 | CHAPTER SIX Nostromo: a Tale of the Seaboard / Joseph Conrad |  |
6. CHAPTER SIX
THE declining sun had shifted the shadows from west
to east amongst the houses of the town. It had shifted
them upon the whole extent of the immense Campo,
with the white walls of its haciendas on the knolls
dominating the green distances; with its grass-thatched
ranches crouching in the folds of ground by the banks
of streams; with the dark islands of clustered trees on a
clear sea of grass, and the precipitous range of the
Cordillera, immense and motionless, emerging from the
billows of the lower forests like the barren coast of a
land of giants. The sunset rays striking the snow-slope
of Higuerota from afar gave it an air of rosy youth,
while the serrated mass of distant peaks remained black,
as if calcined in the fiery radiance. The undulating
surface of the forests seemed powdered with pale gold
dust; and away there, beyond Rincon, hidden from
the town by two wooded spurs, the rocks of the San
Tomé gorge, with the flat wall of the mountain itself
crowned by gigantic ferns, took on warm tones of brown
and yellow, with red rusty streaks, and the dark green
clumps of bushes rooted in crevices. From the plain
the stamp sheds and the houses of the mine appeared
dark and small, high up, like the nests of birds clustered
on the ledges of a cliff. The zigzag paths resembled
faint tracings scratched on the wall of a cyclopean
blockhouse. To the two sereños of the mine on
patrol duty, strolling, carbine in hand, and watchful
eyes, in the shade of the trees lining the stream near
the bridge, Don Pépé, descending the path from
beetle.
With his air of aimless, insect-like going to and fro
upon the face of the rock, Don Pépé's figure kept on
descending steadily, and, when near the bottom, sank
at last behind the roofs of store-houses, forges, and
workshops. For a time the pair of sereños strolled
back and forth before the bridge, on which they had
stopped a horseman holding a large white envelope in
his hand. Then Don Pépé, emerging in the village
street from amongst the houses, not a stone's throw from
the frontier bridge, approached, striding in wide dark
trousers tucked into boots, a white linen jacket, sabre
at his side, and revolver at his belt. In this disturbed
time nothing could find the Señor Gobernador with
his boots off, as the saying is.
At a slight nod from one of the sereños, the man, a
messenger from the town, dismounted, and crossed the
bridge, leading his horse by the bridle.
Don Pépé received the letter from his other hand,
slapped his left side and his hips in succession, feeling
for his spectacle case. After settling the heavy silver-
mounted affair astride his nose, and adjusting it carefully
behind his ears, he opened the envelope, holding
it up at about a foot in front of his eyes. The paper he
pulled out contained some three lines of writing. He
looked at them for a long time. His grey moustache
moved slightly up and down, and the wrinkles, radiating
at the corners of his eyes, ran together. He nodded
serenely. "Bueno," he said. "There is no answer."
Then, in his quiet, kindly way, he engaged in a cautious
conversation with the man, who was willing to talk
cheerily, as if something lucky had happened to him
recently. He had seen from a distance Sotillo's infantry
camped along the shore of the harbour on each
to the buildings. The foreigners of the railway remained
shut up within the yards. They were no longer
anxious to shoot poor people. He cursed the foreigners;
then he reported Montero's entry and the rumours of
the town. The poor were going to be made rich now.
That was very good. More he did not know, and,
breaking into propitiatory smiles, he intimated that he
was hungry and thirsty. The old major directed him to
go to the alcalde of the first village. The man rode off,
and Don Pépé, striding slowly in the direction of a little
wooden belfry, looked over a hedge into a little garden,
and saw Father Romàn sitting in a white hammock slung
between two orange trees in front of the presbytery.
An enormous tamarind shaded with its dark foliage
the whole white framehouse. A young Indian girl with
long hair, big eyes, and small hands and feet, carried out
a wooden chair, while a thin old woman, crabbed and
vigilant, watched her all the time from the verandah.
Don Pépé sat down in the chair and lighted a cigar;
the priest drew in an immense quantity of snuff out
of the hollow of his palm. On his reddish-brown
face, worn, hollowed as if crumbled, the eyes, fresh
and candid, sparkled like two black diamonds.
Don Pépé, in a mild and humorous voice, informed
Father Romàn that Pedrito Montero, by the hand of
Señor Fuentes, had asked him on what terms he would
surrender the mine in proper working order to a legally
constituted commission of patriotic citizens, escorted
by a small military force. The priest cast his eyes up
to heaven. However, Don Pépé continued, the mozo
who brought the letter said that Don Carlos Gould
was alive, and so far unmolested.
Father Romàn expressed in a few words his thankfulness
at hearing of the Señor Administrador's safety.
The hour of oration had gone by in the silvery ringing
of a bell in the little belfry. The belt of forest
closing the entrance of the valley stood like a screen
between the low sun and the street of the village. At
the other end of the rocky gorge, between the walls of
basalt and granite, a forest-clad mountain, hiding all
the range from the San Tomé dwellers, rose steeply,
lighted up and leafy to the very top. Three small rosy
clouds hung motionless overhead in the great depth
of blue. Knots of people sat in the street between the
wattled huts. Before the casa of the alcalde, the foremen
of the night-shift, already assembled to lead their
men, squatted on the ground in a circle of leather skull-
caps, and, bowing their bronze backs, were passing
round the gourd of maté. The mozo from the town,
having fastened his horse to a wooden post before
the door, was telling them the news of Sulaco as the
blackened gourd of the decoction passed from hand to
hand. The grave alcalde himself, in a white waistcloth
and a flowered chintz gown with sleeves, open wide upon
his naked stout person with an effect of a gaudy bathing
robe, stood by, wearing a rough beaver hat at the back
of his head, and grasping a tall staff with a silver knob
in his hand. These insignia of his dignity had been
conferred upon him by the Administration of the mine,
the fountain of honour, of prosperity, and peace. He
had been one of the first immigrants into this valley;
his sons and sons-in-law worked within the mountain
which seemed with its treasures to pour down the
thundering ore shoots of the upper mesa, the gifts of
well-being, security, and justice upon the toilers. He
listened to the news from the town with curiosity
and indifference, as if concerning another world than
his own. And it was true that they appeared to
him so. In a very few years the sense of belonging
in these harassed, half-wild Indians. They were proud
of, and attached to, the mine. It had secured their
confidence and belief. They invested it with a protecting
and invincible virtue as though it were a fetish
made by their own hands, for they were ignorant, and
in other respects did not differ appreciably from the
rest of mankind which puts infinite trust in its own
creations. It never entered the alcalde's head that
the mine could fail in its protection and force. Politics
were good enough for the people of the town and the
Campo. His yellow, round face, with wide nostrils,
and motionless in expression, resembled a fierce full
moon. He listened to the excited vapourings of the
mozo without misgivings, without surprise, without
any active sentiment whatever.
Padre Romàn sat dejectedly balancing himself, his
feet just touching the ground, his hands gripping the
edge of the hammock. With less confidence, but as
ignorant as his flock, he asked the major what did he
think was going to happen now.
Don Pépé, bolt upright in the chair, folded his hands
peacefully on the hilt of his sword, standing perpendicular
between his thighs, and answered that he did not
know. The mine could be defended against any force
likely to be sent to take possession. On the other hand,
from the arid character of the valley, when the regular
supplies from the Campo had been cut off, the population
of the three villages could be starved into submission.
Don Pépé exposed these contingencies with
serenity to Father Romàn, who, as an old campaigner,
was able to understand the reasoning of a military man.
They talked with simplicity and directness. Father
Romàn was saddened at the idea of his flock being
scattered or else enslaved. He had no illusions as to
of political atrocities, which seemed to him
fatal and unavoidable in the life of a State. The working
of the usual public institutions presented itself to
him most distinctly as a series of calamities overtaking
private individuals and flowing logically from each other
through hate, revenge, folly, and rapacity, as though
they had been part of a divine dispensation. Father
Romàn's clear-sightedness was served by an uninformed
intelligence; but his heart, preserving its tenderness
amongst scenes of carnage, spoliation, and violence,
abhorred these calamities the more as his association
with the victims was closer. He entertained towards
the Indians of the valley feelings of paternal scorn.
He had been marrying, baptizing, confessing, absolving,
and burying the workers of the San Tomé mine with
dignity and unction for five years or more; and he believed
in the sacredness of these ministrations, which
made them his own in a spiritual sense. They were
dear to his sacerdotal supremacy. Mrs. Gould's earnest
interest in the concerns of these people enhanced
their importance in the priest's eyes, because it really
augmented his own. When talking over with her the
innumerable Marias and Brigidas of the villages, he felt
his own humanity expand. Padre Romàn was incapable
of fanaticism to an almost reprehensible degree.
The English señora was evidently a heretic; but at the
same time she seemed to him wonderful and angelic.
Whenever that confused state of his feelings occurred
to him, while strolling, for instance, his breviary under
his arm, in the wide shade of the tamarind, he would
stop short to inhale with a strong snuffling noise a large
quantity of snuff, and shake his head profoundly. At
the thought of what might befall the illustrious señora
presently, he became gradually overcome with dismay.
lost his serenity for a moment. He leaned forward
stiffly.
"Listen, Padre. The very fact that those thieving
macaques in Sulaco are trying to find out the price of my
honour proves that Señor Don Carlos and all in the Casa
Gould are safe. As to my honour, that also is safe, as
every man, woman, and child knows. But the negro
Liberals who have snatched the town by surprise do not
know that. Bueno. Let them sit and wait. While
they wait they can do no harm."
And he regained his composure. He regained it
easily, because whatever happened his honour of an old
officer of Paez was safe. He had promised Charles
Gould that at the approach of an armed force he would
defend the gorge just long enough to give himself time
to destroy scientifically the whole plant, buildings, and
workshops of the mine with heavy charges of dynamite;
block with ruins the main tunnel, break down the pathways,
blow up the dam of the water-power, shatter
the famous Gould Concession into fragments, flying
sky high out of a horrified world. The mine had got
hold of Charles Gould with a grip as deadly as ever
it had laid upon his father. But this extreme resolution
had seemed to Don Pépé the most natural thing in the
world. His measures had been taken with judgment.
Everything was prepared with a careful completeness.
And Don Pépé folded his hands pacifically on his
sword hilt, and nodded at the priest. In his excitement,
Father Romàn had flung snuff in handfuls at his
face, and, all besmeared with tobacco, round-eyed, and
beside himself, had got out of the hammock to walk
about, uttering exclamations.
Don Pépé stroked his grey and pendant moustache,
whose fine ends hung far below the clean-cut line
reputation.
"So, Padre, I don't know what will happen. But I
know that as long as I am here Don Carlos can speak to
that macaque, Pedrito Montero, and threaten the destruction
of the mine with perfect assurance that he will
be taken seriously. For people know me."
He began to turn the cigar in his lips a little nervously,
and went on —
"But that is talk — good for the politicos. I am a
military man. I do not know what may happen. But
I know what ought to be done — the mine should march
upon the town with guns, axes, knives tied up to sticks
— por Dios. That is what should be done. Only —"
His folded hands twitched on the hilt. The cigar
turned faster in the corner of his lips.
"And who should lead but I? Unfortunately — observe
— I have given my word of honour to Don Carlos
not to let the mine fall into the hands of these thieves.
In war — you know this, Padre — the fate of battles is
uncertain, and whom could I leave here to act for me
in case of defeat? The explosives are ready. But it
would require a man of high honour, of intelligence, of
judgment, of courage, to carry out the prepared destruction.
Somebody I can trust with my honour as I
can trust myself. Another old officer of Paez, for instance.
Or — or — perhaps one of Paez's old chaplains
would do."
He got up, long, lank, upright, hard, with his martial
moustache and the bony structure of his face, from which
the glance of the sunken eyes seemed to transfix the
priest, who stood still, an empty wooden snuff-box held
upside down in his hand, and glared back, speechless,
at the governor of the mine.
| CHAPTER SIX Nostromo: a Tale of the Seaboard / Joseph Conrad | |