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diff --git a/old/afost10.txt b/old/afost10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2bccc8d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/afost10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1786 @@ +**The Project Gutenberg Etext of Amy Foster, by Joseph Conrad** +#6 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 posting these files! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. 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If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Association / Illinois + Benedictine College" within the 60 days following each + date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) + your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, +scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty +free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution +you can think of. Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg +Association / Illinois Benedictine College". + +*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +AMY FOSTER + + + + + +Kennedy is a country doctor, and lives in Cole- +brook, on the shores of Eastbay. The high +ground rising abruptly behind the red roofs of the +little town crowds the quaint High Street against +the wall which defends it from the sea. Beyond +the sea-wall there curves for miles in a vast and +regular sweep the barren beach of shingle, with the +village of Brenzett standing out darkly across the +water, a spire in a clump of trees; and still further +out the perpendicular column of a lighthouse, look- +ing in the distance no bigger than a lead pencil, +marks the vanishing-point of the land. The coun- +try at the back of Brenzett is low and flat, but the +bay is fairly well sheltered from the seas, and occa- +sionally a big ship, windbound or through stress +of weather, makes use of the anchoring ground a +mile and a half due north from you as you stand +at the back door of the "Ship Inn" in Brenzett. +A dilapidated windmill near by lifting its shattered +arms from a mound no loftier than a rubbish heap, +and a Martello tower squatting at the water's edge +half a mile to the south of the Coastguard cottages, +are familiar to the skippers of small craft. These +are the official seamarks for the patch of trust- +worthy bottom represented on the Admiralty charts +by an irregular oval of dots enclosing several fig- +ures six, with a tiny anchor engraved among them, +and the legend "mud and shells" over all. + +The brow of the upland overtops the square +tower of the Colebrook Church. The slope is +green and looped by a white road. Ascending +along this road, you open a valley broad and shal- +low, a wide green trough of pastures and hedges +merging inland into a vista of purple tints and +flowing lines closing the view. + +In this valley down to Brenzett and Colebrook +and up to Darnford, the market town fourteen +miles away, lies the practice of my friend Kennedy. +He had begun life as surgeon in the Navy, and +afterwards had been the companion of a famous +traveller, in the days when there were continents +with unexplored interiors. His papers on the +fauna and flora made him known to scientific socie- +ties. And now he had come to a country practice +--from choice. The penetrating power of his +mind, acting like a corrosive fluid, had destroyed +his ambition, I fancy. His intelligence is of a +scientific order, of an investigating habit, and of +that unappeasable curiosity which believes that +there is a particle of a general truth in every mys- +tery. + +A good many years ago now, on my return from +abroad, he invited me to stay with him. I came +readily enough, and as he could not neglect his +patients to keep me company, he took me on his +rounds--thirty miles or so of an afternoon, some- +times. I waited for him on the roads; the horse +reached after the leafy twigs, and, sitting in +the dogcart, I could hear Kennedy's laugh through +the half-open door left open of some cottage. He +had a big, hearty laugh that would have fitted a +man twice his size, a brisk manner, a bronzed face, +and a pair of grey, profoundly attentive eyes. He +had the talent of making people talk to him freely, +and an inexhaustible patience in listening to their +tales. + +One day, as we trotted out of a large village into +a shady bit of road, I saw on our left hand a low, +black cottage, with diamond panes in the windows, +a creeper on the end wall, a roof of shingle, and +some roses climbing on the rickety trellis-work of +the tiny porch. Kennedy pulled up to a walk. A +woman, in full sunlight, was throwing a dripping +blanket over a line stretched between two old ap- +ple-trees. And as the bobtailed, long-necked chest- +nut, trying to get his head, jerked the left hand, +covered by a thick dogskin glove, the doctor raised +his voice over the hedge: "How's your child, +Amy?" + +I had the time to see her dull face, red, not with +a mantling blush, but as if her flat cheeks had been +vigorously slapped, and to take in the squat figure, +the scanty, dusty brown hair drawn into a tight +knot at the back of the head. She looked quite +young. With a distinct catch in her breath, her +voice sounded low and timid. + +"He's well, thank you." + +We trotted again. "A young patient of +yours," I said; and the doctor, flicking the chest- +nut absently, muttered, "Her husband used to be." + +"She seems a dull creature," I remarked list- +lessly. + +"Precisely," said Kennedy. "She is very pas- +sive. It's enough to look at the red hands hanging +at the end of those short arms, at those slow, prom- +inent brown eyes, to know the inertness of her mind +--an inertness that one would think made it ever- +lastingly safe from all the surprises of imagina- +tion. And yet which of us is safe? At any rate, +such as you see her, she had enough imagination +to fall in love. She's the daughter of one Isaac +Foster, who from a small farmer has sunk into a +shepherd; the beginning of his misfortunes dating +from his runaway marriage with the cook of his +widowed father--a well-to-do, apoplectic grazier, +who passionately struck his name off his will, and +had been heard to utter threats against his life. +But this old affair, scandalous enough to serve as +a motive for a Greek tragedy, arose from the simi- +larity of their characters. There are other trage- +dies, less scandalous and of a subtler poignancy, +arising from irreconcilable differences and from +that fear of the Incomprehensible that hangs over +all our heads--over all our heads. . . ." + +The tired chestnut dropped into a walk; and the +rim of the sun, all red in a speckless sky, touched +familiarly the smooth top of a ploughed rise near +the road as I had seen it times innumerable touch +the distant horizon of the sea. The uniform +brownness of the harrowed field glowed with a rosy +tinge, as though the powdered clods had sweated +out in minute pearls of blood the toil of uncounted +ploughmen. From the edge of a copse a waggon +with two horses was rolling gently along the ridge. +Raised above our heads upon the sky-line, it loomed +up against the red sun, triumphantly big, enor- +mous, like a chariot of giants drawn by two slow- +stepping steeds of legendary proportions. And +the clumsy figure of the man plodding at the head +of the leading horse projected itself on the back- +ground of the Infinite with a heroic uncouthness. +The end of his carter's whip quivered high up in +the blue. Kennedy discoursed. + +"She's the eldest of a large family. At the age +of fifteen they put her out to service at the New +Barns Farm. I attended Mrs. Smith, the tenant's +wife, and saw that girl there for the first time. +Mrs. Smith, a genteel person with a sharp nose, +made her put on a black dress every afternoon. I +don't know what induced me to notice her at all. +There are faces that call your attention by a cu- +rious want of definiteness in their whole aspect, as, +walking in a mist, you peer attentively at a vague +shape which, after all, may be nothing more cu- +rious or strange than a signpost. The only pecu- +liarity I perceived in her was a slight hesitation in +her utterance, a sort of preliminary stammer which +passes away with the first word. When sharply +spoken to, she was apt to lose her head at once; but +her heart was of the kindest. She had never been +heard to express a dislike for a single human being, +and she was tender to every living creature. She +was devoted to Mrs. Smith, to Mr. Smith, to their +dogs, cats, canaries; and as to Mrs. Smith's grey +parrot, its peculiarities exercised upon her a posi- +tive fascination. Nevertheless, when that outland- +ish bird, attacked by the cat, shrieked for help in +human accents, she ran out into the yard stopping +her ears, and did not prevent the crime. For Mrs. +Smith this was another evidence of her stupidity; +on the other hand, her want of charm, in view of +Smith's well-known frivolousness, was a great rec- +commendation. Her short-sighted eyes would swim +with pity for a poor mouse in a trap, and she had +been seen once by some boys on her knees in the wet +grass helping a toad in difficulties. If it's true, as +some German fellow has said, that without phos- +phorus there is no thought, it is still more true that +there is no kindness of heart without a certain +amount of imagination. She had some. She had +even more than is necessary to understand suffer- +ing and to be moved by pity. She fell in love un- +der circumstances that leave no room for doubt in +the matter; for you need imagination to form a +notion of beauty at all, and still more to discover +your ideal in an unfamiliar shape. + +"How this aptitude came to her, what it did +feed upon, is an inscrutable mystery. She was +born in the village, and had never been further +away from it than Colebrook or perhaps Darnford. +She lived for four years with the Smiths. New +Barns is an isolated farmhouse a mile away from +the road, and she was content to look day after +day at the same fields, hollows, rises; at the trees +and the hedgerows; at the faces of the four men +about the farm, always the same--day after day, +month after month, year after year. She never +showed a desire for conversation, and, as it seemed +to me, she did not know how to smile. Sometimes +of a fine Sunday afternoon she would put on her +best dress, a pair of stout boots, a large grey hat +trimmed with a black feather (I've seen her in that +finery), seize an absurdly slender parasol, climb +over two stiles, tramp over three fields and along +two hundred yards of road--never further. There +stood Foster's cottage. She would help her mother +to give their tea to the younger children, wash up +the crockery, kiss the little ones, and go back to +the farm. That was all. All the rest, all the +change, all the relaxation. She never seemed to +wish for anything more. And then she fell in love. +She fell in love silently, obstinately--perhaps help- +lessly. It came slowly, but when it came it worked +like a powerful spell; it was love as the Ancients +understood it: an irresistible and fateful impulse-- +a possession! Yes, it was in her to become haunted +and possessed by a face, by a presence, fatally, as +though she had been a pagan worshipper of form +under a joyous sky--and to be awakened at last +from that mysterious forgetfulness of self, from +that enchantment, from that transport, by a +fear resembling the unaccountable terror of a +brute. . . ." + +With the sun hanging low on its western limit, +the expanse of the grass-lands framed in the coun- +ter-scarps of the rising ground took on a gorgeous +and sombre aspect. A sense of penetrating sad- +ness, like that inspired by a grave strain of music, +disengaged itself from the silence of the fields. +The men we met walked past slow, unsmiling, with +downcast eyes, as if the melancholy of an over-bur- +dened earth had weighted their feet, bowed their +shoulders, borne down their glances. + +"Yes," said the doctor to my remark, "one +would think the earth is under a curse, since of all +her children these that cling to her the closest are +uncouth in body and as leaden of gait as if their +very hearts were loaded with chains. But here on +this same road you might have seen amongst these +heavy men a being lithe, supple, and long-limbed, +straight like a pine with something striving up- +wards in his appearance as though the heart with- +in him had been buoyant. Perhaps it was only the +force of the contrast, but when he was passing one +of these villagers here, the soles of his feet did not +seem to me to touch the dust of the road. He +vaulted over the stiles, paced these slopes with a +long elastic stride that made him noticeable at a +great distance, and had lustrous black eyes. He +was so different from the mankind around that, +with his freedom of movement, his soft--a little +startled, glance, his olive complexion and graceful +bearing, his humanity suggested to me the nature +of a woodland creature. He came from there." + +The doctor pointed with his whip, and from the +summit of the descent seen over the rolling tops of +the trees in a park by the side of the road, appeared +the level sea far below us, like the floor of an im- +mense edifice inlaid with bands of dark ripple, with +still trails of glitter, ending in a belt of glassy +water at the foot of the sky. The light blur of +smoke, from an invisible steamer, faded on the +great clearness of the horizon like the mist of a +breath on a mirror; and, inshore, the white sails of +a coaster, with the appearance of disentangling +themselves slowly from under the branches, floated +clear of the foliage of the trees. + +"Shipwrecked in the bay?" I said. + +"Yes; he was a castaway. A poor emigrant +from Central Europe bound to America and washed +ashore here in a storm. And for him, who knew +nothing of the earth, England was an undiscovered +country. It was some time before he learned its +name; and for all I know he might have expected +to find wild beasts or wild men here, when, crawling +in the dark over the sea-wall, he rolled down the +other side into a dyke, where it was another miracle +he didn't get drowned. But he struggled instinc- +tively like an animal under a net, and this blind +struggle threw him out into a field. He must have +been, indeed, of a tougher fibre than he looked to +withstand without expiring such buffetings, the +violence of his exertions, and so much fear. Later +on, in his broken English that resembled curiously +the speech of a young child, he told me himself that +he put his trust in God, believing he was no longer +in this world. And truly--he would add--how was +he to know? He fought his way against the rain +and the gale on all fours, and crawled at last +among some sheep huddled close under the lee of a +hedge. They ran off in all directions, bleating in +the darkness, and he welcomed the first familiar +sound he heard on these shores. It must have been +two in the morning then. And this is all we know +of the manner of his landing, though he did not +arrive unattended by any means. Only his grisly +company did not begin to come ashore till much +later in the day. . . ." + +The doctor gathered the reins, clicked his +tongue; we trotted down the hill. Then turning, +almost directly, a sharp corner into the High +Street, we rattled over the stones and were home. + +Late in the evening Kennedy, breaking a spell +of moodiness that had come over him, returned to +the story. Smoking his pipe, he paced the long +room from end to end. A reading-lamp concen- +trated all its light upon the papers on his desk; +and, sitting by the open window, I saw, after the +windless, scorching day, the frigid splendour of a +hazy sea lying motionless under the moon. Not a +whisper, not a splash, not a stir of the shingle, not +a footstep, not a sigh came up from the earth be- +low--never a sign of life but the scent of climbing +jasmine; and Kennedy's voice, speaking behind me, +passed through the wide casement, to vanish out- +side in a chill and sumptuous stillness. + +". . . The relations of shipwrecks in the +olden time tell us of much suffering. Often the +castaways were only saved from drowning to die +miserably from starvation on a barren coast; oth- +ers suffered violent death or else slavery, passing +through years of precarious existence with people +to whom their strangeness was an object of suspi- +cion, dislike or fear. We read about these things, +and they are very pitiful. It is indeed hard upon +a man to find himself a lost stranger, helpless, +incomprehensible, and of a mysterious origin, in +some obscure corner of the earth. Yet amongst all +the adventurers shipwrecked in all the wild parts of +the world there is not one, it seems to me, that ever +had to suffer a fate so simply tragic as the man I +am speaking of, the most innocent of adventurers +cast out by the sea in the bight of this bay, almost +within sight from this very window. + +"He did not know the name of his ship. Indeed, +in the course of time we discovered he did not even +know that ships had names--'like Christian peo- +ple'; and when, one day, from the top of the Tal- +fourd Hill, he beheld the sea lying open to his view, +his eyes roamed afar, lost in an air of wild surprise, +as though he had never seen such a sight before. +And probably he had not. As far as I could make +out, he had been hustled together with many others +on board an emigrant-ship lying at the mouth of +the Elbe, too bewildered to take note of his sur- +roundings, too weary to see anything, too anxious +to care. They were driven below into the 'tween- +deck and battened down from the very start. It +was a low timber dwelling--he would say--with +wooden beams overhead, like the houses in his coun- +try, but you went into it down a ladder. It was +very large, very cold, damp and sombre, with places +in the manner of wooden boxes where people had to +sleep, one above another, and it kept on rocking all +ways at once all the time. He crept into one of +these boxes and laid down there in the clothes in +which he had left his home many days before, keep- +ing his bundle and his stick by his side. People +groaned, children cried, water dripped, the lights +went out, the walls of the place creaked, and every- +thing was being shaken so that in one's little box +one dared not lift one's head. He had lost touch +with his only companion (a young man from the +same valley, he said), and all the time a great noise +of wind went on outside and heavy blows fell-- +boom! boom! An awful sickness overcame him, +even to the point of making him neglect his pray- +ers. Besides, one could not tell whether it was +morning or evening. It seemed always to be night +in that place. + +"Before that he had been travelling a long, long +time on the iron track. He looked out of the win- +dow, which had a wonderfully clear glass in it, and +the trees, the houses, the fields, and the long roads +seemed to fly round and round about him till his +head swam. He gave me to understand that he had +on his passage beheld uncounted multitudes of peo- +ple--whole nations--all dressed in such clothes as +the rich wear. Once he was made to get out of the +carriage, and slept through a night on a bench in +a house of bricks with his bundle under his head; +and once for many hours he had to sit on a floor of +flat stones dozing, with his knees up and with his +bundle between his feet. There was a roof over him, +which seemed made of glass, and was so high that +the tallest mountain-pine he had ever seen would +have had room to grow under it. Steam-machines +rolled in at one end and out at the other. People +swarmed more than you can see on a feast-day +round the miraculous Holy Image in the yard of +the Carmelite Convent down in the plains where, +before he left his home, he drove his mother in a +wooden cart--a pious old woman who wanted to +offer prayers and make a vow for his safety. He +could not give me an idea of how large and lofty +and full of noise and smoke and gloom, and clang +of iron, the place was, but some one had told him +it was called Berlin. Then they rang a bell, and +another steam-machine came in, and again he was +taken on and on through a land that wearied his +eyes by its flatness without a single bit of a hill to +be seen anywhere. One more night he spent shut +up in a building like a good stable with a litter of +straw on the floor, guarding his bundle amongst a +lot of men, of whom not one could understand a +single word he said. In the morning they were all +led down to the stony shores of an extremely broad +muddy river, flowing not between hills but between +houses that seemed immense. There was a steam- +machine that went on the water, and they all stood +upon it packed tight, only now there were with +them many women and children who made much +noise. A cold rain fell, the wind blew in his face; +he was wet through, and his teeth chattered. He +and the young man from the same valley took each +other by the hand. + +"They thought they were being taken to Amer- +ica straight away, but suddenly the steam-machine +bumped against the side of a thing like a house on +the water. The walls were smooth and black, and +there uprose, growing from the roof as it were, +bare trees in the shape of crosses, extremely high. +That's how it appeared to him then, for he had +never seen a ship before. This was the ship that +was going to swim all the way to America. Voices +shouted, everything swayed; there was a ladder +dipping up and down. He went up on his hands +and knees in mortal fear of falling into the water +below, which made a great splashing. He got sep- +arated from his companion, and when he descended +into the bottom of that ship his heart seemed to melt +suddenly within him. + +"It was then also, as he told me, that he lost con- +tact for good and all with one of those three men +who the summer before had been going about +through all the little towns in the foothills of his +country. They would arrive on market days driv- +ing in a peasant's cart, and would set up an office +in an inn or some other Jew's house. There were +three of them, of whom one with a long beard +looked venerable; and they had red cloth collars +round their necks and gold lace on their sleeves +like Government officials. They sat proudly behind +a long table; and in the next room, so that the com- +mon people shouldn't hear, they kept a cunning +telegraph machine, through which they could talk +to the Emperor of America. The fathers hung +about the door, but the young men of the mountains +would crowd up to the table asking many questions, +for there was work to be got all the year round at +three dollars a day in America, and no military +service to do. + +"But the American Kaiser would not take every- +body. Oh, no! He himself had a great difficulty +in getting accepted, and the venerable man in uni- +form had to go out of the room several times to +work the telegraph on his behalf. The American +Kaiser engaged him at last at three dollars, he +being young and strong. However, many able +young men backed out, afraid of the great dis- +tance; besides, those only who had some money +could be taken. There were some who sold their +huts and their land because it cost a lot of money +to get to America; but then, once there, you had +three dollars a day, and if you were clever you +could find places where true gold could be picked +up on the ground. His father's house was getting +over full. Two of his brothers were married and +had children. He promised to send money home +from America by post twice a year. His father +sold an old cow, a pair of piebald mountain ponies +of his own raising, and a cleared plot of fair pas- +ture land on the sunny slope of a pine-clad pass to +a Jew inn-keeper in order to pay the people of the +ship that took men to America to get rich in a +short time. + +"He must have been a real adventurer at heart, +for how many of the greatest enterprises in the +conquest of the earth had for their beginning just +such a bargaining away of the paternal cow for the +mirage or true gold far away! I have been telling +you more or less in my own words what I learned +fragmentarily in the course of two or three years, +during which I seldom missed an opportunity of a +friendly chat with him. He told me this story of +his adventure with many flashes of white teeth and +lively glances of black eyes, at first in a sort of anx- +ious baby-talk, then, as he acquired the language, +with great fluency, but always with that singing, +soft, and at the same time vibrating intonation that +instilled a strangely penetrating power into the +sound of the most familiar English words, as if +they had been the words of an unearthly language. +And he always would come to an end, with many +emphatic shakes of his head, upon that awful sen- +sation of his heart melting within him directly he +set foot on board that ship. Afterwards there +seemed to come for him a period of blank ignorance, +at any rate as to facts. No doubt he must have +been abominably sea-sick and abominably unhappy +--this soft and passionate adventurer, taken thus +out of his knowledge, and feeling bitterly as he lay +in his emigrant bunk his utter loneliness; for his +was a highly sensitive nature. The next thing we +know of him for certain is that he had been hiding +in Hammond's pig-pound by the side of the road +to Norton six miles, as the crow flies, from the sea. +Of these experiences he was unwilling to speak: +they seemed to have seared into his soul a sombre +sort of wonder and indignation. Through the ru- +mours of the country-side, which lasted for a good +many days after his arrival, we know that the fish- +ermen of West Colebrook had been disturbed and +startled by heavy knocks against the walls of +weatherboard cottages, and by a voice crying +piercingly strange words in the night. Several of +them turned out even, but, no doubt, he had fled in +sudden alarm at their rough angry tones hailing +each other in the darkness. A sort of frenzy must +have helped him up the steep Norton hill. It was +he, no doubt, who early the following morning had +been seen lying (in a swoon, I should say) on the +roadside grass by the Brenzett carrier, who actually +got down to have a nearer look, but drew back, in- +timidated by the perfect immobility, and by some- +thing queer in the aspect of that tramp, sleeping +so still under the showers. As the day advanced, +some children came dashing into school at Norton +in such a fright that the schoolmistress went out +and spoke indignantly to a 'horrid-looking man' +on the road. He edged away, hanging his head, +for a few steps, and then suddenly ran off with ex- +traordinary fleetness. The driver of Mr. Brad- +ley's milk-cart made no secret of it that he had +lashed with his whip at a hairy sort of gipsy fel- +low who, jumping up at a turn of the road by the +Vents, made a snatch at the pony's bridle. And +he caught him a good one too, right over the face, +he said, that made him drop down in the mud a +jolly sight quicker than he had jumped up; but it +was a good half-a-mile before he could stop the +pony. Maybe that in his desperate endeavours to +get help, and in his need to get in touch with some +one, the poor devil had tried to stop the cart. Also +three boys confessed afterwards to throwing stones +at a funny tramp, knocking about all wet and +muddy, and, it seemed, very drunk, in the narrow +deep lane by the limekilns. All this was the talk of +three villages for days; but we have Mrs. Finn's +(the wife of Smith's waggoner) unimpeachable +testimony that she saw him get over the low wall of +Hammond's pig-pound and lurch straight at her, +babbling aloud in a voice that was enough to make +one die of fright. Having the baby with her in a +perambulator, Mrs. Finn called out to him to go +away, and as he persisted in coming nearer, she hit +him courageously with her umbrella over the head +and, without once looking back, ran like the wind +with the perambulator as far as the first house in +the village. She stopped then, out of breath, and +spoke to old Lewis, hammering there at a heap of +stones; and the old chap, taking off his immense +black wire goggles, got up on his shaky legs to +look where she pointed. Together they followed +with their eyes the figure of the man running over +a field; they saw him fall down, pick himself up, +and run on again, staggering and waving his long +arms above his head, in the direction of the New +Barns Farm. From that moment he is plainly in +the toils of his obscure and touching destiny. +There is no doubt after this of what happened to +him. All is certain now: Mrs. Smith's intense ter- +ror; Amy Foster's stolid conviction held against +the other's nervous attack, that the man 'meant no +harm'; Smith's exasperation (on his return from +Darnford Market) at finding the dog barking +himself into a fit, the back-door locked, his wife in +hysterics; and all for an unfortunate dirty tramp, +supposed to be even then lurking in his stackyard. +Was he? He would teach him to frighten women. + +"Smith is notoriously hot-tempered, but the +sight of some nondescript and miry creature sitting +crosslegged amongst a lot of loose straw, and +swinging itself to and fro like a bear in a cage, +made him pause. Then this tramp stood up si- +lently before him, one mass of mud and filth from +head to foot. Smith, alone amongst his stacks with +this apparition, in the stormy twilight ringing with +the infuriated barking of the dog, felt the dread +of an inexplicable strangeness. But when that be- +ing, parting with his black hands the long matted +locks that hung before his face, as you part the two +halves of a curtain, looked out at him with glisten- +ing, wild, black-and-white eyes, the weirdness of +this silent encounter fairly staggered him. He had +admitted since (for the story has been a legitimate +subject of conversation about here for years) that +he made more than one step backwards. Then a +sudden burst of rapid, senseless speech persuaded +him at once that he had to do with an escaped luna- +tic. In fact, that impression never wore off com- +pletely. Smith has not in his heart given up his +secret conviction of the man's essential insanity to +this very day. + +"As the creature approached him, jabbering in +a most discomposing manner, Smith (unaware that +he was being addressed as 'gracious lord,' and ad- +jured in God's name to afford food and shelter) +kept on speaking firmly but gently to it, and re- +treating all the time into the other yard. At last, +watching his chance, by a sudden charge he bun- +dled him headlong into the wood-lodge, and in- +stantly shot the bolt. Thereupon he wiped his +brow, though the day was cold. He had done his +duty to the community by shutting up a wander- +ing and probably dangerous maniac. Smith isn't +a hard man at all, but he had room in his brain only +for that one idea of lunacy. He was not imagina- +tive enough to ask himself whether the man might +not be perishing with cold and hunger. Meantime, +at first, the maniac made a great deal of noise in +the lodge. Mrs. Smith was screaming upstairs, +where she had locked herself in her bedroom; but +Amy Foster sobbed piteously at the kitchen door, +wringing her hands and muttering, 'Don't! +don't!' I daresay Smith had a rough time of it +that evening with one noise and another, and this +insane, disturbing voice crying obstinately through +the door only added to his irritation. He couldn't +possibly have connected this troublesome lunatic +with the sinking of a ship in Eastbay, of which +there had been a rumour in the Darnford market- +place. And I daresay the man inside had been very +near to insanity on that night. Before his excite- +ment collapsed and he became unconscious he was +throwing himself violently about in the dark, roll- +ing on some dirty sacks, and biting his fists with +rage, cold, hunger, amazement, and despair. + +"He was a mountaineer of the eastern range of +the Carpathians, and the vessel sunk the night be- +fore in Eastbay was the Hamburg emigrant-ship +<i>Herzogin Sophia-Dorothea</i>, of appalling mem- +ory. + +"A few months later we could read in the papers +the accounts of the bogus 'Emigration Agencies' +among the Sclavonian peasantry in the more re- +mote provinces of Austria. The object of these +scoundrels was to get hold of the poor ignorant +people's homesteads, and they were in league with +the local usurers. They exported their victims +through Hamburg mostly. As to the ship, I had +watched her out of this very window, reaching +close-hauled under short canvas into the bay on a +dark, threatening afternoon. She came to an an- +chor, correctly by the chart, off the Brenzett Coast- +guard station. I remember before the night fell +looking out again at the outlines of her spars and +rigging that stood out dark and pointed on a back- +ground of ragged, slaty clouds like another and a +slighter spire to the left of the Brenzett church- +tower. In the evening the wind rose. At midnight +I could hear in my bed the terrific gusts and the +sounds of a driving deluge. + +"About that time the Coastguardmen thought +they saw the lights of a steamer over the anchoring- +ground. In a moment they vanished; but it is clear +that another vessel of some sort had tried for shel- +ter in the bay on that awful, blind night, had +rammed the German ship amidships (a breach-- +as one of the divers told me afterwards--'that you +could sail a Thames barge through'), and then +had gone out either scathless or damaged, who shall +say; but had gone out, unknown, unseen, and fatal, +to perish mysteriously at sea. Of her nothing ever +came to light, and yet the hue and cry that was +raised all over the world would have found her out +if she had been in existence anywhere on the face +of the waters. + +"A completeness without a clue, and a stealthy +silence as of a neatly executed crime, characterise +this murderous disaster, which, as you may remem- +ber, had its gruesome celebrity. The wind would +have prevented the loudest outcries from reaching +the shore; there had been evidently no time for sig- +nals of distress. It was death without any sort of +fuss. The Hamburg ship, filling all at once, cap- +sized as she sank, and at daylight there was not +even the end of a spar to be seen above water. She +was missed, of course, and at first the Coastguard- +men surmised that she had either dragged her an- +chor or parted her cable some time during the +night, and had been blown out to sea. Then, after +the tide turned, the wreck must have shifted a little +and released some of the bodies, because a child +--a little fair-haired child in a red frock-- +came ashore abreast of the Martello tower. By +the afternoon you could see along three miles of +beach dark figures with bare legs dashing in +and out of the tumbling foam, and rough-look- +ing men, women with hard faces, children, mostly +fair-haired, were being carried, stiff and dripping, +on stretchers, on wattles, on ladders, in a long +procession past the door of the 'Ship Inn,' to be +laid out in a row under the north wall of the +Brenzett Church. + +"Officially, the body of the little girl in the red +frock is the first thing that came ashore from that +ship. But I have patients amongst the seafaring +population of West Colebrook, and, unofficially, I +am informed that very early that morning two +brothers, who went down to look after their cobble +hauled up on the beach, found, a good way from +Brenzett, an ordinary ship's hencoop lying high +and dry on the shore, with eleven drowned ducks +inside. Their families ate the birds, and the hen- +coop was split into firewood with a hatchet. It is +possible that a man (supposing he happened to be +on deck at the time of the accident) might have +floated ashore on that hencoop. He might. I ad- +mit it is improbable, but there was the man--and +for days, nay, for weeks--it didn't enter our heads +that we had amongst us the only living soul that +had escaped from that disaster. The man himself, +even when he learned to speak intelligibly, could +tell us very little. He remembered he had felt bet- +ter (after the ship had anchored, I suppose), and +that the darkness, the wind, and the rain took his +breath away. This looks as if he had been on deck +some time during that night. But we mustn't forget +he had been taken out of his knowledge, that he +had been sea-sick and battened down below for four +days, that he had no general notion of a ship or of +the sea, and therefore could have no definite idea +of what was happening to him. The rain, the +wind, the darkness he knew; he understood the +bleating of the sheep, and he remembered the pain +of his wretchedness and misery, his heartbroken as- +tonishment that it was neither seen nor understood, +his dismay at finding all the men angry and all the +women fierce. He had approached them as a beg- +gar, it is true, he said; but in his country, even if +they gave nothing, they spoke gently to beggars. +The children in his country were not taught to +throw stones at those who asked for compassion. +Smith's strategy overcame him completely. The +wood-lodge presented the horrible aspect of a dun- +geon. What would be done to him next? . . . +No wonder that Amy Foster appeared to his eyes +with the aureole of an angel of light. The girl +had not been able to sleep for thinking of the poor +man, and in the morning, before the Smiths were +up, she slipped out across the back yard. Holding +the door of the wood-lodge ajar, she looked in and +extended to him half a loaf of white bread--'such +bread as the rich eat in my country,' he used to +say. + +"At this he got up slowly from amongst all sorts +of rubbish, stiff, hungry, trembling, miserable, and +doubtful. 'Can you eat this?' she asked in her +soft and timid voice. He must have taken her for +a 'gracious lady.' He devoured ferociously, and +tears were falling on the crust. Suddenly he +dropped the bread, seized her wrist, and im- +printed a kiss on her hand. She was not fright- +ened. Through his forlorn condition she had +observed that he was good-looking. She shut +the door and walked back slowly to the kitchen. +Much later on, she told Mrs. Smith, who shud- +dered at the bare idea of being touched by that +creature. + +"Through this act of impulsive pity he was +brought back again within the pale of human rela- +tions with his new surroundings. He never forgot +it--never. + +"That very same morning old Mr. Swaffer +(Smith's nearest neighbour) came over to give his +advice, and ended by carrying him off. He stood, +unsteady on his legs, meek, and caked over in half- +dried mud, while the two men talked around him in +an incomprehensible tongue. Mrs. Smith had re- +fused to come downstairs till the madman was off +the premises; Amy Foster, far from within the dark +kitchen, watched through the open back door; and +he obeyed the signs that were made to him to the +best of his ability. But Smith was full of mistrust. +'Mind, sir! It may be all his cunning,' he cried +repeatedly in a tone of warning. When Mr. +Swaffer started the mare, the deplorable being sit- +ting humbly by his side, through weakness, nearly +fell out over the back of the high two-wheeled cart. +Swaffer took him straight home. And it is then +that I come upon the scene. + +"I was called in by the simple process of the old +man beckoning to me with his forefinger over the +gate of his house as I happened to be driving past. +I got down, of course. + +"'I've got something here,' he mumbled, lead- +ing the way to an outhouse at a little distance from +his other farm-buildings. + +"It was there that I saw him first, in a long low +room taken upon the space of that sort of coach- +house. It was bare and whitewashed, with a small +square aperture glazed with one cracked, dusty +pane at its further end. He was lying on his back +upon a straw pallet; they had given him a couple +of horse-blankets, and he seemed to have spent the +remainder of his strength in the exertion of clean- +ing himself. He was almost speechless; his quick +breathing under the blankets pulled up to his chin, +his glittering, restless black eyes reminded me of a +wild bird caught in a snare. While I was examining +him, old Swaffer stood silently by the door, passing +the tips of his fingers along his shaven upper lip. +I gave some directions, promised to send a bottle of +medicine, and naturally made some inquiries. + +"'Smith caught him in the stackyard at New +Barns,' said the old chap in his deliberate, unmoved +manner, and as if the other had been indeed a sort +of wild animal. 'That's how I came by him. +Quite a curiosity, isn't he? Now tell me, doctor-- +you've been all over the world--don't you think +that's a bit of a Hindoo we've got hold of here.' + +"I was greatly surprised. His long black hair +scattered over the straw bolster contrasted with the +olive pallor of his face. It occurred to me he might +be a Basque. It didn't necessarily follow that he +should understand Spanish; but I tried him with +the few words I know, and also with some French. +The whispered sounds I caught by bending my ear +to his lips puzzled me utterly. That afternoon the +young ladies from the Rectory (one of them read +Goethe with a dictionary, and the other had strug- +gled with Dante for years), coming to see Miss +Swaffer, tried their German and Italian on him +from the doorway. They retreated, just the least +bit scared by the flood of passionate speech which, +turning on his pallet, he let out at them. They ad- +mitted that the sound was pleasant, soft, musical-- +but, in conjunction with his looks perhaps, it was +startling--so excitable, so utterly unlike anything +one had ever heard. The village boys climbed up +the bank to have a peep through the little square +aperture. Everybody was wondering what Mr. +Swaffer would do with him. + +"He simply kept him. + +"Swaffer would be called eccentric were he not +so much respected. They will tell you that Mr. +Swaffer sits up as late as ten o'clock at night to +read books, and they will tell you also that he can +write a cheque for two hundred pounds without +thinking twice about it. He himself would tell +you that the Swaffers had owned land between +this and Darnford for these three hundred years. +He must be eighty-five to-day, but he does not look +a bit older than when I first came here. He is a +great breeder of sheep, and deals extensively in cat- +tle. He attends market days for miles around in +every sort of weather, and drives sitting bowed low +over the reins, his lank grey hair curling over the +collar of his warm coat, and with a green plaid rug +round his legs. The calmness of advanced age +gives a solemnity to his manner. He is clean- +shaved; his lips are thin and sensitive; something +rigid and monarchal in the set of his features lends +a certain elevation to the character of his face. He +has been known to drive miles in the rain to see a +new kind of rose in somebody's garden, or a mon- +strous cabbage grown by a cottager. He loves to +hear tell of or to be shown something that he calls +'outlandish.' Perhaps it was just that outlandish- +ness of the man which influenced old Swaffer. Per- +haps it was only an inexplicable caprice. All I +know is that at the end of three weeks I caught +sight of Smith's lunatic digging in Swaffer's kitch- +en garden. They had found out he could use a +spade. He dug barefooted. + +"His black hair flowed over his shoulders. I +suppose it was Swaffer who had given him the +striped old cotton shirt; but he wore still the na- +tional brown cloth trousers (in which he had been +washed ashore) fitting to the leg almost like +tights; was belted with a broad leathern belt stud- +ded with little brass discs; and had never yet ven- +tured into the village. The land he looked upon +seemed to him kept neatly, like the grounds round +a landowner's house; the size of the cart-horses +struck him with astonishment; the roads resembled +garden walks, and the aspect of the people, espe- +cially on Sundays, spoke of opulence. He won- +dered what made them so hardhearted and their +children so bold. He got his food at the back door, +carried it in both hands carefully to his outhouse, +and, sitting alone on his pallet, would make the sign +of the cross before he began. Beside the same pal- +let, kneeling in the early darkness of the short days, +he recited aloud the Lord's Prayer before he slept. +Whenever he saw old Swaffer he would bow with +veneration from the waist, and stand erect while +the old man, with his fingers over his upper lip, sur- +veyed him silently. He bowed also to Miss Swaffer, +who kept house frugally for her father--a broad- +shouldered, big-boned woman of forty-five, with +the pocket of her dress full of keys, and a grey, +steady eye. She was Church--as people said +(while her father was one of the trustees of the +Baptist Chapel)--and wore a little steel cross at +her waist. She dressed severely in black, in mem- +ory of one of the innumerable Bradleys of the +neighbourhood, to whom she had been engaged +some twenty-five years ago--a young farmer who +broke his neck out hunting on the eve of the wed- +ding day. She had the unmoved countenance of +the deaf, spoke very seldom, and her lips, thin like +her father's, astonished one sometimes by a myste- +riously ironic curl. + +"These were the people to whom he owed alle- +giance, and an overwhelming loneliness seemed to +fall from the leaden sky of that winter without sun- +shine. All the faces were sad. He could talk to +no one, and had no hope of ever understanding +anybody. It was as if these had been the faces of +people from the other world--dead people--he +used to tell me years afterwards. Upon my word, +I wonder he did not go mad. He didn't know +where he was. Somewhere very far from his moun- +tains--somewhere over the water. Was this Amer- +ica, he wondered? + +"If it hadn't been for the steel cross at Miss +Swaffer's belt he would not, he confessed, have +known whether he was in a Christian country at +all. He used to cast stealthy glances at it, and feel +comforted. There was nothing here the same as in +his country! The earth and the water were differ- +ent; there were no images of the Redeemer by the +roadside. The very grass was different, and the +trees. All the trees but the three old Norway pines +on the bit of lawn before Swaffer's house, and +these reminded him of his country. He had been +detected once, after dusk, with his forehead against +the trunk of one of them, sobbing, and talking to +himself. They had been like brothers to him at that +time, he affirmed. Everything else was strange. +Conceive you the kind of an existence overshad- +owed, oppressed, by the everyday material appear- +ances, as if by the visions of a nightmare. At +night, when he could not sleep, he kept on thinking +of the girl who gave him the first piece of bread he +had eaten in this foreign land. She had been +neither fierce nor angry, nor frightened. Her face +he remembered as the only comprehensible face +amongst all these faces that were as closed, as mys- +terious, and as mute as the faces of the dead who +are possessed of a knowledge beyond the compre- +hension of the living. I wonder whether the mem- +ory of her compassion prevented him from cutting +his throat. But there! I suppose I am an old sen- +timentalist, and forget the instinctive love of life +which it takes all the strength of an uncommon de- +spair to overcome. + +"He did the work which was given him with an +intelligence which surprised old Swaffer. By-and- +by it was discovered that he could help at the +ploughing, could milk the cows, feed the bullocks +in the cattle-yard, and was of some use with the +sheep. He began to pick up words, too, very fast; +and suddenly, one fine morning in spring, he res- +cued from an untimely death a grand-child of old +Swaffer. + +"Swaffer's younger daughter is married to +Willcox, a solicitor and the Town Clerk of Cole- +brook. Regularly twice a year they come to stay +with the old man for a few days. Their only child, +a little girl not three years old at the time, ran out +of the house alone in her little white pinafore, and, +toddling across the grass of a terraced garden, +pitched herself over a low wall head first into the +horsepond in the yard below. + +"Our man was out with the waggoner and the +plough in the field nearest to the house, and as he +was leading the team round to begin a fresh fur- +row, he saw, through the gap of the gate, what for +anybody else would have been a mere flutter of +something white. But he had straight-glancing, +quick, far-reaching eyes, that only seemed to flinch +and lose their amazing power before the immensity +of the sea. He was barefooted, and looking as out- +landish as the heart of Swaffer could desire. Leav- +ing the horses on the turn, to the inexpressible dis- +ust of the waggoner he bounded off, going over +the ploughed ground in long leaps, and suddenly +appeared before the mother, thrust the child into +her arms, and strode away. + +"The pond was not very deep; but still, if he +had not had such good eyes, the child would have +perished--miserably suffocated in the foot or so of +sticky mud at the bottom. Old Swaffer walked out +slowly into the field, waited till the plough came +over to his side, had a good look at him, and with- +out saying a word went back to the house. But +from that time they laid out his meals on the kitch- +en table; and at first, Miss Swaffer, all in black and +with an inscrutable face, would come and stand in +the doorway of the living-room to see him make a +big sign of the cross before he fell to. I believe that +from that day, too, Swaffer began to pay him reg- +ular wages. + +"I can't follow step by step his development. +He cut his hair short, was seen in the village and +along the road going to and fro to his work like +any other man. Children ceased to shout after him. +He became aware of social differences, but re- +mained for a long time surprised at the bare pov- +erty of the churches among so much wealth. He +couldn't understand either why they were kept shut +up on week days. There was nothing to steal in +them. Was it to keep people from praying too +often? The rectory took much notice of him about +that time, and I believe the young ladies attempted +to prepare the ground for his conversion. They +could not, however, break him of his habit of cross- +ing himself, but he went so far as to take off the +string with a couple of brass medals the size of a +sixpence, a tiny metal cross, and a square sort of +scapulary which he wore round his neck. He hung +them on the wall by the side of his bed, and he was +still to be heard every evening reciting the Lord's +Prayer, in incomprehensible words and in a slow, +fervent tone, as he had heard his old father do at +the head of all the kneeling family, big and little, +on every evening of his life. And though he wore +corduroys at work, and a slop-made pepper-and- +salt suit on Sundays, strangers would turn round +to look after him on the road. His foreignness had +a peculiar and indelible stamp. At last people be- +came used to see him. But they never became used +to him. His rapid, skimming walk; his swarthy +complexion; his hat cocked on the left ear; his hab- +it, on warm evenings, of wearing his coat over one +shoulder, like a hussar's dolman; his manner of +leaping over the stiles, not as a feat of agility, but +in the ordinary course of progression--all these +peculiarities were, as one may say, so many causes +of scorn and offence to the inhabitants of the vil- +lage. <i>They</i> wouldn't in their dinner hour lie flat +on their backs on the grass to stare at the sky. +Neither did they go about the fields screaming dis- +mal tunes. Many times have I heard his high- +pitched voice from behind the ridge of some slop- +ing sheep-walk, a voice light and soaring, like a +lark's, but with a melancholy human note, over our +fields that hear only the song of birds. And I +should be startled myself. Ah! He was different: +innocent of heart, and full of good will, which no- +body wanted, this castaway, that, like a man trans- +planted into another planet, was separated by an +immense space from his past and by an immense +ignorance from his future. His quick, fervent ut- +terance positively shocked everybody. 'An excit- +able devil,' they called him. One evening, in the +tap-room of the Coach and Horses (having drunk +some whisky), he upset them all by singing a love +song of his country. They hooted him down, and +he was pained; but Preble, the lame wheelwright, +and Vincent, the fat blacksmith, and the other nota- +bles too, wanted to drink their evening beer in +peace. On another occasion he tried to show them +how to dance. The dust rose in clouds from the +sanded floor; he leaped straight up amongst the +deal tables, struck his heels together, squatted on +one heel in front of old Preble, shooting out the +other leg, uttered wild and exulting cries, jumped up +to whirl on one foot, snapping his fingers above his +head--and a strange carter who was having a drink +in there began to swear, and cleared out with his +half-pint in his hand into the bar. But when sud- +denly he sprang upon a table and continued to +dance among the glasses, the landlord interfered. +He didn't want any 'acrobat tricks in the tap- +room.' They laid their hands on him. Having +had a glass or two, Mr. Swaffer's foreigner tried +to expostulate: was ejected forcibly: got a black +eye. + +"I believe he felt the hostility of his human sur- +roundings. But he was tough--tough in spirit, +too, as well as in body. Only the memory of the +sea frightened him, with that vague terror that is +left by a bad dream. His home was far away; and +he did not want now to go to America. I had often +explained to him that there is no place on earth +where true gold can be found lying ready and to be +got for the trouble of the picking up. How then, +he asked, could he ever return home with empty +hands when there had been sold a cow, two ponies, +and a bit of land to pay for his going? His eyes +would fill with tears, and, averting them from the +immense shimmer of the sea, he would throw him- +self face down on the grass. But sometimes, cock- +ing his hat with a little conquering air, he would +defy my wisdom. He had found his bit of true +gold. That was Amy Foster's heart; which was 'a +golden heart, and soft to people's misery,' he +would say in the accents of overwhelming convic- +tion. + +"He was called Yanko. He had explained that +this meant little John; but as he would also repeat +very often that he was a mountaineer (some word +sounding in the dialect of his country like Goorall) +he got it for his surname. And this is the only +trace of him that the succeeding ages may find in +the marriage register of the parish. There it +stands--Yanko Goorall--in the rector's handwrit- +ing. The crooked cross made by the castaway, a +cross whose tracing no doubt seemed to him the +most solemn part of the whole ceremony, is all that +remains now to perpetuate the memory of his name. + +"His courtship had lasted some time--ever since +he got his precarious footing in the community. It +began by his buying for Amy Foster a green satin +ribbon in Darnford. This was what you did in his +country. You bought a ribbon at a Jew's stall on +a fair-day. I don't suppose the girl knew what to +do with it, but he seemed to think that his honoura- +ble intentions could not be mistaken. + +"It was only when he declared his purpose to +get married that I fully understood how, for a hun- +dred futile and inappreciable reasons, how--shall +I say odious?--he was to all the countryside. +Every old woman in the village was up in arms. +Smith, coming upon him near the farm, promised +to break his head for him if he found him about +again. But he twisted his little black moustache +with such a bellicose air and rolled such big, black +fierce eyes at Smith that this promise came to noth- +ing. Smith, however, told the girl that she must +be mad to take up with a man who was surely wrong +in his head. All the same, when she heard him in +the gloaming whistle from beyond the orchard a +couple of bars of a weird and mournful tune, she +would drop whatever she had in her hand--she +would leave Mrs. Smith in the middle of a sentence +--and she would run out to his call. Mrs. Smith +called her a shameless hussy. She answered noth- +ing. She said nothing at all to anybody, and went +on her way as if she had been deaf. She and I alone +all in the land, I fancy, could see his very real +beauty. He was very good-looking, and most +graceful in his bearing, with that something wild +as of a woodland creature in his aspect. Her moth- +er moaned over her dismally whenever the girl came +to see her on her day out. The father was surly, +but pretended not to know; and Mrs. Finn once +told her plainly that 'this man, my dear, will do +you some harm some day yet.' And so it went on. +They could be seen on the roads, she tramping stol- +idly in her finery--grey dress, black feather, stout +boots, prominent white cotton gloves that caught +your eye a hundred yards away; and he, his coat +slung picturesquely over one shoulder, pacing by +her side, gallant of bearing and casting tender +glances upon the girl with the golden heart. I +wonder whether he saw how plain she was. Perhaps +among types so different from what he had ever +seen, he had not the power to judge; or perhaps +he was seduced by the divine quality of her +pity. + +"Yanko was in great trouble meantime. In his +country you get an old man for an ambassador in +marriage affairs. He did not know how to pro- +ceed. However, one day in the midst of sheep in a +field (he was now Swaffer's under-shepherd with +Foster) he took off his hat to the father and de- +clared himself humbly. 'I daresay she's fool +enough to marry you,' was all Foster said. 'And +then,' he used to relate, 'he puts his hat on his head, +looks black at me as if he wanted to cut my throat, +whistles the dog, and off he goes, leaving me to do +the work.' The Fosters, of course, didn't like to +lose the wages the girl earned: Amy used to give all +her money to her mother. But there was in Foster +a very genuine aversion to that match. He con- +tended that the fellow was very good with sheep, +but was not fit for any girl to marry. For one +thing, he used to go along the hedges muttering to +himself like a dam' fool; and then, these foreign- +ers behave very queerly to women sometimes. And +perhaps he would want to carry her off somewhere +--or run off himself. It was not safe. He +preached it to his daughter that the fellow might +ill-use her in some way. She made no answer. It +was, they said in the village, as if the man had done +something to her. People discussed the matter. It +was quite an excitement, and the two went on +'walking out' together in the face of opposition. +Then something unexpected happened. + +"I don't know whether old Swaffer ever under- +stood how much he was regarded in the light of a +father by his foreign retainer. Anyway the rela- +tion was curiously feudal. So when Yanko asked +formally for an interview--'and the Miss too' (he +called the severe, deaf Miss Swaffer simply <i>Miss</i>) +--it was to obtain their permission to marry. +Swaffer heard him unmoved, dismissed him by a +nod, and then shouted the intelligence into Miss +Swaffer's best ear. She showed no surprise, and +only remarked grimly, in a veiled blank voice, 'He +certainly won't get any other girl to marry him.' + +"It is Miss Swaffer who has all the credit of the +munificence: but in a very few days it came out +that Mr. Swaffer had presented Yanko with a cot- +tage (the cottage you've seen this morning) and +something like an acre of ground--had made it +over to him in absolute property. Willcox expe- +dited the deed, and I remember him telling me he +had a great pleasure in making it ready. It re- +cited: 'In consideration of saving the life of my +beloved grandchild, Bertha Willcox.' + +"Of course, after that no power on earth could +prevent them from getting married. + +"Her infatuation endured. People saw her go- +ing out to meet him in the evening. She stared +with unblinking, fascinated eyes up the road where +he was expected to appear, walking freely, with a +swing from the hip, and humming one of the love- +tunes of his country. When the boy was born, he +got elevated at the 'Coach and Horses,' essayed +again a song and a dance, and was again ejected. +People expressed their commiseration for a woman +married to that Jack-in-the-box. He didn't care. +There was a man now (he told me boastfully) to +whom he could sing and talk in the language of his +country, and show how to dance by-and-by. + +"But I don't know. To me he appeared to have +grown less springy of step, heavier in body, less +keen of eye. Imagination, no doubt; but it seems +to me now as if the net of fate had been drawn +closer round him already. + +"One day I met him on the footpath over the +Talfourd Hill. He told me that 'women were fun- +ny.' I had heard already of domestic differences. +People were saying that Amy Foster was begin- +ning to find out what sort of man she had married. +He looked upon the sea with indifferent, unseeing +eyes. His wife had snatched the child out of his +arms one day as he sat on the doorstep crooning to +it a song such as the mothers sing to babies in his +mountains. She seemed to think he was doing it +some harm. Women are funny. And she had ob- +jected to him praying aloud in the evening. Why? +He expected the boy to repeat the prayer aloud +after him by-and-by, as he used to do after his old +father when he was a child--in his own country. +And I discovered he longed for their boy to grow +up so that he could have a man to talk with in that +language that to our ears sounded so disturbing, +so passionate, and so bizarre. Why his wife +should dislike the idea he couldn't tell. But that +would pass, he said. And tilting his head know- +ingly, he tapped his breastbone to indicate that she +had a good heart: not hard, not fierce, open to com- +passion, charitable to the poor! + +"I walked away thoughtfully; I wondered +whether his difference, his strangeness, were not +penetrating with repulsion that dull nature they +had begun by irresistibly attracting. I won- +dered. . . ." + +The Doctor came to the window and looked out +at the frigid splendour of the sea, immense in +the haze, as if enclosing all the earth with all +the hearts lost among the passions of love and +fear. + +"Physiologically, now," he said, turning away +abruptly, "it was possible. It was possible." + +He remained silent. Then went on-- + +"At all events, the next time I saw him he was +ill--lung trouble. He was tough, but I daresay he +was not acclimatised as well as I had supposed. It +was a bad winter; and, of course, these mountain- +eers do get fits of home sickness; and a state of de- +pression would make him vulnerable. He was lying +half dressed on a couch downstairs. + +"A table covered with a dark oilcloth took up all +the middle of the little room. There was a wicker +cradle on the floor, a kettle spouting steam on the +hob, and some child's linen lay drying on the +fender. The room was warm, but the door opens +right into the garden, as you noticed perhaps. + +"He was very feverish, and kept on muttering +to himself. She sat on a chair and looked at him +fixedly across the table with her brown, blurred +eyes. 'Why don't you have him upstairs?' I +asked. With a start and a confused stammer she +said, 'Oh! ah! I couldn't sit with him upstairs, +Sir.' + +"I gave her certain directions; and going out- +side, I said again that he ought to be in bed up- +stairs. She wrung her hands. 'I couldn't. I +couldn't. He keeps on saying something--I don't +know what.' With the memory of all the talk +against the man that had been dinned into her ears, +I looked at her narrowly. I looked into her short- +sighted eyes, at her dumb eyes that once in her life +had seen an enticing shape, but seemed, staring at +me, to see nothing at all now. But I saw she was +uneasy. + +"'What's the matter with him?' she asked in a +sort of vacant trepidation. 'He doesn't look very +ill. I never did see anybody look like this be- +fore. . . .' + +"'Do you think,' I asked indignantly, 'he is +shamming?' + +"'I can't help it, sir,' she said stolidly. And +suddenly she clapped her hands and looked right +and left. 'And there's the baby. I am so fright- +ened. He wanted me just now to give him the +baby. I can't understand what he says to it.' + +"'Can't you ask a neighbour to come in to- +night?' I asked. + +"'Please, sir, nobody seems to care to come,' she +muttered, dully resigned all at once. + +"I impressed upon her the necessity of the +greatest care, and then had to go. There was a +good deal of sickness that winter. 'Oh, I hope he +won't talk!' she exclaimed softly just as I was go- +ing away. + +"I don't know how it is I did not see--but I +didn't. And yet, turning in my trap, I saw her +lingering before the door, very still, and as if med- +itating a flight up the miry road. + +"Towards the night his fever increased. + +"He tossed, moaned, and now and then muttered +a complaint. And she sat with the table between +her and the couch, watching every movement and +every sound, with the terror, the unreasonable ter- +ror, of that man she could not understand creeping +over her. She had drawn the wicker cradle close +to her feet. There was nothing in her now but the +maternal instinct and that unaccountable fear. + +"Suddenly coming to himself, parched, he de- +manded a drink of water. She did not move. She +had not understood, though he may have thought +he was speaking in English. He waited, looking at +her, burning with fever, amazed at her silence and +immobility, and then he shouted impatiently, +'Water! Give me water!' + +"She jumped to her feet, snatched up the child, +and stood still. He spoke to her, and his passion- +ate remonstrances only increased her fear of that +strange man. I believe he spoke to her for a long +time, entreating, wondering, pleading, ordering, I +suppose. She says she bore it as long as she could. +And then a gust of rage came over him. + +"He sat up and called out terribly one word-- +some word. Then he got up as though he hadn't +been ill at all, she says. And as in fevered dismay, +indignation, and wonder he tried to get to her +round the table, she simply opened the door and ran +out with the child in her arms. She heard him call +twice after her down the road in a terrible voice-- +and fled. . . . Ah! but you should have seen stir- +ring behind the dull, blurred glance of these eyes +the spectre of the fear which had hunted her on +that night three miles and a half to the door of Fos- +ter's cottage! I did the next day. + +"And it was I who found him lying face down +and his body in a puddle, just outside the little +wicket-gate. + +"I had been called out that night to an urgent +case in the village, and on my way home at day- +break passed by the cottage. The door stood open. +My man helped me to carry him in. We laid him +on the couch. The lamp smoked, the fire was out, +the chill of the stormy night oozed from the cheer- +less yellow paper on the wall. 'Amy!' I called +aloud, and my voice seemed to lose itself in the +emptiness of this tiny house as if I had cried in a +desert. He opened his eyes. 'Gone!' he said dis- +tinctly. 'I had only asked for water--only for a +little water. . . .' + +"He was muddy. I covered him up and stood +waiting in silence, catching a painfully gasped +word now and then. They were no longer in his +own language. The fever had left him, taking +with it the heat of life. And with his panting +breast and lustrous eyes he reminded me again of a +wild creature under the net; of a bird caught in a +snare. She had left him. She had left him--sick +--helpless--thirsty. The spear of the hunter had +entered his very soul. 'Why?' he cried in the pen- +etrating and indignant voice of a man calling to a +responsible Maker. A gust of wind and a swish of +rain answered. + +"And as I turned away to shut the door he pro- +nounced the word 'Merciful!' and expired. + +"Eventually I certified heart-failure as the im- +mediate cause of death. His heart must have in- +deed failed him, or else he might have stood this +night of storm and exposure, too. I closed his eyes +and drove away. Not very far from the cottage I +met Foster walking sturdily between the dripping +hedges with his collie at his heels. + +"'Do you know where your daughter is?' I +asked. + +"'Don't I!' he cried. 'I am going to talk to +him a bit. Frightening a poor woman like this.' + +"'He won't frighten her any more,' I said. +'He is dead.' + +"He struck with his stick at the mud. + +"'And there's the child.' + +"Then, after thinking deeply for a while-- + +"'I don't know that it isn't for the best.' + +"That's what he said. And she says nothing at +all now. Not a word of him. Never. Is his im- +age as utterly gone from her mind as his lithe and +striding figure, his carolling voice are gone from +our fields? He is no longer before her eyes to ex- +cite her imagination into a passion of love or fear; +and his memory seems to have vanished from her +dull brain as a shadow passes away upon a white +screen. She lives in the cottage and works for Miss +Swaffer. She is Amy Foster for everybody, and +the child is 'Amy Foster's boy.' She calls him +Johnny--which means Little John. + +"It is impossible to say whether this name re- +calls anything to her. Does she ever think of the +past? I have seen her hanging over the boy's cot +in a very passion of maternal tenderness. The lit- +tle fellow was lying on his back, a little frightened +at me, but very still, with his big black eyes, with +his fluttered air of a bird in a snare. And looking +at him I seemed to see again the other one--the +father, cast out mysteriously by the sea to perish +in the supreme disaster of loneliness and despair." + + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Amy Foster, by Joseph Conrad + |