Joseph Conrad: Nostromo

PART THIRD: THE LIGHTHOUSE 11. CHAPTER ELEVEN (continued)

"I am afraid of being overwhelmed by too much gratitude. However,
these people interest me. I went out several times to the Great
Isabel light to look after old Giorgio."

He did not tell Mrs. Gould that it was because he found there, in
her absence, the relief of an atmosphere of congenial sentiment
in old Giorgio's austere admiration for the "English signora--the
benefactress"; in black-eyed Linda's voluble, torrential,
passionate affection for "our Dona Emilia--that angel"; in the
white-throated, fair Giselle's adoring upward turn of the eyes,
which then glided towards him with a sidelong, half-arch,
half-candid glance, which made the doctor exclaim to himself
mentally, "If I weren't what I am, old and ugly, I would think
the minx is making eyes at me. And perhaps she is. I dare say she
would make eyes at anybody." Dr. Monygham said nothing of this to
Mrs. Gould, the providence of the Viola family, but reverted to
what he called "our great Nostromo."

"What I wanted to tell you is this: Our great Nostromo did not
take much notice of the old man and the children for some years.
It's true, too, that he was away on his coasting voyages
certainly ten months out of the twelve. He was making his
fortune, as he told Captain Mitchell once. He seems to have done
uncommonly well. It was only to be expected. He is a man full of
resource, full of confidence in himself, ready to take chances
and risks of every sort. I remember being in Mitchell's office
one day, when he came in with that calm, grave air he always
carries everywhere. He had been away trading in the Gulf of
California, he said, looking straight past us at the wall, as his
manner is, and was glad to see on his return that a lighthouse
was being built on the cliff of the Great Isabel. Very glad, he
repeated. Mitchell explained that it was the O. S. N. Co. who was
building it, for the convenience of the mail service, on his own
advice. Captain Fidanza was good enough to say that it was
excellent advice. I remember him twisting up his moustaches and
looking all round the cornice of the room before he proposed that
old Giorgio should be made the keeper of that light."