"Conrad, Joseph - Almayer's Folly" - читать интересную книгу автора (Conrad Joseph)

the place--the right hand of the Master.

In that clear space Almayer worked at his table not far from a
little green painted door, by which always stood a Malay in a red
sash and turban, and whose hand, holding a small string dangling
from above, moved up and down with the regularity of a machine.
The string worked a punkah on the other side of the green door,
where the so-called private office was, and where old Hudig--the
Master--sat enthroned, holding noisy receptions. Sometimes the
little door would fly open disclosing to the outer world, through
the bluish haze of tobacco smoke, a long table loaded with
bottles of various shapes and tall water-pitchers, rattan
easy-chairs occupied by noisy men in sprawling attitudes, while
the Master would put his head through and, holding by the handle,
would grunt confidentially to Vinck; perhaps send an order
thundering down the warehouse, or spy a hesitating stranger and
greet him with a friendly roar, "Welgome, Gapitan! ver' you gome
vrom? Bali, eh? Got bonies? I vant bonies! Vant all you got;
ha! ha! ha! Gome in!" Then the stranger was dragged in, in a
tempest of yells, the door was shut, and the usual noises
refilled the place; the song of the workmen, the rumble of
barrels, the scratch of rapid pens; while above all rose the
musical chink of broad silver pieces streaming ceaselessly
through the yellow fingers of the attentive Chinamen.

At that time Macassar was teeming with life and commerce. It was
the point in the islands where tended all those bold spirits who,
fitting out schooners on the Australian coast, invaded the Malay
Archipelago in search of money and adventure. Bold, reckless,
keen in business, not disinclined for a brush with the pirates
that were to be found on many a coast as yet, making money fast,
they used to have a general "rendezvous" in the bay for purposes
of trade and dissipation. The Dutch merchants called those men
English pedlars; some of them were undoubtedly gentlemen for whom
that kind of life had a charm; most were seamen; the acknowledged
king of them all was Tom Lingard, he whom the Malays, honest or
dishonest, quiet fishermen or desperate cut-throats, recognised
as "the Rajah-Laut"--the King of the Sea.

Almayer had heard of him before he had been three days in
Macassar, had heard the stories of his smart business
transactions, his loves, and also of his desperate fights with
the Sulu pirates, together with the romantic tale of some child--
a girl--found in a piratical prau by the victorious Lingard,
when, after a long contest, he boarded the craft, driving the
crew overboard. This girl, it was generally known, Lingard had
adopted, was having her educated in some convent in Java, and
spoke of her as "my daughter." He had sworn a mighty oath to
marry her to a white man before he went home and to leave her all
his money. "And Captain Lingard has lots of money," would say