Then the English girl screams. She’s flung herself into the shallows near the dead boxer and is coating her hair with sand in a series of hysterical gestures.
‘Why did you have to kill him? You murdered him, that’s what you did! You just come here and I’ll. .’
But for the moment they all keep a respectful distance.
3
Eventually, they gather around her in a circle, or rather: a semi-circle. Tim Solider joins in as well; he’s groggy but he’s regained consciousness, the bleeding has stopped, he’s very weak but he walks stiffly, straight as a ramrod, a skeleton of terror holding him together. He’s afraid they’ll gang up on him again and if he falls asleep, use that as an excuse to kill him. That’s why he hardly dares look down at the sand: it seems to have eyes sucking him down towards them, his knees are buckling, a dull feeling of weariness is taking possession of him and anyone who likes could overpower him. Instead, he’s constantly looking round, scrutinizing them all one after the other just as a chess player scrutinizes his opponent’s pieces as he fights to keep them at bay. They keep their distance because they respect his wounds, because one ought to have more respect for a dying man than a living one; but Tim thinks it’s his fierce glare that’s holding them off, and the moment they overstep a certain mark, the moment they come one inch too close, his arms start twitching and his hands clench to form fists.
He’s still dazed following the attack and he thinks they hate him because they were all passengers and since he’s the only one of the crew to survive, he’s taken on the captain’s responsibility for the catastrophe. He’s not even sure any more which one of them flung him to the ground, his last recollections are completely overshadowed by the giant iguanas as they hurtle down upon him like thunderbolts and burrow down deep into his agony. Nor can he remember who rescued him. He thinks they all deserted him and he managed to drag himself down the cliff face all by himself only to collapse with exhaustion on the beach, and he’s just grateful they didn’t take advantage of the situation in order to get rid of him.
They approach the screaming girl cautiously from three directions: from up the beach and from out of the water on either side of her. It’s as if they’re carrying a bird-trapper’s net between them in order to capture her screams and they’re all taking the same short, stealthy steps, no matter whether they’re edging out into the water or tip-toeing over the sand. And all the time the screams are pouring out of her, without a pause, as if all her dams had suddenly burst and all her pent-up screams were cascading forth in one rush. Now and then a word tumbles out like a scrap of bark tossing about in the raging torrent, but before anyone can catch its meaning, it’s been dragged down by the eddies and disappeared. She’s lying on her stomach in the water and her head is smothered in wet sand and as they get nearer she starts crawling out of the water like an iguana, with her breast and stomach pressed hard against the sand. Her screams subside into a shrill whimpering and then she’s just sobbing loudly and steadily as she starts taking away the stones holding down the canvas sheet over the boxer’s dead body.
But she doesn’t manage to see him: as many as there’s room for fling themselves upon her and drag her away towards the fire, she’s kicking and screaming — oh, those screams are so horrible they all want to start screaming — and the sand and the water come showering all round her and cool them all down, for the heat is starting now and steam is rising from the boxer’s canvas and the reek of his death spreads slowly over them like a parachute. Then she breaks loose and runs stark naked into the water up to her waist and Lucas Egmont wants to shout and warn her about the big, dangerous fish at the bottom of the lagoon, but then she stops and turns slowly to face them and they can see her white body glistening through the water like white marble through a torrent of green rain. She stands there motionless, looking down at her feet, two small white fish sleeping belly-up on the bottom, and just for a moment the whole world stands still. Behind her silent head lies the calm ocean, a single, eternal wave arches its way over the horizon only to be swallowed up swiftly by the silence of the sea and it seems to one of them as if she’s leaning back against the thin line of the horizon, so beautiful is the backward curve of her body.
Then she raises her arms out of the water and rubs off the sand, muttering half-aloud, ‘Let him come to me, let him come to me. .’
But they don’t let him go to her, no matter how entreatingly she pleads. They stand guard round the dead man, their fingers turning white from the painful strain of holding back a scream. They glance quickly round, sizing each other up and down as the hot sweat starts trickling down their bodies, and everything grows harder to bear for the ones that aren’t in the water: the heat is now suspended over their heads like a heavy, heavy extra-cranium and their pulse suddenly starts running wild, it’s like being locked in a sauna with the heat getting more and more intense until in the end you’re crawling around on the floor, moaning, and begging for the most absurd of rescues: please let the earth open up beneath us so the sauna collapses and we can get away from this fiendish heat.
Oh, if only the English girl would start screaming again, if only there would be some violent explosion which would get them out of this awful predicament — but all that happens is that the girl cups her hands and quietly proceeds to pour water over her breasts and all the time she keeps on repeating in a nagging monotone, ‘Let him come to me, let him come to me.’
Then she stops pouring and comes a few paces closer and suddenly she starts dancing in the water, at times her body is completely submerged and they can see her legs pedalling away with short, painful movements while her arms rise and fall like the skirts of a jellyfish and then her dazzling shoulders leap up and she soars high over the horizon before sinking back down into the greenness like a silken sheet. It’s a dance of desire, a dance of desire which would hate to be satisfied, a desire for oblivion.
Then Madame finds the English girl’s cloth on the sands and she flings it over her shoulder and she runs away from the stench, the heat, the men whose horrible smell of manhood she has only just become aware of; she’s shaking with shame and bitterness, having just realized how horribly naked she herself has become thanks to the naked girl’s obscene dance: the mad girl is exposing both of them to the lustful stares from the beach — and Madame grabs hold of her by the shoulder and stops her in mid-leap. They glare at each other like two people confronting each other on the lonely rope between terror and hatred and there’s nothing for it but for one of them to fall. Madame shields her with the cloth as they approach the beach and then she says disdainfully, ‘Are you on your way to your lover now? Is this how he wants you?’
The English girl punches her right between the eyes with her hard knuckles, and as she butts Madame in the back and tries to bite her, she yells at her, ‘You killed him, that’s what you did. Don’t think I don’t know. Just wait till it gets dark, just wait till it gets dark.’
‘Is he dead? Is your lover dead?’ asks Madame in mild surprise, holding her at arm’s length. ‘That can’t be true, my dear.’
And she lifts the girl’s hand and lets it glide over the three angry red bites on her shoulder. And the hand is surprised and then the hand is filled with hatred and one of those standing on the beach feels painfully moved by the gesture of ice-cold fury described by the hand as it slumps down to her hip.