<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2>
<p>When, in compliance with Lingard’s abrupt demand, Almayer consented
to wed the Malay girl, no one knew that on the day when the interesting
young convert had lost all her natural relations and found a white father,
she had been fighting desperately like the rest of them on board the
prau, and was only prevented from leaping overboard, like the few other
survivors, by a severe wound in the leg. There, on the fore-deck
of the prau, old Lingard found her under a heap of dead and dying pirates,
and had her carried on the poop of the <i>Flash</i> before the Malay
craft was set on fire and sent adrift. She was conscious, and
in the great peace and stillness of the tropical evening succeeding
the turmoil of the battle, she watched all she held dear on earth after
her own savage manner, drift away into the gloom in a great roar of
flame and smoke. She lay there unheeding the careful hands attending
to her wound, silent and absorbed in gazing at the funeral pile of those
brave men she had so much admired and so well helped in their contest
with the redoubtable “Rajah-Laut.”</p>
<p>* * * * *</p>
<p>The light night breeze fanned the brig gently to the southward, and
the great blaze of light got smaller and smaller till it twinkled only
on the horizon like a setting star. It set: the heavy canopy of
smoke reflected the glare of hidden flames for a short time and then
disappeared also.</p>
<p>She realised that with this vanishing gleam her old life departed
too. Thenceforth there was slavery in the far countries, amongst
strangers, in unknown and perhaps terrible surroundings. Being
fourteen years old, she realised her position and came to that conclusion,
the only one possible to a Malay girl, soon ripened under a tropical
sun, and not unaware of her personal charms, of which she heard many
a young brave warrior of her father’s crew express an appreciative
admiration. There was in her the dread of the unknown; otherwise
she accepted her position calmly, after the manner of her people, and
even considered it quite natural; for was she not a daughter of warriors,
conquered in battle, and did she not belong rightfully to the victorious
Rajah? Even the evident kindness of the terrible old man must
spring, she thought, from admiration for his captive, and the flattered
vanity eased for her the pangs of sorrow after such an awful calamity.
Perhaps had she known of the high walls, the quiet gardens, and the
silent nuns of the Samarang convent, where her destiny was leading her,
she would have sought death in her dread and hate of such a restraint.
But in imagination she pictured to herself the usual life of a Malay
girl—the usual succession of heavy work and fierce love, of intrigues,
gold ornaments, of domestic drudgery, and of that great but occult influence
which is one of the few rights of half-savage womankind. But her
destiny in the rough hands of the old sea-dog, acting under unreasoning
impulses of the heart, took a strange and to her a terrible shape.
She bore it all—the restraint and the teaching and the new faith—with
calm submission, concealing her hate and contempt for all that new life.
She learned the language very easily, yet understood but little of the
new faith the good sisters taught her, assimilating quickly only the
superstitious elements of the religion. She called Lingard father,
gently and caressingly, at each of his short and noisy visits, under
the clear impression that he was a great and dangerous power it was
good to propitiate. Was he not now her master? And during
those long four years she nourished a hope of finding favour in his
eyes and ultimately becoming his wife, counsellor, and guide.</p>
<p>Those dreams of the future were dispelled by the Rajah Laut’s
“fiat,” which made Almayer’s fortune, as that young
man fondly hoped. And dressed in the hateful finery of Europe,
the centre of an interested circle of Batavian society, the young convert
stood before the altar with an unknown and sulky-looking white man.
For Almayer was uneasy, a little disgusted, and greatly inclined to
run away. A judicious fear of the adopted father-in-law and a
just regard for his own material welfare prevented him from making a
scandal; yet, while swearing fidelity, he was concocting plans for getting
rid of the pretty Malay girl in a more or less distant future.
She, however, had retained enough of conventual teaching to understand
well that according to white men’s laws she was going to be Almayer’s
companion and not his slave, and promised to herself to act accordingly.</p>
<p>So when the <i>Flash</i> freighted with materials for building a
new house left the harbour of Batavia, taking away the young couple
into the unknown Borneo, she did not carry on her deck so much love
and happiness as old Lingard was wont to boast of before his casual
friends in the verandahs of various hotels. The old seaman himself
was perfectly happy. Now he had done his duty by the girl.
“You know I made her an orphan,” he often concluded solemnly,
when talking about his own affairs to a scratch audience of shore loafers—as
it was his habit to do. And the approbative shouts of his half-intoxicated
auditors filled his simple soul with delight and pride. “I
carry everything right through,” was another of his sayings, and
in pursuance of that principle he pushed the building of house and godowns
on the Pantai River with feverish haste. The house for the young
couple; the godowns for the big trade Almayer was going to develop while
he (Lingard) would be able to give himself up to some mysterious work
which was only spoken of in hints, but was understood to relate to gold
and diamonds in the interior of the island. Almayer was impatient
too. Had he known what was before him he might not have been so
eager and full of hope as he stood watching the last canoe of the Lingard
expedition disappear in the bend up the river. When, turning round,
he beheld the pretty little house, the big godowns built neatly by an
army of Chinese carpenters, the new jetty round which were clustered
the trading canoes, he felt a sudden elation in the thought that the
world was his.</p>
<p>But the world had to be conquered first, and its conquest was not
so easy as he thought. He was very soon made to understand that
he was not wanted in that corner of it where old Lingard and his own
weak will placed him, in the midst of unscrupulous intrigues and of
a fierce trade competition. The Arabs had found out the river,
had established a trading post in Sambir, and where they traded they
would be masters and suffer no rival. Lingard returned unsuccessful
from his first expedition, and departed again spending all the profits
of the legitimate trade on his mysterious journeys. Almayer struggled
with the difficulties of his position, friendless and unaided, save
for the protection given to him for Lingard’s sake by the old
Rajah, the predecessor of Lakamba. Lakamba himself, then living
as a private individual on a rice clearing, seven miles down the river,
exercised all his influence towards the help of the white man’s
enemies, plotting against the old Rajah and Almayer with a certainty
of combination, pointing clearly to a profound knowledge of their most
secret affairs. Outwardly friendly, his portly form was often
to be seen on Almayer’s verandah; his green turban and gold-embroidered
jacket shone in the front rank of the decorous throng of Malays coming
to greet Lingard on his returns from the interior; his salaams were
of the lowest, and his hand-shakings of the heartiest, when welcoming
the old trader. But his small eyes took in the signs of the times,
and he departed from those interviews with a satisfied and furtive smile
to hold long consultations with his friend and ally, Syed Abdulla, the
chief of the Arab trading post, a man of great wealth and of great influence
in the islands.</p>
<p>It was currently believed at that time in the settlement that Lakamba’s
visits to Almayer’s house were not limited to those official interviews.
Often on moonlight nights the belated fishermen of Sambira saw a small
canoe shooting out from the narrow creek at the back of the white man’s
house, and the solitary occupant paddle cautiously down the river in
the deep shadows of the bank; and those events, duly reported, were
discussed round the evening fires far into the night with the cynicism
of expression common to aristocratic Malays, and with a malicious pleasure
in the domestic misfortunes of the Orang Blando—the hated Dutchman.
Almayer went on struggling desperately, but with a feebleness of purpose
depriving him of all chance of success against men so unscrupulous and
resolute as his rivals the Arabs. The trade fell away from the
large godowns, and the godowns themselves rotted piecemeal. The
old man’s banker, Hudig of Macassar, failed, and with this went
the whole available capital. The profits of past years had been
swallowed up in Lingard’s exploring craze. Lingard was in
the interior—perhaps dead—at all events giving no sign of
life. Almayer stood alone in the midst of those adverse circumstances,
deriving only a little comfort from the companionship of his little
daughter, born two years after the marriage, and at the time some six
years old. His wife had soon commenced to treat him with a savage
contempt expressed by sulky silence, only occasionally varied by a flood
of savage invective. He felt she hated him, and saw her jealous
eyes watching himself and the child with almost an expression of hate.
She was jealous of the little girl’s evident preference for the
father, and Almayer felt he was not safe with that woman in the house.
While she was burning the furniture, and tearing down the pretty curtains
in her unreasoning hate of those signs of civilisation, Almayer, cowed
by these outbursts of savage nature, meditated in silence on the best
way of getting rid of her. He thought of everything; even planned
murder in an undecided and feeble sort of way, but dared do nothing—expecting
every day the return of Lingard with news of some immense good fortune.
He returned indeed, but aged, ill, a ghost of his former self, with
the fire of fever burning in his sunken eyes, almost the only survivor
of the numerous expedition. But he was successful at last!
Untold riches were in his grasp; he wanted more money—only a little
more torealise a dream of fabulous fortune. And Hudig had failed!
Almayer scraped all he could together, but the old man wanted more.
If Almayer could not get it he would go to Singapore—to Europe
even, but before all to Singapore; and he would take the little Nina
with him. The child must be brought up decently. He had
good friends in Singapore who would take care of her and have her taught
properly. All would be well, and that girl, upon whom the old
seaman seemed to have transferred all his former affection for the mother,
would be the richest woman in the East—in the world even.
So old Lingard shouted, pacing the verandah with his heavy quarter-deck
step, gesticulating with a smouldering cheroot; ragged, dishevelled,
enthusiastic; and Almayer, sitting huddled up on a pile of mats, thought
with dread of the separation with the only human being he loved—with
greater dread still, perhaps, of the scene with his wife, the savage
tigress deprived of her young. She will poison me, thought the
poor wretch, well aware of that easy and final manner of solving the
social, political, or family problems in Malay life.</p>
<p>To his great surprise she took the news very quietly, giving only
him and Lingard a furtive glance, and saying not a word. This,
however, did not prevent her the next day from jumping into the river
and swimming after the boat in which Lingard was carrying away the nurse
with the screaming child. Almayer had to give chase with his whale-boat
and drag her in by the hair in the midst of cries and curses enough
to make heaven fall. Yet after two days spent in wailing, she
returned to her former mode of life, chewing betel-nut, and sitting
all day amongst her women in stupefied idleness. She aged very
rapidly after that, and only roused herself from her apathy to acknowledge
by a scathing remark or an insulting exclamation the accidental presence
of her husband. He had built for her a riverside hut in the compound
where she dwelt in perfect seclusion. Lakamba’s visits had
ceased when, by a convenient decree of Providence and the help of a
little scientific manipulation, the old ruler of Sambir departed this
life. Lakamba reigned in his stead now, having been well served
by his Arab friends with the Dutch authorities. Syed Abdulla was
the great man and trader of the Pantai. Almayer lay ruined and
helpless under the close-meshed net of their intrigues, owing his life
only to his supposed knowledge of Lingard’s valuable secret.
Lingard had disappeared. He wrote once from Singapore saying the
child was well, and under the care of a Mrs. Vinck, and that he himself
was going to Europe to raise money for the great enterprise. “He
was coming back soon. There would be no difficulties,” he
wrote; “people would rush in with their money.” Evidently
they did not, for there was only one letter more from him saying he
was ill, had found no relation living, but little else besides.
Then came a complete silence. Europe had swallowed up the Rajah
Laut apparently, and Almayer looked vainly westward for a ray of light
out of the gloom of his shattered hopes. Years passed, and the
rare letters from Mrs. Vinck, later on from the girl herself, were the
only thing to be looked to to make life bearable amongst the triumphant
savagery of the river. Almayer lived now alone, having even ceased
to visit his debtors who would not pay, sure of Lakamba’s protection.
The faithful Sumatrese Ali cooked his rice and made his coffee, for
he dared not trust any one else, and least of all his wife. He
killed time wandering sadly in the overgrown paths round the house,
visiting the ruined godowns where a few brass guns covered with verdigris
and only a few broken cases of mouldering Manchester goods reminded
him of the good early times when all this was full of life and merchandise,
and he overlooked a busy scene on the river bank, his little daughter
by his side. Now the up-country canoes glided past the little
rotten wharf of Lingard and Co., to paddle up the Pantai branch, and
cluster round the new jetty belonging to Abdulla. Not that they
loved Abdulla, but they dared not trade with the man whose star had
set. Had they done so they knew there was no mercy to be expected
from Arab or Rajah; no rice to be got on credit in the times of scarcity
from either; and Almayer could not help them, having at times hardly
enough for himself. Almayer, in his isolation and despair, often
envied his near neighbour the Chinaman, Jim-Eng, whom he could see stretched
on a pile of cool mats, a wooden pillow under his head, an opium pipe
in his nerveless fingers. He did not seek, however, consolation
in opium—perhaps it was too expensive—perhaps his white
man’s pride saved him from that degradation; but most likely it
was the thought of his little daughter in the far-off Straits Settlements.
He heard from her oftener since Abdulla bought a steamer, which ran
now between Singapore and the Pantai settlement every three months or
so. Almayer felt himself nearer his daughter. He longed
to see her, and planned a voyage to Singapore, but put off his departure
from year to year, always expecting some favourable turn of fortune.
He did not want to meet her with empty hands and with no words of hope
on his lips. He could not take her back into that savage life
to which he was condemned himself. He was also a little afraid
of her. What would she think of him? He reckoned the years.
A grown woman. A civilised woman, young and hopeful; while he
felt old and hopeless, and very much like those savages round him.
He asked himself what was going to be her future. He could not
answer that question yet, and he dared not face her. And yet he
longed after her. He hesitated for years.</p>
<p>His hesitation was put an end to by Nina’s unexpected appearance
in Sambir. She arrived in the steamer under the captain’s
care. Almayer beheld her with surprise not unmixed with wonder.
During those ten years the child had changed into a woman, black-haired,
olive-skinned, tall, and beautiful, with great sad eyes, where the startled
expression common to Malay womankind was modified by a thoughtful tinge
inherited from her European ancestry. Almayer thought with dismay
of the meeting of his wife and daughter, of what this grave girl in
European clothes would think of her betel-nut chewing mother, squatting
in a dark hut, disorderly, half naked, and sulky. He also feared
an outbreak of temper on the part of that pest of a woman he had hitherto
managed to keep tolerably quiet, thereby saving the remnants of his
dilapidated furniture. And he stood there before the closed door
of the hut in the blazing sunshine listening to the murmur of voices,
wondering what went on inside, wherefrom all the servant-maids had been
expelled at the beginning of the interview, and now stood clustered
by the palings with half-covered faces in a chatter of curious speculation.
He forgot himself there trying to catch a stray word through the bamboo
walls, till the captain of the steamer, who had walked up with the girl,
fearing a sunstroke, took him under the arm and led him into the shade
of his own verandah: where Nina’s trunk stood already, having
been landed by the steamer’s men. As soon as Captain Ford
had his glass before him and his cheroot lighted, Almayer asked for
the explanation of his daughter’s unexpected arrival. Ford
said little beyond generalising in vague but violent terms upon the
foolishness of women in general, and of Mrs. Vinck in particular.</p>
<p>“You know, Kaspar,” said he, in conclusion, to the excited
Almayer, “it is deucedly awkward to have a half-caste girl in
the house. There’s such a lot of fools about. There
was that young fellow from the bank who used to ride to the Vinck bungalow
early and late. That old woman thought it was for that Emma of
hers. When she found out what he wanted exactly, there was a row,
I can tell you. She would not have Nina—not an hour longer—in
the house. Fact is, I heard of this affair and took the girl to
my wife. My wife is a pretty good woman—as women go—and
upon my word we would have kept the girl for you, only she would not
stay. Now, then! Don’t flare up, Kaspar. Sit
still. What can you do? It is better so. Let her stay
with you. She was never happy over there. Those two Vinck
girls are no better than dressed-up monkeys. They slighted her.
You can’t make her white. It’s no use you swearing
at me. You can’t. She is a good girl for all that,
but she would not tell my wife anything. If you want to know,
ask her yourself; but if I was you I would leave her alone. You
are welcome to her passage money, old fellow, if you are short now.”
And the skipper, throwing away his cigar, walked off to “wake
them up on board,” as he expressed it.</p>
<p>Almayer vainly expected to hear of the cause of his daughter’s
return from his daughter’s lips. Not that day, not on any
other day did she ever allude to her Singapore life. He did not
care to ask, awed by the calm impassiveness of her face, by those solemn
eyes looking past him on the great, still forests sleeping in majestic
repose to the murmur of the broad river. He accepted the situation,
happy in the gentle and protecting affection the girl showed him, fitfully
enough, for she had, as she called it, her bad days when she used to
visit her mother and remain long hours in the riverside hut, coming
out as inscrutable as ever, but with a contemptuous look and a short
word ready to answer any of his speeches. He got used even to
that, and on those days kept quiet, although greatly alarmed by his
wife’s influence upon the girl. Otherwise Nina adapted herself
wonderfully to the circumstances of a half-savage and miserable life.
She accepted without question or apparent disgust the neglect, the decay,
the poverty of the household, the absence of furniture, and the preponderance
of rice diet on the family table. She lived with Almayer in the
little house (now sadly decaying) built originally by Lingard for the
young couple. The Malays eagerly discussed her arrival.
There were at the beginning crowded levées of Malay women with
their children, seeking eagerly after “Ubat” for all the
ills of the flesh from the young Mem Putih. In the cool of the
evening grave Arabs in long white shirts and yellow sleeveless jackets
walked slowly on the dusty path by the riverside towards Almayer’s
gate, and made solemn calls upon that Unbeliever under shallow pretences
of business, only to get a glimpse of the young girl in a highly decorous
manner. Even Lakamba came out of his stockade in a great pomp
of war canoes and red umbrellas, and landed on the rotten little jetty
of Lingard and Co. He came, he said, to buy a couple of brass
guns as a present to his friend the chief of Sambir Dyaks; and while
Almayer, suspicious but polite, busied himself in unearthing the old
popguns in the godowns, the Rajah sat on an armchair in the verandah,
surrounded by his respectful retinue waiting in vain for Nina’s
appearance. She was in one of her bad days, and remained in her
mother’s hut watching with her the ceremonious proceedings on
the verandah. The Rajah departed, baffled but courteous, and soon
Almayer began to reap the benefit of improved relations with the ruler
in the shape of the recovery of some debts, paid to him with many apologies
and many a low salaam by debtors till then considered hopelessly insolvent.
Under these improving circumstances Almayer brightened up a little.
All was not lost perhaps. Those Arabs and Malays saw at last that
he was a man of some ability, he thought. And he began, after
his manner, to plan great things, to dream of great fortunes for himself
and Nina. Especially for Nina! Under these vivifying impulses
he asked Captain Ford to write to his friends in England making inquiries
after Lingard. Was he alive or dead? If dead, had he left
any papers, documents; any indications or hints as to his great enterprise?
Meantime he had found amongst the rubbish in one of the empty rooms
a note-book belonging to the old adventurer. He studied the crabbed
handwriting of its pages and often grew meditative over it. Other
things also woke him up from his apathy. The stir made in the
whole of the island by the establishment of the British Borneo Company
affected even the sluggish flow of the Pantai life. Great changes
were expected; annexation was talked of; the Arabs grew civil.
Almayer began building his new house for the use of the future engineers,
agents, or settlers of the new Company. He spent every available
guilder on it with a confiding heart. One thing only disturbed
his happiness: his wife came out of her seclusion, importing her green
jacket, scant sarongs, shrill voice, and witch-like appearance, into
his quiet life in the small bungalow. And his daughter seemed
to accept that savage intrusion into their daily existence with wonderful
equanimity. He did not like it, but dared say nothing.</p>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />
1 of 2
2 of 2
Previous
Next
Update Required
To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.