 Part 3 Chapter 11 of Nostromo. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Mario Pineda. Nostromo by Joseph Conrad. Part 3 The Lighthouse. Chapter 11. Sulaco outstripped Nostromo's prudence, grabbing rich swiftly on the hidden treasures of the earth, hovered over by the anxious spirits of good and evil, turned out by the laboring hands of the people. He was like a second youth, like a new life full of promise, of unrest, of toil, scattering, lavishly its wealth to the four corners of an excited world. Material changes swept along the detainment of material interests, and other changes, more subtle, outwardly unmarked, affected the minds and hearts of the workers. Captain Mitchell had gone home to live on his savings, invested in the Santa May mine, and Dr. Moneham had grown older, with his head still gray, and the unchanged expression of his face, living in on the inaccessible treasure of his devotion drawn upon in the secret of his heart, like a store of unloved wealth. The Inspector General of State Hospitals, whose maintenance is in charge upon the Good Concession, official advisor on sanitation to the municipality, Chief Medical Officer of the Santa May Consolidator Mines, whose territory containing gold, silver, copper, lead, cobalt, extends for miles along the foothills of the Cordillera, had felt poverty stricken, miserable, and starved during the prolonged second visit to the good spade to Europe and the United States of America. Intimate of the Casa, proved friend, a bachelor without ties and without establishment, except for the professional sort, he had been asked to take up his quarters in the Good House. In the eleven months of their absence, the family of rooms, recalling that every glance, the woman to whom he had given all his loyalty, had grown intolerable. As the day approached for the arrival of the male boat herms, the latest addition to the OSN, Coase, Splendid Fleet, the doctor hobbled about morbidiously, snapped more sardonyically, at simple and gentle, out of sheer nervousness. He packed up his mother's trunk in with speed, with fury, with enthusiasm, and so it carried out past the old porter at the gate of the Casa Good, with delight, with intoxication. Then, as the hour approached, sitting alone in the great lendo, behind the white mills, a little sideways, his droning face positively bent over with the effort of circontrol, and holding a pair of new globs in his left hand, he dropped to the harbor. His heart delighted within him so, when he saw the ghouls on the deck of the herms, that his greetings were reduced to a casual mutter. Driving back to town, all three were silent. And in the party of the doctor, in a more natural manner, said, I'll leave you now to yourselves. I'll call tomorrow, if I may. Come to lunch, dear Dr. Moneham, and come early, save Mr. Scoot, in her troubling dress and her vial down, turning to look at him at the foot of the stairs. While at the top of the flight, the Madonna, in blue robes and a child on her arm, I'd like to welcome her with an aspect of pyrrhen tenderness. Don't expect to find me at home, Charles Scoot warned him. I'll be off early to the mine. After lunch, Donia Emilia and the senior doctor came slowly through the inner gateway of the patio. The large gardens of the Casa Gould, surrounded by high walls and the red-tile slopes of neighboring roofs, lay open before them, passes of shade under the trees and leveled surfaces of sunlight upon the lawns. A triple rub of all-orange trees surrounded the hall. Barefooted, brown gardeners in snowy white shirts and white calcineras dotted the grounds, squatting over flowerbeds passing between the trees, dragging slender Indian rubber tubes across the gravel of the paths. And the fine jets of water crossed each other in graceful curves, sparkling in the sunshine with a slight pattering noise upon the bushes and an effect of shower diamonds upon the grass. Donia Emilia, holding up the train of a clear dress, walked by the side of Dr. Moniham in a longish black coat and severe black bow on an immaculate shirfront. Under the shady clump of trees, where stood scattered little tables and weaker, easy chairs, Mr. Scoot sat down in a low and ample seat. Don't go yet, she said to Dr. Moniham, who was unable to tear himself away from the spot. His chin nestling within the points of his collar, he debourned her stealthily with his eyes, which, luckily, were round and hard like clouded marbles and incapable of disclosing his sentiments. He speedened the motion at the marks of time upon the face of that woman, the air of frailty and weary fatigue that had settled upon the eyes and temples of the never-tired senora, as Tom Pepe years ago just to call her with admiration, touched him almost to tears. Don't go yet, today is all my own. Mr. Scoot arched gently. We are not back yet officially, no one will come. It's only tomorrow that the windows of the Casa Good are to be lit up for a reception. The doctor dropped into a chair. Given a tertulia, he said with a detached air. A simple greeting for all the kind friends who care to come. And only tomorrow? Yes, Charles will be tired out after a day at the mine, and so I, it would be good to have him to myself for one evening on our return to this house I love. It has seen all my life. Ah, yes, snarled the doctor suddenly. Women count time from the marriage feast. Didn't you leave a little before? Yes, but what is there to remember? There were no cares. Mr. Scoot sighed. And as two friends, after a long separation, will revert to the most agitated period of their lives, they began to talk at the Sulaco Revolution. It seemed estranged to Mr. Scoot that people who had taken part in it seemed to forget its memory and its lesson. And yet, struck in the doctor, we, who played our part in it, had our reward. Don Pepe, the superannuated, still considered a horse. Marius is drinking himself to death in Jobel Company away somewhere on his foundation, beyond the bulls on the Tornado. And the heroic father of a man, I imagine the old padre blowing up systematically the centre of my mind, uttering the pious exclamation of every bank and taking handfuls of snuff between the explosions. The heroic padre, Roman, says he is not afraid of the harm Hulveress missionaries can do to his flock as long as he is alive. Mr. Scoot shuddered a little at the allusion to the destruction that had come so near to descend to my mind. Ah, but you, dear friend, I did the work I was fit for. You faced the most cruel dangers of all, something more than death. No, Mr. Scoot, only death, by hanging, and I am rewarded beyond my deserts. Noticing Mr. Scoot's case fixed upon him, he dropped his eyes. I've made my career, as you see, said the Inspector General of State Hospitals, taking up lightly the labels of his superfine blood coat. The doctor's self-respect marked inwardly by the almost complete disappearance from his dreams of Father Baron appear visibly in what, by contrast, with former carelessness, seeming in moderate cult of personal appearance. Carried out within severe limits of form and color and in perpetual freshness, this change of apparel gave to Dr. Moniham an air at the same time professional and festive, while his gait and the unchanged crapped character of his face acquired from it a starling force of incongruity. Yes, he went on. We all harrow our rewards. The engineering chief, Captain Mitchell. We saw him interrupted Mr. Scoot in her charming voice. The poor, dear man came up from the country on purpose to call on us in our hotel in London. He comported himself with great dignity, but I fancy he regrets Sulaco. He rambled frivilly about historical events till I felt I could have a cry. Hmm, granted the doctor, getting old, I suppose. Even Nostromo is getting older, though he is not changed. And, speaking of that fellow, I wanted to tell you something. For some time, the house had been full of murmurs of agitation. Suddenly, the two gardeners, busy with rose trees at the side of the garden arch, fell upon their knees with bald heads on the passage of Antonio Avigianus, who appeared walking beside her uncle. Invested with the red hat after a short visit to Rome, where he had been invited by the propaganda, Father Gorbellon, missionary to the Wild Indians, conspirator, friend and patron of Hernandez, a robber, advanced with big, slow strides, gaunt and lingering forward, with his powerful hands clasped behind his back. The first cardinal archbishop of Sulaco had preserved his fanatical and morose heir, the aspect of a chaplain on bandits. It was believed that his unexpected elevation to the purple was a counter-move to the protest animation of Sulaco organized by the Holroyd Missionary Fund. Antonia, the beauty of her face as if a little blurred, her figure slightly fuller, advanced with her light walk and her high serenity, smiling from a distance at Mr. Scoot. She had brought her uncle over to see the Remilia, without ceremony, just for a moment before the siesta. When all were seated again, Dr. Moneham, who had come to dislike heartily everybody who approached Mr. Scoot with any intimacy, kept aside, pretending to be lost in profound meditation. A louder phrase of Antonia made him lift his head. How can we abandon, grounded on their operation, those who have been our countrymen only a few years ago, who are our countrymen now? Mr. Vianas was saying. How can we remain blind and deaf, with a pity to the cruel wrongs suffered by our brothers? There's a remedy. Annexed the rest of Costa Juana to the order and prosperity of Sulaco, is not the doctor. There is no other remedy. I am convinced, Sr. Dr. Antonia said, with the earnest calm of invincible resolution, that this was from the first poor Martin's intention. Yes, but the material interests will not led you jeopardize their development for a mere idea of pity and justice, the doctor muttered grumpily, and it is just as well perhaps. The coronal archbishop straightened up his gaunt, but in frame. We have worked for them. We have made them. This material interests of their Floriners, the last of the Kerbalans, are in a deep denunciatory tone. And without them you're nothing, cried the doctor from the distance. They will not led you. Let them beware, then, lest the people, prevented from their aspirations, should rise and claim their share of the wealth and their share of the power. The popular cardinal archbishop of Tullac declared significantly, menacingly, a silence ensued during which his eminences stared, frowning at the ground, and Antonia, graceful and rigid in her chair, breathed calmly in the strength of her convictions. Then the conversation took a social turn, touching on the visit of the ghouls to Europe. The coronal archbishop, when in Rome, had suffered from neuralgia in the head all the time. It was the climate, the bad air. When uncle and niece had gone away, with the servants again falling on their knees, and the old porter who had known Henry Gould almost totally blind and impotent now, creeping up to kiss his eminences' extended hand, Dr. Moneham, looking after them, pronounced the one word, incorrigible. Mr. Scoot, with a look upwards, dropped warily on her lap her white hands flashing with the gold and stones of many rings. Conspiring, yes, said the doctor. The last of the Avigianos, and the last of the Corbellans, are conspiring with the refugees from Santa Marta that flock here after every revolution. The Café Lamproso, at the corner of the plaza, is full of them. You can hear their chatter across the street, like the noise of a pearl house. They are conspiring for the invasion of Costa Juana. And do you know where they go for strength for the necessary force? To the secret societies amongst immigrants and natives, where Nostromo, I should say Captain Fidanza, is a great man. What gives him that position? Who can say? Genius? He has genius. He is greater with the populace that ever he has before. It is as if he had some secret power, some mysterious means to keep up his influence. He holds conferences with the Archbishop as in those old days which you and I remember. Barrios is useless. But for a military head, they have the pious Hernandez. And they may erase the country with the new cry of the wealth for the people. Will there be never any peace? Will there be no rest? Mr. Scoot whispered. I thought that we... No, interrupted the doctor. There is no peace and no rest in the development of material interests. They have their law and their justice, but it is founded on expediency and it is inhuman. It is without rectitude, without the continuity and the force that can be found only in a moral principle. Mr. Scoot, the time approaches when all that a good concession stands for shall weigh as heavily upon the people as the barbarism, cruelty and misrule of a few years back. How can you say that, Dr. Moneham? She cried out as if heard in the most sensitive place of her soul. I can say what is true, the doctor insisted obstinately. It will weigh as heavily and provoke resentment, bloodshed and vengeance because the men have grown different. Do you think that now the mind would march upon the town to save their senora-ministrador? Do you think that? She pressed the backs of her entwined hands on her eyes and murmured hopelessly. Is it this we have worked for, then? The doctor lowered his head. He could follow her silent thought. Was it for this that her life had been roved of all the intimate felicities of daily affection which her tenderness needed as the human body needs air to breathe? And the doctor, indignant with Charles Scoot's blindness, hastened to change the conversation. It is about Nostromo that I wanted to talk to you. Ah, that fellow has some continuity and force. Nothing will put an end to him. But never mind that. There is something inexplicable going on or perhaps only too easy to explain, you know. Linda is practically the lighthouse keeper of the Great Disable Light. The Igarival Dino is too old now. His part is to clean the lamps and to cook in the house. But he can't get up to stairs any longer. The black-eyed Linda slips all day and watches the light all night. Not all day, though. Up towards five in the afternoon when our Nostromo, wherever he is in harbor with his schooner, comes out of his curtain-pissed, pulling in a small boat. Aren't they marri-jet? Mr. Scoot asked. The motor wished it, as far as I can understand, while Linda was quite a child. When I had the girls with me for a year or so during the war of separation, that extraordinary Linda used to declare quite simply that she was going to be Jan Batista's wife. They are not marri-jet, said the doctor currently. I have looked after them a little. Thank you, dear Dr. Moneham, said Mr. Scoot, and under the shade of the big trees, her little, even teeth gleamed in the joyful smile of gentle malice. People don't know how really good you are. You will not let them know, as if on purpose, to annoy me, who have put my faith in your good heart long ago. The doctor, with a lifting up of his upper leaf, as though he were longing to bite, bowed stiffly in his chair. With the utter absorption of a man to whom love comes late, not as the most splendid of illusions, but like an enlightening and priceless misfortune, the sight of that woman, of whom he had been deprived for an earlier year, suggested ideas of adoration, of kissing the hem of her robe. And this excessive feeling translated itself naturally into an augmented grimness of speech. I'm afraid of being overwhelmed by too much gratitude. However, these people interest me. I went out several times to the great Isabel Light to look after all Giorgio. He did not tell Mr. Scoot that it was because he found there, in her absence, the relief of an atmosphere of continual sentiment in all Giorgio's austere admiration for the English Signora, the benefactress. In black eye Linda's volleyball torrential passionate affection for Ardonia Emilia, that angel, in the white-throated, fair Giselle's adoring upward turn of the eyes, which then glided towards him with a side-long half-arch, half-candid lance, which made the doctor exclaim to himself mentally. If I weren't what I am, all that ugly, I would think the minks is making eyes at me. And perhaps she is. I dare say she would make eyes at anybody. Dr. Morihan said nothing of these to Mr. Scoot, the providence of the Viola family, but reverted to what he called our great Nostroma. What I wanted to tell you is these. Our great Nostroma did not take much notice of the old man and the children for some years. It's true, too, that he was away on his coast in budgetes certainly ten months out of the twelve. He was making his fortune, as he told Captain Mitchell once. He seems to have done uncommonly well. He was only to be expected. He is a man full of research, full of confidence in himself, ready to take chances on risks of every sort. I remember being in Mitchell's office one day when he came in with that calm, gray air he always carries everywhere. He had been away trading in the Gulf of California, he said, looking straight past us at the wall, as his manneries, and was glad to see on his return that a lighthouse was being built on the cliff of the great Isabel. Very glad, he repeated. Mitchell explained that it was the OSN Co. who was building it for the convenience of the mail service, on his own advice. Captain Fidanza was good enough to say that it was excellent advice. I remember him twisting up his mustaches and looking all round the corners of the room before he proposed that all Georgia should be made the keeper of that light. I heard of this. I was consulted at the time, Mr. Skult said. I doubted whether it would be good for these girls to be shot up on that island as if in a prison. The proposal fell in with the gold Garibaldino's humor. As to Linda, any place was lovely and delightful enough for her as long as it was no strong of suggestion. She could wait for her giant Batista's good pleasure there as well as anywhere else. My opinion is that she was always in love with that incorruptible capitas. Moreover, both father and sister were anxious to get Gisele away from the attentions of a certain Ramirez. Ah, said Mr. Skult interested. Ramirez? What sort of man is that? Just the most of the town, his father was a cargador. As a lanky boy, he ran about the wharf in regs till no stroma took him up and made him out of him. When he got a little older he put him into a lighter and very soon gave him charge of the number 3 boat the boat which took the silver away. Mr. Skult. Nostromo selected that lighter for the work because she was the best selling and the strongest boat of all the company's fleet. Jungramirez was one of the five cargadores and trusted with the removal of the treasure from the custom house on that famous night. As the boat he had charge of was sunk Nostromo on limiting company service recommended him to Captain Mitchell for his successor. He had trained him in the routine of work perfectly and thus Mr. Ramirez from a starving wave becomes a man and the capitas of the Sulaco Cargadores. Thanks to Nostromo said Mr. Skult with warm approval. Thanks to Nostromo repeated Dr. Moneham. Upon my word, the fellow's power frightens me when I think of it. That our poor Orle Mitchell was only too glad to appoint somebody trained to the work who saved him trouble. It's not surprising. What is wonderful is the fact that the Sulaco Cargadores accepted Ramirez for their chief simply because such was Nostromo's good pleasure. Of course, he's not a second Nostromo as he fondly imagined he would be but still the position was brilliant enough. It emboldened him to make up to Giselle Biola who, you know, is a recognized beauty of the town. The old Garibaldino, however, took a violent dislike to him. I don't know why. Perhaps because he was not a model of perfection like his Gian Battista, the incarnation of the courage, the fidelity, the honor of the people. Sr. Biola does not think much of Sulaco natives. Both of them, the old Spartan and that white-faced Linda with her red mouth and cold black eyes were looking rather firstly after the fair one. Ramirez was warned off. Father Biola, I'm told, threatened him with his gun once. But why did Giselle herself ask Mr. Scud? She's a bit of a flirt, I believe, said the doctor. I don't think she cared much one way or another. Of course, she likes men's attentions. Ramirez was not the only one let me tell you, Mr. Scud. There was one engineer, at least, under Elway's staff who got warned off with a gun, too. Al Biola does not allow any trifling with his owner. He has grown uneasy and suspicious since his wife died. He was very pleased to remove his youngest girl away from the town. But look what happens, Mr. Scud. Ramirez, the honest, loblorn swan, is forbidden the island. Very well, he respects the prohibition, but naturally turns his eyes frequently towards the great Isabel. It seems as though he had been in the habit of gazing late at night upon the light. And during these sentimental vigils he discovers that Nostromo, Captain Fidanza, that is, returns very late from his visits to the Biolas, as late as midnight at times. The doctor paused and stared meaningfully at Mr. Scud. Yes, but I don't understand, she began looking puzzled. Now comes the strange part, went on Dr. Moniham. Biola, who is king of his island, is still on it after dark. Even Captain Fidanza has got to leave after sunset, when Linda has gone up to turn the light. And Nostromo goes away immediately. But what happens afterwards? Why does he do in the gulf between half past six and midnight? He has been seen more than once at that late hour, pulling quietly into the harbor. Ramirez is debowered by jealousy. He dare not approach all Biola, but he plugged up courage to tell Linda about it on Sunday morning as she came on the main line to hear Mass and visit her mother's grave. There was a scene on the wharf, which as a matter of fact I witnessed. It was early morning. He must have been waiting for her on purpose. I was there by the mirror's chance, having been called to an urgent consultation by the doctor of the German gun boot in the harbor. She put wrath, scorn and flame upon Ramirez, who seemed out of his mind. It was a strange sight, but it was good. The long jetty, with this rabing cargo door in his crimson sash and the girl all in black at the end. The early Sunday morning, quiet of the harbor and the shade of the mountains. Nothing but a canoe or two moving between the ships on anchor, and the German gunboat's gig coming to take me off. Linda passed me within the foot. I noticed her wild eyes. I called out to her. She never saw me. But a look at her face. It was awful in its anger and wretchedness. Mrs. Good sat up, upper and her eyes very wide. What do you mean, Dr. Moniham? Do you mean to say that you suspect the younger sister? Who can tell? Said the doctor, shrugging his shoulders like a born costa guanero. Ramirez came up to me on the wharf. He reeled. He looked insane. He took his head into his hands. Someone simply had to. Of course, for all his mad state he recognized me. People know me well here. I have lived too long amongst them to be anything else, but the evil eye doctor who can cure all the ill-soaked flesh and bring back luck by any glance. He came up to me. He tried to be calm. He tried to make it out that he wanted Merly to war me against Nostromo. It seems that Captain Fidanza had mentioned me as the worst despiser of all the poor of the people. It is very possible. He honors me with his undying dislike. An award from the great Fidanza might be quite enough to send some fool's knife into my back. The sanitary commission I preside over is not in favor with the populace. Beware of him, Senior Doctor. Destroy him, Senior Doctor. Ramirez hissed right into my face. And then he broke out. That man, he spluttered, has cast a spell upon both these girls. As to himself, he had said too much. He must run away now. Run away and hide somewhere. He moaned tenderly about Giselle and then called her names that cannot be repeated. If he thought she could be made to love him by any means, he would carry her off from the island. Off into the woods, but it was no good. He is thrown away, flourishing his arms above his head. Then I noticed an old negro who had been sitting behind a pile of cases fishing from the wharf. He wound up his lines and slunk away at once. But he must have heard something and must have talked to because some of the old Garibaldinos were friends. I suppose warned him against Ramirez. At any rate, the fighter has been warned but Ramirez has disappeared from the town. I feel I have a duty towards these girls, said Mr. Skulden easily. Is Nostromo in Sulaco now? He is, since last Sunday. He had of bespoken too, at once. Who will dare speak to him? Even the love mad Ramirez runs away from the mere shadow of Captain Fidanza. I can. I will, Mr. Skulde declared. A war will be enough for a man like Nostromo. The doctor smiles sourly. He must end this situation which lends itself to I can't believe it of that child pursuing Mr. Skulde. He's very attractive, murder the doctor gloomily. He'll see it, I'm sure. He must put an end to all these by Marin Linda at once, pronounced the first lady of Sulaco within men's decision. Through the garden gate emerge Basilio, ground fat and sleek with an eerily hairless face, wrinkled at corners of his eyes and his jet black, coarse hair plastered down smoothly. The stupid carefully behind an ornamental clump of bushes he put down with precaution a small child he had been carrying on his shoulder, his own and Leonardo's last born. The pudding spoiled Camerista and he had most of the Casa Gould had been married for some years now. He remained squatting on his heels for a time, gazing fondly at his offspring which returned his stare with imperturbable gravity. Then, solemn and respectable, walked down the path. What is it Basilio? asked Mr. Skulde. A telephone came through from the office of the mine. The master remains to sleep at the mountain tonight. Dr. Moniham had got up and stood looking away. A profound silence rined for the time under the shade of the biggest trees in the lovely gardens of the Casa Gould. Very well Basilio said Mr. Skulde. She watched him walk away along the path, step aside behind the flower and bush and reappear with the child sitting on his shoulder. He passed through the gateway between the garden and the patio with measured steps careful of his light burden. The doctor, with his back to Mr. Skulde, contemplated a flower bed away in the sunshine. People believed him scornful and soured. The truth of his nature consisted in his capacity for passion and in the sensitiveness of his impairment. What he liked was the polished callousness of man of the world the callousness from which springs an easy tolerance for oneself and others the tolerance wide as poles asunder from true sympathy and human compassion. This want of callousness accounted for his sardonic turn of mind and his biting speeches. In profound silence and glaring viciously at the brilliant flower bed Mr. Morihan poured mental implications on Charles Skulde's head. Behind him the immobility of Mr. Skulde added to the grace of her sit-off figure the charm of art of an attitude cut and interpreted forever. Turning abruptly the doctor took his leave. Mr. Skulde leaned back at the shade of the big trees planted in a circle. She leaned back with her eyes closed and her white hands lying idle on the arms of her seat. A rough light under the thick mass of leaves brought out the joyful prettiness of her face made the clear light fabrics and white lace of her dress appear luminous. Small and dainty as if radiating light of her own in the deep shade of the interlaced bows she resembled a good fairy wary of with a long career of well-doing touched by the withering suspicion of the uselessness of her labors the powerlessness of her magic. Had anybody asked her of what she was thinking alone in the garden of the casa with her husband at the mine and a house close to the street like an empty dwelling her frankness would have had to obey the question. It had come into her mind that for life to be large and full it must contain the care of the past and of the future in every passing moment of the present. Our daily work must be done to the glory of the dead and of those who come after. She thought that and sighed without opening her eyes without moving at all. Mrs. Gould's face became set on rigid for a second as if to receive without flinching a great wave of loneliness that swept over her head and it came into her mind too that no one would ever ask her with solicitude what she was thinking of no one but perhaps the man who had just gone away No, no one who could be answered with carol of sincerity in the ideal perfection of confidence. The word incorrigible, the word lately pronounced by Dr. Moneham floored her in her stilt and sad immobility. Incorrigible in his devotion to the great silver mine was the Senora Minister Dore. Incorrigible in his heart determined service of the maternal interest to which he had pinned his faith in the triumph of order and justice. Poor boy she had a clear vision of the gray hairs on his temples. He was perfect, perfect what more could she have expected it was a colossal and lasting success and love was only a short moment of forgetfulness a short intoxication whose delight one remember with a sense of sadness as if he had been a deep grief lived through there was something inherent in the necessities of successful action which carried with it the moral degradation of the idea she saw the sentome mountain hanging over the camp over the whole land, feared, hated wealthy more soulless than any tyrant more pitiless and autocratic than the worst government ready to crush innumerable lives in the expansion of its greatness he did not see it he could not see it it was not his fault he was perfect, perfect perfect but she would never have him to herself never, not for one short hour all together to herself in this old spanish house she loved so well incorrigible the last of the corbellus the last of the avianus the doctor had said but she saw clearly the sentome mine possessing, consuming burning up the life of the last of the costawana goods mastering the energetic spirit of the sun as it had mastered the lamentable weakness of the fatter a terrible success for the last of the goods the last she had hoped for a long, long time that perhaps, but no there were to be no more an immense desolation the dread of her own continued life descended upon the first lady of solaco with a prophetic vision she saw herself surviving alone the degradation of her young ideal of life, of love of a work, all alone in the treasure house of the world the profound, blind, suffering expression of a painful dream settled on her face with its closed eyes in the indistinct voice of an unlucky slipper lying passive in the grip of her merciless nightmare she stammered out aimlessly the words material interest end of part 3 chapter 11 part 3 chapter 12 of nostromo this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org recording by Mario Pineda nostromo by Joseph Conrad part 3 The Like House chapter 12 nostromo had been growing rich very slowly it was an effect of his prudence he could command himself even when thrown off his balance and to become the slave of a treasure with full self-knowledge is an occurrence rare and mentally disturbing but it was also in a great part because of the difficulty of converting it into a form in which it could become available the mere act of getting it away from the island piecemeal little by little was surrounded by difficulties by the dangers of imminent detection he had to visit the great Isabel in secret between his budgages along the coast which were the ostensible source of his fortune the crew of his own schooner were to be feared as if they had been spies of under-dreader captain he did not dare stay too long in port when his coaster was unloaded he hurried away on another trip for he feared and roused his suspicion even by a day's delay sometimes during a week's stay or more he could only manage one visit to the treasure and that was all a couple of ingots he suffered through his fears as much as through his prudence to do things by itself humiliated him and he suffered most from the concentration of his thought upon the treasure a transgression, a crime entering a man's existence eats it up like a malignant growth consumes it like a fever Nostromo had lost his peace the genuineness of all his qualities was destroyed he felt it himself and often cursed the silver of Santome his courage, his magnificence his leisure, his work everything was as before only everything was a sham but the treasure was real he clung to it with a more tenacious mental grip but he hated the feel of the ingots sometimes after putting away a couple of them in his cabin the fruit of a secret night expedition to the great Isabel he would look fixedly at his fingers as if surprised they had left no stain on his skin he had found means of disposing of the silver bars and distant ports the necessity to go far afield made his coasting budget just long and coasted his visits to the Biola household to be rare and far between he was fated to have his wife from there he had said so once to Giorgio himself but the Garibaldino had put aside with a majestic wave of his hand clutching a smoldering black briar root pipe there was plenty of time he was not demand to force his girls upon anybody as time went on Nostromo discovered his preference for the younger of the two they had some profound similarities of nature which most exist for complete confidence and understanding no matter what our differences of temperament there might be to exercise their own fascination of contrast his wife would have to know his secret or else life would be impossible he was attracted by Giselle with her candid gaze and white throat pliable silent fond of excitement under her quiet endolence whereas Linda with her intense passionately pale face energetic all far and words touched with gloom and scorn a cheap of the old block true daughter of the austere republican but with Teresa's boys inspired him with a deep seated mistrust moreover the poor girl could not conceal her love for Giambattista he could see it would be violent exacting, suspicious, uncompromising like her soul Giselle by her fair but warm beauty by the surface placidity of her nature holding the promise of submissiveness but the charm of her girlish mysteriousness excited his passion and allied his fears as to the future his absences from Sulaco were long and returning from the longest of them he made out lighters loaded with blocks of stone lined under the cliff of the great Isabel cranes and scaffolding above workmen's figures moving about and a small lighthouse already riser from its foundations on the edge of the cliff at this unexpected undrammed off a startling sight he thought himself lost a red probability what could save him from detection now nothing he was struck with amazed dread at this turn of chance that would kindle a far reaching light upon the only secret spot of his life that life whose very essence value reality consisted in its reflection from the admiring eyes of men all of it but that thing which was beyond common comprehension which stood between him and the power that hears and gives effect to the evil intention of curses it was dark not every man had such a darkness and they were going to put a light at their light he saw it shining upon this grace poverty contempt somebody who assured to perhaps somebody had already the incomparable Nostroma the Capitas the respected and feared captain Fidanza the unquestioned pattern of secret societies a republican like all georgia and a revolutionist at heart but in another manner he was on the point of jumping overboard from the deck of his own schooner that man subjected almost to insanity looked suicide deliberately in the face but he never lost his head he was checked by the thought that this was no escape he imagined himself dead and the disgrace the shame going on or rather properly speaking he could not imagine himself dead he was possessed too strongly by the sense of his own existence a thing of infinite duration in his changes to grasp the notion of finality the earth goes on forever and he was courageous he was a corrupt courage but he was as good for his purposes as the other kind he sailed close to the cliff of the great Isabel throwing a penetrating glance from the deck at the mouth of the ravine tangled in an undisturbed graft of bushes he sailed close enough to exchange hails with the workmen shading their eyes on the edge of the sheer drop of the cliff overhung by the jeep head of a powerful crane he perceived that none of them had an occasion even to approach the ravine where the silver lay hidden let alone to enter it on the harbor he learned that no one slept on the island the laboring gangs returned to port every evening singing current songs in the empty lighters touted by the harbor tug for the moment he had nothing to fear but afterwards he asked himself later when a keeper came to live in the cottage that was being built some 150 yards back from the low light tower and 400 on zoe from the dark shady jungly ravine containing the secret of his safety of his influence of his magnificence of his power over the future and the power of every possible betrayal from rich and poor alike what then? he could never shake off the treasure his audacity greater than that of other men had welded that mine of silver into his life and the feeling of fearful and ardent subjection the feeling of his slavery so irremitable and profound and often in his thoughts he compared himself to the legendary gringos neither dead nor alive found down to the conquest of unlawful wealth on Oswera waked heavily on the independent captain Fedenza owner and master of a coasting schooner who's a smart appearance and fabulous good luck in trading were so well known along the western seaboard of a vast continent firstly whiskered and graped a shadeless supple in his walk the bigger and symmetry of his powerful limbs lost the vulgarity of a brown twitsuit made by Jews in the slums of London and sold by the closing department of the company A&C captain Fedenza was seen in the streets of Sulaco attending to his business as usual that trip and as usual he allowed it to get about that he had made a great profit of his cargo it was a cargo of salt fish and land was approaching he was seen in trunkers going to and fro between the town and the harbor he talked with people in a café or two in his measured steady voice captain Fedenza was seen the generation that would know nothing of the famous riot to Caeta was not born gent Nostromo, the miss called Capotas de Cargadores had made for himself under his rightful name another public existence but modified but in new conditions less picturesque more difficult to keep up in the increased size of a riot population of Sulaco, the progressive capital of the occidental republic captain Fedenza, unpicturesque but always a little mysterious was recognized quite sufficiently under the lofty glass and iron roof of the Sulaco Railway Station he took a local train and got out in Rincón where he visited the widow of the Cargador who had died of his wounds at the dawn of the new era like Don Jose Villanos in the patio of the Casa Gould he intended to sit down and drink a glass of cool lemonade in the hut while the woman standing up poured the perfect torrent of words to which he did not listen he left some money with her as usual the orphan children growing up and well-schooled calling him uncle Claymore for his blessing he gave that too and in the doorway posed for a moment to look at the flat face of the Santa May Mountain with a faint frown this is like contraction of his bronze brow cast in a marked tinge of severity upon his usual unbending expression was observed at the lodge which he attended but went away before the banquet he warded at the meeting of some good comrades, Italians and Occidentals assembled in his honor under the presidency of an indigent, sickly, somehow hunchbacked little photographer with a white face and a magnanimous soul died crimson by the bloodthirsty hate of all capitalists oppressors of the two hemispheres the heroic Giorgio Biola all revolutionist would have understood nothing of his opinion in speech and Captain Fidanza lavishly generous as usual to some poor comrades made no speech at all he had listened, frowning with his mind far away and walked off unapproachable silent like a man full of cares his frown depended as in the morning he watched the stone masons go off to the great Isabel and lighters loaded with squared blocks of stone and off to add another curse to the squad light tower that was the rate of the work one curse per day and Captain Fidanza meditated the presence of strangers on the island could cut him completely off the treasure it had been difficult and dangerous enough before he was afraid and he was angry he thought with the resolution of a master and the cunning of a cow slave then he went ashore he was a man of resource and ingenuity and as usual the expedient he found at a critical moment was effective enough to alter the situation radically he had the gift of evolving safety out of the very danger this incomparable nostroma this fellow in the thousand with Giorgio established on the great Isabel there would be no need for concealment he would be able to go openly in daylight to see his daughters one of his daughters and stay late talking to the old Carrivaldino then in the dark night after night he would dare to grow rich quicker now had gerund to clasp and brace observe, subjugate and on question possession this treasure whose tyranny had weighed upon his mind his actions, his very sleep he went to see his friend Captain Mitchell and the thing was done as Dr. Moneyham what had related to Mr. Skull when the project was mooted to the Carrivaldino something like the faint reflection the dim ghost of a very ancient smile is stalled under the white and enormous mustaches of the old hater of kings and ministers his daughters were the object of his anxious care the junger especially Linda with her mother's voice had taken more her mother's place her deep vibrating eh, padre, seemed but for the change of the word the very echo of the impassion remonstrating eh, Giorgio of poor Signora Teresa it was his fixed opinion that the town was no proper place for his girls the infatuated but guileless Ramirez was the object of his profound aversion as resuming the sins of the country whose people were blind, vile esclavos his return from his next voyage captain Fidenza found the violas settled in the light keeper's cottage his knowledge of Giorgio's idiosyncrasies had not played him false the Carrivaldino had refused to entertain the idea of any companion whatever except his girls and captain Mitchell anxious to please his poor nostromo with that felicity of inspiration which only true affection can give had formally appointed Linda Biola as underkeeper of the Isabel Light the light is private property he just explained he belongs to my company I have the power to nominate whom I like and Biola shall be it's about the only thing nostromo a man worth his weight in gold mind you has ever asked me to do for him directly his schooner was anchored opposite the new custom house with his sham air of a Greek temple flat roofed with a colonnade captain Fidenza went pulling his small boat out of the harbour bound for the great Isabel up only in the light of a declining day before all men's eyes with a sense of having mastered the fates he must establish a regular position he would ask him for his daughter now he thought of Gisela as he pulled Linda loved him perhaps but the old man would be glad to keep the elder who was his wife's boys he did not pull for the narrowest or he had landed with the good and afterwards alone on his first visit to the treasure he made for the beach at the other end and walked up the regular and gently slop on the wedge shaped island Giorgio Biola whom he saw from afar sitting on the bench under the front wall of the cottage lifted his arms slightly to his loud hail he walked up nighty road the girls appeared it is good here said the old man in his austere far away manner Nostromo noted then after a short silence you saw my schooner pass in not two hours ago do you know why I am here before so to speak my anchor has fairly bitten into the ground of this port of Sulaco you are welcome like a son the old man declared quietly staring away upon the sea oh Dyson I know I am what Dyson would have been it is well Viejo it is a very good welcome listen I have come to ask you for a sudden dread came up upon the furlough an incorruptible mostromo he dared not utter the name in his mind the slight pose only imparted a marked weight of solemnity to the changed end of the phrase for my wife his heart was beating fast it is time you the Garibaldino arrested him with an extender arm that was left for you to judge he got up slowly his bird unclipped since Teresa's death thick snow white covered his powerful chest he turned his head to the door and called out in his strong boys Linda her answer came sharp and faint from within and the Apolnostromo stood up too but remained mute gazing at the door he was afraid he was not afraid of being refused the girl he loved no mere refusal could stand between him and a woman he desired but the shining inspector of the treasure rose before him claiming his allegiance in a silence that could not be gained he was afraid because neither dead nor alive like the gringos on a sweater he belonged body and soul to the unlawfulness of his audacity he was afraid of being forbidden the island he was afraid and said nothing seeing the two men standing up side by side to await her Linda stopped in the doorway nothing could alter the passionate dead whiteness of her face but her black eyes seemed to catch and concentrate all the light of the low zone in a flaming spark within the black depths covered at once by this low descent of heavy eyelids behold thy husband master and benefactor all by Allah's voice resounded with a force that seemed to fill the whole wolf she stepped forward with her eyes nearly closed like a sleepwalker Nostromo made a superhuman effort it is time Linda with two were betrothed he said steadily in his level careless unbending tone she put her hand into his offer palm lowering her head dark with bronze glints upon which her father's hand rested for a moment and so the soul of the dead is satisfied this came from George of Biola who went on talking for a while of his dead wife while the two side by side never looked at each other then the old man ceased and Linda motionless began to speak ever since I felt I lived in the world I have lived for you alone Jean Baptista and that you knew you knew it Baptista she pronounced his name exactly with her mother's intonation a gloom as of the grave covered Nostromo's heart yes I knew he said the heroic Garibaldino sat on the same bench with his horny head his old soul dwelling along with his memories tender and violent terrible and dreary solid tarnished on the earth full of men and Linda his best loved daughter was saying I was yours ever since I can't remember I had only to think of you for the earth to become empty to my eyes when you were there I could see it no one else I was yours nothing has changed the world belongs to you let me live in it she dropped her bow by braiding boys to a still lower note and found other things to say torturing for the man at her side her murmur run on, ardored and bullible she did not seem to see her sister who came out with an altar cloak she was embroidering her hands and passed in front of him silent, fresh, fair with a quick glance and a faint smile to sit a little away on the other side of Nostromo the evening was still the sun sank almost to the edge of a purple ocean and a white lighthouse livened against the background of clouds filling the head of the gulf bore the lantern red and glowing like a live amber kindled by the fire of the sky Giselle, Indolent and Demure raised the altar cloak from time to time to hide nervous johns as of a young panther suddenly, Linda rushed at her sister and sizing her head with kisses Nostromo's brain reeled when she left her, as if astounded by the violin carousels with her hands lying in her lap the slave of the pressure felt as if he could shoot that woman all georgia lifted his leonine head where are you going, Linda? to the light, Padre Mio see, see, to your duty he got up too, looked after his elder's daughter then, in a tone whose festive note simmed the echo of a mood lost in the night of ages I am going in to cook something aha, son, the old man knows where to find a bottle of wine too he turned to Giselle with a change of a sturdy tenderness and you, little one, pray not to the god of priests and slaves but to the god of orphans of the oppressed, of the poor, of little children to give thee a man like this one for a husband his hand rested heavily for a moment on Nostromo's shoulder then he went in and, to me, silver felt at this words the venomous fangs of jealousy biting deep into his heart he was appalled by the novelty of the experience by its force, by its physical intimacy a husband a husband for her and yet it was natural that Giselle should have a husband at some time on order he had never realized that before in discovering that her beauty could belong to another he felt as though he could kill this one of his daughters also he muttered moodily they said you love Ramirez she shook her head without looking at him coppery greens rippled to and fro on the walls of her gold hair her smooth forehead had the soft, pure sheen of a priceless pearl in the splendor of the sunset mingling the gloom of starry spaces the purple of the sea and the crimson on the sky in a magnificent stillness I never loved him I think I never he loves me, perhaps the seduction of her slow voice died out of the air and her raised eyes remained fixed on nothing as if indifferent and without thought Ramirez told you he loved you asked Nostromo restraining himself ah, once what an evening the miserable, huh he had jumped up as if stoned by a fly and stood before her mute with anchor Mr. Rekordia Divina, you too Jean Batista, poor wretch that I am she lamented in ingenious tones I told Linda and she's called it she's called it am I to live blind, dumb and deaf in this world? and she told father who took down his gun and cleaned it, poor Ramirez then you came and she told you he looked at her he fastened his eyes upon the hollow white throat, which had the invincible charm of things, Jean palpitating, delicate and alive was this the child he had known? was it possible? it dawned upon him that in these last years he had really seen very little, nothing of her, nothing she had come into the world like a thing unknown, she had come upon him on her words she was a danger, a frightful danger the indistictive the mood of fierce determination that had never felt him before the perils of this life added its steady force to the violence of his passion she, in a voice that recalled to him the song of running water the thinking of a silver bell continued and between Jew three you have brought me here into this captivity to the sky and water nothing else, sky and water oh, sanctissima madre the mysterious island I could hate you, Giambattista he laughed loudly her voice enveloped him like a carous she bemoaned her fate spreading unconsciously like a flower its perfume in the coolness of the evening the indefinable seduction of her person was it her fault that nobody ever admired Linda? even when they were little going out with their motor to mass she remembered that people took no notice of Linda who was fearless and chose instead to frighten her who was timid with their attention it was her hair like gold, she supposed he broke out your hair like gold and your eyes like violins and your lips like the roost your own arms, your white throat imperturbable in the indolence of her pose she blushed deeply all over to the roots of her hair she was not considered she was no more self-conscious than a flower she was pleased and perhaps even the flower loves to hear itself braced he glanced down and added impatiently your little feet leaning back against the rough stone wall of the cottage she seemed to bask languidly in the warmth of the rosy flush only her lowered eyes glanced on her little feet and so you're going at last to Mario or Linda she's terrible now she will understand better since you have told her you love her she will not be so fierce chica said no stromo I have not told her anything then make haste come tomorrow, come and tell her so that I may have some peace from her scolding and perhaps who knows be allowed to listen to your Ramirez eh? is that it? you mercy of God how violent you are Giovanni she said and moved who is Ramirez? Ramirez who is he? she repeated in the dusk and gloom of her clouded gulf with a low red streak in the west like a hot bar of glowing iron laid across the entrance of a world somber as a cavern where the magnificent capitas de cargadores had hearing his conquests of love and wealth listen Giselle he said and measured tons I will tell no world of love to your sister do you want to know why? alas I could not understand perhaps Giovanni today is your not like other men that no one had ever understood you properly that the reach will be surprised yet oh saints in heaven I am wary she raised her embroidery to conceal the lower part of her face then let it fall on her lap the lantern was shaded on the land side but slanting away from the dark column of the lighthouse they could see the long shaft of light kindled by Linda go out to strike the inspiring glow and red. Giselle Biola with her head resting against the wall of the house her eyes half closed and her little feet in white stockings and black slippers crossed over each other seemed to surrender herself tranquil and fatal to the gathering dusk the charm of her body the promise and mysteriousness of her indolence went out into the night of the plastic gulf like a fresh and intoxicating fragrance spreading out in the shadows the incorruptible Nostromo breathed her ambient seduction in the tumultuous heaven of his breast before leaving the harbor he had thrown off the store clothing of Captain Fidanza for greater ease in the long pool out of the islands he stood before her in the red sash and checked shirt as he used to appear on the company's wharf a Mediterranean sailor come ashore to try his lug in Costa Juana the dusk of purple and red enveloped him too soft, profound as no more than 50 yards from the spot it had gathered evening after evening about the self-destructive passion of Don Martin the good's utter skepticism flaming up to death in solitude you have got to hear he began at last with perfect self-control I shall say no word of love to your sister to whom I have betrothed from this evening because it is you that I love it is you the dusk let him see yet the tender the voluptuous smile that came instinctively upon her lips shaped for love and kisses free his heart in the drown hog our lines of terror he could not restrain himself any longer while she shrunk from his approach her arms went out to him abandoned and regarded the dignity of her language surrender he hailed her head in his two hands and showered rapid kisses upon the upturned face that claimed in the purple dusk masterful and tender and turned slowly upon the fullness of his position and he perceived as she was crying then the incomparable capitas the man of careless lobs became gentle and caressing like a woman to the grief of a child he murmured to her fondly he sat down by her and nursed her fair head on his breast he called her his star and his little flower it had grown dark from the living room of the light keeper's cottage where Giorgio, one of the immortal thousand was bending his lionine and heroic head over a charcoal fire there came the sound of sizzling and the aroma of an artistic fritura in the obscure disarray of that thing happening like a cataclysm it was in her feminine head that some gleam of reason survived he was lost to the world in their embrace and stillness but she said whispering into his ear god of mercy what will become of me here now, between this sky and this water I hate Linda, Linda, I see her she tried to get out of his arms suddenly relaxed at the sound of that name but there was no one approaching the black shapes and lays and struggling on the white background on the wall Linda, poor Linda, I tremble I shall die of fear before my poor sister Linda but throwed it today to Giovanni, my lover Giovanni, you must have been mad I cannot understand you you are not like other men I will not give you up never, only to god himself but why have you done this blind, mild, cruel, frightful thing released she hung her head let fall her hands the altar cloth, as if towed by a great wind lay far away from him leaving a white on the black ground from fear losing my hope of you said Nostromo you knew that you had my soul you know everything it was made for you but what could stand between you and me what, tell me she repeated without impatience in superb assurance your dead mother, he said, very low ah, poor mother she has always she is a saint in heaven now and I cannot give you up to her no, Giovanni, only to god alone you were mad it is done oh, what have you done Giovanni, my beloved, my life, my master do not leave me here in this grave of clouds you cannot leave me now you must take me away at once, this instant in a little boat Giovanni, carry me off tonight from my fear of Linda's eyes before I have to look at her again she nestled close to him this label descent to me silver fell the weight of chains upon his limbs a pressured ass of a cold hand upon his lips he struggled against the spell I cannot, he said not yet there is something that stands between us two and the freedom of the world she pressed her form closer to his eye with a subtle and naive instinct of seduction you raped Giovanni, my lover she whispered engagingly what can there be carry me off in thy very hands to Donia Emilia, away from here I am not very heavy it seems as though she expected him to leave her up at once in his two palms she had lost the notion of all impossibility anything could happen in this night of wonder as he made the movement she almost cried out I tell you, I am afraid of Linda and still he did not move she became quite unwilling what can there be, she asked coaxingly he felt her warm breathing alive, quivering and hollow of his arm in the exalting consciousness of his strength and the triumph and excitement of his mind he struck out for his freedom a treasure, he said all was still she did not understand a treasure, a treasure of silver to buy a gold crown for thy brow a treasure she repeated in the faint voice as if from the depths of a dream what is it you say she disengaged herself gently she got up and looked down at her aware of her face, of her hair her lips, the dimples of her cheeks seeing the fascination of her person in the night and the gulf as if in the blaze of noonday her nonchalant and seductive voice trembled with the excitement of a marion o an ungovernable curiosity a treasure of silver she stammered out then pressed on faster what, where, how did you get it, Giovanni he wrestled with the spell of captivity it was as if striking a heroic blow that he burst out like a thief the densest blackness of the placid gulf seemed to fall upon his head he could not see her now she had bandaged into a long obscure abysmal silence once her voice came back to him after a time with a faint glimmer which was her face I love you, I love you these words gave him an unwanted sense of freedom he cast the spell stronger than the accursed spell of the treasure they changed his wary subjection to that dead thing into an exultant conviction of his power he could cherish her he said in an splendor as great as Donia Emilia's the rich lived unwealth-stolen from the people but he had taken from the rich nothing nothing that was not lost to them already but their folly and their betrayal for he had been betrayed he said deceived, tempted she believed him he had kept the treasure for purposes of revenge but now he cared nothing for it he cared only for her he would put her beauty in a palace on a hill crowned with olive trees a white palace above a blue sea he would keep her there like a jewel in a casket he would get land for her her own land fertile with vines and corn to set her little feet upon he kissed them he had already paid for it all with the soul of a woman and the life of a man the capitas of Cargadores tasted the supreme intoxication of his generosity he flaunt the master treasure superbly at her feet in the impenetrable darkness of the gulf in the darkness defined as men said the knowledge of gold and the weight of the devil but she must let him grow rich fast she listened as if in a trance her fingers stirred in his hair he got up from his knees reeling weak, empty as though he had flown his soul away may hasten, she said may haste, Giovanni, my lover my master, for I will give the up to no one but God and I am afraid of Linda he gasped at her shutter and swore to do his best he trusted the courage of her love she promised to be brave in order to love always far away in a white palace upon a hill, above a blue sea then, with a timid tentative eagerness, she murmured where is it where? tell me that, Giovanni he opened his mouth and remained silent, thunder struck not that, not that he gasped out, appalled at the spell of secrecy that had kept him dumb before so many people falling upon his lips again with unimpaired force not even to her not even to her he was too dangerous I forbid thee to ask, he cried at her didn't unconsciously the anger of his boys he had not regained his freedom the inspector of the unlawful treasure arose standing by her side like a figure of silver pedales and secret with a finger on its pale lips his soul died within him at the vision of himself creeping impressively along the ravine with the smell of earth of damp foliage in his nostrils creeping in, determined in a purpose that numbed his breast and creeping out again, lordy woodsilver with his ears alert to every sound it must be done on this very night that work of a craven slave he stooped low, pressed the home of her skirt to his lips with a moderate command tell him, I would not stay and was gone suddenly from her silent, without as much as a footfall in the dark night she sat still her head, resting indolently against the wall and her little feet in white stockings and black slippers crossed over each other all Giorgio, coming out, did not seem to be surprised at the intelligence as much as she had vaguely feared for she was full of inexplicable fear now feared of everything and everybody except for her gemini and his treasure but that was incredible the heroic Garibaldino accepted Nostromo's abrupt departure with a sagacious indulgence he remembered his own feelings and exhibited a masculine penetration of the true state of the case Babene, let him go ha, ha, no matter how fair the woman engulfs a little liberty, liberty there's more than one kind he has said the great word and so in Giambattista is not the tame to be instructing the emotionless and scared to sell a man should not be tame he added dramatically out of the doorway her stillness and silence seemed to displease him do not give away to the embusiness of your sister's lot he admonished her very grave in his deep voice presently he had come to the door again to call in his younger daughter he was late he shouted her name three times before she even moved her head left alone the helpless prey of astonishment she walked into the bathroom she shared with Linda like a person profoundly asleep that aspect was so marked that even all Giorgio, spectacled raising his eyes from the bible shook his head as she shot the door behind her she walked right across the room without looking at anything and sat down at once by the open window Linda, distilling down from the tower in the exuberance of her happiness found her with a light candle on her back facing the black night full of siding gusts of wind and the sound of distant showers a true night of the gulf two dents for the eye of God and the wiles of the devil she did not turn her head at the opening of the door there was something in that immobility which reached Linda in the depths of her paradise the elder sister guessed angrily the child is thinking of that retro Ramirez Linda longed to talk she said in her arbitrary voice Giselle and was not answered by the slightest movement the girl that was going to live in a palace and walked on ground of her own was ready to die with terror not for anything in the world would she have turned her head to face her sister her heart was beating madly she said with subdued haste do not speak to me I am praying Linda, disappointed, went out quietly and Giselle sat on unbelieving, lost dazed, patient as if waiting for the confirmation of the incredible the hopeless blackness of the clouds seemed part of a dream, too she waited she did not wait in vain the man whose soul was dead with him been creeping out of the ravine waited with silver, had seen the gleam of the lighter window and could not help retracing his steps from the beach on that impenetrable background obliterating the lofty mountains up by the seaboard, she saw this label that sent to me silver as if by an extraordinary power of a miracle she accepted his return as if henceforth the world could hold no surprise for all eternity she rose, compelled and rigid and began to speak long before the light from within fell upon the face of the approaching man you have come back to carry me off it is well, open thy arms, Giovanni my lover, I am coming his prudent footsteps stopped and with his eyes glistening widely he spoke in a harsh voice not yet I must grow rich slowly a threatening note came into his tongue do not forget that you have a tea for your lover yes, yes, she whispered hastily come nearer, listen do not give me up, Giovanni never, never I will be patient her form drooped consolingly over the low casement towards the slave of the unlawful treasure the light in the room went out and waited with silver the magnificent capitas clasped her round hair white neck and the darkness of the gulf as a drowning man clutches at the straw End of Part 3, Chapter 12 Chapter 13, Part 3 of Nostromo this is a LibriVox recording for all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Mario Pineda Nostromo by Joseph Conrad Part 3, The Lighthouse Chapter 13 On the day Mr. Good was going in Dr. Monigham's words to give a tertulia Captain Fidanza went down the side of his schooner lying in Sulaco Harbor calm and bending operating the way he sat down in his dingy and took up his skulls he was later than usual the afternoon was well advanced before he landed on the beach of the Great Disable and with a steady pace climbed the slope of the island from a distance he made out of a cell sitting in a chair tilted back against the end of the house under the window of the girl's room She had her embroidering in her hands and held it well up to her eyes the tranquility of that girlish figure exasperated the feeling of perpetual struggle and strife he carried in his breast he became angry it seemed to him that she ought to hear the clanking on his fetters his silver fetters from afar and while ashore that day he had met the doctor with the evil eye who had looked at him very hard the racing of her eyes modified him they smiled in their flower-like freshness straight upon his heart then she frowned it was a warning to be cautious he stopped some distance away and in a loud and different tone said Good day, Giselle Is Linda up yet? Yes, she is in the big room with father he approached then and looking through the window into the bedroom for fear of being detected by Linda returning there for some reason he said moving on in his lips you love me? more than my life she went on with her embroidery under his contemplating gaze and continued to speak looking at her work or I could not leave I could not, Giovanni for this life is like death oh Giovanni, I shall perish if you do not take me away he smiled carelessly I will come to the window when it is dark he said no, don't Giovanni not tonight Linda and father have been talking together for a long time today what about? Ramirez, I fancy, I heard I do not know why in a thousand times a day your love is to me like your treasure to you it is there but I can never get enough of it he looked at her very still she was beautiful his desire had grown within him he had two masters now but she was incapable of sustaining the motion she was sincere in what she said but she slept placidly at night when she saw him she flamed up always then only an increased thus eternity she remarked the change in her she was afraid of betraying herself she was afraid of pain of bodily harm of sharp words of facing anger and witnessing violence for her soul was light and tender with a pagan sincerity in its impulses she murmured give up the palazzo Giovanni and the vineyard on the hills for which we are starving our love she ceased seeing Linda standing silent in the house Nostromo turned to his affian's wife with a greeting and was amazed at her sunken eyes at her hollow cheeks at the air of illness and anguish in her face have you been ill he asked trying to put some concern into his question her black eyes blaze at him am I thinner she asked yes perhaps a little an older everyday counts for all of us I shall go gray her fear before the rings on my finger she said slowly keeping her gaze fastened upon him she waited for what he would say rolling down her turned up sleeves no fear of that he said absently she turned away as if it had been something final and visited herself with household chores while Nostromo talked with her father conversation with the old Gary Baldino was not easy age had left his faculties unimpaired only they seemed to have withdrawn somewhere they would end him his answers were slow in coming with an effect of all those gravity but that day he was more animated quicker there seemed to be more life in the old lion he was uneasy for the integrity of his owner he believed Sidon is warning as to Ramirez designs upon his younger daughter and he did not trust her she was flighting he said nothing of his cares to Sonja Batista he was a touch of senile vanity he wanted to show that he was equal yet to the task of guarding along the owner of his house Nostromo went away early as soon as he had disappeared walking towards the beach Linda stepped over the threshold and with a hugger smile sat down by the side of her father ever since that Sunday when the infatuated and desperate Ramirez had waited for her on the wharf she had no doubts whatever the jealous ravings of that man were no revelation they had only fixed with precision as with a nail driven into her heart that sense of unreality and exception which instead of bliss and security she had found in her intercourse with her promised husband she had passed on for an indignation and scorn upon Ramirez but that Sunday she nearly died of wretchedness and shame lying on the carved and littered stone of Teresa's grave subscribed for by the engine drivers the fitters of the railway workshops inside of their respect for the hero of Italian unity old Viola had not been able to carry out his desire of burying his wife and the sea and Linda wept upon the stone Degra twitches outrage appalled her if he wished to break her heart well and good everything was permitted to Giambattista but why trample upon the pieces why seek to emulate her spirit aha, he could not break that she dry her tears and Giselle the little one that ever since she could total had always clung to her skirt for protection what duplicity but she could not help it properly when there was a man in the case the poor feather-headed wretch could not help herself Linda had a good share of the Viola's toy system she resolved to say nothing but woman-like she put passion into her toy system prompted by fearful caution drove her beside herself by the courtness that resembled this dain one day she flung herself from the chair in which her indolent sister was lying and impressed the mark of her teeth at the base of the whitest neck in Sulaco Giselle cried out but she had her share of the Viola heroism ready to fend with terror she only said in a lazy voice Madre de Dios are you going to eat me alive Linda and this outburst passed off leaving no trace upon the situation she knows nothing she cannot know anything perhaps it is not true it cannot be true Linda tried to persuade herself but when she saw Captain Fidanza for the first time after her meeting with the destructed Ramirez the certitude of her misfortune returned she watched him from the doorway go away to his boat asking herself stoically will they meet tonight she made up her mind not to leave the tower for a second when he had disappeared she came out and sat down with her father the venerable Garibaldino felt on his own words a young man yet in one way or another a good deal of talk about Ramirez had reached him of late and his contempt and dislike of that man who obviously was not what his son would have been had made him restless he slept very little now but for several nights passed or only sitting with Mr. Skuld's silver spectacles on his nose before the open battle he had been provoking actively all about the island with his old gun on watch over his honor Linda, laying her thin brown hand on his knee tried to soothe his excitement Ramirez was not in Sulaco nobody knew where he was he was gone his talk about what he would do meant nothing no the old man interrupted but Sonja Batista told me himself that the cowardly slave was drinking and gambling with the rascals of Zapiga over there on the north side of the Gulf he might get some of the worst scoundrels of that scoundrel town of Negros to help him in his attempt on the little one but I am not so old no she argued anonymously against the probability of any attempt being made and at last the old man fell silent chewing his white moustache women had their obstinate notions which must be humored his poor wife was like that and Linda resembled her mother it was not simply for a man to argue maybe maybe he mumbled she was by no means easy in her mind she loved no stroma she turned her eyes upon herself sitting at a distance with something of maternal tenderness and the jealous anguish of her rival outraged in her defeat then she rose and walked over to her and knew, she said roughly the invincible candor of the gaze raised up, all violet and deep excited her rage and admiration she had beautiful eyes, the chica this bile thing of white flesh and black deception she did not know whether she wanted to tear them out with shouts of vengeance or covered up their mysterious and shameless innocence with kisses of pity and love and suddenly they became empty gazing blankly at her not quite buried deep enough with all the other emotions in Giselle's heart Linda said Ramirez is boasting in town that he will carry you off from the island what folly answered the other and in a perversity born of long restrain she added he is not the man in a just in tone with a trembling audacity no said Linda through her clenched teeth, is he not well then, look to it because Fetter has been walking about it is not good for him you must tell him not to Linda he will not listen to me I shall sell nothing, never anymore to anybody, cried Linda passionately this could not last thought Giselle Giovanni must take her away soon the very next time he came she would not suffer these terrors forever so much silver to speak with her sister made her real when she was not in easy at her Fetter's watchfulness she had begged Nostroma not to come to the window that night he had promised to keep away for this once and she did not know could not guess or imagine that he had another reason for coming to the island Linda had gone straight to the tower it was time to light up she unlocked the little lore and went heavily up the spiral staircase carrying her love for the magnificent Capitas de Cargadores like an ever increasing load of shameful fetters no, she could not throw it off no, let heaven dispose of this too and moving about the lantern filled with twilight and the shin of the moon with careful movements she lighted the lamp then her arms fell along her body and with our mother looking on she murmured my own sister, the chica the whole refracting apparatus with its brass fittings and rings of prisms glittered and sparkle like a dumb shaped shrine of diamonds containing not a lamp but some sacred flame dominating the sea and Linda, the keeper in black with a pale face drooped low in the wooden chair along with her jealousy far above the shames and passions of the earth a strange, dragging pain as if somebody were pulling her about brutally by her dark hair with bronze clings made her put her hands up to her temples they would meet and she knew where too at the window the sweat of torture fell and dropped in her cheeks while the moonlight in the offering closed as if with a colossal bar of silver at the entrance of the placid gulf the sombre cavern of clouds and stillness in the sore freddered seaboard Linda Bayola stood up suddenly with a finger on her lip he lobbed neither her nor her sister the whole thing seemed so objectless as to finding her and also give her some hope why did he not carry her off what prevented him he was incomprehensible what were they wearing for for what end were these two lying and deceiving not for the ends of their lob there was no such thing the hope of regaining him for herself made her break her bow of not leaving the tower that night she most talked her once to her father who was wise and would understand she ran down the spiral stairs at the moment of opening the door at the bottom she heard the sound of first shot ever fired on a great isabel she felt a shock as though the bullet had struck her breast she ran on without pausing the cottage was dark she cried at the door Giselle, Giselle then dashed round the corner and screamed her sister's name at the open window without getting an answer but as she was rushing distracted round the house Giselle came out the door and darted past her running silently her hair loose she seemed to skim along the grass as if on diptoe and banished Linda walked on slowly with her arms stretched out before her all was still on the island she did not know where she was going the tree under which Martin could spend his last days beholding life like a succession of senseless images threw a large blotch of black shade upon the grass suddenly she saw her father quietly all alone in the moonlight the ingaribaldino big, erect with his snow white hair and beard had a monumental repose in his immobility leaning upon a rifle she put her hand upon his arm lightly he never steered what have you done? she asked in her ordinary boys I have shot dramaters in fame he answered with his eyes directed toward the shade was blackest like a thief he came and like a thief he fell the child had to be protected he did not offer to move an inch to advance a single step he stood there wroth and unsteering like a statue of an old man guarding the owner of his house Linda removed her trembling hand from his arm firm and steady like an arm of stone and without a word entered the blackness of the shade she saw his tear of formless shapes on the ground and stopped short a murmur of despair and tears grew louder to her strain hearing I untreated you not to come tonight oh my Giovanni and you promised oh why why did you come Giovanni it was her sister's voice it broke on a hard trending sub and the voice of the resourceful capitals de cargadores master and slave of the santometresher who had been caught unawares by all Giorgio and then towards the ravine to get some more silver answered careless and cool but something sternly weak from the ground it seemed as though I could not live through the night without seeing the once more my star my little flower the brilliant tertulia was just over the last guests had departed and the senior administrator had gone to his room already when Dr. Moniham who had been expected in the evening but had not turned up he arrived driving along the wood block pavement under the electric lamps of the deserted Calle della Constitución and found the great gateway of the casa still open he limped in stomped at the stairs and found the fat and sleek basilio on the point of turning off the lights in the sala the prosperous major domo remained open baffled at this late invasion don't put out the lights commanded the doctor I want to see the senora the senora is in the senora administrator's conciliaria said basilio in an anxious voice the senora administrator starts for the mountain in an hour there is some trouble with the workmen to be feared it appears a shameless people without reason and decency an idle senor idle you are shamelessly lazy and imbecile yourself said the doctor with a faculty for ex-expiration which made him so generally beloved don't put lights out with dignity doctor moneyham waiting in the brilliantly lighted sala heard presently a door close at the further end of the house a jingle of spurs died out the senora administrator was off to the mountain with a major switch of her long train flashing with jewels and the shimmer of silk her delicate head bowed as if under the weight of a mass of fair hair in which the silver threads were lost the first lady of Sulaco as captain Mitchell used to describe her moved along the lighted corridor wealthy beyond great dreams of wealth considered loved respected, honored and as solitary as any human being had ever been, perhaps, on this earth the doctor's measures good one minute stopped her with a start at the door of the lighted and empty sala from the similarity of mood and circumstance the sight of the doctor standing there all along amongst groups of furniture recalled to her emotional memory with Martin Dekoud she seemed to hear in the silence the voice of that man that miserably so many years ago pronounced the words, Antonia left her fan here but it was the doctor's voice that spoke a little altered by his excitement she remarked his shiny eyes Mr. Scoot, you are wanted do you know what has happened you remember what I told you just about Nostromo well, it seems that a lancia a boat coming from Zapiga with four niggers in her passing close to the great Isabel was hailed from the cliffs by a woman's boys Lindas, as a matter of fact commanding them, it is a moonlight night to go around to the beach and take up a wounded man to the town the patron from whom I've heard all this of course, did so at once he told me that when they got round to the low side of the great Isabel they found Linda Biola waiting for them they followed her, she let them on the retreat not far from the cottage there, they found Nostromo lying on the ground with his head and the young girl's lap and father Biola standing some distance off leaning on his gun under Linda's direction they got a table out of the cottage for a stretcher after breaking off the legs they are here, Mr. Scoot I mean Nostromo and Giselle the niggers brought him in to the first state hospital near the harbor he made the attendance sent for me but it was not me he wanted to see it was you, Mr. Scoot, it was you me? Mr. Scoot shrink a little yes, you, the doctor burst out he begged me, his enemy as he thinks to bring you to him at once it seems he has something to say to you alone impossible Mr. Scoot he said to me, remind her that I have done something to keep a roof over her head Mr. Scoot the doctor pursued in the greatest excitement do you remember the silver? the silver in the lighter? that was lost? Mr. Scoot remembered but she did not say she hated the mere mention of that silver fragments personified she remembered with an exaggerated horror that for the first and last time of her life she had concealed the truth from her husband about that very silver she had been corrupted by her fears at that time and she had never forgiven herself moreover, that silver which would never have come down if her husband had been made acquainted with the news brought by the Coot had been in a roundabout way narrowly the cause of Dr. Moniham's death and these things appeared to her very dreadful was it lost though? the doctor exclaimed I've always felt that there was a mystery about our nostromo ever since I do believe he wants now at the point of death the point of death? repeated Mr. Scoot yes he wants perhaps to tell you something concerning that silver which oh no no exclaimed Mr. Scoot in the law boys isn't it lost and done with isn't there enough treasure without it to make everybody in the world miserable? the doctor remained still in a submissive, disappointed silence at last he ventured very low and there is that Biola Garrel, Giselle what are we to do? it looks as though father and sister had Mr. Scoot admitted that she felt in duty bound to do her best for these girls I have a volunteer here the doctor said you do not mind getting into that he waited all in patience till Mr. Scoot reappeared having thrown over her dress a great cloak with a deep hood it was thus that cloaked and monastically hooded over her evening costume this woman full of endurance and compassion stood by her side of the bed on which the splendid as the Cargadores lay stretched out motionless on his back the whiteness of Sheets and pillows gave a somber and energetic relief to his bronze face to the dark, nervous hands so good on a tiller upon a brittle on the trigger lying open an idol upon a white coverlet she is innocent, the capitas was saying in a deep and little voice as though afraid that a louder word would break the slender hold his spirit still kept upon his body she is innocent, it is I alone but no matter for these things I will answer to no man or woman alive he posed Mr. Scoot's face, buried wide within the shadow of her hood bent over him put an invincible and dreary sadness and the low sobs of Giselle Biola kneeling at the end of the bed her gold hair with coppery gleams loose and scattered over the capitas's feet hardly troubled the silence of the room ha, old Giorgio a guardian of fine honor fancy the back you coming upon me so light of food, so steady of aim I myself could have done no better but the price of a charge of powder might have been saved the honor was safe, senora she would have followed to the end of the world no straw, no teeth I have said the word, the spell is broken a low moan from the girl made him cast his eyes down I cannot see her, no matter how long would the shadow of the all-magnificent carelessness in his voice one kiss is enough if there is no time for more an airy soul, senora bright and warm like sunshine soon clouded and soon serene they would crush it there between them, senora cast on her the eye of your compassion as famed from one end of the land to the order as the courage and daring of the man who speaks to you would console herself in time and even Ramirez is not a bad fellow I am not angry, no it is not Ramirez who overcame the capitas of this lack of cargadores he posed made an effort and in louder voice a little widely declared I die betrayed betrayed by but he did not say by whom or by what he was dying betrayed she would not have betrayed me he began again opening his eyes very wide she was faithful we were going very far very soon I could have torn myself away from that accursed treasure for her for that child that would have left boxes and boxes of it full and the coup took four four ingots why Picardia to betray me who could I give back the treasure with four ingots missing they would have said I had prolonged them the doctor would have said that alas it holds me yet mister's good bent low fascinated called with apprehension what became of the martino that night Nostromo who knows I wonder what would become of me now I know death was to come upon me unawares he went away he betrayed me and you think I have killed him you are all alike you find people the silver has killed me it has held me it holds me jet nobody knows where it is but you are the wife of Don Carlos who put it into my hands and said save it on your life and when I returned and you all thought it was lost what do I hear it was nothing of importance let it go up Nostromo the faithful and right away to save us for their life Nostromo mister's good whispered bending very low I too have hated the idea of that silver from the bottom of my heart marbles that one of you should hate the wealth that you know so well how to take from the hands of the poor the world rests upon the poor as old Giorgio says you have been always good to the poor but there is something that occurs in wealth senora shall I tell you where the treasure is to you alone shining incorruptible a pain involuntary reluctance lingered in his tone in his eyes playing to the woman with the genius of sympathetic intuition she averted her glance from the miserable subjection of the dying man appalled wishing to hear no more of the silver no capitas she said no one misses it now let it be lost forever after hearing these words Nostromo closed his eyes uttered no word made no movement outside the door of the sick room Dr. Moneham excited to the highest pitch his eyes shining with eagerness came up to the two women now mister's good he said he was barely in his impatient tell me was alright there is a mystery you have got the word of it have you not he told you he told me nothing said mister's good the light of his temperamental amnesty to Nostromo went out the Dr. Moneham's eyes he stepped back submissibly he did not believe mister's good but her war was law he accepted her denial like an inexplicable fatality affirming the victory of Nostromo's even before that woman whom he loved with secret devotion he had been defeated by the manifesting capitas de cargadores the man who had lived his own life on the assumption of unbroken fidelity rectitude and courage praise said that once somebody from a carriage spoke which was good from within her hood then turning to Giselle Biola come nearer me child come closer we will wait here Giselle Biola heartbroken childlike her face filed in her falling hair crept out to her side mister's good slipped her hand through the arm of the unworthy daughter of all Biola the immaculate republican the hero without a stain slowly, gradually as a withered flower droops the head of the girl who would have followed the thief to the end of the world rested on the shoulder of Donia Emilia the first lady of Sulaco the wife for the senior administrator and mister's good feeling her suppressed sobbing nervous and excited had the first and only moment of bitterness in her life it was worthy of Dr. Moneham himself consult yourself child very soon he would have forgotten you for his treasure senora he loved me, he loved me Giselle whispered despairingly he loved me as no one had ever been loved before I have been loved too mister's good said in a severe tone Giselle clung to her compulsively oh senora but you shall leave a door to the end of your life she soft out mister's good kept an unbroken silence till the carriage arrived she helped in the half-fating girl after the doctor had shut the door of the Lando, she leaned over to him you can do nothing she whispered no mister's good, moreover he won't let us touch him it does not matter, I just had one look just less but he promised to see all Biola and the other girl that very night he could get the police boat to take him off to the island he remained in the street looking after the Lando rolling away slowly behind the white mules the rumor of some accident and accident to Captain Fidenza had been spreading along the nukeways with their rows of lamps and the dark shapes of towering cranes a note of night prowlers the poorest of the poor hung about the door at the first aid hospital whispering the moonlight of the empty street there was no one with the wounded man but the pale photographer small, frail broad thirsty the hater of capitalists perched on a high stool nearly head of the bed with his knees up and his chin in his hands he had been fetched by a comrade who, working late on that work had heard from a negro belonging to Alancia that Captain Fidenza had been brought ashore and mortally wounded have you any dispositions to make comrade he asked anxiously do not forget that we want money from our work the rich must be fought with their own weapons Nostromo made no answer the order did not insist remaining huddled up on this stool shock-headed, widely hairy like a hunchbacked monkey then, after a long silence comrade Fidenza he began solemnly you have refused all day from that doctor is he really a dangerous enemy of the people? in the dimly lit room Nostromo rolled his head slowly on the pillow and opened his eyes directing at a weird figure perched by his bedside a glance of enigmatic and profound inquiry then his head rolled back his eyelids fell and the capitas de cargadores died without a war or mourn after an hour of immobility broken by short shooters justifying to the most atrocious sufferings Dr. Moneham, going out in the police galley to the islands, beheld the glitter of the moon upon the gulf and the high black shape of the great Isabel, sent in a shaft of light afar from under the canopy of clouds pull easy, he said wondering what he would find there he tried to imagine Linda and her father and discovered a strange reluctance with himself pull easy, he repeated from the moment he fired at the teeth of his honor, Giorgio Biola had not steered from the spot he stood, his all gone grounded, his hand grasping the barrel near the muscle after the lunch I carried Nostromo forever from her hand, left the shore Linda, coming up, stopped the fornum he did not seem to be aware of her presence, but when losing her force, calmness she cried out do you know whom you have killed? he answered, Ramirez, the bagamon bright and staring insanely at her father Linda laughed in his face after a time he joined her faintly in a deep tone, a distant echo of her petals then she stopped, and the old man spoke as if startled he cried out in son Giambattista's voice the gun fell from his open hand but the arm remained extended for a moment, as if still supported Linda sized it roughly you are too old to understand come into the house he let her lead him on the threshold, he stumbled heavily, nearly coming to the ground together with his daughter his excitement, his activity of the last few days had been like the flare of a dying lamp he caught at the back of his chair in son Giambattista's voice here appearing in superton I heard him, Ramirez, the miserable Linda helped him into the chair and bending low, he stinking in his ear, you have killed Giambattista, the old man while under his thick moustache women had strange fancies where is the child, he asked surprised at the penetrating chilliness of the air, and the unwanted dimness of the lamp by which he used to sit up half the night with the open bible before him Linda hesitated a moment then a burdened her eyes she is asleep, she said we shall talk to her tomorrow she could not bear to look at him he filled her with terror in an almost unbearable feeling of pity she had observed the change that came over him he would never understand what he had done, and even to her the whole thing remained incomprehensible he said with difficulty give me the book Linda laid on the table the close volume in his worn letter cover the bible given him jersey goba and englishmen in palermo the child had to be protected he said in a strange mournful voice Linda wrung her hands crying without noise suddenly she stared for the door he heard her move where are you going? he asked to the light she answered turning around to look at him balefully the light, see, duty very upright, white haired, leonine heroic in his absurd quietness he felt in the pocket of his red shirt for the spectacles given him by donya emilia and put them on after a long period of immobility he opened the book and from on high looked through the glasses at the small print in double columns a rigid stern expression settled upon his features with his light frown as if in response to some gloomy thought of implicit sensation but he never detached his eyes from the book while he swayed forward gently, gradually till his snow white head a wooden clock ticked methodically on the white-washed wall and growing slowly cold the garibaldino lay alone rugged, undecayed, like an old oak uprooted by a treacherous gusts of wind the light of the great isabel burned and failing above the lost treasure of the santum emi into the bluish shin of the night without stars the lantern sent out a yellow beam towards the far horizon like a black speck upon the shining paints, linda crouching in the outer gallery rested her head on the rail the moon, drooping in the western board, looked at her right gantly below, at the foot of the cliff the regular splash of oars from passing both ceased and Dr. Monningham stood up in the steering sheets linda, he shouted, troubling back his head linda, linda stood up she had recognized the boys is he dead? she cried bending over yes, my poor girl i am coming round, the doctor answered from below, pulled to the beach he said to the rowers linda's black figure detached itself upright on the light of the lantern with her arms raised above her head as though she were going to throw herself over it is I who loved you she whispered with a face as set and wide as marble in the moonlight I, only I she will forget thee killed miserably for her preface I cannot understand I cannot understand what I shall never forget thee never, she stood silent and still collecting her strength to throw all her fidelity her pain bewilderment and despair into one great cry never, John Batista Dr. Monningham pulling round in the police galley heard the name pass over his head it was an order of Nostromo's triumphs the greatest, the most unbiable the most sinister of all in that true cry of undying passion that seemed to ring a laugh from Punta Mala to Aswera and away to the bright line of the horizon overhung by a big white cloud shining like a mass of solid silver the genius of the magnificent capitas de cargadores dominated the dark gulf containing his conquests of treasure and love end of part 3 chapter 13 end of Nostromo by Joseph Conrad