twenty-four hours seemed also to be a part of a vanished dream. The hooded and cloaked figure was part of it, too. It spoke not; it moved not; it would vanish presently. Lingard tried to remember Mrs. Travers' features, even as she sat within two feet of him in the boat. He seemed to have taken from that vanished schooner not a woman but a memory—the tormenting recollection of a human being he would see no more.
At every stroke of the short sculls Mrs. Travers felt the boat leap forward with her. Lingard, to keep his direction, had to look over his shoulder frequently—'You will be safe in the brig,' he said. She was silent. A dream! A dream! He lay back vigorously; the water slapped loudly against the blunt bows. The ruddy glow thrown afar by the flares was reflected deep within the hood. The dream had a pale visage, the memory had living eyes.
'I had to come for you myself,' he said.
'I expected it of you.' These were the first words he had heard her say since they had met for the third time.
'And I swore—before you, too—that I would never put my foot on board your craft.'
'It was good of you to—' she began.
'I forgot somehow,' he said, simply.
'I expected it of you,' she repeated. He gave three quick strokes before he asked very gently:
'What more do you expect?'
'Everything,' she said. He was rounding then the stern of the brig and had to look away. Then he turned to her.
'And you trust me to—' he exclaimed.
'I would like to trust you,' she interrupted, 'because—'
Above them a startled voice cried in Malay, 'Captain coming.' The strange sound silenced her. Lingard laid in his sculls and she saw herself gliding under the high side of the brig. A dark, staring face appeared very near her eyes, black fingers caught the gunwale of the boat. She stood up swaying. 'Take care,' said Lingard again, but this time, in the light, did not offer to help her. She went up alone and he followed her over the rail.
The quarter-deck was thronged by men of two races. Lingard and Mrs. Travers crossed it rapidly between the groups that moved out of the way on their passage. Lingard threw open the cabin door for her, but remained on deck to inquire about his boats. They had returned while he was on board the yacht, and the two men in charge of them came aft to make their reports. The boat sent north had seen nothing. The boat which had been directed to explore the banks and islets to the south had actually been in sight of Daman's praus. The man in charge reported that several fires were burning on the shore, the crews of the two praus being encamped on a sandbank. Cooking was going on. They had been near enough to hear the voices. There was a man keeping watch on the ridge; they knew this because they heard him shouting to the people below, by the fires. Lingard wanted to know how they had managed to remain unseen. 'The night was our hiding place,' answered the man in his deep growling voice. He knew nothing of any white men being in Daman's camp. Why should there be? Rajah Hassim and the Lady, his sister, appeared unexpectedly near his boat in their canoe. Rajah Hassim had ordered him then in whispers to go back to the brig at once, and tell Tuan what he had observed. Rajah Hassim said also that he would return to the brig with more news very soon. He obeyed because the Rajah was to him a person of authority, 'having the perfect knowledge of Tuan's mind as we all know.'—'Enough,' cried Lingard, suddenly.
The man looked up heavily for a moment, and retreated forward without another word. Lingard followed him with irritated eyes. A new power had come into the world, had possessed itself of human speech, had imparted to it a sinister irony of allusion. To be told that someone had 'a perfect knowledge of his mind' startled him and made him wince. It made him aware that now he did not know his mind himself—that it seemed impossible for him ever to regain that knowledge. And the new power not only had cast its spell upon the words he had to hear, but also upon the facts that assailed him, upon the people he saw, upon the thoughts he had to guide, upon the feelings he had to bear. They remained what they had ever been—the visible surface of life open in the sun to the conquering tread of an unfettered will. Yesterday they could have been discerned clearly, mastered and despised; but now another power had come into the world, and had cast over them all the wavering gloom of a dark and inscrutable purpose.
II
Recovering himself with a slight start Lingard gave the order to extinguish all the lights in the brig. Now the transfer of the crew from the yacht had been effected there was every advantage in the darkness. He gave the order from instinct, it being the right thing to do in the circumstances. His thoughts were in the cabin of his brig, where there was a woman waiting. He put his hand over his eyes, collecting himself as if before a great mental effort. He could hear about him the excited murmurs of the white men whom in the morning he had so ardently desired to have safe in his keeping. He had them there now; but accident, ill-luck, a cursed folly, had tricked him out of the success of his plan. He would have to go in and talk to Mrs. Travers. The idea dismayed him. Of necessity he was not one of those men who have the mastery of expression. To liberate his soul was for him a gigantic undertaking, a matter of desperate effort, of doubtful success. 'I must have it out with her,' he murmured to himself as though at the prospect of a struggle. He was uncertain of himself, of her; he was uncertain of everything and everybody; but he was very certain he wanted to look at her.
At the moment he turned to the door of the cabin both flares went out together and the black vault of the night upheld above the brig by the fierce flames fell behind him and buried the deck in sudden darkness. The buzz of strange voices instantly hummed louder with a startled note. 'Hallo!'—'Can't see a mortal thing'—'Well, what next?'—insisted a voice—'I want to know what next?'
Lingard checked himself ready to open the door and waited absurdly for the answer as though in the hope of some suggestion. 'What's up with you? Think yourself lucky,' said somebody.—'It's all very well—for to-night,' began the voice.—'What are you fashing yourself for?' remonstrated the other, reasonably, 'we'll get home right enough.'—'I am not so sure; the second mate he says—' 'Never mind what he says; that 'ere man who has got this brig will see us through. The owner's wife will talk to him—she will. Money can do a lot.' The two voices came nearer, and spoke more distinctly, close behind Lingard. 'Suppose them blooming savages set fire to the yacht. What's to prevent them?'—'And suppose they do. This 'ere brig's good enough to get away in. Ain't she? Guns and all. We'll get home yet all right. What do you say, John?'
'I say nothing and care less,' said a third voice, peaceful and faint.
'D'you mean to say, John, you would go to the bottom as soon as you would go home? Come now!'—'To the bottom,' repeated the wan voice, composedly. 'Aye! That's where we all are going to, in one way or another. The way don't matter.'
'Ough! You would give the blues to the funny man of a blooming circus. What would my missus say if I wasn't to turn up never at all?'—'She would get another man; there's always plenty of fools about.' A quiet and mirthless
