h kept on
increasing, swelling into a roar that came nearer, rushed down the
river, passed close in a tearing crash--and instantly sounded faint,
dying away in monotonous and dull repetitions amongst the endless
sinuosities of the lower reaches. Over the great forests, over all the
innumerable people of unstirring trees--over all that living people
immense, motionless, and mute--the silence, that had rushed in on the
track of the passing tumult, remained suspended as deep and complete as
if it had never been disturbed from the beginning of remote ages.
Then, through it, after a time, came to Lingard's ears the voice of the
running river: a voice low, discreet, and sad, like the persistent and
gentle voices that speak of the past in the silence of dreams.

He felt a great emptiness in his heart. It seemed to him that there was
within his breast a great space without any light, where his thoughts
wandered forlornly, unable to escape, unable to rest, unable to die,
to vanish--and to relieve him from the fearful oppression of their
existence. Speech, action, anger, forgiveness, all appeared to him alike
useless and vain, appeared to him unsatisfactory, not worth the effort
of hand or brain that was needed to give them effect. He could not see
why he should not remain standing there, without ever doing anything, to
the end of time. He felt something, something like a heavy chain, that
held him there. This wouldn't do. He backed away a little from Willems
and Aissa, leaving them close together, then stopped and looked at both.
The man and the woman appeared to him much further than they really
were. He had made only about three steps backward, but he believed for
a moment that another step would take him out of earshot for ever. They
appeared to him slightly under life size, and with a great cleanness of
outlines, like figures carved with great precision of detail and highly
finished by a skilful hand. He pulled himself together. The strong
consciousness of his own personality came back to him. He had a notion
of surveying them from a great and inaccessible height.

He said slowly: "You have been possessed of a devil."

"Yes," answered Willems gloomily, and looking at Aissa. "Isn't it
pretty?"

"I've heard this kind of talk before," said Lingard, in a scornful tone;
then paused, and went on steadily after a while: "I regret nothing. I
picked you up by the waterside, like a starving cat--by God. I regret
nothing; nothing t