The Rescue (38 page)

Lingard said nothing but there was in Jaffir a faith in that white man
which was not easily shaken.

"How are you going to save them this time, O Rajah Laut?" he asked,
simply.

"Belarab is my friend," murmured Lingard.

In his anxiety Jaffir was very outspoken. "A man of peace!" he exclaimed
in a low tone. "Who could be safe with a man like that?" he asked,
contemptuously.

"There is no war," said Lingard

"There is suspicion, dread, and revenge, and the anger of armed men,"
retorted Jaffir. "You have taken the white prisoners out of their hands
by the force of your words alone. Is that so, Tuan?"

"Yes," said Lingard.

"And you have them on board here?" asked Jaffir, with a glance over his
shoulder at the white and misty structure within which by the light of a
small oil flame d'Alcacer and Mrs. Travers were just then conversing.

"Yes, I have them here."

"Then, Rajah Laut," whispered Jaffir, "you can make all safe by giving
them back."

"Can I do that?" were the words breathed out through Lingard's lips to
the faithful follower of Hassim and Immada.

"Can you do anything else?" was the whispered retort of Jaffir the
messenger accustomed to speak frankly to the great of the earth. "You
are a white man and you can have only one word. And now I go."

A small, rough dug-out belonging to the Emma had been brought round to
the ladder. A shadowy calash hovering respectfully in the darkness of
the deck had already cleared his throat twice in a warning manner.

"Yes, Jaffir, go," said Lingard, "and be my friend."

"I am the friend of a great prince," said the other, sturdily. "But you,
Rajah Laut, were even greater. And great you will remain while you are
with us, people of this sea and of this land. But what becomes of the
strength of your arms before your own white people? Where does it go to,
I say? Well, then, we must trust in the strength of your heart."

"I hope that will never fail," said Lingard, and Jaffir emitted a grunt
of satisfaction. "But God alone sees into men's hearts."

"Yes. Our refuge is with Allah," assented Jaffir, who had acquired
the habit of pious turns of speech in the frequentation of professedly
religious men, of whom there were many in Belarab's stockade. As a
matter of fact, he reposed all his trust in Lingard who had with him
the prestige of a providential man sent at the hour of need by heaven
itself. He waited a while, then: "What is the message I am to take?" he
asked.

"Tell the whole tale to the Rajah Hassim," said Lingard. "And tell him
to make his way here with the lady his sister secretly and with speed.
The time of great trouble has come. Let us, at least, be together."

"Right! Right!" Jaffir approved, heartily. "To die alone under the
weight of one's enemies is a dreadful fate."

He stepped back out of the sheen of the lamp by which they had been
talking and making his way down into the small canoe he took up a paddle
and without a splash vanished on the dark lagoon.

It was then that Mrs. Travers and d'Alcacer heard Lingard call aloud for
Jorgenson. Instantly the familiar shadow stood at Lingard's elbow and
listened in detached silence. Only at the end of the tale it marvelled
audibly: "Here's a mess for you if you like." But really nothing in the
world could astonish or startle old Jorgenson. He turned away muttering
in his moustache. Lingard remained with his chin in his hand and
Jaffir's last words took gradual possession of his mind. Then brusquely
he picked up the lamp and went to seek Mrs. Travers. He went to seek her
because he actually needed her bodily presence, the sound of her voice,
the dark, clear glance of her eyes. She could do nothing for him. On
his way he became aware that Jorgenson had turned out the few Malays
on board the Emma and was disposing them about the decks to watch
the lagoon in all directions. On calling Mrs. Travers out of the Cage
Lingard was, in the midst of his mental struggle, conscious of a certain
satisfaction in taking her away from d'Alcacer. He couldn't spare any of
her attention to any other man, not the least crumb of her time, not
the least particle of her thought! He needed it all. To see it withdrawn
from him for the merest instant was irritating—seemed a disaster.

D'Alcacer, left alone, wondered at the imperious tone of Lingard's call.
To this observer of shades the fact seemed considerable. "Sheer nerves,"
he concluded, to himself. "The man is overstrung. He must have had some
sort of shock." But what could it be—he wondered to himself. In the
tense stagnation of those days of waiting the slightest tremor had an
enormous importance. D'Alcacer did not seek his camp bedstead. He didn't
even sit down. With the palms of his hands against the edge of the table
he leaned back against it. In that negligent attitude he preserved an
alert mind which for a moment wondered whether Mrs. Travers had
not spoiled Lingard a little. Yet in the suddenness of the forced
association, where, too, d'Alcacer was sure there was some moral problem
in the background, he recognized the extreme difficulty of weighing
accurately the imperious demands against the necessary reservations, the
exact proportions of boldness and caution. And d'Alcacer admired upon
the whole Mrs. Travers' cleverness.

There could be no doubt that she had the situation in her hands. That,
of course, did not mean safety. She had it in her hands as one may hold
some highly explosive and uncertain compound. D'Alcacer thought of her
with profound sympathy and with a quite unselfish interest. Sometimes
in a street we cross the path of personalities compelling sympathy and
wonder but for all that we don't follow them home. D'Alcacer refrained
from following Mrs. Travers any further. He had become suddenly aware
that Mr. Travers was sitting up on his camp bedstead. He must have done
it very suddenly. Only a moment before he had appeared plunged in
the deepest slumber, and the stillness for a long time now had been
perfectly unbroken. D'Alcacer was startled enough for an exclamation
and Mr. Travers turned his head slowly in his direction. D'Alcacer
approached the bedstead with a certain reluctance.

"Awake?" he said.

"A sudden chill," said Mr. Travers. "But I don't feel cold now. Strange!
I had the impression of an icy blast."

"Ah!" said d'Alcacer.

"Impossible, of course!" went on Mr. Travers. "This stagnating air never
moves. It clings odiously to one. What time is it?"

"Really, I don't know."

"The glass of my watch was smashed on that night when we were so
treacherously assailed by the savages on the sandbank," grumbled Mr.
Travers.

"I must say I was never so surprised in my life," confessed d'Alcacer.
"We had stopped and I was lighting a cigar, you may remember."

"No," said Mr. Travers. "I had just then pulled out my watch. Of course
it flew out of my hand but it hung by the chain. Somebody trampled on
it. The hands are broken off short. It keeps on ticking but I can't tell
the time. It's absurd. Most provoking."

"Do you mean to say," asked d'Alcacer, "that you have been winding it up
every evening?"

Mr. Travers looked up from his bedstead and he also seemed surprised.
"Why! I suppose I have." He kept silent for a while. "It isn't so
much blind habit as you may think. My habits are the outcome of strict
method. I had to order my life methodically. You know very well, my dear
d'Alcacer, that without strict method I would not have been able to get
through my work and would have had no time at all for social duties,
which, of course, are of very great importance. I may say that,
materially, method has been the foundation of my success in public life.
There were never any empty moments in my day. And now this! . . ." He
looked all round the Cage. . . . "Where's my wife?" he asked.

"I was talking to her only a moment ago," answered d'Alcacer. "I don't
know the time. My watch is on board the yacht; but it isn't late, you
know."

Mr. Travers flung off with unwonted briskness the light cotton sheet
which covered him. He buttoned hastily the tunic which he had unfastened
before lying down, and just as d'Alcacer was expecting him to swing
his feet to the deck impetuously, he lay down again on the pillow and
remained perfectly still.

D'Alcacer waited awhile and then began to pace the Cage. After a couple
of turns he stopped and said, gently:

"I am afraid, Travers, you are not very well."

"I don't know what illness is," answered the voice from the pillow to
the great relief of d'Alcacer who really had not expected an answer.
"Good health is a great asset in public life. Illness may make you miss
a unique opportunity. I was never ill."

All this came out deadened in tone, as if the speaker's face had been
buried in the pillow. D'Alcacer resumed his pacing.

"I think I asked you where my wife was," said the muffled voice.

With great presence of mind d'Alcacer kept on pacing the Cage as if
he had not heard.—"You know, I think she is mad," went on the muffled
voice. "Unless I am."

Again d'Alcacer managed not to interrupt his regular pacing. "Do you
know what I think?" he said, abruptly. "I think, Travers, that you
don't want to talk about her. I think that you don't want to talk about
anything. And to tell you the truth I don't want to, either."

D'Alcacer caught a faint sigh from the pillow and at the same time saw
a small, dim flame appear outside the Cage. And still he kept on his
pacing. Mrs. Travers and Lingard coming out of the deckhouse stopped
just outside the door and Lingard stood the deck-lamp on its roof. They
were too far from d'Alcacer to be heard, but he could make them out:
Mrs. Travers, as straight as an arrow, and the heavy bulk of the man who
faced her with a lowered head. He saw it in profile against the light
and as if deferential in its slight droop. They were looking straight at
each other. Neither of them made the slightest gesture.

"There is that in me," Lingard murmured, deeply, "which would set my
heart harder than a stone. I am King Tom, Rajah Laut, and fit to
look any man hereabouts in the face. I have my name to take care of.
Everything rests on that."

"Mr. d'Alcacer would express this by saying that everything rested on
honour," commented Mrs. Travers with lips that did not tremble, though
from time to time she could feel the accelerated beating of her heart.

"Call it what you like. It's something that a man needs to draw a free
breath. And look!—as you see me standing before you here I care for it
no longer."

"But I do care for it," retorted Mrs. Travers. "As you see me standing
here—I do care. This is something that is your very own. You have a
right to it. And I repeat I do care for it."

"Care for something of my own," murmured Lingard, very close to her
face. "Why should you care for my rights?"

"Because," she said, holding her ground though their foreheads were
nearly touching, "because if I ever get back to my life I don't want to
make it more absurd by real remorse."

Her tone was soft and Lingard received the breath of those words like a
caress on his face. D'Alcacer, in the Cage, made still another effort
to keep up his pacing. He didn't want to give Mr. Travers the slightest
excuse for sitting up again and looking round.

"That I should live to hear anybody say they cared anything for what
was mine!" whispered Lingard. "And that it should be you—you, who have
taken all hardness out of me."

"I don't want your heart to be made hard. I want it to be made firm."

"You couldn't have said anything better than what you have said just now
to make it steady," flowed the murmur of Lingard's voice with something
tender in its depth. "Has anybody ever had a friend like this?" he
exclaimed, raising his head as if taking the starry night to witness.

"And I ask myself is it possible that there should be another man on
earth that I could trust as I trust you. I say to you: Yes! Go and save
what you have a right to and don't forget to be merciful. I will not
remind you of our perfect innocence. The earth must be small indeed that
we should have blundered like this into your life. It's enough to make
one believe in fatality. But I can't find it in me to behave like a
fatalist, to sit down with folded hands. Had you been another kind of
man I might have been too hopeless or too disdainful. Do you know what
Mr. d'Alcacer calls you?"

Inside the Cage d'Alcacer, casting curious glances in their direction,
saw Lingard shake his head and thought with slight uneasiness: "He is
refusing her something."

"Mr. d'Alcacer's name for you is the 'Man of Fate'," said Mrs. Travers,
a little breathlessly.

"A mouthful. Never mind, he is a gentleman. It's what you. . . ."

"I call you all but by your Christian name," said Mrs. Travers, hastily.
"Believe me, Mr. d'Alcacer understands you."

"He is all right," interjected Lingard.

"And he is innocent. I remember what you have said—that the innocent
must take their chance. Well, then, do what is right."

"You think it would be right? You believe it? You feel it?"

"At this time, in this place, from a man like you—Yes, it is right."

Lingard thought that woman wonderfully true to him and wonderfully
fearless with herself. The necessity to take back the two captives to
the stockade was so clear and unavoidable now, that he believed nothing
on earth could have stopped him from doing so, but where was there
another woman in the world who would have taken it like this? And he
reflected that in truth and courage there is found wisdom. It seemed to
him that till Mrs. Travers came to stand by his side he had never known
what truth and courage and wisdom were. With his eyes on her face and
having been told that in her eyes he appeared worthy of being both
commanded and entreated, he felt an instant of complete content, a
moment of, as it were, perfect emotional repose.