“Drunk, drunk; I am drunk!”
And the women of Badoer came out of their houses, and saw with sorrow poor Saïdjah standing there, for they knew him, and understood that he was looking for the house of Adinda, and they knew that there was no house of Adinda in the village of Badoer.
For, when the district chief of Parang-Koodjang had taken away Adinda’s father’s buffaloes.…
I told you, reader! that my narrative was monotonous.
… Adinda’s mother died of grief, and her baby sister died because she had no mother, and had no one to suckle her. And Adinda’s father, who feared to be punished for not paying his land-taxes.…
I know, I know that my tale is monotonous.
… had fled out of the country; he had taken Adinda and her brothers with him. But he had heard how the father of Saïdjah had been punished at Buitenzorg with stripes for leaving Badoer without a passport. And, therefore, Adinda’s father had not gone to Buitenzorg, nor to the Preangan, nor to Bantam. He had gone to Tjilangkahan, the quarter of Lebak bordering on the sea. There he had concealed himself in the woods, and waited for the arrival of Pa Ento, Pa Lontah, Si Oeniah, Pa Ansive, [[347]]Abdoel Isma, and some others that had been robbed of their buffaloes by the district chief of Parang-Koodjang, and all of whom feared punishment for not paying their land-taxes.
There they had at night taken possession of a fishing-boat, and had gone to sea. They had steered towards the west, and kept the country to the right of them as far as Java Head: then they had steered northwards till they came in sight of Prince’s Island, and sailed round the east coast of that island, and from there to the Lampoons.
Such at least was the way that people told each other in whispers in Lebak, when there was a question of buffalo robbery and unpaid land-taxes.
But Saïdjah did not well understand what they said to him; he did not even quite understand the news of his father’s death. There was a buzzing in his ears, as if a gong had been sounded in his head: he felt the blood throbbing convulsively through the veins of his temples, that threatened to yield under the pressure of such severe distension. He spoke not: and looked about as one stupefied, without seeing what was round and about him; and at last he began to laugh horribly.