Joseph Conrad: Nostromo

PART SECOND: THE ISABELS 3. CHAPTER THREE (continued)

He had known her some eight years since, shortly before the
Avellanos had left Europe for good, as a tall girl of sixteen,
youthfully austere, and of a character already so formed that she
ventured to treat slightingly his pose of disabused wisdom. On
one occasion, as though she had lost all patience, she flew out
at him about the aimlessness of his life and the levity of his
opinions. He was twenty then, an only son, spoiled by his adoring
family. This attack disconcerted him so greatly that he had
faltered in his affectation of amused superiority before that
insignificant chit of a school-girl. But the impression left was
so strong that ever since all the girl friends of his sisters
recalled to him Antonia Avellanos by some faint resemblance, or
by the great force of contrast. It was, he told himself, like a
ridiculous fatality. And, of course, in the news the Decouds
received regularly from Costaguana, the name of their friends,
the Avellanos, cropped up frequently--the arrest and the
abominable treatment of the ex-Minister, the dangers and
hardships endured by the family, its withdrawal in poverty to
Sulaco, the death of the mother.

The Monterist pronunciamento had taken place before Martin Decoud
reached Costaguana. He came out in a roundabout way, through
Magellan's Straits by the main line and the West Coast Service of
the O.S.N. Company. His precious consignment arrived just in
time to convert the first feelings of consternation into a mood
of hope and resolution. Publicly he was made much of by the
familias principales. Privately Don Jose, still shaken and weak,
embraced him with tears in his eyes.

"You have come out yourself! No less could be expected from a
Decoud. Alas! our worst fears have been realized," he moaned,
affectionately. And again he hugged his god-son. This was indeed
the time for men of intellect and conscience to rally round the
endangered cause.