for a time. Deplorable! Upon the whole, the trade will
suffer. I don't deny there is a remarkable quantity of ivory--mostly
fossil. We must save it, at all events--but look how precarious the
position is--and why? Because the method is unsound.' 'Do you,' said I,
looking at the shore, 'call it "unsound method?"' 'Without doubt,' he
exclaimed hotly. 'Don't you?'... 'No method at all,' I murmured after
a while. 'Exactly,' he exulted. 'I anticipated this. Shows a complete
want of judgment. It is my duty to point it out in the proper quarter.'
'Oh,' said I, 'that fellow--what's his name?--the brickmaker, will make
a readable report for you.' He appeared confounded for a moment. It
seemed to me I had never breathed an atmosphere so vile, and I turned
mentally to Kurtz for relief--positively for relief. 'Nevertheless I
think Mr. Kurtz is a remarkable man,' I said with emphasis. He started,
dropped on me a heavy glance, said very quietly, 'he _was_,' and turned
his back on me. My hour of favour was over; I found myself lumped along
with Kurtz as a partisan of methods for which the time was not ripe:
I was unsound! Ah! but it was something to have at least a choice of
nightmares.

"I had turned to the wilderness really, not to Mr. Kurtz, who, I was
ready to admit, was as good as buried. And for a moment it seemed to me
as if I also were buried in a vast grave full of unspeakable secrets. I
felt an intolerable weight oppressing my breast, the smell of the damp
earth, the unseen presence of victorious corruption, the darkness of an
impenetrable night.... The Russian tapped me on the shoulder. I heard
him mumbling and stammering something about 'brother seaman--couldn't
conceal--knowledge of matters that would affect Mr. Kurtz's
reputation.' I waited. For him evidently Mr. Kurtz was not in his grave;
I suspect that for him Mr. Kurtz was one of the immortals. 'Well!' said
I at last, 'speak out. As it happens, I am Mr. Kurtz's friend--in a
way.'

"He stated with a good deal of formality that had we not been 'of the
same profession,' he would have kept the matter to himself without
regard to consequences. 'He suspected there was an active ill-will
towards him on the part of these white men that--' 'You are right,' I
said, remembering a certain conversation I had overheard. 'The manager
thinks you ought to be hanged.' He showed a concern at this intelligence
which amused me at first. 'I had better get out of the way quietly,'
he sai