She cried—”Your purpose! You know nothing. I must . . .”
He interrupted—unreasonably excited, as if she had, by her look, inoculated him with some of her own distress.
“I know enough.”
She approached, and stood facing him at arm’s length, with both her hands on his shoulders; and he, surprised by that audacity, closed and opened his eyes two or three times, aware of some emotion arising within him, from her words, her tone, her contact; an emotion unknown, singular, penetrating and sad—at the close sight of that strange woman, of that being savage and tender, strong and delicate, fearful and resolute, that had got entangled so fatally between their two lives—his own and that other white man’s, the abominable scoundrel.
“How can you know?” she went on, in a persuasive tone that seemed to flow out of her very heart—”how can you know? I live with him all the days. All the nights. I look at him; I see his every breath, every glance of his eye, every movement of his lips. I see nothing else! What else is there? And even I do not understand. I do not understand him!—Him!—My life! Him who to me is so great that his presence hides the earth and the water from my sight!”
Lingard stood straight, with his hands deep in the pockets of his jacket. His eyes winked quickly, because she spoke very close to his face. She disturbed him and he had a sense of the efforts he was making to get hold of her meaning, while all the time he could not help telling himself that all this was of no use.
She added after a pause—”There has been a time when I could understand him. When I knew what was in his mind better than he knew it himself. When I felt him. When I held him…. And now he has escaped.”
“Escaped? What? Gone away!” shouted Lingard.
“Escaped from me,” she said; “left me alone. Alone. And I am ever near him. Yet alone.”
Her hands slipped slowly off Lingard’s shoulders and her arms fell by her side, listless, discouraged, as if to her—to her, the savage, violent, and ignorant creature—had been revealed clearly in that moment the tremendous fact of our isolation, of the loneliness impenetrable and transparent, elusive and everlasting; of the indestructible loneliness that surrounds, envelopes, clothes every human soul from the cradle to the grave, and, perhaps, beyond.
“Aye! Very well! I understand. His face is turned away from you,” said Lingard. “Now, what do you want?”
“I want … I have looked—for help …everywhere …against men…. All men … I do not know. First they came, the invisible whites, and dealt death from afar …then he came. He came to me who was alone and sad. He came; angry with his brothers; great amongst his own people; angry with those I have not seen: with the people where men have no mercy and women have no shame. He was of them, and great amongst them. For he was great?”
Lingard shook his head slightly. She frowned at him, and went on in disordered haste—
“Listen. I saw him. I have lived by the side of brave men …of chiefs. When he came I was the daughter of a beggar—of a blind man without strength and hope. He spoke to me as if I had been brighter than the sunshine—more delightful than the cool water of the brook by which we met—more . . .” Her anxious eyes saw some shade of expression pass on her listener’s face that made her hold her breath for a second, and then explode into pained fury so violent that it drove Lingard back a pace, like an unexpected blast of wind. He lifted both his hands, incongruously paternal in his venerable aspect, bewildered and soothing, while she stretched her neck forward and shouted at him.
“I tell you I was all that to him. I know it! I saw it! … There are times when even you white men speak the truth. I saw his eyes. I felt his eyes, I tell you! I saw him tremble when I came near—when I spoke—when I touched him. Look at me! You have been young. Look at me. Look, Rajah Laut!”