‘All the population was on the river bank staring silently, as Malays will do, at the Sissie anchored in the stream. She was as wonderful to them as an angel’s visit. Many of the old people had only heard vaguely of “fire-ships”, and none of the children had ever seen a white man. On the back path Davidson strolled in perfect solitude. But he became aware of a bad smell and concluded he would go no farther.

‘While he stood wiping his forehead he heard from somewhere the exclamation, “My God! It’s Davy!”

‘Davidson’s lower jaw, as he expressed it, came unhooked at the crying of this excited voice. Davy was the name used by the associates of his young days; he hadn’t heard it for many years. He stared about with his mouth open and saw a white woman issue from the long grass in which a small hut stood buried nearly up to the roof.

‘Try to imagine the shock: in that wild place that you couldn’t find on a map, and more squalid than the most poverty-stricken Malay Settlement had a right to be, this European woman coming swishing out of the long grass, in a fanciful tea-grown^* thing, with a long train, dingy pink satin and frayed lace trimmings; her eyes like black coals in a pasty-white face.…Davidson thought that he was asleep, that he was delirious.

‘The woman came forward, her arms extended, and laid her hands on Davidson’s shoulders, exclaiming:

“‘Why! You have hardly changed at all. The same good Davy.…” And she laughed a little wildly. This sound was to Davidson like a galvanic shock to a corpse. He started in every muscle.

“‘Laughing Anne,” he said in an awe-struck voice.

“‘All that’s left of her, Davy.…All that’s left of her.”

‘Davidson looked up at the sky, but there was to be seen no balloon from which she could have fallen on that spot. When he brought his distracted gaze down it rested on a child holding on with a brown little paw to the pink satin gown. He had run out of the grass after her. Had Davidson seen a real hobgoblin his eyes could not have bulged more than at this small boy in a dirty white blouse and ragged knickers. He had a round head of tight chestnut curls, very sunburnt legs, a freckled face and merry eyes.

‘Davidson, overcome, looked up at the woman in silence. She sent the child back to the hut and when he had disappeared in the grass she turned to Davidson, tried to speak, but after getting out the words, “That’s my Tony,” burst into a long fit of crying. She had to lean on Davidson’s shoulder. He, distressed in the goodness of his heart, stood rooted to the spot where she had come upon him.

‘What a meeting—eh? Bamtz had sent her out to see what white man it was who had landed. And she had recognized him from that time when Davidson, who had been pearling himself in his youth, had been associating with Harry the Pearler and others, the quietest of a rather rowdy set.

‘Before Davidson retraced his steps to go on board his steamer, he had heard much of Laughing Anne’s story and had even an interview, on the path, with Bamtz himself. She went to the hut to fetch him, and he come out lounging, with his hands in his pockets with that detached, casual manner under which he concealed his propensity to cringe.

‘Bamtz wanted Davidson to promise to call more or less regularly. He thought he saw an opening to do business with rattans there, if only he could depend on some craft to bring out trading goods and take away his produce.

“‘I have a few dollars to make a start on. The people are all right. The Orang Kaya^* has given me that empty house there to live in as long as I will stay,” added Bamtz.

“‘Do it, Davy,” cried the woman suddenly. “Think of that poor kid.”