Call of the Caribbean/Chapter 12
XII.
MATTHEW BURNIE remained with us during the afternoon. He was quiet, with the tranquility of those who have lived close to the earth and who are meditating on the end of existence without fear. His habitation in the hills had been undisturbed by the coast tribes, and the hillmen, he explained, feared him because of his custom of singing psalms aloud.
“It is my habit every evening,” he said slowly, “to lift my voice in praise of the Lord. No doubt they think I am mad.”
Others than the hillmen would have called him mad. Yet not if they had seen the very austere face, lined and sallow. He had lived on fruit, yams, fish and the oysters that are found in mangrove swamps.
“No one has come to look for me,” he observed, after we had sat in silence for a while, “because the coast tribes fear to tell of my presence. That is because they think the white traders will avenge Esther. I know not. Esther, who was my wife, was murdered by the coast tribes of Santo and eaten.”
Stuart and I sought for words and were silent. The patriarch spoke calmly. Time had removed the bitterness from his sorrow. From time to time he lifted his head, listening to sounds in the trees near by. I heard them as well and I guessed that Mary was not far away, coaxing Stuart, after her fashion, to come away from the danger that was Matthew Burnie.
Clearly the girl had absorbed the fear of the hillmen for the missionary.
The tale of Burnie was soon told. He and his wife had landed among the tribe that we knew was Johnny Gorai’s. They had been well received, and had passed months in some comfort. Esther had fallen sick, and once when he was away from her the savages had clubbed her to death. They had intended to do the same to him, for they did not wish word of the deed to reach the white men outside Santo.
At that time there had been a raid by the hillmen and some confusion, in which the missionary was left to his own devices. His misery had taken him to the hills where he had wandered several days. He had returned to the coast village, expecting to share the fate of his wife. Believing him mad, as no doubt he appeared to be at the time, they had spared him.
He had gone back to the hills. The coast tribes, he said, took care that he did not reach the shore or talk with any white men. But he had little desire to rejoin his own kind after what had happened. Instead he remained in the hill garden of Santo.
“I believe, sir,” he said, “the hand of the Lord is nearer to us in the lonely spots of the earth than in the crowded marts of men.”