Fariha’s Reviews > Almayer’s Folly > Status Update

"I shall always remember," returned Nina, earnestly; "but where is my power, and what can I do?"
"Do not let him look too long in your eyes, nor lay his head on your knees without reminding him that men should fight before they rest. And if he lingers, give him his kriss yourself and bid him go, as the wife of a mighty prince should do when the enemies are near.

"Forget that you ever looked at a white face; forget their words; forget their thoughts. They speak lies. And they think lies because they despise us that are better than they are, but not so strong. Forget their friendship and their contempt; forget their many gods. Girl, why do you want to remember the past when there is a warrior and a chief ready to give many lives—his own life—for one of your smiles?"

She heard, but did not understand, and drank in the dreamy joy of her new existence without troubling about its meaning or its end,

In that supple figure straight as an arrow, so graceful and free in its walk, behind those soft eyes that spoke of nothing but of unconscious resignation, there slept all feelings and all passions, all hopes and all fears, the curse of life and the consolation of death. She lived like the tall palms amongst whom she was passing now, seeking the light, desiring the sunshine, fearing the storm, unconscious of either.

Nina nodded to him with an uncertain smile,&was going to speak,when a sharp report from the gun mounted in the bow of the steam launch that was just then coming into view arrested the words on her parted lips.The smile died out,&was replaced by the old look of anxious attention.From the hills far away the echo came back like a long-drawn & mournful sigh,as if the land had sent it in answer to the voice of its masters

And she submitted after a short and fierce struggle of her old self against the new principle of her life. She wrapped herself up in absolute silence; she could not trust herself to make a sign, to murmur a word for fear of saying too much and the very violence of the feelings that stirred the innermost recesses of her soul seemed to turn her person into a stone.

She recognised with a thrill of delicious fear the mysterious consciousness of her identity with that being. Listening to his words, it seemed to her she was born only then to a knowledge of a new existence, that her life was complete only when near him, and she abandoned herself to a feeling of dreamy happiness, while with half-veiled face and in silence—as became a Malay girl

...and hidden there, leaning against the smooth trunk of a tall palm, he waited with gleaming eyes and an assured smile to hear the faint rustle of dried grass under the light footsteps of Nina.

When questioned with languid courtesy by the grave Abdulla he sought refuge in a vacant stare of his one eye, and in the affectation of extreme simplicity.
“I am only my master’s slave,” murmured Babalatchi,
And the two would separate, the Arab cursing inwardly the wily dog, while Babalatchi went on his way walking on the dusty path, his body swaying, his chin with its few grey hairs pushed forward, resembling [...]

Nina saw those eyes fixed upon her with such an uncontrolled expression of admiration & desire that she felt a hitherto unknown feeling of shyness, mixed with alarm & some delight, enter & penetrate her whole being. Confused by those unusual sensations she stopped in the doorway & instinctively drew the lower part of the curtain across her face, leaving only half a rounded cheek, a stray tress, and one eye exposed,