Basil Hayle had not been dismissed in consequence of his crushing defeat at the hands of Felizardo’s bolomen; in fact, greatly to his surprise, he had not even been reprimanded. Commissioner Furber had been quick to see that really he, himself, was to blame for having sent the small force of Constabulary against the outlaws; and he was not anxious to have Basil back in Manila, telling all men of what had happened on the mountain-side. Consequently, he had sent Basil fifty fresh men—from the Island of Samar, like those who had been killed—and had ordered him to proceed to the northern side of the range, and build a regular stockaded camp in the neighbourhood of one of the villages; meanwhile, Captain Bush’s Scouts were to watch the southern side of the range, learning the lay of the country, endeavouring to obtain information concerning Felizardo and his band, and, as far as possible, preparing the way for a large expedition, which the Government intended to despatch in a few months’ time.
From first to last, Basil Hayle had only remained ten days in Igut, but the time had sufficed to complete his infatuation for Mrs Bush, and to confirm his detestation of her husband. At first by accident, then by design, he had met Mrs Bush practically every day, whilst he had barely spoken to Bush or his white associates. Old Don Juan Ramirez, the Spanish merchant, had told him all about the lives they led—of the mestiza girls at the other end of the town, and the drinking bouts in the spirit shop at the corner of the plaza; with the result that Basil had considered himself perfectly justified in taking the part of Mrs Bush against all the others, in showing his respect for her, and his scorn for them—which was very chivalrous in theory, and very injudicious in practice, as he had realised the moment he received orders to leave Igut. Still, in the end, his parting from her had been admirably unemotional; and if she did cry for hours after he had gone, and if his feelings did find vent in Language, no one in Igut had been aware of these facts.
In Europe and America, where men and women are discreet, such things do not happen—at least they are supposed not to happen—for fear of the Law, or the Church, or of the Mightiest One of all, Mrs Grundy; but in the Tropics, especially in the Philippines, and more especially under the shadow of places like Felizardo’s mountains, where Death is stalking by your side all day, squatting just outside the circle of firelight at night, conventions are apt to lose much of their force. Basil Hayle was in love with Mrs Bush. That would have been very wicked elsewhere, possibly it was wicked in Igut; but what was wholly admirable was that, in the circumstances, Basil Hayle did not become an open convert to the Law of the Bolo, and deal with Captain Bush according to that code. But this is a view of the case which few could understand, unless they had lived with bolomen as the background of their lives.
Basil Hayle had marched away up the valley to the end of Felizardo’s range, over the pass which formed the boundary of the old outlaw’s territory, and down into the rich hemp lands on the other side where, near a village called Silang, he had built a stockaded post, after the custom of the Islands—big nipa-covered shacks, surrounded at a little distance by a high palisade, with a platform at a convenient height, and little watch-towers at each corner; and then he had sat down, and drilled his little brown men, and taught them to shoot, and, incidentally, taught them to love him above everything else on earth, and had waited patiently for the coming of Felizardo, or the ladrones, or the head-hunters, or any one else who was in search of trouble, being tired of looking for trouble for himself. Yet, all the time, he was thinking of Mrs Bush, wishing he could write, but not writing for fear of the letter going astray; though, had he but known, she heard of him, of his safety and his continued good health, every few days, and she concluded that the messages came from him, never suspecting that the servant who delivered them received them from a certain clerk in the Supervisor’s office, the same clerk who had sent word concerning Basil and Mrs Bush to Felizardo; and whence that clerk now obtained the messages it is not hard to guess. Old Felizardo or Dolores Lasara could have told you ….
When he landed at Igut and found that there was no hotel in the place, Mr Joseph Gobbitt turned angrily to John Mackay. “Most scandalous thing! You should have warned me about this. We may be here a day, even two days. What are we going to do?”
The Scotchman answered without removing his cigar from his mouth—Mr Gobbitt hated to see an employé, a mere paid person, smoking in his presence, as Mackay had already divined. “I guess the Bushes will put you up, whilst I shall go to old Don Juan’s,” he answered.
Mr Gobbitt snorted, not liking the casual disposal of himself, and his temper was not improved when, without the slightest warning, he found himself the centre of an unusually vigorous dog-and-pig fight, none of the combatants in which was over-clean. “Most scandalous thing,” he repeated, “most scandalous! I wonder what the police can be about to allow it. I shall certainly summons the owners if I can …. I am sure I see nothing to smile at, Mr Mackay,” he added with great dignity.
A moment later, Captain Bush lounged up, and nodded to Mackay. “Hullo, John. What’s on now? Coming across soon?” indicating the spirit shop with a jerk of his thumb. He was passing on, to see if there were any mails on the launch, when Mackay stopped him. “Here, Captain. This is Mr Joseph Gobbitt of London, who has a letter of introduction to you from the Commission.”
Captain Bush pulled himself together. “Glad to meet you, sir. If you’ll wait a moment, we might go up to the house together. It is only a step. I suppose you’re not going on. No? Well, you must stay with us. My wife will be delighted. Here, muchachos, take the Senor’s luggage up to my house.”
Captain Bush was in an exceptionally good humour, having just won some money off the Treasurer; but, in addition to that, he had understood instantly that the stranger must be a man of position, probably a wealthy English merchant and his own state of chronic insolvency made it necessary for him to lose no chances.