De stille kracht. English

by Louis Couperus

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Yes, Theo knew. He had spoken to Oorip after lunch; and althoughthe maid had at first tried to deny everything, afraid of losingthe sarongs, she had been unable to continue lying and had contentedherself with feeble little protests of "no ... no."... And, still earlythat same afternoon, raging with jealousy, he sought out Addie. ButTheo was calmed by the indifferent composure of the good-looking youth,with his Moorish face, already so fully sated with his conquests thathe himself never felt any jealousy. Theo was calmed by the completeabsence of thought in this tempter, who at once forgot everythingafter an hour of love; forgot so gracefully that he looked up witheyes of ingenuous surprise when Theo, red and boiling with fury, burstinto his room and, standing before his bed--where he was lying quitenaked, as was his habit during his siesta, with the magnificence of abronze statue, sublime as an ancient sculpture--declared that he wouldstrike him across the face. And Addie's surprise was so artless, hisindifference so harmonious, he seemed to have so utterly forgottenhis hour of love of the night before, he laughed so serenely atthe idea of fighting about a woman that Theo quieted down and cameand sat on the edge of his bed. And then Addie, who was a couple ofyears younger but possessed incomparable experience, told him thathe really mustn't do it again--get so angry about a woman, a mistresswho gave herself to another. And Addie patted him on the shoulder withalmost fatherly compassion; and now, since they understood each other,they went on confidentially pumping one another as they chatted.

  They exchanged further confidences, about women, about girls. Theoasked if Addie was going to marry Doddie. But Addie said that hewasn't thinking of marrying and that the resident wouldn't be willingeither, because he didn't care for Addie's family and thought themtoo Indian. Then, in a single word, he let slip his pride in hisSolo descent and his pride in the halo which shone dimly behind theheads of all the De Luces. And Addie asked if Theo knew that he had ayoung brother running wild in the compound. Theo knew nothing aboutit. But Addie assured him that it was so: a young son of papa's,mark you, from the time when the governor was still controller atNgadjiwa; a fellow of their own age, a regular Eurasian: the motherwas dead. Perhaps the old man himself didn't know that he still hada son in the compound, but it was true; everybody knew it: the regentknew, the native councillor knew, the head of the district knew, andthe meanest coolie knew. There was no actual proof; but a thing likethat, which was known the whole world over, was as true as that theworld itself existed.... What did the fellow do? Nothing, except curseand swear, declaring that he was a son of the kandjeng tuan residen,who allowed him to rot in the compound.... What did he live on? Onnothing, on what he got by shameless begging, on what people gave himand then ... by all sorts of practices: by going round the districts,through all the villages, and asking if there were any complaintsand then drawing up little petitions; by encouraging people to goto Mecca and let him book their passages with very cheap littlesteamship-companies of which he was the unofficial agent: he wouldgo to the remotest village and display coloured posters representinga steamer full of Mecca pilgrims and the Kaaba and the Sacred Tombof Mohammed. He would mess around like this, sometimes mixed up inrows, once in a robbery, sometimes dressed in a sarong, sometimesin an old striped calico suit; and he slept anywhere. And, when Theoshowed surprise and said that he had never heard of this half-brotherof his and expressed curiosity, Addie suggested that they should goand look him up, if he was to be found in the compound. And Addiegaily and quickly took his bath and put on a clean white suit; andthey went across the road and along the rice-fields into the compound.

  It was already dusk under the heavy trees: the bananas lifted thecool green paddles of their leaves; and under the stately canopy ofthe coco-palms the little bamboo houses hid, romantically Oriental,idyllic, with their palm-leaf roofs, their doors often alreadyclosed, or, if open, framing a little black inward vista, with thevague outline of a bench on which squatted a dark figure. The scabby,hairless dogs barked; the children, naked, with bells dangling fromtheir stomachs, ran indoors and stared out of the houses; the womenkept quiet, recognizing the tempter and vaguely laughing, blinkingtheir eyes as he passed in his glory. And Addie pointed to the littlehouse where his old babu lived, Tidjem, the woman who helped him,who always opened her door to him when he wanted the use of her hut,who worshipped him as his mother and his sisters and his little niecesworshipped him. He showed Theo the house and thought of his walk lastnight with Doddie under the tjemaras. Tidjem the babu saw him andran up to him delightedly. She squatted down beside him, she pressedhis leg against her withered breast, she rubbed her forehead againsthis knee, she kissed his white shoe, she gazed at him in rapture, herbeautiful prince, her raden, whom she had rocked as a little chubbyboy in her already infatuated arms. He tapped her on the shoulder andgave her a rix-dollar and asked her if she knew where Si-Oudijck was,because his brother wished to see him.

  Tidjem stood up and beckoned to him to follow: it was some way towalk. And they stepped out of the compound into an open road withrails along it, by which the bamboo baskets filled with sugar wereremoved to the proas that lay moored at a landing-stage yonder,in the Brantas. The sun was going down in a fan-shaped glory oforange sheaves; and the distant rows of trees that outlined thepaddy-fields were washed in with dark, soft, velvety touches againsttheir arrogant glow. These fields were not yet planted, but their dark,earth-coloured expanse lay as broken by the plough. From the factorycame a few men and women, making their way home. Beside the river,by the landing-stage, a small market of portable kitchens had beenset up under a sacred, five-fold banyan-tree, with its five trunksmerging into one another and its wide-spreading roots. Tidjem calledthe ferry-man and he put them across, across the orange Brantas,amidst the last yellow rays of the sun, outspread fanwise like apeacock's tail. When they were on the other bank, the night fell overeverything, like the hasty fall of a gauze curtain; and the clouds,which all through November had threatened the low horizons, hungoppressively on the sultry air. And they entered another compound,lit here and there by a paraffin-lamp, set down on the ground, witha long lamp-glass but no globe. At last they came to a little house,built partly of bamboo, partly of old packing-cases, and roofed partlywith tiles, partly with palm-leaves. Tidjem pointed to it and, oncemore squatting on the ground and embracing and kissing Addie's knee,asked permission to depart. Addie knocked at the door; a grumblingand rumbling within was the only answer; but, when Addie called out,the door was kicked open and the two young men stepped into the oneroom of which the hut consisted: half bamboo, half deal boards frompacking-cases; a couch with a couple of dirty pillows in a corner,and a limp chintz curtain dangling in front of it; a crazy table witha chair or two; on the table, a paraffin-lamp without a globe; and alitter of oddments stacked on a packing-case in a corner. Everythingwas permeated with an acrid odour of opium.

  And Si-Oudijck was sitting at the table with an Arab, while a Javanesewoman squatted on the couch, preparing a leaf of betel for herself. Afew sheets of paper lay on the table between the Arab and the younghalf-caste. The last-named, evidently annoyed by the unexpected visit,hurriedly crumpled the papers together. But he recovered his composureand, assuming a jovial air, cried:

  "Hullo, Adipati! Susuhunan! Sultan of Patjaram! Sugar-lord! How areyou, my god of beauty, the ruin of all good women?"

  His jovial torrent of greetings continued without ceasing, whilehe scrambled the papers together and made a sign to the Arab, whodisappeared through the other door, at the back.

  "And who's that with you, Raden Mas Adrianus, my bonnie Lucius?"

  "It's your little brother," said Addie.

  Si-Oudijck looked up suddenly:

  "Oh, is it really?" said he, speaking broken Dutch, Javanese andMalay in the same breath. "I can see it is: my legitimate one. Andwhat does the fellow want?"

  "He's come to see what you're like."

  The two brothers looked at each other: Theo inquisitively, rejoicingat having made this discovery, as a weapon against the o
ld man,if the weapon ever became necessary; the other, Si-Oudijck, secretlyrestraining, behind his brown, crafty, leering face, all his jealousy,all his bitterness and hatred.

  "Is this where you live?" asked Theo, for the sake of saying something.

  "No, I'm just staying with her for the time being," replied Si-Oudijck,with a jerk of his head towards the woman.

  "Has your mother been dead long?"

  "Yes. Yours is still alive, isn't she? She lives in Batavia. I knowher. Do you ever see her?"

  "No."

  "H'm.... Prefer your step-mother?"

  "Pretty well," said Theo, drily. And, changing the subject, "I don'tbelieve the old man knows that you exist."

  "Yes, he does."

  "I doubt it. Have you ever spoken to him?"

  "Yes, formerly. Years ago."

  "Well?"

  "No use. He says I'm not his son."

  "It must be difficult to prove."

  "Legally, yes. But it's a fact and everybody knows it. It's knownall over Ngadjiwa."

  "Have you no sort of evidence?"

  "Only the oath which my mother took when she was dying, beforewitnesses."

  "Come, tell me things," said Theo. "Walk a bit of the way with us:it's stuffy in here."

  They left the hut and sauntered back through the compounds, whileSi-Oudijck told his story. They strolled beside the Brantas, whichwound vaguely in the evening dusk under a sky powdered with stars.

  It did Theo good to hear about all this, about that housekeeperof his father's, in the days of his controllership, dismissed foran infidelity of which she was guiltless; the child born later andnever recognized, never maintained; the boy wandering from compoundto compound, romantically proud of his inhuman father, whom hewatched from a distance, following him with his furtive glancewhen the father became assistant-resident and resident, married,divorced his wife and married again; by slow degrees learning toread and write from a native scrivener of his acquaintance. Itdid the legitimate son good to hear about all this, because in hisinnermost self, fair-haired and fair-skinned though he might be,he was more the son of his mother, the half-caste, than of hisfather; because in his innermost self he hated his father, notfor this or that reason, but from a secret antipathy in his blood,because, despite the appearance and behaviour of a fair-haired andfair-skinned European, he felt a secret kinship for this illegitimatebrother, felt a vague sympathy for him. Were they not both sons ofthe self-same motherland, for which their father felt nothing exceptas a result of his acquired development, the artificially cultivated,humane love of the ruler for the territory which he governs. From hischildhood Theo had felt like that, far removed from his father; andlater that antipathy had grown into a slumbering hatred. It gave himpleasure to hear the legend of his faultless parent demolished; theimpeccable, magnanimous man, a functionary of the highest integrity,who loved his domestic circle, loved his residency, loved the Javanese,and was anxious to uphold the regent's family, not only because hisofficial instructions prescribed that the Javanese nobility should berespected, but because his own heart told him as much, when he thoughtof the noble old pangeran.... Theo knew that his father was all this:blameless, high-minded, upright, magnanimous; and it did him good,here, in the mysterious evening beside the Brantas, to hear thatblamelessness, that high-minded, upright magnanimity torn to ribbons;it did him good to meet an outcast who in one moment spattered thathigh-throned paternal figure with mud and filth, dragging him from hispedestal, making him appear no higher than another, sinful, wicked,heartless, mean. It filled him with a wicked joy, even as he wasfilled with a wicked joy at possessing his father's wife, whom hisfather adored. What to do with this dark secret he did not yet know,but he clutched at it as a weapon; he was whetting it there, thatvery evening, while he listened to the end to what this furtive-eyedhalf-caste, ranting and working himself up, had to say. And Theo hidhis secret, hid his weapon deep in his heart.

  Grievances rose in his mind; and he too now, the legitimate son,abused his father; declared that the resident did no more to help him,his own lawful son, to get on than he would do for any of his clerks;told him how his father had once recommended him to the manager of animpossible undertaking, a rice-plantation, where he had been unableto stay longer than a single month; how afterwards he had left himto his fate, thwarting him when he went hunting after concessions,even in other residencies, even in Borneo, until he was now obligedto remain hanging about and sponging at home, unable to find a job,thanks to his father, and merely tolerated in that house where hedisliked everything.

  "Except your step-mother!" Si-Oudijck interpolated, drily.

  But Theo went on, growing confidential in his turn and telling hisbrother that it would be no great advantage for him even if he wereacknowledged and legitimatized. And in this way they both becameexcited, glad to have met each other, to have grown intimate in thisbrief hour. And beside them walked Addie, surprised by this quickmutual attraction, but otherwise empty of thought. They had crosseda bridge and by a circuitous route had come out behind the Patjaramfactory-buildings. Here Si-Oudijck said good-night, shaking hands withTheo, who slipped a couple of rix-dollars into his palm. They wereaccepted greedily, with a flicker of the furtive glance, but not aword of thanks. And Addie and Theo went past the factory, now silent,to the house. The family were strolling, outside, in the garden and inthe tjemara-avenue. And, as the two young men approached, the golden,eight-year-old child came running towards them, the old grandmother'slittle foster-princess, with her fringe of hair and her whitenedforehead, in her rich little, doll-like dress. She came runningup to them and suddenly stopped in front of Addie and looked up athim. Addie asked her what she wanted, but the child did not answer andonly looked up at him and then, putting out her little hand, strokedhis hand with it. It was all so clearly the result of an irresistiblemagnetism in the shy child, this running up, stopping, looking upand stroking, that Addie laughed aloud and stooped and kissed herlightly. The child skipped back contentedly. And Theo, still excitedby his evening, first by his conversation with Oorip and then by hisexplanation with Addie, his meeting with his half-brother, his ownconfidences about his father--Theo, feeling bitter and interesting,was so greatly irritated by this trivial behaviour of Addie and thechild, that he exclaimed, almost angrily:

  "Oh, you ... you'll never be anything but a woman's man!..."