 - it is
finished; it is finished« - announces calamity and death in the popular belief,
drifted vaguely like a large dark ball across his path. In the downfall of all
the realities that made his force, he was affected by the superstition, and
shuddered slightly. Signora Teresa must have died, then. It could mean nothing
else. The cry of the ill-omened bird, the first sound he was to hear on his
return, was a fitting welcome for his betrayed individuality. The unseen powers
which he had offended by refusing to bring a priest to a dying woman were
lifting up their voice against him. She was dead. With admirable and human
consistency he referred everything to himself. She had been a woman of good
counsel always. And the bereaved old Giorgio remained stunned by his loss just
as he was likely to require the advice of his sagacity. The blow would render
the dreamy old man quite stupid for a time.
    As to Captain Mitchell, Nostromo, after the manner of trusted subordinates,
considered him as a person fitted by education perhaps to sign papers in an
office and to give orders, but otherwise of no use whatever, and something of a
fool. The necessity of winding round his little finger, almost daily, the
pompous and testy self-importance of the old seaman had grown irksome with use
to Nostromo. At first it had given him an inward satisfaction. But the necessity
of overcoming small obstacles becomes wearisome to a self-confident personality
as much by the certitude of success as by the monotony of effort. He mistrusted
his superior's proneness to fussy action. That old Englishman had no judgment,
he said to himself. It was useless to suppose that, acquainted with the true
state of the case, he would keep it to himself. He would talk of doing
impracticable things. Nostromo feared him as one would fear saddling one's self
with some persistent worry. He had no discretion. He would betray the treasure.
And Nostromo had made up his mind that the treasure should not be betrayed.
    The word had fixed itself tenaciously in his intelligence. His imagination
had seized upon the clear and simple notion of betrayal to account for the dazed
feeling of enlightenment as to being done for, of having inadvertently gone out
of his existence on an issue in which his personality had not been taken into
account. A man betrayed is a man destroyed. Signora Teresa (may God have her
soul!) had been right. He had never been taken into account. Destroyed! Her
white form sitting up bowed in bed, the falling black hair
