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diff --git a/23694-0.txt b/23694-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4a08c58 --- /dev/null +++ b/23694-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,883 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Homo, by F. Hopkinson Smith + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Homo + 1909 + +Author: F. Hopkinson Smith + +Release Date: December 3, 2007 [EBook #23694] +Last Updated: December 20, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMO *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + + +HOMO + +By F. Hopkinson Smith + +1909 + + +Dinner was over, and Mme. Constantin and her guests were seated under +the lighted candles in her cosey salon. + +With the serving of the coffee and cigarettes, pillows had been adjusted +to bare shoulders, stools moved under slippered feet, and easy lounges +pushed nearer the fire. Greenough, his long body aslant, his head on the +edge of a chair, his feet on the hearth rug, was blowing rings to the +ceiling. Bayard, the African explorer, and the young Russian Secretary, +Ivan Petrovski, had each the end of a long sofa, with pretty Mme. +Petrovski and old Baron Sleyde between them, while Mme. Constantin lay +nestled like a kitten among the big and little cushions of a divan. + +The dinner had been a merry one, with every brain at its best; this +restful silence was but another luxury. Only the Baron rattled on. A +duel of unusual ferocity had startled Paris, and the old fellow knew its +every detail. Mme. Petrovski was listening in a languid way: + +“Dead, isn’t he?” she asked in an indifferent tone, as being the better +way to change the subject. Duels did not interest the young bride. + +“No,” answered the Baron, flicking the ashes from his cigarette--“going +to get well, so Mercier, who operated, told a friend of mine to-day.” + +“Where did they fight?” she asked, as she took a fresh cigarette from +her case. “Ivan told me, but I forgot.” + +“At Surenne, above the bridge. You know the row of trees by the water; +we walked there the day we dined at the Cycle.” + +“Both of them fools!” cried the Russian from the depths of his seat. “La +Clou wasn’t worth it--she’s getting fat.” + +Greenough drew his long legs back from the fender and, looking toward +the young Secretary, said in a decided tone:-- + +“I don’t agree with you, Ivan. Served the beggar right; the only pity is +that he’s going to get well.” + +“But she wasn’t his wife,” remarked Mme. Petrovski with increased +interest, as she lighted her cigarette. + +“No matter, he loved her,” returned the Englishman, straightening in his +seat and squaring his broad shoulders. + +“And so did the poor devil whom Mercier sewed up,” laughed the old +Baron, his eyes twinkling. + +Mme. Constantin raised her blonde head from the edge of the divan. + +“Is there any wrong, you dear Greenough, you would forgive where a woman +is concerned?” + +“Plenty. Any wrong that you would commit, my dear lady, for instance; +but not the kind the Baron refers to.” + +“But why do you Englishmen always insist on an eye for an eye and a +tooth for a tooth? Can’t you make some allowance for the weakness of +human nature?” she asked, smiling. + +“But why only Englishmen?” demanded Greenough. “All nationalities feel +alike where a man’s honor and the honor of his home are concerned. It is +only the punishment that differs. The Turk, for instance, bowstrings you +or tries to, for peeping under his wife’s veil; the American shoots you +at sight for speaking slightingly of his daughter. Both are right in a +way. I am not brutal; I am only just, and I tell you there is only one +way of treating a man who has robbed you dishonestly of the woman you +love, and that is to finish him so completely that the first man +called in will be the undertaker--not the surgeon. I am not talking +at random--I know a case in point, which always sets me blazing when +I think of it. He was at the time attached to our embassy at Berlin. I +hear now that he has returned to England and is dying--dying, remember, +of a broken heart--won’t live the year out. He ought to have shot +the scoundrel when he had a chance. Not her fault, perhaps--not his +fault--fault of a man he trusted--that both trusted, that’s the worst of +it.” + +Bayard sat gazing into the fire, its glow deepening the color of his +bronze cheek and bringing into high relief a body so strong and well +knit that it was difficult to believe that scarcely a year had passed +since he dragged himself, starving and half dead, from the depths of an +African jungle. + +So far he had taken no part in the discussion. Mme. Constantin, who knew +his every mood, had seen his face grow grave, his lips straighten, and a +certain subdued impatience express itself in the opening and shutting of +his hands, but no word of comment had followed. + +“Come, we are waiting, Bayard,” she said at last, with a smile. “What do +you think of Greenough’s theory?” + +The traveller pushed his cup from him, shook the ashes from his cigar, +and answered slowly:-- + +“That there is something stronger than vengeance, Louise--something +higher.” + +“You mean mercy?” + +“Something infinitely more powerful--the Primeval.” + +The Baron twisted his short neck and faced the speaker. Greenough rose +to his feet, relighted his cigar at the silver lamp, and said with some +impatience:-- + +“I don’t understand your meaning, Bayard; make it clear, will you?” + +“You don’t understand, Greenough, because you have not suffered--not as +some men I know, not as one man I have in mind.” + +Mme. Constantin slipped from her cushions, crossed to where Bayard sat, +and nestled on a low ottoman beside him. + +“Is it something you haven’t told me, Bayard?” she asked, looking up +into his face. These two had been friends for years. Sometimes in his +wanderings the letters came in bunches; at other times the silence +continued for months. + +“Yes, something I haven’t told you, Louise--not all of it. I remember +writing you about his arrival at Babohunga, and what a delightful fellow +he was, but I couldn’t tell you the rest of it. I will now, and I want +Greenough to listen. + +“He was, I think, the handsomest young fellow that I ever saw--tall, +broad shouldered, well built, curly hair cut close to his head, light, +upturned mustache, white teeth, clear, fair skin--really you’d hardly +meet another such young fellow anywhere. He had come up from Zanzibar +and had pushed on to my camp, hoping, he said, to join some caravan +going into the interior. He explained that he was an officer in the +Belgian army, that he had friends further up, near Lake Mantumba, +and that he came for sport alone. I, of course, was glad to take him +in--glad that year to take anybody in who was white, especially +this young fellow, who was such a contrast to the customary +straggler--escaped convict, broken-down gambler, disgraced officer, Arab +trader, and other riffraff that occasionally passed my way. + +“And then, again, his manners, his smile, the easy grace of his +movements--even his linen, bearing his initials and a crown--something +he never referred to--all showed him to be a man accustomed to the +refinements of society. Another reason was his evident inexperience with +the life about him. His ten days’ march from the landing below to my +camp had been a singularly lucky one. They generally plunge into the +forest in perfect health, only to crawl back to the river--those who +live to crawl--their bones picked clean by its merciless fingers. To +push on now, with the rainy season setting in, meant certain death. + +“The second day he paid the price and fell ill. He complained of his +feet--the tramp had knocked him out, he said. I examined his toes, cut +out some poisonous wood ticks that had buried themselves under the skin, +and put him to bed. Fever then set in, and for two days and nights +I thought he would go under. During the delirium he kept repeating a +woman’s name, begging her to give him a drink, to lift his head so he +could look into her eyes. Once I had to hold him by main force to keep +him from following this fancy of his brain into the forest. When he +began to hobble about once more he again wanted to push on, but I +determined to hold onto him. I was alone at the time--that is, without +a white companion, Judson having gone down to Zanzibar with some +despatches for the company--and his companionship was a godsend. + +“What seemed to worry him most after he got well was his enforced use +of my wardrobe and outfit. He had brought little of his own except his +clothes and some blankets, and no arms of any kind but the revolver +he carried around his waist in a holster. All his heavier luggage, he +explained, was at a landing below. This objection I met by promising +to send for it by the first band of carriers after the rainy season +was over. In the meantime he must, I insisted, use my own guns and +ammunition, or anything else that my kit afforded. + +“Up to this time he had never mentioned his home or the names of any of +his people, nor had he offered any explanation of his choice of Africa +as a hunting ground, nor did he ever seek to learn my own impressions +regarding his self-imposed exile (it was really exile, for he never +hunted a single day while he was with me), except to ask me one morning +in a casual way, whether anything he had said in his delirium had made +me think the less of him--all of which I laughed at, never mentioning, +of course, what I had been obliged to hear. + +“One night, when a tropical storm of unusual severity was passing, I +found him sealing a letter at my table with the aid of a lantern held +close. Presently he got up and began pacing the floor, seemingly in +great agitation; then he reached over, picked up the letter from the +table, lighted one end of it in the blaze of the lantern, dropped it to +the floor, waited until it was entirely consumed, and then put his foot +on the ashes. + +“‘Rather a waste of time, wasn’t it?’ I said with a laugh. + +“‘Yes, all of it has been a waste of time--and my life with it. Now +and then I write these letters. They’re always burned in the end. No +use--nothing to gain. Yes, waste of time. There are some things in the +world that no man ought ever to ask forgiveness for.’ He threw himself +into a chair and went on:-- + +“‘You never went crazy mad over a woman, did you? No--you’re not built +that way. I am. She was different from the women I had met. She was not +of my people--she was English. We met first in Brussels; then I followed +her to Vienna. For six months she was free to do as she pleased. We +lived the life--well, you know! Then her husband returned.’ + +“‘Oh, she was married!’ I remarked casually. + +“‘Yes, and to a man you would have thought she would have been true +to, although he was nearly twice her age. I knew all this--knew when +I started in to make her love me--as a matter of pride first--as a boy +walks on thin ice, believing he can cross in safety. Perhaps she had +some such idea about me. Then the crust gave way, and we were both in +the depths. The affair had lasted about six months--all the time her +husband was gone. Then I either had to face the consequences or leave +Vienna. To have done the first meant ruin to her; the last meant ruin to +me. It had not been her fault--it had been mine. He sent me word that he +would shoot me at sight, and he meant it. But the madness had not worked +out of me yet. She clung to me like a frightened child in her +agony, begging me not to leave her--not to meet her husband; to go +somewhere--suddenly, as if I had been ordered away by my government; +to make no reply to her husband, who, so far, could prove +nothing--somewhere, later on, when he was again on a mission, we could +meet. + +“‘You have known me now for some time--the last month intimately. Do I +look like a coward and a cur? Well, I am both. That very night I saw him +coming toward my quarters in search of me. Did I face him? No. I stooped +down behind a fence and hid until he passed. + +“‘That summer, some months later, we met in Lucerne. She had left him +in Venice and he was to meet her in Paris. Two days later he walked into +the small hotel where she had stopped and the end came. + +“‘But I took her with me this time. One of the porters who knew him and +knew her helped; and we boarded the night train for Paris without his +finding us. I had then given up about everything in life; I was away +without leave, had lost touch with my world--with everybody--except my +agents, who sent me money. Then began a still hunt, he following us and +we shifting from place to place, until we hid ourselves in a little town +in Northern Italy. + +“‘Two years had now passed, I still crazy mad--knowing nothing, thinking +nothing--one blind idolatry! One morning I found a note on my table; +she was going to Venice. I was not to follow until she sent for me. She +never sent--not a line--no message. Then the truth came out--she never +intended to send--she was tired of it all!’ + +“The young fellow rose from his seat and began pacing the dirt floor +again. He seemed strangely stirred. I waited for the sequel, but he kept +silent. + +“‘Is this why you came here?’ I asked. + +“‘Yes and no. I came here because one of my brother officers is at one +of the stations up the river, and because here I could be lost. You +can explain it as you will, but go where I may I live in deadly fear +of meeting the man I wronged. Here he can’t hunt me, as he has done all +over Europe. If we meet there is but one thing left--either I must kill +him or he will kill me. I would have faced him at any time but for her. +Now I could not harm him. We have both suffered from the same cause--the +loss of a woman we loved. I had caused his agony and it is for me to +make amends, but not by sending him to his grave. Here he is out of +my way and I out of his. You saw me burn that letter; I have destroyed +dozens of them. When I can stand the pressure no longer I sit down +and ask his pardon; then I tear it up or burn it. He couldn’t +understand--wouldn’t understand. He’d think I was afraid to meet him +and was begging for my life. Don’t you see how impossible it all is--how +damnably I am placed?’” + +Mme. Constantin and the others had gathered closer to where Bayard sat. +Even the wife of the young secretary had moved her chair so she could +look into the speaker’s face. All were absorbed in the story. Bayard +went on:-- + +“One of the queer things about the African fever is the way it affects +the brain. The delirium passes when the temperature goes down, but +certain hallucinations last sometimes for weeks. How much of the queer +story was true, therefore, and how much was due to his convalescence--he +was by no means himself again--I could not decide. That a man should +lose his soul and freedom over a woman was not new, but that he should +bury himself in the jungle to keep from killing a man whose pardon he +wanted to ask for betraying his wife was new. + +“I sympathized with him, of course, telling him he was too young to let +the world go by; that when the husband got cool he would give up the +chase--had given it up long ago, no doubt, now that he realized how good +for nothing the woman was--said all the things, of course, one naturally +says to a man you suspect to be slightly out of his head. + +“The next night Judson returned. He brought newspapers and letters, and +word from the outside world; among other things that he had met a man +at the landing below who was on his way to the camp above us. He had +offered to bring him with him, but he had engaged some Zanzibari of his +own and intended to make a shorter route to the north of our camp +and then join one of the bands in charge of an Arab trader-some of +Tippu-Tib’s men really. He knew of the imminence of the rainy season +and wanted, to return to Zanzibar before it set in in earnest. Judson’s +news--all his happenings, for that matter--interested the young Belgian +even more than they did me, and before the week was out the two were +constantly together--a godsend in his present state of mind--saved +him in fact from a relapse, I thought--Judson’s odd way of looking +at things, as well as his hard, common sense, being just what the +high-strung young fellow needed most. + +“Some weeks after this--perhaps two, I can’t remember exactly--a party +of my men whom I sent out for plantains and corn (our provisions were +running low) returned to camp bringing me a scrap of paper which a white +man had given them. They had found him half dead a day’s journey away. +On it was scrawled in French a request for food and help. I started +at once, taking the things I knew would be wanted. The young Belgian +offered to go with me--he was always ready to help--but Judson had gone +to a neighboring village and there was no one to leave in charge but +him. I had now not only begun to like him but to trust him. + +“I have seen a good many starving men in my time, but this lost stranger +when I found him was the most miserable object I ever beheld. He lay +propped up against a tree, with his feet over a pool of water, near +where my men had left him. His eyes were sunk in his head, his lips +parched and cracked, his voice almost gone. A few hours more and he +would have been beyond help. He had fainted, so they told me, after +writing the scrawl, and only the efforts of my men and the morsel of +food they could spare him brought him back to life. When I had poured a +few drops of brandy down his throat and had made him a broth and warmed +him up his strength began to come back. It is astonishing what a few +ounces of food will do for a starving man. + +“He told me he had been deserted by his carriers, who had robbed him of +all he had--food, ammunition, everything--and since then he had wandered +aimlessly about, living on bitter berries and fungi. He had, it appears, +been sent to Zanzibar by his government to straighten out some matters +connected with one of the missions, and, wishing to see something of +the country, he had pushed on, relying on his former experiences--he had +been on similar excursions in Brazil--to pull him through. + +“Then followed the story of the last few weeks--the terrors of the long +nights, as he listened to the cries of prowling animals; his hunger and +increasing weakness--the counting of the days and hours he could live; +the indescribable fright that overpowered him when he realized he must +die, alone, and away from his people. Raising himself on his elbow--he +was still too weak to stand on his feet--he motioned to me to come +nearer, and, as I bent my head he said in a hoarse whisper, as if he +were in the presence of some mighty spirit who would overhear:-- + +“‘In these awful weeks I have faced the primeval. God stripped me +naked--naked as Adam, and like him, left me alone. In my hunger I cried +out; in my weakness I prayed. No answer--nothing but silence--horrible, +overpowering silence. Then in my despair I began to curse--to strike +the trees with my clenched fists, only to sink down exhausted. I could +not--I would not die! Soon all my life passed in review. All the mean +things I had done to others; all the mean things they had done to me. +Then love, honor, hatred, revenge, official promotion, money, the +good opinion of my fellows--all the things we value and that make our +standards--took form, one after another, and as quickly vanished in the +gloom of the jungle. Of what use were they--any of them? If I was to +live I must again become the Homo--the Primeval Man--eat as he ate, +sleep as he slept, be simple, brave, forgiving, obedient, as he had +been. All I had brought with me of civilization--my civilization--the +one we men make and call life--were as nothing, if it could not bring me +a cup of water, a handful of corn or a coal of fire to warm my shivering +body.’ + +“I am not giving you his exact words, Louise, not all of them, but I +am giving you as near as I can the effect untamed, mighty, irresistible +nature produced on his mind. Lying there, his shrivelled white face +supported on one shrunken hand, his body emaciated so that the bones of +his knees and elbows protruded from his ragged clothes, he seemed like +some prophet of old, lifting his voice in the wilderness, proclaiming a +new faith and a new life. + +“Nor can I give you any idea of the way the words came, nor of the +glassy brilliance of his eyes, set in a face dry as a skull, the +yellow teeth chattering between tightly stretched lips. Oh! it was +horrible--horrible! + +“The second day he was strong enough to stand, but not to walk. The +rain, due now every hour, comes without warning, making the swamps +impassable, and there was no time to lose. I left two men to care for +him, and hurried back to camp to get some sort of a stretcher on which +to bring him out. + +“That night, sitting under our lamp--we were alone at the time, my +men being again away--I gave the young Belgian the details of my trip, +telling him the man’s name and object in coming into the wilderness, +describing his sufferings and relating snaps of his talk. He listened +with a curious expression on his face, his eyes growing strangely +bright, his fingers twitching like those of a nervous person unused to +tales of suffering and privation. + +“‘And he will live?’ he said, with a smile, as I finished. + +“‘Certainly; all he wanted was something in his stomach; he’s got that. +He’ll be here to-morrow.’ + +“For some time he did not speak; then he rose from his seat, looked at +me steadily for a moment, grasped my hand, and with a certain tenderness +in his voice, said: + +“‘Thank you.’ + +“‘For what?’ I asked in surprise. + +“‘For being kind. I’ll go to the spring and get a drink, and then I’ll +go to sleep. Good night!’ + +“I watched him disappear into the dark, wondering at his mood. Hardly +had I regained my seat when a pistol shot rang out. He had blown the top +of his head off. + +“That night I buried him in the soft ooze near the spring, covering him +so the hyenas could not reach his body. + +“The next morning my men arrived, carrying the stranger. He had been +plucky and had insisted on walking a little, and the party arrived +earlier than I expected. When he had thanked me for what I had done, he +began an inspection of my rude dwelling and the smaller lean-to, even +peering into the huts connected with my bungalow--new in his experience. + +“‘And you are all alone except for your black men?’ he asked in an eager +tone. + +“‘No, I have Mr. Judson with me. He is away this week--and a young +Belgian officer--and--I--’ + +“‘Yes, I remember Mr. Judson,’ he interrupted. ‘I met him at the landing +below. I should have taken his advice and joined him. And the young +officer--has he been long with you?’ + +“‘About two months.’ + +“‘He is the same man who left some of his luggage at the landing below, +is he not?’ + +“‘Yes, I think so,’ I answered. + +“‘A young man with light curly hair and upturned mustache, very strong, +quick in his movements, shows his teeth when he speaks--very white +teeth--’ + +“‘He was smiling--a strange smile from one whose lips were still +parched. + +“‘Yes,’ I replied. + +“‘Can I see him?’ + +“‘No, he is dead!’ + +“Had I not stretched out my hand to steady him he would have fallen. + +“‘Dead!’ he cried, a look of horror in his eyes. ‘No! You don’t +mean--not starved to death! No, no, you don’t mean that!’ He was +trembling all over. + +“‘No, he blew out his brains last night. His grave is outside. Come, I +will show it to you.’ + +“I had almost to carry him. For an instant he leaned against a tree +growing near the poor fellow’s head, his eyes fixed on the rude mound. +Then he slowly sank to his knees and burst into tears, sobbing: + +“‘Oh! If I could have stopped him! He was so young to die.’ + +“Two days later he set out on his return to the coast.” + +With the ending of the story, Bayard turned to Mme. Constantin: + +“There, Louise, you have the rest of it. You understand now what I meant +when I said there was something stronger than revenge;--the primeval.” + +Greenough, who had sat absorbed, drinking in every word, laid his hand +on Bayard’s shoulder. + +“You haven’t told us their names.” + +“Do you want them?” + +“Yes, but write them on this card.” + +Bayard slipped his gold pencil from its chain and traced two names. “My +God, Bayard! That’s the same man I told you is dying of a broken heart.” + +“Yes--that’s why I told you the story, Greenough. But his heart is not +breaking for the woman he loved and lost, but for the man he hunted--the +man I buried.” + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Homo, by F. Hopkinson Smith + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMO *** + +***** This file should be named 23694-0.txt or 23694-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/6/9/23694/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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