V
D'Alcacer sat down on the bench again. "I wonder what she knows," hethought, "and I wonder what I have done." He wondered also how far hehad been sincere and how far affected by a very natural aversion frombeing murdered obscurely by ferocious Moors with all the circumstancesof barbarity. It was a very naked death to come upon one suddenly. Itwas robbed of all helpful illusions, such as the free will of a suicide,the heroism of a warrior, or the exaltation of a martyr. "Hadn't Ibetter make some sort of fight of it?" he debated with himself. He sawhimself rushing at the naked spears without any enthusiasm. Or wouldn'tit be better to go forth to meet his doom (somewhere outside thestockade on that horrible beach) with calm dignity. "Pah! I shall beprobably speared through the back in the beastliest possible fashion,"he thought with an inward shudder. It was certainly not a shudder offear, for Mr. d'Alcacer attached no high value to life. It was a shudderof disgust because Mr. d'Alcacer was a civilized man and though he hadno illusions about civilization he could not but admit the superiorityof its methods. It offered to one a certain refinement of form, acomeliness of proceedings and definite safeguards against deadlysurprises. "How idle all this is," he thought, finally. His next thoughtwas that women were very resourceful. It was true, he went on meditatingwith unwonted cynicism, that strictly speaking they had only oneresource but, generally, it served--it served.
He was surprised by his supremely shameless bitterness at this juncture.It was so uncalled for. This situation was too complicated to beentrusted to a cynical or shameless hope. There was nothing to trust to.At this moment of his meditation he became aware of Lingard's approach.He raised his head eagerly. D'Alcacer was not indifferent to his fateand even to Mr. Travers' fate. He would fain learn. . . . But one lookat Lingard's face was enough. "It's no use asking him anything," he saidto himself, "for he cares for nothing just now."
Lingard sat down heavily on the other end of the bench, and d'Alcacer,looking at his profile, confessed to himself that this was the mostmasculinely good-looking face he had ever seen in his life. It wasan expressive face, too, but its present expression was also beyondd'Alcacer's past experience. At the same time its quietness set up abarrier against common curiosities and even common fears. No, it wasno use asking him anything. Yet something should be said to break thespell, to call down again this man to the earth. But it was Lingard whospoke first. "Where has Mrs. Travers gone?"
"She has gone . . . where naturally she would be anxious to go first ofall since she has managed to come to us," answered d'Alcacer, wordinghis answer with the utmost regard for the delicacy of the situation.
The stillness of Lingard seemed to have grown even more impressive. Hespoke again.
"I wonder what those two can have to say to each other."
He might have been asking that of the whole darkened part of the globe,but it was d'Alcacer who answered in his courteous tones.
"Would it surprise you very much, Captain Lingard, if I were to tell youthat those two people are quite fit to understand each other thoroughly?Yes? It surprises you! Well, I assure you that seven thousand miles fromhere nobody would wonder."
"I think I understand," said Lingard, "but don't you know the man islight-headed? A man like that is as good as mad."
"Yes, he had been slightly delirious since seven o'clock," saidd'Alcacer. "But believe me, Captain Lingard," he continued, earnestly,and obeying a perfectly disinterested impulse, "that even in hisdelirium he is far more understandable to her and better able tounderstand her than . . . anybody within a hundred miles from here."
"Ah!" said Lingard without any emotion, "so you don't wonder. You don'tsee any reason for wonder."
"No, for, don't you see, I do know."
"What do you know?"
"Men and women, Captain Lingard, which you. . . ."
"I don't know any woman."
"You have spoken the strictest truth there," said d'Alcacer, and for thefirst time Lingard turned his head slowly and looked at his neighbour onthe bench.
"Do you think she is as good as mad, too?" asked Lingard in a startledvoice.
D'Alcacer let escape a low exclamation. No, certainly he did not thinkso. It was an original notion to suppose that lunatics had a sort ofcommon logic which made them understandable to each other. D'Alcacertried to make his voice as gentle as possible while he pursued: "No,Captain Lingard, I believe the woman of whom we speak is and will alwaysremain in the fullest possession of herself."
Lingard, leaning back, clasped his hands round his knees. He seemednot to be listening and d'Alcacer, pulling a cigarette case out of hispocket, looked for a long time at the three cigarettes it contained. Itwas the last of the provision he had on him when captured. D'Alcacerhad put himself on the strictest allowance. A cigarette was only to belighted on special occasions; and now there were only three left andthey had to be made to last till the end of life. They calmed, theysoothed, they gave an attitude. And only three left! One had to bekept for the morning, to be lighted before going through the gate ofdoom--the gate of Belarab's stockade. A cigarette soothed, it gave anattitude. Was this the fitting occasion for one of the remaining two?D'Alcacer, a true Latin, was not afraid of a little introspection. Inthe pause he descended into the innermost depths of his being, thenglanced up at the night sky. Sportsman, traveller, he had often lookedup at the stars before to see how time went. It was going very slowly.He took out a cigarette, snapped-to the case, bent down to the embers.Then he sat up and blew out a thin cloud of smoke. The man by his sidelooked with his bowed head and clasped knee like a masculine renderingof mournful meditation. Such attitudes are met with sometimes on thesculptures of ancient tombs. D'Alcacer began to speak:
"She is a representative woman and yet one of those of whom there arebut very few at any time in the world. Not that they are very rare butthat there is but little room on top. They are the iridescent gleams ona hard and dark surface. For the world is hard, Captain Lingard, it ishard, both in what it will remember and in what it will forget. Itis for such women that people toil on the ground and underground andartists of all sorts invoke their inspiration."
Lingard seemed not to have heard a word. His chin rested on his breast.D'Alcacer appraised the remaining length of his cigarette and went on inan equable tone through which pierced a certain sadness:
"No, there are not many of them. And yet they are all. They decorate ourlife for us. They are the gracious figures on the drab wall which lieson this side of our common grave. They lead a sort of ritual dance, thatmost of us have agreed to take seriously. It is a very binding agreementwith which sincerity and good faith and honour have nothing to do.Very binding. Woe to him or her who breaks it. Directly they leave thepageant they get lost."
Lingard turned his head sharply and discovered d'Alcacer looking at himwith profound attention.
"They get lost in a maze," continued d'Alcacer, quietly. "They wander init lamenting over themselves. I would shudder at that fate for anythingI loved. Do you know, Captain Lingard, how people lost in a maze end?"he went on holding Lingard by a steadfast stare. "No? . . . I willtell you then. They end by hating their very selves, and they die indisillusion and despair."
As if afraid of the force of his words d'Alcacer laid a soothing handlightly on Lingard's shoulder. But Lingard continued to look into theembers at his feet and remained insensible to the friendly touch. Yetd'Alcacer could not imagine that he had not been heard. He folded hisarms on his breast.
"I don't know why I have been telling you all this," he said,apologetically. "I hope I have not been intruding on your thoughts."
"I can think of nothing," Lingard declared, unexpectedly. "I only knowthat your voice was friendly; and for the rest--"
"One must get through a night like this somehow," said d'Alcacer."The very stars seem to lag on their way. It's a common belief that adrowning man is irresistibly compelled to review his past experience.Just now I feel quite out of my depth, and whatever I have said has comefrom my experience. I am sure you will fo
rgive me. All that it amountsto is this: that it is natural for us to cry for the moon but it wouldbe very fatal to have our cries heard. For what could any one of us dowith the moon if it were given to him? I am speaking now of us--commonmortals."
It was not immediately after d'Alcacer had ceased speaking but onlyafter a moment that Lingard unclasped his fingers, got up, and walkedaway. D'Alcacer followed with a glance of quiet interest the big,shadowy form till it vanished in the direction of an enormous foresttree left in the middle of the stockade. The deepest shade of the nightwas spread over the ground of Belarab's fortified courtyard. The veryembers of the fires had turned black, showing only here and there a merespark; and the forms of the prone sleepers could hardly be distinguishedfrom the hard ground on which they rested, with their arms lyingbeside them on the mats. Presently Mrs. Travers appeared quite close tod'Alcacer, who rose instantly.
"Martin is asleep," said Mrs. Travers in a tone that seemed to haveborrowed something of the mystery and quietness of the night.
"All the world's asleep," observed d'Alcacer, so low that Mrs. Traversbarely caught the words, "Except you and me, and one other who has leftme to wander about in the night."
"Was he with you? Where has he gone?"
"Where it's darkest I should think," answered d'Alcacer, secretly. "It'sno use going to look for him; but if you keep perfectly still and holdyour breath you may presently hear his footsteps."
"What did he tell you?" breathed out Mrs. Travers.
"I didn't ask him anything. I only know that something has happenedwhich has robbed him of his power of thinking . . . Hadn't I better goto the hut? Don Martin ought to have someone with him when he wakes up."Mrs. Travers remained perfectly still and even now and then held herbreath with a vague fear of hearing those footsteps wandering in thedark. D'Alcacer had disappeared. Again Mrs. Travers held her breath. No.Nothing. Not a sound. Only the night to her eyes seemed to have growndarker. Was that a footstep? "Where could I hide myself?" she thought.But she didn't move.
After leaving d'Alcacer, Lingard threading his way between the firesfound himself under the big tree, the same tree against which Daman hadbeen leaning on the day of the great talk when the white prisoners hadbeen surrendered to Lingard's keeping on definite conditions. Lingardpassed through the deep obscurity made by the outspread boughs of theonly witness left there of a past that for endless ages had seen nomankind on this shore defended by the Shallows, around this lagoonovershadowed by the jungle. In the calm night the old giant, withoutshudders or murmurs in its enormous limbs, saw the restless man driftthrough the black shade into the starlight.
In that distant part of the courtyard there were only a few sentrieswho, themselves invisible, saw Lingard's white figure pace to and froendlessly. They knew well who that was. It was the great white man. Avery great man. A very rich man. A possessor of fire-arms, who coulddispense valuable gifts and deal deadly blows, the friend of theirRuler, the enemy of his enemies, known to them for years and alwaysmysterious. At their posts, flattened against the stakes near convenientloopholes, they cast backward glances and exchanged faint whispers fromtime to time.
Lingard might have thought himself alone. He had lost touch with theworld. What he had said to d'Alcacer was perfectly true. He had nothought. He was in the state of a man who, having cast his eyes throughthe open gates of Paradise, is rendered insensible by that moment'svision to all the forms and matters of the earth; and in the extremityof his emotion ceases even to look upon himself but as the subject ofa sublime experience which exalts or unfits, sanctifies or damns--hedidn't know which. Every shadowy thought, every passing sensation waslike a base intrusion on that supreme memory. He couldn't bear it.
When he had tried to resume his conversation with Belarab after Mrs.Travers' arrival he had discovered himself unable to go on. He had justenough self-control to break off the interview in measured terms. Hepointed out the lateness of the hour, a most astonishing excuse topeople to whom time is nothing and whose life and activities are notruled by the clock. Indeed Lingard hardly knew what he was saying ordoing when he went out again leaving everybody dumb with astonishmentat the change in his aspect and in his behaviour. A suspicious silencereigned for a long time in Belarab's great audience room till the Chiefdismissed everybody by two quiet words and a slight gesture.
With her chin in her hand in the pose of a sybil trying to read thefuture in the glow of dying embers, Mrs. Travers, without holdingher breath, heard quite close to her the footsteps which she had beenlistening for with mingled alarm, remorse, and hope.
She didn't change her attitude. The deep red glow lighted her up dimly,her face, the white hand hanging by her side, her feet in their sandals.The disturbing footsteps stopped close to her.
"Where have you been all this time?" she asked, without looking round.
"I don't know," answered Lingard. He was speaking the exact truth.He didn't know. Ever since he had released that woman from his armseverything but the vaguest notions had departed from him. Events,necessities, things--he had lost his grip on them all. And he didn'tcare. They were futile and impotent; he had no patience with them. Theoffended and astonished Belarab, d'Alcacer with his kindly touch andfriendly voice, the sleeping men, the men awake, the Settlement full ofunrestful life and the restless Shallows of the coast, were removed fromhim into an immensity of pitying contempt. Perhaps they existed. Perhapsall this waited for him. Well, let all this wait; let everything wait,till to-morrow or to the end of time, which could now come at any momentfor all he cared--but certainly till to-morrow.
"I only know," he went on with an emphasis that made Mrs. Travers raiseher head, "that wherever I go I shall carry you with me--against mybreast."
Mrs. Travers' fine ear caught the mingled tones of suppressed exultationand dawning fear, the ardour and the faltering of those words. She wasfeeling still the physical truth at the root of them so strongly thatshe couldn't help saying in a dreamy whisper:
"Did you mean to crush the life out of me?"
He answered in the same tone:
"I could not have done it. You are too strong. Was I rough? I didn'tmean to be. I have been often told I didn't know my own strength. Youdid not seem able to get through that opening and so I caught holdof you. You came away in my hands quite easily. Suddenly I thought tomyself, 'now I will make sure.'"
He paused as if his breath had failed him. Mrs. Travers dared not makethe slightest movement. Still in the pose of one in quest of hiddentruth she murmured, "Make sure?"
"Yes. And now I am sure. You are here--here! Before I couldn't tell."
"Oh, you couldn't tell before," she said.
"No."
"So it was reality that you were seeking."
He repeated as if speaking to himself: "And now I am sure."
Her sandalled foot, all rosy in the glow, felt the warmth of the embers.The tepid night had enveloped her body; and still under the impressionof his strength she gave herself up to a momentary feeling of quietudethat came about her heart as soft as the night air penetrated by thefeeble clearness of the stars. "This is a limpid soul," she thought.
"You know I always believed in you," he began again. "You know I did.Well. I never believed in you so much as I do now, as you sit there,just as you are, and with hardly enough light to make you out by."
It occurred to her that she had never heard a voice she liked sowell--except one. But that had been a great actor's voice; whereas thisman was nothing in the world but his very own self. He persuaded, hemoved, he disturbed, he soothed by his inherent truth. He had wanted tomake sure and he had made sure apparently; and too weary to resistthe waywardness of her thoughts Mrs. Travers reflected with a sort ofamusement that apparently he had not been disappointed. She thought, "Hebelieves in me. What amazing words. Of all the people that might havebelieved in me I had to find this one here. He believes in me more thanin himself." A gust of sudden remorse tore her out from her quietness,made her cry out to him:
"Captain Lin
gard, we forget how we have met, we forget what is going on.We mustn't. I won't say that you placed your belief wrongly but I haveto confess something to you. I must tell you how I came here to-night.Jorgenson . . ."
He interrupted her forcibly but without raising his voice.
"Jorgenson. Who's Jorgenson? You came to me because you couldn't helpyourself."
This took her breath away. "But I must tell you. There is something inmy coming which is not clear to me."
"You can tell me nothing that I don't know already," he said ina pleading tone. "Say nothing. Sit still. Time enough to-morrow.To-morrow! The night is drawing to an end and I care for nothing in theworld but you. Let me be. Give me the rest that is in you."
She had never heard such accents on his lips and she felt for him agreat and tender pity. Why not humour this mood in which he wanted topreserve the moments that would never come to him again on this earth?She hesitated in silence. She saw him stir in the darkness as if hecould not make up his mind to sit down on the bench. But suddenly hescattered the embers with his foot and sank on the ground against herfeet, and she was not startled in the least to feel the weight of hishead on her knee. Mrs. Travers was not startled but she felt profoundlymoved. Why should she torment him with all those questions of freedomand captivity, of violence and intrigue, of life and death? He was notin a state to be told anything and it seemed to her that she did notwant to speak, that in the greatness of her compassion she simply couldnot speak. All she could do for him was to rest her hand lightly on hishead and respond silently to the slight movement she felt, sigh or sob,but a movement which suddenly immobilized her in an anxious emotion.
About the same time on the other side of the lagoon Jorgenson, raisinghis eyes, noted the stars and said to himself that the night would notlast long now. He wished for daylight. He hoped that Lingard had alreadydone something. The blaze in Tengga's compound had been re-lighted.Tom's power was unbounded, practically unbounded. And he wasinvulnerable.
Jorgenson let his old eyes wander amongst the gleams and shadows of thegreat sheet of water between him and that hostile shore and fancied hecould detect a floating shadow having the characteristic shape of a manin a small canoe.
"O! Ya! Man!" he hailed. "What do you want?" Other eyes, too, haddetected that shadow. Low murmurs arose on the deck of the Emma. "If youdon't speak at once I shall fire," shouted Jorgenson, fiercely.
"No, white man," returned the floating shape in a solemn drawl. "I amthe bearer of friendly words. A chief's words. I come from Tengga."
"There was a bullet that came on board not a long time ago--also fromTengga," said Jorgenson.
"That was an accident," protested the voice from the lagoon. "What elsecould it be? Is there war between you and Tengga? No, no, O white man!All Tengga desires is a long talk. He has sent me to ask you to comeashore."
At these words Jorgenson's heart sank a little. This invitation meantthat Lingard had made no move. Was Tom asleep or altogether mad?
"The talk would be of peace," declared impressively the shadow which haddrifted much closer to the hulk now.
"It isn't for me to talk with great chiefs," Jorgenson returned,cautiously.
"But Tengga is a friend," argued the nocturnal messenger. "And by thatfire there are other friends--your friends, the Rajah Hassim and thelady Immada, who send you their greetings and who expect their eyes torest on you before sunrise."
"That's a lie," remarked Jorgenson, perfunctorily, and fell intothought, while the shadowy bearer of words preserved a scandalizedsilence, though, of course, he had not expected to be believed for amoment. But one could never tell what a white man would believe. Hehad wanted to produce the impression that Hassim and Immada were thehonoured guests of Tengga. It occurred to him suddenly that perhapsJorgenson didn't know anything of the capture. And he persisted.
"My words are all true, Tuan. The Rajah of Wajo and his sister are withmy master. I left them sitting by the fire on Tengga's right hand. Willyou come ashore to be welcomed amongst friends?"
Jorgenson had been reflecting profoundly. His object was to gain as muchtime as possible for Lingard's interference which indeed could not failto be effective. But he had not the slightest wish to entrust himself toTengga's friendliness. Not that he minded the risk; but he did not seethe use of taking it.
"No!" he said, "I can't go ashore. We white men have ways of our ownand I am chief of this hulk. And my chief is the Rajah Laut, a white manlike myself. All the words that matter are in him and if Tengga is sucha great chief let him ask the Rajah Laut for a talk. Yes, that's theproper thing for Tengga to do if he is such a great chief as he says."
"The Rajah Laut has made his choice. He dwells with Belarab, and withthe white people who are huddled together like trapped deer in Belarab'sstockade. Why shouldn't you meantime go over where everything is lightedup and open and talk in friendship with Tengga's friends, whose heartshave been made sick by many doubts; Rajah Hassim and the lady Immada andDaman, the chief of the men of the sea, who do not know now whom theycan trust unless it be you, Tuan, the keeper of much wealth?"
The diplomatist in the small dugout paused for a moment to give specialweight to the final argument:
"Which you have no means to defend. We know how many armed men there arewith you."
"They are great fighters," Jorgenson observed, unconcernedly, spreadinghis elbows on the rail and looking over at the floating black patch ofcharacteristic shape whence proceeded the voice of the wily envoy ofTengga. "Each man of them is worth ten of such as you can find in theSettlement."
"Yes, by Allah. Even worth twenty of these common people. Indeed, youhave enough with you to make a great fight but not enough for victory."
"God alone gives victory," said suddenly the voice of Jaffir, who, verystill at Jorgenson's elbow, had been listening to the conversation.
"Very true," was the answer in an extremely conventional tone. "Will youcome ashore, O white man; and be the leader of chiefs?"
"I have been that before," said Jorgenson, with great dignity, "and nowall I want is peace. But I won't come ashore amongst people whose mindsare so much troubled, till Rajah Hassim and his sister return on boardthis ship and tell me the tale of their new friendship with Tengga."
His heart was sinking with every minute, the very air was growingheavier with the sense of oncoming disaster, on that night that wasneither war nor peace and whose only voice was the voice of Tengga'senvoy, insinuating in tone though menacing in words.
"No, that cannot be," said that voice. "But, Tuan, verily Tengga himselfis ready to come on board here to talk with you. He is very ready tocome and indeed, Tuan, he means to come on board here before very long."
"Yes, with fifty war-canoes filled with the ferocious rabble of theShore of Refuge," Jaffir was heard commenting, sarcastically, over therail; and a sinister muttered "It may be so," ascended alongside fromthe black water.
Jorgenson kept silent as if waiting for a supreme inspiration andsuddenly he spoke in his other-world voice: "Tell Tengga from me that aslong as he brings with him Rajah Hassim and the Rajah's sister, he andhis chief men will be welcome on deck here, no matter how many boatscome along with them. For that I do not care. You may go now."
A profound silence succeeded. It was clear that the envoy was gone,keeping in the shadow of the shore. Jorgenson turned to Jaffir.
"Death amongst friends is but a festival," he quoted, mumbling in hismoustache.
"It is, by Allah," assented Jaffir with sombre fervour.