The Rescue (47 page)

"What did he tell you?" breathed out Mrs. Travers.

"I didn't ask him anything. I only know that something has happened
which has robbed him of his power of thinking . . . Hadn't I better go
to the hut? Don Martin ought to have someone with him when he wakes up."
Mrs. Travers remained perfectly still and even now and then held her
breath with a vague fear of hearing those footsteps wandering in the
dark. D'Alcacer had disappeared. Again Mrs. Travers held her breath. No.
Nothing. Not a sound. Only the night to her eyes seemed to have grown
darker. Was that a footstep? "Where could I hide myself?" she thought.
But she didn't move.

After leaving d'Alcacer, Lingard threading his way between the fires
found himself under the big tree, the same tree against which Daman had
been leaning on the day of the great talk when the white prisoners had
been surrendered to Lingard's keeping on definite conditions. Lingard
passed through the deep obscurity made by the outspread boughs of the
only witness left there of a past that for endless ages had seen no
mankind on this shore defended by the Shallows, around this lagoon
overshadowed by the jungle. In the calm night the old giant, without
shudders or murmurs in its enormous limbs, saw the restless man drift
through the black shade into the starlight.

In that distant part of the courtyard there were only a few sentries
who, themselves invisible, saw Lingard's white figure pace to and fro
endlessly. They knew well who that was. It was the great white man. A
very great man. A very rich man. A possessor of fire-arms, who could
dispense valuable gifts and deal deadly blows, the friend of their
Ruler, the enemy of his enemies, known to them for years and always
mysterious. At their posts, flattened against the stakes near convenient
loopholes, they cast backward glances and exchanged faint whispers from
time to time.

Lingard might have thought himself alone. He had lost touch with the
world. What he had said to d'Alcacer was perfectly true. He had no
thought. He was in the state of a man who, having cast his eyes through
the open gates of Paradise, is rendered insensible by that moment's
vision to all the forms and matters of the earth; and in the extremity
of his emotion ceases even to look upon himself but as the subject of
a sublime experience which exalts or unfits, sanctifies or damns—he
didn't know which. Every shadowy thought, every passing sensation was
like a base intrusion on that supreme memory. He couldn't bear it.

When he had tried to resume his conversation with Belarab after Mrs.
Travers' arrival he had discovered himself unable to go on. He had just
enough self-control to break off the interview in measured terms. He
pointed out the lateness of the hour, a most astonishing excuse to
people to whom time is nothing and whose life and activities are not
ruled by the clock. Indeed Lingard hardly knew what he was saying or
doing when he went out again leaving everybody dumb with astonishment
at the change in his aspect and in his behaviour. A suspicious silence
reigned for a long time in Belarab's great audience room till the Chief
dismissed everybody by two quiet words and a slight gesture.

With her chin in her hand in the pose of a sybil trying to read the
future in the glow of dying embers, Mrs. Travers, without holding
her breath, heard quite close to her the footsteps which she had been
listening for with mingled alarm, remorse, and hope.

She didn't change her attitude. The deep red glow lighted her up dimly,
her face, the white hand hanging by her side, her feet in their sandals.
The disturbing footsteps stopped close to her.

"Where have you been all this time?" she asked, without looking round.

"I don't know," answered Lingard. He was speaking the exact truth.
He didn't know. Ever since he had released that woman from his arms
everything but the vaguest notions had departed from him. Events,
necessities, things—he had lost his grip on them all. And he didn't
care. They were futile and impotent; he had no patience with them. The
offended and astonished Belarab, d'Alcacer with his kindly touch and
friendly voice, the sleeping men, the men awake, the Settlement full of
unrestful life and the restless Shallows of the coast, were removed from
him into an immensity of pitying contempt. Perhaps they existed. Perhaps
all this waited for him. Well, let all this wait; let everything wait,
till to-morrow or to the end of time, which could now come at any moment
for all he cared—but certainly till to-morrow.

"I only know," he went on with an emphasis that made Mrs. Travers raise
her head, "that wherever I go I shall carry you with me—against my
breast."

Mrs. Travers' fine ear caught the mingled tones of suppressed exultation
and dawning fear, the ardour and the faltering of those words. She was
feeling still the physical truth at the root of them so strongly that
she couldn't help saying in a dreamy whisper:

"Did you mean to crush the life out of me?"

He answered in the same tone:

"I could not have done it. You are too strong. Was I rough? I didn't
mean to be. I have been often told I didn't know my own strength. You
did not seem able to get through that opening and so I caught hold
of you. You came away in my hands quite easily. Suddenly I thought to
myself, 'now I will make sure.'"

He paused as if his breath had failed him. Mrs. Travers dared not make
the slightest movement. Still in the pose of one in quest of hidden
truth she murmured, "Make sure?"

"Yes. And now I am sure. You are here—here! Before I couldn't tell."

"Oh, you couldn't tell before," she said.

"No."

"So it was reality that you were seeking."

He repeated as if speaking to himself: "And now I am sure."

Her sandalled foot, all rosy in the glow, felt the warmth of the embers.
The tepid night had enveloped her body; and still under the impression
of his strength she gave herself up to a momentary feeling of quietude
that came about her heart as soft as the night air penetrated by the
feeble clearness of the stars. "This is a limpid soul," she thought.

"You know I always believed in you," he began again. "You know I did.
Well. I never believed in you so much as I do now, as you sit there,
just as you are, and with hardly enough light to make you out by."

It occurred to her that she had never heard a voice she liked so
well—except one. But that had been a great actor's voice; whereas this
man was nothing in the world but his very own self. He persuaded, he
moved, he disturbed, he soothed by his inherent truth. He had wanted to
make sure and he had made sure apparently; and too weary to resist
the waywardness of her thoughts Mrs. Travers reflected with a sort of
amusement that apparently he had not been disappointed. She thought, "He
believes in me. What amazing words. Of all the people that might have
believed in me I had to find this one here. He believes in me more than
in himself." A gust of sudden remorse tore her out from her quietness,
made her cry out to him:

"Captain Lingard, we forget how we have met, we forget what is going on.
We mustn't. I won't say that you placed your belief wrongly but I have
to confess something to you. I must tell you how I came here to-night.
Jorgenson . . ."

He interrupted her forcibly but without raising his voice.

"Jorgenson. Who's Jorgenson? You came to me because you couldn't help
yourself."

This took her breath away. "But I must tell you. There is something in
my coming which is not clear to me."

"You can tell me nothing that I don't know already," he said in
a pleading tone. "Say nothing. Sit still. Time enough to-morrow.
To-morrow! The night is drawing to an end and I care for nothing in the
world but you. Let me be. Give me the rest that is in you."

She had never heard such accents on his lips and she felt for him a
great and tender pity. Why not humour this mood in which he wanted to
preserve the moments that would never come to him again on this earth?
She hesitated in silence. She saw him stir in the darkness as if he
could not make up his mind to sit down on the bench. But suddenly he
scattered the embers with his foot and sank on the ground against her
feet, and she was not startled in the least to feel the weight of his
head on her knee. Mrs. Travers was not startled but she felt profoundly
moved. Why should she torment him with all those questions of freedom
and captivity, of violence and intrigue, of life and death? He was not
in a state to be told anything and it seemed to her that she did not
want to speak, that in the greatness of her compassion she simply could
not speak. All she could do for him was to rest her hand lightly on his
head and respond silently to the slight movement she felt, sigh or sob,
but a movement which suddenly immobilized her in an anxious emotion.

About the same time on the other side of the lagoon Jorgenson, raising
his eyes, noted the stars and said to himself that the night would not
last long now. He wished for daylight. He hoped that Lingard had already
done something. The blaze in Tengga's compound had been re-lighted.
Tom's power was unbounded, practically unbounded. And he was
invulnerable.

Jorgenson let his old eyes wander amongst the gleams and shadows of the
great sheet of water between him and that hostile shore and fancied he
could detect a floating shadow having the characteristic shape of a man
in a small canoe.

"O! Ya! Man!" he hailed. "What do you want?" Other eyes, too, had
detected that shadow. Low murmurs arose on the deck of the Emma. "If you
don't speak at once I shall fire," shouted Jorgenson, fiercely.

"No, white man," returned the floating shape in a solemn drawl. "I am
the bearer of friendly words. A chief's words. I come from Tengga."

"There was a bullet that came on board not a long time ago—also from
Tengga," said Jorgenson.

"That was an accident," protested the voice from the lagoon. "What else
could it be? Is there war between you and Tengga? No, no, O white man!
All Tengga desires is a long talk. He has sent me to ask you to come
ashore."

At these words Jorgenson's heart sank a little. This invitation meant
that Lingard had made no move. Was Tom asleep or altogether mad?

"The talk would be of peace," declared impressively the shadow which had
drifted much closer to the hulk now.

"It isn't for me to talk with great chiefs," Jorgenson returned,
cautiously.

"But Tengga is a friend," argued the nocturnal messenger. "And by that
fire there are other friends—your friends, the Rajah Hassim and the
lady Immada, who send you their greetings and who expect their eyes to
rest on you before sunrise."

"That's a lie," remarked Jorgenson, perfunctorily, and fell into
thought, while the shadowy bearer of words preserved a scandalized
silence, though, of course, he had not expected to be believed for a
moment. But one could never tell what a white man would believe. He
had wanted to produce the impression that Hassim and Immada were the
honoured guests of Tengga. It occurred to him suddenly that perhaps
Jorgenson didn't know anything of the capture. And he persisted.

"My words are all true, Tuan. The Rajah of Wajo and his sister are with
my master. I left them sitting by the fire on Tengga's right hand. Will
you come ashore to be welcomed amongst friends?"

Jorgenson had been reflecting profoundly. His object was to gain as much
time as possible for Lingard's interference which indeed could not fail
to be effective. But he had not the slightest wish to entrust himself to
Tengga's friendliness. Not that he minded the risk; but he did not see
the use of taking it.

"No!" he said, "I can't go ashore. We white men have ways of our own
and I am chief of this hulk. And my chief is the Rajah Laut, a white man
like myself. All the words that matter are in him and if Tengga is such
a great chief let him ask the Rajah Laut for a talk. Yes, that's the
proper thing for Tengga to do if he is such a great chief as he says."

"The Rajah Laut has made his choice. He dwells with Belarab, and with
the white people who are huddled together like trapped deer in Belarab's
stockade. Why shouldn't you meantime go over where everything is lighted
up and open and talk in friendship with Tengga's friends, whose hearts
have been made sick by many doubts; Rajah Hassim and the lady Immada and
Daman, the chief of the men of the sea, who do not know now whom they
can trust unless it be you, Tuan, the keeper of much wealth?"

The diplomatist in the small dugout paused for a moment to give special
weight to the final argument:

"Which you have no means to defend. We know how many armed men there are
with you."

"They are great fighters," Jorgenson observed, unconcernedly, spreading
his elbows on the rail and looking over at the floating black patch of
characteristic shape whence proceeded the voice of the wily envoy of
Tengga. "Each man of them is worth ten of such as you can find in the
Settlement."

"Yes, by Allah. Even worth twenty of these common people. Indeed, you
have enough with you to make a great fight but not enough for victory."

"God alone gives victory," said suddenly the voice of Jaffir, who, very
still at Jorgenson's elbow, had been listening to the conversation.

"Very true," was the answer in an extremely conventional tone. "Will you
come ashore, O white man; and be the leader of chiefs?"

"I have been that before," said Jorgenson, with great dignity, "and now
all I want is peace. But I won't come ashore amongst people whose minds
are so much troubled, till Rajah Hassim and his sister return on board
this ship and tell me the tale of their new friendship with Tengga."

His heart was sinking with every minute, the very air was growing
heavier with the sense of oncoming disaster, on that night that was
neither war nor peace and whose only voice was the voice of Tengga's
envoy, insinuating in tone though menacing in words.