Transcribed from the 1921 T. Fisher Unwin by David Price,
[email protected] THE ARROW OF GOLD
A STORY BETWEEN TWO NOTES
BY JOSEPH CONRAD
Celui qui n'a connu que des hommes polis et raisonnables, ou ne connait pas l'homme, ou ne le connait qu'a demi.
CARACTERES.
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T. FISHER UNWIN, LTD. LONDON: ADELPHI TERRACE
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_First published_ _August_ 1919_Reprinted_ _December_ 1919_Reprinted_ _October_ 1921
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ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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TO RICHARD CURLE
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FIRST NOTE
The pages which follow have been extracted from a pile of manuscriptwhich was apparently meant for the eye of one woman only. She seems tohave been the writer's childhood's friend. They had parted as children,or very little more than children. Years passed. Then somethingrecalled to the woman the companion of her young days and she wrote tohim: "I have been hearing of you lately. I know where life has broughtyou. You certainly selected your own road. But to us, left behind, italways looked as if you had struck out into a pathless desert. We alwaysregarded you as a person that must be given up for lost. But you haveturned up again; and though we may never see each other, my memorywelcomes you and I confess to you I should like to know the incidents onthe road which has led you to where you are now."
And he answers her: "I believe you are the only one now alive whoremembers me as a child. I have heard of you from time to time, but Iwonder what sort of person you are now. Perhaps if I did know I wouldn'tdare put pen to paper. But I don't know. I only remember that we weregreat chums. In fact, I chummed with you even more than with yourbrothers. But I am like the pigeon that went away in the fable of theTwo Pigeons. If I once start to tell you I would want you to feel thatyou have been there yourself. I may overtax your patience with the storyof my life so different from yours, not only in all the facts butaltogether in spirit. You may not understand. You may even be shocked.I say all this to myself; but I know I shall succumb! I have a distinctrecollection that in the old days, when you were about fifteen, youalways could make me do whatever you liked."
He succumbed. He begins his story for her with the minute narration ofthis adventure which took about twelve months to develop. In the form inwhich it is presented here it has been pruned of all allusions to theircommon past, of all asides, disquisitions, and explanations addresseddirectly to the friend of his childhood. And even as it is the wholething is of considerable length. It seems that he had not only a memorybut that he also knew how to remember. But as to that opinions maydiffer.
This, his first great adventure, as he calls it, begins in Marseilles.It ends there, too. Yet it might have happened anywhere. This does notmean that the people concerned could have come together in pure space.The locality had a definite importance. As to the time, it is easilyfixed by the events at about the middle years of the seventies, when DonCarlos de Bourbon, encouraged by the general reaction of all Europeagainst the excesses of communistic Republicanism, made his attempt forthe throne of Spain, arms in hand, amongst the hills and gorges ofGuipuzcoa. It is perhaps the last instance of a Pretender's adventurefor a Crown that History will have to record with the usual grave moraldisapproval tinged by a shamefaced regret for the departing romance.Historians are very much like other people.
However, History has nothing to do with this tale. Neither is the moraljustification or condemnation of conduct aimed at here. If anything itis perhaps a little sympathy that the writer expects for his buriedyouth, as he lives it over again at the end of his insignificant courseon this earth. Strange person--yet perhaps not so very different fromourselves.
A few words as to certain facts may be added.
It may seem that he was plunged very abruptly into this long adventure.But from certain passages (suppressed here because mixed up withirrelevant matter) it appears clearly that at the time of the meeting inthe cafe, Mills had already gathered, in various quarters, a definiteview of the eager youth who had been introduced to him in thatultra-legitimist salon. What Mills had learned represented him as ayoung gentleman who had arrived furnished with proper credentials and whoapparently was doing his best to waste his life in an eccentric fashion,with a bohemian set (one poet, at least, emerged out of it later) on oneside, and on the other making friends with the people of the Old Town,pilots, coasters, sailors, workers of all sorts. He pretended ratherabsurdly to be a seaman himself and was already credited with anill-defined and vaguely illegal enterprise in the Gulf of Mexico. Atonce it occurred to Mills that this eccentric youngster was the veryperson for what the legitimist sympathizers had very much at heart justthen: to organize a supply by sea of arms and ammunition to the Carlistdetachments in the South. It was precisely to confer on that matter withDona Rita that Captain Blunt had been despatched from Headquarters.
Mills got in touch with Blunt at once and put the suggestion before him.The Captain thought this the very thing. As a matter of fact, on thatevening of Carnival, those two, Mills and Blunt, had been actuallylooking everywhere for our man. They had decided that he should be drawninto the affair if it could be done. Blunt naturally wanted to see himfirst. He must have estimated him a promising person, but, from anotherpoint of view, not dangerous. Thus lightly was the notorious (and at thesame time mysterious) Monsieur George brought into the world; out of thecontact of two minds which did not give a single thought to his flesh andblood.
Their purpose explains the intimate tone given to their firstconversation and the sudden introduction of Dona Rita's history. Mills,of course, wanted to hear all about it. As to Captain Blunt--I suspectthat, at the time, he was thinking of nothing else. In addition it wasDona Rita who would have to do the persuading; for, after all, such anenterprise with its ugly and desperate risks was not a trifle to putbefore a man--however young.
It cannot be denied that Mills seems to have acted somewhatunscrupulously. He himself appears to have had some doubt about it, at agiven moment, as they were driving to the Prado. But perhaps Mills, withhis penetration, understood very well the nature he was dealing with. Hemight even have envied it. But it's not my business to excuse Mills. Asto him whom we may regard as Mills' victim it is obvious that he hasnever harboured a single reproachful thought. For him Mills is not to becriticized. A remarkable instance of the great power of mereindividuality over the young.