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.And when he moved to Singapore, there would not only be the Governor and public affairs demanding his attention, but also the woman he had once loved!She would be beautiful and sophisticated and would renew for him all he had enjoyed in the past.She thought of how once again Lady Ellenton had called Lord Saire scornfully ‘the Love Pirate’.Yet if he had plundered her of her love and her heart, she must seem to him a very small and insignificant little vessel compared with the big ships he had captured in the past and would go on capturing in the future.“He will forget me,” she said decisively, “but I will never, never, if I live to be a hundred, ever forget him!”All the same, however fraught her feelings were on leaving the man she loved, she could not help being interested as later the following day they drew near to Kuching, which was the Capital and Port of Sarawak.As she moved about the crowded deck where most of the passengers had slept the night, she found they were many nationalities, but mostly Malayan and they smiled at her in a friendly fashion and she smiled back.She was not able to converse with them and she was in fact rather glad when an old white-haired trader singled her out.She was not at all afraid of him, for there was something pleasant and fatherly about him, which did not in any way resemble Mr.Van de Kaempfer’s approach.“Is this your first visit to Sarawak, young lady?” he asked.“It is,” she replied, “and I believe it is a very beautiful country.”“Beautiful indeed!” he replied.“But still very primitive and the people are hard to trade with.”“Why is that?” Bertilla asked.“Because they’re not really interested in money,” he replied.“Unlike most of the world, they are happy enough without it.”When Bertilla looked at him in surprise, he added,“There are areas being cultivated with pineapples and roads being built, but there’s a long way to go before they learn that we need their gutta-percha and sago.”“Is that all you can buy from them?” Bertilla asked interestedly.“A few diamonds,” the old man answered, “birds’ nests, bêche-de-mer or as you may call it ‘sea cucumber’, and bezoar stones, but the majority of the population would rather go headhunting than grow anything I want.”Bertilla felt herself shudder.“Are they still – cutting off the heads of – people?”There was no mistaking the apprehension in her voice and the old trader smiled kindly.“You’ll be safe enough,” he said.“They’re not likely to touch a white woman, but you have to understand that headhunting is part of their lives.It’ll take a great many years before the White Rajah or anyone else persuades them to give it up.”Bertilla was silent, wishing absurdly that Lord Saire were there to protect her and the old trader continued,“When a young Dyak comes of age, no matter how handsome he may be, the girls of his tribe think little of him until he has at least two or three heads to his credit.”“Two or three – heads!” Bertilla repeated in a whisper.“He can sing his love songs and dance his war dances,” the trader went on, “but always there comes the question, ‘how many heads hast thou taken?’”“So what do the men do?” Bertilla asked, knowing it was an unnecessary question.“They go hunting,” the trader replied, “and when a man returns with his trophy, preparations are made for a great feast – ‘the Feast of the Dried Heads.”“But – surely the Missionaries can – persuade them that it is – wrong?”The trader laughed.“From what I’ve seen of the Missionaries, they are more trouble than they’re worth.Most of them convert only the foolish who are too afraid to run away from them or those who are crafty and think they’ve something to gain from the white man.”Bertilla was silent, feeling there was nothing she could say and that once again she was alone in the world with nobody to look after her and no one she could turn to.“Now don’t worry yourself,” the trader said as if he realised that he had upset her
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