PART II

CHAPTER ONE

The light and heat fell upon the settlement, the clearings, and the

river as if flung down by an angry hand. The land lay silent, still,

and brilliant under the avalanche of burning rays that had destroyed all

sound and all motion, had buried all shadows, had choked every breath.

No living thing dared to affront the serenity of this cloudless sky,

dared to revolt against the oppression of this glorious and cruel

sunshine. Strength and resolution, body and mind alike were helpless,

and tried to hide before the rush of the fire from heaven. Only the

frail butterflies, the fearless children of the sun, the capricious

tyrants of the flowers, fluttered audaciously in the open, and their

minute shadows hovered in swarms over the drooping blossoms, ran lightly

on the withering grass, or glided on the dry and cracked earth. No voice

was heard in this hot noontide but the faint murmur of the river that

hurried on in swirls and eddies, its sparkling wavelets chasing each

other in their joyous course to the sheltering depths, to the cool

refuge of the sea.

Almayer had dismissed his workmen for the midday rest, and, his little

daughter on his shoulder, ran quickly across the courtyard, making for

the shade of the verandah of his house. He laid the sleepy child on the

seat of the big rocking-chair, on a pillow which he took out of his

own hammock, and stood for a while looking down at her with tender and

pensive eyes. The child, tired and hot, moved uneasily, sighed, and

looked up at him with the veiled look of sleepy fatigue. He picked up

from the floor a broken palm-leaf fan, and began fanning gently the

flushed little face. Her eyelids fluttered and Almayer smiled. A

responsive smile brightened for a second her heavy eyes, broke with a

dimple the soft outline of her cheek; then the eyelids dropped suddenly,

she drew a long breath through the parted lips--and was in a deep sleep

before the fleeting smile could vanish from her face.

Almayer moved lightly off, took one of the wooden armchairs, and placing

it close to the balustrade of the verandah sat down with a sigh of

relief. He spread his elbows on the top rail and resting his chin on his

clasped hands looked absently at the river, at the dance of sunlight

on the flowing water. Gradually the forest of the further bank became

smaller, as if sinking below the level of the river. The outlines

wavered, grew thin, dissolved in the air. Before his eyes there was

now only a space of undulating blue--one big, empty sky growing dark at

times. . . . Where was the sunshine? . . . He felt soothed and happy, as

if some gentle and invisible hand had removed from his soul the burden

of his body. In another second he seemed to float out into a cool

brightness where there was no such thing as memory or pain. Delicious.

His eyes closed--opened--closed again.

“Almayer!”

With a sudden jerk of his whole body he sat up, grasping the front rail

with both his hands, and blinked stupidly.

“What? What’s that?” he muttered, looking round vaguely.

“Here! Down here, Almayer.”

Half rising in his chair, Almayer looked over the rail at the foot of

the verandah, and fell back with a low whistle of astonishment.

“A ghost, by heavens!” he exclaimed softly to himself.

“Will you listen to me?” went on the husky voice from the courtyard.

“May I come up, Almayer?”

Almayer stood up and leaned over the rail. “Don’t you dare,” he said,

in a voice subdued but distinct. “Don’t you dare! The child sleeps here.

And I don’t want to hear you--or speak to you either.”

“You must listen to me! It’s something important.”

“Not to me, surely.”

“Yes! To you. Very important.”

“You were always a humbug,” said Almayer, after a short silence, in an

indulgent tone. “Always! I remember the old days. Some fellows used to

say there was no one like you for smartness--but you never took me in.

Not quite. I never quite believed in you, Mr. Willems.”

“I admit your superior intelligence,” retorted Willems, with scornful

impatience, from below. “Listening to me would be a further proof of it.

You will be sorry if you don’t.”

“Oh, you funny fellow!” said Almayer, banteringly. “Well, come up. Don’t

make a noise, but come up. You’ll catch a sunstroke down there and die

on my doorstep perhaps. I don’t want any tragedy here. Come on!”

Before he finished speaking Willems’ head appeared above the level of

the floor, then his shoulders rose gradually and he stood at last before

Almayer--a masquerading spectre of the once so very confidential clerk

of the richest merchant in the islands. His jacket was soiled and torn;

below the waist he was clothed in a worn-out and faded sarong. He flung

off his hat, uncovering his long, tangled hair that stuck in wisps on

his perspiring forehead and straggled over his eyes, which glittered

deep down in the sockets like the last sparks amongst the black embers

of a burnt-out fire. An unclean beard grew out of the caverns of his

sunburnt cheeks. The hand he put out towards Almayer was very unsteady.

The once firm mouth had the tell-tale droop of mental suffering and

physical exhaustion. He was barefooted. Almayer surveyed him with

leisurely composure.

“Well!” he said at last, without taking the extended hand which dropped

slowly along Willems’ body.

“I am come,” began Willems.

“So I see,” interrupted Almayer. “You might have spared me this treat

without making me unhappy. You have been away five weeks, if I am not

mistaken. I got on very well without you--and now you are here you are

not pretty to look at.”

“Let me speak, will you!” exclaimed Willems.

“Don’t shout like this. Do you think yourself in the forest with your

. . . your friends? This is a civilized man’s house. A white man’s.

Understand?”

“I am come,” began Willems again; “I am come for your good and mine.”

“You look as if you had come for a good feed,” chimed in the

irrepressible Almayer, while Willems waved his hand in a discouraged

gesture. “Don’t they give you enough to eat,” went on Almayer, in a tone

of easy banter, “those--what am I to call them--those new relations of

yours? That old blind scoundrel must be delighted with your company. You

know, he was the greatest thief and murderer of those seas. Say! do

you exchange confidences? Tell me, Willems, did you kill somebody in

Macassar or did you only steal something?”

“It is not true!” exclaimed Willems, hotly. “I only borrowed. . . . They

all lied! I . . .”

“Sh-sh!” hissed Almayer, warningly, with a look at the sleeping child.

“So you did steal,” he went on, with repressed exultation. “I thought

there was something of the kind. And now, here, you steal again.”

For the first time Willems raised his eyes to Almayer’s face.

“Oh, I don’t mean from me. I haven’t missed anything,” said Almayer,

with mocking haste. “But that girl. Hey! You stole her. You did not pay

the old fellow. She is no good to him now, is she?”

“Stop that. Almayer!”

Something in Willems’ tone caused Almayer to pause. He looked narrowly

at the man before him, and could not help being shocked at his

appearance.

“Almayer,” went on Willems, “listen to me. If you are a human being you

will. I suffer horribly--and for your sake.”

Almayer lifted his eyebrows. “Indeed! How? But you are raving,” he

added, negligently.

“Ah! You don’t know,” whispered Willems. “She is gone. Gone,” he

repeated, with tears in his voice, “gone two days ago.”

“No!” exclaimed the surprised Almayer. “Gone! I haven’t heard that

news yet.” He burst into a subdued laugh. “How funny! Had enough of you

already? You know it’s not flattering for you, my superior countryman.”

Willems--as if not hearing him--leaned against one of the columns of the

roof and looked over the river. “At first,” he whispered, dreamily, “my

life was like a vision of heaven--or hell; I didn’t know which. Since

she went I know what perdition means; what darkness is. I know what it

is to be torn to pieces alive. That’s how I feel.”

“You may come and live with me again,” said Almayer, coldly. “After all,

Lingard--whom I call my father and respect as such--left you under my

care. You pleased yourself by going away. Very good. Now you want

to come back. Be it so. I am no friend of yours. I act for Captain

Lingard.”

“Come back?” repeated Willems, passionately. “Come back to you and

abandon her? Do you think I am mad? Without her! Man! what are you

made of? To think that she moves, lives, breathes out of my sight. I am

jealous of the wind that fans her, of the air she breathes, of the earth

that receives the caress of her foot, of the sun that looks at her now

while I . . . I haven’t seen her for two days--two days.”

The intensity of Willems’ feeling moved Almayer somewhat, but he

affected to yawn elaborately, “You do bore me,” he muttered. “Why don’t

you go after her instead of coming here?”

“Why indeed?”

“Don’t you know where she is? She can’t be very far. No native craft has

left this river for the last fortnight.”

“No! not very far--and I will tell you where she is. She is in Lakamba’s

campong.” And Willems fixed his eyes steadily on Almayer’s face.

“Phew! Patalolo never sent to let me know. Strange,” said Almayer,

thoughtfully. “Are you afraid of that lot?” he added, after a short

pause.

“I--afraid!”

“Then is it the care of your dignity which prevents you from following

her there, my high-minded friend?” asked Almayer, with mock solicitude.

“How noble of you!”

There was a short silence; then Willems said, quietly, “You are a fool.

I should like to kick you.”

“No fear,” answered Almayer, carelessly; “you are too weak for that. You

look starved.”

“I don’t think I have eaten anything for the last two days; perhaps

more--I don’t remember. It does not matter. I am full of live embers,”

said Willems, gloomily. “Look!” and he bared an arm covered with fresh

scars. “I have been biting myself to forget in that pain the fire that

hurts me there!” He struck his breast violently with his fist, reeled

under his own blow, fell into a chair that stood near and closed his

eyes slowly.

“Disgusting exhibition,” said Almayer, loftily. “What could father ever

see in you? You are as estimable as a heap of garbage.”

“You talk like that! You, who sold your soul for a few guilders,”

muttered Willems, wearily, without opening his eyes.

“Not so few,” said Almayer, with instinctive readiness, and stopped

confused for a moment. He recovered himself quickly, however, and went

on: “But you--you have thrown yours away for nothing; flung it under

the feet of a damned savage woman who has made you already the thing you

are, and will kill you very soon, one way or another, with her love or

with her hate. You spoke just now about guilders. You meant Lingard’s

money, I suppose. Well, whatever I have sold, and for whatever price, I

never meant you--you of all people--to spoil my bargain. I feel pretty

safe though. Even father, even Captain Lingard, would not touch you now

with a pair of tongs; not with a ten-foot pole. . . .”

He spoke excitedly, all in one breath, and, ceasing suddenly, glared at

Willems and breathed hard through his nose in sulky resentment. Willems

looked at him steadily for a moment, then got up.

“Almayer,” he said resolutely, “I want to become a trader in this

place.”

Almayer shrugged his shoulders.

“Yes. And you shall set me up. I want a house and trade goods--perhaps a

little money. I ask you for it.”

“Anything else you want? Perhaps this coat?” and here Almayer unbuttoned

his jacket--“or my house--or my boots?”

“After all it’s natural,” went on Willems, without paying any attention

to Almayer--“it’s natural that she should expect the advantages which

. . . and then I could shut up that old wretch and then . . .”

He paused, his face brightened with the soft light of dreamy enthusiasm,

and he turned his eyes upwards. With his gaunt figure and dilapidated

appearance he looked like some ascetic dweller in a wilderness, finding

the reward of a self-denying life in a vision of dazzling glory. He went

on in an impassioned murmur--

“And then I would have her all to myself away from her people--all

to myself--under my own influence--to fashion--to mould--to adore--to

soften--to . . . Oh! Delight! And then--then go away to some distant

place where, far from all she knew, I would be all the world to her! All

the world to her!”

His face changed suddenly. His eyes wandered for awhile and then became

steady all at once.

“I would repay every cent, of course,” he said, in a business-like tone,

with something of his old assurance, of his old belief in himself, in

it. “Every cent. I need not interfere with your business. I shall cut

out the small native traders. I have ideas--but never mind that now. And

Captain Lingard would approve, I feel sure. After all it’s a loan, and I

shall be at hand. Safe thing for you.”

“Ah! Captain Lingard would approve! He would app . . .” Almayer choked.

The notion of Lingard doing something for Willems enraged him. His face

was purple. He spluttered insulting words. Willems looked at him coolly.

“I assure you, Almayer,” he said, gently, “that I have good grounds for

my demand.”

“Your cursed impudence!”

“Believe me, Almayer, your position here is not so safe as you may

think. An unscrupulous rival here would destroy your trade in a year.

It would be ruin. Now Lingard’s long absence gives courage to certain

individuals. You know?--I have heard much lately. They made proposals to

me . . . You are very much alone here. Even Patalolo . . .”

“Damn Patalolo! I am master in this place.”

“But, Almayer, don’t you see . . .”

“Yes, I see. I see a mysterious ass,” interrupted Almayer, violently.

“What is the meaning of your veiled threats? Don’t you think I know

something also? They have been intriguing for years--and nothing has

happened. The Arabs have been hanging about outside this river for

years--and I am still the only trader here; the master here. Do you

bring me a declaration of war? Then it’s from yourself only. I know all

my other enemies. I ought to knock you on the head. You are not worth

powder and shot though. You ought to be destroyed with a stick--like a

snake.”

Almayer’s voice woke up the little girl, who sat up on the pillow with a

sharp cry. He rushed over to the chair, caught up the child in his arms,

walked back blindly, stumbled against Willems’ hat which lay on the

floor, and kicked it furiously down the steps.

“Clear out of this! Clear out!” he shouted.

Willems made an attempt to speak, but Almayer howled him down.

“Take yourself off! Don’t you see you frighten the child--you scarecrow!

No, no! dear,” he went on to his little daughter, soothingly, while

Willems walked down the steps slowly. “No. Don’t cry. See! Bad man going

away. Look! He is afraid of your papa. Nasty, bad man. Never come back

again. He shall live in the woods and never come near my little girl. If

he comes papa will kill him--so!” He struck his fist on the rail of the

balustrade to show how he would kill Willems, and, perching the consoled

child on his shoulder held her with one hand, while he pointed toward

the retreating figure of his visitor.

“Look how he runs away, dearest,” he said, coaxingly. “Isn’t he funny.

Call ‘pig’ after him, dearest. Call after him.”

The seriousness of her face vanished into dimples. Under the long

eyelashes, glistening with recent tears, her big eyes sparkled and

danced with fun. She took firm hold of Almayer’s hair with one hand,

while she waved the other joyously and called out with all her might, in

a clear note, soft and distinct like the pipe of a bird:--

“Pig! Pig! Pig!”

CHAPTER TWO

A sigh under the flaming blue, a shiver of the sleeping sea, a cool

breath as if a door had been swung upon the frozen spaces of the

universe, and with a stir of leaves, with the nod of boughs, with the

tremble of slender branches the sea breeze struck the coast, rushed up

the river, swept round the broad reaches, and travelled on in a soft

ripple of darkening water, in the whisper of branches, in the rustle of

leaves of the awakened forests. It fanned in Lakamba’s campong the dull

red of expiring embers into a pale brilliance; and, under its touch,

the slender, upright spirals of smoke that rose from every glowing heap

swayed, wavered, and eddying down filled the twilight of clustered shade

trees with the aromatic scent of the burning wood. The men who had been

dozing in the shade during the hot hours of the afternoon woke up, and

the silence of the big courtyard was broken by the hesitating murmur

of yet sleepy voices, by coughs and yawns, with now and then a burst of

laughter, a loud hail, a name or a joke sent out in a soft drawl. Small

groups squatted round the little fires, and the monotonous undertone of

talk filled the enclosure; the talk of barbarians, persistent, steady,

repeating itself in the soft syllables, in musical tones of the

never-ending discourses of those men of the forests and the sea, who

can talk most of the day and all the night; who never exhaust a subject,

never seem able to thresh a matter out; to whom that talk is poetry and

painting and music, all art, all history; their only accomplishment,

their only superiority, their only amusement. The talk of camp fires,

which speaks of bravery and cunning, of strange events and of far

countries, of the news of yesterday and the news of to-morrow. The talk

about the dead and the living--about those who fought and those who

loved.

Lakamba came out on the platform before his own house and sat

down--perspiring, half asleep, and sulky--in a wooden armchair under the

shade of the overhanging eaves. Through the darkness of the doorway

he could hear the soft warbling of his womenkind, busy round the looms

where they were weaving the checkered pattern of his gala sarongs. Right

and left of him on the flexible bamboo floor those of his followers to

whom their distinguished birth, long devotion, or faithful service had

given the privilege of using the chief’s house, were sleeping on mats

or just sat up rubbing their eyes: while the more wakeful had mustered

enough energy to draw a chessboard with red clay on a fine mat and were

now meditating silently over their moves. Above the prostrate forms

of the players, who lay face downward supported on elbow, the soles of

their feet waving irresolutely about, in the absorbed meditation of the

game, there towered here and there the straight figure of an attentive

spectator looking down with dispassionate but profound interest. On the

edge of the platform a row of high-heeled leather sandals stood ranged

carefully in a level line, and against the rough wooden rail leaned the

slender shafts of the spears belonging to these gentlemen, the broad

blades of dulled steel looking very black in the reddening light of

approaching sunset.

A boy of about twelve--the personal attendant of Lakamba--squatted

at his master’s feet and held up towards him a silver siri box. Slowly

Lakamba took the box, opened it, and tearing off a piece of green leaf

deposited in it a pinch of lime, a morsel of gambier, a small bit of

areca nut, and wrapped up the whole with a dexterous twist. He paused,

morsel in hand, seemed to miss something, turned his head from side

to side, slowly, like a man with a stiff neck, and ejaculated in an

ill-humoured bass--

“Babalatchi!”

The players glanced up quickly, and looked down again directly. Those

men who were standing stirred uneasily as if prodded by the sound of

the chief’s voice. The one nearest to Lakamba repeated the call, after

a while, over the rail into the courtyard. There was a movement

of upturned faces below by the fires, and the cry trailed over the

enclosure in sing-song tones. The thumping of wooden pestles husking

the evening rice stopped for a moment and Babalatchi’s name rang

afresh shrilly on women’s lips in various keys. A voice far off shouted

something--another, nearer, repeated it; there was a short hubbub which

died out with extreme suddenness. The first crier turned to Lakamba,

saying indolently--

“He is with the blind Omar.”

Lakamba’s lips moved inaudibly. The man who had just spoken was again

deeply absorbed in the game going on at his feet; and the chief--as if

he had forgotten all about it already--sat with a stolid face amongst

his silent followers, leaning back squarely in his chair, his hands on

the arms of his seat, his knees apart, his big blood-shot eyes blinking

solemnly, as if dazzled by the noble vacuity of his thoughts.

Babalatchi had gone to see old Omar late in the afternoon. The delicate

manipulation of the ancient pirate’s susceptibilities, the skilful

management of Aissa’s violent impulses engrossed him to the exclusion

of every other business--interfered with his regular attendance upon his

chief and protector--even disturbed his sleep for the last three nights.

That day when he left his own bamboo hut--which stood amongst others in

Lakamba’s campong--his heart was heavy with anxiety and with doubt as

to the success of his intrigue. He walked slowly, with his usual air of

detachment from his surroundings, as if unaware that many sleepy eyes

watched from all parts of the courtyard his progress towards a small

gate at its upper end. That gate gave access to a separate enclosure

in which a rather large house, built of planks, had been prepared by

Lakamba’s orders for the reception of Omar and Aissa. It was a superior

kind of habitation which Lakamba intended for the dwelling of his chief

adviser--whose abilities were worth that honour, he thought. But after

the consultation in the deserted clearing--when Babalatchi had disclosed

his plan--they both had agreed that the new house should be used at

first to shelter Omar and Aissa after they had been persuaded to leave

the Rajah’s place, or had been kidnapped from there--as the case might

be. Babalatchi did not mind in the least the putting off of his own

occupation of the house of honour, because it had many advantages for

the quiet working out of his plans. It had a certain seclusion, having

an enclosure of its own, and that enclosure communicated also with

Lakamba’s private courtyard at the back of his residence--a place set

apart for the female household of the chief. The only communication with

the river was through the great front courtyard always full of armed men

and watchful eyes. Behind the whole group of buildings there stretched

the level ground of rice-clearings, which in their turn were closed in

by the wall of untouched forests with undergrowth so thick and tangled

that nothing but a bullet--and that fired at pretty close range--could

penetrate any distance there.

Babalatchi slipped quietly through the little gate and, closing it, tied

up carefully the rattan fastenings. Before the house there was a square

space of ground, beaten hard into the level smoothness of asphalte. A

big buttressed tree, a giant left there on purpose during the process

of clearing the land, roofed in the clear space with a high canopy of

gnarled boughs and thick, sombre leaves. To the right--and some small

distance away from the large house--a little hut of reeds, covered with

mats, had been put up for the special convenience of Omar, who, being

blind and infirm, had some difficulty in ascending the steep plankway

that led to the more substantial dwelling, which was built on low posts

and had an uncovered verandah. Close by the trunk of the tree, and

facing the doorway of the hut, the household fire glowed in a small

handful of embers in the midst of a large circle of white ashes. An

old woman--some humble relation of one of Lakamba’s wives, who had been

ordered to attend on Aissa--was squatting over the fire and lifted up

her bleared eyes to gaze at Babalatchi in an uninterested manner, as he

advanced rapidly across the courtyard.

Babalatchi took in the courtyard with a keen glance of his solitary eye,

and without looking down at the old woman muttered a question. Silently,

the woman stretched a tremulous and emaciated arm towards the hut.

Babalatchi made a few steps towards the doorway, but stopped outside in

the sunlight.

“O! Tuan Omar, Omar besar! It is I--Babalatchi!”

Within the hut there was a feeble groan, a fit of coughing and an

indistinct murmur in the broken tones of a vague plaint. Encouraged

evidently by those signs of dismal life within, Babalatchi entered the

hut, and after some time came out leading with rigid carefulness the

blind Omar, who followed with both his hands on his guide’s shoulders.

There was a rude seat under the tree, and there Babalatchi led his old

chief, who sat down with a sigh of relief and leaned wearily against the

rugged trunk. The rays of the setting sun, darting under the spreading

branches, rested on the white-robed figure sitting with head thrown back

in stiff dignity, on the thin hands moving uneasily, and on the stolid

face with its eyelids dropped over the destroyed eyeballs; a face set

into the immobility of a plaster cast yellowed by age.

“Is the sun near its setting?” asked Omar, in a dull voice.

“Very near,” answered Babalatchi.

“Where am I? Why have I been taken away from the place which I

knew--where I, blind, could move without fear? It is like black night to

those who see. And the sun is near its setting--and I have not heard the

sound of her footsteps since the morning! Twice a strange hand has given

me my food to-day. Why? Why? Where is she?”

“She is near,” said Babalatchi.

“And he?” went on Omar, with sudden eagerness, and a drop in his voice.

“Where is he? Not here. Not here!” he repeated, turning his head from

side to side as if in deliberate attempt to see.

“No! He is not here now,” said Babalatchi, soothingly. Then, after a

pause, he added very low, “But he shall soon return.”

“Return! O crafty one! Will he return? I have cursed him three times,”

exclaimed Omar, with weak violence.

“He is--no doubt--accursed,” assented Babalatchi, in a conciliating

manner--“and yet he will be here before very long--I know!”

“You are crafty and faithless. I have made you great. You were dirt

under my feet--less than dirt,” said Omar, with tremulous energy.

“I have fought by your side many times,” said Babalatchi, calmly.

“Why did he come?” went on Omar. “Did you send him? Why did he come to

defile the air I breathe--to mock at my fate--to poison her mind and

steal her body? She has grown hard of heart to me. Hard and merciless

and stealthy like rocks that tear a ship’s life out under the smooth

sea.” He drew a long breath, struggled with his anger, then broke

down suddenly. “I have been hungry,” he continued, in a whimpering

tone--“often I have been very hungry--and cold--and neglected--and

nobody near me. She has often forgotten me--and my sons are dead, and

that man is an infidel and a dog. Why did he come? Did you show him the

way?”

“He found the way himself, O Leader of the brave,” said Babalatchi,

sadly. “I only saw a way for their destruction and our own greatness.

And if I saw aright, then you shall never suffer from hunger any more.

There shall be peace for us, and glory and riches.”

“And I shall die to-morrow,” murmured Omar, bitterly.

“Who knows? Those things have been written since the beginning of the

world,” whispered Babalatchi, thoughtfully.

“Do not let him come back,” exclaimed Omar.

“Neither can he escape his fate,” went on Babalatchi. “He shall come

back, and the power of men we always hated, you and I, shall crumble

into dust in our hand.” Then he added with enthusiasm, “They shall fight

amongst themselves and perish both.”

“And you shall see all this, while, I . . .”

“True!” murmured Babalatchi, regretfully. “To you life is darkness.”

“No! Flame!” exclaimed the old Arab, half rising, then falling back in

his seat. “The flame of that last day! I see it yet--the last thing I

saw! And I hear the noise of the rent earth--when they all died. And

I live to be the plaything of a crafty one,” he added, with

inconsequential peevishness.

“You are my master still,” said Babalatchi, humbly. “You are very

wise--and in your wisdom you shall speak to Syed Abdulla when he comes

here--you shall speak to him as I advised, I, your servant, the man who

fought at your right hand for many years. I have heard by a messenger

that the Syed Abdulla is coming to-night, perhaps late; for those things

must be done secretly, lest the white man, the trader up the river,

should know of them. But he will be here. There has been a surat

delivered to Lakamba. In it, Syed Abdulla says he will leave his ship,

which is anchored outside the river, at the hour of noon to-day. He will

be here before daylight if Allah wills.”

He spoke with his eye fixed on the ground, and did not become aware of

Aissa’s presence till he lifted his head when he ceased speaking. She

had approached so quietly that even Omar did not hear her footsteps, and

she stood now looking at them with troubled eyes and parted lips, as

if she was going to speak; but at Babalatchi’s entreating gesture she

remained silent. Omar sat absorbed in thought.

“Ay wa! Even so!” he said at last, in a weak voice. “I am to speak

your wisdom, O Babalatchi! Tell him to trust the white man! I do not

understand. I am old and blind and weak. I do not understand. I am very

cold,” he continued, in a lower tone, moving his shoulders uneasily. He

ceased, then went on rambling in a faint whisper. “They are the sons of

witches, and their father is Satan the stoned. Sons of witches. Sons

of witches.” After a short silence he asked suddenly, in a firmer

voice--“How many white men are there here, O crafty one?”

“There are two here. Two white men to fight one another,” answered

Babalatchi, with alacrity.

“And how many will be left then? How many? Tell me, you who are wise.”

“The downfall of an enemy is the consolation of the unfortunate,” said

Babalatchi, sententiously. “They are on every sea; only the wisdom of

the Most High knows their number--but you shall know that some of them

suffer.”

“Tell me, Babalatchi, will they die? Will they both die?” asked Omar, in

sudden agitation.

Aissa made a movement. Babalatchi held up a warning hand.

“They shall, surely, die,” he said steadily, looking at the girl with

unflinching eye.

“Ay wa! But die soon! So that I can pass my hand over their faces when

Allah has made them stiff.”

“If such is their fate and yours,” answered Babalatchi, without

hesitation. “God is great!”

A violent fit of coughing doubled Omar up, and he rocked himself to and

fro, wheezing and moaning in turns, while Babalatchi and the girl looked

at him in silence. Then he leaned back against the tree, exhausted.

“I am alone, I am alone,” he wailed feebly, groping vaguely about with

his trembling hands. “Is there anybody near me? Is there anybody? I am

afraid of this strange place.”

“I am by your side, O Leader of the brave,” said Babalatchi, touching

his shoulder lightly. “Always by your side as in the days when we both

were young: as in the time when we both went with arms in our hands.”

“Has there been such a time, Babalatchi?” said Omar, wildly; “I have

forgotten. And now when I die there will be no man, no fearless man to

speak of his father’s bravery. There was a woman! A woman! And she has

forsaken me for an infidel dog. The hand of the Compassionate is heavy

on my head! Oh, my calamity! Oh, my shame!”

He calmed down after a while, and asked quietly--

“Is the sun set, Babalatchi?”

“It is now as low as the highest tree I can see from here,” answered

Babalatchi.

“It is the time of prayer,” said Omar, attempting to get up.

Dutifully Babalatchi helped his old chief to rise, and they walked

slowly towards the hut. Omar waited outside, while Babalatchi went in

and came out directly, dragging after him the old Arab’s praying

carpet. Out of a brass vessel he poured the water of ablution on

Omar’s outstretched hands, and eased him carefully down into a kneeling

posture, for the venerable robber was far too infirm to be able to

stand. Then as Omar droned out the first words and made his first bow

towards the Holy City, Babalatchi stepped noiselessly towards Aissa, who

did not move all the time.

Aissa looked steadily at the one-eyed sage, who was approaching her

slowly and with a great show of deference. For a moment they stood

facing each other in silence. Babalatchi appeared embarrassed. With a

sudden and quick gesture she caught hold of his arm, and with the other

hand pointed towards the sinking red disc that glowed, rayless, through

the floating mists of the evening.

“The third sunset! The last! And he is not here,” she whispered; “what

have you done, man without faith? What have you done?”

“Indeed I have kept my word,” murmured Babalatchi, earnestly. “This

morning Bulangi went with a canoe to look for him. He is a strange

man, but our friend, and shall keep close to him and watch him without

ostentation. And at the third hour of the day I have sent another canoe

with four rowers. Indeed, the man you long for, O daughter of Omar! may

come when he likes.”

“But he is not here! I waited for him yesterday. To-day! To-morrow I

shall go.”

“Not alive!” muttered Babalatchi to himself. “And do you doubt your

power,” he went on in a louder tone--“you that to him are more beautiful

than an houri of the seventh Heaven? He is your slave.”

“A slave does run away sometimes,” she said, gloomily, “and then the

master must go and seek him out.”

“And do you want to live and die a beggar?” asked Babalatchi,

impatiently.

“I care not,” she exclaimed, wringing her hands; and the black pupils of

her wide-open eyes darted wildly here and there like petrels before the

storm.

“Sh! Sh!” hissed Babalatchi, with a glance towards Omar. “Do you think,

O girl! that he himself would live like a beggar, even with you?”

“He is great,” she said, ardently. “He despises you all! He despises you

all! He is indeed a man!”

“You know that best,” muttered Babalatchi, with a fugitive smile--“but

remember, woman with the strong heart, that to hold him now you must be

to him like the great sea to thirsty men--a never-ceasing torment, and a

madness.”

He ceased and they stood in silence, both looking on the ground, and

for a time nothing was heard above the crackling of the fire but the

intoning of Omar glorifying the God--his God, and the Faith--his faith.

Then Babalatchi cocked his head on one side and appeared to listen

intently to the hum of voices in the big courtyard. The dull noise

swelled into distinct shouts, then into a great tumult of voices, dying

away, recommencing, growing louder, to cease again abruptly; and in

those short pauses the shrill vociferations of women rushed up, as if

released, towards the quiet heaven. Aissa and Babalatchi started, but

the latter gripped in his turn the girl’s arm and restrained her with a

strong grasp.

“Wait,” he whispered.

The little door in the heavy stockade which separated Lakamba’s private

ground from Omar’s enclosure swung back quickly, and the noble exile

appeared with disturbed mien and a naked short sword in his hand. His

turban was half unrolled, and the end trailed on the ground behind him.

His jacket was open. He breathed thickly for a moment before he spoke.

“He came in Bulangi’s boat,” he said, “and walked quietly till he was

in my presence, when the senseless fury of white men caused him to rush

upon me. I have been in great danger,” went on the ambitious nobleman

in an aggrieved tone. “Do you hear that, Babalatchi? That eater of swine

aimed a blow at my face with his unclean fist. He tried to rush amongst

my household. Six men are holding him now.”

A fresh outburst of yells stopped Lakamba’s discourse. Angry voices

shouted: “Hold him. Beat him down. Strike at his head.”

Then the clamour ceased with sudden completeness, as if strangled by

a mighty hand, and after a second of surprising silence the voice of

Willems was heard alone, howling maledictions in Malay, in Dutch, and in

English.

“Listen,” said Lakamba, speaking with unsteady lips, “he blasphemes his

God. His speech is like the raving of a mad dog. Can we hold him for

ever? He must be killed!”

“Fool!” muttered Babalatchi, looking up at Aissa, who stood with set

teeth, with gleaming eyes and distended nostrils, yet obedient to the

touch of his restraining hand. “It is the third day, and I have kept

my promise,” he said to her, speaking very low. “Remember,” he added

warningly--“like the sea to the thirsty! And now,” he said aloud,

releasing her and stepping back, “go, fearless daughter, go!”

Like an arrow, rapid and silent she flew down the enclosure, and

disappeared through the gate of the courtyard. Lakamba and Babalatchi

looked after her. They heard the renewed tumult, the girl’s clear voice

calling out, “Let him go!” Then after a pause in the din no longer

than half the human breath the name of Aissa rang in a shout loud,

discordant, and piercing, which sent through them an involuntary

shudder. Old Omar collapsed on his carpet and moaned feebly; Lakamba

stared with gloomy contempt in the direction of the inhuman sound; but

Babalatchi, forcing a smile, pushed his distinguished protector through

the narrow gate in the stockade, followed him, and closed it quickly.

The old woman, who had been most of the time kneeling by the fire, now

rose, glanced round fearfully and crouched hiding behind the tree. The

gate of the great courtyard flew open with a great clatter before a

frantic kick, and Willems darted in carrying Aissa in his arms. He

rushed up the enclosure like a tornado, pressing the girl to his breast,

her arms round his neck, her head hanging back over his arm, her eyes

closed and her long hair nearly touching the ground. They appeared for

a second in the glare of the fire, then, with immense strides, he dashed

up the planks and disappeared with his burden in the doorway of the big

house.

Inside and outside the enclosure there was silence. Omar lay supporting

himself on his elbow, his terrified face with its closed eyes giving him

the appearance of a man tormented by a nightmare.

“What is it? Help! Help me to rise!” he called out faintly.

The old hag, still crouching in the shadow, stared with bleared eyes

at the doorway of the big house, and took no notice of his call. He

listened for a while, then his arm gave way, and, with a deep sigh of

discouragement, he let himself fall on the carpet.

The boughs of the tree nodded and trembled in the unsteady currents of

the light wind. A leaf fluttered down slowly from some high branch and

rested on the ground, immobile, as if resting for ever, in the glow of

the fire; but soon it stirred, then soared suddenly, and flew, spinning

and turning before the breath of the perfumed breeze, driven helplessly

into the dark night that had closed over the land.

CHAPTER THREE

For upwards of forty years Abdulla had walked in the way of his Lord.

Son of the rich Syed Selim bin Sali, the great Mohammedan trader of the

Straits, he went forth at the age of seventeen on his first commercial

expedition, as his father’s representative on board a pilgrim ship

chartered by the wealthy Arab to convey a crowd of pious Malays to the

Holy Shrine. That was in the days when steam was not in those seas--or,

at least, not so much as now. The voyage was long, and the young man’s

eyes were opened to the wonders of many lands. Allah had made it his

fate to become a pilgrim very early in life. This was a great favour

of Heaven, and it could not have been bestowed upon a man who prized it

more, or who made himself more worthy of it by the unswerving piety of

his heart and by the religious solemnity of his demeanour. Later on it

became clear that the book of his destiny contained the programme of a

wandering life. He visited Bombay and Calcutta, looked in at the Persian

Gulf, beheld in due course the high and barren coasts of the Gulf of

Suez, and this was the limit of his wanderings westward. He was then

twenty-seven, and the writing on his forehead decreed that the time had

come for him to return to the Straits and take from his dying father’s

hands the many threads of a business that was spread over all the

Archipelago: from Sumatra to New Guinea, from Batavia to Palawan.

Very soon his ability, his will--strong to obstinacy--his wisdom beyond

his years, caused him to be recognized as the head of a family whose

members and connections were found in every part of those seas. An uncle

here--a brother there; a father-in-law in Batavia, another in Palembang;

husbands of numerous sisters; cousins innumerable scattered north,

south, east, and west--in every place where there was trade: the great

family lay like a network over the islands. They lent money to

princes, influenced the council-rooms, faced--if need be--with peaceful

intrepidity the white rulers who held the land and the sea under the

edge of sharp swords; and they all paid great deference to Abdulla,

listened to his advice, entered into his plans--because he was wise,

pious, and fortunate.

He bore himself with the humility becoming a Believer, who never

forgets, even for one moment of his waking life, that he is the servant

of the Most High. He was largely charitable because the charitable man

is the friend of Allah, and when he walked out of his house--built of

stone, just outside the town of Penang--on his way to his godowns in the

port, he had often to snatch his hand away sharply from under the lips

of men of his race and creed; and often he had to murmur deprecating

words, or even to rebuke with severity those who attempted to touch his

knees with their finger-tips in gratitude or supplication. He was very

handsome, and carried his small head high with meek gravity. His lofty

brow, straight nose, narrow, dark face with its chiselled delicacy of

feature, gave him an aristocratic appearance which proclaimed his pure

descent. His beard was trimmed close and to a rounded point. His large

brown eyes looked out steadily with a sweetness that was belied by the

expression of his thin-lipped mouth. His aspect was serene. He had a

belief in his own prosperity which nothing could shake.

Restless, like all his people, he very seldom dwelt for many days

together in his splendid house in Penang. Owner of ships, he was often

on board one or another of them, traversing in all directions the field

of his operations. In every port he had a household--his own or that

of a relation--to hail his advent with demonstrative joy. In every port

there were rich and influential men eager to see him, there was

business to talk over, there were important letters to read: an immense

correspondence, enclosed in silk envelopes--a correspondence which had

nothing to do with the infidels of colonial post-offices, but came into

his hands by devious, yet safe, ways. It was left for him by taciturn

nakhodas of native trading craft, or was delivered with profound salaams

by travel-stained and weary men who would withdraw from his presence

calling upon Allah to bless the generous giver of splendid rewards. And

the news was always good, and all his attempts always succeeded, and

in his ears there rang always a chorus of admiration, of gratitude, of

humble entreaties.

A fortunate man. And his felicity was so complete that the good genii,

who ordered the stars at his birth, had not neglected--by a refinement

of benevolence strange in such primitive beings--to provide him with a

desire difficult to attain, and with an enemy hard to overcome. The envy

of Lingard’s political and commercial successes, and the wish to get the

best of him in every way, became Abdulla’s mania, the paramount interest

of his life, the salt of his existence.

For the last few months he had been receiving mysterious messages from

Sambir urging him to decisive action. He had found the river a couple of

years ago, and had been anchored more than once off that estuary where

the, till then, rapid Pantai, spreading slowly over the lowlands, seems

to hesitate, before it flows gently through twenty outlets; over a maze

of mudflats, sandbanks and reefs, into the expectant sea. He had never

attempted the entrance, however, because men of his race, although brave

and adventurous travellers, lack the true seamanlike instincts, and he

was afraid of getting wrecked. He could not bear the idea of the Rajah

Laut being able to boast that Abdulla bin Selim, like other and lesser

men, had also come to grief when trying to wrest his secret from him.

Meantime he returned encouraging answers to his unknown friends in

Sambir, and waited for his opportunity in the calm certitude of ultimate

triumph.

Such was the man whom Lakamba and Babalatchi expected to see for the

first time on the night of Willems’ return to Aissa. Babalatchi, who had

been tormented for three days by the fear of having over-reached

himself in his little plot, now, feeling sure of his white man, felt

lighthearted and happy as he superintended the preparations in the

courtyard for Abdulla’s reception. Half-way between Lakamba’s house and

the river a pile of dry wood was made ready for the torch that would

set fire to it at the moment of Abdulla’s landing. Between this and

the house again there was, ranged in a semicircle, a set of low

bamboo frames, and on those were piled all the carpets and cushions of

Lakamba’s household. It had been decided that the reception was to take

place in the open air, and that it should be made impressive by the

great number of Lakamba’s retainers, who, clad in clean white, with

their red sarongs gathered round their waists, chopper at side and lance

in hand, were moving about the compound or, gathering into small knots,

discussed eagerly the coming ceremony.

Two little fires burned brightly on the water’s edge on each side of

the landing place. A small heap of damar-gum torches lay by each, and

between them Babalatchi strolled backwards and forwards, stopping often

with his face to the river and his head on one side, listening to the

sounds that came from the darkness over the water. There was no moon and

the night was very clear overhead, but, after the afternoon breeze had

expired in fitful puffs, the vapours hung thickening over the glancing

surface of the Pantai and clung to the shore, hiding from view the

middle of the stream.

A cry in the mist--then another--and, before Babalatchi could answer,

two little canoes dashed up to the landing-place, and two of the

principal citizens of Sambir, Daoud Sahamin and Hamet Bahassoen, who had

been confidentially invited to meet Abdulla, landed quickly and after

greeting Babalatchi walked up the dark courtyard towards the house. The

little stir caused by their arrival soon subsided, and another silent

hour dragged its slow length while Babalatchi tramped up and down

between the fires, his face growing more anxious with every passing

moment.

At last there was heard a loud hail from down the river. At a call from

Babalatchi men ran down to the riverside and, snatching the torches,

thrust them into the fires, then waved them above their heads till they

burst into a flame. The smoke ascended in thick, wispy streams, and hung

in a ruddy cloud above the glare that lit up the courtyard and flashed

over the water, showing three long canoes manned by many paddlers lying

a little off; the men in them lifting their paddles on high and dipping

them down together, in an easy stroke that kept the small flotilla

motionless in the strong current, exactly abreast of the landing-place.

A man stood up in the largest craft and called out--

“Syed Abdulla bin Selim is here!”

Babalatchi answered aloud in a formal tone--

“Allah gladdens our hearts! Come to the land!”

Abdulla landed first, steadying himself by the help of Babalatchi’s

extended hand. In the short moment of his passing from the boat to the

shore they exchanged sharp glances and a few rapid words.

“Who are you?”

“Babalatchi. The friend of Omar. The protected of Lakamba.”

“You wrote?”

“My words were written, O Giver of alms!”

And then Abdulla walked with composed face between the two lines of

men holding torches, and met Lakamba in front of the big fire that was

crackling itself up into a great blaze. For a moment they stood with

clasped hands invoking peace upon each other’s head, then Lakamba, still

holding his honoured guest by the hand, led him round the fire to the

prepared seats. Babalatchi followed close behind his protector. Abdulla

was accompanied by two Arabs. He, like his companions, was dressed in a

white robe of starched muslin, which fell in stiff folds straight from

the neck. It was buttoned from the throat halfway down with a close row

of very small gold buttons; round the tight sleeves there was a narrow

braid of gold lace. On his shaven head he wore a small skull-cap of

plaited grass. He was shod in patent leather slippers over his naked

feet. A rosary of heavy wooden beads hung by a round turn from his right

wrist. He sat down slowly in the place of honour, and, dropping his

slippers, tucked up his legs under him decorously.

The improvised divan was arranged in a wide semi-circle, of which the

point most distant from the fire--some ten yards--was also the nearest

to Lakamba’s dwelling. As soon as the principal personages were seated,

the verandah of the house was filled silently by the muffled-up forms of

Lakamba’s female belongings. They crowded close to the rail and looked

down, whispering faintly. Below, the formal exchange of compliments

went on for some time between Lakamba and Abdulla, who sat side by side.

Babalatchi squatted humbly at his protector’s feet, with nothing but a

thin mat between himself and the hard ground.

Then there was a pause. Abdulla glanced round in an expectant manner,

and after a while Babalatchi, who had been sitting very still in a

pensive attitude, seemed to rouse himself with an effort, and began to

speak in gentle and persuasive tones. He described in flowing sentences

the first beginnings of Sambir, the dispute of the present ruler,

Patalolo, with the Sultan of Koti, the consequent troubles ending

with the rising of Bugis settlers under the leadership of Lakamba. At

different points of the narrative he would turn for confirmation to

Sahamin and Bahassoen, who sat listening eagerly and assented together

with a “Betul! Betul! Right! Right!” ejaculated in a fervent undertone.

Warming up with his subject as the narrative proceeded, Babalatchi went

on to relate the facts connected with Lingard’s action at the critical

period of those internal dissensions. He spoke in a restrained voice

still, but with a growing energy of indignation. What was he, that

man of fierce aspect, to keep all the world away from them? Was he a

government? Who made him ruler? He took possession of Patalolo’s mind

and made his heart hard; he put severe words into his mouth and caused

his hand to strike right and left. That unbeliever kept the Faithful

panting under the weight of his senseless oppression. They had to trade

with him--accept such goods as he would give--such credit as he would

accord. And he exacted payment every year . . .

“Very true!” exclaimed Sahamin and Bahassoen together.

Babalatchi glanced at them approvingly and turned to Abdulla.

“Listen to those men, O Protector of the oppressed!” he exclaimed. “What

could we do? A man must trade. There was nobody else.”

Sahamin got up, staff in hand, and spoke to Abdulla with ponderous

courtesy, emphasizing his words by the solemn flourishes of his right

arm.

“It is so. We are weary of paying our debts to that white man here,

who is the son of the Rajah Laut. That white man--may the grave of his

mother be defiled!--is not content to hold us all in his hand with a

cruel grasp. He seeks to cause our very death. He trades with the Dyaks

of the forest, who are no better than monkeys. He buys from them guttah

and rattans--while we starve. Only two days ago I went to him and

said, ‘Tuan Almayer’--even so; we must speak politely to that friend of

Satan--‘Tuan Almayer, I have such and such goods to sell. Will you buy?’

And he spoke thus--because those white men have no understanding of any

courtesy--he spoke to me as if I was a slave: ‘Daoud, you are a lucky

man’--remark, O First amongst the Believers! that by those words he

could have brought misfortune on my head--‘you are a lucky man to have

anything in these hard times. Bring your goods quickly, and I shall

receive them in payment of what you owe me from last year.’ And he

laughed, and struck me on the shoulder with his open hand. May Jehannum

be his lot!”

“We will fight him,” said young Bahassoen, crisply. “We shall fight if

there is help and a leader. Tuan Abdulla, will you come among us?”

Abdulla did not answer at once. His lips moved in an inaudible whisper

and the beads passed through his fingers with a dry click. All waited in

respectful silence. “I shall come if my ship can enter this river,” said

Abdulla at last, in a solemn tone.

“It can, Tuan,” exclaimed Babalatchi. “There is a white man here

who . . .”

“I want to see Omar el Badavi and that white man you wrote about,”

interrupted Abdulla.

Babalatchi got on his feet quickly, and there was a general move.

The women on the verandah hurried indoors, and from the crowd that had

kept discreetly in distant parts of the courtyard a couple of men ran

with armfuls of dry fuel, which they cast upon the fire. One of them, at

a sign from Babalatchi, approached and, after getting his orders, went

towards the little gate and entered Omar’s enclosure. While waiting

for his return, Lakamba, Abdulla, and Babalatchi talked together in low

tones. Sahamin sat by himself chewing betel-nut sleepily with a slight

and indolent motion of his heavy jaw. Bahassoen, his hand on the hilt

of his short sword, strutted backwards and forwards in the full light of

the fire, looking very warlike and reckless; the envy and admiration of

Lakamba’s retainers, who stood in groups or flitted about noiselessly in

the shadows of the courtyard.

The messenger who had been sent to Omar came back and stood at a

distance, waiting till somebody noticed him. Babalatchi beckoned him

close.

“What are his words?” asked Babalatchi.

“He says that Syed Abdulla is welcome now,” answered the man.

Lakamba was speaking low to Abdulla, who listened to him with deep

interest.

“. . . We could have eighty men if there was need,” he was

saying--“eighty men in fourteen canoes. The only thing we want is

gunpowder . . .”

“Hai! there will be no fighting,” broke in Babalatchi. “The fear of your

name will be enough and the terror of your coming.”

“There may be powder too,” muttered Abdulla with great nonchalance, “if

only the ship enters the river safely.”

“If the heart is stout the ship will be safe,” said Babalatchi. “We will

go now and see Omar el Badavi and the white man I have here.”

Lakamba’s dull eyes became animated suddenly.

“Take care, Tuan Abdulla,” he said, “take care. The behaviour of that

unclean white madman is furious in the extreme. He offered to

strike . . .”

“On my head, you are safe, O Giver of alms!” interrupted Babalatchi.

Abdulla looked from one to the other, and the faintest flicker of a

passing smile disturbed for a moment his grave composure. He turned to

Babalatchi, and said with decision--

“Let us go.”

“This way, O Uplifter of our hearts!” rattled on Babalatchi, with fussy

deference. “Only a very few paces and you shall behold Omar the brave,

and a white man of great strength and cunning. This way.”

He made a sign for Lakamba to remain behind, and with respectful touches

on the elbow steered Abdulla towards the gate at the upper end of the

court-yard. As they walked on slowly, followed by the two Arabs, he kept

on talking in a rapid undertone to the great man, who never looked at

him once, although appearing to listen with flattering attention. When

near the gate Babalatchi moved forward and stopped, facing Abdulla, with

his hand on the fastenings.

“You shall see them both,” he said. “All my words about them are true.

When I saw him enslaved by the one of whom I spoke, I knew he would be

soft in my hand like the mud of the river. At first he answered my

talk with bad words of his own language, after the manner of white

men. Afterwards, when listening to the voice he loved, he hesitated.

He hesitated for many days--too many. I, knowing him well, made Omar

withdraw here with his . . . household. Then this red-faced man raged

for three days like a black panther that is hungry. And this evening,

this very evening, he came. I have him here. He is in the grasp of one

with a merciless heart. I have him here,” ended Babalatchi, exultingly

tapping the upright of the gate with his hand.

“That is good,” murmured Abdulla.

“And he shall guide your ship and lead in the fight--if fight there be,”

went on Babalatchi. “If there is any killing--let him be the slayer. You

should give him arms--a short gun that fires many times.”

“Yes, by Allah!” assented Abdulla, with slow thoughtfulness.

“And you will have to open your hand, O First amongst the generous!”

continued Babalatchi. “You will have to satisfy the rapacity of a

white man, and also of one who is not a man, and therefore greedy of

ornaments.”

“They shall be satisfied,” said Abdulla; “but . . .” He hesitated,

looking down on the ground and stroking his beard, while Babalatchi

waited, anxious, with parted lips. After a short time he spoke again

jerkily in an indistinct whisper, so that Babalatchi had to turn his

head to catch the words. “Yes. But Omar is the son of my father’s uncle

. . . and all belonging to him are of the Faith . . . while that man is

an unbeliever. It is most unseemly . . . very unseemly. He cannot live

under my shadow. Not that dog. Penitence! I take refuge with my God,” he

mumbled rapidly. “How can he live under my eyes with that woman, who is

of the Faith? Scandal! O abomination!”

He finished with a rush and drew a long breath, then added dubiously--

“And when that man has done all we want, what is to be done with him?”

They stood close together, meditative and silent, their eyes roaming

idly over the courtyard. The big bonfire burned brightly, and a wavering

splash of light lay on the dark earth at their feet, while the lazy

smoke wreathed itself slowly in gleaming coils amongst the black boughs

of the trees. They could see Lakamba, who had returned to his place,

sitting hunched up spiritlessly on the cushions, and Sahamin, who had

got on his feet again and appeared to be talking to him with dignified

animation. Men in twos or threes came out of the shadows into the light,

strolling slowly, and passed again into the shadows, their faces turned

to each other, their arms moving in restrained gestures. Bahassoen, his

head proudly thrown back, his ornaments, embroideries, and sword-hilt

flashing in the light, circled steadily round the fire like a planet

round the sun. A cool whiff of damp air came from the darkness of the

riverside; it made Abdulla and Babalatchi shiver, and woke them up from

their abstraction.

“Open the gate and go first,” said Abdulla; “there is no danger?”

“On my life, no!” answered Babalatchi, lifting the rattan ring. “He is

all peace and content, like a thirsty man who has drunk water after many

days.”

He swung the gate wide, made a few paces into the gloom of the

enclosure, and retraced his steps suddenly.

“He may be made useful in many ways,” he whispered to Abdulla, who had

stopped short, seeing him come back.

“O Sin! O Temptation!” sighed out Abdulla, faintly. “Our refuge is with

the Most High. Can I feed this infidel for ever and for ever?” he added,

impatiently.

“No,” breathed out Babalatchi. “No! Not for ever. Only while he serves

your designs, O Dispenser of Allah’s gifts! When the time comes--and

your order . . .”

He sidled close to Abdulla, and brushed with a delicate touch the hand

that hung down listlessly, holding the prayer-beads.

“I am your slave and your offering,” he murmured, in a distinct and

polite tone, into Abdulla’s ear. “When your wisdom speaks, there may be

found a little poison that will not lie. Who knows?”

CHAPTER FOUR

Babalatchi saw Abdulla pass through the low and narrow entrance into the

darkness of Omar’s hut; heard them exchange the usual greetings and

the distinguished visitor’s grave voice asking: “There is no

misfortune--please God--but the sight?” and then, becoming aware of

the disapproving looks of the two Arabs who had accompanied Abdulla,

he followed their example and fell back out of earshot. He did it

unwillingly, although he did not ignore that what was going to happen

in there was now absolutely beyond his control. He roamed irresolutely

about for awhile, and at last wandered with careless steps towards the

fire, which had been moved, from under the tree, close to the hut and a

little to windward of its entrance. He squatted on his heels and began

playing pensively with live embers, as was his habit when engrossed in

thought, withdrawing his hand sharply and shaking it above his head when

he burnt his fingers in a fit of deeper abstraction. Sitting there

he could hear the murmur of the talk inside the hut, and he could

distinguish the voices but not the words. Abdulla spoke in deep tones,

and now and then this flowing monotone was interrupted by a querulous

exclamation, a weak moan or a plaintive quaver of the old man. Yes. It

was annoying not to be able to make out what they were saying, thought

Babalatchi, as he sat gazing fixedly at the unsteady glow of the fire.

But it will be right. All will be right. Abdulla inspired him with

confidence. He came up fully to his expectation. From the very first

moment when he set his eye on him he felt sure that this man--whom he

had known by reputation only--was very resolute. Perhaps too resolute.

Perhaps he would want to grasp too much later on. A shadow flitted over

Babalatchi’s face. On the eve of the accomplishment of his desires he

felt the bitter taste of that drop of doubt which is mixed with the

sweetness of every success.

When, hearing footsteps on the verandah of the big house, he lifted his

head, the shadow had passed away and on his face there was an expression

of watchful alertness. Willems was coming down the plankway, into the

courtyard. The light within trickled through the cracks of the badly

joined walls of the house, and in the illuminated doorway appeared

the moving form of Aissa. She also passed into the night outside and

disappeared from view. Babalatchi wondered where she had got to, and for

the moment forgot the approach of Willems. The voice of the white man

speaking roughly above his head made him jump to his feet as if impelled

upwards by a powerful spring.

“Where’s Abdulla?”

Babalatchi waved his hand towards the hut and stood listening intently.

The voices within had ceased, then recommenced again. He shot an oblique

glance at Willems, whose indistinct form towered above the glow of dying

embers.

“Make up this fire,” said Willems, abruptly. “I want to see your face.”

With obliging alacrity Babalatchi put some dry brushwood on the coals

from a handy pile, keeping all the time a watchful eye on Willems.

When he straightened himself up his hand wandered almost involuntarily

towards his left side to feel the handle of a kriss amongst the folds of

his sarong, but he tried to look unconcerned under the angry stare.

“You are in good health, please God?” he murmured.

“Yes!” answered Willems, with an unexpected loudness that caused

Babalatchi to start nervously. “Yes! . . . Health! . . . You . . .”

He made a long stride and dropped both his hands on the Malay’s

shoulders. In the powerful grip Babalatchi swayed to and fro limply, but

his face was as peaceful as when he sat--a little while ago--dreaming by

the fire. With a final vicious jerk Willems let go suddenly, and turning

away on his heel stretched his hands over the fire. Babalatchi stumbled

backwards, recovered himself, and wriggled his shoulders laboriously.

“Tse! Tse! Tse!” he clicked, deprecatingly. After a short silence he

went on with accentuated admiration: “What a man it is! What a strong

man! A man like that”--he concluded, in a tone of meditative wonder--“a

man like that could upset mountains--mountains!”

He gazed hopefully for a while at Willems’ broad shoulders, and

continued, addressing the inimical back, in a low and persuasive voice--

“But why be angry with me? With me who think only of your good? Did I

not give her refuge, in my own house? Yes, Tuan! This is my own house.

I will let you have it without any recompense because she must have a

shelter. Therefore you and she shall live here. Who can know a woman’s

mind? And such a woman! If she wanted to go away from that other place,

who am I--to say no! I am Omar’s servant. I said: ‘Gladden my heart by

taking my house.’ Did I say right?”

“I’ll tell you something,” said Willems, without changing his position;

“if she takes a fancy to go away from this place it is you who shall

suffer. I will wring your neck.”

“When the heart is full of love there is no room in it for justice,”

recommenced Babalatchi, with unmoved and persistent softness. “Why slay

me? You know, Tuan, what she wants. A splendid destiny is her desire--as

of all women. You have been wronged and cast out by your people. She

knows that. But you are brave, you are strong--you are a man; and,

Tuan--I am older than you--you are in her hand. Such is the fate of

strong men. And she is of noble birth and cannot live like a slave. You

know her--and you are in her hand. You are like a snared bird, because

of your strength. And--remember I am a man that has seen much--submit,

Tuan! Submit! . . . Or else . . .”

He drawled out the last words in a hesitating manner and broke off his

sentence. Still stretching his hands in turns towards the blaze and

without moving his head, Willems gave a short, lugubrious laugh, and

asked--

“Or else what?”

“She may go away again. Who knows?” finished Babalatchi, in a gentle and

insinuating tone.

This time Willems spun round sharply. Babalatchi stepped back.

“If she does it will be the worse for you,” said Willems, in a menacing

voice. “It will be your doing, and I . . .”

Babalatchi spoke, from beyond the circle of light, with calm disdain.

“Hai--ya! I have heard before. If she goes--then I die. Good! Will that

bring her back do you think--Tuan? If it is my doing it shall be well

done, O white man! and--who knows--you will have to live without her.”

Willems gasped and started back like a confident wayfarer who, pursuing

a path he thinks safe, should see just in time a bottomless chasm

under his feet. Babalatchi came into the light and approached Willems

sideways, with his head thrown back and a little on one side so as to

bring his only eye to bear full on the countenance of the tall white

man.

“You threaten me,” said Willems, indistinctly.

“I, Tuan!” exclaimed Babalatchi, with a slight suspicion of irony in the

affected surprise of his tone. “I, Tuan? Who spoke of death? Was it

I? No! I spoke of life only. Only of life. Of a long life for a lonely

man!”

They stood with the fire between them, both silent, both aware, each

in his own way, of the importance of the passing minutes. Babalatchi’s

fatalism gave him only an insignificant relief in his suspense, because

no fatalism can kill the thought of the future, the desire of success,

the pain of waiting for the disclosure of the immutable decrees of

Heaven. Fatalism is born of the fear of failure, for we all believe that

we carry success in our own hands, and we suspect that our hands are

weak. Babalatchi looked at Willems and congratulated himself upon his

ability to manage that white man. There was a pilot for Abdulla--a

victim to appease Lingard’s anger in case of any mishap. He would take

good care to put him forward in everything. In any case let the white

men fight it out amongst themselves. They were fools. He hated them--the

strong fools--and knew that for his righteous wisdom was reserved the

safe triumph.

Willems measured dismally the depth of his degradation. He--a white man,

the admired of white men, was held by those miserable savages whose tool

he was about to become. He felt for them all the hate of his race, of

his morality, of his intelligence. He looked upon himself with dismay

and pity. She had him. He had heard of such things. He had heard of

women who . . . He would never believe such stories. . . . Yet they

were true. But his own captivity seemed more complete, terrible, and

final--without the hope of any redemption. He wondered at the wickedness

of Providence that had made him what he was; that, worse still,

permitted such a creature as Almayer to live. He had done his duty by

going to him. Why did he not understand? All men were fools. He gave

him his chance. The fellow did not see it. It was hard, very hard on

himself--Willems. He wanted to take her from amongst her own people.

That’s why he had condescended to go to Almayer. He examined himself.

With a sinking heart he thought that really he could not--somehow--live

without her. It was terrible and sweet. He remembered the first days.

Her appearance, her face, her smile, her eyes, her words. A savage

woman! Yet he perceived that he could think of nothing else but of the

three days of their separation, of the few hours since their reunion.

Very well. If he could not take her away, then he would go to her. . . .

He had, for a moment, a wicked pleasure in the thought that what he had

done could not be undone. He had given himself up. He felt proud of it.

He was ready to face anything, do anything. He cared for nothing, for

nobody. He thought himself very fearless, but as a matter of fact he was

only drunk; drunk with the poison of passionate memories.

He stretched his hands over the fire, looked round and called out--

“Aissa!”

She must have been near, for she appeared at once within the light of

the fire. The upper part of her body was wrapped up in the thick folds

of a head covering which was pulled down over her brow, and one end of

it thrown across from shoulder to shoulder hid the lower part of her

face. Only her eyes were visible--sombre and gleaming like a starry

night.

Willems, looking at this strange, muffled figure, felt exasperated,

amazed and helpless. The ex-confidential clerk of the rich Hudig would

hug to his breast settled conceptions of respectable conduct. He sought

refuge within his ideas of propriety from the dismal mangroves, from

the darkness of the forests and of the heathen souls of the savages that

were his masters. She looked like an animated package of cheap cotton

goods! It made him furious. She had disguised herself so because a man

of her race was near! He told her not to do it, and she did not obey.

Would his ideas ever change so as to agree with her own notions of what

was becoming, proper and respectable? He was really afraid they

would, in time. It seemed to him awful. She would never change! This

manifestation of her sense of proprieties was another sign of their

hopeless diversity; something like another step downwards for him. She

was too different from him. He was so civilized! It struck him suddenly

that they had nothing in common--not a thought, not a feeling; he could

not make clear to her the simplest motive of any act of his . . . and he

could not live without her.

The courageous man who stood facing Babalatchi gasped unexpectedly with

a gasp that was half a groan. This little matter of her veiling

herself against his wish acted upon him like a disclosure of some

great disaster. It increased his contempt for himself as the slave of

a passion he had always derided, as the man unable to assert his will.

This will, all his sensations, his personality--all this seemed to be

lost in the abominable desire, in the priceless promise of that woman.

He was not, of course, able to discern clearly the causes of his misery;

but there are none so ignorant as not to know suffering, none so simple

as not to feel and suffer from the shock of warring impulses. The

ignorant must feel and suffer from their complexity as well as the

wisest; but to them the pain of struggle and defeat appears strange,

mysterious, remediable and unjust. He stood watching her, watching

himself. He tingled with rage from head to foot, as if he had been

struck in the face. Suddenly he laughed; but his laugh was like a

distorted echo of some insincere mirth very far away.

From the other side of the fire Babalatchi spoke hurriedly--

“Here is Tuan Abdulla.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Directly on stepping outside Omar’s hut Abdulla caught sight of Willems.

He expected, of course, to see a white man, but not that white man, whom

he knew so well. Everybody who traded in the islands, and who had any

dealings with Hudig, knew Willems. For the last two years of his stay in

Macassar the confidential clerk had been managing all the local trade

of the house under a very slight supervision only on the part of the

master. So everybody knew Willems, Abdulla amongst others--but he was

ignorant of Willems’ disgrace. As a matter of fact the thing had been

kept very quiet--so quiet that a good many people in Macassar were

expecting Willems’ return there, supposing him to be absent on some

confidential mission. Abdulla, in his surprise, hesitated on the

threshold. He had prepared himself to see some seaman--some old officer

of Lingard’s; a common man--perhaps difficult to deal with, but still

no match for him. Instead, he saw himself confronted by an individual

whose reputation for sagacity in business was well known to him. How did

he get here, and why? Abdulla, recovering from his surprise, advanced in

a dignified manner towards the fire, keeping his eyes fixed steadily on

Willems. When within two paces from Willems he stopped and lifted his

right hand in grave salutation. Willems nodded slightly and spoke after

a while.

“We know each other, Tuan Abdulla,” he said, with an assumption of easy

indifference.

“We have traded together,” answered Abdulla, solemnly, “but it was far

from here.”

“And we may trade here also,” said Willems.

“The place does not matter. It is the open mind and the true heart that

are required in business.”

“Very true. My heart is as open as my mind. I will tell you why I am

here.”

“What need is there? In leaving home one learns life. You travel.

Travelling is victory! You shall return with much wisdom.”

“I shall never return,” interrupted Willems. “I have done with my

people. I am a man without brothers. Injustice destroys fidelity.”

Abdulla expressed his surprise by elevating his eyebrows. At the same

time he made a vague gesture with his arm that could be taken as an

equivalent of an approving and conciliating “just so!”

Till then the Arab had not taken any notice of Aissa, who stood by the

fire, but now she spoke in the interval of silence following Willems’

declaration. In a voice that was much deadened by her wrappings she

addressed Abdulla in a few words of greeting, calling him a kinsman.

Abdulla glanced at her swiftly for a second, and then, with perfect

good breeding, fixed his eyes on the ground. She put out towards him her

hand, covered with a corner of her face-veil, and he took it, pressed it

twice, and dropping it turned towards Willems. She looked at the two

men searchingly, then backed away and seemed to melt suddenly into the

night.

“I know what you came for, Tuan Abdulla,” said Willems; “I have been

told by that man there.” He nodded towards Babalatchi, then went on

slowly, “It will be a difficult thing.”

“Allah makes everything easy,” interjected Babalatchi, piously, from a

distance.

The two men turned quickly and stood looking at him thoughtfully, as

if in deep consideration of the truth of that proposition. Under their

sustained gaze Babalatchi experienced an unwonted feeling of shyness,

and dared not approach nearer. At last Willems moved slightly, Abdulla

followed readily, and they both walked down the courtyard, their voices

dying away in the darkness. Soon they were heard returning, and the

voices grew distinct as their forms came out of the gloom. By the fire

they wheeled again, and Babalatchi caught a few words. Willems was

saying--

“I have been at sea with him many years when young. I have used my

knowledge to observe the way into the river when coming in, this time.”

Abdulla assented in general terms.

“In the variety of knowledge there is safety,” he said; and then they

passed out of earshot.

Babalatchi ran to the tree and took up his position in the solid

blackness under its branches, leaning against the trunk. There he was

about midway between the fire and the other limit of the two men’s walk.

They passed him close. Abdulla slim, very straight, his head high, and

his hands hanging before him and twisting mechanically the string of

beads; Willems tall, broad, looking bigger and stronger in contrast to

the slight white figure by the side of which he strolled carelessly,

taking one step to the other’s two; his big arms in constant motion as

he gesticulated vehemently, bending forward to look Abdulla in the face.

They passed and repassed close to Babalatchi some half a dozen times,

and, whenever they were between him and the fire, he could see them

plain enough. Sometimes they would stop short, Willems speaking

emphatically, Abdulla listening with rigid attention, then, when the

other had ceased, bending his head slightly as if consenting to some

demand, or admitting some statement. Now and then Babalatchi caught

a word here and there, a fragment of a sentence, a loud exclamation.

Impelled by curiosity he crept to the very edge of the black shadow

under the tree. They were nearing him, and he heard Willems say--

“You will pay that money as soon as I come on board. That I must have.”

He could not catch Abdulla’s reply. When they went past again, Willems

was saying--

“My life is in your hand anyway. The boat that brings me on board your

ship shall take the money to Omar. You must have it ready in a sealed

bag.”

Again they were out of hearing, but instead of coming back they stopped

by the fire facing each other. Willems moved his arm, shook his hand

on high talking all the time, then brought it down jerkily--stamped his

foot. A short period of immobility ensued. Babalatchi, gazing intently,

saw Abdulla’s lips move almost imperceptibly. Suddenly Willems seized

the Arab’s passive hand and shook it. Babalatchi drew the long breath of

relieved suspense. The conference was over. All well, apparently.

He ventured now to approach the two men, who saw him and waited in

silence. Willems had retired within himself already, and wore a look of

grim indifference. Abdulla moved away a step or two. Babalatchi looked

at him inquisitively.

“I go now,” said Abdulla, “and shall wait for you outside the river,

Tuan Willems, till the second sunset. You have only one word, I know.”

“Only one word,” repeated Willems.

Abdulla and Babalatchi walked together down the enclosure, leaving the

white man alone by the fire. The two Arabs who had come with Abdulla

preceded them and passed at once through the little gate into the light

and the murmur of voices of the principal courtyard, but Babalatchi and

Abdulla stopped on this side of it. Abdulla said--

“It is well. We have spoken of many things. He consents.”

“When?” asked Babalatchi, eagerly.

“On the second day from this. I have promised every thing. I mean to

keep much.”

“Your hand is always open, O Most Generous amongst Believers! You will

not forget your servant who called you here. Have I not spoken the

truth? She has made roast meat of his heart.”

With a horizontal sweep of his arm Abdulla seemed to push away that last

statement, and said slowly, with much meaning--

“He must be perfectly safe; do you understand? Perfectly safe--as if he

was amongst his own people--till . . .”

“Till when?” whispered Babalatchi.

“Till I speak,” said Abdulla. “As to Omar.” He hesitated for a moment,

then went on very low: “He is very old.”

“Hai-ya! Old and sick,” murmured Babalatchi, with sudden melancholy.

“He wanted me to kill that white man. He begged me to have him killed at

once,” said Abdulla, contemptuously, moving again towards the gate.

“He is impatient, like those who feel death near them,” exclaimed

Babalatchi, apologetically.

“Omar shall dwell with me,” went on Abdulla, “when . . . But no matter.

Remember! The white man must be safe.”

“He lives in your shadow,” answered Babalatchi, solemnly. “It is

enough!” He touched his forehead and fell back to let Abdulla go first.

And now they are back in the courtyard wherefrom, at their appearance,

listlessness vanishes, and all the faces become alert and interested

once more. Lakamba approaches his guest, but looks at Babalatchi, who

reassures him by a confident nod. Lakamba clumsily attempts a smile,

and looking, with natural and ineradicable sulkiness, from under his

eyebrows at the man whom he wants to honour, asks whether he would

condescend to visit the place of sitting down and take food. Or perhaps

he would prefer to give himself up to repose? The house is his, and what

is in it, and those many men that stand afar watching the interview are

his. Syed Abdulla presses his host’s hand to his breast, and informs him

in a confidential murmur that his habits are ascetic and his temperament

inclines to melancholy. No rest; no food; no use whatever for those

many men who are his. Syed Abdulla is impatient to be gone. Lakamba is

sorrowful but polite, in his hesitating, gloomy way. Tuan Abdulla must

have fresh boatmen, and many, to shorten the dark and fatiguing road.

Hai-ya! There! Boats!

By the riverside indistinct forms leap into a noisy and disorderly

activity. There are cries, orders, banter, abuse. Torches blaze sending

out much more smoke than light, and in their red glare Babalatchi comes

up to say that the boats are ready.

Through that lurid glare Syed Abdulla, in his long white gown, seems

to glide fantastically, like a dignified apparition attended by two

inferior shades, and stands for a moment at the landing-place to

take leave of his host and ally--whom he loves. Syed Abdulla says so

distinctly before embarking, and takes his seat in the middle of the

canoe under a small canopy of blue calico stretched on four sticks.

Before and behind Syed Abdulla, the men squatting by the gunwales hold

high the blades of their paddles in readiness for a dip, all together.

Ready? Not yet. Hold on all! Syed Abdulla speaks again, while Lakamba

and Babalatchi stand close on the bank to hear his words. His words are

encouraging. Before the sun rises for the second time they shall meet,

and Syed Abdulla’s ship shall float on the waters of this river--at

last! Lakamba and Babalatchi have no doubt--if Allah wills. They are in

the hands of the Compassionate. No doubt. And so is Syed Abdulla, the

great trader who does not know what the word failure means; and so is

the white man--the smartest business man in the islands--who is lying

now by Omar’s fire with his head on Aissa’s lap, while Syed Abdulla

flies down the muddy river with current and paddles between the sombre

walls of the sleeping forest; on his way to the clear and open sea where

the Lord of the Isles (formerly of Greenock, but condemned, sold, and

registered now as of Penang) waits for its owner, and swings erratically

at anchor in the currents of the capricious tide, under the crumbling

red cliffs of Tanjong Mirrah.

For some time Lakamba, Sahamin, and Bahassoen looked silently into the

humid darkness which had swallowed the big canoe that carried Abdulla

and his unvarying good fortune. Then the two guests broke into a talk

expressive of their joyful anticipations. The venerable Sahamin, as

became his advanced age, found his delight in speculation as to the

activities of a rather remote future. He would buy praus, he would send

expeditions up the river, he would enlarge his trade, and, backed by

Abdulla’s capital, he would grow rich in a very few years. Very few.

Meantime it would be a good thing to interview Almayer to-morrow and,

profiting by the last day of the hated man’s prosperity, obtain some

goods from him on credit. Sahamin thought it could be done by skilful

wheedling. After all, that son of Satan was a fool, and the thing was

worth doing, because the coming revolution would wipe all debts out.

Sahamin did not mind imparting that idea to his companions, with much

senile chuckling, while they strolled together from the riverside

towards the residence. The bull-necked Lakamba, listening with pouted

lips without the sign of a smile, without a gleam in his dull, bloodshot

eyes, shuffled slowly across the courtyard between his two guests. But

suddenly Bahassoen broke in upon the old man’s prattle with the generous

enthusiasm of his youth. . . . Trading was very good. But was the

change that would make them happy effected yet? The white man should be

despoiled with a strong hand! . . . He grew excited, spoke very loud,

and his further discourse, delivered with his hand on the hilt of his

sword, dealt incoherently with the honourable topics of throat-cutting,

fire-raising, and with the far-famed valour of his ancestors.

Babalatchi remained behind, alone with the greatness of his conceptions.

The sagacious statesman of Sambir sent a scornful glance after his noble

protector and his noble protector’s friends, and then stood meditating

about that future which to the others seemed so assured. Not so to

Babalatchi, who paid the penalty of his wisdom by a vague sense of

insecurity that kept sleep at arm’s length from his tired body. When he

thought at last of leaving the waterside, it was only to strike a path

for himself and to creep along the fences, avoiding the middle of the

courtyard where small fires glimmered and winked as though the sinister

darkness there had reflected the stars of the serene heaven. He slunk

past the wicket-gate of Omar’s enclosure, and crept on patiently along

the light bamboo palisade till he was stopped by the angle where it

joined the heavy stockade of Lakamba’s private ground. Standing there,

he could look over the fence and see Omar’s hut and the fire before its

door. He could also see the shadow of two human beings sitting between

him and the red glow. A man and a woman. The sight seemed to inspire the

careworn sage with a frivolous desire to sing. It could hardly be called

a song; it was more in the nature of a recitative without any rhythm,

delivered rapidly but distinctly in a croaking and unsteady voice; and

if Babalatchi considered it a song, then it was a song with a purpose

and, perhaps for that reason, artistically defective. It had all the

imperfections of unskilful improvisation and its subject was gruesome.

It told a tale of shipwreck and of thirst, and of one brother killing

another for the sake of a gourd of water. A repulsive story which might

have had a purpose but possessed no moral whatever. Yet it must have

pleased Babalatchi for he repeated it twice, the second time even in

louder tones than at first, causing a disturbance amongst the white

rice-birds and the wild fruit-pigeons which roosted on the boughs of

the big tree growing in Omar’s compound. There was in the thick foliage

above the singer’s head a confused beating of wings, sleepy remarks in

bird-language, a sharp stir of leaves. The forms by the fire moved; the

shadow of the woman altered its shape, and Babalatchi’s song was cut

short abruptly by a fit of soft and persistent coughing. He did not try

to resume his efforts after that interruption, but went away stealthily

to seek--if not sleep--then, at least, repose.

CHAPTER SIX

As soon as Abdulla and his companions had left the enclosure, Aissa

approached Willems and stood by his side. He took no notice of her

expectant attitude till she touched him gently, when he turned furiously

upon her and, tearing off her face-veil, trampled upon it as though

it had been a mortal enemy. She looked at him with the faint smile of

patient curiosity, with the puzzled interest of ignorance watching the

running of a complicated piece of machinery. After he had exhausted his

rage, he stood again severe and unbending looking down at the fire, but

the touch of her fingers at the nape of his neck effaced instantly the

hard lines round his mouth; his eyes wavered uneasily; his lips trembled

slightly. Starting with the unresisting rapidity of a particle of

iron--which, quiescent one moment, leaps in the next to a powerful

magnet--he moved forward, caught her in his arms and pressed her

violently to his breast. He released her as suddenly, and she stumbled a

little, stepped back, breathed quickly through her parted lips, and said

in a tone of pleased reproof--

“O Fool-man! And if you had killed me in your strong arms what would you

have done?”

“You want to live . . . and to run away from me again,” he said gently.

“Tell me--do you?”

She moved towards him with very short steps, her head a little on one

side, hands on hips, with a slight balancing of her body: an approach

more tantalizing than an escape. He looked on, eager--charmed. She spoke

jestingly.

“What am I to say to a man who has been away three days from me? Three!”

she repeated, holding up playfully three fingers before Willems’ eyes.

He snatched at the hand, but she was on her guard and whisked it behind

her back.

“No!” she said. “I cannot be caught. But I will come. I am coming myself

because I like. Do not move. Do not touch me with your mighty hands, O

child!”

As she spoke she made a step nearer, then another. Willems did not stir.

Pressing against him she stood on tiptoe to look into his eyes, and

her own seemed to grow bigger, glistening and tender, appealing and

promising. With that look she drew the man’s soul away from him through

his immobile pupils, and from Willems’ features the spark of reason

vanished under her gaze and was replaced by an appearance of physical

well-being, an ecstasy of the senses which had taken possession of his

rigid body; an ecstasy that drove out regrets, hesitation and doubt,

and proclaimed its terrible work by an appalling aspect of idiotic

beatitude. He never stirred a limb, hardly breathed, but stood in stiff

immobility, absorbing the delight of her close contact by every pore.

“Closer! Closer!” he murmured.

Slowly she raised her arms, put them over his shoulders, and clasping

her hands at the back of his neck, swung off the full length of her

arms. Her head fell back, the eyelids dropped slightly, and her thick

hair hung straight down: a mass of ebony touched by the red gleams of

the fire. He stood unyielding under the strain, as solid and motionless

as one of the big trees of the surrounding forests; and his eyes

looked at the modelling of her chin, at the outline of her neck, at

the swelling lines of her bosom, with the famished and concentrated

expression of a starving man looking at food. She drew herself up to him

and rubbed her head against his cheek slowly and gently. He sighed. She,

with her hands still on his shoulders, glanced up at the placid stars

and said--

“The night is half gone. We shall finish it by this fire. By this

fire you shall tell me all: your words and Syed Abdulla’s words; and

listening to you I shall forget the three days--because I am good. Tell

me--am I good?”

He said “Yes” dreamily, and she ran off towards the big house.

When she came back, balancing a roll of fine mats on her head, he had

replenished the fire and was ready to help her in arranging a couch

on the side of it nearest to the hut. She sank down with a quick but

gracefully controlled movement, and he threw himself full length with

impatient haste, as if he wished to forestall somebody. She took his

head on her knees, and when he felt her hands touching his face, her

fingers playing with his hair, he had an expression of being taken

possession of; he experienced a sense of peace, of rest, of happiness,

and of soothing delight. His hands strayed upwards about her neck, and

he drew her down so as to have her face above his. Then he whispered--“I

wish I could die like this--now!” She looked at him with her big sombre

eyes, in which there was no responsive light. His thought was so remote

from her understanding that she let the words pass by unnoticed, like

the breath of the wind, like the flight of a cloud. Woman though

she was, she could not comprehend, in her simplicity, the tremendous

compliment of that speech, that whisper of deadly happiness, so

sincere, so spontaneous, coming so straight from the heart--like every

corruption. It was the voice of madness, of a delirious peace, of

happiness that is infamous, cowardly, and so exquisite that the debased

mind refuses to contemplate its termination: for to the victims of such

happiness the moment of its ceasing is the beginning afresh of that

torture which is its price.

With her brows slightly knitted in the determined preoccupation of her

own desires, she said--

“Now tell me all. All the words spoken between you and Syed Abdulla.”

Tell what? What words? Her voice recalled back the consciousness that

had departed under her touch, and he became aware of the passing minutes

every one of which was like a reproach; of those minutes that falling,

slow, reluctant, irresistible into the past, marked his footsteps on the

way to perdition. Not that he had any conviction about it, any notion of

the possible ending on that painful road. It was an indistinct feeling,

a threat of suffering like the confused warning of coming disease,

an inarticulate monition of evil made up of fear and pleasure, of

resignation and of revolt. He was ashamed of his state of mind. After

all, what was he afraid of? Were those scruples? Why that hesitation to

think, to speak of what he intended doing? Scruples were for imbeciles.

His clear duty was to make himself happy. Did he ever take an oath of

fidelity to Lingard? No. Well then--he would not let any interest of

that old fool stand between Willems and Willems’ happiness. Happiness?

Was he not, perchance, on a false track? Happiness meant money. Much

money. At least he had always thought so till he had experienced those

new sensations which . . .

Aissa’s question, repeated impatiently, interrupted his musings, and

looking up at her face shining above him in the dim light of the fire

he stretched his limbs luxuriously and obedient to her desire, he spoke

slowly and hardly above his breath. She, with her head close to his

lips, listened absorbed, interested, in attentive immobility. The many

noises of the great courtyard were hushed up gradually by the sleep that

stilled all voices and closed all eyes. Then somebody droned out a song

with a nasal drawl at the end of every verse. He stirred. She put her

hand suddenly on his lips and sat upright. There was a feeble coughing,

a rustle of leaves, and then a complete silence took possession of the

land; a silence cold, mournful, profound; more like death than peace;

more hard to bear than the fiercest tumult. As soon as she removed her

hand he hastened to speak, so insupportable to him was that stillness

perfect and absolute in which his thoughts seemed to ring with the

loudness of shouts.

“Who was there making that noise?” he asked.

“I do not know. He is gone now,” she answered, hastily. “Tell me, you

will not return to your people; not without me. Not with me. Do you

promise?”

“I have promised already. I have no people of my own. Have I not told

you, that you are everybody to me?”

“Ah, yes,” she said, slowly, “but I like to hear you say that

again--every day, and every night, whenever I ask; and never to be angry

because I ask. I am afraid of white women who are shameless and have

fierce eyes.” She scanned his features close for a moment and added:

“Are they very beautiful? They must be.”

“I do not know,” he whispered, thoughtfully. “And if I ever did know,

looking at you I have forgotten.”

“Forgotten! And for three days and two nights you have forgotten me

also! Why? Why were you angry with me when I spoke at first of Tuan

Abdulla, in the days when we lived beside the brook? You remembered

somebody then. Somebody in the land whence you come. Your tongue is

false. You are white indeed, and your heart is full of deception. I know

it. And yet I cannot help believing you when you talk of your love for

me. But I am afraid!”

He felt flattered and annoyed by her vehemence, and said--

“Well, I am with you now. I did come back. And it was you that went

away.”

“When you have helped Abdulla against the Rajah Laut, who is the first

of white men, I shall not be afraid any more,” she whispered.

“You must believe what I say when I tell you that there never was

another woman; that there is nothing for me to regret, and nothing but

my enemies to remember.”

“Where do you come from?” she said, impulsive and inconsequent, in a

passionate whisper. “What is that land beyond the great sea from which

you come? A land of lies and of evil from which nothing but misfortune

ever comes to us--who are not white. Did you not at first ask me to go

there with you? That is why I went away.”

“I shall never ask you again.”

“And there is no woman waiting for you there?”

“No!” said Willems, firmly.

She bent over him. Her lips hovered above his face and her long hair

brushed his cheeks.

“You taught me the love of your people which is of the Devil,” she

murmured, and bending still lower, she said faintly, “Like this?”

“Yes, like this!” he answered very low, in a voice that trembled

slightly with eagerness; and she pressed suddenly her lips to his while

he closed his eyes in an ecstasy of delight.

There was a long interval of silence. She stroked his head with gentle

touches, and he lay dreamily, perfectly happy but for the annoyance of

an indistinct vision of a well-known figure; a man going away from him

and diminishing in a long perspective of fantastic trees, whose every

leaf was an eye looking after that man, who walked away growing smaller,

but never getting out of sight for all his steady progress. He felt a

desire to see him vanish, a hurried impatience of his disappearance, and

he watched for it with a careful and irksome effort. There was something

familiar about that figure. Why! Himself! He gave a sudden start and

opened his eyes, quivering with the emotion of that quick return from so

far, of finding himself back by the fire with the rapidity of a flash of

lightning. It had been half a dream; he had slumbered in her arms for

a few seconds. Only the beginning of a dream--nothing more. But it was

some time before he recovered from the shock of seeing himself go away

so deliberately, so definitely, so unguardedly; and going away--where?

Now, if he had not woke up in time he would never have come back again

from there; from whatever place he was going to. He felt indignant. It

was like an evasion, like a prisoner breaking his parole--that thing

slinking off stealthily while he slept. He was very indignant, and was

also astonished at the absurdity of his own emotions.

She felt him tremble, and murmuring tender words, pressed his head

to her breast. Again he felt very peaceful with a peace that was as

complete as the silence round them. He muttered--

“You are tired, Aissa.”

She answered so low that it was like a sigh shaped into faint words.

“I shall watch your sleep, O child!”

He lay very quiet, and listened to the beating of her heart. That sound,

light, rapid, persistent, and steady; her very life beating against his

cheek, gave him a clear perception of secure ownership, strengthened his

belief in his possession of that human being, was like an assurance of

the vague felicity of the future. There were no regrets, no doubts,

no hesitation now. Had there ever been? All that seemed far away, ages

ago--as unreal and pale as the fading memory of some delirium. All the

anguish, suffering, strife of the past days; the humiliation and anger

of his downfall; all that was an infamous nightmare, a thing born in

sleep to be forgotten and leave no trace--and true life was this: this

dreamy immobility with his head against her heart that beat so steadily.

He was broad awake now, with that tingling wakefulness of the tired body

which succeeds to the few refreshing seconds of irresistible sleep, and

his wide-open eyes looked absently at the doorway of Omar’s hut. The

reed walls glistened in the light of the fire, the smoke of which, thin

and blue, drifted slanting in a succession of rings and spirals across

the doorway, whose empty blackness seemed to him impenetrable and

enigmatical like a curtain hiding vast spaces full of unexpected

surprises. This was only his fancy, but it was absorbing enough to make

him accept the sudden appearance of a head, coming out of the gloom, as

part of his idle fantasy or as the beginning of another short dream,

of another vagary of his overtired brain. A face with drooping eyelids,

old, thin, and yellow, above the scattered white of a long beard that

touched the earth. A head without a body, only a foot above the ground,

turning slightly from side to side on the edge of the circle of light

as if to catch the radiating heat of the fire on either cheek in

succession. He watched it in passive amazement, growing distinct, as if

coming nearer to him, and the confused outlines of a body crawling

on all fours came out, creeping inch by inch towards the fire, with

a silent and all but imperceptible movement. He was astounded at the

appearance of that blind head dragging that crippled body behind,

without a sound, without a change in the composure of the sightless

face, which was plain one second, blurred the next in the play of the

light that drew it to itself steadily. A mute face with a kriss between

its lips. This was no dream. Omar’s face. But why? What was he after?

He was too indolent in the happy languor of the moment to answer the

question. It darted through his brain and passed out, leaving him

free to listen again to the beating of her heart; to that precious and

delicate sound which filled the quiet immensity of the night. Glancing

upwards he saw the motionless head of the woman looking down at him in

a tender gleam of liquid white between the long eyelashes, whose shadow

rested on the soft curve of her cheek; and under the caress of that

look, the uneasy wonder and the obscure fear of that apparition,

crouching and creeping in turns towards the fire that was its guide,

were lost--were drowned in the quietude of all his senses, as pain is

drowned in the flood of drowsy serenity that follows upon a dose of

opium.

He altered the position of his head by ever so little, and now could see

easily that apparition which he had seen a minute before and had nearly

forgotten already. It had moved closer, gliding and noiseless like the

shadow of some nightmare, and now it was there, very near, motionless

and still as if listening; one hand and one knee advanced; the neck

stretched out and the head turned full towards the fire. He could see

the emaciated face, the skin shiny over the prominent bones, the black

shadows of the hollow temples and sunken cheeks, and the two patches of

blackness over the eyes, over those eyes that were dead and could not

see. What was the impulse which drove out this blind cripple into

the night to creep and crawl towards that fire? He looked at him,

fascinated, but the face, with its shifting lights and shadows, let out

nothing, closed and impenetrable like a walled door.

Omar raised himself to a kneeling posture and sank on his heels, with

his hands hanging down before him. Willems, looking out of his dreamy

numbness, could see plainly the kriss between the thin lips, a bar

across the face; the handle on one side where the polished wood caught a

red gleam from the fire and the thin line of the blade running to a dull

black point on the other. He felt an inward shock, which left his body

passive in Aissa’s embrace, but filled his breast with a tumult of

powerless fear; and he perceived suddenly that it was his own death that

was groping towards him; that it was the hate of himself and the hate of

her love for him which drove this helpless wreck of a once brilliant and

resolute pirate, to attempt a desperate deed that would be the glorious

and supreme consolation of an unhappy old age. And while he looked,

paralyzed with dread, at the father who had resumed his cautious

advance--blind like fate, persistent like destiny--he listened with

greedy eagerness to the heart of the daughter beating light, rapid, and

steady against his head.

He was in the grip of horrible fear; of a fear whose cold hand robs its

victim of all will and of all power; of all wish to escape, to resist,

or to move; which destroys hope and despair alike, and holds the empty

and useless carcass as if in a vise under the coming stroke. It was not

the fear of death--he had faced danger before--it was not even the fear

of that particular form of death. It was not the fear of the end, for he

knew that the end would not come then. A movement, a leap, a shout would

save him from the feeble hand of the blind old man, from that hand that

even now was, with cautious sweeps along the ground, feeling for his

body in the darkness. It was the unreasoning fear of this glimpse

into the unknown things, into those motives, impulses, desires he had

ignored, but that had lived in the breasts of despised men, close by his

side, and were revealed to him for a second, to be hidden again behind

the black mists of doubt and deception. It was not death that frightened

him: it was the horror of bewildered life where he could understand

nothing and nobody round him; where he could guide, control, comprehend

nothing and no one--not even himself.

He felt a touch on his side. That contact, lighter than the caress of a

mother’s hand on the cheek of a sleeping child, had for him the force of

a crushing blow. Omar had crept close, and now, kneeling above him, held

the kriss in one hand while the other skimmed over his jacket up towards

his breast in gentle touches; but the blind face, still turned to

the heat of the fire, was set and immovable in its aspect of stony

indifference to things it could not hope to see. With an effort Willems

took his eyes off the deathlike mask and turned them up to Aissa’s head.

She sat motionless as if she had been part of the sleeping earth, then

suddenly he saw her big sombre eyes open out wide in a piercing stare

and felt the convulsive pressure of her hands pinning his arms along

his body. A second dragged itself out, slow and bitter, like a day of

mourning; a second full of regret and grief for that faith in her which

took its flight from the shattered ruins of his trust. She was holding

him! She too! He felt her heart give a great leap, his head slipped down

on her knees, he closed his eyes and there was nothing. Nothing! It was

as if she had died; as though her heart had leaped out into the night,

abandoning him, defenceless and alone, in an empty world.

His head struck the ground heavily as she flung him aside in her sudden

rush. He lay as if stunned, face up and, daring not move, did not see

the struggle, but heard the piercing shriek of mad fear, her low angry

words; another shriek dying out in a moan. When he got up at last he

looked at Aissa kneeling over her father, he saw her bent back in the

effort of holding him down, Omar’s contorted limbs, a hand thrown up

above her head and her quick movement grasping the wrist. He made an

impulsive step forward, but she turned a wild face to him and called out

over her shoulder--

“Keep back! Do not come near! Do not. . . .”

And he stopped short, his arms hanging lifelessly by his side, as if

those words had changed him into stone. She was afraid of his possible

violence, but in the unsettling of all his convictions he was struck

with the frightful thought that she preferred to kill her father all

by herself; and the last stage of their struggle, at which he looked

as though a red fog had filled his eyes, loomed up with an unnatural

ferocity, with a sinister meaning; like something monstrous and

depraved, forcing its complicity upon him under the cover of that awful

night. He was horrified and grateful; drawn irresistibly to her--and

ready to run away. He could not move at first--then he did not want

to stir. He wanted to see what would happen. He saw her lift, with

a tremendous effort, the apparently lifeless body into the hut, and

remained standing, after they disappeared, with the vivid image in his

eyes of that head swaying on her shoulder, the lower jaw hanging down,

collapsed, passive, meaningless, like the head of a corpse.

Then after a while he heard her voice speaking inside, harshly, with an

agitated abruptness of tone; and in answer there were groans and

broken murmurs of exhaustion. She spoke louder. He heard her saying

violently--“No! No! Never!”

And again a plaintive murmur of entreaty as of some one begging for a

supreme favour, with a last breath. Then she said--

“Never! I would sooner strike it into my own heart.”

She came out, stood panting for a short moment in the doorway, and then

stepped into the firelight. Behind her, through the darkness came the

sound of words calling the vengeance of heaven on her head, rising

higher, shrill, strained, repeating the curse over and over again--till

the voice cracked in a passionate shriek that died out into hoarse

muttering ending with a deep and prolonged sigh. She stood facing

Willems, one hand behind her back, the other raised in a gesture

compelling attention, and she listened in that attitude till all was

still inside the hut. Then she made another step forward and her hand

dropped slowly.

“Nothing but misfortune,” she whispered, absently, to herself. “Nothing

but misfortune to us who are not white.” The anger and excitement died

out of her face, and she looked straight at Willems with an intense and

mournful gaze.

He recovered his senses and his power of speech with a sudden start.

“Aissa,” he exclaimed, and the words broke out through his lips with

hurried nervousness. “Aissa! How can I live here? Trust me. Believe in

me. Let us go away from here. Go very far away! Very far; you and I!”

He did not stop to ask himself whether he could escape, and how, and

where. He was carried away by the flood of hate, disgust, and contempt

of a white man for that blood which is not his blood, for that race

which is not his race; for the brown skins; for the hearts false like

the sea, blacker than night. This feeling of repulsion overmastered his

reason in a clear conviction of the impossibility for him to live with

her people. He urged her passionately to fly with him because out of all

that abhorred crowd he wanted this one woman, but wanted her away from

them, away from that race of slaves and cut-throats from which she

sprang. He wanted her for himself--far from everybody, in some safe and

dumb solitude. And as he spoke his anger and contempt rose, his hate

became almost fear; and his desire of her grew immense, burning,

illogical and merciless; crying to him through all his senses;

louder than his hate, stronger than his fear, deeper than his

contempt--irresistible and certain like death itself.

Standing at a little distance, just within the light--but on the

threshold of that darkness from which she had come--she listened, one

hand still behind her back, the other arm stretched out with the hand

half open as if to catch the fleeting words that rang around her,

passionate, menacing, imploring, but all tinged with the anguish of his

suffering, all hurried by the impatience that gnawed his breast. And

while she listened she felt a slowing down of her heart-beats as the

meaning of his appeal grew clearer before her indignant eyes, as she saw

with rage and pain the edifice of her love, her own work, crumble slowly

to pieces, destroyed by that man’s fears, by that man’s falseness. Her

memory recalled the days by the brook when she had listened to other

words--to other thoughts--to promises and to pleadings for other things,

which came from that man’s lips at the bidding of her look or her smile,

at the nod of her head, at the whisper of her lips. Was there then in

his heart something else than her image, other desires than the desires

of her love, other fears than the fear of losing her? How could that be?

Had she grown ugly or old in a moment? She was appalled, surprised and

angry with the anger of unexpected humiliation; and her eyes looked

fixedly, sombre and steady, at that man born in the land of violence

and of evil wherefrom nothing but misfortune comes to those who are not

white. Instead of thinking of her caresses, instead of forgetting all

the world in her embrace, he was thinking yet of his people; of that

people that steals every land, masters every sea, that knows no mercy

and no truth--knows nothing but its own strength. O man of strong arm

and of false heart! Go with him to a far country, be lost in the throng

of cold eyes and false hearts--lose him there! Never! He was mad--mad

with fear; but he should not escape her! She would keep him here a slave

and a master; here where he was alone with her; where he must live for

her--or die. She had a right to his love which was of her making, to the

love that was in him now, while he spoke those words without sense. She

must put between him and other white men a barrier of hate. He must not

only stay, but he must also keep his promise to Abdulla, the fulfilment

of which would make her safe.

“Aissa, let us go! With you by my side I would attack them with my naked

hands. Or no! Tomorrow we shall be outside, on board Abdulla’s ship.

You shall come with me and then I could . . . If the ship went ashore by

some chance, then we could steal a canoe and escape in the confusion.

. . . You are not afraid of the sea . . . of the sea that would give me

freedom . . .”

He was approaching her gradually with extended arms, while he pleaded

ardently in incoherent words that ran over and tripped each other in the

extreme eagerness of his speech. She stepped back, keeping her distance,

her eyes on his face, watching on it the play of his doubts and of his

hopes with a piercing gaze, that seemed to search out the innermost

recesses of his thought; and it was as if she had drawn slowly the

darkness round her, wrapping herself in its undulating folds that made

her indistinct and vague. He followed her step by step till at last they

both stopped, facing each other under the big tree of the enclosure.

The solitary exile of the forests, great, motionless and solemn in his

abandonment, left alone by the life of ages that had been pushed away

from him by those pigmies that crept at his foot, towered high and

straight above their heads. He seemed to look on, dispassionate and

imposing, in his lonely greatness, spreading his branches wide in a

gesture of lofty protection, as if to hide them in the sombre shelter

of innumerable leaves; as if moved by the disdainful compassion of the

strong, by the scornful pity of an aged giant, to screen this struggle

of two human hearts from the cold scrutiny of glittering stars.

The last cry of his appeal to her mercy rose loud, vibrated under the

sombre canopy, darted among the boughs startling the white birds that

slept wing to wing--and died without an echo, strangled in the dense

mass of unstirring leaves. He could not see her face, but he heard

her sighs and the distracted murmur of indistinct words. Then, as he

listened holding his breath, she exclaimed suddenly--

“Have you heard him? He has cursed me because I love you. You brought

me suffering and strife--and his curse. And now you want to take me far

away where I would lose you, lose my life; because your love is my

life now. What else is there? Do not move,” she cried violently, as he

stirred a little--“do not speak! Take this! Sleep in peace!”

He saw a shadowy movement of her arm. Something whizzed past and struck

the ground behind him, close to the fire. Instinctively he turned round

to look at it. A kriss without its sheath lay by the embers; a sinuous

dark object, looking like something that had been alive and was now

crushed, dead and very inoffensive; a black wavy outline very distinct

and still in the dull red glow. Without thinking he moved to pick it up,

stooping with the sad and humble movement of a beggar gathering the

alms flung into the dust of the roadside. Was this the answer to his

pleading, to the hot and living words that came from his heart? Was this

the answer thrown at him like an insult, that thing made of wood and

iron, insignificant and venomous, fragile and deadly? He held it by the

blade and looked at the handle stupidly for a moment before he let

it fall again at his feet; and when he turned round he faced only the

night:--the night immense, profound and quiet; a sea of darkness in

which she had disappeared without leaving a trace.

He moved forward with uncertain steps, putting out both his hands before

him with the anguish of a man blinded suddenly.

“Aissa!” he cried--“come to me at once.”

He peered and listened, but saw nothing, heard nothing. After a while

the solid blackness seemed to wave before his eyes like a curtain

disclosing movements but hiding forms, and he heard light and hurried

footsteps, then the short clatter of the gate leading to Lakamba’s

private enclosure. He sprang forward and brought up against the rough

timber in time to hear the words, “Quick! Quick!” and the sound of the

wooden bar dropped on the other side, securing the gate. With his arms

thrown up, the palms against the paling, he slid down in a heap on the

ground.

“Aissa,” he said, pleadingly, pressing his lips to a chink between the

stakes. “Aissa, do you hear me? Come back! I will do what you want, give

you all you desire--if I have to set the whole Sambir on fire and put

that fire out with blood. Only come back. Now! At once! Are you there?

Do you hear me? Aissa!”

On the other side there were startled whispers of feminine voices; a

frightened little laugh suddenly interrupted; some woman’s admiring

murmur--“This is brave talk!” Then after a short silence Aissa cried--

“Sleep in peace--for the time of your going is near. Now I am afraid of

you. Afraid of your fear. When you return with Tuan Abdulla you shall

be great. You will find me here. And there will be nothing but love.

Nothing else!--Always!--Till we die!”

He listened to the shuffle of footsteps going away, and staggered to his

feet, mute with the excess of his passionate anger against that being

so savage and so charming; loathing her, himself, everybody he had

ever known; the earth, the sky, the very air he drew into his oppressed

chest; loathing it because it made him live, loathing her because she

made him suffer. But he could not leave that gate through which she had

passed. He wandered a little way off, then swerved round, came back and

fell down again by the stockade only to rise suddenly in another attempt

to break away from the spell that held him, that brought him back there,

dumb, obedient and furious. And under the immobilized gesture of lofty

protection in the branches outspread wide above his head, under the

high branches where white birds slept wing to wing in the shelter of

countless leaves, he tossed like a grain of dust in a whirlwind--sinking

and rising--round and round--always near that gate. All through the

languid stillness of that night he fought with the impalpable; he fought

with the shadows, with the darkness, with the silence. He fought without

a sound, striking futile blows, dashing from side to side; obstinate,

hopeless, and always beaten back; like a man bewitched within the

invisible sweep of a magic circle.