Heart of Darkness

by Joseph Conrad

ted to draw back my hesitating foot. And perhaps in

  this is the whole difference; perhaps all the wisdom,

  and all truth, and all sincerity, are just compressed

  into that inappreciable moment of time in which we

  step over the threshold of the invisible. Perhaps! I

  like to think my summing-up would not have been a

  word of careless contempt. Better his cry -- much bet-

  ter. It was an affirmation, a moral victory paid for by

  innumerable defeats, by abominable terrors, by abomi-

  nable satisfactions. But it was a victory! That is why I

  have remained loyal to Kurtz to the last, and even

  beyond, when a long time after I heard once more,

  not his own voice, but the echo of his magnificent elo-

  quence thrown to me from a soul as translucently pure

  as a cliff of crystal.

  "No, they did not bury me, though there is a period

  of time which I remember mistily, with a shuddering

  wonder, like a passage through some inconceivable

  world that had no hope in it and no desire. I found

  myself back in the sepulchral city resenting the sight

  of people hurrying through the streets to filch a little

  money from each other, to devour their infamous

  cookery, to gulp their unwholesome beer, to dream

  their insignificant and silly dreams. They trespassed

  upon my thoughts. They were intruders whose knowl-

  edge of life was to me an irritating pretence, because I

  felt so sure they could not possibly know the things I

  knew. Their bearing, which was simply the bearing of

  commonplace individuals going about their business in

  the assurance of perfect safety, was offensive to me

  like the outrageous flauntings of folly in the face of a

  danger it is unable to comprehend. I had no particular

  desire to enlighten them, but I had some difficulty in

  restraining myself from laughing in their faces so full

  of stupid importance. I daresay I was not very well at

  that time. I tottered about the streets -- there were

  various affairs to settle -- grinning bitterly at perfectly

  respectable persons. I admit my behaviour was inex-

  cusable, but then my temperature was seldom normal

  in these days. My dear aunt's endeavours to 'nurse up

  my strength' seemed altogether beside the mark. It

  was not my strength that wanted nursing, it was my

  imagination that wanted soothing. I kept the bundle

  of papers given me by Kurtz, not knowing exactly

  what to do with it. His mother had died lately,

  watched over, as I was told, by his Intended. A clean-

  shaved man, with an official manner and wearing

  gold-rimmed spectacles, called on me one day and

  made inquiries, at first circuitous, afterwards suavely

  pressing, about what he was pleased to denominate

  certain 'documents.' I was not surprised, because I had

  had two rows with the manager on the subject out

  there. I had refused to give up the smallest scrap out

  of that package, and I took the same attitude with the

  spectacled man. He became darkly menacing at Last,

  and with much heat argued that the Company had the

  right to every bit of information about its 'territories.'

  And said he, 'Mr. Kurtz's knowledge of unexplored

  regions must have been necessarily extensive and pe-

  culiar -- owing to his great abilities and to the deplor-

  able circumstances in which he had been placed:

  therefore --' I assured him Mr. Kurtz's knowledge,

  however extensive, did not bear upon the problems of

  commerce or administration. He invoked then the

  name of science. 'It would be an incalculable loss if,'

  etc., etc. I offered him the report on the 'Suppression

  of Savage Customs,' with the postscriptum torn off.

  He took it up eagerly, but ended by sniffing at it with

  an air of contempt. 'This is not what we had a right to

  expect,' he remarked. 'Expect nothing else,' I said.

  'There are only private letters.' He withdrew upon

  some threat of legal proceedings, and I saw him no

  more; but another fellow, calling himself Kurtz's

  cousin, appeared two days later, and was anxious to

  hear all the details about his dear relative's last mo-

  ments. Incidentally he gave me to understand that

  Kurtz had been essentially a great musician. 'There

  was the making of an immense success,' said the man,

  who was an organist, I believe, with lank grey hair

  flowing over a greasy coat-collar. I had no reason to

  doubt his statement, and to this day I am unable to

  say what was Kurtz's profession, whether he ever had

  any -- which was the greatest of his talents. I had taken

  him for a painter who wrote for the papers, or else for

  a journalist who could paint -- but even the cousin

  (who took snuff during the interview) could not tell

  me what he had been -- exactly. He was a universal

  genius -- on that point I agreed with the old chap, who

  thereupon blew his nose noisily into a large cotton

  handkerchief and withdrew in senile agitation, bear-

  ing off some family letters and memoranda without

  importance. Ultimately a journalist anxious to know

  something of the fate of his 'dear colleague' turned

  up. This visitor informed me Kurtz's proper sphere

  ought to have been politics 'on the popular side.' He

  had furry straight eyebrows, bristly hair cropped

  short, an eyeglass on a broad ribbon, and, becoming

  expansive, confessed his opinion that Kurtz really

  couldn't write a bit -- 'but heavens! how that man

  could talk. He electrified large meetings. He had

  faith -- don't you see? -- he had the faith. He could get

  himself to believe anything -- anything. He would

  have been a splendid leader of an extreme party.'

  'What party?' I asked. 'Any party,' answered the

  other. 'He was an -- an -- extremist.' Did I not think

  so? I assented. Did I know, he asked, with a sudden

  flash of curiosity, 'what it was that had induced him

  to go out there?' 'Yes,' said I, and forthwith handed

  him the famous Report for publication, if he thought

  fit. He glanced through it hurriedly, mumbling all

  the time, judged 'it would do,' and took himself off

  with this plunder.

  "Thus I was left at last with a slim packet of let-

  ters and the girl's portrait. She struck me as beautiful

  -- I mean she had a beautiful expression. I know that

  the sunlight can be made to lie, too, yet one felt that

  no manipulation of light and pose could have con-

  veyed the delicate shade of truthfulness upon those

  features. She seemed ready to listen without mental

  reservation, without suspicion, without a thought for

  herself. I conclucled I would go and give her back her

  portrait and those letters myself. Curiosity? Yes; and

  also some other feeling perhaps. All that had been

  Kurtz's had passed out of my hands: his soul, his

  body, his station, his plans, his ivory, his career. There

  remained only his memory and his Intended -- and I

 
; wanted to give that up, too, to the past, in a way -- to

  surrender personally all that remained of him with

  me to that oblivion which is the last word of our

  common fate. I don't defend myself. I had no clear

  perception of what it was I really wanted. Perhaps it

  was an impulse of unconscious loyalty, or the fulfil-

  ment of one of those ironic necessities that lurk in the

  facts of human existence. I don't know. I can't tell.

  But I went.

  "I thought his memory was like the other memo-

  ries of the dead that accumulate in every man's life --

  a vague impress on the brain of shadows that had

  fallen on it in their swift and final passage; but before

  the high and ponderous door, between the tall houses

  of a street as still and decorous as a well-kept alley in

  a cemetery, I had a vision of him on the stretcher,

  opening his mouth voraciously, as if to devour all the

  earth with all its mankind. He lived then before me;

  he lived as much as he had ever lived -- a shadow in-

  satiable of splendid appearances, of frightful realities;

  a shadow darker than the shadow of the night, and

  draped nobly in the folds of a gorgeous eloquence.

  The vision seemed to enter the house with me -- the

  stretcher, the phantom-bearers, the wild crowd of

  obedient worshippers, the gloom of the forests, the

  glitter of the reach between the murky bends, the beat

  of the drum, regular and muffled like the beating of a

  heart -- the heart of a conquering darkness. It was a

  moment of triumph for the wilderness, an invading

  and vengeful rush which, it seemed to me, I would

  have to keep back alone for the salvation of another

  soul. And the memory of what I had heard him say

  afar there, with the horned shapes stirring at my back,

  in the glow of fires, within the patient woods, those

  broken phrases came back to me, were heard again in

  their ominous and terrifying simplicity. I remem-

  bered his abject pleading, his abject threats, the colos-

  sal scale of his vile desires, the meanness, the torment,

  the tempestuous anguish of his soul. And later on I

  seemed to see his collected languid manner, when he

  said one day, 'This lot of ivory now is really mine.

  The Company did not pay for it. I collected it myself

  at a very great personal risk. I am afraid they will try

  to claim it as theirs though. H'm. It is a difficult case.

  What do you think I ought to do -- resist? Eh? I want

  no more than justice.' . . . He wanted no more than

  justice -- no more than justice. I rang the bell before a

  mahogany door on the first floor, and while I waited

  he seemed to stare at me out of the glassy panel -- stare

  with that wide and immense stare embracing, con-

  demning, loathing all the universe. I seemed to hear

  the whispered cry, 'The horror! The horror! '

  "The dusk was falling. I had to wait in a lofty

  drawingroom with three long windows from floor to

  ceiling that were like three luminous and bedraped

  columns. The bent gilt legs and backs of the furniture

  shone in indistinct curves. The tall marble fireplace

  had a cold and monumental whiteness. A grand piano

  stood massively in a corner; with dark gleams on the

  flat surfaces like a sombre and polished sarcophagus.

  A high door opened closed I rose.

  "She came forward, all in black, with a pale head,

  floating towards me in the dusk. She was in mourning.

  It was more than a year since his death, more than a

  year since the news came; she seemed as though she

  would remember and mourn forever. She took both

  my hands in hers and murmured, 'I had heard you

  were coming.' I noticed she was not very young -- I

  mean not girlish. She had a mature capacity for fidel-

  ity, for belief, for suffering. The room seemed to have

  grown darker, as if all the sad light of the cloudy eve-

  ning had taken refuge on her forehead. This fair hair,

  this pale visage, this pure brow, seemed surrounded

  by an ashy halo from which the dark eyes looked out

  at me. Their glance was guileless, profound, confi-

  dent, and trustful. She carried her sorrowful head as

  though she were proud of that sorrow, as though she

  would say, 'I -- I alone know how to mourn for him

  as he deserves.' But while we were still shaking hands,

  such a look of awful desolation came upon her face

  that I perceived she was one of those creatures that

  are not the playthings of Time. For her he had died

  only yesterday. And, by Jove! the impression was so

  powerful that for me, too, he seemed to have died

  only yesterday -- nay, this very minute. I saw her and

  him in the same instant of time -- his death and her

  sorrow -- I saw her sorrow in the very moment of his

  death. Do you understand? I saw them together - I

  heard them together. She had said, with a deep catch

  of the breath, 'I have survived' while my strained ears

  seemed to hear distinctly, mingled with her tone of

  despairing regret, the summing up whisper of his

  eternal condemnation. I asked myself what I was

  doing there, with a sensation of panic in my heart as

  though I had blundered into a place of cruel and

  absurd mysteries not fit for a human being to behold.

  She motioned me to a chair. We sat down. I laid the

  packet gently on the little table, and she put her hand

  over it.... 'You knew him well,' she murmured,

  after a moment of mourning silence.

  " 'Intimacy grows quickly out there,' I said. 'I

  knew him as well as it is possible for one man to know

  another.'

  " 'And you admired him,' she said. 'It was impos-

  sible to know him and not to admire him. Was it?'

  " 'He was a remarkable man,' I said, unsteadily.

  Then before the appealing fixity of her gaze, that

  seemed to watch for more words on my lips, I went

  on, 'It was impossible not to --'

  " 'Love him,' she finished eagerly, silencing me

  into an appalled dumbness. 'How true! how truel

  But when you think that no one knew him so well as

  I! I had all his noble confidence. I knew him best.'

  " 'You knew him best,' I repeated. And perhaps

  she did. But with every word spoken the room was

  growing darker, and only her forehead, smooth and

  white, remained illumined by the unextinguishable

  light of belief and love.

  " 'You were his friend,' she went on. 'His friend,'

  she repeated, a little louder. 'You must have been, if

  he had given you this, and sent you to me. I feel I can

  speak to you -- and oh! I must speak. I want you -- you

  who have heard his last words -- to know I have been

  worthy of him.... It is not pride.... Yes! I am

  proud to know I understood him better than any one

  on earth -- he told me so himself. And since his mother

  died I have had no one -- no one -- to -- to --'

  "I listened. The darkness deepened. I was not even


  sure whether he had given me the right bundle. I

  rather suspect he wanted me to take care of another

  batch of his papers which, after his death, I saw the

  manager examining under the lamp. And the girl

  talked, easing her pain in the certitude of my sympa-

  thy; she talked as thirsty men drink. I had heard that

  her engagement with Kurtz had been disapproved by

  her people. He wasn't rich enough or something. And

  indeed I don't know whether he had not been a pau-

  per all his life. He had given me some reason to infer

  that it was his impatience of comparative poverty that

  drove him out there.

  " '. . . Who was not his friend who had heard him

  speak once?' she was saying. 'He drew men towards

  him by what was best in them.' She looked at me with

  intensity. 'It is the gift of the great,' she went on, and

  the sound of her low voice seemed to have the ac-

  companiment of all the other sounds, full of mystery,

  desolation, and sorrow, I had ever heard -- the ripple

  of the river, the soughing of the trees swayed by the

  wind, the murmurs of the crowds, the faint ring of

  incomprehensible words cried from afar, the whisper

  of a voice speaking from beyond the threshold of an

  eternal darkness. 'But you have heard him! You

  know!' she cried.

  " 'Yes, I know,' I said with something like despair

  in my heart, but bowing my head before the faith that

  was in her, before that great and saving illusion

  that shone with an unearthly glow in the darkness, in

  the triumphant darkness from which I could not have

  defended her -- from which I could not even defend

  myself.

  " 'What a loss to me -- to us!' -- she corrected her-

  self with beautiful generosity; then added in a mur-

  mur, 'To the world.' By the last gleams of twilight I

  could see the glitter of her eyes, full of tears -- of tears

  that would not fall.

  " 'I have been very happy -- very fortunate -- very

  proud,' she went on. 'Too fortunate. Too happy for a

  little while. And now I am unhappy for -- for life.'

  "She stood up; her fair hair seemed to catch all the

  remaining light in a glimmer of gold. I rose, too.

  " 'And of all this,' she went on mournfully, 'of all

  his promise, and of all his greatness, of his generous

  mind, of his noble heart, nothing remains -- nothing

  but a memory. You and I --'

  " 'We shall always remember him,' I said hastily.

  " 'No!' she cried. 'It is impossible that all this

  should be lost -- that such a life should be sacrificed to

  leave nothing -- but sorrow. You know what vast plans

  he had. I knew of them, too -- I could not perhaps

  understand -- but others knew of them. Something

  must remain. His words, at least, have not died.'

  " 'His words will remain,' I said.

  " 'And his example,' she whispered to herself. 'Men

  looked up to him -- his goodness shone in every act.

  His example --'

  " 'True,' I said; 'his example, too. Yes, his example.

  I forgot that.'

  " 'But I do not. I cannot -- I cannot believe -- not

  yet. I cannot believe that I shall never see him again,

  that nobody will see him again, never, never, never.'

  "She put out her arms as if after a retreating figure,

  stretching them back and with clasped pale hands

  across the fading and narrow sheen of the window.

  Never see him! I saw him clearly enough then. I

  shall see this eloquent phantom as long as I live, and

  I shall see her, too, a tragic and familiar Shade,

  resembling in this gesture another one, tragic also,

  and bedecked with powerless charms, stretching bare

  brown arms over the glitter of the infernal stream,

  the stream of darkness. She said suddenly very low,

  'He died as he lived.'

  " 'His end,' said I, with dull anger stirring in me,

  'was in every way worthy of his life.'

  " 'And I was not with him,' she murmured. My

  anger subsided before a feeling of infinite pity.

  " 'Everything that could be done --' I mumbled.

  " 'Ah, but I believed in him more than any one on

  earth -- more than his own mother, more than -- him-

  self. He needed me! Me! I would have treasured

  every sigh, every word, every sign, every glance.'

  "I felt like a chill grip on my chest. 'Don't,' I said,

  in a muffled voice.

  " 'Forgive me. I -- I have mourned so long in

  silence -- in silence.... You were with him -- to the

  last? I think of his loneliness. Nobody near to under-

  stand him as I would have understood. Perhaps no

  one to hear....'

  " 'To the very end,' I said, shakily. 'I heard his

  very last words....' I stopped in a fright.