Chapter 10. THE OPEN DOOR
The captain and Herrick meanwhile turned their back upon the lights inAttwater's verandah, and took a direction towards the pier and the beachof the lagoon.
The isle, at this hour, with its smooth floor of sand, the pillared roofoverhead, and the prevalent illumination of the lamps, wore an air ofunreality like a deserted theatre or a public garden at midnight. A manlooked about him for the statues and tables. Not the least air of windwas stirring among the palms, and the silence was emphasised by thecontinuous clamour of the surf from the seashore, as it might be oftraffic in the next street.
Still talking, still soothing him, the captain hurried his patient on,brought him at last to the lagoon-side, and leading him down the beach,laved his head and face with the tepid water. The paroxysm graduallysubsided, the sobs became less convulsive and then ceased; by an odd butnot quite unnatural conjunction, the captain's soothing current oftalk died away at the same time and by proportional steps, and thepair remained sunk in silence. The lagoon broke at their feet in pettywavelets, and with a sound as delicate as a whisper; stars of alldegrees looked down on their own images in that vast mirror; and themore angry colour of the Farallone's riding lamp burned in the middledistance. For long they continued to gaze on the scene before them, andhearken anxiously to the rustle and tinkle of that miniature surf, orthe more distant and loud reverberations from the outer coast. For longspeech was denied them; and when the words came at last, they came toboth simultaneously. 'Say, Herrick...'the captain was beginning.
But Herrick, turning swiftly towards his companion, bent him down withthe eager cry: 'Let's up anchor, captain, and to sea!'
'Where to, my son?' said the captain. 'Up anchor's easy saying. Butwhere to?'
'To sea,' responded Herrick. 'The sea's big enough! To sea--away fromthis dreadful island and that, oh! that sinister man!'
'Oh, we'll see about that,' said Davis. 'You brace up, and we'll seeabout that. You're all run down, that's what's wrong with you; you'reall nerves, like Jemimar; you've got to brace up good and be yourselfagain, and then we'll talk.'
'To sea,' reiterated Herrick, 'to sea tonight--now--this moment!'
'It can't be, my son,' replied the captain firmly. 'No ship of mine putsto sea without provisions, you can take that for settled.'
'You don't seem to understand,' said Herrick. 'The whole thing is over,I tell you. There is nothing to do here, when he knows all. That manthere with the cat knows all; can't you take it in?'
'All what?' asked the captain, visibly discomposed. 'Why, he received uslike a perfect gentleman and treated us real handsome, until you beganwith your foolery--and I must say I seen men shot for less, and nobodysorry! What more do you expect anyway?'
Herrick rocked to and fro upon the sand, shaking his head.
'Guying us,' he said, 'he was guying us--only guying us; it's all we'regood for.'
'There was one queer thing, to be sure,' admitted the captain, with amisgiving of the voice; 'that about the sherry. Damned if I caught on tothat. Say, Herrick, you didn't give me away?'
'Oh! give you away!' repeated Herrick with weary, querulous scorn. 'Whatwas there to give away? We're transparent; we've got rascal brandedon us: detected rascal--detected rascal! Why, before he came on board,there was the name painted out, and he saw the whole thing. He made surewe would kill him there and then, and stood guying you and Huish on thechance. He calls that being frightened! Next he had me ashore; a finetime I had! THE TWO WOLVES, he calls you and Huish.--WHAT IS THE PUPPYDOING WITH THE TWO WOLVES? he asked. He showed me his pearls; he saidthey might be dispersed before morning, and ALL HUNG BY A HAIr--andsmiled as he said it, such a smile! O, it's no use, I tell you! He knowsall, he sees through all; we only make him laugh with our pretences--helooks at us and laughs like God!'
There was a silence. Davis stood with contorted brows, gazing into thenight.
'The pearls?' he said suddenly. 'He showed them to you? he has them?'
'No, he didn't show them; I forgot: only the safe they were in,' saidHerrick. 'But you'll never get them!'
'I've two words to say to that,' said the captain.
'Do you think he would have been so easy at table, unless he wasprepared?' cried Herrick. 'The servants were both armed. He was armedhimself; he always is; he told me. You will never deceive his vigilance.Davis, I know it! It's all up; all up. There's nothing for it, there'snothing to be done: all gone: life, honour, love. Oh, my God, my God,why was I born?'
Another pause followed upon this outburst.
The captain put his hands to his brow.
'Another thing!' he broke out. 'Why did he tell you all this? Seems likemadness to me!'
Herrick shook his head with gloomy iteration. 'You wouldn't understandif I were to tell you,' said he.
'I guess I can understand any blame' thing that you can tell me,' saidthe captain.
'Well, then, he's a fatalist,' said Herrick.
'What's that, a fatalist?' said Davis.
'Oh, it's a fellow that believes a lot of things,' said Herrick,'believes that his bullets go true; believes that all falls out as Godchooses, do as you like to prevent it; and all that.'
'Why, I guess I believe right so myself,' said Davis.
'You do?' said Herrick.
'You bet I do!' says Davis.
Herrick shrugged his shoulders. 'Well, you must be a fool,' said he, andhe leaned his head upon his knees.
The captain stood biting his hands.
'There's one thing sure,' he said at last. 'I must get Huish out ofthat. HE'S not fit to hold his end up with a man like you describe.'
And he turned to go away. The words had been quite simple; not so thetone; and the other was quick to catch it.
'Davis!' he cried, 'no! Don't do it. Spare ME, and don't do it--spareyourself, and leave it alone--for God's sake, for your children's sake!'
His voice rose to a passionate shrillness; another moment, and he mightbe overheard by their not distant victim. But Davis turned on him with asavage oath and gesture; and the miserable young man rolled over on hisface on the sand, and lay speechless and helpless.
The captain meanwhile set out rapidly for Attwater's house. As he went,he considered with himself eagerly, his thoughts racing. The man hadunderstood, he had mocked them from the beginning; he would teach himto make a mockery of John Davis! Herrick thought him a god; give him asecond to aim in, and the god was overthrown. He chuckled as he felt thebutt of his revolver. It should be done now, as he went in. From behind?It was difficult to get there. From across the table? No, the captainpreferred to shoot standing, so as you could be sure to get your handupon your gun. The best would be to summon Huish, and when Attwaterstood up and turned--ah, then would be the moment. Wrapped in his ardentprefiguration of events, the captain posted towards the house with hishead down.
'Hands up! Halt!' cried the voice of Attwater.
And the captain, before he knew what he was doing, had obeyed. Thesurprise was complete and irremediable. Coming on the top crest of hismurderous intentions, he had walked straight into an ambuscade, and nowstood, with his hands impotently lifted, staring at the verandah.
The party was now broken up. Attwater leaned on a post, and kept Daviscovered with a Winchester. One of the servants was hard by with asecond at the port arms, leaning a little forward, round-eyed with eagerexpectancy. In the open space at the head of the stair, Huish was partlysupported by the other native; his face wreathed in meaningless smiles,his mind seemingly sunk in the contemplation of an unlighted cigar.
'Well,' said Attwater, 'you seem to me to be a very twopenny pirate!'
The captain uttered a sound in his throat for which we have no name;rage choked him.
'I am going to give you Mr Whish--or the wine-sop that remains of him,'continued Attwater. 'He talks a great deal when he drinks, CaptainDavis of the Sea Ranger. But I have quite done with him--and return thearticle with thanks. Now,' he cried sharply. 'Another false movementlike
that, and your family will have to deplore the loss of aninvaluable parent; keep strictly still, Davis.'
Attwater said a word in the native, his eye still undeviatingly fixed onthe captain; and the servant thrust Huish smartly forward from thebrink of the stair. With an extraordinary simultaneous dispersion ofhis members, that gentleman bounded forth into space, struck the earth,ricocheted, and brought up with his arms about a palm. His mind wasquite a stranger to these events; the expression of anguish thatdeformed his countenance at the moment of the leap was probablymechanical; and he suffered these convulsions in silence; clung to thetree like an infant; and seemed, by his dips, to suppose himself engagedin the pastime of bobbing for apples. A more finely sympathetic mind ora more observant eye might have remarked, a little in front of him onthe sand, and still quite beyond reach, the unlighted cigar.
'There is your Whitechapel carrion!' said Attwater. 'And nowyou might very well ask me why I do not put a period to you at once, asyou deserve. I will tell you why, Davis. It is because I have nothing todo with the Sea Ranger and the people you drowned, or the Farallone andthe champagne that you stole. That is your account with God, He keepsit, and He will settle it when the clock strikes. In my own case, I havenothing to go on but suspicion, and I do not kill on suspicion, not evenvermin like you. But understand! if ever I see any of you again, it isanother matter, and you shall eat a bullet. And now take yourself off.March! and as you value what you call your life, keep your hands up asyou go!'
The captain remained as he was, his hands up, his mouth open: mesmerisedwith fury.
'March!' said Attwater. 'One--two--three!'
And Davis turned and passed slowly away. But even as he went, he wasmeditating a prompt, offensive return. In the twinkling of an eye,he had leaped behind a tree; and was crouching there, pistol in hand,peering from either side of his place of ambush with bared teeth; aserpent already poised to strike. And already he was too late. Attwaterand his servants had disappeared; and only the lamps shone on thedeserted table and the bright sand about the house, and threw into thenight in all directions the strong and tall shadows of the palms.
Davis ground his teeth. Where were they gone, the cowards? to what holehad they retreated beyond reach? It was in vain he should try anything,he, single and with a second-hand revolver, against three persons,armed with Winchesters, and who did not show an ear out of any of theapertures of that lighted and silent house? Some of them might havealready ducked below it from the rear, and be drawing a bead upon him atthat moment from the low-browed crypt, the receptacle of empty bottlesand broken crockery. No, there was nothing to be done but to bring away(if it were still possible) his shattered and demoralised forces.
'Huish,' he said, 'come along.'
''S lose my ciga',' said Huish, reaching vaguely forward.
The captain let out a rasping oath. 'Come right along here,' said he.
''S all righ'. Sleep here 'th Atty-Attwa. Go boar' t'morr',' replied thefestive one.
'If you don't come, and come now, by the living God, I'll shoot you!'cried the captain.
It is not to be supposed that the sense of these words in any waypenetrated to the mind of Hulsh; rather that, in a fresh attempt uponthe cigar, he overbalanced himself and came flying erratically forward:a course which brought him within reach of Davis.
'Now you walk straight,' said the captain, clutching him, 'or I'll knowwhy not!'
''S lose my ciga',' replied Huish.
The captain's contained fury blazed up for a moment. He twisted Huishround, grasped him by the neck of the coat, ran him in front of him tothe pier end, and flung him savagely forward on his face.
'Look for your cigar then, you swine!' said he, and blew his boat calltill the pea in it ceased to rattle.
An immediate activity responded on board the Farallone; far away voices,and soon the sound of oars, floated along the surface of the lagoon; andat the same time, from nearer hand, Herrick aroused himself and strolledlanguidly up. He bent over the insignificant figure of Huish, where itgrovelled, apparently insensible, at the base of the figure-head.
'Dead?' he asked.
'No, he's not dead,' said Davis.
'And Attwater?' asked Herrick.
'Now you just shut your head!' replied Davis. 'You can do that, I fancy,and by God, I'll show you how! I'll stand no more of your drivel.'
They waited accordingly in silence till the boat bumped on the furthestpiers; then raised Huish, head and heels, carried him down the gangway,and flung him summarily in the bottom. On the way out he was heardmurmuring of the loss of his cigar; and after he had been handed up theside like baggage, and cast down in the alleyway to slumber, his lastaudible expression was: 'Splen'l fl' Attwa'!' This the expert construedinto 'Splendid fellow, Attwater'; with so much innocence had this greatspirit issued from the adventures of the evening.
The captain went and walked in the waist with brief, irate turns;Herrick leaned his arms on the taffrail; the crew had all turned in. Theship had a gentle, cradling motion; at times a block piped like a bird.On shore, through the colonnade of palm stems, Attwater's house was tobe seen shining steadily with many lamps. And there was nothing elsevisible, whether in the heaven above or in the lagoon below, but thestars and their reflections. It might have been minutes or it might havebeen hours, that Herrick leaned there, looking in the glorified waterand drinking peace. 'A bath of stars,' he was thinking; when a hand waslaid at last on his shoulder.
'Herrick,' said the captain, 'I've been walking off my trouble.'
A sharp jar passed through the young man, but he neither answered nor somuch as turned his head.
'I guess I spoke a little rough to you on shore,' pursued the captain;'the fact is, I was real mad; but now it's over, and you and me have toturn to and think.'
'I will NOT think,' said Herrick.
'Here, old man!' said Davis, kindly; 'this won't fight, you know! You'vegot to brace up and help me get things straight. You're not going backon a friend? That's not like you, Herrick!'
'O yes, it is,' said Herrick.
'Come, come!' said the captain, and paused as if quite at a loss. 'Lookhere,' he cried, 'you have a glass of champagne. I won't touch it, sothat'll show you if I'm in earnest. But it's just the pick-me-up foryou; it'll put an edge on you at once.'
'O, you leave me alone!' said Herrick, and turned away.
The captain caught him by the sleeve; and he shook him off and turned onhim, for the moment, like a demoniac.
'Go to hell in your own way!' he cried.
And he turned away again, this time unchecked, and stepped forward towhere the boat rocked alongside and ground occasionally against theschooner. He looked about him. A corner of the house was interposedbetween the captain and himself; all was well; no eye must see him inthat last act. He slid silently into the boat; thence, silently, intothe starry water.
Instinctively he swam a little; it would be time enough to stop by andby.
The shock of the immersion brightened his mind immediately. The eventsof the ignoble day passed before him in a frieze of pictures, and hethanked 'whatever Gods there be' for that open door of suicide. In sucha little while he would be done with it, the random business at an end,the prodigal son come home. A very bright planet shone before him anddrew a trenchant wake along the water. He took that for his line andfollowed it. That was the last earthly thing that he should look upon;that radiant speck, which he had soon magnified into a City of Laputa,along whose terraces there walked men and women of awful and benignantfeatures, who viewed him with distant commiseration. These imaginaryspectators consoled him; he told himself their talk, one to another; itwas of himself and his sad destiny.
From such flights of fancy, he was aroused by the growing coldness ofthe water. Why should he delay? Here, where he was now, let him drop thecurtain, let him seek the ineffable refuge, let him lie down with allraces and generations of men in the house of sleep. It was easy to say,easy to do. To stop swimming: there was no mystery in that,
if he coulddo it. Could he? And he could not. He knew it instantly. He was awareinstantly of an opposition in his members, unanimous and invincible,clinging to life with a single and fixed resolve, finger by finger,sinew by sinew; something that was at once he and not he--at once withinand without him;--the shutting of some miniature valve in his brain,which a single manly thought should suffice to open--and the grasp of anexternal fate ineluctable as gravity. To any man there may come at timesa consciousness that there blows, through all the articulations of hisbody, the wind of a spirit not wholly his; that his mind rebels; thatanother girds him and carries him whither he would not. It came nowto Herrick, with the authority of a revelation. There was no escapepossible. The open door was closed in his recreant face. He must go backinto the world and amongst men without illusion. He must stagger on tothe end with the pack of his responsibility and his disgrace, untila cold, a blow, a merciful chance ball, or the more merciful hangman,should dismiss him from his infamy. There were men who could commitsuicide; there were men who could not; and he was one who could not.
For perhaps a minute, there raged in his mind the coil of thisdiscovery; then cheerless certitude followed; and, with an incrediblesimplicity of submission to ascertained fact, he turned round andstruck out for shore. There was a courage in this which he could notappreciate; the ignobility of his cowardice wholly occupying him. Astrong current set against him like a wind in his face; he contendedwith it heavily, wearily, without enthusiasm, but with substantialadvantage; marking his progress the while, without pleasure, by theoutline of the trees. Once he had a moment of hope. He heard to thesouthward of him, towards the centre of the lagoon, the wallowing ofsome great fish, doubtless a shark, and paused for a little, treadingwater. Might not this be the hangman? he thought. But the wallowing diedaway; mere silence succeeded; and Herrick pushed on again for the shore,raging as he went at his own nature. Ay, he would wait for the shark;but if he had heard him coming!... His smile was tragic. He could havespat upon himself.
About three in the morning, chance, and the set of the current, and thebias of his own right-handed body, so decided it between them that hecame to shore upon the beach in front of Attwater's. There he sat down,and looked forth into a world without any of the lights of hope. Thepoor diving dress of self-conceit was sadly tattered! With the fairytale of suicide, of a refuge always open to him, he had hithertobeguiled and supported himself in the trials of life; and behold!that also was only a fairy tale, that also was folk-lore. With theconsequences of his acts he saw himself implacably confronted for theduration of life: stretched upon a cross, and nailed there with the ironbolts of his own cowardice. He had no tears; he told himself no stories.His disgust with himself was so complete that even the process ofapologetic mythology had ceased. He was like a man cast down from apillar, and every bone broken. He lay there, and admitted the facts, anddid not attempt to rise.
Dawn began to break over the far side of the atoll, the sky brightened,the clouds became dyed with gorgeous colours, the shadows of the nightlifted. And, suddenly, Herrick was aware that the lagoon and the treeswore again their daylight livery; and he saw, on board the Farallone,Davis extinguishing the lantern, and smoke rising from the galley.
Davis, without doubt, remarked and recognised the figure on the beach;or perhaps hesitated to recognise it; for after he had gazed a longwhile from under his hand, he went into the house and fetched a glass.It was very powerful; Herrick had often used it. With an instinct ofshame, he hid his face in his hands.
'And what brings you here, Mr Herrick-Hay, or Mr Hay-Herrick?' askedthe voice of Attwater. 'Your back view from my present position isremarkably fine, and I would continue to present it. We can get on verynicely as we are, and if you were to turn round, do you know? I think itwould be awkward.'
Herrick slowly rose to his feet; his heart throbbed hard, a hideousexcitement shook him, but he was master of himself. Slowly he turned,and faced Attwater and the muzzle of a pointed rifle. 'Why could I notdo that last night?' he thought.
'Well, why don't you fire?' he said aloud, with a voice that trembled.
Attwater slowly put his gun under his arm, then his hands in hispockets.
'What brings you here?' he repeated.
'I don't know,' said Herrick; and then, with a cry: 'Can you do anythingwith me?'
'Are you armed?' said Attwater. 'I ask for the form's sake.'
'Armed? No!' said Herrick. 'O yes, I am, too!' And he flung upon thebeach a dripping pistol.
'You are wet,' said Attwater.
'Yes, I am wet,' said Herrick. 'Can you do anything with me?'
Attwater read his face attentively.
'It would depend a good deal upon what you are,' said he.
'What I am? A coward!' said Herrick.
'There is very little to be done with that,' said Attwater. 'And yet thedescription hardly strikes one as exhaustive.'
'Oh, what does it matter?' cried Herrick. 'Here I am. I am brokencrockery; I am a burst drum; the whole of my life is gone to water; Ihave nothing left that I believe in, except my living horror of myself.Why do I come to you? I don't know; you are cold, cruel, hateful; andI hate you, or I think I hate you. But you are an honest man, an honestgentleman. I put myself, helpless, in your hands. What must I do? If Ican't do anything, be merciful and put a bullet through me; it's only apuppy with a broken leg!'
'If I were you, I would pick up that pistol, come up to the house, andput on some dry clothes,' said Attwater.
'If you really mean it?' said Herrick. 'You know they--we--they. .. Butyou know all.'
'I know quite enough,' said Attwater. 'Come up to the house.'
And the captain, from the deck of the Farallone, saw the two men passtogether under the shadow of the grove.
The Ebb-Tide: A Trio And Quartette Page 10