Lord Jim
glitter of stars. He told me it was a beautiful night--quite cool, with
a little stir of breeze from the river. It seems he noticed its friendly
beauty. Remember this is a love story I am telling you now. A lovely
night seemed to breathe on them a soft caress. The flame of the torch
streamed now and then with a fluttering noise like a flag, and for
a time this was the only sound. “They are in the storeroom waiting,”
whispered the girl; “they are waiting for the signal.” “Who’s to give
it?” he asked. She shook the torch, which blazed up after a shower of
sparks. “Only you have been sleeping so restlessly,” she continued in
a murmur; “I watched your sleep, too.” “You!” he exclaimed, craning his
neck to look about him. “You think I watched on this night only!” she
said, with a sort of despairing indignation.
‘He says it was as if he had received a blow on the chest. He gasped.
He thought he had been an awful brute somehow, and he felt remorseful,
touched, happy, elated. This, let me remind you again, is a love story;
you can see it by the imbecility, not a repulsive imbecility, the
exalted imbecility of these proceedings, this station in torchlight, as
if they had come there on purpose to have it out for the edification of
concealed murderers. If Sherif Ali’s emissaries had been possessed--as
Jim remarked--of a pennyworth of spunk, this was the time to make a
rush. His heart was thumping--not with fear--but he seemed to hear the
grass rustle, and he stepped smartly out of the light. Something dark,
imperfectly seen, flitted rapidly out of sight. He called out in a
strong voice, “Cornelius! O Cornelius!” A profound silence succeeded:
his voice did not seem to have carried twenty feet. Again the girl was
by his side. “Fly!” she said. The old woman was coming up; her broken
figure hovered in crippled little jumps on the edge of the light; they
heard her mumbling, and a light, moaning sigh. “Fly!” repeated the girl
excitedly. “They are frightened now--this light--the voices. They know
you are awake now--they know you are big, strong, fearless . . .” “If
I am all that,” he began; but she interrupted him: “Yes--to-night! But
what of to-morrow night? Of the next night? Of the night after--of all
the many, many nights? Can I be always watching?” A sobbing catch of her
breath affected him beyond the power of words.
‘He told me that he had never felt so small, so powerless--and as to
courage, what was the good of it? he thought. He was so helpless that
even flight seemed of no use; and though she kept on whispering, “Go to
Doramin, go to Doramin,” with feverish insistence, he realised that for
him there was no refuge from that loneliness which centupled all his
dangers except--in her. “I thought,” he said to me, “that if I went
away from her it would be the end of everything somehow.” Only as they
couldn’t stop there for ever in the middle of that courtyard, he made
up his mind to go and look into the storehouse. He let her follow
him without thinking of any protest, as if they had been indissolubly
united. “I am fearless--am I?” he muttered through his teeth. She
restrained his arm. “Wait till you hear my voice,” she said, and,
torch in hand, ran lightly round the corner. He remained alone in the
darkness, his face to the door: not a sound, not a breath came from
the other side. The old hag let out a dreary groan somewhere behind his
back. He heard a high-pitched almost screaming call from the girl. “Now!
Push!” He pushed violently; the door swung with a creak and a clatter,
disclosing to his intense astonishment the low dungeon-like interior
illuminated by a lurid, wavering glare. A turmoil of smoke eddied down
upon an empty wooden crate in the middle of the floor, a litter of rags
and straw tried to soar, but only stirred feebly in the draught. She had
thrust the light through the bars of the window. He saw her bare round
arm extended and rigid, holding up the torch with the steadiness of
an iron bracket. A conical ragged heap of old mats cumbered a distant
corner almost to the ceiling, and that was all.
‘He explained to me that he was bitterly disappointed at this. His
fortitude had been tried by so many warnings, he had been for weeks
surrounded by so many hints of danger, that he wanted the relief of
some reality, of something tangible that he could meet. “It would have
cleared the air for a couple of hours at least, if you know what I
mean,” he said to me. “Jove! I had been living for days with a stone on
my chest.” Now at last he had thought he would get hold of something,
and--nothing! Not a trace, not a sign of anybody. He had raised his
weapon as the door flew open, but now his arm fell. “Fire! Defend
yourself,” the girl outside cried in an agonising voice. She, being in
the dark and with her arm thrust in to the shoulder through the small
hole, couldn’t see what was going on, and she dared not withdraw
the torch now to run round. “There’s nobody here!” yelled Jim
contemptuously, but his impulse to burst into a resentful exasperated
laugh died without a sound: he had perceived in the very act of turning
away that he was exchanging glances with a pair of eyes in the heap of
mats. He saw a shifting gleam of whites. “Come out!” he cried in a fury,
a little doubtful, and a dark-faced head, a head without a body, shaped
itself in the rubbish, a strangely detached head, that looked at him
with a steady scowl. Next moment the whole mound stirred, and with a
low grunt a man emerged swiftly, and bounded towards Jim. Behind him the
mats as it were jumped and flew, his right arm was raised with a crooked
elbow, and the dull blade of a kriss protruded from his fist held off,
a little above his head. A cloth wound tight round his loins seemed
dazzlingly white on his bronze skin; his naked body glistened as if wet.
‘Jim noted all this. He told me he was experiencing a feeling of
unutterable relief, of vengeful elation. He held his shot, he says,
deliberately. He held it for the tenth part of a second, for three
strides of the man--an unconscionable time. He held it for the pleasure
of saying to himself, That’s a dead man! He was absolutely positive
and certain. He let him come on because it did not matter. A dead man,
anyhow. He noticed the dilated nostrils, the wide eyes, the intent,
eager stillness of the face, and then he fired.
‘The explosion in that confined space was stunning. He stepped back a
pace. He saw the man jerk his head up, fling his arms forward, and drop
the kriss. He ascertained afterwards that he had shot him through the
mouth, a little upwards, the bullet coming out high at the back of the
skull. With the impetus of his rush the man drove straight on, his face
suddenly gaping disfigured, with his hands open before him gropingly, as
though blinded, and landed with terrific violence on his forehead, just
short of Jim’s bare toes. Jim says he didn’t lose the smallest detail
of all this. He found himself calm, appeased, without rancour, without
uneasiness, as if the death of that man had atoned for everything. The
place was getting very full of sooty smoke from the torch, in which
the unswaying flame burned blood-red without a flicker. He walked in
resolutely, striding over the dead body, and covered with his revolver
another naked figure outlined vaguely at the other end. As he was about
to pull the trigger, the man threw away with force a short heavy spear,
and squatted submissively on his hams, his back to the wall and his
clasped hands between his legs. “You want your life?” Jim said. The
other made no sound. “How many more of you?” asked Jim again. “Two more,
Tuan,” said the man very softly, looking with big fascinated eyes into
the muzzle of the revolver. Accordingly two more crawled from under the
mats, holding out ostentatiously their empty hands.’
CHAPTER 32
‘Jim took up an advantageous position and shepherded them out in a bunch
through the doorway: all that time the torch had remained vertical in
the grip of a little hand, without so much as a tremble. The three men
obeyed him, perfectly mute, moving automatically. He ranged them in a
row. “Link arms!” he ordered. They did so. “The first who withdraws his
arm or turns his head is a dead man,” he said. “March!” They stepped out
together, rigidly; he followed, and at the side the girl, in a trailing
white gown, her black hair falling as low as her waist, bore the light.
Erect and swaying, she seemed to glide without touching the earth; the
only sound was the silky swish and rustle of the long grass. “Stop!”
cried Jim.
‘The river-bank was steep; a great freshness ascended, the light fell on
the edge of smooth dark water frothing without a ripple; right and left
the shapes of the houses ran together below the sharp outlines of the
roofs. “Take my greetings to Sherif Ali--till I come myself,” said
Jim. Not one head of the three budged. “Jump!” he thundered. The
three splashes made one splash, a shower flew up, black heads bobbed
convulsively, and disappeared; but a great blowing and spluttering went
on, growing faint, for they were diving industriously in great fear of
a parting shot. Jim turned to the girl, who had been a silent and
attentive observer. His heart seemed suddenly to grow too big for his
breast and choke him in the hollow of his throat. This probably made
him speechless for so long, and after returning his gaze she flung the
burning torch with a wide sweep of the arm into the river. The ruddy
fiery glare, taking a long flight through the night, sank with a vicious
hiss, and the calm soft starlight descended upon them, unchecked.
‘He did not tell me what it was he said when at last he recovered his
voice. I don’t suppose he could be very eloquent. The world was still,
the night breathed on them, one of those nights that seem created for
the sheltering of tenderness, and there are moments when our souls, as
if freed from their dark envelope, glow with an exquisite sensibility
that makes certain silences more lucid than speeches. As to the girl,
he told me, “She broke down a bit. Excitement--don’t you know.
Reaction. Deucedly tired she must have been--and all that kind of thing.
And--and--hang it all--she was fond of me, don’t you see. . . . I
too . . . didn’t know, of course . . . never entered my head . . .”
‘Then he got up and began to walk about in some agitation. “I--I love
her dearly. More than I can tell. Of course one cannot tell. You take a
different view of your actions when you come to understand, when you
are _made_ to understand every day that your existence is necessary--you
see, absolutely necessary--to another person. I am made to feel that.
Wonderful! But only try to think what her life has been. It is too
extravagantly awful! Isn’t it? And me finding her here like this--as you
may go out for a stroll and come suddenly upon somebody drowning in a
lonely dark place. Jove! No time to lose. Well, it is a trust too . . .
I believe I am equal to it . . .”
‘I must tell you the girl had left us to ourselves some time before. He
slapped his chest. “Yes! I feel that, but I believe I am equal to all my
luck!” He had the gift of finding a special meaning in everything that
happened to him. This was the view he took of his love affair; it was
idyllic, a little solemn, and also true, since his belief had all the
unshakable seriousness of youth. Some time after, on another occasion,
he said to me, “I’ve been only two years here, and now, upon my word, I
can’t conceive being able to live anywhere else. The very thought of the
world outside is enough to give me a fright; because, don’t you see,” he
continued, with downcast eyes watching the action of his boot busied in
squashing thoroughly a tiny bit of dried mud (we were strolling on the