The Hidden Force Part 3

"And those others, mevrouw," stooping attentively: then, in her most charming tones, "those others ... they too are paste."

Mrs. van Does looked at her with delight. Then she said to Doddie and Theo, archly:

"That mamma of yours ... oh, so shrewd! She sees at once!"

And she laughed aloud. They all laughed. Mrs. van Does returned the stones to the bottle:

"A joke, yes, mevrouw? I only wanted to see if you understood. I give you my word, of course: I should never have sold them to you.... But there ... look!..."

And now solemnly, almost religiously, she opened the other little phial, which contained only a few stones, and placed them lovingly on the black velvet.

"That one would be splendid ... for a pendant," said Mrs. van Oudijck, gazing at a very large brilliant.

"There, what did I tell you?" said the Indian lady.

And they all gazed at the diamonds, at the real ones, which came out of the "real" bottle, and held them up carefully to the light.

Mrs. van Oudijck saw that they were all real:

"I really have no money, dear mevrouw!" she said.

"This big one ... for a pendant ... six hundred guilders. [2] ... A bargain, I a.s.sure you, mevrouw!"

"Oh, mevrouw, never!"

"How much then? You are doing a charity if you buy. Poor thing, her husband once a great swell, Indian Council."

"Two hundred."

"Oh dear! What next? Two hundred guilders!"

"Two hundred and fifty, but no more. I really have no money."

"The residen!" whispered Mrs. van Does, catching sight of Van Oudijck, who, now that the cases were finished, was coming to the back verandah. "The residen ... he buy for you!"

Mrs. van Oudijck smiled and looked at the sparkling drop of light on the black velvet. She liked jewels, she was not altogether indifferent to diamonds. And she looked at her husband:

"Mrs. van Does is showing us a lot of beautiful things," she said, caressingly.

Van Oudijck felt an inward shock. He was never pleased to see Mrs. van Does in his house. She always had something to sell: at one time, richly embroidered counterpanes; at another time, a pair of woven slippers; at another, magnificent but very expensive table-slips, with golden flowers in batik on yellow glazed linen. Mrs. van Does always brought something with her, was always in touch with the wives of erstwhile "great swells," whom she helped by selling their things for a very high commission. A morning call from Mrs. van Does cost him each time at least a few rix-dollars and very often fifty guilders, for his wife had a calm habit of always buying things which she did not need but which she was too indifferent to refuse to buy of Mrs. van Does. He did not see the two bottles at once, but he saw the drop of light on the black velvet and he understood that the visit would cost him more than fifty guilders this time, unless he was very firm:

"Mevrouwtje!" he exclaimed, in dismay. "It's the end of the month: there's no question of buying diamonds to-day! And bottles full too!" he added, with a stare, when he now saw them glittering on the table, among the gla.s.ses of tamarind-syrup.

"Oh, that residen!" laughed Mrs. van Does, as though a resident were bound to be always well off.

Van Oudijck hated that little laugh. His household cost him every month a few odd hundred guilders above his salary; and he was living beyond his income, was in debt. His wife never troubled herself with money matters; for these more especially she reserved her most smiling indifference.

She made the diamond sparkle in the sun and shoot forth a blue ray.

"It's a beauty ... for two hundred and fifty," said Mrs. van Oudijck.

"For three hundred then, dear mevrouw...."

"Three hundred?" she asked, dreamily, playing with the gem.

Whether it cost three hundred or four or five hundred was all one to her. It left her wholly indifferent. But she liked the stone and meant to have it, at whatever price. And therefore she quietly put the stone down and said:

"No, dear mevrouw, really ... it's too expensive; and my husband has no money."

She said it so prettily that there was no guessing her intention. She was adorably self-sacrificing as she spoke the words. Van Oudijck felt a second inward shock. He could refuse his wife nothing.

"Mevrouw," he said, "you can leave the stone ... for three hundred guilders. But for G.o.d's sake take your bottles away with you!"

Mrs. van Does looked up delightedly:

"There, what did I tell you? I knew for certain the residen would buy for you!..."

Mrs. van Oudijck looked up in gentle reproach:

"But, Otto!" she said: "How can you?"

"Do you like the stone?"

"Yes, it's beautiful.... But such a lot of money! For one diamond!"

And she drew her husband's hand towards her and suffered him to kiss her on the forehead, because he had been permitted to buy her a three-hundred-guilder diamond. Doddie and Theo stood winking at each other.

CHAPTER FOUR

Leonie Van Oudijck always enjoyed her siesta. She only slept for a moment, but she loved after lunch to be alone in her cool bedroom till five or half-past five. She read a little, mostly the magazines from the circulating library, but as a rule she did nothing but dream. Her dreams were vague imaginings, which rose before her as in an azure mist during her afternoons of solitude. n.o.body knew of them and she kept them very secret, like a secret vice, a sin. She committed herself much more readily--to the world--where her liaisons were concerned. These never lasted long; they counted for little in her life; she never wrote letters; and the favours which she granted afforded the recipient no privileges in the daily intercourse of society. Hers was a silent, correct depravity, both physical and moral. For her imaginings too, despite their poetical insipidity, were depraved. Her pet author was Catulle Mendes: she loved all those little flowers of azure sentimentality, those rosy, affected little cupids, with one little finger in the air and their legs gracefully hovering around the most vicious themes and motives of perverted pa.s.sion. In her bedroom hung a few engravings: a young woman lying on a lace-covered bed and being kissed by two sportive angels; another: a lion with an arrow through its breast at the feet of a smiling maiden; lastly, a large coloured advertis.e.m.e.nt of some scent or other: a sort of floral nymph whose veils were being drawn on either side by playful little cherubs, of the kind which we see on soap-boxes. This "picture" in particular she thought splendid; she could imagine nothing with a greater aesthetic appeal. She knew that the plate was monstrous, but she had never been able to prevail upon herself to take the horrible thing down, though it was looked at askance by everybody: her friends, her step-children, all of whom walked in and out of her room with the Indian casualness which makes no secret of the toilet. She could stare at it for minutes on end, as though bewitched; she thought it perfectly charming; and her own dreams resembled this print. She also treasured a chocolate-box with a keepsake picture on it, as the type of beauty which she admired, even above her own: the pink flush on the cheeks, the brown eyes under unconvincing golden hair, the bosom showing through the lace. But she never committed herself in respect of this absurdity, which she vaguely suspected; she never spoke of these prints and boxes, just because she knew that actually they were hideous. But she thought them lovely; for her they were delightful, were artistic and poetical.

These were her happiest hours.

Here, at Labuw.a.n.gi, she dared not do what she did in Batavia; and here, at Labuw.a.n.gi, people hardly believed what people in Batavia said. Nevertheless, Mrs. van Does averred that this resident and that inspector--the one travelling for his pleasure, the other on an official circuit--staying for a few days at the residency, had found their way in the afternoon, during the siesta, to Leonie's bedroom. But all the same at Labuw.a.n.gi any such actual occurrences were the rarest of interludes between Mrs. van Oudijck's rosy afternoon visions.

Still, this afternoon it seemed as though, after dozing a little while and after all the dullness caused by the journey and the heat had cleared away from her milk-white complexion--it seemed, now that she was looking at the romping angels of the scent-advertis.e.m.e.nt, that her thoughts were no longer dwelling on those rosy, tender, doll-like forms, but as though she were listening to the sounds outside....

She was wearing nothing but a sarong, which she had pulled up under her arms and hitched in a twist across her breast. Her beautiful fair hair hung loose. Her pretty little white feet were bare: she had not even put on her slippers. And she looked through the slats of the shutters.

Between the flower-pots, which, standing on the side steps of the house, masked her windows with great ma.s.ses of foliage, she could see an annexe consisting of four rooms, the spare-rooms, one of which was Theo's.

She stood peering for a moment and then set the shutter ajar. And she saw that the shutter of Theo's room also opened a little way....