A MESSAGE FROM JIENG
Buttoning up his waistcoat, Pierre went to the window and pushed open
the blinds. A wave of sunlight flooded his little room, lighting up
the whitewashed walls and making the copper-mounted bed sparkle. Under
its influence, the odor of drugs which had filled the room seemed to
evaporate from the two arm-chairs and the bamboo table loaded with
pots and bottles. Outside, the clock that ornamented the façade of the
hospital struck the hour, five clear leisurely strokes, which fell
slowly, one by one, in the vast sluggishness of the afternoon. Other
blinds were thrown back noisily, and little by little life pursued its
daily resurrection after the torrid hours of the siesta.
Leaning on his elbows at his window, Pierre let his glance wander over
the familiar scene. Beyond the great veranda which ran the whole length
of the building, and upon which the rooms of the patients opened,
he could see the hospital park spreading out with its green turf
and leafy trees, and between them the sanded walks, stretching like
yellow ribbons striped alternately with shadow and sunlight. Far off,
half seen through the gaps in the foliage, shone the whiteness of the
hospital wall which kept at a distance the noise and the traffic of
Saigon.
Pierre stretched himself and tried his muscles. He felt himself
very weak, his nerves flabby and his body heavy; the slowness and
uncertainty of each of his movements showing him how complete had been
his physical breakdown, how deep and lasting the disarrangement of his
vital mechanism to which five months of hospital treatment had only
succeeded in bringing back a weak illusion of energy, a pretense of
strength.... He smiled bitterly. Nothing would ever bring back to him
the vigor of his body, the richness and the freshness of his blood--in
a word, his youth!... And his mind itself, disrupted by suffering,
suddenly appeared to him old, worn out and pitiful.
The noise of the door opening behind him interrupted his gloomy
thoughts.
He turned about, raising his sallow face to the Sister of Charity who
had just entered. She smiled softly, with that self-effacing smile
which was habitual with her:
"Well, my child, I hope you are pleased. Today for the first time you
are to be allowed to go out into the park."
He made no answer, keeping his expression of indifference and
depression.
She shook her head, making the white wings of her head-dress flap to
and fro:
"How do you feel?"
She looked into his eyes.
"Come," said she, "that's enough of those black thoughts. Come for a
walk outside--the sun will do you good."
He bowed his head and remained motionless and lifeless.
"Listen, Sister Thérèse," he said, "I want...."
He hesitated, his eyes sought the eyes of the sister:
"What?" she asked, "still full of questions, eh? How did you get here?
This is the twentieth time you have asked me that, but I know nothing
about it, my child. If I knew, I would tell you, you know that! Why
should I want to hide it from you? But no, I promise you.... They
brought you here one evening; I was on duty, and I took you in and
looked after you. You were delirious, and I thought,--I can tell you
this now that you are practically cured--that you were going to slip
away from me. And then you had an attack of gastritis complicated with
brain-fever and you talked ... you talked...."
Pierre raised his head quickly.
"What did I say?"
"How do I know? If you think I take notice of all the nonsense my
patients talk! I have lots of other things to think about. First of all
I had to prevent you getting out of bed, and your one idea was to dress
yourself and start off."
She spoke lightly, accompanying her phrases with gestures. Underneath
her words could be felt the joy which she experienced in seeing this
patient of hers, for whose life she had fought hour by hour, up and
about again. She took his arm and shook it affectionately.
"Now, go, you stupid!" she said. "Underneath the wall over there you
will find your friends. Talk with them: it will ease your mind. They
will tell you the latest scandal of Saigon. You will see, they have
lots of jokes--at least I suppose so from hearing their shouts of
laughter--for they take very good care never to tell them to me, the
scamps!"
And she pushed him out of the door and shut it behind his back with a
little laugh.
* * * * *
Pierre found himself under the veranda. The sweetish smell of the
bougainvilleas in flower, the stems of which crept in masses over the
wooden balustrade, floated heavily in the air and mingled with the
stale odor of drugs, whiffs of which escaped from the open door. Rolled
up in rugs, their skeleton-like bodies loose in the hospital pyjamas
of gray wool, the convalescents lay, trying to accustom their eyes to
the blazing light which fell from a cloudless sky the color of deep
turquoise. A gentle breeze drifted among the deck-chairs, enveloping
the patients with its kindly warmth.
Pierre went down a staircase and came out into an avenue. He walked
slowly with short steps as groping and uncertain as his thoughts.
In the middle of a circle of turf a watering-pipe sent up a mist of
spray which the setting sun edged with a miniature rainbow. A vast
peace lay over the whole park,--a satisfying and contemplative silence
broken only here and there by the sudden whistlings of birds. Pierre,
following his course, came into an avenue of flame-trees: on the bare
earth large purple blossoms fallen from the branches made spots of
vivid red across the patches of shade which were riddled with little
circles of sunlight ceaselessly trembling and dancing among them.
At the end of the avenue a chorus of cries greeted him:
"Aha, Lursac! Out for the first time?"
"This is better than the native huts!"
Pierre acknowledged the greetings with a weary movement of his hand.
There were four of them--four young men escaped like himself from the
privations of the forest and re-united here by the chances of sickness.
One down from Cambodia, two from the Chinese frontier and the fourth
just brought in from Cochin-China.
This last said to him:
"Yes ... it is a good deal better. As for me, when they let me out
after three months in bed...."
And he went off into a long account of his own convalescence.
Pierre lay back in an arm-chair by the table on which playing-cards
were lying about in disorder by open newspapers.
The man who had spoken first--a big fellow with laughing eyes and
sarcastic mouth--took one of the papers, unfolded it, looking for
something.
"Here you are, old chap. There's something about you in this ... half a
column at least. 'The famous Post 32 again!' Good heading, eh? As for
the article, it is a regular wonder, nothing better was ever invented
in any editorial office!"
Pierre stretched out his hand for it.
"No, listen.... I'll read it to you out loud. It is worth the
trouble!..."
And in his mocking voice he declaimed:
"'THE FAMOUS POST 32 AGAIN
"'Without doubt our readers will remember the tragedy which took
place here some five months ago at the foot of the Pou-Kas, the
scene of which was Post 32, long celebrated in the annals of our
Indo-Chinese history. For those of our readers who have forgotten
this sad affair we will give a brief resumé of it. M. de Lursac,
a young administrator with splendid prospects ... (I salute you,
my boy; the Press admires you! It is the only original passage in
the article. I continue:) ... a young administrator with splendid
prospects was despatched at his own request to Post 32, the
responsibility for which he was to share with Lieutenant Redeski.
Administrator Lursac had been ordered to proceed, on taking up his
duties, with a police operation against the independent Moï tribes
of the district. Everybody still remembers the result of this
expedition. Starting out in company with the Rev. Father Ravennes,
of the Apostolic Mission to the Banhars, M. de Lursac was found a
month later wandering in the forest in a condition of collapse and
sickness which left the possibility of his recovery doubtful for
a long time. His escort of native riflemen scattered in continual
attacks, his elephants killed by poisoned arrows, his reverend
companion dead by the way of a wound received in an ambush, he
was alone in the midst of the vast Lao-ese forest. M. de Lursac
was attempting to find his way back to the Post when he fell,
conquered by weakness and exhaustion; but he had succeeded, thanks
to an extraordinary will power ... (I greet you once more!) ...
in reaching the outskirts of it, and it was at a distance of only
a few miles from the station which had been destroyed during his
absence that the converts of Father Ravennes discovered the young
administrator, dying, and in a state of destitution impossible
to describe. We understand that a successor to him has just been
appointed. Would it not be better before uselessly sacrificing
the lives and energies of our young men ... (All salute him,
gentlemen!) ... to first of all set to work seriously to clean out
the district and to put down with an iron hand this rebellious
horde that makes our rule over this part of the hinterland simply
illusory? It appears to us indeed, impossible that the authorities
who pretend to be so anxious about it, etc., etc.'
"Then follows a whole list of suggestions--all illusory, as the editor
of this estimable journal would say--in which the Colonial Government
gets a few of these truths which it is customary to hand it on
occasion.... What have you got to say about it, young administrator of
most splendid prospects?"
He stopped speaking. All eyes turned to Lursac. He considered. What
could he tell them? The truth!... Ah! the truth!... He shrugged his
shoulders, deciding to leave uncontradicted the fantastic version given
by the Saigon papers.
But the other obstinately asked a definite question:
"How much truth is there in all this nonsense?"
Pierre felt that it was necessary to give some answer.
"Sentences here and there!" he said, evasively. "It was very simple....
The _linhs_ deserted almost at once; the mahouts in their turn got away
with their animals and all the provisions, so that I found myself one
fine day alone with Father Ravennes, who had been wounded the night
before during an attack on a village. We wandered through the forest
aimlessly, straying here and there and going in a circle and then ...
and then...."
He shut his eyes. An unconquerable lassitude fell upon him, he lay back
heavily in his chair.
"And then," continued the voice of one of the young men, "you woke up
in hospital. Here or elsewhere it is always the same story. Some leave
their skins behind and others bring them out with them. That's life,
that is!... They give us an order, we carry it out. As for the rest, it
all depends on the will of Buddha. As my girl says to me, 'We are in
the hands of the Perfect One!'"
He crumpled up the paper, rolled it into a ball and flung it over the
wall.
There was a long silence. In the street which ran just the other side
of the wall, the rhythmic trot of a rickshaw coolie came up, passed by,
and died into the distance, and then a song rose; it was the song of a
beggar imploring charity in a tremulous tearful voice. The sun, slowly
descending, shot slanting rays of light across the avenues of the park.
The sky, changing slowly through gold and purple, became mauve: the
piping birds sounded more softly and less often: an invisible bell
behind the wall of trees and buildings sounded out in short repeated
strokes.
The young men got up.
"Are you coming, Lursac?"
Pierre was recalling the past. Once more he saw Ravennes and the humble
tomb of greenery above it; and in the depths of the vast Lao-ese forest
the rosary that would swing its crucifix of tarnished silver whenever
the wind blew from the north down the slope of the Pou-Kas. He thought
of Wanda. Where was she, and what had become of her? Was she still a
prisoner of the tribe? Prisoner?...
He saw again the wild rush of the men of Gondwana. He thought of the
love of their chief for Wanda. Prisoner? Ah!... Ah!...
A hand shook him:
"Lursac! Here, Lursac! When are you going to finish dreaming with your
eyes open? The first dinner bell has just rung. Are you coming?"
Suddenly the song of the beggar on the other side of the wall died away.
Pierre shook his head.
"I have plenty of time," he said, "it is still quarter of an hour to
the second bell."
The young men, careless, left him. One of them began telling a
scandalous story which was going the round in Saigon. Gradually his
voice and the laughter of his fellows became indistinct as they moved
away.
Once more fallen into a revery, Pierre felt a bitter pleasure in again
going over his sufferings in detail. Suddenly his former despair fell
upon him. Again he was tortured,--perhaps more terribly than he had
ever been. His grief which had remained in abeyance during his illness
came alive again. His heart contracted; he called out, hoarsely:
"Wanda!... Wanda!..."
Behind the tall white wall the dragging footstep of the beggar and her
song came again--then something pale, flung from the street, fell on
an arm-chair, rebounded and rolled on the ground. Pierre, surprised,
remained motionless for a second. The song had again ceased and hurried
steps could be heard making away. Bending down he picked up the object
and examined it. It was a packet, carefully done up in a dirty rag.
Opening it with an instinctive fear he looked at the contents and
seized with a convulsive fit of trembling remained nailed to his seat,
incapable of moving.... Then, he rushed to the entrance gate. The
rifleman on guard, scared at his violence, watched him go out without
making any effort to stop him. There was not a soul in the street.
Pierre made the complete circuit of the hospital, running as hard as
he could, coming back to the entrance gate. Then dashing into the next
street he followed it exhausted, his heart beating so as to suffocate
him, until he could run no longer. His clenched hand clung to the
packet.
About him people hurried to and fro, elbowing him and pushing him aside
without his noticing it. At the corner of the boulevard he was almost
run over. The coachman, flinging himself back on his seat with the
reins pulled up tight, dragged his ponies to one side and missed him
by an inch, cursing him volubly. He heard him not and noticed nothing.
His eyes looking straight before him saw a phantom which fled him
ceaselessly and which he as ceaselessly pursued.
At last, opposite a shop window he pulled up. The glass of the
window reflected his own image and he looked at it for a moment with
stupefaction. Was that he?... This fleshless skeleton of a body ...
with gestures feverish, ugly and grotesque? Was that the body of him,
Pierre de Lursac?... That livid face, all flat hollows and projecting
bones; this withered flesh; these wrinkles; these eyes shining with
fever and yet dull; these loose burned up lips--all these things ...
were they his eyes, his face, his mouth?... He gave a terrible grin and
clenched his fists; the packet which he was still carrying crackled....
And once more he resumed his aimless way.
* * * * *
Under the arched trees along the avenues the shade was deeper.
Rickshaws and carriages went about hurriedly to unknown destinations.
The usual life cast up its flood of passers-by, its under-current of
natives, its noises, its smells;--and he, among it all, was like a
scrap of flotsam drifting at random.... Then night fell, and lights
shone through the dark. They became fewer and disappeared altogether
for a while, for he was following a road which led out of the city and
ran across the open country.
He still kept going.... He came to a canal and followed it. The voices
of sampan men came to him and the smell of Annamese cooking. At long
distances between, a victoria, a malabar and a few rickshaws passed him
or met him. The light of their lanterns striking out in the darkness
threw a brief illumination upon him and shed a narrow, yellow light
on the opposite side of the road which quickly fled away from him and
disappeared....
Then, again, he found himself in the neighborhood of a crowd of human
beings, the lights and the human scurryings of a native village. And
suddenly he came to himself. With a flash the cloud of hallucination
which had encompassed him fell away and vanished. He looked about him
with haggard eyes. He was on the outskirts of Cho-lon. On his left he
could see the dark furrow of the canal crowded with a mass of junks and
sampans and spotted with enormous native lamps; on his right the houses
of the Chinese town rose with their colored lanterns and flamboyant
signs and gildings and their stalls.
He hesitated. Casting a heavy glance over the canal with its black and
oily water, stagnant between its muddy banks, he then turned towards
the town and saw in front of him a shop above which a panel of black
lacquer bore in gold letters the name of the proprietor. He read
mechanically between two columns of Chinese characters:
TSEN-TAC
CHINESE CURIOS AND SILKS
CANTON. SAIGON. SHANGHAI.
He said to himself:
"Tsen-Tac?... Tsen-Tac?..."
This name brought to life in some obscure corner of his mind a sleeping
memory. Suddenly he remembered: at the bottom of the passageway in the
inner shop: Opium,--the drug that gives forgetfulness and peace.
Making up his mind he walked to the door and pushed it open violently.
The pot-bellied owner, with his little narrow eyes lost among the
billowings of his vast face, greeted him with an obsequious smile. He
was already framing a phrase of welcome when Pierre cut him short with
a rough shrug of the shoulders.
"Shandoo," he said heavily.
And he rattled several piastres in the bottom of his pocket.
The "compere"[20] made his smile still broader. His fat face took on an
air of secrecy. He flung a cautious look around the empty shop and then
with his hand, sparkling with rings of pink and green jade, he pointed
to a hanging in the furthest corner.
[Footnote 20: Name given to the Chinese.]
Pierre, raising it, slid into the passage. In front of him at the
further end stood a door, lighted by a dim lantern of figured silk. He
stopped for a second, pushing his hands into his pockets. With a hoarse
sigh, he felt the packet which had come to him in such a strange manner
a few hours earlier and he began to withdraw his hand slowly, bringing
out with it towards the light the.... A shudder shook him from head to
foot. He could not complete the movement; more haggard than before, if
possible, he bent his head....
"I cannot ... not yet.... Later ... presently.... When I have smoked
ten pipes ... twelve pipes.... When the opium has.... Then, yes....
I will see if it is really her ... her hand ... with the ring ... my
signet ring...."
An uncontrollable sob shook him.
Once more he repeated:
"Her hand ... her hand...."
And he pushed open the door and entered the opium den.
* * * * *
[Transcriber's Note: Inconsistent hyphenation left as printed.]