Also Perhap .... The Kriss Incarnadine 1

....

He stood there for a long moment, searching the

room with his eyes till they fell upon me. Then he

crept forward, and, regarding my master carefully the

while, he took me up and drew me slowly and noiselessly

from the sheath. I wondered what he could

want with me at the dead of night ; I wondered what

my master would do if he saw that man standing by

his head with his own naked kris in his hand, and I

saw how easy it would be to kill the Buggis as he lay

there, should the stranger desire it. Evidently that was

not his intention, for, with the same precautions, and

without any hurry, he returned whence he had come,

raised the heavy arras, stooped under them and passed

in. As the gaudily-coloured folds of stuff fell into

their places, the stranger dropped on his knee beside

the handsome girl, whom I had already observed as the

favourite of the mistress of the house. The girl was

locked in that profound sleep wherein respiration seems

almost to cease, and not the slightest movement stirred

the sleeper.

Again I wondered, what could the man want with

me ? Still, I had not lived all those years in the

Sultan's Astlna without learning something, and I saw

that, if there was to be any killing, the stranger had

come unprepared ; for there was no weapon within

the curtains but the one he held in his hand.

The man listened to the girl's hardly perceptible

breathing for a while, and looked fixedly at her. She

wore, as was the custom of that country, a short silk

jacket with tight sleeves, and a pair of loose trousers,

things seldom or never worn in the house. Thrown

negligently over her was the silk sarong or skirt, the

garment common to both men and women. Except for

the girl's regular breathing there was not a sound inside

the curtain ; but occasionally the faintly-sounding

movements or a restless sleeper came, half-smothered,

from without. The stranger stooped down close over

the girl, and put^the fingers of his left hand under a

silken cord, tied so tightly that it cut into her waist.

Then, very carefully, to avoid cutting himself or her,

he took me by the blade, near the point, in the fingers

of his right hand, and getting the kris under the cord

by raising it with two fingers of his left hand the

razor-like edge severed it in an instant, and at the same

moment the sleeper awoke.

I was outraged. Was I a pair of scissors to be used

for cutting thread ? Was it for this that Tukang Burok

had fashioned me and then paid for his labour with his

own life ? Why did not my master wake and strike

this man, as the Sultan struck the unoffending smith ?

Alas ! I could not shout for help, and, though the girl

seemed to want it, and fought desperately, she uttered

no cry, only struggled to get free from the man who

seemed at last to lose his temper, and, seizing me by the

hilt, placed the point close to her heart and threatened

to kill her if she were not quiet. Either she did not

believe him, or she did not care, for she wriggled out or

his grasp and, lifting the far side of the curtain, disappeared

into the women's apartment, where he dared

not follow her.

The stranger threw himselfon the mattress exhausted

by the struggle ; but, as he regained his composure, he

looked at me in a pensive, distrait fashion, and smiled as

he swore gently under his breath. Then he lay down

and slept ; but at dawn, before the Buggis was awake,

he took me back and put me in my sheath again.

We left the place for my master's village, two

hundred miles nearer the coast, but about a month later,

when my master was going up river, we met the

stranger being paddled down stream, and, as the boats

passed each other, I saw that same girl look out of the

after-house window of his boat, and smile as she said

something to her companion. I think she was reminding

him of the evening when he borrowed me. One

sees as much, and may learn as much, on that western

waterway, as in the Astana of an East Coast Sultan.

After a time, white men came into the Peninsula and

made trouble, so that the Buggis determined to leave

the place. Just before his departure, a boy who had

seen me, and thought I was too good for a foreigner,

appropriated me and made his way back to the upcountry

fastness where he dwelt.

Years passed and my new owner quarrelled with a

Javanese, stabbed him to death and fled into the jungle.

No one cared much, and as the boy had many powerful

relatives he managed to evade capture. But he was

married, and though he was a proclaimed outlaw, his

young wife remained in her husband's house in the

centre of a considerable village. The husband used to

appear at unexpected moments and demand food and

shelter, and, when his wants had been satisfied, he

remained in the house till he was warned that further

delay would cost him his liberty. The absences were

long, the moments passed with his wife brief, and the

outlaw became suspicious of the girl's fidelity. Perhaps

the poisonous breath of gossip penetrated to his uncertain

hiding-places, perhaps jealousy alone was responsible, or

perhaps, having little else to do, he acted as his own

detective and made some discovery. Whatever the

cause the village awoke one day to the knowledge that

the man had murdered his wife and left a message with

some wanderer, whom he met by the way, to the effect

that there were twelve people in the neighbourhood

whose lives he meant to take. As a curious instance or

the panic that one desperate man may cause, it is a fact

that, from this time forward, the people of the village

would not go about singly, and all the houses were shut

and barricaded at four o'clock in the afternoon. The

two murders following on each other so quickly, the

outlaw's boastful threat, and the report that he was

armed with a wonderful kris, caused the same paralysing

fear as the knowledge that an amok-runner

is abroad, ready to slay whomsoever shall cross his

path.

The feelings of a large section of the villagers were,

however, affected by the fact that the murdered girl

had many relatives, and these, indifferent, or even

sympathetic, to a man who had only slain a stranger,

desired vengeance for the blood of their kinswoman.

Therefore the people of the district herded together to

seek the murderer, and beat the jungle for him as

they would for a man-eating tiger, but without result.

Then the white men, who, by this time controlled the

government of the country, took the case up and warned

the native headmen that they would be held responsible

if the murderer were not arrested within a given time.

The headmen appeared to be very zealous in the

pursuit, and scoured the country with hundreds of

armed followers, but found no trace of the man who

had caused all this commotion.

It may have been that some more powerful native

authority had issued secret instructions to search the

least likely coverts ;

it may have been that none of the

searchers particularly relished the idea of meeting a

desperate and well-armed man. Whatever the cause,

the murderer was still at large when the services of a

foreign Malay, of rank and tried courage, were enlisted

to do what the people of the country could not or would

not accomplish.

This stranger took with him only two followers,

and, going straight to the village where the murderer's

house was situated, they quietly obtained the information

they wanted, and in twenty-four hours were hot

on the trail of the outlaw. My latest master had

discovered a deserted hut in a patch of bananas,

surrounded by dense forest, unknown to almost

every one, but still at no great distance from the scene

of his last crime. There he had dwelt in hiding ever

since he murdered his wife, but, even then, his whereabouts

were known to some of his own family, who

supplied him with food, though they held no intercourse

with him beyond telling him of the intentions

and exploits of the great search parties, whose halfhearted

schemes he easily baffled. When the foreign

Raja took up the trail the affair assumed a different

complexion. His inquiries were conducted mainly

through foreign Malays, his following was small, his

movements rapid, his object fixed and unwavering, his

courage of the highest order, and he kept his own

counsel. Therefore it happened that, as my master

was sitting at sundown, within the open door of the

hut, his body hidden, but his legs visible in the doorway,

he was startled by hearing a voice in the banana

patch call him by name, saying,

" Come out, it is

I, Raja Radin, who am waiting for you." My

master seized a pair of spears that were leaning against

the wall and rushed down the steps to the ground.

At a distance of only a few yards, right in the

path leading to the door, stood Raja Radin, who had

not even drawn the'Jcris he carried in his belt. Behind

him were two followers, one armed with a gun and the

other with a spear.

My master ran straight at the Raja, casting a spear

which the other avoided. Then, with the second

spear in both hands, the assailant thrust with all his

might at the Raja, but the blade passed through his

trousers and the force of the ineffective blow brought

the outlaw to his knee. As Raja Radin grasped the

shaft of the spear, the outlaw whipped me from my

sheath but, before he could strike, one of the mens

behind the Raja thrust his spear over his chief's

shoulder and the point entering my master's neck

thrust him back on to the ground. Almost at the

same moment the man with the musket fired, and the

bullet, striking the outlaw fair in the chest, killed him

almost instantly. The Raja, who had never drawn his

kris, was very angry with his followers, saying, he meant

to take the outlaw alive and would have done so if they

had shown a little more courage. As it was, there

was nothing to be done but to carry the body to the

nearest police station, the Raja possessing himself or

the dead man's kris.

Thus I changed hands again, and I was not sorry to

be in such good keeping, for there are few men, white

or brown, with a stouter heart than little Raja Radin,

of Sumatra.

It was very Malay-like that when the dead man's

body was carried, next morning, to the police station,

the Raja and his two followers were scowled at by every

man and boy in the crowd of Malays who collected

round the little procession. Had it not been for the

Raja's personal reputation, his recent exhibition ot

prowess, and the knowledge that the Government was

behind him, I think there would have been more

blood shed on that day.

Raja Radin, like every other fighting Malay that I

have ever seen, suffered from a permanant state of

impecuniosity, and before twelve months had passed

he sold me to a white man, saying that, since Malay

rule was over, a kris was more or less of a useless

luxury, and the one he had worn for so many years

would serve him to the end.

So I came to be a white man's plaything ; not that

he used me ill ; he did not cut cake with me, or lay

me on the floor for dancers to caper over, as I have

seen other white men do with their dishonoured blades.

My complaint was that he did not use me at all. I

was cared for, and honoured, and made much of, and

my latest owner would draw me from the sheath and

praise my virtues as though he were a Malay. But

for all that, I lay upon the table, where I never heard

the sound of voices raised in anger, or saw the bloodlight

darken any man's eye.

And now, once again, I have found a new home :

for the white man has given me to a white woman.

I have seen her and I am glad. For all her fair face,

and pretty child-like ways, it will go ill with any one

who really angers her, if I am within her reach. And

she is a woman over whom, unless I am mistaken,

many a man has lost his head and some their lives.

The measure is not yet full ; for though many have

sought, none has been chosen, so there has been no

betrayal. With trust there is always the possibility of

betrayal, and with betrayal will come my opportunity.