What Became of the White Savage (13 page)

The amorous pair repaired to Bill’s straw mattress where they embarked upon their homage, if not to Venus, assuredly to Eros. In the throes of passion the linen maid happened to look up and was aghast to see Narcisse standing at the window. Arms folded on the window ledge, he was smiling as he gazed upon the wanton spectacle of the two servants cavorting in the heat of the afternoon.

The girl screamed. Bill was stunned and then enraged at having been thus interrupted. He jumped up, ran to the window and delivered a violent punch to Narcisse, who was taken completely by surprise and had no chance to evade the blow. Bill adjusted his dress and ran into the garden ready for a fight, an enterprise that met with little success, as I have already described.

Perhaps you consider this tawdry anecdote unworthy of your attention, but I urge you to allow me to persuade you otherwise.

Both Bill and the linen maid, when questioned separately, gave me the same description of Narcisse watching them: he was smiling. Not with the lascivious grin of a voyeur, savouring a forbidden spectacle, and risking being discovered and shamed; but with the candid smile of one who is witnessing an agreeable display, enjoying it with the participants. Narcisse is without any sense of shame.

I tried to explain to him what had transpired. Beneath his right eye, he had an impressive bruise, and he was fully aware that my servant had struck him because he had seen him with the linen maid. But he was at a loss to understand why this should be so. Such was the substance of my uncomfortable exchange with Narcisse. He held no grudge against Bill, and once again, he was baffled by our customs but accepted them with equanimity.

This discovery seems to me to be of major importance. In Narcisse’s tribe, men and women must make no attempt to conceal their amorous activities, displaying their passion for all to see. Our temple of Venus is within our own house, between the sheets in the bedchamber where no candle burns. Even persons of the lowest order such as Bill and the linen maid, disporting themselves on a straw mattress in the full light of day, conceal themselves behind closed doors, away from prying eyes. Only with the greatest embarrassment can one imagine being watched in such circumstances; and who but the most inexplicably depraved would choose to watch? A sense of decorum has prevailed throughout the ages in all climes. And yet none of this has any meaning for Narcisse whose innocence has allowed me to glimpse something about which I would never have thought to ask him. As a result of Bill’s corruption, scheming and subsequent rage, Narcisse has imparted to me a precious gem of information.

Alas, such innocence is lost as soon as it comes to light. If I had so wished, I might have staged a repetition of this scene. I could easily have offered a soldier and a girl from the port a few coins in exchange for allowing themselves to be surprised in a similar situation. But I had no desire to play the matchmaker for such a singular enterprise, nor would I be able to draw any conclusions from Narcisse’s reaction to the charade. He will have learnt from the blow delivered by Bill and will think twice before watching at the window again. Never again shall that benign look of innocence be seen on his face, that smile beheld only by the linen maid and her paramour.

Narcisse is changing. With each day that passes, he comes closer to us and moves further away from the depths of the Australian bush. No sooner has he perceived our customs than he adapts to them. The breeches he wears, the words he succeeds in saying, the relationship he has established with me, all these bring him closer to us while hiding within him that which I seek to learn.

As I ponder this incident, I see that Narcisse bears a message. But like words traced with a fingertip on a pane of glass, the message vanishes as the mist evaporates from the glass. His secrets are lost forever. I must therefore make a record of all that I learn, for it will surely all melt away. With every day that passes, Narcisse will lose something of his purity – but not of his own doing. A chemist can repeat the same experiment a hundred times in order to validate his results. Narcisse’s voyage back into our world will happen only once, and in one direction only. To record that journey will be my duty.

With such musings, I was able to counter the disharmony in my household and bring calm to my spirit. I instructed Bill and the linen maid to leave the premises and to depart with the dinghy: I could no longer retain in my service a convict who had raised his hand against my countryman.

There was one further lesson to be derived from this incident. When Bill had struck out at Narcisse the second time, Narcisse had parried the blows, but made no attempt to deliver any of his own. He had reacted spontaneously as a Christian should: I grant that he did not turn the other cheek, in strict accordance with the Bible’s teaching, but he did demonstrate a forbearance of which few among us, having been struck once, would be capable. A dog bares its teeth when beaten, a child tries to scratch when scolded. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. To suppress the urge to return the attack and defend oneself only by evading blows requires exceptional mastery of the passions and the will.

But what does this mean? Must we recognise as civilised the primitive customs that Narcisse manifests at every moment? This cannot be. And yet, as I write these lines this evening, I do not know what to make of his gentle nature. One conclusion cannot be avoided. In this distasteful altercation, Narcisse, the white savage, showed himself to be more civilised than Bill, the convict.

Where will this conclusion lead me? I believe the time has come to take to the seas once more.

I remain your faithful servant…

When he awoke the next morning, the old woman was no longer lying beside him, the storm had passed and with it, his fever. He still felt weak, but his head was clear, his body calmed. Hunger gnawed at him again and he felt strangely reassured by the return of the familiar pangs. The throbbing pains in his ear had gone.

He stood up steadily, no longer shaking with fever, and took a few steps. Two women walked past and he instinctively brought his hands to his groin, conscious once more of his nakedness. The dust and earth the old woman had covered him with had mingled with the sweat from his fever and hardened to form a crust that hindered his movements. His face itched from the stubble that covered his cheeks and chin. He’d never gone so long without shaving or trimming his moustache. He’d been so proud of his moustache, tending it carefully whenever time allowed, relishing the swash-buckling air it gave him. And now, it was probably indistinguishable from the rest of his unshaven beard.

He reached the pond and immersed himself in water up to his waist, doing what he could to clean himself up. The cool sensation of the water was soothing, and he scrubbed at himself for a long time with his bare hands, cleaning himself thoroughly as if to erase the past. As he went through the motions unthinkingly, his hand brushed his left ear. With a shock, he realised that something was wrong. He felt his other ear whilst searching in vain for his reflection in the ripples on the surface of the water. With no mirror of any kind, he had only his sense of touch to rely on. His fingertips left him with no doubt: his left earlobe had been almost completely torn off.

They had mutilated him. For the sake of his gilt earring, the tribesmen had done this to him. And yet, the old woman had taken care of him. She was one of the tribe too, and she had nursed him and watched over him. She’d kept him warm, given him food and water. Her incantations and fumigations may not have had much effect, but there was no doubt that she had done all she could to tend his wound and calm his fever. But there had been no sign of compassion or pity for him in her ministrations. It was as if she were merely fulfilling a responsibility that fell to her; there was no emotion involved. But through her, the tribe was watching out for his health, in its own way. They did not wish to harm him – or at least not right away. If they were keeping him alive to eat him, they’d have to fatten him up a bit to be able to feast on him. Narcisse had never had much fat on him and now he was gaunt from hunger and sickness. And there was always a chance, he told himself, that they didn’t eat human flesh after all. There was hope.

He walked slowly over to the fire and sat down. An animal the size of a calf had been cooked there the night before, while he’d been trembling with cold as the storm raged. A few bones lay scattered around in the sand, ribs with scraps of meat still clinging to them. The old man he’d decided to call Chief was dozing next to the fire. Narcisse picked up a bone, brushed off some of the dust and began to eat. The meat was stringy and cold and tasted strongly of smoke. He scraped and gnawed on the bone and managed to tear off all the bits of sinewy flesh. A young boy squatted down next to him and watched him, not saying a word.

Narcisse spent most of the morning eating. After drinking from a discarded gourd, he slept in the shade all afternoon. He listened to the chanting around the fire in the evening, and ate again when the old woman served him. That night, for the first time since he’d been abandoned, he felt a little less unhappy.

The next morning, as the tribe rose in their usual way, getting up one by one as they awoke in their own time, Narcisse noticed a change in their activities. Instead of spending the morning playing games, going for walks, having naps, they were busy and active. They all seemed to have a task to perform and were calmly going about their work. But what was it all for? He watched them gathering into small groups for quick discussions; what were they talking about? And why did that branch have to be moved? Why were they weaving vines into baskets, covering the dead coals with stones?

Before the sun was at its highest, the women and the children formed into a group. The old woman walked up to Narcisse and held out two water pouches, signalling to him that he was to carry them. He hesitated for a moment and eventually took hold of them. They were not heavy, but there were no handles or cords to hold them and he found it awkward. What was he doing agreeing to carry them? And who was she to give him orders?

The old woman rejoined the group as they started to move deeper into the forest, the adolescents following behind the women. No one made any effort to communicate with him, and Narcisse was left wondering what he was supposed to do.

Looking at the now almost deserted encampment, he thought how dismal it seemed. The makeshift sleeping shelters were scarcely visible, the branches used to build them almost indistinguishable from the surrounding vegetation. And now the men too were coming together into a group, each one of them carrying something: stones, a basket, an animal skin, a water gourd. From the clearing could be heard the sound of melancholy chanting.

One by one they began to walk towards the forest in the same direction as the women and children, setting off at regular intervals in seemingly random order. The tribe was abandoning the encampment by the water hole.

Should he stay here? He knew he wouldn’t survive by himself, that he’d soon starve to death. And he didn’t have the strength to endure the crushing solitude of those first few days again. He was better off in the company of these people, in spite of the absurd sufferings and the pain they’d inflicted on him. Better that than face the certainty of his imminent demise alone in this barren forest.

Picking up the two gourds the old woman had entrusted to him, he started off in the same direction as the group. He stopped at the edge of the forest and turned around. Kermarec and Wanderer still hadn’t left. Were they waiting to bring up the rear? Were they making sure no one was left behind?

The whole tribe was leaving. They had stayed here at the encampment for the four days he’d been in the grip of the fever, and they’d waited another day while he recovered his strength. Did this mean they’d delayed their departure on his account? Had they been waiting until he was back on his feet?

He began to walk, carrying the two water pouches. They were probably made from the organs of some animal, the bladder most likely. Helping the tribe seemed like the natural thing to do: they were feeding him, it was only right that he should make himself useful. Was this what his future held in store for him? Being a porter, a slave for a pack of savages? And his life at sea? His decision to become a sailor had been easily arrived at. As the second son, he could not count on work in the family workshop. He could go to sea, or spend his life in the village where he was born, working as a farmhand, never marrying. The choice had been easy; he’d opted for the seafaring life. And now here he was, a servant, a water-carrier for an old woman. Addressing the trees around him, he murmured: “I am Narcisse Pelletier, seaman on the schooner
Saint-Paul
.”

The forest was cool, even in the middle of the day. He tried to work out which direction they were moving in. They seemed to be walking more or less towards the north, as he’d done the previous week with the old woman. He’d never really paid attention to the maps on board the
Saint-Paul
, but he could just about remember that the coastline ran north-south for a considerable distance. So at least their route was not taking them further away from the sea.

The group of men, with Narcisse following them, caught up with the women and moved along at their pace. There was no path, no trail to guide their steps.

They stopped in a scarcely distinguishable valley where the bushes grew a bit thicker, and spent the hottest part of the day in the welcome shade. The exhausted children drank from the water pouches and fell asleep immediately.

In the mid-afternoon, they set off again, the men and younger adults moving gradually ahead of the women. They carried on walking in the same direction until the evening when they arrived at a low hill and stopped. Some of the men spread out in the forest to hunt, while the young people arranged branches for the shelters and prepared the fire. After a while, the hunters came straggling back, some with game and others, empty-handed.

The meal was short, served in the same manner as before. The old woman brought Narcisse a roasted bird complete with its feathers, which he pulled to pieces carefully before sucking on the bones. The walk had done him good, but his appetite had returned with full force since his recovery and this meagre meal did little to appease his hunger. Afterwards, he spent a long time massaging his left ear before he closed his eyes and dropped off to sleep.