Heart of Darkness Page 5
behind me! There was nothing but that wretched,
old, mangled steamboat I was leaning against, while
he talked fluently about 'the necessity for every man
to get on.' 'And when one comes out here, you con-
ceive, it is not to gaze at the moon.' Mr. Kurtz was a
'universal genius,' but even a genius would find it
easier to work with 'adequate tools -- intelligent men.'
He did not make bricks -- why, there was a physical
impossibility in the way -- as I was well aware; and if
he did secretarial work for the manager, it was be-
cause 'no sensible man rejects wantonly the confidence
of his superiors.' Did I see it? I saw it. What more did
I want? What I really wanted was rivets, by heaven!
Rivets. To get on with the work -- to stop the hole.
Rivets I wanted. There were cases of them down at
the coast cases piled up -- burst -- split! You kicked
a loose rivet at every second step in that station-yard
on the hillside. Rivets had rolled into the grove of
death. You could fill your pockets with rivets for the
trouble of stooping down -- and there wasn't one rivet
to be found where it was wanted. We had plates that
would to, but nothing to fasten them with. And every
week the messenger, a lone negro, letterbag on shoul-
der and staff in hand, left our station for the coast.
And several times a week a coast caravan came in with
trade goods -- ghastly glazed calico that made you
shudder only to look at it, glass beads value about a
penny a quart, confounded spotted cotton handker-
chiefs. And no rivets. Three carriers could have
brought all that was wanted to set that steamboat
afloat.
"He was becoming confidential now, but I fancy my
unresponsive attitude must have exasperated him at
last, for he judged it necessary to inform me he feared
neither God nor devil, let alone any mere man. I said
I could see that very well, but what I wanted was a
certain quantity of rivets -- and rivets were what really
Mr. Kurtz wanted, if he had only known it. Now
letters went to the coast every week.... 'My dear
sir,' he cried, 'I write from dictation.' I demanded
rivets. There was a way -- for an intelligent man. He
changed his manner; became very cold, and suddenly
began to talk about a hippopotamus; wondered
whether sleeping on board the steamer (I stuck to
my salvage night and day) I wasn't disturbed. There
was an old hippo that had the bad habit of getting out
on the bank and roaming at night over the station
grounds. The pilgrims used to turn out in a body and
empty every rifle they could lay hands on at him.
Some even had sat up o' nights for him. All this
energy was wasted, though. 'That animal has a
charmed life,' he said; 'but you can say this only of
brutes in this country. No man -- you apprehend me?
-- no man here bears a charmed life.' He stood there
for a moment in the moonlight with his delicate
hooked nose set a little askew, and his mica eyes
glittering without a wink, then, with a curt Good-
night, he strode off. I could see he was disturbed and
considerably puzzled, which made me feel more hope-
ful than I had been for days. It was a great comfort
to turn from that chap to my influential friend, the
battered, twisted, ruined, tin-pot steamboat. I clam-
bered on board. She rang under my feet like an empty
Huntley & Palmer biscuit-tin kicked along a gutter;
she was nothing so solid in make, and rather less pretty
in shape, but I had expended enough hard work on
her to make me love her. No influential friend would
have served me better. She had given me a chance to
come out a bit -- to find out what I could do. No, I
don't like work. I had rather laze about and think of
all the fine things that can be done. I don't like work
-- no man does -- but I like what is in the work -- the
chance to find yourself. Your own reality -- for your-
self, not for others -- what no other man can ever
know. They can only see the mere show, and never
can tell what it really means.
"I was not surprised to see somebody sitting aft, on
the deck, with his legs dangling over the mud. You
see I rather chummed with the few mechanics there
were in that station, whom the other pilgrims natur-
ally despised -- on account of their imperfect manners,
I suppose. This was the foreman -- a boiler-maker by
trade -- a good worker. He was a lank, bony, yellow-
faced man, with big intense eyes. His aspect was
worried, and his head was as bald as the palm of my
hand; but his hair in falling seemed to have stuck to
his chin, and had prospered in the new locality, for
his beard hung down to his waist. He was a widower
with six young children (he had left them in charge
of a sister of his to come out there), and the passion of
his life was pigeon-flying. He was an enthusiast and
a connoisseur. He would rave about pigeons. After
work hours he used sometimes to come over from his
hut for a talk about his children and his pigeons; at
work, when he had to crawl in the mud under the
bottom of the steamboat, he would tie up that beard
of his in a kind of white serviette he brought for the
purpose. It had loops to go over his ears. In the eve-
ning he could be seen squatted on the bank rinsing that
wrapper in the creek with great care, then spreading
it solemnly on a bush to dry.
"I slapped him on the back and shouted, 'We shall
have rivets!' He scrambled to his feet exclaiming,
'No! Rivets!' as though he couldn't believe his ears.
Then in a low voice, 'You . . . eh?' I don't know
why we behaved like lunatics. I put my finger to the
side of my nose and nodded mysteriously. 'Good for
you!' he cried, snapped his fingers above his head,
lifting one foot. I tried a jig. We capered on the iron
deck. A frightful clatter came out of that hulk, and
the virgin forest on the other bank of the creek sent
it back in a thundering roll upon the sleeping station.
It must have made some of the pilgrims sit up in their
hovels. A dark figure obscured the lighted doorway
of the manager's hut, vanished, then, a second or
so after, the doorway itself vanished, too. We stopped,
and the silence driven away by the stamping of our
feet flowed back again from the recesses of the land.
The great wall of vegetation, an exuberant and en-
tangled mass of trunks, branches, leaves, boughs, fes-
toons, motionless in the moonlight, was like a rioting
invasion of soundless life, a rolling wave of plants,
piled up, crested, ready to topple over the creek, to
sweep every little man of us out of his little existence.
And it moved not. A deadened burst of mighty
splashes and snorts reached us from afar, as though
an ichthyosaurus had been taking a bath of glitter in
reasonable tone, 'why shouldn't we get the rivets?'
Why not, indeed! I did not know of any reason why
we shouldn't. 'They'll come in three weeks,' I said,
confidently.
"But they didn't. Instead of rivets there came an
invasion, an infliction, a visitation. It came in sections
during the next three weeks, each section headed by
a donkey carrying a white man in new clothes and
tan shoes, bowing from that elevation right and left
to the impressed pilgrims. A quarrelsome band of
footsore sulky niggers trod on the heels of the don-
key; a lot of tents, campstools, tin boxes, white cases,
brown bales would be shot down in the court-yard,
and the air of mystery would deepen a little over the
muddle of the station. Five such instalments came,
with their absurd air of disorderly flight with the
loot of innumerable outfit shops and provision stores,
that, one would think, they were lugging, after a
raid, into the wilderness for equitable division. It was
an inextricable mess of things decent in themselves
but that human folly made look like the spoils of
thieving.
"This devoted band called itself the Eldorado
Exploring Expedition, and I believe they were sworn
to secrecy. Their talk, however, was the talk of sordid
buccaneers: it was reckless without hardihood, greedy
without audacity, and cruel without courage; there
was not an atom of foresight or of serious intention in
the whole batch of them, and they did not seem aware
these things are wanted for the work of the world.
To tear treasure out of the bowels of the land was
their desire, with no more moral purpose at the back
of it than there is in burglars breaking into a safe.
Who paid the expenses of the noble enterprise I don't
know; but the uncle of our manager was leader of
that lot.
"In exterior he resembled a butcher in a poor neigh-
bourhood, and his eyes had a look of sleepy cunning.
He carried his fat paunch with ostentation on his
short legs, and during the time his gang infested the
station spoke to no one but his nephew. You could
see these two roaming about all day long with their
heads close together in an everlasting confab.
"I had given up worrying myself about the rivets.
One's capacity for that kind of folly is more limited
than you would suppose. I said Hang! -- and let
things slide. I had plenty of time for meditation, and
now and then I would give some thought to Kurtz.
I wasn't very interested in him. No. Still, I was curious
to see whether this man, who had come out equipped
with moral ideas of some sort, would climb to the top
after all and how he would set about his work when
there."
II
"One evening as I was lying flat on the deck of my
steamboat, I heard voices approaching -- and there
were the nephew and the uncle strolling along the
bank. I laid my head on my arm again, and had nearly
lost myself in a doze, when somebody said in my ear,
as it were: 'I am as harmless as a little child, but I
don't like to be dictated to. Am I the manager -- or am
I not? I was ordered to send him there. It's incred-
ible.'. . . I became aware that the two were standing
on the shore alongside the forepart of the steamboat,
just below my head. I did not move; it did not occur
to me to move: I was sleepy. 'It is unpleasant,'
grunted the uncle. 'He has asked the Administration
to be sent there,' said the other, 'with the idea of show-
ing what he could do; and I was instructed accord-
ingly. Look at the influence that man must have. Is
it not frightful?' They both agreed it was frightful,
then made several bizarre remarks: 'Make rain and
fine weather -- one man -- the Council -- by the nose' --
bits of absurd sentences that got the better of my
drowsiness, so that I had pretty near the whole of my
wits about me when the uncle said, 'The climate may
do away with this difficulty for you. Is he alone there?'
'Yes,' answered the manager; 'he sent his assistant
down the river with a note to me in these terms:
"Clear this poor devil out of the country, and don't
bother sending more of that sort. I had rather be
alone than have the kind of men you can dispose of
with me." It was more than a year ago. Can you im-
agine such impudence!' 'Anything since then?' asked
the other hoarsely. 'Ivory,' jerked the nephew; 'lots
of it -- prime sort -- lots -- most annoying, from him.'
'And with that?' questioned the heavy rumble. 'In-
voice,' was the reply fired out, so to speak. Then si-
lence. They had been talking about Kurtz.
"I was broad awake by this time, but, lying per-
fectly at ease, remained still, having no inducement to
change my position. 'How did that ivory come all
this way?' growled the elder man, who seemed very
vexed. The other explained that it had come with a
fleet of canoes in charge of an English half-caste
clerk Kurtz had with him; that Kurtz had apparently
intended to return himself, the station being by that
time bare of goods and stores, but after coming three
hundred miles, had suddenly decided to go back,
which he started to do alone in a small dugout with
four paddlers, leaving the half-caste to continue down
the river with the ivory. The two fellows there seemed
astounded at anybody attempting such a thing. They
were at a loss for an adequate motive. As to me, I
seemed to see Kurtz for the first time. It was a distinct
glimpse: the dugout, four paddling savages, and the
lone white man turning his back suddenly on the
headquarters, on relief, on thoughts of home -- per-
haps; setting his face towards the depths of the wil-
derness, towards his empty and desolate station. I
did not know the motive. Perhaps he was just simply
a fine fellow who stuck to his work for its own sake.
His name, you understand, had not been pronounced
once. He was 'that man.' The half caste, who, as far
as I could see, had conducted a difficult trip with great
prudence and pluck, was invariably alluded to as
'that scoundrel.' The 'scoundrel' had reported that
the 'man' had been very ill -- had recovered imper-
fectly.... The two below me moved away then a
few paces, and strolled back and forth at some little
distance. I heard: 'Military post -- doctor -- two hun-
dred miles -- quite alone now -- unavoidable delays --
nine months -- no news -- strange rumours.' They ap-
proached again, just as the manager was saying, 'No
one, as far as I know, unless a species of wandering
trader -- a pestilential fellow, snapping ivory from the
natives.' Who was it they were talking about now? I
gathered in snatches that thi
s was some man supposed
to be in Kurtz's district, and of whom the manager
did not approve. 'We will not be free from unfair
competition till one of these fellows is hanged for an
example,' he said. 'Certainly,' grunted the other; 'get
him hanged! Why not? Anything -- anything can be
done in this country. That's what I say; nobody here,
you understand, here, can endanger your position.
And why? You stand the climate -- you outlast them
all. The danger is in Europe; but there before I left
I took care to --' They moved off and whispered,
then their voices rose again. 'The extraordinary series
of delays is not my fault. I did my best.' The fat man
sighed. 'Very sad.' 'And the pestiferous absurdity of
his talk,' continued the other; 'he bothered me enough
when he was here. "Each station should be like a
beacon on the road towards better things, a centre for
trade of course, but also for humanizing, improving,
instructing." Conceive you -- that ass! And he wants
to be manager! No, it's --' Here he got choked by
excessive indignation, and I lifted my head the least
bit. I was surprised to see how near they were --
right under me. I could have spat upon their hats.
They were looking on the ground, absorbed in
thought. The manager was switching his leg with a
slender twig: his sagacious relative lifted his head.
'You have been well since you came out this time?' he
asked. The other gave a start. 'Who? I? Oh! Like a
charm -- like a charm. But the rest -- oh, my goodness!
All sick. They die so quick, too, that I haven't the
time to send them out of the country -- it's incredible!'
'H'm. Just so,' grunted the uncle. 'Ah! my boy, trust
to this -- I say, trust to this.' I saw him extend his
short flipper of an arm for a gesture that took in the
forest, the creek, the mud, the river -- seemed to
beckon with a dishonouring flourish before the sunlit
face of the land a treacherous appeal to the lurking
death, to the hidden evil, to the profound darkness of
its heart. It was so startling that I leaped to my feet
and looked back at the edge of the forest, as though
I had expected an answer of some sort to that black
display of confidence. You know the foolish notions
that come to one sometimes. The high stillness con-
fronted these two figures with its ominous patience,
waiting for the passing away of a fantastic invasion.
"They swore aloud together -- out of sheer fright,
I believe -- then pretending not to know anything of
my existence, turned back to the station. The sun was
low; and leaning forward side by side, they seemed
to be tugging painfully uphill their two ridiculous
shadows of unequal length, that trailed behind them
slowly over the tall grass without bending a single
blade.
"In a few days the Eldorado Expedition went into
the patient wilderness, that dosed upon it as the sea
closes over a diver. Long afterwards the news came
that all the donkeys were dead. I know nothing as to
the fate of the less valuable animals. They, no doubt,
like the rest of us, found what they deserved. I did not
inquire. I was then rather excited at the prospect of
meeting Kurtz very soon. When I say very soon I
mean it comparatively. It was just two months from
the day we left the creek when we came to the bank
below Kurtz's station.
"Going up that river was like travelling back to the
earliest beginnings of the world, when vegetation
rioted on the earth and the big trees were kings. An
empty stream, a great silence, an impenetrable forest.
The air was warm, thick, heavy, sluggish. There was
no joy in the brilliance of sunshine. The long stretches
of the waterway ran on, deserted, into the gloom of
over-shadowed distances. On silvery sandbanks hippos
and alligators sunned themselves side by side. The
broadening waters flowed through a mob of wooded
islands; you lost your way on that river as you would
in a desert, and butted all day long against shoals,
trying to find the channel, till you thought yourself
bewitched and cut off for ever from everything you
had known once -- somewhere -- far away -- in another
existence perhaps. There were moments when one's
past came back to one, as it will sometimes when you
have not a moment to spare to yourself; but it came in
the shape of an unrestful and noisy dream, remembered
with wonder amongst the overwhelming realities
of this strange world of plants, and water, and silence.
And this stillness of life did not in the least resemble