desolation. And everywhere we watched, we listened, we asked. We asked
traders, robbers, white men. We heard jeers, mockery, threats--words of
wonder and words of contempt. We never knew rest; we never thought of
home, for our work was not done. A year passed, then another. I ceased
to count the number of nights, of moons, of years. I watched over
Matara. He had my last handful of rice; if there was water enough for
one he drank it; I covered him up when he shivered with cold; and when
the hot sickness came upon him I sat sleepless through many nights and
fanned his face. He was a fierce man, and my friend. He spoke of her
with fury in the daytime, with sorrow in the dark; he remembered her in
health, in sickness. I said nothing; but I saw her every day--always!
At first I saw only her head, as of a woman walking in the low mist on
a river bank. Then she sat by our fire. I saw her! I looked at her! She
had tender eyes and a ravishing face. I murmured to her in the night.
Matara said sleepily sometimes, 'To whom are you talking? Who is there?'
I answered quickly, 'No one' . . . It was a lie! She never left me. She
shared the warmth of our fire, she sat on my couch of leaves, she swam
on the sea to follow me. . . . I saw her! . . . I tell you I saw her
long black hair spread behind her upon the moonlit water as she struck
out with bare arms by the side of a swift prau. She was beautiful, she
was faithful, and in the silence of foreign countries she spoke to me
very low in the language of my people. No one saw her; no one heard her;
she was mine only! In daylight she moved with a swaying walk before me
upon the weary paths; her figure was straight and flexible like the stem
of a slender tree; the heels of her feet were round and polished like
shells of eggs; with her round arm she made signs. At night she looked
into my face. And she was sad! Her eyes were tender and frightened; her
voice soft and pleading. Once I murmured to her, 'You shall not die,'
and she smiled . . . ever after she smiled! . . . She gave me courage to
bear weariness and hardships. Those were times of pain, and she soothed