The Hidden Force (5 page)

However, after they had gasped a few times in those tails and stiff collars, everyone found Mrs Eldersma’s dinners delightful, precisely because they were so European in style.

E
VA ENTERTAINED GUESTS
every two weeks.

“My dear Commissioner, it’s not a reception,” she would always say to Van Oudijck in her defence. I’m well aware that no one in the provinces is allowed to “receive” except the commissioner and his wife. It really isn’t a
reception
, Commissioner. I wouldn’t dare call it that. I simply have an at-home day every two weeks, and am pleased if my friends can come… Surely there’s no harm in that, Commissioner, provided it’s not a
reception
?”

Van Oudijck would give a cheerful laugh that shook his jovial military moustache, and ask if dear Mrs Eldersma were pulling his leg. She could do what she liked, as long as she went on providing some fun, some theatre, some music to brighten social life. That was quite simply her responsibility: to provide some sophistication in Labuwangi.

Her at-home days were not at all colonial. In the District Commissioner’s house, for example, receptions were
organized
according to traditional provincial Indies custom: all the ladies sat together on the chairs along the walls, and Mrs Van Oudijck did the rounds, talking with each of them for a moment, standing while the ladies remained seated; in
another gallery, the District Commissioner conversed with the gentlemen. Men and women did not mix. Bitters, port and iced water were served.

At Eva’s, people walked and strolled through the galleries, sat down here and there; everyone talked to everyone. It did not have the stateliness of the commissioner’s mansion, but had the chic of a French salon, with an artistic touch. It had become the custom for the ladies to dress up more for Eva’s days than for receptions at the commissioner’s house; at Eva’s they wore hats, a sign of the greatest elegance in the Indies. Fortunately, it did not matter at all to Léonie, but left her completely indifferent.

In the middle gallery Léonie was now sitting on a divan and stayed sitting there with the
radèn-ayu
, the prince’s wife. She found the old custom convenient; everyone came to her. At her own receptions she had to walk so much, working her way along the rows of women by the wall… Now she was taking it easy, sitting down, smiling at anyone who came to pay her a compliment. But apart from that it was a bustling throng of guests. Eva was everywhere.

“Do you like it here?” Mrs Van Does asked Léonie, casting a glance over the middle gallery, and surveying in
bewilderment
the line of matt arabesques painted with lime as frescos on the soft grey wall, the
jati
-wood panelling, carved by skilful Chinese cabinet-makers from a drawing in
The Studio
magazine, the bronze Japanese vases on jati-wood pedestals, in which bamboo branches and bunches of gigantic flowers cast a soft shadow up to the ceiling.

“Strange… but very nice! Unusual…” murmured Léonie, to whom Eva’s taste was still a mystery. Withdrawn as she was into her temple of egoism, what others did and felt didn’t matter to her, not even how someone else arranged their house. But she could never have lived here. She preferred her engravings—Veronese, Shakespeare and Tasso—which she thought distinguished, rather than the splendid sepia photographs of Italian masters that Eva had displayed on easels here and there. Most of all she liked her chocolate box, and the perfume advert with the cherubs.

“Do you like that dress?” Mrs Van Does then asked.

“Oh yes,” said Léonie smiling sweetly. “Eva is very clever; she painted blue irises on Chinese silk herself…”

She never said anything but sweet smiling things. She never spoke ill of people; it was all indifferent to her. And she now turned back to the
radèn-ayu
and thanked her in sweet, drawling sentences for some fruit she had sent. The Prince came along to talk to her and she inquired about his two young sons. She spoke in Dutch and the Prince and the
radèn-ayu
replied in Malay. The Prince of Labuwangi, Radèn Adipati Surio Sunario, was still young, just thirty, with a fine Javanese face like that of a supercilious
wayang
shadow puppet, and a little moustache with the tips carefully twisted, and above all a striking stare, a stare as if he were in a perpetual trance, a stare that seemed to plumb visible reality and see through it, a stare from eyes like glowing coals, sometimes dull and tired, sometimes glowing like sparks of ecstasy and fanaticism. Among the native population—almost
slavishly attached to their royal family—he had the
reputation
of holiness and mystery, though no one ever got to the bottom of the matter. Here, on Eva’s veranda, he simply made the puppet-like impression of a distinguished native prince: the only surprise was his trancelike expression. The sarong that fitted smoothly around his hips hung in front in a bunch of flat, regular pleats that fluttered open; he wore a white starched shirt with diamond studs and a thin blue tie, over it a blue linen uniform jacket with gold buttons bearing the letter W for Wilhelmina and the crown; on his bare feet he wore black patent leather pumps turned up at the front; the kerchief wound carefully round his head in narrow folds gave his delicate face a feminine look, but his black eyes, occasionally tired, kept flashing in an ecstatic trance. His blue and gold belt held the golden
kris
dagger, fixed at the small of his back; on his small, slim hand shone a gemstone, and a cigarette case of braided gold wire peeped out of his jacket pocket. He said little—sometimes he looked drowsy, then suddenly his strange eyes would flash into life—and he replied to what Léonie said almost exclusively with a curt, abrupt:

“
Saya
… Your humble servant.”

He pronounced the two syllables in a harsh, sibilant tone of politeness, giving each syllable equal emphasis, and
accompanied
the formula with a brief, automatic nod of the head. The
radèn-ayu
, seated beside Léonie, answered in the same way:

“Saya…”

Though she invariably followed it with a slightly
embarrassed
laugh. She was still very young, perhaps just turned eighteen. She was a princess from Solo, and Van Oudijck could not stand her, because she introduced Solo manners and Solo expressions into Labuwangi, in her arrogant assumption that nothing was as distinguished and purely aristocratic as the customs and expressions of the court of Solo. She used courtly words, which the population of Labuwangi did not understand, and she had forced on the Prince a coachman from Solo, complete with the royal livery, which included a wig and a false moustache, at which the population stared goggle-eyed. Her yellow complexion was made even paler by a light layer of rice powder, applied moist, the eyebrows slightly arched by a line of black; jewels were pinned in her hair, which she wore in a traditional glossy bun, and in the centre was a
kenanga
flower. Over a full-length batik robe, which according to the custom of the Solo court trailed in front of her, she wore a red brocade jacket trimmed with gold braid and fastened with three large jewels. Two fabulous gems, in heavy silver settings, weighed down her ear lobes. She wore light mesh stockings and gold-embroidered Chinese slippers. Her small, slender fingers were covered in rings, as if set with diamonds, and she carried a white feather fan.

“
Saya
…
saya
…” she answered politely, with her shy laugh.

Léonie paused for a moment, tired of the one-sided conversation. Once she had talked to the Prince and the
radèn-ayu
about their sons, there was little else for her to say. Van Oudijck, whom Eva had given a guided tour of
her galleries—since there was always something new to admire—rejoined his wife; the Prince rose to his feet.

“Well, Prince,” Van Oudijck said, in Dutch. “How is
radènayu
pangéran
, the Princess dowager?”

He inquired about the widow of the old prince, Sunario’s mother.

“Very well… thank you…” muttered the Prince in Malay. “But Mama has not come with us… so old… tires easily.”

“I need to talk to you for a moment, Prince.”

The Prince followed Van Oudijck onto the front veranda, which was empty.

“I’m sorry to have to tell you that I’ve just received bad news about your brother, the Prince of Ngajiwa… I am informed that he has recently started gambling again and has lost large sums. Have you any knowledge of this, Prince?”

The Prince withdrew into his puppet-like stiffness, and said nothing. His eyes stared right through Van Oudijck, as if focused on something far in the distance.

“
Tida
…” came the negative reply.

“I instruct you, as head of the family, to investigate this matter and to keep an eye on your brother. He gambles, he drinks, he dishonours your name, Prince. If the old
pangéran
, your father, had had any inkling that his second son was wasting his life like this, it would have grieved him greatly. He bore his name with pride. He was one of the wisest and most noble princes that the government has ever had on Java, and you know how highly the government esteemed the
pangéran
. Even in the days of the Dutch East India Company, Holland
was greatly indebted to your family, which was always loyal. But times appear to be changing… It is very sad, Prince, that an old Javanese family with such an exalted tradition as yours is no longer able to adhere to that tradition…”

Radèn Adipati Surio Sunario turned a shade of olive green. His trancelike gaze pierced the District Commissioner, but he saw that the Commissioner too was seething with rage. And he smothered his strange flashing gaze till it became a sleepy, tired look.

“I thought, Commissioner, that you had always felt
affection
for my house,” he murmured, almost plaintively.

“You thought correctly, Prince. I held the
pangéran
in great affection. I have always admired your noble house, and I have always tried to support it. I should like to continue to support it, together with you, Prince, hoping that you see not only—as you are said to—the world beyond this one, but also the reality around you. But it is your brother, Prince, for whom I feel no affection and whom I cannot possibly respect. I have been told—and can trust those who told me—that the Prince of Ngajiwa has not only gambled… but has also failed to pay the chiefs of Ngajiwa their salaries this month…”

They looked each other in the eye and Van Oudijck’s calm, assured gaze once again met the Prince’s flashing trancelike stare.

“Your informants may be mistaken…”

“I suspect that they would not bring such reports without having absolute certainty. Prince, this matter is very sensitive. Once again: you are the head of your family. Investigate the
extent to which your younger brother has misused
government
funds and ensure that complete reparation is made as soon as possible. I am deliberately leaving the matter to you. I shall not raise the question with your brother, in order to spare a member of your family for as long as I can. It is up to you to reprimand your brother and point out to him what in my eyes is a crime, but one which you through your prestige as head of the family can still expunge. Forbid him to go on gambling and order him to keep his passion in check. Otherwise, I foresee very regrettable consequences, and I shall have to recommend your brother’s dismissal. You yourself know how reluctant I am to do this, since the Prince of Ngajiwa is the second son of the old
pangéran
, whom I held in high esteem, just as I would always wish to spare your mother, the
radèn-ayu pangéran
, any kind of sorrow.”

“I thank you…” murmured Sunario.

“Take good note of what I am saying to you, Prince. If you cannot make your brother see reason, and control his passion—if the salaries of the heads are not paid as soon as possible… then
I
shall be forced to act. And if my warning is to no avail… that would mean your brother’s downfall. You yourself know that the dismissal of a prince is such an exceptional event that it would bring shame upon your family. Help me to save the house of the Adiningrats from such ignominy.”

“I promise,” murmured the Prince.

“Give me your hand, Prince.”

Van Oudijck pressed the thin fingers of the Javanese.

“Can I trust you?” he asked urgently.

“In life… in death…”

“Let us go in then. And let me know your findings as soon as possible…”

The Prince bowed. His pale olive skin betrayed the silent, hidden rage churning inside him like the magma of a volcano. His eyes drilled with silent hatred into Van Oudijck’s back, the Dutchman, the base Dutchman, the commoner, the unclean dog, the infidel Christian, who, whatever he might feel in his polluted soul, had no business concerning himself with anything of his,
his
house, his father, his mother, their sacrosanct nobility and aristocracy… even though they had always bowed under the yoke of superior strength…

“
I
’
M COUNTING ON YOU
to stay for dinner,” said Eva.

“Of course,” replied Controller Van Helderen and his wife.

The reception—
not
a reception, as Eva always pleaded—was coming to an end: the Van Oudijck’s had left first; the Prince followed. The Eldersma’s were left alone with their intimate circle: Doctor Rantzow, senior engineer Doorn de Bruijn, with their wives and the Van Helderens. They sat down on the front veranda with some sense of relief and rocked comfortably to and fro. Whisky sodas and lemonade with great chunks of ice were served.

“Always full to burst, Eva’s reception,” said Mrs Van Helderen. “Fuller than last time at the Commissioner’s…”

Ida van Helderen was a typical white Eurasian, who always tried to behave in a very European way, and speak correct Dutch; she even pretended to speak bad Malay and not like either
rijsttafel
or spicy fruit salad. She was short and plump, very white, with big black eyes that always looked startled. She was full of little secret whims, hatreds, affections; they all welled up in her from mysterious, unfathomable motives. Sometimes she hated Eva, sometimes she adored her. She
was totally unpredictable; every action, every movement, every word could hold a surprise. She was always in love, tragically. She saw her little private emotions in an extremely tragic light, grand and sombre—without any sense of
proportion
—and then poured her heart out to Eva, who laughed and comforted her. Her husband, the controller, had never been in Holland: he had been educated entirely in Batavia, in the Colonial Department of King William III College. And it was a very strange sight to see this Creole,
apparently
completely European—tall, blond, pale, with a blond moustache, his lively, expressive blue eyes full of interest, with his manners that were more refined than those of the most select circles in Europe, and yet so Indies in his ideas, vocabulary, dress. He spoke about Paris and Vienna as if he had spent years there, though he had never left Java; he loved music, though he found it difficult to come to terms with Wagner, when Eva played for him; and his great dream was to go to Europe one day on leave, to see the Paris Exhibition. There was an astonishing distinction and innate style about this young man, as if he were not the child of European parents, who had spent their whole lives in the Indies, but a stranger from an unknown country, whose nationality one could not immediately call to mind… At most there was a certain softness in his accent—the influence of the climate. He spoke Dutch so correctly that it would have appeared almost stiff amid the careless slang of the motherland; and he spoke French, English and German with greater ease than most Dutchmen. Perhaps he derived that exotic politeness
and courtesy from a French mother: innate, pleasant, natural. In his wife, also of French origin, who came from Réunion, that exoticism had resulted in a mysterious mixture that had retained nothing but childishness: a welter of petty emotions, petty passions, while with her sombre eyes she strove for a tragic view of life, which she had merely flicked through like a badly written novelette.

Now she imagined she was in love with the senior engineer, the black-bearded doyen of the clique, already greying; and, in her tragic way, she imagined scenes with Mrs Doorn de Bruijn, a portly, placid, melancholy woman. The other couple in their intimate circle, Doctor Rantzow and his wife, were German: he, fat, blond, rather vulgar, with a middle-age spread; she, a pleasant, matronly type who spoke animatedly in Dutch with a German accent.

This was the clique where Eva’s word was law. Apart from Frans van Helderen, the controller, it consisted of very
ordinary
Indies and European types, people without any aesthetic sense, as Eva said, but she had no other choice in Labuwangi, and so she amused herself with Ida’s petty Eurasian tragedies, and resigned herself to the rest. Her husband, Onno, tired from his work as always, did not contribute much to the conversation, but listened.

“How long was Mrs Van Oudijck in Batavia?” asked Ida.

“Two months,” said the doctor’s wife. “A long stay this time.”

“I’ve heard,” said Mrs Doorn de Bruijn—placid,
melancholy
, and quietly venomous—that this time a member
of the Council of the Indies, a head of department in the colonial service and three young men in trade amused Mrs Van Oudijck in Batavia.”

“And I can assure you all,” ventured the doctor, “that if Mrs Van Oudijck did not go regularly to Batavia, she would forgo a very salutary cure, even though she is taking it on her own initiative and not… on my orders.”

“Don’t let’s speak ill of her!” Eva interrupted him almost pleadingly. “Mrs Van Oudijck is beautiful—with a calm Junoesque type of beauty, with the eyes of Venus—and I’m prepared to forgive beautiful people around me a lot. And you, Doctor…” she wagged her finger at him. “Don’t betray professional secrets. You know that doctors in the Indies are often too free with their patients’ secrets. If ever I’m ill, I’ll never have anything worse than a headache. You won’t forget that, will you, Doctor?”

“The Commissioner looked preoccupied,” said Doorn de Bruijn.

“Do you think he knows… about his wife?” asked Ida gloomily, with her large eyes full of black velvet tragedy.

“The Commissioner is often like that,” said Frans van Helderen. “He has his moods. At times he’s good company, cheerful, jovial, as on the recent inspection tour. At others, he has his dark days, he works and works and works, and roars that the only person who does any work is himself.”

“My poor, unappreciated Onno!” sighed Eva.

“I think he’s working too hard,” Van Helderen went on. “Labuwangi has been a huge burden. And the Commissioner
takes too much to heart, both at home and outside. His relationship with his son
and
with the Prince.”

“I’d get rid of the Prince,” said the doctor.

“But, Doctor,” said Van Helderen, “you know enough about conditions in Java to realize that it’s not as easy as that. The Prince’s family is too identified with Labuwangi and too highly regarded by the people…”

“Yes, I know Dutch policy… The British in India are more high-handed and peremptory with their Indian princes. The Dutch defer to them too much.”

“It remains to be seen which policy is best in the long run,” said Van Helderen drily, who could not stand a foreigner criticizing anything in a Dutch colony. “Fortunately we don’t have conditions of squalor and famine like they have in British India.”

“I saw the Commissioner talking very seriously to the Prince,” said Doorn de Bruijn.

“The Commissioner is too sensitive,” said Van Helderen. “He’s definitely troubled by the slow decline of an ancient Javanese family, a family that is doomed to fall but one that he would like to preserve. In that respect, however cool and practical he may be, the Commissioner is behaving rather poetically, although he wouldn’t admit it. But he remembers the glorious past of the Adiningrats, he still remembers the last glorious figure, the noble old
pangéran
, and he compares him with his sons, one a fanatic, the other a gambler…”

“I think our Prince—not the Prince of Ngajiwa: he’s just a coolie—is divine!” said Eva. “I think he looks just like a
living shadow puppet. But I’m afraid of his eyes. What
terrible
eyes! Sometimes they’re sleepy, but sometimes they’re the eyes of a madman… But he’s so refined, so distinguished. And the
radèn-ayu
is an exquisite little doll too: yes, yes… She says nothing, but she looks decorative. I’m always glad when they do me the honour of attending my parties, and when they’re not there, there’s something missing. And what about the old
radèn-ayu pangéran
, grey, dignified, a queen…

“An inveterate gambler,” said Eldersma.

“They’re gambling everything away,” said Van Helderen. “She and the Prince of Ngajiwa. They’re no longer rich. The old
pangéran
had wonderful regalia for state occasions, magnificent lances, a jewelled betel-nut box, spittoons—useful items, those!—priceless. The old
radèn-ayu pangéran
has gambled it all away. I think that all she has left is her pension, 240 guilders, I believe. And how our Prince manages to keep all his cousins in his official residence according to Javanese custom, is a mystery to me.

“What custom?” asked the doctor.

“Every prince gathers his family round him like parasites, clothes them, feeds them, gives them pocket money… and the population finds that dignified and chic.”

“Sad… greatness fallen into decay!” said Ida gloomily.

A boy came and announced that dinner was ready and they adjourned to the rear veranda, and took their places at table.

“And what have you got up your sleeve, dear lady?” asked the senior engineer. “What are the plans? Labuwangi has been very quiet recently.”

“It’s awful really,” said Eva. “If I didn’t have my friends, it would be awful. If I weren’t making plans the whole time, having ideas, it would be awful, living like this in Labuwangi. My husband doesn’t feel the same, he works, just as all of you gentlemen work; what else can one do in the Indies but work, despite the heat. But for us women! Really, what a life, if one does not discover happiness in oneself, in one’s home, in one’s circle of friends—if one is fortunate enough to have such a circle. Outside of that there’s nothing. Not a painting, not a sculpture to be seen, no music to be heard. Don’t be angry, Van Helderen. Your cello-playing is delightful, but no one in the Indies keeps up with the latest developments. The Italian opera is performing…
Il Trovatore
. The amateur companies—not bad at all in Batavia—do…
Il Trovatore
. And you, Van Helderen… don’t deny it. I saw how entranced you were when the Italian opera from Surabaya brought
Il Trovatore
to the club here. You were in seventh heaven.”

“There were some lovely voices…”

“But twenty years ago—so I’m told—people were just as enchanted by…
Il Trovatore
. It’s terrible! Sometimes, all of a sudden, it weighs me down. Sometimes I have the sudden feeling that I have not grown accustomed to the Indies, and that I never will, and I feel homesick for Europe, for life!

“But, Eva…” protested Eldersma in alarm, frightened that she would actually go back and leave him alone in his utterly joyless working environment in Labuwangi. “You know you sometimes appreciate the Indies, your home; the good, full life…”

“Good materially…”

“And you appreciate your work. I mean, all the things you can do here.”

“What? Organizing parties? Organizing fêtes?”

“You’re the real commissioner’s wife, Eva,” enthused Ida.

“Which fortunately brings us back to Mrs Van Oudijck,” teased Mrs Doorn de Bruijn.

“And to professional secrecy,” said Doctor Rantzow.

“No,” sighed Eva. “We need something new. Balls, parties, picnics, trips to the mountains… We’ve exhausted them all. I can’t think of anything else. The pressure of the Indies is weighing on me again. I’m in one of my melancholy moods. I suddenly have a horror of my servants’ brown faces around me. Sometimes the Indies frighten me. Don’t any of you feel that? A vague fear, a mysterious feeling in the air, something menacing… I don’t know. The evenings are so full of mystery and there is something mysterious in the character of the native, who is so far removed from us, is so different from us…”

“Artistic feelings,” teased Van Helderen. No, I don’t feel that. The Indies are my country.”

“Typical!” said Eva, teasing him in turn. “Why are you as you are? So strangely European; I can’t call it Dutch.”

“My mother was French.”

“But still you’re a colonial, born and brought up here. But you don’t behave at all like a colonial. I’m delighted to have met you, you’re a breath of fresh air… Help me then. Suggest something new. Not a ball and not a trip to the mountains.
I need something new. Otherwise I shall feel homesick for my father’s paintings, my mother’s singing, for our beautiful artistic house in The Hague. Without novelty, I shall die. I’m like your wife, Van Helderen, forever in love.”

“Eva, please!” begged Ida.

“Tragically in love, with her beautiful, sombre eyes. Always with her husband first and then with someone else. I’m never in love. Not even with my husband any more. He is with me. But I haven’t got a passionate nature. Quite a lot of love goes on here in the Indies, doesn’t it, Doctor? So… no balls, no mountain trips, no love. My God, what else is there, what else?…”

“I know what we could do,” said Mrs Doorn de Bruijn, her placid melancholy suddenly tinged with fear. She shot a sideways look at Mrs Rantzow, and the German woman understood her meaning…

“What is it?” they all asked, inquisitively.

“Table-turning,” the two women whispered.

There was general laughter.

“Oh,” sighed Eva, disappointed. “A gimmick, a novelty, a game for an evening. No, I need something that will fill my life for at least a month.”

“Table-turning,” repeated Mrs Rantzow.

“Shall I tell you something?” said Mrs Doorn de Bruijn.

“The other day, for fun, we tried to get a three-legged table to turn. We promised each other that we would be absolutely honest. The table… moved and spelt out words by tapping alphabetically.”

“But was there no cheating?” asked the doctor, Eldersma and Van Helderen.

“You must trust us,” said the two ladies in self-defence.

“Agreed!” said Eva. “We’ve finished dinner. Let’s do table-turning.”

“We must promise each other that we will be honest…” said Mrs Rantzow. “I can see… that my husband will be antipathetic, but Ida… will be a great medium.”

They got up.

“Do we have to turn the lights off?” asked Eva.

“No,” said Mrs Doorn de Bruijn.

“An ordinary side table?”

“A wooden side table.”

“All eight of us?”

“No, let’s choose first. For example, you Eva, Ida, Van Helderen and Mrs Rantzow. The doctor is not sympathetic, nor is Eldersma. De Bruijn and I can relieve you.”