It was not the most pleasant situation imaginable. We were well aware of the excitable nature and the undisciplined minds of the people among whom we were; we knew that they passed in an instant from extreme friendliness to a Berserker rage; and we were but two against three hundred; our means of defence consisted of only two revolvers. Grave as we knew the danger must be, we very fortunately did not know until some time afterward, from Tama Bulan, how extreme it was, and how difficult it had been for him to save our lives.
After Tama Bulan had left us, we heard a pounding and chopping against the partition wall of the room to which the body had been carried; several boards were removed, and an opening made from it into the veranda; through this opening the corpse was borne; it must not pass through a doorway used by the living. The poor, inanimate body was decked out in all the gay garments so recently worn at the feast, and, with a cigarette between the fingers, it was laid partly recumbent on a bier that had been quickly constructed, and draped with white cloth. On the bier beside the corpse an old woman seated herself (all this we could observe through the crevices of our room) and at once began a wail for the dead. This lugubrious wailing was kept up, to my certain knowledge, without intermission for two nights and a day. Of course, there were constant relief parties.
During these two nights and a day we remained close prisoners in our little room. Throughout the first long night Tama Bulan proved himself inflexibly our staunch friend; he insisted over and over again on our innocence, and pleaded for us with the adherents of Lueng’s husband and brother, who were clamouring for our heads as offerings to the dead woman and as decorations for their homes. This thirst for our blood lasted during our imprisonment, and was throughout restricted to the husband and brother of Lueng and to their immediate friends. They were all guests, who had come to the Naming.
When the wailing had been adequately performed the corpse was placed in a coffin hewn from a large log and the cover sealed down with raw gutta percha.
Our most friendly relations with Tama Bulan’s household had not for a moment been broken. Nevertheless, the next day Tama Bulan came to us and said that, in view of all the circumstances, he thought it best that our visit should come to an end; and, inasmuch as Laki La and his followers were going down the river, we had better take advantage of the chance and accompany them. Of course, we acquiesced. The object for which we had come was accomplished. We had seen that which no white man had ever before reported, namely, the noteworthy ceremonies of a Naming, and we had passed six delightful weeks in the far interior of Borneo, in intimate, friendly intercourse with men, whom nous autres are pleased to term savages. So we fell to work, packed up our things, distributed among our especial friends all that was left of our stores of cloth and tobacco, made Tama Bulan’s eyes sparkle with delight over our present of silver dollars, bade good-bye to his daughter Bulan, and his two wives, not forgetting a chuck under the chin to little Lijow, and hastened down to the boat. Our final parting with dear old Tama Bulan was almost watery; and, as we swept out into the current, with our pith helmets we waved a prolonged farewell to the row of flapping palm-leaf hats which lined the long veranda.
Old Laki La was as affable as possible while he sat in our canoe, and we even volunteered to draw for him the solitary tooth remaining in his lower jaw. He waggled it with his tongue pensively for a moment, and then remarked that as he should not live much longer anyhow, he thought that it had better die with him. We considered him a most pleasant old fellow, until we reached his very large house on the Pata, not far below Tama Bulan’s; but as soon as we touched his landing-place we were undeceived; he disembarked without so much as turning round to say good-bye, and behind him trooped all our paddlers, whom we had expected to take us down at least as far as Tama Lohong’s house on the Baram.
Here was a serious difficulty, and Laki La would pay absolutely no attention to any appeal to him for men.
It was on this occasion that the man I mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter came forward most kindly, and offered to get together some men to take us as far as Tama Lohong’s, and all the way down to the Fort, if necessary; and so it fell out. It made me blush to think of the ingratitude I showed in forgetting his name, and I am still blushing; for even now, cudgel my brains as I will, I cannot recall it.