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elia-de-silentio · 2 years

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The Tigers Of Mompracem

Healing And Love

Lady Marianna Guillonk was born under the beautiful Italian sky, on the coasts of the gorgeous Neapolitan Gulf, from an Italian mother and English father. She had found herself an orphan at the age of eleven and heir of a conspicuous fortune, she had been taken in by her uncle James, the only one of her relatives who back then was in Europe.

Back then James Guillonk was one of the most audacious sea wolves of the two worlds, owner of a ship armed and equipped for war, to cooperate with James Brooke, later rajah of Sarawack, for the extermination of the Malaysian pirates, terrible enemies of English commerce in those faraway seas. Despite that lord James, harsh as all sailors, unable to feel whatever affection, didn’t feel any terrible tenderness for his young niece, rather than leave her to stranger hands, had her boarded on his boat taking her to Borneo and exposing her to the grave dangers of those harsh cruises. For three years, the little girl had born witness to those bloody fights, during which thousands of pirates died and which gave to the future rajah Brooke that sad fame that deeply moved and indignated his own compatriots.

But one day lord James, tired of butcheries and dangers, maybe remembering having a niece, had abandoned the sea and had taken residence to Labuan, burying himself under the great woods of the center.

Lady Marianna, then going on fourteen, and who in that dangerous life had acquired an unique energy and fierceness, despite looking like a fragile child, had tried to rebel to his uncle’s wishes, believing herself unable of getting used to that isolation and almost wild lifestyle, but the sea wolf, who seemed not to have much affection for her, had remained unmovable.

Forced to endure that strange prisony, she had dedicated entirely to complete her own education, which up to that point she hadn’t had any time to attend to. Endowed of a tenacious will, little by little she had tamed the fierce fits contracted in those harsh and bloody battles, and that roughness contracted in the continuous vicinity with people of the sea. She had so become a passionate lover of music, flowers, and beautiful arts, thanks to the instructions of an old confidant of her mother, later consumed by the scorching tropical climate. With the progression of her education, even while preserving in the depths of her soul something of her old fierceness, she had become good, generous, charitable.

She hadn’t abandoned her passions for the arms and violent exercises, and often, as an untamed Amazon, she ran for the woods, following even tigers, or like a Naiad she bravely dived into the blue waves of the Malaysian sea; but more often she found herself where misery or misfortune hit, bringing aid to all the natives around, those natives who lord James hated with a passion, as descendants of ancient pirates.

And so that maiden, with her bravery and goodness and beauty, had deserved the nickname of ‘Pearl of Labuan’, nickname who had run so far away and had made the heart of the formidable Tiger of Malaysia beat faster. But under those woods, almost far away from every civil creature, the child, turned girl, had never noticed she was a woman; but when she had seen that proud pirate, without knowing why, she had felt a strange perturbation. What was it? She ignored it, but he was always in front of her eyes, and in her dreams at night, that man of such proud figure, with the nobility of a sultan and the gallantry of an European knight, that man with shining eyes, long black hair and visage on which it could be clearly read a more than indomitable courage and a more than unique energy. After she had charmed him with her eyes, with her voice, with her beauty, she in turn had been charmed and won.

She had at first tried to fight against that heartbeat, new to her, as new it was for Sandokan, but in vain. She always felt that an irresistible force pushed her to see that man again and she couldn’t find peace but with him; she only felt happy at his bedside and when she calmed his acute pains with her chats, her smiles, her uncomparable voice and her mandola. And he was a sight to behold in those moments, Sandokan, when she sang the sweet songs of her faraway mother country, accompanying them with the delicate sound of the melodious instrument.

Then he was no more the Tiger of Malaysia, no more the bloodthirsty pirate. Mute, wanting, covered in sweat, holding his breath, to not disturb that musical and argentine voice, he listened like a man who dreams, as if he wished to impress in his mind that foreign tongue that inebriated him, that suffocated the pangs of his wounds, and when the voice, after vibrating on the last note, died on the last note of the mandola, you could see him remain for a long time in that position, his arms extended as if he wanted to pull the maiden to himself, his blazing gaze fixed in that liquid of hers, his heart lifted and ears pricked as if he was still listening.

In those moments he no longer remembered being the Tiger, he forgot his Mompracem, his prahos, his tiger cubs and the Portuguese, who perhaps at that time, believing him forever extinguished, avenged his death with who knows what bloody vengeances.

Thus the days flew away quickly and his healing, powerfully aided by the passion that devoured his blood, proceeded fast.

In the afternoon of the fifteenth day the lord, suddenly gone in, found the pirate on his feet, ready to leave.

“Oh! My worthy friend!” he cheerfully exclaimed. “I’m so happy of seeing you on your feet!”

“It was no longer possible to remain in bed, milord” answered Sandokan. “After all, I feel strong enough to fight a tiger”

“Excellent, so I’ll soon put you at task!”

“In which way?”

“I have invited some good friends to hunt a tiger that often comes to prowl about my park’s wall. As I see you healed, this evening I’ll go to tell them that tomorrow morning we’ll hunt the beast”

“I’ll be of the party, milord”

“I believe so, but tell me now, I hope you’ll remain as my guest for some time”

“Milord, serious matters call me elsewhere and I need to leave you soon”

“Leave me! Don’t think about it, there is always time for matters and I warn you that I won’t let you leave sooner than a few months; now, promise me you’ll stay”

Sandokan stared at him with flashing eyes. For him, staying in that villa, next to the maiden that had charmed him, was everything. He didn’t ask for more for the moment.

What did he care that the pirates of Mompracem mourned him for dead, when he could see that divine maiden for many days still? What did he care for his faithful Yanez, who perhaps looked anxiously for him on the beaches of the island, betting his life, when Marianna started to love him? And what did he care if he didn’t hear anymore the thunder of the fumin artilleries, when he could still hear the delightful voice of his beloved woman, or feel the terrible emotions of the battles, when she made him feel more sublime emotions? And lastly, what did he care if he ran the risk of being discovered, maybe taken, maybe killed, when he could still breathe the same air that fed his Marianna, live in the midst of the great woods where she lived?

He would have forgotten everything to keep like this for a hundred years still, his Mompracem, his tiger cubs, his boats and even his bloody vengeances.

“Yes, milord, I’ll stay for as long as you want” he said impulsively. “I accept the hospitality you so cordially offer me and if a day, don’t forget these words milord, we’ll have to meet each other as no longer friends, but fierce enemies, weapons at hand, I’ll remember then the debt I owe you”

The Englishman stared at him astonished.

“Why do you speak me so?”

“Maybe one day you’ll know” Sandokan answered gravely.

“I don’t want to investigate your secrets for now” said the lord with a smile. “I’ll wait for that day”

He took his watch and checked.

“I need to depart immediately, if I want to warn my friends of the hunt we’ll engage. Goodbye, my dear prince” he said.

He was about to get out, when he said, stopping:

“If you want to go to the park, you’ll find my niece, whom I hope will keep you good company”

“Thank you, my lord”

It was what Sandokan desired; to find it himself, even for a few minutes, alone with the maiden, perhaps to reveal the enormous passion which devoured his heart.

As soon as he found himself alone, he quickly went to a window facing on an gigantic park.

There, in the shadow of a Chinese magnolia littered with sharply-scented flowers, sitting on the revolted trunk of an arenga, was the young lady. She was alone, thoughtful, her mandola on her knees. To Sandokan, she looked like a celestial vision. All of his blood went to his head, and his heart started beating with indescribable violence.

He stayed there, his eyes piercingly fixated on the maiden, even holding his breath, as if he feared to disturb her.

But he suddenly backtracked, with a strangled cry, which sounded like a faraway roar. His visage scarily alterated, taking on a fierce expression.

The Tiger of Malaysia, up to that moment charmed, bewitched, now that felt healed, suddenly reawakened. The fierce man returned, ruthless, bloodthirsty, his heart unaccessible to every passion.

“What am I about to do?” he exclaimed, waving his hand on his scorching forehead. “Is it true that I love that maiden? Was it a dream or inexplicable madness?Am I no longer the pirate of Mompracem, to feel attracted by irresistible force to that daughter of a race to which I vowed eternal hatred?”

“Me, love! … I, who never felt anything but fits of hatred and bear the name of a bloodthirsty beast! … Would I forget my savage Mompracem, my faithful tiger cubs, my Yanez, who wait for me in who knows which anxieties? Do I maybe forget that the compatriots of that girl don’t wait for anything but the right moment to destroy my might?”

“Out with this vision that persecuted me for so many nights, out these shivers unworthy of the Tiger of Malaysia! Let’s extinguish this vulcano that burns my heart and let’s instead make a thousand abysses between me and that bewitching siren!...”

“Come on, Tiger, let your roar be heard, bury the gratitude you owe to these people who healed you, go, run far from these places and return to that sea which unwittingly pushed you to these shores, return to being the fearsome pirate of the formidable Mompracem!”

So speaking, Sandokan had risen in front of the window with his fists closed and gritted teeth, all shaking from the rage.

It seemed to him that he had become a giant, and to hear from far away the cries of his tiger cubs who called him to the fight and the thunderin of the artillery.

Still he remained there, as if nailed in front of the window, held back by a force stronger than his wrath, his eyes always burningly fixed on the young lady.

“Marianna!” he exclaimed suddenly. “Marianna!”

At that beloved name, that fit of rage and hatred evaporated like fog in the sun. The Tiger returned a man, and a lover to boot!...

His hands unwittingly ran to the hook and with a quick movement he opened the window.

A breeze of warm air, charged with the scent of a thousand flowers, entered the room. In breathing those balsamic perfumes, the pirate felt himself inebriated and reawakening in his heart, stronger than ever, that passion he had tried to suffocate a moment before.

He bent on the windowsill and admired in silence, writhing, deliriously, the fair lady. An intense fever devoured him, fire slithered in his veins pouring into his heart, red clouds ran in front of his eyes, but even amidst these he saw the one who had bewitched him.

How long did he stay there? Surely a long time, because when he shook himself, the young lady was no longer in the park, the sun had went down, the darkness had fallen and a thousand stars glimmered in the sky.

He started to walk across the room, his hands crossed on his chest and the head bent, submerged in dark thoughts.

“Look!” he said, returning to the window and exposing his scorching forehead to the fresh night’s air. “Here’s happiness, here’s a new life, here’s a new drunkness, sweet, quiet; there Mompracem, a stormy life, hurricanes of iron, thunders of artillery, bloody butcheries, my swift prahos, my tiger cubs, my good Yanez! … Which of these two lives?”

“Yet all of my blood burns, when I think about this maiden who made my heart beat before I even saw her, and I feel molten bronze run in my veins, when I think of her! One would say I put her before my tiger cubs and my revenges! Yet I feel shame on me, thinking she’s daughter of that race I hate so vehemently! What if I forgot about her?

“Ah! You bleed, my poor heart, don’t you want so?

“Before I was the terror of these seas, before I had never known affection, before I had never tasted anything but the drunkness of battles and blood … and now I feel I could never taste anything far from her!...”

He fell silent, listening to the rustling of leaves and the whistle of his blood.

“What if I put between me and that divine woman the forest, then the sea, then hatred? …” he continued. “Hatred! Could I hate her? Yet I need to escape, to return to my Mompracem, to my tiger cubs! … If I stayed here the fever would end up devouring all of my energy, I feel that I’ll put down forever my might, that I would no longer be the Tiger of Malaysia … Come on, let’s depart!”

He looked down: only three metres separated him from the ground. He listened; he heard no noise.

He jumped over the windowsill, and lightly stepped among the flower beds and went towards the tree, on which a few hours before Marianna had sat down.

“It was here that she rested” he whispered sadly. “Oh! How beautiful were you oh Marianna! … And I’ll never see you again! … And I won’t hear your voice anymore, never … never!...”

He bent over the tree and plucked a flower, a wild rose, that the young lady had let fall. He admired it for long, smelled it several times, and passionately hid it in his chest, then he swiftly moved towards the walls of the park whispering:

“Let’s go, Sandokan; all is over!”

He had reached the fence and was about to lunge, when he backtracked, his hands in his hair, his gaze dark, emitting a sort of sigh.

“No, no!” he cried desperately. “I can’t, I can’t! … Let Mompracem go down, let my tiger cubs kill themselves, let my might be dispersed, I’m staying!”

He started running in the park as if he feared finding himself under the fence, and he didn’t stop until he was under the windows of his room. He exitated another time, then with a leap he grasped to a tree branch and reached the windowsill.

When he found himself in that house he had left with the firm decision of no longer return, a second sigh rumbled in the back of his throat.

“Ah!” he exclaimed. “The Tiger of Malaysia is about to go down!...”

Repetitia iuvat: tira più un pelo di figa che un carro da buoi. To make a short recap: after Sandokan had fallen from the boat in the last translated chapter, he had been picked up, ironically, from one of the English colonizers, lord James, who had decided to save and heal him believing him to be some prince. So Sandokan can finally see the woman he has obsessed insofar. Now, I had previously said that Salgari had characterized Sandokan as extremely impulsive, almost unable to control himself, but here’s some prime material! How many times has he changed his mind?

Thank to everyone who read this translation. If you liked it, please consider offering me a coffee!

#emilio salgari #sandokan #italian literature #19th century #elia's translations

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