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AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS
BOOKS BY JOSEPH CONRAD
ALMAYER'S FOLLY
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLAND
ARROW OF GOLD, THE
CHANCE
FALK. AND OTHER STORIES
LORD JIM: A ROMANCE
MIRROR OF THE SEA, THE
NIGGER OF THE NARCISSUS, THE '
NOSTROMO: A TALE OF THE SEABOARD
PERSONAL RECORD, A
RESCUE, THE
SECRET AGENT, THE
SET OF SIX. A
SHADOW LINE. THE
TALES OF UNREST
•TWIXT LAND AND SEA
TYPHOON
UNDER WESTERN EYES
VICTORY
WITHIN THE TIDES
YOUTH: A NARRATIVE
WITH FORD M. HUEFFER
INHERITORS, THE: AN EXTRAVAGANT STORY
ROMANCE: A NOVEL
^
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS
BY
JOSEPH CONRAD
Pues el delito mayor
Del hombre es haber nacito
— Calderon
GARDEN CITY NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
1922
To R"''"
A
osi6^
0
COPYRIGHT, 1896, BY
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION
INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES
AT
THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y.
TO
EDWARD LANCELOT SANDERSON,
520704
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
PART I. I.
When he stepped off the straight and narrow path of his pecuHar honesty, it was with an inward asser- tion of unflinching resolve to fall back again into the monotonous but safe stride of virtue as soon as his little excursion into the wayside quagmires had pro- duced the desired effect. It was going to be a short episode — a sentence in brackets, so to speak — in the flowing tale of his life: a thing of no moment, to be done unwillingly, yet neatly, and to be quickly for- gotten. He imagined that he could go on afterwards looking at the sunshine, enjoying the shade, breathing in the perfume of flowers in the small garden before his house. He fancied that nothing would be changed, that he would be able as heretofore to tyrannise good- liumouredly over his half-caste wife, to notice with tender contempt his pale yellow child, to patronise loftily his dark-skinned brother-in-law, who loved pink neckties and wore patent-leather boots on his little feet, and was so humble before the white hus- band of the lucky sister. Those were the delights of his life, and he was unable to conceive that the moral significance of any act of his could interfere with the very nature of things, could dim the light of the sun, could destroy the perfume of the flowers, the submis- sion of his wife, the smile of his child, the awe-struck
I
2 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
respect of Leonard da Souza and of all the Da Souza family. That family's admiration was the great lux- ury of his life. It rounded and completed his exist- ence in a perpetual assurance of unquestionable su- periority. He loved to breathe the coarse incense they offered before the shrine of the successful white man; the man that had done them the honour to marry their daughter, sister, cousin; the rising man sure to climb very high; the confidential clerk of Hudig & Co. They were a numerous and unclean crowd, liv- ing in ruined bamboo houses, surrounded by neglected compounds, on the outskirts of Macassar. He kept them at arm's length and even further off, perhaps, having no illusions as to their worth. They were a half- caste, lazy lot, and he saw them as they were — ragged, lean, unwashed, under-sized men of various ages, shuffling about aimlessly in slippers; motionless old women who looked like monstrous bags of pink calico stuffed with shapeless lumps of fat, and deposited askew upon decaying rattan chairs in shady corners of dusty verandahs; young women, slim and yellowy big-eyed, long-haired, moving languidly amongst the dirt and rubbish of their dwellings as if every step they took was going to be their very last. He heard their shrill quarrellings, the squalling of their children, the grunting of their pigs; he smelt the odours of the heaps of garbage in their courtyards: and he was greatly disgusted. But he fed and clothed that shabby multitude; those degenerate descendants of Portu- guese conquerors; he was their providence; he kept them singing his praises in the midst of their laziness, of their dirt, of their immense and hopeless squalor: and he was greatly delighted. They wanted much, but he could give them all they wanted without ruin- ing himself. In exchange he had their silent fear, their loquacious love, their noisy veneration. It is a- fine thing to be a providence, and to be told so on every
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 3
day of one's life. It gives one a feeling of enormously remote superiority, and Willems revelled in it. He did not analyse the state of his mind, but probably his greatest delight lay in the unexpressed but intimate conviction that, should he close his hand, all those admiring human beings would starve. His munifi- cence had demorahsed them. An easy task. Since he descended amongst them and married Joanna they had lost the little aptitude and strength for work they might have had to put forth under the stress of ex- treme necessity. They lived now by the grace of his will. This was power. Willems loved it.
In another, and perhaps a lower plane, his days did not want for their less complex but more obvious pleasures. He liked the simple games of skill — bill- iards; also games not so simple, and calling for quite another kind of skill — poker. He had been the aptest pupil of a steady-eyed, sententious American, who had drifted mysteriously into Macassar from the wastes of the Pacific, and, after knocking about for a time in the eddies of town life, had drifted out enigmatically into the sunny solitudes of the Indian Ocean. The memory of the Californian stranger was perpetuated in the game of poker — which became popular in the capital of Celebes from that time — and in a powerful cocktail, the recipe for wdiich is transmitted — in the Kwang-tung dialect — from head boy to head boy of the Chinese servants in the Sunda Hotel even to this day. Willems was a connoisseur in the drink and an adept at the game. Of those accomplishments he was moderately proud. Of the confidence reposed in him by Hudig — the master — he w^as boastfully and obtru- sively proud. This arose from his great benevolence, and from an exalted sense of his duty to himself and the world at large. He experienced that 4n?esistible (li^apulse to irn^art intormatjion_which is inseparable from g'rosslgnorance. There is always some one thing
4 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
which the ignorant man knows, and that thing is the onTything worth knowing; it fills^ttie Ignorant man's uiliy£rse. Willems knew^alTaboiTr himself. On the day when, with many misgivings, he ran away from a Dutch East-Indiaman in Samarang roads, he had com- menced that study of himself, of his own ways, of his own abilities, of those fate-compelling qualities of his which led him towards that lucrative position which he now filled. Being of a modest and diffident na- ture, his successes amazed, almost frightened him, and ended — as he got over the succeeding shocks of sur- prise— by making him ferociously conceitedx. He be- lieved in his genius and in his knowledge of the world. Others should know of it also; for their own good and for his greater glory. ^All those friendly men who slapped him on the back and greeted him noisily should have the benefit of his example. For that he must talk. He talked to them conscientiously. Lin the after- noon he expounded his theory of success over the little tables, dipping now and then his moustache in the crushed ice of the cocktails; in the evening he would often hold forth, cue in hand, to a young listener across the billiard table^The billiard balls stood still as if listening also, under the vivid brilliance of the shaded oil lamps hung low over the cloth ; while away in the shadows of the big room the Chinaman marker would lean wearily against the wall, the blank mask of his face looking pale under the mahogany marking- board; his eyelids dropped in the drowsy fatigue of late hours and in the buzzing monotony of the unin- telligible stream of words poured out by the white man. In a sudden pause of the talk the game would recom- mence with a sharp click and go on for a time in the flowing soft whirr and the subdued thuds as the balls rolled zig-zagging towards the inevitably successful cannon. Through the big windows and the open doors the salt dampness of the sea, the vague smell of mould
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 5
and flowers from the garden of the hotel drifted in and mingled with the odour of lamp oil, growing heavier as the night advanced. The players' heads dived into the light as they bent down for the stroke, springing back again smartly into the greenish gloom of broad lamp-shades; the clock ticked methodically; the un- moved Chinaman continuously repeated the score in a lifeless voice, like a big talking doll — and Willems would win the game. With a remark that it was get- ting late, and that he was a married man, he would say a patronising good-night and step out into the long, empty street. At that hour its white dust was like a dazzling streak of moonlight where the eye sought repose in the dimmer gleam of rare oil lamps. Wil- lems walked homewards, following the line of walls overtopped by the luxuriant vegetation of the front gardens. The houses right and left were hidden be- hind the black masses of flowering shrubs. Willems had the street to himself. 'He would walk in the mid- dle, his shadow gliding obsequiously before him. He looked down on it complacently. The -hadow of a successful man! He would be slightly dzzy with the cocktails and wfthFthe intoxication of his own glor^J As he often told people, he came east fourteen years ago — a cabin boy. A small boy. His shadow must have been very small at that time; he thought with a smile that he was not aware then he had anything — even a shadow — which he dared call his own. And now he was looking at the shadow of the confidential clerk of Hudig & Co. going home. How glorious! How good was life for those that were on the win- ning side! He had won the game of Hfe; also the game of billiards. He walked faster, jingling his win- nings, and thinking of the white stone days that had marked the path of his existence. He thought of the trip to Lombok for ponies — that first important trans- action confided to him by Hudig; then he reviewed
6 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
the more important affairs: the quiet deal in opium, the illegal traffic in gunpowder; the great affair of smuggled firearms, the difficult business of the Rajah of Goak. He carried that last through by sheer pluck; he had bearded the savage old ruler in his council room; he had bribed him with a gilt glass coach, which, rumour said, was used as a hen-coop now; he had overpersuaded him; he had bested him in every way. That was the way to get on. He disapproved of the elementary dishonesty that dips the hand in the cash-box, but one could evade the laws and push the principles of trade to their furthest consequences. Some call that cheating. Those are the fools^ the weak, the contemptible. IThe wise, the strong, the respected, have no scruples. Where there are scruples ther^ can be no power. On that text he preached often to the young men. It was his doctrine, and h^, himself, was a shining example of its truth./
Night after night he went home thus, after a day of toil and pleasure, drunk with the_ sound of his own voice celebrating his own prosperity. On his thirtieth birthday he went home thus. He had spent in good company a nice, noisy evening, and, as he walked along the empty street, the feeling of his own great- ness grew upon him, lifted him above the white dust of Macassar road, and filled him with exultation and regrets. He had not done himself justice over there in the hotel, he had not talked enough about himself, he had not impressed his hearers enough. Never mind. Some other time. Now he would go home and make his wife get up and listen to him. Why should she not get up? — and mix a cocktail for him ■ — and listen patiently. Just so. She shall. If he wanted he could make all the Da Souza family get up. He had only to say a word and they would all come and sit silently in their night vestments on the hard, cold ground of his compound and listen, as long
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 7
as he wished to go on explaining to them from the top of the stairs, how great and good he was. They would. However, his wife would do — for to-night.
His wife! He winced inwardly. A dismal woman with startled eyes and dolorously drooping mouth, that would listen to him in pained wonder and mute still- ness. She was used to those night-discourses now. She had rebelled once— at the beginning. Only once. Now, while he sprawled in the long chair and drank and talked, she would stand at the further end of the table, her hands resting on the edge, her frightened eyes watching his lips, without a sound, without a stir, hardly breathing, till he dismissed her with a con- temptuous : " Go to bed, dummy." She would draw a long breath then and trail out of the room, reheved but unmoved. Nothing could startle her, make her scold or make her cry. She did not complain, she did not rebel. That first difference of theirs was decisive. Too decisive, thought Willems, discontentedly. It had frightened the soul out of her body apparently. A dismal woman! A damn'd business altogether! What the devil did he want to go and saddle himself. . . . Ah! Well! he wanted a home, and the match seemed to please Hudig, and Hudig gave him the bungalow, that flower-bowered "house to which he was wending his way in the cool moonlight. And he had the worship of the Da Souza tribe. A man of his stamp could carry off. anything, do anything, aspire to any- thing. In another five years those white people who attended the Sunday card-parties of the Governor would accept him — half-caste wife and all! Hooray! He saw his shadow dart forward and wave a hat, as big as a rum barrel, at the end of an arm several yards long. . . . Who shouted hooray? ... He smiled shamefacedly to himself, and, pushing his hands deep into his pockets, walked faster 'with a suddenly grave face.
8 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
Behind him — to the left — a cigar end glowed in the ^gateway of Mr. Vinck's front yard. .Leaning against one of the brick pillars, Mr. Vinck, the cashier of Hudig & Co., smoked the last cheroot of the even- ing. Amongst the shadows of the trimmed bushes Mrs. Vinck crunched slowly, with measured steps, the gravel of the circular path before the house.
" There's Willems going home on foot — and drunk I fancy," said Mr. Vinck over his shoulder. '' I saw him jump and wave his hat."
The crunching of the gravel stopped.
" Horrid man," said Mrs. Vinck, calmly. '' I have heard he beats his wife."
" Oh no, my dear, no," muttered absently Mr. Vinck, with a vague gesture. The aspect of Willems as a wife-beater presented to him no interest. How women do misjudge! If Willems wanted to torture his wife he would have recourse to less primitive meth- ods. Mr. Vinck knew Willems well, and believed him to be very able, very smart — objectionably so. As he took the last quick draws at the stump of his cheroot, Mr. Vinck reflected that the confidence accorded by Hudig to Willems was open, under the circumstances, to loyal criticism from Hudig's cashier.
" He is becoming dangerous; he knows too much. He will have to be got rid of," said Mr. Vinck aloud. But Mrs. Vinck had gone in already, and after shaking his head he threw away his cheroot and followed her slowly.
Willems walked on homeward weaving the splen- did web of his future. The road'to greatness lay plain- ly before his eyes, straight and shining, without any obstacle that he could see. He had stepped ofif the path of honesty, as he understood it, but he would soon regain it, never to leave it any more! It was a very small matter. He would soon put it right again. Meantime his duty was not to be found out, and he
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. g
trusted in his skill, in his luck, in his well-estabHshed reputation that would disarm suspicion if anybody dared to suspect. But nobody would dare! True, he was conscious of a sHght deterioration. He had appropriated temporarily some of Hudig's money. A deplorable necessity. But he judged himself with the indulgence that should be extended to the weaknesses of genius. He would make reparation and all would be as before; nobody would be the loser for it, and he would go on unchecked towards the brilliant goal of his ambition.
Hudig's partner!
Before going up the steps of his house he stood for awhile, his feet well apart, chin in hand, contemplat- ing mentally Hudig's future partner. A glorious oc- cupation. He saw him quite safe; soHd as the hills; deep — deep as an abyss; discreet as the gr?ve-
n.
The sea, perhaps because of its saltness, roughens the outside but keeps sweet the kernel of its servants' soul. The old sea; the sea of many years ago, whose servants were devoted slaves and went from youth to age or to a sudden grave without needing to open the book of life, because they could look at eternity re- flected on the element that gave the life and dealt the death. Like a beautiful and unscrupulous woman, the sea of the past was glorious in its smiles, irresistible in its anger, capricious, enticing, illogical, irresponsi- ble; a thing to love, a thing to fear. It cast a spell, it gave joy, it lulled gently into boundless faith; then with quick and causeless anger it killed. But its cruelty was redeemed by the charm of its inscrutable
lO AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
mystery, by the immensity of its promise, by the su- preme witchery of its possible favour. Strong men with childHke hearts were faithful to it, were content to live by its grace — to die by its will. That was the sea before the time when the French mind set the Egyptian muscle in motion and produced a dismal but profitable ditch. Then a great pall of smoke sent out by countless steamboats was spread over the restless mirror of the Infinite. The hand of the engineer tore down the veil of the terrible beauty in order that greedy and faithless landlubbers might pocket dividends. The mystery was destroyed. Like all mysteries, it lived only in the hearts of its worshippers. The hearts changed; the men changed. The once loving and devoted servants went out armed with fire and iron, and conquering the fe^r of their own hearts became a calculating crowd of cold and exacting masters. The sea of the past was an incomparably beautiful mistress, with inscrutable face, with cruel and promising eyes. The sea of to-day is a used-up drudge, wrinkled and defaced by the churned-up wakes of brutal propellers, robbed of the enslaving charm of its vastness, stripped of its beauty, of its mystery and of its promise.
Tom_Lingai;d was a master, a lover, a servant of the sea. The sea took him young, fashioned him body and soul; gave him his fierce aspect, his loud voice, his fearless eyes, his stupidly guileless heart. Gener- ously it gave him his absurd faith in himself, his uni- versal love of creation, his wide indulgence, his con- temptuous severity, his straightforward simplicity of motive and honesty of aim. Having made him what he was, wQmanlike, the sea served him humbly and let him bask unTiarmed in the sunshine of its terribly uncertain favour. Tom Lingard grew rich on the sea and by the sea. He loved it with the ardent affection of a lover, he made light of it with the assurance of perfect mastery, he feared it with the wise fear of a
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. n
brave man, and he took liberties with it as a spoiled child might do with a paternal and good-natured ogre. He was grateful to it, with the gratitude of an honest heart. His greatest pride lay in his profound con- viction of its faithfulness — in the deep sense of his un- erring knowledge of its treachery.
The little brig Flash was the instrument of Lin- gard's fortune. They came north together— both young — out of an Australian port, and after a very few years there was not a white man in the islands, from Palembang to Ternate, from Ombawa to Pala- wan, that did not know Captain Tom and his lucky craft. He was liked for his reckless generosity, for his unswerving honesty, and at first was a little feared on account of his violent temper. Very soon, how- ever, they found him out, and the word went round that Captain Tom's fury was less dangerous than many a man's smile. He prospered greatly. After his first —and successful — fight with the sea robbers, when he rescued, as rumour had it, the yacht of some big wig from home, somewhere down Carimata way, his great popularity began. As years went on it grew apace. Always visiting out-of-the-way places of that part of the world, always in search of new markets for his cargoes — not so much for profit as* for the pleasure of finding them — he soon became known to the Ma- lays, and by his succ*sful recklessness in several en- counters with pirates, established the terror of his name. Those white men with whom he had business, and who naturally were on the look-out for his weak- nesses, could easily see that it was enough to give him his Malay title to flatter him greatly. So when there was anything to be srained by it, and sometimes out of pure' and unprofitable good nature, they would drop the ceremonious ''Captain Lingard " and address " him half seriously as Rajah Laut— the King of the ^Xi^j Sea. /
12 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
He carried the name bravely on his broad shoul- ders. He had carried it many years already when the boy Willems ran barefooted on the deck of the ship Kosmopoliet IV. in Samarang roads, looking with innocent eyes on the strange shore and objurgating his immediate surroundings with blasphemous lips, while his childish brain worked upon the heroic idea of running away. From the poop of the Flash Lin- gard saw in the early morning the Dutch ship get lumberingly under weigh, bound for the eastern ports. Very late in the evening of the same day he stood on the quay of the landing canal, ready to go on board of his brig. The night was starry and clear; the little custom-house building was shut up, and as the gharry that brought him down disappeared up the long avenue of dusty trees leading to the town, Lingard thought himself alone on the quay. He roused up his sleeping boat-crew and stood waiting for them to get ready, when he felt a tug at his coat and a thin voice said, very distinctly —
*' English captain."
Lingard turned round quickly, and what seemed to be a very lean boy jumped back with commendable activity.
*' Who are you? Where do you spring from?" asked Lingard, in startled surprise.
From a safe distance the boy pointed towards a cargo lighter moored to the quay.
"Been hiding there, have you?" said Lingard. " Well, what do you want? Speak out, confound you. You did not come here to scare me to death, for fun, did you?"
The boy tried to explain in imperfect English, but very soon Lingard interrupted him.
" I see," he exclaimed, *' you ran away from the big ship that sailed this morning. Well, why don't you go to your countrymen here?"
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 1 3
" Ship gone only a little way — to Sourabaya. Make me go back to the ship," explained the boy.
*' Best thing for you," affirmed Lingard with con- viction.
" No," retorted the boy; " me want stop here; not want go home. Get money here; home no good."
'' This beats all my going a-fishing," commented the astonished Lingard. " It's money you want? Well! well! And you were not afraid to run away, you bag of bones, you ! "
The boy intimated that he was frightened of noth- ing but of being sent back to the ship. Lingard looked at him in meditative silence.
'* Come closer," he said at last. He took the boy by the chin, and turning up his face gave him a search- ing look. " How old are you? " " Seventeen."
" There's not much of you for seventeen. Are you hungry ? " " A little."
*' Will you come with me, in that brig there? " The boy moved without a word towards the boat and scrambled into the bows.
" Knows his place," muttered Lingard to himself as he stepped heavily into the stern sheets and took up the yoke lines. " Give way there."
The Malay boat crew lay back together, and the gig sprang away from the quay heading towards the brig's riding Hght.
Sucli^as the begianing^ of .Willems^career. Cingard learned in half an hour all that there was of Willems' commonplace story. Father outdoor clerk of some ship-broker in Rotterdam ; mother dead. The boy quick in learning, but idle in school. The strait- ened circumstances in the house filled with small brothers and sisters, sufficiently clothed and fed but otherwise running wild, while the disconsolate widow-
14 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
er tramped about all day in a shabby overcoat and im- perfect boots on the muddy quays, and in the evening piloted wearily the half-intoxicated foreign skippers amongst the places of cheap delights, returning home late, sick with too much smoking and drinking — for company's sake — with these men, who expected such attentions in the way of business. Then the offer of the good-natured captain of Kosmopoliet IV., who was pleased to do something for the patient and obliging fellow; young Willems' great joy, his still greater dis- appointment with the sea that looked so charming from afar, but proved so hard and exacting on closer ac- quaintance— and then this running away by a sudden impulse. The boy was hopelessly at variance with the spirit of the sea. He had an instinctive contempt for the honest simplicity of that work which led to noth- ing he cared for. Lingard soon found this out. He offered to send him home in an English ship, but the boy begged hard to be permitted to remain. He wrote a beautiful hand, became soon perfect in English, was quick at figures ; and Lingard made him useful in that way. As he grew older his trading instincts developed themselves astonishingly, and Lingard left him often to trade in one island or another while he, himself, made an intermediate trip to some out-of-the-way place. On Willems expressing a wish to that effect, Lingard let him enter Hudig's service. He felt a lit- tle sore at that abandonment because he had attached himself, in a way, to his protege. Still he was proud of him, and spoke up for him loyally. At first it was, " Smart boy that — never make a seaman though." Then when Willems was helping in the trading he referred to him as " that clever young fellow." Later on, when Willems became the confidential agent of Hudig, employed in many a delicate affair, the simple- hearted old seaman would point an admiring finger at his back and whisper to whoever stood near at the
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 1 5
moment, " Long-headed chap that; deuced long- headed chap. Look at him. Confidential man of old Hudig. I picked him up in a ditch, you may say, like a starved cat. Skin and bone. Ton my word I did. And now he knows more than I do about island trading. Fact. I am not joking. More than I do," he would repeat, seriously, with iniiocent pride in his honest eyes.
From the safe elevation of his commercial suc- cesses Willems patronised Lingard. He had a liking for his benefactor, not unmixed with some disdain for the crude directness of the old fellow's methods of conduct. There were, however, certain sides of Lin- gard's character for which Willems felt a qualified re- spect. The talkative seaman knew how to be silent on certain matters that to Willems were very inter- esting. Besides, Lingard was rich, and that in itself was enough to compel Willems' unwilling admira- tion. In his confidential chats with Hudig, Willems generally alluded to the benevolent Englishman as the " lucky old fool " in a very distinct tone of vexa- tion; Hudig would grunt an unquahfied assent, and then the two would look at each other in a sudden immobility of pupils fixed by a stare of unexpressed thought.
" You can't find out where he gets all that india- rubber, hey, Willems? " Hudig would ask at last, turn- ing away and bending over the papers on his desk.^ " No, Mr. Hudig. Not yet. But I am trying," was Willems' invariable reply, delivered with a ring of regretful deprecation.
"Try! Always try! You may try! You think yourself clever perhaps," rumbled on Hudig, without looking up. " I have been trading with him twenty —thirty years now. The old fox. And I have tried. Bah!"
He stretched out a short, podgy leg and contem-
l6 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
plated the bare Instep and the grass shpper hanging by the toes. '' You can't make him drunk? " he would add, after a pause of stertorous breathing.
" No, Mr. Hudig, I can't really," protested Wil- lems, earnestly.
" Well, don't try. I know him. Don't try," ad- vised the master, and, bending again over his desk, his staring bloodshot eyes close to the paper, he would go on tracing laboriously with his thick fingers the slim unsteady letters of his correspondence, while Willems waited respectfully for his further good pleas- ure before asking, with great deference —
"Any orders, Mr. Hudig?"
" Hm! yes. Go to Bun-Hin yourself and see the dollars of that payment counted and packed, and have them put on board the mail-boat for Ternate. She's due here this afternoon."
" Yes, Mr. Hudig."
" And, look here. If the boat is late, leave the case in Bun-Hin's godown till to-morrow. Seal it up. Eight seals as usual. Don't take it away till the boat is here."
" No, Mr. Hudig."
'' And don't forget about these opium cases. It's for to-night. Use my own boatmen. Tranship them from the Caroline to the Arab barque," went on the master in his hoarse undertone. " And don't you come to me with another story of a case dropped over- board Hke last time," he added, with sudden ferocity, looking up at his confidential clerk.
" No, Mr. Hudig. I will take care."
" That's all. Tell that pig as you go out that if he doesn't make the punkah go a little better I will break every bone in his body," finished up Hudig, wiping his purple face with a red silk handke4xhiei-iiearly as big as a counterpane.
Noiselessly Willems went out, shutting carefully
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
17
behind him the httle green door through which he passed to the warehouse. Hudig, pen in hand, hstened to him buhying the punkah boy with profane violence, born of unbounded zeal for the master's comfort, be- fore he returned to his writing amid the rustling of papers fluttering in the wind sent down by the punkah that waved in wide sweeps above his head.
Willems would nod familiarly to Mr. Vinck, who had his desk close to the little door of the private office, and march down the warehouse with an important air. Mr. Vinck — extreme dislike lurking in every wrinkle of his gentlemanly countenance — would follow with his eyes the white figure flitting in the gloom amongst the piles of bales and cases till it passed out through the big archway into the glare of the street.
III.
The opportunity and the temptation were too much for Willems, and under the pressure of sudden neces- sity he abused that trust which was his pride, the per- petual sign of his cleverness and a load too heav} for him to carry. A run of bad luck at cards, the failure of a small speculation undertaken on his own account, an unexpected demand for money from one or an- other member of the Da Souza family — and almost before he was well aware of it he was off the path of his peculiar honesty. It was such a faint and ill-de- fined track that it took him some time to find out how far he had strayed amongst the brambles of the dan- gerous wilderness he had been skirting for so many years, without any other guide than his own con- venience and that doctrine of success which he had found for himself in the bgok of life — in those inter-
l8 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
esting chapters that the Devil has been permitted to write in it, to test the sharpness of men's eyesight and the steadfastness of their hearts. For one short, dark and sohtary moment he was dismayed, but he had .thaJxourag£L.that_:^iItnQt_&caleJieig±it^^ bravelx through the mud — if there be no other road. He apphed himself to the task of restitution, and de- voted himself to the duty of not being found out. On his thirtieth birthday he had almost accomplished the task — and the duty had been faithfully and cleverly performed. He saw himself safe. Again he could look hopefully towards the goal of his legitimate ambition. Nobody would dare to suspect him, and in a few days there would be nothing to suspect. He was elated. He did not know that his prosperity had touched then its high-water mark, and that the tide was already on the turn.
Two days afterwards he knew. ]\Ir. Vinck, hear- ing the rattle of the door-handle, jumped up from his desk — where he had been tremulously listening to the loud voices in the private office — and buried his face in the big safe with nervous haste. For the last time Willems passed through the little green door leading to Hudig's sanctum, which, during the past half-hour, might have been taken — from the fiendish noise within — for the cavern of some wild beast. Willems' trou- bled eyes took in the quick impression of men and things as he came out from the place of his humilia- tion. He saw the scared expression of the punkah boy; the Chinamen tellers sitting on their heels with unmovable faces turned up blankly towards him, while their arrested hands hovered over the little piles of bright guilders ranged on the floor; Mr. Vinck's shoulder-blades with the fleshy rims of two red ears above. He saw the long avenue of gin cases stretch- ing from where he stood to the arched doorway be- yond which he would be able to breathe perhaps. A
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. jg
thin rope's end lay across his path and he saw it dis- tinctly, yet stumbled heavily over it as if it had been a bar of iron. Then he found himself in the street at last, but could not find air enough to fill his lungs. He walked towards his home, gasping.
As the sound of Hudig's insults that lingered in his ears grew fainter by the lapse of time, the feeling of shame was replaced slowly by a passion of anger against himself and still more against the stupid con- course of circumstances that had driven him into his idiotic indiscretion. Idiotic indiscretion; that is how he defined his guilt to himself. Could there be any- thing worse from the point of view of his undeniable cleverness? What a fatal aberration of an acute mind! He did not recognise himself there. He must have been mad. That's it. A sudden gust of madness. And now the work of long years was destroyed utterly. What would become of him?
Before he could answer that question he found himself in the garden before his house, Hudig's wed- ding gift. He looked at it with a vague surprise to find it there. His past was so utterly gone from him that the dwelling which belonged to it appeared to him incongruous standing there intact, neat, and cheerful in the sunshine of the hot afternoon. The house was a pretty Httle structure all doors and win- dows, surrounded on all sides by the deep verandah supported on slender columns clothed in the green foliage of creepers, which also fringed the overhanging eaves of the high-pitched roof. Slowly, Willems mounted the dozen steps that led to the verandah. He paused at every step. He must tell his wife. He felt frightened at the prospect, and his alarm dismayed him. Frightened to face her! Nothing could give him a better measure of the greatness of the change around him, and in him. Another man — and another life with the faith in himself g'one. He could not
20 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
be worth much if he was afraid to face that wo- man.
He dared not enter the house through the open door of the dining-room, but stood irresolute by the httle work-table where trailed a white piece of calico, with a needle stuck in it, as if the work had been left hurriedly. The pink-crested cockatoo started, on his appearance, into clumsy activity and began to climb laboriously up and down his perch, calling " Joanna " with indistinct loudness and a persistent screech that prolonged the last syllable of the name as if in a peal of insane laughter. The screen in the doorway moved gently once or twice in the breeze, and each time Wil- lems started slightly, expecting his wife, but he never lifted his eyes, although straining his ears for the sound of her footsteps. Gradually he lost himself in his thoughts, in the endless speculation as to the manner in which she would receive his news — and his orders. In this preoccupation he almost forgot the fear of her presence. No doubt she will cry, she will lament, she will be helpless and frightened and passive as ever. And he would have to drag that limp weight on and on through the darkness of a spoiled life. Horrible! Of course he could not abandon her and the child to certain misery or possible starvation. The wife and the child of Willems. Willems the successful, the smart; Willems the conf .... Pah! And what was Willems now? Willems the .... He strangled the half-born thought, and cleared his throat to stifle a groan. Ah! Won't they talk to-night in the billiard- room — his world, where he had been first — all those men to whom he had been so superciliously conde- scending. Won't they talk with surprise, and afifected regret, and grave faces, and wise nods. Some of them owed him money, but he never pressed anybody. Not he. Willems, the prince of good fellows, they called him. And now they will rejoice, no doubt, at his
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 2 1
downfall. A crowd of imbeciles. In his abasement he was yet aware of his superiority over those fellows, who were merely honest or simply not found out yet. A crowd of imbeciles! He shook his fist at the evoked image of his friends, and the startled parrot fluttered its wings and shrieked in desperate fright.
In a short glance upwards Willems saw his wife come round the corner of the house. He lowered his eyelids quickly, and waited silently till she came near and stood on the other side of the little table. He would not look at her face, but he could see the red dressing-gown he knew so well. She trailed through life in that red dressing-gown, with its row of dirty blue bows down the front, stained, and hooked on awry; a torn flounce at the bottom following her like a snake as she moved languidly about, with her hair negligently caught up, and a tangled wisp straggling untidily down her back. His gaze travelled upwards from bow to bow, noticing those that hung only by a thread, but it did not go beyond her chin. He looked at her lean throat, at the obtrusive collar-bone visible in the disarray of the upper part of her attire. He saw the thin arm and the bony hand clasping the child she carried, and he felt an immense distaste for those en- cumbrances of his life. He waited for her to say some- thing, but as he felt her eyes rest on him in unbroken silence he sighed and began to speak.
It was a hard task. He spoke slowly, lingering amongst the memories of this early life in his reluc- tance to confess that this was the end of it and the beginning of a less splendid existence. In his con- viction of having made her happiness in the full satis- faction of all material wants he never doubted for a moment that she was ready to keep him company on no matter how hard and stony a road. He was not elated by this certitude. He had married her to please Hudig, and the greatness of his sacrifice ought to have
22 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
made her happy without any further exertion on his part. She had years of glory as Willems' wife, and years of comfort, of loyal care, and of such tenderness as she deserved. He had guarded her carefully from any bodily hurt; and of^any other_ suffering he had no conception. The assertion of his superiority was only another benefit conferred on her. All this was a mat- ter of course, but he told her all this so as to bring vividly before her the greatness of her loss. She was so dull of understanding that she would not grasp it else. And now it was at an end. They would have to go. Leave this house, leave this island, go far away where he was unknown. To the English Strait-Set- tlements perhaps. He would find an opening there for his abilities — and juster men to deal with than old Hudig. He laughed bitterly.
" You have the money I left at home this morning, Joanna? " he asked. '' We will want it all now."
As he spoke those words he thought he was a fine fellow. Nothing new that. Still, he surpassed there his own expectations. Hang it all, there are sacred things in life, after all. The marriage tie was one of them, and he was not the man to break it. The solid- ity of his principles caused him great satisfaction, but he did not care to look at his wife, for all that. He waited for her to speak. Then he shall have to con- sole her; tell her not to be a crying fool; to get ready to go. Go where? How? When? He shook his head. They must leave at once; that was the prin- cipal thing. He felt a sudden need to hurry up his departure.
" Well, Joanna," he said, a little impatiently — "don't stand there in a trance. Do you hear? We must . . ."
He looked up at his wife, and whatever he was going to add remained unspoken. She was staring at him with her big, slanting eyes, that seemed to hiro
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 23
twice their natural size. The child, its dirty little face pressed to its mothers shoulder, was sleeping peace- fully. The deep silence of the house was not broken, but rather accentuated, by the low mutter of the cocka- too, now very still on its perch. As Willems was look- ing at Joanna her upper lip was drawn up on one side, giving to her melancholy face a vicious expression altogether new to his experience. He stepped back in his surprise.
"Oh! You great man!" she said distinctly, but in a voice that was hardly above a whisper.
Those words, and still more her tone, stunned him as if somebody had fired a gun close to his ear. He stared back at her stupidly.
''Oh! you great man!" she repeated slowly, glancing right and left as if meditating a sudden es- cape. " And you think that I am going to starve with you. You are nobody now. You think my mamma and Leonard would let me go away? And with you! With you," she repeated scornfully, raising her voice, which woke up the child and caused it to whimper feebly.
"Joanna!" exclaimed Willems.
" Do not speak to me. I have heard what I have waited for all these years. You are less than dirt, you that have wiped your feet on me. I have waited for this. I am not afraid now. I do not want you; do not come near me. Ah — ^h ! " she screamed shrilly, as he held out his hand in an entreating gesture — " Ah! Keep ofif me! Keep off me! Keep off! "
She backed away, looking at him with eyes both angry and frightened. Willems stared motionless, in dumb amazement at the mystery of anger and revolt in the head of his wife. Why? What had he ever done to her? This was the day of injustice indeed. First Hudig — and now his wife. He felt a terror at this hate that had lived stealthily so near him for years.
24
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
He tried to speak, but she shrieked again, and it was Hke a needle through his heart. Again he raised his hand.
" Help! " called Mrs. Willems, in a piercing voice. "Help!"
''Be quiet! You fool!" shouted Willems, trying to drown the noise of his wife and child in his own angry accents and rattling violently the little zinc table in his exasperation.
From under the house, where there were bath- rooms and a tool closet, appeared Leonard, a rusty iron bar in his hand. He called threateningly from the bottom of the stairs.
" Do not hurt her, Mr. Willems. You are a sav- age. Not at all like we, whites."
"You too!" said the bewildered Willems. "I haven't touched her. Is this a madhouse?" He moved towards the stairs, and Leonard dropped the bar with a clang and made for the gate of the com- pound. Willems turned back to his wife.
" So you expected this," he said. " It is a con- spiracy. Who's that sobbing and groaning in the room? Some more of your precious family. Hey? "
She was more calm now, and putting hastily the crying child in the big chair walked towards him with sudden fearlessness.
" My mother," she said, " my mother who came to defend me from you — man from nowhere; a vaga- bond!"
" You did not call me a vagabond when you hung round my neck — before we were married," said Wil- lems, contemptuously.
" You took good care that I should not hang round your neck after we were," she answered, clenching her hands, and putting her face close to his. " You boasted while I suffered and said nothing. What has become of your greatness; of our greatness — you
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 25
were always speaking about? Now I am going to live on the charity of your master. Yes. That is true. He sent Leonard to tell me so. And you will go and boast somewhere else, and starve. So! Ah! I can breathe now! This house is mine."
" Enough! " said Willems, slowly, with an arrest- ing gesture.
She leaped back, the fright again in her eyes, snatched up the child, pressed it to her breast, and, falling into a chair, drummed insanely with her heels on the resounding floor of the verandah.
'' I shall go," said Willems, steadily. " I thank you. For the first time in your life you make me hap- py. You were a stone round my neck; you under- stand. I did not mean to tell you that as long as you lived, but you made me — now. Before I pass this gate you shall be gone from my mind. You made it very easy. I thank you."
He turned and went down the steps without giv- ing her a glance, while she sat upright and quiet, with wide-open eyes, the child crying querulously in her arms. At the gate he came suddenly upon Leonard, who had been dodging about there and failed to get out of the way in time.
'' Do not be brutal, Mr. Willems," said Leonard, hurriedly. " It is unbecoming between white men with all those natives looking on." Leonard's legs trem- bled very much, and his voice wavered between high and low tones without any attempt at control on his part. '' Restrain your improper violence," he went on mumbhng rapidly. *' I am a respectable man of very good family, while you ... it is regrettable . . . they all say so . . ."
"What?" thundered Willems. He felt a sudden impulse of mad anger, and before he knew what had happened he was looking at Leonard da Souza rolHng in the dust at his feet. He stepped over his prostrate
26 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
brother-in-law and tore blindly down the street, every- body making way for the frantic white man.
When he came to himself he was beyond the out- skirts of the town, stumbling on the hard and cracked earth of reaped rice fields. How did he get there? It was dark. He must get back. As he walked towards the town slowly, his mind reviewed the events of the day and he felt a sense of bitter loneliness. His wife had turned him out of his own house. He had as- saulted brutally his brother-in-law, a member of the Da Souza family — of that band of his worshippers. He did. Well, no! It was some other man. Another man was coming back. A man without a past, with- out a future, yet full of pain and shame and anger. He stopped and looked round. A dog or two glided across the empty street and rushed past him with a frightened snarl. He was now in the midst of the Malay quarter whose bamboo houses, hidden in the verdure of their little gardens, were dark and silent. Men, women and children slept in there. Human beings. Would he ever sleep, and where? He felt as if he was the out- cast of all mankind, and as he looked hopelessly round, before resuming his weary march, it seemed to him that the world was bigger, the night more vast and more black; but he went on doggedly with his head down as if pushing his way through some thick bram- bles. Then suddenly he felt planks under his feet and, looking up, saw the red light at the end of the jetty. He walked quite to the end and stood leaning against the post, under the lamp, looking at the roadstead where two vessels at anchor swayed their slender rig- ging amongst the stars. The end of the jetty ; and here in one step more the end of life ; the end of everything. Better so. What else could he do? Nothing ever comes back. He saw it clearly. The respect and ad- miration of them all, the old habits and old affections finished abruptly in the clear perception of the cause
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 27
of his disgrace. He saw all this; and for a time he came out of himself, out of his selfishness — out of the constant preoccupation of his interests and his desires • — out of the temple of self and the concentration of personal thought.
His thoughts now wandered home. Standing in the tepid stillness of a starry tropical night he felt the breath of the bitter east wind, he saw the high and narrow fronts of tall houses under the gloom of a clouded sky; and on muddy quays he saw the shabby, high-shouldered figure — the patient, faded face of the weary man earning bread for the children that waited for him in a dingy home. It was miserable, miserable. But it would never come back. What was there in common between those things and Willems the clever, Willems the successful. He' had cut himself adrift from that home many years ago. Better for him then. Better for them now. All this was gone, never to come back again; and suddenly he shivered, seeing himself alone in the presence of unknown and terrible dangers.
For the first time in his life he felt afraid of the future, because he had lost his faith, the faith in his own success. And he had destroyed it foolishly with his own hands!
IV.
His meditation which resembled slow drifting into suicide was interrupted by Lingard, who, with a loud " I've got you at last! " dropped his hand heavily on Willems' shoulder. This time it was the old seaman himself going out of his way to pick up the uninter- esting waif — all that there was left of that sudden ^nd sordid shipwreck. To Willems, the rough, friendly
4
28 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
voice was a quick and fleeting relief followed by a sharper pang of anger and unavailing regret. That voice carried him back to the beginning of his promis- ing career, the end of which was very visible now from the jetty where they both stood. He shook himself free from the friendly grasp, saying with ready bitter- ness—
'' It's all your fault. Give me a push now, do, and send me over. I have been standing here waiting for help. You are the man — of all men. You helped at the beginning; you ought to have a hand in the end."
" I have better use for you than to throw you to the fishes," said Lingard, seriously, taking Willems by the arm and forcing him gently to walk up the 1 jetty. " I have been buzzing over this town like a bluebottle fly, looking for you high and low. I have heard a lot. 1 will tell you what, Willems; you are no saint, that's a fact. And you have not been over- wise either. I am not throwing stones," he added, hastily, as Willems made an effort to get away, *' but I am not going to mince matters. Never could! You keep quiet while I talk. Can't you?"
With a gesture of resignation and a half-stifled groan Willems submitted to the stronger will, and the two men paced slowly up and down the resounding planks, while Lingard disclosed to Willems the exact manner of his undoing. After the first shock Willems lost the faculty of surprise in the overpowering feeling of indignation. So it was Vinck and Leonard who had served him so. They had watched him, tracked his misdeeds, reported them to Hudig. They had bribed obscure Chinamen, wormed out confidences from tipsy skippers, got at various boatmen, and had pieced out in that way the story of his irregularities. The blackness of this dark intrigue filled him with horror. He could understand Vinck. There was no love lost between them. But Leonard! Leonard!
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 29
" Why, Captain Lingard," he burst out, " the fel- low licked my boots."
" Yes, yes, yes," said Lingard, testily, " we know that, and you did your best to cram your boot down his throat. No man likes that, my boy."
" I was always giving money to all that hungry lot," went on Willems, passionately. " Always my hand in my pocket. They never had to ask twice."
*' Just so. Your generosity frightened them. They asked themselves where all that came from, and con- cluded that it was safer to throw you overboard. After all, Hudig is a much greater man than you, my friend, and they have a claim on him also."
"What do you mean. Captain Lingard?"
" What do I mean? " repeated Lingard, slowly. " Why, you are not going to make me believe you did not know your wife was Hudig's daughter. Come> now ! "
Willems stopped suddenly and swayed about.
'' Ah! I understand," he gasped. '' I never heard. . . . Lately I thought there was . . . But no, I never guessed."
"Oh, you simpleton!" said Lingard, pityingly. " Ton my word," he muttered to himself, " I don't believe the fellow knew. Well! well! Steady now. Pull yourself together. What's wrong there. She is a good wife to you."
" Excellent wife," said Willems, in a dreary voice, looking far over the black and scintillating water.
" Very well then," went on Lingard, with increas- ing friendliness. " Nothing wrong there. But did you really think that Hudig was marrying you ofif and giv- ing you a house and I don't know what, out of love for you?"
" I had served him well," answered Willems. " How well, you know yourself — through thick and
30 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
thin. No matter what work and what risk, I was al- ways there; ahvays ready."
How well he saw the greatness of his work and the immensity of that injustice which was his reward She was that man's daughter! In the light of this dis- closure the facts of the last five years of his life stood clearly revealed in their full meaning. He had spoken first to Joanna at the gate of their dwelling as he went to his work in the brilliant flush of the early morning, when women and flowers are charming even to the dullest eyes. A most respectable family — two women and a young man — were his next-door neighbours. Nobody ever came to their Httle house but the priest, a native from the Spanish islands, now and then. The young man Leonard he had met in town, and was flat- tered by the little fellow's immense respect for the great Willems. He let him bring chairs, call the wait- ers, chalk his cues when playing billiards, express his admiration in choice words. He even condescended to listen patiently to Leonard's allusions to " our be- loved father," a man of official position, a government agent in Koti, where he died of cholera, alas! a victim to duty, like a good Catholic and a good man. It sounded very respectable, and Willems approved of those feeling references. Moreover, he prided him- self upon having no colour-prejudices and no racial antipathies. He consented to drink curaqoa one after- noon on the verandah of Mrs. da Souza's house. He remembered Joanna that day, swinging in a hammock. She was untidy even then, he remembered, and that was the only impression he carried away from that visit. He had no time for love in those glorious days, no time even for a passing fancy, but gradually he fell into the habit of calling almost every day at that little house where he was greeted by Mrs. da Souza's shrill voice screaming for Joanna to come and enter- tain the gentleman from Hudig & Co. And then the
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
31
sudden and unexpected visit of the priest. He remem- bered the man's flat, yellow face, his thin legs, his pro- pitiatory smile, his beaming black eyes, his conciliat- ing manner, his veiled hints which he did not under- stand at the time. How he wondered what the man wanted, and how unceremoniously he got rid of him. And then came vividly into his recollection the morn- ing when he met again that fellow coming out of Hu- dig's office, and how he was amused at the incongruous visit. And that morning with Hudig! Would he ever forget it? Would he ever forget his surprise as the master, instead of plunging at once into business, looked at him thoughtfully before turning, with a fur- tive smile, to the papers on the desk? He could hear him now, his nose in the paper before him, dropping astonishing words in the intervals of wheezy breath- ing.
" Heard said . . . called there often . . . most re- spectable ladies . . . knew the father very well . . . estimable . . . best thing for a young man . . . settle down. . . . Personally, very glad to hear . . . thing arranged. . . . Suitable recognition of valuable ser- vices. . . . Best thing — best thing to do."
And he believed! What credulity! What an ass! Hudig knew the father! Rather. And so did every- body else probably; all except himself. How proud he had been of Hudig's benevolent interest in his fate! How proud he was when invited by Hudig to stay with him at his little house in the country — where he could meet men, men of official position — as a friend. Vinck had been green with envy- Oh, yes! He had believed in the best thing, and took the girl like a gift of fortune. How he boasted to Hudig of being free] from prejudices. The old scoundrel must have been laughing in his sleeve at his fool of a confidential clerk. He took the girl, guessing nothing How could he? There had been a father of some kind to the common
32 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
knowledge. Men knew him; spoke about him. A lank man of hopelessly mixed descent, but otherwise — apparently — unobjectionable. The shady relations came out afterwards, but — with his freedom from prejudices — he did not mind them, because, with their humble dependence, they completed his triumphant life. Taken in! taken in! Hudig had found an easy way to provide for the begging crowd. He had shifted the burden of his youthful vagaries on to the shoulders of his confidential clerk; and while he worked for the master, the master had cheated him; had stolen his very self from him. He was married. He belonged to that woman, no matter what she might do! . . . Had sworn ... for all life! . . . Thrown himself away. . . . And that man dared this very morning call him a thief! Damnation!
'* Let go, Lingard!" he shouted, trying to get away by a sudden jerk from the watchful old seaman. " Let me go and kill that . . ."
"No you don't!" panted Lingard, hanging on manfully. '' You want to kill, do you? You lunatic. Ah! — I've got you now! Be quiet, I say! "
They struggled violently, Lingard forcing Willems slowly toward the guard-rail. Under their feet the jetty sounded like a drum in the quiet night. On the shore end the native caretaker of the wharf watched the combat, squatting behind the safe shelter of some big cases. The next day he informed his friends, with calm satisfaction, that two drunken white men had fought on the jetty. It had been a great fight. They fought without arms, like wild beasts, after the manner of white men. No! nobody was killed, or there would have been trouble and a report to make. How could he know why they fought? White men have no rea- son when they are like that.
Just as Lingard was beginning to fear that he would be unable to restrain much longer the violence
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
33
of the younger man, he felt Willems' muscles relax- ing, and took advantage of this opportunity to pin him, by a last effort, to the rail. They both panted heavily, speechless, their faces very close.
" All right," muttered Willems at last. '' Don't break my back over this infernal rail. I will be quiet."
" Now you are reasonable," said Lingard, much reheved. ''What made you fly into that passion?" he asked, leading him back to the end of the jetty, and, still holding him prudently with one hand, he fumbled with the other for his whistle and blew a shrill and prolonged blast. Over the smooth water of the roadstead came in answer a faint cry from one of the ships at anchor.
" My boat will be here directly," said Lingard. " Think of what you are going to do. I sail to-night."
*' What is there for me to do, except one thing?" said Willems, gloomily.
" Look here," said Lingard; " I picked you up as a boy, and consider myself responsible for you in a way. You took your life into your own hands many years ago — but still . . ."
He paused, listening, till he heard the regular grind of the oars in the rowlocks of the approaching boat, then went on again.
" I have made it all right with Hudig. You owe him nothing now. Go back to your wife. She is a good woman. Go back to her."
** Why, Captain Lingard," exclaimed Willems, "she . . ."
" It was most affecting," went on Lingard, without heeding him. " I went to your house to look for you and there I saw her despair. It was heart-breaking. She called for you ; she entreated me to find you. She spoke wildly, poor woman, as if all this was her fault."
Willems Hstened amazed. The blind old idiot! How queerly he misunderstood! But if it was true,
34 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
if it was even true, the very idea of seeing her filled his soul with intense loathing. He did not break his oath, but he would not go back to her. Let hers Be the sin of that separation; of the sacred bond broken. He revelled in the extreme purity of his heart, and he would not go back to her. Let her come back to him. He had the comfortable conviction that he would never see her again, and that through her own fault only. In this conviction he told himself solemnly that if she would come to him he would receive her with gener- ous forgiveness, because such was the praiseworthy solidity of his principles. But he hesitated whether he would or would not disclose to Lingard the revolt- ing completeness of his humiliation. Turned out of his house — and by his wife; that woman who hardly dared to breathe in his presence, yesterday. He re- mained perplexed and silent. No. He lacked the courage to tell the ignoble story.
As the boat of the brig appeared suddenly on the black water close to the jetty, Lingard broke the pain- ful silence.
'' I always thought," he said, sadly, *' I always thought you were somewhat heartless, Willems, and apt to cast adrift those that thought most of you. I appeal to what is best in you; do not abandon that woman."
'' I have not abandoned her," answered Willems, quickly, with conscious truthfulness. " Why should I? As you so justly observed, she has been a good wife to me. A very good, quiet, obedient, loving wife, and I love her as much as she loves me. Every bit. But as to going back now, to that place where I ... To walk again amongst those men who yes- terday were ready to crawl before me, and then feel on my back the sting of their pitying or satisfied smiles — no! I can't. I would rather hide from them at the bottom of the sea," he went on, with resolute energy.
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 35
" I don't think, Captain Lingard," he added, more quietly, " I don't think that you reahse what my posi- tion was there."
In a wide sweep of his hand he took in the sleeping sliore from north to south, as if wishing it a proud and threatening good-bye. For a short moment he forgot his downfall in the recollection of his brilliant triumphs. Amongst the men of his class and occupation who slept in those dark houses he had been indeed the first.
" It is hard," muttered Lingard, pensively. " But whose the fault? Whose the fault?"
''Captain Lingard!" cried Willems, under the sudden impulse of a felicitous inspiration, " if you leave me here on this jetty — it's murder. I shall never re- turn to that place alive, wife or no wife. You may just as well cut my throat at once."
The old seaman started.
" Don't try to frighten me, Willems," he said, with great severity, and paused.
Above the accents of Willems' brazen despair he heard, with considerable uneasiness, thg^^whisp^ of his gy^n absurd conscienjC£. He meditated for awhile with an irresolute air.
" I could tell you to go and drown yourself, and be damned to you," he said, with an unsuccessful assump- tion of brutality in his manner, " but I won't. We are responsible for one another — worse luck. I am almost ashamed of myself, but I can understand your dirty pride. I can! By . . ."
He broke ofif with a loud sigh and' walked briskly to the steps, at the bottom of which lay his boat, rising and falling gently on the slight and invisible swell.
" Below there! Got a lamp in the boat? Well, Hght it and bring it up, one of you. Hurry now! "
He tore out a page of his pocket-book, moistened his pencil with great energy and waited, stamping his feet impatiently.
36 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
" I will see this thing through," he muttered to himself. " And I will have it all square and shipshape; see if I don't! Are you going to bring that lamp, you son of a crippled mud-turtle? I am waiting."
The gleam of the light on the paper placated his professional anger, and he wrote rapidly, the final dash of his signature curling the paper up in a triangular tear.
'* Take that to this white Tuan's house. I will send the boat back for you in half an hour."
The coxswain raised his lamp deliberately to Wil- lems' face.
*' This Tuan? Tau! I know."
"Quick then!" said Lingard, taking the lamp from him — and the man went off at a run.
" Kassi mem! To the lady herself," called Lin- gard after him.
Then, when the man disappeared, he turned to Willems.
" I have written to your wife," he said. " If you do not return for good, you do not go back to that house only for another parting. You must come as you stand. I won't have that poor woman tormented. I will see to it that you are not separated for long. Trust me !"
Willems shivered, then smiled in the darkness.
" No fear of that," he muttered, enigmatically. " I trust you implicitly. Captain Lingard," he added, in a louder tone.
Lingard led the way down the steps, swinging the lamp and speaking over his shoulder.
" It is the second time, Willems, I take you in hand. Mind it is the last. The second time; and the only difference between then and now is that you were barefooted then and have boots now. In fourteen years. With all your smartness! A poor recult that. A very poor result."
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
37
He stood for awhile on the lowest platform of the steps, the light of the lamp falling on the upturned face of the stroke oar, who held the gunwale of the boat close alongside, ready for the captain to step in.
" You see," he went on, argumentatively, fumbling about the top of the lamp, " you got yourself so crooked amongst those 'longshore quill-drivers that you could not run clear in any way. That's what comes of such talk as yours, and of such a life. A man sees so much falsehood that he begins to lie to himself. Pah! " he said, in disgust, " there's only one place for an honest man. The sea, my boy, the sea! But you never would; didn't think there was enough money in it; and now — look! "
He blew the light out, and, stepping into the boat, stretched quickly his hand towards Willems, with friendly care. Willems sat by him in silence, and the boat shoved off, sweeping in a wide circle towards the brig.
" Your compassion is all for my wife. Captain Lin- gard," said Willems, moodily. " Do you think I am so very happy? "
" No! no! " said Lingard, heartily. " Not a word more shall pass my Hps. I had to speak my mind once, seeing that I knew you from a child, so to speak. And now I shall forget; but you are young yet. Life is very long," he went on, with unconscious sadness; " let this be a lesson to you."
He laid his hand affectionately on Willems' shoul- der, and they both sat silent till the boat came along- side the ship's ladder.
When on board Lingard gave orders to his mate, and leading Willems on the poop, sat on the breech of one of the brass six-pounders with which his vessel was armed. The boat went off again to bring back the messenger. As soon as it was seen returning dark forms appeared on the brig's spars; then the sails fell
38 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
in festoons with a swish of their heavy folds, and hung motionless under the yards in the dead calm of the clear and dewy night. From the forward end came the clink of the windlass, and soon afterwards the hail of the chief mate informing Lingard that the cable was hove short.
" Hold on everything," hailed back Lingard; " we must wait for the land-breeze before we let go our hold of the ground."
He approached Willems, who sat on the skylight, his body bent down, his head low, and his hands hang- ing listlessly between his knees.
" I am going to take you to Sambir," he said. " You've never heard of the place, have you? Well, it's up that river of mine about which people talk so much and know so little. I've found out the entrance for a ship of Flash's size. It isn't easy. You'll see. I will show you. You have been at sea long enough to take an interest. . . . Pity you didn't stick to it. Well, I am going there. I have my own trading post in the place. Almayer is my partner. You knew him when he was at Hudig's. Oh, he lives there as happy as a king. D'ye see, I have them all in my pocket. The rajah is an old friend of mine. My word is law — and I am the only trader. No other white man but Almayer had ever been in that settlement. You will live quietly there till I come back from my next cruise to the westward. We shall see then what can be done for you. Never fear. I have no doubt my secret will be safe with you. Keep mum about my river when you get amongst the traders again. There's many would give their ears for the knowledge of it. I'll tell you something: that's where I get all my guttah and rattans. Simply inexhaustible, my boy."
While Lingard spoke Willems looked up quickly, but soon his head fell on his breast in the discouraging certitude that the knowledge he and Hudig had wished
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 39
for SO much had come tc him too late. He sat in a listless attitude.
" You will help Almayer in his trading if you have a heart for it," continued Lingard, '' just to kill time till I come back for you. Only six weeks or so."
Over their heads the damp sails fluttered noisily in the first faint puff of the breeze; then, as the airs fresh- ened, the brig tended to the wind, and the silenced canvas lay quietly aback. The mate spoke with low distinctness from the shadows of the quarter-deck.
'' There's the breeze. Which way do you want to cast her head. Captain Lingard? "
Lingard's eyes, that had been fixed aloft, glanced down at the dejected figure of the man sitting on the skylight. He seemed to hesitate for a minute.
" To the northward, to the northward," he an- swered, testily, as if annoyed at his own fleeting thought, " and bear a hand there. Every puff of wind is worth money in these seas."
He remained motionless, listening to the rattle of blocks and the creaking of trusses as the head-yards were hauled round. Sail was made on the ship and the windlass manned again while he stood still, lost in thought. He only roused himself when a barefooted seacannie glided past him silently on his way to the wheel.
''Put the helm aport! Hard over!" he said, in his harsh sea-voice, to the man whose face appeared suddenly out of the darkness in the circle of light thrown upwards from the binnacle lamps.
The anchor was secured, the yards trimmed, and the brig began to move out of the roadstead. The sea woke up under the push of the sharp cutwater, and whispered softly to the gliding craft in that tender and rippling murmur in which it speaks sometimes to those it nurses and loves. Lingard stood by the taff- rail listening, with a pleased smile till the Flash began
I
40 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. ^
to draw close to the only other vessel in the anchor- age.
" Here, Willems," he said, calling him to his side, " d'ye see that barque here? That's an Arab vessel. White men have mostly given up the game, but this fellow drops in my wake often, and lives in hopes of cutting me out in that settlement. Not while I live, I trust. You see, Willems, I brought prosperity to that place. I composed their quarrels, and saw them grow under my eyes. There's peace and happiness there. I am more master there than his Dutch Ex- cellency down in Batavia ever will be when some day a lazy man-of-war blunders at last against the river. I mean to keep the Arabs out of it, with their lies and their intrigues. I shall keep the venomous breed out, if it costs me my fortune."
The Flash drew quietly abreast of the barque, and was beginning to drop it astern when a white hgure started up on the poop of the Arab vessel, and a voice called out —
'' Greeting to the Rajah Laut! "
*' To you greeting!" answered Lingard, after a moment of hesitating surprise. Then he turned to Willems with a grim smile. " That's^AbdullaJs voice," he said. " Mighty civil all of a sudden, isn't he? I wonder what it means. Just like his impudence! No matter! His civility or his impudence are all one to me. I know that this fellow will be under way and after me like a shot. I don't care! I have the heels of any- thing that floats in these seas," he added, while his proud and loving glance ran over and rested fondly amongst the brig's lofty and graceful spars.
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 41
V. -
" It was the writing on his forehead," said Baba- iaichi, adding a couple of small sticks to the Httle fire by which he was squatting, and without looking at Lakamba who lay down supported on his elbow on the other side of the embers. " It was written when he was born that he should end his life in darkness, and now he is like a man walking in a black night — with his eyes open, yet seeing not. I knew him well when he had slaves, and many wives, and" much mer- chandise, and trading praus, and praus for fighting. Hay — ya! He was a great fighter in the days before the breath of the Merciful put out the light in his eyes. He was a pilgrim, and had many virtues: he was brave, his hand was open, and he was a great robber. For many years he led the men that drank blood on the sea: first in prayer and first in fight! Have I not stood behind him when his face was turned to the West? Have I not watched by his side ships with high masts burning in a straight flame on the calm water? Have I not followed him on dark nights amongst sleeping men that woke up only to die? His sword was swifter than the fire from Heaven, and struck be- fore it flashed. Ha'i! Tuan! Those were the days and that was a leader, and I myself was younger; and in those days there were not so many fireships with guns that deal fiery death from afar. Over the hill and over the forest— 6 ! Tuan Lakamba! they dropped whistling fireballs into the creek where our praus took refuge, and where they dared not follow men who had arms in their hands."
He shook his head with mournful regret and threw another handful of fuel on the fire. The burst of clear flame lit up his broad, dark, and pock-marked face, where the big lips, stained with betel-juice, looked
42 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
like a deep and bleeding gash of a fresh wound. The reflection of the firelight gleamed brightly in his soli- tary eye, lending it for a moment a fierce animation that died out together with the short-lived flame. With quick touches of his bare hands he raked the embers into a heap, then, wiping the warm ash on his waistcloth — his only garment — he clasped his thin legs with his entwined fingers, and rested his chin on his drawn-up knees. Lakamba stirred slightly without changing his position or taking his eyes ofif the glow- ing coals, on which they had been fixed in dreamy immobility.
" Yes," went on Babalatchi, in a low monotone, as if pursuing aloud a train of thought that had its begin- ning in the silent contemplation of the unstable nature of earthly greatness — " yes. He has been rich and strong, and now he lives on alms: old, feeble, blind and without companions, but for his daughter. The Rajah Patalolo gives him rice, and the pale woman — his daughter — cooks it for him, for he has no slave."
** I saw her from afar," muttered Lakamba, dis- paragingly. ** A she-dog with white-teeth, like a woman of the Orang-Putih."
''Right, right," assented Babalatchi; "but you have not seen her near. Her mother was a woman from the west; a Baghdad! woman with veiled face. Now she goes uncovered, like our women do, for she is poor and he is blind, and nobody ever comes near them unless to ask for a charm or a blessing and de- part quickly for fear of his anger and of the Rajah's hand. You have not been on that side of the river? "
" Not for a long time. If I go . . ."
''True! true!" interrupted Babalatchi, soothing- ly, " but I go often alone — for your good — and look — and listen. When the time comes; when we both go together towards the Rajah's campong, it will be to enter — and to remain."
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 43
Lakamba sat up and looked at Babalatchi gloomily.
''This is good talk, once, twice; when it is heard too often it becomes foolish, like the prattle of chil- dren."
" Many, many times have I seen the cloudy sky and have heard the wind of the rainy seasons," said Baba- latchi, impressively.
" And where is your wisdom? It must be with the wind and the clouds of seasons past, for I do not hear it in your talk."
" Those are the words of the ungrateful! " shouted Babalatchi, with sudden exasperation. " Verily, our only refuge is with the One, the Mighty, the Re- dresser of . . ."
"Peace! peace!" growled the startled Lakamba. " It is but a friend's talk."
Babalachi subsided into his former attitude, mut- tering to himself. After awhile he went on again in a louder voice —
" Since the Rajah Laut left another white man here in Sambir, the daughter of the bhnd Omar el Badavi has spoken to other ears than mine."
" Would a white man listen to a beggar's daugh- ter? " said Lakamba, doubtingly.
" Ha'i ! I have seen . . ."
"And what did you see? O one-eyed one!" ex- claimed Lakamba, contemptuously.
" I have seen the strange white man walking on the narrow path before the sun could dry the drops of dew on the bushes, and I have heard the whisper of his voice when he spoke through the smoke of the morning fire to that woman with big eyes and a pale skin. Woman in body, but in heart a man! She knows no fear and no shame. I have heard her voice too."
He nodded twice at Lakamba sagaciously and gave himself up to silent musing, his solitary eye fixed im-
44 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
movably upon the straight wall of forest on the oppo- site bank. Lakamba lay silent, staring vacantly. Under them Lingard's own river rippled softly amongst the piles supporting the bamboo platform of the little watch-house before which they were lying. Behind the house the ground rose in a gentle swell of a low hill cleared of the big timber, but thickly over- grown with the grass and bushes, now withered and burnt up in the long drought of the dry season. This old rice clearing, which had been several years lying fallow, was framed on three sides by the impenetrable and tangled growth of the untouched forest, and on the fourth came down to the muddy river bank. There was not a breath of wind on the land or river, but high above, in the transparent sky, little clouds rus^.ed past the moon, now appearing in her diffused rays with the brilliance of silver, now obscuring her face with the blackness of ebony. Far away, in the middle of the river, a fish would leap now and then with a short splash, the very loudness of which meas- ured the profundity of the overpowering silence that swallowed up the sharp sound suddenly.
Lakamba dozed uneasily oflf, but the wakeful Baba- latchi sat thinking deeply, sighing from time to time, and slapping himself over his naked torso incessantly in a vain endeavour to keep off an occasional and wandering mosquito that, rising as high as the plat- form above the swarms of the riverside, would settle with a ping of triumph on the unexpected victim. The moon, pursuing her silent and toilsome path, attained her highest elevation, and chasing the shadow of the roof-eaves from Lakamba's face, seemed to hang ar- rested over their heads. Babalatchi revived the fire and woke up his companion, who sat up yawning and shivering discontentedly.
Babalatchi spoke again in a voice which was like the murmur of a brook that runs over the stones:
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 45
low, monotonous, persistent; irresistible in its power to wear out and to destroy the hardest obstacles. La- kamba listened, silent but interested. They were Malay adventurers; ambitious men of that place and time; the Bohemians of their race. In the early days of the settlement, before the ruler Patalolo had shaken ofif his allegiance to the Sultan of Koti, Lakamba appeared in the river with two small trading vessels. He was disappointed to find already some semblance of organisation amongst the settlers of various races who recognised the unobtrusive sway of old Patalolo, and he was not politic enough to conceal his disap- pointment. He declared himself to be a man from the east, from those parts where no white man ruled, and to be of an oppressed race, but of a princely family. And truly enough he had all the gifts of an exiled prince. He was discontented, ungrateful, turbulent; a man full of envy and ready for intrigue, with brave words and empty promises for ever on his lips. He was obstinate, but his will was made up of short im- pulses that never lasted long enough to carry him to the goal of his ambition. Received coldly by the sus- picious Patalolo, he persisted — permission or no per- mission— in clearing the ground on a good spot some fourteen miles down the river from Sambir, and built himself a house there, which he fortified by a high palisade. As he had many followers and seemed very reckless, the old Rajah did not think it prudent at the time to interfere with him by force. Once settled, he began to intrigue. The quarrel of Patalolo with the Sultan of Koti was of his fomenting, but failed to produce the result he expected because the Sultan could not back him up effectively at such a great dis- tance. Disappointed in that scheme, he promptly or- ganised an outbreak of the Bugis settlers, and besieged the old Rajah in his stockade with much noisy valour and a fair chance of success; but Lingard then ap-
46 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
peared on the scene with the armed brig, and the old seaman's hairy forefinger, shaken menacingly in his face, quelled his martial ardour. No man cared to encounter the Rajah Laut, and Lakamba, with mo- mentary resignation, subsided into a half-cultivator, half-trader, and nursed in his fortified house his wrath and his ambition, keeping it for use on a more pro- pitious occasion. Still faithful to his character of a prince-pretender, he would not recognise the consti- tuted authorities, answering sulkily the Rajah's mes- senger, who claimed the tribute for the cultivated fields, that the Rajah had better come and take it him- self. By Lingard's advice he was left alone, notwith- standing his rebellious mood; and for many days he lived undisturbed amongst his wives and retainers, cherishing that persistent and causeless hope of better times, the possession of which seems to be the uni- versal privilege of exiled greatness.
But the passing days brought no change. The hope grew faint and the hot ambition burnt itself out, leaving only a feeble and expiring spark amongst a heap of dull and tepid ashes of indolent acquiescence with the decrees of Fate, till Babalatchi fanned it again into a bright flame. Babalatchi had blundered upon the river while in search of a safe refuge for his dis- reputable head. He was a vagabond of the seas, a true Orang-Laut, living by rapine and plunder of coasts and ships in his prosperous days; earning his living by honest and irksome toil when the days of adversity were upon him. So, although at times leading the Sulu rovers, he had also served as Serang of country ships, and in that wise had visited the distant seas, be- held the glories of Bombay, the might of the IMascati Sultan; had even struggled in a pious throng for the privilege of touching with his Hps the Sacred Stone of the Holy City. He gathered experience and wisdom in many lands, and after attaching himself to Omar el
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
47
Badavi, he affected great piety (as became a pilgrim), although unable to read the inspired words of the Prophet. He was brave and bloodthirsty without any affectation, and he hated the white men who interfered with the manly pursuits of throat-cutting, kidnapping, slave-dealing, and fire-raising, that were the only pos- sible occupation for a true man of the sea. He found favour in the eyes of his chief, the fearless Omar el Badavi, the leader of Brunei rovers, whom he followed with unquestioning loyalty through the long years of successful depredation. And when that long career of murder, robbery and violence received its first seri- ous check at the hands of white men, he stood faith- fully by his chief, looked steadily at the bursting shells, was undismayed by the flames of the burning strong- hold, by the death of his companions, by the shrieks of their women, the waiHng of their children ; by the sudden ruin and destruction of all that he deemed indispensable to a happy and glorious existence. The beaten ground between the houses was slippery with blood, and the dark mangroves of the muddy creeks were full of sighs of the dying men who were stricken down before they could see their enemy. They died helplessly, for into the tangled forest there was no escape, and their swift praus, in which they had so often scoured the coast and the seas, now wedged to- gether in the narrow creek, were burning fiercely. Babalatchi, with the clear perception of the coming end, devoted all his energies to saving if it was but only one of them. He succeeded in time. When the end came in the explosion of the stored powder-bar- rels, he was ready to look for his chief. He found him half dead and totally blinded, with nobody near him but his daughter A'issa: — the sons had fallen earlier in the day, as became men of their courage. Helped by the girl with the steadfast heart, Babalatchi car- ried Omar on board the light prau and succeeded in
48 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
escaping, but with very few companions only. As they hauled their craft into the network of dark and silent creeks, they could hear the cheering of the crews of the man-of-war's boats dashing to the attack of the rover's village. A'issa, sitting on the high after-deck, her father's blackened and bleeding head in her lap, looked up with fearless eyes at Babalatchi. " They shall find only smoke, blood and dead men, and women mad with fear there, but nothing else living," she said, mournfully. Babalatchi, pressing with his right hand the deep gash on his shoulder, answered sadly: '' They are very strong. When we fight with them we can only die. Yet," he added, menancingly — '* some of us still live! Some of us still live! "
For a short time he dreamed of vengeance, but his dream was dispelled by the cold reception of the Sultan of Sulu, with whom they sought refuge at first and who gave them only a contemptuous and grudg- ing hospitality. While Omar, nursed by A'issa, was recovering from his wounds, Babalatchi attended in- dustriously before the exalted Presence that had ex- tended to them the hand of protection. For all that, when Babalatchi spoke into the Sultan's ear certain proposals of a great and profitable raid, that was to sweep the islands from Ternate to Acheen, the Sultan was very angry. " I know you, you men from the west," he exclaimed, angrily. " Your words are poison in a Ruler's ears. Your talk is of fire and murder and booty — but on our heads falls the vengeance of the blood you drink. Begone! "
There was nothing to be done. Times were changed. So changed that, when a Spanish frigate appeared before the island and a demand was sent to the Sultan to deliver Omar and his companions, Baba- latchi was not surprised to hear that they were going to be made the victims of political expediency. But from that sane appreciation of danger to tame sub-
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 49
mission was a very long step. And then began Omar's second flight. It began arms in hand, for the Httle band had to fight in the night on the beach for the possession of the small canoes in which those that sur- vived got away at last. The story of that escape lives in the hearts of brave men even to this day. They talk of Babalatchi and of the strong woman who carried her blind father through the surf under the fire of the warship from the north. The companions of that piratical and son-less ^neas are dead now, but their ghosts wander over the waters and the islands at night —after the manner of ghosts — and haunt the fires by which sit armed men, as is meet for the spirits of fear- less warriors who died in battle. There they may hear the story of their own deeds, of their own courage, suffering and death, on the lips of living men. That story is told in many places. On the cool mats in breezy verandahs of Rajahs' houses il is alluded to disdainfully by impassible statesmen, but amongst armed men that throng the courtyards it is a tale w^iich stills the murmur of voices and the tinkle of anklets; arrests the passage of the siri-vessel, and fixes the eyes in absorbed gaze. They talk of the fight, of the fear- less woman, of the wise man ; of long suffering on the thirsty sea in leaky canoes; of those who died. . . . Many died. A few survived. The chief, the woman, and another one who became great.
There was no hint of incipient greatness in Baba- latchi's unostentatious arrival in Sambir. He came with Omar and Aissa in a small prau loaded with green cocoanuts, and claimed the ownership of both vessel and cargo. How it came to pass that Babalatchi, flee- ing for his life in a small canoe, managed to end his hazardous journey in a vessel full of a valuable com- modity, is one of those secrets of the sea that baffle the most searching inquiry. In truth nobody inquired much. There were rumours of a missino^ trading prau
50
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
belonging to Menado, but they were vague and re- mained mysterious. Babalatchi told a story which — it must be said in justice to Patalolo's knowledge^ of the world — was not believed. When the Rajah ven- tured to state his doubts, Babalatchi asked him in tones of calm remonstrance whether he could rea- sonably suppose that two oldish men — who had only one eye amongst them — and a young woman were likely to gain possession of anything whatever by vio- lence? Charity was a virtue recommended by the Prophet. There were charitable people, and their hand was open to the deserving. Patalolo wagged his aged head doubtingly, and Babalatchi withdrew with a shocked mien and put himself forthwith under Lakam- 'ba's protection. The two men who completed the prau's crew followed him into that magnate's cam- pong. The blind Omar, with A'issa, remained under the care of the Rajah, and the Rajah confiscated the cargo. The prau hauled up on the mud-bank, at the junction of the two branches of the Pantai, rotted in the rain, warped in the sun, fell to pieces and gradually vanished into the smoke of household fires of the set- tlement. Only a forgotten plank and a rib or two, sticking neglected in the shiny ooze for a long time, served to remind Babalatchi during many months that he was a stranger in the land.
Otherwise, he felt perfectly at home in Lakamba's establishment, where his peculiar position and influ- ence were quickly recognised and soon submitted to even by the women. He had all a true vagabond's plia- bility to circumstances and adaptiveness to momentary surroundings. In his readiness to learn from experi- ence that contempt for early principles so necessary to a true statesman, he equalled the most successful politicians of any age ; and he had enough persuasive- ness and firmness of purpose to acquire a complete mastery over Lakamba's vacillating mind — where
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 51
there was nothing stable but an all-pervading discon- tent. He kept the discontent alive, he rekindled the expiring ambition, he moderated the poor exile's not unnatural impatience to attain a high and lucrative position. He — the man of violence — deprecated the use of force, for he had a clear comprehension of the difficult situation. From the same cause, he — the hater of white men — would to some extent admit the eventual expediency of Dutch protection. But noth- ing should be done in a hurry. Whatever his master Lakamba might think, there was no use in poisoning old Patalolo, he maintained. It could be done, of course; but what then? As long as Lingard's influ-. ence was paramount — as long as Almayer, Lingard's representative, was the only great trader of the settle- ment, it was not worth Lakamba's while — even if it had been possible — to grasp the rule of the young state. Killing Almayer and Lingard was so difficult and so risky that it might be dismissed as impractica- ble. What was wanted was an alliance; somebody to set up against the white men's influence — and some- body who, while favourable to Lakamba, would at the same time be a person of a good standing with the Dutch authorities. A rich and considered trader was wanted. Such a person once firmly established in Sambir would help them to oust the old Rajah, to re- move him from power or from life if there was no other way. Then it would be time to apply to the Orang Blanda for a flag; for a recognition of their meritori- ous services; for that protection which would make them safe for ever! The word of a rich and loyal trader would mean something with the Ruler down in Batavia. The first thing to do was to find such an ally and to induce him to settle in Sambir. A white trader would not do. A white man would not fall in v;ith their ideas — would not be trustworthy. The man they wanted should be rich, unscrupulous, have many
52 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
followers, and be a well-known personality In the isl- ands. Such a man might be found amongst the Arab traders. Lingard's jealousy, said Babalatchi, kept all the traders out of the river. Some were afraid, and some did not know how to get there; others ignored the very existence of Sambir; a good many did not think it worth their while to run the risk of Lingard's enmity for the doubtful advantage of trade with a com- paratively unknown settlement. The great majority were undesirable or untrustworthy. And Babalatchi mentioned regretfully the men he had known in his young days: wealthy, resolute, courageous, reckless, ready for any enterprise! But why lament the past and speak about the dead? There is one man — living — great — not far ofT. . . .
Such was Babalatchi's line of policy laid before his ambitious protector. Lakamba assented, his only ob- jection being that it was very slow work. In his extreme desire to grasp dollars and power, the unintel- lectual exile was ready to throw himself into the arms of any wandering cut-throat whose help could be se- cured, and Babalatchi experienced great difficulty in restraining him from unconsidered violence. It would not do to let it be seen that they had any hand in in- troducing a new element into the social and political life of Sambir. There was always a possibility of fail- ure, and in that case Lingard's vengeance would be swift and certain. No risk should be run. They must wait.
Meantime he pervaded the settlement, squatting in the course of each day by many household fires, testing the public temper and public opinion — and always talking about his impending departure. At night he would often take Lakamba's smallest canoe and depart silently to pay mysterious visits to his old chief on the other side of the river. Omar lived in odour of sanc- tity under the wing of Patalolo. Between the bamboo
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53
fence, enclosing the houses of the Rajah, and the wild forest, there was a banana plantation, and on its fur- ther edge stood two little houses built on low piles under a few precious fruit trees that grew on the banks of a clear brook, which, bubbling up behind the house, ran in its short and rapid course down to the big river. Along the brook a narrow path led through the dense second growth of a neglected clearing to the banana plantation and to the houses in it which the Rajah had given for residence to Omar. The Rajah was greatly impressed by Omar's ostentatious piety, by his oracu- lar wisdom, by his many misfortunes, by the solemn fortitude with which he bore his affliction. Often the old ruler of Sambir would visit informally the blind Arab and listen gravely to his talk during the hot hours of an afternoon. In the night, Babalatchi would call and interrupt Omar's repose, unrebuked. Aissa, standing silently at the door of one of the huts, could see the two old friends as they sat very still by the fire in the middle of the beaten ground between the two houses, talking in an indistinct murmur far into the night. She could not hear their words, but she watched the two formless shadows curiously. Finally Baba- latchi would rise and, taking her father by the wrist, would lead him back to the house, arrange his mats for him, and go out quietly. Instead of going away, Babalatchi, unconscious of Aissa's eyes, often sat again by the fire, in a long and deep meditation. Aissa looked with respect on that wise and brave man — she was accustomed to see at her father's side as long as she could remember — sitting alone and thoughtful in the silent night by the dying fire, his body motionless and his mind wandering in the land of memories, or — who knows? — perhaps groping for a road in the waste spaces of the uncertain future.
Babalatchi noted the arrival of Willems with alarm at this new accession to the white men's strength.
54 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
Afterwards he changed his opinion. He met Willems one night on the path leading to Omar's house, and noticed later on, with only a moderate surprise, that the blind Arab did not seem to be aware of the new white man's visits to the neighbourhood of his dwell- ing. Once, coming unexpectedly in the daytime, Babalatchi fancied he could see the gleam of a white jacket in the bushes on the other side of the brook. That day he watched Aissa pensively as she moved about preparing the evening rice; but after awhile he went hurriedly away before sunset, refusing Omar's hospitable invitation, in the name of Allah, to share their meal. That same evening he startled Lakamba by announcing that the time had come at last to make the first move in their long-deferred game. Lakamba asked excitedly for explanation. Babalatchi shook his head and pointed to the flitting shadows of moving women and to the vague forms of men sitting by the evening fires in the courtyard. Not a word would he speak here, he declared. But when the whole house- hold was reposing, Babalatchi and Lakamba passed silently amongst sleeping groups to the riverside, and, taking a canoe, paddled of¥ stealthily on their way to the dilapidated guard-hut in the old rice-clearing. There they were safe from all eyes and ears, and could account, if need be, for their excursion by the wish to kill a deer, the spot being well known as the drink- ing-place of all kinds of game. In the seclusion of its quiet solitude Babalatchi explained his plan to the attentive Lakamba. His idea was to make use of Wil- lems for the destruction of Lingard's influence.
" I know the white men, Tuan," he said, in con- clusion. ''In many lands have I seen them; always the slaves of their desires, always ready to give up their strength and their reason into the hands of some woman. The fate of the Believers is written by tlie hand of the Mighty One, but they who worship many
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
55
gods are thrown into the world with smooth fore- heads, for any woman's hand to mark their destruc- tion there. Let one white man destroy another. The will of the Most High is that they should be fools. They know how to keep faith with their enemies, but towards each other they know only deception. Hai! I have seen! I have seen!"
He stretched himself full length before the fire, and closed his eye in real or simulated sleep. Lakam- ba, not quite convinced, sat for a long time with his gaze riveted on the dull embers. As the night ad- vanced, a slight white mist rose'from the river, and the decliniri"^ moori, bowed over the tops of the forest, seemed to seek the repose of the earth, like a wayward and wandering lover who returns at last to lay his tired and silent head on his beloved's breast.
VI.
" Lend me your gun, Almayer," said Willems, across the table on which a smoky lamp shone redly above the disorder of a finished meal. '' I have a mind to go and look for a deer when the moon rises to- night."
Almayer, sitting sidewise to the table, his elbow pushed amongst the dirty plates, his chin on his breast and his legs stretched stiffly out, kept his eyes steadily on the toes of his grass slippers and laughed abruptly.
" You might say yes or no instead of making that unpleasant noise," remarked Willems, with calm irri- tation.
'' If I believed one word of what you say, I would," answered Almayer without changing his attitude and speaking slowly, with pauses, as if dropping his words
56 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
on the floor. "As it is — what's the use? You know where the gun is; you may take it or leave it. Gun. Deer. Bosh! Hunt deer! Pah! It's a . . . gazelle you are after, my honoured guest. You want gold inklets and silk sarongs for that game — my mighty hunter. And you won't get those for the asking, I promise you. All day amongst the natives. A fine help you are to me."
*' You shouldn't drink so much, Almayer," said Willems, disguising his fury under an affected drawl. " You have no head. Never had, as far as I can re- member, in the old days in Macassar. You drink too much."
*' I drink my own," retorted Almayer, lifting his head quickly and darting an angry glance at Willems.
Those two sj)ecimens of the superior race glared at each other savagely for a minute, then turned away their heads at the same moment as if by previous ar- rangement, and both got up. Almayer kicked off his slippers and scrambled into his hammock, which hung between two wooden columns of the verandah so as to catch every rare breeze of the dry season, and Wil- lems, after standing irresolutely by the table for a short time, walked without a word down the steps of the house and over the courtyard towards the little wooden jetty, where several small canoes and a couple of big white whale-boats were made fast, tugging at their short painters and bumping together in the swift current of the river. He jumped into the smallest canoe, balancing himself clumsily, slipped the rattan painter, and gave an unnecessary and violent shove, which nearly sent him headlong overboard. By the time he regained his balance the canoe had drifted some fifty yards down the river. He knelt in the bot- tom of his little craft and fought the current with long sweeps of the paddle. Almayer sat up in his hammock, grasping his feet and peering over the river with parted
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
57
lips till he made out the shadowy form of man and canoe as they struggled past the jetty again.
" I thought you would go,", he shouted. " Won't you take the gun? Hey?" ihe yelled, straining his voice. Then he fell back in his hammock and laughed to himself feebly till he fell asleep. On the river, Wil- lems, his eyes fixed intently ahead, swept his paddle right and left, unheeding the words that reached him faintly.
It was now three months since Lingard had landed Willems in Sambir and had departed hurriedly, leav- ing him in Almayer's care. The two white men did not get on well together. Almayer, remembering the time when they both served Hudig, and when the su- perior Willems treated him with ofifensive condescen- sion, felt a great dislike towards his guest. He was also jealous of Lingard's favour. Almayer had mar- ried a Malay girl whom the old seaman had adopted in one of his accesses of unreasoning benevolence, and as the marriage was not a happy one from a domestic point of view, he looked to Lingard's fortune for com- pensation in his matrimonial unhappiness. The ap- pearance of that man, who seemed to have a claim of some sort upon Lingard, filled him with considerable uneasiness, the more so because the old seaman did not choose to acquaint the husband of his adopted daughter with Willems' history, or to confide to him his intentions as to that individual's future fate. Sus- picious from the first, Almayer discouraged Willems' attempts to help him in his trading, and then when Willems drew back, he made, with characteristic per- verseness, a grievance of his unconcern. From cold civility in their relations, the two men drifted into si- lent hostility, then into outspoken enmity, and both wished ardently for Lingard's return and the end of a situation that grew more intolerable from day to day. The time dragged slowly. Willems watched the sue-
58 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
ceeding sunrises wondering dismally whether before the evening some change would occur in the deadly dulness of his life. He missed the commercial activity of that existence which seemed to him far ofi, irrep- arably lost, buried out of sight under the ruins of his past success — now gone from him beyond the pos- sibility of redemption. He mooned disconsolately about Almayer's courtyard, watching from afar, with uninterested eyes, the upcountry canoes discharging guttah or rattans, and loading rice or European goods on the little wharf of Lingard & Co. Big as was the extent of ground owned by Almayer, Willems yet felt that there was not enough room for him inside those neat fences. The man who, during long years, be- came accustomed to think of himself as indispensable to others, felt a bitter and savage rage at the cruel con- sciousness of his superfluity, of his uselessness; at the cold hostility visible in every look of the only white man in this barbarous corner of the world. He gnashed his teeth when he thought of the wasted days, of the life thrown away in the unwilling company of that peevish and suspicious fool. He heard the reproach of his idleness in the murmurs of the river, in the un- ceasing whisper of the great forests. Round him everything stirred, moved, swept by in a rush; the earth under his feet and the heavens above his head. The very savages around him strove, struggled, fought, worked — if only to prolong a miserable existence ; but they lived, they lived! And it was only himself that seemed to be left outside the scheme of creation in a hopeless immobility filled with tormenting anger and with ever-stinging regret.
He took to wandering about the settlement. The afterwards flourishing Sambir was born in a swamp and passed its youth in malodorous mud. The houses crowded the bank, and, as if to get away from the unhealthy shore, stepped boldly irrto the river, shoot-
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
S9
ing over it in a close row of bamboo platforms elevated on high piles, amongst which the current below spoke in a soft and unceasing plaint of murmuring eddies. Thei_ was only one path in the whole town and it ran al the back of the houses along the succession of blackened circular patches that marked the place of the household fires. On the other side the virgin forest bordered the path, coming close to it, as if to provoke impudently any passer-by to the solution of the gloomy problem of its depths. Nobody would accept the deceptive challenge. There were only a few feeble attempts at a clearing here and there, but the ground was low and the river, retiring after its yearly floods, left on each a gradually diminishing mud-hole, where the imported buffaloes of the Bugis settlers wallowed happily during the heat of the day. When Willems walked on the path, the indolent men stretched on the shady side of the houses looked at him with calm curiosity, the women busy round the cooking fires would send after him wondering and timid glances, while the children would only look once, and then run away yelling with fright at the horrible appearance of the man wnth a red and white face. These manifestations of childish diso-ust and fear stung Willems with a sense of absurd humiliation; he sought in his walks the comparative solitude of the rudi- mentary clearings, but the ve*-v buffaloes snorted with alarm at his sight, scrambled lumberingly out of the cool mud and stared wildly in a compact herd at him as he tried to slink unperceived along the edge of the forest. One day, at some un2:uarded and sudden movement of his, the whole herd stampeded down the path, scattered the fires, sent the women flying with shrill cries, and left behind a track of smashed pots, trampled rice, overturned children, and a crowd of anqry men brandishing sticks in loud-voiced pursuit. The mnocent cause of that disturbance ran shama-
6o AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
facedly the gauntlet of black looks and unfriendly re- marks, and hastily sought refuge in Almayer's cam- pong. After that he left the settlement alone.
Later on, when the enforced confinement grew irksome, Willems took one of Almayer's many canoes and crossed the main branch of the Pantai in search of some solitary spot where he could hide his dis- couragement and his weariness. He skirted in his little craft the wall of tangled verdure, keeping in the dead water close to the bank where the spreading nipa palms nodded their broad leaves over his head as if in contemptuous pity of the wandering outcast. Here and there he could see the beginnings of chopped-out pathways, and, with the fixed idea of getting out of sight of the busy river, he would land and follow the narrow and winding path, only to find that it led no- where, ending abruptly in the discouragement of thorny thickets. He would go back slowly, with a bitter sense of unreasonable disappointment and sad- ness; oppressed by the hot smell of earth, dampness, and decay in that forest which seemed to push him mercilessly back into the glittering sunshine of the river. And he would recommence paddling with tired arms to seek another opening, to find another decep- tion.
As he paddled up to the point where the Rajah's stockade came down to the river, the nipas were left behind rattling their leaves over the brown water, and the big trees would appear on the bank, tall, strong, indifferent in the immense solidity of their life, which endures for ages, to that short and fleeting life in the heart of the man who crept painfully amongst their shadows in search of a refuge from the unceasing re- proach of his thoughts. Amongst their smooth trunks a clear brook meandered for a time in twining lacets before it made up its mind to take a leap into the hur- rying river, over the edge of the steep bank. There
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 6l
was also a pathway there and it seemed frequented. Willems landed, and following the capricious promise of the track soon found himself in a comparatively clear space, where the confused tracery of sunlight fell through the branches and the foliage overhead, and lay on the stream that shone in an easy curve like a bright swordblade dropped amongst the long and feathery grass. Further on, the path continued narrowed again in the thick undergrowth. At the end of the first turning Willems saw a flash of white and colour, a gleam of gold like a sun-ray lost in shadow, and a vision of blackness darker than the deepest shade of the forest. He stopped, surprised, and fancied he had heard light footsteps — growing lighter — ceas- ing. He looked around. The grass on the bank of the stream trembled and a tremulous path of its shiv- ering, silver-grey tops ran from the water to the be- ginning of the thicket. And yet there was not a breath of wind. Somebody had passed there. He looked pensive while the tremor died out in a quick tremble under his eyes; and the grass stood high, unstirring, with dropping heads in the warm and motionless air. He hurried on, driven by a suddenly awakened curiosity, and entered the narrow way between the bushes. At the next turn of the path he caught again the glimpse of coloured stufT and of a woman's black hair before him. He hastened his pace and came in full view of the object of his pursuit. The woman, who was carrying two bamboo vessels full of water, heard his footsteps, stopped, and putting the bamboos down half turned to look back. Willems also stood still for a minute, then walked steadily on with a firm tread, while the woman moved aside to let him pass. He kept his eyes fixed straight before him, yet almost unconsciously he took in every detail of the tall and graceful figure. As he approached her the woman tossed her head slightly back, and with a free gesture
62 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
of her strong, round arm, caught up the mass of loose black hair and brought it over her shoulder and across the lower part of her face. The next moment he was passing her close, walking rigidly, like a man in a trance. He heard her rapid breathing and he felt the touch of a look darted at him from half-open eyes. It touched his brain and his heart together. It seemed to him to be something loud and stirring like a shout, silent and penetrating like an inspiration. The mo- mentum of his motion carried him past her, but an in- visible force made up of surprise and curiosity and desire spun him round as soon as he had passed.
She had taken up her burden already, with the in- tention of pursuing her path. His sudden movement arrested her at the first step, and again she stood straight, slim, expectant, with a readiness to dart away suggested in the light immobility of her pose. High above, the branches of the trees met in a transparent shimmer of waving green mist, through which the rain of yellow rays descended upon her head, streamed in glints down her black tresses, shone with the chang- ing glow of liquid metal on her face, and lost itself in vanishing sparks in the sombre depths of her eyes that, wide open now, with enlarged pupils, looked steadily at the man in her path. And Willems stared at her, charmed with a charm that carries with it a sense of irreparable loss, tingling with that feeling which begins like a caress and ends in a blow, in that sudden hurt of a new emotion making its way into a human heart, with the brusque stirring of sleeping sensations awakening suddenly to the rush of new hopes, new fears, new desires — and to the flight of one's old self.
She moved a step forward and again halted. A breath of wind that came through the trees, but in Willems' fancy seemed to be driven by her moving figure, rippled in a hot wave round his body and
r>y%/
. J
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
63
scorched his face in a burning touch. He drew it in with a long breath, the breath that gives courage to confront the menace of death or the storm of pas- sion.
Who was she? Where did she come from? Won- deringly he took his eyes ofif her face to look round at the serried trees of the forest that stood big and still and straight, as if watching him and her breath- lessly. He had been baffled, repelled, almost fright- ened by the intensity of that tropical life which wants the sunshine but works in gloom; which seems to be all grace of colour and form, all brilliance, all smiles, but is only the blossoming of the dead; whose mystery holds the promise of joy and beauty, yet contains noth- ing but poison and decay. He had been frightened by the vague perception of danger before, but now, as he looked at that life again, his eyes seemed able to pierce the fantastic veil of creepers and leaves, to look past the solid trunks, to see through the forbid- ding gloom — and the mystery was disclosed — enchant- ing, subduing, beautiful. He looked at the woman. Through the checkered light between them she ap- peared to him with the impalpable distinctness of a dream. She seemed to him at once enticing and bril- Hant — sombre and repelHng: the very spirit of that land of mysterious forests, standing before him, with the vague beauty of wavering outline; like an appari- tion behind a transparent veil — a veil woven of sun- beams and shadows.
She had approached him still nearer. He felt a strange impatience within him at her advance. Con- fused thoughts rushed through his head, disordered, shapeless, stunning. Then he heard his own voice asking —
" Who are you? "
" I am the daughter of the blind Omar," she an- swered, in a low but steady tone. " And you," she
64 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
went on, a little louder, " you are the white trader — the great man of this place."
** Yes," said Willems, holding her eyes wdth his in a sense of extreme effort, " Yes, I am white." Then he added, feeling as if he spoke about some other man, " But I am the outcast of my people."
She listened to him gravely. Through the mesh of scattered hair her face looked like the face of a golden statue with living eyes. The heavy eyelids dropped slightly, and from between the long eyelashes she sent out a sidelong look: hard, keen, and narrow, like the gleam of sharp steel. Her lips were firm and composed in a graceful curve, but the distended nos- trils, the upward poise of the half-averted head, gave to her whole person the expression of a wild and resent- ful defiance.
A shadow passed over Willems' face. He put his hand over his lips as if to keep back the words that wanted to come out in a surge of impulsive necessity, the outcome of dominant thought that rushes from the heart to the brain and must be spoken in the face of doubt, of danger, of fear, of destruction itself.
'' You are beautiful," he whispered.
She looked at him again with a glance that running in one quick flash of her eyes over his sunburnt fea- tures, his broad shoulders, his straight, tall, motion- less figure, rested at last on the ground at his feet. Then she smiled. In the sombre beauty of her face that smile was like a gleam of dawn on a stormy morn- ing; like the first ray of eastern light that darts evanes- cent and pale through the gloomy clouds: the fore- runner of sunrise and of thunder.
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
VII.
65
There_aTejn_aur_]iy£s_sliQ^ no
place in memory biij.t_onjy_as^jtIie reoolkLCtion of a feel- ing! There is no remembrance of gesture, of action, oT^any outward manifestation of life; those are lost in the unearthly brilliance or in the unearthly gloom of such moments. We are absorbed in the contempla- tion of that something, within our bodies, which re- joices or suffers while the body goes on breathing, instinctively runs away or, not less instinctively, fights — perhaps dies. But death in such a moment is the privilege of the fortunate, it is a high and rare favour, a supreme grace.
Willems never remembered how and when he parted from Aissa. He caught himself drinking the muddy water out of the hollow of his hand, while his canoe was drifting in mid-stream past the last houses of Sambir. With his returning wits came the fear of something unknown that had taken possession of his heart, of something inarticulate and masterful which could not speak and would be obeyed. His first im- pulse was that of revolt. He would never go back there. Never! He looked round slowly at the bril- liance of things in the deadly sunshine and took up his paddle! How changed everything seemed! The river was broader, the sky was higher. How fast the canoe flew under the strokes of his paddle! Since when had he acquired the strength of two men or more? He looked up and down the reach at the for- ests of the bank with a confused notion that with one sweep of his hand he could tumble all these trees into the stream. His face felt burning. He drank again, and shuddered with a depraved sense of pleasure at the after-tfme of -slime in the water.
It was late when he reached Almayer's house, but
e6 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
he crossed the dark and uneven courtyard without stumbling, unhesitatingly, walking lightly in the radi- ance of some light of his own that was invisible to other eyes. His host's sulky greeting jarred him like a sudden fall down a great height. He took his place at the table opposite Almayer and tried to speak cheerfully to his gloomy companion, but when the meal was ended and they sat smoking in silence he felt an abrupt discouragement, a lassitude in all his limbs, a sense of immense sadness as after some great and irreparable loss. The light died out and the dark- ness of the night entered his heart, bringing with it doubt and hesitation and dull anger with himself and all the world. He had an impulse to shout horrible curses, to quarrel with Almayer, to do something vio- lent. Quite without any immediate provocation he thought he would like to assault the wretched, sulky beast. He glanced at him ferociously from under his eyebrows. The unconscious Almayer smoked thought- fully, planning to-morrow's work probably. The man's composure seemed to Willems an unpardon- able insult. Why didn't that idiot talk to-night when he wanted him to? ... on other nights he was ready enough to chatter. And such dull nonsense too! And Willems, trying hard to repress his own senseless rage, looked fixedly through the thick tobacco-smoke at the stained tablecloth.
They retired early, as usual, but in the middle of the night Willems leaped out of his hammock with a stifled execration and ran down the steps into the courtyard. The two night watchmen, who sat by a little fire talking together in a monotonous undertone, lifted their heads to look wonderingly at the discom- posed features of the white man as he crossed the circle of light thrown out by their fire. He disappeared in the darkness and then came back again, passing them close, but with no sign of consciousness of their pres-
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. dj
ence on his face. Backwards and forwards he paced, muttering to himself, and the two Malays, after a short consultation in whispers left the fire quietly, not think- ing it safe to remain in the vicinity of a white man who behaved in such a strange manner. They retired round the corner of the godown and watched Willems curi- ously through the night, till the short daybreak was followed by the sudden blaze of the rising sun, and Almayer's establishment woke up to life and work.
As soon as he could get away unnoticed in the bustle of the busy riverside, Willems crossed the river on his way to the place where he had met A'issa. He threw himself down in the grass by the side of the brook and listened for the sound of her footsteps. The brilliant light of day fell through the irregular opening in the high branches of the trees and streamed down, softened, amongst the shadows of big trunks. Here and there a narrow sunbeam touched the rugged bark of a tree with a golden splash, sparkled on the leaping water of the brook, or rested on a leaf that stood out, shimmering and distinct, on the monotonous back- ground of sombre green tints. The clear gap of blue above his head was crossed by the quick flight of white rice-birds whose wings flashed in the sunlight, while through it the heat poured down from the sky, clung about the steaming earth, rolled among the trees, and wrapped up Willems in the soft and odorous folds of air heavy with the faint scent of blossoms and with the acrid smell of decaying life. And in that atmos- phere of Nature's workshop Willems felt soothed and lulled into forgetfulness of his past, into indifference as to his future. The recollections of his triumphs, of his wrongs and of his ambition vanished in that warmth, which seemed to melt all regrets, all hope, all anger, all strength out of his heart. And he lay there, dreamily contented, in the tepid and perfumed shelter, thinking of A'issa's eyes; recalling the sound
68 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
of her voice, the quiver of her lips — her frowns and her smile.
She came, of course. To her he was something new, unknown and strange. He was bigger, stronger than any man she had seen before, and altogether different from all those she knew. He was of the vic- torious race. With a vivid remembrance of the great catastrophe of her life he appeared to her with all the fascination of a great and dangerous thing; of a terror vanquished, surmounted, made a plaything of. They spoke with just such a deep voice — those victorious men; they looked with just such hard blue eyes at their enemies. And she made that voice speak softly to her, those eyes look tenderly at her face! He was indeed a man. She could not understand all he told her of his life, but the fragments she understood she made up for herself into a story of a man great amongst his own people, valorous and unfortunate; an un- daunted fugitive dreaming of vengeance against his enemies. He had all the attractiveness of the vague and the unknown — of the unforeseen and of the sud- den; of a being strong, dangerous, alive, and human, ready to be enslaved.
She felt that he was ready. She felt it with the unerring intuition of a primitive woman confronted by a simple impulse. Day after day, when they met and she stood a little way off, listening to his words, holding him with her look, the undefined terror of the new conquest became faint and blurred like the mem- ory of a dream, and the certitude grew distinct, and convincing, and visible to the eyes like some material thing in full sunlight. It was a deep joy, a great pride, a tangible sweetness that seemed to leave the taste of honey on her lips. He lay stretched at her feet with- out moving, for he knew from experience how a slight movement of his could frighten her away in those first days of their intercourse. He lay very quiet, with all
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 69
the ardour of his desire ringing in his voice and shin- ing in his eyes, whilst his body was still, like death itself. And he looked at her, standing above him, her head lost in the shadow of broad and graceful leaves that touched her cheek; while the slender spikes of pale green orchids streamed down from amongst the boughs and mingled with the black hair that framed her face, as if all those plants claimed her for their own — the animated and brilliant flower of all that ex- uberant life which, born in gloom, struggles for ever towards the sunshine.
Every day she came a little nearer. He watched her slow progress — the gradual taming of that woman by the words of his love. It was the monotonous song of praise and desire that, commencing at creation, wraps up the world like an atmosphere and shall end only in the end of all things — when there are no lips to sing and no ears to hear. He told her that she was beautiful and desirable, and he repeated it again and again ; for when he told her that, he had said all there was within him — he had expressed his only thought, his only feeling. And he watched the startled look of wonder and mistrust vanish from her face with the passing days, her eyes soften, the smile dwell longer and longer on her lips; a smile as of one charmed by a delightful dream, with the slight exaltation of intoxi- cating triumph lurking in its dawning tenderness.
And while she was near there was nothing in the whole world — for that idle man — but her look and her smile. Nothing in the past, nothing in the future; and in the present only the luminous fact of her exist- ence. But in the sudden darkness of her going he would be left weak and helpless, as though despoiled violently of all that was himself. He who had lived all his life with no preoccupation but that of his own career, contemptuously indifferent to all feminine in- fluence, full of scorn for men that would submit to it,
70 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
if ever so little; he, so strong, so superior even in his errors, realised at last that his very individuality was snatched from within himself by the hand of a woman. Where was the assurance and pride of his cleverness; the belief in success, the anger of failure, the wish to retrieve his fortune, the certitude of his ability to ac- complish it yet? Gone. All gone. All that had been a man within him was gone, and there remained only the trouble of his heart — that heart which had become a contemptible thing; which could be fluttered by a look or a smile, tormented by a word, soothed by a promise.
When the longed-for day came at last, when she sank on the grass by his side and with a quick gesture took his hand in hers, he sat up suddenly with the movement and look of a man awakened by the crash of his own falling house. All his blood, all his sensa- tion, all his life seemed to rush into that hand leaving him without strength, in a cold shiver, in the sudden clamminess and collapse as of a deadly gun-shot wound. He flung her hand away brutally, like some- thing burning, and sat motionless, his head fallen for- ward, staring on the ground and catching his breath in painful gasps. His impulse of fear and apparent horror did not dismay her in the least. Her face was grave and her eyes looked seriously at him. Her fin- gers touched the hair of his temple, ran in a light caress down his cheek, twisted gently the end of his long moustache ; and while he sat in the tremor of that con- tact she ran off with startling fleetness and disappeared in a peal of clear laughter, in the stir of grass, in the nod of young twigs growing over the path; leaving behind only a vanishing trail of motion and sound.
He scrambled to his feet slowly and painfully, like a man with a burden on his shoulders, and walked towards the riverside. He hugged to his breast the recollection of his fear and of his delight, but told
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. ^f
himself seriously over and over again that this must be the end of that adventure. After shoving off his canoe into the stream he lifted his eyes to the bank and gazed at it long and steadily, as if taking his last look at a place of charming memories. He marched up to Almayer's house with the concentrated expres- sion and the determined step of a man who had just taken a momentous resolution. His face was set and rigid, his gestures and movements were guarded and slow. He was keeping a tight hand on himself. A very tight hand. He had a vivid illusion — as vivid as reality almost — of being in charge of a sHppery pris- oner. He sat opposite Almayer during that dinner — which was their last meal together — with a perfectly calm face and within him a growing terror of escape from his own self. Now and then he would grasp the edge of the table and set his teeth hard in a sudden wave of acute despair, like one who, falling down a smooth and rapid declivity that ends in a precipice, digs his finger-nails into the yielding surface and feels himself slipping helplessly to inevitable destruc- tion.
Then, abruptly, came a relaxation of his muscles, the giving way of his will. Something seemed to snap in his head, and that wish, that idea kept back during all those hours, darted into his brain with the heat and noise of a conflagration. He must see her! See her at once! Go now! To-night! He had the raging regret of the lost hour, of every passing moment. There was no thought of resistance now. Yet with the instinctive fear of the irrevocable, with the innate falseness of the human heart, he wanted to keep open the way of retreat. He had never absented himself during the night. What did Almayer know? What would Almayer think? Better ask him for the gun. A moonhght night. . . . Look for deer. ... A col- ourable pretext. He would lie to Almayer. What did
*j2 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
it matter! He lied to himself every minute of his Hfe. And for what? For a woman. And such. . . .
Almayer's answer showed him that deception was useless. Everything gets to be known, even in this place. Well, he did not care. Cared for nothing but for the lost seconds. What if he should suddenly die. Die before he saw her. Before he could . . .
As, with the sound of Almayer's laughter in his ears, he urged the canoe in a slanting course across the rapid current, he tried to tell himself that he could return at any moment. He would just go and look at the place where they used to meet, at the tree under w^hich he lay when she took his hand, at the spot where she sat by his side. Just go there and then return — nothing more; but when his little skif¥ touched the bank he leaped out, forgetting the painter, and the canoe hung for a moment amongst the bushes and then swung out of sight before he had time to dash into the water and secure it. He was thunderstruck at first. Now he could not go back unless he called up the Rajah's people to get a boat and rowers — and the way to Patalolo's campong led past Aissa's house!
He went up the path with the eager eyes and re- luctant steps of a man pursuing a phantom, and when he found himself at a place where a narrow track branched ofif to the left towards Omar's clearing he stood still, with a look of strained attention on his face as if listening to a far-ofif voice — the voice of his fate. It w^as a sound inarticulate but full of meaning; and following it there came a rending and tearing within his breast. He twisted his fingers together, and the joints of his hands and arms cracked. On his forehead the perspiration stood out in small pearly drops. He looked round wildly. Above the shapeless darkness of the forest undergrowth rose the tree-tops with their high boughs and leaves standing out black on the pale sky — like fragments of night floating on moonbeams.
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 73
Under his feet warm steam rose from the heated earth. Round him there was a great silence.
He was looking round for help. This silence, this immobility of his surroundings seemed to him a cold rebuke, a stern refusal, a cruel unconcern. There was no safety outside of himself — and in himself there was no refuge; there was only the image of that woman. He had a sudden moment of lucidity^zzoi-that-criiel tgggityThat comes onceji^n^life t^ the most benighted. A strange disclosure gjweakness, of want of logjc^ of the usual blindness of our impulses. He seemed to see wHallvenroirwithin him, and was horrified at the strange sight. He, a white man! A man of practical ambitions, whose worst fault till then had been a little want of judgment and too much confidence in the rectitude of his kind. That woman was a pretty sav- age, and ... He tried to tell himself that the thing was of no consequence. No consequence. It was a vain effort. Hudig's partner was gone already, and now the feeling that the clever Willems was going too forced itself upon him. mercilessly. The novelty of the sensations he had never experienced before in the slightest degree, yet had despised on hearsay from his safe position of a civilised man, destroyed his courage. He was disappointed with himself. He seemed to be surrendering to a wild creature the unstained purity of his life, of his race, of his civilisation. He did not tell himself all this, but he had a notion of being lost amongst shapeless things that were dangerous and ghastly. He struggled with the sense of certain de- feat— lost his footing — fell back into the darkness. With a faint cry and an upward throw of his arms he gave up as a tired swimmer gives up: because the swamped craft is gone from under his feet; because the night is dark and the shore is far; — becau.^e deavb is better than strife.
PART II. I.
The light and heat fell upon the settlement, the clear- ings, and the river as if fiung down by an angry hand. The land lay silent, still, and brilliant under the ava- lanche 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 flow- ers, fluttered audaciously in the open, and their minute shadows hovered in swarms over the drooping blos- soms, 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 shel- tering depths, to the cool refuge of the sea.
Almayer had dismissed his workmen for the mid- day 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.
74
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 75
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 be- fore the fleeting smile could vanish from her face.
Almayer moved lightl}- ofif, 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 sun- shine? . . . 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.
•j6
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
"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 impor^ tant."
*' 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. " Lis- tening to me would be a further proof of it. You will be sorry if you don't."
"Oh, you funny fellow!" said Almayer, banter- ingly. " 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 ap- peared 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 confi- dential 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 of¥ 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
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
17
like the last sparks amongst the black embers of a burnt-out fire. An unclean beard grew out of the cav- erns 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 ex- tended 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 civilised 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 scoun- drel must be dehghted 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
75
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
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 Al- mayer's face.
" Oh, I don't mean from me. I haven't missed any- thing," 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, w4th 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 sub- dued laugh. " How funny. Had enough of you al- ready? You know it's not flattering for you, my su- perior 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 Al- mayer, 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.
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
79
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, Hves, 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 fort- night."
" No I 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 pre- vents 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,
80 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
gloomily. " Look! " and he bared an arm covered with fresh scars. " I have been biting myself to for- get 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.
" Disgoasting exhibition," said Almayer, loftily. " What could father ever see in you?/ You are as es- timable 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 readi- ness, and^stopped confused for a moment. He recov- ered 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 an excess of 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?"
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 8 1
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, find- ing the reward of a self-denying life in a vision of dazzling glory. He went on in an impassioned mur- mur—
" And then I would have her all to myself away from her people — all to myself — under my own influ- ence— 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 a while 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! "
32 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
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 hang- ing 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 Btick — 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.
" Get out! Get out! Get out! 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 —
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 83
so! " He struck his fist on the rail of the bakistrade to show how he would kill Willems, and, perching the consoled child on Ins shoulder held her with one hand, w^hile he pointed towards the retreating figure of his visitor.
" Look how he runs away, dearest," he said, coax- ingly. " 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 tw^itter^ of a bird: —
"Pig! Pig! Pig!"
11.
A sigh under the flaming blue, a shiver of the sleep- ing 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 trav- elled on in a soft ripple of darkening water, in the w^hisper of branches, in the rustle of leaves of the awak- ened 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 glownng 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
84 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
the hot hours of the afternoon woke up, and the silence of the big courtyard was broken by the hesitating mur- mur of yet sleepy voices, by coughs and yawns, wuth 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 bar- barians, persistent, steady, repeating itself in the soft syllables, in musical tones of the never-ending dis- courses 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 accompHshment, 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 oi 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 over- hanging 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 fol- lowers to whom their distinguished birth, long de- votion, 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 si- lently 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,
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 85
in the absorbed meditation of the game, there towered here and there the straight figure of an attentive spec- tator 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 gentle- men, 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 hme, a morsel of gam- bier, 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 ejacu- lated 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 ex- treme 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
86 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
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 exclu- sion of every other business — interfered with his regU' lar attendance upon his chief and protector — even dis- turbed his sleep for the last three nights, as his wife — the gift of Lakamba — had remarked, with piercing and reproachful volubility, more than once. 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 de- tachment from his surroundings, as if unaware that many sleepy eyes watched from all parts of the court- yard 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 La- kamba 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 per- suaded to leave the Raiah's place, or had been kid- napped from there — as the case might be. Babalatchi did not mind in the least the putting of¥ of his own oc- cvipation of the house of honour, because it had many advantages for the quiet working out of his plans. It
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 8/
had a certain seclusion, having an enclosure of its own, and that enclosure communicated also with Lakam- ba'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 w^as through the great front courtyard always full of armed men and watchful eyes. Behind the whole group of build- ings there stretched the level ground of rice-clearings, which in their turn were closed in by the wall of un- touched 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 dur- ing 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 dis- tance 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 bHnd and infirm, had some difificulty 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 La- kamba'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
88 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
Stretched a tremulous and emaciated arm towards the hut. Babalatchi made a few steps toward the door- way, but stopped outside in the sunHght.
"O! Tuan Omar, Omar besar! It is I — Baba- latchi!"
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 care- fulness 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 stifif 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, sooth-
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 89
ingly. 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 Babalat- chi, 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 hun- ger 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 Baba- latchi, thoughtfully.
QO AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
*' Do not let him come back," exclaimed Omar.
" Neither can he escape his fate," went on Baba- latchi. " 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 ris- ing, 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, hum- bly. " 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 La- kamba. 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 ap- proached 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 re- mained silent. Omar sat absorbed in thought.
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91
" 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 under- stand. I am old and blind and weak. I do not un- derstand. I am very cold," he continued, in a lower tone, moving his shoulders uneasily. He ceased, then went on rambhng 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 sufifer."
'* Tell me, Babalatchi, will they die? Will they both die?" asked Omar, in sudden agitation.
Ai'ssa 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 Baba- latchi, 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, ex- hausted.
" I am alone, I am alone," he wailed feebly, grop- 9
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ing vaguely about with his trembhng 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 wo- man! 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 pray- ing carpet. Out of a brass vessel he poured the water of absolution 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 that 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.
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 03
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 Baba- latchi, 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. In- deed, 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 a 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 to- wards Omar. " Do you think, O girl ! that he him- self 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! "
" Y©u know that best," muttered Babalatchi, with a fmgitive smile — " but remember, woman with the strong heart, that to hold him now you must be to
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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, to- wards the (juiet 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 sepa- rated Lakamba's private ground from Omar's enclos- ure swung back quickly, and the noble exile ap- peared 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 am- bitious 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 outl)urst of yells stopped Lakamba's dis- course. Angry voices shouted: "Hold him. Beat him down. Strike at his head." Then the clamour
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95
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 male- dictions 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 A'is- sa, 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 promnse," 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 con- tempt 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 fear- fully 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 Ai'ssa in his arms. He rushed up the enclosure like a tornado, pressing the girl to his breast, her arms
96 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
round his neck, her head hanging back over his arm, lier 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 door- way of the big house.
Inside and outside the enclosure there was silence. Omar lay supporting himself on his elbow, his terri- fied face with its closed eyes giving him the appear- ance 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 dis- [Tfagement, 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 flut- tered 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 sud- denly, and flew, spinning and turning before the breath of the perfumed breeze, driven helplessly into the dark night that had closed over the land.
ni.
/ A ^^ ' 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 com- mercial expedition, as his father's representative on board a pilgrim ship chartered by the wealthy Arab
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97
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. 1 he 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 un- swerving piety of his heart and by the religious so- lemnity 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 Cal- cutta, 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 be- yond his years, caused him to be recognised 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, an- other in Palembang; husbands of numerous sisters; cousins innumerable scattered north, south, east, and west — in every place wdiere 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 a great deference to Abdulla, listened to his advice, entered into his plans — because he was wise, pious, and fortunate.
^8 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
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 chari- table 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 re- buke with severity those who attempted to touch his knees with their finger-tips in gratitude or supplica- tion. 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-Hpped mouth. His as- pect was serene. He had a belief in his own pros- perity which nothing could shake.
Restless, like all his people, he very seldom dwelt for many days together in his splendid house in Pe- nang. 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 house- hold— 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-of^fices, 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
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travel-Stained and weary men who would withdraw from his presence calling upon Allah to bless the gen- erous giver of splendid rewards. And the nevv^s were always good, and all his attempts always succeeded, and in his ears there rang always a chorus of admira- tion, of gratitude, of humble entreaties.
A fortunate man. And his felicity was so com- plete that the good genii, wdio ordered the stars at liis birth, had not neglected — by a refinement of be- nevolence strange in such primitive beings — to pro- vide 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 de- cisive 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, spread- ing 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 adven- turous 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. Meantim.e he returned encouraging an- swers 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 'i'-ipected to see for the first time on the ni^jht of Wil-
lOO AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
lems' return to Aissa. Babalatchi, who had been tor- mented for three days by the fear of having over- reached himself in his httle 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 car- pets 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 dark- ness 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 Ba- balatchi 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
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Up the dark courtyard towards the house. The Httle 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 grow- ing 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 AbduUa 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 ex- changed 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 be- tween the two lines of men holding torches, and met Takamba 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
TO? AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
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 w^ore 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 dovvn 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 semicircle, of which the point most distant from tlie fire — some ten yards — was also the nearest to La- kamba's dwelling. As soon as the principal person- ages were seated, the verandah of the house was filled silently by the muf^ed-up forms of Lakamba's female belongings. They crowded close to the rail and looked down, wdiispering faintly. Below, the formal exchange of compliments went on for some time be- tween 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 efifort, 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
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Lakamba. At different points of the narrative he would turn for confirmation toSahamin and Bahas- soen, 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 con- nected with Lingard's action at the critical period of those internal dissensions. He spoke in a restrained voice still, but with a grov/ing 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 Pata- lolo'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 yea.r . . .
" Very true! " exclaimed Sahamin and Bahassoen together.
Babalatchi glanced at them approvingly and turned to Abdulla.
" Listen to those men, O Protector of the op- pressed! " he exclaimed. "What could we do? A man must trade. There was nobody else."
Sahamin got up, stafif in hand, and spoke to Ab- dulla with ponderous courtesy, emphasising 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, wlio are no better than monkeys. He buys from them guttah
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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, yoit are a lucky man ' — remark, O First amongst the Believers! that by those words he could have brought misfor- tune 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, crisp- ly. " We shall fight if there is help and a leader. Tuan Abdulla, will you come among us?"
Abdulla did not answer at once. His Hps 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 hur- ried indoors, and from the crowd that had kept dis- creetly 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 Baba- latchi, 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
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 105
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 back- wards and forwards in the full light of the fire, looking very warhke and reckless; the envy and admiration of Laicamba'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 lis- tened to him with deep interest.
". . . We could have eighty men if there was need," he was saying — " eighty men in fourteen ca- noes. The only thing we want is gunpowder . . ."
" Hai! there will be no fighting," broke in Baba- latchi. '' 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 Ba- davi 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 furi- ous 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 mo- ment his grave composure. He turned to Babalatchi, and said with decision —
I06 AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS.
" 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 Ab- dulla 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, al- though appearing to listen with flattering attention. When near the gate Babalatchi moved forward and stopped, facing AbduUa, with his hand on the fasten- ings.
" You shall see them both," he said. '' All my words about them are true. When I saw him en- slaved 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 lan- guage, after the manner of white men. Afterv/ards, 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 . . . house- hold. Then this red-faced man raged for three days like a black panther that is hungry. And this even- ing, 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. " This 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."
AN OUTCAST OF THE ISLANDS. 107
*' 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 strok- ing 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 mum- bled 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. IMen in twos or threes came out of the shadows into the light, strolling slowly, and pas«ed again into the shadows.