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<h2> CHAPTER 43 </h2>
<p>'Tamb' Itam behind his chair was thunderstruck. The declaration produced
an immense sensation. "Let them go because this is best in my knowledge
which has never deceived you," Jim insisted. There was a silence. In the
darkness of the courtyard could be heard the subdued whispering, shuffling
noise of many people. Doramin raised his heavy head and said that there
was no more reading of hearts than touching the sky with the hand, but—he
consented. The others gave their opinion in turn. "It is best," "Let them
go," and so on. But most of them simply said that they "believed Tuan
Jim."</p>
<p>'In this simple form of assent to his will lies the whole gist of the
situation; their creed, his truth; and the testimony to that faithfulness
which made him in his own eyes the equal of the impeccable men who never
fall out of the ranks. Stein's words, "Romantic!—Romantic!" seem to
ring over those distances that will never give him up now to a world
indifferent to his failings and his virtues, and to that ardent and
clinging affection that refuses him the dole of tears in the bewilderment
of a great grief and of eternal separation. From the moment the sheer
truthfulness of his last three years of life carries the day against the
ignorance, the fear, and the anger of men, he appears no longer to me as I
saw him last—a white speck catching all the dim light left upon a
sombre coast and the darkened sea—but greater and more pitiful in
the loneliness of his soul, that remains even for her who loved him best a
cruel and insoluble mystery.</p>
<p>'It is evident that he did not mistrust Brown; there was no reason to
doubt the story, whose truth seemed warranted by the rough frankness, by a
sort of virile sincerity in accepting the morality and the consequences of
his acts. But Jim did not know the almost inconceivable egotism of the man
which made him, when resisted and foiled in his will, mad with the
indignant and revengeful rage of a thwarted autocrat. But if Jim did not
mistrust Brown, he was evidently anxious that some misunderstanding should
not occur, ending perhaps in collision and bloodshed. It was for this
reason that directly the Malay chiefs had gone he asked Jewel to get him
something to eat, as he was going out of the fort to take command in the
town. On her remonstrating against this on the score of his fatigue, he
said that something might happen for which he would never forgive himself.
"I am responsible for every life in the land," he said. He was moody at
first; she served him with her own hands, taking the plates and dishes (of
the dinner-service presented him by Stein) from Tamb' Itam. He brightened
up after a while; told her she would be again in command of the fort for
another night. "There's no sleep for us, old girl," he said, "while our
people are in danger." Later on he said jokingly that she was the best man
of them all. "If you and Dain Waris had done what you wanted, not one of
these poor devils would be alive to-day." "Are they very bad?" she asked,
leaning over his chair. "Men act badly sometimes without being much worse
than others," he said after some hesitation.</p>
<p>'Tamb' Itam followed his master to the landing-stage outside the fort. The
night was clear but without a moon, and the middle of the river was dark,
while the water under each bank reflected the light of many fires "as on a
night of Ramadan," Tamb' Itam said. War-boats drifted silently in the dark
lane or, anchored, floated motionless with a loud ripple. That night there
was much paddling in a canoe and walking at his master's heels for Tamb'
Itam: up and down the street they tramped, where the fires were burning,
inland on the outskirts of the town where small parties of men kept guard
in the fields. Tuan Jim gave his orders and was obeyed. Last of all they
went to the Rajah's stockade, which a detachment of Jim's people manned on
that night. The old Rajah had fled early in the morning with most of his
women to a small house he had near a jungle village on a tributary stream.
Kassim, left behind, had attended the council with his air of diligent
activity to explain away the diplomacy of the day before. He was
considerably cold-shouldered, but managed to preserve his smiling, quiet
alertness, and professed himself highly delighted when Jim told him
sternly that he proposed to occupy the stockade on that night with his own
men. After the council broke up he was heard outside accosting this and
that deputing chief, and speaking in a loud, gratified tone of the Rajah's
property being protected in the Rajah's absence.</p>
<p>'About ten or so Jim's men marched in. The stockade commanded the mouth of
the creek, and Jim meant to remain there till Brown had passed below. A
small fire was lit on the flat, grassy point outside the wall of stakes,
and Tamb' Itam placed a little folding-stool for his master. Jim told him
to try and sleep. Tamb' Itam got a mat and lay down a little way off; but
he could not sleep, though he knew he had to go on an important journey
before the night was out. His master walked to and fro before the fire
with bowed head and with his hands behind his back. His face was sad.
Whenever his master approached him Tamb' Itam pretended to sleep, not
wishing his master to know he had been watched. At last his master stood
still, looking down on him as he lay, and said softly, "It is time."</p>
<p>'Tamb' Itam arose directly and made his preparations. His mission was to
go down the river, preceding Brown's boat by an hour or more, to tell Dain
Waris finally and formally that the whites were to be allowed to pass out
unmolested. Jim would not trust anybody else with that service. Before
starting, Tamb' Itam, more as a matter of form (since his position about
Jim made him perfectly known), asked for a token. "Because, Tuan," he
said, "the message is important, and these are thy very words I carry."
His master first put his hand into one pocket, then into another, and
finally took off his forefinger Stein's silver ring, which he habitually
wore, and gave it to Tamb' Itam. When Tamb' Itam left on his mission,
Brown's camp on the knoll was dark but for a single small glow shining
through the branches of one of the trees the white men had cut down.</p>
<p>'Early in the evening Brown had received from Jim a folded piece of paper
on which was written, "You get the clear road. Start as soon as your boat
floats on the morning tide. Let your men be careful. The bushes on both
sides of the creek and the stockade at the mouth are full of well-armed
men. You would have no chance, but I don't believe you want bloodshed."
Brown read it, tore the paper into small pieces, and, turning to
Cornelius, who had brought it, said jeeringly, "Good-bye, my excellent
friend." Cornelius had been in the fort, and had been sneaking around
Jim's house during the afternoon. Jim chose him to carry the note because
he could speak English, was known to Brown, and was not likely to be shot
by some nervous mistake of one of the men as a Malay, approaching in the
dusk, perhaps might have been.</p>
<p>'Cornelius didn't go away after delivering the paper. Brown was sitting up
over a tiny fire; all the others were lying down. "I could tell you
something you would like to know," Cornelius mumbled crossly. Brown paid
no attention. "You did not kill him," went on the other, "and what do you
get for it? You might have had money from the Rajah, besides the loot of
all the Bugis houses, and now you get nothing." "You had better clear out
from here," growled Brown, without even looking at him. But Cornelius let
himself drop by his side and began to whisper very fast, touching his
elbow from time to time. What he had to say made Brown sit up at first,
with a curse. He had simply informed him of Dain Waris's armed party down
the river. At first Brown saw himself completely sold and betrayed, but a
moment's reflection convinced him that there could be no treachery
intended. He said nothing, and after a while Cornelius remarked, in a tone
of complete indifference, that there was another way out of the river
which he knew very well. "A good thing to know, too," said Brown, pricking
up his ears; and Cornelius began to talk of what went on in town and
repeated all that had been said in council, gossiping in an even undertone
at Brown's ear as you talk amongst sleeping men you do not wish to wake.
"He thinks he has made me harmless, does he?" mumbled Brown very low. . .
. "Yes. He is a fool. A little child. He came here and robbed me," droned
on Cornelius, "and he made all the people believe him. But if something
happened that they did not believe him any more, where would he be? And
the Bugis Dain who is waiting for you down the river there, captain, is
the very man who chased you up here when you first came." Brown observed
nonchalantly that it would be just as well to avoid him, and with the same
detached, musing air Cornelius declared himself acquainted with a
backwater broad enough to take Brown's boat past Waris's camp. "You will
have to be quiet," he said as an afterthought, "for in one place we pass
close behind his camp. Very close. They are camped ashore with their boats
hauled up." "Oh, we know how to be as quiet as mice; never fear," said
Brown. Cornelius stipulated that in case he were to pilot Brown out, his
canoe should be towed. "I'll have to get back quick," he explained.</p>
<p>'It was two hours before the dawn when word was passed to the stockade
from outlying watchers that the white robbers were coming down to their
boat. In a very short time every armed man from one end of Patusan to the
other was on the alert, yet the banks of the river remained so silent that
but for the fires burning with sudden blurred flares the town might have
been asleep as if in peace-time. A heavy mist lay very low on the water,
making a sort of illusive grey light that showed nothing. When Brown's
long-boat glided out of the creek into the river, Jim was standing on the
low point of land before the Rajah's stockade—on the very spot where
for the first time he put his foot on Patusan shore. A shadow loomed up,
moving in the greyness, solitary, very bulky, and yet constantly eluding
the eye. A murmur of low talking came out of it. Brown at the tiller heard
Jim speak calmly: "A clear road. You had better trust to the current while
the fog lasts; but this will lift presently." "Yes, presently we shall see
clear," replied Brown.</p>
<p>'The thirty or forty men standing with muskets at ready outside the
stockade held their breath. The Bugis owner of the prau, whom I saw on
Stein's verandah, and who was amongst them, told me that the boat, shaving
the low point close, seemed for a moment to grow big and hang over it like
a mountain. "If you think it worth your while to wait a day outside,"
called out Jim, "I'll try to send you down something—a bullock, some
yams—what I can." The shadow went on moving. "Yes. Do," said a
voice, blank and muffled out of the fog. Not one of the many attentive
listeners understood what the words meant; and then Brown and his men in
their boat floated away, fading spectrally without the slightest sound.</p>
<p>'Thus Brown, invisible in the mist, goes out of Patusan elbow to elbow
with Cornelius in the stern-sheets of the long-boat. "Perhaps you shall
get a small bullock," said Cornelius. "Oh yes. Bullock. Yam. You'll get it
if he said so. He always speaks the truth. He stole everything I had. I
suppose you like a small bullock better than the loot of many houses." "I
would advise you to hold your tongue, or somebody here may fling you
overboard into this damned fog," said Brown. The boat seemed to be
standing still; nothing could be seen, not even the river alongside, only
the water-dust flew and trickled, condensed, down their beards and faces.
It was weird, Brown told me. Every individual man of them felt as though
he were adrift alone in a boat, haunted by an almost imperceptible
suspicion of sighing, muttering ghosts. "Throw me out, would you? But I
would know where I was," mumbled Cornelius surlily. "I've lived many years
here." "Not long enough to see through a fog like this," Brown said,
lolling back with his arm swinging to and fro on the useless tiller. "Yes.
Long enough for that," snarled Cornelius. "That's very useful," commented
Brown. "Am I to believe you could find that backway you spoke of
blindfold, like this?" Cornelius grunted. "Are you too tired to row?" he
asked after a silence. "No, by God!" shouted Brown suddenly. "Out with
your oars there." There was a great knocking in the fog, which after a
while settled into a regular grind of invisible sweeps against invisible
thole-pins. Otherwise nothing was changed, and but for the slight splash
of a dipped blade it was like rowing a balloon car in a cloud, said Brown.
Thereafter Cornelius did not open his lips except to ask querulously for
somebody to bale out his canoe, which was towing behind the long-boat.
Gradually the fog whitened and became luminous ahead. To the left Brown
saw a darkness as though he had been looking at the back of the departing
night. All at once a big bough covered with leaves appeared above his
head, and ends of twigs, dripping and still, curved slenderly close
alongside. Cornelius, without a word, took the tiller from his hand.'</p>
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<h2> CHAPTER 44 </h2>
<p>'I don't think they spoke together again. The boat entered a narrow
by-channel, where it was pushed by the oar-blades set into crumbling
banks, and there was a gloom as if enormous black wings had been outspread
above the mist that filled its depth to the summits of the trees. The
branches overhead showered big drops through the gloomy fog. At a mutter
from Cornelius, Brown ordered his men to load. "I'll give you a chance to
get even with them before we're done, you dismal cripples, you," he said
to his gang. "Mind you don't throw it away—you hounds." Low growls
answered that speech. Cornelius showed much fussy concern for the safety
of his canoe.</p>
<p>'Meantime Tamb' Itam had reached the end of his journey. The fog had
delayed him a little, but he had paddled steadily, keeping in touch with
the south bank. By-and-by daylight came like a glow in a ground glass
globe. The shores made on each side of the river a dark smudge, in which
one could detect hints of columnar forms and shadows of twisted branches
high up. The mist was still thick on the water, but a good watch was being
kept, for as Iamb' Itam approached the camp the figures of two men emerged
out of the white vapour, and voices spoke to him boisterously. He
answered, and presently a canoe lay alongside, and he exchanged news with
the paddlers. All was well. The trouble was over. Then the men in the
canoe let go their grip on the side of his dug-out and incontinently fell
out of sight. He pursued his way till he heard voices coming to him
quietly over the water, and saw, under the now lifting, swirling mist, the
glow of many little fires burning on a sandy stretch, backed by lofty thin
timber and bushes. There again a look-out was kept, for he was challenged.
He shouted his name as the two last sweeps of his paddle ran his canoe up
on the strand. It was a big camp. Men crouched in many little knots under
a subdued murmur of early morning talk. Many thin threads of smoke curled
slowly on the white mist. Little shelters, elevated above the ground, had
been built for the chiefs. Muskets were stacked in small pyramids, and
long spears were stuck singly into the sand near the fires.</p>
<p>'Tamb' Itam, assuming an air of importance, demanded to be led to Dain
Waris. He found the friend of his white lord lying on a raised couch made
of bamboo, and sheltered by a sort of shed of sticks covered with mats.
Dain Waris was awake, and a bright fire was burning before his
sleeping-place, which resembled a rude shrine. The only son of nakhoda
Doramin answered his greeting kindly. Tamb' Itam began by handing him the
ring which vouched for the truth of the messenger's words. Dain Waris,
reclining on his elbow, bade him speak and tell all the news. Beginning
with the consecrated formula, "The news is good," Tamb' Itam delivered
Jim's own words. The white men, deputing with the consent of all the
chiefs, were to be allowed to pass down the river. In answer to a question
or two Tamb' Itam then reported the proceedings of the last council. Dain
Waris listened attentively to the end, toying with the ring which
ultimately he slipped on the forefinger of his right hand. After hearing
all he had to say he dismissed Tamb' Itam to have food and rest. Orders
for the return in the afternoon were given immediately. Afterwards Dain
Waris lay down again, open-eyed, while his personal attendants were
preparing his food at the fire, by which Tamb' Itam also sat talking to
the men who lounged up to hear the latest intelligence from the town. The
sun was eating up the mist. A good watch was kept upon the reach of the
main stream where the boat of the whites was expected to appear every
moment.</p>
<p>'It was then that Brown took his revenge upon the world which, after
twenty years of contemptuous and reckless bullying, refused him the
tribute of a common robber's success. It was an act of cold-blooded
ferocity, and it consoled him on his deathbed like a memory of an
indomitable defiance. Stealthily he landed his men on the other side of
the island opposite to the Bugis camp, and led them across. After a short
but quite silent scuffle, Cornelius, who had tried to slink away at the
moment of landing, resigned himself to show the way where the undergrowth
was most sparse. Brown held both his skinny hands together behind his back
in the grip of one vast fist, and now and then impelled him forward with a
fierce push. Cornelius remained as mute as a fish, abject but faithful to
his purpose, whose accomplishment loomed before him dimly. At the edge of
the patch of forest Brown's men spread themselves out in cover and waited.
The camp was plain from end to end before their eyes, and no one looked
their way. Nobody even dreamed that the white men could have any knowledge
of the narrow channel at the back of the island. When he judged the moment
come, Brown yelled, "Let them have it," and fourteen shots rang out like
one.</p>
<p>'Tamb' Itam told me the surprise was so great that, except for those who
fell dead or wounded, not a soul of them moved for quite an appreciable
time after the first discharge. Then a man screamed, and after that scream
a great yell of amazement and fear went up from all the throats. A blind
panic drove these men in a surging swaying mob to and fro along the shore
like a herd of cattle afraid of the water. Some few jumped into the river
then, but most of them did so only after the last discharge. Three times
Brown's men fired into the ruck, Brown, the only one in view, cursing and
yelling, "Aim low! aim low!"</p>
<p>'Tamb' Itam says that, as for him, he understood at the first volley what
had happened. Though untouched he fell down and lay as if dead, but with
his eyes open. At the sound of the first shots Dain Waris, reclining on
the couch, jumped up and ran out upon the open shore, just in time to
receive a bullet in his forehead at the second discharge. Tamb' Itam saw
him fling his arms wide open before he fell. Then, he says, a great fear
came upon him—not before. The white men retired as they had come—unseen.</p>
<p>'Thus Brown balanced his account with the evil fortune. Notice that even
in this awful outbreak there is a superiority as of a man who carries
right—the abstract thing—within the envelope of his common
desires. It was not a vulgar and treacherous massacre; it was a lesson, a
retribution—a demonstration of some obscure and awful attribute of
our nature which, I am afraid, is not so very far under the surface as we
like to think.</p>
<p>'Afterwards the whites depart unseen by Tamb' Itam, and seem to vanish
from before men's eyes altogether; and the schooner, too, vanishes after
the manner of stolen goods. But a story is told of a white long-boat
picked up a month later in the Indian Ocean by a cargo steamer. Two
parched, yellow, glassy-eyed, whispering skeletons in her recognised the
authority of a third, who declared that his name was Brown. His schooner,
he reported, bound south with a cargo of Java sugar, had sprung a bad leak
and sank under his feet. He and his companions were the survivors of a
crew of six. The two died on board the steamer which rescued them. Brown
lived to be seen by me, and I can testify that he had played his part to
the last.</p>
<p>'It seems, however, that in going away they had neglected to cast off
Cornelius's canoe. Cornelius himself Brown had let go at the beginning of
the shooting, with a kick for a parting benediction. Tamb' Itam, after
arising from amongst the dead, saw the Nazarene running up and down the
shore amongst the corpses and the expiring fires. He uttered little cries.
Suddenly he rushed to the water, and made frantic efforts to get one of
the Bugis boats into the water. "Afterwards, till he had seen me," related
Tamb' Itam, "he stood looking at the heavy canoe and scratching his head."
"What became of him?" I asked. Tamb' Itam, staring hard at me, made an
expressive gesture with his right arm. "Twice I struck, Tuan," he said.
"When he beheld me approaching he cast himself violently on the ground and
made a great outcry, kicking. He screeched like a frightened hen till he
felt the point; then he was still, and lay staring at me while his life
went out of his eyes."</p>
<p>'This done, Tamb' Itam did not tarry. He understood the importance of
being the first with the awful news at the fort. There were, of course,
many survivors of Dain Waris's party; but in the extremity of panic some
had swum across the river, others had bolted into the bush. The fact is
that they did not know really who struck that blow—whether more
white robbers were not coming, whether they had not already got hold of
the whole land. They imagined themselves to be the victims of a vast
treachery, and utterly doomed to destruction. It is said that some small
parties did not come in till three days afterwards. However, a few tried
to make their way back to Patusan at once, and one of the canoes that were
patrolling the river that morning was in sight of the camp at the very
moment of the attack. It is true that at first the men in her leaped
overboard and swam to the opposite bank, but afterwards they returned to
their boat and started fearfully up-stream. Of these Tamb' Itam had an
hour's advance.'</p>
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