Monkeys in the Dark

by Blanche d'Alpuget

  ‘I’ve had to sack her. Stupid cow,’ David said.

  ‘Oh, David!’

  ‘Yeah. She damned near poisoned me,’ he added.

  ‘But you always said she was a marvellous cook.’

  He gave a heavy sigh. ‘Yeah. The grub was good. But she got some funny ideas about me. I’ve been, you know, slipping her a length, now and then …’ He fell silent, then added, ‘She thought I’d marry her, and decided to make sure I would by giving me this love potion.’

  ‘What was it?’

  ‘You’ll laugh,’ he said, then glumly looked out the window. They were driving down Iman Bondjol, a grand avenue of two-storied houses where the gardens had room for separate guest pavilions. Neatly-dressed Javanese children, some holding umbrellas to protect themselves from the sun, were chatting in groups on the footpath, waiting for chauffeurs to take them to school. They were beautiful children; already the little girls had the delicate head and hand movements of grown women. They glanced discreetly at the foreigners in the embassy car and smiled when they caught David’s eye. After a few minutes David turned back to Alex.

  ‘Jesus Christ! I like this town. I like these people. They’d pinch the teeth out of yer head, but they’re good fun. They love a laugh and a roll in the hay. Then something like this happens and you think, “Forget it. Just earn your pile here, and get out.” You know what she was giving me? This love potion?’ He was overcome with male coyness, and had to whisper. ‘Menstrual blood. In m’morning coffee … I knew you’d laugh.’

  Alex stopped after a while and wrinkled her nose. ‘It is disgusting,’ she agreed. ‘But it’s your fault.’

  ‘I know. It’s always our fault here,’ David sighed.

  Alex had forgotten about Thornton while she had been in the car with David. The memory came back when she sat down at her desk, but because she was no longer angry she recalled things that had been only at the periphery of her consciousness during the confrontation. Thornton had been more than alarmed—he had been very frightened. He had clasped his baby as if Alex were about to snatch Amanda from him, and as she had walked away down the path the child had started to bawl.

  Thornton would lose Amanda if there were a scandal, Julie, if she ever found out, would be in her solicitor’s office before she could say, ‘Absolutely typical’. And she would skin Thornton—not that he had much skin to offer: only a three-bedroom brick veneer bungalow in a new area of Canberra. But it was all he had … and he would be sacked from External Affairs. The horridness of his life suddenly overcame Alex: a forced relationship with a querulous, silly woman who lived in dim suspicion of him and who controlled his future. No doubt he’d married in an attempt to force away his inclinations. Djakarta, where the boys were so slender and had such shining eyes—and so little money—was a minefield for him.

  At coffee time, nine o’clock, Alex went down the corridor to Thornton’s office.

  ‘I’ve come to apologise,’ she said from the doorway.

  Thornton managed a smile. ‘You’d better come in.’ She now noticed he was flushed and seemed to have a bad hangover. His eyes were red and he looked listless and puffy. ‘I was abominably rude to you. I’m sorry about that.’ He stared at his desk blotter and at the blank writing pad in front of him. Alex began to feel more embarrassed.

  ‘Thornton, I wouldn’t have gone to the Ambassador. I’m not like that. I just lost my temper with you.’

  He nodded. There was a curtain of silence between them. ‘Well, I didn’t mean it either, but Julie and I had had a row—not about my friends, but about everything else, and I don’t know what came over me. I just …’ His voice trailed off. ‘It’s too late,’ he said. ‘When you threatened to report me, I decided to get in first.’ There was silence again. ‘I haven’t been to the Boss, but I went and had a long talk to Colonel James—told him about the scene at the party, and that you were there with Maruli. I think I exaggerated a bit. I said you were necking on the dance floor.’

  ‘Thornton! I wouldn’t do that! Neither would any Indonesian. They don’t.’

  ‘I know.’

  Alex snorted. ‘So nobody who knows anything will believe you. That’s one good thing. The other good thing, I suppose, is that you went to James and not to Anthony. The Colonel will huff and puff at me, but Anthony would have given me hell.’

  Thornton’s expression brightened and he reached forward to pat her clumsily. ‘I feel an absolute fool. I can’t retract it, but I can add that I’ve investigated the situation further and now believe that you’re not actually having an affair.’ His eyebrows flashed up; his voice was arch. ‘James will be frightfully disappointed—he’s a great one for a spot of voyeurism.’

  He added, ‘You know, Alex, I’ve often thought that Sinclaire is jealous about you. Sometimes I’ve caught him watching you, when you weren’t aware of it, and it gave me the strangest feeling. He looked as if he wanted to eat you …’

  Alex frowned. ‘We have a difficult relationship.’

  ‘Yairs. I used to think it was platonic …’

  ‘It is,’ she said quickly. ‘It always has been.’

  She saw it again: Mother had looked up from filing her nails. ‘Alex, have you had an abortion?’ she had asked. ‘Yes’. ‘I thought so.’ She had gone on filing her nails. An hour later she had announced a migraine. Nothing was said, but everyone knew I had done something terrible … Anthony came to see her with an armful of chrysanthemums. They were closeted in her bedroom for an hour. When he came out he said quizzically, ‘She’s going to increase my share of the trust to your disadvantage. You’re too soft, Alex. Why didn’t you tell her? You’d have been forgiven—and so would have I, in time. It’s family, after all.’ Alex sighed, and concentrated again on Thornton.

  He was fiddling with some papers in his top drawer.

  ‘Thank heavens we’re speaking again,’ he said. ‘Sutrisno has given me an extra invitation card to the President’s Independence Day speech. He didn’t say so, of course, but I know he wanted you to have it. Do you think you could ignore your dislike for Trisno and come along? It will be an historic event.’

  She hesitated. The thought which came to her was so precise and strong that she felt for a moment washed in bright, clear light. Her mind said, Don’t go. Don’t go to Bandung. Don’t go to the speech. Leave Maruli. Avoid Sutrisno.

  She began smiling at the silliness of the ideas. ‘Yes, I’ll come. In fact, I’ve changed my mind about Trisno … I could never like him, but I do feel sorry for him.’

  ‘Really?’ Thornton sounded delighted. ‘Sorry for a millionaire? Oh well, I’ve never pretended to understand women—and you’re more peculiar than most.’

  He thought as he closed the door behind her that Alex would be dressing up in a sarong next. ‘Amazing what love will do,’ he remarked to his empty room, then added mentally, ‘Maruli is heavenly-looking—if you like the chunky-style.’ Personally, he liked something taller.

  7

  Banana trees grew outside the doorway to the printing shed, so that from the rest of the Pusat Kesenian compound one could not see who entered there. The shed was guarded by a pair of geese and a black dog. The geese made an ear-splitting noise when strangers approached their territory around the shed; the dog was disciplined and barked rarely. It had been trained in a military camp.

  The dog recognised only four people—Maruli, Usman and two other students, but none of the students could attempt to pass it if unaccompanied by Maruli.

  Usman had asked to be allowed to help Maruli pack the material for Bandung. As they reached the shed, the dog, which had rushed forward to greet Maruli, swerved and rounded on Usman. Its ears were laid back and its teeth bared. Maruli spoke to it sharply, but it stood stiff-legged with its hackles up, snarling at Usman, who giggled and covered his mouth with his hand.

  ‘Go first,’ Maruli said, glancing down at Usman’s feet as the boy entered the shed. Maruli was not superstitious, but Usman was. Like most Javanese, Usman beli
eved in the unconscious language of the body: he too looked down at his feet, then tripped and fell. He had lifted the left foot to enter the shed: the sign of intent to deceive.

  Maruli suddenly felt old and dispirited. He was divorced by age, education, religion and intellect from the boy who was now, in some way which he knew he would soon discover, betraying his trust. For months Maruli had tried to educate the children—he had talked to them of history, of social justice, of the vision of freedom and dignity that Sukarno had clarified. Of how Independence had been corrupted, become a mockery. Usman wanted the status symbol of a gun in his pocket; he reduced the Continuing Revolution to a cowboy movie.

  ‘Why are you frightened of the dog? Why did you walk like that?’ Maruli said.

  Usman grinned. ‘Bapak sees everything.’

  Maruli began to pack the suitcase. At length Usman said, ‘My mind is troubled, Bapak.’ Maruli made no reply, but continued laying the hand bills carefully in the bottom of the suitcase. He had decided to take a risk and pack it full, with only a sarong over the top of the thousands of pieces of paper. If it were searched, he was finished. That was of no consequence. He had to try to deliver the manifesto to Bandung before Independence Day.

  ‘One of my students has psychological problems—he wants to come with us to Bandung for a talk,’ Maruli told Alex that afternoon.

  ‘Why can’t he chat with you in Djakarta?’

  ‘He’s too nervous.’

  ‘Hell! I don’t want anybody else in the car, Maruli. Please put him off. He can wait until Monday.’

  ‘I shall telephone him,’ Maruli said and left the lunch table.

  Itji, who had served their lunch with an expression of deepest reproach, stood facing Alex behind Maruli’s empty chair. ‘Non’s friend has a very heavy suitcase,’ she said. ‘Itji couldn’t lift it …’ She flashed one of her Hallowe’en-night smiles. ‘Non’s friend must be very strong!’

  ‘He is,’ Alex agreed, trying to look solemn, but Itji was grinning from ear to ear.

  ‘Non likes strong friends,’ Itji burst out, and gave a screech of laughter. Then her face went blank and she continued serving the lunch. When Maruli returned from the telephone Itji called him ‘Tuan’.

  ‘You’ve been accepted,’ Alex whispered. The servant’s sudden approval seemed to Alex a blessing on the trip. She was feeling lightheaded; Maruli, too, was excited—he had joked with the embassy driver when his suitcase had been lifted into the boot of the car. ‘Gold bricks’, he had said, then turned to Alex and added in Indonesian, ‘My friend, Hadi, loves reading. I’ve taken him every book I could fit in the case.’

  They set out at three-thirty, siesta time, when traffic was light. The city ended abruptly with a cluster of concrete buildings and a roadblock. The military police rose languidly from their roadside chairs, glanced at Maruli through the window, then raised the red and white boom and waved the car through. They had not even bothered to ask for the surat djalan, the travel permit. Maruli, who had chosen to sit in the front next to the driver, turned round to Alex.

  ‘They think I’m your houseboy,’ he said. She was embarrassed for him, but he added, ‘I don’t mind.’

  The car passed under the boom and it lowered again, trapping the next vehicle—a bus, from which all the passengers were forced to descend, including those sitting on the roof and carrying their household goods. Alex thought of the roadblock as a division between two worlds, and as it closed behind them the sense of strain left her—she and Maruli had escaped. They were now in the countryside, in West Java.

  A ribbon of woven palm leaf houses shaded by fruit trees lined the roadside. Behind the houses golden fields of rice stretched back and all along the dirt footpaths there were fruit stalls. The smell of pineapples and bananas mingled with the smell of open drains. Long-legged hens wandered in front of the houses and countrywomen stood vacant-eyed, feeding their babies. The babies, and even children aged five or six, were bare-bottomed: in the city, they tended to be bare-topped. There was plenty of time to observe differences, for the south road was neglected, even by Djakarta standards, and sometimes the car was slowed down to five miles an hour.

  ‘This is the road our soldiers must use when they want to invade Australia,’ Maruli said, straight-faced.

  At Bogor, the first southern town, the air became cooler; they had left the northern plain and were now in the foothills of the mountains. Past Bogor, terraced ricefields began. Much of the crop was near ripe, and the fields were dry, but from the seeding fields where the young shoots were covered with water, the mountainside became a patchwork of mirrors, reflecting the sky. The sky here was different, too—unfevered. It was a rich, late-afternoon blue. In the rivers which the car passed or crossed every few miles, boys as shiny and slender as eels were bathing. They leapt from the rocks to the brown river water, thrown off balance by modesty, which required that they cover their genitals with their left hands.

  ‘I wondered where you got that habit,’ Alex said in English, indicating a stark naked soldier with his hand clasped to his crotch and his clothes and rifle lying on a rock. Maruli gave a small laugh: he was tense, Alex realised. He had been talking very little, and mostly to the driver. Much of their discussion had centred on the number of roadblocks between Djakarta and Bandung. They had passed another one, before Bogor. There the military police had recognised the chauffeur—embassy people regularly spent their weekends in bungalows in the mountains between Bogor and the Puntjak—and had immediately waved them through. The next roadblock, she had gathered, would be at the Puntjak, the pass through the mountains. After it they would descend into a long plain, before the final ascent to Bandung.

  The road had become steep and winding; tea plantations had replaced the rice terraces, and the bungalows with gardens of bougainvillaea, roses and lilies had been left behind. The volcano’s crest, a deep purple-black, loomed above them.

  The cold seemed biting. People on the roadside had pink cheeks and were carrying on their backs loads of hay and firewood, going at a jog-trot down the mountain towards the villages. Alex was conscious of feeling healthy, almost for the first time since arriving in Indonesia. But Maruli and the driver were shivering.

  They reached the peak at the height of sunset, the sky bloody and flashed with gold. A boom stretched across the width of the road. Two military policemen ambled forward. One jerked his head at the driver to get out and open the boot; the other held out his hand for their surat djalan. Maruli turned round to Alex—his eyes were sharp; he said nothing, just smiled at her.

  ‘I think I’ll stretch my legs,’ she said, alighted from the car and went round to the boot.

  ‘There are books in that one,’ the driver was explaining. The police were fingering Maruli’s case.

  Alex had already seen the way policemen behaved when they wanted a bribe—they looked grave and touched things a lot. People spending the weekend in the hills always took with them one or two cartons of duty-free cigarettes for the police, which were on sale next day in roadside stalls, the packets stamped NOT FOR RESALE. The policemen continued to poke about in the boot and to look at Maruli’s case. He, too, had alighted from the car and walked round to the boot.

  ‘They want something,’ Alex murmured to him.

  ‘Aah,’ he said, then rubbed his forearms and said in Indonesian, ‘I’m so cold. I need a kretek to get warm.’ He unlocked the case. Lying on top of a checked sarong was a carton of the most expensive brand of cigarette. Alex smiled, Maruli smiled and the policemen smiled most of all as they at first rejected, then accepted, the gift.

  As they returned to the car Alex said, ‘You don’t even like that brand.’

  ‘No. But the police do.’ Maruli sighed, ‘I know my people.’

  He climbed in the back seat beside her and spoke quickly and quietly. ‘Alex, there will be another check at Bandung. Offer to open the suitcase, then look for the key in your handbag. Be embarrassed that you can’t find it. They should not insist if
they believe it is your suitcase, but in case they do, I will give them money.’ He handed her the key.

  ‘But I don’t need it, if I’m not going to find it.’

  ‘Please keep it. It is more realistic.’

  Alex dropped the key into her bag. ‘What’s in your suitcase, then?’

  ‘Pornography,’ Maruli replied blithely.

  Alex shut her handbag slowly. She knew now that he was using her, but she did not know if it mattered. She, too, was using him—to escape from her colleagues, from her cousin, from her isolation in a strange crowd. The streets were less sinister to her because Maruli knew them; through loving him, she felt that she, too, knew the streets. And she used his body, also. His skin was hairless and silky. When he made love to her he would do it for an hour or more, gripping her with his eyes; they gazed at each other, amazed by what they were doing. As she recalled those minutes of ecstatic silence she felt cleft from crotch to belly with lust for him.

  At the Bandung roadblock Alex searched for the key, while Maruli and the military policemen made jokes about women’s handbags. They finally insisted that she look for it no longer, promising that if she came to the police station next morning an expert there would pick the lock for her.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Maruli said when they got back in the car. Alex was still feeling sullen and resentful when they arrived at Hadi the painter’s house.

  ‘Have you forgiven me for that little play?’ Maruli asked later that night. She had.

  Their bedroom was on the upper storey of the house, which was set high up on the slopes of the volcano that rose in a black hump behind Bandung. The bedroom overlooked, in the distance, the city lights. Immediately below it was a courtyard with a dovecote and a pool of carp. The room was whitewashed and almost bare of furniture but it had a sweet feeling, as did everything about Hadi’s household—his delicate watercolours, his uncountable number of children, his wife who wore an old yellow dress and didn’t comb her hair and who said, ‘Good! A woman who smokes,’ as soon as she and Alex sat down. And, to Maruli, ‘How did an ugly old man like you get such a beautiful girl friend?’