“He’s been through that, Itam. Are you deaf?” asked the parasol bearer wearily. “He goes to a secret place and holds up his stick and where the end of the stick points is exactly where the gold is. Right, Rat?”
“It’s a bit more complicated than that,” said Rat. “There are notches and I have to hold it up in different ways to get the lines to meet up. But in essence, that’s it. You get me that stick and I’ll find the gold. If you mess with me, though, I’ll break the stick and you’ll get nothing.”
The men were quiet as they passed the tuak around.
“What you’re forgetting, Rat,” said the prince, “is that gold or no gold we stand to do quite nicely out of this little venture so long as we all keep our wits about us. So calm down and don’t go doing anything stupid.”
“So long as you honour your promise,” Rat grumbled. “You can do what you want with the rest of them but keep my mother and my sister out of it.”
“Of course, dear Rat,” said the prince. His voice was smooth and mellow but there was something about it that made Kancil think of a snake. “Though I think I’ve figured out which one of that buffoon’s household is your mother,” the prince continued, “and I can’t say I understand your devotion. What are you going to do with the old hag? She’ll be your responsibility you know, once we’ve–”
The prince was cut off in mid-sentence and the pendopo shook as someone lunged across the floor. From the noises, Kancil guessed that Rat had the prince by the throat. The lamplight flickered as other men rose to their feet and joined the scuffle. A confusion of thumps and grunts and groans followed. Then there was a particularly loud thump and a body crashed to the floor.
“Is he all right?” Fatty asked.
“He will be when he wakes up,” said the parasol bearer. “Now where’s that tuak?”
Very slowly, so as not to make a sound, Kancil stretched out along the ground to stop the numbness that was creeping into her legs. So there was gold buried somewhere – could it be the temple treasures? Small Aunt said the juru kunci saw the scoundrel handing the treasure over to the bandits. Perhaps the juru kunci was confused and it was actually the bandits handing over the treasure to the scoundrel to bury.
Kancil tried to remember exactly what Small Aunt had told her. She was so tired she was finding it hard to concentrate. She yawned and blinked her eyes, trying to stay awake. Think about that later, she told herself. Right now, you’ve got to listen for clues to what the Rat meant when he said “you can do what you want with the rest of them”.
Kancil woke with such a start that she jumped and her head banged against a floorboard. The conversation above her stopped. “What was that?” the parasol bearer asked.
“There’s something under the floor.”
The men kneeled on the floor to peer between the boards. Kancil could smell the tuak on their breath and was grateful that the alcohol had made them clumsy, so that they kept blocking their own light.
“Can’t see anything,” the prince slurred. “Go down there and have a look.”
Somebody took a lamp and stomped down the steps. In a desperate move, Kancil wedged herself against a floor beam, hoping that the lamplight would shine past her. She rolled onto something furry. It scurried out from under her with a squeal and for a moment the realisation that she had almost squashed a rat with her own body outweighed her fear of discovery.
She managed to stop herself from scrambling out from under the pendopo. That was what the rat did – just as Itam bent down with the lamp to inspect the underfloor space.
“Ugh! A rat!” he exclaimed, leaping backwards.
“Wha …?” Rat woke up to the sound of his name. The others all roared with laughter and the noise under the floorboards was forgotten. Kancil rubbed at the bump on her head. She was wide awake now.
Somebody went inside the dalem. Kancil heard something wooden clatter to the floor above her. “There’s your precious stick,” the parasol bearer said.
“When did you find that?” Rat grabbed at the stick.
“Never mind that,” the parasol bearer replied. “Now, you’ll take that stick and figure out where the treasure is, but you’re not going to dig anything up until we get there. Red and Tor will go with you to keep you honest.” Two of the bearers rose to their feet.
“We’ll be at the meeting place at sundown a week from today,” the prince said. “We don’t want you coming anywhere near here or the village until then, do you hear?”
Rat grunted in reply.
“You’ve got a week, Rat.” It was the parasol bearer speaking again. “That’s five days. Can you count to five?”
Rat muttered something under his breath.
“Your mother will be with us. You know what will happen if you’re not there. Or if anything is missing. Now go!” said the parasol bearer.
When the scoundrel and the two bearers had gone, the others settled back to drink more tuak.
“The wedding is settled, then?” Fatty ventured.
“Yes,” the prince sighed. “It took some work to convince the priest that three days from today is an auspicious date. And it’s lucky for us the juru kunci was away talking to his mountain spirits all day. Those two aren’t as stupid as the girl’s father and the other one. Anyway, it’s all arranged. They think that every able-bodied villager is leaving with us in a week to help me present my bride to the king at the full moon festival in Trowulan. I hope you all appreciate the sacrifices I’m making for you. These people are insufferable.”
Itam, who Kancil had noticed always seemed to be given the worst jobs, spoke up now. “What’s so difficult about acting like royalty all day?” he grumbled.
The prince turned on him. “I am royalty, and don’t you forget it!” he snarled. “Just because my father fell out with the old Queen Tribhuwana and lost his rightful position, doesn’t change the fact that I have royal blood. I can’t wait to see the look on the king’s face when we take the Majapahit Palace. My cousin, King Hayam Wuruk! What a joke!”
Scar cleared his throat. “Are there really enough men in this village to take Trowulan?” he asked.
“We’ll take Salatiga first to boost our numbers,” the prince replied. “It will only take a fraction of our gold to buy the cooperation of those who matter there. And don’t forget, the tiger stone is with the hoard. With its power we can’t lose.”
Kancil caught her breath. She should have quizzed Kitchen Boy when he asked if her father had mentioned the tiger stone.
“Forgive me, Bhre, but are you sure?” Fatty asked. “Trowulan is the capital; it will be crawling with soldiers and we can’t be certain about the tiger stone. That holy man seemed a bit mad to me, the one who told us that the tiger stone would give you power over wild beasts. It’s a nice idea to have a tiger at your side in battle, but wouldn’t it be better to take the gold back to a Sunda port to sell? Nobody would ask questions there and we’d be nicely set up. You could rule all the trade in Nusantara. You’d be rich beyond your dreams.”
“I don’t want to be rich!” fumed the prince. “I’m not going to spend the rest of my life watching over pirate rabble in some stinking port. I’m going to avenge my father’s honour and I’m going to be the King of Majapahit.”
“Again, Bhre, forgive me,” Fatty continued. “None of us doubts your right to the throne, but these people, they’re farmers, not soldiers. How will they defeat the king’s guard?”
“They won’t,” the prince replied. “Don’t underestimate these yokels, though. They’re a proud bunch and when I whisper in a certain doting father’s ear, all the insulting things the king’s guard have said about Princess Citra, his blood will boil. He’ll fire his people up to fight for her honour. We’ll let them make a bit of a show then we come from behind to put down the Mataram rebellion. My dear cousin, the so-called king, will be full of gratitude and grant me a private audience. It’s only a well-judged knife throw then, between me and the throne.”
“It is a masterfu
l plan, Bhre,” the parasol bearer spoke for the first time since sending the scoundrel on his way. “We must make sure that the dalang and his troupe go back to Pekalongan as soon as they have performed the wayang for the wedding. We don’t want them getting in the way.”
Kancil lay in her cramped hiding place, taking in what she had just heard. She quite liked the part where the prince knifed King Hayam Wuruk, the king responsible for her own father’s murder, but it was the plan of a madman.
Mad or not, the prince had a hold over the other bandits and he would soon have a hold over Big Uncle. It was easy to imagine Big Uncle, with his pompous vanity and his poor command of polite Jawa language, being tricked into going along with the prince until it was too late.
If Kancil left with the dalang’s troupe, as she hoped to do, she would save herself. Yet how could she possibly do that, knowing what she knew? The prince had to be stopped, but how?
The faint light in the sky told her that it would soon be dawn. The men had fallen silent, then each in turn had started to snore. She waited until she could hear six different sleepers before she carefully uncurled and crawled out from under the floor. She took a moment to rub the life back into her legs, all the while straining her ears for the slightest sound, then she stood up.
It was still so dark that she could only make out the broad shape of the black bamboo and the outline of the shrines.
If anybody is awake, she told herself, they won’t know it’s me unless they catch me. They would know someone had been spying on them, though.
Kancil didn’t want their suspicion falling on Small Aunt and Kitchen Boy – she had no doubt that the prince would use his influence over Big Uncle to make them suffer if he wanted to.
She stepped out of the shadow of the pendopo and began to walk slowly towards the front gate. Her heart was beating wildly and every nerve in her body told her to run, yet she forced herself to keep her back straight and take small even steps so she might look as though she were floating. If any of the men did catch sight of her, she wanted them to think she was a spirit. They might be big scary bandits, but even bandits would think twice about approaching a spirit in the middle of the night.
19
A PLAN
“They’re bandits,” said Kancil when she had reached the pondok and shaken Kitchen Boy awake. “They might even be the same bandits that Small Aunt told us about, the ones who used to play dice games in the forest, the ones who led the scoundrel astray.”
Kitchen Boy’s eyes widened.
“And speaking of the scoundrel – he’s alive.”
Kitchen Boy’s mouth dropped open. Kancil wished she wasn’t so tired. As it was, she couldn’t properly enjoy the pleasure of shocking him.
“That’s not possible,” he said. “Ibu Jamu said he sacrificed himself to Mbah Merapi.”
Kancil shook her head. “She said he was last seen walking towards the mountain as everybody else was running away. He must have tricked them, doubled back or something. I don’t think anyone would take the time to make certain he’d burned to death when they were all busy saving themselves.
“In any case, he’s alive and they call him Rat and he’s buried some gold somewhere. I think it’s the gold that they stole from the temple and he’s on his way to find it again now. But they’re planning something much worse than stealing the temple treasures …”
Kancil told Kitchen Boy everything she had heard.
“Are you sure that’s what they said about the tiger stone?”
“Yes,” Kancil replied. “What do you know about it?”
“Well,” said Kitchen Boy, “that holy man I told you about, the one I met in the temple. He told me a story about the tiger stone. If it was the same holy man, then I think he told the bandits a different story to the one he told me.”
“What did he tell you?” Kancil was growing impatient. “You thought it had something to do with my father.”
“He told me that he met a trader at the temple many years ago. The trader was meditating at the temple because a precious stone had been stolen from him and he wanted the spirits’ advice about what to do. The trader called it the tiger stone and said that it had been passed down to him from his father and his father’s father and so on.
“The trader’s father told him that the stone had special powers but he didn’t know what they were. The trader came from a long line of sons and the family legend said that only a daughter could unlock the stone’s power.”
“What made you think the trader was my father?” Kancil asked.
“Your eyes. The way they reminded me of my tiger spirit. Tiger eyes, tiger spirit, tiger stone. It all seemed like too much of a coincidence. The bandit was right about the holy man though: he was a bit mad. So who knows what the real story is?”
Kancil was silent, thinking. If Father was the trader who had met the holy man, perhaps he had told him the story of his father coaxing the tiger away from the village. When the holy man told the bandits that the stone would give its owner power over wild beasts, perhaps he got the story muddled up, or perhaps he lied to them for reasons of his own.
She remembered the puzzle that had been playing on her mind since that day she dreamed of her shell necklace sinking into the mud: the scoundrel, the temple treasure, Agus. She was sure her father’s spirit had given her that dream and there must be a reason why he had put those three thoughts together for her.
Perhaps the scoundrel had stolen the stone from Father and hidden it with the temple treasure. If that was true, then she was the daughter who could unlock the stone’s power. Perhaps Father’s spirit knew what that power was now. Could it be that the stone could somehow lead her to Agus? She remembered what Father had murmured on the beach when he gave her the shell necklace: “What is lost is lost.” Could he have been talking about the tiger stone?
Don’t be stupid, she told herself. Father never said anything about a tiger stone and he loved talking about tigers. It was much more likely that the tiger stone was a story made up by a charlatan posing as a holy man to coax food and drink out of fellow travellers. Wondering about it was distracting her from coming up with a plan to stop her cousin from marrying the prince.
“What should we do now?” Kitchen Boy broke the silence.
“You’re asking me?” Kancil was incredulous.
“Yes,” he said, “why not?”
“Because you’re usually the one with all the ideas and I’ve just spent the night stuck in a hole in the ground. It’s your turn to think of something.”
“We could wait until the bandits dig up the treasure then steal the tiger stone from them. Then you do whatever it is you have to do with it to harness its power to save the village.”
Kancil stared at him. “What you’re saying is, if I want a sensible plan to stop the bandits, then I’ll have to think of it myself?”
Kitchen Boy laughed. “I guess so,” he said.
“We’re not sure the tiger stone is real and stopping the bandits from getting away with the treasure isn’t the most important thing. The most important thing is to stop the wedding,” she said.
“I thought perhaps you might take some pleasure in seeing your darling cousin married off to a bandit,” said Kitchen Boy.
“She’s a pain, but she doesn’t deserve that,” Kancil said. She was thinking about the look on her cousin’s face when their eyes met at the welcome dance. That look had told her they did have something in common; they were both trapped. “Anyway, it’s not only her we have to save. If the wedding goes ahead, then the whole village is in danger. I can’t speak, so you’ll have to tell Big Uncle what I overheard.”
“That won’t work,” said Kitchen Boy. “He’ll only consider an idea if it comes from someone important or if he thinks it was his idea in the first place.”
Kancil was so tired now that she was beginning to see phantom bandits climbing over the edge of the pondok. She shook her head. “I have to sleep,” she said and stretched out on the floor.
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“We should go back to the village,” Kitchen Boy said, trying to pull her upright. “It will be light soon.”
“No,” Kancil said firmly. “I’m going to sleep now. Wake me when you can see who is asleep in the lookout post.”
“It’s Eko.” Kitchen Boy was shaking Kancil to wake up.
“What?” she asked sleepily.
“It’s Eko on lookout duty. He’s not asleep any more so we’re going to have to explain ourselves.” He held up some weeds he had collected in the forest. “Bibi sent us to collect dusk lily. It rained. We took shelter in the pondok and fell asleep. Lucky for us it did rain last night. Come on, I’d better get back and make some kind of a concoction for Bibi’s head.”
Kancil didn’t move. She was watching a wisp of smoke rising from somebody’s kitchen fire.
“The smoking jamu that you put in the jar in the kitchen – is it still there?”
Kitchen Boy nodded. He looked puzzled. “I didn’t think you wanted anything more to do with that after what happened with your mother,” he said.
Kancil ignored him. “Can you get hold of a brazier and the smoking jamu and meet me behind the pavilion where Big Uncle sleeps after everyone has gone to bed tonight?”
“Maybe …” Kitchen Boy was looking at her sideways, a teasing grin forming on his lips.
“Are you going to help me save the village or not?” Kancil snapped.
“Of course, madam,” he said, bowing deeply before her. “I assume I would be foolish to expect any kind of explanation in advance as to my role in saving the village?”
“You assume correctly,” Kancil replied.
Kitchen Boy was looking thoughtful. “There are some things I have to do in the forest this evening. I’ll be back before your uncle starts snoring.”
“I wish I knew how you manage to come and go as you please without getting into trouble,” Kancil said.
Kitchen Boy shrugged. “It’s just the way it is,” he said. “Freedom to come and go as I please has its advantages. The other side of it is that if I go and don’t come back, nobody’s likely to come looking for me.”
Tiger Stone Page 13