Complete Works

house.  In his long talks by the evening fires of the settlement he used to tell his intimate friends of Almayer’s strange doings.  His master had turned sorcerer in his old age.  Ali said that often when Tuan Putih had retired for the night he could hear him talking to something in his room.  Ali thought that it was a spirit in the shape of a child.  He knew his master spoke to a child from certain expressions and words his master used.  His master spoke in Malay a little, but mostly in English, which he, Ali, could understand.  Master spoke to the child at times tenderly, then he would weep over it, laugh at it, scold it, beg of it to go away; curse it.  It was a bad and stubborn spirit.  Ali thought his master had imprudently called it up, and now could not get rid of it.  His master was very brave; he was not afraid to curse this spirit in the very Presence; and once he fought with it.  Ali had heard a great noise as of running about inside the room and groans.  His master groaned.  Spirits do not groan.  His master was brave, but foolish.  You cannot hurt a spirit.  Ali expected to find his master dead next morning, but he came out very early, looking much older than the day before, and had no food all day.
    So far Ali to the settlement.  To Captain Ford he was much more communicative, for the good reason that Captain Ford had the purse and gave orders.  On each of Ford’s monthly visits to Sambir Ali had to go on board with a report about the inhabitant of “Almayer’s Folly.”  On his first visit to Sambir, after Nina’s departure, Ford had taken charge of Almayer’s affairs.  They were not cumbersome.  The shed for the storage of goods was empty, the boats had disappeared, appropriated — generally in night-time — by various citizens of Sambir in need of means of transport.  During a great flood the jetty of Lingard and Co. left the bank and floated down the river, probably in search of more cheerful surroundings; even the flock of geese — ”the only geese on the east coast” — departed somewhere, preferring the unknown dangers of the bush to the desolation of their old home.  As time went on the grass grew over the black patch of ground where the old house used to stand, and nothing remained to mark the place of the dwelling that had sheltered Almayer’s young hopes, his foolish dream of splendid future, his awakening, and his despair.
    Ford did not often visit Almayer, for visiting Almayer was not a pleasant task.  At first he used to respond listlessly to the old seaman’s boisterous inquiries about his health; he even made efforts to talk, asking for news in a voice that made it perfectly clear that no news from this world had any interest for him.  Then gradually he became more silent — not sulkily — but as if he was forgetting how to speak.  He used also to hide in the darkest rooms of the house, where Ford had to seek him out guided by the patter of the monkey galloping before him.  The monkey was always there to receive and introduce Ford.  The little animal seemed to have taken complete charge of its master, and whenever it wished for his presence on the verandah it would tug perseveringly at his jacket, till Almayer obediently came out into the sunshine, which he seemed to dislike so much.
    One morning Ford found him sitting on the floor of the verandah, his back against the wall, his legs stretched stiffly out, his arms hanging by his side.  His expressionless face, his eyes open wide with immobile pupils, and the rigidity of his pose, made him look like an immense man-doll broken and flung there out of the way.  As Ford came up the steps he turned his head slowly.
    “Ford,” he murmured from the floor, “I cannot forget.”
    “Can’t you?” said Ford, innocently, with an attempt at joviality: “I wish I was like you.  I am losing my memory — age, I suppose; only the other day my mate — ”
    He stopped, for Almayer had got up, stumbled, and steadied himself on his friend’s arm.
    “Hallo!  You are better to-day.  Soon be all right,” said Ford, cheerfully, but feeling rather scared.
    Almayer let go his arm and stood very straight with his head up and shoulders thrown back, looking stonily at the multitude of suns shining in ripples of the river.  His jacket and his loose trousers flapped in the breeze on his thin limbs.
    “Let her go!” he whispered in a grating voice.  “Let her go.  To-morrow I shall forget.  I am a firm