"Mr. d"Alcacer would express this by saying that everything rested on honour," commented Mrs. Travers with lips that did not tremble, though from time to time she could feel the accelerated beating of her heart.
"Call it what you like. It"s something that a man needs to draw a free breath. And look!--as you see me standing before you here I care for it no longer."
"But I do care for it," retorted Mrs. Travers. "As you see me standing here--I do care. This is something that is your very own. You have a right to it. And I repeat I do care for it."
"Care for something of my own," murmured Lingard, very close to her face. "Why should you care for my rights?"
"Because," she said, holding her ground though their foreheads were nearly touching, "because if I ever get back to my life I don"t want to make it more absurd by real remorse."
Her tone was soft and Lingard received the breath of those words like a caress on his face. D"Alcacer, in the Cage, made still another effort to keep up his pacing. He didn"t want to give Mr. Travers the slightest excuse for sitting up again and looking round.
"That I should live to hear anybody say they cared anything for what was mine!" whispered Lingard. "And that it should be you--you, who have taken all hardness out of me."
"I don"t want your heart to be made hard. I want it to be made firm."
"You couldn"t have said anything better than what you have said just now to make it steady," flowed the murmur of Lingard"s voice with something tender in its depth. "Has anybody ever had a friend like this?" he exclaimed, raising his head as if taking the starry night to witness.
"And I ask myself is it possible that there should be another man on earth that I could trust as I trust you. I say to you: Yes! Go and save what you have a right to and don"t forget to be merciful. I will not remind you of our perfect innocence. The earth must be small indeed that we should have blundered like this into your life. It"s enough to make one believe in fatality. But I can"t find it in me to behave like a fatalist, to sit down with folded hands. Had you been another kind of man I might have been too hopeless or too disdainful. Do you know what Mr. d"Alcacer calls you?"
Inside the Cage d"Alcacer, casting curious glances in their direction, saw Lingard shake his head and thought with slight uneasiness: "He is refusing her something."
"Mr. d"Alcacer"s name for you is the "Man of Fate"," said Mrs. Travers, a little breathlessly.
"A mouthful. Never mind, he is a gentleman. It"s what you. . . ."
"I call you all but by your Christian name," said Mrs. Travers, hastily.
"Believe me, Mr. d"Alcacer understands you."
"He is all right," interjected Lingard.
"And he is innocent. I remember what you have said--that the innocent must take their chance. Well, then, do what is right."
"You think it would be right? You believe it? You feel it?"
"At this time, in this place, from a man like you--Yes, it is right."
Lingard thought that woman wonderfully true to him and wonderfully fearless with herself. The necessity to take back the two captives to the stockade was so clear and unavoidable now, that he believed nothing on earth could have stopped him from doing so, but where was there another woman in the world who would have taken it like this? And he reflected that in truth and courage there is found wisdom. It seemed to him that till Mrs. Travers came to stand by his side he had never known what truth and courage and wisdom were. With his eyes on her face and having been told that in her eyes he appeared worthy of being both commanded and entreated, he felt an instant of complete content, a moment of, as it were, perfect emotional repose.
During the silence Mrs. Travers with a quick side-glance noticed d"Alcacer as one sees a man in a mist, his mere dark shape arrested close to the muslin screen. She had no doubt that he was looking in their direction and that he could see them much more plainly than she could see him. Mrs. Travers thought suddenly how anxious he must be; and she remembered that he had begged her for some sign, for some warning, beforehand, at the moment of crisis. She had understood very well his hinted request for time to get prepared. If he was to get more than a few minutes, _this_ was the moment to make him a sign--the sign he had suggested himself. Mrs. Travers moved back the least bit so as to let the light fall in front of her and with a slow, distinct movement she put her left hand to her forehead.
"Well, then," she heard Lingard"s forcible murmur, "well, then, Mrs.
Travers, it must be done to-night."
One may be true, fearless, and wise, and yet catch one"s breath before the simple finality of action. Mrs. Travers caught her breath: "To-night! To-night!" she whispered. D"Alcacer"s dark and misty silhouette became more blurred. He had seen her sign and had retreated deeper within the Cage.
"Yes, to-night," affirmed Lingard. "Now, at once, within the hour, this moment," he murmured, fiercely, following Mrs. Travers in her recoiling movement. She felt her arm being seized swiftly. "Don"t you see that if it is to do any good, that if they are not to be delivered to mere slaughter, it must be done while all is dark ash.o.r.e, before an armed mob in boats comes clamouring alongside? Yes. Before the night is an hour older, so that I may be hammering at Belarab"s gate while all the Settlement is still asleep."
Mrs. Travers didn"t dream of protesting. For the moment she was unable to speak. This man was very fierce and just as suddenly as it had been gripped (making her think incongruously in the midst of her agitation that there would be certainly a bruise there in the morning) she felt her arm released and a penitential tone come into Lingard"s murmuring voice.
"And even now it"s nearly too late! The road was plain, but I saw you on it and my heart failed me. I was there like an empty man and I dared not face you. You must forgive me. No, I had no right to doubt you for a moment. I feel as if I ought to go on my knees and beg your pardon for forgetting what you are, for daring to forget."
"Why, King Tom, what is it?"
"It seems as if I had sinned," she heard him say. He seized her by the shoulders, turned her about, moved her forward a step or two. His hands were heavy, his force irresistible, though he himself imagined he was handling her gently. "Look straight before you," he growled into her ear. "Do you see anything?" Mrs. Travers, pa.s.sive between the rigid arms, could see nothing but, far off, the ma.s.sed, featureless shadows of the sh.o.r.e.
"No, I see nothing," she said.
"You can"t be looking the right way," she heard him behind her. And now she felt her head between Lingard"s hands. He moved it the least bit to the right. "There! See it?"
"No. What am I to look for?"
"A gleam of light," said Lingard, taking away his hands suddenly. "A gleam that will grow into a blaze before our boat can get half way across the lagoon."
Even as Lingard spoke Mrs. Travers caught sight of a red spark far away. She had looked often enough at the Settlement, as on the face of a painting on a curtain, to have its configuration fixed in her mind, to know that it was on the beach at its end furthest from Belarab"s stockade.
"The brushwood is catching," murmured Lingard in her ear. "If they had some dry gra.s.s the whole pile would be blazing by now."
"And this means. . . ."
"It means that the news has spread. And it is before Tengga"s enclosure on his end of the beach. That"s where all the brains of the Settlement are. It means talk and excitement and plenty of crafty words. Tengga"s fire! I tell you, Mrs. Travers, that before half an hour has pa.s.sed Daman will be there to make friends with the fat Tengga, who is ready to say to him, "I told you so"."
"I see," murmured Mrs. Travers. Lingard drew her gently to the rail.
"And now look over there at the other end of the beach where the shadows are heaviest. That is Belarab"s fort, his houses, his treasure, his dependents. That"s where the strength of the Settlement is. I kept it up. I made it last. But what is it now? It"s like a weapon in the hand of a dead man. And yet it"s all we have to look to, if indeed there is still time. I swear to you I wouldn"t dare land them in daylight for fear they should be slaughtered on the beach."
"There is no time to lose," whispered Mrs. Travers, and Lingard, too, spoke very low.
"No, not if I, too, am to keep what is my right. It"s you who have said it."
"Yes, I have said it," she whispered, without lifting her head. Lingard made a brusque movement at her elbow and bent his head close to her shoulder.
"And I who mistrusted you! Like Arabs do to their great men, I ought to kiss the hem of your robe in repentance for having doubted the greatness of your heart."
"Oh! my heart!" said Mrs. Travers, lightly, still gazing at the fire, which had suddenly shot up to a tall blaze. "I can a.s.sure you it has been of very little account in the world." She paused for a moment to steady her voice, then said, firmly, "Let"s get this over."
"To tell you the truth the boat has been ready for some time."
"Well, then. . . ."
"Mrs. Travers," said Lingard with an effort, "they are people of your own kind." And suddenly he burst out: "I cannot take them ash.o.r.e bound hand and foot."
"Mr. d"Alcacer knows. You will find him ready. Ever since the beginning he has been prepared for whatever might happen."
"He is a man," said Lingard with conviction. "But it"s of the other that I am thinking."
"Ah, the other," she repeated. "Then, what about my thoughts? Luckily we have Mr. d"Alcacer. I shall speak to him first."
She turned away from the rail and moved toward the Cage.