Baboe Dalima; or, The Opium Fiend

by M. T. H. Perelaer

As soon as the mounted men had disappeared with their prisoner, the party which was left behind set fire to the sugar-canes. The reedy stems burned fiercely and soon the dreadful roar of the flames was mingled with the sharp crackling of the canes. Under cover of these flames and of the smoke, the party were enabled to make good their escape; and it was not until then that the big gong of the factory began to sound the alarm.

While this seizure was taking place at Soeka maniesan, another surprise of the same kind was being carried out with equal success in another quarter.

About six pals from the town of Santjoemeh there stood a quaint looking building, hidden away very pleasantly amid charming scenery in the bends of the rising ground. Had the house been built in anything like Swiss or Italian style, it might have been called a chalet or a villa; but the order of its architecture was so distinctly Mongolian that no mistake could be made as to its origin. It was, in fact, a Chinese pavilion which lately had become the property of Lim Ho the son of the opium factor at Santjoemeh. If anyone had fondly hoped that, after his marriage, our babah would have settled down and become somewhat less irregular in his habits, a single peep into the interior of that pavilion must have dispersed all such pleasant illusions. That small building, situated there in so charming and lonely a spot was, in fact, nothing else than a trap into which the licentious young Chinaman was wont to decoy the victims of his lust and was enabled to ensure their ruin. The apartments of the pavilion were all furnished regardless of cost and in the most sumptuous Asiatic style. In every room there were luxurious divans and on every wall hung pictures which might be valuable, perhaps, as works of art, but the subjects of which were sensual and immoral to the lowest degree. On that same night in which the attack was made upon Soeka maniesan, that Chinese pavilion also was surprised. Here the attempt succeeded even more easily than that on the sugar plantation. Lim Ho had that evening left his house in Santjoemeh and was sitting in his pavilion impatiently awaiting for some poor creature who had aroused his passions, and whom his agents had promised to bring him. He had with him only two Chinese servants, fellows who neither would nor could offer the faintest resistance. About midnight, a knock was heard at the door. It was a low faint knock, and the babah, in a fever of expectation, and thinking it was the pigeon which had been decoyed to his den, gave the word at once to open the door.

No sooner, however, had the bolts been drawn and the key turned in the lock, than half-a-dozen men with blackened faces and armed to the teeth sprang in. Lim Ho, true to the cowardly nature of his race, turned pale as death but never for an instant thought of resistance. He glanced round nervously to see whether any way of escape lay open to him; but when he saw both doors occupied and guarded by the attacking party, he tried, in his unmanly terror, to hide himself by creeping under one of the divans. In a very few minutes, however, he was dragged out of that hiding place and was securely bound, strapped to a horse and carried off.

Here again, just as at Soeka maniesan, the attacking party left everything untouched. They did not lay a finger on any of the articles of value which lay scattered about; but they confined themselves strictly to the murder of Mrs. van Gulpendam and to the capture of the Resident and of the opium farmer’s son.

The proprietor of the sugar factory had, it is true, been knocked down by a blow of one of their clubs; but that blow had not been struck wantonly. It was inflicted simply as a precaution and in self-defence; for the man would undoubtedly have run off and spread the alarm. He would have roused his factory hands and caused the whole plot to fail, and he would immediately have started in pursuit of the raiders. That had to be guarded against at all hazards. But the blow did not prove deadly or even dangerous. As soon as the first excitement, consequent upon the discovery of Laurentia’s murder, had somewhat subsided, a band of men had sallied forth to put out the fire in the fields, and then the owner of the factory was discovered lying insensible just outside his own grounds. At first they thought he was dead; for he was quite unconscious. They carried him into the house, and then his wife soon found out that her husband, though stunned by a severe blow, was neither wounded nor materially injured. Every effort was made to restore him, and after some time, he recovered his senses. The day had dawned before the police had arrived at Soeka maniesan and began to make their inquiries. There and then a careful examination was held of the entire staff employed on the factory—every single individual being submitted to a rigorous interrogatory; but no clue was found which could lead to the detection of the perpetrators of this daring outrage. Just outside the yet smouldering cane-fields, were found the tracks of horses; but that led to no result for the weather had for a long time been very dry and the morning breeze had covered all further tracks with a thick layer of fine dust. Thus there was nothing, absolutely nothing, to indicate the direction the horsemen might have taken. The proprietor himself, poor fellow, could not give the slightest information. All he knew was that, as he was quietly walking about engaged in argument with the Resident, a number of fellows with blackened faces had started up from behind one of the tall piles of leaves, that he had attempted to run away, but had been overtaken and had received a blow on the head which stunned him. Of what had taken place after that he, of course, knew nothing whatever. The overseer’s story was, if possible, still more unsatisfactory. He said that the instant he saw the threatening forms appearing from behind the heap of dadoe, he had flung himself down flat upon the ground and then crept under another heap of leaves; and that he had not ventured to stir out of that hiding place until he heard the crackling of the canes and began to fear that the leaves which covered him might be attacked by the flames. While in this state of terror and suspense, he had seen nothing and had heard nothing. Now, the question was: where were they to look for Resident van Gulpendam? The police were at their wits’ end. The whole district of Santjoemeh was, naturally enough, in the greatest excitement; and universal horror prevailed at the terrible fate which, in all probability, had overtaken the chief of the district. But do what they could, and search where they would, not a trace of the criminals could be discovered, not a single gleam of light could be cast upon the impenetrable mystery. For a day or two this state of suspense endured until a fisherman, as he was trying to get his boat into the Moeara Tjatjing, caught sight of the naked body of a European floating just outside the surf. He made for it and drew it into his boat and then took it to the loerah of Kaligaweh which was the nearest dessa.

Had this simple Javanese fisherman only known that it was the body of the kandjeng toean, he would no doubt have turned away his head and quietly said to his mates: “Let Allah’s justice float by undisturbed.”

Had he been able to foresee what troubles he was bringing upon himself by raising that corpse from its watery grave, he would have taken good care not to touch it. The alligators would, no doubt, soon enough have provided for its burial.

As it was, the loerah of the dessa began by locking up the poor fellow. Then he had to submit to endless examinations by the wedono, by the pattih, by the regent, by the controller, by the assistant resident, by the public prosecutor. All these authorities were most eager in the matter; and thought that, in this poor man, they held in their hands a clue to the mysterious drama enacted at Soeka maniesan. Thus they vied with one another in badgering the poor devil, until they drove him to desperation, and he at length was forced to declare that he was light-headed and of weak intellect.

The body was readily identified as that of Resident van Gulpendam. There could be no doubt about that; for the features were almost intact. But all the parts which the sea-monsters had spared appeared extremely inflamed and swollen; and it was evident that the unhappy man must have died under an extremity of torture, though there was nothing to show that any knife or sharp instrument had caused his death.