"Not now. I've just given him another hypodermic. That's all we can do
for him"
They went together into the stateroom. Captain Bradley lay quietly
against a heap of pillows, with his eyes half closed. He had regained
consciousness as soon as they had brought him below. As the mate bent
above him, he opened his eyes and stared dully around the room. He was
muttering to himself. The mate leaned closer--then drew back sharply,
realizing that the words were only the product of delirium.
"Hello, hello! ... that you, Sargent? When did you arrive? Let's get a
couple of chairs this afternoon, and go along Glenealy Road. I want to
see Hong Kong harbour again through the bamboo trees.... Remember that
day we had a picnic on Glenealy Road? You had your wife with you that
voyage. My Frankie got tired: I had to carry him in my arms....
Frankie never grew up. No.... He died"
The mate shook his head violently, as if to throw off the mortality of
the scene. He turned away from the bunk. "Why does the old man have to
wander so?" he demanded sharply.
"The opiate" said the doctor "Don't worry--he isn't suffering now"
Captain Bradley regarded his officer with a long and profound stare.
Suddenly, recognition dawned in his eyes.
"Oh, Foster!--what do you say? How much water do the pumps give now?
Any chance of the leak drying up?"
"Only a couple of feet left in her, Captain. Four men have come off from
shore to relieve our crew. We'll soon have her as dry as a bone, sir"
"No use" Captain Bradley rolled his head on the pillow "You'll find
her larboard strake started--port side of the keel. She's finished.
She'll have to go to the junk heap now" He lay quiet a moment,
thinking. "If I had my way, she should be towed to sea, and sunk in
deep water. I ought to go along with her.... But I suppose she's worth
a few dollars as junk" Suddenly he sat up in bed, threw off the clothes,
and raised his clenched hands above his head. "Oh, my God!" he screamed
"I've been working all my life, and I haven't a few dollars to redeem my
old ship!"
"Lie down, Captain. You must keep quiet. Lie down, sir. You'll feel
better in a little while"
"Yes, yes" The paroxysm passed; the old man fell back exhausted. Again
his mind wandered; he seemed to be sinking off into a doze. Like a
child at the end of the day, half way between sleeping and waking, he
babbled of endeavours on the playground of the world.
"After that typhoon, I rigged a jury rudder and brought her into
Manila.... Oh, yes, they said it was.... You wouldn't expect an
accident in the trade winds. The fore-topmast went at the head of the
lower mast, carrying the jibboom with it; but in a couple of weeks you
couldn't have told that anything had happened.... Pleasant weather,
pleasant weather.... I looked up, and saw his green light almost
hanging over my bow.... Funny, isn't it, how things come round?..."
Gradually he stopped muttering. The doctor took his pulse, then
beckoned the mate to follow him into the cabin. "It can't be long now"
he whispered "Who was the old fellow, anyway? He seems to have a
strange assortment on his mind"
"I don't know much about him. He was a fine man.... Say, you stand in
the door, there, and tell me when he's finished. I can't bear to watch
him any longer"
They had been waiting some time in silence, when a quick movement in the
bunk started them running toward the stateroom. Captain Bradley was
sitting up in bed again. All trace of pain had left his features. His
hands lay quietly on the coverlet, his eyes were fixed on something far
away. The faint shadow of a smile crossed his face, illuminating it
with an expression of wisdom and serenity.
"Grace! Frankie! _Under sail!_" he cried in a loud voice--then settled
slowly back among the pillows.
When they reached him, the old man was dead.
*ANJER*
*ANJER*
*I*
"Do you see that mass of trees in the deep shadow?" asked Nichols,
pointing toward the shore "There's a house behind them--the old
consulate bungalow. Years ago, when the China trade was flourishing,
all ships used to stop at Anjer for mail and orders; for this reason, I
suppose, our government used to keep a consul here, though he wasn't
much but a postmaster. Anjer was the first port of call after the long
outward passage; every man who has sailed to the East remembers it with
affection. You crossed the Indian Ocean in the 'roaring forties' then
swung abruptly north through the southeast trades. At length, one
morning, fresh from a three months' chase of the empty horizon, you
sighted Java Head, that black old foreland looming out of the water like
a gigantic sperm whale; and before the day had gone, you'd entered the
Straits of Sunda, with Java to starboard, close aboard, and Sumatra in
the distance to port; had passed Princess Island, sighted and drawn
abreast of Krakatoa, taken your cross-bearings on the Button and the
Cap, turned off at Twart-the-Way; and, toward sunset, had drifted into
Anjer Roads, before the last puffs of the sea-breeze.
"You had reached the land again. Reached it?--you'd plunged into its
very heart. And such a heart--and such a land. The Gateway of the
East, the Portal of the Dawn--a scene of love and longing, the ecstasy
of life, rich with tumultuous growth, and charged with the passionate
odour of blooming flowers. You had come to it from the ocean, remember;
from wide expanses of waste and emptiness, from the high sky and the
brooding night and the homeless wind, from the mental standpoint of one
who had forgotten his measure of comparison, who had lost his grip on
reality. The very strangeness of the limited and circumscribed sea,
with shores on every hand, with mountains piling the whole horizon,
inspired a sensation of wonder and curiosity, as if this had been your
first view of the terrestrial world. But ere this sensation, the
breaking of the sea-habit, the shortening of the focus, the opening of
the door, had fairly possessed you, other allurements were striving for
the mastery. There was the hand of the East, held out in alien
greeting; there was the breath of romance in the nostrils, the call of
love in the heart, the smells, the voices, the colours, the whisper of
adventure, the touch of magic and mystery. All this, in the old days,
was meant to you by Anjer, by that cluster of bamboo houses beyond the
fringe of the banyan trees, that point, that lighthouse, those hills
climbing the eastern sky, and this secluded anchorage, where we happened
to drift before the tide--deserted now, as you see it, and quite
forgotten, but once the toll-keeper of the sailing fleets of the world"
Nichols waved a hand.
"What about the old consulate bungalow?" someone asked,
"Oh, yes; I'll tell you" The captain of the _Omega_ pulled himself up
abruptly "I knew it first as a boy before the mast. My maiden voyage
was made into the East; I came to Anjer, saw the native dugouts gather
around the ship, examined their wares of fruit and birds and monkeys,
rolls of painted cloth and wonderful shells; I saw the consul's boat
bring off the old tin post-box that visited every ship calling at
Anjer--it disgorged for my delight, I remember, a letter from my mother,
the first home letter that I had ever received at sea; and later in the
day, I pulled bow oar in the captain's, boat when he went ashore to pay
the consul a social call. From that time onward, hardly a year passed
that I didn't see the consulate bungalow. When I became master of a
vessel, I always used to go ashore and visit the place; it's beautifully
situated among palm trees, with an open view of the roadstead and a
winding path leading up from the landing. Old Reardon was glad to see a
fellow countryman; we'd have a drink or two, chat for an hour over some
month-old piece of news that had just reached this outpost of
civilization; then part for another interval, he to hold the lodge of
the Orient, I to continue an endless pilgrimage.
"Yes, I felt that I knew the consulate bungalow of Anjer pretty well.
But, in these quick lands, a house is a mere incident, is nothing but
its inhabitants; and my familiarity with this structure in Reardon's
time didn't exactly prepare me for what I was afterwards to meet between
its walls.... And now I'll have to begin at the beginning"
*II*
He waited so long in silence that we began to grow impatient. A faint
evening breeze drew across the water, bringing the heavy scent of the
land. Above the Anjer hills hung a full golden moon, beneath which, in
vague, translucent shadow, the shores of Java seemed sunk in an
enchanted calm.
"I was wondering whether I could show you the sort of man Bert Mackay
was" Nichols resumed suddenly "It's difficult enough to lay down the
lines of any human being; and Bert was a doubly complex subject,
chiefly, perhaps, because the key to his nature was so simple.
Simplicity seems the most erratic of qualities to a world trained in
suppression and negation. He was one of those startling fellows whom
people instinctively like, but daren't approve of. He was brilliant but
not entirely well balanced, let us put it; as primitive a soul as I've
ever come in contact with. In fact, he was really wild, like
nature--didn't attempt to pause or reckon, but let life come and go; and
like nature, too, his growth was a series of instinctive processes. A
man of the open, swift-minded, magnetic, and sincere, he was a
tremendous vital force, stirring life violently wherever he touched it;
while a romantic conscience, which plunged him into moods of contrition
and despair, seemed to bring him out of every experience with a clear
eye and an innocence apparently unimpaired.
"You can imagine, with all this, that his way with women was rash,
sudden, appalling, and awfully fascinating. He couldn't talk well, but
had a presence and manner that spoke for him louder than words. He was
tall and dark and virile, a devilishly handsome chap. In fact, he
possessed the secret of power that can't be cultivated or affected, the
emanation of love, a glorious and terrible inheritance. Something quite
different, you know, from any trace of carnality; he wasn't a sensual
man at all. He broke many hearts, I'm afraid; how, in the ordinary
course of life and days, could it have been otherwise? I used to warn
him to watch out; to tell him that some day, in a stroke of divine
retribution, his own heart would be broken past mending.
"'I hope so, Nichols!' he used to fling out, with the serious gaiety
that was one of his most charming characteristics 'You can't imagine
what a lost soul I am. Nothing else will save me'
"I'd known Bert Mackay since college days, when for a couple of years we
had roomed together and established one of the priceless understandings
of life. The affection that lay between us was closer than that of
brothers, close enough mutually to excuse our faults in each other's
eyes. He became an electrical engineer, went to New York, and rose
rapidly in his profession; while I, as you know, followed the sea.
Every now and then I'd come to New York; and while in port, would move
my things uptown and live with him. He was well connected, knew many
groups of interesting people, and seemed, to my eye, to be living the
richest sort of life. Our intermittent relation was an ideal one for
two friends; our intimacy grew closer, as voyage followed voyage, and I
supposed there wasn't an adventure of his that I didn't know about. But
I might have realized, of course, that when the bolt of divine
retribution actually struck him, it would be the last subject on which
he'd give me his confidence.
"However that may be, I wasn't aware of any trouble, hadn't anticipated
disaster, and was both shocked and alarmed, on my arrival in New York
one summer, to find a brief note from him saying that he had gone away.
He gave no address, and told me not to hunt for him. The letter was
four or five months old. 'I am trying to do the right thing' he wrote
'God knows, I've done enough wrong things. Perhaps you'll hear from me
again, perhaps you won't. It will depend on how I feel. I'm throwing up
the whole game here. Something pretty hard has come into my life, and I
have got to go. I must work this out alone. There isn't much of a
chance--but that doesn't matter. The price has to be paid just the
same' Then, after a few instructions about some of his private affairs,
he asked me to forgive him, said I was not to worry, and assured me of
his unfailing affection.
"You can imagine how the news took hold of me. The nature of the affair
was unmistakeable; a tragedy of the heart had overtaken him--the fate
that I'd often lightly predicted, and that he as often had expressed a
willingness to find. Well, he was saved now, it would seem. I
wondered.... Searching the past for a clue to this untoward
development, I recalled his air of mingled restraint and melancholy at
the time of our last meeting, the year before. I had noticed it only to
put it down to one of his many incomprehensible moods. The night of my
departure, I remembered, after we'd come in from the theatre, he had
spent hours, it seemed, on the couch in the studio living-room,
strumming on an old guitar and singing to himself in an incoherent form
of improvisation, a habit of his when he was feeling especially blue.
I'd been trying to write some letters, and the maddening mournful
sounds, with the notes of the guitar picking through, had at length
driven me to desperation.
"'For God's sake, sing something!' I cried, dashing out of my room--he
was a brilliant musician. 'But if you go on whining like the wind
through a knothole, I can't be answerable for the consequences'
"'All right, Nicky, I'll stop' he had answered with a grin 'I'm a
selfish ass, I know. But I'm not whining.... No, I don't feel like
singing to-night' I realized now that, even then, he must have been in
the toils of the tragedy.
"So this was the end of a comradeship all too brief, as life goes.
Friends are scarce enough, heaven knows, without a fellow's losing one
in such vague circumstances. But the years went by, and I didn't hear a
word from Bert. At first, I missed and worried about him acutely; then,
little by little, he faded off into the background, as even the sharpest
details of the great picture of life do if we keep moving. Perspectives
change, too. I continued, of course, to think of him now and then,
wondering what he might have lost or found. But I never felt occasion
to doubt the nature of his quest; he had come into that heritage
foreordained at the launching of his sensitive and romantic soul.
Something had called him down the wind, some note, some fragrance, some
face of beauty, some revelation of delight; and he'd gone out to find
the answer and consummation--love or death--that hearts like his pursue"
*III*
Nichols reached for a cigar. "Ten years and more had gone by" he went
on slowly "when, one voyage, I reached the Straits of Sunda, bound for
Hong Kong and Amoy. The southwest monsoon was on the point of breaking;
for several days we'd been treated to baffling winds. It was in the
latter part of the afternoon that, favoured by an unexpected slant of
offshore wind, I managed to fetch the anchorage here, slipped into Anjer
Roads with quite a rush, and dropped my anchor in a berth abreast of the
landing. I hadn't been through Sunda for a couple of years.
"The first boat that came off from shore--Reardon's old
whaleboat--brought me disappointing news. Reardon himself, it seemed,
had been transferred to Batavia the year before, and the consulate had
been discontinued; my letters, if any had been sent to Anjer, were being
held in Batavia or Singapore. Old Sa-lee, Reardon's boatswain, was
still in charge of the boat, but seemed to be merely following a
lifelong habit in coming off to every ship that called. He wanted to
see his old friends, to gossip, and to bemoan the decline of human
institutions. While we talked, leaning across the rail, he told me in
the course of conversation that, some time after Reardon had left Anjer,
the consulate bungalow had been occupied by a stranger. The fact wasn't
of sufficient interest to me just then to elicit an inquiry. I had just
reached the realization, with a shock of deep regret, that Anjer the
beautiful had taken its place with the rest of the world's lost glories,
that another page in the romantic annals of seafaring had closed.
"The air was hot and heavy that evening--one of those nights of
threatening showers that never come. After supper, I had settled myself
morosely in a deck-chair; it seemed quite unaccountable not to be going
ashore in this familiar situation. The moon was high and full above the
hills, as it is to-night, but clouded by a faint mist like descending
veils of dew. The ship seemed resting after the long passage; on the
forecastle-head a couple of men were singing, accompanied by an old
accordion. Across the water, as if in answer, floated the voices of
natives somewhere in the jungle, lifted in wild and startling melodies.
The same breeze fanned down from the land--the breeze that seems always
to be blowing here in the early evening, filling the straits with the
overpowering sweetness of bloom and decay.
"It must have been quite late--the moon had risen overhead, and the
singing had died out forward and ashore--when I first noticed lights in
the old consulate bungalow. I at once thought of the stranger whom
Sa-lee had mentioned. Who could he be? What misanthrope had chosen that
house of solitude for his habitation? How did he manage to pass the
time? It went without saying that he was a European; Sa-lee would not
have mentioned him otherwise. I kept my eye on the light, which seemed
to travel about, vanishing now and then as if behind a closed door. As
I watched, my interest became more and more awakened. I began to
imagine all sorts of people in that bungalow; a tremendous failure, a
fellow who'd fled from the wreck of a tragic past; an exile, for some
romantic reason or other, who had seen my ship in the offing, had
hurried home, and was making ready for a visit, longing for the sight of
a strange face and a word from the outside world; a criminal, who feared
my presence in the roadstead, who was even now busy concealing evidence,
sweeping tables, locking drawers.
"Suddenly it occurred to me to go ashore and satisfy my curiosity. Why
hadn't I thought of it before? I called my mate. 'Mr. Hunter' said I
'send some men aft and throw the dingey overboard. Then haul her up to
the side-ladder'
"Handling the tiller-ropes of the dingey, with two men rowing, I
directed her bow toward Reardon's old landing. Under the hills the land
loomed high. You know that feeling of strangeness, of transmutation,
which comes at the end of a voyage at sea, when for the first time you
step from the ship's deck into a small boat, when you look across the
water from a lower level, see the shore approach, and hear the hum of
waves on a beach close at hand. There's a trace almost of apprehension
mingled with it, the instinct of the sailor warning him of shallow water
and danger in proximity. I felt it, a nameless tingling excitement;
besides, I had by this time worked myself to quite a pitch of fancy over
Sa-lee's stranger.
"Reardon's landing was already dilapidated; I scrambled up it and picked
my way to the shore, telling the men to wait there for me without fail,
for I didn't want them straying to the village. Striking the path at the
head of the pier, I hurried forward, keeping myself as much as possible
in the deep shadow of palm trees that lined the up-hill slope. I wanted
to catch this fellow napping, whoever he was, wanted to observe his face
in a moment of surprise. Then I should be better able to place him.
The air under the trees was thick with the reek of tropic earth; sounds
made themselves distinctly heard in the great silence. I advanced up the
path noiseless and unseen, and in a few minutes arrived in plain sight
of the bungalow.
"The little house, with its broad flanking verandahs, stood surrounded
by trees and underbrush. It had a neglected appearance; even in the
night I could make out how the jungle had closed around it in the two
years since Reardon's departure. The light inside the bungalow was
gone; heavy shadows filled the verandahs, so that I couldn't have seen a
person sitting there. I began to wonder whether the tenant had turned
in for the night; stepped aside from the path, and started to skirt the
house, with the instinct that invariably leads a man to the rear when
he's eavesdropping; and was about to strike across a patch of bright
moonlight toward the side porch, when a strange sound broke the intense
stillness and knocked me back into the shadow as if by a physical blow.
"Someone had begun to play a guitar on the verandah. The next moment a
voice came out on the night, soft and suppressed, a voice like an echo,
that seemed to lose itself in the silken chamber of the night. Either a
baritone or a very deep contralto; but I felt it to be a man's voice,
without understanding why. I listened, but couldn't hear distinctly.
While I listened, I was conscious of an exquisite perfection of emotion.
I seemed to stand at the heart of an old and visionary land, the witness
of an ancient parable; the voice was the voice of Adam singing the first
love song in Eden, and the veiled languorous moon was the same moon that
had stirred that song through the untold nights of men.
"Suddenly the voice rose and swelled; I caught the words, the tone, the
melody.... All at once I remembered--and knew, with a shock of
recollection, who it was. The quality of the voice hadn't changed; the
song itself was familiar. I'd heard it often, as he lay on the couch in
the New York studio, or sat at the piano in one of his wandering musical
moods. It seemed impossible. How could he be here? I choked, in the
midst of uttering a low exclamation--must have made quite a fuss. He
got up abruptly, breaking off the song; I heard the guitar strike the
floor with a hollow clash.
"'Who is there?' he asked softly, as if expecting a visitor from that
direction.
"I pulled myself together, started across the patch of open ground, and
came into the moonlight. When I'd reached a little nearer, I saw him
standing at the rail of the verandah; he leaned out, showing his face--a
good deal older than I remembered, but unmistakeably the face of my
vanished friend.
"'Who is it?' he asked again, sharply now, for he had discovered that it
was a man.
"I felt the need of making an excuse for introduction. 'Bert' said I 'I
haven't been following your trail. It's just an amazing stroke of
chance. That is my ship in the roadstead. I happened to call.
"He leaned out farther, a look of helpless bewilderment on his face.
Then recognition dawned with a great rush. 'Nichols!' he cried
desperately. Gazing at me wide-eyed, he repeated my name in a lower
tone, in accents of simple wonder. Suddenly, as he gazed, the weight of
the years seemed to strike him with a crushing force; he crumpled,
dropped to his knees, and buried his face on the railing. When I took
his hand, he gripped me like a vice. We didn't speak for a long time.
*IV*
"After I'd sent my boat back aboard, with orders to come ashore for me
in the morning, we sat talking on the verandah till late in the night.
Ten years of life had to be reconstructed; the astonishing thing was
that I had found him even then. 'Of all places on earth' I asked 'how
did you happen to land in this God-forsaken spot?'
"'Oh, I came up from Australia, about eight months ago' said he 'A
friend of mine down there, a sea captain, told me about it; said the
bungalow was vacant and could be had almost for the asking. It's quiet
here, and yet a fellow sees ships and things--watches life go by' He
had been pacing backward and forward, and now stopped in front of my
chair. 'It's heaven!' he cried 'Nothing to raise a row, nothing to
fight for, nothing to live for, much.... Nothing to bother--that is....
You can't imagine how quiet and peaceful it seems'
"His words confirmed the impression I'd always had of his disappearance;
yet, even in the midst of his hopelessness I seemed to detect a note of
hesitation, something concealed from me--perhaps concealed from him, for
he rarely analyzed his own reactions. I led him away from his story for
a while, trying to fix the status of his existence. We talked of old
times; he remembered them keenly, kept citing queer details, jests that
used to amuse us, chance remarks that seemed to have lodged in his mind.
Almost at once, his infectious laugh came into play. The old spirit was
unquenchable. By Jove, the man wasn't half so hopeless as he would have
himself believe.... I took my eyes away from him, looked around at the
jungle rising against the hills; and all at once it struck me how
closely he resembled, in essential nature, the land he'd stumbled on. A
land full of the instinct of beauty, the gift of love; weary, too, and
wise with age, yet fired with the undying youth of quick vitality.
"'Why don't you stay here?' I demanded 'Why talk of going home? I have
a notion that you belong here. Why don't you love, be happy?...'
"'No, no!' he interrupted hurriedly 'You don't know what you're talking
about' He stopped short, gazing at me as if he were searching my mind.
'Love won't come to me again' said he.
"'Nonsense!' I answered 'That's morbid, Bert. What possible reason...'
"'Good God!' he burst out 'Haven't I the right to know?' He wandered
to the railing, leaned against a post there, and turned his face away.
'Long ago' said he slowly 'I took every ray and hope of love out of my
heart, and took them in my hands--so--and crushed them, and killed them,
and threw them down--as if I'd taken my heart itself and squeezed the
last drop of blood out of it like a sponge. I tell you, Nichols, the
thing's dead'
"'But you haven't told me' I reminded him.
"He took a longer walk this time, round the corner of the verandah; when
he came back, he sat down beside me like a man tired with carrying a
load. 'Do you remember a little girl I used to talk about?' he asked
'I think you met her once in New York, the year before I left. Her name
was Helen Rand'
"'A slender girl with dark hair and brown eyes?'
"'Yes.... Well, she went away. She's got the same eyes now, wide
childish....'
"'Now!' I shouted 'You don't mean--she isn't...'
"'No, no' said he 'I haven't seen her for these eight months. She's
down in Australia--was then--Melbourne'
"'What have you been doing now?...' I began, but he cut me off sharply.
"'Nothing' said he 'She isn't mine--never has been' He leaned toward
me 'But I've been near her night and day--as near as I could get. Ready
to help, you know--anything. God, I had to be in the same place. But
perhaps you won't understand' He hesitated, then went on doggedly 'I
found out too late that I loved her. I found it out just one day too
late. I've been paying for that one day. And all I've done, all I
could do, wouldn't begin to balance the account. I wonder whether you
see?'
"'How could you keep it going so long?' I asked.
"He laughed harshly. 'I knew you wouldn't understand. Just because you
think that love means faith and chastity, quietness, placid days and
years, you have no eye for the love that lives in the fires of hell.
But it's the same love. Bad as she is, I can't help loving her'
"The story, coming brokenly, by fits and starts, achieved by its very
barrenness a certain grim intensity. The white light of his
extraordinary narrative revealed a background sombre and hard, against
which stood the drama of his ineffectual warfare, a play without hope
and without reward, saved from inanity only by the tremendous fervour of
his love. She had fled from New York without warning, it seems, fleeing
from life, from him, from the scene and memory, perhaps, of that one
day. He had a slight clue, but it took him half a year to find her.
When at last they met, she didn't want him, didn't need him, wouldn't
have him. This was in San Francisco, where she went on the stage again,
and lived for over a year, successful, apparently happy, and growing
more beautiful every day. 'People talked about her, you know' he told
me 'She became quite the rage. Such a little girl, with serious
eyes....'
She must have been clever, too, for she kept a good grip on herself.
Soon she married a man of twice her years with a considerable fortune,
and passed into another world. Bert had forsaken his profession, and
had gone into journalism; he could have done anything passably well.
One thing, however, he could not bring himself to do again, and that was
to enter society. He didn't get on as a journalist--couldn't put his
heart into the business of life. He told me that for a time he went
shabby and hungry. Once in a great while he would see her, perhaps in
passing, and they would have a few words together; but the occasions
became more and more infrequent.
"'Then she left her husband, in the whirlwind of a sensational scandal.
Bert missed only by the merest chance having to write about it for his
paper. He sought her out at once; she had gone to an hotel there in the
city, where she lived openly as the mistress of the other man. 'What
are you doing, Bert, hanging around this town?' she had asked him point
blank 'I want to be near in case you need me, Helen' he answered
humbly. She gazed at him with those eyes that, according to his
account, still retained their innocence--though it's hard to believe
they hadn't by then acquired a trace or two of calculation. 'It's gone
a long way beyond that' said she coldly 'I won't need you again' He
tried to take her hand. 'I can't let you go thus, Helen!' he cried
'Let me go? You sent me' she told him.
"'What was the use?' said he to me 'I thought of the old days--they
seemed old already; and when I looked at her, I couldn't realize that
there had been any change. But it seemed pretty evident that she had
left off caring. So I left her--but I couldn't go away'
"Some months later, she went in a yacht for a cruise among the South Sea
Islands. The cruise was a long one; it ended, for her, in a quarrel at
Honolulu, as a result of which she changed her second man for a third,
and took up her abode in that glorious island of the Pacific where
everything but happiness is supposed to wither and die in the magic sun.
In the course of time Bert heard the details, folded his tent and
followed her. But almost as soon as he landed in Honolulu she was off
on another tack; for by now she had settled into the stride of her
career.
"So it went on, year after year, from Honolulu to Shanghai, from
Shanghai to Hong Kong, and down the coast to Singapore; a term in
Calcutta, another term in Batavia; a year on the West Coast, Lima,
Iquiqui, Valparaiso, she never resting, and he following in due time.
It's hard to imagine what her life must have been during this
pilgrimage; for now we know that she loved him, too, and that her heart
likewise burned in the fires of hell. Pride, pride, what anguish will
be borne in thy name! She had of course grown into a strong,
clear-headed woman; only strength could have carried her so far. But he
must have managed things very badly. I haven't a doubt that the thought
of him constantly at her heels, the sight of him now and then in her
wake, making hard weather of it, spurred her to the course that she had
chosen. No woman respects a man who can't solve his own destiny.
"How they finally came to Australia, I don't clearly remember. They
must have been there some time; he spoke of Sydney, of Newcastle, of
Brisbane, and of Melbourne, where he saw her for the last time. 'I met
her face to face one day' said he 'She looked a little tarnished--as if
things had been going downhill with her. I suppose I told her so; I
wasn't in the mood to dodge facts that day. She was angry at my
comment--I don't blame her. But I tried to make up for it the next
moment--show her what I really meant, how glad I would be--that is, that
it rested with her to change everything. I asked her if I mightn't come
to see her; she answered that it wasn't difficult to gain access to her
apartment. All the while she was looking me over with a sort of amused
scorn. Then she said something that was quite unnecessary. She said I
didn't look as if I had the price.... That woke me up. I realized
suddenly, fully, decisively, how impossible it was to keep on.
Impossible!...' By chance, I'd been talking about Anjer with Captain
Roach that very morning. He was sailing the next day, bound up this
way, and I came along with him. Reardon leased me the bungalow; I went
with Roach to Batavia, for he knew that the consulate had been
abandoned. So here I am. I've got a little money, enough to live on.
And God's being good to me--I've found a measure of peace. Now you have
come along--I think I'll be all right....'
"'Yes, this certainly was the place for you' I temporized, struggling
with irritation at the mess he had made of existence. I couldn't but
recognize the inevitability of what he had told me; but my heart kept
asking, why is it necessary for men to be so selfish, so helpless in the
face of results clearly to be foreseen?
"'Exactly' he agreed with my spoken word. 'This land has taught me a
great lesson. I'm getting back my grip ... more than I hoped....' He
stopped abruptly. Again I had the feeling of something being held back,
of something missing from the story. I awoke to the fact that,
notwithstanding all he had told me, his present spiritual status
remained unexplained. He quite obviously _had_ recovered his grip--but
how, and why? It wasn't in keeping with the rest of the hidden years.
And of course I didn't believe my own platitude on the influence of the
land.
"'I mean, I'm getting back my self-respect' he said 'I'm really
thinking of going home. The past begins to look like a sort of joke--a
horrible, fantastic joke; but I shall leave off loving her now. Try to,
anyway. I've learned....'
"I wondered what it could be that so puzzled me about the case. After
I'd gone to bed that night--it was nearly morning--I lay awake for a
long while trying to think the problem out. Why had he lost his
self-respect, in the beginning? Because she wouldn't love him? I
thought I knew him well enough to recognize this as the correct answer;
he belonged to the unhappy company of men who can't support life when
the ego is denied. But she had sent him away, at last, with a lash of
the whip, with scorn that even his tried humility couldn't brook. How
the devil, then, had he recovered his self-respect? Self-respect is a
matter of human relations; it can't be drawn out of the air.
*V*
"While I tossed on the bed, vainly trying to piece this broken logic
together, I heard someone moving on the opposite side of the house.
Bert and I were alone in the bungalow. He, too, had been kept awake by
the excitement of our meeting. Soon he began to pace softly up and down
the far side of the verandah. I was debating in my mind the wisdom of
going out to have another smoke with him, when his footsteps seemed to
leave the porch and sink into the grass. In a moment I heard low voices
outside, a little distance from the house. I couldn't make out what was
being said. Suddenly I thought that someone must have come with a
message from the ship. I jumped up and ran to the window.
"My window opened on the patch of moonlight across which I'd come
earlier in the evening. He stood there now, as if waiting; and, before
I could speak, a woman came toward him with a gliding, crouching step,
starting out of the very shadow where I'd paused to hear the song. As
she drew near, he held out his arms; she quickened her pace, like a
jungle deer, and flung herself on his breast, uttering low, native
cries. 'You are safe? You will not go?' she asked breathlessly. 'Safe?'
he asked, bending above her 'Have you been watching?' She looked into
his face with a glance of infinite concern. 'The man stood beside me,
as I was about to call' said she 'I would have killed him, but I saw
that you were warned' 'Thank God!' he exclaimed 'You should have
known--and gone away' She drew her arms about his neck. 'I could not
go!' she cried 'I had to see you!' 'Hush!' said he 'Speak lower--you
will wake my friend'
"She used perfect English, though her language was picturesque. 'Your
friend? Who is your friend?' she asked fiercely 'In all the time that
you have dwelt here, no ships have waited, you have had no friends come.
Who is your friend that comes in a great ship, unknown and unbidden?'
He smiled down at her. 'Dear heart' said he 'he is more than brother to
me, and I have not seen him for many years'
"She shrank away from him. 'Ah!' she cried 'Then he will take you--you
will go?'
"'No, not yet' he told her 'Not, perhaps, for a long time'
"'But you will go?' she persisted 'Some day you will not be here--and,
for me, the sun will fail to rise, and the moon and stars will grow
cold, and all light will die--and you will not be here!'
"'I have told you, dear, it must be so' said he. 'You knew it long ago'
"Again her arms clasped him. 'No, no!' she cried 'I cannot let you!
You are mine! Stay here. It is a fair land--and am I not fair?' She
touched her breast 'You will not look at me!' said she.
"'I dare not!'
"'Then look!' she whispered.
"I saw him take her in his arms. So he had found ... this, beyond what
he had hoped. Another wave of irritation at his heartlessness swept over
me. I turned away angrily--then paused a moment, considering the true
nature of the phenomenon that had appeared before me as if out of the
sky. I felt that he hadn't sought this new entanglement. No, but he
had evidently accepted it. Yet the woman had furnished the motive
force, literally had flung herself at his head. Nonsense!--why be a
prudish ass? It wasn't in the least a matter of morals; why persist,
then, in viewing it on the moral plane? Incurable habit of
conventionality, never so strong as when we strive to be unconventional!
Here was a meeting of instincts and elements, a transaction in lucid
terms, according to a simple formula. It was a phase of God's
excruciating biological experiment. She wanted him alone, and had taken
her way to get him. He was receptive, for he wanted love. Could she
have awakened love in him, he would not have denied it. Failing that,
he would be forced to seek elsewhere. In the meantime, why repel divine
experience? ... But the shocking callousness of this experiment! While
he dallied, detached and unconcerned, his life had been refreshed as if
at a fountain of vitality. His heart sang with the knowledge that she
loved him; he was happy, whole, and conscious of his power again. He'd
said that he had recovered his self-respect--a curious choice of words,
in view of the occasion; but now I understood what he had meant....
This had been her priceless gift to him.
"A quick exclamation outside drew me again to the window--could you
fellows have kept away? He was trying to disengage her arms from about
his neck. 'It cannot be!' said he decisively 'It is impossible! So,
to save greater pain, I will go at once'
"She clung to him desperately. 'I do not understand' she cried.
"'Dear heart' he answered 'I have seen too much, and failed too
miserably, to want the spell to fall on you. All that I touch turns to
ashes; whoever enters my life is cursed with my own pain'
"She gazed deeply into his eyes. 'I am not afraid' said she 'It is for
this I love. For what is past, I have no memory. To-day lives,
to-morrow we carry with us like a child unborn, but yesterday is dead.
What do you seek? Love? Have I not given you all?' She threw out her
arm in a sweeping gesture 'My love will never fail!' she cried.
"'I prize your love above all else' said he.
"'What do you seek?' she cried again, springing away, confronting him
with a savage crouching intensity. 'Faith? Happiness? Peace? All are
here. My people will honour you, for I am noble in the hills. What do
you seek? Ask, and I will give!'
"He leaned toward her, held her at arm's length, returned her gaze. I
heard him heave a sigh.
"'It is because you do not love!' said she quite low 'Before Allah, am
I not fair? Why have I not your love? Look--we are alone. See how I
hold you, feel my heart here, behold my eyes--ah!' Her face was close
to his. 'If love lay in your heart, you could not stand thus' she
whispered.
"'Stop!' he cried 'You cannot see...'
"'I cannot see, my eyes are dim with love!'
"He thrust her away suddenly, as if in fear. 'Listen' said he in a dead
voice 'For many years I have followed a woman who would not love me.
To the ends of the earth I have followed her, until I am weary, and
heartsick, and must forget. I have left my home, I have forsaken my
friends. But now I must return. Dear heart' said he 'if I were young
and full of hope, I would not stand here idly, I would stay with you.
But I have nothing left to offer. An old heart--broken--a brain without
fire...'
"'I will make well the heart, and fire the brain!' she cried.
"He swayed toward her, met her in a brief embrace--then broke away. She
gave a little cry. 'You will not?' said she 'I cannot ask again'
"'Dear, it is not to hurt you...' he began 'Why won't you understand?'
He covered his face with his hands 'Oh, God, why can't I make you
understand?'
"She pointed toward the house. 'It is because your friend has come'
said she fiercely 'Never before have you been as to-night. Never
before have you refused me. He brings you memory, and now you think of
home. I should have killed him when I stood at his side!' She fell
back a step, a savage figure, magnificently tall 'So--you have chosen'
said she 'This which I offer, you throw down. What is it that you
seek? What will you find? Is love so strong in your land, are nights
like this, is happiness so deep? In convent-school I learned otherwise'
He put out his hand; she drew away like a wild creature. 'No! It is
done' she cried.
"A moment passed. He stood irresolute, the plaything of fate, while she
devoured him with her eyes. Then, with a swift motion, she left him
standing in the grass, and ran toward the shadow. He started to follow.
She must have turned at the border of the jungle; I couldn't see her
clearly, but she seemed to make a violent gesture, and the moonlight
struck sharply on a bracelet that she wore"
*VI*
"Bert spent the following day with me aboard the ship; I had decided to
remain another night in Anjer. We found much to talk about, but didn't
approach the incident outside my window that morning; although I'd felt
certain that he, not suspecting my awareness, would broach the subject.
In fact, I more than once adroitly guided the conversation in this
direction; but his mouth was closed. This gave me both alarm and
satisfaction; at least, he took the affair with the seriousness that it
deserved.
"Late in the afternoon, as we sat here under a little patch of awning
spread from the spanker boom, we sighted a small barque to the westward,
coming up the straits. She'd just appeared beyond the lower point, some
three or four miles distant. Watching her idly through the glass---I had
a powerful telescope--I seemed to find something familiar about her; and
a little later, when she had drifted another mile nearer, I suddenly
recognized the craft. 'That's Halsted, in his little packet' I remarked
'Her name's the _Senegal_. You must have seen her before, if you've
been here over six months. He makes two trips a year'
"Bert took the glass from my hand. 'I can't remember' said he after a
moment's scrutiny 'Ships look all alike to me. Where has she come from?
You seem to know about her'
"'Why, Australia, of course!' I exclaimed, suddenly remembering his own
point of departure for Anjer 'You must have seen this little barque in
Melbourne, if you were familiar with the waterfront. Halsted runs a
sort of packet service from there to Singapore'
"'Halsted, Halsted' said Bert 'No, I think I've never met anyone of
that name--certainly not there. Look, Nichols, he seems to have run
into a strip of calm'
"'Yes, and that strip of calm will spread until it covers the straits' I
answered 'I know the box he's in--he's just about an hour too late.
There's a nasty current off the point, with a tide-rip on the ebb.
He'll drift away from us for several hours, then slip back in the night,
when he picks up the land breeze'
"After supper we went ashore. I planned to sail in the morning, but
should be down the China Sea again in three months' time. Bert had
promised to make his arrangements in the meanwhile, and to leave Anjer
with me on my return. I'd urged him to come at once, and would have
waited a day or two longer, but he wouldn't listen to it. It was
another calm, hazy evening, with no wind on the water, but a faint
languorous breeze among the palms. We sat on the verandah planning the
future, if you please; he seemed to want to talk about the world, and I
felt it best to encourage the inclination.
"'Well, old man' said he at last 'I've got to turn in. I'm weary to
the bone--didn't sleep well last night, at all. This has been an
exciting time for me, you know'
"'Go ahead, and leave me here to finish out my smoke' I answered 'I'll
be all right--I know my way about'
"To tell the truth, I welcomed the opportunity to sit for a while alone,
in the midst of the luminous night, close to the land. Perhaps I might
achieve the hint of a solution; I was baffled and pained by the
tremendous vital difficulties I'd observed. The wind had risen; it
swept down the hillside in a solid breath of sweetness, softly clashing
together the broad leaves of the palms. Halsted, it occurred to me in a
wandering moment, would now be creeping up under the lee of the land. I
drew my chair to the edge of the verandah. The scene of the previous
night stood vividly before me; I couldn't keep my eyes away from that
region of heavy shadow, where she stood at my elbow undecided whether to
kill me or let me go. Suddenly I started; was there a movement in the
shadow? I watched it narrowly---and, by Jove, in a moment she actually
materialized there, as if in answer to my thoughts; advanced, became
substantial, and moved into the moonlight, coming swiftly in my
direction. I remained seated, chained to my chair. She came to the
railing and put her hand lightly on my arm, as if administering caution.
Her eyes were level with mine.
"'I must see you' said she in a repressed voice 'I have waited for him
to go'
"'Me?' I exclaimed, for my first thought had been that she'd mistaken
the figure on the verandah 'What do you want of me?'
"'Like you, I am his friend' she answered simply.
"'Yes?...' I parried. Face to face with her, I saw how beautiful she
was. She had the golden Malay skin, dusky, full, smooth as dark marble;
across her brow she wore an ornament of ivory and carved blackwood; her
breast was bare in a long slit, shadowed like the face of a quiet pool.
The moonlight revealed her, the jungle stood at her back: and through
her hand on my arm I felt the blood of the East, rustling like water in
the hills after a tropical rain.
"I stood up abruptly. 'All are his friends' said I. She lifted her
eyebrows. 'Has it been thus?' she asked with meaning. I nodded,
marvelling meanwhile at her admirable directness; a woman pure as
diamond, true as steel. She lived, like light, in instantaneous
collimation. 'Yes' said I 'he has found many friends'
"She pondered the fact. 'But none have loved him with the heart?' Was
it a question, or a statement? 'Many' I answered 'but none gained the
answer' 'None?' she asked, searchingly 'You know, and I can only repeat
what is true' said I 'His heart is given to one who wears it on a chain
for play'
"She trembled at the thought. 'Where is she?' she demanded. I told her
that I didn't know. 'Not ... home?' she asked 'Not there?...' She
stretched out a hand vaguely. 'Oh, no' said I, relieved to be able to
speak an open word 'Then it is not for her that he goes?' she cried,
pathetically relieved. 'No' said I again. She leaned toward me, as if
to make a critical examination. 'Why have you come, to change and take
him from me?' she asked bitterly. 'I came by chance, without knowing' I
answered 'It is the hand of destiny' Throwing back her head, with a
passionate gesture she flung an uplifted arm across her eyes. 'Is she
so beautiful?' she cried in a low voice, like one pleading with fate.
"I heard a slight movement behind me, and whirled, to find Bert standing
in the doorway. He gazed from one to the other of us in troubled
silence; then crossed the porch and stood beside me at the rail. She
heard his step, and turned, a superb figure, her uplifted arm still
shading her eyes.
"'Nichols, I'm awfully sorry...' he began weakly.
"'Ah!' she cried, her arrow-like candour tearing the veil he would have
dropped. She went to him swiftly. 'All day I have wandered in the
hills' said she 'All day I have thought of your choice. I have asked
the forest, why? and the mountains, why? and the great ocean, why? I
have held up my hands to the white clouds, to the sun of life and
wisdom, asking why, why? Now I have come to you--and him--to ask you,
why? My Love' said she softly 'I think it is that you do not understand,
and your words fall without knowledge. You are the light of life to me,
and the breath of the body. I cannot live alone. You have taken my
heart from my breast, and now would carry it with you to a strange land,
where it would perish and die. But these are words--you cannot mean
them. You will not go. See how I hold you fast!'
"He gazed at her in trepidation. 'It is decided' said he 'When the
ship returns, I am to go' 'Then I shall follow!' she told him. 'I
shall go with you ... home' He snatched his hands away. 'Oh, no, you
can't!' he shouted 'It isn't what you think' 'Blind one' she answered
'would I not be near you?' He started violently; she took his lands
again. 'Then stay with me, here in my land, which waits for us alone.
Stay with me in these nights that never end!'
"He sighed profoundly. 'It would soon be over....'
"'When it had ended, we could die' she whispered 'I would gladly die
thus, having lived for a time. Stay with me till love grows cold!'
"He pushed her off like one dazed and distracted. For a long while he
stood perfectly motionless. 'Stay!' she whispered once more 'Be
quiet--let me think' said he. She pressed against the railing. 'Look
down!' said she 'To-night we live--but there may be no to-morrow!'
While she was speaking, clear and sharp across the water came the rattle
of a falling anchor-chain.
"He seemed to stiffen where he stood. His face in the moonlight looked
sterner than its wont, set in the struggle that came hard to him. 'No!'
he cried in a loud voice. The word seemed to echo among the palms, a
tragic whisper of universal negation. She gazed at him a moment in
naked terror--then tottered and sank slowly to the ground, uttering
little stifled cries. I saw him leap the railing and kneel beside her;
but I didn't wait for more. I'd stayed too long already; and what was
coming would be harder than what had gone.
"It must have been fully an hour later, after I'd lost the path and
threshed around in the jungle until I was tired out, that I succeeded in
regaining the bungalow. Bert was sitting on the porch, alone. I
dropped into a chair beside him. 'Too bad, old man' said he, observing
the state of my white linens 'It was decent of you, though'
"'Yes, we're a decent breed, aren't we?' I snapped in reply 'Anyway,
let's not balance a heart against an hour of discomfort and a suit of
clothes' He turned his head and looked me over. 'I can't say that I
blame you' he exclaimed 'But honestly, old man, I think she will forget'
'I don't' said I 'Did you?' He winced, but I went on angrily 'You
ought to know better by this time. You've had a double experience
now--the chaser and the chased....' 'Hold on, Nichols!' he interrupted
'You're getting unpardonable. What would you have me do? Do you want
me to stay here and live with her?' 'No, I don't!' I shouted 'I merely
want a revision of life and human nature--no one to be unhappy, no love
to go unrequited, no heart to be thrown away' He laughed. 'I'd like
that, too' said he.
"The silence lengthened between us, as we gazed across the placid
harbour, thinking our own thoughts. In the brilliant moonlight, every
object in the roadstead was plainly discernible. 'I see your friend has
arrived' said Bert suddenly 'He's anchored pretty close to your vessel.
By Jove, that must have been his chain..' 'It was' I answered, musing
on the fortuitousness of events that shape our lives. 'Now he seems to
be getting a boat into the water. Where are your night glasses?' In a
moment Bert brought them to me. Aboard the new arrival there was an
unaccountable flurry, but I couldn't make out the scene below the rail.
In a short while, however, a boat appeared out of the shadow there, and
swam toward us through the bright moonlight. 'I wonder why he's coming
ashore, at this time of night' I murmured. 'Can't imagine' Bert
replied. Soon we heard the chunking of oars in the rowlocks, and two or
three quick commands. The boat was nearing the beach. She passed for a
moment behind the point of the jetty. Now she had reached the landing.
A confusion of voices broke out, loud and jarring, pitched in a key of
anger and violence. Then, cutting the stillness like a knife, came a
sudden sharp cry.
"My heart leaped into my mouth. 'My God, did you hear that?' asked
Bert, breathlessly. 'Keep still--it sounded like a woman's voice' said
I. We leaned across the rail, straining our eyes, but couldn't see what
was taking place; the landing lay too close under the trees. After the
cry, an absolute silence had fallen. This lasted a full minute. Then a
man's voice started up, the same angry, jarring tone 'Give way, boys!'
Almost immediately, we heard the sound of the oars again.
"The unexpectedness of the occurrence had held us spellbound; we stood
gazing at each other like two wooden images. Then, in the same instant,
we found our voices, began to confer hurriedly, and started on the run
for the centre of the verandah, where a broad flight of steps led down
to the jetty path. At the head of the path we both halted as if
transfixed. Someone was coming up from the landing. The moonlight
plainly showed it to be a woman. She advanced slowly, stopping now and
then, staggering as she walked. When she drew nearer, we could see that
she was hatless and empty-handed. She walked like a somnambulist,
gazing fixedly on the ground before her, now and then holding out a hand
as if to feel the way. At the last turn of the path, she stopped and
raised her head. Bert, at my side, made a low strangling sound.
Evidently discovering us, she started forward again. Her face was quite
terrible. All hope seemed gone from it, like the dead face of a suicide
that I once saw; her eyes stared at us blankly, and she clutched with
one hand at the bosom of her dress.
"'Who is there?' she asked brokenly.
"Bert left my side and flung himself toward her. 'Helen!' he cried.
She would have fallen, but he caught her in his arms. 'Helen!' said he
again, with his face close to hers.
"'Bert?' she asked in eager fearfulness. Her low voice seemed to tear
the heart. She gazed at him long and deep, while desperation turned to
wonder in her eyes.
"For the second time that evening I fled the scene of life's amazing
hazard. This time I hurried down the path with all haste, making for
the jetty; by shouting, I should be able to raise the ship and have a
boat sent ashore for me. As I glanced back at the corner, I saw Bert
help the woman up the steps. I thought I heard her sobbing; but, in a
moment, I realized that the sound came from another direction. Off
among the trees, in the heavy shadow, someone was uttering smothered,
choking cries. I broke into a run. The ways of the land were getting
too damnably complicated altogether; I wanted to surround myself again
with a safe strip of water.
*VII*
Nichols reached for another cigar. "And that's the way he found her" he
went on "For it wouldn't be true to say that she had found him; until
the moment in front of the bungalow when he took her in his arms, she
hadn't dreamed that he was there.
"I heard the final chapter of their romance while we were going up the
China Sea; I'd waited for him, after all, and had taken them both north
with me. After Bert had left Melbourne, she had missed him, and had
awakened to the realization that she'd driven him out of her life. So
she discovered what it meant to her, what she'd been doing, and bowed
before the law that through any wrong keeps the heart pure and the
spirit ready to fulfil itself. She had determined to follow, but
couldn't locate him. Some said he was in Singapore, some in Hong Kong;
the consensus of many vague rumours, however, agreed that he had gone
north into the China Sea region. It was familiar ground to her; she had
friends there, and sources of information. She's always known of
Halsted's packet service; the next time he came around, she had taken
passage in the _Senegal_ for an indeterminate trip up the coast.
"Unfortunately, Halsted also knew of her. He was a beastly sort of
character. The moment they got outside he grew familiar, and soon was
making forthright approaches. She was the only woman on the vessel; the
other passenger was an elderly man, to whom she couldn't hope to look
for protection. She, of course, was a woman of experience, as capable
of protecting herself as is humanly possible; but there are limits to
the power of the mind over brute force, when passion is engaged. Make
no mistake--her aversion from him was virginal, and nothing could have
induced her submission.
"'I took my revolver on deck one morning, to show him my marksmanship'
said she 'I shot a bird on the end of the spanker gaff. Then I got him
on one side, and told him what I would do. I told him that I should be
constantly on the watch, and that I would shoot him dead if he came near
me. It was the only way--but I knew he was a coward'
"So this was the situation on board the _Senegal_--on the one hand
defiance, on the other baulked and fermenting desire. Halsted watched
her as a cat watches a mouse, trying to catch her off guard. Throughout
the afternoon while they had been coming up the straits, even while my
glass had been looking them over, the silent battle had been going on.
The presence of the land had filled her with nameless apprehension.
Then they had run into the calm; in this condition, the supper hour had
arrived. She had waited on deck until she thought the others would be
nearly finished; when she entered the forward cabin, she saw that she
had waited too long. The mate and the old gentleman had gone on deck
forward; Halsted sat there alone. She had to pass him to reach her
seat. As she attempted to slip by, he rose suddenly and crushed her in
his arms. The Chinese steward in the pantry turned his back on the
scene.
"'My hand fell on a table knife' said she 'I fought him with
it--succeeded in cutting him badly about the hands. The blood
frightened him; he had to let me go. I've never seen a human being in
such a dreadful rage. He swore he wouldn't keep me on board an hour
longer'
"The rage had persisted; as soon as the sails had been furled, after
dropping the anchor, he had put a boat overboard and bundled her into
it, bag and baggage--well he knew that she was in no position to make
trouble for him. She had thought of trying to attract the attention of
the other vessel, but finally had decided that she had better take her
chances on land. She had supposed there were white people ashore; at
the landing, where her things had been pitched at her feet, she had
asked Halsted the way to the settlement. When he'd told her brutally
what an abandoned place it was, she'd suddenly lost heart. It was then
that we had heard her cry out.
"'Go up to the consulate bungalow' Halsted had told her 'See the
lights? Somebody must live up there'
"So she had climbed the hill, trusting to luck, which had already
arranged the scene. It might have been vastly different, you know.
Suppose she had found him with the native woman? Well, suppose it--the
renunciation would merely have changed hands. Inexorable formula!--for
them, one or the other; for him, heads I win, tails you lose"
*VIII*
Nichols went to the rail, and stood for some time in silence, facing the
land. "And I have seen the other" said he slowly "It was about a year
later that my course led me again through Sunda Straits, and I arrived
at Anjer on another evening of moonlight and stillness and awakened
memory. After the anchor was down I ordered a boat to be set overboard,
and went ashore in the late evening to revisit the bungalow. As I went
up the path, the shadows seemed to start and move about me, and a
wandering breeze stirred the palm trees with a quick rustle as of
departing feet. I found the wreck of a rattan chair standing on the
verandah, pulled it to the railing, and sat there a long while facing
the oval of grass flooded with moonlight, the fixed scene, as it were,
where the actors of this unseen drama had stalked through their
extravagant business and said their futile words.
"Nothing had changed; I seemed as if I had left the place but yesterday.
I turned to the heavy shadow where I had seen and heard her last, the
shadow that must have marked the end of a hillside trail; and it wasn't
surprising to me, but only natural, to see her standing there once more,
her form drawn back as if from a sight she didn't dare behold. In a
moment the tense figure moved. She walked like a tiger, with a
crouching step of absolute grace, cautious yet unafraid. Crossing the
oval, she came directly to the railing. I got up hastily, in excitement
and alarm; and we faced each other without speaking for quite a period.
"'You?...' said she at last in a low voice, drawing back. Her hand
tightened on the rail. She was regally beautiful.
"'For what do you wait?' I asked, striving to be calm.
"She threw down her arms with a violent gesture. 'A word, a message!'
she cried 'Can you tell me nothing? Has he come?'
"'He is far away' I answered.
"She put her hand on mine. 'You are his friend' said she 'I do not
blame you now; I see that it rested with him alone. But keep nothing
from me. Has he sent no word by you?'
"'He does not know that I have come' said I.
"'Ah, I have waited, night upon night!' she cried 'Whenever ships stop,
I have waited here--in darkness, in rain--always!--thinking to see you,
or that he might come, or that a message.... Will he not come? Tell
me!'
"'He will never come' said I.
"She drew her hand away, and stepped back sharply. Her voice rang out,
fierce with hate. 'He was a child. The woman took him! Tell me,
why?...'
"'The woman was his wife' I felt obliged to say.
"'Enough!' she cried. Her form became rigid, as if every muscle were
stretched to the point of breaking. Suddenly she relaxed, and turned to
me for the last time.
"'He is happy?' she asked quietly.
"I nodded--for the moment I couldn't speak.
"'She loves him?'
"Again I nodded.
"Her voice caught at the next question, but rallied bravely. 'He loves
her?--you are sure?...'
"I cursed myself for having come--but there could be no kindness in
sustaining the delusion. 'I am certain' I answered 'He will never tire
of her. He loves her better than all the world'
"She gave a quick cry, like one who has received a mortal wound. Before
I could recognize the significance of the moment, she had moved swiftly
into the open. For an instant she stood with arms outstretched; but not
until the dagger flashed above her breast did I see what she held in her
hand. When I reached her she'd fallen in the rank grass, and life had
gone.
"And that's the way I left her, a figure very beautiful, crouching low
as if to spring, the tall grass closing over her, the mystery dissolved
in mystery. Aha!--these high spirits, this gruelling difficulty of
life. But she, you'll note, had solved the difficulty, had met it
boldly and triumphantly, with the master stroke that levels fate itself
to the dust. As for the others, they had solved it, too, though not so
keenly, had triumphed, though not so magnificently--had gone away, had
found their home, were happy, for a little longer.... What did it
signify?"
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