CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
"And how are you, mevrouwtje? How's the depression? Is India suitingyou any better to-day?"
His words sounded cheerful to Eva, as she saw him coming throughthe garden, on the stroke of eight, for dinner. His tone expressednothing more than the gay greeting of a man who has been working hardat his desk and is delighted to see a pretty woman at whose table he isabout to sit. She was filled with surprise and admiration. There wasnot a suggestion of a man who is plagued all day long, in a desertedhouse, by strange and incomprehensible happenings. There was hardlya shadow of dejection on his wide forehead, hardly a care seemed torest upon his broad, slightly bowed back; and the jovial, smiling lineabout his thick moustache was there as usual. Eldersma came up; andEva divined in his greeting, in his pressure of the hand, a silentfreemasonry of things known, of confidences shared in common. AndVan Oudijck drank his gin-and-bitters in a perfectly normal manner,spoke of a letter from his wife, who was probably going on to Batavia,said that Rene and Ricus were staying in the Preanger [12] withfriends who had a plantation there. He did not speak of the reasonwhy they were not with him, why he had been entirely abandoned by hisfamily and servants. In the intimacy of their circle, which he nowvisited twice a day for his meals, he had never spoken of this. And,though Eva did not ask any questions, it was making her extremelynervous. So close to the house, the haunted house, whose pillarsshe could see by day in the distance, gleaming through the foliageof the trees, she became more and more nervous daily. All day long,the servants whispered around her and peered timidly at the hauntedresidency. At night, unable to sleep, she strained her ears to hearwhether she could detect anything strange, the moaning of the littlechildren. The Indian night was so full of voices that it could butmake her shudder on her bed. Through the imperious bellowing of thefrogs for rain and rain and more rain still, the constant croakingon the one bellowing note, she heard thousands of ghostly sounds thatkept her from sleeping. Through it all the lizards and geckos emittedtheir clockwork strokes, like strange mysterious time-pieces.
She thought of it all day long. Eldersma did not speak of iteither. But, when she saw Van Oudijck come to lunch or dinner,she had to compress her lips lest she should question him. Andthe conversation touched upon all sorts of topics, but never uponthe strange happenings. After lunch, Van Oudijck went across to theresidency again; after dinner, at ten o'clock, she saw him once morevanish into the haunting shadow of the garden. With a calm step, everyevening he went back, through the enchanted night, to his wretched,deserted house, where the messengers and Kario sat squatting closetogether outside his office; and he worked until late in the night. Henever complained. He pursued his enquiries closely, all through thedistrict, but nothing came to light. Everything continued to happenin impenetrable mystery.
"And how does India suit you this evening, mevrouwtje?"
It was always more or less the same pleasantry; but each time sheadmired his tone. Courage, robust self-confidence, a certainty inhis own knowledge, a belief in what he knew for certain: all theserang in his voice with metallic clearness. Miserable though he mustfeel--he, the man of profoundly domestic inclinations and of cool,practical sense--in a house deserted by those who belonged to himand full of inexplicable happenings, there was not a trace of doubtor dejection in his unfailing masculine simplicity. He went hisway and did his work, more conscientiously than ever; he continuedhis investigations. And at Eva's table he always kept up an animatedconversation, on politics in India and the new craze for having Indiaruled from Holland by lay-men who did not know even the A.B.C. ofthe business. And he talked with an easy, pleasant vivacity, freefrom all effort, till Eva came to admire him more and more.
But with her, a sensitive woman, it became a nervous obsession. Andonce, in the evening, as she was walking a little way with him,she asked him if it wasn't terrible, if he couldn't leave the house,if he couldn't go on circuit, for a good long time. She saw his faceclouding at her questions. But still he answered kindly, saying thatit was not so bad, even though it was all inexplicable, and that hewould back himself to get to the bottom of the conjuring. And he addedthat he really ought to be going on circuit, but that he would not go,lest he should seem to be running away. Then he hurriedly pressedher hand and told her not to upset herself and not to think aboutit any more or talk about it. The last words sounded like a friendlyadmonition. She pressed his hand again, with tears in her eyes. Andshe watched him walk away, with his calm, firm step, and disappear inthe darkness of his garden, where the enchantment must be creeping inthrough the croaking of the frogs. But standing there like that madeher shudder; and she hurried indoors. And she felt that her house,that roomy house of hers, was small and unduly open and defencelessagainst the vast Indian night, which could enter from every side.
But she was not the only person obsessed by the mysterioushappenings. Their inexplicable nature lay like an oppression over thewhole town, so completely did it clash with the things of everydaylife. The mystery was discussed in every house, but only in a whisper,lest the children should be frightened and the servants perceivethat people were impressed by the Javanese conjuring, as the residenthimself had called it. And the uneasiness and depression were makingeverybody ill with apprehension and nervous listening when the darknesswas teeming with voices in the night, which drifted down on the townin a dense, velvety greyness; and the town seemed to be hiding itselfmore deeply than ever in the foliage of its gardens, seemed, in thesemoist evening twilights, to be shrinking away altogether in dull,silent resignation, bowing before the mystery.
Then Van Oudijck thought it time to take strong measures. He wroteto the major commanding the garrison at Ngadjiwa to come over witha captain, a couple of lieutenants and a company of soldiers. Thatevening, the officers, with the resident and Van Helderen, dined atthe Eldersmas'. They hurried through their meal; and Eva, standingat the garden-gate, saw them all--the resident, the secretary,the controller and the four officers--go into the dark garden ofthe haunted house. The residency-grounds were shut off, the housesurrounded and the churchyard watched. The men went to the bathroomby themselves.
They remained there all through the night. And all through the nightthe grounds and house remained shut off and surrounded. They cameout at about five o'clock and went straight to the swimming-bath andbathed, all of them together. What had happened to them they did notsay, but they had had a terrible night. That morning the bathroomwas pulled down.
They had all promised Van Oudijck not to speak about that night;and Eldersma would not tell anything to Eva, nor Van Helderen toIda. The officers too, on their return to Ngadjiwa, were silent. Theymerely said that their night in the bathroom was too improbable forany one to believe the story. At last one of the young lieutenantsallowed a hint of his adventures to escape him. And a tale ofbetel-juice-spitting and stone-throwing, of a floor that heaved,while they struck at it with sticks and swords, and of something more,something unutterably horrible that had happened in the water of thebath, went the rounds. Every one added to it. When the story reachedVan Oudijck's ears, he hardly recognized it as an account of theterrible night, which had been terrible enough without any additions.
Meanwhile Eldersma had written a report of their united vigil;and they all signed the improbable story. Van Oudijck himself tookthe report to Batavia and delivered it to the governor-general withhis own hands. Thenceforth it slumbered in the secret archives ofthe government.
The governor-general advised Van Oudijck to go to Holland on leave fora short period, assuring him that this leave would have no influenceon his promotion to a residency of the first class, which was nearlydue. He refused this favour, however, and returned to Labuwangi. Theonly concession that he made was to move into Eldersma's house untilthe residency should be thoroughly cleaned. But the flag continuedto wave from the flagstaff in the residency-grounds.
On his return from Batavia, Van Oudijck often met Sunario, the regent,on matters of business. And, in his intercourse with the regent, there
sident remained stern and formal. Then he had a brief interview,first with the regent and afterwards with his mother, the raden-ajupangeran. The two conversations did not last longer than twentyminutes. But it appeared that those few words were of great andportentous moment.
For the strange happenings ceased. When everything had been cleanedand repaired, under Eva's supervision, Van Oudijck compelled Leonieto come back, because he wished to give a great ball on New Year'sDay. In the morning, the resident received all his European and nativeofficials. In the evening, the guests streamed into the brightly litgalleries from every part of the town, still inclined to shudder andvery inquisitive and instinctively looking around and above them. And,while the champagne went round, Van Oudijck himself took a glass andoffered it to the regent with a deliberate breach of etiquette; and,in a tone of solemn admonition mingled with good-humoured jest, heuttered these words, which were seized upon and repeated on every handand which continued to be repeated for months throughout Labuwangi:
"Drink with an easy mind, regent. I give you my word of honour thatno more glasses will be broken in my house, except by accident orcarelessness."
He was able to say this because he knew that--this time--he had beentoo strong for the hidden force, merely through his simple courageas an official, a Hollander and a man.
But in the regent's gaze, as he drank, there was still a veryslight gleam of irony, intimating that, though the hidden force hadnot conquered, this time, it would yet remain an enigma, foreverinexplicable to the short-sighted eyes of the Europeans....
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