III
Lingard's gaze, detaching itself from the silent sea, travelled slowlyover the silent figures clustering forward, over the faces of the seamenattentive and surprised, over the faces never seen before yet suggestingold days--his youth--other seas--the distant shores of early memories.Mr. Travers gave a start also, and the hand which had been busy withhis left whisker went into the pocket of his jacket, as though hehad plucked out something worth keeping. He made a quick step towardLingard.
"I don't see my way to utilize your services," he said, with coldfinality.
Lingard, grasping his beard, looked down at him thoughtfully for a shorttime.
"Perhaps it's just as well," he said, very slowly, "because I did notoffer my services. I've offered to take you on board my brig for afew days, as your only chance of safety. And you asked me what weremy motives. My motives! If you don't see them they are not for you toknow."
And these men who, two hours before had never seen each other, stoodfor a moment close together, antagonistic, as if they had been life-longenemies, one short, dapper and glaring upward, the other toweringheavily, and looking down in contempt and anger.
Mr. d'Alcacer, without taking his eyes off them, bent low over the deckchair.
"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 slowflutter of the fan. "No, I did not know it was ever done; men burrowunder or slip round quietly while they look the other way."
"Ah! you define diplomacy," murmured d'Alcacer. "A little of it herewould do no harm. But our picturesque visitor has none of it. I've agreat liking for him."
"Already!" breathed out Mrs. Travers, with a smile that touched her lipswith its bright wing and was flown almost before it could be seen.
"There is liking at first sight," affirmed d'Alcacer, "as well as loveat first sight--the coup de foudre--you know."
She looked up for a moment, and he went on, gravely: "I think it is thetruest, the most profound of sentiments. You do not love because of whatis in the other. You love because of something that is in you--somethingalive--in yourself." He struck his breast lightly with the tip of onefinger. "A capacity in you. And not everyone may have it--not everyonedeserves 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, evenif 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 tothe governor of the Straits. Don't be importunate."
Then Lingard, standing with his back to them, growled out somethingwhich must have exasperated Mr. Travers, because his voice was pitchedhigher:
"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 Lingardinterrupted 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 youis 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 knowwho you are."
Every eye in the yacht was wide open. The men, crowded upon eachother, stared stupidly like a flock of sheep. Mr. Travers pulled outa handkerchief and passed it over his forehead. The face of thesailing-master who leaned against the main mast--as near as he daredto 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 waitingto 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 abenevolent neutral? I like that man with the beard."
The interchange of angry phrases went on aloud, amidst generalconsternation.
"I would turn my back on you only I am thinking of these poor devilshere," growled Lingard, furiously. "Did you ask them how they feel aboutit?"
"I ask no one," spluttered Mr. Travers. "Everybody here depends on myjudgment."
"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 toshout:
"You are an impudent fellow. I have nothing more to say to you."
D'Alcacer, after muttering to himself, "This is getting serious," made amovement, and could not believe his ears when he heard Mrs. Travers sayrapidly with a kind of fervour:
"Don't go, pray; don't stop them. Oh! This is truth--this isanger--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 onpaws 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 withlittle bursts of merriment between every few words:
"No, but this is--such--such a fresh experience for me to hear--to seesomething--genuine and human. Ah! ah! one would think they had waitedall their lives for this opportunity--ah! ah! ah! All their lives--forthis! ah! ah! ah!"
These strange words struck d'Alcacer as perfectly just, as throwing anunexpected light. But after a smile, he said, seriously:
"This reality may go too far. A man who looks so picturesque is capableof anything. Allow me--" And he left her side, moving toward Lingard,loose-limbed and gaunt, yet having in his whole bearing, in his walk, inevery leisurely movement, an air of distinction and ceremony.
Lingard spun round with aggressive mien to the light touch on hisshoulder, but as soon as he took his eyes off Mr. Travers, his angerfell, seemed to sink without a sound at his feet like a rejectedgarment.
"Pardon me," said d'Alcacer, composedly. The slight wave of his hand washardly more than an indication, the beginning of a conciliating gesture."Pardon me; but this is a matter requiring perfect confidence on bothsides. 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 wordI have," declared Lingard with an air of good temper.
"Ah!" said d'Alcacer, reflectively, "then your reserve is a matter ofpledged 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 myhand when I put it out to him as I came aboard."
"You have so much the advantage of us here," replied d'Alcacer, "thatyou may well be generous and forget that oversight; and then just alittle more confidence. . . ."
"My dear d'Alcacer, you are absurd," broke in Mr. Travers, in a calmvoice but with white lips. "I did not come out all this way to shakehands promiscuously and receive confidences from the first adventurerthat comes along."
D'Alcacer stepped back with an almost imperceptible inclination of thehead at Lingard, who stood for a moment with twitching face.
"I _am_ an adventurer," he burst out, "and if I hadn't been anadventurer, I would have had to starve or work at home for such peopleas you. If I weren't an adventurer, you would be most likely lying deadon this deck with your cut throat gaping at the sky."
Mr. Travers waved this speech away. But other
s also had heard. Carterlistened watchfully and something, some alarming notion seemed to dawnall at once upon the thick little sailing-master, who rushed on hisshort legs, and tugging at Carter's sleeve, stammered desperately:
"What's he saying? Who's he? What's up? Are the natives unfriendly? Mybook says--'Natives friendly all along this coast!' My book says--"
Carter, who had glanced over the side, jerked his arm free.
"You go down into the pantry, where you belong, Skipper, and read thatbit about the natives over again," he said to his superior officer, withsavage contempt. "I'll be hanged if some of them ain't coming aboard nowto eat you--book and all. Get out of the way, and let the gentlemen havethe first chance of a row."
Then addressing Lingard, he drawled in his old way:
"That crazy mate of yours has sent your boat back, with a couple ofvisitors in her, too."
Before he apprehended plainly the meaning of these words, Lingard caughtsight of two heads rising above the rail, the head of Hassim and thehead of Immada. Then their bodies ascended into view as though these twobeings had gradually emerged from the Shallows. They stood for a momenton the platform looking down on the deck as if about to step into theunknown, then descended and walking aft entered the half-light under theawning shading the luxurious surroundings, the complicated emotions ofthe, to them, inconceivable existences.
Lingard without waiting a moment cried:
"What news, O Rajah?"
Hassim's eyes made the round of the schooner's decks. He had left hisgun in the boat and advanced empty handed, with a tranquil assurance asif bearing a welcome offering in the faint smile of his lips. Immada,half hidden behind his shoulder, followed lightly, her elbows pressedclose to her side. The thick fringe of her eyelashes was dropped likea veil; she looked youthful and brooding; she had an aspect of shyresolution.
They stopped within arm's length of the whites, and for some time nobodysaid a word. Then Hassim gave Lingard a significant glance, and utteredrapidly with a slight toss of the head that indicated in a manner thewhole of the yacht:
"I see no guns!"
"N--no!" said Lingard, looking suddenly confused. It had occurred to himthat for the first time in two years or more he had forgotten, utterlyforgotten, these people's existence.
Immada stood slight and rigid with downcast eyes. Hassim, at his ease,scrutinized the faces, as if searching for elusive points of similitudeor for subtle shades of difference.
"What is this new intrusion?" asked Mr. Travers, angrily.
"These are the fisher-folk, sir," broke in the sailing-master, "we'veobserved these three days past flitting about in a canoe; but theynever had the sense to answer our hail; and yet a bit of fish foryour breakfast--" He smiled obsequiously, and all at once, withoutprovocation, began to bellow:
"Hey! Johnnie! Hab got fish? Fish! One peecee fish! Eh? Savee? Fish!Fish--" He gave it up suddenly to say in a deferential tone--"Can'tmake them savages understand anything, sir," and withdrew as if after aclever feat.
Hassim looked at Lingard.
"Why did the little white man make that outcry?" he asked, anxiously.
"Their desire is to eat fish," said Lingard in an enraged tone.
Then before the air of extreme surprise which incontinently appeared onthe other's face, he could not restrain a short and hopeless laugh.
"Eat fish," repeated Hassim, staring. "O you white people! O you whitepeople! Eat fish! Good! But why make that noise? And why did you sendthem here without guns?" After a significant glance down upon the slopeof the deck caused by the vessel being on the ground, he added with aslight nod at Lingard--"And without knowledge?"
"You should not have come here, O Hassim," said Lingard, testily. "Hereno one understands. They take a rajah for a fisherman--"
"Ya-wa! A great mistake, for, truly, the chief of ten fugitives withouta country is much less than the headman of a fishing village," observedHassim, composedly. Immada sighed. "But you, Tuan, at least know thetruth," he went on with quiet irony; then after a pause--"We came herebecause you had forgotten to look toward us, who had waited, sleepinglittle at night, and in the day watching with hot eyes the empty waterat the foot of the sky for you."
Immada murmured, without lifting her head:
"You never looked for us. Never, never once."
"There was too much trouble in my eyes," explained Lingard with thatpatient gentleness of tone and face which, every time he spoke to theyoung girl, seemed to disengage itself from his whole person, envelopinghis fierceness, softening his aspect, such as the dreamy mist that inthe early radiance of the morning weaves a veil of tender charm about arugged rock in mid-ocean. "I must look now to the right and to theleft as in a time of sudden danger," he added after a moment and shewhispered an appalled "Why?" so low that its pain floated away in thesilence of attentive men, without response, unheard, ignored, like thepain of an impalpable thought.
The Rescue: A Romance of the Shallows Page 14
