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05 - Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad · Thrilling Adventures - Daily

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Speaker 1: Part one of chapter three of Heart of Darkness by
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Speaker 1: Joseph Conrad. I looked at him, lost in astonishment. There
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Speaker 1: he was before me in Motley, as though he had
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Speaker 1: absconded from a troop of mimes, enthusiastic, fabulous. His very
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Speaker 1: existence was improbable, inexplicable, and altogether bewildering. He was an
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Speaker 1: insoluble problem. It was inconceivable how he had existed, how
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Speaker 1: he had succeeded in getting so far, how he had
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Speaker 1: managed to remain, why he did not instantly disappear. I
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Speaker 1: went a little farther, he said, Then still a little farther,
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Speaker 1: till I had gone so far that I don't know
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Speaker 1: how I ever got back. Never mind, plenty time I
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Speaker 1: can manage. You. Take courts away quick quick, I tell you.
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Speaker 1: The glamor of youth enveloped his partly colored, his destitution,
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Speaker 1: his loneliness, the essential desolation of his futile wanderings for months,
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Speaker 1: for years, his life hadn't been worth a day's purchase.
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Speaker 1: And there he was, gallantly, thoughtlessly, alive to all appearances, indestructible,
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Speaker 1: solely by the virtue of his few years and of
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Speaker 1: his unreflecting audacity. I was seduced into something like admiration.
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Speaker 1: Like envy, Glamour urged him on, glamour kept him unscathed.
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Speaker 1: He surely wanted nothing from the wilderness but space to
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Speaker 1: breathe in and to push on through. His need was
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Speaker 1: to exist and to move onwards at the greatest possible
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Speaker 1: risk and with a maximum of privation. If the absolutely pure, uncalculating,
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Speaker 1: unpractical spirit of adventure had ever ruled a human being,
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Speaker 1: it ruled this bepatched youth. I almost envied him the
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Speaker 1: possession of this modest and clear flame. It seemed to
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Speaker 1: have consumed all thought of self so completely that even
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Speaker 1: while he was talking to you, you forgot that it
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Speaker 1: was he, the man before your eyes, who had gone
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Speaker 1: through these things. I did not envy him his devotion
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Speaker 1: to Kurtz, though he had not meditated over it. It
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Speaker 1: came to him, and he accepted it with a sort
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Speaker 1: of eager fatalism. I must say that to me it
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Speaker 1: appeared about the most dangerous thing in every way he
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Speaker 1: had come upon so far. They had come together unavoidably,
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Speaker 1: like two ships becalmed near each other and lay rubbing
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Speaker 1: sides at last. I suppose Kurtz wanted an audience, because
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Speaker 1: on a certain occasion, when it camped in the forest,
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Speaker 1: they had talked all night, or more probably Kurtz had talked.
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Speaker 1: We talked of everything, he said, quite transported. At the recollection,
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Speaker 1: I forgot there was such a thing as sleep. The
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Speaker 1: night did not seem to last an hour. Everything everything
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Speaker 1: of love too. Ah, he talked to you of love,
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Speaker 1: I said, much amused. It isn't what you think, he cried,
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Speaker 1: almost passionately. It was in general he made me see
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Speaker 1: things things. He threw his arms up. We were on
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Speaker 1: deck at the time, and the headman of my woodcutters,
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Speaker 1: lounging near by, turned upon him, his heavy and glittering eyes.
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Speaker 1: I looked around, and I don't know why, but I
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Speaker 1: assure you that never, never before, did this land, this river,
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Speaker 1: this jungle, the very arch of this blazing sky appeared
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Speaker 1: to me so hopeless and so dark, so impenetrable to
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Speaker 1: human thought, so pitiless to human weakness. And ever since
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Speaker 1: you have been with him, of course, I said, on
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Speaker 1: the contrary, it appears their intercourse had been very much
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Speaker 1: broken by various causes. He had, as he informed me, proudly,
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Speaker 1: managed to nurse kurt through two illnesses. He alluded to
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Speaker 1: it as you would to some risky feet. But as
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Speaker 1: a rule Kurt wandered alone far in the depths of
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Speaker 1: the forest, very often coming to this station. I had
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Speaker 1: to wait days and days before he would turn up.
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Speaker 1: He said, Ah, it was worth waiting for sometimes. What
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Speaker 1: was he doing exploring? Or what? I asked? Oh? Yes,
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Speaker 1: of course he had discovered lots of villages a lake too.
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Speaker 1: He did not know exactly in what direction. It was
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Speaker 1: dang interest to inquire too much, but mostly his expeditions
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Speaker 1: had been for ivery, but he had no goods to
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Speaker 1: trade with by that time. I objected, there's a good
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Speaker 1: lot of cartridges left. Even yet, he answered, looking away,
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Speaker 1: to speak plainly, he raided the country, I said. He nodded,
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Speaker 1: Not alone, surely. He muttered something about the villages round
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Speaker 1: that lake. Kurt's got the tribe to follow him, did he?
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Speaker 1: I suggested? He fidgeted a little. They adored him, he said.
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Speaker 1: The tone of these words was so extraordinary that I
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Speaker 1: looked at him searchingly. It was curious to see his
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Speaker 1: mingled eagerness and the reluctance to speak of Kurts. The
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Speaker 1: man filled his life, occupied his thoughts swayed his emotions.
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Speaker 1: What can you expect he burst out. He came to
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Speaker 1: them with thunder and lightning, you know, and they had
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Speaker 1: never seen anything like it, and very terrible. He could
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Speaker 1: be very terrible. You can't judge mister Kurtz as you
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Speaker 1: would an ordinary man. No, no, no, now, just to
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Speaker 1: give you an idea, I don't mind telling you. He
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Speaker 1: wanted to shoot me too one day. But I don't
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Speaker 1: judge him shoot you. I cried, what for? Well, I
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Speaker 1: had a small lot of ivory the chief of that
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Speaker 1: village near my house gave me. You see, I used
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Speaker 1: to shoot game for them. Well, he wanted it, and
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Speaker 1: wouldn't hear reason. He declared he would shoot me unless
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Speaker 1: I gave him the ivory and then cleared out of
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Speaker 1: the country because he could do so and had a
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Speaker 1: fancy for it, and there was nothing on earth to
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Speaker 1: prevent him killing whom he jolly well pleased. And it
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Speaker 1: was true too, I gave him the ivory. What did
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Speaker 1: I care? But I didn't clear out. No, no, I
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Speaker 1: couldn't leave him. I had to be careful, of course,
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Speaker 1: till we got friendly again. For a time he had
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Speaker 1: his second illness. Then afterwards I had to keep out
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Speaker 1: of the way, but I didn't mind. He was living
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Speaker 1: for the most part in those villages on the lake.
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Speaker 1: When he came down to the river, sometimes he would
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Speaker 1: take to me, and sometimes it was better for me
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Speaker 1: to be careful. This man suffered too much, he hated
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Speaker 1: all this, and somehow he couldn't get away. When I
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Speaker 1: had a chance. I begged him to try and leave
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Speaker 1: while there was time. I offered to go back with him,
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Speaker 1: and he would say yes, and then he would remain,
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Speaker 1: go off on another ivory hunt, disappear for weeks, forgot
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Speaker 1: himself amongst these people, forgot himself. You know why he's mad,
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Speaker 1: I said, he protested indignantly. Mister Kurtz couldn't be mad.
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Speaker 1: If I had heard him talk only two days ago,
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Speaker 1: I wouldn't dare hint at such a thing. I had
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Speaker 1: taken up my binoculars while we talked, and was looking
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Speaker 1: at the shore, sweeping the limit of the forest at
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Speaker 1: each side and at the back of the house. The
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Speaker 1: consciousness of there being people in that bush, so silent,
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Speaker 1: so quiet, as silent and quiet as the ruined house
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Speaker 1: on the hill, made me uneasy. There was no sign
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Speaker 1: on the face of nature of this amazing tale that
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Speaker 1: was not so much told as suggested to me in
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Speaker 1: desolate exclamations completed by shrugs. It interrupted phrases in hints,
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Speaker 1: ending in deep sighs. The woods were unmoved, like a mask, heavy,
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Speaker 1: like the closed door of a prison. They looked with
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Speaker 1: their air of hidden knowledge, of patient expectation, of unapproachable silence.
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Speaker 1: The Russian was explaining to me that it was only
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Speaker 1: lately that mister Kurtz had come down to the river,
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Speaker 1: bringing along with him all the fighting men of that
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Speaker 1: lake tribe. He had been absent for several months, getting
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Speaker 1: himself adored, I suppose, and had come down unexpectedly with
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Speaker 1: the intention to all appearance of making a raid, either
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Speaker 1: across the river or down stream. Evidently the appetite for
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Speaker 1: more ivory had got the better of the what shall
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Speaker 1: I say, the less material aspirations. However, he had got
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Speaker 1: much worse. Suddenly I heard he was lying helpless, and
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Speaker 1: so I came up, took my chance, said the Russian. Oh,
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Speaker 1: he is bad, very bad. I directed my glass to
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Speaker 1: the house. There were no signs of life, but there
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Speaker 1: was the ruined roof the long mud wall peeping above
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Speaker 1: the grass with three little square window holes, no two
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Speaker 1: of the same size. All this brought within reach of
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Speaker 1: my hand, as it were. And then I made a
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Speaker 1: brusque movement, and one of the remaining posts of that
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Speaker 1: vanished forest leaped up in the field of my glass.
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Speaker 1: You remember I told you I had been struck at
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Speaker 1: the distance by certain attempts at ornamentation, rather remarkable in
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Speaker 1: the ruinous aspect of the place. Now I suddenly had
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Speaker 1: a nearer view, and its first result was to make
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Speaker 1: me throw my head back, as if before a blow.
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Speaker 1: Then I went carefully from post to post with my glass,
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Speaker 1: and I saw my mistake. These round knobs were not ornamental,
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Speaker 1: but symbolic. They were expressive and puzzling, striking and disturbing,
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Speaker 1: food for thought and also for vulgures if there had
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Speaker 1: been any looking down from the sky. But at all events,
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Speaker 1: for such ants as were industrious enough to ascend the pole,
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Speaker 1: they would have been even more impressive. These heads on
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Speaker 1: the stakes, if their faces had not been turned to
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Speaker 1: the house. Only one the first I had made out,
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Speaker 1: was facing my way. I was not so shocked as
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Speaker 1: you may think. The start back I had given was
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Speaker 1: really nothing, but a movement of surprise. I had expected
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Speaker 1: to see a knob of wood there, you know, I'd
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Speaker 1: returned deliberately to the first I had seen. And there
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Speaker 1: it was black, dried, sunken with closed eyelids, a head
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Speaker 1: that seemed to sleep at the top of that pole,
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Speaker 1: and with the shrunken, dry lips showing a narrow white
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Speaker 1: line of the teeth. Was smiling too, smiling continuously at
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Speaker 1: some endless and jocose dream of that eternal slumber. I
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Speaker 1: am not disclosing any trade secrets. In fact, the manager
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Speaker 1: said afterwards that mister Kurtz's methods had ruined the district.
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Speaker 1: I have no opinion on that point, but I want
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Speaker 1: you clearly to understand that there was nothing exactly profitable
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Speaker 1: in these heads being there. They only showed that mister
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Speaker 1: Kurtz lacked restraint in the gratification of his various lusts,
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Speaker 1: that there was something wanting in him, some small matter, which,
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Speaker 1: when the pressing need arose, could not be found under
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Speaker 1: his magnificent eloquence. Whether he knew of this deficiency himself,
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Speaker 1: I can't say. I think the knowledge came to him
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Speaker 1: at last, only at the very last. But the wilderness
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Speaker 1: had found him out early, and had taken on him
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Speaker 1: a terrible vengeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it
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Speaker 1: had whispered to him things about himself which he did
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Speaker 1: not know, things of which he had no conception till
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Speaker 1: he took counsel with this great solitude, and the whisper
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Speaker 1: had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within him, because
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Speaker 1: he was hollow at the core. I put down the glass,
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Speaker 1: and the head that had appeared near enough to be
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Speaker 1: spoken to, seemed at once to have leaped away from
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Speaker 1: me into inaccessible distance. The admirer of mister Kurtz was
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Speaker 1: a bit crestfallen. In a hurried, indistinct voice, he began
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Speaker 1: to assure me he had not dared to take these
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Speaker 1: say symbols down. He was not afraid of the natives.
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Speaker 1: They would not stir till mister Kurtz gave the word.
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Speaker 1: His ascendancy was extraordinary. The camps of these people surrounded
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Speaker 1: the place, and the chiefs came every day to see him.
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Speaker 1: They would crawl. I don't want to know anything of
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Speaker 1: the ceremonies used when approaching mister Kurtz. I shouted, curious,
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Speaker 1: this feeling that came over me that such details would
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Speaker 1: be more intolerable than those heads drying on the stakes
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Speaker 1: under mister Kurtz's windows. After all, that was only a
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Speaker 1: savage sight, while I seemed at one bound to have
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Speaker 1: been transported into some lightless region of subtle horrors, where pure,
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Speaker 1: uncomplicated savagery was a positive relief, being something that had
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Speaker 1: a right to exist obviously in the sunshine. The young
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Speaker 1: man looked at me with surprise. I suppose it did
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Speaker 1: not occur to him that mister Kurtz was no idol
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Speaker 1: of mine. He forgot I hadn't heard any of these
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Speaker 1: splendid monologs on what was it on love, justice, conduct
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Speaker 1: of life, or what not? If it had come to
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Speaker 1: crawling before mister Kurtz, he crawled as much as the
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Speaker 1: veriest savage of them all, I had no idea of
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Speaker 1: the conditions. He said, these heads were the heads of rebels.
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Speaker 1: I shocked him excessively by laughing, rebels. What would be
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Speaker 1: the next definition? I was to hear? There had been enemies, criminals, workers,
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Speaker 1: and these were rebels. These rebellious heads looked very subdued
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Speaker 1: to me on their sticks. You don't know how such
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Speaker 1: a life tries a man like Kurtz, cried Kurtz's last disciple.
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Speaker 1: Well and you, I said I I I am a
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Speaker 1: simple man. I have no great thoughts. I want nothing
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Speaker 1: from anybody. How can you compare me to? His feelings
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Speaker 1: were too much for speech, and suddenly he broke down.
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Speaker 1: I don't understand, he groaned. I've been doing my best
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Speaker 1: to keep him alive, and that's enough. I had no
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Speaker 1: hand in all this. I have no abilities. There hasn't
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Speaker 1: been a drop of medicine or a mouthful of invalid
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Speaker 1: food for months. Here he was shamefully abandoned, a man
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Speaker 1: like this with such ideas, shamefully, shamefully, I I haven't
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Speaker 1: slept for the last ten nights. His voice lost itself.
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Speaker 1: In the calm of the evening. The long shadows of
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Speaker 1: the forest had slipped down hill while we talked, had
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Speaker 1: gone far beyond the ruined hovel, beyond the symbolic row
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Speaker 1: of stakes. All this was in the gloom, while we
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Speaker 1: down there were yet in the sunshine, and the stretch
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Speaker 1: of the river abreast of the clearing, glittered in a
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Speaker 1: still and dazzling splendor, with a murky and overshadowed, bend
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Speaker 1: over and below. Oh, not a living soul was seen
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Speaker 1: on the shore. The bushes did not rustle. Suddenly, round
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Speaker 1: the corner of the house a group of men appeared,
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Speaker 1: as though they had come up from the ground. They
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Speaker 1: waded waist deep in the grass in a compact body,
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Speaker 1: bearing an improvised stretcher in their midst Instantly, in the
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Speaker 1: emptiness of the landscape, a cry arose, whose shrillness pierced
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Speaker 1: the still air, like a sharp arrow flying straight to
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Speaker 1: the very heart of the land. And as if by enchantment,
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Speaker 1: streams of human beings, of naked human beings with spears
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Speaker 1: in their hands, with bows, with shields, with wild glances
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Speaker 1: and savage movements, were poured into the clearing by the
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Speaker 1: dark faced and pensive forest. The bushes shook, the grass
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Speaker 1: swayed for a time, and then everything stood still in
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Speaker 1: attentive immobility. Now, if he does not say the right
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Speaker 1: thing to them, we are all done for, said the
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Speaker 1: Russian at my elbow. The knot of men with a
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Speaker 1: stretcher had stopped too, half way to the steamer. As
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Speaker 1: if petrified, I saw the men on the stretcher set
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Speaker 1: up lank and with an uplifted arm above the shoulders
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Speaker 1: of the bearers. Let us hope that the man who
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Speaker 1: can talk so well of love in general will find
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Speaker 1: some particular reason to spare us this time, I said,
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Speaker 1: I resented bitterly the absurd danger of our situation, as
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Speaker 1: if to be at the mercy of that atrocious phantom
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Speaker 1: had been a dishonoring necessity. I could not hear a sound,
18:47
Speaker 1: but through my glasses I saw the thin arm extended commandingly,
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Speaker 1: the lower jaw moving, the eyes of that apparition shining
18:55
Speaker 1: darkly far in its bony head, that nodded with grotesque
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Speaker 1: church kurts, kurts that means short and German. Don't it well?
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Speaker 1: The name was as true as everything else in his
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Speaker 1: life and death. He looked at least seven feet long.
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Speaker 1: His covering had fallen off, and his body emerged from it,
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Speaker 1: pitiful and appalling, as from a winding sheet. I could
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Speaker 1: see the cage of his ribs all astir, the bones
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Speaker 1: of his arm waving. It was as though an animated
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Speaker 1: image of death carved out of old ivory, had been
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Speaker 1: shaking its hand with menaces, and a motionless crowd of
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Speaker 1: men made of dark and glittering bronze. I saw him
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Speaker 1: open his mouth wide. It gave him a weirdly voracious aspect,
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Speaker 1: as though he had wanted to swallow all the air,
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Speaker 1: all the earth, all the men before him. A deep
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Speaker 1: voice reached me faintly. He must have been shouting. He
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Speaker 1: fell back. Suddenly the stretcher shook as the bearers staggered
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Speaker 1: forward again, and almost at the same time, I noticed
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Speaker 1: that the crowd of savages was vanishing, without any perceptible
20:11
Speaker 1: movement of retreat, as if the forest that had ejected
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Speaker 1: these beings so suddenly had drawn them in again as
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Speaker 1: the breath is drawn in a long aspiration. Some of
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Speaker 1: the pilgrims behind the stretcher carried his arms two shot guns,
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Speaker 1: a heavy rifle and a light revolver carbine, the thunderbolts
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Speaker 1: of that pitiful Jupiter. The manager bent over him, murmuring
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Speaker 1: as he walked beside his head. They laid him down
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Speaker 1: in one of the little cabins, just a room for
20:43
Speaker 1: a bed place and a campstool or two. You know,
20:47
Speaker 1: he had brought his belated correspondence, and a lot of
20:50
Speaker 1: torn envelopes and opened letters littered his bed. His hand
20:55
Speaker 1: roamed feebly amongst his papers. I was struck by the
20:59
Speaker 1: fire of his eyes eyes, and the composed languor of
21:01
Speaker 1: his expression. It was not so much the exhaustion of disease.
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Speaker 1: He did not seem in pain. This shadow looked satiated
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Speaker 1: and calm, as though for the moments it had had
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Speaker 1: its fill of all the emotions. He rustled one of
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Speaker 1: the letters, and looking straight in my face, said, I
21:24
Speaker 1: am glad somebody had been writing to him about me.
21:30
Speaker 1: These special recommendations were turning up again. The volume of
21:35
Speaker 1: tone he emitted, without effort, almost without the trouble of
21:38
Speaker 1: moving his lips, amazed me. A voice, a voice. It
21:45
Speaker 1: was grave, profound, vibrating. While the man did not seem
21:49
Speaker 1: capable of a whisper, however, he had enough strength in
21:53
Speaker 1: him fact issues no doubt, to very nearly make an
21:57
Speaker 1: end of us. As you shall hear directly, the manager
22:03
Speaker 1: appeared silently in the doorway. I stepped out at once,
22:06
Speaker 1: and he drew a curtain after me. The Russian, eyed
22:10
Speaker 1: curiously by the pilgrims, was staring at the shore. I
22:15
Speaker 1: followed the direction of his glands. Dark human shapes could
22:20
Speaker 1: be made out in the distance, flitting indistinctly against the
22:24
Speaker 1: gloomy border of the forest, and near the river, two
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Speaker 1: bronze figures, leaning on tall spears, stood in the sunlight
22:32
Speaker 1: under fantastic head dresses of spotted skins, warlike and still
22:37
Speaker 1: in statuesque repose, And from right to left along the
22:42
Speaker 1: lighted shore moved a wild and gorgeous apparition of a woman.
22:48
Speaker 1: She walked with measured steps, draped in striped and fringed cloths,
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Speaker 1: treading the earth proudly. With a slight jingle and flash
22:57
Speaker 1: of barbarous ornaments, carried her head high. Her hair was
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Speaker 1: done in the shape of a helmet. She had brass
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Speaker 1: leggings to the knee, brass wire gauntless to the elbow,
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Speaker 1: a crimson spot on her tawny cheek, innumerable necklaces of
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Speaker 1: glass beads on her neck, bizarre things, charms, gifts of
23:19
Speaker 1: witch men that hung about her, glittered and trembled at
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Speaker 1: every step. She must have had the value of several
23:26
Speaker 1: elephant tusks upon her. She was savage and superb wild
23:31
Speaker 1: eyed and magnificent. There was something ominous and stately in
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Speaker 1: her deliberate progress, and in the hush that had fallen
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Speaker 1: suddenly upon the whole sorrowful land, the immense wilderness, the
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Speaker 1: colossal body of the fakened and mysterious life seemed to
23:49
Speaker 1: look at her pensive, as though it had been looking
23:52
Speaker 1: at the image of its own tenebrous and passionate soul.
23:56
Speaker 1: She came abreast of the steamer, stood still and faced us.
24:01
Speaker 1: Her long shadow fell to the water's edge. Her face
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Speaker 1: had a tragic and fierce aspect of wild sorrow and
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Speaker 1: of dumb pain, mingled with the fear of some struggling,
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Speaker 1: half shaped resolve. She stood looking at us without a stir,
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Speaker 1: and like the wilderness itself, with an air of brooding
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Speaker 1: over an inscrutable purpose. A whole minute passed, and then
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Speaker 1: she made a step forward. There was a low jingle,
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Speaker 1: a glint of yellow metal, a sway of fringed draperies,
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Speaker 1: and she stopped, as if her heart had failed her.
24:41
Speaker 1: The young fellow by my side growled, the pilgrims murmured
24:45
Speaker 1: at my back. She looked at us all as if
24:49
Speaker 1: her life had depended upon the unswerving steadiness of her glance.
24:54
Speaker 1: Suddenly she opened her bared arms and threw them up
24:58
Speaker 1: rigid above her head. As though in an uncontrollable desire
25:02
Speaker 1: to touch the sky. And at the same time, the
25:05
Speaker 1: swift shadows darted out on the earth, swept around on
25:09
Speaker 1: the river, gathering the steamer into a shadowy embrace. A
25:14
Speaker 1: formidable silence hung over the scene. She turned away, slowly
25:21
Speaker 1: walked on, following the bank, and passed into the bushes
25:24
Speaker 1: to the left. Once only her eyes gleamed back at
25:28
Speaker 1: us in the dusk of the thickets before she disappeared.
25:33
Speaker 1: If she had offered to come aboard, I really think
25:37
Speaker 1: I would have tried to shoot her, said the man
25:40
Speaker 1: of patches nervously. I have been risking my life every
25:44
Speaker 1: day for the last fortnight to keep her out of
25:46
Speaker 1: the house. She got in one day and kicked up
25:50
Speaker 1: a row about these miserable rags I picked up in
25:53
Speaker 1: the storeroom to mend my clothes with. I wasn't decent,
25:58
Speaker 1: at least it must have been that, for she talked
26:01
Speaker 1: like a fury to Kurtz for an hour, pointing at
26:04
Speaker 1: me now and then. I don't understand the dialect of
26:08
Speaker 1: this tribe. Luckily for me, I fancy. Kurtz felt too
26:12
Speaker 1: ill that day to care, or they would have been mischief.
26:16
Speaker 1: I don't understand. No, it's too much for me. Oh well,
26:23
Speaker 1: it's all over now. At this moment, I heard Kurtz's
26:29
Speaker 1: deep voice behind the curtain. Save me, save the ivy.
26:35
Speaker 1: You mean, don't tell me, save me? Why I've had
26:40
Speaker 1: to save you. You are interrupting my plans now, sick, sick,
26:47
Speaker 1: not so sick as you would like to believe. Never mind,
26:53
Speaker 1: I'll carry my ideas out yet I will return. I'll
26:59
Speaker 1: show you what can be done. You with your little
27:03
Speaker 1: peddling notions, you are interfering with me. I will return.
27:08
Speaker 1: Hei the manager came out. He did me the honor
27:14
Speaker 1: to take me under the arm and lead me aside.
27:19
Speaker 1: He is very low, very low, he said. He considered
27:24
Speaker 1: it necessary to sigh, but neglected to be consistently sorrowful.
27:30
Speaker 1: We have done all we could for him, haven't we.
27:34
Speaker 1: But there is no disguising the fact mister Kirks has
27:38
Speaker 1: done more harm than good to the company. He did
27:42
Speaker 1: not see the time was not ripe for vigorous action. Cautiously, cautiously,
27:48
Speaker 1: that's my principle. We must be cautious. Yet the district
27:53
Speaker 1: is close to us for a time, upon the whole
27:56
Speaker 1: the trade will suffer. I don't deny there the remarkable
28:00
Speaker 1: quantity of ivory, mostly fossil. We must save it at
28:05
Speaker 1: all events. But look how precarious the position is, and
28:09
Speaker 1: why because the method is unsound? Do you, said I,
28:16
Speaker 1: looking at the shore, call it unsound method? Without doubt?
28:22
Speaker 1: He exclaimed hotly. Don't you no method at all? I
28:27
Speaker 1: murmured after a while, exactly, he exulted. I anticipated this
28:33
Speaker 1: shows a complete want of judgment. It is my duty
28:36
Speaker 1: to point it out in the proper quarter. Oh, said I.
28:41
Speaker 1: That fellow what's his name, the brickmaker, will make a
28:45
Speaker 1: readable report for you. He appeared confounded for a moment.
28:50
Speaker 1: It seemed to me I had never breathed an atmosphere
28:53
Speaker 1: so vile, and I turned mentally to Kurt's for relief,
28:58
Speaker 1: positively for relief. Nevertheless, I think Kurt is a remarkable man,
29:04
Speaker 1: I said with emphasis. He started dropped on me a
29:08
Speaker 1: heavy glance, said very quietly he was, and turned his
29:15
Speaker 1: back on me. My hour of favor was over. I
29:20
Speaker 1: found myself lumped along with Kurts as a partisan of
29:23
Speaker 1: methods for which the time was not ripe. I was unsound, Ah,
29:31
Speaker 1: but it was something to have at least a choice
29:33
Speaker 1: of nightmares. I had turned to the wilderness, really, not
29:38
Speaker 1: to mister Kurtz, who I was ready to admit was
29:41
Speaker 1: as good as buried. And for a moment it seemed
29:45
Speaker 1: to me as if I also were buried in a
29:47
Speaker 1: vast grave full of unspeakable secrets. I felt an intolerable
29:53
Speaker 1: way of pressing my breast, the smell of the damp earth,
29:57
Speaker 1: the unseen presence of victorious corruption, that darkness of an
30:00
Speaker 1: impenetrable night. The Russian tapped me on the shoulder. I
30:06
Speaker 1: heard him mumbling and stammering something about brother Seamen. Couldn't
30:10
Speaker 1: conceive knowledge of matters that would affect mister Kurtz's reputation.
30:15
Speaker 1: I waited for him. Evidently mister Kurtz was not in
30:19
Speaker 1: his grave. I suspect that for him, mister Kurtz was
30:24
Speaker 1: one of the immortals. Well said, I at last speak out,
30:30
Speaker 1: as it happens. I am mister Kurtz's friend in a way.
30:35
Speaker 1: He stated with a good deal of formality that had
30:39
Speaker 1: we not been of the same profession, he would have
30:42
Speaker 1: kept the matter to himself without regarding consequences. He suspected
30:47
Speaker 1: there was an active ill will towards him on the
30:49
Speaker 1: part of these white men. That you are right, I said,
30:53
Speaker 1: remembering a certain conversation I had overheard. The manager thinks
30:58
Speaker 1: you are to be hanged. He showed a concern at
31:02
Speaker 1: this intelligence, which amused me at first. I had better
31:07
Speaker 1: get out of the way quietly, he said, earnestly. I
31:11
Speaker 1: can do no more for Kurtz now, and they would
31:14
Speaker 1: soon find some excuse. What's to stop them. There's a
31:19
Speaker 1: military post three hundred miles from here. Well, upon my word,
31:25
Speaker 1: said I, perhaps you had better go. If you have
31:27
Speaker 1: any friends amongst the savages nearby plenty, he said. They
31:32
Speaker 1: are simple people, and I want nothing, you know, he stood,
31:37
Speaker 1: biting his lip. Then I don't want any harm to
31:41
Speaker 1: happen to these whites here. But of course I was
31:43
Speaker 1: thinking of mister Kurtz's reputation. But you are a brother, seaman,
31:48
Speaker 1: and all right, said I. After a time, mister Kurtz's
31:54
Speaker 1: reputation is safe with me. I did not know how
31:59
Speaker 1: truly I spoke. He informed me, lowering his voice, that
32:04
Speaker 1: it was Kurtz who had ordered the attack to be
32:06
Speaker 1: made on the steamer. He hated sometimes the idea of
32:11
Speaker 1: being taken away and then again. But I don't understand
32:16
Speaker 1: these matters. I am a simple man. He thought it
32:19
Speaker 1: would scare you away, that you would give it up.
32:22
Speaker 1: Thinking him dead, I could not stop him. Oh, I
32:27
Speaker 1: had an awful time of it this last month. Very well,
32:32
Speaker 1: I said, He is all right now? Yes, he muttered,
32:38
Speaker 1: not very convinced. Apparently, thanks, said I I shall keep
32:43
Speaker 1: my eyes open. Won't good? Quiet? Eh? He urged anxiously.
32:48
Speaker 1: It would be awful for his reputation if anybody here.
32:53
Speaker 1: I promised a complete discretion with great gravity. I have
32:58
Speaker 1: a canoe and three black fellows was waiting, not very
33:01
Speaker 1: far off. I am off. Could you give me a
33:06
Speaker 1: few martini Henry Cartridges? I could, and did with proper secrecy.
33:14
Speaker 1: He helped himself with a wink at me to a
33:16
Speaker 1: handful of my tobacco between sailors, you know, good English tobacco.
33:24
Speaker 1: At the door of the pilot house, he turned round.
33:27
Speaker 1: I say, haven't you a pair of shoes you could spare?
33:32
Speaker 1: He raised one leg. Look. The soles were tied with
33:36
Speaker 1: knotted strings sandalwise under his bare feet. I rooted out
33:41
Speaker 1: an old pair, at which he looked with admiration. Before
33:45
Speaker 1: tucking it under his left arm. One of his pockets,
33:49
Speaker 1: bright red, was bulging with cartridges. From the other, dark blue,
33:54
Speaker 1: peeped thousands inquiry. Met Sena at Cena, he seemed to
33:59
Speaker 1: think himself excellently well equipped for a renewed encounter with
34:04
Speaker 1: the wilderness. Ah, I'll never never meet such a man again.
34:12
Speaker 1: You ought to have heard him recite poetry his own too,
34:16
Speaker 1: it was he told me poetry. He rode his eyes
34:22
Speaker 1: at the recollection of these delights. Oh, he enlarged my mind.
34:30
Speaker 1: Good Bye, said I. He shook hands and vanished in
34:34
Speaker 1: the night. Sometimes I asked myself whether I had ever
34:38
Speaker 1: really seen him, whether it was possible to meet such
34:42
Speaker 1: a phenomenon. When I woke up shortly after midnights, his
34:47
Speaker 1: warning came to my mind, with its hint of danger
34:50
Speaker 1: that seemed in the starred darkness, real enough to make
34:53
Speaker 1: me get up for the purpose of having a look
34:55
Speaker 1: round on the hill. A big fire burned, illuminating fitfully
35:01
Speaker 1: a crooked corner of the station house. One of the agents,
35:05
Speaker 1: with a picket of a few of our blacks armed
35:08
Speaker 1: for the purpose, was keeping guard over the ivory. But
35:11
Speaker 1: deep within the forest, red gleams that wavered, that seemed
35:16
Speaker 1: to sink and rise from the ground. Amongst confused columnar
35:19
Speaker 1: shapes of intense blackness showed the exact position of the
35:23
Speaker 1: camp where mister Kurtz's adorers were keeping their uneasy vigil.
35:28
Speaker 1: The monotonous beating of a big drum filled the air
35:31
Speaker 1: with muffled shocks and a lingering vibration, a steady droning
35:36
Speaker 1: sound of many men chanting each to himself. Some weird
35:40
Speaker 1: incantation came out from the black flat wall of the woods,
35:44
Speaker 1: as the humming of bees comes out of a hive,
35:47
Speaker 1: and had a strange narcotic effect upon my half awake senses.
35:51
Speaker 1: I believe I dozed off leaning over the rail till
35:55
Speaker 1: an abrupt burst of yells and overwhelming outbreak of a
35:59
Speaker 1: pent up and mysterious frenzy woke me up in a
36:02
Speaker 1: bewildered wonder. It was cut short all at once, and
36:07
Speaker 1: the low droning went on with an effect of audible
36:10
Speaker 1: and soothing silence. I glanced casually into the little cabin.
36:15
Speaker 1: A light was burning within, but mister Kurtz was not there.
36:21
Speaker 1: I think I would have raised an outcry if I
36:23
Speaker 1: had believed my eyes, but I didn't believe them at first.
36:26
Speaker 1: The thing seemed so impossible. The fact is I was
36:30
Speaker 1: completely unnerved by a sheer, blank fright, pure abstract terror,
36:36
Speaker 1: unconnected with any distinct shape of physical danger. What made
36:40
Speaker 1: this emotion so overpowering was, how shall I define it?
36:45
Speaker 1: The moral shock I received, as if something altogether monstrous,
36:50
Speaker 1: intolerable to thought, and odious to the soul had been
36:54
Speaker 1: thrust upon me unexpectedly. This lasted, of course, the merest
36:59
Speaker 1: fraction of a set, and then the usual sense of commonplace,
37:03
Speaker 1: deadly danger. The possibility of a sudden onslaught and massacre,
37:08
Speaker 1: or something of the kind which I saw impending, was
37:11
Speaker 1: positively welcome and composing. It pacified me, in fact, so
37:16
Speaker 1: much that I did not raise an alarm. There was
37:20
Speaker 1: an agent buttoned up inside an ulster and sleeping on
37:24
Speaker 1: a chair on deck, within three feet of me. The
37:27
Speaker 1: yells had not awakened him. He snored very slightly. I
37:31
Speaker 1: left him to his slumbers and leaped ashore. I did
37:35
Speaker 1: not betray mister Kurtz. It was ordered I should never
37:40
Speaker 1: betray him. It was written, I should be loyal to
37:43
Speaker 1: the nightmare of my choice. I was anxious to deal
37:47
Speaker 1: with this shadow by myself alone, and to this day
37:51
Speaker 1: I don't know why I was so jealous of sharing
37:54
Speaker 1: with any one the peculiar blackness of that experience. As
38:00
Speaker 1: soon as I got on the bank, I saw a trail,
38:03
Speaker 1: a broad trail through the grass. I remember the exultation
38:07
Speaker 1: with which I said to myself, he can't walk, he
38:12
Speaker 1: is crawling on all fours. I've got him. The grass
38:16
Speaker 1: was wet with dew. I strode rapidly with clinched fists.
38:21
Speaker 1: I fancy I had some vague notion of falling upon
38:24
Speaker 1: him and giving him a drubbing. I don't know. I
38:28
Speaker 1: had some imbecile thoughts. The knitting old woman with the
38:32
Speaker 1: cat obtruded herself upon my memory as a most improper
38:36
Speaker 1: person to be sitting at the other end of such
38:38
Speaker 1: an affair. I saw a row of pilgrims squirting lead
38:42
Speaker 1: in the air out of Winchester's held to the ship.
38:45
Speaker 1: I thought I would never get back to the steamer,
38:48
Speaker 1: and imagined myself living alone and unarmed in the woods
38:52
Speaker 1: to an advanced age. Such silly things, you know, And
38:58
Speaker 1: I remember I confounded the of the drum with the
39:01
Speaker 1: beating of my heart, and was pleased at its calm regularity.
39:07
Speaker 1: I kept to the track, though then stopped to listen.
39:11
Speaker 1: The night was very clear, a dark blue space, sparkling
39:15
Speaker 1: with dew and starlight, in which black things stood very still.
39:20
Speaker 1: I thought I could see a kind of motion ahead
39:22
Speaker 1: of me. I was strangely cocksure of everything that night.
39:26
Speaker 1: I actually left the track and ran in a great semicircle,
39:30
Speaker 1: I verily believe, chuckling to myself, so as to get
39:34
Speaker 1: in front of that stir of that motion I had seen,
39:38
Speaker 1: if indeed I had seen anything, I was circumventing Kurts
39:42
Speaker 1: as though it had been a boyish game. I came
39:47
Speaker 1: upon him, and if he had not heard me coming,
39:50
Speaker 1: I would have fallen over him too. But he got
39:53
Speaker 1: up in time. He rose unsteady, long, pale, indistinct, like
39:59
Speaker 1: a vapor exhaled by the earth, and swayed slightly, misty
40:04
Speaker 1: and silent before me, while at my back the fires
40:08
Speaker 1: loomed between the trees, and the murmur of many voices
40:11
Speaker 1: issued from the forest. I had cut him off cleverly,
40:15
Speaker 1: but when actually confronting him, I seemed to come to
40:19
Speaker 1: my senses. I saw the danger in its right proportion.
40:24
Speaker 1: It was by no means over yet Suppose he began
40:28
Speaker 1: to shout, though he could hardly stand, there was still
40:32
Speaker 1: plenty of vigor in his voice. Go away, hide yourself,
40:39
Speaker 1: he said, in that profound tone. It was very awful.
40:46
Speaker 1: I glanced back. We were within thirty yards from the
40:49
Speaker 1: nearest fire. A black figure stood up, strolled on long
40:54
Speaker 1: black legs, waving long black arms across the glow. It
40:59
Speaker 1: had horn antelope poems. I think on its head, some sorcerer,
41:05
Speaker 1: some witch man, No doubt, it looked fiendlike enough. Do
41:12
Speaker 1: you know what you are doing? I whispered perfectly, he answered,
41:19
Speaker 1: raising his voice for that single word. It sounded to
41:23
Speaker 1: me far off and yet loud, like a hail through
41:26
Speaker 1: a speaking trumpet. If he makes a row, we are lost,
41:31
Speaker 1: I thought to myself. This clearly was not a case
41:35
Speaker 1: for fisticuffs, even apart from the very natural aversion. I
41:39
Speaker 1: had to beat that shadow, this wandering and tormented thing.
41:44
Speaker 1: You will be lost, I said, utterly lost. One gets
41:50
Speaker 1: sometimes such a flash of inspiration. You know, I did
41:54
Speaker 1: say the right thing, though indeed he could not have
41:57
Speaker 1: been more irretrievably lost than he was at this very moment,
42:01
Speaker 1: when the foundations of our intimacy were being laid. To endure,
42:06
Speaker 1: to endure, even to the end, even beyond. I had
42:12
Speaker 1: immense plans, he muttered, irresolutely, Yes, said I. But if
42:19
Speaker 1: you try to shout, I'll smash your head with There
42:23
Speaker 1: was not a stick or a stone near. I will
42:27
Speaker 1: throttle you for good, I corrected myself. I was on
42:32
Speaker 1: the threshold of great things, he pleaded, in a voice
42:37
Speaker 1: of longing, with a wistfulness of tone that made my
42:40
Speaker 1: blood run cold. And now for this stupid scoundrel, your
42:47
Speaker 1: success in Europe is assured. In any case, I affirmed steadily.
42:52
Speaker 1: I did not want to have the throttling of him,
42:56
Speaker 1: you understand, And indeed it would have been very little
42:59
Speaker 1: useful any practical purpose. I tried to break the spell,
43:04
Speaker 1: the heavy, mute spell of the wilderness that seemed to
43:07
Speaker 1: draw him to its pitiless breast, by the awakening of
43:10
Speaker 1: forgotten and brutal instincts, by the memory of gratified and
43:15
Speaker 1: monstrous passions. This alone, I was convinced, had driven him
43:21
Speaker 1: out to the edge of the forest, to the bush,
43:24
Speaker 1: towards the gleam of fires, the throb of drums, the
43:27
Speaker 1: drone of weird incantations. This alone had beguiled his unlawful
43:33
Speaker 1: soul beyond the bounds of permitted aspirations. And don't you
43:38
Speaker 1: see the terror of the position was not in being
43:42
Speaker 1: knocked on the head, though I had a very lively
43:45
Speaker 1: sense of that danger too, But in this that I
43:49
Speaker 1: had to deal with a being to whom I could
43:51
Speaker 1: not appeal in the name of anything high or low.
43:56
Speaker 1: I had, even, like the niggers, to invoke him himself,
44:00
Speaker 1: his own exalted and incredible degradation. There was nothing either
44:05
Speaker 1: above or below him. I knew it. He had kicked
44:10
Speaker 1: himself loose of the earth, confound the man. He had
44:14
Speaker 1: kicked the very earth to pieces. He was alone, and
44:18
Speaker 1: I before him, did not know whether I stood on
44:21
Speaker 1: the ground or floated in the air. I've been telling
44:25
Speaker 1: you what we said, repeating the phrases we pronounced. But
44:29
Speaker 1: what's the good? They were common every day words, the familiar,
44:35
Speaker 1: vague sounds, exchanged on every waking day of life. But
44:39
Speaker 1: what of that they had behind them? To my mind?
44:43
Speaker 1: The terrific suggestiveness of words heard in dreams, of phrases
44:48
Speaker 1: spoken in nightmares. Soul. If anybody ever struggled with a soul.
44:55
Speaker 1: I am the man, and I wasn't arguing with a
44:59
Speaker 1: loun either believe me or not. His intelligence was perfectly clear, concentrated,
45:07
Speaker 1: it is true, upon himself, with horrible intensity, yet clear.
45:12
Speaker 1: And therein was my only chance, barring, of course, the
45:16
Speaker 1: killing him there and then, which wasn't so good on
45:20
Speaker 1: account of unavoidable noise. But his soul was mad. Being
45:26
Speaker 1: alone in the wilderness, it had looked within itself, and
45:30
Speaker 1: by Heavens, I tell you it had gone mad. I
45:35
Speaker 1: had for my sins, I suppose to go through the
45:39
Speaker 1: ordeal of looking into myself. No eloquence could have been
45:44
Speaker 1: so withering to one's belief in mankind as his final
45:49
Speaker 1: burst of sincerity. He struggled with himself too. I saw it,
45:54
Speaker 1: I heard it. I saw the inconceivable mystery of a
45:58
Speaker 1: soul that knew no restraint, no faith, no fear, yet
46:03
Speaker 1: struggling blindly with itself. I kept my head pretty well,
46:09
Speaker 1: But when I had him at last stretched on the couch,
46:13
Speaker 1: I wiped my forehead while my legs shook under me,
46:16
Speaker 1: as though I had carried half a ton on my
46:19
Speaker 1: back down the hill. And yet I had only supported him,
46:24
Speaker 1: his bony arm clasped round my neck. He was not
46:28
Speaker 1: much heavier than a child. And of part one of
46:34
Speaker 1: Chapter three