Уильям Моэм - The Explorer

'Let me go, damn you!' cried George, his voice shrill with rage.

'You need not hold him,' said Alec.

It was second nature with them all to perform Alec's commands, and without thinking twice they dropped their hands. George sank cowering into a chair. Walker, bending down, picked up the revolver and gave it to Alec, who silently fitted into an empty chamber the cartridge that had been brought to him.

'You see that it fits,' he said. 'Hadn't you better make a clean breast of it?'

George was utterly cowed. A sob broke from him.

'Yes, I shot her,' he said brokenly. 'She made a row and the devil got into me. I didn't know what I'd done till she screamed and I saw the blood.'

He cursed himself for being such a fool as to throw the cartridge away. His first thought had been to have all the chambers filled.

'Do you remember that two months ago I hanged a man to the nearest tree because he'd murdered one of the natives?'

George sprang up in terror, and he began to tremble.

'You wouldn't do that to me.'

A wild prayer went up in his heart that mercy might be shown him, and then bitter anger seized him because he had ever come out to that country.

'You need not be afraid,' answered Alec coldly. 'In any case I must preserve the native respect for the white man.'

'I was half drunk when I saw the woman. I wasn't responsible for my actions.'

'In any case the result is that the whole tribe has turned against us.'

The chief was Alec's friend, and it was he who had sent him the exploded cartridge. The news came to Alec like a thunderclap, for the Turkana were the best part of his fighting force, and he had always placed the utmost reliance on their fidelity. The chief said that he could not hold in his young men, and not only must Alec cease to count upon them, but they would probably insist on attacking him openly. They had stirred up the neighbouring tribes against him and entered into communication with the Arabs. He had been just at the turning point and on the verge of a great success, but now all that had been done during three years was frustrated. The Arabs had seized the opportunity and suddenly assumed the offensive. The unexpectedness of their attack had nearly proved fatal to Alec's party, and since then they had all had to fight for bare life.

George watched Alec as he stared at the ground.

'I suppose the whole damned thing's my fault,' he muttered.

Alec did not answer directly.

'I think we may take it for certain that the natives will go over to the slavers to–morrow, and then we shall be attacked on all sides. We can't hold out against God knows how many thousands. I've sent Rogers and Deacon to bring in all the Latukas, but heaven knows if they can arrive in time.'

'And if they don't?'

Alec shrugged his shoulders, but did not speak. George's breathing came hurriedly, and a sob rose to his throat.

'What are you going to do to me, Alec?'

MacKenzie walked up and down, thinking of the gravity of their position. In a moment he stopped and looked at Walker.

'I daresay you have some preparations to make,' he said.

Walker got up.

'I'll be off,' he answered, with a slight smile.

He was glad to go, for it made him ashamed to watch the boy's humiliation. His own nature was so honest, his loyalty so unbending, that the sight of viciousness affected him with a physical repulsion, and he turned away from it as he would have done from the sight of some hideous ulcer. The doctor surmised that his presence too was undesired. Murmuring that he had no time to lose if he wanted to get his patients ready for a night march, he followed Walker out of the tent. George breathed more freely when he was alone with Alec.

'I'm sorry I did that silly thing just now,' he said. 'I'm glad I didn't hit you.'

'It doesn't matter at all,' smiled Alec. 'I'd forgotten all about it.'

'I lost my head. I didn't know what I was doing.'

'You need not trouble about that. In Africa even the strongest of us are apt to lose our balance.'

Alec filled his pipe again, and lighting it, blew heavy clouds of smoke into the damp air. His voice was softer when he spoke.

'Did you ever know that before we came away I asked Lucy to marry me?'

George did not answer. He stifled a sob, for the recollection of Lucy, the centre of his love and the mainspring of all that was decent in him, transfixed his heart with pain.

'She asked me to bring you here in the hope that you'd,'—Alec had some difficulty in expressing himself—'do something that would make people forget what happened to your father. She's very proud of her family. She feels that your good name is—besmirched, and she wanted you to give it a new lustre. I think that is the object she has most at heart in the world. It is as great as her love for you. The plan hasn't been much of a success, has it?'

'She ought to have known that I wasn't suited for this sort of life,' answered George, bitterly.

'I saw very soon that you were weak and irresolute, but I thought I could put some backbone into you. I hoped for her sake to make something of you after all. Your intentions seemed good enough, but you never had the strength to carry them out.' Alec had been watching the smoke that rose from his pipe, but now he looked at George. 'I'm sorry if I seem to be preaching at you.'

'Oh, do you think I care what anyone says to me now?'

Alec went on very gravely, but not unkindly.

'Then I found you were drinking. I told you that no man could stand liquor in this country, and you gave me your word of honour that you wouldn't touch it again.'

'Yes, I broke it. I couldn't help myself. The temptation was too strong.'

'When we came to the station at Munias, and I was laid up with fever, you and Macinnery took the opportunity to get into an ugly scrape with some native women. You knew that that was the one thing I would not stand. I have nothing to do with morality—everyone is free in these things to do as he chooses—but I do know that nothing causes more trouble with the natives, and I've made definite rules on the subject. If the culprits are Swahilis I flog them, and if they're whites I send them back to the coast. That's what I ought to have done with you, but it would have broken Lucy's heart.'

'It was Macinnery's fault.'

'It's because I thought Macinnery was chiefly to blame that I sent him back alone. I determined to give you another chance. It struck me that the feeling of authority might have some influence on you, and so, when I had to build a boma to guard the road down to the coast, I put the chief part of the stores in your care and left you in command. I need not remind you what happened there.'

George looked down at the floor sulkily, and in default of excuses, kept silent. He felt a sullen resentment as he remembered Alec's anger. He had never seen him give way before or since to such a furious wrath, and he had seen Alec hold himself with all his strength so that he might not thrash him. Alec remembered too, and his voice once more grew hard and cold.

'I came to the conclusion that it was hopeless. You seemed to me rotten through and through.'

'Like my father before me,' sneered George, with a little laugh.

'I couldn't believe a word you said. You were idle and selfish. Above all you were loathsomely, wantonly cruel. I was aghast when I heard of the fiendish cruelty with which you'd used the wretched men whom I left with you. If I hadn't returned in the nick of time, they'd have killed you and looted all the stores.'

'It would have upset you to lose the stores, wouldn't it?'

'Is that all you've got to say?'

'You always believed their stories rather than mine.'

'It was difficult not to believe when a man showed me his back all torn and bleeding, and said you'd had him flogged because he didn't cook your food to your satisfaction.'