“I may have,” Burton said. “Isabel had been after me for years to convert, though she never dared urge me directly. When I was so sick there, at the last, I may have told her I would do so in order to make her happy. She was so grief-stricken, so distressed, so afraid my soul would burn in Hell.”
“Then you did love her?” Frigate had said.
“I Would have done the same for a dog,” Burton replied.
“For somebody who can be so upsettingly frank and direct you can be very ambiguous at times.” This conversation had taken place about two months after First Day, A.R. 1. The result had been something like that which Doctor Johnson would have felt on encountering another Boswell.
This had been the second stage of their curious relationship. Frigate became closer but at the same time, more of an annoyance. The American had always been restrained in his comments on Burton’s attitudes, undoubtedly because he did not want to anger him. Frigate made a very conscious effort not to anger anybody. But he also made unconscious efforts to antagonize them. His hostilities came out in many subtle, and some not so subtle, actions and words. Burton did not like this. He was direct, not at all afraid of anger. Perhaps, as Frigate pointed out, he was too eager for hostile confrontations.
One evening, as they were sitting around a fire under a grailstone Frigate had spoken about Karachi. This village, which later became the capital of Pakistan, the nation created in 1947, had only 2,000 population in Burton’s time. By 1970, its population was approximately 2,000,000. That led to Frigate’s asking, rather indirectly, about the report Burton had made to his general, Sir Robert Napier, on houses of male prostitution in Karachi. The report was supposed to be kept in the secret files of the East India Army, but it was found by one of the many enemies of Burton. Though the report was never mentioned publicly, it had been used against him throughout his life. Burton had disguised himself as a native in order to get into the house and make observations that no European would have been allowed to make. He had been proud that he had escaped detection, and he had taken the unsavory job because he was the only one who could do it and because his beloved leader, Napier, had asked him to.
Burton had replied to Frigate’s questions somewhat surlily. Alice had angered him earlier that day – she seemed to be able to do so very easily lately – and he was thinking of a way to anger her. Now he seized upon the opportunity given him by Frigate. He launched into an uninhibited account of what went on in the Karachi houses. Ruach finally got up and walked away. Frigate looked as if he were sick, but he stayed. Wilfreda laughed until she rolled on the ground. Kazz and Monat kept stolid expressions. Gwenafra was sleeping on the boat, so Burton did not have to take her into account. Loghu seemed to be fascinated but also slightly-repulsed.
Alice, his main target, turned pale and then, later, red. Finally, she rose and said, “Really, Mr. Burton, I had thought you were low before. But to brag of this … this … you are utterly contemptible, degenerate, and repulsive. Not that I believe a word of what you’ve been telling me. I can’t believe that anybody would behave as you claim you did and then boast about it. You are living up to your reputation as a man who likes to shock others no matter what damage it does to his own reputation.” She had walked off into the darkness.
Frigate had said, “Sometime, maybe, you will tell me how much of that is true. I used to think as she did. But when I got older, more evidence about you was turned up, and one biographer made a psychoanalysis of you based on your own writing and various documentary sources.”
“And the conclusions?” Burton said mockingly.
“Later, Dick,” Frigate said. “Ruffian Dick,” he added, and he, too, left.
Now, standing at the tiller, watching the sun beat down on the group, listening to the hissing of water cut by the two sharp prows, and the creaking of rigging, he wondered what lay ahead on the other side of the canyon-like channel. Not the end of The River, surely. That would probably go on forever. But the end of the group might be near. They had been cooped up too long together. Too many days had been spent on the narrow deck with too little to do except talk or help sail the ship. They were rubbing each other raw and had been doing it for a long time. Even Wilfreda had been quiet and unresponsive lately. Not that he had been too stimulating. Frankly, he was tired of her. He did not hate her or wish her any ill. He was just tired of her, and the fact that he could have her and not have Alice Hargreaves made him even more tired of her.