''Could I?' he said. 'I could try, anyhow.' He paused, and added hardly above his breath, 'For the lady—of course.'
Lingard seemed staggered as though he had been hit in the chest. 'I was thinking of the brig,' he said, gently.
'Mrs. Travers would be on board,' retorted Carter.
'What! on board. Ah yes; on board. Where else?' stammered Lingard.
Carter looked at him in amazement. 'Fight! You ask!' he said, slowly. 'You just try me.'
'I shall,' ejaculated Lingard. He left the cabin calling out 'serang!' A thin cracked voice was heard immediately answering, 'Tuan!' and the door slammed to.
'You trust him, Mrs. Travers?' asked Carter, rapidly.
'You do not—why?' she answered.
'I can't make him out. If he was another kind of man I would say he was drunk,' said Carter. 'Why is he here at all—he, and this brig of his? Excuse my boldness—but have you promised him anything?'
'I—I promised!' exclaimed Mrs. Travers in a bitter tone which silenced Carter for a moment.
'So much the better,' he said at last. 'Let him show what he can do first and . . .'
'Here! Take this,' said Lingard, who re-entered the cabin fumbling about his neck. Carter mechanically extended his hand.
'What's this for?' he asked, looking at a small brass key attached to a thin chain.
'Powder magazine. Trap door under the table. The man who has this key commands the brig while I am away. The serang understands. You have her very life in your hand there.'
Carter looked at the small key lying in his half-open palm.
'I was just telling Mrs. Travers I didn't trust you—not altogether. . . .'
'I know all about it,' interrupted Lingard, contemptuously. 'You carry a blamed pistol in your pocket to blow my brains out—don't you? What's that to me? I am thinking of the brig. I think I know your sort. You will do.'
'Well, perhaps I might,' mumbled Carter, modestly.
'Don't be rash,' said Lingard, anxiously. 'If you've got to fight use your head as well as your hands. If there's a breeze fight under way. If they should try to board in a calm, trust to the small arms to hold them off. Keep your head and—' He looked intensely into Carter's eyes; his lips worked without a sound as though he had been suddenly struck dumb. 'Don't think about me. What's that to you who I am? Think of the ship,' he burst out. 'Don't let her go!—Don't let her go!' The passion in his voice impressed his hearers who for a time preserved a profound silence.
'All right,' said Carter at last. 'I will stick to your brig as though she were my own; but I would like to see clear through all this. Look here—you are going off somewhere? Alone, you said?'
'Yes. Alone.'
'Very well. Mind, then, that you don't come back with a crowd of those brown friends of yours—or by the Heavens above us I won't let you come within hail of your own ship. Am I to keep this key?'
'Captain Lingard,' said Mrs. Travers suddenly. 'Would it not be better to tell him everything?'
'Tell him everything?' repeated Lingard. 'Everything! Yesterday it might have been done. Only yesterday! Yesterday, did I say? Only six hours ago—only six hours ago I had something to tell. You heard it. And now it's gone. Tell him! There's nothing to tell any more.' He remained for a time with bowed head, while before him Mrs. Travers, who had begun a gesture of protest, dropped her arms suddenly. In a moment he looked up again.
'Keep the key,' he said, calmly, 'and when the time comes step forward and take charge. I am satisfied.'
'I would like to see clear through all this though,' muttered Carter again. 'And for how long are you leaving us, Captain?' Lingard made no answer. Carter waited awhile. 'Come, sir,' he urged. 'I ought to have some notion. What is it? Two, three days?' Lingard started.
'Days,' he repeated. 'Ah, days. What is it you want to know? Two . . . three—what did the old fellow say— perhaps for life.' This was spoken so low that no one but Carter heard the last words.—'Do you mean it?' he murmured. Lingard nodded.—'Wait as long as you can—then go,' he said in the same hardly audible voice. 'Go where?'—'Where you like, nearest port, any port.'—'Very good. That's something plain at any rate,' commented the young man with imperturbable good humour.
'I go, O Hassim!' began Lingard and the Malay made a slow inclination of the head which he did not raise again till Lingard had ceased speaking. He betrayed neither surprise nor any other emotion while Lingard in a few concise and sharp sentences made him acquainted with his purpose to bring about singlehanded the release of the prisoners. When Lingard had ended with the words: 'And you must find a way to help me in the time of trouble, O Rajah Hassim,' he looked up and said:
'Good. You never asked me for anything before.'
He smiled at his white friend. There was something subtle in the smile and afterward an added firmness in the repose of the lips. Immada moved a step forward. She looked at Lingard with terror in her black and dilated eyes. She exclaimed in a voice whose vibration startled the hearts of all the hearers with an indefinable sense of alarm, 'He will perish, Hassim! He will perish alone!'
'No,' said Hassim. 'Thy fear is as vain to-night as it was at sunrise. He shall not perish alone.'
Her eyelids dropped slowly. From her veiled eyes the tears fell, vanishing in the silence. Lingard's forehead became furrowed by folds that seemed to contain an infinity of sombre thoughts. 'Remember, O Hassim, that when I promised you to take you back to your country you promised me to be a friend to all white men. A friend to all whites who are of my people, forever.'
'My memory is good, O Tuan,' said Hassim; 'I am not yet back in my country, but is not everyone the ruler of
