Complete Works of Joseph Conrad (Illustrated) (569 page)

“No, I see nothing,” she said.

“You can’t be looking the right way,” she heard him behind her. And now she felt her head between Lingard’s hands. He moved it the least bit to the right. “There! See it?”

“No. What am I to look for?”

“A gleam of light,” said Lingard, taking away his hands suddenly. “A gleam that will grow into a blaze before our boat can get half way across the lagoon.”

Even as Lingard spoke Mrs. Travers caught sight of a red spark far away. She had looked often enough at the Settlement, as on the face of a painting on a curtain, to have its configuration fixed in her mind, to know that it was on the beach at its end furthest from Belarab’s stockade.

“The brushwood is catching,” murmured Lingard in her ear. “If they had some dry grass the whole pile would be blazing by now.”

“And this means. . . .”

“It means that the news has spread. And it is before Tengga’s enclosure on his end of the beach. That’s where all the brains of the Settlement are. It means talk and excitement and plenty of crafty words. Tengga’s fire! I tell you, Mrs. Travers, that before half an hour has passed Daman will be there to make friends with the fat Tengga, who is ready to say to him, ‘I told you so’.”

“I see,” murmured Mrs. Travers. Lingard drew her gently to the rail.

“And now look over there at the other end of the beach where the shadows are heaviest. That is Belarab’s fort, his houses, his treasure, his dependents. That’s where the strength of the Settlement is. I kept it up. I made it last. But what is it now? It’s like a weapon in the hand of a dead man. And yet it’s all we have to look to, if indeed there is still time. I swear to you I wouldn’t dare land them in daylight for fear they should be slaughtered on the beach.”

“There is no time to lose,” whispered Mrs. Travers, and Lingard, too, spoke very low.

“No, not if I, too, am to keep what is my right. It’s you who have said it.”

“Yes, I have said it,” she whispered, without lifting her head. Lingard made a brusque movement at her elbow and bent his head close to her shoulder.

“And I who mistrusted you! Like Arabs do to their great men, I ought to kiss the hem of your robe in repentance for having doubted the greatness of your heart.”

“Oh! my heart!” said Mrs. Travers, lightly, still gazing at the fire, which had suddenly shot up to a tall blaze. “I can assure you it has been of very little account in the world.” She paused for a moment to steady her voice, then said, firmly, “Let’s get this over.”

“To tell you the truth the boat has been ready for some time.”

“Well, then. . . .”

“Mrs. Travers,” said Lingard with an effort, “they are people of your own kind.” And suddenly he burst out: “I cannot take them ashore bound hand and foot.”

“Mr. d’Alcacer knows. You will find him ready. Ever since the beginning he has been prepared for whatever might happen.”

“He is a man,” said Lingard with conviction. “But it’s of the other that I am thinking.”

“Ah, the other,” she repeated. “Then, what about my thoughts? Luckily we have Mr. d’Alcacer. I shall speak to him first.”

She turned away from the rail and moved toward the Cage.

“Jorgenson,” the voice of Lingard resounded all along the deck, “get a light on the gangway.” Then he followed Mrs. Travers slowly.

VI

D’Alcacer, after receiving his warning, stepped back and leaned against the edge of the table. He could not ignore in himself a certain emotion. And indeed, when he had asked Mrs. Travers for a sign he expected to be moved — but he had not expected the sign to come so soon. He expected this night to pass like other nights, in broken slumbers, bodily discomfort, and the unrest of disconnected thinking. At the same time he was surprised at his own emotion. He had flattered himself on the possession of more philosophy. He thought that this famous sense of self-preservation was a queer thing, a purely animal thing. “For, as a thinking man,” he reflected, “I really ought not to care.” It was probably the unusual that affected him. Clearly. If he had been lying seriously ill in a room in a hotel and had overheard some ominous whispers he would not have cared in the least. Ah, but then he would have been ill — and in illness one grows so indifferent. Illness is a great help to unemotional behaviour, which of course is the correct behaviour for a man of the world. He almost regretted he was not very ill. But, then, Mr. Travers was obviously ill and it did not seem to help him much. D’Alcacer glanced at the bedstead where Mr. Travers preserved an immobility which struck d’Alcacer as obviously affected. He mistrusted it. Generally he mistrusted Mr. Travers. One couldn’t tell what he would do next. Not that he could do much one way or another, but that somehow he threatened to rob the situation of whatever dignity it may have had as a stroke of fate, as a call on courage. Mr. d’Alcacer, acutely observant and alert for the slightest hints, preferred to look upon himself as the victim not of a swindle but of a rough man naively engaged in a contest with heaven’s injustice. D’Alcacer did not examine his heart, but some lines of a French poet came into his mind, to the effect that in all times those who fought with an unjust heaven had possessed the secret admiration and love of men. He didn’t go so far as love but he could not deny to himself that his feeling toward Lingard was secretly friendly and — well, appreciative. Mr. Travers sat up suddenly. What a horrible nuisance, thought d’Alcacer, fixing his eyes on the tips of his shoes with the hope that perhaps the other would lie down again. Mr. Travers spoke.

“Still up, d’Alcacer?”

“I assure you it isn’t late. It’s dark at six, we dined before seven, that makes the night long and I am not a very good sleeper; that is, I cannot go to sleep till late in the night.”

“I envy you,” said Mr. Travers, speaking with a sort of drowsy apathy. “I am always dropping off and the awakenings are horrible.”

D’Alcacer, raising his eyes, noticed that Mrs. Travers and Lingard had vanished from the light. They had gone to the rail where d’Alcacer could not see them. Some pity mingled with his vexation at Mr. Travers’ snatchy wakefulness. There was something weird about the man, he reflected. “Jorgenson,” he began aloud.

“What’s that?” snapped Mr. Travers.

“It’s the name of that lanky old store-keeper who is always about the decks.”

“I haven’t seen him. I don’t see anybody. I don’t know anybody. I prefer not to notice.”

“I was only going to say that he gave me a pack of cards; would you like a game of piquet?”

“I don’t think I could keep my eyes open,” said Mr. Travers in an unexpectedly confidential tone. “Isn’t it funny, d’Alcacer? And then I wake up. It’s too awful.”

D’Alcacer made no remark and Mr. Travers seemed not to have expected any.

“When I said my wife was mad,” he began, suddenly, causing d’Alcacer to start, “I didn’t mean it literally, of course.” His tone sounded slightly dogmatic and he didn’t seem to be aware of any interval during which he had appeared to sleep. D’Alcacer was convinced more than ever that he had been shamming, and resigned himself wearily to listen, folding his arms across his chest. “What I meant, really,” continued Mr. Travers, “was that she is the victim of a craze. Society is subject to crazes, as you know very well. They are not reprehensible in themselves, but the worst of my wife is that her crazes are never like those of the people with whom she naturally associates. They generally run counter to them. This peculiarity has given me some anxiety, you understand, in the position we occupy. People will begin to say that she is eccentric. Do you see her anywhere, d’Alcacer?”

D’Alcacer was thankful to be able to say that he didn’t see Mrs. Travers. He didn’t even hear any murmurs, though he had no doubt that everybody on board the Emma was wide awake by now. But Mr. Travers inspired him with invincible mistrust and he thought it prudent to add:

“You forget that your wife has a room in the deckhouse.”

This was as far as he would go, for he knew very well that she was not in the deckhouse. Mr. Travers, completely convinced by the statement, made no sound. But neither did he lie down again. D’Alcacer gave himself up to meditation. The night seemed extremely oppressive. At Lingard’s shout for Jorgenson, that in the profound silence struck his ears ominously, he raised his eyes and saw Mrs. Travers outside the door of the Cage. He started forward but she was already within. He saw she was moved. She seemed out of breath and as if unable to speak at first.

“Hadn’t we better shut the door?” suggested d’Alcacer.

“Captain Lingard’s coming in,” she whispered to him. “He has made up his mind.”

“That’s an excellent thing,” commented d’Alcacer, quietly. “I conclude from this that we shall hear something.”

“You shall hear it all from me,” breathed out Mrs. Travers.

“Ah!” exclaimed d’Alcacer very low.

By that time Lingard had entered, too, and the decks of the Emma were all astir with moving figures. Jorgenson’s voice was also heard giving directions. For nearly a minute the four persons within the Cage remained motionless. A shadowy Malay in the gangway said suddenly: “Sudah, Tuan,” and Lingard murmured, “Ready, Mrs. Travers.”

She seized d’Alcacer’s arm and led him to the side of the Cage furthest from the corner in which Mr. Travers’ bed was placed, while Lingard busied himself in pricking up the wick of the Cage lantern as if it had suddenly occurred to him that this, whatever happened, should not be a deed of darkness. Mr. Travers did nothing but turn his head to look over his shoulder.

“One moment,” said d’Alcacer, in a low tone and smiling at Mrs. Travers’ agitation. “Before you tell me anything let me ask you: ‘Have you made up your mind?’“ He saw with much surprise a widening of her eyes. Was it indignation? A pause as of suspicion fell between those two people. Then d’Alcacer said apologetically: “Perhaps I ought not to have asked that question,” and Lingard caught Mrs. Travers’ words, “Oh, I am not afraid to answer that question.”

Then their voices sank. Lingard hung the lamp up again and stood idle in the revived light; but almost immediately he heard d’Alcacer calling him discreetly.

“Captain Lingard!”

He moved toward them at once. At the same instant Mr. Travers’ head pivoted away from the group to its frontal position.

D’Alcacer, very serious, spoke in a familiar undertone.

“Mrs. Travers tells me that we must be delivered up to those Moors on shore.”

“Yes, there is nothing else for it,” said Lingard.

“I confess I am a bit startled,” said d’Alcacer; but except for a slightly hurried utterance nobody could have guessed at anything resembling emotion.

“I have a right to my good name,” said Lingard, also very calm, while Mrs. Travers near him, with half-veiled eyes, listened impassive like a presiding genius.

“I wouldn’t question that for a moment,” conceded d’Alcacer. “A point of honour is not to be discussed. But there is such a thing as humanity, too. To be delivered up helplessly. . . .”

“Perhaps!” interrupted Lingard. “But you needn’t feel hopeless. I am not at liberty to give up my life for your own. Mrs. Travers knows why. That, too, is engaged.”

“Always on your honour?”

“I don’t know. A promise is a promise.”

“Nobody can be held to the impossible,” remarked d’Alcacer.

“Impossible! What is impossible? I don’t know it. I am not a man to talk of the impossible or dodge behind it. I did not bring you here.”

D’Alcacer lowered his head for a moment. “I have finished,” he said, gravely. “That much I had to say. I hope you don’t think I have appeared unduly anxious.”

“It’s the best policy, too.” Mrs. Travers made herself heard suddenly. Nothing of her moved but her lips, she did not even raise her eyes. “It’s the only possible policy. You believe me, Mr. d’Alcacer? . . .” He made an almost imperceptible movement of the head. . . . “Well, then, I put all my hope in you, Mr. d’Alcacer, to get this over as easily as possible and save us all from some odious scene. You think perhaps that it is I who ought to. . . .”

“No, no! I don’t think so,” interrupted d’Alcacer. “It would be impossible.”

“I am afraid it would,” she admitted, nervously.

D’Alcacer made a gesture as if to beg her to say no more and at once crossed over to Mr. Travers’ side of the Cage. He did not want to give himself time to think about his task. Mr. Travers was sitting up on the camp bedstead with a light cotton sheet over his legs. He stared at nothing, and on approaching him d’Alcacer disregarded the slight sinking of his own heart at this aspect which seemed to be that of extreme terror. “This is awful,” he thought. The man kept as still as a hare in its form.

The impressed d’Alcacer had to make an effort to bring himself to tap him lightly on the shoulder.

“The moment has come, Travers, to show some fortitude,” he said with easy intimacy. Mr. Travers looked up swiftly. “I have just been talking to your wife. She had a communication from Captain Lingard for us both. It remains for us now to preserve as much as possible our dignity. I hope that if necessary we will both know how to die.”

In a moment of profound stillness, d’Alcacer had time to wonder whether his face was as stony in expression as the one upturned to him. But suddenly a smile appeared on it, which was certainly the last thing d’Alcacer expected to see. An indubitable smile. A slightly contemptuous smile.

“My wife has been stuffing your head with some more of her nonsense.” Mr. Travers spoke in a voice which astonished d’Alcacer as much as the smile, a voice that was not irritable nor peevish, but had a distinct note of indulgence. “My dear d’Alcacer, that craze has got such a hold of her that she would tell you any sort of tale. Social impostors, mediums, fortune-tellers, charlatans of all sorts do obtain a strange influence over women. You have seen that sort of thing yourself. I had a talk with her before dinner. The influence that bandit has got over her is incredible. I really believe the fellow is half crazy himself. They often are, you know. I gave up arguing with her. Now, what is it you have got to tell me? But I warn you that I am not going to take it seriously.”

He rejected briskly the cotton sheet, put his feet to the ground and buttoned his jacket. D’Alcacer, as he talked, became aware by the slight noise behind him that Mrs. Travers and Lingard were leaving the Cage, but he went on to the end and then waited anxiously for the answer.