The big office desk was pushed on one side, and Joanna came with
her little shabby trunk and with her child and took possession in

her dreamy, slack, half-asleep way; took possession of the dust,
dirt, and squalor, where she appeared naturally at home, where

she dragged a melancholy and dull existence; an existence made up
of sad remorse and frightened hope, amongst the hopeless

disorder--the senseless and vain decay of all these emblems of
civilized commerce. Bits of white stuff; rags yellow, pink,

blue: rags limp, brilliant and soiled, trailed on the floor, lay
on the desk amongst the sombre covers of books soiled, grimy, but

stiff-backed, in virtue, perhaps, of their European origin. The
biggest set of bookshelves was partlyhidden by a petticoat, the

waistband of which was caught upon the back of a slender book
pulled a little out of the row so as to make an improvised

clothespeg. The folding canvas bedstead stood nearly in the
middle of the room, stood anyhow, parallel to no wall, as if it

had been, in the process of transportation to some remote place,
dropped casually there by tired bearers. And on the tumbled

blankets that lay in a disordered heap on its edge, Joanna sat
almost all day with her stockingless feet upon one of the bed

pillows that were somehow always kicking about the floor. She
sat there, vaguely tormented at times by the thought of her

absent husband, but most of the time thinking tearfully of
nothing at all, looking with swimming eyes at her little son--at

the big-headed, pasty-faced, and sickly Louis Willems--who rolled
a glass inkstand, solid with dried ink, about the floor, and

tottered after it with the portentous gravity of demeanour and
absolute absorption by the business in hand that characterize the

pursuits of early childhood. Through the half-open shutter a ray
of sunlight, a ray merciless and crude, came into the room, beat

in the early morning upon the safe in the far-off corner, then,
travelling against the sun, cut at midday the big desk in two

with its solid and clean-edged brilliance; with its hot
brilliance in which a swarm of flies hovered in dancing flight

over some dirty plate forgotten there amongst yellow papers for
many a day. And towards the evening the cynical ray seemed to

cling to the raggedpetticoat, lingered on it with wicked
enjoyment of that misery it had exposed all day; lingered on the

corner of the dusty bookshelf, in a red glow intense and mocking,
till it was suddenly snatched by the setting sun out of the way

of the coming night. And the night entered the room. The night
abrupt, impenetrable and all-filling with its flood of darkness;

the night cool and merciful; the blind night that saw nothing,
but could hear the fretful whimpering of the child, the creak of

the bedstead, Joanna's deep sighs as she turned over, sleepless,
in the confused conviction of her wickedness, thinking of that

man masterful, fair-headed, and strong--a man hard perhaps, but
her husband; her clever and handsome husband to whom she had

acted so cruelly on the advice of bad people, if her own people;
and of her poor, dear, deceived mother.

To Almayer, Joanna's presence was a constant worry, a worry
unobtrusive yet intolerable; a constant, but mostly mute, warning

of possible danger. In view of the absurdsoftness of Lingard's
heart, every one in whom Lingard manifested the slightest

interest was to Almayer a natural enemy. He was quite alive to
that feeling, and in the intimacy of the secret intercourse with

his inner self had often congratulated himself upon his own
wide-awake comprehension of his position. In that way, and

impelled by that motive, Almayer had hated many and various
persons at various times. But he never had hated and feared

anybody so much as he did hate and fear Willems. Even after
Willems' treachery, which seemed to remove him beyond the pale of

all human sympathy, Almayer mistrusted the situation and groaned
in spirit every time he caught sight of Joanna.

He saw her very seldom in the daytime. But in the short and
opal-tinted twilights, or in the azure dusk of starry evenings,

he often saw, before he slept, the slender and tall figure
trailing to and fro the ragged tail of its white gown over the

dried mud of the riverside in front of the house. Once or twice
when he sat late on the verandah, with his feet upon the deal

table on a level with the lamp, reading the seven months' old
copy of the North China Herald, brought by Lingard, he heard the

stairs creak, and, looking round the paper, he saw her frail and
meagre form rise step by step and toil across the verandah,

carrying with difficulty the big, fat child, whose head, lying on
the mother's bony shoulder, seemed of the same size as Joanna's

own. Several times she had assailed him with tearful clamour or
mad entreaties: asking about her husband, wanting to know where

he was, when he would be back; and ending every such outburst
with despairing and incoherent self-reproaches that were

absolutely incomprehensible to Almayer. On one or two occasions
she had overwhelmed her host with vituperative abuse, making him

responsible for her husband's absence. Those scenes, begun
without any warning, ended abruptly in a sobbing flight and a

bang of the door; stirred the house with a sudden, a fierce, and
an evanescent disturbance; like those inexplicable whirlwinds

that rise, run, and vanish without apparent cause upon the
sun-scorched dead level of arid and lamentable plains.

But to-night the house was quiet, deadly quiet, while Almayer
stood still, watching that delicate balance where he was weighing

all his chances: Joanna's intelligence, Lingard's credulity,
Willems' recklessaudacity, desire to escape, readiness to seize

an unexpected opportunity. He weighed, anxious and attentive,
his fears and his desires against the tremendous risk of a

quarrel with Lingard. . . . Yes. Lingard would be angry.
Lingard might suspect him of some connivance in his prisoner's

escape--but surely he would not quarrel with him--Almayer--about
those people once they were gone--gone to the devil in their own

way. And then he had hold of Lingard through the little girl.
Good. What an annoyance! A prisoner! As if one could keep him

in there. He was bound to get away some time or other. Of
course. A situation like that can't last. vAnybody could see

that. Lingard's eccentricity passed all bounds. You may kill a
man, but you mustn't torture him. It was almost criminal. It

caused worry, trouble, and unpleasantness. . . . Almayer for a
moment felt very angry with Lingard. He made him responsible for

the anguish he suffered from, for the anguish of doubt and fear;
for compelling him--the practical and innocent Almayer--to such

painful efforts of mind in order to find out some issue for
absurd situations created by the unreasonable sentimentality of

Lingard's unpractical impulses.
"Now if the fellow were dead it would be all right," said Almayer

to the verandah.
He stirred a little, and scratching his nose thoughtfully,

revelled in a short flight of fancy, showing him his own image
crouching in a big boat, that floated arrested--say fifty yards

off--abreast of Willems' landing-place. In the bottom of the
boat there was a gun. A loaded gun. One of the boatmen would

shout, and Willems would answer--from the bushes.c The rascal
would be suspicious. Of course. Then the man would wave a piece

of paper urging Willems to come to the landing-place and receive
an important message. "From the Rajah Laut" the man would yell

as the boat edged in-shore, and that would fetch Willems out.
Wouldn't it? Rather! And Almayer saw himself jumping up at the

right moment, taking aim, pulling the trigger--and Willems
tumbling over, his head in the water--the swine!

He seemed to hear the report of the shot. It made him thrill
from head to foot where he stood. . . . How simple! . . .

Unfortunate . . . Lingard . . . He sighed, shook his head.
Pity. Couldn't be done. And couldn't leave him there either!

Suppose the Arabs were to get hold of him again--for instance to
lead an expedition up the river! Goodness only knows what harm

would come of it. . . .
The balance was at rest now and inclining to the side of

immediate action. Almayer walked to the door, walked up very
close to it, knocked loudly, and turned his head away, looking

frightened for a moment at what he had done. After waiting for a
while he put his ear against the panel and listened. Nothing.

He composed his features into an agreeable expression while he
stood listening and thinking to himself: I hear her. Crying.