THE TREMBLING OF A LEAF
By Somerset Maugham
II
Mackintosh
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HE splashed about for a few minutes in the sea; it was too
shallow to swim in and for fear of sharks he could not go out of his depth;
then he got out and went into the bath-house for a shower. The coldness
of the fresh water was grateful after the heavy stickiness of the salt
Pacific, so warm, though it was only just after seven, that to bathe in
it did not brace you but rather increased your languor; and when
he had dried himself, slipping into a bath-gown, he called out to the
Chinese cook that he would be ready for breakfast in five minutes. He
walked barefoot across the patch of coarse grass which Walker, the administrator,
proudly thought was a lawn, to his own quarters and dressed. This did
not take long, for he put on nothing but a shirt and a pair of duck trousers
and then went over to his chiefs house on the other side of the
compound. The two men had their meals together, but the Chinese cook told
him that Walker had set out on horseback at five and would not be back
for another hour.
Mackintosh had slept badly and he looked with distaste at the paw-paw
and the eggs and bacon which were set before him. The mosquitoes had been
maddening that night; they flew about the net under which he slept in
such numbers that their humming, pitiless and menacing, had the
effect of a note, infinitely drawn out, played on a distant organ, and
whenever he dozed off he awoke with a start in the belief that one had
found its way inside his curtains. It was so hot that he lay naked. He
turned from side to side. And gradually the dull roar of the breakers
on the reef, so unceasing and so regular that generally you did not hear
it, grew distinct on his consciousness, its rhythm hammered on his tired
nerves and he held himself with clenched hands in the effort to bear it.
The thought that nothing could stop that sound, for it would continue
to all eternity, was almost impossible to bear, and, as though his strength
were a match for the ruthless forces of nature, he had an insane
impulse to do some violent thing. He felt he must cling to his self-control
or he would go mad. And now, looking out of the window at the lagoon and
the strip of foam which marked the reef, he shuddered with hatred of the
brilliant scene. The cloudless sky was like an inverted bowl that hemmed
it in. He lit his pipe and turned over the pile of Auckland papers that
had come over from Apia a few days before. The newest of them was three
weeks old. They gave an impression of incredible dullness.
Then he went into the office. It was a large, bare room with two desks
in it and a bench along one side. A number of natives were seated on this,
and a couple of women. They gossiped while they waited for the administrator,
and when Mackintosh came in they greeted him.
Talofa li.
He returned their greeting and sat down at his desk. He began to write,
working on a report which the governor of Samoa had been clamouring for
and which Walker, with his usual dilatoriness, had neglected to prepare.
Mackintosh as he made his notes reflected vindictively that Walker
was late with his report because he was so illiterate that he had an invincible
distaste for anything to do with pens and paper; and now when it was at
last ready, concise and neatly official, he would accept his subordinates
work without a word of appreciation, with a sneer rather or a gibe,
and send it on to his own superior as though it were his own composition.
He could not have written a word of it. Mackintosh thought with rage that
if his chief pencilled in some insertion it would be childish in expression
and faulty in language. If he remonstrated or sought to put his
meaning into an intelligible phrase, Walker would fly into a passion
and cry:
What the hell do I care about grammar? Thats what I want
to say and thats how I want to say it.
At last Walker came in. The natives surrounded him as he entered, trying
to get his immediate attention, but he turned on them roughly and told
them to sit down and hold their tongues. He threatened that if they were
not quiet he would have them all turned out and see none of them that
day. He nodded to Mackintosh.
Hulloa, Mac; up at last? I dont know how you can waste the
best part of the day in bed. You ought to have been up before dawn like
me. Lazy beggar.
He threw himself heavily into his chair and wiped his face with a large
bandana.
By heaven, Ive got a thirst.
He turned to the policeman who stood at the door, a picturesque
figure in his white jacket and lava-lava, the loin cloth of the
Samoan, and told him to bring kava. The kava bowl stood
on the floor in the corner of the room, and the policeman filled a half
coconut shell and brought it to Walker. He poured a few drops on the ground,
murmured the customary words to the company, and drank with relish.
Then he told the policeman to serve the waiting natives, and the shell
was handed to each one in order of birth or importance and emptied with
the same ceremonies.
Then he set about the days work. He was a little man, considerably
less than of middle height, and enormously stout; he had a large, fleshy
face, clean-shaven, with the cheeks hanging on each side in great dew-laps,
and three vast chins; his small features were all dissolved in fat; and,
but for a crescent of white hair at the back of his head, he was completely
bald. He reminded you of Mr Pickwick. He was grotesque, a figure
of fun, and yet, strangely enough, not without dignity. His blue eyes,
behind large gold-rimmed spectacles, were shrewd and vivacious,
and there was a great deal of determination in his face. He was sixty,
but his native vitality triumphed over advancing years. Notwithstanding
his corpulence his movements were quick, and he walked with a heavy, resolute
tread as though he sought to impress his weight upon the earth. He spoke
in a loud, gruff voice.
It was two years now since Mackintosh had been appointed Walkers
assistant. Walker, who had been for a quarter of a century administrator
of Talua, one of the larger islands in the Samoan group, was a man known
in person or by report through the length and breadth of the South Seas;
and it was with lively curiosity that Mackintosh looked forward to his
first meeting with him. For one reason or another he stayed a couple of
weeks at Apia before he took up his post and both at Chaplins hotel
and at the English club he heard innumerable stories about the
administrator. He thought now with irony of his interest in them.
Since then he had heard them a hundred times from Walker himself. Walker
knew that he was a character, and, proud of his reputation, deliberately
acted up to it. He was jealous of his legend and anxious that
you should know the exact details of any of the celebrated stories that
were told of him. He was ludicrously angry with anyone who had
told them to the stranger incorrectly.
There was a rough cordiality about Walker which Mackintosh at first found
not unattractive, and Walker, glad to have a listener to whom all he said
was fresh, gave of his best. He was good-humoured, hearty, and considerate.
To Mackintosh, who had lived the sheltered life of a government official
in London till at the age of thirty-four an attack of pneumonia, leaving
him with the threat of tuberculosis, had forced him to seek a post in
the Pacific, Walkers existence seemed extraordinarily romantic.
The adventure with which he started on his conquest of circumstance was
typical of the man. He ran away to sea when he was fifteen and for over
a year was employed in shovelling coal on a collier. He was an
undersized boy and both men and mates were kind to him, but the
captain for some reason conceived a savage dislike of him. He used the
lad cruelly so that, beaten and kicked, he often could not sleep for the
pain that racked his limbs. He loathed the captain with all his
soul. Then he was given a tip for some race and managed to borrow twenty-five
pounds from a friend he had picked up in Belfast. He put it on the horse,
an outsider, at long odds. He had no means of repaying the money if he
lost, but it never occurred to him that he could lose. He felt himself
in luck. The horse won and he found himself with something over a thousand
pounds in hard cash. Now his chance had come. He found out who was the
best solicitor in the townthe collier lay then somewhere
on the Irish coastwent to him, and, telling him that he heard the
ship was for sale, asked him to arrange the purchase for him. The solicitor
was amused at his small client, he was only sixteen and did not look so
old, and, moved perhaps by sympathy, promised not only to arrange the
matter for him but to see that he made a good bargain. After a little
while Walker found himself the owner of the ship. He went back to her
and had what he described as the most glorious moment of his life when
he gave the skipper notice and told him that he must get off his
ship in half an hour. He made the mate captain and sailed on the collier
for another nine months, at the end of which he sold her at a profit.
He came out to the islands at the age of twenty-six as a planter. He
was one of the few white men settled in Talua at the time of the German
occupation and had then already some influence with the natives. The Germans
made him administrator, a position which he occupied for twenty years,
and when the island was seized by the British he was confirmed in his
post. He ruled the island despotically, but with complete success.
The prestige of this success was another reason for the interest that
Mackintosh took in him.
But the two men were not made to get on. Mackintosh was an ugly man,
with ungainly gestures, a tall thin fellow, with a narrow chest
and bowed shoulders. He had sallow, sunken cheeks, and his eyes
were large and sombre. He was a great reader, and when his books
arrived and were unpacked Walker came over to his quarters and looked
at them. Then he turned to Mackintosh with a coarse laugh.
What in Hell have you brought all this muck for? he asked.
Mackintosh flushed darkly.
I'm sorry you think it muck. I brought my books because I want
to read them.
When you said youd got a lot of books coming I thought thered
be something for me to read. Havent you got any detective stories?
Detective stories dont interest me.
Youre a damned fool then.
I'm content that you should think so.
Every mail brought Walker a mass of periodical literature, papers from
New Zealand and magazines from America, and it exasperated him
that Mackintosh showed his contempt for these ephemeral publications.
He had no patience with the books that absorbed Mackintoshs leisure
and thought it only a pose that he read Gibbons Decline and Fall
or Burtons Anatomy of Melancholy. And since he had never
learned to put any restraint on his tongue, he expressed his opinion of
his assistant freely. Mackintosh began to see the real man, and under
the boisterous good-humour he discerned a vulgar
cunning which was hateful; he was vain and domineering, and it
was strange that he had notwithstanding a shyness which made him dislike
people who were not quite of his kidney. He judged others, naovely, by
their language, and if it was free from the oaths and the obscenity which
made up the greater part of his own conversation, he looked upon them
with suspicion. In the evening the two men played piquet. He played badly
but vaingloriously, crowing over his opponent when he won and losing
his temper when he lost. On rare occasions a couple of planters or traders
would drive over to play bridge, and then Walker showed himself in what
Mackintosh considered a characteristic light. He played regardless of
his partner, calling up in his desire to play the hand, and argued interminably,
beating down opposition by the loudness of his voice. He constantly revoked,
and when he did so said with an ingratiating whine: Oh, you
wouldnt count it against an old man who can hardly see. Did
he know that his opponents thought it as well to keep on the right side
of him and hesitated to insist on the rigour of the game? Mackintosh watched
him with an icy contempt. When the game was over, while they smoked their
pipes and drank whisky, they would begin telling stories. Walker told
with gusto the story of his marriage. He had got so drunk at the
wedding feast that the bride had fled and he had never seen her since.
He had had numberless adventures, commonplace and sordid, with
the women of the island and he described them with a pride in his own
prowess which was an offence to Mackintoshs fastidious
ears. He was a gross, sensual old man. He thought Mackintosh a
poor fellow because he would not share his promiscuous amours and
remained sober when the company was drunk.
He despised him also for the orderliness with which he did his official
work. Mackintosh liked to do everything just so. His desk was always tidy,
his papers were always neatly docketed, he could put his hand on any document
that was needed, and he had at his fingers' ends all the regulations that
were required for the business of their administration.
Fudge, fudge, said Walker. Ive run this island
for twenty years without red tape, and I dont want it now.
Does it make it any easier for you that when you want a letter
you have to hunt half an hour for it? answered Mackintosh.
Youre nothing but a damned official. But youre not
a bad fellow; when youve been out here a year or two youll
be all right. Whats wrong about you is that you wont drink.
You wouldnt be a bad sort if you got soused once a week.
The curious thing was that Walker remained perfectly unconscious of the
dislike for him which every month increased in the breast of his subordinate.
Although he laughed at him, as he grew accustomed to him, he began almost
to like him. He had a certain tolerance for the peculiarities of others,
and he accepted Mackintosh as a queer fish. Perhaps he liked him, unconsciously,
because he could chaff him. His humour consisted of coarse banter
and he wanted a butt. Mackintoshs exactness, his morality,
his sobriety, were all fruitful subjects; his Scots name gave an
opportunity for the usual jokes about Scotland; he enjoyed himself thoroughly
when two or three men were there and he could make them all laugh at the
expense of Mackintosh. He would say ridiculous things about him to the
natives, and Mackintosh, his knowledge of Samoan still imperfect, would
see their unrestrained mirth when Walker had made an obscene reference
to him. He smiled good-humouredly.
Ill say this for you, Mac, Walker would say in his
gruff loud voice, you can take a joke.
Was it a joke? smiled Mackintosh. I didnt know.
Scots wha hae! shouted Walker, with a bellow of laughter.
Theres only one way to make a Scotchman see a joke and thats
by a surgical operation.
Walker little knew that there was nothing Mackintosh could stand less
than chaff. He would wake in the night, the breathless night of
the rainy season, and brood sullenly over the gibe
that Walker had uttered carelessly days before. It rankled. His
heart swelled with rage, and he pictured to himself ways in which he might
get even with the bully. He had tried answering him, but Walker had a
gift of repartee, coarse and obvious, which gave him an advantage.
The dullness of his intellect made him impervious to a delicate
shaft. His self-satisfaction made it impossible to wound him. His loud
voice, his bellow of laughter, were weapons against which Mackintosh had
nothing to counter, and he learned that the wisest thing was never to
betray his irritation. He learned to control himself. But his hatred grew
till it was a monomania. He watched Walker with an insane vigilance.
He fed his own self-esteem by every instance of meanness on Walkers
part, by every exhibition of childish vanity, of cunning and of vulgarity.
Walker ate greedily, noisily, filthily, and Mackintosh watched him with
satisfaction. He took note of the foolish things he said and of his mistakes
in grammar. He knew that Walker held him in small esteem, and he
found a bitter satisfaction in his chiefs opinion of him; it increased
his own contempt for the narrow, complacent old man. And it gave
him a singular pleasure to know that Walker was entirely unconscious
of the hatred he felt for him. He was a fool who liked popularity, and
he blandly fancied that everyone admired him. Once Mackintosh had overheard
Walker speaking of him.
Hell be all right when Ive licked him into shape,
he said. Hes a good dog and he loves his master.
Mackintosh silently, without a movement of his long, sallow face,
laughed long and heartily.
But his hatred was not blind; on the contrary, it was peculiarly clear-sighted,
and he judged Walkers capabilities with precision. He ruled his
small kingdom with efficiency. He was just and honest. With opportunities
to make money he was a poorer man than when he was first appointed to
his post, and his only support for his old age was the pension
which he expected when at last he retired from official life. His pride
was that with an assistant and a half-caste clerk he was able to
administer the island more competently than Upolu, the island of
which Apia is the chief town, was administered with its army of functionaries.
He had a few native policemen to sustain his authority, but he made no
use of them. He governed by bluff and his Irish humour.
They insisted on building a jail for me, he said. What
the devil do I want a jail for? I'm not going to put the natives in prison.
If they do wrong I know how to deal with them.
One of his quarrels with the higher authorities at Apia was that he claimed
entire jurisdiction over the natives of his island. Whatever their
crimes he would not give them up to courts competent to deal with
them, and several times an angry correspondence had passed between him
and the Governor at Upolu. For he looked upon the natives as his children.
And that was the amazing thing about this coarse, vulgar, selfish
man; he loved the island on which he had lived so long with passion, and
he had for the natives a strange rough tenderness which was quite wonderful.
He loved to ride about the island on his old grey mare and he was never
tired of its beauty. Sauntering along the grassy roads among the
coconut trees he would stop every now and then to admire the loveliness
of the scene. Now and then he would come upon a native village and stop
while the head man brought him a bowl of kava. He would look at
the little group of bell-shaped huts with their high thatched roofs,
like beehives, and a smile would spread over his fat face. His eyes rested
happily on the spreading green of the bread-fruit trees.
By George, its like the garden of Eden.
Sometimes his rides took him along the coast and through the trees he
had a glimpse of the wide sea, empty, with never a sail to disturb the
loneliness; sometimes he climbed a hill so that a great stretch of country,
with little villages nestling among the tall trees, was spread
out before him like the kingdom of the world, and he would sit there for
an hour in an ecstasy of delight. But he had no words to express
his feelings and to relieve them would utter an obscene jest; it was as
though his emotion was so violent that he needed vulgarity to break
the tension.
Mackintosh observed this sentiment with an icy disdain. Walker
had always been a heavy drinker, he was proud of his capacity to see men
half his age under the table when he spent a night in Apia, and he had
the sentimentality of the toper. He could cry over the stories he read
in his magazines and yet would refuse a loan to some trader in difficulties
whom he had known for twenty years. He was close with his money. Once
Mackintosh said to him:
No one could accuse you of giving money away.
He took it as a compliment. His enthusiasm for nature was but the drivelling
sensibility of the drunkard. Nor had Mackintosh any sympathy for
his chiefs feelings towards the natives. He loved them because they
were in his power, as a selfish man loves his dog, and his mentality was
on a level with theirs. Their humour was obscene and he was never at a
loss for the lewd remark. He understood them and they understood
him. He was proud of his influence over them. He looked upon them as his
children and he mixed himself in all their affairs. But he was very jealous
of his authority; if he ruled them with a rod of iron, brooking no contradiction,
he would not suffer any of the white men on the island to take advantage
of them. He watched the missionaries suspiciously and, if they did anything
of which he disapproved, was able to make life so unendurable to them
that if he could not get them removed they were glad to go of their own
accord. His power over the natives was so great that on his word they
would refuse labour and food to their pastor. On the other hand he showed
the traders no favour. He took care that they should not cheat the natives;
he saw that they got a fair reward for their work and their copra and
that the traders made no extravagant profit on the wares they sold them.
He was merciless to a bargain that he thought unfair. Sometimes the traders
would complain at Apia that they did not get fair opportunities. They
suffered for it. Walker then hesitated at no calumny, at no outrageous
lie, to get even with them, and they found that if they wanted not only
to live at peace, but to exist at all, they had to accept the situation
on his own terms. More than once the store of a trader obnoxious to him
had been burned down, and there was only the appositeness of the event
to show that the administrator had instigated it. Once a Swedish
half-caste, ruined by the burning, had gone to him and roundly
accused him of arson. Walker laughed in his face.
You dirty dog. Your mother was a native and you try to cheat the
natives. If your rotten old store is burned down its a judgment
of Providence; thats what it is, a judgment of Providence. Get out.
And as the man was hustled out by two native policemen the administrator
laughed fatly.
A judgment of Providence.
And now Mackintosh watched him enter upon the days work. He began
with the sick, for Walker added doctoring to his other activities, and
he had a small room behind the office full of drugs. An elderly man came
forward, a man with a crop of curly grey hair, in a blue lava-lava,
elaborately tatooed, with the skin of his body wrinkled like a wine-skin.
What have you come for? Walker asked him abruptly.
In a whining voice the man said that he could not eat without vomiting
and that he had pains here and pains there.
Go to the missionaries, said Walker. You know that
I only cure children.
I have been to the missionaries and they do me no good.
Then go home and prepare yourself to die. Have you lived so long
and still want to go on living? Youre a fool.
The man broke into querulous expostulation, but Walker,
pointing to a woman with a sick child in her arms, told her to bring it
to his desk. He asked her questions and looked at the child.
I will give you medicine, he said. He turned to the half-caste
clerk. Go into the dispensary and bring me some calomel pills.
He made the child swallow one there and then and gave another to the
mother.
Take the child away and keep it warm. To-morrow it will be dead
or better.
He leaned back in his chair and lit his pipe.
Wonderful stuff, calomel. Ive saved more lives with it than
all the hospital doctors at Apia put together.
Walker was very proud of his skill, and with the dogmatism of ignorance
had no patience with the members of the medical profession.
The sort of case I like, he said, is the one that all
the doctors have given up as hopeless. When the doctors have said they
cant cure you, I say to them, 'come to me.' Did I ever tell you
about the fellow who had a cancer?
Frequently, said Mackintosh.
I got him right in three months.
Youve never told me about the people you havent cured.
He finished this part of the work and went on to the rest. It was a queer
medley. There was a woman who could not get on with her husband
and a man who complained that his wife had run away from him.
Lucky dog, said Walker. Most men wish their wives would
too.
There was a long complicated quarrel about the ownership of a few yards
of land. There was a dispute about the sharing out of a catch of fish.
There was a complaint against a white trader because he had given short
measure. Walker listened attentively to every case, made up his mind quickly,
and gave his decision. Then he would listen to nothing more; if the complainant
went on he was hustled out of the office by a policeman. Mackintosh listened
to it all with sullen irritation. On the whole, perhaps, it might
be admitted that rough justice was done, but it exasperated the
assistant that his chief trusted his instinct rather than the evidence.
He would not listen to reason. He browbeat the witnesses and when
they did not see what he wished them to called them thieves and liars.
He left to the last a group of men who were sitting in the corner of
the room. He had deliberately ignored them. The party consisted of an
old chief, a tall, dignified man with short, white hair, in a new lava-lava,
bearing a huge fly wisp as a badge of office, his son, and half a dozen
of the important men of the village. Walker had had a feud with
them and had beaten them. As was characteristic of him he meant now to
rub in his victory, and because he had them down to profit by their helplessness.
The facts were peculiar. Walker had a passion for building roads. When
he had come to Talua there were but a few tracks here and there, but in
course of time he had cut roads through the country, joining the villages
together, and it was to this that a great part of the islands prosperity
was due. Whereas in the old days it had been impossible to get the produce
of the land, copra chiefly, down to the coast where it could be put on
schooners or motor launches and so taken to Apia, now transport was easy
and simple. His ambition was to make a road right round the island and
a great part of it was already built.
In two years I shall have done it, and then I can die or they can
fire me, I dont care.
His roads were the joy of his heart and he made excursions constantly
to see that they were kept in order. They were simple enough, wide tracks,
grass covered, cut through the scrub or through the plantations; but trees
had to be rooted out, rocks dug up or blasted, and here and there levelling
had been necessary. He was proud that he had surmounted by his
own skill such difficulties as they presented. He rejoiced in his disposition
of them so that they were not only convenient, but showed off the beauties
of the island which his soul loved. When he spoke of his roads he was
almost a poet. They meandered through those lovely scenes, and
Walker had taken care that here and there they should run in a straight
line, giving you a green vista through the tall trees, and here
and there should turn and curve so that the heart was rested by the diversity.
It was amazing that this coarse and sensual man should exercise
so subtle an ingenuity to get the effects which his fancy
suggested to him. He had used in making his roads all the fantastic skill
of a Japanese gardener. He received a grant from headquarters for the
work but took a curious pride in using but a small part of it, and the
year before had spent only a hundred pounds of the thousand assigned to
him.
What do they want money for? he boomed. Theyll
only spend it on all kinds of muck they dont want; what the missionaries
leave them, that is to say.
For no particular reason, except perhaps pride in the economy of his
administration and the desire to contrast his efficiency with the wasteful
methods of the authorities at Apia, he got the natives to do the work
he wanted for wages that were almost nominal. It was owing to this
that he had lately had difficulty with the village whose chief men now
were come to see him. The chiefs son had been in Upolu for a year
and on coming back had told his people of the large sums that were paid
at Apia for the public works. In long, idle talks he had inflamed their
hearts with the desire for gain. He held out to them visions of vast wealth
and they thought of the whisky they could buyit was dear, since
there was a law that it must not be sold to natives, and so it cost them
double what the white man had to pay for itthey thought of the great
sandal-wood boxes in which they kept their treasures, and the scented
soap and potted salmon, the luxuries for which the Kanaka will sell his
soul; so that when the administrator sent for them and told them he wanted
a road made from their village to a certain point along the coast and
offered them twenty pounds, they asked him a hundred. The chiefs
son was called Manuma. He was a tall, handsome fellow, copper-coloured,
with his fuzzy hair dyed red with lime, a wreath of red berries round
his neck, and behind his ear a flower like a scarlet flame against his
brown face. The upper part of his body was naked, but to show that he
was no longer a savage, since he had lived in Apia, he wore a pair of
dungarees instead of a lava-lava. He told them that if they held
together the administrator would be obliged to accept their terms. His
heart was set on building the road and when he found they would not work
for less he would give them what they asked. But they must not move; whatever
he said they must not abate their claim; they had asked a hundred
and that they must keep to. When they mentioned the figure, Walker burst
into a shout of his long, deep-voiced laughter. He told them not to make
fools of themselves, but to set about the work at once. Because he was
in a good humour that day he promised to give them a feast when the road
was finished. But when he found that no attempt was made to start work,
he went to the village and asked the men what silly game they were playing.
Manuma had coached them well. They were quite calm, they did not attempt
to argueand argument is a passion with the Kanakathey merely
shrugged their shoulders: they would do it for a hundred pounds, and if
he would not give them that they would do no work. He could please himself.
They did not care. Then Walker flew into a passion. He was ugly then.
His short fat neck swelled ominously, his red face grew purple,
he foamed at the mouth. He set upon the natives with invective.
He knew well how to wound and how to humiliate. He was terrifying. The
older men grew pale and uneasy. They hesitated. If it had not been for
Manuma, with his knowledge of the great world, and their dread of his
ridicule, they would have yielded. It was Manuma who answered Walker.
Pay us a hundred pounds and we will work.
Walker, shaking his fist at him, called him every name he could think
of. He riddled him with scorn. Manuma sat still and smiled. There may
have been more bravado than confidence in his smile, but he had
to make a good show before the others. He repeated his words.
Pay us a hundred pounds and we will work.
They thought that Walker would spring on him. It would not have been
the first time that he had thrashed a native with his own hands; they
knew his strength, and though Walker was three times the age of the young
man and six inches shorter they did not doubt that he was more than a
match for Manuma. No one had ever thought of resisting the savage onslaught
of the administrator. But Walker said nothing. He chuckled.
I am not going to waste my time with a pack of fools, he
said. Talk it over again. You know what I have offered. If you do
not start in a week, take care.
He turned round and walked out of the chiefs hut. He untied his
old mare and it was typical of the relations between him and the natives
that one of the elder men hung on to the off stirrup while Walker from
a convenient boulder hoisted himself heavily into the saddle.
That same night when Walker according to his habit was strolling along
the road that ran past his house, he heard something whizz past him and
with a thud strike a tree. Something had been thrown at him. He ducked
instinctively. With a shout, Whos that? he ran towards
the place from which the missile had come and he heard the sound of a
man escaping through the bush. He knew it was hopeless to pursue in the
darkness, and besides he was soon out of breath, so he stopped and made
his way back to the road. He looked about for what had been thrown, but
could find nothing. It was quite dark. He went quickly back to the house
and called Mackintosh and the Chinese boy.
One of those devils has thrown something at me. Come along and
lets find out what it was.
He told the boy to bring a lantern and the three of them made their way
back to the place. They hunted about the ground, but could not find what
they sought. Suddenly the boy gave a guttural cry. They turned to look.
He held up the lantern, and there, sinister in the light that cut
the surrounding darkness, was a long knife sticking into the trunk of
a coconut tree. It had been thrown with such force that it required quite
an effort to pull it out.
By George, if he hadnt missed me Id have been in a
nice state.
Walker handled the knife. It was one of those knives, made in imitation
of the sailor knives brought to the islands a hundred years before by
the first white men, used to divide the coconuts in two so that the copra
might be dried. It was a murderous weapon, and the blade, twelve inches
long, was very sharp. Walker chuckled softly.
The devil, the impudent devil.
He had no doubt it was Manuma who had flung the knife. He had escaped
death by three inches. He was not angry. On the contrary, he was in high
spirits; the adventure exhilarated him, and when they got back
to the house, calling for drinks, he rubbed his hands gleefully.
Ill make them pay for this!
His little eyes twinkled. He blew himself out like a turkey-cock, and
for the second time within half an hour insisted on telling Mackintosh
every detail of the affair. Then he asked him to play piquet, and while
they played he boasted of his intentions. Mackintosh listened with tightened
lips.
But why should you grind them down like this? he asked. Twenty
pounds is precious little for the work you want them to do.
They ought to be precious thankful I give them anything.
Hang it all, its not your own money. The government allots
you a reasonable sum. They wont complain if you spend it.
Theyre a bunch of fools at Apia.
Mackintosh saw that Walkers motive was merely vanity. He shrugged
his shoulders.
It wont do you much good to score off the fellows at Apia
at the cost of your life.
Bless you, they wouldnt hurt me, these people. They couldnt
do without me. They worship me. Manuma is a fool. He only threw that knife
to frighten me.
The next day Walker rode over again to the village. It was called Matautu.
He did not get off his horse. When he reached the chiefs house he
saw that the men were sitting round the floor in a circle, talking, and
he guessed they were discussing again the question of the road. The Samoan
huts are formed in this way: Trunks of slender trees are placed in a circle
at intervals of perhaps five or six feet; a tall tree is set in the middle
and from this downwards slopes the thatched roof. Venetian blinds
of coconut leaves can be pulled down at night or when it is raining. Ordinarily
the hut is open all round so that the breeze can blow through freely.
Walker rode to the edge of the hut and called out to the chief.
Oh, there, Tangatu, your son left his knife in a tree last night.
I have brought it back to you.
He flung it down on the ground in the midst of the circle, and with a
low burst of laughter ambled off.
On Monday he went out to see if they had started work. There was no sign
of it. He rode through the village. The inhabitants were about their ordinary
avocations. Some were weaving mats of the pandanus leaf, one old
man was busy with a kava bowl, the children were playing, the women
went about their household chores. Walker, a smile on his lips, came to
the chiefs house.
Talofa-li, said the chief.
Talofa, answered Walker.
Manuma was making a net. He sat with a cigarette between his lips and
looked up at Walker with a smile of triumph.
You have decided that you will not make the road?
The chief answered.
Not unless you pay us one hundred pounds.
You will regret it. He turned to Manuma. And you, my
lad, I shouldnt wonder if your back was very sore before youre
much older.
He rode away chuckling. He left the natives vaguely uneasy. They feared
the fat sinful old man, and neither the missionaries' abuse of him nor
the scorn which Manuma had learnt in Apia made them forget that he had
a devilish cunning and that no man had ever braved him without in the
long run suffering for it. They found out within twenty-four hours what
scheme he had devised. It was characteristic. For next morning a great
band of men, women, and children came into the village and the chief men
said that they had made a bargain with Walker to build the road. He had
offered them twenty pounds and they had accepted. Now the cunning lay
in this, that the Polynesians have rules of hospitality which have
all the force of laws; an etiquette of absolute rigidity
made it necessary for the people of the village not only to give lodging
to the strangers, but to provide them with food and drink as long as they
wished to stay. The inhabitants of Matautu were outwitted. Every morning
the workers went out in a joyous band, cut down trees, blasted rocks,
levelled here and there and then in the evening tramped back again, and
ate and drank, ate heartily, danced, sang hymns, and enjoyed life. For
them it was a picnic. But soon their hosts began to wear long faces; the
strangers had enormous appetites, and the plantains and the bread-fruit
vanished before their rapacity; the alligator-pear trees, whose fruit
sent to Apia might sell for good money, were stripped bare. Ruin stared
them in the face. And then they found that the strangers were working
very slowly. Had they received a hint from Walker that they might take
their time? At this rate by the time the road was finished there would
not be a scrap of food in the village. And worse than this, they were
a laughing-stock; when one or other of them went to some distant hamlet
on an errand he found that the story had got there before him, and he
was met with derisive laughter. There is nothing the Kanaka can
endure less than ridicule. It was not long before much angry talk
passed among the sufferers. Manuma was no longer a hero; he had to put
up with a good deal of plain speaking, and one day what Walker had suggested
came to pass: a heated argument turned into a quarrel and half a dozen
of the young men set upon the chiefs son and gave him such a beating
that for a week he lay bruised and sore on the pandanus mats. He turned
from side to side and could find no ease. Every day or two the administrator
rode over on his old mare and watched the progress of the road. He was
not a man to resist the temptation of taunting the fallen foe,
and he missed no opportunity to rub into the shamed inhabitants of Matautu
the bitterness of their humiliation. He broke their spirit. And one morning,
putting their pride in their pockets, a figure of speech, since pockets
they had not, they all set out with the strangers and started working
on the road. It was urgent to get it done quickly if they wanted to save
any food at all, and the whole village joined in. But they worked silently,
with rage and mortification in their hearts, and even the children
toiled in silence. The women wept as they carried away bundles
of brushwood. When Walker saw them he laughed so much that he almost rolled
out of his saddle. The news spread quickly and tickled the people of the
island to death. This was the greatest joke of all, the crowning triumph
of that cunning old white man whom no Kanaka had ever been able to circumvent;
and they came from distant villages, with their wives and children, to
look at the foolish folk who had refused twenty pounds to make the road
and now were forced to work for nothing. But the harder they worked the
more easily went the guests. Why should they hurry, when they were getting
good food for nothing and the longer they took about the job the better
the joke became? At last the wretched villagers could stand it no longer,
and they were come this morning to beg the administrator to send the strangers
back to their own homes. If he would do this they promised to finish the
road themselves for nothing. For him it was a victory complete and unqualified.
They were humbled. A look of arrogant complacence spread over his
large, naked face, and he seemed to swell in his chair like a great bullfrog.
There was something sinister in his appearance, so that Mackintosh
shivered with disgust. Then in his booming tones he began to speak.
Is it for my good that I make the road? What benefit do you think
I get out of it? It is for you, so that you can walk in comfort and carry
your copra in comfort. I offered to pay you for your work, though it was
for your own sake the work was done. I offered to pay you generously.
Now you must pay. I will send the people of Manua back to their
homes if you will finish the road and pay the twenty pounds that I have
to pay them.
There was an outcry. They sought to reason with him. They told him they
had not the money. But to everything they said he replied with brutal
gibes. Then the clock struck.
Dinner time, he said. Turn them all out.
He raised himself heavily from his chair and walked out of the room.
When Mackintosh followed him he found him already seated at table, a napkin
tied round his neck, holding his knife and fork in readiness for the meal
the Chinese cook was about to bring. He was in high spirits.
I did 'em down fine, he said, as Mackintosh sat down. I
shant have much trouble with the roads after this.
I suppose you were joking, said Mackintosh icily.
What do you mean by that?
Youre not really going to make them pay twenty pounds?
You bet your life I am.
I'm not sure youve got any right to.
Aint you? I guess Ive got the right to do any damned
thing I like on this island.
I think youve bullied them quite enough.
Walker laughed fatly. He did not care what Mackintosh thought.
When I want your opinion Ill ask for it. Mackintosh
grew very white. He knew by bitter experience that he could do nothing
but keep silence, and the violent effort at self-control made him sick
and faint. He could not eat the food that was before him and with disgust
he watched Walker shovel meat into his vast mouth. He was a dirty feeder,
and to sit at table with him needed a strong stomach. Mackintosh shuddered.
A tremendous desire seized him to humiliate that gross and cruel man;
he would give anything in the world to see him in the dust, suffering
as much as he had made others suffer. He had never loathed the
bully with such loathing as now.
The day wore on. Mackintosh tried to sleep after dinner, but the passion
in his heart prevented him; he tried to read, but the letters swam before
his eyes. The sun beat down pitilessly, and he longed for rain; but he
knew that rain would bring no coolness; it would only make it hotter and
more steamy. He was a native of Aberdeen and his heart yearned
suddenly for the icy winds that whistled through the granite streets of
that city. Here he was a prisoner, imprisoned not only by that placid
sea, but by his hatred for that horrible old man. He pressed his hands
to his aching head. He would like to kill him. But he pulled himself together.
He must do something to distract his mind, and since he could not read
he thought he would set his private papers in order. It was a job which
he had long meant to do and which he had constantly put off. He unlocked
the drawer of his desk and took out a handful of letters. He caught sight
of his revolver. An impulse, no sooner realised than set aside, to put
a bullet through his head and so escape from the intolerable bondage
of life flashed through his mind. He noticed that in the damp air the
revolver was slightly rusted, and he got an oil rag and began to clean
it. It was while he was thus occupied that he grew aware of someone slinking
round the door. He looked up and called:
Who is there?
There was a moments pause, then Manuma showed himself.
What do you want?
The chiefs son stood for a moment, sullen and silent, and
when he spoke it was with a strangled voice.
We cant pay twenty pounds. We havent the money.
What am I to do? said Mackintosh. You heard what Mr
Walker said.
Manuma began to plead, half in Samoan and half in English. It was a sing-song
whine, with the quavering intonations of a beggar, and it filled
Mackintosh with disgust. It outraged him that the man should let himself
be so crushed. He was a pitiful object.
I can do nothing, said Mackintosh irritably. You know
that Mr Walker is master here.
Manuma was silent again. He still stood in the doorway.
I am sick, he said at last. Give me some medicine.
What is the matter with you?
I do not know. I am sick. I have pains in my body.
Dont stand there, said Mackintosh sharply. Come
in and let me look at you.
Manuma entered the little room and stood before the desk.
I have pains here and here.
He put his hands to his loins and his face assumed an expression
of pain. Suddenly Mackintosh grew conscious that the boys eyes were
resting on the revolver which he had laid on the desk when Manuma appeared
in the doorway. There was a silence between the two which to Mackintosh
was endless. He seemed to read the thoughts which were in the Kanakas
mind. His heart beat violently. And then he felt as though something possessed
him so that he acted under the compulsion of a foreign will. Himself did
not make the movements of his body, but a power that was strange to him.
His throat was suddenly dry, and he put his hand to it mechanically in
order to help his speech. He was impelled to avoid Manumas
eyes.
Just wait here, he said, his voice sounded as though someone
had seized him by the windpipe, and Ill fetch you something
from the dispensary.
He got up. Was it his fancy that he staggered a little? Manuma stood
silently, and though he kept his eyes averted, Mackintosh knew
that he was looking dully out of the door. It was this other person that
possessed him that drove him out of the room, but it was himself that
took a handful of muddled papers and threw them on the revolver in order
to hide it from view. He went to the dispensary. He got a pill and poured
out some blue draught into a small bottle, and then came out into
the compound. He did not want to go back into his own bungalow, so he
called to Manuma.
Come here.
He gave him the drugs and instructions how to take them. He did not know
what it was that made it impossible for him to look at the Kanaka. While
he was speaking to him he kept his eyes on his shoulder. Manuma took the
medicine and slunk out of the gate.
Mackintosh went into the dining-room and turned over once more the old
newspapers. But he could not read them. The house was very still. Walker
was upstairs in his room asleep, the Chinese cook was busy in the kitchen,
the two policemen were out fishing. The silence that seemed to brood
over the house was unearthly, and there hammered in Mackintoshs
head the question whether the revolver still lay where he had placed it.
He could not bring himself to look. The uncertainty was horrible, but
the certainty would be more horrible still. He sweated. At last he could
stand the silence no longer, and he made up his mind to go down the road
to the traders , a man named Jervis, who had a store about a mile
away. He was a half-caste, but even that amount of white blood
made him possible to talk to. He wanted to get away from his bungalow,
with the desk littered with untidy papers, and underneath them something,
or nothing. He walked along the road. As he passed the fine hut of a chief
a greeting was called out to him. Then he came to the store. Behind the
counter sat the traders daughter, a swarthy broad-featured
girl in a pink blouse and a white drill skirt. Jervis hoped he would marry
her. He had money, and he had told Mackintosh that his daughters
husband would be well-to-do. She flushed a little when she saw Mackintosh.
Fathers just unpacking some cases that have come in this
morning. Ill tell him youre here.
He sat down and the girl went out behind the shop. In a moment her mother
waddled in, a huge old woman, a chiefess, who owned much land in her own
right; and gave him her hand. Her monstrous obesity was an offence, but
she managed to convey an impression of dignity. She was cordial
without obsequiousness; affable, but conscious of her station.
Youre quite a stranger, Mr Mackintosh. Teresa was saying
only this morning: 'Why, we never see Mr Mackintosh now.'
He shuddered a little as he thought of himself as that old natives
son-in-law. It was notorious that she ruled her husband, notwithstanding
his white blood, with a firm hand. Hers was the authority and hers the
business head. She might be no more than Mrs Jervis to the white people,
but her father had been a chief of the blood royal, and his father and
his fathers father had ruled as kings. The trader came in, small
beside his imposing wife, a dark man with a black beard going grey, in
ducks, with handsome eyes and flashing teeth. He was very British, and
his conversation was slangy, but you felt he spoke English as a foreign
tongue; with his family he used the language of his native mother. He
was a servile man, cringing and obsequious.
Ah, Mr Mackintosh, this is a joyful surprise. Get the whisky, Teresa;
Mr Mackintosh will have a gargle with us.
He gave all the latest news of Apia, watching his guests eyes the
while, so that he might know the welcome thing to say.
And how is Walker? Weve not seen him just lately. Mrs Jervis
is going to send him a sucking-pig one day this week.
I saw him riding home this morning, said Teresa.
Heres how, said Jervis, holding up his whisky.
Mackintosh drank. The two women sat and looked at him, Mrs Jervis in
her black Mother Hubbard, placid and haughty, and Teresa, anxious
to smile whenever she caught his eye, while the trader gossiped insufferably.
They were saying in Apia it was about time Walker retired. He aint
so young as he was. Things have changed since he first come to the islands
and he aint changed with them.
Hell go too far, said the old chiefess. The natives
arent satisfied.
That was a good joke about the road, laughed the trader.
When I told them about it in Apia they fair split their sides with
laughing. Good old Walker.
Mackintosh looked at him savagely. What did he mean by talking of him
in that fashion? To a half-caste trader he was Mr Walker. It was
on his tongue to utter a harsh rebuke for the impertinence.
He did not know what held him back.
When he goes I hope youll take his place, Mr Mackintosh,
said Jervis. We all like you on the island. You understand the natives.
Theyre educated now, they must be treated differently to the old
days. It wants an educated man to be administrator now. Walker was only
a trader same as I am.
Teresas eyes glistened.
When the time comes if theres anything anyone can do here,
you bet your bottom dollar well do it. Id get all the chiefs
to go over to Apia and make a petition.
Mackintosh felt horribly sick. It had not struck him that if anything
happened to Walker it might be he who would succeed him. It was true that
no one in his official position knew the island so well. He got up suddenly
and scarcely taking his leave walked back to the compound. And now he
went straight to his room. He took a quick look at his desk. He rummaged
among the papers.
The revolver was not there.
His heart thumped violently against his ribs. He looked for the revolver
everywhere. He hunted in the chairs and in the drawers. He looked desperately,
and all the time he knew he would not find it. Suddenly he heard Walkers
gruff, hearty voice.
What the devil are you up to, Mac?
He started. Walker was standing in the doorway and instinctively he turned
round to hide what lay upon his desk.
Tidying up? quizzed Walker. Ive told 'em to put
the grey in the trap. I'm going down to Tafoni to bathe. Youd better
come along.
All right, said Mackintosh.
So long as he was with Walker nothing could happen. The place they were
bound for was about three miles away, and there was a fresh-water pool,
separated by a thin barrier of rock from the sea, which the administrator
had blasted out for the natives to bathe in. He had done this at spots
round the island, wherever there was a spring; and the fresh water, compared
with the sticky warmth of the sea, was cool and invigorating. They drove
along the silent grassy road, splashing now and then through fords, where
the sea had forced its way in, past a couple of native villages, the bell-shaped
huts spaced out roomily and the white chapel in the middle, and at the
third village they got out of the trap, tied up the horse, and walked
down to the pool. They were accompanied by four or five girls and a dozen
children. Soon they were all splashing about, shouting and laughing, while
Walker, in a lava-lava, swam to and fro like an unwieldy
porpoise. He made lewd jokes with the girls, and they amused themselves
by diving under him and wriggling away when he tried to catch them. When
he was tired he lay down on a rock, while the girls and children surrounded
him; it was a happy family; and the old man, huge, with his crescent of
white hair and his shining bald crown, looked like some old sea god. Once
Mackintosh caught a queer soft look in his eyes.
Theyre dear children, he said. They look upon
me as their father.
And then without a pause he turned to one of the girls and made an obscene
remark which sent them all into fits of laughter. Mackintosh started to
dress. With his thin legs and thin arms he made a grotesque figure,
a sinister Don Quixote, and Walker began to make coarse jokes about
him. They were acknowledged with little smothered laughs. Mackintosh struggled
with his shirt. He knew he looked absurd, but he hated being laughed at.
He stood silent and glowering.
If you want to get back in time for dinner you ought to come soon.
Youre not a bad fellow, Mac. Only youre a fool. When
youre doing one thing you always want to do another. Thats
not the way to live.
But all the same he raised himself slowly to his feet and began to put
on his clothes. They sauntered back to the village, drank a bowl
of kava with the chief, and then, after a joyful farewell from
all the lazy villagers, drove home.
After dinner, according to his habit, Walker, lighting his cigar, prepared
to go for a stroll. Mackintosh was suddenly seized with fear.
Dont you think its rather unwise to go out at night
by yourself just now?
Walker stared at him with his round blue eyes.
What the devil do you mean?
Remember the knife the other night. Youve got those fellows'
backs up.
Pooh! They wouldnt dare.
Someone dared before.
That was only a bluff. They wouldnt hurt me. They
look upon me as a father. They know that whatever I do is for their own
good.
Mackintosh watched him with contempt in his heart. The mans self-complacency
outraged him, and yet something, he knew not what, made him insist.
Remember what happened this morning. It wouldnt hurt you
to stay at home just to-night. Ill play piquet with you.
Ill play piquet with you when I come back. The Kanaka isnt
born yet who can make me alter my plans.
Youd better let me come with you.
You stay where you are.
Mackintosh shrugged his shoulders. He had given the man full warning.
If he did not heed it that was his own lookout. Walker put on his hat
and went out. Mackintosh began to read; but then he thought of something;
perhaps it would be as well to have his own whereabouts quite clear. He
crossed over to the kitchen and, inventing some pretext, talked
for a few minutes with the cook. Then he got out the gramophone and put
a record on it, but while it ground out its melancholy tune, some comic
song of a London music-hall, his ear was strained for a sound away there
in the night. At his elbow the record reeled out its loudness, the words
were raucous, but notwithstanding he seemed to be surrounded by
an unearthly silence. He heard the dull roar of the breakers against the
reef. He heard the breeze sigh, far up, in the leaves of the coconut trees.
How long would it be? It was awful.
He heard a hoarse laugh.
Wonders will never cease. Its not often you play yourself
a tune, Mac.
Walker stood at the window, red-faced, bluff and jovial.
Well, you see I'm alive and kicking. What were you playing for?
Walker came in.
Nerves a bit dicky, eh? Playing a tune to keep your pecker up?
I was playing your requiem.
What the devils that?
'Alf o' bitter an' a pint of stout.
A rattling good song too. I dont mind how often I hear it.
Now I'm ready to take your money off you at piquet.
They played and Walker bullied his way to victory, bluffing his
opponent, chaffing him, jeering at his mistakes, up to every dodge,
browbeating him, exulting. Presently Mackintosh recovered his coolness,
and standing outside himself, as it were, he was able to take a detached
pleasure in watching the overbearing old man and in his own cold reserve.
Somewhere Manuma sat quietly and awaited his opportunity.
Walker won game after game and pocketed his winnings at the end of the
evening in high good humour.
Youll have to grow a little bit older before you stand much
chance against me, Mac. The fact is I have a natural gift for cards.
I dont know that theres much gift about it when I happen
to deal you fourteen aces.
Good cards come to good players, retorted Walker.
Id have won if Id had your hands.
He went on to tell long stories of the various occasions on which he
had played cards with notorious sharpers and to their consternation
had taken all their money from them. He boasted. He praised himself. And
Mackintosh listened with absorption. He wanted now to feed his
hatred; and everything Walker said, every gesture, made him more detestable.
At last Walker got up.
Well, I'm going to turn in, he said with a loud yawn. Ive
got a long day to-morrow.
What are you going to do?
I'm driving over to the other side of the island. Ill start
at five, but I dont expect I shall get back to dinner till late.
They generally dined at seven.
Wed better make it half past seven then.
I guess it would be as well.
Mackintosh watched him knock the ashes out of his pipe. His vitality
was rude and exuberant. It was strange to think that death hung
over him. A faint smile flickered in Mackintoshs cold, gloomy eyes.
Would you like me to come with you?
What in Gods name should I want that for? I'm using the mare
and shell have enough to do to carry me; she dont want to
drag you over thirty miles of road.
Perhaps you dont quite realise what the feeling is at Matautu.
I think it would be safer if I came with you.
Walker burst into contemptuous laughter.
Youd be a fine lot of use in a scrap. I'm not a great hand
at getting the wind up.
Now the smile passed from Mackintoshs eyes to his lips. It distorted
them painfully.
Quem deus vult perdere prius dementat.
What the hell is that? said Walker.
Latin, answered Mackintosh as he went out.
And now he chuckled. His mood had changed. He had done all he could and
the matter was in the hands of fate. He slept more soundly than he had
done for weeks. When he awoke next morning he went out. After a good night
he found a pleasant exhilaration in the freshness of the early
air. The sea was a more vivid blue, the sky more brilliant, than
on most days, the trade wind was fresh, and there was a ripple on the
lagoon as the breeze brushed over it like velvet brushed the wrong way.
He felt himself stronger and younger. He entered upon the days work
with zest. After luncheon he slept again, and as evening drew on he had
the bay saddled and sauntered through the bush. He seemed to see
it all with new eyes. He felt more normal. The extraordinary thing was
that he was able to put Walker out of his mind altogether. So far as he
was concerned he might never have existed.
He returned late, hot after his ride, and bathed again. Then he sat on
the verandah, smoking his pipe, and looked at the day declining
over the lagoon. In the sunset the lagoon, rosy and purple and green,
was very beautiful. He felt at peace with the world and with himself.
When the cook came out to say that dinner was ready and to ask whether
he should wait, Mackintosh smiled at him with friendly eyes. He looked
at his watch.
Its half-past seven. Better not wait. One cant tell
when the bossll be back.
The boy nodded, and in a moment Mackintosh saw him carry across the yard
a bowl of steaming soup. He got up lazily, went into the dining-room,
and ate his dinner. Had it happened? The uncertainty was amusing and Mackintosh
chuckled in the silence. The food did not seem so monotonous as
usual, and even though there was Hamburger steak, the cooks invariable
dish when his poor invention failed him, it tasted by some miracle succulent
and spiced. After dinner he strolled over lazily to his bungalow to get
a book. He liked the intense stillness, and now that the night had fallen
the stars were blazing in the sky. He shouted for a lamp and in a moment
the Chink pattered over on his bare feet, piercing the darkness
with a ray of light. He put the lamp on the desk and noiselessly slipped
out of the room. Mackintosh stood rooted to the floor, for there, half
hidden by untidy papers, was his revolver. His heart throbbed painfully,
and he broke into a sweat. It was done then.
He took up the revolver with a shaking hand. Four of the chambers were
empty. He paused a moment and looked suspiciously out into the night,
but there was no one there. He quickly slipped four cartridges into the
empty chambers and locked the revolver in his drawer.
He sat down to wait.
An hour passed, a second hour passed. There was nothing. He sat at his
desk as though he were writing, but he neither wrote nor read. He merely
listened. He strained his ears for a sound travelling from a far distance.
At last he heard hesitating footsteps and knew it was the Chinese cook.
Ah-Sung, he called.
The boy came to the door.
Boss velly late, he said. Dinner no good.
Mackintosh stared at him, wondering whether he knew what had happened,
and whether, when he knew, he would realise on what terms he and Walker
had been. He went about his work, sleek, silent, and smiling, and who
could tell his thoughts?
I expect hes had dinner on the way, but you must keep the
soup hot at all events.
The words were hardly out of his mouth when the silence was suddenly
broken into by a confusion, cries, and a rapid patter of naked
feet. A number of natives ran into the compound, men and women and children;
they crowded round Mackintosh and they all talked at once. They were unintelligible.
They were excited and frightened and some of them were crying. Mackintosh
pushed his way through them and went to the gateway. Though he had scarcely
understood what they said he knew quite well what had happened. And as
he reached the gate the dog-cart arrived. The old mare was being led by
a tall Kanaka, and in the dog-cart crouched two men, trying to hold Walker
up. A little crowd of natives surrounded it.
The mare was led into the yard and the natives surged in after it. Mackintosh
shouted to them to stand back and the two policemen, sprang suddenly from
God knows where, pushed them violently aside. By now he had managed to
understand that some lads who had been fishing, on their way back to their
village had come across the cart on the home side of the ford. The mare
was nuzzling about the herbage and in the darkness they could just see
the great white bulk of the old man sunk between the seat and the dashboard.
At first they thought he was drunk and they peered in, grinning, but then
they heard him groan, and guessed that something was amiss. They ran to
the village and called for help. It was when they returned, accompanied
by half a hundred people, that they discovered Walker had been shot.
With a sudden thrill of horror Mackintosh asked himself whether he was
already dead. The first thing at all events was to get him out of the
cart, and that, owing to Walkers corpulence, was a difficult job.
It took four strong men to lift him. They jolted him and he uttered a
dull groan. He was still alive. At last they carried him into the house,
up the stairs, and placed him on his bed. Then Mackintosh was able to
see him, for in the yard, lit only by half a dozen hurricane lamps, everything
had been obscured. Walkers white ducks were stained with
blood, and the men who had carried him wiped their hands, red and sticky,
on their lava-lavas. Mackintosh held up the lamp. He had not expected
the old man to be so pale. His eyes were closed. He was breathing still,
his pulse could be just felt, but it was obvious that he was dying. Mackintosh
had not bargained for the shock of horror that convulsed him. He
saw that the native clerk was there, and in a voice hoarse with fear told
him to go into the dispensary and get what was necessary for a hypodermic
injection. One of the policemen had brought up the whisky, and Mackintosh
forced a little into the old mans mouth. The room was crowded with
natives. They sat about the floor, speechless now and terrified, and every
now and then one wailed aloud. It was very hot, but Mackintosh felt cold,
his hands and his feet were like ice, and he had to make a violent effort
not to tremble in all his limbs. He did not know what to do. He did not
know if Walker was bleeding still, and if he was, how he could stop the
bleeding.
The clerk brought the hypodermic needle.
You give it to him, said Mackintosh. Youre more
used to that sort of thing than I am.
His head ached horribly. It felt as though all sorts of little savage
things were beating inside it, trying to get out. They watched for the
effect of the injection. Presently Walker opened his eyes slowly. He did
not seem to know where he was.
Keep quiet, said Mackintosh. Youre at home. Youre
quite safe.
Walkers lips outlined a shadowy smile.
Theyve got me, he whispered.
Ill get Jervis to send his motor-boat to Apia at once. Well
get a doctor out by to-morrow afternoon.
There was a long pause before the old man answered,
I shall be dead by then.
A ghastly expression passed over Mackintoshs pale face.
He forced himself to laugh.
What rot! You keep quiet and youll be as right as rain.
Give me a drink, said Walker. A stiff one.
With shaking hand Mackintosh poured out whisky and water, half and half,
and held the glass while Walker drank greedily. It seemed to restore him.
He gave a long sigh and a little colour came into his great fleshy face.
Mackintosh felt extraordinarily helpless. He stood and stared at the old
man.
If youll tell me what to do Ill do it, he said.
Theres nothing to do. Just leave me alone. I'm done for.
He looked dreadfully pitiful as he lay on the great bed, a huge, bloated,
old man; but so wan, so weak, it was heart-rending. As he rested,
his mind seemed to grow clearer.
You were right, Mac, he said presently. You warned
me.
I wish to God Id come with you.
Youre a good chap, Mac, only you dont drink.
There was another long silence, and it was clear that Walker was sinking.
There was an internal hfmorrhage and even Mackintosh in his ignorance
could not fail to see that his chief had but an hour or two to live. He
stood by the side of the bed stock still. For half an hour perhaps Walker
lay with his eyes closed, then he opened them.
Theyll give you my job, he said, slowly. Last
time I was in Apia I told them you were all right. Finish my road. I want
to think thatll be done. All round the island.
I dont want your job. Youll get all right.
Walker shook his head wearily.
Ive had my day. Treat them fairly, thats the great
thing. Theyre children. You must always remember that. You must
be firm with them, but you must be kind. And you must be just. Ive
never made a bob out of them. I havent saved a hundred pounds in
twenty years. The roads the great thing. Get the road finished.
Something very like a sob was wrung from Mackintosh.
Youre a good fellow, Mac. I always liked you.
He closed his eyes, and Mackintosh thought that he would never open them
again. His mouth was so dry that he had to get himself something to drink.
The Chinese cook silently put a chair for him. He sat down by the side
of the bed and waited. He did not know how long a time passed. The night
was endless. Suddenly one of the men sitting there broke into uncontrollable
sobbing, loudly, like a child, and Mackintosh grew aware that the room
was crowded by this time with natives. They sat all over the floor on
their haunches, men and women, staring at the bed.
What are all these people doing here? said Mackintosh. Theyve
got no right. Turn them out, turn them out, all of them.
His words seemed to rouse Walker, for he opened his eyes once more, and
now they were all misty. He wanted to speak, but he was so weak that Mackintosh
had to strain his ears to catch what he said.
Let them stay. Theyre my children. They ought to be here.
Mackintosh turned to the natives.
Stay where you are. He wants you. But be silent.
A faint smile came over the old mans white face.
Come nearer, he said.
Mackintosh bent over him. His eyes were closed and the words he said
were like a wind sighing through the fronds of the coconut trees.
Give me another drink. Ive got something to say.
This time Mackintosh gave him his whisky neat. Walker collected his strength
in a final effort of will.
Dont make a fuss about this. In 'ninety-five when there were
troubles white men were killed, and the fleet came and shelled the villages.
A lot of people were killed whod had nothing to do with it. Theyre
damned fools at Apia. If they make a fuss theyll only punish the
wrong people. I dont want anyone punished.
He paused for a while to rest.
You must say it was an accident. No ones to blame. Promise
me that.
Ill do anything you like, whispered Mackintosh.
Good chap. One of the best. Theyre children. I'm their father.
A father dont let his children get into trouble if he can help it.
A ghost of a chuckle came out of his throat. It was astonishingly weird
and ghastly.
Youre a religious chap, Mac. Whats that about forgiving
them? You know.
For a while Mackintosh did not answer. His lips trembled.
Forgive them, for they know not what they do?
Thats right. Forgive them. Ive loved them, you know,
always loved them.
He sighed. His lips faintly moved, and now Mackintosh had to put his
ears quite close to them in order to hear.
Hold my hand, he said.
Mackintosh gave a gasp. His heart seemed wrenched. He took the old mans
hand, so cold and weak, a coarse, rough hand, and held it in his own.
And thus he sat until he nearly started out of his seat, for the silence
was suddenly broken by a long rattle. It was terrible and unearthly. Walker
was dead. Then the natives broke out with loud cries. The tears ran down
their faces, and they beat their breasts.
Mackintosh disengaged his hand from the dead mans , and staggering
like one drunk with sleep he went out of the room. He went to the locked
drawer in his writing-desk and took out the revolver. He walked down to
the sea and walked into the lagoon; he waded out cautiously, so that he
should not trip against a coral rock, till the water came to his arm-pits.
Then he put a bullet through his head.
An hour later half a dozen slim brown sharks were splashing and struggling
at the spot where he fell.
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