Was he alive or dead?
If dead, had he left any papers, documents; any indications or hints as to his great enterprise?
Meantime he had found amongst the rubbish in one of the empty rooms a note-book belonging to the old adventurer.

He studied the crabbed handwriting of its pages and often grew meditative over it.

Other things also woke him up from his apathy.
The stir made in the whole of the island by the establishment of the British Borneo Company affected even the sluggish flow of the Pantai life.

Great changes were expected; annexation was talked of; the Arabs grew civil.

Almayer began building his new house for the use of the future engineers, agents, or settlers of the new Company.