“Will you eat rice and drink sagueir?” he said. “I have waked up my household.”
“My friend,” said Lingard, without looking at him, “when I come to see Lakamba, or any of Lakamba’s servants, I am never hungry and never thirsty. Tau! Savee! Never! Do you think I am devoid of reason? That there is nothing there?”
He sat up, and, fixing abruptly his eyes on Babalatchi, tapped his own forehead significantly.
“Tse! Tse! Tse! How can you talk like that, Tuan!” exclaimed Babalatchi, in a horrified tone.
“I talk as I think. I have lived many years,” said Lingard, stretching his arm negligently to take up the gun, which he began to examine knowingly, cocking it, and easing down the hammer several times. “This is good. Mataram make. Old, too,” he went on. “Hai!” broke in Babalatchi, eagerly. “I got it when I was young. He was an Aru trader, a man with a big stomach and a loud voice, and brave—very brave. When we came up with his prau in the grey morning, he stood aft shouting to his men and fired this gun at us once. Only once!” … He paused, laughed softly, and went on in a low, dreamy voice. “In the grey morning we came up: forty silent men in a swift Sulu prau; and when the sun was so high”—here he held up his hands about three feet apart—”when the sun was only so high, Tuan, our work was done—and there was a feast ready for the fishes of the sea.”
“Aye! aye!” muttered Lingard, nodding his head slowly. “I see. You should not let it get rusty like this,” he added.
He let the gun fall between his knees, and moving back on his seat, leaned his head against the wall of the hut, crossing his arms on his breast.
“A good gun,” went on Babalatchi. “Carry far and true. Better than this—there.”
With the tips of his fingers he touched gently the butt of a revolver peeping out of the right pocket of Lingard’s white jacket.
“Take your hand off that,” said Lingard sharply, but in a good-humoured tone and without making the slightest movement.
Babalatchi smiled and hitched his seat a little further off.
For some time they sat in silence. Lingard, with his head tilted back, looked downwards with lowered eyelids at Babalatchi, who was tracing invisible lines with his finger on the mat between his feet. Outside, they could hear Ali and the other boatmen chattering and laughing round the fire they had lighted in the big and deserted courtyard.
“Well, what about that white man?” said Lingard, quietly.
It seemed as if Babalatchi had not heard the question. He went on tracing elaborate patterns on the floor for a good while. Lingard waited motionless. At last the Malay lifted his head.
“Hai! The white man. I know!” he murmured absently. “This white man or another…. Tuan,” he said aloud with unexpected animation, “you are a man of the sea?”
“You know me. Why ask?” said Lingard, in a low tone.
“Yes. A man of the sea—even as we are. A true Orang Laut,” went on Babalatchi, thoughtfully, “not like the rest of the white men.”
“I am like other whites, and do not wish to speak many words when the truth is short. I came here to see the white man that helped Lakamba against Patalolo, who is my friend. Show me where that white man lives; I want him to hear my talk.”
“Talk only? Tuan! Why hurry? The night is long and death is swift—as you ought to know; you who have dealt it to so many of my people. Many years ago I have faced you, arms in hand. Do you not remember? It was in Carimata—far from here.”
“I cannot remember every vagabond that came in my way,” protested Lingard, seriously.
“Hai! Hai!” continued Babalatchi, unmoved and dreamy. “Many years ago. Then all this”—and looking up suddenly at Lingard’s beard, he flourished his fingers below his own beardless chin—”then all this was like gold in sunlight, now it is like the foam of an angry sea.”
“Maybe, maybe,” said Lingard, patiently, paying the involuntary tribute of a faint sigh to the memories of the past evoked by Babalatchi’s words.