This word, recurring often, becomes a kind of catchphrase by which Nostromo expresses
his condition to himself. On the surface he means that the Ribierists betrayed
him by luring him into their service, then making no provision for his safety
when things turned bad. (His view is somewhat in error, as he doesn't know that
he could take safe refuge at the Goulds' house.) Allegorically, however, there
is a level at which the People as a whole have been "betrayed" by their
service to the vast dream-ideals of the rulers, which always claim to act for
their benefit (the elevation of mankind) but which always leave them poor and
forgotten. There is also a thematic level, at which anyone subscribing to a dream-ideal,
like Nostromo's of reputation, is "betrayed" when the ideal proves to
be an evanescent illusion.