Max Havelaar;

by Multatuli

And suspended by a cord round his neck, under his baadjoe,[34] he wore a small silk bag, in which were some withered leaves of the ‘melatti.’

Was it a wonder that he stopped no longer at Sangerang than was necessary to visit the acquaintances of his father who made such fine straw hats? Was it a wonder [[336]]that he said little to the girls on his road, who asked him where he came from, and where he was going—the common salutation in those regions? Was it a wonder that he no longer thought Serang so beautiful, he who had learnt to know Batavia? That he hid himself no more behind the ‘pagger’ as he did three years ago, when he saw the Resident riding out; for he had seen the much grander lord, who lives at Buitenzorg, and who is the grandfather of the Soosoohoonan (Emperor) of Solo?[35] Was it a wonder that he did not pay much attention to the tales of those who went a part of the way with him, and spoke of the news in Bantam-Kidool; how the coffee culture had been quite suspended after much unrewarded labour; how the district chief of Parang-Koodjang had been condemned to fourteen days’ arrest at the house of his father-in-law for highway robbery; how the capital had been removed to Rankas-Betong; how a new Assistant Resident was there, because the other had died some months ago; how this new functionary had spoken at the first Sebah meeting; how for some time nobody had been punished for complaining; how the people hoped that all that had been stolen would be returned or paid for?

No, he had sublime visions before his mind’s eye. He sought for the ‘Ketapan’ tree in the clouds, as he was still too far off to seek it at Badoer. He caught at the air [[337]]which surrounded him, as if he would embrace the form which was to meet him under that tree. He pictured to himself the face of Adinda, her head, her shoulders; he saw the heavy kondeh (chignon), so black and glossy, confined in a net, hanging down her neck; he saw her large eye glistening in dark reflection; the nostrils which she raised so proudly as a child, when he——how was it possible?——vexed her, and the corner of her lips, where she preserved a smile; he saw her breast, which would now swell under the kabaai;[36] he saw how well the sarong of her own making fitted her hips, and descending along the thighs in a curve, fell in graceful folds on the small foot.

No; he heard little of what was told him. He heard quite different tones; he heard how Adinda would say “Welcome, Saïdjah! I have thought of you in spinning and weaving, and stamping the rice on the floor, which bears three times twelve lines made by my hand. Here I am under the ‘Ketapan’ the first day of the new moon. Welcome, Saïdjah, I will be your wife.”

That was the music which resounded in his ears, and prevented him from listening to all the news that was told him on the road.

At last he saw the ‘Ketapan’ or rather he saw a large dark spot, which many stars covered, before his eye. That must be the wood of Djati, near the tree where he should see again Adinda, next morning after sunrise. He [[338]]sought in the dark, and felt many trunks—soon found the well-known roughness on the south side of a tree, and thrust his finger into a hole which Si-Panteh had cut with his parang[37] to exorcise the pontianak[38] who was the cause of his mother’s toothache, a short time before the birth of Panteh’s little brother. That was the Ketapan he looked for.

Yes, this was indeed the spot where he had looked upon Adinda for the first time with quite a different eye from his other companions in play, because she had for the first time refused to take part in a game which she had played with other children—boys and girls—only a short time before. There she had given him the ‘melatti.’ He sat down at the foot of the tree, and looked at the stars; and when he saw a shooting-star he accepted it as a welcome of his return to Badoer, and he thought whether Adinda would now be asleep, and whether she had rightly cut the moons on her rice floor. It would be such a grief to him if she had omitted a moon, as if thirty-six were not enough!… And he wondered whether she had made nice ‘sarongs’ and ‘slendangs?’ And he asked himself, too, who would now be dwelling in her father’s house? And he thought of his youth, and of his mother; and how that buffalo had saved him from the tiger, and he thought of what would have become of Adinda if that buffalo had [[339]]been less faithful! He paid much attention to the sinking of the stars in the west, and as each star disappeared in the horizon, he calculated how much nearer the sun was to his rising in the east, and how much nearer he himself was to seeing Adinda. For she would certainly come at the first beam——yes, at daybreak she would be there,… Ah! Why had not she already come the day before?

It pained him, that she had not anticipated the supreme moment which had lighted up his soul for three years with inexpressible brightness; and, unjust as he was in the selfishness of his love, it appeared to him that Adinda ought to have been there waiting for him, who complained before the time appointed, that he had to wait for her.

And he complained unjustly, for neither had the sun risen, nor had the eye of day cast a glance on the plain. The stars, it is true, were growing pale up there! ashamed as they were of the approaching end of their rule; strange colours were flowing over the tops of the mountains, which appeared darker as they contrasted sharply with places more brightly illuminated; here and there flowed something glowing in the east—arrows of gold and of fire that were shot hither and thither, parallel to the horizon;—but they disappeared again, and seemed to fall down behind the impenetrable curtain, which hid the day from the eyes of Saïdjah. Yet it grew lighter and lighter around him—he now saw the landscape, and could [[340]]already distinguish a part of the Klappa-wood behind which Badoer lay:—there Adinda slept.

No! surely she did not sleep; how could she sleep?… Did she not know that Saïdjah would be awaiting her? She had not slept the whole night certainly; the night police of the village had knocked at her door to ask, why the pelitat (Javanese lamp) continued burning in her cottage; and with a sweet laugh she had said, that a vow kept her awake to weave the ‘slendang,’ in which she was occupied, and which must be ready before the first day of the new moon.