<p><SPAN name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"></SPAN></p>
<h2> CHAPTER 23 </h2>
<p>'He did not return till next morning. He had been kept to dinner and for
the night. There never had been such a wonderful man as Mr. Stein. He had
in his pocket a letter for Cornelius ("the Johnnie who's going to get the
sack," he explained, with a momentary drop in his elation), and he
exhibited with glee a silver ring, such as natives use, worn down very
thin and showing faint traces of chasing.</p>
<p>'This was his introduction to an old chap called Doramin—one of the
principal men out there—a big pot—who had been Mr. Stein's
friend in that country where he had all these adventures. Mr. Stein called
him "war-comrade." War-comrade was good. Wasn't it? And didn't Mr. Stein
speak English wonderfully well? Said he had learned it in Celebes—of
all places! That was awfully funny. Was it not? He did speak with an
accent—a twang—did I notice? That chap Doramin had given him
the ring. They had exchanged presents when they parted for the last time.
Sort of promising eternal friendship. He called it fine—did I not?
They had to make a dash for dear life out of the country when that
Mohammed—Mohammed—What's-his-name had been killed. I knew the
story, of course. Seemed a beastly shame, didn't it? . . .</p>
<p>'He ran on like this, forgetting his plate, with a knife and fork in hand
(he had found me at tiffin), slightly flushed, and with his eyes darkened
many shades, which was with him a sign of excitement. The ring was a sort
of credential—("It's like something you read of in books," he threw
in appreciatively)—and Doramin would do his best for him. Mr. Stein
had been the means of saving that chap's life on some occasion; purely by
accident, Mr. Stein had said, but he—Jim—had his own opinion
about that. Mr. Stein was just the man to look out for such accidents. No
matter. Accident or purpose, this would serve his turn immensely. Hoped to
goodness the jolly old beggar had not gone off the hooks meantime. Mr.
Stein could not tell. There had been no news for more than a year; they
were kicking up no end of an all-fired row amongst themselves, and the
river was closed. Jolly awkward, this; but, no fear; he would manage to
find a crack to get in.</p>
<p>'He impressed, almost frightened, me with his elated rattle. He was
voluble like a youngster on the eve of a long holiday with a prospect of
delightful scrapes, and such an attitude of mind in a grown man and in
this connection had in it something phenomenal, a little mad, dangerous,
unsafe. I was on the point of entreating him to take things seriously when
he dropped his knife and fork (he had begun eating, or rather swallowing
food, as it were, unconsciously), and began a search all round his plate.
The ring! The ring! Where the devil . . . Ah! Here it was . . . He closed
his big hand on it, and tried all his pockets one after another. Jove!
wouldn't do to lose the thing. He meditated gravely over his fist. Had it?
Would hang the bally affair round his neck! And he proceeded to do this
immediately, producing a string (which looked like a bit of a cotton
shoe-lace) for the purpose. There! That would do the trick! It would be
the deuce if . . . He seemed to catch sight of my face for the first time,
and it steadied him a little. I probably didn't realise, he said with a
naive gravity, how much importance he attached to that token. It meant a
friend; and it is a good thing to have a friend. He knew something about
that. He nodded at me expressively, but before my disclaiming gesture he
leaned his head on his hand and for a while sat silent, playing
thoughtfully with the bread-crumbs on the cloth . . . "Slam the door—that
was jolly well put," he cried, and jumping up, began to pace the room,
reminding me by the set of the shoulders, the turn of his head, the
headlong and uneven stride, of that night when he had paced thus,
confessing, explaining—what you will—but, in the last
instance, living—living before me, under his own little cloud, with
all his unconscious subtlety which could draw consolation from the very
source of sorrow. It was the same mood, the same and different, like a
fickle companion that to-day guiding you on the true path, with the same
eyes, the same step, the same impulse, to-morrow will lead you hopelessly
astray. His tread was assured, his straying, darkened eyes seemed to
search the room for something. One of his footfalls somehow sounded louder
than the other—the fault of his boots probably—and gave a
curious impression of an invisible halt in his gait. One of his hands was
rammed deep into his trousers' pocket, the other waved suddenly above his
head. "Slam the door!" he shouted. "I've been waiting for that. I'll show
yet . . . I'll . . . I'm ready for any confounded thing . . . I've been
dreaming of it . . . Jove! Get out of this. Jove! This is luck at last . .
. You wait. I'll . . ."</p>
<p>'He tossed his head fearlessly, and I confess that for the first and last
time in our acquaintance I perceived myself unexpectedly to be thoroughly
sick of him. Why these vapourings? He was stumping about the room
flourishing his arm absurdly, and now and then feeling on his breast for
the ring under his clothes. Where was the sense of such exaltation in a
man appointed to be a trading-clerk, and in a place where there was no
trade—at that? Why hurl defiance at the universe? This was not a
proper frame of mind to approach any undertaking; an improper frame of
mind not only for him, I said, but for any man. He stood still over me.
Did I think so? he asked, by no means subdued, and with a smile in which I
seemed to detect suddenly something insolent. But then I am twenty years
his senior. Youth is insolent; it is its right—its necessity; it has
got to assert itself, and all assertion in this world of doubts is a
defiance, is an insolence. He went off into a far corner, and coming back,
he, figuratively speaking, turned to rend me. I spoke like that because I—even
I, who had been no end kind to him—even I remembered—remembered—against
him—what—what had happened. And what about others—the—the—world?
Where's the wonder he wanted to get out, meant to get out, meant to stay
out—by heavens! And I talked about proper frames of mind!</p>
<p>'"It is not I or the world who remember," I shouted. "It is you—you,
who remember."</p>
<p>'He did not flinch, and went on with heat, "Forget everything, everybody,
everybody." . . . His voice fell. . . "But you," he added.</p>
<p>'"Yes—me too—if it would help," I said, also in a low tone.
After this we remained silent and languid for a time as if exhausted. Then
he began again, composedly, and told me that Mr. Stein had instructed him
to wait for a month or so, to see whether it was possible for him to
remain, before he began building a new house for himself, so as to avoid
"vain expense." He did make use of funny expressions—Stein did.
"Vain expense" was good. . . . Remain? Why! of course. He would hang on.
Let him only get in—that's all; he would answer for it he would
remain. Never get out. It was easy enough to remain.</p>
<p>'"Don't be foolhardy," I said, rendered uneasy by his threatening tone.
"If you only live long enough you will want to come back."</p>
<p>'"Come back to what?" he asked absently, with his eyes fixed upon the face
of a clock on the wall.</p>
<p>'I was silent for a while. "Is it to be never, then?" I said. "Never," he
repeated dreamily without looking at me, and then flew into sudden
activity. "Jove! Two o'clock, and I sail at four!"</p>
<p>'It was true. A brigantine of Stein's was leaving for the westward that
afternoon, and he had been instructed to take his passage in her, only no
orders to delay the sailing had been given. I suppose Stein forgot. He
made a rush to get his things while I went aboard my ship, where he
promised to call on his way to the outer roadstead. He turned up
accordingly in a great hurry and with a small leather valise in his hand.
This wouldn't do, and I offered him an old tin trunk of mine supposed to
be water-tight, or at least damp-tight. He effected the transfer by the
simple process of shooting out the contents of his valise as you would
empty a sack of wheat. I saw three books in the tumble; two small, in dark
covers, and a thick green-and-gold volume—a half-crown complete
Shakespeare. "You read this?" I asked. "Yes. Best thing to cheer up a
fellow," he said hastily. I was struck by this appreciation, but there was
no time for Shakespearian talk. A heavy revolver and two small boxes of
cartridges were lying on the cuddy-table. "Pray take this," I said. "It
may help you to remain." No sooner were these words out of my mouth than I
perceived what grim meaning they could bear. "May help you to get in," I
corrected myself remorsefully. He however was not troubled by obscure
meanings; he thanked me effusively and bolted out, calling Good-bye over
his shoulder. I heard his voice through the ship's side urging his boatmen
to give way, and looking out of the stern-port I saw the boat rounding
under the counter. He sat in her leaning forward, exciting his men with
voice and gestures; and as he had kept the revolver in his hand and seemed
to be presenting it at their heads, I shall never forget the scared faces
of the four Javanese, and the frantic swing of their stroke which snatched
that vision from under my eyes. Then turning away, the first thing I saw
were the two boxes of cartridges on the cuddy-table. He had forgotten to
take them.</p>
<p>'I ordered my gig manned at once; but Jim's rowers, under the impression
that their lives hung on a thread while they had that madman in the boat,
made such excellent time that before I had traversed half the distance
between the two vessels I caught sight of him clambering over the rail,
and of his box being passed up. All the brigantine's canvas was loose, her
mainsail was set, and the windlass was just beginning to clink as I
stepped upon her deck: her master, a dapper little half-caste of forty or
so, in a blue flannel suit, with lively eyes, his round face the colour of
lemon-peel, and with a thin little black moustache drooping on each side
of his thick, dark lips, came forward smirking. He turned out,
notwithstanding his self-satisfied and cheery exterior, to be of a
careworn temperament. In answer to a remark of mine (while Jim had gone
below for a moment) he said, "Oh yes. Patusan." He was going to carry the
gentleman to the mouth of the river, but would "never ascend." His flowing
English seemed to be derived from a dictionary compiled by a lunatic. Had
Mr. Stein desired him to "ascend," he would have "reverentially"—(I
think he wanted to say respectfully—but devil only knows)—"reverentially
made objects for the safety of properties." If disregarded, he would have
presented "resignation to quit." Twelve months ago he had made his last
voyage there, and though Mr. Cornelius "propitiated many offertories" to
Mr. Rajah Allang and the "principal populations," on conditions which made
the trade "a snare and ashes in the mouth," yet his ship had been fired
upon from the woods by "irresponsive parties" all the way down the river;
which causing his crew "from exposure to limb to remain silent in
hidings," the brigantine was nearly stranded on a sandbank at the bar,
where she "would have been perishable beyond the act of man." The angry
disgust at the recollection, the pride of his fluency, to which he turned
an attentive ear, struggled for the possession of his broad simple face.
He scowled and beamed at me, and watched with satisfaction the undeniable
effect of his phraseology. Dark frowns ran swiftly over the placid sea,
and the brigantine, with her fore-topsail to the mast and her main-boom
amidships, seemed bewildered amongst the cat's-paws. He told me further,
gnashing his teeth, that the Rajah was a "laughable hyaena" (can't imagine
how he got hold of hyaenas); while somebody else was many times falser
than the "weapons of a crocodile." Keeping one eye on the movements of his
crew forward, he let loose his volubility—comparing the place to a
"cage of beasts made ravenous by long impenitence." I fancy he meant
impunity. He had no intention, he cried, to "exhibit himself to be made
attached purposefully to robbery." The long-drawn wails, giving the time
for the pull of the men catting the anchor, came to an end, and he lowered
his voice. "Plenty too much enough of Patusan," he concluded, with energy.</p>
<p>'I heard afterwards he had been so indiscreet as to get himself tied up by
the neck with a rattan halter to a post planted in the middle of a
mud-hole before the Rajah's house. He spent the best part of a day and a
whole night in that unwholesome situation, but there is every reason to
believe the thing had been meant as a sort of joke. He brooded for a while
over that horrid memory, I suppose, and then addressed in a quarrelsome
tone the man coming aft to the helm. When he turned to me again it was to
speak judicially, without passion. He would take the gentleman to the
mouth of the river at Batu Kring (Patusan town "being situated
internally," he remarked, "thirty miles"). But in his eyes, he continued—a
tone of bored, weary conviction replacing his previous voluble delivery—the
gentleman was already "in the similitude of a corpse." "What? What do you
say?" I asked. He assumed a startlingly ferocious demeanour, and imitated
to perfection the act of stabbing from behind. "Already like the body of
one deported," he explained, with the insufferably conceited air of his
kind after what they imagine a display of cleverness. Behind him I
perceived Jim smiling silently at me, and with a raised hand checking the
exclamation on my lips.</p>
<p>'Then, while the half-caste, bursting with importance, shouted his orders,
while the yards swung creaking and the heavy boom came surging over, Jim
and I, alone as it were, to leeward of the mainsail, clasped each other's
hands and exchanged the last hurried words. My heart was freed from that
dull resentment which had existed side by side with interest in his fate.
The absurd chatter of the half-caste had given more reality to the
miserable dangers of his path than Stein's careful statements. On that
occasion the sort of formality that had been always present in our
intercourse vanished from our speech; I believe I called him "dear boy,"
and he tacked on the words "old man" to some half-uttered expression of
gratitude, as though his risk set off against my years had made us more
equal in age and in feeling. There was a moment of real and profound
intimacy, unexpected and short-lived like a glimpse of some everlasting,
of some saving truth. He exerted himself to soothe me as though he had
been the more mature of the two. "All right, all right," he said, rapidly,
and with feeling. "I promise to take care of myself. Yes; I won't take any
risks. Not a single blessed risk. Of course not. I mean to hang out. Don't
you worry. Jove! I feel as if nothing could touch me. Why! this is luck
from the word Go. I wouldn't spoil such a magnificent chance!" . . . A
magnificent chance! Well, it <i>was</i> magnificent, but chances are what
men make them, and how was I to know? As he had said, even I—even I
remembered—his—his misfortune against him. It was true. And
the best thing for him was to go.</p>
<p>'My gig had dropped in the wake of the brigantine, and I saw him aft
detached upon the light of the westering sun, raising his cap high above
his head. I heard an indistinct shout, "You—shall—hear—of—me."
Of me, or from me, I don't know which. I think it must have been of me. My
eyes were too dazzled by the glitter of the sea below his feet to see him
clearly; I am fated never to see him clearly; but I can assure you no man
could have appeared less "in the similitude of a corpse," as that
half-caste croaker had put it. I could see the little wretch's face, the
shape and colour of a ripe pumpkin, poked out somewhere under Jim's elbow.
He, too, raised his arm as if for a downward thrust. Absit omen!'</p>
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<h2> CHAPTER 24 </h2>
<p>'The coast of Patusan (I saw it nearly two years afterwards) is straight
and sombre, and faces a misty ocean. Red trails are seen like cataracts of
rust streaming under the dark-green foliage of bushes and creepers
clothing the low cliffs. Swampy plains open out at the mouth of rivers,
with a view of jagged blue peaks beyond the vast forests. In the offing a
chain of islands, dark, crumbling shapes, stand out in the everlasting
sunlit haze like the remnants of a wall breached by the sea.</p>
<p>'There is a village of fisher-folk at the mouth of the Batu Kring branch
of the estuary. The river, which had been closed so long, was open then,
and Stein's little schooner, in which I had my passage, worked her way up
in three tides without being exposed to a fusillade from "irresponsive
parties." Such a state of affairs belonged already to ancient history, if
I could believe the elderly headman of the fishing village, who came on
board to act as a sort of pilot. He talked to me (the second white man he
had ever seen) with confidence, and most of his talk was about the first
white man he had ever seen. He called him Tuan Jim, and the tone of his
references was made remarkable by a strange mixture of familiarity and
awe. They, in the village, were under that lord's special protection,
which showed that Jim bore no grudge. If he had warned me that I would
hear of him it was perfectly true. I was hearing of him. There was already
a story that the tide had turned two hours before its time to help him on
his journey up the river. The talkative old man himself had steered the
canoe and had marvelled at the phenomenon. Moreover, all the glory was in
his family. His son and his son-in-law had paddled; but they were only
youths without experience, who did not notice the speed of the canoe till
he pointed out to them the amazing fact.</p>
<p>'Jim's coming to that fishing village was a blessing; but to them, as to
many of us, the blessing came heralded by terrors. So many generations had
been released since the last white man had visited the river that the very
tradition had been lost. The appearance of the being that descended upon
them and demanded inflexibly to be taken up to Patusan was discomposing;
his insistence was alarming; his generosity more than suspicious. It was
an unheard-of request. There was no precedent. What would the Rajah say to
this? What would he do to them? The best part of the night was spent in
consultation; but the immediate risk from the anger of that strange man
seemed so great that at last a cranky dug-out was got ready. The women
shrieked with grief as it put off. A fearless old hag cursed the stranger.</p>
<p>'He sat in it, as I've told you, on his tin box, nursing the unloaded
revolver on his lap. He sat with precaution—than which there is
nothing more fatiguing—and thus entered the land he was destined to
fill with the fame of his virtues, from the blue peaks inland to the white
ribbon of surf on the coast. At the first bend he lost sight of the sea
with its labouring waves for ever rising, sinking, and vanishing to rise
again—the very image of struggling mankind—and faced the
immovable forests rooted deep in the soil, soaring towards the sunshine,
everlasting in the shadowy might of their tradition, like life itself. And
his opportunity sat veiled by his side like an Eastern bride waiting to be
uncovered by the hand of the master. He too was the heir of a shadowy and
mighty tradition! He told me, however, that he had never in his life felt
so depressed and tired as in that canoe. All the movement he dared to
allow himself was to reach, as it were by stealth, after the shell of half
a cocoa-nut floating between his shoes, and bale some of the water out
with a carefully restrained action. He discovered how hard the lid of a
block-tin case was to sit upon. He had heroic health; but several times
during that journey he experienced fits of giddiness, and between whiles
he speculated hazily as to the size of the blister the sun was raising on
his back. For amusement he tried by looking ahead to decide whether the
muddy object he saw lying on the water's edge was a log of wood or an
alligator. Only very soon he had to give that up. No fun in it. Always
alligator. One of them flopped into the river and all but capsized the
canoe. But this excitement was over directly. Then in a long empty reach
he was very grateful to a troop of monkeys who came right down on the bank
and made an insulting hullabaloo on his passage. Such was the way in which
he was approaching greatness as genuine as any man ever achieved.
Principally, he longed for sunset; and meantime his three paddlers were
preparing to put into execution their plan of delivering him up to the
Rajah.</p>
<p>'"I suppose I must have been stupid with fatigue, or perhaps I did doze
off for a time," he said. The first thing he knew was his canoe coming to
the bank. He became instantaneously aware of the forest having been left
behind, of the first houses being visible higher up, of a stockade on his
left, and of his boatmen leaping out together upon a low point of land and
taking to their heels. Instinctively he leaped out after them. At first he
thought himself deserted for some inconceivable reason, but he heard
excited shouts, a gate swung open, and a lot of people poured out, making
towards him. At the same time a boat full of armed men appeared on the
river and came alongside his empty canoe, thus shutting off his retreat.</p>
<p>'"I was too startled to be quite cool—don't you know? and if that
revolver had been loaded I would have shot somebody—perhaps two,
three bodies, and that would have been the end of me. But it wasn't. . .
." "Why not?" I asked. "Well, I couldn't fight the whole population, and I
wasn't coming to them as if I were afraid of my life," he said, with just
a faint hint of his stubborn sulkiness in the glance he gave me. I
refrained from pointing out to him that they could not have known the
chambers were actually empty. He had to satisfy himself in his own way. .
. . "Anyhow it wasn't," he repeated good-humouredly, "and so I just stood
still and asked them what was the matter. That seemed to strike them dumb.
I saw some of these thieves going off with my box. That long-legged old
scoundrel Kassim (I'll show him to you to-morrow) ran out fussing to me
about the Rajah wanting to see me. I said, 'All right.' I too wanted to
see the Rajah, and I simply walked in through the gate and—and—here
I am." He laughed, and then with unexpected emphasis, "And do you know
what's the best in it?" he asked. "I'll tell you. It's the knowledge that
had I been wiped out it is this place that would have been the loser."</p>
<p>'He spoke thus to me before his house on that evening I've mentioned—after
we had watched the moon float away above the chasm between the hills like
an ascending spirit out of a grave; its sheen descended, cold and pale,
like the ghost of dead sunlight. There is something haunting in the light
of the moon; it has all the dispassionateness of a disembodied soul, and
something of its inconceivable mystery. It is to our sunshine, which—say
what you like—is all we have to live by, what the echo is to the
sound: misleading and confusing whether the note be mocking or sad. It
robs all forms of matter—which, after all, is our domain—of
their substance, and gives a sinister reality to shadows alone. And the
shadows were very real around us, but Jim by my side looked very stalwart,
as though nothing—not even the occult power of moonlight—could
rob him of his reality in my eyes. Perhaps, indeed, nothing could touch
him since he had survived the assault of the dark powers. All was silent,
all was still; even on the river the moonbeams slept as on a pool. It was
the moment of high water, a moment of immobility that accentuated the
utter isolation of this lost corner of the earth. The houses crowding
along the wide shining sweep without ripple or glitter, stepping into the
water in a line of jostling, vague, grey, silvery forms mingled with black
masses of shadow, were like a spectral herd of shapeless creatures
pressing forward to drink in a spectral and lifeless stream. Here and
there a red gleam twinkled within the bamboo walls, warm, like a living
spark, significant of human affections, of shelter, of repose.</p>
<p>'He confessed to me that he often watched these tiny warm gleams go out
one by one, that he loved to see people go to sleep under his eyes,
confident in the security of to-morrow. "Peaceful here, eh?" he asked. He
was not eloquent, but there was a deep meaning in the words that followed.
"Look at these houses; there's not one where I am not trusted. Jove! I
told you I would hang on. Ask any man, woman, or child . . ." He paused.
"Well, I am all right anyhow."</p>
<p>'I observed quickly that he had found that out in the end. I had been sure
of it, I added. He shook his head. "Were you?" He pressed my arm lightly
above the elbow. "Well, then—you were right."</p>
<p>'There was elation and pride, there was awe almost, in that low
exclamation. "Jove!" he cried, "only think what it is to me." Again he
pressed my arm. "And you asked me whether I thought of leaving. Good God!
I! want to leave! Especially now after what you told me of Mr. Stein's . .
. Leave! Why! That's what I was afraid of. It would have been—it
would have been harder than dying. No—on my word. Don't laugh. I
must feel—every day, every time I open my eyes—that I am
trusted—that nobody has a right—don't you know? Leave! For
where? What for? To get what?"</p>
<p>'I had told him (indeed it was the main object of my visit) that it was
Stein's intention to present him at once with the house and the stock of
trading goods, on certain easy conditions which would make the transaction
perfectly regular and valid. He began to snort and plunge at first.
"Confound your delicacy!" I shouted. "It isn't Stein at all. It's giving
you what you had made for yourself. And in any case keep your remarks for
McNeil—when you meet him in the other world. I hope it won't happen
soon. . . ." He had to give in to my arguments, because all his conquests,
the trust, the fame, the friendships, the love—all these things that
made him master had made him a captive, too. He looked with an owner's eye
at the peace of the evening, at the river, at the houses, at the
everlasting life of the forests, at the life of the old mankind, at the
secrets of the land, at the pride of his own heart; but it was they that
possessed him and made him their own to the innermost thought, to the
slightest stir of blood, to his last breath.</p>
<p>'It was something to be proud of. I, too, was proud—for him, if not
so certain of the fabulous value of the bargain. It was wonderful. It was
not so much of his fearlessness that I thought. It is strange how little
account I took of it: as if it had been something too conventional to be
at the root of the matter. No. I was more struck by the other gifts he had
displayed. He had proved his grasp of the unfamiliar situation, his
intellectual alertness in that field of thought. There was his readiness,
too! Amazing. And all this had come to him in a manner like keen scent to
a well-bred hound. He was not eloquent, but there was a dignity in this
constitutional reticence, there was a high seriousness in his stammerings.
He had still his old trick of stubborn blushing. Now and then, though, a
word, a sentence, would escape him that showed how deeply, how solemnly,
he felt about that work which had given him the certitude of
rehabilitation. That is why he seemed to love the land and the people with
a sort of fierce egoism, with a contemptuous tenderness.'</p>
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