The Hidden Force

1

ONNO ELDERSMA, the secretary, was busy. Every day the post brought an average of several hundred letters and documents to the commissioner’s office, which employed two senior clerks, numerous native scribes and office assistants, and the commissioner complained as soon as they fell behind with their work. He himself worked hard and he demanded the same of his staff. But sometimes they were deluged with documents, claims and applications. Eldersma was a typical civil servant, completely wrapped up in his administrative work and always busy. He worked morning, noon and night. He didn’t take a siesta. He ate a quick dish of rice at four in the afternoon, and had a brief rest. Fortunately he had a sound, strong, Frisian constitution, but he needed all his energy and his nerves for his work. It wasn’t just scribbling, red tape — it was pencraft, muscular work, nervous work, and it went on and on. He was burning up, wearing himself out as he wrote. He no longer had any other ideas, he was nothing but a civil servant, a bureaucrat. He had a charming house, the sweetest, most exceptional wife, a charming child, but he never saw them. He lived only vaguely in his home surroundings. He just worked, conscientiously, finishing what he could. Sometimes he told the commissioner that he could not possibly do any more. But on this point Van Oudijck was inexorable, pitiless. He had been district secretary himself, and knew what it meant. It meant work, it meant plodding along like a carthorse. It meant living, eating and sleeping with pen in hand. Then Van Oudijck would show him this and that piece of work that had to be finished, and Eldersma, who had said that he could do no more than he was doing, would finish the work, and so always did a little more than he thought he could.

Then his wife, Eva, would say: my husband isn’t human any more — he’s a civil servant. The young wife, very European, who had never before been in the Indies and who been in Labuwangi for a year or so, had never known that one could work as hard as her husband did in a place as hot as Labuwangi was in the east monsoon. At first she had fought against it, and had tried to assert her rights over him, but when she saw that he really hadn’t a minute to spare, she waived those rights. She had immediately realized that her husband would not share her life, nor she his, not because he was not a good husband who was very fond of his wife, but simply because the mail brought two hundred documents daily. She had seen at once that in Labuwangi — where there was nothing — she would have to console herself with her house and, later, her child. She arranged her house as a temple to art and home comforts, and racked her brains over her little boy’s education. A highly cultured woman, she came from an artistic background. Her father was Van Hove, a well-known landscape painter, and her mother, Stella Couberg, a famous concert singer. Eva had grown up in a home filled with art and music, which she had absorbed from an early age from children’s books and nursery rhymes, then she had married an East Indies civil servant and accompanied him to Labuwangi. She loved her husband, a strapping Frisian fellow, with enough education to have wide interests. She had gone with him to the Indies, happy in her love and full of illusions about the Eastern mystery of the tropics. She had tried to hold on to her illusions, despite many warnings. In Singapore she had been struck by the bronze sculptured bodies of the naked Malays and the multi-coloured orientalism of the Chinese and Arab quarters, the chrysanthemum-scented poetry of the Japanese tea-houses she passed… But very soon, in Batavia, grey disillusionment drizzled down over her expectations of seeing beautiful sights everywhere in the Indies, like in a fairy tale out of the Arabian Nights. The routine of petty, ordinary, everyday life dampened all her enthusiasm to admire, and she suddenly saw all that was ridiculous, even before she could see any beauty. The men in pyjama bottoms and loose jackets stretched out on their reclining chairs, their legs stretched out on the extended slats, their feet — although very well cared for — bare, and the toes moving in an easy-going game of big and little toes, even as she passed… Or the ladies in sarongs and loose jackets — the only practical morning wear, which can be quickly changed two or three times before noon, but which suits so few people; the sarong, with its straight fall at the back is particularly angular and ugly, however elegant and expensive the garment. The banality of the houses with all their whitewash and tar and ugly rows of flowerpots; the parched, scorched look of nature, the filthiness of the natives… All those little absurdities in European colonial life: the accents punctuated with exclamations, the provincial airs and graces of the civil servants — the members of the Council of the Indies being the only ones entitled to wear a top hat; the strictly observed points of etiquette, such as when the senior official was first to leave a reception, and the others waited their turn… And the little tropical idiosyncrasies, such as the use of wooden Devoe-paint crates and paraffin tins for every conceivable purpose: the wood for shop windows, dustbins and home-made furniture; the tins for gutters, watering cans and every kind of domestic utensil… The young, highly cultured young woman, with her fantasies of the Arabian Nights, not distinguishing in these first impressions between colonialism — the ways of the European who settles in a country alien to his blood — and what was truly poetic and belonged genuinely to the Indies, was authentically Eastern, purely Javanese — the young woman, because of all these absurdities and many others besides, had immediately felt disappointed, as anyone with an artistic bent does in the colonial Indies, which are not at all poetic or artistic, and where people carefully pile as much horse manure as possible around the roses in white pots as a fertilizer, so that when a breeze gets up the scent of roses mingles with the stench of freshly watered manure. And she was unjust, as were all new Dutch arrivals, towards the beautiful country that they wished to see according to their preconceived notion of colonialism. And she forgot that the country itself, originally so beautiful, was not to blame for that absurdity.

She had experienced several years of this and had been amazed, sometimes alarmed and sometimes shocked, sometimes amused and sometimes irritated, and had finally, with her reasonable nature and the practical reverse side to her artistic sensibility, grown used to it all. She had grown used to the game with the toes, to the manure round the roses; she had grown used to her husband, who was no longer a human being or a husband, but a civil servant. She had suffered greatly, had written desperate letters, had been dreadfully homesick for her parents’ house, and had been on the point of leaving — but had not gone through with it, not wanting to abandon her husband, and so she had accustomed herself to her life, had come to terms with it. Eva was a woman who besides having the soul of an artist — she was an exceptional pianist — had a courageous heart. She was still in love with her husband and knew that despite everything she managed to provide him with a comfortable home. She gave much serious thought to her child’s education. And once she had accustomed herself, she became less unjust and suddenly saw much of the beauty of the Indies. She appreciated the stately grace of a coconut palm; the exquisite, heavenly flavour of the local fruits; the splendour of the trees in blossom; and in the interior she had discovered the noble grandeur of nature, the harmony of the rolling hills, the fairy-tale groves of giant ferns, the menacing ravines of the craters, the gleaming terraces of the wet paddy fields and the tender green of the young rice plants. And the Javanese character had been like an artistic revelation to her with its elegance, its grace, its formalized greetings, its dance, its distinguished aristocracy, often so clearly descended from a noble line, from generations of nobles, and modernizing until it acquired diplomatic flexibility, with a natural worship of authority, and fatalistically resigned beneath the yoke of the rulers whose gold braid awakens its innate respect.

In her parental home, Eva had always been surrounded by the cult of art and beauty, indeed, to the point of decadence; those around her, whether in an outward environment of aesthetic perfection, in beautiful words or in music, had always directed her towards life’s graceful contours, perhaps too exclusively. And now she was too well trained in this aestheticism to remain stuck in her disappointment and see nothing but the whitewash and tar of the houses, the petty quirks of officialdom, the paint crates and the horse manure. Her literary imagination now saw the palatial quality of the houses and the humorous side to official pomposity, which was almost inevitable. As she saw all those details more precisely, her view of the world of the Indies widened, until it became revelation upon revelation. Except that she continued to feel something strange, something she could not analyse, something mysterious, a dark secret whose soft approach she felt at night… But she thought it was just the atmosphere created by the darkness and the very dense foliage, like very faint music from very strange stringed instruments, the distant rustling sound of a harp in a minor key, a vague warning voice… A noise in the night, that was all, which gave rise to poetic fantasies.

In Labuwangi — a small, provincial centre — she often shocked her more provincial countrymen with her air of excitement, her enthusiasm, her spontaneity, her joie de vivre (even in the Indies) and joy in the beauty of life. Her instincts were healthy, though gently tempered and blurred by a charming affectation of wanting only what was beautiful: the line of beauty, the beautiful colour, artistic notions. Those who knew her felt either antipathy or extreme sympathy: few people were indifferent to her. In the Indies she had gained a reputation for being out of the ordinary: her house, her clothes, her child’s upbringing, her ideas were all out of the ordinary; the only ordinary thing about her was her Frisian husband, who was almost too ordinary for those surroundings, which seemed to have been cut out of an art magazine. Being a sociable person, she gathered around her as many members as possible of the European community, to which — though the community was seldom artistic — she brought an appealing tone that reminded them all of Holland. This tightly knit group admired her and naturally followed the tone she set. She was dominant because of her superior education, without being dominant by nature. Not everyone approved of this, and her critics called her eccentric, but the tightly knit group remained loyal to her, inspired by her amid the languor of Indies life to savour concerts, ideas, all that made life worth living.

For example, she had around her the doctor and his wife, the senior engineer and his wife, the district controller and his wife, and sometimes, from outside, a few controllers and a few young clerks from the sugar factories. It was quite a lively circle of people, with whom she called the tune, put on plays, organized picnics, and whom she enchanted with her house, her dresses and her Epicurean artistic flair. They forgave her everything they could not understand — her aesthetic credo, her love of Wagner’s music — because she offered them merriment, a little joie de vivre and conviviality amid the deadly colonial tedium. For that they were deeply grateful to her. And in this way her house had become the real centre of the social life of Labuwangi, while the district commissioner’s mansion opposite withdrew grandly into the shade of its banyan trees. Léonie van Oudijck was not jealous. She liked to be left in peace and was only too happy to give control to Eva Eldersma. And so Léonie had no part in anything: music or amateur dramatic societies, or charitable work. She delegated all the social duties that the wife of a district commissioner normally undertakes, to Eva. Léonie had her reception once a month, spoke to everyone, smiled at everyone and at New Year gave her annual ball. That was the extent of social life in the commissioner’s mansion. For the rest she lived for herself, in the comfort that she had selfishly created around her, in her pink fantasy of cherubs and whatever love she could find. At intervals she felt the need for Batavia and went there for a few months. And so, as the wife of the district commissioner, she went her own way, while Eva did everything, and set the tone. There were sometimes petty jealousies, for example between her and the wife of the inspector of finances, who felt it was she and not the secretary’s wife who should take second place after Mrs Van Oudijck. This led to squabbling over colonial civil service etiquette, and to stories and gossip that circulated, blown up out of all proportion, in the remotest sugar factories in the district. Eva paid no attention to the rumours, preferring to inject some life into Labuwangi, and to that worthy end, she and her club took charge. She had been elected district president of the Thalia amateur dramatic society, and had accepted, provided the rules were abolished. She was prepared to be queen, but without a constitution. The general consensus was that this was impossible: there had always been a rule book. But Eva insisted that she did not wish to be president if there were rules. In that case, she simply preferred to act. They gave in: the rules of Thalia were abolished and Eva had absolute power to choose the plays and cast the productions. The company flourished — under her direction the standard of acting was so high that people came from Surabaya to attend performances at the Concordia club. The plays performed were of a quality never before seen in Concordia.

This made her very popular in some quarters and very unpopular in others. But she pressed on and provided some European culture, to avoid gathering too much colonial “mould” in Labuwangi. And people went to great lengths to secure an invitation to her dinners, which were famed and notorious, since she demanded that the gentlemen came in evening dress and not in their Singapore jackets with no shirts underneath. She stipulated white tie and tails and would not budge. The ladies wore low-cut gowns as usual, to keep cool, and were delighted. But their partners protested and, on the first occasion, were all choking in their stiff collars and gasping for breath. The doctor maintained it was unhealthy; colonial veterans maintained it was absurd and contrary to all good old Indies customs…

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.

2

EVA 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…

3

“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.”

“Off we go then,” said Eva. A new resource for the social life of Labuwangi. “And no cheating…”

“As friends, we’ll give each other our word of honour… that we won’t cheat.”

“Agreed,” they all said.

The doctor sniggered. Eldersma shrugged his shoulders. A boy brought a side table. They sat around the wooden table and some placed their fingers on it light-heartedly, looking at each other with curiosity and suspicion. Mrs Rantzow was solemn, Ida sombre, Eva amused, Van Helderen laughing indifferently. Suddenly Ida’s lovely Eurasian face tautened.

The table trembled…

They looked at each other in alarm, and the doctor sniggered.

Then slowly the table raised one of its three legs, and carefully set it down again.

“Did anyone move?” asked Eva.

They all shook their heads. Ida had gone pale.

“I can feel vibrations in my fingers,” she murmured.

The table once again raised its leg, and creakily described an angry quarter turn on the marble floor, setting the leg down again with a violent thud.

They looked at each other in bewilderment.

Ida sat staring blankly ahead, with outspread fingers, ecstatic.

And the table, for the third time, raised its leg.

4

IT WAS CERTAINLY VERY STRANGE.

For a moment Eva was unsure whether Mrs Rantzow was lifting the table, but when she looked quizzically at the doctor’s wife, Mrs Rantzow shook her head and Eva could see she was acting in good faith. Once more they promised each other that they would be scrupulously honest… And, very oddly, once they were absolutely sure of each other, the table went on describing angrily grating semicircles and raising its leg and tapping on the marble floor.

“Is there a spirit revealing itself?” asked Mrs Rantzow, looking at the table leg.

The table tapped once: yes.

But when the spirit tried to spell its name, tapping the letters alphabetically, what came out was: “Z, X, R, S, A”, which was incomprehensible.

But all of a sudden the table started spelling out a name, as if being pursued… They counted the taps, and what came out was:

“Le…onie Ou…dijck?…”

“What about Mrs Van Oudijck?”

A vulgar word followed.

The ladies were alarmed, except for Ida, who sat as if in a trance.

“Did the table speak? What did it say? What is Mrs Van Oudijck?” people clamoured all at once.

“It’s unbelievable,” muttered Eva. “Are none of us cheating?”

Everyone swore they were playing fair.

“Let’s be absolutely honest, otherwise it’s no fun… I really wish I could be sure…”

That was what they all wished: Mrs Rantzow, Ida, Van Helderen, Eva. The others looked on eagerly, believing what they heard, though the doctor was sceptical and went on sniggering.

The table grated angrily and tapped, and the leg repeated:

“A…”

And the leg repeated the dirty word.

“Why?” asked Mrs Rantzow.

The table tapped.

“Write it down, Onno!” said Eva to her husband.

Eldersma found a pencil and paper and took down the messages.

Three names were given: a member of the Council of the Indies, a departmental head and a young businessman.

“In the Indies, when people are not gossiping, the tables are doing it for them!” said Eva.

“The spirits…” murmured Ida.

“Such phenomena are usually mocking spirits,” lectured Mrs Rantzow.

But the table went on tapping…

“Take it down, Onno!” said Eva.

Eldersma went on writing.

“A-d-d-y!” the leg tapped out.

“No!” everyone said at once, vehemently denying the imputation. “The table is mistaken about that! At least young De Luce has never been mentioned in connection with Mrs Van Oudijck.”

“T-h-e-o!” tapped the table, correcting itself.

“Her stepson! How awful! That’s different! That’s common knowledge!” cried the babble of voices in agreement.

“But we know that!” said Mrs Rantzow, focusing on the table leg. “Why don’t you tell us something we don’t know? Come on, table; come on, come on, spirit!”

She addressed the table leg sweetly and cajolingly. People laughed. The table grated.

“Be serious!” warned Mrs Doorn de Bruijn.

The table fell on to Ida’s lap with a thud.

“Adu! I don’t believe it,” cried the beautiful Eurasian woman, as if awakening from her trance. “It hit my tummy!..”

They laughed and laughed. The table revolved angrily, and they got up off their chairs, keeping their hands on the side table, and followed its angry waltzing movements.

“Next… year…” the table tapped.

Eldersma wrote it down.

“Terrible… war…”

“Between whom and whom?”

“Europe… and… China.”

“That sounds like a fairy tale,” sniggered Doctor Rantzow.

“La…bu…wangi,” tapped the table.

“What?” they asked.

“Is… a… hole…”

Please say something serious, table” begged Mrs Rantzow sweetly, in her pleasant German matronly tone.

“Dan…ger,” tapped the table.

“Where?”

“Threatens…” the table continued. “Labu…wangi.”

“Danger threatens Labuwangi?”

“Yes!” the table tapped once, angrily.

“What danger?”

“Rebellion…”

“Rebellion? Who is going to rebel?”

“Within two… months… Sunario…”

They listened intently.

But the table suddenly and unexpectedly bumped against Ida’s stomach again.

“Adu! I don’t believe it,” cried the young woman.

The table had had enough.

“Tired…” it tapped.

They kept their hands on it.

“Stop it now,” the table tapped.

The doctor, sniggering, put his broad hand on it, as if trying to force it to stop.

“Damned miser!” cursed the table, grating and turning.

“Swine!” it went on.

And a few more dirty words followed, directed at the doctor, as if a street urchin were shouting at him: filthy words without rhyme or reason.

“Who is thinking up those words?” asked Eva indignantly.

Obviously no one was making them up, neither the three ladies nor Van Helderen, always very correct and obviously indignant at the shamelessness of the poltergeist.

“It really is a ghost,” said Ida, ashen-faced.

“I’m stopping,” said Eva nervously and lifted her finger off. “I can’t make head or tail of this nonsense. It may be amusing… but the table isn’t used to decent company.”

“We have a new resource for Labuwangi!” said Eldersma. “No more picnics or balls… but table-turning!”

“We must practice!” said Mrs Doorn de Bruijn.

Eva shrugged her shoulders.

“It’s inexplicable,” she said. “I can only believe that we were all playing fair. It’d not be at all like Van Helderen to suggest such words.”

“Madam,” protested Van Helderen

“We must do it more often,” said Ida. “Look, there’s a pilgrim to Mecca leaving the grounds…”

She pointed to the garden.

“A pilgrim?” asked Eva.

They looked in the garden. There was no sign of anything.

“Oh no,” said Ida. “I thought it was a haji… It’s nothing: the moonlight…”

It had got late. They took their leave, laughing and cheerfully bewildered, but unable to find an explanation.

“As long as it hasn’t made the ladies nervous!” said the doctor.

No. Relatively speaking they were not nervous. They were more amused, although they didn’t understand.

It was two o’clock in the morning by the time they left. The town was deathly quiet in the velvet shadow of the gardens, the moonlight streaming down.

5

THE NEXT DAY, when Eldersma had left for his office and Eva was wandering through her house on domestic duty, dressed in a sarong and a jacket, she saw Frans van Helderen coming through the garden.

“May I?” he called out.

“Of course!” she shouted. “Come in. But I’m on my way to the pantry.”

And she showed him her basket of keys.

“I’m due to see the Commissioner in half an hour, but I’m too early… That’s why I’ve dropped by.”

She smiled.

“But I’m busy, you know!” she said. “Come along with me to the pantry.”

He followed her, wearing a black lustre jacket, since he was about to see the Commissioner.

“How’s Ida?” asked Eva. “Did she sleep well after last night’s seance?”

“So-so,” said Frans van Helderen. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for her to repeat it. She kept waking up with a start, throwing her arms round my neck and asking forgiveness, I’ve no idea what for.”

“It didn’t make me nervous in the least,” said Eva. “Though I can’t make head or tail of it…”

She opened the pantry, called her cook, and arranged the menu with her. The cook suffered from a nervous affliction that caused her, when surprised, to obey any order and imitate whoever spoke to her, and Eva liked to tease the old woman.

“La… la-illa-lala!” she cried.

The cook jumped, repeated the cry, and the next moment came to her senses, begging for forgiveness.

“Throw it down, cook, throw it down!” cried Eva, and the cook, reacting to the suggestion, threw a tray of rambutan and mangosteen fruits on the floor, and instantly came to herself, begging forgiveness, picking up the scattered fruit, shaking her head and clicking her tongue.

“Come with me!” said Eva to Frans. “Or she’ll be breaking my eggs next. Come on, outside with you, cook!”

“Come on, outside!” repeated the cook with the nervous condition. “I beg forgiveness, nyonya. Enough, mistress!”

“Come and sit down for a moment,” said Eva.

He followed her.

“You’re so cheerful,” he said.

“Aren’t you?”

“No, I’ve been feeling melancholy recently.”

“So have I. There’s something in the air in Labuwangi. We must pin our hopes on our table-turning.”

They sat down on the back veranda. He sighed.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I can’t help it,” he said. “I’m fond of you. I love you.”

She was silent for a moment.

“Again,” she said reproachfully.

He didn’t reply.

“I’ve told you, I haven’t got a passionate nature. I’m cold. I love my husband and my child. Let’s be friends, Van Helderen.”

“I try to fight it, but it’s no good.”

“I’m fond of Ida, I wouldn’t want to hurt her for anything in the world.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever loved her.”

“Van Helderen…”

“Perhaps just her pretty face. But however white she may be, she’s a Eurasian, with her whims and childish petty tragedies. I never realized it before, but now I do. I’ve met European women before you. But you’ve been a revelation to me, of everything that is enchanting, gracious and artistic in a woman… Your exoticism complements my own.”

“I value your friendship highly. Let’s keep it like that.”

“Sometimes it’s as if I’m crazy, sometimes I dream… that we’re travelling through Europe as a couple, that we’re in Paris together. Sometimes I see us together in a private room by the fire, you talking about art and me about contemporary social issues. But then I see us in a more intimate situation.”

“Van Helderen…”

“It doesn’t matter if you warn me off. I love you, Eva, Eva…”

“I don’t think there’s any country on earth where so many people are in love as in the Indies. It must be the heat…”

“Don’t crush me with your sarcasm. No woman has ever appealed to me so completely, body and soul, as you, Eva…”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“Don’t be angry, Van Helderen, but I can’t stand those clichés. Let’s be sensible. I have a charming husband, and you have a sweet wife. We’re all good friends and have fun together.

“You’re so cool.”

“I don’t want to spoil our happy friendship.”

“Friendship!”

“Friendship. There’s nothing I value as much apart from my domestic happiness. I couldn’t live without friends. After happiness with my husband and my child, the first thing I need is friends.”

“To admire you, and for you to dominate,” he said angrily.

She looked at him.

“Perhaps,” she said. “Perhaps I need to be admired and to dominate. We all have our weaknesses.”

“I have mine,” he said bitterly.

“Come on,” she said in a warmer tone. “Let’s stay friends.”

“I’m deeply unhappy,” he said in a flat voice. “It’s as if I’ve missed out on everything in my life. I’ve never left Java, and I feel a sense of incompleteness because I’ve never seen snow or ice. Snow… for me it stands for a strange, unknown purity. I never even come close to what I long for. When will I see Europe? When will I stop enthusing over Il Trovatore and be able to go to Bayreuth? When will I reach you, Eva? I reach out everywhere with my antennae, like a wingless insect… What does the rest of my life hold for me? With Ida, with three children, who I know will grow up to be just like their mother. I’ll work as a controller for years, and then — perhaps — become an assistant commissioner… and rise no further. And then finally I’ll leave the service, retire or be retired, and move to Sukabumi and vegetate on a small pension. Everything in me seems to long for a life of idleness.”

“But you love your work, and you’re a good official. Eldersma always says: anyone in the Indies who doesn’t work and doesn’t like his work is lost…”

“You haven’t got a nature for love, and I haven’t got one for work, for nothing but work. I can work for a purpose, which I can see before me in all its beauty, but I can’t work… for the sake of work and to fill the emptiness in my life.”

“Your purpose is the Indies.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“Fine words,” he said. “That may be true of someone like the Commissioner, whose career is going smoothly, who has never sat and pored over the Colonial List and speculated about so-and-so’s illness and so-and-so’s death… in the hope of promotion. For someone like Van Oudijck, who really believes, in all his idealistic honesty, that the Indies are his purpose, not for Holland but for the Indies themselves, for the Javanese, whom he as an administrator protects from the tyranny of landlords and planters. I’m more cynically inclined…”

“But don’t be so lukewarm about the Indies. It isn’t just fine words: that’s what I feel. The Indies are where the true greatness of us Dutch lies. Listen to foreigners talk about the Indies, and they are all enraptured by its glories and about our way of colonizing… Don’t associate yourself with that wretched spirit you find in Holland, which knows nothing about the Indies and always has a sarcastic word for them in its petty, stiff, bourgeois narrow-mindedness…”

“I didn’t realize you were such a fan of the Indies. Just yesterday you felt anxious here, and I defended my country…”

“Oh, I feel a shudder in the mysteriousness of the evenings, when some imminent danger — I don’t know what — seems to threaten: a frightening future, a danger to us… I feel that I personally remain far removed from the Indies, though I don’t wish to be… that here I miss the art I was brought up with, that here I’m without that line of beauty in people’s lives, which my parents always drew my attention to… But I’m not unjust. The Indies as our colony I find great; us, in our colony, I find great…”

“In the past perhaps, but now everything is going wrong, now we are no longer great. You have an artistic nature; despite the fact that you seldom find it, you always look for the artistic line in the Indies. Then that great, glorious image comes to your mind. That is the poetry. The prose is a huge, but exhausted colony, still ruled from Holland with one idea in mind: profit. The reality is not that the rulers are great in the Indies, but that the rulers are petty-minded exploiters. The country is being sucked dry, and the real population — not the Dutch, who spend their money from the Indies in The Hague, but the native population, attached to the soil of the Indies — are being oppressed by a disdainful overlord, who once helped create that population from his own blood. Now they are threatening to rise up against that oppression and that contempt. You, being an artist, feel the danger approaching, vaguely, like a cloud in the air, in the tropical night. I see a very real danger arising — for Holland — if not from America and Japan, then from the soil of this land itself.”

She smiled.

“I like it when you talk like that,” she said. “You might convince me in the long run.”

“If only I could achieve that much with words!” he laughed bitterly as he got up. “My half hour is up: the Commissioner is expecting me and he doesn’t like to be kept waiting. Goodbye, forgive me.”

“Tell me, am I a flirt?”

“No,” he replied. “You are as you are. And I can’t help loving you… I keep extending my antennae. That’s my fate…”

“I’ll help you to forget me,” she said, with warm conviction.

He laughed briefly and took his leave. She saw him crossing the road to the Commissioner’s compound, where he was met by an attendant…

“Actually life is one long self-deception, one long wild-goose chase after illusions,” she thought despondently. “A great goal, a universal goal… or a small private goal, for my own body and soul… Oh God, how little it all means! We wander round a bit, without knowing anything, and every one of us is in pursuit of his own little goal, his own fantasy. The only ones who are happy are the exceptions, such as Léonie van Oudijck, who is no more alive than a beautiful flower, or a beautiful animal.”

Her child toddled towards her, an engaging, fat, blond little boy.

“My baby!” she thought. “What will become of you? What will life bring you? Oh, nothing out of the ordinary perhaps. Perhaps a repeat of what has happened countless times before… Oh, when one feels like this, the Indies are so oppressive!”

She hugged her son and her tears dripped on to his blond curls.

“Van Oudijck has his office of commissioner; I have my little circle of… admiration and domination; Frans has his love… for me… we all have our toys to play with, just as my little Onno plays with his little horse. How little there is to us, how little there is to us!.. All through our lives we give ourselves airs, imagine all kinds of things. We are convinced we have a direction and purpose to our poor, lost, little lives. Oh, what’s got into me, darling? And what awaits you, my darling?”