________________________________________________
_ The very day that Travers and d'Alcacer had come on board the
Emma Hassim and Immada had departed on their mission; for
Lingard, of course, could not think of leaving the white people
alone with Jorgenson. Jorgenson was all right, but his
ineradicable habit of muttering in his moustache about "throwing
a lighted match amongst the powder barrels" had inspired Lingard
with a certain amount of mistrust. And, moreover, he did not want
to go away from Mrs. Travers.
It was the only correct inspiration on Carter's part to send
Jaffir with his report to Lingard. That stout-hearted fighter,
swimmer, and devoted follower of the princely misfortunes of
Hassim and Immada, had looked upon his mission to catch the chief
officer of the yacht (which he had received from Lingard in
Carimata) as a trifling job. It took him a little longer than he
expected but he had got back to the brig just in time to be sent
on to Lingard with Carter's letter after a couple of hours' rest.
He had the story of all the happenings from Wasub before he left
and though his face preserved its grave impassivity, in his heart
he did not like it at all.
Fearless and wily, Jaffir was the man for difficult missions and
a born messenger--as he expressed it himself--"to bear weighty
words between great men." With his unfailing memory he was able
to reproduce them exactly, whether soft or hard, in council or in
private; for he knew no fear. With him there was no need for
writing which might fall into the hands of the enemy. If he died
on the way the message would die with him. He had also the gift
of getting at the sense of any situation and an observant eye. He
was distinctly one of those men from whom trustworthy information
can be obtained by the leaders of great enterprises. Lingard did
put several questions to him, but in this instance, of course,
Jaffir could have only very little to say. Of Carter, whom he
called the "young one," he said that he looked as white men look
when they are pleased with themselves; then added without waiting
for a definite question--"The ships out there are now safe
enough, O, Rajah Laut!" There was no elation in his tone.
Lingard looked at him blankly. When the Greatest of White Men
remarked that there was yet a price to be paid for that safety,
Jaffir assented by a "Yes, by Allah!" without losing for a moment
his grim composure. When told that he would be required to go and
find his master and the lady Immada who were somewhere in the
back country, in Belarab's travelling camp, he declared himself
ready to proceed at once. He had eaten his fill and had slept
three hours on board the brig and he was not tired. When he was
young he used to get tired sometimes; but for many years now he
had known no such weakness. He did not require the boat with
paddlers in which he had come up into the lagoon. He would go
alone in a small canoe. This was no time, he remarked, for
publicity and ostentation. His pent-up anxiety burst through his
lips. "It is in my mind, Tuan, that death has not been so near
them since that night when you came sailing in a black cloud and
took us all out of the stockade."
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.
During the silence Mrs. Travers with a quick sideglance noticed
d'Alcacer as one sees a man in a mist, his mere dark shape
arrested close to the muslin screen. She had no doubt that he was
looking in their direction and that he could see them much more
plainly than she could see him. Mrs. Travers thought suddenly how
anxious he must be; and she remembered that he had begged her for
some sign, for some warning, beforehand, at the moment of crisis.
She had understood very well his hinted request for time to get
prepared. If he was to get more than a few minutes, THIS was the
moment to make him a sign--the sign he had suggested himself.
Mrs. Travers moved back the least bit so as to let the light fall
in front of her and with a slow, distinct movement she put her
left hand to her forehead.
"Well, then," she heard Lingard's forcible murmur, "well, then,
Mrs. Travers, it must be done to-night."
One may be true, fearless, and wise, and yet catch one's breath
before the simple finality of action. Mrs. Travers caught her
breath: "To-night! To-night!" she whispered. D'Alcacer's dark and
misty silhouette became more blurred. He had seen her sign and
had retreated deeper within the Cage.
"Yes, to-night," affirmed Lingard. "Now, at once, within the
hour, this moment," he murmured, fiercely, following Mrs. Travers
in her recoiling movement. She felt her arm being seized swiftly.
"Don't you see that if it is to do any good, that if they are not
to be delivered to mere slaughter, it must be done while all is
dark ashore, before an armed mob in boats comes clamouring
alongside? Yes. Before the night is an hour older, so that I may
be hammering at Belarab's gate while all the Settlement is still
asleep."
Mrs. Travers didn't dream of protesting. For the moment she was
unable to speak. This man was very fierce and just as suddenly as
it had been gripped (making her think incongruously in the midst
of her agitation that there would be certainly a bruise there in
the morning) she felt her arm released and a penitential tone
come into Lingard's murmuring voice.
"And even now it's nearly too late! The road was plain, but I saw
you on it and my heart failed me. I was there like an empty man
and I dared not face you. You must forgive me. No, I had no right
to doubt you for a moment. I feel as if I ought to go on my knees
and beg your pardon for forgetting what you are, for daring to
forget."
"Why, King Tom, what is it?"
"It seems as if I had sinned," she heard him say. He seized her
by the shoulders, turned her about, moved her forward a step or
two. His hands were heavy, his force irresistible, though he
himself imagined he was handling her gently. "Look straight
before you," he growled into her ear. "Do you see anything?" Mrs.
Travers, passive between the rigid arms, could see nothing but,
far off, the massed, featureless shadows of the shore.
"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. _
Read next: PART V. THE POINT OF HONOUR AND THE POINT OF PASSION: CHAPTER VI
Read previous: PART V. THE POINT OF HONOUR AND THE POINT OF PASSION: CHAPTER IV
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