Transcribed from the 1915 T. Fisher Unwin Ltd. edition ,email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
Qui de nous n’a eu sa terre promise, son jour d’extaseet sa fin en exil?—Amiel.
LONDON: T. FISHER UNWIN, LTD.
adelphi terrace
First Edition . . . 1895
Second Impression, 1907
Third ,, 1914
Fourth ,, 1915
To the memory of T. B.
“Kaspar! Makan!”
The well-known shrill voice startled Almayer from his dream of splendidfuture into the unpleasant realities of the present hour. An unpleasantvoice too. He had heard it for many years, and with every yearhe liked it less. No matter; there would be an end to all thissoon.
He shuffled uneasily, but took no further notice of the call. Leaning with both his elbows on the balustrade of the verandah, he wenton looking fixedly at the great river that flowed—indifferentand hurried—before his eyes. He liked to look at it aboutthe time of sunset; perhaps because at that time the sinking sun wouldspread a glowing gold tinge on the waters of the Pantai, and Almayer’sthoughts were often busy with gold; gold he had failed to secure; goldthe others had secured—dishonestly, of course—or gold hemeant to secure yet, through his own honest exertions, for himself andNina. He absorbed himself in his dream of wealth and power awayfrom this coast where he had dwelt for so many years, forgetting thebitterness of toil and strife in the vision of a great and splendidreward. They would live in Europe, he and his daughter. They would be rich and respected. Nobody would think of her mixedblood in the presence of her great beauty and of his immense wealth. Witnessing her triumphs he would grow young again, he would forget thetwenty-five years of heart-breaking struggle on this coast where hefelt like a prisoner. All this was nearly within his reach. Let only Dain return! And return soon he must—in his owninterest, for his own share. He was now more than a week late! Perhaps he would return to-night. Such were Almayer’s thoughtsas, standing on the verandah of his new but already decaying house—thatlast failure of his life—he looked on the broad river. Therewas no tinge of gold on it this evening, for it had been swollen bythe rains, and rolled an angry and muddy flood under his inattentiveeyes, carrying small drift-wood and big dead logs, and whole uprootedtrees with branches and foliage, amongst which the water swirled androared angrily.
One of those drifting trees grounded on the shelving shore, justby the house, and Almayer, neglecting his dream, watched it with languidinterest. The tree swung slowly round, amid the hiss and foamof the water, and soon getting free of the obstruction began to movedown stream again, rolling slowly over, raising upwards a long, denudedbranch, like a hand lifted in mute appeal to heaven against the river’sbrutal and unnecessary violence. Almayer’s interest in thefate of that tree increased rapidly. He leaned over to see ifit would clear the low point below. It did; then he drew back,thinking that now its course was free down to the sea, and he enviedthe lot of that inanimate thing now growing small and indistinct inthe deepening darkness. As he lost sight of it altogether he beganto wonder how far out to sea it would drift. Would the currentcarry it north or south? South, probably, till it drifted in sightof Celebes, as far as Macassar, perhaps!
Macassar! Almayer’s quickened fancy distanced the treeon its imaginary voyage, but his memory lagging behind some twenty yearsor more in point of time saw a young and slim Alm