Achmed Abdullah

“ And so the Captain ordered the two women and the Chaplain to remain at the outskirts of the village.
Nervously, Delia watched him go down the street. Directly he appeared the father of the sick child rushed at him, pouring out a torrent of abuse, so frenzied and rapid that Burbank could not understand him. The other villagers gathered around, all talking in high-pitched, threatening voices.
“The boy has died,” interpreted Tulawee. “Be pleased to come away quickly. These people have gone crazy.” ”

“ The Moro looked at the American as though he would read his very heart. Ancient prejudice and bigotry fought hard with his anxiety for the boy's welfare which called on him not to lose a chance. His love won, and he held forth the fever-worn scrap of humanity to the doctor.
Carefully and tenderly Burbank examined the child. ”

“ But here, in this yellow land streaked with heat and snakes and cockroaches, this land which dying Spain had palmed off in its last lucid moment on a greedy and credulous young democracy, even the men in olive-drab withered under the curse of the tropics. ”

“ You've claimed the usual wretched privilege of decently good people. I'm not altogether a fool. I've seen you draw your skirts about you whenever I happened to pass close to your deck chair. I've overheard stray remarks ... how could I help it? ... even if that little cad of a Rockway had not told me...”
She was horribly embarrassed and did not know what to say. There was something just in Burbank's indignation, and she knew it. Then she decided to brave it out. ”

“ Then, following unusually heavy rains, fever stalked through the district, and heaped corpse on corpse, black and bloated and stinking.
Delia volunteered to act as nurse. Her father remonstrated. He wanted to send her back to Manila. But she carried her point.
“You are a soldier, father dear, and I am a soldier's daughter. Would. you like me to be a coward and run away?”
Major Kane's wife also volunteered; and so, every day, the two women, accompanied by the Chaplain, set out to carry help to the villages. And every day they met Burbank and acted under his short, gruff orders. ”

“ Even her father, the Colonel of the regiment, mentioned them in a casual way.
“I'm sorry you had to meet Burbank, my dear. Couldn't be helped. He belongs to the regiment. But I'll see that he gets a detail away from barracks as soon as we make our post. Brutal, objectionable beast ... keep away from him.”
Still, considering that silence is the only weapon which civilization has left to man in his battles with the other sex, she should not have drawn her skirts so tightly about her when the Captain passed her chair on his eternal pacings around the promenade deck. ”

“ Then he gave his verdict.
“From eating the quinine balls there can come no good to the child. He is near death. Only with the means which I shall show to you is there a chance for life. Even then there is grave doubt of his becoming better. But without it he will assuredly die.”
And he explained his desire to inject the quinine into the child's body. At length, grudgingly, distrustingly, despairingly, the native submitted his son to the experiment.
Early the next morning they returned to the village, Tulawee, the Captain's Filipino boy, accompanying them as usual. ”

“ Of course they took the pills he gave them. For the word “Quinine” is known even to the most primitive tribes in the Islands. But all his entreaties to be allowed to inject the drug in the most severe cases was brusquely refused.
In a little hut at the outskirts of the village, they found a wasted man, his own eyes bright with fever, sitting with a small boy clasped to his bosom, a sheet around them both, trying with the warmth of his own body to warm away the child's shivering fit.
The Captain stopped. He offered his services and his craft, speaking in the native dialect. ”

“ You're always so ready to forgive and to assist the erring, the sinners. Let a man commit murder or robbery or some other crime, and then you go to work and discover that he was born and bred in the slums, in the gutter ... ”

“ The very next day the regiment received marching orders for Mindanao.
It was her first trip to the Islands, and so her father, who had been stationed there before, decided that she should stay with an aunt of hers in Manila for a few months ... “to get a little climatic and social seasoning” as he expressed it. Later on she could come down to Mindanao and join him in cantonments.
She was very busy during the next few days, very busy and happy and contented. There were the ancient streets of the town to be explored. ”

“ He's a reformed character, just like in a novel. That Filipino boy whom he beat so brutally ... I'm sure you must have heard the story, my dear ... well, somehow or other he found ... him and now he's with him again ... and they do say that he simply worships his master...”
Rockway cut into the conversation.
“Burbank a reformed character! Funny, isn't it? I guess there's some woman at the other end of it, some fool girl he's trying to impress with his new-found goodness. I tell you, Miss Montgomery, old Burbank uses his reform only as a fork to scratch his back with.” ”

“ It appeared that the regiment had been in excellent health since they reached Mindanao, and the Colonel had lent Burbank to the civil authorities. He was now the doctor of the district. At first, everybody had expressed sympathy for the poor natives who would come under his medical sway. ”

“ Suddenly two outlines rose flush against the sky line ... a tall, soldierly figure, and at his heels, trotting like a dog, a short, squat native...
“There they are now, Delia.” The Chaplain had stepped out on the porch. “There they are ... Captain Burbank and his faithful retainer.”
She turned round. She had known the Chaplain since she was a small child, and she was very fond of him.
“Yes, Padre. I just saw him come from the village. I wonder what he does there at night.”
“Looking after the sick. I suppose our friends in there spoke the truth, Delia. Burbank has found ... ”