Island of Demons

by Nigel Barley

  “You are right, Bonnetchen. There are larger issues. For example, I have an order for two paintings from London. Now I don’t know. Should I send them or not?”

  As it turned out, Mr Kasimura was unjustifiably Wagnerian in his view of the war’s course, for it had entered a stage, less Blitzkrieg than Sitzkrieg, what the English called the “phony war”, where each camp glared at the other from the security of its own side of the border but neither wanted to cross a conceptual line by deliberately breaking something. Political hostility had yet to be transmuted into the hard currency of personal hatred. In Europe, a long hot autumn and clement spring spun out inaction day by day – the calm before the storm. In neutral Bali, too, there seemed suddenly nothing to do but cultivate the arts of leisure, for tourists and European goods had virtually disappeared overnight, only deepening our sense of tranquil isolation and balmy security, the knowledge that Bali held aloof from a snarling world. In our boredom, we even went to a janger performance.

  Ask about the origins of janger, as a dance, and you will receive the same sort of answers accorded inquiries into the sexually transmitted diseases of Europe. The French pox is the English disease is the Spanish distemper is the German plague, according to where you are. North Balinese declare janger to have been invented in the south, south Balinese in the north. In the east, it is from the west or even the offshore island of Nusa Penida. Everywhere, it is strange and exotic, enjoyed but despised and had swept the island as the musical sensation of the early Thirties. To dance janger is to be as irremediably common as a man who sits, in stained underwear, eating pickled herring straight from the jar. It has ancient origins, the same spirit-possession dances as Walter’s own kecak, but simultaneously sweet- and soured with the dissonances of bitter Chinese opera, syrupy Malay theatre, sickly American songs and even the oompahing circus and it draws on a young teenaged pool of talent, divided ruthlessly into boys and girls. We had come at the instigation of Alit, there in the crowd, whose younger brother was an enthusiast of the genre. Inevitably, we were introduced to him – a skinny but moon-faced youth whose comrades went into sniggering elbow-digging that suggested they kept abreast of the latest law reports. As so often, I felt like a walking dirty joke. I was the titter that ran round the room.

  The boys were divided into singers and caks, whose task was to chatter nonsense syllables in tight synchronisation, with rapid changes of speed and emphasis as Walter’s monkeys did in kecak. They marched in and performed stylised movements of military drill – but more in the fashion of chorus girls – martial arts lunges at lightning speed and rapid dance steps. Then they leapt up onto each others’ shoulders into extraordinary revolving pyramids that dissolved into gymnastic debris, reformed, bent into arches, dissolved again, all in time to a hammering gamelan with flute descant. Their costumes were an eclectic mix of elements of desirable modernity – tight football shorts, shoes and long stockings, bright red military tunics with gold epaulettes, white gloves, thick, corked moustaches and bibs covered with mirror fragments that sent light ricocheting like the revolving silver balls seen in common dancehalls. Their straining adolescent voices raged hoarsely. They smashed their fists into their palms, rocked, swayed undulated and crashed to a finale in – God help us – a mass Nazi salute.

  Then it was the girls’ turn, entering through the overarched arms of the boys, in swaying sarongs and sashes, headdresses of golden sunbursts trembling about their heads, flashing eye movements under the usual absolute control. Their voices rose in a high nasal whine, like a chorus of cats, as they took their places demurely in two seated rows, facing each other, reciprocally undulant, and the boys did the same to create a square. What happened within that square, over the next few hours, was a bizarre goulash of cultural influences. First, came a “Dutchman” in a long grey suit, spectacles and what was – surely – Walter’s appalling beret, who made a long telephone call to the gods in Gunung Agung, arranging the programme for the evening, a brief song from the arja, or Balinese opera, an acting out of one of the more syrupy love stories of Hindu legend and a brief skit of two white people – Margaret and Greg? – being eaten by New Guineans in a comedy cannibalism scene. Then came more songs from the boys and girls, all with the same wild exuberance and intensity, a very correct rendition of Dutch nursery rhymes and an interaction between Capuk, the greedy braggart of Balinese theatre, and a dour and self-important Javanese student who made a loudly progressive political speech before being carried away for more fine dining by the New Guineans. The audience, that seemed to comprise every soul of the village regardless of age, loved it.

  At midnight, we two had had enough and walked back alone through the velvet air, our feet crunching, in untheatrical modern shoes, on the gravel of the Dutch road, Walter so sunk in the Balineseness of the evening that he took my hand innocently, as one of the villagers would his friend’s and swung it back and forth as we walked. “I know that was all pretty gruesome,” he mused, as though I were the one always railing against the Balinese neglect of their own musical heritage, “but it all shows a wisdom we lack. Even at their silliest, they go to the heart of things. The appeal of dictators and militarism is a matter of pure choreography, supplemented by nice shiny uniforms and rough boyish games. That is janger in short. They have turned history into spectacle not bloodshed, into art not politics. If it is bad art that is only because it comes from our own bad politics.”

  I paid no heed to the rest of it, replying with grunts and mild affirmations – just as my father had when my mother was talking of shoes or hats or his children’s hopes and dreams for the future, subjects in which he took no interest – the actual content of Walter’s thoughts less important than the circumstances of them. My palm was tingling, in his, with a childish excitement at once sad and elated. Like many men, I had come to a point where I could say to myself, “This is not perfect but it is good enough, I can make do with this.” Like many others, I had grown accustomed to ranging love and sex on separate shelves with only the weasel word “affection” to confuse the two. I was – I saw – a mere reverberator for Walter’s constantly hammering keys. He stopped and looked out over the valley, lit only by the stars and the fireflies.

  “Do you know Den frohen Wandersmann?” he asked, “The old Eichendorff poem? Plumpe and I used to recite it to each other when we went hiking,” and launched into it. “‘Wem Gott will rechte Gunst erweisen, Den schickt er in die weite Welt, Dem will er seine Wunder weisen In Berg und Wald und Strom und Feld. Die Trägen die zu Hause liegen, Erquicket nich das Morgenrot. Sie wissen nur von Kinderwiegen, Von Sorgen, Last und Not um Brot …’ There is much more …” It rolled on. I shut my ears to it, just listening to the music of his voice over the gushing river and suddenly, something Greg had said popped into my head.

  “When you marry, old man …” this had been at a very early stage of our friendship, “… marry an anthropologist. They will have been trained for years only to say just enough to keep you talking and will never interrupt and, deep down, that’s what every man really wants more than anything, a captive audience”. He paused reflectively. “That, of course, takes no account of Margaret.”

  ***

  Manxi’s was slowly creeping back to muted but still scandalous life. The airboys were glad to have it back as an informal – no ties required – extension to their messroom and doubtless patriotic motives had been invoked to justify the granting of a licence. For legalistic reasons, local “ladies” seemed now to patrol exclusively outside on the beach with Manxi’s as a sort of terminus to which they periodically returned to retouch, refuel and debrief. There was, I noted with relief, no musical signature tune of bagpipes to mark my entrance. A new, large radio of many valves was tuned to a Surabaya dance-music station, cheap music that sighed and faded over the mountains. Perhaps, like with religious offerings, the gods there were sucking the essence from it. There came just a flutter of fingers from the barman and a screech of greeting from Manxi. Walter executed a courtly bow in r
eturn. She was garbed in an extraordinary outfit, clearly of her own devising, half sarong, half plaid.

  “For God’s sake don’t encourage her, Walter. Oh Jesus, she’s coming over.” She was badly in need of a tidy up, herself, fierce red roots showing in the black, pudding-basin haircut, makeup thickly applied like slapdash plaster over structural faults. We sat hurriedly.

  “’Ow’s my boys?” she asked, thrusting out a Macsaronged leg. Then, not waiting for an answer, “I ’eard as ’ow you’d bin in a bit of trouble, Walt.” Her tone suggested that, in her career, many of her friends had encountered a bit of trouble. “Several of me gentlemen ’ad to leg it sharpish and – if you know what I mean – several of the ladies ’ad to become gentlemen again, for a bit anyway.”

  “For a bit of what, Manxi?”

  She screeched. “Oh Walt, you are a caution. Inne? Inne a caution, Rudi? I ’ad to ’ave a little ’oliday myself, draw me ’orns in. Up in the ’ills, you know.” That would be the boyfriend in Bangli. “Did some luvverly paintings. You must come round and see.” I felt Walter shrink a little beside me. “Now dearie, what’ll it be? One of me friends brought in a nice drop of Canadian scotch the other day. Two? Yes?” She clomped off in big, black shoes and passed the order to the barman in muscular articulations.

  “Cheers,” I offered, holding out one of the chipped glasses delivered to the table. He made a donkey face. I coaxed. “At least you are winning the war – Poland, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Norway conquered, Britain and France all but beaten. All part of your glorious Reich. You are now a member of the master race, Walter. That must be nice, especially at breakfast. Thank God the political gymnastics will soon be over with minimum bloodshed and we can all get back to normal.” Over by the bar, Manxi let out a shriek and pinched the cheeks of a well-fleshed airboy.

  “Normal. Yes. I suppose so. Was there ever such an insane time to live in? War is even more stupid and moronic than football. I hope Kasimura breaks his neck on that bicycle and the Balinese never learn to play football. Charlie is wrong. Vicki is wrong. The Covarrubiases are most wrong of all. Real artists cannot be engagiert. It dulls the mind. Like your Holland, I am neutral. I am,” he brightened, “a hotly disputed no-man’s land in the battle of the sexes.” Where had he got that from? We clinked glasses. The whisky was terrible. Two of the airboys had begun to dance, Manxi shouting about her licence and seeking to interpose herself and push them apart, like a referee at a boxing match. “Lieftinck,” he said as though it were a natural progression, “from the botanical garden in Bogor, is very excited by my pictures of dragonflies and fish. Fish pictures are important because the specimens change colour when they are taken from the water and pickled, but my dragonflies are even more special. Those I found in the remote forests, they already know but those taken from the valley right outside the house are new species, totally unknown to science. They plan to name one of them after me in the taxonomical index. In German, we call dragonflies Jungfern, “maids”, “virgins”. So, in a few months is my forty-fifth birthday and the Dutch state, having put me in jail for sex, is about to name me an official virgin with a letter of thanks from Queen Wilhelmina.”

  Manxi appeared at his elbow, hot and tousled, blowing air, visibly refreshed by the scrum, and dispensed more drink, despite our protests. “Don’t talk to me about being a virgin,” she opined. “With me, it gets truer every day. Oi! I told you …” The airboys were at grips again. Her grasp on the bottle switched instinctively to the neck as she hurried over, making it a weapon of offence, then – repenting of her aggression – using it merely to poke and provoke giggles. They, backing away from intimate prodding, knocked into the table of two tall Buginese “ladies”, turned over glasses, screams, wiping off of splashes – oh dear let me – grasping and clutching, general mêlée that merged into a sort of joint quickstep as a cheery tune – one of Noel’s – struck up on the wireless. I realised how irrevocably inappropriate it would be for me and Walter to dance, which also – according to some befuddled but inexorable logic – meant that I would also never paint him. Then, Manxi was there, hand appropriately reaching for the great knob to cut off the excuse for joy, when a voice like that of a headmaster walking in on a schoolboy brawl rang out and everyone froze.

  “This is His Excellency Jonkeer Alidius Warmoldus Lambertus Tjarda van Starkenborgh Stachouwer, Governor General of the Netherlands East Indies, speaking to you all from Batavia. It is with the deepest sadness that I have to tell you the gravest news from the motherland. At 3.55 this morning, German forces launched a brutal and premeditated attack on the Royal Dutch Airforce base at Waalhaven, south of Rotterdam, but, encountering fierce and heroic resistance, were successfully driven off. Paratroopers are reported to have attempted landings in various parts of the country but have been contained and are being wiped up by victorious Dutch forces. A state of war henceforth exists between our nation and the German Reich. Naval and land forces have engaged the enemy and inflicted heavy losses. It is for us to remain calm and support the motherland in its time of need. We face a shameless and cowardly foe with steadfast courage and determination and our victory is certain. Further announcements will follow. God save the Queen!”

  The airboys gawped and attempted a belated weak cheer. Manxi’s jaw dropped. “Cripes!” Walter did not react. He had possibly not followed the aristocratic haw-hawing Dutch.

  “Out!” I hissed, head down. “Do nothing. Say nothing. Stand up and just walk out. Now!”

  ***

  “If I may say so,” said Walter, saying so, “you look well in uniform.” He was sitting on the ground, leaning against a tree, looking up at me. “Those with no dress sense always look their best when decisions are made for them. It is one of the few arguments that convince for marriage.” This from a man wearing a collapsed straw hat, torn khaki shorts and a shirt, once red, now an indeterminate shade of pink, far too tight in the chest and revealing bare midriff, feet clad in worn sandals, the face fringed by a ratty blond beard – the sort that is born of neglect, not cultivation. He had lost weight, acquired deep lines at the sides of his mouth and the eyes had sunk to Rasputin-like profundity. He seemed bleached and shrivelled. Three plates of army stodge a day were filling me out while the military were obsessed with my regular depilation and the sharpness of my creases. We were in Ngawi, a couple of hours’ drive from Solo, in Java’s dry season, than which few things are drier. The regular cone of volcanic Mount Lawu towered over us like a pale imitation of Mount Fuji. I sat down reluctantly in the dust beside him.

  “It is not the real army,” I hastened to reassure. “Just a sort of militia, mostly aircraft-spotting and a bit of ack-ack but there was no chance of getting through the gate without a uniform. It seems everyone needs one these days. Since Holland fell, people have changed. There’s more patriotism about – the call of a lost cause, perhaps. A white face is no longer enough. I am supposed to be on a gas familiarisation course in Solo. It seemed like a golden opportunity.” It had not been as easy as I pretended. Visits were not encouraged. This was not a bad billet. But then internment was not supposed to be a prison. There was the inevitable tired barbed wire and bored guards, they not real army either but militia like myself. I had a swift fantasy that I would get myself posted here, become Walter’s guard, protect him. Accommodation was in flimsy wooden huts but there was an adequacy of shade from trees. This had once been a teak plantation and the huge trees were everywhere. The main problem seemed to be sheer lack of space, with some five hundred men crowded into four small compounds. A skinny, buck-toothed man came, stood over us and stared silently with mad eyes, his glottis working furiously.

  “Things are better than they were.” Walter’s own eyes were tired, red. “They took all the real Nazis and shut them up together. They used to drive us crazy, spent all their time being blond beasts, shouting slogans, drilling, marching up and down – just like bad janger. Finally, they paid me the compliment of putting me in the ‘traitors’ section with all the J
ews, anti-Nazis, pro-Dutch and communists.” He smiled. “The Neuhaus brothers are here. You remember them? They are very kind and sort of look after me.” I offered a cigarette. Jealousy flared with the flame. I dumped several more packets, with matches, from under my shirt, down on the ground between us where the guards could not see. It was forbidden but they did not seem to mind. Still, one had to show respect. The madman laughed, pointed and danced on the spot. Walter gave him a cigarette and sent him gently away. “Did you know that this place is otherwise famous for the discovery of the remains of southeast Asia’s great evolutionary leap, down there by the river – when there is a river – homo erectus?” He slumped in counter-illustration of erectness. “A Frenchman, Eugene Dubois. I understand there is a decent little museum somewhere if they would only let me take a look.”

  “The house, the animals, the servants are all being looked after till you get back. You have so many friends, you know. We are getting up a petition to have you released.” He patted my knee absently and sighed and shrugged. I was the one who needed comfort. He seemed remote, like a painting behind glass. To formally visit like this, was moving us apart. This was not how I had expected him to take to internment. I had thought he would have seduced all the guards with his charm and proffered portraits, be sleeping with the handsomest of them, having his food sent in. But, of course, these were not lissom locals but implacably Dutch and of the clerkish class.

  Then, it slipped out. “Oh, Walter, why didn’t you take Dutch nationality years ago when it would have been so easy?”