some men do say that; but I really don't. You are no more to + me one way or another than that fly there. Just so. I'd squash you or + leave you alone. I don't care what I do.” + </p> + <p> + If real force of character consists in overcoming our sudden weaknesses, + Schomberg displayed plenty of that quality. At the mention of the fly, he + re-enforced the severe dignity of his attitude as one inflates a + collapsing toy balloon with a great effort of breath. The easy-going, + relaxed attitude of Ricardo was really appalling. + </p> + <p> + “That's so,” he went on. “I am that sort of fellow. You wouldn't think it, + would you? No. You have to be told. So I am telling you, and I dare say + you only half believe it. But you can't say to yourself that I am drunk, + stare at me as you may. I haven't had anything stronger than a glass of + iced water all day. Takes a real gentleman to see through a fellow. Oh, + yes—he spotted me. I told you we had a few talks at sea about one + thing or another. And I used to watch him down the skylight, playing cards + in the cuddy with the others. They had to pass the time away somehow. By + the same token he caught me at it once, and it was then that I told him I + was fond of cards—and generally lucky in gambling, too. Yes, he had + sized me up. Why not? A gentleman's just like any other man—and + something more.” + </p> + <p> + It flashed through Schomberg's mind: that these two were indeed well + matched in their enormous dissimilarity, identical souls in different + disguises. + </p> + <p> + “Says he to me”—Ricardo started again in a gossiping manner—'I'm + packed up. It's about time to go, Martin.' + </p> + <p> + “It was the first time he called me Martin. Says I: + </p> + <p> + “'Is that it, sir?' + </p> + <p> + “'You didn't think I was after that sort of treasure, did you? I wanted to + clear out from home quietly. It's a pretty expensive way of getting a + passage across, but it has served my turn.' + </p> + <p> + “I let him know very soon that I was game for anything, from pitch and + toss to wilful murder, in his company. + </p> + <p> + “'Wilful murder?' says he in his quiet way. 'What the deuce is that? What + are you talking about? People do get killed sometimes when they get in + one's way, but that's self-defence—you understand?' + </p> + <p> + “I told him I did. And then I said I would run below for a minute, to ram + a few of my things into a sailor's bag I had. I've never cared for a lot + of dunnage; I believed in going about flying light when I was at sea. I + came back and found him strolling up and down the deck, as if he were + taking a breath of fresh air before turning in, like any other evening. + </p> + <p> + “'Ready?' + </p> + <p> + “'Yes, sir.' + </p> + <p> + “He didn't even look at me. We had had a boat in the water astern ever + since we came to anchor in the afternoon. He throws the stump of his cigar + overboard. + </p> + <p> + “'Can you get the captain out on deck?' he asks. + </p> + <p> + “That was the last thing in the world I should have thought of doing. I + lost my tongue for a moment. + </p> + <p> + “'I can try,' says I. + </p> + <p> + “'Well, then, I am going below. You get him up and keep him with you till + I come back on deck. Mind! Don't let him go below till I return.' + </p> + <p> + “I could not help asking why he told me to rouse a sleeping man, when we + wanted everybody on board to sleep sweetly till we got clear of the + schooner. He laughs a little and says that I didn't see all the bearings + of this business. + </p> + <p> + “'Mind,' he says, 'don't let him leave you till you see me come up again.' + He puts his eyes close to mine. 'Keep him with you at all costs.' + </p> + <p> + “'And that means?' says I. + </p> + <p> + “'All costs to him—by every possible or impossible means. I don't + want to be interrupted in my business down below. He would give me lots of + trouble. I take you with me to save myself trouble in various + circumstances; and you've got to enter on your work right away.' + </p> + <p> + “'Just so, sir,' says I; and he slips down the companion. + </p> + <p> + “With a gentleman you know at once where you are; but it was a ticklish + job. The skipper was nothing to me one way or another, any more than you + are at this moment, Mr. Schomberg. You may light your cigar or blow your + brains out this minute, and I don't care a hang which you do, both or + neither. To bring the skipper up was easy enough. I had only to stamp on + the deck a few times over his head. I stamped hard. But how to keep him up + when he got there? + </p> + <p> + “'Anything the matter; Mr. Ricardo?' I heard his voice behind me. + </p> + <p> + “There he was, and I hadn't thought of anything to say to him; so I didn't + turn round. The moonlight was brighter than many a day I could remember in + the North Sea. + </p> + <p> + “'Why did you call me? What are you staring at out there, Mr. Ricardo?' + </p> + <p> + “He was deceived by my keeping my back to him. I wasn't staring at + anything, but his mistake gave me a notion. + </p> + <p> + “'I am staring at something that looks like a canoe over there,' I said + very slowly. + </p> + <p> + “The skipper got concerned at once. It wasn't any danger from the + inhabitants, whoever they were. + </p> + <p> + “'Oh, hang it!' says he. 'That's very unfortunate.' He had hoped that the + schooner being on the coast would not get known so very soon. 'Dashed + awkward, with the business we've got in hand, to have a lot of niggers + watching operations. But are you certain this is a canoe?' + </p> + <p> + “'It may be a drift-log,' I said; 'but I thought you had better have a + look with your own eyes. You may make it out better than I can.' + </p> + <p> + “His eyes weren't anything as good as mine. But he says: + </p> + <p> + “'Certainly. Certainly. You did quite right.' + </p> + <p> + “And it's a fact I had seen some drift-logs at sunset. I saw what they + were then and didn't trouble my head about them, forgot all about it till + that very moment. Nothing strange in seeing drift-logs off a coast like + that; and I'm hanged if the skipper didn't make one out in the wake of the + moon. Strange what a little thing a man's life hangs on sometimes—a + single word! Here you are, sitting unsuspicious before me, and you may let + out something unbeknown to you that would settle your hash. Not that I + have any ill-feeling. I have no feelings. If the skipper had said, 'O, + bosh!' and had turned his back on me, he would not have gone three steps + towards his bed; but he stood there and stared. And now the job was to get + him off the deck when he was no longer wanted there. + </p> + <p> + “'We are just trying to make out if that object there is a canoe or a + log,' says he to Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + “Mr Jones had come up, lounging as carelessly as when he went below. While + the skipper was jawing about boats and drifting logs. I asked by signs, + from behind, if I hadn't better knock him on the head and drop him quietly + overboard. The night was slipping by, and we had to go. It couldn't be put + off till next night no more. No. No more. And do you know why?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg made a slight negative sign with his head. This direct appeal + annoyed him, jarred on the induced quietude of a great talker forced into + the part of a listener and sunk in it as a man sinks into slumber. Mr. + Ricardo struck a note of scorn. + </p> + <p> + “Don't know why? Can't you guess? No? Because the boss had got hold of the + skipper's cash-box by then. See?” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SEVEN + </h2> + <p> + “A common thief!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg bit his tongue just too late, and woke up completely as he saw + Ricardo retract his lips in a cat-like grin; but the companion of “plain + Mr. Jones” didn't alter his comfortable, gossiping attitude. + </p> + <p> + “Garn! What if he did want to see his money back, like any tame + shopkeeper, hash-seller, gin-slinger, or ink-spewer does? Fancy a mud + turtle like you trying to pass an opinion on a gentleman! A gentleman + isn't to be sized up so easily. Even I ain't up to it sometimes. For + instance, that night, all he did was to waggle his finger at me. The + skipper stops his silly chatter, surprised. + </p> + <p> + “'Eh? What's the matter?' asks he. + </p> + <p> + “The matter! It was his reprieve—that's what was the matter. + </p> + <p> + “'O, nothing, nothing,' says my gentleman. 'You are perfectly right. A log—nothing + but a log.' + </p> + <p> + “Ha, ha! Reprieve, I call it, because if the skipper had gone on with his + silly argument much longer he would have had to be knocked out of the way. + I could hardly hold myself in on account of the precious minutes. However, + his guardian angel put it into his head to shut up and go back to his bed. + I was ramping mad about the lost time.” + </p> + <p> + “'Why didn't you let me give him one on his silly coconut sir?' I asks. + </p> + <p> + “'No ferocity, no ferocity,' he says, raising his finger at me as calm as + you please. + </p> + <p> + “You can't tell how a gentleman takes that sort of thing. They don't lose + their temper. It's bad form. You'll never see him lose his temper—not + for anybody to see anyhow. Ferocity ain't good form, either—that + much I've learned by this time, and more, too. I've had that schooling + that you couldn't tell by my face if I meant to rip you up the next minute—as + of course I could do in less than a jiffy. I have a knife up the leg of my + trousers.” + </p> + <p> + “You haven't!” exclaimed Schomberg incredulously. + </p> + <p> + Mr Ricardo was as quick as lightning in changing his lounging, idle + attitude for a stooping position, and exhibiting the weapon with one jerk + at the left leg of his trousers. Schomberg had just a view of it, strapped + to a very hairy limb, when Mr. Ricardo, jumping up, stamped his foot to + get the trouser-leg down, and resumed his careless pose with one elbow on + the table. + </p> + <p> + “It's a more handy way to carry a tool than you would think,” he went on, + gazing abstractedly into Schomberg's wide-open eyes. “Suppose some little + difference comes up during a game. Well, you stoop to pick up a dropped + card, and when you come up—there you are ready to strike, or with + the thing up you sleeve ready to throw. Or you just dodge under the table + when there's some shooting coming. You wouldn't believe the damage a + fellow with a knife under the table can do to ill-conditioned skunks that + want to raise trouble, before they begin to understand what the + screaming's about, and make a bolt—those that can, that is.” + </p> + <p> + The roses of Schomberg's cheek at the root of his chestnut beard faded + perceptibly. Ricardo chuckled faintly. + </p> + <p> + “But no ferocity—no ferocity! A gentleman knows. What's the good of + getting yourself into a state? And no shirking necessity, either. No + gentleman ever shirks. What I learn I don't forget. Why! We gambled on the + plains, with a damn lot of cattlemen in ranches; played fair, mind—and + then had to fight for our winnings afterwards as often as not. We've + gambled on the hills and in the valleys and on the sea-shore, and out of + sight of land—mostly fair. Generally it's good enough. We began in + Nicaragua first, after we left that schooner and her fool errand. There + were one hundred and twenty-seven sovereigns and some Mexican dollars in + that skipper's cash-box. Hardly enough to knock a man on the head for from + behind, I must confess; but that the skipper had a narrow escape the + governor himself could not deny afterwards. + </p> + <p> + “'Do you want me to understand, sir, that you mind there being one life + more or less on this earth?' I asked him, a few hours after we got away. + </p> + <p> + “'Certainly not,' says he. + </p> + <p> + “'Well, then, why did you stop me?' + </p> + <p> + “'There's a proper way of doing things. You'll have to learn to be + correct. There's also unnecessary exertion. That must be avoided, too—if + only for the look of the thing.' A gentleman's way of putting things to + you—and no mistake! + </p> + <p> + “At sunrise we got into a creek, to lie hidden in case the treasure hunt + party had a mind to take a spell hunting for us. And dash me if they + didn't! We saw the schooner away out, running to leeward, with ten pairs + of binoculars sweeping the sea, no doubt on all sides. I advised the + governor to give her time to beat back again before we made a start. So we + stayed up that creek something like ten days, as snug as can be. On the + seventh day we had to kill a man, though—the brother of this Pedro + here. They were alligator-hunters, right enough. We got our lodgings in + their hut. Neither the boss nor I could habla Espanol—speak Spanish, + you know—much then. Dry bank, nice shade, jolly hammocks, fresh + fish, good game, everything lovely. The governor chucked them a few + dollars to begin with; but it was like boarding with a pair of savage + apes, anyhow. By and by we noticed them talking a lot together. They had + twigged the cash-box, and the leather portmanteaus, and my bag—a + jolly lot of plunder to look at. They must have been saying to each other: + </p> + <p> + “'No one's ever likely to come looking for these two fellows, who seem to + have fallen from the moon. Let's cut their throats.' + </p> + <p> + “Why, of course! Clear as daylight. I didn't need to spy one of them + sharpening a devilish long knife behind some bushes, while glancing right + and left with his wild eyes, to know what was in the wind. Pedro was + standing by, trying the edge of another long knife. They thought we were + away on our lookout at the mouth of the river, as was usual with us during + the day. Not that we expected to see much of the schooner, but it was just + as well to make certain, if possible; and then it was cooler out of the + woods, in the breeze. Well, the governor was there right enough, lying + comfortable on a rug, where he could watch the offing, but I had gone back + to the hut to get a chew of tobacco out of my bag. I had not broken myself + of the habit then, and I couldn't be happy unless I had a lump as big as a + baby's fist in my cheek.” + </p> + <p> + At the cannibalistic comparison, Schomberg muttered a faint, sickly + “don't.” Ricardo hitched himself up in his seat and glanced down his + outstretched legs complacently. + </p> + <p> + “I am tolerably light on my feet, as a general thing,” he went on. “Dash + me if I don't think I could drop a pinch of salt on a sparrow's tail, if I + tried. Anyhow, they didn't hear me. I watched them two brown, hairy brutes + not ten yards off. All they had on was white linen drawers rolled up on + their thighs. Not a word they said to each other. Antonio was down on his + thick hams, busy rubbing a knife on a flat stone; Pedro was leaning + against a small tree and passing his thumb along the edge of his blade. I + got away quieter than a mouse, you bet.” + </p> + <p> + “I didn't say anything to the boss then. He was leaning on his elbow on + his rug, and didn't seem to want to be spoken to. He's like that—sometimes + that familiar you might think he would eat out of your hand, and at others + he would snub you sharper than a devil—but always quiet. Perfect + gentleman, I tell you. I didn't bother him, then; but I wasn't likely to + forget them two fellows, so businesslike with their knives. At that time + we had only one revolver between us two—the governor's six-shooter, + but loaded only in five chambers; and we had no more cartridges. He had + left the box behind in a drawer in his cabin. Awkward! I had nothing but + an old clasp-knife—no good at all for anything serious. + </p> + <p> + “In the evening we four sat round a bit of fire outside the sleeping-shed, + eating broiled fish off plantain leaves, with roast yams for bread—the + usual thing. The governor and I were on one side, and these two beauties + cross-legged on the other, grunting a word or two to each other, now and + then, hardly human speech at all, and their eyes down, fast on the ground. + For the last three days we couldn't get them to look us in the face. + Presently I began to talk to the boss quietly, just as I am talking to you + now, careless like, and I told him all I had observed. He goes on picking + up pieces of fish and putting them into his mouth as calm as anything. + It's a pleasure to have anything to do with a gentleman. Never looked + across at them once. + </p> + <p> + “'And now,' says I, yawning on purpose, 'we've got to stand watch at + night, turn about, and keep our eyes skinned all day, too, and mind we + don't get jumped upon suddenly.' + </p> + <p> + “'It's perfectly intolerable,' says the governor. 'And you with no weapon + of any sort!' + </p> + <p> + “'I mean to stick pretty close to you, sir, from this on, if you don't + mind,' says I. + </p> + <p> + “He just nods the least bit, wipes his fingers on the plantain leaf, puts + his hand behind his back, as if to help himself to rise from the ground, + snatches his revolver from under his jacket and plugs a bullet plumb + centre into Mr. Antonio's chest. See what it is to have to do with a + gentleman. No confounded fuss, and things done out of hand. But he might + have tipped me a wink or something. I nearly jumped out of my skin. Scared + ain't in it! I didn't even know who had fired. Everything had been so + still just before that the bang of the shot seemed the loudest noise I had + ever heard. The honourable Antonio pitches forward—they always do, + towards the shot; you must have noticed that yourself—yes, he + pitches forward on to the embers, and all that lot of hair on his face and + head flashes up like a pinch of gunpowder. Greasy, I expect; always + scraping the fat off them alligators' hides—” + </p> + <p> + “Look here,” exclaimed Schomberg violently, as if trying to burst some + invisible bonds, “do you mean to say that all this happened?” + </p> + <p> + “No,” said Ricardo coolly. “I am making it all up as I go along, just to + help you through the hottest part of the afternoon. So down he pitches his + nose on the red embers, and up jumps our handsome Pedro and I at the same + time, like two Jacks-in-the-box. He starts to bolt away, with his head + over his shoulder, and I, hardly knowing what I was doing, spring on his + back. I had the sense to get my hands round his neck at once, and it's + about all I could do to lock my fingers tight under his jaw. You saw the + beauty's neck, didn't you? Hard as iron, too. Down we both went. Seeing + this the governor puts his revolver in his pocket. + </p> + <p> + “'Tie his legs together, sir,' I yell. 'I'm trying to strangle him.' + </p> + <p> + “There was a lot of their fibre-lines lying about. I gave him a last + squeeze and then got up. + </p> + <p> + “'I might have shot you,' says the governor, quite concerned. + </p> + <p> + “'But you are glad to have saved a cartridge, sir,' I tell him. + </p> + <p> + “My jump did save it. It wouldn't have done to let him get away in the + dark like that, and have the beauty dodging around in the bushes, perhaps, + with the rusty flint-lock gun they had. The governor owned up that the + jump was the correct thing. + </p> + <p> + “'But he isn't dead,' says he, bending over him. + </p> + <p> + “Might as well hope to strangle an ox. We made haste to tie his elbows + back, and then, before he came to himself, we dragged him to a small tree, + sat him up, and bound him to it, not by the waist but by the neck—some + twenty turns of small line round his throat and the trunk, finished off + with a reef-knot under his ear. Next thing we did was to attend to the + honourable Antonio, who was making a great smell frizzling his face on the + red coals. We pushed and rolled him into the creek, and left the rest to + the alligators. + </p> + <p> + “I was tired. That little scrap took it out of me something awful. The + governor hadn't turned a hair. That's where a gentleman has the pull of + you. He don't get excited. No gentleman does—or hardly ever. I fell + asleep all of a sudden and left him smoking by the fire I had made up, his + railway rug round his legs, as calm as if he were sitting in a first-class + carriage. We hardly spoke ten words to each other after it was over, and + from that day to this we have never talked of the business. I wouldn't + have known he remembered it if he hadn't alluded to it when talking with + you the other day—you know, with regard to Pedro.” + </p> + <p> + “It surprised you, didn't it? That's why I am giving you this yarn of how + he came to be with us, like a sort of dog—dashed sight more useful, + though. You know how he can trot around with trays? Well, he could bring + down an ox with his fist, at a word from the boss, just as cleverly. And + fond of the governor! Oh, my word! More than any dog is of any man.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg squared his chest. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, and that's one of the things I wanted to mention to Mr. Jones,” he + said. “It's unpleasant to have that fellow round the house so early. He + sits on the stairs at the back for hours before he is needed here, and + frightens people so that the service suffers. The Chinamen—” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo nodded and raised his hand. + </p> + <p> + “When I first saw him he was fit to frighten a grizzly bear, let alone a + Chinaman. He's become civilized now to what he once was. Well, that + morning, first thing on opening my eyes, I saw him sitting there, tied up + by the neck to the tree. He was blinking. We spent the day watching the + sea, and we actually made out the schooner working to windward, which + showed that she had given us up. Good! When the sun rose again, I took a + squint at our Pedro. He wasn't blinking. He was rolling his eyes, all + white one minute and black the next, and his tongue was hanging out a + yard. Being tied up short by the neck like this would daunt the arch devil + himself—in time—in time, mind! I don't know but that even a + real gentleman would find it difficult to keep a stiff lip to the end. + Presently we went to work getting our boat ready. I was busying myself + setting up the mast, when the governor passes the remark: + </p> + <p> + “'I think he wants to say something.' + </p> + <p> + “I had heard a sort of croaking going on for some time, only I wouldn't + take any notice; but then I got out of the boat and went up to him, with + some water. His eyes were red—red and black and half out of his + head. He drank all the water I gave him, but he hadn't much to say for + himself. I walked back to the governor. + </p> + <p> + “'He asks for a bullet in his head before we go,' I said. I wasn't at all + pleased. + </p> + <p> + “'Oh, that's out of the question altogether,' says the governor. + </p> + <p> + “He was right there. Only four shots left, and ninety miles of wild coast + to put behind us before coming to the first place where you could expect + to buy revolver cartridges. + </p> + <p> + “'Anyhow,' I tells him, 'he wants to be killed some way or other, as a + favour.' + </p> + <p> + “And then I go on setting up the boat's mast. I didn't care much for the + notion of butchering a man bound hand and foot and fastened by the neck + besides. I had a knife then—the honourable Antonio's knife; and that + knife is this knife. + </p> + <p> + “Ricardo gave his leg a resounding slap. + </p> + <p> + “First spoil in my new life,” he went on with harsh joviality. “The dodge + of carrying it down there I learned later. I carried it stuck in my belt + that day. No, I hadn't much stomach for the job; but when you work with a + gentleman of the real right sort you may depend on your feelings being + seen through your skin. Says the governor suddenly: + </p> + <p> + “'It may even be looked upon as his right'—you hear a gentleman + speaking there?—'but what do you think of taking him with us in the + boat?' + </p> + <p> + “And the governor starts arguing that the beggar would be useful in + working our way along the coast. We could get rid of him before coming to + the first place that was a little civilized. I didn't want much talking + over. Out I scrambled from the boat. + </p> + <p> + “'Ay, but will he be manageable, sir?' + </p> + <p> + “'Oh, yes. He's daunted. Go on, cut him loose—I take the + responsibility.' + </p> + <p> + “'Right you are, sir.' + </p> + <p> + “He sees me come along smartly with his brother's knife in my hand—I + wasn't thinking how it looked from his side of the fence, you know—and + jiminy, it nearly killed him! He stared like a crazed bullock and began to + sweat and twitch all over, something amazing. I was so surprised, that I + stopped to look at him. The drops were pouring over his eyebrows, down his + beard, off his nose—and he gurgled. Then it struck me that he + couldn't see what was in my mind. By favour or by right he didn't like to + die when it came to it; not in that way, anyhow. When I stepped round to + get at the lashing, he let out a sort of soft bellow. Thought I was going + to stick him from behind, I guess. I cut all the turns with one slash, and + he went over on his side, flop, and started kicking with his tied legs. + Laugh! I don't know what there was so funny about it, but I fairly + shouted. What between my laughing and his wriggling, I had a job in + cutting him free. As soon as he could feel his limbs he makes for the + bank, where the governor was standing, crawls up to him on his hands and + knees, and embraces his legs. Gratitude, eh? You could see that being + allowed to live suited that chap down to the ground. The governor gets his + legs away from him gently and just mutters to me: + </p> + <p> + “'Let's be off. Get him into the boat.' + </p> + <p> + “It was not difficult,” continued Ricardo, after eyeing Schomberg fixedly + for a moment. “He was ready enough to get into the boat, and—here he + is. He would let himself be chopped into small pieces—with a smile, + mind; with a smile!—for the governor. I don't know about him doing + that much for me; but pretty near, pretty near. I did the tying up and the + untying, but he could see who was the boss. And then he knows a gentleman. + A dog knows a gentleman—any dog. It's only some foreigners that + don't know; and nothing can teach them, either.” + </p> + <p> + “And you mean to say,” asked Schomberg, disregarding what might have been + annoying for himself in the emphasis of the final remark, “you mean to say + that you left steady employment at good wages for a life like this?” + </p> + <p> + “There!” began Ricardo quietly. “That's just what a man like you would + say. You are that tame! I follow a gentleman. That ain't the same thing as + to serve an employer. They give you wages as they'd fling a bone to a dog, + and they expect you to be grateful. It's worse than slavery. You don't + expect a slave that's bought for money to be grateful. And if you sell + your work—what is it but selling your own self? You've got so many + days to live and you sell them one after another. Hey? Who can pay me + enough for my life? Ay! But they throw at you your week's money and expect + you to say 'thank you' before you pick it up.” + </p> + <p> + He mumbled some curses, directed at employers generally, as it seemed, + then blazed out: + </p> + <p> + “Work be damned! I ain't a dog walking on its hind legs for a bone; I am a + man who's following a gentleman. There's a difference which you will never + understand, Mr. Tame Schomberg.” + </p> + <p> + He yawned slightly. Schomberg, preserving a military stiffness reinforced + by a slight frown, had allowed his thoughts to stray away. They were busy + detailing the image of a young girl—absent—gone—stolen + from him. He became enraged. There was that rascal looking at him + insolently. If the girl had not been shamefully decoyed away from him, he + would not have allowed anyone to look at him insolently. He would have + made nothing of hitting that rogue between the eyes. Afterwards he would + have kicked the other without hesitation. He saw himself doing it; and in + sympathy with this glorious vision Schomberg's right foot, and arm moved + convulsively. + </p> + <p> + At this moment he came out of his sudden reverie to note with alarm the + wide-awake curiosity of Mr. Ricardo's stare. + </p> + <p> + “And so you go like this about the world, gambling,” he remarked inanely, + to cover his confusion. But Ricardo's stare did not change its character, + and he continued vaguely: + </p> + <p> + “Here and there and everywhere.” He pulled himself together, squared his + shoulders. “Isn't it very precarious?” he said firmly. + </p> + <p> + The word precarious—seemed to be effective, because Ricardo's eyes + lost their dangerously interested expression. + </p> + <p> + “No, not so bad,” Ricardo said, with indifference. “It's my opinion that + men will gamble as long as they have anything to put on a card. Gamble? + That's nature. What's life itself? You never know what may turn up. The + worst of it is that you never can tell exactly what sort of cards you are + holding yourself. What's trumps?—that is the question. See? Any man + will gamble if only he's given a chance, for anything or everything. You + too—” + </p> + <p> + “I haven't touched a card now for twenty years,” said Schomberg in an + austere tone. + </p> + <p> + “Well, if you got your living that way you would be no worse than you are + now, selling drinks to people—beastly beer and spirits, rotten stuff + fit to make an old he-goat yell if you poured it down its throat. Pooh! I + can't stand the confounded liquor. Never could. A whiff of neat brandy in + a glass makes me feel sick. Always did. If everybody was like me, liquor + would be going a-begging. You think it's funny in a man, don't you?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg made a vague gesture of toleration. Ricardo hitched up his chair + and settled his elbow afresh on the table. + </p> + <p> + “French siros I must say I do like. Saigon's the place for them. I see you + have siros in the bar. Hang me if I ain't getting dry, conversing like + this with you. Come, Mr. Schomberg, be hospitable, as the governor says.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg rose and walked with dignity to the counter. His footsteps + echoed loudly on the floor of polished boards. He took down a bottle, + labelled “Sirop de Groseille.” The little sounds he made, the clink of + glass, the gurgling of the liquid, the pop of the soda-water cork had a + preternatural sharpness. He came back carrying a pink and glistening + tumbler. Mr. Ricardo had followed his movements with oblique, coyly + expectant yellow eyes, like a cat watching the preparation of a saucer of + milk, and the satisfied sound after he had drunk might have been a + slightly modified form of purring, very soft and deep in his throat. It + affected Schomberg unpleasantly as another example of something inhuman in + those men wherein lay the difficulty of dealing with them. A spectre, a + cat, an ape—there was a pretty association for a mere man to + remonstrate with, he reflected with an inward shudder; for Schomberg had + been overpowered, as it were, by his imagination, and his reason could not + react against that fanciful view of his guests. And it was not only their + appearance. The morals of Mr. Ricardo seemed to him to be pretty much the + morals of a cat. Too much. What sort of argument could a mere man offer to + a . . . or to a spectre, either! What the morals of a spectre could be, + Schomberg had no idea. Something dreadful, no doubt. Compassion certainly + had no place in them. As to the ape—well, everybody knew what an ape + was. It had no morals. Nothing could be more hopeless. + </p> + <p> + Outwardly, however, having picked up the cigar which he had laid aside to + get the drink, with his thick fingers, one of them ornamented by a gold + ring, Schomberg smoked with moody composure. Facing him, Ricardo blinked + slowly for a time, then closed his eyes altogether, with the placidity of + the domestic cat dozing on the hearth-rug. In another moment he opened + them very wide, and seemed surprised to see Schomberg there. + </p> + <p> + “You're having a very slack time today, aren't you?” he observed. “But + then this whole town is confoundedly slack, anyhow; and I've never faced + such a slack party at a table before. Come eleven o'clock, they begin to + talk of breaking up. What's the matter with them? Want to go to bed so + early, or what?” + </p> + <p> + “I reckon you don't lose a fortune by their wanting to go to bed,” said + Schomberg, with sombre sarcasm. + </p> + <p> + “No,” admitted Ricardo, with a grin that stretched his thin mouth from ear + to ear, giving a sudden glimpse of his white teeth. “Only, you see, when I + once start, I would play for nuts, for parched peas, for any rubbish. I + would play them for their souls. But these Dutchmen aren't any good. They + never seem to get warmed up properly, win or lose. I've tried them both + ways, too. Hang them for a beggarly, bloodless lot of animated cucumbers!” + </p> + <p> + “And if anything out of the way was to happen, they would be just as cool + in locking you and your gentleman up,” Schomberg snarled unpleasantly. + </p> + <p> + “Indeed!” said Ricardo slowly, taking Schomberg's measure with his eyes. + “And what about you?” + </p> + <p> + “You talk mighty big,” burst out the hotel-keeper. “You talk of ranging + all over the world, and doing great things, and taking fortune by the + scruff of the neck, but here you stick at this miserable business!” + </p> + <p> + “It isn't much of a lay—that's a fact,” admitted Ricardo + unexpectedly. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg was red in the face with audacity. + </p> + <p> + “I call it paltry,” he spluttered. + </p> + <p> + “That's how it looks. Can't call it anything else.” Ricardo seemed to be + in an accommodating mood. “I should be ashamed of it myself, only you see + the governor is subject to fits—” + </p> + <p> + “Fits!” Schomberg cried out, but in a low tone. “You don't say so!” He + exulted inwardly, as if this disclosure had in some way diminished the + difficulty of the situation. “Fits! That's a serious thing, isn't it? You + ought to take him to the civil hospital—a lovely place.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo nodded slightly, with a faint grin. + </p> + <p> + “Serious enough. Regular fits of laziness, I call them. Now and then he + lays down on me like this, and there's no moving him. If you think I like + it, you're a long way out. Generally speaking, I can talk him over. I know + how to deal with a gentleman. I am no daily-bread slave. But when he has + said, 'Martin, I am bored,' then look out! There's nothing to do but to + shut up, confound it!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, very much cast down, had listened open-mouthed. + </p> + <p> + “What's the cause of it?” he asked. “Why is he like this? I don't + understand.” + </p> + <p> + “I think I do,” said Ricardo. “A gentleman, you know, is not such a simple + person as you or I; and not so easy to manage, either. If only I had + something to lever him out with!” + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean, to lever him out with?” muttered Schomberg hopelessly. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo was impatient with this denseness. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you understand English? Look here! I couldn't make this billiard + table move an inch if I talked to it from now till the end of days—could + I? Well, the governor is like that, too, when the fits are on him. He's + bored. Nothing's worthwhile, nothing's good enough, that's mere sense. But + if I saw a capstan bar lying about here, I would soon manage to shift that + billiard table of yours a good many inches. And that's all there is to + it.” + </p> + <p> + He rose noiselessly, stretched himself, supple and stealthy, with curious + sideways movements of his head and unexpected elongations of his thick + body, glanced out of the corners of his eyes in the direction of the door, + and finally leaned back against the table, folding his arms on his breast + comfortably, in a completely human attitude. + </p> + <p> + “That's another thing you can tell a gentleman by—his freakishness. + A gentleman ain't accountable to nobody, any more than a tramp on the + roads. He ain't got to keep time. The governor got like this once in a + one-horse Mexican pueblo on the uplands, away from everywhere. He lay all + day long in a dark room—” + </p> + <p> + “Drunk?” This word escaped Schomberg by inadvertence at which he became + frightened. But the devoted secretary seemed to find it natural. + </p> + <p> + “No, that never comes on together with this kind of fit. He just lay there + full length on a mat, while a ragged, bare-legged boy that he had picked + up in the street sat in the patio, between two oleanders near the open + door of his room, strumming on a guitar and singing tristes to him from + morning to night. You know tristes—twang, twang, twang, aouh, hoo! + Chroo, yah!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg uplifted his hands in distress. This tribute seemed to flatter + Ricardo. His mouth twitched grimly. + </p> + <p> + “Like that—enough to give colic to an ostrich, eh? Awful. Well, + there was a cook there who loved me—an old fat, Negro woman with + spectacles. I used to hide in the kitchen and turn her to, to make me + dulces—sweet things, you know, mostly eggs and sugar—to pass + the time away. I am like a kid for sweet things. And, by the way, why + don't you ever have a pudding at your tablydott, Mr. Schomberg? Nothing + but fruit, morning, noon, and night. Sickening! What do you think a fellow + is—a wasp?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg disregarded the injured tone. + </p> + <p> + “And how long did that fit, as you call it, last?” he asked anxiously. + </p> + <p> + “Weeks, months, years, centuries, it seemed to me,” returned Mr. Ricardo + with feeling. “Of an evening the governor would stroll out into the sala + and fritter his life away playing cards with the juez of the place—a + little Dago with a pair of black whiskers—ekarty, you know, a quick + French game, for small change. And the comandante, a one-eyed, + half-Indian, flat-nosed ruffian, and I, we had to stand around and bet on + their hands. It was awful!” + </p> + <p> + “Awful,” echoed Schomberg, in a Teutonic throaty tone of despair. “Look + here, I need your rooms.” + </p> + <p> + “To be sure. I have been thinking that for some time past,” said Ricardo + indifferently. + </p> + <p> + “I was mad when I listened to you. This must end!” + </p> + <p> + “I think you are mad yet,” said Ricardo, not even unfolding his arms or + shifting his attitude an inch. He lowered his voice to add: “And if I + thought you had been to the police, I would tell Pedro to catch you round + the waist and break your fat neck by jerking your head backward—snap! + I saw him do it to a big buck nigger who was flourishing a razor in front + of the governor. It can be done. You hear a low crack, that's all—and + the man drops down like a limp rag.” + </p> + <p> + Not even Ricardo's head, slightly inclined on the left shoulder, had + moved; but when he ceased the greenish irises which had been staring out + of doors glided into the corners of his eyes nearest to Schomberg and + stayed there with a coyly voluptuous expression. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER EIGHT + </h2> + <p> + Schomberg felt desperation, that lamentable substitute for courage, ooze + out of him. It was not so much the threat of death as the weirdly + circumstantial manner of its declaration which affected him. A mere “I'll + murder you,” however ferocious in tone, and earnest, in purpose, he could + have faced; but before this novel mode of speech and procedure, his + imagination being very sensitive to the unusual, he collapsed as if indeed + his moral neck had been broken—snap! + </p> + <p> + “Go to the police? Of course not. Never dreamed of it. Too late now. I've + let myself be mixed up in this. You got my consent while I wasn't myself. + I explained it to you at the time.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo's eye glided gently off Schomberg to stare far away. + </p> + <p> + “Ay! Some trouble with a girl. But that's nothing to us.” + </p> + <p> + “Naturally. What I say is, what's the good of all that savage talk to me?” + A bright argument occurred to him. “It's out of proportion; for even if I + were fool enough to go to the police now, there's nothing serious to + complain about. It would only mean deportation for you. They would put you + on board the first west-bound steamer to Singapore.” He had become + animated. “Out of this to the devil,” he added between his teeth for his + own private satisfaction. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo made no comment, and gave no sign of having heard a single word. + This discouraged Schomberg, who had looked up hopefully. + </p> + <p> + “Why do you want to stick here?” he cried. “It can't pay you people to + fool around like this. Didn't you worry just now about moving your + governor? Well, the police would move him for you; and from Singapore you + can go on to the east coast of Africa.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll be hanged if the fellow isn't up to that silly trick!” was Ricardo's + comment, spoken in an ominous tone which recalled Schomberg to the + realities of his position. + </p> + <p> + “No! No!” he protested. “It's a manner of speaking. Of course I wouldn't.” + </p> + <p> + “I think that trouble about the girl has really muddled your brains, Mr. + Schomberg. Believe me, you had better part friends with us; for, + deportation or no deportation, you'll be seeing one of us turning up + before long to pay you off for any nasty dodge you may be hatching in that + fat head of yours.” + </p> + <p> + “Gott im Himmel!” groaned Schomberg. “Will nothing move him out? Will he + stop here immer—I mean always? Suppose I were to make it worth your + while, couldn't you—” + </p> + <p> + “No,” Ricardo interrupted. “I couldn't, unless I had something to lever + him out with. I've told you that before.” + </p> + <p> + “An inducement?” muttered Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + “Ay. The east coast of Africa isn't good enough. He told me the other day + that it will have to wait till he is ready for it; and he may not be ready + for a long time, because the east coast can't run away, and no one is + likely to run off with it.” + </p> + <p> + These remarks, whether considered as truisms or as depicting Mr. Jones's + mental state, were distinctly discouraging to the long-suffering + Schomberg; but there is truth in the well-known saying that places the + darkest hour before the dawn. The sound of words, apart from the context, + has its power; and these two words, 'run off,' had a special affinity to + the hotel-keeper's, haunting idea. It was always present in his brain, and + now it came forward evoked by a purely fortuitous expression. No, nobody + could run off with a continent; but Heyst had run off with the girl! + </p> + <p> + Ricardo could have had no conception of the cause of Schomberg's changed + expression. Yet it was noticeable enough to interest him so much that he + stopped the careless swinging of his leg and said, looking at the + hotel-keeper: + </p> + <p> + “There's not much use arguing against that sort of talk—is there?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg was not listening. + </p> + <p> + “I could put you on another track,” he said slowly, and stopped, as if + suddenly choked by an unholy emotion of intense eagerness combined with + fear of failure. Ricardo waited, attentive, yet not without a certain + contempt. + </p> + <p> + “On the track of a man!” Schomberg uttered convulsively, and paused again, + consulting his rage and his conscience. + </p> + <p> + “The man in the moon, eh?” suggested Ricardo, in a jeering murmur. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg shook his head. + </p> + <p> + “It would be nearly as safe to rook him as if he were the Man in the moon. + You go and try. It isn't so very far.” + </p> + <p> + He reflected. These men were thieves and murderers as well as gamblers. + Their fitness for purposes of vengeance was appallingly complete. But he + preferred not to think of it in detail. He put it to himself summarily + that he would be paying Heyst out and would, at the same time, relieve + himself of these men's oppression. He had only to let loose his natural + gift for talking scandalously about his fellow creatures. And in this case + his great practice in it was assisted by hate, which, like love, has an + eloquence of its own. With the utmost ease he portrayed for Ricardo, now + seriously attentive, a Heyst fattened by years of private and public + rapines, the murderer of Morrison, the swindler of many shareholders, a + wonderful mixture of craft and impudence, of deep purposes and simple + wiles, of mystery and futility. In this exercise of his natural function + Schomberg revived, the colour coming back to his face, loquacious, florid, + eager, his manliness set off by the military bearing. + </p> + <p> + “That's the exact story. He was seen hanging about this part of the world + for years, spying into everybody's business: but I am the only one who has + seen through him from the first—contemptible, double-faced, + stick-at-nothing, dangerous fellow.” + </p> + <p> + “Dangerous, is he?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg came to himself at the sound of Ricardo's voice. + </p> + <p> + “Well, you know what I mean,” he said uneasily. “A lying, circumventing, + soft-spoken, polite, stuck-up rascal. Nothing open about him.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Ricardo had slipped off the table, and was prowling about the room in + an oblique, noiseless manner. He flashed a grin at Schomberg in passing, + and a snarling: + </p> + <p> + “Ah! H'm!” + </p> + <p> + “Well, what more dangerous do you want?” argued Schomberg. “He's in no way + a fighting man, I believe,” he added negligently. + </p> + <p> + “And you say he has been living alone there?” + </p> + <p> + “Like the man in the moon,” answered Schomberg readily. “There's no one + that cares a rap what becomes of him. He has been lying low, you + understand, after bagging all that plunder.” + </p> + <p> + “Plunder, eh? Why didn't he go home with it?” inquired Ricardo. + </p> + <p> + The henchman of plain Mr. Jones was beginning to think that this was + something worth looking into. And he was pursuing truth in the manner of + men of sounder morality and purer intentions than his own; that is he + pursued it in the light of his own experience and prejudices. For facts, + whatever their origin (and God only knows where they come from), can be + only tested by our own particular suspicions. Ricardo was suspicious all + round. Schomberg, such is the tonic of recovered self-esteem, Schomberg + retorted fearlessly: + </p> + <p> + “Go home? Why don't you go home? To hear your talk, you must have made a + pretty considerable pile going round winning people's money. You ought to + be ready by this time.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo stopped to look at Schomberg with surprise. + </p> + <p> + “You think yourself very clever, don't you?” he said. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg just then was so conscious of being clever that the snarling + irony left him unmoved. There was positively a smile in his noble Teutonic + beard, the first smile for weeks. He was in a felicitous vein. + </p> + <p> + “How do you know that he wasn't thinking of going home? As a matter of + fact, he was on his way home.” + </p> + <p> + “And how do I know that you are not amusing yourself by spinning out a + blamed fairy tale?” interrupted Ricardo roughly. “I wonder at myself + listening to the silly rot!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg received this turn of temper unmoved. He did not require to be + very subtly observant to notice that he had managed to arouse some sort of + feeling, perhaps of greed, in Ricardo's breast. + </p> + <p> + “You won't believe me? Well! You can ask anybody that comes here if that—that + Swede hadn't got as far as this house on his way home. Why should he turn + up here if not for that? You ask anybody.” + </p> + <p> + “Ask, indeed!” returned the other. “Catch me asking at large about a man I + mean to drop on! Such jobs must be done on the quiet—or not at all.” + </p> + <p> + The peculiar intonation of the last phrase touched the nape of Schomberg's + neck with a chill. He cleared his throat slightly and looked away as + though he had heard something indelicate. Then, with a jump as it were: + </p> + <p> + “Of course he didn't tell me. Is it likely? But haven't I got eyes? + Haven't I got my common sense to tell me? I can see through people. By the + same token, he called on the Tesmans. Why did he call on the Tesmans two + days running, eh? You don't know? You can't tell?” + </p> + <p> + He waited complacently till Ricardo had finished swearing quite openly at + him for a confounded chatterer, and then went on: + </p> + <p> + “A fellow doesn't go to a counting-house in business hours for a chat + about the weather, two days running. Then why? To close his account with + them one day, and to get his money out the next! Clear, what?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo, with his trick of looking one way and moving another approached + Schomberg slowly. + </p> + <p> + “To get his money?” he purred. + </p> + <p> + “Gewiss,” snapped Schomberg with impatient superiority. “What else? That + is, only the money he had with the Tesmans. What he has buried or put away + on the island, devil only knows. When you think of the lot of hard cash + that passed through that man's hands, for wages and stores and all that—and + he's just a cunning thief, I tell you.” Ricardo's hard stare discomposed + the hotel-keeper, and he added in an embarrassed tone: “I mean a common, + sneaking thief—no account at all. And he calls himself a Swedish + baron, too! Tfui!” + </p> + <p> + “He's a baron, is he? That foreign nobility ain't much,” commented Mr. + Ricardo seriously. “And then what? He hung about here!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, he hung about,” said Schomberg, making a wry mouth. “He—hung + about. That's it. Hung—” + </p> + <p> + His voice died out. Curiosity was depicted in Ricardo's countenance. + </p> + <p> + “Just like that; for nothing? And then turned about and went back to that + island again?” + </p> + <p> + “And went back to that island again,” Schomberg echoed lifelessly, fixing + his gaze on the floor. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter with you?” asked Ricardo with genuine surprise. “What + is it?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg, without looking up, made an impatient gesture. His face was + crimson, and he kept it lowered. Ricardo went back to the point. + </p> + <p> + “Well, but how do you account for it? What was his reason? What did he go + back to the island for?” + </p> + <p> + “Honeymoon!” spat out Schomberg viciously. + </p> + <p> + Perfectly still, his eyes downcast, he suddenly, with no preliminary stir, + hit the table with his fist a blow which caused the utterly unprepared + Ricardo to leap aside. And only then did Schomberg look up with a dull, + resentful expression. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo stared hard for a moment, spun on his heel, walked to the end of + the room, came back smartly, and muttered a profound “Ay! Ay!” above + Schomberg's rigid head. That the hotel-keeper was capable of a great moral + effort was proved by a gradual return of his severe, + Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve manner. + </p> + <p> + “Ay, ay!” repeated Ricardo more deliberately than before, and as if after + a further survey of the circumstances, “I wish I hadn't asked you, or that + you had told me a lie. It don't suit me to know that there's a woman mixed + up in this affair. What's she like? It's the girl you—” + </p> + <p> + “Leave off!” muttered Schomberg, utterly pitiful behind his stiff military + front. + </p> + <p> + “Ay, ay!” Ricardo ejaculated for the third time, more and more enlightened + and perplexed. “Can't bear to talk about it—so bad as that? And yet + I would bet she isn't a miracle to look at.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg made a gesture as if he didn't know, as if he didn't care. Then + he squared his shoulders and frowned at vacancy. + </p> + <p> + “Swedish baron—h'm!” Ricardo continued meditatively. “I believe the + governor would think that business worth looking up, quite, if I put it to + him properly. The governor likes a duel, if you will call it so; but I + don't know a man that can stand up to him on the square. Have you ever + seen a cat play with a mouse? It's a pretty sight!” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo, with his voluptuously gleaming eyes and the coy expression, + looked so much like a cat that Schomberg would have felt all the alarm of + a mouse if other feelings had not had complete possession of his breast. + </p> + <p> + “There are no lies between you and me,” he said, more steadily than he + thought he could speak. + </p> + <p> + “What's the good now? He funks women. In that Mexican pueblo where we lay + grounded on our beef-bones, so to speak, I used to go to dances of an + evening. The girls there would ask me if the English caballero in the + posada was a monk in disguise, or if he had taken a vow to the sancissima + madre not to speak to a woman, or whether—You can imagine what + fairly free-spoken girls will ask when they come to the point of not + caring what they say; and it used to vex me. Yes, the governor funks + facing women.” + </p> + <p> + “One woman?” interjected Schomberg in guttural tones. + </p> + <p> + “One may be more awkward to deal with than two, or two hundred, for that + matter. In a place that's full of women you needn't look at them unless + you like; but if you go into a room where there is only one woman, young + or old, pretty or ugly, you have got to face her. And, unless you are + after her, then—the governor is right enough—she's in the + way.” + </p> + <p> + “Why notice them?” muttered Schomberg. “What can they do?” + </p> + <p> + “Make a noise, if nothing else,” opined Mr. Ricardo curtly, with the + distaste of a man whose path is a path of silence; for indeed, nothing is + more odious than a noise when one is engaged in a weighty and absorbing + card game. “Noise, noise, my friend,” he went on forcibly; “confounded + screeching about something or other, and I like it no more than the + governor does. But with the governor there's something else besides. He + can't stand them at all.” + </p> + <p> + He paused to reflect on this psychological phenomenon, and as no + philosopher was at hand to tell him that there is no strong sentiment + without some terror, as there is no real religion without a little + fetishism, he emitted his own conclusion, which surely could not go to the + root of the matter. + </p> + <p> + “I'm hanged if I don't think they are to him what liquor is to me. Brandy—pah!” + </p> + <p> + He made a disgusted face, and produced a genuine shudder. Schomberg + listened to him in wonder. It looked as if the very scoundrelism, of that—that + Swede would protect him; the spoil of his iniquity standing between the + thief and the retribution. + </p> + <p> + “That's so, old buck.” Ricardo broke the silence after contemplating + Schomberg's mute dejection with a sort of sympathy. “I don't think this + trick will work.” + </p> + <p> + “But that's silly,” whispered the man deprived of the vengeance which he + had seemed already to hold in his hand, by a mysterious and exasperating + idiosyncrasy. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you set yourself to judge a gentleman.” Ricardo without anger + administered a moody rebuke. “Even I can't understand the governor + thoroughly. And I am an Englishman and his follower. No, I don't think I + care to put it before him, sick as I am of staying here.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo could not be more sick of staying than Schomberg was of seeing him + stay. Schomberg believed so firmly in the reality of Heyst as created by + his own power of false inferences, of his hate, of his love of scandal, + that he could not contain a stifled cry of conviction as sincere as most + of our convictions, the disguised servants of our passions, can appear at + a supreme moment. + </p> + <p> + “It would have been like going to pick up a nugget of a thousand pounds, + or two or three times as much, for all I know. No trouble, no—” + </p> + <p> + “The petticoat's the trouble,” Ricardo struck in. + </p> + <p> + He had resumed his noiseless, feline, oblique prowling, in which an + observer would have detected a new character of excitement, such as a wild + animal of the cat species, anxious to make a spring, might betray. + Schomberg saw nothing. It would probably have cheered his drooping + spirits; but in a general way he preferred not to look at Ricardo. + Ricardo, however, with one of his slanting, gliding, restless glances, + observed the bitter smile on Schomberg's bearded lips—the + unmistakable smile of ruined hopes. + </p> + <p> + “You are a pretty unforgiving sort of chap,” he said, stopping for a + moment with an air of interest. “Hang me if I ever saw anybody look so + disappointed! I bet you would send black plague to that island if you only + knew how—eh, what? Plague too good for them? Ha, ha, ha!” + </p> + <p> + He bent down to stare at Schomberg who sat unstirring with stony eyes and + set features, and apparently deaf to the rasping derision of that laughter + so close to his red fleshy ear. + </p> + <p> + “Black plague too good for them, ha, ha!” Ricardo pressed the point on the + tormented hotel-keeper. Schomberg kept his eyes down obstinately. + </p> + <p> + “I don't wish any harm to the girl—” he muttered. + </p> + <p> + “But did she bolt from you? A fair bilk? Come!” + </p> + <p> + “Devil only knows what that villainous Swede had done to her—what he + promised her, how he frightened her. She couldn't have cared for him, I + know.” Schomberg's vanity clung to the belief in some atrocious, + extraordinary means of seduction employed by Heyst. “Look how he bewitched + that poor Morrison,” he murmured. + </p> + <p> + “Ah, Morrison—got all his money, what?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes—and his life.” + </p> + <p> + “Terrible fellow, that Swedish baron! How is one to get at him?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg exploded. + </p> + <p> + “Three against one! Are you shy? Do you want me to give you a letter of + introduction?” + </p> + <p> + “You ought to look at yourself in a glass,” Ricardo said quietly. “Dash me + if you don't get a stroke of some kind presently. And this is the fellow + who says women can do nothing! That one will do for you, unless you manage + to forget her.” + </p> + <p> + “I wish I could,” Schomberg admitted earnestly. “And it's all the doing of + that Swede. I don't get enough sleep, Mr. Ricardo. And then, to finish me + off, you gentlemen turn up . . . as if I hadn't enough worry.” + </p> + <p> + “That's done you good,” suggested the secretary with ironic seriousness. + “Takes your mind off that silly trouble. At your age too.” + </p> + <p> + He checked himself, as if in pity, and changing his tone: + </p> + <p> + “I would really like to oblige you while doing a stroke of business at the + same time.” + </p> + <p> + “A good stroke,” insisted Schomberg, as if it were mechanically. In his + simplicity he was not able to give up the idea which had entered his head. + An idea must be driven out by another idea, and with Schomberg ideas were + rare and therefore tenacious. “Minted gold,” he murmured with a sort of + anguish. + </p> + <p> + Such an expressive combination of words was not without effect upon + Ricardo. Both these men were amenable to the influence of verbal + suggestions. The secretary of “plain Mr. Jones” sighed and murmured. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. But how is one to get at it?” + </p> + <p> + “Being three to one,” said Schomberg, “I suppose you could get it for the + asking.” + </p> + <p> + “One would think the fellow lived next door,” Ricardo growled impatiently. + “Hang it all, can't you understand a plain question? I have asked you the + way.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg seemed to revive. + </p> + <p> + “The way?” + </p> + <p> + The torpor of deceived hopes underlying his superficial changes of mood + had been pricked by these words which seemed pointed with purpose. + </p> + <p> + “The way is over the water, of course,” said the hotel-keeper. “For people + like you, three days in a good, big boat is nothing. It's no more than a + little outing, a bit of a change. At this season the Java Sea is a pond. I + have an excellent, safe boat—a ship's life-boat—carry thirty, + let alone three, and a child could handle her. You wouldn't get a wet face + at this time of the year. You might call it a pleasure-trip.” + </p> + <p> + “And yet, having this boat, you didn't go after her yourself—or + after him? Well, you are a fine fellow for a disappointed lover.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg gave a start at the suggestion. + </p> + <p> + “I am not three men,” he said sulkily, as the shortest answer of the + several he could have given. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I know your sort,” Ricardo let fall negligently. “You are like most + people—or perhaps just a little more peaceable than the rest of the + buying and selling gang that bosses this rotten show. Well, well, you + respectable citizen,” he went on, “let us go thoroughly into the matter.” + </p> + <p> + When Schomberg had been made to understand that Mr. Jones's henchman was + ready to discuss, in his own words, “this boat of yours, with courses and + distances,” and such concrete matters of no good augury to that villainous + Swede, he recovered his soldierly bearing, squared his shoulders, and + asked in his military manner: + </p> + <p> + “You wish, then, to proceed with the business?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo nodded. He had a great mind to, he said. A gentleman had to be + humoured as much as possible; but he must be managed, too, on occasions, + for his own good. And it was the business of the right sort of “follower” + to know the proper time and the proper methods of that delicate part of + his duty. Having exposed this theory Ricardo proceeded to the application. + </p> + <p> + “I've never actually lied to him,” he said, “and I ain't going to now. I + shall just say nothing about the girl. He will have to get over the shock + the best he can. Hang it all! Too much humouring won't do here.” + </p> + <p> + “Funny thing,” Schomberg observed crisply. + </p> + <p> + “Is it? Ay, you wouldn't mind taking a woman by the throat in some dark + corner and nobody by, I bet!” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo's dreadful, vicious, cat-like readiness to get his claws out at + any moment startled Schomberg as usual. But it was provoking too. + </p> + <p> + “And you?” he defended himself. “Don't you want me to believe you are up + to anything?” + </p> + <p> + “I, my boy? Oh, yes. I am not that gentleman; neither are you. Take 'em by + the throat or chuck 'em under the chin is all one to me—almost,” + affirmed Ricardo, with something obscurely ironical in his complacency. + “Now, as to this business. A three days' jaunt in a good boat isn't a + thing to frighten people like us. You are right, so far; but there are + other details.” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg was ready enough to enter into details. He explained that he had + a small plantation, with a fairly habitable hut on it, on Madura. He + proposed that his guest should start from town in his boat, as if going + for an excursion to that rural spot. The custom-house people on the quay + were used to see his boat go off on such trips. + </p> + <p> + From Madura, after some repose and on a convenient day, Mr. Jones and + party would make the real start. It would all be plain sailing. Schomberg + undertook to provision the boat. The greatest hardship the voyagers need + apprehend would be a mild shower of rain. At that season of the year there + were no serious thunderstorms. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg's heart began to thump as he saw himself nearing his vengeance. + His speech was thick but persuasive. + </p> + <p> + “No risk at all—none whatever.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo dismissed these assurances of safety with an impatient gesture. He + was thinking of other risks. + </p> + <p> + “The getting away from here is all right; but we may be sighted at sea, + and that may bring awkwardness later on. A ship's boat with three white + men in her, knocking about out of sight of land, is bound to make talk. + Are we likely to be seen on our way?” + </p> + <p> + “No, unless by native craft,” said Schomberg. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo nodded, satisfied. Both these white men looked on native life as a + mere play of shadows. A play of shadows the dominant race could walk + through unaffected and disregarded in the pursuit of its incomprehensible + aims and needs. No. Native craft did not count, of course. It was an + empty, solitary part of the sea, Schomberg expounded further. Only the + Ternate mail-boat crossed that region about the eighth of every month, + regularly—nowhere near the island though. Rigid, his voice hoarse, + his heart thumping, his mind concentrated on the success of his plan, the + hotel-keeper multiplied words, as if to keep as many of them as possible + between himself and the murderous aspect of his purpose. + </p> + <p> + “So, if you gentlemen depart from my plantation quietly at sunset on the + eighth—always best to make a start at night, with a land breeze—it's + a hundred to one—What am I saying?—it's a thousand to one that + no human eye will see you on the passage. All you've got to do is keep her + heading north-east for, say, fifty hours; perhaps not quite so long. There + will always be draft enough to keep a boat moving; you may reckon on that; + and then—” + </p> + <p> + The muscles about his waist quivered under his clothes with eagerness, + with impatience, and with something like apprehension, the true nature of + which was not clear to him. And he did not want to investigate it. Ricardo + regarded him steadily, with those dry eyes of his shining more like + polished stones than living tissue. + </p> + <p> + “And then what?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “And then—why, you will astonish der herr baron—ha, ha!” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg seemed to force the words and the laugh out of himself in a + hoarse bass. + </p> + <p> + “And you believe he has all that plunder by him?” asked Ricardo, rather + perfunctorily, because the fact seemed to him extremely probable when + looked at all round by his acute mind. + </p> + <p> + Schomberg raised his hands and lowered them slowly. + </p> + <p> + “How can it be otherwise? He was going home, he was on his way, in this + hotel. Ask people. Was it likely he would leave it behind him?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo was thoughtful. Then, suddenly raising his head, he remarked: + </p> + <p> + “Steer north-east for fifty hours, eh? That's not much of a sailing + direction. I've heard of a port being missed before on better information. + Can't you say what sort of landfall a fellow may expect? But I suppose you + have never seen that island yourself?” + </p> + <p> + Schomberg admitted that he had not seen it, in a tone in which a man + congratulates himself on having escaped the contamination of an unsavoury + experience. No, certainly not. He had never had any business to call + there. But what of that? He could give Mr. Ricardo as good a sea-mark as + anybody need wish for. He laughed nervously. Miss it! He defied anyone + that came within forty miles of it to miss the retreat of that villainous + Swede. + </p> + <p> + “What do you think of a pillar of smoke by day and a loom of fire at + night? There's a volcano in full blast near that island—enough to + guide almost a blind man. What more do you want? An active volcano to + steer by?” + </p> + <p> + These last words he roared out exultingly, then jumped up and glared. The + door to the left of the bar had swung open, and Mrs. Schomberg, dressed + for duty, stood facing him down the whole length of the room. She clung to + the handle for a moment, then came in and glided to her place, where she + sat down to stare straight before her, as usual. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART3" id="link2H_PART3"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PART THREE + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER ONE + </h2> + <p> + Tropical nature had been kind to the failure of the commercial enterprise. + The desolation of the headquarters of the Tropical Belt Coal Company had + been screened from the side of the sea; from the side where prying eyes—if + any were sufficiently interested, either in malice or in sorrow—could + have noted the decaying bones of that once sanguine enterprise. + </p> + <p> + Heyst had been sitting among the bones buried so kindly in the grass of + two wet seasons' growth. The silence of his surroundings, broken only by + such sounds as a distant roll of thunder, the lash of rain through the + foliage of some big trees, the noise of the wind tossing the leaves of the + forest, and of the short seas breaking against the shore, favoured rather + than hindered his solitary meditation. + </p> + <p> + A meditation is always—in a white man, at least—more or less + an interrogative exercise. Heyst meditated in simple terms on the mystery + of his actions; and he answered himself with the honest reflection: + </p> + <p> + “There must be a lot of the original Adam in me, after all.” + </p> + <p> + He reflected, too, with the sense of making a discovery, that this + primeval ancestor is not easily suppressed. The oldest voice in the world + is just the one that never ceases to speak. If anybody could have silenced + its imperative echoes, it should have been Heyst's father, with his + contemptuous, inflexible negation of all effort; but apparently he could + not. There was in the son a lot of that first ancestor who, as soon as he + could uplift his muddy frame from the celestial mould, started inspecting + and naming the animals of that paradise which he was so soon to lose. + </p> + <p> + Action—the first thought, or perhaps the first impulse, on earth! + The barbed hook, baited with the illusions of progress, to bring out of + the lightless void the shoals of unnumbered generations! + </p> + <p> + “And I, the son of my father, have been caught too, like the silliest fish + of them all.” Heyst said to himself. + </p> + <p> + He suffered. He was hurt by the sight of his own life, which ought to have + been a masterpiece of aloofness. He remembered always his last evening + with his father. He remembered the thin features, the great mass of white + hair, and the ivory complexion. A five-branched candlestick stood on a + little table by the side of the easy chair. They had been talking a long + time. The noises of the street had died out one by one, till at last, in + the moonlight, the London houses began to look like the tombs of an + unvisited, unhonoured, cemetery of hopes. + </p> + <p> + He had listened. Then, after a silence, he had asked—for he was + really young then: + </p> + <p> + “Is there no guidance?” + </p> + <p> + His father was in an unexpectedly soft mood on that night, when the moon + swam in a cloudless sky over the begrimed shadows of the town. + </p> + <p> + “You still believe in something, then?” he said in a clear voice, which + had been growing feeble of late. “You believe in flesh and blood, perhaps? + A full and equable contempt would soon do away with that, too. But since + you have not attained to it, I advise you to cultivate that form of + contempt which is called pity. It is perhaps the least difficult—always + remembering that you, too, if you are anything, are as pitiful as the + rest, yet never expecting any pity for yourself.” + </p> + <p> + “What is one to do, then?” sighed the young man, regarding his father, + rigid in the high-backed chair. + </p> + <p> + “Look on—make no sound,” were the last words of the man who had + spent his life in blowing blasts upon a terrible trumpet which filled + heaven and earth with ruins, while mankind went on its way unheeding. + </p> + <p> + That very night he died in his bed, so quietly that they found him in his + usual attitude of sleep, lying on his side, one hand under his cheek, and + his knees slightly bent. He had not even straightened his legs. + </p> + <p> + His son buried the silenced destroyer of systems, of hopes, of beliefs. He + observed that the death of that bitter contemner of life did not trouble + the flow of life's stream, where men and women go by thick as dust, + revolving and jostling one another like figures cut out of cork and + weighted with lead just sufficiently to keep them in their proudly upright + posture. + </p> + <p> + After the funeral, Heyst sat alone, in the dusk, and his meditation took + the form of a definite vision of the stream, of the fatuously jostling, + nodding, spinning figures hurried irresistibly along, and giving no sign + of being aware that the voice on the bank had been suddenly silenced . . . + Yes. A few obituary notices generally insignificant and some grossly + abusive. The son had read them all with mournful detachment. + </p> + <p> + “This is the hate and rage of their fear,” he thought to himself, “and + also of wounded vanity. They shriek their little shriek as they fly past. + I suppose I ought to hate him too . . .” + </p> + <p> + He became aware of his eyes being wet. It was not that the man was his + father. For him it was purely a matter of hearsay which could not in + itself cause this emotion. No! It was because he had looked at him so long + that he missed him so much. The dead man had kept him on the bank by his + side. And now Heyst felt acutely that he was alone on the bank of the + stream. In his pride he determined not to enter it. + </p> + <p> + A few slow tears rolled down his face. The rooms, filling with shadows, + seemed haunted by a melancholy, uneasy presence which could not express + itself. The young man got up with a strange sense of making way for + something impalpable that claimed possession, went out of the house, and + locked the door. A fortnight later he started on his travels—to + “look on and never make a sound.” + </p> + <p> + The elder Heyst had left behind him a little money and a certain quantity + of movable objects, such as books, tables, chairs, and pictures, which + might have complained of heartless desertion after many years of faithful + service; for there is a soul in things. Heyst, our Heyst, had often + thought of them, reproachful and mute, shrouded and locked up in those + rooms, far away in London with the sounds of the street reaching them + faintly, and sometimes a little sunshine, when the blinds were pulled up + and the windows opened from time to time in pursuance of his original + instructions and later reminders. It seemed as if in his conception of a + world not worth touching, and perhaps not substantial enough to grasp, + these objects familiar to his childhood and his youth, and associated with + the memory of an old man, were the only realities, something having an + absolute existence. He would never have them sold, or even moved from the + places they occupied when he looked upon them last. When he was advised + from London that his lease had expired, and that the house, with some + others as like it as two peas, was to be demolished, he was surprisingly + distressed. + </p> + <p> + He had entered by then the broad, human path of inconsistencies. Already + the Tropical Belt Coal Company was in existence. He sent instructions to + have some of the things sent out to him at Samburan, just as any ordinary, + credulous person would have done. They came, torn out from their long + repose—a lot of books, some chairs and tables, his father's portrait + in oils, which surprised Heyst by its air of youth, because he remembered + his father as a much older man; a lot of small objects, such as + candlesticks, inkstands, and statuettes from his father's study, which + surprised him because they looked so old and so much worn. + </p> + <p> + The manager of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, unpacking them on the + veranda in the shade besieged by a fierce sunshine, must have felt like a + remorseful apostate before these relics. He handled them tenderly; and it + was perhaps their presence there which attached him to the island when he + woke up to the failure of his apostasy. Whatever the decisive reason, + Heyst had remained where another would have been glad to be off. The + excellent Davidson had discovered the fact without discovering the reason, + and took a humane interest in Heyst's strange existence, while at the same + time his native delicacy kept him from intruding on the other's whim of + solitude. He could not possibly guess that Heyst, alone on the island, + felt neither more nor less lonely than in any other place, desert or + populous. Davidson's concern was, if one may express it so, the danger of + spiritual starvation; but this was a spirit which had renounced all + outside nourishment, and was sustaining itself proudly on its own contempt + of the usual coarse ailments which life offers to the common appetites of + men. + </p> + <p> + Neither was Heyst's body in danger of starvation, as Schomberg had so + confidently asserted. At the beginning of the company's operations the + island had been provisioned in a manner which had outlasted the need. + Heyst did not need to fear hunger; and his very loneliness had not been + without some alleviation. Of the crowd of imported Chinese labourers, one + at least had remained in Samburan, solitary and strange, like a swallow + left behind at the migrating season of his tribe. + </p> + <p> + Wang was not a common coolie. He had been a servant to white men before. + The agreement between him and Heyst consisted in the exchange of a few + words on the day when the last batch of the mine coolies was leaving + Samburan. Heyst, leaning over the balustrade of the veranda, was looking + on, as calm in appearance as though he had never departed from the + doctrine that this world, for the wise, is nothing but an amusing + spectacle. Wang came round the house, and standing below, raised up his + yellow, thin face. + </p> + <p> + “All finished?” he asked. Heyst nodded slightly from above, glancing + towards the jetty. A crowd of blue-clad figures with yellow faces and + calves was being hustled down into the boats of the chartered steamer + lying well out, like a painted ship on a painted sea; painted in crude + colours, without shadows, without feeling, with brutal precision. + </p> + <p> + “You had better hurry up if you don't want to be left behind.” + </p> + <p> + But the Chinaman did not move. + </p> + <p> + “We stop,” he declared. Heyst looked down at him for the first time. + </p> + <p> + “You want to stop here?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “What were you? What was your work here?” + </p> + <p> + “Mess-loom boy.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you want to stay with me here as my boy?” inquired Heyst, surprised. + </p> + <p> + The Chinaman unexpectedly put on a deprecatory expression, and said, after + a marked pause: + </p> + <p> + “Can do.” + </p> + <p> + “You needn't,” said Heyst, “unless you like. I propose to stay on here—it + may be for a very long time. I have no power to make you go if you wish to + remain, but I don't see why you should.” + </p> + <p> + “Catchee one piecee wife,” remarked Wang unemotionally, and marched off, + turning his back on the wharf and the great world beyond, represented by + the steamer waiting for her boats. + </p> + <p> + Heyst learned presently that Wang had persuaded one of the women of Alfuro + village, on the west shore of the island, beyond the central ridge, to + come over to live with him in a remote part of the company's clearing. It + was a curious case, inasmuch as the Alfuros, having been frightened by the + sudden invasion of Chinamen, had blocked the path over the ridge by + felling a few trees, and had kept strictly on their own side. The coolies, + as a body, mistrusting the manifest mildness of these harmless + fisher-folk, had kept to their lines, without attempting to cross the + island. Wang was the brilliant exception. He must have been uncommonly + fascinating, in a way that was not apparent to Heyst, or else uncommonly + persuasive. The woman's services to Heyst were limited to the fact that + she had anchored Wang to the spot by her charms, which remained unknown to + the white man, because she never came near the houses. The couple lived at + the edge of the forest, and she could sometimes be seen gazing towards the + bungalow shading her eyes with her hand. Even from a distance she appeared + to be a shy, wild creature, and Heyst, anxious not to try her primitive + nerves unduly, scrupulously avoided that side of the clearing in his + strolls. + </p> + <p> + The day—or rather the first night—after his hermit life began, + he was aware of vague sounds of revelry in that direction. Emboldened by + the departure of the invading strangers, some Alfuros, the woman's friends + and relations, had ventured over the ridge to attend something in the + nature of a wedding feast. Wang had invited them. But this was the only + occasion when any sound louder than the buzzing of insects had troubled + the profound silence of the clearing. The natives were never invited + again. Wang not only knew how to live according to conventional + proprieties, but had strong personal views as to the manner of arranging + his domestic existence. After a time Heyst perceived that Wang had annexed + all the keys. Any keys left lying about vanished after Wang had passed + that way. Subsequently some of them—those that did not belong to the + store-rooms and the empty bungalows, and could not be regarded as the + common property of this community of two—were returned to Heyst, + tied in a bunch with a piece of string. He found them one morning lying by + the side of his plate. He had not been inconvenienced by their absence, + because he never locked up anything in the way of drawers and boxes. Heyst + said nothing. Wang also said nothing. Perhaps he had always been a + taciturn man; perhaps he was influenced by the genius of the locality, + which was certainly that of silence. Till Heyst and Morrison had landed in + Black Diamond Bay, and named it, that side of Samburan had hardly ever + heard the sound of human speech. It was easy to be taciturn with Heyst, + who had plunged himself into an abyss of meditation over books, and + remained in it till the shadow of Wang falling across the page, and the + sound of a rough, low voice uttering the Malay word “makan,” would force + him to climb out to a meal. + </p> + <p> + Wang in his native province in China might have been an aggressively, + sensitively genial person; but in Samburan he had clothed himself in a + mysterious stolidity and did not seem to resent not being spoken to except + in single words, at a rate which did not average half a dozen per day. And + he gave no more than he got. It is to be presumed that if he suffered he + made up for it with the Alfuro woman. He always went back to her at the + first fall of dusk, vanishing from the bungalow suddenly at this hour, + like a sort of topsy-turvy, day-hunting, Chinese ghost with a white jacket + and a pigtail. Presently, giving way to a Chinaman's ruling passion, he + could be observed breaking the ground near his hut, between the mighty + stumps of felled trees, with a miner's pickaxe. After a time, he + discovered a rusty but serviceable spade in one of the empty store-rooms, + and it is to be supposed that he got on famously; but nothing of it could + be seen, because he went to the trouble of pulling to pieces one of the + company's sheds in order to get materials for making a high and very close + fence round his patch, as if the growing of vegetables were a patented + process, or an awful and holy mystery entrusted to the keeping of his + race. + </p> + <p> + Heyst, following from a distance the progress of Wang's gardening and of + these precautions—there was nothing else to look at—was amused + at the thought that he, in his own person, represented the market for its + produce. The Chinaman had found several packets of seeds in the + store-rooms, and had surrendered to an irresistible impulse to put them + into the ground. He would make his master pay for the vegetables which he + was raising to satisfy his instinct. And, looking silently at the silent + Wang going about his work in the bungalow in his unhasty, steady way; + Heyst envied the Chinaman's obedience to his instincts, the powerful + simplicity of purpose which made his existence appear almost automatic in + the mysterious precision of its facts. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TWO + </h2> + <p> + During his master's absence at Sourabaya, Wang had busied himself with the + ground immediately in front of the principal bungalow. Emerging from the + fringe of grass growing across the shore end of the coal-jetty, Heyst + beheld a broad, clear space, black and level, with only one or two clumps + of charred twigs, where the flame had swept from the front of his house to + the nearest trees of the forest. + </p> + <p> + “You took the risk of firing the grass?” Heyst asked. + </p> + <p> + Wang nodded. Hanging on the arm of the white man before whom he stood was + the girl called Alma; but neither from the Chinaman's eyes nor from his + expression could anyone have guessed that he was in the slightest degree + aware of the fact. + </p> + <p> + “He has been tidying the place in his labour-saving way,” explained Heyst, + without looking at the girl, whose hand rested on his forearm. “He's the + whole establishment, you see. I told you I hadn't even a dog to keep me + company here.” + </p> + <p> + Wang had marched off towards the wharf. + </p> + <p> + “He's like those waiters in that place,” she said. That place was + Schomberg's hotel. + </p> + <p> + “One Chinaman looks very much like another,” Heyst remarked. “We shall + find it useful to have him here. This is the house.” + </p> + <p> + They faced, at some distance, the six shallow steps leading up to the + veranda. The girl had abandoned Heyst's arm. + </p> + <p> + “This is the house,” he repeated. + </p> + <p> + She did not offer to budge away from his side, but stood staring fixedly + at the steps, as if they had been something unique and impracticable. He + waited a little, but she did not move. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you want to go in?” he asked, without turning his head to look at + her. “The sun's too heavy to stand about here.” He tried to overcome a + sort of fear, a sort of impatient faintness, and his voice sounded rough. + “You had better go in,” he concluded. + </p> + <p> + They both moved then, but at the foot of the stairs Heyst stopped, while + the girl went on rapidly, as if nothing could stop her now. She crossed + the veranda swiftly, and entered the twilight of the big central room + opening upon it, and then the deeper twilight of the room beyond. She + stood still in the dusk, in which her dazzled eyes could scarcely make out + the forms of objects, and sighed a sigh of relief. The impression of the + sunlight, of sea and sky, remained with her like a memory of a painful + trial gone through—done with at last! + </p> + <p> + Meanwhile Heyst had walked back slowly towards the jetty; but he did not + get so far as that. The practical and automatic Wang had got hold of one + of the little trucks that had been used for running baskets of coal + alongside ships. He appeared pushing it before him, loaded lightly with + Heyst's bag and the bundle of the girl's belongings, wrapped in Mrs. + Schomberg's shawl. Heyst turned about and walked by the side of the rusty + rails on which the truck ran. Opposite the house Wang stopped, lifted the + bag to his shoulder, balanced it carefully, and then took the bundle in + his hand. + </p> + <p> + “Leave those things on the table in the big room—understand?” + </p> + <p> + “Me savee,” grunted Wang, moving off. + </p> + <p> + Heyst watched the Chinaman disappear from the veranda. It was not till he + had seen Wang come out that he himself entered the twilight of the big + room. By that time Wang was out of sight at the back of the house, but by + no means out of hearing. The Chinaman could hear the voice of him who, + when there were many people there, was generally referred to as “Number + One.” Wang was not able to understand the words, but the tone interested + him. + </p> + <p> + “Where are you?” cried Number One. + </p> + <p> + Then Wang heard, much more faint, a voice he had never heard before—a + novel impression which he acknowledged by cocking his head slightly to one + side. + </p> + <p> + “I am here—out of the sun.” + </p> + <p> + The new voice sounded remote and uncertain. Wang heard nothing more, + though he waited for some time, very still, the top of his shaven poll + exactly level with the floor of the back veranda. His face meanwhile + preserved an inscrutable immobility. Suddenly he stooped to pick up the + lid of a deal candle-box which was lying on the ground by his foot. + Breaking it up with his fingers, he directed his steps towards the + cook-shed, where, squatting on his heels, he proceeded to kindle a small + fire under a very sooty kettle, possibly to make tea. Wang had some + knowledge of the more superficial rites and ceremonies of white men's + existence, otherwise so enigmatically remote to his mind, and containing + unexpected possibilities of good and evil, which had to be watched for + with prudence and care. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER THREE + </h2> + <p> + That morning, as on all the others of the full tale of mornings since his + return with the girl to Samburan, Heyst came out on the veranda and spread + his elbows on the railing, in an easy attitude of proprietorship. The bulk + of the central ridge of the island cut off the bungalow from sunrises, + whether glorious or cloudy, angry or serene. The dwellers therein were + debarred from reading early the fortune of the new-born day. It sprang + upon them in its fulness with a swift retreat of the great shadow when the + sun, clearing the ridge, looked down, hot and dry, with a devouring glare + like the eye of an enemy. But Heyst, once the Number One of this locality, + while it was comparatively teeming with mankind, appreciated the + prolongation of early coolness, the subdued, lingering half-light, the + faint ghost of the departed night, the fragrance of its dewy, dark soul + captured for a moment longer between the great glow of the sky and the + intense blaze of the uncovered sea. + </p> + <p> + It was naturally difficult for Heyst to keep his mind from dwelling on the + nature and consequences of this, his latest departure from the part of an + unconcerned spectator. Yet he had retained enough of his wrecked + philosophy to prevent him from asking himself consciously how it would + end. But at the same time he could not help being temperamentally, from + long habit and from set purpose, a spectator still, perhaps a little less + naive but (as he discovered with some surprise) not much more far sighted + than the common run of men. Like the rest of us who act, all he could say + to himself, with a somewhat affected grimness, was: + </p> + <p> + “We shall see!” + </p> + <p> + This mood of grim doubt intruded on him only when he was alone. There were + not many such moments in his day now; and he did not like them when they + came. On this morning he had no time to grow uneasy. Alma came out to join + him long before the sun, rising above the Samburan ridge, swept the cool + shadow of the early morning and the remnant of the night's coolness clear + off the roof under which they had dwelt for more than three months + already. She came out as on other mornings. He had heard her light + footsteps in the big room—the room where he had unpacked the cases + from London; the room now lined with the backs of books halfway up on its + three sides. Above the cases the fine matting met the ceiling of tightly + stretched white calico. In the dusk and coolness nothing gleamed except + the gilt frame of the portrait of Heyst's father, signed by a famous + painter, lonely in the middle of a wall. + </p> + <p> + Heyst did not turn round. + </p> + <p> + “Do you know what I was thinking of?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “No,” she said. Her tone betrayed always a shade of anxiety, as though she + were never certain how a conversation with him would end. She leaned on + the guard-rail by his side. + </p> + <p> + “No,” she repeated. “What was it?” She waited. Then, rather with + reluctance than shyness, she asked: + </p> + <p> + “Were you thinking of me?” + </p> + <p> + “I was wondering when you would come out,” said Heyst, still without + looking at the girl—to whom, after several experimental essays in + combining detached letters and loose syllables, he had given the name of + Lena. + </p> + <p> + She remarked after a pause: + </p> + <p> + “I was not very far from you.” + </p> + <p> + “Apparently you were not near enough for me.” + </p> + <p> + “You could have called if you wanted me,” she said. “And I wasn't so long + doing my hair.” + </p> + <p> + “Apparently it was too long for me.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, you were thinking of me, anyhow. I am glad of it. Do you know, it + seems to me, somehow, that if you were to stop thinking of me I shouldn't + be in the world at all!” + </p> + <p> + He turned round and looked at her. She often said things which surprised + him. A vague smile faded away on her lips before his scrutiny. + </p> + <p> + “What is it?” he asked. “Is it a reproach?” + </p> + <p> + “A reproach! Why, how could it be?” she defended herself. + </p> + <p> + “Well, what did it mean?” he insisted. + </p> + <p> + “What I said—just what I said. Why aren't you fair?” + </p> + <p> + “Ah, this is at least a reproach!” + </p> + <p> + She coloured to the roots of her hair. + </p> + <p> + “It looks as if you were trying to make out that I am disagreeable,” she + murmured. “Am I? You will make me afraid to open my mouth presently. I + shall end by believing I am no good.” + </p> + <p> + Her head drooped a little. He looked at her smooth, low brow, the faintly + coloured cheeks, and the red lips parted slightly, with the gleam of her + teeth within. + </p> + <p> + “And then I won't be any good,” she added with conviction. “That I won't! + I can only be what you think I am.” + </p> + <p> + He made a slight movement. She put her hand on his arm, without raising + her head, and went on, her voice animated in the stillness of her body: + </p> + <p> + “It is so. It couldn't be any other way with a girl like me and a man like + you. Here we are, we two alone, and I can't even tell where we are.” + </p> + <p> + “A very well-known spot of the globe,” Heyst uttered gently. “There must + have been at least fifty thousand circulars issued at the time—a + hundred and fifty thousand, more likely. My friend was looking after that, + and his ideas were large and his belief very strong. Of us two it was he + who had the faith. A hundred and fifty thousand, certainly.” + </p> + <p> + “What is it you mean?” she asked in a low tone. + </p> + <p> + “What should I find fault with you for?” Heyst went on. “For being + amiable, good, gracious—and pretty?” + </p> + <p> + A silence fell. Then she said: + </p> + <p> + “It's all right that you should think that of me. There's no one here to + think anything of us, good or bad.” + </p> + <p> + The rare timbre of her voice gave a special value to what she uttered. The + indefinable emotion which certain intonations gave him, he was aware, was + more physical than moral. Every time she spoke to him she seemed to + abandon to him something of herself—something excessively subtle and + inexpressible, to which he was infinitely sensible, which he would have + missed horribly if she were to go away. While he was looking into her eyes + she raised her bare forearm, out of the short sleeve, and held it in the + air till he noticed it and hastened to pose his great bronze moustaches on + the whiteness of the skin. Then they went in. + </p> + <p> + Wang immediately appeared in front, and, squatting on his heels, began to + potter mysteriously about some plants at the foot of the veranda. When + Heyst and the girl came out again, the Chinaman had gone in his peculiar + manner, which suggested vanishing out of existence rather than out of + sight, a process of evaporation rather than of movement. They descended + the steps, looking at each other, and started off smartly across the + cleared ground; but they were not ten yards away when, without perceptible + stir or sound, Wang materialized inside the empty room. The Chinaman stood + still with roaming eyes, examining the walls as if for signs, for + inscriptions; exploring the floor as if for pitfalls, for dropped coins. + Then he cocked his head slightly at the profile of Heyst's father, pen in + hand above a white sheet of paper on a crimson tablecloth; and, moving + forward noiselessly, began to clear away the breakfast things. + </p> + <p> + Though he proceeded without haste, the unerring precision of his + movements, the absolute soundlessness of the operation, gave it something + of the quality of a conjuring trick. And, the trick having been performed, + Wang vanished from the scene, to materialize presently in front of the + house. He materialized walking away from it, with no visible or guessable + intention; but at the end of some ten paces he stopped, made a half turn, + and put his hand up to shade his eyes. The sun had topped the grey ridge + of Samburan. The great morning shadow was gone; and far away in the + devouring sunshine Wang was in time to see Number One and the woman, two + remote white specks against the sombre line of the forest. In a moment + they vanished. With the smallest display of action, Wang also vanished + from the sunlight of the clearing. + </p> + <p> + Heyst and Lena entered the shade of the forest path which crossed the + island, and which, near its highest point had been blocked by felled + trees. But their intention was not to go so far. After keeping to the path + for some distance, they left it at a point where the forest was bare of + undergrowth, and the trees, festooned with creepers, stood clear of one + another in the gloom of their own making. Here and there great splashes of + light lay on the ground. They moved, silent in the great stillness, + breathing the calmness, the infinite isolation, the repose of a slumber + without dreams. They emerged at the upper limit of vegetation, among some + rocks; and in a depression of the sharp slope, like a small platform, they + turned about and looked from on high over the sea, lonely, its colour + effaced by sunshine, its horizon a heat mist, a mere unsubstantial shimmer + in the pale and blinding infinity overhung by the darker blaze of the sky. + </p> + <p> + “It makes my head swim,” the girl murmured, shutting her eyes and putting + her hand on his shoulder. + </p> + <p> + Heyst, gazing fixedly to the southward, exclaimed: + </p> + <p> + “Sail ho!” + </p> + <p> + A moment of silence ensued. + </p> + <p> + “It must be very far away,” he went on. “I don't think you could see it. + Some native craft making for the Moluccas, probably. Come, we mustn't stay + here.” + </p> + <p> + With his arm round her waist, he led her down a little distance, and they + settled themselves in the shade; she, seated on the ground, he a little + lower, reclining at her feet. + </p> + <p> + “You don't like to look at the sea from up there?” he said after a time. + </p> + <p> + She shook her head. That empty space was to her the abomination of + desolation. But she only said again: + </p> + <p> + “It makes my head swim.” + </p> + <p> + “Too big?” he inquired. + </p> + <p> + “Too lonely. It makes my heart sink, too,” she added in a low voice, as if + confessing a secret. + </p> + <p> + “I'm afraid,” said Heyst, “that you would be justified in reproaching me + for these sensations. But what would you have?” + </p> + <p> + His tone was playful, but his eyes, directed at her face, were serious. + She protested. + </p> + <p> + “I am not feeling lonely with you—not a bit. It is only when we come + up to that place, and I look at all that water and all that light—” + </p> + <p> + “We will never come here again, then,” he interrupted her. + </p> + <p> + She remained silent for a while, returning his gaze till he removed it. + </p> + <p> + “It seems as if everything that there is had gone under,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Reminds you of the story of the deluge,” muttered the man, stretched at + her feet and looking at them. “Are you frightened at it?” + </p> + <p> + “I should be rather frightened to be left behind alone. When I say, I, of + course I mean we.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you?” . . . Heyst remained silent for a while. “The vision of a world + destroyed,” he mused aloud. “Would you be sorry for it?” + </p> + <p> + “I should be sorry for the happy people in it,” she said simply. + </p> + <p> + His gaze travelled up her figure and reached her face, where he seemed to + detect the veiled glow of intelligence, as one gets a glimpse of the sun + through the clouds. + </p> + <p> + “I should have thought it's they specially who ought to have been + congratulated. Don't you?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes—I understand what you mean; but there were forty days + before it was all over.” + </p> + <p> + “You seem to be in possession of all the details.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst spoke just to say something rather than to gaze at her in silence. + She was not looking at him. + </p> + <p> + “Sunday school,” she murmured. “I went regularly from the time I was eight + till I was thirteen. We lodged in the north of London, off Kingsland Road. + It wasn't a bad time. Father was earning good money then. The woman of the + house used to pack me off in the afternoon with her own girls. She was a + good woman. Her husband was in the post office. Sorter or something. Such + a quiet man. He used to go off after supper for night-duty, sometimes. + Then one day they had a row, and broke up the home. I remember I cried + when we had to pack up all of a sudden and go into other lodgings. I never + knew what it was, though—” + </p> + <p> + “The deluge,” muttered Heyst absently. + </p> + <p> + He felt intensely aware of her personality, as if this were the first + moment of leisure he had found to look at her since they had come + together. The peculiar timbre of her voice, with its modulations of + audacity and sadness, would have given interest to the most inane chatter. + But she was no chatterer. She was rather silent, with a capacity for + immobility, an upright stillness, as when resting on the concert platform + between the musical numbers, her feet crossed, her hands reposing on her + lap. But in the intimacy of their life her grey, unabashed gaze forced + upon him the sensation of something inexplicable reposing within her; + stupidity or inspiration, weakness or force—or simply an abysmal + emptiness, reserving itself even in the moments of complete surrender. + </p> + <p> + During a long pause she did not look at him. Then suddenly, as if the word + “deluge” had stuck in her mind, she asked, looking up at the cloudless + sky: + </p> + <p> + “Does it ever rain here?” + </p> + <p> + “There is a season when it rains almost every day,” said Heyst, surprised. + “There are also thunderstorms. We once had a 'mud-shower.'” + </p> + <p> + “Mud-shower?” + </p> + <p> + “Our neighbour there was shooting up ashes. He sometimes clears his + red-hot gullet like that; and a thunderstorm came along at the same time. + It was very messy; but our neighbour is generally well behaved—just + smokes quietly, as he did that day when I first showed you the smudge in + the sky from the schooner's deck. He's a good-natured, lazy fellow of a + volcano.” + </p> + <p> + “I saw a mountain smoking like that before,” she said, staring at the + slender stem of a tree-fern some dozen feet in front of her. “It wasn't + very long after we left England—some few days, though. I was so ill + at first that I lost count of days. A smoking mountain—I can't think + how they called it.” + </p> + <p> + “Vesuvius, perhaps,” suggested Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “That's the name.” + </p> + <p> + “I saw it, too, years, ages ago,” said Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “On your way here?” + </p> + <p> + “No, long before I ever thought of coming into this part of the world. I + was yet a boy.” + </p> + <p> + She turned and looked at him attentively, as if seeking to discover some + trace of that boyhood in the mature face of the man with the hair thin at + the top and the long, thick moustaches. Heyst stood the frank examination + with a playful smile, hiding the profound effect these veiled grey eyes + produced—whether on his heart or on his nerves, whether sensuous or + spiritual, tender or irritating, he was unable to say. + </p> + <p> + “Well, princess of Samburan,” he said at last, “have I found favour in + your sight?” + </p> + <p> + She seemed to wake up, and shook her head. + </p> + <p> + “I was thinking,” she murmured very low. + </p> + <p> + “Thought, action—so many snares! If you begin to think you will be + unhappy.” + </p> + <p> + “I wasn't thinking of myself!” she declared with a simplicity which took + Heyst aback somewhat. + </p> + <p> + “On the lips of a moralist this would sound like a rebuke,” he said, half + seriously; “but I won't suspect you of being one. Moralists and I haven't + been friends for many years.” + </p> + <p> + She had listened with an air of attention. + </p> + <p> + “I understood you had no friends,” she said. “I am pleased that there's + nobody to find fault with you for what you have done. I like to think that + I am in no one's way.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst would have said something, but she did not give him time. + Unconscious of the movement he made she went on: + </p> + <p> + “What I was thinking to myself was, why are you here?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst let himself sink on his elbow again. + </p> + <p> + “If by 'you' you mean 'we'—well, you know why we are here.” + </p> + <p> + She bent her gaze down at him. + </p> + <p> + “No, it isn't that. I meant before—all that time before you came + across me and guessed at once that I was in trouble, with no one to turn + to. And you know it was desperate trouble too.” + </p> + <p> + Her voice fell on the last words, as if she would end there; but there was + something so expectant in Heyst's attitude as he sat at her feet, looking + up at her steadily, that she continued, after drawing a short, quick + breath: + </p> + <p> + “It was, really. I told you I had been worried before by bad fellows. It + made me unhappy, disturbed—angry, too. But oh, how I hated, hated, + <i>hated</i> that man!” + </p> + <p> + “That man” was the florid Schomberg with the military bearing, benefactor + of white men ('decent food to eat in decent company')—mature victim + of belated passion. The girl shuddered. The characteristic harmoniousness + of her face became, as it were, decomposed for an instant. Heyst was + startled. + </p> + <p> + “Why think of it now?” he cried. + </p> + <p> + “It's because I was cornered that time. It wasn't as before. It was worse, + ever so much. I wished I could die of my fright—and yet it's only + now that I begin to understand what a horror it might have been. Yes, only + now, since we—” + </p> + <p> + Heyst stirred a little. + </p> + <p> + “Came here,” he finished. + </p> + <p> + Her tenseness relaxed, her flushed face went gradually back to its normal + tint. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” she said indifferently, but at the same time she gave him a + stealthy glance of passionate appreciation; and then her face took on a + melancholy cast, her whole figure drooped imperceptibly. + </p> + <p> + “But you were coming back here anyhow?” she asked. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. I was only waiting for Davidson. Yes, I was coming back here, to + these ruins—to Wang, who perhaps did not expect to see me again. + It's impossible to guess at the way that Chinaman draws his conclusions, + and how he looks upon one.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't talk about him. He makes me feel uncomfortable. Talk about + yourself!” + </p> + <p> + “About myself? I see you are still busy with the mystery of my existence + here; but it isn't at all mysterious. Primarily the man with the quill pen + in his hand in that picture you so often look at is responsible for my + existence. He is also responsible for what my existence is, or rather has + been. He was a great man in his way. I don't know much of his history. I + suppose he began like other people; took fine words for good, ringing coin + and noble ideals for valuable banknotes. He was a great master of both, + himself, by the way. Later he discovered—how am I to explain it to + you? Suppose the world were a factory and all mankind workmen in it. Well, + he discovered that the wages were not good enough. That they were paid in + counterfeit money.” + </p> + <p> + “I see!” the girl said slowly. + </p> + <p> + “Do you?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst, who had been speaking as if to himself, looked up curiously. + </p> + <p> + “It wasn't a new discovery, but he brought his capacity for scorn to bear + on it. It was immense. It ought to have withered this globe. I don't know + how many minds he convinced. But my mind was very young then, and youth I + suppose can be easily seduced—even by a negation. He was very + ruthless, and yet he was not without pity. He dominated me without + difficulty. A heartless man could not have done so. Even to fools he was + not utterly merciless. He could be indignant, but he was too great for + flouts and jeers. What he said was not meant for the crowd; it could not + be; and I was flattered to find myself among the elect. They read his + books, but I have heard his living word. It was irresistible. It was as if + that mind were taking me into its confidence, giving me a special insight + into its mastery of despair. Mistake, no doubt. There is something of my + father in every man who lives long enough. But they don't say anything. + They can't. They wouldn't know how, or perhaps, they wouldn't speak if + they could. Man on this earth is an unforeseen accident which does not + stand close investigation. However, that particular man died as quietly as + a child goes to sleep. But, after listening to him, I could not take my + soul down into the street to fight there. I started off to wander about, + an independent spectator—if that is possible.” + </p> + <p> + For a long time the girl's grey eyes had been watching his face. She + discovered that, addressing her, he was really talking to himself. Heyst + looked up, caught sight of her as it were, and caught himself up, with a + low laugh and a change of tone. + </p> + <p> + “All this does not tell you why I ever came here. Why, indeed? It's like + prying into inscrutable mysteries which are not worth scrutinizing. A man + drifts. The most successful men have drifted into their successes. I don't + want to tell you that this is a success. You wouldn't believe me if I did. + It isn't; neither is it the ruinous failure it looks. It proves nothing, + unless perhaps some hidden weakness in my character—and even that is + not certain.” + </p> + <p> + He looked fixedly at her, and with such grave eyes that she felt obliged + to smile faintly at him, since she did not understand what he meant. Her + smile was reflected, still fainter, on his lips. + </p> + <p> + “This does not advance you much in your inquiry,” he went on. “And in + truth your question is unanswerable; but facts have a certain positive + value, and I will tell you a fact. One day I met a cornered man. I use the + word because it expresses the man's situation exactly, and because you + just used it yourself. You know what that means?” + </p> + <p> + “What do you say?” she whispered, astounded. “A man!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst laughed at her wondering eyes. + </p> + <p> + “No! No! I mean in his own way.” + </p> + <p> + “I knew very well it couldn't be anything like that,” she observed under + her breath. + </p> + <p> + “I won't bother you with the story. It was a custom-house affair, strange + as it may sound to you. He would have preferred to be killed outright—that + is, to have his soul dispatched to another world, rather than to be robbed + of his substance, his very insignificant substance, in this. I saw that he + believed in another world because, being cornered, as I have told you, he + went down on his knees and prayed. What do you think of that?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst paused. She looked at him earnestly. + </p> + <p> + “You didn't make fun of him for that?” she said. + </p> + <p> + Heyst made a brusque movement of protest + </p> + <p> + “My dear girl, I am not a ruffian,” he cried. Then, returning to his usual + tone: “I didn't even have to conceal a smile. Somehow it didn't look a + smiling matter. No, it was not funny; it was rather pathetic; he was so + representative of all the past victims of the Great Joke. But it is by + folly alone that the world moves, and so it is a respectable thing upon + the whole. And besides, he was what one would call a good man. I don't + mean especially because he had offered up a prayer. No! He was really a + decent fellow, he was quite unfitted for this world, he was a failure, a + good man cornered—a sight for the gods; for no decent mortal cares + to look at that sort.” A thought seemed to occur to him. He turned his + face to the girl. “And you, who have been cornered too—did you think + of offering a prayer?” + </p> + <p> + Neither her eyes nor a single one of her features moved the least bit. She + only let fall the words: + </p> + <p> + “I am not what they call a good girl.” + </p> + <p> + “That sounds evasive,” said Heyst after a short silence. “Well, the good + fellow did pray and after he had confessed to it I was struck by the + comicality of the situation. No, don't misunderstand me—I am not + alluding to his act, of course. And even the idea of Eternity, Infinity, + Omnipotence, being called upon to defeat the conspiracy of two miserable + Portuguese half-castes did not move my mirth. From the point of view of + the supplicant, the danger to be conjured was something like the end of + the world, or worse. No! What captivated my fancy was that I, Axel Heyst, + the most detached of creatures in this earthly captivity, the veriest + tramp on this earth, an indifferent stroller going through the world's + bustle—that I should have been there to step into the situation of + an agent of Providence. <i>I</i>, a man of universal scorn and unbelief. . + . .” + </p> + <p> + “You are putting it on,” she interrupted in her seductive voice, with a + coaxing intonation. + </p> + <p> + “No. I am not like that, born or fashioned, or both. I am not for nothing + the son of my father, of that man in the painting. I am he, all but the + genius. And there is even less in me than I make out, because the very + scorn is falling away from me year after year. I have never been so amused + as by that episode in which I was suddenly called to act such an + incredible part. For a moment I enjoyed it greatly. It got him out of his + corner, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “You saved a man for fun—is that what you mean? Just for fun?” + </p> + <p> + “Why this tone of suspicion?” remonstrated Heyst. “I suppose the sight of + this particular distress was disagreeable to me. What you call fun came + afterwards, when it dawned on me that I was for him a walking, breathing, + incarnate proof of the efficacy of prayer. I was a little fascinated by it—and + then, could I have argued with him? You don't argue against such evidence, + and besides it would have looked as if I had wanted to claim all the + merit. Already his gratitude was simply frightful. Funny position, wasn't + it? The boredom came later, when we lived together on board his ship. I + had, in a moment of inadvertence, created for myself a tie. How to define + it precisely I don't know. One gets attached in a way to people one has + done something for. But is that friendship? I am not sure what it was. I + only know that he who forms a tie is lost. The germ of corruption has + entered into his soul.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst's tone was light, with the flavour of playfulness which seasoned all + his speeches and seemed to be of the very essence of his thoughts. The + girl he had come across, of whom he had possessed himself, to whose + presence he was not yet accustomed, with whom he did not yet know how to + live; that human being so near and still so strange, gave him a greater + sense of his own reality than he had ever known in all his life. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FOUR + </h2> + <p> + With her knees drawn up, Lena rested her elbows on them and held her head + in both her hands. + </p> + <p> + “Are you tired of sitting here?” Heyst asked. + </p> + <p> + An almost imperceptible negative movement of the head was all the answer + she made. + </p> + <p> + “Why are you looking so serious?” he pursued, and immediately thought that + habitual seriousness, in the long run, was much more bearable than + constant gaiety. “However, this expression suits you exceedingly,” he + added, not diplomatically, but because, by the tendency of his taste, it + was a true statement. “And as long as I can be certain that it is not + boredom which gives you this severe air, I am willing to sit here and look + at you till you are ready to go.” + </p> + <p> + And this was true. He was still under the fresh sortilege of their common + life, the surprise of novelty, the flattered vanity of his possession of + this woman; for a man must feel that, unless he has ceased to be + masculine. Her eyes moved in his direction, rested on him, then returned + to their stare into the deeper gloom at the foot of the straight + tree-trunks, whose spreading crowns were slowly withdrawing their shade. + The warm air stirred slightly about her motionless head. She would not + look at him, from some obscure fear of betraying herself. She felt in her + innermost depths an irresistible desire to give herself up to him more + completely, by some act of absolute sacrifice. This was something of which + he did not seem to have an idea. He was a strange being without needs. She + felt his eyes fixed upon her; and as he kept silent, she said uneasily—for + she didn't know what his silences might mean: + </p> + <p> + “And so you lived with that friend—that good man?” + </p> + <p> + “Excellent fellow,” Heyst responded, with a readiness that she did not + expect. “But it was a weakness on my part. I really didn't want to, only + he wouldn't let me off, and I couldn't explain. He was the sort of man to + whom you can't explain anything. He was extremely sensitive, and it would + have been a tigerish thing to do to mangle his delicate feelings by the + sort of plain speaking that would have been necessary. His mind was like a + white-walled, pure chamber, furnished with, say, six straw-bottomed + chairs, and he was always placing and displacing them in various + combinations. But they were always the same chairs. He was extremely easy + to live with; but then he got hold of this coal idea—or, rather, the + idea got hold of him, it entered into that scantily furnished chamber of + which I have just spoken, and sat on all the chairs. There was no + dislodging it, you know! It was going to make his fortune, my fortune, + everybody's fortune. In past years, in moments of doubt that will come to + a man determined to remain free from absurdities of existence, I often + asked myself, with a momentary dread, in what way would life try to get + hold of me? And this was the way. He got it into his head that he could do + nothing without me. And was I now, he asked me, to spurn and ruin him? + Well, one morning—I wonder if he had gone down on his knees to pray + that night!—one morning I gave in.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst tugged violently at a tuft of dried grass, and cast it away from him + with a nervous gesture. + </p> + <p> + “I gave in,” he repeated. + </p> + <p> + Looking towards him with a movement of her eyes only, the girl noticed the + strong feeling on his face with that intense interest which his person + awakened in her mind and in her heart. But it soon passed away, leaving + only a moody expression. + </p> + <p> + “It's difficult to resist where nothing matters,” he observed. “And + perhaps there is a grain of freakishness in my nature. It amused me to go + about uttering silly, commonplace phrases. I was never so well thought of + in the islands till I began to jabber commercial gibberish like the + veriest idiot. Upon my word, I believe that I was actually respected for a + time. I was as grave as an owl over it; I had to be loyal to the man. I + have been, from first to last, completely, utterly loyal to the best of my + ability. I thought he understood something about coal. And if I had been + aware that he knew nothing of it, as in fact he didn't, well—I don't + know what I could have done to stop him. In one way or another I should + have had to be loyal. Truth, work, ambition, love itself, may be only + counters in the lamentable or despicable game of life, but when one takes + a hand one must play the game. No, the shade of Morrison needn't haunt me. + What's the matter? I say, Lena, why are you staring like that? Do you feel + ill?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst made as if to get on his feet. The girl extended her arm to arrest + him, and he remained staring in a sitting posture, propped on one arm, + observing her indefinable expression of anxiety, as if she were unable to + draw breath. + </p> + <p> + “What has come to you?” he insisted, feeling strangely unwilling to move, + to touch her. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing!” She swallowed painfully. “Of course it can't be. What name did + you say? I didn't hear it properly.” + </p> + <p> + “Name?” repeated Heyst dazedly. “I only mentioned Morrison. It's the name + of that man of whom I've been speaking. What of it?” + </p> + <p> + “And you mean to say that he was your friend?” + </p> + <p> + “You have heard enough to judge for yourself. You know as much of our + connection as I know myself. The people in this part of the world went by + appearances, and called us friends, as far as I can remember. Appearances—what + more, what better can you ask for? In fact you can't have better. You + can't have anything else.” + </p> + <p> + “You are trying to confuse me with your talk,” she cried. “You can't make + fun of this.” + </p> + <p> + “Can't? Well, no I can't. It's a pity. Perhaps it would have been the best + way,” said Heyst, in a tone which for him could be called gloomy. “Unless + one could forget the silly business altogether.” His faint playfulness of + manner and speech returned, like a habit one has schooled oneself into, + even before his forehead had cleared completely. “But why are you looking + so hard at me? Oh, I don't object, and I shall try not to flinch. Your + eyes—” + </p> + <p> + He was looking straight into them, and as a matter of fact had forgotten + all about the late Morrison at that moment. + </p> + <p> + “No,” he exclaimed suddenly. “What an impenetrable girl you are Lena, with + those grey eyes of yours! Windows of the soul, as some poet has said. The + fellow must have been a glazier by vocation. Well, nature has provided + excellently for the shyness of your soul.” + </p> + <p> + When he ceased speaking, the girl came to herself with a catch of her + breath. He heard her voice, the varied charm of which he thought he knew + so well, saying with an unfamiliar intonation: + </p> + <p> + “And that partner of yours is dead?” + </p> + <p> + “Morrison? Oh, yes, as I've told you, he—” + </p> + <p> + “You never told me.” + </p> + <p> + “Didn't I? I thought I did; or, rather, I thought you must know. It seems + impossible that anybody with whom I speak should not know that Morrison is + dead.” + </p> + <p> + She lowered her eyelids, and Heyst was startled by something like an + expression of horror on her face. + </p> + <p> + “Morrison!” she whispered in an appalled tone. “Morrison!” Her head + drooped. Unable to see her features, Heyst could tell from her voice that + for some reason or other she was profoundly moved by the syllables of that + unromantic name. A thought flashed through his head—could she have + known Morrison? But the mere difference of their origins made it wildly + improbable. + </p> + <p> + “This is very extraordinary!” he said. “Have you ever heard the name + before?” + </p> + <p> + Her head moved quickly several times in tiny affirmative nods, as if she + could not trust herself to speak, or even to look at him. She was biting + her lower lip. + </p> + <p> + “Did you ever know anybody of that name?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + The girl answered by a negative sign; and then at last she spoke, jerkily, + as if forcing herself against some doubt or fear. She had heard of that + very man, she told Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “Impossible!” he said positively. “You are mistaken. You couldn't have + heard of him, it's—” + </p> + <p> + He stopped short, with the thought that to talk like this was perfectly + useless; that one doesn't argue against thin air. + </p> + <p> + “But I did hear of him; only I didn't know then, I couldn't guess, that it + was your partner they were talking about.” + </p> + <p> + “Talking about my partner?” repeated Heyst slowly. + </p> + <p> + “No.” Her mind seemed almost as bewildered, as full of incredulity, as + his. “No. They were talking of you really; only I didn't know it.” + </p> + <p> + “Who were they?” Heyst raised his voice. “Who was talking of me? Talking + where?” + </p> + <p> + With the first question he had lifted himself from his reclining position; + at the last he was on his knees before her, their heads on a level. + </p> + <p> + “Why, in that town, in that hotel. Where else could it have been?” she + said. + </p> + <p> + The idea of being talked about was always novel to Heyst's simplified + conception of himself. For a moment he was as much surprised as if he had + believed himself to be a mere gliding shadow among men. Besides, he had in + him a half-unconscious notion that he was above the level of island + gossip. + </p> + <p> + “But you said first that it was of Morrison they talked,” he remarked to + the girl, sinking on his heels, and no longer much interested. “Strange + that you should have the opportunity to hear any talk at all! I was rather + under the impression that you never saw anybody belonging to the town + except from the platform.” + </p> + <p> + “You forget that I was not living with the other girls,” she said. “After + meals they used to go back to the Pavilion, but I had to stay in the hotel + and do my sewing, or what not, in the room where they talked.” + </p> + <p> + “I didn't think of that. By the by, you never told me who they were.” + </p> + <p> + “Why, that horrible red-faced beast,” she said, with all the energy of + disgust which the mere thought of the hotel-keeper provoked in her. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Schomberg!” Heyst murmured carelessly. + </p> + <p> + “He talked to the boss—to Zangiacomo, I mean. I had to sit there. + That devil-woman sometimes wouldn't let me go away. I mean Mrs. + Zangiacomo.” + </p> + <p> + “I guessed,” murmured Heyst. “She liked to torment you in a variety of + ways. But it is really strange that the hotel-keeper should talk of + Morrison to Zangiacomo. As far as I can remember he saw very little of + Morrison professionally. He knew many others much better.” + </p> + <p> + The girl shuddered slightly. + </p> + <p> + “That was the only name I ever overheard. I would get as far away from + them as I could, to the other end of the room, but when that beast started + shouting I could not help hearing. I wish I had never heard anything. If I + had got up and gone out of the room I don't suppose the woman would have + killed me for it; but she would have rowed me in a nasty way. She would + have threatened me and called me names. That sort, when they know you are + helpless, there's nothing to stop them. I don't know how it is, but bad + people, real bad people that you can see are bad, they get over me + somehow. It's the way they set about downing one. I am afraid of + wickedness.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst watched the changing expressions of her face. He encouraged her, + profoundly sympathetic, a little amused. + </p> + <p> + “I quite understand. You needn't apologize for your great delicacy in the + perception of inhuman evil. I am a little like you.” + </p> + <p> + “I am not very plucky,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Well! I don't know myself what I would do, what countenance I would have + before a creature which would strike me as being evil incarnate. Don't you + be ashamed!” + </p> + <p> + She sighed, looked up with her pale, candid gaze and a timid expression on + her face, and murmured: + </p> + <p> + “You don't seem to want to know what he was saying.” + </p> + <p> + “About poor Morrison? It couldn't have been anything bad, for the poor + fellow was innocence itself. And then, you know, he is dead, and nothing + can possibly matter to him now.” + </p> + <p> + “But I tell you that it was of you he was talking!” she cried. + </p> + <p> + “He was saying that Morrison's partner first got all there was to get out + of him, and then, and then—well, as good as murdered him—sent + him out to die somewhere!” + </p> + <p> + “You believe that of me?” said Heyst, after a moment of perfect silence. + </p> + <p> + “I didn't know it had anything to do with you. Schomberg was talking of + some Swede. How was I to know? It was only when you began telling me about + how you came here—” + </p> + <p> + “And now you have my version.” Heyst forced himself to speak quietly. “So + that's how the business looked from outside!” he muttered. + </p> + <p> + “I remember him saying that everybody in these parts knew the story,” the + girl added breathlessly. + </p> + <p> + “Strange that it should hurt me!” mused Heyst to himself; “yet it does. I + seem to be as much of a fool as those everybodies who know the story and + no doubt believe it. Can you remember any more?” he addressed the girl in + a grimly polite tone. “I've often heard of the moral advantages of seeing + oneself as others see one. Let us investigate further. Can't you recall + something else that everybody knows?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh! Don't laugh!” she cried. + </p> + <p> + “Did I laugh? I assure you I was not aware of it. I won't ask you whether + you believe the hotel-keeper's version. Surely you must know the value of + human judgement!” + </p> + <p> + She unclasped her hands, moved them slightly, and twined her fingers as + before. Protest? Assent? Was there to be nothing more? He was relieved + when she spoke in that warm and wonderful voice which in itself comforted + and fascinated one's heart, which made her lovable. + </p> + <p> + “I heard this before you and I ever spoke to each other. It went out of my + memory afterwards. Everything went out of my memory then; and I was glad + of it. It was a fresh start for me, with you—and you know it. I wish + I had forgotten who I was—that would have been best; and I very + nearly did forget.” + </p> + <p> + He was moved by the vibrating quality of the last words. She seemed to be + talking low of some wonderful enchantment, in mysterious terms of special + significance. He thought that if she only could talk to him in some + unknown tongue, she would enslave him altogether by the sheer beauty of + the sound, suggesting infinite depths of wisdom and feeling. + </p> + <p> + “But,” she went on, “the name stuck in my head, it seems; and when you + mentioned it—” + </p> + <p> + “It broke the spell,” muttered Heyst in angry disappointment as if he had + been deceived in some hope. + </p> + <p> + The girl, from her position a little above him, surveyed with still eyes + the abstracted silence of the man on whom she now depended with a + completeness of which she had not been vividly conscious before, because, + till then, she had never felt herself swinging between the abysses of + earth and heaven in the hollow of his arm. What if he should grow weary of + the burden? + </p> + <p> + “And, moreover, nobody had ever believed that tale!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst came out with an abrupt burst of sound which made her open her + steady eyes wider, with an effect of immense surprise. It was a purely + mechanical effect, because she was neither surprised nor puzzled. In fact, + she could understand him better then than at any moment since she first + set eyes on him. + </p> + <p> + He laughed scornfully. + </p> + <p> + “What am I thinking of?” he cried. “As if it could matter to me what + anybody had ever said or believed, from the beginning of the world till + the crack of doom!” + </p> + <p> + “I never heard you laugh till today,” she observed. “This is the second + time!” + </p> + <p> + He scrambled to his feet and towered above her. + </p> + <p> + “That's because, when one's heart has been broken into in the way you have + broken into mine, all sorts of weaknesses are free to enter—shame, + anger, stupid indignation, stupid fears—stupid laughter, too. I + wonder what interpretation you are putting on it?” + </p> + <p> + “It wasn't gay, certainly,” she said. “But why are you angry with me? Are + you sorry you took me away from those beasts? I told you who I was. You + could see it.” + </p> + <p> + “Heavens!” he muttered. He had regained his command of himself. “I assure + you I could see much more than you could tell me. I could see quite a lot + that you don't even suspect yet, but you can't be seen quite through.” + </p> + <p> + He sank to the ground by her side and took her hand. She asked gently: + </p> + <p> + “What more do you want from me?” + </p> + <p> + He made no sound for a time. + </p> + <p> + “The impossible, I suppose,” he said very low, as one makes a confidence, + and pressing the hand he grasped. + </p> + <p> + It did not return the pressure. He shook his head as if to drive away the + thought of this, and added in a louder, light tone: + </p> + <p> + “Nothing less. And it isn't because I think little of what I've got + already. Oh, no! It is because I think so much of this possession of mine + that I can't have it complete enough. I know it's unreasonable. You can't + hold back anything—now.” + </p> + <p> + “Indeed I couldn't,” she whispered, letting her hand lie passive in his + tight grasp. “I only wish I could give you something more, or better, or + whatever it is you want.” + </p> + <p> + He was touched by the sincere accent of these simple words. + </p> + <p> + “I tell you what you can do—you can tell me whether you would have + gone with me like this if you had known of whom that abominable idiot of a + hotel-keeper was speaking. A murderer—no less!” + </p> + <p> + “But I didn't know you at all then,” she cried. “And I had the sense to + understand what he was saying. It wasn't murder, really. I never thought + it was.” + </p> + <p> + “What made him invent such an atrocity?” Heyst exclaimed. “He seems a + stupid animal. He <i>is</i> stupid. How did he manage to hatch that pretty + tale? Have I a particularly vile countenance? Is black selfishness written + all over my face? Or is that sort of thing so universally human that it + might be said of anybody?” + </p> + <p> + “It wasn't murder,” she insisted earnestly. + </p> + <p> + “I know. I understand. It was worse. As to killing a man, which would be a + comparatively decent thing to do, well—I have never done that.” + </p> + <p> + “Why should you do it?” she asked in a frightened voice. + </p> + <p> + “My dear girl, you don't know the sort of life I have been leading in + unexplored countries, in the wilds; it's difficult to give you an idea. + There are men who haven't been in such tight places as I have found myself + in who have had to—to shed blood, as the saying is. Even the wilds + hold prizes which tempt some people; but I had no schemes, no plans—and + not even great firmness of mind to make me unduly obstinate. I was simply + moving on, while the others, perhaps, were going somewhere. An + indifference as to roads and purposes makes one meeker, as it were. And I + may say truly, too, that I never did care, I won't say for life—I + had scorned what people call by that name from the first—but for + being alive. I don't know if that is what men call courage, but I doubt it + very much.” + </p> + <p> + “You! You have no courage?” she protested. + </p> + <p> + “I really don't know. Not the sort that always itches for a weapon, for I + have never been anxious to use one in the quarrels that a man gets into in + the most innocent way sometimes. The differences for which men murder each + other are, like everything else they do, the most contemptible, the most + pitiful things to look back upon. No, I've never killed a man or loved a + woman—not even in my thoughts, not even in my dreams.” + </p> + <p> + He raised her hand to his lips, and let them rest on it for a space, + during which she moved a little closer to him. After the lingering kiss he + did not relinquish his hold. + </p> + <p> + “To slay, to love—the greatest enterprises of life upon a man! And I + have no experience of either. You must forgive me anything that may have + appeared to you awkward in my behaviour, inexpressive in my speeches, + untimely in my silences.” + </p> + <p> + He moved uneasily, a little disappointed by her attitude, but indulgent to + it, and feeling, in this moment of perfect quietness, that in holding her + surrendered hand he had found a closer communion than they had ever + achieved before. But even then there still lingered in him a sense of + incompleteness not altogether overcome—which, it seemed, nothing + ever would overcome—the fatal imperfection of all the gifts of life, + which makes of them a delusion and a snare. + </p> + <p> + All of a sudden he squeezed her hand angrily. His delicately playful + equanimity, the product of kindness and scorn, had perished with the loss + of his bitter liberty. + </p> + <p> + “Not murder, you say! I should think not. But when you led me to talk just + now, when the name turned up, when you understood that it was of me that + these things had been said, you showed a strange emotion. I could see it.” + </p> + <p> + “I was a bit startled,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “At the baseness of my conduct?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “I wouldn't judge you, not for anything.” + </p> + <p> + “Really?” + </p> + <p> + “It would be as if I dared to judge everything that there is.” With her + other hand she made a gesture that seemed to embrace in one movement the + earth and the heaven. “I wouldn't do such a thing.” + </p> + <p> + Then came a silence, broken at last by Heyst: + </p> + <p> + “I! I! do a deadly wrong to my poor Morrison!” he cried. “I, who could not + bear to hurt his feelings. I, who respected his very madness! Yes, this + madness, the wreck of which you can see lying about the jetty of Diamond + Bay. What else could I do? He insisted on regarding me as his saviour; he + was always restraining the eternal obligation on the tip of his tongue, + till I was burning with shame at his gratitude. What could I do? He was + going to repay me with this infernal coal, and I had to join him as one + joins a child's game in a nursery. One would no more have thought of + humiliating him than one would think of humiliating a child. What's the + use of talking of all this! Of course, the people here could not + understand the truth of our relation to each other. But what business of + theirs was it? Kill old Morrison! Well, it is less criminal, less base—I + am not saying it is less difficult—to kill a man than to cheat him + in that way. You understand that?” + </p> + <p> + She nodded slightly, but more than once and with evident conviction. His + eyes rested on her, inquisitive, ready for tenderness. + </p> + <p> + “But it was neither one nor the other,” he went on. “Then, why your + emotion? All you confess is that you wouldn't judge me.” + </p> + <p> + She turned upon him her veiled, unseeing grey eyes in which nothing of her + wonder could be read. + </p> + <p> + “I said I couldn't,” she whispered. + </p> + <p> + “But you thought that there was no smoke without fire!” the playfulness of + tone hardly concealed his irritation. “What power there must be in words, + only imperfectly heard—for you did not listen with particular care, + did you? What were they? What evil effort of invention drove them into + that idiot's mouth out of his lying throat? If you were to try to + remember, they would perhaps convince me, too.” + </p> + <p> + “I didn't listen,” she protested. “What was it to me what they said of + anybody? He was saying that there never were such loving friends to look + at as you two; then, when you got all you wanted out of him and got + thoroughly tired of him, too, you kicked him out to go home and die.” + </p> + <p> + Indignation, with an undercurrent of some other feeling, rang in these + quoted words, uttered in her pure and enchanting voice. She ceased + abruptly and lowered her long, dark lashes, as if mortally weary, sick at + heart. + </p> + <p> + “Of course, why shouldn't you get tired of that or any other—company? + You aren't like anyone else, and—and the thought of it made me + unhappy suddenly; but indeed, I did not believe anything bad of you. I—” + </p> + <p> + A brusque movement of his arm, flinging her hand away, stopped her short. + Heyst had again lost control of himself. He would have shouted, if + shouting had been in his character. + </p> + <p> + “No, this earth must be the appointed hatching planet of calumny enough to + furnish the whole universe. I feel a disgust at my own person, as if I had + tumbled into some filthy hole. Pah! And you—all you can say is that + you won't judge me; that you—” + </p> + <p> + She raised her head at this attack, though indeed he had not turned to + her. + </p> + <p> + “I don't believe anything bad of you,” she repeated. “I couldn't.” + </p> + <p> + He made a gesture as if to say: + </p> + <p> + “That's sufficient.” + </p> + <p> + In his soul and in his body he experienced a nervous reaction from + tenderness. All at once, without transition, he detested her. But only for + a moment. He remembered that she was pretty, and, more, that she had a + special grace in the intimacy of life. She had the secret of individuality + which excites—and escapes. + </p> + <p> + He jumped up and began to walk to and fro. Presently his hidden fury fell + into dust within him, like a crazy structure, leaving behind emptiness, + desolation, regret. His resentment was not against the girl, but against + life itself—that commonest of snares, in which he felt himself + caught, seeing clearly the plot of plots and unconsoled by the lucidity of + his mind. + </p> + <p> + He swerved and, stepping up to her, sank to the ground by her side. Before + she could make a movement or even turn her head his way, he took her in + his arms and kissed her lips. He tasted on them the bitterness of a tear + fallen there. He had never seen her cry. It was like another appeal to his + tenderness—a new seduction. The girl glanced round, moved suddenly + away, and averted her face. With her hand she signed imperiously to him to + leave her alone—a command which Heyst did not obey. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FIVE + </h2> + <p> + When she opened her eyes at last and sat up, Heyst scrambled quickly to + his feet and went to pick up her cork helmet, which had rolled a little + way off. Meanwhile she busied herself in doing up her hair, plaited on the + top of her head in two heavy, dark tresses, which had come loose. He + tendered her the helmet in silence, and waited as if unwilling to hear the + sound of his own voice. + </p> + <p> + “We had better go down now,” he suggested in a low tone. + </p> + <p> + He extended his hand to help her up. He had the intention to smile, but + abandoned it at the nearer sight of her still face, in which was depicted + the infinite lassitude of her soul. On their way to regain the forest path + they had to pass through the spot from which the view of the sea could be + obtained. The flaming abyss of emptiness, the liquid, undulating glare, + the tragic brutality of the light, made her long for the friendly night, + with its stars stilled by an austere spell; for the velvety dark sky and + the mysterious great shadow of the sea, conveying peace to the day-weary + heart. She put her hand to her eyes. Behind her back Heyst spoke gently. + </p> + <p> + “Let us get on, Lena.” + </p> + <p> + She walked ahead in silence. Heyst remarked that they had never been out + before during the hottest hours. It would do her no good, he feared. This + solicitude pleased and soothed her. She felt more and more like herself—a + poor London girl playing in an orchestra, and snatched out from the + humiliations, the squalid dangers of a miserable existence, by a man like + whom there was not, there could not be, another in this world. She felt + this with elation, with uneasiness, with an intimate pride—and with + a peculiar sinking of the heart. + </p> + <p> + “I am not easily knocked out by any such thing as heat,” she said + decisively. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but I don't forget that you're not a tropical bird.” + </p> + <p> + “You weren't born in these parts, either,” she returned. + </p> + <p> + “No, and perhaps I haven't even your physique. I am a transplanted being. + Transplanted! I ought to call myself uprooted—an unnatural state of + existence; but a man is supposed to stand anything.” + </p> + <p> + She looked back at him and received a smile. He told her to keep in the + shelter of the forest path, which was very still and close, full of heat + if free from glare. Now and then they had glimpses of the company's old + clearing blazing with light, in which the black stumps of trees stood + charred, without shadows, miserable and sinister. They crossed the open in + a direct line for the bungalow. On the veranda they fancied they had a + glimpse of the vanishing Wang, though the girl was not at all sure that + she had seen anything move. Heyst had no doubts. + </p> + <p> + “Wang has been looking out for us. We are late.” + </p> + <p> + “Was he? I thought I saw something white for a moment, and then I did not + see it any more.” + </p> + <p> + “That's it—he vanishes. It's a very remarkable gift in that + Chinaman.” + </p> + <p> + “Are they all like that?” she asked with naive curiosity and uneasiness. + </p> + <p> + “Not in such perfection,” said Heyst, amused. + </p> + <p> + He noticed with approval that she was not heated by the walk. The drops of + perspiration on her forehead were like dew on the cool, white petal of a + flower. He looked at her figure of grace and strength, solid and supple, + with an ever-growing appreciation. + </p> + <p> + “Go in and rest yourself for a quarter of an hour; and then Mr. Wang will + give us something to eat,” he said. + </p> + <p> + They had found the table laid. When they came together again and sat down + to it, Wang materialized without a sound, unheard, uncalled, and did his + office. Which being accomplished, at a given moment he was not. + </p> + <p> + A great silence brooded over Samburan—the silence of the great heat + that seems pregnant with fatal issues, like the silence of ardent thought. + Heyst remained alone in the big room. The girl seeing him take up a book, + had retreated to her chamber. Heyst sat down under his father's portrait; + and the abominable calumny crept back into his recollection. The taste of + it came on his lips, nauseating and corrosive like some kinds of poison. + He was tempted to spit on the floor, naively, in sheer unsophisticated + disgust of the physical sensation. He shook his head, surprised at + himself. He was not used to receive his intellectual impressions in that + way—reflected in movements of carnal emotion. He stirred impatiently + in his chair, and raised the book to his eyes with both hands. It was one + of his father's. He opened it haphazard, and his eyes fell on the middle + of the page. The elder Heyst had written of everything in many books—of + space and of time, of animals and of stars; analysing ideas and actions, + the laughter and the frowns of men, and the grimaces of their agony. The + son read, shrinking into himself, composing his face as if under the + author's eye, with a vivid consciousness of the portrait on his right + hand, a little above his head; a wonderful presence in its heavy frame on + the flimsy wall of mats, looking exiled and at home, out of place and + masterful, in the painted immobility of profile. + </p> + <p> + And Heyst, the son, read: + </p> + <p> + Of the stratagems of life the most cruel is the consolation of love—the + most subtle, too; for the desire is the bed of dreams. + </p> + <p> + He turned the pages of the little volume, “Storm and Dust,” glancing here + and there at the broken text of reflections, maxims, short phrases, + enigmatical sometimes and sometimes eloquent. It seemed to him that he was + hearing his father's voice, speaking and ceasing to speak again. Startled + at first, he ended by finding a charm in the illusion. He abandoned + himself to the half-belief that something of his father dwelt yet on earth—a + ghostly voice, audible to the ear of his own flesh and blood. With what + strange serenity, mingled with terrors, had that man considered the + universal nothingness! He had plunged into it headlong, perhaps to render + death, the answer that faced one at every inquiry, more supportable. + </p> + <p> + Heyst stirred, and the ghostly voice ceased; but his eyes followed the + words on the last page of the book: + </p> + <p> + Men of tormented conscience, or of a criminal imagination, are aware of + much that minds of a peaceful, resigned cast do not even suspect. It is + not poets alone who dare descend into the abyss of infernal regions, or + even who dream of such a descent. The most inexpressive of human beings + must have said to himself, at one time or another: “Anything but this!” . + . . + </p> + <p> + We all have our instants of clairvoyance. They are not very helpful. The + character of the scheme does not permit that or anything else to be + helpful. Properly speaking its character, judged by the standards + established by its victims, is infamous. It excuses every violence of + protest and at the same time never fails to crush it, just as it crushes + the blindest assent. The so-called wickedness must be, like the so-called + virtue, its own reward—to be anything at all . . . + </p> + <p> + Clairvoyance or no clairvoyance, men love their captivity. To the unknown + force of negation they prefer the miserably tumbled bed of their + servitude. Man alone can give one the disgust of pity; yet I find it + easier to believe in the misfortune of mankind than in its wickedness. + </p> + <p> + These were the last words. Heyst lowered the book to his knees. Lena's + voice spoke above his drooping head: + </p> + <p> + “You sit there as if you were unhappy.” + </p> + <p> + “I thought you were asleep,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “I was lying down right enough, but I never closed my eyes.” + </p> + <p> + “The rest would have done you good after our walk. Didn't you try?” + </p> + <p> + “I was lying down, I tell you, but sleep I couldn't.” + </p> + <p> + “And you made no sound! What want of sincerity. Or did you want to be + alone for a time?” + </p> + <p> + “I—alone?” she murmured. + </p> + <p> + He noticed her eyeing the book, and got up to put it back in the bookcase. + When he turned round, he saw that she had dropped into the chair—it + was the one she always used—and looked as if her strength had + suddenly gone from her, leaving her only her youth, which seemed very + pathetic, very much at his mercy. He moved quickly towards the chair. + </p> + <p> + “Tired, are you? It's my fault, taking you up so high and keeping you out + so long. Such a windless day, too!” + </p> + <p> + She watched his concern, her pose languid, her eyes raised to him, but as + unreadable as ever. He avoided looking into them for that very reason. He + forgot himself in the contemplation of those passive arms, of these + defenceless lips, and—yes, one had to go back to them—of these + wide-open eyes. Something wild in their grey stare made him think of + sea-birds in the cold murkiness of high latitudes. He started when she + spoke, all the charm of physical intimacy revealed suddenly in that voice. + </p> + <p> + “You should try to love me!” she said. + </p> + <p> + He made a movement of astonishment. + </p> + <p> + “Try,” he muttered. “But it seems to me—” He broke off, saying to + himself that if he loved her, he had never told her so in so many words. + Simple words! They died on his lips. “What makes you say that?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + She lowered her eyelids and turned her head a little. + </p> + <p> + “I have done nothing,” she said in a low voice. “It's you who have been + good, helpful, and tender to me. Perhaps you love me for that—just + for that; or perhaps you love me for company, and because—well! But + sometimes it seems to me that you can never love me for myself, only for + myself, as people do love each other when it is to be for ever.” Her head + drooped. “Forever,” she breathed out again; then, still more faintly, she + added an entreating: “Do try!” + </p> + <p> + These last words went straight to his heart—the sound of them more + than the sense. He did not know what to say, either from want of practice + in dealing with women or simply from his innate honesty of thought. All + his defences were broken now. Life had him fairly by the throat. But he + managed a smile, though she was not looking at him; yes, he did manage it—the + well-known Heyst smile of playful courtesy, so familiar to all sorts and + conditions of men in the islands. + </p> + <p> + “My dear Lena,” he said, “it looks as if you were trying to pick a very + unnecessary quarrel with me—of all people!” + </p> + <p> + She made no movement. With his elbows spread out he was twisting the ends + of his long moustaches, very masculine and perplexed, enveloped in the + atmosphere of femininity as in a cloud, suspecting pitfalls, and as if + afraid to move. + </p> + <p> + “I must admit, though,” he added, “that there is no one else; and I + suppose a certain amount of quarrelling is necessary for existence in this + world.” + </p> + <p> + That girl, seated in her chair in graceful quietude, was to him like a + script in an unknown language, or even more simply mysterious, like any + writing to the illiterate. As far as women went he was altogether + uninstructed and he had not the gift of intuition which is fostered in the + days of youth by dreams and visions, exercises of the heart fitting it for + the encounters of a world, in which love itself rests as much on + antagonism as on attraction. His mental attitude was that of a man looking + this way and that on a piece of writing which he is unable to decipher, + but which may be big with some revelation. He didn't know what to say. All + he found to add was: + </p> + <p> + “I don't even understand what I have done or left undone to distress you + like this.” + </p> + <p> + He stopped, struck afresh by the physical and moral sense of the + imperfections of their relations—a sense which made him desire her + constant nearness, before his eyes, under his hand, and which, when she + was out of his sight, made her so vague, so elusive and illusory, a + promise that could not be embraced and held. + </p> + <p> + “No! I don't see clearly what you mean. Is your mind turned towards the + future?” he interpellated her with marked playfulness, because he was + ashamed to let such a word pass his lips. But all his cherished negations + were falling off him one by one. + </p> + <p> + “Because if it is so there is nothing easier than to dismiss it. In our + future, as in what people call the other life, there is nothing to be + frightened of.” + </p> + <p> + She raised her eyes to him; and if nature had formed them to express + anything else but blank candour he would have learned how terrified she + was by his talk and the fact that her sinking heart loved him more + desperately than ever. He smiled at her. + </p> + <p> + “Dismiss all thought of it,” he insisted. “Surely you don't suspect after + what I have heard from you, that I am anxious to return to mankind. I! I! + murder my poor Morrison! It's possible that I may be really capable of + that which they say I have done. The point is that I haven't done it. But + it is an unpleasant subject to me. I ought to be ashamed to confess it—but + it is! Let us forget it. There's that in you, Lena, which can console me + for worse things, for uglier passages. And if we forget, there are no + voices here to remind us.” + </p> + <p> + She had raised her head before he paused. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing can break in on us here,” he went on and, as if there had been an + appeal or a provocation in her upward glance, he bent down and took her + under the arms, raising her straight out of the chair into a sudden and + close embrace. Her alacrity to respond, which made her seem as light as a + feather, warmed his heart at that moment more than closer caresses had + done before. He had not expected that ready impulse towards himself which + had been dormant in her passive attitude. He had just felt the clasp of + her arms round his neck, when, with a slight exclamation—“He's + here!”—she disengaged herself and bolted, away into her room. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SIX + </h2> + <p> + Heyst was astounded. Looking all round, as if to take the whole room to + witness of this outrage, he became aware of Wang materialized in the + doorway. The intrusion was as surprising as anything could be, in view of + the strict regularity with which Wang made himself visible. Heyst was + tempted to laugh at first. This practical comment on his affirmation that + nothing could break in on them relieved the strain of his feelings. He was + a little vexed, too. The Chinaman preserved a profound silence. + </p> + <p> + “What do you want?” asked Heyst sternly. + </p> + <p> + “Boat out there,” said the Chinaman. + </p> + <p> + “Where? What do you mean? Boat adrift in the straits?” + </p> + <p> + Some subtle change in Wang's bearing suggested his being out of breath; + but he did not pant, and his voice was steady. + </p> + <p> + “No—row.” + </p> + <p> + It was Heyst now who was startled and raised his voice. + </p> + <p> + “Malay man, eh?” + </p> + <p> + Wang made a slight negative movement with his head. + </p> + <p> + “Do you hear, Lena?” Heyst called out. “Wang says there is a boat in sight—somewhere + near apparently. Where's that boat Wang?” + </p> + <p> + “Round the point,” said Wang, leaping into Malay unexpectedly, and in a + loud voice. “White men three.” + </p> + <p> + “So close as that?” exclaimed Heyst, moving out on the veranda followed by + Wang. “White men? Impossible!” + </p> + <p> + Over the clearing the shadows were already lengthening. The sun hung low; + a ruddy glare lay on the burnt black patch in front of the bungalow, and + slanted on the ground between the straight, tall, mast-like trees soaring + a hundred feet or more without a branch. The growth of bushes cut off all + view of the jetty from the veranda. Far away to the right Wang's hut, or + rather its dark roof of mats, could be seen above the bamboo fence which + insured the privacy of the Alfuro woman. The Chinaman looked that way + swiftly. Heyst paused, and then stepped back a pace into the room. + </p> + <p> + “White men, Lena, apparently. What are you doing?” + </p> + <p> + “I am just bathing my eyes a little,” the girl's voice said from the inner + room. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes; all right!” + </p> + <p> + “Do you want me?” + </p> + <p> + “No. You had better—I am going down to the jetty. Yes, you had + better stay in. What an extraordinary thing!” + </p> + <p> + It was so extraordinary that nobody could possibly appreciate how + extraordinary it was but himself. His mind was full of mere exclamations, + while his feet were carrying him in the direction of the jetty. He + followed the line of the rails, escorted by Wang. + </p> + <p> + “Where were you when you first saw the boat?” he asked over his shoulder. + </p> + <p> + Wang explained in Malay that he had gone to the shore end of the wharf, to + get a few lumps of coal from the big heap, when, happening to raise his + eyes from the ground, he saw the boat—a white man boat, not a canoe. + He had good eyes. He had seen the boat, with the men at the oars; and here + Wang made a particular gesture over his eyes, as if his vision had + received a blow. He had turned at once and run to the house to report. + </p> + <p> + “No mistake, eh?” said Heyst, moving on. At the very outer edge of the + belt he stopped short. Wang halted behind him on the path, till the voice + of Number One called him sharply forward into the open. He obeyed. + </p> + <p> + “Where's that boat?” asked Heyst forcibly. “I say—where is it?” + </p> + <p> + Nothing whatever was to be seen between the point and the jetty. The + stretch of Diamond Bay was like a piece of purple shadow, lustrous and + empty, while beyond the land, the open sea lay blue and opaque under the + sun. Heyst's eyes swept all over the offing till they met, far off, the + dark cone of the volcano, with its faint plume of smoke broadening and + vanishing everlastingly at the top, without altering its shape in the + glowing transparency of the evening. + </p> + <p> + “The fellow has been dreaming,” he muttered to himself. + </p> + <p> + He looked hard at the Chinaman. Wang seemed turned into stone. Suddenly, + as if he had received a shock, he started, flung his arm out with a + pointing forefinger, and made guttural noises to the effect that there, + there, there, he had seen a boat. + </p> + <p> + It was very uncanny. Heyst thought of some strange hallucination. Unlikely + enough; but that a boat with three men in it should have sunk between the + point and the jetty, suddenly, like a stone, without leaving as much on + the surface as a floating oar, was still more unlikely. The theory of a + phantom boat would have been more credible than that. + </p> + <p> + “Confound it!” he muttered to himself. + </p> + <p> + He was unpleasantly affected by this mystery; but now a simple explanation + occurred to him. He stepped hastily out on the wharf. The boat, if it had + existed and had retreated, could perhaps be seen from the far end of the + long jetty. + </p> + <p> + Nothing was to be seen. Heyst let his eyes roam idly over the sea. He was + so absorbed in his perplexity that a hollow sound, as of somebody tumbling + about in a boat, with a clatter of oars and spars, failed to make him move + for a moment. When his mind seized its meaning, he had no difficulty in + locating the sound. It had come from below—under the jetty! + </p> + <p> + He ran back for a dozen yards or so, and then looked over. His sight + plunged straight into the stern-sheets of a big boat, the greater part of + which was hidden from him by the planking of the jetty. His eyes fell on + the thin back of a man doubled up over the tiller in a queer, + uncomfortable attitude of drooping sorrow. Another man, more directly + below Heyst, sprawled on his back from gunwale to gunwale, half off the + after thwart, his head lower than his feet. This second man glared wildly + upward, and struggled to raise himself, but to all appearance was much too + drunk to succeed. The visible part of the boat contained also a flat, + leather trunk, on which the first man's long legs were tucked up + nervelessly. A large earthenware jug, with its wide mouth uncorked, rolled + out on the bottom-boards from under the sprawling man. + </p> + <p> + Heyst had never been so much astonished in his life. He stared dumbly at + the strange boat's crew. From the first he was positive that these men + were not sailors. They wore the white drill-suit of tropical civilization; + but their apparition in a boat Heyst could not connect with anything + plausible. The civilization of the tropics could have had nothing to do + with it. It was more like those myths, current in Polynesia, of amazing + strangers, who arrive at an island, gods or demons, bringing good or evil + to the innocence of the inhabitants—gifts of unknown things, words + never heard before. + </p> + <p> + Heyst noticed a cork helmet floating alongside the boat, evidently fallen + from the head of the man doubled over the tiller, who displayed a dark, + bony poll. An oar, too, had been knocked overboard, probably by the + sprawling man, who was still struggling, between the thwarts. By this time + Heyst regarded the visitation no longer with surprise, but with the + sustained attention demanded by a difficult problem. With one foot poised + on the string-piece, and leaning on his raised knee, he was taking in + everything. The sprawling man rolled off the thwart, collapsed, and, most + unexpectedly, got on his feet. He swayed dizzily, spreading his arms out + and uttered faintly a hoarse, dreamy “Hallo!” His upturned face was + swollen, red, peeling all over the nose and cheeks. His stare was + irrational. Heyst perceived stains of dried blood all over the front of + his dirty white coat, and also on one sleeve. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter? Are you wounded?” + </p> + <p> + The other glanced down, reeled—one of his feet was inside a large + pith hat—and, recovering himself, let out a dismal, grating sound in + the manner of a grim laugh. + </p> + <p> + “Blood—not mine. Thirst's the matter. Exhausted's the matter. Done + up. Drink, man! Give us water!” + </p> + <p> + Thirst was in the very tone of his words, alternating a broken croak and a + faint, throaty rustle which just reached Heyst's ears. The man in the boat + raised his hands to be helped up on the jetty, whispering: + </p> + <p> + “I tried. I am too weak. I tumbled down.” + </p> + <p> + Wang was coming along the jetty slowly, with intent, straining eyes. + </p> + <p> + “Run back and bring a crowbar here. There's one lying by the coal-heap,” + Heyst shouted to him. + </p> + <p> + The man standing in the boat sat down on the thwart behind him. A horrible + coughing laugh came through his swollen lips. + </p> + <p> + “Crowbar? What's that for?” he mumbled, and his head dropped on his chest + mournfully. + </p> + <p> + Meantime, Heyst, as if he had forgotten the boat, started kicking hard at + a large brass tap projecting above the planks. To accommodate ships that + came for coal and happened to need water as well, a stream had been tapped + in the interior and an iron pipe led along the jetty. It terminated with a + curved end almost exactly where the strangers' boat had been driven + between the piles; but the tap was set fast. + </p> + <p> + “Hurry up!” Heyst yelled to the Chinaman, who was running with the crowbar + in his hand. + </p> + <p> + Heyst snatched it from him and, obtaining a leverage against the + string-piece, wrung the stiff tap round with a mighty jerk. “I hope that + pipe hasn't got choked!” he muttered to himself anxiously. + </p> + <p> + It hadn't; but it did not yield a strong gush. The sound of a thin stream, + partly breaking on the gunwale of the boat and partly splashing alongside, + became at once audible. It was greeted by a cry of inarticulate and savage + joy. Heyst knelt on the string-piece and peered down. The man who had + spoken was already holding his open mouth under the bright trickle. Water + ran over his eyelids and over his nose, gurgled down his throat, flowed + over his chin. Then some obstruction in the pipe gave way, and a sudden + thick jet broke on his face. In a moment his shoulders were soaked, the + front of his coat inundated; he streamed and dripped; water ran into his + pockets, down his legs, into his shoes; but he had clutched the end of the + pipe, and, hanging on with both hands, swallowed, spluttered, choked, + snorted with the noises of a swimmer. Suddenly a curious dull roar reached + Heyst's ears. Something hairy and black flew from under the jetty. A + dishevelled head, coming on like a cannonball, took the man at the pipe in + flank, with enough force to tear his grip loose and fling him headlong + into the stern-sheets. He fell upon the folded legs of the man at the + tiller, who, roused by the commotion in the boat, was sitting up, silent, + rigid, and very much like a corpse. His eyes were but two black patches, + and his teeth glistened with a death's head grin between his retracted + lips, no thicker than blackish parchment glued over the gums. + </p> + <p> + From him Heyst's eyes wandered to the creature who had replaced the first + man at the end of the water-pipe. Enormous brown paws clutched it + savagely; the wild, big head hung back, and in a face covered with a wet + mass of hair there gaped crookedly a wide mouth full of fangs. The water + filled it, welled up in hoarse coughs, ran down on each side of the jaws + and down the hairy throat, soaked the black pelt of the enormous chest, + naked under a torn check shirt, heaving convulsively with a play of + massive muscles carved in red mahogany. + </p> + <p> + As soon as the first man had recovered the breath knocked out of him by + the irresistible charge, a scream of mad cursing issued from the + stern-sheets. With a rigid, angular crooking of the elbow, the man at the + tiller put his hand back to his hip. + </p> + <p> + “Don't shoot him, sir!” yelled the first man. “Wait! Let me have that + tiller. I will teach him to shove himself in front of a caballero!” + </p> + <p> + Martin Ricardo flourished the heavy piece of wood, leaped forward with + astonishing vigour, and brought it down on Pedro's head with a crash that + resounded all over the quiet sweep of Black Diamond Bay. A crimson patch + appeared on the matted hair, red veins appeared in the water flowing all + over his face, and it dripped in rosy drops off his head. But the man hung + on. Not till a second furious blow descended did the hairy paws let go + their grip and the squirming body sink limply. Before it could touch the + bottom-boards, a tremendous kick in the ribs from Ricardo's foot shifted + it forward out of sight, whence came the noise of a heavy thud, a clatter + of spars, and a pitiful grunt. Ricardo stooped to look under the jetty. + </p> + <p> + “Aha, dog! This will teach you to keep back where you belong, you + murdering brute, you slaughtering savage, you! You infidel, you robber of + churches! Next time I will rip you open from neck to heel, you + carrion-eater! Esclavo!” + </p> + <p> + He backed a little and straightened himself up. + </p> + <p> + “I don't mean it really,” he remarked to Heyst, whose steady eyes met his + from above. He ran aft briskly. + </p> + <p> + “Come along, sir. It's your turn. I oughtn't to have drunk first. 'S + truth, I forgot myself! A gentleman like you will overlook that, I know.” + As he made these apologies, Ricardo extended his hand. “Let me steady you, + sir.” + </p> + <p> + Slowly Mr. Jones unfolded himself in all his slenderness, rocked, + staggered, and caught Ricardo's shoulder. His henchman assisted him to the + pipe, which went on gushing a clear stream of water, sparkling exceedingly + against the black piles and the gloom under the jetty. + </p> + <p> + “Catch hold, sir,” Ricardo advised solicitously. “All right?” + </p> + <p> + He stepped back, and, while Mr. Jones revelled in the abundance of water, + he addressed himself to Heyst with a sort of justificatory speech, the + tone of which, reflecting his feelings, partook of purring and spitting. + They had been thirty hours tugging at the oars, he explained, and they had + been more than forty hours without water, except that the night before + they had licked the dew off the gunwales. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo did not explain to Heyst how it happened. At that precise moment + he had no explanation ready for the man on the wharf, who, he guessed, + must be wondering much more at the presence of his visitors than at their + plight. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SEVEN + </h2> + <p> + The explanation lay in the two simple facts that the light winds and + strong currents of the Java Sea had drifted the boat about until they + partly lost their bearings; and that by some extra-ordinary mistake one of + the two jars put into the boat by Schomberg's man contained salt water. + Ricardo tried to put some pathos into his tones. Pulling for thirty hours + with eighteen-foot oars! And the sun! Ricardo relieved his feelings by + cursing the sun. They had felt their hearts and lungs shrivel within them. + And then, as if all that hadn't been trouble enough, he complained + bitterly, he had had to waste his fainting strength in beating their + servant about the head with a stretcher. The fool had wanted to drink sea + water, and wouldn't listen to reason. There was no stopping him otherwise. + It was better to beat him into insensibility than to have him go crazy in + the boat, and to be obliged to shoot him. The preventive, administered + with enough force to brain an elephant, boasted Ricardo, had to be applied + on two occasions—the second time all but in sight of the jetty. + </p> + <p> + “You have seen the beauty,” Ricardo went on expansively, hiding his lack + of some sort of probable story under this loquacity. “I had to hammer him + away from the spout. Opened afresh all the old broken spots on his head. + You saw how hard I had to hit. He has no restraint, no restraint at all. + If it wasn't that he can be made useful in one way or another, I would + just as soon have let the governor shoot him.” + </p> + <p> + He smiled up at Heyst in his peculiar lip-retracting manner, and added by + way of afterthought: + </p> + <p> + “That's what will happen to him in the end, if he doesn't learn to + restrain himself. But I've taught him to mind his manners for a while, + anyhow!” + </p> + <p> + And again he addressed his quick grin up to the man on the wharf. His + round eyes had never left Heyst's face ever since he began to deliver his + account of the voyage. + </p> + <p> + “So that's how he looks!” Ricardo was saying to himself. + </p> + <p> + He had not expected Heyst to be like this. He had formed for himself a + conception containing the helpful suggestion of a vulnerable point. These + solitary men were often tipplers. But no!—this was not a drinking + man's face; nor could he detect the weakness of alarm, or even the + weakness of surprise, on these features, in those steady eyes. + </p> + <p> + “We were too far gone to climb out,” Ricardo went on. “I heard you walking + along though. I thought I shouted; I tried to. You didn't hear me shout?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst made an almost imperceptible negative sign, which the greedy eyes of + Ricardo—greedy for all signs—did not miss. + </p> + <p> + “Throat too parched. We didn't even care to whisper to each other lately. + Thirst chokes one. We might have died there under this wharf before you + found us.” + </p> + <p> + “I couldn't think where you had gone to.” Heyst was heard at last, + addressing directly the newcomers from the sea. “You were seen as soon as + you cleared that point.” + </p> + <p> + “We were seen, eh?” grunted Mr. Ricardo. “We pulled like machines—daren't + stop. The governor sat at the tiller, but he couldn't speak to us. She + drove in between the piles till she hit something, and we all tumbled off + the thwarts as if we had been drunk. Drunk—ha, ha! Too dry, by + George! We fetched in here with the very last of our strength, and no + mistake. Another mile would have done for us. When I heard your footsteps, + above, I tried to get up, and I fell down.” + </p> + <p> + “That was the first sound I heard,” said Heyst. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones, the front of his soiled white tunic soaked and plastered against + his breast-bone, staggered away from the water-pipe. Steadying himself on + Ricardo's shoulder, he drew a long breath, raised his dripping head, and + produced a smile of ghastly amiability, which was lost upon the thoughtful + Heyst. Behind his back the sun, touching the water, was like a disc of + iron cooled to a dull red glow, ready to start rolling round the circular + steel plate of the sea, which, under the darkening sky, looked more solid + than the high ridge of Samburan; more solid than the point, whose long + outlined slope melted into its own unfathomable shadow blurring the dim + sheen on the bay. The forceful stream from the pipe broke like shattered + glass on the boat's gunwale. Its loud, fitful, and persistent splashing + revealed the depths of the world's silence. + </p> + <p> + “Great notion, to lead the water out here,” pronounced Ricardo + appreciatively. + </p> + <p> + Water was life. He felt now as if he could run a mile, scale a ten-foot + wall, sing a song. Only a few minutes ago he was next door to a corpse, + done up, unable to stand, to lift a hand; unable to groan. A drop of water + had done that miracle. + </p> + <p> + “Didn't you feel life itself running and soaking into you, sir?” he asked + his principal, with deferential but forced vivacity. + </p> + <p> + Without a word, Mr. Jones stepped off the thwart and sat down in the + stern-sheets. + </p> + <p> + “Isn't that man of yours bleeding to death in the bows under there?” + inquired Heyst. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo ceased his ecstasies over the life-giving water and answered in a + tone of innocence: + </p> + <p> + “He? You may call him a man, but his hide is a jolly sight tougher than + the toughest alligator he ever skinned in the good old days. You don't + know how much he can stand: I do. We have tried him a long time ago. Ola, + there! Pedro! Pedro!” he yelled, with a force of lung testifying to the + regenerative virtues of water. + </p> + <p> + A weak “Senor?” came from under the wharf. + </p> + <p> + “What did I tell you?” said Ricardo triumphantly. “Nothing can hurt him. + He's all right. But, I say, the boat's getting swamped. Can't you turn + this water off before you sink her under us? She's half full already.” + </p> + <p> + At a sign from Heyst, Wang hammered at the brass tap on the wharf, then + stood behind Number One, crowbar in hand, motionless as before. Ricardo + was perhaps not so certain of Pedro's toughness as he affirmed; for he + stooped, peering under the wharf, then moved forward out of sight. The + gush of water ceasing suddenly, made a silence which became complete when + the after-trickle stopped. Afar, the sun was reduced to a red spark, + glowing very low in the breathless immensity of twilight. Purple gleams + lingered on the water all round the boat. The spectral figure in the + stern-sheets spoke in a languid tone: + </p> + <p> + “That—er—companion—er—secretary of mine is a queer + chap. I am afraid we aren't presenting ourselves in a very favourable + light.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst listened. It was the conventional voice of an educated man, only + strangely lifeless. But more strange yet was this concern for appearances, + expressed, he did not know, whether in jest or in earnest. Earnestness was + hardly to be supposed under the circumstances, and no one had ever jested + in such dead tones. It was something which could not be answered, and + Heyst said nothing. The other went on: + </p> + <p> + “Travelling as I do, I find a man of his sort extremely useful. He has his + little weaknesses, no doubt.” + </p> + <p> + “Indeed!” Heyst was provoked into speaking. “Weakness of the arm is not + one of them; neither is an exaggerated humanity, as far as I can judge.” + </p> + <p> + “Defects of temper,” explained Mr. Jones from the stern-sheets. + </p> + <p> + The subject of this dialogue, coming out just then from under the wharf + into the visible part of the boat, made himself heard in his own defence, + in a voice full of life, and with nothing languid in his manner on the + contrary, it was brisk, almost jocose. He begged pardon for contradicting. + He was never out of temper with “our Pedro.” The fellow was a Dago of + immense strength and of no sense whatever. This combination made him + dangerous, and he had to be treated accordingly, in a manner which he + could understand. Reasoning was beyond him. + </p> + <p> + “And so”—Ricardo addressed Heyst with animation—“you mustn't + be surprised if—” + </p> + <p> + “I assure you,” Heyst interrupted, “that my wonder at your arrival in your + boat here is so great that it leaves no room for minor astonishments. But + hadn't you better land?” + </p> + <p> + “That's the talk, sir!” Ricardo began to bustle about the boat, talking + all the time. Finding himself unable to “size up” this man, he was + inclined to credit him with extraordinary powers of penetration, which, it + seemed to him, would be favoured by silence. Also, he feared some + pointblank question. He had no ready-made story to tell. He and his patron + had put off considering that rather important detail too long. For the + last two days, the horrors of thirst, coming on them unexpectedly, had + prevented consultation. They had had to pull for dear life. But the man on + the wharf, were he in league with the devil himself, would pay for all + their sufferings, thought Ricardo with an unholy joy. + </p> + <p> + Meantime, splashing in the water which covered the bottom-boards, Ricardo + congratulated himself aloud on the luggage being out of the way of the + wet. He had piled it up forward. He had roughly tied up Pedro's head. + Pedro had nothing to grumble about. On the contrary, he ought to be mighty + thankful to him, Ricardo, for being alive at all. + </p> + <p> + “Well, now, let me give you a leg up, sir,” he said cheerily to his + motionless principal in the stern-sheets. “All our troubles are over—for + a time, anyhow. Ain't it luck to find a white man on this island? I would + have just as soon expected to meet an angel from heaven—eh, Mr. + Jones? Now then—ready, sir? one, two, three, up you go!” + </p> + <p> + Helped from below by Ricardo, and from above by the man more unexpected + than an angel, Mr. Jones scrambled up and stood on the wharf by the side + of Heyst. He swayed like a reed. The night descending on Samburan turned + into dense shadow the point of land and the wharf itself, and gave a dark + solidity to the unshimmering water extending to the last faint trace of + light away to the west. Heyst stared at the guests whom the renounced + world had sent him thus at the end of the day. The only other vestige of + light left on earth lurked in the hollows of the thin man's eyes. They + gleamed, mobile and languidly evasive. The eyelids fluttered. + </p> + <p> + “You are feeling weak,” said Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “For the moment, a little,” confessed the other. + </p> + <p> + With loud panting, Ricardo scrambled on his hands and knees upon the + wharf, energetic and unaided. He rose up at Heyst's elbow and stamped his + foot on the planks, with a sharp, provocative, double beat, such as is + heard sometimes in fencing-schools before the adversaries engage their + foils. Not that the renegade seaman Ricardo knew anything of fencing. What + he called “shooting-irons,” were his weapons, or the still less + aristocratic knife, such as was even then ingeniously strapped to his leg. + He thought of it, at that moment. A swift stooping motion, then, on the + recovery, a ripping blow, a shove off the wharf, and no noise except a + splash in the water that would scarcely disturb the silence. Heyst would + have no time for a cry. It would be quick and neat, and immensely in + accord with Ricardo's humour. But he repressed this gust of savagery. The + job was not such a simple one. This piece had to be played to another + tune, and in much slower time. He returned to his note of talkative + simplicity. + </p> + <p> + “Ay; and I too don't feel as strong as I thought I was when the first + drink set me up. Great wonder-worker water is! And to get it right here on + the spot! It was heaven—hey, sir?” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones, being directly addressed, took up his part in the concerted + piece: + </p> + <p> + “Really, when I saw a wharf on what might have been an uninhabited island, + I couldn't believe my eyes. I doubted its existence. I thought it was a + delusion till the boat actually drove between the piles, as you see her + lying now.” + </p> + <p> + While he was speaking faintly, in a voice which did not seem to belong to + the earth, his henchman, in extremely loud and terrestrial accents, was + fussing about their belongings in the boat, addressing himself to Pedro: + </p> + <p> + “Come, now—pass up the dunnage there! Move, yourself, hombre, or + I'll have to get down again and give you a tap on those bandages of yours, + you growling bear, you!” + </p> + <p> + “Ah! You didn't believe in the reality of the wharf?” Heyst was saying to + Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + “You ought to kiss my hands!” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo caught hold of an ancient Gladstone bag and swung it on the wharf + with a thump. + </p> + <p> + “Yes! You ought to burn a candle before me as they do before the saints in + your country. No saint has ever done so much for you as I have, you + ungrateful vagabond. Now then! Up you get!” + </p> + <p> + Helped by the talkative Ricardo, Pedro scrambled up on the wharf, where he + remained for some time on all fours, swinging to and fro his shaggy head + tied up in white rags. Then he got up clumsily, like a bulky animal in the + dusk, balancing itself on its hind legs. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones began to explain languidly to Heyst that they were in a pretty + bad state that morning, when they caught sight of the smoke of the + volcano. It nerved them to make an effort for their lives. Soon afterwards + they made out the island. + </p> + <p> + “I had just wits enough left in my baked brain to alter the direction of + the boat,” the ghostly voice went on. “As to finding assistance, a wharf, + a white man—nobody would have dreamed of it. Simply preposterous!” + </p> + <p> + “That's what I thought when my Chinaman came and told me he had seen a + boat with white men pulling up,” said Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “Most extraordinary luck,” interjected Ricardo, standing by anxiously + attentive to every word. “Seems a dream,” he added. “A lovely dream!” + </p> + <p> + A silence fell on that group of three, as if everyone had become afraid to + speak, in an obscure sense of an impending crisis. Pedro on one side of + them and Wang on the other had the air of watchful spectators. A few stars + had come out pursuing the ebbing twilight. A light draught of air tepid + enough in the thickening twilight after the scorching day, struck a chill + into Mr. Jones in his soaked clothes. + </p> + <p> + “I may infer, then, that there is a settlement of white people here?” he + murmured, shivering visibly. + </p> + <p> + Heyst roused himself. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, abandoned, abandoned. I am alone here—practically alone; but + several empty houses are still standing. No lack of accommodation. We may + just as well—here, Wang, go back to the shore and run the trolley + out here.” + </p> + <p> + The last words having been spoken in Malay, he explained courteously that + he had given directions for the transport of the luggage. Wang had melted + into the night—in his soundless manner. + </p> + <p> + “My word! Rails laid down and all,” exclaimed Ricardo softly, in a tone of + admiration. “Well, I never!” + </p> + <p> + “We were working a coal-mine here,” said the late manager of the Tropical + Belt Coal Company. “These are only the ghosts of things that have been.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones's teeth were suddenly started chattering by another faint puff of + wind, a mere sigh from the west, where Venus cast her rays on the dark + edge of the horizon, like a bright lamp hung above the grave of the sun. + </p> + <p> + “We might be moving on,” proposed Heyst. “My Chinaman and that—ah—ungrateful + servant of yours, with the broken head, can load the things and come along + after us.” + </p> + <p> + The suggestion was accepted without words. Moving towards the shore, the + three men met the trolley, a mere metallic rustle which whisked past them, + the shadowy Wang running noiselessly behind. Only the sound of their + footsteps accompanied them. It was a long time since so many footsteps had + rung together on that jetty. Before they stepped on to the path trodden + through the grass, Heyst said: + </p> + <p> + “I am prevented from offering you a share of my own quarters.” The distant + courtliness of this beginning arrested the other two suddenly, as if + amazed by some manifest incongruity. “I should regret it more,” he went + on, “if I were not in a position to give you the choice of those empty + bungalows for a temporary home.” + </p> + <p> + He turned round and plunged into the narrow track, the two others + following in single file. + </p> + <p> + “Queer start!” Ricardo took the opportunity for whispering, as he fell + behind Mr. Jones, who swayed in the gloom, enclosed by the stalks of + tropical grass, almost as slender as a stalk of grass himself. + </p> + <p> + In this order they emerged into the open space kept clear of vegetation by + Wang's judicious system of periodic firing. The shapes of buildings, + unlighted, high-roofed, looked mysteriously extensive and featureless + against the increasing glitter of the stars. Heyst was pleased at the + absence of light in his bungalow. It looked as uninhabited as the others. + He continued to lead the way, inclining to the right. His equable voice + was heard: + </p> + <p> + “This one would be the best. It was our counting-house. There is some + furniture in it yet. I am pretty certain that you'll find a couple of camp + bedsteads in one of the rooms.” + </p> + <p> + The high-pitched roof of the bungalow towered up very close, eclipsing the + sky. + </p> + <p> + “Here we are. Three steps. As you see, there's a wide veranda. Sorry to + keep you waiting for a moment; the door is locked, I think.” + </p> + <p> + He was heard trying it. Then he leaned against the rail, saying: + </p> + <p> + “Wang will get the keys.” + </p> + <p> + The others waited, two vague shapes nearly mingled together in the + darkness of the veranda, from which issued a sudden chattering of Mr. + Jones's teeth, directly suppressed, and a slight shuffle of Ricardo's + feet. Their guide and host, his back against the rail, seemed to have + forgotten their existence. Suddenly he moved, and murmured: + </p> + <p> + “Ah, here's the trolley.” + </p> + <p> + Then he raised his voice in Malay, and was answered, “Ya tuan,” from an + indistinct group that could be made out in the direction of the track. + </p> + <p> + “I have sent Wang for the key and a light,” he said, in a voice that came + out without any particular direction—a peculiarity which + disconcerted Ricardo. + </p> + <p> + Wang did not tarry long on his mission. Very soon from the distant + recesses of obscurity appeared the swinging lantern he carried. It cast a + fugitive ray on the arrested trolley with the uncouth figure of the wild + Pedro drooping over the load; then it moved towards the bungalow and + ascended the stairs. After working at the stiff lock, Wang applied his + shoulder to the door. It came open with explosive suddenness, as if in a + passion at being thus disturbed after two years' repose. From the dark + slope of a tall stand-up writing-desk a forgotten, solitary sheet of paper + flew up and settled gracefully on the floor. + </p> + <p> + Wang and Pedro came and went through the offended door, bringing the + things off the trolley, one flitting swiftly in and out, the other + staggering heavily. Later, directed by a few quiet words from Number One, + Wang made several journeys with the lantern to the store-rooms, bringing + in blankets, provisions in tins, coffee, sugar, and a packet of candles. + He lighted one, and stuck it on the ledge of the stand-up desk. Meantime + Pedro, being introduced to some kindling-wood and a bundle of dry sticks, + had busied himself outside in lighting a fire, on which he placed a + ready-filled kettle handed to him by Wang impassively, at arm's length, as + if across a chasm. Having received the thanks of his guests, Heyst wished + them goodnight and withdrew, leaving them to their repose. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER EIGHT + </h2> + <p> + Heyst walked away slowly. There was still no light in his bungalow, and he + thought that perhaps it was just as well. By this time he was much less + perturbed. Wang had preceded him with the lantern, as if in a hurry to get + away from the two white men and their hairy attendant. The light was not + dancing along any more; it was standing perfectly still by the steps of + the veranda. + </p> + <p> + Heyst, glancing back casually, saw behind him still another light—the + light of the strangers' open fire. A black, uncouth form, stooping over it + monstrously, staggered away into the outlying shadows. The kettle had + boiled, probably. + </p> + <p> + With that weird vision of something questionably human impressed upon his + senses, Heyst moved on a pace or two. What could the people be who had + such a creature for their familiar attendant? He stopped. The vague + apprehension, of a distant future, in which he saw Lena unavoidably + separated from him by profound and subtle differences; the sceptical + carelessness which had accompanied every one of his attempts at action, + like a secret reserve of his soul, fell away from him. He no longer + belonged to himself. There was a call far more imperious and august. He + came up to the bungalow, and at the very limit of the lantern's light, on + the top step, he saw her feet and the bottom part of her dress. The rest + of her person was suggested dimly as high as her waist. She sat on a + chair, and the gloom of the low eaves descended upon her head and + shoulders. She didn't stir. + </p> + <p> + “You haven't gone to sleep here?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, no! I was waiting for you—in the dark.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst, on the top step, leaned against a wooden pillar, after moving the + lantern to one side. + </p> + <p> + “I have been thinking that it is just as well you had no light. But wasn't + it dull for you to sit in the dark?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't need a light to think of you.” Her charming voice gave a value to + this banal answer, which had also the merit of truth. Heyst laughed a + little, and said that he had had a curious experience. She made no remark. + He tried to figure to himself the outlines of her easy pose. A spot of dim + light here and there hinted at the unfailing grace of attitude which was + one of her natural possessions. + </p> + <p> + She had thought of him, but not in connection with the strangers. She had + admired him from the first; she had been attracted by his warm voice, his + gentle eye, but she had felt him too wonderfully difficult to know. He had + given to life a savour, a movement, a promise mingled with menaces, which + she had not suspected were to be found in it—or, at any rate, not by + a girl wedded to misery as she was. She said to herself that she must not + be irritated because he seemed too self-contained, and as if shut up in a + world of his own. When he took her in his arms, she felt that his embrace + had a great and compelling force, that he was moved deeply, and that + perhaps he would not get tired of her so very soon. She thought that he + had opened to her the feelings of delicate joy, that the very uneasiness + he caused her was delicious in its sadness, and that she would try to hold + him as long as she could—till her fainting arms, her sinking soul, + could cling to him no more. + </p> + <p> + “Wang's not here, of course?” Heyst said suddenly. She answered as if in + her sleep. + </p> + <p> + “He put this light down here without stopping, and ran.” + </p> + <p> + “Ran, did he? H'm! Well, it's considerably later than his usual time to go + home to his Alfuro wife; but to be seen running is a sort of degradation + for Wang, who has mastered the art of vanishing. Do you think he was + startled out of his perfection by something?” + </p> + <p> + “Why should he be startled?” + </p> + <p> + Her voice remained dreamy, a little uncertain. + </p> + <p> + “I have been startled,” Heyst said. + </p> + <p> + She was not listening to him. The lantern at their feet threw the shadows + of her face upward. Her eyes glistened, as if frightened and attentive, + above a lighted chin and a very white throat. + </p> + <p> + “Upon my word,” mused Heyst, “now that I don't see them, I can hardly + believe that those fellows exist!” + </p> + <p> + “And what about me?” she asked, so swiftly that he made a movement like + somebody pounced upon from an ambush. “When you don't see me, do you + believe that I exist?” + </p> + <p> + “Exist? Most charmingly! My dear Lena, you don't know your own advantages. + Why, your voice alone would be enough to make you unforgettable!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I didn't mean forgetting in that way. I dare say if I were to die you + would remember me right enough. And what good would that be to anybody? + It's while I am alive that I want—” + </p> + <p> + Heyst stood by her chair, a stalwart figure imperfectly lighted. The broad + shoulders, the martial face that was like a disguise of his disarmed soul, + were lost in the gloom above the plane of light in which his feet were + planted. He suffered from a trouble with which she had nothing to do. She + had no general conception of the conditions of the existence he had + offered to her. Drawn into its peculiar stagnation she remained unrelated + to it because of her ignorance. + </p> + <p> + For instance, she could never perceive the prodigious improbability of the + arrival of that boat. She did not seem to be thinking of it. Perhaps she + had already forgotten the fact herself. And Heyst resolved suddenly to say + nothing more of it. It was not that he shrank from alarming her. Not + feeling anything definite himself he could not imagine a precise effect + being produced on her by any amount of explanation. There is a quality in + events which is apprehended differently by different minds or even by the + same mind at different times. Any man living at all consciously knows that + embarrassing truth. Heyst was aware that this visit could bode nothing + pleasant. In his present soured temper towards all mankind he looked upon + it as a visitation of a particularly offensive kind. + </p> + <p> + He glanced along the veranda in the direction of the other bungalow. The + fire of sticks in front of it had gone out. No faint glow of embers, not + the slightest thread of light in that direction, hinted at the presence of + strangers. The darker shapes in the obscurity, the dead silence, betrayed + nothing of that strange intrusion. The peace of Samburan asserted itself + as on any other night. Everything was as before, except—Heyst became + aware of it suddenly—that for a whole minute, perhaps, with his hand + on the back of the girl's chair and within a foot of her person, he had + lost the sense of her existence, for the first time since he had brought + her over to share this invincible, this undefiled peace. He picked up the + lantern, and the act made a silent stir all along the veranda. A spoke of + shadow swung swiftly across her face, and the strong light rested on the + immobility of her features, as of a woman looking at a vision. Her eyes + were still, her lips serious. Her dress, open at the neck, stirred + slightly to her even breathing. + </p> + <p> + “We had better go in, Lena,” suggested Heyst, very low, as if breaking a + spell cautiously. + </p> + <p> + She rose without a word. Heyst followed her indoors. As they passed + through the living-room, he left the lantern burning on the centre table. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER NINE + </h2> + <p> + That night the girl woke up, for the first time in her new experience, + with the sensation of having been abandoned to her own devices. She woke + up from a painful dream of separation brought about in a way which she + could not understand, and missed the relief of the waking instant. The + desolate feeling of being alone persisted. She was really alone. A + night-light made it plain enough, in the dim, mysterious manner of a + dream; but this was reality. It startled her exceedingly. + </p> + <p> + In a moment she was at the curtain that hung in the doorway, and raised it + with a steady hand. The conditions of their life in Samburan would have + made peeping absurd; nor was such a thing in her character. This was not a + movement of curiosity, but of downright alarm—the continued distress + and fear of the dream. The night could not have been very far advanced. + The light of the lantern was burning strongly, striping the floor and + walls of the room with thick black bands. She hardly knew whether she + expected to see Heyst or not; but she saw him at once, standing by the + table in his sleeping-suit, his back to the doorway. She stepped in + noiselessly with her bare feet, and let the curtain fall behind her. + Something characteristic in Heyst's attitude made her say, almost in a + whisper: + </p> + <p> + “You are looking for something.” + </p> + <p> + He could not have heard her before; but he didn't start at the unexpected + whisper. He only pushed the drawer of the table in and, without even + looking over his shoulder, asked quietly, accepting her presence as if he + had been aware of all her movements: + </p> + <p> + “I say, are you certain that Wang didn't go through this room this + evening?” + </p> + <p> + “Wang? When?” + </p> + <p> + “After leaving the lantern, I mean.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, no. He ran on. I watched him.” + </p> + <p> + “Or before, perhaps—while I was with these boat people? Do you know? + Can you tell?” + </p> + <p> + “I hardly think so. I came out as the sun went down, and sat outside till + you came back to me.” + </p> + <p> + “He could have popped in for an instant through the back veranda.” + </p> + <p> + “I heard nothing in here,” she said. “What is the matter?” + </p> + <p> + “Naturally you wouldn't hear. He can be as quiet as a shadow, when he + likes. I believe he could steal the pillows from under our heads. He might + have been here ten minutes ago.” + </p> + <p> + “What woke you up? Was it a noise?” + </p> + <p> + “Can't say that. Generally one can't tell, but is it likely, Lena? You + are, I believe, the lighter sleeper of us two. A noise loud enough to wake + me up would have awakened you, too. I tried to be as quiet as I could. + What roused you?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know—a dream, perhaps. I woke up crying.” + </p> + <p> + “What was the dream?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst, with one hand resting on the table, had turned in her direction, + his round, uncovered head set on a fighter's muscular neck. She left his + question unanswered, as if she had not heard it. + </p> + <p> + “What is it you have missed?” she asked in her turn, very grave. + </p> + <p> + Her dark hair, drawn smoothly back, was done in two thick tresses for the + night. Heyst noticed the good form of her brow, the dignity of its width, + its unshining whiteness. It was a sculptural forehead. He had a moment of + acute appreciation intruding upon another order of thoughts. It was as if + there could be no end of his discoveries about that girl, at the most + incongruous moments. + </p> + <p> + She had on nothing but a hand-woven cotton sarong—one of Heyst's few + purchases, years ago, in Celebes, where they are made. He had forgotten + all about it till she came, and then had found it at the bottom of an old + sandalwood trunk dating back to pre-Morrison days. She had quickly learned + to wind it up under her armpits with a safe twist, as Malay village girls + do when going down to bathe in a river. Her shoulders and arms were bare; + one of her tresses, hanging forward, looked almost black against the white + skin. As she was taller than the average Malay woman, the sarong ended a + good way above her ankles. She stood poised firmly, half-way between the + table and the curtained doorway, the insteps of her bare feet gleaming + like marble on the overshadowed matting of the floor. The fall of her + lighted shoulders, the strong and fine modelling of her arms hanging down + her sides, her immobility, too, had something statuesque, the charm of art + tense with life. She was not very big—Heyst used to think of her, at + first, as “that poor little girl,”—but revealed free from the shabby + banality of a white platform dress, in the simple drapery of the sarong, + there was that in her form and in the proportions of her body which + suggested a reduction from a heroic size. + </p> + <p> + She moved forward a step. + </p> + <p> + “What is it you have missed?” she asked again. + </p> + <p> + Heyst turned his back altogether on the table. The black spokes of + darkness over the floor and the walls, joining up on the ceiling in a path + of shadow, were like the bars of a cage about them. It was his turn to + ignore a question. + </p> + <p> + “You woke up in a fright, you say?” he said. + </p> + <p> + She walked up to him, exotic yet familiar, with her white woman's face and + shoulders above the Malay sarong, as if it were an airy disguise, but her + expression was serious. + </p> + <p> + “No,” she replied. “It was distress, rather. You see, you weren't there, + and I couldn't tell why you had gone away from me. A nasty dream—the + first I've had, too, since—” + </p> + <p> + “You don't believe in dreams, do you?” asked Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “I once knew a woman who did. Leastwise, she used to tell people what + dreams mean, for a shilling.” + </p> + <p> + “Would you go now and ask her what this dream means?” inquired Heyst + jocularly. + </p> + <p> + “She lived in Camberwell. She was a nasty old thing!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst laughed a little uneasily. + </p> + <p> + “Dreams are madness, my dear. It's things that happen in the waking world, + while one is asleep, that one would be glad to know the meaning of.” + </p> + <p> + “You have missed something out of this drawer,” she said positively. + </p> + <p> + “This or some other. I have looked into every single one of them and come + back to this again, as people do. It's difficult to believe the evidence + of my own senses; but it isn't there. Now, Lena, are you sure that you + didn't—” + </p> + <p> + “I have touched nothing in the house but what you have given me.” + </p> + <p> + “Lena!” he cried. + </p> + <p> + He was painfully affected by this disclaimer of a charge which he had not + made. It was what a servant might have said—an inferior open to + suspicion—or, at any rate, a stranger. He was angry at being so + wretchedly misunderstood; disenchanted at her not being instinctively + aware of the place he had secretly given her in his thoughts. + </p> + <p> + “After all,” he said to himself, “we are strangers to each other.” + </p> + <p> + And then he felt sorry for her. He spoke calmly: + </p> + <p> + “I was about to say, are you sure you have no reason to think that the + Chinaman has been in this room tonight?” + </p> + <p> + “You suspect him?” she asked, knitting her eyebrows. + </p> + <p> + “There is no one else to suspect. You may call it a certitude.” + </p> + <p> + “You don't want to tell me what it is?” she inquired, in the equable tone + in which one takes a fact into account. + </p> + <p> + Heyst only smiled faintly. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing very precious, as far as value goes,” he replied. + </p> + <p> + “I thought it might have been money,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Money!” exclaimed Heyst, as if the suggestion had been altogether + preposterous. She was so visibly surprised that he hastened to add: “Of + course, there is some money in the house—there, in that + writing-desk, the drawer on the left. It's not locked. You can pull it + right out. There is a recess, and the board at the back pivots: a very + simple hiding-place, when you know the way to it. I discovered it by + accident, and I keep our store of sovereigns in there. The treasure, my + dear, is not big enough to require a cavern.” + </p> + <p> + He paused, laughed very low, and returned her steady stare. + </p> + <p> + “The loose silver, some guilders and dollars, I have always kept in that + unlocked left drawer. I have no doubt Wang knows what there is in it, but + he isn't a thief, and that's why I—no, Lena, what I've missed is not + gold or jewels; and that's what makes the fact interesting—which the + theft of money cannot be.” + </p> + <p> + She took a long breath, relieved to hear that it was not money. A great + curiosity was depicted on her face, but she refrained from pressing him + with questions. She only gave him one of her deep-gleaming smiles. + </p> + <p> + “It isn't me so it must be Wang. You ought to make him give it back to + you.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst said nothing to that naive and practical suggestion, for the object + that he missed from the drawer was his revolver. + </p> + <p> + It was a heavy weapon which he had owned for many years and had never used + in his life. Ever since the London furniture had arrived in Samburan, it + had been reposing in the drawer of the table. The real dangers of life, + for him, were not those which could be repelled by swords or bullets. On + the other hand neither his manner nor his appearance looked sufficiently + inoffensive to expose him to light-minded aggression. + </p> + <p> + He could not have explained what had induced him to go to the drawer in + the middle of the night. He had started up suddenly—which was very + unusual with him. He had found himself sitting up and extremely wide awake + all at once, with the girl reposing by his side, lying with her face away + from him, a vague, characteristically feminine form in the dim light. She + was perfectly still. + </p> + <p> + At that season of the year there were no mosquitoes in Samburan, and the + sides of the mosquito net were looped up. Heyst swung his feet to the + floor, and found himself standing there, almost before he had become aware + of his intention to get up. + </p> + <p> + Why he did this he did not know. He didn't wish to wake her up, and the + slight creak of the broad bedstead had sounded very loud to him. He turned + round apprehensively and waited for her to move, but she did not stir. + While he looked at her, he had a vision of himself lying there too, also + fast asleep, and—it occurred to him for the first time in his life—very + defenceless. This quite novel impression of the dangers of slumber made + him think suddenly of his revolver. He left the bedroom with noiseless + footsteps. The lightness of the curtain he had to lift as he passed out, + and the outer door, wide open on the blackness of the veranda—for + the roof eaves came down low, shutting out the starlight—gave him a + sense of having been dangerously exposed, he could not have said to what. + He pulled the drawer open. Its emptiness cut his train of self-communion + short. He murmured to the assertive fact: + </p> + <p> + “Impossible! Somewhere else!” + </p> + <p> + He tried to remember where he had put the thing; but those provoked + whispers of memory were not encouraging. Foraging in every receptacle and + nook big enough to contain a revolver, he came slowly to the conclusion + that it was not in that room. Neither was it in the other. The whole + bungalow consisted of the two rooms and a profuse allowance of veranda all + round. Heyst stepped out on the veranda. + </p> + <p> + “It's Wang, beyond a doubt,” he thought, staring into the night. “He has + got hold of it for some reason.” + </p> + <p> + There was nothing to prevent that ghostly Chinaman from materializing + suddenly at the foot of the stairs, or anywhere, at any moment, and + toppling him over with a dead sure shot. The danger was so irremediable + that it was not worth worrying about, any more than the general + precariousness of human life. Heyst speculated on this added risk. How + long had he been at the mercy of a slender yellow finger on the trigger? + That is, if that was the fellow's reason for purloining the revolver. + </p> + <p> + “Shoot and inherit,” thought Heyst. “Very simple.” Yet there was in his + mind a marked reluctance to regard the domesticated grower of vegetables + in the light of a murderer. + </p> + <p> + “No, it wasn't that. For Wang could have done it any time this last twelve + months or more—” + </p> + <p> + Heyst's mind had worked on the assumption that Wang had possessed himself + of the revolver during his own absence from Samburan; but at that period + of his speculation his point of view changed. It struck him with the force + of manifest certitude that the revolver had been taken only late in the + day, or on that very night. Wang, of course. But why? So there had been no + danger in the past. It was all ahead. + </p> + <p> + “He has me at his mercy now,” thought Heyst, without particular + excitement. + </p> + <p> + The sentiment he experienced was curiosity. He forgot himself in it: it + was as if he were considering somebody else's strange predicament. But + even that sort of interest was dying out when, looking to his left, he saw + the accustomed shapes of the other bungalows looming in the night, and + remembered the arrival of the thirsty company in the boat. Wang would + hardly risk such a crime in the presence of other white men. It was a + peculiar instance of the “safety in numbers,” principle, which somehow was + not much to Heyst's taste. + </p> + <p> + He went in gloomily, and stood over the empty drawer in deep and + unsatisfactory thought. He had just made up his mind that he must breathe + nothing of this to the girl, when he heard her voice behind him. She had + taken him by surprise, but he resisted the impulse to turn round at once + under the impression that she might read his trouble in his face. Yes, she + had taken him by surprise, and for that reason the conversation which + began was not exactly as he would have conducted it if he had been + prepared for her pointblank question. He ought to have said at once: “I've + missed nothing.” It was a deplorable thing that he should have let it come + so far as to have her ask what it was he missed. He closed the + conversation by saying lightly: + </p> + <p> + “It's an object of very small value. Don't worry about it—it isn't + worth while. The best you can do is to go and lie down again, Lena.” + </p> + <p> + Reluctant she turned away, and only in the doorway asked: “And you?” + </p> + <p> + “I think I shall smoke a cheroot on the veranda. I don't feel sleepy for + the moment.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, don't be long.” + </p> + <p> + He made no answer. She saw him standing there, very still, with a frown on + his brow, and slowly dropped the curtain. + </p> + <p> + Heyst did really light a cheroot before going out again on the veranda. He + glanced up from under the low eaves, to see by the stars how the night + went on. It was going very slowly. Why it should have irked him he did not + know, for he had nothing to expect from the dawn; but everything round him + had become unreasonable, unsettled, and vaguely urgent, laying him under + an obligation, but giving him no line of action. He felt contemptuously + irritated with the situation. The outer world had broken upon him; and he + did not know what wrong he had done to bring this on himself, any more + than he knew what he had done to provoke the horrible calumny about his + treatment of poor Morrison. For he could not forget this. It had reached + the ears of one who needed to have the most perfect confidence in the + rectitude of his conduct. + </p> + <p> + “And she only half disbelieves it,” he thought, with hopeless humiliation. + </p> + <p> + This moral stab in the back seemed to have taken some of his strength from + him, as a physical wound would have done. He had no desire to do anything—neither + to bring Wang to terms in the matter of the revolver nor to find out from + the strangers who they were, and how their predicament had come about. He + flung his glowing cigar away into the night. But Samburan was no longer a + solitude wherein he could indulge in all his moods. The fiery parabolic + path the cast-out stump traced in the air was seen from another veranda at + a distance of some twenty yards. It was noted as a symptom of importance + by an observer with his faculties greedy for signs, and in a state of + alertness tense enough almost to hear the grass grow. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TEN + </h2> + <p> + The observer was Martin Ricardo. To him life was not a matter of passive + renunciation, but of a particularly active warfare. He was not mistrustful + of it, he was not disgusted with it, still less was he inclined to be + suspicious of its disenchantments; but he was vividly aware that it held + many possibilities of failure. Though very far from being a pessimist, he + was not a man of foolish illusions. He did not like failure, not only + because of its unpleasant and dangerous consequences, but also because of + its damaging effect upon his own appreciation of Martin Ricardo. And this + was a special job, of his own contriving, and of considerable novelty. It + was not, so to speak, in his usual line of business—except, perhaps, + from a moral standpoint, about which he was not likely to trouble his + head. For these reasons Martin Ricardo was unable to sleep. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones, after repeated shivering fits, and after drinking much hot tea, + had apparently fallen into deep slumber. He had very peremptorily + discouraged attempts at conversation on the part of his faithful follower. + Ricardo listened to his regular breathing. It was all very well for the + governor. He looked upon it as a sort of sport. A gentleman naturally + would. But this ticklish and important job had to be pulled off at all + costs, both for honour and for safety. Ricardo rose quietly, and made his + way on the veranda. He could not lie still. He wanted to go out for air, + and he had a feeling that by the force of his eagerness even the darkness + and the silence could be made to yield something to his eyes and ears. + </p> + <p> + He noted the stars, and stepped back again into the dense darkness. He + resisted the growing impulse to go out and steal towards the other + bungalow. It would have been madness to start prowling in the dark on + unknown ground. And for what end? Unless to relieve the oppression. + Immobility lay on his limbs like a leaden garment. And yet he was + unwilling to give up. He persisted in his objectless vigil. The man of the + island was keeping quiet. + </p> + <p> + It was at that moment that Ricardo's eyes caught the vanishing red trail + of light made by the cigar—a startling revelation of the man's + wakefulness. He could not suppress a low “Hallo!” and began to sidle along + towards the door, with his shoulders rubbing the wall. For all he knew, + the man might have been out in front by this time, observing the veranda. + As a matter of fact, after flinging away the cheroot, Heyst had gone + indoors with the feeling of a man who gives up an unprofitable occupation. + But Ricardo fancied he could hear faint footfalls on the open ground, and + dodged quickly into the room. There he drew breath, and meditated for a + while. His next step was to feel for the matches on the tall desk, and to + light the candle. He had to communicate to his governor views and + reflections of such importance that it was absolutely necessary for him to + watch their effect on the very countenance of the hearer. At first he had + thought that these matters could have waited till daylight; but Heyst's + wakefulness, disclosed in that startling way, made him feel suddenly + certain that there could be no sleep for him that night. + </p> + <p> + He said as much to his governor. When the little dagger-like flame had + done its best to dispel the darkness, Mr. Jones was to be seen reposing on + a camp bedstead, in a distant part of the room. A railway rug concealed + his spare form up to his very head, which rested on the other railway rug + rolled up for a pillow. Ricardo plumped himself down cross-legged on the + floor, very close to the low bedstead; so that Mr. Jones—who perhaps + had not been so very profoundly asleep—on opening his eyes found + them conveniently levelled at the face of his secretary. + </p> + <p> + “Eh? What is it you say? No sleep for you tonight? But why can't you let + <i>me</i> sleep? Confound your fussiness!” + </p> + <p> + “Because that there fellow can't sleep—that's why. Dash me if he + hasn't been doing a think just now! What business has he to think in the + middle of the night?” + </p> + <p> + “How do you know?” + </p> + <p> + “He was out, sir—up in the middle of the night. My own eyes saw it.” + </p> + <p> + “But how do you know that he was up to think?” inquired Mr. Jones. “It + might have been anything—toothache, for instance. And you may have + dreamed it for all I know. Didn't you try to sleep?” + </p> + <p> + “No, sir. I didn't even try to go to sleep.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo informed his patron of his vigil on the veranda, and of the + revelation which put an end to it. He concluded that a man up with a cigar + in the middle of the night must be doing a think. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones raised himself on his elbow. This sign of interest comforted his + faithful henchman. + </p> + <p> + “Seems to me it's time we did a little think ourselves,” added Ricardo, + with more assurance. Long as they had been together the moods of his + governor were still a source of anxiety to his simple soul. + </p> + <p> + “You are always making a fuss,” remarked Mr. Jones, in a tolerant tone. + </p> + <p> + “Ay, but not for nothing, am I? You can't say that, sir. Mine may not be a + gentleman's way of looking round a thing, but it isn't a fool's way, + either. You've admitted that much yourself at odd times.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo was growing warmly argumentative. Mr. Jones interrupted him + without heat. + </p> + <p> + “You haven't roused me to talk about yourself, I presume?” + </p> + <p> + “No, sir.” Ricardo remained silent for a minute, with the tip of his + tongue caught between his teeth. “I don't think I could tell you anything + about myself that you don't know,” he continued. There was a sort of + amused satisfaction in his tone which changed completely as he went on. + “It's that man, over there, that's got to be talked over. I don't like + him.” + </p> + <p> + He, failed to observe the flicker of a ghastly smile on his governor's + lips. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you?” murmured Mr. Jones, whose face, as he reclined on his elbow, + was on a level with the top of his follower's head. + </p> + <p> + “No, sir,” said Ricardo emphatically. The candle from the other side of + the room threw his monstrous black shadow on the wall. “He—I don't + know how to say it—he isn't hearty-like.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones agreed languidly in his own manner: + </p> + <p> + “He seems to be a very self-possessed man.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay, that's it. Self—” Ricardo choked with indignation. “I would + soon let out some of his self-possession through a hole between his ribs, + if this weren't a special job!” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones had been making his own reflections, for he asked: + </p> + <p> + “Do you think he is suspicious?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't see very well what he can be suspicious of,” pondered Ricardo. + “Yet there he was doing a think. And what could be the object of it? What + made him get out of his bed in the middle of the night. 'Tain't fleas, + surely.” + </p> + <p> + “Bad conscience, perhaps,” suggested Mr. Jones jocularly. + </p> + <p> + His faithful secretary suffered from irritation, and did not see the joke. + In a fretful tone he declared that there was no such thing as conscience. + There was such a thing as funk; but there was nothing to make that fellow + funky in any special way. He admitted, however, that the man might have + been uneasy at the arrival of strangers, because of all that plunder of + his put away somewhere. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo glanced here and there, as if he were afraid of being overheard by + the heavy shadows cast by the dim light all over the room. His patron, + very quiet, spoke in a calm whisper: + </p> + <p> + “And perhaps that hotel-keeper has been lying to you about him. He may be + a very poor devil indeed.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo shook his head slightly. The Schombergian theory of Heyst had + become in him a profound conviction, which he had absorbed as naturally as + a sponge takes up water. His patron's doubts were a wanton denying of what + was self-evident; but Ricardo's voice remained as before, a soft purring + with a snarling undertone. + </p> + <p> + “I am sup-prised at you, sir! It's the very way them tame ones—the + common 'yporcrits of the world—get on. When it comes to plunder + drifting under one's very nose, there's not one of them that would keep + his hands off. And I don't blame them. It's the way they do it that sets + my back up. Just look at the story of how he got rid of that pal of his! + Send a man home to croak of a cold on the chest—that's one of your + tame tricks. And d'you mean to say, sir, that a man that's up to it + wouldn't bag whatever he could lay his hands in his 'yporcritical way? + What was all that coal business? Tame citizen dodge; 'yporcrisy—nothing + else. No, no, sir! The thing is to extract it from him as neatly as + possible. That's the job; and it isn't so simple as it looks. I reckon you + have looked at it all round, sir, before you took up the notion of this + trip.” + </p> + <p> + “No.” Mr. Jones was hardly audible, staring far away from his couch. “I + didn't think about it much. I was bored.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay, that you were—bad. I was feeling pretty desperate that + afternoon, when that bearded softy of a landlord got talking to me about + this fellow here. Quite accidentally, it was. Well, sir, here we are after + a mighty narrow squeak. I feel all limp yet; but never mind—his swag + will pay for the lot!” + </p> + <p> + “He's all alone here,” remarked Mr. Jones in a hollow murmur. + </p> + <p> + “Ye-es, in a way. Yes, alone enough. Yes, you may say he is.” + </p> + <p> + “There's that Chinaman, though.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay, there's the Chink,” assented Ricardo rather absentmindedly. + </p> + <p> + He was debating in his mind the advisability of making a clean breast of + his knowledge of the girl's existence. Finally he concluded he wouldn't. + The enterprise was difficult enough without complicating it with an upset + to the sensibilities of the gentleman with whom he had the honour of being + associated. Let the discovery come of itself, he thought, and then he + could swear that he had known nothing of that offensive presence. + </p> + <p> + He did not need to lie. He had only to hold his tongue. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” he muttered reflectively, “there's that Chink, certainly.” + </p> + <p> + At bottom, he felt a certain ambiguous respect for his governor's + exaggerated dislike of women, as if that horror of feminine presence were + a sort of depraved morality; but still morality, since he counted it as an + advantage. It prevented many undesirable complications. He did not pretend + to understand it. He did not even try to investigate this idiosyncrasy of + his chief. All he knew was that he himself was differently inclined, and + that it did not make him any happier or safer. He did not know how he + would have acted if he had been knocking about the world on his own. + Luckily he was a subordinate, not a wage-slave but a follower—which + was a restraint. Yes! The other sort of disposition simplified matters in + general; it wasn't to be gainsaid. But it was clear that it could also + complicate them—as in this most important and, in Ricardo's view, + already sufficiently delicate case. And the worst of it was that one could + not tell exactly in what precise manner it would act. + </p> + <p> + It was unnatural, he thought somewhat peevishly. How was one to reckon up + the unnatural? There were no rules for that. The faithful henchman of + plain Mr. Jones, foreseeing many difficulties of a material order, decided + to keep the girl out of the governor's knowledge, out of his sight, too, + for as long a time as it could be managed. That, alas, seemed to be at + most a matter of a few hours; whereas Ricardo feared that to get the + affair properly going would take some days. Once well started, he was not + afraid of his gentleman failing him. As is often the case with lawless + natures, Ricardo's faith in any given individual was of a simple, + unquestioning character. For man must have some support in life. + </p> + <p> + Cross-legged, his head drooping a little and perfectly still, he might + have been meditating in a bonze-like attitude upon the sacred syllable + “Om.” It was a striking illustration of the untruth of appearances, for + his contempt for the world was of a severely practical kind. There was + nothing oriental about Ricardo but the amazing quietness of his pose. Mr. + Jones was also very quiet. He had let his head sink on the rolled-up rug, + and lay stretched out on his side with his back to the light. In that + position the shadows gathered in the cavities of his eyes made them look + perfectly empty. When he spoke, his ghostly voice had only to travel a few + inches straight into Ricardo's left ear. + </p> + <p> + “Why don't you say something, now that you've got me awake?” + </p> + <p> + “I wonder if you were sleeping as sound as you are trying to make out, + sir,” said the unmoved Ricardo. + </p> + <p> + “I wonder,” repeated Mr. Jones. “At any rate, I was resting quietly!” + </p> + <p> + “Come, sir!” Ricardo's whisper was alarmed. “You don't mean to say you're + going to be bored?” + </p> + <p> + “No.” + </p> + <p> + “Quite right!” The secretary was very much relieved. “There's no occasion + to be, I can tell you, sir,” he whispered earnestly. “Anything but that! + If I didn't say anything for a bit, it ain't because there isn't plenty to + talk about. Ay, more than enough.” + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter with you?” breathed out his patron. “Are you going to + turn pessimist?” + </p> + <p> + “Me turn? No, sir! I ain't of those that turn. You may call me hard names, + if you like, but you know very well that I ain't a croaker.” Ricardo + changed his tone. “If I said nothing for a while, it was because I was + meditating over the Chink, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “You were? Waste of time, my Martin. A Chinaman is unfathomable.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo admitted that this might be so. Anyhow, a Chink was neither here + nor there, as a general thing, unfathomable as he might be; but a Swedish + baron wasn't—couldn't be! The woods were full of such barons. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know that he is so tame,” was Mr. Jones's remark, in a sepulchral + undertone. + </p> + <p> + “How do you mean, sir? He ain't a rabbit, of course. You couldn't + hypnotize him, as I saw you do to more than one Dago, and other kinds of + tame citizens, when it came to the point of holding them down to a game.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't you reckon on that,” murmured plain Mr. Jones seriously. + </p> + <p> + “No, sir, I don't, though you have a wonderful power of the eye. It's a + fact.” + </p> + <p> + “I have a wonderful patience,” remarked Mr. Jones dryly. + </p> + <p> + A dim smile flitted over the lips of the faithful Ricardo who never raised + his head. + </p> + <p> + “I don't want to try you too much, sir, but this is like no other job we + ever turned our minds to.” + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps not. At any rate let us think so.” + </p> + <p> + A weariness with the monotony of life was reflected in the tone of this + qualified assent. It jarred on the nerves of the sanguine Ricardo. + </p> + <p> + “Let us think of the way to go to work,” he retorted a little impatiently. + “He's a deep one. Just look at the way he treated that chum of his. Did + you ever hear of anything so low? And the artfulness of the beast—the + dirty, tame artfulness!” + </p> + <p> + “Don't you start moralizing, Martin,” said Mr. Jones warningly. “As far as + I can make out the story that German hotel-keeper told you, it seems to + show a certain amount of character;—and independence from common + feelings which is not usual. It's very remarkable, if true.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay, ay! Very remarkable. It's mighty low down, all the same,” muttered, + Ricardo obstinately. “I must say I am glad to think he will be paid off + for it in a way that'll surprise him!” + </p> + <p> + The tip of his tongue appeared lively for an instant, as if trying for the + taste of that ferocious retribution on his compressed lips. For Ricardo + was sincere in his indignation before the elementary principle of loyalty + to a chum violated in cold blood, slowly, in a patient duplicity of years. + There are standards in villainy as in virtue, and the act as he pictured + it to himself acquired an additional horror from the slow pace of that + treachery so atrocious and so tame. But he understood too the educated + judgement of his governor, a gentleman looking on all this with the + privileged detachment of a cultivated mind, of an elevated personality. + </p> + <p> + “Ay, he's deep—he's artful,” he mumbled between his sharp teeth. + </p> + <p> + “Confound you!” Mr. Jones's calm whisper crept into his ear. “Come to the + point.” + </p> + <p> + Obedient, the secretary shook off his thoughtfulness. There was a + similarity of mind between these two—one the outcast of his vices, + the other inspired by a spirit of scornful defiance, the aggressiveness of + a beast of prey looking upon all the tame creatures of the earth as its + natural victim. Both were astute enough, however, and both were aware that + they had plunged into this adventure without a sufficient scrutiny of + detail. The figure of a lonely man far from all assistance had loomed up + largely, fascinating and defenceless in the middle of the sea, filling the + whole field of their vision. There had not seemed to be any need for + thinking. As Schomberg had been saying: “Three to one.” + </p> + <p> + But it did not look so simple now in the face of that solitude which was + like an armour for this man. The feeling voiced by the henchman in his own + way—“We don't seem much forwarder now we are here” was acknowledged + by the silence of the patron. It was easy enough to rip a fellow up or + drill a hole in him, whether he was alone or not, Ricardo reflected in + low, confidential tones, but— + </p> + <p> + “He isn't alone,” Mr. Jones said faintly, in his attitude of a man + composed for sleep. “Don't forget that Chinaman.” Ricardo started + slightly. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, ay—the Chink!” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo had been on the point of confessing about the girl; but no! He + wanted his governor to be unperturbed and steady. Vague thoughts, which he + hardly dared to look in the face, were stirring his brain in connection + with that girl. She couldn't be much account, he thought. She could be + frightened. And there were also other possibilities. The Chink, however, + could be considered openly. + </p> + <p> + “What I was thinking about it, sir,” he went on earnestly, “is this—here + we've got a man. He's nothing. If he won't be good, he can be made quiet. + That's easy. But then there's his plunder. He doesn't carry it in his + pocket.” + </p> + <p> + “I hope not,” breathed Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + “Same here. It's too big, we know, but if he were alone, he would not feel + worried about it overmuch—I mean the safety of the pieces. He would + just put the lot into any box or drawer that was handy.” + </p> + <p> + “Would he?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir. He would keep it under his eye, as it were. Why not? It is + natural. A fellow doesn't put his swag underground, unless there's a very + good reason for it.” + </p> + <p> + “A very good reason, eh?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir. What do you think a fellow is—a mole?” + </p> + <p> + From his experience, Ricardo declared that man was not a burrowing beast. + Even the misers very seldom buried their hoard, unless for exceptional + reasons. In the given situation of a man alone on an island, the company + of a Chink was a very good reason. Drawers would not be safe, nor boxes, + either, from a prying, slant-eyed Chink. No, sir, unless a safe—a + proper office safe. But the safe was there in the room. + </p> + <p> + “Is there a safe in this room? I didn't notice it,” whispered Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + That was because the thing was painted white, like the walls of the room; + and besides, it was tucked away in the shadows of a corner. Mr. Jones had + been too tired to observe anything on his first coming ashore; but Ricardo + had very soon spotted the characteristic form. He only wished he could + believe that the plunder of treachery, duplicity, and all the moral + abominations of Heyst had been there. But no; the blamed thing was open. + </p> + <p> + “It might have been there at one time or another,” he commented gloomily, + “but it isn't there now.” + </p> + <p> + “The man did not elect to live in this house,” remarked Mr. Jones. “And by + the by, what could he have meant by speaking of circumstances which + prevented him lodging us in the other bungalow? You remember what he said, + Martin? Sounded cryptic.” + </p> + <p> + Martin, who remembered and understood the phrase as directly motived by + the existence of the girl, waited a little before saying: + </p> + <p> + “Some of his artfulness, sir; and not the worst of it either. That manner + of his to us, this asking no questions, is some more of his artfulness. A + man's bound to be curious, and he is; yet he goes on as if he didn't care. + He does care—or else what was he doing up with a cigar in the middle + of the night, doing a think? I don't like it.” + </p> + <p> + “He may be outside, observing the light here, and saying the very same + thing to himself of our own wakefulness,” gravely suggested Ricardo's + governor. + </p> + <p> + “He may be, sir; but this is too important to be talked over in the dark. + And the light is all right, it can be accounted for. There's a light in + this bungalow in the middle of the night because—why, because you + are not well. Not well, sir—that's what's the matter, and you will + have to act up to it.” + </p> + <p> + The consideration had suddenly occurred to the faithful henchman, in the + light of a felicitous expedient to keep his governor and the girl apart as + long as possible. Mr. Jones received the suggestion without the slightest + stir, even in the deep sockets of his eyes, where a steady, faint gleam + was the only thing telling of life and attention in his attenuated body. + But Ricardo, as soon as he had enunciated his happy thought, perceived in + it other possibilities more to the point and of greater practical + advantage. + </p> + <p> + “With your looks, sir, it will be easy enough,” he went on evenly, as if + no silence had intervened, always respectful, but frank, with perfect + simplicity of purpose. “All you've got to do is just to lie down quietly. + I noticed him looking sort of surprised at you on the wharf, sir.” + </p> + <p> + At these words, a naive tribute to the aspect of his physique, even more + suggestive of the grave than of the sick-bed, a fold appeared on that side + of the governor's face which was exposed to the dim light—a deep, + shadowy, semicircular fold from the side of the nose to bottom of the chin—a + silent smile. By a side-glance Ricardo had noted this play of features. He + smiled, too, appreciative, encouraged. + </p> + <p> + “And you as hard as nails all the time,” he went on. “Hang me if anybody + would believe you aren't sick, if I were to swear myself black in the + face! Give us a day or two to look into matters and size up that + 'yporcrit.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo's eyes remained fixed on his crossed shins. The chief, in his + lifeless accents, approved. + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps it would be a good idea.” + </p> + <p> + “The Chink, he's nothing. He can be made quiet any time.” + </p> + <p> + One of Ricardo's hands, reposing palm upwards on his folded legs, made a + swift thrusting gesture, repeated by the enormous darting shadow of an arm + very low on the wall. It broke the spell of perfect stillness in the room. + The secretary eyed moodily the wall from which the shadow had gone. + Anybody could be made quiet, he pointed out. It was not anything that the + Chink could do; no, it was the effect that his company must have produced + on the conduct of the doomed man. A man! What was a man? A Swedish baron + could be ripped up, or else holed by a shot, as easily as any other + creature; but that was exactly what was to be avoided, till one knew where + he had hidden his plunder. + </p> + <p> + “I shouldn't think it would be some sort of hole in his bungalow,” argued + Ricardo with real anxiety. + </p> + <p> + No. A house can be burnt—set on fire accidentally, or on purpose, + while a man's asleep. Under the house—or in some crack, cranny, or + crevice? Something told him it wasn't that. The anguish of mental effort + contracted Ricardo's brow. The skin of his head seemed to move in this + travail of vain and tormenting suppositions. + </p> + <p> + “What did you think a fellow is, sir—a baby?” he said, in answer to + Mr. Jones's objections. “I am trying to find out what I would do myself. + He wouldn't be likely to be cleverer than I am.” + </p> + <p> + “And what do you know about yourself?” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones seemed to watch his follower's perplexities with amusement + concealed in a death-like composure. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo disregarded the question. The material vision of the spoil + absorbed all his faculties. A great vision! He seemed to see it. A few + small canvas bags tied up with thin cord, their distended rotundity + showing the inside pressure of the disk-like forms of coins—gold, + solid, heavy, eminently portable. Perhaps steel cash-boxes with a chased + design, on the covers; or perhaps a black and brass box with a handle on + the top, and full of goodness knows what. Bank notes? Why not? The fellow + had been going home; so it was surely something worth going home with. + </p> + <p> + “And he may have put it anywhere outside—anywhere!” cried Ricardo in + a deadened voice, “in the forest—” + </p> + <p> + That was it! A temporary darkness replaced the dim light of the room. The + darkness of the forest at night and in it the gleam of a lantern, by which + a figure is digging at the foot of a tree-trunk. As likely as not, another + figure holding that lantern—ha, feminine! The girl! + </p> + <p> + The prudent Ricardo stifled a picturesque and profane exclamation, partly + joy, partly dismay. Had the girl been trusted or mistrusted by that man? + Whatever it was, it was bound to be wholly! With women there could be no + half-measures. He could not imagine a fellow half-trusting a woman in that + intimate relation to himself, and in those particular circumstances of + conquest and loneliness where no confidences could appear dangerous since, + apparently, there could be no one she could give him away to. Moreover, in + nine cases out of ten the woman would be trusted. But, trusted or + mistrusted, was her presence a favourable or unfavourable condition of the + problem? That was the question! + </p> + <p> + The temptation to consult his chief, to talk over the weighty fact, and + get his opinion on it, was great indeed. Ricardo resisted it; but the + agony of his solitary mental conflict was extremely sharp. A woman in a + problem is an incalculable quantity, even if you have something to go upon + in forming your guess. How much more so when you haven't even once caught + sight of her. + </p> + <p> + Swift as were his mental processes, he felt that a longer silence was + inadvisable. He hastened to speak: + </p> + <p> + “And do you see us, sir, you and I, with a couple of spades having to + tackle this whole confounded island?” + </p> + <p> + He allowed himself a slight movement of the arm. The shadow enlarged it + into a sweeping gesture. + </p> + <p> + “This seems rather discouraging, Martin,” murmured the unmoved governor. + </p> + <p> + “We mustn't be discouraged—that's all!” retorted his henchman. “And + after what we had to go through in that boat too! Why it would be—” + </p> + <p> + He couldn't find the qualifying words. Very calm, faithful, and yet + astute, he expressed his new-born hopes darkly. + </p> + <p> + “Something's sure to turn up to give us a hint; only this job can't be + rushed. You may depend on me to pick up the least little bit of a hint; + but you, sir—you've got to play him very gently. For the rest you + can trust me.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes; but I ask myself what YOU are trusting to.” + </p> + <p> + “Our luck,” said the faithful Ricardo. “Don't say a word against that. It + might spoil the run of it.” + </p> + <p> + “You are a superstitious beggar. No, I won't say anything against it.” + </p> + <p> + “That's right, sir. Don't you even think lightly of it. Luck's not to be + played with.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, luck's a delicate thing,” assented Mr. Jones in a dreamy whisper. + </p> + <p> + A short silence ensued, which Ricardo ended in a discreet and tentative + voice. + </p> + <p> + “Talking of luck, I suppose he could be made to take a hand with you, sir—two-handed + picket or ekkarty, you being seedy and keeping indoors—just to pass + the time. For all we know, he may be one of them hot ones once they start—” + </p> + <p> + “Is it likely?” came coldly from the principal. “Considering what we know + of his history—say with his partner.” + </p> + <p> + “True, sir. He's a cold-blooded beast; a cold-blooded, inhuman—” + </p> + <p> + “And I'll tell you another thing that isn't likely. He would not be likely + to let himself be stripped bare. We haven't to do with a young fool that + can be led on by chaff or flattery, and in the end simply overawed. This + is a calculating man.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo recognized that clearly. What he had in his mind was something on + a small scale, just to keep the enemy busy while he, Ricardo, had time to + nose around a bit. + </p> + <p> + “You could even lose a little money to him, sir,” he suggested. + </p> + <p> + “I could.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo was thoughtful for a moment. + </p> + <p> + “He strikes me, too, as the sort of man to start prancing when one didn't + expect it. What do you think, sir? Is he a man that would prance? That is, + if something startled him. More likely to prance than to run—what?” + </p> + <p> + The answer came at once, because Mr. Jones understood the peculiar idiom + of his faithful follower. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, without doubt! Without doubt!” + </p> + <p> + “It does me good to hear that you think so. He's a prancing beast, and so + we mustn't startle him—not till I have located the stuff. Afterwards—” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo paused, sinister in the stillness of his pose. Suddenly he got up + with a swift movement and gazed down at his chief in moody abstraction. + Mr. Jones did not stir. + </p> + <p> + “There's one thing that's worrying me,” began Ricardo in a subdued voice. + </p> + <p> + “Only one?” was the faint comment from the motionless body on the + bedstead. + </p> + <p> + “I mean more than all the others put together.” + </p> + <p> + “That's grave news.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay, grave enough. It's this—how do you feel in yourself, sir? Are + you likely to get bored? I know them fits come on you suddenly; but surely + you can tell—” + </p> + <p> + “Martin, you are an ass.” + </p> + <p> + The moody face of the secretary brightened up. + </p> + <p> + “Really, sir? Well, I am quite content to be on these terms—I mean + as long as you don't get bored. It wouldn't do, sir.” + </p> + <p> + For coolness, Ricardo had thrown open his shirt and rolled up his sleeves. + He moved stealthily across the room, bare-footed, towards the candle, the + shadow of his head and shoulders growing bigger behind him on the opposite + wall, to which the face of plain Mr. Jones was turned. With a feline + movement, Ricardo glanced over his shoulder at the thin back of the + spectre reposing on the bed, and then blew out the candle. + </p> + <p> + “In fact, I am rather amused, Martin,” Mr. Jones said in the dark. + </p> + <p> + He heard the sound of a slapped thigh and the jubilant exclamation of his + henchman: + </p> + <p> + “Good! That's the way to talk, sir!” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PART4" id="link2H_PART4"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PART FOUR + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER ONE + </h2> + <p> + Ricardo advanced prudently by short darts from one tree-trunk to another, + more in the manner of a squirrel than a cat. The sun had risen some time + before. Already the sparkle of open sea was encroaching rapidly on the + dark, cool, early-morning blue of Diamond Bay; but the deep dusk lingered + yet under the mighty pillars of the forest, between which the secretary + dodged. + </p> + <p> + He was watching Number One's bungalow with an animal-like patience, if + with a very human complexity of purpose. This was the second morning of + such watching. The first one had not been rewarded by success. Well, + strictly speaking, there was no hurry. + </p> + <p> + The sun, swinging above the ridge all at once, inundated with light the + space of burnt grass in front of Ricardo and the face of the bungalow, on + which his eyes were fixed, leaving only the one dark spot of the doorway. + To his right, to his left, and behind him, splashes of gold appeared in + the deep shade of the forest, thinning the gloom under the ragged roof of + leaves. + </p> + <p> + This was not a very favourable circumstance for Ricardo's purpose. He did + not wish to be detected in his patient occupation. For what he was + watching for was a sight of the girl—that girl! just a glimpse + across the burnt patch to see what she was like. He had excellent eyes, + and the distance was not so great. He would be able to distinguish her + face quite easily if she only came out on the veranda; and she was bound + to do that sooner or later. He was confident that he could form some + opinion about her—which, he felt, was very necessary, before + venturing on some steps to get in touch with her behind that Swedish + baron's back. His theoretical view of the girl was such that he was quite + prepared, on the strength of that distant examination, to show himself + discreetly—perhaps even make a sign. It all depended on his reading + of the face. She couldn't be much. He knew that sort! + </p> + <p> + By protruding his head a little he commanded, through the foliage of a + festooning creeper, a view of the three bungalows. Irregularly disposed + along a flat curve, over the veranda rail of the farthermost one hung a + dark rug of a tartan pattern, amazingly conspicuous. Ricardo could see the + very checks. A brisk fire of sticks was burning on the ground in front of + the steps, and in the sunlight the thin, fluttering flame had paled almost + to invisibility—a mere rosy stir under a faint wreath of smoke. He + could see the white bandage on the head of Pedro bending over it, and the + wisps of black hair standing up weirdly. He had wound that bandage + himself, after breaking that shaggy and enormous head. The creature + balanced it like a load, staggering towards the steps. Ricardo could see a + small, long-handled saucepan at the end of a great hairy paw. + </p> + <p> + Yes, he could see all that there was to be seen, far and near. Excellent + eyes! The only thing they could not penetrate was the dark oblong of the + doorway on the veranda under the low eaves of the bungalow's roof. And + that was vexing. It was an outrage. Ricardo was easily outraged. Surely + she would come out presently! Why didn't she? Surely the fellow did not + tie her up to the bedpost before leaving the house! + </p> + <p> + Nothing appeared. Ricardo was as still as the leafy cables of creepers + depending in a convenient curtain from the mighty limb sixty feet above + his head. His very eyelids were still, and this unblinking watchfulness + gave him the dreamy air of a cat posed on a hearth-rug contemplating the + fire. Was he dreaming? There, in plain sight, he had before him a white, + blouse-like jacket, short blue trousers, a pair of bare yellow calves, a + pigtail, long and slender— + </p> + <p> + “The confounded Chink!” he muttered, astounded. + </p> + <p> + He was not conscious of having looked away; and yet right there, in the + middle of the picture, without having come round the right-hand corner or + the left-hand corner of the house, without falling from the sky or surging + up from the ground, Wang had become visible, large as life, and engaged in + the young-ladyish occupation of picking flowers. Step by step, stooping + repeatedly over the flower-beds at the foot of the veranda, the + startlingly materialized Chinaman passed off the scene in a very + commonplace manner, by going up the steps and disappearing in the darkness + of the doorway. + </p> + <p> + Only then the yellow eyes of Martin Ricardo lost their intent fixity. He + understood that it was time for him to be moving. That bunch of flowers + going into the house in the hand of a Chinaman was for the + breakfast-table. What else could it be for? + </p> + <p> + “I'll give you flowers!” he muttered threateningly. “You wait!” + </p> + <p> + Another moment, just for a glance towards the Jones bungalow, whence he + expected Heyst to issue on his way to that breakfast so offensively + decorated, and Ricardo began his retreat. His impulse, his desire, was for + a rush into the open, face to face with the appointed victim, for what he + called a “ripping up,” visualized greedily, and always with the swift + preliminary stooping movement on his part—the forerunner of certain + death to his adversary. This was his impulse; and as it was, so to speak, + constitutional, it was extremely difficult to resist when his blood was + up. What could be more trying than to have to skulk and dodge and restrain + oneself, mentally and physically, when one's blood was up? Mr. Secretary + Ricardo began his retreat from his post of observation behind a tree + opposite Heyst's bungalow, using great care to remain unseen. His + proceedings were made easier by the declivity of the ground, which sloped + sharply down to the water's edge. There, his feet feeling the warmth of + the island's rocky foundation already heated by the sun, through the thin + soles of his straw slippers he was, as it were, sunk out of sight of the + houses. A short scramble of some twenty feet brought him up again to the + upper level, at the place where the jetty had its root in the shore. He + leaned his back against one of the lofty uprights which still held up the + company's signboard above the mound of derelict coal. Nobody could have + guessed how much his blood was up. To contain himself he folded his arms + tightly on his breast. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo was not used to a prolonged effort of self-control. His craft, his + artfulness, felt themselves always at the mercy of his nature, which was + truly feral and only held in subjection by the influence of the + “governor,” the prestige of a gentleman. It had its cunning too, but it + was being almost too severely tried since the feral solution of a growl + and a spring was forbidden by the problem. Ricardo dared not venture out + on the cleared ground. He dared not. + </p> + <p> + “If I meet the beggar,” he thought, “I don't know what I mayn't do. I + daren't trust myself.” + </p> + <p> + What exasperated him just now was his inability to understand Heyst. + Ricardo was human enough to suffer from the discovery of his limitations. + No, he couldn't size Heyst up. He could kill him with extreme ease—a + growl and a spring—but that was forbidden! However, he could not + remain indefinitely under the funereal blackboard. + </p> + <p> + “I must make a move,” he thought. + </p> + <p> + He moved on, his head swimming a little with the repressed desire of + violence, and came out openly in front of the bungalows, as if he had just + been down to the jetty to look at the boat. The sunshine enveloped him, + very brilliant, very still, very hot. The three buildings faced him. The + one with the rug on the balustrade was the most distant; next to it was + the empty bungalow; the nearest, with the flower-beds at the foot of its + veranda, contained that bothersome girl, who had managed so provokingly to + keep herself invisible. That was why Ricardo's eyes lingered on that + building. The girl would surely be easier to “size up” than Heyst. A sight + of her, a mere glimpse, would have been something to go by, a step nearer + to the goal—the first real move, in fact. Ricardo saw no other move. + And any time she might appear on that veranda! + </p> + <p> + She did not appear; but, like a concealed magnet, she exercised her + attraction. As he went on, he deviated towards the bungalow. Though his + movements were deliberate, his feral instincts had such sway that if he + had met Heyst walking towards him, he would have had to satisfy his need + of violence. But he saw nobody. Wang was at the back of the house, keeping + the coffee hot against Number One's return for breakfast. Even the simian + Pedro was out of sight, no doubt crouching on the door-step, his red + little eyes fastened with animal-like devotion on Mr. Jones, who was in + discourse with Heyst in the other bungalow—the conversation of an + evil spectre with a disarmed man, watched by an ape. + </p> + <p> + His will having very little to do with it, Ricardo, darting swift glances + in all directions, found himself at the steps of the Heyst bungalow. Once + there, falling under an uncontrollable force of attraction, he mounted + them with a savage and stealthy action of his limbs, and paused for a + moment under the eaves to listen to the silence. Presently he advanced + over the threshold one leg—it seemed to stretch itself, like a limb + of india-rubber—planted his foot within, brought up the other + swiftly, and stood inside the room, turning his head from side to side. To + his eyes, brought in there from the dazzling sunshine, all was gloom for a + moment. His pupils, like a cat's, dilating swiftly, he distinguished an + enormous quantity of books. He was amazed; and he was put off too. He was + vexed in his astonishment. He had meant to note the aspect and nature of + things, and hoped to draw some useful inference, some hint as to the man. + But what guess could one make out of a multitude of books? He didn't know + what to think; and he formulated his bewilderment in the mental + exclamation: + </p> + <p> + “What the devil has this fellow been trying to set up here—a + school?” + </p> + <p> + He gave a prolonged stare to the portrait of Heyst's father, that severe + profile ignoring the vanities of this earth. His eyes gleamed sideways at + the heavy silver candlesticks—signs of opulence. He prowled as a + stray cat entering a strange place might have done, for if Ricardo had not + Wang's miraculous gift of materializing and vanishing, rather than coming + and going, he could be nearly as noiseless in his less elusive movements. + He noted the back door standing just ajar; and all the time his slightly + pointed ears, at the utmost stretch of watchfulness, kept in touch with + the profound silence outside enveloping the absolute stillness of the + house. + </p> + <p> + He had not been in the room two minutes when it occurred to him that he + must be alone in the bungalow. The woman, most likely, had sneaked out and + was walking about somewhere in the grounds at the back. She had been + probably ordered to keep out of sight. Why? Because the fellow mistrusted + his guests; or was it because he mistrusted <i>her</i>? + </p> + <p> + Ricardo reflected that from a certain point of view it amounted nearly to + the same thing. He remembered Schomberg's story. He felt that running away + with somebody only to get clear of that beastly, tame, hotel-keeper's + attention was no proof of hopeless infatuation. She could be got in touch + with. + </p> + <p> + His moustaches stirred. For some time he had been looking at a closed + door. He would peep into that other room, and perhaps see something more + informing than a confounded lot of books. As he crossed over, he thought + recklessly: + </p> + <p> + “If the beggar comes in suddenly, and starts to prance, I'll rip him up + and be done with it!” + </p> + <p> + He laid his hand on the handle, and felt the door come unlatched. Before + he pulled it open, he listened again to the silence. He felt it all about + him, complete, without a flaw. + </p> + <p> + The necessity of prudence had exasperated his self-restraint. A mood of + ferocity woke up in him, and, as always at such times, he became + physically aware of the sheeted knife strapped to his leg. He pulled at + the door with fierce curiosity. It came open without a squeak of hinge, + without a rustle, with no sound at all; and he found himself glaring at + the opaque surface of some rough blue stuff, like serge. A curtain was + fitted inside, heavy enough and long enough not to stir. + </p> + <p> + A curtain! This unforeseen veil, baffling his curiosity checked his + brusqueness. He did not fling it aside with an impatient movement; he only + looked at it closely, as if its texture had to be examined before his hand + could touch such stuff. In this interval of hesitation, he seemed to + detect a flaw in the perfection of the silence, the faintest possible + rustle, which his ears caught and instantly, in the effort of conscious + listening, lost again. No! Everything was still inside and outside the + house, only he had no longer the sense of being alone there. + </p> + <p> + When he put out his hand towards the motionless folds it was with extreme + caution, and merely to push the stuff aside a little, advancing his head + at the same time to peep within. A moment of complete immobility ensued. + Then, without anything else of him stirring, Ricardo's head shrank back on + his shoulders, his arm descended slowly to his side. There was a woman in + there. The very woman! Lighted dimly by the reflection of the outer glare, + she loomed up strangely big and shadowy at the other end of the long, + narrow room. With her back to the door, she was doing her hair with bare + arms uplifted. One of them gleamed pearly white; the other detached its + perfect form in black against the unshuttered, uncurtained square + window-hole. She was there, her fingers busy with her dark hair, utterly + unconscious, exposed and defenceless—and tempting. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo drew back one foot and pressed his elbows close to his sides; his + chest started heaving convulsively as if he were wrestling or running a + race; his body began to sway gently back and forth. The self-restraint was + at an end: his psychology must have its way. The instinct for the feral + spring could no longer be denied. Ravish or kill—it was all one to + him, as long as by the act he liberated the suffering soul of savagery + repressed for so long. After a quick glance over his shoulder, which + hunters of big game tell us no lion or tiger omits to give before charging + home, Ricardo charged, head down, straight at the curtain. The stuff, + tossed up violently by his rush, settled itself with a slow, floating + descent into vertical folds, motionless, without a shudder even, in the + still, warm air. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TWO + </h2> + <p> + The clock—which once upon a time had measured the hours of + philosophic meditation—could not have ticked away more than five + seconds when Wang materialized within the living-room. His concern + primarily was with the delayed breakfast, but at once his slanting eyes + became immovably fixed upon the unstirring curtain. For it was behind it + that he had located the strange, deadened scuffling sounds which filled + the empty room. The slanting eyes of his race could not achieve a round, + amazed stare, but they remained still, dead still, and his impassive + yellow face grew all at once careworn and lean with the sudden strain of + intense, doubtful, frightened watchfulness. Contrary impulses swayed his + body, rooted to the floor-mats. He even went so far as to extend his hand + towards the curtain. He could not reach it, and he didn't make the + necessary step forward. + </p> + <p> + The mysterious struggle was going on with confused thuds of bare feet, in + a mute wrestling match, no human sound, hiss, groan, murmur, or + exclamation coming through the curtain. A chair fell over, not with a + crash but lightly, as if just grazed, and a faint metallic ring of the tin + bath succeeded. Finally the tense silence, as of two adversaries locked in + a deadly grip, was ended by the heavy, dull thump of a soft body flung + against the inner partition of planks. It seemed to shake the whole + bungalow. By that time, walking backward, his eyes, his very throat, + strained with fearful excitement, his extended arm still pointing at the + curtain, Wang had disappeared through the back door. Once out in the + compound, he bolted round the end of the house. Emerging innocently + between the two bungalows he lingered and lounged in the open, where + anybody issuing from any of the dwellings was bound to see him—a + self-possessed Chinaman idling there, with nothing but perhaps an unserved + breakfast on his mind. + </p> + <p> + It was at this time that Wang made up his mind to give up all connection + with Number One, a man not only disarmed but already half vanquished. Till + that morning he had had doubts as to his course of action, but this + overheard scuffle decided the question. Number One was a doomed man—one + of those beings whom it is unlucky to help. Even as he walked in the open + with a fine air of unconcern, Wang wondered that no sound of any sort was + to be heard inside the house. For all he knew, the white woman might have + been scuffling in there with an evil spirit, which had of course killed + her. For nothing visible came out of the house he watched out of the + slanting corner of his eye. The sunshine and the silence outside the + bungalow reigned undisturbed. + </p> + <p> + But in the house the silence of the big room would not have struck an + acute ear as perfect. It was troubled by a stir so faint that it could + hardly be called a ghost of whispering from behind the curtain. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo, feeling his throat with tender care, breathed out admiringly: + </p> + <p> + “You have fingers like steel. Jimminy! You have muscles like a giant!” + </p> + <p> + Luckily for Lena, Ricardo's onset had been so sudden—she was winding + her two heavy tresses round her head—that she had no time to lower + her arms. This, which saved them from being pinned to her sides, gave her + a better chance to resist. His spring had nearly thrown her down. Luckily, + again, she was standing so near the wall that, though she was driven + against it headlong, yet the shock was not heavy enough to knock all the + breath out of her body. On the contrary, it helped her first instinctive + attempt to drive her assailant backward. + </p> + <p> + After the first gasp of a surprise that was really too over-powering for a + cry, she was never in doubt of the nature of her danger. She defended + herself in the full, clear knowledge of it, from the force of instinct + which is the true source of every great display of energy, and with a + determination which could hardly have been expected from a girl who, + cornered in a dim corridor by the red-faced, stammering Schomberg, had + trembled with shame, disgust, and fear; had drooped, terrified, before + mere words spluttered out odiously by a man who had never in his life laid + his big paw on her. + </p> + <p> + This new enemy's attack was simple, straightforward violence. It was not + the slimy, underhand plotting to deliver her up like a slave, which had + sickened her heart and had made her feel in her loneliness that her + oppressors were too many for her. She was no longer alone in the world + now. She resisted without a moment of faltering, because she was no longer + deprived of moral support; because she was a human being who counted; + because she was no longer defending herself for herself alone; because of + the faith that had been born in her—the faith in the man of her + destiny, and perhaps in the Heaven which had sent him so wonderfully to + cross her path. + </p> + <p> + She had defended herself principally by maintaining a desperate, murderous + clutch on Ricardo's windpipe, till she felt a sudden relaxation of the + terrific hug in which he stupidly and ineffectually persisted to hold her. + Then with a supreme effort of her arms and of her suddenly raised knee, + she sent him flying against the partition. The cedar-wood chest stood in + the way, and Ricardo, with a thump which boomed hollow through the whole + bungalow, fell on it in a sitting posture, half strangled, and exhausted + not so much by the efforts as by the emotions of the struggle. + </p> + <p> + With the recoil of her exerted strength, she too reeled, staggered back, + and sat on the edge of the bed. Out of breath, but calm and unabashed, she + busied herself in readjusting under her arms the brown and yellow figured + Celebes sarong, the tuck of which had come undone during the fight. Then, + folding her bare arms tightly on her breast, she leaned forward on her + crossed legs, determined and without fear. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo, leaning forward too, his nervous force gone, crestfallen like a + beast of prey that has missed its spring, met her big grey eyes looking at + him—wide open, observing, mysterious—from under the dark + arches of her courageous eyebrows. Their faces were not a foot apart. He + ceased feeling about his aching throat and dropped the palms of his hands + heavily on his knees. He was not looking at her bare shoulders, at her + strong arms; he was looking down at the floor. He had lost one of his + straw slippers. A chair with a white dress on it had been overturned. + These, with splashes of water on the floor out of a brusquely misplaced + sponge-bath, were the only traces of the struggle. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo swallowed twice consciously, as if to make sure of his throat + before he spoke again: + </p> + <p> + “All right. I never meant to hurt you—though I am no joker when it + comes to it.” + </p> + <p> + He pulled up the leg of his pyjamas to exhibit the strapped knife. She + glanced at it without moving her head, and murmured with scornful + bitterness: + </p> + <p> + “Ah, yes—with that thing stuck in my side. In no other way.” + </p> + <p> + He shook his head with a shamefaced smile. + </p> + <p> + “Listen! I am quiet now. Straight—I am. I don't need to explain why—you + know how it is. And I can see, now, this wasn't the way with you.” + </p> + <p> + She made no sound. Her still, upward gaze had a patient, mournfulness + which troubled him like a suggestion of an inconceivable depth. He added + thoughtfully: + </p> + <p> + “You are not going to make a noise about this silly try of mine?” + </p> + <p> + She moved her head the least bit. + </p> + <p> + “Jee-miny! You are a wonder—” he murmured earnestly, relieved more + than she could have guessed. + </p> + <p> + Of course, if she had attempted to run out, he would have stuck the knife + between her shoulders, to stop her screaming; but all the fat would have + been in the fire, the business utterly spoiled, and the rage of the + governor—especially when he learned the cause—boundless. A + woman that does not make a noise after an attempt of that kind has tacitly + condoned the offence. Ricardo had no small vanities. But clearly, if she + would pass it over like this, then he could not be so utterly repugnant to + her. He felt flattered. And she didn't seem afraid of him either. He + already felt almost tender towards the girl—that plucky, fine girl + who had not tried to run screaming from him. + </p> + <p> + “We shall be friends yet. I don't give you up. Don't think it. Friends as + friends can be!” he whispered confidently. “Jee-miny! You aren't a tame + one. Neither am I. You will find that out before long.” + </p> + <p> + He could not know that if she had not run out, it was because that + morning, under the stress of growing uneasiness at the presence of the + incomprehensible visitors, Heyst had confessed to her that it was his + revolver he had been looking for in the night; that it was gone, that he + was a disarmed, defenceless man. She had hardly comprehended the meaning + of his confession. Now she understood better what it meant. The effort of + her self-control, her stillness, impressed Ricardo. Suddenly she spoke: + </p> + <p> + “What are you after?” + </p> + <p> + He did not raise his eyes. His hands reposing on his knees, his drooping + head, something reflective in his pose, suggested the weariness of a + simple soul, the fatigue of a mental rather than physical contest. He + answered the direct question by a direct statement, as if he were too + tired to dissemble: + </p> + <p> + “After the swag.” + </p> + <p> + The word was strange to her. The veiled ardour of her grey gaze from under + the dark eyebrows never left Ricardo's. + </p> + <p> + “A swag?” she murmured quietly. “What's that?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, swag, plunder—what your gentleman has been pinching right and + left for years—the pieces. Don't you know? This!” + </p> + <p> + Without looking up, he made the motion of counting money into the palm of + his hand. She lowered her eyes slightly to observe this bit of pantomime, + but returned them to his face at once. Then, in a mere breath: + </p> + <p> + “How do you know anything about him?” she asked, concealing her puzzled + alarm. “What has it got to do with you?” + </p> + <p> + “Everything,” was Ricardo's concise answer, in a low, emphatic whisper. He + reflected that this girl was really his best hope. Out of the unfaded + impression of past violence there was growing the sort of sentiment which + prevents a man from being indifferent to a woman he has once held in his + arms—if even against her will—and still more so if she has + pardoned the outrage. It becomes then a sort of bond. He felt positively + the need to confide in her—a subtle trait of masculinity, this + almost physical need of trust which can exist side by side with the most + brutal readiness of suspicion. + </p> + <p> + “It's a game of grab—see?” he went on, with a new inflection of + intimacy in his murmur. He was looking straight at her now. + </p> + <p> + “That fat, tame slug of a gin-slinger, Schomberg, put us up to it.” + </p> + <p> + So strong is the impression of helpless and persecuted misery, that the + girl who had fought down a savage assault without faltering could not + completely repress a shudder at the mere sound of the abhorred name. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo became more rapid and confidential: + </p> + <p> + “He wants to pay him off—pay both of you, at that; so he told me. He + was hot after you. He would have given all he had into those hands of + yours that have nearly strangled me. But you couldn't, eh? Nohow—what?” + He paused. “So, rather than—you followed a gentleman?” + </p> + <p> + He noticed a slight movement of her head and spoke quickly. + </p> + <p> + “Same here—rather than be a wage-slave. Only these foreigners aren't + to be trusted. You're too good for him. A man that will rob his best + chum?” She raised her head. He went on, well pleased with his progress, + whispering hurriedly: “Yes. I know all about him. So you may guess how + he's likely to treat a woman after a bit!” + </p> + <p> + He did not know that he was striking terror into her breast now. Still the + grey eyes remained fixed on him unmovably watchful, as if sleepy under the + white forehead. She was beginning to understand. His words conveyed a + definite, dreadful meaning to her mind, which he proceeded to enlighten + further in a convinced murmur. + </p> + <p> + “You and I are made to understand each other. Born alike, bred alike, I + guess. You are not tame. Same here! You have been chucked out into this + rotten world of 'yporcrits. Same here!” + </p> + <p> + Her stillness, her appalled stillness, wore to him an air of fascinated + attention. He asked abruptly: + </p> + <p> + “Where is it?” + </p> + <p> + She made an effort to breathe out: + </p> + <p> + “Where's what?” + </p> + <p> + His tone expressed excited secrecy. + </p> + <p> + “The swag—plunder—pieces. It's a game of grab. We must have + it; but it isn't easy, and so you will have to lend a hand. Come! is it + kept in the house?” + </p> + <p> + As often with women, her wits were sharpened by the very terror of the + glimpsed menace. She shook her head negatively. + </p> + <p> + “No.” + </p> + <p> + “Sure?” + </p> + <p> + “Sure,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Ay! Thought so. Does your gentleman trust you?” + </p> + <p> + Again she shook her head. + </p> + <p> + “Blamed 'yporcrit,” he said feelingly, and then reflected: “He's one of + the tame ones, ain't he?” + </p> + <p> + “You had better find out for yourself,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “You trust me. I don't want to die before you and I have made friends.” + This was said with a strange air of feline gallantry. Then, tentatively: + “But he could be brought to trust you, couldn't he?” + </p> + <p> + “Trust me?” she said, in a tone which bordered on despair, but which he + mistook for derision. + </p> + <p> + “Stand in with us,” he urged. “Give the chuck to all this blamed + 'yporcrisy. Perhaps, without being trusted, you have managed to find out + something already, eh?” + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps I have,” she uttered with lips that seemed to her to be freezing + fast. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo now looked at her calm face with something like respect. He was + even a little awed by her stillness, by her economy of words. Womanlike, + she felt the effect she had produced, the effect of knowing much and of + keeping all her knowledge in reserve. So far, somehow, this had come, + about of itself. Thus encouraged, directed in the way of duplicity, the + refuge of the weak, she made a heroically conscious effort and forced her + stiff, cold lips into a smile. + </p> + <p> + Duplicity—the refuge of the weak and the cowardly, but of the + disarmed, too! Nothing stood between the enchanted dream of her existence + and a cruel catastrophe but her duplicity. It seemed to her that the man + sitting there before her was an unavoidable presence, which had attended + all her life. He was the embodied evil of the world. She was not ashamed + of her duplicity. With a woman's frank courage, as soon as she saw that + opening she threw herself into it without reserve, with only one doubt—that + of her own strength. She was appalled by the situation; but already all + her aroused femininity, understanding that whether Heyst loved her or not + she loved him, and feeling that she had brought this on his head, faced + the danger with a passionate desire to defend her own. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER THREE + </h2> + <p> + To Ricardo the girl had been so unforeseen that he was unable to bring + upon her the light of his critical faculties. Her smile appeared to him + full of promise. He had not expected her to be what she was. Who, from the + talk he had heard, could expect to meet a girl like this? She was a + blooming miracle, he said to himself, familiarly, yet with a tinge of + respect. She was no meat for the likes of that tame, respectable + gin-slinger. Ricardo grew hot with indignation. Her courage, her physical + strength, demonstrated at the cost of his discomfiture, commanded his + sympathy. He felt himself drawn to her by the proofs of her amazing + spirit. Such a girl! She had a strong soul; and her reflective disposition + to throw over her connection proved that she was no hypocrite. + </p> + <p> + “Is your gentleman a good shot?” he said, looking down on the floor again, + as if indifferent. + </p> + <p> + She hardly understood the phrase; but in its form it suggested some + accomplishment. It was safe to whisper an affirmative. + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Mine, too—and better than good,” Ricardo murmured, and then, in a + confidential burst: “I am not so good at it, but I carry a pretty deadly + thing about me, all the same!” + </p> + <p> + He tapped his leg. She was past the stage of shudders now. Stiff all over, + unable even to move her eyes, she felt an awful mental tension which was + like blank forgetfulness. Ricardo tried to influence her in his own way. + </p> + <p> + “And my gentleman is not the sort that would drop me. He ain't no + foreigner; whereas you, with your baron, you don't know what's before you—or, + rather, being a woman, you know only too well. Much better not to wait for + the chuck. Pile in with us and get your share—of the plunder, I + mean. You have some notion about it already.” + </p> + <p> + She felt that if she as much as hinted by word or sign that there was no + such thing on the island, Heyst's life wouldn't be worth half an hour's + purchase; but all power of combining words had vanished in the tension of + her mind. Words themselves were too difficult to think of—all except + the word “yes,” the saving word! She whispered it with not a feature of + her face moving. To Ricardo the faint and concise sound proved a cool, + reserved assent, more worth having from that amazing mistress of herself + than a thousand words from any other woman. He thought with exultation + that he had come upon one in a million—in ten millions! His whisper + became frankly entreating. + </p> + <p> + “That's good! Now all you've got to do is to make sure where he keeps his + swag. Only do be quick about it! I can't stand much longer this + crawling-on-the-stomach business so as not to scare your gentleman. What + do you think a fellow is—a reptile?” + </p> + <p> + She stared without seeing anyone, as a person in the night sits staring + and listening to deadly sounds, to evil incantations. And always in her + head there was that tension of the mind trying to get hold of something, + of a saving idea which seemed to be so near and could not be captured. + Suddenly she seized it. Yes—she had to get that man out of the + house. At that very moment, raised outside, not very near, but heard + distinctly, Heyst's voice uttered the words: + </p> + <p> + “Have you been looking out for me, Wang?” + </p> + <p> + It was for her like a flash of lightning framed in the darkness which had + beset her on all sides, showing a deadly precipice right under her feet. + With a convulsive movement she sat up straight, but had no power to rise. + Ricardo, on the contrary, was on his feet on the instant, as noiseless as + a cat. His yellow eyes gleamed, gliding here and there; but he too seemed + unable to make another movement. Only his moustaches stirred visibly, like + the feelers of some animal. + </p> + <p> + Wang's answer, “Ya tuan,” was heard by the two in the room, but more + faintly. Then Heyst again: + </p> + <p> + “All right! You may bring the coffee in. Mem Putih out in the room yet?” + </p> + <p> + To this question Wang made no answer. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo's and the girl's eyes met, utterly without expression, all their + faculties being absorbed in listening for the first sound of Heyst's + footsteps, for any sound outside which would mean that Ricardo's retreat + was cut off. Both understood perfectly well that Wang must have gone round + the house, and that he was now at the back, making it impossible for + Ricardo to slip out unseen that way before Heyst came in at the front. + </p> + <p> + A darkling shade settled on the face of the devoted secretary. Here was + the business utterly spoiled! It was the gloom of anger, and even of + apprehension. He would perhaps have made a dash for it through the back + door, if Heyst had not been heard ascending the front steps. He climbed + them slowly, very slowly, like a man who is discouraged or weary—or + simply thoughtful; and Ricardo had a mental vision of his face, with its + martial moustache, the lofty forehead, the impassive features, and the + quiet, meditative eyes. Trapped! Confound it! After all, perhaps the + governor was right. Women had to be shunned. Fooling with this one had + apparently ruined the whole business. For, trapped as he was he might just + as well kill, since, anyhow, to be seen was to be unmasked. But he was too + fair-minded to be angry with the girl. + </p> + <p> + Heyst had paused on the veranda, or in the very doorway. + </p> + <p> + “I shall be shot down like a dog if I ain't quick,” Ricardo muttered + excitedly to the girl. + </p> + <p> + He stooped to get hold of his knife; and the next moment would have hurled + himself out through the curtain, nearly, as prompt and fully as deadly to + Heyst as an unexpected thunderbolt. The feel more than the strength of the + girl's hand, clutching at his shoulder, checked him. He swung round, + crouching with a yellow upward glare. Ah! Was she turning against him? + </p> + <p> + He would have stuck his knife into the hollow of her bare throat if he had + not seen her other hand pointing to the window. It was a long opening, + high up, close under the ceiling almost, with a single pivoting shutter. + </p> + <p> + While he was still looking at it she moved noiselessly away, picking up + the overturned chair, and placed it under the wall. Then she looked round; + but he didn't need to be beckoned to. In two long, tiptoeing strides he + was at her side. + </p> + <p> + “Be quick!” she gasped. + </p> + <p> + He seized her hand and wrung it with all the force of his dumb gratitude, + as a man does to a chum when there is no time for words. Then he mounted + the chair. Ricardo was short—too short to get over without a noisy + scramble. He hesitated an instant; she, watchful, bore rigidly on the seat + with her beautiful bare arms, while, light and sure, he used the back of + the chair as a ladder. The masses of her brown hair fell all about her + face. + </p> + <p> + Footsteps resounded in the next room, and Heyst's voice, not very loud, + called her by name. + </p> + <p> + “Lena!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes! In a minute,” she answered with a particular intonation which she + knew would prevent Heyst from coming in at once. + </p> + <p> + When she looked up, Ricardo had vanished, letting himself down outside so + lightly that she had not heard the slightest noise. She stood up then, + bewildered, frightened, as if awakened from a drugged sleep, with heavy, + downcast, unseeing eyes, her fortitude tired out, her imagination as if + dead within her and unable to keep her fear alive. + </p> + <p> + Heyst moved about aimlessly in the other room. This sound roused her + exhausted wits. At once she began to think, hear, see; and what she saw—or + rather recognized, for her eyes had been resting on it all the time—was + Ricardo's straw slipper, lost in the scuffle, lying near the bath. She had + just time to step forward and plant her foot on it when the curtains + shook, and, pushed aside, disclosed Heyst in the doorway. + </p> + <p> + Out of the appeased enchantment of the senses she had found with him, like + a sort of bewitched state, his danger brought a sensation of warmth to her + breast. She felt something stir in there, something profound, like a new + sort of life. + </p> + <p> + The room was in partial darkness, Ricardo having accidentally swung the + pivoted shutter as he went out of the window. Heyst peered from the + doorway. + </p> + <p> + “Why, you haven't done your hair yet,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “I won't stop to do it now. I shan't be long,” she replied steadily, and + remained still, feeling Ricardo's slipper under the sole of her foot. + </p> + <p> + Heyst, with a movement of retreat, let the curtain drop slowly. On the + instant she stooped for the slipper, and, with it in her hand, spun round + wildly, looking for some hiding-place; but there was no such spot in the + bare room. The chest, the leather bunk, a dress or two of hers hanging on + pegs—there was no place where the merest hazard might not guide + Heyst's hand at any moment. Her wildly roaming eyes were caught by the + half-closed window. She ran to it, and by raising herself on her toes was + able to reach the shutter with her fingertips. She pushed it square, stole + back to the middle of the room, and, turning about, swung her arm, + regulating the force of the throw so as not to let the slipper fly too far + out and hit the edge of the overhanging eaves. It was a task of the nicest + judgement for the muscles of those round arms, still quivering from the + deadly wrestle with a man, for that brain, tense with the excitement of + the situation and for the unstrung nerves flickering darkness before her + eyes. At last the slipper left her hand. As soon as it passed the opening, + it was out of her sight. She listened. She did not hear it strike + anything; it just vanished, as if it had wings to fly on through the air. + Not a sound! It had gone clear. + </p> + <p> + Her valiant arms hanging close against her side, she stood as if turned + into stone. A faint whistle reached her ears. The forgetful Ricardo, + becoming very much aware of his loss, had been hanging about in great + anxiety, which was relieved by the appearance of the slipper flying from + under the eaves; and now, thoughtfully, he had ventured a whistle to put + her mind at ease. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly the girl reeled forward. She saved herself from a fall only by + embracing with both arms one of the tall, roughly carved posts holding the + mosquito net above the bed. For a long time she clung to it, with her + forehead leaning against the wood. One side of her loosened sarong had + slipped down as low as her hip. The long brown tresses of her hair fell in + lank wisps, as if wet, almost black against her white body. Her uncovered + flank, damp with the sweat of anguish and fatigue, gleamed coldly with the + immobility of polished marble in the hot, diffused light falling through + the window above her head—a dim reflection of the consuming, + passionate blaze of sunshine outside, all aquiver with the effort to set + the earth on fire, to burn it to ashes. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FOUR + </h2> + <p> + Heyst, seated at the table with his chin on his breast, raised his head at + the faint rustle of Lena's dress. He was startled by the dead pallor of + her cheeks, by something lifeless in her eyes, which looked at him + strangely, without recognition. But to his anxious inquiries she answered + reassuringly that there was nothing the matter with her, really. She had + felt giddy on rising. She had even had a moment of faintness, after her + bath. She had to sit down to wait for it to pass. This had made her late + dressing. + </p> + <p> + “I didn't try to do my hair. I didn't want to keep you waiting any + longer,” she said. + </p> + <p> + He was unwilling to press her with questions about her health, since she + seemed to make light of this indisposition. She had not done her hair, but + she had brushed it, and had tied it with a ribbon behind. With her + forehead uncovered, she looked very young, almost a child, a careworn + child; a child with something on its mind. + </p> + <p> + What surprised Heyst was the non-appearance of Wang. The Chinaman had + always materialized at the precise moment of his service, neither too soon + nor too late. This time the usual miracle failed. What was the meaning of + this? + </p> + <p> + Heyst raised his voice—a thing he disliked doing. It was promptly + answered from the compound: + </p> + <p> + “Ada tuan!” + </p> + <p> + Lena, leaning on her elbow, with her eyes on her plate, did not seem to + hear anything. When Wang entered with a tray, his narrow eyes, tilted + inward by the prominence of salient cheek-bones, kept her under stealthy + observation all the time. Neither the one nor the other of that white + couple paid the slightest attention to him and he withdrew without having + heard them exchange a single word. He squatted on his heels on the back + veranda. His Chinaman's mind, very clear but not far-reaching, was made up + according to the plain reason of things, such as it appeared to him in the + light of his simple feeling for self-preservation, untrammelled by any + notions of romantic honour or tender conscience. His yellow hands, lightly + clasped, hung idly between his knees. The graves of Wang's ancestors were + far away, his parents were dead, his elder brother was a soldier in the + yamen of some Mandarin away in Formosa. No one near by had a claim on his + veneration or his obedience. He had been for years a labouring restless + vagabond. His only tie in the world was the Alfuro woman, in exchange for + whom he had given away some considerable part of his hard-earned + substance; and his duty, in reason, could be to no one but himself. + </p> + <p> + The scuffle behind the curtain was a thing of bad augury for that Number + One for whom the Chinaman had neither love nor dislike. He had been awed + enough by that development to hang back with the coffee-pot till at last + the white man was induced to call him in. Wang went in with curiosity. + Certainly, the white woman looked as if she had been wrestling with a + spirit which had managed to tear half her blood out of her before letting + her go. As to the man, Wang had long looked upon him as being in some sort + bewitched; and now he was doomed. He heard their voices in the room. Heyst + was urging the girl to go and lie down again. He was extremely concerned. + She had eaten nothing. + </p> + <p> + “The best thing for you. You really must!” + </p> + <p> + She sat listless, shaking her head from time to time negatively, as if + nothing could be any good. But he insisted; she saw the beginning of + wonder in his eyes, and suddenly gave way. + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps I had better.” + </p> + <p> + She did not want to arouse his wonder, which would lead him straight to + suspicion. He must not suspect! + </p> + <p> + Already, with the consciousness of her love for this man, of that + something rapturous and profound going beyond the mere embrace, there was + born in her a woman's innate mistrust of masculinity, of that seductive + strength allied to an absurd, delicate shrinking from the recognition of + the naked necessity of facts, which never yet frightened a woman worthy of + the name. She had no plan; but her mind, quieted down somewhat by the very + effort to preserve outward composure for his sake, perceived that her + behaviour had secured, at any rate, a short period of safety. Perhaps + because of the similarity of their miserable origin in the dregs of + mankind, she had understood Ricardo perfectly. He would keep quiet for a + time now. In this momentarily soothing certitude her bodily fatigue + asserted itself, the more overpoweringly since its cause was not so much + the demand on her strength as the awful suddenness of the stress she had + had to meet. She would have tried to overcome it from the mere instinct of + resistance, if it had not been for Heyst's alternate pleadings and + commands. Before this eminently masculine fussing she felt the woman's + need to give way, the sweetness of surrender. + </p> + <p> + “I will do anything you like,” she said. + </p> + <p> + Getting up, she was surprised by a wave of languid weakness that came over + her, embracing and enveloping her like warm water, with a noise in her + ears as of a breaking sea. + </p> + <p> + “You must help me along,” she added quickly. + </p> + <p> + While he put his arm round her waist—not by any means an uncommon + thing for him to do—she found a special satisfaction in the feeling + of being thus sustained. She abandoned all her weight to that encircling + and protecting pressure, while a thrill went through her at the sudden + thought that it was she who would have to protect him, to be the defender + of a man who was strong enough to lift her bodily, as he was doing even + then in his two arms. For Heyst had done this as soon as they had crept + through the doorway of the room. He thought it was quicker and simpler to + carry her the last step or two. He had grown really too anxious to be + aware of the effort. He lifted her high and deposited her on the bed, as + one lays a child on its side in a cot. Then he sat down on the edge, + masking his concern with a smile which obtained no response from the + dreamy immobility of her eyes. But she sought his hand, seized it eagerly; + and while she was pressing it with all the force of which she was capable, + the sleep she needed overtook her suddenly, overwhelmingly, as it + overtakes a child in a cot, with her lips parted for a safe, endearing + word which she had thought of but had no time to utter. + </p> + <p> + The usual flaming silence brooded over Samburan. + </p> + <p> + “What in the world is this new mystery?” murmured Heyst to himself, + contemplating her deep slumber. + </p> + <p> + It was so deep, this enchanted sleep, that when some time afterwards he + gently tried to open her fingers and free his hand, he succeeded without + provoking the slightest stir. + </p> + <p> + “There is some very simple explanation, no doubt,” he thought, as he stole + out into the living-room. + </p> + <p> + Absent-mindedly he pulled a book out of the top shelf, and sat down with + it; but even after he had opened it on his knee, and had been staring at + the pages for a time, he had not the slightest idea of what it was about. + He stared and stared at the crowded, parallel lines. It was only when, + raising his eyes for no particular reason, he saw Wang standing motionless + on the other side of the table, that he regained complete control of his + faculties. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes,” he said, as if suddenly reminded of a forgotten appointment of + a not particularly welcome sort. + </p> + <p> + He waited a little, and then, with reluctant curiosity, forced himself to + ask the silent Wang what he had to say. He had some idea that the matter + of the vanished revolver would come up at last; but the guttural sounds + which proceeded from the Chinaman did not refer to that delicate subject. + His speech was concerned with cups, saucers, plates, forks, and knives. + All these things had been put away in the cupboards on the back veranda, + where they belonged, perfectly clean, “all plopel.” Heyst wondered at the + scrupulosity of a man who was about to abandon him; for he was not + surprised to hear Wang conclude the account of his stewardship with the + words: + </p> + <p> + “I go now.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh! You go now?” said Heyst, leaning back, his book on his knees. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Me no likee. One man, two man, three man—no can do! Me go + now.” + </p> + <p> + “What's frightening you away like this?” asked Heyst, while through his + mind flashed the hope that something enlightening might come from that + being so unlike himself, taking contact with the world with a simplicity + and directness of which his own mind was not capable. “Why?” he went on. + “You are used to white men. You know them well.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Me savee them,” assented Wang inscrutably. “Me savee plenty.” + </p> + <p> + All that he really knew was his own mind. He had made it up to withdraw + himself and the Alfuro woman from the uncertainties of the relations which + were going to establish themselves between those white men. It was Pedro + who had been the first cause of Wang's suspicion and fear. The Chinaman + had seen wild men. He had penetrated, in the train of a Chinese pedlar, up + one or two of the Bornean rivers into the country of the Dyaks. He had + also been in the interior of Mindanao, where there are people who live in + trees—savages, no better than animals; but a hairy brute like Pedro, + with his great fangs and ferocious growls, was altogether beyond his + conception of anything that could be looked upon as human. The strong + impression made on him by Pedro was the prime inducement which had led + Wang to purloin the revolver. Reflection on the general situation, and on + the insecurity of Number One, came later, after he had obtained possession + of the revolver and of the box of cartridges out of the table drawer in + the living-room. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you savee plenty about white men,” Heyst went on in a slightly + bantering tone, after a moment of silent reflection in which he had + confessed to himself that the recovery of the revolver was not to be + thought of, either by persuasion or by some more forcible means. “You + speak in that fashion, but you are frightened of those white men over + there.” + </p> + <p> + “Me no flightened,” protested Wang raucously, throwing up his head—which + gave to his throat a more strained, anxious appearance than ever. “Me no + likee,” he added in a quieter tone. “Me velly sick.” + </p> + <p> + He put his hand over the region under the breast-bone. + </p> + <p> + “That,” said Heyst, serenely positive, “belong one piecee lie. That isn't + proper man-talk at all. And after stealing my revolver, too!” + </p> + <p> + He had suddenly decided to speak about it, because this frankness could + not make the situation much worse than it was. He did not suppose for a + moment that Wang had the revolver anywhere about his person; and after + having thought the matter over, he had arrived at the conclusion that the + Chinaman never meant to use the weapon against him. After a slight start, + because the direct charge had taken him unawares, Wang tore open the front + of his jacket with a convulsive show of indignation. + </p> + <p> + “No hab got. Look see!” he mouthed in pretended anger. + </p> + <p> + He slapped his bare chest violently; he uncovered his very ribs, all astir + with the panting of outraged virtue; his smooth stomach heaved with + indignation. He started his wide blue breeches flapping about his yellow + calves. Heyst watched him quietly. + </p> + <p> + “I never said you had it on you,” he observed, without raising his voice; + “but the revolver is gone from where I kept it.” + </p> + <p> + “Me no savee levolvel,” Wang said obstinately. + </p> + <p> + The book lying open on Heyst's knee slipped suddenly and he made a sharp + movement to catch it up. Wang was unable to see the reason of this because + of the table, and leaped away from what seemed to him a threatening + symptom. When Heyst looked up, the Chinaman was already at the door facing + the room, not frightened, but alert. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter?” asked Heyst. + </p> + <p> + Wang nodded his shaven head significantly at the curtain closing the + doorway of the bedroom. + </p> + <p> + “Me no likee,” he repeated. + </p> + <p> + “What the devil do you mean?” Heyst was genuinely amazed. “Don't like + what?” + </p> + <p> + Wang pointed a long lemon-coloured finger at the motionless folds. + </p> + <p> + “Two,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “Two what? I don't understand.” + </p> + <p> + “Suppose you savee, you no like that fashion. Me savee plenty. Me go now.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst had risen from his chair, but Wang kept his ground in the doorway + for a little longer. His almond-shaped eyes imparted to his face an + expression of soft and sentimental melancholy. The muscles of his throat + moved visibly while he uttered a distinct and guttural “Goodbye” and + vanished from Number One's sight. + </p> + <p> + The Chinaman's departure altered the situation. Heyst reflected on what + would be best to do in view of that fact. For a long time he hesitated; + then, shrugging his shoulders wearily, he walked out on the veranda, down + the steps, and continued at a steady gait, with a thoughtful mien, in the + direction of his guests' bungalow. He wanted to make an important + communication to them, and he had no other object—least of all to + give them the shock of a surprise call. Nevertheless, their brutish + henchman not being on watch, it was Heyst's fate to startle Mr. Jones and + his secretary by his sudden appearance in the doorway. Their conversation + must have been very interesting to prevent them from hearing the visitor's + approach. In the dim room—the shutters were kept constantly closed + against the heat—Heyst saw them start apart. It was Mr. Jones who + spoke: + </p> + <p> + “Ah, here you are again! Come in, come in!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst, taking his hat off in the doorway, entered the room. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FIVE + </h2> + <p> + Waking up suddenly, Lena looked, without raising her head from the pillow, + at the room in which she was alone. She got up quickly, as if to + counteract the awful sinking of her heart by the vigorous use of her + limbs. But this sinking was only momentary. Mistress of herself from + pride, from love, from necessity, and also because of a woman's vanity in + self-sacrifice, she met Heyst, returning from the strangers' bungalow, + with a clear glance and a smile. + </p> + <p> + The smile he managed to answer, but, noticing that he avoided her eyes, + she composed her lips and lowered her gaze. For the same reason she + hastened to speak to him in a tone of indifference, which she put on + without effort, as if she had grown adept in duplicity since sunrise. + </p> + <p> + “You have been over there again?” + </p> + <p> + “I have. I thought—but you had better know first that we have lost + Wang for good.” + </p> + <p> + She repeated “For good?” as if she had not understood. + </p> + <p> + “For good or evil—I shouldn't know which if you were to ask me. He + has dismissed himself. He's gone.” + </p> + <p> + “You expected him to go, though, didn't you?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst sat down on the other side of the table. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. I expected it as soon as I discovered that he had annexed my + revolver. He says he hasn't taken it. That's untrue of course. A Chinaman + would not see the sense of confessing under any circumstances. To deny any + charge is a principle of right conduct; but he hardly expected to be + believed. He was a little enigmatic at the last, Lena. He startled me.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst paused. The girl seemed absorbed in her own thoughts. + </p> + <p> + “He startled me,” repeated Heyst. She noted the anxiety in his tone, and + turned her head slightly to look at him across the table. + </p> + <p> + “It must have been something—to startle you,” she said. In the depth + of her parted lips, like a ripe pomegranate, there was a gleam of white + teeth. + </p> + <p> + “It was only a single word—and some of his gestures. He had been + making a good deal of noise. I wonder we didn't wake you up. How soundly + you can sleep! I say, do you feel all right now?” + </p> + <p> + “As fresh as can be,” she said, treating him to another deep gleam of a + smile. “I heard no noise, and I'm glad of it. The way he talks in his + harsh voice frightens me. I don't like all these foreign people.” + </p> + <p> + “It was just before he went away—bolted out, I should say. He nodded + and pointed at the curtain to our room. He knew you were there, of course. + He seemed to think—he seemed to try to give me to understand that + you were in special—well, danger. You know how he talks.” + </p> + <p> + She said nothing; she made no sound, only the faint tinge of colour ebbed + out of her cheek. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” Heyst went on. “He seemed to try to warn me. That must have been it + Did he imagine I had forgotten your existence? The only word he said was + 'two'. It sounded so, at least. Yes, 'two'—and that he didn't like + it.” + </p> + <p> + “What does that mean?” she whispered. + </p> + <p> + “We know what the word two means, don't we, Lena? We are two. Never were + such a lonely two out of the world, my dear! He might have tried to remind + me that he himself has a woman to look after. Why are you so pale, Lena?” + </p> + <p> + “Am I pale?” she asked negligently. + </p> + <p> + “You are.” Heyst was really anxious. + </p> + <p> + “Well, it isn't from fright,” she protested truthfully. + </p> + <p> + Indeed, what she felt was a sort of horror which left her absolutely in + the full possession of all her faculties; more difficult to bear, perhaps, + for that reason, but not paralysing to her fortitude. + </p> + <p> + Heyst in his turn smiled at her. + </p> + <p> + “I really don't know that there is any reason to be frightened.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean I am not frightened for myself.” + </p> + <p> + “I believe you are very plucky,” he said. The colour had returned to her + face. “I” continued Heyst, “am so rebellious to outward impressions that I + can't say that much about myself. I don't react with sufficient + distinctness.” He changed his tone. “You know I went to see those men + first thing this morning.” + </p> + <p> + “I know. Be careful!” she murmured. + </p> + <p> + “I wonder how one can be careful! I had a long talk with—but I don't + believe you have seen them. One of them is a fantastically thin, long + person, apparently ailing; I shouldn't wonder if he were really so. He + makes rather a point of it in a mysterious manner. I imagine he must have + suffered from tropical fevers, but not so much as he tries to make out. + He's what people would call a gentleman. He seemed on the point of + volunteering a tale of his adventures—for which I didn't ask him—but + remarked that it was a long story; some other time, perhaps. + </p> + <p> + “'I suppose you would like to know who I am?' he asked me. + </p> + <p> + “I told him I would leave it to him, in a tone which, between gentlemen, + could have left no doubt in his mind. He raised himself on his elbow—he + was lying down on the camp-bed—and said: + </p> + <p> + “'I am he who is—'” + </p> + <p> + Lena seemed not to be listening; but when Heyst paused, she turned her + head quickly to him. He took it for a movement of inquiry, but in this he + was wrong. A great vagueness enveloped her impressions, but all her energy + was concentrated on the struggle that she wanted to take upon herself, in + a great exaltation of love and self-sacrifice, which is woman's sublime + faculty; altogether on herself, every bit of it, leaving him nothing, not + even the knowledge of what she did, if that were possible. She would have + liked to lock him up by some stratagem. Had she known of some means to put + him to sleep for days she would have used incantations or philtres without + misgivings. He seemed to her too good for such contacts, and not + sufficiently equipped. This last feeling had nothing to do with the + material fact of the revolver being stolen. She could hardly appreciate + that fact at its full value. + </p> + <p> + Observing her eyes fixed and as if sightless—for the concentration + on her purpose took all expression out of them—Heyst imagined it to + be the effect of a great mental effort. + </p> + <p> + “No use asking me what he meant, Lena; I don't know, and I did not ask + him. The gentleman, as I have told you before, seems devoted to + mystification. I said nothing, and he laid down his head again on the + bundle of rugs he uses for a pillow. He affects a state of great weakness, + but I suspect that he's perfectly capable of leaping to his feet if he + likes. Having been ejected, he said, from his proper social sphere because + he had refused to conform to certain usual conventions, he was a rebel + now, and was coming and going up and down the earth. As I really did not + want to listen to all this nonsense, I told him that I had heard that sort + of story about somebody else before. His grin is really ghastly. He + confessed that I was very far from the sort of man he expected to meet. + Then he said: + </p> + <p> + “'As to me, I am no blacker than the gentleman you are thinking of, and I + have neither more nor less determination.'” + </p> + <p> + Heyst looked across the table at Lena. Propped on her elbows, and holding + her head in both hands, she moved it a little with an air of + understanding. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing could be plainer, eh?” said Heyst grimly. “Unless, indeed, this + is his idea of a pleasant joke; for, when he finished speaking, he burst + into a loud long laugh. I didn't join him!” + </p> + <p> + “I wish you had,” she breathed out. + </p> + <p> + “I didn't join him. It did not occur to me. I am not much of a + diplomatist. It would probably have been wise, for, indeed, I believe he + had said more than he meant to say, and was trying to take it back by this + affected jocularity. Yet when one thinks of it, diplomacy without force in + the background is but a rotten reed to lean upon. And I don't know whether + I could have done it if I had thought of it. I don't know. It would have + been against the grain. Could I have done it? I have lived too long within + myself, watching the mere shadows and shades of life. To deceive a man on + some issue which could be decided quicker, by his destruction while one is + disarmed, helpless, without even the power to run away—no! That + seems to me too degrading. And yet I have you here. I have your very + existence in my keeping. What do you say, Lena? Would I be capable of + throwing you to the lions to save my dignity?” + </p> + <p> + She got up, walked quickly round the table, posed herself on his knees + lightly, throwing one arm round his neck, and whispered in his ear: + </p> + <p> + “You may if you like. And may be that's the only way I would consent to + leave you. For something like that. If it were something no bigger than + your little finger.” + </p> + <p> + She gave him a light kiss on the lips and was gone before he could detain + her. She regained her seat and propped her elbows again on the table. It + was hard to believe that she had moved from the spot at all. The fleeting + weight of her body on his knees, the hug round his neck, the whisper in + his ear, the kiss on his lips, might have been the unsubstantial + sensations of a dream invading the reality of waking life; a sort of + charming mirage in the barren aridity of his thoughts. He hesitated to + speak till she said, businesslike: + </p> + <p> + “Well. And what then?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst gave a start. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes. I didn't join him. I let him have his laugh out by himself. He + was shaking all over, like a merry skeleton, under a cotton sheet he was + covered with—I believe in order to conceal the revolver that he had + in his right hand. I didn't see it, but I have a distinct impression it + was there in his fist. As he had not been looking at me for some time, but + staring into a certain part of the room, I turned my head and saw a hairy, + wild sort of creature which they take about with them, squatting on its + heels in the angle of the walls behind me. He wasn't there when I came in. + I didn't like the notion of that watchful monster behind my back. If I had + been less at their mercy, I should certainly have changed my position. As + things are now, to move would have been a mere weakness. So I remained + where I was. The gentleman on the bed said he could assure me of one + thing; and that was that his presence here was no more morally + reprehensible than mine. + </p> + <p> + “'We pursue the same ends,' he said, 'only perhaps I pursue them with more + openness than you—with more simplicity.' + </p> + <p> + “That's what he said,” Heyst went on, after looking at Lena in a sort of + inquiring silence. “I asked him if he knew beforehand that I was living + here; but he only gave me a ghastly grin. I didn't press him for an + answer, Lena. I thought I had better not.” + </p> + <p> + On her smooth forehead a ray of light always seemed to rest. Her loose + hair, parted in the middle, covered the hands sustaining her head. She + seemed spellbound by the interest of the narrative. Heyst did not pause + long. He managed to continue his relation smoothly enough, beginning + afresh with a piece of comment. + </p> + <p> + “He would have lied impudently—and I detest being told a lie. It + makes me uncomfortable. It's pretty clear that I am not fitted for the + affairs of the wide world. But I did not want him to think that I accepted + his presence too meekly, so I said that his comings or goings on the earth + were none of my business, of course, except that I had a natural curiosity + to know when he would find it convenient to resume them. + </p> + <p> + “He asked me to look at the state he was in. Had I been all alone here, as + they think I am, I should have laughed at him. But not being alone—I + say, Lena, you are sure you haven't shown yourself where you could be + seen?” + </p> + <p> + “Certain,” she said promptly. + </p> + <p> + He looked relieved. + </p> + <p> + “You understand, Lena, that when I ask you to keep so strictly out of + sight, it is because you are not for them to look at—to talk about. + My poor Lena! I can't help that feeling. Do you understand it?” + </p> + <p> + She moved her head slightly in a manner that was neither affirmative nor + negative. + </p> + <p> + “People will have to see me some day,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “I wonder how long it will be possible for you to keep out of sight?” + murmured Heyst thoughtfully. He bent over the table. “Let me finish + telling you. I asked him point blank what it was he wanted with me; he + appeared extremely unwilling to come to the point. It was not really so + pressing as all that, he said. His secretary, who was in fact his partner, + was not present, having gone down to the wharf to look at their boat. + Finally the fellow proposed that he should put off a certain communication + he had to make till the day after tomorrow. I agreed; but I also told him + that I was not at all anxious to hear it. I had no conception in what way + his affairs could concern me. + </p> + <p> + “'Ah, Mr. Heyst,' he said, 'you and I have much more in common than you + think.'” + </p> + <p> + Heyst struck the table with his fist unexpectedly. + </p> + <p> + “It was a jeer; I am sure it was!” + </p> + <p> + He seemed ashamed of this outburst and smiled faintly into the motionless + eyes of the girl. + </p> + <p> + “What could I have done—even if I had had my pockets full of + revolvers?” + </p> + <p> + She made an appreciative sign. + </p> + <p> + “Killing's a sin, sure enough,” she murmured. + </p> + <p> + “I went away,” Heyst continued. “I left him there, lying on his side with + his eyes shut. When I got back here, I found you looking ill. What was it, + Lena? You did give me a scare! Then I had the interview with Wang while + you rested. You were sleeping quietly. I sat here to consider all these + things calmly, to try to penetrate their inner meaning and their outward + bearing. It struck me that the two days we have before us have the + character of a sort of truce. The more I thought of it, the more I felt + that this was tacitly understood between Jones and myself. It was to our + advantage, if anything can be of advantage to people caught so completely + unawares as we are. Wang was gone. He, at any rate, had declared himself, + but as I did not know what he might take it into his head to do, I thought + I had better warn these people that I was no longer responsible for the + Chinaman. I did not want Mr. Wang making some move which would precipitate + the action against us. Do you see my point of view?” + </p> + <p> + She made a sign that she did. All her soul was wrapped in her passionate + determination, in an exalted belief in herself—in the contemplation + of her amazing opportunity to win the certitude, the eternity, of that + man's love. + </p> + <p> + “I never saw two men,” Heyst was saying, “more affected by a piece of + information than Jones and his secretary, who was back in the bungalow by + then. They had not heard me come up. I told them I was sorry to intrude. + </p> + <p> + “'Not at all! Not at all,' said Jones. + </p> + <p> + “The secretary backed away into a corner and watched me like a wary cat. + In fact, they both were visibly on their guard. + </p> + <p> + “'I am come,' I told them, 'to let you know that my servant has deserted—gone + off.' + </p> + <p> + “At first they looked at each other as if they had not understood what I + was saying; but very soon they seemed quite concerned. + </p> + <p> + “'You mean to say your Chink's cleared out?' said Ricardo, coming forward + from his corner. 'Like this—all at once? What did he do it for?' + </p> + <p> + “I said that a Chinaman had always a simple and precise reason for what he + did, but that to get such a reason out of him was not so easy. All he told + me, I said, was that he 'didn't like'. + </p> + <p> + “They were extremely disturbed at this. Didn't like what, they wanted to + know. + </p> + <p> + “'The looks of you and your party,' I told Jones. + </p> + <p> + “'Nonsense!' he cried out, and immediately Ricardo, the short man, struck + in. + </p> + <p> + “'Told you that? What did he take you for, sir—an infant? Or do you + take us for kids?—meaning no offence. Come, I bet you will tell us + next that you've missed something.'” + </p> + <p> + “'I didn't mean to tell you anything of the sort,' I said, 'but as a + matter of fact it is so.' + </p> + <p> + “He slapped his thigh. + </p> + <p> + “'Thought so. What do you think of this trick, governor?' + </p> + <p> + “Jones made some sort of sign to him, and then that extraordinary + cat-faced associate proposed that he and their servant should come out and + help me catch or kill the Chink. + </p> + <p> + “My object, I said, was not to get assistance. I did not intend to chase + the Chinaman. I had come only to warn them that he was armed, and that he + really objected to their presence on the island. I wanted them to + understand that I was not responsible for anything that might happen. + </p> + <p> + “'Do you mean to tell us,' asked Ricardo, 'that there is a crazy Chink + with a six-shooter broke loose on this island, and that you don't care?' + </p> + <p> + “Strangely enough they did not seem to believe my story. They were + exchanging significant looks all the time. Ricardo stole up close to his + principal; they had a confabulation together, and then something happened + which I did not expect. It's rather awkward, too. + </p> + <p> + “Since I would not have their assistance to get hold of the Chink and + recover my property, the least they could do was to send me their servant. + It was Jones who said that, and Ricardo backed up the idea. + </p> + <p> + “'Yes, yes—let our Pedro cook for all hands in your compound! He + isn't so bad as he looks. That's what we will do!' + </p> + <p> + “He bustled out of the room to the veranda, and let out an ear-splitting + whistle for their Pedro. Having heard the brute's answering howl, Ricardo + ran back into the room. + </p> + <p> + “'Yes, Mr. Heyst. This will do capitally, Mr. Heyst. You just direct him + to do whatever you are accustomed to have done for you in the way of + attendance. See?' + </p> + <p> + “Lena, I confess to you that I was taken completely by surprise. I had not + expected anything of the sort. I don't know what I expected. I am so + anxious about you that I can't keep away from these infernal scoundrels. + And only two months ago I would not have cared. I would have defied their + scoundrelism as much as I have scorned all the other intrusions of life. + But now I have you! You stole into my life, and—” + </p> + <p> + Heyst drew a deep breath. The girl gave him a quick, wide-eyed glance. + </p> + <p> + “Ah! That's what you are thinking of—that you have me!” + </p> + <p> + It was impossible to read the thoughts veiled by her steady grey eyes, to + penetrate the meaning of her silences, her words, and even her embraces. + He used to come out of her very arms with the feeling of a baffled man. + </p> + <p> + “If I haven't you, if you are not here, then where are you?” cried Heyst. + “You understand me very well.” + </p> + <p> + She shook her head a little. Her red lips, at which he looked now, her + lips as fascinating as the voice that came out of them, uttered the words: + </p> + <p> + “I hear what you say; but what does it mean?” + </p> + <p> + “It means that I could lie and perhaps cringe for your sake.” + </p> + <p> + “No! No! Don't you ever do that,” she said in haste, while her eyes + glistened suddenly. “You would hate me for it afterwards!” + </p> + <p> + “Hate you?” repeated Heyst, who had recalled his polite manner. “No! You + needn't consider the extremity of the improbable—as yet. But I will + confess to you that I—how shall I call it?—that I dissembled. + First I dissembled my dismay at the unforeseen result of my idiotic + diplomacy. Do you understand, my dear girl?” + </p> + <p> + It was evident that she did not understand the word. Heyst produced his + playful smile, which contrasted oddly with the worried character of his + whole expression. His temples seemed to have sunk in, his face looked a + little leaner. + </p> + <p> + “A diplomatic statement, Lena, is a statement of which everything is true, + but the sentiment which seems to prompt it. I have never been diplomatic + in my relation with mankind—not from regard for its feelings, but + from a certain regard for my own. Diplomacy doesn't go well with + consistent contempt. I cared little for life and still less for death.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't talk like that!” + </p> + <p> + “I dissembled my extreme longing to take these wandering scoundrels by + their throats,” he went on. “I have only two hands—I wish I had a + hundred to defend you—and there were three throats. By that time + their Pedro was in the room too. Had he seen me engaged with their two + throats, he would have been at mine like a fierce dog, or any other savage + and faithful brute. I had no difficulty in dissembling my longing for the + vulgar, stupid, and hopeless argument of fight. I remarked that I really + did not want a servant. I couldn't think of depriving them of their man's + services; but they would not hear me. They had made up their minds. + </p> + <p> + “'We shall send him over at once,' Ricardo said, 'to start cooking dinner + for everybody. I hope you won't mind me coming to eat it with you in your + bungalow; and we will send the governor's dinner over to him here.' + </p> + <p> + “I could do nothing but hold my tongue or bring on a quarrel—some + manifestation of their dark purpose, which we have no means to resist. Of + course, you may remain invisible this evening; but with that + atrocious-brute prowling all the time at the back of the house, how long + can your presence be concealed from these men?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst's distress could be felt in his silence. The girl's head, sustained + by her hands buried in the thick masses of her hair, had a perfect + immobility. + </p> + <p> + “You are certain you have not been seen so far?” he asked suddenly. + </p> + <p> + The motionless head spoke. + </p> + <p> + “How can I be certain? You told me you wanted me to keep out of the way. I + kept out of the way. I didn't ask your reason. I thought you didn't want + people to know that you had a girl like me about you.” + </p> + <p> + “What? Ashamed?” cried Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “It isn't what's right, perhaps—I mean for you—is it?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst lifted his hands, reproachfully courteous. + </p> + <p> + “I look upon it as so very much right that I couldn't bear the idea of any + other than sympathetic, respectful eyes resting on you. I disliked and + mistrusted these fellows from the first. Didn't you understand?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes; I did keep out of sight,” she said. + </p> + <p> + A silence fell. At last Heyst stirred slightly. + </p> + <p> + “All this is of very little importance now,” he said with a sigh. “This is + a question of something infinitely worse than mere looks and thoughts, + however base and contemptible. As I have told you, I met Ricardo's + suggestions by silence. As I was turning away he said: + </p> + <p> + “'If you happen to have the key of that store-room of yours on you, Mr. + Heyst, you may just as well let me have it; I will give it to our Pedro.' + </p> + <p> + “I had it on me, and I tendered it to him without speaking. The hairy + creature was at the door by then, and caught the key, which Ricardo threw + to him, better than any trained ape could have done. I came away. All the + time I had been thinking anxiously of you, whom I had left asleep, alone + here, and apparently ill.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst interrupted himself, with a listening turn of his head. He had heard + the faint sound of sticks being snapped in the compound. He rose and + crossed the room to look out of the back door. + </p> + <p> + “And here the creature is,” he said, returning to the table. “Here he is, + already attending to the fire. Oh, my dear Lena!” + </p> + <p> + She had followed him with her eyes. She watched him go out on the front + veranda cautiously. He lowered stealthily a couple of screens that hung + between the column, and remained outside very still, as if interested by + something on the open ground. Meantime she had risen in her turn, to take + a peep into the compound. Heyst, glancing over his shoulder, saw her + returning to her seat. He beckoned to her, and she continued to move, + crossing the shady room, pure and bright in her white dress, her hair + loose, with something of a sleep-walker in her unhurried motion, in her + extended hand, in the sightless effect of her grey eyes luminous in the + half-light. He had never seen such an expression in her face before. It + had dreaminess in it, intense attention, and something like sternness. + Arrested in the doorway by Heyst's extended arm, she seemed to wake up, + flushed faintly—and this flush, passing off, carried away with it + the strange transfiguring mood. With a courageous gesture she pushed back + the heavy masses of her hair. The light clung to her forehead. Her + delicate nostrils quivered. Heyst seized her arm and whispered excitedly: + </p> + <p> + “Slip out here, quickly! The screens will conceal you. Only you must mind + the stair-space. They are actually out—I mean the other two. You had + better see them before you—” + </p> + <p> + She made a barely perceptible movement of recoil, checked at once, and + stood still. Heyst released her arm. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, perhaps I had better,” she said with unnatural deliberation, and + stepped out on the veranda to stand close by his side. + </p> + <p> + Together, one on each side of the screen, they peeped between the edge of + the canvas and the veranda-post entwined with creepers. A great heat + ascended from the sun-smitten ground, in an ever-rising wave, as if from + some secret store of earth's fiery heart; for the sky was growing cooler + already, and the sun had declined sufficiently for the shadows of Mr. + Jones and his henchman to be projected towards the bungalow side by side—one + infinitely slender, the other short and broad. + </p> + <p> + The two visitors stood still and gazed. To keep up the fiction of his + invalidism, Mr. Jones, the gentleman, leaned on the arm of Ricardo, the + secretary, the top of whose hat just came up to his governor's shoulder. + </p> + <p> + “Do you see them?” Heyst whispered into the girl's ear. “Here they are, + the envoys of the outer world. Here they are before you—evil + intelligence, instinctive savagery, arm in arm. The brute force is at the + back. A trio of fitting envoys perhaps—but what about the welcome? + Suppose I were armed, could I shoot these two down where they stand? Could + I?” + </p> + <p> + Without moving her head, the girl felt for Heyst's hand, pressed it and + thereafter did not let it go. He continued, bitterly playful: + </p> + <p> + “I don't know. I don't think so. There is a strain in me which lays me + under an insensate obligation to avoid even the appearance of murder. I + have never pulled a trigger or lifted my hand on a man, even in + self-defence.” + </p> + <p> + The suddenly tightened grip of her hand checked him. + </p> + <p> + “They are making a move,” she murmured. + </p> + <p> + “Can they be thinking of coming here?” Heyst wondered anxiously. + </p> + <p> + “No, they aren't coming this way,” she said; and there was another pause. + “They are going back to their house,” she reported finally. + </p> + <p> + After watching them a little longer, she let go Heyst's hand and moved + away from the screen. He followed her into the room. + </p> + <p> + “You have seen them now,” he began. “Think what it was to me to see them + land in the dusk, fantasms from the sea—apparitions, chimeras! And + they persist. That's the worst of it—they persist. They have no + right to be—but they are. They ought to have aroused my fury. But I + have refined everything away by this time—anger, indignation, scorn + itself. Nothing's left but disgust. Since you have told me of that + abominable calumny, it has become immense—it extends even to + myself.” He looked up at her. + </p> + <p> + “But luckily I have you. And if only Wang had not carried off that + miserable revolver—yes, Lena, here we are, we two!” + </p> + <p> + She put both her hands on his shoulders and looked straight into his eyes. + He returned her penetrating gaze. It baffled him. He could not pierce the + grey veil of her eyes; but the sadness of her voice thrilled him + profoundly. + </p> + <p> + “You are not reproaching me?” she asked slowly. + </p> + <p> + “Reproach? What a word between us! It could only be myself—but the + mention of Wang has given me an idea. I have been, not exactly cringing, + not exactly lying, but still dissembling. You have been hiding yourself, + to please me, but still you have been hiding. All this is very dignified. + Why shouldn't we try begging now? A noble art? Yes. Lena, we must go out + together. I couldn't think of leaving you alone, and I must—yes, I + must speak to Wang. We shall go and seek that man, who knows what he wants + and how to secure what he wants. We will go at once!” + </p> + <p> + “Wait till I put my hair up,” she agreed instantly, and vanished behind + the curtain. + </p> + <p> + When the curtain had fallen behind her, she turned her head back with an + expression of infinite and tender concern for him—for him whom she + could never hope to understand, and whom she was afraid she could never + satisfy, as if her passion were of a hopelessly lower quality, unable to + appease some exalted and delicate desire of his superior soul. In a couple + of minutes she reappeared. They left the house by the door of the + compound, and passed within three feet of the thunderstruck Pedro, without + even looking in his direction. He rose from stooping over a fire of + sticks, and, balancing himself clumsily, uncovered his enormous fangs in + gaping astonishment. Then suddenly he set off rolling on his bandy legs to + impart to his masters the astonishing discovery of a woman. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SIX + </h2> + <p> + As luck would have it, Ricardo was lounging alone on the veranda of the + former counting-house. He scented some new development at once, and ran + down to meet the trotting, bear-like figure. The deep, growling noises it + made, though they had only a very remote resemblance to the Spanish + language, or indeed to any sort of human speech, were from long practice + quite intelligible to Mr. Jones's secretary. Ricardo was rather surprised. + He had imagined that the girl would continue to keep out of sight. That + line apparently was given up. He did not mistrust her. How could he? + Indeed, he could not think of her existence calmly. + </p> + <p> + He tried to keep her image out of his mind so that he should be able to + use its powers with some approach to that coolness which the complex + nature of the situation demanded from him, both for his own sake and as + the faithful follower of plain Mr. Jones, gentleman. + </p> + <p> + He collected his wits and thought. This was a change of policy, probably + on the part of Heyst. If so, what could it mean? A deep fellow! Unless it + was her doing; in which case—h'm—all right. Must be. She would + know what she was doing. Before him Pedro, lifting his feet alternately, + swayed to and fro sideways—his usual attitude of expectation. His + little red eyes, lost in the mass of hair, were motionless. Ricardo stared + into them with calculated contempt and said in a rough, angry voice: + </p> + <p> + “Woman! Of course there is. We know that without you!” He gave the tame + monster a push. “Git! Vamos! Waddle! Get back and cook the dinner. Which + way did they go, then?” + </p> + <p> + Pedro extended a huge, hairy forearm to show the direction, and went off + on his bandy legs. Advancing a few steps, Ricardo was just in time to see, + above some bushes, two white helmets moving side by side in the clearing. + They disappeared. Now that he had managed to keep Pedro from informing the + governor that there was a woman on the island, he could indulge in + speculation as to the movements of these people. His attitude towards Mr. + Jones had undergone a spiritual change, of which he himself was not yet + fully aware. + </p> + <p> + That morning, before tiffin, after his escape from the Heyst bungalow, + completed in such an inspiring way by the recovery of the slipper, Ricardo + had made his way to their allotted house, reeling as he ran, his head in a + whirl. He was wildly excited by visions of inconceivable promise. He + waited to compose himself before he dared to meet the governor. On + entering the room, he found Mr. Jones sitting on the camp bedstead like a + tailor on his board, cross-legged, his long back against the wall. + </p> + <p> + “I say, sir. You aren't going to tell me you are bored?” + </p> + <p> + “Bored! No! Where the devil have you been all this time?” + </p> + <p> + “Observing—watching—nosing around. What else? I knew you had + company. Have you talked freely, sir?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I have,” muttered Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + “Not downright plain, sir?” + </p> + <p> + “No. I wished you had been here. You loaf all the morning, and now you + come in out of breath. What's the matter?” + </p> + <p> + “I haven't been wasting my time out there,” said Ricardo. “Nothing's the + matter. I—I—might have hurried a bit.” He was in truth still + panting; only it was not with running, but with the tumult of thoughts and + sensations long repressed, which had been set free by the adventure of the + morning. He was almost distracted by them now. He forgot himself in the + maze of possibilities threatening and inspiring. “And so you had a long + talk?” he said, to gain time. + </p> + <p> + “Confound you! The sun hasn't affected your head, has it? Why are you + staring at me like a basilisk?” + </p> + <p> + “Beg pardon, sir. Wasn't aware I stared,” Ricardo apologized + good-humouredly. “The sun might well affect a thicker skull than mine. It + blazes. Phew! What do you think a fellow is, sir—a salamander?” + </p> + <p> + “You ought to have been here,” observed Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + “Did the beast give any signs of wanting to prance?” asked Ricardo + quickly, with absolutely genuine anxiety. “It wouldn't do, sir. You must + play him easy for at least a couple of days, sir. I have a plan. I have a + notion that I can find out a lot in a couple of days.” + </p> + <p> + “You have? In what way?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, by watching,” Ricardo answered slowly. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones grunted. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing new, that. Watch, eh? Why not pray a little, too?” + </p> + <p> + “Ha, ha, ha! That's a good one,” burst out the secretary, fixing Mr. Jones + with mirthless eyes. + </p> + <p> + The latter dropped the subject indolently. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you may be certain of at least two days,” he said. + </p> + <p> + Ricardo recovered himself. His eyes gleamed voluptuously. + </p> + <p> + “We'll pull this off yet—clean—whole—right through, if + you will only trust me, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “I am trusting you right enough,” said Mr. Jones. “It's your interest, + too.” + </p> + <p> + And, indeed, Ricardo was truthful enough in his statement. He did + absolutely believe in success now. But he couldn't tell his governor that + he had intelligences in the enemy's camp. It wouldn't do to tell him of + the girl. Devil only knew what he would do if he learned there was a woman + about. And how could he begin to tell of it? He couldn't confess his + sudden escapade. + </p> + <p> + “We'll pull it off, sir,” he said, with perfectly acted cheerfulness. He + experienced gusts of awful joy expanding in his heart and hot like a + fanned flame. + </p> + <p> + “We must,” pronounced Mr. Jones. “This thing, Martin, is not like our + other tries. I have a peculiar feeling about this. It's a different thing. + It's a sort of test.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo was impressed by the governor's manner; for the first time a hint + of passion could be detected in him. But also a word he used, the word + “test,” had struck him as particularly significant somehow. It was the + last word uttered during that morning's conversation. Immediately + afterwards Ricardo went out of the room. It was impossible for him to keep + still. An elation in which an extraordinary softness mingled with savage + triumph would not allow it. It prevented his thinking, also. He walked up + and down the veranda far into the afternoon, eyeing the other bungalow at + every turn. It gave no sign of being inhabited. Once or twice he stopped + dead short and looked down at his left slipper. Each time he chuckled + audibly. His restlessness kept on increasing till at last it frightened + him. He caught hold of the balustrade of the veranda and stood still, + smiling not at his thought but at the strong sense of life within him. He + abandoned himself to it carelessly, even recklessly. He cared for no one, + friend or enemy. At that moment Mr. Jones called him by name from within. + A shadow fell on the secretary's face. + </p> + <p> + “Here, sir,” he answered; but it was a moment before he could make up his + mind to go in. + </p> + <p> + He found the governor on his feet. Mr. Jones was tired of lying down when + there was no necessity for it. His slender form, gliding about the room, + came to a standstill. + </p> + <p> + “I've been thinking, Martin, of something you suggested. At the time it + did not strike me as practical; but on reflection it seems to me that to + propose a game is as good a way as any to let him understand that the time + has come to disgorge. It's less—how should I say?—vulgar. He + will know what it means. It's not a bad form to give to the business—which + in itself is crude, Martin, crude.” + </p> + <p> + “Want to spare his feelings?” jeered the secretary in such a bitter tone + that Mr. Jones was really surprised. + </p> + <p> + “Why, it was your own notion, confound you!” + </p> + <p> + “Who says it wasn't?” retorted Ricardo sulkily. “But I am fairly sick of + this crawling. No! No! Get the exact bearings of his swag and then a rip + up. That's plenty good enough for him.” + </p> + <p> + His passions being thoroughly aroused, a thirst for blood was allied in + him with a thirst for tenderness—yes, tenderness. A sort of anxious, + melting sensation pervaded and softened his heart when he thought of that + girl—one of his own sort. And at the same time jealousy started + gnawing at his breast as the image of Heyst intruded itself on his fierce + anticipation of bliss. + </p> + <p> + “The crudeness of your ferocity is positively gross, Martin,” Mr. Jones + said disdainfully. “You don't even understand my purpose. I mean to have + some sport out of him. Just try to imagine the atmosphere of the game—the + fellow handling the cards—the agonizing mockery of it! Oh, I shall + appreciate this greatly. Yes, let him lose his money instead of being + forced to hand it over. You, of course, would shoot him at once, but I + shall enjoy the refinement and the jest of it. He's a man of the best + society. I've been hounded out of my sphere by people very much like that + fellow. How enraged and humiliated he will be! I promise myself some + exquisite moments while watching his play.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay, and suppose he suddenly starts prancing. He may not appreciate the + fun.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean you to be present,” Mr. Jones remarked calmly. + </p> + <p> + “Well, as long as I am free to plug him or rip him up whenever I think the + time has come, you are welcome to your bit of sport, sir. I shan't spoil + it.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER SEVEN + </h2> + <p> + It was at this precise moment of their conversation that Heyst had + intruded on Mr. Jones and his secretary with his warning about Wang, as he + had related to Lena. When he left them, the two looked at each other in + wondering silence. My Jones was the first to break it. + </p> + <p> + “I say, Martin!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “What does this mean?” + </p> + <p> + “It's some move. Blame me if I can understand.” + </p> + <p> + “Too deep for you?” Mr. Jones inquired dryly. + </p> + <p> + “It's nothing but some of his infernal impudence,” growled the secretary. + “You don't believe all that about the Chink, do you, sir? 'Tain't true.” + </p> + <p> + “It isn't necessary for it to be true to have a meaning for us. It's the + why of his coming to tell us this tale that's important.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you think he made it up to frighten us?” asked Ricardo. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones scowled at him thoughtfully. + </p> + <p> + “The man looked worried,” he muttered, as if to himself. “Suppose that + Chinaman has really stolen his money! The man looked very worried.” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing but his artfulness, sir,” protested Ricardo earnestly, for the + idea was too disconcerting to entertain. “Is it likely that he would have + trusted a Chink with enough knowledge to make it possible?” he argued + warmly. “Why, it's the very thing that he would keep close about. There's + something else there. Ay, but what?” + </p> + <p> + “Ha, ha, ha!” Mr. Jones let out a ghostly, squeaky laugh. “I've never been + placed in such a ridiculous position before,” he went on, with a + sepulchral equanimity of tone. “It's you, Martin, who dragged me into it. + However, it's my own fault too. I ought to—but I was really too + bored to use my brain, and yours is not to be trusted. You are a hothead!” + </p> + <p> + A blasphemous exclamation of grief escaped from Ricardo. Not to be + trusted! Hothead! He was almost tearful. + </p> + <p> + “Haven't I heard you, sir, saying more than twenty times since we got + fired out from Manila that we should want a lot of capital to work the + East Coast with? You were always telling me that to prime properly all + them officials and Portuguese scallywags we should have to lose heavily at + first. Weren't you always worrying about some means of getting hold of a + good lot of cash? It wasn't to be got hold of by allowing yourself to + become bored in that rotten Dutch town and playing a two-penny game with + confounded beggarly bank clerks and such like. Well, I've brought you + here, where there is cash to be got—and a big lot, to a moral,” he + added through his set teeth. + </p> + <p> + Silence fell. Each of them was staring into a different corner of the + room. Suddenly, with a slight stamp of his foot, Mr. Jones made for the + door. Ricardo caught him up outside. + </p> + <p> + “Put an arm through mine, sir,” he begged him gently but firmly. “No use + giving the game away. An invalid may well come out for a breath of fresh + air after the sun's gone down a bit. That's it, sir. But where do you want + to go? Why did you come out, sir?” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones stopped short. + </p> + <p> + “I hardly know myself,” he confessed in a hollow mutter, staring intently + at the Number One bungalow. “It's quite irrational,” he declared in a + still lower tone. + </p> + <p> + “Better go in, sir,” suggested Ricardo. “What's that? Those screens + weren't down before. He's spying from behind them now, I bet—the + dodging, artful, plotting beast!” + </p> + <p> + “Why not go over there and see if we can't get to the bottom of this + game?” was the unexpected proposal uttered by Mr. Jones. “He will have to + talk to us.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo repressed a start of dismay, but for a moment could not speak. He + only pressed the governor's hand to his side instinctively. + </p> + <p> + “No, sir. What could you say? Do you expect to get to the bottom of his + lies? How could you make him talk? It isn't time yet to come to grips with + that gent. You don't think I would hang back, do you? His Chink, of + course, I'll shoot like a dog the moment I catch sight of him; but as to + that Mr. Blasted Heyst, the time isn't yet. My head's cooler just now than + yours. Let's go in again. Why, we are exposed here. Suppose he took it + into his head to let off a gun on us! He's an unaccountable, 'yporcritical + skunk.” + </p> + <p> + Allowing himself to be persuaded, Mr. Jones returned to his seclusion. The + secretary, however, remained on the veranda—for the purpose, he + said, of seeing whether that Chink wasn't sneaking around; in which case + he proposed to take a long shot at the galoot and chance the consequences. + His real reason was that he wanted to be alone, away from the governor's + deep-sunk eyes. He felt a sentimental desire to indulge his fancies in + solitude. A great change had come over Mr. Ricardo since that morning. A + whole side of him which from prudence, from necessity, from loyalty, had + been kept dormant, was aroused now, colouring his thoughts and disturbing + his mental poise by the vision of such staggering consequences as, for + instance, the possibility of an active conflict with the governor. The + appearance of the monstrous Pedro with his news drew Ricardo out of a + feeling of dreaminess wrapped up in a sense of impending trouble. A woman? + Yes, there was one; and it made all the difference. After driving away + Pedro, and watching the white helmets of Heyst and Lena vanishing among + the bushes he stood lost in meditation. + </p> + <p> + “Where could they be off to like this?” he mentally asked himself. + </p> + <p> + The answer found by his speculative faculties on their utmost stretch was—to + meet that Chink. For in the desertion of Wang Ricardo did not believe. It + was a lying yarn, the organic part of a dangerous plot. Heyst had gone to + combine some fresh move. But then Ricardo felt sure that the girl was with + him—the girl full of pluck, full of sense, full of understanding; an + ally of his own kind! + </p> + <p> + He went indoors briskly. Mr. Jones had resumed his cross-legged pose at + the head of the bed, with his back against the wall. + </p> + <p> + “Anything new?” + </p> + <p> + “No, sir.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo walked about the room as if he had no care in the world. He hummed + snatches of song. Mr. Jones raised his waspish eyebrows, at the sound. The + secretary got down on his knees before an old leather trunk, and, + rummaging in there, brought out a small looking-glass. He fell to + examining his physiognomy in it with silent absorption. + </p> + <p> + “I think I'll shave,” he decided, getting up. + </p> + <p> + He gave a sidelong glance to the governor, and repeated it several times + during the operation, which did not take long, and even afterwards, when + after putting away the implements, he resumed his walking, humming more + snatches of unknown songs. Mr. Jones preserved a complete immobility, his + thin lips compressed, his eyes veiled. His face was like a carving. + </p> + <p> + “So you would like to try your hand at cards with that skunk, sir?” said + Ricardo, stopping suddenly and rubbing his hands. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones gave no sign of having heard anything. + </p> + <p> + “Well, why not? Why shouldn't he have the experience? You remember in that + Mexican town—what's its name?—the robber fellow they caught in + the mountains and condemned to be shot? He played cards half the night + with the jailer and the sheriff. Well, this fellow is condemned, too. He + must give you your game. Hang it all, a gentleman ought to have some + little relaxation! And you have been uncommonly patient, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “You are uncommonly volatile all of a sudden,” Mr. Jones remarked in a + bored voice. “What's come to you?” + </p> + <p> + The secretary hummed for a while, and then said: + </p> + <p> + “I'll try to get him over here for you tonight, after dinner. If I ain't + here myself, don't you worry, sir. I shall be doing a bit of nosing around—see?” + </p> + <p> + “I see,” sneered Mr. Jones languidly. “But what do you expect to see in + the dark?” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo made no answer, and after another turn or two slipped out of the + room. He no longer felt comfortable alone with the governor. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER EIGHT + </h2> + <p> + Meantime Heyst and Lena, walking rather fast, approached Wang's hut. + Asking the girl to wait, Heyst ascended the little ladder of bamboos + giving access to the door. It was as he had expected. The smoky interior + was empty, except for a big chest of sandalwood too heavy for hurried + removal. Its lid was thrown up, but whatever it might have contained was + no longer there. All Wang's possessions were gone. Without tarrying in the + hut, Heyst came back to the girl, who asked no questions, with her strange + air of knowing or understanding everything. + </p> + <p> + “Let us push on,” he said. + </p> + <p> + He went ahead, the rustle of her white skirt following him into the shades + of the forest, along the path of their usual walk. Though the air lay + heavy between straight denuded trunks, the sunlit patches moved on the + ground, and raising her eyes Lena saw far above her head the flutter of + the leaves, the surface shudder on the mighty limbs extended horizontally + in the perfect immobility of patience. Twice Heyst looked over his + shoulder at her. Behind the readiness of her answering smile there was a + fund of devoted, concentrated passion, burning with the hope of a more + perfect satisfaction. They passed the spot where it was their practice to + turn towards the barren summit of the central hill. Heyst held steadily on + his way towards the upper limit of the forest. The moment they left its + shelter, a breeze enveloped them, and a great cloud, racing over the sun, + threw a peculiar sombre tint over everything. Heyst pointed up a + precipitous, rugged path clinging to the side of the hill. It ended in a + barricade of felled trees, a primitively conceived obstacle which must + have cost much labour to erect at just that spot. + </p> + <p> + “This,” Heyst, explained in his urbane tone, “is a barrier against the + march of civilization. The poor folk over there did not like it, as it + appeared to them in the shape of my company—a great step forward, as + some people used to call it with mistaken confidence. The advanced foot + has been drawn back, but the barricade remains.” + </p> + <p> + They went on climbing slowly. The cloud had driven over, leaving an added + brightness on the face of the world. + </p> + <p> + “It's a very ridiculous thing,” Heyst went on; “but then it is the product + of honest fear—fear of the unknown, of the incomprehensible. It's + pathetic, too, in a way. And I heartily wish, Lena, that we were on the + other side of it.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, stop, stop!” she cried, seizing his arm. + </p> + <p> + The face of the barricade they were approaching had been piled up with a + lot of fresh-cut branches. The leaves were still green. A gentle breeze, + sweeping over the top, stirred them a little; but what had startled the + girl was the discovery of several spear-blades protruding from the mass of + foliage. She had made them out suddenly. They did not gleam, but she saw + them with extreme distinctness, very still, very vicious to look at. + </p> + <p> + “You had better let me go forward alone, Lena,” said Heyst. + </p> + <p> + She tugged, persistently at his arm, but after a time, during which he + never ceased to look smilingly into her terrified eyes, he ended by + disengaging himself. + </p> + <p> + “It's a sign rather than a demonstration,” he argued, persuasively. “Just + wait here a moment. I promise not to approach near enough to be stabbed.” + </p> + <p> + As in a nightmare she watched Heyst go up the few yards of the path as if + he never meant to stop; and she heard his voice, like voices heard in + dreams, shouting unknown words in an unearthly tone. Heyst was only + demanding to see Wang. He was not kept waiting very long. Recovering from + the first flurry of her fright, Lena noticed a commotion in the green + top-dressing of the barricade. She exhaled a sigh of relief when the + spear-blades retreated out of sight, sliding inward—the horrible + things! in a spot facing Heyst a pair of yellow hands parted the leaves, + and a face filled the small opening—a face with very noticeable + eyes. It was Wang's face, of course, with no suggestion of a body + belonging to it, like those cardboard faces at which she remembered gazing + as a child in the window of a certain dim shop kept by a mysterious little + man in Kingsland Road. Only this face, instead of mere holes, had eyes + which blinked. She could see the beating of the eyelids. The hands on each + side of the face, keeping the boughs apart, also did not look as if they + belonged to any real body. One of them was holding a revolver—a + weapon which she recognized merely by intuition, never having seen such an + object before. + </p> + <p> + She leaned her shoulders against the rock of the perpendicular hillside + and kept her eyes on Heyst, with comparative composure, since the spears + were not menacing him any longer. Beyond the rigid and motionless back he + presented to her, she saw Wang's unreal cardboard face moving its thin + lips and grimacing artificially. She was too far down the path to hear the + dialogue, carried on in an ordinary voice. She waited patiently for its + end. Her shoulders felt the warmth of the rock; now and then a whiff of + cooler air seemed to slip down upon her head from above; the ravine at her + feet, choked full of vegetation, emitted the faint, drowsy hum of insect + life. Everything was very quiet. She failed to notice the exact moment + when Wang's head vanished from the foliage, taking the unreal hands away + with it. To her horror, the spear-blades came gliding slowly out. The very + hair on her head stirred; but before she had time to cry out, Heyst, who + seemed rooted to the ground, turned round abruptly and began to move + towards her. His great moustaches did not quite hide an ugly but + irresolute smile; and when he had come down near enough to touch her, he + burst out into a harsh laugh: + </p> + <p> + “Ha, ha, ha!” + </p> + <p> + She looked at him, uncomprehending. He cut short his laugh and said + curtly: + </p> + <p> + “We had better go down as we came.” + </p> + <p> + She followed him into the forest. The advance of the afternoon had filled + it with gloom. Far away a slant of light between the trees closed the + view. All was dark beyond. Heyst stopped. + </p> + <p> + “No reason to hurry, Lena,” he said in his ordinary, serenely polite + tones. “We return unsuccessful. I suppose you know, or at least can guess, + what was my object in coming up there?” + </p> + <p> + “No, I can't guess, dear,” she said, and smiled, noticing with emotion + that his breast was heaving as if he had been out of breath. Nevertheless, + he tried to command his speech, pausing only a little between the words. + </p> + <p> + “No? I went up to find Wang. I went up”—he gasped again here, but + this was for the last time—“I made you come with me because I didn't + like to leave you unprotected in the proximity of those fellows.” Suddenly + he snatched his cork helmet off his head and dashed it on the ground. + “No!” he cried roughly. “All this is too unreal altogether. It isn't to be + borne! I can't protect you! I haven't the power.” + </p> + <p> + He glared at her for a moment, then hastened after his hat which had + bounded away to some distance. He came back looking at her face, which was + very white. + </p> + <p> + “I ought to beg your pardon for these antics,” he said, adjusting his hat. + “A movement of childish petulance! Indeed, I feel very much like a child + in my ignorance, in my powerlessness, in my want of resource, in + everything except in the dreadful consciousness of some evil hanging over + your head—yours!” + </p> + <p> + “It's you they are after,” she murmured. + </p> + <p> + “No doubt, but unfortunately—” + </p> + <p> + “Unfortunately—what?” + </p> + <p> + “Unfortunately, I have not succeeded with Wang,” he said. “I failed to + move his Celestial, heart—that is, if there is such a thing. He told + me with horrible Chinese reasonableness that he could not let us pass the + barrier, because we should be pursued. He doesn't like fights. He gave me + to understand that he would shoot me with my own revolver without any sort + of compunction, rather than risk a rude and distasteful contest with the + strange barbarians for my sake. He has preached to the villagers. They + respect him. He is the most remarkable man they have ever seen, and their + kinsman by marriage. They understand his policy. And anyway only women and + children and a few old fellows are left in the village. This is the season + when the men are away in trading vessels. But it would have been all the + same. None of them have a taste for fighting—and with white men too! + They are peaceable, kindly folk and would have seen me shot with extreme + satisfaction. Wang seemed to think my insistence—for I insisted, you + know—very stupid and tactless. But a drowning man clutches at + straws. We were talking in such Malay as we are both equal to. + </p> + <p> + “'Your fears are foolish,' I said to him. + </p> + <p> + “'Foolish? of course I am foolish,' he replied. 'If I were a wise man, I + would be a merchant with a big hong in Singapore, instead of being a mine + coolie turned houseboy. But if you don't go away in time, I will shoot you + before it grows too dark to take aim. Not till then, Number One, but I + will do it then. Now—finish!' + </p> + <p> + “'All right,' I said. 'Finish as far as I am concerned; but you can have + no objections to the mem putih coming over to stay with the Orang Kaya's + women for a few days. I will make a present in silver for it.' Orang Kaya, + is the head man of the village, Lena,” added Heyst. + </p> + <p> + She looked at him in astonishment. + </p> + <p> + “You wanted me to go to that village of savages?” she gasped. “You wanted + me to leave you?” + </p> + <p> + “It would have given me a freer hand.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst stretched out his hands and looked at them for a moment, then let + them fall by his side. Indignation was expressed more in the curve of her + lips than in her clear eyes, which never wavered. + </p> + <p> + “I believe Wang laughed,” he went on. “He made a noise like a + turkey-cock.” + </p> + <p> + “'That would be worse than anything,' he told me. + </p> + <p> + “I was taken aback. I pointed out to him that he was talking nonsense. It + could not make any difference to his security where you were, because the + evil men, as he calls them, did not know of your existence. I did not lie + exactly, Lena, though I did stretch the truth till it cracked; but the + fellow seems to have an uncanny insight. He shook his head. He assured me + they knew all about you. He made a horrible grimace at me.” + </p> + <p> + “It doesn't matter,” said the girl. “I didn't want—I would not have + gone.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst raised his eyes. + </p> + <p> + “Wonderful intuition! As I continued to press him, Wang made that very + remark about you. When he smiles, his face looks like a conceited death's + head. It was his very last remark that you wouldn't want to. I went away + then.” + </p> + <p> + She leaned back against a tree. Heyst faced her in the same attitude of + leisure, as if they had done with time and all the other concerns of the + earth. Suddenly, high above their heads the roof of leaves whispered at + them tumultuously and then ceased. + </p> + <p> + “That was a strange notion of yours, to send me away,” she said. “Send me + away? What for? Yes, what for?” + </p> + <p> + “You seem indignant,” he remarked listlessly. + </p> + <p> + “To these savages, too!” she pursued. “And you think I would have gone? + You can do what you like with me—but not that, not that!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst looked into the dim aisles of the forest. Everything was so still + now that the very ground on which they stood seemed to exhale silence into + the shade. + </p> + <p> + “Why be indignant?” he remonstrated. “It has not happened. I gave up + pleading with Wang. Here we are, repulsed! Not only without power to + resist the evil, but unable to make terms for ourselves with the worthy + envoys, the envoys extraordinary of the world we thought we had done with + for years and years. And that's bad, Lena, very bad.” + </p> + <p> + “It's funny,” she said thoughtfully. “Bad? I suppose it is. I don't know + that it is. But do you? Do you? You talk as if you didn't believe in it.” + </p> + <p> + She gazed at him earnestly. + </p> + <p> + “Do I? Ah! That's it. I don't know how to talk. I have managed to refine + everything away. I've said to the Earth that bore me: 'I am I and you are + a shadow.' And, by Jove, it is so! But it appears that such words cannot + be uttered with impunity. Here I am on a Shadow inhabited by Shades. How + helpless a man is against the Shades! How is one to intimidate, persuade, + resist, assert oneself against them? I have lost all belief in realities . + . . Lena, give me your hand.” + </p> + <p> + She looked at him surprised, uncomprehending. + </p> + <p> + “Your hand,” he cried. + </p> + <p> + She obeyed; he seized it with avidity as if eager to raise it to his lips, + but halfway up released his grasp. They looked at each other for a time. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter, dear?” she whispered timidly. + </p> + <p> + “Neither force nor conviction,” Heyst muttered wearily to himself. “How am + I to meet this charmingly simple problem?” + </p> + <p> + “I am sorry,” she murmured. + </p> + <p> + “And so am I,” he confessed quickly. “And the bitterest of this + humiliation is its complete uselessness—which I feel, I feel!” + </p> + <p> + She had never before seen him give such signs of feeling. Across his + ghastly face the long moustaches flamed in the shade. He spoke suddenly: + </p> + <p> + “I wonder if I could find enough courage to creep among them in the night, + with a knife, and cut their throats one after another, as they slept! I + wonder—” + </p> + <p> + She was frightened by his unwonted appearance more than by the words in + his mouth, and said earnestly: + </p> + <p> + “Don't you try to do such a thing! Don't you think of it!” + </p> + <p> + “I don't possess anything bigger than a penknife. As to thinking of it, + Lena, there's no saying what one may think of. I don't think. Something in + me thinks—something foreign to my nature. What is the matter?” + </p> + <p> + He noticed her parted lips, and the peculiar stare in her eyes, which had + wandered from his face. + </p> + <p> + “There's somebody after us. I saw something white moving,” she cried. + </p> + <p> + Heyst did not turn his head; he only glanced at her out-stretched arm. + </p> + <p> + “No doubt we are followed; we are watched.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't see anything now,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “And it does not matter,” Heyst went on in his ordinary voice. “Here we + are in the forest. I have neither strength nor persuasion. Indeed, it's + extremely difficult to be eloquent before a Chinaman's head stuck at one + out of a lot of brushwood. But can we wander among these big trees + indefinitely? Is this a refuge? No! What else is left to us? I did think + for a moment of the mine; but even there we could not remain very long. + And then that gallery is not safe. The props were too weak to begin with. + Ants have been at work there—ants after the men. A death-trap, at + best. One can die but once, but there are many manners of death.” + </p> + <p> + The girl glanced about fearfully, in search of the watcher or follower + whom she had glimpsed once among the trees; but if he existed, he had + concealed himself. Nothing met her eyes but the deepening shadows of the + short vistas between the living columns of the still roof of leaves. She + looked at the man beside her expectantly, tenderly, with suppressed + affright and a sort of awed wonder. + </p> + <p> + “I have also thought of these people's boat,” Heyst went on. “We could get + into that, and—only they have taken everything out of her. I have + seen her oars and mast in a corner of their room. To shove off in an empty + boat would be nothing but a desperate expedient, supposing even that she + would drift out a good distance between the islands before the morning. It + would only be a complicated manner of committing suicide—to be found + dead in a boat, dead from sun and thirst. A sea mystery. I wonder who + would find us! Davidson, perhaps; but Davidson passed westward ten days + ago. I watched him steaming past one early morning, from the jetty.” + </p> + <p> + “You never told me,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “He must have been looking at me through his big binoculars. Perhaps, if I + had raised my arm—but what did we want with Davidson then, you and + I? He won't be back this way for three weeks or more, Lena. I wish I had + raised my arm that morning.” + </p> + <p> + “What would have been the good of it?” she sighed out. + </p> + <p> + “What good? No good, of course. We had no forebodings. This seemed to be + an inexpugnable refuge, where we could live untroubled and learn to know + each other.” + </p> + <p> + “It's perhaps in trouble that people get to know each other,” she + suggested. + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps,” he said indifferently. “At any rate, we would not have gone + away from here with him; though I believe he would have come in eagerly + enough, and ready for any service he could render. It's that fat man's + nature—a delightful fellow. You would not come on the wharf that + time I sent the shawl back to Mrs. Schomberg through him. He has never + seen you.” + </p> + <p> + “I didn't know that you wanted anybody ever to see me,” she said. + </p> + <p> + He had folded his arms on his breast and hung his head. + </p> + <p> + “And I did not know that you cared to be seen as yet. A misunderstanding + evidently. An honourable misunderstanding. But it does not matter now.” + </p> + <p> + He raised his head after a silence. + </p> + <p> + “How gloomy this forest has grown! Yet surely the sun cannot have set + already.” + </p> + <p> + She looked round; and as if her eyes had just been opened, she perceived + the shades of the forest surrounding her, not so much with gloom, but with + a sullen, dumb, menacing hostility. Her heart sank in the engulfing + stillness, at that moment she felt the nearness of death, breathing on her + and on the man with her. If there had been a sudden stir of leaves, the + crack of a dry branch, the faintest rustle, she would have screamed aloud. + But she shook off the unworthy weakness. Such as she was, a + fiddle-scraping girl picked up on the very threshold of infamy, she would + try to rise above herself, triumphant and humble; and then happiness would + burst on her like a torrent, flinging at her feet the man whom she loved. + </p> + <p> + Heyst stirred slightly. + </p> + <p> + “We had better be getting back, Lena, since we can't stay all night in the + woods—or anywhere else, for that matter. We are the slaves of this + infernal surprise which has been sprung on us by—shall I say fate?—your + fate, or mine.” + </p> + <p> + It was the man who had broken the silence, but it was the woman who led + the way. At the very edge of the forest she stopped, concealed by a tree. + He joined her cautiously. + </p> + <p> + “What is it? What do you see, Lena?” he whispered. + </p> + <p> + She said that it was only a thought that had come into her head. She + hesitated for a moment giving him over her shoulder a shining gleam in her + grey eyes. She wanted to know whether this trouble, this danger, this + evil, whatever it was, finding them out in their retreat, was not a sort + of punishment. + </p> + <p> + “Punishment?” repeated Heyst. He could not understand what she meant. When + she explained, he was still more surprised. “A sort of retribution, from + an angry Heaven?” he said in wonder. “On us? What on earth for?” + </p> + <p> + He saw her pale face darken in the dusk. She had blushed. Her whispering + flowed very fast. It was the way they lived together—that wasn't + right, was it? It was a guilty life. For she had not been forced into it, + driven, scared into it. No, no—she had come to him of her own free + will, with her whole soul yearning unlawfully. + </p> + <p> + He was so profoundly touched that he could not speak for a moment. To + conceal his trouble, he assumed his best Heystian manner. + </p> + <p> + “What? Are our visitors then messengers of morality, avengers of + righteousness, agents of Providence? That's certainly an original view. + How flattered they would be if they could hear you!” + </p> + <p> + “Now you are making fun of me,” she said in a subdued voice which broke + suddenly. + </p> + <p> + “Are you conscious of sin?” Heyst asked gravely. She made no answer. “For + I am not,” he added; “before Heaven, I am not!” + </p> + <p> + “You! You are different. Woman is the tempter. You took me up from pity. I + threw myself at you.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you exaggerate, you exaggerate. It was not so bad as that,” he said + playfully, keeping his voice steady with an effort. + </p> + <p> + He considered himself a dead man already, yet forced to pretend that he + was alive for her sake, for her defence. He regretted that he had no + Heaven to which he could recommend this fair, palpitating handful of ashes + and dust—warm, living sentient his own—and exposed helplessly + to insult, outrage, degradation, and infinite misery of the body. + </p> + <p> + She had averted her face from him and was still. He suddenly seized her + passive hand. + </p> + <p> + “You will have it so?” he said. “Yes? Well, let us then hope for mercy + together.” + </p> + <p> + She shook her head without looking at him, like an abashed child. + </p> + <p> + “Remember,” he went on incorrigible with his delicate raillery, “that hope + is a Christian virtue, and surely you can't want all the mercy for + yourself.” + </p> + <p> + Before their eyes the bungalow across the cleared ground stood bathed in a + sinister light. An unexpected chill gust of wind made a noise in the + tree-tops. She snatched her hand away and stepped out into the open; but + before she had advanced more than three yards, she stood still and pointed + to the west. + </p> + <p> + “Oh look there!” she exclaimed. + </p> + <p> + Beyond the headland of Diamond Bay, lying black on a purple sea, great + masses of cloud stood piled up and bathed in a mist of blood. A crimson + crack like an open wound zigzagged between them, with a piece of dark red + sun showing at the bottom. Heyst cast an indifferent glance at the + ill-omened chaos of the sky. + </p> + <p> + “Thunderstorm making up. We shall hear it all night, but it won't visit + us, probably. The clouds generally gather round the volcano.” + </p> + <p> + She was not listening to him. Her eyes reflected the sombre and violent + hues of the sunset. + </p> + <p> + “That does not look much like a sign of mercy,” she said slowly, as if to + herself, and hurried on, followed by Heyst. Suddenly she stopped. “I don't + care. I would do more yet! And some day you'll forgive me. You'll have to + forgive me!” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER NINE + </h2> + <p> + Stumbling up the steps, as if suddenly exhausted, Lena entered the room + and let herself fall on the nearest chair. Before following her, Heyst + took a survey of the surroundings from the veranda. It was a complete + solitude. There was nothing in the aspect of this familiar scene to tell + him that he and the girl were not as completely alone as they had been in + the early days of their common life on this abandoned spot, with only Wang + discreetly materializing from time to time and the uncomplaining memory of + Morrison to keep them company. + </p> + <p> + After the cold gust of wind there was an absolute stillness of the air. + The thunder-charged mass hung unbroken beyond the low, ink-black headland, + darkening the twilight. By contrast, the sky at the zenith displayed + pellucid clearness, the sheen of a delicate glass bubble which the merest + movement of air might shatter. A little to the left, between the black + masses of the headland and of the forest, the volcano, a feather of smoke + by day and a cigar-glow at night, took its first fiery expanding breath of + the evening. Above it a reddish star came out like an expelled spark from + the fiery bosom of the earth, enchanted into permanency by the mysterious + spell of frozen spaces. + </p> + <p> + In front of Heyst the forest, already full of the deepest shades, stood + like a wall. But he lingered, watching its edge, especially where it ended + at the line of bushes, masking the land end of the jetty. Since the girl + had spoken of catching a glimpse of something white among the trees, he + believed pretty firmly that they had been followed in their excursion up + the mountain by Mr. Jones's secretary. No doubt the fellow had watched + them out of the forest, and now, unless he took the trouble to go back + some distance and fetch a considerable circuit inland over the clearing, + he was bound to walk out into the open space before the bungalows. Heyst + did, indeed, imagine at one time some movement between the trees, lost as + soon as perceived. He stared patiently, but nothing more happened. After + all, why should he trouble about these people's actions? Why this stupid + concern for the preliminaries, since, when the issue was joined, it would + find him disarmed and shrinking from the ugliness and degradation of it? + </p> + <p> + He turned and entered the room. Deep dusk reigned in there already. Lena, + near the door, did not move or speak. The sheen of the white tablecloth + was very obtrusive. The brute these two vagabonds had tamed had entered on + its service while Heyst and Lena were away. The table was laid. Heyst + walked up and down the room several times. The girl remained without sound + or movement on the chair. But when Heyst, placing the two silver + candelabra on the table, struck a match to light the candles, she got up + suddenly and went into the bedroom. She came out again almost immediately, + having taken off her hat. Heyst looked at her over his shoulder. + </p> + <p> + “What's the good of shirking the evil hour? I've lighted these candles for + a sign of our return. After all, we might not have been watched—while + returning, I mean. Of course we were seen leaving the house.” + </p> + <p> + The girl sat down again. The great wealth of her hair looked very dark + above her colourless face. She raised her eyes, glistening softly in the + light with a sort of unreadable appeal, with a strange effect of unseeing + innocence. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Heyst across the table, the fingertips of one hand resting on + the immaculate cloth. “A creature with an antediluvian lower jaw, hairy + like a mastodon, and formed like a pre-historic ape, has laid this table. + Are you awake, Lena? Am I? I would pinch myself, only I know that nothing + would do away with this dream. Three covers. You know it is the shorter of + the two who's coming—the gentleman who, in the play of his shoulders + as he walks, and in his facial structure, recalls a Jaguar. Ah, you don't + know what a jaguar is? But you have had a good look at these two. It's the + short one, you know, who's to be our guest.” + </p> + <p> + She made a sign with her head that she knew; Heyst's insistence brought + Ricardo vividly before her mental vision. A sudden languor, like the + physical echo of her struggle with the man, paralysed all her limbs. She + lay still in the chair, feeling very frightened at this phenomenon—ready + to pray aloud for strength. + </p> + <p> + Heyst had started to pace the room. + </p> + <p> + “Our guest! There is a proverb—in Russia, I believe—that when + a guest enters the house, God enters the house. The sacred virtue of + hospitality! But it leads one into trouble as well as any other.” + </p> + <p> + The girl unexpectedly got up from the chair, swaying her supple figure and + stretching her arms above her head. He stopped to look at her curiously, + paused, and then went on: + </p> + <p> + “I venture to think that God has nothing to do with such a hospitality and + with such a guest!” + </p> + <p> + She had jumped to her feet to react against the numbness, to discover + whether her body would obey her will. It did. She could stand up, and she + could move her arms freely. Though no physiologist, she concluded that all + that sudden numbness was in her head, not in her limbs. Her fears + assuaged, she thanked God for it mentally, and to Heyst murmured a + protest: + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes! He's got to do with everything—every little thing. Nothing + can happen—” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” he said hastily, “one of the two sparrows can't be struck to the + ground—you are thinking of that.” The habitual playful smile faded + on the kindly lips under the martial moustache. “Ah, you remember what you + have been told—as a child—on Sundays.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I do remember.” She sank into the chair again. “It was the only + decent bit of time I ever had when I was a kid, with our landlady's two + girls, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “I wonder, Lena,” Heyst said, with a return to his urbane playfulness, + “whether you are just a little child, or whether you represent something + as old as the world.” + </p> + <p> + She surprised Heyst by saying dreamily: + </p> + <p> + “Well—and what about you?” + </p> + <p> + “I? I date later—much later. I can't call myself a child, but I am + so recent that I may call myself a man of the last hour—or is it the + hour before last? I have been out of it so long that I am not certain how + far the hands of the clock have moved since—since—” + </p> + <p> + He glanced at the portrait of his father, exactly above the head of the + girl, as if it were ignoring her in its painted austerity of feeling. He + did not finish the sentence; but he did not remain silent for long. + </p> + <p> + “Only what must be avoided are fallacious inferences, my dear Lena—especially + at this hour.” + </p> + <p> + “Now you are making fun of me again,” she said without looking up. + </p> + <p> + “Am I?” he cried. “Making fun? No, giving warning. Hang it all, whatever + truth people told you in the old days, there is also this one—that + sparrows do fall to the ground, that they are brought to the ground. This + is no vain assertion, but a fact. That's why”—again his tone + changed, while he picked up the table knife and let it fall disdainfully—“that's + why I wish these wretched round knives had some edge on them. Absolute + rubbish—neither edge, point, nor substance. I believe one of these + forks would make a better weapon at a pinch. But can I go about with a + fork in my pocket?” He gnashed his teeth with a rage very real, and yet + comic. + </p> + <p> + “There used to be a carver here, but it was broken and thrown away a long + time ago. Nothing much to carve here. It would have made a noble weapon, + no doubt; but—” + </p> + <p> + He stopped. The girl sat very quiet, with downcast eyes. As he kept + silence for some time, she looked up and said thoughtfully: + </p> + <p> + “Yes, a knife—it's a knife that you would want, wouldn't you, in + case, in case—” + </p> + <p> + He shrugged his shoulders. + </p> + <p> + “There must be a crowbar or two in the sheds; but I have given up all the + keys together. And then, do you see me walking about with a crowbar in my + hand? Ha, ha! And besides, that edifying sight alone might start the + trouble for all I know. In truth, why has it not started yet?” + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps they are afraid of you,” she whispered, looking down again. + </p> + <p> + “By Jove, it looks like it,” he assented meditatively. “They do seem to + hang back for some reason. Is that reason prudence, or downright fear, or + perhaps the leisurely method of certitude?” + </p> + <p> + Out in the black night, not very far from the bungalow, resounded a loud + and prolonged whistle. Lena's hands grasped the sides of the chair, but + she made no movement. Heyst started, and turned his face away from the + door. + </p> + <p> + The startling sound had died away. + </p> + <p> + “Whistles, yells, omens, signals, portents—what do they matter?” he + said. “But what about the crowbar? Suppose I had it! Could I stand in + ambush at the side of the door—this door—and smash the first + protruding head, scatter blood and brains over the floor, over these + walls, and then run stealthily to the other door to do the same thing—and + repeat the performance for a third time, perhaps? Could I? On suspicion, + without compunction, with a calm and determined purpose? No, it is not in + me. I date too late. Would you like to see me attempt this thing while + that mysterious prestige of mine lasts—or their not less mysterious + hesitation?” + </p> + <p> + “No, no!” she whispered ardently, as if compelled to speak by his eyes + fixed on her face. “No, it's a knife you want to defend yourself with—to + defend—there will be time—” + </p> + <p> + “And who knows if it isn't really my duty?” he began again, as if he had + not heard her disjointed words at all. “It may be—my duty to you, to + myself. For why should I put up with the humiliation of their secret + menaces? Do you know what the world would say?” + </p> + <p> + He emitted a low laugh, which struck her with terror. She would have got + up, but he stooped so low over her that she could not move without first + pushing him away. + </p> + <p> + “It would say, Lena, that I—the Swede—after luring my friend + and partner to his death from mere greed of money, have murdered these + unoffending shipwrecked strangers from sheer funk. That would be the story + whispered—perhaps shouted—certainly spread out, and believed—and + believed, my dear Lena!” + </p> + <p> + “Who would believe such awful things?” + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps you wouldn't—not at first, at any rate; but the power of + calumny grows with time. It's insidious and penetrating. It can even + destroy one's faith in oneself—dry-rot the soul.” + </p> + <p> + All at once her eyes leaped to the door and remained fixed, stony, a + little enlarged. Turning his head, Heyst beheld the figure of Ricardo + framed in the doorway. For a moment none of the three moved, then, looking + from the newcomer to the girl in the chair, Heyst formulated a sardonic + introduction. + </p> + <p> + “Mr Ricardo, my dear.” + </p> + <p> + Her head drooped a little. Ricardo's hand went up to his moustache. His + voice exploded in the room. + </p> + <p> + “At your service, ma'am!” + </p> + <p> + He stepped in, taking his hat off with a flourish, and dropping it + carelessly on a chair near the door. + </p> + <p> + “At your service,” he repeated, in quite another tone. “I was made aware + there was a lady about, by that Pedro of ours; only I didn't know I should + have the privilege of seeing you tonight, ma'am.” + </p> + <p> + Lena and Heyst looked at him covertly, but he, with a vague gaze avoiding + them both, looked at nothing, seeming to pursue some point in space. + </p> + <p> + “Had a pleasant walk?” he asked suddenly. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. And you?” returned Heyst, who had managed to catch his glance. + </p> + <p> + “I haven't been a yard away from the governor this afternoon till I + started for here.” The genuineness of the accent surprised Heyst, without + convincing him of the truth of the words. + </p> + <p> + “Why do you ask?” pursued Ricardo with every inflection of perfect + candour. + </p> + <p> + “You might have wished to explore the island a little,” said Heyst, + studying the man, who, to render him justice, did not try to free his + captured gaze. “I may remind you that it wouldn't be a perfectly safe + proceeding.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo presented a picture of innocence. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes—meaning that Chink that has ran away from you. He ain't + much!” + </p> + <p> + “He has a revolver,” observed Heyst meaningly. + </p> + <p> + “Well, and you have a revolver, too,” Mr. Ricardo argued unexpectedly. “I + don't worry myself about that.” + </p> + <p> + “That's different. I am not afraid of you,” Heyst made answer after a + short pause. + </p> + <p> + “Of me?” + </p> + <p> + “Of all of you.” + </p> + <p> + “You have a queer way of putting things,” began Ricardo. + </p> + <p> + At that moment the door on the compound side of the house came open with + some noise, and Pedro entered, pressing the edge of a loaded tray to his + breast. His big, hairy head rolled a little, his feet fell in front of + each other with a short, hard thump on the floor. The arrival changed the + current of Ricardo's thought, perhaps, but certainly of his speech. + </p> + <p> + “You heard me whistling a little while ago outside? That was to give him a + hint, as I came along, that it was time to bring in the dinner; and here + it is.” + </p> + <p> + Lena rose and passed to the right of Ricardo, who lowered his glance for a + moment. They sat down at the table. The enormous gorilla back of Pedro + swayed out through the door. + </p> + <p> + “Extraordinary strong brute, ma'am,” said Ricardo. He, had a propensity to + talk about “his Pedro,” as some men will talk of their dog. “He ain't + pretty, though. No, he ain't pretty. And he has got to be kept under. I am + his keeper, as it might be. The governor don't trouble his head much about + dee-tails. All that's left to Martin. Martin, that's me, ma'am.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst saw the girl's eyes turn towards Mr. Jones's secretary and rest + blankly on his face. Ricardo, however, looked vaguely into space, and, + with faint flickers of a smile about his lips, made conversation + indefatigably against the silence of his entertainers. He boasted largely + of his long association with Mr. Jones—over four years now, he said. + Then, glancing rapidly at Heyst: + </p> + <p> + “You can see at once he's a gentleman, can't you?” + </p> + <p> + “You people,” Heyst said, his habitual playful intonation tinged with + gloom, “are divorced from all reality in my eyes.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo received this speech as if he had been expecting to hear those + very words, or else did not mind at all what Heyst might say. He muttered + an absent-minded “Ay, ay,” played with a bit of biscuit, sighed, and said, + with a peculiar stare which did not seem to carry any distance, but to + stop short at a point in the air very near his face: + </p> + <p> + “Anybody can see at once <i>you</i> are one. You and the governor ought to + understand each other. He expects to see you tonight. The governor isn't + well, and we've got to think of getting away from here.” + </p> + <p> + While saying these words he turned himself full towards Lena, but without + any marked expression. Leaning back with folded arms, the girl stared + before her as if she had been alone in the room. But under that aspect of + almost vacant unconcern the perils and emotion that had entered into her + life warmed her heart, exalted her mind with a sense of an inconceivable + intensity of existence. + </p> + <p> + “Really? Thinking of going away from here?” Heyst murmured. + </p> + <p> + “The best of friends must part,” Ricardo pronounced slowly. “And, as long + as they part friends, there's no harm done. We two are used to be on the + move. You, I understand, prefer to stick in one place.” + </p> + <p> + It was obvious that all this was being said merely for the sake of + talking, and that Ricardo's mind was concentrated on some purpose + unconnected with the words that were coming out of his mouth. + </p> + <p> + “I should like to know,” Heyst asked with incisive politeness, “how you + have come to understand this or anything else about me? As far as I can + remember, I've made you no confidences.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo, gazing comfortably into space out of the back of his chair—for + some time all three had given up any pretence of eating—answered + abstractedly: + </p> + <p> + “Any fellow might have guessed it!” He sat up suddenly, and uncovered all + his teeth in a grin of extraordinary ferocity, which was belied by the + persistent amiability of his tone. “The governor will be the man to tell + you something about that. I wish you would say you would see my governor. + He's the one who does all our talking. Let me take you to him this + evening. He ain't at all well; and he can't make up his mind to go away + without having a talk with you.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst, looking up, met Lena's eyes. Their expression of candour seemed to + hide some struggling intention. Her head, he fancied, had made an + imperceptible affirmative movement. Why? What reason could she have? Was + it the prompting of some obscure instinct? Or was it simply a delusion of + his own senses? But in this strange complication invading the quietude of + his life, in his state of doubt and disdain and almost of despair with + which he looked at himself, he would let even a delusive appearance guide + him through a darkness so dense that it made for indifference. + </p> + <p> + “Well, suppose I <i>do</i> say so.” + </p> + <p> + Ricardo did not conceal his satisfaction, which for a moment interested + Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “It can't be my life they are after,” he said to himself. “What good could + it be to them?” + </p> + <p> + He looked across the table at the girl. What did it matter whether she had + nodded or not? As always when looking into her unconscious eyes, he tasted + something like the dregs of tender pity. He had decided to go. Her nod, + imaginary or not imaginary, advice or illusion, had tipped the scale. He + reflected that Ricardo's invitation could scarcely be anything in the + nature of a trap. It would have been too absurd. Why carry subtly into a + trap someone already bound hand and foot, as it were? + </p> + <p> + All this time he had been looking fixedly at the girl he called Lena. In + the submissive quietness of her being, which had been her attitude ever + since they had begun their life on the island, she remained as secret as + ever. Heyst got up abruptly, with a smile of such enigmatic and despairing + character that Mr. Secretary Ricardo, whose abstract gaze had an all-round + efficiency, made a slight crouching start, as if to dive under the table + for his leg-knife—a start that was repressed, as soon as begun. He + had expected Heyst to spring on him or draw a revolver, because he created + for himself a vision of him in his own image. Instead of doing either of + these obvious things, Heyst walked across the room, opened the door and + put his head through it to look out into the compound. + </p> + <p> + As soon as his back was turned, Ricardo's hand sought the girl's arm under + the table. He was not looking at her, but she felt the groping, nervous + touch of his search, felt suddenly the grip of his fingers above her + wrist. He leaned forward a little; still he dared not look at her. His + hard stare remained fastened on Heyst's back. In an extremely low hiss, + his fixed idea of argument found expression scathingly: + </p> + <p> + “See! He's no good. He's not the man for you!” + </p> + <p> + He glanced at her at last. Her lips moved a little, and he was awed by + that movement without a sound. Next instant the hard grasp of his fingers + vanished from her arm. Heyst had shut the door. On his way back to the + table, he crossed the path of the girl they had called Alma—she + didn't know why—also Magdalen, whose mind had remained so long in + doubt as to the reason of her own existence. She no longer wondered at + that bitter riddle, since her heart found its solution in a blinding, hot + glow of passionate purpose. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TEN + </h2> + <p> + She passed by Heyst as if she had indeed been blinded by some secret, + lurid, and consuming glare into which she was about to enter. The curtain + of the bedroom door fell behind her into rigid folds. Ricardo's vacant + gaze seemed to be watching the dancing flight of a fly in mid air. + </p> + <p> + “Extra dark outside, ain't it?” he muttered. + </p> + <p> + “Not so dark but that I could see that man of yours prowling about there,” + said Heyst in measured tones. + </p> + <p> + “What—Pedro? He's scarcely a man you know; or else I wouldn't be so + fond of him as I am.” + </p> + <p> + “Very well. Let's call him your worthy associate.” + </p> + <p> + “Ay! Worthy enough for what we want of him. A great standby is Peter in a + scrimmage. A growl and a bite—oh, my! And you don't want him about?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't.” + </p> + <p> + “You want him out of the way?” insisted Ricardo with an affectation of + incredulity which Heyst accepted calmly, though the air in the room seemed + to grow more oppressive with every word spoken. + </p> + <p> + “That's it. I do want him out of the way.” He forced himself to speak + equably. + </p> + <p> + “Lor'! That's no great matter. Pedro's not much use here. The business my + governor's after can be settled by ten minutes' rational talk with—with + another gentleman. Quiet talk!” + </p> + <p> + He looked up suddenly with hard, phosphorescent eyes. Heyst didn't move a + muscle. Ricardo congratulated himself on having left his revolver behind. + He was so exasperated that he didn't know what he might have done. He said + at last: + </p> + <p> + “You want poor, harmless Peter out of the way before you let me take you + to see the governor—is that it?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, that is it.” + </p> + <p> + “H'm! One can see,” Ricardo said with hidden venom, “that you are a + gentleman; but all that gentlemanly fancifulness is apt to turn sour on a + plain man's stomach. However—you'll have to pardon me.” + </p> + <p> + He put his fingers into his mouth and let out a whistle which seemed to + drive a thin, sharp shaft of air solidly against one's nearest ear-drum. + Though he greatly enjoyed Heyst's involuntary grimace, he sat perfectly + stolid waiting for the effect of the call. + </p> + <p> + It brought Pedro in with an extraordinary, uncouth, primeval impetuosity. + The door flew open with a clatter, and the wild figure it disclosed seemed + anxious to devastate the room in leaps and bounds; but Ricardo raised his + open palm, and the creature came in quietly. His enormous half-closed paws + swung to and fro a little in front of his bowed trunk as he walked. + Ricardo looked on truculently. + </p> + <p> + “You go to the boat—understand? Go now!” + </p> + <p> + The little red eyes of the tame monster blinked with painful attention in + the mass of hair. + </p> + <p> + “Well? Why don't you get? Forgot human speech, eh? Don't you know any + longer what a boat is?” + </p> + <p> + “Si—boat,” the creature stammered out doubtfully. + </p> + <p> + “Well, go there—the boat at the jetty. March off to it and sit + there, lie down there, do anything but go to sleep there—till you + hear my call, and then fly here. Them's your orders. March! Get, vamos! + No, not that way—out through the front door. No sulks!” + </p> + <p> + Pedro obeyed with uncouth alacrity. When he had gone, the gleam of + pitiless savagery went out of Ricardo's yellow eyes, and his physiognomy + took on, for the first time that evening, the expression of a domestic cat + which is being noticed. + </p> + <p> + “You can watch him right into the bushes, if you like. Too dark, eh? Why + not go with him to the very spot, then?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst made a gesture of vague protest. + </p> + <p> + “There's nothing to assure me that he will stay there. I have no doubt of + his going, but it's an act without guarantee.” + </p> + <p> + “There you are!” Ricardo shrugged his shoulders philosophically. “Can't be + helped. Short of shooting our Pedro, nobody can make absolutely sure of + his staying in the same place longer than he has a mind to; but I tell + you, he lives in holy terror of my temper. That's why I put on my + sudden-death air when I talk to him. And yet I wouldn't shoot him—not + I, unless in such a fit of rage as would make a man shoot his favourite + dog. Look here, sir! This deal is on the square. I didn't tip him a wink + to do anything else. He won't budge from the jetty. Are you coming along + now, sir?” + </p> + <p> + A short-silence ensued. Ricardo's jaws were working ominously under his + skin. His eyes glided: voluptuously here and there, cruel and dreamy, + Heyst checked a sudden movement, reflected for a while, then said: + </p> + <p> + “You must wait a little.” + </p> + <p> + “Wait a little! Wait a little! What does he think a fellow is—a + graven image?” grumbled Ricardo half audibly. + </p> + <p> + Heyst went into the bedroom, and shut the door after him with a bang. + Coming from the light, he could not see a thing in there at first; yet he + received the impression of the girl getting up from the floor. On the less + opaque darkness of the shutter-hole, her head detached itself suddenly, + very faint, a mere hint of a round, dark shape without a face. + </p> + <p> + “I am going, Lena. I am going to confront these scoundrels.” He was + surprised to feel two arms falling on his shoulders. “I thought that you—” + he began. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, yes!” the girl whispered hastily. + </p> + <p> + She neither clung to him, nor yet did she try to draw him to her. Her + hands grasped his shoulders, and she seemed to him to be staring into his + face in the dark. And now he could see something of her face, too—an + oval without features—and faintly distinguish her person, in the + blackness, a form without definite lines. + </p> + <p> + “You have a black dress here, haven't you, Lena?” he asked, speaking + rapidly, and so low that she could just hear him. + </p> + <p> + “Yes—an old thing.” + </p> + <p> + “Very good. Put it on at once.” + </p> + <p> + “But why?” + </p> + <p> + “Not for mourning!” There was something peremptory in the slightly ironic + murmur. “Can you find it and get into it in the dark?” + </p> + <p> + She could. She would try. He waited, very still. He could imagine her + movements over there at the far end of the room; but his eyes, accustomed + now to the darkness, had lost her completely. When she spoke, her voice + surprised him by its nearness. She had done what he had told her to do, + and had approached him, invisible. + </p> + <p> + “Good! Where's that piece of purple veil I've seen lying about?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + There was no answer, only a slight rustle. + </p> + <p> + “Where is it?” he repeated impatiently. + </p> + <p> + Her unexpected breath was on his cheek. + </p> + <p> + “In my hands.” + </p> + <p> + “Capital! Listen, Lena. As soon as I leave the bungalow with that horrible + scoundrel, you slip out at the back—instantly, lose no time!—and + run round into the forest. That will be your time, while we are walking + away, and I am sure he won't give me the slip. Run into the forest behind + the fringe of bushes between the big trees. You will know, surely, how to + find a place in full view of the front door. I fear for you; but in this + black dress, with most of your face muffled up in that dark veil, I defy + anybody to find you there before daylight. Wait in the forest till the + table is pushed into full view of the doorway, and you see three candles + out of four blown out and one relighted—or, should the lights be put + out here while you watch them, wait till three candles are lighted and + then two put out. At either of these signals run back as hard as you can, + for it will mean that I am waiting for you here.” + </p> + <p> + While he was speaking, the girl had sought and seized one of his hands. + She did not press it; she held it loosely, as it were timidly, + caressingly. It was no grasp; it was a mere contact, as if only to make + sure that he was there, that he was real and no mere darker shadow in the + obscurity. The warmth of her hand gave Heyst a strange, intimate sensation + of all her person. He had to fight down a new sort of emotion, which + almost unmanned him. He went on, whispering sternly: + </p> + <p> + “But if you see no such signals, don't let anything—fear, curiosity, + despair, or hope—entice you back to this house; and with the first + sign of dawn steal away along the edge of the clearing till you strike the + path. Wait no longer, because I shall probably be dead.” + </p> + <p> + The murmur of the word “Never!” floated into his ear as if it formed + itself in the air. + </p> + <p> + “You know the path,” he continued. “Make your way to the barricade. Go to + Wang—yes, to Wang. Let nothing stop you!” It seemed to him that the + girl's hand trembled a little. “The worst he can do to you is to shoot + you, but he won't. I really think he won't, if I am not there. Stay with + the villagers, with the wild people, and fear nothing. They will be more + awed by you than you can be frightened of them. Davidson's bound to turn + up before very long. Keep a look-out for a passing steamer. Think of some + sort of signal to call him.” + </p> + <p> + She made no answer. The sense of the heavy, brooding silence in the + outside world seemed to enter and fill the room—the oppressive + infinity of it, without breath, without light. It was as if the heart of + hearts had ceased to beat and the end of all things had come. + </p> + <p> + “Have you understood? You are to run out of the house at once,” Heyst + whispered urgently. + </p> + <p> + She lifted his hand to her lips and let it go. He was startled. + </p> + <p> + “Lena!” he cried out under his breath. + </p> + <p> + She was gone from his side. He dared not trust himself—no, not even + to the extent of a tender word. + </p> + <p> + Turning to go out he heard a thud somewhere in the house. To open the + door, he had first to lift the curtain; he did so with his face over his + shoulder. The merest trickle of light, coming through the keyhole and one + or two cracks, was enough for his eyes to see her plainly, all black, down + on her knees, with her head and arms flung on the foot of the bed—all + black in the desolation of a mourning sinner. What was this? A suspicion + that there were everywhere more things than he could understand crossed + Heyst's mind. Her arm, detached from the bed, motioned him away. He + obeyed, and went out, full of disquiet. + </p> + <p> + The curtain behind him had not ceased to tremble when she was up on her + feet, close against it, listening for sounds, for words, in a stooping, + tragic attitude of stealthy attention, one hand clutching at her breast as + if to compress, to make less loud the beating of her heart. Heyst had + caught Mr. Jones's secretary in the contemplation of his closed + writing-desk. Ricardo might have been meditating how to break into it; but + when he turned about suddenly, he showed so distorted a face that it made + Heyst pause in wonder at the upturned whites of the eyes, which were + blinking horribly, as if the man were inwardly convulsed. + </p> + <p> + “I thought you were never coming,” Ricardo mumbled. + </p> + <p> + “I didn't know you were pressed for time. Even if your going away depends + on this conversation, as you say, I doubt if you are the men to put to sea + on such a night as this,” said Heyst, motioning Ricardo to precede him out + of the house. + </p> + <p> + With feline undulations of hip and shoulder, the secretary left the room + at once. There was something cruel in the absolute dumbness of the night. + The great cloud covering half the sky hung right against one, like an + enormous curtain hiding menacing preparations of violence. As the feet of + the two men touched the ground, a rumble came from behind it, preceded by + a swift, mysterious gleam of light on the waters of the bay. + </p> + <p> + “Ha!” said Ricardo. “It begins.” + </p> + <p> + “It may be nothing in the end,” observed Heyst, stepping along steadily. + </p> + <p> + “No! Let it come!” Ricardo said viciously. “I am in the humour for it!” + </p> + <p> + By the time the two men had reached the other bungalow, the far-off + modulated rumble growled incessantly, while pale lightning in waves of + cold fire flooded and ran off the island in rapid succession. Ricardo, + unexpectedly, dashed ahead up the steps and put his head through the + doorway. + </p> + <p> + “Here he is, governor! Keep him with you as long as you can—till you + hear me whistle. I am on the track.” + </p> + <p> + He flung these words into the room with inconceivable speed, and stood + aside to let the visitor pass through the doorway; but he had to wait an + appreciable moment, because Heyst, seeing his purpose, had scornfully + slowed his pace. When Heyst entered the room it was with a smile, the + Heyst smile, lurking under his martial moustache. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER ELEVEN + </h2> + <p> + Two candles were burning on the stand-up desk. Mr. Jones, tightly enfolded + in an old but gorgeous blue silk dressing-gown, kept his elbows close + against his sides and his hands deeply plunged into the extraordinarily + deep pockets of the garment. The costume accentuated his emaciation. He + resembled a painted pole leaning against the edge of the desk, with a + dried head of dubious distinction stuck on the top of it. Ricardo lounged + in the doorway. Indifferent in appearance to what was going on, he was + biding his time. At a given moment, between two flickers of lightning, he + melted out of his frame into the outer air. His disappearance was observed + on the instant by Mr. Jones, who abandoned his nonchalant immobility + against the desk, and made a few steps calculated to put him between Heyst + and the doorway. + </p> + <p> + “It's awfully close,” he remarked + </p> + <p> + Heyst, in the middle of the room, had made up his mind to speak plainly. + </p> + <p> + “We haven't met to talk about the weather. You favoured me earlier in the + day with a rather cryptic phrase about yourself. 'I am he that is,' you + said. What does that mean?” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Jones, without looking at Heyst, continued his absentminded movements + till, attaining the desired position, he brought his shoulders with a + thump against the wall near the door, and raised his head. In the emotion + of the decisive moment his haggard face glistened with perspiration. Drops + ran down his hollow cheeks and almost blinded the spectral eyes in their + bony caverns. + </p> + <p> + “It means that I am a person to be reckoned with. No—stop! Don't put + your hand into your pocket—don't.” + </p> + <p> + His voice had a wild, unexpected shrillness. Heyst started, and there + ensued a moment of suspended animation, during which the thunder's deep + bass muttered distantly and the doorway to the right of Mr. Jones + flickered with bluish light. At last Heyst shrugged his shoulders; he even + looked at his hand. He didn't put it in his pocket, however. Mr. Jones, + glued against the wall, watched him raise both his hands to the ends of + his horizontal moustaches, and answered the note of interrogation in his + steady eyes. + </p> + <p> + “A matter of prudence,” said Mr. Jones in his natural hollow tones, and + with a face of deathlike composure. “A man of your free life has surely + perceived that. You are a much talked-about man, Mr. Heyst—and + though, as far as I understand, you are accustomed to employ the subtler + weapons of intelligence, still I can't afford to take any risks of the—er—grosser + methods. I am not unscrupulous enough to be a match for you in the use of + intelligence; but I assure you, Mr. Heyst, that in the other way you are + no match for me. I have you covered at this very moment. You have been + covered ever since you entered this room. Yes—from my pocket.” + </p> + <p> + During this harangue Heyst looked deliberately over his shoulder, stepped + back a pace, and sat down on the end of the camp bedstead. Leaning his + elbow on one knee, he laid his cheek in the palm of his hand and seemed to + meditate on what he should say next. Mr. Jones, planted against the wall, + was obviously waiting for some sort of overture. As nothing came, he + resolved to speak himself; but he hesitated. For, though he considered + that the most difficult step had been taken, he said to himself that every + stage of progress required great caution, lest the man in Ricardo's + phraseology, should “start to prance”—which would be most + inconvenient. He fell back on a previous statement: + </p> + <p> + “And I am a person to be reckoned with.” + </p> + <p> + The other man went on looking at the floor, as if he were alone in the + room. There was a pause. + </p> + <p> + “You have heard of me, then?” Heyst said at length, looking up. + </p> + <p> + “I should think so! We have been staying at Schomberg's hotel.” + </p> + <p> + “Schom—” Heyst choked on the word. + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter, Mr. Heyst?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing. Nausea,” Heyst said resignedly. He resumed his former attitude + of meditative indifference. “What is this reckoning you are talking + about?” he asked after a time, in the quietest possible tone. “I don't + know you.” + </p> + <p> + “It's obvious that we belong to the same—social sphere,” began Mr. + Jones with languid irony. Inwardly he was as watchful as he could be. + “Something has driven you out—the originality of your ideas, + perhaps. Or your tastes.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones indulged in one of his ghastly smiles. In repose his features had + a curious character of evil, exhausted austerity; but when he smiled, the + whole mask took on an unpleasantly infantile expression. A recrudescence + of the rolling thunder invaded the room loudly, and passed into silence. + </p> + <p> + “You are not taking this very well,” observed Mr. Jones. This was what he + said, but as a matter of fact he thought that the business was shaping + quite satisfactorily. The man, he said to himself, had no stomach for a + fight. Aloud he continued: “Come! You can't expect to have it always your + own way. You are a man of the world.” + </p> + <p> + “And you?” Heyst interrupted him unexpectedly. “How do you define + yourself?” + </p> + <p> + “I, my dear sir? In one way I am—yes, I am the world itself, come to + pay you a visit. In another sense I am an outcast—almost an outlaw. + If you prefer a less materialistic view, I am a sort of fate—the + retribution that waits its time.” + </p> + <p> + “I wish to goodness you were the commonest sort of ruffian!” said Heyst, + raising his equable gaze to Mr. Jones. “One would be able to talk to you + straight then, and hope for some humanity. As it is—” + </p> + <p> + “I dislike violence and ferocity of every sort as much as you do,” Mr. + Jones declared, looking very languid as he leaned against the wall, but + speaking fairly loud. “You can ask my Martin if it is not so. This, Mr. + Heyst, is a soft age. It is also an age without prejudices. I've heard + that you are free from them yourself. You mustn't be shocked if I tell you + plainly that we are after your money—or I am, if you prefer to make + me alone responsible. Pedro, of course, knows no more of it than any other + animal would. Ricardo is of the faithful-retainer class—absolutely + identified with all my ideas, wishes, and even whims!” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones pulled his left hand out of his pocket, got a handkerchief out of + another, and began to wipe the perspiration from his forehead, neck, and + chin. The excitement from which he suffered made his breathing visible. In + his long dressing-gown he had the air of a convalescent invalid who had + imprudently overtaxed his strength. Heyst, broad-shouldered, robust, + watched the operation from the end of the camp bedstead, very calm, his + hands on his knees. + </p> + <p> + “And by the by,” he asked, “where is he now, that henchman of yours? + Breaking into my desk?” + </p> + <p> + “That would be crude. Still, crudeness is one of life's conditions.” There + was the slightest flavour of banter in the tone of Ricardo's governor. + “Conceivable, but unlikely. Martin is a little crude; but you are not, Mr. + Heyst. To tell you the truth, I don't know precisely where he is. He has + been a little mysterious of late; but he has my confidence. No, don't get + up, Mr. Heyst!” + </p> + <p> + The viciousness of his spectral face was indescribable. Heyst, who had + moved a little, was surprised by the disclosure. + </p> + <p> + “It was not my intention,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “Pray remain seated,” Mr. Jones insisted in a languid voice, but with a + very determined glitter in his black eye-caverns. + </p> + <p> + “If you were more observant,” said Heyst with dispassionate contempt, “you + would have known before I had been five minutes in the room that I had no + weapon of any sort on me.” + </p> + <p> + “Possibly; but pray keep your hands still. They are very well where they + are. This is too big an affair for me to take any risks.” + </p> + <p> + “Big? Too big?” Heyst repeated with genuine surprise. “Good Heavens! + Whatever you are looking for, there's very little of it here—very + little of anything.” + </p> + <p> + “You would naturally say so, but that's not what we have heard,” retorted + Mr. Jones quickly, with a grin so ghastly that it was impossible to think + it voluntary. + </p> + <p> + Heyst's face had grown very gloomy. He knitted his brows. + </p> + <p> + “What have you heard?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “A lot, Mr. Heyst—a lot,” affirmed Mr. Jones. He was vying to + recover his manner of languid superiority. “We have heard, for instance, + of a certain Mr. Morrison, once your partner.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst could not repress a slight movement. + </p> + <p> + “Aha!” said Mr. Jones, with a sort of ghostly glee on his face. + </p> + <p> + The muffled thunder resembled the echo of a distant cannonade below the + horizon, and the two men seemed to be listening to it in sullen silence. + </p> + <p> + “This diabolical calumny will end in actually and literally taking my life + from me,” thought Heyst. + </p> + <p> + Then, suddenly, he laughed. Portentously spectral, Mr. Jones frowned at + the sound. + </p> + <p> + “Laugh as much as you please,” he said. “I, who have been hounded out from + society by a lot of highly moral souls, can't see anything funny in that + story. But here we are, and you will now have to pay for your fun, Mr. + Heyst.” + </p> + <p> + “You have heard a lot of ugly lies,” observed Heyst. “Take my word for + it!” + </p> + <p> + “You would say so, of course—very natural. As a matter of fact I + haven't heard very much. Strictly speaking, it was Martin. He collects + information, and so on. You don't suppose I would talk to that Schomberg + animal more than I could help? It was Martin whom he took into his + confidence.” + </p> + <p> + “The stupidity of that creature is so great that it becomes formidable,” + Heyst said, as if speaking to himself. + </p> + <p> + Involuntarily, his mind turned to the girl, wandering in the forest, alone + and terrified. Would he ever see her again? At that thought he nearly lost + his self-possession. But the idea that if she followed his instructions + those men were not likely to find her steadied him a little. They did not + know that the island had any inhabitants; and he himself once disposed of, + they would be too anxious to get away to waste time hunting for a vanished + girl. + </p> + <p> + All this passed through Heyst's mind in a flash, as men think in moments + of danger. He looked speculatively at Mr. Jones, who, of course, had never + for a moment taken his eyes from his intended victim. And, the conviction + came to Heyst that this outlaw from the higher spheres was an absolutely + hard and pitiless scoundrel. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones's voice made him start. + </p> + <p> + “It would be useless, for instance, to tell me that your Chinaman has run + off with your money. A man living alone with a Chinaman on an island takes + care to conceal property of that kind so well that the devil himself—” + </p> + <p> + “Certainly,” Heyst muttered. + </p> + <p> + Again, with his left hand, Mr. Jones mopped his frontal bone, his + stalk-like neck, his razor jaws, his fleshless chin. Again his voice + faltered and his aspect became still more gruesomely malevolent as of a + wicked and pitiless corpse. + </p> + <p> + “I see what you mean,” he cried, “but you mustn't put too much trust in + your ingenuity. You don't strike me as a very ingenious person, Mr. Heyst. + Neither am I. My talents lie another way. But Martin—” + </p> + <p> + “Who is now engaged in rifling my desk,” interjected Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “I don't think so. What I was going to say is that Martin is much cleverer + than a Chinaman. Do you believe in racial superiority, Mr. Heyst? I do, + firmly. Martin is great at ferreting out such secrets as yours, for + instance.” + </p> + <p> + “Secrets like mine!” repeated Heyst bitterly. “Well I wish him joy of all + he can ferret out!” + </p> + <p> + “That's very kind of you,” remarked Mr. Jones. He was beginning to be + anxious for Martin's return. Of iron self-possession at the gaming-table, + fearless in a sudden affray, he found that this rather special kind of + work was telling on his nerves. “Keep still as you are!” he cried sharply. + </p> + <p> + “I've told you I am not armed,” said Heyst, folding his arms on his + breast. + </p> + <p> + “I am really inclined to believe that you are not,” admitted Mr. Jones + seriously. “Strange!” he mused aloud, the caverns of his eyes turned upon + Heyst. Then briskly: “But my object is to keep you in this room. Don't + provoke me, by some unguarded movement, to smash your knee or do something + definite of that sort.” He passed his tongue over his lips, which were dry + and black, while his forehead glistened with moisture. “I don't know if it + wouldn't be better to do it at once!” + </p> + <p> + “He who deliberates is lost,” said Heyst with grave mockery. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones disregarded the remark. He had the air of communing with himself. + </p> + <p> + “Physically I am no match for you,” he said slowly, his black gaze fixed + upon the man sitting on the end of the bed. “You could spring—” + </p> + <p> + “Are you trying to frighten yourself?” asked Heyst abruptly. “You don't + seem to have quite enough pluck for your business. Why don't you do it at + once?” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones, taking violent offence, snorted like a savage skeleton. + </p> + <p> + “Strange as it may seem to you, it is because of my origin, my breeding, + my traditions, my early associations, and such-like trifles. Not everybody + can divest himself of the prejudices of a gentleman as easily as you have + done, Mr. Heyst. But don't worry about my pluck. If you were to make a + clean spring at me, you would receive in mid air, so to speak, something + that would make you perfectly harmless by the time you landed. No, don't + misapprehend us, Mr. Heyst. We are—er—adequate bandits; and we + are after the fruit of your labours as a—er—successful + swindler. It's the way of the world—gorge and disgorge!” + </p> + <p> + He leaned wearily the back of his head against the wall. His vitality + seemed exhausted. Even his sunken eyelids drooped within the bony sockets. + Only his thin, waspish, beautifully pencilled eyebrows, drawn together a + little, suggested the will and the power to sting—something vicious, + unconquerable, and deadly. + </p> + <p> + “Fruits! Swindler!” repeated Heyst, without heat, almost without contempt. + “You are giving yourself no end of trouble, you and your faithful + henchman, to crack an empty nut. There are no fruits here, as you imagine. + There are a few sovereigns, which you may have if you like; and since you + have called yourself a bandit—” + </p> + <p> + “Yaas!” drawled Mr. Jones. “That, rather than a swindler. Open warfare at + least!” + </p> + <p> + “Very good! Only let me tell you that there were never in the world two + more deluded bandits—never!” + </p> + <p> + Heyst uttered these words with such energy that Mr. Jones, stiffening up, + seemed to become thinner and taller in his metallic blue dressing-gown + against the whitewashed wall. + </p> + <p> + “Fooled by a silly, rascally innkeeper!” Heyst went on. “Talked over like + a pair of children with a promise of sweets!” + </p> + <p> + “I didn't talk with that disgusting animal,” muttered Mr. Jones sullenly; + “but he convinced Martin, who is no fool.” + </p> + <p> + “I should think he wanted very much to be convinced,” said Heyst, with the + courteous intonation so well known in the Islands. “I don't want to + disturb your touching trust in your—your follower, but he must be + the most credulous brigand in existence. What do you imagine? If the story + of my riches were ever so true, do you think Schomberg would have imparted + it to you from sheer altruism? Is that the way of the world, Mr. Jones?” + </p> + <p> + For a moment the lower jaw of Ricardo's gentleman dropped; but it came up + with a snap of scorn, and he said with spectral intensity: + </p> + <p> + “The beast is cowardly! He was frightened, and wanted to get rid of us, if + you want to know, Mr. Heyst. I don't know that the material inducement was + so very great, but I was bored, and we decided to accept the bribe. I + don't regret it. All my life I have been seeking new impressions, and you + have turned out to be something quite out of the common. Martin, of + course, looks to the material results. He's simple—and faithful—and + wonderfully acute.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah, yes! He's on the track—” and now Heyst's speech had the + character of politely grim raillery—“but not sufficiently on the + track, as yet, to make it quite convenient to shoot me without more ado. + Didn't Schomberg tell you precisely where I conceal the fruit of my + rapines? Pah! Don't you know he would have told you anything, true or + false, from a very clear motive? Revenge! Mad hate—the unclean + idiot!” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones did not seem very much moved. On his right hand the doorway + incessantly flickered with distant lightning, and the continuous rumble of + thunder went on irritatingly, like the growl of an inarticulate giant + muttering fatuously. + </p> + <p> + Heyst overcame his immense repugnance to allude to her whose image, + cowering in the forest was constantly before his eyes, with all the pathos + and force of its appeal, august, pitiful, and almost holy to him. It was + in a hurried, embarrassed manner that he went on: + </p> + <p> + “If it had not been for that girl whom he persecuted with his insane and + odious passion, and who threw herself on my protection, he would never + have—but you know well enough!” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know!” burst out Mr. Jones with amazing heat. “That hotel-keeper + tried to talk to me once of some girl he had lost, but I told him I didn't + want to hear any of his beastly women stories. It had something to do with + you, had it?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst looked on serenely at this outburst, then lost his patience a + little. + </p> + <p> + “What sort of comedy is this? You don't mean to say that you didn't know + that I had—that there was a girl living with me here?” + </p> + <p> + One could see that the eyes of Mr. Jones had become fixed in the depths of + their black holes by the gleam of white becoming steady there. The whole + man seemed frozen still. + </p> + <p> + “Here! Here!” he screamed out twice. There was no mistaking his + astonishment, his shocked incredulity—something like frightened + disgust. + </p> + <p> + Heyst was disgusted also, but in another way. He too was incredulous. He + regretted having mentioned the girl; but the thing was done, his + repugnance had been overcome in the heat of his argument against the + absurd bandit. + </p> + <p> + “Is it possible that you didn't know of that significant fact?” he + inquired. “Of the only effective truth in the welter of silly lies that + deceived you so easily?” + </p> + <p> + “No, I didn't!” Mr. Jones shouted. “But Martin did!” he added in a faint + whisper, which Heyst's ears just caught and no more. + </p> + <p> + “I kept her out of sight as long as I could,” said Heyst. “Perhaps, with + your bringing up, traditions, and so on; you will understand my reason for + it.” + </p> + <p> + “He knew. He knew before!” Mr. Jones mourned in a hollow voice. “He knew + of her from the first!” + </p> + <p> + Backed hard against the wall he no longer watched Heyst. He had the air of + a man who had seen an abyss yawning under his feet. + </p> + <p> + “If I want to kill him, this is my time,” thought Heyst; but he did not + move. + </p> + <p> + Next moment Mr. Jones jerked his head up, glaring with sardonic fury. + </p> + <p> + “I have a good mind to shoot you, you woman-ridden hermit, you man in the + moon, that can't exist without—no, it won't be you that I'll shoot. + It's the other woman-lover—the prevaricating, sly, low-class, + amorous cuss! And he shaved—shaved under my very nose. I'll shoot + him!” + </p> + <p> + “He's gone mad,” thought Heyst, startled by the spectre's sudden fury. + </p> + <p> + He felt himself more in danger, nearer death, than ever since he had + entered that room. An insane bandit is a deadly combination. He did not, + could not know that Mr. Jones was quick-minded enough to see already the + end of his reign over his excellent secretary's thoughts and feelings; the + coming failure of Ricardo's fidelity. A woman had intervened! A woman, a + girl, who apparently possessed the power to awaken men's disgusting folly. + Her power had been proved in two instances already—the beastly + innkeeper, and that man with moustaches, upon whom Mr. Jones, his deadly + right hand twitching in his pocket, glared more in repulsion than in + anger. The very object of the expedition was lost from view in his sudden + and overwhelming sense of utter insecurity. And this made Mr. Jones feel + very savage; but not against the man with the moustaches. Thus, while + Heyst was really feeling that his life was not worth two minutes, + purchase, he heard himself addressed with no affectation of languid + impertinence but with a burst of feverish determination. + </p> + <p> + “Here! Let's call a truce!” said Mr. Jones. + </p> + <p> + Heyst's heart was too sick to allow him to smile. + </p> + <p> + “Have I been making war on you?” he asked wearily. “How do you expect me + to attach any meaning to your words?” he went on. “You seem to be a + morbid, senseless sort of bandit. We don't speak the same language. If I + were to tell you why I am here, talking to you, you wouldn't believe me, + because you would not understand me. It certainly isn't the love of life, + from which I have divorced myself long ago—not sufficiently, + perhaps; but if you are thinking of yours, then I repeat to you that it + has never been in danger from me. I am unarmed.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones was biting his lower lip, in a deep meditation. It was only + towards the last that he looked at Heyst. + </p> + <p> + “Unarmed, eh?” Then he burst out violently: “I tell you, a gentleman is no + match for the common herd. And yet one must make use of the brutes. + Unarmed, eh? And I suppose that creature is of the commonest sort. You + could hardly have got her out of a drawing-room. Though they're all alike, + for that matter. Unarmed! It's a pity. I am in much greater danger than + you are or were—or I am much mistaken. But I am not—I know my + man!” + </p> + <p> + He lost his air of mental vacancy and broke out into shrill exclamations. + To Heyst they seemed madder than anything that had gone before. + </p> + <p> + “On the track! On the scent!” he cried, forgetting himself to the point of + executing a dance of rage in the middle of the floor. + </p> + <p> + Heyst looked on, fascinated by this skeleton in a gay dressing-gown, + jerkily agitated like a grotesque toy on the end of an invisible string. + It became quiet suddenly. + </p> + <p> + “I might have smelt a rat! I always knew that this would be the danger.” + He changed suddenly to a confidential tone, fixing his sepulchral stare on + Heyst. “And yet here I am, taken in by the fellow, like the veriest fool. + I've been always on the watch for some beastly influence, but here I am, + fairly caught. He shaved himself right in front of me and I never + guessed!” + </p> + <p> + The shrill laugh, following on the low tone of secrecy, sounded so + convincingly insane that Heyst got up as if moved by a spring. Mr. Jones + stepped back two paces, but displayed no uneasiness. + </p> + <p> + “It's as clear as daylight!” he uttered mournfully, and fell silent. + </p> + <p> + Behind him the doorway flickered lividly, and the sound as of a naval + action somewhere away on the horizon filled the breathless pause. Mr. + Jones inclined his head on his shoulder. His mood had completely changed. + </p> + <p> + “What do you say, unarmed man? Shall we go and see what is detaining my + trusted Martin so long? He asked me to keep you engaged in friendly + conversation till he made a further examination of that track. Ha, ha, + ha!” + </p> + <p> + “He is no doubt ransacking my house,” said Heyst. + </p> + <p> + He was bewildered. It seemed to him that all this was an incomprehensible + dream, or perhaps an elaborate other-world joke, contrived by that spectre + in a gorgeous dressing gown. + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones looked at him with a horrible, cadaverous smile of inscrutable + mockery, and pointed to the door. Heyst passed through it first. His + feelings had become so blunted that he did not care how soon he was shot + in the back. + </p> + <p> + “How oppressive the air is!” the voice of Mr. Jones said at his elbow. + “This stupid storm gets on my nerves. I would welcome some rain, though it + would be unpleasant to get wet. On the other hand, this exasperating + thunder has the advantage of covering the sound of our approach. The + lightning's not so convenient. Ah, your house is fully illuminated! My + clever Martin is punishing your stock of candles. He belongs to the + unceremonious classes, which are also unlovely, untrustworthy, and so on.” + </p> + <p> + “I left the candles burning,” said Heyst, “to save him trouble.” + </p> + <p> + “You really believed he would go to your house?” asked Mr. Jones with + genuine interest. + </p> + <p> + “I had that notion, strongly. I do believe he is there now.” + </p> + <p> + “And you don't mind?” + </p> + <p> + “No!” + </p> + <p> + “You don't!” Mr. Jones stopped to wonder. “You are an extraordinary man,” + he said suspiciously, and moved on, touching elbows with Heyst. + </p> + <p> + In the latter's breast dwelt a deep silence, the complete silence of + unused faculties. At this moment, by simply shouldering Mr. Jones, he + could have thrown him down and put himself, by a couple of leaps, beyond + the certain aim of the revolver; but he did not even think of that. His + very will seemed dead of weariness. He moved automatically, his head low, + like a prisoner captured by the evil power of a masquerading skeleton out + of a grave. Mr. Jones took charge of the direction. They fetched a wide + sweep. The echoes of distant thunder seemed to dog their footsteps. + </p> + <p> + “By the by,” said Mr. Jones, as if unable to restrain his curiosity, + “aren't you anxious about that—ouch!—that fascinating creature + to whom you owe whatever pleasure you can find in our visit?” + </p> + <p> + “I have placed her in safety,” said Heyst. “I—I took good care of + that.” + </p> + <p> + Mr Jones laid a hand on his arm. + </p> + <p> + “You have? Look! is that what you mean?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst raised his head. In the flicker of lightning the desolation of the + cleared ground on his left leaped out and sank into the night, together + with the elusive forms of things distant, pale, unearthly. But in the + brilliant square of the door he saw the girl—the woman he had longed + to see once more as if enthroned, with her hands on the arms of the chair. + She was in black; her face was white, her head dreamily inclined on her + breast. He saw her only as low as her knees. He saw her—there, in + the room, alive with a sombre reality. It was no mocking vision. She was + not in the forest—but there! She sat there in the chair, seemingly + without strength, yet without fear, tenderly stooping. + </p> + <p> + “Can you understand their power?” whispered the hot breath of Mr. Jones + into his ear. “Can there be a more disgusting spectacle? It's enough to + make the earth detestable. She seems to have found her affinity. Move on + closer. If I have to shoot you in the end, then perhaps you will die + cured.” + </p> + <p> + Heyst obeyed the pushing pressure of a revolver barrel between his + shoulders. He felt it distinctly, but he did not feel the ground under his + feet. They found the steps, without his being aware that he was ascending + them—slowly, one by one. Doubt entered into him—a doubt of a + new kind, formless, hideous. It seemed to spread itself all over him, + enter his limbs, and lodge in his entrails. He stopped suddenly, with a + thought that he who experienced such a feeling had no business to live—or + perhaps was no longer living. + </p> + <p> + Everything—the bungalow, the forest, the open ground—trembled + incessantly, the earth, the sky itself, shivered all the time, and the + only thing immovable in the shuddering universe was the interior of the + lighted room and the woman in black sitting in the light of the eight + candle-flames. They flung around her an intolerable brilliance which hurt + his eyes, seemed to sear his very brain with the radiation of infernal + heat. It was some time before his scorched eyes made out Ricardo seated on + the floor at some little distance, his back to the doorway, but only + partly so; one side of his upturned face showing the absorbed, all + forgetful rapture of his contemplation. + </p> + <p> + The grip of Mr. Jones's hard claw drew Heyst back a little. In the roll of + thunder, swelling and subsiding, he whispered in his ear a sarcastic: “Of + course!” + </p> + <p> + A great shame descended upon Heyst—the shame of guilt, absurd and + maddening. Mr. Jones drew him still farther back into the darkness of the + veranda. + </p> + <p> + “This is serious,” he went on, distilling his ghostly venom into Heyst's + very ear. “I had to shut my eyes many times to his little flings; but this + is serious. He has found his soul-mate. Mud souls, obscene and cunning! + Mud bodies, too—the mud of the gutter! I tell you, we are no match + for the vile populace. I, even I, have been nearly caught. He asked me to + detain you till he gave me the signal. It won't be you that I'll have to + shoot, but him. I wouldn't trust him near me for five minutes after this!” + </p> + <p> + He shook Heyst's arm a little. + </p> + <p> + “If you had not happened to mention the creature, we should both have been + dead before morning. He would have stabbed you as you came down the steps + after leaving me and then he would have walked up to me and planted the + same knife between my ribs. He has no prejudices. The viler the origin, + the greater the freedom of these simple souls!” + </p> + <p> + He drew a cautious, hissing breath and added in an agitated murmur: “I can + see right into his mind, I have been nearly caught napping by his + cunning.” + </p> + <p> + He stretched his neck to peer into the room from the side. Heyst, too, + made a step forward, under the slight impulse of that slender hand + clasping his hand with a thin, bony grasp. + </p> + <p> + “Behold!” the skeleton of the crazy bandit jabbered thinly into his ear in + spectral fellowship. “Behold the simple, Acis kissing the sandals of the + nymph, on the way to her lips, all forgetful, while the menacing fife of + Polyphemus already sounds close at hand—if he could only hear it! + Stoop a little.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0037" id="link2HCH0037"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER TWELVE + </h2> + <p> + On returning to the Heyst bungalow, rapid as if on wings, Ricardo found + Lena waiting for him. She was dressed in black; and at once his uplifting + exultation was replaced by an awed and quivering patience before her white + face, before the immobility of her reposeful pose, the more amazing to him + who had encountered the strength of her limbs and the indomitable spirit + in her body. She had come out after Heyst's departure, and had sat down + under the portrait to wait for the return of the man of violence and + death. While lifting the curtain, she felt the anguish of her disobedience + to her lover, which was soothed by a feeling she had known before—a + gentle flood of penetrating sweetness. She was not automatically obeying a + momentary suggestion, she was under influences more deliberate, more + vague, and of greater potency. She had been prompted, not by her will, but + by a force that was outside of her and more worthy. She reckoned upon + nothing definite; she had calculated nothing. She saw only her purpose of + capturing death—savage, sudden, irresponsible death, prowling round + the man who possessed her, death embodied in the knife ready to strike + into his heart. No doubt it had been a sin to throw herself into his arms. + With that inspiration that descends at times from above for the good or + evil of our common mediocrity, she had a sense of having been for him only + a violent and sincere choice of curiosity and pity—a thing that + passes. She did not know him. If he were to go away from her and + disappear, she would utter no reproach, she would not resent it; for she + would hold in herself the impress of something most rare and precious—his + embraces made her own by her courage in saving his life. + </p> + <p> + All she thought of—the essence of her tremors, her flushes of heat, + and her shudders of cold—was the question how to get hold of that + knife, the mark and sign of stalking death. A tremor of impatience to + clutch the frightful thing, glimpsed once and unforgettable, agitated her + hands. + </p> + <p> + The instinctive flinging forward of these hands stopped Ricardo dead short + between the door and her chair, with the ready obedience of a conquered + man who can bide his time. Her success disconcerted her. She listened to + the man's impassioned transports of terrible eulogy and even more awful + declarations of love. She was even able to meet his eyes, oblique, apt to + glide away, throwing feral gleams of desire. + </p> + <p> + “No!” he was saying, after a fiery outpouring of words in which the most + ferocious phrases of love were mingled with wooing accents of entreaty. “I + will have no more of it! Don't you mistrust me. I am sober in my talk. + Feel how quietly my heart beats. Ten times today when you, you, you, swam + in my eye, I thought it would burst one of my ribs or leap out of my + throat. It has knocked itself dead and tired, waiting for this evening, + for this very minute. And now it can do no more. Feel how quiet it is!” + </p> + <p> + He made a step forward, but she raised her clear voice commandingly: + </p> + <p> + “No nearer!” + </p> + <p> + He stopped with a smile of imbecile worship on his lips, and with the + delighted obedience of a man who could at any moment seize her in his + hands and dash her to the ground. + </p> + <p> + “Ah! If I had taken you by the throat this morning and had my way with + you, I should never have known what you are. And now I do. You are a + wonder! And so am I, in my way. I have nerve, and I have brains, too. We + should have been lost many times but for me. I plan—I plot for my + gentleman. Gentleman—pah! I am sick of him. And you are sick of + yours, eh? You, you!” + </p> + <p> + He shook all over; he cooed at her a string of endearing names, obscene + and tender, and then asked abruptly: + </p> + <p> + “Why don't you speak to me?” + </p> + <p> + “It's my part to listen,” she said, giving him an inscrutable smile, with + a flush on her cheek and her lips cold as ice. + </p> + <p> + “But you will answer me?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” she said, her eyes dilated as if with sudden interest. + </p> + <p> + “Where's that plunder? Do you know?” + </p> + <p> + “No! Not yet.” + </p> + <p> + “But there is plunder stowed somewhere that's worth having?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I think so. But who knows?” she added after a pause. + </p> + <p> + “And who cares?” he retorted recklessly. “I've had enough of this crawling + on my belly. It's you who are my treasure. It's I who found you out where + a gentleman had buried you to rot for his accursed pleasure!” + </p> + <p> + He looked behind him and all around for a seat, then turned to her his + troubled eyes and dim smile. + </p> + <p> + “I am dog-tired,” he said, and sat down on the floor. “I went tired this + morning, since I came in here and started talking to you—as tired as + if I had been pouring my life-blood here on these planks for you to dabble + your white feet in.” + </p> + <p> + Unmoved, she nodded at him thoughtfully. Woman-like, all her faculties + remained concentrated on her heart's desire—on the knife—while + the man went on babbling insanely at her feet, ingratiating and savage, + almost crazy with elation. But he, too, was holding on to his purpose. + </p> + <p> + “For you! For you I will throw away money, lives—all the lives but + mine! What you want is a man, a master that will let you put the heel of + your shoe on his neck; not that skulker, who will get tired of you in a + year—and you of him. And then what? You are not the one to sit + still; neither am I. I live for myself, and you shall live for yourself, + too—not for a Swedish baron. They make a convenience of people like + you and me. A gentleman is better than an employer, but an equal + partnership against all the 'yporcrits is the thing for you and me. We'll + go on wandering the world over, you and I both free and both true. You are + no cage bird. We'll rove together, for we are of them that have no homes. + We are born rovers!” + </p> + <p> + She listened to him with the utmost attention, as if any unexpected word + might give her some sort of opening to get that dagger, that awful knife—to + disarm murder itself, pleading for her love at her feet. Again she nodded + at him thoughtfully, rousing a gleam in his yellow eyes, yearning + devotedly upon her face. When he hitched himself a little closer, her soul + had no movement of recoil. This had to be. Anything had to be which would + bring the knife within her reach. He talked more confidentially now. + </p> + <p> + “We have met, and their time has come,” he began, looking up into her + eyes. “The partnership between me and my gentleman has to be ripped up. + There's no room for him where we two are. Why, he would shoot me like a + dog! Don't you worry. This will settle it not later than tonight!” + </p> + <p> + He tapped his folded leg below the knee, and was surprised, flattered, by + the lighting up of her face, which stooped towards him eagerly and + remained expectant, the lips girlishly parted, red in the pale face, and + quivering in the quickened drawing of her breath. + </p> + <p> + “You marvel, you miracle, you man's luck and joy—one in a million! + No, the only one. You have found your man in me,” he whispered + tremulously. “Listen! They are having their last talk together; for I'll + do for your gentleman, too, by midnight.” + </p> + <p> + Without the slightest tremor she murmured, as soon as the tightening of + her breast had eased off and the words would come: + </p> + <p> + “I wouldn't be in too much of a hurry—with him.” + </p> + <p> + The pause, the tone, had all the value of meditated advice. + </p> + <p> + “Good, thrifty girl!” he laughed low, with a strange feline gaiety, + expressed by the undulating movement of his shoulders and the sparkling + snap of his oblique eyes. “You are still thinking about the chance of that + swag. You'll make a good partner, that you will! And, I say, what a decoy + you will make! Jee-miny!” + </p> + <p> + He was carried away for a moment, but his face darkened swiftly. + </p> + <p> + “No! No reprieve. What do you think a fellow is—a scarecrow? All hat + and clothes and no feeling, no inside, no brain to make fancies for + himself? No!” he went on violently. “Never in his life will he go again + into that room of yours—never any more!” + </p> + <p> + A silence fell. He was gloomy with the torment of his jealousy, and did + not even look at her. She sat up and slowly, gradually, bent lower and + lower over him, as if ready to fall into his arms. He looked up at last, + and checked this droop unwittingly. + </p> + <p> + “Say! You, who are up to fighting a man with your bare hands, could you—eh?—could + you manage to stick one with a thing like that knife of mine?” + </p> + <p> + She opened her eyes very wide and gave him a wild smile. + </p> + <p> + “How can I tell?” she whispered enchantingly. “Will you let me have a look + at it?” + </p> + <p> + Without taking his eyes from her face, he pulled the knife out of its + sheath—a short, broad, cruel double-edged blade with a bone handle—and + only then looked down at it. + </p> + <p> + “A good friend,” he said simply. “Take it in your hand and feel the + balance,” he suggested. + </p> + <p> + At the moment when she bent forward to receive it from him, there was a + flash of fire in her mysterious eyes—a red gleam in the white mist + which wrapped the promptings and longings of her soul. She had done it! + The very sting of death was in her hands, the venom of the viper in her + paradise, extracted, safe in her possession—and the viper's head all + but lying under her heel. Ricardo, stretched on the mats of the floor, + crept closer and closer to the chair in which she sat. + </p> + <p> + All her thoughts were busy planning how to keep possession of that weapon + which had seemed to have drawn into itself every danger and menace on the + death-ridden earth. She said with a low laugh, the exultation in which he + failed to recognize: + </p> + <p> + “I didn't think that you would ever trust me with that thing!” + </p> + <p> + “Why not?” + </p> + <p> + “For fear I should suddenly strike you with it.” + </p> + <p> + “What for? For this morning's work? Oh, no! There's no spite in you for + that. You forgave me. You saved me. You got the better of me, too. And + anyhow, what good would it be?” + </p> + <p> + “No, no good,” she admitted. + </p> + <p> + In her heart she felt that she would not know how to do it; that if it + came to a struggle, she would have to drop the dagger and fight with her + hands. + </p> + <p> + “Listen. When we are going about the world together, you shall always call + me husband. Do you hear?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” she said bracing herself for the contest, in whatever shape it was + coming. + </p> + <p> + The knife was lying in her lap. She let it slip into the fold of her + dress, and laid her forearms with clasped fingers over her knees, which + she pressed desperately together. The dreaded thing was out of sight at + last. She felt a dampness break out all over her. + </p> + <p> + “I am not going to hide you, like that good-for-nothing, finicky, sneery + gentleman. You shall be my pride and my chum. Isn't that better than + rotting on an island for the pleasure of a gentleman, till he gives you + the chuck?” + </p> + <p> + “I'll be anything you like,” she said. + </p> + <p> + In his intoxication he crept closer with every word she uttered, with + every movement she made. + </p> + <p> + “Give your foot,” he begged in a timid murmur, and in the full + consciousness of his power. + </p> + <p> + Anything! Anything to keep murder quiet and disarmed till strength had + returned to her limbs and she could make up her mind what to do. Her + fortitude had been shaken by the very facility of success that had come to + her. She advanced her foot forward a little from under the hem of her + skirt; and he threw himself on it greedily. She was not even aware of him. + She had thought of the forest, to which she had been told to run. Yes, the + forest—that was the place for her to carry off the terrible spoil, + the sting of vanquished death. Ricardo, clasping her ankle, pressed his + lips time after time to the instep, muttering gasping words that were like + sobs, making little noises that resembled the sounds of grief and + distress. Unheard by them both, the thunder growled distantly with angry + modulations of it's tremendous voice, while the world outside shuddered + incessantly around the dead stillness of the room where the framed profile + of Heyst's father looked severely into space. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly Ricardo felt himself spurned by the foot he had been cherishing—spurned + with a push of such violence into the very hollow of his throat that it + swung him back instantly into an upright position on his knees. He read + his danger in the stony eyes of the girl; and in the very act of leaping + to his feet he heard sharply, detached on the comminatory voice of the + storm the brief report of a shot which half stunned him, in the manner of + a blow. He turned his burning head, and saw Heyst towering in the doorway. + The thought that the beggar had started to prance darted through his mind. + For a fraction of a second his distracted eyes sought for his weapon all + over the floor. He couldn't see it. + </p> + <p> + “Stick him, you!” he called hoarsely to the girl, and dashed headlong for + the door of the compound. + </p> + <p> + While he thus obeyed the instinct of self-preservation, his reason was + telling him that he could not possibly reach it alive. It flew open, + however, with a crash, before his launched weight, and instantly he swung + it to behind him. There, his shoulder leaning against it, his hands + clinging to the handle, dazed and alone in the night full of shudders and + muttered menaces, he tried to pull himself together. He asked himself if + he had been shot at more than once. His shoulder was wet with the blood + trickling from his head. Feeling above his ear, he ascertained that it was + only a graze, but the shock of the surprise had unmanned him for the + moment. + </p> + <p> + What the deuce was the governor about to let the beggar break loose like + this? Or—was the governor dead, perhaps? + </p> + <p> + The silence within the room awed him. Of going back there could be no + question. + </p> + <p> + “But she knows how to take care of her self,” he muttered. + </p> + <p> + She had his knife. It was she now who was deadly, while he was disarmed, + no good for the moment. He stole away from the door, staggering, the warm + trickle running down his neck, to find out what had become of the governor + and to provide himself with a firearm from the armoury in the trunks. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0038" id="link2HCH0038"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER THIRTEEN + </h2> + <p> + Mr Jones, after firing his shot over Heyst's shoulder, had thought it + proper to dodge away. Like the spectre he was, he noiselessly vanished + from the veranda. Heyst stumbled into the room and looked around. All the + objects in there—the books, portrait on the wall—seemed + shadowy, unsubstantial, the dumb accomplices of an amazing dream-plot + ending in an illusory effect of awakening and the impossibility of ever + closing his eyes again. With dread he forced himself to look at the girl. + Still in the chair, she was leaning forward far over her knees, and had + hidden her face in her hands. Heyst remembered Wang suddenly. How clear + all this was—and how extremely amusing! Very. + </p> + <p> + She sat up a little, then leaned back, and taking her hands from her face, + pressed both of them to her breast as if moved to the heart by seeing him + there looking at her with a black, horror-struck curiosity. He would have + pitied her, if the triumphant expression of her face had not given him a + shock which destroyed the balance of his feelings. She spoke with an + accent of wild joy: + </p> + <p> + “I knew you would come back in time! You are safe now. I have done it! I + would never, never have let him—” Her voice died out, while her eyes + shone at him as when the sun breaks through a mist. “Never get it back. + Oh, my beloved!” + </p> + <p> + He bowed his head gravely, and said in his polite. Heystian tone: + </p> + <p> + “No doubt you acted from instinct. Women have been provided with their own + weapon. I was a disarmed man, I have been a disarmed man all my life as I + see it now. You may glory in your resourcefulness and your profound + knowledge of yourself; but I may say that the other attitude, suggestive + of shame, had its charm. For you are full of charm!” + </p> + <p> + The exultation vanished from her face. + </p> + <p> + “You mustn't make fun of me now. I know no shame. I was thanking God with + all my sinful heart for having been able to do it—for giving you to + me in that way—oh, my beloved—all my own at last!” + </p> + <p> + He stared as if mad. Timidly she tried to excuse herself for disobeying + his directions for her safety. Every modulation of her enchanting voice + cut deep into his very breast, so that he could hardly understand the + words for the sheer pain of it. He turned his back on her; but a sudden + drop, an extraordinary faltering of her tone, made him spin round. On her + white neck her pale head dropped as in a cruel drought a withered flower + droops on its stalk. He caught his breath, looked at her closely, and + seemed to read some awful intelligence in her eyes. At the moment when her + eyelids fell as if smitten from above by an the gleam of old silver + familiar to him from boyhood, the very invisible power, he snatched her up + bodily out of the chair, and disregarding an unexpected metallic clatter + on the floor, carried her off into the other room. The limpness of her + body frightened him. Laying her down on the bed, he ran out again, seized + a four-branched candlestick on the table, and ran back, tearing down with + a furious jerk the curtain that swung stupidly in his way, but after + putting the candlestick on the table by the bed, he remained absolutely + idle. There did not seem anything more for him to do. Holding his chin in + his hand he looked down intently at her still face. + </p> + <p> + “Has she been stabbed with this thing?” asked Davidson, whom suddenly he + saw standing by his side and holding up Ricardo's dagger to his sight. + Heyst uttered no word of recognition or surprise. He gave Davidson only a + dumb look of unutterable awe, then, as if possessed with a sudden fury, + started tearing open the front of the girls dress. She remained insensible + under his hands, and Heyst let out a groan which made Davidson shudder + inwardly the heavy plaint of a man who falls clubbed in the dark. + </p> + <p> + They stood side by side, looking mournfully at the little black hole made + by Mr. Jones's bullet under the swelling breast of a dazzling and as it + were sacred whiteness. It rose and fell slightly—so slightly that + only the eyes of the lover could detect the faint stir of life. Heyst, + calm and utterly unlike himself in the face, moving about noiselessly, + prepared a wet cloth, and laid it on the insignificant wound, round which + there was hardly a trace of blood to mar the charm, the fascination, of + that mortal flesh. + </p> + <p> + Her eyelids fluttered. She looked drowsily about, serene, as if fatigued + only by the exertions of her tremendous victory, capturing the very sting + of death in the service of love. But her eyes became very wide awake when + they caught sight of Ricardo's dagger, the spoil of vanquished death, + which Davidson was still holding, unconsciously. + </p> + <p> + “Give it to me,” she said. “It's mine.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson put the symbol of her victory into her feeble hands extended to + him with the innocent gesture of a child reaching eagerly for a toy. + </p> + <p> + “For you,” she gasped, turning her eyes to Heyst. “Kill nobody.” + </p> + <p> + “No,” said Heyst, taking the dagger and laying it gently on her breast, + while her hands fell powerless by her side. + </p> + <p> + The faint smile on her deep-cut lips waned, and her head sank deep into + the pillow, taking on the majestic pallor and immobility of marble. But + over the muscles, which seemed set in their transfigured beauty for ever, + passed a slight and awful tremor. With an amazing strength she asked + loudly: + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter with me?” + </p> + <p> + “You have been shot, dear Lena,” Heyst said in a steady voice, while + Davidson, at the question, turned away and leaned his forehead against the + post of the foot of the bed. + </p> + <p> + “Shot? I did think, too, that something had struck me.” + </p> + <p> + Over Samburan the thunder had ceased to growl at last, and the world of + material forms shuddered no more under the emerging stars. The spirit of + the girl which was passing away from under them clung to her triumph + convinced of the reality of her victory over death. + </p> + <p> + “No more,” she muttered. “There will be no more! Oh, my beloved,” she + cried weakly, “I've saved you! Why don't you take me into your arms and + carry me out of this lonely place?” + </p> + <p> + Heyst bent low over her, cursing his fastidious soul, which even at that + moment kept the true cry of love from his lips in its infernal mistrust of + all life. He dared not touch her and she had no longer the strength to + throw her arms about his neck. + </p> + <p> + “Who else could have done this for you?” she whispered gloriously. + </p> + <p> + “No one in the world,” he answered her in a murmur of unconcealed despair. + </p> + <p> + She tried to raise herself, but all she could do was to lift her head a + little from the pillow. With a terrible and gentle movement, Heyst + hastened to slip his arm under her neck. She felt relieved at once of an + intolerable weight, and was content to surrender to him the infinite + weariness of her tremendous achievement. Exulting, she saw herself + extended on the bed, in a black dress, and profoundly at peace, while, + stooping over her with a kindly, playful smile, he was ready to lift her + up in his firm arms and take her into the sanctuary of his innermost heart—for + ever! The flush of rapture flooding her whole being broke out in a smile + of innocent, girlish happiness; and with that divine radiance on her lips + she breathed her last--triumphant, seeking for his glance in the shades of + death. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0039" id="link2HCH0039"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER FOURTEEN + </h2> + <p> + “Yes, Excellency,” said Davidson in his placid voice; “there are more dead + in this affair—more white people, I mean—than have been killed + in many of the battles in the last Achin war.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson was talking with an Excellency, because what was alluded to in + conversation as “the mystery of Samburan” had caused such a sensation in + the Archipelago that even those in the highest spheres were anxious to + hear something at first hand. Davidson had been summoned to an audience. + It was a high official on his tour. + </p> + <p> + “You knew the late Baron Heyst well?” + </p> + <p> + “The truth is that nobody out here can boast of having known him well,” + said Davidson. “He was a queer chap. I doubt if he himself knew how queer + he was. But everybody was aware that I was keeping my eye on him in a + friendly way. And that's how I got the warning which made me turn round in + my tracks. In the middle of my trip and steam back to Samburan, where, I + am grieved to say, I arrived too late.” + </p> + <p> + Without enlarging very much, Davidson explained to the attentive + Excellency how a woman, the wife of a certain hotel-keeper named + Schomberg, had overheard two card-sharping rascals making inquiries from + her husband as to the exact position of the island. She caught only a few + words referring to the neighbouring volcano, but there were enough to + arouse her suspicions—“which,” went on Davidson, “she imparted to + me, your Excellency. They were only too well founded!” + </p> + <p> + “That was very clever of her,” remarked the great man. + </p> + <p> + “She's much cleverer than people have any conception of,” said Davidson. + </p> + <p> + But he refrained from disclosing to the Excellency the real cause which + had sharpened Mrs. Schomberg's wits. The poor woman was in mortal terror + of the girl being brought back within reach of her infatuated Wilhelm. + Davidson only said that her agitation had impressed him; but he confessed + that while going back, he began to have his doubts as to there being + anything in it. + </p> + <p> + “I steamed into one of those silly thunderstorms that hang about the + volcano, and had some trouble in making the island,” narrated Davidson. “I + had to grope my way dead slow into Diamond Bay. I don't suppose that + anybody, even if looking out for me, could have heard me let go the + anchor.” + </p> + <p> + He admitted that he ought to have gone ashore at once; but everything was + perfectly dark and absolutely quiet. He felt ashamed of his impulsiveness. + What a fool he would have looked, waking up a man in the middle of the + night just to ask him if he was all right! And then the girl being there, + he feared that Heyst would look upon his visit as an unwarrantable + intrusion. + </p> + <p> + The first intimation he had of there being anything wrong was a big white + boat, adrift, with the dead body of a very hairy man inside, bumping + against the bows of his steamer. Then indeed he lost no time in going + ashore—alone, of course, from motives of delicacy. + </p> + <p> + “I arrived in time to see that poor girl die, as I have told your + Excellency,” pursued Davidson. “I won't tell you what a time I had with + him afterwards. He talked to me. His father seems to have been a crank, + and to have upset his head when he was young. He was a queer chap. + Practically the last words he said to me, as we came out on the veranda, + were: + </p> + <p> + “'Ah, Davidson, woe to the man whose heart has not learned while young to + hope, to love—and to put its trust in life!' + </p> + <p> + “As we stood there, just before I left him, for he said he wanted to be + alone with his dead for a time, we heard a snarly sort of voice near the + bushes by the shore calling out: + </p> + <p> + “'Is that you, governor?' + </p> + <p> + “'Yes, it's me.' + </p> + <p> + “'Jeeminy! I thought the beggar had done for you. He has started prancing + and nearly had me. I have been dodging around, looking for you ever + since.' + </p> + <p> + “'Well, here I am,' suddenly screamed the other voice, and then a shot + rang out. + </p> + <p> + “'This time he has not missed him,' Heyst said to me bitterly, and went + back into the house. + </p> + <p> + “I returned on board as he had insisted I should do. I didn't want to + intrude on his grief. Later, about five in the morning, some of my + calashes came running to me, yelling that there was a fire ashore. I + landed at once, of course. The principal bungalow was blazing. The heat + drove us back. The other two houses caught one after another like + kindling-wood. There was no going beyond the shore end of the jetty till + the afternoon.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson sighed placidly. + </p> + <p> + “I suppose you are certain that Baron Heyst is dead?” + </p> + <p> + “He is—ashes, your Excellency,” said Davidson, wheezing a little; + “he and the girl together. I suppose he couldn't stand his thoughts before + her dead body—and fire purifies everything. That Chinaman of whom I + told your Excellency helped me to investigate next day, when the embers + got cooled a little. We found enough to be sure. He's not a bad Chinaman. + He told me that he had followed Heyst and the girl through the forest from + pity, and partly out of curiosity. He watched the house till he saw Heyst + go out, after dinner, and Ricardo come back alone. While he was dodging + there, it occurred to him that he had better cast the boat adrift, for + fear those scoundrels should come round by water and bombard the village + from the sea with their revolvers and Winchesters. He judged that they + were devils enough for anything. So he walked down the wharf quietly; and + as he got into the boat, to cast her off, that hairy man who, it seems, + was dozing in her, jumped up growling, and Wang shot him dead. Then he + shoved the boat off as far as he could and went away.” + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. Presently Davidson went on, in his tranquil manner: + </p> + <p> + “Let Heaven look after what has been purified. The wind and rain will take + care of the ashes. The carcass of that follower, secretary, or whatever + the unclean ruffian called himself, I left where it lay, to swell and rot + in the sun. His principal had shot him neatly through the head. Then, + apparently, this Jones went down to the wharf to look for the boat and for + the hairy man. I suppose he tumbled into the water by accident—or + perhaps not by accident. The boat and the man were gone, and the scoundrel + saw himself alone, his game clearly up, and fairly trapped. Who knows? The + water's very clear there, and I could see him huddled up on the bottom, + between two piles, like a heap of bones in a blue silk bag, with only the + head and the feet sticking out. Wang was very pleased when he discovered + him. That made everything safe, he said, and he went at once over the hill + to fetch his Alfuro woman back to the hut.” + </p> + <p> + Davidson took out his handkerchief to wipe the perspiration off his + forehead. + </p> + <p> + “And then, your Excellency, I went away. There was nothing to be done + there.” + </p> + <p> + “Clearly!” assented the Excellency. + </p> + <p> + Davidson, thoughtful, seemed to weigh the matter in his mind, and then + murmured with placid sadness: + </p> + <p> + “Nothing!” + </p> + <p> + <b>October 1912—May 1914</b> + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Victory, by Joseph Conrad + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VICTORY *** + +***** This file should be named 6378-h.htm or 6378-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/7/6378/ + +Produced by Tracy Camp and David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project +Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the Foundation” + or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase “Project +Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase “Project Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +“Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, “Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.” + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +“Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right +of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/old/old-2024-02-03/6378.txt b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bc57b1f --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378.txt @@ -0,0 +1,13930 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Victory, by Joseph Conrad + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost +no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use +it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this +eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Victory + +Author: Joseph Conrad + +Release Date: January 9, 2006 [EBook #6378] +Last Updated: November 4,2010 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VICTORY *** + + + + +Produced by Tracy Camp and David Widger + + + + + +VICTORY: AN ISLAND TALE + +By Joseph Conrad + + + +Contents + + +NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + + +PART ONE + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + + +PART TWO + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +CHAPTER EIGHT + + + + + + + + + + + + +PART THREE + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +CHAPTER NINE + +CHAPTER TEN + + +PART FOUR + +CHAPTER ONE + +CHAPTER TWO + +CHAPTER THREE + +CHAPTER FOUR + +CHAPTER FIVE + +CHAPTER SIX + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +CHAPTER NINE + +CHAPTER TEN + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + + + + + +NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION + +The last word of this novel was written on 29 May 1914. And that last +word was the single word of the title. + +Those were the times of peace. Now that the moment of publication +approaches I have been considering the discretion of altering the +title-page. The word "Victory" the shining and tragic goal of noble +effort, appeared too great, too august, to stand at the head of a mere +novel. There was also the possibility of falling under the suspicion of +commercial astuteness deceiving the public into the belief that the book +had something to do with war. + +Of that, however, I was not afraid very much. What influenced my +decision most were the obscure promptings of that pagan residuum of +awe and wonder which lurks still at the bottom of our old humanity. +"Victory" was the last word I had written in peace-time. It was the last +literary thought which had occurred to me before the doors of the Temple +of Janus flying open with a crash shook the minds, the hearts, the +consciences of men all over the world. Such coincidence could not be +treated lightly. And I made up my mind to let the word stand, in the +same hopeful spirit in which some simple citizen of Old Rome would have +"accepted the Omen." + +The second point on which I wish to offer a remark is the existence (in +the novel) of a person named Schomberg. + +That I believe him to be true goes without saying. I am not likely to +offer pinchbeck wares to my public consciously. Schomberg is an old +member of my company. A very subordinate personage in Lord Jim as far +back as the year 1899, he became notably active in a certain short story +of mine published in 1902. Here he appears in a still larger part, true +to life (I hope), but also true to himself. Only, in this instance, his +deeper passions come into play, and thus his grotesque psychology is +completed at last. + +I don't pretend to say that this is the entire Teutonic psychology; but +it is indubitably the psychology of a Teuton. My object in mentioning +him here is to bring out the fact that, far from being the incarnation +of recent animosities, he is the creature of my old deep-seated, and, as +it were, impartial conviction. + +J. C. + + + +AUTHOR'S NOTE + +On approaching the task of writing this Note for Victory, the first +thing I am conscious of is the actual nearness of the book, its nearness +to me personally, to the vanished mood in which it was written, and to +the mixed feelings aroused by the critical notices the book obtained +when first published almost exactly a year after the beginning of the +war. The writing of it was finished in 1914 long before the murder of an +Austrian Archduke sounded the first note of warning for a world already +full of doubts and fears. + +The contemporaneous very short Author's Note which is preserved in this +edition bears sufficient witness to the feelings with which I consented +to the publication of the book. The fact of the book having been +published in the United States early in the year made it difficult +to delay its appearance in England any longer. It came out in the +thirteenth month of the war, and my conscience was troubled by the awful +incongruity of throwing this bit of imagined drama into the welter +of reality, tragic enough in all conscience, but even more cruel than +tragic and more inspiring than cruel. It seemed awfully presumptuous to +think there would be eyes to spare for those pages in a community which +in the crash of the big guns and in the din of brave words expressing +the truth of an indomitable faith could not but feel the edge of a sharp +knife at its throat. + +The unchanging Man of history is wonderfully adaptable both by his power +of endurance and in his capacity for detachment. The fact seems to +be that the play of his destiny is too great for his fears and too +mysterious for his understanding. Were the trump of the Last Judgement +to sound suddenly on a working day the musician at his piano would go on +with his performance of Beethoven's sonata and the cobbler at his +stall stick to his last in undisturbed confidence in the virtues of the +leather. And with perfect propriety. For what are we to let ourselves be +disturbed by an angel's vengeful music too mighty for our ears and too +awful for our terrors? Thus it happens to us to be struck suddenly +by the lightning of wrath. The reader will go on reading if the book +pleases him and the critic will go on criticizing with that faculty of +detachment born perhaps from a sense of infinite littleness and which is +yet the only faculty that seems to assimilate man to the immortal gods. + +It is only when the catastrophe matches the natural obscurity of our +fate that even the best representative of the race is liable to lose his +detachment. It is very obvious that on the arrival of the gentlemanly +Mr. Jones, the single-minded Ricardo, and the faithful Pedro, Heyst, the +man of universal detachment, loses his mental self-possession, that fine +attitude before the universally irremediable which wears the name of +stoicism. It is all a matter of proportion. There should have been a +remedy for that sort of thing. And yet there is no remedy. Behind this +minute instance of life's hazards Heyst sees the power of blind destiny. +Besides, Heyst in his fine detachment had lost the habit of asserting +himself. I don't mean the courage of self-assertion, either moral or +physical, but the mere way of it, the trick of the thing, the readiness +of mind and the turn of the hand that come without reflection and lead +the man to excellence in life, in art, in crime, in virtue, and, for the +matter of that, even in love. Thinking is the great enemy of perfection. +The habit of profound reflection, I am compelled to say, is the most +pernicious of all the habits formed by the civilized man. + +But I wouldn't be suspected even remotely of making fun of Axel Heyst. I +have always liked him. The flesh-and-blood individual who stands +behind the infinitely more familiar figure of the book I remember as a +mysterious Swede right enough. Whether he was a baron, too, I am not so +certain. He himself never laid claim to that distinction. His detachment +was too great to make any claims, big or small, on one's credulity. I +will not say where I met him because I fear to give my readers a +wrong impression, since a marked incongruity between a man and his +surroundings is often a very misleading circumstance. We became very +friendly for a time, and I would not like to expose him to unpleasant +suspicions though, personally, I am sure he would have been indifferent +to suspicions as he was indifferent to all the other disadvantages of +life. He was not the whole Heyst of course; he is only the physical and +moral foundation of my Heyst laid on the ground of a short acquaintance. +That it was short was certainly not my fault for he had charmed me by +the mere amenity of his detachment which, in this case, I cannot help +thinking he had carried to excess. He went away from his rooms without +leaving a trace. I wondered where he had gone to--but now I know. +He vanished from my ken only to drift into this adventure that, +unavoidable, waited for him in a world which he persisted in looking +upon as a malevolent shadow spinning in the sunlight. Often in the +course of years an expressed sentiment, the particular sense of a phrase +heard casually, would recall him to my mind so that I have fastened on +to him many words heard on other men's lips and belonging to other men's +less perfect, less pathetic moods. + +The same observation will apply mutatis mutandis to Mr. Jones, who is +built on a much slenderer connection. Mr. Jones (or whatever his name +was) did not drift away from me. He turned his back on me and walked out +of the room. It was in a little hotel in the island of St. Thomas in +the West Indies (in the year '75) where we found him one hot afternoon +extended on three chairs, all alone in the loud buzzing of flies to +which his immobility and his cadaverous aspect gave a most gruesome +significance. Our invasion must have displeased him because he got off +the chairs brusquely and walked out, leaving with me an indelibly weird +impression of his thin shanks. One of the men with me said that the +fellow was the most desperate gambler he had ever come across. I said: +"A professional sharper?" and got for an answer: "He's a terror; but I +must say that up to a certain point he will play fair. . . ." I wonder +what the point was. I never saw him again because I believe he went +straight on board a mail-boat which left within the hour for other +ports of call in the direction of Aspinall. Mr. Jones's characteristic +insolence belongs to another man of a quite different type. I will say +nothing as to the origins of his mentality because I don't intend to +make any damaging admissions. + +It so happened that the very same year Ricardo--the physical +Ricardo--was a fellow passenger of mine on board an extremely small and +extremely dirty little schooner, during a four days' passage between two +places in the Gulf of Mexico whose names don't matter. For the most part +he lay on deck aft as it were at my feet, and raising himself from time +to time on his elbow would talk about himself and go on talking, not +exactly to me or even at me (he would not even look up but kept his +eyes fixed on the deck) but more as if communing in a low voice with +his familiar devil. Now and then he would give me a glance and make the +hairs of his stiff little moustache stir quaintly. His eyes were green +and every cat I see to this day reminds me of the exact contour of his +face. What he was travelling for or what was his business in life he +never confided to me. Truth to say, the only passenger on board that +schooner who could have talked openly about his activities and purposes +was a very snuffy and conversationally delightful friar, the superior +of a convent, attended by a very young lay brother, of a particularly +ferocious countenance. We had with us also, lying prostrate in the dark +and unspeakable cuddy of that schooner, an old Spanish gentleman, owner +of much luggage and, as Ricardo assured me, very ill indeed. Ricardo +seemed to be either a servant or the confidant of that aged and +distinguished-looking invalid, who early on the passage held a long +murmured conversation with the friar, and after that did nothing but +groan feebly, smoke cigarettes, and now and then call for Martin in a +voice full of pain. Then he who had become Ricardo in the book would go +below into that beastly and noisome hole, remain there mysteriously, +and coming up on deck again with a face on which nothing could be read, +would as likely as not resume for my edification the exposition of his +moral attitude towards life illustrated by striking particular instances +of the most atrocious complexion. Did he mean to frighten me? Or seduce +me? Or astonish me? Or arouse my admiration? All he did was to arouse my +amused incredulity. As scoundrels go he was far from being a bore. +For the rest my innocence was so great then that I could not take his +philosophy seriously. All the time he kept one ear turned to the cuddy +in the manner of a devoted servant, but I had the idea that in some way +or other he had imposed the connection on the invalid for some end of +his own. The reader, therefore, won't be surprised to hear that one +morning I was told without any particular emotion by the padrone of the +schooner that the "rich man" down there was dead: He had died in the +night. I don't remember ever being so moved by the desolate end of a +complete stranger. I looked down the skylight, and there was the devoted +Martin busy cording cowhide trunks belonging to the deceased whose white +beard and hooked nose were the only parts I could make out in the dark +depths of a horrible stuffy bunk. + +As it fell calm in the course of the afternoon and continued calm during +all that night and the terrible, flaming day, the late "rich man" had +to be thrown overboard at sunset, though as a matter of fact we were in +sight of the low pestilential mangrove-lined coast of our destination. +The excellent Father Superior mentioned to me with an air of immense +commiseration: "The poor man has left a young daughter." Who was to look +after her I don't know, but I saw the devoted Martin taking the trunks +ashore with great care just before I landed myself. I would perhaps have +tracked the ways of that man of immense sincerity for a little while, +but I had some of my own very pressing business to attend to, which in +the end got mixed up with an earthquake and so I had no time to give +to Ricardo. The reader need not be told that I have not forgotten him, +though. + +My contact with the faithful Pedro was much shorter and my observation +of him was less complete but incomparably more anxious. It ended in a +sudden inspiration to get out of his way. It was in a hovel of sticks +and mats by the side of a path. As I went in there only to ask for a +bottle of lemonade I have not to this day the slightest idea what in +my appearance or actions could have roused his terrible ire. It became +manifest to me less than two minutes after I had set eyes on him for the +first time, and though immensely surprised of course I didn't stop +to think it out I took the nearest short cut--through the wall. This +bestial apparition and a certain enormous buck nigger encountered in +Haiti only a couple of months afterwards, have fixed my conception of +blind, furious, unreasoning rage, as manifested in the human animal, to +the end of my days. Of the nigger I used to dream for years afterwards. +Of Pedro never. The impression was less vivid. I got away from him too +quickly. + +It seems to me but natural that those three buried in a corner of my +memory should suddenly get out into the light of the world--so natural +that I offer no excuse for their existence, They were there, they had to +come out; and this is a sufficient excuse for a writer of tales who had +taken to his trade without preparation, or premeditation, and without +any moral intention but that which pervades the whole scheme of this +world of senses. + +Since this Note is mostly concerned with personal contacts and the +origins of the persons in the tale, I am bound also to speak of Lena, +because if I were to leave her out it would look like a slight; and +nothing would be further from my thoughts than putting a slight on Lena. +If of all the personages involved in the "mystery of Samburan" I have +lived longest with Heyst (or with him I call Heyst) it was at her, whom +I call Lena, that I have looked the longest and with a most sustained +attention. This attention originated in idleness for which I have a +natural talent. One evening I wandered into a cafe, in a town not of the +tropics but of the South of France. It was filled with tobacco smoke, +the hum of voices, the rattling of dominoes, and the sounds of strident +music. The orchestra was rather smaller than the one that performed +at Schomberg's hotel, had the air more of a family party than of an +enlisted band, and, I must confess, seemed rather more respectable than +the Zangiacomo musical enterprise. It was less pretentious also, more +homely and familiar, so to speak, insomuch that in the intervals when +all the performers left the platform one of them went amongst the +marble tables collecting offerings of sous and francs in a battered +tin receptacle recalling the shape of a sauceboat. It was a girl. +Her detachment from her task seems to me now to have equalled or even +surpassed Heyst's aloofness from all the mental degradations to which +a man's intelligence is exposed in its way through life. Silent and +wide-eyed she went from table to table with the air of a sleep-walker +and with no other sound but the slight rattle of the coins to attract +attention. It was long after the sea-chapter of my life had been closed +but it is difficult to discard completely the characteristics of half +a lifetime, and it was in something of the Jack-ashore spirit that +I dropped a five-franc piece into the sauceboat; whereupon the +sleep-walker turned her head to gaze at me and said "Merci, Monsieur" +in a tone in which there was no gratitude but only surprise. I must have +been idle indeed to take the trouble to remark on such slight evidence +that the voice was very charming and when the performers resumed +their seats I shifted my position slightly in order not to have that +particular performer hidden from me by the little man with the beard who +conducted, and who might for all I know have been her father, but whose +real mission in life was to be a model for the Zangiacomo of Victory. +Having got a clear line of sight I naturally (being idle) continued to +look at the girl through all the second part of the programme. The shape +of her dark head inclined over the violin was fascinating, and, while +resting between the pieces of that interminable programme she was, in +her white dress and with her brown hands reposing in her lap, the very +image of dreamy innocence. The mature, bad-tempered woman at the +piano might have been her mother, though there was not the slightest +resemblance between them. All I am certain of in their personal relation +to each other is that cruel pinch on the upper part of the arm. That I +am sure I have seen! There could be no mistake. I was in too idle a mood +to imagine such a gratuitous barbarity. It may have been playfulness, +yet the girl jumped up as if she had been stung by a wasp. It may have +been playfulness. Yet I saw plainly poor "dreamy innocence" rub gently +the affected place as she filed off with the other performers down the +middle aisle between the marble tables in the uproar of voices, the +rattling of dominoes through a blue atmosphere of tobacco smoke. I +believe that those people left the town next day. + +Or perhaps they had only migrated to the other big cafe, on the other +side of the Place de la Comedie. It is very possible. I did not go +across to find out. It was my perfect idleness that had invested the +girl with a peculiar charm, and I did not want to destroy it by +any superfluous exertion. The receptivity of my indolence made the +impression so permanent that when the moment came for her meeting with +Heyst I felt that she would be heroically equal to every demand of the +risky and uncertain future. I was so convinced of it that I let her go +with Heyst, I won't say without a pang but certainly without misgivings. +And in view of her triumphant end what more could I have done for her +rehabilitation and her happiness? + +1920. J. C. + + + + +VICTORY: AN ISLAND TALE PART ONE + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +There is, as every schoolboy knows in this scientific age, a very +close chemical relation between coal and diamonds. It is the reason, I +believe, why some people allude to coal as "black diamonds." Both these +commodities represent wealth; but coal is a much less portable form +of property. There is, from that point of view, a deplorable lack of +concentration in coal. Now, if a coal-mine could be put into one's +waistcoat pocket--but it can't! At the same time, there is a fascination +in coal, the supreme commodity of the age in which we are camped like +bewildered travellers in a garish, unrestful hotel. And I suppose +those two considerations, the practical and the mystical, prevented +Heyst--Axel Heyst--from going away. + +The Tropical Belt Coal Company went into liquidation. The world of +finance is a mysterious world in which, incredible as the fact may +appear, evaporation precedes liquidation. First the capital evaporates, +and then the company goes into liquidation. These are very unnatural +physics, but they account for the persistent inertia of Heyst, at which +we "out there" used to laugh among ourselves--but not inimically. An +inert body can do no harm to anyone, provokes no hostility, is scarcely +worth derision. It may, indeed, be in the way sometimes; but this could +not be said of Axel Heyst. He was out of everybody's way, as if he +were perched on the highest peak of the Himalayas, and in a sense as +conspicuous. Everyone in that part of the world knew of him, dwelling on +his little island. An island is but the top of a mountain. Axel Heyst, +perched on it immovably, was surrounded, instead of the imponderable +stormy and transparent ocean of air merging into infinity, by a tepid, +shallow sea; a passionless offshoot of the great waters which embrace +the continents of this globe. His most frequent visitors were shadows, +the shadows of clouds, relieving the monotony of the inanimate, brooding +sunshine of the tropics. His nearest neighbour--I am speaking now of +things showing some sort of animation--was an indolent volcano which +smoked faintly all day with its head just above the northern horizon, +and at night levelled at him, from amongst the clear stars, a dull red +glow, expanding and collapsing spasmodically like the end of a gigantic +cigar puffed at intermittently in the dark. Axel Heyst was also a +smoker; and when he lounged out on his veranda with his cheroot, the +last thing before going to bed, he made in the night the same sort of +glow and of the same size as that other one so many miles away. + +In a sense, the volcano was company to him in the shades of the +night--which were often too thick, one would think, to let a breath of +air through. There was seldom enough wind to blow a feather along. On +most evenings of the year Heyst could have sat outside with a naked +candle to read one of the books left him by his late father. It was not +a mean store. But he never did that. Afraid of mosquitoes, very likely. +Neither was he ever tempted by the silence to address any casual remarks +to the companion glow of the volcano. He was not mad. Queer chap--yes, +that may have been said, and in fact was said; but there is a tremendous +difference between the two, you will allow. + +On the nights of full moon the silence around Samburan--the "Round +Island" of the charts--was dazzling; and in the flood of cold light +Heyst could see his immediate surroundings, which had the aspect of +an abandoned settlement invaded by the jungle: vague roofs above low +vegetation, broken shadows of bamboo fences in the sheen of long grass, +something like an overgrown bit of road slanting among ragged thickets +towards the shore only a couple of hundred yards away, with a black +jetty and a mound of some sort, quite inky on its unlighted side. But +the most conspicuous object was a gigantic blackboard raised on two +posts and presenting to Heyst, when the moon got over that side, the +white letters "T. B. C. Co." in a row at least two feet high. These were +the initials of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, his employers--his late +employers, to be precise. + +According to the unnatural mysteries of the financial world, the T. B. +C. Company's capital having evaporated in the course of two years, the +company went into liquidation--forced, I believe, not voluntary. There +was nothing forcible in the process, however. It was slow; and while the +liquidation--in London and Amsterdam--pursued its languid course, Axel +Heyst, styled in the prospectus "manager in the tropics," remained at +his post on Samburan, the No. 1 coaling-station of the company. + +And it was not merely a coaling-station. There was a coal-mine there, +with an outcrop in the hillside less than five hundred yards from the +rickety wharf and the imposing blackboard. The company's object had been +to get hold of all the outcrops on tropical islands and exploit them +locally. And, Lord knows, there were any amount of outcrops. It was +Heyst who had located most of them in this part of the tropical belt +during his rather aimless wanderings, and being a ready letter-writer +had written pages and pages about them to his friends in Europe. At +least, so it was said. + +We doubted whether he had any visions of wealth--for himself, at any +rate. What he seemed mostly concerned for was the "stride forward," +as he expressed it, in the general organization of the universe, +apparently. He was heard by more than a hundred persons in the islands +talking of a "great stride forward for these regions." The convinced +wave of the hand which accompanied the phrase suggested tropical +distances being impelled onward. In connection with the finished +courtesy of his manner, it was persuasive, or at any rate silencing--for +a time, at least. Nobody cared to argue with him when he talked in this +strain. His earnestness could do no harm to anybody. There was no danger +of anyone taking seriously his dream of tropical coal, so what was the +use of hurting his feelings? + +Thus reasoned men in reputable business offices where he had his entree +as a person who came out East with letters of introduction--and modest +letters of credit, too--some years before these coal-outcrops began to +crop up in his playfully courteous talk. From the first there was +some difficulty in making him out. He was not a traveller. A traveller +arrives and departs, goes on somewhere. Heyst did not depart. I met a +man once--the manager of the branch of the Oriental Banking Corporation +in Malacca--to whom Heyst exclaimed, in no connection with anything in +particular (it was in the billiard-room of the club): + +"I am enchanted with these islands!" + +He shot it out suddenly, a propos des bottes, as the French say, and +while chalking his cue. And perhaps it was some sort of enchantment. +There are more spells than your commonplace magicians ever dreamed of. + +Roughly speaking, a circle with a radius of eight hundred miles drawn +round a point in North Borneo was in Heyst's case a magic circle. It +just touched Manila, and he had been seen there. It just touched Saigon, +and he was likewise seen there once. Perhaps these were his attempts to +break out. If so, they were failures. The enchantment must have been +an unbreakable one. The manager--the man who heard the exclamation--had +been so impressed by the tone, fervour, rapture, what you will, or +perhaps by the incongruity of it that he had related the experience to +more than one person. + +"Queer chap, that Swede," was his only comment; but this is the origin +of the name "Enchanted Heyst" which some fellows fastened on our man. + +He also had other names. In his early years, long before he got so +becomingly bald on the top, he went to present a letter of introduction +to Mr. Tesman of Tesman Brothers, a Sourabaya firm--tip-top house. Well, +Mr. Tesman was a kindly, benevolent old gentleman. He did not know what +to make of that caller. After telling him that they wished to render his +stay among the islands as pleasant as possible, and that they were +ready to assist him in his plans, and so on, and after receiving Heyst's +thanks--you know the usual kind of conversation--he proceeded to query +in a slow, paternal tone: + +"And you are interested in--?" + +"Facts," broke in Heyst in his courtly voice. "There's nothing worth +knowing but facts. Hard facts! Facts alone, Mr. Tesman." + +I don't know if old Tesman agreed with him or not, but he must have +spoken about it, because, for a time, our man got the name of "Hard +Facts." He had the singular good fortune that his sayings stuck to him +and became part of his name. Thereafter he mooned about the Java Sea in +some of the Tesmans' trading schooners, and then vanished, on board an +Arab ship, in the direction of New Guinea. He remained so long in that +outlying part of his enchanted circle that he was nearly forgotten +before he swam into view again in a native proa full of Goram vagabonds, +burnt black by the sun, very lean, his hair much thinned, and a +portfolio of sketches under his arm. He showed these willingly, but +was very reserved as to anything else. He had had an "amusing time," he +said. A man who will go to New Guinea for fun--well! + +Later, years afterwards, when the last vestiges of youth had gone off +his face and all the hair off the top of his head, and his red-gold +pair of horizontal moustaches had grown to really noble proportions, +a certain disreputable white man fastened upon him an epithet. Putting +down with a shaking hand a long glass emptied of its contents--paid +for by Heyst--he said, with that deliberate sagacity which no mere +water-drinker ever attained: + +"Heyst's a puffect g'n'lman. Puffect! But he's a ut-uto-utopist." + +Heyst had just gone out of the place of public refreshment where this +pronouncement was voiced. Utopist, eh? Upon my word, the only thing +I heard him say which might have had a bearing on the point was his +invitation to old McNab himself. Turning with that finished courtesy of +attitude, movement voice, which was his obvious characteristic, he had +said with delicate playfulness: + +"Come along and quench your thirst with us, Mr. McNab!" + +Perhaps that was it. A man who could propose, even playfully, to quench +old McNab's thirst must have been a utopist, a pursuer of chimeras; for +of downright irony Heyst was not prodigal. And, may be, this was the +reason why he was generally liked. At that epoch in his life, in the +fulness of his physical development, of a broad, martial presence, with +his bald head and long moustaches, he resembled the portraits of Charles +XII., of adventurous memory. However, there was no reason to think that +Heyst was in any way a fighting man. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +It was about this time that Heyst became associated with Morrison on +terms about which people were in doubt. Some said he was a partner, +others said he was a sort of paying guest, but the real truth of the +matter was more complex. One day Heyst turned up in Timor. Why in Timor, +of all places in the world, no one knows. Well, he was mooning about +Delli, that highly pestilential place, possibly in search of some +undiscovered facts, when he came in the street upon Morrison, who, in +his way, was also an "enchanted" man. When you spoke to Morrison of +going home--he was from Dorsetshire--he shuddered. He said it was dark +and wet there; that it was like living with your head and shoulders in +a moist gunny-bag. That was only his exaggerated style of talking. +Morrison was "one of us." He was owner and master of the Capricorn, +trading brig, and was understood to be doing well with her, except for +the drawback of too much altruism. He was the dearly beloved friend of a +quantity of God-forsaken villages up dark creeks and obscure bays, where +he traded for produce. He would often sail, through awfully dangerous +channels up to some miserable settlement, only to find a very hungry +population clamorous for rice, and without so much "produce" between +them as would have filled Morrison's suitcase. Amid general rejoicings, +he would land the rice all the same, explain to the people that it was +an advance, that they were in debt to him now; would preach to them +energy and industry, and make an elaborate note in a pocket-diary which +he always carried; and this would be the end of that transaction. +I don't know if Morrison thought so, but the villagers had no doubt +whatever about it. Whenever a coast village sighted the brig it would +begin to beat all its gongs and hoist all its streamers, and all its +girls would put flowers in their hair and the crowd would line the river +bank, and Morrison would beam and glitter at all this excitement through +his single eyeglass with an air of intense gratification. He was tall +and lantern-jawed, and clean-shaven, and looked like a barrister who had +thrown his wig to the dogs. + +We used to remonstrate with him: + +"You will never see any of your advances if you go on like this, +Morrison." + +He would put on a knowing air. + +"I shall squeeze them yet some day--never you fear. And that reminds +me"--pulling out his inseparable pocketbook--"there's that So-and-So +village. They are pretty well off again; I may just as well squeeze them +to begin with." + +He would make a ferocious entry in the pocketbook. + +Memo: Squeeze the So-and-So village at the first time of calling. + +Then he would stick the pencil back and snap the elastic on with +inflexible finality; but he never began the squeezing. Some men grumbled +at him. He was spoiling the trade. Well, perhaps to a certain extent; +not much. Most of the places he traded with were unknown not only to +geography but also to the traders' special lore which is transmitted by +word of mouth, without ostentation, and forms the stock of mysterious +local knowledge. It was hinted also that Morrison had a wife in each and +every one of them, but the majority of us repulsed these innuendoes +with indignation. He was a true humanitarian and rather ascetic than +otherwise. + +When Heyst met him in Delli, Morrison was walking along the street, +his eyeglass tossed over his shoulder, his head down, with the hopeless +aspect of those hardened tramps one sees on our roads trudging from +workhouse to workhouse. Being hailed on the street he looked up with a +wild worried expression. He was really in trouble. He had come the week +before into Delli and the Portuguese authorities, on some pretence +of irregularity in his papers, had inflicted a fine upon him and had +arrested his brig. + +Morrison never had any spare cash in hand. With his system of trading +it would have been strange if he had; and all these debts entered in +the pocketbook weren't good enough to raise a millrei on--let alone a +shilling. The Portuguese officials begged him not to distress himself. +They gave him a week's grace, and then proposed to sell the brig at +auction. This meant ruin for Morrison; and when Heyst hailed him across +the street in his usual courtly tone, the week was nearly out. + +Heyst crossed over, and said with a slight bow, and in the manner of a +prince addressing another prince on a private occasion: + +"What an unexpected pleasure. Would you have any objection to drink +something with me in that infamous wine-shop over there? The sun is +really too strong to talk in the street." + +The haggard Morrison followed obediently into a sombre, cool hovel which +he would have distained to enter at any other time. He was distracted. +He did not know what he was doing. You could have led him over the edge +of a precipice just as easily as into that wine-shop. He sat down like +an automaton. He was speechless, but he saw a glass full of rough red +wine before him, and emptied it. Heyst meantime, politely watchful, had +taken a seat opposite. + +"You are in for a bout of fever, I fear," he said sympathetically. + +Poor Morrison's tongue was loosened at that. + +"Fever!" he cried. "Give me fever. Give me plague. They are diseases. +One gets over them. But I am being murdered. I am being murdered by the +Portuguese. The gang here downed me at last among them. I am to have my +throat cut the day after tomorrow." + +In the face of this passion Heyst made, with his eyebrows, a +slight motion of surprise which would not have been misplaced in a +drawing-room. Morrison's despairing reserve had broken down. He had been +wandering with a dry throat all over that miserable town of mud hovels, +silent, with no soul to turn to in his distress, and positively +maddened by his thoughts; and suddenly he had stumbled on a white man, +figuratively and actually white--for Morrison refused to accept the +racial whiteness of the Portuguese officials. He let himself go for the +mere relief of violent speech, his elbows planted on the table, his +eyes blood-shot, his voice nearly gone, the brim of his round pith hat +shading an unshaven, livid face. His white clothes, which he had not +taken off for three days, were dingy. He had already gone to the bad, +past redemption. The sight was shocking to Heyst; but he let nothing +of it appear in his bearing, concealing his impression under that +consummate good-society manner of his. Polite attention, what's due from +one gentleman listening to another, was what he showed; and, as usual, +it was catching; so that Morrison pulled himself together and finished +his narrative in a conversational tone, with a man-of-the-world air. + +"It's a villainous plot. Unluckily, one is helpless. That scoundrel +Cousinho--Andreas, you know--has been coveting the brig for years. +Naturally, I would never sell. She is not only my livelihood; she's my +life. So he has hatched this pretty little plot with the chief of the +customs. The sale, of course, will be a farce. There's no one here to +bid. He will get the brig for a song--no, not even that--a line of a +song. You have been some years now in the islands, Heyst. You know us +all; you have seen how we live. Now you shall have the opportunity +to see how some of us end; for it is the end, for me. I can't deceive +myself any longer. You see it--don't you?" + +Morrison had pulled himself together, but one felt the snapping strain +on his recovered self-possession. Heyst was beginning to say that +he "could very well see all the bearings of this unfortunate--" when +Morrison interrupted him jerkily. + +"Upon my word, I don't know why I have been telling you all this. I +suppose seeing a thoroughly white man made it impossible to keep my +trouble to myself. Words can't do it justice; but since I've told you so +much I may as well tell you more. Listen. This morning on board, in my +cabin I went down on my knees and prayed for help. I went down on my +knees!" + +"You are a believer, Morrison?" asked Heyst with a distinct note of +respect. + +"Surely I am not an infidel." + +Morrison was swiftly reproachful in his answer, and there came a pause, +Morrison perhaps interrogating his conscience, and Heyst preserving a +mien of unperturbed, polite interest. + +"I prayed like a child, of course. I believe in children praying--well, +women, too, but I rather think God expects men to be more self-reliant. +I don't hold with a man everlastingly bothering the Almighty with his +silly troubles. It seems such cheek. Anyhow, this morning I--I have +never done any harm to any God's creature knowingly--I prayed. A sudden +impulse--I went flop on my knees; so you may judge--" + +They were gazing earnestly into each other's eyes. Poor Morrison added, +as a discouraging afterthought: + +"Only this is such a God-forsaken spot." + +Heyst inquired with a delicate intonation whether he might know the +amount for which the brig was seized. + +Morrison suppressed an oath, and named curtly a sum which was in itself +so insignificant that any other person than Heyst would have exclaimed +at it. And even Heyst could hardly keep incredulity out of his politely +modulated voice as he asked if it was a fact that Morrison had not that +amount in hand. + +Morrison hadn't. He had only a little English gold, a few sovereigns, on +board. He had left all his spare cash with the Tesmans, in Samarang, to +meet certain bills which would fall due while he was away on his cruise. +Anyhow, that money would not have been any more good to him than if it +had been in the innermost depths of the infernal regions. He said all +this brusquely. He looked with sudden disfavour at that noble forehead, +at those great martial moustaches, at the tired eyes of the man sitting +opposite him. Who the devil was he? What was he, Morrison, doing there, +talking like this? Morrison knew no more of Heyst than the rest of us +trading in the Archipelago did. Had the Swede suddenly risen and hit +him on the nose, he could not have been taken more aback than when this +stranger, this nondescript wanderer, said with a little bow across the +table: + +"Oh! If that's the case I would be very happy if you'd allow me to be of +use!" + +Morrison didn't understand. This was one of those things that don't +happen--unheard of things. He had no real inkling of what it meant, till +Heyst said definitely: + +"I can lend you the amount." + +"You have the money?" whispered Morrison. "Do you mean here, in your +pocket?" + +"Yes, on me. Glad to be of use." + +Morrison, staring open-mouthed, groped over his shoulder for the cord of +the eyeglass hanging down his back. When he found it, he stuck it in his +eye hastily. It was as if he expected Heyst's usual white suit of the +tropics to change into a shining garment, flowing down to his toes, +and a pair of great dazzling wings to sprout out on the Swede's +shoulders--and didn't want to miss a single detail of the +transformation. But if Heyst was an angel from on high, sent in answer +to prayer, he did not betray his heavenly origin by outward signs. +So, instead of going on his knees, as he felt inclined to do, Morrison +stretched out his hand, which Heyst grasped with formal alacrity and a +polite murmur in which "Trifle--delighted--of service," could just be +distinguished. + +"Miracles do happen," thought the awestruck Morrison. To him, as to +all of us in the Islands, this wandering Heyst, who didn't toil or spin +visibly, seemed the very last person to be the agent of Providence in +an affair concerned with money. The fact of his turning up in Timor or +anywhere else was no more wonderful than the settling of a sparrow on +one's window-sill at any given moment. But that he should carry a sum of +money in his pocket seemed somehow inconceivable. + +So inconceivable that as they were trudging together through the sand +of the roadway to the custom-house--another mud hovel--to pay the +fine, Morrison broke into a cold sweat, stopped short, and exclaimed in +faltering accents: + +"I say! You aren't joking, Heyst?" + +"Joking!" Heyst's blue eyes went hard as he turned them on the +discomposed Morrison. "In what way, may I ask?" he continued with +austere politeness. + +Morrison was abashed. + +"Forgive me, Heyst. You must have been sent by God in answer to my +prayer. But I have been nearly off my chump for three days with worry; +and it suddenly struck me: 'What if it's the Devil who has sent him?'" + +"I have no connection with the supernatural," said Heyst graciously, +moving on. "Nobody has sent me. I just happened along." + +"I know better," contradicted Morrison. "I may be unworthy, but I have +been heard. I know it. I feel it. For why should you offer--" + +Heyst inclined his head, as from respect for a conviction in which he +could not share. But he stuck to his point by muttering that in the +presence of an odious fact like this, it was natural-- + +Later in the day, the fine paid, and the two of them on board the brig, +from which the guard had been removed, Morrison who, besides, being a +gentleman was also an honest fellow began to talk about repayment. He +knew very well his inability to lay by any sum of money. It was partly +the fault of circumstances and partly of his temperament; and it would +have been very difficult to apportion the responsibility between the +two. Even Morrison himself could not say, while confessing to the fact. +With a worried air he ascribed it to fatality: + +"I don't know how it is that I've never been able to save. It's some +sort of curse. There's always a bill or two to meet." + +He plunged his hand into his pocket for the famous notebook so well +known in the islands, the fetish of his hopes, and fluttered the pages +feverishly. + +"And yet--look," he went on. "There it is--more than five thousand +dollars owing. Surely that's something." + +He ceased suddenly. Heyst, who had been all the time trying to look +as unconcerned as he could, made reassuring noises in his throat. +But Morrison was not only honest. He was honourable, too; and on this +stressful day, before this amazing emissary of Providence and in the +revulsion of his feelings, he made his great renunciation. He cast off +the abiding illusion of his existence. + +"No. No. They are not good. I'll never be able to squeeze them. Never. +I've been saying for years I would, but I give it up. I never really +believed I could. Don't reckon on that, Heyst. I have robbed you." + +Poor Morrison actually laid his head on the cabin table, and remained +in that crushed attitude while Heyst talked to him soothingly with the +utmost courtesy. The Swede was as much distressed as Morrison; for he +understood the other's feelings perfectly. No decent feeling was ever +scorned by Heyst. But he was incapable of outward cordiality of manner, +and he felt acutely his defect. Consummate politeness is not the right +tonic for an emotional collapse. They must have had, both of them, a +fairly painful time of it in the cabin of the brig. In the end Morrison, +casting desperately for an idea in the blackness of his despondency, +hit upon the notion of inviting Heyst to travel with him in his brig and +have a share in his trading ventures up to the amount of his loan. + +It is characteristic of Heyst's unattached, floating existence that he +was in a position to accept this proposal. There is no reason to think +that he wanted particularly just then to go poking aboard the brig into +all the holes and corners of the Archipelago where Morrison picked up +most of his trade. Far from it; but he would have consented to almost +any arrangement in order to put an end to the harrowing scene in the +cabin. There was at once a great transformation act: Morrison raising +his diminished head, and sticking the glass in his eye to look +affectionately at Heyst, a bottle being uncorked, and so on. It was +agreed that nothing should be said to anyone of this transaction. +Morrison, you understand, was not proud of the episode, and he was +afraid of being unmercifully chaffed. + +"An old bird like me! To let myself be trapped by those damned +Portuguese rascals! I should never hear the last of it. We must keep it +dark." + +From quite other motives, among which his native delicacy was the +principal, Heyst was even more anxious to bind himself to silence. A +gentleman would naturally shrink from the part of heavenly messenger +that Morrison would force upon him. It made Heyst uncomfortable, as it +was. And perhaps he did not care that it should be known that he had +some means, whatever they might have been--sufficient, at any rate, to +enable him to lend money to people. These two had a duet down there, +like conspirators in a comic opera, of "Sh--ssh, shssh! Secrecy! +Secrecy!" It must have been funny, because they were very serious about +it. + +And for a time the conspiracy was successful in so far that we all +concluded that Heyst was boarding with the good-natured--some said: +sponging on the imbecile--Morrison, in his brig. But you know how it +is with all such mysteries. There is always a leak somewhere. Morrison +himself, not a perfect vessel by any means, was bursting with gratitude, +and under the stress he must have let out something vague--enough to +give the island gossip a chance. And you know how kindly the world is +in its comments on what it does not understand. A rumour sprang out that +Heyst, having obtained some mysterious hold on Morrison, had fastened +himself on him and was sucking him dry. Those who had traced these +mutters back to their origin were very careful not to believe them. The +originator, it seems, was a certain Schomberg, a big, manly, bearded +creature of the Teutonic persuasion, with an ungovernable tongue which +surely must have worked on a pivot. Whether he was a Lieutenant of the +Reserve, as he declared, I don't know. Out there he was by profession a +hotel-keeper, first in Bangkok, then somewhere else, and ultimately in +Sourabaya. He dragged after him up and down that section of the tropical +belt a silent, frightened, little woman with long ringlets, who smiled +at one stupidly, showing a blue tooth. I don't know why so many of us +patronized his various establishments. He was a noxious ass, and he +satisfied his lust for silly gossip at the cost of his customers. It +was he who, one evening, as Morrison and Heyst went past the hotel--they +were not his regular patrons--whispered mysteriously to the mixed +company assembled on the veranda: + +"The spider and the fly just gone by, gentlemen." Then, very important +and confidential, his thick paw at the side of his mouth: "We are among +ourselves; well, gentlemen, all I can say is, don't you ever get mixed +up with that Swede. Don't you ever get caught in his web." + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +Human nature being what it is, having a silly side to it as well as +a mean side, there were not a few who pretended to be indignant on no +better authority than a general propensity to believe every evil report; +and a good many others who found it simply funny to call Heyst the +Spider--behind his back, of course. He was as serenely unconscious of +this as of his several other nicknames. But soon people found other +things to say of Heyst; not long afterwards he came very much to the +fore in larger affairs. He blossomed out into something definite. He +filled the public eye as the manager on the spot of the Tropical Belt +Coal Company with offices in London and Amsterdam, and other things +about it that sounded and looked grandiose. The offices in the two +capitals may have consisted--and probably did--of one room in each; +but at that distance, out East there, all this had an air. We were more +puzzled than dazzled, it is true; but even the most sober-minded among +us began to think that there was something in it. The Tesmans appointed +agents, a contract for government mail-boats secured, the era of steam +beginning for the islands--a great stride forward--Heyst's stride! + +And all this sprang from the meeting of the cornered Morrison and of the +wandering Heyst, which may or may not have been the direct outcome of a +prayer. Morrison was not an imbecile, but he seemed to have got himself +into a state of remarkable haziness as to his exact position towards +Heyst. For, if Heyst had been sent with money in his pocket by a direct +decree of the Almighty in answer to Morrison's prayer then there was no +reason for special gratitude, since obviously he could not help himself. +But Morrison believed both, in the efficacy of prayer and in the +infinite goodness of Heyst. He thanked God with awed sincerity for his +mercy, and could not thank Heyst enough for the service rendered as +between man and man. In this (highly creditable) tangle of strong +feelings Morrison's gratitude insisted on Heyst's partnership in the +great discovery. Ultimately we heard that Morrison had gone home through +the Suez Canal in order to push the magnificent coal idea personally +in London. He parted from his brig and disappeared from our ken; but +we heard that he had written a letter or letters to Heyst, saying that +London was cold and gloomy; that he did not like either the men or +things, that he was "as lonely as a crow in a strange country." In +truth, he pined after the Capricorn--I don't mean only the tropic; I +mean the ship too. Finally he went into Dorsetshire to see his people, +caught a bad cold, and died with extraordinary precipitation in the +bosom of his appalled family. Whether his exertions in the City of +London had enfeebled his vitality I don't know; but I believe it was +this visit which put life into the coal idea. Be it as it may, the +Tropical Belt Coal Company was born very shortly after Morrison, +the victim of gratitude and his native climate, had gone to join his +forefathers in a Dorsetshire churchyard. + +Heyst was immensely shocked. He got the news in the Moluccas through the +Tesmans, and then disappeared for a time. It appears that he stayed with +a Dutch government doctor in Amboyna, a friend of his who looked after +him for a bit in his bungalow. He became visible again rather suddenly, +his eyes sunk in his head, and with a sort of guarded attitude, as if +afraid someone would reproach him with the death of Morrison. + +Naive Heyst! As if anybody would . . . Nobody amongst us had any +interest in men who went home. They were all right; they did not count +any more. Going to Europe was nearly as final as going to Heaven. It +removed a man from the world of hazard and adventure. + +As a matter of fact, many of us did not hear of this death till months +afterwards--from Schomberg, who disliked Heyst gratuitously and made up +a piece of sinister whispered gossip: + +"That's what comes of having anything to do with that fellow. He +squeezes you dry like a lemon, then chucks you out--sends you home to +die. Take warning by Morrison!" + +Of course, we laughed at the innkeeper's suggestions of black mystery. +Several of us heard that Heyst was prepared to go to Europe himself, +to push on his coal enterprise personally; but he never went. It wasn't +necessary. The company was formed without him, and his nomination of +manager in the tropics came out to him by post. + +From the first he had selected Samburan, or Round Island, for the +central station. Some copies of the prospectus issued in Europe, having +found their way out East, were passed from hand to hand. We greatly +admired the map which accompanied them for the edification of the +shareholders. On it Samburan was represented as the central spot of the +Eastern Hemisphere with its name engraved in enormous capitals. Heavy +lines radiated from it in all directions through the tropics, figuring a +mysterious and effective star--lines of influence or lines of distance, +or something of that sort. Company promoters have an imagination of +their own. There's no more romantic temperament on earth than the +temperament of a company promoter. Engineers came out, coolies were +imported, bungalows were put up on Samburan, a gallery driven into the +hillside, and actually some coal got out. + +These manifestations shook the soberest minds. For a time everybody in +the islands was talking of the Tropical Belt Coal, and even those who +smiled quietly to themselves were only hiding their uneasiness. Oh, yes; +it had come, and anybody could see what would be the consequences--the +end of the individual trader, smothered under a great invasion of +steamers. We could not afford to buy steamers. Not we. And Heyst was the +manager. + +"You know, Heyst, enchanted Heyst." + +"Oh, come! He has been no better than a loafer around here as far back +as any of us can remember." + +"Yes, he said he was looking for facts. Well, he's got hold of one that +will do for all of us," commented a bitter voice. + +"That's what they call development--and be hanged to it!" muttered +another. + +Never was Heyst talked about so much in the tropical belt before. + +"Isn't he a Swedish baron or something?" + +"He, a baron? Get along with you!" + +For my part I haven't the slightest doubt that he was. While he was +still drifting amongst the islands, enigmatical and disregarded like an +insignificant ghost, he told me so himself on a certain occasion. It +was a long time before he materialized in this alarming way into the +destroyer of our little industry--Heyst the Enemy. + +It became the fashion with a good many to speak of Heyst as the Enemy. +He was very concrete, very visible now. He was rushing all over the +Archipelago, jumping in and out of local mail-packets as if they had +been tram-cars, here, there, and everywhere--organizing with all his +might. This was no mooning about. This was business. And this sudden +display of purposeful energy shook the incredulity of the most +sceptical more than any scientific demonstration of the value of these +coal-outcrops could have done. It was impressive. Schomberg was the +only one who resisted the infection. Big, manly in a portly style, +and profusely bearded, with a glass of beer in his thick paw, he would +approach some table where the topic of the hour was being discussed, +would listen for a moment, and then come out with his invariable +declaration: + +"All this is very well, gentlemen; but he can't throw any of his +coal-dust in my eyes. There's nothing in it. Why, there can't be +anything in it. A fellow like that for manager? Phoo!" + +Was it the clairvoyance of imbecile hatred, or mere stupid tenacity of +opinion, which ends sometimes by scoring against the world in a most +astonishing manner? Most of us can remember instances of triumphant +folly; and that ass Schomberg triumphed. The T.B.C. Company went into +liquidation, as I began by telling you. The Tesmans washed their hands +of it. The Government cancelled those famous contracts, the talk died +out, and presently it was remarked here and there that Heyst had faded +completely away. He had become invisible, as in those early days when +he used to make a bolt clear out of sight in his attempts to break away +from the enchantment of "these isles," either in the direction of New +Guinea or in the direction of Saigon--to cannibals or to cafes. The +enchanted Heyst! Had he at last broken the spell? Had he died? We were +too indifferent to wonder overmuch. You see we had on the whole liked +him well enough. And liking is not sufficient to keep going the interest +one takes in a human being. With hatred, apparently, it is otherwise. +Schomberg couldn't forget Heyst. The keen, manly Teutonic creature was a +good hater. A fool often is. + +"Good evening, gentlemen. Have you got everything you want? So! Good! +You see? What was I always telling you? Aha! There was nothing in it. I +knew it. But what I would like to know is what became of that--Swede." + +He put a stress on the word Swede as if it meant scoundrel. He detested +Scandinavians generally. Why? Goodness only knows. A fool like that is +unfathomable. He continued: + +"It's five months or more since I have spoken to anybody who has seen +him." + +As I have said, we were not much interested; but Schomberg, of course, +could not understand that. He was grotesquely dense. Whenever three +people came together in his hotel, he took good care that Heyst should +be with them. + +"I hope the fellow did not go and drown himself," he would add with a +comical earnestness that ought to have made us shudder; only our crowd +was superficial, and did not apprehend the psychology of this pious +hope. + +"Why? Heyst isn't in debt to you for drinks is he?" somebody asked him +once with shallow scorn. + +"Drinks! Oh, dear no!" + +The innkeeper was not mercenary. Teutonic temperament seldom is. But he +put on a sinister expression to tell us that Heyst had not paid perhaps +three visits altogether to his "establishment." This was Heyst's crime, +for which Schomberg wished him nothing less than a long and tormented +existence. Observe the Teutonic sense of proportion and nice forgiving +temper. + +At last, one afternoon, Schomberg was seen approaching a group of his +customers. He was obviously in high glee. He squared his manly chest +with great importance. + +"Gentlemen, I have news of him. Who? why, that Swede. He is still +on Samburan. He's never been away from it. The company is gone, +the engineers are gone, the clerks are gone, the coolies are gone, +everything's gone; but there he sticks. Captain Davidson, coming by from +the westward, saw him with his own eyes. Something white on the wharf, +so he steamed in and went ashore in a small boat. Heyst, right enough. +Put a book into his pocket, always very polite. Been strolling on +the wharf and reading. 'I remain in possession here,' he told Captain +Davidson. What I want to know is what he gets to eat there. A piece of +dried fish now and then--what? That's coming down pretty low for a man +who turned up his nose at my table d'hote!" + +He winked with immense malice. A bell started ringing, and he led the +way to the dining-room as if into a temple, very grave, with the air +of a benefactor of mankind. His ambition was to feed it at a profitable +price, and his delight was to talk of it behind its back. It was very +characteristic of him to gloat over the idea of Heyst having nothing +decent to eat. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +A few of us who were sufficiently interested went to Davidson for +details. These were not many. He told us that he passed to the north of +Samburan on purpose to see what was going on. At first, it looked as if +that side of the island had been altogether abandoned. This was what he +expected. Presently, above the dense mass of vegetation that Samburan +presents to view, he saw the head of the flagstaff without a flag. Then, +while steaming across the slight indentation which for a time was known +officially as Black Diamond Bay, he made out with his glass the white +figure on the coaling-wharf. It could be no one but Heyst. + +"I thought for certain he wanted to be taken off, so I steamed in. He +made no signs. However, I lowered a boat. I could not see another living +being anywhere. Yes. He had a book in his hand. He looked exactly as we +have always seen him--very neat, white shoes, cork helmet. He explained +to me that he had always had a taste for solitude. It was the first I +ever heard of it, I told him. He only smiled. What could I say? He isn't +the sort of man one can speak familiarly to. There's something in him. +One doesn't care to. + +"'But what's the object? Are you thinking of keeping possession of the +mine?' I asked him. + +"'Something of the sort,' he says. 'I am keeping hold.' + +"'But all this is as dead as Julius Caesar,' I cried. 'In fact, you have +nothing worth holding on to, Heyst.' + +"'Oh, I am done with facts,' says he, putting his hand to his helmet +sharply with one of his short bows." + +Thus dismissed, Davidson went on board his ship, swung her out, and as +he was steaming away he watched from the bridge Heyst walking shoreward +along the wharf. He marched into the long grass and vanished--all but +the top of his white cork helmet, which seemed to swim in a green sea. +Then that too disappeared, as if it had sunk into the living depths of +the tropical vegetation, which is more jealous of men's conquests than +the ocean, and which was about to close over the last vestiges of the +liquidated Tropical Belt Coal Company--A. Heyst, manager in the East. + +Davidson, a good, simple fellow in his way, was strangely affected. It +is to be noted that he knew very little of Heyst. He was one of those +whom Heyst's finished courtesy of attitude and intonation most strongly +disconcerted. He himself was a fellow of fine feeling, I think, though +of course he had no more polish than the rest of us. We were naturally +a hail-fellow-well-met crowd, with standards of our own--no worse, I +daresay, than other people's; but polish was not one of them. Davidson's +fineness was real enough to alter the course of the steamer he +commanded. Instead of passing to the south of Samburan, he made it his +practice to take the passage along the north shore, within about a mile +of the wharf. + +"He can see us if he likes to see us," remarked Davidson. Then he had an +afterthought: "I say! I hope he won't think I am intruding, eh?" + +We reassured him on the point of correct behaviour. The sea is open to +all. + +This slight deviation added some ten miles to Davidson's round trip, but +as that was sixteen hundred miles it did not matter much. + +"I have told my owner of it," said the conscientious commander of the +Sissie. + +His owner had a face like an ancient lemon. He was small and +wizened--which was strange, because generally a Chinaman, as he grows in +prosperity, puts on inches of girth and stature. To serve a Chinese firm +is not so bad. Once they become convinced you deal straight by them, +their confidence becomes unlimited. You can do no wrong. So Davidson's +old Chinaman squeaked hurriedly: + +"All right, all right, all right. You do what you like, captain--" + +And there was an end of the matter; not altogether, though. From time to +time the Chinaman used to ask Davidson about the white man. He was still +there, eh? + +"I never see him," Davidson had to confess to his owner, who would peer +at him silently through round, horn-rimmed spectacles, several sizes too +large for his little old face. "I never see him." + +To me, on occasions he would say: + +"I haven't a doubt he's there. He hides. It's very unpleasant." Davidson +was a little vexed with Heyst. "Funny thing," he went on. "Of all the +people I speak to, nobody ever asks after him but that Chinaman of +mine--and Schomberg," he added after a while. + +Yes, Schomberg, of course. He was asking everybody about everything, and +arranging the information into the most scandalous shape his imagination +could invent. From time to time he would step up, his blinking, +cushioned eyes, his thick lips, his very chestnut beard, looking full of +malice. + +"Evening, gentlemen. Have you got all you want? So! Good! Well, I am +told the jungle has choked the very sheds in Black Diamond Bay. Fact. +He's a hermit in the wilderness now. But what can this manager get to +eat there? It beats me." + +Sometimes a stranger would inquire with natural curiosity: + +"Who? What manager?" + +"Oh, a certain Swede,"--with a sinister emphasis, as if he were saying +"a certain brigand." "Well known here. He's turned hermit from shame. +That's what the devil does when he's found out." + +Hermit. This was the latest of the more or less witty labels applied +to Heyst during his aimless pilgrimage in this section of the tropical +belt, where the inane clacking of Schomberg's tongue vexed our ears. + +But apparently Heyst was not a hermit by temperament. The sight of his +land was not invincibly odious to him. We must believe this, since +for some reason or other he did come out from his retreat for a while. +Perhaps it was only to see whether there were any letters for him at the +Tesmans. I don't know. No one knows. But this reappearance shows that +his detachment from the world was not complete. And incompleteness of +any sort leads to trouble. Axel Heyst ought not to have cared for his +letters--or whatever it was that brought him out after something more +than a year and a half in Samburan. But it was of no use. He had not the +hermit's vocation! That was the trouble, it seems. + +Be this as it may, he suddenly reappeared in the world, broad chest, +bald forehead, long moustaches, polite manner, and all--the complete +Heyst, even to the kindly sunken eyes on which there still rested the +shadow of Morrison's death. Naturally, it was Davidson who had given him +a lift out of his forsaken island. There were no other opportunities, +unless some native craft were passing by--a very remote and +unsatisfactory chance to wait for. Yes, he came out with Davidson, to +whom he volunteered the statement that it was only for a short time--a +few days, no more. He meant to go back to Samburan. + +Davidson expressing his horror and incredulity of such foolishness, +Heyst explained that when the company came into being he had his few +belongings sent out from Europe. + +To Davidson, as to any of us, the idea of Heyst, the wandering drifting, +unattached Heyst, having any belongings of the sort that can furnish a +house was startlingly novel. It was grotesquely fantastic. It was like a +bird owning real property. + +"Belongings? Do you mean chairs and tables?" Davidson asked with +unconcealed astonishment. + +Heyst did mean that. "My poor father died in London. It has been all +stored there ever since," he explained. + +"For all these years?" exclaimed Davidson, thinking how long we all had +known Heyst flitting from tree to tree in a wilderness. + +"Even longer," said Heyst, who had understood very well. + +This seemed to imply that he had been wandering before he came under our +observation. In what regions? And what early age? Mystery. Perhaps he +was a bird that had never had a nest. + +"I left school early," he remarked once to Davidson, on the passage. "It +was in England. A very good school. I was not a shining success there." + +The confessions of Heyst. Not one of us--with the probable exception of +Morrison, who was dead--had ever heard so much of his history. It +looks as if the experience of hermit life had the power to loosen one's +tongue, doesn't it? + +During that memorable passage, in the Sissie, which took about two days, +he volunteered other hints--for you could not call it information--about +his history. And Davidson was interested. He was interested not because +the hints were exciting but because of that innate curiosity about our +fellows which is a trait of human nature. Davidson's existence, too, +running the Sissie along the Java Sea and back again, was distinctly +monotonous and, in a sense, lonely. He never had any sort of company on +board. Native deck-passengers in plenty, of course, but never a white +man, so the presence of Heyst for two days must have been a godsend. +Davidson was telling us all about it afterwards. Heyst said that his +father had written a lot of books. He was a philosopher. + +"Seems to me he must have been something of a crank, too," was +Davidson's comment. "Apparently he had quarrelled with his people in +Sweden. Just the sort of father you would expect Heyst to have. Isn't +he a bit of a crank himself? He told me that directly his father died he +lit out into the wide world on his own, and had been on the move till he +fetched up against this famous coal business. Fits the son of the father +somehow, don't you think?" + +For the rest, Heyst was as polite as ever. He offered to pay for his +passage; but when Davidson refused to hear of it he seized him heartily +by the hand, gave one of his courtly bows, and declared that he was +touched by his friendly proceedings. + +"I am not alluding to this trifling amount which you decline to take," +he went on, giving a shake to Davidson's hand. "But I am touched by your +humanity." Another shake. "Believe me, I am profoundly aware of having +been an object of it." Final shake of the hand. All this meant that +Heyst understood in a proper sense the little Sissie's periodic +appearance in sight of his hermitage. + +"He's a genuine gentleman," Davidson said to us. "I was really sorry +when he went ashore." + +We asked him where he had left Heyst. + +"Why, in Sourabaya--where else?" + +The Tesmans had their principal counting-house in Sourabaya. There had +long existed a connection between Heyst and the Tesmans. The incongruity +of a hermit having agents did not strike us, nor yet the absurdity of a +forgotten cast-off, derelict manager of a wrecked, collapsed, vanished +enterprise, having business to attend to. We said Sourabaya, of course, +and took it for granted that he would stay with one of the Tesmans. +One of us even wondered what sort of reception he would get; for it was +known that Julius Tesman was unreasonably bitter about the Tropical +Belt Coal fiasco. But Davidson set us right. It was nothing of the +kind. Heyst went to stay in Schomberg's hotel, going ashore in the hotel +launch. Not that Schomberg would think of sending his launch alongside +a mere trader like the Sissie. But she had been meeting a coasting +mail-packet, and had been signalled to. Schomberg himself was steering +her. + +"You should have seen Schomberg's eyes bulge out when Heyst jumped in +with an ancient brown leather bag!" said Davidson. "He pretended not +to know who it was--at first, anyway. I didn't go ashore with them. We +didn't stay more than a couple of hours altogether. Landed two thousand +coconuts and cleared out. I have agreed to pick him up again on my next +trip in twenty days' time." + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +Davidson happened to be two days late on his return trip; no great +matter, certainly, but he made a point of going ashore at once, during +the hottest hour of the afternoon, to look for Heyst. Schomberg's hotel +stood back in an extensive enclosure containing a garden, some large +trees, and, under their spreading boughs, a detached "hall available +for concerts and other performances," as Schomberg worded it in his +advertisements. Torn, and fluttering bills, intimating in heavy red +capitals CONCERTS EVERY NIGHT, were stuck on the brick pillars on each +side of the gateway. + +The walk had been long and confoundedly sunny. Davidson stood wiping his +wet neck and face on what Schomberg called "the piazza." Several doors +opened on to it, but all the screens were down. Not a soul was in sight, +not even a China boy--nothing but a lot of painted iron chairs and +tables. Solitude, shade, and gloomy silence--and a faint, treacherous +breeze which came from under the trees and quite unexpectedly caused the +melting Davidson to shiver slightly--the little shiver of the tropics +which in Sourabaya, especially, often means fever and the hospital to +the incautious white man. + +The prudent Davidson sought shelter in the nearest darkened room. In the +artificial dusk, beyond the levels of shrouded billiard-tables, a white +form heaved up from two chairs on which it had been extended. The middle +of the day, table d'hote tiffin once over, was Schomberg's easy time. He +lounged out, portly, deliberate, on the defensive, the great fair beard +like a cuirass over his manly chest. He did not like Davidson, never a +very faithful client of his. He hit a bell on one of the tables as he +went by, and asked in a distant, Officer-in-Reserve manner: + +"You desire?" + +The good Davidson, still sponging his wet neck, declared with simplicity +that he had come to fetch away Heyst, as agreed. + +"Not here!" + +A Chinaman appeared in response to the bell. Schomberg turned to him +very severely: + +"Take the gentleman's order." + +Davidson had to be going. Couldn't wait--only begged that Heyst should +be informed that the Sissie would leave at midnight. + +"Not--here, I am telling you!" + +Davidson slapped his thigh in concern. + +"Dear me! Hospital, I suppose." A natural enough surmise in a very +feverish locality. + +The Lieutenant of the Reserve only pursed up his mouth and raised his +eyebrows without looking at him. It might have meant anything, but +Davidson dismissed the hospital idea with confidence. However, he had to +get hold of Heyst between this and midnight: + +"He has been staying here?" he asked. + +"Yes, he was staying here." + +"Can you tell me where he is now?" Davidson went on placidly. Within +himself he was beginning to grow anxious, having developed the affection +of a self-appointed protector towards Heyst. The answer he got was: + +"Can't tell. It's none of my business," accompanied by majestic +oscillations of the hotel-keeper's head, hinting at some awful mystery. + +Davidson was placidity itself. It was his nature. He did not betray his +sentiments, which were not favourable to Schomberg. + +"I am sure to find out at the Tesmans' office," he thought. But it was +a very hot hour, and if Heyst was down at the port he would have learned +already that the Sissie was in. It was even possible that Heyst had +already gone on board, where he could enjoy a coolness denied to the +town. Davidson, being stout, was much preoccupied with coolness and +inclined to immobility. He lingered awhile, as if irresolute. Schomberg, +at the door, looking out, affected perfect indifference. He could not +keep it up, though. Suddenly he turned inward and asked with brusque +rage: + +"You wanted to see him?" + +"Why, yes," said Davidson. "We agreed to meet--" + +"Don't you bother. He doesn't care about that now." + +"Doesn't he?" + +"Well, you can judge for yourself. He isn't here, is he? You take my +word for it. Don't you bother about him. I am advising you as a friend." + +"Thank you," said, Davidson, inwardly startled at the savage tone. "I +think I will sit down for a moment and have a drink, after all." + +This was not what Schomberg had expected to hear. He called brutally: + +"Boy!" + +The Chinaman approached, and after referring him to the white man by a +nod the hotel-keeper departed, muttering to himself. Davidson heard him +gnash his teeth as he went. + +Davidson sat alone with the billiard-tables as if there had been not a +soul staying in the hotel. His placidity was so genuine that he was not +unduly, fretting himself over the absence of Heyst, or the mysterious +manners Schomberg had treated him to. He was considering these things in +his own fairly shrewd way. Something had happened; and he was loath to +go away to investigate, being restrained by a presentiment that somehow +enlightenment would come to him there. A poster of CONCERTS EVERY +EVENING, like those on the gate, but in a good state of preservation, +hung on the wall fronting him. He looked at it idly and was struck by +the fact--then not so very common--that it was a ladies' orchestra; +"Zangiacomo's eastern tour--eighteen performers." The poster stated +that they had had the honour of playing their select repertoire before +various colonial excellencies, also before pashas, sheiks, chiefs, H. H. +the Sultan of Mascate, etc., etc. + +Davidson felt sorry for the eighteen lady-performers. He knew what that +sort of life was like, the sordid conditions and brutal incidents of +such tours led by such Zangiacomos who often were anything but musicians +by profession. While he was staring at the poster, a door somewhere at +his back opened, and a woman came in who was looked upon as Schomberg's +wife, no doubt with truth. As somebody remarked cynically once, she was +too unattractive to be anything else. The opinion that he treated her +abominably was based on her frightened expression. Davidson lifted his +hat to her. Mrs. Schomberg gave him an inclination of her sallow head +and incontinently sat down behind a sort of raised counter, facing the +door, with a mirror and rows of bottles at her back. Her hair was very +elaborately done with two ringlets on the left side of her scraggy neck; +her dress was of silk, and she had come on duty for the afternoon. For +some reason or other Schomberg exacted this from her, though she added +nothing to the fascinations of the place. She sat there in the smoke and +noise, like an enthroned idol, smiling stupidly over the billiards from +time to time, speaking to no one, and no one speaking to her. Schomberg +himself took no more interest in her than may be implied in a sudden +and totally unmotived scowl. Otherwise the very Chinamen ignored her +existence. + +She had interrupted Davidson in his reflections. Being alone with her, +her silence and open-eyed immobility made him uncomfortable. He was +easily sorry for people. It seemed rude not to take any notice of her. +He said, in allusion to the poster: + +"Are you having these people in the house?" + +She was so unused to being addressed by customers that at the sound of +his voice she jumped in her seat. Davidson was telling us afterwards +that she jumped exactly like a figure made of wood, without losing her +rigid immobility. She did not even move her eyes; but she answered him +freely, though her very lips seemed made of wood. + +"They stayed here over a month. They are gone now. They played every +evening." + +"Pretty good, were they?" + +To this she said nothing; and as she kept on staring fixedly in front +of her, her silence disconcerted Davidson. It looked as if she had not +heard him--which was impossible. Perhaps she drew the line of speech +at the expression of opinions. Schomberg might have trained her, for +domestic reasons, to keep them to herself. But Davidson felt in honour +obliged to converse; so he said, putting his own interpretation on this +surprising silence: + +"I see--not much account. Such bands hardly ever are. An Italian lot, +Mrs. Schomberg, to judge by the name of the boss?" + +She shook her head negatively. + +"No. He is a German really; only he dyes his hair and beard black for +business. Zangiacomo is his business name." + +"That's a curious fact," said Davidson. His head being full of Heyst, it +occurred to him that she might be aware of other facts. This was a very +amazing discovery to anyone who looked at Mrs. Schomberg. Nobody had +ever suspected her of having a mind. I mean even a little of it, I mean +any at all. One was inclined to think of her as an It--an automaton, a +very plain dummy, with an arrangement for bowing the head at times +and smiling stupidly now and then. Davidson viewed her profile with a +flattened nose, a hollow cheek, and one staring, unwinking, goggle eye. +He asked himself: Did that speak just now? Will it speak again? It was +as exciting, for the mere wonder of it, as trying to converse with a +mechanism. A smile played about the fat features of Davidson; the smile +of a man making an amusing experiment. He spoke again to her: + +"But the other members of that orchestra were real Italians, were they +not?" + +Of course, he didn't care. He wanted to see whether the mechanism would +work again. It did. It said they were not. They were of all sorts, +apparently. It paused, with the one goggle eye immovably gazing down +the whole length of the room and through the door opening on to the +"piazza." It paused, then went on in the same low pitch: + +"There was even one English girl." + +"Poor devil!"--said Davidson, "I suppose these women are not much better +than slaves really. Was that fellow with the dyed beard decent in his +way?" + +The mechanism remained silent. The sympathetic soul of Davidson drew its +own conclusions. + +"Beastly life for these women!" he said. "When you say an English girl, +Mrs. Schomberg, do you really mean a young girl? Some of these orchestra +girls are no chicks." + +"Young enough," came the low voice out of Mrs. Schomberg's unmoved +physiognomy. + +Davidson, encouraged, remarked that he was sorry for her. He was easily +sorry for people. + +"Where did they go to from here?" he asked. + +"She did not go with them. She ran away." + +This was the pronouncement Davidson obtained next. It introduced a new +sort of interest. + +"Well! Well!" he exclaimed placidly; and then, with the air of a man who +knows life: "Who with?" he inquired with assurance. + +Mrs. Schomberg's immobility gave her an appearance of listening +intently. Perhaps she was really listening; but Schomberg must have been +finishing his sleep in some distant part of the house. The silence was +profound, and lasted long enough to become startling. Then, enthroned +above Davidson, she whispered at last: + +"That friend of yours." + +"Oh, you know I am here looking for a friend," said Davidson hopefully. +"Won't you tell me--" + +"I've told you" + +"Eh?" + +A mist seemed to roll away from before Davidson's eyes, disclosing +something he could not believe. + +"You can't mean it!" he cried. "He's not the man for it." But the last +words came out in a faint voice. Mrs. Schomberg never moved her head the +least bit. Davidson, after the shock which made him sit up, went slack +all over. + +"Heyst! Such a perfect gentleman!" he exclaimed weakly. + +Mrs. Schomberg did not seem to have heard him. This startling fact did +not tally somehow with the idea Davidson had of Heyst. He never talked +of women, he never seemed to think of them, or to remember that they +existed; and then all at once--like this! Running off with a casual +orchestra girl! + +"You might have knocked me down with a feather," Davidson told us some +time afterwards. + +By then he was taking an indulgent view of both the parties to that +amazing transaction. First of all, on reflection, he was by no means +certain that it prevented Heyst from being a perfect gentleman, as +before. He confronted our open grins or quiet smiles with a serious +round face. Heyst had taken the girl away to Samburan; and that was +no joking matter. The loneliness, the ruins of the spot, had impressed +Davidson's simple soul. They were incompatible with the frivolous +comments of people who had not seen it. That black jetty, sticking out +of the jungle into the empty sea; these roof-ridges of deserted houses +peeping dismally above the long grass! Ough! The gigantic and funereal +blackboard sign of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, still emerging from a +wild growth of bushes like an inscription stuck above a grave figured by +the tall heap of unsold coal at the shore end of the wharf, added to the +general desolation. + +Thus was the sensitive Davidson. The girl must have been miserable +indeed to follow such a strange man to such a spot. Heyst had, no doubt, +told her the truth. He was a gentleman. But no words could do justice to +the conditions of life on Samburan. A desert island was nothing to it. +Moreover, when you were cast away on a desert island--why, you could not +help yourself; but to expect a fiddle-playing girl out of an ambulant +ladies' orchestra to remain content there for a day, for one single day, +was inconceivable. She would be frightened at the first sight of it. She +would scream. + +The capacity for sympathy in these stout, placid men! Davidson was +stirred to the depths; and it was easy to see that it was about Heyst +that he was concerned. We asked him if he had passed that way lately. + +"Oh, yes. I always do--about half a mile off." + +"Seen anybody about?" + +"No, not a soul. Not a shadow." + +"Did you blow your whistle?" + +"Blow the whistle? You think I would do such a thing?" + +He rejected the mere possibility of such an unwarrantable intrusion. +Wonderfully delicate fellow, Davidson! + +"Well, but how do you know that they are there?" he was naturally asked. + +Heyst had entrusted Mrs. Schomberg with a message for Davidson--a few +lines in pencil on a scrap of crumpled paper. It was to the effect: that +an unforeseen necessity was driving him away before the appointed time. +He begged Davidson's indulgence for the apparent discourtesy. The woman +of the house--meaning Mrs. Schomberg--would give him the facts, though +unable to explain them, of course. + +"What was there to explain?" wondered Davidson dubiously. + +"He took a fancy to that fiddle-playing girl, and--" + +"And she to him, apparently," I suggested. + +"Wonderfully quick work," reflected Davidson. "What do you think will +come of it?" + +"Repentance, I should say. But how is it that Mrs. Schomberg has been +selected for a confidante?" + +For indeed a waxwork figure would have seemed more useful than that +woman whom we all were accustomed to see sitting elevated above the two +billiard-tables--without expression, without movement, without voice, +without sight. + +"Why, she helped the girl to bolt," said Davidson turning at me his +innocent eyes, rounded by the state of constant amazement in which +this affair had left him, like those shocks of terror or sorrow which +sometimes leave their victim afflicted by nervous trembling. It looked +as though he would never get over it. + +"Mrs. Schomberg jerked Heyst's note, twisted like a pipe-light, into my +lap while I sat there unsuspecting," Davidson went on. "Directly I had +recovered my senses, I asked her what on earth she had to do with it +that Heyst should leave it with her. And then, behaving like a painted +image rather than a live woman, she whispered, just loud enough for me +to hear: + +"I helped them. I got her things together, tied them up in my own shawl, +and threw them into the compound out of a back window. I did it." + +"That woman that you would say hadn't the pluck to lift her little +finger!" marvelled Davidson in his quiet, slightly panting voice. "What +do you think of that?" + +I thought she must have had some interest of her own to serve. She was +too lifeless to be suspected of impulsive compassion. It was impossible +to think that Heyst had bribed her. Whatever means he had, he had +not the means to do that. Or could it be that she was moved by +that disinterested passion for delivering a woman to a man which in +respectable spheres is called matchmaking?--a highly irregular example +of it! + +"It must have been a very small bundle," remarked Davidson further. + +"I imagine the girl must have been specially attractive," I said. + +"I don't know. She was miserable. I don't suppose it was more than +a little linen and a couple of those white frocks they wear on the +platform." + +Davidson pursued his own train of thought. He supposed that such a thing +had never been heard of in the history of the tropics. For where could +you find anyone to steal a girl out of an orchestra? No doubt fellows +here and there took a fancy to some pretty one--but it was not for +running away with her. Oh dear no! It needed a lunatic like Heyst. + +"Only think what it means," wheezed Davidson, imaginative under his +invincible placidity. "Just only try to think! Brooding alone on +Samburan has upset his brain. He never stopped to consider, or he +couldn't have done it. No sane man . . . How is a thing like that to go +on? What's he going to do with her in the end? It's madness." + +"You say that he's mad. Schomberg tells us that he must be starving on +his island; so he may end yet by eating her," I suggested. + +Mrs. Schomberg had had no time to enter into details, Davidson told us. +Indeed, the wonder was that they had been left alone so long. The +drowsy afternoon was slipping by. Footsteps and voices resounded on the +veranda--I beg pardon, the piazza; the scraping of chairs, the ping of +a smitten bell. Customers were turning up. Mrs. Schomberg was begging +Davidson hurriedly, but without looking at him, to say nothing to +anyone, when on a half-uttered word her nervous whisper was cut short. +Through a small inner door Schomberg came in, his hair brushed, his +beard combed neatly, but his eyelids still heavy from his nap. He looked +with suspicion at Davidson, and even glanced at his wife; but he was +baffled by the natural placidity of the one and the acquired habit of +immobility in the other. + +"Have you sent out the drinks?" he asked surlily. + +She did not open her lips, because just then the head boy appeared with +a loaded tray, on his way out. Schomberg went to the door and greeted +the customers outside, but did not join them. He remained blocking +half the doorway, with his back to the room, and was still there when +Davidson, after sitting still for a while, rose to go. At the noise +he made Schomberg turned his head, watched him lift his hat to Mrs. +Schomberg and receive her wooden bow accompanied by a stupid grin, and +then looked away. He was loftily dignified. Davidson stopped at the +door, deep in his simplicity. + +"I am sorry you won't tell me anything about my friend's absence," he +said. "My friend Heyst, you know. I suppose the only course for me now +is to make inquiries down at the port. I shall hear something there, I +don't doubt." + +"Make inquiries of the devil!" replied Schomberg in a hoarse mutter. + +Davidson's purpose in addressing the hotel-keeper had been mainly to +make Mrs. Schomberg safe from suspicion; but he would fain have heard +something more of Heyst's exploit from another point of view. It was +a shrewd try. It was successful in a rather startling way, because the +hotel-keeper's point of view was horribly abusive. All of a sudden, in +the same hoarse sinister tone, he proceeded to call Heyst many names, of +which "pig-dog" was not the worst, with such vehemence that he actually +choked himself. Profiting from the pause, Davidson, whose temperament +could withstand worse shocks, remonstrated in an undertone: + +"It's unreasonable to get so angry as that. Even if he had run off with +your cash-box--" + +The big hotel-keeper bent down and put his infuriated face close to +Davidson's. + +"My cash-box! My--he--look here, Captain Davidson! He ran off with a +girl. What do I care for the girl? The girl is nothing to me." + +He shot out an infamous word which made Davidson start. That's what the +girl was; and he reiterated the assertion that she was nothing to him. +What he was concerned for was the good name of his house. Wherever he +had been established, he had always had "artist parties" staying in his +house. One recommended him to the others; but what would happen now, +when it got about that leaders ran the risk in his house--his house--of +losing members of their troupe? And just now, when he had spent seven +hundred and thirty-four guilders in building a concert-hall in his +compound. Was that a thing to do in a respectable hotel? The cheek, the +indecency, the impudence, the atrocity! Vagabond, impostor, swindler, +ruffian, schwein-hund! + +He had seized Davidson by a button of his coat, detaining him in +the doorway, and exactly in the line of Mrs. Schomberg's stony gaze. +Davidson stole a glance in that direction and thought of making some +sort of reassuring sign to her, but she looked so bereft of senses, and +almost of life, perched up there, that it seemed not worth while. +He disengaged his button with firm placidity. Thereupon, with a last +stifled curse, Schomberg vanished somewhere within, to try and compose +his spirits in solitude. Davidson stepped out on the veranda. The party +of customers there had become aware of the explosive interlude in the +doorway. Davidson knew one of these men, and nodded to him in passing; +but his acquaintance called out: + +"Isn't he in a filthy temper? He's been like that ever since." + +The speaker laughed aloud, while all the others sat smiling. Davidson +stopped. + +"Yes, rather." His feelings were, he told us, those of bewildered +resignation; but of course that was no more visible to the others than +the emotions of a turtle when it withdraws into its shell. + +"It seems unreasonable," he murmured thoughtfully. + +"Oh, but they had a scrap!" the other said. + +"What do you mean? Was there a fight!--a fight with Heyst?" asked +Davidson, much perturbed, if somewhat incredulous. + +"Heyst? No, these two--the bandmaster, the fellow who's taking these +women about and our Schomberg. Signor Zangiacomo ran amuck in the +morning, and went for our worthy friend. I tell you, they were rolling +on the floor together on this very veranda, after chasing each other all +over the house, doors slamming, women screaming, seventeen of them, in +the dining-room; Chinamen up the trees. Hey, John? You climb tree to see +the fight, eh?" + +The boy, almond-eyed and impassive, emitted a scornful grunt, finished +wiping the table, and withdrew. + +"That's what it was--a real, go-as-you-please scrap. And Zangiacomo +began it. Oh, here's Schomberg. Say, Schomberg, didn't he fly at you, +when the girl was missed, because it was you who insisted that the +artists should go about the audience during the interval?" + +Schomberg had reappeared in the doorway. He advanced. His bearing +was stately, but his nostrils were extraordinarily expanded, and he +controlled his voice with apparent effort. + +"Certainly. That was only business. I quoted him special terms and +all for your sake, gentlemen. I was thinking of my regular customers. +There's nothing to do in the evenings in this town. I think, gentlemen, +you were all pleased at the opportunity of hearing a little good music; +and where's the harm of offering a grenadine, or what not, to a lady +artist? But that fellow--that Swede--he got round the girl. He got round +all the people out here. I've been watching him for years. You remember +how he got round Morrison." + +He changed front abruptly, as if on parade, and marched off. The +customers at the table exchanged glances silently. Davidson's attitude +was that of a spectator. Schomberg's moody pacing of the billiard-room +could be heard on the veranda. + +"And the funniest part is," resumed the man who had been speaking +before--an English clerk in a Dutch house--"the funniest part is that +before nine o'clock that same morning those two were driving together +in a gharry down to the port, to look for Heyst and the girl. I saw them +rushing around making inquiries. I don't know what they would have +done to the girl, but they seemed quite ready to fall upon your Heyst, +Davidson, and kill him on the quay." + +He had never, he said, seen anything so queer. Those two investigators +working feverishly to the same end were glaring at each other with +surprising ferocity. In hatred and mistrust they entered a steam-launch, +and went flying from ship to ship all over the harbour, causing no end +of sensation. The captains of vessels, coming on shore later in the day, +brought tales of a strange invasion, and wanted to know who were the two +offensive lunatics in a steam-launch, apparently after a man and a girl, +and telling a story of which one could make neither head nor tail. Their +reception by the roadstead was generally unsympathetic, even to the +point of the mate of an American ship bundling them out over the rail +with unseemly precipitation. + +Meantime Heyst and the girl were a good few miles away, having gone in +the night on board one of the Tesman schooners bound to the eastward. +This was known afterwards from the Javanese boatmen whom Heyst hired +for the purpose at three o'clock in the morning. The Tesman schooner had +sailed at daylight with the usual land breeze, and was probably still in +sight in the offing at the time. However, the two pursuers after their +experience with the American mate, made for the shore. On landing, they +had another violent row in the German language. But there was no second +fight; and finally, with looks of fierce animosity, they got together +into a gharry--obviously with the frugal view of sharing expenses--and +drove away, leaving an astonished little crowd of Europeans and natives +on the quay. + +After hearing this wondrous tale, Davidson went away from the hotel +veranda, which was filling with Schomberg's regular customers. Heyst's +escapade was the general topic of conversation. Never before had that +unaccountable individual been the cause of so much gossip, he judged. +No! Not even in the beginnings of the Tropical Belt Coal Company when +becoming for a moment a public character was he the object of a silly +criticism and unintelligent envy for every vagabond and adventurer in +the islands. Davidson concluded that people liked to discuss that sort +of scandal better than any other. + +I asked him if he believed that this was such a great scandal after all. + +"Heavens, no!" said that excellent man who, himself, was incapable of +any impropriety of conduct. "But it isn't a thing I would have done +myself; I mean even if I had not been married." + +There was no implied condemnation in the statement; rather something +like regret. Davidson shared my suspicion that this was in its essence +the rescue of a distressed human being. Not that we were two romantics, +tingeing the world to the hue of our temperament, but that both of us +had been acute enough to discover a long time ago that Heyst was. + +"I shouldn't have had the pluck," he continued. "I see a thing all +round, as it were; but Heyst doesn't, or else he would have been scared. +You don't take a woman into a desert jungle without being made sorry for +it sooner or later, in one way or another; and Heyst being a gentleman +only makes it worse." + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +We said no more about Heyst on that occasion, and it so happened that +I did not meet Davidson again for some three months. When we did come +together, almost the first thing he said to me was: + +"I've seen him." + +Before I could exclaim, he assured me that he had taken no liberty, +that he had not intruded. He was called in. Otherwise he would not have +dreamed of breaking in upon Heyst's privacy. + +"I am certain you wouldn't," I assured him, concealing my amusement at +his wonderful delicacy. He was the most delicate man that ever took a +small steamer to and fro among the islands. But his humanity, which was +not less strong and praiseworthy, had induced him to take his +steamer past Samburan wharf (at an average distance of a mile) every +twenty-three days--exactly. Davidson was delicate, humane, and regular. + +"Heyst called you in?" I asked, interested. + +Yes, Heyst had called him in as he was going by on his usual date. +Davidson was examining the shore through his glasses with his unwearied +and punctual humanity as he steamed past Samburan. + +I saw a man in white. It could only have been Heyst. He had fastened +some sort of enormous flag to a bamboo pole, and was waving it at the +end of the old wharf. + +Davidson didn't like to take his steamer alongside--for fear of being +indiscreet, I suppose; but he steered close inshore, stopped his +engines, and lowered a boat. He went himself in that boat, which was +manned, of course, by his Malay seamen. + +Heyst, when he saw the boat pulling towards him, dropped his +signalling-pole; and when Davidson arrived, he was kneeling down engaged +busily in unfastening the flag from it. + +"Was there anything wrong?" I inquired, Davidson having paused in his +narrative and my curiosity being naturally aroused. You must remember +that Heyst as the Archipelago knew him was not--what shall I say--was +not a signalling sort of man. + +"The very words that came out of my mouth," said Davidson, "before I +laid the boat against the piles. I could not help it!" + +Heyst got up from his knees and began carefully folding up the flag +thing, which struck Davidson as having the dimensions of a blanket. + +"No, nothing wrong," he cried. His white teeth flashed agreeably below +the coppery horizontal bar of his long moustaches. + +I don't know whether it was his delicacy or his obesity which prevented +Davidson from clambering upon the wharf. He stood up in the boat, +and, above him, Heyst stooped low with urbane smiles, thanking him and +apologizing for the liberty, exactly in his usual manner. Davidson had +expected some change in the man, but there was none. Nothing in him +betrayed the momentous fact that within that jungle there was a girl, a +performer in a ladies' orchestra, whom he had carried straight off the +concert platform into the wilderness. He was not ashamed or defiant +or abashed about it. He might have been a shade confidential when +addressing Davidson. And his words were enigmatical. + +"I took this course of signalling to you," he said to Davidson, "because +to preserve appearances might be of the utmost importance. Not to me, of +course. I don't care what people may say, and of course no one can hurt +me. I suppose I have done a certain amount of harm, since I allowed +myself to be tempted into action. It seemed innocent enough, but all +action is bound to be harmful. It is devilish. That is why this world +is evil upon the whole. But I have done with it! I shall never lift a +little finger again. At one time I thought that intelligent observation +of facts was the best way of cheating the time which is allotted to us +whether we want it or not; but now I, have done with observation, too." + +Imagine poor, simple Davidson being addressed in such terms alongside +an abandoned, decaying wharf jutting out of tropical bush. He had +never heard anybody speak like this before; certainly not Heyst, whose +conversation was concise, polite, with a faint ring of playfulness in +the cultivated tones of his voice. + +"He's gone mad," Davidson thought to himself. + +But, looking at the physiognomy above him on the wharf, he was obliged +to dismiss the notion of common, crude lunacy. It was truly most unusual +talk. Then he remembered--in his surprise he had lost sight of it--that +Heyst now had a girl there. This bizarre discourse was probably the +effect of the girl. Davidson shook off the absurd feeling, and asked, +wishing to make clear his friendliness, and not knowing what else to +say: + +"You haven't run short of stores or anything like that?" + +Heyst smiled and shook his head: + +"No, no. Nothing of the kind. We are fairly well off here. Thanks, all +the same. If I have taken the liberty to detain you, it is not from any +uneasiness for myself and my--companion. The person I was thinking of +when I made up my mind to invoke your assistance is Mrs. Schomberg." + +"I have talked with her," interjected Davidson. + +"Oh! You? Yes, I hoped she would find means to--" + +"But she didn't tell me much," interrupted Davidson, who was not averse +from hearing something--he hardly knew what. + +"H'm--Yes. But that note of mine? Yes? She found an opportunity to give +it to you? That's good, very good. She's more resourceful than one would +give her credit for." + +"Women often are--" remarked Davidson. The strangeness from which he had +suffered, merely because his interlocutor had carried off a girl, wore +off as the minutes went by. "There's a lot of unexpectedness about +women," he generalized with a didactic aim which seemed to miss its +mark; for the next thing Heyst said was: + +"This is Mrs. Schomberg's shawl." He touched the stuff hanging over +his arm. "An Indian thing, I believe," he added, glancing at his arm +sideways. + +"It isn't of particular value," said Davidson truthfully. + +"Very likely. The point is that it belongs to Schomberg's wife. That +Schomberg seems to be an unconscionable ruffian--don't you think so?" + +Davidson smiled faintly. + +"We out here have got used to him," he said, as if excusing a universal +and guilty toleration of a manifest nuisance. "I'd hardly call him that. +I only know him as a hotel-keeper." + +"I never knew him even as that--not till this time, when you were so +obliging as to take me to Sourabaya, I went to stay there from economy. +The Netherlands House is very expensive, and they expect you to bring +your own servant with you. It's a nuisance." + +"Of course, of course," protested Davidson hastily. + +After a short silence Heyst returned to the matter of the shawl. He +wanted to send it back to Mrs. Schomberg. He said that it might be very +awkward for her if she were unable, if asked, to produce it. This had +given him, Heyst, much uneasiness. She was terrified of Schomberg. +Apparently she had reason to be. + +Davidson had remarked that, too. Which did not prevent her, he pointed +out, from making a fool of him, in a way, for the sake of a stranger. + +"Oh! You know!" said Heyst. "Yes, she helped me--us." + +"She told me so. I had quite a talk with her," Davidson informed him. +"Fancy anyone having a talk with Mrs. Schomberg! If I were to tell the +fellows they wouldn't believe me. How did you get round her, Heyst? +How did you think of it? Why, she looks too stupid to understand human +speech and too scared to shoo a chicken away. Oh, the women, the women! +You don't know what there may be in the quietest of them." + +"She was engaged in the task of defending her position in life," said +Heyst. "It's a very respectable task." + +"Is that it? I had some idea it was that," confessed Davidson. + +He then imparted to Heyst the story of the violent proceedings following +on the discovery of his flight. Heyst's polite attention to the tale +took on a sombre cast; but he manifested no surprise, and offered no +comment. When Davidson had finished he handed down the shawl into +the boat, and Davidson promised to do his best to return it to Mrs. +Schomberg in some secret fashion. Heyst expressed his thanks in a few +simple words, set off by his manner of finished courtesy. Davidson +prepared to depart. They were not looking at each other. Suddenly Heyst +spoke: + +"You understand that this was a case of odious persecution, don't you? I +became aware of it and--" + +It was a view which the sympathetic Davidson was capable of +appreciating. + +"I am not surprised to hear it," he said placidly. "Odious enough, I +dare say. And you, of course--not being a married man--were free to step +in. Ah, well!" + +He sat down in the stern-sheets, and already had the steering lines in +his hands when Heyst observed abruptly: + +"The world is a bad dog. It will bite you if you give it a chance; but I +think that here we can safely defy the fates." + +When relating all this to me, Davidson's only comment was: + +"Funny notion of defying the fates--to take a woman in tow!" + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +Some considerable time afterwards--we did not meet very often--I asked +Davidson how he had managed about the shawl and heard that he had +tackled his mission in a direct way, and had found it easy enough. At +the very first call he made in Samarang he rolled the shawl as tightly +as he could into the smallest possible brown-paper parcel, which he +carried ashore with him. His business in the town being transacted, +he got into a gharry with the parcel and drove to the hotel. With his +precious experience, he timed his arrival accurately for the hour of +Schomberg's siesta. Finding the place empty as on the former occasion, +he marched into the billiard-room, took a seat at the back, near the +sort of dais which Mrs. Schomberg would in due course come to occupy, +and broke the slumbering silence of the house by thumping a bell +vigorously. Of course a Chinaman appeared promptly. Davidson ordered a +drink and sat tight. + +"I would have ordered twenty drinks one after another, if necessary," +he said--Davidson's a very abstemious man--"rather than take that parcel +out of the house again. Couldn't leave it in a corner without letting +the woman know it was there. It might have turned out worse for her than +not bringing the thing back at all." + +And so he waited, ringing the bell again and again, and swallowing two +or three iced drinks which he did not want. Presently, as he hoped it +would happen, Mrs. Schomberg came in, silk dress, long neck, ringlets, +scared eyes, and silly grin--all complete. Probably that lazy beast had +sent her out to see who was the thirsty customer waking up the echoes of +the house at this quiet hour. Bow, nod--and she clambered up to her post +behind the raised counter, looking so helpless, so inane, as she sat +there, that if it hadn't been for the parcel, Davidson declared, he +would have thought he had merely dreamed all that had passed between +them. He ordered another drink, to get the Chinaman out of the room, and +then seized the parcel, which was reposing on a chair near him, and +with no more than a mutter--"this is something of yours"--he rammed it +swiftly into a recess in the counter, at her feet. There! The rest +was her affair. And just in time, too. Schomberg turned up, yawning +affectedly, almost before Davidson had regained his seat. He cast about +suspicious and irate glances. An invincible placidity of expression +helped Davidson wonderfully at the moment, and the other, of course, +could have no grounds for the slightest suspicion of any sort of +understanding between his wife and this customer. + +As to Mrs. Schomberg, she sat there like a joss. Davidson was lost in +admiration. He believed, now, that the woman had been putting it on +for years. She never even winked. It was immense! The insight he had +obtained almost frightened him; he couldn't get over his wonder at +knowing more of the real Mrs. Schomberg than anybody in the Islands, +including Schomberg himself. She was a miracle of dissimulation. No +wonder Heyst got the girl away from under two men's noses, if he had her +to help with the job! + +The greatest wonder, after all, was Heyst getting mixed up with +petticoats. The fellow's life had been open to us for years and nothing +could have been more detached from feminine associations. Except that he +stood drinks to people on suitable occasions, like any other man, this +observer of facts seemed to have no connection with earthly affairs and +passions. The very courtesy of his manner, the flavour of playfulness in +the voice set him apart. He was like a feather floating lightly in +the workaday atmosphere which was the breath of our nostrils. For this +reason whenever this looker-on took contact with things he attracted +attention. First, it was the Morrison partnership of mystery, then +came the great sensation of the Tropical Belt Coal where indeed varied +interests were involved: a real business matter. And then came this +elopement, this incongruous phenomenon of self-assertion, the greatest +wonder of all, astonishing and amusing. + +Davidson admitted to me that, the hubbub was subsiding; and the affair +would have been already forgotten, perhaps, if that ass Schomberg +had not kept on gnashing his teeth publicly about it. It was really +provoking that Davidson should not be able to give one some idea of the +girl. Was she pretty? He didn't know. He had stayed the whole afternoon +in Schomberg's hotel, mainly for the purpose of finding out something +about her. But the story was growing stale. The parties at the tables on +the veranda had other, fresher, events to talk about and Davidson shrank +from making direct inquiries. He sat placidly there, content to be +disregarded and hoping for some chance word to turn up. I shouldn't +wonder if the good fellow hadn't been dozing. It's difficult to give you +an adequate idea of Davidson's placidity. + +Presently Schomberg, wandering about, joined a party that had taken the +table next to Davidson's. + +"A man like that Swede, gentlemen, is a public danger," he began. "I +remember him for years. I won't say anything of his spying--well, he +used to say himself he was looking for out-of-the-way facts and what is +that if not spying? He was spying into everybody's business. He got hold +of Captain Morrison, squeezed him dry, like you would an orange, and +scared him off to Europe to die there. Everybody knows that Captain +Morrison had a weak chest. Robbed first and murdered afterwards! I don't +mince words--not I. Next he gets up that swindle of the Belt Coal. You +know all about it. And now, after lining his pockets with other people's +money, he kidnaps a white girl belonging to an orchestra which is +performing in my public room for the benefit of my patrons, and goes +off to live like a prince on that island, where nobody can get at him. A +damn silly girl . . . It's disgusting--tfui!" + +He spat. He choked with rage--for he saw visions, no doubt. He jumped up +from his chair, and went away to flee from them--perhaps. He went into +the room where Mrs. Schomberg sat. Her aspect could not have been very +soothing to the sort of torment from which he was suffering. + +Davidson did not feel called upon to defend Heyst. His proceeding was to +enter into conversation with one and another, casually, and showing no +particular knowledge of the affair, in order to discover something about +the girl. Was she anything out of the way? Was she pretty? She couldn't +have been markedly so. She had not attracted special notice. She was +young--on that everybody agreed. The English clerk of Tesmans remembered +that she had a sallow face. He was respectable and highly proper. He +was not the sort to associate with such people. Most of these women were +fairly battered specimens. Schomberg had them housed in what he called +the Pavilion, in the grounds, where they were hard at it mending and +washing their white dresses, and could be seen hanging them out to dry +between the trees, like a lot of washerwomen. They looked very much +like middle-aged washerwomen on the platform, too. But the girl had +been living in the main building along with the boss, the director, the +fellow with the black beard, and a hard-bitten, oldish woman who took +the piano and was understood to be the fellow's wife. + +This was not a very satisfactory result. Davidson stayed on, and even +joined the table d'hote dinner, without gleaning any more information. +He was resigned. + +"I suppose," he wheezed placidly, "I am bound to see her some day." + +He meant to take the Samburan channel every trip, as before of course. + +"Yes," I said. "No doubt you will. Some day Heyst will be signalling to +you again; and I wonder what it will be for." + +Davidson made no reply. He had his own ideas about that, and his silence +concealed a good deal of thought. We spoke no more of Heyst's girl. +Before we separated, he gave me a piece of unrelated observation. + +"It's funny," he said, "but I fancy there's some gambling going on +in the evening at Schomberg's place, on the quiet. I've noticed men +strolling away in twos and threes towards that hall where the orchestra +used to play. The windows must be specially well shuttered, because I +could not spy the smallest gleam of light from that direction; but I +can't believe that those beggars would go in there only to sit and think +of their sins in the dark." + +"That's strange. It's incredible that Schomberg should risk that sort of +thing," I said. + + + + + +PART TWO + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +As we know, Heyst had gone to stay in Schomberg's hotel in complete +ignorance that his person was odious to that worthy. When he arrived, +Zangiacomo's Ladies' Orchestra had been established there for some time. + +The business which had called him out from his seclusion in his lost +corner of the Eastern seas was with the Tesmans, and it had something +to do with money. He transacted it quickly, and then found himself with +nothing to do while he awaited Davidson, who was to take him back to his +solitude; for back to his solitude Heyst meant to go. He whom we used +to refer to as the Enchanted Heyst was suffering from thorough +disenchantment. Not with the islands, however. The Archipelago has a +lasting fascination. It is not easy to shake off the spell of island +life. Heyst was disenchanted with life as a whole. His scornful +temperament, beguiled into action, suffered from failure in a subtle way +unknown to men accustomed to grapple with the realities of common human +enterprise. It was like the gnawing pain of useless apostasy, a sort of +shame before his own betrayed nature; and in addition, he also suffered +from plain, downright remorse. He deemed himself guilty of Morrison's +death. A rather absurd feeling, since no one could possibly have +foreseen the horrors of the cold, wet summer lying in wait for poor +Morrison at home. + +It was not in Heyst's character to turn morose; but his mental state was +not compatible with a sociable mood. He spent his evenings sitting +apart on the veranda of Schomberg's hotel. The lamentations of string +instruments issued from the building in the hotel compound, the +approaches to which were decorated with Japanese paper lanterns strung +up between the trunks of several big trees. Scraps of tunes more or +less plaintive reached his ears. They pursued him even into his bedroom, +which opened into an upstairs veranda. The fragmentary and rasping +character of these sounds made their intrusion inexpressibly tedious in +the long run. Like most dreamers, to whom it is given sometimes to hear +the music of the spheres, Heyst, the wanderer of the Archipelago, had +a taste for silence which he had been able to gratify for years. The +islands are very quiet. One sees them lying about, clothed in their dark +garments of leaves, in a great hush of silver and azure, where the sea +without murmurs meets the sky in a ring of magic stillness. A sort of +smiling somnolence broods over them; the very voices of their people are +soft and subdued, as if afraid to break some protecting spell. + +Perhaps this was the very spell which had enchanted Heyst in the early +days. For him, however, that was broken. He was no longer enchanted, +though he was still a captive of the islands. He had no intention to +leave them ever. Where could he have gone to, after all these years? +Not a single soul belonging to him lived anywhere on earth. Of this +fact--not such a remote one, after all--he had only lately become aware; +for it is failure that makes a man enter into himself and reckon up his +resources. And though he had made up his mind to retire from the world +in hermit fashion, yet he was irrationally moved by this sense of +loneliness which had come to him in the hour of renunciation. It hurt +him. Nothing is more painful than the shock of sharp contradictions that +lacerate our intelligence and our feelings. + +Meantime Schomberg watched Heyst out of the corner of his eye. +Towards the unconscious object of his enmity he preserved a distant +lieutenant-of-the-Reserve demeanour. Nudging certain of his customers +with his elbow, he begged them to observe what airs "that Swede" was +giving himself. + +"I really don't know why he has come to stay in my house. This place +isn't good enough for him. I wish to goodness he had gone somewhere else +to show off his superiority. Here I have got up this series of concerts +for you gentlemen, just to make things a little brighter generally; and +do you think he'll condescend to step in and listen to a piece or two of +an evening? Not he. I know him of old. There he sits at the dark end of +the piazza, all the evening long--planning some new swindle, no doubt. +For two-pence I would ask him to go and look for quarters somewhere +else; only one doesn't like to treat a white man like that out in the +tropics. I don't know how long he means to stay, but I'm willing to bet +a trifle that he'll never work himself up to the point of spending the +fifty cents of entrance money for the sake of a little good music." + +Nobody cared to bet, or the hotel-keeper would have lost. One evening +Heyst was driven to desperation by the rasped, squeaked, scraped +snatches of tunes pursuing him even to his hard couch, with a mattress +as thin as a pancake and a diaphanous mosquito net. He descended among +the trees, where the soft glow of Japanese lanterns picked out parts of +their great rugged trunks, here and there, in the great mass of darkness +under the lofty foliage. More lanterns, of the shape of cylindrical +concertinas, hanging in a row from a slack string, decorated the doorway +of what Schomberg called grandiloquently "my concert-hall." In his +desperate mood Heyst ascended three steps, lifted a calico curtain, and +went in. + +The uproar in that small, barn-like structure, built of imported +pine boards, and raised clear of the ground, was simply stunning. An +instrumental uproar, screaming, grunting, whining, sobbing, scraping, +squeaking some kind of lively air; while a grand piano, operated upon +by a bony, red-faced woman with bad-tempered nostrils, rained hard notes +like hail through the tempest of fiddles. The small platform was filled +with white muslin dresses and crimson sashes slanting from shoulders +provided with bare arms, which sawed away without respite. Zangiacomo +conducted. He wore a white mess-jacket, a black dress waistcoat, and +white trousers. His longish, tousled hair and his great beard were +purple-black. He was horrible. The heat was terrific. There were perhaps +thirty people having drinks at several little tables. Heyst, quite +overcome by the volume of noise, dropped into a chair. In the quick time +of that music, in the varied, piercing clamour of the strings, in the +movements of the bare arms, in the low dresses, the coarse faces, +the stony eyes of the executants, there was a suggestion of +brutality--something cruel, sensual and repulsive. + +"This is awful!" Heyst murmured to himself. + +But there is an unholy fascination in systematic noise. He did not +flee from it incontinently, as one might have expected him to do. He +remained, astonished at himself for remaining, since nothing could have +been more repulsive to his tastes, more painful to his senses, and, +so to speak, more contrary to his genius, than this rude exhibition +of vigour. The Zangiacomo band was not making music; it was simply +murdering silence with a vulgar, ferocious energy. One felt as if +witnessing a deed of violence; and that impression was so strong that it +seemed marvellous to see the people sitting so quietly on their +chairs, drinking so calmly out of their glasses, and giving no signs +of distress, anger, or fear. Heyst averted his gaze from the unnatural +spectacle of their indifference. + +When the piece of music came to an end the relief was so great that he +felt slightly dizzy, as if a chasm of silence had yawned at his feet. +When he raised his eyes, the audience, most perversely, was exhibiting +signs of animation and interest in their faces, and the women in white +muslin dresses were coming down in pairs from the platform into the body +of Schomberg's "concert-hall." They dispersed themselves all over the +place. The male creature with the hooked nose and purple-black beard +disappeared somewhere. This was the interval during which, as the astute +Schomberg had stipulated, the members of the orchestra were encouraged +to favour the members of the audience with their company--that is, such +members as seemed inclined to fraternize with the arts in a familiar and +generous manner; the symbol of familiarity and generosity consisting in +offers of refreshment. + +The procedure struck Heyst as highly incorrect. However, the impropriety +of Schomberg's ingenious scheme was defeated by the circumstance that +most of the women were no longer young, and that none of them had ever +been beautiful. Their more or less worn cheeks were slightly rouged, but +apart from that fact, which might have been simply a matter of routine, +they did not seem to take the success of the scheme unduly to heart. +The impulse to fraternize with the arts being obviously weak in the +audience, some of the musicians sat down listlessly at unoccupied +tables, while others went on perambulating the central passage: arm in +arm, glad enough, no doubt, to stretch their legs while resting their +arms. Their crimson sashes gave a factitious touch of gaiety to the +smoky atmosphere of the concert-hall; and Heyst felt a sudden pity for +these beings, exploited, hopeless, devoid of charm and grace, whose fate +of cheerless dependence invested their coarse and joyless features with +a touch of pathos. + +Heyst was temperamentally sympathetic. To have them passing and +repassing close to his little table was painful to him. He was preparing +to rise and go out when he noticed that two white muslin dresses and +crimson sashes had not yet left the platform. One of these dresses +concealed the raw-boned frame of the woman with the bad-tempered curve +to her nostrils. She was no less a personage than Mrs. Zangiacomo. She +had left the piano, and, with her back to the hall, was preparing the +parts for the second half of the concert, with a brusque, impatient +action of her ugly elbow. This task done, she turned, and, perceiving +the other white muslin dress motionless on a chair in the second row, +she strode towards it between the music-stands with an aggressive and +masterful gait. On the lap of that dress there lay, unclasped and idle, +a pair of small hands, not very white, attached to well-formed arms. +The next detail Heyst was led to observe was the arrangement of the +hair--two thick, brown tresses rolled round an attractively shaped head. + +"A girl, by Jove!" he exclaimed mentally. + +It was evident that she was a girl. It was evident in the outline of the +shoulders, in the slender white bust springing up, barred slantwise by +the crimson sash, from the bell-shaped spread of muslin skirt hiding the +chair on which she sat averted a little from the body of the hall. Her +feet, in low white shoes, were crossed prettily. + +She had captured Heyst's awakened faculty of observation; he had +the sensation of a new experience. That was because his faculty of +observation had never before been captured by any feminine creature in +that marked and exclusive fashion. He looked at her anxiously, as no man +ever looks at another man; and he positively forgot where he was. He had +lost touch with his surroundings. The big woman, advancing, concealed +the girl from his sight for a moment. She bent over the seated youthful +figure, in passing it very close, as if to drop a word into its ear. +Her lips did certainly move. But what sort of word could it have been +to make the girl jump up so swiftly? Heyst, at his table, was surprised +into a sympathetic start. He glanced quickly round. Nobody was looking +towards the platform; and when his eyes swept back there again, the +girl, with the big woman treading at her heels, was coming down the +three steps from the platform to the floor of the hall. There she +paused, stumbled one pace forward, and stood still again, while +the other--the escort, the dragoon, the coarse big woman of the +piano--passed her roughly, and, marching truculently down the centre +aisle between the chairs and tables, went out to rejoin the hook-nosed +Zangiacomo somewhere outside. During her extraordinary transit, as if +everything in the hall were dirt under her feet, her scornful eyes met +the upward glance of Heyst, who looked away at once towards the girl. +She had not moved. Her arms hung down; her eyelids were lowered. + +Heyst laid down his half-smoked cigar and compressed his lips. Then he +got up. It was the same sort of impulse which years ago had made him +cross the sandy street of the abominable town of Delli in the island of +Timor and accost Morrison, practically a stranger to him then, a man in +trouble, expressively harassed, dejected, lonely. + +It was the same impulse. But he did not recognize it. He was not +thinking of Morrison then. It may be said that, for the first time +since the final abandonment of the Samburan coal mine, he had completely +forgotten the late Morrison. It is true that to a certain extent he +had forgotten also where he was. Thus, unchecked by any sort of self +consciousness, Heyst walked up the central passage. + +Several of the women, by this time, had found anchorage here and there +among the occupied tables. They talked to the men, leaning on their +elbows, and suggesting funnily--if it hadn't been for the crimson +sashes--in their white dresses an assembly of middle-aged brides +with free and easy manners and hoarse voices. The murmuring noise +of conversations carried on with some spirit filled Schomberg's +concert-room. Nobody remarked Heyst's movements; for indeed he was not +the only man on his legs there. He had been confronting the girl for +some time before she became aware of his presence. She was looking down, +very still, without colour, without glances, without voice, without +movement. It was only when Heyst addressed her in his courteous tone +that she raised her eyes. + +"Excuse me," he said in English, "but that horrible female has done +something to you. She has pinched you, hasn't she? I am sure she pinched +you just now, when she stood by your chair." + +The girl received this overture with the wide, motionless stare of +profound astonishment. Heyst, vexed with himself, suspected that she did +not understand what he said. One could not tell what nationality these +women were, except that they were of all sorts. But she was astonished +almost more by the near presence of the man himself, by his largely +bald head, by the white brow, the sunburnt cheeks, the long, horizontal +moustaches of crinkly bronze hair, by the kindly expression of the man's +blue eyes looking into her own. He saw the stony amazement in hers +give way to a momentary alarm, which was succeeded by an expression of +resignation. + +"I am sure she pinched your arm most cruelly," he murmured, rather +disconcerted now at what he had done. + +It was a great comfort to hear her say: + +"It wouldn't have been the first time. And suppose she did--what are you +going to do about it?" + +"I don't know," he said with a faint, remote playfulness in his tone +which had not been heard in it lately, and which seemed to catch her +ear pleasantly. "I am grieved to say that I don't know. But can I do +anything? What would you wish me to do? Pray command me." + +Again, the greatest astonishment became visible in her face; for she now +perceived how different he was from the other men in the room. He was as +different from them as she was different from the other members of the +ladies' orchestra. + +"Command you?" she breathed, after a time, in a bewildered tone. "Who +are you?" she asked a little louder. + +"I am staying in this hotel for a few days. I just dropped in casually +here. This outrage--" + +"Don't you try to interfere," she said so earnestly that Heyst asked, in +his faintly playful tone: + +"Is it your wish that I should leave you?" + +"I haven't said that," the girl answered. "She pinched me because I +didn't get down here quick enough--" + +"I can't tell you how indignant I am--" said Heyst. "But since you are +down here now," he went on, with the ease of a man of the world speaking +to a young lady in a drawing-room, "hadn't we better sit down?" + +She obeyed his inviting gesture, and they sat down on the nearest +chairs. They looked at each other across a little round table with a +surprised, open gaze, self-consciousness growing on them so slowly that +it was a long time before they averted their eyes; and very soon they +met again, temporarily, only to rebound, as it were. At last they +steadied in contact, but by that time, say some fifteen minutes from the +moment when they sat down, the "interval" came to an end. + +So much for their eyes. As to the conversation, it had been perfectly +insignificant because naturally they had nothing to say to each other. +Heyst had been interested by the girl's physiognomy. Its expression was +neither simple nor yet very clear. It was not distinguished--that could +not be expected--but the features had more fineness than those of any +other feminine countenance he had ever had the opportunity to observe so +closely. There was in it something indefinably audacious and infinitely +miserable--because the temperament and the existence of that girl were +reflected in it. But her voice! It seduced Heyst by its amazing quality. +It was a voice fit to utter the most exquisite things, a voice which +would have made silly chatter supportable and the roughest talk +fascinating. Heyst drank in its charm as one listens to the tone of some +instrument without heeding the tune. + +"Do you sing as well as play?" he asked her abruptly. + +"Never sang a note in my life," she said, obviously surprised by the +irrelevant question; for they had not been discoursing of sweet sounds. +She was clearly unaware of her voice. "I don't remember that I ever had +much reason to sing since I was little," she added. + +That inelegant phrase, by the mere vibrating, warm nobility of the +sound, found its way into Heyst's heart. His mind, cool, alert, watched +it sink there with a sort of vague concern at the absurdity of +the occupation, till it rested at the bottom, deep down, where our +unexpressed longings lie. + +"You are English, of course?" he said. + +"What do you think?" she answered in the most charming accents. Then, as +if thinking that it was her turn to place a question: "Why do you always +smile when you speak?" + +It was enough to make anyone look grave, but her good faith was so +evident that Heyst recovered himself at once. + +"It's my unfortunate manner--" he said with his delicate, polished +playfulness. "Is is very objectionable to you?" + +She was very serious. + +"No. I only noticed it. I haven't come across so many pleasant people as +all that, in my life." + +"It's certain that this woman who plays the piano is infinitely more +disagreeable than any cannibal I have ever had to do with." + +"I believe you!" She shuddered. "How did you come to have anything to do +with cannibals?" + +"It would be too long a tale," said Heyst with a faint smile. Heyst's +smiles were rather melancholy, and accorded badly with his great +moustaches, under which his mere playfulness lurked as comfortable as a +shy bird in its native thicket. "Much too long. How did you get amongst +this lot here?" + +"Bad luck," she answered briefly. + +"No doubt, no doubt," Heyst assented with slight nods. Then, still +indignant at the pinch which he had divined rather than actually seen +inflicted: "I say, couldn't you defend yourself somehow?" + +She had risen already. The ladies of the orchestra were slowly regaining +their places. Some were already seated, idle stony-eyed, before the +music-stands. Heyst was standing up, too. + +"They are too many for me," she said. + +These few words came out of the common experience of mankind; yet by +virtue of her voice, they thrilled Heyst like a revelation. His feelings +were in a state of confusion, but his mind was clear. + +"That's bad. But it isn't actual ill-usage that this girl is complaining +of," he thought lucidly after she left him. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +That was how it began. How it was that it ended, as we know it did end, +is not so easy to state precisely. It is very clear that Heyst was not +indifferent, I won't say to the girl, but to the girl's fate. He was +the same man who had plunged after the submerged Morrison whom he +hardly knew otherwise than by sight and through the usual gossip of the +islands. But this was another sort of plunge altogether, and likely to +lead to a very different kind of partnership. + +Did he reflect at all? Probably. He was sufficiently reflective. But +if he did, it was with insufficient knowledge. For there is no evidence +that he paused at any time between the date of that evening and the +morning of the flight. Truth to say, Heyst was not one of those men +who pause much. Those dreamy spectators of the world's agitation are +terrible once the desire to act gets hold of them. They lower their +heads and charge a wall with an amazing serenity which nothing but an +indisciplined imagination can give. + +He was not a fool. I suppose he knew--or at least he felt--where this +was leading him. But his complete inexperience gave him the necessary +audacity. The girl's voice was charming when she spoke to him of her +miserable past, in simple terms, with a sort of unconscious cynicism +inherent in the truth of the ugly conditions of poverty. And whether +because he was humane or because her voice included all the modulations +of pathos, cheerfulness, and courage in its compass, it was not disgust +that the tale awakened in him, but the sense of an immense sadness. + +On a later evening, during the interval between the two parts of the +concert, the girl told Heyst about herself. She was almost a child +of the streets. Her father was a musician in the orchestras of small +theatres. Her mother ran away from him while she was little, and the +landladies of various poor lodging-houses had attended casually to her +abandoned childhood. It was never positive starvation and absolute rags, +but it was the hopeless grip of poverty all the time. It was her father +who taught her to play the violin. It seemed that he used to get drunk +sometimes, but without pleasure, and only because he was unable to +forget his fugitive wife. After he had a paralytic stroke, falling +over with a crash in the well of a music-hall orchestra during the +performance, she had joined the Zangiacomo company. He was now in a home +for incurables. + +"And I am here," she finished, "with no one to care if I make a hole in +the water the next chance I get or not." + +Heyst told her that he thought she could do a little better than that, +if it was only a question of getting out of the world. She looked at him +with special attention, and with a puzzled expression which gave to her +face an air of innocence. + +This was during one of the "intervals" between the two parts of the +concert. She had come down that time without being incited thereto by a +pinch from the awful Zangiacomo woman. It is difficult to suppose that +she was seduced by the uncovered intellectual forehead and the long +reddish moustaches of her new friend. New is not the right word. She had +never had a friend before; and the sensation of this friendliness going +out to her was exciting by its novelty alone. Besides, any man who did +not resemble Schomberg appeared for that very reason attractive. She was +afraid of the hotel-keeper, who, in the daytime, taking advantage of the +fact that she lived in the hotel itself, and not in the Pavilion with +the other "artists" prowled round her, mute, hungry, portentous behind +his great beard, or else assailed her in quiet corners and empty +passages with deep, mysterious murmurs from behind, which, not +withstanding their clear import, sounded horribly insane somehow. + +The contrast of Heyst's quiet, polished manner gave her special delight +and filled her with admiration. She had never seen anything like that +before. If she had, perhaps, known kindness in her life, she had never +met the forms of simple courtesy. She was interested by it as a very +novel experience, not very intelligible, but distinctly pleasurable. + +"I tell you they are too many for me," she repeated, sometimes +recklessly, but more often shaking her head with ominous dejection. + +She had, of course, no money at all. The quantities of "black men" all +about frightened her. She really had no definite idea where she was on +the surface of the globe. The orchestra was generally taken from the +steamer to some hotel, and kept shut up there till it was time to go on +board another steamer. She could not remember the names she heard. + +"How do you call this place again?" she used to ask Heyst. + +"Sourabaya," he would say distinctly, and would watch the discouragement +at the outlandish sound coming into her eyes, which were fastened on his +face. + +He could not defend himself from compassion. He suggested that she might +go to the consul, but it was his conscience that dictated this advice, +not his conviction. She had never heard of the animal or of its uses. A +consul! What was it? Who was he? What could he do? And when she learned +that perhaps he could be induced to send her home, her head dropped on +her breast. + +"What am I to do when I get there?" she murmured with an intonation so +just, with an accent so penetrating--the charm of her voice did not fail +her even in whispering--that Heyst seemed to see the illusion of human +fellowship on earth vanish before the naked truth of her existence, and +leave them both face to face in a moral desert as arid as the sands of +Sahara, without restful shade, without refreshing water. + +She leaned slightly over the little table, the same little table at +which they had sat when they first met each other; and with no other +memories but of the stones in the streets her childhood had known, in +the distress of the incoherent, confused, rudimentary impressions of her +travels inspiring her with a vague terror of the world she said rapidly, +as one speaks in desperation: + +"You do something! You are a gentleman. It wasn't I who spoke to you +first, was it? I didn't begin, did I? It was you who came along and +spoke to me when I was standing over there. What did you want to speak +to me for? I don't care what it is, but you must do something." + +Her attitude was fierce and entreating at the same time--clamorous, in +fact though her voice had hardly risen above a breath. It was clamorous +enough to be noticed. Heyst, on purpose, laughed aloud. She nearly +choked with indignation at this brutal heartlessness. + +"What did you mean, then, by saying 'command me!'?" she almost hissed. + +Something hard in his mirthless stare, and a quiet final "All right," +steadied her. + +"I am not rich enough to buy you out," he went on, speaking with an +extraordinary detached grin, "even if it were to be done; but I can +always steal you." + +She looked at him profoundly, as though these words had a hidden and +very complicated meaning. + +"Get away now," he said rapidly, "and try to smile as you go." + +She obeyed with unexpected readiness; and as she had a set of very good +white teeth, the effect of the mechanical, ordered smile was joyous, +radiant. It astonished Heyst. No wonder, it flashed through his mind, +women can deceive men so completely. The faculty was inherent in them; +they seemed to be created with a special aptitude. Here was a smile +the origin of which was well known to him; and yet it had conveyed a +sensation of warmth, had given him a sort of ardour to live which was +very new to his experience. + +By this time she was gone from the table, and had joined the other +"ladies of the orchestra." They trooped towards the platform, driven in +truculently by the haughty mate of Zangiacomo, who looked as though +she were restraining herself with difficulty from punching their backs. +Zangiacomo followed, with his great, pendulous dyed beard and short +mess-jacket, with an aspect of hang-dog concentration imparted by his +drooping head and the uneasiness of his eyes, which were set very close +together. He climbed the steps last of all, turned about, displaying +his purple beard to the hall, and tapped with his bow. Heyst winced in +anticipation of the horrible racket. It burst out immediately unabashed +and awful. At the end of the platform the woman at the piano, presenting +her cruel profile, her head tilted back, banged the keys without looking +at the music. + +Heyst could not stand the uproar for more than a minute. He went out, +his brain racked by the rhythm of some more or less Hungarian dance +music. The forests inhabited by the New Guinea cannibals where he had +encountered the most exciting of his earlier futile adventures were +silent. And this adventure, not in its execution, perhaps, but in its +nature, required even more nerve than anything he had faced before. +Walking among the paper lanterns suspended to trees he remembered with +regret the gloom and the dead stillness of the forests at the back of +Geelvink Bay, perhaps the wildest, the unsafest, the most deadly spot +on earth from which the sea can be seen. Oppressed by his thoughts, +he sought the obscurity and peace of his bedroom; but they were not +complete. The distant sounds of the concert reached his ear, faint +indeed, but still disturbing. Neither did he feel very safe in there; +for that sentiment depends not on extraneous circumstances but on our +inward conviction. He did not attempt to go to sleep; he did not even +unbutton the top button of his tunic. He sat in a chair and mused. +Formerly, in solitude and in silence, he had been used to think clearly +and sometimes even profoundly, seeing life outside the flattering +optical delusion of everlasting hope, of conventional self-deceptions, +of an ever-expected happiness. But now he was troubled; a light veil +seemed to hang before his mental vision; the awakening of a tenderness, +indistinct and confused as yet, towards an unknown woman. + +Gradually silence, a real silence, had established itself round him. The +concert was over; the audience had gone; the concert-hall was dark; and +even the Pavilion, where the ladies' orchestra slept after its noisy +labours, showed not a gleam of light. Heyst suddenly felt restless in +all his limbs, as this reaction from the long immobility would not be +denied, he humoured it by passing quietly along the back veranda and out +into the grounds at the side of the house, into the black shadows under +the trees, where the extinguished paper lanterns were gently swinging +their globes like withered fruit. + +He paced there to and fro for a long time, a calm, meditative ghost in +his white drill-suit, revolving in his head thoughts absolutely novel, +disquieting, and seductive; accustoming his mind to the contemplation +of his purpose, in order that by being faced steadily it should appear +praiseworthy and wise. For the use of reason is to justify the obscure +desires that move our conduct, impulses, passions, prejudices, and +follies, and also our fears. + +He felt that he had engaged himself by a rash promise to an action big +with incalculable consequences. And then he asked himself if the girl +had understood what he meant. Who could tell? He was assailed by all +sorts of doubts. Raising his head, he perceived something white flitting +between the trees. It vanished almost at once; but there could be no +mistake. He was vexed at being detected roaming like this in the middle +of the night. Who could that be? It never occurred to him that perhaps +the girl, too, would not be able to sleep. He advanced prudently. Then +he saw the white, phantom-like apparition again; and the next moment +all his doubts as to the state of her mind were laid at rest, because he +felt her clinging to him after the manner of supplicants all the world +over. Her whispers were so incoherent that he could not understand +anything; but this did not prevent him from being profoundly moved. He +had no illusions about her; but his sceptical mind was dominated by the +fulness of his heart. + +"Calm yourself, calm yourself," he murmured in her ear, returning her +clasp at first mechanically, and afterwards with a growing appreciation +of her distressed humanity. The heaving of her breast and the trembling +of all her limbs, in the closeness of his embrace, seemed to enter his +body, to infect his very heart. While she was growing quieter in his +arms, he was becoming more agitated, as if there were only a fixed +quantity of violent emotion on this earth. The very night seemed +more dumb, more still, and the immobility of the vague, black shapes, +surrounding him more perfect. + +"It will be all right," he tried to reassure her, with a tone of +conviction, speaking into her ear, and of necessity clasping her more +closely than before. + +Either the words or the action had a very good effect. He heard a light +sigh of relief. She spoke with a calmed ardour. + +"Oh, I knew it would be all right from the first time you spoke to me! +Yes, indeed, I knew directly you came up to me that evening. I knew it +would be all right, if you only cared to make it so; but of course I +could not tell if you meant it. 'Command me,' you said. Funny thing for +a man like you to say. Did you really mean it? You weren't making fun of +me?" + +He protested that he had been a serious person all his life. + +"I believe you," she said ardently. He was touched by this declaration. +"It's the way you have of speaking as if you were amused with people," +she went on. "But I wasn't deceived. I could see you were angry with +that beast of a woman. And you are clever. You spotted something at +once. You saw it in my face, eh? It isn't a bad face--say? You'll never +be sorry. Listen--I'm not twenty yet. It's the truth, and I can't be so +bad looking, or else--I will tell you straight that I have been worried +and pestered by fellows like this before. I don't know what comes to +them--" + +She was speaking hurriedly. She choked, and then exclaimed, with an +accent of despair: + +"What is it? What's the matter?" + +Heyst had removed his arms from her suddenly, and had recoiled a little. +"Is it my fault? I didn't even look at them, I tell you straight. Never! +Have I looked at you? Tell me. It was you that began it." + +In truth, Heyst had shrunk from the idea of competition with fellows +unknown, with Schomberg the hotel-keeper. The vaporous white figure +before him swayed pitifully in the darkness. He felt ashamed of his +fastidiousness. + +"I am afraid we have been detected," he murmured. "I think I saw +somebody on the path between the house and the bushes behind you." + +He had seen no one. It was a compassionate lie, if there ever was one. +His compassion was as genuine as his shrinking had been, and in his +judgement more honourable. + +She didn't turn her head. She was obviously relieved. + +"Would it be that brute?" she breathed out, meaning Schomberg, of +course. "He's getting too forward with me now. What can you expect? Only +this evening, after supper, he--but I slipped away. You don't mind him, +do you? Why, I could face him myself now that I know you care for me. +A girl can always put up a fight. You believe me? Only it isn't easy to +stand up for yourself when you feel there's nothing and nobody at your +back. There's nothing so lonely in the world as a girl who has got to +look after herself. When I left poor dad in that home--it was in the +country, near a village--I came out of the gates with seven shillings +and threepence in my old purse, and my railway ticket. I tramped a mile, +and got into a train--" + +She broke off, and was silent for a moment. + +"Don't you throw me over now," she went on. "If you did, what should +I do? I should have to live, to be sure, because I'd be afraid to kill +myself, but you would have done a thousand times worse than killing a +body. You told me you had been always alone, you had never had a dog +even. Well, then, I won't be in anybody's way if I live with you--not +even a dog's. And what else did you mean when you came up and looked at +me so close?" + +"Close? Did I?" he murmured unstirring before her in the profound +darkness. "So close as that?" + +She had an outbreak of anger and despair in subdued tones. + +"Have you forgotten, then? What did you expect to find? I know what sort +of girl I am; but all the same I am not the sort that men turn their +backs on--and you ought to know it, unless you aren't made like the +others. Oh, forgive me! You aren't like the others; you are like no one +in the world I ever spoke to. Don't you care for me? Don't you see--?" + +What he saw was that, white and spectral, she was putting out her arms +to him out of the black shadows like an appealing ghost. He took her +hands, and was affected, almost surprised, to find them so warm, so +real, so firm, so living in his grasp. He drew her to him, and she +dropped her head on his shoulder with a deep-sigh. + +"I am dead tired," she whispered plaintively. + +He put his arms around her, and only by the convulsive movements of her +body became aware that she was sobbing without a sound. Sustaining her, +he lost himself in the profound silence of the night. After a while she +became still, and cried quietly. Then, suddenly, as if waking up, she +asked: + +"You haven't seen any more of that somebody you thought was spying +about?" + +He started at her quick, sharp whisper, and answered that very likely he +had been mistaken. + +"If it was anybody at all," she reflected aloud, "it wouldn't have been +anyone but that hotel woman--the landlord's wife." + +"Mrs. Schomberg," Heyst said, surprised. + +"Yes. Another one that can't sleep o' nights. Why? Don't you see why? +Because, of course, she sees what's going on. That beast doesn't even +try to keep it from her. If she had only the least bit of spirit! She +knows how I feel, too, only she's too frightened even to look him in the +face, let alone open her mouth. He would tell her to go hang herself." + +For some time Heyst said nothing. A public, active contest with the +hotel-keeper was not to be thought of. The idea was horrible. Whispering +gently to the girl, he tried to explain to her that as things stood, an +open withdrawal from the company would be probably opposed. She listened +to his explanation anxiously, from time to time pressing the hand she +had sought and got hold of in the dark. + +"As I told you, I am not rich enough to buy you out so I shall steal you +as soon as I can arrange some means of getting away from here. Meantime +it would be fatal to be seen together at night. We mustn't give +ourselves away. We had better part at once. I think I was mistaken just +now; but if, as you say, that poor Mrs. Schomberg can't sleep of nights, +we must be more careful. She would tell the fellow." + +The girl had disengaged herself from his loose hold while he talked, and +now stood free of him, but still clasping his hand firmly. + +"Oh, no," she said with perfect assurance. "I tell you she daren't open +her mouth to him. And she isn't as silly as she looks. She wouldn't give +us away. She knows a trick worth two of that. She'll help--that's what +she'll do, if she dares do anything at all." + +"You seem to have a very clear view of the situation," said Heyst, and +received a warm, lingering kiss for this commendation. + +He discovered that to part from her was not such an easy matter as he +had supposed it would be. + +"Upon my word," he said before they separated, "I don't even know your +name." + +"Don't you? They call me Alma. I don't know why. Silly name! Magdalen +too. It doesn't matter; you can call me by whatever name you choose. +Yes, you give me a name. Think of one you would like the sound +of--something quite new. How I should like to forget everything that has +gone before, as one forgets a dream that's done with, fright and all! I +would try." + +"Would you really?" he asked in a murmur. "But that's not forbidden. I +understand that women easily forget whatever in their past diminishes +them in their eyes." + +"It's your eyes that I was thinking of, for I'm sure I've never wished +to forget anything till you came up to me that night and looked me +through and through. I know I'm not much account; but I know how to +stand by a man. I stood by father ever since I could understand. He +wasn't a bad chap. Now that I can't be of any use to him, I would just +as soon forget all that and make a fresh start. But these aren't things +that I could talk to you about. What could I ever talk to you about?" + +"Don't let it trouble you," Heyst said. "Your voice is enough. I am in +love with it, whatever it says." + +She remained silent for a while, as if rendered breathless by this quiet +statement. + +"Oh! I wanted to ask you--" + +He remembered that she probably did not know his name, and expected the +question to be put to him now; but after a moment of hesitation she went +on: + +"Why was it that you told me to smile this evening in the concert-room +there--you remember?" + +"I thought we were being observed. A smile is the best of masks. +Schomberg was at a table next but one to us, drinking with some Dutch +clerks from the town. No doubt he was watching us--watching you, at +least. That's why I asked you to smile." + +"Ah, that's why. It never came into my head!" + +"And you did it very well, too--very readily, as if you had understood +my intention." + +"Readily!" she repeated. "Oh, I was ready enough to smile then. That's +the truth. It was the first time for years I may say that I felt +disposed to smile. I've not had many chances to smile in my life, I can +tell you; especially of late." + +"But you do it most charmingly--in a perfectly fascinating way." + +He paused. She stood still, waiting for more with the stillness of +extreme delight, wishing to prolong the sensation. + +"It astonished me," he added. "It went as straight to my heart as though +you had smiled for the purpose of dazzling me. I felt as if I had never +seen a smile before in my life. I thought of it after I left you. It +made me restless." + +"It did all that?" came her voice, unsteady, gentle, and incredulous. + +"If you had not smiled as you did, perhaps I should not have come out +here tonight," he said, with his playful earnestness of tone. "It was +your triumph." + +He felt her lips touch his lightly, and the next moment she was gone. +Her white dress gleamed in the distance, and then the opaque darkness of +the house seemed to swallow it. Heyst waited a little before he went the +same way, round the corner, up the steps of the veranda, and into his +room, where he lay down at last--not to sleep, but to go over in his +mind all that had been said at their meeting. + +"It's exactly true about that smile," he thought. There he had spoken +the truth to her; and about her voice, too. For the rest--what must be +must be. + +A great wave of heat passed over him. He turned on his back, flung his +arms crosswise on the broad, hard bed, and lay still, open-eyed under +the mosquito net, till daylight entered his room, brightened swiftly, +and turned to unfailing sunlight. He got up then, went to a small +looking-glass hanging on the wall, and stared at himself steadily. It +was not a new-born vanity which induced this long survey. He felt +so strange that he could not resist the suspicion of his personal +appearance having changed during the night. What he saw in the glass, +however, was the man he knew before. It was almost a disappointment--a +belittling of his recent experience. And then he smiled at his +naiveness; for, being over five and thirty years of age, he ought to +have known that in most cases the body is the unalterable mask of the +soul, which even death itself changes but little, till it is put out of +sight where no changes matter any more, either to our friends or to our +enemies. + +Heyst was not conscious of either friends or of enemies. It was the very +essence of his life to be a solitary achievement, accomplished not by +hermit-like withdrawal with its silence and immobility, but by a system +of restless wandering, by the detachment of an impermanent dweller +amongst changing scenes. In this scheme he had perceived the means of +passing through life without suffering and almost without a single care +in the world--invulnerable because elusive. + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +For fifteen years Heyst had wandered, invariably courteous and +unapproachable, and in return was generally considered a "queer chap." +He had started off on these travels of his after the death of his +father, an expatriated Swede who died in London, dissatisfied with his +country and angry with all the world, which had instinctively rejected +his wisdom. + +Thinker, stylist, and man of the world in his time, the elder Heyst +had begun by coveting all the joys, those of the great and those of the +humble, those of the fools and those of the sages. For more than sixty +years he had dragged on this painful earth of ours the most weary, the +most uneasy soul that civilization had ever fashioned to its ends of +disillusion and regret. One could not refuse him a measure of greatness, +for he was unhappy in a way unknown to mediocre souls. His mother Heyst +had never known, but he kept his father's pale, distinguished face +in affectionate memory. He remembered him mainly in an ample blue +dressing-gown in a large house of a quiet London suburb. For three +years, after leaving school at the age of eighteen, he had lived with +the elder Heyst, who was then writing his last book. In this work, at +the end of his life, he claimed for mankind that right to absolute moral +and intellectual liberty of which he no longer believed them worthy. + +Three years of such companionship at that plastic and impressionable age +were bound to leave in the boy a profound mistrust of life. The young +man learned to reflect, which is a destructive process, a reckoning +of the cost. It is not the clear-sighted who lead the world. Great +achievements are accomplished in a blessed, warm mental fog, which the +pitiless cold blasts of the father's analysis had blown away from the +son. + +"I'll drift," Heyst had said to himself deliberately. + +He did not mean intellectually or sentimentally or morally. He meant +to drift altogether and literally, body and soul, like a detached leaf +drifting in the wind-currents under the immovable trees of a forest +glade; to drift without ever catching on to anything. + +"This shall be my defence against life," he had said to himself with a +sort of inward consciousness that for the son of his father there was no +other worthy alternative. + +He became a waif and stray, austerely, from conviction, as others +do through drink, from vice, from some weakness of character--with +deliberation, as others do in despair. This, stripped of its facts, had +been Heyst's life up to that disturbing night. Next day, when he saw the +girl called Alma, she managed to give him a glance of frank tenderness, +quick as lightning and leaving a profound impression, a secret touch on +the heart. It was in the grounds of the hotel, about tiffin time, while +the Ladies of the orchestra were strolling back to their pavilion after +rehearsal, or practice, or whatever they called their morning musical +exercises in the hall. Heyst, returning from the town, where he had +discovered that there would be difficulties in the way of getting away +at once, was crossing the compound, disappointed and worried. He had +walked almost unwittingly into the straggling group of Zangiacomo's +performers. It was a shock to him, on coming out of his brown study, to +find the girl so near to him, as if one waking suddenly should see the +figure of his dream turned into flesh and blood. She did not raise her +shapely head, but her glance was no dream thing. It was real, the most +real impression of his detached existence--so far. + +Heyst had not acknowledged it in any way, though it seemed to him +impossible that its effect on him should not be visible to anyone who +happened to be looking on. And there were several men on the +veranda, steady customers of Schomberg's table d'hote, gazing in his +direction--at the ladies of the orchestra, in fact. Heyst's dread arose, +not out of shame or timidity, but from his fastidiousness. On getting +amongst them, however, he noticed no signs of interest or astonishment +in their faces, any more than if they had been blind men. Even Schomberg +himself, who had to make way for him at the top of the stairs, was +completely unperturbed, and continued the conversation he was carrying +on with a client. + +Schomberg, indeed, had observed "that Swede" talking with the girl in +the intervals. A crony of his had nudged him; and he had thought that it +was so much the better; the silly fellow would keep everybody else off. +He was rather pleased than otherwise and watched them out of the corner +of his eye with a malicious enjoyment of the situation--a sort of +Satanic glee. For he had little doubt of his personal fascination, and +still less of his power to get hold of the girl, who seemed too ignorant +to know how to help herself, and who was worse than friendless, since +she had for some reason incurred the animosity of Mrs. Zangiacomo, a +woman with no conscience. The aversion she showed him as far as she +dared (for it is not always safe for the helpless to display the +delicacy of their sentiments), Schomberg pardoned on the score of +feminine conventional silliness. He had told Alma, as an argument, that +she was a clever enough girl to see that she could do no better than to +put her trust in a man of substance, in the prime of life, who knew +his way about. But for the excited trembling of his voice, and the +extraordinary way in which his eyes seemed to be starting out of his +crimson, hirsute countenance, such speeches had every character of calm, +unselfish advice--which, after the manner of lovers, passed easily into +sanguine plans for the future. + +"We'll soon get rid of the old woman," he whispered to her hurriedly, +with panting ferocity. "Hang her! I've never cared for her. The climate +don't suit her; I shall tell her to go to her people in Europe. She will +have to go, too! I will see to it. Eins, zwei, march! And then we shall +sell this hotel and start another somewhere else." + +He assured her that he didn't care what he did for her sake; and it +was true. Forty-five is the age of recklessness for many men, as if in +defiance of the decay and death waiting with open arms in the sinister +valley at the bottom of the inevitable hill. Her shrinking form, her +downcast eyes, when she had to listen to him, cornered at the end of an +empty corridor, he regarded as signs of submission to the overpowering +force of his will, the recognition of his personal fascinations. For +every age is fed on illusions, lest men should renounce life early and +the human race come to an end. + +It's easy to imagine Schomberg's humiliation, his shocked fury, when +he discovered that the girl who had for weeks resisted his attacks, his +prayers, and his fiercest protestations, had been snatched from under +his nose by "that Swede," apparently without any trouble worth speaking +of. He refused to believe the fact. He would have it, at first, that +the Zangiacomos, for some unfathomable reason, had played him a scurvy +trick, but when no further doubt was possible, he changed his view of +Heyst. The despised Swede became for Schomberg the deepest, the most +dangerous, the most hateful of scoundrels. He could not believe that the +creature he had coveted with so much force and with so little effect, +was in reality tender, docile to her impulse, and had almost offered +herself to Heyst without a sense of guilt, in a desire of safety, and +from a profound need of placing her trust where her woman's instinct +guided her ignorance. Nothing would serve Schomberg but that she must +have been circumvented by some occult exercise of force or craft, by the +laying of some subtle trap. His wounded vanity wondered ceaselessly at +the means "that Swede" had employed to seduce her away from a man +like him--Schomberg--as though those means were bound to have been +extraordinary, unheard of, inconceivable. He slapped his forehead openly +before his customers; he would sit brooding in silence or else would +burst out unexpectedly declaiming against Heyst without measure, +discretion, or prudence, with swollen features and an affectation of +outraged virtue which could not have deceived the most childlike of +moralists for a moment--and greatly amused his audience. + +It became a recognized entertainment to go and hear his abuse of Heyst, +while sipping iced drinks on the veranda of the hotel. It was, in a +manner, a more successful draw than the Zangiacomo concerts had ever +been--intervals and all. There was never any difficulty in starting the +performer off. Anybody could do it, by almost any distant allusion. +As likely as not he would start his endless denunciations in the very +billiard-room where Mrs. Schomberg sat enthroned as usual, swallowing +her sobs, concealing her tortures of abject humiliation and terror under +her stupid, set, everlasting grin, which, having been provided for her +by nature, was an excellent mask, in as much as nothing--not even death +itself, perhaps--could tear it away. + +But nothing lasts in this world, at least without changing its +physiognomy. So, after a few weeks, Schomberg regained his outward calm, +as if his indignation had dried up within him. And it was time. He was +becoming a bore with his inability to talk of anything else but Heyst's +unfitness to be at large, Heyst's wickedness, his wiles, his astuteness, +and his criminality. Schomberg no longer pretended to despise him. He +could not have done it. After what had happened he could not pretend, +even to himself. But his bottled-up indignation was fermenting +venomously. At the time of his immoderate loquacity one of his +customers, an elderly man, had remarked one evening: + +"If that ass keeps on like this, he will end by going crazy." + +And this belief was less than half wrong. Schomberg had Heyst on the +brain. Even the unsatisfactory state of his affairs, which had +never been so unpromising since he came out East directly after the +Franco-Prussian War, he referred to some subtly noxious influence of +Heyst. It seemed to him that he could never be himself again till he had +got even with that artful Swede. He was ready to swear that Heyst had +ruined his life. The girl so unfairly, craftily, basely decoyed away +would have inspired him to success in a new start. Obviously Mrs. +Schomberg, whom he terrified by savagely silent moods combined with +underhand, poisoned glances, could give him no inspiration. He had grown +generally neglectful, but with a partiality for reckless expedients, as +if he did not care when and how his career as a hotel-keeper was to be +brought to an end. This demoralized state accounted for what Davidson +had observed on his last visit to the Schomberg establishment, some two +months after Heyst's secret departure with the girl to the solitude of +Samburan. + +The Schomberg of a few years ago--the Schomberg of the Bangkok days, +for instance, when he started the first of his famed table d'hote +dinners--would never have risked anything of the sort. His genius ran to +catering, "white man for white men" and to the inventing, elaborating, +and retailing of scandalous gossip with asinine unction and impudent +delight. But now his mind was perverted by the pangs of wounded vanity +and of thwarted passion. In this state of moral weakness Schomberg +allowed himself to be corrupted. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +The business was done by a guest who arrived one fine morning by +mail-boat--immediately from Celebes, having boarded her in Macassar, +but generally, Schomberg understood, from up China Sea way; a wanderer +clearly, even as Heyst was, but not alone and of quite another kind. + +Schomberg, looking up from the stern-sheets of his steam-launch, which +he used for boarding passenger ships on arrival, discovered a dark +sunken stare plunging down on him over the rail of the first-class part +of the deck. He was no great judge of physiognomy. Human beings, for +him, were either the objects of scandalous gossip or else recipients of +narrow strips of paper, with proper bill-heads stating the name of his +hotel--"W. Schomberg, proprietor, accounts settled weekly." + +So in the clean-shaven, extremely thin face hanging over the mail-boat's +rail Schomberg saw only the face of a possible "account." The +steam-launches of other hotels were also alongside, but he obtained the +preference. + +"You are Mr. Schomberg, aren't you?" the face asked quite unexpectedly. + +"I am at your service," he answered from below; for business is +business, and its forms and formulas must be observed, even if one's +manly bosom is tortured by that dull rage which succeeds the fury of +baffled passion, like the glow of embers after a fierce blaze. + +Presently the possessor of the handsome but emaciated face was seated +beside Schomberg in the stern-sheets of the launch. His body was long +and loose-jointed, his slender fingers, intertwined, clasped the leg +resting on the knee, as he lolled back in a careless yet tense attitude. +On the other side of Schomberg sat another passenger, who was introduced +by the clean-shaven man as-- + +"My secretary. He must have the room next to mine." + +"We can manage that easily for you." + +Schomberg steered with dignity, staring straight ahead, but very much +interested by these two promising "accounts." Their belongings, a couple +of large leather trunks browned by age and a few smaller packages, +were piled up in the bows. A third individual--a nondescript, hairy +creature--had modestly made his way forward and had perched himself on +the luggage. The lower part of his physiognomy was over-developed; +his narrow and low forehead, unintelligently furrowed by horizontal +wrinkles, surmounted wildly hirsute cheeks and a flat nose with wide, +baboon-like nostrils. There was something equivocal in the appearance of +his shaggy, hair-smothered humanity. He, too, seemed to be a follower of +the clean-shaven man, and apparently had travelled on deck with native +passengers, sleeping under the awnings. His broad, squat frame denoted +great strength. Grasping the gunwales of the launch, he displayed a +pair of remarkably long arms, terminating in thick, brown hairy paws of +simian aspect. + +"What shall we do with the fellow of mine?" the chief of the party asked +Schomberg. "There must be a boarding-house somewhere near the port--some +grog-shop where they could let him have a mat to sleep on?" + +Schomberg said there was a place kept by a Portuguese half-caste. + +"A servant of yours?" he asked. + +"Well, he hangs on to me. He is an alligator-hunter. I picked him up in +Colombia, you know. Ever been in Colombia?" + +"No," said Schomberg, very much surprised. "An alligator-hunter? Funny +trade! Are you coming from Colombia, then?" + +"Yes, but I have been coming for a long time. I come from a good many +places. I am travelling west, you see." + +"For sport, perhaps?" suggested Schomberg. + +"Yes. Sort of sport. What do you say to chasing the sun?" + +"I see--a gentleman at large," said Schomberg, watching a sailing canoe +about to cross his bow, and ready to clear it by a touch of the helm. + +The other passenger made himself heard suddenly. + +"Hang these native craft! They always get in the way." + +He was a muscular, short man with eyes that gleamed and blinked, a harsh +voice, and a round, toneless, pock-marked face ornamented by a thin, +dishevelled moustache, sticking out quaintly under the tip of a rigid +nose. Schomberg made the reflection that there was nothing secretarial +about him. Both he and his long, lank principal wore the usual white +suit of the tropics, cork helmets, pipe-clayed white shoes--all correct. +The hairy nondescript creature perched on their luggage in the bow had a +check shirt and blue dungaree trousers. He gazed in their direction from +forward in an expectant, trained-animal manner. + +"You spoke to me first," said Schomberg in his manly tones. "You were +acquainted with my name. Where did you hear of me, gentlemen, may I +ask?" + +"In Manila," answered the gentleman at large, readily. "From a man with +whom I had a game of cards one evening in the Hotel Castille." + +"What man? I've no friends in Manila that I know of," wondered Schomberg +with a severe frown. + +"I can't tell you his name. I've clean forgotten it; but don't you +worry. He was anything but a friend of yours. He called you all the +names he could think of. He said you set a lot of scandal going about +him once, somewhere--in Bangkok, I think. Yes, that's it. You were +running a table d'hote in Bangkok at one time, weren't you?" + +Schomberg, astounded by the turn of the information, could only throw +out his chest more and exaggerate his austere Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve +manner. A table d'hote? Yes, certainly. He always--for the sake of white +men. And here in this place, too? Yes, in this place, too. + +"That's all right, then." The stranger turned his black, cavernous, +mesmerizing glance away from the bearded Schomberg, who sat gripping +the brass tiller in a sweating palm. "Many people in the evening at your +place?" + +Schomberg had recovered somewhat. + +"Twenty covers or so, take one day with another," he answered feelingly, +as befitted a subject on which he was sensitive. "Ought to be more, +if only people would see that it's for their own good. Precious little +profit I get out of it. You are partial to tables d'hote, gentlemen?" + +The new guest made answer that he liked a hotel where one could find +some local people in the evening. It was infernally dull otherwise. The +secretary, in sign of approval, emitted a grunt of astonishing ferocity, +as if proposing to himself to eat the local people. All this sounded +like a longish stay, thought Schomberg, satisfied under his grave air; +till, remembering the girl snatched away from him by the last guest who +had made a prolonged stay in his hotel, he ground his teeth so audibly +that the other two looked at him in wonder. The momentary convulsion +of his florid physiognomy seemed to strike them dumb. They exchanged a +quick glance. Presently the clean-shaven man fired out another question +in his curt, unceremonious manner: + +"You have no women in your hotel, eh?" + +"Women!" Schomberg exclaimed indignantly, but also as if a little +frightened. "What on earth do you mean by women? What women? There's +Mrs. Schomberg, of course," he added, suddenly appeased, with lofty +indifference. + +"If she knows how to keep her place, then it will do. I can't stand +women near me. They give me the horrors," declared the other. "They are +a perfect curse!" + +During this outburst the secretary wore a savage grin. The chief guest +closed his sunken eyes, as if exhausted, and leaned the back of his head +against the stanchion of the awning. In this pose, his long, feminine +eyelashes were very noticeable, and his regular features, sharp line of +the jaw, and well-cut chin were brought into prominence, giving him a +used-up, weary, depraved distinction. He did not open his eyes till +the steam-launch touched the quay. Then he and the other man got ashore +quickly, entered a carriage, and drove away to the hotel, leaving +Schomberg to look after their luggage and take care of their strange +companion. The latter, looking more like a performing bear abandoned by +his show men than a human being, followed all Schomberg's movements step +by step, close behind his back, muttering to himself in a language +that sounded like some sort of uncouth Spanish. The hotel-keeper felt +uncomfortable till at last he got rid of him at an obscure den where +a very clean, portly Portuguese half-caste, standing serenely in the +doorway, seemed to understand exactly how to deal with clients of every +kind. He took from the creature the strapped bundle it had been hugging +closely through all its peregrinations in that strange town, and cut +short Schomberg's attempts at explanation by a most confident-- + +"I comprehend very well, sir." + +"It's more than I do," thought Schomberg, going away thankful at being +relieved of the alligator-hunter's company. He wondered what these +fellows were, without being able to form a guess of sufficient +probability. Their names he learned that very day by direct inquiry "to +enter in my books," he explained in his formal military manner, chest +thrown out, beard very much in evidence. + +The shaven man, sprawling in a long chair, with his air of withered +youth, raised his eyes languidly. + +"My name? Oh, plain Mr. Jones--put that down--a gentleman at large. And +this is Ricardo." The pock-marked man, lying prostrate in another long +chair, made a grimace, as if something had tickled the end of his nose, +but did not come out of his supineness. "Martin Ricardo, secretary. You +don't want any more of our history, do you? Eh, what? Occupation? Put +down, well--tourists. We've been called harder names before now; it +won't hurt our feelings. And that fellow of mine--where did you tuck him +away? Oh, he will be all right. When he wants anything he'll take it. +He's Peter. Citizen of Colombia. Peter, Pedro--I don't know that he ever +had any other name. Pedro, alligator hunter. Oh, yes--I'll pay his board +with the half-caste. Can't help myself. He's so confoundedly devoted to +me that if I were to give him the sack he would fly at my throat. Shall +I tell you how I killed his brother in the wilds of Colombia? Well, +perhaps some other time--it's a rather long story. What I shall always +regret is that I didn't kill him, too. I could have done it without any +extra trouble then; now it's too late. Great nuisance; but he's useful +sometimes. I hope you are not going to put all this in your book?" + +The offhand, hard manner and the contemptuous tone of "plain Mr. Jones" +disconcerted Schomberg utterly. He had never been spoken to like this +in his life. He shook his head in silence and withdrew, not exactly +scared--though he was in reality of a timid disposition under his manly +exterior--but distinctly mystified and impressed. + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +Three weeks later, after putting his cash-box away in the safe which +filled with its iron bulk a corner of their room, Schomberg turned +towards his wife, but without looking at her exactly, and said: + +"I must get rid of these two. It won't do!" + +Mrs. Schomberg had entertained that very opinion from the first; but she +had been broken years ago into keeping her opinions to herself. Sitting +in her night attire in the light of a single candle, she was careful not +to make a sound, knowing from experience that her very assent would be +resented. With her eyes she followed the figure of Schomberg, clad in +his sleeping suit, and moving restlessly about the room. + +He never glanced her way, for the reason that Mrs. Schomberg, in +her night attire, looked the most unattractive object in +existence--miserable, insignificant, faded, crushed, old. And the +contrast with the feminine form he had ever in his mind's eye made his +wife's appearance painful to his aesthetic sense. + +Schomberg walked about swearing and fuming for the purpose of screwing +his courage up to the sticking point. + +"Hang me if I ought not to go now, at once, this minute, into his +bedroom, and tell him to be off--him and that secretary of his--early in +the morning. I don't mind a round game of cards, but to make a decoy of +my table d'hote--my blood boils! He came here because some lying rascal +in Manila told him I kept a table d'hote." + +He said these things, not for Mrs. Schomberg's information, but simply +thinking aloud, and trying to work his fury up to a point where it would +give him courage enough to face "plain Mr. Jones." + +"Impudent overbearing, swindling sharper," he went on. "I have a good +mind to--" + +He was beside himself in his lurid, heavy, Teutonic manner, so unlike +the picturesque, lively rage of the Latin races; and though his eyes +strayed about irresolutely, yet his swollen, angry features awakened in +the miserable woman over whom he had been tyrannizing for years a fear +for his precious carcass, since the poor creature had nothing else but +that to hold on to in the world. She knew him well; but she did not know +him altogether. The last thing a woman will consent to discover in a man +whom she loves, or on whom she simply depends, is want of courage. And, +timid in her corner, she ventured to say pressingly: + +"Be careful, Wilhelm! Remember the knives and revolvers in their +trunks." + +In guise of thanks for that anxious reminder, he swore horribly in +the direction of her shrinking person. In her scanty nightdress, and +barefooted, she recalled a mediaeval penitent being reproved for her +sins in blasphemous terms. Those lethal weapons were always present to +Schomberg's mind. Personally, he had never seen them. His part, ten +days after his guests' arrival, had been to lounge in manly, careless +attitudes on the veranda--keeping watch--while Mrs. Schomberg, provided +with a bunch of assorted keys, her discoloured teeth chattering and her +globular eyes absolutely idiotic with fright, was "going through" the +luggage of these strange clients. Her terrible Wilhelm had insisted on +it. + +"I'll be on the look-out, I tell you," he said. "I shall give you a +whistle when I see them coming back. You couldn't whistle. And if he +were to catch you at it, and chuck you out by the scruff of the neck, it +wouldn't hurt you much; but he won't touch a woman. Not he! He has told +me so. Affected beast. I must find out something about their little +game, and so there's an end of it. Go in! Go now! Quick march!" + +It had been an awful job; but she did go in, because she was much more +afraid of Schomberg than of any possible consequences of the act. Her +greatest concern was lest no key of the bunch he had provided her with +should fit the locks. It would have been such a disappointment for +Wilhelm. However, the trunks, she found, had been left open; but her +investigation did not last long. She was frightened of firearms, and +generally of all weapons, not from personal cowardice, but as some women +are, almost superstitiously, from an abstract horror of violence and +murder. She was out again on the veranda long before Wilhelm had any +occasion for a warning whistle. The instinctive, motiveless fear being +the most difficult to overcome, nothing could induce her to return to +her investigations, neither threatening growls nor ferocious hisses, nor +yet a poke or two in the ribs. + +"Stupid female!" muttered the hotel-keeper, perturbed by the notion +of that armoury in one of his bedrooms. This was from no abstract +sentiment, with him it was constitutional. "Get out of my sight," he +snarled. "Go and dress yourself for the table d'hote." + +Left to himself, Schomberg had meditated. What the devil did this mean? +His thinking processes were sluggish and spasmodic; but suddenly the +truth came to him. + +"By heavens, they are desperadoes!" he thought. + +Just then he beheld "plain Mr. Jones" and his secretary with the +ambiguous name of Ricardo entering the grounds of the hotel. They had +been down to the port on some business, and now were returning; Mr. +Jones lank, spare, opening his long legs with angular regularity like +a pair of compasses, the other stepping out briskly by his side. +Conviction entered Schomberg's heart. They were two desperadoes--no +doubt about it. But as the funk which he experienced was merely +a general sensation, he managed to put on his most severe +Officer-of-the-Reserve manner, long before they had closed with him. + +"Good morning, gentlemen." + +Being answered with derisive civility, he became confirmed in his sudden +conviction of their desperate character. The way Mr. Jones turned his +hollow eyes on one, like an incurious spectre, and the way the other, +when addressed, suddenly retracted his lips and exhibited his teeth +without looking round--here was evidence enough to settle that point. +Desperadoes! They passed through the billiard-room, inscrutably +mysterious, to the back of the house, to join their violated trunks. + +"Tiffin bell will ring in five minutes, gentlemen." Schomberg called +after them, exaggerating the deep manliness of his tone. + +He had managed to upset himself very much. He expected to see them come +back infuriated and begin to bully him with an odious lack of restraint. +Desperadoes! However they didn't; they had not noticed anything unusual +about their trunks and Schomberg recovered his composure and said +to himself that he must get rid of this deadly incubus as soon as +practicable. They couldn't possibly want to stay very long; this was not +the town--the colony--for desperate characters. He shrank from action. +He dreaded any kind of disturbance--"fracas" he called it--in his hotel. +Such things were not good for business. Of course, sometimes one had to +have a "fracas;" but it had been a comparatively trifling task to seize +the frail Zangiacomo--whose bones were no larger than a chicken's--round +the ribs, lift him up bodily, dash him to the ground, and fall on +him. It had been easy. The wretched, hook-nosed creature lay without +movement, buried under its purple beard. + +Suddenly, remembering the occasion of that "fracas," Schomberg groaned +with the pain as of a hot coal under his breastbone, and gave himself up +to desolation. Ah, if he only had that girl with him he would have been +masterful and resolute and fearless--fight twenty desperadoes--care +for nobody on earth! Whereas the possession of Mrs. Schomberg was no +incitement to a display of manly virtues. Instead of caring for no one, +he felt that he cared for nothing. Life was a hollow sham; he wasn't +going to risk a shot through his lungs or his liver in order to preserve +its integrity. It had no savour--damn it! + +In his state of moral decomposition, Schomberg, master as he was of the +art of hotel-keeping, and careful of giving no occasion for criticism +to the powers regulating that branch of human activity, let things take +their course; though he saw very well where that course was tending. +It began first with a game or two after dinner--for the drinks, +apparently--with some lingering customer, at one of the little tables +ranged against the walls of the billiard-room. Schomberg detected the +meaning of it at once. "That's what it was! This was what they were!" +And, moving about restlessly (at that time his morose silent period had +set in), he cast sidelong looks at the game; but he said nothing. It was +not worth while having a row with men who were so overbearing. Even when +money appeared in connection with these postprandial games, into which +more and more people were being drawn, he still refrained from raising +the question; he was reluctant to draw unduly the attention of "plain +Mr. Jones" and of the equivocal Ricardo, to his person. One evening, +however, after the public rooms of the hotel had become empty, Schomberg +made an attempt to grapple with the problem in an indirect way. + +In a distant corner the tired China boy dozed on his heels, his back +against the wall. Mrs. Schomberg had disappeared, as usual, between ten +and eleven. Schomberg walked about slowly in and out of the room and +the veranda, thoughtful, waiting for his two guests to go to bed. Then +suddenly he approached them, militarily, his chest thrown out, his voice +curt and soldierly. + +"Hot night, gentlemen." + +Mr Jones, lolling back idly in a chair, looked up. Ricardo, as idle, but +more upright, made no sign. + +"Won't you have a drink with me before retiring?" went on Schomberg, +sitting down by the little table. + +"By all means," said Mr. Jones lazily. + +Ricardo showed his teeth in a strange, quick grin. Schomberg felt +painfully how difficult it was to get in touch with these men, both +so quiet, so deliberate, so menacingly unceremonious. He ordered the +Chinaman to bring in the drinks. His purpose was to discover how long +these guests intended to stay. Ricardo displayed no conversational vein, +but Mr. Jones appeared communicative enough. His voice somehow matched +his sunken eyes. It was hollow without being in the least mournful; +it sounded distant, uninterested, as though he were speaking from the +bottom of a well. Schomberg learned that he would have the privilege of +lodging and boarding these gentlemen for at least a month more. He could +not conceal his discomfiture at this piece of news. + +"What's the matter? Don't you like to have people in your house?" asked +plain Mr. Jones languidly. "I should have thought the owner of a hotel +would be pleased." + +He lifted his delicate and beautifully pencilled eyebrows. Schomberg +muttered something about the locality being dull and uninteresting to +travellers--nothing going on--too quiet altogether, but he only provoked +the declaration that quiet had its charm sometimes, and even dullness +was welcome as a change. + +"We haven't had time to be dull for the last three years," added plain +Mr. Jones, his eyes fixed darkly on Schomberg whom he further more +invited to have another drink, this time with him, and not to worry +himself about things he did not understand; and especially not to be +inhospitable--which in a hotel-keeper is highly unprofessional. + +"I don't understand," grumbled Schomberg. "Oh, yes, I understand +perfectly well. I--" + +"You are frightened," interrupted Mr. Jones. "What is the matter?" + +"I don't want any scandal in my place. That's what's the matter." + +Schomberg tried to face the situation bravely, but that steady, black +stare affected him. And when he glanced aside uncomfortably, he met +Ricardo's grin uncovering a lot of teeth, though the man seemed absorbed +in his thoughts all the time. + +"And, moreover," went on Mr. Jones in that distant tone of his, "you +can't help yourself. Here we are and here we stay. Would you try to +put us out? I dare say you could do it; but you couldn't do it without +getting hurt--very badly hurt. We can promise him that, can't we, +Martin?" + +The secretary retracted his lips and looked up sharply at Schomberg, as +if only too anxious to leap upon him with teeth and claws. + +Schomberg managed to produce a deep laugh. + +"Ha! Ha! Ha!" + +Mr Jones closed his eyes wearily, as if the light hurt them, and looked +remarkably like a corpse for a moment. This was bad enough; but when he +opened them again, it was almost a worse trial for Schomberg's nerves. +The spectral intensity of that glance, fixed on the hotel-keeper (and +this was most frightful) without any definite expression, seemed to +dissolve the last grain of resolution in his character. + +"You don't think, by any chance, that you have to do with ordinary +people, do you?" inquired Mr. Jones, in his lifeless manner, which +seemed to imply some sort of menace from beyond the grave. + +"He's a gentleman," testified Martin Ricardo with a sudden snap of the +lips, after which his moustaches stirred by themselves in an odd, feline +manner. + +"Oh, I wasn't thinking of that," said plain Mr. Jones, while Schomberg, +dumb and planted heavily in his chair looked from one to the other, +leaning forward a little. "Of course I am that; but Ricardo attaches +too much importance to a social advantage. What I mean, for instance, is +that he, quiet and inoffensive as you see him sitting here, would think +nothing of setting fire to this house of entertainment of yours. It +would blaze like a box of matches. Think of that! It wouldn't advance +your affairs much, would it?--whatever happened to us." + +"Come, come gentlemen," remonstrated Schomberg, in a murmur. "This is +very wild talk!" + +"And you have been used to deal with tame people, haven't you? But we +aren't tame. We once kept a whole angry town at bay for two days, and +then we got away with our plunder. It was in Venezuela. Ask Martin +here--he can tell you." + +Instinctively Schomberg looked at Ricardo, who only passed the tip of +his tongue over his lips with an uncanny sort of gusto, but did not +offer to begin. + +"Well, perhaps it would be a rather long story," Mr. Jones conceded +after a short silence. + +"I have no desire to hear it, I am sure," said Schomberg. "This isn't +Venezuela. You wouldn't get away from here like that. But all this is +silly talk of the worst sort. Do you mean to say you would make deadly +trouble for the sake of a few guilders that you and that other"--eyeing +Ricardo suspiciously, as one would look at a strange animal--"gentleman +can win of an evening? Isn't as if my customers were a lot of rich men +with pockets full of cash. I wonder you take so much trouble and risk +for so little money." + +Schomberg's argument was met by Mr. Jones's statement that one must do +something to kill time. Killing time was not forbidden. For the rest, +being in a communicative mood, Mr. Jones said languidly and in a voice +indifferent, as if issuing from a tomb, that he depended on himself, as +if the world were still one great, wild jungle without law. Martin was +something like that, too--for reasons of his own. + +All these statements Ricardo confirmed by short, inhuman grins. +Schomberg lowered his eyes, for the sight of these two men intimidated +him; but he was losing patience. + +"Of course, I could see at once that you were two desperate +characters--something like what you say. But what would you think if +I told you that I am pretty near as desperate as you two gentlemen? +'Here's that Schomberg has an easy time running his hotel,' people +think; and yet it seems to me I would just as soon let you rip me open +and burn the whole show as not. There!" + +A low whistle was heard. It came from Ricardo, and was derisive. +Schomberg, breathing heavily, looked on the floor. He was really +desperate. Mr. Jones remained languidly sceptical. + +"Tut, tut! You have a tolerable business. You are perfectly tame; you--" +He paused, then added in a tone of disgust: "You have a wife." + +Schomberg tapped the floor angrily with his foot and uttered an +indistinct, laughing curse. + +"What do you mean by flinging that damned trouble at my head?" he cried. +"I wish you would carry her off with you some where to the devil! I +wouldn't run after you." + +The unexpected outburst affected Mr. Jones strangely. He had a horrified +recoil, chair and all, as if Schomberg had thrust a wriggling viper in +his face. + +"What's this infernal nonsense?" he muttered thickly. "What do you mean? +How dare you?" + +Ricardo chuckled audibly. + +"I tell you I am desperate," Schomberg repeated. "I am as desperate as +any man ever was. I don't care a hang what happens to me!" + +"Well, then"--Mr. Jones began to speak with a quietly threatening +effect, as if the common words of daily use had some other deadly +meaning to his mind--"well, then, why should you make yourself +ridiculously disagreeable to us? If you don't care, as you say, you +might just as well let us have the key of that music-shed of yours for +a quiet game; a modest bank--a dozen candles or so. It would be greatly +appreciated by your clients, as far as I can judge from the way they +betted on a game of ecarte I had with that fair, baby-faced man--what's +his name? They just yearn for a modest bank. And I am afraid Martin here +would take it badly if you objected; but of course you won't. Think of +the calls for drinks!" + +Schomberg, raising his eyes, at last met the gleams in two dark caverns +under Mr. Jones's devilish eyebrows, directed upon him impenetrably. He +shuddered as if horrors worse than murder had been lurking there, and +said, nodding towards Ricardo: + +"I dare say he wouldn't think twice about sticking me, if he had you at +his back! I wish I had sunk my launch, and gone to the bottom myself +in her, before I boarded the steamer you came by. Ah, well, I've been +already living in hell for weeks, so you don't make much difference. +I'll let you have the concert-room--and hang the consequences. But +what about the boy on late duty? If he sees the cards and actual money +passing, he will be sure to blab, and it will be all over the town in no +time." + +A ghastly smile stirred the lips of Mr. Jones. + +"Ah, I see you want to make a success of it. Very good. That's the way +to get on. Don't let it disturb you. You chase all the Chinamen to bed +early, and we'll get Pedro here every evening. He isn't the conventional +waiter's cut, but he will do to run to and fro with the tray, while +you sit here from nine to eleven serving out drinks and gathering the +money." + +"There will be three of them now," thought the unlucky Schomberg. + +But Pedro, at any rate, was just a simple, straightforward brute, if +a murderous one. There was no mystery about him, nothing uncanny, no +suggestion of a stealthy, deliberate wildcat turned into a man, or of an +insolent spectre on leave from Hades, endowed with skin and bones and +a subtle power of terror. Pedro with his fangs, his tangled beard, and +queer stare of his little bear's eyes was, by comparison, delightfully +natural. Besides, Schomberg could no longer help himself. + +"That will do very well," he asserted mournfully. "But if you gentlemen, +if you had turned up here only three months ago--ay, less than three +months ago--you would have found somebody very different from what I am +now to talk to you. It's true. What do you think of that?" + +"I scarcely know what to think. I should think it was a lie. You were +probably as tame three months ago as you are now. You were born tame, +like most people in the world." + +Mr Jones got up spectrally, and Ricardo imitated him with a snarl and a +stretch. Schomberg, in a brown study, went on, as if to himself: + +"There has been an orchestra here--eighteen women." + +Mr Jones let out an exclamation of dismay, and looked about as if the +walls around him and the whole house had been infected with plague. Then +he became very angry, and swore violently at Schomberg for daring to +bring up such subjects. The hotel-keeper was too much surprised to get +up. He gazed from his chair at Mr. Jones's anger, which had nothing +spectral in it but was not the more comprehensible for that. + +"What's the matter?" he stammered out. "What subject? Didn't you hear me +say it was an orchestra? There's nothing wrong in that. Well, there was +a girl amongst them--" Schomberg's eyes went stony; he clasped his hands +in front of his breast with such force that his knuckles came out white. +"Such a girl! Tame, am I? I would have kicked everything to pieces about +me for her. And she, of course . . . I am in the prime of life . . . +then a fellow bewitched her--a vagabond, a false, lying, swindling, +underhand, stick-at-nothing brute. Ah!" + +His entwined fingers cracked as he tore his hands apart, flung out his +arms, and leaned his forehead on them in a passion of fury. The other +two looked at his shaking back--the attenuated Mr. Jones with mingled +scorn and a sort of fear, Ricardo with the expression of a cat which +sees a piece of fish in the pantry out of reach. Schomberg flung himself +backwards. He was dry-eyed, but he gulped as if swallowing sobs. + +"No wonder you can do with me what you like. You have no idea--just let +me tell you of my trouble--" + +"I don't want to know anything of your beastly trouble," said Mr. Jones, +in his most lifelessly positive voice. + +He stretched forth an arresting hand, and, as Schomberg remained +open-mouthed, he walked out of the billiard-room in all the uncanniness +of his thin shanks. Ricardo followed at his leader's heels; but he +showed his teeth to Schomberg over his shoulder. + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +From that evening dated those mysterious but significant phenomena in +Schomberg's establishment which attracted Captain Davidson's casual +notice when he dropped in, placid yet astute, in order to return +Mrs. Schomberg's Indian shawl. And strangely enough, they lasted +some considerable time. It argued either honesty and bad luck or +extraordinary restraint on the part of "plain Mr. Jones and Co." in +their discreet operations with cards. + +It was a curious and impressive sight, the inside of Schomberg's +concert-hall, encumbered at one end by a great stack of chairs piled up +on and about the musicians' platform, and lighted at the other by two +dozen candles disposed about a long trestle table covered with green +cloth. In the middle, Mr. Jones, a starved spectre turned into a banker, +faced Ricardo, a rather nasty, slow-moving cat turned into a croupier. +By contrast, the other faces round that table, anything between twenty +and thirty, must have looked like collected samples of intensely +artless, helpless humanity--pathetic in their innocent watch for the +small turns of luck which indeed might have been serious enough for +them. They had no notice to spare for the hairy Pedro, carrying a tray +with the clumsiness of a creature caught in the woods and taught to walk +on its hind legs. + +As to Schomberg, he kept out of the way. He remained in the +billiard-room, serving out drinks to the unspeakable Pedro with an air +of not seeing the growling monster, of not knowing where the drinks +went, of ignoring that there was such a thing as a music-room over there +under the trees within fifty yards of the hotel. He submitted himself +to the situation with a low-spirited stoicism compounded of fear and +resignation. Directly the party had broken up, (he could see dark +shapes of the men drifting singly and in knots through the gate of +the compound), he would withdraw out of sight behind a door not quite +closed, in order to avoid meeting his two extraordinary guests; but he +would watch through the crack their contrasted forms pass through the +billiard-room and disappear on their way to bed. Then he would hear +doors being slammed upstairs; and a profound silence would fall upon the +whole house, upon his hotel appropriated, haunted by those insolently +outspoken men provided with a whole armoury of weapons in their trunks. +A profound silence. Schomberg sometimes could not resist the notion that +he must be dreaming. Shuddering, he would pull himself together, +and creep out, with movements strangely inappropriate to the +Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve bearing by which he tried to keep up his +self-respect before the world. + +A great loneliness oppressed him. One after another he would extinguish +the lamps, and move softly towards his bedroom, where Mrs. Schomberg +waited for him--no fit companion for a man of his ability and "in the +prime of life." But that life, alas, was blighted. He felt it; and never +with such force as when on opening the door he perceived that woman +sitting patiently in a chair, her toes peeping out under the edge of her +night-dress, an amazingly small amount of hair on her head drooping +on the long stalk of scraggy neck, with that everlasting scared grin +showing a blue tooth and meaning nothing--not even real fear. For she +was used to him. + +Sometimes he was tempted to screw the head off the stalk. He imagined +himself doing it--with one hand, a twisting movement. Not seriously, of +course. Just a simple indulgence for his exasperated feelings. He wasn't +capable of murder. He was certain of that. And, remembering suddenly the +plain speeches of Mr. Jones, he would think: "I suppose I am too tame +for that"--quite unaware that he had murdered the poor woman morally +years ago. He was too unintelligent to have the notion of such a crime. +Her bodily presence was bitterly offensive, because of its contrast with +a very different feminine image. And it was no use getting rid of her. +She was a habit of years, and there would be nothing to put in her +place. At any rate, he could talk to that idiot half the night if he +chose. + +That night he had been vapouring before her as to his intention to face +his two guests and, instead of that inspiration he needed, had merely +received the usual warning: "Be careful, Wilhelm." He did not want to be +told to be careful by an imbecile female. What he needed was a pair of +woman's arms which, flung round his neck, would brace him up for the +encounter. Inspire him, he called it to himself. + +He lay awake a long time; and his slumbers, when they came, were +unsatisfactory and short. The morning light had no joy for his eyes. +He listened dismally to the movements in the house. The Chinamen were +unlocking and flinging wide the doors of the public rooms which opened +on the veranda. Horrors! Another poisoned day to get through somehow! +The recollection of his resolve made him feel actually sick for a +moment. First of all the lordly, abandoned attitudes of Mr. Jones +disconcerted him. Then there was his contemptuous silence. Mr. Jones +never addressed himself to Schomberg with any general remarks, never +opened his lips to him unless to say "Good morning"--two simple words +which, uttered by that man, seemed a mockery of a threatening character. +And, lastly, it was not a frank physical fear he inspired--for as to +that, even a cornered rat will fight--but a superstitious shrinking awe, +something like an invincible repugnance to seek speech with a wicked +ghost. That it was a daylight ghost surprisingly angular in his +attitudes, and for the most part spread out on three chairs, did +not make it any easier. Daylight only made him a more weird, a more +disturbing and unlawful apparition. Strangely enough in the evening when +he came out of his mute supineness, this unearthly side of him was less +obtrusive. At the gaming-table, when actually handling the cards, it was +probably sunk quite out of sight; but Schomberg, having made up his mind +in ostrich-like fashion to ignore what was going on, never entered the +desecrated music-room. He had never seen Mr. Jones in the exercise of +his vocation--or perhaps it was only his trade. + +"I will speak to him tonight," Schomberg said to himself, while he drank +his morning tea, in pyjamas, on the veranda, before the rising sun had +topped the trees of the compound, and while the undried dew still +lay silvery on the grass, sparkled on the blossoms of the central +flower-bed, and darkened the yellow gravel of the drive. "That's what +I'll do. I won't keep out of sight tonight. I shall come out and catch +him as he goes to bed carrying the cash-box." + +After all, what was the fellow but a common desperado? Murderous? Oh, +yes; murderous enough, perhaps--and the muscles of Schomberg's stomach +had a quivering contraction under his airy attire. But even a common +desperado would think twice or, more likely, a hundred times, before +openly murdering an inoffensive citizen in a civilized, European-ruled +town. He jerked his shoulders. Of course! He shuddered again, and +paddled back to his room to dress himself. His mind was made up, and he +would think no more about it; but still he had his doubts. They grew and +unfolded themselves with the progress of the day, as some plants do. At +times they made him perspire more than usual, and they did away with +the possibility of his afternoon siesta. After turning over on his couch +more than a dozen times, he gave up this mockery of repose, got up, and +went downstairs. + +It was between three and four o'clock, the hour of profound peace. The +very flowers seemed to doze on their stalks set with sleepy leaves. Not +even the air stirred, for the sea-breeze was not due till later. The +servants were out of sight, catching naps in the shade somewhere behind +the house. Mrs. Schomberg in a dim up-stair room with closed jalousies, +was elaborating those two long pendant ringlets which were such a +feature of her hairdressing for her afternoon duties. At that time no +customers ever troubled the repose of the establishment. Wandering about +his premises in profound solitude, Schomberg recoiled at the door of the +billiard-room, as if he had seen a snake in his path. All alone with the +billiards, the bare little tables, and a lot of untenanted chairs, Mr. +Secretary Ricardo sat near the wall, performing with lightning rapidity +something that looked like tricks with his own personal pack of cards, +which he always carried about in his pocket. Schomberg would have backed +out quietly if Ricardo had not turned his head. Having been seen, the +hotel-keeper elected to walk in as the lesser risk of the two. The +consciousness of his inwardly abject attitude towards these men caused +him always to throw his chest out and assume a severe expression. +Ricardo watched his approach, clasping the pack of cards in both hands. + +"You want something, perhaps?" suggested Schomberg in his +lieutenant-of-the-Reserve voice. + +Ricardo shook his head in silence and looked expectant. With him +Schomberg exchanged at least twenty words every day. He was infinitely +more communicative than his patron. At times he looked very much like +an ordinary human being of his class; and he seemed to be in an amiable +mood at that moment. Suddenly spreading some ten cards face downward in +the form of a fan, he thrust them towards Schomberg. + +"Come, man, take one quick!" + +Schomberg was so surprised that he took one hurriedly, after a very +perceptible start. The eyes of Martin Ricardo gleamed phosphorescent +in the half-light of the room screened from the heat and glare of the +tropics. + +"That's the king of hearts you've got," he chuckled, showing his teeth +in a quick flash. + +Schomberg, after looking at the card, admitted that it was, and laid it +down on the table. + +"I can make you take any card I like nine times out of ten," exulted the +secretary, with a strange curl of his lips and a green flicker in his +raised eyes. + +Schomberg looked down at him dumbly. For a few seconds neither of them +stirred; then Ricardo lowered his glance, and, opening his fingers, +let the whole pack fall on the table. Schomberg sat down. He sat down +because of the faintness in his legs, and for no other reason. His mouth +was dry. Having sat down, he felt that he must speak. He squared his +shoulders in parade style. + +"You are pretty good at that sort of thing," he said. + +"Practice makes perfect," replied the secretary. + +His precarious amiability made it impossible for Schomberg to get away. +Thus, from his very timidity, the hotel-keeper found himself engaged +in a conversation the thought of which filled him with apprehension. It +must be said, in justice to Schomberg, that he concealed his funk very +creditably. The habit of throwing out his chest and speaking in a severe +voice stood him in good stead. With him, too, practice made perfect; and +he would probably have kept it up to the end, to the very last moment, +to the ultimate instant of breaking strain which would leave him +grovelling on the floor. To add to his secret trouble, he was at a loss +what to say. He found nothing else but the remark: + +"I suppose you are fond of cards." + +"What would you expect?" asked Ricardo in a simple, philosophical tone. +"It is likely I should not be?" Then, with sudden fire: "Fond of cards? +Ay, passionately!" + +The effect of this outburst was augmented by the quiet lowering of the +eyelids, by a reserved pause as though this had been a confession of +another kind of love. Schomberg cudgelled his brains for a new topic, +but he could not find one. His usual scandalous gossip would not serve +this turn. That desperado did not know anyone anywhere within a thousand +miles. Schomberg was almost compelled to keep to the subject. + +"I suppose you've always been so--from your early youth." + +Ricardo's eyes remained cast down. His fingers toyed absently with the +pack on the table. + +"I don't know that it was so early. I first got in the way of it playing +for tobacco--in forecastles of ships, you know--common sailor games. We +used to spend whole watches below at it, round a chest, under a +slush lamp. We would hardly spare the time to get a bite of salt +horse--neither eat nor sleep. We could hardly stand when the watches +were mustered on deck. Talk of gambling!" He dropped the reminiscent +tone to add the information, "I was bred to the sea from a boy, you +know." + +Schomberg had fallen into a reverie, but without losing the sense of +impending calamity. The next words he heard were: + +"I got on all right at sea, too. Worked up to be mate. I was mate of a +schooner--a yacht, you might call her--a special good berth too, in the +Gulf of Mexico, a soft job that you don't run across more than once in a +lifetime. Yes, I was mate of her when I left the sea to follow him." + +Ricardo tossed up his chin to indicate the room above; from which +Schomberg, his wits painfully aroused by this reminder of Mr. Jones's +existence, concluded that the latter had withdrawn into his bedroom. +Ricardo, observing him from under lowered eyelids, went on: + +"It so happened that we were shipmates." + +"Mr Jones, you mean? Is he a sailor too?" + +Ricardo raised his eyelids at that. + +"He's no more Mr. Jones than you are," he said with obvious pride. "He a +sailor! That just shows your ignorance. But there! A foreigner can't be +expected to know any better. I am an Englishman, and I know a gentleman +at sight. I should know one drunk, in the gutter, in jail, under the +gallows. There's a something--it isn't exactly the appearance, it's +a--no use me trying to tell you. You ain't an Englishman, and if you +were, you wouldn't need to be told." + +An unsuspected stream of loquacity had broken its dam somewhere deep +within the man, had diluted his fiery blood and softened his pitiless +fibre. Schomberg experienced mingled relief and apprehension, as if +suddenly an enormous savage cat had begun to wind itself about his legs +in inexplicable friendliness. No prudent man under such circumstances +would dare to stir. Schomberg didn't stir. Ricardo assumed an easy +attitude, with an elbow on the table. Schomberg squared his shoulders +afresh. + +"I was employed, in that there yacht--schooner, whatever you call it--by +ten gentlemen at once. That surprises you, eh? Yes, yes, ten. Leastwise +there were nine of them gents good enough in their way, and one +downright gentleman, and that was . . ." + +Ricardo gave another upward jerk of his chin as much as to say: He! The +only one. + +"And no mistake," he went on. "I spotted him from the first day. How? +Why? Ay, you may ask. Hadn't seen that many gentlemen in my life. Well, +somehow I did. If you were an Englishman, you would--" + +"What was your yacht?" Schomberg interrupted as impatiently as he dared; +for this harping on nationality jarred on his already tried nerves. +"What was the game?" + +"You have a headpiece on you! Game! 'Xactly. That's what it was--the +sort of silliness gentlemen will get up among themselves to play at +adventure. A treasure-hunting expedition. Each of them put down so much +money, you understand, to buy the schooner. Their agent in the city +engaged me and the skipper. The greatest secrecy and all that. I reckon +he had a twinkle in his eye all the time--and no mistake. But that +wasn't our business. Let them bust their money as they like. The pity of +it was that so little of it came our way. Just fair pay and no more. And +damn any pay, much or little, anyhow--that's what I say!" + +He blinked his eyes greenishly in the dim light. The heat seemed to +have stilled everything in the world but his voice. He swore at large, +abundantly, in snarling undertones, it was impossible to say why, then +calmed down as inexplicably, and went on, as a sailor yarns. + +"At first there were only nine of them adventurous sparks, then, just a +day or two before the sailing date, he turned up. Heard of it somehow, +somewhere--I would say from some woman, if I didn't know him as I do. He +would give any woman a ten-mile berth. He can't stand them. Or maybe in +a flash bar. Or maybe in one of them grand clubs in Pall Mall. Anyway, +the agent netted him in all right--cash down, and only about four and +twenty hours for him to get ready; but he didn't miss his ship. Not he! +You might have called it a pier-head jump--for a gentleman. I saw him +come along. Know the West India Docks, eh?" + +Schomberg did not know the West India Docks. Ricardo looked at him +pensively for a while, and then continued, as if such ignorance had to +be disregarded. + +"Our tug was already alongside. Two loafers were carrying his dunnage +behind him. I told the dockman at our moorings to keep all fast for a +minute. The gangway was down already; but he made nothing of it. Up he +jumps, one leap, swings his long legs over the rail, and there he is +on board. They pass up his swell dunnage, and he puts his hand in his +trousers pocket and throws all his small change on the wharf for them +chaps to pick up. They were still promenading that wharf on all fours +when we cast off. It was only then that he looked at me--quietly, you +know; in a slow way. He wasn't so thin then as he is now; but I noticed +he wasn't so young as he looked--not by a long chalk. He seemed to touch +me inside somewhere. I went away pretty quick from there; I was wanted +forward anyhow. I wasn't frightened. What should I be frightened for? I +only felt touched--on the very spot. But Jee-miny, if anybody had told +me we should be partners before the year was out--well, I would have--" + +He swore a variety of strange oaths, some common, others quaintly +horrible to Schomberg's ears, and all mere innocent exclamations of +wonder at the shifts and changes of human fortune. Schomberg moved +slightly in his chair. But the admirer and partner of "plain Mr. Jones" +seemed to have forgotten Schomberg's existence for the moment. The +stream of ingenuous blasphemy--some of it in bad Spanish--had run dry, +and Martin Ricardo, connoisseur in gentlemen, sat dumb with a stony gaze +as if still marvelling inwardly at the amazing elections, conjunctions, +and associations of events which influence man's pilgrimage on this +earth. + +At last Schomberg spoke tentatively: + +"And so the--the gentleman, up there, talked you over into leaving a +good berth?" + +Ricardo started. + +"Talked me over! Didn't need to talk me over. Just beckoned to me, and +that was enough. By that time we were in the Gulf of Mexico. One night +we were lying at anchor, close to a dry sandbank--to this day I am not +sure where it was--off the Colombian coast or thereabouts. We were +to start digging the next morning, and all hands had turned in early, +expecting a hard day with the shovels. Up he comes, and in his quiet, +tired way of speaking--you can tell a gentleman by that as much as by +anything else almost--up he comes behind me and says, just like that +into my ear, in a manner: 'Well, what do you think of our treasure hunt +now?' + +"I didn't even turn my head; 'xactly as I stood, I remained, and I spoke +no louder than himself: + +"'If you want to know, sir, it's nothing but just damned tom-foolery.' + +"We had, of course, been having short talks together at one time or +another during the passage. I dare say he had read me like a book. There +ain't much to me, except that I have never been tame, even when walking +the pavement and cracking jokes and standing drinks to chums--ay, and to +strangers, too. I would watch them lifting their elbows at my expense, +or splitting their side at my fun--I can be funny when I like, you bet!" + +A pause for self-complacent contemplation of his own fun and generosity +checked the flow of Ricardo's speech. Schomberg was concerned to keep +within bounds the enlargement of his eyes, which he seemed to feel +growing bigger in his head. + +"Yes, yes," he whispered hastily. + +"I would watch them and think: 'You boys don't know who I am. If you +did--!' With girls, too. Once I was courting a girl. I used to kiss her +behind the ear and say to myself: 'If you only knew who's kissing you, +my dear, you would scream and bolt!' Ha! ha! Not that I wanted to +do them any harm; but I felt the power in myself. Now, here we sit, +friendly like, and that's all right. You aren't in my way. But I am not +friendly to you. I just don't care. Some men do say that; but I really +don't. You are no more to me one way or another than that fly there. +Just so. I'd squash you or leave you alone. I don't care what I do." + +If real force of character consists in overcoming our sudden weaknesses, +Schomberg displayed plenty of that quality. At the mention of the fly, +he re-enforced the severe dignity of his attitude as one inflates a +collapsing toy balloon with a great effort of breath. The easy-going, +relaxed attitude of Ricardo was really appalling. + +"That's so," he went on. "I am that sort of fellow. You wouldn't think +it, would you? No. You have to be told. So I am telling you, and I dare +say you only half believe it. But you can't say to yourself that I am +drunk, stare at me as you may. I haven't had anything stronger than a +glass of iced water all day. Takes a real gentleman to see through a +fellow. Oh, yes--he spotted me. I told you we had a few talks at sea +about one thing or another. And I used to watch him down the skylight, +playing cards in the cuddy with the others. They had to pass the time +away somehow. By the same token he caught me at it once, and it was then +that I told him I was fond of cards--and generally lucky in gambling, +too. Yes, he had sized me up. Why not? A gentleman's just like any other +man--and something more." + +It flashed through Schomberg's mind: that these two were indeed well +matched in their enormous dissimilarity, identical souls in different +disguises. + +"Says he to me"--Ricardo started again in a gossiping manner--'I'm +packed up. It's about time to go, Martin.' + +"It was the first time he called me Martin. Says I: + +"'Is that it, sir?' + +"'You didn't think I was after that sort of treasure, did you? I wanted +to clear out from home quietly. It's a pretty expensive way of getting a +passage across, but it has served my turn.' + +"I let him know very soon that I was game for anything, from pitch and +toss to wilful murder, in his company. + +"'Wilful murder?' says he in his quiet way. 'What the deuce is that? +What are you talking about? People do get killed sometimes when they get +in one's way, but that's self-defence--you understand?' + +"I told him I did. And then I said I would run below for a minute, to +ram a few of my things into a sailor's bag I had. I've never cared for +a lot of dunnage; I believed in going about flying light when I was at +sea. I came back and found him strolling up and down the deck, as if +he were taking a breath of fresh air before turning in, like any other +evening. + +"'Ready?' + +"'Yes, sir.' + +"He didn't even look at me. We had had a boat in the water astern ever +since we came to anchor in the afternoon. He throws the stump of his +cigar overboard. + +"'Can you get the captain out on deck?' he asks. + +"That was the last thing in the world I should have thought of doing. I +lost my tongue for a moment. + +"'I can try,' says I. + +"'Well, then, I am going below. You get him up and keep him with you +till I come back on deck. Mind! Don't let him go below till I return.' + +"I could not help asking why he told me to rouse a sleeping man, when +we wanted everybody on board to sleep sweetly till we got clear of the +schooner. He laughs a little and says that I didn't see all the bearings +of this business. + +"'Mind,' he says, 'don't let him leave you till you see me come up +again.' He puts his eyes close to mine. 'Keep him with you at all +costs.' + +"'And that means?' says I. + +"'All costs to him--by every possible or impossible means. I don't want +to be interrupted in my business down below. He would give me lots +of trouble. I take you with me to save myself trouble in various +circumstances; and you've got to enter on your work right away.' + +"'Just so, sir,' says I; and he slips down the companion. + +"With a gentleman you know at once where you are; but it was a ticklish +job. The skipper was nothing to me one way or another, any more than you +are at this moment, Mr. Schomberg. You may light your cigar or blow your +brains out this minute, and I don't care a hang which you do, both or +neither. To bring the skipper up was easy enough. I had only to stamp on +the deck a few times over his head. I stamped hard. But how to keep him +up when he got there? + +"'Anything the matter; Mr. Ricardo?' I heard his voice behind me. + +"There he was, and I hadn't thought of anything to say to him; so I +didn't turn round. The moonlight was brighter than many a day I could +remember in the North Sea. + +"'Why did you call me? What are you staring at out there, Mr. Ricardo?' + +"He was deceived by my keeping my back to him. I wasn't staring at +anything, but his mistake gave me a notion. + +"'I am staring at something that looks like a canoe over there,' I said +very slowly. + +"The skipper got concerned at once. It wasn't any danger from the +inhabitants, whoever they were. + +"'Oh, hang it!' says he. 'That's very unfortunate.' He had hoped that +the schooner being on the coast would not get known so very soon. +'Dashed awkward, with the business we've got in hand, to have a lot of +niggers watching operations. But are you certain this is a canoe?' + +"'It may be a drift-log,' I said; 'but I thought you had better have a +look with your own eyes. You may make it out better than I can.' + +"His eyes weren't anything as good as mine. But he says: + +"'Certainly. Certainly. You did quite right.' + +"And it's a fact I had seen some drift-logs at sunset. I saw what they +were then and didn't trouble my head about them, forgot all about it +till that very moment. Nothing strange in seeing drift-logs off a coast +like that; and I'm hanged if the skipper didn't make one out in the +wake of the moon. Strange what a little thing a man's life hangs on +sometimes--a single word! Here you are, sitting unsuspicious before me, +and you may let out something unbeknown to you that would settle your +hash. Not that I have any ill-feeling. I have no feelings. If the +skipper had said, 'O, bosh!' and had turned his back on me, he would not +have gone three steps towards his bed; but he stood there and stared. +And now the job was to get him off the deck when he was no longer wanted +there. + +"'We are just trying to make out if that object there is a canoe or a +log,' says he to Mr. Jones. + +"Mr Jones had come up, lounging as carelessly as when he went below. +While the skipper was jawing about boats and drifting logs. I asked by +signs, from behind, if I hadn't better knock him on the head and drop +him quietly overboard. The night was slipping by, and we had to go. It +couldn't be put off till next night no more. No. No more. And do you +know why?" + +Schomberg made a slight negative sign with his head. This direct appeal +annoyed him, jarred on the induced quietude of a great talker forced +into the part of a listener and sunk in it as a man sinks into slumber. +Mr. Ricardo struck a note of scorn. + +"Don't know why? Can't you guess? No? Because the boss had got hold of +the skipper's cash-box by then. See?" + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + + "A common thief!" + +Schomberg bit his tongue just too late, and woke up completely as he saw +Ricardo retract his lips in a cat-like grin; but the companion of "plain +Mr. Jones" didn't alter his comfortable, gossiping attitude. + +"Garn! What if he did want to see his money back, like any tame +shopkeeper, hash-seller, gin-slinger, or ink-spewer does? Fancy a mud +turtle like you trying to pass an opinion on a gentleman! A gentleman +isn't to be sized up so easily. Even I ain't up to it sometimes. For +instance, that night, all he did was to waggle his finger at me. The +skipper stops his silly chatter, surprised. + +"'Eh? What's the matter?' asks he. + +"The matter! It was his reprieve--that's what was the matter. + +"'O, nothing, nothing,' says my gentleman. 'You are perfectly right. A +log--nothing but a log.' + +"Ha, ha! Reprieve, I call it, because if the skipper had gone on with +his silly argument much longer he would have had to be knocked out +of the way. I could hardly hold myself in on account of the precious +minutes. However, his guardian angel put it into his head to shut up and +go back to his bed. I was ramping mad about the lost time." + +"'Why didn't you let me give him one on his silly coconut sir?' I asks. + +"'No ferocity, no ferocity,' he says, raising his finger at me as calm +as you please. + +"You can't tell how a gentleman takes that sort of thing. They don't +lose their temper. It's bad form. You'll never see him lose his +temper--not for anybody to see anyhow. Ferocity ain't good form, +either--that much I've learned by this time, and more, too. I've had +that schooling that you couldn't tell by my face if I meant to rip you +up the next minute--as of course I could do in less than a jiffy. I have +a knife up the leg of my trousers." + +"You haven't!" exclaimed Schomberg incredulously. + +Mr Ricardo was as quick as lightning in changing his lounging, idle +attitude for a stooping position, and exhibiting the weapon with one +jerk at the left leg of his trousers. Schomberg had just a view of it, +strapped to a very hairy limb, when Mr. Ricardo, jumping up, stamped his +foot to get the trouser-leg down, and resumed his careless pose with one +elbow on the table. + +"It's a more handy way to carry a tool than you would think," he went +on, gazing abstractedly into Schomberg's wide-open eyes. "Suppose some +little difference comes up during a game. Well, you stoop to pick up a +dropped card, and when you come up--there you are ready to strike, or +with the thing up you sleeve ready to throw. Or you just dodge under the +table when there's some shooting coming. You wouldn't believe the damage +a fellow with a knife under the table can do to ill-conditioned skunks +that want to raise trouble, before they begin to understand what the +screaming's about, and make a bolt--those that can, that is." + +The roses of Schomberg's cheek at the root of his chestnut beard faded +perceptibly. Ricardo chuckled faintly. + +"But no ferocity--no ferocity! A gentleman knows. What's the good of +getting yourself into a state? And no shirking necessity, either. No +gentleman ever shirks. What I learn I don't forget. Why! We gambled +on the plains, with a damn lot of cattlemen in ranches; played fair, +mind--and then had to fight for our winnings afterwards as often as not. +We've gambled on the hills and in the valleys and on the sea-shore, and +out of sight of land--mostly fair. Generally it's good enough. We began +in Nicaragua first, after we left that schooner and her fool errand. +There were one hundred and twenty-seven sovereigns and some Mexican +dollars in that skipper's cash-box. Hardly enough to knock a man on the +head for from behind, I must confess; but that the skipper had a narrow +escape the governor himself could not deny afterwards. + +"'Do you want me to understand, sir, that you mind there being one life +more or less on this earth?' I asked him, a few hours after we got away. + +"'Certainly not,' says he. + +"'Well, then, why did you stop me?' + +"'There's a proper way of doing things. You'll have to learn to be +correct. There's also unnecessary exertion. That must be avoided, +too--if only for the look of the thing.' A gentleman's way of putting +things to you--and no mistake! + +"At sunrise we got into a creek, to lie hidden in case the treasure hunt +party had a mind to take a spell hunting for us. And dash me if they +didn't! We saw the schooner away out, running to leeward, with ten pairs +of binoculars sweeping the sea, no doubt on all sides. I advised the +governor to give her time to beat back again before we made a start. So +we stayed up that creek something like ten days, as snug as can be. On +the seventh day we had to kill a man, though--the brother of this Pedro +here. They were alligator-hunters, right enough. We got our lodgings in +their hut. Neither the boss nor I could habla Espanol--speak Spanish, +you know--much then. Dry bank, nice shade, jolly hammocks, fresh fish, +good game, everything lovely. The governor chucked them a few dollars to +begin with; but it was like boarding with a pair of savage apes, anyhow. +By and by we noticed them talking a lot together. They had twigged +the cash-box, and the leather portmanteaus, and my bag--a jolly lot of +plunder to look at. They must have been saying to each other: + +"'No one's ever likely to come looking for these two fellows, who seem +to have fallen from the moon. Let's cut their throats.' + +"Why, of course! Clear as daylight. I didn't need to spy one of them +sharpening a devilish long knife behind some bushes, while glancing +right and left with his wild eyes, to know what was in the wind. Pedro +was standing by, trying the edge of another long knife. They thought we +were away on our lookout at the mouth of the river, as was usual with us +during the day. Not that we expected to see much of the schooner, but +it was just as well to make certain, if possible; and then it was cooler +out of the woods, in the breeze. Well, the governor was there right +enough, lying comfortable on a rug, where he could watch the offing, but +I had gone back to the hut to get a chew of tobacco out of my bag. I had +not broken myself of the habit then, and I couldn't be happy unless I +had a lump as big as a baby's fist in my cheek." + +At the cannibalistic comparison, Schomberg muttered a faint, sickly +"don't." Ricardo hitched himself up in his seat and glanced down his +outstretched legs complacently. + +"I am tolerably light on my feet, as a general thing," he went on. "Dash +me if I don't think I could drop a pinch of salt on a sparrow's tail, +if I tried. Anyhow, they didn't hear me. I watched them two brown, hairy +brutes not ten yards off. All they had on was white linen drawers rolled +up on their thighs. Not a word they said to each other. Antonio was +down on his thick hams, busy rubbing a knife on a flat stone; Pedro was +leaning against a small tree and passing his thumb along the edge of his +blade. I got away quieter than a mouse, you bet." + +"I didn't say anything to the boss then. He was leaning on his elbow +on his rug, and didn't seem to want to be spoken to. He's like +that--sometimes that familiar you might think he would eat out of your +hand, and at others he would snub you sharper than a devil--but always +quiet. Perfect gentleman, I tell you. I didn't bother him, then; but +I wasn't likely to forget them two fellows, so businesslike with their +knives. At that time we had only one revolver between us two--the +governor's six-shooter, but loaded only in five chambers; and we had no +more cartridges. He had left the box behind in a drawer in his cabin. +Awkward! I had nothing but an old clasp-knife--no good at all for +anything serious. + +"In the evening we four sat round a bit of fire outside the +sleeping-shed, eating broiled fish off plantain leaves, with roast yams +for bread--the usual thing. The governor and I were on one side, and +these two beauties cross-legged on the other, grunting a word or two +to each other, now and then, hardly human speech at all, and their eyes +down, fast on the ground. For the last three days we couldn't get them +to look us in the face. Presently I began to talk to the boss quietly, +just as I am talking to you now, careless like, and I told him all I had +observed. He goes on picking up pieces of fish and putting them into his +mouth as calm as anything. It's a pleasure to have anything to do with a +gentleman. Never looked across at them once. + +"'And now,' says I, yawning on purpose, 'we've got to stand watch at +night, turn about, and keep our eyes skinned all day, too, and mind we +don't get jumped upon suddenly.' + +"'It's perfectly intolerable,' says the governor. 'And you with no +weapon of any sort!' + +"'I mean to stick pretty close to you, sir, from this on, if you don't +mind,' says I. + +"He just nods the least bit, wipes his fingers on the plantain leaf, +puts his hand behind his back, as if to help himself to rise from the +ground, snatches his revolver from under his jacket and plugs a bullet +plumb centre into Mr. Antonio's chest. See what it is to have to do with +a gentleman. No confounded fuss, and things done out of hand. But he +might have tipped me a wink or something. I nearly jumped out of my +skin. Scared ain't in it! I didn't even know who had fired. Everything +had been so still just before that the bang of the shot seemed +the loudest noise I had ever heard. The honourable Antonio pitches +forward--they always do, towards the shot; you must have noticed that +yourself--yes, he pitches forward on to the embers, and all that lot of +hair on his face and head flashes up like a pinch of gunpowder. Greasy, +I expect; always scraping the fat off them alligators' hides--" + +"Look here," exclaimed Schomberg violently, as if trying to burst some +invisible bonds, "do you mean to say that all this happened?" + +"No," said Ricardo coolly. "I am making it all up as I go along, just to +help you through the hottest part of the afternoon. So down he pitches +his nose on the red embers, and up jumps our handsome Pedro and I at the +same time, like two Jacks-in-the-box. He starts to bolt away, with his +head over his shoulder, and I, hardly knowing what I was doing, spring +on his back. I had the sense to get my hands round his neck at once, and +it's about all I could do to lock my fingers tight under his jaw. You +saw the beauty's neck, didn't you? Hard as iron, too. Down we both went. +Seeing this the governor puts his revolver in his pocket. + +"'Tie his legs together, sir,' I yell. 'I'm trying to strangle him.' + +"There was a lot of their fibre-lines lying about. I gave him a last +squeeze and then got up. + +"'I might have shot you,' says the governor, quite concerned. + +"'But you are glad to have saved a cartridge, sir,' I tell him. + +"My jump did save it. It wouldn't have done to let him get away in +the dark like that, and have the beauty dodging around in the bushes, +perhaps, with the rusty flint-lock gun they had. The governor owned up +that the jump was the correct thing. + +"'But he isn't dead,' says he, bending over him. + +"Might as well hope to strangle an ox. We made haste to tie his elbows +back, and then, before he came to himself, we dragged him to a small +tree, sat him up, and bound him to it, not by the waist but by the +neck--some twenty turns of small line round his throat and the trunk, +finished off with a reef-knot under his ear. Next thing we did was to +attend to the honourable Antonio, who was making a great smell frizzling +his face on the red coals. We pushed and rolled him into the creek, and +left the rest to the alligators. + +"I was tired. That little scrap took it out of me something awful. The +governor hadn't turned a hair. That's where a gentleman has the pull +of you. He don't get excited. No gentleman does--or hardly ever. I fell +asleep all of a sudden and left him smoking by the fire I had made +up, his railway rug round his legs, as calm as if he were sitting in a +first-class carriage. We hardly spoke ten words to each other after +it was over, and from that day to this we have never talked of the +business. I wouldn't have known he remembered it if he hadn't alluded to +it when talking with you the other day--you know, with regard to Pedro." + +"It surprised you, didn't it? That's why I am giving you this yarn of +how he came to be with us, like a sort of dog--dashed sight more useful, +though. You know how he can trot around with trays? Well, he could bring +down an ox with his fist, at a word from the boss, just as cleverly. And +fond of the governor! Oh, my word! More than any dog is of any man." + +Schomberg squared his chest. + +"Oh, and that's one of the things I wanted to mention to Mr. Jones," he +said. "It's unpleasant to have that fellow round the house so early. He +sits on the stairs at the back for hours before he is needed here, and +frightens people so that the service suffers. The Chinamen--" + +Ricardo nodded and raised his hand. + +"When I first saw him he was fit to frighten a grizzly bear, let alone +a Chinaman. He's become civilized now to what he once was. Well, that +morning, first thing on opening my eyes, I saw him sitting there, tied +up by the neck to the tree. He was blinking. We spent the day watching +the sea, and we actually made out the schooner working to windward, +which showed that she had given us up. Good! When the sun rose again, I +took a squint at our Pedro. He wasn't blinking. He was rolling his eyes, +all white one minute and black the next, and his tongue was hanging out +a yard. Being tied up short by the neck like this would daunt the arch +devil himself--in time--in time, mind! I don't know but that even a +real gentleman would find it difficult to keep a stiff lip to the end. +Presently we went to work getting our boat ready. I was busying myself +setting up the mast, when the governor passes the remark: + +"'I think he wants to say something.' + +"I had heard a sort of croaking going on for some time, only I wouldn't +take any notice; but then I got out of the boat and went up to him, with +some water. His eyes were red--red and black and half out of his +head. He drank all the water I gave him, but he hadn't much to say for +himself. I walked back to the governor. + +"'He asks for a bullet in his head before we go,' I said. I wasn't at +all pleased. + +"'Oh, that's out of the question altogether,' says the governor. + +"He was right there. Only four shots left, and ninety miles of wild +coast to put behind us before coming to the first place where you could +expect to buy revolver cartridges. + +"'Anyhow,' I tells him, 'he wants to be killed some way or other, as a +favour.' + +"And then I go on setting up the boat's mast. I didn't care much for the +notion of butchering a man bound hand and foot and fastened by the neck +besides. I had a knife then--the honourable Antonio's knife; and that +knife is this knife. + +"Ricardo gave his leg a resounding slap. + +"First spoil in my new life," he went on with harsh joviality. "The +dodge of carrying it down there I learned later. I carried it stuck in +my belt that day. No, I hadn't much stomach for the job; but when you +work with a gentleman of the real right sort you may depend on your +feelings being seen through your skin. Says the governor suddenly: + +"'It may even be looked upon as his right'--you hear a gentleman +speaking there?--'but what do you think of taking him with us in the +boat?' + +"And the governor starts arguing that the beggar would be useful in +working our way along the coast. We could get rid of him before coming +to the first place that was a little civilized. I didn't want much +talking over. Out I scrambled from the boat. + +"'Ay, but will he be manageable, sir?' + +"'Oh, yes. He's daunted. Go on, cut him loose--I take the +responsibility.' + +"'Right you are, sir.' + +"He sees me come along smartly with his brother's knife in my hand--I +wasn't thinking how it looked from his side of the fence, you know--and +jiminy, it nearly killed him! He stared like a crazed bullock and began +to sweat and twitch all over, something amazing. I was so surprised, +that I stopped to look at him. The drops were pouring over his eyebrows, +down his beard, off his nose--and he gurgled. Then it struck me that he +couldn't see what was in my mind. By favour or by right he didn't like +to die when it came to it; not in that way, anyhow. When I stepped round +to get at the lashing, he let out a sort of soft bellow. Thought I was +going to stick him from behind, I guess. I cut all the turns with one +slash, and he went over on his side, flop, and started kicking with his +tied legs. Laugh! I don't know what there was so funny about it, but I +fairly shouted. What between my laughing and his wriggling, I had a job +in cutting him free. As soon as he could feel his limbs he makes for the +bank, where the governor was standing, crawls up to him on his hands and +knees, and embraces his legs. Gratitude, eh? You could see that being +allowed to live suited that chap down to the ground. The governor gets +his legs away from him gently and just mutters to me: + +"'Let's be off. Get him into the boat.' + +"It was not difficult," continued Ricardo, after eyeing Schomberg +fixedly for a moment. "He was ready enough to get into the boat, +and--here he is. He would let himself be chopped into small pieces--with +a smile, mind; with a smile!--for the governor. I don't know about him +doing that much for me; but pretty near, pretty near. I did the tying up +and the untying, but he could see who was the boss. And then he knows a +gentleman. A dog knows a gentleman--any dog. It's only some foreigners +that don't know; and nothing can teach them, either." + +"And you mean to say," asked Schomberg, disregarding what might have +been annoying for himself in the emphasis of the final remark, "you mean +to say that you left steady employment at good wages for a life like +this?" + +"There!" began Ricardo quietly. "That's just what a man like you would +say. You are that tame! I follow a gentleman. That ain't the same thing +as to serve an employer. They give you wages as they'd fling a bone to +a dog, and they expect you to be grateful. It's worse than slavery. You +don't expect a slave that's bought for money to be grateful. And if you +sell your work--what is it but selling your own self? You've got so many +days to live and you sell them one after another. Hey? Who can pay me +enough for my life? Ay! But they throw at you your week's money and +expect you to say 'thank you' before you pick it up." + +He mumbled some curses, directed at employers generally, as it seemed, +then blazed out: + +"Work be damned! I ain't a dog walking on its hind legs for a bone; I am +a man who's following a gentleman. There's a difference which you will +never understand, Mr. Tame Schomberg." + +He yawned slightly. Schomberg, preserving a military stiffness +reinforced by a slight frown, had allowed his thoughts to stray away. +They were busy detailing the image of a young girl--absent--gone--stolen +from him. He became enraged. There was that rascal looking at him +insolently. If the girl had not been shamefully decoyed away from him, +he would not have allowed anyone to look at him insolently. He would +have made nothing of hitting that rogue between the eyes. Afterwards he +would have kicked the other without hesitation. He saw himself doing it; +and in sympathy with this glorious vision Schomberg's right foot, and +arm moved convulsively. + +At this moment he came out of his sudden reverie to note with alarm the +wide-awake curiosity of Mr. Ricardo's stare. + +"And so you go like this about the world, gambling," he remarked +inanely, to cover his confusion. But Ricardo's stare did not change its +character, and he continued vaguely: + +"Here and there and everywhere." He pulled himself together, squared his +shoulders. "Isn't it very precarious?" he said firmly. + +The word precarious--seemed to be effective, because Ricardo's eyes lost +their dangerously interested expression. + +"No, not so bad," Ricardo said, with indifference. "It's my opinion that +men will gamble as long as they have anything to put on a card. Gamble? +That's nature. What's life itself? You never know what may turn up. The +worst of it is that you never can tell exactly what sort of cards you +are holding yourself. What's trumps?--that is the question. See? Any man +will gamble if only he's given a chance, for anything or everything. You +too--" + +"I haven't touched a card now for twenty years," said Schomberg in an +austere tone. + +"Well, if you got your living that way you would be no worse than you +are now, selling drinks to people--beastly beer and spirits, rotten +stuff fit to make an old he-goat yell if you poured it down its throat. +Pooh! I can't stand the confounded liquor. Never could. A whiff of neat +brandy in a glass makes me feel sick. Always did. If everybody was like +me, liquor would be going a-begging. You think it's funny in a man, +don't you?" + +Schomberg made a vague gesture of toleration. Ricardo hitched up his +chair and settled his elbow afresh on the table. + +"French siros I must say I do like. Saigon's the place for them. I see +you have siros in the bar. Hang me if I ain't getting dry, conversing +like this with you. Come, Mr. Schomberg, be hospitable, as the governor +says." + +Schomberg rose and walked with dignity to the counter. His footsteps +echoed loudly on the floor of polished boards. He took down a bottle, +labelled "Sirop de Groseille." The little sounds he made, the clink of +glass, the gurgling of the liquid, the pop of the soda-water cork had +a preternatural sharpness. He came back carrying a pink and glistening +tumbler. Mr. Ricardo had followed his movements with oblique, coyly +expectant yellow eyes, like a cat watching the preparation of a saucer +of milk, and the satisfied sound after he had drunk might have been a +slightly modified form of purring, very soft and deep in his throat. It +affected Schomberg unpleasantly as another example of something inhuman +in those men wherein lay the difficulty of dealing with them. A +spectre, a cat, an ape--there was a pretty association for a mere man to +remonstrate with, he reflected with an inward shudder; for Schomberg had +been overpowered, as it were, by his imagination, and his reason could +not react against that fanciful view of his guests. And it was not only +their appearance. The morals of Mr. Ricardo seemed to him to be pretty +much the morals of a cat. Too much. What sort of argument could a mere +man offer to a . . . or to a spectre, either! What the morals of a +spectre could be, Schomberg had no idea. Something dreadful, no +doubt. Compassion certainly had no place in them. As to the ape--well, +everybody knew what an ape was. It had no morals. Nothing could be more +hopeless. + +Outwardly, however, having picked up the cigar which he had laid aside +to get the drink, with his thick fingers, one of them ornamented by a +gold ring, Schomberg smoked with moody composure. Facing him, Ricardo +blinked slowly for a time, then closed his eyes altogether, with the +placidity of the domestic cat dozing on the hearth-rug. In another +moment he opened them very wide, and seemed surprised to see Schomberg +there. + +"You're having a very slack time today, aren't you?" he observed. "But +then this whole town is confoundedly slack, anyhow; and I've never faced +such a slack party at a table before. Come eleven o'clock, they begin to +talk of breaking up. What's the matter with them? Want to go to bed so +early, or what?" + +"I reckon you don't lose a fortune by their wanting to go to bed," said +Schomberg, with sombre sarcasm. + +"No," admitted Ricardo, with a grin that stretched his thin mouth from +ear to ear, giving a sudden glimpse of his white teeth. "Only, you see, +when I once start, I would play for nuts, for parched peas, for any +rubbish. I would play them for their souls. But these Dutchmen aren't +any good. They never seem to get warmed up properly, win or lose. I've +tried them both ways, too. Hang them for a beggarly, bloodless lot of +animated cucumbers!" + +"And if anything out of the way was to happen, they would be just +as cool in locking you and your gentleman up," Schomberg snarled +unpleasantly. + +"Indeed!" said Ricardo slowly, taking Schomberg's measure with his eyes. +"And what about you?" + +"You talk mighty big," burst out the hotel-keeper. "You talk of ranging +all over the world, and doing great things, and taking fortune by the +scruff of the neck, but here you stick at this miserable business!" + +"It isn't much of a lay--that's a fact," admitted Ricardo unexpectedly. + +Schomberg was red in the face with audacity. + +"I call it paltry," he spluttered. + +"That's how it looks. Can't call it anything else." Ricardo seemed to +be in an accommodating mood. "I should be ashamed of it myself, only you +see the governor is subject to fits--" + +"Fits!" Schomberg cried out, but in a low tone. "You don't say so!" He +exulted inwardly, as if this disclosure had in some way diminished the +difficulty of the situation. "Fits! That's a serious thing, isn't it? +You ought to take him to the civil hospital--a lovely place." + +Ricardo nodded slightly, with a faint grin. + +"Serious enough. Regular fits of laziness, I call them. Now and then +he lays down on me like this, and there's no moving him. If you think I +like it, you're a long way out. Generally speaking, I can talk him over. +I know how to deal with a gentleman. I am no daily-bread slave. But when +he has said, 'Martin, I am bored,' then look out! There's nothing to do +but to shut up, confound it!" + +Schomberg, very much cast down, had listened open-mouthed. + +"What's the cause of it?" he asked. "Why is he like this? I don't +understand." + +"I think I do," said Ricardo. "A gentleman, you know, is not such a +simple person as you or I; and not so easy to manage, either. If only I +had something to lever him out with!" + +"What do you mean, to lever him out with?" muttered Schomberg +hopelessly. + +Ricardo was impatient with this denseness. + +"Don't you understand English? Look here! I couldn't make this +billiard table move an inch if I talked to it from now till the end of +days--could I? Well, the governor is like that, too, when the fits are +on him. He's bored. Nothing's worthwhile, nothing's good enough, that's +mere sense. But if I saw a capstan bar lying about here, I would soon +manage to shift that billiard table of yours a good many inches. And +that's all there is to it." + +He rose noiselessly, stretched himself, supple and stealthy, with +curious sideways movements of his head and unexpected elongations of his +thick body, glanced out of the corners of his eyes in the direction of +the door, and finally leaned back against the table, folding his arms on +his breast comfortably, in a completely human attitude. + +"That's another thing you can tell a gentleman by--his freakishness. +A gentleman ain't accountable to nobody, any more than a tramp on the +roads. He ain't got to keep time. The governor got like this once in a +one-horse Mexican pueblo on the uplands, away from everywhere. He lay +all day long in a dark room--" + +"Drunk?" This word escaped Schomberg by inadvertence at which he became +frightened. But the devoted secretary seemed to find it natural. + +"No, that never comes on together with this kind of fit. He just lay +there full length on a mat, while a ragged, bare-legged boy that he had +picked up in the street sat in the patio, between two oleanders near the +open door of his room, strumming on a guitar and singing tristes to him +from morning to night. You know tristes--twang, twang, twang, aouh, hoo! +Chroo, yah!" + +Schomberg uplifted his hands in distress. This tribute seemed to flatter +Ricardo. His mouth twitched grimly. + +"Like that--enough to give colic to an ostrich, eh? Awful. Well, there +was a cook there who loved me--an old fat, Negro woman with spectacles. +I used to hide in the kitchen and turn her to, to make me dulces--sweet +things, you know, mostly eggs and sugar--to pass the time away. I am +like a kid for sweet things. And, by the way, why don't you ever have +a pudding at your tablydott, Mr. Schomberg? Nothing but fruit, morning, +noon, and night. Sickening! What do you think a fellow is--a wasp?" + +Schomberg disregarded the injured tone. + +"And how long did that fit, as you call it, last?" he asked anxiously. + +"Weeks, months, years, centuries, it seemed to me," returned Mr. Ricardo +with feeling. "Of an evening the governor would stroll out into the sala +and fritter his life away playing cards with the juez of the place--a +little Dago with a pair of black whiskers--ekarty, you know, a +quick French game, for small change. And the comandante, a one-eyed, +half-Indian, flat-nosed ruffian, and I, we had to stand around and bet +on their hands. It was awful!" + +"Awful," echoed Schomberg, in a Teutonic throaty tone of despair. "Look +here, I need your rooms." + +"To be sure. I have been thinking that for some time past," said Ricardo +indifferently. + +"I was mad when I listened to you. This must end!" + +"I think you are mad yet," said Ricardo, not even unfolding his arms or +shifting his attitude an inch. He lowered his voice to add: "And if +I thought you had been to the police, I would tell Pedro to catch +you round the waist and break your fat neck by jerking your head +backward--snap! I saw him do it to a big buck nigger who was flourishing +a razor in front of the governor. It can be done. You hear a low crack, +that's all--and the man drops down like a limp rag." + +Not even Ricardo's head, slightly inclined on the left shoulder, had +moved; but when he ceased the greenish irises which had been staring out +of doors glided into the corners of his eyes nearest to Schomberg and +stayed there with a coyly voluptuous expression. + + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +Schomberg felt desperation, that lamentable substitute for courage, +ooze out of him. It was not so much the threat of death as the weirdly +circumstantial manner of its declaration which affected him. A mere +"I'll murder you," however ferocious in tone, and earnest, in purpose, +he could have faced; but before this novel mode of speech and procedure, +his imagination being very sensitive to the unusual, he collapsed as if +indeed his moral neck had been broken--snap! + +"Go to the police? Of course not. Never dreamed of it. Too late now. +I've let myself be mixed up in this. You got my consent while I wasn't +myself. I explained it to you at the time." + +Ricardo's eye glided gently off Schomberg to stare far away. + +"Ay! Some trouble with a girl. But that's nothing to us." + +"Naturally. What I say is, what's the good of all that savage talk to +me?" A bright argument occurred to him. "It's out of proportion; for +even if I were fool enough to go to the police now, there's nothing +serious to complain about. It would only mean deportation for you. They +would put you on board the first west-bound steamer to Singapore." He +had become animated. "Out of this to the devil," he added between his +teeth for his own private satisfaction. + +Ricardo made no comment, and gave no sign of having heard a single word. +This discouraged Schomberg, who had looked up hopefully. + +"Why do you want to stick here?" he cried. "It can't pay you people +to fool around like this. Didn't you worry just now about moving your +governor? Well, the police would move him for you; and from Singapore +you can go on to the east coast of Africa." + +"I'll be hanged if the fellow isn't up to that silly trick!" was +Ricardo's comment, spoken in an ominous tone which recalled Schomberg to +the realities of his position. + +"No! No!" he protested. "It's a manner of speaking. Of course I +wouldn't." + +"I think that trouble about the girl has really muddled your brains, +Mr. Schomberg. Believe me, you had better part friends with us; for, +deportation or no deportation, you'll be seeing one of us turning up +before long to pay you off for any nasty dodge you may be hatching in +that fat head of yours." + +"Gott im Himmel!" groaned Schomberg. "Will nothing move him out? Will +he stop here immer--I mean always? Suppose I were to make it worth your +while, couldn't you--" + +"No," Ricardo interrupted. "I couldn't, unless I had something to lever +him out with. I've told you that before." + +"An inducement?" muttered Schomberg. + +"Ay. The east coast of Africa isn't good enough. He told me the other +day that it will have to wait till he is ready for it; and he may not be +ready for a long time, because the east coast can't run away, and no one +is likely to run off with it." + +These remarks, whether considered as truisms or as depicting Mr. +Jones's mental state, were distinctly discouraging to the long-suffering +Schomberg; but there is truth in the well-known saying that places +the darkest hour before the dawn. The sound of words, apart from the +context, has its power; and these two words, 'run off,' had a special +affinity to the hotel-keeper's, haunting idea. It was always present +in his brain, and now it came forward evoked by a purely fortuitous +expression. No, nobody could run off with a continent; but Heyst had run +off with the girl! + +Ricardo could have had no conception of the cause of Schomberg's changed +expression. Yet it was noticeable enough to interest him so much that +he stopped the careless swinging of his leg and said, looking at the +hotel-keeper: + +"There's not much use arguing against that sort of talk--is there?" + +Schomberg was not listening. + +"I could put you on another track," he said slowly, and stopped, as if +suddenly choked by an unholy emotion of intense eagerness combined with +fear of failure. Ricardo waited, attentive, yet not without a certain +contempt. + +"On the track of a man!" Schomberg uttered convulsively, and paused +again, consulting his rage and his conscience. + +"The man in the moon, eh?" suggested Ricardo, in a jeering murmur. + +Schomberg shook his head. + +"It would be nearly as safe to rook him as if he were the Man in the +moon. You go and try. It isn't so very far." + +He reflected. These men were thieves and murderers as well as gamblers. +Their fitness for purposes of vengeance was appallingly complete. But he +preferred not to think of it in detail. He put it to himself summarily +that he would be paying Heyst out and would, at the same time, relieve +himself of these men's oppression. He had only to let loose his natural +gift for talking scandalously about his fellow creatures. And in this +case his great practice in it was assisted by hate, which, like love, +has an eloquence of its own. With the utmost ease he portrayed for +Ricardo, now seriously attentive, a Heyst fattened by years of private +and public rapines, the murderer of Morrison, the swindler of many +shareholders, a wonderful mixture of craft and impudence, of deep +purposes and simple wiles, of mystery and futility. In this exercise of +his natural function Schomberg revived, the colour coming back to his +face, loquacious, florid, eager, his manliness set off by the military +bearing. + +"That's the exact story. He was seen hanging about this part of the +world for years, spying into everybody's business: but I am the only +one who has seen through him from the first--contemptible, double-faced, +stick-at-nothing, dangerous fellow." + +"Dangerous, is he?" + +Schomberg came to himself at the sound of Ricardo's voice. + +"Well, you know what I mean," he said uneasily. "A lying, circumventing, +soft-spoken, polite, stuck-up rascal. Nothing open about him." + +Mr Ricardo had slipped off the table, and was prowling about the room in +an oblique, noiseless manner. He flashed a grin at Schomberg in passing, +and a snarling: + +"Ah! H'm!" + +"Well, what more dangerous do you want?" argued Schomberg. "He's in no +way a fighting man, I believe," he added negligently. + +"And you say he has been living alone there?" + +"Like the man in the moon," answered Schomberg readily. "There's no +one that cares a rap what becomes of him. He has been lying low, you +understand, after bagging all that plunder." + +"Plunder, eh? Why didn't he go home with it?" inquired Ricardo. + +The henchman of plain Mr. Jones was beginning to think that this was +something worth looking into. And he was pursuing truth in the manner +of men of sounder morality and purer intentions than his own; that is he +pursued it in the light of his own experience and prejudices. For facts, +whatever their origin (and God only knows where they come from), can be +only tested by our own particular suspicions. Ricardo was suspicious all +round. Schomberg, such is the tonic of recovered self-esteem, Schomberg +retorted fearlessly: + +"Go home? Why don't you go home? To hear your talk, you must have made +a pretty considerable pile going round winning people's money. You ought +to be ready by this time." + +Ricardo stopped to look at Schomberg with surprise. + +"You think yourself very clever, don't you?" he said. + +Schomberg just then was so conscious of being clever that the snarling +irony left him unmoved. There was positively a smile in his noble +Teutonic beard, the first smile for weeks. He was in a felicitous vein. + +"How do you know that he wasn't thinking of going home? As a matter of +fact, he was on his way home." + +"And how do I know that you are not amusing yourself by spinning out +a blamed fairy tale?" interrupted Ricardo roughly. "I wonder at myself +listening to the silly rot!" + +Schomberg received this turn of temper unmoved. He did not require to be +very subtly observant to notice that he had managed to arouse some sort +of feeling, perhaps of greed, in Ricardo's breast. + +"You won't believe me? Well! You can ask anybody that comes here if +that--that Swede hadn't got as far as this house on his way home. Why +should he turn up here if not for that? You ask anybody." + +"Ask, indeed!" returned the other. "Catch me asking at large about a man +I mean to drop on! Such jobs must be done on the quiet--or not at all." + +The peculiar intonation of the last phrase touched the nape of +Schomberg's neck with a chill. He cleared his throat slightly and looked +away as though he had heard something indelicate. Then, with a jump as +it were: + +"Of course he didn't tell me. Is it likely? But haven't I got eyes? +Haven't I got my common sense to tell me? I can see through people. By +the same token, he called on the Tesmans. Why did he call on the Tesmans +two days running, eh? You don't know? You can't tell?" + +He waited complacently till Ricardo had finished swearing quite openly +at him for a confounded chatterer, and then went on: + +"A fellow doesn't go to a counting-house in business hours for a chat +about the weather, two days running. Then why? To close his account with +them one day, and to get his money out the next! Clear, what?" + +Ricardo, with his trick of looking one way and moving another approached +Schomberg slowly. + +"To get his money?" he purred. + +"Gewiss," snapped Schomberg with impatient superiority. "What else? That +is, only the money he had with the Tesmans. What he has buried or put +away on the island, devil only knows. When you think of the lot of hard +cash that passed through that man's hands, for wages and stores and all +that--and he's just a cunning thief, I tell you." Ricardo's hard stare +discomposed the hotel-keeper, and he added in an embarrassed tone: "I +mean a common, sneaking thief--no account at all. And he calls himself a +Swedish baron, too! Tfui!" + +"He's a baron, is he? That foreign nobility ain't much," commented Mr. +Ricardo seriously. "And then what? He hung about here!" + +"Yes, he hung about," said Schomberg, making a wry mouth. "He--hung +about. That's it. Hung--" + +His voice died out. Curiosity was depicted in Ricardo's countenance. + +"Just like that; for nothing? And then turned about and went back to +that island again?" + +"And went back to that island again," Schomberg echoed lifelessly, +fixing his gaze on the floor. + +"What's the matter with you?" asked Ricardo with genuine surprise. "What +is it?" + +Schomberg, without looking up, made an impatient gesture. His face was +crimson, and he kept it lowered. Ricardo went back to the point. + +"Well, but how do you account for it? What was his reason? What did he +go back to the island for?" + +"Honeymoon!" spat out Schomberg viciously. + +Perfectly still, his eyes downcast, he suddenly, with no preliminary +stir, hit the table with his fist a blow which caused the utterly +unprepared Ricardo to leap aside. And only then did Schomberg look up +with a dull, resentful expression. + +Ricardo stared hard for a moment, spun on his heel, walked to the end +of the room, came back smartly, and muttered a profound "Ay! Ay!" above +Schomberg's rigid head. That the hotel-keeper was capable of a +great moral effort was proved by a gradual return of his severe, +Lieutenant-of-the-Reserve manner. + +"Ay, ay!" repeated Ricardo more deliberately than before, and as if +after a further survey of the circumstances, "I wish I hadn't asked you, +or that you had told me a lie. It don't suit me to know that there's a +woman mixed up in this affair. What's she like? It's the girl you--" + +"Leave off!" muttered Schomberg, utterly pitiful behind his stiff +military front. + +"Ay, ay!" Ricardo ejaculated for the third time, more and more +enlightened and perplexed. "Can't bear to talk about it--so bad as that? +And yet I would bet she isn't a miracle to look at." + +Schomberg made a gesture as if he didn't know, as if he didn't care. +Then he squared his shoulders and frowned at vacancy. + +"Swedish baron--h'm!" Ricardo continued meditatively. "I believe the +governor would think that business worth looking up, quite, if I put it +to him properly. The governor likes a duel, if you will call it so; but +I don't know a man that can stand up to him on the square. Have you ever +seen a cat play with a mouse? It's a pretty sight!" + +Ricardo, with his voluptuously gleaming eyes and the coy expression, +looked so much like a cat that Schomberg would have felt all the alarm +of a mouse if other feelings had not had complete possession of his +breast. + +"There are no lies between you and me," he said, more steadily than he +thought he could speak. + +"What's the good now? He funks women. In that Mexican pueblo where we +lay grounded on our beef-bones, so to speak, I used to go to dances of +an evening. The girls there would ask me if the English caballero in +the posada was a monk in disguise, or if he had taken a vow to the +sancissima madre not to speak to a woman, or whether--You can imagine +what fairly free-spoken girls will ask when they come to the point of +not caring what they say; and it used to vex me. Yes, the governor funks +facing women." + +"One woman?" interjected Schomberg in guttural tones. + +"One may be more awkward to deal with than two, or two hundred, for that +matter. In a place that's full of women you needn't look at them unless +you like; but if you go into a room where there is only one woman, young +or old, pretty or ugly, you have got to face her. And, unless you are +after her, then--the governor is right enough--she's in the way." + +"Why notice them?" muttered Schomberg. "What can they do?" + +"Make a noise, if nothing else," opined Mr. Ricardo curtly, with the +distaste of a man whose path is a path of silence; for indeed, nothing +is more odious than a noise when one is engaged in a weighty and +absorbing card game. "Noise, noise, my friend," he went on forcibly; +"confounded screeching about something or other, and I like it no more +than the governor does. But with the governor there's something else +besides. He can't stand them at all." + +He paused to reflect on this psychological phenomenon, and as no +philosopher was at hand to tell him that there is no strong sentiment +without some terror, as there is no real religion without a little +fetishism, he emitted his own conclusion, which surely could not go to +the root of the matter. + +"I'm hanged if I don't think they are to him what liquor is to me. +Brandy--pah!" + +He made a disgusted face, and produced a genuine shudder. Schomberg +listened to him in wonder. It looked as if the very scoundrelism, of +that--that Swede would protect him; the spoil of his iniquity standing +between the thief and the retribution. + +"That's so, old buck." Ricardo broke the silence after contemplating +Schomberg's mute dejection with a sort of sympathy. "I don't think this +trick will work." + +"But that's silly," whispered the man deprived of the vengeance which he +had seemed already to hold in his hand, by a mysterious and exasperating +idiosyncrasy. + +"Don't you set yourself to judge a gentleman." Ricardo without anger +administered a moody rebuke. "Even I can't understand the governor +thoroughly. And I am an Englishman and his follower. No, I don't think I +care to put it before him, sick as I am of staying here." + +Ricardo could not be more sick of staying than Schomberg was of seeing +him stay. Schomberg believed so firmly in the reality of Heyst as +created by his own power of false inferences, of his hate, of his love +of scandal, that he could not contain a stifled cry of conviction +as sincere as most of our convictions, the disguised servants of our +passions, can appear at a supreme moment. + +"It would have been like going to pick up a nugget of a thousand pounds, +or two or three times as much, for all I know. No trouble, no--" + +"The petticoat's the trouble," Ricardo struck in. + +He had resumed his noiseless, feline, oblique prowling, in which an +observer would have detected a new character of excitement, such as a +wild animal of the cat species, anxious to make a spring, might betray. +Schomberg saw nothing. It would probably have cheered his drooping +spirits; but in a general way he preferred not to look at Ricardo. +Ricardo, however, with one of his slanting, gliding, restless glances, +observed the bitter smile on Schomberg's bearded lips--the unmistakable +smile of ruined hopes. + +"You are a pretty unforgiving sort of chap," he said, stopping for a +moment with an air of interest. "Hang me if I ever saw anybody look so +disappointed! I bet you would send black plague to that island if you +only knew how--eh, what? Plague too good for them? Ha, ha, ha!" + +He bent down to stare at Schomberg who sat unstirring with stony eyes +and set features, and apparently deaf to the rasping derision of that +laughter so close to his red fleshy ear. + +"Black plague too good for them, ha, ha!" Ricardo pressed the point on +the tormented hotel-keeper. Schomberg kept his eyes down obstinately. + +"I don't wish any harm to the girl--" he muttered. + +"But did she bolt from you? A fair bilk? Come!" + +"Devil only knows what that villainous Swede had done to her--what he +promised her, how he frightened her. She couldn't have cared for him, +I know." Schomberg's vanity clung to the belief in some atrocious, +extraordinary means of seduction employed by Heyst. "Look how he +bewitched that poor Morrison," he murmured. + +"Ah, Morrison--got all his money, what?" + +"Yes--and his life." + +"Terrible fellow, that Swedish baron! How is one to get at him?" + +Schomberg exploded. + +"Three against one! Are you shy? Do you want me to give you a letter of +introduction?" + +"You ought to look at yourself in a glass," Ricardo said quietly. "Dash +me if you don't get a stroke of some kind presently. And this is the +fellow who says women can do nothing! That one will do for you, unless +you manage to forget her." + +"I wish I could," Schomberg admitted earnestly. "And it's all the doing +of that Swede. I don't get enough sleep, Mr. Ricardo. And then, to +finish me off, you gentlemen turn up . . . as if I hadn't enough worry." + +"That's done you good," suggested the secretary with ironic seriousness. +"Takes your mind off that silly trouble. At your age too." + +He checked himself, as if in pity, and changing his tone: + +"I would really like to oblige you while doing a stroke of business at +the same time." + +"A good stroke," insisted Schomberg, as if it were mechanically. In his +simplicity he was not able to give up the idea which had entered his +head. An idea must be driven out by another idea, and with Schomberg +ideas were rare and therefore tenacious. "Minted gold," he murmured with +a sort of anguish. + +Such an expressive combination of words was not without effect upon +Ricardo. Both these men were amenable to the influence of verbal +suggestions. The secretary of "plain Mr. Jones" sighed and murmured. + +"Yes. But how is one to get at it?" + +"Being three to one," said Schomberg, "I suppose you could get it for +the asking." + +"One would think the fellow lived next door," Ricardo growled +impatiently. "Hang it all, can't you understand a plain question? I have +asked you the way." + +Schomberg seemed to revive. + +"The way?" + +The torpor of deceived hopes underlying his superficial changes of mood +had been pricked by these words which seemed pointed with purpose. + +"The way is over the water, of course," said the hotel-keeper. "For +people like you, three days in a good, big boat is nothing. It's no more +than a little outing, a bit of a change. At this season the Java Sea +is a pond. I have an excellent, safe boat--a ship's life-boat--carry +thirty, let alone three, and a child could handle her. You wouldn't get +a wet face at this time of the year. You might call it a pleasure-trip." + +"And yet, having this boat, you didn't go after her yourself--or after +him? Well, you are a fine fellow for a disappointed lover." + +Schomberg gave a start at the suggestion. + +"I am not three men," he said sulkily, as the shortest answer of the +several he could have given. + +"Oh, I know your sort," Ricardo let fall negligently. "You are like most +people--or perhaps just a little more peaceable than the rest of the +buying and selling gang that bosses this rotten show. Well, well, +you respectable citizen," he went on, "let us go thoroughly into the +matter." + +When Schomberg had been made to understand that Mr. Jones's henchman was +ready to discuss, in his own words, "this boat of yours, with courses +and distances," and such concrete matters of no good augury to that +villainous Swede, he recovered his soldierly bearing, squared his +shoulders, and asked in his military manner: + +"You wish, then, to proceed with the business?" + +Ricardo nodded. He had a great mind to, he said. A gentleman had to be +humoured as much as possible; but he must be managed, too, on occasions, +for his own good. And it was the business of the right sort of +"follower" to know the proper time and the proper methods of that +delicate part of his duty. Having exposed this theory Ricardo proceeded +to the application. + +"I've never actually lied to him," he said, "and I ain't going to now. +I shall just say nothing about the girl. He will have to get over the +shock the best he can. Hang it all! Too much humouring won't do here." + +"Funny thing," Schomberg observed crisply. + +"Is it? Ay, you wouldn't mind taking a woman by the throat in some dark +corner and nobody by, I bet!" + +Ricardo's dreadful, vicious, cat-like readiness to get his claws out at +any moment startled Schomberg as usual. But it was provoking too. + +"And you?" he defended himself. "Don't you want me to believe you are up +to anything?" + +"I, my boy? Oh, yes. I am not that gentleman; neither are you. Take 'em +by the throat or chuck 'em under the chin is all one to me--almost," +affirmed Ricardo, with something obscurely ironical in his complacency. +"Now, as to this business. A three days' jaunt in a good boat isn't a +thing to frighten people like us. You are right, so far; but there are +other details." + +Schomberg was ready enough to enter into details. He explained that he +had a small plantation, with a fairly habitable hut on it, on Madura. He +proposed that his guest should start from town in his boat, as if going +for an excursion to that rural spot. The custom-house people on the quay +were used to see his boat go off on such trips. + +From Madura, after some repose and on a convenient day, Mr. Jones +and party would make the real start. It would all be plain sailing. +Schomberg undertook to provision the boat. The greatest hardship the +voyagers need apprehend would be a mild shower of rain. At that season +of the year there were no serious thunderstorms. + +Schomberg's heart began to thump as he saw himself nearing his +vengeance. His speech was thick but persuasive. + +"No risk at all--none whatever." + +Ricardo dismissed these assurances of safety with an impatient gesture. +He was thinking of other risks. + +"The getting away from here is all right; but we may be sighted at sea, +and that may bring awkwardness later on. A ship's boat with three white +men in her, knocking about out of sight of land, is bound to make talk. +Are we likely to be seen on our way?" + +"No, unless by native craft," said Schomberg. + +Ricardo nodded, satisfied. Both these white men looked on native life as +a mere play of shadows. A play of shadows the dominant race could +walk through unaffected and disregarded in the pursuit of its +incomprehensible aims and needs. No. Native craft did not count, of +course. It was an empty, solitary part of the sea, Schomberg expounded +further. Only the Ternate mail-boat crossed that region about the eighth +of every month, regularly--nowhere near the island though. Rigid, his +voice hoarse, his heart thumping, his mind concentrated on the success +of his plan, the hotel-keeper multiplied words, as if to keep as many +of them as possible between himself and the murderous aspect of his +purpose. + +"So, if you gentlemen depart from my plantation quietly at sunset on the +eighth--always best to make a start at night, with a land breeze--it's a +hundred to one--What am I saying?--it's a thousand to one that no +human eye will see you on the passage. All you've got to do is keep her +heading north-east for, say, fifty hours; perhaps not quite so long. +There will always be draft enough to keep a boat moving; you may reckon +on that; and then--" + +The muscles about his waist quivered under his clothes with eagerness, +with impatience, and with something like apprehension, the true nature +of which was not clear to him. And he did not want to investigate it. +Ricardo regarded him steadily, with those dry eyes of his shining more +like polished stones than living tissue. + +"And then what?" he asked. + +"And then--why, you will astonish der herr baron--ha, ha!" + +Schomberg seemed to force the words and the laugh out of himself in a +hoarse bass. + +"And you believe he has all that plunder by him?" asked Ricardo, rather +perfunctorily, because the fact seemed to him extremely probable when +looked at all round by his acute mind. + +Schomberg raised his hands and lowered them slowly. + +"How can it be otherwise? He was going home, he was on his way, in this +hotel. Ask people. Was it likely he would leave it behind him?" + +Ricardo was thoughtful. Then, suddenly raising his head, he remarked: + +"Steer north-east for fifty hours, eh? That's not much of a sailing +direction. I've heard of a port being missed before on better +information. Can't you say what sort of landfall a fellow may expect? +But I suppose you have never seen that island yourself?" + +Schomberg admitted that he had not seen it, in a tone in which a +man congratulates himself on having escaped the contamination of an +unsavoury experience. No, certainly not. He had never had any business +to call there. But what of that? He could give Mr. Ricardo as good a +sea-mark as anybody need wish for. He laughed nervously. Miss it! He +defied anyone that came within forty miles of it to miss the retreat of +that villainous Swede. + +"What do you think of a pillar of smoke by day and a loom of fire at +night? There's a volcano in full blast near that island--enough to guide +almost a blind man. What more do you want? An active volcano to steer +by?" + +These last words he roared out exultingly, then jumped up and glared. +The door to the left of the bar had swung open, and Mrs. Schomberg, +dressed for duty, stood facing him down the whole length of the room. +She clung to the handle for a moment, then came in and glided to her +place, where she sat down to stare straight before her, as usual. + + + + + +PART THREE + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +Tropical nature had been kind to the failure of the commercial +enterprise. The desolation of the headquarters of the Tropical Belt Coal +Company had been screened from the side of the sea; from the side where +prying eyes--if any were sufficiently interested, either in malice or +in sorrow--could have noted the decaying bones of that once sanguine +enterprise. + +Heyst had been sitting among the bones buried so kindly in the grass of +two wet seasons' growth. The silence of his surroundings, broken only by +such sounds as a distant roll of thunder, the lash of rain through the +foliage of some big trees, the noise of the wind tossing the leaves of +the forest, and of the short seas breaking against the shore, favoured +rather than hindered his solitary meditation. + +A meditation is always--in a white man, at least--more or less an +interrogative exercise. Heyst meditated in simple terms on the mystery +of his actions; and he answered himself with the honest reflection: + +"There must be a lot of the original Adam in me, after all." + +He reflected, too, with the sense of making a discovery, that this +primeval ancestor is not easily suppressed. The oldest voice in the +world is just the one that never ceases to speak. If anybody could have +silenced its imperative echoes, it should have been Heyst's father, with +his contemptuous, inflexible negation of all effort; but apparently he +could not. There was in the son a lot of that first ancestor who, +as soon as he could uplift his muddy frame from the celestial mould, +started inspecting and naming the animals of that paradise which he was +so soon to lose. + +Action--the first thought, or perhaps the first impulse, on earth! The +barbed hook, baited with the illusions of progress, to bring out of the +lightless void the shoals of unnumbered generations! + +"And I, the son of my father, have been caught too, like the silliest +fish of them all." Heyst said to himself. + +He suffered. He was hurt by the sight of his own life, which ought to +have been a masterpiece of aloofness. He remembered always his last +evening with his father. He remembered the thin features, the great mass +of white hair, and the ivory complexion. A five-branched candlestick +stood on a little table by the side of the easy chair. They had been +talking a long time. The noises of the street had died out one by one, +till at last, in the moonlight, the London houses began to look like the +tombs of an unvisited, unhonoured, cemetery of hopes. + +He had listened. Then, after a silence, he had asked--for he was really +young then: + +"Is there no guidance?" + +His father was in an unexpectedly soft mood on that night, when the moon +swam in a cloudless sky over the begrimed shadows of the town. + +"You still believe in something, then?" he said in a clear voice, +which had been growing feeble of late. "You believe in flesh and blood, +perhaps? A full and equable contempt would soon do away with that, too. +But since you have not attained to it, I advise you to cultivate +that form of contempt which is called pity. It is perhaps the least +difficult--always remembering that you, too, if you are anything, are as +pitiful as the rest, yet never expecting any pity for yourself." + +"What is one to do, then?" sighed the young man, regarding his father, +rigid in the high-backed chair. + +"Look on--make no sound," were the last words of the man who had spent +his life in blowing blasts upon a terrible trumpet which filled heaven +and earth with ruins, while mankind went on its way unheeding. + +That very night he died in his bed, so quietly that they found him +in his usual attitude of sleep, lying on his side, one hand under his +cheek, and his knees slightly bent. He had not even straightened his +legs. + +His son buried the silenced destroyer of systems, of hopes, of beliefs. +He observed that the death of that bitter contemner of life did not +trouble the flow of life's stream, where men and women go by thick as +dust, revolving and jostling one another like figures cut out of cork +and weighted with lead just sufficiently to keep them in their proudly +upright posture. + +After the funeral, Heyst sat alone, in the dusk, and his meditation took +the form of a definite vision of the stream, of the fatuously jostling, +nodding, spinning figures hurried irresistibly along, and giving no sign +of being aware that the voice on the bank had been suddenly silenced . +. . Yes. A few obituary notices generally insignificant and some grossly +abusive. The son had read them all with mournful detachment. + +"This is the hate and rage of their fear," he thought to himself, "and +also of wounded vanity. They shriek their little shriek as they fly +past. I suppose I ought to hate him too . . ." + +He became aware of his eyes being wet. It was not that the man was his +father. For him it was purely a matter of hearsay which could not in +itself cause this emotion. No! It was because he had looked at him so +long that he missed him so much. The dead man had kept him on the bank +by his side. And now Heyst felt acutely that he was alone on the bank of +the stream. In his pride he determined not to enter it. + +A few slow tears rolled down his face. The rooms, filling with shadows, +seemed haunted by a melancholy, uneasy presence which could not express +itself. The young man got up with a strange sense of making way for +something impalpable that claimed possession, went out of the house, and +locked the door. A fortnight later he started on his travels--to "look +on and never make a sound." + +The elder Heyst had left behind him a little money and a certain +quantity of movable objects, such as books, tables, chairs, and +pictures, which might have complained of heartless desertion after many +years of faithful service; for there is a soul in things. Heyst, our +Heyst, had often thought of them, reproachful and mute, shrouded and +locked up in those rooms, far away in London with the sounds of the +street reaching them faintly, and sometimes a little sunshine, when +the blinds were pulled up and the windows opened from time to time in +pursuance of his original instructions and later reminders. It seemed +as if in his conception of a world not worth touching, and perhaps not +substantial enough to grasp, these objects familiar to his childhood and +his youth, and associated with the memory of an old man, were the only +realities, something having an absolute existence. He would never have +them sold, or even moved from the places they occupied when he looked +upon them last. When he was advised from London that his lease had +expired, and that the house, with some others as like it as two peas, +was to be demolished, he was surprisingly distressed. + +He had entered by then the broad, human path of inconsistencies. Already +the Tropical Belt Coal Company was in existence. He sent instructions +to have some of the things sent out to him at Samburan, just as any +ordinary, credulous person would have done. They came, torn out from +their long repose--a lot of books, some chairs and tables, his father's +portrait in oils, which surprised Heyst by its air of youth, because he +remembered his father as a much older man; a lot of small objects, such +as candlesticks, inkstands, and statuettes from his father's study, +which surprised him because they looked so old and so much worn. + +The manager of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, unpacking them on the +veranda in the shade besieged by a fierce sunshine, must have felt like +a remorseful apostate before these relics. He handled them tenderly; +and it was perhaps their presence there which attached him to the island +when he woke up to the failure of his apostasy. Whatever the decisive +reason, Heyst had remained where another would have been glad to be off. +The excellent Davidson had discovered the fact without discovering the +reason, and took a humane interest in Heyst's strange existence, while +at the same time his native delicacy kept him from intruding on the +other's whim of solitude. He could not possibly guess that Heyst, alone +on the island, felt neither more nor less lonely than in any other +place, desert or populous. Davidson's concern was, if one may express it +so, the danger of spiritual starvation; but this was a spirit which had +renounced all outside nourishment, and was sustaining itself proudly on +its own contempt of the usual coarse ailments which life offers to the +common appetites of men. + +Neither was Heyst's body in danger of starvation, as Schomberg had so +confidently asserted. At the beginning of the company's operations the +island had been provisioned in a manner which had outlasted the need. +Heyst did not need to fear hunger; and his very loneliness had not been +without some alleviation. Of the crowd of imported Chinese labourers, +one at least had remained in Samburan, solitary and strange, like a +swallow left behind at the migrating season of his tribe. + +Wang was not a common coolie. He had been a servant to white men before. +The agreement between him and Heyst consisted in the exchange of a few +words on the day when the last batch of the mine coolies was leaving +Samburan. Heyst, leaning over the balustrade of the veranda, was looking +on, as calm in appearance as though he had never departed from the +doctrine that this world, for the wise, is nothing but an amusing +spectacle. Wang came round the house, and standing below, raised up his +yellow, thin face. + +"All finished?" he asked. Heyst nodded slightly from above, glancing +towards the jetty. A crowd of blue-clad figures with yellow faces and +calves was being hustled down into the boats of the chartered steamer +lying well out, like a painted ship on a painted sea; painted in crude +colours, without shadows, without feeling, with brutal precision. + +"You had better hurry up if you don't want to be left behind." + +But the Chinaman did not move. + +"We stop," he declared. Heyst looked down at him for the first time. + +"You want to stop here?" + +"Yes." + +"What were you? What was your work here?" + +"Mess-loom boy." + +"Do you want to stay with me here as my boy?" inquired Heyst, surprised. + +The Chinaman unexpectedly put on a deprecatory expression, and said, +after a marked pause: + +"Can do." + +"You needn't," said Heyst, "unless you like. I propose to stay on +here--it may be for a very long time. I have no power to make you go if +you wish to remain, but I don't see why you should." + +"Catchee one piecee wife," remarked Wang unemotionally, and marched off, +turning his back on the wharf and the great world beyond, represented by +the steamer waiting for her boats. + +Heyst learned presently that Wang had persuaded one of the women of +Alfuro village, on the west shore of the island, beyond the central +ridge, to come over to live with him in a remote part of the company's +clearing. It was a curious case, inasmuch as the Alfuros, having been +frightened by the sudden invasion of Chinamen, had blocked the path over +the ridge by felling a few trees, and had kept strictly on their own +side. The coolies, as a body, mistrusting the manifest mildness of these +harmless fisher-folk, had kept to their lines, without attempting to +cross the island. Wang was the brilliant exception. He must have been +uncommonly fascinating, in a way that was not apparent to Heyst, or else +uncommonly persuasive. The woman's services to Heyst were limited to +the fact that she had anchored Wang to the spot by her charms, which +remained unknown to the white man, because she never came near the +houses. The couple lived at the edge of the forest, and she could +sometimes be seen gazing towards the bungalow shading her eyes with her +hand. Even from a distance she appeared to be a shy, wild creature, +and Heyst, anxious not to try her primitive nerves unduly, scrupulously +avoided that side of the clearing in his strolls. + +The day--or rather the first night--after his hermit life began, he was +aware of vague sounds of revelry in that direction. Emboldened by the +departure of the invading strangers, some Alfuros, the woman's friends +and relations, had ventured over the ridge to attend something in the +nature of a wedding feast. Wang had invited them. But this was the only +occasion when any sound louder than the buzzing of insects had troubled +the profound silence of the clearing. The natives were never invited +again. Wang not only knew how to live according to conventional +proprieties, but had strong personal views as to the manner of arranging +his domestic existence. After a time Heyst perceived that Wang had +annexed all the keys. Any keys left lying about vanished after Wang had +passed that way. Subsequently some of them--those that did not belong +to the store-rooms and the empty bungalows, and could not be regarded +as the common property of this community of two--were returned to Heyst, +tied in a bunch with a piece of string. He found them one morning +lying by the side of his plate. He had not been inconvenienced by their +absence, because he never locked up anything in the way of drawers and +boxes. Heyst said nothing. Wang also said nothing. Perhaps he had always +been a taciturn man; perhaps he was influenced by the genius of the +locality, which was certainly that of silence. Till Heyst and Morrison +had landed in Black Diamond Bay, and named it, that side of Samburan had +hardly ever heard the sound of human speech. It was easy to be taciturn +with Heyst, who had plunged himself into an abyss of meditation over +books, and remained in it till the shadow of Wang falling across the +page, and the sound of a rough, low voice uttering the Malay word +"makan," would force him to climb out to a meal. + +Wang in his native province in China might have been an aggressively, +sensitively genial person; but in Samburan he had clothed himself in +a mysterious stolidity and did not seem to resent not being spoken to +except in single words, at a rate which did not average half a dozen per +day. And he gave no more than he got. It is to be presumed that if he +suffered he made up for it with the Alfuro woman. He always went back to +her at the first fall of dusk, vanishing from the bungalow suddenly at +this hour, like a sort of topsy-turvy, day-hunting, Chinese ghost with a +white jacket and a pigtail. Presently, giving way to a Chinaman's ruling +passion, he could be observed breaking the ground near his hut, between +the mighty stumps of felled trees, with a miner's pickaxe. After a +time, he discovered a rusty but serviceable spade in one of the empty +store-rooms, and it is to be supposed that he got on famously; but +nothing of it could be seen, because he went to the trouble of pulling +to pieces one of the company's sheds in order to get materials for +making a high and very close fence round his patch, as if the growing +of vegetables were a patented process, or an awful and holy mystery +entrusted to the keeping of his race. + +Heyst, following from a distance the progress of Wang's gardening and of +these precautions--there was nothing else to look at--was amused at +the thought that he, in his own person, represented the market for +its produce. The Chinaman had found several packets of seeds in the +store-rooms, and had surrendered to an irresistible impulse to put them +into the ground. He would make his master pay for the vegetables which +he was raising to satisfy his instinct. And, looking silently at the +silent Wang going about his work in the bungalow in his unhasty, +steady way; Heyst envied the Chinaman's obedience to his instincts, the +powerful simplicity of purpose which made his existence appear almost +automatic in the mysterious precision of its facts. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +During his master's absence at Sourabaya, Wang had busied himself with +the ground immediately in front of the principal bungalow. Emerging +from the fringe of grass growing across the shore end of the coal-jetty, +Heyst beheld a broad, clear space, black and level, with only one or two +clumps of charred twigs, where the flame had swept from the front of his +house to the nearest trees of the forest. + +"You took the risk of firing the grass?" Heyst asked. + +Wang nodded. Hanging on the arm of the white man before whom he stood +was the girl called Alma; but neither from the Chinaman's eyes nor from +his expression could anyone have guessed that he was in the slightest +degree aware of the fact. + +"He has been tidying the place in his labour-saving way," explained +Heyst, without looking at the girl, whose hand rested on his forearm. +"He's the whole establishment, you see. I told you I hadn't even a dog +to keep me company here." + +Wang had marched off towards the wharf. + +"He's like those waiters in that place," she said. That place was +Schomberg's hotel. + +"One Chinaman looks very much like another," Heyst remarked. "We shall +find it useful to have him here. This is the house." + +They faced, at some distance, the six shallow steps leading up to the +veranda. The girl had abandoned Heyst's arm. + +"This is the house," he repeated. + +She did not offer to budge away from his side, but stood staring fixedly +at the steps, as if they had been something unique and impracticable. He +waited a little, but she did not move. + +"Don't you want to go in?" he asked, without turning his head to look at +her. "The sun's too heavy to stand about here." He tried to overcome +a sort of fear, a sort of impatient faintness, and his voice sounded +rough. "You had better go in," he concluded. + +They both moved then, but at the foot of the stairs Heyst stopped, while +the girl went on rapidly, as if nothing could stop her now. She crossed +the veranda swiftly, and entered the twilight of the big central room +opening upon it, and then the deeper twilight of the room beyond. She +stood still in the dusk, in which her dazzled eyes could scarcely make +out the forms of objects, and sighed a sigh of relief. The impression +of the sunlight, of sea and sky, remained with her like a memory of a +painful trial gone through--done with at last! + +Meanwhile Heyst had walked back slowly towards the jetty; but he did not +get so far as that. The practical and automatic Wang had got hold of +one of the little trucks that had been used for running baskets of coal +alongside ships. He appeared pushing it before him, loaded lightly with +Heyst's bag and the bundle of the girl's belongings, wrapped in Mrs. +Schomberg's shawl. Heyst turned about and walked by the side of the +rusty rails on which the truck ran. Opposite the house Wang stopped, +lifted the bag to his shoulder, balanced it carefully, and then took the +bundle in his hand. + +"Leave those things on the table in the big room--understand?" + +"Me savee," grunted Wang, moving off. + +Heyst watched the Chinaman disappear from the veranda. It was not till +he had seen Wang come out that he himself entered the twilight of the +big room. By that time Wang was out of sight at the back of the house, +but by no means out of hearing. The Chinaman could hear the voice of +him who, when there were many people there, was generally referred to +as "Number One." Wang was not able to understand the words, but the tone +interested him. + +"Where are you?" cried Number One. + +Then Wang heard, much more faint, a voice he had never heard before--a +novel impression which he acknowledged by cocking his head slightly to +one side. + +"I am here--out of the sun." + +The new voice sounded remote and uncertain. Wang heard nothing more, +though he waited for some time, very still, the top of his shaven poll +exactly level with the floor of the back veranda. His face meanwhile +preserved an inscrutable immobility. Suddenly he stooped to pick up +the lid of a deal candle-box which was lying on the ground by his foot. +Breaking it up with his fingers, he directed his steps towards the +cook-shed, where, squatting on his heels, he proceeded to kindle a small +fire under a very sooty kettle, possibly to make tea. Wang had some +knowledge of the more superficial rites and ceremonies of white men's +existence, otherwise so enigmatically remote to his mind, and containing +unexpected possibilities of good and evil, which had to be watched for +with prudence and care. + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +That morning, as on all the others of the full tale of mornings since +his return with the girl to Samburan, Heyst came out on the veranda and +spread his elbows on the railing, in an easy attitude of proprietorship. +The bulk of the central ridge of the island cut off the bungalow from +sunrises, whether glorious or cloudy, angry or serene. The dwellers +therein were debarred from reading early the fortune of the new-born +day. It sprang upon them in its fulness with a swift retreat of the +great shadow when the sun, clearing the ridge, looked down, hot and dry, +with a devouring glare like the eye of an enemy. But Heyst, once the +Number One of this locality, while it was comparatively teeming with +mankind, appreciated the prolongation of early coolness, the subdued, +lingering half-light, the faint ghost of the departed night, the +fragrance of its dewy, dark soul captured for a moment longer between +the great glow of the sky and the intense blaze of the uncovered sea. + +It was naturally difficult for Heyst to keep his mind from dwelling on +the nature and consequences of this, his latest departure from the part +of an unconcerned spectator. Yet he had retained enough of his wrecked +philosophy to prevent him from asking himself consciously how it would +end. But at the same time he could not help being temperamentally, from +long habit and from set purpose, a spectator still, perhaps a little +less naive but (as he discovered with some surprise) not much more far +sighted than the common run of men. Like the rest of us who act, all he +could say to himself, with a somewhat affected grimness, was: + +"We shall see!" + +This mood of grim doubt intruded on him only when he was alone. There +were not many such moments in his day now; and he did not like them when +they came. On this morning he had no time to grow uneasy. Alma came out +to join him long before the sun, rising above the Samburan ridge, swept +the cool shadow of the early morning and the remnant of the night's +coolness clear off the roof under which they had dwelt for more than +three months already. She came out as on other mornings. He had heard +her light footsteps in the big room--the room where he had unpacked the +cases from London; the room now lined with the backs of books halfway up +on its three sides. Above the cases the fine matting met the ceiling of +tightly stretched white calico. In the dusk and coolness nothing gleamed +except the gilt frame of the portrait of Heyst's father, signed by a +famous painter, lonely in the middle of a wall. + +Heyst did not turn round. + +"Do you know what I was thinking of?" he asked. + +"No," she said. Her tone betrayed always a shade of anxiety, as though +she were never certain how a conversation with him would end. She leaned +on the guard-rail by his side. + +"No," she repeated. "What was it?" She waited. Then, rather with +reluctance than shyness, she asked: + +"Were you thinking of me?" + +"I was wondering when you would come out," said Heyst, still without +looking at the girl--to whom, after several experimental essays in +combining detached letters and loose syllables, he had given the name of +Lena. + +She remarked after a pause: + +"I was not very far from you." + +"Apparently you were not near enough for me." + +"You could have called if you wanted me," she said. "And I wasn't so +long doing my hair." + +"Apparently it was too long for me." + +"Well, you were thinking of me, anyhow. I am glad of it. Do you know, +it seems to me, somehow, that if you were to stop thinking of me I +shouldn't be in the world at all!" + +He turned round and looked at her. She often said things which surprised +him. A vague smile faded away on her lips before his scrutiny. + +"What is it?" he asked. "Is it a reproach?" + +"A reproach! Why, how could it be?" she defended herself. + +"Well, what did it mean?" he insisted. + +"What I said--just what I said. Why aren't you fair?" + +"Ah, this is at least a reproach!" + +She coloured to the roots of her hair. + +"It looks as if you were trying to make out that I am disagreeable," she +murmured. "Am I? You will make me afraid to open my mouth presently. I +shall end by believing I am no good." + +Her head drooped a little. He looked at her smooth, low brow, the +faintly coloured cheeks, and the red lips parted slightly, with the +gleam of her teeth within. + +"And then I won't be any good," she added with conviction. "That I +won't! I can only be what you think I am." + +He made a slight movement. She put her hand on his arm, without raising +her head, and went on, her voice animated in the stillness of her body: + +"It is so. It couldn't be any other way with a girl like me and a man +like you. Here we are, we two alone, and I can't even tell where we +are." + +"A very well-known spot of the globe," Heyst uttered gently. "There +must have been at least fifty thousand circulars issued at the time--a +hundred and fifty thousand, more likely. My friend was looking after +that, and his ideas were large and his belief very strong. Of us two it +was he who had the faith. A hundred and fifty thousand, certainly." + +"What is it you mean?" she asked in a low tone. + +"What should I find fault with you for?" Heyst went on. "For being +amiable, good, gracious--and pretty?" + +A silence fell. Then she said: + +"It's all right that you should think that of me. There's no one here to +think anything of us, good or bad." + +The rare timbre of her voice gave a special value to what she uttered. +The indefinable emotion which certain intonations gave him, he was +aware, was more physical than moral. Every time she spoke to him she +seemed to abandon to him something of herself--something excessively +subtle and inexpressible, to which he was infinitely sensible, which he +would have missed horribly if she were to go away. While he was looking +into her eyes she raised her bare forearm, out of the short sleeve, and +held it in the air till he noticed it and hastened to pose his great +bronze moustaches on the whiteness of the skin. Then they went in. + +Wang immediately appeared in front, and, squatting on his heels, began +to potter mysteriously about some plants at the foot of the veranda. +When Heyst and the girl came out again, the Chinaman had gone in his +peculiar manner, which suggested vanishing out of existence rather than +out of sight, a process of evaporation rather than of movement. They +descended the steps, looking at each other, and started off smartly +across the cleared ground; but they were not ten yards away when, +without perceptible stir or sound, Wang materialized inside the empty +room. The Chinaman stood still with roaming eyes, examining the walls as +if for signs, for inscriptions; exploring the floor as if for pitfalls, +for dropped coins. Then he cocked his head slightly at the profile of +Heyst's father, pen in hand above a white sheet of paper on a crimson +tablecloth; and, moving forward noiselessly, began to clear away the +breakfast things. + +Though he proceeded without haste, the unerring precision of his +movements, the absolute soundlessness of the operation, gave it +something of the quality of a conjuring trick. And, the trick having +been performed, Wang vanished from the scene, to materialize presently +in front of the house. He materialized walking away from it, with no +visible or guessable intention; but at the end of some ten paces he +stopped, made a half turn, and put his hand up to shade his eyes. The +sun had topped the grey ridge of Samburan. The great morning shadow was +gone; and far away in the devouring sunshine Wang was in time to see +Number One and the woman, two remote white specks against the sombre +line of the forest. In a moment they vanished. With the smallest display +of action, Wang also vanished from the sunlight of the clearing. + +Heyst and Lena entered the shade of the forest path which crossed the +island, and which, near its highest point had been blocked by felled +trees. But their intention was not to go so far. After keeping to the +path for some distance, they left it at a point where the forest was +bare of undergrowth, and the trees, festooned with creepers, stood clear +of one another in the gloom of their own making. Here and there great +splashes of light lay on the ground. They moved, silent in the great +stillness, breathing the calmness, the infinite isolation, the repose of +a slumber without dreams. They emerged at the upper limit of vegetation, +among some rocks; and in a depression of the sharp slope, like a small +platform, they turned about and looked from on high over the sea, +lonely, its colour effaced by sunshine, its horizon a heat mist, a mere +unsubstantial shimmer in the pale and blinding infinity overhung by the +darker blaze of the sky. + +"It makes my head swim," the girl murmured, shutting her eyes and +putting her hand on his shoulder. + +Heyst, gazing fixedly to the southward, exclaimed: + +"Sail ho!" + +A moment of silence ensued. + +"It must be very far away," he went on. "I don't think you could see it. +Some native craft making for the Moluccas, probably. Come, we mustn't +stay here." + +With his arm round her waist, he led her down a little distance, and +they settled themselves in the shade; she, seated on the ground, he a +little lower, reclining at her feet. + +"You don't like to look at the sea from up there?" he said after a time. + +She shook her head. That empty space was to her the abomination of +desolation. But she only said again: + +"It makes my head swim." + +"Too big?" he inquired. + +"Too lonely. It makes my heart sink, too," she added in a low voice, as +if confessing a secret. + +"I'm afraid," said Heyst, "that you would be justified in reproaching me +for these sensations. But what would you have?" + +His tone was playful, but his eyes, directed at her face, were serious. +She protested. + +"I am not feeling lonely with you--not a bit. It is only when we come up +to that place, and I look at all that water and all that light--" + +"We will never come here again, then," he interrupted her. + +She remained silent for a while, returning his gaze till he removed it. + +"It seems as if everything that there is had gone under," she said. + +"Reminds you of the story of the deluge," muttered the man, stretched at +her feet and looking at them. "Are you frightened at it?" + +"I should be rather frightened to be left behind alone. When I say, I, +of course I mean we." + +"Do you?" . . . Heyst remained silent for a while. "The vision of a +world destroyed," he mused aloud. "Would you be sorry for it?" + +"I should be sorry for the happy people in it," she said simply. + +His gaze travelled up her figure and reached her face, where he seemed +to detect the veiled glow of intelligence, as one gets a glimpse of the +sun through the clouds. + +"I should have thought it's they specially who ought to have been +congratulated. Don't you?" + +"Oh, yes--I understand what you mean; but there were forty days before +it was all over." + +"You seem to be in possession of all the details." + +Heyst spoke just to say something rather than to gaze at her in silence. +She was not looking at him. + +"Sunday school," she murmured. "I went regularly from the time I +was eight till I was thirteen. We lodged in the north of London, off +Kingsland Road. It wasn't a bad time. Father was earning good money +then. The woman of the house used to pack me off in the afternoon with +her own girls. She was a good woman. Her husband was in the post office. +Sorter or something. Such a quiet man. He used to go off after supper +for night-duty, sometimes. Then one day they had a row, and broke up the +home. I remember I cried when we had to pack up all of a sudden and go +into other lodgings. I never knew what it was, though--" + +"The deluge," muttered Heyst absently. + +He felt intensely aware of her personality, as if this were the first +moment of leisure he had found to look at her since they had come +together. The peculiar timbre of her voice, with its modulations of +audacity and sadness, would have given interest to the most inane +chatter. But she was no chatterer. She was rather silent, with a +capacity for immobility, an upright stillness, as when resting on the +concert platform between the musical numbers, her feet crossed, her +hands reposing on her lap. But in the intimacy of their life her grey, +unabashed gaze forced upon him the sensation of something inexplicable +reposing within her; stupidity or inspiration, weakness or force--or +simply an abysmal emptiness, reserving itself even in the moments of +complete surrender. + +During a long pause she did not look at him. Then suddenly, as if +the word "deluge" had stuck in her mind, she asked, looking up at the +cloudless sky: + +"Does it ever rain here?" + +"There is a season when it rains almost every day," said Heyst, +surprised. "There are also thunderstorms. We once had a 'mud-shower.'" + +"Mud-shower?" + +"Our neighbour there was shooting up ashes. He sometimes clears his +red-hot gullet like that; and a thunderstorm came along at the +same time. It was very messy; but our neighbour is generally well +behaved--just smokes quietly, as he did that day when I first showed +you the smudge in the sky from the schooner's deck. He's a good-natured, +lazy fellow of a volcano." + +"I saw a mountain smoking like that before," she said, staring at the +slender stem of a tree-fern some dozen feet in front of her. "It wasn't +very long after we left England--some few days, though. I was so ill at +first that I lost count of days. A smoking mountain--I can't think how +they called it." + +"Vesuvius, perhaps," suggested Heyst. + +"That's the name." + +"I saw it, too, years, ages ago," said Heyst. + +"On your way here?" + +"No, long before I ever thought of coming into this part of the world. I +was yet a boy." + +She turned and looked at him attentively, as if seeking to discover some +trace of that boyhood in the mature face of the man with the hair +thin at the top and the long, thick moustaches. Heyst stood the frank +examination with a playful smile, hiding the profound effect these +veiled grey eyes produced--whether on his heart or on his nerves, +whether sensuous or spiritual, tender or irritating, he was unable to +say. + +"Well, princess of Samburan," he said at last, "have I found favour in +your sight?" + +She seemed to wake up, and shook her head. + +"I was thinking," she murmured very low. + +"Thought, action--so many snares! If you begin to think you will be +unhappy." + +"I wasn't thinking of myself!" she declared with a simplicity which took +Heyst aback somewhat. + +"On the lips of a moralist this would sound like a rebuke," he said, +half seriously; "but I won't suspect you of being one. Moralists and I +haven't been friends for many years." + +She had listened with an air of attention. + +"I understood you had no friends," she said. "I am pleased that there's +nobody to find fault with you for what you have done. I like to think +that I am in no one's way." + +Heyst would have said something, but she did not give him time. +Unconscious of the movement he made she went on: + +"What I was thinking to myself was, why are you here?" + +Heyst let himself sink on his elbow again. + +"If by 'you' you mean 'we'--well, you know why we are here." + +She bent her gaze down at him. + +"No, it isn't that. I meant before--all that time before you came across +me and guessed at once that I was in trouble, with no one to turn to. +And you know it was desperate trouble too." + +Her voice fell on the last words, as if she would end there; but there +was something so expectant in Heyst's attitude as he sat at her feet, +looking up at her steadily, that she continued, after drawing a short, +quick breath: + +"It was, really. I told you I had been worried before by bad fellows. +It made me unhappy, disturbed--angry, too. But oh, how I hated, hated, +hated that man!" + +"That man" was the florid Schomberg with the military bearing, +benefactor of white men ('decent food to eat in decent company')--mature +victim of belated passion. The girl shuddered. The characteristic +harmoniousness of her face became, as it were, decomposed for an +instant. Heyst was startled. + +"Why think of it now?" he cried. + +"It's because I was cornered that time. It wasn't as before. It was +worse, ever so much. I wished I could die of my fright--and yet it's +only now that I begin to understand what a horror it might have been. +Yes, only now, since we--" + +Heyst stirred a little. + +"Came here," he finished. + +Her tenseness relaxed, her flushed face went gradually back to its +normal tint. + +"Yes," she said indifferently, but at the same time she gave him a +stealthy glance of passionate appreciation; and then her face took on a +melancholy cast, her whole figure drooped imperceptibly. + +"But you were coming back here anyhow?" she asked. + +"Yes. I was only waiting for Davidson. Yes, I was coming back here, to +these ruins--to Wang, who perhaps did not expect to see me again. It's +impossible to guess at the way that Chinaman draws his conclusions, and +how he looks upon one." + +"Don't talk about him. He makes me feel uncomfortable. Talk about +yourself!" + +"About myself? I see you are still busy with the mystery of my existence +here; but it isn't at all mysterious. Primarily the man with the quill +pen in his hand in that picture you so often look at is responsible for +my existence. He is also responsible for what my existence is, or +rather has been. He was a great man in his way. I don't know much of his +history. I suppose he began like other people; took fine words for good, +ringing coin and noble ideals for valuable banknotes. He was a great +master of both, himself, by the way. Later he discovered--how am I to +explain it to you? Suppose the world were a factory and all mankind +workmen in it. Well, he discovered that the wages were not good enough. +That they were paid in counterfeit money." + +"I see!" the girl said slowly. + +"Do you?" + +Heyst, who had been speaking as if to himself, looked up curiously. + +"It wasn't a new discovery, but he brought his capacity for scorn to +bear on it. It was immense. It ought to have withered this globe. I +don't know how many minds he convinced. But my mind was very young then, +and youth I suppose can be easily seduced--even by a negation. He was +very ruthless, and yet he was not without pity. He dominated me without +difficulty. A heartless man could not have done so. Even to fools he was +not utterly merciless. He could be indignant, but he was too great for +flouts and jeers. What he said was not meant for the crowd; it could not +be; and I was flattered to find myself among the elect. They read his +books, but I have heard his living word. It was irresistible. It was +as if that mind were taking me into its confidence, giving me a special +insight into its mastery of despair. Mistake, no doubt. There is +something of my father in every man who lives long enough. But they +don't say anything. They can't. They wouldn't know how, or perhaps, +they wouldn't speak if they could. Man on this earth is an unforeseen +accident which does not stand close investigation. However, that +particular man died as quietly as a child goes to sleep. But, after +listening to him, I could not take my soul down into the street to fight +there. I started off to wander about, an independent spectator--if that +is possible." + +For a long time the girl's grey eyes had been watching his face. She +discovered that, addressing her, he was really talking to himself. Heyst +looked up, caught sight of her as it were, and caught himself up, with a +low laugh and a change of tone. + +"All this does not tell you why I ever came here. Why, indeed? It's like +prying into inscrutable mysteries which are not worth scrutinizing. A +man drifts. The most successful men have drifted into their successes. +I don't want to tell you that this is a success. You wouldn't believe +me if I did. It isn't; neither is it the ruinous failure it looks. It +proves nothing, unless perhaps some hidden weakness in my character--and +even that is not certain." + +He looked fixedly at her, and with such grave eyes that she felt obliged +to smile faintly at him, since she did not understand what he meant. Her +smile was reflected, still fainter, on his lips. + +"This does not advance you much in your inquiry," he went on. "And in +truth your question is unanswerable; but facts have a certain positive +value, and I will tell you a fact. One day I met a cornered man. I use +the word because it expresses the man's situation exactly, and because +you just used it yourself. You know what that means?" + +"What do you say?" she whispered, astounded. "A man!" + +Heyst laughed at her wondering eyes. + +"No! No! I mean in his own way." + +"I knew very well it couldn't be anything like that," she observed under +her breath. + +"I won't bother you with the story. It was a custom-house affair, +strange as it may sound to you. He would have preferred to be killed +outright--that is, to have his soul dispatched to another world, rather +than to be robbed of his substance, his very insignificant substance, in +this. I saw that he believed in another world because, being cornered, +as I have told you, he went down on his knees and prayed. What do you +think of that?" + +Heyst paused. She looked at him earnestly. + +"You didn't make fun of him for that?" she said. + +Heyst made a brusque movement of protest + +"My dear girl, I am not a ruffian," he cried. Then, returning to his +usual tone: "I didn't even have to conceal a smile. Somehow it didn't +look a smiling matter. No, it was not funny; it was rather pathetic; he +was so representative of all the past victims of the Great Joke. But it +is by folly alone that the world moves, and so it is a respectable thing +upon the whole. And besides, he was what one would call a good man. I +don't mean especially because he had offered up a prayer. No! He was +really a decent fellow, he was quite unfitted for this world, he was a +failure, a good man cornered--a sight for the gods; for no decent mortal +cares to look at that sort." A thought seemed to occur to him. He turned +his face to the girl. "And you, who have been cornered too--did you +think of offering a prayer?" + +Neither her eyes nor a single one of her features moved the least bit. +She only let fall the words: + +"I am not what they call a good girl." + +"That sounds evasive," said Heyst after a short silence. "Well, the good +fellow did pray and after he had confessed to it I was struck by the +comicality of the situation. No, don't misunderstand me--I am not +alluding to his act, of course. And even the idea of Eternity, Infinity, +Omnipotence, being called upon to defeat the conspiracy of two miserable +Portuguese half-castes did not move my mirth. From the point of view of +the supplicant, the danger to be conjured was something like the end +of the world, or worse. No! What captivated my fancy was that I, Axel +Heyst, the most detached of creatures in this earthly captivity, the +veriest tramp on this earth, an indifferent stroller going through the +world's bustle--that I should have been there to step into the situation +of an agent of Providence. I, a man of universal scorn and unbelief. . . +." + +"You are putting it on," she interrupted in her seductive voice, with a +coaxing intonation. + +"No. I am not like that, born or fashioned, or both. I am not for +nothing the son of my father, of that man in the painting. I am he, all +but the genius. And there is even less in me than I make out, because +the very scorn is falling away from me year after year. I have never +been so amused as by that episode in which I was suddenly called to act +such an incredible part. For a moment I enjoyed it greatly. It got him +out of his corner, you know." + +"You saved a man for fun--is that what you mean? Just for fun?" + +"Why this tone of suspicion?" remonstrated Heyst. "I suppose the sight +of this particular distress was disagreeable to me. What you call fun +came afterwards, when it dawned on me that I was for him a walking, +breathing, incarnate proof of the efficacy of prayer. I was a little +fascinated by it--and then, could I have argued with him? You don't +argue against such evidence, and besides it would have looked as if +I had wanted to claim all the merit. Already his gratitude was simply +frightful. Funny position, wasn't it? The boredom came later, when we +lived together on board his ship. I had, in a moment of inadvertence, +created for myself a tie. How to define it precisely I don't know. One +gets attached in a way to people one has done something for. But is that +friendship? I am not sure what it was. I only know that he who forms a +tie is lost. The germ of corruption has entered into his soul." + +Heyst's tone was light, with the flavour of playfulness which seasoned +all his speeches and seemed to be of the very essence of his thoughts. +The girl he had come across, of whom he had possessed himself, to whose +presence he was not yet accustomed, with whom he did not yet know how to +live; that human being so near and still so strange, gave him a greater +sense of his own reality than he had ever known in all his life. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +With her knees drawn up, Lena rested her elbows on them and held her +head in both her hands. + +"Are you tired of sitting here?" Heyst asked. + +An almost imperceptible negative movement of the head was all the answer +she made. + +"Why are you looking so serious?" he pursued, and immediately thought +that habitual seriousness, in the long run, was much more bearable than +constant gaiety. "However, this expression suits you exceedingly," he +added, not diplomatically, but because, by the tendency of his taste, +it was a true statement. "And as long as I can be certain that it is not +boredom which gives you this severe air, I am willing to sit here and +look at you till you are ready to go." + +And this was true. He was still under the fresh sortilege of their +common life, the surprise of novelty, the flattered vanity of his +possession of this woman; for a man must feel that, unless he has ceased +to be masculine. Her eyes moved in his direction, rested on him, +then returned to their stare into the deeper gloom at the foot of the +straight tree-trunks, whose spreading crowns were slowly withdrawing +their shade. The warm air stirred slightly about her motionless head. +She would not look at him, from some obscure fear of betraying herself. +She felt in her innermost depths an irresistible desire to give herself +up to him more completely, by some act of absolute sacrifice. This was +something of which he did not seem to have an idea. He was a strange +being without needs. She felt his eyes fixed upon her; and as he kept +silent, she said uneasily--for she didn't know what his silences might +mean: + +"And so you lived with that friend--that good man?" + +"Excellent fellow," Heyst responded, with a readiness that she did not +expect. "But it was a weakness on my part. I really didn't want to, only +he wouldn't let me off, and I couldn't explain. He was the sort of man +to whom you can't explain anything. He was extremely sensitive, and it +would have been a tigerish thing to do to mangle his delicate feelings +by the sort of plain speaking that would have been necessary. His +mind was like a white-walled, pure chamber, furnished with, say, six +straw-bottomed chairs, and he was always placing and displacing them +in various combinations. But they were always the same chairs. He was +extremely easy to live with; but then he got hold of this coal idea--or, +rather, the idea got hold of him, it entered into that scantily +furnished chamber of which I have just spoken, and sat on all the +chairs. There was no dislodging it, you know! It was going to make his +fortune, my fortune, everybody's fortune. In past years, in moments of +doubt that will come to a man determined to remain free from absurdities +of existence, I often asked myself, with a momentary dread, in what way +would life try to get hold of me? And this was the way. He got it into +his head that he could do nothing without me. And was I now, he asked +me, to spurn and ruin him? Well, one morning--I wonder if he had gone +down on his knees to pray that night!--one morning I gave in." + +Heyst tugged violently at a tuft of dried grass, and cast it away from +him with a nervous gesture. + +"I gave in," he repeated. + +Looking towards him with a movement of her eyes only, the girl noticed +the strong feeling on his face with that intense interest which his +person awakened in her mind and in her heart. But it soon passed away, +leaving only a moody expression. + +"It's difficult to resist where nothing matters," he observed. "And +perhaps there is a grain of freakishness in my nature. It amused me +to go about uttering silly, commonplace phrases. I was never so well +thought of in the islands till I began to jabber commercial gibberish +like the veriest idiot. Upon my word, I believe that I was actually +respected for a time. I was as grave as an owl over it; I had to be +loyal to the man. I have been, from first to last, completely, utterly +loyal to the best of my ability. I thought he understood something about +coal. And if I had been aware that he knew nothing of it, as in fact he +didn't, well--I don't know what I could have done to stop him. In one +way or another I should have had to be loyal. Truth, work, ambition, +love itself, may be only counters in the lamentable or despicable game +of life, but when one takes a hand one must play the game. No, the shade +of Morrison needn't haunt me. What's the matter? I say, Lena, why are +you staring like that? Do you feel ill?" + +Heyst made as if to get on his feet. The girl extended her arm to arrest +him, and he remained staring in a sitting posture, propped on one arm, +observing her indefinable expression of anxiety, as if she were unable +to draw breath. + +"What has come to you?" he insisted, feeling strangely unwilling to +move, to touch her. + +"Nothing!" She swallowed painfully. "Of course it can't be. What name +did you say? I didn't hear it properly." + +"Name?" repeated Heyst dazedly. "I only mentioned Morrison. It's the +name of that man of whom I've been speaking. What of it?" + +"And you mean to say that he was your friend?" + +"You have heard enough to judge for yourself. You know as much of our +connection as I know myself. The people in this part of the world +went by appearances, and called us friends, as far as I can remember. +Appearances--what more, what better can you ask for? In fact you can't +have better. You can't have anything else." + +"You are trying to confuse me with your talk," she cried. "You can't +make fun of this." + +"Can't? Well, no I can't. It's a pity. Perhaps it would have been the +best way," said Heyst, in a tone which for him could be called gloomy. +"Unless one could forget the silly business altogether." His faint +playfulness of manner and speech returned, like a habit one has schooled +oneself into, even before his forehead had cleared completely. "But why +are you looking so hard at me? Oh, I don't object, and I shall try not +to flinch. Your eyes--" + +He was looking straight into them, and as a matter of fact had forgotten +all about the late Morrison at that moment. + +"No," he exclaimed suddenly. "What an impenetrable girl you are Lena, +with those grey eyes of yours! Windows of the soul, as some poet has +said. The fellow must have been a glazier by vocation. Well, nature has +provided excellently for the shyness of your soul." + +When he ceased speaking, the girl came to herself with a catch of her +breath. He heard her voice, the varied charm of which he thought he knew +so well, saying with an unfamiliar intonation: + +"And that partner of yours is dead?" + +"Morrison? Oh, yes, as I've told you, he--" + +"You never told me." + +"Didn't I? I thought I did; or, rather, I thought you must know. It +seems impossible that anybody with whom I speak should not know that +Morrison is dead." + +She lowered her eyelids, and Heyst was startled by something like an +expression of horror on her face. + +"Morrison!" she whispered in an appalled tone. "Morrison!" Her head +drooped. Unable to see her features, Heyst could tell from her voice +that for some reason or other she was profoundly moved by the syllables +of that unromantic name. A thought flashed through his head--could she +have known Morrison? But the mere difference of their origins made it +wildly improbable. + +"This is very extraordinary!" he said. "Have you ever heard the name +before?" + +Her head moved quickly several times in tiny affirmative nods, as if she +could not trust herself to speak, or even to look at him. She was biting +her lower lip. + +"Did you ever know anybody of that name?" he asked. + +The girl answered by a negative sign; and then at last she spoke, +jerkily, as if forcing herself against some doubt or fear. She had heard +of that very man, she told Heyst. + +"Impossible!" he said positively. "You are mistaken. You couldn't have +heard of him, it's--" + +He stopped short, with the thought that to talk like this was perfectly +useless; that one doesn't argue against thin air. + +"But I did hear of him; only I didn't know then, I couldn't guess, that +it was your partner they were talking about." + +"Talking about my partner?" repeated Heyst slowly. + +"No." Her mind seemed almost as bewildered, as full of incredulity, as +his. "No. They were talking of you really; only I didn't know it." + +"Who were they?" Heyst raised his voice. "Who was talking of me? Talking +where?" + +With the first question he had lifted himself from his reclining +position; at the last he was on his knees before her, their heads on a +level. + +"Why, in that town, in that hotel. Where else could it have been?" she +said. + +The idea of being talked about was always novel to Heyst's simplified +conception of himself. For a moment he was as much surprised as if he +had believed himself to be a mere gliding shadow among men. Besides, +he had in him a half-unconscious notion that he was above the level of +island gossip. + +"But you said first that it was of Morrison they talked," he remarked to +the girl, sinking on his heels, and no longer much interested. "Strange +that you should have the opportunity to hear any talk at all! I was +rather under the impression that you never saw anybody belonging to the +town except from the platform." + +"You forget that I was not living with the other girls," she said. +"After meals they used to go back to the Pavilion, but I had to stay in +the hotel and do my sewing, or what not, in the room where they talked." + +"I didn't think of that. By the by, you never told me who they were." + +"Why, that horrible red-faced beast," she said, with all the energy of +disgust which the mere thought of the hotel-keeper provoked in her. + +"Oh, Schomberg!" Heyst murmured carelessly. + +"He talked to the boss--to Zangiacomo, I mean. I had to sit there. That +devil-woman sometimes wouldn't let me go away. I mean Mrs. Zangiacomo." + +"I guessed," murmured Heyst. "She liked to torment you in a variety +of ways. But it is really strange that the hotel-keeper should talk of +Morrison to Zangiacomo. As far as I can remember he saw very little of +Morrison professionally. He knew many others much better." + +The girl shuddered slightly. + +"That was the only name I ever overheard. I would get as far away from +them as I could, to the other end of the room, but when that beast +started shouting I could not help hearing. I wish I had never heard +anything. If I had got up and gone out of the room I don't suppose the +woman would have killed me for it; but she would have rowed me in a +nasty way. She would have threatened me and called me names. That sort, +when they know you are helpless, there's nothing to stop them. I don't +know how it is, but bad people, real bad people that you can see are +bad, they get over me somehow. It's the way they set about downing one. +I am afraid of wickedness." + +Heyst watched the changing expressions of her face. He encouraged her, +profoundly sympathetic, a little amused. + +"I quite understand. You needn't apologize for your great delicacy in +the perception of inhuman evil. I am a little like you." + +"I am not very plucky," she said. + +"Well! I don't know myself what I would do, what countenance I would +have before a creature which would strike me as being evil incarnate. +Don't you be ashamed!" + +She sighed, looked up with her pale, candid gaze and a timid expression +on her face, and murmured: + +"You don't seem to want to know what he was saying." + +"About poor Morrison? It couldn't have been anything bad, for the poor +fellow was innocence itself. And then, you know, he is dead, and nothing +can possibly matter to him now." + +"But I tell you that it was of you he was talking!" she cried. + +"He was saying that Morrison's partner first got all there was to get +out of him, and then, and then--well, as good as murdered him--sent him +out to die somewhere!" + +"You believe that of me?" said Heyst, after a moment of perfect silence. + +"I didn't know it had anything to do with you. Schomberg was talking +of some Swede. How was I to know? It was only when you began telling me +about how you came here--" + +"And now you have my version." Heyst forced himself to speak quietly. +"So that's how the business looked from outside!" he muttered. + +"I remember him saying that everybody in these parts knew the story," +the girl added breathlessly. + +"Strange that it should hurt me!" mused Heyst to himself; "yet it does. +I seem to be as much of a fool as those everybodies who know the story +and no doubt believe it. Can you remember any more?" he addressed the +girl in a grimly polite tone. "I've often heard of the moral advantages +of seeing oneself as others see one. Let us investigate further. Can't +you recall something else that everybody knows?" + +"Oh! Don't laugh!" she cried. + +"Did I laugh? I assure you I was not aware of it. I won't ask you +whether you believe the hotel-keeper's version. Surely you must know the +value of human judgement!" + +She unclasped her hands, moved them slightly, and twined her fingers as +before. Protest? Assent? Was there to be nothing more? He was relieved +when she spoke in that warm and wonderful voice which in itself +comforted and fascinated one's heart, which made her lovable. + +"I heard this before you and I ever spoke to each other. It went out of +my memory afterwards. Everything went out of my memory then; and I was +glad of it. It was a fresh start for me, with you--and you know it. I +wish I had forgotten who I was--that would have been best; and I very +nearly did forget." + +He was moved by the vibrating quality of the last words. She seemed to +be talking low of some wonderful enchantment, in mysterious terms of +special significance. He thought that if she only could talk to him +in some unknown tongue, she would enslave him altogether by the sheer +beauty of the sound, suggesting infinite depths of wisdom and feeling. + +"But," she went on, "the name stuck in my head, it seems; and when you +mentioned it--" + +"It broke the spell," muttered Heyst in angry disappointment as if he +had been deceived in some hope. + +The girl, from her position a little above him, surveyed with still +eyes the abstracted silence of the man on whom she now depended with +a completeness of which she had not been vividly conscious before, +because, till then, she had never felt herself swinging between the +abysses of earth and heaven in the hollow of his arm. What if he should +grow weary of the burden? + +"And, moreover, nobody had ever believed that tale!" + +Heyst came out with an abrupt burst of sound which made her open her +steady eyes wider, with an effect of immense surprise. It was a purely +mechanical effect, because she was neither surprised nor puzzled. In +fact, she could understand him better then than at any moment since she +first set eyes on him. + +He laughed scornfully. + +"What am I thinking of?" he cried. "As if it could matter to me what +anybody had ever said or believed, from the beginning of the world till +the crack of doom!" + +"I never heard you laugh till today," she observed. "This is the second +time!" + +He scrambled to his feet and towered above her. + +"That's because, when one's heart has been broken into in the way you +have broken into mine, all sorts of weaknesses are free to enter--shame, +anger, stupid indignation, stupid fears--stupid laughter, too. I wonder +what interpretation you are putting on it?" + +"It wasn't gay, certainly," she said. "But why are you angry with me? +Are you sorry you took me away from those beasts? I told you who I was. +You could see it." + +"Heavens!" he muttered. He had regained his command of himself. "I +assure you I could see much more than you could tell me. I could see +quite a lot that you don't even suspect yet, but you can't be seen quite +through." + +He sank to the ground by her side and took her hand. She asked gently: + +"What more do you want from me?" + +He made no sound for a time. + +"The impossible, I suppose," he said very low, as one makes a +confidence, and pressing the hand he grasped. + +It did not return the pressure. He shook his head as if to drive away +the thought of this, and added in a louder, light tone: + +"Nothing less. And it isn't because I think little of what I've got +already. Oh, no! It is because I think so much of this possession of +mine that I can't have it complete enough. I know it's unreasonable. You +can't hold back anything--now." + +"Indeed I couldn't," she whispered, letting her hand lie passive in his +tight grasp. "I only wish I could give you something more, or better, or +whatever it is you want." + +He was touched by the sincere accent of these simple words. + +"I tell you what you can do--you can tell me whether you would have gone +with me like this if you had known of whom that abominable idiot of a +hotel-keeper was speaking. A murderer--no less!" + +"But I didn't know you at all then," she cried. "And I had the sense to +understand what he was saying. It wasn't murder, really. I never thought +it was." + +"What made him invent such an atrocity?" Heyst exclaimed. "He seems +a stupid animal. He is stupid. How did he manage to hatch that pretty +tale? Have I a particularly vile countenance? Is black selfishness +written all over my face? Or is that sort of thing so universally human +that it might be said of anybody?" + +"It wasn't murder," she insisted earnestly. + +"I know. I understand. It was worse. As to killing a man, which would be +a comparatively decent thing to do, well--I have never done that." + +"Why should you do it?" she asked in a frightened voice. + +"My dear girl, you don't know the sort of life I have been leading in +unexplored countries, in the wilds; it's difficult to give you an idea. +There are men who haven't been in such tight places as I have found +myself in who have had to--to shed blood, as the saying is. Even the +wilds hold prizes which tempt some people; but I had no schemes, no +plans--and not even great firmness of mind to make me unduly obstinate. +I was simply moving on, while the others, perhaps, were going somewhere. +An indifference as to roads and purposes makes one meeker, as it were. +And I may say truly, too, that I never did care, I won't say for life--I +had scorned what people call by that name from the first--but for being +alive. I don't know if that is what men call courage, but I doubt it +very much." + +"You! You have no courage?" she protested. + +"I really don't know. Not the sort that always itches for a weapon, for +I have never been anxious to use one in the quarrels that a man gets +into in the most innocent way sometimes. The differences for which +men murder each other are, like everything else they do, the most +contemptible, the most pitiful things to look back upon. No, I've never +killed a man or loved a woman--not even in my thoughts, not even in my +dreams." + +He raised her hand to his lips, and let them rest on it for a space, +during which she moved a little closer to him. After the lingering kiss +he did not relinquish his hold. + +"To slay, to love--the greatest enterprises of life upon a man! And I +have no experience of either. You must forgive me anything that may have +appeared to you awkward in my behaviour, inexpressive in my speeches, +untimely in my silences." + +He moved uneasily, a little disappointed by her attitude, but indulgent +to it, and feeling, in this moment of perfect quietness, that in holding +her surrendered hand he had found a closer communion than they had ever +achieved before. But even then there still lingered in him a sense of +incompleteness not altogether overcome--which, it seemed, nothing ever +would overcome--the fatal imperfection of all the gifts of life, which +makes of them a delusion and a snare. + +All of a sudden he squeezed her hand angrily. His delicately playful +equanimity, the product of kindness and scorn, had perished with the +loss of his bitter liberty. + +"Not murder, you say! I should think not. But when you led me to talk +just now, when the name turned up, when you understood that it was of me +that these things had been said, you showed a strange emotion. I could +see it." + +"I was a bit startled," she said. + +"At the baseness of my conduct?" he asked. + +"I wouldn't judge you, not for anything." + +"Really?" + +"It would be as if I dared to judge everything that there is." With her +other hand she made a gesture that seemed to embrace in one movement the +earth and the heaven. "I wouldn't do such a thing." + +Then came a silence, broken at last by Heyst: + +"I! I! do a deadly wrong to my poor Morrison!" he cried. "I, who could +not bear to hurt his feelings. I, who respected his very madness! Yes, +this madness, the wreck of which you can see lying about the jetty of +Diamond Bay. What else could I do? He insisted on regarding me as his +saviour; he was always restraining the eternal obligation on the tip of +his tongue, till I was burning with shame at his gratitude. What could I +do? He was going to repay me with this infernal coal, and I had to join +him as one joins a child's game in a nursery. One would no more have +thought of humiliating him than one would think of humiliating a child. +What's the use of talking of all this! Of course, the people here +could not understand the truth of our relation to each other. But what +business of theirs was it? Kill old Morrison! Well, it is less criminal, +less base--I am not saying it is less difficult--to kill a man than to +cheat him in that way. You understand that?" + +She nodded slightly, but more than once and with evident conviction. His +eyes rested on her, inquisitive, ready for tenderness. + +"But it was neither one nor the other," he went on. "Then, why your +emotion? All you confess is that you wouldn't judge me." + +She turned upon him her veiled, unseeing grey eyes in which nothing of +her wonder could be read. + +"I said I couldn't," she whispered. + +"But you thought that there was no smoke without fire!" the playfulness +of tone hardly concealed his irritation. "What power there must be in +words, only imperfectly heard--for you did not listen with particular +care, did you? What were they? What evil effort of invention drove them +into that idiot's mouth out of his lying throat? If you were to try to +remember, they would perhaps convince me, too." + +"I didn't listen," she protested. "What was it to me what they said of +anybody? He was saying that there never were such loving friends to +look at as you two; then, when you got all you wanted out of him and got +thoroughly tired of him, too, you kicked him out to go home and die." + +Indignation, with an undercurrent of some other feeling, rang in these +quoted words, uttered in her pure and enchanting voice. She ceased +abruptly and lowered her long, dark lashes, as if mortally weary, sick +at heart. + +"Of course, why shouldn't you get tired of that or any other--company? +You aren't like anyone else, and--and the thought of it made me unhappy +suddenly; but indeed, I did not believe anything bad of you. I--" + +A brusque movement of his arm, flinging her hand away, stopped her +short. Heyst had again lost control of himself. He would have shouted, +if shouting had been in his character. + +"No, this earth must be the appointed hatching planet of calumny enough +to furnish the whole universe. I feel a disgust at my own person, as if +I had tumbled into some filthy hole. Pah! And you--all you can say is +that you won't judge me; that you--" + +She raised her head at this attack, though indeed he had not turned to +her. + +"I don't believe anything bad of you," she repeated. "I couldn't." + +He made a gesture as if to say: + +"That's sufficient." + +In his soul and in his body he experienced a nervous reaction from +tenderness. All at once, without transition, he detested her. But only +for a moment. He remembered that she was pretty, and, more, that she +had a special grace in the intimacy of life. She had the secret of +individuality which excites--and escapes. + +He jumped up and began to walk to and fro. Presently his hidden fury +fell into dust within him, like a crazy structure, leaving behind +emptiness, desolation, regret. His resentment was not against the girl, +but against life itself--that commonest of snares, in which he felt +himself caught, seeing clearly the plot of plots and unconsoled by the +lucidity of his mind. + +He swerved and, stepping up to her, sank to the ground by her side. +Before she could make a movement or even turn her head his way, he took +her in his arms and kissed her lips. He tasted on them the bitterness +of a tear fallen there. He had never seen her cry. It was like another +appeal to his tenderness--a new seduction. The girl glanced round, +moved suddenly away, and averted her face. With her hand she signed +imperiously to him to leave her alone--a command which Heyst did not +obey. + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +When she opened her eyes at last and sat up, Heyst scrambled quickly to +his feet and went to pick up her cork helmet, which had rolled a little +way off. Meanwhile she busied herself in doing up her hair, plaited on +the top of her head in two heavy, dark tresses, which had come loose. He +tendered her the helmet in silence, and waited as if unwilling to hear +the sound of his own voice. + +"We had better go down now," he suggested in a low tone. + +He extended his hand to help her up. He had the intention to smile, +but abandoned it at the nearer sight of her still face, in which was +depicted the infinite lassitude of her soul. On their way to regain the +forest path they had to pass through the spot from which the view of +the sea could be obtained. The flaming abyss of emptiness, the liquid, +undulating glare, the tragic brutality of the light, made her long for +the friendly night, with its stars stilled by an austere spell; for the +velvety dark sky and the mysterious great shadow of the sea, conveying +peace to the day-weary heart. She put her hand to her eyes. Behind her +back Heyst spoke gently. + +"Let us get on, Lena." + +She walked ahead in silence. Heyst remarked that they had never been +out before during the hottest hours. It would do her no good, he feared. +This solicitude pleased and soothed her. She felt more and more like +herself--a poor London girl playing in an orchestra, and snatched out +from the humiliations, the squalid dangers of a miserable existence, +by a man like whom there was not, there could not be, another in this +world. She felt this with elation, with uneasiness, with an intimate +pride--and with a peculiar sinking of the heart. + +"I am not easily knocked out by any such thing as heat," she said +decisively. + +"Yes, but I don't forget that you're not a tropical bird." + +"You weren't born in these parts, either," she returned. + +"No, and perhaps I haven't even your physique. I am a transplanted +being. Transplanted! I ought to call myself uprooted--an unnatural state +of existence; but a man is supposed to stand anything." + +She looked back at him and received a smile. He told her to keep in the +shelter of the forest path, which was very still and close, full of heat +if free from glare. Now and then they had glimpses of the company's old +clearing blazing with light, in which the black stumps of trees stood +charred, without shadows, miserable and sinister. They crossed the open +in a direct line for the bungalow. On the veranda they fancied they had +a glimpse of the vanishing Wang, though the girl was not at all sure +that she had seen anything move. Heyst had no doubts. + +"Wang has been looking out for us. We are late." + +"Was he? I thought I saw something white for a moment, and then I did +not see it any more." + +"That's it--he vanishes. It's a very remarkable gift in that Chinaman." + +"Are they all like that?" she asked with naive curiosity and uneasiness. + +"Not in such perfection," said Heyst, amused. + +He noticed with approval that she was not heated by the walk. The drops +of perspiration on her forehead were like dew on the cool, white petal +of a flower. He looked at her figure of grace and strength, solid and +supple, with an ever-growing appreciation. + +"Go in and rest yourself for a quarter of an hour; and then Mr. Wang +will give us something to eat," he said. + +They had found the table laid. When they came together again and sat +down to it, Wang materialized without a sound, unheard, uncalled, and +did his office. Which being accomplished, at a given moment he was not. + +A great silence brooded over Samburan--the silence of the great heat +that seems pregnant with fatal issues, like the silence of ardent +thought. Heyst remained alone in the big room. The girl seeing him +take up a book, had retreated to her chamber. Heyst sat down under +his father's portrait; and the abominable calumny crept back into his +recollection. The taste of it came on his lips, nauseating and corrosive +like some kinds of poison. He was tempted to spit on the floor, naively, +in sheer unsophisticated disgust of the physical sensation. He shook his +head, surprised at himself. He was not used to receive his intellectual +impressions in that way--reflected in movements of carnal emotion. He +stirred impatiently in his chair, and raised the book to his eyes with +both hands. It was one of his father's. He opened it haphazard, and +his eyes fell on the middle of the page. The elder Heyst had written of +everything in many books--of space and of time, of animals and of stars; +analysing ideas and actions, the laughter and the frowns of men, and the +grimaces of their agony. The son read, shrinking into himself, composing +his face as if under the author's eye, with a vivid consciousness of +the portrait on his right hand, a little above his head; a wonderful +presence in its heavy frame on the flimsy wall of mats, looking exiled +and at home, out of place and masterful, in the painted immobility of +profile. + +And Heyst, the son, read: + +Of the stratagems of life the most cruel is the consolation of love--the +most subtle, too; for the desire is the bed of dreams. + +He turned the pages of the little volume, "Storm and Dust," glancing +here and there at the broken text of reflections, maxims, short phrases, +enigmatical sometimes and sometimes eloquent. It seemed to him that he +was hearing his father's voice, speaking and ceasing to speak again. +Startled at first, he ended by finding a charm in the illusion. He +abandoned himself to the half-belief that something of his father dwelt +yet on earth--a ghostly voice, audible to the ear of his own flesh and +blood. With what strange serenity, mingled with terrors, had that man +considered the universal nothingness! He had plunged into it headlong, +perhaps to render death, the answer that faced one at every inquiry, +more supportable. + +Heyst stirred, and the ghostly voice ceased; but his eyes followed the +words on the last page of the book: + +Men of tormented conscience, or of a criminal imagination, are aware of +much that minds of a peaceful, resigned cast do not even suspect. It is +not poets alone who dare descend into the abyss of infernal regions, or +even who dream of such a descent. The most inexpressive of human beings +must have said to himself, at one time or another: "Anything but this!" +. . . + +We all have our instants of clairvoyance. They are not very helpful. +The character of the scheme does not permit that or anything else to +be helpful. Properly speaking its character, judged by the standards +established by its victims, is infamous. It excuses every violence of +protest and at the same time never fails to crush it, just as it +crushes the blindest assent. The so-called wickedness must be, like the +so-called virtue, its own reward--to be anything at all . . . + +Clairvoyance or no clairvoyance, men love their captivity. To the +unknown force of negation they prefer the miserably tumbled bed of their +servitude. Man alone can give one the disgust of pity; yet I find it +easier to believe in the misfortune of mankind than in its wickedness. + +These were the last words. Heyst lowered the book to his knees. Lena's +voice spoke above his drooping head: + +"You sit there as if you were unhappy." + +"I thought you were asleep," he said. + +"I was lying down right enough, but I never closed my eyes." + +"The rest would have done you good after our walk. Didn't you try?" + +"I was lying down, I tell you, but sleep I couldn't." + +"And you made no sound! What want of sincerity. Or did you want to be +alone for a time?" + +"I--alone?" she murmured. + +He noticed her eyeing the book, and got up to put it back in the +bookcase. When he turned round, he saw that she had dropped into the +chair--it was the one she always used--and looked as if her strength had +suddenly gone from her, leaving her only her youth, which seemed very +pathetic, very much at his mercy. He moved quickly towards the chair. + +"Tired, are you? It's my fault, taking you up so high and keeping you +out so long. Such a windless day, too!" + +She watched his concern, her pose languid, her eyes raised to him, +but as unreadable as ever. He avoided looking into them for that very +reason. He forgot himself in the contemplation of those passive arms, of +these defenceless lips, and--yes, one had to go back to them--of these +wide-open eyes. Something wild in their grey stare made him think of +sea-birds in the cold murkiness of high latitudes. He started when she +spoke, all the charm of physical intimacy revealed suddenly in that +voice. + +"You should try to love me!" she said. + +He made a movement of astonishment. + +"Try," he muttered. "But it seems to me--" He broke off, saying to +himself that if he loved her, he had never told her so in so many words. +Simple words! They died on his lips. "What makes you say that?" he +asked. + +She lowered her eyelids and turned her head a little. + +"I have done nothing," she said in a low voice. "It's you who have been +good, helpful, and tender to me. Perhaps you love me for that--just +for that; or perhaps you love me for company, and because--well! But +sometimes it seems to me that you can never love me for myself, only +for myself, as people do love each other when it is to be for ever." +Her head drooped. "Forever," she breathed out again; then, still more +faintly, she added an entreating: "Do try!" + +These last words went straight to his heart--the sound of them more than +the sense. He did not know what to say, either from want of practice in +dealing with women or simply from his innate honesty of thought. All +his defences were broken now. Life had him fairly by the throat. But he +managed a smile, though she was not looking at him; yes, he did manage +it--the well-known Heyst smile of playful courtesy, so familiar to all +sorts and conditions of men in the islands. + +"My dear Lena," he said, "it looks as if you were trying to pick a very +unnecessary quarrel with me--of all people!" + +She made no movement. With his elbows spread out he was twisting the +ends of his long moustaches, very masculine and perplexed, enveloped in +the atmosphere of femininity as in a cloud, suspecting pitfalls, and as +if afraid to move. + +"I must admit, though," he added, "that there is no one else; and I +suppose a certain amount of quarrelling is necessary for existence in +this world." + +That girl, seated in her chair in graceful quietude, was to him like a +script in an unknown language, or even more simply mysterious, like +any writing to the illiterate. As far as women went he was altogether +uninstructed and he had not the gift of intuition which is fostered in +the days of youth by dreams and visions, exercises of the heart fitting +it for the encounters of a world, in which love itself rests as much +on antagonism as on attraction. His mental attitude was that of a man +looking this way and that on a piece of writing which he is unable to +decipher, but which may be big with some revelation. He didn't know what +to say. All he found to add was: + +"I don't even understand what I have done or left undone to distress you +like this." + +He stopped, struck afresh by the physical and moral sense of the +imperfections of their relations--a sense which made him desire her +constant nearness, before his eyes, under his hand, and which, when +she was out of his sight, made her so vague, so elusive and illusory, a +promise that could not be embraced and held. + +"No! I don't see clearly what you mean. Is your mind turned towards the +future?" he interpellated her with marked playfulness, because he +was ashamed to let such a word pass his lips. But all his cherished +negations were falling off him one by one. + +"Because if it is so there is nothing easier than to dismiss it. In our +future, as in what people call the other life, there is nothing to be +frightened of." + +She raised her eyes to him; and if nature had formed them to express +anything else but blank candour he would have learned how terrified +she was by his talk and the fact that her sinking heart loved him more +desperately than ever. He smiled at her. + +"Dismiss all thought of it," he insisted. "Surely you don't suspect +after what I have heard from you, that I am anxious to return to +mankind. I! I! murder my poor Morrison! It's possible that I may be +really capable of that which they say I have done. The point is that I +haven't done it. But it is an unpleasant subject to me. I ought to be +ashamed to confess it--but it is! Let us forget it. There's that in you, +Lena, which can console me for worse things, for uglier passages. And if +we forget, there are no voices here to remind us." + +She had raised her head before he paused. + +"Nothing can break in on us here," he went on and, as if there had been +an appeal or a provocation in her upward glance, he bent down and took +her under the arms, raising her straight out of the chair into a sudden +and close embrace. Her alacrity to respond, which made her seem as light +as a feather, warmed his heart at that moment more than closer caresses +had done before. He had not expected that ready impulse towards himself +which had been dormant in her passive attitude. He had just felt the +clasp of her arms round his neck, when, with a slight exclamation--"He's +here!"--she disengaged herself and bolted, away into her room. + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +Heyst was astounded. Looking all round, as if to take the whole room +to witness of this outrage, he became aware of Wang materialized in the +doorway. The intrusion was as surprising as anything could be, in view +of the strict regularity with which Wang made himself visible. Heyst +was tempted to laugh at first. This practical comment on his affirmation +that nothing could break in on them relieved the strain of his feelings. +He was a little vexed, too. The Chinaman preserved a profound silence. + +"What do you want?" asked Heyst sternly. + +"Boat out there," said the Chinaman. + +"Where? What do you mean? Boat adrift in the straits?" + +Some subtle change in Wang's bearing suggested his being out of breath; +but he did not pant, and his voice was steady. + +"No--row." + +It was Heyst now who was startled and raised his voice. + +"Malay man, eh?" + +Wang made a slight negative movement with his head. + +"Do you hear, Lena?" Heyst called out. "Wang says there is a boat in +sight--somewhere near apparently. Where's that boat Wang?" + +"Round the point," said Wang, leaping into Malay unexpectedly, and in a +loud voice. "White men three." + +"So close as that?" exclaimed Heyst, moving out on the veranda followed +by Wang. "White men? Impossible!" + +Over the clearing the shadows were already lengthening. The sun +hung low; a ruddy glare lay on the burnt black patch in front of +the bungalow, and slanted on the ground between the straight, tall, +mast-like trees soaring a hundred feet or more without a branch. The +growth of bushes cut off all view of the jetty from the veranda. Far +away to the right Wang's hut, or rather its dark roof of mats, could +be seen above the bamboo fence which insured the privacy of the Alfuro +woman. The Chinaman looked that way swiftly. Heyst paused, and then +stepped back a pace into the room. + +"White men, Lena, apparently. What are you doing?" + +"I am just bathing my eyes a little," the girl's voice said from the +inner room. + +"Oh, yes; all right!" + +"Do you want me?" + +"No. You had better--I am going down to the jetty. Yes, you had better +stay in. What an extraordinary thing!" + +It was so extraordinary that nobody could possibly appreciate +how extraordinary it was but himself. His mind was full of mere +exclamations, while his feet were carrying him in the direction of the +jetty. He followed the line of the rails, escorted by Wang. + +"Where were you when you first saw the boat?" he asked over his +shoulder. + +Wang explained in Malay that he had gone to the shore end of the wharf, +to get a few lumps of coal from the big heap, when, happening to raise +his eyes from the ground, he saw the boat--a white man boat, not a +canoe. He had good eyes. He had seen the boat, with the men at the oars; +and here Wang made a particular gesture over his eyes, as if his vision +had received a blow. He had turned at once and run to the house to +report. + +"No mistake, eh?" said Heyst, moving on. At the very outer edge of the +belt he stopped short. Wang halted behind him on the path, till the +voice of Number One called him sharply forward into the open. He obeyed. + +"Where's that boat?" asked Heyst forcibly. "I say--where is it?" + +Nothing whatever was to be seen between the point and the jetty. The +stretch of Diamond Bay was like a piece of purple shadow, lustrous and +empty, while beyond the land, the open sea lay blue and opaque under the +sun. Heyst's eyes swept all over the offing till they met, far off, the +dark cone of the volcano, with its faint plume of smoke broadening and +vanishing everlastingly at the top, without altering its shape in the +glowing transparency of the evening. + +"The fellow has been dreaming," he muttered to himself. + +He looked hard at the Chinaman. Wang seemed turned into stone. Suddenly, +as if he had received a shock, he started, flung his arm out with a +pointing forefinger, and made guttural noises to the effect that there, +there, there, he had seen a boat. + +It was very uncanny. Heyst thought of some strange hallucination. +Unlikely enough; but that a boat with three men in it should have sunk +between the point and the jetty, suddenly, like a stone, without leaving +as much on the surface as a floating oar, was still more unlikely. The +theory of a phantom boat would have been more credible than that. + +"Confound it!" he muttered to himself. + +He was unpleasantly affected by this mystery; but now a simple +explanation occurred to him. He stepped hastily out on the wharf. The +boat, if it had existed and had retreated, could perhaps be seen from +the far end of the long jetty. + +Nothing was to be seen. Heyst let his eyes roam idly over the sea. He +was so absorbed in his perplexity that a hollow sound, as of somebody +tumbling about in a boat, with a clatter of oars and spars, failed to +make him move for a moment. When his mind seized its meaning, he had +no difficulty in locating the sound. It had come from below--under the +jetty! + +He ran back for a dozen yards or so, and then looked over. His sight +plunged straight into the stern-sheets of a big boat, the greater part +of which was hidden from him by the planking of the jetty. His eyes +fell on the thin back of a man doubled up over the tiller in a queer, +uncomfortable attitude of drooping sorrow. Another man, more directly +below Heyst, sprawled on his back from gunwale to gunwale, half off +the after thwart, his head lower than his feet. This second man glared +wildly upward, and struggled to raise himself, but to all appearance was +much too drunk to succeed. The visible part of the boat contained also +a flat, leather trunk, on which the first man's long legs were tucked +up nervelessly. A large earthenware jug, with its wide mouth uncorked, +rolled out on the bottom-boards from under the sprawling man. + +Heyst had never been so much astonished in his life. He stared dumbly at +the strange boat's crew. From the first he was positive that these +men were not sailors. They wore the white drill-suit of tropical +civilization; but their apparition in a boat Heyst could not connect +with anything plausible. The civilization of the tropics could have +had nothing to do with it. It was more like those myths, current in +Polynesia, of amazing strangers, who arrive at an island, gods or +demons, bringing good or evil to the innocence of the inhabitants--gifts +of unknown things, words never heard before. + +Heyst noticed a cork helmet floating alongside the boat, evidently +fallen from the head of the man doubled over the tiller, who displayed +a dark, bony poll. An oar, too, had been knocked overboard, probably +by the sprawling man, who was still struggling, between the thwarts. +By this time Heyst regarded the visitation no longer with surprise, but +with the sustained attention demanded by a difficult problem. With one +foot poised on the string-piece, and leaning on his raised knee, he +was taking in everything. The sprawling man rolled off the thwart, +collapsed, and, most unexpectedly, got on his feet. He swayed dizzily, +spreading his arms out and uttered faintly a hoarse, dreamy "Hallo!" His +upturned face was swollen, red, peeling all over the nose and cheeks. +His stare was irrational. Heyst perceived stains of dried blood all over +the front of his dirty white coat, and also on one sleeve. + +"What's the matter? Are you wounded?" + +The other glanced down, reeled--one of his feet was inside a large pith +hat--and, recovering himself, let out a dismal, grating sound in the +manner of a grim laugh. + +"Blood--not mine. Thirst's the matter. Exhausted's the matter. Done up. +Drink, man! Give us water!" + +Thirst was in the very tone of his words, alternating a broken croak and +a faint, throaty rustle which just reached Heyst's ears. The man in the +boat raised his hands to be helped up on the jetty, whispering: + +"I tried. I am too weak. I tumbled down." + +Wang was coming along the jetty slowly, with intent, straining eyes. + +"Run back and bring a crowbar here. There's one lying by the coal-heap," +Heyst shouted to him. + +The man standing in the boat sat down on the thwart behind him. A +horrible coughing laugh came through his swollen lips. + +"Crowbar? What's that for?" he mumbled, and his head dropped on his +chest mournfully. + +Meantime, Heyst, as if he had forgotten the boat, started kicking hard +at a large brass tap projecting above the planks. To accommodate ships +that came for coal and happened to need water as well, a stream had +been tapped in the interior and an iron pipe led along the jetty. It +terminated with a curved end almost exactly where the strangers' boat +had been driven between the piles; but the tap was set fast. + +"Hurry up!" Heyst yelled to the Chinaman, who was running with the +crowbar in his hand. + +Heyst snatched it from him and, obtaining a leverage against the +string-piece, wrung the stiff tap round with a mighty jerk. "I hope that +pipe hasn't got choked!" he muttered to himself anxiously. + +It hadn't; but it did not yield a strong gush. The sound of a thin +stream, partly breaking on the gunwale of the boat and partly +splashing alongside, became at once audible. It was greeted by a cry of +inarticulate and savage joy. Heyst knelt on the string-piece and peered +down. The man who had spoken was already holding his open mouth under +the bright trickle. Water ran over his eyelids and over his nose, +gurgled down his throat, flowed over his chin. Then some obstruction in +the pipe gave way, and a sudden thick jet broke on his face. In a moment +his shoulders were soaked, the front of his coat inundated; he streamed +and dripped; water ran into his pockets, down his legs, into his shoes; +but he had clutched the end of the pipe, and, hanging on with both +hands, swallowed, spluttered, choked, snorted with the noises of a +swimmer. Suddenly a curious dull roar reached Heyst's ears. Something +hairy and black flew from under the jetty. A dishevelled head, coming on +like a cannonball, took the man at the pipe in flank, with enough force +to tear his grip loose and fling him headlong into the stern-sheets. He +fell upon the folded legs of the man at the tiller, who, roused by the +commotion in the boat, was sitting up, silent, rigid, and very much like +a corpse. His eyes were but two black patches, and his teeth glistened +with a death's head grin between his retracted lips, no thicker than +blackish parchment glued over the gums. + +From him Heyst's eyes wandered to the creature who had replaced the +first man at the end of the water-pipe. Enormous brown paws clutched it +savagely; the wild, big head hung back, and in a face covered with a wet +mass of hair there gaped crookedly a wide mouth full of fangs. The water +filled it, welled up in hoarse coughs, ran down on each side of the jaws +and down the hairy throat, soaked the black pelt of the enormous chest, +naked under a torn check shirt, heaving convulsively with a play of +massive muscles carved in red mahogany. + +As soon as the first man had recovered the breath knocked out of him +by the irresistible charge, a scream of mad cursing issued from the +stern-sheets. With a rigid, angular crooking of the elbow, the man at +the tiller put his hand back to his hip. + +"Don't shoot him, sir!" yelled the first man. "Wait! Let me have that +tiller. I will teach him to shove himself in front of a caballero!" + +Martin Ricardo flourished the heavy piece of wood, leaped forward with +astonishing vigour, and brought it down on Pedro's head with a crash +that resounded all over the quiet sweep of Black Diamond Bay. A crimson +patch appeared on the matted hair, red veins appeared in the water +flowing all over his face, and it dripped in rosy drops off his head. +But the man hung on. Not till a second furious blow descended did the +hairy paws let go their grip and the squirming body sink limply. Before +it could touch the bottom-boards, a tremendous kick in the ribs from +Ricardo's foot shifted it forward out of sight, whence came the noise of +a heavy thud, a clatter of spars, and a pitiful grunt. Ricardo stooped +to look under the jetty. + +"Aha, dog! This will teach you to keep back where you belong, you +murdering brute, you slaughtering savage, you! You infidel, you robber +of churches! Next time I will rip you open from neck to heel, you +carrion-eater! Esclavo!" + +He backed a little and straightened himself up. + +"I don't mean it really," he remarked to Heyst, whose steady eyes met +his from above. He ran aft briskly. + +"Come along, sir. It's your turn. I oughtn't to have drunk first. 'S +truth, I forgot myself! A gentleman like you will overlook that, I +know." As he made these apologies, Ricardo extended his hand. "Let me +steady you, sir." + +Slowly Mr. Jones unfolded himself in all his slenderness, rocked, +staggered, and caught Ricardo's shoulder. His henchman assisted him +to the pipe, which went on gushing a clear stream of water, sparkling +exceedingly against the black piles and the gloom under the jetty. + +"Catch hold, sir," Ricardo advised solicitously. "All right?" + +He stepped back, and, while Mr. Jones revelled in the abundance of +water, he addressed himself to Heyst with a sort of justificatory +speech, the tone of which, reflecting his feelings, partook of purring +and spitting. They had been thirty hours tugging at the oars, he +explained, and they had been more than forty hours without water, except +that the night before they had licked the dew off the gunwales. + +Ricardo did not explain to Heyst how it happened. At that precise moment +he had no explanation ready for the man on the wharf, who, he guessed, +must be wondering much more at the presence of his visitors than at +their plight. + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +The explanation lay in the two simple facts that the light winds and +strong currents of the Java Sea had drifted the boat about until they +partly lost their bearings; and that by some extra-ordinary mistake +one of the two jars put into the boat by Schomberg's man contained salt +water. Ricardo tried to put some pathos into his tones. Pulling for +thirty hours with eighteen-foot oars! And the sun! Ricardo relieved +his feelings by cursing the sun. They had felt their hearts and lungs +shrivel within them. And then, as if all that hadn't been trouble +enough, he complained bitterly, he had had to waste his fainting +strength in beating their servant about the head with a stretcher. The +fool had wanted to drink sea water, and wouldn't listen to reason. +There was no stopping him otherwise. It was better to beat him into +insensibility than to have him go crazy in the boat, and to be obliged +to shoot him. The preventive, administered with enough force to brain +an elephant, boasted Ricardo, had to be applied on two occasions--the +second time all but in sight of the jetty. + +"You have seen the beauty," Ricardo went on expansively, hiding his lack +of some sort of probable story under this loquacity. "I had to hammer +him away from the spout. Opened afresh all the old broken spots on his +head. You saw how hard I had to hit. He has no restraint, no restraint +at all. If it wasn't that he can be made useful in one way or another, I +would just as soon have let the governor shoot him." + +He smiled up at Heyst in his peculiar lip-retracting manner, and added +by way of afterthought: + +"That's what will happen to him in the end, if he doesn't learn to +restrain himself. But I've taught him to mind his manners for a while, +anyhow!" + +And again he addressed his quick grin up to the man on the wharf. His +round eyes had never left Heyst's face ever since he began to deliver +his account of the voyage. + +"So that's how he looks!" Ricardo was saying to himself. + +He had not expected Heyst to be like this. He had formed for himself +a conception containing the helpful suggestion of a vulnerable point. +These solitary men were often tipplers. But no!--this was not a drinking +man's face; nor could he detect the weakness of alarm, or even the +weakness of surprise, on these features, in those steady eyes. + +"We were too far gone to climb out," Ricardo went on. "I heard you +walking along though. I thought I shouted; I tried to. You didn't hear +me shout?" + +Heyst made an almost imperceptible negative sign, which the greedy eyes +of Ricardo--greedy for all signs--did not miss. + +"Throat too parched. We didn't even care to whisper to each other +lately. Thirst chokes one. We might have died there under this wharf +before you found us." + +"I couldn't think where you had gone to." Heyst was heard at last, +addressing directly the newcomers from the sea. "You were seen as soon +as you cleared that point." + +"We were seen, eh?" grunted Mr. Ricardo. "We pulled like +machines--daren't stop. The governor sat at the tiller, but he couldn't +speak to us. She drove in between the piles till she hit something, and +we all tumbled off the thwarts as if we had been drunk. Drunk--ha, +ha! Too dry, by George! We fetched in here with the very last of our +strength, and no mistake. Another mile would have done for us. When I +heard your footsteps, above, I tried to get up, and I fell down." + +"That was the first sound I heard," said Heyst. + +Mr Jones, the front of his soiled white tunic soaked and plastered +against his breast-bone, staggered away from the water-pipe. Steadying +himself on Ricardo's shoulder, he drew a long breath, raised his +dripping head, and produced a smile of ghastly amiability, which was +lost upon the thoughtful Heyst. Behind his back the sun, touching the +water, was like a disc of iron cooled to a dull red glow, ready to start +rolling round the circular steel plate of the sea, which, under the +darkening sky, looked more solid than the high ridge of Samburan; more +solid than the point, whose long outlined slope melted into its own +unfathomable shadow blurring the dim sheen on the bay. The forceful +stream from the pipe broke like shattered glass on the boat's gunwale. +Its loud, fitful, and persistent splashing revealed the depths of the +world's silence. + +"Great notion, to lead the water out here," pronounced Ricardo +appreciatively. + +Water was life. He felt now as if he could run a mile, scale a ten-foot +wall, sing a song. Only a few minutes ago he was next door to a corpse, +done up, unable to stand, to lift a hand; unable to groan. A drop of +water had done that miracle. + +"Didn't you feel life itself running and soaking into you, sir?" he +asked his principal, with deferential but forced vivacity. + +Without a word, Mr. Jones stepped off the thwart and sat down in the +stern-sheets. + +"Isn't that man of yours bleeding to death in the bows under there?" +inquired Heyst. + +Ricardo ceased his ecstasies over the life-giving water and answered in +a tone of innocence: + +"He? You may call him a man, but his hide is a jolly sight tougher than +the toughest alligator he ever skinned in the good old days. You don't +know how much he can stand: I do. We have tried him a long time ago. +Ola, there! Pedro! Pedro!" he yelled, with a force of lung testifying to +the regenerative virtues of water. + +A weak "Senor?" came from under the wharf. + +"What did I tell you?" said Ricardo triumphantly. "Nothing can hurt him. +He's all right. But, I say, the boat's getting swamped. Can't you turn +this water off before you sink her under us? She's half full already." + +At a sign from Heyst, Wang hammered at the brass tap on the wharf, then +stood behind Number One, crowbar in hand, motionless as before. Ricardo +was perhaps not so certain of Pedro's toughness as he affirmed; for he +stooped, peering under the wharf, then moved forward out of sight. The +gush of water ceasing suddenly, made a silence which became complete +when the after-trickle stopped. Afar, the sun was reduced to a red +spark, glowing very low in the breathless immensity of twilight. Purple +gleams lingered on the water all round the boat. The spectral figure in +the stern-sheets spoke in a languid tone: + +"That--er--companion--er--secretary of mine is a queer chap. I am afraid +we aren't presenting ourselves in a very favourable light." + +Heyst listened. It was the conventional voice of an educated man, +only strangely lifeless. But more strange yet was this concern for +appearances, expressed, he did not know, whether in jest or in earnest. +Earnestness was hardly to be supposed under the circumstances, and no +one had ever jested in such dead tones. It was something which could not +be answered, and Heyst said nothing. The other went on: + +"Travelling as I do, I find a man of his sort extremely useful. He has +his little weaknesses, no doubt." + +"Indeed!" Heyst was provoked into speaking. "Weakness of the arm is not +one of them; neither is an exaggerated humanity, as far as I can judge." + +"Defects of temper," explained Mr. Jones from the stern-sheets. + +The subject of this dialogue, coming out just then from under the +wharf into the visible part of the boat, made himself heard in his own +defence, in a voice full of life, and with nothing languid in his manner +on the contrary, it was brisk, almost jocose. He begged pardon for +contradicting. He was never out of temper with "our Pedro." The +fellow was a Dago of immense strength and of no sense whatever. This +combination made him dangerous, and he had to be treated accordingly, in +a manner which he could understand. Reasoning was beyond him. + +"And so"--Ricardo addressed Heyst with animation--"you mustn't be +surprised if--" + +"I assure you," Heyst interrupted, "that my wonder at your arrival +in your boat here is so great that it leaves no room for minor +astonishments. But hadn't you better land?" + +"That's the talk, sir!" Ricardo began to bustle about the boat, talking +all the time. Finding himself unable to "size up" this man, he was +inclined to credit him with extraordinary powers of penetration, which, +it seemed to him, would be favoured by silence. Also, he feared some +pointblank question. He had no ready-made story to tell. He and his +patron had put off considering that rather important detail too +long. For the last two days, the horrors of thirst, coming on them +unexpectedly, had prevented consultation. They had had to pull for +dear life. But the man on the wharf, were he in league with the devil +himself, would pay for all their sufferings, thought Ricardo with an +unholy joy. + +Meantime, splashing in the water which covered the bottom-boards, +Ricardo congratulated himself aloud on the luggage being out of the way +of the wet. He had piled it up forward. He had roughly tied up Pedro's +head. Pedro had nothing to grumble about. On the contrary, he ought to +be mighty thankful to him, Ricardo, for being alive at all. + +"Well, now, let me give you a leg up, sir," he said cheerily to +his motionless principal in the stern-sheets. "All our troubles are +over--for a time, anyhow. Ain't it luck to find a white man on this +island? I would have just as soon expected to meet an angel from +heaven--eh, Mr. Jones? Now then--ready, sir? one, two, three, up you +go!" + +Helped from below by Ricardo, and from above by the man more unexpected +than an angel, Mr. Jones scrambled up and stood on the wharf by the side +of Heyst. He swayed like a reed. The night descending on Samburan turned +into dense shadow the point of land and the wharf itself, and gave a +dark solidity to the unshimmering water extending to the last faint +trace of light away to the west. Heyst stared at the guests whom the +renounced world had sent him thus at the end of the day. The only other +vestige of light left on earth lurked in the hollows of the thin man's +eyes. They gleamed, mobile and languidly evasive. The eyelids fluttered. + +"You are feeling weak," said Heyst. + +"For the moment, a little," confessed the other. + +With loud panting, Ricardo scrambled on his hands and knees upon the +wharf, energetic and unaided. He rose up at Heyst's elbow and stamped +his foot on the planks, with a sharp, provocative, double beat, such +as is heard sometimes in fencing-schools before the adversaries engage +their foils. Not that the renegade seaman Ricardo knew anything of +fencing. What he called "shooting-irons," were his weapons, or the still +less aristocratic knife, such as was even then ingeniously strapped +to his leg. He thought of it, at that moment. A swift stooping motion, +then, on the recovery, a ripping blow, a shove off the wharf, and no +noise except a splash in the water that would scarcely disturb the +silence. Heyst would have no time for a cry. It would be quick and neat, +and immensely in accord with Ricardo's humour. But he repressed this +gust of savagery. The job was not such a simple one. This piece had to +be played to another tune, and in much slower time. He returned to his +note of talkative simplicity. + +"Ay; and I too don't feel as strong as I thought I was when the first +drink set me up. Great wonder-worker water is! And to get it right here +on the spot! It was heaven--hey, sir?" + +Mr Jones, being directly addressed, took up his part in the concerted +piece: + +"Really, when I saw a wharf on what might have been an uninhabited +island, I couldn't believe my eyes. I doubted its existence. I thought +it was a delusion till the boat actually drove between the piles, as you +see her lying now." + +While he was speaking faintly, in a voice which did not seem to belong +to the earth, his henchman, in extremely loud and terrestrial accents, +was fussing about their belongings in the boat, addressing himself to +Pedro: + +"Come, now--pass up the dunnage there! Move, yourself, hombre, or I'll +have to get down again and give you a tap on those bandages of yours, +you growling bear, you!" + +"Ah! You didn't believe in the reality of the wharf?" Heyst was saying +to Mr. Jones. + +"You ought to kiss my hands!" + +Ricardo caught hold of an ancient Gladstone bag and swung it on the +wharf with a thump. + +"Yes! You ought to burn a candle before me as they do before the saints +in your country. No saint has ever done so much for you as I have, you +ungrateful vagabond. Now then! Up you get!" + +Helped by the talkative Ricardo, Pedro scrambled up on the wharf, where +he remained for some time on all fours, swinging to and fro his shaggy +head tied up in white rags. Then he got up clumsily, like a bulky animal +in the dusk, balancing itself on its hind legs. + +Mr Jones began to explain languidly to Heyst that they were in a pretty +bad state that morning, when they caught sight of the smoke of the +volcano. It nerved them to make an effort for their lives. Soon +afterwards they made out the island. + +"I had just wits enough left in my baked brain to alter the direction +of the boat," the ghostly voice went on. "As to finding assistance, +a wharf, a white man--nobody would have dreamed of it. Simply +preposterous!" + +"That's what I thought when my Chinaman came and told me he had seen a +boat with white men pulling up," said Heyst. + +"Most extraordinary luck," interjected Ricardo, standing by anxiously +attentive to every word. "Seems a dream," he added. "A lovely dream!" + +A silence fell on that group of three, as if everyone had become afraid +to speak, in an obscure sense of an impending crisis. Pedro on one side +of them and Wang on the other had the air of watchful spectators. A few +stars had come out pursuing the ebbing twilight. A light draught of air +tepid enough in the thickening twilight after the scorching day, struck +a chill into Mr. Jones in his soaked clothes. + +"I may infer, then, that there is a settlement of white people here?" he +murmured, shivering visibly. + +Heyst roused himself. + +"Oh, abandoned, abandoned. I am alone here--practically alone; but +several empty houses are still standing. No lack of accommodation. We +may just as well--here, Wang, go back to the shore and run the trolley +out here." + +The last words having been spoken in Malay, he explained courteously +that he had given directions for the transport of the luggage. Wang had +melted into the night--in his soundless manner. + +"My word! Rails laid down and all," exclaimed Ricardo softly, in a tone +of admiration. "Well, I never!" + +"We were working a coal-mine here," said the late manager of the +Tropical Belt Coal Company. "These are only the ghosts of things that +have been." + +Mr Jones's teeth were suddenly started chattering by another faint puff +of wind, a mere sigh from the west, where Venus cast her rays on the +dark edge of the horizon, like a bright lamp hung above the grave of the +sun. + +"We might be moving on," proposed Heyst. "My Chinaman and +that--ah--ungrateful servant of yours, with the broken head, can load +the things and come along after us." + +The suggestion was accepted without words. Moving towards the shore, +the three men met the trolley, a mere metallic rustle which whisked past +them, the shadowy Wang running noiselessly behind. Only the sound of +their footsteps accompanied them. It was a long time since so many +footsteps had rung together on that jetty. Before they stepped on to the +path trodden through the grass, Heyst said: + +"I am prevented from offering you a share of my own quarters." The +distant courtliness of this beginning arrested the other two suddenly, +as if amazed by some manifest incongruity. "I should regret it more," +he went on, "if I were not in a position to give you the choice of those +empty bungalows for a temporary home." + +He turned round and plunged into the narrow track, the two others +following in single file. + +"Queer start!" Ricardo took the opportunity for whispering, as he fell +behind Mr. Jones, who swayed in the gloom, enclosed by the stalks of +tropical grass, almost as slender as a stalk of grass himself. + +In this order they emerged into the open space kept clear of vegetation +by Wang's judicious system of periodic firing. The shapes of buildings, +unlighted, high-roofed, looked mysteriously extensive and featureless +against the increasing glitter of the stars. Heyst was pleased at +the absence of light in his bungalow. It looked as uninhabited as +the others. He continued to lead the way, inclining to the right. His +equable voice was heard: + +"This one would be the best. It was our counting-house. There is some +furniture in it yet. I am pretty certain that you'll find a couple of +camp bedsteads in one of the rooms." + +The high-pitched roof of the bungalow towered up very close, eclipsing +the sky. + +"Here we are. Three steps. As you see, there's a wide veranda. Sorry to +keep you waiting for a moment; the door is locked, I think." + +He was heard trying it. Then he leaned against the rail, saying: + +"Wang will get the keys." + +The others waited, two vague shapes nearly mingled together in the +darkness of the veranda, from which issued a sudden chattering of Mr. +Jones's teeth, directly suppressed, and a slight shuffle of Ricardo's +feet. Their guide and host, his back against the rail, seemed to have +forgotten their existence. Suddenly he moved, and murmured: + +"Ah, here's the trolley." + +Then he raised his voice in Malay, and was answered, "Ya tuan," from an +indistinct group that could be made out in the direction of the track. + +"I have sent Wang for the key and a light," he said, in a voice +that came out without any particular direction--a peculiarity which +disconcerted Ricardo. + +Wang did not tarry long on his mission. Very soon from the distant +recesses of obscurity appeared the swinging lantern he carried. It cast +a fugitive ray on the arrested trolley with the uncouth figure of the +wild Pedro drooping over the load; then it moved towards the bungalow +and ascended the stairs. After working at the stiff lock, Wang applied +his shoulder to the door. It came open with explosive suddenness, as if +in a passion at being thus disturbed after two years' repose. From the +dark slope of a tall stand-up writing-desk a forgotten, solitary sheet +of paper flew up and settled gracefully on the floor. + +Wang and Pedro came and went through the offended door, bringing the +things off the trolley, one flitting swiftly in and out, the other +staggering heavily. Later, directed by a few quiet words from Number +One, Wang made several journeys with the lantern to the store-rooms, +bringing in blankets, provisions in tins, coffee, sugar, and a packet of +candles. He lighted one, and stuck it on the ledge of the stand-up desk. +Meantime Pedro, being introduced to some kindling-wood and a bundle of +dry sticks, had busied himself outside in lighting a fire, on which he +placed a ready-filled kettle handed to him by Wang impassively, at arm's +length, as if across a chasm. Having received the thanks of his guests, +Heyst wished them goodnight and withdrew, leaving them to their repose. + + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +Heyst walked away slowly. There was still no light in his bungalow, and +he thought that perhaps it was just as well. By this time he was much +less perturbed. Wang had preceded him with the lantern, as if in a hurry +to get away from the two white men and their hairy attendant. The light +was not dancing along any more; it was standing perfectly still by the +steps of the veranda. + +Heyst, glancing back casually, saw behind him still another light--the +light of the strangers' open fire. A black, uncouth form, stooping over +it monstrously, staggered away into the outlying shadows. The kettle had +boiled, probably. + +With that weird vision of something questionably human impressed upon +his senses, Heyst moved on a pace or two. What could the people be who +had such a creature for their familiar attendant? He stopped. The vague +apprehension, of a distant future, in which he saw Lena unavoidably +separated from him by profound and subtle differences; the sceptical +carelessness which had accompanied every one of his attempts at action, +like a secret reserve of his soul, fell away from him. He no longer +belonged to himself. There was a call far more imperious and august. He +came up to the bungalow, and at the very limit of the lantern's light, +on the top step, he saw her feet and the bottom part of her dress. The +rest of her person was suggested dimly as high as her waist. She sat +on a chair, and the gloom of the low eaves descended upon her head and +shoulders. She didn't stir. + +"You haven't gone to sleep here?" he asked. + +"Oh, no! I was waiting for you--in the dark." + +Heyst, on the top step, leaned against a wooden pillar, after moving the +lantern to one side. + +"I have been thinking that it is just as well you had no light. But +wasn't it dull for you to sit in the dark?" + +"I don't need a light to think of you." Her charming voice gave a value +to this banal answer, which had also the merit of truth. Heyst laughed +a little, and said that he had had a curious experience. She made no +remark. He tried to figure to himself the outlines of her easy pose. +A spot of dim light here and there hinted at the unfailing grace of +attitude which was one of her natural possessions. + +She had thought of him, but not in connection with the strangers. She +had admired him from the first; she had been attracted by his warm +voice, his gentle eye, but she had felt him too wonderfully difficult to +know. He had given to life a savour, a movement, a promise mingled with +menaces, which she had not suspected were to be found in it--or, at any +rate, not by a girl wedded to misery as she was. She said to herself +that she must not be irritated because he seemed too self-contained, and +as if shut up in a world of his own. When he took her in his arms, she +felt that his embrace had a great and compelling force, that he was +moved deeply, and that perhaps he would not get tired of her so very +soon. She thought that he had opened to her the feelings of delicate +joy, that the very uneasiness he caused her was delicious in its +sadness, and that she would try to hold him as long as she could--till +her fainting arms, her sinking soul, could cling to him no more. + +"Wang's not here, of course?" Heyst said suddenly. She answered as if in +her sleep. + +"He put this light down here without stopping, and ran." + +"Ran, did he? H'm! Well, it's considerably later than his usual time +to go home to his Alfuro wife; but to be seen running is a sort of +degradation for Wang, who has mastered the art of vanishing. Do you +think he was startled out of his perfection by something?" + +"Why should he be startled?" + +Her voice remained dreamy, a little uncertain. + +"I have been startled," Heyst said. + +She was not listening to him. The lantern at their feet threw the +shadows of her face upward. Her eyes glistened, as if frightened and +attentive, above a lighted chin and a very white throat. + +"Upon my word," mused Heyst, "now that I don't see them, I can hardly +believe that those fellows exist!" + +"And what about me?" she asked, so swiftly that he made a movement like +somebody pounced upon from an ambush. "When you don't see me, do you +believe that I exist?" + +"Exist? Most charmingly! My dear Lena, you don't know your own +advantages. Why, your voice alone would be enough to make you +unforgettable!" + +"Oh, I didn't mean forgetting in that way. I dare say if I were to +die you would remember me right enough. And what good would that be to +anybody? It's while I am alive that I want--" + +Heyst stood by her chair, a stalwart figure imperfectly lighted. The +broad shoulders, the martial face that was like a disguise of his +disarmed soul, were lost in the gloom above the plane of light in which +his feet were planted. He suffered from a trouble with which she had +nothing to do. She had no general conception of the conditions of the +existence he had offered to her. Drawn into its peculiar stagnation she +remained unrelated to it because of her ignorance. + +For instance, she could never perceive the prodigious improbability of +the arrival of that boat. She did not seem to be thinking of it. Perhaps +she had already forgotten the fact herself. And Heyst resolved suddenly +to say nothing more of it. It was not that he shrank from alarming her. +Not feeling anything definite himself he could not imagine a precise +effect being produced on her by any amount of explanation. There is a +quality in events which is apprehended differently by different minds +or even by the same mind at different times. Any man living at all +consciously knows that embarrassing truth. Heyst was aware that this +visit could bode nothing pleasant. In his present soured temper +towards all mankind he looked upon it as a visitation of a particularly +offensive kind. + +He glanced along the veranda in the direction of the other bungalow. The +fire of sticks in front of it had gone out. No faint glow of embers, not +the slightest thread of light in that direction, hinted at the presence +of strangers. The darker shapes in the obscurity, the dead silence, +betrayed nothing of that strange intrusion. The peace of Samburan +asserted itself as on any other night. Everything was as before, +except--Heyst became aware of it suddenly--that for a whole minute, +perhaps, with his hand on the back of the girl's chair and within a foot +of her person, he had lost the sense of her existence, for the first +time since he had brought her over to share this invincible, this +undefiled peace. He picked up the lantern, and the act made a silent +stir all along the veranda. A spoke of shadow swung swiftly across her +face, and the strong light rested on the immobility of her features, as +of a woman looking at a vision. Her eyes were still, her lips serious. +Her dress, open at the neck, stirred slightly to her even breathing. + +"We had better go in, Lena," suggested Heyst, very low, as if breaking a +spell cautiously. + +She rose without a word. Heyst followed her indoors. As they passed +through the living-room, he left the lantern burning on the centre +table. + + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +That night the girl woke up, for the first time in her new experience, +with the sensation of having been abandoned to her own devices. She woke +up from a painful dream of separation brought about in a way which she +could not understand, and missed the relief of the waking instant. +The desolate feeling of being alone persisted. She was really alone. +A night-light made it plain enough, in the dim, mysterious manner of a +dream; but this was reality. It startled her exceedingly. + +In a moment she was at the curtain that hung in the doorway, and raised +it with a steady hand. The conditions of their life in Samburan would +have made peeping absurd; nor was such a thing in her character. This +was not a movement of curiosity, but of downright alarm--the continued +distress and fear of the dream. The night could not have been very far +advanced. The light of the lantern was burning strongly, striping the +floor and walls of the room with thick black bands. She hardly knew +whether she expected to see Heyst or not; but she saw him at once, +standing by the table in his sleeping-suit, his back to the doorway. +She stepped in noiselessly with her bare feet, and let the curtain fall +behind her. Something characteristic in Heyst's attitude made her say, +almost in a whisper: + +"You are looking for something." + +He could not have heard her before; but he didn't start at the +unexpected whisper. He only pushed the drawer of the table in and, +without even looking over his shoulder, asked quietly, accepting her +presence as if he had been aware of all her movements: + +"I say, are you certain that Wang didn't go through this room this +evening?" + +"Wang? When?" + +"After leaving the lantern, I mean." + +"Oh, no. He ran on. I watched him." + +"Or before, perhaps--while I was with these boat people? Do you know? +Can you tell?" + +"I hardly think so. I came out as the sun went down, and sat outside +till you came back to me." + +"He could have popped in for an instant through the back veranda." + +"I heard nothing in here," she said. "What is the matter?" + +"Naturally you wouldn't hear. He can be as quiet as a shadow, when he +likes. I believe he could steal the pillows from under our heads. He +might have been here ten minutes ago." + +"What woke you up? Was it a noise?" + +"Can't say that. Generally one can't tell, but is it likely, Lena? You +are, I believe, the lighter sleeper of us two. A noise loud enough to +wake me up would have awakened you, too. I tried to be as quiet as I +could. What roused you?" + +"I don't know--a dream, perhaps. I woke up crying." + +"What was the dream?" + +Heyst, with one hand resting on the table, had turned in her direction, +his round, uncovered head set on a fighter's muscular neck. She left his +question unanswered, as if she had not heard it. + +"What is it you have missed?" she asked in her turn, very grave. + +Her dark hair, drawn smoothly back, was done in two thick tresses for +the night. Heyst noticed the good form of her brow, the dignity of its +width, its unshining whiteness. It was a sculptural forehead. He had a +moment of acute appreciation intruding upon another order of thoughts. +It was as if there could be no end of his discoveries about that girl, +at the most incongruous moments. + +She had on nothing but a hand-woven cotton sarong--one of Heyst's few +purchases, years ago, in Celebes, where they are made. He had forgotten +all about it till she came, and then had found it at the bottom of an +old sandalwood trunk dating back to pre-Morrison days. She had quickly +learned to wind it up under her armpits with a safe twist, as Malay +village girls do when going down to bathe in a river. Her shoulders and +arms were bare; one of her tresses, hanging forward, looked almost black +against the white skin. As she was taller than the average Malay woman, +the sarong ended a good way above her ankles. She stood poised firmly, +half-way between the table and the curtained doorway, the insteps of her +bare feet gleaming like marble on the overshadowed matting of the floor. +The fall of her lighted shoulders, the strong and fine modelling of +her arms hanging down her sides, her immobility, too, had something +statuesque, the charm of art tense with life. She was not very +big--Heyst used to think of her, at first, as "that poor little +girl,"--but revealed free from the shabby banality of a white platform +dress, in the simple drapery of the sarong, there was that in her form +and in the proportions of her body which suggested a reduction from a +heroic size. + +She moved forward a step. + +"What is it you have missed?" she asked again. + +Heyst turned his back altogether on the table. The black spokes of +darkness over the floor and the walls, joining up on the ceiling in a +path of shadow, were like the bars of a cage about them. It was his turn +to ignore a question. + +"You woke up in a fright, you say?" he said. + +She walked up to him, exotic yet familiar, with her white woman's face +and shoulders above the Malay sarong, as if it were an airy disguise, +but her expression was serious. + +"No," she replied. "It was distress, rather. You see, you weren't there, +and I couldn't tell why you had gone away from me. A nasty dream--the +first I've had, too, since--" + +"You don't believe in dreams, do you?" asked Heyst. + +"I once knew a woman who did. Leastwise, she used to tell people what +dreams mean, for a shilling." + +"Would you go now and ask her what this dream means?" inquired Heyst +jocularly. + +"She lived in Camberwell. She was a nasty old thing!" + +Heyst laughed a little uneasily. + +"Dreams are madness, my dear. It's things that happen in the waking +world, while one is asleep, that one would be glad to know the meaning +of." + +"You have missed something out of this drawer," she said positively. + +"This or some other. I have looked into every single one of them and +come back to this again, as people do. It's difficult to believe the +evidence of my own senses; but it isn't there. Now, Lena, are you sure +that you didn't--" + +"I have touched nothing in the house but what you have given me." + +"Lena!" he cried. + +He was painfully affected by this disclaimer of a charge which he had +not made. It was what a servant might have said--an inferior open +to suspicion--or, at any rate, a stranger. He was angry at being so +wretchedly misunderstood; disenchanted at her not being instinctively +aware of the place he had secretly given her in his thoughts. + +"After all," he said to himself, "we are strangers to each other." + +And then he felt sorry for her. He spoke calmly: + +"I was about to say, are you sure you have no reason to think that the +Chinaman has been in this room tonight?" + +"You suspect him?" she asked, knitting her eyebrows. + +"There is no one else to suspect. You may call it a certitude." + +"You don't want to tell me what it is?" she inquired, in the equable +tone in which one takes a fact into account. + +Heyst only smiled faintly. + +"Nothing very precious, as far as value goes," he replied. + +"I thought it might have been money," she said. + +"Money!" exclaimed Heyst, as if the suggestion had been altogether +preposterous. She was so visibly surprised that he hastened to add: "Of +course, there is some money in the house--there, in that writing-desk, +the drawer on the left. It's not locked. You can pull it right out. +There is a recess, and the board at the back pivots: a very simple +hiding-place, when you know the way to it. I discovered it by accident, +and I keep our store of sovereigns in there. The treasure, my dear, is +not big enough to require a cavern." + +He paused, laughed very low, and returned her steady stare. + +"The loose silver, some guilders and dollars, I have always kept in that +unlocked left drawer. I have no doubt Wang knows what there is in it, +but he isn't a thief, and that's why I--no, Lena, what I've missed is +not gold or jewels; and that's what makes the fact interesting--which +the theft of money cannot be." + +She took a long breath, relieved to hear that it was not money. A great +curiosity was depicted on her face, but she refrained from pressing him +with questions. She only gave him one of her deep-gleaming smiles. + +"It isn't me so it must be Wang. You ought to make him give it back to +you." + +Heyst said nothing to that naive and practical suggestion, for the +object that he missed from the drawer was his revolver. + +It was a heavy weapon which he had owned for many years and had never +used in his life. Ever since the London furniture had arrived in +Samburan, it had been reposing in the drawer of the table. The real +dangers of life, for him, were not those which could be repelled +by swords or bullets. On the other hand neither his manner nor his +appearance looked sufficiently inoffensive to expose him to light-minded +aggression. + +He could not have explained what had induced him to go to the drawer +in the middle of the night. He had started up suddenly--which was very +unusual with him. He had found himself sitting up and extremely wide +awake all at once, with the girl reposing by his side, lying with her +face away from him, a vague, characteristically feminine form in the dim +light. She was perfectly still. + +At that season of the year there were no mosquitoes in Samburan, and the +sides of the mosquito net were looped up. Heyst swung his feet to the +floor, and found himself standing there, almost before he had become +aware of his intention to get up. + +Why he did this he did not know. He didn't wish to wake her up, and +the slight creak of the broad bedstead had sounded very loud to him. He +turned round apprehensively and waited for her to move, but she did not +stir. While he looked at her, he had a vision of himself lying there +too, also fast asleep, and--it occurred to him for the first time in his +life--very defenceless. This quite novel impression of the dangers of +slumber made him think suddenly of his revolver. He left the bedroom +with noiseless footsteps. The lightness of the curtain he had to lift +as he passed out, and the outer door, wide open on the blackness of +the veranda--for the roof eaves came down low, shutting out the +starlight--gave him a sense of having been dangerously exposed, he could +not have said to what. He pulled the drawer open. Its emptiness cut his +train of self-communion short. He murmured to the assertive fact: + +"Impossible! Somewhere else!" + +He tried to remember where he had put the thing; but those provoked +whispers of memory were not encouraging. Foraging in every receptacle +and nook big enough to contain a revolver, he came slowly to the +conclusion that it was not in that room. Neither was it in the other. +The whole bungalow consisted of the two rooms and a profuse allowance of +veranda all round. Heyst stepped out on the veranda. + +"It's Wang, beyond a doubt," he thought, staring into the night. "He has +got hold of it for some reason." + +There was nothing to prevent that ghostly Chinaman from materializing +suddenly at the foot of the stairs, or anywhere, at any moment, and +toppling him over with a dead sure shot. The danger was so irremediable +that it was not worth worrying about, any more than the general +precariousness of human life. Heyst speculated on this added risk. How +long had he been at the mercy of a slender yellow finger on the trigger? +That is, if that was the fellow's reason for purloining the revolver. + +"Shoot and inherit," thought Heyst. "Very simple." Yet there was in his +mind a marked reluctance to regard the domesticated grower of vegetables +in the light of a murderer. + +"No, it wasn't that. For Wang could have done it any time this last +twelve months or more--" + +Heyst's mind had worked on the assumption that Wang had possessed +himself of the revolver during his own absence from Samburan; but at +that period of his speculation his point of view changed. It struck him +with the force of manifest certitude that the revolver had been taken +only late in the day, or on that very night. Wang, of course. But why? +So there had been no danger in the past. It was all ahead. + +"He has me at his mercy now," thought Heyst, without particular +excitement. + +The sentiment he experienced was curiosity. He forgot himself in it: it +was as if he were considering somebody else's strange predicament. But +even that sort of interest was dying out when, looking to his left, he +saw the accustomed shapes of the other bungalows looming in the night, +and remembered the arrival of the thirsty company in the boat. Wang +would hardly risk such a crime in the presence of other white men. It +was a peculiar instance of the "safety in numbers," principle, which +somehow was not much to Heyst's taste. + +He went in gloomily, and stood over the empty drawer in deep and +unsatisfactory thought. He had just made up his mind that he must +breathe nothing of this to the girl, when he heard her voice behind him. +She had taken him by surprise, but he resisted the impulse to turn round +at once under the impression that she might read his trouble in his +face. Yes, she had taken him by surprise, and for that reason the +conversation which began was not exactly as he would have conducted it +if he had been prepared for her pointblank question. He ought to have +said at once: "I've missed nothing." It was a deplorable thing that he +should have let it come so far as to have her ask what it was he missed. +He closed the conversation by saying lightly: + +"It's an object of very small value. Don't worry about it--it isn't +worth while. The best you can do is to go and lie down again, Lena." + +Reluctant she turned away, and only in the doorway asked: "And you?" + +"I think I shall smoke a cheroot on the veranda. I don't feel sleepy for +the moment." + +"Well, don't be long." + +He made no answer. She saw him standing there, very still, with a frown +on his brow, and slowly dropped the curtain. + +Heyst did really light a cheroot before going out again on the veranda. +He glanced up from under the low eaves, to see by the stars how the +night went on. It was going very slowly. Why it should have irked him he +did not know, for he had nothing to expect from the dawn; but everything +round him had become unreasonable, unsettled, and vaguely urgent, laying +him under an obligation, but giving him no line of action. He felt +contemptuously irritated with the situation. The outer world had broken +upon him; and he did not know what wrong he had done to bring this on +himself, any more than he knew what he had done to provoke the horrible +calumny about his treatment of poor Morrison. For he could not forget +this. It had reached the ears of one who needed to have the most perfect +confidence in the rectitude of his conduct. + +"And she only half disbelieves it," he thought, with hopeless +humiliation. + +This moral stab in the back seemed to have taken some of his strength +from him, as a physical wound would have done. He had no desire to do +anything--neither to bring Wang to terms in the matter of the revolver +nor to find out from the strangers who they were, and how their +predicament had come about. He flung his glowing cigar away into the +night. But Samburan was no longer a solitude wherein he could indulge in +all his moods. The fiery parabolic path the cast-out stump traced in the +air was seen from another veranda at a distance of some twenty yards. It +was noted as a symptom of importance by an observer with his faculties +greedy for signs, and in a state of alertness tense enough almost to +hear the grass grow. + + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +The observer was Martin Ricardo. To him life was not a matter of +passive renunciation, but of a particularly active warfare. He was +not mistrustful of it, he was not disgusted with it, still less was he +inclined to be suspicious of its disenchantments; but he was vividly +aware that it held many possibilities of failure. Though very far from +being a pessimist, he was not a man of foolish illusions. He did +not like failure, not only because of its unpleasant and dangerous +consequences, but also because of its damaging effect upon his own +appreciation of Martin Ricardo. And this was a special job, of his own +contriving, and of considerable novelty. It was not, so to speak, in his +usual line of business--except, perhaps, from a moral standpoint, about +which he was not likely to trouble his head. For these reasons Martin +Ricardo was unable to sleep. + +Mr Jones, after repeated shivering fits, and after drinking much hot +tea, had apparently fallen into deep slumber. He had very peremptorily +discouraged attempts at conversation on the part of his faithful +follower. Ricardo listened to his regular breathing. It was all very +well for the governor. He looked upon it as a sort of sport. A gentleman +naturally would. But this ticklish and important job had to be pulled +off at all costs, both for honour and for safety. Ricardo rose quietly, +and made his way on the veranda. He could not lie still. He wanted to +go out for air, and he had a feeling that by the force of his eagerness +even the darkness and the silence could be made to yield something to +his eyes and ears. + +He noted the stars, and stepped back again into the dense darkness. +He resisted the growing impulse to go out and steal towards the other +bungalow. It would have been madness to start prowling in the dark on +unknown ground. And for what end? Unless to relieve the oppression. +Immobility lay on his limbs like a leaden garment. And yet he was +unwilling to give up. He persisted in his objectless vigil. The man of +the island was keeping quiet. + +It was at that moment that Ricardo's eyes caught the vanishing red +trail of light made by the cigar--a startling revelation of the man's +wakefulness. He could not suppress a low "Hallo!" and began to sidle +along towards the door, with his shoulders rubbing the wall. For all he +knew, the man might have been out in front by this time, observing the +veranda. As a matter of fact, after flinging away the cheroot, Heyst +had gone indoors with the feeling of a man who gives up an unprofitable +occupation. But Ricardo fancied he could hear faint footfalls on the +open ground, and dodged quickly into the room. There he drew breath, and +meditated for a while. His next step was to feel for the matches on +the tall desk, and to light the candle. He had to communicate to his +governor views and reflections of such importance that it was absolutely +necessary for him to watch their effect on the very countenance of the +hearer. At first he had thought that these matters could have waited +till daylight; but Heyst's wakefulness, disclosed in that startling way, +made him feel suddenly certain that there could be no sleep for him that +night. + +He said as much to his governor. When the little dagger-like flame had +done its best to dispel the darkness, Mr. Jones was to be seen reposing +on a camp bedstead, in a distant part of the room. A railway rug +concealed his spare form up to his very head, which rested on the +other railway rug rolled up for a pillow. Ricardo plumped himself down +cross-legged on the floor, very close to the low bedstead; so that Mr. +Jones--who perhaps had not been so very profoundly asleep--on opening +his eyes found them conveniently levelled at the face of his secretary. + +"Eh? What is it you say? No sleep for you tonight? But why can't you let +me sleep? Confound your fussiness!" + +"Because that there fellow can't sleep--that's why. Dash me if he hasn't +been doing a think just now! What business has he to think in the middle +of the night?" + +"How do you know?" + +"He was out, sir--up in the middle of the night. My own eyes saw it." + +"But how do you know that he was up to think?" inquired Mr. Jones. "It +might have been anything--toothache, for instance. And you may have +dreamed it for all I know. Didn't you try to sleep?" + +"No, sir. I didn't even try to go to sleep." + +Ricardo informed his patron of his vigil on the veranda, and of the +revelation which put an end to it. He concluded that a man up with a +cigar in the middle of the night must be doing a think. + +Mr Jones raised himself on his elbow. This sign of interest comforted +his faithful henchman. + +"Seems to me it's time we did a little think ourselves," added Ricardo, +with more assurance. Long as they had been together the moods of his +governor were still a source of anxiety to his simple soul. + +"You are always making a fuss," remarked Mr. Jones, in a tolerant tone. + +"Ay, but not for nothing, am I? You can't say that, sir. Mine may not be +a gentleman's way of looking round a thing, but it isn't a fool's way, +either. You've admitted that much yourself at odd times." + +Ricardo was growing warmly argumentative. Mr. Jones interrupted him +without heat. + +"You haven't roused me to talk about yourself, I presume?" + +"No, sir." Ricardo remained silent for a minute, with the tip of +his tongue caught between his teeth. "I don't think I could tell you +anything about myself that you don't know," he continued. There was a +sort of amused satisfaction in his tone which changed completely as he +went on. "It's that man, over there, that's got to be talked over. I +don't like him." + +He, failed to observe the flicker of a ghastly smile on his governor's +lips. + +"Don't you?" murmured Mr. Jones, whose face, as he reclined on his +elbow, was on a level with the top of his follower's head. + +"No, sir," said Ricardo emphatically. The candle from the other side of +the room threw his monstrous black shadow on the wall. "He--I don't know +how to say it--he isn't hearty-like." + +Mr Jones agreed languidly in his own manner: + +"He seems to be a very self-possessed man." + +"Ay, that's it. Self--" Ricardo choked with indignation. "I would soon +let out some of his self-possession through a hole between his ribs, if +this weren't a special job!" + +Mr Jones had been making his own reflections, for he asked: + +"Do you think he is suspicious?" + +"I don't see very well what he can be suspicious of," pondered Ricardo. +"Yet there he was doing a think. And what could be the object of it? +What made him get out of his bed in the middle of the night. 'Tain't +fleas, surely." + +"Bad conscience, perhaps," suggested Mr. Jones jocularly. + +His faithful secretary suffered from irritation, and did not see the +joke. In a fretful tone he declared that there was no such thing as +conscience. There was such a thing as funk; but there was nothing to +make that fellow funky in any special way. He admitted, however, that +the man might have been uneasy at the arrival of strangers, because of +all that plunder of his put away somewhere. + +Ricardo glanced here and there, as if he were afraid of being overheard +by the heavy shadows cast by the dim light all over the room. His +patron, very quiet, spoke in a calm whisper: + +"And perhaps that hotel-keeper has been lying to you about him. He may +be a very poor devil indeed." + +Ricardo shook his head slightly. The Schombergian theory of Heyst had +become in him a profound conviction, which he had absorbed as naturally +as a sponge takes up water. His patron's doubts were a wanton denying +of what was self-evident; but Ricardo's voice remained as before, a soft +purring with a snarling undertone. + +"I am sup-prised at you, sir! It's the very way them tame ones--the +common 'yporcrits of the world--get on. When it comes to plunder +drifting under one's very nose, there's not one of them that would keep +his hands off. And I don't blame them. It's the way they do it that sets +my back up. Just look at the story of how he got rid of that pal of his! +Send a man home to croak of a cold on the chest--that's one of your tame +tricks. And d'you mean to say, sir, that a man that's up to it wouldn't +bag whatever he could lay his hands in his 'yporcritical way? What was +all that coal business? Tame citizen dodge; 'yporcrisy--nothing else. +No, no, sir! The thing is to extract it from him as neatly as possible. +That's the job; and it isn't so simple as it looks. I reckon you have +looked at it all round, sir, before you took up the notion of this +trip." + +"No." Mr. Jones was hardly audible, staring far away from his couch. "I +didn't think about it much. I was bored." + +"Ay, that you were--bad. I was feeling pretty desperate that afternoon, +when that bearded softy of a landlord got talking to me about this +fellow here. Quite accidentally, it was. Well, sir, here we are after a +mighty narrow squeak. I feel all limp yet; but never mind--his swag will +pay for the lot!" + +"He's all alone here," remarked Mr. Jones in a hollow murmur. + +"Ye-es, in a way. Yes, alone enough. Yes, you may say he is." + +"There's that Chinaman, though." + +"Ay, there's the Chink," assented Ricardo rather absentmindedly. + +He was debating in his mind the advisability of making a clean breast of +his knowledge of the girl's existence. Finally he concluded he wouldn't. +The enterprise was difficult enough without complicating it with an +upset to the sensibilities of the gentleman with whom he had the honour +of being associated. Let the discovery come of itself, he thought, +and then he could swear that he had known nothing of that offensive +presence. + +He did not need to lie. He had only to hold his tongue. + +"Yes," he muttered reflectively, "there's that Chink, certainly." + +At bottom, he felt a certain ambiguous respect for his governor's +exaggerated dislike of women, as if that horror of feminine presence +were a sort of depraved morality; but still morality, since he counted +it as an advantage. It prevented many undesirable complications. He did +not pretend to understand it. He did not even try to investigate +this idiosyncrasy of his chief. All he knew was that he himself was +differently inclined, and that it did not make him any happier or safer. +He did not know how he would have acted if he had been knocking about +the world on his own. Luckily he was a subordinate, not a wage-slave but +a follower--which was a restraint. Yes! The other sort of disposition +simplified matters in general; it wasn't to be gainsaid. But it was +clear that it could also complicate them--as in this most important and, +in Ricardo's view, already sufficiently delicate case. And the worst of +it was that one could not tell exactly in what precise manner it would +act. + +It was unnatural, he thought somewhat peevishly. How was one to reckon +up the unnatural? There were no rules for that. The faithful henchman +of plain Mr. Jones, foreseeing many difficulties of a material order, +decided to keep the girl out of the governor's knowledge, out of his +sight, too, for as long a time as it could be managed. That, alas, +seemed to be at most a matter of a few hours; whereas Ricardo feared +that to get the affair properly going would take some days. Once well +started, he was not afraid of his gentleman failing him. As is often the +case with lawless natures, Ricardo's faith in any given individual was +of a simple, unquestioning character. For man must have some support in +life. + +Cross-legged, his head drooping a little and perfectly still, he might +have been meditating in a bonze-like attitude upon the sacred syllable +"Om." It was a striking illustration of the untruth of appearances, for +his contempt for the world was of a severely practical kind. There was +nothing oriental about Ricardo but the amazing quietness of his pose. +Mr. Jones was also very quiet. He had let his head sink on the rolled-up +rug, and lay stretched out on his side with his back to the light. In +that position the shadows gathered in the cavities of his eyes made +them look perfectly empty. When he spoke, his ghostly voice had only to +travel a few inches straight into Ricardo's left ear. + +"Why don't you say something, now that you've got me awake?" + +"I wonder if you were sleeping as sound as you are trying to make out, +sir," said the unmoved Ricardo. + +"I wonder," repeated Mr. Jones. "At any rate, I was resting quietly!" + +"Come, sir!" Ricardo's whisper was alarmed. "You don't mean to say +you're going to be bored?" + +"No." + +"Quite right!" The secretary was very much relieved. "There's no +occasion to be, I can tell you, sir," he whispered earnestly. "Anything +but that! If I didn't say anything for a bit, it ain't because there +isn't plenty to talk about. Ay, more than enough." + +"What's the matter with you?" breathed out his patron. "Are you going to +turn pessimist?" + +"Me turn? No, sir! I ain't of those that turn. You may call me hard +names, if you like, but you know very well that I ain't a croaker." +Ricardo changed his tone. "If I said nothing for a while, it was because +I was meditating over the Chink, sir." + +"You were? Waste of time, my Martin. A Chinaman is unfathomable." + +Ricardo admitted that this might be so. Anyhow, a Chink was neither +here nor there, as a general thing, unfathomable as he might be; but a +Swedish baron wasn't--couldn't be! The woods were full of such barons. + +"I don't know that he is so tame," was Mr. Jones's remark, in a +sepulchral undertone. + +"How do you mean, sir? He ain't a rabbit, of course. You couldn't +hypnotize him, as I saw you do to more than one Dago, and other kinds +of tame citizens, when it came to the point of holding them down to a +game." + +"Don't you reckon on that," murmured plain Mr. Jones seriously. + +"No, sir, I don't, though you have a wonderful power of the eye. It's a +fact." + +"I have a wonderful patience," remarked Mr. Jones dryly. + +A dim smile flitted over the lips of the faithful Ricardo who never +raised his head. + +"I don't want to try you too much, sir, but this is like no other job we +ever turned our minds to." + +"Perhaps not. At any rate let us think so." + +A weariness with the monotony of life was reflected in the tone of this +qualified assent. It jarred on the nerves of the sanguine Ricardo. + +"Let us think of the way to go to work," he retorted a little +impatiently. "He's a deep one. Just look at the way he treated that chum +of his. Did you ever hear of anything so low? And the artfulness of the +beast--the dirty, tame artfulness!" + +"Don't you start moralizing, Martin," said Mr. Jones warningly. "As far +as I can make out the story that German hotel-keeper told you, it seems +to show a certain amount of character;--and independence from common +feelings which is not usual. It's very remarkable, if true." + +"Ay, ay! Very remarkable. It's mighty low down, all the same," muttered, +Ricardo obstinately. "I must say I am glad to think he will be paid off +for it in a way that'll surprise him!" + +The tip of his tongue appeared lively for an instant, as if trying for +the taste of that ferocious retribution on his compressed lips. For +Ricardo was sincere in his indignation before the elementary principle +of loyalty to a chum violated in cold blood, slowly, in a patient +duplicity of years. There are standards in villainy as in virtue, and +the act as he pictured it to himself acquired an additional horror +from the slow pace of that treachery so atrocious and so tame. But +he understood too the educated judgement of his governor, a gentleman +looking on all this with the privileged detachment of a cultivated mind, +of an elevated personality. + +"Ay, he's deep--he's artful," he mumbled between his sharp teeth. + +"Confound you!" Mr. Jones's calm whisper crept into his ear. "Come to +the point." + +Obedient, the secretary shook off his thoughtfulness. There was a +similarity of mind between these two--one the outcast of his vices, the +other inspired by a spirit of scornful defiance, the aggressiveness of +a beast of prey looking upon all the tame creatures of the earth as its +natural victim. Both were astute enough, however, and both were aware +that they had plunged into this adventure without a sufficient scrutiny +of detail. The figure of a lonely man far from all assistance had +loomed up largely, fascinating and defenceless in the middle of the sea, +filling the whole field of their vision. There had not seemed to be any +need for thinking. As Schomberg had been saying: "Three to one." + +But it did not look so simple now in the face of that solitude which was +like an armour for this man. The feeling voiced by the henchman in his +own way--"We don't seem much forwarder now we are here" was acknowledged +by the silence of the patron. It was easy enough to rip a fellow up or +drill a hole in him, whether he was alone or not, Ricardo reflected in +low, confidential tones, but-- + +"He isn't alone," Mr. Jones said faintly, in his attitude of a man +composed for sleep. "Don't forget that Chinaman." Ricardo started +slightly. + +"Oh, ay--the Chink!" + +Ricardo had been on the point of confessing about the girl; but no! He +wanted his governor to be unperturbed and steady. Vague thoughts, +which he hardly dared to look in the face, were stirring his brain in +connection with that girl. She couldn't be much account, he thought. She +could be frightened. And there were also other possibilities. The Chink, +however, could be considered openly. + +"What I was thinking about it, sir," he went on earnestly, "is +this--here we've got a man. He's nothing. If he won't be good, he can be +made quiet. That's easy. But then there's his plunder. He doesn't carry +it in his pocket." + +"I hope not," breathed Mr. Jones. + +"Same here. It's too big, we know, but if he were alone, he would not +feel worried about it overmuch--I mean the safety of the pieces. He +would just put the lot into any box or drawer that was handy." + +"Would he?" + +"Yes, sir. He would keep it under his eye, as it were. Why not? It is +natural. A fellow doesn't put his swag underground, unless there's a +very good reason for it." + +"A very good reason, eh?" + +"Yes, sir. What do you think a fellow is--a mole?" + +From his experience, Ricardo declared that man was not a burrowing +beast. Even the misers very seldom buried their hoard, unless for +exceptional reasons. In the given situation of a man alone on an island, +the company of a Chink was a very good reason. Drawers would not be +safe, nor boxes, either, from a prying, slant-eyed Chink. No, sir, +unless a safe--a proper office safe. But the safe was there in the room. + +"Is there a safe in this room? I didn't notice it," whispered Mr. Jones. + +That was because the thing was painted white, like the walls of the +room; and besides, it was tucked away in the shadows of a corner. Mr. +Jones had been too tired to observe anything on his first coming ashore; +but Ricardo had very soon spotted the characteristic form. He only +wished he could believe that the plunder of treachery, duplicity, and +all the moral abominations of Heyst had been there. But no; the blamed +thing was open. + +"It might have been there at one time or another," he commented +gloomily, "but it isn't there now." + +"The man did not elect to live in this house," remarked Mr. Jones. "And +by the by, what could he have meant by speaking of circumstances which +prevented him lodging us in the other bungalow? You remember what he +said, Martin? Sounded cryptic." + +Martin, who remembered and understood the phrase as directly motived by +the existence of the girl, waited a little before saying: + +"Some of his artfulness, sir; and not the worst of it either. That +manner of his to us, this asking no questions, is some more of his +artfulness. A man's bound to be curious, and he is; yet he goes on as if +he didn't care. He does care--or else what was he doing up with a cigar +in the middle of the night, doing a think? I don't like it." + +"He may be outside, observing the light here, and saying the very same +thing to himself of our own wakefulness," gravely suggested Ricardo's +governor. + +"He may be, sir; but this is too important to be talked over in the +dark. And the light is all right, it can be accounted for. There's a +light in this bungalow in the middle of the night because--why, because +you are not well. Not well, sir--that's what's the matter, and you will +have to act up to it." + +The consideration had suddenly occurred to the faithful henchman, in the +light of a felicitous expedient to keep his governor and the girl apart +as long as possible. Mr. Jones received the suggestion without the +slightest stir, even in the deep sockets of his eyes, where a steady, +faint gleam was the only thing telling of life and attention in his +attenuated body. But Ricardo, as soon as he had enunciated his happy +thought, perceived in it other possibilities more to the point and of +greater practical advantage. + +"With your looks, sir, it will be easy enough," he went on evenly, as +if no silence had intervened, always respectful, but frank, with +perfect simplicity of purpose. "All you've got to do is just to lie down +quietly. I noticed him looking sort of surprised at you on the wharf, +sir." + +At these words, a naive tribute to the aspect of his physique, even more +suggestive of the grave than of the sick-bed, a fold appeared on that +side of the governor's face which was exposed to the dim light--a deep, +shadowy, semicircular fold from the side of the nose to bottom of the +chin--a silent smile. By a side-glance Ricardo had noted this play of +features. He smiled, too, appreciative, encouraged. + +"And you as hard as nails all the time," he went on. "Hang me if anybody +would believe you aren't sick, if I were to swear myself black in +the face! Give us a day or two to look into matters and size up that +'yporcrit." + +Ricardo's eyes remained fixed on his crossed shins. The chief, in his +lifeless accents, approved. + +"Perhaps it would be a good idea." + +"The Chink, he's nothing. He can be made quiet any time." + +One of Ricardo's hands, reposing palm upwards on his folded legs, made +a swift thrusting gesture, repeated by the enormous darting shadow of an +arm very low on the wall. It broke the spell of perfect stillness in +the room. The secretary eyed moodily the wall from which the shadow had +gone. Anybody could be made quiet, he pointed out. It was not anything +that the Chink could do; no, it was the effect that his company must +have produced on the conduct of the doomed man. A man! What was a man? A +Swedish baron could be ripped up, or else holed by a shot, as easily as +any other creature; but that was exactly what was to be avoided, till +one knew where he had hidden his plunder. + +"I shouldn't think it would be some sort of hole in his bungalow," +argued Ricardo with real anxiety. + +No. A house can be burnt--set on fire accidentally, or on purpose, while +a man's asleep. Under the house--or in some crack, cranny, or crevice? +Something told him it wasn't that. The anguish of mental effort +contracted Ricardo's brow. The skin of his head seemed to move in this +travail of vain and tormenting suppositions. + +"What did you think a fellow is, sir--a baby?" he said, in answer to Mr. +Jones's objections. "I am trying to find out what I would do myself. He +wouldn't be likely to be cleverer than I am." + +"And what do you know about yourself?" + +Mr Jones seemed to watch his follower's perplexities with amusement +concealed in a death-like composure. + +Ricardo disregarded the question. The material vision of the spoil +absorbed all his faculties. A great vision! He seemed to see it. A few +small canvas bags tied up with thin cord, their distended rotundity +showing the inside pressure of the disk-like forms of coins--gold, +solid, heavy, eminently portable. Perhaps steel cash-boxes with a chased +design, on the covers; or perhaps a black and brass box with a handle +on the top, and full of goodness knows what. Bank notes? Why not? The +fellow had been going home; so it was surely something worth going home +with. + +"And he may have put it anywhere outside--anywhere!" cried Ricardo in a +deadened voice, "in the forest--" + +That was it! A temporary darkness replaced the dim light of the room. +The darkness of the forest at night and in it the gleam of a lantern, by +which a figure is digging at the foot of a tree-trunk. As likely as not, +another figure holding that lantern--ha, feminine! The girl! + +The prudent Ricardo stifled a picturesque and profane exclamation, +partly joy, partly dismay. Had the girl been trusted or mistrusted by +that man? Whatever it was, it was bound to be wholly! With women there +could be no half-measures. He could not imagine a fellow half-trusting +a woman in that intimate relation to himself, and in those particular +circumstances of conquest and loneliness where no confidences could +appear dangerous since, apparently, there could be no one she could +give him away to. Moreover, in nine cases out of ten the woman would be +trusted. But, trusted or mistrusted, was her presence a favourable or +unfavourable condition of the problem? That was the question! + +The temptation to consult his chief, to talk over the weighty fact, and +get his opinion on it, was great indeed. Ricardo resisted it; but the +agony of his solitary mental conflict was extremely sharp. A woman in +a problem is an incalculable quantity, even if you have something to go +upon in forming your guess. How much more so when you haven't even once +caught sight of her. + +Swift as were his mental processes, he felt that a longer silence was +inadvisable. He hastened to speak: + +"And do you see us, sir, you and I, with a couple of spades having to +tackle this whole confounded island?" + +He allowed himself a slight movement of the arm. The shadow enlarged it +into a sweeping gesture. + +"This seems rather discouraging, Martin," murmured the unmoved governor. + +"We mustn't be discouraged--that's all!" retorted his henchman. "And +after what we had to go through in that boat too! Why it would be--" + +He couldn't find the qualifying words. Very calm, faithful, and yet +astute, he expressed his new-born hopes darkly. + +"Something's sure to turn up to give us a hint; only this job can't be +rushed. You may depend on me to pick up the least little bit of a hint; +but you, sir--you've got to play him very gently. For the rest you can +trust me." + +"Yes; but I ask myself what YOU are trusting to." + +"Our luck," said the faithful Ricardo. "Don't say a word against that. +It might spoil the run of it." + +"You are a superstitious beggar. No, I won't say anything against it." + +"That's right, sir. Don't you even think lightly of it. Luck's not to be +played with." + +"Yes, luck's a delicate thing," assented Mr. Jones in a dreamy whisper. + +A short silence ensued, which Ricardo ended in a discreet and tentative +voice. + +"Talking of luck, I suppose he could be made to take a hand with +you, sir--two-handed picket or ekkarty, you being seedy and keeping +indoors--just to pass the time. For all we know, he may be one of them +hot ones once they start--" + +"Is it likely?" came coldly from the principal. "Considering what we +know of his history--say with his partner." + +"True, sir. He's a cold-blooded beast; a cold-blooded, inhuman--" + +"And I'll tell you another thing that isn't likely. He would not be +likely to let himself be stripped bare. We haven't to do with a young +fool that can be led on by chaff or flattery, and in the end simply +overawed. This is a calculating man." + +Ricardo recognized that clearly. What he had in his mind was something +on a small scale, just to keep the enemy busy while he, Ricardo, had +time to nose around a bit. + +"You could even lose a little money to him, sir," he suggested. + +"I could." + +Ricardo was thoughtful for a moment. + +"He strikes me, too, as the sort of man to start prancing when one +didn't expect it. What do you think, sir? Is he a man that would prance? +That is, if something startled him. More likely to prance than to +run--what?" + +The answer came at once, because Mr. Jones understood the peculiar idiom +of his faithful follower. + +"Oh, without doubt! Without doubt!" + +"It does me good to hear that you think so. He's a prancing beast, +and so we mustn't startle him--not till I have located the stuff. +Afterwards--" + +Ricardo paused, sinister in the stillness of his pose. Suddenly he +got up with a swift movement and gazed down at his chief in moody +abstraction. Mr. Jones did not stir. + +"There's one thing that's worrying me," began Ricardo in a subdued +voice. + +"Only one?" was the faint comment from the motionless body on the +bedstead. + +"I mean more than all the others put together." + +"That's grave news." + +"Ay, grave enough. It's this--how do you feel in yourself, sir? Are you +likely to get bored? I know them fits come on you suddenly; but surely +you can tell--" + +"Martin, you are an ass." + +The moody face of the secretary brightened up. + +"Really, sir? Well, I am quite content to be on these terms--I mean as +long as you don't get bored. It wouldn't do, sir." + +For coolness, Ricardo had thrown open his shirt and rolled up his +sleeves. He moved stealthily across the room, bare-footed, towards the +candle, the shadow of his head and shoulders growing bigger behind him +on the opposite wall, to which the face of plain Mr. Jones was turned. +With a feline movement, Ricardo glanced over his shoulder at the thin +back of the spectre reposing on the bed, and then blew out the candle. + +"In fact, I am rather amused, Martin," Mr. Jones said in the dark. + +He heard the sound of a slapped thigh and the jubilant exclamation of +his henchman: + +"Good! That's the way to talk, sir!" + + + + + +PART FOUR + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +Ricardo advanced prudently by short darts from one tree-trunk to +another, more in the manner of a squirrel than a cat. The sun had +risen some time before. Already the sparkle of open sea was encroaching +rapidly on the dark, cool, early-morning blue of Diamond Bay; but the +deep dusk lingered yet under the mighty pillars of the forest, between +which the secretary dodged. + +He was watching Number One's bungalow with an animal-like patience, if +with a very human complexity of purpose. This was the second morning +of such watching. The first one had not been rewarded by success. Well, +strictly speaking, there was no hurry. + +The sun, swinging above the ridge all at once, inundated with light the +space of burnt grass in front of Ricardo and the face of the bungalow, +on which his eyes were fixed, leaving only the one dark spot of the +doorway. To his right, to his left, and behind him, splashes of gold +appeared in the deep shade of the forest, thinning the gloom under the +ragged roof of leaves. + +This was not a very favourable circumstance for Ricardo's purpose. He +did not wish to be detected in his patient occupation. For what he was +watching for was a sight of the girl--that girl! just a glimpse across +the burnt patch to see what she was like. He had excellent eyes, and +the distance was not so great. He would be able to distinguish her face +quite easily if she only came out on the veranda; and she was bound +to do that sooner or later. He was confident that he could form some +opinion about her--which, he felt, was very necessary, before venturing +on some steps to get in touch with her behind that Swedish baron's back. +His theoretical view of the girl was such that he was quite prepared, +on the strength of that distant examination, to show himself +discreetly--perhaps even make a sign. It all depended on his reading of +the face. She couldn't be much. He knew that sort! + +By protruding his head a little he commanded, through the foliage of a +festooning creeper, a view of the three bungalows. Irregularly disposed +along a flat curve, over the veranda rail of the farthermost one hung a +dark rug of a tartan pattern, amazingly conspicuous. Ricardo could see +the very checks. A brisk fire of sticks was burning on the ground in +front of the steps, and in the sunlight the thin, fluttering flame had +paled almost to invisibility--a mere rosy stir under a faint wreath of +smoke. He could see the white bandage on the head of Pedro bending over +it, and the wisps of black hair standing up weirdly. He had wound that +bandage himself, after breaking that shaggy and enormous head. The +creature balanced it like a load, staggering towards the steps. Ricardo +could see a small, long-handled saucepan at the end of a great hairy +paw. + +Yes, he could see all that there was to be seen, far and near. Excellent +eyes! The only thing they could not penetrate was the dark oblong of the +doorway on the veranda under the low eaves of the bungalow's roof. And +that was vexing. It was an outrage. Ricardo was easily outraged. Surely +she would come out presently! Why didn't she? Surely the fellow did not +tie her up to the bedpost before leaving the house! + +Nothing appeared. Ricardo was as still as the leafy cables of creepers +depending in a convenient curtain from the mighty limb sixty feet above +his head. His very eyelids were still, and this unblinking watchfulness +gave him the dreamy air of a cat posed on a hearth-rug contemplating the +fire. Was he dreaming? There, in plain sight, he had before him a white, +blouse-like jacket, short blue trousers, a pair of bare yellow calves, a +pigtail, long and slender-- + +"The confounded Chink!" he muttered, astounded. + +He was not conscious of having looked away; and yet right there, in the +middle of the picture, without having come round the right-hand corner +or the left-hand corner of the house, without falling from the sky or +surging up from the ground, Wang had become visible, large as life, +and engaged in the young-ladyish occupation of picking flowers. Step +by step, stooping repeatedly over the flower-beds at the foot of the +veranda, the startlingly materialized Chinaman passed off the scene in +a very commonplace manner, by going up the steps and disappearing in the +darkness of the doorway. + +Only then the yellow eyes of Martin Ricardo lost their intent fixity. He +understood that it was time for him to be moving. That bunch of +flowers going into the house in the hand of a Chinaman was for the +breakfast-table. What else could it be for? + +"I'll give you flowers!" he muttered threateningly. "You wait!" + +Another moment, just for a glance towards the Jones bungalow, whence +he expected Heyst to issue on his way to that breakfast so offensively +decorated, and Ricardo began his retreat. His impulse, his desire, was +for a rush into the open, face to face with the appointed victim, for +what he called a "ripping up," visualized greedily, and always with +the swift preliminary stooping movement on his part--the forerunner of +certain death to his adversary. This was his impulse; and as it was, so +to speak, constitutional, it was extremely difficult to resist when his +blood was up. What could be more trying than to have to skulk and dodge +and restrain oneself, mentally and physically, when one's blood was up? +Mr. Secretary Ricardo began his retreat from his post of observation +behind a tree opposite Heyst's bungalow, using great care to remain +unseen. His proceedings were made easier by the declivity of the ground, +which sloped sharply down to the water's edge. There, his feet feeling +the warmth of the island's rocky foundation already heated by the sun, +through the thin soles of his straw slippers he was, as it were, sunk +out of sight of the houses. A short scramble of some twenty feet brought +him up again to the upper level, at the place where the jetty had its +root in the shore. He leaned his back against one of the lofty uprights +which still held up the company's signboard above the mound of derelict +coal. Nobody could have guessed how much his blood was up. To contain +himself he folded his arms tightly on his breast. + +Ricardo was not used to a prolonged effort of self-control. His craft, +his artfulness, felt themselves always at the mercy of his nature, which +was truly feral and only held in subjection by the influence of the +"governor," the prestige of a gentleman. It had its cunning too, but it +was being almost too severely tried since the feral solution of a growl +and a spring was forbidden by the problem. Ricardo dared not venture out +on the cleared ground. He dared not. + +"If I meet the beggar," he thought, "I don't know what I mayn't do. I +daren't trust myself." + +What exasperated him just now was his inability to understand +Heyst. Ricardo was human enough to suffer from the discovery of his +limitations. No, he couldn't size Heyst up. He could kill him with +extreme ease--a growl and a spring--but that was forbidden! However, he +could not remain indefinitely under the funereal blackboard. + +"I must make a move," he thought. + +He moved on, his head swimming a little with the repressed desire of +violence, and came out openly in front of the bungalows, as if he had +just been down to the jetty to look at the boat. The sunshine enveloped +him, very brilliant, very still, very hot. The three buildings faced +him. The one with the rug on the balustrade was the most distant; next +to it was the empty bungalow; the nearest, with the flower-beds at the +foot of its veranda, contained that bothersome girl, who had managed +so provokingly to keep herself invisible. That was why Ricardo's eyes +lingered on that building. The girl would surely be easier to "size up" +than Heyst. A sight of her, a mere glimpse, would have been something to +go by, a step nearer to the goal--the first real move, in fact. Ricardo +saw no other move. And any time she might appear on that veranda! + +She did not appear; but, like a concealed magnet, she exercised her +attraction. As he went on, he deviated towards the bungalow. Though his +movements were deliberate, his feral instincts had such sway that if he +had met Heyst walking towards him, he would have had to satisfy his +need of violence. But he saw nobody. Wang was at the back of the house, +keeping the coffee hot against Number One's return for breakfast. Even +the simian Pedro was out of sight, no doubt crouching on the door-step, +his red little eyes fastened with animal-like devotion on Mr. Jones, who +was in discourse with Heyst in the other bungalow--the conversation of +an evil spectre with a disarmed man, watched by an ape. + +His will having very little to do with it, Ricardo, darting swift +glances in all directions, found himself at the steps of the Heyst +bungalow. Once there, falling under an uncontrollable force of +attraction, he mounted them with a savage and stealthy action of his +limbs, and paused for a moment under the eaves to listen to the silence. +Presently he advanced over the threshold one leg--it seemed to stretch +itself, like a limb of india-rubber--planted his foot within, brought up +the other swiftly, and stood inside the room, turning his head from side +to side. To his eyes, brought in there from the dazzling sunshine, all +was gloom for a moment. His pupils, like a cat's, dilating swiftly, he +distinguished an enormous quantity of books. He was amazed; and he was +put off too. He was vexed in his astonishment. He had meant to note the +aspect and nature of things, and hoped to draw some useful inference, +some hint as to the man. But what guess could one make out of a +multitude of books? He didn't know what to think; and he formulated his +bewilderment in the mental exclamation: + +"What the devil has this fellow been trying to set up here--a school?" + +He gave a prolonged stare to the portrait of Heyst's father, that severe +profile ignoring the vanities of this earth. His eyes gleamed sideways +at the heavy silver candlesticks--signs of opulence. He prowled as a +stray cat entering a strange place might have done, for if Ricardo had +not Wang's miraculous gift of materializing and vanishing, rather than +coming and going, he could be nearly as noiseless in his less elusive +movements. He noted the back door standing just ajar; and all the time +his slightly pointed ears, at the utmost stretch of watchfulness, kept +in touch with the profound silence outside enveloping the absolute +stillness of the house. + +He had not been in the room two minutes when it occurred to him that he +must be alone in the bungalow. The woman, most likely, had sneaked out +and was walking about somewhere in the grounds at the back. She had +been probably ordered to keep out of sight. Why? Because the fellow +mistrusted his guests; or was it because he mistrusted her? + +Ricardo reflected that from a certain point of view it amounted nearly +to the same thing. He remembered Schomberg's story. He felt that +running away with somebody only to get clear of that beastly, tame, +hotel-keeper's attention was no proof of hopeless infatuation. She could +be got in touch with. + +His moustaches stirred. For some time he had been looking at a closed +door. He would peep into that other room, and perhaps see something more +informing than a confounded lot of books. As he crossed over, he thought +recklessly: + +"If the beggar comes in suddenly, and starts to prance, I'll rip him up +and be done with it!" + +He laid his hand on the handle, and felt the door come unlatched. Before +he pulled it open, he listened again to the silence. He felt it all +about him, complete, without a flaw. + +The necessity of prudence had exasperated his self-restraint. A mood +of ferocity woke up in him, and, as always at such times, he became +physically aware of the sheeted knife strapped to his leg. He pulled at +the door with fierce curiosity. It came open without a squeak of hinge, +without a rustle, with no sound at all; and he found himself glaring at +the opaque surface of some rough blue stuff, like serge. A curtain was +fitted inside, heavy enough and long enough not to stir. + +A curtain! This unforeseen veil, baffling his curiosity checked his +brusqueness. He did not fling it aside with an impatient movement; he +only looked at it closely, as if its texture had to be examined before +his hand could touch such stuff. In this interval of hesitation, he +seemed to detect a flaw in the perfection of the silence, the faintest +possible rustle, which his ears caught and instantly, in the effort of +conscious listening, lost again. No! Everything was still inside and +outside the house, only he had no longer the sense of being alone there. + +When he put out his hand towards the motionless folds it was with +extreme caution, and merely to push the stuff aside a little, advancing +his head at the same time to peep within. A moment of complete +immobility ensued. Then, without anything else of him stirring, +Ricardo's head shrank back on his shoulders, his arm descended slowly to +his side. There was a woman in there. The very woman! Lighted dimly +by the reflection of the outer glare, she loomed up strangely big and +shadowy at the other end of the long, narrow room. With her back to +the door, she was doing her hair with bare arms uplifted. One of them +gleamed pearly white; the other detached its perfect form in black +against the unshuttered, uncurtained square window-hole. She was there, +her fingers busy with her dark hair, utterly unconscious, exposed and +defenceless--and tempting. + +Ricardo drew back one foot and pressed his elbows close to his sides; +his chest started heaving convulsively as if he were wrestling or +running a race; his body began to sway gently back and forth. The +self-restraint was at an end: his psychology must have its way. The +instinct for the feral spring could no longer be denied. Ravish or +kill--it was all one to him, as long as by the act he liberated the +suffering soul of savagery repressed for so long. After a quick glance +over his shoulder, which hunters of big game tell us no lion or tiger +omits to give before charging home, Ricardo charged, head down, straight +at the curtain. The stuff, tossed up violently by his rush, settled +itself with a slow, floating descent into vertical folds, motionless, +without a shudder even, in the still, warm air. + + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +The clock--which once upon a time had measured the hours of philosophic +meditation--could not have ticked away more than five seconds when Wang +materialized within the living-room. His concern primarily was with the +delayed breakfast, but at once his slanting eyes became immovably fixed +upon the unstirring curtain. For it was behind it that he had located +the strange, deadened scuffling sounds which filled the empty room. The +slanting eyes of his race could not achieve a round, amazed stare, but +they remained still, dead still, and his impassive yellow face grew all +at once careworn and lean with the sudden strain of intense, doubtful, +frightened watchfulness. Contrary impulses swayed his body, rooted to +the floor-mats. He even went so far as to extend his hand towards the +curtain. He could not reach it, and he didn't make the necessary step +forward. + +The mysterious struggle was going on with confused thuds of bare feet, +in a mute wrestling match, no human sound, hiss, groan, murmur, or +exclamation coming through the curtain. A chair fell over, not with a +crash but lightly, as if just grazed, and a faint metallic ring of the +tin bath succeeded. Finally the tense silence, as of two adversaries +locked in a deadly grip, was ended by the heavy, dull thump of a soft +body flung against the inner partition of planks. It seemed to shake +the whole bungalow. By that time, walking backward, his eyes, his +very throat, strained with fearful excitement, his extended arm still +pointing at the curtain, Wang had disappeared through the back door. +Once out in the compound, he bolted round the end of the house. Emerging +innocently between the two bungalows he lingered and lounged in the +open, where anybody issuing from any of the dwellings was bound to see +him--a self-possessed Chinaman idling there, with nothing but perhaps an +unserved breakfast on his mind. + +It was at this time that Wang made up his mind to give up all connection +with Number One, a man not only disarmed but already half vanquished. +Till that morning he had had doubts as to his course of action, but this +overheard scuffle decided the question. Number One was a doomed man--one +of those beings whom it is unlucky to help. Even as he walked in the +open with a fine air of unconcern, Wang wondered that no sound of any +sort was to be heard inside the house. For all he knew, the white woman +might have been scuffling in there with an evil spirit, which had of +course killed her. For nothing visible came out of the house he watched +out of the slanting corner of his eye. The sunshine and the silence +outside the bungalow reigned undisturbed. + +But in the house the silence of the big room would not have struck an +acute ear as perfect. It was troubled by a stir so faint that it could +hardly be called a ghost of whispering from behind the curtain. + +Ricardo, feeling his throat with tender care, breathed out admiringly: + +"You have fingers like steel. Jimminy! You have muscles like a giant!" + +Luckily for Lena, Ricardo's onset had been so sudden--she was winding +her two heavy tresses round her head--that she had no time to lower her +arms. This, which saved them from being pinned to her sides, gave her a +better chance to resist. His spring had nearly thrown her down. Luckily, +again, she was standing so near the wall that, though she was driven +against it headlong, yet the shock was not heavy enough to knock all the +breath out of her body. On the contrary, it helped her first instinctive +attempt to drive her assailant backward. + +After the first gasp of a surprise that was really too over-powering for +a cry, she was never in doubt of the nature of her danger. She defended +herself in the full, clear knowledge of it, from the force of instinct +which is the true source of every great display of energy, and with a +determination which could hardly have been expected from a girl who, +cornered in a dim corridor by the red-faced, stammering Schomberg, had +trembled with shame, disgust, and fear; had drooped, terrified, before +mere words spluttered out odiously by a man who had never in his life +laid his big paw on her. + +This new enemy's attack was simple, straightforward violence. It was not +the slimy, underhand plotting to deliver her up like a slave, which +had sickened her heart and had made her feel in her loneliness that her +oppressors were too many for her. She was no longer alone in the world +now. She resisted without a moment of faltering, because she was no +longer deprived of moral support; because she was a human being who +counted; because she was no longer defending herself for herself alone; +because of the faith that had been born in her--the faith in the man of +her destiny, and perhaps in the Heaven which had sent him so wonderfully +to cross her path. + +She had defended herself principally by maintaining a desperate, +murderous clutch on Ricardo's windpipe, till she felt a sudden +relaxation of the terrific hug in which he stupidly and ineffectually +persisted to hold her. Then with a supreme effort of her arms and of +her suddenly raised knee, she sent him flying against the partition. +The cedar-wood chest stood in the way, and Ricardo, with a thump which +boomed hollow through the whole bungalow, fell on it in a sitting +posture, half strangled, and exhausted not so much by the efforts as by +the emotions of the struggle. + +With the recoil of her exerted strength, she too reeled, staggered back, +and sat on the edge of the bed. Out of breath, but calm and unabashed, +she busied herself in readjusting under her arms the brown and yellow +figured Celebes sarong, the tuck of which had come undone during the +fight. Then, folding her bare arms tightly on her breast, she leaned +forward on her crossed legs, determined and without fear. + +Ricardo, leaning forward too, his nervous force gone, crestfallen like a +beast of prey that has missed its spring, met her big grey eyes looking +at him--wide open, observing, mysterious--from under the dark arches of +her courageous eyebrows. Their faces were not a foot apart. He ceased +feeling about his aching throat and dropped the palms of his hands +heavily on his knees. He was not looking at her bare shoulders, at her +strong arms; he was looking down at the floor. He had lost one of his +straw slippers. A chair with a white dress on it had been overturned. +These, with splashes of water on the floor out of a brusquely misplaced +sponge-bath, were the only traces of the struggle. + +Ricardo swallowed twice consciously, as if to make sure of his throat +before he spoke again: + +"All right. I never meant to hurt you--though I am no joker when it +comes to it." + +He pulled up the leg of his pyjamas to exhibit the strapped knife. +She glanced at it without moving her head, and murmured with scornful +bitterness: + +"Ah, yes--with that thing stuck in my side. In no other way." + +He shook his head with a shamefaced smile. + +"Listen! I am quiet now. Straight--I am. I don't need to explain +why--you know how it is. And I can see, now, this wasn't the way with +you." + +She made no sound. Her still, upward gaze had a patient, mournfulness +which troubled him like a suggestion of an inconceivable depth. He added +thoughtfully: + +"You are not going to make a noise about this silly try of mine?" + +She moved her head the least bit. + +"Jee-miny! You are a wonder--" he murmured earnestly, relieved more than +she could have guessed. + +Of course, if she had attempted to run out, he would have stuck the +knife between her shoulders, to stop her screaming; but all the fat +would have been in the fire, the business utterly spoiled, and the rage +of the governor--especially when he learned the cause--boundless. A +woman that does not make a noise after an attempt of that kind has +tacitly condoned the offence. Ricardo had no small vanities. But +clearly, if she would pass it over like this, then he could not be so +utterly repugnant to her. He felt flattered. And she didn't seem afraid +of him either. He already felt almost tender towards the girl--that +plucky, fine girl who had not tried to run screaming from him. + +"We shall be friends yet. I don't give you up. Don't think it. Friends +as friends can be!" he whispered confidently. "Jee-miny! You aren't a +tame one. Neither am I. You will find that out before long." + +He could not know that if she had not run out, it was because that +morning, under the stress of growing uneasiness at the presence of the +incomprehensible visitors, Heyst had confessed to her that it was his +revolver he had been looking for in the night; that it was gone, that he +was a disarmed, defenceless man. She had hardly comprehended the meaning +of his confession. Now she understood better what it meant. The effort +of her self-control, her stillness, impressed Ricardo. Suddenly she +spoke: + +"What are you after?" + +He did not raise his eyes. His hands reposing on his knees, his drooping +head, something reflective in his pose, suggested the weariness of a +simple soul, the fatigue of a mental rather than physical contest. He +answered the direct question by a direct statement, as if he were too +tired to dissemble: + +"After the swag." + +The word was strange to her. The veiled ardour of her grey gaze from +under the dark eyebrows never left Ricardo's. + +"A swag?" she murmured quietly. "What's that?" + +"Why, swag, plunder--what your gentleman has been pinching right and +left for years--the pieces. Don't you know? This!" + +Without looking up, he made the motion of counting money into the +palm of his hand. She lowered her eyes slightly to observe this bit +of pantomime, but returned them to his face at once. Then, in a mere +breath: + +"How do you know anything about him?" she asked, concealing her puzzled +alarm. "What has it got to do with you?" + +"Everything," was Ricardo's concise answer, in a low, emphatic whisper. +He reflected that this girl was really his best hope. Out of the unfaded +impression of past violence there was growing the sort of sentiment +which prevents a man from being indifferent to a woman he has once held +in his arms--if even against her will--and still more so if she has +pardoned the outrage. It becomes then a sort of bond. He felt positively +the need to confide in her--a subtle trait of masculinity, this almost +physical need of trust which can exist side by side with the most brutal +readiness of suspicion. + +"It's a game of grab--see?" he went on, with a new inflection of +intimacy in his murmur. He was looking straight at her now. + +"That fat, tame slug of a gin-slinger, Schomberg, put us up to it." + +So strong is the impression of helpless and persecuted misery, that the +girl who had fought down a savage assault without faltering could not +completely repress a shudder at the mere sound of the abhorred name. + +Ricardo became more rapid and confidential: + +"He wants to pay him off--pay both of you, at that; so he told me. He +was hot after you. He would have given all he had into those hands of +yours that have nearly strangled me. But you couldn't, eh? Nohow--what?" +He paused. "So, rather than--you followed a gentleman?" + +He noticed a slight movement of her head and spoke quickly. + +"Same here--rather than be a wage-slave. Only these foreigners aren't to +be trusted. You're too good for him. A man that will rob his best +chum?" She raised her head. He went on, well pleased with his progress, +whispering hurriedly: "Yes. I know all about him. So you may guess how +he's likely to treat a woman after a bit!" + +He did not know that he was striking terror into her breast now. Still +the grey eyes remained fixed on him unmovably watchful, as if sleepy +under the white forehead. She was beginning to understand. His words +conveyed a definite, dreadful meaning to her mind, which he proceeded to +enlighten further in a convinced murmur. + +"You and I are made to understand each other. Born alike, bred alike, I +guess. You are not tame. Same here! You have been chucked out into this +rotten world of 'yporcrits. Same here!" + +Her stillness, her appalled stillness, wore to him an air of fascinated +attention. He asked abruptly: + +"Where is it?" + +She made an effort to breathe out: + +"Where's what?" + +His tone expressed excited secrecy. + +"The swag--plunder--pieces. It's a game of grab. We must have it; but it +isn't easy, and so you will have to lend a hand. Come! is it kept in the +house?" + +As often with women, her wits were sharpened by the very terror of the +glimpsed menace. She shook her head negatively. + +"No." + +"Sure?" + +"Sure," she said. + +"Ay! Thought so. Does your gentleman trust you?" + +Again she shook her head. + +"Blamed 'yporcrit," he said feelingly, and then reflected: "He's one of +the tame ones, ain't he?" + +"You had better find out for yourself," she said. + +"You trust me. I don't want to die before you and I have made friends." +This was said with a strange air of feline gallantry. Then, tentatively: +"But he could be brought to trust you, couldn't he?" + +"Trust me?" she said, in a tone which bordered on despair, but which he +mistook for derision. + +"Stand in with us," he urged. "Give the chuck to all this blamed +'yporcrisy. Perhaps, without being trusted, you have managed to find out +something already, eh?" + +"Perhaps I have," she uttered with lips that seemed to her to be +freezing fast. + +Ricardo now looked at her calm face with something like respect. He was +even a little awed by her stillness, by her economy of words. Womanlike, +she felt the effect she had produced, the effect of knowing much and of +keeping all her knowledge in reserve. So far, somehow, this had come, +about of itself. Thus encouraged, directed in the way of duplicity, the +refuge of the weak, she made a heroically conscious effort and forced +her stiff, cold lips into a smile. + +Duplicity--the refuge of the weak and the cowardly, but of the disarmed, +too! Nothing stood between the enchanted dream of her existence and +a cruel catastrophe but her duplicity. It seemed to her that the man +sitting there before her was an unavoidable presence, which had attended +all her life. He was the embodied evil of the world. She was not ashamed +of her duplicity. With a woman's frank courage, as soon as she saw +that opening she threw herself into it without reserve, with only one +doubt--that of her own strength. She was appalled by the situation; but +already all her aroused femininity, understanding that whether Heyst +loved her or not she loved him, and feeling that she had brought this on +his head, faced the danger with a passionate desire to defend her own. + + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +To Ricardo the girl had been so unforeseen that he was unable to bring +upon her the light of his critical faculties. Her smile appeared to him +full of promise. He had not expected her to be what she was. Who, from +the talk he had heard, could expect to meet a girl like this? She was +a blooming miracle, he said to himself, familiarly, yet with a tinge +of respect. She was no meat for the likes of that tame, respectable +gin-slinger. Ricardo grew hot with indignation. Her courage, her +physical strength, demonstrated at the cost of his discomfiture, +commanded his sympathy. He felt himself drawn to her by the proofs +of her amazing spirit. Such a girl! She had a strong soul; and her +reflective disposition to throw over her connection proved that she was +no hypocrite. + +"Is your gentleman a good shot?" he said, looking down on the floor +again, as if indifferent. + +She hardly understood the phrase; but in its form it suggested some +accomplishment. It was safe to whisper an affirmative. + +"Yes." + +"Mine, too--and better than good," Ricardo murmured, and then, in a +confidential burst: "I am not so good at it, but I carry a pretty deadly +thing about me, all the same!" + +He tapped his leg. She was past the stage of shudders now. Stiff all +over, unable even to move her eyes, she felt an awful mental tension +which was like blank forgetfulness. Ricardo tried to influence her in +his own way. + +"And my gentleman is not the sort that would drop me. He ain't no +foreigner; whereas you, with your baron, you don't know what's before +you--or, rather, being a woman, you know only too well. Much better +not to wait for the chuck. Pile in with us and get your share--of the +plunder, I mean. You have some notion about it already." + +She felt that if she as much as hinted by word or sign that there was no +such thing on the island, Heyst's life wouldn't be worth half an hour's +purchase; but all power of combining words had vanished in the tension +of her mind. Words themselves were too difficult to think of--all except +the word "yes," the saving word! She whispered it with not a feature of +her face moving. To Ricardo the faint and concise sound proved a cool, +reserved assent, more worth having from that amazing mistress of herself +than a thousand words from any other woman. He thought with exultation +that he had come upon one in a million--in ten millions! His whisper +became frankly entreating. + +"That's good! Now all you've got to do is to make sure where he keeps +his swag. Only do be quick about it! I can't stand much longer this +crawling-on-the-stomach business so as not to scare your gentleman. What +do you think a fellow is--a reptile?" + +She stared without seeing anyone, as a person in the night sits staring +and listening to deadly sounds, to evil incantations. And always in her +head there was that tension of the mind trying to get hold of something, +of a saving idea which seemed to be so near and could not be captured. +Suddenly she seized it. Yes--she had to get that man out of the +house. At that very moment, raised outside, not very near, but heard +distinctly, Heyst's voice uttered the words: + +"Have you been looking out for me, Wang?" + +It was for her like a flash of lightning framed in the darkness which +had beset her on all sides, showing a deadly precipice right under her +feet. With a convulsive movement she sat up straight, but had no power +to rise. Ricardo, on the contrary, was on his feet on the instant, as +noiseless as a cat. His yellow eyes gleamed, gliding here and there; +but he too seemed unable to make another movement. Only his moustaches +stirred visibly, like the feelers of some animal. + +Wang's answer, "Ya tuan," was heard by the two in the room, but more +faintly. Then Heyst again: + +"All right! You may bring the coffee in. Mem Putih out in the room yet?" + +To this question Wang made no answer. + +Ricardo's and the girl's eyes met, utterly without expression, all their +faculties being absorbed in listening for the first sound of Heyst's +footsteps, for any sound outside which would mean that Ricardo's retreat +was cut off. Both understood perfectly well that Wang must have gone +round the house, and that he was now at the back, making it impossible +for Ricardo to slip out unseen that way before Heyst came in at the +front. + +A darkling shade settled on the face of the devoted secretary. Here was +the business utterly spoiled! It was the gloom of anger, and even of +apprehension. He would perhaps have made a dash for it through the back +door, if Heyst had not been heard ascending the front steps. He climbed +them slowly, very slowly, like a man who is discouraged or weary--or +simply thoughtful; and Ricardo had a mental vision of his face, with its +martial moustache, the lofty forehead, the impassive features, and the +quiet, meditative eyes. Trapped! Confound it! After all, perhaps the +governor was right. Women had to be shunned. Fooling with this one had +apparently ruined the whole business. For, trapped as he was he might +just as well kill, since, anyhow, to be seen was to be unmasked. But he +was too fair-minded to be angry with the girl. + +Heyst had paused on the veranda, or in the very doorway. + +"I shall be shot down like a dog if I ain't quick," Ricardo muttered +excitedly to the girl. + +He stooped to get hold of his knife; and the next moment would have +hurled himself out through the curtain, nearly, as prompt and fully as +deadly to Heyst as an unexpected thunderbolt. The feel more than the +strength of the girl's hand, clutching at his shoulder, checked him. He +swung round, crouching with a yellow upward glare. Ah! Was she turning +against him? + +He would have stuck his knife into the hollow of her bare throat if +he had not seen her other hand pointing to the window. It was a long +opening, high up, close under the ceiling almost, with a single pivoting +shutter. + +While he was still looking at it she moved noiselessly away, picking +up the overturned chair, and placed it under the wall. Then she looked +round; but he didn't need to be beckoned to. In two long, tiptoeing +strides he was at her side. + +"Be quick!" she gasped. + +He seized her hand and wrung it with all the force of his dumb +gratitude, as a man does to a chum when there is no time for words. Then +he mounted the chair. Ricardo was short--too short to get over without a +noisy scramble. He hesitated an instant; she, watchful, bore rigidly on +the seat with her beautiful bare arms, while, light and sure, he used +the back of the chair as a ladder. The masses of her brown hair fell all +about her face. + +Footsteps resounded in the next room, and Heyst's voice, not very loud, +called her by name. + +"Lena!" + +"Yes! In a minute," she answered with a particular intonation which she +knew would prevent Heyst from coming in at once. + +When she looked up, Ricardo had vanished, letting himself down outside +so lightly that she had not heard the slightest noise. She stood up +then, bewildered, frightened, as if awakened from a drugged sleep, with +heavy, downcast, unseeing eyes, her fortitude tired out, her imagination +as if dead within her and unable to keep her fear alive. + +Heyst moved about aimlessly in the other room. This sound roused her +exhausted wits. At once she began to think, hear, see; and what she +saw--or rather recognized, for her eyes had been resting on it all the +time--was Ricardo's straw slipper, lost in the scuffle, lying near the +bath. She had just time to step forward and plant her foot on it when +the curtains shook, and, pushed aside, disclosed Heyst in the doorway. + +Out of the appeased enchantment of the senses she had found with him, +like a sort of bewitched state, his danger brought a sensation of warmth +to her breast. She felt something stir in there, something profound, +like a new sort of life. + +The room was in partial darkness, Ricardo having accidentally swung +the pivoted shutter as he went out of the window. Heyst peered from the +doorway. + +"Why, you haven't done your hair yet," he said. + +"I won't stop to do it now. I shan't be long," she replied steadily, and +remained still, feeling Ricardo's slipper under the sole of her foot. + +Heyst, with a movement of retreat, let the curtain drop slowly. On the +instant she stooped for the slipper, and, with it in her hand, spun +round wildly, looking for some hiding-place; but there was no such spot +in the bare room. The chest, the leather bunk, a dress or two of hers +hanging on pegs--there was no place where the merest hazard might not +guide Heyst's hand at any moment. Her wildly roaming eyes were caught +by the half-closed window. She ran to it, and by raising herself on her +toes was able to reach the shutter with her fingertips. She pushed it +square, stole back to the middle of the room, and, turning about, swung +her arm, regulating the force of the throw so as not to let the slipper +fly too far out and hit the edge of the overhanging eaves. It was a +task of the nicest judgement for the muscles of those round arms, still +quivering from the deadly wrestle with a man, for that brain, tense with +the excitement of the situation and for the unstrung nerves flickering +darkness before her eyes. At last the slipper left her hand. As soon as +it passed the opening, it was out of her sight. She listened. She did +not hear it strike anything; it just vanished, as if it had wings to fly +on through the air. Not a sound! It had gone clear. + +Her valiant arms hanging close against her side, she stood as if turned +into stone. A faint whistle reached her ears. The forgetful Ricardo, +becoming very much aware of his loss, had been hanging about in great +anxiety, which was relieved by the appearance of the slipper flying from +under the eaves; and now, thoughtfully, he had ventured a whistle to put +her mind at ease. + +Suddenly the girl reeled forward. She saved herself from a fall only by +embracing with both arms one of the tall, roughly carved posts holding +the mosquito net above the bed. For a long time she clung to it, with +her forehead leaning against the wood. One side of her loosened sarong +had slipped down as low as her hip. The long brown tresses of her hair +fell in lank wisps, as if wet, almost black against her white body. Her +uncovered flank, damp with the sweat of anguish and fatigue, gleamed +coldly with the immobility of polished marble in the hot, diffused +light falling through the window above her head--a dim reflection of the +consuming, passionate blaze of sunshine outside, all aquiver with the +effort to set the earth on fire, to burn it to ashes. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +Heyst, seated at the table with his chin on his breast, raised his head +at the faint rustle of Lena's dress. He was startled by the dead pallor +of her cheeks, by something lifeless in her eyes, which looked at +him strangely, without recognition. But to his anxious inquiries she +answered reassuringly that there was nothing the matter with her, +really. She had felt giddy on rising. She had even had a moment of +faintness, after her bath. She had to sit down to wait for it to pass. +This had made her late dressing. + +"I didn't try to do my hair. I didn't want to keep you waiting any +longer," she said. + +He was unwilling to press her with questions about her health, since she +seemed to make light of this indisposition. She had not done her hair, +but she had brushed it, and had tied it with a ribbon behind. With her +forehead uncovered, she looked very young, almost a child, a careworn +child; a child with something on its mind. + +What surprised Heyst was the non-appearance of Wang. The Chinaman had +always materialized at the precise moment of his service, neither too +soon nor too late. This time the usual miracle failed. What was the +meaning of this? + +Heyst raised his voice--a thing he disliked doing. It was promptly +answered from the compound: + +"Ada tuan!" + +Lena, leaning on her elbow, with her eyes on her plate, did not seem to +hear anything. When Wang entered with a tray, his narrow eyes, tilted +inward by the prominence of salient cheek-bones, kept her under stealthy +observation all the time. Neither the one nor the other of that white +couple paid the slightest attention to him and he withdrew without +having heard them exchange a single word. He squatted on his heels on +the back veranda. His Chinaman's mind, very clear but not far-reaching, +was made up according to the plain reason of things, such as it appeared +to him in the light of his simple feeling for self-preservation, +untrammelled by any notions of romantic honour or tender conscience. His +yellow hands, lightly clasped, hung idly between his knees. The graves +of Wang's ancestors were far away, his parents were dead, his elder +brother was a soldier in the yamen of some Mandarin away in Formosa. No +one near by had a claim on his veneration or his obedience. He had been +for years a labouring restless vagabond. His only tie in the world +was the Alfuro woman, in exchange for whom he had given away some +considerable part of his hard-earned substance; and his duty, in reason, +could be to no one but himself. + +The scuffle behind the curtain was a thing of bad augury for that Number +One for whom the Chinaman had neither love nor dislike. He had been awed +enough by that development to hang back with the coffee-pot till at last +the white man was induced to call him in. Wang went in with curiosity. +Certainly, the white woman looked as if she had been wrestling with +a spirit which had managed to tear half her blood out of her before +letting her go. As to the man, Wang had long looked upon him as being in +some sort bewitched; and now he was doomed. He heard their voices in +the room. Heyst was urging the girl to go and lie down again. He was +extremely concerned. She had eaten nothing. + +"The best thing for you. You really must!" + +She sat listless, shaking her head from time to time negatively, as if +nothing could be any good. But he insisted; she saw the beginning of +wonder in his eyes, and suddenly gave way. + +"Perhaps I had better." + +She did not want to arouse his wonder, which would lead him straight to +suspicion. He must not suspect! + +Already, with the consciousness of her love for this man, of that +something rapturous and profound going beyond the mere embrace, there +was born in her a woman's innate mistrust of masculinity, of that +seductive strength allied to an absurd, delicate shrinking from the +recognition of the naked necessity of facts, which never yet frightened +a woman worthy of the name. She had no plan; but her mind, quieted down +somewhat by the very effort to preserve outward composure for his sake, +perceived that her behaviour had secured, at any rate, a short period of +safety. Perhaps because of the similarity of their miserable origin in +the dregs of mankind, she had understood Ricardo perfectly. He would +keep quiet for a time now. In this momentarily soothing certitude her +bodily fatigue asserted itself, the more overpoweringly since its cause +was not so much the demand on her strength as the awful suddenness of +the stress she had had to meet. She would have tried to overcome it +from the mere instinct of resistance, if it had not been for Heyst's +alternate pleadings and commands. Before this eminently masculine +fussing she felt the woman's need to give way, the sweetness of +surrender. + +"I will do anything you like," she said. + +Getting up, she was surprised by a wave of languid weakness that came +over her, embracing and enveloping her like warm water, with a noise in +her ears as of a breaking sea. + +"You must help me along," she added quickly. + +While he put his arm round her waist--not by any means an uncommon thing +for him to do--she found a special satisfaction in the feeling of being +thus sustained. She abandoned all her weight to that encircling and +protecting pressure, while a thrill went through her at the sudden +thought that it was she who would have to protect him, to be the +defender of a man who was strong enough to lift her bodily, as he was +doing even then in his two arms. For Heyst had done this as soon as they +had crept through the doorway of the room. He thought it was quicker +and simpler to carry her the last step or two. He had grown really too +anxious to be aware of the effort. He lifted her high and deposited her +on the bed, as one lays a child on its side in a cot. Then he sat down +on the edge, masking his concern with a smile which obtained no response +from the dreamy immobility of her eyes. But she sought his hand, seized +it eagerly; and while she was pressing it with all the force of +which she was capable, the sleep she needed overtook her suddenly, +overwhelmingly, as it overtakes a child in a cot, with her lips parted +for a safe, endearing word which she had thought of but had no time to +utter. + +The usual flaming silence brooded over Samburan. + +"What in the world is this new mystery?" murmured Heyst to himself, +contemplating her deep slumber. + +It was so deep, this enchanted sleep, that when some time afterwards he +gently tried to open her fingers and free his hand, he succeeded without +provoking the slightest stir. + +"There is some very simple explanation, no doubt," he thought, as he +stole out into the living-room. + +Absent-mindedly he pulled a book out of the top shelf, and sat down with +it; but even after he had opened it on his knee, and had been staring +at the pages for a time, he had not the slightest idea of what it was +about. He stared and stared at the crowded, parallel lines. It was only +when, raising his eyes for no particular reason, he saw Wang standing +motionless on the other side of the table, that he regained complete +control of his faculties. + +"Oh, yes," he said, as if suddenly reminded of a forgotten appointment +of a not particularly welcome sort. + +He waited a little, and then, with reluctant curiosity, forced himself +to ask the silent Wang what he had to say. He had some idea that the +matter of the vanished revolver would come up at last; but the guttural +sounds which proceeded from the Chinaman did not refer to that delicate +subject. His speech was concerned with cups, saucers, plates, forks, and +knives. All these things had been put away in the cupboards on the +back veranda, where they belonged, perfectly clean, "all plopel." Heyst +wondered at the scrupulosity of a man who was about to abandon him; +for he was not surprised to hear Wang conclude the account of his +stewardship with the words: + +"I go now." + +"Oh! You go now?" said Heyst, leaning back, his book on his knees. + +"Yes. Me no likee. One man, two man, three man--no can do! Me go now." + +"What's frightening you away like this?" asked Heyst, while through his +mind flashed the hope that something enlightening might come from that +being so unlike himself, taking contact with the world with a simplicity +and directness of which his own mind was not capable. "Why?" he went on. +"You are used to white men. You know them well." + +"Yes. Me savee them," assented Wang inscrutably. "Me savee plenty." + +All that he really knew was his own mind. He had made it up to withdraw +himself and the Alfuro woman from the uncertainties of the relations +which were going to establish themselves between those white men. It +was Pedro who had been the first cause of Wang's suspicion and fear. The +Chinaman had seen wild men. He had penetrated, in the train of a Chinese +pedlar, up one or two of the Bornean rivers into the country of the +Dyaks. He had also been in the interior of Mindanao, where there are +people who live in trees--savages, no better than animals; but a +hairy brute like Pedro, with his great fangs and ferocious growls, was +altogether beyond his conception of anything that could be looked upon +as human. The strong impression made on him by Pedro was the prime +inducement which had led Wang to purloin the revolver. Reflection on +the general situation, and on the insecurity of Number One, came later, +after he had obtained possession of the revolver and of the box of +cartridges out of the table drawer in the living-room. + +"Oh, you savee plenty about white men," Heyst went on in a slightly +bantering tone, after a moment of silent reflection in which he had +confessed to himself that the recovery of the revolver was not to be +thought of, either by persuasion or by some more forcible means. "You +speak in that fashion, but you are frightened of those white men over +there." + +"Me no flightened," protested Wang raucously, throwing up his +head--which gave to his throat a more strained, anxious appearance than +ever. "Me no likee," he added in a quieter tone. "Me velly sick." + +He put his hand over the region under the breast-bone. + +"That," said Heyst, serenely positive, "belong one piecee lie. That +isn't proper man-talk at all. And after stealing my revolver, too!" + +He had suddenly decided to speak about it, because this frankness could +not make the situation much worse than it was. He did not suppose for a +moment that Wang had the revolver anywhere about his person; and after +having thought the matter over, he had arrived at the conclusion that +the Chinaman never meant to use the weapon against him. After a slight +start, because the direct charge had taken him unawares, Wang tore open +the front of his jacket with a convulsive show of indignation. + +"No hab got. Look see!" he mouthed in pretended anger. + +He slapped his bare chest violently; he uncovered his very ribs, all +astir with the panting of outraged virtue; his smooth stomach heaved +with indignation. He started his wide blue breeches flapping about his +yellow calves. Heyst watched him quietly. + +"I never said you had it on you," he observed, without raising his +voice; "but the revolver is gone from where I kept it." + +"Me no savee levolvel," Wang said obstinately. + +The book lying open on Heyst's knee slipped suddenly and he made a +sharp movement to catch it up. Wang was unable to see the reason of +this because of the table, and leaped away from what seemed to him a +threatening symptom. When Heyst looked up, the Chinaman was already at +the door facing the room, not frightened, but alert. + +"What's the matter?" asked Heyst. + +Wang nodded his shaven head significantly at the curtain closing the +doorway of the bedroom. + +"Me no likee," he repeated. + +"What the devil do you mean?" Heyst was genuinely amazed. "Don't like +what?" + +Wang pointed a long lemon-coloured finger at the motionless folds. + +"Two," he said. + +"Two what? I don't understand." + +"Suppose you savee, you no like that fashion. Me savee plenty. Me go +now." + +Heyst had risen from his chair, but Wang kept his ground in the doorway +for a little longer. His almond-shaped eyes imparted to his face an +expression of soft and sentimental melancholy. The muscles of his throat +moved visibly while he uttered a distinct and guttural "Goodbye" and +vanished from Number One's sight. + +The Chinaman's departure altered the situation. Heyst reflected on what +would be best to do in view of that fact. For a long time he hesitated; +then, shrugging his shoulders wearily, he walked out on the veranda, +down the steps, and continued at a steady gait, with a thoughtful mien, +in the direction of his guests' bungalow. He wanted to make an important +communication to them, and he had no other object--least of all to give +them the shock of a surprise call. Nevertheless, their brutish henchman +not being on watch, it was Heyst's fate to startle Mr. Jones and his +secretary by his sudden appearance in the doorway. Their conversation +must have been very interesting to prevent them from hearing the +visitor's approach. In the dim room--the shutters were kept constantly +closed against the heat--Heyst saw them start apart. It was Mr. Jones +who spoke: + +"Ah, here you are again! Come in, come in!" + +Heyst, taking his hat off in the doorway, entered the room. + + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +Waking up suddenly, Lena looked, without raising her head from the +pillow, at the room in which she was alone. She got up quickly, as if +to counteract the awful sinking of her heart by the vigorous use of her +limbs. But this sinking was only momentary. Mistress of herself from +pride, from love, from necessity, and also because of a woman's +vanity in self-sacrifice, she met Heyst, returning from the strangers' +bungalow, with a clear glance and a smile. + +The smile he managed to answer, but, noticing that he avoided her eyes, +she composed her lips and lowered her gaze. For the same reason she +hastened to speak to him in a tone of indifference, which she put on +without effort, as if she had grown adept in duplicity since sunrise. + +"You have been over there again?" + +"I have. I thought--but you had better know first that we have lost Wang +for good." + +She repeated "For good?" as if she had not understood. + +"For good or evil--I shouldn't know which if you were to ask me. He has +dismissed himself. He's gone." + +"You expected him to go, though, didn't you?" + +Heyst sat down on the other side of the table. + +"Yes. I expected it as soon as I discovered that he had annexed my +revolver. He says he hasn't taken it. That's untrue of course. A +Chinaman would not see the sense of confessing under any circumstances. +To deny any charge is a principle of right conduct; but he hardly +expected to be believed. He was a little enigmatic at the last, Lena. He +startled me." + +Heyst paused. The girl seemed absorbed in her own thoughts. + +"He startled me," repeated Heyst. She noted the anxiety in his tone, and +turned her head slightly to look at him across the table. + +"It must have been something--to startle you," she said. In the depth +of her parted lips, like a ripe pomegranate, there was a gleam of white +teeth. + +"It was only a single word--and some of his gestures. He had been making +a good deal of noise. I wonder we didn't wake you up. How soundly you +can sleep! I say, do you feel all right now?" + +"As fresh as can be," she said, treating him to another deep gleam of +a smile. "I heard no noise, and I'm glad of it. The way he talks in his +harsh voice frightens me. I don't like all these foreign people." + +"It was just before he went away--bolted out, I should say. He nodded +and pointed at the curtain to our room. He knew you were there, of +course. He seemed to think--he seemed to try to give me to understand +that you were in special--well, danger. You know how he talks." + +She said nothing; she made no sound, only the faint tinge of colour +ebbed out of her cheek. + +"Yes," Heyst went on. "He seemed to try to warn me. That must have been +it Did he imagine I had forgotten your existence? The only word he said +was 'two'. It sounded so, at least. Yes, 'two'--and that he didn't like +it." + +"What does that mean?" she whispered. + +"We know what the word two means, don't we, Lena? We are two. Never +were such a lonely two out of the world, my dear! He might have tried +to remind me that he himself has a woman to look after. Why are you so +pale, Lena?" + +"Am I pale?" she asked negligently. + +"You are." Heyst was really anxious. + +"Well, it isn't from fright," she protested truthfully. + +Indeed, what she felt was a sort of horror which left her absolutely +in the full possession of all her faculties; more difficult to bear, +perhaps, for that reason, but not paralysing to her fortitude. + +Heyst in his turn smiled at her. + +"I really don't know that there is any reason to be frightened." + +"I mean I am not frightened for myself." + +"I believe you are very plucky," he said. The colour had returned to her +face. "I" continued Heyst, "am so rebellious to outward impressions +that I can't say that much about myself. I don't react with sufficient +distinctness." He changed his tone. "You know I went to see those men +first thing this morning." + +"I know. Be careful!" she murmured. + +"I wonder how one can be careful! I had a long talk with--but I don't +believe you have seen them. One of them is a fantastically thin, long +person, apparently ailing; I shouldn't wonder if he were really so. He +makes rather a point of it in a mysterious manner. I imagine he must +have suffered from tropical fevers, but not so much as he tries to make +out. He's what people would call a gentleman. He seemed on the point of +volunteering a tale of his adventures--for which I didn't ask him--but +remarked that it was a long story; some other time, perhaps. + +"'I suppose you would like to know who I am?' he asked me. + +"I told him I would leave it to him, in a tone which, between gentlemen, +could have left no doubt in his mind. He raised himself on his elbow--he +was lying down on the camp-bed--and said: + +"'I am he who is--'" + +Lena seemed not to be listening; but when Heyst paused, she turned her +head quickly to him. He took it for a movement of inquiry, but in this +he was wrong. A great vagueness enveloped her impressions, but all her +energy was concentrated on the struggle that she wanted to take upon +herself, in a great exaltation of love and self-sacrifice, which is +woman's sublime faculty; altogether on herself, every bit of it, leaving +him nothing, not even the knowledge of what she did, if that were +possible. She would have liked to lock him up by some stratagem. Had +she known of some means to put him to sleep for days she would have used +incantations or philtres without misgivings. He seemed to her too good +for such contacts, and not sufficiently equipped. This last feeling had +nothing to do with the material fact of the revolver being stolen. She +could hardly appreciate that fact at its full value. + +Observing her eyes fixed and as if sightless--for the concentration on +her purpose took all expression out of them--Heyst imagined it to be the +effect of a great mental effort. + +"No use asking me what he meant, Lena; I don't know, and I did not +ask him. The gentleman, as I have told you before, seems devoted to +mystification. I said nothing, and he laid down his head again on +the bundle of rugs he uses for a pillow. He affects a state of great +weakness, but I suspect that he's perfectly capable of leaping to his +feet if he likes. Having been ejected, he said, from his proper social +sphere because he had refused to conform to certain usual conventions, +he was a rebel now, and was coming and going up and down the earth. As +I really did not want to listen to all this nonsense, I told him that +I had heard that sort of story about somebody else before. His grin is +really ghastly. He confessed that I was very far from the sort of man he +expected to meet. Then he said: + +"'As to me, I am no blacker than the gentleman you are thinking of, and +I have neither more nor less determination.'" + +Heyst looked across the table at Lena. Propped on her elbows, and +holding her head in both hands, she moved it a little with an air of +understanding. + +"Nothing could be plainer, eh?" said Heyst grimly. "Unless, indeed, this +is his idea of a pleasant joke; for, when he finished speaking, he burst +into a loud long laugh. I didn't join him!" + +"I wish you had," she breathed out. + +"I didn't join him. It did not occur to me. I am not much of a +diplomatist. It would probably have been wise, for, indeed, I believe +he had said more than he meant to say, and was trying to take it back by +this affected jocularity. Yet when one thinks of it, diplomacy without +force in the background is but a rotten reed to lean upon. And I don't +know whether I could have done it if I had thought of it. I don't know. +It would have been against the grain. Could I have done it? I have lived +too long within myself, watching the mere shadows and shades of life. +To deceive a man on some issue which could be decided quicker, by his +destruction while one is disarmed, helpless, without even the power to +run away--no! That seems to me too degrading. And yet I have you here. +I have your very existence in my keeping. What do you say, Lena? Would I +be capable of throwing you to the lions to save my dignity?" + +She got up, walked quickly round the table, posed herself on his knees +lightly, throwing one arm round his neck, and whispered in his ear: + +"You may if you like. And may be that's the only way I would consent to +leave you. For something like that. If it were something no bigger than +your little finger." + +She gave him a light kiss on the lips and was gone before he could +detain her. She regained her seat and propped her elbows again on the +table. It was hard to believe that she had moved from the spot at all. +The fleeting weight of her body on his knees, the hug round his neck, +the whisper in his ear, the kiss on his lips, might have been the +unsubstantial sensations of a dream invading the reality of waking life; +a sort of charming mirage in the barren aridity of his thoughts. He +hesitated to speak till she said, businesslike: + +"Well. And what then?" + +Heyst gave a start. + +"Oh, yes. I didn't join him. I let him have his laugh out by himself. He +was shaking all over, like a merry skeleton, under a cotton sheet he was +covered with--I believe in order to conceal the revolver that he had in +his right hand. I didn't see it, but I have a distinct impression it was +there in his fist. As he had not been looking at me for some time, but +staring into a certain part of the room, I turned my head and saw a +hairy, wild sort of creature which they take about with them, squatting +on its heels in the angle of the walls behind me. He wasn't there when +I came in. I didn't like the notion of that watchful monster behind my +back. If I had been less at their mercy, I should certainly have changed +my position. As things are now, to move would have been a mere weakness. +So I remained where I was. The gentleman on the bed said he could assure +me of one thing; and that was that his presence here was no more morally +reprehensible than mine. + +"'We pursue the same ends,' he said, 'only perhaps I pursue them with +more openness than you--with more simplicity.' + +"That's what he said," Heyst went on, after looking at Lena in a sort of +inquiring silence. "I asked him if he knew beforehand that I was living +here; but he only gave me a ghastly grin. I didn't press him for an +answer, Lena. I thought I had better not." + +On her smooth forehead a ray of light always seemed to rest. Her loose +hair, parted in the middle, covered the hands sustaining her head. She +seemed spellbound by the interest of the narrative. Heyst did not pause +long. He managed to continue his relation smoothly enough, beginning +afresh with a piece of comment. + +"He would have lied impudently--and I detest being told a lie. It makes +me uncomfortable. It's pretty clear that I am not fitted for the affairs +of the wide world. But I did not want him to think that I accepted his +presence too meekly, so I said that his comings or goings on the +earth were none of my business, of course, except that I had a natural +curiosity to know when he would find it convenient to resume them. + +"He asked me to look at the state he was in. Had I been all alone here, +as they think I am, I should have laughed at him. But not being alone--I +say, Lena, you are sure you haven't shown yourself where you could be +seen?" + +"Certain," she said promptly. + +He looked relieved. + +"You understand, Lena, that when I ask you to keep so strictly out of +sight, it is because you are not for them to look at--to talk about. My +poor Lena! I can't help that feeling. Do you understand it?" + +She moved her head slightly in a manner that was neither affirmative nor +negative. + +"People will have to see me some day," she said. + +"I wonder how long it will be possible for you to keep out of sight?" +murmured Heyst thoughtfully. He bent over the table. "Let me finish +telling you. I asked him point blank what it was he wanted with me; he +appeared extremely unwilling to come to the point. It was not really +so pressing as all that, he said. His secretary, who was in fact his +partner, was not present, having gone down to the wharf to look at +their boat. Finally the fellow proposed that he should put off a certain +communication he had to make till the day after tomorrow. I agreed; +but I also told him that I was not at all anxious to hear it. I had no +conception in what way his affairs could concern me. + +"'Ah, Mr. Heyst,' he said, 'you and I have much more in common than you +think.'" + +Heyst struck the table with his fist unexpectedly. + +"It was a jeer; I am sure it was!" + +He seemed ashamed of this outburst and smiled faintly into the +motionless eyes of the girl. + +"What could I have done--even if I had had my pockets full of +revolvers?" + +She made an appreciative sign. + +"Killing's a sin, sure enough," she murmured. + +"I went away," Heyst continued. "I left him there, lying on his side +with his eyes shut. When I got back here, I found you looking ill. What +was it, Lena? You did give me a scare! Then I had the interview with +Wang while you rested. You were sleeping quietly. I sat here to consider +all these things calmly, to try to penetrate their inner meaning and +their outward bearing. It struck me that the two days we have before +us have the character of a sort of truce. The more I thought of it, the +more I felt that this was tacitly understood between Jones and myself. +It was to our advantage, if anything can be of advantage to people +caught so completely unawares as we are. Wang was gone. He, at any rate, +had declared himself, but as I did not know what he might take it into +his head to do, I thought I had better warn these people that I was no +longer responsible for the Chinaman. I did not want Mr. Wang making some +move which would precipitate the action against us. Do you see my point +of view?" + +She made a sign that she did. All her soul was wrapped in her passionate +determination, in an exalted belief in herself--in the contemplation +of her amazing opportunity to win the certitude, the eternity, of that +man's love. + +"I never saw two men," Heyst was saying, "more affected by a piece of +information than Jones and his secretary, who was back in the bungalow +by then. They had not heard me come up. I told them I was sorry to +intrude. + +"'Not at all! Not at all,' said Jones. + +"The secretary backed away into a corner and watched me like a wary cat. +In fact, they both were visibly on their guard. + +"'I am come,' I told them, 'to let you know that my servant has +deserted--gone off.' + +"At first they looked at each other as if they had not understood what I +was saying; but very soon they seemed quite concerned. + +"'You mean to say your Chink's cleared out?' said Ricardo, coming +forward from his corner. 'Like this--all at once? What did he do it +for?' + +"I said that a Chinaman had always a simple and precise reason for what +he did, but that to get such a reason out of him was not so easy. All he +told me, I said, was that he 'didn't like'. + +"They were extremely disturbed at this. Didn't like what, they wanted to +know. + +"'The looks of you and your party,' I told Jones. + +"'Nonsense!' he cried out, and immediately Ricardo, the short man, +struck in. + +"'Told you that? What did he take you for, sir--an infant? Or do you +take us for kids?--meaning no offence. Come, I bet you will tell us next +that you've missed something.'" + +"'I didn't mean to tell you anything of the sort,' I said, 'but as a +matter of fact it is so.' + +"He slapped his thigh. + +"'Thought so. What do you think of this trick, governor?' + +"Jones made some sort of sign to him, and then that extraordinary +cat-faced associate proposed that he and their servant should come out +and help me catch or kill the Chink. + +"My object, I said, was not to get assistance. I did not intend to chase +the Chinaman. I had come only to warn them that he was armed, and that +he really objected to their presence on the island. I wanted them to +understand that I was not responsible for anything that might happen. + +"'Do you mean to tell us,' asked Ricardo, 'that there is a crazy Chink +with a six-shooter broke loose on this island, and that you don't care?' + +"Strangely enough they did not seem to believe my story. They were +exchanging significant looks all the time. Ricardo stole up close to +his principal; they had a confabulation together, and then something +happened which I did not expect. It's rather awkward, too. + +"Since I would not have their assistance to get hold of the Chink +and recover my property, the least they could do was to send me their +servant. It was Jones who said that, and Ricardo backed up the idea. + +"'Yes, yes--let our Pedro cook for all hands in your compound! He isn't +so bad as he looks. That's what we will do!' + +"He bustled out of the room to the veranda, and let out an ear-splitting +whistle for their Pedro. Having heard the brute's answering howl, +Ricardo ran back into the room. + +"'Yes, Mr. Heyst. This will do capitally, Mr. Heyst. You just direct +him to do whatever you are accustomed to have done for you in the way of +attendance. See?' + +"Lena, I confess to you that I was taken completely by surprise. I had +not expected anything of the sort. I don't know what I expected. I am so +anxious about you that I can't keep away from these infernal scoundrels. +And only two months ago I would not have cared. I would have defied +their scoundrelism as much as I have scorned all the other intrusions of +life. But now I have you! You stole into my life, and--" + +Heyst drew a deep breath. The girl gave him a quick, wide-eyed glance. + +"Ah! That's what you are thinking of--that you have me!" + +It was impossible to read the thoughts veiled by her steady grey eyes, +to penetrate the meaning of her silences, her words, and even her +embraces. He used to come out of her very arms with the feeling of a +baffled man. + +"If I haven't you, if you are not here, then where are you?" cried +Heyst. "You understand me very well." + +She shook her head a little. Her red lips, at which he looked now, her +lips as fascinating as the voice that came out of them, uttered the +words: + +"I hear what you say; but what does it mean?" + +"It means that I could lie and perhaps cringe for your sake." + +"No! No! Don't you ever do that," she said in haste, while her eyes +glistened suddenly. "You would hate me for it afterwards!" + +"Hate you?" repeated Heyst, who had recalled his polite manner. "No! +You needn't consider the extremity of the improbable--as yet. But I will +confess to you that I--how shall I call it?--that I dissembled. First I +dissembled my dismay at the unforeseen result of my idiotic diplomacy. +Do you understand, my dear girl?" + +It was evident that she did not understand the word. Heyst produced his +playful smile, which contrasted oddly with the worried character of his +whole expression. His temples seemed to have sunk in, his face looked a +little leaner. + +"A diplomatic statement, Lena, is a statement of which everything is +true, but the sentiment which seems to prompt it. I have never been +diplomatic in my relation with mankind--not from regard for its +feelings, but from a certain regard for my own. Diplomacy doesn't go +well with consistent contempt. I cared little for life and still less +for death." + +"Don't talk like that!" + +"I dissembled my extreme longing to take these wandering scoundrels +by their throats," he went on. "I have only two hands--I wish I had a +hundred to defend you--and there were three throats. By that time +their Pedro was in the room too. Had he seen me engaged with their two +throats, he would have been at mine like a fierce dog, or any other +savage and faithful brute. I had no difficulty in dissembling my longing +for the vulgar, stupid, and hopeless argument of fight. I remarked that +I really did not want a servant. I couldn't think of depriving them of +their man's services; but they would not hear me. They had made up their +minds. + +"'We shall send him over at once,' Ricardo said, 'to start cooking +dinner for everybody. I hope you won't mind me coming to eat it with +you in your bungalow; and we will send the governor's dinner over to him +here.' + +"I could do nothing but hold my tongue or bring on a quarrel--some +manifestation of their dark purpose, which we have no means to resist. +Of course, you may remain invisible this evening; but with that +atrocious-brute prowling all the time at the back of the house, how long +can your presence be concealed from these men?" + +Heyst's distress could be felt in his silence. The girl's head, +sustained by her hands buried in the thick masses of her hair, had a +perfect immobility. + +"You are certain you have not been seen so far?" he asked suddenly. + +The motionless head spoke. + +"How can I be certain? You told me you wanted me to keep out of the way. +I kept out of the way. I didn't ask your reason. I thought you didn't +want people to know that you had a girl like me about you." + +"What? Ashamed?" cried Heyst. + +"It isn't what's right, perhaps--I mean for you--is it?" + +Heyst lifted his hands, reproachfully courteous. + +"I look upon it as so very much right that I couldn't bear the idea of +any other than sympathetic, respectful eyes resting on you. I disliked +and mistrusted these fellows from the first. Didn't you understand?" + +"Yes; I did keep out of sight," she said. + +A silence fell. At last Heyst stirred slightly. + +"All this is of very little importance now," he said with a sigh. +"This is a question of something infinitely worse than mere looks and +thoughts, however base and contemptible. As I have told you, I met +Ricardo's suggestions by silence. As I was turning away he said: + +"'If you happen to have the key of that store-room of yours on you, +Mr. Heyst, you may just as well let me have it; I will give it to our +Pedro.' + +"I had it on me, and I tendered it to him without speaking. The hairy +creature was at the door by then, and caught the key, which Ricardo +threw to him, better than any trained ape could have done. I came away. +All the time I had been thinking anxiously of you, whom I had left +asleep, alone here, and apparently ill." + +Heyst interrupted himself, with a listening turn of his head. He had +heard the faint sound of sticks being snapped in the compound. He rose +and crossed the room to look out of the back door. + +"And here the creature is," he said, returning to the table. "Here he +is, already attending to the fire. Oh, my dear Lena!" + +She had followed him with her eyes. She watched him go out on the front +veranda cautiously. He lowered stealthily a couple of screens that hung +between the column, and remained outside very still, as if interested +by something on the open ground. Meantime she had risen in her turn, to +take a peep into the compound. Heyst, glancing over his shoulder, saw +her returning to her seat. He beckoned to her, and she continued to +move, crossing the shady room, pure and bright in her white dress, her +hair loose, with something of a sleep-walker in her unhurried motion, in +her extended hand, in the sightless effect of her grey eyes luminous in +the half-light. He had never seen such an expression in her face +before. It had dreaminess in it, intense attention, and something like +sternness. Arrested in the doorway by Heyst's extended arm, she seemed +to wake up, flushed faintly--and this flush, passing off, carried away +with it the strange transfiguring mood. With a courageous gesture +she pushed back the heavy masses of her hair. The light clung to her +forehead. Her delicate nostrils quivered. Heyst seized her arm and +whispered excitedly: + +"Slip out here, quickly! The screens will conceal you. Only you must +mind the stair-space. They are actually out--I mean the other two. You +had better see them before you--" + +She made a barely perceptible movement of recoil, checked at once, and +stood still. Heyst released her arm. + +"Yes, perhaps I had better," she said with unnatural deliberation, and +stepped out on the veranda to stand close by his side. + +Together, one on each side of the screen, they peeped between the edge +of the canvas and the veranda-post entwined with creepers. A great heat +ascended from the sun-smitten ground, in an ever-rising wave, as if from +some secret store of earth's fiery heart; for the sky was growing cooler +already, and the sun had declined sufficiently for the shadows of Mr. +Jones and his henchman to be projected towards the bungalow side by +side--one infinitely slender, the other short and broad. + +The two visitors stood still and gazed. To keep up the fiction of his +invalidism, Mr. Jones, the gentleman, leaned on the arm of Ricardo, the +secretary, the top of whose hat just came up to his governor's shoulder. + +"Do you see them?" Heyst whispered into the girl's ear. "Here they +are, the envoys of the outer world. Here they are before you--evil +intelligence, instinctive savagery, arm in arm. The brute force is at +the back. A trio of fitting envoys perhaps--but what about the welcome? +Suppose I were armed, could I shoot these two down where they stand? +Could I?" + +Without moving her head, the girl felt for Heyst's hand, pressed it and +thereafter did not let it go. He continued, bitterly playful: + +"I don't know. I don't think so. There is a strain in me which lays me +under an insensate obligation to avoid even the appearance of murder. +I have never pulled a trigger or lifted my hand on a man, even in +self-defence." + +The suddenly tightened grip of her hand checked him. + +"They are making a move," she murmured. + +"Can they be thinking of coming here?" Heyst wondered anxiously. + +"No, they aren't coming this way," she said; and there was another +pause. "They are going back to their house," she reported finally. + +After watching them a little longer, she let go Heyst's hand and moved +away from the screen. He followed her into the room. + +"You have seen them now," he began. "Think what it was to me to see them +land in the dusk, fantasms from the sea--apparitions, chimeras! And they +persist. That's the worst of it--they persist. They have no right to +be--but they are. They ought to have aroused my fury. But I have +refined everything away by this time--anger, indignation, scorn itself. +Nothing's left but disgust. Since you have told me of that abominable +calumny, it has become immense--it extends even to myself." He looked up +at her. + +"But luckily I have you. And if only Wang had not carried off that +miserable revolver--yes, Lena, here we are, we two!" + +She put both her hands on his shoulders and looked straight into his +eyes. He returned her penetrating gaze. It baffled him. He could not +pierce the grey veil of her eyes; but the sadness of her voice thrilled +him profoundly. + +"You are not reproaching me?" she asked slowly. + +"Reproach? What a word between us! It could only be myself--but the +mention of Wang has given me an idea. I have been, not exactly cringing, +not exactly lying, but still dissembling. You have been hiding +yourself, to please me, but still you have been hiding. All this is very +dignified. Why shouldn't we try begging now? A noble art? Yes. Lena, +we must go out together. I couldn't think of leaving you alone, and +I must--yes, I must speak to Wang. We shall go and seek that man, who +knows what he wants and how to secure what he wants. We will go at +once!" + +"Wait till I put my hair up," she agreed instantly, and vanished behind +the curtain. + +When the curtain had fallen behind her, she turned her head back with +an expression of infinite and tender concern for him--for him whom she +could never hope to understand, and whom she was afraid she could never +satisfy, as if her passion were of a hopelessly lower quality, unable +to appease some exalted and delicate desire of his superior soul. In a +couple of minutes she reappeared. They left the house by the door of +the compound, and passed within three feet of the thunderstruck Pedro, +without even looking in his direction. He rose from stooping over a fire +of sticks, and, balancing himself clumsily, uncovered his enormous fangs +in gaping astonishment. Then suddenly he set off rolling on his bandy +legs to impart to his masters the astonishing discovery of a woman. + + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +As luck would have it, Ricardo was lounging alone on the veranda of the +former counting-house. He scented some new development at once, and ran +down to meet the trotting, bear-like figure. The deep, growling noises +it made, though they had only a very remote resemblance to the Spanish +language, or indeed to any sort of human speech, were from long +practice quite intelligible to Mr. Jones's secretary. Ricardo was rather +surprised. He had imagined that the girl would continue to keep out of +sight. That line apparently was given up. He did not mistrust her. How +could he? Indeed, he could not think of her existence calmly. + +He tried to keep her image out of his mind so that he should be able +to use its powers with some approach to that coolness which the complex +nature of the situation demanded from him, both for his own sake and as +the faithful follower of plain Mr. Jones, gentleman. + +He collected his wits and thought. This was a change of policy, probably +on the part of Heyst. If so, what could it mean? A deep fellow! Unless +it was her doing; in which case--h'm--all right. Must be. She would +know what she was doing. Before him Pedro, lifting his feet alternately, +swayed to and fro sideways--his usual attitude of expectation. His +little red eyes, lost in the mass of hair, were motionless. Ricardo +stared into them with calculated contempt and said in a rough, angry +voice: + +"Woman! Of course there is. We know that without you!" He gave the tame +monster a push. "Git! Vamos! Waddle! Get back and cook the dinner. Which +way did they go, then?" + +Pedro extended a huge, hairy forearm to show the direction, and went off +on his bandy legs. Advancing a few steps, Ricardo was just in time to +see, above some bushes, two white helmets moving side by side in the +clearing. They disappeared. Now that he had managed to keep Pedro from +informing the governor that there was a woman on the island, he could +indulge in speculation as to the movements of these people. His attitude +towards Mr. Jones had undergone a spiritual change, of which he himself +was not yet fully aware. + +That morning, before tiffin, after his escape from the Heyst bungalow, +completed in such an inspiring way by the recovery of the slipper, +Ricardo had made his way to their allotted house, reeling as he ran, +his head in a whirl. He was wildly excited by visions of inconceivable +promise. He waited to compose himself before he dared to meet the +governor. On entering the room, he found Mr. Jones sitting on the camp +bedstead like a tailor on his board, cross-legged, his long back against +the wall. + +"I say, sir. You aren't going to tell me you are bored?" + +"Bored! No! Where the devil have you been all this time?" + +"Observing--watching--nosing around. What else? I knew you had company. +Have you talked freely, sir?" + +"Yes, I have," muttered Mr. Jones. + +"Not downright plain, sir?" + +"No. I wished you had been here. You loaf all the morning, and now you +come in out of breath. What's the matter?" + +"I haven't been wasting my time out there," said Ricardo. "Nothing's the +matter. I--I--might have hurried a bit." He was in truth still panting; +only it was not with running, but with the tumult of thoughts and +sensations long repressed, which had been set free by the adventure of +the morning. He was almost distracted by them now. He forgot himself in +the maze of possibilities threatening and inspiring. "And so you had a +long talk?" he said, to gain time. + +"Confound you! The sun hasn't affected your head, has it? Why are you +staring at me like a basilisk?" + +"Beg pardon, sir. Wasn't aware I stared," Ricardo apologized +good-humouredly. "The sun might well affect a thicker skull than mine. +It blazes. Phew! What do you think a fellow is, sir--a salamander?" + +"You ought to have been here," observed Mr. Jones. + +"Did the beast give any signs of wanting to prance?" asked Ricardo +quickly, with absolutely genuine anxiety. "It wouldn't do, sir. You must +play him easy for at least a couple of days, sir. I have a plan. I have +a notion that I can find out a lot in a couple of days." + +"You have? In what way?" + +"Why, by watching," Ricardo answered slowly. + +Mr Jones grunted. + +"Nothing new, that. Watch, eh? Why not pray a little, too?" + +"Ha, ha, ha! That's a good one," burst out the secretary, fixing Mr. +Jones with mirthless eyes. + +The latter dropped the subject indolently. + +"Oh, you may be certain of at least two days," he said. + +Ricardo recovered himself. His eyes gleamed voluptuously. + +"We'll pull this off yet--clean--whole--right through, if you will only +trust me, sir." + +"I am trusting you right enough," said Mr. Jones. "It's your interest, +too." + +And, indeed, Ricardo was truthful enough in his statement. He did +absolutely believe in success now. But he couldn't tell his governor +that he had intelligences in the enemy's camp. It wouldn't do to tell +him of the girl. Devil only knew what he would do if he learned there +was a woman about. And how could he begin to tell of it? He couldn't +confess his sudden escapade. + +"We'll pull it off, sir," he said, with perfectly acted cheerfulness. +He experienced gusts of awful joy expanding in his heart and hot like a +fanned flame. + +"We must," pronounced Mr. Jones. "This thing, Martin, is not like our +other tries. I have a peculiar feeling about this. It's a different +thing. It's a sort of test." + +Ricardo was impressed by the governor's manner; for the first time a +hint of passion could be detected in him. But also a word he used, the +word "test," had struck him as particularly significant somehow. It was +the last word uttered during that morning's conversation. Immediately +afterwards Ricardo went out of the room. It was impossible for him to +keep still. An elation in which an extraordinary softness mingled with +savage triumph would not allow it. It prevented his thinking, also. He +walked up and down the veranda far into the afternoon, eyeing the other +bungalow at every turn. It gave no sign of being inhabited. Once or +twice he stopped dead short and looked down at his left slipper. Each +time he chuckled audibly. His restlessness kept on increasing till at +last it frightened him. He caught hold of the balustrade of the veranda +and stood still, smiling not at his thought but at the strong sense of +life within him. He abandoned himself to it carelessly, even recklessly. +He cared for no one, friend or enemy. At that moment Mr. Jones called +him by name from within. A shadow fell on the secretary's face. + +"Here, sir," he answered; but it was a moment before he could make up +his mind to go in. + +He found the governor on his feet. Mr. Jones was tired of lying down +when there was no necessity for it. His slender form, gliding about the +room, came to a standstill. + +"I've been thinking, Martin, of something you suggested. At the time it +did not strike me as practical; but on reflection it seems to me that +to propose a game is as good a way as any to let him understand that the +time has come to disgorge. It's less--how should I say?--vulgar. He will +know what it means. It's not a bad form to give to the business--which +in itself is crude, Martin, crude." + +"Want to spare his feelings?" jeered the secretary in such a bitter tone +that Mr. Jones was really surprised. + +"Why, it was your own notion, confound you!" + +"Who says it wasn't?" retorted Ricardo sulkily. "But I am fairly sick of +this crawling. No! No! Get the exact bearings of his swag and then a rip +up. That's plenty good enough for him." + +His passions being thoroughly aroused, a thirst for blood was allied in +him with a thirst for tenderness--yes, tenderness. A sort of anxious, +melting sensation pervaded and softened his heart when he thought of +that girl--one of his own sort. And at the same time jealousy started +gnawing at his breast as the image of Heyst intruded itself on his +fierce anticipation of bliss. + +"The crudeness of your ferocity is positively gross, Martin," Mr. Jones +said disdainfully. "You don't even understand my purpose. I mean to +have some sport out of him. Just try to imagine the atmosphere of the +game--the fellow handling the cards--the agonizing mockery of it! Oh, +I shall appreciate this greatly. Yes, let him lose his money instead of +being forced to hand it over. You, of course, would shoot him at once, +but I shall enjoy the refinement and the jest of it. He's a man of the +best society. I've been hounded out of my sphere by people very much +like that fellow. How enraged and humiliated he will be! I promise +myself some exquisite moments while watching his play." + +"Ay, and suppose he suddenly starts prancing. He may not appreciate the +fun." + +"I mean you to be present," Mr. Jones remarked calmly. + +"Well, as long as I am free to plug him or rip him up whenever I think +the time has come, you are welcome to your bit of sport, sir. I shan't +spoil it." + + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +It was at this precise moment of their conversation that Heyst had +intruded on Mr. Jones and his secretary with his warning about Wang, as +he had related to Lena. When he left them, the two looked at each other +in wondering silence. My Jones was the first to break it. + +"I say, Martin!" + +"Yes, sir." + +"What does this mean?" + +"It's some move. Blame me if I can understand." + +"Too deep for you?" Mr. Jones inquired dryly. + +"It's nothing but some of his infernal impudence," growled the +secretary. "You don't believe all that about the Chink, do you, sir? +'Tain't true." + +"It isn't necessary for it to be true to have a meaning for us. It's the +why of his coming to tell us this tale that's important." + +"Do you think he made it up to frighten us?" asked Ricardo. + +Mr Jones scowled at him thoughtfully. + +"The man looked worried," he muttered, as if to himself. "Suppose that +Chinaman has really stolen his money! The man looked very worried." + +"Nothing but his artfulness, sir," protested Ricardo earnestly, for the +idea was too disconcerting to entertain. "Is it likely that he would +have trusted a Chink with enough knowledge to make it possible?" he +argued warmly. "Why, it's the very thing that he would keep close about. +There's something else there. Ay, but what?" + +"Ha, ha, ha!" Mr. Jones let out a ghostly, squeaky laugh. "I've never +been placed in such a ridiculous position before," he went on, with a +sepulchral equanimity of tone. "It's you, Martin, who dragged me into +it. However, it's my own fault too. I ought to--but I was really +too bored to use my brain, and yours is not to be trusted. You are a +hothead!" + +A blasphemous exclamation of grief escaped from Ricardo. Not to be +trusted! Hothead! He was almost tearful. + +"Haven't I heard you, sir, saying more than twenty times since we got +fired out from Manila that we should want a lot of capital to work the +East Coast with? You were always telling me that to prime properly all +them officials and Portuguese scallywags we should have to lose heavily +at first. Weren't you always worrying about some means of getting hold +of a good lot of cash? It wasn't to be got hold of by allowing yourself +to become bored in that rotten Dutch town and playing a two-penny game +with confounded beggarly bank clerks and such like. Well, I've brought +you here, where there is cash to be got--and a big lot, to a moral," he +added through his set teeth. + +Silence fell. Each of them was staring into a different corner of the +room. Suddenly, with a slight stamp of his foot, Mr. Jones made for the +door. Ricardo caught him up outside. + +"Put an arm through mine, sir," he begged him gently but firmly. "No use +giving the game away. An invalid may well come out for a breath of fresh +air after the sun's gone down a bit. That's it, sir. But where do you +want to go? Why did you come out, sir?" + +Mr Jones stopped short. + +"I hardly know myself," he confessed in a hollow mutter, staring +intently at the Number One bungalow. "It's quite irrational," he +declared in a still lower tone. + +"Better go in, sir," suggested Ricardo. "What's that? Those screens +weren't down before. He's spying from behind them now, I bet--the +dodging, artful, plotting beast!" + +"Why not go over there and see if we can't get to the bottom of this +game?" was the unexpected proposal uttered by Mr. Jones. "He will have +to talk to us." + +Ricardo repressed a start of dismay, but for a moment could not speak. +He only pressed the governor's hand to his side instinctively. + +"No, sir. What could you say? Do you expect to get to the bottom of his +lies? How could you make him talk? It isn't time yet to come to grips +with that gent. You don't think I would hang back, do you? His Chink, of +course, I'll shoot like a dog the moment I catch sight of him; but as +to that Mr. Blasted Heyst, the time isn't yet. My head's cooler just now +than yours. Let's go in again. Why, we are exposed here. Suppose he +took it into his head to let off a gun on us! He's an unaccountable, +'yporcritical skunk." + +Allowing himself to be persuaded, Mr. Jones returned to his seclusion. +The secretary, however, remained on the veranda--for the purpose, he +said, of seeing whether that Chink wasn't sneaking around; in which +case he proposed to take a long shot at the galoot and chance the +consequences. His real reason was that he wanted to be alone, away from +the governor's deep-sunk eyes. He felt a sentimental desire to indulge +his fancies in solitude. A great change had come over Mr. Ricardo since +that morning. A whole side of him which from prudence, from necessity, +from loyalty, had been kept dormant, was aroused now, colouring +his thoughts and disturbing his mental poise by the vision of such +staggering consequences as, for instance, the possibility of an active +conflict with the governor. The appearance of the monstrous Pedro with +his news drew Ricardo out of a feeling of dreaminess wrapped up in a +sense of impending trouble. A woman? Yes, there was one; and it made all +the difference. After driving away Pedro, and watching the white +helmets of Heyst and Lena vanishing among the bushes he stood lost in +meditation. + +"Where could they be off to like this?" he mentally asked himself. + +The answer found by his speculative faculties on their utmost stretch +was--to meet that Chink. For in the desertion of Wang Ricardo did not +believe. It was a lying yarn, the organic part of a dangerous plot. +Heyst had gone to combine some fresh move. But then Ricardo felt sure +that the girl was with him--the girl full of pluck, full of sense, full +of understanding; an ally of his own kind! + +He went indoors briskly. Mr. Jones had resumed his cross-legged pose at +the head of the bed, with his back against the wall. + +"Anything new?" + +"No, sir." + +Ricardo walked about the room as if he had no care in the world. He +hummed snatches of song. Mr. Jones raised his waspish eyebrows, at the +sound. The secretary got down on his knees before an old leather trunk, +and, rummaging in there, brought out a small looking-glass. He fell to +examining his physiognomy in it with silent absorption. + +"I think I'll shave," he decided, getting up. + +He gave a sidelong glance to the governor, and repeated it several times +during the operation, which did not take long, and even afterwards, when +after putting away the implements, he resumed his walking, humming more +snatches of unknown songs. Mr. Jones preserved a complete immobility, +his thin lips compressed, his eyes veiled. His face was like a carving. + +"So you would like to try your hand at cards with that skunk, sir?" said +Ricardo, stopping suddenly and rubbing his hands. + +Mr Jones gave no sign of having heard anything. + +"Well, why not? Why shouldn't he have the experience? You remember in +that Mexican town--what's its name?--the robber fellow they caught in +the mountains and condemned to be shot? He played cards half the night +with the jailer and the sheriff. Well, this fellow is condemned, too. +He must give you your game. Hang it all, a gentleman ought to have some +little relaxation! And you have been uncommonly patient, sir." + +"You are uncommonly volatile all of a sudden," Mr. Jones remarked in a +bored voice. "What's come to you?" + +The secretary hummed for a while, and then said: + +"I'll try to get him over here for you tonight, after dinner. If I ain't +here myself, don't you worry, sir. I shall be doing a bit of nosing +around--see?" + +"I see," sneered Mr. Jones languidly. "But what do you expect to see in +the dark?" + +Ricardo made no answer, and after another turn or two slipped out of the +room. He no longer felt comfortable alone with the governor. + + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +Meantime Heyst and Lena, walking rather fast, approached Wang's hut. +Asking the girl to wait, Heyst ascended the little ladder of bamboos +giving access to the door. It was as he had expected. The smoky interior +was empty, except for a big chest of sandalwood too heavy for hurried +removal. Its lid was thrown up, but whatever it might have contained was +no longer there. All Wang's possessions were gone. Without tarrying in +the hut, Heyst came back to the girl, who asked no questions, with her +strange air of knowing or understanding everything. + +"Let us push on," he said. + +He went ahead, the rustle of her white skirt following him into the +shades of the forest, along the path of their usual walk. Though the air +lay heavy between straight denuded trunks, the sunlit patches moved on +the ground, and raising her eyes Lena saw far above her head the +flutter of the leaves, the surface shudder on the mighty limbs extended +horizontally in the perfect immobility of patience. Twice Heyst looked +over his shoulder at her. Behind the readiness of her answering smile +there was a fund of devoted, concentrated passion, burning with the hope +of a more perfect satisfaction. They passed the spot where it was their +practice to turn towards the barren summit of the central hill. Heyst +held steadily on his way towards the upper limit of the forest. The +moment they left its shelter, a breeze enveloped them, and a great +cloud, racing over the sun, threw a peculiar sombre tint over +everything. Heyst pointed up a precipitous, rugged path clinging to the +side of the hill. It ended in a barricade of felled trees, a primitively +conceived obstacle which must have cost much labour to erect at just +that spot. + +"This," Heyst, explained in his urbane tone, "is a barrier against the +march of civilization. The poor folk over there did not like it, as it +appeared to them in the shape of my company--a great step forward, as +some people used to call it with mistaken confidence. The advanced foot +has been drawn back, but the barricade remains." + +They went on climbing slowly. The cloud had driven over, leaving an +added brightness on the face of the world. + +"It's a very ridiculous thing," Heyst went on; "but then it is the +product of honest fear--fear of the unknown, of the incomprehensible. +It's pathetic, too, in a way. And I heartily wish, Lena, that we were on +the other side of it." + +"Oh, stop, stop!" she cried, seizing his arm. + +The face of the barricade they were approaching had been piled up with a +lot of fresh-cut branches. The leaves were still green. A gentle breeze, +sweeping over the top, stirred them a little; but what had startled the +girl was the discovery of several spear-blades protruding from the mass +of foliage. She had made them out suddenly. They did not gleam, but she +saw them with extreme distinctness, very still, very vicious to look at. + +"You had better let me go forward alone, Lena," said Heyst. + +She tugged, persistently at his arm, but after a time, during which +he never ceased to look smilingly into her terrified eyes, he ended by +disengaging himself. + +"It's a sign rather than a demonstration," he argued, persuasively. +"Just wait here a moment. I promise not to approach near enough to be +stabbed." + +As in a nightmare she watched Heyst go up the few yards of the path as +if he never meant to stop; and she heard his voice, like voices heard +in dreams, shouting unknown words in an unearthly tone. Heyst was only +demanding to see Wang. He was not kept waiting very long. Recovering +from the first flurry of her fright, Lena noticed a commotion in the +green top-dressing of the barricade. She exhaled a sigh of relief when +the spear-blades retreated out of sight, sliding inward--the horrible +things! in a spot facing Heyst a pair of yellow hands parted the leaves, +and a face filled the small opening--a face with very noticeable eyes. +It was Wang's face, of course, with no suggestion of a body belonging to +it, like those cardboard faces at which she remembered gazing as a child +in the window of a certain dim shop kept by a mysterious little man in +Kingsland Road. Only this face, instead of mere holes, had eyes which +blinked. She could see the beating of the eyelids. The hands on each +side of the face, keeping the boughs apart, also did not look as if they +belonged to any real body. One of them was holding a revolver--a weapon +which she recognized merely by intuition, never having seen such an +object before. + +She leaned her shoulders against the rock of the perpendicular hillside +and kept her eyes on Heyst, with comparative composure, since the spears +were not menacing him any longer. Beyond the rigid and motionless back +he presented to her, she saw Wang's unreal cardboard face moving its +thin lips and grimacing artificially. She was too far down the path to +hear the dialogue, carried on in an ordinary voice. She waited patiently +for its end. Her shoulders felt the warmth of the rock; now and then a +whiff of cooler air seemed to slip down upon her head from above; the +ravine at her feet, choked full of vegetation, emitted the faint, drowsy +hum of insect life. Everything was very quiet. She failed to notice +the exact moment when Wang's head vanished from the foliage, taking the +unreal hands away with it. To her horror, the spear-blades came gliding +slowly out. The very hair on her head stirred; but before she had +time to cry out, Heyst, who seemed rooted to the ground, turned round +abruptly and began to move towards her. His great moustaches did not +quite hide an ugly but irresolute smile; and when he had come down near +enough to touch her, he burst out into a harsh laugh: + +"Ha, ha, ha!" + +She looked at him, uncomprehending. He cut short his laugh and said +curtly: + +"We had better go down as we came." + +She followed him into the forest. The advance of the afternoon had +filled it with gloom. Far away a slant of light between the trees closed +the view. All was dark beyond. Heyst stopped. + +"No reason to hurry, Lena," he said in his ordinary, serenely polite +tones. "We return unsuccessful. I suppose you know, or at least can +guess, what was my object in coming up there?" + +"No, I can't guess, dear," she said, and smiled, noticing with +emotion that his breast was heaving as if he had been out of breath. +Nevertheless, he tried to command his speech, pausing only a little +between the words. + +"No? I went up to find Wang. I went up"--he gasped again here, but this +was for the last time--"I made you come with me because I didn't like +to leave you unprotected in the proximity of those fellows." Suddenly he +snatched his cork helmet off his head and dashed it on the ground. "No!" +he cried roughly. "All this is too unreal altogether. It isn't to be +borne! I can't protect you! I haven't the power." + +He glared at her for a moment, then hastened after his hat which had +bounded away to some distance. He came back looking at her face, which +was very white. + +"I ought to beg your pardon for these antics," he said, adjusting his +hat. "A movement of childish petulance! Indeed, I feel very much like a +child in my ignorance, in my powerlessness, in my want of resource, in +everything except in the dreadful consciousness of some evil hanging +over your head--yours!" + +"It's you they are after," she murmured. + +"No doubt, but unfortunately--" + +"Unfortunately--what?" + +"Unfortunately, I have not succeeded with Wang," he said. "I failed to +move his Celestial, heart--that is, if there is such a thing. He told me +with horrible Chinese reasonableness that he could not let us pass the +barrier, because we should be pursued. He doesn't like fights. He gave +me to understand that he would shoot me with my own revolver without +any sort of compunction, rather than risk a rude and distasteful +contest with the strange barbarians for my sake. He has preached to the +villagers. They respect him. He is the most remarkable man they have +ever seen, and their kinsman by marriage. They understand his policy. +And anyway only women and children and a few old fellows are left in the +village. This is the season when the men are away in trading vessels. +But it would have been all the same. None of them have a taste for +fighting--and with white men too! They are peaceable, kindly folk and +would have seen me shot with extreme satisfaction. Wang seemed to think +my insistence--for I insisted, you know--very stupid and tactless. But a +drowning man clutches at straws. We were talking in such Malay as we are +both equal to. + +"'Your fears are foolish,' I said to him. + +"'Foolish? of course I am foolish,' he replied. 'If I were a wise man, +I would be a merchant with a big hong in Singapore, instead of being a +mine coolie turned houseboy. But if you don't go away in time, I will +shoot you before it grows too dark to take aim. Not till then, Number +One, but I will do it then. Now--finish!' + +"'All right,' I said. 'Finish as far as I am concerned; but you can have +no objections to the mem putih coming over to stay with the Orang Kaya's +women for a few days. I will make a present in silver for it.' Orang +Kaya, is the head man of the village, Lena," added Heyst. + +She looked at him in astonishment. + +"You wanted me to go to that village of savages?" she gasped. "You +wanted me to leave you?" + +"It would have given me a freer hand." + +Heyst stretched out his hands and looked at them for a moment, then let +them fall by his side. Indignation was expressed more in the curve of +her lips than in her clear eyes, which never wavered. + +"I believe Wang laughed," he went on. "He made a noise like a +turkey-cock." + +"'That would be worse than anything,' he told me. + +"I was taken aback. I pointed out to him that he was talking nonsense. +It could not make any difference to his security where you were, because +the evil men, as he calls them, did not know of your existence. I did +not lie exactly, Lena, though I did stretch the truth till it cracked; +but the fellow seems to have an uncanny insight. He shook his head. He +assured me they knew all about you. He made a horrible grimace at me." + +"It doesn't matter," said the girl. "I didn't want--I would not have +gone." + +Heyst raised his eyes. + +"Wonderful intuition! As I continued to press him, Wang made that +very remark about you. When he smiles, his face looks like a conceited +death's head. It was his very last remark that you wouldn't want to. I +went away then." + +She leaned back against a tree. Heyst faced her in the same attitude of +leisure, as if they had done with time and all the other concerns of the +earth. Suddenly, high above their heads the roof of leaves whispered at +them tumultuously and then ceased. + +"That was a strange notion of yours, to send me away," she said. "Send +me away? What for? Yes, what for?" + +"You seem indignant," he remarked listlessly. + +"To these savages, too!" she pursued. "And you think I would have gone? +You can do what you like with me--but not that, not that!" + +Heyst looked into the dim aisles of the forest. Everything was so still +now that the very ground on which they stood seemed to exhale silence +into the shade. + +"Why be indignant?" he remonstrated. "It has not happened. I gave up +pleading with Wang. Here we are, repulsed! Not only without power to +resist the evil, but unable to make terms for ourselves with the worthy +envoys, the envoys extraordinary of the world we thought we had done +with for years and years. And that's bad, Lena, very bad." + +"It's funny," she said thoughtfully. "Bad? I suppose it is. I don't know +that it is. But do you? Do you? You talk as if you didn't believe in +it." + +She gazed at him earnestly. + +"Do I? Ah! That's it. I don't know how to talk. I have managed to refine +everything away. I've said to the Earth that bore me: 'I am I and you +are a shadow.' And, by Jove, it is so! But it appears that such words +cannot be uttered with impunity. Here I am on a Shadow inhabited +by Shades. How helpless a man is against the Shades! How is one to +intimidate, persuade, resist, assert oneself against them? I have lost +all belief in realities . . . Lena, give me your hand." + +She looked at him surprised, uncomprehending. + +"Your hand," he cried. + +She obeyed; he seized it with avidity as if eager to raise it to his +lips, but halfway up released his grasp. They looked at each other for a +time. + +"What's the matter, dear?" she whispered timidly. + +"Neither force nor conviction," Heyst muttered wearily to himself. "How +am I to meet this charmingly simple problem?" + +"I am sorry," she murmured. + +"And so am I," he confessed quickly. "And the bitterest of this +humiliation is its complete uselessness--which I feel, I feel!" + +She had never before seen him give such signs of feeling. Across his +ghastly face the long moustaches flamed in the shade. He spoke suddenly: + +"I wonder if I could find enough courage to creep among them in the +night, with a knife, and cut their throats one after another, as they +slept! I wonder--" + +She was frightened by his unwonted appearance more than by the words in +his mouth, and said earnestly: + +"Don't you try to do such a thing! Don't you think of it!" + +"I don't possess anything bigger than a penknife. As to thinking of it, +Lena, there's no saying what one may think of. I don't think. Something +in me thinks--something foreign to my nature. What is the matter?" + +He noticed her parted lips, and the peculiar stare in her eyes, which +had wandered from his face. + +"There's somebody after us. I saw something white moving," she cried. + +Heyst did not turn his head; he only glanced at her out-stretched arm. + +"No doubt we are followed; we are watched." + +"I don't see anything now," she said. + +"And it does not matter," Heyst went on in his ordinary voice. "Here we +are in the forest. I have neither strength nor persuasion. Indeed, it's +extremely difficult to be eloquent before a Chinaman's head stuck at +one out of a lot of brushwood. But can we wander among these big trees +indefinitely? Is this a refuge? No! What else is left to us? I did think +for a moment of the mine; but even there we could not remain very long. +And then that gallery is not safe. The props were too weak to begin +with. Ants have been at work there--ants after the men. A death-trap, at +best. One can die but once, but there are many manners of death." + +The girl glanced about fearfully, in search of the watcher or follower +whom she had glimpsed once among the trees; but if he existed, he had +concealed himself. Nothing met her eyes but the deepening shadows of the +short vistas between the living columns of the still roof of leaves. +She looked at the man beside her expectantly, tenderly, with suppressed +affright and a sort of awed wonder. + +"I have also thought of these people's boat," Heyst went on. "We could +get into that, and--only they have taken everything out of her. I have +seen her oars and mast in a corner of their room. To shove off in an +empty boat would be nothing but a desperate expedient, supposing even +that she would drift out a good distance between the islands before the +morning. It would only be a complicated manner of committing suicide--to +be found dead in a boat, dead from sun and thirst. A sea mystery. +I wonder who would find us! Davidson, perhaps; but Davidson passed +westward ten days ago. I watched him steaming past one early morning, +from the jetty." + +"You never told me," she said. + +"He must have been looking at me through his big binoculars. Perhaps, if +I had raised my arm--but what did we want with Davidson then, you and +I? He won't be back this way for three weeks or more, Lena. I wish I had +raised my arm that morning." + +"What would have been the good of it?" she sighed out. + +"What good? No good, of course. We had no forebodings. This seemed to be +an inexpugnable refuge, where we could live untroubled and learn to know +each other." + +"It's perhaps in trouble that people get to know each other," she +suggested. + +"Perhaps," he said indifferently. "At any rate, we would not have gone +away from here with him; though I believe he would have come in eagerly +enough, and ready for any service he could render. It's that fat man's +nature--a delightful fellow. You would not come on the wharf that time +I sent the shawl back to Mrs. Schomberg through him. He has never seen +you." + +"I didn't know that you wanted anybody ever to see me," she said. + +He had folded his arms on his breast and hung his head. + +"And I did not know that you cared to be seen as yet. A misunderstanding +evidently. An honourable misunderstanding. But it does not matter now." + +He raised his head after a silence. + +"How gloomy this forest has grown! Yet surely the sun cannot have set +already." + +She looked round; and as if her eyes had just been opened, she perceived +the shades of the forest surrounding her, not so much with gloom, but +with a sullen, dumb, menacing hostility. Her heart sank in the engulfing +stillness, at that moment she felt the nearness of death, breathing on +her and on the man with her. If there had been a sudden stir of leaves, +the crack of a dry branch, the faintest rustle, she would have screamed +aloud. But she shook off the unworthy weakness. Such as she was, a +fiddle-scraping girl picked up on the very threshold of infamy, she +would try to rise above herself, triumphant and humble; and then +happiness would burst on her like a torrent, flinging at her feet the +man whom she loved. + +Heyst stirred slightly. + +"We had better be getting back, Lena, since we can't stay all night in +the woods--or anywhere else, for that matter. We are the slaves of +this infernal surprise which has been sprung on us by--shall I say +fate?--your fate, or mine." + +It was the man who had broken the silence, but it was the woman who +led the way. At the very edge of the forest she stopped, concealed by a +tree. He joined her cautiously. + +"What is it? What do you see, Lena?" he whispered. + +She said that it was only a thought that had come into her head. She +hesitated for a moment giving him over her shoulder a shining gleam in +her grey eyes. She wanted to know whether this trouble, this danger, +this evil, whatever it was, finding them out in their retreat, was not a +sort of punishment. + +"Punishment?" repeated Heyst. He could not understand what she meant. +When she explained, he was still more surprised. "A sort of retribution, +from an angry Heaven?" he said in wonder. "On us? What on earth for?" + +He saw her pale face darken in the dusk. She had blushed. Her whispering +flowed very fast. It was the way they lived together--that wasn't right, +was it? It was a guilty life. For she had not been forced into it, +driven, scared into it. No, no--she had come to him of her own free +will, with her whole soul yearning unlawfully. + +He was so profoundly touched that he could not speak for a moment. To +conceal his trouble, he assumed his best Heystian manner. + +"What? Are our visitors then messengers of morality, avengers of +righteousness, agents of Providence? That's certainly an original view. +How flattered they would be if they could hear you!" + +"Now you are making fun of me," she said in a subdued voice which broke +suddenly. + +"Are you conscious of sin?" Heyst asked gravely. She made no answer. +"For I am not," he added; "before Heaven, I am not!" + +"You! You are different. Woman is the tempter. You took me up from pity. +I threw myself at you." + +"Oh, you exaggerate, you exaggerate. It was not so bad as that," he said +playfully, keeping his voice steady with an effort. + +He considered himself a dead man already, yet forced to pretend that +he was alive for her sake, for her defence. He regretted that he had +no Heaven to which he could recommend this fair, palpitating handful of +ashes and dust--warm, living sentient his own--and exposed helplessly to +insult, outrage, degradation, and infinite misery of the body. + +She had averted her face from him and was still. He suddenly seized her +passive hand. + +"You will have it so?" he said. "Yes? Well, let us then hope for mercy +together." + +She shook her head without looking at him, like an abashed child. + +"Remember," he went on incorrigible with his delicate raillery, "that +hope is a Christian virtue, and surely you can't want all the mercy for +yourself." + +Before their eyes the bungalow across the cleared ground stood bathed in +a sinister light. An unexpected chill gust of wind made a noise in the +tree-tops. She snatched her hand away and stepped out into the open; +but before she had advanced more than three yards, she stood still and +pointed to the west. + +"Oh look there!" she exclaimed. + +Beyond the headland of Diamond Bay, lying black on a purple sea, great +masses of cloud stood piled up and bathed in a mist of blood. A crimson +crack like an open wound zigzagged between them, with a piece of dark +red sun showing at the bottom. Heyst cast an indifferent glance at the +ill-omened chaos of the sky. + +"Thunderstorm making up. We shall hear it all night, but it won't visit +us, probably. The clouds generally gather round the volcano." + +She was not listening to him. Her eyes reflected the sombre and violent +hues of the sunset. + +"That does not look much like a sign of mercy," she said slowly, as if +to herself, and hurried on, followed by Heyst. Suddenly she stopped. "I +don't care. I would do more yet! And some day you'll forgive me. You'll +have to forgive me!" + + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +Stumbling up the steps, as if suddenly exhausted, Lena entered the room +and let herself fall on the nearest chair. Before following her, Heyst +took a survey of the surroundings from the veranda. It was a complete +solitude. There was nothing in the aspect of this familiar scene to tell +him that he and the girl were not as completely alone as they had been +in the early days of their common life on this abandoned spot, with only +Wang discreetly materializing from time to time and the uncomplaining +memory of Morrison to keep them company. + +After the cold gust of wind there was an absolute stillness of the +air. The thunder-charged mass hung unbroken beyond the low, ink-black +headland, darkening the twilight. By contrast, the sky at the zenith +displayed pellucid clearness, the sheen of a delicate glass bubble which +the merest movement of air might shatter. A little to the left, between +the black masses of the headland and of the forest, the volcano, a +feather of smoke by day and a cigar-glow at night, took its first fiery +expanding breath of the evening. Above it a reddish star came out like +an expelled spark from the fiery bosom of the earth, enchanted into +permanency by the mysterious spell of frozen spaces. + +In front of Heyst the forest, already full of the deepest shades, stood +like a wall. But he lingered, watching its edge, especially where it +ended at the line of bushes, masking the land end of the jetty. Since +the girl had spoken of catching a glimpse of something white among the +trees, he believed pretty firmly that they had been followed in their +excursion up the mountain by Mr. Jones's secretary. No doubt the fellow +had watched them out of the forest, and now, unless he took the trouble +to go back some distance and fetch a considerable circuit inland over +the clearing, he was bound to walk out into the open space before the +bungalows. Heyst did, indeed, imagine at one time some movement between +the trees, lost as soon as perceived. He stared patiently, but nothing +more happened. After all, why should he trouble about these people's +actions? Why this stupid concern for the preliminaries, since, when +the issue was joined, it would find him disarmed and shrinking from the +ugliness and degradation of it? + +He turned and entered the room. Deep dusk reigned in there already. +Lena, near the door, did not move or speak. The sheen of the white +tablecloth was very obtrusive. The brute these two vagabonds had tamed +had entered on its service while Heyst and Lena were away. The table was +laid. Heyst walked up and down the room several times. The girl remained +without sound or movement on the chair. But when Heyst, placing the two +silver candelabra on the table, struck a match to light the candles, +she got up suddenly and went into the bedroom. She came out again almost +immediately, having taken off her hat. Heyst looked at her over his +shoulder. + +"What's the good of shirking the evil hour? I've lighted these +candles for a sign of our return. After all, we might not have been +watched--while returning, I mean. Of course we were seen leaving the +house." + +The girl sat down again. The great wealth of her hair looked very dark +above her colourless face. She raised her eyes, glistening softly in +the light with a sort of unreadable appeal, with a strange effect of +unseeing innocence. + +"Yes," said Heyst across the table, the fingertips of one hand resting +on the immaculate cloth. "A creature with an antediluvian lower jaw, +hairy like a mastodon, and formed like a pre-historic ape, has laid this +table. Are you awake, Lena? Am I? I would pinch myself, only I know that +nothing would do away with this dream. Three covers. You know it is the +shorter of the two who's coming--the gentleman who, in the play of his +shoulders as he walks, and in his facial structure, recalls a Jaguar. +Ah, you don't know what a jaguar is? But you have had a good look at +these two. It's the short one, you know, who's to be our guest." + +She made a sign with her head that she knew; Heyst's insistence brought +Ricardo vividly before her mental vision. A sudden languor, like the +physical echo of her struggle with the man, paralysed all her limbs. +She lay still in the chair, feeling very frightened at this +phenomenon--ready to pray aloud for strength. + +Heyst had started to pace the room. + +"Our guest! There is a proverb--in Russia, I believe--that when a +guest enters the house, God enters the house. The sacred virtue of +hospitality! But it leads one into trouble as well as any other." + +The girl unexpectedly got up from the chair, swaying her supple figure +and stretching her arms above her head. He stopped to look at her +curiously, paused, and then went on: + +"I venture to think that God has nothing to do with such a hospitality +and with such a guest!" + +She had jumped to her feet to react against the numbness, to discover +whether her body would obey her will. It did. She could stand up, and +she could move her arms freely. Though no physiologist, she concluded +that all that sudden numbness was in her head, not in her limbs. Her +fears assuaged, she thanked God for it mentally, and to Heyst murmured a +protest: + +"Oh, yes! He's got to do with everything--every little thing. Nothing +can happen--" + +"Yes," he said hastily, "one of the two sparrows can't be struck to the +ground--you are thinking of that." The habitual playful smile faded on +the kindly lips under the martial moustache. "Ah, you remember what you +have been told--as a child--on Sundays." + +"Yes, I do remember." She sank into the chair again. "It was the only +decent bit of time I ever had when I was a kid, with our landlady's two +girls, you know." + +"I wonder, Lena," Heyst said, with a return to his urbane playfulness, +"whether you are just a little child, or whether you represent something +as old as the world." + +She surprised Heyst by saying dreamily: + +"Well--and what about you?" + +"I? I date later--much later. I can't call myself a child, but I am so +recent that I may call myself a man of the last hour--or is it the hour +before last? I have been out of it so long that I am not certain how far +the hands of the clock have moved since--since--" + +He glanced at the portrait of his father, exactly above the head of the +girl, as if it were ignoring her in its painted austerity of feeling. He +did not finish the sentence; but he did not remain silent for long. + +"Only what must be avoided are fallacious inferences, my dear +Lena--especially at this hour." + +"Now you are making fun of me again," she said without looking up. + +"Am I?" he cried. "Making fun? No, giving warning. Hang it all, whatever +truth people told you in the old days, there is also this one--that +sparrows do fall to the ground, that they are brought to the ground. +This is no vain assertion, but a fact. That's why"--again his +tone changed, while he picked up the table knife and let it fall +disdainfully--"that's why I wish these wretched round knives had some +edge on them. Absolute rubbish--neither edge, point, nor substance. I +believe one of these forks would make a better weapon at a pinch. But +can I go about with a fork in my pocket?" He gnashed his teeth with a +rage very real, and yet comic. + +"There used to be a carver here, but it was broken and thrown away a +long time ago. Nothing much to carve here. It would have made a noble +weapon, no doubt; but--" + +He stopped. The girl sat very quiet, with downcast eyes. As he kept +silence for some time, she looked up and said thoughtfully: + +"Yes, a knife--it's a knife that you would want, wouldn't you, in case, +in case--" + +He shrugged his shoulders. + +"There must be a crowbar or two in the sheds; but I have given up all +the keys together. And then, do you see me walking about with a crowbar +in my hand? Ha, ha! And besides, that edifying sight alone might start +the trouble for all I know. In truth, why has it not started yet?" + +"Perhaps they are afraid of you," she whispered, looking down again. + +"By Jove, it looks like it," he assented meditatively. "They do seem to +hang back for some reason. Is that reason prudence, or downright fear, +or perhaps the leisurely method of certitude?" + +Out in the black night, not very far from the bungalow, resounded a loud +and prolonged whistle. Lena's hands grasped the sides of the chair, but +she made no movement. Heyst started, and turned his face away from the +door. + +The startling sound had died away. + +"Whistles, yells, omens, signals, portents--what do they matter?" he +said. "But what about the crowbar? Suppose I had it! Could I stand +in ambush at the side of the door--this door--and smash the first +protruding head, scatter blood and brains over the floor, over these +walls, and then run stealthily to the other door to do the same +thing--and repeat the performance for a third time, perhaps? Could I? On +suspicion, without compunction, with a calm and determined purpose? No, +it is not in me. I date too late. Would you like to see me attempt this +thing while that mysterious prestige of mine lasts--or their not less +mysterious hesitation?" + +"No, no!" she whispered ardently, as if compelled to speak by his +eyes fixed on her face. "No, it's a knife you want to defend yourself +with--to defend--there will be time--" + +"And who knows if it isn't really my duty?" he began again, as if he had +not heard her disjointed words at all. "It may be--my duty to you, to +myself. For why should I put up with the humiliation of their secret +menaces? Do you know what the world would say?" + +He emitted a low laugh, which struck her with terror. She would have got +up, but he stooped so low over her that she could not move without first +pushing him away. + +"It would say, Lena, that I--the Swede--after luring my friend and +partner to his death from mere greed of money, have murdered these +unoffending shipwrecked strangers from sheer funk. That would be +the story whispered--perhaps shouted--certainly spread out, and +believed--and believed, my dear Lena!" + +"Who would believe such awful things?" + +"Perhaps you wouldn't--not at first, at any rate; but the power of +calumny grows with time. It's insidious and penetrating. It can even +destroy one's faith in oneself--dry-rot the soul." + +All at once her eyes leaped to the door and remained fixed, stony, a +little enlarged. Turning his head, Heyst beheld the figure of Ricardo +framed in the doorway. For a moment none of the three moved, then, +looking from the newcomer to the girl in the chair, Heyst formulated a +sardonic introduction. + +"Mr Ricardo, my dear." + +Her head drooped a little. Ricardo's hand went up to his moustache. His +voice exploded in the room. + +"At your service, ma'am!" + +He stepped in, taking his hat off with a flourish, and dropping it +carelessly on a chair near the door. + +"At your service," he repeated, in quite another tone. "I was made aware +there was a lady about, by that Pedro of ours; only I didn't know I +should have the privilege of seeing you tonight, ma'am." + +Lena and Heyst looked at him covertly, but he, with a vague gaze +avoiding them both, looked at nothing, seeming to pursue some point in +space. + +"Had a pleasant walk?" he asked suddenly. + +"Yes. And you?" returned Heyst, who had managed to catch his glance. + +"I haven't been a yard away from the governor this afternoon till +I started for here." The genuineness of the accent surprised Heyst, +without convincing him of the truth of the words. + +"Why do you ask?" pursued Ricardo with every inflection of perfect +candour. + +"You might have wished to explore the island a little," said Heyst, +studying the man, who, to render him justice, did not try to free his +captured gaze. "I may remind you that it wouldn't be a perfectly safe +proceeding." + +Ricardo presented a picture of innocence. + +"Oh, yes--meaning that Chink that has ran away from you. He ain't much!" + +"He has a revolver," observed Heyst meaningly. + +"Well, and you have a revolver, too," Mr. Ricardo argued unexpectedly. +"I don't worry myself about that." + +"That's different. I am not afraid of you," Heyst made answer after a +short pause. + +"Of me?" + +"Of all of you." + +"You have a queer way of putting things," began Ricardo. + +At that moment the door on the compound side of the house came open with +some noise, and Pedro entered, pressing the edge of a loaded tray to his +breast. His big, hairy head rolled a little, his feet fell in front of +each other with a short, hard thump on the floor. The arrival changed +the current of Ricardo's thought, perhaps, but certainly of his speech. + +"You heard me whistling a little while ago outside? That was to give him +a hint, as I came along, that it was time to bring in the dinner; and +here it is." + +Lena rose and passed to the right of Ricardo, who lowered his glance for +a moment. They sat down at the table. The enormous gorilla back of Pedro +swayed out through the door. + +"Extraordinary strong brute, ma'am," said Ricardo. He, had a propensity +to talk about "his Pedro," as some men will talk of their dog. "He ain't +pretty, though. No, he ain't pretty. And he has got to be kept under. I +am his keeper, as it might be. The governor don't trouble his head much +about dee-tails. All that's left to Martin. Martin, that's me, ma'am." + +Heyst saw the girl's eyes turn towards Mr. Jones's secretary and rest +blankly on his face. Ricardo, however, looked vaguely into space, +and, with faint flickers of a smile about his lips, made conversation +indefatigably against the silence of his entertainers. He boasted +largely of his long association with Mr. Jones--over four years now, he +said. Then, glancing rapidly at Heyst: + +"You can see at once he's a gentleman, can't you?" + +"You people," Heyst said, his habitual playful intonation tinged with +gloom, "are divorced from all reality in my eyes." + +Ricardo received this speech as if he had been expecting to hear +those very words, or else did not mind at all what Heyst might say. +He muttered an absent-minded "Ay, ay," played with a bit of biscuit, +sighed, and said, with a peculiar stare which did not seem to carry any +distance, but to stop short at a point in the air very near his face: + +"Anybody can see at once you are one. You and the governor ought to +understand each other. He expects to see you tonight. The governor isn't +well, and we've got to think of getting away from here." + +While saying these words he turned himself full towards Lena, but +without any marked expression. Leaning back with folded arms, the girl +stared before her as if she had been alone in the room. But under +that aspect of almost vacant unconcern the perils and emotion that had +entered into her life warmed her heart, exalted her mind with a sense of +an inconceivable intensity of existence. + +"Really? Thinking of going away from here?" Heyst murmured. + +"The best of friends must part," Ricardo pronounced slowly. "And, as +long as they part friends, there's no harm done. We two are used to be +on the move. You, I understand, prefer to stick in one place." + +It was obvious that all this was being said merely for the sake of +talking, and that Ricardo's mind was concentrated on some purpose +unconnected with the words that were coming out of his mouth. + +"I should like to know," Heyst asked with incisive politeness, "how you +have come to understand this or anything else about me? As far as I can +remember, I've made you no confidences." + +Ricardo, gazing comfortably into space out of the back of his chair--for +some time all three had given up any pretence of eating--answered +abstractedly: + +"Any fellow might have guessed it!" He sat up suddenly, and uncovered +all his teeth in a grin of extraordinary ferocity, which was belied by +the persistent amiability of his tone. "The governor will be the man +to tell you something about that. I wish you would say you would see my +governor. He's the one who does all our talking. Let me take you to him +this evening. He ain't at all well; and he can't make up his mind to go +away without having a talk with you." + +Heyst, looking up, met Lena's eyes. Their expression of candour seemed +to hide some struggling intention. Her head, he fancied, had made an +imperceptible affirmative movement. Why? What reason could she have? Was +it the prompting of some obscure instinct? Or was it simply a delusion +of his own senses? But in this strange complication invading the +quietude of his life, in his state of doubt and disdain and almost of +despair with which he looked at himself, he would let even a delusive +appearance guide him through a darkness so dense that it made for +indifference. + +"Well, suppose I do say so." + +Ricardo did not conceal his satisfaction, which for a moment interested +Heyst. + +"It can't be my life they are after," he said to himself. "What good +could it be to them?" + +He looked across the table at the girl. What did it matter whether she +had nodded or not? As always when looking into her unconscious eyes, he +tasted something like the dregs of tender pity. He had decided to go. +Her nod, imaginary or not imaginary, advice or illusion, had tipped the +scale. He reflected that Ricardo's invitation could scarcely be anything +in the nature of a trap. It would have been too absurd. Why carry subtly +into a trap someone already bound hand and foot, as it were? + +All this time he had been looking fixedly at the girl he called Lena. In +the submissive quietness of her being, which had been her attitude ever +since they had begun their life on the island, she remained as secret +as ever. Heyst got up abruptly, with a smile of such enigmatic and +despairing character that Mr. Secretary Ricardo, whose abstract gaze had +an all-round efficiency, made a slight crouching start, as if to dive +under the table for his leg-knife--a start that was repressed, as soon +as begun. He had expected Heyst to spring on him or draw a revolver, +because he created for himself a vision of him in his own image. Instead +of doing either of these obvious things, Heyst walked across the +room, opened the door and put his head through it to look out into the +compound. + +As soon as his back was turned, Ricardo's hand sought the girl's arm +under the table. He was not looking at her, but she felt the groping, +nervous touch of his search, felt suddenly the grip of his fingers above +her wrist. He leaned forward a little; still he dared not look at her. +His hard stare remained fastened on Heyst's back. In an extremely low +hiss, his fixed idea of argument found expression scathingly: + +"See! He's no good. He's not the man for you!" + +He glanced at her at last. Her lips moved a little, and he was awed +by that movement without a sound. Next instant the hard grasp of his +fingers vanished from her arm. Heyst had shut the door. On his way back +to the table, he crossed the path of the girl they had called Alma--she +didn't know why--also Magdalen, whose mind had remained so long in doubt +as to the reason of her own existence. She no longer wondered at that +bitter riddle, since her heart found its solution in a blinding, hot +glow of passionate purpose. + + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +She passed by Heyst as if she had indeed been blinded by some secret, +lurid, and consuming glare into which she was about to enter. The +curtain of the bedroom door fell behind her into rigid folds. Ricardo's +vacant gaze seemed to be watching the dancing flight of a fly in mid +air. + +"Extra dark outside, ain't it?" he muttered. + +"Not so dark but that I could see that man of yours prowling about +there," said Heyst in measured tones. + +"What--Pedro? He's scarcely a man you know; or else I wouldn't be so +fond of him as I am." + +"Very well. Let's call him your worthy associate." + +"Ay! Worthy enough for what we want of him. A great standby is Peter in +a scrimmage. A growl and a bite--oh, my! And you don't want him about?" + +"I don't." + +"You want him out of the way?" insisted Ricardo with an affectation +of incredulity which Heyst accepted calmly, though the air in the room +seemed to grow more oppressive with every word spoken. + +"That's it. I do want him out of the way." He forced himself to speak +equably. + +"Lor'! That's no great matter. Pedro's not much use here. The business +my governor's after can be settled by ten minutes' rational talk +with--with another gentleman. Quiet talk!" + +He looked up suddenly with hard, phosphorescent eyes. Heyst didn't move +a muscle. Ricardo congratulated himself on having left his revolver +behind. He was so exasperated that he didn't know what he might have +done. He said at last: + +"You want poor, harmless Peter out of the way before you let me take you +to see the governor--is that it?" + +"Yes, that is it." + +"H'm! One can see," Ricardo said with hidden venom, "that you are a +gentleman; but all that gentlemanly fancifulness is apt to turn sour on +a plain man's stomach. However--you'll have to pardon me." + +He put his fingers into his mouth and let out a whistle which seemed to +drive a thin, sharp shaft of air solidly against one's nearest ear-drum. +Though he greatly enjoyed Heyst's involuntary grimace, he sat perfectly +stolid waiting for the effect of the call. + +It brought Pedro in with an extraordinary, uncouth, primeval +impetuosity. The door flew open with a clatter, and the wild figure it +disclosed seemed anxious to devastate the room in leaps and bounds; +but Ricardo raised his open palm, and the creature came in quietly. +His enormous half-closed paws swung to and fro a little in front of his +bowed trunk as he walked. Ricardo looked on truculently. + +"You go to the boat--understand? Go now!" + +The little red eyes of the tame monster blinked with painful attention +in the mass of hair. + +"Well? Why don't you get? Forgot human speech, eh? Don't you know any +longer what a boat is?" + +"Si--boat," the creature stammered out doubtfully. + +"Well, go there--the boat at the jetty. March off to it and sit there, +lie down there, do anything but go to sleep there--till you hear my +call, and then fly here. Them's your orders. March! Get, vamos! No, not +that way--out through the front door. No sulks!" + +Pedro obeyed with uncouth alacrity. When he had gone, the gleam of +pitiless savagery went out of Ricardo's yellow eyes, and his physiognomy +took on, for the first time that evening, the expression of a domestic +cat which is being noticed. + +"You can watch him right into the bushes, if you like. Too dark, eh? Why +not go with him to the very spot, then?" + +Heyst made a gesture of vague protest. + +"There's nothing to assure me that he will stay there. I have no doubt +of his going, but it's an act without guarantee." + +"There you are!" Ricardo shrugged his shoulders philosophically. "Can't +be helped. Short of shooting our Pedro, nobody can make absolutely sure +of his staying in the same place longer than he has a mind to; but I +tell you, he lives in holy terror of my temper. That's why I put on my +sudden-death air when I talk to him. And yet I wouldn't shoot him--not +I, unless in such a fit of rage as would make a man shoot his favourite +dog. Look here, sir! This deal is on the square. I didn't tip him a wink +to do anything else. He won't budge from the jetty. Are you coming along +now, sir?" + +A short-silence ensued. Ricardo's jaws were working ominously under his +skin. His eyes glided: voluptuously here and there, cruel and dreamy, +Heyst checked a sudden movement, reflected for a while, then said: + +"You must wait a little." + +"Wait a little! Wait a little! What does he think a fellow is--a graven +image?" grumbled Ricardo half audibly. + +Heyst went into the bedroom, and shut the door after him with a bang. +Coming from the light, he could not see a thing in there at first; yet +he received the impression of the girl getting up from the floor. On +the less opaque darkness of the shutter-hole, her head detached itself +suddenly, very faint, a mere hint of a round, dark shape without a face. + +"I am going, Lena. I am going to confront these scoundrels." He was +surprised to feel two arms falling on his shoulders. "I thought that +you--" he began. + +"Yes, yes!" the girl whispered hastily. + +She neither clung to him, nor yet did she try to draw him to her. Her +hands grasped his shoulders, and she seemed to him to be staring into +his face in the dark. And now he could see something of her face, +too--an oval without features--and faintly distinguish her person, in +the blackness, a form without definite lines. + +"You have a black dress here, haven't you, Lena?" he asked, speaking +rapidly, and so low that she could just hear him. + +"Yes--an old thing." + +"Very good. Put it on at once." + +"But why?" + +"Not for mourning!" There was something peremptory in the slightly +ironic murmur. "Can you find it and get into it in the dark?" + +She could. She would try. He waited, very still. He could imagine +her movements over there at the far end of the room; but his eyes, +accustomed now to the darkness, had lost her completely. When she spoke, +her voice surprised him by its nearness. She had done what he had told +her to do, and had approached him, invisible. + +"Good! Where's that piece of purple veil I've seen lying about?" he +asked. + +There was no answer, only a slight rustle. + +"Where is it?" he repeated impatiently. + +Her unexpected breath was on his cheek. + +"In my hands." + +"Capital! Listen, Lena. As soon as I leave the bungalow with that +horrible scoundrel, you slip out at the back--instantly, lose no +time!--and run round into the forest. That will be your time, while we +are walking away, and I am sure he won't give me the slip. Run into the +forest behind the fringe of bushes between the big trees. You will know, +surely, how to find a place in full view of the front door. I fear for +you; but in this black dress, with most of your face muffled up in that +dark veil, I defy anybody to find you there before daylight. Wait in the +forest till the table is pushed into full view of the doorway, and you +see three candles out of four blown out and one relighted--or, should +the lights be put out here while you watch them, wait till three candles +are lighted and then two put out. At either of these signals run back as +hard as you can, for it will mean that I am waiting for you here." + +While he was speaking, the girl had sought and seized one of his +hands. She did not press it; she held it loosely, as it were timidly, +caressingly. It was no grasp; it was a mere contact, as if only to make +sure that he was there, that he was real and no mere darker shadow in +the obscurity. The warmth of her hand gave Heyst a strange, intimate +sensation of all her person. He had to fight down a new sort of emotion, +which almost unmanned him. He went on, whispering sternly: + +"But if you see no such signals, don't let anything--fear, curiosity, +despair, or hope--entice you back to this house; and with the first sign +of dawn steal away along the edge of the clearing till you strike the +path. Wait no longer, because I shall probably be dead." + +The murmur of the word "Never!" floated into his ear as if it formed +itself in the air. + +"You know the path," he continued. "Make your way to the barricade. Go +to Wang--yes, to Wang. Let nothing stop you!" It seemed to him that the +girl's hand trembled a little. "The worst he can do to you is to shoot +you, but he won't. I really think he won't, if I am not there. Stay with +the villagers, with the wild people, and fear nothing. They will be more +awed by you than you can be frightened of them. Davidson's bound to turn +up before very long. Keep a look-out for a passing steamer. Think of +some sort of signal to call him." + +She made no answer. The sense of the heavy, brooding silence in the +outside world seemed to enter and fill the room--the oppressive infinity +of it, without breath, without light. It was as if the heart of hearts +had ceased to beat and the end of all things had come. + +"Have you understood? You are to run out of the house at once," Heyst +whispered urgently. + +She lifted his hand to her lips and let it go. He was startled. + +"Lena!" he cried out under his breath. + +She was gone from his side. He dared not trust himself--no, not even to +the extent of a tender word. + +Turning to go out he heard a thud somewhere in the house. To open the +door, he had first to lift the curtain; he did so with his face over his +shoulder. The merest trickle of light, coming through the keyhole and +one or two cracks, was enough for his eyes to see her plainly, all +black, down on her knees, with her head and arms flung on the foot of +the bed--all black in the desolation of a mourning sinner. What was +this? A suspicion that there were everywhere more things than he +could understand crossed Heyst's mind. Her arm, detached from the bed, +motioned him away. He obeyed, and went out, full of disquiet. + +The curtain behind him had not ceased to tremble when she was up on her +feet, close against it, listening for sounds, for words, in a stooping, +tragic attitude of stealthy attention, one hand clutching at her breast +as if to compress, to make less loud the beating of her heart. Heyst +had caught Mr. Jones's secretary in the contemplation of his closed +writing-desk. Ricardo might have been meditating how to break into it; +but when he turned about suddenly, he showed so distorted a face that +it made Heyst pause in wonder at the upturned whites of the eyes, which +were blinking horribly, as if the man were inwardly convulsed. + +"I thought you were never coming," Ricardo mumbled. + +"I didn't know you were pressed for time. Even if your going away +depends on this conversation, as you say, I doubt if you are the men to +put to sea on such a night as this," said Heyst, motioning Ricardo to +precede him out of the house. + +With feline undulations of hip and shoulder, the secretary left the +room at once. There was something cruel in the absolute dumbness of the +night. The great cloud covering half the sky hung right against one, +like an enormous curtain hiding menacing preparations of violence. As +the feet of the two men touched the ground, a rumble came from behind +it, preceded by a swift, mysterious gleam of light on the waters of the +bay. + +"Ha!" said Ricardo. "It begins." + +"It may be nothing in the end," observed Heyst, stepping along steadily. + +"No! Let it come!" Ricardo said viciously. "I am in the humour for it!" + +By the time the two men had reached the other bungalow, the far-off +modulated rumble growled incessantly, while pale lightning in waves of +cold fire flooded and ran off the island in rapid succession. Ricardo, +unexpectedly, dashed ahead up the steps and put his head through the +doorway. + +"Here he is, governor! Keep him with you as long as you can--till you +hear me whistle. I am on the track." + +He flung these words into the room with inconceivable speed, and stood +aside to let the visitor pass through the doorway; but he had to wait +an appreciable moment, because Heyst, seeing his purpose, had scornfully +slowed his pace. When Heyst entered the room it was with a smile, the +Heyst smile, lurking under his martial moustache. + + + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +Two candles were burning on the stand-up desk. Mr. Jones, tightly +enfolded in an old but gorgeous blue silk dressing-gown, kept his +elbows close against his sides and his hands deeply plunged into the +extraordinarily deep pockets of the garment. The costume accentuated his +emaciation. He resembled a painted pole leaning against the edge of the +desk, with a dried head of dubious distinction stuck on the top of it. +Ricardo lounged in the doorway. Indifferent in appearance to what +was going on, he was biding his time. At a given moment, between two +flickers of lightning, he melted out of his frame into the outer +air. His disappearance was observed on the instant by Mr. Jones, who +abandoned his nonchalant immobility against the desk, and made a few +steps calculated to put him between Heyst and the doorway. + +"It's awfully close," he remarked + +Heyst, in the middle of the room, had made up his mind to speak plainly. + +"We haven't met to talk about the weather. You favoured me earlier in +the day with a rather cryptic phrase about yourself. 'I am he that is,' +you said. What does that mean?" + +Mr. Jones, without looking at Heyst, continued his absentminded +movements till, attaining the desired position, he brought his shoulders +with a thump against the wall near the door, and raised his head. In +the emotion of the decisive moment his haggard face glistened with +perspiration. Drops ran down his hollow cheeks and almost blinded the +spectral eyes in their bony caverns. + +"It means that I am a person to be reckoned with. No--stop! Don't put +your hand into your pocket--don't." + +His voice had a wild, unexpected shrillness. Heyst started, and there +ensued a moment of suspended animation, during which the thunder's +deep bass muttered distantly and the doorway to the right of Mr. Jones +flickered with bluish light. At last Heyst shrugged his shoulders; he +even looked at his hand. He didn't put it in his pocket, however. Mr. +Jones, glued against the wall, watched him raise both his hands to +the ends of his horizontal moustaches, and answered the note of +interrogation in his steady eyes. + +"A matter of prudence," said Mr. Jones in his natural hollow tones, and +with a face of deathlike composure. "A man of your free life has surely +perceived that. You are a much talked-about man, Mr. Heyst--and though, +as far as I understand, you are accustomed to employ the subtler +weapons of intelligence, still I can't afford to take any risks of +the--er--grosser methods. I am not unscrupulous enough to be a match for +you in the use of intelligence; but I assure you, Mr. Heyst, that in +the other way you are no match for me. I have you covered at this +very moment. You have been covered ever since you entered this room. +Yes--from my pocket." + +During this harangue Heyst looked deliberately over his shoulder, +stepped back a pace, and sat down on the end of the camp bedstead. +Leaning his elbow on one knee, he laid his cheek in the palm of his hand +and seemed to meditate on what he should say next. Mr. Jones, planted +against the wall, was obviously waiting for some sort of overture. +As nothing came, he resolved to speak himself; but he hesitated. For, +though he considered that the most difficult step had been taken, he +said to himself that every stage of progress required great caution, +lest the man in Ricardo's phraseology, should "start to prance"--which +would be most inconvenient. He fell back on a previous statement: + +"And I am a person to be reckoned with." + +The other man went on looking at the floor, as if he were alone in the +room. There was a pause. + +"You have heard of me, then?" Heyst said at length, looking up. + +"I should think so! We have been staying at Schomberg's hotel." + +"Schom--" Heyst choked on the word. + +"What's the matter, Mr. Heyst?" + +"Nothing. Nausea," Heyst said resignedly. He resumed his former attitude +of meditative indifference. "What is this reckoning you are talking +about?" he asked after a time, in the quietest possible tone. "I don't +know you." + +"It's obvious that we belong to the same--social sphere," began Mr. +Jones with languid irony. Inwardly he was as watchful as he could be. +"Something has driven you out--the originality of your ideas, perhaps. +Or your tastes." + +Mr Jones indulged in one of his ghastly smiles. In repose his features +had a curious character of evil, exhausted austerity; but when he +smiled, the whole mask took on an unpleasantly infantile expression. A +recrudescence of the rolling thunder invaded the room loudly, and passed +into silence. + +"You are not taking this very well," observed Mr. Jones. This was +what he said, but as a matter of fact he thought that the business +was shaping quite satisfactorily. The man, he said to himself, had no +stomach for a fight. Aloud he continued: "Come! You can't expect to have +it always your own way. You are a man of the world." + +"And you?" Heyst interrupted him unexpectedly. "How do you define +yourself?" + +"I, my dear sir? In one way I am--yes, I am the world itself, come to +pay you a visit. In another sense I am an outcast--almost an outlaw. +If you prefer a less materialistic view, I am a sort of fate--the +retribution that waits its time." + +"I wish to goodness you were the commonest sort of ruffian!" said Heyst, +raising his equable gaze to Mr. Jones. "One would be able to talk to you +straight then, and hope for some humanity. As it is--" + +"I dislike violence and ferocity of every sort as much as you do," Mr. +Jones declared, looking very languid as he leaned against the wall, but +speaking fairly loud. "You can ask my Martin if it is not so. This, Mr. +Heyst, is a soft age. It is also an age without prejudices. I've heard +that you are free from them yourself. You mustn't be shocked if I tell +you plainly that we are after your money--or I am, if you prefer to make +me alone responsible. Pedro, of course, knows no more of it than +any other animal would. Ricardo is of the faithful-retainer +class--absolutely identified with all my ideas, wishes, and even whims!" + +Mr Jones pulled his left hand out of his pocket, got a handkerchief out +of another, and began to wipe the perspiration from his forehead, neck, +and chin. The excitement from which he suffered made his breathing +visible. In his long dressing-gown he had the air of a convalescent +invalid who had imprudently overtaxed his strength. Heyst, +broad-shouldered, robust, watched the operation from the end of the camp +bedstead, very calm, his hands on his knees. + +"And by the by," he asked, "where is he now, that henchman of yours? +Breaking into my desk?" + +"That would be crude. Still, crudeness is one of life's conditions." +There was the slightest flavour of banter in the tone of Ricardo's +governor. "Conceivable, but unlikely. Martin is a little crude; but you +are not, Mr. Heyst. To tell you the truth, I don't know precisely +where he is. He has been a little mysterious of late; but he has my +confidence. No, don't get up, Mr. Heyst!" + +The viciousness of his spectral face was indescribable. Heyst, who had +moved a little, was surprised by the disclosure. + +"It was not my intention," he said. + +"Pray remain seated," Mr. Jones insisted in a languid voice, but with a +very determined glitter in his black eye-caverns. + +"If you were more observant," said Heyst with dispassionate contempt, +"you would have known before I had been five minutes in the room that I +had no weapon of any sort on me." + +"Possibly; but pray keep your hands still. They are very well where they +are. This is too big an affair for me to take any risks." + +"Big? Too big?" Heyst repeated with genuine surprise. "Good Heavens! +Whatever you are looking for, there's very little of it here--very +little of anything." + +"You would naturally say so, but that's not what we have heard," +retorted Mr. Jones quickly, with a grin so ghastly that it was +impossible to think it voluntary. + +Heyst's face had grown very gloomy. He knitted his brows. + +"What have you heard?" he asked. + +"A lot, Mr. Heyst--a lot," affirmed Mr. Jones. He was vying to recover +his manner of languid superiority. "We have heard, for instance, of a +certain Mr. Morrison, once your partner." + +Heyst could not repress a slight movement. + +"Aha!" said Mr. Jones, with a sort of ghostly glee on his face. + +The muffled thunder resembled the echo of a distant cannonade below the +horizon, and the two men seemed to be listening to it in sullen silence. + +"This diabolical calumny will end in actually and literally taking my +life from me," thought Heyst. + +Then, suddenly, he laughed. Portentously spectral, Mr. Jones frowned at +the sound. + +"Laugh as much as you please," he said. "I, who have been hounded out +from society by a lot of highly moral souls, can't see anything funny in +that story. But here we are, and you will now have to pay for your fun, +Mr. Heyst." + +"You have heard a lot of ugly lies," observed Heyst. "Take my word for +it!" + +"You would say so, of course--very natural. As a matter of fact I +haven't heard very much. Strictly speaking, it was Martin. He collects +information, and so on. You don't suppose I would talk to that Schomberg +animal more than I could help? It was Martin whom he took into his +confidence." + +"The stupidity of that creature is so great that it becomes formidable," +Heyst said, as if speaking to himself. + +Involuntarily, his mind turned to the girl, wandering in the forest, +alone and terrified. Would he ever see her again? At that thought he +nearly lost his self-possession. But the idea that if she followed +his instructions those men were not likely to find her steadied him a +little. They did not know that the island had any inhabitants; and he +himself once disposed of, they would be too anxious to get away to waste +time hunting for a vanished girl. + +All this passed through Heyst's mind in a flash, as men think in moments +of danger. He looked speculatively at Mr. Jones, who, of course, had +never for a moment taken his eyes from his intended victim. And, the +conviction came to Heyst that this outlaw from the higher spheres was an +absolutely hard and pitiless scoundrel. + +Mr Jones's voice made him start. + +"It would be useless, for instance, to tell me that your Chinaman has +run off with your money. A man living alone with a Chinaman on an island +takes care to conceal property of that kind so well that the devil +himself--" + +"Certainly," Heyst muttered. + +Again, with his left hand, Mr. Jones mopped his frontal bone, his +stalk-like neck, his razor jaws, his fleshless chin. Again his voice +faltered and his aspect became still more gruesomely malevolent as of a +wicked and pitiless corpse. + +"I see what you mean," he cried, "but you mustn't put too much trust +in your ingenuity. You don't strike me as a very ingenious person, Mr. +Heyst. Neither am I. My talents lie another way. But Martin--" + +"Who is now engaged in rifling my desk," interjected Heyst. + +"I don't think so. What I was going to say is that Martin is much +cleverer than a Chinaman. Do you believe in racial superiority, Mr. +Heyst? I do, firmly. Martin is great at ferreting out such secrets as +yours, for instance." + +"Secrets like mine!" repeated Heyst bitterly. "Well I wish him joy of +all he can ferret out!" + +"That's very kind of you," remarked Mr. Jones. He was beginning to +be anxious for Martin's return. Of iron self-possession at the +gaming-table, fearless in a sudden affray, he found that this rather +special kind of work was telling on his nerves. "Keep still as you are!" +he cried sharply. + +"I've told you I am not armed," said Heyst, folding his arms on his +breast. + +"I am really inclined to believe that you are not," admitted Mr. Jones +seriously. "Strange!" he mused aloud, the caverns of his eyes turned +upon Heyst. Then briskly: "But my object is to keep you in this room. +Don't provoke me, by some unguarded movement, to smash your knee or do +something definite of that sort." He passed his tongue over his lips, +which were dry and black, while his forehead glistened with moisture. "I +don't know if it wouldn't be better to do it at once!" + +"He who deliberates is lost," said Heyst with grave mockery. + +Mr Jones disregarded the remark. He had the air of communing with +himself. + +"Physically I am no match for you," he said slowly, his black gaze fixed +upon the man sitting on the end of the bed. "You could spring--" + +"Are you trying to frighten yourself?" asked Heyst abruptly. "You don't +seem to have quite enough pluck for your business. Why don't you do it +at once?" + +Mr Jones, taking violent offence, snorted like a savage skeleton. + +"Strange as it may seem to you, it is because of my origin, my breeding, +my traditions, my early associations, and such-like trifles. Not +everybody can divest himself of the prejudices of a gentleman as easily +as you have done, Mr. Heyst. But don't worry about my pluck. If you were +to make a clean spring at me, you would receive in mid air, so to speak, +something that would make you perfectly harmless by the time you landed. +No, don't misapprehend us, Mr. Heyst. We are--er--adequate bandits; and +we are after the fruit of your labours as a--er--successful swindler. +It's the way of the world--gorge and disgorge!" + +He leaned wearily the back of his head against the wall. His vitality +seemed exhausted. Even his sunken eyelids drooped within the bony +sockets. Only his thin, waspish, beautifully pencilled eyebrows, drawn +together a little, suggested the will and the power to sting--something +vicious, unconquerable, and deadly. + +"Fruits! Swindler!" repeated Heyst, without heat, almost without +contempt. "You are giving yourself no end of trouble, you and your +faithful henchman, to crack an empty nut. There are no fruits here, as +you imagine. There are a few sovereigns, which you may have if you like; +and since you have called yourself a bandit--" + +"Yaas!" drawled Mr. Jones. "That, rather than a swindler. Open warfare +at least!" + +"Very good! Only let me tell you that there were never in the world two +more deluded bandits--never!" + +Heyst uttered these words with such energy that Mr. Jones, stiffening +up, seemed to become thinner and taller in his metallic blue +dressing-gown against the whitewashed wall. + +"Fooled by a silly, rascally innkeeper!" Heyst went on. "Talked over +like a pair of children with a promise of sweets!" + +"I didn't talk with that disgusting animal," muttered Mr. Jones +sullenly; "but he convinced Martin, who is no fool." + +"I should think he wanted very much to be convinced," said Heyst, with +the courteous intonation so well known in the Islands. "I don't want to +disturb your touching trust in your--your follower, but he must be the +most credulous brigand in existence. What do you imagine? If the story +of my riches were ever so true, do you think Schomberg would have +imparted it to you from sheer altruism? Is that the way of the world, +Mr. Jones?" + +For a moment the lower jaw of Ricardo's gentleman dropped; but it came +up with a snap of scorn, and he said with spectral intensity: + +"The beast is cowardly! He was frightened, and wanted to get rid of +us, if you want to know, Mr. Heyst. I don't know that the material +inducement was so very great, but I was bored, and we decided to accept +the bribe. I don't regret it. All my life I have been seeking new +impressions, and you have turned out to be something quite out of +the common. Martin, of course, looks to the material results. He's +simple--and faithful--and wonderfully acute." + +"Ah, yes! He's on the track--" and now Heyst's speech had the character +of politely grim raillery--"but not sufficiently on the track, as +yet, to make it quite convenient to shoot me without more ado. Didn't +Schomberg tell you precisely where I conceal the fruit of my rapines? +Pah! Don't you know he would have told you anything, true or false, from +a very clear motive? Revenge! Mad hate--the unclean idiot!" + +Mr Jones did not seem very much moved. On his right hand the doorway +incessantly flickered with distant lightning, and the continuous rumble +of thunder went on irritatingly, like the growl of an inarticulate giant +muttering fatuously. + +Heyst overcame his immense repugnance to allude to her whose image, +cowering in the forest was constantly before his eyes, with all the +pathos and force of its appeal, august, pitiful, and almost holy to him. +It was in a hurried, embarrassed manner that he went on: + +"If it had not been for that girl whom he persecuted with his insane and +odious passion, and who threw herself on my protection, he would never +have--but you know well enough!" + +"I don't know!" burst out Mr. Jones with amazing heat. "That +hotel-keeper tried to talk to me once of some girl he had lost, but I +told him I didn't want to hear any of his beastly women stories. It had +something to do with you, had it?" + +Heyst looked on serenely at this outburst, then lost his patience a +little. + +"What sort of comedy is this? You don't mean to say that you didn't know +that I had--that there was a girl living with me here?" + +One could see that the eyes of Mr. Jones had become fixed in the depths +of their black holes by the gleam of white becoming steady there. The +whole man seemed frozen still. + +"Here! Here!" he screamed out twice. There was no mistaking his +astonishment, his shocked incredulity--something like frightened +disgust. + +Heyst was disgusted also, but in another way. He too was incredulous. +He regretted having mentioned the girl; but the thing was done, his +repugnance had been overcome in the heat of his argument against the +absurd bandit. + +"Is it possible that you didn't know of that significant fact?" he +inquired. "Of the only effective truth in the welter of silly lies that +deceived you so easily?" + +"No, I didn't!" Mr. Jones shouted. "But Martin did!" he added in a faint +whisper, which Heyst's ears just caught and no more. + +"I kept her out of sight as long as I could," said Heyst. "Perhaps, with +your bringing up, traditions, and so on; you will understand my reason +for it." + +"He knew. He knew before!" Mr. Jones mourned in a hollow voice. "He knew +of her from the first!" + +Backed hard against the wall he no longer watched Heyst. He had the air +of a man who had seen an abyss yawning under his feet. + +"If I want to kill him, this is my time," thought Heyst; but he did not +move. + +Next moment Mr. Jones jerked his head up, glaring with sardonic fury. + +"I have a good mind to shoot you, you woman-ridden hermit, you man in +the moon, that can't exist without--no, it won't be you that I'll shoot. +It's the other woman-lover--the prevaricating, sly, low-class, amorous +cuss! And he shaved--shaved under my very nose. I'll shoot him!" + +"He's gone mad," thought Heyst, startled by the spectre's sudden fury. + +He felt himself more in danger, nearer death, than ever since he had +entered that room. An insane bandit is a deadly combination. He did not, +could not know that Mr. Jones was quick-minded enough to see already the +end of his reign over his excellent secretary's thoughts and feelings; +the coming failure of Ricardo's fidelity. A woman had intervened! +A woman, a girl, who apparently possessed the power to awaken +men's disgusting folly. Her power had been proved in two instances +already--the beastly innkeeper, and that man with moustaches, upon whom +Mr. Jones, his deadly right hand twitching in his pocket, glared more in +repulsion than in anger. The very object of the expedition was lost from +view in his sudden and overwhelming sense of utter insecurity. And +this made Mr. Jones feel very savage; but not against the man with the +moustaches. Thus, while Heyst was really feeling that his life was +not worth two minutes, purchase, he heard himself addressed with +no affectation of languid impertinence but with a burst of feverish +determination. + +"Here! Let's call a truce!" said Mr. Jones. + +Heyst's heart was too sick to allow him to smile. + +"Have I been making war on you?" he asked wearily. "How do you expect +me to attach any meaning to your words?" he went on. "You seem to be a +morbid, senseless sort of bandit. We don't speak the same language. If I +were to tell you why I am here, talking to you, you wouldn't believe +me, because you would not understand me. It certainly isn't the love +of life, from which I have divorced myself long ago--not sufficiently, +perhaps; but if you are thinking of yours, then I repeat to you that it +has never been in danger from me. I am unarmed." + +Mr Jones was biting his lower lip, in a deep meditation. It was only +towards the last that he looked at Heyst. + +"Unarmed, eh?" Then he burst out violently: "I tell you, a gentleman is +no match for the common herd. And yet one must make use of the brutes. +Unarmed, eh? And I suppose that creature is of the commonest sort. You +could hardly have got her out of a drawing-room. Though they're all +alike, for that matter. Unarmed! It's a pity. I am in much greater +danger than you are or were--or I am much mistaken. But I am not--I know +my man!" + +He lost his air of mental vacancy and broke out into shrill +exclamations. To Heyst they seemed madder than anything that had gone +before. + +"On the track! On the scent!" he cried, forgetting himself to the point +of executing a dance of rage in the middle of the floor. + +Heyst looked on, fascinated by this skeleton in a gay dressing-gown, +jerkily agitated like a grotesque toy on the end of an invisible string. +It became quiet suddenly. + +"I might have smelt a rat! I always knew that this would be the danger." +He changed suddenly to a confidential tone, fixing his sepulchral stare +on Heyst. "And yet here I am, taken in by the fellow, like the veriest +fool. I've been always on the watch for some beastly influence, but here +I am, fairly caught. He shaved himself right in front of me and I never +guessed!" + +The shrill laugh, following on the low tone of secrecy, sounded so +convincingly insane that Heyst got up as if moved by a spring. Mr. Jones +stepped back two paces, but displayed no uneasiness. + +"It's as clear as daylight!" he uttered mournfully, and fell silent. + +Behind him the doorway flickered lividly, and the sound as of a naval +action somewhere away on the horizon filled the breathless pause. +Mr. Jones inclined his head on his shoulder. His mood had completely +changed. + +"What do you say, unarmed man? Shall we go and see what is detaining +my trusted Martin so long? He asked me to keep you engaged in friendly +conversation till he made a further examination of that track. Ha, ha, +ha!" + +"He is no doubt ransacking my house," said Heyst. + +He was bewildered. It seemed to him that all this was an +incomprehensible dream, or perhaps an elaborate other-world joke, +contrived by that spectre in a gorgeous dressing gown. + +Mr Jones looked at him with a horrible, cadaverous smile of inscrutable +mockery, and pointed to the door. Heyst passed through it first. His +feelings had become so blunted that he did not care how soon he was shot +in the back. + +"How oppressive the air is!" the voice of Mr. Jones said at his elbow. +"This stupid storm gets on my nerves. I would welcome some rain, though +it would be unpleasant to get wet. On the other hand, this exasperating +thunder has the advantage of covering the sound of our approach. The +lightning's not so convenient. Ah, your house is fully illuminated! +My clever Martin is punishing your stock of candles. He belongs to the +unceremonious classes, which are also unlovely, untrustworthy, and so +on." + +"I left the candles burning," said Heyst, "to save him trouble." + +"You really believed he would go to your house?" asked Mr. Jones with +genuine interest. + +"I had that notion, strongly. I do believe he is there now." + +"And you don't mind?" + +"No!" + +"You don't!" Mr. Jones stopped to wonder. "You are an extraordinary +man," he said suspiciously, and moved on, touching elbows with Heyst. + +In the latter's breast dwelt a deep silence, the complete silence of +unused faculties. At this moment, by simply shouldering Mr. Jones, he +could have thrown him down and put himself, by a couple of leaps, beyond +the certain aim of the revolver; but he did not even think of that. His +very will seemed dead of weariness. He moved automatically, his head +low, like a prisoner captured by the evil power of a masquerading +skeleton out of a grave. Mr. Jones took charge of the direction. They +fetched a wide sweep. The echoes of distant thunder seemed to dog their +footsteps. + +"By the by," said Mr. Jones, as if unable to restrain his curiosity, +"aren't you anxious about that--ouch!--that fascinating creature to whom +you owe whatever pleasure you can find in our visit?" + +"I have placed her in safety," said Heyst. "I--I took good care of +that." + +Mr Jones laid a hand on his arm. + +"You have? Look! is that what you mean?" + +Heyst raised his head. In the flicker of lightning the desolation of the +cleared ground on his left leaped out and sank into the night, together +with the elusive forms of things distant, pale, unearthly. But in the +brilliant square of the door he saw the girl--the woman he had longed to +see once more as if enthroned, with her hands on the arms of the chair. +She was in black; her face was white, her head dreamily inclined on her +breast. He saw her only as low as her knees. He saw her--there, in the +room, alive with a sombre reality. It was no mocking vision. She was not +in the forest--but there! She sat there in the chair, seemingly without +strength, yet without fear, tenderly stooping. + +"Can you understand their power?" whispered the hot breath of Mr. Jones +into his ear. "Can there be a more disgusting spectacle? It's enough to +make the earth detestable. She seems to have found her affinity. Move +on closer. If I have to shoot you in the end, then perhaps you will die +cured." + +Heyst obeyed the pushing pressure of a revolver barrel between his +shoulders. He felt it distinctly, but he did not feel the ground under +his feet. They found the steps, without his being aware that he was +ascending them--slowly, one by one. Doubt entered into him--a doubt of +a new kind, formless, hideous. It seemed to spread itself all over him, +enter his limbs, and lodge in his entrails. He stopped suddenly, with +a thought that he who experienced such a feeling had no business to +live--or perhaps was no longer living. + +Everything--the bungalow, the forest, the open ground--trembled +incessantly, the earth, the sky itself, shivered all the time, and the +only thing immovable in the shuddering universe was the interior of the +lighted room and the woman in black sitting in the light of the eight +candle-flames. They flung around her an intolerable brilliance which +hurt his eyes, seemed to sear his very brain with the radiation of +infernal heat. It was some time before his scorched eyes made out +Ricardo seated on the floor at some little distance, his back to the +doorway, but only partly so; one side of his upturned face showing the +absorbed, all forgetful rapture of his contemplation. + +The grip of Mr. Jones's hard claw drew Heyst back a little. In the roll +of thunder, swelling and subsiding, he whispered in his ear a sarcastic: +"Of course!" + +A great shame descended upon Heyst--the shame of guilt, absurd and +maddening. Mr. Jones drew him still farther back into the darkness of +the veranda. + +"This is serious," he went on, distilling his ghostly venom into Heyst's +very ear. "I had to shut my eyes many times to his little flings; but +this is serious. He has found his soul-mate. Mud souls, obscene and +cunning! Mud bodies, too--the mud of the gutter! I tell you, we are +no match for the vile populace. I, even I, have been nearly caught. He +asked me to detain you till he gave me the signal. It won't be you +that I'll have to shoot, but him. I wouldn't trust him near me for five +minutes after this!" + +He shook Heyst's arm a little. + +"If you had not happened to mention the creature, we should both have +been dead before morning. He would have stabbed you as you came down +the steps after leaving me and then he would have walked up to me and +planted the same knife between my ribs. He has no prejudices. The viler +the origin, the greater the freedom of these simple souls!" + +He drew a cautious, hissing breath and added in an agitated murmur: "I +can see right into his mind, I have been nearly caught napping by his +cunning." + +He stretched his neck to peer into the room from the side. Heyst, too, +made a step forward, under the slight impulse of that slender hand +clasping his hand with a thin, bony grasp. + +"Behold!" the skeleton of the crazy bandit jabbered thinly into his ear +in spectral fellowship. "Behold the simple, Acis kissing the sandals +of the nymph, on the way to her lips, all forgetful, while the menacing +fife of Polyphemus already sounds close at hand--if he could only hear +it! Stoop a little." + + + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +On returning to the Heyst bungalow, rapid as if on wings, Ricardo +found Lena waiting for him. She was dressed in black; and at once his +uplifting exultation was replaced by an awed and quivering patience +before her white face, before the immobility of her reposeful pose, the +more amazing to him who had encountered the strength of her limbs and +the indomitable spirit in her body. She had come out after Heyst's +departure, and had sat down under the portrait to wait for the return of +the man of violence and death. While lifting the curtain, she felt the +anguish of her disobedience to her lover, which was soothed by a feeling +she had known before--a gentle flood of penetrating sweetness. She +was not automatically obeying a momentary suggestion, she was under +influences more deliberate, more vague, and of greater potency. She had +been prompted, not by her will, but by a force that was outside of her +and more worthy. She reckoned upon nothing definite; she had calculated +nothing. She saw only her purpose of capturing death--savage, sudden, +irresponsible death, prowling round the man who possessed her, death +embodied in the knife ready to strike into his heart. No doubt it had +been a sin to throw herself into his arms. With that inspiration +that descends at times from above for the good or evil of our common +mediocrity, she had a sense of having been for him only a violent and +sincere choice of curiosity and pity--a thing that passes. She did not +know him. If he were to go away from her and disappear, she would utter +no reproach, she would not resent it; for she would hold in herself the +impress of something most rare and precious--his embraces made her own +by her courage in saving his life. + +All she thought of--the essence of her tremors, her flushes of heat, and +her shudders of cold--was the question how to get hold of that knife, +the mark and sign of stalking death. A tremor of impatience to clutch +the frightful thing, glimpsed once and unforgettable, agitated her +hands. + +The instinctive flinging forward of these hands stopped Ricardo dead +short between the door and her chair, with the ready obedience of a +conquered man who can bide his time. Her success disconcerted her. She +listened to the man's impassioned transports of terrible eulogy and even +more awful declarations of love. She was even able to meet his eyes, +oblique, apt to glide away, throwing feral gleams of desire. + +"No!" he was saying, after a fiery outpouring of words in which the most +ferocious phrases of love were mingled with wooing accents of entreaty. +"I will have no more of it! Don't you mistrust me. I am sober in my +talk. Feel how quietly my heart beats. Ten times today when you, you, +you, swam in my eye, I thought it would burst one of my ribs or leap +out of my throat. It has knocked itself dead and tired, waiting for this +evening, for this very minute. And now it can do no more. Feel how quiet +it is!" + +He made a step forward, but she raised her clear voice commandingly: + +"No nearer!" + +He stopped with a smile of imbecile worship on his lips, and with the +delighted obedience of a man who could at any moment seize her in his +hands and dash her to the ground. + +"Ah! If I had taken you by the throat this morning and had my way with +you, I should never have known what you are. And now I do. You are a +wonder! And so am I, in my way. I have nerve, and I have brains, too. +We should have been lost many times but for me. I plan--I plot for my +gentleman. Gentleman--pah! I am sick of him. And you are sick of yours, +eh? You, you!" + +He shook all over; he cooed at her a string of endearing names, obscene +and tender, and then asked abruptly: + +"Why don't you speak to me?" + +"It's my part to listen," she said, giving him an inscrutable smile, +with a flush on her cheek and her lips cold as ice. + +"But you will answer me?" + +"Yes," she said, her eyes dilated as if with sudden interest. + +"Where's that plunder? Do you know?" + +"No! Not yet." + +"But there is plunder stowed somewhere that's worth having?" + +"Yes, I think so. But who knows?" she added after a pause. + +"And who cares?" he retorted recklessly. "I've had enough of this +crawling on my belly. It's you who are my treasure. It's I who found you +out where a gentleman had buried you to rot for his accursed pleasure!" + +He looked behind him and all around for a seat, then turned to her his +troubled eyes and dim smile. + +"I am dog-tired," he said, and sat down on the floor. "I went tired this +morning, since I came in here and started talking to you--as tired as if +I had been pouring my life-blood here on these planks for you to dabble +your white feet in." + +Unmoved, she nodded at him thoughtfully. Woman-like, all her faculties +remained concentrated on her heart's desire--on the knife--while the man +went on babbling insanely at her feet, ingratiating and savage, almost +crazy with elation. But he, too, was holding on to his purpose. + +"For you! For you I will throw away money, lives--all the lives but +mine! What you want is a man, a master that will let you put the heel of +your shoe on his neck; not that skulker, who will get tired of you in a +year--and you of him. And then what? You are not the one to sit still; +neither am I. I live for myself, and you shall live for yourself, +too--not for a Swedish baron. They make a convenience of people like you +and me. A gentleman is better than an employer, but an equal partnership +against all the 'yporcrits is the thing for you and me. We'll go on +wandering the world over, you and I both free and both true. You are no +cage bird. We'll rove together, for we are of them that have no homes. +We are born rovers!" + +She listened to him with the utmost attention, as if any unexpected +word might give her some sort of opening to get that dagger, that awful +knife--to disarm murder itself, pleading for her love at her feet. Again +she nodded at him thoughtfully, rousing a gleam in his yellow eyes, +yearning devotedly upon her face. When he hitched himself a little +closer, her soul had no movement of recoil. This had to be. Anything +had to be which would bring the knife within her reach. He talked more +confidentially now. + +"We have met, and their time has come," he began, looking up into her +eyes. "The partnership between me and my gentleman has to be ripped up. +There's no room for him where we two are. Why, he would shoot me like a +dog! Don't you worry. This will settle it not later than tonight!" + +He tapped his folded leg below the knee, and was surprised, flattered, +by the lighting up of her face, which stooped towards him eagerly and +remained expectant, the lips girlishly parted, red in the pale face, and +quivering in the quickened drawing of her breath. + +"You marvel, you miracle, you man's luck and joy--one in a million! No, +the only one. You have found your man in me," he whispered tremulously. +"Listen! They are having their last talk together; for I'll do for your +gentleman, too, by midnight." + +Without the slightest tremor she murmured, as soon as the tightening of +her breast had eased off and the words would come: + +"I wouldn't be in too much of a hurry--with him." + +The pause, the tone, had all the value of meditated advice. + +"Good, thrifty girl!" he laughed low, with a strange feline gaiety, +expressed by the undulating movement of his shoulders and the sparkling +snap of his oblique eyes. "You are still thinking about the chance of +that swag. You'll make a good partner, that you will! And, I say, what a +decoy you will make! Jee-miny!" + +He was carried away for a moment, but his face darkened swiftly. + +"No! No reprieve. What do you think a fellow is--a scarecrow? All hat +and clothes and no feeling, no inside, no brain to make fancies for +himself? No!" he went on violently. "Never in his life will he go again +into that room of yours--never any more!" + +A silence fell. He was gloomy with the torment of his jealousy, and did +not even look at her. She sat up and slowly, gradually, bent lower and +lower over him, as if ready to fall into his arms. He looked up at last, +and checked this droop unwittingly. + +"Say! You, who are up to fighting a man with your bare hands, could +you--eh?--could you manage to stick one with a thing like that knife of +mine?" + +She opened her eyes very wide and gave him a wild smile. + +"How can I tell?" she whispered enchantingly. "Will you let me have a +look at it?" + +Without taking his eyes from her face, he pulled the knife out of its +sheath--a short, broad, cruel double-edged blade with a bone handle--and +only then looked down at it. + +"A good friend," he said simply. "Take it in your hand and feel the +balance," he suggested. + +At the moment when she bent forward to receive it from him, there was +a flash of fire in her mysterious eyes--a red gleam in the white mist +which wrapped the promptings and longings of her soul. She had done it! +The very sting of death was in her hands, the venom of the viper in her +paradise, extracted, safe in her possession--and the viper's head all +but lying under her heel. Ricardo, stretched on the mats of the floor, +crept closer and closer to the chair in which she sat. + +All her thoughts were busy planning how to keep possession of that +weapon which had seemed to have drawn into itself every danger and +menace on the death-ridden earth. She said with a low laugh, the +exultation in which he failed to recognize: + +"I didn't think that you would ever trust me with that thing!" + +"Why not?" + +"For fear I should suddenly strike you with it." + +"What for? For this morning's work? Oh, no! There's no spite in you for +that. You forgave me. You saved me. You got the better of me, too. And +anyhow, what good would it be?" + +"No, no good," she admitted. + +In her heart she felt that she would not know how to do it; that if it +came to a struggle, she would have to drop the dagger and fight with her +hands. + +"Listen. When we are going about the world together, you shall always +call me husband. Do you hear?" + +"Yes," she said bracing herself for the contest, in whatever shape it +was coming. + +The knife was lying in her lap. She let it slip into the fold of her +dress, and laid her forearms with clasped fingers over her knees, which +she pressed desperately together. The dreaded thing was out of sight at +last. She felt a dampness break out all over her. + +"I am not going to hide you, like that good-for-nothing, finicky, sneery +gentleman. You shall be my pride and my chum. Isn't that better than +rotting on an island for the pleasure of a gentleman, till he gives you +the chuck?" + +"I'll be anything you like," she said. + +In his intoxication he crept closer with every word she uttered, with +every movement she made. + +"Give your foot," he begged in a timid murmur, and in the full +consciousness of his power. + +Anything! Anything to keep murder quiet and disarmed till strength had +returned to her limbs and she could make up her mind what to do. Her +fortitude had been shaken by the very facility of success that had come +to her. She advanced her foot forward a little from under the hem of her +skirt; and he threw himself on it greedily. She was not even aware of +him. She had thought of the forest, to which she had been told to run. +Yes, the forest--that was the place for her to carry off the terrible +spoil, the sting of vanquished death. Ricardo, clasping her ankle, +pressed his lips time after time to the instep, muttering gasping words +that were like sobs, making little noises that resembled the sounds of +grief and distress. Unheard by them both, the thunder growled distantly +with angry modulations of it's tremendous voice, while the world outside +shuddered incessantly around the dead stillness of the room where the +framed profile of Heyst's father looked severely into space. + +Suddenly Ricardo felt himself spurned by the foot he had been +cherishing--spurned with a push of such violence into the very hollow of +his throat that it swung him back instantly into an upright position on +his knees. He read his danger in the stony eyes of the girl; and in +the very act of leaping to his feet he heard sharply, detached on the +comminatory voice of the storm the brief report of a shot which half +stunned him, in the manner of a blow. He turned his burning head, and +saw Heyst towering in the doorway. The thought that the beggar had +started to prance darted through his mind. For a fraction of a second +his distracted eyes sought for his weapon all over the floor. He +couldn't see it. + +"Stick him, you!" he called hoarsely to the girl, and dashed headlong +for the door of the compound. + +While he thus obeyed the instinct of self-preservation, his reason was +telling him that he could not possibly reach it alive. It flew open, +however, with a crash, before his launched weight, and instantly he +swung it to behind him. There, his shoulder leaning against it, his +hands clinging to the handle, dazed and alone in the night full of +shudders and muttered menaces, he tried to pull himself together. He +asked himself if he had been shot at more than once. His shoulder was +wet with the blood trickling from his head. Feeling above his ear, he +ascertained that it was only a graze, but the shock of the surprise had +unmanned him for the moment. + +What the deuce was the governor about to let the beggar break loose like +this? Or--was the governor dead, perhaps? + +The silence within the room awed him. Of going back there could be no +question. + +"But she knows how to take care of her self," he muttered. + +She had his knife. It was she now who was deadly, while he was disarmed, +no good for the moment. He stole away from the door, staggering, the +warm trickle running down his neck, to find out what had become of the +governor and to provide himself with a firearm from the armoury in the +trunks. + + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +Mr Jones, after firing his shot over Heyst's shoulder, had thought it +proper to dodge away. Like the spectre he was, he noiselessly vanished +from the veranda. Heyst stumbled into the room and looked around. All +the objects in there--the books, portrait on the wall--seemed shadowy, +unsubstantial, the dumb accomplices of an amazing dream-plot ending in +an illusory effect of awakening and the impossibility of ever closing +his eyes again. With dread he forced himself to look at the girl. Still +in the chair, she was leaning forward far over her knees, and had hidden +her face in her hands. Heyst remembered Wang suddenly. How clear all +this was--and how extremely amusing! Very. + +She sat up a little, then leaned back, and taking her hands from her +face, pressed both of them to her breast as if moved to the heart by +seeing him there looking at her with a black, horror-struck curiosity. +He would have pitied her, if the triumphant expression of her face had +not given him a shock which destroyed the balance of his feelings. She +spoke with an accent of wild joy: + +"I knew you would come back in time! You are safe now. I have done it! +I would never, never have let him--" Her voice died out, while her eyes +shone at him as when the sun breaks through a mist. "Never get it back. +Oh, my beloved!" + +He bowed his head gravely, and said in his polite. Heystian tone: + +"No doubt you acted from instinct. Women have been provided with their +own weapon. I was a disarmed man, I have been a disarmed man all my life +as I see it now. You may glory in your resourcefulness and your profound +knowledge of yourself; but I may say that the other attitude, suggestive +of shame, had its charm. For you are full of charm!" + +The exultation vanished from her face. + +"You mustn't make fun of me now. I know no shame. I was thanking God +with all my sinful heart for having been able to do it--for giving you +to me in that way--oh, my beloved--all my own at last!" + +He stared as if mad. Timidly she tried to excuse herself for disobeying +his directions for her safety. Every modulation of her enchanting voice +cut deep into his very breast, so that he could hardly understand the +words for the sheer pain of it. He turned his back on her; but a sudden +drop, an extraordinary faltering of her tone, made him spin round. On +her white neck her pale head dropped as in a cruel drought a withered +flower droops on its stalk. He caught his breath, looked at her closely, +and seemed to read some awful intelligence in her eyes. At the moment +when her eyelids fell as if smitten from above by an the gleam of +old silver familiar to him from boyhood, the very invisible power, he +snatched her up bodily out of the chair, and disregarding an unexpected +metallic clatter on the floor, carried her off into the other room. The +limpness of her body frightened him. Laying her down on the bed, he +ran out again, seized a four-branched candlestick on the table, and ran +back, tearing down with a furious jerk the curtain that swung stupidly +in his way, but after putting the candlestick on the table by the bed, +he remained absolutely idle. There did not seem anything more for him +to do. Holding his chin in his hand he looked down intently at her still +face. + +"Has she been stabbed with this thing?" asked Davidson, whom suddenly he +saw standing by his side and holding up Ricardo's dagger to his sight. +Heyst uttered no word of recognition or surprise. He gave Davidson only +a dumb look of unutterable awe, then, as if possessed with a sudden +fury, started tearing open the front of the girls dress. She remained +insensible under his hands, and Heyst let out a groan which made +Davidson shudder inwardly the heavy plaint of a man who falls clubbed in +the dark. + +They stood side by side, looking mournfully at the little black hole +made by Mr. Jones's bullet under the swelling breast of a dazzling and +as it were sacred whiteness. It rose and fell slightly--so slightly that +only the eyes of the lover could detect the faint stir of life. Heyst, +calm and utterly unlike himself in the face, moving about noiselessly, +prepared a wet cloth, and laid it on the insignificant wound, +round which there was hardly a trace of blood to mar the charm, the +fascination, of that mortal flesh. + +Her eyelids fluttered. She looked drowsily about, serene, as if fatigued +only by the exertions of her tremendous victory, capturing the very +sting of death in the service of love. But her eyes became very +wide awake when they caught sight of Ricardo's dagger, the spoil of +vanquished death, which Davidson was still holding, unconsciously. + +"Give it to me," she said. "It's mine." + +Davidson put the symbol of her victory into her feeble hands extended to +him with the innocent gesture of a child reaching eagerly for a toy. + +"For you," she gasped, turning her eyes to Heyst. "Kill nobody." + +"No," said Heyst, taking the dagger and laying it gently on her breast, +while her hands fell powerless by her side. + +The faint smile on her deep-cut lips waned, and her head sank deep into +the pillow, taking on the majestic pallor and immobility of marble. +But over the muscles, which seemed set in their transfigured beauty for +ever, passed a slight and awful tremor. With an amazing strength she +asked loudly: + +"What's the matter with me?" + +"You have been shot, dear Lena," Heyst said in a steady voice, while +Davidson, at the question, turned away and leaned his forehead against +the post of the foot of the bed. + +"Shot? I did think, too, that something had struck me." + +Over Samburan the thunder had ceased to growl at last, and the world of +material forms shuddered no more under the emerging stars. The spirit +of the girl which was passing away from under them clung to her triumph +convinced of the reality of her victory over death. + +"No more," she muttered. "There will be no more! Oh, my beloved," she +cried weakly, "I've saved you! Why don't you take me into your arms and +carry me out of this lonely place?" + +Heyst bent low over her, cursing his fastidious soul, which even at that +moment kept the true cry of love from his lips in its infernal mistrust +of all life. He dared not touch her and she had no longer the strength +to throw her arms about his neck. + +"Who else could have done this for you?" she whispered gloriously. + +"No one in the world," he answered her in a murmur of unconcealed +despair. + +She tried to raise herself, but all she could do was to lift her head +a little from the pillow. With a terrible and gentle movement, Heyst +hastened to slip his arm under her neck. She felt relieved at once of +an intolerable weight, and was content to surrender to him the infinite +weariness of her tremendous achievement. Exulting, she saw herself +extended on the bed, in a black dress, and profoundly at peace, while, +stooping over her with a kindly, playful smile, he was ready to lift +her up in his firm arms and take her into the sanctuary of his innermost +heart--for ever! The flush of rapture flooding her whole being broke out +in a smile of innocent, girlish happiness; and with that divine radiance +on her lips she breathed her last--triumphant, seeking for his glance in +the shades of death. + + + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + + "Yes, Excellency," said Davidson in his placid voice; "there are more dead in this affair--more white people, I mean--than have been killed in many of the battles in the last Achin war." + +Davidson was talking with an Excellency, because what was alluded to in +conversation as "the mystery of Samburan" had caused such a sensation in +the Archipelago that even those in the highest spheres were anxious to +hear something at first hand. Davidson had been summoned to an audience. +It was a high official on his tour. + +"You knew the late Baron Heyst well?" + +"The truth is that nobody out here can boast of having known him well," +said Davidson. "He was a queer chap. I doubt if he himself knew how +queer he was. But everybody was aware that I was keeping my eye on him +in a friendly way. And that's how I got the warning which made me turn +round in my tracks. In the middle of my trip and steam back to Samburan, +where, I am grieved to say, I arrived too late." + +Without enlarging very much, Davidson explained to the attentive +Excellency how a woman, the wife of a certain hotel-keeper named +Schomberg, had overheard two card-sharping rascals making inquiries from +her husband as to the exact position of the island. She caught only a +few words referring to the neighbouring volcano, but there were enough +to arouse her suspicions--"which," went on Davidson, "she imparted to +me, your Excellency. They were only too well founded!" + +"That was very clever of her," remarked the great man. + +"She's much cleverer than people have any conception of," said Davidson. + +But he refrained from disclosing to the Excellency the real cause which +had sharpened Mrs. Schomberg's wits. The poor woman was in mortal terror +of the girl being brought back within reach of her infatuated Wilhelm. +Davidson only said that her agitation had impressed him; but he +confessed that while going back, he began to have his doubts as to there +being anything in it. + +"I steamed into one of those silly thunderstorms that hang about the +volcano, and had some trouble in making the island," narrated Davidson. +"I had to grope my way dead slow into Diamond Bay. I don't suppose that +anybody, even if looking out for me, could have heard me let go the +anchor." + +He admitted that he ought to have gone ashore at once; but everything +was perfectly dark and absolutely quiet. He felt ashamed of his +impulsiveness. What a fool he would have looked, waking up a man in the +middle of the night just to ask him if he was all right! And then the +girl being there, he feared that Heyst would look upon his visit as an +unwarrantable intrusion. + +The first intimation he had of there being anything wrong was a big +white boat, adrift, with the dead body of a very hairy man inside, +bumping against the bows of his steamer. Then indeed he lost no time in +going ashore--alone, of course, from motives of delicacy. + +"I arrived in time to see that poor girl die, as I have told your +Excellency," pursued Davidson. "I won't tell you what a time I had with +him afterwards. He talked to me. His father seems to have been a crank, +and to have upset his head when he was young. He was a queer chap. +Practically the last words he said to me, as we came out on the veranda, +were: + +"'Ah, Davidson, woe to the man whose heart has not learned while young +to hope, to love--and to put its trust in life!' + +"As we stood there, just before I left him, for he said he wanted to be +alone with his dead for a time, we heard a snarly sort of voice near the +bushes by the shore calling out: + +"'Is that you, governor?' + +"'Yes, it's me.' + +"'Jeeminy! I thought the beggar had done for you. He has started +prancing and nearly had me. I have been dodging around, looking for you +ever since.' + +"'Well, here I am,' suddenly screamed the other voice, and then a shot +rang out. + +"'This time he has not missed him,' Heyst said to me bitterly, and went +back into the house. + +"I returned on board as he had insisted I should do. I didn't want +to intrude on his grief. Later, about five in the morning, some of my +calashes came running to me, yelling that there was a fire ashore. I +landed at once, of course. The principal bungalow was blazing. The +heat drove us back. The other two houses caught one after another like +kindling-wood. There was no going beyond the shore end of the jetty till +the afternoon." + +Davidson sighed placidly. + +"I suppose you are certain that Baron Heyst is dead?" + +"He is--ashes, your Excellency," said Davidson, wheezing a little; "he +and the girl together. I suppose he couldn't stand his thoughts before +her dead body--and fire purifies everything. That Chinaman of whom I +told your Excellency helped me to investigate next day, when the +embers got cooled a little. We found enough to be sure. He's not a bad +Chinaman. He told me that he had followed Heyst and the girl through the +forest from pity, and partly out of curiosity. He watched the house till +he saw Heyst go out, after dinner, and Ricardo come back alone. While he +was dodging there, it occurred to him that he had better cast the boat +adrift, for fear those scoundrels should come round by water and bombard +the village from the sea with their revolvers and Winchesters. He judged +that they were devils enough for anything. So he walked down the wharf +quietly; and as he got into the boat, to cast her off, that hairy man +who, it seems, was dozing in her, jumped up growling, and Wang shot him +dead. Then he shoved the boat off as far as he could and went away." + +There was a pause. Presently Davidson went on, in his tranquil manner: + +"Let Heaven look after what has been purified. The wind and rain will +take care of the ashes. The carcass of that follower, secretary, or +whatever the unclean ruffian called himself, I left where it lay, to +swell and rot in the sun. His principal had shot him neatly through the +head. Then, apparently, this Jones went down to the wharf to look for +the boat and for the hairy man. I suppose he tumbled into the water by +accident--or perhaps not by accident. The boat and the man were gone, +and the scoundrel saw himself alone, his game clearly up, and fairly +trapped. Who knows? The water's very clear there, and I could see him +huddled up on the bottom, between two piles, like a heap of bones in a +blue silk bag, with only the head and the feet sticking out. Wang was +very pleased when he discovered him. That made everything safe, he said, +and he went at once over the hill to fetch his Alfuro woman back to the +hut." + +Davidson took out his handkerchief to wipe the perspiration off his +forehead. + +"And then, your Excellency, I went away. There was nothing to be done +there." + +"Clearly!" assented the Excellency. + +Davidson, thoughtful, seemed to weigh the matter in his mind, and then +murmured with placid sadness: + +"Nothing!" + +October 1912--May 1914 + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Victory, by Joseph Conrad + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VICTORY *** + +***** This file should be named 6378-h.htm or 6378-h.zip ***** This and +all associated files of various formats will be found in: http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/7/6378/ + +Produced by Tracy Camp and David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be +renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one +owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and +you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission +and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in +the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and +distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the +PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a +registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, +unless you receive specific permission. If you do not charge anything +for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You +may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative +works, reports, performances and research. They may be modified and +printed and given away--you may do practically ANYTHING with public +domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license, +especially commercial redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU +DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full +Project Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree +to and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all the +terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy all +copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be used +on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who agree +to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few things that +you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works even without +complying with the full terms of this agreement. See paragraph 1.C +below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement and help +preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. +See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in +the collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you +are located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent +you from copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating +derivative works based on the work as long as all references to Project +Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the +Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic +works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with +the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name +associated with the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this +agreement by keeping this work in the same format with its attached +full Project Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with +others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing +or creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost +no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use +it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this +eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work with +the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, +you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through +1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute +this electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other +than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official +version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site +(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense +to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means +of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain +Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the full +Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing access +to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth +in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from both the +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael Hart, the +owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the Foundation as +set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm collection. +Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, and the +medium on which they may be stored, may contain "Defects," such as, but +not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or corrupt data, transcription +errors, a copyright or other intellectual property infringement, a +defective or damaged disk or other medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal fees. +YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, +BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE PROVIDED IN +PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE TRADEMARK OWNER, AND +ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR +ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES +EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a defect +in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a written +explanation to the person you received the work from. If you received +the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with your +written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with the +defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, +the trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will remain +freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure and +permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. To +learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and +how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 and the +Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the state +of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal Revenue +Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification number +is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, +email business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official page +at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide spread +public support and donations to carry out its mission of increasing +the number of public domain and licensed works that can be freely +distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest array +of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations ($1 to +$5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt status with +the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND +DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state +visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make any +statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from outside +the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other ways +including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To donate, +please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. unless +a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily keep eBooks +in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, including +how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to subscribe to +our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + + diff --git a/old/old-2024-02-03/6378.zip b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f1068fa --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old-2024-02-03/6378.zip |