A Handful of Dust

by Evelyn Waugh

  “Let’s have the window open,” said Brenda. “It’s stuffy in here.”

  The waiter drew back the curtains, opened the windows.

  “It’s quite light,” she added.

  “After five. Oughtn’t we to go to bed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Only another week and then all the parties will be over,” said Beaver.

  “Yes.”

  “Well, let’s go.”

  “All right. Can you pay? I just haven’t any money.”

  They had come on after the party, for breakfast at a club Daisy had opened. Beaver paid for the kippers and tea. “Eight shillings,” he said. “How does Daisy expect to make a success of the place when she charges prices like that?”

  “It does seem a lot… So you really are going to America?”

  “I must. Mother has taken the tickets.”

  “Nothing I’ve said tonight makes any difference?”

  “Darling, don’t go on. We’ve been through all that. You know it’s the only thing that can happen. Why spoil the last week?”

  “You have enjoyed the summer, haven’t you?”

  “Of course… well, shall we go?”

  “Yes. You needn’t bother to see me home.”

  “Sure you don’t mind? It is miles out of the way and it’s late.”

  “There’s no knowing what I mind.”

  “Brenda, darling, for heaven’s sake… It isn’t like you to go on like this.”

  “I never was one for making myself expensive.”

  *

  The Indians returned during the night, while Tony and Dr. Messinger were asleep; without a word spoken the little people crept out of hiding; the women had removed their clothes and left them at a distance so that no twig should betray their movements; their naked bodies moved soundlessly through the undergrowth; the glowing embers of the fire and the storm lantern twenty yards away were their only light; there was no moon. They collected their wicker baskets and their rations of farina, their bows and arrows, the gun and their broad-bladed knives; they rolled up their hammocks into compact cylinders. They took nothing with them that was not theirs. Then they crept back through the shadows, into the darkness.

  When Tony and Dr. Messinger awoke it was clear to them what had happened.

  “The situation is grave,” said Dr. Messinger. “But not desperate.”

  IV

  For four days Tony and Dr. Messinger paddled downstream. They sat, balancing themselves precariously, at the two ends of the canoe; between them they had piled the most essential of their stores; the remainder, with the other canoes, had been left at the camp, to be called for when they had recruited help from the Pie-wies. Even the minimum which Dr. Messinger had selected overweighted the craft so that it was dangerously low; any movement brought the water to the lip of the gunwale and threatened disaster; it was heavy to steer and they made slow progress, contenting themselves for the most part, with keeping end on, and drifting with the current.

  Twice they came to stretches of cataract, and here they drew in to the bank, unloaded, and waded beside the boat, sometimes plunging waist deep, sometimes clambering over the rocks, guiding it by hand until they reached clear water again. Then they tied up to the bank and carried their cargo down to it through the bush. For the rest of the way the river was broad and smooth; a dark surface which reflected in fine detail the walls of forest on either side, towering up from the undergrowth to their blossoming crown a hundred or more feet above them. Sometimes they came to a stretch of water scattered with fallen petals and floated among them, moving scarcely less slowly than they, as though resting in a flowering meadow. At night they spread their tarpaulin on stretches of dry beach, or hung their hammocks in the bush. Only the cabouri fly and rare, immobile alligators menaced the peace of their days.

  They kept a constant scrutiny of the banks but saw no sign of human life.

  Then Tony developed fever. It came on him quite suddenly, during the fourth afternoon. At their midday halt he was in complete health and shot a small deer that came down to drink on the opposite bank; an hour later he was shivering so violently that he had to lay down his paddle; his head was flaming with heat, his body and limbs frigid; by sunset he was slightly delirious.

  Dr. Messinger took his temperature and found that it was a hundred and four degrees, Fahrenheit. He gave him twenty-five grains of quinine and lit a fire so close to his hammock that by morning it was singed and blacked with smoke. He told Tony to keep wrapped up in his blanket, but at intervals throughout that night he woke from sleep to find himself running with sweat; he was consumed with thirst and drank mug after mug of river water. Neither that evening nor next morning was he able to eat anything.

  But next morning his temperature was down again. He felt weak and exhausted but he was able to keep steady in his place and paddle a little.

  “It was just a passing attack, wasn’t it?” he said. “I shall be perfectly fit tomorrow, shan’t I?”

  “I hope so,” said Dr. Messinger.

  At midday Tony drank some cocoa and ate a cupful of rice. “I feel grand,” he said.

  “Good.”

  That night the fever came on again. They were camping on a sandbank. Dr. Messinger heated stones and put them under Tony’s feet and in the small of his back. He was awake most of the night fueling the fire and refilling Tony’s mug with water. At dawn Tony slept for an hour and woke feeling slightly better; he was taking frequent doses of quinine and his ears were filled with a muffled sound as though he were holding those shells to them in which, he had been told in childhood, one could hear the beat of the sea.

  “We’ve got to go on,” said Dr. Messinger. “We can’t be far from a village now.”

  “I feel awful. Wouldn’t it be better to wait a day till I am perfectly fit again?”

  “It’s no good waiting. We’ve got to get on. D’you think you can manage to get into the canoe?”

  Dr. Messinger knew that Tony was in for a long bout.

  For the first few hours of that day Tony lay limp in the bows. They had shifted the stores so that he could lie full length. Then the fever came on again and his teeth chattered. He sat up and crouched with his head in his knees, shaking all over; only his forehead and cheeks were burning hot under the noon sun. There was still no sign of a village.

  *

  It was late in the afternoon when he first saw Brenda. For some time he had been staring intently at the odd shape amidships where the stores had been piled; then he realized that it was a human being.

  “So the Indians came back?” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “I knew they would. Silly of them to be scared by a toy. I suppose the others are following.”

  “Yes, I expect so. Try and sit still.”

  “Damned fool, being frightened of a toy mouse,” Tony said derisively to the woman amidships. Then he saw that it was Brenda. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t see it was you. You wouldn’t be frightened of a toy mouse.”

  But she did not answer him. She sat as she used often to sit when she came back from London, huddled over her bowl of bread and milk.

  Dr. Messinger steered the boat in to the side. They nearly capsized as he helped Tony out. Brenda got ashore without assistance. She stepped out in her delicate, competent way, keeping the balance of the boat.

  “That’s what poise means,” said Tony. “D’you know I once saw a questionnaire that people had to fill in when they applied for a job in an American firm, and one of the things they had to answer was ‘Have you poise?’ ”

  Brenda was at the top of the bank waiting for him. “What was so absurd about the question was that they only had the applicant’s word for it,” he explained laboriously. “I mean—is it a sign of poise to think you have it?”

  “Just sit quiet here while I sling your hammock.”

  “Yes, I’ll sit here with Brenda. I am so glad she could come. She must have caught the three-eighteen.”

  She
was with him all that night and all the next day. He talked to her ceaselessly but her replies were rare and enigmatic. On the succeeding evening he had another fit of sweating. Dr. Messinger kept a large fire burning by the hammock and wrapped Tony in his own blanket. An hour before dawn Tony fell asleep and when he awoke Brenda had gone.

  “You’re down to normal again.”

  “Thank God. I’ve been pretty ill, haven’t I? I can’t remember much.”

  Dr. Messinger had made something of a camp. He had chopped a square clear of undergrowth, the size of a small room. Their two hammocks hung on opposite sides of it. The stores were all ashore, arranged in an orderly pile on the tarpaulin.

  “How d’you feel?”

  “Grand,” said Tony, but when he got out of his hammock he found he could not stand without help. “Of course, I haven’t eaten anything. I expect it will be a day or two before I’m really well.”

  Dr. Messinger said nothing, but strained the tea clear of leaves by pouring it slowly from one mug into another; he stirred into it a large spoonful of condensed milk.

  “See if you can drink this.”

  Tony drank it with pleasure and ate some biscuits.

  “Are we going on today?” he asked.

  “We’ll think about it.” He took the mugs down to the bank and washed them in the river. When he came back he said, “I think I’d better explain things. It’s no use your thinking you are cured because you are out of fever for one day. That’s the way it goes. One day fever and one day normal. It may take a week or it may take much longer. That’s a thing we’ve got to face. I can’t risk taking you in the canoe. You nearly upset us several times the day before yesterday.”

  “I thought there was someone there I knew.”

  “You thought a lot of things. It’ll go on like that. Meanwhile we’ve provisions for about ten days. There’s no immediate anxiety there but it’s a thing to remember. Besides, what you need is a roof over your head and constant nursing. If only we were at a village…”

  “I’m afraid I’m being a great nuisance.”

  “That’s not the point. The thing is to find what is best for us to do.”

  But Tony felt too tired to think; he dozed for an hour or so. When he awoke, Dr. Messinger was cutting back the bush further. “I’m going to fix up the tarpaulin as a roof.”

  (He had marked this place on his map Temporary Emergency Base Camp.)

  Tony watched him listlessly. Presently he said, “Look here, why don’t you leave me here and go down the river for help?”

  “I thought of that. It’s too big a risk.”

  That afternoon Brenda was back at Tony’s side and he was shivering and tossing in his hammock.

  *

  When he was next able to observe things, Tony noted that there was a tarpaulin over his head, slung to the tree trunks. He asked, “How long have we been here?”

  “Only three days.”

  “What time is it now?”

  “Getting on for ten in the morning.”

  “I feel awful.”

  Dr. Messinger gave him some soup. “I am going downstream for the day,” he said, “to see if there’s any sign of a village. I hate leaving you but it’s a chance worth taking. I shall be able to get a long way in the canoe now it’s empty. Lie quiet. Don’t move from the hammock. I shall be back before night. I hope with some Indians to help.”

  “All right,” said Tony and fell asleep.

  Dr. Messinger went down to the river’s edge and untied the canoe; he brought with him a rifle, a drinking cup and a day’s provisions. He sat in the stern and pushed out from the bank; the current carried the bows down and in a few strokes of the paddle he was in midstream.

  The sun was high and its reflection in the water dazzled and scorched him; he paddled on with regular, leisurely strokes; he was traveling fast. For a mile’s stretch the river narrowed and the water raced so that all he had to do was to trail the blade of the paddle as a rudder; then the walls of forest on either side of him fell back and he drifted into a great open lake, where he had to work heavily to keep in motion; all the time he watched keenly to right and left for the column of smoke, the thatched dome, the sly brown figure in the undergrowth, the drinking cattle, that would disclose the village he sought. But there was no sign. In the open water he took up his field glasses and studied the whole wooded margin. But there was no sign.

  Later the river narrowed once more and the canoe shot forward in the swift current. Ahead of him the surface was broken by rapids; the smooth water seethed and eddied; a low monotone warned him that beyond the rapids was a fall. Dr. Messinger began to steer for the bank. The current was running strongly and he exerted his full strength; ten yards from the beginning of the rapids his bows ran in under the bank. There was a dense growth of thorn here, overhanging the river; the canoe slid under them and bit into the beach; very cautiously Dr. Messinger knelt forward in his place and stretched up to a bough over his head. It was at that moment he came to grief; the stern swung out downstream and as he snatched at the paddle the craft was swept broadside into the troubled waters; there it adopted an eccentric course, spinning and tumbling to the falls. Dr. Messinger was tipped into the water; it was quite shallow in places and he caught at the rocks but they were worn smooth as ivory and afforded no hold for his hands; he rolled over twice, found himself in deep water and attempted to swim, found himself among boulders again and attempted to grapple with them. Then he reached the falls.

  They were unspectacular as falls go in that country—a drop of ten feet or less—but they were enough for Dr. Messinger. At their foot the foam subsided into a great pool, almost still, and strewn with blossom from the forest trees that encircled it. Dr. Messinger’s hat floated very slowly towards the Amazon and the water closed over his bald head.

  *

  Brenda went to see the family solicitors.

  “Mr. Graceful,” she said, “I’ve got to have some more money.”

  Mr. Graceful looked at her sadly. “I should have thought that was really a question for your bank manager. I understand that your securities are in your own name and that the dividends are paid into your account.”

  “They never seem to pay dividends nowadays. Besides it’s really very difficult to live on so little.”

  “No doubt. No doubt.”

  “Mr. Last left you with power of attorney, didn’t he?”

  “With strictly limited powers, Lady Brenda. I am instructed to pay the wage bill at Hetton and all expenses connected with the upkeep of the estate—he is putting in new bathrooms and restoring some decorations in the morning room which had been demolished. But I am afraid that I have no authority to draw on Mr. Last’s account for other charges.”

  “But Mr. Graceful, I am sure he didn’t intend to stay abroad so long. He can’t possibly have meant to leave me stranded like this, can he?… Can he?”

  Mr. Graceful paused and fidgeted a little. “To be quite frank, Lady Brenda, I fear that was his intention. I raised this particular point shortly before his departure. He was quite resolved on the subject.”

  “But is he allowed to do that? I mean, haven’t I got any rights under the marriage settlement or anything?”

  “Nothing which you can claim without application to the courts. You might find solicitors who would advise you to take action. I cannot say that I should be one of them. Mr. Last would oppose any such order to the utmost and I think that, in the present circumstances, the courts would undoubtedly find for him. In any case it would be a prolonged, costly and slightly undignified proceeding.”

  “Oh, I see… well, that’s that, isn’t it?”

  “It certainly looks as though it were.”

  Brenda rose to go. It was high summer and through the open windows she could see the sunbathed gardens of Lincoln’s Inn.

  “There’s one thing. Do you know, I mean, can you tell me whether Mr. Last made another will?”

  “I’m afraid that is a thing I cannot discuss.
”

  “No, I suppose not. I’m sorry if it was wrong to ask. I just wanted to know how I am with him.”

  She still stood between the door and the table, looking lost, in her bright summer clothes. “Perhaps I can say as much as this to guide you. The heirs presumptive to Hetton are now his cousins, the Richard Lasts at Princes Risborough. I think that your knowledge of Mr. Last’s character and opinions will tell you that he would always wish his fortune to go with the estate, in order that it may be preserved in what he holds to be its right condition.”

  “Yes,” said Brenda, “I ought to have thought of that. Well, good-bye.”

  And she went out alone into the sunshine.

  *

  All that day Tony lay alone, fitfully oblivious of the passage of time. He slept a little; once or twice he left his hammock and found himself weak and dizzy. He tried to eat some of the food which Dr. Messinger had left out for him, but without success. It was not until it grew dark that he realized the day was over. He lit the lantern and began to collect wood for the fire, but the sticks kept slipping from his fingers and each time that he stooped he felt giddy, so that after a few fretful efforts he left them where they had fallen and returned to his hammock. And lying there, wrapped in his blanket, he began to cry.

  After some hours of darkness the lamp began to burn low; he leaned painfully over, and shook it. It needed refilling. He knew where the oil was kept, crept to it, supporting himself first on the hammock rope and then on a pile of boxes. He found the keg, pulled out the bung and began to refill the lamp, but his hand trembled and the oil spilled over the ground, then his head began to swim again so that he shut his eyes; the keg rolled over on its side and emptied itself with slow gurglings. When he realized what had happened he began to cry again. He lay down in his hammock and in a few minutes the light sank, flickered and went out. There was a reek of kerosene on his hands and on the sodden earth. He lay awake in the darkness crying.