smoky blaze strings of hard,
round puffs of white smoke, no bigger than peas, which rolled out of
doors in the faint draught that came from invisible cracks of the bamboo
walls. The pungent taint of unclean things below and about the hut
grew heavier, weighing down Lingard's resolution and his thoughts in an
irresistible numbness of the brain. He thought drowsily of himself and
of that man who wanted to see him--who waited to see him. Who waited!
Night and day. Waited. . . . A spiteful but vaporous idea floated
through his brain that such waiting could not be very pleasant to the
fellow. Well, let him wait. He would see him soon enough. And for how
long? Five seconds--five minutes--say nothing--say something. What? No!
Just give him time to take one good look, and then . . .

Suddenly Babalatchi began to speak in a soft voice. Lingard blinked,
cleared his throat--sat up straight.

"You know all now, Tuan. Lakamba dwells in the stockaded house of
Patalolo; Abdulla has begun to build godowns of plank and stone; and now
that Omar is dead, I myself shall depart from this place and live with
Lakamba and speak in his ear. I have served many. The best of them all
sleeps in the ground in a white sheet, with nothing to mark his grave
but the ashes of the hut in which he died. Yes, Tuan! the white man
destroyed it himself. With a blazing brand in his hand he strode around,
shouting to me to come out--shouting to me, who was throwing earth on
the body of a great leader. Yes; swearing to me by the name of your
God and ours that he would burn me and her in there if we did not make
haste. . . . Hai! The white men are very masterful and wise. I dragged
her out quickly!"

"Oh, damn it!" exclaimed Lingard--then went on in Malay, speaking
earnestly. "Listen. That man is not like other white men. You know he is
not. He is not a man at all. He is . . . I don't know."

Babalatchi lifted his hand deprecatingly. His eye twinkled, and his
red-stained big lips, parted by an expressionless grin, uncovered a
stumpy row of black teeth filed evenly to the gums.

"Hai! Hai! Not like you. Not like you," he said, increasing the softness
of his tones as he neared the object uppermost in his mind during that
much-desired interview. "Not like you, Tuan, who are like ourselves,
only wiser and stronger. Yet he, also, is full of great cunning, and
speaks of you without any respect, after the manner of white men when
they talk of one another."

Linga