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diff --git a/old/wthnt10h.htm b/old/wthnt10h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3352a56 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/wthnt10h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6153 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>Within the Tides</title> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">Within the Tides, by Joseph Conrad</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Within the Tides, by Joseph Conrad +(#14 in our series by Joseph Conrad) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Within the Tides + +Author: Joseph Conrad + +Release Date: September, 1997 [EBook #1053] +[This file was first posted on August 29, 1997] +[Most recently updated: June 24, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII +</pre> +<p><a name="startoftext"></a></p> +<p>Scanned and proofed by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h1>Within the Tides</h1> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<p>Contents:</p> +<p>The Planter of Malata<br />The Partner<br />The Inn of the Two Witches<br />Because +of the Dollars</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h2>THE PLANTER OF MALATA</h2> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER I</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>In the private editorial office of the principal newspaper in a great +colonial city two men were talking. They were both young. +The stouter of the two, fair, and with more of an urban look about him, +was the editor and part-owner of the important newspaper.</p> +<p>The other’s name was Renouard. That he was exercised +in his mind about something was evident on his fine bronzed face. +He was a lean, lounging, active man. The journalist continued +the conversation.</p> +<p>“And so you were dining yesterday at old Dunster’s.”</p> +<p>He used the word old not in the endearing sense in which it is sometimes +applied to intimates, but as a matter of sober fact. The Dunster +in question was old. He had been an eminent colonial statesman, +but had now retired from active politics after a tour in Europe and +a lengthy stay in England, during which he had had a very good press +indeed. The colony was proud of him.</p> +<p>“Yes. I dined there,” said Renouard. “Young +Dunster asked me just as I was going out of his office. It seemed +to be like a sudden thought. And yet I can’t help suspecting +some purpose behind it. He was very pressing. He swore that +his uncle would be very pleased to see me. Said his uncle had +mentioned lately that the granting to me of the Malata concession was +the last act of his official life.”</p> +<p>“Very touching. The old boy sentimentalises over the +past now and then.”</p> +<p>“I really don’t know why I accepted,” continued +the other. “Sentiment does not move me very easily. +Old Dunster was civil to me of course, but he did not even inquire how +I was getting on with my silk plants. Forgot there was such a +thing probably. I must say there were more people there than I +expected to meet. Quite a big party.”</p> +<p>“I was asked,” remarked the newspaper man. “Only +I couldn’t go. But when did you arrive from Malata?”</p> +<p>“I arrived yesterday at daylight. I am anchored out there +in the bay—off Garden Point. I was in Dunster’s office +before he had finished reading his letters. Have you ever seen +young Dunster reading his letters? I had a glimpse of him through +the open door. He holds the paper in both hands, hunches his shoulders +up to his ugly ears, and brings his long nose and his thick lips on +to it like a sucking apparatus. A commercial monster.”</p> +<p>“Here we don’t consider him a monster,” said the +newspaper man looking at his visitor thoughtfully.</p> +<p>“Probably not. You are used to see his face and to see +other faces. I don’t know how it is that, when I come to +town, the appearance of the people in the street strike me with such +force. They seem so awfully expressive.”</p> +<p>“And not charming.”</p> +<p>“Well—no. Not as a rule. The effect is forcible +without being clear. . . . I know that you think it’s because +of my solitary manner of life away there.”</p> +<p>“Yes. I do think so. It is demoralising. +You don’t see any one for months at a stretch. You’re +leading an unhealthy life.”</p> +<p>The other hardly smiled and murmured the admission that true enough +it was a good eleven months since he had been in town last.</p> +<p>“You see,” insisted the other. “Solitude +works like a sort of poison. And then you perceive suggestions +in faces—mysterious and forcible, that no sound man would be bothered +with. Of course you do.”</p> +<p>Geoffrey Renouard did not tell his journalist friend that the suggestions +of his own face, the face of a friend, bothered him as much as the others. +He detected a degrading quality in the touches of age which every day +adds to a human countenance. They moved and disturbed him, like +the signs of a horrible inward travail which was frightfully apparent +to the fresh eye he had brought from his isolation in Malata, where +he had settled after five strenuous years of adventure and exploration.</p> +<p>“It’s a fact,” he said, “that when I am at +home in Malata I see no one consciously. I take the plantation +boys for granted.”</p> +<p>“Well, and we here take the people in the streets for granted. +And that’s sanity.”</p> +<p>The visitor said nothing to this for fear of engaging a discussion. +What he had come to seek in the editorial office was not controversy, +but information. Yet somehow he hesitated to approach the subject. +Solitary life makes a man reticent in respect of anything in the nature +of gossip, which those to whom chatting about their kind is an everyday +exercise regard as the commonest use of speech.</p> +<p>“You very busy?” he asked.</p> +<p>The Editor making red marks on a long slip of printed paper threw +the pencil down.</p> +<p>“No. I am done. Social paragraphs. This office +is the place where everything is known about everybody—including +even a great deal of nobodies. Queer fellows drift in and out +of this room. Waifs and strays from home, from up-country, from +the Pacific. And, by the way, last time you were here you picked +up one of that sort for your assistant—didn’t you?”</p> +<p>“I engaged an assistant only to stop your preaching about the +evils of solitude,” said Renouard hastily; and the pressman laughed +at the half-resentful tone. His laugh was not very loud, but his +plump person shook all over. He was aware that his younger friend’s +deference to his advice was based only on an imperfect belief in his +wisdom—or his sagacity. But it was he who had first helped +Renouard in his plans of exploration: the five-years’ programme +of scientific adventure, of work, of danger and endurance, carried out +with such distinction and rewarded modestly with the lease of Malata +island by the frugal colonial government. And this reward, too, +had been due to the journalist’s advocacy with word and pen—for +he was an influential man in the community. Doubting very much +if Renouard really liked him, he was himself without great sympathy +for a certain side of that man which he could not quite make out. +He only felt it obscurely to be his real personality—the true—and, +perhaps, the absurd. As, for instance, in that case of the assistant. +Renouard had given way to the arguments of his friend and backer—the +argument against the unwholesome effect of solitude, the argument for +the safety of companionship even if quarrelsome. Very well. +In this docility he was sensible and even likeable. But what did +he do next? Instead of taking counsel as to the choice with his +old backer and friend, and a man, besides, knowing everybody employed +and unemployed on the pavements of the town, this extraordinary Renouard +suddenly and almost surreptitiously picked up a fellow—God knows +who—and sailed away with him back to Malata in a hurry; a proceeding +obviously rash and at the same time not quite straight. That was +the sort of thing. The secretly unforgiving journalist laughed +a little longer and then ceased to shake all over.</p> +<p>“Oh, yes. About that assistant of yours. . . .”</p> +<p>“What about him,” said Renouard, after waiting a while, +with a shadow of uneasiness on his face.</p> +<p>“Have you nothing to tell me of him?”</p> +<p>“Nothing except. . . .” Incipient grimness vanished +out of Renouard’s aspect and his voice, while he hesitated as +if reflecting seriously before he changed his mind. “No. +Nothing whatever.”</p> +<p>“You haven’t brought him along with you by chance—for +a change.”</p> +<p>The Planter of Malata stared, then shook his head, and finally murmured +carelessly: “I think he’s very well where he is. But +I wish you could tell me why young Dunster insisted so much on my dining +with his uncle last night. Everybody knows I am not a society +man.”</p> +<p>The Editor exclaimed at so much modesty. Didn’t his friend +know that he was their one and only explorer—that he was the man +experimenting with the silk plant. . . .</p> +<p>“Still, that doesn’t tell me why I was invited yesterday. +For young Dunster never thought of this civility before. . . .”</p> +<p>“Our Willie,” said the popular journalist, “never +does anything without a purpose, that’s a fact.”</p> +<p>“And to his uncle’s house too!”</p> +<p>“He lives there.”</p> +<p>“Yes. But he might have given me a feed somewhere else. +The extraordinary part is that the old man did not seem to have anything +special to say. He smiled kindly on me once or twice, and that +was all. It was quite a party, sixteen people.”</p> +<p>The Editor then, after expressing his regret that he had not been +able to come, wanted to know if the party had been entertaining.</p> +<p>Renouard regretted that his friend had not been there. Being +a man whose business or at least whose profession was to know everything +that went on in this part of the globe, he could probably have told +him something of some people lately arrived from home, who were amongst +the guests. Young Dunster (Willie), with his large shirt-front +and streaks of white skin shining unpleasantly through the thin black +hair plastered over the top of his head, bore down on him and introduced +him to that party, as if he had been a trained dog or a child phenomenon. +Decidedly, he said, he disliked Willie—one of these large oppressive +men. . . .</p> +<p>A silence fell, and it was as if Renouard were not going to say anything +more when, suddenly, he came out with the real object of his visit to +the editorial room.</p> +<p>“They looked to me like people under a spell.”</p> +<p>The Editor gazed at him appreciatively, thinking that, whether the +effect of solitude or not, this was a proof of a sensitive perception +of the expression of faces.</p> +<p>“You omitted to tell me their name, but I can make a guess. +You mean Professor Moorsom, his daughter and sister—don’t +you?”</p> +<p>Renouard assented. Yes, a white-haired lady. But from +his silence, with his eyes fixed, yet avoiding his friend, it was easy +to guess that it was not in the white-haired lady that he was interested.</p> +<p>“Upon my word,” he said, recovering his usual bearing. +“It looks to me as if I had been asked there only for the daughter +to talk to me.”</p> +<p>He did not conceal that he had been greatly struck by her appearance. +Nobody could have helped being impressed. She was different from +everybody else in that house, and it was not only the effect of her +London clothes. He did not take her down to dinner. Willie +did that. It was afterwards, on the terrace. . . .</p> +<p>The evening was delightfully calm. He was sitting apart and +alone, and wishing himself somewhere else—on board the schooner +for choice, with the dinner-harness off. He hadn’t exchanged +forty words altogether during the evening with the other guests. +He saw her suddenly all by herself coming towards him along the dimly +lighted terrace, quite from a distance.</p> +<p>She was tall and supple, carrying nobly on her straight body a head +of a character which to him appeared peculiar, something—well—pagan, +crowned with a great wealth of hair. He had been about to rise, +but her decided approach caused him to remain on the seat. He +had not looked much at her that evening. He had not that freedom +of gaze acquired by the habit of society and the frequent meetings with +strangers. It was not shyness, but the reserve of a man not used +to the world and to the practice of covert staring, with careless curiosity. +All he had captured by his first, keen, instantly lowered, glance was +the impression that her hair was magnificently red and her eyes very +black. It was a troubling effect, but it had been evanescent; +he had forgotten it almost till very unexpectedly he saw her coming +down the terrace slow and eager, as if she were restraining herself, +and with a rhythmic upward undulation of her whole figure. The +light from an open window fell across her path, and suddenly all that +mass of arranged hair appeared incandescent, chiselled and fluid, with +the daring suggestion of a helmet of burnished copper and the flowing +lines of molten metal. It kindled in him an astonished admiration. +But he said nothing of it to his friend the Editor. Neither did +he tell him that her approach woke up in his brain the image of love’s +infinite grace and the sense of the inexhaustible joy that lives in +beauty. No! What he imparted to the Editor were no emotions, +but mere facts conveyed in a deliberate voice and in uninspired words.</p> +<p>“That young lady came and sat down by me. She said: ‘Are +you French, Mr. Renouard?’”</p> +<p>He had breathed a whiff of perfume of which he said nothing either—of +some perfume he did not know. Her voice was low and distinct. +Her shoulders and her bare arms gleamed with an extraordinary splendour, +and when she advanced her head into the light he saw the admirable contour +of the face, the straight fine nose with delicate nostrils, the exquisite +crimson brushstroke of the lips on this oval without colour. The +expression of the eyes was lost in a shadowy mysterious play of jet +and silver, stirring under the red coppery gold of the hair as though +she had been a being made of ivory and precious metals changed into +living tissue.</p> +<p>“. . . I told her my people were living in Canada, but that +I was brought up in England before coming out here. I can’t +imagine what interest she could have in my history.”</p> +<p>“And you complain of her interest?”</p> +<p>The accent of the all-knowing journalist seemed to jar on the Planter +of Malata.</p> +<p>“No!” he said, in a deadened voice that was almost sullen. +But after a short silence he went on. “Very extraordinary. +I told her I came out to wander at large in the world when I was nineteen, +almost directly after I left school. It seems that her late brother +was in the same school a couple of years before me. She wanted +me to tell her what I did at first when I came out here; what other +men found to do when they came out—where they went, what was likely +to happen to them—as if I could guess and foretell from my experience +the fates of men who come out here with a hundred different projects, +for hundreds of different reasons—for no reason but restlessness—who +come, and go, and disappear! Preposterous. She seemed to +want to hear their histories. I told her that most of them were +not worth telling.”</p> +<p>The distinguished journalist leaning on his elbow, his head resting +against the knuckles of his left hand, listened with great attention, +but gave no sign of that surprise which Renouard, pausing, seemed to +expect.</p> +<p>“You know something,” the latter said brusquely. +The all-knowing man moved his head slightly and said, “Yes. +But go on.”</p> +<p>“It’s just this. There is no more to it. +I found myself talking to her of my adventures, of my early days. +It couldn’t possibly have interested her. Really,” +he cried, “this is most extraordinary. Those people have +something on their minds. We sat in the light of the window, and +her father prowled about the terrace, with his hands behind his back +and his head drooping. The white-haired lady came to the dining-room +window twice—to look at us I am certain. The other guests +began to go away—and still we sat there. Apparently these +people are staying with the Dunsters. It was old Mrs. Dunster +who put an end to the thing. The father and the aunt circled about +as if they were afraid of interfering with the girl. Then she +got up all at once, gave me her hand, and said she hoped she would see +me again.”</p> +<p>While he was speaking Renouard saw again the sway of her figure in +a movement of grace and strength—felt the pressure of her hand—heard +the last accents of the deep murmur that came from her throat so white +in the light of the window, and remembered the black rays of her steady +eyes passing off his face when she turned away. He remembered +all this visually, and it was not exactly pleasurable. It was +rather startling like the discovery of a new faculty in himself. +There are faculties one would rather do without—such, for instance, +as seeing through a stone wall or remembering a person with this uncanny +vividness. And what about those two people belonging to her with +their air of expectant solicitude! Really, those figures from +home got in front of one. In fact, their persistence in getting +between him and the solid forms of the everyday material world had driven +Renouard to call on his friend at the office. He hoped that a +little common, gossipy information would lay the ghost of that unexpected +dinner-party. Of course the proper person to go to would have +been young Dunster, but, he couldn’t stand Willie Dunster—not +at any price.</p> +<p>In the pause the Editor had changed his attitude, faced his desk, +and smiled a faint knowing smile.</p> +<p>“Striking girl—eh?” he said.</p> +<p>The incongruity of the word was enough to make one jump out of the +chair. Striking! That girl striking! Stri . . .! +But Renouard restrained his feelings. His friend was not a person +to give oneself away to. And, after all, this sort of speech was +what he had come there to hear. As, however, he had made a movement +he re-settled himself comfortably and said, with very creditable indifference, +that yes—she was, rather. Especially amongst a lot of over-dressed +frumps. There wasn’t one woman under forty there.</p> +<p>“Is that the way to speak of the cream of our society; the +‘top of the basket,’ as the French say,” the Editor +remonstrated with mock indignation. “You aren’t moderate +in your expressions—you know.”</p> +<p>“I express myself very little,” interjected Renouard +seriously.</p> +<p>“I will tell you what you are. You are a fellow that +doesn’t count the cost. Of course you are safe with me, +but will you never learn. . . .”</p> +<p>“What struck me most,” interrupted the other, “is +that she should pick me out for such a long conversation.”</p> +<p>“That’s perhaps because you were the most remarkable +of the men there.”</p> +<p>Renouard shook his head.</p> +<p>“This shot doesn’t seem to me to hit the mark,” +he said calmly. “Try again.”</p> +<p> “Don’t you believe me? Oh, you modest creature. +Well, let me assure you that under ordinary circumstances it would have +been a good shot. You are sufficiently remarkable. But you +seem a pretty acute customer too. The circumstances are extraordinary. +By Jove they are!”</p> +<p>He mused. After a time the Planter of Malata dropped a negligent +-</p> +<p>“And you know them.”</p> +<p>“And I know them,” assented the all-knowing Editor, soberly, +as though the occasion were too special for a display of professional +vanity; a vanity so well known to Renouard that its absence augmented +his wonder and almost made him uneasy as if portending bad news of some +sort.</p> +<p>“You have met those people?” he asked.</p> +<p>“No. I was to have met them last night, but I had to +send an apology to Willie in the morning. It was then that he +had the bright idea to invite you to fill the place, from a muddled +notion that you could be of use. Willie is stupid sometimes. +For it is clear that you are the last man able to help.”</p> +<p>“How on earth do I come to be mixed up in this—whatever +it is?” Renouard’s voice was slightly altered by nervous +irritation. “I only arrived here yesterday morning.”</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER II</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>His friend the Editor turned to him squarely. “Willie +took me into consultation, and since he seems to have let you in I may +just as well tell you what is up. I shall try to be as short as +I can. But in confidence—mind!”</p> +<p>He waited. Renouard, his uneasiness growing on him unreasonably, +assented by a nod, and the other lost no time in beginning. Professor +Moorsom—physicist and philosopher—fine head of white hair, +to judge from the photographs—plenty of brains in the head too—all +these famous books—surely even Renouard would know. . . .</p> +<p>Renouard muttered moodily that it wasn’t his sort of reading, +and his friend hastened to assure him earnestly that neither was it +his sort—except as a matter of business and duty, for the literary +page of that newspaper which was his property (and the pride of his +life). The only literary newspaper in the Antipodes could not +ignore the fashionable philosopher of the age. Not that anybody +read Moorsom at the Antipodes, but everybody had heard of him—women, +children, dock labourers, cabmen. The only person (besides himself) +who had read Moorsom, as far as he knew, was old Dunster, who used to +call himself a Moorsomian (or was it Moorsomite) years and years ago, +long before Moorsom had worked himself up into the great swell he was +now, in every way. . . Socially too. Quite the fashion in the +highest world.</p> +<p>Renouard listened with profoundly concealed attention. “A +charlatan,” he muttered languidly.</p> +<p>“Well—no. I should say not. I shouldn’t +wonder though if most of his writing had been done with his tongue in +his cheek. Of course. That’s to be expected. +I tell you what: the only really honest writing is to be found in newspapers +and nowhere else—and don’t you forget it.”</p> +<p>The Editor paused with a basilisk stare till Renouard had conceded +a casual: “I dare say,” and only then went on to explain +that old Dunster, during his European tour, had been made rather a lion +of in London, where he stayed with the Moorsoms—he meant the father +and the girl. The professor had been a widower for a long time.</p> +<p>“She doesn’t look just a girl,” muttered Renouard. +The other agreed. Very likely not. Had been playing the +London hostess to tip-top people ever since she put her hair up, probably.</p> +<p>“I don’t expect to see any girlish bloom on her when +I do have the privilege,” he continued. “Those people +are staying with the Dunster’s <i>incog</i>., in a manner, you +understand—something like royalties. They don’t deceive +anybody, but they want to be left to themselves. We have even +kept them out of the paper—to oblige old Dunster. But we +shall put your arrival in—our local celebrity.”</p> +<p>“Heavens!”</p> +<p>“Yes. Mr. G. Renouard, the explorer, whose indomitable +energy, etc., and who is now working for the prosperity of our country +in another way on his Malata plantation . . . And, by the by, how’s +the silk plant—flourishing?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“Did you bring any fibre?”</p> +<p>“Schooner-full.”</p> +<p>“I see. To be transhipped to Liverpool for experimental +manufacture, eh? Eminent capitalists at home very much interested, +aren’t they?”</p> +<p>“They are.”</p> +<p>A silence fell. Then the Editor uttered slowly—“You +will be a rich man some day.”</p> +<p>Renouard’s face did not betray his opinion of that confident +prophecy. He didn’t say anything till his friend suggested +in the same meditative voice -</p> +<p>“You ought to interest Moorsom in the affair too—since +Willie has let you in.”</p> +<p>“A philosopher!”</p> +<p>“I suppose he isn’t above making a bit of money. +And he may be clever at it for all you know. I have a notion that +he’s a fairly practical old cove. . . . Anyhow,” and here +the tone of the speaker took on a tinge of respect, “he has made +philosophy pay.”</p> +<p>Renouard raised his eyes, repressed an impulse to jump up, and got +out of the arm-chair slowly. “It isn’t perhaps a bad +idea,” he said. “I’ll have to call there in +any case.”</p> +<p>He wondered whether he had managed to keep his voice steady, its +tone unconcerned enough; for his emotion was strong though it had nothing +to do with the business aspect of this suggestion. He moved in +the room in vague preparation for departure, when he heard a soft laugh. +He spun about quickly with a frown, but the Editor was not laughing +at him. He was chuckling across the big desk at the wall: a preliminary +of some speech for which Renouard, recalled to himself, waited silent +and mistrustful.</p> +<p>“No! You would never guess! No one would ever guess +what these people are after. Willie’s eyes bulged out when +he came to me with the tale.”</p> +<p>“They always do,” remarked Renouard with disgust. +“He’s stupid.”</p> +<p>“He was startled. And so was I after he told me. +It’s a search party. They are out looking for a man. +Willie’s soft heart’s enlisted in the cause.”</p> +<p>Renouard repeated: “Looking for a man.”</p> +<p>He sat down suddenly as if on purpose to stare. “Did +Willie come to you to borrow the lantern,” he asked sarcastically, +and got up again for no apparent reason.</p> +<p>“What lantern?” snapped the puzzled Editor, and his face +darkened with suspicion. “You, Renouard, are always alluding +to things that aren’t clear to me. If you were in politics, +I, as a party journalist, wouldn’t trust you further than I could +see you. Not an inch further. You are such a sophisticated +beggar. Listen: the man is the man Miss Moorsom was engaged to +for a year. He couldn’t have been a nobody, anyhow. +But he doesn’t seem to have been very wise. Hard luck for +the young lady.”</p> +<p>He spoke with feeling. It was clear that what he had to tell +appealed to his sentiment. Yet, as an experienced man of the world, +he marked his amused wonder. Young man of good family and connections, +going everywhere, yet not merely a man about town, but with a foot in +the two big F’s.</p> +<p>Renouard lounging aimlessly in the room turned round: “And +what the devil’s that?” he asked faintly.</p> +<p>“Why Fashion and Finance,” explained the Editor. +“That’s how I call it. There are the three R’s +at the bottom of the social edifice and the two F’s on the top. +See?”</p> +<p>“Ha! Ha! Excellent! Ha! Ha!” Renouard laughed +with stony eyes.</p> +<p>“And you proceed from one set to the other in this democratic +age,” the Editor went on with unperturbed complacency. “That +is if you are clever enough. The only danger is in being too clever. +And I think something of the sort happened here. That swell I +am speaking of got himself into a mess. Apparently a very ugly +mess of a financial character. You will understand that Willie +did not go into details with me. They were not imparted to him +with very great abundance either. But a bad mess—something +of the criminal order. Of course he was innocent. But he +had to quit all the same.”</p> +<p>“Ha! Ha!” Renouard laughed again abruptly, staring as +before. “So there’s one more big F in the tale.”</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” inquired the Editor quickly, with +an air as if his patent were being infringed.</p> +<p>“I mean—Fool.”</p> +<p>“No. I wouldn’t say that. I wouldn’t +say that.”</p> +<p>“Well—let him be a scoundrel then. What the devil +do I care.”</p> +<p>“But hold on! You haven’t heard the end of the +story.”</p> +<p>Renouard, his hat on his head already, sat down with the disdainful +smile of a man who had discounted the moral of the story. Still +he sat down and the Editor swung his revolving chair right round. +He was full of unction.</p> +<p>“Imprudent, I should say. In many ways money is as dangerous +to handle as gunpowder. You can’t be too careful either +as to who you are working with. Anyhow there was a mighty flashy +burst up, a sensation, and—his familiar haunts knew him no more. +But before he vanished he went to see Miss Moorsom. That very +fact argues for his innocence—don’t it? What was said +between them no man knows—unless the professor had the confidence +from his daughter. There couldn’t have been much to say. +There was nothing for it but to let him go—was there?—for +the affair had got into the papers. And perhaps the kindest thing +would have been to forget him. Anyway the easiest. Forgiveness +would have been more difficult, I fancy, for a young lady of spirit +and position drawn into an ugly affair like that. Any ordinary +young lady, I mean. Well, the fellow asked nothing better than +to be forgotten, only he didn’t find it easy to do so himself, +because he would write home now and then. Not to any of his friends +though. He had no near relations. The professor had been +his guardian. No, the poor devil wrote now and then to an old +retired butler of his late father, somewhere in the country, forbidding +him at the same time to let any one know of his whereabouts. So +that worthy old ass would go up and dodge about the Moorsom’s +town house, perhaps waylay Miss Moorsom’s maid, and then would +write to ‘Master Arthur’ that the young lady looked well +and happy, or some such cheerful intelligence. I dare say he wanted +to be forgotten, but I shouldn’t think he was much cheered by +the news. What would you say?”</p> +<p>Renouard, his legs stretched out and his chin on his breast, said +nothing. A sensation which was not curiosity, but rather a vague +nervous anxiety, distinctly unpleasant, like a mysterious symptom of +some malady, prevented him from getting up and going away.</p> +<p>“Mixed feelings,” the Editor opined. “Many +fellows out here receive news from home with mixed feelings. But +what will his feelings be when he hears what I am going to tell you +now? For we know he has not heard yet. Six months ago a +city clerk, just a common drudge of finance, gets himself convicted +of a common embezzlement or something of that kind. Then seeing +he’s in for a long sentence he thinks of making his conscience +comfortable, and makes a clean breast of an old story of tampered with, +or else suppressed, documents, a story which clears altogether the honesty +of our ruined gentleman. That embezzling fellow was in a position +to know, having been employed by the firm before the smash. There +was no doubt about the character being cleared—but where the cleared +man was nobody could tell. Another sensation in society. +And then Miss Moorsom says: ‘He will come back to claim me, and +I’ll marry him.’ But he didn’t come back. +Between you and me I don’t think he was much wanted—except +by Miss Moorsom. I imagine she’s used to have her own way. +She grew impatient, and declared that if she knew where the man was +she would go to him. But all that could be got out of the old +butler was that the last envelope bore the postmark of our beautiful +city; and that this was the only address of ‘Master Arthur’ +that he ever had. That and no more. In fact the fellow was +at his last gasp—with a bad heart. Miss Moorsom wasn’t +allowed to see him. She had gone herself into the country to learn +what she could, but she had to stay downstairs while the old chap’s +wife went up to the invalid. She brought down the scrap of intelligence +I’ve told you of. He was already too far gone to be cross-examined +on it, and that very night he died. He didn’t leave behind +him much to go by, did he? Our Willie hinted to me that there +had been pretty stormy days in the professor’s house, but—here +they are. I have a notion she isn’t the kind of everyday +young lady who may be permitted to gallop about the world all by herself—eh? +Well, I think it rather fine of her, but I quite understand that the +professor needed all his philosophy under the circumstances. She +is his only child now—and brilliant—what? Willie positively +spluttered trying to describe her to me; and I could see directly you +came in that you had an uncommon experience.”</p> +<p>Renouard, with an irritated gesture, tilted his hat more forward +on his eyes, as though he were bored. The Editor went on with +the remark that to be sure neither he (Renouard) nor yet Willie were +much used to meet girls of that remarkable superiority. Willie +when learning business with a firm in London, years before, had seen +none but boarding-house society, he guessed. As to himself in +the good old days, when he trod the glorious flags of Fleet Street, +he neither had access to, nor yet would have cared for the swells. +Nothing interested him then but parliamentary politics and the oratory +of the House of Commons.</p> +<p>He paid to this not very distant past the tribute of a tender, reminiscent +smile, and returned to his first idea that for a society girl her action +was rather fine. All the same the professor could not be very +pleased. The fellow if he was as pure as a lily now was just about +as devoid of the goods of the earth. And there were misfortunes, +however undeserved, which damaged a man’s standing permanently. +On the other hand, it was difficult to oppose cynically a noble impulse—not +to speak of the great love at the root of it. Ah! Love! +And then the lady was quite capable of going off by herself. She +was of age, she had money of her own, plenty of pluck too. Moorsom +must have concluded that it was more truly paternal, more prudent too, +and generally safer all round to let himself be dragged into this chase. +The aunt came along for the same reasons. It was given out at +home as a trip round the world of the usual kind.</p> +<p>Renouard had risen and remained standing with his heart beating, +and strangely affected by this tale, robbed as it was of all glamour +by the prosaic personality of the narrator. The Editor added: +“I’ve been asked to help in the search—you know.”</p> +<p>Renouard muttered something about an appointment and went out into +the street. His inborn sanity could not defend him from a misty +creeping jealousy. He thought that obviously no man of that sort +could be worthy of such a woman’s devoted fidelity. Renouard, +however, had lived long enough to reflect that a man’s activities, +his views, and even his ideas may be very inferior to his character; +and moved by a delicate consideration for that splendid girl he tried +to think out for the man a character of inward excellence and outward +gifts—some extraordinary seduction. But in vain. Fresh +from months of solitude and from days at sea, her splendour presented +itself to him absolutely unconquerable in its perfection, unless by +her own folly. It was easier to suspect her of this than to imagine +in the man qualities which would be worthy of her. Easier and +less degrading. Because folly may be generous—could be nothing +else but generosity in her; whereas to imagine her subjugated by something +common was intolerable.</p> +<p>Because of the force of the physical impression he had received from +her personality (and such impressions are the real origins of the deepest +movements of our soul) this conception of her was even inconceivable. +But no Prince Charming has ever lived out of a fairy tale. He +doesn’t walk the worlds of Fashion and Finance—and with +a stumbling gait at that. Generosity. Yes. It was +her generosity. But this generosity was altogether regal in its +splendour, almost absurd in its lavishness—or, perhaps, divine.</p> +<p>In the evening, on board his schooner, sitting on the rail, his arms +folded on his breast and his eyes fixed on the deck, he let the darkness +catch him unawares in the midst of a meditation on the mechanism of +sentiment and the springs of passion. And all the time he had +an abiding consciousness of her bodily presence. The effect on +his senses had been so penetrating that in the middle of the night, +rousing up suddenly, wide-eyed in the darkness of his cabin, he did +not create a faint mental vision of her person for himself, but, more +intimately affected, he scented distinctly the faint perfume she used, +and could almost have sworn that he had been awakened by the soft rustle +of her dress. He even sat up listening in the dark for a time, +then sighed and lay down again, not agitated but, on the contrary, oppressed +by the sensation of something that had happened to him and could not +be undone.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER III</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>In the afternoon he lounged into the editorial office, carrying with +affected nonchalance that weight of the irremediable he had felt laid +on him suddenly in the small hours of the night—that consciousness +of something that could no longer be helped. His patronising friend +informed him at once that he had made the acquaintance of the Moorsom +party last night. At the Dunsters, of course. Dinner.</p> +<p>“Very quiet. Nobody there. It was much better for +the business. I say . . .”</p> +<p>Renouard, his hand grasping the back of a chair, stared down at him +dumbly.</p> +<p>“Phew! That’s a stunning girl. . . Why do you want +to sit on that chair? It’s uncomfortable!”</p> +<p>“I wasn’t going to sit on it.” Renouard walked +slowly to the window, glad to find in himself enough self-control to +let go the chair instead of raising it on high and bringing it down +on the Editor’s head.</p> +<p>“Willie kept on gazing at her with tears in his boiled eyes. +You should have seen him bending sentimentally over her at dinner.”</p> +<p>“Don’t,” said Renouard in such an anguished tone +that the Editor turned right round to look at his back.</p> +<p>“You push your dislike of young Dunster too far. It’s +positively morbid,” he disapproved mildly. “We can’t +be all beautiful after thirty. . . . I talked a little, about you mostly, +to the professor. He appeared to be interested in the silk plant—if +only as a change from the great subject. Miss Moorsom didn’t +seem to mind when I confessed to her that I had taken you into the confidence +of the thing. Our Willie approved too. Old Dunster with +his white beard seemed to give me his blessing. All those people +have a great opinion of you, simply because I told them that you’ve +led every sort of life one can think of before you got struck on exploration. +They want you to make suggestions. What do you think ‘Master +Arthur’ is likely to have taken to?”</p> +<p>“Something easy,” muttered Renouard without unclenching +his teeth.</p> +<p>“Hunting man. Athlete. Don’t be hard on the +chap. He may be riding boundaries, or droving cattle, or humping +his swag about the back-blocks away to the devil—somewhere. +He may be even prospecting at the back of beyond—this very moment.”</p> +<p>“Or lying dead drunk in a roadside pub. It’s late +enough in the day for that.”</p> +<p>The Editor looked up instinctively. The clock was pointing +at a quarter to five. “Yes, it is,” he admitted. +“But it needn’t be. And he may have lit out into the +Western Pacific all of a sudden—say in a trading schooner. +Though I really don’t see in what capacity. Still . . . +”</p> +<p>“Or he may be passing at this very moment under this very window.”</p> +<p>“Not he . . . and I wish you would get away from it to where +one can see your face. I hate talking to a man’s back. +You stand there like a hermit on a sea-shore growling to yourself. +I tell you what it is, Geoffrey, you don’t like mankind.”</p> +<p>“I don’t make my living by talking about mankind’s +affairs,” Renouard defended himself. But he came away obediently +and sat down in the armchair. “How can you be so certain +that your man isn’t down there in the street?” he asked. +“It’s neither more nor less probable than every single one +of your other suppositions.”</p> +<p>Placated by Renouard’s docility the Editor gazed at him for +a while. “Aha! I’ll tell you how. Learn +then that we have begun the campaign. We have telegraphed his +description to the police of every township up and down the land. +And what’s more we’ve ascertained definitely that he hasn’t +been in this town for the last three months at least. How much +longer he’s been away we can’t tell.”</p> +<p>“That’s very curious.”</p> +<p>“It’s very simple. Miss Moorsom wrote to him, to +the post office here directly she returned to London after her excursion +into the country to see the old butler. Well—her letter +is still lying there. It has not been called for. Ergo, +this town is not his usual abode. Personally, I never thought +it was. But he cannot fail to turn up some time or other. +Our main hope lies just in the certitude that he must come to town sooner +or later. Remember he doesn’t know that the butler is dead, +and he will want to inquire for a letter. Well, he’ll find +a note from Miss Moorsom.”</p> +<p>Renouard, silent, thought that it was likely enough. His profound +distaste for this conversation was betrayed by an air of weariness darkening +his energetic sun-tanned features, and by the augmented dreaminess of +his eyes. The Editor noted it as a further proof of that immoral +detachment from mankind, of that callousness of sentiment fostered by +the unhealthy conditions of solitude—according to his own favourite +theory. Aloud he observed that as long as a man had not given +up correspondence he could not be looked upon as lost. Fugitive +criminals had been tracked in that way by justice, he reminded his friend; +then suddenly changed the bearing of the subject somewhat by asking +if Renouard had heard from his people lately, and if every member of +his large tribe was well and happy.</p> +<p>“Yes, thanks.”</p> +<p>The tone was curt, as if repelling a liberty. Renouard did +not like being asked about his people, for whom he had a profound and +remorseful affection. He had not seen a single human being to +whom he was related, for many years, and he was extremely different +from them all.</p> +<p>On the very morning of his arrival from his island he had gone to +a set of pigeon-holes in Willie Dunster’s outer office and had +taken out from a compartment labelled “Malata” a very small +accumulation of envelopes, a few addressed to himself, and one addressed +to his assistant, all to the care of the firm, W. Dunster and Co. +As opportunity offered, the firm used to send them on to Malata either +by a man-of-war schooner going on a cruise, or by some trading craft +proceeding that way. But for the last four months there had been +no opportunity.</p> +<p>“You going to stay here some time?” asked the Editor, +after a longish silence.</p> +<p>Renouard, perfunctorily, did see no reason why he should make a long +stay.</p> +<p>“For health, for your mental health, my boy,” rejoined +the newspaper man. “To get used to human faces so that they +don’t hit you in the eye so hard when you walk about the streets. +To get friendly with your kind. I suppose that assistant of yours +can be trusted to look after things?”</p> +<p>“There’s the half-caste too. The Portuguese. +He knows what’s to be done.”</p> +<p>“Aha!” The Editor looked sharply at his friend. +“What’s his name?”</p> +<p>“Who’s name?”</p> +<p>“The assistant’s you picked up on the sly behind my back.”</p> +<p>Renouard made a slight movement of impatience.</p> +<p>“I met him unexpectedly one evening. I thought he would +do as well as another. He had come from up country and didn’t +seem happy in a town. He told me his name was Walter. I +did not ask him for proofs, you know.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think you get on very well with him.”</p> +<p>“Why? What makes you think so.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know. Something reluctant in your manner +when he’s in question.”</p> +<p>“Really. My manner! I don’t think he’s +a great subject for conversation, perhaps. Why not drop him?”</p> +<p>“Of course! You wouldn’t confess to a mistake. +Not you. Nevertheless I have my suspicions about it.”</p> +<p>Renouard got up to go, but hesitated, looking down at the seated +Editor.</p> +<p>“How funny,” he said at last with the utmost seriousness, +and was making for the door, when the voice of his friend stopped him.</p> +<p>“You know what has been said of you? That you couldn’t +get on with anybody you couldn’t kick. Now, confess—is +there any truth in the soft impeachment?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Renouard. “Did you print that +in your paper.”</p> +<p>“No. I didn’t quite believe it. But I will +tell you what I believe. I believe that when your heart is set +on some object you are a man that doesn’t count the cost to yourself +or others. And this shall get printed some day.”</p> +<p>“Obituary notice?” Renouard dropped negligently.</p> +<p>“Certain—some day.”</p> +<p>“Do you then regard yourself as immortal?”</p> +<p>“No, my boy. I am not immortal. But the voice of +the press goes on for ever. . . . And it will say that this was the +secret of your great success in a task where better men than you—meaning +no offence—did fail repeatedly.”</p> +<p>“Success,” muttered Renouard, pulling-to the office door +after him with considerable energy. And the letters of the word +PRIVATE like a row of white eyes seemed to stare after his back sinking +down the staircase of that temple of publicity.</p> +<p>Renouard had no doubt that all the means of publicity would be put +at the service of love and used for the discovery of the loved man. +He did not wish him dead. He did not wish him any harm. +We are all equipped with a fund of humanity which is not exhausted without +many and repeated provocations—and this man had done him no evil. +But before Renouard had left old Dunster’s house, at the conclusion +of the call he made there that very afternoon, he had discovered in +himself the desire that the search might last long. He never really +flattered himself that it might fail. It seemed to him that there +was no other course in this world for himself, for all mankind, but +resignation. And he could not help thinking that Professor Moorsom +had arrived at the same conclusion too.</p> +<p>Professor Moorsom, slight frame of middle height, a thoughtful keen +head under the thick wavy hair, veiled dark eyes under straight eyebrows, +and with an inward gaze which when disengaged and arriving at one seemed +to issue from an obscure dream of books, from the limbo of meditation, +showed himself extremely gracious to him. Renouard guessed in +him a man whom an incurable habit of investigation and analysis had +made gentle and indulgent; inapt for action, and more sensitive to the +thoughts than to the events of existence. Withal not crushed, +sub-ironic without a trace of acidity, and with a simple manner which +put people at ease quickly. They had a long conversation on the +terrace commanding an extended view of the town and the harbour.</p> +<p>The splendid immobility of the bay resting under his gaze, with its +grey spurs and shining indentations, helped Renouard to regain his self-possession, +which he had felt shaken, in coming out on the terrace, into the setting +of the most powerful emotion of his life, when he had sat within a foot +of Miss Moorsom with fire in his breast, a humming in his ears, and +in a complete disorder of his mind. There was the very garden +seat on which he had been enveloped in the radiant spell. And +presently he was sitting on it again with the professor talking of her. +Near by the patriarchal Dunster leaned forward in a wicker arm-chair, +benign and a little deaf, his big hand to his ear with the innocent +eagerness of his advanced age remembering the fires of life.</p> +<p>It was with a sort of apprehension that Renouard looked forward to +seeing Miss Moorsom. And strangely enough it resembled the state +of mind of a man who fears disenchantment more than sortilege. +But he need not have been afraid. Directly he saw her in a distance +at the other end of the terrace he shuddered to the roots of his hair. +With her approach the power of speech left him for a time. Mrs. +Dunster and her aunt were accompanying her. All these people sat +down; it was an intimate circle into which Renouard felt himself cordially +admitted; and the talk was of the great search which occupied all their +minds. Discretion was expected by these people, but of reticence +as to the object of the journey there could be no question. Nothing +but ways and means and arrangements could be talked about.</p> +<p>By fixing his eyes obstinately on the ground, which gave him an air +of reflective sadness, Renouard managed to recover his self-possession. +He used it to keep his voice in a low key and to measure his words on +the great subject. And he took care with a great inward effort +to make them reasonable without giving them a discouraging complexion. +For he did not want the quest to be given up, since it would mean her +going away with her two attendant grey-heads to the other side of the +world.</p> +<p>He was asked to come again, to come often and take part in the counsels +of all these people captivated by the sentimental enterprise of a declared +love. On taking Miss Moorsom’s hand he looked up, would +have liked to say something, but found himself voiceless, with his lips +suddenly sealed. She returned the pressure of his fingers, and +he left her with her eyes vaguely staring beyond him, an air of listening +for an expected sound, and the faintest possible smile on her lips. +A smile not for him, evidently, but the reflection of some deep and +inscrutable thought.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER IV</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>He went on board his schooner. She lay white, and as if suspended, +in the crepuscular atmosphere of sunset mingling with the ashy gleam +of the vast anchorage. He tried to keep his thoughts as sober, +as reasonable, as measured as his words had been, lest they should get +away from him and cause some sort of moral disaster. What he was +afraid of in the coming night was sleeplessness and the endless strain +of that wearisome task. It had to be faced however. He lay +on his back, sighing profoundly in the dark, and suddenly beheld his +very own self, carrying a small bizarre lamp, reflected in a long mirror +inside a room in an empty and unfurnished palace. In this startling +image of himself he recognised somebody he had to follow—the frightened +guide of his dream. He traversed endless galleries, no end of +lofty halls, innumerable doors. He lost himself utterly—he +found his way again. Room succeeded room. At last the lamp +went out, and he stumbled against some object which, when he stooped +for it, he found to be very cold and heavy to lift. The sickly +white light of dawn showed him the head of a statue. Its marble +hair was done in the bold lines of a helmet, on its lips the chisel +had left a faint smile, and it resembled Miss Moorsom. While he +was staring at it fixedly, the head began to grow light in his fingers, +to diminish and crumble to pieces, and at last turned into a handful +of dust, which was blown away by a puff of wind so chilly that he woke +up with a desperate shiver and leaped headlong out of his bed-place. +The day had really come. He sat down by the cabin table, and taking +his head between his hands, did not stir for a very long time.</p> +<p>Very quiet, he set himself to review this dream. The lamp, +of course, he connected with the search for a man. But on closer +examination he perceived that the reflection of himself in the mirror +was not really the true Renouard, but somebody else whose face he could +not remember. In the deserted palace he recognised a sinister +adaptation by his brain of the long corridors with many doors, in the +great building in which his friend’s newspaper was lodged on the +first floor. The marble head with Miss Moorsom’s face! +Well! What other face could he have dreamed of? And her +complexion was fairer than Parian marble, than the heads of angels. +The wind at the end was the morning breeze entering through the open +porthole and touching his face before the schooner could swing to the +chilly gust.</p> +<p>Yes! And all this rational explanation of the fantastic made +it only more mysterious and weird. There was something daemonic +in that dream. It was one of those experiences which throw a man +out of conformity with the established order of his kind and make him +a creature of obscure suggestions.</p> +<p>Henceforth, without ever trying to resist, he went every afternoon +to the house where she lived. He went there as passively as if +in a dream. He could never make out how he had attained the footing +of intimacy in the Dunster mansion above the bay—whether on the +ground of personal merit or as the pioneer of the vegetable silk industry. +It must have been the last, because he remembered distinctly, as distinctly +as in a dream, hearing old Dunster once telling him that his next public +task would be a careful survey of the Northern Districts to discover +tracts suitable for the cultivation of the silk plant. The old +man wagged his beard at him sagely. It was indeed as absurd as +a dream.</p> +<p>Willie of course would be there in the evening. But he was +more of a figure out of a nightmare, hovering about the circle of chairs +in his dress-clothes like a gigantic, repulsive, and sentimental bat. +“Do away with the beastly cocoons all over the world,” he +buzzed in his blurred, water-logged voice. He affected a great +horror of insects of all kinds. One evening he appeared with a +red flower in his button-hole. Nothing could have been more disgustingly +fantastic. And he would also say to Renouard: “You may yet +change the history of our country. For economic conditions do +shape the history of nations. Eh? What?” And +he would turn to Miss Moorsom for approval, lowering protectingly his +spatulous nose and looking up with feeling from under his absurd eyebrows, +which grew thin, in the manner of canebrakes, out of his spongy skin. +For this large, bilious creature was an economist and a sentimentalist, +facile to tears, and a member of the Cobden Club.</p> +<p>In order to see as little of him as possible Renouard began coming +earlier so as to get away before his arrival, without curtailing too +much the hours of secret contemplation for which he lived. He +had given up trying to deceive himself. His resignation was without +bounds. He accepted the immense misfortune of being in love with +a woman who was in search of another man only to throw herself into +his arms. With such desperate precision he defined in his thoughts +the situation, the consciousness of which traversed like a sharp arrow +the sudden silences of general conversation. The only thought +before which he quailed was the thought that this could not last; that +it must come to an end. He feared it instinctively as a sick man +may fear death. For it seemed to him that it must be the death +of him followed by a lightless, bottomless pit. But his resignation +was not spared the torments of jealousy: the cruel, insensate, poignant, +and imbecile jealousy, when it seems that a woman betrays us simply +by this that she exists, that she breathes—and when the deep movements +of her nerves or her soul become a matter of distracting suspicion, +of killing doubt, of mortal anxiety.</p> +<p>In the peculiar condition of their sojourn Miss Moorsom went out +very little. She accepted this seclusion at the Dunsters’ +mansion as in a hermitage, and lived there, watched over by a group +of old people, with the lofty endurance of a condescending and strong-headed +goddess. It was impossible to say if she suffered from anything +in the world, and whether this was the insensibility of a great passion +concentrated on itself, or a perfect restraint of manner, or the indifference +of superiority so complete as to be sufficient to itself. But +it was visible to Renouard that she took some pleasure in talking to +him at times. Was it because he was the only person near her age? +Was this, then, the secret of his admission to the circle?</p> +<p>He admired her voice as well poised as her movements, as her attitudes. +He himself had always been a man of tranquil tones. But the power +of fascination had torn him out of his very nature so completely that +to preserve his habitual calmness from going to pieces had become a +terrible effort.</p> +<p>He used to go from her on board the schooner exhausted, broken, shaken +up, as though he had been put to the most exquisite torture. When +he saw her approaching he always had a moment of hallucination. +She was a misty and fair creature, fitted for invisible music, for the +shadows of love, for the murmurs of waters. After a time (he could +not be always staring at the ground) he would summon up all his resolution +and look at her. There was a sparkle in the clear obscurity of +her eyes; and when she turned them on him they seemed to give a new +meaning to life. He would say to himself that another man would +have found long before the happy release of madness, his wits burnt +to cinders in that radiance. But no such luck for him. His +wits had come unscathed through the furnaces of hot suns, of blazing +deserts, of flaming angers against the weaknesses of men and the obstinate +cruelties of hostile nature.</p> +<p>Being sane he had to be constantly on his guard against falling into +adoring silences or breaking out into wild speeches. He had to +keep watch on his eyes, his limbs, on the muscles of his face. +Their conversations were such as they could be between these two people: +she a young lady fresh from the thick twilight of four million people +and the artificiality of several London seasons; he the man of definite +conquering tasks, the familiar of wide horizons, and in his very repose +holding aloof from these agglomerations of units in which one loses +one’s importance even to oneself. They had no common conversational +small change. They had to use the great pieces of general ideas, +but they exchanged them trivially. It was no serious commerce. +Perhaps she had not much of that coin. Nothing significant came +from her. It could not be said that she had received from the +contacts of the external world impressions of a personal kind, different +from other women. What was ravishing in her was her quietness +and, in her grave attitudes, the unfailing brilliance of her femininity. +He did not know what there was under that ivory forehead so splendidly +shaped, so gloriously crowned. He could not tell what were her +thoughts, her feelings. Her replies were reflective, always preceded +by a short silence, while he hung on her lips anxiously. He felt +himself in the presence of a mysterious being in whom spoke an unknown +voice, like the voice of oracles, bringing everlasting unrest to the +heart.</p> +<p>He was thankful enough to sit in silence with secretly clenched teeth, +devoured by jealousy—and nobody could have guessed that his quiet +deferential bearing to all these grey-heads was the supreme effort of +stoicism, that the man was engaged in keeping a sinister watch on his +tortures lest his strength should fail him. As before, when grappling +with other forces of nature, he could find in himself all sorts of courage +except the courage to run away.</p> +<p>It was perhaps from the lack of subjects they could have in common +that Miss Moorsom made him so often speak of his own life. He +did not shrink from talking about himself, for he was free from that +exacerbated, timid vanity which seals so many vain-glorious lips. +He talked to her in his restrained voice, gazing at the tip of her shoe, +and thinking that the time was bound to come soon when her very inattention +would get weary of him. And indeed on stealing a glance he would +see her dazzling and perfect, her eyes vague, staring in mournful immobility, +with a drooping head that made him think of a tragic Venus arising before +him, not from the foam of the sea, but from a distant, still more formless, +mysterious, and potent immensity of mankind.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER V</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>One afternoon Renouard stepping out on the terrace found nobody there. +It was for him, at the same time, a melancholy disappointment and a +poignant relief.</p> +<p>The heat was great, the air was still, all the long windows of the +house stood wide open. At the further end, grouped round a lady’s +work-table, several chairs disposed sociably suggested invisible occupants, +a company of conversing shades. Renouard looked towards them with +a sort of dread. A most elusive, faint sound of ghostly talk issuing +from one of the rooms added to the illusion and stopped his already +hesitating footsteps. He leaned over the balustrade of stone near +a squat vase holding a tropical plant of a bizarre shape. Professor +Moorsom coming up from the garden with a book under his arm and a white +parasol held over his bare head, found him there and, closing the parasol, +leaned over by his side with a remark on the increasing heat of the +season. Renouard assented and changed his position a little; the +other, after a short silence, administered unexpectedly a question which, +like the blow of a club on the head, deprived Renouard of the power +of speech and even thought, but, more cruel, left him quivering with +apprehension, not of death but of everlasting torment. Yet the +words were extremely simple.</p> +<p>“Something will have to be done soon. We can’t +remain in a state of suspended expectation for ever. Tell me what +do you think of our chances?”</p> +<p>Renouard, speechless, produced a faint smile. The professor +confessed in a jocular tone his impatience to complete the circuit of +the globe and be done with it. It was impossible to remain quartered +on the dear excellent Dunsters for an indefinite time. And then +there were the lectures he had arranged to deliver in Paris. A +serious matter.</p> +<p>That lectures by Professor Moorsom were a European event and that +brilliant audiences would gather to hear them Renouard did not know. +All he was aware of was the shock of this hint of departure. The +menace of separation fell on his head like a thunderbolt. And +he saw the absurdity of his emotion, for hadn’t he lived all these +days under the very cloud? The professor, his elbows spread out, +looked down into the garden and went on unburdening his mind. +Yes. The department of sentiment was directed by his daughter, +and she had plenty of volunteered moral support; but he had to look +after the practical side of life without assistance.</p> +<p>“I have the less hesitation in speaking to you about my anxiety, +because I feel you are friendly to us and at the same time you are detached +from all these sublimities—confound them.”</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” murmured Renouard.</p> +<p>“I mean that you are capable of calm judgment. Here the +atmosphere is simply detestable. Everybody has knuckled under +to sentiment. Perhaps your deliberate opinion could influence +. . .”</p> +<p>“You want Miss Moorsom to give it up?” The professor +turned to the young man dismally.</p> +<p>“Heaven only knows what I want.”</p> +<p>Renouard leaning his back against the balustrade folded his arms +on his breast, appeared to meditate profoundly. His face, shaded +softly by the broad brim of a planter’s Panama hat, with the straight +line of the nose level with the forehead, the eyes lost in the depth +of the setting, and the chin well forward, had such a profile as may +be seen amongst the bronzes of classical museums, pure under a crested +helmet—recalled vaguely a Minerva’s head.</p> +<p>“This is the most troublesome time I ever had in my life,” +exclaimed the professor testily.</p> +<p>“Surely the man must be worth it,” muttered Renouard +with a pang of jealousy traversing his breast like a self-inflicted +stab.</p> +<p>Whether enervated by the heat or giving way to pent up irritation +the professor surrendered himself to the mood of sincerity.</p> +<p>“He began by being a pleasantly dull boy. He developed +into a pointlessly clever young man, without, I suspect, ever trying +to understand anything. My daughter knew him from childhood. +I am a busy man, and I confess that their engagement was a complete +surprise to me. I wish their reasons for that step had been more +naïve. But simplicity was out of fashion in their set. +From a worldly point of view he seems to have been a mere baby. +Of course, now, I am assured that he is the victim of his noble confidence +in the rectitude of his kind. But that’s mere idealising +of a sad reality. For my part I will tell you that from the very +beginning I had the gravest doubts of his dishonesty. Unfortunately +my clever daughter hadn’t. And now we behold the reaction. +No. To be earnestly dishonest one must be really poor. This +was only a manifestation of his extremely refined cleverness. +The complicated simpleton. He had an awful awakening though.”</p> +<p>In such words did Professor Moorsom give his “young friend” +to understand the state of his feelings toward the lost man. It +was evident that the father of Miss Moorsom wished him to remain lost. +Perhaps the unprecedented heat of the season made him long for the cool +spaces of the Pacific, the sweep of the ocean’s free wind along +the promenade decks, cumbered with long chairs, of a ship steaming towards +the Californian coast. To Renouard the philosopher appeared simply +the most treacherous of fathers. He was amazed. But he was +not at the end of his discoveries.</p> +<p>“He may be dead,” the professor murmured.</p> +<p>“Why? People don’t die here sooner than in Europe. +If he had gone to hide in Italy, for instance, you wouldn’t think +of saying that.”</p> +<p>“Well! And suppose he has become morally disintegrated. +You know he was not a strong personality,” the professor suggested +moodily. “My daughter’s future is in question here.”</p> +<p>Renouard thought that the love of such a woman was enough to pull +any broken man together—to drag a man out of his grave. +And he thought this with inward despair, which kept him silent as much +almost as his astonishment. At last he managed to stammer out +a generous -</p> +<p>“Oh! Don’t let us even suppose. . .”</p> +<p>The professor struck in with a sadder accent than before -</p> +<p>“It’s good to be young. And then you have been +a man of action, and necessarily a believer in success. But I +have been looking too long at life not to distrust its surprises. +Age! Age! Here I stand before you a man full of doubts and +hesitation—<i>spe lentus, timidus futuri</i>.”</p> +<p>He made a sign to Renouard not to interrupt, and in a lowered voice, +as if afraid of being overheard, even there, in the solitude of the +terrace -</p> +<p>“And the worst is that I am not even sure how far this sentimental +pilgrimage is genuine. Yes. I doubt my own child. +It’s true that she’s a woman. . . . ”</p> +<p>Renouard detected with horror a tone of resentment, as if the professor +had never forgiven his daughter for not dying instead of his son. +The latter noticed the young man’s stony stare.</p> +<p>“Ah! you don’t understand. Yes, she’s clever, +open-minded, popular, and—well, charming. But you don’t +know what it is to have moved, breathed, existed, and even triumphed +in the mere smother and froth of life—the brilliant froth. +There thoughts, sentiments, opinions, feelings, actions too, are nothing +but agitation in empty space—to amuse life—a sort of superior +debauchery, exciting and fatiguing, meaning nothing, leading nowhere. +She is the creature of that circle. And I ask myself if she is +obeying the uneasiness of an instinct seeking its satisfaction, or is +it a revulsion of feeling, or is she merely deceiving her own heart +by this dangerous trifling with romantic images. And everything +is possible—except sincerity, such as only stark, struggling humanity +can know. No woman can stand that mode of life in which women +rule, and remain a perfectly genuine, simple human being. Ah! +There’s some people coming out.”</p> +<p>He moved off a pace, then turning his head: “Upon my word! +I would be infinitely obliged to you if you could throw a little cold +water. . . ” and at a vaguely dismayed gesture of Renouard, he +added: “Don’t be afraid. You wouldn’t be putting +out a sacred fire.”</p> +<p>Renouard could hardly find words for a protest: “I assure you +that I never talk with Miss Moorsom—on—on—that. +And if you, her father . . . ”</p> +<p>“I envy you your innocence,” sighed the professor. +“A father is only an everyday person. Flat. Stale. +Moreover, my child would naturally mistrust me. We belong to the +same set. Whereas you carry with you the prestige of the unknown. +You have proved yourself to be a force.”</p> +<p>Thereupon the professor followed by Renouard joined the circle of +all the inmates of the house assembled at the other end of the terrace +about a tea-table; three white heads and that resplendent vision of +woman’s glory, the sight of which had the power to flutter his +heart like a reminder of the mortality of his frame.</p> +<p>He avoided the seat by the side of Miss Moorsom. The others +were talking together languidly. Unnoticed he looked at that woman +so marvellous that centuries seemed to lie between them. He was +oppressed and overcome at the thought of what she could give to some +man who really would be a force! What a glorious struggle with +this amazon. What noble burden for the victorious strength.</p> +<p>Dear old Mrs. Dunster was dispensing tea, looking from time to time +with interest towards Miss Moorsom. The aged statesman having +eaten a raw tomato and drunk a glass of milk (a habit of his early farming +days, long before politics, when, pioneer of wheat-growing, he demonstrated +the possibility of raising crops on ground looking barren enough to +discourage a magician), smoothed his white beard, and struck lightly +Renouard’s knee with his big wrinkled hand.</p> +<p>“You had better come back to-night and dine with us quietly.”</p> +<p>He liked this young man, a pioneer, too, in more than one direction. +Mrs. Dunster added: “Do. It will be very quiet. I +don’t even know if Willie will be home for dinner.” +Renouard murmured his thanks, and left the terrace to go on board the +schooner. While lingering in the drawing-room doorway he heard +the resonant voice of old Dunster uttering oracularly -</p> +<p>“. . . the leading man here some day. . . . Like me.”</p> +<p>Renouard let the thin summer portière of the doorway fall +behind him. The voice of Professor Moorsom said -</p> +<p>“I am told that he has made an enemy of almost every man who +had to work with him.”</p> +<p>“That’s nothing. He did his work. . . . Like me.”</p> +<p>“He never counted the cost they say. Not even of lives.”</p> +<p>Renouard understood that they were talking of him. Before he +could move away, Mrs. Dunster struck in placidly -</p> +<p>“Don’t let yourself be shocked by the tales you may hear +of him, my dear. Most of it is envy.”</p> +<p>Then he heard Miss Moorsom’s voice replying to the old lady +-</p> +<p>“Oh! I am not easily deceived. I think I may say +I have an instinct for truth.”</p> +<p>He hastened away from that house with his heart full of dread.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER VI</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>On board the schooner, lying on the settee on his back with the knuckles +of his hands pressed over his eyes, he made up his mind that he would +not return to that house for dinner—that he would never go back +there any more. He made up his mind some twenty times. The +knowledge that he had only to go up on the quarter deck, utter quietly +the words: “Man the windlass,” and that the schooner springing +into life would run a hundred miles out to sea before sunrise, deceived +his struggling will. Nothing easier! Yet, in the end, this +young man, almost ill-famed for his ruthless daring, the inflexible +leader of two tragically successful expeditions, shrank from that act +of savage energy, and began, instead, to hunt for excuses.</p> +<p>No! It was not for him to run away like an incurable who cuts +his throat. He finished dressing and looked at his own impassive +face in the saloon mirror scornfully. While being pulled on shore +in the gig, he remembered suddenly the wild beauty of a waterfall seen +when hardly more than a boy, years ago, in Menado. There was a +legend of a governor-general of the Dutch East Indies, on official tour, +committing suicide on that spot by leaping into the chasm. It +was supposed that a painful disease had made him weary of life. +But was there ever a visitation like his own, at the same time binding +one to life and so cruelly mortal!</p> +<p>The dinner was indeed quiet. Willie, given half an hour’s +grace, failed to turn up, and his chair remained vacant by the side +of Miss Moorsom. Renouard had the professor’s sister on +his left, dressed in an expensive gown becoming her age. That +maiden lady in her wonderful preservation reminded Renouard somehow +of a wax flower under glass. There were no traces of the dust +of life’s battles on her anywhere. She did not like him +very much in the afternoons, in his white drill suit and planter’s +hat, which seemed to her an unduly Bohemian costume for calling in a +house where there were ladies. But in the evening, lithe and elegant +in his dress clothes and with his pleasant, slightly veiled voice, he +always made her conquest afresh. He might have been anybody distinguished—the +son of a duke. Falling under that charm probably (and also because +her brother had given her a hint), she attempted to open her heart to +Renouard, who was watching with all the power of his soul her niece +across the table. She spoke to him as frankly as though that miserable +mortal envelope, emptied of everything but hopeless passion, were indeed +the son of a duke.</p> +<p>Inattentive, he heard her only in snatches, till the final confidential +burst: “. . . glad if you would express an opinion. Look +at her, so charming, such a great favourite, so generally admired! +It would be too sad. We all hoped she would make a brilliant marriage +with somebody very rich and of high position, have a house in London +and in the country, and entertain us all splendidly. She’s +so eminently fitted for it. She has such hosts of distinguished +friends! And then—this instead! . . . My heart really aches.”</p> +<p>Her well-bred if anxious whisper was covered by the voice of professor +Moorsom discoursing subtly down the short length of the dinner table +on the Impermanency of the Measurable to his venerable disciple. +It might have been a chapter in a new and popular book of Moorsonian +philosophy. Patriarchal and delighted, old Dunster leaned forward +a little, his eyes shining youthfully, two spots of colour at the roots +of his white beard; and Renouard, glancing at the senile excitement, +recalled the words heard on those subtle lips, adopted their scorn for +his own, saw their truth before this man ready to be amused by the side +of the grave. Yes! Intellectual debauchery in the froth +of existence! Froth and fraud!</p> +<p>On the same side of the table Miss Moorsom never once looked towards +her father, all her grace as if frozen, her red lips compressed, the +faintest rosiness under her dazzling complexion, her black eyes burning +motionless, and the very coppery gleams of light lying still on the +waves and undulation of her hair. Renouard fancied himself overturning +the table, smashing crystal and china, treading fruit and flowers under +foot, seizing her in his arms, carrying her off in a tumult of shrieks +from all these people, a silent frightened mortal, into some profound +retreat as in the age of Cavern men. Suddenly everybody got up, +and he hastened to rise too, finding himself out of breath and quite +unsteady on his feet.</p> +<p>On the terrace the philosopher, after lighting a cigar, slipped his +hand condescendingly under his “dear young friend’s” +arm. Renouard regarded him now with the profoundest mistrust. +But the great man seemed really to have a liking for his young friend—one +of those mysterious sympathies, disregarding the differences of age +and position, which in this case might have been explained by the failure +of philosophy to meet a very real worry of a practical kind.</p> +<p>After a turn or two and some casual talk the professor said suddenly: +“My late son was in your school—do you know? I can +imagine that had he lived and you had ever met you would have understood +each other. He too was inclined to action.”</p> +<p>He sighed, then, shaking off the mournful thought and with a nod +at the dusky part of the terrace where the dress of his daughter made +a luminous stain: “I really wish you would drop in that quarter +a few sensible, discouraging words.”</p> +<p>Renouard disengaged himself from that most perfidious of men under +the pretence of astonishment, and stepping back a pace -</p> +<p>“Surely you are making fun of me, Professor Moorsom,” +he said with a low laugh, which was really a sound of rage.</p> +<p>“My dear young friend! It’s no subject for jokes, +to me. . . You don’t seem to have any notion of your prestige,” +he added, walking away towards the chairs.</p> +<p>“Humbug!” thought Renouard, standing still and looking +after him. “And yet! And yet! What if it were +true?”</p> +<p>He advanced then towards Miss Moorsom. Posed on the seat on +which they had first spoken to each other, it was her turn to watch +him coming on. But many of the windows were not lighted that evening. +It was dark over there. She appeared to him luminous in her clear +dress, a figure without shape, a face without features, awaiting his +approach, till he got quite near to her, sat down, and they had exchanged +a few insignificant words. Gradually she came out like a magic +painting of charm, fascination, and desire, glowing mysteriously on +the dark background. Something imperceptible in the lines of her +attitude, in the modulations of her voice, seemed to soften that suggestion +of calm unconscious pride which enveloped her always like a mantle. +He, sensitive like a bond slave to the moods of the master, was moved +by the subtle relenting of her grace to an infinite tenderness. +He fought down the impulse to seize her by the hand, lead her down into +the garden away under the big trees, and throw himself at her feet uttering +words of love. His emotion was so strong that he had to cough +slightly, and not knowing what to talk to her about he began to tell +her of his mother and sisters. All the family were coming to London +to live there, for some little time at least.</p> +<p>“I hope you will go and tell them something of me. Something +seen,” he said pressingly.</p> +<p>By this miserable subterfuge, like a man about to part with his life, +he hoped to make her remember him a little longer.</p> +<p>“Certainly,” she said. “I’ll be glad +to call when I get back. But that ‘when’ may be a +long time.”</p> +<p>He heard a light sigh. A cruel jealous curiosity made him ask +-</p> +<p>“Are you growing weary, Miss Moorsom?”</p> +<p>A silence fell on his low spoken question.</p> +<p>“Do you mean heart-weary?” sounded Miss Moorsom’s +voice. “You don’t know me, I see.”</p> +<p>“Ah! Never despair,” he muttered.</p> +<p>“This, Mr. Renouard, is a work of reparation. I stand +for truth here. I can’t think of myself.”</p> +<p>He could have taken her by the throat for every word seemed an insult +to his passion; but he only said -</p> +<p>“I never doubted the—the—nobility of your purpose.”</p> +<p>“And to hear the word weariness pronounced in this connection +surprises me. And from a man too who, I understand, has never +counted the cost.”</p> +<p>“You are pleased to tease me,” he said, directly he had +recovered his voice and had mastered his anger. It was as if Professor +Moorsom had dropped poison in his ear which was spreading now and tainting +his passion, his very jealousy. He mistrusted every word that +came from those lips on which his life hung. “How can you +know anything of men who do not count the cost?” he asked in his +gentlest tones.</p> +<p>“From hearsay—a little.”</p> +<p>“Well, I assure you they are like the others, subject to suffering, +victims of spells. . . .”</p> +<p>“One of them, at least, speaks very strangely.”</p> +<p>She dismissed the subject after a short silence. “Mr. +Renouard, I had a disappointment this morning. This mail brought +me a letter from the widow of the old butler—you know. I +expected to learn that she had heard from—from here. But +no. No letter arrived home since we left.”</p> +<p>Her voice was calm. His jealousy couldn’t stand much +more of this sort of talk; but he was glad that nothing had turned up +to help the search; glad blindly, unreasonably—only because it +would keep her longer in his sight—since she wouldn’t give +up.</p> +<p>“I am too near her,” he thought, moving a little further +on the seat. He was afraid in the revulsion of feeling of flinging +himself on her hands, which were lying on her lap, and covering them +with kisses. He was afraid. Nothing, nothing could shake +that spell—not if she were ever so false, stupid, or degraded. +She was fate itself. The extent of his misfortune plunged him +in such a stupor that he failed at first to hear the sound of voices +and footsteps inside the drawing-room. Willie had come home—and +the Editor was with him.</p> +<p>They burst out on the terrace babbling noisily, and then pulling +themselves together stood still, surprising—and as if themselves +surprised.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER VII</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>They had been feasting a poet from the bush, the latest discovery +of the Editor. Such discoveries were the business, the vocation, +the pride and delight of the only apostle of letters in the hemisphere, +the solitary patron of culture, the Slave of the Lamp—as he subscribed +himself at the bottom of the weekly literary page of his paper. +He had had no difficulty in persuading the virtuous Willie (who had +festive instincts) to help in the good work, and now they had left the +poet lying asleep on the hearthrug of the editorial room and had rushed +to the Dunster mansion wildly. The Editor had another discovery +to announce. Swaying a little where he stood he opened his mouth +very wide to shout the one word “Found!” Behind him +Willie flung both his hands above his head and let them fall dramatically. +Renouard saw the four white-headed people at the end of the terrace +rise all together from their chairs with an effect of sudden panic.</p> +<p>“I tell you—he—is—found,” the patron +of letters shouted emphatically.</p> +<p>“What is this!” exclaimed Renouard in a choked voice. +Miss Moorsom seized his wrist suddenly, and at that contact fire ran +through all his veins, a hot stillness descended upon him in which he +heard the blood—or the fire—beating in his ears. He +made a movement as if to rise, but was restrained by the convulsive +pressure on his wrist.</p> +<p>“No, no.” Miss Moorsom’s eyes stared black +as night, searching the space before her. Far away the Editor +strutted forward, Willie following with his ostentatious manner of carrying +his bulky and oppressive carcass which, however, did not remain exactly +perpendicular for two seconds together.</p> +<p>“The innocent Arthur . . . Yes. We’ve got him,” +the Editor became very business-like. “Yes, this letter +has done it.”</p> +<p>He plunged into an inside pocket for it, slapped the scrap of paper +with his open palm. “From that old woman. William +had it in his pocket since this morning when Miss Moorsom gave it to +him to show me. Forgot all about it till an hour ago. Thought +it was of no importance. Well, no! Not till it was properly +read.”</p> +<p>Renouard and Miss Moorsom emerged from the shadows side by side, +a well-matched couple, animated yet statuesque in their calmness and +in their pallor. She had let go his wrist. On catching sight +of Renouard the Editor exclaimed:</p> +<p>“What—you here!” in a quite shrill voice.</p> +<p>There came a dead pause. All the faces had in them something +dismayed and cruel.</p> +<p>“He’s the very man we want,” continued the Editor. +“Excuse my excitement. You are the very man, Renouard. +Didn’t you tell me that your assistant called himself Walter? +Yes? Thought so. But here’s that old woman—the +butler’s wife—listen to this. She writes: All I can +tell you, Miss, is that my poor husband directed his letters to the +name of H. Walter.”</p> +<p>Renouard’s violent but repressed exclamation was lost in a +general murmur and shuffle of feet. The Editor made a step forward, +bowed with creditable steadiness.</p> +<p>“Miss Moorsom, allow me to congratulate you from the bottom +of my heart on the happy—er—issue. . . ”</p> +<p>“Wait,” muttered Renouard irresolutely.</p> +<p>The Editor jumped on him in the manner of their old friendship. +“Ah, you! You are a fine fellow too. With your solitary +ways of life you will end by having no more discrimination than a savage. +Fancy living with a gentleman for months and never guessing. A +man, I am certain, accomplished, remarkable, out of the common, since +he had been distinguished” (he bowed again) “by Miss Moorsom, +whom we all admire.”</p> +<p>She turned her back on him.</p> +<p>“I hope to goodness you haven’t been leading him a dog’s +life, Geoffrey,” the Editor addressed his friend in a whispered +aside.</p> +<p>Renouard seized a chair violently, sat down, and propping his elbow +on his knee leaned his head on his hand. Behind him the sister +of the professor looked up to heaven and wrung her hands stealthily. +Mrs. Dunster’s hands were clasped forcibly under her chin, but +she, dear soul, was looking sorrowfully at Willie. The model nephew! +In this strange state! So very much flushed! The careful +disposition of the thin hairs across Willie’s bald spot was deplorably +disarranged, and the spot itself was red and, as it were, steaming.</p> +<p>“What’s the matter, Geoffrey?” The Editor +seemed disconcerted by the silent attitudes round him, as though he +had expected all these people to shout and dance. “You have +him on the island—haven’t you?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes: I have him there,” said Renouard, without looking +up.</p> +<p>“Well, then!” The Editor looked helplessly around +as if begging for response of some sort. But the only response +that came was very unexpected. Annoyed at being left in the background, +and also because very little drink made him nasty, the emotional Willie +turned malignant all at once, and in a bibulous tone surprising in a +man able to keep his balance so well -</p> +<p>“Aha! But you haven’t got him here—not yet!” +he sneered. “No! You haven’t got him yet.”</p> +<p>This outrageous exhibition was to the Editor like the lash to a jaded +horse. He positively jumped.</p> +<p>“What of that? What do you mean? We—haven’t—got—him—here. +Of course he isn’t here! But Geoffrey’s schooner is +here. She can be sent at once to fetch him here. No! +Stay! There’s a better plan. Why shouldn’t you +all sail over to Malata, professor? Save time! I am sure +Miss Moorsom would prefer. . .”</p> +<p>With a gallant flourish of his arm he looked for Miss Moorsom. +She had disappeared. He was taken aback somewhat.</p> +<p>“Ah! H’m. Yes. . . . Why not. A pleasure +cruise, delightful ship, delightful season, delightful errand, del . +. . No! There are no objections. Geoffrey, I understand, +has indulged in a bungalow three sizes too large for him. He can +put you all up. It will be a pleasure for him. It will be +the greatest privilege. Any man would be proud of being an agent +of this happy reunion. I am proud of the little part I’ve +played. He will consider it the greatest honour. Geoff, +my boy, you had better be stirring to-morrow bright and early about +the preparations for the trip. It would be criminal to lose a +single day.”</p> +<p>He was as flushed as Willie, the excitement keeping up the effect +of the festive dinner. For a time Renouard, silent, as if he had +not heard a word of all that babble, did not stir. But when he +got up it was to advance towards the Editor and give him such a hearty +slap on the back that the plump little man reeled in his tracks and +looked quite frightened for a moment.</p> +<p>“You are a heaven-born discoverer and a first-rate manager. +. . He’s right. It’s the only way. You can’t +resist the claim of sentiment, and you must even risk the voyage to +Malata. . . ” Renouard’s voice sank. “A lonely +spot,” he added, and fell into thought under all these eyes converging +on him in the sudden silence. His slow glance passed over all +the faces in succession, remaining arrested on Professor Moorsom, stony +eyed, a smouldering cigar in his fingers, and with his sister standing +by his side.</p> +<p>“I shall be infinitely gratified if you consent to come. +But, of course, you will. We shall sail to-morrow evening then. +And now let me leave you to your happiness.”</p> +<p>He bowed, very grave, pointed suddenly his finger at Willie who was +swaying about with a sleepy frown. . . . “Look at him. He’s +overcome with happiness. You had better put him to bed . . . ” +and disappeared while every head on the terrace was turned to Willie +with varied expressions.</p> +<p>Renouard ran through the house. Avoiding the carriage road +he fled down the steep short cut to the shore, where his gig was waiting. +At his loud shout the sleeping Kanakas jumped up. He leaped in. +“Shove off. Give way!” and the gig darted through +the water. “Give way! Give way!” She flew +past the wool-clippers sleeping at their anchors each with the open +unwinking eye of the lamp in the rigging; she flew past the flagship +of the Pacific squadron, a great mass all dark and silent, heavy with +the slumbers of five hundred men, and where the invisible sentries heard +his urgent “Give way! Give way!” in the night. +The Kanakas, panting, rose off the thwarts at every stroke. Nothing +could be fast enough for him! And he ran up the side of his schooner +shaking the ladder noisily with his rush.</p> +<p>On deck he stumbled and stood still.</p> +<p>Wherefore this haste? To what end, since he knew well before +he started that he had a pursuer from whom there was no escape.</p> +<p>As his foot touched the deck his will, his purpose he had been hurrying +to save, died out within. It had been nothing less than getting +the schooner under-way, letting her vanish silently in the night from +amongst these sleeping ships. And now he was certain he could +not do it. It was impossible! And he reflected that whether +he lived or died such an act would lay him under a dark suspicion from +which he shrank. No, there was nothing to be done.</p> +<p>He went down into the cabin and, before even unbuttoning his overcoat, +took out of the drawer the letter addressed to his assistant; that letter +which he had found in the pigeon-hole labelled “Malata” +in young Dunster’s outer office, where it had been waiting for +three months some occasion for being forwarded. From the moment +of dropping it in the drawer he had utterly forgotten its existence—till +now, when the man’s name had come out so clamorously. He +glanced at the common envelope, noted the shaky and laborious handwriting: +H. Walter, Esqre. Undoubtedly the very last letter the old butler +had posted before his illness, and in answer clearly to one from “Master +Arthur” instructing him to address in the future: “Care +of Messrs. W. Dunster and Co.” Renouard made as if to open +the envelope, but paused, and, instead, tore the letter deliberately +in two, in four, in eight. With his hand full of pieces of paper +he returned on deck and scattered them overboard on the dark water, +in which they vanished instantly.</p> +<p>He did it slowly, without hesitation or remorse. H. Walter, +Esqre, in Malata. The innocent Arthur—What was his name? +The man sought for by that woman who as she went by seemed to draw all +the passion of the earth to her, without effort, not deigning to notice, +naturally, as other women breathed the air. But Renouard was no +longer jealous of her very existence. Whatever its meaning it +was not for that man he had picked up casually on obscure impulse, to +get rid of the tiresome expostulations of a so-called friend; a man +of whom he really knew nothing—and now a dead man. In Malata. +Oh, yes! He was there secure enough, untroubled in his grave. +In Malata. To bury him was the last service Renouard had rendered +to his assistant before leaving the island on this trip to town.</p> +<p>Like many men ready enough for arduous enterprises Renouard was inclined +to evade the small complications of existence. This trait of his +character was composed of a little indolence, some disdain, and a shrinking +from contests with certain forms of vulgarity—like a man who would +face a lion and go out of his way to avoid a toad. His intercourse +with the meddlesome journalist was that merely outward intimacy without +sympathy some young men get drawn into easily. It had amused him +rather to keep that “friend” in the dark about the fate +of his assistant. Renouard had never needed other company than +his own, for there was in him something of the sensitiveness of a dreamer +who is easily jarred. He had said to himself that the all-knowing +one would only preach again about the evils of solitude and worry his +head off in favour of some forlornly useless protégé of +his. Also the inquisitiveness of the Editor had irritated him +and had closed his lips in sheer disgust.</p> +<p>And now he contemplated the noose of consequences drawing tight around +him.</p> +<p>It was the memory of that diplomatic reticence which on the terrace +had stiffled his first cry which would have told them all that the man +sought for was not to be met on earth any more. He shrank from +the absurdity of hearing the all-knowing one, and not very sober at +that, turning on him with righteous reproaches -</p> +<p>“You never told me. You gave me to understand that your +assistant was alive, and now you say he’s dead. Which is +it? Were you lying then or are you lying now?” No! +the thought of such a scene was not to be borne. He had sat down +appalled, thinking: “What shall I do now?”</p> +<p>His courage had oozed out of him. Speaking the truth meant +the Moorsoms going away at once—while it seemed to him that he +would give the last shred of his rectitude to secure a day more of her +company. He sat on—silent. Slowly, from confused sensations, +from his talk with the professor, the manner of the girl herself, the +intoxicating familiarity of her sudden hand-clasp, there had come to +him a half glimmer of hope. The other man was dead. Then! +. . . Madness, of course—but he could not give it up. He +had listened to that confounded busybody arranging everything—while +all these people stood around assenting, under the spell of that dead +romance. He had listened scornful and silent. The glimmers +of hope, of opportunity, passed before his eyes. He had only to +sit still and say nothing. That and no more. And what was +truth to him in the face of that great passion which had flung him prostrate +in spirit at her adored feet!</p> +<p>And now it was done! Fatality had willed it! With the +eyes of a mortal struck by the maddening thunderbolt of the gods, Renouard +looked up to the sky, an immense black pall dusted over with gold, on +which great shudders seemed to pass from the breath of life affirming +its sway.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER VIII</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>At last, one morning, in a clear spot of a glassy horizon charged +with heraldic masses of black vapours, the island grew out from the +sea, showing here and there its naked members of basaltic rock through +the rents of heavy foliage. Later, in the great spilling of all +the riches of sunset, Malata stood out green and rosy before turning +into a violet shadow in the autumnal light of the expiring day. +Then came the night. In the faint airs the schooner crept on past +a sturdy squat headland, and it was pitch dark when her headsails ran +down, she turned short on her heel, and her anchor bit into the sandy +bottom on the edge of the outer reef; for it was too dangerous then +to attempt entering the little bay full of shoals. After the last +solemn flutter of the mainsail the murmuring voices of the Moorsom party +lingered, very frail, in the black stillness.</p> +<p>They were sitting aft, on chairs, and nobody made a move. Early +in the day, when it had become evident that the wind was failing, Renouard, +basing his advice on the shortcomings of his bachelor establishment, +had urged on the ladies the advisability of not going ashore in the +middle of the night. Now he approached them in a constrained manner +(it was astonishing the constraint that had reigned between him and +his guests all through the passage) and renewed his arguments. +No one ashore would dream of his bringing any visitors with him. +Nobody would even think of coming off. There was only one old +canoe on the plantation. And landing in the schooner’s boats +would be awkward in the dark. There was the risk of getting aground +on some shallow patches. It would be best to spend the rest of +the night on board.</p> +<p>There was really no opposition. The professor smoking a pipe, +and very comfortable in an ulster buttoned over his tropical clothes, +was the first to speak from his long chair.</p> +<p>“Most excellent advice.”</p> +<p>Next to him Miss Moorsom assented by a long silence. Then in +a voice as of one coming out of a dream -</p> +<p>“And so this is Malata,” she said. “I have +often wondered . . .”</p> +<p>A shiver passed through Renouard. She had wondered! What +about? Malata was himself. He and Malata were one. +And she had wondered! She had . . .</p> +<p>The professor’s sister leaned over towards Renouard. +Through all these days at sea the man’s—the found man’s—existence +had not been alluded to on board the schooner. That reticence +was part of the general constraint lying upon them all. She, herself, +certainly had not been exactly elated by this finding—poor Arthur, +without money, without prospects. But she felt moved by the sentiment +and romance of the situation.</p> +<p>“Isn’t it wonderful,” she whispered out of her +white wrap, “to think of poor Arthur sleeping there, so near to +our dear lovely Felicia, and not knowing the immense joy in store for +him to-morrow.”</p> +<p>There was such artificiality in the wax-flower lady that nothing +in this speech touched Renouard. It was but the simple anxiety +of his heart that he was voicing when he muttered gloomily -</p> +<p>“No one in the world knows what to-morrow may hold in store.”</p> +<p>The mature lady had a recoil as though he had said something impolite. +What a harsh thing to say—instead of finding something nice and +appropriate. On board, where she never saw him in evening clothes, +Renouard’s resemblance to a duke’s son was not so apparent +to her. Nothing but his—ah—bohemianism remained. +She rose with a sort of ostentation.</p> +<p>“It’s late—and since we are going to sleep on board +to-night . . .” she said. “But it does seem so cruel.”</p> +<p>The professor started up eagerly, knocking the ashes out of his pipe. +“Infinitely more sensible, my dear Emma.”</p> +<p>Renouard waited behind Miss Moorsom’s chair.</p> +<p>She got up slowly, moved one step forward, and paused looking at +the shore. The blackness of the island blotted out the stars with +its vague mass like a low thundercloud brooding over the waters and +ready to burst into flame and crashes.</p> +<p>“And so—this is Malata,” she repeated dreamily, +moving towards the cabin door. The clear cloak hanging from her +shoulders, the ivory face—for the night had put out nothing of +her but the gleams of her hair—made her resemble a shining dream-woman +uttering words of wistful inquiry. She disappeared without a sign, +leaving Renouard penetrated to the very marrow by the sounds that came +from her body like a mysterious resonance of an exquisite instrument.</p> +<p>He stood stock still. What was this accidental touch which +had evoked the strange accent of her voice? He dared not answer +that question. But he had to answer the question of what was to +be done now. Had the moment of confession come? The thought +was enough to make one’s blood run cold.</p> +<p>It was as if those people had a premonition of something. In +the taciturn days of the passage he had noticed their reserve even amongst +themselves. The professor smoked his pipe moodily in retired spots. +Renouard had caught Miss Moorsom’s eyes resting on himself more +than once, with a peculiar and grave expression. He fancied that +she avoided all opportunities of conversation. The maiden lady +seemed to nurse a grievance. And now what had he to do?</p> +<p>The lights on the deck had gone out one after the other. The +schooner slept.</p> +<p>About an hour after Miss Moorsom had gone below without a sign or +a word for him, Renouard got out of his hammock slung in the waist under +the midship awning—for he had given up all the accommodation below +to his guests. He got out with a sudden swift movement, flung +off his sleeping jacket, rolled his pyjamas up his thighs, and stole +forward, unseen by the one Kanaka of the anchor-watch. His white +torso, naked like a stripped athlete’s, glimmered, ghostly, in +the deep shadows of the deck. Unnoticed he got out of the ship +over the knight-heads, ran along the back rope, and seizing the dolphin-striker +firmly with both hands, lowered himself into the sea without a splash.</p> +<p>He swam away, noiseless like a fish, and then struck boldly for the +land, sustained, embraced, by the tepid water. The gentle, voluptuous +heave of its breast swung him up and down slightly; sometimes a wavelet +murmured in his ears; from time to time, lowering his feet, he felt +for the bottom on a shallow patch to rest and correct his direction. +He landed at the lower end of the bungalow garden, into the dead stillness +of the island. There were no lights. The plantation seemed +to sleep, as profoundly as the schooner. On the path a small shell +cracked under his naked heel.</p> +<p>The faithful half-caste foreman going his rounds cocked his ears +at the sharp sound. He gave one enormous start of fear at the +sight of the swift white figure flying at him out of the night. +He crouched in terror, and then sprang up and clicked his tongue in +amazed recognition.</p> +<p>“Tse! Tse! The master!”</p> +<p>“Be quiet, Luiz, and listen to what I say.”</p> +<p>Yes, it was the master, the strong master who was never known to +raise his voice, the man blindly obeyed and never questioned. +He talked low and rapidly in the quiet night, as if every minute were +precious. On learning that three guests were coming to stay Luiz +clicked his tongue rapidly. These clicks were the uniform, stenographic +symbols of his emotions, and he could give them an infinite variety +of meaning. He listened to the rest in a deep silence hardly affected +by the low, “Yes, master,” whenever Renouard paused.</p> +<p>“You understand?” the latter insisted. “No +preparations are to be made till we land in the morning. And you +are to say that Mr. Walter has gone off in a trading schooner on a round +of the islands.”</p> +<p>“Yes, master.”</p> +<p>“No mistakes—mind!”</p> +<p>“No, master.”</p> +<p>Renouard walked back towards the sea. Luiz, following him, +proposed to call out half a dozen boys and man the canoe.</p> +<p>“Imbecile!”</p> +<p>“Tse! Tse! Tse!”</p> +<p>“Don’t you understand that you haven’t seen me?”</p> +<p>“Yes, master. But what a long swim. Suppose you +drown.”</p> +<p>“Then you can say of me and of Mr. Walter what you like. +The dead don’t mind.”</p> +<p>Renouard entered the sea and heard a faint “Tse! Tse! Tse!” +of concern from the half-caste, who had already lost sight of the master’s +dark head on the overshadowed water.</p> +<p>Renouard set his direction by a big star that, dipping on the horizon, +seemed to look curiously into his face. On this swim back he felt +the mournful fatigue of all that length of the traversed road, which +brought him no nearer to his desire. It was as if his love had +sapped the invisible supports of his strength. There came a moment +when it seemed to him that he must have swum beyond the confines of +life. He had a sensation of eternity close at hand, demanding +no effort—offering its peace. It was easy to swim like this +beyond the confines of life looking at a star. But the thought: +“They will think I dared not face them and committed suicide,” +caused a revolt of his mind which carried him on. He returned +on board, as he had left, unheard and unseen. He lay in his hammock +utterly exhausted and with a confused feeling that he had been beyond +the confines of life, somewhere near a star, and that it was very quiet +there.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER IX</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>Sheltered by the squat headland from the first morning sparkle of +the sea the little bay breathed a delicious freshness. The party +from the schooner landed at the bottom of the garden. They exchanged +insignificant words in studiously casual tones. The professor’s +sister put up a long-handled eye-glass as if to scan the novel surroundings, +but in reality searching for poor Arthur anxiously. Having never +seen him otherwise than in his town clothes she had no idea what he +would look like. It had been left to the professor to help his +ladies out of the boat because Renouard, as if intent on giving directions, +had stepped forward at once to meet the half-caste Luiz hurrying down +the path. In the distance, in front of the dazzlingly sunlit bungalow, +a row of dark-faced house-boys unequal in stature and varied in complexion +preserved the immobility of a guard of honour.</p> +<p>Luiz had taken off his soft felt hat before coming within earshot. +Renouard bent his head to his rapid talk of domestic arrangements he +meant to make for the visitors; another bed in the master’s room +for the ladies and a cot for the gentleman to be hung in the room opposite +where—where Mr. Walter—here he gave a scared look all round—Mr. +Walter—had died.</p> +<p>“Very good,” assented Renouard in an even undertone. +“And remember what you have to say of him.”</p> +<p>“Yes, master. Only”—he wriggled slightly +and put one bare foot on the other for a moment in apologetic embarrassment—“only +I—I—don’t like to say it.”</p> +<p>Renouard looked at him without anger, without any sort of expression. +“Frightened of the dead? Eh? Well—all right. +I will say it myself—I suppose once for all. . . Immediately he +raised his voice very much.</p> +<p>“Send the boys down to bring up the luggage.”</p> +<p>“Yes, master.”</p> +<p>Renouard turned to his distinguished guests who, like a personally +conducted party of tourists, had stopped and were looking about them.</p> +<p>“I am sorry,” he began with an impassive face. +“My man has just told me that Mr. Walter . . .” he managed +to smile, but didn’t correct himself . . . “has gone in +a trading schooner on a short tour of the islands, to the westward.”</p> +<p>This communication was received in profound silence.</p> +<p>Renouard forgot himself in the thought: “It’s done!” +But the sight of the string of boys marching up to the house with suit-cases +and dressing-bags rescued him from that appalling abstraction.</p> +<p>“All I can do is to beg you to make yourselves at home . . +. with what patience you may.”</p> +<p>This was so obviously the only thing to do that everybody moved on +at once. The professor walked alongside Renouard, behind the two +ladies.</p> +<p>“Rather unexpected—this absence.”</p> +<p>“Not exactly,” muttered Renouard. “A trip +has to be made every year to engage labour.”</p> +<p>“I see . . . And he . . . How vexingly elusive the poor fellow +has become! I’ll begin to think that some wicked fairy is +favouring this love tale with unpleasant attentions.”</p> +<p>Renouard noticed that the party did not seem weighed down by this +new disappointment. On the contrary they moved with a freer step. +The professor’s sister dropped her eye-glass to the end of its +chain. Miss Moorsom took the lead. The professor, his lips +unsealed, lingered in the open: but Renouard did not listen to that +man’s talk. He looked after that man’s daughter—if +indeed that creature of irresistible seductions were a daughter of mortals. +The very intensity of his desire, as if his soul were streaming after +her through his eyes, defeated his object of keeping hold of her as +long as possible with, at least, one of his senses. Her moving +outlines dissolved into a misty coloured shimmer of a woman made of +flame and shadows, crossing the threshold of his house.</p> +<p>The days which followed were not exactly such as Renouard had feared—yet +they were not better than his fears. They were accursed in all +the moods they brought him. But the general aspect of things was +quiet. The professor smoked innumerable pipes with the air of +a worker on his holiday, always in movement and looking at things with +that mysteriously sagacious aspect of men who are admittedly wiser than +the rest of the world. His white head of hair—whiter than +anything within the horizon except the broken water on the reefs—was +glimpsed in every part of the plantation always on the move under the +white parasol. And once he climbed the headland and appeared suddenly +to those below, a white speck elevated in the blue, with a diminutive +but statuesque effect.</p> +<p>Felicia Moorsom remained near the house. Sometimes she could +be seen with a despairing expression scribbling rapidly in her lock-up +dairy. But only for a moment. At the sound of Renouard’s +footsteps she would turn towards him her beautiful face, adorable in +that calm which was like a wilful, like a cruel ignoring of her tremendous +power. Whenever she sat on the verandah, on a chair more specially +reserved for her use, Renouard would stroll up and sit on the steps +near her, mostly silent, and often not trusting himself to turn his +glance on her. She, very still with her eyes half-closed, looked +down on his head—so that to a beholder (such as Professor Moorsom, +for instance) she would appear to be turning over in her mind profound +thoughts about that man sitting at her feet, his shoulders bowed a little, +his hands listless—as if vanquished. And, indeed, the moral +poison of falsehood has such a decomposing power that Renouard felt +his old personality turn to dead dust. Often, in the evening, +when they sat outside conversing languidly in the dark, he felt that +he must rest his forehead on her feet and burst into tears.</p> +<p>The professor’s sister suffered from some little strain caused +by the unstability of her own feelings toward Renouard. She could +not tell whether she really did dislike him or not. At times he +appeared to her most fascinating; and, though he generally ended by +saying something shockingly crude, she could not resist her inclination +to talk with him—at least not always. One day when her niece +had left them alone on the verandah she leaned forward in her chair—speckless, +resplendent, and, in her way, almost as striking a personality as her +niece, who did not resemble her in the least. “Dear Felicia +has inherited her hair and the greatest part of her appearance from +her mother,” the maiden lady used to tell people.</p> +<p>She leaned forward then, confidentially.</p> +<p>“Oh! Mr. Renouard! Haven’t you something +comforting to say?”</p> +<p>He looked up, as surprised as if a voice from heaven had spoken with +this perfect society intonation, and by the puzzled profundity of his +blue eyes fluttered the wax-flower of refined womanhood. She continued. +“For—I can speak to you openly on this tiresome subject—only +think what a terrible strain this hope deferred must be for Felicia’s +heart—for her nerves.”</p> +<p>“Why speak to me about it,” he muttered feeling half +choked suddenly.</p> +<p>“Why! As a friend—a well-wisher—the kindest +of hosts. I am afraid we are really eating you out of house and +home.” She laughed a little. “Ah! When, +when will this suspense be relieved! That poor lost Arthur! +I confess that I am almost afraid of the great moment. It will +be like seeing a ghost.”</p> +<p>“Have you ever seen a ghost?” asked Renouard, in a dull +voice.</p> +<p>She shifted her hands a little. Her pose was perfect in its +ease and middle-aged grace.</p> +<p>“Not actually. Only in a photograph. But we have +many friends who had the experience of apparitions.”</p> +<p>“Ah! They see ghosts in London,” mumbled Renouard, +not looking at her.</p> +<p>“Frequently—in a certain very interesting set. +But all sorts of people do. We have a friend, a very famous author—his +ghost is a girl. One of my brother’s intimates is a very +great man of science. He is friendly with a ghost . . . Of a girl +too,” she added in a voice as if struck for the first time by +the coincidence. “It is the photograph of that apparition +which I have seen. Very sweet. Most interesting. A +little cloudy naturally. . . . Mr. Renouard! I hope you are not +a sceptic. It’s so consoling to think. . .”</p> +<p>“Those plantation boys of mine see ghosts too,” said +Renouard grimly.</p> +<p>The sister of the philosopher sat up stiffly. What crudeness! +It was always so with this strange young man.</p> +<p>“Mr. Renouard! How can you compare the superstitious +fancies of your horrible savages with the manifestations . . . ”</p> +<p>Words failed her. She broke off with a very faint primly angry +smile. She was perhaps the more offended with him because of that +flutter at the beginning of the conversation. And in a moment +with perfect tact and dignity she got up from her chair and left him +alone.</p> +<p>Renouard didn’t even look up. It was not the displeasure +of the lady which deprived him of his sleep that night. He was +beginning to forget what simple, honest sleep was like. His hammock +from the ship had been hung for him on a side verandah, and he spent +his nights in it on his back, his hands folded on his chest, in a sort +of half conscious, oppressed stupor. In the morning he watched +with unseeing eyes the headland come out a shapeless inkblot against +the thin light of the false dawn, pass through all the stages of daybreak +to the deep purple of its outlined mass nimbed gloriously with the gold +of the rising sun. He listened to the vague sounds of waking within +the house: and suddenly he became aware of Luiz standing by the hammock—obviously +troubled.</p> +<p>“What’s the matter?”</p> +<p>“Tse! Tse! Tse!”</p> +<p>“Well, what now? Trouble with the boys?”</p> +<p>“No, master. The gentleman when I take him his bath water +he speak to me. He ask me—he ask—when, when, I think +Mr. Walter, he come back.”</p> +<p>The half-caste’s teeth chattered slightly. Renouard got +out of the hammock.</p> +<p>“And he is here all the time—eh?”</p> +<p>Luiz nodded a scared affirmative, but at once protested, “I +no see him. I never. Not I! The ignorant wild boys +say they see . . . Something! Ough!”</p> +<p>He clapped his teeth on another short rattle, and stood there, shrunk, +blighted, like a man in a freezing blast.</p> +<p>“And what did you say to the gentleman?”</p> +<p>“I say I don’t know—and I clear out. I—I +don’t like to speak of him.”</p> +<p>“All right. We shall try to lay that poor ghost,” +said Renouard gloomily, going off to a small hut near by to dress. +He was saying to himself: “This fellow will end by giving me away. +The last thing that I . . . No! That mustn’t be.” +And feeling his hand being forced he discovered the whole extent of +his cowardice.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER X</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>That morning wandering about his plantation, more like a frightened +soul than its creator and master, he dodged the white parasol bobbing +up here and there like a buoy adrift on a sea of dark-green plants. +The crop promised to be magnificent, and the fashionable philosopher +of the age took other than a merely scientific interest in the experiment. +His investments were judicious, but he had always some little money +lying by, for experiments.</p> +<p>After lunch, being left alone with Renouard, he talked a little of +cultivation and such matters. Then suddenly:</p> +<p>“By the way, is it true what my sister tells me, that your +plantation boys have been disturbed by a ghost?”</p> +<p>Renouard, who since the ladies had left the table was not keeping +such a strict watch on himself, came out of his abstraction with a start +and a stiff smile.</p> +<p>“My foreman had some trouble with them during my absence. +They funk working in a certain field on the slope of the hill.”</p> +<p>“A ghost here!” exclaimed the amused professor. +“Then our whole conception of the psychology of ghosts must be +revised. This island has been uninhabited probably since the dawn +of ages. How did a ghost come here. By air or water? +And why did it leave its native haunts. Was it from misanthropy? +Was he expelled from some community of spirits?”</p> +<p>Renouard essayed to respond in the same tone. The words died +on his lips. Was it a man or a woman ghost, the professor inquired.</p> +<p>“I don’t know.” Renouard made an effort to +appear at ease. He had, he said, a couple of Tahitian amongst +his boys—a ghost-ridden race. They had started the scare. +They had probably brought their ghost with them.</p> +<p>“Let us investigate the matter, Renouard,” proposed the +professor half in earnest. “We may make some interesting +discoveries as to the state of primitive minds, at any rate.”</p> +<p>This was too much. Renouard jumped up and leaving the room +went out and walked about in front of the house. He would allow +no one to force his hand. Presently the professor joined him outside. +He carried his parasol, but had neither his book nor his pipe with him. +Amiably serious he laid his hand on his “dear young friend’s” +arm.</p> +<p>“We are all of us a little strung up,” he said. +“For my part I have been like sister Anne in the story. +But I cannot see anything coming. Anything that would be the least +good for anybody—I mean.”</p> +<p>Renouard had recovered sufficiently to murmur coldly his regret of +this waste of time. For that was what, he supposed, the professor +had in his mind.</p> +<p>“Time,” mused Professor Moorsom. “I don’t +know that time can be wasted. But I will tell you, my dear friend, +what this is: it is an awful waste of life. I mean for all of +us. Even for my sister, who has got a headache and is gone to +lie down.”</p> +<p>He shook gently Renouard’s arm. “Yes, for all of +us! One may meditate on life endlessly, one may even have a poor +opinion of it—but the fact remains that we have only one life +to live. And it is short. Think of that, my young friend.”</p> +<p>He released Renouard’s arm and stepped out of the shade opening +his parasol. It was clear that there was something more in his +mind than mere anxiety about the date of his lectures for fashionable +audiences. What did the man mean by his confounded platitudes? +To Renouard, scared by Luiz in the morning (for he felt that nothing +could be more fatal than to have his deception unveiled otherwise than +by personal confession), this talk sounded like encouragement or a warning +from that man who seemed to him to be very brazen and very subtle. +It was like being bullied by the dead and cajoled by the living into +a throw of dice for a supreme stake.</p> +<p>Renouard went away to some distance from the house and threw himself +down in the shade of a tree. He lay there perfectly still with +his forehead resting on his folded arms, light-headed and thinking. +It seemed to him that he must be on fire, then that he had fallen into +a cool whirlpool, a smooth funnel of water swirling about with nauseating +rapidity. And then (it must have been a reminiscence of his boyhood) +he was walking on the dangerous thin ice of a river, unable to turn +back. . . . Suddenly it parted from shore to shore with a loud crack +like the report of a gun.</p> +<p>With one leap he found himself on his feet. All was peace, +stillness, sunshine. He walked away from there slowly. Had +he been a gambler he would have perhaps been supported in a measure +by the mere excitement. But he was not a gambler. He had +always disdained that artificial manner of challenging the fates. +The bungalow came into view, bright and pretty, and all about everything +was peace, stillness, sunshine. . . .</p> +<p>While he was plodding towards it he had a disagreeable sense of the +dead man’s company at his elbow. The ghost! He seemed +to be everywhere but in his grave. Could one ever shake him off? +he wondered. At that moment Miss Moorsom came out on the verandah; +and at once, as if by a mystery of radiating waves, she roused a great +tumult in his heart, shook earth and sky together—but he plodded +on. Then like a grave song-note in the storm her voice came to +him ominously.</p> +<p>“Ah! Mr. Renouard. . . ” He came up and smiled, +but she was very serious. “I can’t keep still any +longer. Is there time to walk up this headland and back before +dark?”</p> +<p>The shadows were lying lengthened on the ground; all was stillness +and peace. “No,” said Renouard, feeling suddenly as +steady as a rock. “But I can show you a view from the central +hill which your father has not seen. A view of reefs and of broken +water without end, and of great wheeling clouds of sea-birds.”</p> +<p>She came down the verandah steps at once and they moved off. +“You go first,” he proposed, “and I’ll direct +you. To the left.”</p> +<p>She was wearing a short nankin skirt, a muslin blouse; he could see +through the thin stuff the skin of her shoulders, of her arms. +The noble delicacy of her neck caused him a sort of transport. +“The path begins where these three palms are. The only palms +on the island.”</p> +<p>“I see.”</p> +<p>She never turned her head. After a while she observed: “This +path looks as if it had been made recently.”</p> +<p>“Quite recently,” he assented very low.</p> +<p>They went on climbing steadily without exchanging another word; and +when they stood on the top she gazed a long time before her. The +low evening mist veiled the further limit of the reefs. Above +the enormous and melancholy confusion, as of a fleet of wrecked islands, +the restless myriads of sea-birds rolled and unrolled dark ribbons on +the sky, gathered in clouds, soared and stooped like a play of shadows, +for they were too far for them to hear their cries.</p> +<p>Renouard broke the silence in low tones.</p> +<p>“They’ll be settling for the night presently.” +She made no sound. Round them all was peace and declining sunshine. +Near by, the topmost pinnacle of Malata, resembling the top of a buried +tower, rose a rock, weather-worn, grey, weary of watching the monotonous +centuries of the Pacific. Renouard leaned his shoulders against +it. Felicia Moorsom faced him suddenly, her splendid black eyes +full on his face as though she had made up her mind at last to destroy +his wits once and for all. Dazzled, he lowered his eyelids slowly.</p> +<p>“Mr. Renouard! There is something strange in all this. +Tell me where he is?”</p> +<p>He answered deliberately.</p> +<p>“On the other side of this rock. I buried him there myself.”</p> +<p>She pressed her hands to her breast, struggled for her breath for +a moment, then: “Ohhh! . . . You buried him! . . . What sort of +man are you? . . . You dared not tell! . . . He is another of your victims? +. . . You dared not confess that evening. . . . You must have killed +him. What could he have done to you? . . . You fastened on him +some atrocious quarrel and . . .”</p> +<p>Her vengeful aspect, her poignant cries left him as unmoved as the +weary rock against which he leaned. He only raised his eyelids +to look at her and lowered them slowly. Nothing more. It +silenced her. And as if ashamed she made a gesture with her hand, +putting away from her that thought. He spoke, quietly ironic at +first.</p> +<p>“Ha! the legendary Renouard of sensitive idiots—the ruthless +adventurer—the ogre with a future. That was a parrot cry, +Miss Moorsom. I don’t think that the greatest fool of them +all ever dared hint such a stupid thing of me that I killed men for +nothing. No, I had noticed this man in a hotel. He had come +from up country I was told, and was doing nothing. I saw him sitting +there lonely in a corner like a sick crow, and I went over one evening +to talk to him. Just on impulse. He wasn’t impressive. +He was pitiful. My worst enemy could have told you he wasn’t +good enough to be one of Renouard’s victims. It didn’t +take me long to judge that he was drugging himself. Not drinking. +Drugs.”</p> +<p>“Ah! It’s now that you are trying to murder him,” +she cried.</p> +<p>“Really. Always the Renouard of shopkeepers’ legend. +Listen! I would never have been jealous of him. And yet +I am jealous of the air you breathe, of the soil you tread on, of the +world that sees you—moving free—not mine. But never +mind. I rather liked him. For a certain reason I proposed +he should come to be my assistant here. He said he believed this +would save him. It did not save him from death. It came +to him as it were from nothing—just a fall. A mere slip +and tumble of ten feet into a ravine. But it seems he had been +hurt before up-country—by a horse. He ailed and ailed. +No, he was not a steel-tipped man. And his poor soul seemed to +have been damaged too. It gave way very soon.”</p> +<p>“This is tragic!” Felicia Moorsom whispered with feeling. +Renouard’s lips twitched, but his level voice continued mercilessly.</p> +<p>“That’s the story. He rallied a little one night +and said he wanted to tell me something. I, being a gentleman, +he said, he could confide in me. I told him that he was mistaken. +That there was a good deal of a plebeian in me, that he couldn’t +know. He seemed disappointed. He muttered something about +his innocence and something that sounded like a curse on some woman, +then turned to the wall and—just grew cold.”</p> +<p>“On a woman,” cried Miss Moorsom indignantly. “What +woman?”</p> +<p>“I wonder!” said Renouard, raising his eyes and noting +the crimson of her ear-lobes against the live whiteness of her complexion, +the sombre, as if secret, night-splendour of her eyes under the writhing +flames of her hair. “Some woman who wouldn’t believe +in that poor innocence of his. . . Yes. You probably. And +now you will not believe in me—not even in me who must in truth +be what I am—even to death. No! You won’t. +And yet, Felicia, a woman like you and a man like me do not often come +together on this earth.”</p> +<p>The flame of her glorious head scorched his face. He flung +his hat far away, and his suddenly lowered eyelids brought out startlingly +his resemblance to antique bronze, the profile of Pallas, still, austere, +bowed a little in the shadow of the rock. “Oh! If +you could only understand the truth that is in me!” he added.</p> +<p>She waited, as if too astounded to speak, till he looked up again, +and then with unnatural force as if defending herself from some unspoken +aspersion, “It’s I who stand for truth here! Believe +in you! In you, who by a heartless falsehood—and nothing +else, nothing else, do you hear?—have brought me here, deceived, +cheated, as in some abominable farce!” She sat down on a +boulder, rested her chin in her hands, in the pose of simple grief—mourning +for herself.</p> +<p>“It only wanted this. Why! Oh! Why is it +that ugliness, ridicule, and baseness must fall across my path.”</p> +<p>On that height, alone with the sky, they spoke to each other as if +the earth had fallen away from under their feet.</p> +<p>“Are you grieving for your dignity? He was a mediocre +soul and could have given you but an unworthy existence.”</p> +<p>She did not even smile at those words, but, superb, as if lifting +a corner of the veil, she turned on him slowly.</p> +<p>“And do you imagine I would have devoted myself to him for +such a purpose! Don’t you know that reparation was due to +him from me? A sacred debt—a fine duty. To redeem +him would not have been in my power—I know it. But he was +blameless, and it was for me to come forward. Don’t you +see that in the eyes of the world nothing could have rehabilitated him +so completely as his marriage with me? No word of evil could be +whispered of him after I had given him my hand. As to giving myself +up to anything less than the shaping of a man’s destiny—if +I thought I could do it I would abhor myself. . . .” She +spoke with authority in her deep fascinating, unemotional voice. +Renouard meditated, gloomy, as if over some sinister riddle of a beautiful +sphinx met on the wild road of his life.</p> +<p>“Yes. Your father was right. You are one of these +aristocrats . . .”</p> +<p>She drew herself up haughtily.</p> +<p>“What do you say? My father! . . . I an aristocrat.”</p> +<p>“Oh! I don’t mean that you are like the men and +women of the time of armours, castles, and great deeds. Oh, no! +They stood on the naked soil, had traditions to be faithful to, had +their feet on this earth of passions and death which is not a hothouse. +They would have been too plebeian for you since they had to lead, to +suffer with, to understand the commonest humanity. No, you are +merely of the topmost layer, disdainful and superior, the mere pure +froth and bubble on the inscrutable depths which some day will toss +you out of existence. But you are you! You are you! +You are the eternal love itself—only, O Divinity, it isn’t +your body, it is your soul that is made of foam.”</p> +<p>She listened as if in a dream. He had succeeded so well in +his effort to drive back the flood of his passion that his life itself +seemed to run with it out of his body. At that moment he felt +as one dead speaking. But the headlong wave returning with tenfold +force flung him on her suddenly, with open arms and blazing eyes. +She found herself like a feather in his grasp, helpless, unable to struggle, +with her feet off the ground. But this contact with her, maddening +like too much felicity, destroyed its own end. Fire ran through +his veins, turned his passion to ashes, burnt him out and left him empty, +without force—almost without desire. He let her go before +she could cry out. And she was so used to the forms of repression +enveloping, softening the crude impulses of old humanity that she no +longer believed in their existence as if it were an exploded legend. +She did not recognise what had happened to her. She came safe +out of his arms, without a struggle, not even having felt afraid.</p> +<p>“What’s the meaning of this?” she said, outraged +but calm in a scornful way.</p> +<p>He got down on his knees in silence, bent low to her very feet, while +she looked down at him, a little surprised, without animosity, as if +merely curious to see what he would do. Then, while he remained +bowed to the ground pressing the hem of her skirt to his lips, she made +a slight movement. He got up.</p> +<p>“No,” he said. “Were you ever so much mine +what could I do with you without your consent? No. You don’t +conquer a wraith, cold mist, stuff of dreams, illusion. It must +come to you and cling to your breast. And then! Oh! +And then!”</p> +<p>All ecstasy, all expression went out of his face.</p> +<p>“Mr. Renouard,” she said, “though you can have +no claim on my consideration after having decoyed me here for the vile +purpose, apparently, of gloating over me as your possible prey, I will +tell you that I am not perhaps the extraordinary being you think I am. +You may believe me. Here I stand for truth itself.”</p> +<p>“What’s that to me what you are?” he answered. +“At a sign from you I would climb up to the seventh heaven to +bring you down to earth for my own—and if I saw you steeped to +the lips in vice, in crime, in mud, I would go after you, take you to +my arms—wear you for an incomparable jewel on my breast. +And that’s love—true love—the gift and the curse of +the gods. There is no other.”</p> +<p>The truth vibrating in his voice made her recoil slightly, for she +was not fit to hear it—not even a little—not even one single +time in her life. It was revolting to her; and in her trouble, +perhaps prompted by the suggestion of his name or to soften the harshness +of expression, for she was obscurely moved, she spoke to him in French.</p> +<p>“<i>Assez! J’ai horreur de tout cela</i>,” +she said.</p> +<p>He was white to his very lips, but he was trembling no more. +The dice had been cast, and not even violence could alter the throw. +She passed by him unbendingly, and he followed her down the path. +After a time she heard him saying:</p> +<p>“And your dream is to influence a human destiny?”</p> +<p>“Yes!” she answered curtly, unabashed, with a woman’s +complete assurance.</p> +<p>“Then you may rest content. You have done it.”</p> +<p>She shrugged her shoulders slightly. But just before reaching +the end of the path she relented, stopped, and went back to him.</p> +<p>“I don’t suppose you are very anxious for people to know +how near you came to absolute turpitude. You may rest easy on +that point. I shall speak to my father, of course, and we will +agree to say that he has died—nothing more.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Renouard in a lifeless voice. “He +is dead. His very ghost shall be done with presently.”</p> +<p>She went on, but he remained standing stock still in the dusk. +She had already reached the three palms when she heard behind her a +loud peal of laughter, cynical and joyless, such as is heard in smoking-rooms +at the end of a scandalous story. It made her feel positively +faint for a moment.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER XI</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>Slowly a complete darkness enveloped Geoffrey Renouard. His +resolution had failed him. Instead of following Felicia into the +house, he had stopped under the three palms, and leaning against a smooth +trunk had abandoned himself to a sense of an immense deception and the +feeling of extreme fatigue. This walk up the hill and down again +was like the supreme effort of an explorer trying to penetrate the interior +of an unknown country, the secret of which is too well defended by its +cruel and barren nature. Decoyed by a mirage, he had gone too +far—so far that there was no going back. His strength was +at an end. For the first time in his life he had to give up, and +with a sort of despairing self-possession he tried to understand the +cause of the defeat. He did not ascribe it to that absurd dead +man.</p> +<p>The hesitating shadow of Luiz approached him unnoticed till it spoke +timidly. Renouard started.</p> +<p>“Eh? What? Dinner waiting? You must say I +beg to be excused. I can’t come. But I shall see them +to-morrow morning, at the landing place. Take your orders from +the professor as to the sailing of the schooner. Go now.”</p> +<p>Luiz, dumbfounded, retreated into the darkness. Renouard did +not move, but hours afterwards, like the bitter fruit of his immobility, +the words: “I had nothing to offer to her vanity,” came +from his lips in the silence of the island. And it was then only +that he stirred, only to wear the night out in restless tramping up +and down the various paths of the plantation. Luiz, whose sleep +was made light by the consciousness of some impending change, heard +footsteps passing by his hut, the firm tread of the master; and turning +on his mats emitted a faint Tse! Tse! Tse! of deep concern.</p> +<p>Lights had been burning in the bungalow almost all through the night; +and with the first sign of day began the bustle of departure. +House boys walked processionally carrying suit-cases and dressing-bags +down to the schooner’s boat, which came to the landing place at +the bottom of the garden. Just as the rising sun threw its golden +nimbus around the purple shape of the headland, the Planter of Malata +was perceived pacing bare-headed the curve of the little bay. +He exchanged a few words with the sailing-master of the schooner, then +remained by the boat, standing very upright, his eyes on the ground, +waiting.</p> +<p>He had not long to wait. Into the cool, overshadowed garden +the professor descended first, and came jauntily down the path in a +lively cracking of small shells. With his closed parasol hooked +on his forearm, and a book in his hand, he resembled a banal tourist +more than was permissible to a man of his unique distinction. +He waved the disengaged arm from a distance, but at close quarters, +arrested before Renouard’s immobility, he made no offer to shake +hands. He seemed to appraise the aspect of the man with a sharp +glance, and made up his mind.</p> +<p>“We are going back by Suez,” he began almost boisterously. +“I have been looking up the sailing lists. If the zephirs +of your Pacific are only moderately propitious I think we are sure to +catch the mail boat due in Marseilles on the 18th of March. This +will suit me excellently. . . .” He lowered his tone. +“My dear young friend, I’m deeply grateful to you.”</p> +<p>Renouard’s set lips moved.</p> +<p>“Why are you grateful to me?”</p> +<p>“Ah! Why? In the first place you might have made +us miss the next boat, mightn’t you? . . . I don’t thank +you for your hospitality. You can’t be angry with me for +saying that I am truly thankful to escape from it. But I am grateful +to you for what you have done, and—for being what you are.”</p> +<p>It was difficult to define the flavour of that speech, but Renouard +received it with an austerely equivocal smile. The professor stepping +into the boat opened his parasol and sat down in the stern-sheets waiting +for the ladies. No sound of human voice broke the fresh silence +of the morning while they walked the broad path, Miss Moorsom a little +in advance of her aunt.</p> +<p>When she came abreast of him Renouard raised his head.</p> +<p>“Good-bye, Mr. Renouard,” she said in a low voice, meaning +to pass on; but there was such a look of entreaty in the blue gleam +of his sunken eyes that after an imperceptible hesitation she laid her +hand, which was ungloved, in his extended palm.</p> +<p>“Will you condescend to remember me?” he asked, while +an emotion with which she was angry made her pale cheeks flush and her +black eyes sparkle.</p> +<p>“This is a strange request for you to make,” she said +exaggerating the coldness of her tone.</p> +<p>“Is it? Impudent perhaps. Yet I am not so guilty +as you think; and bear in mind that to me you can never make reparation.”</p> +<p>“Reparation? To you! It is you who can offer me +no reparation for the offence against my feelings—and my person; +for what reparation can be adequate for your odious and ridiculous plot +so scornful in its implication, so humiliating to my pride. No! +I don’t want to remember you.”</p> +<p>Unexpectedly, with a tightening grip, he pulled her nearer to him, +and looking into her eyes with fearless despair -</p> +<p>“You’ll have to. I shall haunt you,” he said +firmly.</p> +<p>Her hand was wrenched out of his grasp before he had time to release +it. Felicia Moorsom stepped into the boat, sat down by the side +of her father, and breathed tenderly on her crushed fingers.</p> +<p>The professor gave her a sidelong look—nothing more. +But the professor’s sister, yet on shore, had put up her long-handle +double eye-glass to look at the scene. She dropped it with a faint +rattle.</p> +<p>“I’ve never in my life heard anything so crude said to +a lady,” she murmured, passing before Renouard with a perfectly +erect head. When, a moment afterwards, softening suddenly, she +turned to throw a good-bye to that young man, she saw only his back +in the distance moving towards the bungalow. She watched him go +in—amazed—before she too left the soil of Malata.</p> +<p>Nobody disturbed Renouard in that room where he had shut himself +in to breathe the evanescent perfume of her who for him was no more, +till late in the afternoon when the half-caste was heard on the other +side of the door.</p> +<p>He wanted the master to know that the trader <i>Janet</i> was just +entering the cove.</p> +<p>Renouard’s strong voice on his side of the door gave him most +unexpected instructions. He was to pay off the boys with the cash +in the office and arrange with the captain of the <i>Janet</i> to take +every worker away from Malata, returning them to their respective homes. +An order on the Dunster firm would be given to him in payment.</p> +<p>And again the silence of the bungalow remained unbroken till, next +morning, the half-caste came to report that everything was done. +The plantation boys were embarking now.</p> +<p>Through a crack in the door a hand thrust at him a piece of paper, +and the door slammed to so sharply that Luiz stepped back. Then +approaching cringingly the keyhole, in a propitiatory tone he asked:</p> +<p>“Do I go too, master?”</p> +<p>“Yes. You too. Everybody.”</p> +<p>“Master stop here alone?”</p> +<p>Silence. And the half-caste’s eyes grew wide with wonder. +But he also, like those “ignorant savages,” the plantation +boys, was only too glad to leave an island haunted by the ghost of a +white man. He backed away noiselessly from the mysterious silence +in the closed room, and only in the very doorway of the bungalow allowed +himself to give vent to his feelings by a deprecatory and pained -</p> +<p>“Tse! Tse! Tse!”</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER XII</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>The Moorsoms did manage to catch the homeward mail boat all right, +but had only twenty-four hours in town. Thus the sentimental Willie +could not see very much of them. This did not prevent him afterwards +from relating at great length, with manly tears in his eyes, how poor +Miss Moorsom—the fashionable and clever beauty—found her +betrothed in Malata only to see him die in her arms. Most people +were deeply touched by the sad story. It was the talk of a good +many days.</p> +<p>But the all-knowing Editor, Renouard’s only friend and crony, +wanted to know more than the rest of the world. From professional +incontinence, perhaps, he thirsted for a full cup of harrowing detail. +And when he noticed Renouard’s schooner lying in port day after +day he sought the sailing master to learn the reason. The man +told him that such were his instructions. He had been ordered +to lie there a month before returning to Malata. And the month +was nearly up. “I will ask you to give me a passage,” +said the Editor.</p> +<p>He landed in the morning at the bottom of the garden and found peace, +stillness, sunshine reigning everywhere, the doors and windows of the +bungalow standing wide open, no sight of a human being anywhere, the +plants growing rank and tall on the deserted fields. For hours +the Editor and the schooner’s crew, excited by the mystery, roamed +over the island shouting Renouard’s name; and at last set themselves +in grim silence to explore systematically the uncleared bush and the +deeper ravines in search of his corpse. What had happened? +Had he been murdered by the boys? Or had he simply, capricious +and secretive, abandoned his plantation taking the people with him. +It was impossible to tell what had happened. At last, towards +the decline of the day, the Editor and the sailing master discovered +a track of sandals crossing a strip of sandy beach on the north shore +of the bay. Following this track fearfully, they passed round +the spur of the headland, and there on a large stone found the sandals, +Renouard’s white jacket, and the Malay sarong of chequered pattern +which the planter of Malata was well known to wear when going to bathe. +These things made a little heap, and the sailor remarked, after gazing +at it in silence -</p> +<p>“Birds have been hovering over this for many a day.”</p> +<p>“He’s gone bathing and got drowned,” cried the +Editor in dismay.</p> +<p>“I doubt it, sir. If he had been drowned anywhere within +a mile from the shore the body would have been washed out on the reefs. +And our boats have found nothing so far.”</p> +<p>Nothing was ever found—and Renouard’s disappearance remained +in the main inexplicable. For to whom could it have occurred that +a man would set out calmly to swim beyond the confines of life—with +a steady stroke—his eyes fixed on a star!</p> +<p>Next evening, from the receding schooner, the Editor looked back +for the last time at the deserted island. A black cloud hung listlessly +over the high rock on the middle hill; and under the mysterious silence +of that shadow Malata lay mournful, with an air of anguish in the wild +sunset, as if remembering the heart that was broken there.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div> +<p>Dec. 1913.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h2>THE PARTNER</h2> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<p>“And that be hanged for a silly yarn. The boatmen here +in Westport have been telling this lie to the summer visitors for years. +The sort that gets taken out for a row at a shilling a head—and +asks foolish questions—must be told something to pass the time +away. D’ye know anything more silly than being pulled in +a boat along a beach? . . . It’s like drinking weak lemonade when +you aren’t thirsty. I don’t know why they do it! +They don’t even get sick.”</p> +<p>A forgotten glass of beer stood at his elbow; the locality was a +small respectable smoking-room of a small respectable hotel, and a taste +for forming chance acquaintances accounts for my sitting up late with +him. His great, flat, furrowed cheeks were shaven; a thick, square +wisp of white hairs hung from his chin; its waggling gave additional +point to his deep utterance; and his general contempt for mankind with +its activities and moralities was expressed in the rakish set of his +big soft hat of black felt with a large rim, which he kept always on +his head.</p> +<p>His appearance was that of an old adventurer, retired after many +unholy experiences in the darkest parts of the earth; but I had every +reason to believe that he had never been outside England. From +a casual remark somebody dropped I gathered that in his early days he +must have been somehow connected with shipping—with ships in docks. +Of individuality he had plenty. And it was this which attracted +my attention at first. But he was not easy to classify, and before +the end of the week I gave him up with the vague definition, “an +imposing old ruffian.”</p> +<p>One rainy afternoon, oppressed by infinite boredom, I went into the +smoking-room. He was sitting there in absolute immobility, which +was really fakir-like and impressive. I began to wonder what could +be the associations of that sort of man, his “milieu,” his +private connections, his views, his morality, his friends, and even +his wife—when to my surprise he opened a conversation in a deep, +muttering voice.</p> +<p>I must say that since he had learned from somebody that I was a writer +of stories he had been acknowledging my existence by means of some vague +growls in the morning.</p> +<p>He was essentially a taciturn man. There was an effect of rudeness +in his fragmentary sentences. It was some time before I discovered +that what he would be at was the process by which stories—stories +for periodicals—were produced.</p> +<p>What could one say to a fellow like that? But I was bored to +death; the weather continued impossible; and I resolved to be amiable.</p> +<p>“And so you make these tales up on your own. How do they +ever come into your head?” he rumbled.</p> +<p>I explained that one generally got a hint for a tale.</p> +<p>“What sort of hint?”</p> +<p>“Well, for instance,” I said, “I got myself rowed +out to the rocks the other day. My boatman told me of the wreck +on these rocks nearly twenty years ago. That could be used as +a hint for a mainly descriptive bit of story with some such title as +‘In the Channel,’ for instance.”</p> +<p>It was then that he flew out at the boatmen and the summer visitors +who listen to their tales. Without moving a muscle of his face +he emitted a powerful “Rot,” from somewhere out of the depths +of his chest, and went on in his hoarse, fragmentary mumble. “Stare +at the silly rocks—nod their silly heads [the visitors, I presume]. +What do they think a man is—blown-out paper bag or what?—go +off pop like that when he’s hit—Damn silly yarn—Hint +indeed! . . . A lie?”</p> +<p>You must imagine this statuesque ruffian enhaloed in the black rim +of his hat, letting all this out as an old dog growls sometimes, with +his head up and staring-away eyes.</p> +<p>“Indeed!” I exclaimed. “Well, but even if +untrue it <i>is</i> a hint, enabling me to see these rocks, this gale +they speak of, the heavy seas, etc., etc., in relation to mankind. +The struggle against natural forces and the effect of the issue on at +least one, say, exalted—”</p> +<p>He interrupted me by an aggressive -</p> +<p>“Would truth be any good to you?”</p> +<p>“I shouldn’t like to say,” I answered, cautiously. +“It’s said that truth is stranger than fiction.”</p> +<p>“Who says that?” he mouthed.</p> +<p>“Oh! Nobody in particular.”</p> +<p>I turned to the window; for the contemptuous beggar was oppressive +to look at, with his immovable arm on the table. I suppose my +unceremonious manner provoked him to a comparatively long speech.</p> +<p>“Did you ever see such a silly lot of rocks? Like plums +in a slice of cold pudding.”</p> +<p>I was looking at them—an acre or more of black dots scattered +on the steel-grey shades of the level sea, under the uniform gossamer +grey mist with a formless brighter patch in one place—the veiled +whiteness of the cliff coming through, like a diffused, mysterious radiance. +It was a delicate and wonderful picture, something expressive, suggestive, +and desolate, a symphony in grey and black—a Whistler. But +the next thing said by the voice behind me made me turn round. +It growled out contempt for all associated notions of roaring seas with +concise energy, then went on -</p> +<p>“I—no such foolishness—looking at the rocks out +there—more likely call to mind an office—I used to look +in sometimes at one time—office in London—one of them small +streets behind Cannon Street Station. . . ”</p> +<p>He was very deliberate; not jerky, only fragmentary; at times profane.</p> +<p>“That’s a rather remote connection,” I observed, +approaching him.</p> +<p>“Connection? To Hades with your connections. It +was an accident.”</p> +<p>“Still,” I said, “an accident has its backward +and forward connections, which, if they could be set forth—”</p> +<p>Without moving he seemed to lend an attentive ear.</p> +<p>“Aye! Set forth. That’s perhaps what you +could do. Couldn’t you now? There’s no sea life +in this connection. But you can put it in out of your head—if +you like.”</p> +<p>“Yes. I could, if necessary,” I said. “Sometimes +it pays to put in a lot out of one’s head, and sometimes it doesn’t. +I mean that the story isn’t worth it. Everything’s +in that.”</p> +<p>It amused me to talk to him like this. He reflected audibly +that he guessed story-writers were out after money like the rest of +the world which had to live by its wits: and that it was extraordinary +how far people who were out after money would go. . . Some of them.</p> +<p>Then he made a sally against sea life. Silly sort of life, +he called it. No opportunities, no experience, no variety, nothing. +Some fine men came out of it—he admitted—but no more chance +in the world if put to it than fly. Kids. So Captain Harry +Dunbar. Good sailor. Great name as a skipper. Big +man; short side-whiskers going grey, fine face, loud voice. A +good fellow, but no more up to people’s tricks than a baby.</p> +<p>“That’s the captain of the <i>Sagamore</i> you’re +talking about,” I said, confidently.</p> +<p>After a low, scornful “Of course” he seemed now to hold +on the wall with his fixed stare the vision of that city office, “at +the back of Cannon Street Station,” while he growled and mouthed +a fragmentary description, jerking his chin up now and then, as if angry.</p> +<p>It was, according to his account, a modest place of business, not +shady in any sense, but out of the way, in a small street now rebuilt +from end to end. “Seven doors from the Cheshire Cat public +house under the railway bridge. I used to take my lunch there +when my business called me to the city. Cloete would come in to +have his chop and make the girl laugh. No need to talk much, either, +for that. Nothing but the way he would twinkle his spectacles +on you and give a twitch of his thick mouth was enough to start you +off before he began one of his little tales. Funny fellow, Cloete. +C-l-o-e-t-e—Cloete.”</p> +<p>“What was he—a Dutchman?” I asked, not seeing in +the least what all this had to do with the Westport boatmen and the +Westport summer visitors and this extraordinary old fellow’s irritable +view of them as liars and fools. “Devil knows,” he +grunted, his eyes on the wall as if not to miss a single movement of +a cinematograph picture. “Spoke nothing but English, anyway. +First I saw him—comes off a ship in dock from the States—passenger. +Asks me for a small hotel near by. Wanted to be quiet and have +a look round for a few days. I took him to a place—friend +of mine. . . Next time—in the City—Hallo! You’re +very obliging—have a drink. Talks plenty about himself. +Been years in the States. All sorts of business all over the place. +With some patent medicine people, too. Travels. Writes advertisements +and all that. Tells me funny stories. Tall, loose-limbed +fellow. Black hair up on end, like a brush; long face, long legs, +long arms, twinkle in his specs, jocular way of speaking—in a +low voice. . . See that?”</p> +<p>I nodded, but he was not looking at me.</p> +<p>“Never laughed so much in my life. The beggar—would +make you laugh telling you how he skinned his own father. He was +up to that, too. A man who’s been in the patent-medicine +trade will be up to anything from pitch-and-toss to wilful murder. +And that’s a bit of hard truth for you. Don’t mind +what they do—think they can carry off anything and talk themselves +out of anything—all the world’s a fool to them. Business +man, too, Cloete. Came over with a few hundred pounds. Looking +for something to do—in a quiet way. Nothing like the old +country, after all, says he. . . And so we part—I with more drinks +in me than I was used to. After a time, perhaps six months or +so, I run up against him again in Mr. George Dunbar’s office. +Yes, <i>that</i> office. It wasn’t often that I . . . However, +there was a bit of his cargo in a ship in dock that I wanted to ask +Mr. George about. In comes Cloete out of the room at the back +with some papers in his hand. Partner. You understand?”</p> +<p>“Aha!” I said. “The few hundred pounds.”</p> +<p>“And that tongue of his,” he growled. “Don’t +forget that tongue. Some of his tales must have opened George +Dunbar’s eyes a bit as to what business means.”</p> +<p>“A plausible fellow,” I suggested.</p> +<p>“H’m! You must have it in your own way—of +course. Well. Partner. George Dunbar puts his top-hat +on and tells me to wait a moment. . . George always looked as though +he were making a few thousands a year—a city swell. . . Come along, +old man! And he and Captain Harry go out together—some business +with a solicitor round the corner. Captain Harry, when he was +in England, used to turn up in his brother’s office regularly +about twelve. Sat in a corner like a good boy, reading the paper +and smoking his pipe. So they go out. . . Model brothers, says +Cloete—two love-birds—I am looking after the tinned-fruit +side of this cozy little show. . . Gives me that sort of talk. +Then by-and-by: What sort of old thing is that <i>Sagamore</i>? Finest +ship out—eh? I dare say all ships are fine to you. +You live by them. I tell you what; I would just as soon put my +money into an old stocking. Sooner!”</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div> +<p>He drew a breath, and I noticed his hand, lying loosely on the table, +close slowly into a fist. In that immovable man it was startling, +ominous, like the famed nod of the Commander.</p> +<p>“So, already at that time—note—already,” +he growled.</p> +<p>“But hold on,” I interrupted. “The <i>Sagamore</i> +belonged to Mundy and Rogers, I’ve been told.”</p> +<p>He snorted contemptuously. “Damn boatmen—know no +better. Flew the firm’s <i>house-flag</i>. That’s +another thing. Favour. It was like this: When old man Dunbar +died, Captain Harry was already in command with the firm. George +chucked the bank he was clerking in—to go on his own with what +there was to share after the old chap. George was a smart man. +Started warehousing; then two or three things at a time: wood-pulp, +preserved-fruit trade, and so on. And Captain Harry let him have +his share to work with. . . I am provided for in my ship, he says. . +. But by-and-by Mundy and Rogers begin to sell out to foreigners all +their ships—go into steam right away. Captain Harry gets +very upset—lose command, part with the ship he was fond of—very +wretched. Just then, so it happened, the brothers came in for +some money—an old woman died or something. Quite a tidy +bit. Then young George says: There’s enough between us two +to buy the <i>Sagamore</i> with. . . But you’ll need more money +for your business, cries Captain Harry—and the other laughs at +him: My business is going on all right. Why, I can go out and +make a handful of sovereigns while you are trying to get your pipe to +draw, old man. . . Mundy and Rogers very friendly about it: Certainly, +Captain. And we will manage her for you, if you like, as if she +were still our own. . . Why, with a connection like that it was good +investment to buy that ship. Good! Aye, at the time.”</p> +<p>The turning of his head slightly toward me at this point was like +a sign of strong feeling in any other man.</p> +<p>“You’ll mind that this was long before Cloete came into +it at all,” he muttered, warningly.</p> +<p>“Yes. I will mind,” I said. “We generally +say: some years passed. That’s soon done.”</p> +<p>He eyed me for a while silently in an unseeing way, as if engrossed +in the thought of the years so easily dealt with; his own years, too, +they were, the years before and the years (not so many) after Cloete +came upon the scene. When he began to speak again, I discerned +his intention to point out to me, in his obscure and graphic manner, +the influence on George Dunbar of long association with Cloete’s +easy moral standards, unscrupulously persuasive gift of humour (funny +fellow), and adventurously reckless disposition. He desired me +anxiously to elaborate this view, and I assured him it was quite within +my powers. He wished me also to understand that George’s +business had its ups and downs (the other brother was meantime sailing +to and fro serenely); that he got into low water at times, which worried +him rather, because he had married a young wife with expensive tastes. +He was having a pretty anxious time of it generally; and just then Cloete +ran up in the city somewhere against a man working a patent medicine +(the fellow’s old trade) with some success, but which, with capital, +capital to the tune of thousands to be spent with both hands on advertising, +could be turned into a great thing—infinitely better—paying +than a gold-mine. Cloete became excited at the possibilities of +that sort of business, in which he was an expert. I understood +that George’s partner was all on fire from the contact with this +unique opportunity.</p> +<p>“So he goes in every day into George’s room about eleven, +and sings that tune till George gnashes his teeth with rage. Do +shut up. What’s the good? No money. Hardly any +to go on with, let alone pouring thousands into advertising. Never +dare propose to his brother Harry to sell the ship. Couldn’t +think of it. Worry him to death. It would be like the end +of the world coming. And certainly not for a business of that +kind! . . . Do you think it would be a swindle? asks Cloete, twitching +his mouth. . . George owns up: No-would be no better than a squeamish +ass if he thought that, after all these years in business.</p> +<p>“Cloete looks at him hard—Never thought of <i>selling</i> +the ship. Expected the blamed old thing wouldn’t fetch half +her insured value by this time. Then George flies out at him. +What’s the meaning, then, of these silly jeers at ship-owning +for the last three weeks? Had enough of them, anyhow.</p> +<p>“Angry at having his mouth made to water, see. Cloete +don’t get excited. . . I am no squeamish ass, either, says he, +very slowly. ’Tisn’t selling your old <i>Sagamore</i> +wants. The blamed thing wants tomahawking (seems the name <i>Sagamore</i> +means an Indian chief or something. The figure-head was a half-naked +savage with a feather over one ear and a hatchet in his belt). +Tomahawking, says he.</p> +<p>“What do you mean? asks George. . . Wrecking—it could +be managed with perfect safety, goes on Cloete—your brother would +then put in his share of insurance money. Needn’t tell him +exactly what for. He thinks you’re the smartest business +man that ever lived. Make his fortune, too. . . George grips the +desk with both hands in his rage. . . You think my brother’s a +man to cast away his ship on purpose. I wouldn’t even dare +think of such a thing in the same room with him—the finest fellow +that ever lived. . . Don’t make such noise; they’ll hear +you outside, says Cloete; and he tells him that his brother is the salted +pattern of all virtues, but all that’s necessary is to induce +him to stay ashore for a voyage—for a holiday—take a rest—why +not? . . . In fact, I have in view somebody up to that sort of game—Cloete +whispers.</p> +<p>“George nearly chokes. . . So you think I am of that sort—you +think <i>me</i> capable—What do you take me for? . . . He almost +loses his head, while Cloete keeps cool, only gets white about the gills. +. . I take you for a man who will be most cursedly hard up before long. +. . He goes to the door and sends away the clerks—there were only +two—to take their lunch hour. Comes back . . . What are +you indignant about? Do I want you to rob the widow and orphan? +Why, man! Lloyd’s a corporation, it hasn’t got a body +to starve. There’s forty or more of them perhaps who underwrote +the lines on that silly ship of yours. Not one human being would +go hungry or cold for it. They take every risk into consideration. +Everything I tell you. . . That sort of talk. H’m! +George too upset to speak—only gurgles and waves his arms; so +sudden, you see. The other, warming his back at the fire, goes +on. Wood-pulp business next door to a failure. Tinned-fruit +trade nearly played out. . . You’re frightened, he says; but the +law is only meant to frighten fools away. . . And he shows how safe +casting away that ship would be. Premiums paid for so many, many +years. No shadow of suspicion could arise. And, dash it +all! a ship must meet her end some day. . .</p> +<p>“I am not frightened. I am indignant,” says George +Dunbar.</p> +<p>“Cloete boiling with rage inside. Chance of a lifetime—his +chance! And he says kindly: Your wife’ll be much more indignant +when you ask her to get out of that pretty house of yours and pile in +into a two-pair back—with kids perhaps, too. . .</p> +<p>“George had no children. Married a couple of years; looked +forward to a kid or two very much. Feels more upset than ever. +Talks about an honest man for father, and so on. Cloete grins: +You be quick before they come, and they’ll have a rich man for +father, and no one the worse for it. That’s the beauty of +the thing.</p> +<p>“George nearly cries. I believe he did cry at odd times. +This went on for weeks. He couldn’t quarrel with Cloete. +Couldn’t pay off his few hundreds; and besides, he was used to +have him about. Weak fellow, George. Cloete generous, too. +. . Don’t think of my little pile, says he. Of course it’s +gone when we have to shut up. But I don’t care, he says. +. . And then there was George’s new wife. When Cloete dines +there, the beggar puts on a dress suit; little woman liked it; . . . +Mr. Cloete, my husband’s partner; such a clever man, man of the +world, so amusing! . . . When he dines there and they are alone: Oh, +Mr. Cloete, I wish George would do something to improve our prospects. +Our position is really so mediocre. . . And Cloete smiles, but isn’t +surprised, because he had put all these notions himself into her empty +head. . . What your husband wants is enterprise, a little audacity. +You can encourage him best, Mrs. Dunbar. . . She was a silly, extravagant +little fool. Had made George take a house in Norwood. Live +up to a lot of people better off than themselves. I saw her once; +silk dress, pretty boots, all feathers and scent, pink face. More +like the Promenade at the Alhambra than a decent home, it looked to +me. But some women do get a devil of a hold on a man.”</p> +<p>“Yes, some do,” I assented. “Even when the +man is the husband.”</p> +<p>“My missis,” he addressed me unexpectedly, in a solemn, +surprisingly hollow tone, “could wind me round her little finger. +I didn’t find it out till she was gone. Aye. But she +was a woman of sense, while that piece of goods ought to have been walking +the streets, and that’s all I can say. . . You must make her up +out of your head. You will know the sort.”</p> +<p>“Leave all that to me,” I said.</p> +<p>“H’m!” he grunted, doubtfully, then going back +to his scornful tone: “A month or so afterwards the <i>Sagamore</i> +arrives home. All very jolly at first. . . Hallo, George boy! +Hallo, Harry, old man! . . . But by and by Captain Harry thinks his +clever brother is not looking very well. And George begins to +look worse. He can’t get rid of Cloete’s notion. +It has stuck in his head. . . There’s nothing wrong—quite +well. . . Captain Harry still anxious. Business going all right, +eh? Quite right. Lots of business. Good business. +. . Of course Captain Harry believes that easily. Starts chaffing +his brother in his jolly way about rolling in money. George’s +shirt sticks to his back with perspiration, and he feels quite angry +with the captain. . . The fool, he says to himself. Rolling in +money, indeed! And then he thinks suddenly: Why not? . . . Because +Cloete’s notion has got hold of his mind.</p> +<p>“But next day he weakens and says to Cloete . . . Perhaps it +would be best to sell. Couldn’t you talk to my brother? +and Cloete explains to him over again for the twentieth time why selling +wouldn’t do, anyhow. No! The <i>Sagamore</i> must +be tomahawked—as he would call it; to spare George’s feelings, +maybe. But every time he says the word, George shudders. . . I’ve +got a man at hand competent for the job who will do the trick for five +hundred, and only too pleased at the chance, says Cloete. . . George +shuts his eyes tight at that sort of talk—but at the same time +he thinks: Humbug! There can be no such man. And yet if +there was such a man it would be safe enough—perhaps.</p> +<p>“And Cloete always funny about it. He couldn’t +talk about anything without it seeming there was a great joke in it +somewhere. . . Now, says he, I know you are a moral citizen, George. +Morality is mostly funk, and I think you’re the funkiest man I +ever came across in my travels. Why, you are afraid to speak to +your brother. Afraid to open your mouth to him with a fortune +for us all in sight. . . George flares up at this: no, he ain’t +afraid; he will speak; bangs fist on the desk. And Cloete pats +him on the back. . . We’ll be made men presently, he says.</p> +<p>“But the first time George attempts to speak to Captain Harry +his heart slides down into his boots. Captain Harry only laughs +at the notion of staying ashore. He wants no holiday, not he. +But Jane thinks of remaining in England this trip. Go about a +bit and see some of her people. Jane was the Captain’s wife; +round-faced, pleasant lady. George gives up that time; but Cloete +won’t let him rest. So he tries again; and the Captain frowns. +He frowns because he’s puzzled. He can’t make it out. +He has no notion of living away from his <i>Sagamore</i>. . .</p> +<p>“Ah!” I cried. “Now I understand.”</p> +<p>“No, you don’t,” he growled, his black, contemptuous +stare turning on me crushingly.</p> +<p>“I beg your pardon,” I murmured.</p> +<p>“H’m! Very well, then. Captain Harry looks +very stern, and George crumples all up inside. . . He sees through me, +he thinks. . . Of course it could not be; but George, by that time, +was scared at his own shadow. He is shirking it with Cloete, too. +Gives his partner to understand that his brother has half a mind to +try a spell on shore, and so on. Cloete waits, gnawing his fingers; +so anxious. Cloete really had found a man for the job. Believe +it or not, he had found him inside the very boarding-house he lodged +in—somewhere about Tottenham Court Road. He had noticed +down-stairs a fellow—a boarder and not a boarder—hanging +about the dark—part of the passage mostly; sort of ‘man +of the house,’ a slinking chap. Black eyes. White +face. The woman of the house—a widow lady, she called herself—very +full of Mr. Stafford; Mr. Stafford this and Mr. Stafford that. . . Anyhow, +Cloete one evening takes him out to have a drink. Cloete mostly +passed away his evenings in saloon bars. No drunkard, though, +Cloete; for company; liked to talk to all sorts there; just habit; American +fashion.</p> +<p>“So Cloete takes that chap out more than once. Not very +good company, though. Little to say for himself. Sits quiet +and drinks what’s given to him, eyes always half closed, speaks +sort of demure. . . I’ve had misfortunes, he says. The truth +was they had kicked him out of a big steam-ship company for disgraceful +conduct; nothing to affect his certificate, you understand; and he had +gone down quite easily. Liked it, I expect. Anything’s +better than work. Lived on the widow lady who kept that boarding-house.”</p> +<p>“That’s almost incredible,” I ventured to interrupt. +“A man with a master’s certificate, do you mean?”</p> +<p>“I do; I’ve known them ’bus cads,” he growled, +contemptuously. “Yes. Swing on the tail-board by the +strap and yell, ‘tuppence all the way.’ Through drink. +But this Stafford was of another kind. Hell’s full of such +Staffords; Cloete would make fun of him, and then there would be a nasty +gleam in the fellow’s half-shut eye. But Cloete was generally +kind to him. Cloete was a fellow that would be kind to a mangy +dog. Anyhow, he used to stand drinks to that object, and now and +then gave him half a crown—because the widow lady kept Mr. Stafford +short of pocket-money. They had rows almost every day down in +the basement. . .</p> +<p>It was the fellow being a sailor that put into Cloete’s mind +the first notion of doing away with the <i>Sagamore</i>. He studies +him a bit, thinks there’s enough devil in him yet to be tempted, +and one evening he says to him . . . I suppose you wouldn’t mind +going to sea again, for a spell? . . . The other never raises his eyes; +says it’s scarcely worth one’s while for the miserable salary +one gets. . . Well, but what do you say to captain’s wages for +a time, and a couple of hundred extra if you are compelled to come home +without the ship. Accidents will happen, says Cloete. . . Oh! +sure to, says that Stafford; and goes on taking sips of his drink as +if he had no interest in the matter.</p> +<p>“Cloete presses him a bit; but the other observes, impudent +and languid like: You see, there’s no future in a thing like that—is +there? . . Oh! no, says Cloete. Certainly not. I don’t +mean this to have any future—as far as you are concerned. +It’s a ‘once for all’ transaction. Well, what +do you estimate your future at? he asks. . . The fellow more listless +than ever—nearly asleep.—I believe the skunk was really +too lazy to care. Small cheating at cards, wheedling or bullying +his living out of some woman or other, was more his style. Cloete +swears at him in whispers something awful. All this in the saloon +bar of the Horse Shoe, Tottenham Court Road. Finally they agree, +over the second sixpennyworth of Scotch hot, on five hundred pounds +as the price of tomahawking the <i>Sagamore</i>. And Cloete waits +to see what George can do.</p> +<p>“A week or two goes by. The other fellow loafs about +the house as if there had been nothing, and Cloete begins to doubt whether +he really means ever to tackle that job. But one day he stops +Cloete at the door, with his downcast eyes: What about that employment +you wished to give me? he asks. . . You see, he had played some more +than usual dirty trick on the woman and expected awful ructions presently; +and to be fired out for sure. Cloete very pleased. George +had been prevaricating to him such a lot that he really thought the +thing was as well as settled. And he says: Yes. It’s +time I introduced you to my friend. Just get your hat and we will +go now. . .</p> +<p>“The two come into the office, and George at his desk sits +up in a sudden panic—staring. Sees a tallish fellow, sort +of nasty-handsome face, heavy eyes, half shut; short drab overcoat, +shabby bowler hat, very careful—like in his movements. And +he thinks to himself, Is that how such a man looks! No, the thing’s +impossible. . . Cloete does the introduction, and the fellow turns round +to look behind him at the chair before he sits down. . . A thoroughly +competent man, Cloete goes on . . . The man says nothing, sits perfectly +quiet. And George can’t speak, throat too dry. Then +he makes an effort: H’m! H’m! Oh yes—unfortunately—sorry +to disappoint—my brother—made other arrangements—going +himself.</p> +<p>“The fellow gets up, never raising his eyes off the ground, +like a modest girl, and goes out softly, right out of the office without +a sound. Cloete sticks his chin in his hand and bites all his +fingers at once. George’s heart slows down and he speaks +to Cloete. . . This can’t be done. How can it be? +Directly the ship is lost Harry would see through it. You know +he is a man to go to the underwriters himself with his suspicions. +And he would break his heart over me. How can I play that on him? +There’s only two of us in the world belonging to each other. . +.</p> +<p>“Cloete lets out a horrid cuss-word, jumps up, bolts away into +his room, and George hears him there banging things around. After +a while he goes to the door and says in a trembling voice: You ask me +for an impossibility. . . Cloete inside ready to fly out like a tiger +and rend him; but he opens the door a little way and says softly: Talking +of hearts, yours is no bigger than a mouse’s, let me tell you. +. . But George doesn’t care—load off the heart, anyhow. +And just then Captain Harry comes in. . . Hallo, George boy. I +am little late. What about a chop at the Cheshire, now? . . . +Right you are, old man. . . And off they go to lunch together. +Cloete has nothing to eat that day.</p> +<p>“George feels a new man for a time; but all of a sudden that +fellow Stafford begins to hang about the street, in sight of the house +door. The first time George sees him he thinks he made a mistake. +But no; next time he has to go out, there is the very fellow skulking +on the other side of the road. It makes George nervous; but he +must go out on business, and when the fellow cuts across the road-way +he dodges him. He dodges him once, twice, three times; but at +last he gets nabbed in his very doorway. . . What do you want? he says, +trying to look fierce.</p> +<p>“It seems that ructions had come in the basement of that boarding-house, +and the widow lady had turned on him (being jealous mad), to the extent +of talking of the police. <i>That</i> Mr. Stafford couldn’t +stand; so he cleared out like a scared stag, and there he was, chucked +into the streets, so to speak. Cloete looked so savage as he went +to and fro that he hadn’t the spunk to tackle him; but George +seemed a softer kind to his eye. He would have been glad of half +a quid, anything. . . I’ve had misfortunes, he says softly, in +his demure way, which frightens George more than a row would have done. +. . Consider the severity of my disappointment, he says. . .</p> +<p>“George, instead of telling him to go to the devil, loses his +head. . . I don’t know you. What do you want? he cries, +and bolts up-stairs to Cloete. . . . Look what’s come of it, he +gasps; now we are at the mercy of that horrid fellow. . . Cloete tries +to show him that the fellow can do nothing; but George thinks that some +sort of scandal may be forced on, anyhow. Says that he can’t +live with that horror haunting him. Cloete would laugh if he weren’t +too weary of it all. Then a thought strikes him and he changes +his tune. . . Well, perhaps! I will go down-stairs and send him +away to begin with. . . He comes back. . . He’s gone. But +perhaps you are right. The fellow’s hard up, and that’s +what makes people desperate. The best thing would be to get him +out of the country for a time. Look here, the poor devil is really +in want of employment. I won’t ask you much this time: only +to hold your tongue; and I shall try to get your brother to take him +as chief officer. At this George lays his arms and his head on +his desk, so that Cloete feels sorry for him. But altogether Cloete +feels more cheerful because he has shaken the ghost a bit into that +Stafford. That very afternoon he buys him a suit of blue clothes, +and tells him that he will have to turn to and work for his living now. +Go to sea as mate of the <i>Sagamore</i>. The skunk wasn’t +very willing, but what with having nothing to eat and no place to sleep +in, and the woman having frightened him with the talk of some prosecution +or other, he had no choice, properly speaking. Cloete takes care +of him for a couple of days. . . Our arrangement still stands, says +he. Here’s the ship bound for Port Elizabeth; not a safe +anchorage at all. Should she by chance part from her anchors in +a north-east gale and get lost on the beach, as many of them do, why, +it’s five hundred in your pocket—and a quick return home. +You are up to the job, ain’t you?</p> +<p>“Our Mr. Stafford takes it all in with downcast eyes. . . I +am a competent seaman, he says, with his sly, modest air. A ship’s +chief mate has no doubt many opportunities to manipulate the chains +and anchors to some purpose. . . At this Cloete thumps him on the back: +You’ll do, my noble sailor. Go in and win. . .</p> +<p>“Next thing George knows, his brother tells him that he had +occasion to oblige his partner. And glad of it, too. Likes +the partner no end. Took a friend of his as mate. Man had +his troubles, been ashore a year nursing a dying wife, it seems. +Down on his luck. . . George protests earnestly that he knows nothing +of the person. Saw him once. Not very attractive to look +at. . . And Captain Harry says in his hearty way, That’s so, but +must give the poor devil a chance. . .</p> +<p>“So Mr. Stafford joins in dock. And it seems that he +did manage to monkey with one of the cables—keeping his mind on +Port Elizabeth. The riggers had all the cable ranged on deck to +clean lockers. The new mate watches them go ashore—dinner +hour—and sends the ship-keeper out of the ship to fetch him a +bottle of beer. Then he goes to work whittling away the forelock +of the forty-five-fathom shackle-pin, gives it a tap or two with a hammer +just to make it loose, and of course that cable wasn’t safe any +more. Riggers come back—you know what riggers are: come +day, go day, and God send Sunday. Down goes the chain into the +locker without their foreman looking at the shackles at all. What +does he care? He ain’t going in the ship. And two +days later the ship goes to sea. . . ”</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div> +<p>At this point I was incautious enough to breathe out another “I +see,” which gave offence again, and brought on me a rude “No, +you don’t”—as before. But in the pause he remembered +the glass of beer at his elbow. He drank half of it, wiped his +mustaches, and remarked grimly -</p> +<p>“Don’t you think that there will be any sea life in this, +because there ain’t. If you’re going to put in any +out of your own head, now’s your chance. I suppose you know +what ten days of bad weather in the Channel are like? I don’t. +Anyway, ten whole days go by. One Monday Cloete comes to the office +a little late—hears a woman’s voice in George’s room +and looks in. Newspapers on the desk, on the floor; Captain Harry’s +wife sitting with red eyes and a bag on the chair near her. . . Look +at this, says George, in great excitement, showing him a paper. +Cloete’s heart gives a jump. Ha! Wreck in Westport +Bay. The <i>Sagamore</i> gone ashore early hours of Sunday, and +so the newspaper men had time to put in some of their work. Columns +of it. Lifeboat out twice. Captain and crew remain by the +ship. Tugs summoned to assist. If the weather improves, +this well-known fine ship may yet be saved. . . You know the way these +chaps put it. . . Mrs. Harry there on her way to catch a train from +Cannon Street. Got an hour to wait.</p> +<p>“Cloete takes George aside and whispers: Ship saved yet! +Oh, damn! That must never be; you hear? But George looks +at him dazed, and Mrs. Harry keeps on sobbing quietly: . . . I ought +to have been with him. But I am going to him. . . We are all going +together, cries Cloete, all of a sudden. He rushes out, sends +the woman a cup of hot bovril from the shop across the road, buys a +rug for her, thinks of everything; and in the train tucks her in and +keeps on talking, thirteen to the dozen, all the way, to keep her spirits +up, as it were; but really because he can’t hold his peace for +very joy. Here’s the thing done all at once, and nothing +to pay. Done. Actually done. His head swims now and +again when he thinks of it. What enormous luck! It almost +frightens him. He would like to yell and sing. Meantime +George Dunbar sits in his corner, looking so deadly miserable that at +last poor Mrs. Harry tries to comfort him, and so cheers herself up +at the same time by talking about how her Harry is a prudent man; not +likely to risk his crew’s life or his own unnecessarily—and +so on.</p> +<p>“First thing they hear at Westport station is that the life-boat +has been out to the ship again, and has brought off the second officer, +who had hurt himself, and a few sailors. Captain and the rest +of the crew, about fifteen in all, are still on board. Tugs expected +to arrive every moment.</p> +<p>“They take Mrs. Harry to the inn, nearly opposite the rocks; +she bolts straight up-stairs to look out of the window, and she lets +out a great cry when she sees the wreck. She won’t rest +till she gets on board to her Harry. Cloete soothes her all he +can. . . All right; you try to eat a mouthful, and we will go to make +inquiries.</p> +<p>“He draws George out of the room: Look here, she can’t +go on board, but I shall. I’ll see to it that he doesn’t +stop in the ship too long. Let’s go and find the coxswain +of the life-boat. . . George follows him, shivering from time to time. +The waves are washing over the old pier; not much wind, a wild, gloomy +sky over the bay. In the whole world only one tug away off, heading +to the seas, tossed in and out of sight every minute as regular as clockwork.</p> +<p>“They meet the coxswain and he tells them: Yes! He’s +going out again. No, they ain’t in danger on board—not +yet. But the ship’s chance is very poor. Still, if +the wind doesn’t pipe up again and the sea goes down something +might be tried. After some talk he agrees to take Cloete on board; +supposed to be with an urgent message from the owners to the captain.</p> +<p>“Whenever Cloete looks at the sky he feels comforted; it looks +so threatening. George Dunbar follows him about with a white face +and saying nothing. Cloete takes him to have a drink or two, and +by and by he begins to pick up. . . That’s better, says Cloete; +dash me if it wasn’t like walking about with a dead man before. +You ought to be throwing up your cap, man. I feel as if I wanted +to stand in the street and cheer. Your brother is safe, the ship +is lost, and we are made men.</p> +<p>“Are you certain she’s lost? asks George. It would +be an awful blow after all the agonies I have gone through in my mind, +since you first spoke to me, if she were to be got off—and—and—all +this temptation to begin over again. . . For we had nothing to do with +this; had we?</p> +<p>“Of course not, says Cloete. Wasn’t your brother +himself in charge? It’s providential. . . Oh! cries George, +shocked. . . Well, say it’s the devil, says Cloete, cheerfully. +I don’t mind! You had nothing to do with it any more than +a baby unborn, you great softy, you. . . Cloete has got so that he almost +loved George Dunbar. Well. Yes. That was so. +I don’t mean he respected him. He was just fond of his partner.</p> +<p>“They go back, you may say fairly skipping, to the hotel, and +find the wife of the captain at the open window, with her eyes on the +ship as if she wanted to fly across the bay over there. . . Now then, +Mrs. Dunbar, cries Cloete, you can’t go, but I am going. +Any messages? Don’t be shy. I’ll deliver every +word faithfully. And if you would like to give me a kiss for him, +I’ll deliver that too, dash me if I don’t.</p> +<p>“He makes Mrs. Harry laugh with his patter. . . Oh, dear Mr. +Cloete, you are a calm, reasonable man. Make him behave sensibly. +He’s a bit obstinate, you know, and he’s so fond of the +ship, too. Tell him I am here—looking on. . . Trust me, +Mrs. Dunbar. Only shut that window, that’s a good girl. +You will be sure to catch cold if you don’t, and the Captain won’t +be pleased coming off the wreck to find you coughing and sneezing so +that you can’t tell him how happy you are. And now if you +can get me a bit of tape to fasten my glasses on good to my ears, I +will be going. . .</p> +<p>“How he gets on board I don’t know. All wet and +shaken and excited and out of breath, he does get on board. Ship +lying over, smothered in sprays, but not moving very much; just enough +to jag one’s nerve a bit. He finds them all crowded on the +deck-house forward, in their shiny oilskins, with faces like sick men. +Captain Harry can’t believe his eyes. What! Mr. Cloete! +What are you doing here, in God’s name? . . . Your wife’s +ashore there, looking on, gasps out Cloete; and after they had talked +a bit, Captain Harry thinks it’s uncommonly plucky and kind of +his brother’s partner to come off to him like this. Man +glad to have somebody to talk to. . . It’s a bad business, Mr. +Cloete, he says. And Cloete rejoices to hear that. Captain +Harry thinks he had done his best, but the cable had parted when he +tried to anchor her. It was a great trial to lose the ship. +Well, he would have to face it. He fetches a deep sigh now and +then. Cloete almost sorry he had come on board, because to be +on that wreck keeps his chest in a tight band all the time. They +crouch out of the wind under the port boat, a little apart from the +men. The life-boat had gone away after putting Cloete on board, +but was coming back next high water to take off the crew if no attempt +at getting the ship afloat could be made. Dusk was falling; winter’s +day; black sky; wind rising. Captain Harry felt melancholy. +God’s will be done. If she must be left on the rocks—why, +she must. A man should take what God sends him standing up. . +. Suddenly his voice breaks, and he squeezes Cloete’s arm: It +seems as if I couldn’t leave her, he whispers. Cloete looks +round at the men like a lot of huddled sheep and thinks to himself: +They won’t stay. . . Suddenly the ship lifts a little and sets +down with a thump. Tide rising. Everybody beginning to look +out for the life-boat. Some of the men made her out far away and +also two more tugs. But the gale has come on again, and everybody +knows that no tug will ever dare come near the ship.</p> +<p>“That’s the end, Captain Harry says, very low. . . . +Cloete thinks he never felt so cold in all his life. . . And I feel +as if I didn’t care to live on just now, mutters Captain Harry +. . . Your wife’s ashore, looking on, says Cloete . . . Yes. +Yes. It must be awful for her to look at the poor old ship lying +here done for. Why, that’s our home.</p> +<p>“Cloete thinks that as long as the <i>Sagamore’s</i> +done for he doesn’t care, and only wishes himself somewhere else. +The slightest movement of the ship cuts his breath like a blow. +And he feels excited by the danger, too. The captain takes him +aside. . . The life-boat can’t come near us for more than an hour. +Look here, Cloete, since you are here, and such a plucky one—do +something for me. . . He tells him then that down in his cabin aft in +a certain drawer there is a bundle of important papers and some sixty +sovereigns in a small canvas bag. Asks Cloete to go and get these +things out. He hasn’t been below since the ship struck, +and it seems to him that if he were to take his eyes off her she would +fall to pieces. And then the men—a scared lot by this time—if +he were to leave them by themselves they would attempt to launch one +of the ship’s boats in a panic at some heavier thump—and +then some of them bound to get drowned. . . There are two or three boxes +of matches about my shelves in my cabin if you want a light, says Captain +Harry. Only wipe your wet hands before you begin to feel for them. +. .</p> +<p>“Cloete doesn’t like the job, but doesn’t like +to show funk, either—and he goes. Lots of water on the main-deck, +and he splashes along; it was getting dark, too. All at once, +by the mainmast, somebody catches him by the arm. Stafford. +He wasn’t thinking of Stafford at all. Captain Harry had +said something as to the mate not being quite satisfactory, but it wasn’t +much. Cloete doesn’t recognise him in his oilskins at first. +He sees a white face with big eyes peering at him. . . Are you pleased, +Mr. Cloete . . . ?</p> +<p>“Cloete is moved to laugh at the whine, and shakes him off. +But the fellow scrambles on after him on the poop and follows him down +into the cabin of that wrecked ship. And there they are, the two +of them; can hardly see each other. . . You don’t mean to make +me believe you have had anything to do with this, says Cloete. . .</p> +<p>“They both shiver, nearly out of their wits with the excitement +of being on board that ship. She thumps and lurches, and they +stagger together, feeling sick. Cloete again bursts out laughing +at that wretched creature Stafford pretending to have been up to something +so desperate. . . Is that how you think you can treat me now? yells +the other man all of a sudden. . .</p> +<p>“A sea strikes the stern, the ship trembles and groans all +round them, there’s the noise of the seas about and overhead, +confusing Cloete, and he hears the other screaming as if crazy. . . +Ah, you don’t believe me! Go and look at the port chain. +Parted? Eh? Go and see if it’s parted. Go and +find the broken link. You can’t. There’s no +broken link. That means a thousand pounds for me. No less. +A thousand the day after we get ashore—prompt. I won’t +wait till she breaks up, Mr. Cloete. To the underwriters I go +if I’ve to walk to London on my bare feet. Port cable! +Look at her port cable, I will say to them. I doctored it—for +the owners—tempted by a low rascal called Cloete.</p> +<p>“Cloete does not understand what it means exactly. All +he sees is that the fellow means to make mischief. He sees trouble +ahead. . . Do you think you can scare me? he asks,—you poor miserable +skunk. . . And Stafford faces him out—both holding on to the cabin +table: No, damn you, you are only a dirty vagabond; but I can scare +the other, the chap in the black coat. . .</p> +<p>“Meaning George Dunbar. Cloete’s brain reels at +the thought. He doesn’t imagine the fellow can do any real +harm, but he knows what George is; give the show away; upset the whole +business he had set his heart on. He says nothing; he hears the +other, what with the funk and strain and excitement, panting like a +dog—and then a snarl. . . A thousand down, twenty-four hours after +we get ashore; day after to-morrow. That’s my last word, +Mr. Cloete. . . A thousand pounds, day after to-morrow, says Cloete. +Oh yes. And to-day take this, you dirty cur. . . He hits straight +from the shoulder in sheer rage, nothing else. Stafford goes away +spinning along the bulk-head. Seeing this, Cloete steps out and +lands him another one somewhere about the jaw. The fellow staggers +backward right into the captain’s cabin through the open door. +Cloete, following him up, hears him fall down heavily and roll to leeward, +then slams the door to and turns the key. . . There! says he to himself, +that will stop you from making trouble.”</p> +<p>“By Jove!” I murmured.</p> +<p>The old fellow departed from his impressive immobility to turn his +rakishly hatted head and look at me with his old, black, lack-lustre +eyes.</p> +<p>“He did leave him there,” he uttered, weightily, returning +to the contemplation of the wall. “Cloete didn’t mean +to allow anybody, let alone a thing like Stafford, to stand in the way +of his great notion of making George and himself, and Captain Harry, +too, for that matter, rich men. And he didn’t think much +of consequences. These patent-medicine chaps don’t care +what they say or what they do. They think the world’s bound +to swallow any story they like to tell. . . He stands listening for +a bit. And it gives him quite a turn to hear a thump at the door +and a sort of muffled raving screech inside the captain’s room. +He thinks he hears his own name, too, through the awful crash as the +old <i>Sagamore</i> rises and falls to a sea. That noise and that +awful shock make him clear out of the cabin. He collects his senses +on the poop. But his heart sinks a little at the black wildness +of the night. Chances that he will get drowned himself before +long. Puts his head down the companion. Through the wind +and breaking seas he can hear the noise of Stafford’s beating +against the door and cursing. He listens and says to himself: +No. Can’t trust him now. . .</p> +<p>“When he gets back to the top of the deck-house he says to +Captain Harry, who asks him if he got the things, that he is very sorry. +There was something wrong with the door. Couldn’t open it. +And to tell you the truth, says he, I didn’t like to stop any +longer in that cabin. There are noises there as if the ship were +going to pieces. . . Captain Harry thinks: Nervous; can’t be anything +wrong with the door. But he says: Thanks—never mind, never +mind. . . All hands looking out now for the life-boat. Everybody +thinking of himself rather. Cloete asks himself, will they miss +him? But the fact is that Mr. Stafford had made such poor show +at sea that after the ship struck nobody ever paid any attention to +him. Nobody cared what he did or where he was. Pitch dark, +too—no counting of heads. The light of the tug with the +lifeboat in tow is seen making for the ship, and Captain Harry asks: +Are we all there? . . . Somebody answers: All here, sir. . . Stand by +to leave the ship, then, says Captain Harry; and two of you help the +gentleman over first. . . Aye, aye, sir. . . Cloete was moved to ask +Captain Harry to let him stay till last, but the life-boat drops on +a grapnel abreast the fore-rigging, two chaps lay hold of him, watch +their chance, and drop him into her, all safe.</p> +<p>“He’s nearly exhausted; not used to that sort of thing, +you see. He sits in the stern-sheets with his eyes shut. +Don’t want to look at the white water boiling all around. +The men drop into the boat one after another. Then he hears Captain +Harry’s voice shouting in the wind to the coxswain, to hold on +a moment, and some other words he can’t catch, and the coxswain +yelling back: Don’t be long, sir. . . What is it? Cloete +asks feeling faint. . . Something about the ship’s papers, says +the coxswain, very anxious. It’s no time to be fooling about +alongside, you understand. They haul the boat off a little and +wait. The water flies over her in sheets. Cloete’s +senses almost leave him. He thinks of nothing. He’s +numb all over, till there’s a shout: Here he is! . . . They see +a figure in the fore-rigging waiting—they slack away on the grapnel-line +and get him in the boat quite easy. There is a little shouting—it’s +all mixed up with the noise of the sea. Cloete fancies that Stafford’s +voice is talking away quite close to his ear. There’s a +lull in the wind, and Stafford’s voice seems to be speaking very +fast to the coxswain; he tells him that of course he was near his skipper, +was all the time near him, till the old man said at the last moment +that he must go and get the ship’s papers from aft; would insist +on going himself; told him, Stafford, to get into the life-boat. . . +He had meant to wait for his skipper, only there came this smooth of +the seas, and he thought he would take his chance at once.</p> +<p>“Cloete opens his eyes. Yes. There’s Stafford +sitting close by him in that crowded life-boat. The coxswain stoops +over Cloete and cries: Did you hear what the mate said, sir? . . . Cloete’s +face feels as if it were set in plaster, lips and all. Yes, I +did, he forces himself to answer. The coxswain waits a moment, +then says: I don’t like it. . . And he turns to the mate, telling +him it was a pity he did not try to run along the deck and hurry up +the captain when the lull came. Stafford answers at once that +he did think of it, only he was afraid of missing him on the deck in +the dark. For, says he, the captain might have got over at once, +thinking I was already in the life-boat, and you would have hauled off +perhaps, leaving me behind. . . True enough, says the coxswain. +A minute or so passes. This won’t do, mutters the coxswain. +Suddenly Stafford speaks up in a sort of hollow voice: I was by when +he told Mr. Cloete here that he didn’t know how he would ever +have the courage to leave the old ship; didn’t he, now? . . . +And Cloete feels his arm being gripped quietly in the dark. . . Didn’t +he now? We were standing together just before you went over, Mr. +Cloete? . . .</p> +<p>“Just then the coxswain cries out: I’m going on board +to see. . . Cloete tears his arm away: I am going with you. . .</p> +<p>“When they get aboard, the coxswain tells Cloete to go aft +along one side of the ship and he would go along the other so as not +to miss the captain. . . And feel about with your hands, too, says he; +he might have fallen and be lying insensible somewhere on the deck. +. . When Cloete gets at last to the cabin companion on the poop the +coxswain is already there, peering down and sniffing. I detect +a smell of smoke down there, says he. And he yells: Are you there, +sir? . . . This is not a case for shouting, says Cloete, feeling his +heart go stony, as it were. . . Down they go. Pitch dark; the +inclination so sharp that the coxswain, groping his way into the captain’s +room, slips and goes tumbling down. Cloete hears him cry out as +though he had hurt himself, and asks what’s the matter. +And the coxswain answers quietly that he had fallen on the captain, +lying there insensible. Cloete without a word begins to grope +all over the shelves for a box of matches, finds one, and strikes a +light. He sees the coxswain in his cork jacket kneeling over Captain +Harry. . . Blood, says the coxswain, looking up, and the match goes +out. . .</p> +<p>“Wait a bit, says Cloete; I’ll make paper spills. . . +He had felt the back of books on the shelves. And so he stands +lighting one spill from another while the coxswain turns poor Captain +Harry over. Dead, he says. Shot through the heart. +Here’s the revolver. . . He hands it up to Cloete, who looks at +it before putting it in his pocket, and sees a plate on the butt with +<i>H. Dunbar</i> on it. . . His own, he mutters. . . Whose else revolver +did you expect to find? snaps the coxswain. And look, he took +off his long oilskin in the cabin before he went in. But what’s +this lot of burnt paper? What could he want to burn the ship’s +papers for? . . .</p> +<p>Cloete sees all, the little drawers drawn out, and asks the coxswain +to look well into them. . . There’s nothing, says the man. +Cleaned out. Seems to have pulled out all he could lay his hands +on and set fire to the lot. Mad—that’s what it is—went +mad. And now he’s dead. You’ll have to break +it to his wife. . .</p> +<p>“I feel as if I were going mad myself, says Cloete, suddenly, +and the coxswain begs him for God’s sake to pull himself together, +and drags him away from the cabin. They had to leave the body, +and as it was they were just in time before a furious squall came on. +Cloete is dragged into the life-boat and the coxswain tumbles in. +Haul away on the grapnel, he shouts; the captain has shot himself. . +.</p> +<p>“Cloete was like a dead man—didn’t care for anything. +He let that Stafford pinch his arm twice without making a sign. +Most of Westport was on the old pier to see the men out of the life-boat, +and at first there was a sort of confused cheery uproar when she came +alongside; but after the coxswain has shouted something the voices die +out, and everybody is very quiet. As soon as Cloete has set foot +on something firm he becomes himself again. The coxswain shakes +hands with him: Poor woman, poor woman, I’d rather you had the +job than I. . .</p> +<p>“Where’s the mate?” asks Cloete. He’s +the last man who spoke to the master. . . Somebody ran along—the +crew were being taken to the Mission Hall, where there was a fire and +shake-downs ready for them—somebody ran along the pier and caught +up with Stafford. . . Here! The owner’s agent wants you. +. . Cloete tucks the fellow’s arm under his own and walks away +with him to the left, where the fishing-harbour is. . . I suppose I +haven’t misunderstood you. You wish me to look after you +a bit, says he. The other hangs on him rather limp, but gives +a nasty little laugh: You had better, he mumbles; but mind, no tricks; +no tricks, Mr. Cloete; we are on land now.</p> +<p>“There’s a police office within fifty yards from here, +says Cloete. He turns into a little public house, pushes Stafford +along the passage. The landlord runs out of the bar. . . This +is the mate of the ship on the rocks, Cloete explains; I wish you would +take care of him a bit to-night. . . What’s the matter with him? +asks the man. Stafford leans against the wall in the passage, +looking ghastly. And Cloete says it’s nothing—done +up, of course. . . I will be responsible for the expense; I am the owner’s +agent. I’ll be round in an hour or two to see him.</p> +<p>And Cloete gets back to the hotel. The news had travelled there +already, and the first thing he sees is George outside the door as white +as a sheet waiting for him. Cloete just gives him a nod and they +go in. Mrs. Harry stands at the head of the stairs, and, when +she sees only these two coming up, flings her arms above her head and +runs into her room. Nobody had dared tell her, but not seeing +her husband was enough. Cloete hears an awful shriek. . . Go to +her, he says to George.</p> +<p>“While he’s alone in the private parlour Cloete drinks +a glass of brandy and thinks it all out. Then George comes in. +. . The landlady’s with her, he says. And he begins to walk +up and down the room, flinging his arms about and talking, disconnected +like, his face set hard as Cloete has never seen it before. . . What +must be, must be. Dead—only brother. Well, dead—his +troubles over. But we are living, he says to Cloete; and I suppose, +says he, glaring at him with hot, dry eyes, that you won’t forget +to wire in the morning to your friend that we are coming in for certain. +. .</p> +<p>“Meaning the patent-medicine fellow. . . Death is death and +business is business, George goes on; and look—my hands are clean, +he says, showing them to Cloete. Cloete thinks: He’s going +crazy. He catches hold of him by the shoulders and begins to shake +him: Damn you—if you had had the sense to know what to say to +your brother, if you had had the spunk to speak to him at all, you moral +creature you, he would be alive now, he shouts.</p> +<p>“At this George stares, then bursts out weeping with a great +bellow. He throws himself on the couch, buries his face in a cushion, +and howls like a kid. . . That’s better, thinks Cloete, and he +leaves him, telling the landlord that he must go out, as he has some +little business to attend to that night. The landlord’s +wife, weeping herself, catches him on the stairs: Oh, sir, that poor +lady will go out of her mind. . .</p> +<p>“Cloete shakes her off, thinking to himself: Oh no! She +won’t. She will get over it. Nobody will go mad about +this affair unless I do. It isn’t sorrow that makes people +go mad, but worry.</p> +<p>“There Cloete was wrong. What affected Mrs. Harry was +that her husband should take his own life, with her, as it were, looking +on. She brooded over it so that in less than a year they had to +put her into a Home. She was very, very quiet; just gentle melancholy. +She lived for quite a long time.</p> +<p>“Well, Cloete splashes along in the wind and rain. Nobody +in the streets—all the excitement over. The publican runs +out to meet him in the passage and says to him: Not this way. +He isn’t in his room. We couldn’t get him to go to +bed nohow. He’s in the little parlour there. We’ve +lighted him a fire. . . You have been giving him drinks too, says Cloete; +I never said I would be responsible for drinks. How many? . . +. Two, says the other. It’s all right. I don’t +mind doing that much for a shipwrecked sailor. . . Cloete smiles his +funny smile: Eh? Come. He paid for them. . . The publican +just blinks. . . Gave you gold, didn’t he? Speak up! . . +. What of that! cries the man. What are you after, anyway? +He had the right change for his sovereign.</p> +<p>“Just so, says Cloete. He walks into the parlour, and +there he sees our Stafford; hair all up on end, landlord’s shirt +and pants on, bare feet in slippers, sitting by the fire. When +he sees Cloete he casts his eyes down.</p> +<p>“You didn’t mean us ever to meet again, Mr. Cloete, Stafford +says, demurely. . . That fellow, when he had the drink he wanted—he +wasn’t a drunkard—would put on this sort of sly, modest +air. . . But since the captain committed suicide, he says, I have been +sitting here thinking it out. All sorts of things happen. +Conspiracy to lose the ship—attempted murder—and this suicide. +For if it was not suicide, Mr. Cloete, then I know of a victim of the +most cruel, cold-blooded attempt at murder; somebody who has suffered +a thousand deaths. And that makes the thousand pounds of which +we spoke once a quite insignificant sum. Look how very convenient +this suicide is. . .</p> +<p>“He looks up at Cloete then, who smiles at him and comes quite +close to the table.</p> +<p>“You killed Harry Dunbar, he whispers. . . The fellow glares +at him and shows his teeth: Of course I did! I had been in that +cabin for an hour and a half like a rat in a trap. . . Shut up and left +to drown in that wreck. Let flesh and blood judge. Of course +I shot him! I thought it was you, you murdering scoundrel, come +back to settle me. He opens the door flying and tumbles right +down upon me; I had a revolver in my hand, and I shot him. I was +crazy. Men have gone crazy for less.</p> +<p>“Cloete looks at him without flinching. Aha! That’s +your story, is it? . . . And he shakes the table a little in his passion +as he speaks. . . Now listen to mine. What’s this conspiracy? +Who’s going to prove it? You were there to rob. You +were rifling his cabin; he came upon you unawares with your hands in +the drawer; and you shot him with his own revolver. You killed +to steal—to steal! His brother and the clerks in the office +know that he took sixty pounds with him to sea. Sixty pounds in +gold in a canvas bag. He told me where they were. The coxswain +of the life-boat can swear to it that the drawers were all empty. +And you are such a fool that before you’re half an hour ashore +you change a sovereign to pay for a drink. Listen to me. +If you don’t turn up day after to-morrow at George Dunbar’s +solicitors, to make the proper deposition as to the loss of the ship, +I shall set the police on your track. Day after to-morrow. . .</p> +<p>“And then what do you think? That Stafford begins to +tear his hair. Just so. Tugs at it with both hands without +saying anything. Cloete gives a push to the table which nearly +sends the fellow off his chair, tumbling inside the fender; so that +he has got to catch hold of it to save himself. . .</p> +<p>“You know the sort of man I am, Cloete says, fiercely. +I’ve got to a point that I don’t care what happens to me. +I would shoot you now for tuppence.</p> +<p>“At this the cur dodges under the table. Then Cloete +goes out, and as he turns in the street—you know, little fishermen’s +cottages, all dark; raining in torrents, too—the other opens the +window of the parlour and speaks in a sort of crying voice -</p> +<p>“You low Yankee fiend—I’ll pay you off some day.</p> +<p>“Cloete passes by with a damn bitter laugh, because he thinks +that the fellow in a way has paid him off already, if he only knew it.”</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div> +<p>My impressive ruffian drank what remained of his beer, while his +black, sunken eyes looked at me over the rim.</p> +<p>“I don’t quite understand this,” I said. +“In what way?”</p> +<p>He unbent a little and explained without too much scorn that Captain +Harry being dead, his half of the insurance money went to his wife, +and her trustees of course bought consols with it. Enough to keep +her comfortable. George Dunbar’s half, as Cloete feared +from the first, did not prove sufficient to launch the medicine well; +other moneyed men stepped in, and these two had to go out of that business, +pretty nearly shorn of everything.</p> +<p>“I am curious,” I said, “to learn what the motive +force of this tragic affair was—I mean the patent medicine. +Do you know?”</p> +<p>He named it, and I whistled respectfully. Nothing less than +Parker’s Lively Lumbago Pills. Enormous property! +You know it; all the world knows it. Every second man, at least, +on this globe of ours has tried it.</p> +<p>“Why!” I cried, “they missed an immense fortune.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” he mumbled, “by the price of a revolver-shot.”</p> +<p>He told me also that eventually Cloete returned to the States, passenger +in a cargo-boat from Albert Dock. The night before he sailed he +met him wandering about the quays, and took him home for a drink. +“Funny chap, Cloete. We sat all night drinking grogs, till +it was time for him to go on board.”</p> +<p>It was then that Cloete, unembittered but weary, told him this story, +with that utterly unconscious frankness of a patent-medicine man stranger +to all moral standards. Cloete concluded by remarking that he, +had “had enough of the old country.” George Dunbar +had turned on him, too, in the end. Cloete was clearly somewhat +disillusioned.</p> +<p>As to Stafford, he died, professed loafer, in some East End hospital +or other, and on his last day clamoured “for a parson,” +because his conscience worried him for killing an innocent man. +“Wanted somebody to tell him it was all right,” growled +my old ruffian, contemptuously. “He told the parson that +I knew this Cloete who had tried to murder him, and so the parson (he +worked among the dock labourers) once spoke to me about it. That +skunk of a fellow finding himself trapped yelled for mercy. . . Promised +to be good and so on. . . Then he went crazy . . . screamed and threw +himself about, beat his head against the bulkheads . . . you can guess +all that—eh? . . . till he was exhausted. Gave up. +Threw himself down, shut his eyes, and wanted to pray. So he says. +Tried to think of some prayer for a quick death—he was that terrified. +Thought that if he had a knife or something he would cut his throat, +and be done with it. Then he thinks: No! Would try to cut +away the wood about the lock. . . He had no knife in his pocket. . . +he was weeping and calling on God to send him a tool of some kind when +suddenly he thinks: Axe! In most ships there is a spare emergency +axe kept in the master’s room in some locker or other. . . Up +he jumps. . . Pitch dark. “Pulls at the drawers to find +matches and, groping for them, the first thing he comes upon—Captain +Harry’s revolver. Loaded too. He goes perfectly quiet +all over. Can shoot the lock to pieces. See? Saved! +God’s providence! There are boxes of matches too. +Thinks he: I may just as well see what I am about.</p> +<p>“Strikes a light and sees the little canvas bag tucked away +at the back of the drawer. Knew at once what that was. Rams +it into his pocket quick. Aha! says he to himself: this requires +more light. So he pitches a lot of paper on the floor, set fire +to it, and starts in a hurry rummaging for more valuables. Did +you ever? He told that East-End parson that the devil tempted +him. First God’s mercy—then devil’s work. +Turn and turn about. . .</p> +<p>“Any squirming skunk can talk like that. He was so busy +with the drawers that the first thing he heard was a shout, Great Heavens. +He looks up and there was the door open (Cloete had left the key in +the lock) and Captain Harry holding on, well above him, very fierce +in the light of the burning papers. His eyes were starting out +of his head. Thieving, he thunders at him. A sailor! +An officer! No! A wretch like you deserves no better than +to be left here to drown.</p> +<p>“This Stafford—on his death-bed—told the parson +that when he heard these words he went crazy again. He snatched +his hand with the revolver in it out of the drawer, and fired without +aiming. Captain Harry fell right in with a crash like a stone +on top of the burning papers, putting the blaze out. All dark. +Not a sound. He listened for a bit then dropped the revolver and +scrambled out on deck like mad.”</p> +<p>The old fellow struck the table with his ponderous fist.</p> +<p>“What makes me sick is to hear these silly boat-men telling +people the captain committed suicide. Pah! Captain Harry +was a man that could face his Maker any time up there, and here below, +too. He wasn’t the sort to slink out of life. Not +he! He was a good man down to the ground. He gave me my +first job as stevedore only three days after I got married.”</p> +<p>As the vindication of Captain Harry from the charge of suicide seemed +to be his only object, I did not thank him very effusively for his material. +And then it was not worth many thanks in any case.</p> +<p>For it is too startling even to think of such things happening in +our respectable Channel in full view, so to speak, of the luxurious +continental traffic to Switzerland and Monte Carlo. This story +to be acceptable should have been transposed to somewhere in the South +Seas. But it would have been too much trouble to cook it for the +consumption of magazine readers. So here it is raw, so to speak—just +as it was told to me—but unfortunately robbed of the striking +effect of the narrator; the most imposing old ruffian that ever followed +the unromantic trade of master stevedore in the port of London.</p> +<p>Oct. 1910.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h2>THE INN OF THE TWO WITCHES—A FIND</h2> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<p>This tale, episode, experience—call it how you will—was +related in the fifties of the last century by a man who, by his own +confession, was sixty years old at the time. Sixty is not a bad +age—unless in perspective, when no doubt it is contemplated by +the majority of us with mixed feelings. It is a calm age; the +game is practically over by then; and standing aside one begins to remember +with a certain vividness what a fine fellow one used to be. I +have observed that, by an amiable attention of Providence, most people +at sixty begin to take a romantic view of themselves. Their very +failures exhale a charm of peculiar potency. And indeed the hopes +of the future are a fine company to live with, exquisite forms, fascinating +if you like, but—so to speak—naked, stripped for a run. +The robes of glamour are luckily the property of the immovable past +which, without them, would sit, a shivery sort of thing, under the gathering +shadows.</p> +<p>I suppose it was the romanticism of growing age which set our man +to relate his experience for his own satisfaction or for the wonder +of his posterity. It could not have been for his glory, because +the experience was simply that of an abominable fright—terror +he calls it. You would have guessed that the relation alluded +to in the very first lines was in writing.</p> +<p>This writing constitutes the Find declared in the sub-title. +The title itself is my own contrivance, (can’t call it invention), +and has the merit of veracity. We will be concerned with an inn +here. As to the witches that’s merely a conventional expression, +and we must take our man’s word for it that it fits the case.</p> +<p>The Find was made in a box of books bought in London, in a street +which no longer exists, from a second-hand bookseller in the last stage +of decay. As to the books themselves they were at least twentieth-hand, +and on inspection turned out not worth the very small sum of money I +disbursed. It might have been some premonition of that fact which +made me say: “But I must have the box too.” The decayed +bookseller assented by the careless, tragic gesture of a man already +doomed to extinction.</p> +<p>A litter of loose pages at the bottom of the box excited my curiosity +but faintly. The close, neat, regular handwriting was not attractive +at first sight. But in one place the statement that in A.D. 1813 +the writer was twenty-two years old caught my eye. Two and twenty +is an interesting age in which one is easily reckless and easily frightened; +the faculty of reflection being weak and the power of imagination strong.</p> +<p>In another place the phrase: “At night we stood in again,” +arrested my languid attention, because it was a sea phrase. “Let’s +see what it is all about,” I thought, without excitement.</p> +<p>Oh! but it was a dull-faced MS., each line resembling every other +line in their close-set and regular order. It was like the drone +of a monotonous voice. A treatise on sugar-refining (the dreariest +subject I can think of) could have been given a more lively appearance. +“In A.D. 1813, I was twenty-two years old,” he begins earnestly +and goes on with every appearance of calm, horrible industry. +Don’t imagine, however, that there is anything archaic in my find. +Diabolic ingenuity in invention though as old as the world is by no +means a lost art. Look at the telephones for shattering the little +peace of mind given to us in this world, or at the machine guns for +letting with dispatch life out of our bodies. Now-a-days any blear-eyed +old witch if only strong enough to turn an insignificant little handle +could lay low a hundred young men of twenty in the twinkling of an eye.</p> +<p>If this isn’t progress! . . . Why immense! We have moved +on, and so you must expect to meet here a certain naiveness of contrivance +and simplicity of aim appertaining to the remote epoch. And of +course no motoring tourist can hope to find such an inn anywhere, now. +This one, the one of the title, was situated in Spain. That much +I discovered only from internal evidence, because a good many pages +of that relation were missing—perhaps not a great misfortune after +all. The writer seemed to have entered into a most elaborate detail +of the why and wherefore of his presence on that coast—presumably +the north coast of Spain. His experience has nothing to do with +the sea, though. As far as I can make it out, he was an officer +on board a sloop-of-war. There’s nothing strange in that. +At all stages of the long Peninsular campaign many of our men-of-war +of the smaller kind were cruising off the north coast of Spain—as +risky and disagreeable a station as can be well imagined.</p> +<p>It looks as though that ship of his had had some special service +to perform. A careful explanation of all the circumstances was +to be expected from our man, only, as I’ve said, some of his pages +(good tough paper too) were missing: gone in covers for jampots or in +wadding for the fowling-pieces of his irreverent posterity. But +it is to be seen clearly that communication with the shore and even +the sending of messengers inland was part of her service, either to +obtain intelligence from or to transmit orders or advice to patriotic +Spaniards, guerilleros or secret juntas of the province. Something +of the sort. All this can be only inferred from the preserved +scraps of his conscientious writing.</p> +<p>Next we come upon the panegyric of a very fine sailor, a member of +the ship’s company, having the rating of the captain’s coxswain. +He was known on board as Cuba Tom; not because he was Cuban however; +he was indeed the best type of a genuine British tar of that time, and +a man-of-war’s man for years. He came by the name on account +of some wonderful adventures he had in that island in his young days, +adventures which were the favourite subject of the yarns he was in the +habit of spinning to his shipmates of an evening on the forecastle head. +He was intelligent, very strong, and of proved courage. Incidentally +we are told, so exact is our narrator, that Tom had the finest pigtail +for thickness and length of any man in the Navy. This appendage, +much cared for and sheathed tightly in a porpoise skin, hung half way +down his broad back to the great admiration of all beholders and to +the great envy of some.</p> +<p>Our young officer dwells on the manly qualities of Cuba Tom with +something like affection. This sort of relation between officer +and man was not then very rare. A youngster on joining the service +was put under the charge of a trustworthy seaman, who slung his first +hammock for him and often later on became a sort of humble friend to +the junior officer. The narrator on joining the sloop had found +this man on board after some years of separation. There is something +touching in the warm pleasure he remembers and records at this meeting +with the professional mentor of his boyhood.</p> +<p>We discover then that, no Spaniard being forthcoming for the service, +this worthy seaman with the unique pigtail and a very high character +for courage and steadiness had been selected as messenger for one of +these missions inland which have been mentioned. His preparations +were not elaborate. One gloomy autumn morning the sloop ran close +to a shallow cove where a landing could be made on that iron-bound shore. +A boat was lowered, and pulled in with Tom Corbin (Cuba Tom) perched +in the bow, and our young man (Mr. Edgar Byrne was his name on this +earth which knows him no more) sitting in the stern sheets.</p> +<p>A few inhabitants of a hamlet, whose grey stone houses could be seen +a hundred yards or so up a deep ravine, had come down to the shore and +watched the approach of the boat. The two Englishmen leaped ashore. +Either from dullness or astonishment the peasants gave no greeting, +and only fell back in silence.</p> +<p>Mr. Byrne had made up his mind to see Tom Corbin started fairly on +his way. He looked round at the heavy surprised faces.</p> +<p>“There isn’t much to get out of them,” he said. +“Let us walk up to the village. There will be a wine shop +for sure where we may find somebody more promising to talk to and get +some information from.”</p> +<p>“Aye, aye, sir,” said Tom falling into step behind his +officer. “A bit of palaver as to courses and distances can +do no harm; I crossed the broadest part of Cuba by the help of my tongue +tho’ knowing far less Spanish than I do now. As they say +themselves it was ‘four words and no more’ with me, that +time when I got left behind on shore by the <i>Blanche</i>, frigate.”</p> +<p>He made light of what was before him, which was but a day’s +journey into the mountains. It is true that there was a full day’s +journey before striking the mountain path, but that was nothing for +a man who had crossed the island of Cuba on his two legs, and with no +more than four words of the language to begin with.</p> +<p>The officer and the man were walking now on a thick sodden bed of +dead leaves, which the peasants thereabouts accumulate in the streets +of their villages to rot during the winter for field manure. Turning +his head Mr. Byrne perceived that the whole male population of the hamlet +was following them on the noiseless springy carpet. Women stared +from the doors of the houses and the children had apparently gone into +hiding. The village knew the ship by sight, afar off, but no stranger +had landed on that spot perhaps for a hundred years or more. The +cocked hat of Mr. Byrne, the bushy whiskers and the enormous pigtail +of the sailor, filled them with mute wonder. They pressed behind +the two Englishmen staring like those islanders discovered by Captain +Cook in the South Seas.</p> +<p>It was then that Byrne had his first glimpse of the little cloaked +man in a yellow hat. Faded and dingy as it was, this covering +for his head made him noticeable.</p> +<p>The entrance to the wine shop was like a rough hole in a wall of +flints. The owner was the only person who was not in the street, +for he came out from the darkness at the back where the inflated forms +of wine skins hung on nails could be vaguely distinguished. He +was a tall, one-eyed Asturian with scrubby, hollow cheeks; a grave expression +of countenance contrasted enigmatically with the roaming restlessness +of his solitary eye. On learning that the matter in hand was the +sending on his way of that English mariner toward a certain Gonzales +in the mountains, he closed his good eye for a moment as if in meditation. +Then opened it, very lively again.</p> +<p>“Possibly, possibly. It could be done.”</p> +<p>A friendly murmur arose in the group in the doorway at the name of +Gonzales, the local leader against the French. Inquiring as to +the safety of the road Byrne was glad to learn that no troops of that +nation had been seen in the neighbourhood for months. Not the +smallest little detachment of these impious <i>polizones</i>. +While giving these answers the owner of the wine-shop busied himself +in drawing into an earthenware jug some wine which he set before the +heretic English, pocketing with grave abstraction the small piece of +money the officer threw upon the table in recognition of the unwritten +law that none may enter a wine-shop without buying drink. His +eye was in constant motion as if it were trying to do the work of the +two; but when Byrne made inquiries as to the possibility of hiring a +mule, it became immovably fixed in the direction of the door which was +closely besieged by the curious. In front of them, just within +the threshold, the little man in the large cloak and yellow hat had +taken his stand. He was a diminutive person, a mere homunculus, +Byrne describes him, in a ridiculously mysterious, yet assertive attitude, +a corner of his cloak thrown cavalierly over his left shoulder, muffling +his chin and mouth; while the broad-brimmed yellow hat hung on a corner +of his square little head. He stood there taking snuff, repeatedly.</p> +<p>“A mule,” repeated the wine-seller, his eyes fixed on +that quaint and snuffy figure. . . “No, señor officer! +Decidedly no mule is to be got in this poor place.”</p> +<p>The coxswain, who stood by with the true sailor’s air of unconcern +in strange surroundings, struck in quietly -</p> +<p>“If your honour will believe me Shank’s pony’s +the best for this job. I would have to leave the beast somewhere, +anyhow, since the captain has told me that half my way will be along +paths fit only for goats.”</p> +<p>The diminutive man made a step forward, and speaking through the +folds of the cloak which seemed to muffle a sarcastic intention -</p> +<p>“Si, señor. They are too honest in this village +to have a single mule amongst them for your worship’s service. +To that I can bear testimony. In these times it’s only rogues +or very clever men who can manage to have mules or any other four-footed +beasts and the wherewithal to keep them. But what this valiant +mariner wants is a guide; and here, señor, behold my brother-in-law, +Bernardino, wine-seller, and alcade of this most Christian and hospitable +village, who will find you one.”</p> +<p>This, Mr. Byrne says in his relation, was the only thing to do. +A youth in a ragged coat and goat-skin breeches was produced after some +more talk. The English officer stood treat to the whole village, +and while the peasants drank he and Cuba Tom took their departure accompanied +by the guide. The diminutive man in the cloak had disappeared.</p> +<p>Byrne went along with the coxswain out of the village. He wanted +to see him fairly on his way; and he would have gone a greater distance, +if the seaman had not suggested respectfully the advisability of return +so as not to keep the ship a moment longer than necessary so close in +with the shore on such an unpromising looking morning. A wild +gloomy sky hung over their heads when they took leave of each other, +and their surroundings of rank bushes and stony fields were dreary.</p> +<p>“In four days’ time,” were Byrne’s last words, +“the ship will stand in and send a boat on shore if the weather +permits. If not you’ll have to make it out on shore the +best you can till we come along to take you off.”</p> +<p>“Right you are, sir,” answered Tom, and strode on. +Byrne watched him step out on a narrow path. In a thick pea-jacket +with a pair of pistols in his belt, a cutlass by his side, and a stout +cudgel in his hand, he looked a sturdy figure and well able to take +care of himself. He turned round for a moment to wave his hand, +giving to Byrne one more view of his honest bronzed face with bushy +whiskers. The lad in goatskin breeches looking, Byrne says, like +a faun or a young satyr leaping ahead, stopped to wait for him, and +then went off at a bound. Both disappeared.</p> +<p>Byrne turned back. The hamlet was hidden in a fold of the ground, +and the spot seemed the most lonely corner of the earth and as if accursed +in its uninhabited desolate barrenness. Before he had walked many +yards, there appeared very suddenly from behind a bush the muffled up +diminutive Spaniard. Naturally Byrne stopped short.</p> +<p>The other made a mysterious gesture with a tiny hand peeping from +under his cloak. His hat hung very much at the side of his head. +“Señor,” he said without any preliminaries. +“Caution! It is a positive fact that one-eyed Bernardino, +my brother-in-law, has at this moment a mule in his stable. And +why he who is not clever has a mule there? Because he is a rogue; +a man without conscience. Because I had to give up the <i>macho</i> +to him to secure for myself a roof to sleep under and a mouthful of +<i>olla</i> to keep my soul in this insignificant body of mine. +Yet, señor, it contains a heart many times bigger than the mean +thing which beats in the breast of that brute connection of mine of +which I am ashamed, though I opposed that marriage with all my power. +Well, the misguided woman suffered enough. She had her purgatory +on this earth—God rest her soul.”</p> +<p>Byrne says he was so astonished by the sudden appearance of that +sprite-like being, and by the sardonic bitterness of the speech, that +he was unable to disentangle the significant fact from what seemed but +a piece of family history fired out at him without rhyme or reason. +Not at first. He was confounded and at the same time he was impressed +by the rapid forcible delivery, quite different from the frothy excited +loquacity of an Italian. So he stared while the homunculus letting +his cloak fall about him, aspired an immense quantity of snuff out of +the hollow of his palm.</p> +<p>“A mule,” exclaimed Byrne seizing at last the real aspect +of the discourse. “You say he has got a mule? That’s +queer! Why did he refuse to let me have it?”</p> +<p>The diminutive Spaniard muffled himself up again with great dignity.</p> +<p>“<i>Quien sabe</i>,” he said coldly, with a shrug of +his draped shoulders. “He is a great <i>politico</i> in +everything he does. But one thing your worship may be certain +of—that his intentions are always rascally. This husband +of my <i>defunta</i> sister ought to have been married a long time ago +to the widow with the wooden legs.” <a name="citation1"></a><a href="#footnote1">{1}</a></p> +<p>“I see. But remember that; whatever your motives, your +worship countenanced him in this lie.”</p> +<p>The bright unhappy eyes on each side of a predatory nose confronted +Byrne without wincing, while with that testiness which lurks so often +at the bottom of Spanish dignity -</p> +<p>“No doubt the señor officer would not lose an ounce +of blood if I were stuck under the fifth rib,” he retorted. +“But what of this poor sinner here?” Then changing +his tone. “Señor, by the necessities of the times +I live here in exile, a Castilian and an old Christian, existing miserably +in the midst of these brute Asturians, and dependent on the worst of +them all, who has less conscience and scruples than a wolf. And +being a man of intelligence I govern myself accordingly. Yet I +can hardly contain my scorn. You have heard the way I spoke. +A caballero of parts like your worship might have guessed that there +was a cat in there.”</p> +<p>“What cat?” said Byrne uneasily. “Oh, I see. +Something suspicious. No, señor. I guessed nothing. +My nation are not good guessers at that sort of thing; and, therefore, +I ask you plainly whether that wine-seller has spoken the truth in other +particulars?”</p> +<p>“There are certainly no Frenchmen anywhere about,” said +the little man with a return to his indifferent manner.</p> +<p>“Or robbers—<i>ladrones</i>?”</p> +<p>“<i>Ladrones en grande—</i>no! Assuredly not,” +was the answer in a cold philosophical tone. “What is there +left for them to do after the French? And nobody travels in these +times. But who can say! Opportunity makes the robber. +Still that mariner of yours has a fierce aspect, and with the son of +a cat rats will have no play. But there is a saying, too, that +where honey is there will soon be flies.”</p> +<p>This oracular discourse exasperated Byrne. “In the name +of God,” he cried, “tell me plainly if you think my man +is reasonably safe on his journey.”</p> +<p>The homunculus, undergoing one of his rapid changes, seized the officer’s +arm. The grip of his little hand was astonishing.</p> +<p>“Señor! Bernardino had taken notice of him. +What more do you want? And listen—men have disappeared on +this road—on a certain portion of this road, when Bernardino kept +a <i>meson</i>, an inn, and I, his brother-in-law, had coaches and mules +for hire. Now there are no travellers, no coaches. The French +have ruined me. Bernardino has retired here for reasons of his +own after my sister died. They were three to torment the life +out of her, he and Erminia and Lucilla, two aunts of his—all affiliated +to the devil. And now he has robbed me of my last mule. +You are an armed man. Demand the <i>macho</i> from him, with a +pistol to his head, señor—it is not his, I tell you—and +ride after your man who is so precious to you. And then you shall +both be safe, for no two travellers have been ever known to disappear +together in those days. As to the beast, I, its owner, I confide +it to your honour.”</p> +<p>They were staring hard at each other, and Byrne nearly burst into +a laugh at the ingenuity and transparency of the little man’s +plot to regain possession of his mule. But he had no difficulty +to keep a straight face because he felt deep within himself a strange +inclination to do that very extraordinary thing. He did not laugh, +but his lip quivered; at which the diminutive Spaniard, detaching his +black glittering eyes from Byrne’s face, turned his back on him +brusquely with a gesture and a fling of the cloak which somehow expressed +contempt, bitterness, and discouragement all at once. He turned +away and stood still, his hat aslant, muffled up to the ears. +But he was not offended to the point of refusing the silver <i>duro</i> +which Byrne offered him with a non-committal speech as if nothing extraordinary +had passed between them.</p> +<p>“I must make haste on board now,” said Byrne, then.</p> +<p>“<i>Vaya usted con Dios</i>,” muttered the gnome. +And this interview ended with a sarcastic low sweep of the hat which +was replaced at the same perilous angle as before.</p> +<p>Directly the boat had been hoisted the ship’s sails were filled +on the off-shore tack, and Byrne imparted the whole story to his captain, +who was but a very few years older than himself. There was some +amused indignation at it—but while they laughed they looked gravely +at each other. A Spanish dwarf trying to beguile an officer of +his majesty’s navy into stealing a mule for him—that was +too funny, too ridiculous, too incredible. Those were the exclamations +of the captain. He couldn’t get over the grotesqueness of +it.</p> +<p>“Incredible. That’s just it,” murmured Byrne +at last in a significant tone.</p> +<p>They exchanged a long stare. “It’s as clear as +daylight,” affirmed the captain impatiently, because in his heart +he was not certain. And Tom the best seaman in the ship for one, +the good-humouredly deferential friend of his boyhood for the other, +was becoming endowed with a compelling fascination, like a symbolic +figure of loyalty appealing to their feelings and their conscience, +so that they could not detach their thoughts from his safety. +Several times they went up on deck, only to look at the coast, as if +it could tell them something of his fate. It stretched away, lengthening +in the distance, mute, naked, and savage, veiled now and then by the +slanting cold shafts of rain. The westerly swell rolled its interminable +angry lines of foam and big dark clouds flew over the ship in a sinister +procession.</p> +<p>“I wish to goodness you had done what your little friend in +the yellow hat wanted you to do,” said the commander of the sloop +late in the afternoon with visible exasperation.</p> +<p>“Do you, sir?” answered Byrne, bitter with positive anguish. +“I wonder what you would have said afterwards? Why! +I might have been kicked out of the service for looting a mule from +a nation in alliance with His Majesty. Or I might have been battered +to a pulp with flails and pitch-forks—a pretty tale to get abroad +about one of your officers—while trying to steal a mule. +Or chased ignominiously to the boat—for you would not have expected +me to shoot down unoffending people for the sake of a mangy mule. . +. And yet,” he added in a low voice, “I almost wish myself +I had done it.”</p> +<p>Before dark those two young men had worked themselves up into a highly +complex psychological state of scornful scepticism and alarmed credulity. +It tormented them exceedingly; and the thought that it would have to +last for six days at least, and possibly be prolonged further for an +indefinite time, was not to be borne. The ship was therefore put +on the inshore tack at dark. All through the gusty dark night +she went towards the land to look for her man, at times lying over in +the heavy puffs, at others rolling idle in the swell, nearly stationary, +as if she too had a mind of her own to swing perplexed between cool +reason and warm impulse.</p> +<p>Then just at daybreak a boat put off from her and went on tossed +by the seas towards the shallow cove where, with considerable difficulty, +an officer in a thick coat and a round hat managed to land on a strip +of shingle.</p> +<p>“It was my wish,” writes Mr. Byrne, “a wish of +which my captain approved, to land secretly if possible. I did +not want to be seen either by my aggrieved friend in the yellow hat, +whose motives were not clear, or by the one-eyed wine-seller, who may +or may not have been affiliated to the devil, or indeed by any other +dweller in that primitive village. But unfortunately the cove +was the only possible landing place for miles; and from the steepness +of the ravine I couldn’t make a circuit to avoid the houses.”</p> +<p>“Fortunately,” he goes on, “all the people were +yet in their beds. It was barely daylight when I found myself +walking on the thick layer of sodden leaves filling the only street. +No soul was stirring abroad, no dog barked. The silence was profound, +and I had concluded with some wonder that apparently no dogs were kept +in the hamlet, when I heard a low snarl, and from a noisome alley between +two hovels emerged a vile cur with its tail between its legs. +He slunk off silently showing me his teeth as he ran before me, and +he disappeared so suddenly that he might have been the unclean incarnation +of the Evil One. There was, too, something so weird in the manner +of its coming and vanishing, that my spirits, already by no means very +high, became further depressed by the revolting sight of this creature +as if by an unlucky presage.”</p> +<p>He got away from the coast unobserved, as far as he knew, then struggled +manfully to the west against wind and rain, on a barren dark upland, +under a sky of ashes. Far away the harsh and desolate mountains +raising their scarped and denuded ridges seemed to wait for him menacingly. +The evening found him fairly near to them, but, in sailor language, +uncertain of his position, hungry, wet, and tired out by a day of steady +tramping over broken ground during which he had seen very few people, +and had been unable to obtain the slightest intelligence of Tom Corbin’s +passage. “On! on! I must push on,” he had been saying +to himself through the hours of solitary effort, spurred more by incertitude +than by any definite fear or definite hope.</p> +<p>The lowering daylight died out quickly, leaving him faced by a broken +bridge. He descended into the ravine, forded a narrow stream by +the last gleam of rapid water, and clambering out on the other side +was met by the night which fen like a bandage over his eyes. The +wind sweeping in the darkness the broadside of the sierra worried his +ears by a continuous roaring noise as of a maddened sea. He suspected +that he had lost the road. Even in daylight, with its ruts and +mud-holes and ledges of outcropping stone, it was difficult to distinguish +from the dreary waste of the moor interspersed with boulders and clumps +of naked bushes. But, as he says, “he steered his course +by the feel of the wind,” his hat rammed low on his brow, his +head down, stopping now and again from mere weariness of mind rather +than of body—as if not his strength but his resolution were being +overtaxed by the strain of endeavour half suspected to be vain, and +by the unrest of his feelings.</p> +<p>In one of these pauses borne in the wind faintly as if from very +far away he heard a sound of knocking, just knocking on wood. +He noticed that the wind had lulled suddenly.</p> +<p>His heart started beating tumultuously because in himself he carried +the impression of the desert solitudes he had been traversing for the +last six hours—the oppressive sense of an uninhabited world. +When he raised his head a gleam of light, illusory as it often happens +in dense darkness, swam before his eyes. While he peered, the +sound of feeble knocking was repeated—and suddenly he felt rather +than saw the existence of a massive obstacle in his path. What +was it? The spur of a hill? Or was it a house! Yes. +It was a house right close, as though it had risen from the ground or +had come gliding to meet him, dumb and pallid; from some dark recess +of the night. It towered loftily. He had come up under its +lee; another three steps and he could have touched the wall with his +hand. It was no doubt a <i>posada</i> and some other traveller +was trying for admittance. He heard again the sound of cautious +knocking.</p> +<p>Next moment a broad band of light fell into the night through the +opened door. Byrne stepped eagerly into it, whereupon the person +outside leaped with a stifled cry away into the night. An exclamation +of surprise was heard too, from within. Byrne, flinging himself +against the half closed door, forced his way in against some considerable +resistance.</p> +<p>A miserable candle, a mere rushlight, burned at the end of a long +deal table. And in its light Byrne saw, staggering yet, the girl +he had driven from the door. She had a short black skirt, an orange +shawl, a dark complexion—and the escaped single hairs from the +mass, sombre and thick like a forest and held up by a comb, made a black +mist about her low forehead. A shrill lamentable howl of: “Misericordia!” +came in two voices from the further end of the long room, where the +fire-light of an open hearth played between heavy shadows. The +girl recovering herself drew a hissing breath through her set teeth.</p> +<p>It is unnecessary to report the long process of questions and answers +by which he soothed the fears of two old women who sat on each side +of the fire, on which stood a large earthenware pot. Byrne thought +at once of two witches watching the brewing of some deadly potion. +But all the same, when one of them raising forward painfully her broken +form lifted the cover of the pot, the escaping steam had an appetising +smell. The other did not budge, but sat hunched up, her head trembling +all the time.</p> +<p>They were horrible. There was something grotesque in their +decrepitude. Their toothless mouths, their hooked noses, the meagreness +of the active one, and the hanging yellow cheeks of the other (the still +one, whose head trembled) would have been laughable if the sight of +their dreadful physical degradation had not been appalling to one’s +eyes, had not gripped one’s heart with poignant amazement at the +unspeakable misery of age, at the awful persistency of life becoming +at last an object of disgust and dread.</p> +<p>To get over it Byrne began to talk, saying that he was an Englishman, +and that he was in search of a countryman who ought to have passed this +way. Directly he had spoken the recollection of his parting with +Tom came up in his mind with amazing vividness: the silent villagers, +the angry gnome, the one-eyed wine-seller, Bernardino. Why! +These two unspeakable frights must be that man’s aunts—affiliated +to the devil.</p> +<p>Whatever they had been once it was impossible to imagine what use +such feeble creatures could be to the devil, now, in the world of the +living. Which was Lucilla and which was Erminia? They were +now things without a name. A moment of suspended animation followed +Byrne’s words. The sorceress with the spoon ceased stirring +the mess in the iron pot, the very trembling of the other’s head +stopped for the space of breath. In this infinitesimal fraction +of a second Byrne had the sense of being really on his quest, of having +reached the turn of the path, almost within hail of Tom.</p> +<p>“They have seen him,” he thought with conviction. +Here was at last somebody who had seen him. He made sure they +would deny all knowledge of the Ingles; but on the contrary they were +eager to tell him that he had eaten and slept the night in the house. +They both started talking together, describing his appearance and behaviour. +An excitement quite fierce in its feebleness possessed them. The +doubled-up sorceress flourished aloft her wooden spoon, the puffy monster +got off her stool and screeched, stepping from one foot to the other, +while the trembling of her head was accelerated to positive vibration. +Byrne was quite disconcerted by their excited behaviour. . . Yes! +The big, fierce Ingles went away in the morning, after eating a piece +of bread and drinking some wine. And if the caballero wished to +follow the same path nothing could be easier—in the morning.</p> +<p>“You will give me somebody to show me the way?” said +Byrne.</p> +<p>“Si, señor. A proper youth. The man the +caballero saw going out.”</p> +<p>“But he was knocking at the door,” protested Byrne. +“He only bolted when he saw me. He was coming in.”</p> +<p>“No! No!” the two horrid witches screamed out together. +“Going out. Going out!”</p> +<p>After all it may have been true. The sound of knocking had been faint, +elusive, reflected Byrne. Perhaps only the effect of his fancy. +He asked -</p> +<p>“Who is that man?”</p> +<p>“Her <i>novio</i>.” They screamed pointing to the +girl. “He is gone home to a village far away from here. +But he will return in the morning. Her <i>novio</i>! And +she is an orphan—the child of poor Christian people. She +lives with us for the love of God, for the love of God.”</p> +<p>The orphan crouching on the corner of the hearth had been looking +at Byrne. He thought that she was more like a child of Satan kept +there by these two weird harridans for the love of the Devil. +Her eyes were a little oblique, her mouth rather thick, but admirably +formed; her dark face had a wild beauty, voluptuous and untamed. +As to the character of her steadfast gaze attached upon him with a sensuously +savage attention, “to know what it was like,” says Mr. Byrne, +“you have only to observe a hungry cat watching a bird in a cage +or a mouse inside a trap.”</p> +<p>It was she who served him the food, of which he was glad; though +with those big slanting black eyes examining him at close range, as +if he had something curious written on his face, she gave him an uncomfortable +sensation. But anything was better than being approached by these +blear-eyed nightmarish witches. His apprehensions somehow had +been soothed; perhaps by the sensation of warmth after severe exposure +and the ease of resting after the exertion of fighting the gale inch +by inch all the way. He had no doubt of Tom’s safety. +He was now sleeping in the mountain camp having been met by Gonzales’ +men.</p> +<p>Byrne rose, filled a tin goblet with wine out of a skin hanging on +the wall, and sat down again. The witch with the mummy face began +to talk to him, ramblingly of old times; she boasted of the inn’s +fame in those better days. Great people in their own coaches stopped +there. An archbishop slept once in the <i>casa</i>, a long, long +time ago.</p> +<p>The witch with the puffy face seemed to be listening from her stool, +motionless, except for the trembling of her head. The girl (Byrne +was certain she was a casual gipsy admitted there for some reason or +other) sat on the hearth stone in the glow of the embers. She +hummed a tune to herself, rattling a pair of castanets slightly now +and then. At the mention of the archbishop she chuckled impiously +and turned her head to look at Byrne, so that the red glow of the fire +flashed in her black eyes and on her white teeth under the dark cowl +of the enormous overmantel. And he smiled at her.</p> +<p>He rested now in the ease of security. His advent not having +been expected there could be no plot against him in existence. +Drowsiness stole upon his senses. He enjoyed it, but keeping a +hold, so he thought at least, on his wits; but he must have been gone +further than he thought because he was startled beyond measure by a +fiendish uproar. He had never heard anything so pitilessly strident +in his life. The witches had started a fierce quarrel about something +or other. Whatever its origin they were now only abusing each +other violently, without arguments; their senile screams expressed nothing +but wicked anger and ferocious dismay. The gipsy girl’s +black eyes flew from one to the other. Never before had Byrne +felt himself so removed from fellowship with human beings. Before +he had really time to understand the subject of the quarrel, the girl +jumped up rattling her castanets loudly. A silence fell. +She came up to the table and bending over, her eyes in his -</p> +<p>“Señor,” she said with decision, “You shall +sleep in the archbishop’s room.”</p> +<p>Neither of the witches objected. The dried-up one bent double +was propped on a stick. The puffy faced one had now a crutch.</p> +<p>Byrne got up, walked to the door, and turning the key in the enormous +lock put it coolly in his pocket. This was clearly the only entrance, +and he did not mean to be taken unawares by whatever danger there might +have been lurking outside.</p> +<p>When he turned from the door he saw the two witches “affiliated +to the Devil” and the Satanic girl looking at him in silence. +He wondered if Tom Corbin took the same precaution last might. +And thinking of him he had again that queer impression of his nearness. +The world was perfectly dumb. And in this stillness he heard the +blood beating in his ears with a confused rushing noise, in which there +seemed to be a voice uttering the words: “Mr. Byrne, look out, +sir.” Tom’s voice. He shuddered; for the delusions +of the senses of hearing are the most vivid of all, and from their nature +have a compelling character.</p> +<p>It seemed impossible that Tom should not be there. Again a +slight chill as of stealthy draught penetrated through his very clothes +and passed over all his body. He shook off the impression with +an effort.</p> +<p>It was the girl who preceded him upstairs carrying an iron lamp from +the naked flame of which ascended a thin thread of smoke. Her +soiled white stockings were full of holes.</p> +<p>With the same quiet resolution with which he had locked the door +below, Byrne threw open one after another the doors in the corridor. +All the rooms were empty except for some nondescript lumber in one or +two. And the girl seeing what he would be at stopped every time, +raising the smoky light in each doorway patiently. Meantime she +observed him with sustained attention. The last door of all she +threw open herself.</p> +<p>“You sleep here, señor,” she murmured in a voice +light like a child’s breath, offering him the lamp.</p> +<p>“<i>Buenos noches, senorita</i>,” he said politely, taking +it from her.</p> +<p>She didn’t return the wish audibly, though her lips did move +a little, while her gaze black like a starless night never for a moment +wavered before him. He stepped in, and as he turned to close the +door she was still there motionless and disturbing, with her voluptuous +mouth and slanting eyes, with the expression of expectant sensual ferocity +of a baffled cat. He hesitated for a moment, and in the dumb house +he heard again the blood pulsating ponderously in his ears, while once +more the illusion of Tom’s voice speaking earnestly somewhere +near by was specially terrifying, because this time he could not make +out the words.</p> +<p>He slammed the door in the girl’s face at last, leaving her +in the dark; and he opened it again almost on the instant. Nobody. +She had vanished without the slightest sound. He closed the door +quickly and bolted it with two heavy bolts.</p> +<p>A profound mistrust possessed him suddenly. Why did the witches +quarrel about letting him sleep here? And what meant that stare +of the girl as if she wanted to impress his features for ever in her +mind? His own nervousness alarmed him. He seemed to himself +to be removed very far from mankind.</p> +<p>He examined his room. It was not very high, just high enough +to take the bed which stood under an enormous baldaquin-like canopy +from which fell heavy curtains at foot and head; a bed certainly worthy +of an archbishop. There was a heavy table carved all round the +edges, some arm-chairs of enormous weight like the spoils of a grandee’s +palace; a tall shallow wardrobe placed against the wall and with double +doors. He tried them. Locked. A suspicion came into +his mind, and he snatched the lamp to make a closer examination. +No, it was not a disguised entrance. That heavy, tall piece of +furniture stood clear of the wall by quite an inch. He glanced +at the bolts of his room door. No! No one could get at him +treacherously while he slept. But would he be able to sleep? he +asked himself anxiously. If only he had Tom there—the trusty +seaman who had fought at his right hand in a cutting out affair or two, +and had always preached to him the necessity to take care of himself. +“For it’s no great trick,” he used to say, “to +get yourself killed in a hot fight. Any fool can do that. +The proper pastime is to fight the Frenchies and then live to fight +another day.”</p> +<p>Byrne found it a hard matter not to fall into listening to the silence. +Somehow he had the conviction that nothing would break it unless he +heard again the haunting sound of Tom’s voice. He had heard +it twice before. Odd! And yet no wonder, he argued with +himself reasonably, since he had been thinking of the man for over thirty +hours continuously and, what’s more, inconclusively. For +his anxiety for Tom had never taken a definite shape. “Disappear,” +was the only word connected with the idea of Tom’s danger. +It was very vague and awful. “Disappear!” What +did that mean?</p> +<p>Byrne shuddered, and then said to himself that he must be a little +feverish. But Tom had not disappeared. Byrne had just heard +of him. And again the young man felt the blood beating in his +ears. He sat still expecting every moment to hear through the +pulsating strokes the sound of Tom’s voice. He waited straining +his ears, but nothing came. Suddenly the thought occurred to him: +“He has not disappeared, but he cannot make himself heard.”</p> +<p>He jumped up from the arm-chair. How absurd! Laying his +pistol and his hanger on the table he took off his boots and, feeling +suddenly too tired to stand, flung himself on the bed which he found +soft and comfortable beyond his hopes.</p> +<p>He had felt very wakeful, but he must have dozed off after all, because +the next thing he knew he was sitting up in bed and trying to recollect +what it was that Tom’s voice had said. Oh! He remembered +it now. It had said: “Mr. Byrne! Look out, sir!” +A warning this. But against what?</p> +<p>He landed with one leap in the middle of the floor, gasped once, +then looked all round the room. The window was shuttered and barred +with an iron bar. Again he ran his eyes slowly all round the bare +walls, and even looked up at the ceiling, which was rather high. +Afterwards he went to the door to examine the fastenings. They +consisted of two enormous iron bolts sliding into holes made in the +wall; and as the corridor outside was too narrow to admit of any battering +arrangement or even to permit an axe to be swung, nothing could burst +the door open—unless gunpowder. But while he was still making +sure that the lower bolt was pushed well home, he received the impression +of somebody’s presence in the room. It was so strong that +he spun round quicker than lightning. There was no one. +Who could there be? And yet . . .</p> +<p>It was then that he lost the decorum and restraint a man keeps up +for his own sake. He got down on his hands and knees, with the +lamp on the floor, to look under the bed, like a silly girl. He +saw a lot of dust and nothing else. He got up, his cheeks burning, +and walked about discontented with his own behaviour and unreasonably +angry with Tom for not leaving him alone. The words: “Mr. +Byrne! Look out, sir,” kept on repeating themselves in his +head in a tone of warning.</p> +<p>“Hadn’t I better just throw myself on the bed and try +to go to sleep,” he asked himself. But his eyes fell on +the tall wardrobe, and he went towards it feeling irritated with himself +and yet unable to desist. How he could explain to-morrow the burglarious +misdeed to the two odious witches he had no idea. Nevertheless +he inserted the point of his hanger between the two halves of the door +and tried to prize them open. They resisted. He swore, sticking +now hotly to his purpose. His mutter: “I hope you will be +satisfied, confound you,” was addressed to the absent Tom. +Just then the doors gave way and flew open.</p> +<p>He was there.</p> +<p>He—the trusty, sagacious, and courageous Tom was there, drawn +up shadowy and stiff, in a prudent silence, which his wide-open eyes +by their fixed gleam seemed to command Byrne to respect. But Byrne +was too startled to make a sound. Amazed, he stepped back a little—and +on the instant the seaman flung himself forward headlong as if to clasp +his officer round the neck. Instinctively Byrne put out his faltering +arms; he felt the horrible rigidity of the body and then the coldness +of death as their heads knocked together and their faces came into contact. +They reeled, Byrne hugging Tom close to his breast in order not to let +him fall with a crash. He had just strength enough to lower the +awful burden gently to the floor—then his head swam, his legs +gave way, and he sank on his knees, leaning over the body with his hands +resting on the breast of that man once full of generous life, and now +as insensible as a stone.</p> +<p>“Dead! my poor Tom, dead,” he repeated mentally. +The light of the lamp standing near the edge of the table fell from +above straight on the stony empty stare of these eyes which naturally +had a mobile and merry expression.</p> +<p>Byrne turned his own away from them. Tom’s black silk +neckerchief was not knotted on his breast. It was gone. +The murderers had also taken off his shoes and stockings. And +noticing this spoliation, the exposed throat, the bare up-turned feet, +Byrne felt his eyes run full of tears. In other respects the seaman +was fully dressed; neither was his clothing disarranged as it must have +been in a violent struggle. Only his checked shirt had been pulled +a little out the waistband in one place, just enough to ascertain whether +he had a money belt fastened round his body. Byrne began to sob +into his handkerchief.</p> +<p>It was a nervous outburst which passed off quickly. Remaining +on his knees he contemplated sadly the athletic body of as fine a seaman +as ever had drawn a cutlass, laid a gun, or passed the weather earring +in a gale, lying stiff and cold, his cheery, fearless spirit departed—perhaps +turning to him, his boy chum, to his ship out there rolling on the grey +seas off an iron-bound coast, at the very moment of its flight.</p> +<p>He perceived that the six brass buttons of Tom’s jacket had +been cut off. He shuddered at the notion of the two miserable +and repulsive witches busying themselves ghoulishly about the defenceless +body of his friend. Cut off. Perhaps with the same knife +which . . . The head of one trembled; the other was bent double, and +their eyes were red and bleared, their infamous claws unsteady. . . +It must have been in this very room too, for Tom could not have been +killed in the open and brought in here afterwards. Of that Byrne +was certain. Yet those devilish crones could not have killed him +themselves even by taking him unawares—and Tom would be always +on his guard of course. Tom was a very wide awake wary man when +engaged on any service. . . And in fact how did they murder him? +Who did? In what way?</p> +<p>Byrne jumped up, snatched the lamp off the table, and stooped swiftly +over the body. The light revealed on the clothing no stain, no +trace, no spot of blood anywhere. Byrne’s hands began to +shake so that he had to set the lamp on the floor and turn away his +head in order to recover from this agitation.</p> +<p>Then he began to explore that cold, still, and rigid body for a stab, +a gunshot wound, for the trace of some killing blow. He felt all +over the skull anxiously. It was whole. He slipped his hand +under the neck. It was unbroken. With terrified eyes he +peered close under the chin and saw no marks of strangulation on the +throat.</p> +<p>There were no signs anywhere. He was just dead.</p> +<p>Impulsively Byrne got away from the body as if the mystery of an +incomprehensible death had changed his pity into suspicion and dread. +The lamp on the floor near the set, still face of the seaman showed +it staring at the ceiling as if despairingly. In the circle of +light Byrne saw by the undisturbed patches of thick dust on the floor +that there had been no struggle in that room. “He has died +outside,” he thought. Yes, outside in that narrow corridor, +where there was hardly room to turn, the mysterious death had come to +his poor dear Tom. The impulse of snatching up his pistols and +rushing out of the room abandoned Byrne suddenly. For Tom, too, +had been armed—with just such powerless weapons as he himself +possessed—pistols, a cutlass! And Tom had died a nameless +death, by incomprehensible means.</p> +<p>A new thought came to Byrne. That stranger knocking at the +door and fleeing so swiftly at his appearance had come there to remove +the body. Aha! That was the guide the withered witch had +promised would show the English officer the shortest way of rejoining +his man. A promise, he saw it now, of dreadful import. He +who had knocked would have two bodies to deal with. Man and officer +would go forth from the house together. For Byrne was certain +now that he would have to die before the morning—and in the same +mysterious manner, leaving behind him an unmarked body.</p> +<p>The sight of a smashed head, of a throat cut, of a gaping gunshot +wound, would have been an inexpressible relief. It would have +soothed all his fears. His soul cried within him to that dead +man whom he had never found wanting in danger. “Why don’t +you tell me what I am to look for, Tom? Why don’t you?” +But in rigid immobility, extended on his back, he seemed to preserve +an austere silence, as if disdaining in the finality of his awful knowledge +to hold converse with the living.</p> +<p>Suddenly Byrne flung himself on his knees by the side of the body, +and dry-eyed, fierce, opened the shirt wide on the breast, as if to +tear the secret forcibly from that cold heart which had been so loyal +to him in life! Nothing! Nothing! He raised the lamp, +and all the sign vouchsafed to him by that face which used to be so +kindly in expression was a small bruise on the forehead—the least +thing, a mere mark. The skin even was not broken. He stared +at it a long time as if lost in a dreadful dream. Then he observed +that Tom’s hands were clenched as though he had fallen facing +somebody in a fight with fists. His knuckles, on closer view, +appeared somewhat abraded. Both hands.</p> +<p>The discovery of these slight signs was more appalling to Byrne than +the absolute absence of every mark would have been. So Tom had +died striking against something which could be hit, and yet could kill +one without leaving a wound—by a breath.</p> +<p>Terror, hot terror, began to play about Byrne’s heart like +a tongue of flame that touches and withdraws before it turns a thing +to ashes. He backed away from the body as far as he could, then +came forward stealthily casting fearful glances to steal another look +at the bruised forehead. There would perhaps be such a faint bruise +on his own forehead—before the morning.</p> +<p>“I can’t bear it,” he whispered to himself. +Tom was for him now an object of horror, a sight at once tempting and +revolting to his fear. He couldn’t bear to look at him.</p> +<p>At last, desperation getting the better of his increasing horror, +he stepped forward from the wall against which he had been leaning, +seized the corpse under the armpits, and began to lug it over to the +bed. The bare heels of the seaman trailed on the floor noiselessly. +He was heavy with the dead weight of inanimate objects. With a +last effort Byrne landed him face downwards on the edge of the bed, +rolled him over, snatched from under this stiff passive thing a sheet +with which he covered it over. Then he spread the curtains at +head and foot so that joining together as he shook their folds they +hid the bed altogether from his sight.</p> +<p>He stumbled towards a chair, and fell on it. The perspiration +poured from his face for a moment, and then his veins seemed to carry +for a while a thin stream of half, frozen blood. Complete terror +had possession of him now, a nameless terror which had turned his heart +to ashes.</p> +<p>He sat upright in the straight-backed chair, the lamp burning at +his feet, his pistols and his hanger at his left elbow on the end of +the table, his eyes turning incessantly in their sockets round the walls, +over the ceiling, over the floor, in the expectation of a mysterious +and appalling vision. The thing which could deal death in a breath +was outside that bolted door. But Byrne believed neither in walls +nor bolts now. Unreasoning terror turning everything to account, +his old time boyish admiration of the athletic Tom, the undaunted Tom +(he had seemed to him invincible), helped to paralyse his faculties, +added to his despair.</p> +<p>He was no longer Edgar Byrne. He was a tortured soul suffering +more anguish than any sinner’s body had ever suffered from rack +or boot. The depth of his torment may be measured when I say that +this young man, as brave at least as the average of his kind, contemplated +seizing a pistol and firing into his own head. But a deadly, chilly, +langour was spreading over his limbs. It was as if his flesh had +been wet plaster stiffening slowly about his ribs. Presently, +he thought, the two witches will be coming in, with crutch and stick—horrible, +grotesque, monstrous—affiliated to the devil—to put a mark +on his forehead, the tiny little bruise of death. And he wouldn’t +be able to do anything. Tom had struck out at something, but he +was not like Tom. His limbs were dead already. He sat still, +dying the death over and over again; and the only part of him which +moved were his eyes, turning round and round in their sockets, running +over the walls, the floor, the ceiling, again and again till suddenly +they became motionless and stony-starting out of his head fixed in the +direction of the bed.</p> +<p>He had seen the heavy curtains stir and shake as if the dead body +they concealed had turned over and sat up. Byrne, who thought +the world could hold no more terrors in store, felt his hair stir at +the roots. He gripped the arms of the chair, his jaw fell, and +the sweat broke out on his brow while his dry tongue clove suddenly +to the roof of his mouth. Again the curtains stirred, but did +not open. “Don’t, Tom!” Byrne made effort to +shout, but all he heard was a slight moan such as an uneasy sleeper +may make. He felt that his brain was going, for, now, it seemed +to him that the ceiling over the bed had moved, had slanted, and came +level again—and once more the closed curtains swayed gently as +if about to part.</p> +<p>Byrne closed his eyes not to see the awful apparition of the seaman’s +corpse coming out animated by an evil spirit. In the profound +silence of the room he endured a moment of frightful agony, then opened +his eyes again. And he saw at once that the curtains remained +closed still, but that the ceiling over the bed had risen quite a foot. +With the last gleam of reason left to him he understood that it was +the enormous baldaquin over the bed which was coming down, while the +curtains attached to it swayed softly, sinking gradually to the floor. +His drooping jaw snapped to—and half rising in his chair he watched +mutely the noiseless descent of the monstrous canopy. It came +down in short smooth rushes till lowered half way or more, when it took +a run and settled swiftly its turtle-back shape with the deep border +piece fitting exactly the edge of the bedstead. A slight crack +or two of wood were heard, and the overpowering stillness of the room +resumed its sway.</p> +<p>Byrne stood up, gasped for breath, and let out a cry of rage and +dismay, the first sound which he is perfectly certain did make its way +past his lips on this night of terrors. This then was the death +he had escaped! This was the devilish artifice of murder poor +Tom’s soul had perhaps tried from beyond the border to warn him +of. For this was how he had died. Byrne was certain he had +heard the voice of the seaman, faintly distinct in his familiar phrase, +“Mr. Byrne! Look out, sir!” and again uttering words +he could not make out. But then the distance separating the living +from the dead is so great! Poor Tom had tried. Byrne ran +to the bed and attempted to lift up, to push off the horrible lid smothering +the body. It resisted his efforts, heavy as lead, immovable like +a tombstone. The rage of vengeance made him desist; his head buzzed +with chaotic thoughts of extermination, he turned round the room as +if he could find neither his weapons nor the way out; and all the time +he stammered awful menaces. . .</p> +<p>A violent battering at the door of the inn recalled him to his soberer +senses. He flew to the window pulled the shutters open, and looked +out. In the faint dawn he saw below him a mob of men. Ha! +He would go and face at once this murderous lot collected no doubt for +his undoing. After his struggle with nameless terrors he yearned +for an open fray with armed enemies. But he must have remained +yet bereft of his reason, because forgetting his weapons he rushed downstairs +with a wild cry, unbarred the door while blows were raining on it outside, +and flinging it open flew with his bare hands at the throat of the first +man he saw before him. They rolled over together. Byrne’s +hazy intention was to break through, to fly up the mountain path, and +come back presently with Gonzales’ men to exact an exemplary vengeance. +He fought furiously till a tree, a house, a mountain, seemed to crash +down upon his head—and he knew no more.</p> +<p>* * * * *</p> +<p>Here Mr. Byrne describes in detail the skilful manner in which he +found his broken head bandaged, informs us that he had lost a great +deal of blood, and ascribes the preservation of his sanity to that circumstance. +He sets down Gonzales’ profuse apologies in full too. For +it was Gonzales who, tired of waiting for news from the English, had +come down to the inn with half his band, on his way to the sea. +“His excellency,” he explained, “rushed out with fierce +impetuosity, and, moreover, was not known to us for a friend, and so +we . . . etc., etc. When asked what had become of the witches, +he only pointed his finger silently to the ground, then voiced calmly +a moral reflection: “The passion for gold is pitiless in the very +old, señor,” he said. “No doubt in former days +they have put many a solitary traveller to sleep in the archbishop’s +bed.”</p> +<p>“There was also a gipsy girl there,” said Byrne feebly +from the improvised litter on which he was being carried to the coast +by a squad of guerilleros.</p> +<p>“It was she who winched up that infernal machine, and it was +she too who lowered it that night,” was the answer.</p> +<p>“But why? Why?” exclaimed Byrne. “Why +should she wish for my death?”</p> +<p>“No doubt for the sake of your excellency’s coat buttons,” +said politely the saturnine Gonzales. “We found those of +the dead mariner concealed on her person. But your excellency +may rest assured that everything that is fitting has been done on this +occasion.”</p> +<p>Byrne asked no more questions. There was still another death +which was considered by Gonzales as “fitting to the occasion.” +The one-eyed Bernardino stuck against the wall of his wine-shop received +the charge of six escopettas into his breast. As the shots rang +out the rough bier with Tom’s body on it went past carried by +a bandit-like gang of Spanish patriots down the ravine to the shore, +where two boats from the ship were waiting for what was left on earth +of her best seaman.</p> +<p>Mr. Byrne, very pale and weak, stepped into the boat which carried +the body of his humble friend. For it was decided that Tom Corbin +should rest far out in the bay of Biscay. The officer took the +tiller and, turning his head for the last look at the shore, saw on +the grey hillside something moving, which he made out to be a little +man in a yellow hat mounted on a mule—that mule without which +the fate of Tom Corbin would have remained mysterious for ever.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines1"><br /></div> +<p>June, 1913.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h2>BECAUSE OF THE DOLLARS</h2> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER I</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>While we were hanging about near the water’s edge, as sailors +idling ashore will do (it was in the open space before the Harbour Office +of a great Eastern port), a man came towards us from the “front” +of business houses, aiming obliquely at the landing steps. He +attracted my attention because in the movement of figures in white drill +suits on the pavement from which he stepped, his costume, the usual +tunic and trousers, being made of light grey flannel, made him noticeable.</p> +<p>I had time to observe him. He was stout, but he was not grotesque. +His face was round and smooth, his complexion very fair. On his +nearer approach I saw a little moustache made all the fairer by a good +many white hairs. And he had, for a stout man, quite a good chin. +In passing us he exchanged nods with the friend I was with and smiled.</p> +<p>My friend was Hollis, the fellow who had so many adventures and had +known so many queer people in that part of the (more or less) gorgeous +East in the days of his youth. He said: “That’s a +good man. I don’t mean good in the sense of smart or skilful +in his trade. I mean a really <i>good</i> man.”</p> +<p>I turned round at once to look at the phenomenon. The “really +<i>good</i> man” had a very broad back. I saw him signal +a sampan to come alongside, get into it, and go off in the direction +of a cluster of local steamers anchored close inshore.</p> +<p>I said: “He’s a seaman, isn’t he?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Commands that biggish dark-green steamer: ‘<i>Sissie</i>—Glasgow.’ +He has never commanded anything else but the <i>‘Sissie—</i>Glasgow,’ +only it wasn’t always the same <i>Sissie</i>. The first +he had was about half the length of this one, and we used to tell poor +Davidson that she was a size too small for him. Even at that time +Davidson had bulk. We warned him he would get callosities on his +shoulders and elbows because of the tight fit of his command. +And Davidson could well afford the smiles he gave us for our chaff. +He made lots of money in her. She belonged to a portly Chinaman +resembling a mandarin in a picture-book, with goggles and thin drooping +moustaches, and as dignified as only a Celestial knows how to be.</p> +<p>“The best of Chinamen as employers is that they have such gentlemanly +instincts. Once they become convinced that you are a straight +man, they give you their unbounded confidence. You simply can’t +do wrong, then. And they are pretty quick judges of character, +too. Davidson’s Chinaman was the first to find out his worth, +on some theoretical principle. One day in his counting-house, +before several white men he was heard to declare: ‘Captain Davidson +is a good man.’ And that settled it. After that you +couldn’t tell if it was Davidson who belonged to the Chinaman +or the Chinaman who belonged to Davidson. It was he who, shortly +before he died, ordered in Glasgow the new <i>Sissie</i> for Davidson +to command.”</p> +<p>We walked into the shade of the Harbour Office and leaned our elbows +on the parapet of the quay.</p> +<p>“She was really meant to comfort poor Davidson,” continued +Hollis. “Can you fancy anything more naïvely touching +than this old mandarin spending several thousand pounds to console his +white man? Well, there she is. The old mandarin’s +sons have inherited her, and Davidson with her; and he commands her; +and what with his salary and trading privileges he makes a lot of money; +and everything is as before; and Davidson even smiles—you have +seen it? Well, the smile’s the only thing which isn’t +as before.”</p> +<p>“Tell me, Hollis,” I asked, “what do you mean by +good in this connection?”</p> +<p>“Well, there are men who are born good just as others are born +witty. What I mean is his nature. No simpler, more scrupulously +delicate soul had ever lived in such a—a—comfortable envelope. +How we used to laugh at Davidson’s fine scruples! In short, +he’s thoroughly humane, and I don’t imagine there can be +much of any other sort of goodness that counts on this earth. +And as he’s that with a shade of particular refinement, I may +well call him a ‘<i>really</i> good man.’”</p> +<p>I knew from old that Hollis was a firm believer in the final value +of shades. And I said: “I see”—because I really +did see Hollis’s Davidson in the sympathetic stout man who had +passed us a little while before. But I remembered that at the +very moment he smiled his placid face appeared veiled in melancholy—a +sort of spiritual shadow. I went on.</p> +<p>“Who on earth has paid him off for being so fine by spoiling +his smile?”</p> +<p>“That’s quite a story, and I will tell it to you if you +like. Confound it! It’s quite a surprising one, too. +Surprising in every way, but mostly in the way it knocked over poor +Davidson—and apparently only because he is such a good sort. +He was telling me all about it only a few days ago. He said that +when he saw these four fellows with their heads in a bunch over the +table, he at once didn’t like it. He didn’t like it +at all. You mustn’t suppose that Davidson is a soft fool. +These men -</p> +<p>“But I had better begin at the beginning. We must go +back to the first time the old dollars had been called in by our Government +in exchange for a new issue. Just about the time when I left these +parts to go home for a long stay. Every trader in the islands +was thinking of getting his old dollars sent up here in time, and the +demand for empty French wine cases—you know the dozen of vermouth +or claret size—was something unprecedented. The custom was +to pack the dollars in little bags of a hundred each. I don’t +know how many bags each case would hold. A good lot. Pretty +tidy sums must have been moving afloat just then. But let us get +away from here. Won’t do to stay in the sun. Where +could we—? I know! let us go to those tiffin-rooms over +there.”</p> +<p>We moved over accordingly. Our appearance in the long empty +room at that early hour caused visible consternation amongst the China +boys. But Hollis led the way to one of the tables between the +windows screened by rattan blinds. A brilliant half-light trembled +on the ceiling, on the whitewashed walls, bathed the multitude of vacant +chairs and tables in a peculiar, stealthy glow.</p> +<p>“All right. We will get something to eat when it’s +ready,” he said, waving the anxious Chinaman waiter aside. +He took his temples touched with grey between his hands, leaning over +the table to bring his face, his dark, keen eyes, closer to mine.</p> +<p>“Davidson then was commanding the steamer <i>Sissie—</i>the +little one which we used to chaff him about. He ran her alone, +with only the Malay serang for a deck officer. The nearest approach +to another white man on board of her was the engineer, a Portuguese +half-caste, as thin as a lath and quite a youngster at that. For +all practical purposes Davidson was managing that command of his single-handed; +and of course this was known in the port. I am telling you of +it because the fact had its influence on the developments you shall +hear of presently.</p> +<p>“His steamer, being so small, could go up tiny creeks and into +shallow bays and through reefs and over sand-banks, collecting produce, +where no other vessel but a native craft would think of venturing. +It is a paying game, often. Davidson was known to visit in her +places that no one else could find and that hardly anybody had ever +heard of.</p> +<p>“The old dollars being called in, Davidson’s Chinaman +thought that the <i>Sissie</i> would be just the thing to collect them +from small traders in the less frequented parts of the Archipelago. +It’s a good business. Such cases of dollars are dumped aft +in the ship’s lazarette, and you get good freight for very little +trouble and space.</p> +<p>“Davidson, too, thought it was a good idea; and together they +made up a list of his calls on his next trip. Then Davidson (he +had naturally the chart of his voyages in his head) remarked that on +his way back he might look in at a certain settlement up a mere creek, +where a poor sort of white man lived in a native village. Davidson +pointed out to his Chinaman that the fellow was certain to have some +rattans to ship.</p> +<p>“‘Probably enough to fill her forward,’ said Davidson. +‘And that’ll be better than bringing her back with empty +holds. A day more or less doesn’t matter.’</p> +<p>“This was sound talk, and the Chinaman owner could not but +agree. But if it hadn’t been sound it would have been just +the same. Davidson did what he liked. He was a man that +could do no wrong. However, this suggestion of his was not merely +a business matter. There was in it a touch of Davidsonian kindness. +For you must know that the man could not have continued to live quietly +up that creek if it had not been for Davidson’s willingness to +call there from time to time. And Davidson’s Chinaman knew +this perfectly well, too. So he only smiled his dignified, bland +smile, and said: ‘All right, Captain. You do what you like.’</p> +<p>“I will explain presently how this connection between Davidson +and that fellow came about. Now I want to tell you about the part +of this affair which happened here—the preliminaries of it.</p> +<p>“You know as well as I do that these tiffin-rooms where we +are sitting now have been in existence for many years. Well, next +day about twelve o’clock, Davidson dropped in here to get something +to eat.</p> +<p>“And here comes the only moment in this story where accident—mere +accident—plays a part. If Davidson had gone home that day +for tiffin, there would be now, after twelve years or more, nothing +changed in his kindly, placid smile.</p> +<p>“But he came in here; and perhaps it was sitting at this very +table that he remarked to a friend of mine that his next trip was to +be a dollar-collecting trip. He added, laughing, that his wife +was making rather a fuss about it. She had begged him to stay +ashore and get somebody else to take his place for a voyage. She +thought there was some danger on account of the dollars. He told +her, he said, that there were no Java-sea pirates nowadays except in +boys’ books. He had laughed at her fears, but he was very +sorry, too; for when she took any notion in her head it was impossible +to argue her out of it. She would be worrying herself all the +time he was away. Well, he couldn’t help it. There +was no one ashore fit to take his place for the trip.</p> +<p>“This friend of mine and I went home together in the same mail-boat, +and he mentioned that conversation one evening in the Red Sea while +we were talking over the things and people we had just left, with more +or less regret.</p> +<p>“I can’t say that Davidson occupied a very prominent +place. Moral excellence seldom does. He was quietly appreciated +by those who knew him well; but his more obvious distinction consisted +in this, that he was married. Ours, as you remember, was a bachelor +crowd; in spirit anyhow, if not absolutely in fact. There might +have been a few wives in existence, but if so they were invisible, distant, +never alluded to. For what would have been the good? Davidson +alone was visibly married.</p> +<p>“Being married suited him exactly. It fitted him so well +that the wildest of us did not resent the fact when it was disclosed. +Directly he had felt his feet out here, Davidson sent for his wife. +She came out (from West Australia) in the <i>Somerset</i>, under the +care of Captain Ritchie—you know, Monkey-face Ritchie—who +couldn’t praise enough her sweetness, her gentleness, and her +charm. She seemed to be the heaven-born mate for Davidson. +She found on arrival a very pretty bungalow on the hill, ready for her +and the little girl they had. Very soon he got for her a two-wheeled +trap and a Burmah pony, and she used to drive down of an evening to +pick up Davidson, on the quay. When Davidson, beaming, got into +the trap, it would become very full all at once.</p> +<p>“We used to admire Mrs. Davidson from a distance. It +was a girlish head out of a keepsake. From a distance. We +had not many opportunities for a closer view, because she did not care +to give them to us. We would have been glad to drop in at the +Davidson bungalow, but we were made to feel somehow that we were not +very welcome there. Not that she ever said anything ungracious. +She never had much to say for herself. I was perhaps the one who +saw most of the Davidsons at home. What I noticed under the superficial +aspect of vapid sweetness was her convex, obstinate forehead, and her +small, red, pretty, ungenerous mouth. But then I am an observer +with strong prejudices. Most of us were fetched by her white, +swan-like neck, by that drooping, innocent profile. There was +a lot of latent devotion to Davidson’s wife hereabouts, at that +time, I can tell you. But my idea was that she repaid it by a +profound suspicion of the sort of men we were; a mistrust which extended—I +fancied—to her very husband at times. And I thought then +she was jealous of him in a way; though there were no women that she +could be jealous about. She had no women’s society. +It’s difficult for a shipmaster’s wife unless there are +other shipmasters’ wives about, and there were none here then. +I know that the dock manager’s wife called on her; but that was +all. The fellows here formed the opinion that Mrs. Davidson was +a meek, shy little thing. She looked it, I must say. And +this opinion was so universal that the friend I have been telling you +of remembered his conversation with Davidson simply because of the statement +about Davidson’s wife. He even wondered to me: ‘Fancy +Mrs. Davidson making a fuss to that extent. She didn’t seem +to me the sort of woman that would know how to make a fuss about anything.’</p> +<p>“I wondered, too—but not so much. That bumpy forehead—eh? +I had always suspected her of being silly. And I observed that +Davidson must have been vexed by this display of wifely anxiety.</p> +<p>“My friend said: ‘No. He seemed rather touched +and distressed. There really was no one he could ask to relieve +him; mainly because he intended to make a call in some God-forsaken +creek, to look up a fellow of the name of Bamtz who apparently had settled +there.’</p> +<p>“And again my friend wondered. ‘Tell me,’ +he cried, ‘what connection can there be between Davidson and such +a creature as Bamtz?’</p> +<p>“I don’t remember now what answer I made. A sufficient +one could have been given in two words: ‘Davidson’s goodness.’ +<i>That</i> never boggled at unworthiness if there was the slightest +reason for compassion. I don’t want you to think that Davidson +had no discrimination at all. Bamtz could not have imposed on +him. Moreover, everybody knew what Bamtz was. He was a loafer +with a beard. When I think of Bamtz, the first thing I see is +that long black beard and a lot of propitiatory wrinkles at the corners +of two little eyes. There was no such beard from here to Polynesia, +where a beard is a valuable property in itself. Bamtz’s +beard was valuable to him in another way. You know how impressed +Orientals are by a fine beard. Years and years ago, I remember, +the grave Abdullah, the great trader of Sambir, unable to repress signs +of astonishment and admiration at the first sight of that imposing beard. +And it’s very well known that Bamtz lived on Abdullah off and +on for several years. It was a unique beard, and so was the bearer +of the same. A unique loafer. He made a fine art of it, +or rather a sort of craft and mystery. One can understand a fellow +living by cadging and small swindles in towns, in large communities +of people; but Bamtz managed to do that trick in the wilderness, to +loaf on the outskirts of the virgin forest.</p> +<p>“He understood how to ingratiate himself with the natives. +He would arrive in some settlement up a river, make a present of a cheap +carbine or a pair of shoddy binoculars, or something of that sort, to +the Rajah, or the head-man, or the principal trader; and on the strength +of that gift, ask for a house, posing mysteriously as a very special +trader. He would spin them no end of yarns, live on the fat of +the land, for a while, and then do some mean swindle or other—or +else they would get tired of him and ask him to quit. And he would +go off meekly with an air of injured innocence. Funny life. +Yet, he never got hurt somehow. I’ve heard of the Rajah +of Dongala giving him fifty dollars’ worth of trade goods and +paying his passage in a prau only to get rid of him. Fact. +And observe that nothing prevented the old fellow having Bamtz’s +throat cut and the carcase thrown into deep water outside the reefs; +for who on earth would have inquired after Bamtz?</p> +<p>“He had been known to loaf up and down the wilderness as far +north as the Gulf of Tonkin. Neither did he disdain a spell of +civilisation from time to time. And it was while loafing and cadging +in Saigon, bearded and dignified (he gave himself out there as a bookkeeper), +that he came across Laughing Anne.</p> +<p>“The less said of her early history the better, but something +must be said. We may safely suppose there was very little heart +left in her famous laugh when Bamtz spoke first to her in some low café. +She was stranded in Saigon with precious little money and in great trouble +about a kid she had, a boy of five or six.</p> +<p>“A fellow I just remember, whom they called Pearler Harry, +brought her out first into these parts—from Australia, I believe. +He brought her out and then dropped her, and she remained knocking about +here and there, known to most of us by sight, at any rate. Everybody +in the Archipelago had heard of Laughing Anne. She had really +a pleasant silvery laugh always at her disposal, so to speak, but it +wasn’t enough apparently to make her fortune. The poor creature +was ready to stick to any half-decent man if he would only let her, +but she always got dropped, as it might have been expected.</p> +<p>“She had been left in Saigon by the skipper of a German ship +with whom she had been going up and down the China coast as far as Vladivostok +for near upon two years. The German said to her: ‘This is +all over, <i>mein Taubchen</i>. I am going home now to get married +to the girl I got engaged to before coming out here.’ And +Anne said: ‘All right, I’m ready to go. We part friends, +don’t we?’</p> +<p>“She was always anxious to part friends. The German told +her that of course they were parting friends. He looked rather +glum at the moment of parting. She laughed and went ashore.</p> +<p>“But it was no laughing matter for her. She had some +notion that this would be her last chance. What frightened her +most was the future of her child. She had left her boy in Saigon +before going off with the German, in the care of an elderly French couple. +The husband was a doorkeeper in some Government office, but his time +was up, and they were returning to France. She had to take the +boy back from them; and after she had got him back, she did not like +to part with him any more.</p> +<p>“That was the situation when she and Bamtz got acquainted casually. +She could not have had any illusions about that fellow. To pick +up with Bamtz was coming down pretty low in the world, even from a material +point of view. She had always been decent, in her way; whereas +Bamtz was, not to mince words, an abject sort of creature. On +the other hand, that bearded loafer, who looked much more like a pirate +than a bookkeeper, was not a brute. He was gentle—rather—even +in his cups. And then, despair, like misfortune, makes us acquainted +with strange bed-fellows. For she may well have despaired. +She was no longer young—you know.</p> +<p>“On the man’s side this conjunction is more difficult +to explain, perhaps. One thing, however, must be said of Bamtz; +he had always kept clear of native women. As one can’t suspect +him of moral delicacy, I surmise that it must have been from prudence. +And he, too, was no longer young. There were many white hairs +in his valuable black beard by then. He may have simply longed +for some kind of companionship in his queer, degraded existence. +Whatever their motives, they vanished from Saigon together. And +of course nobody cared what had become of them.</p> +<p>“Six months later Davidson came into the Mirrah Settlement. +It was the very first time he had been up that creek, where no European +vessel had ever been seen before. A Javanese passenger he had +on board offered him fifty dollars to call in there—it must have +been some very particular business—and Davidson consented to try. +Fifty dollars, he told me, were neither here nor there; but he was curious +to see the place, and the little <i>Sissie</i> could go anywhere where +there was water enough to float a soup-plate.</p> +<p>“Davidson landed his Javanese plutocrat, and, as he had to +wait a couple of hours for the tide, he went ashore himself to stretch +his legs.</p> +<p>“It was a small settlement. Some sixty houses, most of +them built on piles over the river, the rest scattered in the long grass; +the usual pathway at the back; the forest hemming in the clearing and +smothering what there might have been of air into a dead, hot stagnation.</p> +<p>“All the population was on the river-bank staring silently, +as Malays will do, at the <i>Sissie</i> anchored in the stream. +She was almost as wonderful to them as an angel’s visit. +Many of the old people had only heard vaguely of fire-ships, and not +many of the younger generation had seen one. On the back path +Davidson strolled in perfect solitude. But he became aware of +a bad smell and concluded he would go no farther.</p> +<p>“While he stood wiping his forehead, he heard from somewhere +the exclamation: ‘My God! It’s Davy!’</p> +<p>“Davidson’s lower jaw, as he expressed it, came unhooked +at the crying of this excited voice. Davy was the name used by +the associates of his young days; he hadn’t heard it for many +years. He stared about with his mouth open and saw a white woman +issue from the long grass in which a small hut stood buried nearly up +to the roof.</p> +<p>“Try to imagine the shock: in that wild place that you couldn’t +find on a map, and more squalid than the most poverty-stricken Malay +settlement had a right to be, this European woman coming swishing out +of the long grass in a fanciful tea-gown thing, dingy pink satin, with +a long train and frayed lace trimmings; her eyes like black coals in +a pasty-white face. Davidson thought that he was asleep, that +he was delirious. From the offensive village mudhole (it was what +Davidson had sniffed just before) a couple of filthy buffaloes uprose +with loud snorts and lumbered off crashing through the bushes, panic-struck +by this apparition.</p> +<p>“The woman came forward, her arms extended, and laid her hands +on Davidson’s shoulders, exclaiming: ‘Why! You have +hardly changed at all. The same good Davy.’ And she +laughed a little wildly.</p> +<p>“This sound was to Davidson like a galvanic shock to a corpse. +He started in every muscle. ‘Laughing Anne,’ he said +in an awe-struck voice.</p> +<p>“‘All that’s left of her, Davy. All that’s +left of her.’</p> +<p>“Davidson looked up at the sky; but there was to be seen no +balloon from which she could have fallen on that spot. When he +brought his distracted gaze down, it rested on a child holding on with +a brown little paw to the pink satin gown. He had run out of the +grass after her. Had Davidson seen a real hobgoblin his eyes could +not have bulged more than at this small boy in a dirty white blouse +and ragged knickers. He had a round head of tight chestnut curls, +very sunburnt legs, a freckled face, and merry eyes. Admonished +by his mother to greet the gentleman, he finished off Davidson by addressing +him in French.</p> +<p>“‘<i>Bonjour</i>.’</p> +<p>“Davidson, overcome, looked up at the woman in silence. +She sent the child back to the hut, and when he had disappeared in the +grass, she turned to Davidson, tried to speak, but after getting out +the words, ‘That’s my Tony,’ burst into a long fit +of crying. She had to lean on Davidson’s shoulder. +He, distressed in the goodness of his heart, stood rooted to the spot +where she had come upon him.</p> +<p>“What a meeting—eh? Bamtz had sent her out to see +what white man it was who had landed. And she had recognised him +from that time when Davidson, who had been pearling himself in his youth, +had been associating with Harry the Pearler and others, the quietest +of a rather rowdy set.</p> +<p>“Before Davidson retraced his steps to go on board the steamer, +he had heard much of Laughing Anne’s story, and had even had an +interview, on the path, with Bamtz himself. She ran back to the +hut to fetch him, and he came out lounging, with his hands in his pockets, +with the detached, casual manner under which he concealed his propensity +to cringe. Ya-a-as-as. He thought he would settle here permanently—with +her. This with a nod at Laughing Anne, who stood by, a haggard, +tragically anxious figure, her black hair hanging over her shoulders.</p> +<p>“‘No more paint and dyes for me, Davy,’ she struck +in, ‘if only you will do what he wants you to do. You know +that I was always ready to stand by my men—if they had only let +me.’</p> +<p>“Davidson had no doubt of her earnestness. It was of +Bamtz’s good faith that he was not at all sure. Bamtz wanted +Davidson to promise to call at Mirrah more or less regularly. +He thought he saw an opening to do business with rattans there, if only +he could depend on some craft to bring out trading goods and take away +his produce.</p> +<p>“‘I have a few dollars to make a start on. The +people are all right.’</p> +<p>“He had come there, where he was not known, in a native prau, +and had managed, with his sedate manner and the exactly right kind of +yarn he knew how to tell to the natives, to ingratiate himself with +the chief man.</p> +<p>“‘The Orang Kaya has given me that empty house there +to live in as long as I will stay,’ added Bamtz.</p> +<p>“‘Do it, Davy,’ cried the woman suddenly. +‘Think of that poor kid.’</p> +<p>“‘Seen him? ‘Cute little customer,’ +said the reformed loafer in such a tone of interest as to surprise Davidson +into a kindly glance.</p> +<p>“‘I certainly can do it,’ he declared. He +thought of at first making some stipulation as to Bamtz behaving decently +to the woman, but his exaggerated delicacy and also the conviction that +such a fellow’s promises were worth nothing restrained him. +Anne went a little distance down the path with him talking anxiously.</p> +<p>“‘It’s for the kid. How could I have kept +him with me if I had to knock about in towns? Here he will never +know that his mother was a painted woman. And this Bamtz likes +him. He’s real fond of him. I suppose I ought to thank +God for that.’</p> +<p>“Davidson shuddered at any human creature being brought so +low as to have to thank God for the favours or affection of a Bamtz.</p> +<p>“‘And do you think that you can make out to live here?’ +he asked gently.</p> +<p>“‘Can’t I? You know I have always stuck to +men through thick and thin till they had enough of me. And now +look at me! But inside I am as I always was. I have acted +on the square to them all one after another. Only they do get +tired somehow. Oh, Davy! Harry ought not to have cast me +off. It was he that led me astray.’</p> +<p>“Davidson mentioned to her that Harry the Pearler had been +dead now for some years. Perhaps she had heard?</p> +<p>“She made a sign that she had heard; and walked by the side +of Davidson in silence nearly to the bank. Then she told him that +her meeting with him had brought back the old times to her mind. +She had not cried for years. She was not a crying woman either. +It was hearing herself called Laughing Anne that had started her sobbing +like a fool. Harry was the only man she had loved. The others +-</p> +<p>“She shrugged her shoulders. But she prided herself on +her loyalty to the successive partners of her dismal adventures. +She had never played any tricks in her life. She was a pal worth +having. But men did get tired. They did not understand women. +She supposed it had to be.</p> +<p>“Davidson was attempting a veiled warning as to Bamtz, but +she interrupted him. She knew what men were. She knew what +this man was like. But he had taken wonderfully to the kid. +And Davidson desisted willingly, saying to himself that surely poor +Laughing Anne could have no illusions by this time. She wrung +his hand hard at parting.</p> +<p>“‘It’s for the kid, Davy—it’s for the +kid. Isn’t he a bright little chap?’</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<h3>CHAPTER II</h3> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines2"><br /><br /></div> +<p>“All this happened about two years before the day when Davidson, +sitting in this very room, talked to my friend. You will see presently +how this room can get full. Every seat’ll be occupied, and +as you notice, the tables are set close, so that the backs of the chairs +are almost touching. There is also a good deal of noisy talk here +about one o’clock.</p> +<p>“I don’t suppose Davidson was talking very loudly; but +very likely he had to raise his voice across the table to my friend. +And here accident, mere accident, put in its work by providing a pair +of fine ears close behind Davidson’s chair. It was ten to +one against, the owner of the same having enough change in his pockets +to get his tiffin here. But he had. Most likely had rooked +somebody of a few dollars at cards overnight. He was a bright +creature of the name of Fector, a spare, short, jumpy fellow with a +red face and muddy eyes. He described himself as a journalist +as certain kind of women give themselves out as actresses in the dock +of a police-court.</p> +<p>“He used to introduce himself to strangers as a man with a +mission to track out abuses and fight them whenever found. He +would also hint that he was a martyr. And it’s a fact that +he had been kicked, horsewhipped, imprisoned, and hounded with ignominy +out of pretty well every place between Ceylon and Shanghai, for a professional +blackmailer.</p> +<p>“I suppose, in that trade, you’ve got to have active +wits and sharp ears. It’s not likely that he overheard every +word Davidson said about his dollar collecting trip, but he heard enough +to set his wits at work.</p> +<p>“He let Davidson go out, and then hastened away down to the +native slums to a sort of lodging-house kept in partnership by the usual +sort of Portuguese and a very disreputable Chinaman. Macao Hotel, +it was called, but it was mostly a gambling den that one used to warn +fellows against. Perhaps you remember?</p> +<p>“There, the evening before, Fector had met a precious couple, +a partnership even more queer than the Portuguese and the Chinaman. +One of the two was Niclaus—you know. Why! the fellow with +a Tartar moustache and a yellow complexion, like a Mongolian, only that +his eyes were set straight and his face was not so flat. One couldn’t +tell what breed he was. A nondescript beggar. From a certain +angle you would think a very bilious white man. And I daresay +he was. He owned a Malay prau and called himself The Nakhoda, +as one would say: The Captain. Aha! Now you remember. +He couldn’t, apparently, speak any other European language than +English, but he flew the Dutch flag on his prau.</p> +<p>“The other was the Frenchman without hands. Yes. +The very same we used to know in ‘79 in Sydney, keeping a little +tobacco shop at the lower end of George Street. You remember the +huge carcase hunched up behind the counter, the big white face and the +long black hair brushed back off a high forehead like a bard’s. +He was always trying to roll cigarettes on his knee with his stumps, +telling endless yarns of Polynesia and whining and cursing in turn about +‘<i>mon malheur</i>.’ His hands had been blown away +by a dynamite cartridge while fishing in some lagoon. This accident, +I believe, had made him more wicked than before, which is saying a good +deal.</p> +<p>“He was always talking about ‘resuming his activities’ +some day, whatever they were, if he could only get an intelligent companion. +It was evident that the little shop was no field for his activities, +and the sickly woman with her face tied up, who used to look in sometimes +through the back door, was no companion for him.</p> +<p>“And, true enough, he vanished from Sydney before long, after +some trouble with the Excise fellows about his stock. Goods stolen +out of a warehouse or something similar. He left the woman behind, +but he must have secured some sort of companion—he could not have +shifted for himself; but whom he went away with, and where, and what +other companions he might have picked up afterwards, it is impossible +to make the remotest guess about.</p> +<p>“Why exactly he came this way I can’t tell. Towards +the end of my time here we began to hear talk of a maimed Frenchman +who had been seen here and there. But no one knew then that he +had foregathered with Niclaus and lived in his prau. I daresay +he put Niclaus up to a thing or two. Anyhow, it was a partnership. +Niclaus was somewhat afraid of the Frenchman on account of his tempers, +which were awful. He looked then like a devil; but a man without +hands, unable to load or handle a weapon, can at best go for one only +with his teeth. From that danger Niclaus felt certain he could +always defend himself.</p> +<p>“The couple were alone together loafing in the common-room +of that infamous hotel when Fector turned up. After some beating +about the bush, for he was doubtful how far he could trust these two, +he repeated what he had overheard in the tiffin-rooms.</p> +<p>“His tale did not have much success till he came to mention +the creek and Bamtz’s name. Niclaus, sailing about like +a native in a prau, was, in his own words, ‘familiar with the +locality.’ The huge Frenchman, walking up and down the room +with his stumps in the pockets of his jacket, stopped short in surprise. +‘<i>Comment? Bamtz! Bamtz</i>!’</p> +<p>“He had run across him several times in his life. He +exclaimed: ‘<i>Bamtz</i>! <i>Mais je ne connais que</i> +<i>ca</i>!’ And he applied such a contemptuously indecent +epithet to Bamtz that when, later, he alluded to him as ‘<i>une +chiffe</i>’ (a mere rag) it sounded quite complimentary. +‘We can do with him what we like,’ he asserted confidently. +‘Oh, yes. Certainly we must hasten to pay a visit to that—’ +(another awful descriptive epithet quite unfit for repetition). +‘Devil take me if we don’t pull off a coup that will set +us all up for a long time.’</p> +<p>“He saw all that lot of dollars melted into bars and disposed +of somewhere on the China coast. Of the escape after the <i>coup</i> +he never doubted. There was Niclaus’s prau to manage that +in.</p> +<p>“In his enthusiasm he pulled his stumps out of his pockets +and waved them about. Then, catching sight of them, as it were, +he held them in front of his eyes, cursing and blaspheming and bewailing +his misfortune and his helplessness, till Niclaus quieted him down.</p> +<p>“But it was his mind that planned out the affair and it was +his spirit which carried the other two on. Neither of them was +of the bold buccaneer type; and Fector, especially, had never in his +adventurous life used other weapons than slander and lies.</p> +<p>“That very evening they departed on a visit to Bamtz in Niclaus’s +prau, which had been lying, emptied of her cargo of cocoanuts, for a +day or two under the canal bridge. They must have crossed the +bows of the anchored <i>Sissie</i>, and no doubt looked at her with +interest as the scene of their future exploit, the great haul, <i>le +grand coup</i>!</p> +<p>“Davidson’s wife, to his great surprise, sulked with +him for several days before he left. I don’t know whether +it occurred to him that, for all her angelic profile, she was a very +stupidly obstinate girl. She didn’t like the tropics. +He had brought her out there, where she had no friends, and now, she +said, he was becoming inconsiderate. She had a presentiment of +some misfortune, and notwithstanding Davidson’s painstaking explanations, +she could not see why her presentiments were to be disregarded. +On the very last evening before Davidson went away she asked him in +a suspicious manner:</p> +<p>“‘Why is it that you are so anxious to go this time?’</p> +<p>“‘I am not anxious,’ protested the good Davidson. +‘I simply can’t help myself. There’s no one +else to go in my place.’</p> +<p>“‘Oh! There’s no one,’ she said, turning +away slowly.</p> +<p>“She was so distant with him that evening that Davidson from +a sense of delicacy made up his mind to say good-bye to her at once +and go and sleep on board. He felt very miserable and, strangely +enough, more on his own account than on account of his wife. She +seemed to him much more offended than grieved.</p> +<p>“Three weeks later, having collected a good many cases of old +dollars (they were stowed aft in the lazarette with an iron bar and +a padlock securing the hatch under his cabin-table), yes, with a bigger +lot than he had expected to collect, he found himself homeward bound +and off the entrance of the creek where Bamtz lived and even, in a sense, +flourished.</p> +<p>“It was so late in the day that Davidson actually hesitated +whether he should not pass by this time. He had no regard for +Bamtz, who was a degraded but not a really unhappy man. His pity +for Laughing Anne was no more than her case deserved. But his +goodness was of a particularly delicate sort. He realised how +these people were dependent on him, and how they would feel their dependence +(if he failed to turn up) through a long month of anxious waiting. +Prompted by his sensitive humanity, Davidson, in the gathering dusk, +turned the <i>Sissie’s</i> head towards the hardly discernible +coast, and navigated her safety through a maze of shallow patches. +But by the time he got to the mouth of the creek the night had come.</p> +<p>“The narrow waterway lay like a black cutting through the forest. +And as there were always grounded snaggs in the channel which it would +be impossible to make out, Davidson very prudently turned the <i>Sissie</i> +round, and with only enough steam on the boilers to give her a touch +ahead if necessary, let her drift up stern first with the tide, silent +and invisible in the impenetrable darkness and in the dumb stillness.</p> +<p>“It was a long job, and when at the end of two hours Davidson +thought he must be up to the clearing, the settlement slept already, +the whole land of forests and rivers was asleep.</p> +<p>“Davidson, seeing a solitary light in the massed darkness of +the shore, knew that it was burning in Bamtz’s house. This +was unexpected at this time of the night, but convenient as a guide. +By a turn of the screw and a touch of the helm he sheered the <i>Sissie</i> +alongside Bamtz’s wharf—a miserable structure of a dozen +piles and a few planks, of which the ex-vagabond was very proud. +A couple of Kalashes jumped down on it, took a turn with the ropes thrown +to them round the posts, and the <i>Sissie</i> came to rest without +a single loud word or the slightest noise. And just in time too, +for the tide turned even before she was properly moored.</p> +<p>“Davidson had something to eat, and then, coming on deck for +a last look round, noticed that the light was still burning in the house.</p> +<p>“This was very unusual, but since they were awake so late, +Davidson thought that he would go up to say that he was in a hurry to +be off and to ask that what rattans there were in store should be sent +on board with the first sign of dawn.</p> +<p>“He stepped carefully over the shaky planks, not being anxious +to get a sprained ankle, and picked his way across the waste ground +to the foot of the house ladder. The house was but a glorified +hut on piles, unfenced and lonely.</p> +<p>“Like many a stout man, Davidson is very lightfooted. +He climbed the seven steps or so, stepped across the bamboo platform +quietly, but what he saw through the doorway stopped him short.</p> +<p>“Four men were sitting by the light of a solitary candle. +There was a bottle, a jug and glasses on the table, but they were not +engaged in drinking. Two packs of cards were lying there too, +but they were not preparing to play. They were talking together +in whispers, and remained quite unaware of him. He himself was +too astonished to make a sound for some time. The world was still, +except for the sibilation of the whispering heads bunched together over +the table.</p> +<p>“And Davidson, as I have quoted him to you before, didn’t +like it. He didn’t like it at all.</p> +<p>“The situation ended with a scream proceeding from the dark, +interior part of the room. ‘O Davy! you’ve given me +a turn.’</p> +<p>“Davidson made out beyond the table Anne’s very pale +face. She laughed a little hysterically, out of the deep shadows +between the gloomy mat walls. ‘Ha! ha! ha!’</p> +<p>“The four heads sprang apart at the first sound, and four pairs +of eyes became fixed stonily on Davidson. The woman came forward, +having little more on her than a loose chintz wrapper and straw slippers +on her bare feet. Her head was tied up Malay fashion in a red +handkerchief, with a mass of loose hair hanging under it behind. +Her professional, gay, European feathers had literally dropped off her +in the course of these two years, but a long necklace of amber beads +hung round her uncovered neck. It was the only ornament she had +left; Bamtz had sold all her poor-enough trinkets during the flight +from Saigon—when their association began.</p> +<p>“She came forward, past the table, into the light, with her +usual groping gesture of extended arms, as though her soul, poor thing! +had gone blind long ago, her white cheeks hollow, her eyes darkly wild, +distracted, as Davidson thought. She came on swiftly, grabbed +him by the arm, dragged him in. ‘It’s heaven itself +that sends you to-night. My Tony’s so bad—come and +see him. Come along—do!’</p> +<p>“Davidson submitted. The only one of the men to move +was Bamtz, who made as if to get up but dropped back in his chair again. +Davidson in passing heard him mutter confusedly something that sounded +like ‘poor little beggar.’</p> +<p>“The child, lying very flushed in a miserable cot knocked up +out of gin-cases, stared at Davidson with wide, drowsy eyes. It +was a bad bout of fever clearly. But while Davidson was promising +to go on board and fetch some medicines, and generally trying to say +reassuring things, he could not help being struck by the extraordinary +manner of the woman standing by his side. Gazing with despairing +expression down at the cot, she would suddenly throw a quick, startled +glance at Davidson and then towards the other room.</p> +<p>“‘Yes, my poor girl,’ he whispered, interpreting +her distraction in his own way, though he had nothing precise in his +mind. ‘I’m afraid this bodes no good to you. +How is it they are here?’</p> +<p>“She seized his forearm and breathed out forcibly: ‘No +good to me! Oh, no! But what about you! They are after +the dollars you have on board.’</p> +<p>“Davidson let out an astonished ‘How do they know there +are any dollars?’</p> +<p>“She clapped her hands lightly, in distress. ‘So +it’s true! You have them on board? Then look out for +yourself.’</p> +<p>“They stood gazing down at the boy in the cot, aware that they +might be observed from the other room.</p> +<p>“‘We must get him to perspire as soon as possible,’ +said Davidson in his ordinary voice. ‘You’ll have +to give him hot drink of some kind. I will go on board and bring +you a spirit-kettle amongst other things.’ And he added +under his breath: ‘Do they actually mean murder?’</p> +<p>“She made no sign, she had returned to her desolate contemplation +of the boy. Davidson thought she had not heard him even, when +with an unchanged expression she spoke under her breath.</p> +<p>“‘The Frenchman would, in a minute. The others +shirk it—unless you resist. He’s a devil. He +keeps them going. Without him they would have done nothing but +talk. I’ve got chummy with him. What can you do when you +are with a man like the fellow I am with now. Bamtz is terrified +of them, and they know it. He’s in it from funk. Oh, +Davy! take your ship away—quick!’</p> +<p>“‘Too late,’ said Davidson. ‘She’s +on the mud already.’</p> +<p>“If the kid hadn’t been in this state I would have run +off with him—to you—into the woods—anywhere. +Oh, Davy! will he die?’ she cried aloud suddenly.</p> +<p>“Davidson met three men in the doorway. They made way +for him without actually daring to face his glance. But Bamtz +was the only one who looked down with an air of guilt. The big +Frenchman had remained lolling in his chair; he kept his stumps in his +pockets and addressed Davidson.</p> +<p>“‘Isn’t it unfortunate about that child! +The distress of that woman there upsets me, but I am of no use in the +world. I couldn’t smooth the sick pillow of my dearest friend. +I have no hands. Would you mind sticking one of those cigarettes +there into the mouth of a poor, harmless cripple? My nerves want +soothing—upon my honour, they do.’</p> +<p>“Davidson complied with his naturally kind smile. As +his outward placidity becomes only more pronounced, if possible, the +more reason there is for excitement; and as Davidson’s eyes, when +his wits are hard at work, get very still and as if sleepy, the huge +Frenchman might have been justified in concluding that the man there +was a mere sheep—a sheep ready for slaughter. With a ‘<i>merci +bien</i>’ he uplifted his huge carcase to reach the light of the +candle with his cigarette, and Davidson left the house.</p> +<p>“Going down to the ship and returning, he had time to consider +his position. At first he was inclined to believe that these men +(Niclaus—the white Nakhoda—was the only one he knew by sight +before, besides Bamtz) were not of the stamp to proceed to extremities. +This was partly the reason why he never attempted to take any measures +on board. His pacific Kalashes were not to be thought of as against +white men. His wretched engineer would have had a fit from fright +at the mere idea of any sort of combat. Davidson knew that he +would have to depend on himself in this affair if it ever came off.</p> +<p>“Davidson underestimated naturally the driving power of the +Frenchman’s character and the force of the actuating motive. +To that man so hopelessly crippled these dollars were an enormous opportunity. +With his share of the robbery he would open another shop in Vladivostok, +Haïphong, Manila—somewhere far away.</p> +<p>“Neither did it occur to Davidson, who is a man of courage, +if ever there was one, that his psychology was not known to the world +at large, and that to this particular lot of ruffians, who judged him +by his appearance, he appeared an unsuspicious, inoffensive, soft creature, +as he passed again through the room, his hands full of various objects +and parcels destined for the sick boy.</p> +<p>“All the four were sitting again round the table. Bamtz +not having the pluck to open his mouth, it was Niclaus who, as a collective +voice, called out to him thickly to come out soon and join in a drink.</p> +<p>“‘I think I’ll have to stay some little time in +there, to help her look after the boy,’ Davidson answered without +stopping.</p> +<p>“This was a good thing to say to allay a possible suspicion. +And, as it was, Davidson felt he must not stay very long.</p> +<p>“He sat down on an old empty nail-keg near the improvised cot +and looked at the child; while Laughing Anne, moving to and fro, preparing +the hot drink, giving it to the boy in spoonfuls, or stopping to gaze +motionless at the flushed face, whispered disjointed bits of information. +She had succeeded in making friends with that French devil. Davy +would understand that she knew how to make herself pleasant to a man.</p> +<p>“And Davidson nodded without looking at her.</p> +<p>“The big beast had got to be quite confidential with her. +She held his cards for him when they were having a game. Bamtz! +Oh! Bamtz in his funk was only too glad to see the Frenchman humoured. +And the Frenchman had come to believe that she was a woman who didn’t +care what she did. That’s how it came about they got to +talk before her openly. For a long time she could not make out +what game they were up to. The new arrivals, not expecting to +find a woman with Bamtz, had been very startled and annoyed at first, +she explained.</p> +<p>“She busied herself in attending to the boy; and nobody looking +into that room would have seen anything suspicious in those two people +exchanging murmurs by the sick-bedside.</p> +<p>“‘But now they think I am a better man than Bamtz ever +was,’ she said with a faint laugh.</p> +<p>“The child moaned. She went down on her knees, and, bending +low, contemplated him mournfully. Then raising her head, she asked +Davidson whether he thought the child would get better. Davidson +was sure of it. She murmured sadly: ‘Poor kid. There’s +nothing in life for such as he. Not a dog’s chance. +But I couldn’t let him go, Davy! I couldn’t.’</p> +<p>“Davidson felt a profound pity for the child. She laid +her hand on his knee and whispered an earnest warning against the Frenchman. +Davy must never let him come to close quarters. Naturally Davidson +wanted to know the reason, for a man without hands did not strike him +as very formidable under any circumstances.</p> +<p>“‘Mind you don’t let him—that’s all,’ +she insisted anxiously, hesitated, and then confessed that the Frenchman +had got her away from the others that afternoon and had ordered her +to tie a seven-pound iron weight (out of the set of weights Bamtz used +in business) to his right stump. She had to do it for him. +She had been afraid of his savage temper. Bamtz was such a craven, +and neither of the other men would have cared what happened to her. +The Frenchman, however, with many awful threats had warned her not to +let the others know what she had done for him. Afterwards he had +been trying to cajole her. He had promised her that if she stood +by him faithfully in this business he would take her with him to Haïphong +or some other place. A poor cripple needed somebody to take care +of him—always.</p> +<p>“Davidson asked her again if they really meant mischief. +It was, he told me, the hardest thing to believe he had run up against, +as yet, in his life. Anne nodded. The Frenchman’s +heart was set on this robbery. Davy might expect them, about midnight, +creeping on board his ship, to steal anyhow—to murder, perhaps. +Her voice sounded weary, and her eyes remained fastened on her child.</p> +<p>“And still Davidson could not accept it somehow; his contempt +for these men was too great.</p> +<p>“‘Look here, Davy,’ she said. ‘I’ll +go outside with them when they start, and it will be hard luck if I +don’t find something to laugh at. They are used to that +from me. Laugh or cry—what’s the odds. You will +be able to hear me on board on this quiet night. Dark it is too. +Oh! it’s dark, Davy!—it’s dark!’</p> +<p>“‘Don’t you run any risks,’ said Davidson. +Presently he called her attention to the boy, who, less flushed now, +had dropped into a sound sleep. ‘Look. He’ll +be all right.’</p> +<p>“She made as if to snatch the child up to her breast, but restrained +herself. Davidson prepared to go. She whispered hurriedly:</p> +<p>“‘Mind, Davy! I’ve told them that you generally +sleep aft in the hammock under the awning over the cabin. They +have been asking me about your ways and about your ship, too. +I told them all I knew. I had to keep in with them. And +Bamtz would have told them if I hadn’t—you understand?’</p> +<p>“He made a friendly sign and went out. The men about +the table (except Bamtz) looked at him. This time it was Fector +who spoke. ‘Won’t you join us in a quiet game, Captain?’</p> +<p>“Davidson said that now the child was better he thought he +would go on board and turn in. Fector was the only one of the +four whom he had, so to speak, never seen, for he had had a good look +at the Frenchman already. He observed Fector’s muddy eyes, +his mean, bitter mouth. Davidson’s contempt for those men +rose in his gorge, while his placid smile, his gentle tones and general +air of innocence put heart into them. They exchanged meaning glances.</p> +<p>“‘We shall be sitting late over the cards,’ Fector +said in his harsh, low voice.</p> +<p>“‘Don’t make more noise than you can help.’</p> +<p>“‘Oh! we are a quiet lot. And if the invalid shouldn’t +be so well, she will be sure to send one of us down to call you, so +that you may play the doctor again. So don’t shoot at sight.’</p> +<p>“‘He isn’t a shooting man,’ struck in Niclaus.</p> +<p>“‘I never shoot before making sure there’s a reason +for it—at any rate,’ said Davidson.</p> +<p>“Bamtz let out a sickly snigger. The Frenchman alone +got up to make a bow to Davidson’s careless nod. His stumps +were stuck immovably in his pockets. Davidson understood now the +reason.</p> +<p>“He went down to the ship. His wits were working actively, +and he was thoroughly angry. He smiled, he says (it must have +been the first grim smile of his life), at the thought of the seven-pound +weight lashed to the end of the Frenchman’s stump. The ruffian +had taken that precaution in case of a quarrel that might arise over +the division of the spoil. A man with an unsuspected power to +deal killing blows could take his own part in a sudden scrimmage round +a heap of money, even against adversaries armed with revolvers, especially +if he himself started the row.</p> +<p>“‘He’s ready to face any of his friends with that +thing. But he will have no use for it. There will be no +occasion to quarrel about these dollars here,’ thought Davidson, +getting on board quietly. He never paused to look if there was +anybody about the decks. As a matter of fact, most of his crew +were on shore, and the rest slept, stowed away in dark corners.</p> +<p>“He had his plan, and he went to work methodically.</p> +<p>“He fetched a lot of clothing from below and disposed it in +his hammock in such a way as to distend it to the shape of a human body; +then he threw over all the light cotton sheet he used to draw over himself +when sleeping on deck. Having done this, he loaded his two revolvers +and clambered into one of the boats the <i>Sissie</i> carried right +aft, swung out on their davits. Then he waited.</p> +<p>“And again the doubt of such a thing happening to him crept +into his mind. He was almost ashamed of this ridiculous vigil +in a boat. He became bored. And then he became drowsy. +The stillness of the black universe wearied him. There was not +even the lapping of the water to keep him company, for the tide was +out and the <i>Sissie</i> was lying on soft mud. Suddenly in the +breathless, soundless, hot night an argus pheasant screamed in the woods +across the stream. Davidson started violently, all his senses +on the alert at once.</p> +<p>“The candle was still burning in the house. Everything +was quiet again, but Davidson felt drowsy no longer. An uneasy +premonition of evil oppressed him.</p> +<p>“‘Surely I am not afraid,’ he argued with himself.</p> +<p>“The silence was like a seal on his ears, and his nervous inward +impatience grew intolerable. He commanded himself to keep still. +But all the same he was just going to jump out of the boat when a faint +ripple on the immensity of silence, a mere tremor in the air, the ghost +of a silvery laugh, reached his ears.</p> +<p>“Illusion!</p> +<p>“He kept very still. He had no difficulty now in emulating +the stillness of the mouse—a grimly determined mouse. But +he could not shake off that premonition of evil unrelated to the mere +danger of the situation. Nothing happened. It had been an +illusion!</p> +<p>“A curiosity came to him to learn how they would go to work. +He wondered and wondered, till the whole thing seemed more absurd than +ever.</p> +<p>“He had left the hanging lamp in the cabin burning as usual. +It was part of his plan that everything should be as usual. Suddenly +in the dim glow of the skylight panes a bulky shadow came up the ladder +without a sound, made two steps towards the hammock (it hung right over +the skylight), and stood motionless. The Frenchman!</p> +<p>“The minutes began to slip away. Davidson guessed that +the Frenchman’s part (the poor cripple) was to watch his (Davidson’s) +slumbers while the others were no doubt in the cabin busy forcing off +the lazarette hatch.</p> +<p>“What was the course they meant to pursue once they got hold +of the silver (there were ten cases, and each could be carried easily +by two men) nobody can tell now. But so far, Davidson was right. +They were in the cabin. He expected to hear the sounds of breaking-in +every moment. But the fact was that one of them (perhaps Fector, +who had stolen papers out of desks in his time) knew how to pick a lock, +and apparently was provided with the tools. Thus while Davidson +expected every moment to hear them begin down there, they had the bar +off already and two cases actually up in the cabin out of the lazarette.</p> +<p>“In the diffused faint glow of the skylight the Frenchman moved +no more than a statue. Davidson could have shot him with the greatest +ease—but he was not homicidally inclined. Moreover, he wanted +to make sure before opening fire that the others had gone to work. +Not hearing the sounds he expected to hear, he felt uncertain whether +they all were on board yet.</p> +<p>“While he listened, the Frenchman, whose immobility might have +but cloaked an internal struggle; moved forward a pace, then another. +Davidson, entranced, watched him advance one leg, withdraw his right +stump, the armed one, out of his pocket, and swinging his body to put +greater force into the blow, bring the seven-pound weight down on the +hammock where the head of the sleeper ought to have been.</p> +<p>“Davidson admitted to me that his hair stirred at the roots +then. But for Anne, his unsuspecting head would have been there. +The Frenchman’s surprise must have been simply overwhelming. +He staggered away from the lightly swinging hammock, and before Davidson +could make a movement he had vanished, bounding down the ladder to warn +and alarm the other fellows.</p> +<p>“Davidson sprang instantly out of the boat, threw up the skylight +flap, and had a glimpse of the men down there crouching round the hatch. +They looked up scared, and at that moment the Frenchman outside the +door bellowed out ‘<i>Trahison</i>—<i>trahison</i>!’ +They bolted out of the cabin, falling over each other and swearing awfully. +The shot Davidson let off down the skylight had hit no one; but he ran +to the edge of the cabin-top and at once opened fire at the dark shapes +rushing about the deck. These shots were returned, and a rapid +fusillade burst out, reports and flashes, Davidson dodging behind a +ventilator and pulling the trigger till his revolver clicked, and then +throwing it down to take the other in his right hand.</p> +<p>“He had been hearing in the din the Frenchman’s infuriated +yells ‘<i>Tuez-le! tuez-le</i>!’ above the fierce cursing +of the others. But though they fired at him they were only thinking +of clearing out. In the flashes of the last shots Davidson saw +them scrambling over the rail. That he had hit more than one he +was certain. Two different voices had cried out in pain. +But apparently none of them were disabled.</p> +<p>“Davidson leaned against the bulwark reloading his revolver +without haste. He had not the slightest apprehension of their +coming back. On the other hand, he had no intention of pursuing +them on shore in the dark. What they were doing he had no idea. +Looking to their hurts probably. Not very far from the bank the +invisible Frenchman was blaspheming and cursing his associates, his +luck, and all the world. He ceased; then with a sudden, vengeful +yell, ‘It’s that woman!—it’s that woman that +has sold us,’ was heard running off in the night.</p> +<p>“Davidson caught his breath in a sudden pang of remorse. +He perceived with dismay that the stratagem of his defence had given +Anne away. He did not hesitate a moment. It was for him +to save her now. He leaped ashore. But even as he landed +on the wharf he heard a shrill shriek which pierced his very soul.</p> +<p>“The light was still burning in the house. Davidson, +revolver in hand, was making for it when another shriek, away to his +left, made him change his direction.</p> +<p>“He changed his direction—but very soon he stopped. +It was then that he hesitated in cruel perplexity. He guessed +what had happened. The woman had managed to escape from the house +in some way, and now was being chased in the open by the infuriated +Frenchman. He trusted she would try to run on board for protection.</p> +<p>“All was still around Davidson. Whether she had run on +board or not, this silence meant that the Frenchman had lost her in +the dark.</p> +<p>“Davidson, relieved, but still very anxious, turned towards +the river-side. He had not made two steps in that direction when +another shriek burst out behind him, again close to the house.</p> +<p>“He thinks that the Frenchman had lost sight of the poor woman +right enough. Then came that period of silence. But the +horrible ruffian had not given up his murderous purpose. He reasoned +that she would try to steal back to her child, and went to lie in wait +for her near the house.</p> +<p>“It must have been something like that. As she entered +the light falling about the house-ladder, he had rushed at her too soon, +impatient for vengeance. She had let out that second scream of +mortal fear when she caught sight of him, and turned to run for life +again.</p> +<p>“This time she was making for the river, but not in a straight +line. Her shrieks circled about Davidson. He turned on his +heels, following the horrible trail of sound in the darkness. +He wanted to shout ‘This way, Anne! I am here!’ but +he couldn’t. At the horror of this chase, more ghastly in +his imagination than if he could have seen it, the perspiration broke +out on his forehead, while his throat was as dry as tinder. A +last supreme scream was cut short suddenly.</p> +<p>“The silence which ensued was even more dreadful. Davidson +felt sick. He tore his feet from the spot and walked straight +before him, gripping the revolver and peering into the obscurity fearfully. +Suddenly a bulky shape sprang from the ground within a few yards of +him and bounded away. Instinctively he fired at it, started to +run in pursuit, and stumbled against something soft which threw him +down headlong.</p> +<p>“Even as he pitched forward on his head he knew it could be +nothing else but Laughing Anne’s body. He picked himself +up and, remaining on his knees, tried to lift her in his arms. +He felt her so limp that he gave it up. She was lying on her face, +her long hair scattered on the ground. Some of it was wet. +Davidson, feeling about her head, came to a place where the crushed +bone gave way under his fingers. But even before that discovery +he knew that she was dead. The pursuing Frenchman had flung her +down with a kick from behind, and, squatting on her back, was battering +in her skull with the weight she herself had fastened to his stump, +when the totally unexpected Davidson loomed up in the night and scared +him away.</p> +<p>“Davidson, kneeling by the side of that woman done so miserably +to death, was overcome by remorse. She had died for him. +His manhood was as if stunned. For the first time he felt afraid. +He might have been pounced upon in the dark at any moment by the murderer +of Laughing Anne. He confesses to the impulse of creeping away +from that pitiful corpse on his hands and knees to the refuge of the +ship. He even says that he actually began to do so. . .</p> +<p>“One can hardly picture to oneself Davidson crawling away on +all fours from the murdered woman—Davidson unmanned and crushed +by the idea that she had died for him in a sense. But he could +not have gone very far. What stopped him was the thought of the +boy, Laughing Anne’s child, that (Davidson remembered her very +words) would not have a dog’s chance.</p> +<p>“This life the woman had left behind her appeared to Davidson’s +conscience in the light of a sacred trust. He assumed an erect +attitude and, quaking inwardly still, turned about and walked towards +the house.</p> +<p>“For all his tremors he was very determined; but that smashed +skull had affected his imagination, and he felt very defenceless in +the darkness, in which he seemed to hear faintly now here, now there, +the prowling footsteps of the murderer without hands. But he never +faltered in his purpose. He got away with the boy safely after +all. The house he found empty. A profound silence encompassed +him all the time, except once, just as he got down the ladder with Tony +in his arms, when a faint groan reached his ears. It seemed to +come from the pitch-black space between the posts on which the house +was built, but he did not stop to investigate.</p> +<p>“It’s no use telling you in detail how Davidson got on +board with the burden Anne’s miserably cruel fate had thrust into +his arms; how next morning his scared crew, after observing from a distance +the state of affairs on board, rejoined with alacrity; how Davidson +went ashore and, aided by his engineer (still half dead with fright), +rolled up Laughing Anne’s body in a cotton sheet and brought it +on board for burial at sea later. While busy with this pious task, +Davidson, glancing about, perceived a huge heap of white clothes huddled +up against the corner-post of the house. That it was the Frenchman +lying there he could not doubt. Taking it in connection with the +dismal groan he had heard in the night, Davidson is pretty sure that +his random shot gave a mortal hurt to the murderer of poor Anne.</p> +<p>“As to the others, Davidson never set eyes on a single one +of them. Whether they had concealed themselves in the scared settlement, +or bolted into the forest, or were hiding on board Niclaus’s prau, +which could be seen lying on the mud a hundred yards or so higher up +the creek, the fact is that they vanished; and Davidson did not trouble +his head about them. He lost no time in getting out of the creek +directly the <i>Sissie</i> floated. After steaming some twenty +miles clear of the coast, he (in his own words) ‘committed the +body to the deep.’ He did everything himself. He weighted +her down with a few fire-bars, he read the service, he lifted the plank, +he was the only mourner. And while he was rendering these last +services to the dead, the desolation of that life and the atrocious +wretchedness of its end cried aloud to his compassion, whispered to +him in tones of self-reproach.</p> +<p>“He ought to have handled the warning she had given him in +another way. He was convinced now that a simple display of watchfulness +would have been enough to restrain that vile and cowardly crew. +But the fact was that he had not quite believed that anything would +be attempted.</p> +<p>“The body of Laughing Anne having been ‘committed to +the deep’ some twenty miles S.S.W. from Cape Selatan, the task +before Davidson was to commit Laughing Anne’s child to the care +of his wife. And there poor, good Davidson made a fatal move. +He didn’t want to tell her the whole awful story, since it involved +the knowledge of the danger from which he, Davidson, had escaped. +And this, too, after he had been laughing at her unreasonable fears +only a short time before.</p> +<p>“‘I thought that if I told her everything,’ Davidson +explained to me, ‘she would never have a moment’s peace +while I was away on my trips.’</p> +<p>“He simply stated that the boy was an orphan, the child of +some people to whom he, Davidson, was under the greatest obligation, +and that he felt morally bound to look after him. Some day he +would tell her more, he said, and meantime he trusted in the goodness +and warmth of her heart, in her woman’s natural compassion.</p> +<p>“He did not know that her heart was about the size of a parched +pea, and had the proportional amount of warmth; and that her faculty +of compassion was mainly directed to herself. He was only startled +and disappointed at the air of cold surprise and the suspicious look +with which she received his imperfect tale. But she did not say +much. She never had much to say. She was a fool of the silent, +hopeless kind.</p> +<p>“What story Davidson’s crew thought fit to set afloat +in Malay town is neither here nor there. Davidson himself took +some of his friends into his confidence, besides giving the full story +officially to the Harbour Master.</p> +<p>“The Harbour Master was considerably astonished. He didn’t +think, however, that a formal complaint should be made to the Dutch +Government. They would probably do nothing in the end, after a +lot of trouble and correspondence. The robbery had not come off, +after all. Those vagabonds could be trusted to go to the devil +in their own way. No amount of fuss would bring the poor woman +to life again, and the actual murderer had been done justice to by a +chance shot from Davidson. Better let the matter drop.</p> +<p>“This was good common sense. But he was impressed.</p> +<p>“‘Sounds a terrible affair, Captain Davidson.’</p> +<p>“‘Aye, terrible enough,’ agreed the remorseful +Davidson. But the most terrible thing for him, though he didn’t +know it yet then, was that his wife’s silly brain was slowly coming +to the conclusion that Tony was Davidson’s child, and that he +had invented that lame story to introduce him into her pure home in +defiance of decency, of virtue—of her most sacred feelings.</p> +<p>“Davidson was aware of some constraint in his domestic relations. +But at the best of times she was not demonstrative; and perhaps that +very coldness was part of her charm in the placid Davidson’s eyes. +Women are loved for all sorts of reasons and even for characteristics +which one would think repellent. She was watching him and nursing +her suspicions.</p> +<p>“Then, one day, Monkey-faced Ritchie called on that sweet, +shy Mrs. Davidson. She had come out under his care, and he considered +himself a privileged person—her oldest friend in the tropics. +He posed for a great admirer of hers. He was always a great chatterer. +He had got hold of the story rather vaguely, and he started chattering +on that subject, thinking she knew all about it. And in due course +he let out something about Laughing Anne.</p> +<p>“‘Laughing Anne,’ says Mrs. Davidson with a start. +‘What’s that?’</p> +<p>Ritchie plunged into circumlocution at once, but she very soon stopped +him. ‘Is that creature dead?’ she asks.</p> +<p>“‘I believe so,’ stammered Ritchie. ‘Your +husband says so.’</p> +<p>“‘But you don’t know for certain?’</p> +<p>“‘No! How could I, Mrs. Davidson!’</p> +<p>“‘That’s all wanted to know,’ says she, and +goes out of the room.</p> +<p>“When Davidson came home she was ready to go for him, not with +common voluble indignation, but as if trickling a stream of cold clear +water down his back. She talked of his base intrigue with a vile +woman, of being made a fool of, of the insult to her dignity.</p> +<p>“Davidson begged her to listen to him and told her all the +story, thinking that it would move a heart of stone. He tried +to make her understand his remorse. She heard him to the end, +said ‘Indeed!’ and turned her back on him.</p> +<p>“‘Don’t you believe me?’ he asked, appalled.</p> +<p>“She didn’t say yes or no. All she said was, ‘Send +that brat away at once.’</p> +<p>“‘I can’t throw him out into the street,’ +cried Davidson. ‘You don’t mean it.’</p> +<p>“‘I don’t care. There are charitable institutions +for such children, I suppose.’</p> +<p>“‘That I will never do,’ said Davidson.</p> +<p>“‘Very well. That’s enough for me.’</p> +<p>“Davidson’s home after this was like a silent, frozen +hell for him. A stupid woman with a sense of grievance is worse +than an unchained devil. He sent the boy to the White Fathers +in Malacca. This was not a very expensive sort of education, but +she could not forgive him for not casting the offensive child away utterly. +She worked up her sense of her wifely wrongs and of her injured purity +to such a pitch that one day, when poor Davidson was pleading with her +to be reasonable and not to make an impossible existence for them both, +she turned on him in a chill passion and told him that his very sight +was odious to her.</p> +<p>“Davidson, with his scrupulous delicacy of feeling, was not +the man to assert his rights over a woman who could not bear the sight +of him. He bowed his head; and shortly afterwards arranged for +her to go back to her parents. That was exactly what she wanted +in her outraged dignity. And then she had always disliked the +tropics and had detested secretly the people she had to live amongst +as Davidson’s wife. She took her pure, sensitive, mean little +soul away to Fremantle or somewhere in that direction. And of +course the little girl went away with her too. What could poor +Davidson have done with a little girl on his hands, even if she had +consented to leave her with him—which is unthinkable.</p> +<p>“This is the story that has spoiled Davidson’s smile +for him—which perhaps it wouldn’t have done so thoroughly +had he been less of a good fellow.”</p> +<p>Hollis ceased. But before we rose from the table I asked him +if he knew what had become of Laughing Anne’s boy.</p> +<p>He counted carefully the change handed him by the Chinaman waiter, +and raised his head.</p> +<p>“Oh! that’s the finishing touch. He was a bright, +taking little chap, as you know, and the Fathers took very special pains +in his bringing up. Davidson expected in his heart to have some +comfort out of him. In his placid way he’s a man who needs +affection. Well, Tony has grown into a fine youth—but there +you are! He wants to be a priest; his one dream is to be a missionary. +The Fathers assure Davidson that it is a serious vocation. They +tell him he has a special disposition for mission work, too. So +Laughing Anne’s boy will lead a saintly life in China somewhere; +he may even become a martyr; but poor Davidson is left out in the cold. +He will have to go downhill without a single human affection near him +because of these old dollars.”</p> +<p>Jan. 1914</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<p>Footnotes:</p> +<p><a name="footnote1"></a><a href="#citation1">{1}</a> The gallows, +supposed to be widowed of the last executed criminal and waiting for +another.</p> +<div class="GutenbergBlankLines3"><br /><br /><br /></div> +<p>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, WITHIN THE TIDES ***</p> +<pre> + +******This file should be named wthnt10h.htm or wthnt10h.zip****** +Corrected EDITIONS of our EBooks get a new NUMBER, wthnt11h.htm +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, wthnt10ah.htm + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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