Of the three other persons aft, Mr. Travers kept his hands in the side pockets of his jacket and did not conceal his growing disgust.
On the other side of the deck, a lady, in a long chair, had a passive attitude that to Mr. d’Alcacer, standing near her, seemed characteristic of the manner in which she accepted the necessities of existence. Years before, as an attache of his Embassy in London, he had found her an interesting hostess. She was even more interesting now, since a chance meeting and Mr. Travers’ offer of a passage to Batavia had given him an opportunity of studying the various shades of scorn which he suspected to be the secret of her acquiescence in the shallowness of events and the monotony of a worldly existence.
There were things that from the first he had not been able to understand; for instance, why she should have married Mr. Travers. It must have been from ambition. He could not help feeling that such a successful mistake would explain completely her scorn and also her acquiescence. The meeting in Manila had been utterly unexpected to him, and he accounted for it to his uncle, the Governor-General of the colony, by pointing out that Englishmen, when worsted in the struggle of love or politics, travel extensively, as if by encompassing a large portion of earth’s surface they hoped to gather fresh strength for a renewed contest. As to himself, he judged — but did not say — that his contest with fate was ended, though he also travelled, leaving behind him in the capitals of Europe a story in which there was nothing scandalous but the publicity of an excessive feeling, and nothing more tragic than the early death of a woman whose brilliant perfections were no better known to the great world than the discreet and passionate devotion she had innocently inspired.
The invitation to join the yacht was the culminating point of many exchanged civilities, and was mainly prompted by Mr. Travers’ desire to have somebody to talk to. D’Alcacer had accepted with the reckless indifference of a man to whom one method of flight from a relentless enemy is as good as another. Certainly the prospect of listening to long monologues on commerce, administration, and politics did not promise much alleviation to his sorrow; and he could not expect much else from Mr. Travers, whose life and thought, ignorant of human passion, were devoted to extracting the greatest possible amount of personal advantage from human institutions. D’Alcacer found, however, that he could attain a measure of forgetfulness — the most precious thing for him now — in the society of Edith Travers.
She had awakened his curiosity, which he thought nothing and nobody on earth could do any more.
These two talked of things indifferent and interesting, certainly not connected with human institutions, and only very slightly with human passions; but d’Alcacer could not help being made aware of her latent capacity for sympathy developed in those who are disenchanted with life or death. How far she was disenchanted he did not know, and did not attempt to find out. This restraint was imposed upon him by the chivalrous respect he had for the secrets of women and by a conviction that deep feeling is often impenetrably obscure, even to those it masters for their inspiration or their ruin. He believed that even she herself would never know; but his grave curiosity was satisfied by the observation of her mental state, and he was not sorry that the stranding of the yacht prolonged his opportunity.
Time passed on that mudbank as well as anywhere else, and it was not from a multiplicity of events, but from the lapse of time alone, that he expected relief. Yet in the sameness of days upon the Shallows, time flowing ceaselessly, flowed imperceptibly; and, since every man clings to his own, be it joy, be it grief, he was pleased after the unrest of his wanderings to be able to fancy the whole universe and even time itself apparently come to a standstill; as if unwilling to take him away further from his sorrow, which was fading indeed but undiminished, as things fade, not in the distance but in the mist.
II
D’Alcacer was a man of nearly forty, lean and sallow, with hollow eyes and a drooping brown moustache. His gaze was penetrating and direct, his smile frequent and fleeting. He observed Lingard with great interest. He was attracted by that elusive something — a line, a fold, perhaps the form of the eye, the droop of an eyelid, the curve of a cheek, that trifling trait which on no two faces on earth is alike, that in each face is the very foundation of expression, as if, all the rest being heredity, mystery, or accident, it alone had been shaped consciously by the soul within.
Now and then he bent slightly over the slow beat of a red fan in the curve of the deck chair to say a few words to Mrs. Travers, who answered him without looking up, without a modulation of tone or a play of feature, as if she had spoken from behind the veil of an immense indifference stretched between her and all men, between her heart and the meaning of events, between her eyes and the shallow sea which, like her gaze, appeared profound, forever stilled, and seemed, far off in the distance of a faint horizon, beyond the reach of eye, beyond the power of hand or voice, to lose itself in the sky.
Mr. Travers stepped aside, and speaking to Carter, overwhelmed him with reproaches.
“You misunderstood your instructions,” murmured Mr. Travers rapidly. “Why did you bring this man here? I am surprised — ”
“Not half so much as I was last night,” growled the young seaman, without any reverence in his tone, very provoking to Mr. Travers.
“I perceive now you were totally unfit for the mission I entrusted you with,” went on the owner of the yacht.
“It’s he who got hold of me,” said Carter. “Haven’t you heard him yourself, sir?”
“Nonsense,” whispered Mr. Travers, angrily. “Have you any idea what his intentions may be?”
“I half believe,” answered Carter, “that his intention was to shoot me in his cabin last night if I — ”
“That’s not the point,” interrupted Mr. Travers. “Have you any opinion as to his motives in coming here?”
Carter raised his weary, bloodshot eyes in a face scarlet and peeling as though it had been licked by a flame. “I know no more than you do, sir. Last night when he had me in that cabin of his, he said he would just as soon shoot me as let me go to look for any other help. It looks as if he were desperately bent upon getting a lot of salvage money out of a stranded yacht.”
Mr. Travers turned away, and, for a moment, appeared immersed in deep thought. This accident of stranding upon a deserted coast was annoying as a loss of time. He tried to minimize it by putting in order the notes collected during the year’s travel in the East. He had sent off for assistance; his sailing-master, very crestfallen, made bold to say that the yacht would most likely float at the next spring tides; d’Alcacer, a person of undoubted nobility though of inferior principles, was better than no company, in so far at least that he could play picquet.
Mr. Travers had made up his mind to wait. Then suddenly this rough man, looking as if he had stepped out from an engraving in a book about buccaneers, broke in upon his resignation with mysterious allusions to danger, which sounded absurd yet were disturbing; with dark and warning sentences that sounded like disguised menaces.
Mr. Travers had a heavy and rather long chin which he shaved. His eyes were blue, a chill, naive blue. He faced Lingard untouched by travel, without a mark of weariness or exposure, with the air of having been born invulnerable. He had a full, pale face; and his complexion was perfectly colourless, yet amazingly fresh, as if he had been reared in the shade.
He thought:
“I must put an end to this preposterous hectoring. I won’t be intimidated into paying for services I don’t need.”
Mr. Travers felt a strong disgust for the impudence of the attempt; and all at once, incredibly, strangely, as though the thing, like a contest with a rival or a friend, had been of profound importance to his career, he felt inexplicably elated at the thought of defeating the secret purposes of that man.
Lingard, unconscious of everything and everybody, contemplated the sea. He had grown on it, he had lived with it; it had enticed him away from home; on it his thoughts had expanded and his hand had fou
nd work to do. It had suggested endeavour, it had made him owner and commander of the finest brig afloat; it had lulled him into a belief in himself, in his strength, in his luck — and suddenly, by its complicity in a fatal accident, it had brought him face to face with a difficulty that looked like the beginning of disaster.
He had said all he dared to say — and he perceived that he was not believed. This had not happened to him for years. It had never happened. It bewildered him as if he had suddenly discovered that he was no longer himself. He had come to them and had said: “I mean well by you. I am Tom Lingard — ” and they did not believe! Before such scepticism he was helpless, because he had never imagined it possible. He had said: “You are in the way of my work. You are in the way of what I can not give up for any one; but I will see you through all safe if you will only trust me — me, Tom Lingard.” And they would not believe him! It was intolerable. He imagined himself sweeping their disbelief out of his way. And why not? He did not know them, he did not care for them, he did not even need to lift his hand against them! All he had to do was to shut his eyes now for a day or two, and afterward he could forget that he had ever seen them. It would be easy. Let their disbelief vanish, their folly disappear, their bodies perish. . . . It was that — or ruin!
III
Lingard’s gaze, detaching itself from the silent sea, travelled slowly over the silent figures clustering forward, over the faces of the seamen attentive and surprised, over the faces never seen before yet suggesting old days — his youth — other seas — the distant shores of early memories. Mr. Travers gave a start also, and the hand which had been busy with his left whisker went into the pocket of his jacket, as though he had plucked out something worth keeping. He made a quick step toward Lingard.
“I don’t see my way to utilize your services,” he said, with cold finality.
Lingard, grasping his beard, looked down at him thoughtfully for a short time.
“Perhaps it’s just as well,” he said, very slowly, “because I did not offer my services. I’ve offered to take you on board my brig for a few days, as your only chance of safety. And you asked me what were my motives. My motives! If you don’t see them they are not for you to know.”
And these men who, two hours before had never seen each other, stood for a moment close together, antagonistic, as if they had been life-long enemies, one short, dapper and glaring upward, the other towering heavily, and looking down in contempt and anger.
Mr. d’Alcacer, without taking his eyes off them, bent low over the deck chair.
“Have you ever seen a man dashing himself at a stone wall?” he asked, confidentially.
“No,” said Mrs. Travers, gazing straight before her above the slow flutter of the fan. “No, I did not know it was ever done; men burrow under or slip round quietly while they look the other way.”
“Ah! you define diplomacy,” murmured d’Alcacer. “A little of it here would do no harm. But our picturesque visitor has none of it. I’ve a great liking for him.”
“Already!” breathed out Mrs. Travers, with a smile that touched her lips with its bright wing and was flown almost before it could be seen.
“There is liking at first sight,” affirmed d’Alcacer, “as well as love at first sight — the coup de foudre — you know.”
She looked up for a moment, and he went on, gravely: “I think it is the truest, the most profound of sentiments. You do not love because of what is in the other. You love because of something that is in you — something alive — in yourself.” He struck his breast lightly with the tip of one finger. “A capacity in you. And not everyone may have it — not everyone deserves to be touched by fire from heaven.”
“And die,” she said.
He made a slight movement.
“Who can tell? That is as it may be. But it is always a privilege, even if one must live a little after being burnt.”
Through the silence between them, Mr. Travers’ voice came plainly, saying with irritation:
“I’ve told you already that I do not want you. I’ve sent a messenger to the governor of the Straits. Don’t be importunate.”
Then Lingard, standing with his back to them, growled out something which must have exasperated Mr. Travers, because his voice was pitched higher:
“You are playing a dangerous game, I warn you. Sir John, as it happens, is a personal friend of mine. He will send a cruiser — ” and Lingard interrupted recklessly loud:
“As long as she does not get here for the next ten days, I don’t care. Cruisers are scarce just now in the Straits; and to turn my back on you is no hanging matter anyhow. I would risk that, and more! Do you hear? And more!”
He stamped his foot heavily, Mr. Travers stepped back.
“You will gain nothing by trying to frighten me,” he said. “I don’t know who you are.”
Every eye in the yacht was wide open. The men, crowded upon each other, stared stupidly like a flock of sheep. Mr. Travers pulled out a handkerchief and passed it over his forehead. The face of the sailing-master who leaned against the main mast — as near as he dared to approach the gentry — was shining and crimson between white whiskers, like a glowing coal between two patches of snow.
D’Alcacer whispered:
“It is a quarrel, and the picturesque man is angry. He is hurt.”
Mrs. Travers’ fan rested on her knees, and she sat still as if waiting to hear more.
“Do you think I ought to make an effort for peace?” asked d’Alcacer.
She did not answer, and after waiting a little, he insisted:
“What is your opinion? Shall I try to mediate — as a neutral, as a benevolent neutral? I like that man with the beard.”
The interchange of angry phrases went on aloud, amidst general consternation.
“I would turn my back on you only I am thinking of these poor devils here,” growled Lingard, furiously. “Did you ask them how they feel about it?”
“I ask no one,” spluttered Mr. Travers. “Everybody here depends on my judgment.”
“I am sorry for them then,” pronounced Lingard with sudden deliberation, and leaning forward with his arms crossed on his breast.
At this Mr. Travers positively jumped, and forgot himself so far as to shout:
“You are an impudent fellow. I have nothing more to say to you.”
D’Alcacer, after muttering to himself, “This is getting serious,” made a movement, and could not believe his ears when he heard Mrs. Travers say rapidly with a kind of fervour:
“Don’t go, pray; don’t stop them. Oh! This is truth — this is anger — something real at last.”
D’Alcacer leaned back at once against the rail.
Then Mr. Travers, with one arm extended, repeated very loudly:
“Nothing more to say. Leave my ship at once!”
And directly the black dog, stretched at his wife’s feet, muzzle on paws and blinking yellow eyes, growled discontentedly at the noise. Mrs. Travers laughed a faint, bright laugh, that seemed to escape, to glide, to dart between her white teeth. D’Alcacer, concealing his amazement, was looking down at her gravely: and after a slight gasp, she said with little bursts of merriment between every few words:
“No, but this is — such — such a fresh experience for me to hear — to see something — genuine and human. Ah! ah! one would think they had waited all their lives for this opportunity — ah! ah! ah! All their lives — for this! ah! ah! ah!”
These strange words struck d’Alcacer as perfectly just, as throwing an unexpected light. But after a smile, he said, seriously:
“This reality may go too far. A man who looks so picturesque is capable of anything. Allow me — ” And he left her side, moving toward Lingard, loose-limbed and gaunt, yet having in his whole bearing, in his walk, in every leisurely movement, an air of distinction and ceremony.
Lingard spun round with aggressive mien to the light touch on his shoulder, but as soon as he took his eyes off Mr. Travers, his anger fell, seemed to si
nk without a sound at his feet like a rejected garment.
“Pardon me,” said d’Alcacer, composedly. The slight wave of his hand was hardly more than an indication, the beginning of a conciliating gesture. “Pardon me; but this is a matter requiring perfect confidence on both sides. Don Martin, here, who is a person of importance. . . .”
“I’ve spoken my mind plainly. I have said as much as I dare. On my word I have,” declared Lingard with an air of good temper.
“Ah!” said d’Alcacer, reflectively, “then your reserve is a matter of pledged faith — of — of honour?”
Lingard also appeared thoughtful for a moment.
“You may put it that way. And I owe nothing to a man who couldn’t see my hand when I put it out to him as I came aboard.”
“You have so much the advantage of us here,” replied d’Alcacer, “that you may well be generous and forget that oversight; and then just a little more confidence. . . .”
“My dear d’Alcacer, you are absurd,” broke in Mr. Travers, in a calm voice but with white lips. “I did not come out all this way to shake hands promiscuously and receive confidences from the first adventurer that comes along.”
D’Alcacer stepped back with an almost imperceptible inclination of the head at Lingard, who stood for a moment with twitching face.
“I am an adventurer,” he burst out, “and if I hadn’t been an adventurer, I would have had to starve or work at home for such people as you. If I weren’t an adventurer, you would be most likely lying dead on this deck with your cut throat gaping at the sky.”
Mr. Travers waved this speech away. But others also had heard. Carter listened watchfully and something, some alarming notion seemed to dawn all at once upon the thick little sailing-master, who rushed on his short legs, and tugging at Carter’s sleeve, stammered desperately:
“What’s he saying? Who’s he? What’s up? Are the natives unfriendly? My book says — ’Natives friendly all along this coast!’ My book says — ”
Complete Works of Joseph Conrad (Illustrated) Page 431
